Chapter 4 The Lady of the Forest by L. T. Meade
A SPARTAN BOY
“Philip?”
“Yes, mother.”
“You quite understand that you have got to be a very good little boy?”
“Oh, yes, mother, I understand.”
“It’s a big, grand place – it’s what is described as an ancient place, and dates back hundreds and hundreds of years, and you, you – why, what is the matter, Philip?”
“Is it antediluvian?” asked Philip, jumping up from his seat opposite his mother in the railway carriage. “Oh, I do hope and trust it’s antediluvian!”
“How you do puzzle me with your queer words, Philip. Antediluvian! – that means before the Flood. Oh, no, Avonsyde wasn’t in existence before the Flood; but still it is very old, and the ladies who live there are extremely grand people. You haven’t been accustomed to living in a great ancient house, and you haven’t been accustomed to the manner of such grand ancient ladies as the Misses Griselda and Katharine Lovel, and I do trust – I do hope you will behave properly.”
“Hullo! There’s a spider up in that window,” interrupted the boy. “I must try to catch him. There! he has run into his hole. Oh, mother, mother, look! there’s a windmill! See, it’s going round so fast! And, I say, isn’t that a jolly river? I want to fish and to shoot when I get to the grand place. I don’t care what else I do if only I have plenty of fishing and shooting.”
Philip Lovel’s mother knit her brows. She was a tall, fashionably dressed woman, with a pale face, a somewhat peevish expression, and a habit of drawing her eyebrows together until they nearly met.
“Philip, you must attend to me,” she said, drawing the little boy down to stand quietly by her side. “I have got you a whole trunkful of nice gentlemanly clothes, and I have spent a heap of money over you, and you must – yes, you must please the old ladies. Why, Phil, if this scheme fails we shall starve.”
“Oh, don’t, mother, don’t!” said little Phil, looking full up into his mother’s face, and revealing as he did so two sensitive and beautiful brown eyes, the only redeeming features in a very plain little countenance. “Don’t cry, mother! I’ll be a good boy, of course. Now, may I go back and see if that spider has come out of his hole?”
“No, Philip, never mind the spider. I have you all to myself, and we shall be at Avonsyde in less than an hour. I want to impress it upon you, so that you may keep it well in your memory what you are to do. Now, are you listening to me, Phil?”
“I am trying to,” answered Philip. “I do hope, mother, you won’t tell me too many things, for I never can remember anything for more than a minute at a time.”
Philip smiled and looked up saucily, but Mrs. Lovel was far too much absorbed in what she was about to say to return his smiling glance.
“Philip, I trained you badly,” she began. “You were let run wild; you were let do pretty much as you liked; you weren’t at all particularly obedient. Now, I don’t at all want the Miss Lovels to find that out. You are never to tell how you helped Betty with the cakes, and you are never to tell about polishing your own boots, and you are not to let out for a moment how you and I did our own gardening. If you speak of Betty you must call her your nurse; and if you speak of Jim, who was such a troublesome boy, you can mention him as the gardener, and not say that he was only twelve years old.”
“What a lot of lies I’m to tell,” said Philip, opening his eyes wider and wider. “Go on, mother – what else am I to do?”
Mrs. Lovel gave the little speaker a shake.
“Philip, what an exasperating child you are! Of course you are not to be so wicked as to attempt to tell lies. Oh, what a bad boy you are even to think of such a thing! I only want you to be a nice, gentlemanly little boy and not to speak of vulgar things, and of course it is very vulgar to allude to a maid-of-all-work like Betty and to cleaning one’s own boots; but as to lies – what do you mean, sir? Oh, there, the train is slackening speed. We’ll soon be at the station, and the carriage was to meet us. Remember, Philip, always be on your best behavior at Avonsyde! Don’t speak unless you are spoken to, and always be on the lookout to please the old ladies. There are two little girls, I believe; but they are not of the slightest consequence. Dear, dear, I feel quite trembling! I hope – I trust all will go well! Philip, dear, you have not felt that pain in your side all day, have you?”
“No, mother; I have not felt it for days. I am much better really.”
“I don’t want you to speak of it, love. I am most anxious that the ladies should consider you a strong boy. The doctors say you are almost certain to get over the pain; and when the Miss Lovels appoint you their heir it will be time enough to mention it. If the pain comes on very badly you will keep it to yourself – won’t you, Phil? You won’t groan or scream or anything of that sort; and you can always run up to my room and I can give you the drops. Oh, Phil, Phil, if this scheme fails we shall simply starve!”
