Hildegarde's Home

"You're right to stand up for your father, my lad," he said, with gruff heartiness. "It was unnecessary in this case, for I would be cut into inch pieces and served up on toast if it would do my brother Raymond any good; but you are right all the same. If anybody else ever says he hasn't common sense, knock him down, do you hear? A blow from the shoulder, sir! that's the proper answer."

"Yes, uncle," said the boy demurely; but he looked up with a twinkle in his eye. "It's lucky for me that I don't have to knock you down, sir," he added. "You're awfully strong, aren't you? I wish I were!"

"You, sir!" rejoined the Colonel. "You have the frame of an ox, if you had any flesh to cover it. Exercise is what you need, Nephew Jack! Fencing is what you want, sir! Take that walking-stick! Harry Monmouth! I'll give you a lesson, now. On guard! So! defend yourself! Ha! humph!" The last exclamation was one of disgust, for at the Colonel's first thrust, Jack's stick flew out of his hand, and knocked over a porcelain vase, shattering it in pieces, Jack, meanwhile, standing rubbing his arm and looking very foolish.

"Humph!" repeated Colonel Ferrers, looking rather disconcerted himself, and all the more fierce therefore. "That comes of trying to instruct a person who has not been taught to hold himself together. You are a milksop, my poor fellow! a sad milksop! but we are going to change all that. There! never mind about the pieces. Giuseppe will pick up the pieces. Get your supper, and then go to bed."

"I don't care about supper, thank you, uncle," said the lad.

"Pooh! pooh! don't talk nonsense!" cried the Colonel. "You don't go to bed without supper."

He led the way into the dining-room, a long, low room, panelled with dark oak. Walls, table, sideboard, shone like mirrors, with the polish of many years. Over the sideboard was the head of a gigantic moose, with huge, spreading antlers. On the sideboard itself were some beautiful pieces of old silver, shining with the peculiar blue lustre that comes from long rubbing, and from that alone. A tray stood on the table, and on it was a pitcher of milk, two glasses, and a plate of very attractive-looking little cakes. The colonel filled Jack's glass, and stood by with grim determination till he had drunk every drop.

"Now, a cake, sir," he added, sipping his own glass leisurely. "A plummy cake, of Mrs. Beadle's best make. Down with it, I insist!" In the matter of the plum cake, little insistence was necessary, and between uncle and nephew both plate and pitcher were soon empty.

"There," said the good Colonel, as they returned to the library, "now you have something to sleep on, my friend. No empty stomachs in this house, to distract people's brains and make mooncalves of them. Ten minutes' exercise with the Indian clubs – you have them in your room? – and then to bed. Hand me the 'Worthies of England,' will you? Bookcase on the right of the door, third shelf from the bottom, fifth book from the left. Thomas Fuller. Yes, thank you. Good-night, my boy! don't forget the clubs, and don't poke your head forward like a ritualist parson, because you are not otherwise cut out for one."

Leaving his uncle comfortably established with his book and reading-lamp, Jack Ferrers took his way upstairs. It was not late, but he had already found out that his uncle had nothing to say to him or any one else after the frugal nine o'clock supper, and his own taste for solitude prompted him to seek his room. As he passed along a dark corridor, a gleam of light shot out from a half-open door.

"Are you awake, Biddy?" he asked.

"Yes, dear!" answered a kind, hearty voice. "Come in, Master Jack, if you've a mind."

The room was so bright that Jack screwed up his eyes for a moment. The lamp was bright, the carpet was bright, the curtains almost danced on the wall from their own gayety, while the coloured prints, in shining gilt frames, sang the whole gamut of colour up and down and round and round. But brighter than all else in the gay little room was the gay little woman who sat by the round table (which answered every purpose of a mirror), piecing a rainbow-coloured quilt. Her face was as round and rosy as a Gravenstein apple. She had bright yellow ribbons in her lace cap, and her gown was of the most wonderful merino that ever was seen, with palm-leaves three inches long curling on a crimson ground.

"How very bright you are in here, Biddy!" said Jack, sitting down on the floor, with his long legs curled under him. "You positively make my eyes ache."

"It's cheerful, dear," replied the good housekeeper. "I like to see things cheerful, that I do. Will you have a drop of shrub, Master Jack? there's some in the cupboard there, and 'twill warm you up, like, before going to bed."

