Letters Home

4

Letters Home

    “Cor,” Bunch had said thoughtfully to her companion-in-arms as the sitting-room door was heard to close on the Misses Blake, Worrington and Ogilvie retiring to change their dress for dinner.

    To say truth the most exciting thing so far about that cupboard had been the fact of its admitting one to the crawl-space by the headmistress’s private sitting-room; this was in fact the very first time that Bunch had overheard anything that could have been described as a guilty secret. The cupboard being the sort of secret that had to be shared in order to be enjoyed, this afternoon her companion-in-arms was not Corky, who was laid up with a head-cold, but little Lizzie Amory, who had been admitted into the secret faute de mieux.

    Lizzie gave a smothered giggle. “You’re not supposed to say that, Bunch!” she hissed.

    “Never mind that. Come on, let’s tell Corky!”

    With infinite precautions the conspirators wriggled out of the crawl-space, descended into the cupboard, inspected the passage through the keyhole, and scampered off to the little sick-room, where Corky was the sole occupant.

    “Guess what!” panted Bunch. “Miss Ogilvie isn’t Miss Ogilvie at all, she’s only seventeen, and Delphie’s the grown-up one! They have exchanged places!”

    Corky had been drinking soup. She set the bowl down and said scornfully: “What a hum!”

    “No! It’s true!” cried Bunch.

    “Yes, it is, Corky,” agreed Lizzie. “Delphie is really a grown-up lady!”

    “Pooh, you would say anything that Bunch told you to!”

    “I would not! it’s really, really true!”

    “Yes. Listen,” said Bunch earnestly: “We were in the cupboard, you see—”

    The narrative was so very circumstantial that in the end the sceptical Corky was convinced.

    “Help! O.B. would kill them, if she knew!” she gasped with bulging eyes.

    Bunch and Lizzie saw nothing to carp at in this piece of wild hyperbole: they nodded. After a moment Bunch said, narrowing her eyes: “If I were to hint to Miss Ogilvie that I know, perhaps she would let me off beastly mathematics.”

    Intrepid though she was, this remark met only with a disbelieving silence.

    “Well, l suppose it would be... du chantage,” admitted Bunch, who had grown up speaking French at home. As neither of the other two knew that word they were unable to respond. “So I won’t. Though it’s an awful pity we can’t think of something to do with it!”

    “Yes. But it makes things more exciting,” said Corky with a happy sigh.

    “Ooh, yes!” squeaked Lizzie.

    Bunch admitted that it did; but being of a more practical, not to say more ruthless, turn of mind than her companions-in-arms, was still of the opinion that it was an awful pity they couldn’t do anything with the knowledge.

    Perhaps it was this feeling of mild frustration that induced all three little girls to write home of their exciting discovery; or perhaps it was merely the effort not to impart it to such untrustworthy personalities as Miss Miranda Peabody, Miss Maria Owens, and Miss Prunella Brinsley-Pugh.

    As Bunch normally wrote everything to her twin, she of course mentioned their exciting discovery in her very next letter. Master Bungo Ainsley was at Winchester, and naturally a fellow who was at a real school could not be bothered with the silly little goings-on at what he and his peers referred to witheringly as a hen-coop. So his next letter mentioned only such points as unknown hands’ having inserted a grass-snake in Matron’s bed, resulting in the gating of the entire middle school, and the new top which was not half bad possessed by one, Francis Knight.

    Not unnaturally Bunch was incensed by this reception of her stunning news and without thinking very much upon the wisdom of doing so, wrote off to her favourite cousin, who she knew would fully appreciate the story, as follows:

Dear Hildy,

    You will never guess, it is such a joke, Miss Ogilvie is not Miss Ogilvie at all she is only 17. Me and Une Certaine were in the Armoire, tu sais, and heard it all. The Ladies was come to call and they were her cousin’s. I mean of Miss Ogilvie. They said it was the older one that was Fillerdelphia. Delphie cryed she said it was true. Me and Une Certaine was in the seeling meantime almost killing ourselves not to laugh. Miss Ogilvie her name is Pansy, she said they changed Places because else they would have had to live with an old Great Uncle who has a frezzing house. So they did it because Delphie does not know mathermaticks and géographie et ces sortes de choses. But Miss Ogilvie is Clever at them.

