Sarah's Cottage (Sarah Morris Book 2)

by D. E. Stevenson

  I let in the clutch and drove on.

  “My nephew is staying with me,” continued Sir Rupert. “His ship is at Rosyth and he got a few days’ leave so he came over on his motor-bike. He’s my sister’s boy. In one way I’m glad he’s here—I should like you to meet him—but in another way it’s rather a pity. Shane doesn’t know about my toys—it’s better that he shouldn’t know—and I was looking forward to showing them to you. In fact that was one of the reasons why I was so anxious for you to come.”

  “Your toys? Do you mean you’ve got them here?” I asked in alarm.

  “I enjoy them, Mrs Reede. What’s the good of having them if I’ve got to keep them locked up in the bank? Sometimes I wish I had made a collection of cigarette cards or matchboxes. Nobody would have bothered about them,” declared Sir Rupert in plaintive tones. “Just because my toys are worth hard cash I have all this fuss and bother!”

  “Have you had any more bother?”

  “No, and I’m not likely to! Nobody knows my toys are here—except you, of course.”

  “All the same they would be safer in the bank.”

  “So would you,” he retorted. Then, seeing my bewilderment, he cackled and added, “Your Charles would be safer to keep you in the bank instead of allowing you to stray about the country in this enormous car . . . Look out, Mrs Reede! There’s a boggy ditch on your left!”

  He had spoken too late. The front wheels were embedded in the mud.

  “Sorry!” said Sir Rupert remorsefully. “I should have warned you before, but there’s no damage! If you can reverse the engines you’ll get back on to the road . . . Ah, that’s right! Very neatly done, Mrs Reede! I see you’re an expert. Remember in future that the right side of my avenue is smoother when you’re going up but you must keep to the left going down.”

  I wasn’t sure whether or not this advice was intended as a joke, but already I had begun to experience the curious other-worldly feeling which had made my previous visit to the Brig seem like an Alice-in-Wonderland dream.

  “Starboard up, port down,” I murmured.

  “Good!” cried the Admiral, cackling in delight. “Very good indeed! I’ll remember that.”

  It occurred to me that Sir Rupert was different today, but that was natural, of course. Charles and I had arrived out of the blue when he had every reason to be suspicious of strangers; he had been excited and over-wrought by his alarming experience—no wonder he had seemed mad! Today he was in tremendous form, friendly and cheerful, and not any more eccentric than a distinguished admiral of advanced age had a right to be.

  “I have an apology to make, Mrs Reede,” said Sir Rupert, as we crawled slowly up the hill on “the smoother side” of his avenue. “When I met you just now I was on my way to the shepherd’s cottage. I have an arrangement with Mrs Sprugge to buy bread and buns for me from the baker’s van—and various other provisions. Shane is young and has a hearty appetite so we need more food. I shall have to leave you with Shane for a few minutes while I run down and collect the stuff. It’s a nuisance, but there it is! Vans call daily at the shepherd’s cottage but nothing on earth will induce them to call on me.”

  “The road is rather——” I began.

  “Oh, it’s devilish, of course! But what can I do? How much do you think it would cost to put my avenue in reasonable order? Look out for that hole, Mrs Reede! Ah, good! You saw it in time. Perhaps you should stop here—on the right—where there’s room to turn. The last little bit is pretty steep.”

  We walked up the steep bit together and again I noticed with amusement that the distinguished Admiral was exactly the same height as myself—and, as he was sparely built, he was probably about the same weight—but his voice was the voice of a six-footer.

  “Shane!” he bellowed. “Shane, where are you? We’ve got a visitor!”

  The young man appeared from behind the Brig with a spade in his hand; he was tall and dark and well made . . . and extremely good-looking. Presumably he had been digging in his uncle’s garden but his attire seemed unsuitable for manual work; he was wearing light grey flannel trousers, immaculately creased, and a pink linen shirt open at the neck. Altogether he was a surprising vision in this wild, isolated spot but everything here was so dream-like that I wasn’t really surprised. It wouldn’t have surprised me to see a giraffe browsing on the rough green grass which surrounded the Admiral’s dwelling.

