Edgar Jepson

“ They were in the strongest contrast to one another. Beside the clear golden tan of the Terror and the deeper gipsy-like brown of Erebus the pale face of the princess looked waxen. The blue linen blouse, short serge skirt and bare head and legs of Erebus and the blue linen shirt, serge knickerbockers and bare head and legs of the Terror gave them an air not only of coolness but also of a workmanlike freedom of limb. In her woolen blouse, brown serge jacket and skirt, woolen stockings and heavily-trimmed drooping hat the poor little princess looked a swaddled sweltering doll melting in the heat. ”

“ Dangerfield had lost some of her charm: she was the mother of the Terror. He found, too, that his instinctive distaste for the company of Erebus was not ungrounded. She was a nuisance; she would talk about wet boots; the subject seemed to fascinate her. Then, when at last he recovered his spirits, grew once more humorous, and even rose to the proposing point, there was no getting rid of her. She was impervious to hints; she refused, somewhat pertly, to pause and gather the luscious blackberries. How could a man be his humorous self in these circumstances? ”

“ That cigarette-case! Come on!” cried the Terror; and he led the way swiftly out of the garden and took the path to Little Deeping.
“Where are we going?” said Erebus.
“We’re going to make him that apple-pie bed. There’s nothing like making a beginning. We shall think of heaps of other things. If we don’t worry about them, they’ll occur to us. They always do,” said the Terror, at once practical and philosophical.
They walked briskly down to The Plough, the one inn of Little Deeping, where, as usual, Captain Baster was staying, and went in through the front door which stood open. ”

“ But it’s the home wood—the jolliest part of the estate,” cried the Terror in the liveliest surprise. “And there are two paths straight into it from the gardens.”
“But I stay always in the gardens,” said the princess sedately. “The Baroness Von Aschersleben does not walk mooch; and she will not that I go out of sight of her.”
“But you must get awfully slack, sticking in the gardens all the time,” said Erebus.
“Slack? What is slack?” said the princess.
“She means feeble,” said the Terror. “But all the same those gardens are big enough; there’s plenty of room to run about in them.” ”

“ Wiggins bolted for the door; the keeper grabbed at him and missed; the footman grabbed, and grabbed the interposing Erebus. She slammed the door behind the vanished Wiggins.
Mr. D’Arcy Rosenheimer dashed heavily down the hall with a thick howl. Erebus set her back against the door. He caught her by the left arm to sling her out of the way. It was a silly arm to choose, for she caught him a slap on his truly Pomeranian expanse of cheek with the full swing of her right, a slap that rang through the great hall like the crack of a whip-lash. Mr. D’Arcy Rosenheimer was large but tender. ”

“ And, after all, we shouldn’t mind Sir James when we got used to him.”
“But we should! And look how we stopped the Cruncher!”
“Sir James isn’t like the Cruncher—at all,” said the Terror.
“All stepfathers are alike; and they’re beastly!” cried Erebus.
“Now, it’s no good your getting yourself obstinate about it,” said the Terror firmly. “That won’t be of any use at all, if they’ve made up their minds. But what’s bothering me is what that old cat meant by saying that the Morgans were rovers.”
Erebus’ frown deepened as she knitted her brow over the cryptic utterance of Mrs. Blenkinsop. ”

“ Suppose we taught you some exercises. You could practise them at home; and soon you’d be able to do things when you were with us.”
“What things?” said the princess.
“Oh, you’d be able to run—and jump. Why we might even be able to teach you to climb,” said the Terror with a touch of enthusiasm in his tone as the loftier heights of philanthropy loomed upon his inner vision.
“Oh, that would be nice!” cried the princess. Forthwith the Twins set about teaching her some of the exercises which go to the making of muscle; and the princess was a painstaking pupil. ”

“ That was indeed the practise at Little Deeping. Butter-making was its chief industry; and the skim-milk went to the pigs.
“If it fattens pigs, it will fatten kittens,” said the Terror firmly.
“But how can we get it? They don’t sell it about here,” said Erebus. “And you know what they are: if Granfeytner didn’t sell skim-milk, nobody’s going to sell skim-milk to-day.”
“Oh, yes: old Stubbs will sell it,” said the Terror confidently.
“Old Stubbs! But he hates us worse than any one!” cried Erebus.
“Oh, yes; he doesn’t like us. But he’s awfully keen on money; every one says so. ”