    Do you not think they are increddibly Daring? I do. O.B. has not a notion that they are not who she Thinks. Me and Une Certaine and also Une Trosieme allmost kill ourselves laughing when ever we think of it. I allways said that Armoire would proove a God send and I was rite.

    Do not beleive Bungo if he writes you about a snake in Matron’s bed in any case it was but a Grass snake and I would not be surprizzed if it was all a Hum.

    Horatio Nelson Cat has cort another huge Rat. Me and Corky thort of something Extra Good to do with it only Cook burnt it up in the stove affore we could moove.

    I wish I was at home I could see you and the Major and Diablo Cat and Mrs Spofford Cat and Baby Henry. Christa writ me but it was all soppy. Her new baby borls all day and night. I do not care what she calls it but she can call it Elinor like me if she likes.

    Miss Blake sends regards only as she does not know you I find this curious, pas toi?

Trusting this finds you as it leaves me,

I remain, Dear Hildy,

Your loving Cousin,

Bunch.

    Young Mrs Kernohan, who was sitting up in bed with Baby Henry beside her and the two furry monsters, Diablo and Mrs Spofford, by her legs, at first laughed very much over this missive. Then she re-read it and looked thoughtful. Then she bit her lip. When Major Kernohan came in to see what she had to report from her perusal of the post she handed the letter to him with the uncertain remark: “Aurry, do you think we should do anything about this? It seems... Well, I’m not sure. But tell me what you think.”

    Major Aurelius Kernohan was a good deal older than his little wife. And a good deal more sensible. He read the letter through slowly, frowning a little.

    “Bunch’s written English is improving, though an outsider might not collect that!” said Hildy with a nervous laugh.

    “Indeed.”

    She swallowed. “Well?”

    The Major hesitated. “Dearest, what exactly do you make of it?” he said at last.

    “Um, you mean what do I think she’s talking about?”—He nodded.—Hildy licked her lips. “Um—well, it seems very far-fetched, but the way I interpret it is, these Ogilvie sisters, the elder one being Delphie and the younger Pansy, exchanged places in order to get the place at Miss Blake’s. The younger can teach mathematics and geography and the older cannot. Is that what you understood, Aurry?”

    The Major sat down on the edge of the bed, frowning. “Yes.”

    Mrs Kernohan gulped. “Dearest, if we—if we tell Miss Blake, then the poor Miss Ogilvies will have to go to this horrid great-uncle.”

    “The one who has a ‘frezzing’ house: quite.”

    “There must be more to it than that! To drive them to such a thing!”

    “So I would suppose. I feel sorry for them, too, my love. But I don’t think that we can countenance such a deception. What sort of example is it setting the girls? And then... Well,” he said reluctantly, looking at his wife’s distressed face: “I do not think the parents would care for their children’s being in the hands of a young woman who would practise such a deception.”

    “No,” she gulped. “Shall you speak to Cousin Paul?”

    “I think I must. He is, after all, Bunch’s guardian.”

    “Yes. It is betraying Bunch’s trust, though, Aurry!”

    The Major just waited.

    “I suppose it is the case of the greater good,” admitted Mrs Kernohan in a small voice.

    Major Kernohan dropped a kiss on her auburn curls. “Indeed it is, my love. I shall ride over and see Paul today.”

    Mrs Kernohan sighed but raised no objections.

    Corky’s letter was phrased in similar vein. She had, however, had the sense not to address it to a grown-up, however sympathetic, but only to her sister. Forgetting that, at nearly seventeen, Miss Angela Corcoran might have been supposed to have been approaching the attaining of years of discretion.

    Angie did not betray her little sister to the extent of taking the letter straight to her Mamma. She did, however, show it to her older brother, who was home on furlough.

    “Eh?” said Lieutenant Corcoran, staring. “What is this bilgewater?”

    “Read it over, Johnny,” gulped Angie. “See what you think.”

