No – papa and mamma had not been thinking of anything of that kind – afterwards mamma told me they had only been saying to each other how sweet and pretty it all looked and – though perhaps they did not say so aloud – feeling no doubt how sad it was that we should so soon have to leave it.

But they came in quite brightly, and mamma answered gaily to Esmé's exclamations about the 'lovely tea-party.'

'Yes,' she said, 'it does look nice. And muffins too' – as Geordie glanced up with a very red face from the fire where he was toasting one; 'don't scorch yourself too much, in our service, my dear boy.'

'It's a good bit for myself as well,' said Geordie in his rather gruff way. He always spoke like that if he thought he was being praised – above all, the least over-praised. 'I like muffins better than any kind of cake or things.'

He certainly knew how to toast and butter them to perfection. I remember how very good they were that day. Indeed, the tea-party was a great success altogether. After it was over we carried all the cups and saucers and plates into the kitchen, to be ready for Margery to wash up, for mamma had left word at home that she was to come down to the hut to do so, which we were very glad of.

'I wanted to be together as much as possible to-day,' said mamma in her kind way. And just as we had cleared away everything in the parlour we saw Margery coming, and to my great delight Esmé asked if she and Denzil might 'help her' in the kitchen, for Dods and I had been wondering how we could get rid of the little ones without seeming unkind.

So off they ran, and then for a few minutes we four – 'big ones,' I was going to say, only that does seem putting Geordie and myself too much on a line with papa and mamma, doesn't it? – sat silent. I was feeling rather nervous, not afraid of papa and mamma, but afraid of them thinking it was all a perfectly impossible plan.

But at last, after looking at me several times and even giving me two or three little kicks, Geordie plunged in, as was his way —

'Ida has something to say to you,' he began. 'It's only fair for her to say it, for it's all her own idea, though we have talked about it a good deal.'

Papa looked at me very kindly.

'What is it, my little girl?' he said. 'I am sure you know how pleased I – and your mother – will be to do anything we can to – to brighten all these troubles.'

He seemed to know by instinct that what I had to say must have to do with what he had told us the day before. Yes – only the day before! I could scarcely believe it – it seemed years ago.

I felt my face growing red; mamma was looking at me too, and though her eyes were very kind, I grew more and more nervous, and of course I blurted it out quite differently from what I had meant to.

'It isn't only for us ourselves,' I began, 'though we should like it ever so much – awfully much better than anything else. But I feel as if it would be nicer for everybody – for mamma too, and for papa, when you are far away, you know,' and here I turned specially to him, 'not to have to think of us in a strange place and among strange people. And – and – there are lots of little bits of it that seem to fit in so well.'

'But, my dear child, I must interrupt you,' said papa smiling, 'before you go on to the "bits," do tell us what the whole is?'

I had really forgotten that I had not done so – my own mind was so full of it, you see.

'Oh,' I said, feeling very much ashamed of myself, especially as I knew Geordie's blue eyes were fixed on me reproachfully. 'I'm very sorry for being so stupid. It's just this, papa – we've been thinking, at least I thought of it first, and Dods has joined in the planning, that – why shouldn't we all, mamma and us four, come to live here, really to live here altogether, while you are away?'

Papa gazed at me as if he did not understand, and no doubt just at first he did not.

'Live here,' he repeated, 'but that is just – '

'Yes,' I interrupted, – 'here, in the hut. I don't mean of course go on living at home, at Eastercove, though it would be Eastercove too. That's the beauty of it; you would be able to feel that we were at home, and close to all our friends.'

But still papa repeated, in a dazed sort of way, I would say 'stupid,' only it would seem rude —

'Live here.'

(I do think men are far slower at taking up new ideas than women.)

'Live here,' he said again, till I really wished it would not be disrespectful to give him a little shake, and even Dods, who is far patienter and less im – what should I say? – impetuous or impulseful, I must ask mamma which is best, began to look rather provoked. But mamma put it all right.

'Yes, Jack,' she said, the colour rushing into her face and her eyes sparkling, – 'yes, here in the hut, is what the child means, and, really, I think it is an inspiration.' Mamma is quick, and she has such a beautifully ready imagination. 'I don't see why we shouldn't. It is perfectly healthy; dry and airy and quite warm except perhaps in the middle of winter, and we surely could find ways and means of making a dry house warm. Ida, darling, I believe you have hit upon a way out of our greatest difficulty. Do say you think so too, Jack!'

