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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, Great Uncle Hoot-Toot, by Mrs. Molesworth,
+Illustrated by Gordon Browne, E. J. Walker, Lizzie Lawson, J. Bligh, and
+Maynard Brown
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with
+almost no restrictions whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or
+re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included
+with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org
+
+
+
+
+
+Title: Great Uncle Hoot-Toot
+
+
+Author: Mrs. Molesworth
+
+
+
+Release Date: July 3, 2009  [eBook #29295]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK GREAT UNCLE HOOT-TOOT***
+
+
+E-text prepared by Delphine Lettau, Paul Dring, and the Project Gutenberg
+Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net)
+
+
+
+Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this
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+      See 29295-h.htm or 29295-h.zip:
+      (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/29295/29295-h/29295-h.htm)
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+
+
+
+
+
+GREAT-UNCLE HOOT-TOOT.
+
+by
+
+MRS. MOLESWORTH,
+
+Author of
+"The Palace in the Garden," "'Carrots': Just a Little Boy,"
+"The Cuckoo Clock," Etc.
+
+Illustrated by
+Gordon Browne, E. J. Walker, Lizzie Lawson, J. Bligh,
+and Maynard Brown.
+
+Published Under the Direction of the
+Committee of General Literature and Education
+Appointed by
+the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge.
+
+
+
+
+
+
+
+London:
+Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge,
+Northumberland Avenue, Charing Cross, W.C.;
+43, Queen Victoria Street, E.C.
+Brighton: 135, North Street.
+New York: E. & J. B. Young and Co.
+
+
+[Illustration: FRANCES AND ELSA.]
+
+
+
+
+GREAT-UNCLE HOOT-TOOT.
+
+
+  "... what we have we prize not to the worth
+  Whiles we enjoy it; but being lack'd and lost,
+  Why then we rack the value."--_Much Ado about Nothing._
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+THE MASTER OF THE HOUSE.
+
+
+"That's Geoff, I'm sure," said Elsa; "I always know his ring. I do
+hope----" and she stopped and sighed a little.
+
+"What?" said Frances, looking up quickly.
+
+"Oh, nothing particular. Run down, Vic, dear, and get Geoff to go
+straight into the school-room. Order his tea at once. I _don't_ want him
+to come upstairs just now. Mamma is so busy and worried with those
+letters."
+
+[Illustration: VICKY.]
+
+Vic, a little girl of nine, with long fair hair and long black legs, and
+a pretty face with a bright, eager expression, needed no second bidding.
+She was off almost before Elsa had finished speaking.
+
+"What a good child she is!" said Frances. "What a clever, nice boy she
+would have made! And if Geoff had been a girl, perhaps he would have
+been more easily managed."
+
+"I don't know," said Elsa. "Perhaps if Vicky had been a boy she would
+have been spoilt and selfish too."
+
+"Elsa," said Frances, "I think you are rather hard upon Geoff. He is
+like all boys. Everybody says they are more selfish than girls, and then
+they grow out of it."
+
+"They grow out of showing it so plainly, perhaps," replied Elsa, rather
+bitterly. "But you contradict yourself, Frances. Just a moment ago you
+said what a much nicer boy Vic would have made. All boys aren't like
+Geoff. Of course, I don't mean that he is really a bad boy; but it just
+comes over me now and then that it is a _shame_ he should be such a
+tease and worry, boy or not. When mamma is anxious, and with good
+reason, and we girls are doing all we can, why should Geoff be the one
+we have to keep away from her, and to smooth down, as it were? It's all
+for her sake, of course; but it makes me ashamed, all the same, to feel
+that we are really almost afraid of him. There now----" And she started
+up as the sound of a door, slammed violently in the lower regions,
+reached her ears.
+
+But before she had time to cross the room, Vicky reappeared.
+
+"It's nothing, Elsa," the child began eagerly. "Geoff's all right; he's
+not cross. He only slammed the door at the top of the kitchen stair
+because I reminded him not to leave it open."
+
+"You might have shut it yourself, rather than risk a noise to-night,"
+said Elsa. "What was he doing at the top of the kitchen stair?"
+
+Vicky looked rather guilty.
+
+"He was calling to Phoebe to boil two eggs for his tea. He says he is so
+hungry. I would have run up to tell you; but I thought it was better
+than his teasing mamma about letting him come in to dinner."
+
+Elsa glanced at Frances.
+
+"You see," her glance seemed to say.
+
+"Yes, dear," she said aloud to the little sister, "anything is better
+than that. Run down again, Vicky, and keep him as quiet as you can."
+
+"Would it not be better, perhaps," asked Frances, rather timidly, "for
+one of us to go and speak to him, and tell him quietly about mamma
+having had bad news?"
+
+"He wouldn't rest then till he had heard all about it from herself,"
+said Elsa. "Of course he'd be sorry for her, and all that, but he would
+only show it by teasing."
+
+It was Frances's turn to sigh, for in spite of her determination to see
+everything and everybody in the best possible light, she knew that Elsa
+was only speaking the truth about Geoffrey.
+
+Half an hour later the two sisters were sitting at dinner with their
+mother. She was anxious and tired, as they knew, but she did her utmost
+to seem cheerful.
+
+"I have seen and heard nothing of Geoff," she said suddenly. "Has he
+many lessons to do to-night? He's all right, I suppose?"
+
+"Oh yes," said Frances. "Vic's with him, looking out his words. He seems
+in very good spirits. I told him you were busy writing for the mail, and
+persuaded him to finish his lessons first. He'll be coming up to the
+drawing-room later."
+
+"I think mamma had better go to bed almost at once," said Elsa,
+abruptly. "You've finished those letters, dear, haven't you?"
+
+"Yes--all that I can write as yet. But I must go to see Mr. Norris first
+thing to-morrow morning. I have said to your uncle that I cannot send
+him particulars till next mail."
+
+"Mamma, darling," said Frances, "do you really think it's going to be
+very bad?"
+
+Mrs. Tudor smiled rather sadly.
+
+"I'm afraid so," she said; "but the suspense is the worst. Once we
+really _know_, we can meet it. You three girls are all so good, and
+Geoff, poor fellow--he _means_ to be good too."
+
+"Yes," said Frances, eagerly, "I'm sure he does."
+
+"But 'meaning' alone isn't much use," said Elsa. "Mamma," she went on
+with sudden energy, "if this does come--if we really do lose all our
+money, perhaps it will be the best thing for Geoff in the end."
+
+Mrs. Tudor seemed to wince a little.
+
+"You needn't make the very worst of it just yet, any way," said Frances,
+reproachfully.
+
+"And it would in one sense be the hardest on Geoff," said the mother,
+"for his education would have to be stopped, just when he's getting on
+so well, too."
+
+"But----" began Elsa, but she said no more. It was no use just then
+expressing what was in her mind--that getting on well at school, winning
+the good opinion of his masters, the good fellowship of his companions,
+did not comprise the whole nor even the most important part of the duty
+of a boy who was also a son and a brother--a son, too, of a widowed
+mother, and a brother of fatherless sisters. "I would almost rather,"
+she said to herself, "that he got on less well at school if he were more
+of a comfort at home. It would be more manly, somehow."
+
+Her mother did not notice her hesitation.
+
+"Let us go upstairs, dears," she said. "I _am_ tired, but I am not going
+to let myself be over-anxious. I shall try to put things aside, as it
+were, till I hear from Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot. I have the fullest
+confidence in his advice."
+
+"I wish he would take it into his head to come home," said Frances.
+
+"So do I," agreed her mother.
+
+They were hardly settled in the drawing-room before Vic appeared.
+
+"Elsa," she whispered, "Geoff sent me to ask if he may have something to
+eat."
+
+"Something to eat," repeated Elsa. "He had two eggs with his tea. He
+can't be hungry."
+
+"No--o-- But there were anchovy toasts at dinner--Harvey told him. And
+he's so fond of anchovy toasts. I think you'd better say he may, Elsa,
+because of mamma."
+
+"Very well," the elder sister replied. "It's not right--it's always the
+way. But what are we to do?"
+
+Vicky waited not to hear her misgivings, but flew off. She was
+well-drilled, poor little soul.
+
+Her brother was waiting for her, midway between the school-room and
+dining-room doors.
+
+"Well?" he said, moving towards the latter.
+
+"Yes. Elsa says you may," replied the breathless little envoy.
+
+"Elsa! What has she to do with it? I told you to ask mamma, not Elsa,"
+he said roughly.
+
+He stood leaning against the jamb of the door, his hands in his
+pockets, with a very cross look on his handsome face. But Victoria,
+devoted little sister though she was, was not to be put down by any
+cross looks when she knew she was in the right.
+
+"Geoff," she said sturdily, "I'll just leave off doing messages or
+anything for you if you are _so_ selfish. How could I go teasing mamma
+about anchovy toasts for you when she is so worried?"
+
+"How should I know she is busy and worried?" said Geoff. "What do you
+mean? What is it about?"
+
+"I don't know. At least I only know that Elsa and Francie told me that
+she _was_ worried, and that she had letters to write for the ship that
+goes to India to-morrow."
+
+"For the Indian mail you mean, I suppose," said Geoff. "What a donkey
+you are for your age, Vic! Oh, if it's only that, she's writing to that
+old curmudgeon; _that's_ nothing new. Come along, Vicky, and I'll give
+you a bit of my toasts."
+
+[Illustration: HER BROTHER WAS WAITING FOR HER.]
+
+He went into the dining-room as he spoke, and rang the bell.
+
+"Harvey'll bring them up. I said I'd ring if I was to have them. Upon my
+word, Vic, it isn't every fellow of my age that would take things so
+quietly. Never touching a scrap without leave, when lots like me come
+home to late dinner every night."
+
+"Elsa says it's only middle-class people who let children dine late,"
+said Vic, primly, "_I_ shan't come down to dinner till I'm _out_."
+
+Geoffrey burst out laughing.
+
+"Rubbish!" he said. "Elsa finds reasons for everything that suits her.
+Here, Vicky, take your piece."
+
+Vicky was not partial to anchovy toasts, but to-night she was so anxious
+to keep Geoff in a good humour, that she would have eaten anything he
+chose to give her, and pretended to like it. So she accepted her share,
+and Geoff munched his in silence.
+
+He was a well-made, manly looking boy, not tall for his years, which
+were fourteen, but in such good proportion as to give promise of
+growing into a strong and vigorous man. His face was intended by nature
+to be a very pleasing one. The features were all good; there was
+nobility in the broad forehead, and candour in the bright dark eyes,
+and--sometimes--sweetness in the mouth. But this "sometimes" had for
+long been becoming of less and less frequent occurrence. A querulous,
+half-sulky expression had invaded the whole face: its curves and lines
+were hardening as those of no young face should harden; the very
+carriage of the boy was losing its bright upright fearlessness--his
+shoulders were learning to bend, his head to slouch forward. One needed
+but to glance at him to see that Geoffrey Tudor was fast becoming that
+most disagreeable of social characters, a grumbler! And with grumbling
+unrepressed, and indulged in, come worse things, for it has its root in
+that true "root of all evil," selfishness.
+
+As the last crumbs of the anchovy toasts disappeared, Geoff glanced
+round him.
+
+"I say, Vic," he began, "is there any water on the sideboard? Those
+things are awfully salt. But I don't know that I'm exactly thirsty,
+either. I know what I'd like--a glass of claret, and I don't see why I
+shouldn't have it, either. At my age it's really too absurd that----"
+
+"What are you talking about, Geoff?" said Elsa's voice in the doorway.
+"Mamma wants you to come up to the drawing-room for a little. What is it
+that is too absurd at your age?"
+
+"Nothing in particular--or rather everything," said Geoff, with a slight
+tone of defiance. There was something in Elsa's rather too superior, too
+elder-sisterly way of speaking that, as he would have expressed it, "set
+him up." "I was saying to Vic that I'd like a glass of claret, and that
+I don't see why I shouldn't have it, either. Other fellows would help
+themselves to it. I often think I'm a great donkey for my pains."
+
+Elsa looked at him with a strange mixture of sadness and contempt.
+
+"What will he be saying next, I wonder?" her glance seemed to say.
+
+But the words were not expressed.
+
+"Come upstairs," she said. "Vicky has told you, I know, that you must be
+_particularly_ careful not to tease mamma to-night."
+
+Geoff returned her look with an almost fierce expression in the eyes
+that could be so soft and gentle.
+
+"I wish you'd mind your own business, and leave mother and me to
+ourselves. It's your meddling puts everything wrong," he muttered.
+
+But he followed his elder sister upstairs quietly enough. Down in the
+bottom of his heart was hidden great faith in Elsa. He would, had
+occasion demanded it, have given his life, fearlessly, cheerfully, for
+her or his mother, or the others. But the smaller sacrifices, of his
+likes and dislikes, of his silly boyish temper and humours--of "self,"
+in short, he could not or would not make. Still, something in Elsa's
+words and manner this evening impressed him in spite of himself. He
+followed her into the drawing-room, fully _meaning_ to be good and
+considerate.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+"MAYN'T I SPEAK TO YOU, MAMMA?"
+
+
+That was the worst of it--the most puzzling part of it, rather, perhaps
+we should say--with Geoffrey. He _meant_ to be good. He would not for
+worlds have done anything that he distinctly saw to be wrong. He worked
+well at his lessons, though to an accompaniment of constant grumbling--at
+home, that is to say; grumbling at school is not encouraged. He was
+rather a favourite with his companions, for he was a manly and "plucky"
+boy, entering heartily into the spirit of all their games and amusements,
+and he was thought well of by the masters for his steadiness and
+perseverance, though not by any means of naturally studious tastes. The
+wrong side of him was all reserved for home, and for his own family.
+
+Yet, only son and fatherless though he was, he had not been "spoilt" in
+the ordinary sense of the word. Mrs. Tudor, though gentle, and in some
+ways timid, was not a weak or silly woman. She had brought up her
+children on certain broad rules of "must," as to which she was as firm
+as a rock, and these had succeeded so well with the girls that it was a
+complete surprise as well as the greatest of sorrows to her when she
+first began to see signs of trouble with her boy. And gradually her
+anxiety led her into the fatal mistake of spoiling Geoffrey by making
+him of too much consequence. It came to be recognized in the household
+that his moods and humours were to be a sort of family barometer, and
+that all efforts were to be directed towards the avoidance of storms.
+Not that Geoff was passionate or violent. Had he been so, things would
+have sooner come to a crisis. He was simply _tiresome_--tiresome to a
+degree that can scarcely be understood by those who have not experienced
+such tiresomeness for themselves. And as there is no doubt a grain of
+the bully somewhere in the nature of every boy--if not of every human
+being--what this tiresomeness might have grown into had the Fates, or
+something higher than the Fates, not interposed, it would be difficult
+to exaggerate.
+
+The cloudy look had not left Geoff's face when he came into the
+drawing-room. But, alas! it was nothing new to see him "looking like
+that." His mother took no notice of it.
+
+"Well, Geoff?" she said pleasantly. "How have you got on to-day, my
+boy?"
+
+He muttered something indistinctly, which sounded like, "Oh, all right;"
+then catching sight of Elsa's reproachful face, he seemed to put some
+constraint on himself, and, coming forward to his mother, kissed her
+affectionately.
+
+"Are you very tired to-night, mamma?" he said. "Must I not speak to
+you?"
+
+Mrs. Tudor _was_ very tired, and she knew by old experience what Geoff's
+"speaking" meant--an hour or more's unmitigated grumbling, and dragging
+forward of every possible grievance, to have each in turn talked over,
+and sympathized about, and smoothed down by her patient hand. Such talks
+were not without their effect on the boy; much that his mother said
+appealed to his good sense and good feeling, though he but seldom gave
+her the satisfaction of seeing this directly. But they were very wearing
+to _her_, and it was carrying motherly unselfishness too far to undertake
+such discussion with Geoff, when she was already worn out with unusual
+anxiety.
+
+She smiled, however, brightly enough, in reply to his questions. It
+cheered her to see that he could consider her even thus much.
+
+"Of course I can speak to you, Geoff. Have you anything particular to
+tell me?"
+
+"Lots of things," said the boy. He drew forward a chair in which to
+settle himself comfortably beside his mother, darting an indignant
+glance at his sisters as he did so. "Humbugging me as usual about
+mamma--anything to keep me away from her," he muttered. But Elsa and
+Frances only glanced at each other in despair.
+
+"Well," said Mrs. Tudor, resignedly, leaning back in her chair.
+
+"Mamma," began Geoffrey, "there must be something done about my
+pocket-money. I just can't do with what I've got. I've waited to speak
+about it till I had talked it over with some of the other fellows. They
+nearly all have more than I."
+
+"Boys of your age--surely not?" interposed Mrs. Tudor.
+
+[Illustration: "THERE MUST BE SOMETHING DONE ABOUT MY POCKET-MONEY."]
+
+"Well, _some_ of them are not older than I," allowed Geoff. "If you'd
+give me more, and let me manage things for myself--football boots,
+and cricket-shoes, and that sort of thing. The girls"--with cutting
+emphasis--"are always hinting that I ask you for too many things, and
+_I_ hate to be seeming to be always at you for something. If you'd give
+me a regular allowance, now, and let me manage for myself."
+
+"At your age," repeated his mother, "that surely is very unusual."
+
+"I don't see that it matters exactly about age," said Geoff, "if one's
+got sense."
+
+"But have you got sense enough, Geoff?" said Frances, gently. "I'm three
+years older than you, and I've only just begun to have an allowance for
+my clothes, and I should have got into a dreadful mess if it hadn't been
+for Elsa helping me."
+
+"Girls are quite different," said Geoff. "They want all sorts of
+rubbishing ribbons and crinolines and flounces. Boys only need regular
+necessary things."
+
+"Then you haven't any wants at present, I should think, Geoff," said
+Elsa, in her peculiarly clear, rather aggravating tones. "You were
+completely rigged out when you came back from the country, three weeks
+ago."
+
+Geoff glowered at her.
+
+"Mamma," he said, "will you once for all make Elsa and Frances
+understand that when I'm speaking to you they needn't interfere?"
+
+Mrs. Tudor did not directly respond to this request.
+
+"Will you tell me, Geoff," she said, "what has put all this into your
+head? What things are you in want of?"
+
+Geoff hesitated. Fancied wants, like fancied grievances, have an
+annoying trick of refusing to answer to the roll-call when distinctly
+summoned to do so.
+
+"There's lots of things," he began. "I _should_ have a pair of proper
+football boots, instead of just an old common pair with ribs stuck on,
+you know, like I have. All the fellows have proper ones when they're
+fifteen or so."
+
+"But you are not fifteen."
+
+"Well, I might wait about the _boots_ till next term. But I do really
+want a pair of boxing-gloves dreadfully," he went on energetically, as
+the idea occurred to him; "you know I began boxing this term."
+
+"And don't they provide boxing-gloves? How have you managed hitherto?"
+asked his mother, in surprise.
+
+"Oh, well, yes--there _are_ gloves; but of course it's much nicer to
+have them of one's own. It's horrid always to seem just one of the lot
+that can't afford things of their own."
