Ethel Turner

“ The great solemn place is not a quarter full; the air hangs chill and strange; the light is dim in the far-away aisles and pews, but near the altar gas is burning.
When the great organ rolls vibratingly through all the place, and the far-off voices of the choristers rise to the huge domed roof and die away, Phyl and Dolly grip each other’s hands very tightly, their throats swell, and they badly want to cry; though why they have no idea. ”

“ A WINTER SUNDAY On Sunday evenings it had always been the custom for the little girls to gather round their mother, and talk of their funny little plans, tell of their past week’s naughtinesses, make high resolutions with earnest eyes for future weeks, and generally disburden themselves. Of late the time had been very precious to both mother and children, for all week-days had been so brimmed with work, the mother had scarcely any time to pause to watch the wings of their young souls develop, and prune them, and pluck out the dark feathers that creep in so readily. ”

“ No light burned in any of the rooms, but through the windows, where the blinds were up, a woe-begone struggling moon shone palely.
The big bedroom at the front of the house was empty, and the moonbeams lay quiet on the smooth white counterpane of the canopied bed. Even in so faint a light it was plain to see the room was unused; the chairs and sofa held no heaps of flung-off clothes, the dressing-table appointments were in the most precise order, the chill air lay over everything, unbroken by the regular fall and rise of human breath. ”

“ The little girls’ faces fall greatly when the harassed-looking woman appears with a tray that contains nothing more than a dish of rather burnt-looking chops, and a plate loaded with potatoes. But they brighten when the mother requests that instead of one large one, four little tea-pots shall be brought, so that each may pour out for herself.
For pudding, they have hastily stewed prunes, a box of figs, plenty of bread-and-butter, and strawberry-jam. And so hungry has the chill air made them, they are surprised to find they have greatly enjoyed their Christmas dinner. ”

“ She would lie and blink at the patch of light made on the ceiling by Dolly’s wash-stand candle, her throat swelling with self-pity. She saw a picture of herself growing daily thinner and thinner, her cheeks white, the eyes unnaturally large and bright. Yet all the family went on with its own occupations, too engrossed to notice her failing strength. And one by one her duties would be given up, meal after meal and only her vacant chair would be at the table. ”

“ The girls had become acquainted with a woman journalist, a clever, really excellent woman, but one entirely devoid of any personal vanity. Ted said he was convinced she only did her hair once a month, used her hat for a pillow, and fashioned her dresses out of old bagging. Phyl and Dolly, full of admiration for her powers, suddenly felt themselves conceited little butterflies to be so fond of pretty, fresh muslins and chiffon daintinesses and well-fitting shoes and gloves. They began to think it necessary to live up to their profession, and hence that careless collar and unchanged frock. ”

“ Yet the cottage was the daintiest of places, for the mother would not let the memory of an ugly home lie on their minds, when the little girls grew older.
The sitting-room had unlined weatherboard walls, varnished however to a warm brown seemliness. White matting was on the floor, white soft curtains blew about the ever open window, round which, in early summer, wisteria hung heavy with sweetness. There were only two chairs, but who minded that when there was a comfortable sofa, made soft and inviting with cushions of delicate flowered chintz, and chintz-covered box seats for the small ones? ”

“ Their mother, of course, would strive to earn a livelihood by singing in the snowy London streets, Weenie in her arms, themselves beside her trying to sell bunches of violets or watercress, or even shoelaces. Sometimes the passers-by would put pennies into their mother’s hand, or buy their own wares, but sometimes no one would take any notice of them at all, and they would go home at length to a dark, damp cellar, and divide a crust of bread amongst them, and sleep on the old floor beneath sacks. ”

“ At this point in the pleasing prospect Weenie used to cry dismally, and their own eyes would fill with tears of self-pity.
They would pursue it a little further, however; their clothes would grow more and more ragged, and the wind would whistle through them, and chill them to the bone; they would all be barefoot, their boots having worn out and their stockings gone long since; and they would all have such hacking coughs that the passers-by, hurrying away to their rich, luxurious homes, would occasionally fling them a glance of pity. ”

“ Saturday afternoon, after they returned to Sydney, always found the little girls on some beach—Manly, Bondi, Coogee, or Bronté,—for it seemed a delightful thing to them that the seaside was to be reached at any time by a tram or boat ride, instead of waiting a whole year for three or four weeks of it as had been their English habit.
And lying on the beach Dolly could pursue her shell stories in the loveliest fashion, the best of materials to hand, and no fear of laughing detection. ”

“ And yet none of these things quite killed the romance for them. Phyl even stood still one dreadful half-second.
“This really ought to have been part of their adventure; we oughtn’t to rescue them so soon,” she said gloomily, “it would have been an experience.”
But Dolly’s heart was bleeding, and she dragged on so determinedly that the other half of the quilt was forced to follow.
“Oh,” she said in a most poignant tone of grief, “they can’t go on having expewiences when it’s snowing, Phyl.”
Where the cabbages ended a row of rhubarb-plants divided the vegetables from the gooseberry-bushes. ”

