Part 21 (2/2)

It must be broken gently to them; and how to do this had been on Barbara's mind all the time they had been in the cart, for up till then she had been able to think of nothing but how to get the children along.

They, of course--except perhaps that they were too tired for any more excitement--would have been for running straight in with joyful cries.

But they were so subdued by fatigue that their old friend found no difficulty in persuading them to sit down quietly by the hedge, guarded by Tim, while she and Toby went in to prepare the way.

”For you know, my dearies, your poor Grandmamma has not been well and the start might be bad for her,” she explained.

”But you're sure Grandmamma isn't _dead_?” said poor Pamela, looking up piteously in Barbara's face. ”Duke was afraid she might be if us didn't come soon.”

”But now you _have_ come she'll soon get well again, please G.o.d,” said Barbara, though her own heart beat tremulously as she made her way round by the back entrance.

It was Toby after all who ”broke” the happy tidings. In spite of all Barbara could do--of all her ”Hush, Toby, then,”'s ”Gently my little doggie,”'s--he _would_ rush in to the parlour as soon as the door was opened in such a rapture of joyful barking, tail wagging and rus.h.i.+ng and das.h.i.+ng, that Grandmamma looked up from the knitting she was trying to fancy she was doing in her arm-chair by the fire, and Grandpapa put down his five days' old newspaper which he was reading by the window, with a curious flutter of sudden hope all through them, notwithstanding their many disappointments.

”It is you, Barbara, back again at last,” began Grandmamma. ”How white you look, my poor Barbara--and--why, what's the matter with Toby? Is he so pleased to see us old people again?”

”He _is_ very pleased, ma'am--he's a very wise and a very good feeling dog is Toby, there's no doubt. And one that knows when to be sad and--and when to be rejoiced, as I might say,” said Barbara, though her voice trembled with the effort to speak calmly.

Something seemed to flash across the room to Grandmamma as Mrs. Twiss spoke--down fell the knitting, the needles, and the wool, all in a tangle, as the old lady started to her feet.

”Barbara--Barbara Twiss!” she cried. ”What do you mean? Oh Barbara, you have news of our darlings? Marmaduke, my dear husband, do you hear?” and she raised her voice, ”she has brought us news at last,” and Grandmamma tottered forward a few steps and then, growing suddenly dazed and giddy, would have fallen had not Grandpapa and Barbara started towards her from different sides and caught her. But she soon recovered herself, and eagerly signed to Barbara to ”tell.” How Barbara told she never knew. It seemed to her that Grandmamma guessed the words before she spoke them, and looking back on it all afterwards she could recollect nothing but a sort of joyous confusion--Grandpapa rus.h.i.+ng out without his hat, but stopping to take his stick all the same--Grandmamma holding by the table to steady herself when, in another moment, they were all back again--then a cl.u.s.ter all together--of Grandpapa, Grandmamma, Duke, Pamela and Barbara, with Nurse and Biddy, and Dymock and Cook, and stable-boys and gardeners, and everybody, and Toby everywhere at once.

Broken words and sobs and kisses and tears and blessings all together, and Pamela's little soft high voice sounding above all as she cried--

”Oh, dear Grandmamma, us _is_ so glad you are not dead. Duke was so afraid you might be.”

And Tim--where was he?--standing outside in the porch, but smiling to himself--not afraid of being forgotten, for he had a trustful nature.

”It's easy to see as the old gentleman and lady is terrible fond of master and missy,” he thought. ”But they must be terrible clever folk in these parts to have writing outside of the house even,” for his glance had fallen on the quaintly-carved letters on the lintel, ”Niks sonder Arbitt.” ”I wonder now what that there writing says,” he reflected.

But he was not allowed to wonder long. A few moments more and there came the summons his faithful little heart had been sure would come.

”Tim, Tim--where is Tim? Come and see our Grandpapa and our Grandmamma, Tim,” and two pairs of little hot hands dragged him into the parlour.

It was not at all like his dream, but it was far grander than any room he had ever been in before, and never afterwards did the boy forget the strange sweet perfume which seemed a part of it all--the scent of the dried rose-leaves in the jars, though he did not then know what it was.

But it always came back to him when he thought of that first evening--the beginning to him of a good and honest and useful life--when the tall old gentleman and the sweet little old lady laid their hands on his curly head and blessed him for what he had done and promised to be his friends.

They kept their promise well and wisely. Grandpapa took real trouble to find out what the boy was best fitted for, and when he found it was for gardening, Tim was thoroughly trained by old n.o.ble till he was able to get a good place of his own. He lived with Barbara in her neat little cottage, and in the evenings learned to read and write and cipher, so that before very long he could make out the letters in the porch, though Grandpapa had to be asked to tell their meaning.

”Nothing without work,” was what they meant. They had been carved there by the old Dutchman who had built the farmhouse, afterwards turned into the pretty quaint ”Arbitt Lodge.”

”A good and true saying,” added Grandpapa, and so the three children to whom he was speaking found it. For all three in their different ways worked hard and well, and when in my childhood I knew them as old people, I felt, even before I quite understood it, that ”the Colonel,”

as he then had become, and his sweet white-haired sister deserved the love and respect they seemed everywhere to receive. And I could see that it was no common tie which bound to them their faithful servant Timothy, whose roses were the pride of all the country-side, when, after many years of separation, he came to end his life in their service, after Duke's ”fighting days” were over and his widowed sister was, but for him, alone in the world.

One question may be asked. Did they ever hear of Diana again? Yes, though not till Tim had grown into a strapping young fellow, and the twins were tall and thin, and had long since left off talking of ”us.”

There came along the lanes one summer's day a covered van hung over at the back with baskets, such as the children well remembered. A good-humoured looking man was walking by the horse, a handsome woman was sitting by the door plaiting straw.

”Gipsies,” cried the children, who were on their way to the village, and, big as they were, they were a little frightened when, with a cry, the woman jumped down and flew towards them.

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