    Looking sceptical, the Lieutenant read it aloud:

Dear Angie,

    I have startling News. Miss Ogilvie is not Miss O. at all. She is but 17. Her name is Pansy. It is D.O. who is the elder. She is but prettending to be a School girl. B.A. and L.A. were in the Secrett Place and overheard it all. Miss O.’s cousins were come to call. They said it was Delphie as was Miss O. She broke down and cryed and admitted to it all. I wish I had herd it. At first I thought it was but a Hum because I have been caught that way by B.A. before. Only it is too True and O.B. has not a notion of it. She would kill the both of them an she knew. She is very Strictt as I have said.

    Well, dearest Angie that is allmost all the news except to say that H.N.C. has caught yet another Giant Rat. Pointer says we are over run with them. But Cook says he is worth his wait in Gold, he is keeping them Down. She gave him a piece of steak which Mlle La P. had been promissed to her dinner. And so would I. I wish he were mine.

    Kiss Mamma and Papa and Julia and Baby Fred for me.

    Miss Blake sends regards.

Trusting this finds you as it leaves me,

I remain, dearest Angelica,

Your loving sister,

Belinda Corcoran.

    “Bilgewater,” pronounced the gallant Lieutenant.

    “Johnny!”

    “Well, what the deuce are all these dashed initials? The whole thing is incomprehensible!”

    “Oh,” said Angie limply. “Well, ‘Miss O.’ is Miss Ogilvie, and ‘D.O.’ is Delphie Ogilvie, that is her sister. And ‘O.B.’ is Miss Blake. You know, Johnny, the girls call her ‘Old Blakey’!”

    “Oh, aye,” he said, grinning. “Well... I suppose it’s starting to make sense. Who the Devil’s H.N.C., though?”

    “Horatio Nelson.”

    The Lieutenant’s jaw sagged.

    “No!” gasped Angie. “l mean Horatio Nelson is the school cat, Johnny!”

    “Naming a dashed cat after the hero of Trafalgar and the Nile?” he gasped.

    “Well, don’t blame me,” said Angie weakly. “Um—‘B.A.’ and ‘L.A.’ are her little friends.”

    “That monster of a brat Bunch Ainsley, you mean,” spotted the Lieutenant unerringly. “Here—L.A.? Don’t tell me another one of ’em’s started there!”

    “What? Oh—no,” said Angie limply. “No, um, that’s Lizzie Something, I forget her name, but she’s no relation.”

    “Sounds just as bad,” he grunted.

    “Yes—um—do you think the whole thing could be a leg-pull?” squeaked Angie hopefully.

    “If it is, I’ll get down there and scrag the brat myself!” he said wrathfully. “Um—let’s see... “ He read it over again. His sister was used to him: she did not remark on the fact that as he translated the initialisms his lips moved.

    “By George, it ain’t a jest, you know,” he decided limply. “Can’t say how I know, but it has the ring of truth about it.”

    “Yes,” said Angie, biting her lip. “Belinda is naturally a truthful girl. And in any case the story seems so far-fetched that I don’t think a little girl could have dreamed it up.”

    The Lieutenant would not have put it past B.A., but he read the first paragraph once more and admitted: “No. Don’t think either of ’em made it up.”

    “No. What—what should we do, Johnny?” quavered Angie. “Should we tell Mamma?”

    “Tell Mamma?” returned the Lieutenant, scandalized. “I should just think not! I’m taking this straight to Papa!”

    Angie gulped but did not attempt to dissuade him.

    … “What do you think, sir?” he said as his father read over the letter and put it down, frowning.

    Sir James Corcoran replied grimly: “I think that I was perfectly correct in the first instance in advising your mamma not to let her damned sister talk her into sending Belinda away to this damned place!”

    “Er—mm. Well, Hell of a long way off, mm. Never get to see the poor little soul, hardly,” agreed the kind-hearted Johnny.

    “No, quite! Well,” he said with a sigh, “clearly something must be done about this.”

    “What I thought,” agreed the Lieutenant with gloomy pride.

