Great Uncle Hoot-Toot

Geoff glowered at her.

"Mamma," he said, "will you once for all make Elsa and Frances understand that when I'm speaking to you they needn't interfere?"

Mrs. Tudor did not directly respond to this request.

"Will you tell me, Geoff," she said, "what has put all this into your head? What things are you in want of?"

Geoff hesitated. Fancied wants, like fancied grievances, have an annoying trick of refusing to answer to the roll-call when distinctly summoned to do so.

"There's lots of things," he began. "I should have a pair of proper football boots, instead of just an old common pair with ribs stuck on, you know, like I have. All the fellows have proper ones when they're fifteen or so."

"But you are not fifteen."

"Well, I might wait about the boots till next term. But I do really want a pair of boxing-gloves dreadfully," he went on energetically, as the idea occurred to him; "you know I began boxing this term."

"And don't they provide boxing-gloves? How have you managed hitherto?" asked his mother, in surprise.

"Oh, well, yes – there are gloves; but of course it's much nicer to have them of one's own. It's horrid always to seem just one of the lot that can't afford things of their own."

"And if you are not rich – and I dare say nearly all your schoolfellows are richer than you" – said Elsa, "is it not much better not to sham that you are?"

"Sham," repeated Geoff, roughly. "Mamma, I do think you should speak to Elsa. – If you were a boy – " he added, turning to his sister threateningly. "I don't want to sham about anything; but it's very hard to be sent to a school when you can't have everything the same as the others."

A look of pain crept over Mrs. Tudor's tired face. Had she done wrong? Was it another of her "mistakes" – of which, like all candid people, she felt she had made many in her life – to have sent Geoff to a first-class school?

"Geoff," she said weariedly, "you surely do not realize what you cause me when you speak so. It was almost my principal reason for settling in London seven years ago, that I might be able to send you to one of the best schools. We could have lived more cheaply, and more comfortably, in the country; but you would have had to go to a different class of school."

"Well, I wish I had, then," said Geoff, querulously. "I perfectly hate London; I have always told you so. I shouldn't mind what I did if it was in the country. It isn't that I want to spend money, or that I've extravagant ideas; but it's too hard to be in a false position, as I am at school – not able to have things like the other fellows. You would have made me far happier if you had gone to live in the country and let me go to a country school. I hate London; and just because I want things like other fellows, I'm scolded."

Mrs. Tudor did not speak. She looked sad and terribly tired.

"Geoff," said Elsa, putting great control on herself so as to speak very gently, for she felt as if she could gladly shake him, "you must see that mamma is very tired. Do wait to talk to her till she is better able for it. And it is getting late."

"Do go, Geoff," said his mother. "I have listened to what you have said; it is not likely I shall forget it. I will talk to you afterwards."

The boy looked rather ashamed.

"I haven't meant to vex you," he said, as he stooped to kiss his mother. "I'm sorry you're so tired."

There was silence for a moment after he had left the room.

"I am afraid there is a mixture of truth in what he says," said Mrs. Tudor, at last. "It has been one of the many mistakes I have made, and now I suppose I am to be punished for it."

Elsa made a movement of impatience.

"Mamma dear!" she exclaimed, "I don't think you would speak that way if you weren't tired. There isn't any truth in what Geoff says. I don't mean that he tells stories; but it's just his incessant grumbling. He makes himself believe all sorts of nonsense. He has everything right for a boy of his age to have. I know there are boys whose parents are really rich who have less than he has."

"Yes, indeed, mamma; Elsa is right," said Frances. "Geoff is insatiable. He picks out the things boys here and there may have as an exception, and wants to have them all. He has a perfect genius for grumbling."

"Because he is always thinking of himself," said Elsa. "Mamma, don't think me disrespectful, but would it not be better to avoid saying things which make him think himself of such consequence – like telling him that we came to live in town principally for his sake?"

"Perhaps so," said her mother. "I am always in hopes of making him ashamed, by showing how much has been done for him."

"And he does feel ashamed," said Frances, eagerly. "I saw it to-night; he'd have liked to say something more if he hadn't been too proud to own that he had been inventing grievances."

