there was no need of the proverbial feather. mrs. muldoon made a grab at the settle but missed it. she caught at a chair, but that gave way. it was the floor that finally stopped her.
"we're so sorry," apologised victor. "we thought you knew. we ought to have said mademoiselle malvina."
mrs. muldoon regained her feet, and without answering walked straight into the study.
"they want to know," said mrs. muldoon, "if the fairy's in." the professor, with his back to the window, was reading. the light in the room was somewhat faint.
"who wants to know?" demanded the professor.
"the twins from the manor house," explained mrs. muldoon.
"but what?—but who?" began the professor.
"shall i say 'not at home'?" suggested mrs. muldoon. "or hadn't you better see them yourself."
"show them in," directed the professor.
they came in, looking a little scared and still holding one another by the hand. they wished the professor good evening, and when he rose they backed away from him. the professor shook hands with them, but they did not let go, so that victoria gave him her right hand and victor his left, and then at the professor's invitation they sat themselves down on the extreme edge of the sofa.
"i hope we do not disturb you," said victor. "we wanted to see mademoiselle malvina."
"why do you want to see mademoiselle malvina?" inquired the professor.
"it is something very private," said victor.
"we wanted to ask her a great favour," said victoria.
"i'm sorry," said the professor, "but she isn't in. at least, i don't think so." (the professor never was quite sure. "she slips in and out making no more noise than a wind-driven rose leaf," was mrs. muldoon's explanation.) "hadn't you better tell me? leave me to put it to her."
they looked at one another. it would never do to offend the wise and learned christopher. besides, a magician, it is to be assumed, has more ways than one of learning what people are thinking.
"it is about mamma," explained victoria. "we wondered if malvina would mind changing her."
the professor had been reading up malvina. it flashed across him that this had always been her speciality: changing people. how had the arlington twins discovered it? and why did they want their mother changed? and what did they want her changed into? it was shocking when you come to think of it! the professor became suddenly so stern, that if the twins could have seen his expression—which, owing to the fading light, they couldn't—they would have been too frightened to answer.
"why do you want your mother changed?" demanded the professor. even as it was his voice alarmed them.
"it's for her own good," faltered victoria.
"of course we don't mean into anything," explained victor.
"only her inside," added victoria.
"we thought that malvina might be able to improve her," completed victor.
it was still very disgraceful. what were we coming to when children went about clamouring for their mothers to be "improved"! the atmosphere was charged with indignation. the twins felt it.
"she wants to be," persisted victoria. "she wants to be energetic and to get up early in the morning and do things."
"you see," added victor, "she was never properly brought up."
the professor maintains stoutly that his only intention was a joke. it was not even as if anything objectionable had been suggested. the professor himself had on occasions been made the confidant of both.
"best woman that ever lived, if only one could graft a little energy upon her. no sense of time. too easy-going. no idea of keeping people up to the mark." so mr. arlington, over the nuts and wine.
"it's pure laziness. oh, yes, it is. my friends say i'm so 'restful'; but that's the proper explanation of it—born laziness. and yet i try. you have no idea, professor littlecherry, how much i try." so mrs. arlington, laughingly, while admiring the professor's roses.
besides, how absurd to believe that malvina could possibly change anybody! way back, when the human brain was yet in process of evolution, such things may have been possible. hypnotic suggestion, mesmeric influence, dormant brain cells quickened into activity by magnetic vibration. all that had been lost. these were the days of george the fifth, not of king heremon. what the professor was really after was: how would malvina receive the proposal? of course she would try to get out of it. a dear little thing. but could any sane man, professor of mathematics...
malvina was standing beside him. no one had remarked her entrance. the eyes of the twins had been glued upon the wise and learned christopher. the professor, when he was thinking, never saw anything. still, it was rather startling.
"we should never change what the good god has once fashioned," said malvina. she spoke very gravely. the childishness seemed to have fallen from her.
"you didn't always think so," said the professor. it nettled the professor that all idea of this being a good joke had departed with the sound of malvina's voice. she had that way with her.
she made a little gesture. it conveyed to the professor that his remark had not been altogether in good taste.
"i speak as one who has learned," said malvina.
"i beg your pardon," said the professor. "i ought not to have said that."
malvina accepted the professor's apology with a bow.
"but this is something very different," continued the professor. quite another interest had taken hold of the professor. it was easy enough to summon dame commonsense to one's aid when malvina was not present. before those strange eyes the good lady had a habit of sneaking away. suppose—of course the idea was ridiculous, but suppose—something did happen! as a psychological experiment was not one justified? what was the beginning of all science but applied curiosity? malvina might be able—and willing—to explain how it was done. that is, if anything did happen, which, of course, it wouldn't, and so much the better. this thing had got to be ended.
