JENNIFER J.

Otago Witness, Issue 3566, 18 July 1922, Page 52

JENNIFER J.

By

ETHEL TURNER (Mrs H. R. Crulewis).

Author of “Seven Little Australians,” “The Wonder Child,” “The Chib,” “Laughing Water,” etc. CHAPTER TV—THE SECRET FORTRESS.—(Continued.) Jennifer let one leg cautiously down through the trap door and felt about for the step ladder; then the other leg. Her oare feet touched the ground. The house was still wrapped in the deep sleep of the blessed Sabbath, not even Phil or Peggy was silently bathing yet, or silently dressing and creeping down the stairs. Suppose Mrs Sams went in hysterics at the charge and disturbed the peace of the house arid brought Andrew —.Jennifer had a quaint habit of frequently thinking of her father as Andrew—out of his blessed Sabbath bed! The idea was not to be contemplated. She stole back to her room, and suddenly, having time to realise how cold she was, roiled herself up in her blankets and eiderdown, and was asleep again in five minutes. She awoke to Peggy silently thumping her. In the house of an editor of a morning paper everything upstairs is conducted silently until he rises. “We’ve all nearly finished,” she whispered, “and Mrs Sams says she’s not going to keep your porr'dge hot, no, not if she knows it, seein’ ?t’s me Sunday out, an’ Sunday not in the ’abit of turning up twice in a week or hahnanacs in these day’s.” Even Peggy could not resist the temptation to quote Mrs Sams verbatim. Mrs Sams. Recollection came flooding. Jennifer rolled out of bed, silently’, and as silently bathed and dressed. But downstairs in the dining room, though the table was almost cleared, and Mrs Sams was furiously washing up, in order to get away early, Jennifer had not been forgotten. Her porridge steamed over a- saucepan of hot water, her boiled egg had an egg cosey on it, her thin strip of bacon sizzled in the pan, there was even toast ready for her. She bad gone into the kitchen to carry them in for herself as she deserved, seeing Bertha had by this started on her task of dusting and putting in order the big living room. But she was far too ashamed to look at Mrs Sains : she avoided the lady’s eye all the time that she loaded her tray. “Next time it will be cold, so you’d better believe it, young lady,” said Mrs Sams cheerfully, “an’ it would have been this morning only’ your dear Ala used to worry over you bein' that white. But just you wait till nex’ time.” Jennifer knew she need have no fear; Mrs Sams threatened them all like this, but it was very seldom even John, perennially late for meals, came in for quite cold comfort. The woman had a cheery, dependable air about her, there was no doubt. In her large white apron and lier spotted blue and white print dress, she looked made by’ Providence to preside over a large shining stove ou which perpetually cooked, in an atmosphere of rich and savoury fragrance, a fatted calf ready to the minute 'for ail the waifs and strays and hundreds of the world. “Mrs Sams,” said Jennifer, sternly. “Now, don’t you begin chattering, my pet,” said Mrs 'Sams, “or I’ll never get away. “Ton run along in with that there tray’, and gobble it all up, and bring me back the dishes.” Jennifer stood an irresolute second or two longer, and then melted away. The charge was simply preposterous; she could not make it. But she became fortified again after porridge, boiled egg, a slender—very slender—strip of bacon, and plenty of toast and jam. Mrs Sams had explained to her about the cat treading on the buter, so there was no intermediary layer between the toast and jam of the pleasant yellow substance that nature craves on a winter morning. She stalked out to the kitchen again, bearing her tray, and with her chin up. “Merton!” she said to herself. Now Merton was the name of the house of the Firths, and to the passer-by a very unarresting name. But it was Fidelia- who had given the house the name in its baptism. Fidelia’s father had been a Fellow of Merton, and when he married and lost his Fellowship and became a professor to win daily bread for Fidelia, and Fidelia's mother, he settled down in a little ancient house under the very shadow of the Merton grand tower, within a stone”s throw of the quaint little Mob Quad, which Fidelia had impressed on her familv in its earliest infancy was the very first form of college quadrangle known. Tim family had always liked the stories of Merton—whatever : ts errors, Merton had always “gone the whole hog,” as John termed it, in any cause. It was a Fellow of Merton who presided over the burning of Ridley and Latimer : it was fellows of Merton, who, when they turned and espoused Puritanism, out-Heroded llerod in Puritanism. Fellows of Merton did what they conceived to be right, and the consequences might be hanged. “Merton,” said Jennifer to her shrinking soul, as she stalked into the kitchen with an empty tray and a beating heart. Thoughtfully crunching her toast, she had decided that she would deal with the business herself. She had come by the unpleasant knowledge in an unpleasant way —you could not call it eavesdropping exactly ; but skylight-dropping seemed a close cousin to that unpleasant thing, and the honourable way seemed to be to keep the matter between the two persons concerned. ’.Mrs Sams!”

