Chapter V

Alison had then to lay out the second five hundred, or £6 5s., on herself and herself alone. This was easier. She and her father spent three afternoons among the old furniture shops of Kensington and the Brompton Road, and at last came upon the very thing they were looking for in the back room of a shop close to the Oratory, kept by an elderly Jewish lady with a perfectly gigantic nose and rings on every finger.

This was an old bureau writing-desk, with drawers, and a flap to pull down to write on, and lots of pigeon-holes, and a very strong lock. Also a secret drawer. After some bargaining Mr. Muirhead got it for six pounds, which left five shillings for writing paper and sealing-wax and blotting-paper and nibs.

And that was an end of the thousand threepenny bits, as the balance-sheet on the opposite page shows.

At least, not quite the end, as I will tell you. The face of the old Jewess, when the time came to pay for the bureau and Alison took forty-eight little packets of ten threepenny bits each out of her bag and laid them on the table, was a picture of perplexity and amusement.

“Well, ma tear, what’s that?” she asked.

“Four hundred and eighty threepenny bits--six pounds,” said Alison.

“But, ma tear, what will I do with all the little money?”

“It’s all I’ve got,” said Alison.

“You see,” said Mr. Muirhead--and then he told the old lady with the big nose the story.

STATEMENT OF ACCOUNTS

FIRST ACCOUNT--FOR OTHER PEOPLE.

Threepences. £ s. d.
A year’s flowers for mother, twice a week,
at 3d. a bunch 104 1 6 0
The _Sphere_ for a year 104 1 6 0
Postage of same to a lighthouse 8 0 2 0
Odd threepenny bits given to unhappy
people in the streets, etc. 50 0 12 6
Tobacco and pipes to thirty sandwichmen,
at 3d. each 30 0 7 6
Three Christmas puddings for the cabmen’s
shelter near De Vere Gardens, at 2s. 6d. 30 0 7 6
Ten Fagg children, at 1s. each 40 0 10 0
Two pipes for Jack and Willy Fagg, at 1s. 8 0 2 0
Two pounds tea for Mrs. Jack and Mrs.
Willy, at 2s. 16 0 4 0
Mittens for cabmen, etc. 30 0 7 6
Sixty picture postcards for the Smith family
at 1d., and postage at ½d. 30 0 7 6
Silver collar for Jimmie, with engraving 50 0 12 6
---- ----------
500 £6 5 0

SECOND ACCOUNT--FOR ALISON MUIRHEAD HERSELF.

Threepences. £ s. d.
Old Bureau 480 6 0 0
Writing paper, etc. 20 0 5 0
---- ----------
500 6 5 0
First account total 500 6 5 0
---- ----------
Grand total 1000 £12 10 0
==== ============
Audited and found correct,
(_Signed_) THOMAS W. CATHCART.

And what do you think she did? “Well, ma tear,” she said, “I can’t let you go away without something left, in case you met a poor beggar in the street. You must take back one of those little packets to go on with, as a present from me;” and she picked up one and placed it in Alison’s hand, and Alison took it gladly.

And that was the beginning of a new Threepenny Trust, for Mr. Cathcart also contributed a little heap, and Mr. Muirhead henceforward made a point of saving every threepenny bit that he received in change (and I believe that sometimes he asked specially for them when he went to his bank) and bringing them home for Alison’s fund; and Uncle Mordaunt must have done the same, for the last time he came to dinner he said to Alison, “I wish you’d get rid of this rubbish for me,” and handed her seventeen of the little coins.

So you see that there is every chance of Mr. James Thomson’s kind scheme going on for a long time yet; but, in so far as his own thousand threepenny bits are concerned, the story is done.

RODERICK’S PROS.

RODERICK’S PROS.

Once upon a time there was a little boy of ten, who bowled out C. B. Fry. This little boy’s name was Roderick Bulstrode (or Bulstrode is the name that we will give him here), and he lived in St. John’s Wood, in one of the houses whose gardens join Lord’s. His father played for the M.C.C. a good deal, and practised in the nets almost every day, to the bowling of various professionals, or pros., as they are called for short, but chiefly to that of Tom Stick; and in the summer Roderick was more often at Lord’s than not.

