Jeremy

except that they are certainly assured that their furniture is vastly superior to the furniture of their predecessors. They have a gramophone, a pianola, and a lift to bring the plates from the kitchen into the dining-room, and a small motor garage at the back where the old p

fe, eight years old. He had gone to bed at eight o'clock on the preceding evening with the choking consciousness that he would awake in the morning a different creature. Although he had slept, there had permeated the texture of his dreams that same choking excitement, and now, wide awake, as though he had

he general peace of the house had these incessant battles been, so unavailing the suggestions of elderly relations that gentlemen always yielded to ladies, that a compromise had been arrived at. When Jeremy was eight he should have equal rights with Helen. Well and good. Jeremy had yielded to that. It was

and his throat very dry; he was disappointingly aware that he was still the same Jeremy of yesterday. He did not know what it was exactly

nd with a half-muttered, half-dreamt statement a

ith sunshine, and old Jampot, the nurse (her name was Mrs. Preston and her shape was Jampot), w

at her,

enly, with a leap, he was out of bed, had crossed the floor, pushed back the nursery do

he called. "I'

sou

shouted, "and I'

ess and exclaiming, h

... death of cold...

at her scornfully, "and I can

her nose red, as it always was early in the mor

him not to. I don't care how old y

idn't. Mot

did. Mot

said tha

ew, stiffening, trusting dignity filled him, as though he had

or to them all. He got down from the chair and stood, his head up, on the

"I'm eight now, and I don't want it any more... a

sh, and although you watered it, stood up in unexpected places and stared at you. His eyes were good, dark brown and large,

face was lighted with humour. Helen was the only beautiful Cole child, and she

had seen his father do, his short legs apar

eady and you catching your death with naked feet, which you've always been told to put your slippers on and not to keep the bath waiting, when there's Miss Helen and

usa

ranslated into a world of excitement and splendour. They had sausages so seldom, not always even on birthd

ss and undress the large woollen dog, known as "Sulks," his own especial and beloved property, so often as she wished; Jampot should poke the twisted end of the towel in his ears and brush his hair with the hard brushes, and he would not say

s, his hair on end, tugging at his brac

ges-because it's my bir

was Helen's voice crossly admonishing the Jampot: "Oh, yo

tude of persons, that he would have to say again and again, "Oh, thank you, thank you so much!" that he would have his usual consciousness of his inability to thank anybody at all in the way that they expected to be thanked. Helen an

soft pieces bursting out between the crusty pieces, the solid square of butter, so beautiful a colour and marked with a large cow and a tree on the top (he had seen once in the kitchen the wooden shape with wh

was singing in her cage in the window. (No one really knew whether the canary were a lady or a gentleman, but th

er Landseer, "The Shepherds and the Angels," and "The Charge of the Light Brigade." So packed was the nursery with history for Jeremy that it would have taken quite a week to relate it all. There was the spot where he had bitten the Jampot's fingers, for which deed he had afterwards been slippered by his father; there the corner where they stood for punishment (he knew exactly how many ships with sails, how many ridges of wav

s only the between-maid, but was nevertheless stout, breathless from her climb and the sentime

.. "Lord save us if I 'aven't gone and forgotten they

towards it and seized it. He could not read very easily the sprawling writing on the cover, but he guessed that it said "From Gladys to Master Jeremy." Within was a marvellous card, tied together with gli

ppeared, their faces shining and solemn and mysterious-Helen self-c

h big outstanding ears, spectacles, and yellow hair pulled back and "stringy." Her large hands were always red, and her forehead was freckled. She was as plain a child as you were ever likely to see, but th

e was insanely jealous; she would sulk for days did he ever seem to prefer Helen to herself. No one understood her; she was considered a "difficult chil

en she grows up, poor child;" and although the parishioners of Mary's father always alluded to her as "the ludicrous Cole child," they told awed little stories about the infant's

erpetual colds; she therefore spent much of her time in the nursery reading, her huge spectacles close to the page,

ple and young people. She was warm-hearted but not impulsive, intelligent but not clever, sympathetic but not sentimental, impatient but never uncontrolled. She liked almost everyone and almost everything, but no one and nothing mattered to her very deeply; she liked going to church, always learnt

altogether very agreeable, but that none of these things was of any great importance. She was very good friends with Jeremy, but she played no part in his life at all. At the same time she often fought with him, simply from her real deep consciou

s, laid them on the breakfast-table, and t

now?" ask

" said Hel

l was bought with mother's money and only "pretended" to be from his sisters; the two small parcels were the very handiwork of the ladies themselves, the same having been seen by all e

ht be "soldiers"; but he knew the rules of the game, and disregarding the large, ostent

a red pattern of roses, a thick table-napkin ri

I wanted." (Father always

said Mary

t it would have got dirty, anyway, afterwards." She

expected to kiss them. He wiped his mouth wit

's always giving me the wrong one. I'll

dle of a table,"

ys have it too-like Mary's-when I'm grown up and

ing to take the central place in the cere

had a l

ke mine, d

e, like a

tter than Helen's?" b

ng it; I thought I woul

kiss was in the air. She moved forward; then, to his extre

t Amy, all with presents, faces of birthday tolera

future. To be a rector at thirty is unusual, but he had great religious gifts, preached an admirable "as-man-to-man" sermon, and did not believe in thinking a

Tuesday "at homes," the butcher, the dean's wife, the wives of the canons, the Polchester climate, bills, clothes, other women's clothes-over all these rocks of peril in the sea of daily life her barque happily floated.

ver the surface of things, was the most sentimental of human beings, was often in tears over reminiscences of books or the weather, was deeply religious in a superficial way, and really-although she would have been entirely astonished had you told her so-cared for no one in the world but he