+
+"And if you are _not_ rich--and I dare say nearly all your schoolfellows
+are richer than you"--said Elsa, "is it not much better not to sham that
+you are?"
+
+"Sham," repeated Geoff, roughly. "Mamma, I do think you should speak
+to Elsa.--If you were a boy----" he added, turning to his sister
+threateningly. "I don't want to sham about anything; but it's very hard
+to be sent to a school when you can't have everything the same as the
+others."
+
+A look of pain crept over Mrs. Tudor's tired face. Had she done wrong?
+Was it another of her "mistakes"--of which, like all candid people, she
+felt she had made many in her life--to have sent Geoff to a first-class
+school?
+
+"Geoff," she said weariedly, "you surely do not realize what you cause
+me when you speak so. It was almost my principal reason for settling in
+London seven years ago, that I might be able to send you to one of the
+best schools. We could have lived more cheaply, and more comfortably,
+in the country; but you would have had to go to a different class of
+school."
+
+"Well, I wish I had, then," said Geoff, querulously. "I perfectly hate
+London; I have always told you so. I shouldn't mind what I did if it
+was in the country. It isn't that I want to spend money, or that I've
+extravagant ideas; but it's too hard to be in a false position, as I am
+at school--not able to have things like the other fellows. You would
+have made _me_ far happier if you had gone to live in the country and
+let me go to a country school. I _hate_ London; and just because I want
+things like other fellows, I'm scolded."
+
+Mrs. Tudor did not speak. She looked sad and terribly tired.
+
+"Geoff," said Elsa, putting great control on herself so as to speak very
+gently, for she felt as if she could gladly shake him, "you must see
+that mamma is very tired. Do wait to talk to her till she is better able
+for it. And it is getting late."
+
+"Do go, Geoff," said his mother. "I have listened to what you have said;
+it is not likely I shall forget it. I will talk to you afterwards."
+
+The boy looked rather ashamed.
+
+"I haven't meant to vex you," he said, as he stooped to kiss his mother.
+"I'm sorry you're so tired."
+
+There was silence for a moment after he had left the room.
+
+"I am afraid there is a mixture of truth in what he says," said Mrs.
+Tudor, at last. "It has been one of the many mistakes I have made, and
+now I suppose I am to be punished for it."
+
+Elsa made a movement of impatience.
+
+"Mamma dear!" she exclaimed, "I don't think you would speak that way if
+you weren't tired. There isn't any truth in what Geoff says. I don't
+mean that he tells stories; but it's just his incessant grumbling. He
+makes himself believe all sorts of nonsense. He has everything right
+for a boy of his age to have. I know there are boys whose parents are
+really rich who have less than he has."
+
+"Yes, indeed, mamma; Elsa is right," said Frances. "Geoff is insatiable.
+He picks out the things boys here and there may have as an exception,
+and wants to have them all. He has a perfect genius for grumbling."
+
+"Because he is always thinking of himself," said Elsa. "Mamma, don't
+think me disrespectful, but would it not be better to avoid saying
+things which make him think himself of such consequence--like telling
+him that we came to live in town principally for _his_ sake?"
+
+"Perhaps so," said her mother. "I am always in hopes of making him
+ashamed, by showing how much _has_ been done for him."
+
+"And he does feel ashamed," said Frances, eagerly. "I saw it to-night;
+he'd have liked to say something more if he hadn't been too proud to own
+that he had been inventing grievances."
+
+"Things have been too smooth for him," said Elsa; "that's the truth of
+it. He needs some hardships."
+
+"And as things are turning out he's very likely to get them," said Mrs.
+Tudor, with a rather wintry smile.
+
+"Oh, mamma, forgive me! Do you know, I had forgotten all about our money
+troubles," Elsa exclaimed. "Why don't you tell Geoff about them, mamma?
+It's in a way hardly fair on him; for if he knew, it _might_ make him
+understand how wrong and selfish he is."
+
+"I will tell him soon, but not just yet. I do not want to distract his
+mind from his lessons, and I wish to be quite sure first. I think I
+should wait till I hear from your great-uncle."
+
+"And that will be--how long? It is how many weeks since Mr. Norris first
+wrote that he was uneasy? About seven, I should say," said Elsa.
+
+"Quite that," said her mother. "It is the waiting that is so trying. I
+can do nothing without Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's advice."
+
+That last sentence had been a familiar one to Mrs. Tudor's children
+almost ever since they could remember. "Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot" had been
+a sort of autocrat and benefactor in one, to the family. His opinions,
+his advice had been asked on all matters of importance; his approval
+had been held out to them as the highest reward, his displeasure as the
+punishment most to be dreaded. And yet they had never seen him!
+
+"I wish he would come home himself," said Elsa. "I think Geoff would be
+much the better for a visit from him," she added, with a slight touch of
+sharpness in her tone.
+
+"Poor Geoff!" said her mother. "I suppose the truth is that very few
+women know how to manage boys."
+
+"I don't see that," said Elsie. "On the contrary, a generous-natured
+boy is often more influenced by a woman's gentleness than by a man's
+severity. It is just that, that I don't like about Geoff. There is a
+want of generous, chivalrous feeling about him."
+
+"No," said Frances. "I don't quite agree with you. I think it is
+there, but somehow not awakened. Mamma," she went on, "supposing our
+great-uncle did come home, would he be dreadfully angry if he found out
+that we all called him 'Hoot-Toot'?"
+
+"Oh no," said her mother, smiling; "he's quite used to it. Your father
+told me he had had the trick nearly all his life of saying 'Hoot-toot,
+hoot-toot!' if ever he was perplexed or disapproving."
+
+"What a _very_ funny little boy he must have been!" exclaimed both the
+girls together.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+AN UNLOOKED-FOR ARRIVAL.
+
+
+The next few days were trying ones for all the Tudor family. The mother
+was waiting anxiously for further news of the money losses, with which,
+as her lawyers told her, she was threatened; the sisters were anxious
+too, though, with the bright hopefulness of their age, the troubles
+which distressed their mother fell much more lightly on them: _they_
+were anxious because they saw _her_ suffering.
+
+Vicky had some misty idea that something was wrong, but she knew very
+little, and had been forbidden to say anything to Geoff about the little
+she did know. So that of the whole household Geoff was the only one who
+knew nothing, and went on living in his Fool's Paradise of having all
+his wants supplied, yet grumbling that he had nothing! He was in a
+particularly tiresome mood--perhaps, in spite of themselves, it was
+impossible for his sisters to bear with him as patiently as usual;
+perhaps the sight of his mother's pale face made him dissatisfied with
+himself and cross because he would not honestly own that he was doing
+nothing to help and please her. And the weather was very disagreeable,
+and among Geoff's many "hates" was a very exaggerated dislike to bad
+weather. About this sort of thing he had grumbled much more since his
+return from a long visit to some friends in the country the summer
+before, when the weather had been splendid, and everything done to make
+him enjoy himself, in consequence of which he had come home with a fixed
+idea that the country was always bright and charming; that it was only
+in town that one had to face rain and cold and mud. As to fog, he had
+perhaps more ground for his belief.
+
+"Did you ever see such beastly weather?" were his first words to Vicky
+one evening when the good little sister had rushed to the door on
+hearing Geoff's ring, so that his majesty should not be kept waiting an
+unnecessary moment. "I am perfectly drenched, and as cold as ice. Is tea
+ready, Vic?"
+
+"Quite ready--at least it will be by the time you've changed your
+things. Do run up quick, Geoff. It's a bad thing to keep on wet
+clothes."
+
+"Mamma should have thought of that before she sent me to a day-school,"
+said Geoff. "I've a good mind just _not_ to change my clothes, and take
+my chance of getting cold. It's perfect slavery--up in the morning
+before it's light, and not home till pitch dark, and soaked into the
+bargain."
+
+"Hadn't you your mackintosh on?" asked Vicky.
+
+"My mackintosh! It's in rags. I should have had a new one ages ago."
+
+"Geoff! I'm sure it can't be so bad. You've not had it a year."
+
+"A year. No one wears a mackintosh for a year. The buttons are all off,
+and the button-holes are burst."
+
+"I'm sure they can be mended. Martha would have done it if you'd asked
+her," said Vic, resolving to see to the unhappy mackintosh herself. "I
+know poor mamma doesn't want to spend any extra money just now."
+
+"There's a great deal too much spent on Elsa and Frances, and all their
+furbelows," said Geoff, in what he thought a very manly tone. "Here,
+Vicky, help me to pull off my boots, and then I must climb up to the top
+of the house to change my things."
+
+Vicky knelt down obediently and tugged at the muddy boots, though it was
+a task she disliked as much as she could dislike anything. She was
+rewarded by a gruff "Thank you," and when Geoff came down again in dry
+clothes, to find the table neatly prepared, and his little sister ready
+to pour out his tea, he did condescend to say that she was a good child!
+But even though his toast was hot and crisp, and his egg boiled to
+perfection, Geoff's pleasanter mood did not last long. He had a good
+many lessons to do that evening, and they were lessons he disliked.
+Vicky sat patiently, doing her best to help him till her bedtime came,
+and he had barely finished when Frances brought a message that he was to
+come upstairs--mamma said he was not to work any longer.
+
+"You have finished, surely, Geoff?" she said, when he entered the
+drawing-room.
+
+"If I had finished, I would have come up sooner. You don't suppose I
+stay down there grinding away to please myself, do you?" replied the
+boy, rudely.
+
+"Geoff!" exclaimed his sisters, unwisely, perhaps.
+
+He turned upon them.
+
+"I've not come to have you preaching at me. Mamma, will you speak to
+them?" he burst out. "I hate this life--nothing but fault-finding as
+soon as I show my face. I wish I were out of it, I do! I'd rather be the
+poorest ploughboy in the country than lead this miserable life in this
+hateful London."
+
+[Illustration: VICKY ... TUGGED AT THE MUDDY BOOTS.]
+
+He said the last words loudly, almost shouting them, indeed. To do him
+justice, it was not often his temper got so completely the better of
+him. The noise he was making had prevented him and the others from
+hearing the bell ring--prevented them, too, from hearing, a moment or
+two later, a short colloquy on the stairs between Harvey and a
+new-comer.
+
+"Thank you," said the latter; "I don't want you to announce me. I'll do
+it myself."
+
+Geoff had left the door open.
+
+"Yes," he was just repeating, even more loudly than before, "I hate this
+life, I do. I am grinding at lessons from morning to night, and when I
+come home this is the way you treat me. I----"
+
+But a voice behind him made him start.
+
+"Hoot-toot, young man," it said. "Hoot-toot, hoot-toot! Come, I say,
+this sort of thing will never do. And ladies present! Hoot----"
+
+But the "toot" was drowned in a scream from Mrs. Tudor.
+
+"Uncle, dear uncle, is it you? Can it be you yourself? Oh, Geoff, Geoff!
+he is not often such a foolish boy, uncle, believe me. Oh, how--how
+thankful I am you have come!"
+
+She had risen from her seat and rushed forward to greet the stranger,
+but suddenly she grew strangely pale, and seemed on the point of
+falling. Elsa flew towards her on the one side, and the old gentleman on
+the other.
+
+"Poor dear!" he exclaimed. "I have startled her, I'm afraid. Hoot-toot,
+hoot-toot, silly old man that I am. Where's that ill-tempered fellow off
+to?" he went on, glancing round. "Can't he fetch a glass of water, or
+make himself useful in some way?"
+
+"I will," said Frances, darting forward. Geoffrey had disappeared, and
+small wonder.
+
+"I am quite right now, thank you," said Mrs. Tudor, trying to smile,
+when Elsa had got her on to the sofa. "Don't be frightened, Elsa dear.
+Nor you, uncle; it was just the--the start. I've had a good deal to make
+me anxious lately, you know."
+
+"I should think I did--those idiots of lawyers!" muttered the old man.
+
+"And poor Geoff," she went on; "I am afraid I have not paid much
+attention to him lately, and he's felt it--foolishly, perhaps."
+
+"Rubbish!" said Uncle Hoot-Toot under his breath. "Strikes me he's used
+to a good deal too much attention," he added as an aside to Elsa, with a
+quick look of inquiry in his bright keen eyes.
+
+Elsa could hardly help smiling, but for her mother's sake she restrained
+herself.
+
+"It will be all right now you have come home, dear uncle," Mrs. Tudor
+went on gently. "How was it? Had you started before you got my letters?
+Why did you not let us know?"
+
+"I was on the point of writing to announce my departure," said the old
+gentleman, "when your letter came. It struck me then that I could get
+home nearly as quickly as a letter, and so I thought it was no use
+writing."
+
+"Then you know--you know all about this bad news?" said Mrs. Tudor
+falteringly.
+
+[Illustration: THE ARRIVAL OF GREAT-UNCLE HOOT-TOOT.]
+
+"Yes; those fellows wrote to me. _That_ was right enough; but what they
+meant by worrying you about it, my dear, I can't conceive. It was quite
+against all my orders. What did poor Frank make me your trustee for, if
+it wasn't to manage these things for you?"
+
+"Then you think, you hope, there may be something left to manage, do
+you?" asked Mrs. Tudor, eagerly. "I have been anticipating the very
+worst. I did not quite like to put it in words to these poor
+children"--and she looked up affectionately at the two girls; "but I
+have really been trying to make up my mind to our being quite ruined."
+
+"Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!" said her uncle. "No such nonsense, my dear. I
+shall go to Norris's to-morrow morning and have it out with him. Ruined!
+No, no. It'll be all right, you'll see. We'll go into it all, and you
+have nothing to do but leave things to me. Now let us talk of pleasanter
+matters. What a nice, pretty little house you've got! And what nice,
+pretty little daughters! Good girls, too, or I'm uncommonly mistaken.
+They're comforts to you, Alice, my dear, eh?"
+
+"The greatest possible comforts," answered the mother, warmly. "And so
+is little Vic. You haven't seen her yet."
+
+"Little Vic? Oh, to be sure--my namesake." For Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's
+real name, you must know, was Mr. Victor Byrne. "To be sure; must see
+her to-morrow; Vic, to be sure."
+
+"And Geoffrey," Mrs. Tudor went on less assuredly. "Geoff is doing very
+well at school. You will have a good report of him from his masters. He
+is a steady worker, and----"
+
+"But how about the _home_ report of him, eh?" said Mr. Byrne, drily.
+"There's two sides to most things, and I've rather a weakness for seeing
+both. Never mind about that just now. I never take up impressions
+hastily. Don't be afraid. I'll see Master Geoff for myself. Let's talk
+of other things. What do these young ladies busy themselves about? Are
+they good housekeepers, eh?"
+
+Mrs. Tudor smiled.
+
+"Can you make a pudding and a shirt, Elsa and Frances?" she asked. "Tell
+your uncle your capabilities."
+
+"I could manage the pudding," said Elsa. "I think the days for home-made
+shirts are over."
+
+"Hoot-toot, toot-toot!" said Mr. Byrne; "new-fangled notions, eh?"
+
+"No, indeed, Great-Uncle Hoot----" began Frances, eagerly. Then blushing
+furiously, she stopped short.
+
+The old gentleman burst out laughing.
+
+"Never mind, my dear; I'm used to it. It's what they always called
+me--all my nephews and nieces."
+
+"Have you a great many nephews and nieces besides us?" asked Elsa.
+
+Mr. Byrne laughed again.
+
+"That depends upon myself," he said. "I make them, you see. I have had
+any quantity in my day, but they're scattered far and wide. And--there
+are a great many blanks, Alice, my dear, since I was last at home," he
+added, turning to Mrs. Tudor. "I don't know that any of them was ever
+quite such a pet of mine as this little mother of yours, my dears."
+
+"Oh!" said Elsa, looking rather disappointed; "you are not our real
+uncle, then? I always thought you were."
+
+[Illustration: MY BLACKAMOOR.]
+
+"Well, think so still," said Mr. Byrne. "At any rate, you must treat me
+so, and then I shall be quite content. But I must be going. I shall see
+you to-morrow after I've had it out with that donkey Norris. What a
+stupid idiot he is, to be sure!" and for a moment Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot
+looked quite fierce. "And then I must see little Vic. What time shall I
+come to-morrow, Alice?"
+
+"Whenever you like, uncle," she said. "Will you not come and stay here
+altogether?"
+
+"No, thank you, my dear. I've got my own ways, you see. I'm a fussy old
+fellow. And I've got my servant--my blackamoor. He'd frighten all the
+neighbours. And you'd fuss yourself, thinking I wasn't comfortable. I'll
+come up to-morrow afternoon and stay on to dinner, if you like. And just
+leave the boy to me a bit. Good night, all of you; good night."
+
+And in another moment the little old gentleman was gone.
+
+The two girls and their mother sat staring at each other when he had
+disappeared.
+
+"Isn't it like a dream? Can you believe he has really come, mamma?" said
+Elsa.
+
+"Hardly," replied her mother. "But I am very thankful. If only Geoff
+will not vex him."
+
+Elsa and Frances said nothing. They had their own thoughts about their
+brother, but they felt it best not to express them.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+FOOLISH GEOFF.
+
+
+"Is he like what you expected, Elsa?" asked Frances, when they were in
+their own room.
+
+"Who? Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot? I'm sure I don't know. I don't think I ever
+thought about what he'd be like."
+
+"Oh, I _had_ an idea," said Frances. "Quite different, of course, from
+what he really is. I had fancied he'd be tall and stooping, and with a
+big nose and very queer eyes. I think I must have mixed him up with the
+old godfather in the 'Nutcracker of Nuremberg,' without knowing it."
+
+"Well, he's not so bad as that, anyway," said Elsa. "He looks rather
+shrivelled and dried up; but he's so very neat and refined-looking. Did
+you notice what small brown hands he has, and such _very_ bright eyes?
+Isn't it funny that he's only an adopted uncle, after all?"
+
+"I think mamma had really forgotten he wasn't our real uncle," said
+Frances. "Elsa, I am very glad he has come. I think poor mamma has been
+far more unhappy than she let us know. She does look so ill."
+
+"It's half of it Geoff," said Elsa, indignantly. "And now he must needs
+spoil Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's arrival by his tempers. Perhaps it's just
+as well, however. 'By the pricking of my thumbs,' I fancy Geoff has met
+his master."
+
+"Elsa, you frighten me a little," said Frances. "You don't think he'll
+be very severe with poor Geoff?"
+
+"I don't think he'll be more severe than is for Geoff's good," replied
+Elsa. "I must confess, though, I shouldn't like to face Great-Uncle
+Hoot-Toot if I felt I had been behaving badly. How his eyes can gleam!"
+
+"And how he seemed to flash in upon us all of a sudden, and to disappear
+almost as quickly! I'm afraid there's something a little bit uncanny
+about him," said Frances, who was very imaginative. "But if he helps to
+put all the money troubles right, he will certainly be like a good fairy
+to us."
+
+"Yes; and if he takes Geoff in hand," added Elsa. "But, Frances, we must
+go to bed. I want to make everything very nice to-morrow; I'm going to
+think about what to have for dinner while I go to sleep."
+
+For Elsa was housekeeper--a very zealous and rather anxious-minded young
+housekeeper. Her dreams were often haunted by visions of bakers' books
+and fishmongers' bills; to-night curry and pilau chased each other
+through her brain, and Frances was aroused from her first sweet slumbers
+to be asked if she would remember to look first thing to-morrow morning
+if there was a bottle of chutney in the store-closet.
