Pixie O'Shaughnessy Part 14

Mademoiselle looked, as she felt, decidedly uncomfortable, but the first glance at Bridgie's face sufficed to restore her complacency, for the smile was without a shadow of offence, and the voice in which she replied was cheerfulness itself.

"Indeed that's true! We can get hunting for half of the year, but it's not every day we have a visitor in the house. You go with father, Esmeralda, and don't think of me! We will have a fine little spree on our own account, Mademoiselle and I! Maybe we'll drive into Roskillie and have a look at the shops!"

Mademoiselle remembered the Rue de la Paix, and smiled to herself at the thought of the shops in the Irish village, but she said honestly enough that she would enjoy the expedition; for would not Bridgie O'Shaughnessy be her companion, and did she not appear sweeter and more attractive with every moment that pa.s.sed? Nearly an hour had elapsed since breakfast began, and still she sat behind the urn, smiling brilliantly at each fresh laggard, and looking as unruffled as if she had nothing to do but attend to his demands! It was the quaintest meal Mademoiselle had ever known, and seemed as if it would never come to an end, for just as she was expecting a general rise the Major would cry, "What about a fresh brew of tea? I could drink another cup if I were pressed," and presto! it took on a new lease of life. Last of all Pixie made her appearance, to be invited to a seat on each knee, and embraced with a fervour which made Mademoiselle realise more fully than ever what the child must have suffered during those weeks of suspicion and coldness.

"How's my ferret?" she inquired, with her mouth full of toast, selected from her father's plate; and Pat seized the occasion to deliver his outstanding account.

"Grown out of knowledge! Eightpence halfpenny you owe me now. I had to put on another farthing a week because his appet.i.te grew so big. I knew you would rather pay more than see him suffer. And the guinea-pig died.

There's twopence extra for funeral expenses. We put him in the orchard beside the dogs, and made a headstone out of your old slate. It's a rattling good idea, because, don't you see, you can write your own inscription!"

"If it was my own slate, and I am to make up the inscription, I don't see why I should pay!" reasoned Pixie, with a business sharpness which sent her father into fits of delighted laughter, though it left Pat obstinately firm.

"Man's time!" he said stolidly. "That's what costs nowadays. You look at any bill, and you'll find the labour comes to ten times as much as the material. You needn't grudge the poor thing its last resting-place.

He was a good guinea-pig to you."

"I don't care how much I owe, for I have no money to pay with," returned Pixie, unconsciously echoing her father's financial principles. "Give Pat a s.h.i.+lling, please, Major, for taking care of my animals while I was away." And that gentleman promptly threw a coin across the table.

"I wish my animals were as cheap to keep! Well, who is coming out with me this morning? I have an appointment in Roskillie at 10:30, but I can't be there now until 11, so there's no use hurrying. Put on your cap, piccaninny, and come to the stables with me. The girls will look after you, Mademoiselle, and find some means of amusing you for the day."

"Oh yes, we'll take care of her!" said Esmeralda lightly; then, as the boys withdrew after their father, she planted her elbows on the table and looked across under questioning eyebrows. "Please, have we to call you 'Mademoiselle' all the time? Haven't you a nice, pretty French name that we could call you instead?"

"Therese! Yes, please do! I should feel so much more happy!" cried Mademoiselle eagerly, and Bridgie nodded in approval.

"Therese is charming, and it's so much more friendly to use Christian names at Christmas-time. I shall begin at once. We want you to help us with the decoration of the rooms, Therese! We shall be just a family party, but Jack will be at home, and we will have games and charades to make it lively. We might rehea.r.s.e something this morning, mightn't we, Joan dear?"

"_I_ mightn't!" replied "Joan dear" promptly, "because why?--I've got something better to do. There is plenty of time still, and you will agree with me later that my business is important. If you put on a cloak, Therese, I will come back for you in ten minutes, and take you to the stables to join father and Pixie. It will amuse you, I'm sure."

She left the room without waiting for a reply, and Bridgie heaved a sigh of disappointment.

"She's just mad after horses, that girl. Now she will be off with father, and not a sight of her shall we have until afternoon. It's easy to say there is time to spare, but to-morrow we must decorate, and look after all the arrangements for Jack's return, and I do hate a scramble.

However, when Esmeralda says she won't, she won't, and there's an end of it. You had better go with her, dear, while I interview the servants."

"I suppose I had," said Mademoiselle slowly. She thought Esmeralda selfish and autocratic, but she was fascinated, despite herself, by her beauty and brightness, and anxious to know her better; so she obediently went up to her room to heap on the wraps, for the morning was cold, though by this time the sun was struggling from behind the clouds. On the way down she was joined by Esmeralda in riding costume--a most peculiar riding costume, and, extraordinary to relate, most unbecoming into the bargain. Mademoiselle's critical glance roamed from head to foot, back again from foot to head, while Esmeralda stood watching her with tightened lips and curious twinkling eyes. Then Bridgie appeared upon the scene, and stopped short, uttering shrill cries of astonishment, as she looked at the slovenly tie, the twisted skirt, the general air of dishevelment and shabbiness.

