“Miss Phipps”

Star (Christchurch), Issue 17455, 5 February 1925, Page 13

“Miss Phipps”

NEW SERIAL.

By

KATHERINE TYNAN.

CHAPTER X. (Continued.) j I “I'm glad to sec you coming back to yourself, ? v fr Talbot," said the mail who was showing them the cars. "I am certainly much better, Smithson/’ Christopher Talbot replied hap‘Wothing like a car to complete the cure, - ’ said the man jovially. “It has been sad to see you, sir, creeping along behind those slow old horses, muffled to the neck, you that was such a keen rider and never missed a morning with the hounds. Now you have the young lady you'll be getting rid of that hospital nurse. You’ve no use for her any longer.” “I mustn't go too fast,” said Christopher Talbot, “though I am certainly much better.” He looked at Delia again with the mischievous smile of the schoolboy which transformed his face, making him look very 3-oung. ‘‘There’ll be the devil to pa)* with Miss Phipps about the motor-car—the devil to pay. We’ll have to weather the storm together, little girl." he said, as they jogged home behind the slow horses. Then his expression changed. •T'U be master in my own house,” he said, as though to reassure himself. “She must understand that, though I can never forget her devoted , serSomehow Delia understood that some weakness in him quailed before the terror of Miss Phipps. A great tenderness and pity surged like a wave in her heart. She put a hand in his impulsively. “We shall bear it together. Cousin Kit,” she said. “We’ll halve it. She can only be half as troublesome then.” His face cleared magically as he pressed her hand in his own. “You’ll stav with me. Delia?” he said. “You won’t let her banish you? You see. 1 can’t do without her, but I want you too."

“I shall stick like a burr," said Delia. CHAPTER XI. They were home just before the teahour. Heaving Christopher Talbot talking to Turner, not at all in the manner of a sick man, Delia went on upstairs. On the way she met Miss Phipps hurrying down. Miss Phipps had two fierce red spots on either cheek-bone. She gave one balefuL glance at Delia without speaking and went on h-i way. At the staircase window which overlooked the gravel sweep Delia paused for an instant to watch Miss Phipps’s movements. She had joined Christopher Talbot, who tvas still talking to Turner, and liad laid a hand on his coat sleeve. '• r had no idea you were going driving this morning.” she said. In the stillness of the summer afternoon, her voice, a. little less controlled than usual, reached Delia’s ears. “You should have given me warning. With-,' out 3-our wraps, too ! You were very imprudent. Hadn’t you better come and lie down?” Apparently Miss Phipps had overreached herself. Perhaps Christopher Talbot was stung to anger even to the point of resistance by her speech and manner in the presence of his serDolia in her excitement leant a little way out to see and hear. She saw Mr Talbot very gently shake off the nurse’s hold and heard him answer : “ The drive has done me nothing but good, thank you. Ido not need to lie down.” He went on with what he had been saying, and Miss Phipps turned and re-entered the house. Delia, looking down as she passed beneath, saw for a second the thin division of her hair and the little knob into which she rolled it. the pinched chest and drooping shoulders, and said to herself that Miss Phipps could he shrewish, before she t urned and fled to her or. n room, so as not to be detected in her act of espionage. She was hardly in her own room before Esther was tapping at the door. Delia hastened to admit- her. ” Mis s Phipps is put out,” Esther said. ‘• I shouldn’t be surprised now if she was to make herself a downright noosance. She rang for me at halfpast twelve to turn on her bath. She wouldn’t! thiftk ot' doin’ it for herself. She asked if the master had been ringin’ for her and when 1 said you was gone out drivin’ with him 1 thought she’d have a tit. I suspected she knew beforehand for I could see she was in a. proper temper. ‘ Drivin’ !’ she said. 4 Where?’ She hollo red for once. 11 I did hear Turner say- Keswick,’ I said. Miss Delia, I thought she’d have let out Billin’sgate on me. But she only said in a voice like, as if she’d choke, ‘Go out and close the door.’ The simple words were like swear words, Mis s Delia. I suppose she had to have it out by herself- I met her on the stairs just now! • Bring tea to my bedroom.’ she says in a hollow voice. Her eyes were scarlet-red. 1 wouldn’t be sur-

