The Heart of Una Sackville Part 13

I said, (properly), that Amy was a sn.o.b and an idiot, and that it mattered less than nothing what she thought, but all the time I knew that I should have felt humiliated myself, and Lorna knew it, too, but was not vexed with me for pretending the contrary, for it is only right to set a good example.

"Of course," she said, "one ought to be above such petty trials. If a friends.h.i.+p hangs upon chiffoniers and bead mats, it can't be worth keeping. I have told myself so ever since, but human nature is hard to kill, and I _should_ have liked the house to look nice when Amy called!

I despise myself for it, but I foresee that that room is going to be a continual trial. Its ugliness weighs upon me, and I feel self-conscious and uncomfortable every time my friends come to call, but I am not going to attempt any more changes. I wouldn't make the dear old mother cry again for fifty drawing-rooms!"

I thought it was sweet of her to talk like that, and wanted so badly to find a way out of the difficulty. I always feel there must be a way, and if one only thinks long enough it can generally be found. I sat plunged in thought, and at last the inspiration came.

"Didn't you say this room was your own to do with as you liked?"

"Yes; mother said I could have it for my den. n.o.body uses it now; but, Una, it is hideous, too!"

"But it might be made pretty! It is small, and wouldn't take much furnis.h.i.+ng. You could pick up a few odds and ends from other rooms that would not be missed."

"Oh, yes, mother wouldn't mind that, and the green felting on the floor is quite nice and new; but the paint, and the paper-saffron roses--and gold skriggles--and a light oak door! How could you possibly make anything look artistic against such a background?"

"You couldn't, and it wouldn't be much fun if you could. I've thought of something far more exciting. Lorna, let us paper and paint it ourselves! Let us go to town to-morrow, and choose the very, very most artistic and up-to-date paper that can be bought, and buy some tins of enamel, and turn workmen every morning. Oh, do! I should love it; and you were saying only an hour ago that you did not know how to amuse me in the mornings. If we did the room together you would always a.s.sociate me with it, and I should feel as if it were partly mine, and be able to imagine just where you were sitting. Oh, do, Lorna! It would be such ripping sport!"

She didn't speak for a good half-minute, but just sat staring up in ecstasy of joy.

"You angel!" she cried at last. "You simple duck! How can you think of such lovely plans? Oh, Una, how have I lived without you all these months? Of course, I'll do it. I'd love to! I am never happier than when I am wrapped up in an ap.r.o.n with a brush in my hand. I've enamelled things before now, but never hung a paper. Do you really think we could?"

"Of course! If the British workman can do it, there can't be much skill required, and we with our trained intelligence will soon overcome any difficulty," I said grandiloquently. "All we want is a pot of paste, and a pair of big scissors, and a table to lay the strips of paper on.

I've seen it done scores of times."

"So have I," said Lorna. "And doesn't the paste smell! I expect, what with that and the enamel, we shall have no appet.i.tes left. It will spoil our complexions, too, very likely, and make us pale and sallow, but that doesn't matter."

I thought it mattered a good deal. It was all very well for her, but she wasn't staying with a friend who had an interesting grown-up brother. Even the finest natures can be inconsiderate sometimes.

CHAPTER SIXTEEN.

_September 23rd_.

The next morning we went to a paperhanger's shop and asked to see the very newest and most artistic designs in stock. There were lots of lovely things, but after great discussion we decided on a thick white paper, perfectly plain, except in each corner of the room, where there was a sort of conventional rose tree, growing up about seven feet high, with outstanding branches laden with the most exquisite pink roses. The white of the background was partly tinged with blue, with here and there a soft, irregular blue like a cloud. Looking up suddenly, you might imagine you were in the open air in the midst of a rose garden, and that would be a very pleasant delusion in Onslow Square.

The salesman asked how many pieces he should send, and whether we wished it hung at once. When I said we intended to hang it ourselves, he said--

"Oh, indeed, madam!" and looked unutterable things.

