“Take the boots and shoes back to the kitchen,” said Uncle Ambrose. “It is nearly time for tea. Robert has not appeared. I’ll fetch him.”
Robert, having swept out the stable and made everything neat and tidy, was lovingly polishing Rob- Roy’s harness and talking to Rob-Roy, who answered him with soft conversational sounds that he thought were peculiar to Rob-Roy, for he had never heard a horse or a mare talking to its foal. If he had he would have recognized the low-toned consolation and endearments. They talked of a dream Robert had, a dream of galloping over the moors before breakfast, the two of them alone together, and then long outings when they would be out from the first cry of the bird of dawning until the star of evening brought them home. It struck Robert that since they had come to England he had never felt more comforted than he did now. The sound of the rain drumming on the roof only seemed to make the warm stable safer and warmer. He did not
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want his afternoon with Rob-Roy ever to end and when he had finished the harness, rubbing away at it until he had the leather shining like satin and the metal buckles winking like diamonds, he tackled the cart and made that spick-and-span too. Then he set to work on Rob-Roy himself, combing his mane with a curry comb and stopping now and then to lean his cheek against Rob-Roy’s neck and tell him how he missed Father. Because he was the elder son, Father had talked to him a good deal and had, he knew, felt special about him. One of his ears buried against Rob-Roy, and the other filled with the noise of the rain, he did not hear Uncle Ambrose come into the stable, and did not know he was there until he felt a hand on his shoulder and looking up saw the tall figure draped in a dripping mackintosh and wearing the most extraordinary head- gear he had ever seen. Once it had been Uncle Ambrose’s best top hat but now, having become his third- best, it had shut up like a concertina beneath the weight of water that had descended upon it during the years that Uncle Ambrose had lived in Devonshire, and it was not what it had been.
“You miss your father?” asked Uncle Ambrose.
“Yes, sir,” said Robert.
“Time passes,” said Uncle Ambrose, his grip tightening on Robert’s shoulder. “You’ll be surprised at the way it passes. Before you know it your father will be home again. Robert, would you like to ride Rob-Roy?”
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Robert looked up at him with shining eyes. “Yes, sir,” he said. “I could ride him bareback, couldn’t I, until I’d saved up enough to buy a saddle?”
Uncle Ambrose’s eyes twinkled. “Ah, that explains that pailful of snails.” He glanced around the stable. “You've worked well this afternoon, Robert, you’ve worked very well indeed. I’ll give you the saddle and you can save up yourself for the bit and bridle.” Robert was speechless with shock, joy and adoration, and also shame. How could he ever have thought Uncle Ambrose a beast? His uncle gave his shoulder a friendly shake. “Come along now. It’s teatime. If I can teach you to construe a few simple Greek sentences as well as you polish harness I shall live to be proud of you.”
They went back to the house together most amicably and found that Ezra had made buttered toast for tea, and after tea, while they were still sitting around the dining room table, Uncle Ambrose said, “This question of pocket money. The sums owing to you all should, I think, be paid on Saturdays. Shall we see what is owing today?”
He took his gold pencil and a notebook from his pocket but it was unnecessary, for Robert had already totted up the total while the others were washing their hands for tea. He now laid the piece of paper before his relative. Uncle Ambrose adjusted his spectacles, his mouth twitching a little at the corners. Nan was already coming to recognize this twitching as amusement on the part of Uncle Ambrose, amusement which it was
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necessary to control lest Robert get too great an opinion of himself. Uncle Ambrose read aloud the information Robert had inscribed upon the grubby piece of paper.
Robert. Rob-Roy 6d. Snails 3d. Washing-up id. Total lod.
Nan. Darning socks 6d. Washing-up id. Total yd.
Timothy. Boots and shoes 6d. Washing-up id. Total
7d.
Betsy. Washing-up id.
Total 2s. id.
“Not correct, Robert,” said Uncle Ambrose. “The sixpences are, if you remember, for a week's labor on Rob-Roy, socks and shoes. Only one day’s labor on Rob- Roy, socks and shoes has actually taken place.”
