Part 6 (1/2)

'Grantly's gone to the shop,' she said, 'to learn to be a soldier'; and I said, 'Well, the gentry's got more sense than I thought for, if they gives 'em a trade as well.' And Miss Mary she said again, he'd gone to a shop right enough, and went off laughing.”

”But that's impossible,” said Eloquent. ”He must have gone either to Sandhurst or Woolwich; there's nowhere else he could go.”

”She never mentioned neither of those names. 'Shop,' she said . . .

you needn't look at me like that, Eloquent . . . I'm positive.”

”You were telling me how many children there were,” Eloquent remarked pacifically, ”Grantly, the eldest son, and then . . . ?”

”I'm getting warm,” his mind kept saying.

”Then Miss Mary, just a year younger, very like her mother she is . . .

in looks, but she hasn't got the gumption of Mrs Ffolliot. That'll come, perhaps . . . later. A bit of a tomboy she's bin, but she's settling down.”

”I suppose she is nearly grown up?”

”Between seventeen and eighteen, she'll be, but not done up her hair yet--that's Mr Ffolliot's doin's; he's full of fads as an egg's full o'

meat. Then there's the twins, Uz and Buz they calls 'em. They're at Rugby School, they are, but they'll be home for the holidays almost directly. I can't say I'm partial to scripture names myself, and only last time he was here I asked Mr Grantly what they called them that for, when there was so many prettier names in our language, and he said, quite solemn like, 'Uz his first-born and Buz his brother, that's why, you see.' And I said, 'but they're twins, sir'; and he said, 'but Uz was born five minutes before Buz, so it's quite correct,' and went off laughing. They're always laughing at something, those children.”

”Then are there just the four?' asked Eloquent, who knew perfectly well there were more.

”Oh, bless you, no; there's Master Ger; now I call him the pick of the bunch, the most conformable little chap and full of sense: he'll talk to you like one of yourselves; he's everybody's friend, is Master Ger.

Miss Kitten's the youngest, and a nice handful she is. She and Master Ger does everything together, and they do say as she's the only one as don't care two pins for her papa; nothing cows her, she'd sauce the king himself if she got the chance.”

”From what you say, I gather that they seem to do pretty much as they like,” Eloquent remarked primly.

”Outside they do, but in the house they say those poor children's hushed up something dreadful. Mr Ffolliot's a regular old Betty, he never ought to have had one child, let alone six. He's always reading and writing and studying and sitting with his nose in a book, and then he complains of nerves. I'd nerve him if I was his wife--but she's all for peace, poor lady, and I suppose she makes the best of a bad job.”

”Is she unhappy?” Eloquent demanded, with real solicitude.

”If she is, she don't show it, anyhow. She goes her way, and he goes his, and her way's crowded with the children, and there it is.”

”Are you thinking of going to church, Aunt Susan?”

Miss Gallup looked surprised.

”Well, no, not if you don't want to come. I generally go, but I'm more than willing to stop with you.”

”But I'd like to go,” Eloquent a.s.serted, and got very red in the face as he did so. ”I don't think I've ever been in the church here.”

”Well, there's no chapel as you could go to if you was ever so minded.

Old Mr Molyneux mayn't be so active as some, but there's never been no dissent since he was vicar, and that's forty years last Michaelmas.”

”What about my father?” Eloquent suggested.

”Your dear father got his dissenting opinions and his politics in Marlehouse, not here.”

”Then I'm afraid I shan't get many votes from this village,” said Eloquent, but he said it cheerfully, as though he didn't care.