“No. They want to go on a world cruise. They’ve won a lot of money in a lottery—that new government thing— and apparently can’t wait to blue some of it.”
“I suppose it means Simon will take that Sabbatical which is due to him. I’m very glad. He works so hard, poor boy.
“That’s all very well! My God! A three-month babysit if the rest of the relatives opt out! We should never survive it.”
“Oh, nonsense, darling! The children are perfectly sweet and I’d love to have them. May I see the letter?”
Jonathan handed it over and, as his young relative had done, walked over to the window. Outside his Cotswold home lay the January snow, deep, limitless and shining, and the world was stilled in the hush that only snow can bring. At the foot of the long slope of the hill ran a little river and beyond the river rose the dark and bare-branched wood which hid the village from view.
“Didn’t you get as far as the third page?” asked Deborah, as Jonathan turned round. “Simon suggests that we use their house for any part of the time we choose. There’s the sea and the use of his boat, and he’ll put you up for guest membership of the golf-club and he reminds us that Aunt Adela doesn’t live all that far away. He is certain she and Laura will take the children off our hands for a fortnight when we feel we must have a break.”
“He’s more certain about that than I am. Besides, with Laura in charge of them, the children would probably break their necks.”
“Her own children didn’t.”
“Look, Deb, it’s an absolute imposition and it’s definitely not on. I’ll write straight back and say so.”
“We are going to the Cotswolds,” said Rosamund to her brother.
“What’s Cotswolds?”
“Where Uncle Jon and Aunt Deb live. You went there for three weeks last summer. Don’t you remember? You ran down the hill and fell over.”
“Jack an’ Jill went up the hill to fetcher pailer water. Jack fell down an’ broke his crown an’ Jill came tumberling after. Did they really?”
“They did, if it says so. It’s printed in your book, so it must be true. They wouldn’t print anything that wasn’t true.”
“Was Jack a king?”
“He must have been if he had a crown. I expect he cried when he broke it. I cried when I broke my best dolly.”
“If I was a king I wouldn’t break my crown. I would wear it every day and every night.”
“You couldn’t wear it in bed and you couldn’t wear it all day.”
“I could! I could!”
“You would have to take it off to wash your hair.”
“Kings don’t wash their hair and they don’t get soap in their eyes.”
“Neither would you if you kept your eyes shut. Anyway, we’re going to stay with Uncle Jon and Auntie Deb in the Cotswolds. Mummy said so. She said Auntie Deb must have talked Uncle Jon into having us.”
“I don’t want to go.”
“Yes, you do. There are dogs and rabbits and horses and a little donkey and geese and chickens and there’s almost sure to be a hound puppy like last time, and there’s the duck-pond and we can look for frogs and newts and those big snails Uncle Jon says you can eat, and we can dig up worms for the ducks and go into the woods and look for badger holes with the gamekeeper and find empty birds’ nests and paddle in the brook.”
“Will Uncle Jon give me a puppy of my very own if I go?”
“Cook says ‘them as don’t ask don’t want, and them as does ask shan’t have’, so I don’t know.”
“Cook is mistaken in her first premise, and her second argues little faith in the efficacy of prayer,” said Simon, who had caught the end of the children’s conversation.
“Cook says prayers are only a way of asking God for the things nobody else will give you,” said his daughter.
“You are not to go into the kitchen and bother Cook.”
“I didn’t. I only heard what she said to Carrie. Are we really going to have a lot of new clothes?”
“Well, if you are going to stay with other people while we go on our second honeymoon, you must be kitted out decently, I suppose.”
“What’s a second honeymoon?”
“A compensation for the first one, which is hardly ever a success.”
“Why isn’t it?”
“The bride is nervous, the groom inadequate.”
“Is it compensation to give us a lot of new clothes?”
“No. It is for the sake of appearances. The compensation will be in the form of new toys. We shall take you to London to choose them for yourselves.”
“Can we eat at a real hotel?”
“Certainly. It will be part of the compensation.”