'That you, my pet?” said Mrs Sams, hurriedly mopping up her table and draining board. “Stack your things over there, and they can be done with the dinner things. Whose turn is to help Byrtha dry up to-day? I hone to goodness gracious not yours. Miss Sheila s bad enough—takes me half Monday to find the things after Miss Sheila’s put them away. But you—do you know where you put the egg-slice and the gravy strainer las’ time you dried up ? In the wine cupboard, no less. Bad girl—had little girl. Now run away, or I’ll mop you up with the table.” “Mrs Sams!” said Jennifer desperately. The cheap old fibre suitcase was standing, right in her line of vision, under the washing-up table. “Another hour an’ I’ll be with my little loves of boys,” burst out Mrs Bams, the tenderest look on her face. ‘ 1 was dreaming about ’Airy las' night. T dreamed he had a large piece of red flannel tied round his neck. I hope it don't mean the dipfeeria—you're not up in the signs of dreams, are you, my pet! Nor Miss Shi ala nor Alisa Marta, neither. You’d think in a studious fam’ly like this, all books and papers and ink spots on everyone’s clothes, they’d know something about dreams. But no, none of you —of course, I didn’t ast your pa, though I might have, and he might have taken a hint and done a leader on it, like. Namin’ no names and meanin’ no offence. Miss Jennifer, the leaders in some people’s papers are too much for anythink. Me and Bertha have sat down more than once and tried with our fingers in our ears to find out what they’re all about, feelin it our dooty, livin’ in a editor's house arid all, to know what he’s tryin’ to write about, stopping up all night and all that, and bein' that cantakerous in a morning you have to wear felt slippers all the morning, the same bein' the worst things known for giving corns. You might put it to him, my pet, that morning papers ought to have things in, besides murders, that everyone can read, even if they re only cook-g’n’rals and not studious, so to speak, not havin’ time to be. Now if he’d do dreams for a time everybody would read him willing.” Jennifer had firmly resisted the temptation to say that to dream of a littlj) boy having red flannel round his neck was an infallible sign that the boy would sooner or later be hanged. But as the woman’s voice went on and on and on, accompanied by moppings and turning down of washing-up bowls and the hanging up of dish mops and soap savers, the girl had found a line of attack. “Mrs Sams,” she began in a measured voice, “I didn’t dream of red flannel, but I did have a dream. I dreamed I found Philly’s blue socks—they—they were in a sort' of—of suitcase—with some bacon.” She was fairly gasping now. Airs Sams paused with saucepan-scraper in her hand, and she looked—yes, quite deliberately she looked at the fibre suitcase upon which Jennifer’s eyes were fixed. “That was a funny dream, too,” she said. T lf you dream you’ve got white gloves on it’s a wedding, but I’ve never seed nothing about blue socks.” “Merton!” said Jennifer’s spirit again to Jennifer’s courage. Aloud she said, advancing nearer to the suitcase. “It was such a vivid dream I’m going to look in all the suitcases in the house. I’ll begin with that one.” She took another swift step forward. “Master Philly’s blue socks!” said Mrs Sams. ‘ Haven’t you found them yet? Why, they’re hanging on the line at the bottom of the drying ground yet—l seen them this very morning.'’ Jennifer drew a breath. Oh, the relief if t-hev should be! This was the most hateful business into which she had ever been plunged. She hurried through the laundry, down the steps into the. little asphalt yard, then into the grassed space where a few tea-towels and nondescript articles sti-ll dangled on the line, although it was nearly a week since the last ministrations of the red-haired Mrs Brown. But nothing blue dangled there, not even on the fig tree that often bore a fine crop cf wet socks and handkerchiefs on washing days when the lines were full. She went back with absolutely determined eyes. “Merton,” she said once more, and strode across the kitchen and grasped the suitcase. Mrs Sams was now engaged on the final obsequies