+
+[Illustration: ELSA WAS HOUSEKEEPER.]
+
+At breakfast Geoff came in, looking glum and slightly defiant. But he
+said nothing except "Good morning." He started, however, a little, when
+he saw his mother.
+
+"Mamma," he said, "are you not well? You look so very pale."
+
+The girls glanced up at this. It was true. They had not observed it in
+the excitement of discussing the new arrival, and the satisfaction of
+knowing it had brought relief to Mrs. Tudor's most pressing anxieties.
+
+"Yes, mamma dear. It is true. You do look very pale. Now, you must not
+do anything to tire yourself all day. We will manage everything, so that
+Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot shall see we are not silly useless girls," said
+Elsa.
+
+Geoffrey's lips opened as if he were about to speak, but he closed them
+again. He was still on his high horse.
+
+"Geoff," said his mother, as he was leaving, "you will dine with us this
+evening. Try to get your lessons done quickly. Uncle will wish to see
+something of you."
+
+He muttered an indistinct "Very well, mamma," as he shut the door.
+
+"Humph!" he said to himself, "I suppose Elsa will want to make him think
+I'm properly treated. But _I_ shall tell him the truth--any _man_ will
+understand how impossible it is for me to stand it any longer. I don't
+mind if he did hear me shouting last night. There's a limit to endurance.
+But I wish mamma didn't look so pale. Of course they'll make out it's
+all _my_ fault."
+
+And feeling himself and his grievances of even more consequence than
+usual, Master Geoff stalked off.
+
+Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot made his appearance in the afternoon rather earlier
+than he was expected. He found Mrs. Tudor alone in the drawing-room, and
+had a talk with her by themselves, and then Vicky was sent for, to make
+his acquaintance. The little girl came into the drawing-room looking
+very much on her good behaviour indeed--so much so that Elsa and Frances,
+who were with her, could scarcely help laughing.
+
+"How do you do, my dear?" said her great-uncle, looking at her with his
+bright eyes.
+
+"Quite well, thank you," replied the little girl.
+
+"Hoot-toot!" said the old gentleman; "and is that all you've got to say
+to me?--a poor old fellow like me, who have come all the way from India
+to see you."
+
+Vicky looked up doubtfully, her blue eyes wandered all over Great-Uncle
+Hoot-Toot's queer brown face and trim little figure. A red flush spread
+slowly upwards from her cheeks to the roots of her fair hair, and by the
+peculiar droop in the corners of her mouth, Elsa, who was nearest her,
+saw that tears were not far off.
+
+"What is it, Vicky dear?" she whispered. "What _will_ he think of the
+children? Geoff in a temper, and Vicky crying for nothing!" she said to
+herself. "You are not frightened?" she added aloud.
+
+"No," said Vicky, trying to recover herself. "It's only about Geoff. I
+want to ask--_him_--not to be angry with Geoff."
+
+"And why should I be angry with Geoff?" said the old gentleman, his eyes
+twinkling. "Has he been saying so to you?"
+
+"Oh no!" the little girl eagerly replied. "Geoff didn't say anything. It
+was Harvey and Martha. They said they hoped he'd find his master now
+_you'd_ come, and that it was time he had some of his nonsense whipped
+out of him. You won't whip him, will you? Oh, please, please say you
+won't!" and she clasped her hands beseechingly. "Geoff isn't naughty
+_really_. He doesn't mean to be naughty."
+
+The tears were very near now.
+
+"Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!" said Mr. Byrne. "Come, come, my little Vic; I
+don't like this at all. So they've been making me out an ogre. That's
+too bad. Me whip Geoff! Why, I think he could better whip me--a strong,
+sturdy fellow like that. No, no, I don't want to whip him, I assure you.
+But I'm glad to see Geoff's got such a good little sister, and that
+she's so fond of him. He's not a bad brother to you, I hope? You
+couldn't be so fond of him if he were."
+
+"Oh no; Geoff's not naughty to me, scarcely _never_," said Vicky,
+eagerly. "I'm sure he never wants to be naughty. It's just that he's got
+some bad habits, of teasing and grumbling, and he can't get out of
+them," she went on, with a little air of wisdom that was very funny.
+
+"Exactly," said Uncle Hoot-Toot, nodding his head. "Well, don't you
+think it would be a very good thing if we could help him to get out of
+them?"
+
+Vicky looked up doubtfully again.
+
+"If I think of some plan--something that may really do him good, you'll
+trust your poor old uncle, won't you, my little Vic?"
+
+She gave him a long steady stare.
+
+"Yes," she said at last. Then with a sigh, "I would like Geoff to get
+out of his tiresome ways."
+
+And from this time Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot and Vicky were fast friends.
+
+Then he asked Elsa and Frances to go out a little walk with him.
+
+"Is your mother always as pale as I have seen her?" he said abruptly,
+almost as soon as they were alone.
+
+Elsa hesitated.
+
+"No," she said at last. "I'm afraid she is not at all well. Geoff
+noticed it this morning."
+
+"Oh, indeed! Then he does notice things sometimes?" said Mr. Byrne,
+drily.
+
+"He's very fond of mamma," put in Frances.
+
+"He takes a queer way to show it, it strikes me," remarked her uncle.
+
+"It's--it's all his temper, I'm afraid," Frances allowed reluctantly.
+
+"It is that he's spoilt," said Elsa. "He's perhaps not spoilt in one
+way, but in another he is. He has never known any hardships or been
+forced into any self-denial. Great-uncle," she went on earnestly, "if
+it's true that we have lost or are going to lose nearly all our money,
+won't it perhaps be a good thing for Geoff?"
+
+"Who says you're going to lose your money?"
+
+"I don't know exactly why I feel sure it's not coming right. I know you
+said so to mamma--at least you tried to make her happier; but I can't
+understand it. If that Mr. Norris wrote so strongly, there must be
+something wrong."
+
+Mr. Byrne moved and looked at her sharply.
+
+"You don't speak that way to your mother, I hope?"
+
+"Of course not," said Elsa; "I'm only too glad for her to feel happier
+about it. I was only speaking of what I thought myself."
+
+"Well--well--as long as your mother's mind is easier it doesn't matter.
+I cannot explain things fully to you at present, but you seem to be
+sensible girls, and girls to be trusted. I may just tell you this
+much--all this trouble is nothing new; I had seen it coming for years.
+The only thing I had not anticipated was that those fools of lawyers
+should have told your mother about the crash when it did come. There was
+no need for her to know anything about it. I'm her trustee----"
+
+"But not legally," interrupted Elsa. "Mamma explained to us that you
+couldn't be held responsible, as it was only like a friend that you had
+helped her all these years."
+
+"Hoot-toot, toot-toot!" he replied testily; "what difference does that
+make? But never mind. I will explain all about it to you both--before
+long. Just now the question is your mother. I think you will agree with
+me when I say that it is plain to me that Master Geoff should leave
+home?"
+
+"I'm afraid mamma will be very much against it," said Elsa. "You see,
+Geoff is a good boy in big things, and mamma thinks it is owing to her
+having kept home influence over him. He's truthful and conscientious--he
+is, indeed, and you must see I'm not inclined to take his part."
+
+"But he's selfish, and bullying, and ungrateful. Not pretty qualities,
+my dear, or likely to make a good foundation for a man's after-life. I'm
+not going to send him to a grand boarding-school, however--that I
+promise you, for I think it would be the ruin of him. Whatever I may do
+to save your mother, I don't see but that Master Geoff should face his
+true position."
+
+"And we too, great-uncle," said Frances, eagerly. "Elsa and I are quite
+ready to work; we've thought of several plans already."
+
+"I quite believe you, my dear," said Mr. Byrne, approvingly. "You shall
+tell me your plans some time soon, and I will tell you mine. No fear but
+that you shall have work to do."
+
+"And----" began Elsa, but then she hesitated. "I was going to ask you
+not to decide anything about Geoff till you have seen more of him. If
+Frances and I could earn enough to keep him at school as he is, so that
+mamma could have the comf---- No, I'm afraid I can't honestly say that
+having Geoff at home would be any comfort to her--less than ever if
+Frances and I were away. Great-uncle, don't you think Geoff should have
+some idea of all this?"
+
+"Certainly. But I cannot risk his teasing your mother. We will wait a
+few days. I should like to see poor Alice looking better; and I shall
+judge of Geoff for myself, my dears."
+
+They were just at home again by this time. Vicky met them at the door.
+She was in great excitement about Mr. Byrne's Indian servant, who had
+come with his master's evening clothes.
+
+"I was watching for Geoff, to tell him!" she exclaimed. "But my tea's
+ready; I must go." And off she ran.
+
+"Good little girl," said Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot, nodding his head
+approvingly. "No grumbling from _her_, eh?"
+
+"No, never," said Elsa, warmly. "She's having her tea alone to-day.
+Geoff's coming in to dinner in your honour."
+
+"Humph!" said the old gentleman.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration: GEOFF'S INTERVIEW WITH GREAT-UNCLE HOOT-TOOT.]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+A CRISIS.
+
+
+Mrs. Tudor and the two girls had gone upstairs to the drawing-room.
+Geoff glanced dubiously at Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot.
+
+"Shall I--shall I stay with you, sir?" he asked.
+
+Geoff was on his good behaviour.
+
+The old gentleman glanced at him.
+
+"Certainly, my boy, if you've nothing better to do," he said. "No
+lessons--eh?"
+
+"No, sir," Geoff replied. "I've got all done, except a little I can do
+in the morning."
+
+"They work you pretty hard, eh?"
+
+"Yes, they do. There's not much fun for a fellow who's at school in
+London. It's pretty much the same story--grind, grind, from one week's
+end to another."
+
+"Hoot-toot! That sounds melancholy," said Mr. Byrne. "No holidays, eh?"
+
+"Oh, of course, I've some holidays," said Geoff. "But, you see, when a
+fellow has only got a mother and sisters----"
+
+"_Only_," repeated the old gentleman; but Geoff detected no sarcasm in
+his tone.
+
+"And mother's afraid of my skating, or boating on the river, or----"
+
+"Doesn't she let you go in for the school games?" interrupted Mr. Byrne
+again.
+
+"Oh yes; it would be too silly not to do _that_. I told her at the
+beginning--I mean, she understood--it wouldn't do. But there's lots of
+things I'd like to do, if mother wasn't afraid. I should like to ride,
+or at least to have a tricycle. It's about the only thing to make life
+bearable in this horrible place. Such weather! I do hate London!"
+
+"Indeed!" said Mr. Byrne. "It's a pity your mother didn't consult you
+before settling here."
+
+"She did it for the best, I suppose," said Geoff. "She didn't want to
+part with me, you see. But I'd rather have been at a boarding-school in
+the country; I do so detest London. And then it's not pleasant to be too
+poor to have things one should have at a public school."
+
+"What may those be?" inquired the old gentleman.
+
+"Oh, heaps of things. Pocket-money, for one thing. I was telling mother
+about it. I really should have more, if I'm to stay properly at school.
+There's Dick Colethorne, where I was staying last holidays--cousins of
+ours; he has six times what I have, and he's only two years older."
+
+"And--is his mother a widow, and in somewhat restricted circumstances?"
+asked Mr. Byrne.
+
+"Oh no," replied Geoff, unwarily. "His father's a very rich man; and
+Dick is the only child."
+
+"All the same, begging Mr. Colethorne's pardon, if he were twenty times
+as rich as Croesus, I think he's making a tremendous mistake in giving
+his boy a great deal of pocket-money," said Mr. Byrne.
+
+"Well, of course, I shouldn't want as much as he has," said Geoff; "but
+still----"
+
+"Geoffrey, my boy," said the old gentleman, rising as he spoke, "it
+strikes me you're getting on a wrong tack. But we'll have some more talk
+about all this. I don't want to keep your mother waiting, as I promised
+to talk some more to _her_ this evening. So we'll go upstairs. Some day,
+perhaps, I'll tell you some of the experiences of _my_ boyhood. I'm
+glad, by-the-by, to see that you don't take wine."
+
+"No-o," said Geoff. "That's one of the things mother is rather fussy
+about. I'd like to talk about it with you, sir; I don't see but that at
+my age I might now and then take a glass of sherry--or of claret, even.
+It looks so foolish never to touch any. It's not that I _care_ about
+it, you know."
+
+"At your age?" repeated Mr. Byrne, slowly. "Well, Geoff--do you know, I
+don't quite agree with you. Nor do I see the fun of taking a thing you
+'don't care about,' just for the sake of looking as if those who had the
+care of you didn't know what they were about."
+
+They were half-way upstairs by this time. Geoff's face did not wear its
+pleasantest expression as they entered the drawing-room.
+
+"He's a horrid old curmudgeon," he whispered to Vicky; "I believe Elsa's
+been setting him against me."
+
+Vicky looked at him with reproachful eyes. "Oh, Geoff," she said, "I do
+think he's so nice."
+
+"You do, do you?" said he. "Well, I don't. I'll tell you what, Vicky;
+I've a great mind to run away. I do so hate this life. I work ever so
+much harder than most of the fellows, and I never get any thanks for it;
+and everything I want is grudged me. My umbrella's all in rags, and I'm
+ashamed to take it out; and if I was to ask mamma for a new one, they'd
+all be down on me again, you'd see."
+
+"But you haven't had it long, Geoff," said Vic.
+
+"I've had it nearly a year. You're getting as bad as the rest, Vicky,"
+he said querulously.
+
+He had forgotten that he was not alone in the room with his little
+sister, and had raised his tone, as he was too much in the habit of
+doing.
+
+"Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!" said a now well-known voice from the other side
+of the room; "what's all that about over there? You and Victoria can't
+be quarrelling, surely?"
+
+Mrs. Tudor looked up anxiously.
+
+"Oh no," said Vicky, eagerly; "we were only talking."
+
+"And about what, pray?" persisted Mr. Byrne.
+
+Vicky hesitated. She did not want to vex Geoff, but she was unused to
+any but straightforward replies.
+
+"About Geoff's umbrella," she said, growing very red.
+
+"About Geoff's umbrella?" repeated the old gentleman. "What could there
+be so interesting and exciting to say about Geoff's umbrella?"
+
+"Only that I haven't got one--at least, mine's in rags; and if I say I
+need a new one, they'll all be down upon me for extravagance," said
+Geoff, as sulkily as he dared.
+
+"My dear boy, don't talk in that dreadfully aggrieved tone," said his
+mother, trying to speak lightly. "You know I have never refused you
+anything you really require."
+
+Geoffrey did not reply, at least not audibly. But Elsa's quick ears and
+some other ears besides hers--for it is a curious fact that old people,
+when they are not deaf, are often peculiarly the reverse--caught his
+muttered whisper.
+
+"Of course. Always the way if _I_ want anything."
+
+Mr. Byrne did not stay late. He saw that Mrs. Tudor looked tired and
+depressed, and he did not wish to be alone with her to talk about Geoff,
+as she probably would have done, for he could not have spoken of the boy
+as she would have wished to hear.
+
+A few days passed. Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot spent a part of each with the
+Tudor family, quietly making his observations. Geoff certainly did not
+show to advantage; and though his mother wore herself out with talking to
+him and trying to bring him to a more reasonable frame of mind, it was
+of no use. So at last she took Elsa's advice and left the discontented,
+tiresome boy to himself, for perhaps the first time in his life.
+
+And every evening, when alone with Victoria, the selfish boy entertained
+his poor little sister with his projects of running away from a home
+where he was so little appreciated.
+
+But a change came, and that in a way which Geoffrey little expected.
+
+One evening when Mr. Byrne said "Good night," it struck him that his
+niece looked particularly tired.
+
+"Make your mother go to bed at once, Elsa," he said, "I don't like her
+looks. If she's not better to-morrow, I must have a doctor to see her.
+And," he added in a lower tone still, "don't let Geoffrey go near her
+to-morrow morning. Has he bothered her much lately?"
+
+"Mamma has left him alone. It was much the best thing to do," Elsa
+replied. "But all the same, I can see that it is making her very
+unhappy."
+
+"Time something should be done; that's growing very plain," said Mr.
+Byrne. "Try and keep her quiet in the mean time, my dear. I have nearly
+made up my mind, and I'll tell you all about it to-morrow."
+
+Elsa felt rather frightened.
+
+"Great-uncle," she said, "I don't want to make silly excuses for Geoff,
+but it is true that he has never been quite so ill-natured and worrying
+as lately."
+
+"Or perhaps you have never seen it so plainly," said the old gentleman.
+"But you needn't think I require to be softened to him, my dear; I am
+only thinking of his good. He's not a bad lad at bottom; there's good
+stuff in him. But he's ruining himself, and half killing your mother.
+Life's been too easy to him, as you've said yourself. He needs bringing
+to his senses."
+
+Geoff slept soundly; moreover, his room was at the top of the house. He
+did not hear any disturbance that night--the opening and shutting of
+doors, the anxious whispering voices, the sound of wheels driving
+rapidly up to the door. He knew nothing of it all. For, alas! his
+tiresome, fidgety temper had caused him to be looked upon as no better
+than a sort of naughty child in the house--of no use or assistance,
+concerning whom every one's first thought in any trouble was, "We must
+manage to get Geoff out of the way, or to keep him quiet."
+
+When he awoke it was still dark. But there was a light in his room--some
+one had come in with a candle. It was Elsa. He rubbed his eyes and
+looked at her with a strange unreal feeling, as if he were still
+dreaming. And when he saw her face, the unreal feeling did not go away.
+She seemed so unlike herself, in her long white dressing-gown, the light
+of the candle she was holding making her look so pale, and her eyes so
+strained and anxious--_was_ it the candle, or was she really so very
+pale?
+
+"Elsa," he said sleepily, "what are you doing? What is the matter? Isn't
+it dreadfully late--or--or early for you to be up?" he went on
+confusedly.
+
+"It's the morning," said Elsa, "but we haven't been in bed all
+night--Frances and I. At least, we had only been in bed half an hour or
+so, when we were called up."
+
+"What was it?" asked Geoff, sleepily still. "Was the house on fire?"
+
+"Oh, Geoff, don't be silly!" said Elsa; "it's--it's much worse. Mamma
+has been so ill--she is still."
+
+Geoff started up now.
+
+"Do you want me to go for the doctor?" he said.
+
+"The doctor has been twice already, and he's coming back at nine
+o'clock," she answered sadly. "He thought her a tiny bit better when he
+came the last time. But she's very ill--she must be kept most
+_exceedingly_ quiet, and----"
+
+"I'll get up now at once," said Geoff; "I won't be five minutes, Elsa.
+Tell mamma I'd have got up before if I'd known."
+
+"But, Geoff," said Elsa, firmly, though reluctantly, "it's no use your
+hurrying up for that. You can't see her--you can't possibly see her
+before you go to school, anyway. The doctor says she is to be kept
+_perfectly_ quiet, and not worried in any way."
+
+"I wouldn't worry her, not when she's ill," said Geoff, hastily.
+
+[Illustration: IT WAS ELSA.]