How it came about that Roderick bowled C. B. Fry was this way. Middlesex were playing Sussex, and Mr. Fry went to the nets early to practise, and Roderick’s father bowled to him and let Roderick have the ball now and then. And whether it was that Mr. Fry was not thinking, or was looking another way, or was simply very good-natured, I don’t know, but one of Roderick’s sneaks got under his bat and hit the stumps. (They were not sneaks, you must understand, because he wanted to bowl sneaks, but because he was not big enough to bowl any other way for 22 yards. He was only ten.) Roderick thus did that day what no one else could do, for Mr. Fry went in and made 143 not out, in spite of all the efforts of Albert Trott and Tarrant and J. T. Hearne.

Roderick’s bedroom walls had been covered with portraits of cricketers for years, but after he bowled out C. B. Fry he took away a lot of them and made an open space with the last picture postcard of Mr. Fry right in the middle of it, and underneath, on the mantelpiece, he put the ball he had bowled him with, which his father gave him, under a glass shade. And other little St. John’s Wood boys, friends of Roderick’s from the Abbey Road, and Hamilton Terrace, and Loudoun Road, and that very attractive red-brick village with a green of its own just off the Avenue Road, used to come and see it, and stand in front of it and hold their breath, rather like little girls looking at a new baby.

Roderick also had a “Cricketers’ Birthday Book,” so that when he came down to breakfast he used to say, “Tyldesley’s thirty-five to-day,” “Hutchings is twenty-four,” and so on. And he knew the initials of every first-class amateur and the Christian name of every pro.

That was not Roderick’s only cricketing triumph. It is true that he had never succeeded in bowling out any other really swell batsman, but he had shaken hands with Sammy Woods and J. R. Mason, and one day Lord Hawke took him by both shoulders and lifted him to one side, saying: “Now then, Tommy, out of the way.” But these were only chance acquaintances. His real cricketing friend was Tom Stick, the ground bowler.

Tom Stick came from Devonshire, which is a county without a first-class eleven that plays the M.C.C. in August, and he lived in a little street off Lisson Grove, where he kept a bird-fancier’s shop. For most professional cricketers, you know, are something else as well, or they would not be able to live in the winter. Many of them make cricket-bats, many keep inns, many are gardeners. I know one who is a picture-framer, and another an organist, while George Hirst, who is the greatest of them all, makes toffee. Well, Tom Stick was a bird-fancier, with a partner named Dick Crawley, who used to mind the shop when Tom had to be at Lord’s bowling to gentlemen, Roderick’s father among them, or playing against Haileybury or Rugby or wherever he was sent to do all the hard work and go in last.

Roderick’s father was very fond of Tom and was quite happy to know that Roderick was with him, so that Roderick not only used to join Tom at Lord’s, but also at the shop off Lisson Grove, where he often helped in cleaning out the cages and feeding the birds and teaching the bullfinches to whistle, and was very good friends also with certain puppies and rabbits. His own dog, a fox-terrier named “Sinhji,” had come from Tom.

Tom used to bowl to Roderick in the mornings before the gentlemen arrived for their practice, and he taught him to hold his bat straight and not slope it, and to keep his feet still and not draw them away when the ball was coming (which are the two most important things in batting), and it was he who stopped Roderick from carrying an autograph-book about and worrying the cricketers for their signatures. In fact, Tom was a kind of nurse to Roderick, and they were so much together that, whereas Tom was known to Roderick’s small friends as “Roddy’s Pro,” Roderick was known to Tom’s friends as “Sticky’s Shadow.”

Now it happened that last summer Roderick’s father had been making a great many runs for the M.C.C. in one of their tours. (Roderick did not see him, for he had to stay at home and do his lessons; but his father sent him a telegram after each innings.) Mr. Bulstrode (as we are calling him) batted so well, indeed, that when he returned to London he was asked to play for Middlesex against Yorkshire on the following Monday, to take the place of one of the regular eleven who was ill; and you may be sure he said yes, for, although he was now thirty-two, this was the first time he had ever been asked to play for his county.

Roderick, you may be equally sure, was also pleased; and when his father suddenly said to him, “Would you like to come with me?” his excitement was almost too great to bear.

“And Tom too?” he asked, after a minute or so.

“Yes, Tom’s going,” said his father. “He’s going to field if anyone is hurt or has to leave early. But if he’s not wanted he will look after you.”

“Hurray!” said Roderick. “I know what I shall do. I shall score every run and keep the bowling analysis too.”

The train left St. Pancras on the Sunday afternoon, and that in itself was an excitement, for Roderick had never travelled on Sunday before; but before that had come the rapture of packing his bag, which on this occasion was not an ordinary one, but an old cricket-bag of his father’s, which he begged for, in which were not only his sponge and collars and other necessary things, but his flannels and his bat and pads.