of her Sunday work, sweeping the kitchen floor. “I—l—am sorrv to do this, Airs Sums,” Jennifer said, thickly and wildly, “the—the—very hateful—-rny duty—no one else my father ” “What’s that, my pet?” said Mrs Sams, absently. Did you find the socks?” But Jennifer”s hand was grappling with the clasp of the suitcase—was flinging it dramatically open. It contained two largo worn pairs of Mrs Sam’s boots and one of her blue spotted print dresses. Jennifer choked with emotion. “You're getting a cold, said Airs Sams. “Here, wlnrt are you doin’ with my suitcase? Let my things alone, young lady, and do-get from under mv feet and let me sweep. Didn’t you find the socks? Now I come to think of it, ’twasn”t on the line I saw them, but on the trellis—caught like as if they’d blown over.” She walked to the kitchen window, and pointed out where to the left van a trellis dividing the dryino- ground from the garden. Surely enough, a pair of boy’s blue socks was caught on the top of it. “Do get from under my feet now, mv pet.” she added, making a wide sweep with her broom. Jennifer got from under them and melted away, crushed quite flat. <' IT A BITER V—THE SUBSTITUTE CENTRE OF THE CIRCLE. Aunt Amy, deputy centre of the Merton circle, had burst into tears for a second time, and indignantly shaken the dust of the circle off her feet. the family, as a matter of act, had had no end of trouble with Aunt Amy.

When first, ou Fidelia’s departure, she had come among them, simply bursting with recipes, resources, and a repertoire of stories, she had positively expected to be listened to. deferentially, treated politely, made the very centre of things. The family opened doors for her, found her chairs, passed her tiie salt, said her cakes were good when they were not, and then considered that thev had done all that could be reasonably expected of them for any elderly aunt unexpectedly dumped down upon them as a substitute for a mother. There was the matter of the eggs for breakfast, for instance. Aunt Amy had approached Airs Sams with the greatest possible tact. Well did she know it that cooks like Mrs Sams were not indigenous to every family in the suburbs, and she had no desire to have too much on her hands. “Your pancakes at dinner last night, Airs Sams—delicious, simply delicious,” she had said. “You are a born cook.” “I am that,” said Mrs Sams approvingly, but at the same time keeping her weather eye upon Aunt Amy. “I was going to suggest-—merely to suggest—that perhaps some of my recipes for break-fast might be a change for the young ones,” said Aunt Amy. “See — Thirty-nine Ways of Cooking Eggs —you would find it so interesting to try. Look at this, for instance : Oeufs aux Epinards that’s eggs with spinach, of course—you simply ” “Mr John hates spinach, says it reminds him of the stuff on the top of stagnant ponds,” said Airs Sams stolidly. “Oh, the horrid boy. Well, wliat about this, Oeufs aux pommes de’amour —yes, yes—eggs and tomatoes.” “Miss Sheila .can’t abide tomatoes.” “How tiresome. So wholesome. Still —come, they all like oysters—eggs, creamed, and oyster sauce. Break seven eggs into —” “And oyster sauce, did you say, Miss Firth? Oyster sauce? Do you know what oysters have gone up to? Twopence each, no less. Better give them two eggs each and have done.” “Well, what about this. Oeufs a l’econome —economical eggs, that means. Tako one egg for two persons ” “Aliss Firth, their Ma would want to come back and put me right out of the kitchen, and serve me right it would. One egg for two persings! Namin’ no names and beggin’ your parding, some people don’t know what our young people’s appetites is early in a morning!” “But I am sure they would welcome a change in the monotony,” persisted Aunt Amy, heroically. “Monotony!” said Airs Sams. “Their dear Ala never called it monotony. Monday, boiled eggs; Tuesday', fried; Wednesday, poached; Thursday, scrambled; Friday, boiled ; Saturday, fried ; Sunday, boiled again, which it was my day out and coming easier. Monotony! Why, there’s hardly a day' the same.” However, Aunt Amv standing so valiantly to her guns in demanding a change, Airs Sams promised to try oeufs farcis an jus. She