We were so quelled that we did not dare to ask him about the enamel and paste as we intended, but bought those at a modest little shop further on, and went home rejoicing.

Mrs Forbes had laughed and shaken all over in the most jovial manner when we told her of our plans, but she didn't approve of the white paper and paint, because, forsooth, it would get soiled. Of course it would get soiled! Things always do sooner or later. Old people are so dreadfully prudent that they get no pleasure out of life. When this paper is shabby Lorna can get a new one, or she may be married, or dead, or half a dozen different things. It's absurd to plan years ahead. I cheered up poor Lorna, who is of a sensitive nature and easily depressed, and when she recovered asked what she thought we ought to do next.

"The first thing to settle," she said decidedly, "is Midas! He can help us in a dozen ways if he will, for he is really wonderfully handy for a boy of his age. He will do nothing unless we consult him formally, and make a definite business arrangement, but it pleases him and won't hurt us, as it will be only a few coppers. He is saving up for a motor-car at the present moment, and Wallace says that by steady attention to business he really believes he will get one by the time he is sixty."

We called Midas in and consulted him professionally. He is tall and lanky, and has pale blue eyes with long light eyelashes. You would think to look at him that he was a gentle, unworldly creature, addicted to poetry, but he isn't! He sat astride the table and viewed the landscape o'er.

"The first thing will be to take every stick of furniture out of the room, and have the carpet up. I know what girls are when they do jobs of this kind. You will be up to your eyes in paste, and it won't be safe to leave anything within touching distance. The furniture must be removed and stored. I'll store it for you in my room. Then you'll need a ladder, and some planks for the lengths of paper to lie on, while you paste 'em. I'll hire you the old shutter from the drawing-room."

"The shutters are as much mine as yours," said Lorna. "I don't need to hire them; I can have them if I want!"

"That's where you show your ignorance, my dear. They are in my possession, and I won't give them up without compensation. Then you'll need a man to a.s.sist in the hanging!"

"Say a boy at once, and name your price, and be done with it. You are a regular Shylock!"

Midas grinned as if pleased with the compliment, drew a pocket-book and a stubby end of a pencil from his pocket, and began alternately stroking his chin and jotting down words and figures. Lorna grimaced at me behind his back, but kept a stern expression for his benefit. I suppose she knew that if he saw her smile prices would go up. Presently he drew a line, tore the leaf out of the book and handed it across with a bow.

"My estimate, ladies! It is always more satisfactory to have an agreement beforehand."

I peeped over Lorna's shoulder and read--

Estimate For Proposed Renovations.

+==========================================+=+=+ |To Removal of furniture |1|9| +------------------------------------------+-+-+ |Storage of same at rate of 6 pence per day|1|6| +------------------------------------------+-+-+ |Restoration of same |1|9| +------------------------------------------+-+-+ |Impliments |1|0| +------------------------------------------+-+-+ |Man's time |1|3| +------------------------------------------+-+-+ |Sundrys | |6| +------------------------------------------+-+-+ | |7|9| +==========================================+=+=+

It was quite a formidable total, but Lorna was evidently accustomed to extortionate demands, and began beating him down without delay.

"Well, of all the outrageous pieces of impudence! Seven and ninepence, indeed! You must have taken leave of your senses. If you think I am going to pay you four or five s.h.i.+llings for carrying a few odds and ends of furniture along the pa.s.sage, you are mightily mistaken! And we should have to help you, too, for you couldn't manage alone. If we asked Wallace he'd do it at once, without any pay at all."

"Drink to me only with thine eyes!" chanted the little wretch, folding his arms and gazing fixedly at me with a life-like a.s.sumption of Wallace's att.i.tude and expression, which sent Lorna into fits of laughter, and made me magenta with embarra.s.sment. "If you like to wait until Wallace has time to run your errands and see you through your difficulties, you will get your room finished by Christmas--with luck!

I am sorry you think my charges high, but I'm afraid I don't see my way to reduce 'em."

