Milly and Olly, Mrs. Humphry Ward [ebook e reader .TXT] 📗

hide-and-seek, and Milly hid herself in such out-of-the-way cupboards, and squeezed herself into such small corners, that mother said she was like a needle in a bundle of hay--there was no finding her.

Seven o'clock came before they had time to think about it, and the children went chattering and skipping up to bed, though on fine evenings they had been staying up much later. How the rain did rattle on the window while they were undressing.

"Oh, you tiresome rain," said Milly, standing by the window in her nightdress, and gazing up into the sky. "Where does it all come from, I wonder? Won't it be wet to-morrow, Nana? and oh, what is that roaring over there?"

"That's the beck," said nurse, who was brushing Olly's hair, and trying hard to make him stand still for two minutes.

"The beck! why, what's the matter with it?"

"It's the rain has made it so full I suppose," said nurse. "To-morrow, gardener says, it'll be over the lawn if the rain goes on."

"Oh, but it mustn't go on," said Milly. "Now, rain, dear rain, good rain, do go away to-night, right away up into the mountains. There's plenty of room for you up there, and down here we don't want you a bit. So do be polite and go away."

But the rain didn't see any good reason for going away, in spite of Milly's pretty speeches, and next morning there was the same patter on the window, the same gray sky and dripping garden. After breakfast there was just a hope of its clearing up. For about an hour the rain seemed to get less and the clouds a little brighter. But it soon came on again as fast as ever, and the poor children were very much disappointed.

"Mother," said Milly, when they had settled down to their lessons again in the drawing-room, "when we get back to Willingham, do you know what I shall do?"

"No, Milly."

"I shall ask you to take me to see that old gentleman--you know who I mean--who told you about the rain. And I shall say to him, 'please, Mr. Old Gentleman, at first I thought you were quite wrong about the rain, but afterwards I thought you were quite right, and it does rain dreadfully much in the mountains.'"

"Very well, Milly. But you have only just had a taste of what the rain can do in the lakes you know, so far. Father and I have been here sometimes when it has rained two or three weeks without stopping."

"Oh dear!" said Milly, looking extremely melancholy. "I like the mountains very much, mother; but _do_ you think we'd better come to Ravensnest again after this year?"

"Oh you ungrateful little woman!" said Mrs. Norton, whose love for the place was so real that Milly's speech gave her quite a pang. "Have you forgotten all your happy sunshiny days here, just because it has rained for two? Why, when I was a little girl, and used to come here, the rainy days never made me love the place a bit the less. I always used to think the fine days made up."

"But then, mother, you were a nice little girl," said Milly, throwing her arms round her mother's neck and kissing her. "Now, I don't feel a bit nice this morning. It makes me so cross not to be able to go out and get flowers and wild strawberries. And you know at home it hardly ever rains all day."

"Gardener says sometimes it rains all over the road," interrupted Olly, "and people can't walk along, and they have to go right up on the mountains to get past the water place. And sometimes they have to get a boat to take people across. Do you think we shall have to go in a boat to church on Sunday, mother?"

"Well, we're a long way off that yet, Olly. It will take a good many days' rain to flood the roads so deep that we can't get along them, and this is only the second rainy day. Come, I don't think we've got much to complain of. Now suppose, instead of doing all your lessons this morning, you were presently to write to Jacky and Francis--you write to Jacky, Milly, and Olly to Francis. Don't you think that would be a good thing?"

"Oh yes, yes!" cried Milly, shutting up her copybook in a great hurry. "They'll be so much astonished, mother, for we didn't _promise_ to write to them. I don't believe they ever get any letters."

The children had a great deal of affection and some secret pity for these playfellows of theirs, who had a sick mother, and who did not get half the pleasures and amusements that they did. And, as I have already told you, they could not bear Miss Chesterton, the little boys' aunt, who lived with them. They felt sure that Jacky and Francis must be unhappy, only because they had to live with Miss Chesterton.