had faithfully promised her departing mistress to do her best to please Aliss Firth. And then the oeufs farcis au jus. nestling in their coats of forcemeat, carne on the table, and Aunt Amy having apportioned them, sat ready to receive the exclamations of surprise and gratitude. “What unholy stuff is this?” demanded John suspiciously turning over the compound on his plate. “What in the name of fortune has happened to the eggs?” said Marta. With similar comments of dismay from everyone. And then Aunt Amy learned that in this family eggs were regarded as eggs; that any attempt to tamper with them or disguise them or serve them other than in the first four sacred way's known since the day's of Noah would bo ill-received. The poor lady laid the recipe book back in her box, a sadder and a wiser woman. Still, she might have received a little approbation for her actual personal services ‘ John, my dear, she would observe when John, in the midst of home-lesson time, would be wrestling with a sheet of foolscap on which he had placed various dots and initials that looked as if they might bo from the Alorse code, hut were really only the names and places to be allotted in the next club match. “John, my dear, I put the lost button on your waistcoat and mended your old football jersey' ” John : “Thanks very much, Aunt Atny'.” Aunt Amy: “I darned it backwards with blue wool and forwards with green, and you can hardly' notice it is a darn. I spent the whole afternoon over it.” John (hurriedly'): ‘You’re a trump, Aunt A. Thanks awfully.” Aunt Amy : “And I brushed the mud off vour cap and stitched the lining in.” John (a little desperately) : “Thanks awfully, Aunt A.” Aunt Amy (wistfully): “ There are plenty of cakes in the cupboard, John, if you like to ask your friends Jack and Jo in on the way from school, 1 made them myself. John: ‘ Urn! Ah! Thanks, Aunt.” Aunt Amy (wistfully): “They are the kind you like. I beat the sugar and butter'together for twenty minutes; but as long as you all like them I don’t mind how tired it made me.” John (frantically): “Thanks awfully and frightfully, Aunt A.” Similarly with the tilings she did for Marta and Sheila and Jennifer and Peggy and Phil. Lots of things there were—it is astounding the number of tilings that have to be done by woman’s hands to keep a hearty, healthy, fairly woll-to do family up to the mark the world ex- I pect-s of it. But the family grew bewildered about being told of the deeds so often; they had never heard a word about them from Fidelia- the things were simply done, and that was all there was to the matter. They—everyone of them—began to say “Thanks frightfully, Aunt A.” automatically the moment she began to tell

I them what she had done She noticed I it silent!, after a time. | And there was tile matter of literary j culture. Aunt Amy knew that she was in the bosom o; a highly ‘studios” | family—a family that in very truth was ; all books and papers and spots of ink on its clothing, as Mrs .’Sams had said. And • lie began to brush up her literary talk auJ i to read her brother's leaders witli brows ■ almost as wrinkled as Mrs bams had been when that lady was similarly euj gaged. Act indeed she came of a literary j family herself, their father, her’s, anil j Andrew’s, an Anglican minister in Kent, j had published two books on the subject lof tlif, “Psychology oi Religion.” She ; herself had" written a bright-, chatty | column of church news for her father’* I parish magazine every month for eleven [ years before that father died. Then suddenly, weary to death with Kentish parishes and Kentish church news, she gathered her small inheritance together and struck out for the furthest possible place she could find a wav from them Australia, namely, where Andrew had gone when he first married Fidelia, and wanted a great new continent in which to think great new thoughts and do great new' deeds. Miss Firth generally kept the conversation in this “studjius” family at dinner time on a strictly literary basis. Andrew would take his seat- in front of (he roast mutton—one could riot expect Amy to take the carving over as Fidelia had done—and pick up the carving knife. Then there