About Peggy Saville Part 8

The idea of Shylock as a blonde was too ridiculous to be tolerated.

False hair was not to be bought in a small village, and Maxwell's youthful face boasted as yet only the faintest shadow of a moustache.

The question was left over for consideration, and an inspiration came the same afternoon, when Robert hurled one of the roller-like cus.h.i.+ons of the sofa at Oswald's head, and Oswald, in catching it, tore loose a portion of the covering.

"Now you've done it!" he cried. "The room will be covered with feathers, and then you will say it was my fault! We shall have to fasten the stupid thing up somehow or other!" He peered through the opening as he spoke, and his face changed. "It's not feathers--it's horsehair! Here's a find! What about that wig for Shylock?"

Esther was dubious.

"It would take a great deal of horsehair to make a wig. It would spoil the cus.h.i.+on if the horsehair were taken away; it would spoil the sofa if the cus.h.i.+on were small; it would spoil the room if the sofa--"

Peggy interrupted with a shriek of laughter. "Oh, oh, oh! It's like the 'House that Jack built'! How long do you intend to go on like that?

Nonsense, my dear! It would be perfectly easy to take out what we want, and put it back afterwards. I'll promise to do it myself and sew it up tightly, though, if you desire my opinion, I think the cus.h.i.+on would be improved by letting in a little air. You might as well lean your head on a brick. Max, you are a made man! You shall have a beautiful, crinkly black wig, and a beard to match! We will sew them to your turban, and fasten them with black elastic. It will never show, and I'll finish off the joins after you are dressed. You'll see?"

"You can do as you like! I'm in your hands!" said Max easily; and when the night of the reading arrived, and he was attired in wig and gown, Peggy seated him in a chair and tucked a towel under his chin with an air of business. She had a number of small accessories on a table near at hand, and Max was first instructed to stick pieces of black plaster over alternate teeth, so that he might appear to possess only a few isolated fangs, and then made to lie back in his chair, while his dresser stood over him with a glue-brush in one hand and a bunch of loose horsehair in the other.

"Shut your eyes!" she cried loudly. And before he could say "Jack Robinson" a tuft of the wiry stuff covered his eyebrow. "Keep your face still!" And, to his horror, the gum was daubed from the borders of the beard, halfway up to his eyes, and little p.r.i.c.kly ends of hair were held in Peggy's palm and pressed against his cheeks until they were firmly attached.

This, indeed, was more than he had bargained for! He jerked back his head, and began a loud-voiced protest, only to be interrupted by shrieks of excitement.

"Oh, oh, oh! It's beautiful--beautiful! What a fright! What a delicious fright! No one would know you! You look an old hairy monster who would gobble up half a dozen Christians. Do look at yourself!"

Peggy felt the pride of an artist in the result of her efforts, and Max was hardly less delighted than herself as he stood before the gla.s.s, gazing at his hairy cheeks and leering horribly, to admire his toothless gums. If the result were so hideous as to astonish even those who had watched the process of his make-up, what wonder that the effect upon Shylock's fond parents was of a stupefying nature!

Horror kept Mrs Asplin silent until the middle of the scene between Shylock and Antonio when the bond is signed, and then her agitation could no longer be controlled, and Shylock's little speeches were interrupted by entreaties to take that horrid stuff off his teeth, to use plenty of hot water in was.h.i.+ng his face, and to be sure to anoint it plentifully with cold cream after doing so.

An ordinary lad would have lost his temper at these interruptions; but Max adored his mother, and could never take anything she did in a wrong spirit. Anger being therefore impossible, the only other resource was to laugh, which, in Peggy's opinion, was even worse than the former. A Shylock who chuckled between his speeches, and gave a good-humoured "Ha!

ha!" just before uttering his bitterest invective, was a ridiculous parody of the character, with whom it would be impossible to act. It would be hard indeed if all her carefully rehea.r.s.ed speeches lost their effect, and the famous trial scene were made into a farce through these untimely interruptions!

The second part of the play went more smoothly, however, as the audience settled down to a more attentive hearing, and the actors became less self-conscious and embarra.s.sed. If four out of the six were sticks, who never for a moment approached the verge of the natural, Portia and Shylock did n.o.bly, and, when the reading was over and the young people gathered round the fire in the drawing-room, it was unanimously agreed that they had acquired a more intimate knowledge of the play by this one evening's representation than by weeks of ordinary study.

"I feel so much more intimate with it!" said Esther. "It seems to have made it alive, instead of just something I have read in a book. It was a delightful thought, father, and I am grateful to you for proposing it.

I wish I could do all my lessons in the same way."

"I've not enjoyed myself so much for ages. You just did beautifully, all of you, and the dresses were a sight to behold. As for Peggy, she's a witch, and could make up costumes on a desert island, if she were put to it! But I don't know what is going to happen to my poor, dear boy's face. Oswald, what is he doing? Isn't he coming to have some lemonade and cake?" asked Mrs Asplin anxiously. And Oswald chuckled in a heartless fas.h.i.+on.

