Chapter XIII: Wishes and Chestnut Roasting

The possible stands by us ever fresh,
Fairer than aught which any life hath owned.
* * * * * * * * *
A healthful hunger for the great idea,
The beauty and the blessedness of life.
_Gladys and her Island._ J. INGELOW.

The school-room at Trenant was quite the favourite room in the whole house. In summer time its two French windows, opening on to the lawn, gave a cool out of door feeling, and, if you are obliged to spend a lovely June morning in the house, it is some consolation to have Nature brought as near to you as possible; in winter its coziness was admitted by all, its fireplace was large and burnt better than any other, its half high brass fender made an enchanting footstool, its old-fashioned sofa was exactly the shape which tempts you to curl yourself up with a story-book and forget the cold, and its bookshelves contained such a heterogeneous assortment of volumes that almost everyone could find something to his or her special taste. But the time most favourable of all to the school-room, was the time known as "blind man's holiday" in the winter; it had long been the favourite family gathering place, and on the afternoon of New Year's day--the same New Year which had brought sorrow and bereavement to Oakdene Manor--a very merry party had congregated round the hearth. In the centre of the group knelt Gladys with one arm round Jackie to ward off all danger of fire accidents, and with the other spare hand distributing smooth, brown, hard-skinned chestnuts from a bag; the school-boys, home for their Christmas holidays, sat on the fender punching holes in the nuts before they were put down to roast, and Stephen Causton stood, poker in hand, ready to rake out the lowest bar of the grate at the last moment. It was what Gladys called a "toasty" fire, not a blazing one, but a deep still red one which sent out as much heat as could possibly be desired, and cast a rich glow over wall and ceiling, making the holly wreaths on the picture frames shine out in bold contrast to the blackness of the shadows, and adding such lustre to the old green curtains and furniture, that their faded shabbiness was no longer noticeable. The faces, too, of the little group were ruddy in the firelight, and the golden threads in Gladys' brown hair shone out brightly as she bent down over the wriggling struggling Jackie, whose patience was sorely tried by the slowness with which the chestnuts roasted.

"We must take some to mother and Aunt Margaret in the drawing-room," said Gladys; "how soon will they be ready, Stephen?"

"Not yet; besides, I'm certain my mother wouldn't touch one," said Stephen, a little sulkily, "she doesn't understand that sort of thing."

"My stars! What, not like chestnuts!" ejaculated Bertie, with raised eyebrows.

Gladys and Stephen laughed a little, it was not exactly the want of appreciation of chestnuts which had given the sullen tone to the assertion; Mrs. Causton's utter contempt for the things of this world was not a little trying to her son, and Gladys understood that it was this in general to which he referred. Certainly it did seem a pity, she thought, that Aunt Margaret should speak so very unreservedly, and often so very inopportunely, about religious details, and it seemed strange that she did not notice how it repelled and annoyed her son.

Stephen had left Porthkerran in the previous October, and was now "walking the hospitals." The few months of London life seemed already to have altered him a good deal, he was older, more decided and opinionated, even--Gladys fancied--a little less refined than when he left. But the change which she noticed chiefly in him was an increased dislike to Mrs. Causton's peculiar little phrases and her untimely allusions. His mother worried him, and he allowed this to appear far too plainly.

"Let us wish over them," said Jackie, meditatively, "cos you know it's quite the first time this year we've eaten them."

"I know what the Jackal would wish for," said Bertie, teazingly, "he'd wish for jam at tea; wishing's awful bosh, Jackie, you mustn't be such a baby."

The corners of Jackie's mouth were turned down ominously, and nothing but Gladys' promptitude averted a storm.

"Nonsense, Bert, he wouldn't do anything of the kind; we shall all wish over them, and Jackie shall have the first that's done, because he's the youngest; now, Jack, a very wise wish; what is it to be?"

Jackie thought for the space of thirty seconds, while he tore open the hot chestnut. Then with the conscious importance of one who looks far into the dim future, he announced,

"I wish to be a tiger-hunter in Africa, I shall not go now, I shall wait till I'm sixteen, then I shall be a man, and I shall shoot all the animals, escept a few which I shall catch with nets, and bling home to keep in the nursely."