"Things have been too smooth for him," said Elsa; "that's the truth of it. He needs some hardships."

"And as things are turning out he's very likely to get them," said Mrs. Tudor, with a rather wintry smile.

"Oh, mamma, forgive me! Do you know, I had forgotten all about our money troubles," Elsa exclaimed. "Why don't you tell Geoff about them, mamma? It's in a way hardly fair on him; for if he knew, it might make him understand how wrong and selfish he is."

"I will tell him soon, but not just yet. I do not want to distract his mind from his lessons, and I wish to be quite sure first. I think I should wait till I hear from your great-uncle."

"And that will be – how long? It is how many weeks since Mr. Norris first wrote that he was uneasy? About seven, I should say," said Elsa.

"Quite that," said her mother. "It is the waiting that is so trying. I can do nothing without Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's advice."

That last sentence had been a familiar one to Mrs. Tudor's children almost ever since they could remember. "Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot" had been a sort of autocrat and benefactor in one, to the family. His opinions, his advice had been asked on all matters of importance; his approval had been held out to them as the highest reward, his displeasure as the punishment most to be dreaded. And yet they had never seen him!

"I wish he would come home himself," said Elsa. "I think Geoff would be much the better for a visit from him," she added, with a slight touch of sharpness in her tone.

"Poor Geoff!" said her mother. "I suppose the truth is that very few women know how to manage boys."

"I don't see that," said Elsie. "On the contrary, a generous-natured boy is often more influenced by a woman's gentleness than by a man's severity. It is just that, that I don't like about Geoff. There is a want of generous, chivalrous feeling about him."

"No," said Frances. "I don't quite agree with you. I think it is there, but somehow not awakened. Mamma," she went on, "supposing our great-uncle did come home, would he be dreadfully angry if he found out that we all called him 'Hoot-Toot'?"

"Oh no," said her mother, smiling; "he's quite used to it. Your father told me he had had the trick nearly all his life of saying 'Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!' if ever he was perplexed or disapproving."

"What a very funny little boy he must have been!" exclaimed both the girls together.

CHAPTER III.

AN UNLOOKED-FOR ARRIVAL

The next few days were trying ones for all the Tudor family. The mother was waiting anxiously for further news of the money losses, with which, as her lawyers told her, she was threatened; the sisters were anxious too, though, with the bright hopefulness of their age, the troubles which distressed their mother fell much more lightly on them: they were anxious because they saw her suffering.

Vicky had some misty idea that something was wrong, but she knew very little, and had been forbidden to say anything to Geoff about the little she did know. So that of the whole household Geoff was the only one who knew nothing, and went on living in his Fool's Paradise of having all his wants supplied, yet grumbling that he had nothing! He was in a particularly tiresome mood – perhaps, in spite of themselves, it was impossible for his sisters to bear with him as patiently as usual; perhaps the sight of his mother's pale face made him dissatisfied with himself and cross because he would not honestly own that he was doing nothing to help and please her. And the weather was very disagreeable, and among Geoff's many "hates" was a very exaggerated dislike to bad weather. About this sort of thing he had grumbled much more since his return from a long visit to some friends in the country the summer before, when the weather had been splendid, and everything done to make him enjoy himself, in consequence of which he had come home with a fixed idea that the country was always bright and charming; that it was only in town that one had to face rain and cold and mud. As to fog, he had perhaps more ground for his belief.

"Did you ever see such beastly weather?" were his first words to Vicky one evening when the good little sister had rushed to the door on hearing Geoff's ring, so that his majesty should not be kept waiting an unnecessary moment. "I am perfectly drenched, and as cold as ice. Is tea ready, Vic?"

"Quite ready – at least it will be by the time you've changed your things. Do run up quick, Geoff. It's a bad thing to keep on wet clothes."

"Mamma should have thought of that before she sent me to a day-school," said Geoff. "I've a good mind just not to change my clothes, and take my chance of getting cold. It's perfect slavery – up in the morning before it's light, and not home till pitch dark, and soaked into the bargain."

"Hadn't you your mackintosh on?" asked Vicky.

"My mackintosh! It's in rags. I should have had a new one ages ago."