prised if she had a lie ad ache. She lias been letlin’ fly at cook and that poor fool Dobbs. Cook gave her her answer. 4 Get out o’ my kitching, she says. 4 You . . . woman !’ She wont, and cook has been sittin’ ever since, with arms folded, before the kitching-range. thinkin’ bitter thoughts. I hope she’ll have thought ’em all out before it’s time to cook the dinner. 1 had to make the toast and hot the tea-cakes. She wouldn’t even move her knees out of the way. She was an incumbrance as you’d sav if you’d seen cook.” Delia smiled at this narrative. It was an immediate relief that siie should not meet Miss Phipps at tea. She had a sensitive shrinking from violence and had temper, and >hc said to herself that Esther's judgment had been shrewd. ! Miss Phipps, unrestrained, might be I very ugly indeed. Already Delia had j discovered for herself that the low j voice covered a multitude of deficiencies I j in speech and accent. The long thin back, the wisp of hair, these were shrewish. Esther came back again for a nio--4’ Hook says she won’t stand it. not from her. If she goes shell be the sixth this year. But she may stay. She's took with the master, 'though she'vc only seen his feet as he goes by the kitching window. She won't leave the kitching, not even to see the vest, of him. She likes the sunk kitching, she says, harin’ grown up to it. Soon as she comes out of her bitter thoughts 1 II put it to her that it, s her boun • den duty to stay to spite that one.” Yes, do.” said Delia. A lew minutes later she ran round the gallery, soft-footed, on her way

downstairs. She had been afraid of meeting Miss Phipps, but the sound of Mr Talbot’s voice, raised a little, in the direction of his own room, made her hurry a little faster though it assured her that she was safe from meeting Miss Phipps. A few minutes later Christopher Tal- ; hot joined her in the drawing-room. He was flushed and looked disturbed. 44 Miss Phipps grows too much for me,” he said. ” I am apt to forget when she presumes, what she has been to me when 1 suffer.” Delia did not discuss Miss Phipps. She tried to talk of other things, but did not find it so easy to distract Christopher Talbot this time. He sat moody and silent, all his new-found gaiety gone. After a while he tried to rouse himself to lie agreeable. 44 What would you like to do now. Doha?” ho asked. *'l fear I am very dull company.” , 4 ‘T like you in all moods. Cousin Kit.” she said, noticing with pity that lie was now looking very pale. ‘‘l should rest from now to dinner-time if T were you.” ‘ 4 You would like to he introduced to Lassie and her puppies first?” he asked, caressing the grey and brown head of Argus, who was sitting by his knee, wearing a pitiful expression of anxietx- and sympathy. The dog had an uncanny way of knowing when things were not well with those lie loved. 4 l am hungry to he introduced to Lossie, if it does not trouble you, Cousin Kit.” “We shall have Lossie and tiro puppies on the lawn. 1 can rest as well there as anywhere, and L shall be in the open air.” There was 11 little encampment of garden chairs on the lawn under the chestnut trees. They took out an armful of cushions and Delia settled Mr Talbot comfortably in a long chair, padding him about with cushions, and planing a light rug over his knees. 11 was a beautiful summer evening with a caressing wind. There was a smell of roses and lilies. and the sound of the waterfall was in the air. It was deliciously peaceful. As Delia smoothed and patted the cushions and spread the rug, Christopher Talbot laid hold of one of her hands and kissed it. ‘‘Your hands remind me of hands I used to know. If T had not been the she might have been with me always. It seems a very fair prospect, Delia ; being so unattainable. You can’t know, child, with all your life, before you. what it is to be comparatively young in years, yet with all your life behind you.” Glancing towards the windows of the house Delia, saw a curtain lifted and someone looking out. She had no doubt in her own mind of who it was that spied upon them. Something hurtled itself upon Christopher Talbot like a grey flash. Argus, sitting bolt upright, within reach of his master’s flung-out hand, sighed distressfully. Of course, lie

could not interfere. Lossie was a lady! Lossie’s three fat puppies came waddling across the lawn and simultaneously baited him, two taking a leg. and one his tail and worrying them. He bore it with an air of resigned martyrdom, now and again growling. Lossie meanwhile was frantically licking Christopher Talbot’s face and neck and hands, everywhere she could get a bit of his skin uncovered. He was laughing and pushing her off. For the moment he had forgotten his depression. •‘Here, take her. Delia!” he said, clutching the little grey, squirming body between his hands. ‘‘She hasn’t seen me for several days. T expect she’s pretty tired of the puppies, poor old Delia, took Lossie into her arms. She was a mere grey rag of a dog—ridiculous to bo the mother of those fat puppies. Tier nose was like a wet blackberry, and her ©yes like Scotch | topazes. Delia gave her heart straight off to Lossie. who, after one or two efforts to get back to her master, seemed well content with Delia's lap. 44 1 give you Lossie, Delia.” Christopher Talbot said, “unless you prefer a puppy. She is the kind of dog who is miserable away from her owner, and for me she is only a cause of contention.’’ “Oh, 1 don’t suppose slie’l? want to change owners,” said Delia, flushing with delight. • T accept, her, (’ousin Kir. in part ownership. Argus would take some reconciling to my room. He was rather restless last night. I think he’d prefer your doormat if ho can’t come inside.” (To be continued.)