India tour of West

India tour of West CHAPTER XXVII. "I am glad you are all pleased," says Lady Rodney, in a peculiar tone; and then the gong sounds, and they all rise, as Geoffrey and Mona once more make their appearance. Sir Nicholas gives his arm to Mona, and so begins her first evening at the Towers.,"Now you've done it!" cried Judith in distress. "She knows all about it, and I meant it for a surprise! Oh dear!",“Shall we say our prayers?” asked Tellef.,As the first of September drew near, Johnny Blossom could scarcely sit still a minute, he was so full of joy. He asked if he might not go around and invite the guests himself, it would be so jolly.,"He shall wait upon you at the stroke, sir."，Mother sat alone on the veranda. How good that she was alone! John sat down on the steps, all doubled together, and said not a word.，"Leave it to me," said the Frog. "I will soon get you some." Whereupon the Frog rubbed herself over with sugar, and more than six thousand of her frog friends did likewise; then they repaired to a place where the fairy kept a large store of flies, for the purpose of tormenting some of her unhappy victims. As soon as they smelt the sugar, they flew to it, and stuck to the frogs, and these kind helpers returned at a gallop to the Queen. There had never been such a fly-catching before, nor a better pasty, than that the Queen made for the fairy. The latter was greatly surprised when the Queen handed it to her, and could not imagine how she had been clever enough to catch the flies.，"But why not to-night?" asks her Grace, who has noticed with curiosity the girl's refusal to dance with a lanky young man in a hussar uniform, who had evidently made it the business of the evening to get introduced to her. Indeed, for an hour he had been feasting his eyes upon her fresh young beauty, and, having gone to infinite trouble to get presented to her, had been rewarded for his trouble by a little friendly smile, a shake of the head, and a distinct but kindly refusal to join in the mazy dance.By two o’clock one bright afternoon in May the school children found it hard to keep their minds concentrated on their lessons. But when their teacher said, “Now, Moses, will you pass the singing books,” a wave of awakened interest perceptibly cleared the atmosphere. Moses promptly proceeded to distribute the geography textbooks.

He seemed to know the handwriting on the envelope, and there was a frown upon his face as he broke the big seal. He read it where he stood. It was a letter from a Captain Rousby informing him that he owed him the sum of one hundred guineas, that this money as a debt of honour had been payable immediately on proof of the loss of the wager, but that so far from having received it, Captain Rousby had been waiting for nine months without obtaining further satisfaction than the now wearisome and well-worn excuse that Mr Lawrence could not immediately pay, that he was expecting to obtain employment in the course of the month which would enable him to discharge this debt with interest if Captain Rousby thought proper. The Captain informed Mr Lawrence that last week Mrs Rousby had presented him with twins, a catastrophe which greatly increased his expenses at a time when he was without employment, and when money was never more urgently needed. Captain Rousby then went on to inform[Pg 123] Mr Lawrence that if a portion of this debt, say twenty-five guineas, was not sent to him by the first of June, it would be his unpleasant duty to visit Old Harbour Town, call upon Sir William Lawrence and state the facts of the case to him as an officer and a gentleman. If he could obtain no satisfaction from the Admiral, it would be his painful duty—a duty that must be singularly distasteful to a man who had been a messmate and shipmate of Mr Lawrence—to take such steps as his lawyer might advise.,"I think not. The prospect must brighten before I increase my fleet. The war risks are stupendous. I never see one of my vessels quit her berth, but that I say to myself, 'When I next hear of you, you'll be at Cadiz or Dunkirk, or at the bottom of the sea.'","You may bet anything you like on that," says Geoffrey, cheerfully. "She cares for me just about as much as I care for her,—which means exactly nothing.","Yes,—better than all the women I ever met," corrects Mona, but without placing the faintest emphasis upon the word "women," which omission somehow possesses its charm in Rodney's eyes.,"Alone," said Maurice, significantly.,Oh, I'm hungry, hungry until I cry in my sleep when I dream about a muffin! I thought at first that getting out of bed before my eyes are fairly open, and turning myself into a circus acrobat by doing every kind of overhand, foot, arm and leg contortion that the mind of cruel man could invent to torture a human being with, would kill me before I had been at it a week, but when I read on page sixteen that as soon as all that horror was over I must jump right into the tub of cold water, I kicked, metaphorically speaking. And I've been kicking ever since, literally to keep from freezing.,"Oh, Patricia!" she cried in Patricia's ear, but the words died into the tempest.,“Not this piece, sir,” answered Tom. “I’ve got all I can do helping my father. When we raised more than double the average yield of his fields on our little patch here, he decided that there was something in modern farming methods after all, so this year we’re putting all our corn in as it should be! And we’re going to have some crop, too!”,"Yes,—in her own estimation," says the duchess, somewhat severely, whose crowning horror is a frisky matron, to which title little Mrs. Lennox may safely lay claim.,“He made me his rodman, if that’s any sign.”,"Why, sir," answered the Admiral, "I don't see that we should be late if we did not go at all.",“No use. He just rouse camp. Everything mixed up. Got better plan.”.