"Pride must abide. He would be Shylock, whether we liked it or not, so let him take the consequences. He is fighting it out with cold cream in the bathroom, and some of the horsehair sticks like fun. I'll go up and tell him we have eaten all the cake. He was getting savage when I came down, and it will sweeten his temper!"

CHAPTER TWELVE.

PEGGY IN TROUBLE.

As Peggy sat writing in the study one afternoon, a s.h.a.ggy head came peering round the door, and Robert's voice said eagerly--"Mariquita! A word in your ear! Could you come out and take a turn round the garden for half an hour before tea, or are you too busy?"

"Not at all. I am entirely at your disposal," said Peggy elegantly; and the young people made their way to the cloak-room, swung on coats and sailor hats, and sallied out into the fresh autumn air.

"Mariquita," said Robert then, using once more the name by which he chose to address Peggy in their confidential confabs, "Mariquita, I am in difficulties! There is a microscope advertised in _Science_ this week, that is the very thing I have been pining for for the last six years. I must _get_ it, or die; but the question is--_how_? You see before you a penniless man." He looked at Peggy as he spoke, and met her small, demure smile.

"My dear and honourable sir--"

"Yes, yes, I know; drop that, Mariquita! Don't take for granted, like Mellicent, that because a man has a t.i.tle he must necessarily be a millionaire. Everything is comparative! My father is rich compared to the vicar, but he is really hard-up for a man in his position. He gets almost no rent for his land nowadays, and I am the third son. I haven't as much pocket-money in a month as Oswald gets through in a week. Now that microscope costs twenty pounds, and if I were to ask the governor for it, he wouldn't give it to me, but he would sigh and look wretched at being obliged to refuse. He's a kind-hearted fellow, you know, who doesn't like to say 'No,' and I hate to worry him. Still--that microscope! I must have it. By hook or by crook, I must have it. I've set my mind on that."

"I'm sure I hope you will, though for my part you must not expect me to look through it. I like things to be pretty, and when you see them through a microscope they generally look hideous. I saw my own hand once--ugh!" Peggy shuddered. "Twenty pounds! Well, I can only say that my whole worldly wealth is at your disposal. Draw on me for anything you like--up to seven-and-six! That's all the money I have till the beginning of the month."

"Thanks!--I didn't intend to borrow; I have a better idea than that. I was reading a magazine the other day, and came upon a list of prize compet.i.tions. The first prize offered was thirty pounds, and I'm going to win that prize! The microscope costs only twenty pounds, but the extra ten would come in usefully for--I'll tell you about that later on!

The _Piccadilly Magazine_ is very respectable and all that sort of thing; but the governor is one of the good, old-fas.h.i.+oned, conservative fellows, who would be horrified if he saw my name figuring in it. I'm bound to consider his feelings, but all the same I'm going to win that prize. It says in the rules--I've read them through carefully--that you can ask your friends to help you, so that there would be nothing unfair about going into partners.h.i.+p with someone else. What I was going to suggest was that you and I should collaborate. I'd rather work with you than with any of the others, and I think we could manage it rather well between us. Our contribution should be sent in in your name; that is to say, if you wouldn't object to seeing yourself in print."

"I should love it. I'm proud of my name; and it would be a new sensation." But Peggy spoke in absent-minded fas.h.i.+on, as if her thoughts were running on another subject. Rob had used a word which was unfamiliar in her ears, a big word, a word with a delightful intellectual roll, and she had not the remotest idea of its meaning.

Collaborate! Beautiful! Not for worlds would she confess her ignorance, yet the opportunity could not be thrown away. She must secure the treasure, and add it to her mental store. She put her head on one side, and said pensively--

"I shall be most happy to er--er--In what other words can I express 'collaborate,' Rob? I object to repet.i.tion?"

"Go s.h.a.gs!" returned Robert briefly. "I would do the biggest part of the work, of course--that's only fair, because I want two-thirds of the money--but you could do what you liked, and have ten pounds for your share. Ten pounds would come in very usefully for Christmas."

"Rather! I'd get mother and father lovely presents, and Mrs Asplin too; and buy books for Esther, and a little gold ring for Mellicent-- it's her idea of happiness to have a gold ring. I'll help you with pleasure, Rob, and I'm sure we shall get the prize. What have we to do?

Compose some poetry?"

"Goodness, no! Fancy me making up poetry! It's to make up a calendar.

There are subjects given for each month--sorrow, love, obedience, resignation--that sort of thing, and you have to give a quotation for each day. It will take some time, but we ought to stand a good chance.

You are fond of reading, and know no end of poetry, and where I have a pull is in knowing French and German _so_ well. I can give them some fine translations from the Latin and Greek too, for the matter of that, and put the authors' names underneath. That will impress the judges, and make 'em decide in our favour. I've been working at it only three days, and I've got over fifty quotations already. We must keep note-books in our pockets, and jot down any ideas that occur to us during the day, and go over them together at night. You will know a lot, I'm sure."