“ Life would have been insupportable if they never “pretended,” and played nothing more [135] uneventful than “Chasings” and “Hide-and-seek” and “Hunt the Slipper.” So they shrank together—even, in these matters, from their mother, who had been so busy that last year or two she could not follow them up to their absurd heights. In all the other joys and griefs of their lives they went direct to her; but in the whispering and pretending there was Phyl for Dolly and Dolly for Phyl, and the doors locked firmly on the world. ”

“ Dorothy was summoning a fresh argument, but Phyl’s tender thoughts fled out into the snow.
“Think how they’ll be shivering!” she said. “Come on, Dolly.”
They dragged the eider-down quilt off the bed, doubled it, and wrapped it round the shoulders of both of them, for they were quite alive to the cold. Then they stumbled off softly and awkwardly, thus pinioned together, along the passage, down the dark, still stairs, and to the side-door in the hall. ”

“ In the dining-room nobody spoke for a long time. Dolly went to the window and stood looking out at the willow-trees and grass; and once she broke the silence by laughing in a queer little way, for Jingo was on the path engaged in tearing an old sock to bits, and once he tossed it up in the air and tried to catch it on his nose in the way Alf taught him to catch lumps of sugar. Richie went to Dolly’s side to look also, and they put their arms round each other for comfort as they stood waiting. Phyl presently picked up the geography-book. ”

“ Brown waves of hair strayed on the pillow, brown eyelashes lay motionless on cheeks where the lifeless tinge of grief knew itself for stranger, and was slowly giving way once more to the healthy life-colour that loved to dwell there. The contour of the face was at once grave and childish; an irresponsible flower-life of happiness would have accentuated certain lines about the nostrils and mouth into a look of spirited wilfulness, but the hard climbing of hills had been given to her instead, and the mouth at eight-and-twenty was wholesomely self-reliant. ”

“ She slipped away, away; there came a week when the little boys trod softly about the house, and looked at her with round awed eyes, and never answered a word back when she fretted at them as usual for their noise, their muddy boots, their quarrellings.
What was the strange thing their father had told them that morning? Their mother dying, dying fast. And yet how strange!—she still lay on the old sofa in the dining-room, and only that very morning [166] had sewn up the buttonhole of little Alf’s braces, and stitched the torn brim of Teddie’s hat. ”

“ The mother sat down on a packing-case, struggled to smile and say something cheerful, but found it impossible and burst into tears instead, and the three tired, dispirited little girls joined in heartily.
“Whatever’s up with them?” said Teddie, uneasily.
“They’re in black,” whispered Clif, “some one’s dead.”
“Come, Phyl, come, Dolly, this will never do,” said the mother, drying her eyes after a little time, “we must make the best of it, little daughters, and first of all we must get something to eat or we shall all be ill.” ”

“ Mrs. Conway contended, day after day, with the problem. If she were rich she could fly off with her darling at the approach of winter to Southern France or the warm slopes of Italy.
But how could a widow, almost destitute, contend against so fierce and relentless a foe as the English climate?
When all business affairs had been wound up and all legalities finished with, she found there remained to her nothing in the world but the four hundred pounds left of Phyl’s and Dolly’s little fortune. ”

“ When the tea-bell rang Dorothy picked Jennie up from the salt mine in which she had taken refuge for an hour.
“Let’s ask if we may have waspberry jam for tea, Phyl,” she said, tucking her heroine under her arm.
But Phyl’s eyes still held the fire and glory of the struggle.
“I’ll tell you,” she said; “let’s leave them here on this mountain till bedtime—they never get any real adventures; Grace and Joan didn’t go in and sit by the nursery fire as soon as the tea-bell went.”
“O-oh,” said Dolly, clasping her dear one jealously. ”

“ Conway and the children muffle up to their eyes. All that can be seen of Phyl are two excited blue eyes and the curl or two that peep from under the seal-cap.
Outside there is no snow, only a black drift here and there. A heavy yellow fog obscures everything. Once Weenie strays, and is quite lost for the space of three minutes, during which the greatest excitement and anxiety prevail; finally she is found again, weeping bitterly, not six feet away. After that they all hold each other carefully and walk four abreast, not a difficult thing, for most of the world is cosily indoors to-day. ”

“ There was the time for instance that Phyl and Dolly had written a play which they had acted among themselves with much success. The doctor was much amused one day while rehearsals were still going on to come across Weenie sitting in the summer-house, biting her pen very hard.
“No, I protest,” he said; “look here, two authoresses are enough in the family. For Heaven’s sake don’t you catch the disease.”
“I don’t see why they should be the only ones to write,” Weenie said; “it’s ever so easy; I’m always going to do it.” ”