+
+"You couldn't help it," said Elsa. "She--she was very worried about you
+last night, and she kept talking about your umbrella in a confused sort
+of way now and then all night. We quieted her at last by telling her we
+had given you one to go to school with. But if she saw you, even for an
+instant, she would begin again. The doctor said you were not to go into
+her room."
+
+A choking feeling had come into Geoff's throat when Elsa spoke about the
+umbrella; a very little more and he would have burst into tears of
+remorse. But as she went on, pride and irritation got the better of him.
+He was too completely unused to think of or for any one before himself,
+to be able to do so all of a sudden, and it was a sort of relief to
+burst out at his sister in the old way.
+
+"I think you're forgetting yourself, Elsa. Is mamma not as much to _me_
+as to you girls? Do you think I haven't the sense to know how to behave
+when any one's ill? I tell you I just will and shall go to see her,
+whatever you say;" and he began dragging on his socks as if he were
+going to rush down to his mother's room that very moment.
+
+Elsa grew still paler than she had been before.
+
+"Geoff," she said, "you must listen to me. It was for that I came up to
+tell you. You must _not_ come into mother's room. I'd do anything to
+prevent it, but I can't believe that you'll force me to quarrel with
+you this morning when--when we are all so unhappy. I don't want to
+make you more unhappy, but I can't help speaking plainly to you. You
+_have_ worried mamma terribly lately, Geoff, and now you must bear the
+punishment. It's--it's as much as her life is worth for you to go into
+her room and speak to her this morning. I cannot allow it."
+
+"_You_ allow it!" burst out Geoff. "Are you the head of the house?"
+
+"Yes," said Elsa, "when mamma is ill, I consider that I am. And what's
+more, Geoff, I have telegraphed to Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot. He made me
+promise to do so if mamma were ill. I expect him directly. It is past
+seven. Geoff, you had better dress and take your breakfast as usual. I
+will come down and tell you how mamma is the last thing before you go."
+
+"I _will_ see mamma before I go to school," he replied sharply. "I give
+you fair warning."
+
+"Geoff," said Elsa, "you shall not."
+
+And with these words she left the room.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+GEOFF "WON'T STAND IT."
+
+
+Geoff hurried on with his dressing. He was wretchedly unhappy--all the
+more so because he was furiously angry with Elsa, and perhaps, at the
+bottom of his heart, with himself.
+
+His room was, as I have said, at the top of the house. He did not hear
+the front-door bell ring while he was splashing in his bath; and as he
+rushed downstairs a quarter of an hour or so after Elsa had left him, he
+was considerably taken aback to be met at the foot of the first flight
+by the now familiar figure of Mr. Byrne.
+
+"Geoffrey," he said quietly, "your sisters have gone to lie down and try
+to sleep for a little. They have been up all night, and they are likely
+to want all their strength. Go down to the school-room and get your
+breakfast. When you have finished, I will come to talk to you a little
+before you go to school."
+
+Geoff glanced up. There was something in Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's face
+which made him feel there was no use in blustering or resisting.
+
+"Very well," he said, putting as little expression in his voice as he
+could; and as Mr. Byrne turned away, the boy made his way down to the
+school-room.
+
+It looked dreary and strange this morning. It was earlier than usual,
+and perhaps the room had been less carefully done, for Mrs. Tudor's
+illness had upset the whole household. The fire was only just lighted;
+the preparations for Geoff's breakfast were only half ready. It was a
+very chilly day; and as the boy sat down by the table, leaning his head
+on his hands, he shivered both with cold and unhappiness.
+
+"They all hate me," he said to himself. "I've known it for a long time,
+but I've never been so sure of it before. It is much the best for me to
+go away. Mamma _has_ cared for me; but they're making her leave off, and
+they'll set her entirely against me. She'll be far better and happier
+without me; and when she gets well--I dare say they have exaggerated her
+illness--they will have the pleasure of saying it's because I'm gone.
+There's only Vic who'll really care. But she won't mind so very much,
+either. I'll write to her now and then. I must think how best to do
+about going away. I hate the sea; there's no use thinking of that. I
+don't mind what I do, if it's in the country. I might go down to some
+farmhouse--one of those jolly farms where Dick and I used to get a glass
+of milk last summer. I wouldn't mind a bit, working on one of those
+farms. It would be much jollier than grinding away at school. And I am
+sure Dick and I did as much work as any haymakers last summer."
+
+He had worked himself up into positively looking forward to the idea of
+leaving home. Vague ideas of how his mother and sisters would learn too
+late how little they had appreciated him; visions of magnanimously
+forgiving them all some day when he should have, in some mysterious way,
+become a landed proprietor, riding about his fields, and of inviting
+them all down into the country to visit him, floated before his brain.
+He ate his breakfast with a very good appetite; and when Mr. Byrne
+entered the room, he was surprised to see no look of sulkiness on the
+boy's face; though, on the other hand, there were no signs of concern or
+distress.
+
+"Is he really _heartless_?" thought the old man, with a pang of
+disappointment. "Am I mistaken in thinking the good material is there?"
+
+"I want to talk to you, Geoff," he said. "You are early this morning.
+You need not start for twenty minutes or more."
+
+"Am I to understand you intend to prevent me seeing my mother, sir?"
+said Geoff, in a peculiar tone.
+
+Mr. Byrne looked at him rather sadly.
+
+"It is not _I_ preventing it," he said. "The doctor has left his
+orders."
+
+"I understand," said Geoff, bitterly. "Well, it does not much matter.
+Mother and the others are not likely to see much more of me."
+
+The old gentleman looked at him sharply.
+
+"Are you thinking of running away?" he said.
+
+"Not running away," said Geoffrey. "I'm not going to do it in any secret
+sort of way; but I've made up my mind to go. And now that mother has
+thrown me over too, I don't suppose any one will care."
+
+"You've not been going the way to make any one care, it strikes me,"
+said Mr. Byrne. "But I have something to say to you, Geoff. One thing
+which has helped to make your poor mother ill has been anxiety about
+money matters. I had not wished her to know of it; but it was told her
+by mistake. I myself have known for some time that things were going
+wrong. But now the worst has come----"
+
+"What is the worst?" asked Geoffrey. "Have we lost everything?"
+
+"Yes," said Mr. Byrne, "I think that's about it."
+
+"I think I should have been told this before," said Geoff.
+
+"Well," said his uncle, "I'm not sure but that I agree with you. But
+your mother wished to save you as long as she could. And you have not
+borne small annoyances so well that she could hope for much comfort from
+you in a great trouble."
+
+[Illustration: "I HAVE SOMETHING TO SAY TO YOU, GEOFF."]
+
+Geoff said nothing.
+
+"I shall take care of your mother and sisters," Mr. Byrne went on.
+
+"I am not even to be allowed to work for my mother, then?" said
+Geoffrey.
+
+"At your age it will be as much as you can do to work for yourself,"
+said the old man. "And as yet, you cannot even do that directly. You
+must go on with your education. I have found a school in the country
+where you will be well taught, and where you will not be annoyed by not
+being able to have all that your companions have, as you have so
+complained about."
+
+"And who is to pay for my schooling?" asked the boy.
+
+"I," replied Mr. Byrne.
+
+"Thank you," said Geoffrey. His tone was not exactly disrespectful, but
+it was certainly not grateful. "I know I should thank you, but I don't
+want you to pay schooling or anything else for me. I shall manage for
+myself. It is much best for me to go away altogether. Even--even if this
+about our money hadn't happened, I was already making up my mind to it."
+
+Mr. Byrne looked at him.
+
+"Legally speaking, your mother could stop your leaving her," he said.
+
+"She is not likely to do so," replied the boy, "if she is so ill that
+she cannot even see me."
+
+"Perhaps not," said the old gentleman. "I will send my servant to you at
+mid-day, to say how your mother is."
+
+"Thank you," said Geoffrey again.
+
+Then Mr. Byrne left the room, and Geoff went off to school.
+
+He was in a strange state of mind. He hardly took in what he had been
+told of the state of his mother's money matters. He hardly indeed
+believed it, so possessed was he by the idea that there was a sort of
+plot to get rid of him.
+
+"It isn't mother herself," he reflected. "It's all Elsa and Frances, and
+that horrid old Hoot-Toot. But as for going to any school _he'd_ send me
+to--no, thank you."
+
+He was standing about at noon with some of his companions, when the
+coloured servant appeared.
+
+"Please, sir," he said, "I was to tell you that the lady is
+better--doctor say so;" and with a kind of salaam he waited to see what
+the young gentleman would reply.
+
+"All right," said Geoff, curtly; and the man turned to go.
+
+Geoff did not see that at the gates he stood still a moment speaking to
+another man, who appeared to have been waiting for him.
+
+"That young gentleman with the dark hair. You see plain when I speak to
+him," he said in his rather broken English.
+
+The other man nodded his head.
+
+"I shall know him again, no fear. Tell your master it's all right," he
+said.
+
+Geoff had to stand some chaff from his friends on the subject of the
+"darkey," of course. At another time he would rather have enjoyed it
+than otherwise; but to-day he was unable to take part in any fun.
+
+"What a surly humour Tudor's in!" said one of the boys to another.
+
+Geoff overheard it, and glared at him.
+
+"I shan't be missed here either, it seems," he said to himself.
+
+He did not notice that evening, when he went home, that a respectable
+unobtrusive-looking man, with the air of a servant out of livery, or
+something of that kind, followed him all the way, only turning back when
+he had seen the boy safe within his own door. And there, just within,
+faithful Vicky was awaiting him.
+
+"I've been watching for you such a time, Geoff dear," she said. "Mamma's
+better. _Aren't_ you glad? The doctor's been again, just about an hour
+ago, and he told me so as he went out."
+
+"Have you seen her?" said Geoff, abruptly.
+
+Vicky hesitated. She knew her answer would vex Geoff, and yet she could
+not say what was not true.
+
+[Illustration: HE STOOD STILL A MOMENT SPEAKING TO ANOTHER MAN.]
+
+"I've only _just_ seen her," she said. "Elsa just took me in for a
+moment. She has to be kept very, very quiet, Geoff. She'll have to be
+very quiet for a long time."
+
+"You may as well speak plainly," said her brother. "I know what that
+means--I'm not to be allowed to see her for 'a very, very long time.' Oh
+yes, I quite understand."
+
+He was in his heart thankful to know that his mother was better, but the
+relief only showed itself in additional ill-temper and indignation.
+
+"Geoffrey dear, don't speak like that," said Vicky. "I wish I hadn't
+gone in to see mamma if you couldn't, but I didn't like to say so to
+Elsa. I know you didn't _mean_ ever to vex mamma, and I'm sure you'll
+never do it again, when she gets better, will you? Would you like me
+just to run and tell Elsa and Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot how _dreadfully_
+you'd like to see her just for a minute? If you just peeped in, you
+know, and said 'Good night, mamma; I am so awfully glad you're better!'
+that would be better than nothing. Shall I, Geoff?"
+
+"No," he replied gruffly. "I want to ask nothing. And I'm not sure that
+I _do_ want dreadfully to see her. Caring can't be all on one side."
+
+Vicky's eyes were full of tears by this time.
+
+"Oh, Geoff!" was all she could say. "Mamma not care for you!"
+
+Her distress softened him a little.
+
+"Don't _you_ cry about it, Vic," he said. "I do believe _you_ care for
+me, anyway. You always will, won't you, Vicky?"
+
+"Of course I shall," she sobbed, while some tears dropped into Geoff's
+teacup. They were in the school-room by this time, and Vicky was at her
+usual post.
+
+"And some day," pursued Geoff, condescendingly, "perhaps we'll have a
+little house of our own, Vicky, in the country, you know; we'll have
+cocks and hens of our own, and always fresh eggs, of course, and
+strawberries, and----"
+
+"Cream," suggested Vicky, her eyes gleaming with delight at the tempting
+prospect; "strawberries are nothing without cream."
+
+"Of course," Geoff went on. "I was going to say cream, when you
+interrupted me. We'd have a cream-cow, Vicky."
+
+"A cream-cow," Vicky repeated. "What's that?"
+
+"Oh, I don't know exactly. But one often reads of a milk-cow, so I
+supposed there must be some cows that are all for cream, if some are for
+milk. I'll find out all about it when----" But he stopped short. "Never
+mind, Vicky. When I have a little farm of my own, in the country, I
+promise you I'll send for you to come and live with me."
+
+"But you'll invite mamma and Elsa, and Francie too, Geoff; I wouldn't
+care to come without them," objected Vicky.
+
+"Mamma; oh yes, if she likes to come. Perhaps Elsa and Frances will be
+married, and have houses of their own by then. I'm sure I hope so."
+
+He had talked himself and Vicky into quite good spirits by this time. He
+was almost forgetting about his plan of running away. But it was soon
+recalled to him. Elsa put her head in at the door.
+
+"Vicky," she said, "you may come up to see mamma for a few minutes. Come
+now, quick, before Geoff comes home, or else he will begin about it
+again, and he just _must_ not see her for some days. Mamma sees that he
+must not."
+
+Geoff's face grew dark.
+
+"Elsa," Vicky called out appealingly. But Elsa had already disappeared.
+
+And then Geoffrey _quite_ made up his mind.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+A FORTUNATE CHANCE.
+
+
+He was a sensible, practical enough boy in some ways. He thought it all
+well over that night, and made what preparations he could. He packed up
+the clothes he thought the most necessary and useful in an old carpet-bag
+he found in the box-room, and then he looked over his drawers and
+cupboards to see that all was left in order, and he put together some
+things to be sent to him in case he found it well to write for them.
+
+Then he looked at his purse. He had, carefully stowed away, thirty
+shillings in gold, and of his regular pocket-money a two-shilling piece,
+a shilling, a threepenny bit, and some coppers. It was enough to take
+him some hours' distance out of London, where he would be quite as
+likely to find what he wanted, employment at some farmhouse, as farther
+away.
+
+He did not sleep much that night. He was so anxious to be off early that
+he kept waking up every hour or two. At last, after striking a match to
+see what o'clock it was for perhaps the twentieth time, his watch told
+him it was past six. He got up and dressed, then he shouldered his bag,
+and made his way as quickly as he could downstairs. He could not resist
+lingering a moment outside his mother's door; it was slightly ajar, and
+there was a faint light within. Elsa's voice came to him as he stood
+there.
+
+"I am _so_ glad you are better this morning, dear mamma," she was
+saying. "I hoped you would be when I went to bed, at three o'clock. You
+were sleeping so peacefully. I am sure you will be quite well again
+soon, if we can manage to keep you quiet, and if you won't worry
+yourself. Everything is quite right."
+
+Geoff's face hardened again.
+
+"I know what all that means," he thought. "Yes, indeed, everything is so
+right that I, _I_, have to run away like a thief, because I am too
+miserable to bear it any more."
+
+And he lingered no longer.
+
+He made his way out of the house without difficulty. It was getting
+light after a fashion by this time, though it was quite half an hour
+earlier than he usually started for school. He felt chilly--chillier
+than he had ever felt before, though it was not a very cold morning. But
+going out breakfastless does not tend to make one feel warm, and of this
+sort of thing Geoff had but scant experience. His bag, too, felt very
+heavy; he glanced up and down the street with a vague idea that perhaps
+he would catch sight of some boy who, for a penny or two, would carry it
+for him to the omnibus; but there was no boy in sight. No one at all,
+indeed, except a young man, who crossed the street from the opposite
+side while Geoff was looking about him, and walked on slowly a little in
+front. He was a very respectable-looking young man, far too much so to
+ask him to carry the bag, yet as Geoff overtook him--for, heavy though
+it was, the boy felt he must walk quickly to get off as fast as
+possible--the young man glanced up with a good-natured smile.
+
+"Excuse me, sir," he said civilly, "your bag's a bit heavy for you. Let
+me take hold of it with you, if we're going the same way."
+
+Geoffrey looked at him doubtfully. He was too much of a Londoner to make
+friends hastily.
+
+"Thank you," he said. "I can manage it. I'm only going to the corner to
+wait for the omnibus."
+
+"Just precisely what I'm going to do myself," said the other. "I'm quite
+a stranger hereabouts. I've been staying a day or two with a friend of
+mine who keeps a livery stable, and I'm off for the day to Shalecray, to
+see another friend. Can you tell me, sir, maybe, if the omnibus that
+passes near here takes one to the railway station?"
+
+"Which railway station?" said Geoff, more than half inclined to laugh at
+the stranger's evident countrifiedness.
+
+"Victoria Station, to be sure. It's the one I come by. Isn't it the big
+station for all parts?"
+
+"Bless you! no," said Geoff. "There are six or seven as big as it in
+London. What line is this place on?"
+
+"That's more nor I can say," said the stranger, looking as if he would
+have scratched his head to help him out of his perplexity if he had
+had a hand free. But he had not, for he had caught up the bag, and
+was walking along beside Geoff, and under his arm he carried a very
+substantial alpaca umbrella. And in the interest of the conversation
+Geoff had scarcely noticed the way in which the stranger had, as it
+were, attached himself to him.
+
+"Ah, well! never mind. I'm going to Victoria myself, and when we get
+there I'll look up your place and find you your train," said Geoff,
+patronizingly.
+
+He had kept looking at the stranger, and as he did so, his misgivings
+disappeared.
+
+"He is just a simple country lad," he said to himself. And, indeed, the
+young man's blue eyes, fresh complexion, and open expression would have
+reassured any but a _most_ suspicious person.
+
+[Illustration: WALKING ALONG BESIDE GEOFF.]
+
+"You're very kind, sir," he replied. "You see, London's a big place, and
+country folk feels half stupid-like in it."
+
+"Yes, of course," said Geoff. "For my part, I often wonder any one
+that's free to do as they like cares to live in London. You're a great
+deal better off in the country."
+
+"There's bads and goods everywhere, I take it, sir," said the young man,
+philosophically.
+
+But by this time they had reached the corner where the omnibus started,
+and Geoff's attention was directed to hailing the right one. And an
+omnibus rattling over London stones is not exactly the place for
+conversation, so no more passed between them till they were dropped
+within a stone's throw of Victoria Station.
+
+Geoff was beginning to feel very hungry, and almost faint as well as
+chilly.
+
+"I say," he said to his companion, "you're not in any very desperate
+hurry to get off, are you? For I'm frightfully hungry. You don't mind
+waiting while I have some breakfast, do you? I'll look you out your
+train for that place as soon as I've had some."
+
+"All right, sir," said the stranger. "If it wouldn't be making too free,
+I'd be pleased to join you. But I suppose you'll be going into the
+first-class?"
+
+"Oh no," said Geoff. "I don't mind the second-class."
+
+And into the second-class refreshment-room they went. They grew very
+friendly over hot coffee and a rasher of bacon, and then Geoff laid out
+threepence on a railway guide, and proceeded to hunt up Shalecray.
+
+"Here you are!" he exclaimed. "And upon my word, that's a good joke.
+This place--Shalecray--is on the very line I'm going by. I wonder I
+never noticed it. I came up that way not long ago, from Entlefield."
+
+"Indeed, sir; that's really curious," said the countryman. "And are you
+going to Entlefield to-day?"
