Salome Part 6

"Mr. Arthur Wilton! Poor gentleman. I saw his death in the paper, and thought it must be the doctor's brother. He has left a long family, hasn't he?"

"Yes; that is, shorter than my niece's; but six are enough to provide for when there is nothing left but debts and difficulties."

Ruth was an old married servant of Dr. Wilton's, one of the innumerable young cooks who had been under Miss c.o.x, and had basely deserted her as soon as she could _cook_--send up a dinner fit to be eaten--to dress the dinner of the baker's boy who had served 6 Edinburgh Crescent with bread.

"Dear me! I thought Mr. Wilton was a very rich gentleman. I have heard the young ladies talk of the fine country place. How was it?"

"He had misfortunes and losses, Ruth; and his family are coming here to live in furnished lodgings. But I can meet with none. Can you help me?"

Ruth looked right and left, as if she expected to see some one coming up or down the road with the news of lodgings in their hands, and was silent. At last a light seemed to break over her rosy face. "If they don't mind being next to our shop, I believe I do know the very place.

Will you come and see? The house belongs to my mother-in-law, and she has got it nicely furnished. It is not far; will you come, Miss c.o.x?"

"Is it quite near, Ruth? for I must be back for the children's dinner, and I am so tired."

"You can take a tram from the Three Stars, and that will get you home in no time. It is not far, Miss c.o.x."

"Well, I will come, Ruth; but I don't feel sure about engaging the lodgings. Your mother-in-law won't mind my looking at them?"

"Oh no, ma'am, not a bit. She was an old servant, you know, of some real gentry at Whitelands, and the old lady died last fall twelvemonth, and left mother--I always calls her mother--a nice little sum and some real valuable furniture."

"Oh! then she won't take children," said Miss c.o.x despairingly. "She won't take boys?"

"That she will, if you like the apartments; there won't be no difficulties," said Ruth in a rea.s.suring voice. "You see, my Frank's father died when he was an infant, and mother went back to her old place, where she lived till two years ago, when the mistress died. Then she took this little business for Frank, and the house next. It is quite a private house, and was built by a gentleman. She thought she should be near us and help us on a bit, and so she has. And she put the furniture in it, and has added a bit here and there; and she let it all last winter to the curate and his mother; and here we are, Miss c.o.x. Look straight before you."

Miss c.o.x looked straight before her as she was told, and there, at the end of the road, stood a neat white house with a pretty good-sized baker's shop on the lower floor, and two windows above. There was a wing with a bake-house, and then a tall elm tree, left of its brethren which had once stood there in a stately group, either by accident or by design, and given their name to the locality--Elm Fields.

"There's my Frank at the door," Ruth said, nodding; "he wonders what I am come back for."

"I remember him," said Miss c.o.x; "he used to take an hour to deliver the bread. Ah, Ruth, you should not have married such a boy."

"Shouldn't I? Then, Miss c.o.x, you and I don't agree there. If I am a bit older, Frank is the best husband that ever lived.--This way, ma'am."

Ruth opened a wooden gate and went up a narrow path to the door of a small house, built of old-fas.h.i.+oned brick, with a porch at the side, and a trellis covered with clematis.

"Quite like country, isn't it, ma'am?--Mother," Ruth called. And then from the back of the house Mrs. Pryor emerged, a thin, pale, respectable-looking woman, but with a sad expression on her face.

"Here's a lady, mother, come to look at your apartments, for a family--Dr. Wilton's brother, you know, mother, where I lived when I first saw Frank."

"Ah! indeed; will you please to look round, ma'am? It is a tidy place; I do all I can to keep it neat and clean; and there's some good furniture in it, left me by my dear blessed mistress." And Mrs. Pryor raised her ap.r.o.n to her eyes, and spoke in a low voice, like one on the brink of tears.

"Well then, mother, when ladies come to be in their eighty-sevens, one can't wish or expect them to live. It is only natural; we can't all live to be a hundred."

"I don't like such flighty talk, Ruth," said Mrs. Pryor reprovingly. "It hurts me.--This way, ma'am."

Aunt Betha followed Mrs. Pryor into a sitting-room on the ground floor, square and very neat,--the table in the middle of the room, a large mahogany chiffonier, with a gla.s.s of wax flowers on it, and two old china cups. Miss c.o.x went to the square window and looked out. The ground sloped away from the strip of garden, and the hamlet of Elm Fields, consisting of the cottages and small houses where Frank now delivered his own bread, was seen from it. There was nothing offensive to the eye, and beyond was a line of hills. Harstone lay to the right.

