"Isn"t he an anachronism?" laughed Kate, "I often tell him the reason he has not married is he has never been able to find any one sufficiently Early Victorian for him. Imagine preaching a doctrine of "Thou shalt not write" to women to-day! Every woman her own auth.o.r.ess is the accepted thing."
"Ah well," said Hugh, "I know a better thing." But though Kate pressed him he might not tell to these two spinsters that "Every woman a mother" was in his thoughts.
"I will say good-night," said Miss Bibby, "come children--at once, if you please." She shook hands with Kate and this time only bowed to Hugh.
"Did you give her her present?" asked Kate when the gate closed and the grey figure and the little running ones were merged in the grey of the tender dusk.
"No," said Hugh, "I"ll have to find a better chance; I evidently put my foot in it, didn"t I?" He pondered over the keen eye-glance that had met his once or twice.
"I tell you what it is, Kate," he said, when, his cigar finished, they went into the house, "that girl will never really forgive me for the interview, however much she may think she does."
CHAPTER XXIII
THE PICNIC AT THE FALLS
The morning rose in mist; the sun moved upwards and still the mist lingered, as if anxious to drape and hide the rough edges of this oddly-arranged picnic.
Sometimes the wagonette in front was lost to sight by a rolling curtain of gauze; sometimes a wind swept the road clear and then the children waved hats and kissed hands to each other.
Dora and Beatrice were visions of beauty and fashion in smartly-cut linen gowns and the latest thing in stocks and belts and shoes and hats and gloves and parasols; not over-dressed in the least, but so correct, so up-to-date, so "well-planned," Miss Bibby involuntarily drew a heavy sigh as she looked at them.
In their turn the two young girls pleasantly patronized Miss Bibby. It was the first time they had seen her, though they had heard of her often, and indeed were a little anxious to meet her, for Mrs. Gowan had teased Hugh before them, ever since the interview, about the "fair and mysterious Miss Bibby." But this figure in its plain blue serge and its out-of-date, if spotless, cuffs and collar! This gentle, tired face with faint lines at the eye corners and its brown hair simply waved back from the forehead instead of bulging out on a frame as Fashion insisted!
"We need not have been afraid," they whispered to each other.
Effie and Florence, second and third in age of the five little Gowans and mustering some fifteen years between them, sat up on the box next the driver and whispered together. All the way they hardly moved their eyes from the wagonette in front, where the faces of their loved little friends appeared and disappeared like flowers of the vapour.
The driver was an unemotional man, long used to being squeezed up on his seat by more people than that seat was ever built to accommodate; used, too, to having his ears filled with every sort and condition of conversation. City men talked to each other beside him of stocks and shares; tourists compared the views along the roads with New Zealand views, and American ones and German and Swiss: mothers babbled of their babies and their servants; girls whispered to girls of "Jack" and "Jim"--lovers--and these allowed him more seat s.p.a.ce--of love.
Why should he lend a more than quarter ear as usual to the chatter of two little bits of girls? How should he know the demure holland frocks beside him covered revolutionists?
Hugh started off his first party, Paul and Lynn, m.u.f.fie and Max and Miss Bibby.
The children besought him to come, too.
"It will be just a common picnic, if you don"t," Pauline said, looking disparagingly round her family party.
Hugh promised to divide his time equally between his two sets of guests.
"Let the boys bring your basket down with the other things, Miss Bibby,"
he said, seeking to relieve her of a tiny basket she carried, "then you will have your hands free when you come to the ladder."
"Thank you, it is very light, I can manage it quite well," said Miss Bibby, holding fast to the handle.
"It"s her lunch," volunteered the ever ready m.u.f.fie, "she doesn"t eat things like you"ve got. But we do,--and we"re getting hungry now, aren"t we, Paul?"
"Rather!" said Paul. "Can we begin to set the tables as soon as we get down?"
Hugh looked disappointedly at the miserable little basket.
"Won"t you even make a feast and be merry to-day?" he said.
