Part 14 (1/2)

'You are very like your mother, Angelica, very like indeed.'

I don't think there could have been a merrier party than that Christmas dinner party at Oakfield Place.

Captain Maitland held the same opinion as a wise man who once said that 'it is good to be children sometimes, and never better than at Christmas time, when its mighty Founder was a child Himself.' And the captain had the power of not only being quite childishly happy himself, but of making those about him feel the same. The room was all bright with holly, and when pretty Patty had brought in the Christmas goose, and the captain had handed Angelica with courtly politeness to her place on his right hand, he set himself to keep the whole party laughing, and succeeded very well. For he told stories about Christmases at sea, and days when he was a boy at Oakfield Place, and got into sc.r.a.pes and out again like other boys who had not grown up into heroes. And then he positively asked Mr. Crayshaw if he hadn't some stories of sc.r.a.pes to tell, now that they were all making confessions. And before Betty's eyes had got back to their natural size, after her amazement at the idea of Cousin Crayshaw in a sc.r.a.pe, that gentleman was answering, with a sort of little cackle which really was almost a laugh, that he did remember once being out after time on a half-holiday, and finding the school-gate shut and climbing over it, and that his coat caught on the top and he hung there till it tore.

And at the thought of Cousin Crayshaw hanging on a nail, Betty at any rate hid her face and laughed till she cried, and I believe Angel wasn't far behind her, and, most wonderful of all, Cousin Crayshaw didn't mind a bit. And when dinner was over, and they had drunk to 'Present Company' and 'Absent Friends,' and Mr. Crayshaw had proposed 'The Navy' in quite a fine speech, and Captain Maitland had proposed 'The Law' in a still finer one, then Patty came in with a twinkle in her eyes and moved away the table and pushed the chairs against the walls. And then the captain remarked that it was a cold night, and wouldn't it be a good thing if they were to warm their feet a little?

And the next minute there was the sound of Kiah's wooden leg in the pa.s.sage, and there he was with his fiddle, and the Rogers, all in their Sunday clothes, just behind him. And Patty ran to put down a line of mats, because wooden legs were not good for polished floors. And the captain made Angel such a bow, as if she had been Queen Charlotte herself, and hoped she would put up with an awkward old sailor for a partner, and he was sure Pete would show them the way with Miss Betty.

And G.o.dfrey did his very best to copy the captain as he gave his hand to Nancy. And then happened the most wonderful thing that ever had happened in Oakfield, for as Kiah struck up 'Off she goes!' Mr.

Crayshaw suddenly went up to fair-haired Patty, who hardly knew where to look, and told her he had not danced for twenty years, but Christmas seemed the time for a frolic, and he would ask her to help him.

Then, when even Nancy and G.o.dfrey were breathless, there came in one of Martha's best cakes and a big plate full of oranges. And the captain called upon Kiah for a song, which Kiah sang readily enough, and played for himself, too, on the fiddle, with the music a good way behind the words. And then they all joined in the chorus of 'Hearts of Oak,' and after that Angel's sweet voice started 'G.o.d rest you, merry gentlemen.'

And then out with the lights and in with the blazing dish of snap-dragon! How valiant G.o.dfrey was in pulling out plums for every one; how very, very nearly Betty set her lace ruffles on fire; what queer shadows the flickering light threw on the wall, and how strange the eager faces looked when the captain threw a handful of salt on the fire and the flame burnt blue, while Nancy got half frightened and hid behind Patty's skirts! But at last all the raisins had been pulled out and the fire was dying, and positively there was the clock striking ten! What a time of night for G.o.dfrey and Nancy to be out of bed!

But, as the captain said, who looks at the clock at Christmas time? So Martha and her daughters curtsied themselves out of the room, and Mr.

Crayshaw stood at the door talking quite cheerily with old Kiah, while Betty kept Pete back a minute to ask about her linnet, which was ill--Pete knew so much about birds.

G.o.dfrey had climbed into the window seat, and was peeping between the curtains to see if it looked like another frost.

'Look at the stars, Aunt Angel dear, aren't they bright? Is the Wise Men's Star there still, do you suppose? That's the Plough, isn't it?

If one was up in the Plough could one see Oakfield, do you think?'

'I used to like to think one could,' said the captain, who had come up behind them. 'Many's the time, when I was a little bit of a middy, I used to watch the stars and feel quite friendly to them because they could see home. And the Plough, when I could see it, was a real old friend, I knew the look of it so well from this window.'

'I shall do that when I'm a middy,' said G.o.dfrey gravely, 'and I shall think of them seeing my aunts and Oakfield, and they'll think of them seeing me.'

'So you've quite made up your mind to be a middy?' said the captain, with a hand on G.o.dfrey's shoulder.

'Quite,' said the little boy earnestly; 'Aunt Angel says everybody must be useful, like you and Kiah, and she's teaching me to be. I'm like her's and Aunt Betty's little oak-tree, and they hope I shall grow up a very brave sailor. But she's really braver than me, for she says it will be very hard for her not to mind when the Frenchies shoot my leg off, and I don't think I shall mind much.'

Angel's cheeks were crimson at hearing her own words repeated. She looked so very sweet and womanly as she sat there in the window.

They had not lighted the candles again, and only the flickering fire-light played about her, touching her white dress and the curly locks, knotted up high behind her head, with the gleaming pearls among them.

The captain stroked G.o.dfrey's hair.

'Ay, little man,' he said, 'the bravest hearts are the ones we leave at home; and more shame to us that we're not finer fellows when they take so much thought for us.'

Just then Betty called G.o.dfrey, and he ran to bid Pete good-night. The captain stood looking after him.

'His Majesty's navy will be the richer for that lad one day, Miss Angelica,' he said.

Angel flushed with pleasure.

'I do hope so,' she said simply; 'Betty and I are almost afraid sometimes when we think what we want him to be, and that there is only us to teach him and fit him for it.'