* * * * *
Denny Cradock, proceeding under easy steam across the Indian Ocean,
swung majestically round the edge of a small coppice and brought up all
standing, with much signalling and counter-signalling to the
engine-room, beside the pier at Aden (a split rail fence with a gate in
it).
Denny was the only son of his mother, and she was a widow. Consequently,
having no brother to play with, he was accustomed to invent games which
a man can play by himself. It is true he possessed two sisters, Joan and
Molly; but he would have shrunk with horror from the idea of inviting
either to participate in his present exercises. Joan would have waxed
extremely humorous over the idea of a boy of nearly fourteen solemnly
pretending to be a P. & O. liner proceeding from Bombay to London; while
Molly, though thrilled by the honour of the invitation and anxious to
co-operate, would have been quite incapable of appreciating the
technical niceties of the game.
Denny was an imaginative boy, a sensitive boy, and, above all, a
self-conscious boy. Self-conscious people are apt to be secretive, and
unless they are absolutely certain that you are a kindred spirit, they
keep themselves to themselves and guard their own dreams. If you
endeavour to penetrate within the sanctuary of their minds, even with
the kindliest of intentions, they will sometimes go so far as to lie to
you to put you off the scent. If asked to explain, for instance, why he
was now standing motionless beside a split rail fence gazing into
vacuity and making a noise like a muted trombone, Denny might—I say he
might—have explained to his mother, who always understood, that he was
coaling, and that the captain had ordered the ship’s band to play. But
he most certainly would not have risked imparting such a confidence to
an inquisitive and sardonically inclined young sister of twelve. He
would have said that he was watching a bird’s nest—or, more simply,
have recommended her to go home and burst.
Presently, having warped himself from Aden Pier with a lateral shuffle,
Denny passed through the gate in the fence (the Straits of
Bab-el-Mandeb) and steamed up the Red Sea towards the Isthmus of Suez.
His course for the next few hundred miles being now set, he summoned a
meeting of officers to the captain’s cabin and discussed within himself
certain matters which promised shortly to send the good ship _Denis
Cradock_ sailing upon unknown and uncharted seas. For Denny had won a
scholarship at Eaglescliffe, and was to depart for that ancient seminary
of sound learning almost immediately. The last two days had been rather
thrilling. When we are old, and the sheer adventure of leaving port and
heading for the horizon has lost its glamour, we set out for China or
Peru with as little concern or ceremony as a man walks down the street
to buy a stamp at the post office. But the first breaking of home ties
is a most solemn business. Denny had been bidding a systematic good-bye
to the parish of Ripleigh for nearly a week. To-day matters were
approaching the grand climax. He was on his way to a ceremonial
tea-party of farewell at “Middlefield,” the most considerable house in
the district, the home—in fact, one might almost go so far as to call
it the seat—of the Bagbys.
The Bagby _ménage_ consisted of Mr. Bagby, a kind-hearted, fussy,
utterly futile person of about fifty-five, and his lady wife, a few
years younger, chiefly remarkable for a hypochrondriacal temperament and
a yearning affection for an entirely unresponsive son and daughter. Mr.
and Mrs. Bagby had married comparatively late in life—so late, indeed,
that memories of their own childhood had long faded from their minds,
with the result that they experienced some difficulty in understanding
their offspring, or, indeed, the heart of youth at all. They assumed,
for instance, that since their son Lionel—addressed by his doting
mother as Little Leo, and referred to by the Cradock family among
themselves as Lionel the Terrible—was roughly of an age with Denny
Cradock and a near neighbour, that the two boys must as a matter of
course be “great chums.”
“Denny Cradock will not have your position later in life, darling,” Mrs.
Bagby once explained to her son. “His mother is only moderately well
off, and she has three children to educate; but one should never allow
social distinctions to influence one in one’s selection of one’s
friends, should one? So you would like to invite Denny over to tea this
afternoon, and have a romp with him in the plantations afterwards,
wouldn’t you?”
“No,” replied Little Leo.
However, chums the boys were declared to be, despite Little Leo’s
passionate asseverations to the contrary. He was a youth of high spirit,
and the fact that his parents had decided upon one course of action was
all that was required, as a rule, to send him automatically and
victoriously in the opposite direction. Not that he disliked Denny.
Secretly, he rather admired him—his muscle, his fleetness of foot, and
his obvious abhorrence of such persons as himself—but a principle was
at stake, and Lionel the Terrible was a true son of John Bull.
Denny, on his part, regarded his official chum as a milksop and an oaf.
Otherwise he harboured no ill-feeling towards him whatever.
