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The Shuttle Chapter 14 - In the Gardens · The Frances Hodgson Burnett Library

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  Speaker 1: CHAPTER XIV IN THE GARDENS She came out upon the
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  Speaker 1: stone terrace again rather early in the morning. She wanted
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  Speaker 1: to wander about in the first freshness of the day,
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  Speaker 1: which was always an uplifting thing to her. She wanted
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  Speaker 1: to see the dew on the grass and on the
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  Speaker 1: ragged flower-borders, and to hear the tender broken fluting of
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  Speaker 1: the birds in the trees. One cuckoo was calling to
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  Speaker 1: another in the park, and she stopped and listened intently.
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  Speaker 1: Until yesterday she had never heard a cuckoo call, and
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  Speaker 1: its hollow mellowness gave her delight. It meant the spring
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  Speaker 1: in England and nowhere else. There was space enough to
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  Speaker 1: ramble about in the gardens. Baths and beds were alike
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  Speaker 1: overgrown with weeds, but some strong early blooming things were
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  Speaker 1: fighting for life, refusing to be strangled. Against the beautiful
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  Speaker 1: old red walls, over which age had stolen with a
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  Speaker 1: wonderful grey bloom, Venerable fruit-trees were spread and nailed, and
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  Speaker 1: here and there showed bloom. Clumps of low-growing things sturdily
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  Speaker 1: advanced their yellowness or whiteness, as if defying neglect. In
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  Speaker 1: one place a wall slanted and threatened to fall, bearing
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  Speaker 1: its nectarine-trees with it. In another there was a gap
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  Speaker 1: so evidently not of to-day, that the heap of its
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  Speaker 1: masonry upon the border-bed was already covered with greenery, and
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  Speaker 1: the roots of the fruit-tree it had supported had sent
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  Speaker 1: up strong insistent shoots. She passed down broad paths and
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  Speaker 1: narrow ones, sometimes walking under trees, sometimes pushing her way
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  Speaker 1: between encroaching shrubs. She descended delightful mossy and broken steps,
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  Speaker 1: and came upon dilapidated urns, in which weeds grew instead
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  Speaker 1: of flowers, and over which, rampant but lovely, savage little
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  Speaker 1: creepers clambered and clung. In one of the walled kitchen
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  Speaker 1: gardens she came upon an elderly gardener at work. At
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  Speaker 1: the sound of her approaching steps he glanced around and
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  Speaker 1: then stood up.' touching his forelock in respectful but startled salute.'
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  Speaker 1: He was so plainly amazed at the sight of her'
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  Speaker 1: that she explained herself.' Good morning,' she said.' I am
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  Speaker 1: her ladyship's sister, Miss Vanderpool.' I came yesterday evening.' I' m
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  Speaker 1: looking over your gardens.'' He touched his forehead again and
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  Speaker 1: looked around him.' His manner was not cheerful.' He cast
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  Speaker 1: a troubled eye about him.' They' re not much to see, miss,'
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  Speaker 1: he said.' They ought to be, but they're not.' Growing
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  Speaker 1: things has to be fed and took care of. A
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  Speaker 1: man and a boy can't do it. Or yet four
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  Speaker 1: or five of them. How many ought there to be?
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  Speaker 1: Betty inquired with business-like directness. It was not only the
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  Speaker 1: dew on the grass she had come out to see.
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  Speaker 1: If there was eight or ten of us, we might
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  Speaker 1: put it in order and keep it that way. It's
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  Speaker 1: a big place, miss. Betty looked about her as he
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  Speaker 1: had done, but with less discouraged eye.' It' s a beautiful
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  Speaker 1: place as well as a large one,' she said.' I
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  Speaker 1: can see that there ought to be more workers.'' There' s
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  Speaker 1: no one,' said the gardener,' as it has as many
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  Speaker 1: enemies as a gardener and as many things to fight.'