Then, as Jack declined the shrub with thanks, she continued, "And so you have been to call on the ladies at Braeside, you and the Colonel. Ah! and very sweet ladies, I'm told."

"Very likely!" said Jack absently. "Do you mind if I pull the cat's tail, Biddy?"

He stretched out his hand toward a superb yellow Angora cat which lay curled up on a scarlet cushion, fast asleep.

"Oh! my dear!" cried Mrs. Beadle. "Don't you do it! He's old, and his temper not what it was. Poor old Sunshine! and why would you pull his tail, you naughty boy?"

"Oh! well – no matter!" said Jack. "There's a fugue – that's a piece of music, Biddy – that I am practising, called the 'Cat's Fugue,' and I thought I would see if it really sounded like a cat, that's all."

"Indeed, that's not such music as I should like your uncle to hear!" exclaimed Mrs. Beadle. "And what did you say to the young lady, Master Jack?" she added, as she placed a scarlet block against a purple one. "I'm glad enough you've found some young company, to make you gay, like. You're too quiet for a young lad, that you are."

"Oh, bother!" responded Jack, shaking his shoulders. "Tell me about my father, Biddy. I don't believe he liked g – company, any better than I do. What was he like when he was a boy?"

"An angel!" said Mrs. Beadle fervently. "An angel with his head in his pocket; that is what Mr. Raymond was like."

"Uncle Tom called him an angel, too!" said the lad. "Of course he is; a combination of angel and – why did you say 'with his head in his pocket,' Biddy?"

"Well, dear, it wasn't on his shoulders," replied the housekeeper. "He was in a dream, like, all the time; oh, much worse than you are yourself, Master Jack."

"Thank you!" muttered Jack.

"And forgetful! well! well! he needed to be tied to some one, Mr. Raymond did. To see him come in for his luncheon, and then forget all about it, and stand with a book in his hand, reading as if there was nothing else in the world. And then Mr. Tom – dear! dear! would put his head down and run and butt him right in the stomach, and down they would go together and roll over and over; great big lads, like you, sir, and their father would take the dog-whip and thrash 'em till they got up. 'Twas all in sport like, d'ye see; but Mr. Raymond never let go his book, only beat Mr. Tom with it. Dear! dear! such lads!"

"Tell me about his running away," said Jack.

"After the fiddler, do you mean, dear? That was when he was a little lad. Always mad after music he was, and playing on anything he could get hold of, and singing like a serup, that boy. So one day there came along an Italian, with a fiddle that he played on, and a little boy along with him, that had a fiddle, too. Well, and if Mr. Raymond didn't persuade that boy to change clothes with him, and he to stay here and Mr. Raymond to go with the fiddler and learn to play. Of course the man was a scamp, and had no business; and Mr. Raymond gave him his gold piece to take him, and all! But when the old Squire – that's your grandfather, dear! – when he came in and found that little black-eyed fellow dressed in his son's clothes, and crying with fright, and not a word of English – well, he was neither to hold nor to bind, as the saying is. Luckily Mrs. Ferrers – that's your grandmother, dear! she came in before the child was frightened into a fit, though very near it; and she spoke the language, and with her quiet ways she got the child quiet, and he told her all about it, and how the fiddler beat him, and showed the great bruises. And when she told the Squire, he got black in the face, like he used, and took his dog-whip and rode off on his big grey horse like mad; and when he came back with Mr. Raymond in front of him, the whip was all in pieces, and Mr. Raymond crying and holding the little fiddle tight. And the Italian boy stayed, and the Squire made a man of him, from being a Papist outlandish-man. And that's all the story, Master Jack."

"And he is Giuseppe?" asked Jack.

"And he is Jew Seppy," Mrs. Beadle assented. "Though it seems a hard name to give him, and no Jew blood in him that any one can prove, only his eyes being black. But he won't hear to its being shortened. And now it is getting to be night-cap time, Master Jack," said the good woman, beginning to fold up her work, "and I hope you are going to bed, too, like a good young gentleman. But if you don't, you'll shut the door careful, won't you dear?"

