Man and Maid Part 34

"A nice little smooth-coated dog now," she said, "a fox-terrier, or an Italian greyhound; you see I am not ignorant of the names of various patterns of dog. I will get you one myself; we will go to the Dogs' Home at Battersea, where really nice dogs are often sold quite cheap. Or perhaps they might take your poor cur in exchange."

Judy began to cry.

"Yes, cry, my dear," said the Aunt kindly; "it will do you a world of good."

When the Aunt was asleep--she had closed her ears to the protests of Alcibiades with wadding left over from a handkerchief sachet--Judy crept down in her woolly white dressing-gown, and coaxed the kitchen fire back to life. Then she sat in front of it, on the speckless rag carpet, and nursed Alcibiades and scolded him, and explained that he really must be a good dog, and that we all have something to put up with in this life.

"You know, Alby dear," she said, "it's not very nice for me either, but _I_ don't howl and try to upset mangles. Don't you be afraid, dear: you shan't go to the Dogs' Home."

So kindly, yet strongly, did she urge her point that Alcibiades, tied to the leg of the kitchen table, consented to sleep quietly for the rest of the night.

Next day, when the Aunt enquired searchingly as to Judy's powers of fancywork, and what she would do for the bazaar, Judy declared outright that she did not know one end of a needle from the other.

"But I can paint a little," she said, "and I am rather good at wood-carving."

"That will be very nice." The Aunt already saw, in fancy, her stall outs.h.i.+ne those of all other Tabbies, with glories of sabots and tambourines decorated with rosy sprays "hand-painted," and carved white wood boxes just the size to hold nothing useful.

"And I'll do you some," said Judy; "only I can't work if I'm distracted about Alby--my dog, you know. Oh, Aunt, _do_ let him stay! He really is valuable, and he hasn't made a bit of noise since last night."

"It is quite useless," the Aunt was sternly beginning--then suddenly her voice changed. "Is the cur _really_ valuable?" she asked.

"Uncle Reggie gave five guineas for him when he was a baby boy," said Judy eagerly, "and he's worth much more now."

"But he must be very old--when your Uncle Reggie was a boy----"

"I mean when Alcibiades was a boy."

"And who is Alcibiades?"

Judy began all over again, and urged one or two new points.

"I don't want to be harsh," said the Aunt at last, "you _shall_ have the little breakfast room to paint and carve in as you suggest. Of course I couldn't have shavings and paint pots lying about all over the dining-room and drawing-room. And you shall keep your cur."

"Oh, Aunty," cried Judy, "you are a darling!"

"Yes," the Aunt went on complacently, "you shall keep your cur till the bazaar, and then we will sell it for the benefit of the Fund for the Amelioration of the Daughters of the Country Clergy."

And from this decision no tears and no entreaties would move her.

Judy made a den for herself and Alcibiades in the little breakfast room.

There was no painting light--so she looked out a handful of the sketches that she had done last summer and framed them. Most of her time she spent in writing to her friends to know whether any one could take care of a darling dog, who was a perfect angel. And alas! no one could--or would.

With the connivance of the cook, Alcibiades had a bed in a box in the den, and from the very first he would at a word conceal himself in it the moment the step of the Aunt sounded on the oil-cloth-covered stairs.

The sketches were framed, and some of the frames were lightly carved.

The Aunt was enchanted, but, on the subject of Alcibiades, adamant.

And now it was the day of the bazaar. Judy had run wires along the wall of the schoolroom behind her Aunt's stall, and from it hung the best of the sketches. She had arranged the stall herself, glorifying it with the Eastern shawls and draperies that her father had sent her from India. It did far outs.h.i.+ne any other stall, even that of Lady Bates, the wife of the tallow Knight. The Aunt was really grateful--truly appreciative.

But her mind was made up about the "cur."

"If it really _is_ worth anything we'll sell it. If not----" She paused on the dark hint, and Judy's miserable fancy lost itself among ropes and rivers and rat-poison.

To Alcibiades the bazaar was as much a festival as to any Tabby of them all. He had been washed, which is terrible at the time, but makes you self-respecting afterwards, a little puffed-up even. He had been allowed to come out by the front door, with his mistress in her beautiful dress that reminded him of rabbits. No one but Alcibiades himself will ever know what tortures of shame and misery, fighting with joy and affection, he had endured on those other occasions when he had been smuggled out of the back door in the early morning to take the damp air with his beloved lady and she had worn a shabby mackintosh and a red tam-o-shanter.

