The Long Vacation
Page 6
Such trifles will their hearts engage, A shell, a flower, a feather; If none of these, a cup of joy It is to be together.--ISAAC WILLIAMS.
A retired soldier, living with his sister in a watering-place, is apt toform to himself regular habits, of which one of the most regular is thewalking to the station in quest of his newspaper. Here, then, it wasthat the tall, grey-haired, white-moustached General Mohun beheld,emerging on the platform, a slight figure in a grey suit, bag in hand,accompanied by a pretty pink-cheeked, fair-haired, knicker-bockeredlittle boy, whose air of content and elation at being father's companionmade his sapphire eyes goodly to behold.
"Mr. Underwood! I am glad to see you."
"I thought I would run down and look at the house you were so good as tomention for my sister, and let this chap have a smell of the sea."
There was a contention between General Mohun's hospitality andLancelot's intention of leaving his bag at the railway hotel, but theformer gained the day, the more easily because there was an assurancethat the nephew who slept at Miss Mohun's for the sake of his day-schoolwould take little Felix Underwood under his protection, and show him hiscuriosities. The boy's eyes grew round, and he exclaimed--
"Foolish guillemots' eggs?"
"He is in the egg stage," said his father, smiling.
"I won't answer for guillemots," said the General, "but nothing seems tocome amiss to Fergus, though his chief turn is for stones."
There was a connection between the families, Bernard Underwood, theyoungest brother of Lance, having married the elder sister of theaforesaid Fergus Merrifield. Miss Mohun, the sister who made a home forthe General, had looked out the house that Lance had come to inspect.As it was nearly half-past twelve o'clock, the party went round by theschool, where, in the rear of the other rushing boys, came Fergus, inall the dignity of the senior form.
"Look at him," said the General, "those are honours one only gets onceor twice in one's life, before beginning at the bottom again."
Fergus graciously received the introduction; and the next sound thatwas heard was, "Have you any good fossils about you?" in a tone as ifhe doubted whether so small a boy knew what a fossil meant; but littleFelix was equal to the occasion.
"I once found a shepherd's crown, and father said it was a fossilsea-urchin, and that they are alive sometimes."
"Echini. Oh yes--recent, you mean. There are lots of them here. I don'tgo in for those mere recent things," said Fergus, in a pre-Adamite tone,"but my sister does. I can take you down to a fisherman who has alwaysgot some."
"Father, may I? I've got my eighteenpence," asked the boy, turning uphis animated face, while Fergus, with an air of patronage, vouched forthe honesty of Jacob Green, and undertook to bring his charge back intime for luncheon.
Lancelot Underwood had entirely got over that sense of being in a falseposition which had once rendered society distasteful to him. Many moremen of family were in the like position with himself than had beenthe case when his brother had begun life; moreover, he had personallyachieved some standing and distinction through the 'Pursuivant'.
General Mohun was delighted with his companion, whom he presented to hissister as the speedy consequence of her recommendation. She was rathersurprised at the choice of an emissary, but her heart was won when shefound Mr. Underwood as deep in the voluntary school struggle as shecould be. Her brother held up his hands, and warned her that it wasquite enough to be in the fray without going over it again, and that thebreath of parish troubles would frighten away the invalid.
"I'll promise not to molest him," she said.
"Besides," said Lance, "one can look at other people's parishes morephilosophically than at one's own."
He had begun to grow a little anxious about his boy, but presently fromthe garden, up from the cliff-path, the two bounded in--little Felixwith the brightest of eyes and rosiest of cheeks, and a great ruddy,white-beaded sea-urchin held in triumph in his hands.
"Oh, please," he cried, "my hands are too dirty to shake; we've beendigging in the sand. It's too splendid! And they ought to have spines.When they are alive they walk on them. There's a bay! Oh, do come downand look for them."
"And pray what would become of Aunt Cherry's house, sir? Miss Mohun, mayI take him to make his paws presentable?"
"A jolly little kid," pronounced Fergus, lingering before performing thesame operation, "but he has not got his mind opened to stratification,and only cares for recent rubbish. I wish it was a half-holiday, I wouldshow him something!"