"Never fear," said the boy, gathering himself up from the floor. "I'm sleepy to-night, anyhow; I may go straight to bed. Good-night, Biddy. You're quite sure you like me to call you 'Biddy'?"

"My dear, it makes me feel five-and-twenty years younger!" said the good woman; "and I seem to see your dear father, coming in with his curls a-shaking, calling his Biddy. Ah, well! Good-night, Master Jack, dear! Don't forget to look in when you go by."

"Good-night, Biddy!"

The lad went off with his candle, fairly stumbling along the corridor from sheer sleepiness; but when he reached his own room, which was flooded with moonlight, the drowsiness seemed to take wings and disappear. He sat down by the open window and looked out. Below lay the garden, all black and silver in the intense white light. The smell of the roses came up to him, exquisitely sweet. He leaned his head against the window-frame, and felt as if he were floating away on the buoyant fragrance – far, far away, to the South, where his home was, and where the roses were in bloom so long that it seemed as if there were always roses.

The silver-lit garden vanished from his sight, and he saw instead a long, low room, half garret, half workshop, where a man stood beside a long table, busily at work with some fine tools. The spare, stooping figure, the long, delicate hands, the features carved as if in ivory, the blue, near-sighted eyes peering anxiously at the work in his hands, – all these were as actually present to the boy as if he could put out his own hand and touch them. It was with a start that he came back to the world of tangible surroundings, as a sudden breath of wind waved the trees below him, and sent whisperings of leaf and blossom through his room.

"Daddy!" he said half to himself; and he brushed away something which had no possible place in the eyes of a youth who was to go to college next year. Giving himself a violent shake, Jack Ferrers rose, and, going to a cupboard, took out with great care a long, black, oblong box. This he deposited on the bed; then took off his boots and put on a pair of soft felt slippers. His coat, too, was taken off; and then, holding the black box in his arms, as if it were a particularly delicate baby, he left the room, and softly made his way to the stairs which led to the attic. There was a door at the foot of the stairs, which he opened noiselessly, and then he stopped to listen. All was still. He must have been sitting for some time at the window, for the light in the hall was extinguished, which was a sign that his uncle had gone to bed. In fact, as he listened intently, his ear caught a faint, rhythmic sound, rising and falling at regular intervals, like the distant murmur of surf on the sea-shore; his uncle was asleep. Closing the door softly after him, and clasping the black box firmly, Jack climbed the attic stairs and disappeared in the darkness.

CHAPTER VI

COUSIN JACK

The next day, as Hildegarde was arranging flowers on the piazza, with a table before her covered with bowls and vases, and a great basket of many-coloured blossoms beside her, Jack Ferrers appeared, evidently in the depths of misery, carrying a huge bunch of roses. He stumbled while coming up the steps, and dropped half the roses, which increased his discomfort so much that Hildegarde was really sorry for him. Moreover, when seen by daylight, he was a very pleasant-looking fellow, with curly brown hair and great honest blue eyes very wide open. He was over six feet tall, and as awkward as a human being could be, but of course he could not help that.

"Good-morning, Cousin Jack!" said Hildegarde pleasantly. "What lovely roses! Are they from Colonel Ferrers's garden?"

"Yes," replied Jack Ferrers. "Uncle sends them with his compliments. I'm sorry I knocked over the basket last night. Good-by."

He was about to fling himself down the steps again, but Hildegarde, controlling her desire to laugh, said cordially: "Oh, don't go! Sit down a moment, and tell me the names of some of these beauties."

"Thank you!" muttered the youth, blushing redder than the roses. "I – I think I must go back."

"Are you so very busy?" asked Hildegarde innocently. "I thought this was your vacation. What have you to do?"

"Oh – nothing!" said the lad awkwardly. "Nothing in particular."

"Then sit down," said Hildegarde decidedly.

And Jack Ferrers sat down. A pause followed. Then Hildegarde said in a matter-of-fact tone, "You have no sisters, have you, Cousin Jack?"

"No," was the reply. "How did you know?"

"Because you are so shy," said Hildegarde, smiling. "Boys who have no sisters are apt to regard girls as a kind of griffin. There used to be a boy at dancing-school, two or three years ago, who was so shy it was really painful to dance with him at first, but he got over it after a while. And it was all because he had no sisters."