Miss Bibby glanced away from the kindly eyes. How could they look so clear and merry when he had stolen the work of her brain?
"Thank you," she said coldly, "I prefer my own things." And when he turned away instantly, quite hurt at the unfriendly tone, she caught hold of Max"s hand and began the steep descent with a mist, not entirely of the mountains, blinding her eyes. For she was heartsick this morning, and it was not only the loss of the story that had occasioned the wretchedness, but her faith and admiration for this man had been torn away so roughly that certain sensations she hardly realized seemed numbed.
"Come along, dear, hold my hand," she said to Max,--"Lynn, m.u.f.fie,--walk carefully! Hold to the rail at the steep places, Paul."
But she always said this as a matter of duty, and equally as a matter of duty they never heeded her, for even Max knew every step of the way and had manfully climbed the ladders alone, and crept sure-footed over the great fallen trees that formed bridges, since he was three.
Down, down they went through the exquisite gorge; greener and still more green grew the way as the path wound farther and farther away from the sunburnt lands overhead. Giant tree ferns grouped themselves together in one place and in another guarded the path in sentinel-like rows. You looked up and sheer walls of rock towered thousands of feet above your head--brown, naked, rugged walls here--and there, where the waterfalls dripped, clothed in a marvellous mantle of young ferns. Here a huge, jagged promontory stretched across your way, and the diplomatic path, unable to force a way through, simply ceased in its downward bent, and with handrails and steps led you up again.
As a reward for expended breath, a rail at the top encircled a stone peninsula and gave you a resting-place and an outlook--an outlook startlingly beautiful by reason of its unexpectedness. For the promontory had hidden the valley"s loveliness, and here you found a sudden glorious peep at it. And then your eyes looking down, down below the rail, saw that cascades had met and the water was plunging in a wide glistening sheet down the dizzy height.
The path led downwards again; the heart of the traveller has seen the falling of the water and cannot have its desire until it stands somewhere where the same down-dropping stream forms a deep pool and ceases.
Down, down they went, Miss Bibby, m.u.f.fie and Max leading and, far behind, Pauline and Lynn, lingering as was their wont (they had a pa.s.sion for pretending they were wandering quite alone in the gully)--but occasionally sending downwards a cooee to a.s.sure Miss Bibby of their safety.
They were dangling their legs on a seat in "The Lovers" Cave," two little figures in blue zephyr, when Paul gave a sudden exclamation of dismay.
"Quick, quick," she said, "we"re going too slowly. Here come the others."
She seized Lynn"s hand and the two began to hurry along the path again, for at a bend just above them were the holland frocks and mushroom hats of Florence and Effie.
Down, down, a hundred steps here, round a bend there, down a damp ladder, hard as they could go, and yet the holland frocks gained on the blue every moment. Lynn was panting, Pauline"s face streamed with perspiration, and still they sought to increase the distance; they could not have run more conscientiously from their little friends if they had been lepers.
But on, on, resistlessly came the holland frocks. Driven to bay Paul wheeled round--"We can"t go any faster," she shouted desperately, "you"ll just have to sit down and wait."
[Ill.u.s.tration: "Driven to bay Paul wheeled round."]
On, on came Florence and Effie while Lynn who had pulled up, too, regarded them in horror. When they were within a distance of ten feet she caught at Pauline"s hand and began to run again. But the newcomers who had dropped into a comfortable walk began to run even faster.
Paul and Lynn dodged into "Lurline"s Bower" that came along opportunely.
"We"ll wait here while you go past as you"re in such a hurry," Paul shouted.
But the holland frocks came on steadily, steadily till they stood in the opening of the bower, till they crushed themselves on the very seat with the amazed blue ones.
"You"ll catch our whooping," began Paul.
"We want to," said Effie and Florence succinctly.
"But--but--" said Paul and Lynn agitatedly.
"It"s all right," said Florence, "we "cided all about it coming along, didn"t we, Eff? It"s we"s who haves to cough, not mother, an" we don"t mind, do we, Eff?"