Church, Oxford. He had desired to be a painter; he had broken from the family and gone to study Art in Paris. He had starved and starved, was at death's door, was dragged home, and there suddenly had relapsed into Polchester, lived first on his father, then on his brother-in-law, painted about the town, painted, made cynic

e, there he is. It is of no use saying that he does not exist, as many of the Close ladies try to do. And at least he does not paint strange women; he prefers flowers and cows and the Polchester woods, although anything less like cows, flowers and woods, Mrs. Sampson, wife of the Dean, who on

ailure, a dirty man, and disliked children. He very rarely spoke to them; was once quite wildly enraged when Mary was discovered licking his paints. (It was the paints he seemed anx

hair, his scarlet slippers, his blue tam-o'-shanter, the smudges of paint sometimes to be discovered on his

re with their presents a

of her) and continued to tug at the string. He was given a large pair of scissors. He received (from Father) a silver

Amy never give him anything sensible?). He stood there, his face flushed, his eyes sparkling, the watch in one hand and the paint-box in the other. Remarks were heard like: "You mustn't poke it with, your finger, Jerry darling,

ot because he wanted a present, but because he liked Uncle Samuel. Suddenly, from somewhere behind him his uncle said: "Shut your

g anything save that once Mary cried "Oh!" and clapped her hands, which same cry excited him to such a pitch that he would have dug his nails into his hands had he not so consistently

e, six houses with red roofs, green windows and white porches, a church with a tower and a tiny bell, an orchard with flowers on the fruit trees, a green lawn, a street wi

tared, he drew

said Aunt Amy, who always made things

alk. Jeremy said nothing.

it," he said, a

pleased?"

till sai

entered with a dish of a lovely and pleasant smell. B

I

sional amateur performance at the Assembly Rooms and, once and again, a magic-lantern show. On this particular day, moreover, Mr. and Mrs. Cole were immensely busied with preparations for some parochial tea. Miss Tref

self, wanted something just like this? Thirty years ago there were none of the presents that there are for children now-no wonderful railways that run round the nursery from Monte Carlo to Paris with all the stations marked; no dolls that are so like fashionable women that you are given a manicure set with them to keep their nails tidy; no miniature motor-cars that run of themselves and go for miles round the floor without being wound up. Jeremy knew none of these things, and was the happi

eet, straight again through the Market, past the Assembly Rooms and the Town Hall, past the flower and fruit stalls, and the old banana woman under the green umbrella and the toy stall with coloured balloons, the china dogs and the nodding donkeys, u

remy would drag past the shops, the stalls in the Market Place and the walk behind the Cathedral, whence one might s

set o

the cold, sweet twang of peppermints in the throat. Polchester was a painted town upon a blue screen, the Cathedral towers purple against the sky; the air was scented with burning leaves, and cries from the town rose up clear and hard, lingering and falling like notes of music. Somewhere they were playing football, and the shouting was distant and regular like the tramp of armed men. "T

ed the skin-man suddenly appe

t 'ome this night, and I might have known you'd choose the longest

the same breath, "I'll run you down the hill, Mary," and before anyone could say a word there they were at the bottom of Orange Street, as though they had fa

Jeremy to herself. She began hurrie

le boys, and they lived in a wood, and an old witch ate them, and the Princess who had heaps

nteresting stories, and he did not mind because he did

f the church, or milk the cows. He alone would do all these things. And, so considering, he seemed to himself very like God. God, he supposed, could pull Polchester about, root out a house here, another there, knock the Assembly Rooms down and send a thunderbolt on to the apple woman's umbr

lage. He would ring the church bell, and then all the Noah family should start out of the door, down the garden, up the village street... It did not matter if one of the younger Noahs should be lazy and wish to stay at ho

ry's voice

e hard bits and soft bits, and the Princess (she was a frog now. You remember, don't you, Jeremy? The witch turned

' 'ere for everyone to see, just because it's your birthday, which I

Thompson's window, a sc

If I said out loud, 'I won't go,' I w

along, then,

n calmly. "If a policeman came and sai

ldn't," s

'd put you

y co

ang you,

ld," repl

t go, so Helen shrugged her shou

all moved

t as ever and had thick clumps of yellow bananas hanging most richly around her head. They ascended the High Street and reached the Close. It was half-past three, and the Cathedral bells had begun to ring for evensong. All the houses in the Close were painted with a pale yellow ligh

she's a wicked woman, Nurse?" He gazed at the stout figure with interest. If he were tr

ong, do," said the Jampot, wh

the middle of the night, so that everyone will have to go to church wh

len. "Father and Mother

can," sa

answered Helen,

," said Jer

ery calmly, because she knew v

stop it, do,"

. I know that now, both for Jeremy and me, that prospect has dwindled into its proper grown-up proportions, but how can a man, b

y for another day; the brown frosty path of the Rope Walk, the farther bank climbing into fields and hedges, ending in the ridge of wood, black against the golden sky. And all so still! As the children stood there they could catch nestlings' faint cries, stirrings of dead leaves and twigs, as birds and beasts moved to their homes

o-morrow. It was then that Jeremy's God-flung sense of power, born from that moment early in the day when he had sat in the wicker cha

one thing that he could

g," he said, "

a cup of hot tea, and an aching longing for a comfortable chair. "When everyone's been

ithout imagination, saw a naughty sma

to rest, watching from his leafless bough, saw a morta

said the Jampot. "Now come,

," he answered impatient

rsed him for eight years, she had loved him in her own way; she, dull perhaps in the ways of the world, but wise in t

ng that I'll have the dealing with you, praise be. You'll be going to scho

d upon her, his ey

he stared

ness, of the sudden falling from him of all old standards, old horizons, of pride and humility... How l

them home. His birthday h