Light was gradually penetrating into papa's mind.

'Here in the hut! Yes, I wish it were possible,' he said, 'and I agree with you both so far. It is dry and healthy, and might be made warm, but – it is so small! Ah!' and he started to his feet, his whole face changing, 'talking of inspirations, I'm not sure but that I have got one too – the – '

Here to our amazement, mamma's and mine I mean, in his turn up jumped Dods, and, respectful or not, interrupted papa in the most barefaced way —

'Stop, stop!' he cried, 'let me say it, Dad, do, before you do. I want to have a bit of it. Is your inspiration the old parish room? The iron room they want to get rid of? Is it? – do say.'

They were both so excited it was quite funny to see them, Geordie especially, for he is much calmer than papa naturally. Papa turned to him smiling —

'You have guessed it, my boy. Yes, we might buy the room and turn it into two or three at least. It could not cost much – our own men could do it, I believe. It has doorways and windows and fireplaces too, I think, all ready, and I believe we can have it for an old song – '

'I hope I shan't be the one chosen to sing it!' exclaimed Dods, at which we all laughed, though it was not particularly witty. But we were just in the sort of humour to laugh at the least little piece of fun.

'I wish – upon my word, I wish I could see about it this very afternoon,' went on papa, who was now racing ahead of us all in his eagerness.

'But you can't, dear; it's Sunday, you know,' said mamma, patting his arm; 'and we have plenty to think about. There is no fear of Mr. Lloyd's selling it before to-morrow morning. Let us hear some more of your plan, Ida, dear.'

I was only too ready to tell it – I was bursting to do so, and so was Geordie. We set to work and talked – how we did talk! – papa and mamma putting in a word now and then, though they were so kind, understanding our wish to be considered the 'discoverers,' as it were, of the new home, that they really let us talk ourselves out. Then we four made a sort of progress through the rooms, papa measuring here and there with the little folding-up foot-rule he always carried in his pocket, and mamma planning where she would put such and such a piece of furniture which could be quite well spared from the almost too full rooms up at the house, not to speak of the stores – treasures they were fast becoming in our eyes now – crowded away in the big garret.

'We must go up there first thing to-morrow morning,' said mamma, 'and have a good look round. I don't believe I know half the things we have – no one does, except Hoskins.'

'You will have to take her into your confidence at once, I expect,' said papa.

'Yes, I was just thinking so,' mamma replied; 'but I shall wait till you have inquired about the iron room. She knows our troubles already,' she went on, turning to Geordie and me; 'she has known about them for some days, and she says whatever we do, or wherever we go, she will not leave us.'

'Oh, I am so glad!' exclaimed Geordie and I in a breath. 'We thought she would be like that,' I went on; 'and I should hope she'd like the hut far, far better than going away to some horrid little poky house among strangers. And, mamma, don't you think Margery would be the best for the other servant.'

'Are we to have two?' said mamma laughing. 'Your plans are getting quite grand, Ida!'

'Of course you must have two,' said papa, 'and one of the men to look after things outside. I have an idea about that; Geordie and I will talk about it together,' and he nodded to Geordie, who looked very pleased at being consulted in this way, as if he were quite big.

'When will you ask about the parish room?' he said to papa. 'May I go with you when you do? Perhaps I could help about the measuring.'

For they had already settled as to where it should be placed – at one side of the hut, but a little to the back, so that it should not spoil the rather pretty look we were gradually managing to give to the front, by training creepers over the porch, and filling two or three large square tubs with bushy, hardy plants which would stand the winter, and placing them at each side of the long low windows.

'Certainly,' said papa. 'We can drive down to Kirke immediately after breakfast to-morrow morning. And if it is all right about the room, I will see the man whom, I think, Mr. Lloyd employed to put it up. He will understand the best way of partitioning it off, and our own men can work under his directions.'