would ensue such a conversation as below : Aunt Amy : ‘ And what are you going to write your leader about to night, my dear Andrew?” Phil: “Ugh! Editors don’t write leaders, Aunt Amy. They on'y c'rrect them with b ue pencils.” Aunt Amy: “Little boys should he seen, and not heard, Philip. T am perfectly aware of the fact you speak of. If I must be meticulously correct, let ma amend my utterance. Upon what subjects have von indicated to your leaderwriters, Andrew, that thev shall expatiate for the issue of to-morrow morning?” Phil : “O-o-oh. That’s a good one, Aiuitie A. Met-—met-rick-yulns—how d’you spell it, Aunty A?” Peggy was siiot a glance that said. “Another new word to hag for the ‘Pea-Nut.’ ” Aunt Amy: “Philip! Did you hear what I said about the visibility of little boys?” Phil: “Visa—visa—has it got two s’», Auntie A. please?” Not in the least was the small boy trying to be rude or funny, but merely going off after a new word with the whole-hearted zeal of an ardent collector after a new butterfly. Far down tile table Jennifer to John, in a whisper: “Impenetrability; that’s what I say.” But no one ever deflected Aunt Amy from her purpose without a physical convulsion. “What al*out a sound prohibition leader, Andrew? Turn it over, dear, on the other side ; it is not so red.” Andrew (glancing at the girl at bis elbow) : “That reminds me, has the new Lager come, Bertha?” Then, courteously, to his sister: “Excuse me, Amy, but this is thirsty work. Wliat was it you were saying ?” Aunt Amy (looking to the end of the table) : “Jennifer, mv dear. I atn not suggesting that little girls should be seen and not heard ; you are fourteen, and I believe in girls being early encouraged to take their part in conversation at table. But is not your laughter with Jahu a little too loud?” The astounding Phil : “Caec—cacclc—eacckination, Auntie A. 1 got that yesterday in the dictionary; it means loud and immodrut laughing.” Even Andrew had a cachinnation at this, and Auntie Amy herself, who really believed Phil to he the funniest little boy possible, and, if only he would have let her kiss him sometimes, would have squandered three parts of her affection upon him. However, the cachinnation swept prohibition from the carpet. But with the pudding Aunt Amy sought to draw Sheila or Marta int-o the conversation, feeling it her duty to make it include all and sundry. After an effort, “Did you notice, my dear Sheila,” she said, “in the ‘Bookman’ this month there was an article entitled ‘The Birthday of Byron’ ? In it was given that strange and pathetic incident of the poet’s early youth.” Heie followed the. strange and pathetic incident of the poet’s early youth iu its every word—fully a half-column of it; it takes a good deal of time to recite half a column of it ; it takes a good deal of t’me to recite half a column of the “Bookman” (pica type) in the very middle of dinner, and with Bertha —who liked to get to the pictures at night—waiting to take the meat plates away and bring ou the pudding ones. Yet picture, if you have sympathy enough, that poor little lady painstakingly committing that halfcolumn to memory, as she had done, just for a moment like this! To be quite frank, the family simply did not know what to do with Aunt Amy by the time she had been with them for two months. [f you had asked that barbarian John his opinion of her and insisted upon an answer that, should be the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, he would have replied that she was an old dear, of course, but that the family •was “fed up” with her. But lie was honestly surprised to learn, as he did presently, that Aunt Amy was equally “fed up” with the family. She burst into tears, as said for tbo second time. Hurt, angry, disappointed, she hit about wildiv. “Of all the families I have ever met,” she said, “this is the most selfish and selfcentred. Each one of von is so wrapped up in what he or she is doing that they don’t realise anyone else exists. Now I know why Fidelia went off to Oxford she simply couldn’t stand you—any of you—another day.” They gazed at her open-mouthed with amaze, every one of them. All of theiu hut Andrew were present.