This bag he insisted upon carrying himself all along the platform, and, as several of the Middlesex team were also on their way to the train at the same moment, the presence of so small a cricketer in their midst made a great sensation among the porters.

“My word!” said one, “Yorkshire will have to look out this time.”

“Who’s the giant,” asked another, “walking just behind Albert Trott? I shouldn’t like to be in when he bowled his fastest.”

But Roderick was unconscious of any laughter. He was the proudest boy in London, although his arm, it is true, was beginning to ache horribly. But when, as he was climbing into the carriage, the guard lifted him up and called him “Prince Run-get-simply,” he joined in the fun.

It was a deliriously happy journey, for all the cricketers were very nice to him, and Mr. Warner talked about Australia, and Mr. Bosanquet showed him how he held the ball to make it break from the leg when the batsman thought it was going to break from the off, and at Nottingham Mr. Douglas bought him a bun and a banana. They got to Sheffield just before eight, and Roderick went to bed very soon after, in a little bed in his father’s room in the hotel.

The first thing Roderick did the next morning was to buy a scoring-book and a pencil, and then he and his father explored Sheffield a little before it was time to go to the ground at Bramall Lane and get some practice.

The people clustered all round and in front of the nets and watched the batsmen, and now and then they were nearly killed, as always happens before a match. They pointed out the cricketers to each other.

“There’s Warner,” they said. “That’s Bosanquet--the tall one.” “Where’s Trott? Why, there, bowling at Warner. Good old Alberto!” and so on.

“Who’s the man in the end net?” Roderick heard some one ask.

“I don’t know. One of Middlesex’s many new men, I suppose,” said the other.

“But he can hit a bit, can’t he?” the first man said, as Roderick’s father stepped out to a ball and banged it half-way across the ground.

Roderick was very proud, and he felt that the time had come to make his father known. “That’s Bulstrode,” he said.

“Oh, that’s Bulstrode, is it?” said the second man. “I’ve heard of him. He makes lots of runs on the M.C.C. tours. But I guess Georgy’ll get him.”

“Who is Georgy?” asked Roderick.

“Georgy--why, where do you come from? Fancy being in Sheffield and asking who Georgy is. Georgy is Georgy Hirst, of course.”

Roderick walked back to the pavilion with his father very proudly. “You’ll have to be very careful how you play Hirst,” he said.

“I shall,” said his father; “but why?”

“Because the men were saying he’s going to get you.” Mr. Bulstrode laughed; but he thought it very likely too.

I’m not going to tell you all about the match, for it lasted three days, and was very much like other matches. Roderick had a corner seat in the pavilion, where he could see everything, and for the first day he scored every run and kept the analysis right through. This included his father’s innings, which lasted, alas! far too short a time, for, after making four good hits to the boundary, he was caught close in at what was called silly mid-on off--what bowler do you think?--George Hirst.

But the next day Roderick gave up work, because he wanted to see more of Tom, and Tom made room for him in the professionals’ box while Yorkshire were in, and he saw all the wonderful men--quite close too--Tunnicliffe and Denton and Hirst--and even talked with them. Hirst sat right in front of the box, with his brown sunburned arms on the ledge, and his square, jolly, sunburned face on his arms, and said funny things about the play in broad Yorkshire; and now and then he would say something to Roderick. And then suddenly down went a wicket, and Hirst got up to go in.

“Give me a wish for luck,” he said to Roddy.

“I wish my father may catch you out,” said Roddy; “but not until,” he added, “you have made a lot of runs.”

“If he does,” said Hirst, “I’ll give thee some practice to-morrow morning.”

Poor Roddy, this was almost too much. It is bad enough to watch your favourites batting at any time, for every ball may be the last; but it is terrible when you equally want two people to bring something off--for Roddy wanted Hirst (whom he now adored) to make a good innings, and, at the same time, he wanted his father to catch Hirst out.

Hirst was not out when it was time for lunch, and so Roderick was able to tell his father all about it.

“What’s this, Hirst?” said Mr. Bulstrode, when the teams were being photographed. “Give me a chance, and let me see if I can hold it.”

Hirst laughed, and when he laughs it is like a sunset in fine weather. “I have a spy round to see where thee’re standing every over,” he said, “and that’s where I’ll never knock it.”

“But what about my boy’s practice?” Mr. Bulstrode replied.

“Ah, we’ll see about that,” said the Yorkshireman.

But, as a matter of fact, Roderick got his practice according to the bargain, for, as it happened, it was Mr. Bulstrode who caught Hirst, at third man.

