Harker Miss Esperance and Mr Wycherly

1. Auflage 2017
ISBN: 978-3-7364-1951-3
Verlag: anboco
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: 6 - ePub Watermark

E-Book, Englisch, 334 Seiten

Which Introduces Them The Coming of the Children The Education of Mr. Wycherly The Secretiveness of Mause Robina The Awakening of Mr. Wycherly Elsa Drives the Nail Home Edmund Rechristens Mr. Wycherly Cupid Abroad The Sabbath Loaves and Fishes The Village A Meeting A Parting The Bethune Temperament The Coming of the Colonel Mr. Wycherly Goes Into Society Montagu and His Aunt The Fond Adventure A Question of Theology In which Mr. Wycherly Hangs Up His College Arms Vale

Autoren/Hrsg.

Harker, L. Allen

Leseproben

CHAPTER III

THE EDUCATION OF MR. WYCHERLY

For what are all our contrivings,

And the wisdom of our books,

When compared with your caresses,

And the gladness of your looks?

LONGFELLOW.

For several days Mr. Wycherly's privacy was not again invaded before breakfast, though he heard through the wall continual and loudly expressed demands to visit "man" from his friend of the curly pate and strap shoes. One morning, however, Robina's suspicions as to Edmund's propensity for roving were lulled into security by particularly exemplary conduct on his part during the time of dressing; and she slipped downstairs to give a hand with the breakfast, leaving the children safety shut in their nursery.

No sooner had she departed than Montagu, of whom people expected better things, suggested that they should go and visit Mr. Wycherly next door. The morning hours had been so unusually quiet that that gentleman was still dozing, although Elsa had already brought his hot water. When he heard the now unmistakable fumbling with the door handle, which always proclaimed the advent of the children, he called out—"Come in, but for heaven's sake mind the hot-water can."

In they came without accident of any kind, as Elsa had taken the precaution of placing the can well on the hinge side of the door. Very fresh and spick and span did the two little boys look in clean, blue pinafores, and shining morning faces. Edmund made a dash for Mr. Wycherly, with his usual joyful cry of "Uppee! Uppee!" Montagu hastily banged the door after him to keep Robina out, and he, too, climbed up on Mr. Wycherly's bed. The soft, indescribable fragrance of clean children was supremely pleasurable to Mr. Wycherly, and excited strange, unfamiliar stirrings of recollections, long buried but by no means dead, of his own nursery days in the old house in Shropshire where he and his brothers were brought up.

But there was no time to indulge in retrospect, for Edmund had already settled the programme. "Sing!" he commanded. "Sing, man!"

"I fear," Mr. Wycherly said, somewhat breathlessly, for Edmund was sitting upon that portion of his body known in sporting circles as "the wind," "that I cannot sing, for I don't know any songs."

"Say, zen, say, man," Edmund cried, jumping up and down upon poor Mr. Wycherly's yielding frame.

"He means you to say him a poem," Montagu explained.

Now of poetry Mr. Wycherly knew plenty, both in Greek and Latin and English, but none of it seemed particularly suitable to the present circumstances. The only lines that came willingly to his call were—

Of man's first disobedience, and the fruit

Of that forbidden tree, whose mortal taste,

which he felt would meet with but scant approval from his present audience.

"Say 'ime, say 'ime, man!" cried Edmund, with an ominous droop of the corners of his mouth.

"Say 'Hickory, dickory, dock," Montagu suggested kindly, "he likes that—and you tickle him where it runs up, and where it runs down, and at the end, you know."

"But I don't know any poem called 'Hickory, dickory, dock," Mr. Wycherly protested despairingly.

"Say 'ime, man! Say dock!" Edmund persisted, punching Mr. Wycherly in the chest to emphasise his wishes. "Say dock. Quit."

"I'll whisper it to you," murmured the helpful Montagu, "it goes like this—'Hickory, dickory, dock."

"Hickory, dickory, dock," Mr. Wycherly repeated dutifully and distinctly.

"The mouse ran up the clock," Montagu continued.

"The mouse ran up the clock——"

"But you didn't tickle him," Montagu interrupted.

Mr. Wycherly looked at Edmund, and Edmund looked with eager expectation at Mr. Wycherly.

Now to tickle any one appeared to Mr. Wycherly a most unwarrantable liberty. Such a mode of procedure had never entered into his scheme of life at all. He was not even sure how he ought to set about it. He decided that tickling was altogether out of his province, and he would not experiment, even upon Edmund.

He cleared his throat nervously. "Ahem," said Mr. Wycherly, "Hickory, dickory, dock, the mouse ran up the clock——"

"No! No!" shouted Edmund. "'E mouse 'an down."

"The mouse ran down the clock," echoed the obedient Mr. Wycherly.

