“Poor Robby … so rushed again!” said Isabella in a reproachful tone.
“And while she’s here she may bring the water and the glasses as well,” snarled the master of the house, who had run a flaming eye over the table.
“Tch, tch, tch!” said Mrs. Shepherd, with so little spirit that Laura felt quite sorry for her.
“Really, Maisie!” said Miss Isabella. “And when the poor boy’s so rushed, too.”
This guerilla warfare continued throughout luncheon, and left Laura wondering why, considering the dearth of time, and the distress of the ladies at each fresh contretemps, they did not jump up and fetch the missing articles themselves—as Mother would have done—instead of each time ringing the bell and waiting for the appearance of the saucy, unwilling servant. As it turned out, however, their behaviour had a pedagogic basis. It seemed that they hoped, by constantly summoning the maid, to sharpen her memory. But Mrs. Shepherd was also implicated in the method; and this was the reason why Isabella—as she afterwards explained to Laura—never offered her a thimbleful of help.
“My sister-in-law is nothing of a manager,” she said. “But we still trust she will improve in time, if she always has her attention drawn to her forgetfulness—at least Robby does; I’m afraid I have rather given her up. But Robby’s patience is angelic.” And Laura was of the same opinion, since the couple had been married for more than seven years.
The moment the meal, which lasted a quarter of an hour, was over, Mr. Shepherd clapped on his shovel-hat and started, with long strides, for his class, Mrs. Shepherd, who had not been quite ready, scuttling along a hundred yards behind him, with quick, fussy steps, and bonnet an awry.
Laura and Isabella stood at the gate.
“I ought really to have gone, too,” said Isabella, and smiled at the gutter. “But as you are here, Robby said I had better stay at home today. Now what would you like to do?”
This opened up a dazzling prospect, with the whole of Melbourne before one. But Laura was too polite to pretend anything but indifference.
“Well, perhaps you wouldn’t mind staying in then? I want so much to copy out Robby’s sermon. I always do it, you know, for he can’t read his own writing. But he won’t expect it today and he’ll be so pleased.”
It was a cool, quiet little house, with the slightly unused smell in the rooms that betokens a lack of children. Laura did not dislike the quiet, and sat contentedly in the front parlour till evening fell. Not, however, that she was really within hundreds of miles of Melbourne; for the wonderful book that she held on her knee was called King Solomon’s Mines, and her eyes never rose from the pages.
Supper, when it came, was as scrappy and as hurried as lunch had been: a class of workingmen was momently expected, and Robby had just time to gulp down a cup of tea. Nor could he converse; for he was obliged to spare his throat.
Afterwards the three of them sat listening to the loud talking overhead. This came down distinctly through the thin ceiling, and Mr. Shepherd’s voice—it went on and on—sounded, at such close quarters, both harsh and rasping. Mrs. Shepherd was mending a stole; Isabella stooped over the sermon, which she was writing like copperplate. Laura sat in a corner with her hands before her: she had finished her book, but her eyes were still visionary. When any of the three spoke, it was in a low tone.
Towards nine o’clock Mrs. Shepherd fetched a little saucepan, filled it with milk, and set it on the hob; and after this she hovered undecidedly between door and fireplace, like a distracted moth.
“Now do try to get it right tonight, Maisie,” admonished Isabella; and, turning her face, if not her glance, to Laura, she explained: “It must boil, but not have a scrap of skin on it, or Robby won’t look at it.”
Presently the workingmen were heard pounding down the stairs, and thereupon Maisie vanished from the room.
The next day Laura attended morning and evening service at St. Stephen’s-on-the-Hill, and in the afternoon made one of Isabella’s class at Sunday school.
That morning she had wakened, in what seemed to be the middle of the night, to find Isabella dressing by the light of a single candle.
“Don’t you get up,” said the latter. “We’re all going to early service, and I just want to make Robby some bread and milk beforehand. He would rather communicate fasting, but he has to have something, for he doesn’t get home till dinnertime.”
When midday came, Robby was very fractious. The mutton-bone—no cooking was done—was harder than ever to carve with decency; and poor Mrs. Shepherd, for sheer fidgetiness, could hardly swallow a bite.
But at nine o’clock that evening, when the labours of the day were behind him, he was persuaded to lie down on the sofa and drink a glass of port. At his head sat Mrs. Shepherd, holding the wine and some biscuits; at his feet Isabella, stroking his soles. The stimulant revived him; he grew quite mellow, and presently, taking his wife’s hand, he held it in his—and Laura felt sure that all his querulousness was forgiven him for the sake of this moment. Then, finding a willing listener in the black-eyed little girl who sat before him, he began to talk, to relate his travels, giving, in particular, a vivid account of some months he had once spent in Japan. Laura, who liked nothing better than travelling at second hand—since any other way was out of the question—Laura spent a delightful hour, and said so.
“Yes, Robby quite surpassed himself tonight, I thought,” said Isabella as she let down her hair. “I never heard anyone who could talk as well as he does when he likes. Can you keep a secret, Laura? We are sure, Maisie and I, that Robby will be a Bishop some day. And he means to be, himself. But don’t say a word