I need hardly tell you that Roderick dreamed that night. His sleep was full of Hirsts, all jolly and all hitting catches which his father buttered. But in the morning, when he knew how true his luck was, he was almost too happy. Hirst was as good as his word, and they practised in the nets together for nearly half an hour, and Roderick nearly bowled him twice.

In Middlesex’s next innings Roderick’s father made thirty-five, all of which Roderick scored with the greatest care; but the match could not be finished owing to a very heavy shower, and so this innings did not matter very much one way or the other, except that it made Mr. Bulstrode’s place safe for another match.

Of that match I am not going to tell; but I have perhaps said enough to show you how exceedingly delightful it must be to have a father who plays for his county.

THE MONKEY’S REVENGE

THE MONKEY’S REVENGE

Once upon a time there was a little girl named Clara Amabel Platts. She lived in Kensington, near the Gardens, and every day when it was fine she walked with Miss Hobbs round the Round Pond. Miss Hobbs was her governess. When it was wet she read a book, or as much of a book as she could, being still rather weak in the matter of long words. When she did not read she made wool-work articles for her aunts, and now and then something for her mother’s birthday present or Christmas present, which was supposed to be a secret, but which her mother, however hard she tried not to look, always knew all about. But this did not prevent her mother, who was a very nice lady, from being extraordinarily surprised when the present was given to her. (That word “extraordinarily,” by the way, is one of the words which Clara would have had to pass over if she were reading this story to herself; but you, of course, are cleverer.)

It was generally admitted by Mrs. Platts, and also by Miss Hobbs and Kate Woodley the nurse, that Clara was a very good girl; but she had one fault which troubled them all, and that was too much readiness in saying what came into her mind. Mrs. Platts tried to check her by making her count five before she made any comment on what was happening, so that she could be sure that she really ought to say it; and Kate Woodley used often to click her tongue when Clara was rattling on; but Miss Hobbs had another and more serious remedy. She used to tell Clara to ask herself three questions before she made any of her quick little remarks. These were the questions: (1) “Is it kind?” (2) “Is it true?” (3) “Is it necessary?” If the answer to all three was “Yes,” then Clara might say what she wanted to; otherwise not. The result was that when Clara and Miss Hobbs walked round the Round Pond Clara had very little to say; because, you know, if it comes to that, hardly anything is necessary.

Well, on December 20, 1907, the postman brought Mrs. Platts a letter from Clara’s aunt, Miss Amabel Patterson of Chislehurst, after whom she had been named, and it was that letter which makes this story. It began by saying that Miss Patterson would very much like Clara to have a nice Christmas present, and it went on to say that if she had been very good lately, and continued good up to the time of buying the present, it was to cost seven-and-six, but if she had not been very good it was only to cost a shilling. This shows you the kind of aunt Miss Patterson was. For myself, I don’t think that at Christmas-time a matter of good or bad behaviour ought to be remembered at all. And I think that everything then ought to cost seven-and-six. But Miss Patterson had her own way of doing things; and it did not really matter about the shilling at all, because, as it was agreed that Clara had been very good for a long time, Mrs. Platts (who did not admire Miss Patterson’s methods any more than we do) naturally decided that unless anything still were to happen (which is very unlikely with six-and-sixpence at stake) the present should cost seven-and-six, just as if nothing about a shilling had ever been said.

_Unless anything were to happen._ Ah! Everything in this story depends on that.

Clara was as good as gold all the morning, and she and Miss Hobbs marched round the Round Pond like soldiers, Miss Hobbs talking all the time and Clara as dumb as a fish. At dinner also she behaved beautifully, although the pudding was not at all what she liked; and then it was time for her mother to take her out to buy the present. So, still good, Clara ran upstairs to be dressed.

As I dare say you know, there are in Kensington High Street a great many large shops, and the largest of these, which is called Biter’s, has a very nice way every December of filling one of its windows (which for the rest of the year is full of dull things, such as tables, and rolls of carpets, and coal scuttles) with such seasonable and desirable articles as boats for the Round Pond, and dolls of all sorts and sizes, and steam engines with quite a lot of rails and signals, and clockwork animals, and guns. And when you go inside you can’t help hearing the gramaphone.

