The Annam Jewel (4 page)

Peter broke the point of his dart, and said, “Dash!” Frowning intently, he began on a new one.

Mrs. Spottiswoode came nearer, fluttering. She was plump, but she fluttered. She reminded Peter of a hen, partly because she fluttered, and partly because of the little clucking noises she made.

“You know, Peter, you
ought
to wash your hands.”

“All right,” said Peter, in a bored voice.

Then he stopped whittling and got up. He did this because he was afraid that Cousin Ruth was going to kiss him. He didn't mind presenting his cheek or a portion of his ear to her at breakfast and bedtime, but he had a strong objection to desultory embraces at odd moments.

“Oh, Peter!” said Ruth reproachfully. She sighed and added, “You're going away tomorrow, you know.”

“What time?” asked Peter, with interest.

“Well, Cousin Charlotte wrote the letter, and she said you could be with them for lunch. Of course, I really think it would have suited them much better if you hadn't got there till teatime.”

“'M,” said Peter. Then, after a slight pause, “May I write a letter, Cousin Ruth?”

“Yes, of course. You can write at my table. Who do you want to write to?”

Peter gazed at her seriously.

“I want to write to Uncle Matthew.”

“But, my dear boy, we've written to him—Charlotte wrote to him. You don't need to write.”

“I think it would be better if I did,” said Peter.

“Oh!” It was an exclamation of pure astonishment, checked almost at once and followed by, “Now that's really very nice and polite of you, Peter, and I'm sure your Uncle Matthew will be pleased, and—and your Aunt Emily. Of course, you really ought to write to your Aunt Emily, you know, Peter dear, and not to your Uncle Matthew, as she's the lady of the house, and—yes, I
think
you ought to write your Aunt Emily.”

Peter shook his head.

“Uncle Matthew,” he said laconically. “May I seal it with your sealing-wax, Cousin Ruth?”

“Of course you can, dear boy. Which stick would you like? Well, never mind; you can choose when you've written your letter. And I do think it was a very nice, polite thought—your writing to Uncle Matthew, I mean, and I'm sure he'll be very much pleased. I must remember to tell Cousin Charlotte that it was your own idea.”

“Yes,” said Peter. “May I use the red ink, Cousin Ruth?”

“Anything you like, dear boy.”

Peter, who had settled himself in the position which he affected for writing, received an unexpected kiss upon the top of his head. He scowled at the inkstand, and was much relieved when his Cousin Ruth, announcing that she would just go and lie down for an hour before tea, fluttered from the room. Peter sniffed the air, making deep wrinkles in his nose. Cousin Ruth used a lot of scent; he didn't like scent; he never meant to let Rose Ellen use it. With a little jerk he pulled a sheet of lilactinted paper towards him, and began to write:

Dear Uncle Matthew
. He wrote the name with one “t” first; looked at it critically; added a second; looked at it again; and, in attempting to strike out the first “t”, produced a very large red blot. He proceeded resolutely to the next line.

Cousin Charlotte has written to say I will come to lunch tomorrow. It will be more conveniant—convenniant—conviencnt if I do not come till Monday. I mill send a wire.—Your affectionate nephew,

Peter Waring
.

He made another large blot over his signature, and an attempt to sop it up with a piece of heliotrope blotting paper resulted in a further disaster. He folded the sheet, enclosed it in an envelope, addressed it, and proceeded to the really exhilarating business of sealing the envelope in three places. He used pink, purple, and green wax, and made patterns. He reduced the rose-coloured candle to a guttering wreck. He enjoyed himself very much. When he had quite finished he went to post his letter.

As he walked down the drive between the budding lilacs and horse-chestnut trees, he reviewed the situation. He had to see Rose Ellen. He had promised Rose Ellen that he would see her, and naturally he had to keep his promise. The relations hadn't seemed to understand this at all. It was very odd—but then relations
were
odd.

He had begun about Rose Ellen on the very first day of the holidays. Cousin Ruth had looked sorry, and Cousin Charlotte had looked cross. Neither of them seemed to think that it mattered about breaking his promise. They both said he couldn't possibly go and see Rose Ellen. Peter said, “Why?” and went on saying, “Why?” until they explained in alternate sentences, getting a little flustered and rather red, that it wouldn't do at all.