"No, No," cried both the little boys. "The clock struck one." Here Edmund gave a most tremendous bounce that really hurt Mr. Wycherly.

"Ve mouse 'an down," he continued, scrabbling with his fingers all over Mr. Wycherly's face, and seizing him by the collar of his night shirt to burrow in his neck.

"Hickory, dickory, dock," Montagu concluded in a joyful chant. "Now you know it, only you must run up and down, you know."

"Oh, I really cannot do that," Mr. Wycherly expostulated, "not before I am dressed."

Montagu looked puzzled. "You ought to tickle us, you know, like Edmund did, and with your fingers; it's quite easy, really."

"Adain!" Edmund commanded, squirming and jumping all over the very softest portions of Mr. Wycherly's person, and causing that patient gentleman acute agony. "Adain!"

"Let us all say it together," Mr. Wycherly gasped, painfully drawing himself a little higher up in the bed, "and do you think you could sit a little more to one side, or a little further forward, or a little lower down, or anywhere except just where you are at present?"

"Edmund heavy boy," that youth remarked proudly.

"He is," Mr. Wycherly fervently agreed, "a very heavy boy—ah, that's better now."

"Hickory, dickory, dock" was now performed in chorus, and if one of the trio made any mistakes, his companions were making such a row that they did not detect him. At the conclusion of the verse the little boys gave Mr. Wycherly a practical demonstration as to what they meant by tickling.

It was only when the racket had somewhat subsided that they heard Robina's timid voice outside the door bidding the children come at once to their breakfast.

"Det up, man," Edmund directed, "and take me to 'Obina."

"You are perfectly able to trot across to the door," said Mr. Wycherly, mildly remonstrant and much exhausted.

"Come in," shouted Edmund, "come and fesh me."

"No, don't do anything of the kind," cried Mr. Wycherly, horror-stricken; "he can quite well come to you."

"I'll surely no come in," said Robina in a slightly offended voice. "They're to come oot at once, the mistress is waitin' breakfast."

"Me tiahed," Edmund announced, languidly lying down beside Mr. Wycherly. "Me tay heah."

Robina knocked sharply. "Come at once," she cried. "Please, sir, make them come, or the mistress will be rale vexed."

"Go, Montagu," said Mr. Wycherly firmly. "I suppose I must carry this—myself."

Robina, outside, heard much gurgling and giggling on the part of Edmund, as Mr. Wycherly arose and hastily donned his dressing-gown. He carried the struggling baby across to the door, which he had to open widely in order to give his charge into his nurse's arms. Montagu departed with his little brother, but not one moment sooner.

Mr. Wycherly shut and locked his door, only to remember that he had left his hot water outside. When he had secured it and again made the door fast, he sank upon his bed: "I must certainly lock my door overnight," he reflected; "to be tickled is a truly dreadful experience."

He dressed to the rhythm of "Hickory, dickory, dock," and although the two things had no sort of connection he found himself thinking of the forget-me-nots on the banks of the Cherwell; they were exactly the colour of Baby Edmund's eyes.

It had already become a matter of course that the children should spend half an hour in Mr. Wycherly's study before they went to bed.

They were left in his charge while Robina got things ready for the night, and he strove to make the time pass pleasantly for them by every means in his power. Edmund's requests were occasionally a little difficult to understand, as although his speech was fluent and his vocabulary singularly large for his age, he had a habit of omitting any consonant that was troublesome to pronounce. Both "l" and "r" were of this number. He did not attempt to provide a substitute but simply left the letter out, and nothing delighted old Elsa more than to hear him repeat after her—"'ound the 'ugged 'ock the 'adical 'ascals 'an."

Mr. Wycherly did his best to correct this defect in Edmund's speech, and on this particular evening was showing him a picture book of coloured animals.

"Poor little Edmund can't say lion," he said sadly, apropos of a picture of the king of beasts.

"He can say tigah," that infant rejoined cheerfully; "no maw pitchers. Man, make a 'abbit," and Edmund scrambled off Mr. Wycherly's knee the better to behold the feat in question.

Mr. Wycherly shook his head hopelessly while Montagu shyly explained: "He means a rabbit out of a handkerchief, you know. Daddie always did it, and it ran up his arm and jumped so. Do make one!"

Mr. Wycherly almost groaned. He hadn't the faintest notion how to make a rabbit, and felt that he had lived in vain. He proposed building a tower with some bricks that the children had brought with them, but Edmund would have none of such well-worn devices. He persisted in his demands for "a 'abbit," growing more and more vociferous, till his wishes culminated in a roar that brought Robina to the rescue and to Mr. Wycherly's door, whence she bore Edmund away, wailing dismally.

Mr. Wycherly, helpless and distressed, looked appealingly at Montagu, who only said rather reproachfully, "You...