The Raft
was that the man who had laughed and played with them, who had loved the
sunshine so carelessly, was to be locked up for a time so long that it
seemed like the “ever and forever” of the Bible. It was like burying
someone who was not dead--they seemed to hear him tapping. And they must
not go to him; they must pretend they had not heard. He was a thing to
be shunned and forgotten.
Jehane was anxious to earn her living. But how? She had been trained to
do nothing. Barrington bought her a little cottage near Southgate, which
at this time was still in the country. Gradually he got into the habit
of letting her do a little outside reading for his firm--he did it to
enable her to pretend that she was self-supporting. To his surprise she
developed a faculty for the work and he began to trust her judgment. She
had inherited a literary instinct of which, during her married life, she
had remained unaware. It was a feeble instinct, but in the end it proved
sufficiently rewarding. She took to writing sentimental novelettes,
which found a market. Whatever her faults of heart, she had always been
capable and gifted with a strong sense of duty; so, now that she had
found a means of making money, she worked hard with her pen, stinting
herself and treating her children with foolish liberality.
Her chief regret was that Ocky had spoilt the marriage chances of her
girls; she tried to rub out this social stain by creating the impression
that her husband was dead. She had two extravagances--the purchase of
hair-tonics and a mania for visiting fortune-tellers. She had one great
hope--that in the future she might re-marry. This would entail Ocky's
death; but she was not so cruel as to reason that out. She had one
great mission--to teach her daughters to catch men. Her chief theme of
conversation with her children was the wickedness of their father and
the heroic loyalty of her own conduct. No doubt there were times when
her conscience troubled her.
Peter was just fifteen and Kay was nearly nine when all this happened.
It made a deep impression on both of them, but especially on Peter. For
months the crushed shoulders and sunken face of Uncle Waffles haunted
his memory, so that it seemed a crime to be happy. He could not bear
to enter the stable; he was always expecting to hear a hoarse voice
addressing him in a whisper from the loft, calling him a ha'penny marvel
or enquiring whether he knew the story of the husband whose wife had
black hair. Often in the street he would turn sharply at the sight of
some shabby outcast, shuffling through the crowd with bowed head. He
would run to the window, hardly daring to own what he expected, when
he heard the mournful singing along the Terrace of a group of
out-of-works:
“We've got no work to do,
We've got no work to do;
We're all thrown out, poor labourin' men,
And we've got no work to do.”
Sooner or later he would recognize, he knew, in one of the tattered
singers his Uncle Waffles. Peter was suffering from a suddenly awakened
social conscience; he did not know enough to call it that.
It was partly because Barrington had observed and was distressed by his
boy's sadness, that he granted his desire. He granted it to give him a
new interest. Peter had always dreamt of a day when he should polish up
the tandem tricycle, put Kay on the back seat and ride off with her into
the country.
“Well, Peter, I'll let you do it if you'll promise to be very careful.”
It was early summer when these splendid adventures commenced. Peter had
to do all the work--Kay's legs were too short to reach the pedals. But
what did he care? Just to have his little sister all to himself, London
dropping away behind and the world growing greener before him--what more
could a boy ask to make him happy?
The tandem trike was a clumsy solid-tired affair--desperately heavy and
beyond belief old-fashioned. Peter managed to accomplish six miles an
hour on it. The way out, along Green Lanes to Wood Green and up Jolly
Butcher's Hill, would have been full of ignominy for anybody less
light-hearted. Kay's flying hair and plunging legs would have attracted
attention had the tricycle been ever so new and handsome.
Errand-boys stood still and whistled after them. Tradesmen followed
them in their carts, offering to race them and grinning ridicule. Very
frequently insult set itself to the words of a street song then in
fashion:
“It won't be a stylish marriage;
For I can't afford a carriage;
But you'll look sweet with your two little feet
On a tricycle made for two.”
What did Peter care? Ill-nature failed to touch him. Little boys who
pulled faces at him from the pavements, made long noses at him or stuck
out their tongues, did it in envy. He wished he could take them too. So
he and Kay turned their heads and threw back laughter. It was fun--all
fun. And then there was the anticipation of lunch; two shillings between
two people can buy so much.
Shortly after Jolly Butcher's Hill the country began. At Southgate they
would stop to see their cousins. Riska affected to despise their means
of traveling. She was shooting up into a tall girl, like her mother; she
was darkly handsome and carried herself with a gipsy slouch. Jehane's
philosophy, of teaching her girls how to catch men, was already
beginning to take effect. Outside the cottage-gate she had a little
table from which she sold ginger-beer to Cockney cyclists. She did it
to make pocket-money; even as a child, by this means of introduction she
gathered about her a group of boy-lovers. She was learning early how
to attract when she cared. Her mother was pleased by her foolish
conquests--in the rose-scented air of the cottage garden they seemed
very guileless and humorous. In the presence of men, whatever their
years, Riska invariably tried to fascinate.
“It's an instinct with her, the little puss,” said Barrington; “she even
tries to make love to her old uncle.”
It was a subject for laughter in the family.