Philip, with his queer, old-fashioned face, looked full at his mother.
“I’ll be a Spartan boy and bear the pain,” he said. “I don’t care a bit about being rich or having a big place; but I don’t want you to starve, mother. Oh, I say, there’s that jolly little spider again!”
When the London express halted at last at the small country station, Philip was gazing in ecstasy at a marvelous complication of web and dust, at one or two entrapped flies, and at a very malicious but clever spider. His mother was shaking out her draperies, composing her features, and wondering – wondering hard how a very bold scheme would prosper.
“Jump down, Phil. Here we are!” she called to her boy.
The child, an active, lithe little fellow, obeyed her. Not a trace of anxiety could be discerned on his small face. In truth, he had forgotten Avonsyde in the far more absorbing interest of the spider.
“I am glad to welcome you, Mrs. Lovel!” said Miss Griselda as she came forward to greet the new-comers. She was standing in the old hall, and the light from a western window of rich old stained glass fell in slanting hues on a very eager and interested group. Behind Miss Griselda stood her shadow, Miss Katharine, and Rachel’s bold dark face and Kitty’s sunny one could be seen still further in the background. Rachel pretended not to be the least interested in the arrival of the strangers, nevertheless her bright eyes looked singularly alert. Kitty did not attempt to hide the very keen interest she took in the little boy who was so nearly her own age, and who was to be so greatly honored as to sleep in the tower room. Miss Griselda and Miss Katharine wore their richest black silks and some of their most valuable lace; for surely this was the real heir, and they intended to give him a befitting reception. The old housekeeper and one or two other servants might have been seen peeping in the distance; they were incredulous, but curious. Mrs. Lovel took in the whole scene at a glance; the aspect of affairs pleased her and her versatile spirits rose. She took Philip’s little hand in hers and led him up to Miss Griselda.
“This,” she said in a gentle and humble voice – “this is my little boy.”
“Philip Lovel,” responded Miss Griselda, “look up at me, child – full in the face. Ah! you have got the Lovel eyes. How do you do, my dear? Welcome to Avonsyde!”
“Welcome to Avonsyde!” repeated Miss Katharine, looking anxiously from the fashionably dressed mother to the precocious boy. “Are you very tired, my dear? You look so pale.”
Phil glanced from one old lady’s face to the other. His mother felt herself shaking. She saw at once that he had forgotten their conversation in the train, and wondered what very malapropos remark he would make. Phil had a habit of going off into little dreams and brown-studies. He looked inquiringly at Miss Katharine; then he gazed searchingly at Miss Griselda; then he shook himself and said abruptly:
“I beg your pardon – what did you ask me?”
“Oh, Phil, how rude!” interrupted Mrs. Lovel. “The ladies asked you if you were tired, love. Tell them at once that you are not in the least so. Pale children are so often considered delicate,” continued Mrs. Lovel anxiously, “whereas they are quite acknowledged by many physicians to be stronger than the rosy ones. Say you are not tired, Phil, and thank Miss Katharine for taking an interest in your health.”
Phil smiled.
“I’m not tired,” he said. “I had a pleasant journey. There was a spider in the carriage, and I saw a windmill. And oh! please, am I to call you auntie, or what?”
“Aunt Katharine,” interposed the lady.
“Aunt Katharine, do you fish? and may I fish?”
Here Kitty burst into a delighted chuckle of amusement, and going frankly up to Phil took his hand.
“I can fish,” she said; “of course Aunt Katharine can’t fish, but I can. I’ve got a rod, a nice little rod; and if you are not tired you may as well come and see it.”
“Then I’m going out with my book,” said Rachel. “I’m going into the forest. Perhaps I’ll meet the lady there. Good-by, Kitty-cat; good-by, little boy.”
Rachel disappeared through one door, Kitty and Phil through another, and Mrs. Lovel and the two old ladies of Avonsyde were left to make acquaintance with one another.
“Come into the drawing-room,” said Miss Griselda; “your little boy and the children will get on best alone. He is a muscular-looking little fellow, although singularly pale. Where did you say he was born – in Mexico?”
