Kitabı oku: «Great Uncle Hoot-Toot», sayfa 6
CHAPTER XI.
"HOOT-TOOT" BEHIND THE HEDGE
That first day at the farm was a pretty fair specimen of those that followed. The days grew into weeks and the weeks into one month, and then into two, and Geoff went on with his self-chosen hard and lonely life. The loneliness soon came to be the worst of it. He got used to the hardships so far, and after all they were not very terrible ones. He was better taken care of than he knew, and he was a strong and healthy lad. Had he felt that he was working for others, had he been cheered by loving and encouraging letters, he could have borne it all contentedly. But no letters came, no answer to his note to Vicky begging her to write; and Geoff's proud heart grew prouder and, he tried to think, harder.
"They would let me know, somehow, I suppose, if there was anything much the matter – if – mamma had not got much better yet." For even to himself he would not allow the possibility of anything worse than her not being "much better." And yet she had looked very ill that last evening. He thought of it sometimes in the middle of the night, and started up in a sort of agony of fright, feeling as if at all costs he must set off there and then to see her – to know how she was. Often he did not fall asleep again for hours, and then he would keep sobbing and crying out from time to time, "Oh, mamma, mamma!" But there was no one to hear. And with the morning all the proud, bitter feelings would come back again. "They don't care for me. They are thankful to be rid of me;" and he would picture his future life to himself, friendless and homeless, as if he never had had either friends or home. Sometimes he planned that when he grew older he would emigrate, and in a few years, after having made a great fortune, he would come home again, a millionaire, and shower down coals of fire in the shape of every sort of luxury upon the heads of his unnatural family.
But these plans did not cheer him as they would have done some months ago. His experiences had already made him more practical – he knew that fortunes were not made nowadays in the Dick Whittington way – he was learning to understand that not only are there but twenty shillings in a pound, but, which concerned him more closely, that there are but twelve pence in a shilling, and only thirty in half-a-crown! He saw with dismay the increasing holes in his boots, and bargained hard with the village cobbler to make him cheap a rough, strong pair, which he would never have dreamt of looking at in the old days; he thanked Mrs. Eames more humbly for the well-worn corduroy jacket she made down for him than he had ever thanked his mother for the nice clothes which it had not always been easy for her to procure for him. Yes, Geoff was certainly learning some lessons.
Sundays were in one way the worst, for though he had less to do, he had more time for thinking. He went twice to church, where he managed to sit in a corner out of sight, so that if the tears did sometimes come into his eyes at some familiar hymn or verse, no one could see. And no more was said about the Sunday school, greatly to his relief, for he knew the clergyman would have cross-questioned him. On Sunday afternoons he used to saunter about the park and grounds of Crickwood Bolders. He liked it, and yet it made him melancholy. The house was shut up, but it was easy to see it was a dear old place – just the sort of "home" of Geoff's wildest dreams.
"If we were all living there together, now," he used to say to himself – "mamma quite well and not worried about money – Elsa and Frances would be so happy, we'd never squabble, and Vicky – " But at the idea of Vicky's happiness, words failed him.
It was, it must be allowed, a come-down from such beautiful fancies, to have to hurry back to the farm to harness old Dapple and jog off to the station with the milk. For even on Sundays people can't do without eating and drinking.
One Sunday a queer thing happened. He was just turning home, and passing the lodge at the principal entrance to the Hall, as it was called, when behind the thick evergreen hedge at one side; of the little garden he heard voices. They were speaking too low for him to distinguish the words; but one voice sounded to him very like Eames's. It might be so, for the farmer and the lodge-keeper were friends. And Geoff would have walked on without thinking anything of it, had not a sudden exclamation caught his ear – "Hoot-toot, hoot-toot! I tell you – " But instantly the voice dropped. It sounded as if some one had held up a warning finger. Geoff stood still in amazement. Could Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot be there? It seemed too impossible. But the boy's heart beat fast with a vague feeling of expectation and apprehension mixed together.
"If he has come here accidentally, he must not see me," he said to himself; and he hurried down the road as fast as he could, determined to hasten to the station and back before the old gentleman, if it were he, could get there. But to his surprise, on entering the farm-yard, the first person to meet him was Mr. Eames himself.
"What's the matter, my lad?" he said good humouredly. "Thou'st staring as if I were a ghost."