"it would be using a gift not for one's own purposes, but to help others," urged the professor.
"you see," urged victor, "mamma really wants to be changed."
"and papa wants it too," urged victoria.
"it seems to me, if i may so express it," added the professor, "that really it would be in the nature of making amends for—well, for—for our youthful follies," concluded the professor a little nervously.
malvina's eyes were fixed on the professor. in the dim light of the low-ceilinged room, those eyes seemed all of her that was visible.
"you wish it?" said malvina.
it was not at all fair, as the professor told himself afterwards, her laying the responsibility on him. if she really was the original malvina, lady-in-waiting to queen harbundia, then she was quite old enough to have decided for herself. from the professor's calculations she must now be about three thousand eight hundred. the professor himself was not yet sixty; in comparison a mere babe! but malvina's eyes were compelling.
"well, it can't do any harm," said the professor. and malvina seems to have accepted that as her authority.
"let her come to the cross stones at sundown," directed malvina.
the professor saw the twins to the door. for some reason the professor could not have explained, they all three walked out on tiptoe. old mr. brent, the postman, was passing, and the twins ran after him and each took a hand. malvina was still standing where the professor had left her. it was very absurd, but the professor felt frightened. he went into the kitchen, where it was light and cheerful, and started mrs. muldoon on home rule. when he returned to the parlour malvina was gone.
the twins did not talk that night, and decided next morning not to say a word, but just to ask their mother to come for an evening walk with them. the fear was that she might demand reasons. but, quite oddly, she consented without question. it seemed to the twins that it was mrs. arlington herself who took the pathway leading past the cave, and when they reached the cross stones she sat down and apparently had forgotten their existence. they stole away without her noticing them, but did not quite know what to do with themselves. they ran for half a mile till they came to the wood; there they remained awhile, careful not to venture within; and then they crept back. they found their mother sitting just as they had left her. they thought she was asleep, but her eyes were wide open. they were tremendously relieved, though what they had feared they never knew. they sat down, one on each side of her, and each took a hand, but in spite of her eyes being open, it was quite a time before she seemed conscious of their return. she rose and slowly looked about her, and as she did so the church clock struck nine. she could not at first believe it was so late. convinced by looking at her watch—there was just light enough for her to see it—she became all at once more angry than the twins had ever known her, and for the first time in their lives they both experienced the sensation of having their ears boxed. nine o'clock was the proper time for supper and they were half an hour from home, and it was all their fault. it did not take them half an hour. it took them twenty minutes, mrs. arlington striding ahead and the twins panting breathless behind her. mr. arlington had not yet returned. he came in five minutes afterwards, and mrs. arlington told him what she thought of him. it was the shortest supper within the twins' recollection. they found themselves in bed ten minutes in advance of the record. they could hear their mother's voice from the kitchen. a jug of milk had been overlooked and had gone sour. she had given jane a week's notice before the clock struck ten.
it was from mr. arlington that the professor heard the news. mr. arlington could not stop an instant, dinner being at twelve sharp and it wanting but ten minutes to; but seems to have yielded to temptation. the breakfast hour at the manor farm was now six a.m., had been so since thursday; the whole family fully dressed and mrs. arlington presiding. if the professor did not believe it he could come round any morning and see for himself. the professor appears to have taken mr. arlington's word for it. by six-thirty everybody at their job and mrs. arlington at hers, consisting chiefly of seeing to it for the rest of the day that everybody was. lights out at ten and everybody in bed; most of them only too glad to be there. "quite right; keeps us all up to the mark," was mr. arlington's opinion (this was on saturday). just what was wanted. not perhaps for a permanency; and, of course, there were drawbacks. the strenuous life—seeing to it that everybody else leads the strenuous life; it does not go with unmixed amiability. particularly in the beginning. new-born zeal: must expect it to outrun discretion. does not do to discourage it. modifications to be suggested later. taken all round, mr. arlington's view was that the thing must be regarded almost as the answer to a prayer. mr. arlington's eyes on their way to higher levels, appear to have been arrested by the church clock. it decided mr. arlington to resume his homeward way without further loss of time. at the bend of the lane the professor, looking back, observed that mr. arlington had broken into a trot.
this seems to have been the end of the professor, regarded as a sane and intelligent member of modern society. he had not been sure at the time, but it was now revealed to him that when he had urged malvina to test her strength, so to express it, on the unfortunate mrs. arlington, it was with the conviction that the result would restore him to his mental equilibrium. that malvina with a wave of her wand—or whatever the hocus-pocus may have been—would be able to transform the hitherto incorrigibly indolent and easy-going mrs. arlington into a sort of feminine lloyd george, had not really entered into his calculations.