+
+"Well," said Geoff, "I fancy so. I've not quite made up my mind, to tell
+the truth. I know the country about there. I want to find some--some
+farmhouse."
+
+"Oh, exactly--I understand," interrupted the young man. "You want
+somewhere where they'll put you up tidily for a few days--just for a
+breath of country air."
+
+"Well, no; not exactly," said Geoffrey. "The fact is, I'm looking out
+for--for some sort of situation about a farm. I'm very fond of country
+life. I don't care what I do. I'm not a fine gentleman!"
+
+The countryman looked at him with interest.
+
+"I see," he said. "You're tired of town, I take it, sir. But what do
+your friends say to it, sir? At sixteen, or even seventeen, you have
+still to ask leave, I suppose?"
+
+"Not always," said Geoff. "I've made no secret of it. I've no father,
+and--I'm pretty much my own master."
+
+"'I care for nobody, and nobody cares for me,' eh?" quoted the young
+man, laughing.
+
+"Something like it, I suppose," said Geoff, laughing too, though rather
+forcedly. For a vision of Vicky, sobbing, perhaps, over her lonely
+breakfast, would come before him--of Elsa and Frances trying how to
+break to their mother the news that Geoff had really run away. "They'll
+soon get over it," he said to himself. "They've got that old curmudgeon
+to console them, and I don't want to live on _his_ money."
+
+"Do you think I can easily find a place of some kind?" he went on, after
+a pause.
+
+The countryman this time did scratch his head, while he considered.
+
+"How old may you be, sir? Sixteen or seventeen, maybe?" he inquired.
+
+"I'm not so much; I'm only fourteen," said Geoff, rather reluctantly.
+
+"Really! now, who'd 'a' thought it?" said his new friend, admiringly.
+"You'll be just the man for a country life when you're full-grown. Not
+afraid of roughing it? Fond of riding, I dare say?"
+
+"Oh yes," said Geoff. "At least, in town of course I haven't had as much
+of it as I'd like." He had never ridden in his life, except the previous
+summer, on a peculiarly gentle old pony of Mrs. Colethorne's.
+
+"No, in course not. Well now, sir, if you'd no objection to stopping at
+Shalecray with me, it strikes me my friend there, Farmer Eames, might
+likely enough know of something to suit you. He's a very decent fellow--a
+bit rough-spoken, maybe. But you're used to country ways--you'd not mind
+that."
+
+"Oh, not a bit!" said Geoff. "I'm much obliged to you for thinking of
+it. And you say it's possible--that this Farmer Eames may perhaps have a
+place that I should do for?"
+
+"Nay, sir, I can't say that. It's just a chance. I only said he'd maybe
+know of something."
+
+"Well, I don't see that it will do any harm to ask him. I'll only take
+a ticket to Shalecray, then. I can go on farther later in the day if I
+don't find anything to suit me there. We'd better take the first
+train--a quarter to nine. We've still twenty minutes or so to wait."
+
+"Yes, there's plenty of time--time for a pipe. You don't object, sir?
+But, bless me"--and he felt in his pockets one after the other--"if I
+haven't forgotten my 'bacca! With your leave, sir, I'll run across the
+street to fetch some. I saw a shop as we came in."
+
+"Very well," said Geoff; "I'll wait here. Don't be too late."
+
+He had no particular fancy for going to buy cheap tobacco in the company
+of the very rustic-looking stranger. Besides, he thought it safer to
+remain quiet in a dark corner of the waiting-room.
+
+It was curious that, though the countryman came back with a well-filled
+tobacco-pouch, he had not left the station! He only disappeared for a
+minute or two into the telegraph office, and the message he there
+indited was as follows:--
+
+"Got him all safe. Will report further this evening."
+
+And ten minutes later the two were ensconced in a third-class carriage,
+with tickets for Shalecray.
+
+Geoff had often travelled second, but rarely third. He did not, truth to
+tell, particularly like it. Yet he could not have proposed anything else
+to his companion, unless he had undertaken to pay the difference. And
+as it was, the breakfast and his own third-class ticket had made a
+considerable hole in his thirty shillings. He must be careful, for even
+with all his inexperience he knew it was _possible_ he might have to pay
+his own way for some little time to come.
+
+"Still, the chances are I shall find what I want very easily," he
+reflected. "It is evidently not difficult, by what this fellow tells
+me."
+
+It did not even strike him as in any way a very remarkable coincidence
+that almost on the doorstep of his own home he should have lighted upon
+the very person he needed to give him the particular information he was
+in want of. For in many ways, in spite of his boasted independence, poor
+Geoff was as innocent and unsuspicious as a baby.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII.
+
+"HALF-A-CROWN A WEEK AND HIS VICTUALS."
+
+
+Shalecray was a small station, where no very considerable number of
+trains stopped in the twenty-four hours. It was therefore a slow train
+by which Geoffrey Tudor and his new friend travelled; so, though the
+distance from London was really short, it took them fully two hours to
+reach their destination. And two hours on a raw drizzly November morning
+is quite a long enough time to spend in a third-class carriage, shivering
+if the windows are down, and suffering on the other hand from the odours
+of damp fustian and bad tobacco if they are up.
+
+Cold as it was, it seemed pleasant in comparison when they got out at
+last, and were making their way down a very muddy, but really country
+lane. Geoff gave a sort of snort of satisfaction.
+
+"I do love the country," he said.
+
+His companion looked at him curiously.
+
+"I believe you, sir," he replied. "You must like it, to find it pleasant
+in November," he went on, with a tone which made Geoff glance at him in
+surprise. Somehow in the last few words the countryman's accent seemed
+to have changed a little. Geoff could almost have fancied there was a
+cockney twang about it.
+
+"Why, don't _you_ like it?" said Geoff. "You said you were lost and
+miserable in town."
+
+"Of course, sir. What else could I be? I'm country born and bred. But
+it's not often as a Londoner takes to it as you do, and it's not to say
+lively at this time, and"--he looked down with a grimace--"the lanes is
+uncommon muddy."
+
+"How far is it to your friend's place?" Geoff inquired, thinking to
+himself that if _he_ were to remark on the mud it would not be
+surprising, but that it was rather curious for his companion to do so.
+
+"A matter of two mile or so," Jowett--for Ned Jowett, he had told Geoff,
+was his name--replied; "and now I come to think of it, perhaps it'd be
+as well for you to leave your bag at the station. I'll see that it's all
+right; and as you're not sure of stopping at Crickwood, there's no sense
+in carrying it there and maybe back again for nothing. I'll give it in
+charge to the station-master, and be back in a moment."
+
+He had shouldered it and was hastening back to the station almost before
+Geoff had time to take in what he said. The boy stood looking after him
+vaguely. He was beginning to feel tired and a little dispirited. He did
+not feel as if he could oppose anything just then.
+
+"If he's a cheat and he's gone off with my bag, I just can't help it,"
+he thought. "He won't gain much. Still, he looks honest."
+
+And five minutes later the sight of the young man's cheery face as he
+hastened back removed all his misgivings.
+
+"All right, sir," he called out. "It'll be quite safe; and if by chance
+you hit it off with Mr. Eames, the milk-cart that comes to fetch the
+empty cans in the afternoon can bring the bag too."
+
+They stepped out more briskly after that. It was not such a very long
+walk to the farm, though certainly more than the two miles Jowett had
+spoken of. As they went on, the country grew decidedly pretty, or
+perhaps it would be more correct to say one saw that in summer and
+pleasant weather it must be very pretty. Geoff, however, was hardly at
+the age for admiring scenery much. He looked about him with interest,
+but little more than interest.
+
+"Are there woods about here?" he asked suddenly. "I do like woods."
+
+Jowett hesitated.
+
+"I don't know this part of the country not to say so very well," he
+replied. "There's some fine gentlemen's seats round about, I believe.
+Crickwood Bolders, now, is a fine place--we'll pass by the park wall in
+a minute; it's the place that Eames's should by rights be the home farm
+to, so to say. But it's been empty for a many years. The family died
+down till it come to a distant cousin who was in foreign parts, and he
+let the farm to Eames, and the house has been shut up. They do speak of
+his coming back afore long."
+
+Geoff looked out for the park of which Jowett spoke; they could not see
+much of it, certainly, without climbing the wall, for which he felt no
+energy. But a little farther on they came to gates, evidently a back
+entrance, and they stood still for a moment or two and looked in.
+
+"Yes," said Geoff, gazing over the wide expanse of softly undulating
+ground, broken by clumps of magnificent old trees, which at one side
+extended into a fringe skirting the park for miles apparently, till it
+melted in the distance into a range of blue-topped hills--"yes, it must
+be a fine place indeed. That's the sort of place, now, I'd like to own,
+Jowett."
+
+He spoke more cordially again, for Jowett's acquaintance with the
+neighbourhood had destroyed a sort of misgiving that had somehow come
+over him as to whether his new friend were perhaps "taking him in
+altogether."
+
+[Illustration: THEY STOOD STILL FOR A MOMENT OR TWO.]
+
+"I believe you," said the countryman, laughing loudly, as if Geoff's
+remark had been a very good joke indeed. Geoff felt rather nettled.
+
+"And why shouldn't I own such a place, pray?" he said haughtily. "Such
+things, when one is a _gentleman_, are all a matter of chance, as you
+know. If my father, or my grandfather, rather, had not been a younger
+son, I should have been----"
+
+Ned Jowett turned to him rather gravely.
+
+"I didn't mean to offend you, sir," he said. "But you must remember
+you're taking up a different line from that. Farmer Eames, or farmer
+nobody, wouldn't engage a farm hand that expected to be treated as a
+gentleman. It's not my fault, sir. 'Twas yourself told me what you
+wished."
+
+Geoff was silent for a moment or two. It was not easy all at once to
+make up his mind to _not_ being a gentleman any more, and yet his common
+sense told him that Jowett was right; it must be so. Unless, indeed, he
+gave it all up and went back home again to eat humble pie, and live on
+Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's bounty, and go to some horrid school of his
+choosing, and be more "bullied" (so he expressed it to himself) than
+ever by his sisters, and scarcely allowed to see his mother at all. The
+silent enumeration of these grievances decided him. He turned round to
+Jowett with a smile.
+
+"Yes," he said; "I was forgetting. You must tell Farmer Eames he'll not
+find any nonsense about me."
+
+"All right, sir. But, if you'll excuse me, I'd best perhaps drop the
+'sir'?"
+
+Geoff nodded.
+
+"And that reminds me," Jowett went on, "you've not told me your
+name--leastways, what name you wish me to give Eames. We're close to his
+place now;" and as he spoke he looked about him scrutinizingly. "Ten
+minutes past the back way through the park you'll come to a lane on the
+left. Eames's farm is the first house you come to on the right," he
+repeated to himself, too low for Geoff to hear. "Yes, I can't be wrong."
+
+"You can call me Jim--Jim Jeffreys," said the boy. "He needn't be afraid
+of getting into any trouble if he takes me on. I've no father, and my
+mother won't worry about me," he added bitterly.
+
+The entrance to the lane just then came in sight.
+
+"This here's our way," said Jowett. "Supposing I go on a bit in front. I
+think it would be just as well to explain to Eames about my bringing
+you."
+
+"All right," said Geoff. "I'll come on slowly. Where is the farm?"
+
+"First house to the right; you can't miss it. But I'll come back to meet
+you again."
+
+He hurried on, and Geoff followed slowly. He was hungry now as well as
+cold and tired--at least, he supposed he must be hungry, he felt so dull
+and stupid. What should he do if Farmer Eames could not take him on? he
+began to ask himself; he really felt as if it would be impossible for
+him to set off on his travels again like a tramp, begging for work all
+over the country. And for the first time it began faintly to dawn upon
+him that he had acted very foolishly.
+
+"But it's too late now," he said to himself; "I'd die rather than go
+home and ask to be forgiven, and be treated by them all as if I deserved
+to be sent to prison. I've got enough money to keep me going for a day
+or two, anyway. If it was summer--haymaking-time, for instance, I
+suppose it would be easy enough to get work. But now----" and he
+shivered as he gazed over the bare, dreary, lifeless-looking fields on
+all sides, where it was difficult to believe that the green grass could
+ever spring again, or the golden grain wave in the sunshine--"I really
+wonder what work there can be to do in the winter. The ground's as hard
+as iron; and oh, my goodness, isn't it cold?"
+
+Suddenly some little way in front he descried two figures coming towards
+him. The one was Jowett; the other, an older, stouter man, must be
+Farmer Eames. Geoff's heart began to beat faster. Would he be met by a
+refusal, and told to make his way back to the station? And if so, where
+would he go, what should he do? It had all seemed so easy when he
+planned it at home--he had felt so sure he would find what he wanted at
+once; he had somehow forgotten it would no longer be summer when he got
+out into the country again! For the first time in his life he realized
+what hundreds, nay, thousands of boys, no older than he, must go through
+every day--poor homeless fellows, poor and homeless through no fault of
+their own in many cases.
+
+"If ever I'm a rich man," thought Geoff, "I'll think of to-day."
+
+And his anxiety grew so great that by the time the two men had come up
+to him his usually ruddy face had become almost white.
+
+Jowett looked at him curiously.
+
+"You look uncommon cold, Jim," he said. "This 'ere's Jim Jeffreys as
+I've been a-talking to you of, Mr. Eames," he said, by way of
+introduction to the farmer.
+
+"Ah, indeed!" Farmer Eames replied; "seems a well-grown lad, but looks
+delicate. Is he always so white-like?"
+
+"Bless you! no," said Jowett; "he's only a bit done up with--with one
+thing and another. We made a hearly start of it, and it's chilly this
+morning."
+
+The farmer grunted a little.
+
+"He'd need to get used to starting early of a morning if he was to be
+any use to me," he said half-grudgingly. But even this sounded hopeful
+to Geoff.
+
+"Oh, I don't mind getting up early," he said quickly. "I'm not used to
+lying in bed late."
+
+"There's early _and_ early," said the farmer. "What I might take you
+on trial for would be to drive the milk-cart to and fro the station.
+There's four sendings in all--full and empty together. And the first
+time is for the up-train that passes Shalecray at half-past five."
+
+Geoff shivered a little. But it would not do to seem daunted.
+
+"I'll be punctual," he said.
+
+"And of course, between times you'd have to make yourself useful about
+the dairy, and the pigs--you'd have to see to the pigs, and to make
+yourself useful," repeated the farmer, whose power of expressing himself
+was limited.
+
+"Of course," agreed Geoff as heartily as he could, though, truth to
+tell, the idea of pigs had not hitherto presented itself to him.
+
+"Well," Farmer Eames went on, turning towards Jowett, "I dunno as I mind
+giving him a trial, seeing as I'm just short of a boy as it happens.
+And for the station work, it's well to have a sharpish lad, and a
+civil-spoken one. You'll have to keep a civil tongue in your head, my
+boy--eh?"
+
+"Certainly," said Geoff, but not without a slight touch of haughtiness.
+"Of course I'll be civil to every one who's civil to me."
+
+"And who isn't civil to thee, maybe, now and then," said the farmer,
+with a rather curious smile. "'Twon't be all walking on roses--nay,
+'twon't be all walking on roses to be odd boy in a farm. But there's
+many a one as'd think himself uncommon lucky to get the chance, I can
+tell you."
+
+"Oh, and so I do," said Geoff, eagerly. "I do indeed. I think it's
+awfully good of you to try me; and you'll see I'm not afraid of work."
+
+"And what about his character?" said the farmer, speaking again to
+Jowett. "Can you answer for his honesty?--that's the principal thing."
+
+Geoff's cheeks flamed, and he was starting forward indignantly, when a
+word or two whispered, sternly almost, in his ear by Jowett, forced him
+to be quiet. "Don't be an idiot! do you want to spoil all your chances?"
+he said. And something in the tone again struck Geoff with surprise. He
+could scarcely believe it was the simple young countryman who was
+speaking.
+
+"I don't think you need be uneasy on that score," he said. "You see it's
+all come about in a rather--uncommon sort of way."
+
+"I should rather think so," said the farmer, shrugging his shoulders,
+but smiling too.
+
+"And," pursued Jowett, "you'll have to stretch a point or two. Of course
+he'll want very little in the way of wages to begin."
+
+"Half-a-crown a week and his victuals," replied the farmer, promptly.
+"And he must bind himself for three months certain--I'm not going to be
+thrown out of a boy at the orkardest time of the year for getting 'em
+into sharp ways. And I can't have no asking for holidays for three
+months, either."
+
+Jowett looked at Geoff.
+
+"Very well," said Geoff.
+
+"And you must go to church reg'lar," added the farmer. "You can manage
+it well enough, and Sunday school, too, if you're sharp--there's only
+twice to the station on Sundays."
+
+"On Sundays, too?" repeated Geoff. Sundays at worst had been a day of no
+work at home.
+
+"To be sure," said Eames, sharply. "Beasts can't do for themselves on
+Sundays no more than any other day. And Londoners can't drink sour milk
+on Sundays neither."
+
+"No," said Geoff, meekly enough. "Of course I'm used to church," he
+added, "but I think I'm rather too old for the Sunday school."
+
+"I'll leave that to the parson," said the farmer. "Well, now then, we
+may as well see if dinner's not ready. It's quite time, and you'll be
+getting hungry, Mr. Jowett," he added, with a slight hesitation.
+
+"Why not call me Ned? You're very high in your manners to-day, Eames,"
+said the other, with a sort of wink.
+
+Then they both laughed and walked on, leaving Geoff to follow. Nothing
+was said about _his_ being hungry.
+
+"Perhaps _I_ shall be expected to dine with the pigs," he thought.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX.
+
+PIGS, ETC.
+
+
+It was not quite so bad as that, however. Farmer Eames turned in at the
+farmyard gate and led the two strangers into a good-sized kitchen, where
+the table was already set, in a homely fashion, for dinner. A stout,
+middle-aged woman, with a rather sharp face, turned from the fire, where
+she was superintending some cooking.
+
+"Here we are again, wife," said Eames. "Glad to see dinner's ready. Take
+a chair, Mr. Ned. You'll have a glass of beer to begin with?" and as he
+poured it out, "This here's the new boy, missis--I've settled to give
+him a trial."
+
+Mrs. Eames murmured something, which Geoff supposed must have been
+intended as a kind of welcome. She was just then lifting a large pan of
+potatoes off the fire, and as she turned her face to the light, Geoff
+noticed that it was very red--redder than a moment before. He could
+almost have fancied the farmer's wife was shy.
+
+"Shall I help you?" he exclaimed, darting forward to take hold of the
+pan.
+
+Eames burst out laughing.
+
+"That's a good joke," he said. "He knows which side his bread's buttered
+on, does this 'ere young fellow."
+
+Geoff grew scarlet, and some angry rejoinder was on his lips, when
+Jowett, who to his great indignation was laughing too, clapped him on
+the shoulder.
+
+"Come, my boy, there's naught to fly up about. Eames must have his
+joke."
+
+"I see naught to laugh at," said Mrs. Eames, who had by this time shaken
+the potatoes into a large dish that stood ready to receive them; "the
+lad meant it civil enough."
