Part 9 (1/2)
”Oh! So this is _your_ party, is it, Miss Beth?” he said. ”You ask your friends in, and then you insult them, I see.”
Beth was still effervescing. She put her hands behind her back and answered boldly--
”'Deed, thin, he insulted me, papa. It was Bap-faced Flanagan. He said we were durrty heretics, and--and--I'll not stand that! It's a free country!”
Captain Caldwell looked round, and the people melted from the room under his eye. Then Anne appeared from somewhere.
”Anne, do you teach the children party-songs?” he demanded.
”Shure, they don't need taching, yer honour,” said Anne, disconcerted.
”Miss Beth knows 'em all, and she shouts 'em at the top of her voice down the street till the men shake their fists at her.”
”Why do you do that, Beth?” her father demanded.
”I like to feel,” Beth began, gasping out each word with a mighty effort to express herself--”I like to feel--that I can _make_ them shake their fists.”
Her father looked at her again very queerly.
”Will I take her to the nursery, sir?” Anne asked.
Beth turned on her impatiently, and said something in Irish which made Anne grin. Beth did not understand her father in this mood, and she wanted to see more of him.
”What's that she's saying to you, Anne?” he asked.
”Oh--sure, she's just blessin' me, yer honour,” Anne answered unabashed.
”I believe you!” Captain Caldwell said dryly, as he stretched himself on the sofa. ”Go and fetch a hair-brush.”
While Anne was out of the room he turned to Beth. ”I'll give you a penny,” he said, ”if you'll tell me what you said to Anne.”
”I'll tell you for nothing,” Beth answered. ”I said, 'Yer soul to the devil for an interfering hussy.'”
Captain Caldwell burst out laughing, and laughed till Anne returned with the brush. ”Now, brush my hair,” he said to Beth; and Beth went and stood beside the sofa, and brushed, and brushed, now with one hand, and now with the other, till she ached all over with the effort.
Her father suffered from atrocious headaches, and this was the one thing that relieved him.
”There, that's punishment enough for to-day,” he said at last.
Beth retired to the foot of the couch, and leant there, looking at him solemnly, with the hair-brush still in her hand. ”That's no punishment,” she observed.
”What do you mean?” he asked.
”I mean I like it,” she said. ”I'd brush till I dropped if it did you any good.”
Captain Caldwell looked up at her, and it was as if he had seen the child for the first time.
”Beth,” he said, after a while, ”would you like to come out with me on the car to-morrow?”
”'Deed, then, I would, papa,” Beth answered eagerly.
Then there was a pause, during which Beth rubbed her back against the end of the couch thoughtfully, and looked at the wall opposite as if she could see through it. Her father watched her for a little time with a frown upon his forehead from the pain in his head.