    Sir James paced slowly round his library, thinking. “I’m tempted to take Belinda away from the place immediately. But I suppose the thing is not so very bad. And she wrote your Mamma how much she likes this Delphie Ogilvie girl. She and the sister have acted damned improperly, but at least they don’t seem to have caused any harm by it. Well, only good, actually: Belinda sent us a page of sums that she’d actually got right!” He smiled ruefully. “Miss Blake herself wrote an accompanying note to say how pleased they were with her progress last term. Still, it won’t do: even if the girl can teach... Well, if this is right, old man: seventeen! And lending herself to such a deception! No, it won’t do... The older sister must be something of a weak reed, though no doubt they had their reasons... I wish I could go down myself and find out the ins and outs of it ail. I tell you what I shall do, Johnny, old fellow: I shall write Miss Blake a note, enclosing this, and I think it would be best if you were to take it down there yourself. You may see Belinda, and take her out for an ice or some such—give her a meal at your hotel, she’d like that. And—uh—well, if she seems unhappy, you’d better bring her back home. But I don’t think there’s any fear of that. Er—I know it breaks into your leave a bit, old man, only—”

    The Lieutenant assured his Papa hurriedly that he’d be only too pleased to run the errand for him. And he could take a look-in at dear old Commander Carey, too: he was living somewhere near Brighton: it would be great to see the old fellow again!

    Sir James smiled a little: “old” Commander Carey must only be in his mid-forties, hardly the white-haired sea-dog that his son’s expression conjured up. But he was aware that the Lieutenant owed Commander Carey a lot.

    “I should be glad if you would, dear boy: he wrote us such a very kind letter when you were wounded,” he said, laying his hand fleetingly on his tall son’s shoulder. “You should not neglect to call if you are anywhere at all in his neighbourhood.”

    “Aye. Well, we docked at Falmouth, y’know, sir, and they sent me straight up to London with the damned dispatch, I could not very well break the journey.”

    “No. But visiting the school will give you the chance to see him. Well, I think we had better not delay: l have no confidence whatsoever of Belinda’s and her little friends’ keeping this story to themselves, and I think we had best apprise Miss Blake of the matter before the school is buzzing with it. I shall write immediately and you may leave tomorrow, if that suits.”

    The Lieutenant agreed eagerly that that would suit. Sir James smiled rather ruefully. Well, a young man could not be doing with dawdling round at home, and the property would come to his older brother, not to him; but all the same, it was a little hard on a parent, hardly laying eyes on one’s own son since he turned sixteen. If Johnny had learned certain lessons of obedience, discipline and responsibility during the last ten years he had learned them not from his papa, Sir James was well  aware, but very largely from Commander Carey.

    Owing to the distance Miss Belinda Corcoran’s home was from Brighton, and the delay imposed by the exchange of letters between Miss Elinor Ainsley and her twin, Lieutenant Corcoran set off with his dispatch from Yorkshire at very much the same time that Paul Ainsley, the intrepid Bunch’s older brother and guardian, sat down to pen a letter to Miss Blake.

    Lizzie’s papa, Colonel Amory, who was a widower, had been for some time in London with his younger brother Bobby. He returned to his mother’s house in Bath to find a letter from his little daughter awaiting him.

My Dear Papa,

    I know a big Secret. But I will tell it you. I know you will not tell. I was in a secret Place with Bunch. I cannot tell you where. Bunch made me swere a Vow. We herd some ladies. They are Delphie’s cousins. They said Delphie was a grown up Lady. Miss Ogilvie is the little sister. They are prettending. Bunch says it is because Miss Ogilvie knows sums and geographie. But Delphie does not. Delphie cryed. Bunch says it was because it was all True and she was caught out. She is not bad is she Papa? Miss Blake does not know. Bunch says they are very Darring. They did not want to live with thier uncle. He is a bad old man. At school they have enaugh to eat and they may have Horatio Nelson Cat to live with them. He cought another huge Rat. Cook put it in the stove. Cook said it went strait to the Bad Place. I wrote a peice upon the Sea-faring Life. Miss Ogilvie said it was excelent.

Trusting this finds you as it leaves me,

I remain, Dearest Papa,

Your loving daughter,

Lizzie.