To-day he wore a blue ribbon; it was uncomfortable, but he knew it spelt distinction. He rode in a carriage. It was not like the little governess-cart which had carried him and his mistress through the lanes about Maidstone; but it was a carriage, and a large horse was his slave. His mistress herself had tied his blue ribbon; it was she, too, who adjusted the chain that attached him to a strong staple driven in just above the schoolroom wainscotting. The chain allowed him to sit at her feet as she stood by the stall waiting for purchasers, and scanning the face of each newcomer in an eager anxiety to find there the countenance of some one who really loved dogs.

But the people were most awful, and she had to own it to herself. There were Tabbies by the dozen, and young ladies by the score--young ladies all dressed differently, yet all alike in the fas.h.i.+on of the year before last; all vacant-faced, smiling agreeably because they knew they ought to smile--the young of the Tabby kind--Tabby kittens, in fact. No doubt they were really worthy and interesting, but they did not seem so to Judy.

There was a sprinkling of men--middle-aged mostly, and bald. There were a few youths; by some fatality all were fair, and reminded Judy of pork.

A Tabby stopped at her stall, turned over all things and bought a beaded table-napkin ring. The purchase and the purchaser seemed to Judy to typify her whole life and surroundings. All her soul reached out to the Island. She sighed, then she looked up. The crowd had thickened since she last surveyed it. Four steps led down to the schoolroom from the outer world: on the top step was a lady, well dressed--oh! marvel!--and beside her a man--a gentleman. Well, Judy supposed all these poor dear people were gentlefolk, but these two were of her world. As she gazed her eyes and those of the man met; the lady was lost in the crowd, and Judy saw her no more. The man made straight for the stall where were the framed sketches, the white dress, fur-trimmed, the russet hair and green eyes of Judy, and the brownly-black, blue-ribboned Alcibiades. But before he reached them a wave of buyers broke on the sh.o.r.e of Judy's stall, and he had been watching her for nearly half an hour before a young woman's long-deferred choice of a Christmas gift for a grandfather fell happily on a pair of purple bed-socks, and, for the moment, Judy breathed free.

"I told you so," said the Aunt, rattling money in a leather bag; "I _knew_ just before Christmas was _the_ time. Everybody _has_ to give Christmas presents to all their relations. You see! the things are going like wildfire."

"Yes, Aunt," said Judy. Alcibiades took advantage of the momentary calm to lick her hand exhaustively. Judy wondered wearily what had become of the man, the only man in that cheerless a.s.sembly who looked as though he liked dogs. "He must have been trying to get somewhere else," she said; "he just looked in here by mistake, and when he saw the sort of people we were, he--well--I don't wonder," she sighed, and, raising her eyes, met his.

"I beg your pardon," said he. He meant apology.

She took it for enquiry, and smiled. "Do you want to buy something?" she asked.

Her smile was more tired than she knew.

"I suppose I do," he said; "one does at bazaars, don't you know."

"Do you want a Christmas present?" asked Judy, businesslike; "if so, and if you will tell me what kind of relation you want it for, perhaps I can find something that they'd like."

"Could you? Now, that is really good. I want things for two aunts, three cousins, a little sister, and my mother--but I needn't get _hers_ here unless you've got something you think really--By Jove!"--his eyes had caught the sketches--"are _those_ for sale?"

"That is rather the idea," said Judy. Her spirits were rising, though she couldn't have told you why. "Things at a bazaar are usually for sale, aren't they?"

"Everything?" said he--and he stroked the not resentful neck of Alcibiades; "this good little beast isn't in the market, I'm afraid?"

"Why? Would you buy him?"

"I'd think twice before I said no. My mother is frightfully fond of dogs."

Quite unreasonably Judy felt that she did not want to sell Alcibiades as a present to any one's mother.

"The sketches," she said.

"The sketches," said he; "why, there's Maidstone Church and Farley and Teston Lock and Allington. How much are they?"

She told him.

"I must have some. May I have a dozen? They're disgracefully cheap, and I feel like an American pork man buying works of art by the dozen--for they _are_ jolly good--and it brings back old times. I was quartered there once."

"I knew it," she said to herself. Alcibiades stood up with his paws on her arm. "Be quiet," she said to him; "you mustn't talk now. I'm busy."

Alcibiades gave her a reproachful look, and lay down.

The stranger smiled; a very jolly smile, Judy thought.