  “My nephew, Shane Vidal . . . Mrs Reede,” said Sir Rupert with a little old-fashioned bow. “Shane, my boy, Mrs Reede has come to have tea with us.”

  “How delightful!” said Shane politely.

  “I met Mrs Reede when I was on my way to Sprugge’s cottage,” explained Sir Rupert. “I came up with her to act as pilot, so I must go back now and get our provisions. You can entertain our guest until I return, can’t you, Shane?”

  “Yes, Uncle Rupert. Don’t forget the buns.”

  “Not on your life! Where’s my basket? Oh, I left it in the car!”

  Chapter Twenty-Two

  Shane and I watched Sir Rupert retrieve his basket from the back seat of the car and trot off down the hill to fetch the provisions.

  “He’s rather a wonder, isn’t he?” said Shane.

  “Yes, he is,” I replied . . . and added, “Don’t let me interrupt your work.”

  “My work? Oh, you mean digging!” said Shane. “To tell you the truth I’m not particularly keen on digging but it looks well to walk about with a spade in one’s hand. Besides I’ve got to entertain you, haven’t I? Let’s park ourselves comfortably in the Admiral’s stateroom and have a chat.”

  He leant the spade against the fence and we went in together.

  “It isn’t often we see ladies here,” continued Shane as we sat down. “Mother can’t stand this place, she says it makes her sea-sick, how do you feel about it? Not sea-sick, I hope?”

  “Not in the least, thank you.”

  “You aren’t as imaginative as Mother; that’s the reason.”

  “The reason is I’m a very good sailor,” I explained.

  Shane’s eyes twinkled, but all he said was, “Have you been here often?”

  “Just once—quite a long time ago. Sir Rupert invited us to come again, whenever we liked, but my husband doesn’t approve of the road.”

  “Who does?” exclaimed Shane with feeling. “I’ve got a motorbike so it’s a bit easier to avoid the obstacles. I shouldn’t like to navigate Uncle Rupert’s avenue in a big car like yours.” He added, “What shall we talk about?”

  I tried to think of a subject which would interest this young man . . . but failed.

  “I mean, I’ve got to entertain you,” said Shane. “Shall we talk about the weather and the condition of the crops or something interesting?”

  I smiled and said, “Something interesting, of course. What are you interested in, Shane?”

  “Girls.”

  “Girls?”

  “Why not? Other fellows collect stamps or postcards or curious shells; there’s a fellow in my ship who collects moths.”

  “You mean you collect girls?” I asked incredulously.

  Shane nodded. “It’s a harmless hobby, you know. Girls enjoy being collected, moths don’t . . . so you needn’t be shocked.”

  “I’m not shocked, just a little surprised. How is it done?”

  “Would it entertain you to hear about my methods?”

  “Yes, it would.”

  He drew his chair closer and lowered his voice confidentially. “Initiative is the secret. You must have plenty of initiative to make a success of it . . . and plenty of confidence, of course. A half-hearted approach is hopeless. As a matter of fact I learnt quite a lot from Struthers, who collects moths.”

  Shane hesitated for a few moments. Then he continued, “You can collect girls practically anywhere: in a shop or in a railway-compartment or in the street.”

  “In the street?”

  He nodded. “If you happen to see the right sort of girl—and I can tell at a
glance if it’s the right sort—you just breeze up to her and make an opening. You see, girls like having boy friends; if you keep that in mind you’re more than half-way there.”

  I was willing to believe him; he was a very attractive young man.

  “Parties are the easiest, of course,” continued Shane, in reflective tones. “It’s as easy as pie to collect girls at a party.”

  “You can get someone to introduce you,” I suggested.

  “Definitely not. The one thing to avoid is the conventional approach. You just stalk your prey and come up from behind and exclaim, ‘Hallo, Jane! Nice to see you!’ She says she isn’t Jane, of course, and you say, ‘How silly of me! You’re much prettier than Jane . . . and what a lovely frock!’ You have to vary it, according to circumstances, but that’s the rough idea.”

  “Does it ever fail?” I asked.