“In Mexico,” replied Mrs. Lovel, repressing a sigh. “The true Mexican lads are about the strongest in the world; but he of course is really of English parentage, although his father and his grandfather never saw England. Yes, Phil was born in Mexico, but shortly afterward we moved into the American States, and before my husband died we had emigrated to Australia. Phil is a strong boy and has had the advantage of travel and constant change – that is why he is so wiry. The hot country in which he was born accounts for his pallor, but he is remarkably strong.”
Mrs. Lovel’s words came out quickly and with the nervousness of one who was not very sure of a carefully prepared lesson. Suspicious people would have doubted this anxious-looking woman on the spot, but neither Miss Griselda nor Miss Katharine was at all of a suspicious turn of mind. Miss Griselda said:
“You have traveled over a great part of the habitable globe and we have remained – I and my sister and our immediate ancestors before us – in the privacy and shelter of Avonsyde. To come here will be a great change for you and your boy.”
“A great rest – a great delight!” replied Mrs. Lovel, clasping her hands ecstatically. “Oh, dear Miss Lovel, you don’t know what it is to weary for a home as I have wearied.”
Her words were genuine and tears stood in her pale blue eyes.
Miss Griselda considered tears and raptures rather undignified; but Miss Katharine, who was very sympathetic, looked at the widow with new interest.
“It is wonderfully interesting to feel that your little boy belongs to us,” she said. “He seems a nice little fellow, very naïve and fresh. Won’t you sit in this comfortable chair? You can get such a nice view of the forest from here. And do you take cream and sugar in your tea?”
“A very little cream and no sugar,” replied Mrs. Lovel as she leaned back luxuriously in the proffered chair. “What a lovely view! And what a quaint, beautiful room. I remember my husband telling me that Avonsyde belonged to his family for nearly eight hundred years, and that the house was almost as old as the property. Is this room really eight hundred years old? It looks wonderfully quaint.”
“You happen to be in the most modern part of the house, Mrs. Lovel,” replied Miss Griselda icily. “This drawing-room and all this wing were added by my grandfather, and this special room was first opened for the reception of company when my mother came here as a bride. The exact date of this room is a little over half a century. You shall see the older part of the house presently; this part is very painfully modern.”
Mrs. Lovel bowed and sipped her tea as comfortably as she could under the impression of being snubbed.
“I have never been in a very old house before,” she said. “You know in Mexico, in the States, in Australia, the houses must be modern.”
“May I ask if you have brought your pedigree?” inquired Miss Griselda. “Yes, Katharine, you need not look at me in such a surprised manner. We neither of us have an idea of troubling Mrs. Lovel to show it to us now – not indeed until she has rested; but it is absolutely necessary to trace Philip’s descent from Rupert Lovel at as early a date as possible. That being correctly ascertained and found to be indisputable, we must have him examined by some eminent physician; and if the medical man pronounces him to be an extremely strong boy our quest is ended, and you and I, Katharine, can rest in peace. Mrs. Lovel, you look very tired. Would you like to retire to your room? Katharine, will you ring the bell, dear? We will ask Newbolt to accompany Mrs. Lovel to her room and to attend on her. Newbolt is our maid, Mrs Lovel, and quite a denizen of the forest; she can tell you all the local traditions.”
“Thank you,” said Mrs. Lovel. “Yes, I shall be glad to lie down for a little. I do hope Philip is not tiring himself – not that he is likely to; he is so strong. Thank you, Miss Lovel, I will lie down for a little. Yes, of course I brought the pedigree – and – and – a very quaint house; even the new part looks old to me!”
Mrs. Lovel tripped out of the room, and the two old ladies looked at one another.
“What do you think of her, Katharine?” inquired Miss Griselda. “You are dying to speak, so let me hear your sentiments at once!”
“I don’t quite like her,” said Miss Katharine. “She seems very tired and very nervous, and perhaps it is unfair and unkind to say anything about her until she is rested. I can’t honestly say, however, that my first impression is favorable, and she may be much nicer when she is not so tired and not so nervous. I don’t like her much at present, but I may afterward. What are your opinions, Griselda?”
“Katharine,” said Miss Griselda, “you are the most prosaic and long-winded person I know. You don’t suppose for an instant that I am going to say what I think of Mrs. Lovel to-day. After all, it is the boy in whom we are interested. Time alone can show whether these two are not another couple of impostors. Now, I wonder where that child Rachel has taken herself!”