“Why?” said Peter.

“Because, my dear boy, little Rose Ellen—a nice little girl, I'm sure, and it's very natural for you to be concerned about her, and it does you credit, doesn't it, Charlotte?” That was Ruth Spottiswoode.

Then Cousin Charlotte, red and cross:

“Just put it out of your mind, like a sensible boy, Peter. Rose Ellen is being brought up in quite a different class to you, and it would be most unsuitable for you to go on being thrown with her.”

“Why?” said Peter.

Then they both began again. Cousin Ruth said he was a dear boy and he must be guided by them; and Cousin Charlotte said that Institutions didn't allow visitors. Peter went on saying, “Why?” until Cousin Charlotte lost her temper and went out of the room, banging the door. This was injudicious, as it left Ruth Spottiswoode more or less at Peter's mercy. He took full advantage of the position, and obtained a good deal of useful information. Cousin Ruth had even shown him a picture of St. Gunburga's, under the impression that the imposing building with the group of uniformed staff and quaintly clad children in the foreground would satisfy Peter and make him drop the subject.

Peter scowled whenever he thought of that picture. He hated it quite frightfully. He hated the thought of Rose Ellen in those clothes. He didn't care what the relations said. He was going to see Rose Ellen. Today was Friday. Uncle Matthew would be expecting him in time for lunch tomorrow, but tomorrow morning Uncle Matthew would get his, Peter's, letter saying not to expect him until Monday.

He began to arrange his plans very carefully. Tomorrow he would go and see Rose Ellen. If she was quite well and happy, he would go on to Uncle Matthew's in the evening and explain that, after all, it was better for him to get there before Sunday. If Rose Ellen was unhappy—Peter stood quite still and kicked a large stone several times very hard with his left foot—if Rose Ellen was unhappy, there was only one thing to be done: he would have to take her away.

He stood by the letter-box with his letter in his hand, balanced it for a moment, and shot it through the slit with a jerk. If he had to run away with Rose Ellen, the letter would give them two days' clear start.

CHAPTER IV

Peter started on his journey at eleven o'clock next morning. Charlotte Oakley said good-bye to him in the hall with a hard, brief kiss and a smile of relief, but Ruth Spottiswoode came with him to the station. She embarrassed Peter very much by giving him a hug and several real kisses under the very eyes of his fellow-travellers. At the last minute she gave him ten shillings. Peter saw her dabbing her eyes as the train glided out of the station.

At Waterloo he collected his luggage, had it put on a taxi, and drove to Victoria. By dint of asking questions, he discovered that Parberry, the station for St. Gunburga's, was on a branch line, and that there was no direct connection with Ledlington. There was a train for Parberry in half an hour; he would have to change twice. After some thought he deposited his boxes in the left-luggage office. There was a tin play-box and a worn leather trunk. At the last moment he opened the trunk, rummaged in it, and brought out a white sweater and a grey woollen scarf. At the third attempt he succeeded in cramming these into his bag, which bulged horribly. He then made his way to the platform and waited for his train.

Presently he was sitting in a corner seat, watching rows of little houses slide past. He felt very much pleased with himself. The plan had worked beautifully. There had, to be sure, been one terrible moment when Ruth Spottiswoode, fluttering, had murmured:

“He is rather
young
to go all across London by himself. Don't you
think
, Charlotte, that it would be better if “I saw him off at Victoria?
Wouldn't
you like me to see you off at Victoria, Peter dear?”

Charlotte Oakley said, “Nonsense!” very sharply.

Peter said, “No, Cousin Ruth,” in a tone so final that the threatened danger was averted.

As the train jerked onwards he reviewed his financial position. It had been immensely strengthened by Cousin Ruth's parting gift.

Peter had his own code, an odd one, but quite unbending. The journey money which was to take him to Ledlington was in a pocket by itself. Peter had drawn on it until he reached Victoria. He would draw on it again when he returned to Victoria, but the excursion to Parberry and all expenses incidental thereto were his own private affair, and must be paid for out of his own private money.