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  Speaker 1: There' s crabs and there's green fly and there's drought and
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  Speaker 1: wet and cold and mildew,' and there's what the soil
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  Speaker 1: wants and starves without,' and if you haven't got it
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  Speaker 1: nor your hands and feet and tools enough,' there' s things
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  Speaker 1: to feed and fight and live, let alone bloom and bear.'
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  Speaker 1: I don't know much about gardens, said Miss Vanderpool, but
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  Speaker 1: I can understand that. The scent of fresh-bedewed things was
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  Speaker 1: in the air. It was true that she had not
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  Speaker 1: known much about gardens, but here, standing in the midst
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  Speaker 1: of one, she began to awaken to a new practical interest.
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  Speaker 1: A creature of initiative could not let such a place
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  Speaker 1: as this alone. It was beauty being slowly slain. One
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  Speaker 1: could not pass it by and do nothing. What is
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  Speaker 1: your name? she asked. Kedger's Mist. I've only been here
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  Speaker 1: about a twelve months. I was took on because I'm
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  Speaker 1: getting on in years and can't ask much wage. Can
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  Speaker 1: you spare time to take me through the gardens and
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  Speaker 1: show me things? Yes, he could do it. In truth,
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  Speaker 1: he privately welcomed an opportunity, offering a prospect of excitement
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  Speaker 1: so novel. He had shown more flourishing gardens to other
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  Speaker 1: young ladies in his past years of service, but young
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  Speaker 1: ladies did not come to Stornham. and that one having
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  Speaker 1: with such extraordinary unexpectedness arrived should want to look over
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  Speaker 1: the desolation of these was curious enough to rouse any
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  Speaker 1: one to a sense of a break in accustomed monotony
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  Speaker 1: the young lady herself mystified him by her difference from
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  Speaker 1: such others as he had seen what the man in
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  Speaker 1: the shabby livery had felt he felt also and added
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  Speaker 1: to this was a sense of the practicalness of the
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  Speaker 1: questions she asked and the interest she showed, and a
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  Speaker 1: way she had of seeming singularly to suggest, by the
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  Speaker 1: look in her eyes and the tone of her voice,
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  Speaker 1: that nothing was necessarily without remedy. When her ladyship walked
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  Speaker 1: through the place and looked at things, a pale resignation
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  Speaker 1: expressed itself in the very droop of her figure. When
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  Speaker 1: this one walked through the tumbledown grape-houses, potting-sheds, and conservatories,
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  Speaker 1: she saw where glass was broken, where benches had fallen
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  Speaker 1: and where roofs sagged and leaked. She inquired about the
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  Speaker 1: heating apparatus and asked that she might see it. She
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  Speaker 1: asked about the village and its resources, about labourers and
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  Speaker 1: their wages. As if, commented Kedgers mentally, she was what
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  Speaker 1: Sir Nigel is, leastways what he ought to be and ain't.
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  Speaker 1: She led the way back to the fallen wall and
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  Speaker 1: stood and looked at it. It's a beautiful old wall,
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  Speaker 1: she said. It should be rebuilt with the old brick.
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  Speaker 1: Noo would spoil it. Some of this is broken and
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  Speaker 1: crumbled away, said Kedgers, picking up a piece to show
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  Speaker 1: it to her. Perhaps old brick could be brought somewhere,
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  Speaker 1: replied the young lady speculatively. One ought to be able
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  Speaker 1: to buy old brick in England if one is willing
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  Speaker 1: to pay for it. Kedgers scratched his head and gazed
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  Speaker 1: at her in respectful wonder, which was almost trouble. Who
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  Speaker 1: was going to pay for things, and who was going
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  Speaker 1: to look for things which were not on the spot?
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  Speaker 1: Enterprise like this was not to be explained. WHEN SHE
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  Speaker 1: LEFT HIM HE STOOD AND WATCHED HER UPRIGHT FIGURE DISAPPEAR
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  Speaker 1: THROUGH THE IVY-CROWN DOOR OF THE KITCHEN GARDENS WITH A
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  Speaker 1: DISTURBED BUT ELATED EXPRESSION ON HIS COUNTENANCE. HE DID NOT
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  Speaker 1: KNOW WHY HE FELT ELATED, BUT HE WAS CONSCIOUS OF ELATION.
