That Stick ...

Bertha, as soon as the chief anxiety was over, joined Mrs. Bury in a mountaineering expedition.  She declared that she had never dared to leave Cea before, lest the wretched father, now proved to be a myth, should come and abstract the child.

p. 230CHAPTER XXXIV

THE PHANTOM OF THE STATION

There was a crash in Mrs. Morton’s kitchen, where an elegant five o’clock tea was preparing, not only to greet Herbert, who had just come home to await the news of his fate after the last military examination open to him, but also for a friend or two of his mother’s, who, to his great annoyance, might be expected to drop in on any Wednesday afternoon.

Every one ran out to see what was the matter, and the maid was found picking up Mrs. Morton’s silver teapot, the basket-work handle of which had suddenly collapsed under the weight of tea and tea-leaves.  The mistress’s exclamations and objurgation of the maid for not having discovered its frail condition need not be repeated.  It had been a wedding-present, and was her great pride.  After due examination to see whether there were any bruises or dents, she said—

‘Well, Ida, we must have yours; run and fetch it out of the box.  You have the key of it.’  And she held out the key of the cupboard where the spoons were daily taken out by herself or Ida.

p. 231The teapot had been left to Ida by a godmother, who had been a farmer’s wife, with a small legacy, but was of an unfashionable make and seldom saw the light.

‘That horrid, great clumsy thing!’ said Ida.  ‘You had much better use the blue china one.’

‘I’ll never use that crockery for company when there’s silver in the house!  What would Mrs. Denham say if she dropped in?’

‘I won’t pour out tea in that ugly, heavy brute of a thing.’

‘Then if you won’t, I will.  Give me the key this instant!’

‘It is mine, and I am not going to give it up!’

‘Come, Ida,’ said Herbert, weary of the altercation; ‘any one would think you had made away with it!  Let us have it for peace’s sake.’

‘It’s no business of yours.’

He whistled.  However, at that moment the door-bell rang.

It was to admit a couple of old ladies, whom both the young people viewed as very dull company; and the story of the illness of ‘my brother, Lord Northmoor,’ as related by their mother, had become very tedious, so that as soon as possible they both sauntered out on the beach.

‘I wonder when uncle will send for you!’ Ida said.  ‘He must give you a good allowance now.’

‘Don’t talk of it, Ida; it makes me sick to think of it.  I say—is that the old red rock where they saw the last of the poor little kid?’

‘Yes; that was where his hat was.’

‘Did you find it?  Was it washed up?’

p. 232‘Don’t talk of such dreadful things, Bertie; I can’t bear it!  And there’s Rose Rollstone!’

Ida would have done her utmost to keep her brother and Rose Rollstone apart at any other time, but she was at the moment only too glad to divert his attention, and allowed him, without protest, to walk up to Rose, shake hands with her, and rejoice in her coming home for good; but, do what Ida would, she could not keep him from recurring to the thought of the little cousin of whom he had been very fond.

‘Such a jolly little kid!’ he said; ‘and full of spirit!  You should have seen him when I picked him up before me on the cob.  How he laughed!’

‘So good, too,’ said Rose.  ‘He looked so sweet with those pretty brown eyes and fair curls at church that last Sunday.’

‘I can’t make out how it was.  The tide could not have been high enough to wash him off going round that rock, or the other children would not have gone round it.’

‘Oh, I suppose he ran after a wave,’ said Ida hastily.

‘Do you know,’ said Rose mysteriously, ‘I could have declared I saw him that very evening, and with his nursery-maid, too!’

‘Nonsense, Rose!  We don’t believe in ghosts!’ said Ida.

‘It was not like a ghost,’ said Rose.  ‘You know I had come down for the bank-holiday, and went back to finish my quarter at the art embroidery.  Well, when we stopped at the North Westhaven station, I saw a man, woman, and child get p. 233in, and it struck me that the boy was Master Michael and the woman Louisa Hall.  I think she looked into the carriage where I was, and I was going to ask her where she was taking him.’

‘Nonsense, Rose!  How can you listen to such folly, Herbert?’

‘But that’s not all!  I saw them again under the gas when I got out.  I was very near trying to speak to her, but I lost sight of her in the throng; but I saw that face so like Master Michael, only scared and just ready to cry.’

‘You’ll run about telling that fine ghost-story,’ said Ida roughly.

‘But Louisa could not have been a ghost,’ said Rose, bewildered.  ‘I thought she was his nursery-maid taking him somewhere!  Didn’t she—’ then with a sudden flash—‘Oh!’

‘Turned off long ago for flirting with that scamp Rattler,’ said Herbert.  ‘Now she has run off with him.’

‘There was a sailor-looking man with her,’ said Rose.