It was into this shop that Mrs. Platts and Clara went, wondering whether they would buy just one thing that cost seven-and-six all at once, or a lot of smaller things that came to seven-and-six altogether; which is one of the pleasantest problems to ponder over that this life holds. Well, everything was going splendidly, and Clara, after many changings of her mind, had just decided on a beautiful wax doll with cheeks like tulips and real black hair, when she chanced to look up and saw a funny little old gentleman come in at the door; and all in a flash she forgot her good resolutions and everything that was depending on them, and seizing her mother’s arm, and giving no thought at all to Miss Hobbs’s three questions, or to Kate Woodley’s clicking tongue, or to counting five, she cried in a loud quick whisper, “Oh, mother, do look at that queer little man! Isn’t he just like a monkey?”

Now there were two dreadful things about this speech. One was that it was made before Aunt Amabel’s present had been bought, and therefore Mrs. Platts was only entitled to spend a shilling, and the other was that the little old gentleman quite clearly heard it, for his face flushed and he looked exceedingly uncomfortable. Indeed, it was an uncomfortable time for every one, for Mrs. Platts was very unhappy to think that her little girl not only should have lost the nice doll, but also have been so rude; the little old gentleman was confused and nervous; the girl who was waiting on them was distressed when she knew what Clara’s unlucky speech had cost her; and Clara herself was in a passion of tears. After some time, in which Mrs. Platts and the girl did their best to soothe her, Clara consented to receive a shilling box of chalks as her present, and was led back still sobbing. Never was there such a sad ending to an exciting expedition.

Miss Hobbs luckily had gone home; but Kate Woodley made things worse by being very sorry and clicking away like a Bee clock, and Clara hardly knew how to get through the rest of the day.

Clara’s bedtime came always at a quarter to eight, and between her supper, which was at half-past six, and that hour she used to come downstairs and play with her father and mother. On this evening she was very quiet and miserable, although Mrs. Platts and Mr. Platts did all they could to cheer her; and she even committed one of the most extraordinary actions of her life, for she said, when it was still only half-past seven, that she should like to go to bed.

And she would have gone had not at that very moment a tremendous knock sounded at the front door--so tremendous that, in spite of her unhappiness, Clara had, of course, to wait and see what it was.

And what do you think it was? It was a box addressed to Mrs. Platts, and it came from Biter’s, the very shop where the tragedy had occurred.

“But I haven’t ordered anything,” said Mrs. Platts.

“Never mind,” said Mr. Platts, who had a practical mind. “Open it.”

So the box was opened, and inside was a note, and this is what it said:

“DEAR MADAM,

“I am so distressed to think that I am the cause of your little girl
losing her present, that I feel there is nothing I can do but give
her one myself. For if I had not been so foolish--at my age too!--as
to go to Biter’s this afternoon, without any real purpose but to
look round, she would never have got into trouble. Biter’s is for
children, not for old men with queer faces. And so I beg leave to
send her this doll, which I hope is the right one, and with it a few
clothes and necessaries, and I am sure that she will not forget how
it was that she very nearly lost it altogether.

“Believe me, yours penitently,
“THE LITTLE-OLD-GENTLEMAN-WHO-REALLY-
IS-(AS-HIS-LOOKING-GLASS-HAS-TOO-
OFTEN-TOLD-HIM)-LIKE-A-MONKEY.”

To Clara this letter, when Mrs. Platts read it to her, seemed like something in a dream, but when the box was unpacked it was found to contain, truly enough, not only the identical doll which she had wanted, with cheeks like tulips and real black hair, but also frocks for it, and night-dresses and petticoats, and a card of tortoiseshell toilet requisites, and three hats, and a diabolo set, and a tiny doll’s parasol for Kensington Gardens on sunny days.

Poor Clara didn’t know what to do, and so she simply sat down with the doll in her arms and cried again; but this was a totally different kind of crying from that which had gone before. And when Kate Woodley came to take her to bed she cried too.

And the funny thing is that, though the little old gentleman’s present looks much more like a reward for being naughty than a punishment, Clara has hardly ever since said a quick unkind thing that she could be sorry for, and Miss Hobbs’s three questions are never wanted at all, and Kate Woodley has entirely given up clicking.

THE NOTICE-BOARD

THE NOTICE-BOARD

Once upon a time there was a family called Morgan--Mr. Morgan the father, Mrs. Morgan the mother, Christopher Morgan, aged twelve, Claire Morgan, aged nine, Betty Morgan, aged seven, a fox-terrier, a cat, a bullfinch, a nurse, a cook, a parlourmaid, a housemaid, and a boy named William. William hardly counts, because he came only for a few hours every day, and then lived almost wholly in the basement, and when he did appear above-stairs it was always in the company of a coal-scuttle. That was the family; and at the time this story begins it had just removed from Bloomsbury to Bayswater.