“ Weenie, the essay on her mind, wished she had let well alone.
“You help, will you, Clif?” she said.
“Not I,” said Clif, “I told you, you were a little sneak.”
Weenie’s young, brown face flamed with sudden passion.
“It’s always the way,” she said, “you’re always against me, all of you—if it had been Dolly or Phyl—mother’s the same, and doctor—t-t-think I don’t n-n-notice, don’t you?”
She flung away out of the room and went rushing blindly down the orchard before the boys, startled at the suddenness of her outbreak, could speak. ”

“ But as a rule the sight of Dolly’s flushed cheeks and bent head used to act as an irritant upon her, and she would insist upon a passage being made for her.
“This is my room as much as yours,” she would say, “it’s not right for any one to block it up. I never do.”
“But there’s nowhere else to sit,” poor Dolly would say.
“Write your silly things on the dressing-table, then,” Miss Weenie would suggest.
Dolly could not explain to her how it was growing impossible for her to write well anywhere except on that ancient wash-stand. ”

“ She sprang across to the stones and laid her down recklessly. Phyl placed Joan in an equally exposed position, and then with determined faces but anxious hearts they ran in to tea, and left the heroines to struggle on across Russia in the dark.
When bedtime came Dolly was ready to slip out and bring them in after the long three hours.
But Phyl’s eyes were full of exultation, and drew her sister away from Weenie, who tried thirstily to hear the whisper.
“Let’s let it be a really truly adventure this time,” she said; “let’s let them go on struggling there till morning.” ”

“ Phyl leaned back and gave her mother an impulsive kiss. “What a patient little woman it is!” she said; “sometimes, Clif, when all of you are away she has a dreadful time of it. I know she is often dying to tell us something, but when she sees we are writing she bottles it all up and tip-toes away again.” ”

“ Phyl glanced at him and laughed.
“You must be dreadfully hungry,” she said; “one can generally take it for granted that your hands are crying out for the scrubbing-brush. I believe, Freddie, before they let you into heaven the archangel who keeps the keys will say in a hollow voice, ‘Ferederick James Allison Wise, go back and wash your hands.’”
Freddie smiled rather nervously at the pleasantry and watched his sister uncertainly. ”

“ Rose-Red, with a blissful smile on her face, was in the midst of a conversation with the Prince when the steaming linseed poultice came to interrupt.
“You must keep your arms under the blankets,” the mother said, tucking the clothes well in.
“Oh, mother!” was Phyl’s dismayed answer.
“Wouldn’t it do if you tied some flannel round each arm?” said Dolly anxiously.—How was a fairy to “float” and be “wafted airily,” or to “rustle musically,” with her arms smothered in bed-clothes? ”

“ Mrs. Conway was much startled, though she knew of the strange little bursts of anger that sometimes possessed her second small daughter.
“Oh, Dolly,” she said in a grieving voice, “that a word like that should come from the lips of one of my little girls!”
Dorothy in her turn was horrified.
“Oh,” she said, “I didn’t weally say it with my tongue, mama—Ha’yat didn’t hear at all; I said it down in my thwoat.”
“That is nearly as bad,” said the mother, and called upon the young person to account for such a word rising even to her throat. ”

“ Phyl coloured again under the quiet scrutiny. “Well, really, mother, it’s all very well for girls who have nothing else to do to make themselves look nice,” she said, “but it is too much waste of time when one has work to do.”
Then Clif laughed out—a great roar of laughter. “Don’t you see what it is, Mater,” he said; “it’s the trail of Miss Phillipson. These little donkeys think because they too waste good ink, they ought to look slovenly, and pitchfork their clothes on them like that sweet creature does.” ”

“ Bright and all those people came it was read.”
“But the other will,” said Dolly, “the one that was made before, leaving lots of money to you.”
“My little sweethearts,” said the mother wearily, “what is it you mean? I can’t understand you in the least.”
Phyl made an effort to be intelligible. “We thought,” she said, “if we found another will that we needn’t be poor at all. People often hide them in strange places, behind wainscotching and secret panels and things, or in the loose covers of books. ”

“ Dolly and Phyl had been among the laughers—she directed her anger against them.
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“All right,” she said, “just you wait. I’ll get your diaries and let the boys laugh at them. I’m sure you put far sillier things in yours.”
“I haven’t a single doubt of it,” said Clif.
“Well, laugh at them,” said Weenie; “every one laughs at me, ’tisn’t fair.”
One evening she came bursting into the dining-room where the boys were with a closely-written diary page in her hand.
“Said I’d get it,” she screamed triumphantly; “such fun; just listen, boys.” ”