"Esmeralda, you're an _Object_! Look at the dust on your skirt. You've not half brushed it, and everything is hanging the wrong way. It's a perfect disgrace you look, to ride out with any man!"

"I'm delighted to hear it! That's just my intention," replied the young lady, tugging the disreputable skirt still further awry, and nodding her beautiful head, with an air of mysterious amus.e.m.e.nt. The blue serge had a smudge of white all down one side, which looked suspiciously as if the powder-box had been spilt over it. A seam gaped open and showed little fragments of thread still sticking to the cloth.

If Esmeralda's intention was to look disreputable, she had certainly accomplished her object; and when the stables were reached she took care to place herself conspicuously, so that her father's eyes must of necessity rest upon her.

"I'm going to ride to Roskillie with you, dad! It's a fine morning, and I thought you would be the better of my company."

"That's a good girl!" cried the Major cheerily; then his brow puckered, and he stared uneasily at the untidy figure. He was so unnoticing about clothes that it required a good deal to attract his attention, but surely there was something wrong about the girl's get-up to-day? He kept throwing uneasy glances towards her while the horses were brought out, and Esmeralda strolled about in a patch of suns.h.i.+ne, and picked her steps gingerly over the muddles, like a model of fastidious care. She sprang to the saddle, light as thistledown, and curved her graceful throat with a complacent toss, as the groom smoothed her skirt, bringing the white stain into full prominence.

"You want dusting!" said the Major curtly, and a brush was brought from the stable, and scrubbed vigorously up and down, with the result that the surface of the cloth was frayed and roughened, though there was no appreciable removal of the stain.

"It doesn't seem as if it would come out, does it? but there are plenty more further on," said Esmeralda innocently. "Have a try at another, Dennis!"--but the Major motioned the man away with a hasty gesture.

"Leave the rag alone--it's past dusting! Is that the best habit you have to your back?" he cried testily, and the dark eyes looked into his with angelic resignation.

"It was a very good habit--six years ago! That's as good as twelve, for we've worn it in turns ever since. The bodice is the least thing in the world crinkly, for I'm broader than Bridgie, and stretch it out, and then it goes into creases on her figure. We might try was.h.i.+ng the skirt to take out the stains, and then it would be clean, if the colour _did_ run a bit! Ride round by the back roads, dear, and I'll keep behind, and not disgrace you!"

"Humph," said the Major again, and led the way out of the yard without another word, Esmeralda following, looking over her shoulder at the little group of watchers with a smile of such triumphant enjoyment as took away Mademoiselle's breath to behold. She looked inquiringly at Pixie, but Pixie and Dennis were in silent convulsions of enjoyment, and only waited until the riders were out of hearing before exploding into peals of laughter.

"That bates all for the cleverness of her! Miss Bridgie has been fretting over that old habit for a couple of years, and trying to wheedle a new one out of the Major, but it's Miss Joan that can twist him round her little finger when she takes the work in hand! That was a funny stain, that got the worse the more you brushed it! She never got that on the hunting-field. Go back to the house, Miss Pixie, dearie, and tell the mistress the new habit is as good as paid for. The Major's not the man I take him for, if he pa.s.ses the tailor's door this morning without stepping inside!"

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

CHRISTMAS PREPARATIONS.

Esmeralda strolled into the house in time for afternoon tea, and smiled complacently around as she warmed herself at the fire.

"Blue cloth!" she announced triumphantly. "No more serge, thank you, but good, solid cloth with a fine surface to it, and a smart little coat instead of a bodice, which was pure unselfishness on my part, for I should have been fitted well enough, and the man pressed it on me, but I thought of you, me darling, and the agony it would be to you to have your waist misjudged by a couple of inches, so I stuck to the coat, and I hope you are grateful!"

"I am," said Bridgie frankly; but there was a pained expression mingling with her satisfaction, and presently she added slowly, "So Dennis was right, and you got your way again. I have been trying for ages to persuade father that we needed a new habit, but he paid no attention to me."

"You didn't go about it the right way, me dear. You are fifty times cleverer than I, but there is one thing you don't understand, and that is how to manage men! They hate and detest being told what to do, and the secret of getting round them is to make them believe that what you want is their own suggestion. You have to be very cunning, and that's just what you can never manage to be!"