While the actual moving was going on Christopher Morgan, Claire Morgan, and Betty Morgan, with the dog and the bullfinch, had gone to Sandgate to stay with their grandmother, who, with extraordinary good sense, lived in a house with a garden that ran actually to the beach, so that, although in stormy weather the lawn was covered with pebbles, in fine summer weather you could run from your bedroom into the sea in nothing but a bath-towel or a dressing-gown, or one of those bath-towels which are dressing-gowns. Christopher used to do this, and Claire would have joined him but that the doctor forbade it on account of what he called her defective circulation--two long words which mean cold feet.

When, however, the moving was all done and the new house quite ready, the three children and the dog and the bullfinch returned to London, and getting by great good luck a taxicab at Charing Cross, were whirled to No. 23, Westerham Gardens almost in a minute, at a cost of two-and-eightpence, with fourpence supplement for the luggage. Christopher sat on the front seat, watching the meter all the time, and calling out whenever it had swallowed another twopence. The first eightpence, as you have probably also noticed, goes slowly, but after that the twopences disappear just like sweets.

It is, as you know, a very exciting thing to move to a new house. Everything seems so much better than in the last, especially the cupboards and the wall-papers. In place of the old bell-pulls you find electric bells, and there is a speaking-tube between the dining-room and the kitchen, and the coal-cellar is much larger, and the bath-room has a better arrangement of taps, and you can get hot water on the stairs. But, of course, the electric light is the most exciting thing of all, and it was so at Westerham Gardens, because in Bloomsbury there had been gas. But Mr. Morgan was exceedingly serious about it, and delivered a lecture on the importance--the vital importance--of always turning off the switch as you leave the room, unless, of course, there is some one in it.

Christopher and Claire and Betty were riotously happy in their new home for some few days, especially as they were so near Kensington Gardens, only a very little way, in fact, from the gate where the Dogs’ Cemetery is.

And then suddenly they began to miss something. What it was they had no idea; but they knew that in some mysterious way, nice as the new house was, in one respect it was not so nice as the old one. Something was lacking.

It was quite by chance that they discovered what it was; for, being sent one morning to Whiteley’s, on their return they entered Westerham Gardens by a new way, and there on a board fixed to the railings of the corner house they read the terrible words:

+-------------------------+
| ORGANS AND STREET CRIES |
| |
| PROHIBITED. |
+-------------------------+

Then they all knew in an instant what it was that had vaguely been troubling them in their new house. It was a house without music--a house that stood in a neighbourhood where there were no bands, no organs, and no costermongers.

“What a horrid shame!” said Claire. And then they began to talk about the organs and bands that used to come to their old home in Bloomsbury.

“Do you remember the Italian woman in the yellow handkerchief on Thursday mornings during French?” said Christopher.

“Yes,” said Betty, “and the monkey boy with the accordion on Mondays.”

“And the Punch and Judy on Wednesday afternoons,” said Claire.

“And ‘Fresh wallflowers,’ ‘Nice wallflowers!’ at eleven o’clock every day in spring,” said Christopher.

“And the band that always played ‘Poppies’ on Tuesday evenings at bedtime,” said Claire.

“And the organ with the panorama on Friday mornings,” said Betty.

“And the best organ of all, that had one new tune every week, on Saturdays,” said Christopher.

“It must be a great day for the organists when they have a new tune,” said Claire.

“Yes,” said Betty; “but you have forgotten the funniest of all--the old man with a wooden leg on Tuesday and Friday.”

“But he had only one tune,” said Christopher

“It was a very nice tune,” said Betty. “But why I liked him was because he always nodded and smiled at me.”

“That was only his trick,” said Christopher. “They all do that if they think you have a penny.”

“I don’t care,” said Betty stoutly; “he did it as if he meant it.”

That night, just after Claire had undressed, Christopher came in and sat on her bed. “I’ve got an idea,” he said. “Let’s have a new notice-board painted with

+-------------------------+
| ORGANS AND STREET CRIES |
| |
| INVITED |
+-------------------------+

on it, and have it fixed on our railings. Then we shall get some music again. I reckon that Mr. Randall’s son would make it just like the other for about four shillings, and that’s what we’ve got.”

Mr. Randall’s son was the family carpenter, and he was called that because his father had been the family carpenter before him for many years. When his father, Mr. Randall, was alive, the son had no name, but was always referred to as Mr. Randall’s son, and now that the old man was dead he was still spoken of in that way, although he was a man of fifty and had sons of his own. (But what they would be called it makes my head ache to think.)

