The Wonderful Garden or The Three Cs

‘That’s all right,’ said Charlotte gaily; ‘it must be sharper than a scorpion’s teeth to have a wicked landlord. Now – ’

‘I’ll look now,’ said Caroline; ‘you wash, quick!’

Caroline chose red columbine because it meant ‘anxious and trembling’; ‘and I’m sure we shall be that soon enough,’ she said. The medicine book confirmed her choice by assuring her that columbine was an herb of Venus, commonly used, with good success, for ‘ſore mouths and throats.’

‘Ours will be, before we’ve done,’ she said. ‘We shall have to explain to him a lot.’

The liverwort polyanthus, though signifying confidence, was rejected as being too difficult to find most likely; but the daily rose (‘Thy smile I aspire to’) seemed the very thing, and it was agreed that lemon verbena (‘Unexpected meeting’) would be both scented and appropriate.

‘And I’ve got a little straw too,’ said Caroline – ‘I got it while William was harnessing – it did so well with uncle; and wistaria means ‘Welcome, fair stranger,’ so we’ll have that. There was no time to look these up in the medicine book, except liverwort, and of this they had only to read that ‘It is true that Mizaldus and others, yea, almoſt all aſtrological phyſicians hold this to be an herb of Jupiter, but the truth is it is an herb of Mercury, and a ſingular good herb for all ſadness of ſpirit,’ when Charles came to say ‘Hurry up! or William will be off without us.’

‘To gather the flowers will be but the work of a moment,’ said Caroline; ‘you two go in the carriage, and I’ll tell William to drive out by the deserted lodge and pick me up at the garden gate.’

Unfortunately the flowers were not easy to find. The gardener had to be consulted, and thus the gathering of Lord Andore’s presentation bouquet was the work of about a quarter of an hour, so that William was waiting and very cross indeed when Caroline came running out of the garden with the flowers – a mere bundle, and no bouquet, as Charles told her – in her held-up skirt.

‘No time now to drop people at the lodge gates,’ he said. ‘I’ll set you down at the turning, and even that I didn’t ought to do by rights, being late as it is, and I shall have to fan the horse along something cruel to get to the station in time as it is.’

So the splendour of driving up to the castle in the carriage was denied them; they could not even drive to the lodge. And all they got, after all Caroline’s careful diplomatic treatment of William, was, as she said, ‘just a bit of a lift.’

‘It saves time, though,’ said she, ‘and time’s everything when you’ve got to be home by half-past six. I do hope Lord Andore’s in, don’t you?’

‘I don’t know,’ said Charles. ‘I think it would be more noble if we had to sacrifice ourselves and go to London to see him. We should have to break open our money-boxes. I’ve always wanted to do that. I do wish Rupert had been here. He could have made up something to say in Latin, and then Lord Andore would have had to pay attention.’

‘He’ll have to in English,’ said Caroline quietly, ‘if he’s there. Oh, I do hope he is! The Mineral woman is most likely crying all this time. She only stopped for a minute, I’m certain, to sort the bottles because of the man coming for them with the cart at three. Won’t it be glorious going and telling her that it’s all right and she needn’t go?’

‘But suppose it all isn’t, and she need,’ said Charles gloomily.

‘The spells have never failed us yet,’ said Caroline.

‘I believe it’s something to do with the garden and our being the ancestors of Dame Eleanour,’ said Charlotte; ‘of course it’ll be all right, Charles.’

‘Rupert didn’t think so.’

‘Rupert doesn’t know as much as we do, when it isn’t Latin,’ said Charlotte. ‘We’re going to teach Rupert a lot, by and by. You see if we don’t. All right, William; we’re getting out as fast as we can, aren’t we?’ for the carriage had stopped, and a voice from the box was urging them to look slippy.

The carriage rolled away, leaving them at the corner, with the big bouquet which Caroline had hastily arranged as they drove along.

‘If we see him, you’ll let me tell him, won’t you?’ she said; ‘because the Mineral woman told about it to me.’ And the others agreed, though Charles pointed out that the Mineral woman only told her because she happened to be there.

CHAPTER XVI

THE APPEAL TO CÆSAR

So far all had gone well with the project of calling on Lord Andore to tell him about his unfortunate tenant and the week-ending admirers of her cottage. But at Lord Andore’s lodge gate a check occurred.

As the long gate clicked itself into place after they had passed through it, an elderly person in a black cap with violet ribbons put her head out of the lodge window and said:

‘No, you don’t!’

‘Yes, we do,’ said Charlotte unguardedly.

‘No village children allowed in,’ said the black and violet cap.