“Don’t we start with something in hand?” asked Robert, slightly outraged.
“You do not,” said Uncle Ambrose.
“I only darned for five minutes,” said Nan shamefacedly. “I didn’t do any more work after I went into my parlor.”
“Quite understandable,” said Uncle Ambrose. “A ha’penny out of the sixpence for you. A penny for Robert, a penny for Timothy. And what about Betsy? Didn’t I see her helping Ezra make the Sunday cake? If she’s to be assistant cook, a development which I did not anticipate, she must earn her sixpence a week too. A penny of that for today.” He made calculations with the gold pencil. “The totals for this week are therefore,
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Robert fivepence, Nan a penny-ha’penny, Timothy tuppence, Betsy tuppence.”
He took a handful of change from his pocket, handed out tenpence-ha’penny and immediately changed the subject. “Time for preparation. This evening, Nan and Robert, you will work in here, not in my library where I shall require to be in privacy for the preparation of my sermons for tomorrow which is, you will recollect, Sunday. And you will do work of a different nature. You will study the collect, epistle and gospel for tomorrow, learning the collect by heart and also such portions of the epistle and gospel as I shall choose for you. Timothy must learn the collect and some verses of a simple hymn, Betsy the verses only. I shall require you all to repeat what you have learned to me tomorrow. Robert, fetch the pile of books which you will find on my library table.” Robert did so and they were each handed a large prayer book and hymnbook of their own, and shown what they must learn by heart. The amount which Robert and Nan had to learn was shocking. They dared not look at each other while Uncle Ambrose remained in the room but after he had said good night and left them they did, their jaws dropping in dismay.
“We’ll never do it,” said Robert. “Not in an hour.”
“We will,” said Nan. “If it couldn’t be done in an hour Uncle Ambrose wouldn’t have given it to us. He knows. We’ll all four hear each other.”
It was just as she said. It took Betsy, with Nan’s help, only ten minutes to learn two verses of “All things bright
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and beautiful,” and Timothy took a quarter of an hour over the same two verses and the collect, and then they went off to Ezra for their supper. Nan was a quick learner and at the end of forty-five minutes she was able to concentrate on helping Robert. As the clock struck seven he groaned and removed the wet towel he had wrapped around his head. But he was word perfect.
“Though will I be by the morning?” he asked anxiously.
“I’ll hear you again before breakfast,” Nan promised him.
“Do you suppose we shall have to listen to both Uncle Ambrose’s sermons tomorrow?”
“I think only one to start with,” said Nan. “He lets us down lightly.”
“It’s heavy going when he has us at the bottom,” sighed Robert.
But Nan perceived he was no longer thinking that Uncle Ambrose was a beast. Something nice had happened between them, she was quite sure, something almost as nice as her parlor. Or as nice as her parlor would have been if she had not found the book in it. She pushed the thought of the book away from her and raced Robert down the passage to the kitchen, to the marvelous supper Ezra had prepared for them to make up for last night’s gruel. But later, in bed in the dark, she remembered it again, for the sound of the wind and rain was eerie and she was s
cared. But then she remembered something else and she was no longer afraid. The
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spells in Emma Cobley’s book might be wicked, and Emma Cobley herself, and Frederick the cat, and perhaps old Tom Biddle across the way was not all he should be, but ranged against them was the goodness of Uncle Ambrose, Ezra, Moses Glory Glory Alleluja, Daft Davie and Lady Alicia, and the wholesomeness of the animals, Rob-Roy, Absolom, Abednego, Andromache and her kittens, and of course Hector and the bees, and good spirits whom she could not see but of whom she was aware at this moment, holding over her in the dark a sort of umbrella of safety. She would not be afraid to finish Emma’s book tomorrow. The wind, she realized, was dropping and it was no longer eerie, and the rain was no more than a soft murmur at the window that sang her to sleep.