So it was in the best of spirits – considering, that is to say, the real sorrow of parting with dear papa, and the real anxiety that must hang over us for many months to come, at least – that we set off home again, Esmé chattering about how she had wiped all the tea-cups and saucers, and how Margery had said that she could not possibly have 'got through' without her.

'That is not a very elegant expression, my little girl,' said papa. 'Don't you think you could say it some other way.'

Esmé looked rather puzzled.

'You says,' she replied, and at that papa laughed – I think he felt it was out of the frying-pan into the fire, – 'you says to mamma or to Ida when we're playing croquet, "Now see if you can't get through that hoop."'

'But cups and saucers isn't croquet hoops,' said Denzil solemnly, at which we all laughed. A very small joke will go a long way when people are all happy together, and each one trying to do his best to please or amuse the others.

When I awoke on Monday morning it was with much more quietly hopeful feelings than on that sad Saturday I could have believed possible. I seemed to myself to have grown years older in the two days, which was partly nice and partly, just a very little, 'frightening.' I was proud of my idea being thought so well of, and I was very anxious to think it out more and more, so as really to help mamma and to prove that it was a good one. So, though it was still very early, I lay quite quietly and did not mind the having a good while to wait till it was time to get up, so busied was my brain in going into all the details which I was able to think about.

'Two little beds for Esmé and me,' I began. 'Let me see which are the smallest, to take up the least room? This one is rather too big, and besides, the people who have taken the house will most likely need it left. I wonder what they will do with this room. I daresay they will use it for visitors. It is so pretty – my own dear room!' For since my last birthday I had had a room to myself, all freshly done up with light chintz curtains and covers and white furniture. But I resolutely put the thought of my regret out of my mind, and went on thinking about the hut. Esmé's cot would be big enough for her for a good while, and there was at least one old small bedstead up in the garret, and then Dods and I had saved enough money to buy one, as I said.

'We must spend it on something for the hut,' I reflected. 'Perhaps we had better ask mamma what would be the most useful.'

Then my mind went on again about the other rooms and what would be needed for them, and I had just arrived at the chests of drawers when I must have fallen asleep, for when I was awakened by Margery and the announcement, 'Seven o'clock, Miss Ida,' I found myself dreaming that I was hanging up curtains in front of the fireplace instead of the window, and wondering how we could prevent their flying up the chimney!

After breakfast papa and Geordie set off almost immediately for Kirke, to catch Mr. Lloyd before his week's work began again, papa said. And as soon as mamma had finished her regular housekeeping business for the day, she and I went up to the garret together, to spy the land, or rather the stores. I forget if I said that we happened to be in the middle of our Easter holidays just then, which was most lucky, was it not?

Mamma and I really enjoyed ourselves up in the garret. It was all so neat, and not fusty or dusty or musty, and we came upon treasures – as often is the case if you explore a lumber-room – whose very existence even mamma had forgotten.

'I really think, Ida,' mamma began, pushing her hair out of her eyes in a pretty way she has; her hair is lovely, so curly and fuzzy, like Esmé's, though mine is dreadfully smooth! and theirs never looks messy, however untidy it really may get, – 'I really think we could find enough furniture here to do for all the rooms, after a fashion. And we can certainly take a few things away from downstairs without spoiling the look of the house. Two beds at least – and one or two small tables. I must have a writing-table for myself – and several of the wicker chairs in the verandah might be spared. Yes – I really don't think the furnishing will be much difficulty or expense.'

'And Doddie and I have saved sixteen and sixpence, you know, mamma,' I said. 'We meant to buy a camp bedstead for the hut, you know, whenever you would let us furnish the room that is going to be our drawing-room now. So we can still get one for Dods if you like, or anything else needed.'

'Yes, darling,' said mamma. 'That will be very nice. We can wait a little till we see what is most required.'

She spoke quite as seriously as I had done, though I know now that sixteen and sixpence is really not nearly as much money as I then thought it. But that is what has always been so dear about mamma; she never 'snubs' us. And many people, even really very kind people, do hurt children's feelings dreadfully sometimes without in the least meaning it. It is one of the things I mean to try always to remember when I am quite grown-up myself, and it would be very wrong and ungrateful of any of us ever to forget it, for our father and mother have shown us such a good example about it.

Then mamma went off to write some letters and I to the schoolroom to practise, which had to be done, holidays or no holidays!