"Yes, she can!" came a shrill cry from the doorway, as Pixie burst into the room and made a bee-line for the tea-table. "Indeed she can now, Esmeralda, so it's no use denying it. She can, perfectly well!"

The three listeners looked at each other with questioning glances, for such vehemence was somewhat bewildering on the part of one who could not possibly have heard the first part of the conversation.

"What can she do?" queried Esmeralda sternly.

"Whatever you say she can't," replied the champion, unabashed; and at that the cloud rolled off Bridgie's brow, like mist before the sun.

"Oh, you precious goose! Bridgie can do everything, can't she? She always could in your eyes. It's very silly of you, dear, but it's very nice. I'm not at all vexed with you about it."

"You would be, though, if you were her true friend, but you always spoil one another, you two!" cried Esmeralda lightly. Then she stared round the room with a surprised expression, and added disapprovingly, "You seem to have been fairly lazy while I've been out. I thought you would have been getting on with the decorations. Whatever have you been doing?"

"Roaming about, and actually daring to enjoy ourselves like other people," retorted Bridgie, with what Mademoiselle was glad to recognise as a decided nip of severity; "but from this minute there must be no more playing until the work is finished. Dennis has cut the evergreens, and we must begin making wreaths at once, so as to be in order when Jack arrives to-morrow evening. We could have two hours' work before dinner."

"I loathe making wreaths; they are so dirty and p.r.i.c.kly, and I take a pride in me hands; they are the only ones I have, and what's the use of sleeping in white kid gloves, the same as if I were dressed for a party, if they are to be scratched all over with that hateful holly?"

Esmeralda stretched out two well-shaped, if somewhat large, hands, and gazed at them with pensive admiration; but Bridgie was firm, and, scratches or no scratches, insisted that she should take her own share of the work. As soon as tea was over, then, the family descended to the servants' hall, a whitewashed apartment about as cheerful as a vault, and but little warmer despite the big peat fire, where they set to work to reduce a stack of evergreens into wreaths and borderings for cotton wool "Merrie Christmases" and "Happy Newe Yeares" reserved from former occasions.

Pat and Miles cut the branches into smaller and more workable proportions. Pixie unravelled string and wire, and the three elders worked steadily at their separate wreaths. At the end of an hour they had progressed so well that it was suggested that the three fragments should be tied together, and the wreath hung in the hall, to clear the room for further operations.

The suggestion being universally approved, a stormy half-hour followed, when each of the five O'Shaughnessys harangued the others concerning the superiority of his or her own plan of decoration, and precious lives were imperilled on the oldest and shakiest of step-ladders. The boys could naturally mount to the highest step without a fear, but, when mounted, were so clumsy and inartistic in their arrangements that they were called down with derisive cries, and retired to sulk in a corner.

Then Bridgie lifted her skirt and gallantly ascended five steps, felt the boards sway beneath her, and scuttled down to make way for her sister. The daring rider across country possessed stronger nerves, but also a heavier body, and the ladder creaked so ominously beneath her that she insisted upon the whole company acting as props, in one breath sending them running for hammer and rope, and in the next shrieking to them to return to their posts.

By the time that the wreath was really hung, the friction had reached such a pitch that Mademoiselle expected a state of civil war for the rest of the evening, and even wondered if the atmosphere would have time to clear before Christmas itself. She could hardly believe the evidence of her senses when the boys affably volunteered to clear away the rubbish, and Bridgie and Esmeralda went upstairs with wreathed arms, calling one another "Darling" and "Love," with the echo of sharp taunt and sharper reply still ringing in the air! Certainly, if the Irish tongue were quick, the heart seemed even quicker to forgive an enemy, or pardon an offence.

By the time that Mademoiselle retired to bed that night the last remnant of strangeness had vanished, and she felt like a lifelong friend and confidante. She had seen the menu for the Christmas dinner, and had helped to manufacture jellies and creams, while Pixie perched upon the dresser, industriously sc.r.a.ping basins of their sweet, lemony, creamy leavings, with the aid of a teaspoon and an occasional surrept.i.tious finger when her sisters were looking in an opposite direction. She suggested and achieved such marvels in the way of garnis.h.i.+ng that Molly was greatly impressed, being a very plain cook in more ways than one, and solemnly asked for advice upon the killing of turkeys, when Mademoiselle had to acknowledge ignorance, and lost caste forthwith.

Then Esmeralda invited her to a display of evening dresses in her bedroom, and wished to know which she should wear--the black silk with the net top, or the net top over a white skirt, or the black silk with no top at all, and Bridgie plaintively appealed to her for the casting vote on the great question of crackers or no crackers!

It was certainly a curious mingling of grandeur and poverty, this life in the half-ruined Castle, with its magnificent tapestries and carvings, its evidences of bygone splendour, and, alas! present-day parsimony.