Breakfast was later than usual next morning because Uncle Ambrose went to church before it. They used the extra time in getting themselves what they hoped was word perfect, and it was a mercy they did for Uncle Ambrose had no sooner folded up his napkin after breakfast than he said, “Now then!” and marched them into the library. Under his severe eye, and Hector’s, they acquitted themselves fairly well. Nan and Timothy made no mistakes but Robert stumbled twice and Betsy got so mixed up in the second verse of her hymn that Hector said, “Hick!” and shot out two mouse tails and a coffee spoon. Uncle Ambrose made no heavy weather over Robert’s and Betsy’s failures, merely remarking benignly that he would hear them again after
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dinner, and if they failed again, after tea, but not after supper because if they failed after tea they’d get no supper, but he did not, he said, anticipate that misfortune, and now they must get ready for church.
The storm had passed and white galleons of clouds were sailing across a brilliant blue sky, but there was a morning chill in the wind and Ezra advised blue serge sailor suits, not white linen, for the boys, and coats over the girls’ cotton frocks. Nan’s Sunday coat was pink and Betsy’s was blue. Nan had a straw hat wreathed with roses and Betsy’s bonnet was trimmed with forget-me- nots. They wore gloves for in those days children were very dressy on a Sunday. Grown-ups also. Uncle Ambrose wore a top hat of marvelous height and a coat with long tails. Yet they only had to walk up the back garden and across the churchyard to the church.
Uncle Ambrose went first and the children followed behind in single file like ducklings following their parent to the pond, holding their large prayer books and hymn- books and the pennies that Uncle Ambrose had given them; for to his everlasting honor he was not expecting them to put their own hard-earned pennies in the collection. Uncle Ambrose carried a large Bible bristling with pieces of paper that marked the places. When they reached the beehives they bowed and curtsied, and he raised his top hat and said, “Good morning, madam queens and noble bees. It is the first day of a new week and we wish you well.” Then he replaced his hat and they went on into the churchyard where at this season
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the grass was long, rippling in the wind and full of moon daisies and sorrel.
The children had not been in an English churchyard before and they were fascinated. The very old graves had headstones that leaned this way and that and were so weathered that the lettering on them was worn away, but the not so old ones had stones with names on them that one could read, and carved cherubs’ heads. There were several big tombs overgrown with ivy and surrounded by tall railings. Up the main path from the lych-gate came a stream of villagers in their Sunday best and among them, the children saw to their astonishment, was Emma Cobley in a black bonnet tied beneath the chin with black velvet ribbons, a black shawl and black mittens. She carried a very large prayer book, her eyes were on the ground and she looked very good indeed.
“I’m going in by the vestry door,” said Uncle Ambrose, “but you must go in through the west door under the tower. Nan, lead the way. Do not be alarmed. The sexton will show you the vicarage pew. I trust you will set a good example to the congregation.” Then he removed his top hat, opened a little door under a low arch and vanished.
Holding Betsy’s hand, Nan led her little flock around to the west door. The villagers smiled at them very kindly, and that was nice, but they also drew back respectfully to let them go first, and that was alarming, but with the tremendous clamor of the bells over their
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heads they went into the old church that was like a cavern under the sea lit with dim green light, with an uneven stone floor, shadows and pillars, and sunbeams here and there that had pierced down through miles of water from the world above. A strange little figure in a cassock, with the face of a grave and reverent gnome, moved toward them and to their intense relief they found that the sexton was Ezra. Without moving a muscle of his face, or making any sign whatever to show that he had set eyes on them before, he led them up the aisle and ushered them politely into a pew exactly beneath the pulpit. They trembled, for not only would they be exactly under Uncle Ambrose’s eye when he preached, but the congregation behind them would be able to see what they did. And they would be sure to do something wrong, kneeling down when they should be standing, or dropping their pennies or saying amen in the wrong place.