+
+"You're not to spoil him now, wife," said her husband. "It's no
+counter-jumpers' ways we want hereabouts. Sit thee down, Ned; and Jim,
+there, you can draw the bench by the door a bit nearer the dresser, and
+I'll give you some dinner by-and-by."
+
+Geoff, his heart swelling, did as he was bid. He sat quietly enough,
+glad of the rest and the warmth, till Mr. and Mrs. Eames and their
+guest were all helped, and had allayed the first sharp edge of their
+appetites. But from time to time the farmer's wife glanced at Geoff
+uneasily, and once, he felt sure, he saw her nudge her husband.
+
+"She means to be kind," thought the boy.
+
+And her kindness apparently had some effect. The farmer looked round,
+after a deep draught of beer, and pushed his tankard aside.
+
+"Will you have a sup, Jim?" he said good-naturedly. "I can't promise it
+you every day; but for once in a way."
+
+[Illustration: HE SAT QUIETLY ENOUGH.]
+
+"No, thank you," Geoff replied. "I never take beer; moth----" but he
+stopped suddenly.
+
+"As you like," said the farmer; "but though you're not thirsty, I dare
+say you're hungry."
+
+He cut off a slice of the cold meat before him, and put it on a plate
+with some potatoes, and a bit of dripping from a dish on the table. The
+slice of meat was small in proportion to the helping of potatoes; but
+Geoff was faint with hunger. He took the plate, with the steel-pronged
+fork and coarse black-handled knife, and sat down again by the dresser
+to eat. But, hungry though he was, he could not manage it all. Half-way
+through, a sort of miserable choky feeling came over him: he thought of
+his meals at home--the nice white tablecloth, the sparkling glass and
+silver, the fine china--and all seemed to grow misty before his eyes for
+a minute or two; he almost felt as if he were going to faint, and the
+voices at the table sounded as if they came from the other side of the
+Atlantic. He drank some water--for on his refusing beer, Mrs. Eames had
+handed him a little horn mug filled with water; _it_ was as fresh and
+sweet as any he had ever tasted, and he tried at the same time to swallow
+down his feelings. And by the time that the farmer stood up to say
+grace, he felt pretty right again.
+
+"And what are you going to be about, Eames?" said Jowett. "I'll walk
+round the place with you, if you like. I must take the four train up
+again."
+
+"All right," the farmer replied; "Jim can take you to the station when
+he goes to fetch the cans. You'll see that he doesn't come to grief on
+the way. Do 'ee know how to drive a bit?"
+
+"Oh yes," replied Geoff, eagerly. "I drove a good deal last summer
+at--in the country. And I know I was very fond of it."
+
+"Well," said the farmer, drily, "you'll have enough of it here. But the
+pony's old; you mustn't drive him too fast. Now, I'll tell one of the
+men to show you the yard, and the pig-sties, and the missis'll show you
+where she keeps the swill-tub. It'll want emptying--eh, wife?"
+
+"It do that," she replied. "But he must change his clothes afore he gets
+to that dirty work. Those are your best ones, ain't they?"
+
+Geoff looked down at his suit. It was not his best, for he had left his
+Eton jackets and trousers behind him. The clothes he had on were a rough
+tweed suit he had had for the country; he had thought them very far from
+best. But now it struck him that they did look a great deal too good for
+feeding the pigs in.
+
+"I've got an older pair of trousers in my bag," he said; "but this is my
+oldest jacket."
+
+"He should have a rougher one," said Mrs. Eames. "I'll look out; maybe
+there's an old coat of George's as'd make down."
+
+"All right," said Eames. "But you've no need of a coat at all to feed
+the pigs in. Whoever heard o' such a thing?"
+
+Just then a voice was heard at the door.
+
+"I'm here, master," it said, "fur the new boy."
+
+"All right," said Eames; and, followed by Geoff, in his shirt-sleeves by
+this time, he led the way to the farmyard.
+
+It was interesting, if only it had not been so cold. Matthew, the man,
+was not very communicative certainly, and it seemed to the new boy that
+he eyed him with some disfavour. Eames himself just gave a few short
+directions, and then went off with Jowett.
+
+"Them's the stables," said Matthew, jerking his thumb towards a row of
+old buildings, "and them's the cow-houses," with a jerk the other way.
+"Old pony's with master's mare, as he drives hisself. I've nought to say
+to pony; it's your business. And I'll want a hand with cart-horses and
+plough-horses. Young folks has no call to be idle."
+
+"I don't mean to be idle," said Geoff; "but if Mr. Eames doesn't find
+fault with me, _you_'ve no call to do so either."
+
+He spoke more valiantly than he felt, perhaps, for Matthew's stolid face
+and small, twinkling eyes were not pleasant. He muttered something, and
+then went grumbling across the yard towards a wall, from behind which
+emanated an odour which required no explanation.
+
+"Them's pigs," said he. Matthew had a curious trick of curtailing his
+phrases as his temper waxed sourer. Articles, prepositions, and auxiliary
+verbs disappeared, till at last his language became a sort of spoken
+hieroglyphics.
+
+Geoff looked over the pig-sty wall. Grunt, grumph, snort--out they all
+tumbled, one on the top of the other, making for the trough. Poor
+things! it was still empty. Geoff could hardly help laughing, and yet he
+felt rather sorry for them.
+
+"I'll go and fetch their dinner," he said. "I don't mind pigs; but they
+are awfully dirty."
+
+"Ax the missus for soap to wash 'em," said Matthew, with a grin. He
+hadn't yet made up his mind if the new boy was sharp or not.
+
+"No," said Geoff, "I'll not do that till the first of April; but I'll
+tell you what, Matthew, I'll not keep them as dirty as they are. And _I_
+should say that the chap that's been looking after them is a very idle
+fellow." Matthew scowled. "Pigs don't _need_ to be so dirty," Geoff
+went on. "I know at Cole----" But he stopped abruptly. He was certainly
+not going to take Matthew into his confidence. He asked to be shown the
+pony--poor old pony! it didn't look as if it would be over
+"sperrity"--and then he went back to the house to fetch the pigs'
+dinner.
+
+Very hot, instead of cold, he was by the time he had carried across pail
+after pail of Mrs. Eames's "swill," and emptied it into the barrel which
+stood by the sty. It wasn't savoury work, either, and the farmer's wife
+made a kind of excuse for there being so much of it. "Matthew were that
+idle," and they'd been a hand short the last week or two. But Geoff
+wasn't going to give in; there was a sort of enjoyment in it when it
+came to the actual feeding of the pigs, and for their digestion's sake,
+it was well that the farmer's wife warned him that there _might_ be such
+a thing as over-feeding, even of pigs. He would have spent the best part
+of the afternoon in filling the trough and watching them squabble over
+it.
+
+He was tired and hot, and decidedly dirtier-looking than could have been
+expected, when Eames and Jowett came back from the fields.
+
+"Time to get the pony to!" shouted the farmer. Geoff turned off to the
+stable. He wanted to manage the harnessing alone; but, simple as it was,
+he found it harder than it looked, and he would have been forced to
+apply to Matthew, had not Jowett strolled into the stable. He felt sorry
+for the boy, sorrier than he thought it well to show, when he saw his
+flushed face and trembling hands, and in a trice he had disentangled the
+mysteries of buckles and straps, and got all ready.
+
+"Been working hard?" he said good-naturedly. "Seems a bit strange at
+first."
+
+"I don't mind the work; but--it does all seem very rough," said Geoff.
+
+There was a slight quiver in his voice, but Jowett said no more till
+they were jogging along on their way to the station. Geoff's spirits had
+got up a little again by this time. He liked to feel the reins between
+his fingers, even though the vehicle was only a milk-cart, and the steed
+a sadly broken-winded old gray pony; and he was rather proud at having
+managed to steer safely through the yard gate, as to which, to tell the
+truth, he had felt a little nervous.
+
+"Is there anything I can do for you on my way through town?" asked
+Jowett. "I'll be in your part of the world to-night."
+
+"Are you going to sleep at the livery stables?" asked Geoff.
+
+Jowett nodded.
+
+"I wish----" began the boy. "If I'd thought of it, I'd have written a
+letter for you to post in London. But there's no time now."
+
+Jowett looked at his watch--a very good silver watch it was--"I don't
+know that," he said. "I can get you a piece of paper and an envelope at
+the station, and I'll see that your letter gets to--wherever it is, at
+once."
+
+"Thank you," said Geoff. "And Jowett"--he hesitated. "You've been very
+good to me--would you mind one thing more? There's some one I would like
+to hear from sometimes, but I don't want to give my address. Could I
+tell them--her--it's my sister--to write to your place, and you to send
+it to me?"
+
+"To be sure," said Jowett. "But I won't give my address in the country.
+You just say to send on the letter to the care of
+
+'MR. ABEL SMITH,
+LIVERY STABLES,
+MOWBRAY PLACE MEWS,'
+
+and I'll see it comes straight to you. You won't want to give your name
+maybe? Just put 'Mr. James, care of Abel Smith.'"
+
+"Thank you," said Geoff, with a sigh of relief. "You see," he went on,
+half apologetically, "there's some one ill at home, and I'd like to know
+how--how they are."
+
+"To be sure," said Jowett again; "it's only natural. And however bad
+one's been treated by one's people--and it's easy to see they must have
+treated you _on_common badly to make a young gent like you have to leave
+his home and come down to work for his living like a poor boy, though I
+respects you for it all the more--still own folks is own folks."
+
+He cast a shrewd glance at Geoff, as he spoke. The boy could not help
+colouring. Had he been treated so "oncommon badly"? Was his determination
+to run away and be independent of Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's assistance a
+real manly resolution, or not rather a fit of ill-tempered boyish spite?
+Would he not have been acting with far more true independence by accepting
+gratefully the education which would have fitted him for an honourable
+career in his own rank? for Mr. Byrne, as he knew well by his mother's
+trust in the old gentleman, was not one to have thrown him aside had he
+been worthy of assistance.
+
+"But anyway, it's done now," thought the boy, choking down the feelings
+which began to assert themselves.
+
+At the station, Jowett was as good as his word. He got the paper and a
+pencil, and Geoff wrote a short note to Vicky, just to tell her he was
+"all right," and enclosing the address to which she was to write. And
+Jowett undertook that she should have it that same evening. Had the boy
+been less preoccupied he could not but have been struck by the curious
+inconsistencies in the young countryman, who, when he had first met him
+that morning, had seemed scarcely able to find his way to the station,
+and yet, when occasion arose, had shown himself as sharp and capable as
+any Londoner.
+
+But as it was, when the train had whizzed off again, he only felt as
+if his last friend had deserted him. And it was a very subdued and
+home-sick Geoffrey who, in the chilly, misty autumn evening, drove the
+old pony through the muddy lanes to the farm, the empty milk-cans
+rattling in the cart behind him, and the tears slowly coursing down his
+cheeks now there was no one to see them.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X.
+
+POOR GEOFF!
+
+
+He drove into the yard, where Matthew's disagreeable face and voice soon
+greeted him. Half forgetting himself, Geoff threw the reins on to the
+pony's neck and jumped out of the cart, with his carpet-bag. He was
+making his way into the house, feeling as if even the old bag was a kind
+of comfort in its way, when the farm-man called him back.
+
+"Dost think I's to groom pony?" he said ill-naturedly. "May stand till
+doomsday afore I'll touch him."
+
+[Illustration: MATTHEW, THE MAN.]
+
+Geoff turned back. Of course, he ought to have remembered it was his
+work, and if Matthew had spoken civilly he would even have thanked him
+for the reminder--more gratefully, I dare say, than he had often thanked
+Elsa or Frances for a hint of some forgotten duty. But, as it was, it
+took some self-control not to "fly out," and to set to work, tired as
+he was, to groom the pony and put him up for the night. It was all so
+strange and new too; at Colethorne's he had watched the stablemen at
+their work, and thought it looked easy and amusing, but when it came
+to doing it, it seemed a very different thing, especially in the dusk,
+chilly evening, and feeling as he did both tired and hungry. He did
+his best, however, and the old pony was very patient, poor beast, and
+Geoff's natural love of animals stood him in good stead; he could never
+have relieved his own depression by ill temper to any dumb creature.
+And at last old Dapple was made as comfortable as Geoff knew how, for
+Matthew took care to keep out of the way, and to offer no help or
+advice, and the boy turned towards the house, carpet-bag in hand.
+
+The fire was blazing brightly in the kitchen, and in front of it sat the
+farmer, smoking a long clay pipe, which to Geoff smelt very nasty. He
+coughed, to attract Mr. Eames's attention.
+
+"I've brought my bag from the station," he said. "Will you tell me where
+I'm to sleep?"
+
+The farmer looked up sharply.
+
+"You've brought the milk-cans back, too, I suppose? Your bag's not the
+principal thing. Have you seen to Dapple?"
+
+"Yes," said Geoff, and his tone was somewhat sulky.
+
+Eames looked at him again, and still more sharply.
+
+"I told you at the first you were to keep a civil tongue in your head,"
+he said. "You'll say 'sir' when you speak to me."
+
+But just then Mrs. Eames fortunately made her appearance.
+
+"Don't scold him--he's only a bit strange," she said. "Come with me,
+Jim, and I'll show you your room."
+
+"Thank you," said the boy, gratefully.
+
+Mrs. Eames glanced at her husband, as much as to say she was wiser than
+he, and then led the way out of the kitchen down a short, flagged
+passage, and up a short stair. Then she opened a door, and, by the
+candle she held, Geoff saw a very small, very bare room. There was a
+narrow bed in one corner, a chair, a window-shelf, on which stood a
+basin, and a cupboard in the wall.
+
+Mrs. Eames looked round. "It's been well cleaned out since last boy
+went," she said. "Master and me'll look in now and then to see that you
+keep it clean. Cupboard's handy, and there's a good flock mattress."
+Then she gave him the light, and turned to go.
+
+"Please," said Geoff, meekly, "might I have a piece of bread? I'm rather
+hungry." It was long past his usual tea-time.
+
+"To be sure!" she replied. "You've not had your tea? I put it on the hob
+for you." And the good woman bustled off again.
+
+Geoff followed her, after depositing his bag in the cupboard. She poured
+out the tea into a bowl, and ladled in a good spoonful of brown sugar.
+Then she cut a hunch off a great loaf, and put it beside the bowl on the
+dresser. Geoff was so hungry and thirsty, that he attacked both tea and
+bread, though the former was coarse in flavour, and the latter butterless.
+But it was not the quality of the food that brought back again that
+dreadful choking in his throat, and made the salt tears drop into the
+bowl of tea. It was the thought of tea-time at home--the neat table, and
+Vicky's dear, important-looking little face, as she filled his cup, and
+put in the exact amount of sugar he liked--that came over him suddenly
+with a sort of rush. He felt as if he could not bear it. He swallowed
+down the tea with a gulp, and rammed the bread into his pocket. Then,
+doing his utmost to look unconcerned, he went up to the farmer.
+
+"Shall I go to bed now, please, sir?" he said, with a little hesitation
+at the last word. "I'm--I'm rather tired."
+
+"Go to bed?" repeated Eames. "Yes, I suppose so. You must turn out
+early--the milk must be at the station by half-past five."
+
+"How shall I wake?" asked Geoff, timidly.
+
+"Wake? You'll have to learn to wake like others do. However, for the
+first, I'll tell Matthew to knock you up."
+
+"Thank you. Good-night, sir."
+
+"Good-night." And the farmer turned again to the newspaper he was
+reading.
+
+"You'll find your bed well aired. I made Betsy see to that," called out
+Mrs. Eames.
+
+"Thank you," said Geoff again, more heartily this time. But he overheard
+Eames grumbling at his wife as he left the room, telling her "he'd have
+none of that there coddling of the lad."
+
+"And you'd have him laid up with rheumatics--dying of a chill? That'd be
+a nice finish up to it all. You know quite well----" But Geoff heard no
+more. And he was too worn-out and sleepy to think much of what he had
+heard.
+
+He got out what he required for the night. He wondered shiveringly how
+it would be possible to wash with only a basin. Water he was evidently
+expected to fetch for himself. He tried to say his prayers, but fell
+asleep, the tears running down his face, in the middle, and woke up with
+a sob, and at last managed somehow to tumble into bed. It was very cold,
+but, as Mrs. Eames had said, quite dry. The chilly feeling woke him
+again, and he tried once more to say his prayers, and this time with
+better success. He was able to add a special petition that "mother"
+might soon be well again, and that dear Vicky might be happy. And then
+he fell asleep--so soundly, so heavily, that when a drumming at the door
+made itself heard, he fancied he had only just begun the night. He sat
+up. Where was he? At first, in the darkness, he thought he was in his
+own bed at home, and he wondered who was knocking so roughly--wondered
+still more at the rude voice which was shouting out--
+
+"Up with you there, Jim, d'ye hear? I'm not a-going to stand here all
+day. It's past half-past four. Jim--you lazy lout. I'll call master if
+you don't speak--a-locking of his door like a fine gentleman!"
+
+Gradually Geoff remembered all--the feeling of the things about him--the
+coarse bed-clothes, the slightly mildewy smell of the pillow, helped to
+recall him to the present, even before he could see.
+
+[Illustration: KNOCKING SO ROUGHLY.]
+
+"I'm coming, Matthew!" he shouted back. "I'll be ready in five minutes;"
+and out of bed he crept, sleepy and confused, into the chilly air of the
+little room. He had no matches, but there was a short curtain before the
+window, and when he pulled it back the moonlight came faintly in--enough
+for him to distinguish the few objects in the room. He dared not attempt
+to wash, he was so afraid of being late. He managed to get out his oldest
+pair of trousers, and hurried on his clothes as fast as he could, feeling
+miserably dirty and slovenly, and thinking to himself he would never
+again be hard on poor people for not being clean! "I must try to wash
+when I come back," he said to himself. Then he hurried out, and none too
+soon.
+
+[Illustration: GEOFF AT THE STATION.]
+
+Matthew was in the yard, delighted to frighten him. "You'll have to look
+sharp," he said, as Geoff hurried to the stable. "Betsy's filling the
+cans, and rare and cross she is at having to do it. You should have been
+there to help her, and the missis'll be out in a minute."
+
+The harnessing of Dapple was not easy in the faint light, and he could
+not find the stable lantern. But it got done at last, and Geoff led the
+cart round to the dairy door, where Betsy was filling the last of the
+cans. She was not so cross as she might have been, and Mrs. Eames had
+not yet appeared. They got the cans into the cart, and in a minute or
+two Geoff found himself jogging along the road, already becoming
+familiar, to the station.
+
+It seemed to grow darker instead of lighter, for the moon had gone
+behind a cloud, and sunrise was still a good time off. Geoff wondered
+dreamily to himself why people need get up so early in the country, and
+then remembered that it would take two or three hours for the cans to
+get to London. How little he or Vicky had thought, when they drank at
+breakfast the nice milk which Mrs. Tudor had always taken care to have
+of the best, of the labour and trouble involved in getting it there in
+time! And though he had hurried so, he was only just at the station when
+the train whizzed in, and the one sleepy porter growled at him for not
+having "looked sharper," and banged the milk-cans about unnecessarily in
+his temper, so that Geoff was really afraid they would break or burst
+open, and all the milk come pouring out.