Another room of the same proportions, and four bed-rooms, all very neat, and in one, the pride of Mrs. Pryor's heart, a large four-post bed with carved posts and heavy curtains, the very chief of the dear mistress's gifts and legacies.

Aunt Betha felt it would do--that it must do; and there was a little room for the servant which Mrs. Pryor would throw in, and all for the prescribed two pounds a week.

"I will tell Dr. Wilton about it, and you shall hear this evening, or to-morrow morning at latest, and you will do your best to make them comfortable. They have had great sorrows. One thing I forgot to consider,--how far are we from the college?"

"Not a quarter of an hour by the Whitelands road," said Ruth eagerly. "I can walk it in that time; and young gentlemen, why they would do it in five minutes."

"How many young gentlemen are there?" Mrs. Pryor asked feebly, when they were in the pa.s.sage.

"Two that will go to the college," said Ruth quickly. Then, with a glance at Miss c.o.x, she said in a lower voice, "I will make it right.

Now, ma'am, you will catch the tram at the Three Stars if you make haste."

Poor Aunt Betha trudged off to the Three Stars, and stumbled into the tram just as it was starting.

She reached Edinburgh Crescent almost at the same moment as Dr. Wilton, who was returning from his first round.

"I have found a house which I think will answer for the poor people from Maplestone," she said. "I did not absolutely engage the rooms till I had consulted you and Anna."

Dr. Wilton gave a rapid glance to the white slate in the hall, and then said, "Come in here a minute, auntie," opening the door of his consulting-room. "Where are the lodgings?"

"In the neighbourhood you mentioned--by St. Luke's Church--in that new part by Whitelands called the Elm Fields. They are kept by a respectable woman, the mother of an old servant of ours--Ruth--and there is room for them all. Four bed-rooms, two sitting-rooms, and a little room for the servant."

"I'll take a look at the place this afternoon. I expect it is the very thing; and I have to see a patient in that direction. If I am satisfied, I will engage them from this day week. Guy is better to-day."

"Yes; he slept better," said Aunt Betha.

She was very tired, for she carried the weight of sixty-five years about with her on her errands of love and kindness. "I must go now and carve for Anna," she said. "It is past one o'clock."

Dr. Wilton always took his hasty luncheon in the consulting-room,--a gla.s.s of milk and a few biscuits. He did not encounter that long array of young faces in the dining-room in the middle of his hard day's work.

Aunt Betha departed with her news, which was received with some satisfaction by Mrs. Wilton. At least, Elm Fields did not lie much in the way of Edinburgh Crescent. There was safety in distance. And Aunt Betha wisely forbore to make any reference to the baker's shop.

That afternoon a telegram was handed in at Maplestone, which Salome opened for her mother with trembling fingers:--

"Dr. Wilton, Roxburgh, to Mrs. Wilton, Maplestone Court, near Fairchester.

"I have taken comfortable lodgings here for you from the twenty-third. I will write by post."

CHAPTER V.

A JOURNEY.

That last week at Maplestone was like a hurried dream to all the children, who had known no other home. Their neighbours and friends were very kind and full of sympathy, and Mrs. Wilton and the little boys were invited to spend the last two days with the De Brettes, who lived near, and it was arranged that they should stay there with Ada; and that Salome, and Stevens, and the two elder boys should precede them to Roxburgh. Miss Barnes had said she would come with them for a day or two to help them to arrange the rooms, and prepare everything for Mrs.

Wilton; but she was called away to the sick-bed of her own mother, and Stevens and Salome went with Raymond and Reginald alone. The beautiful summer seemed over, and it was in a chill drizzling rain that Salome looked her last at Maplestone. She did not cry as the fly, laden with boxes, rumbled slowly down the drive. Stevens sobbed aloud, and Raymond and Reginald kept their heads well out of each window; but Salome sat pale and tearless. The coachman's wife at the lodge stood with her children round her at the large gate, and curtseyed; but she hid her face in her ap.r.o.n, and cried bitterly. The gardener had preceded them with the cart to the station, and the boxes were all labelled before the party in the fly arrived.

[Ill.u.s.tration: "The coachman's wife hid her face in her ap.r.o.n, and cried bitterly." _Page 66._]

"Shall I take the tickets?" Raymond asked.

"Yes; let Master Raymond take them," exclaimed Stevens.