LONELY LADY.

Auckland Star, Volume LXVI, Issue 260, 2 November 1935, Page 8 (Supplement)

LONELY LADY.

By AGNES L. WINSKELL

It was the dearest of houses, but oh! so cold and aloo!:, quite, quite unlike any other in the neighbourhood. Most of the village homes were very small; little homely places made gay with a woman's song and a mother's smile, and the- merry, rollicking echo of children's laughing voices. By night the lights shone with a happy, welcoming glow through the curtained windows, playing upon a wild, rambling patch of garden, or on neat rows of peas and cabbages, whilst the jolly clink of teatime knives and forks, cups and plates jingled musically in the silence of evening. Most of the village homes were like that—except Miss Penelope's. Miss Penelope's residence lay well away from the scattered group of cheery homes, perched proudly a short distance up the slope of the solitary hill. The huge cultivated shrubs nestled closely by the brick walls of the big dwelling, and the tall pines' stood sentinel-like in neat rows along each of the boundaries of the property. From the lane that encircled the. hill at its foot it was impossible to ''glimpse more than a red roof here and there, or, again, a protruding chimney-pot. The entrance was, surprisingly, an insignificant little white gate, with a faded name painted upon it, that opened unexpectedly from the lane, between a mass of dense shrubbery, to reveal a carefully-made ladder of some 50 wooden steps that climbed easily and gracefully before darting suddenly into the foliage. Here, it met (although not many knew, for Miss Penelope's visitors were few and far between) a wide, well-kept pathway that wound in and out up the slope calmly and unhurriedly, until, lo! it merged with the numerous narrow paths that untiringly encircled the flower beds.

Miss Penelope -was very proud of her garden. Old Jocelyn, the gardener, tended each bed and every flower lindier Miss Penelope's scrutinising supervision, with glorious success. The hollyhocks stood straight and tall, towering even above Miss Penelope's five foot ten; the violets cuddled together shyly at their foot, in a neat, unstraggly border; and the sweet peas—! It is beyond my power to describe them, those marvellous sweet peas that clung lovingly to the green painted trellises, their

unimaginable colours smiling like fairy lanterns in the sunlight—beautiful bowers of loving care.

Everything was very tidy and orderly in Miss Penelope's garden. Even the white cobbles on the pathways seemed, each of them, to be settled in their appointed places. There were no dogs or cats to scratch up the precious seeds, or break down the flower stems, living at the big house on the hill. No children, either, to scamper round the grounds, careless hands tugging at roots and plants, or roughly pulling the rosy fruit from the plum trees.

Miss Penelope would have been aghast at the suggestion. Dogs? Cats? Children? It was not to be thought of! So, perhaps it was, with the garden and her spotless home her only companions, that here was the reason for her loneliness. For lonely Miss Penelope was. She would have liked a friend, someone like herself, to admire with her those things so dear to her heart. She stood, often in the evening, on the broad balcony and looked downalmost longingly—on the fairyland of illuminated cottages that seemed to make up a world of their own —a little world of sheer delight.

But no friend came Miss Penelope's way, and so day by day she continued, and month by month, to tend the flowers alone, save for silent old Joeelyn, until every bud she knew and the very days they were due to blossom forth. It was not until the dull, drear days of winter came that she found the lack of companionship almost unbearable, but with their arrival she made a startling decision with as startling an unexpectedness that was totally unlike the staid, prim, calm Miss Penelope.

She would adopt a child! A girl it would have to be, for no ha,remscarem boy would roam within the sacred precincts of the garden with her consent! Yes, a girl. A quiet girl with long, fair plaits, perhaps, which were ever tidy, and with serious eyes that shone gently with the same great love of gardens as her own. At last she had discovered the means by which she could obtain her heart's desire.

Miss Penelope's steps were lightly eager, as she let the little white gate click behind her, and started on the short walk to the local orphanage. And there, with theraid of the kindly matron, she found ,a girl who might well have been the subject of her dreams. /

"I'm sure," the matron said, smilingly, "that Prudence is a child you could grow to love as your own. She is the best-behaved kiddie in the

home, and she so loves flowers that I have let her have a patch of garden for her own!" Jshe moved, about to lead Miss Penelope on. "You must speak to her. 111 call her for you." "A moment, please," Miss Penelope urged hastily, and the head of the Meynell Home for Orphans followed with surprise and curiosity the former's intent gaze. "That child there. The one with the black curls. Could you tell me a little about her first?" Miss Penelope's voice was eager. The matron stared at her visitor almost in horror, from her to the child in question, and back again. "Jaldine? Not Jaldine?" She stopped from the utter inability to find words to say more..

