ELINOR had not been three days gone, indeed her mother had but just received a hurried note announcing her arrival in London, when as she sat alone in the house which had become so silent, Mrs. Dennistoun suddenly became aware of a rising of sound of the most jubilant, almost riotous description. It began by the barking of Yarrow, the old colley, who was fond of lying at the gate watching in a philosophic way of his own the mild traffic of the country road, the children trooping by to school, who hung about him in clusters, with lavish offerings of crust and scraps of biscuit, and all the leisurely country flâneurs whom the good dog despised, not thinking that he himself did nothing but flâner at his own door in the sun. A bark from Yarrow was no small thing in the stillness of the spring afternoon, and little Urisk, the terrier, who lay wrapt in dreams at Mrs. Dennistoun’s feet, heard where he lay entranced in the folds of sleep and cocked up an eager ear and uttered a subdued interrogation under his breath. The next thing was no bark, but a shriek of joy from Yarrow, such as could mean nothing in the world but “Philip!” or Pippo, which was what no doubt the dogs called him between following their mistress. Urisk heard and understood. He made but one spring from the footstool on which he lay and flung himself against the door. Mrs. Dennistoun sat for a moment and listened, much disturbed. When some troublous incident occurs in the deep quiet of domestic life how often is it followed by another, and her heart turned a little sick. She was not comforted even by the fact that Urisk was waggling not his tail only, but his whole little form in convulsions of joy, barking, crying aloud for the door to open, to let him forth. By this time all the friendly dogs about had taken up the sound out of sympathy with Yarrow’s yells of delight—and into this came the clang of the gate, the sound of wheels, an outcry in a human voice, that of Barbara, the maid—and then a young shout that rang through the air—“Where’s my mother, Barbara, where’s granny?” Philip, it may be imagined, did not wait for any answer, but came in headlong, Yarrow leaping after him, Urisk springing into the air to meet him—himself in too great a hurry to heed either, flinging himself upon the astonished lady who rose to meet him, with a sudden kiss, and a “Where’s my mother, granny?” of eager greeting.
“Pippo! Good gracious, boy, what’s brought you home now?”
“Nothing but good news,” he said, “so good I thought I must come. I’ve got it, granny: where is my mother——”
“You’ve got it?” she said, so full of other thoughts that she could not recollect what it was he meant. Pippo thought, as Elinor sometimes thought, that his granny was getting slow of understanding—not so bright as she used to be in her mind.
“Oh, granny, you’ve been dozing: the scholarship! I’ve got it—I thought you would know the moment you heard me at the door——”
“My dear boy,” she said, putting her arms about him, while the tall boy stood for the homage done to him—the kiss of congratulation. “You have got the scholarship! notwithstanding Howard and Musgrave and the hard fight there was to be——”
Pippo nodded, with a bright face of pleasure. “But,” he said—“I can’t say I’m sorry I’ve got it, granny—but I wish there had been another for Musgrave: for he worked harder than I did, and he wanted so to win. But so did I, for that matter. And where is my mother all this time?”
“How delighted she will be: and what a comfort to her just now when she is upset and troubled! My dear, it’ll be a dreadful disappointment to you: your mother is in London. She had to hurry off the day before yesterday—on business.”
“In London!” cried Pippo. His countenance fell: he was so much disappointed that for a moment, big boy as he was, he looked ready to cry. He had come in bursting with his news, expecting a reception almost as tumultuous as that given him by the dogs outside. And he found only his grandmother, who forgot what it was he was “in for”—and no mother at all!
“It is a disappointment, Pippo—and it will be such a disappointment to her not to hear it from your own lips: but you must telegraph at once, and that will be next best. She has some worrying business—things that she hates to look after—and this will give her a little heart.”
“What a bore!” said Pippo, with his crest down and the light gone out of him. He gave himself up to the dogs who had been jumping about him, biding their time. “Yarrow knew,” he said, laughing, to get the water out of his eyes. “He gave me a cheer whenever he saw me, dear old fellow—and little Risky too——”
“And only granny forgot,” said Mrs. Dennistoun; “that was very hard upon you, Pippo; my thoughts were all with your mother. And I couldn’t think how you could get back at this time——”
“Well,” said the boy, “my work’s over, you know. There’s nothing for a fellow to do after he’s got the scholarship. I needn’t go back at all—unless you and my mother wish it. I’ve—in a sort of a way, done everything that I can do. Don’t laugh at me, granny!”