Mr. Randall’s son smiled when he was asked if he could and would make a notice-board. “I will, Master Christopher,” he said; “but I’m thinking you had better spend your money on something else. A nice boat, now, for the Round Pond. Or a pair of stilts--I could make you a pair of stilts in about an hour.” Poor Christopher looked wistful, and then bravely said that he would rather have the notice-board. After giving careful instructions as to the style of painting the words, he impressed upon Mr. Randall’s son the importance of wrapping the board very carefully in paper when he brought it back, because it was a surprise.

“A surprise!” said Mr. Randall’s son with a great hearty laugh; “I should think it will be a surprise to some of ’em. I’d like to be there to see the copper’s face when he reads it.”

Mr. Randall’s son was not there to see the copper’s face; but the copper--by which Mr. Randall’s son meant the policeman--did read it in the company of about forty other persons, chiefly errand-boys and cabmen, in front of the Morgans’ house on the morning after Christopher had skilfully fixed it to the area railings; and having read it he walked off quickly to the nearest police-station to take advice.

The result was that just as Mr. Morgan was leaving for the city the policeman knocked at the door and asked to see him.

Mr. Morgan soon afterwards came from the study and showed the policeman out, and then he sent for Christopher. After Christopher had confessed, “My dear boy,” he said, “this won’t do at all. That notice-board at the end of this street means either that the owners of Westerham Gardens or a large number of the tenants wish the neighbourhood to be free from street music. If we, who are new-comers, set up notice-boards to a contrary effect, we are doing a very rude and improper thing. I quite understand that you miss the organs that we used to have, but the only way to get them back would be to obtain the permission of every one in the Gardens; and that, of course, is absurd.” With these words, which he afterwards wished he had never used, Mr. Morgan hurried off to the nearest Tube to make money in the city, which was how he spent his days.

Christopher carried the news to Claire, who at once said, “Then we must go to every house to get leave.”

“Of course,” said Christopher. “How ripping!”

And they started immediately.

It would take too long to tell you how they got on at each house. From some they were sent away; at others they met with sympathy.

Their words to the servant who opened the door were: “Please give your mistress the compliments of No. 23, and ask if she really wants street music to be prohibited.”

“Of course we don’t, my dears,” said an old lady at No. 14. “We should love to have a nice pianoforte organ every now and then, or even a band; but it would never do to say so. Every one is so select about here. Why, in that house opposite lives the widow of a Lord Mayor.”

Claire made a note of the number to tell Betty, who loved rank and grandeur, and then they ascended the next steps, where they found the most useful person of all, a gentleman who came down to see them, smoking a pipe and wearing carpet slippers. “In reply to your question,” he said, “I should welcome street music; but the matter has nothing to do either with me or with you. It is all settled by the old lady at the corner, the house to which the notice-board is fixed. It is she who owns the property, and it is she who stops the organs. If you want to do any good you must see her. Her name is Miss Seaton, and as you will want a little cake and lemonade to give you strength for the interview, you had better come in here for a moment.” So saying he led them into the dining-room, which was hung with coloured pictures of hunting and racing, and made them very comfortable, and then sent them on with best wishes for good luck.

Telling Claire to wait a moment, Christopher ran off to their own house for the board, and returned quickly with it wrapped up under his arm. He rang the bell of the corner house boldly, and then, seeing a notice which ran, “Do not knock unless an answer is required,” knocked boldly, too. It was opened by an elderly butler. “Please tell Miss Seaton that Mr. and Miss Morgan from No. 23 would like to see her,” said Christopher.

“On what business?” asked the butler.

“On important business to Westerham Gardens,” said Christopher.

“Wait here a moment,” said the butler, and creaked slowly upstairs. “Here” was the hall, and they sat on a polished mahogany form, with a little wooden roller at each end, exactly opposite a stuffed dancing bear with his arms hungry for umbrellas. Upstairs they heard a door open and a muttered conversation, and then the door shut and the butler creaked slowly down again.

“Will you come this way?” he said, and creaked slowly up once more, followed by the children, who had great difficulty in finding the steps at that pace, and showed them into a room in which was sitting an old lady in a high-backed arm-chair near the fire. On the hearthrug were five cats, and there was one in her lap and one on the table. “Oh!” thought Claire, “if only Betty was here!” For Betty not only loved rank and grandeur but adored cats.

“Well,” said the old lady, “what is it?”