  “Practically never,” replied Shane. He continued, “If she smiles you can go right ahead and ask her to dance. Then, later, when you’re sitting out in a secluded corner, you can let yourself go a bit. You can say, ‘Isn’t it funny? My mother has a patch of gentians in her garden . . . and they’re exactly the same colour as your eyes.’ Or you can say ‘Your eyes remind me of big brown velvety pansies with the dew on them.’ Girls can take a lot of that sort of thing; especially if they’re very young.”

  “You don’t bother about older girls, I suppose?”

  “You’re wrong! Older girls are more difficult—but that makes the game more interesting. You can have lots of fun with older girls.” He smiled mischievously and added, “Like we’re having.”

  “Are we having fun?”

  “Well, aren’t we? You’re amused, aren’t you, Sarah?”

  “Who said you could call me Sarah?”

  “Please may I?” he asked humbly. “It suits you ever so much better than Mrs Reede . . . and you called me Shane, didn’t you?”

  I laughed. “I suppose you’re going to tell me that my eyes remind you of big brown pansies.”

  “They don’t,” he replied promptly. “They remind me of a mountain burn, alive and sparkly. They’re very sparkly now which means you think I’m awful.”

  He was awful, of course, and it was naughty of me to encourage him, but he was so full of the joy of life that I couldn’t help being amused . . . and he was so young that he made me feel like an indulgent aunt. I was having a miserable time at home and I was in the mood for a little fun. I wondered what Charles would have said if he could have overheard this conversation.

  “Why are you smiling like Mona Lisa?” inquired Shane.

  “You make me feel like an aunt.”

  “Like an aunt?” he exclaimed in astonishment. “Aunts don’t have sparkly eyes and dimples; aunts don’t have beautiful legs and——”

  “That’s enough,” I said sternly.

  “But you have,” he declared, with a hurt expression. “As a matter of fact it was the first thing I noticed about you. It wasn’t until we began to chat that I noticed your eyes.”

  “Let’s change the subject, Shane.”

  “Just as you like,” agreed Shane. “We’ll talk about you, shall we? What do you do?”

  “What do I do?”

  “Yes.”

  “I cook my husband’s dinner,” I said virtuously.

  “That seems rather a dull subject,” complained Shane. “Uncle Rupe said I was to entertain you, didn’t he? Would it entertain you to see me turning Catherine wheels or standing on my head?”

  “Can you, Shane?”

  “Yes, Sarah. I could make my living in a circus. Last week, when I came to see Uncle Rupe, he was out (he had gone to a garden-party) so I climbed on to the top of the Brig and got in through a hatch in the upper deck. I didn’t tell him of course—he might have been annoyed—and he was so excited about the party that he never asked how I got in. By the way, he said he had met a ‘lady friend’ at the party and she had admired his Chinese suit.” Shane paused and looked at me inquiringly.

  “I didn’t actually admire it,” I said hastily. “I was just . . . just interested in its history.”

  “Oh, quite,” agreed Shane. “The smell was interesting too; it took me straight back to China in a moment. Smells do that, don’t they?”

  “You’ve been to China?”

  He nodded. “Join the Navy and see the world, you know.”

  He had begun to tell me about some of his experiences when the Admiral returned, full of apologies for having been away so long.

  Shane immediately sprang up and took the basket, which was bulging with provisions and must have been very heavy. “I’ve been trying to entertain Mrs Reede,” he said solemnly. “You said I was to entertain her, so I’ve done my best . . . but you’ll be able to do it much better, of course. I’ll go and make tea now, shall I?”

  “Yes, but don’t forget to warm the teapot, and make sure the water is boiling,” Sir Rupert replied.

  Shane vanished into the galley with the basket and Sir Rupert sat down in his place.

  “Shane is a good boy,” said Sir Rupert. “He has nice manners and he’s always willing to dig the garden or help with domestic affairs.”

  “Good company for you,” I suggested.

  “Yes, I like having him now and then. He’s not a very enlivening companion; he hasn’t got much ‘go’ in him—you noticed that, of course—but he has been brought up by a doting mother so what can you expect? It worries me a bit,” added Sir Rupert, confidentially.

  “Worries you, Sir Rupert?”