“Laugh at you, my boy! It is likely I should laugh at you. Don’t you know I am as proud of you as your mother herself can be? I am glad and proud,” said Mrs. Dennistoun, “for I am glad for her as well as for you. Now, Pippo, you want something to eat.”
The boy looked up with a laugh. “Yes, granny,” he said, “you always divine that sort of thing. I do.”
Mrs. Dennistoun did not occupy her mind with any thought of that little unintentional and grateful jibe—that she always divined that sort of thing. Among the other great patiences of her life she had learnt to know that the mother and son, loving and tender as they were, had put her back unconsciously into the proper place of the old woman—always consulted, always thought of, never left out; but divining chiefly that sort of thing, the actual needs, the more apparent thoughts of those about her. She knew it, but she did not dwell upon it—sometimes it made her smile, but it scarcely hurt her, and never made her bitter, she comprehended it all so well. Meanwhile Pippo, left alone, devoted himself to the dogs for a minute or two, making them almost too happy. Then, at the very climax of riotous enjoyment, cast them off with a sudden, “Down, Yarrow!” which took all the curl in a moment out of the noble tail with which Yarrow was sweeping all the unconsidered trifles off Mrs. Dennistoun’s worktable. The young autocrat walked to the window as he shook off his adoring vassal, and stared out for a little with his hands deeply dug into his pockets. And then a new idea came into Pippo’s head; the most brilliant new idea, which restored at once the light to his eyes and elevation to his crest. He said nothing of this, however, till he had done justice to the excellent luncheon, while his grandmother, seated beside him in the dining-room with her knitting, looked on with pride and pleasure and saw him eat. This was a thing, they were all of accord, which she always thoroughly understood.
“You will run out now and telegraph to your mother. She is in the old rooms in Ebury Street, Pippo.”
“Yes, granny; don’t you think now a fellow of my age, having done pretty well and all that, might be trusted to—make a little expedition out of his own head?”
“My dear! you have always been trusted, Pippo, you know. I can’t remember when your mother or I either have shown any want of trust——”
“Oh, it’s not that,” said Pippo, confused. “I know I’ve had lots, lots—far more than most fellows—of my own way. It was not that exactly. I meant without consulting any one, just to do a thing out of my own head.”
“I have no doubt it will be quite a right thing, Pippo; but I should know better if you were to tell me.”
“That would scarcely be doing it out of my own head, would it, granny? But I can’t keep a thing to myself; now Musgrave can, you know; that’s the great difference. I suppose it is having nobody but my mother and you, who always spoil me, that has made me that I can’t keep a secret.”
“It is something about making it up to Musgrave for not winning the scholarship?”
Philip grew red all over with a burning blush of shame. “What a beast I am!” he said. “You will scarcely believe me, but I had forgotten that—though I do wish I could. I do wish there was any way—— No, granny, it was all about myself.”
“Well, my dear?” she said, in her benignant, all-indulgent grandmother’s voice.
“It is no use going beating about the bush,” he said. “Granny, I’m not going to telegraph to mamma. I’ll run up to London by the night mail.”
“Pippo!”
“Well, it isn’t so extraordinary; naturally I should like to tell her better than to write. It didn’t quite come off, my telling it to you, did it? but my mother will be excited about it—and then it will be a surprise seeing me at all—and then if she is worried by business it will be a good thing to have me to stand by her. And—why there are a hundred reasons, granny, as you must see. And then I should like it above all.”
“My dear,” said Mrs. Dennistoun, trembling a little. She had time during this long speech to collect herself, to get over the first shock, but her nerves still vibrated. “In ordinary circumstances, I should think it an excellent plan. And you have worked well for it, and won your holiday; and your mother always enjoys wandering about town with you. Still, Pippo——”
“Now what can there be against it?” the boy said, with the same spark of fire coming into his blue eyes which had often been seen in Elinor’s hazel ones. He was like the Comptons, a refined image of his father, with the blue eyes and very dark hair which had once made Phil Compton irresistible. Pippo had the habit, I am sorry to say, of being a little impatient with his grandmother. Her objections seemed old-world and obsolete at the first glance.
“The chief thing against it is that I don’t think your mother—would wish it, Pippo.”
“Mamma—think me a bore, perhaps!” the lad cried, with a laugh of almost scornful amusement at this ridiculous idea.
“She would never, of course, think you a bore in any circumstances—but she will be very much confined—she could not take you with her to—lawyers’ offices. She will scarcely have any time to herself.”