"I thought – I thought," stammered Geoff, "that I saw – no, heard your voice just now at the lodge."
Eames laughed.
"But I couldn't be in two places at once, could I? Well, get off with you to the station."
All was as usual of a Sunday there. No one about, no passengers by the up-train – only the milk-cans; and Geoff, as he drove slowly home again, almost persuaded himself that the familiar "Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!" must have been altogether his own fancy.
But had he been at the little railway-station again an hour or two later, he would have had reason to change his opinion. A passenger did start from Shalecray by the last train for town; and when this same passenger got out at Victoria, he hailed a hansom, and was driven quickly westward. And when he arrived at his destination, and rang the bell, almost before the servant had had time to open the door, a little figure pressed eagerly forward, and a soft, clear voice exclaimed —
"Oh, dear uncle, is that you at last? I've been watching for you such a long time. Oh, do – do tell me about Geoff! Did you see him? And oh, dear uncle, is he very unhappy?"
"Come upstairs, my pet," said the old man, "and you shall hear all I can tell."
The three awaiting him in the drawing-room were nearly as eager as the child. The mother's face grew pale with anxiety, the sisters' eyes sparkled with eagerness.
"Did you find him easily, uncle? Was it where you thought?" asked Vicky.
"Yes, yes; I had no difficulty. I saw him, Vicky, but without his seeing me. He has grown, and perhaps he is a little thinner, but he is quite well. And I had an excellent account of him from the farmer. He is working steadily, and bearing manfully what, to a boy like him, cannot but be privations and hardships. But I am afraid he is very unhappy – his face had a set sad look in it that I do not like to see on one so young. I fear he never got your letters, Vicky. There must have been some mistake about the address. I didn't want to push the thing too far. You must write again, my little girl – say all you can to soften him. What I want is that it should come from his side. He will respect himself all his life for overcoming his pride, and asking to be forgiven, only we must try to make it easy for him, poor fellow! Now go to bed, Vicky, child, and think over what you will write to him to-morrow. I want to talk it all over with your mother. Don't be unhappy about poor old Geoff, my dear."
Obedient Vicky jumped up at once to go to bed. She tried to whisper "Good night" as she went the round of the others to kiss them, but the words would not come, and her pretty blue eyes were full of tears. Still, Vicky's thoughts and dreams were far happier that night than for a long time past.
As soon as she had closed the door after her, the old gentleman turned to the others.
"She doesn't know any more than we agreed upon?" he asked.
"No," said Elsa; "she only knows that you got his exact address from the same person who has told you about him from time to time. She has no idea that the whole thing was planned and arranged by you from the first, when you found he was set upon leaving home."
Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot nodded his head.
"That is all right. Years hence, when he has grown up into a good and sensible man, we may, or if I am no longer here, you may tell him all about it, my dears. But just now it would mortify him, and prevent the lesson from doing him the good we hope for. I should not at all like him to know I had employed detectives. He would be angry at having been taken in. That Jowett is a very decent fellow, and did his part well; but he has mismanaged the letters somehow. I must see him about that. What was the address Geoff gave in his note to Vicky? Are you sure she put it right?"
"Oh yes," said Frances; "I saw it both times. It was —
To Mr. James,
Care of Mr. Adam Smith,
Murray Place Mews.'"
"Hoot-toot!" said Mr. Byrne. He could not make it out. But we, who know in what a hurry Geoff wrote his note at the railway-station while Jowett was waiting to take it, can quite well understand why Vicky's letters had never reached him. For the address he should have given was —
"Abel Smith,
Mowbray Place Mews."
"This time," Mr. Byrne went on, "I'll see that the letter is sent to him direct. Jowett must manage it. Let Vicky address as before, and I'll see that it reaches him."
"What do you think she should write?" said Mrs. Tudor, anxiously.
"What she feels. It does not much matter. But let her make him understand that his home is open to him as ever – that he is neither forgotten nor thought of harshly. If I mistake not, from what I saw and what Eames told me, he will be so happy to find it is so, that all the better side of his character will come out. And he will say more to himself than any of us would ever wish to say to him."
"But, uncle dear," said Elsa, "if it turns out as you hope, and poor Geoff comes home again and is all you and mamma wish – and – if all your delightful plans are realized, won't Geoff find out everything you don't want him to know at present? Indeed, aren't you afraid he may have heard already that you are the new squire there?"