+
+"You'll have to be here in better time for the twelve train," he said
+crossly. "I'm not a-going to do this sort o' work for you nor no chap,
+if you can't be here in time."
+
+Geoff did not answer--he was getting used to sharp words and tones. He
+nearly fell asleep in the cart as he jogged home again, and to add to
+his discomfort a fine, small, chill, November rain began to fall. He
+buttoned up his jacket, and wished he had put on his overcoat; and then
+he laughed rather bitterly to think how absurd he would look with this
+same overcoat, which had been new only a month before, driving old
+Dapple in the milk-cart. He was wet and chilled to the bone when he
+reached the farm, and even if he had energy to drive a little faster he
+would not have dared to do so, after the farmer's warning.
+
+Mrs. Eames was in the kitchen when, after putting up the cart and pony,
+Geoff came in. There was a delicious fragrance of coffee about which
+made his mouth water, but he did not even venture to go near the fire.
+Mrs. Eames heard him, however, and looked up. She started a little at
+the sight of his pale, wan face.
+
+"Bless me, boy!" she exclaimed, "but you do look bad. Whatever's the
+matter?"
+
+Geoff smiled a little--he looked very nice when he smiled; it was only
+when he was in one of his ill-tempered moods that there was anything
+unlovable in his face--and his smile made Mrs. Eames still more sorry
+for him.
+
+"There's nothing the matter, thank you," he said; "I'm only rather
+cold--and wet. I'm strange to it all, I suppose. I wanted to know what I
+should do next. Should I feed the pigs?"
+
+"Have you met the master?" said the farmer's wife. "He's gone down the
+fields with Matthew and the others. Didn't you meet 'em?"
+
+Geoff shook his head.
+
+"No; I went straight to the stable when I came back from the station."
+
+"You'd better take off your wet jacket," she said. "There--hang it
+before the fire. And," she went on, "there's a cup of coffee still hot,
+you can have for your breakfast this morning as you're so cold--it'll
+warm you better nor stir-about; and there's a scrap o' master's bacon
+you can eat with your bread."
+
+She poured out the coffee, steaming hot, and forked out the bacon from
+the frying-pan as she spoke, and set all on the corner of the dresser
+nearest to the fire.
+
+"Thank you, thank you awfully," said Geoff. Oh, how good the coffee
+smelt! He had never enjoyed a meal so much, and yet, had it been at
+home, _how_ he would have grumbled! Coffee in a bowl, with brown
+sugar--bread cut as thick as your fist, and no butter! Truly Geoff was
+already beginning to taste some of the sweet uses of adversity.
+
+Breakfast over, came the pigs. The farmer had left word that the sty was
+to be cleaned out, and fresh straw fetched for the pigs' beds; and as
+Betsy was much more good-natured than Matthew in showing the new boy
+what was expected of him, he got on pretty well, even feeling a certain
+pride in the improved aspect of the pig-sty when he had finished. He
+would have dearly liked to try a scrubbing of the piggies themselves, if
+he had not been afraid of Matthew's mocking him. But besides this there
+was not time. At eleven the second lot of milk had to be carted to the
+station, and with the remembrance of the cross porter Geoff dared not be
+late. And in the still falling rain he set off again, though, thanks to
+Mrs. Eames, with a dry jacket, and, thanks to her too, with a horse-rug
+buckled round him, in which guise surely no one would have recognized
+Master Geoffrey Tudor.
+
+After dinner the farmer set him to cleaning out the stables, which it
+appeared was to be a part of his regular work; then there were the pigs
+to feed again, and at four o'clock the milk-cans to fetch. Oh, how tired
+Geoff was getting of the lane to the station! And the day did not come
+to an end without his getting into terrible disgrace for not having
+rinsed out the cans with boiling water the night before, though nobody
+had told him to do it. For a message had come from London that the cans
+were dirty and the milk in danger of turning sour, and that if it
+happened again Farmer Eames would have to send his milk elsewhere. It
+was natural perhaps that he should be angry, and yet, as no one had
+explained about it to Geoff, it seemed rather hard for him to have to
+take the scolding. _Very_ hard indeed it seemed to him--to proud Geoff,
+who had never yet taken in good part his mother's mildest reprimands.
+And big boy though he was, he sobbed himself to sleep this second night
+of his new life, for it did seem too much, that when he had been trying
+his very best to please, and was aching in every limb from his unwonted
+hard work, he should get nothing but scolding. And yet he knew that he
+was lucky to have fallen into such hands as Farmer Eames's, for, strict
+as he was, he was a fair and reasonable master.
+
+"I suppose," thought Geoff, "I have never really known what hardships
+were, though I did think I had plenty to bear at home."
+
+What would Elsa have said had she heard him?
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI.
+
+"HOOT-TOOT" BEHIND THE HEDGE.
+
+
+That first day at the farm was a pretty fair specimen of those that
+followed. The days grew into weeks and the weeks into one month, and
+then into two, and Geoff went on with his self-chosen hard and lonely
+life. The loneliness soon came to be the worst of it. He got used to the
+hardships so far, and after all they were not very terrible ones. He was
+better taken care of than he knew, and he was a strong and healthy lad.
+Had he felt that he was working for others, had he been cheered by
+loving and encouraging letters, he could have borne it all contentedly.
+But no letters came, no answer to his note to Vicky begging her to
+write; and Geoff's proud heart grew prouder and, he tried to think,
+harder.
+
+"They would let me know, somehow, I suppose, if there was anything much
+the matter--if--mamma had not got much better yet." For even to himself
+he would not allow the possibility of anything worse than her not being
+"much better." And yet she had looked very ill that last evening. He
+thought of it sometimes in the middle of the night, and started up in a
+sort of agony of fright, feeling as if at all costs he must set off
+there and then to see her--to know how she was. Often he did not fall
+asleep again for hours, and then he would keep sobbing and crying out
+from time to time, "Oh, mamma, mamma!" But there was no one to hear. And
+with the morning all the proud, bitter feelings would come back again.
+"They don't care for me. They are thankful to be rid of me;" and he
+would picture his future life to himself, friendless and homeless, as if
+he never had had either friends or home. Sometimes he planned that when
+he grew older he would emigrate, and in a few years, after having made a
+great fortune, he would come home again, a millionaire, and shower down
+coals of fire in the shape of every sort of luxury upon the heads of his
+unnatural family.
+
+But these plans did not cheer him as they would have done some months
+ago. His experiences had already made him more practical--he knew that
+fortunes were not made nowadays in the Dick Whittington way--he was
+learning to understand that not only are there but twenty shillings in a
+pound, but, which concerned him more closely, that there are but twelve
+pence in a shilling, and only thirty in half-a-crown! He saw with dismay
+the increasing holes in his boots, and bargained hard with the village
+cobbler to make him cheap a rough, strong pair, which he would never
+have dreamt of looking at in the old days; he thanked Mrs. Eames more
+humbly for the well-worn corduroy jacket she made down for him than he
+had ever thanked his mother for the nice clothes which it had _not_
+always been easy for her to procure for him. Yes, Geoff was certainly
+learning some lessons.
+
+[Illustration: SOBBING AND CRYING.]
+
+Sundays were in one way the worst, for though he had less to do, he had
+more time for thinking. He went twice to church, where he managed to sit
+in a corner out of sight, so that if the tears did sometimes come into
+his eyes at some familiar hymn or verse, no one could see. And no more
+was said about the Sunday school, greatly to his relief, for he knew the
+clergyman would have cross-questioned him. On Sunday afternoons he used
+to saunter about the park and grounds of Crickwood Bolders. He liked it,
+and yet it made him melancholy. The house was shut up, but it was easy
+to see it was a dear old place--just the sort of "home" of Geoff's
+wildest dreams.
+
+"If we were all living there together, now," he used to say to
+himself--"mamma quite well and not worried about money--Elsa and Frances
+would be so happy, we'd never squabble, and Vicky----" But at the idea
+of _Vicky's_ happiness, words failed him.
+
+It was, it must be allowed, a come-down from such beautiful fancies, to
+have to hurry back to the farm to harness old Dapple and jog off to the
+station with the milk. For even on Sundays people can't do without
+eating and drinking.
+
+[Illustration: GEOFF STOOD STILL IN AMAZEMENT.]
+
+One Sunday a queer thing happened. He was just turning home, and passing
+the lodge at the principal entrance to the Hall, as it was called, when
+behind the thick evergreen hedge at one side of the little garden he
+heard voices. They were speaking too low for him to distinguish the
+words; but one voice sounded to him very like Eames's. It might be so,
+for the farmer and the lodge-keeper were friends. And Geoff would have
+walked on without thinking anything of it, had not a sudden exclamation
+caught his ear--"Hoot-toot, hoot-toot! I tell you----" But instantly the
+voice dropped. It sounded as if some one had held up a warning finger.
+Geoff stood still in amazement. _Could_ Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot be there?
+It seemed too impossible. But the boy's heart beat fast with a vague
+feeling of expectation and apprehension mixed together.
+
+"If he has come here accidentally, he must not see me," he said to
+himself; and he hurried down the road as fast as he could, determined to
+hasten to the station and back before the old gentleman, if it were he,
+could get there. But to his surprise, on entering the farm-yard, the
+first person to meet him was Mr. Eames himself.
+
+"What's the matter, my lad?" he said good humouredly. "Thou'st staring
+as if I were a ghost."
+
+"I thought--I thought," stammered Geoff, "that I saw--no, heard your
+voice just now at the lodge."
+
+Eames laughed.
+
+"But I couldn't be in two places at once, could I? Well, get off with
+you to the station."
+
+All was as usual of a Sunday there. No one about, no passengers by the
+up-train--only the milk-cans; and Geoff, as he drove slowly home again,
+almost persuaded himself that the familiar "Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!" must
+have been altogether his own fancy.
+
+But had he been at the little railway-station again an hour or two
+later, he would have had reason to change his opinion. A passenger did
+start from Shalecray by the last train for town; and when this same
+passenger got out at Victoria, he hailed a hansom, and was driven
+quickly westward. And when he arrived at his destination, and rang the
+bell, almost before the servant had had time to open the door, a little
+figure pressed eagerly forward, and a soft, clear voice exclaimed--
+
+"Oh, dear uncle, is that you at last? I've been watching for you such a
+long time. Oh, do--do tell me about Geoff! Did you see him? And oh, dear
+uncle, is he very unhappy?"
+
+"Come upstairs, my pet," said the old man, "and you shall hear all I can
+tell."
+
+The three awaiting him in the drawing-room were nearly as eager as the
+child. The mother's face grew pale with anxiety, the sisters' eyes
+sparkled with eagerness.
+
+"Did you find him easily, uncle? Was it where you thought?" asked Vicky.
+
+"Yes, yes; I had no difficulty. I saw him, Vicky, but without his seeing
+me. He has grown, and perhaps he is a little thinner, but he is quite
+well. And I had an excellent account of him from the farmer. He is
+working steadily, and bearing manfully what, to a boy like him, cannot
+but be privations and hardships. But I am afraid he is very unhappy--his
+face had a set sad look in it that I do not like to see on one so
+young. I fear he never got your letters, Vicky. There must have been
+some mistake about the address. I didn't want to push the thing too far.
+You must write again, my little girl--say all you can to soften him.
+What I want is that it should come from _his_ side. He will respect
+himself all his life for overcoming his pride, and asking to be forgiven,
+only we must try to make it easy for him, poor fellow! Now go to bed,
+Vicky, child, and think over what you will write to him to-morrow. I
+want to talk it all over with your mother. Don't be unhappy about poor
+old Geoff, my dear."
+
+Obedient Vicky jumped up at once to go to bed. She tried to whisper
+"Good night" as she went the round of the others to kiss them, but the
+words would not come, and her pretty blue eyes were full of tears.
+Still, Vicky's thoughts and dreams were far happier that night than for
+a long time past.
+
+As soon as she had closed the door after her, the old gentleman turned
+to the others.
+
+"She doesn't know any more than we agreed upon?" he asked.
+
+"No," said Elsa; "she only knows that you got his exact address from the
+same person who has told you about him from time to time. She has no
+idea that the whole thing was planned and arranged by you from the
+first, when you found he was set upon leaving home."
+
+Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot nodded his head.
+
+"That is all right. Years hence, when he has grown up into a good and
+sensible man, we may, or if I am no longer here, _you_ may tell him all
+about it, my dears. But just now it would mortify him, and prevent the
+lesson from doing him the good we hope for. I should not at all like him
+to know I had employed detectives. He would be angry at having been
+taken in. That Jowett is a very decent fellow, and did his part well;
+but he has mismanaged the letters somehow. I must see him about that.
+What was the address Geoff gave in his note to Vicky? Are you sure she
+put it right?"
+
+"Oh yes," said Frances; "I saw it both times. It was--
+
+'TO MR. JAMES,
+CARE OF MR. ADAM SMITH,
+MURRAY PLACE MEWS.'"
+
+"Hoot-toot!" said Mr. Byrne. He could not make it out. But we, who know
+in what a hurry Geoff wrote his note at the railway-station while Jowett
+was waiting to take it, can quite well understand why Vicky's letters
+had never reached him. For the address he _should_ have given was--
+
+"ABEL SMITH,
+_Mowbray_ PLACE MEWS."
+
+"This time," Mr. Byrne went on, "I'll see that the letter is sent to him
+direct. Jowett must manage it. Let Vicky address as before, and I'll see
+that it reaches him."
+
+"What do you think she should write?" said Mrs. Tudor, anxiously.
+
+"What she feels. It does not much matter. But let her make him
+understand that his home is open to him as ever--that he is neither
+forgotten nor thought of harshly. If I mistake not, from what I saw and
+what Eames told me, he will be so happy to find it is so, that all the
+better side of his character will come out. And he will say more to
+himself than any of us would ever wish to say to him."
+
+"But, uncle dear," said Elsa, "if it turns out as you hope, and poor
+Geoff comes home again and is all you and mamma wish--and--if _all_ your
+delightful plans are realized, won't Geoff find out everything you don't
+want him to know at present? Indeed, aren't you afraid he may have heard
+already that you are the new squire there?"
+
+"No," said Mr. Byrne. "Eames is a very cautious fellow; and from having
+known me long ago, or rather from his father having known me (it was I
+that got my cousin to give him the farm some years ago, as I told you),
+I found it easy to make him understand all I wished. Crickwood Bolders
+has stood empty so long, that the people about don't take much interest
+in it. They only know vaguely that it has changed hands lately, and
+Eames says I am spoken of as the new Mr. Bolders, and not by my own
+name."
+
+"I see," said Elsa.
+
+"And," continued Mr. Byrne, "of course Geoff will take it for granted
+that it was by the coincidence of his getting taken on at my place that
+we found him out. It _was_ a coincidence that he should have taken it
+into his head to go down to that part of the country, through its being
+on the way to Colethorne's."
+
+"And you say that he is really working hard, and--and making the best of
+things?" asked Mrs. Tudor. She smiled a little as she said it. Geoff's
+"making the best of things" was such a _very_ new idea.
+
+"Yes," replied Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot. "Eames gives him the best of
+characters. He says the boy is thoroughly to be depended upon, and that
+his work is well done, even to cleaning the pigs; and, best of all, he
+is never heard to grumble."
+
+"Fancy Geoff cleaning the pigs!" exclaimed Elsa.
+
+"I don't know that I find _that_ so difficult to fancy," said Frances.
+"I think Geoff has a real love for animals of all kinds, and for all
+country things. We would have sympathized with him about it if it hadn't
+been for his grumbling, which made all his likes and dislikes seem
+unreal. I think what I pity him the most for is the having to get up so
+dreadfully early these cold winter mornings. What time did you say he
+had to get up, uncle?"
+
+[Illustration: VICKY WRITING THE LETTER.]
+
+"He has to be at the station with the milk before five every morning,"
+said the old gentleman, grimly. "Eames says his good woman is inclined
+to 'coddle him a bit'--she can't forget who he really is, it appears. I
+was glad to hear it; I don't want the poor boy actually to suffer--and I
+don't want it to go on much longer. I confess I don't see that there can
+be much 'coddling' if he has to be up and out before five o'clock in the
+morning at this time of the year."
+
+"No, indeed," said the girls. "And he must be _so_ lonely."
+
+"Yes, poor fellow!" said the old gentleman, with a sigh, "I saw that in
+his face. And I was _glad_ to see it. It shows the lesson is not a
+merely surface one. You've had your wish for him to some extent, Elsa,
+my dear. He has at last known some hardships."
+
+Elsa's eyes filled with tears, though Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot had had no
+thought of hurting her.
+
+"Don't say that, please," she entreated. "I think--I am sure--I only
+wanted him to learn how foolish he was, for his own sake more than for
+any one's else even."
+
+"I know, I know," the old gentleman agreed. "But I think he has had
+about enough of it. See that Vicky writes that letter first thing
+to-morrow."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII.
+
+A LETTER AT LAST.
+
+
+Christmas had come and gone. It brought Geoff's home-sick loneliness to
+a point that was almost unbearable. He had looked forward vaguely to the
+twenty-fifth of December with the sort of hope that it would bring him
+some message, some remembrance, if it were but a Christmas card. And for
+two or three days he managed to waylay the postman every morning as he
+passed the farm, and to inquire timidly if there were no letter--was he
+_sure_ there was no letter for James Jeffreys? But the postman only
+shook his head. He had "never had no letter for that name, neither with
+nor without 'care of Mr. Eames,'" as Geoff went on to suggest that if
+the farmer's name had been omitted the letter might have been overlooked.
+And when not only Christmas, but New Year's Day too was past and gone,
+the boy lost hope.
+
+"It is too bad," he sobbed to himself, late at night, alone in his bare
+little room. "I think they might think a _little_ of me. They might be
+sorry for me, even--even if I did worry them all when I was at home.
+They might guess how lonely I am. It isn't the hard work. If it was for
+mother I was working, and if I knew they were all pleased with me, I
+wouldn't mind it. But I can't bear to go on like this."
+
+Yet he could not make up his mind to write home again, for as things
+were it would be like begging for Mr. Byrne's charity. And every feeling
+of independence and manliness in Geoff rose against accepting benefits
+from one whose advice he had scouted and set at defiance. Still, he was
+sensible enough to see that he could not go on with his present life for
+long. "Work on a farm" had turned out very different from his vague
+ideas of it. He could not, for years to come, hope to earn more than
+the barest pittance, and he felt that if he were always to remain the
+companion of the sort of people he was now among, he would not care
+to live. And gradually another idea took shape in his mind--he would
+emigrate! He saw some printed papers in the village post-office, telling
+of government grants of land to able-bodied young men, and giving the
+cost of the passage out, and various details, and he calculated that in
+a year, by scrupulous economy, he might earn about half the sum required,
+for the farmer had told him that if he continued to do well he would
+raise his wages at the end of the first six months.
+
+"And then," thought Geoff, "I might write home and tell them it was all
+settled, and by selling all the things I have at home I might get the
+rest of the money. Or--I would not even mind taking it as a _loan_ from
+Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot. That would seem different; and of course I do owe
+him a great deal now, in a way, for he must be doing everything for
+mother and the girls, and if only I were a man that would be my
+business."
