june 20th.
i’ve been home a month. i’ve got tails to my dresses and silk linings, and my hair done up like the people in advertisements, and parasols with frills, and a pearl necklace to wear at nights with real evening dresses. i wear white veils, too, and such sweet hats—i don’t mind saying it here where no one will see, but i really do look most awfully nice. i should just simply love to be lolling back in the victoria, all frills and feathers, and the crocodiles to march by. wouldn’t they stare! it was always so interesting to see how the girls looked grown up.
the weather has been lovely, and i do think ours is the very dearest old house in the world. it is described in the guide-books as “a fine old jacobean mansion,” and all sorts of foreign royal creatures have stayed here as a place of refuge in olden days before father’s people bought it. it is red brick covered with ivy, and at the right side the walls go out in a great semicircle, with windows all round giving the most lovely view. opposite the door is a beautiful old cedar, which i used to love to climb as a child, and should now if i had my own way. its lower branches dip down to the grass and make the most lovely bridge to the old trunk. on the opposite side of the lawn there’s another huge tree; hardly anyone knows what it is, but it’s a spanish maple really—such a lovely thing, all shining silver leaves on dark stems. i used to look from one to the other and think that they looked like youth and age, and summer and winter, and all sorts of poetical things like that.
on the south side there is another entrance leading down to the terrace by a long flight of stone stairs, the balustrades of which are covered by a tangle of clematis and roses. when i come walking down those steps and see the peacock strutting about in the park, and the old sundial, and the row of beeches in the distance, i feel a thrill of something that makes me hot and cold and proud and weepy all at the same time. father says he feels just the same, in a man-ey way, of course, and that it is much the same thing as patriotism—love of the soil that has come down to you from generations of ancestors, and that it’s a right and natural feeling and ought to be encouraged. i know it is in him, for he will deny himself anything and everything to keep the place in order and give his tenants a good time, but—resolution number two—i, una sackville, solemnly vow to speak the plain truth about my own feelings in this book, and not cover them up with a cloak of fine words—i think there’s a big sprinkling of conceit in my feelings. i do like being the squire’s daughter, and having people stare at me as i go through the town, and rush about to attend to me when i enter a shop. ours is only a little bit of a town, and there is so little going on that people take an extra special interest in us and our doings. i know some of the girls quite well—the vicar’s daughter and the doctor’s, and the heywood girls at the grange, and i am always very nice to them, but i feel all the time that i am being nice, and they feel it too, so we never seem to be real friends. is that being a snob, i wonder? if it is, it’s as much their fault as mine, because they are quite different to me from what they are to each other—so much more polite and well-behaved.
i spend the mornings with father, and the afternoons with mother. at first she had mapped out my whole day for me—practising, reading, driving, etcetera, but i just said straight out that i’d promised to go the rounds with father, and i think she was glad, though very much surprised.
“he will be so pleased to have you! it’s nice of you, dear, to think of it, and after all it will be exercise, and there’s not much going on in the morning.”
she never seemed to think i should enjoy it, and i suppose it would bore her as much to walk round to the stables and kennels, and talk to the keepers about game, and the steward about new roofs to cottages, and cutting timber, as it does him to go to garden-parties and pay formal calls. it seems strange to live together so long and to be so different.
i have not met many strangers as yet, because vere is bringing down a party of visitors for august, and mother is not in a hurry to take me about until i have got all my things; but one morning, when i was out with father, i met such a big, handsome man, quite young, with a brown face and laughing eyes, dressed in the nice country fashion which i love—norfolk jacket, knickerbockers and leggings. father hailed him at once, and they talked together for a moment without taking any notice of me, and then father remembered me suddenly, and said—
“this is my youngest daughter. come home from school to play with me, haven’t you, babs?” and the strange man smiled and nodded, and said, “how do, babs?” just as calmly and patronisingly as if i had been two. for a moment i was furious, until i remembered my hockey skirt and cloth cap, and hair done in a door-knocker, with no doubt ends flying about all round my face. i daresay i looked fourteen at the most, and he thought i was home for the holidays. i decided that it would be rather fun to foster the delusion, and behave just as i liked without thinking of what was proper all the time, and then some day he would find out his mistake, and feel properly abashed. his name is will dudley, and he is staying with mr lloyd, the agent for the property which adjoins father’s, learning how to look after land, for some day he will inherit a big estate from an uncle, so he likes to get all the experience he can, and to talk to father, and go about with him whenever he has the chance, and father likes to have him—i could tell it by the way he looks and talks. we walked miles that morning, over gates and stiles, and across brooks without dreaming of waiting for the bridges, and i climbed and splashed with the best, and mr dudley twinkled his eyes at me, and said, “well jumped, babs!” and lifted me down from the stiles as if i had been a doll. he must be terrifically strong, for i am no light weight, and he didn’t seem to feel me at all.
after that morning we were constantly meeting, and we grew to be quite friends. he has thick, crinkly eyebrows, and is clean-shaven, which i like in his case, as his mouth has such a nice expression. he went on treating me as a child, and father seemed to think it was quite natural. he likes to pretend i am young, poor dear, so that i may be his playmate as long as possible.
yesterday father went in to see some cottagers, and mr dudley and i sat outside on a log of wood, and talked while we waited for him like this. he—patronisingly—
“i suppose it’s a great treat for you to getaway from school for a time. where is your school? town or country? brighton—ugh!” and he made a grimace of disgust. “shops—piers—hotels—an awful place! not a bit of nature left unspoiled; the very sea looks artificial and unlike itself in such unnatural surroundings!”