“ But as he counted the postal orders, a faint flush covered his face; and he said in a somewhat breathless tone: “Thirty pounds—well!”
Erebus executed a short but Bacchic dance which she invented on the spur of that marvelous moment.
“It’s splendid—splendid!” she cried. “It’s the best thing you ever thought of!”
The Terror put the postal orders back into the envelope, and put the envelope into the breast pocket of his coat. A frown of the most thoughtful consideration furrowed his brow. Then he said firmly: “The first thing, to do is to get the bicycles. ”

“ If once we’ve got them, no one will take them away from us.”
“Of course they won’t,” said Erebus, with eager acceptance of his idea.
The breakfast-bell rang; and they went into the house, Erebus spurning the earth as she went, in the very manner of Wiggins.
In the middle of breakfast the Terror said in a casual tone and with a casual air, as if he was not greatly eager for the boon: “May we have the cow-house for our very own, Mum?”
“Oh, Terror! Surely you don’t want to keep ferrets!” cried Mrs. Dangerfield, who lived in fear of the Terror’s developing that inevitable boyish taste. ”

“ How old are they?” said Miss Lambart in an incredulous tone, for fixed very firmly in her mind was the belief that the princess had been carried off by the Socialists and foreigners.
“I never know whether they are thirteen or fourteen. But I do know that nothing out of the common happens in the Deepings without their having a hand in it. I have the honor to be their uncle,” said Sir Maurice.
“But they’d never be able to persuade her to run away with them. She’s a timid child; and she has been coddled and cosseted all her life till she is delicate to fragility,” Miss Lambart protested. ”

“ Miss Hendersyde thought of the Terror’s face, his charming sympathetic manners, and his darned knickerbockers. It was only right that some of Lady Ryehampton’s money should go to him; indeed that money ought to be educating him at a good school. It was monstrous that the great bulk of it should be spent on cats; cats were all very well but human beings came first. And the Terror was such an attractive human being. ”

“ Then the Twins and Wiggins rose and retired firmly into the garden.
They came out into the calm autumn evening with their souls seething.
“He’s a pig—and a beast! We can’t let Mum marry him! We must stop it!” cried Erebus.
“It’s all very well to say ‘must.’ But you know what Mum is: if she thinks a thing is for our good, do it she will,” said the Terror gloomily. ”

“ Having thus abated their hostility, Sir James spared no pains to win their good will. He gave the Terror a rook-rifle and Erebus boxes of chocolate. If he chanced on them when motoring in the afternoon he would carry them off, bicycles and all, in his car and regale them with sumptuous teas at the Grange; and at Colet House he entertained them with stories of the African forest which thrilled Mrs. Dangerfield even more than they thrilled them. ”

“ But come on: we’ve got to make a cats’ home at once!” And he picked up one of the plaintive baskets with the air of a man desperately resolved to act on the instant or perish.
“But we’ve got a cats’ home—only it’s full of kittens,” said Erebus gently.
“Good heavens! Do you mean to say I’ve gone through this nightmare for nothing?” cried Sir Maurice, dropping the basket.
“Oh, no; it was awfully good of you!” said the Terror with swift politeness. “The cats will come in awfully useful.”
“They’ll make the home look so much more natural. All kittens isn’t natural,” said Erebus. ”

“ You’re the princess; and other people ought to do what you tell them; and no old baroness should make you do any silly thing you don’t want to. She wouldn’t me,” said Erebus with even greater conviction than the Terror had shown.
“I don’t think she would,” said the princess with a faint sigh; and she looked at Erebus with envious eyes. “But when she starts making a fuss and gets so red and excited, she—she—rather frightens me.” ”

“ He felt that his humor was growing strained, losing its delightful lightness.
Then the accident: it was entirely Erebus’ own fault (he could swear it) that he tripped over her foot and pitched among those infernal brambles. Her howls of anguish were all humbug: he had not hurt her ankle (he could swear it) ; there was not a tear. The moment he offered, furiously, to carry her, she walked without a vestige of a limp.
Mrs. Dangerfield had no right to look vexed with him; if one brought up one’s children like that—well. Certainly she was losing her charm; she was the mother of Erebus also. ”