"No," said Mr. Byrne. "Eames is a very cautious fellow; and from having known me long ago, or rather from his father having known me (it was I that got my cousin to give him the farm some years ago, as I told you), I found it easy to make him understand all I wished. Crickwood Bolders has stood empty so long, that the people about don't take much interest in it. They only know vaguely that it has changed hands lately, and Eames says I am spoken of as the new Mr. Bolders, and not by my own name."
"I see," said Elsa.
"And," continued Mr. Byrne, "of course Geoff will take it for granted that it was by the coincidence of his getting taken on at my place that we found him out. It was a coincidence that he should have taken it into his head to go down to that part of the country, through its being on the way to Colethorne's."
"And you say that he is really working hard, and – and making the best of things?" asked Mrs. Tudor. She smiled a little as she said it. Geoff's "making the best of things" was such a very new idea.
"Yes," replied Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot. "Eames gives him the best of characters. He says the boy is thoroughly to be depended upon, and that his work is well done, even to cleaning the pigs; and, best of all, he is never heard to grumble."
"Fancy Geoff cleaning the pigs!" exclaimed Elsa.
"I don't know that I find that so difficult to fancy," said Frances. "I think Geoff has a real love for animals of all kinds, and for all country things. We would have sympathized with him about it if it hadn't been for his grumbling, which made all his likes and dislikes seem unreal. I think what I pity him the most for is the having to get up so dreadfully early these cold winter mornings. What time did you say he had to get up, uncle?"
"He has to be at the station with the milk before five every morning," said the old gentleman, grimly. "Eames says his good woman is inclined to 'coddle him a bit' – she can't forget who he really is, it appears. I was glad to hear it; I don't want the poor boy actually to suffer – and I don't want it to go on much longer. I confess I don't see that there can be much 'coddling' if he has to be up and out before five o'clock in the morning at this time of the year."
"No, indeed," said the girls. "And he must be so lonely."
"Yes, poor fellow!" said the old gentleman, with a sigh, "I saw that in his face. And I was glad to see it. It shows the lesson is not a merely surface one. You've had your wish for him to some extent, Elsa, my dear. He has at last known some hardships."
Elsa's eyes filled with tears, though Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot had had no thought of hurting her.
"Don't say that, please," she entreated. "I think – I am sure – I only wanted him to learn how foolish he was, for his own sake more than for any one's else even."
"I know, I know," the old gentleman agreed. "But I think he has had about enough of it. See that Vicky writes that letter first thing to-morrow."
CHAPTER XII.
A LETTER AT LAST
Christmas had come and gone. It brought Geoff's home-sick loneliness to a point that was almost unbearable. He had looked forward vaguely to the twenty-fifth of December with the sort of hope that it would bring him some message, some remembrance, if it were but a Christmas card. And for two or three days he managed to waylay the postman every morning as he passed the farm, and to inquire timidly if there were no letter – was he sure there was no letter for James Jeffreys? But the postman only shook his head. He had "never had no letter for that name, neither with nor without 'care of Mr. Eames,'" as Geoff went on to suggest that if the farmer's name had been omitted the letter might have been overlooked. And when not only Christmas, but New Year's Day too was past and gone, the boy lost hope.
"It is too bad," he sobbed to himself, late at night, alone in his bare little room. "I think they might think a little of me. They might be sorry for me, even – even if I did worry them all when I was at home. They might guess how lonely I am. It isn't the hard work. If it was for mother I was working, and if I knew they were all pleased with me, I wouldn't mind it. But I can't bear to go on like this."
Yet he could not make up his mind to write home again, for as things were it would be like begging for Mr. Byrne's charity. And every feeling of independence and manliness in Geoff rose against accepting benefits from one whose advice he had scouted and set at defiance. Still, he was sensible enough to see that he could not go on with his present life for long. "Work on a farm" had turned out very different from his vague ideas of it. He could not, for years to come, hope to earn more than the barest pittance, and he felt that if he were always to remain the companion of the sort of people he was now among, he would not care to live. And gradually another idea took shape in his mind – he would emigrate! He saw some printed papers in the village post-office, telling of government grants of land to able-bodied young men, and giving the cost of the passage out, and various details, and he calculated that in a year, by scrupulous economy, he might earn about half the sum required, for the farmer had told him that if he continued to do well he would raise his wages at the end of the first six months.