This wish excited a good deal of laughter, for the heroic tiger-hunter of the future had been known to run away from a good-sized dog, and the unkind brothers were sceptical as to the bravery his sixteen years would bring him; but Jackie gnawed his chestnut contentedly, and joined in the laughter.

Nor did the wishes of the other boys rival his in enterprise. Bertie wished to be a sailor like Dick, with a "jolly lot" of climbing to do. Harold aspired to an archbishopric, because it would be "such a lark to be cock of the walk, and to have a big palace to live in." Stephen expressed a modest wish to discover something like the "circulation of the blood," as Harvey had done, and make himself a name to be remembered.

Last of all came Gladys' wish, and all eyes turned upon her as she tossed a chestnut to and fro in her hands, and thought. At last raising her face, she said,

"I wish to be like the people in 'Real Folks,' who got a lot of little children together on Saturday afternoons, in some great, bad town, and gave them a 'good time.'"

"Dirty little children--ugh!" exclaimed Bertie, in disgust.

"Beastly!" said the archbishop of the future, laconically.

"Oh! if you want dirty children," said Stephen, "come to Lambeth. You'll see a goodish few there."

As he spoke the door was opened by Mrs. Tremain.

"All in the gloaming," she said, brightly. "I told Aunt Margaret we should most likely find you here; what a delicious smell of roasting!"

"It's chestnuts, mammy," shouted Jackie, at the top of his voice, as he dragged his mother to a chair, and took up the position on her knee to which, in Nesta's absence, his right was indisputable. "Mammy, do eat this one, it's such a beauty."

"Aunt Margaret, do you like this low chair?" said Gladys, as Mrs. Causton joined the group gathered round the fireplace.

"Thank you, my dear, no, I think I will sit at a little distance, as I must face the cold outside in a minute, it is well not to enjoy too much of the warmth. You have a very large fire."

This last sentence had something of reproach in it, and it stimulated Stephen to a quick rejoinder.

"Prime, isn't it."

"Still," continued Mrs. Causton, "in such a severe winter it seems almost incumbent on one not to be too lavish in the coals which are so much needed by the poor."

"It doesn't make the poor people any warmer for us to be cold," said Stephen, with a suppressed growl.

"Nurse always makes up big fires," said Gladys. "She says it's more economical than always feeding a little one. Won't you have a chestnut, auntie?"

"No, thank you, my dear. It is not more than two hours till dinner time, and I do not think it well to eat between meals."

The chestnut-eaters, conscious of a wicked enjoyment, munched on in silence, the idea of a possible abolition of all promiscuous and informal "feedings" between meal times was not to be tolerated for an instant.

Mrs. Tremain changed the subject.

"And you really go back to London to-morrow, Stephen? You have had a very short holiday."

"Yes; still a few days is better than nothing," he answered, tilting his chair backwards and forwards.

"I only hope, Stephen, that you'll work well," said his mother, anxiously. "These long winter evenings are excellent for reading."

Stephen yawned.

"Do you like your lodgings?" asked Mrs. Tremain.

"Oh! they're awfully dull," said Stephen. "Still they're near the hospital, and that's a great thing."

"And your landlady seems a thoroughly nice woman," said Mrs. Causton, who had taken the rooms herself, and had been favourably impressed by the four large family Bibles placed as ornaments on the conventional lodging-house drawing-room table, as well as by the conversation of the landlady.

"She's well enough," said Stephen, "when she's sober."

Mrs. Causton lamented the deceitfulness of appearances, and said she would look out a tract which Stephen could give to the poor woman. The younger boys, wearying of this talk, began to grow noisy, and it was a relief to everyone, including Stephen, when Mrs. Causton said it was time for them to go home.

When Gladys came back to the school-room, after seeing the last of the two visitors, she found her mother alone; the children had dispersed to their play, and Mrs. Tremain sat silently by the fire, which had now sunk rather low.

"A few more coals, I think, dear," she said, as Gladys closed the door and hurried towards the hearth, "and then, as the room is quiet, I want to have a little talk with you."