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  Speaker 1: SOMETHING NEW HAD WALKED INTO THE PLACE. HE STOPPED HIS
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  Speaker 1: WORK AND GRINNED AND SCRATCHED HIS HEAD SEVERAL TIMES AFTER
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  Speaker 1: HE WENT BACK TO HIS POTTERING AMONG THE CABBAGE PLANTS.'
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  Speaker 1: MY WORD,' HE MUTTERED,' SHE' S A FINE STRAIGHT YOUNG WOMAN.'
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  Speaker 1: If she was a ladyship, things'd be different. Sir Nigel'd
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  Speaker 1: be different, too, or there'd be some fine upsets.' There
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  Speaker 1: was a huge stable-yard, and Betty passed through that on
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  Speaker 1: her way back. The door of the carriage-house was open,
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  Speaker 1: and she saw two or three tumble-down vehicles. One was
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  Speaker 1: a land-dog with a wheel off, one was a shabby
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  Speaker 1: old-fashioned low phaeton. She'd caught sight of a patently venerable
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  Speaker 1: cob in one of the stables. The stalls near him
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  Speaker 1: were empty.' I suppose that is all they have to
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  Speaker 1: depend on, she thought, and the stables are like the gardens.
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  Speaker 1: She found Lady Anstruthers and Uhtred waiting for her upon
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  Speaker 1: the terrace, each of them regarding her with an expression
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  Speaker 1: suggestive of repressed curiosity as she approached. Lady Anstruthers flushed
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  Speaker 1: a little and went to meet her with an eager kiss.
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  Speaker 1: You look like— I don't quite know what you look like, Betty,
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  Speaker 1: she exclaimed. The girl's dimple deepened and her eyes said
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  Speaker 1: smiling things.' It' s the morning, and your gardens?' she answered.'
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  Speaker 1: I have been around your gardens.'' They were beautiful once,
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  Speaker 1: I suppose,' said Rosie, deprecatingly.' They are beautiful now. There's
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  Speaker 1: nothing like them in America, at least.'' I don't remember
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  Speaker 1: any gardens in America,' Lady Anstruthers owned reluctantly.' But everything
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  Speaker 1: seemed so cheerful and well cared for and new.' Don' t laugh, Betty.
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  Speaker 1: I have begun to like new things.' You would if
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  Speaker 1: you had watched old ones tumbling to pieces for twelve years.
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  Speaker 1: They ought not to be allowed to tumble to pieces,
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  Speaker 1: said Betty. She added her next words with simple directness.
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  Speaker 1: She could only discover how any advancing steps would be
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  Speaker 1: taken by taking them. Why do you allow them to
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  Speaker 1: do it? Lady Anstruthers looked away, but as she looked
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  Speaker 1: her eyes passed Uhtred's. Aye, she said, there are so
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  Speaker 1: many other things to do. It would cost so much.
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  Speaker 1: such an enormity to keep it all in order. But
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  Speaker 1: it ought to be done for Uhtred's sake. I know that,
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  Speaker 1: faltered Rosie, but I can't help it. You can, answered Betty,
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  Speaker 1: and she put her arm around her as they turned
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  Speaker 1: to enter the house. When you have become more used
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  Speaker 1: to me in my driving American ways, I will show
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  Speaker 1: you how. The likeness with which she said it had
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  Speaker 1: an odd effect on Lady Anstruthers, Such casual readiness was
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  Speaker 1: so full of the suggestion of unheard possibilities that it
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  Speaker 1: was a kind of shock.' I' ve been twelve years in
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  Speaker 1: getting unused to you. I feel as if it would
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  Speaker 1: take twelve years more to get used again,' she said.'
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  Speaker 1: It won't take twelve weeks,' said Betty. End of chapter
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  Speaker 1: 14