"And then," thought Geoff, "I might write home and tell them it was all settled, and by selling all the things I have at home I might get the rest of the money. Or – I would not even mind taking it as a loan from Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot. That would seem different; and of course I do owe him a great deal now, in a way, for he must be doing everything for mother and the girls, and if only I were a man that would be my business."
And for a while, after coming to this resolution, he felt happier. His old dreams of making a great fortune and being the good genius of his family returned, and he felt more interest in learning all he could of farm-work, that might be useful to him in his new life. But these more hopeful feelings did not last long or steadily; the pain of the home-sickness and loneliness increased so terribly, that at times he felt as if he could not bear it any longer. And he would probably, strong as he was, have fallen ill, had not something happened.
It was about six weeks after the Sunday on which he had thought he had overheard Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's voice through the hedge. It was a Sunday again. Geoff had been at church in the morning, and after dinner he was sitting in a corner of the kitchen, feeling as if he had no energy even to go for his favourite stroll in the grounds of the Hall, when a sudden exclamation from Mrs. Eames made him look up. The farmer's wife had been putting away some of the plates and dishes that had been used at dinner, and in so doing happened to pull aside a large dish leaning on one of the shelves of the high-backed dresser.
As she did so, a letter fell forward. It was addressed in a clear, good hand to
"James Jeffreys,
At Mr. Eames's,
Crickwood Farm,
Shalecray."
"Bless me!" cried the good woman. "What's this a-doing here? Jem, boy, 'tis thine. When can it have come? It may have been up there a good bit."
Geoff started up and dashed forward with outstretched hand.
"Give it me! oh, give it me, please!" he said, in an eager, trembling voice. A look of disappointment crossed his face for a moment when he saw the writing; but he tore the envelope open, and then his eyes brightened up again. For it contained another letter, round which a slip was folded with the words, "I forward enclosed, as agreed. – Ned Jowett." And the second envelope was addressed to "Mr. James" in a round, childish hand, that Geoff knew well. It was Vicky's.
He darted out of the kitchen, and into his own little room. He could not have read the letter before any one. Already the tears were welling up into his eyes. And long before he had finished reading they were running down his face and dropping on to the paper. This was what Vicky said, and the date was nearly six weeks old!
"My Darling Geoff,
"Why haven't you written to us? I wrote you a letter the minute I got your little note with the address, and I have written to you again since then. Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot says you are sure to get this letter. I think you can't have got the others. But still you might have written. I have been so very unhappy about you. Of course I was glad to hear you were getting on well, but still I have been very unhappy. Mamma got better very slowly. I don't think she would have got better if she hadn't heard that you were getting on well, though. She has been very unhappy, too, and so have Elsa and Frances, but poor Vicky most of all. We do so want you at home again. Geoff, I can't tell you how good old Uncle Hoot-Toot is. There is something about money I can't explain, but if you understood it all, you would see we should not be proud about his helping us, for he has done more for us always than we knew; even mamma didn't. Oh, Geoff, darling, do come home. We do all love you so, and mamma and Elsa were only troubled because you didn't seem happy, and you didn't believe that they loved you. I think it would be all different now if you came home again, and we do so want you. I keep your room so nice. I dust it myself every day. Mamma makes me have tea in the drawing-room now, and then I have a little pudding from their dinner, because, you see, one can't eat so much at ladies' afternoon tea. But I was too miserable at tea alone in the school-room. I have wrapped up our teapot, after Harvey had made it very bright, and I won't ever make tea out of it till you come home. Oh, Geoffy, darling, do come home!
"Your loving, unhappy little"Vicky."
The tears came faster and faster – so fast that it was with difficulty Geoff could see to read the last few lines. He hid his face in his hands and sobbed. He was only fourteen, remember, and there was no one to see. And with these sobs and tears – good honest tears that he need not have been ashamed of – there melted away all the unkind, ungrateful feelings out of his poor sore heart. He saw himself as he had really been – selfish, unreasonable, and spoilt.