Gladys put on the coals quickly; her mother's tone had made her feel a little anxious, for though their "talks" together were many, they were not generally spoken of beforehand in this way. Was there some new arrangement to be made, some difficulty to be discussed? Could there be bad news from Dick? Gladys tormented herself with a variety of suppositions, and lifted up such an anxious face to her mother that Mrs. Tremain could not help smiling.

"Did my voice sound so very serious," she said, "that you conjure up all sorts of evils in a minute?"

"Oh! mother, how did you know I had?"

Mrs. Tremain smoothed the anxious, questioning forehead by way of reply, then she began, without further delay, to relieve her child's mind.

"Nothing is wrong at all, dear; but your Aunt Margaret has been talking this afternoon to your father and me. You know that she has taken a little villa at Richmond for the next six months; she wants to be nearer Stephen, and, though she cannot live in London, she thinks that, if she were there, Stephen could spend his Sundays with her. But she dreads the loneliness very much, and cannot bear the thought of settling down by herself in a strange place. She is very anxious, dear, that you should go with her for a time."

Poor Gladys' heart sank; that indefinite expression, "a time," rang unpleasantly in her ears, and the thought of being weeks, or perhaps months, away from home, was terrible to her. Then, too, though she was fond of Mrs. Causton, she was often a good deal annoyed by her peculiarities; and if these were noticeable in the sort of intercourse which they had had at Porthkerran, what would they not be in the close intercourse of daily companionship? It was in rather a choked voice that she asked, after a pause,

"_Must_ I go, mother?"

"It is, of course, dear, for you to decide," said Mrs. Tremain. "If you feel very strongly against it, we should not think of sending you."

"But you wish me to go," said Gladys, a little resentfully, feeling, too, that the very fact of having the matter left in her own hands hardly gave her the choice of doing as she wished; she could not deliberately choose for herself the easy, comfortable, home-keeping path which she longed to take.

"That is hardly a fair way of putting it," said Mrs. Tremain. "For ourselves, darling, of course we want to keep you; for Mrs. Causton's sake and your own, I should like you to go."

"For my own!" exclaimed Gladys, greatly surprised.

"Yes, quite for your own, dear; you have scarcely ever been away from home, and it is time that you should see a little more of life; the change will be good for you in every way. I think it will help to widen you."

"You think me narrow-minded?" said Gladys, pouting.

"Yes, dear, I do--a little," said Mrs. Tremain, laughing. "I don't think you have much sympathy with people you don't agree with, and the best cure for that will be to get out of the old grooves for a little time."

"But you surely don't want me to learn to think differently, and to come home again not agreeing with you and papa?" questioned Gladys.

"No, certainly not; that would not be growing wider, only shifting your narrowness in a new direction."

"But Aunt Margaret is the narrowest person imaginable," said Gladys, perversely. "I shall only grow like her."

"I think not," said Mrs. Tremain; "you would more likely be driven to the opposite extreme. But that is not exactly what I want; I want you to learn to see her real goodness, and to sympathise with that, trying to pass over the little things which annoy you. Besides, you will see other people; the world of Richmond is larger than the world of Porthkerran."

Gladys was not convinced all at once, but before many days had passed her decision was made. Home was to be renounced for six long months, and a new phase--not the least arduous--of her education was to be begun under Mrs. Causton's guidance.

Her stay at Richmond was certainly productive of some good results. Stephen found his home visits attractive, and never failed to appear on Saturday afternoons. Mrs. Causton thoroughly enjoyed her bright cheerful companion, and Gladys herself, in spite of unconquerable home-sickness, found much that was pleasant in her new life, and for many reasons never in after-years regretted the decision she had made.

She saw then, with the strange thrill of joy and wonder which such realisations bring, that on this decision and on this visit to London hinged almost all that was most dear to her in the future, and that, unconsciously, she had then taken the first step towards the attainment of her wish over the chestnut-roasting.

END OF THE FIRST VOLUME.

LONDON: PRINTED BY DUNCAN MACDONALD, BLENHEIM HOUSE.