Miles Banham had given him a sovereign three months ago. Just how much resolution and self-denial it had taken to preserve that sovereign intact throughout the term, only Peter knew. He regretted that he had not been able to save any of his pocketmoney to speak of. His assets, therefore, were one sovereign, one half-sovereign, a sixpence, a threepenny bit which he had forgotten to put into the plate on Sunday, and fourpence halfpenny in coppers. Peter segregated the entire amount in his safest pocket, and felt pleasantly affluent.

An hour later he alighted at Parberry station, where he purchased with his sixpence three ham sandwiches, all very dry, and with his threepenny bit of cup of strong and boiling tea. He felt annoyed about the tea; ginger-beer would have been nicer.

He gave up his ticket, left the station, and, wandering into a small and very dirty sweet-shop, inquired the way to St. Gunburga's. He also bought a pennyworth of acid drops—Rose Ellen liked acid drops.

He learnt that St. Gunburga's lay a mile out of Parberry.

“You can't miss it,” said the sweet-shop woman. “'Orrid, great staring barrack of a place. Looks as if they scrubbed it hall over hevery day. Perreps they do,” she added, patting a large flat fringe. She was a short, bulging young woman with an odd black eye, the sort that always seems to be looking round a corner at something which nobody else can see. Peter didn't like her very much, but he was out for information.

“Is it a nice place?” he asked, spinning his penny on the counter.

The woman sniffed.

“I don't 'old with hinstitutions myself,” she said.

“Why?” asked Peter.

“None of your imperence.”

A young man had come into the shop, and her manner to Peter suddenly became very short.

Peter emerged into the street, asked his way once or twice again, and presently found himself on a road that ran steadily uphill. At first there were houses on either side. They began as villas, and ended as straggly cottages with daffodils coming up between gooseberry and currant bushes in the front gardens. Peter noticed that the cottages seemed to have more flowers than the villas; he wondered why.

When he came to St. Gunburga's he agreed with the woman in the shop. You couldn't miss it, you couldn't possibly miss it. It was very large, very square, and it had a great many windows. None of the windows had any curtains, which gave them a hard staring look. The walls were built of the bright, yellowish red brick which always looks as if it had just been scraped. There was not the least scrap of ivy, or moss, or any growing thing upon the brick. The house was surrounded by about an acre of asphalt, and the acre of asphalt was bounded by a high, grey stone wall with plenty of broken glass on the top of it. In the middle of the wall facing the road there was a tall gate of wrought iron, with the words “St. Gunburga's” across the top of it in hard, gilt letters. There was no grass. There were no flowers. There were no trees.

Peter had a practical soul. He hated St. Gunburga's with a deep, cold hatred, but he did not waste any time in thinking about it. He walked on up the road, and presently climbed a fence, cut back across a field, and began to skirt the grey stone wall which lay between him and Rose Ellen.

St. Gunburga's had been planted on an upland slope amongst fields. They were perfectly good fields, with the normal amount of grass and hedgerows with ivy and docks and celandine growing in them. There were a few elm trees, quite green; willows with withered catkins; and some very prickly hawthorns, well on in leaf.

Peter made his way to the end of the wall. He could hear voices on the other side of it. He turned the corner and stood still, listening.

The wall rose on his right to a height of between seven and eight feet. On his left was a ditch, and beyond the ditch a hedgerow with a few trees standing up above it. Between the ditch and the wall there was a sort of alleyway, nine or ten feet across, where the grass grew rank.

Peter looked at the wall and then at the trees. The farther ones were scraggy wrecks pollarded almost out of recognition, but the one nearest to the corner of the wall was still recognizable as an elm. It ran up to a good height, the trunk densely wreathed with ivy. Some branches stretched backwards over a field beyond the hedgerow, but all the boughs on the side towards St. Gunburga's had been lopped. Some of them lay overgrown with moss in the alleyway and the ditch. Great pendant masses of ivy covered the shortened stumps which remained upon the tree.

Peter climbed over the hedge, got to the farther side of the trunk, and swarmed up it. About twelve feet up he worked his way round the trunk, and found the end of a branch upon which he could sit astride. The ivy from another branch immediately overhead hung down between him and St. Gunburga's like a curtain. He worked himself a little farther along, parted the ivy, and looked over on to the asphalt playground.