“ I didn’t,” said Wiggins.
The active life persisted throughout that day and the days that followed. It kept the princess always beside the Terror. Always he was using his greater strength to help her lead it at the required speed. Never in the history of the courts of Europe has a princess been so hauled, shoved, dragged, jerked, towed and lugged over rough ground. On the second morning she awoke so stiff that she could hardly move; but by the fifth evening she could give forth an ear-piercing yell that would have done credit to Erebus herself. ”

“ Erebus broke in quickly. “We should never have thought of letting him into anything so dangerous! He’s so young!”
“I shall be eleven in a fortnight!” said Wiggins with some heat.
“You see, we wanted a fur stole at Barker’s in Rowington for a Christmas present for mother; and pheasants were the only way we could think of getting it,” said Erebus in a confidential tone.
“Light! Light at last!” cried Mr. Carrington; and he laughed gently. “Well, every one has been assaulted except the poacher; exquisitely Pomeranian! ”

“ They were not hungry, far from it, at the moment; but half-way home the Terror turned out of the main road into the lanes, and they paused at a quiet orchard, in a lovely unguarded spot, and filled the cat-basket on Erebus’ bicycle with excellent apples. The tools had been packed into the Terror’s basket. They did not disturb the farmer’s wife at the busy dinner-hour; the Terror threw the apples over the orchard hedge to Erebus.
As he remembered his bicycle he said dreamily: “I shouldn’t wonder if these bicycles didn’t pay for themselves in time.” ”

“ It was therefore a bitter blow to Erebus to find that she was not only engaged to their Uncle Maurice but also about to be married to him in the course of the next few weeks. She grumbled about it to the Terror and did not hesitate to assert that his bad example in the matter of the princess had put the idea of love-making into these older heads. Then, in a heart to heart talk, she strove earnestly with Miss Lambart, making every effort to convince her that love and marriage were very silly things, quite unworthy of those who led the strenuous life. She failed. ”

“ The Twins puckered their brows as they cudgeled their brains for a pretext for an honest row.
Presently the Terror said: “Why don’t you make them let you have some one to play with? It’s silly being as dull as you are. What’s the good of being a princess, if you haven’t any friends?”
“Oh, yes!” cried the princess; and her cheeks flushed, and her eyes sparkled. “It would be nice! You and Erebus could come to tea with me and sooper and loonch often and again!” ”

“ Lady Ryehampton uttered a short snort; and her eyes flashed.
“Do you mean to tell me that your Uncle Maurice is fond enough of cats to bring them all the way from London to a cats’ home at Deeping? He hates cats, and always has!” she said fiercely.
“Of course, I hate cats,” said Sir Maurice with cold severity. “But I hate children’s being brought up to be careless a great deal more. A cats’ home is not a cats’ home unless it has cats in it; and you’ve been encouraging these children to grow up careless by calling a kittens’ home a cats’ home. ”

“ So young, but already enthusiastic about great things!”
Miss Hendersyde looked at her employer patiently; she foresaw that she was going to have to struggle with her to save her from being once more victimized. She had come to suspect anything that stirred Lady Ryehampton to a noble phrase. Her eyes brightened with humorous appreciation as she read the letter of Erebus; and when she came to the end of it she opened her mouth to point out that Little Deeping was one of the last places in England to need a cats’ home. ”

“ Erebus, on the other hand, infected by Ellen’s pessimism, rode in a gloomy depression.
Presently her face brightened; and with an air of inspiration she said: “I tell you what: even if we don’t sell those kittens, we can always buy the stole. There’s all that cats’ home money in the bank. We can take as much of it as we want, and pay it back by degrees.”
“No, we can’t,” said the Terror firmly. “We’re not going to use that money for anything but the cats’ home. I promised Mum I wouldn’t. Besides, she’d like the stole ever so much better if we’d really earned it ourselves.” ”

“ They could easily have put slates in the place of the sheet of lead we took,” said the Terror with equal bitterness.
“Why can’t they leave us alone? It quite spoils the country not to have catapults,” said Erebus, gazing with mournful eyes on the rich autumn scene through which they moved.
The Twins had several grievances against their elders; but the loss of their catapults was the bitterest. They had used those weapons to enrich the simple diet which was all their mother’s slender means allowed them; on fortunate days they had enriched it in defiance of the game laws. ”