This was Milly's letter when it was done. Milly could only write very slowly, in rather big hand, so that her letters were never very long:

MY DEAR JACKY--Don't you think it very odd getting a letter from me? It is nearly a fortnight since we came here. At first it was _very_ nice. We went up the mountains, and Aunt Emma took us in a boat on the lake. And we gathered some wild strawberries, only some of them were quite white--not red a bit. But now it has begun to rain, and we don't like it at all. Perhaps we sha'n't be able to get home because the rain will cover up the roads. It is _very_ dull staying in, only mother makes us such nice plays. Good-bye, Jacky. I send my love to Francis. Mind you don't forget us.

Your loving little friend, MILLY.

Olly wrote a much longer letter, that is to say, mother wrote for him, and he told her what to say, and as this was a much easier way of writing than Milly's way, he got on very fast, and Mrs. Norton had to write as quickly as she could, to keep up with him. And this was what Olly had to say:

MY DEAR FRANCIS--I wonder what you'll say to-morrow morning when the postman brings you this letter. I hope you'll write back, because it won't be fair if you don't. It isn't such fun here now because it does rain so. Milly and I are always telling the rain to go away, but it won't--though it did at home. Last week we went out in a boat, and I rowed. I rowed a great way, much farther than Milly. We went very slow when Milly rowed. It was very jolly at the picnic. Aunt Emma gave me some cake, and mother gave me some bread and jam. Nana won't let us have cake and jam both, when we have tea at home. Aunt Emma told us a story about King Arthur. I don't believe you ever heard it. The water-fairies took him away, and his friend wanted to go too, but the king said 'No! you must stop behind.' Milly cried because she felt sad about the king. I didn't cry, because I'm a little boy. Mother says you won't understand about the story, and she says we must tell it you when we get home. So we will, only perhaps we sha'n't remember. Do you do lessons now? We don't do any--only when it rains. Milly's writing a letter to Jacky--mine's much longer than hers.

Your little friend, OLLY.

Then came the putting up the letters, addressing them, and stamping them, all of which the children enjoyed very much, and by the time they were laid on the hall table ready to go to the post it was nearly dinner-time.

How the beck did roar that afternoon. And when the children looked out from the drawing-room window they could see a little flood on the lawn, where the water had come over the side of the stream. While they were having their tea, with mother sitting by, working and chattering to them, they heard a knock at the door, and when they opened it there was father standing in the unused kitchen, with the water running off his waterproof coat, making little streams all over the stone floor.

"I have been down to look at the river," he said to Mrs. Norton. "Keep off, children! I'm much too wet to touch. Such rain! It does know how to come down here! The water's over the road just by the stepping-stones. John Backhouse says if it goes on another twenty-four hours like this, there'll be no getting to Wanwick by the road, on foot."

"Father," said Milly, looking at him with a very solemn face, "wouldn't it be dreadful if it went on raining and raining, and if the river came up and up, right up to the drive and into the hall, and we all had to sit upstairs, and the butcher couldn't bring us any meat, and John Backhouse couldn't bring us any milk, and we all _died_ of hunger."

"Then they would put us into some black boxes," said Olly, cheerfully, with his mouth full of bread and butter, "and they would put the black boxes into some boats, and take us right away and bury us krick--wouldn't they, mother?"

"Well, but--" said Mr. Norton, who had by this time got rid of his wet coat, and was seated by Milly, helping himself to some tea, "suppose we got into the boats before we were dead, and rowed away to Windermere station?"

"Oh no! father," said Milly, who always liked her stories to be as gloomy as possible, "they wouldn't know anything about us till we were dead you know, and then they'd come and find us, and be _very_ sorry for us, and say, 'Oh dear! oh dear! what a pity!'"

Olly began to look so dismal as Milly's fancies grew more and more melancholy, that Mrs. Norton took to laughing at them all. What did they know about Westmoreland rain indeed. This was nothing--just nothing at all; she _could_ remember some floods in the wintertime, when she was a little girl, and used to stay with Aunt Emma and great-grandmamma; but as for this, why, it was a good summer wetting, and that was all.

A romp sent the children to bed in excellent spirits again. This time both Milly and Olly stood at the window together, and told the rain to be sure to go to Spain that night, and never come back again while they were at Ravensnest.

"Or you might go to Willingham, you know, dear Mr. Rain," said Milly; "I daresay mother's flowers want a good watering. And there's Spot--you might give her a good washing--she _can_ wash herself, but she won't.