Part 13 (2/2)

By this time Major and Mrs. Rogers and Sheila had all three rushed to the spot, and were able to extend hands from the bank. Carmel and Johnson both scrambled out of the river wet through and covered with mud, the most wretched and dilapidated objects.

”Oh! she'll take a chill! Whatever are we to do to get her dry?” cried Mrs. Rogers distractedly, mopping her young guest's streaming face with a dainty lace-bordered handkerchief. ”Is there a cottage anywhere near?”

”We'd better get into the car and motor along till we find one,”

suggested Major Rogers. ”Johnson, you deserve a medal for this! I never saw anything so prompt in my life. It was like a whirlwind!”

”We shall make a horrible mess of the car!” objected Carmel, trying to wipe some of the mud from her clothes.

”Never mind; sit on this rug. You're s.h.i.+vering already, child! Sheila, bring my hand-bag and your father's cus.h.i.+on. Now, Johnson, just anywhere! The very first cottage that will take us in!”

Luckily they were not far from a village with a fairly comfortable inn, where a sympathetic landlady provided bedrooms and hot water. As their luggage was on the car, it was an easy matter to change, and before very long both Carmel and her rescuer were in dry garments, and drinking the hot coffee which Mrs. Rogers insisted upon as a preventive against catching cold.

”I shall hardly dare to let you out of my sight again, Carmel!” she said, half laughingly, yet half in earnest. ”I don't want to have to write to your mother and tell her you're drowned!”

”Nonsense!” declared the Major rather testily. ”It's not a thing she's likely to do twice! I should think she'd be frightened to go anywhere near a river again just yet. Are those clothes dry? Well, never mind, pack them as they are; we can't wait for them. And the rug, too, just bundle it up and put it at the bottom of the car. Johnson can brush it to-morrow. He's a fine chap. I shall write to the 'Humane Society'

about this business. They ought to give him a medal.”

”I've tried to thank him,” said Carmel, ”but directly I begin he dives away and does something at the car. He doesn't seem to want to be thanked.”

”Oh, that's just Johnson's usual way!” drawled Sheila. ”I expect he's pleased all the same. You look a little more respectable now, Carmel. I shouldn't have liked to take you into the Hill Crest Hotel as you were an hour ago! I expect after this stoppage we shall arrive too late to dress comfortably for dinner, unless Johnson literally tears along, and then I'm scared out of my wits! What a life! I'd never go motoring for choice! It's not my idea of a holiday, I must say.”

After all, though Johnson seldom exceeded the speed limit, the Rogers arrived at Tivermouth in ample time for Sheila to don a fascinating evening costume, and to arrange her fair hair in an elaborate coiffure.

The hotel was full of summer visitors, and in her opinion the large dining-room with its Moorish decorations, the numerous daintily-spread little tables, and the fas.h.i.+onable well-dressed crowd who flocked in at the sounding of a gong were far more entertaining than a wood and a picnic meal. But Sheila was not fond of ”rabbit” holidays.

[Ill.u.s.tration: JOHNSON THE CHAUFFEUR SHOT DOWN THROUGH THE WOOD]

”It beats those old-fas.h.i.+oned places we stayed at in the country towns, doesn't it?” she said to Carmel, as they sat in the lounge, waiting for Major and Mrs. Rogers to come down stairs. ”By the by, are your cousins here? I looked in the visitors' book and couldn't find their names. What has happened to them?”

”A letter from Dulcie was waiting for me,” explained Carmel. ”They couldn't get rooms here. They were writing to the 'Eagle's Nest Hotel,'

and hoped to get taken in there. I don't know whether they've arrived or not. Dulcie didn't say exactly which day they were starting. It's just like Dulcie! She generally misses out the most important point!”

”Well, I suppose they'll look you up when they do arrive,” said Sheila carelessly. ”Anyway, I bless them for giving us some sort of an anchor down here. I feel I'm going to enjoy myself. I asked the manageress, and she says there's to be a dance to-night after dinner.”

Carmel, sitting on a cane chair in the palm lounge next morning, agreed with Sheila that Hill Crest Hotel was a remarkably comfortable and luxurious place. A fountain was splas.h.i.+ng near her, foreign birds sang and twittered in the aviary, and large pots of geraniums made bright patches of color under the green of the palms. Pleasant though it was, however, it lacked the charm of the open air, and, throwing down the magazine she was reading, Carmel strolled through the hall and the gla.s.s veranda on to the terrace outside. The hotel certainly had a most beautiful situation. As its name implied, it stood on the crest of a hill, surrounded by woods and grounds that stretched to the beach. A little noisy Devons.h.i.+re river raced past it through the glen, and behind it lay the heathery waste of a great moorland. Below lay the gleaming waters of the bay, with small boats bobbing about, and a distant view of the crags and headlands of a rugged coast line. The terrace was planted with a border of trailing pink ivy-leaved geraniums, and the bank that sloped below was a superb ma.s.s of hydrangeas in full bloom, their delicate shades of blue and pink looking like the hues of dawn in a clear sky.

Carmel established herself on a seat to enjoy the prospect, and picking up a gray Persian cat which was also sunning itself on the terrace, fondled the pretty creature in her arms. She was seeing England to the best advantage, for nowhere could there have been a lovelier scene than the one which lay before her delighted eyes. Tivermouth had a reputation as a beauty spot, and owing to its long distance from the railway was as yet unspoilt by a too great invasion of tourists. There were other hotels nestling among the greenery of the woods, and Carmel wondered if the Ingletons had arrived at one of them, and at which of the white houses on the beach the boys were staying with Miss Mason.

As she was still gazing and speculating there was a crunch of footsteps on the gravel behind, a voice called her name, and looking round she saw Cousin Clare, Lilias, and Dulcie, hurrying towards her. There was an enthusiastic greeting, followed by explanations from all three.

”We'd the greatest difficulty to get rooms!”

”The whole place seems full up!”

”They couldn't take us at the 'Eagle's Nest.'”

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