"Yes," he said to himself, "that was all I really had to complain of. They considered me too much – they spoilt me. But, oh, I would be so different now! Only – I can't go home and say to Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot, 'I've had enough of working for myself; you may pay for me now.' It would seem too mean. No, I must keep to my plan – it's too late to change. But I think I might go home to see them all, and ask them to forgive me. In three weeks I shall have been here three months, and then I may ask for a holiday. I'll write to Vicky now at once, and tell her so – I can post the letter when I go to the station. They must have thought me so horrid for not having written before. I wonder how it was I never got the other letters? But it doesn't matter now I've got this one. Oh, dear Vicky, I think I shall nearly go out of my mind with joy to see your little face again!"
He had provided himself, luckily, with some letter-paper and envelopes, so there was no delay on that score. And once he had begun, he found no difficulty in writing – indeed, he could have covered pages, for he seemed to have so much to say. This was his letter: —
"Crickwood Farm, February 2.
"My Dearest Vicky,
I have only just got your letter, though you wrote it on the 15th of January. Mrs. Eames – that's the farmer's wife – found it behind a dish on the dresser, where it has been all the time. I never got your other letters; I can't think what became of them. I've asked the postman nearly every day if there was no letter for me. Vicky, I can't tell you all I'd like to say. I thought I'd write to mamma, but I feel as if I couldn't. Will you tell her that I just beg her to forgive me? Not only for leaving home without leave, like I did, but for all the way I went on and all the worry I gave her. I see it all quite plain. I've been getting to see it for a good while, and when I read your dear letter it all came out quite plain like a flash. I don't mind the hard work here, or even the messy sort of ways compared to home – I wouldn't mind anything if I thought I was doing right. But it's the loneliness. Vicky, I have thought sometimes I'd go out of my mind. Will you ask Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot to forgive me, too? I'd like to understand about all he has done for us, and I think I am much sensibler about money than I was, so perhaps he'll tell me. I can ask for a holiday in three weeks, and then I'll come home for one day. I shall have to tell you my plans, and I think mamma will think I'm right. I must work hard, and perhaps in a few years I shall earn enough to come home and have a cottage like we planned. For I've made up my mind to emigrate. I don't think I'd ever get on so well in anything as in a country life; for, though it's very hard work here, I don't mind it, and I love animals, and in the summer it won't be so bad. Please, Vicky, make everybody understand that I hope never to be a trouble and worry any more. – Your very loving
"Geoff .
"P.S. – You may write here now. I don't mind you all knowing where I am."
By the time Geoff had finished this, for him, long epistle, it was nearly dark. He had to hurry off to the station to be in time with the milk. He was well known now by the men about the railway, and by one or two of the guards, and he was glad to see one he knew this evening, as he begged him to post his letter in town, for it was too late for the Shalecray mail. The man was very good-natured, and promised to do as he asked.
"By Tuesday," thought Geoff, "I may have a letter if Vicky writes at once. And I might write again next Sunday. So that we'd hear of each other every week."
And this thought made his face look very bright and cheery as he went whistling into the kitchen, where, as usual of a Sunday evening, Eames was sitting smoking beside the fire.
"The missis has told me about your letter, Jim," said the farmer. "I'm right-down sorry about it, but I don't rightly know who to blame. It's just got slipped out o' sight."
"Thank you," Geoff replied. "I'm awfully glad to have it now."
"He's never looked so bright since he came," said Mr. Eames to his wife when Geoff had left the room. "He's about getting tired of it, I fancy; and the squire's only too ready to forgive and forget, I take it. But he's a deal o' good stuff in him, has the boy, and so I told the squire. He's a fine spirit of his own, too."
"And as civil a lad as ever I seed," added Mrs. Eames. "No nonsense and no airs. One can tell as he's a real gentleman. All the same, I'll be uncommon glad when he's with his own folk again; no one'd believe the weight it's been on my mind to see as he didn't fall ill with us. And you always a-telling me as squire said he wasn't to be coddled and cosseted. Yet you'd have been none so pleased if he'd got a chill and the rheumatics or worse, as might have been if I hadn't myself seen to his bed and his sheets and his blankets, till the weight of them on my mind's been almost more nor I could bear."
"Well, well," said the farmer, soothingly, "all's well as ends well. And you said yourself it'd never 'a' done for us to refuse the squire any mortal service he could have asked of us."
