'Yes, in the Coast-guard's telescope.'
'Oh! That is a new feature in the case!'
'Then he did not insist?' said Mrs. Grinstead.
'It was with the wrong side of his mouth.'
'But why did you send the fisher-boy first, when after all his life was less important?' exclaimed Anna, breaking forth at last.
'First, for the reason that I strove to impress on 'the youthful baronet,' Noblesse oblige. Secondly, that Davy knew how to make his way along the rocks, and also knew where to find the Preventive station. I could leave him to get on, as I could not have done with the precious Adrian, and that gave a much better chance for us all. It was swimming work by the time I got back, and by that time I thought the best alternative for any of us was to keep hold as long as we could, and then keep afloat as best we might till we were picked up. Your boy was the hero of it all. Adrian was so angry with me for my disrespect that I could hardly have got him to listen to me if Fergus had not made him understand, that to let himself be passive and be floated by me till the boats came up was the only thing to be done. There was one howl when he had to let go his beloved aralia, but he showed his soldier blood, and behaved most manfully.'
'I am most thankful to hear it,' said his father, 'and especially thankful to you.'
'Oh! there was not much real danger,' said Gerald lightly, 'to any one who could swim.'
'But Adrian could not,' said Anna. 'Oh! Gerald, what do we not owe to you?'
'I must be off,' said Sir Jasper; 'I must see about a new jacket for my boy. By the bye, do you know how the little Davy fared in the matter of clothes?'
'Better than any of us,' said Gerald. 'He was far too sharp to go mud-larking in anything that would be damaged, and had his boots safe laid up in a corner. I wish mine were equally safe.'
Sir Jasper's purchases were not confined to boots and jacket, but as compensation for his hard words included a certain cabinet full of drawers that had long been Fergus's cynosure.
Anna and her aunt were much concerned at what was said of Adrian, and still more at the boastful account that he seemed to have given; but then something, as Mrs. Grinstead observed, must be allowed for the reporter's satisfaction in having interviewed a live baronet. Each of the parties concerned had one hero, and if the Merrifields' was Fergus, to their own great surprise and satisfaction, Aunt Cherry was very happy over her own especial boy, Gerald, and certainly it was an easier task than to accept 'the youthful baronet' at his own valuation or that of the reporter.
Mrs. Grinstead considered whether to try to make him less conceited about it, and show him his want of truth. She consulted his uncle about it, showing the newspaper, and telling, and causing Gerald to tell, the history of the accident, which Clement had not been fit to hear all the day before.
He was still in bed, but quite ready to attend to anything, and he laughed over the account, which she illustrated by the discoveries she had made from the united witnesses.
'And is it not delightful to see for once what Gerald really is?' she said.
'Yes, he seems to have behaved gallantly,' said his uncle; 'and I won't say just what might have been expected.'
'One does expect something of an Underwood,' she said.
'Little Merrifield too, who saw the danger coming, deserves more honour than he seems to have taken to himself.'
'Yes, he accepted severity from that stern father of his, who seems very sorry for it now. It is curious how those boys' blood comes out in the matter-chasser de race.'
'You must allow something for breeding. Fergus had not been the idol of a mother and sisters, and Gerald remembered his father in danger.'
'Oh, I can never be glad enough that he has that remembrance of him! How like him he grows! That unconscious imitation is so curious.'
'Yes, the other day, when I had been dozing, I caught myself calling out that he was whistling 'Johnny Cope' so loud that he would be heard in the shop.'
'He seems to be settling down more happily here than I expected. I sometimes wonder if there is any attraction at Clipstone.'
'No harm if there were, except-'
'Except what? Early marriage might be the very best thing.'
'Perhaps, though sometimes I doubt whether it is well for a man to have gone through the chief hopes and crises of life so soon. He looks out for fresh excitement.'
'There are so many stages in life,' said Geraldine, sighing. 'And with all his likenesses, Gerald is quite different from any of you.'
'So I suppose each generation feels with those who succeed it. Nor do I feel as if I understood the Universities to-day as I did Cambridge thought of old. We can do nothing but wait and pray, and put out a hand where we see cause.'
'Where we see! It is the not seeing that is so trying. The being sure that there is more going on within than is allowed to meet one's eye, and that one is only patronized as an old grandmother-quite out of it.'
'I think the conditions of life and thought are less simple than in our day.'
'And to come to the present. What is to be done about Adrian-the one who was not a hero, though he made himself out so?'
'Probably he really thought so. He is a mere child, you know, and it was his first adventure, before he has outgrown the days of cowardice.'
'He need not have told stories.'
'Depend upon it, he hardly knew that he did so.'
'He had the reporter to help him certainly, and the 'Rockquay Advertiser' may not keep to the stern veracity and simplicity of the 'Pursuivant'.'
'And was proud to interview a live baronet.'
'Then what shall we do-Anna and I, I mean?'
'Write the simple facts to Vale Leston, and then let it alone.'
'To him?'
'Certainly. He would think your speaking mere nagging. Preserve an ominous silence if he speaks. His school- fellows will be his best cure.'
'Well, he did seem ashamed!'
Clement was right. The boy's only mention of the paragraph was once as 'that beastly thing'; and Anna discovered from Valetta Merrifield, that whatever satisfaction he might have derived from it had been effectually driven out of him by the 'fellows' at Mrs. Edgar's, who had beset him with all their force of derision, called him nothing but the 'youthful Bart.,' and made him ashamed as none of the opposite sex or of maturer years could ever have succeeded in doing. Valetta said Fergus had tried to stop it, but there had certainly been one effect, namely, that Adrian was less disposed to be 'Merry's' shadow than heretofore, and seemed inclined instead to take up with the other seniors.
One thing, however, was certain. Gerald enjoyed a good deal more consideration among the Clipstone damsels than before. True, as Jasper said, it was only what any one would have done; but he had done it, and proved himself by no means inferior to 'any one,' and Fergus regarded him as a true hero, which had a considerable effect on his sisters, the more perhaps because Jasper derided their admiration.
They were doubly bent on securing him for a contributor to the Mouse- trap. They almost thought of inviting him to their Browning afternoons, but decided that he would not appreciate the feminine company, though he did so often have a number of the 'Censor' to discuss it with Dolores, whenever they met him.
CHAPTER XII. THE LITTLE BUTTERFLY
The best actors in the world, either for tragedy, comedy, history, pastoral, pastoral-comical, historical- pastoral.-Hamlet.
The Matrons, otherwise denominated lady patronesses, met in committee, Miss Mohun being of course the soul and spirit of all, though Mrs. Ellesmere, as the wife of the rector of old Rockstone Church, was the president, Lady