Having threaded the Suez Canal, a tortuous pathway between two clumps of
laurel, Denny emerged into the Mediterranean—a broad pasture meadow
with a stile in the far corner.
Seated on the stile, in the company of an upright gentleman just past
middle age, was a little girl in a blue linen frock—a rather misleading
little girl, with dreamy eyes and an appealing mouth and an aureole of
bright golden hair. She looked like a cherub recently promoted to legs.
In reality she was something entirely different—Denny’s sister Joan.
“Here comes old Johnny Head-in-Air, Uncle Tony,” she announced as Denny
approached. “I bet you he’s pretending to be something, and hasn’t seen
us.”
“Pretending to be something?”
“Yes. He’s quite mad. He always thinks he’s a train, or a man-of-war, or
an aeroplane. You see—he’ll stop and blow off steam, or loop the loop,
or something, in a minute.”
Uncle Tony chuckled.
“You’re not imaginative, Joan,” he suggested.
“I’ve got some sense, if that’s what you mean,” replied the young lady
composedly. She inserted two slim fingers into her angelic mouth and
emitted an ear-splitting whistle. “Hallo, star-gazer!” she shouted.
“What are you to-day? Wake up!”
Denny, deep in thought, suddenly called back to the realities of this
world and the existence of unfeeling young sisters, came to himself with
a start, blushed violently, and then tackled the situation with
commendable and brotherly promptitude. He simply made a rush, tipped his
sister over backwards into a conveniently adjacent heap of newly-mown
grass, and took her seat upon the stile.
“That will be all from you,” he announced; then turned to his uncle and
continued, as one man to another: “Hallo, Uncle Tony! I hope this kid
hasn’t been bothering you.”
“Not at all,” replied Uncle Tony. “Joan is a most stimulating companion.
Where are you off to this fine afternoon?”
“Tea at Middlefield,” replied Denny.
“Don’t blush,” urged Joan, resuming her perch and brushing wisps of
grass from her short skirt. Naturally Denny blushed at once.
“Is there romance connected with Middlefield?” inquired Uncle Tony.
“I’ve got to go and have tea with that little skunk Leo Bagby,”
explained Denny.
“Lionel the Terrible,” observed Joan. “He is hated by all.”
“He doesn’t sound very romantic,” said Uncle Tony.
“A lady,” announced Joan with a seraphic smile, “will also be present at
the tea-party.”
“Dry up, Joan!” said Denny uneasily. He was suspected, not entirely
without reason, of a youthful tenderness for Little Leo’s sister Gwen, a
year or two his senior.
“He’s blushing again. Isn’t he awful, Uncle Tony?” demanded Joan
compassionately.
“Joan, you must learn to respect masculine reserve. It is a thing which
young females know nothing about. Denny and I are in alliance against
you on that point.”
“All right,” replied Joan affably. “I won’t rag him any more, as he’s
going away so soon. How long are you going to stay at your party,
Denny?”
“About an hour, I suppose, unless Lionel the Terrible starts a fight
with his father, or the governess, or anybody; then I may get out
sooner.”
“Well, don’t be long. Uncle Tony has promised to tell us some more
stories about the I.C.S.”
“What’s that?”
“The Indian Civil Service,” said Joan carelessly. “Didn’t you know?”
She had made an entire and bloodless conquest of her grand-uncle since
his arrival from India a week ago, and was herself by this time a
seasoned Anglo-Indian. At schoolroom meals she made a point of asking
the respectfully mystified Molly to pass the _pani_ or the _dudh_, and
was full of mysterious and important references to such tremendous
things as mem-sahibs, and tiffin, and _chota hazir_.
“Don’t show off,” said Denny coldly. He turned to his godfather. “When
are you going to begin, Uncle Tony?”
“After tea, I believe.”
“Wait till I come home, will you?”
“Certainly. Is that agreeable to you, Joan?”
Joan affected to consider.
“If you don’t turn up by six,” she announced presently, “we’ll know that
you’re washing Gwen’s dog for her, the same as last time, and we won’t
wait. Come on, Uncle Tony! Mother will be expecting you.”
She slid off the fence and offered a braced shoulder.
“Lean on me,” she said, “and I’ll help you down.”
“I am not yet entirely decrepit, Joan,” replied Uncle Tony gravely; “but
I appreciate the kind thought.”
“Oh, that’s all right,” said Joan. “So long, Denny! Be good, my child,
and give my love to dear little Gwenny.”
With this parting shot Miss Joan began to pilot her elderly relative
back across the field in the direction of Abbot’s Mill, while a somewhat
ruffled P. & O. liner resumed its voyage up the English Channel.
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