  “Yes, I’m afraid he isn’t really the type for the Navy. You want fellows with initiative; you want fellows with lots of ‘go’ about them. I’m beginning to think it was a mistake to put Shane into the Navy. It seemed the best thing at the time. I mean it’s a grand life for a boy—makes a man of him! I wouldn’t have missed it for anything.”

  “Shane isn’t like you.”

  “No, not a bit,” Sir Rupert agreed. “The fact is he’s a mixture. We’re Irish, you know. We come of a very old Irish family, Mrs Reede. The sea is in our blood. That’s one of the reasons why I thought Shane would do well in the Navy but, as you said, he’s different. He’s like his father in appearance . . . but not in character, thank heaven!”

  “Was his father . . .” I began.

  “My sister married a Spaniard. She had gone to Rio de Janeiro with some friends and she met Cèsar and fell in love with him. Her friends knew a little about the fellow and did their best to prevent the marriage but she would have him. It was a very unfortunate marriage for poor Mary,” said Sir Rupert with a heavy sigh. “Very unfortunate indeed. Cèsar spent money like water—Mary’s money, of course. All he cared about was having a good time with women—and low-class women at that! I could tell you things about Cèsar . . . but what’s the good? Well, after several disgraceful incidents—including a clever little bit of forgery—he left Mary: just walked out and went to live with a woman in Paris. That was the end: Mary was obliged to divorce him. I don’t hold with divorce, but in this case there was nothing else to be done. Some time after that Mary began to get letters from him, asking for money . . . and she was so soft that she sent it to him. He was bleeding her dry. At last I had to put my foot down. I got a lawyer to choke him off.”

  “What a dreadful man!”

  “Yes, dreadful,” Sir Rupert agreed. He added, “I don’t know why I’ve bothered you with all this, except that you seemed interested in Shane . . . and that led to Mary and her troubles.”

  “Your sister is lucky to have you!”

  “Well, I won’t say she isn’t because it wouldn’t be true,” said Sir Rupert with engaging frankness. “I’m fond of Mary and I’ve done what I could for her and the boy. She has a small flat in Edinburgh and plays bridge with her cronies—that’s what she enjoys. I go and stay with her occasionally; I like to keep an eye on her, you see.”

  “Yes, of course.”

  “She’s too indulgent with Shane—that’s the trouble. Shane
can do no wrong in his mother’s eyes. I suppose it’s natural.”

  “She has had a sad life, hasn’t she?”

  “Yes, she has, poor dear! That villain ruined Mary’s life.”

  “Where is he now?” I asked.

  “He’s dead,” replied Sir Rupert. “I’m sure the man is dead, otherwise he would have bothered Mary for more money (besides he was drinking too much) but Mary thinks he’s still alive . . . somewhere. Mary thinks about him a good deal, which is funny considering the way he treated her, but he was a tall handsome fellow and most women seem to have a soft spot for bad hats . . . not you, of course.”

  I smiled and said, “I don’t think I’ve met any bad hats.”

  “You wouldn’t like them, Mrs Reede. You’re quite different from Mary. You’ve chosen the right sort of man to make you happy. Yes, your Charles is a real good sort. It was extremely kind of him to come and see what had happened to me that morning. I was all right, of course, but all the same I was glad to see a friendly face. No doubt he told you how I scared off those pirates and sent them packing?”

  “Yes, he told me all about it. I think you were very brave.”

  “Oh, it was nothing! My only regret is that I didn’t manage to drill a hole in one of the devils—I was just too late to catch them—by the time I got into my cabin they had escaped through the porthole . . . don’t say a word to Shane,” he added in a stage whisper.

  I nodded reassuringly. I, too, had heard the approach of Shane. He came in with a tray and proceeded to set the table quickly and deftly: there was a plate of cress sandwiches and another of large sultana buns with sugar on the top; the tea was in a large brown teapot, the milk in a large white jug.

  “It isn’t a proper lady’s tea,” said Shane regretfully.

  “This isn’t a lady’s house,” Sir Rupert pointed out. “No doubt Mrs Reede will make allowances for the deficiencies of a bachelor establishment.”

  “The buns look delicious,” I said.

  “They are,” declared Shane. “I’ve never met such good buns anywhere else. Uncle Rupert always gets a large supply of them when I come to stay with him. Do try one, Mrs Reede.”