"Jaldine. Is that her name?" Miss Penelope asked, happily, and thought to herself, "Jaldido. Jaldine. It is a pleasant word.* But matron had found her voice at last. "Not Jaldine?" She repeated her former words in the same tone. "Why, she's quite the worst child we have here, I'm sure. A real bundle of mischief. In your garden—" She paused. significantly. It was a thought, although Miss Penelope felt her heart sink with its coming. For the dark Jaldine .had captured her fancy, and surely, Miss Penelope thought a little desperately, surely the child would not hurt the garden if asked not to do so. . ' "Couldn't I speak to her for a moment? she begged softly. "I'd like to." The matron looked a little doubtful, but nodded slowly. "Jaldine!" she called across the room, and the child addressed turned and came towards them. The elusive laughter in Jaldine's eyes as they looked curiously up at her went straight to Miss Penelope's heart. Cheeky eyes they were, wide and feeling, and the full, red lips turned up impishly at the corners. There was a dimple in each of the healthy olive cheeks, and a certain lithe suppleness in the plump little body that shrieked of energy. The matron was speaking. "Jaldine, this lady is looking for a little girl to go and live with her —" and Miss Penelope awoke from her fervent study of the child and said quickly, but softly, as though almost afraid for the answer: "Would you like to, Jaldine? Come and be my own little girl?" Jaldine studied her before she spoke. Then" the soft curls bobbed slowly. "I think I would," she said. Miss Penelope's' heart leapt—and, this too, was curious. "You think you would, Jaldine? Are you not sure ?" "Well, you see," Jaldine explained, and the shadows in her eyes were now grave, now gay. "You see, I've got a dog. Toby. He's all that's really mine. He'd have to come." And her eyes questioned Miss Penelope's for the verdict. Miss Penelope had never made so many swift, decisions. She smiled

" and said impulsively, "Of course, Toby can come! And, Jaldine, where do you keep him? I'd love to see him." "You would? Oh! quickly then! You'll just him!" The eager, friendly little bundle of humanity clutched impatiently at Miss Pener lope's hands in an endeavour to propel her, heedless of .matron's frowns, towards the kennel regions. "Oh!" thought Miss Penelope happily, as she willingly allowed herself to be pulled along, "how lucky I was to find the way to her heart." Jaldine, proudly exhibiting her pet, raised cheeky eyes suddenly, and said gravely, "It's really a good thing that you said Toby might come, too." She paused, but before Miss Penelope could speak, continued mischievously, " 'cos I'd have been so awfully Haughty, you'd have just had to send me back to him again!" Miss Penelope laughed in spite of herself. It was terrible, she told herself, but she'd never be able to get cross with Jaldine. Standing there, then, with Jaldine's warm, small hand clasped firmly in her own, she never as much as dreamed of the little frown-wrinkle that would mar her brow; of the feeling of annoyance that would overrun her at a certain time on a certain day to come. • It was the fifth of the prize blooms to be broken down —destroyed. Miss Penelope knelt by the bed and fingered the plant helplessly. Tears of disappointment welled up in the grey eyes; anger in the loving heart. Jaldine should —could—be more careful! It was cruel of the child to break down these things which she knew meant so much. Then swiftly the anger subsided. Oh! she mustn't blame Jaldine—or Toby, either, she told herself. It was just that they were eo young, so healthy, full of life, and, after all, she supposed a little dubiously, a child's happiness meant more than all the flowers in the world. Miss Penelope did not hear Jaldine approaching until the lattcr's voice, strangely subdued, sounded at ,her elbow.

"I'm sorry," she was saying contritely, her eyes falling to the broken plant. "My ball fell into the bed, and —and I trod on the flower when I went to get it." Miss Penelope's eyes shone with love and unshed tears. She was smiling. "It's all right, Jaldine, but you must try and be more careful, eh, darling? For my sake." She drew the child to her with a sudden, impulsive movement, hugging the warm, cuddlesome body against her owni She looked up in surprise as Jaldine made no effort to return her affection. The other's face was flushed rosy red, and the big eyes, usually so wide and open, looked down guiltily under their protecting lids. Miss Penelope felt a minutive tugging at her heart strings, and there was apprehensive f.ear there. (To be concluded.)