On these short visits Kay and Peter saw hardly anything of Glory--she
was doing the work. Just as they were going she would come out from
the kitchen, untying her apron, or would pop her head out of a bedroom
window to shake a duster and smile at them. Then, as the pedals began to
turn, Riska would sing half-tauntingly, and Eustace and Moggs would join
in with her pipingly:
“Daisy, Daisy, give me your answer true,
I 'm half-crazy, all for the love of you.
It won't be a stylish marriage,
For I can't afford a carriage,
But you'll look sweet-”
The words would be lost as the tricycle lumbered into the sunshine
between the hedges.
Kay used to say, when she was very little, that the gladness went into
her feet when she was happy. On these expeditions it went everywhere,
into her feet, her eyes, her lips, her hands. She did the things that
boys do, and yet she had the sweetness of a girl. She ran like a boy and
she swam like a boy. She was a darling and a puzzle to Peter; he could
never make her out. He was always trying to put her dearness into words
and always failing.
“Your voice is like the laughter of birds,” he said. “But why do you
love me so much, Peter?”
He slanted his eyes. “Because I borned you.” He knew better than that
now.
Sometimes they spoke of their cousins.
“I did something horrid this morning.”
“Don't believe it.”
“Oh, but yes. I was brushing the dust off my shoes in the kitchen, and
what do you think I found?”
“Hurry up and tell me.”
“That Glory hadn't had time to eat her breakfast and that some of the
dust had gone into her plate of porridge.”
“Oh, Peter! How careless! Did you tell her?”
“She came in and saw it. You'd never guess what she said.--'Never mind,
old boy. One's got to eat a peck o' dirt before one dies. So mother
says.' And she took a spoon and-----”
“And ate it?”
Peter nodded, trying to look penitent, but laughing.
Then Kay became grave-eyed and asked one of her questions. “But do you?”
“Do you what?”
“Have to eat a peck of dirt before you die?”
Peter wriggled his toes in his shoes and looked down to see them moving.
“Don't know. You and I don't. But that's what Glory says.”
Having learnt to walk like a boy, Kay learnt to whistle. One hot
summer's afternoon they had ridden out and were lying on their backs
in a field tall with grass, nearly ready for cutting. Peter had almost
drowsed with the heavy smell of the wild flowers, when he sat up
suddenly and seized his sister by the arm quite roughly. She was only
whistling a little tune softly and was surprised at the strength he
used.
“Peterkins, what's the matter? You're hurting. I'm sure you've made a
bruise.”
He paid no attention to her protest. “Where'd you learn that?”
“What?”
“That tune you were whistling?”
“Don't know. Just made it up, I suppose. I never heard it.”
“But you must have.”
“But I haven't, Peter.” She was frightened by his earnestness, mistaking
it for anger.
“Did you never hear it in the cupboard in the bedroom--the one that was
yours and mine?”
She hardly knew whether to laugh or cry. “You're joking.”
“I'm not. I'm in dead seriousness.”
The tears came. “I'm telling the truth. I never knew it till this
moment.”
“Whistle it again.”
“I can't. I forget it.”
As the children's legs grew stronger they went further afield,
conquering new territory, exploring all kinds of dusty lanes and
by-roads. They had turned off from Potter's Bar to Northaw, working
round through Gough's Oak to Cheshunt when they were hailed by a
freckled boy, about Peter's age, who sat astride a gate, playing a
mouth-organ.
“Hey, kids! Want to buy anything?”
They jammed on the brakes and addressed him from the trike. “Got
anything to sell?”
“Nope. Just wanted to talk and had to say something.”
“But who are you?”
“I've lived in America and now I'm living here in Friday Lane. I've
often seen you go by.”
They looked round to discover Friday Lane; on every side was a sweep of
country, rolling away in sun-dazzled fields and basking woodlands.
“But--but it's lonely here.”
“Yup. But it's lonelier where I come from. Nothing but Indians and
prairie.”
Even Indians didn't turn them aside; they were trying to unravel the
mystery of Friday Lane.
“Is this road the Lane?”
“That's the Lane.” The boy pointed with a brown hand to a grass-grown
field-track starting from the gate on which he sat and vanishing between
a line of tall oaks--oaks which had probably been standing when the land
was part of the royal chase.
“But there aren't any houses.”
The boy laughed. “Oh, aren't there? There's our house, right over there,
out of sight.”
“And who are you?” Kay and Peter asked together.
“I'm Harry Arran and the house belongs to my brother. He's the Faun Man;
I kind o' look after him and keep him straight. He's a wonder; you'd be
lucky if you knew him.”
“We'd like to know him. We'd both like to know him very much.” Again
they spoke together.
The boy thrust his hands in his pockets and eyed them.
“Don't know so much about that. I'm very particular about my brother. I
don't let him know just anybody.”
He twisted round on the gate, turning his back on them, and re-commenced
playing, giving them plainly to understand that their too eager interest
in his family affairs had made conversation undesirable.
CHAPTER XXV--THE HAPPY COTTAGE
It was the way in which the boy had said “just anybody.” Peter gazed
beyond the gate into the green mysterious depth of country--an Eden from