“If you please,” said Christopher, “we have come about the notice-board outside, which says, ‘Organs and street cries prohibited.’”

“Yes,” Claire broke in; “you see, we have just moved to No. 23, and at our old home--in Bloomsbury, you know--there was such a lot of music, and a Punch and Judy, and there’s none here, and we wondered if it really meant it.”

“Because,” Christopher went on, “it seemed to us that this notice-board”--and here he unwrapped the new one--“could just as easily be put up as the one you have. We had it made on purpose.” And he held it up before Miss Seaton’s astonished eyes.

“‘Organs and street cries _invited_!’” she exclaimed. “Why, I never heard such a thing in my life. They drive me frantic.”

“Couldn’t you put cotton-wool in your ears?” Claire asked.

“Or ask them to move a little further on--nearer No. 23?” said Christopher.

“But, my dear children,” said the old lady, “you really are very wilful. I hope your father and mother don’t know what you are doing.”

“No,” said Christopher.

“Well, sit down, both of you,” said Miss Seaton, “and let us talk it over.” So they sat down, and Claire took up one of the cats and stroked it behind the ears, and Miss Seaton asked them a number of questions.

After a while she rang the bell for the butler, who creaked in and out and then in again with cake and a rather good syrup to mix with water; and they gradually became quite friendly, not only with Miss Seaton, but with each of the cats in turn.

“Are there any more?” Claire asked.

“No, only seven,” said Miss Seaton. “I never have more and I never have fewer.”

“Do you give them all names?” said Claire.

“Of course,” said Miss Seaton. “That is partly why there are only seven. I name them after the days of the week.”

“Oh!” thought Claire again, “if only Betty were here!”

“The black one there, with the white front, is Sunday,” Miss Seaton continued. “That all black one is Monday--black Monday, you know. The tortoiseshell is Friday. The sandy one is Saturday.”

“It was on Saturday,” said Christopher, “that the best organ of all used to come, the one with a new tune every week.”

“The blue Persian is Wednesday,” said Miss Seaton, not taking any notice of his remark. “The white Persian is Tuesday, and the grey Iceland cat is Thursday. And now,” she added, “you must go home, and I will think over your request and let you have the answer.”

That evening, just after the children had finished their supper, a ring came at the door, followed, after it was opened, by scuffling feet and a mysterious thud. Then the front door banged, and Annie the maid came in to say that there was a heavy box in the hall, addressed to Master and Miss Morgan. The children tore out, and found a large case with, just as Annie had said, Christopher and Claire’s name upon it. Christopher rushed off for a hammer and screw-driver, and in a few minutes the case was opened. Inside was a note and a very weighty square thing in brown paper. Christopher began to undo the paper, while Claire read the note aloud:

“1, WESTERHAM GARDENS, W.

“DEAR MISS AND MASTER MORGAN,

“I have been thinking about your request all the afternoon, as I
promised I would, and have been compelled to decide against it in the
interests not only of the property but of several of my old tenants,
whose nerves cannot bear noise. But as I feel that your father, when
he made inquiries about your new house, was not sufficiently informed
as to the want of entertainment in the neighbourhood, I wish to
make it up in so far as I can to you all for your disappointment,
and therefore beg your acceptance of a musical box which was a
great pleasure to me when I was much younger, and may, I trust, do
something to amuse you, although the tunes are, I fear, not of the
newest.
“Believe me yours sincerely,
“VICTORIA SEATON.”

“There, father,” said Christopher, “you see she wasn’t really cross at all.”

“No,” said Mr. Morgan; “but, all the same, this must be the last of such escapades.”

Then he opened the musical box, and they found from the piece of paper inside the lid, written in violet ink in a thin, upright, rather curly foreign hand, that it had twelve tunes. Mr. Morgan wound it up, and they all stood round watching the great brass barrel, with the little spikes on it, slowly revolve, while the teeth of the comb were caught up one by one by the spikes to make the notes. There was also a little drum and a peal of silver bells. Although old, it was in excellent order, and very gentle and ripply in tone; and I wish I had been there too, for it is a long time since I heard a musical box, every one now having gramaphones with sore throats.

The first tune was “The Last Rose of Summer” and the second the beautiful prison song from “Il Trovatore.” When it came to the seventh the children looked at each other and smiled.

“Why,” said Betty, “that’s the tune the nice man with the wooden leg on Tuesdays and Fridays always played.”

And what do you think it was? It was “Home, sweet Home.”

THE MISS BANNISTERS’ BROTHER

THE MISS BANNISTERS’ BROTHER