'I wonder if we shall have a piano at the hut,' I thought. 'I shan't very much mind if we don't,' for at that time I did not care much for music, not, at least, for my own performances. Since then I have come to 'appreciate' it a little better, though I am not at all clever about it, and I am afraid papa and mamma are rather disappointed at this. But Esmé is learning the violin and plays already so well that I hope she will make up for me.

I kept running to the window – the schoolroom overlooks the drive – every time I heard the sound of wheels, to see if it was papa and Geordie coming back, which was very silly, as of course they would have a good deal to do, measuring and seeing the carpenter and arranging it all. But I felt as if I could not settle to anything till I knew about the iron room, as it did seem as if the whole plan depended a good deal on our getting it. And when at last I did catch sight of the dogcart coming swiftly along the avenue, my heart began to beat so fast that I had to stop once or twice to take breath on my way to the hall-door.

Mamma was there before me, as anxious as I, I do believe, though she was too sensible to show it.

But before they got to the house, we knew it was all right. Geordie stood up in the cart and waved his cap for us to understand.

'Oh, I am so glad!' I cried, and mamma smiled.

How strangely things change their – oh, dear, I can't find just the right word; yes, I have it now 'aspects' – in life sometimes. This was Monday; on Saturday only had we heard the sad news, and here we were, quite in good, almost high spirits again, about a little bettering of what, if we had foreseen it a week ago, we should certainly have thought a cloud with no silver lining!

Papa and Dods jumped down in a moment, and threw the reins to the groom.

'Is it – ' I began.

'All right,' papa interrupted. 'Lloyd is delighted. Very kind and sympathising, of course, with us, but so interested in our – I should say,' with a smile to me, 'Ida's scheme. He thinks it a first-rate idea, at any rate till the autumn.'

'And he is coming up himself this afternoon,' said Geordie, 'with the drawings and measures of the room, that he got when he bought it.'

'Very good of him,' said mamma.

'And Jervis, the carpenter, is coming too,' George went on; 'and we must all go down to the hut together. Mr. Lloyd said particularly Ida.'

I felt myself grow red with pleasure.

'Yes,' said papa; 'we must all go and give our opinions. I am very glad to have secured the room. They were already beginning to take it down. It is a very good size really, larger than you would think; and there are two doorways, I am glad to find, and a little porch. I have two or three ideas in my head as to how to join it on and so forth, but I can go into them better on the spot.'

'Ida and I have been busy too,' said mamma. 'Really, Jack, you would scarcely believe the amount of extra furniture we have. There will be very little to buy – only, I do believe, one camp bedstead for Geordie, and perhaps a servant's one; and a few bright, warm-looking rugs.'

'We might buy those, mamma,' I interrupted eagerly. 'I have told mamma about our sixteen and sixpence, Doddie,' I went on, turning to George. 'I knew you wouldn't mind.'

Geordie nodded.

'Sixteen and sixpence,' repeated papa. 'How have you managed to get together all that?'

'It's hut money,' I replied. 'I mean it's on purpose to spend on the hut. We have other savings, too, for Christmas and birthdays – this is all for the hut.'

'And it shall be spent on the hut,' said papa, 'on something lasting – to do honour to you both.'

Wasn't that nice of him?

CHAPTER V
'WHAT CAN SHE MEAN?'

I remember that Monday afternoon so well. It was very interesting. Mr. Lloyd was very kind and clever about things, and the carpenter, though a rather slow, very silent man, understood his business and was quite ready to do all that was wanted. Papa was as eager as a boy, and Geordie full of ideas too. So between us we got it beautifully planned.

It was far nicer than I had dared to hope. They fixed to run a tiny passage between the side of the hut where the room was to be placed, so that the two doorways into it could both be used, – one to enter into Geordie's room, so that he could run in and out without having to go through mamma's or ours, and the other leading into mamma's, from which we could pass to ours. And the partitions made them really as good as three proper rooms, each with a nice window. There could be no fireplace in ours, but as it was the middle one, and therefore sure to be the warmest, that would not matter, as there were two, one at each end in the iron room. If it was very cold, mamma said Esmé and I might undress in hers, and dress in his, Geordie added, as he meant always to be up very early and light his own fire to work by, which rather amused us all, as he was not famed for early rising. Indeed, I never knew such a sleepy head as he was – poor old Dods!