forgetting his lunch, he must have wandered aimlessly about, not returning home until late in the afternoon. during dinner he appears to have been rather restless and nervous—"jumpy," according to the evidence of the little serving maid. once he sprang out of his chair as if shot when the little serving maid accidentally let fall a table-spoon; and twice he upset the salt. it was at mealtime that, as a rule, the professor found his attitude towards malvina most sceptical. a fairy who could put away quite a respectable cut from the joint, followed by two helpings of pie, does take a bit of believing in. to-night the professor found no difficulty. the white ladies had never been averse to accepting mortal hospitality. there must always have been a certain adaptability. malvina, since that fateful night of her banishment, had, one supposes, passed through varied experiences. for present purposes she had assumed the form of a jeune fille of the twentieth century (anno domini). an appreciation of mrs. muldoon's excellent cooking, together with a glass of light sound claret, would naturally go with it.
one takes it that he could not for a moment get mrs. arlington out of his mind. more than once, stealing a covert glance across the table, it seemed to him that malvina was regarding him with a mocking smile. some impish spirit it must have been that had prompted him. for thousands of years malvina had led—at all events so far as was known—a reformed and blameless existence; had subdued and put behind her that fatal passion of hers for change: in other people. what madness to have revived it! and no queen harbundia handy now to keep her in check. the professor had a distinct sensation, while peeling a pear, that he was being turned into a guinea-pig—a curious feeling of shrinking about the legs. so vivid was the impression, that involuntarily the professor jumped off his chair and ran to look at himself in the mirror over the sideboard. he was not fully relieved even then. it may have been the mirror. it was very old; one of those things with little gilt balls all round it; and it looked to the professor as if his nose was growing straight out of his face. malvina, trusting he had not been taken suddenly ill, asked if there was anything she could do for him. he seems to have earnestly begged her not to think of it.
the professor had taught malvina cribbage, and usually of an evening they played a hand or two. but to-night the professor was not in the mood, and malvina had contented herself with a book. she was particularly fond of the old chroniclers. the professor had an entire shelf of them, many in the original french. making believe to be reading himself, he heard malvina break into a cheerful laugh, and went and looked over her shoulder. she was reading the history of her own encounter with the proprietor of tin mines, an elderly gentleman disliking late hours, whom she had turned into a nightingale. it occurred to the professor that prior to the arlington case the recalling of this incident would have brought to her shame and remorse. now she seemed to think it funny.
"a silly trick," commented the professor. he spoke quite heatedly. "no one has any right to go about changing people. muddling up things they don't understand. no right whatever."
malvina looked up. she gave a little sigh.
"not for one's own pleasure or revenge," she made answer. her tone was filled with meekness. it had a touch of self-reproach. "that is very wrong, of course. but changing them for their own good—at least, not changing, improving."
"little hypocrite!" muttered the professor to himself. "she's got back a taste for her old tricks, and lord knows now where she'll stop."
the professor spent the rest of the evening among his indexes in search of the latest information regarding queen harbundia.
meanwhile the arlington affair had got about the village. the twins in all probability had been unable to keep their secret. jane, the dismissed, had looked in to give mrs. muldoon her version of thursday night's scene in the arlington kitchen, and mrs. muldoon, with a sense of things impending, may unconsciously have dropped hints.
the marigolds met the arlingtons on sunday, after morning service, and heard all about it. that is to say, they met mr. arlington and the other children; mrs. arlington, with the two elder girls, having already attended early communion at seven. mrs. marigold was a pretty, fluffy, engaging little woman, ten years younger than her husband. she could not have been altogether a fool, or she would not have known it. marigold, rising politician, ought, of course, to have married a woman able to help him; but seems to have fallen in love with her a few miles out of brussels, over a convent wall. mr. arlington was not a regular church-goer, but felt on this occasion that he owed it to his maker. he was still in love with his new wife. but not blindly. later on a guiding hand might be necessary. but first let the new seed get firmly rooted. marigold's engagements necessitated his returning to town on sunday afternoon, and mrs. marigold walked part of the way with him to the station. on her way back across the fields she picked up the arlington twins. later, she seems to have called in at the cottage and spoken to mrs. muldoon about jane, who, she had heard, was in want of a place. a little before sunset she was seen by the doctor climbing the path to the warren. malvina that evening was missing for dinner. when she returned she seemed pleased with herself.