The General, who had a great turn for children, and for the chase inany form, was sufficiently pleased with little Felix's good mannersand bright intelligence about bird, beast, and fish, as to volunteerto conduct him to the region most favourable to spouting razor-fish andambulatory sea-urchins. The boy turned crimson and gasped--
"Oh, thank you!"
"Thank you indeed," said his father, when he had been carried off toinspect Fergus's museum in the lumber-room. "'To see a real General outof the wars' was one great delight in coming here, though I believe hewould have been no more surprised to hear that you had been at Agincourtthan in Afghanistan. 'It's in history,' he said with an awe-strickenvoice."
When Fergus, after some shouting, was torn from his beloved museum,Felix came down in suppressed ecstasy, declaring it the loveliest andmost delicious of places, all bones and stones, where his father mustcome and see what Fergus thought was a megatherium's tooth. The longword was pronounced with a triumphant delicacy of utterance, amiddancing bounds of the dainty, tightly-hosed little legs.
The General and his companion went their way, while the other two had amore weary search, resulting in the choice of not the most inviting ofthe houses, but the one soonest available within convenient distance ofchurch and sea. When it came to practical details, Miss Mohun was struckby the contrast between her companion's business promptness and therapt, musing look she had seen when she came on him listening to themeasured cadence of the waves upon the cliffs, and the reverberationsin the hollows beneath. And when he went to hire a piano she, albeitunmusical, was struck by what her ears told her, yet far more by thelook of reverent admiration and wonder that his touch and his technicalremarks brought out on the dealer's face.
"Has that man, a bookseller and journalist, missed his vocation?" shesaid to herself. "Yet he looks too strong and happy for that. Has heconquered something, and been the better for it?"
He made so many inquiries about Fergus and his school, that she beganto think it must be with a view to his own pretty boy, who came backall sea-water and ecstasy, with a store of limpets, sea-weeds, scales,purses, and cuttle-fish's backbones for the delectation of his sisters.Above all, he was eloquent on the shell of a lacemaker crab, allover prickles, which he had seen hanging in the window of a littletobacconist. He had been so much fascinated by it that General Mohunregretted not having taken him to buy it, though it appeared to bedisplayed more for ornament than for sale.
"It is a disgusting den," added the General, "with 'Ici on parleFrancais' in the window, and people hanging about among whom I did notfancy taking the boy."
"I know the place," said Miss Mohun. "Strange to say, it produces rathera nice girl, under the compulsion of the school officer. She is plainlyhalf a foreigner, and when Mr. Flight got up those theatricals lastwinter she sung most sweetly, and showed such talent that I thought itquite dangerous."
"I remember," said her brother. "She was a fairy among the clods."
The next morning, to the amazement of Miss Mohun, who thought herselfone of the earliest of risers, she not only met the father and son atearly matins, but found that they had been out for two hours enjoyingsea-side felicity, watching the boats come in, and delighting in thebeauty of the fresh mackerel.
"If they had not all been dead!" sighed the tender-hearted littlefellow. "But I've got my lacemaker for Audrey."
"'The carapace of a pagurus,' as Fergus translated it." Adding, "I don'tknow the species."
"I c
an find out when father has time to let us look at the big naturalhistory book in the shop," said Felix. "We must not look at it unless heturns it over, so Pearl and I are saving up to buy it."
"For instance!" said his father, laughing.
"Oh, I could not help getting something for them all," pleaded the boy,"and pagurus was not dear. At least he is, in the other way."
"Take care, Fely--he won't stand caresses. I should think he was thefirst crab ever so embraced."
"I wonder you got entrance so early in the day," said Miss Mohun.
"The girl was sweeping out the shop, and singing the morning hymn,so sweetly and truly, that it would have attracted me anyway," saidLancelot. "No doubt the seafaring men want 'baccy at all hours. Shewas much amazed at our request, and called her mother, who came out inremarkable dishabille, and is plainly foreign. I can't think whereI have seen such a pair of eyes--most likely in the head of somechorus-singer, indeed the voice had something of the quality. Anyway,she stared at me to the full extent of them."
So Lancelot departed, having put in hand negotiations for a tolerablehouse not far from St. Andrew's Church, and studied the accommodationavailable for horses, and the powers of the pianos on hire.
CHAPTER VI. -- ST. ANDREW'S ROCK