“plenty of crocodiles on the bank, however—that’s natural enough!” i said pertly. i thought it was rather smart, too, but he smiled in a superior “i-will-because-i-must,” sort of way, and said—
“how thankful you must be to get away from it all to this exquisite calm!”
i don’t know much about young men, except what i’ve seen of spencer and his friends, but they would call exquisite calm by a very different name, so i decided at once that mr will dudley must have had a secret trouble which had made him hate the world and long for solitude. perhaps it was a love affair! it would be interesting if he could confide in me, and i could comfort him, so i looked pensive, and said—
“you do get very tired of the glare and the dust! some of the girls wear smoked glasses in summer, and you get so sick of marching up and down the front. do you hate brighton only, or every towny place?”
“i hate all towns, and can’t understand how anyone can live in them who is not obliged. i have tried it for the last five years, but never again!” he stretched his big shoulders, and drew a long breath of determination. “i’ve said ‘good-bye’ for ever to a life of trammelled civilisation, with its so-called amusements and artificial manners, and hollow friendships, and”—he put his hand to his flannel collar, and patted it with an air of blissful satisfaction—“and stiff, uncomfortable clothing! it’s all over and done with now, thank goodness—a dream of the past!”
“and i am just beginning it! and i expect to like it very much,” i thought to myself, but i didn’t say so to him; and he went on muttering and grumbling all the time he was rolling his cigarette and preparing to smoke.
“you don’t understand—a child like you. it’s a pity you ever should, but in a few years’ time you will be so bound round with conventions that you will not dare to follow your own wishes, unless you make a bold stroke for liberty, as i have done, and free yourself once for all; but not many people have the courage to do that—”
“i don’t think it takes much courage to give up what one dislikes, and to do what one likes best,” i said calmly; and he gave a little jump of surprise, and stared at me over the smoke of the match with amused eyes, just as you look at a child who has said a funny thing—rather precocious for its age.
“pray, does that wise remark apply to me or to you?” he asked; and i put my chin in the air and said—
“it was a general statement. of course, i can’t judge of your actions, and, for myself, i can’t tell as yet what i do like. i must try both lives before i can decide.”
“yes, yes. you must run the gauntlet. poor little babs!” he sighed; and after that we sat for quite an age without speaking a word. he was remembering his secret, no doubt, and i was thinking of myself and wondering if it was really true that i was going to have such a bad time. that reminded me of miss martin and her advice, and it came to me with a shock that i’d been home a whole month, and had been so taken up with my own affairs that i had had no time to think of my “sister.” i was in a desperate hurry to find her at once. i always am in a hurry when i remember things, and the sight of the cottages put an idea into my head.
“do you know the people who live in these cottages, mr dudley? i knew the old tenants, of course, but these are new people, and i have not seen them. are they old or young, and have they any children?”
he puffed out words and smoke in turns.
“john williams—puff—wife—puff—one baby, guaranteed to make as much noise as five—it’s a marvel it’s quiet now—puff. you can generally hear it a mile off—”
“is it ill, then, the poor little thing?”
“healthiest child in the world to judge from its appearance and the strength of its lungs! natural depravity, nothing else”—puff!
“and in the next house?”
“thompson—oldish man—widower. maiden sister to keep the house in order—thompson, too, i suspect by the look of him. looks very sorry for himself, poor soul!”
“what’s the matter with him—rheumatism? is he quite crippled or able to get about?”
“thompson? splendid workman—agile as a boy. it was his mental condition to which i referred!”
“and in the end house of all?”
“don’t know the name. middle-aged couple, singularly uninteresting, and two big hulking sons—”
big—hulking! it was most disappointing! no one was delicate! i twisted about on my seat, and cried irritably—
“are they all well, every one of them? are you quite sure? are there no invalid daughters, or crippled children, nor people like that?”
“not that i know of, thank goodness! you don’t mean to say you want them to be ill?” he stared at me as if i were mad, and then suddenly his face changed, and he said softly, “oh, i see! you want to look after them! that’s nice of you, and it would have been uncommonly nice for them, too; but, never fear, you will find plenty of people to help, if that’s what you want. their troubles may not take quite such an obvious form as crutches, but they are in just as much need of sympathy, nevertheless. in this immediate neighbourhood, for instance—” he paused for a moment, and i knew he was going to make fun by the twinkle in his eye and the solemn way he puffed out the smoke. “there’s—myself!” so i just paid him back for his patronage, and led up to the mystery by saying straight out—
“yes, i know! i guessed by what you said about town that you had had some disappointment. i’m dreadfully sorry, and if there’s anything at all that i can do—”
he simply jumped with surprise and stared at me in dead silence for a moment, and then—horrid creature!—he began to laugh and chuckle as if it was the most amusing thing in the world.
“so you have been making up stories about me, eh? am i a blighted creature? am i hiding a broken heart beneath my norfolk jacket? has a lovely lady scorned me and left me in grief to pine—eh, babs? i did not know you were harbouring such unkind thoughts of me. you can’t accuse me of showing signs of melancholy this last week, i’m sure, and as to my remarks about town, they were founded on nothing more romantic than my rooted objection to smoke and dust, and bachelor diggings with careless landladies. i assure you i have no tragic secrets to disclose! i’m sorry, as i’m sure you would find me infinitely more interesting with a broken heart.”
“oh, i’m exceedingly glad, of course; but if you are so happy and contented i don’t see how you need my help,” i said disagreeably; and just then father came out of the cottage, and we started for home.
mr dudley talked to him about business in the most proper fashion, but if he caught my eye, even in the middle of a sentence, he would drop his head on his chest and put on the most absurd expression of misery, and then i would toss my head and smile a scornful smile. some day, when he finds out how old i am, he will be ashamed of treating me like a child.
william dudley is the first stranger mentioned in these pages. for that reason i shall always feel a kind of interest in him, but i am disappointed in his character.