‘We aren’t,’ said Charles. And then the cap disappeared only to reappear a moment later at the lodge door, on the head of a very angry old lady with a very sharp long nose, who might have been Mrs. Wilmington’s grandmother.

‘Out you go, the way you came,’ she said; ‘that’s the order. What do you want, anyhow?’

‘We’ve got a bouquet for Lord Andore,’ said Caroline, showing it.

‘Keep it till the fifteenth,’ said the woman; a silly thing to say, for no bouquet will keep a fortnight. ‘No village people admitted till the gala and fête when his lordship comes of age. You can come then. Out you go. I’ve no patience,’ she added; and it was quite plain that she had not.

They had to go back. I wish I could conceal from you that Charles put out his tongue at her as he passed. It is a dreadful thing to have to relate, and my only comfort is that Caroline and Charlotte did not do it. Charlotte made a face, but Caroline behaved beautifully.

Only, when they were out in the road again, it was Caroline who said, almost ‘between her set teeth’ as heroes do in moments of crisis, ‘You know that broken paling we passed?’ The others instantly understood. They went back, found the broken paling and slipped through. It was Caroline’s dress that was really badly torn. Charlotte’s was only gathers, which you can tuck into your waistband and it only makes a lump and the skirt rather uneven lengths, and it was not the fence but a nail that tore Charles’s stocking so badly.

The shrubbery in which they found themselves was very thorny and undergrowthy, and nearer to the lodge than they would have chosen. They could see its white walls quite plainly every now and then, and they feared that it, or the managing director of it, might be able to see them. But it makes all the difference whether you are looking for a thing or not, doesn’t it? And certainly the last thing the cap woman expected was that any one should dare to defy her.

So, undiscovered and unsuspected, the children crept through the undergrowth. The thorns and briars scratched at the blue muslins, no longer, anyhow, in their first freshness, and Charlotte’s white hat was snatched from her head by a stout chestnut stump. The bouquet, never the handsomest of its kind, was not improved by its travels. But misfortunes such as these occur to all tropical explorers, and they pressed on. They were all very warm and rather dirty when they emerged from the undergrowth into the smooth spacious park, and, beyond a belt of quiet trees, saw the pale grey towers of the castle rise against the sky. They looked back. The lodge was not to be seen.

‘So that’s all right,’ said Caroline. ‘Now we must walk fast and yet not look as if we were hurrying. I think it does that best if you take very long steps. I wish we knew where the front door was. It would be awful if we went to the back one by mistake, and got turned back by Lord Andore’s my-myrmidons.’

‘I expect his back door is grander than our front,’ said Charlotte; ‘so we shan’t really know till the myr-what’s-its-names have gone for us.’

‘If we’d had time to disguise ourselves like grown-ups – Char, for goodness’ sake tear that strip off your hat, it looks like a petticoat’s tape that’s coming down,’ said Caroline – ‘they’d have thought we’d come to call, with cards, and then they’d have had to show us in, unless he wasn’t at home.’

‘He must be at home,’ said Charlotte, tearing a long streamer from the wretched hat, which now looked less like a hat than a fading flower that has been sat on; ‘it would be too much if he wasn’t.’

They passed through the trees and on to a very yellow gravelled drive, hot and gritty to the foot, and distressing to the eye. Following this, they came suddenly, round a corner, on the castle. It was much bigger than they expected, and there seemed to be no doubt which was the front entrance. Two tall grey towers held a big arched gateway between them, and the drive led straight in to this. There seemed to be no door-bell and no knocker, nor, as far as they could see, any door.

‘I feel like Jack the Giant Killer,’ said Charles; ‘only there isn’t a trumpet to blow.’

His voice, though he spoke almost in a whisper, sounded loud and hollow under the echoing arch of the gateway.

Beyond its cool depths was sunshine, with grass and pink geraniums overflowing from stone vases. A fountain in the middle leapt and sank and plashed in a stone basin.

There was a door at the other side of the courtyard – an arched door with steps leading up to it. On the steps stood a footman.

‘He’s exactly like the one in Alice,’ said Caroline; ‘courage and despatch.’

The footman looked curiously at the three children, hot, dusty, and untidy, who advanced through the trim parterre. His glance dwelt more especially on the battered bouquet, on Charlotte’s unspeakable hat, and the riven stocking of Charles.

‘If you please,’ said Caroline, her heart beating heavily, ‘we want to see Lord Andore.’

‘’Slordship’s not at heum,’ said the footman, looking down upon them.

‘When will he be back?’ Charlotte asked, while Caroline suddenly wished that they had at least brought their gloves.

‘Can’t say’m sheur,’ said the footman, doing something to his teeth with a pin; and his tone was wondrous like Mrs. Wilmington’s.