Down Under Read Free

child is so delicate,” said James Carew, stirring his tea. “Poor little Florrie.”
    Miss Hortensia sniffed.
    â€œRuined by indulgence! Just exactly what I always complained of here. Florrie wants treating with firmness. She’s a naughty spoilt child, and those crying fits of hers are nothing but temper. She should be whipped for them instead of being cossetted and encouraged. No, James, I know you don’t agree with me, but that is my opinion, and as for allowing Rose Anne to be at the Garstnets’ beck and call every time Florrie has a tantrum, I consider it the height of folly. Anyhow they’ll have to do without her after tomorrow, so perhaps they’ll try a little discipline for a change.”
    Rose Anne coloured up. She was very fond of Florrie Garstnet, and it troubled her to think of the little creature crying for her when she was far away. She said in a low voice to Madeline,
    â€œShe had some sort of fright. No one knows quite what it was, but it started these crying fits. They send for me because she seems to think she’s safe when I’m there—I don’t know why. It’s dreadful to see a child so frightened, but they hope she’ll grow out of it. She is much better.”
    â€œShe wants a good sound whipping,” said Miss Hortensia in her small acid voice. “And as for those two stepsisters of hers, if they had been properly corrected when they were children they wouldn’t have grown up the way they have.”
    Mr Carew looked up with a frown.
    â€œReally, Hortensia—that’s a little drastic. Fanny and Mabel—”
    Miss Hortensia broke in scornfully.
    â€œFanny and Mabel can always get round a man—you don’t have to tell me that, James! Red-haired flirts both of them! I’m sure I was thankful when Fanny married, though I was sorry for the young man. And if there wasn’t something odd about the whole thing, why wasn’t she married here, and why haven’t they been back to stay?”
    â€œBeast!” said Elfreda to herself. “She’s just doing it out of spite because she knows Rose Anne is fond of Fanny, and that Fanny simply adores Rose Anne. She can’t bear people who adore Rose Anne.”
    Rose Anne had coloured deeply. She said,
    â€œIt’s not very long, Aunt Hortensia—it’s only a year.”
    Miss Hortensia laughed tartly.
    â€œYou see what you have to expect, James. Rose Anne will be letting a year or two go by before she thinks of paying you a visit.”
    Elfreda forgot all about the telephone call. There was going to be a big family dinner—not only the cousins who had dropped in to tea but an uncle who had gone for a walk, two aunts who were resting, and a grandmother, Mary and Madeline’s, who had absolutely refused to stay quietly at home in Torquay though everyone except herself was quite sure that the wedding festivities would be too much for her. She replied to all and sundry that she had been at dear Rosabel’s wedding, and that she meant to be at Rose Anne’s if she had to walk every step of the way, and she meant to be at the dinner too in her new black velvet and her best old lace, and the diamonds which she had left to Madeline and Mary in her will but had no intention of parting with as long as she could wear them herself. And for the wedding she had a puce taffeta, and a sealskin cape, and a most fashionable hat with a purple ostrich feather shading into one of the discreeter pinks. Old Mrs Leigh had been a beauty, and she could still carry fine clothes with an air. She too was resting at the Angel.
    Presently the cousins melted away. Oliver got out his car and went off to Malling to meet his best man. Rose Anne went up to her room. Elfreda ran Aunt Hortensia’s errands, thought for the hundredth time how much she disliked her, and was finally told to go away and make herself tidy, a most irritating injunction.
    The Vicarage was a