    “Good God,” said Richard Amory weakly.

    His mamma looked up from her book. “There is nothing wrong, I hope, dear boy?”

    “No, I— Oh, Lor’,” he said, making a rueful face and thrusting his hand through his hair.

    “Lizzie’s last letter to me indicated she was well and happy: she was very full of the doings of Horatio Nelson Cat!” said Lady Amory with a little laugh.

    “What? Oh: yes,” he said with a faint smile. “Er—Mamma, did she say nothing to you of—well, of anything a little unusual relating to Miss Ogilvie and Miss Delphie?”

    “No-o... You are not referring to the brave girl’s saving our dearest Noël’s life, are you, Richard?”

    “No, not that,” he said with a smile. His nephew Noël, when last seen, had been able to talk of nothing else save his mishap in the briny off Guillyford Point and Miss Ogilvie’s intrepidity during the rescue.

    “Dear boy,” said his mamma with a frown, “it is not that Viola has written anything unsuitable to little Lizzie, is it?”

    Viola, Lady Amory the younger, was Noël’s mamma and resided at Thevenard Manor, the family home in Devon—“infested” it, to hear Noël tell it, and his Uncle Richard was aware that he was not far wrong. Viola Amory was a lachrymose figure, full of sighs, complaints and megrims, and very, very fond of having her own way.

    “No,” said Colonel Amory on a grim note. “But if she has written anything of the sort to you, ma’am, perhaps I had best hear it.”

    Lady Amory nodded towards the little escritoire that stood in a corner of her pleasant sitting-room. “In my writing desk, Richard.”

    The Colonel retrieved the letter. Once he had fought his way through the string of complaints about the weather, the behaviour of her daughters, and the unsatisfactoriness of her only son in such points as ignoring the neighbours’ daughters, refusing to socialize with the neighbours, and absenting himself far too often from his home, he found the relevant passage:

    No doubt you will have heard, dear Mamma-in-law, of this extraordinary adventure of Noël’s. If l have warned him once in the past I am sure I have warned him a thousand times that boats are exceeding Dangerous and that he has a duty to look to his own safety, if for naught else, for the sake of his family. Though I suppose I might have saved my breath; naturally anything that his Mamma may say to him as so much Dross upon the Wind! l cannot but reflect that l was right in warning him of the Dangers of associating with Tarlington. He is a reckless and heedless care-for-nobody who sets our dear boy such a bad example! l beg you will do your best to Discourage the connexion next time Noël should visit with you. We have heard very little since he arrived home but “Miss Ogilvie” until I declare I could scream with vexation. Nothing will serve to make the silly boy understand that, noble though this Ogilvie creature’s act no doubt was, she cannot be else but a vulgar, scheming little Minx on the Catch for him. Well, my dear: out sailing like a boy!!

    I cannot say how thankful I am that Harriet’s representations did not prevail with me and I remained firm in my resolve not to let her attend That School. What must the creature be teaching them? To romp along the beaches like hoydens, perchance! Noël is being so unreasonable on the subject: you would not believe how Obdurate he is become, under Tarlington’s influence. Say what I will I cannot persuade him to behave like a sensible man: he will maintain that the creature is a Heroine! And went so far as to suggest that I should write her a note of thanks myself! This, if you please, after he has revealed that he called in person at the school express to present her with a token of his gratitude! Culled from the conservatory at Guillyford Place with Tarlington’s connivance, I make no doubt whatsoever! And this when a connexion between our two families would be most suitable, too: Lady Tarlington was of course a Gratton-Gordon, and I am assured little Felicity Tarlington is the most charming young woman imaginable. Even though, as you know, my health is uncertain as ever, I feel I should make a push to get up to town this Season, for my dear boy’s sake. He will be throwing himself away on some totally ineligible Female without his Mamma to look to him.

    “Well, that is fairly typical of Viola,” said the Colonel with a grimace, ignoring the phrase about his siter-in-law’s uncertain health: she rarely had so much as a cold. “Though at least she has not, as far as I know, written to Lizzie that Miss Ogilvie is—er—‘a vulgar, scheming little Minx’: you may be easy on that score, ma’am. I note,” he added, glancing rapidly through the rest of the letter, “that though she congratulates herself on not allowing poor little Harriet to attend the school, she does not warn you anywhere to advise me to take Lizzie away from it and consign her into her care.”