+
+And for a while, after coming to this resolution, he felt happier. His
+old dreams of making a great fortune and being the good genius of his
+family returned, and he felt more interest in learning all he could of
+farm-work, that might be useful to him in his new life. But these
+more hopeful feelings did not last long or steadily; the pain of the
+home-sickness and loneliness increased so terribly, that at times he
+felt as if he _could_ not bear it any longer. And he would probably,
+strong as he was, have fallen ill, had not something happened.
+
+It was about six weeks after the Sunday on which he had thought he had
+overheard Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot's voice through the hedge. It was a
+Sunday again. Geoff had been at church in the morning, and after dinner
+he was sitting in a corner of the kitchen, feeling as if he had no
+energy even to go for his favourite stroll in the grounds of the Hall,
+when a sudden exclamation from Mrs. Eames made him look up. The farmer's
+wife had been putting away some of the plates and dishes that had been
+used at dinner, and in so doing happened to pull aside a large dish
+leaning on one of the shelves of the high-backed dresser.
+
+[Illustration: GEOFF READING VICKY'S LETTER.]
+
+As she did so, a letter fell forward. It was addressed in a clear, good
+hand to
+
+"JAMES JEFFREYS,
+AT MR. EAMES'S,
+CRICKWOOD FARM,
+SHALECRAY."
+
+"Bless me!" cried the good woman. "What's this a-doing here? Jem, boy,
+'tis thine. When can it have come? It may have been up there a good
+bit."
+
+Geoff started up and dashed forward with outstretched hand.
+
+"Give it me! oh, give it me, please!" he said, in an eager, trembling
+voice. A look of disappointment crossed his face for a moment when he
+saw the writing; but he tore the envelope open, and then his eyes
+brightened up again. For it contained another letter, round which a slip
+was folded with the words, "I forward enclosed, as agreed.--Ned Jowett."
+And the second envelope was addressed to "Mr. James" in a round,
+childish hand, that Geoff knew well. It was Vicky's.
+
+He darted out of the kitchen, and into his own little room. He could not
+have read the letter before any one. Already the tears were welling up
+into his eyes. And long before he had finished reading they were running
+down his face and dropping on to the paper. This was what Vicky said,
+and the date was nearly six weeks old!
+
+
+   "MY DARLING GEOFF,
+
+   "Why haven't you written to us? I wrote you a letter the minute I
+    got your little note with the address, and I have written to you
+    again since then. Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot says you are sure to get
+    this letter. I think you can't have got the others. But still you
+    might have written. I have been so _very_ unhappy about you. Of
+    course I was glad to hear you were getting on well, but still I
+    have been VERY unhappy. Mamma got better very slowly. I don't
+    think she would have got better if she hadn't heard that you were
+    getting on well, though. She has been very unhappy, too, and so
+    have Elsa and Frances, but poor Vicky most of all. We do so want
+    you at home again. Geoff, I can't tell you how good old Uncle
+    Hoot-Toot is. There is something about money I can't explain, but
+    if you understood it all, you would see we should not be proud
+    about his helping us, for he has done more for us always than we
+    knew; even mamma didn't. Oh, Geoff, darling, do come home. We do
+    all love you so, and mamma and Elsa were only troubled because you
+    didn't seem happy, and you didn't believe that they loved you. I
+    think it would be all different now if you came home again, and we
+    do so want you. I keep your room so nice. I dust it myself every
+    day. Mamma makes me have tea in the drawing-room now, and then I
+    have a little pudding from their dinner, because, you see, one
+    can't eat so much at ladies' afternoon tea. But I was too
+    miserable at tea alone in the school-room. I have wrapped up our
+    teapot, after Harvey had made it very bright, and I won't ever
+    make tea out of it till you come home. Oh, Geoffy, darling, do
+    come home!
+
+   "Your loving, unhappy little
+   "VICKY."
+
+The tears came faster and faster--so fast that it was with difficulty
+Geoff could see to read the last few lines. He hid his face in his hands
+and sobbed. He was only fourteen, remember, and there was no one to see.
+And with these sobs and tears--good honest tears that he need not have
+been ashamed of--there melted away all the unkind, ungrateful feelings
+out of his poor sore heart. He saw himself as he had really
+been--selfish, unreasonable, and spoilt.
+
+"Yes," he said to himself, "that was all I _really_ had to complain of.
+They considered me too much--they spoilt me. But, oh, I would be so
+different now! Only--I can't go home and say to Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot,
+'I've had enough of working for myself; you may pay for me now.' It
+would seem _too_ mean. No, I must keep to my plan--it's too late to
+change. But I think I might go home to see them all, and ask them to
+forgive me. In three weeks I shall have been here three months, and then
+I may ask for a holiday. I'll write to Vicky now at once, and tell her
+so--I can post the letter when I go to the station. They must have
+thought me _so_ horrid for not having written before. I wonder how it
+was I never got the other letters? But it doesn't matter now I've got
+this one. Oh, dear Vicky, I think I shall nearly go out of my mind with
+joy to see your little face again!"
+
+He had provided himself, luckily, with some letter-paper and envelopes,
+so there was no delay on that score. And once he had begun, he found no
+difficulty in writing--indeed, he could have covered pages, for he
+seemed to have so much to say. This was his letter:--
+
+   "Crickwood Farm, February 2.
+
+   "MY DEAREST VICKY,
+
+   "I have only just got your letter, though you wrote it on the 15th
+    of January. Mrs. Eames--that's the farmer's wife--found it behind
+    a dish on the dresser, where it has been all the time. I never got
+    your other letters; I can't think what became of them. I've asked
+    the postman nearly every day if there was no letter for me. Vicky,
+    I can't tell you all I'd like to say. I thought I'd write to
+    mamma, but I feel as if I couldn't. Will you tell her that I just
+    _beg_ her to forgive me? Not only for leaving home without leave,
+    like I did, but for all the way I went on and all the worry I gave
+    her. I see it all quite plain. I've been getting to see it for a
+    good while, and when I read your dear letter it all came out quite
+    plain like a flash. I don't mind the hard work here, or even the
+    messy sort of ways compared to home--I wouldn't mind anything if I
+    thought I was doing right. But it's the loneliness. Vicky, I have
+    thought sometimes I'd go out of my mind. Will you ask Great-Uncle
+    Hoot-Toot to forgive me, too? I'd like to understand about all he
+    has done for us, and I think I am much sensibler about money than
+    I was, so perhaps he'll tell me. I can ask for a holiday in three
+    weeks, and then I'll come home for one day. I shall have to tell
+    you my plans, and I think mamma will think I'm right. I must work
+    hard, and perhaps in a few years I shall earn enough to come home
+    and have a cottage like we planned. For I've made up my mind to
+    emigrate. I don't think I'd ever get on so well in anything as in
+    a country life; for, though it's very hard work here, I don't mind
+    it, and I love animals, and in the summer it won't be so bad.
+    Please, Vicky, make everybody understand that I hope never to be a
+    trouble and worry any more.--Your very loving
+
+   "GEOFF.
+
+   "P.S.--You may write here now. I don't mind you all knowing where
+    I am."
+
+
+By the time Geoff had finished this, for him, long epistle, it was
+nearly dark. He had to hurry off to the station to be in time with the
+milk. He was well known now by the men about the railway, and by one or
+two of the guards, and he was glad to see one he knew this evening, as
+he begged him to post his letter in town, for it was too late for the
+Shalecray mail. The man was very good-natured, and promised to do as he
+asked.
+
+"By Tuesday," thought Geoff, "I may have a letter if Vicky writes at
+once. And I might write again next Sunday. So that we'd hear of each
+other every week."
+
+And this thought made his face look very bright and cheery as he went
+whistling into the kitchen, where, as usual of a Sunday evening, Eames
+was sitting smoking beside the fire.
+
+"The missis has told me about your letter, Jim," said the farmer. "I'm
+right-down sorry about it, but I don't rightly know who to blame. It's
+just got slipped out o' sight."
+
+"Thank you," Geoff replied. "I'm awfully glad to have it now."
+
+"He's never looked so bright since he came," said Mr. Eames to his wife
+when Geoff had left the room. "He's about getting tired of it, I fancy;
+and the squire's only too ready to forgive and forget, I take it. But
+he's a deal o' good stuff in him, has the boy, and so I told the squire.
+He's a fine spirit of his own, too."
+
+"And as civil a lad as ever I seed," added Mrs. Eames. "No nonsense and
+no airs. One can tell as he's a real gentleman. All the same, I'll be
+uncommon glad when he's with his own folk again; no one'd believe the
+weight it's been on my mind to see as he didn't fall ill with us. And
+you always a-telling me as squire said he wasn't to be coddled and
+cosseted. Yet you'd have been none so pleased if he'd got a chill and
+the rheumatics or worse, as might have been if I hadn't myself seen to
+his bed and his sheets and his blankets, till the weight of them on my
+mind's been almost more nor I could bear."
+
+"Well, well," said the farmer, soothingly, "all's well as ends well. And
+you said yourself it'd never 'a' done for us to refuse the squire any
+mortal service he could have asked of us."
+
+[Illustration]
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII.
+
+THE NEW SQUIRE AND HIS FAMILY.
+
+
+Tuesday brought no letter for Geoff--nor Wednesday, nor even Thursday.
+His spirits went down again, and he felt bitterly disappointed. Could
+his friend, the guard, have forgotten to post the letter, after all? he
+asked himself. This thought kept him up till Thursday evening, when,
+happening to see the same man at the station, the guard's first words
+were, "Got any answer to your love-letter yet, eh, Jim? I posted it
+straight away," and then Geoff did not know what to think.
+
+He did not like to write again. He began to fear that Vicky had been
+mistaken in feeling so sure that his mother and Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot
+and Elsa and Frances were all ready to forgive him, and longing for his
+return. Perhaps they were all still too indignant with him to allow
+Vicky to write, and he sighed deeply at the thought.
+
+"I will wait till I can ask for a holiday," he said to himself, "and
+then I will write and say I am coming, and if they won't see me I must
+just bear it. At least, I am sure mother will see me when the time comes
+for me to go to America, though it will be dreadful to have to wait till
+then."
+
+When he got back to the house that evening, the farmer called to him.
+_He_ had had a letter that morning, though Geoff had not; and had it not
+been getting dusk, the boy would have seen a slight twinkle in the good
+man's eyes as he spoke to him.
+
+"Jim, my boy," he said, "I shall want you to do an odd job or so of work
+the next day or two. The new squire's coming down on Monday to look
+round a bit. They've been tidying up at the house; did you know?"
+
+Geoff shook his head; he had no time for strolling about the Hall
+grounds except on Sundays, and on the last Sunday he had been too
+heavy-hearted to notice any change.
+
+"Do you know anything of gardening?" the farmer went on. "They're very
+short of hands, and I've promised to help what I could. The rooms
+on the south side of the house are being got ready, and there's the
+terrace-walk round that way wants doing up sadly. With this mild weather
+the snowdrops and crocuses and all them spring flowers is springing up
+finely; there's lots of them round that south side, and Branch can't
+spare a man to sort them out and rake over the beds."
+
+"I could do that," said Geoff, his eyes sparkling. "I don't know much
+about gardening, but I know enough for that." It was a pleasant prospect
+for him; a day or two's quiet work in the beautiful old garden; he would
+feel almost like a gentleman again, he thought to himself. "When shall I
+go, sir?" he went on eagerly.
+
+"Why, the sooner the better," said Mr. Eames. "To-morrow morning.
+That'll give you two good days. Branch wants it to look nice, for the
+squire's ladies is coming with him. The south parlour is all ready.
+There'll be a deal to do to the house--new furniture and all the rest of
+it. He--the new squire's an old friend of mine and of my father's--and a
+good friend he's been to me," he added in a lower voice.
+
+"Are they going to live here?" asked Geoff. He liked the idea of working
+there, but he rather shrank from being seen as a gardener's boy by the
+new squire and "the ladies." "Though it is very silly of me," he
+reflected; "they wouldn't look at me; it would never strike them that I
+was different from any other."
+
+"Going to live here," repeated the farmer; "yes, of course. The new
+squire would be off his head not to live at Crickwood Bolders, when it
+belongs to him. A beautiful place as it is too."
+
+"Yes," agreed Geoff, heartily, "it would be hard to imagine a more
+beautiful place. The squire should be a happy man."
+
+He thought so more and more during the next two days. There was a great
+charm about the old house and the quaintly laid out grounds in which
+it stood--especially on the south side, where Geoff's work lay. The
+weather, too, was delightfully mild just then; it seemed a sort of
+foretaste of summer, and the boy felt all his old love for the country
+revive and grow stronger than ever as he raked and weeded and did his
+best along the terrace walk.
+
+"I wish the squire would make me his gardener," he said to himself once.
+"But even to be a good gardener I suppose one should learn a lot of
+things I know nothing about."
+
+Good-will goes a long way, however. Geoff felt really proud of his work
+by Saturday evening, and on Sunday the farmer took a look at the
+flower-beds himself, and said he had done well.
+
+"Those beds over yonder look rough still," he went on, pointing to some
+little distance.
+
+"They don't show from the house," said Geoff, "and Branch says it's too
+early to do much. There will be frosts again."
+
+"No matter," said Mr. Eames; "I'd like it all to look as tidy as can be
+for Monday, seeing as I'd promised to help. I'll give you another day
+off the home-work, Jim. Robins's boy's very pleased to do the station
+work."
+
+[Illustration: THE FARMER TOOK A LOOK AT THE FLOWERBEDS HIMSELF.]
+
+Geoff looked up uneasily. It would be very awkward for him, very awkward
+indeed, if "Robins's boy" were to do so well as to replace him
+altogether. But there was a pleasant smile on the farmer's face, which
+reassured him.
+
+"Very well, sir," he said. "I'll do as you like, of course; but I don't
+want any one else to do my own work for long."
+
+"All right," said Eames. For a moment Geoff thought he was going to say
+something more, but if so he changed his mind, and walked quietly away.
+
+Monday saw Geoff again at his post. It was a real early spring day, and
+he could not help feeling the exhilarating influence of the fresh, sweet
+air, though his heart was sad and heavy, for his hopes of a reply from
+Vicky were every day growing fainter and fainter. There was nothing to
+do but to wait till the time came for a holiday, and then to go up to
+London and try to see them.
+
+"And if they won't see me or forgive me," thought the boy with a sigh,
+"I must just work on till I can emigrate."
+
+He glanced up at the terrace as he thought this. He was working this
+morning at some little distance from the house, but he liked to throw
+a look every now and then to the beds which he had raked and tidied
+already; they seemed so neat, and the crocuses were coming out so
+nicely.
+
+The morning was getting on; Geoff looked at his watch--he had kept it
+carefully, but he never looked at it now without a feeling that before
+very long he might have to sell it--it was nearly twelve.
+
+"I must go home to dinner, I suppose," he thought; and he began
+gathering his tools together. As he did so, some slight sounds reached
+him from the terrace, and, glancing in that direction, he saw that one
+of the long windows opening on to it was ajar, and in another moment the
+figures of two ladies could be seen standing just in the aperture, and
+seemingly looking out as if uncertain what they were going to do.
+
+"They have come," thought Geoff. "They'll be out here in another
+instant. I can't help it if it _is_ silly; I should _hate_ ladies and
+gentlemen to see me working here like a common boy;" and his face grew
+crimson with the thought.
+
+He hurried his things together, and was looking round to see if he could
+not make his way out of the grounds without passing near the house, when
+a quick pattering sound along the gravel startled him. A little girl was
+running towards him, flying down the sloping path that led from the
+terrace she came, her feet scarcely seeming to touch the ground, her
+fair hair streaming behind.
+
+"Oh!" was Geoff's first thought, "how like Vicky!"
+
+But it was his first thought only, for almost before he had time to
+complete it the little girl was beside him--_upon_ him, one might almost
+say, for her arms were round him, her sweet face, wet with tears of
+joy, was pressed against his, her dear voice was speaking to him, "Oh,
+Geoffey, Geoffey! My own Geoffey! It's I--it's your Vicky."
+
+Geoff staggered, and almost fell. For a moment or two he felt so giddy
+and confused he could not speak. But the feeling soon went away, and the
+words came only too eagerly.
+
+"How is it? Where have you come from? Do you know the new squire? Where
+is mamma? Why didn't you write?"
+
+And, laughing and crying, Vicky tried to explain. Did she know the
+new squire? Could Geoff not guess? Where were they all? Mamma, Elsa,
+Frances, Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot--where should they be, but in the new
+squire's own house? Up there on the terrace--yes, they were all up
+there; they had sent her to fetch him. And she dragged Geoff up with
+her, Geoff feeling as if he were in a dream, till he felt his mother's
+and sisters' kisses, and heard "the new squire's" voice sounding rather
+choky, as he said, "Hoot-toot, hoot-toot! this will never do--never do,
+Geoff, my boy."
+
+They let Vicky explain it all in her own way. How Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot
+had come home from India, meaning to take them all to live with him in
+the old house which had come to be his. How disappointed he had been by
+Geoff's selfish, discontented temper, and grumbling, worrying ways, and
+had been casting about how best to give him a lesson which should last,
+when Geoff solved the puzzle for him by going off of his own accord.
+
+"And," Vicky went on innocently, "was it not _wonderful_ that you should
+have come to uncle's own place, and got work with Mr. Eames, whom he has
+known so long?" In which Geoff fully agreed; and it was not till many
+years later that he knew how it had really been--how Mr. Byrne had
+planned all for his safety and good, with the help of one of the
+cleverest young detectives in the London police, "Ned Jowett," the
+innocent countryman whom Geoff had patronized!
+
+The boy told all he had been thinking of doing, his idea of emigrating,
+his wish to be "independent," and gain his own livelihood. And his
+mother explained to him what she herself had not thoroughly known till
+lately--that for many years, ever since her husband's death, they had
+owed far more to Great-Uncle Hoot-Toot than they had had any idea of.
+
+"Your father was the son of his dearest friend," she said. "Mr. Byrne
+has no relations of his own. We were left very poor, but he never let
+me know it. The lawyers by mistake wrote to _me_ about the loss of
+money, which uncle had for long known was as good as lost, so that in
+reality it made little difference. So you see, Geoff, what we owe
+him--_everything_--and you must be guided by his wishes entirely."
+
+They were kind and good wishes. He did not want Geoff to emigrate, but
+he sympathized in his love for the country. For two or three years Geoff
+was sent to a first-rate school, where he got on well, and then to an
+agricultural college, where he also did so well that before he was
+twenty he was able to be the squire's right hand in the management of
+his large property, and in this way was able to feel that, without
+sacrificing his independence, he could practically show his gratitude.
+They say that some part of the estate will certainly be left to Geoff at
+Mr. Byrne's death; but that, it is to be hoped, will not come to pass
+for many years yet, for the old gentleman is still very vigorous, and
+the Hall would certainly not seem itself at all if one did not hear his
+"Hoot-toot, hoot-toot!" sounding here, there, and everywhere, as he
+trots busily about.
+
+[Illustration]
+
+
+PRINTED BY WILLIAM CLOWES AND SONS, LIMITED, LONDON AND BECCLES.
+
+
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