“Look at Marta,’’ she continued. “Not a thought in her head but passing examinations. Let me tell you, Marta, passing examinations is not all a girl is in the world lor. Are there no beggars round your door or any poor about your gate?" Marta struggled with the inclination to correct the faulty quotation. “Look at Sheila. Examinations again and long-lashed heroines. Never time to warm her father’s slippers or brush her little sister’s hair or till the vases with flowers as an ideal daughter should.” Jennifer put up a defence for Sheila, who looked quite broken for a minute under so strong an attack from so unexpected a quarter.” ’ •‘lt’s only in books girls warm their father’s slippers, Aunt A..” Jennifer said. “As to the vases, well, since mother went away there don’t seem to be any flowers coming up in the garden. And how can you brush Peggy's hair when she hasn’t any to brush—scarcely?” Miss Firth was not to be turned aside. “As to you, Jennifer ” 4 Yes,” said Jennifer, and blinked defiantly. In reality she was shivering under her very thin skin at the thought of all her sins being exposed in this flagrant fashion. ‘‘Yes, Auntie? And what do I do?” “You don’t do anything,’” said Aunt Amy—“not even try to pass examinations. Your school report was disgraceful. And yet you’are no more comfort to your home than the other girls are. All you seem to do is to roll about on the grass and laugh and ride that dangerous bicycle of John's, and get holes in your stockings.” Jennifer blinked. So this was what she amounted to, was it, after all? But then her lips ran suddenly into their crooked little smile. “Whack John some too, Auntie A. You’re not giving him any,” she said. “Oh, John,” said Aunt Amy bitterly. “One doesn’t expect much from boys and men. They are—born selfish and unkind.” She fell to sobbing again for a little space. / Then she dried her tears, got up, and went away to pack up. Everyone did their best to comfort her, to apologise to her for their behaviour, whatever it had been; even Andrew, who had to be told, did his very best to induce her to stay. But no, since it was Dlain she could not be the hub of their wheel as she dreamed, she entirely refused to be a mere fly upon it. She would go back to her cottage near the Orphans Asylum; she had let it furnished, and fortunately the tenants wanted to give it up. She was of some use there; the orphans, at least, did not laugh at her.' i So there was the Merton circle left spinning giddily along in space with no centre to it whatever. No one thus far had been brave enough to write and tell Fidelia of the fact. , CHATTER VI.—POUNDS SHILLINGS, AND PENCE. “I’m afraid we’d better start, eh, Mingo?” said Firth, and laid down the sheets of ‘Smoke Oh” reluctantly. ‘Oh, no, dad ; you can have another quarter of an hour easily,” said Jennifer. “John’s going to do his home lessons in the dining room, so he can give Phil and Peggy a leg-up if they want it.” This was relief to Firth—of a kind. For the last two or three months Phii and Peggy, about this hour, breathing heavily, and sighing and rustling and creeping and whispering', had taken to settling down just outside the study door. When Merton had been first built Fidelia had planned that spacious living room for her young editor-husband’s prfvate study, being fully seized with respect for his dignified position and the necessity for his seclusion from the noises of the outside world. To add to the spaciousness and dignity of' it she had given up her own undoubted right to a drawing room proper, of Chippendale chairs and china cupboards, and so on. merely furnishing the large square hall with basket chairs and cushions, and a tea table and some bowls of flowers, so that a casual visitor could be entertained there without penetrating to the holy of holies of the calm and beautiful study or to the shabbiness of the dining room. But there came a time when the calm and . beautiful study began to appeal irresistibly to Marta* in the third term of the year. “If I could just have a little desk in this corner of vonr study, dad,” she said, "I could ask you anything I wanted— Plautus is really getting me down.” Firth still retained some of his classics though not as much as Fidelia. “Come, and welcome,” he said, “if mv snorting doesn’t interrupt you—mother used to say she was always* adding the butcher and baker and milk up wronobecause of it.” ’ Then Sheila sniffed the holy calm of the atmosphere With envy. “I could write the loveliest stories if only T could write in here, (laddie,” she eaad. ‘Out in the dining room or my bedroom they get mixed un with algebra and Jennifer and John and horrid things like that.” 6 But how about- my snorting?” inquired Firth again. ‘Won’t, it get miied up with your starry-eyed heroine’s meditations? I haven’t broken myself of it vet, have I, Marta?” Indeed he had not. At anv moment Marta had found he was liable to give a sudden loud snort of disdain or anger at something in MS. that he was reading, rise up, walk furiouslv up and down the carpet half a dozen times, then suddenly resume his seat and go on writing perfectly quietly. Sheila was heard to say that snorting was nothing ; it was grunting that she could not bear, and John was always grunting. Might she came? A bookcase was moved out of the third corner, and she established herself happily there for the “seven to ten” hours every evening, before her father left for the office.

(To be Continued.)