Part 12 (1/2)

”So far as you know, there was nothing in it to cause strong emotion-- nothing to account--?”

”Dear me, no,” answered Mr. Benny, staring at him in mild astonishment; ”so far as I know, nothing whatever.”

After packing Susannah off to her room with a Bible and a smelling-bottle, Mrs. Purchase had set herself to reduce the household to order.

”'Tisn't in nature to think of death,” confessed Martha the dairy-girl, ”when you'm worrited from pillar to post by a woman in creaky boots.”

Above and beside her creaky boots Aunt Hannah had a cheerful, incurable habit of slamming every door she pa.s.sed through. It came, she would explain, of living on s.h.i.+pboard where cabin was divided from cabin either by a simple curtain or by sliding panels. Be this is it may, she kept the house of mourning re-echoing that day ”like a labouring s.h.i.+p with a cargo of tinware,” to quote Martha again, whose speech derived many forcible idioms from her father, the mate of a coaster.

Nevertheless--and although it appeared to induce a steady breeze through the house, rising to a moderate gale when meals were toward--Aunt Hannah's presence acted like a tonic on all. She presented to Mr. Sam a weather-ruddied cheek, receiving his kiss on what, in so round a face as hers, might pa.s.s for the point of the jaw. In saluting Master Calvin she had perforce to take the offensive, and did so with equal aplomb.

After a rapid survey of some three seconds she picked off his velveteen cap and kissed him accurately in the centre of the forehead.

”I meant to do it on the top of his head,” she informed Myra later, ”but the ghastly child was smothered in bear's-grease. Lord knows that, as 'twas, I very nearly slipped in my thumb and kissed _that_, as I've heard tell that folks do in the witness-box.”

Myra did not understand the allusion; but from the first she divined that her aunt misliked Master Calvin and found that mislike consolatory.

”As for these two,” the good lady announced, indicating brother and sister, ”I allow to myself they'll be best out of the way till the funeral. I've been through the clothes-press, and put up their night-clothes and a few odd items in a hand-bag. 'Siah will be here at eight-thirty sharp, to take 'em aboard with him. For my part, I reckon to sleep here to-night and look after things till that fool Susannah comes to her senses. And as for you, Peter Benny, you'll stay supper, I hope, for there's supper ready and waiting to be dished--a roast leg of lamb, with green peas. It puts me in mind of Easter Day,” she added inconsequently.

”You may remember, Sam, that your poor father always stickled for a roast leg of lamb at Easter. He was a good Christian to that extent, I thank the Lord!”

”And I thank _you_, ma'am,” protested Mr. Benny, ”but I couldn't touch a morsel--indeed I couldn't, though you offer it so kindly.”

”To my knowledge, you've not eaten enough to-day to keep a mouse alive.

Well, if you won't, you won't; but I've been through the garden, and there's a dish of strawberries to take home to your wife.”

Mrs. Purchase could not know--good soul--that in removing the two children to s.h.i.+pboard, to spare them the ugly preparations for the funeral, she was connecting their grandfather's death in their minds for ever with the most delightful holiday in life. Yet so it was. Punctually at half-past eight Mr. Purchase appeared and escorted them on board the _Virtuous Lady_; and so, out-tired with their long day, drugged and drowsed by strong salt air and suns.h.i.+ne and the swift homeward drive, they came at nightfall, and as knights and princesses come in fairy tales, to the palace of enchantment.

As they drew close, its walls towered up terribly and overhung them, lightless, forbidding; but far aloft the riding-lamp flamed like a star, and Myra clapped her hands as she reached the deck and peered down into a marvellous doll's-house fitted with couches, muslin blinds, and bra.s.s-locked cupboards that twinkled in the lamplight.

There was a stateroom, too, with a half-drawn red curtain in place of a door, and beyond the curtain a glimpse of two beds, one above the other, with white sheets turned back and ready for the sleepers--at once like and deliciously unlike the beds at home. The children, having unpacked their bag and undressed, knelt down side by side as usual in their white night-rails. But Myra could not pray, although she repeated the words with Clem. Her eyes wandered among marvels. The lower bed (a.s.signed to Clem by reason of his blindness) was not only a bed but a chest of drawers.

”Gentle Jesus, meek and mild, Look upon a little child; Pity my simplicity.”--

Her fingers felt and tried the bra.s.s handles. Yes, a real chest of drawers! And the washstand folded up in a box, and in place of a chair was a rack with netting in which to lay their garments for the night!

”G.o.d bless dear Clem, and grandfather.”--What was she saying?

Their grandfather was dead, and praying for dead people was wicked.

Susannah had once caught her praying for her mother, and had told her that it was wicked, with a decisiveness that closed all argument. None the less she had prayed for her mother since then--once or twice, perhaps half a dozen times--though slily and in a terror of being punished tor it and sent to h.e.l.l. ”And Susannah, and Martha, and Elizabeth Jane,”--this was the housemaid--”and Peter Benny, and Jim Tregay, and all kind friends and relations,”--including Uncle Sam and that odious boy of his? Well, they might go down in the list; but she wouldn't pretend to like them.

”Ready, my dears?” asked Uncle Purchase from outside. ”Sing out when you're in bed, and I'll come and dowse the lights.”

He did so, and stood for a moment hesitating, scarcely visible in the faint radiance cast through the doorway by the lamp in his own cabin.

Maybe the proper thing would be to give them a kiss apiece? He could not be sure, being a childless man. He ended by saying good-night so gruffly that Myra fancied he must be in a bad temper.

”Clem!” she whispered, after lying still for a while, staring into darkness. ”Clem!”

But Clem was already sound asleep.

She sighed and turned on her pillow. She had wanted to discuss with him a thought that vexed her. Did folks love one another when they grew up?