We felt satisfied, as we walked home, that we had done a good day's work.

'Though it couldn't have been managed without the iron room,' Geordie and I agreed.

And a day or two later we felt still more settled and pleased when mamma told us that Hoskins and Margery were coming with us. Hoskins was just a little melancholy about it all, not a bit for herself, I do believe, but because she thought it would be 'such a change, so different' for mamma and us.

She cheered up however when we reminded her how much nicer it would be than a poky little house in a back street at Kirke, or, worse still, away in some other place altogether, among strangers. And when she said something about the cold, in case we stayed at the hut through the winter, Geordie said we could afford plenty of fires as we should have no rent to pay, and that he was going to be 'stoker' for the whole family.

'You won't need to look after any fire but your own, Master George,' said she, 'and not that, unless it amuses you. Margery is not a lazy girl – I would not own her for my niece if she was. And besides that, there will be Barnes to help to carry in the coal.'

Barnes was one of the under-gardeners. He lived with his father and mother at the Lodge, but he had never had anything to do with the house, so I was surprised at what Hoskins said.

'Oh yes,' George explained, looking very business-like and nodding in a way he had, 'that is one of the things papa and I have settled about. We are rigging up a room for Barnes, much nearer than the Lodge – the old woodman's hut within a stone's throw of our hut, Ida, so that a whistle would bring him in a moment. He will still live at the Lodge for eating, you see, but he will come round first thing and last thing. He's as proud as a peacock; he thinks he's going to be a kind of Robinson Crusoe; it will be quite a nice little room; there is even a fireplace in it. He says he won't need coals; there's such lots of brushwood about.'

'I have been thinking of that,' I said eagerly. 'It would seem much more in keeping to burn brushwood than commonplace coals – '

'Except in my kitchen, if you please, Miss Ida,' put in Hoskins.

'And better still than brushwood,' I went on, taking no notice of Hoskins's 'kitchen,' – I would much rather have had a gypsy fire with a pot hanging on three iron rods, the way gypsies do, or are supposed to do, – 'better than brushwood, fir cones. They do smell so delicious when they are burning. We might make a great heap of them before next winter. It would give the children something to do when they are playing in the wood.'

They – the two little ones – were of course in tremendous spirits about the whole thing, – such spirits that they could not even look sad for very long when at last – about three weeks after the days I have just been describing – the sorrowful morning arrived on which dear papa had to leave us. Esmé cried loudly, as was her way; Denzil, more silently and solemnly, as was his; but an hour or two afterwards we heard the little butterfly laughing outside in the garden and ordering Denzil about as usual.

'Never mind,' said mamma, glancing up from the lists of all sorts of things she was already busy at and reading what was in my mind, 'rather let us be glad that the child does not realise it. She is very young; it does not mean that she is heartless,' and mamma herself choked down her tears and turned again to her writing-table.

I too had done my best not to cry, though it was very difficult. I think George and I 'realised' it all – the long, lonely voyage for papa; the risks at sea which are always there; the dangers for his health, for the climate was a bad one, and it was not the safest season by any means. All these, and then the possibility of great disappointment when he got there – of finding that, after all, the discovery of things going wrong had come too late to put them right, and of all that would follow this – the leaving our dear, dear home, not for a few months, or even a year, but for always.

It would not do even to think of it. And I had promised papa to be brave and cheerful.

By this time I must explain that the Hut – from now I must write it with a capital, as mamma did in her letters: 'The Hut, Eastercove' looked quite grand, we thought – was ready for us to move into. Our tenants were expected at the house in a week or ten days, and we were now to leave it as soon as we could.

A great part of the arranging, carting down furniture, and so on had been done, but it had been thought better to put off our actually taking up our quarters in our quaint new home till after papa had gone. He said it would have worried him rather if we had left sooner, but I know the truth was, that he thought the having to be very busy, in a bustle in fact, at once on his going, would be the best for us all – mamma especially.