"Midas, don't be a goose! We will pay you twopence an hour for your time, and twopence a day for storage--that's the limit. That disposes of the first four items. As for the rest, we had better understand each other before we go any further. Kindly distinguish between implements and sundries."

"Is this an Oxford local, or is it a conversation between a brother and sister?" Midas demanded, throwing back his head, and mutely appealing to an unseen arbiter in the corner of the ceiling. "If you can't understand a simple thing like that, it doesn't say much for your education. It is easily seen _you_ were never a plumber! I thought we were going to come to a friendly agreement, but you are so close and grasping, there is no dealing with you. Look here, will you give me half-a-crown for the job?"

I gasped with surprise at this sudden and sweeping reduction of terms, but Lorna said calmly--

"Done! A halfpenny discount if paid within the hour!" and they shook hands with mutual satisfaction.

"Cheap at the price!" was Lorna's comment, as the contractor left the room, and before the next few days were over I heartily agreed with this opinion. Midas was an ideal workman, grudging neither time nor pains to accomplish his task in a satisfactory manner. His long arms and strong wrists made light of what would have been heavy tasks for us, and the dirtier he grew the more he enjoyed it. It must be dreadful to live in a town! Lorna a.s.sured me plaintively that the room had been thoroughly spring-cleaned at Easter, but I should have thought it had happened nearer the Flood. I swallowed pecks of dust, and my hands grew raw with was.h.i.+ng before we began to paint. I thought we should never have finished enamelling that room. The first coat made hardly any impression on the background, and we had to go over it again and again before we got anything like a good effect. To a casual observer it looked really very nice, but we knew where to look for shortcomings, and I grew hot whenever anyone looked at a certain panel in the door.

Then we set to work on the paper. First you cut it into lengths. It seems quite easy, but it isn't, because you waste yards making the patterns meet, and then you haven't enough, and you go into town to buy more, and they haven't it in stock, and it has to be ordered, and you sit and champ, and can't get any further.

Then you make the paste. It smells horrid, and do what you will, cover yourself as best you can, it gets up to the eyes! We wore two old holland skirts of Lorna's, quite short and trig, and was.h.i.+ng s.h.i.+rts, and huge print wrappers; but before we had been working for an hour our fingers were glued together; then we yawned or sneezed and put our hands to our faces, and _they_ were stickied. Then bits of hair--"tendrils"

as they call them in books--fell down, and we fastened them up, and our hair got as bad. We were spectacles!

A kettle was kept on the hob, and we were continually bathing our hands in hot water, for, of course, we dared not touch the outside of the paper unless they were quite clean, and the table wanted was.h.i.+ng before each fresh strip was laid down, as the paste had always oozed off the edges of the last piece. There is one thing sure and certain: I shall never take up paper-hanging as a profession.

The hanging itself is really rather exciting. Midas climbed to the top of the ladder and held the top of the strip in position; Lorna crouched beneath, and guided it in the way it should go, so as to meet the edge of the one before, and I stood on a chair and smoothed it down and down with a clean white cloth. Doing it with great care like this, we got no wrinkles at all, and when the first side of the room was finished, it looked so professional that we danced--literally danced--for joy.

By the end of the afternoon it was done, and so were we! Simply so tired we could hardly stand, but mentally we were full of triumph, for that room was a picture to behold. We ran out into the pa.s.sage and brought in everyone we could find, servants and charwoman included.

Then they made remarks, and we stood and listened.

The cook said, "My, Miss Lorna, wouldn't the pattern go round?" The charwoman said, "I like a bit of gilding meself. It looks 'andsome."

The parlourmaid said, "How will the furniture look against it, miss?"

which was really the nastiest hit of all; only the little Tweeny stared and flushed, and rolled her hands in her ap.r.o.n, and said, "All them roses on the wall! It would be like a Bank-'oliday to sit aside 'em!"

Tweeny has the soul of a poet. I bought her some flowers the very next time I went out. Wallace came in and twiddled his moustache, and said--