    “No,” agreed his mother drily. “You will note also, dear boy, that she urges me to persuade Noël to drop Mr Tarlington in almost the same breath as she declares her plan to marry him off to the man’s sister.”

    “To her share of Aden Tarlington’s fortune, rather. Should I write to say the girl will have a respectable dowry, but that is all?”

    “You should not, but I wish you would!” said old Lady Amory with a laugh. “Well, if it is not Viola’s idiocies upsetting little Lizzie, what is it, pray?”

    “Oh, Lizzie is not upset,” he said hurriedly.

    “Oh?”

    The Colonel rubbed his nose. “I don’t know that I should show it you, Mamma.”

    “How very like a man!” she cried, half laughing, half vexed.

    “Er—well, I cannot help that, ma’am! No, well… It may be something and nothing,” he murmured, half to himself.

    “Richard, I vow I am now nigh dead with curiosity!” cried the old lady vivaciously. “And if you do not instantly reveal the contents of Lizzie’s letter, I shall be prostrated with hysterics!”

    “Aye, like damned Viola,” he noted drily. “I think you had best read it for yourself, Mamma. But bear in mind that—that whatever took place is—is filtered through the mind of a child of ten.”

    “You are making it worse,” she noted drily, holding out her hand for the letter.

    Colonel Amory watched her in some trepidation. He knew his mother to be a broad-minded woman for her age and generation. And he knew, also, that she was very fond of Noël, and naturally felt considerable gratitude towards the young woman who had helped save his life. Nevertheless...

    Lady Amory’s eyebrows rose. She read the letter through carefully twice. Then she said: “‘Miss Ogilvie is the little sister’?”

    The Colonel swallowed. “That seems fairly clear. The one who is of an age with the girls in the senior class.”

    “Mm. And Delphie is the grown-up lady? I think you met her, did you not, last time you delivered Lizzie to the school? Just how grown-up, Richard?”

    Inexplicably the Colonel went very red. “I have no notion, ma’am. Old enough to teach school, one presumes.”

    “And young enough, one can only infer, to consent to this most improper masquerade in order to escape from—er—the uncle who is a bad old man.”

    “And presumably,” said Colonel Amory on an annoyed note, “also from a situation where they would not have sufficient to eat and could not have their beloved cat with them!”

    “Yes, well, shall we leave the domestic fauna out of the discussion, for the nonce? It appears to me that the children have eavesdropped on a private conversation and have overheard something that, if it is not precisely ‘bad’ as the poor little thing wonders, is certainly most improper.”

    “Mamma, that is a little hard. She says that Miss Delphie cried.”

    “Richard, this is a young woman of, I must suppose, twenty years of age or more, who has wilfully practised a deception on a woman who was prepared to hire her in good faith. Not only that, but to put her in charge of young minds!”

    “I know that, Mamma, but...”

    “But?” prompted the old lady in a steely voice.

    A vivid vision of the sweet oval face with its big grey eyes was bright in the Colonel’s mind. He was again very flushed. “Miss Delphie seemed the sweetest thing. And she has been so truly kind to my little Lizzie!”

    “The fact that she knows how to ingratiate herself with little children has nothing to do with the case—”

    “Mamma, she could not ingratiate herself to save her life!” cried the Colonel unguardedly.

    Lady Amory stared at him.

    He bit his lip. “You have not met her,” he said in a stifled voice.

    His mamma took a deep breath. “Very well, Richard, I will allow that she is sweet-natured and has been truly kind to Lizzie. Where does that leave us? With the conclusion that it was all the sister’s doing and that this Miss Delphie is merely a weak-natured fool who cannot stand up to her little sister?”

    “You cannot say— There may have been extenuating circumstances!”