“What is this mysterious business, granny?”
“Indeed, Pippo, I can scarcely tell you. It is something connected with old times—that she wishes to have settled and done with. I did not inquire very closely; neither, I think, should you. You know your poor mother has had troubles in her life——”
“Has she?” said Pippo, with wide open eyes. “I have never seen any. I think, perhaps, don’t you know, granny, ladies—make mountains of molehills—or so at least people say——”
“Do they?” said Mrs. Dennistoun, with a laugh. “So you have begun to learn that sort of thing already, Pippo, even here at the end of the world!”
Pippo was a little mortified by her laugh, and a little ashamed of what he had said. It is very tempting at eighteen to put on a man’s superiority, yet he was conscious that it was perhaps a little ungenerous, he who owed all that he was and had to these two ladies; but naturally he was the more angry because of this.
“I suppose,” he said, “that what is in every book that ever was written is likely to be true! But that has nothing to do with the question. I won’t do anything against you if you forbid me absolutely, granny; but short of that I will go——”
Mrs. Dennistoun looked at the boy with all the heat in him of his first burst of independence. It is only wise to compute the forces opposed to one before one launches a command which one may not have force to ensure obedience to. He said that he would not disobey her “absolutely” with his lips; but his eyes expressed a less dutiful sentiment. She had no mind to be beaten in such a struggle. Elinor had complained of her mother in her youth that she was too reasonable, too unwilling to command, too reluctant to assume the responsibility of an act; and it was not to be supposed that she had mended of this, in all the experience she had had of her impatient daughter, and under the influence of so many additional years. She looked at Philip, and concluded that he would at least find some way of eluding her authority if she exercised it, and it did not consist with her dignity to be either “absolutely” or partially disobeyed.
“You forget,” she said, “that I have never taken such authority upon me since you were a child. I will not forbid you to do what you have set your heart upon. I can only say, Philip, that I don’t think your mother would wish you to go——”
“If that’s all, granny,” said the boy, “I think I can take my mother into my own hands. But why do you call me Philip? You never call me that but when you are angry.”
“Was I ever angry?” she said, with a smile; “but if we are to consider you a man, looking down upon women, and taking your movements upon your own responsibility, my dear, it would be ridiculous that you should be little Pippo any more.”
“Not little Pippo,” he said, with a boyish, complacent laugh, rising up to his full height. A young man nearly six feet high, with a scholarship in his pocket, how is he to be expected to take the law from his old grandmother as to what he is to do?
And young Philip did go to town triumphantly by the night mail. He had never done such a thing before, and his sense of manly independence, of daring, almost of adventure, was more delightful than words could say. There was not even any one, except the man who had driven him into Penrith, to see him away, he who was generally accompanied to the last minute by precautions, and admonitions, and farewells. To feel himself dart away into the night with nobody to look back to on the platform, no gaze, half smiling, half tearful, to follow him, was of itself an emancipation to Pippo. He was a good boy and no rebel against the double maternal bond which had lain so lightly yet so closely upon him all his life. It was only for a year or two that he had suspected that this was unusual, or even imagined that for a growing man the sway of two ladies, and even their devotion, might make others smile. Perhaps he had been a little more particular in his notions, in his manners, in his fastidious dislike to dirt and careless habits, than was common in the somewhat rough north country school which had so risen in scholastic note under the last head master, but which was very far from the refinements of Eton. And lately it had begun to dawn upon him that a mother and a grandmother to watch over him and care for him in everything might be perhaps a little absurd for a young man of his advanced age. Thus his escapade, which was against the will of his elder guardian, and without the knowledge of his mother—which was entirely his own act, and on his own responsibility, went to Philip’s head, and gave him a sort of intoxication of pleasure. That his mother should be displeased, really displeased, should not want him—incredible thought! never entered into his mind save as an accountable delusion of granny’s. His mother not want him! All the arguments in the world would never have got that into young Pippo’s head.
Mrs. Dennistoun waking up in the middle of the night to think of the boy rushing on through the dark on his adventurous way, recollected only then with much confusion and pain that she ought to have telegraphed to Elinor, who might be so engaged as to make it very embarrassing for her in her strange circumstances to see Pippo—that the boy was coming. In her agitation she had forgotten this precaution. Was it perhaps true, as the young ones thought, that she was getting a little slower in her movements, a little dulled in her thoughts?