"'Sorrow and silence are strong, and patient endurance is G.o.dlike, Therefore accomplish thy labour of love, till the heart is made G.o.dlike.'"

quoted Peggy with an air; and Rob nodded approval.

"That's it! That's the style! Something with a bit of a sermon in it to keep 'em up to the mark for the day. Bravo, Mariquita! you'll do it splendidly. That's settled, then. We shall have to work hard, for there is only a month before it must be sent off, and we must finish in good time. When you leave things to the last, something is bound to come in the way. It will take an age to write out three hundred and sixty-five extracts."

"It will indeed, for they must be very nicely done," said Peggy fastidiously. "Of course it is most important that the extracts themselves should be good, but it matters almost as much that they should look neat and attractive. Appearances go such a long way." And when Robert demurred, and stated his opinion that the judges would not trouble their heads about looks, she stuck firmly to her point.

"Oh, won't they, though! Just imagine how you would feel if you were in their position, and had to look over scores of ugly, uninteresting ma.n.u.scripts. You would be bored to death, and, after plodding conscientiously through a few dozen, you would get so mixed up that you would hardly be able to distinguish one from another. Then suddenly-- suddenly,"--Peggy clasped her hands with one of her favourite dramatic gestures--"you would see before you a dainty little volume, prettily written, easy to read, easy to hold, nice to look at, and do you mean to say that your heart wouldn't give a jump, and that you would not take a fancy to the writer from that very moment? Of course you would; and so, if you please, I am going to look after the decorative department, and see what can be done. I must give my mind to it--Oh! I'll tell you what would be just the thing. When I was in the library one day lately I saw some sweet little note-books with pale green leaves and gilt edges. I'll count the pages, and buy enough to make up three hundred and sixty-five, and twelve extra, so as to put one plain sheet between each month. Then we must have a cover. Two pieces of cardboard would do, with gilt edges, and a motto in Old English letters--'_The months in circling-orbit fly_.' Have I read that somewhere, or did I make it up?

It sounds very well. Well, what next?" Peggy was growing quite excited, and the restless hands were waving about at a great rate. "Oh, the pages! We shall have to put the date at the top of each. I could do that in gold ink, and make a pretty little skriggle-- er--'_arabesque_' I should say, underneath, to give it a finish. Then I'd hand them on to you to write the extracts in your tiny little writing. Rob, it will be splendid! Do you really think we shall get the prize?"

"I _mean_ to get it! We have a good library here, and plenty of time, if we like to use it. I'm going to get up at six every morning. I shan't fail for want of trying, and if I miss this I'll win something else. My mind is made up! I'm going to buy that microscope!" Robert tossed his head and looked ferocious, while Peggy peered in his rugged face, and, womanlike, admired him the more for his determination.

They lingered in the garden discussing details, planning out the work, and arranging as to the different books to be overlooked until the tea hour was pa.s.sed, and Mrs Asplin came to the door and called to them to come in.

"And nothing on your feet but your thin slippers? Oh, you Peggy!" she exclaimed in despair. "Now you will have a cold, and ten to one it will fly to your throat. I shall have to line you a penny every time you cross the doorstep without changing your shoes. Summer is over, remember. You can't be too careful in these raw, damp days. Run upstairs this minute and change your stockings."

Peggy looked meek, and went to her room at once to obey orders; but the mischief was done--she s.h.i.+vered, and could not get warm, her head ached, and her eyes felt heavy. Mrs Asplin looked anxiously at her in the drawing-room after dinner, and finally called her to her side.

"Peggy, come here! Aren't you well? Let me feel your hand. Child, it's like a coal! You are in a fever. Why didn't you tell me at once?"

"Because I--really, it's nothing, Mrs Asplin! Don't be worried. I don't know why I feel so hot. I was s.h.i.+vering only a minute ago."

"Go straight upstairs and take a dose of ammoniated quinine. Turn on the fire in your room. Max! Robert! Oswald! Esther! Mellicent! will everyone please look after Peggy in the future, and see that she does not run out in her slippers!" cried Mrs Asplin in a despairing voice; and Peggy bolted out of the door, in haste to escape before more reproaches could be hurled at her head.

But an alarm of a more serious nature than a threatened cold was to take place before the evening was over. The young people answered briefly, Mrs Asplin turned back to her book, and silence settled down upon the occupants of the drawing-room. It was half-past eight, the servants had carried away the dinner things, and were enjoying their evening's rest in the kitchen. The vicar was nodding in his easy-chair, the house was so quiet that the tick of the old grandfather clock in the hall could be heard through the half-opened door. Then suddenly came the sound of flying footsteps, the door burst open, and in rushed Peggy once more,-- but such a Peggy, such an apparition of fear, suffering, and terror as brought a cry of consternation from every lip. Her eyes were starting from her head, her face was contorted in spasmodic gaspings for breath, her arms sawed the air like the sails of a windmill, and she flew round and round the room in a wild, unheeding rush.