Sitting very upright on the edge of the hard seat they glanced furtively at the front pew across the aisle, a much grander pew than theirs with cushions on the seat and hassocks with tassels at the corners, instead of just plain hassocks with sawdust bursting out as theirs did, and even as they looked a small door in the north wall of the church opened, letting in a burst of sunlight, and through it there stalked a most majestic figure. He was tall and stately, dressed in green velvet livery, with knee breeches and buckled shoes, and his white hair must have been washed last night for it was like snow above
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his black face. He carried a tall cane with a silver top, such as majordomos carry in pictures, yellow gloves, and an enormous prayer book with brass clasps. Closing the door behind him, he advanced with immense dignity, looking directly at the children but giving no more sign than Ezra had done that he had ever seen them before. Entering the grand pew he sat down, said a prayer with one large hand over his eyes, then laid his cane and gloves on the seat and his prayer book on the shelf in front of him, placed his hands one upon each knee and gazing straight ahead turned into an ebony statue. Nan, who was nearest to the aisle on her side, gave a sigh of relief. Moses, she knew, would do everything correctly and out of the corner of her eye she would be able to watch what he did and do the same.
The bells stopped and the choir filed in, eight little boys and four men, all with well-scrubbed faces and wearing starched white surplices, and Uncle Ambrose bringing up the rear in a surplice the size of a tent, looking taller than ever and most alarming, and the service began. The choir was accompanied on a wheezy organ played by a stout lady in a purple dress and hat and brown button boots, a little boy with a scarlet face blowing a sort of bellows behind the organ. She played with zeal but no talent and the singing though hearty was not musical, for Uncle Ambrose himself was not musical nor was anyone else. Except perhaps Moses. Nan had a feeling that Moses suffered during the sing
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ing, for though his wonderful deep voice kept the rest of them more or less within reach of the right note its vibrations were full of sadness. And so was Moses himself. He was a tragic figure in the Manor pew, looking at times frozen with sorrow, aware that he was all that was left now of the departed glory.
When the time came for the sermon Uncle Ambrose towered above the congregation like one of the prophets of the Old Testament. He gave out his text in a voice like a trumpet and never had he looked more magnificent, yet it was strange to see him without Hector growing taller and taller on his shoulder. He looked as incomplete as the children felt without Absolom at their heels. “I wish,” Timothy said to Nan, “that animals and birds could come to church.” br />
“Sh!” whispered Nan in anguish, and Timothy was aware of a chasm of icy silence opening between text and sermon, and of Uncle Ambrose’s terrible eyes fixing them over the top of his spectacles. He blushed crimson and straightened himself. All four sat as though they had swallowed pokers, hands folded in their laps and eyes fixed on their prayer books on the shelf in front of them, and so they remained for thirty-five minutes while Uncle Ambrose’s incomprehensible sermon rolled out like thunder over their heads. When it was over and he gave out the last hymn Betsy was so stiff that she nearly fell over when she tried to stand upright, but the last hymn made up for everything because it was “All things bright and beautiful” and she was quite sure, and
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so was Timothy, that Uncle Ambrose had chosen it to please them because it was the one they were learning by heart. No one dropped a penny. All four landed safely in the bag that Ezra carried around.
Sunday dinner was splendid, roast beef and Yorkshire pudding and trifle, and Ezra waited on them in his shepherd’s smock and apron. Nan wondered how he managed to combine being sexton with being everything else that he was. His quick changes were magical and she suddenly wondered whether he was entirely human. Was there perhaps a strain of fairy in him? He had looked like a gnome in church. Were his ears pointed? To stare would have been rude but as he turned to go out of the room she gave a quick glance, and they were. Her heart missed a beat.
After dinner Uncle Ambrose heard Robert and Betsy once more and this time they were word perfect. He handed around peppermint lozenges and said, “Next Sunday, and on subsequent alternate Sundays, Ezra will drive you to take tea with your grandmother, at her request.” He glanced with amusement at their startled faces. “Well may you look astonished. I myself could scarcely believe my ears when I heard that magnanimous old lady express a desire for occasional visits from you. The excellent Miss Bolt would also feel deprived if she were not occasionally in your fatiguing company. But not today. Both the admirable ladies require a short period of convalescence. Today you may do what you like until bedtime but”—and his eyes burned through