And a bustle it was, though things had been hurried on wonderfully fast. The fixing up of the iron room was quite complete and the partitions were already in their places, the furniture roughly in the rooms too. But as everybody who has ever moved from one house to another knows, there were still heaps to be done, and seen to by ourselves, which no work-people could do properly. And besides the arranging at the Hut of course, there was a great deal for mamma to settle at the house, so as to leave everything nice for the people who were coming.

That afternoon, I remember, the afternoon of the day papa left, we were at the Hut till dark, working as hard as we could, even the little ones helping, by running messages and fetching and carrying. And by the time we went home we were very tired and beginning to find it very difficult to look on the bright side of things.

'I don't believe it will ever be really comfortable for mamma,' said Geordie in the growly tone he used when he was anxious or unhappy. 'It's just a horrid business altogether. I don't believe papa will be able to get things right, out at that old hole of a place, and even if he doesn't get ill, as he very likely will, he'll only come home to leave it for good – I mean we'll have to sell Eastercove. I'm almost sorry we did not go away now at once and get it over.'

I glanced before us. Mamma was some little way in front – I could just see her dimly, for it was dusk, with Denzil and Esmé, one on each side; Esmé walking along soberly for once, and I caught snatches of mamma's voice coming back to us, for there was a light, though rather chilly evening breeze, blowing our way. I could hear that she was talking brightly to the children; no doubt it was not easy for her to do so.

'Listen, Geordie,' I said, nodding forwards, so to say, towards mamma.

And he understood, though he did not say anything just at once.

'It is a good thing,' I went on, after a moment's silence, 'that the wind is not the other way. I would not like her to hear you talking like that, within a few hours of papa's going.'

It was not often – very, very seldom indeed – that I felt it my place to blame good old Dods; and honestly, I don't think I did it or meant it in any 'superior' way. I am sure I did not, for the words had scarcely passed my lips before they seemed to me to have been unkind. Geordie was tired; he had been working very hard the last few days, and even a strong boy may feel out of heart when he is tired.

'I don't know what I should do, not to speak of mamma,' I went on, 'if you got gloomy about things. We all depend on you so,' and for a moment or two I really felt as if I must begin to cry!

Then something crept round my neck, and I knew it was all right again. The something was Geordie's arm, and it gave me a little hug, not the most comfortable thing in the world when you are out walking, and it tilts up your hat, but of course I did not mind.

'Yes, Ida,' he said, 'it's very babyish and cowardly of me, and I'm very sorry. I won't be like that again, I promise you.'

Then I gave him a sort of a hug in return, and we hurried on a little, not to leave mamma with the children dragging on at each side of her, as they are apt to do when they are tired. We none of us spoke much the rest of the way home, but Geordie said one or two little things about how comfortable the Hut was getting to look and so on, which I understood, and which prevented poor mamma's suspecting that he was at all in low spirits.

When people really try to do right, I think outside things often come to help them. That very evening we were cheered and amused by a letter which had arrived by the second post while we were all out – a quite unexpected letter.

It was from a cousin of ours, a girl, though a grown-up one, whom we were very fond of. She was almost like a big sister, and her name was Theresa. She was generally called 'Taisy' for short. I have not spoken of her before; but, indeed, when I come to think of it I have not spoken of any of our relations, I have been so entirely taken up with the Hut. We had however none very near. Taisy was almost the nearest. She lived with her grandmother, who was papa's aunt, so Taisy was really only second cousin to us children.

She was now about seventeen, and she was an orphan. Many people like her would have been spoilt, for old Aunt Emmeline adored her and gave her nearly everything she could possibly want. But Taisy wasn't a bit spoilt.

She often came to stay with us, and one of the smaller parts of our big trouble was that we could not look forward to having her this year, at any rate. Papa had written to Lady Emmeline to tell her of what had happened; she was one of the few whom he felt he must write to about it, and it was partly because of Taisy's not coming – I mean our not being able to have her – that he did so.

And he had had a very kind letter back from his aunt. She wished she could help him, but though she was comfortably off, her money was what they call 'tied up,' somehow, and Taisy would have none of hers till she was twenty-one. Besides, papa was not the sort of man to take or expect help, while he was strong and active and could work for us himself, and it was the kind of trouble in which a little help would really have been no use – a large fortune was at stake.