    “Hm,” replied the redoubtable old lady. “If Miss—er—Pansy Ogilvie is the sort of young woman who gets about in boats with common fisherfolk and physically aids in the rescue of foolish young men who have got themselves into tight spots at sea, she has no doubt sufficient determination to persuade any number of sisters to her way of thinking. But as you say, there may have been extenuating circumstances. I would suggest that you go down to Brighton and find out if there were. Immediately. Not to mention, apprise Miss Blake of the situation. And then endeavour to persuade your daughter that whether or no she cried, Miss Delphie Ogilvie is not an object of pity. And that in spite of their ‘daring’, neither of these two unprincipled young women is worthy of the admiration that the little thing seems to be according them!”

    The Colonel swallowed. “l thought it might be better to write.”

    “Rubbish, Richard. This is the sort of business that is best handled in person. And while you are about it, you might drop a hint in Miss Blake’s ear that her practice of allowing the girls to write unsupervised letters home, while it may allow them the privacy to express themselves freely, is, in terms of the practical supervision of her school, most unwise!”

    “No,” he said, flushing up very much. “How could little Lizzie ever confide in me, if she knew her letters were to be read by her teachers? No, I cannot do it, Mamma!”

    “Do not be a fool, boy: the girls need never know the schoolmarms read ’em! And pray do not favour me with a lecture on the moral point at issue, thank you; it was your decision to send the child there.”

    “Dearest Mamma,” said Richard Amory, swallowing a sigh: “you know it would not do, to have the little thing live with you. So few of your acquaintance have young children, and then, when your joints are paining you a child in the house cannot but be a distraction.”

    “Nonsense: she is as quiet as a mouse!”

    “Yes. But I would not care for her to spend her entire childhood as quiet as a mouse,” he responded quietly. “At least Miss Blake sees to it that the little ones take plenty of exercise in the fresh air. And Bunch and Corky are lively girls: they are doing Lizzie good: she is quite visibly improved since my return from India!”

    “Well, I shall not argue with you,” said his mother with a sigh. “She is your child, not mine. And perhaps Miss Blake will perceive for herself the dangers of not checking the girls’ correspondence. –Stay: never tell me she permits the older girls to receive letters at will!”

    “I shall not tell you that, Mamma, for I have no notion whether she does or does not. And Lizzie is years off the age where she might be supposed to be in danger of engaging in amatory correspondence with unsuitable swains.”

    “Richard!” she said in astonishment.

    The Colonel got up with the aid of his stick, grimacing a little. “I beg your pardon, Mamma, that was unnecessarily facetious. You are right, of course: l must see Miss Blake myself. And, I suppose, talk to Lizzie,” he added with a sigh.

    “Yes. You will have to explain to her when it is necessary to betray a trust.”

    “Mm,” he said, biting his lip. “I fear she may hate me: she truly loves Miss Delphie, you know.”

    “Is that not a little exaggerated, Richard?”

    “No,” said the Colonel with a sigh. “She sees her every day and is tucked up by her every night. Whereas me she sees only at intervals of several months at best.”

    “Take her away from the place and have her live with you. She need never know it was you responsible for getting the Ogilvie creatures dismissed.”

    “Mamma, for a woman of strong moral principles, you can be a true Machiavel when it suits!”

    The old lady sniffed. “Mm. Well, I am a woman. –Dear boy, is the leg bad today?” she said as he limped over to the door, leaning heavily on his silver-knobbed cane.

    Colonel Amory had been badly wounded during his service with the Indian Army and been lucky, indeed, not to lose the leg. His mamma, his brother Bobby and his nephew Noël were all aware that he was the last man in the world to complain of his ills or to indulge in self-pity, though in fact the leg still gave him considerable pain. As usual, he replied politely: “No, I thank you, Mamma, it rarely bothers me.”

    His mother sighed a little but said nothing, and he added: “If you will excuse me, l had best see to my packing.”

    Lady Amory did not point out that she had a houseful of servants who could see to his packing: she merely nodded. When he had closed the door behind him she blew her nose hard and said aloud: “Well, there is nothing for it: Miss Blake must be informed. But I confess I wish it was not your poor papa that had to undertake the task, my little Lizzie. For God knows he has little enough love in his life: I would not like to see him lose yours.”

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