The House That Grew

ou cannot get hot water without fire of some kind. But that part of our work we did not dislike at all. We had grown quite clever at making fires and getting them to burn up quickly in

e for weeks, without their

t we got the kettle on and it began to sing, our spi

r, and once he is out there himself, he will find out everything, and perhaps get them put straight once for all. It w

st to be hopeful. So long as there's no talk of our selli

em dull or miserable at having to live differently and go without things we've always bee

sig

big school. But you have cheered me up about that, Ida. I shall hate you and mamma not having a

ould rather have ever so little a house at Kirke than a much better one farther off-except that, well, I m

id; there's no use trying to pretend it won't be. But, Ida, we're not working at all

y all come down here to tea in the afternoon,' for that was a favourite habit of ours. We child

the hut. Then too, even though only an hour or so had passed since we had heard the bad news, I think we had suddenly grown older. I have never felt thoroughly a child again since that morning. For the first time it seemed to come really home to me that life has a serious side to it,

feeling. It makes one feel stronger and braver, and yet more humble too, though that sounds contradict

f mamma, and though I cannot quite explain how, the feeling left by his words had begun to influence us already. We even were extra anxious to do our tidying very well and quickly,

very nice-I never saw it neater, and w

he sea, and here we did the unmessy part of the photographing, and kept any little ornaments or pictures we had. Of the other two rooms one was the 'chemical room,' as we called it, and in a cupboard out of it we hung up our bathing-clothes, and the fourth room,

for which mamma had two or three mattresses and pillows and things like that among the spare ones up in the long garret. But so far we had never got leave to carry our picnicking quite so far. Papa would not have minded, for of all things

had been pu

w,' I said. 'There is enough tea and sugar for two or three more after

d I know she cared for us in a particular way, for her father had been gardener for ages, though ages ago now, as she herself was pretty old, at Eastercove. And

d Dods. 'They don't leave off making

n to say that there was a very tiny village called Easte

ring. I think bread and butter-thin and rolled-is quite as good, and some nice cakes and a big one

eaten much luncheon, which was our early dinner

r epicure about c

r him crossly when I remembered about our great trouble, and thought immediately to myself ho

f you invite them to tea, and I know papa likes that kind of gingerbrea

ays know when he is sorry for teasing m

e woods and in sight of the drive we saw the pony carriage, and we

ly, and papa said in what h

you been about? Run in, Ida, an

ugh the outside cheeriness of papa's words and mann

e tea downstairs, but to-day somehow there seemed no question of our not doing so. I waited till mamm

ugh in my heart I felt sure they hadn't, or they

hook he

e,' she began, but

e had not to be considered so closely. There is no good beating about the bush with George and Ida,' he went on, turning to mamma. 'Now that we have so thoroughly taken them into our confidence it is best to tel

,' said mamma quickly. 'And there is, afte

think of you in it. I would almost rather you went abo

ldn't mind that at all-

eased to see he held out his cup for some more tea (I have found out that things do see

are together, and enjoy this nice spring weather. I am glad, if sad things had to happen, that th

out our having to leav

a no

ped there on our way back, a

ld prepare him for Dods's a

oom! I was looking at it while I was waiting for you, Jack' (that's papa), 'and it

or what they will give, next week,' papa replied. 'It has serv

t?' sai

hrugged his

e hut. It would make into two capital little bedrooms for very little cost, and Lloyd happened to say to-day that the makers would rather sell it for le

llowed really to live at the hut now and then. And with two more rooms we could have had Hoskins with us, and

coming to live here hav

at I said. He was thinking deeply, and almost

replied. 'It has n

there to spend an afternoon now and then. It is so far from the house that we would not seem like i

a fancy to this place-the scent of pine woods and the air about them are considered so good for illnesses of that kind. And sea-air suits him too,

poke and stood looking out withou

od people would be likely to be fussy or ill-natured or to thin

glad to

and have tea there, won't you? It will be the first time this year' (and 'the last perhaps' seemed whispered in

ooked a

inly we will. And the

cakes-and muffins if possible, to please Dods-to Hoskin

hope if she ever reads this, which certainly will not be for three or four or more years from now, she will have gone on sobering down, enough to understand what a 'flibbertigibbet' (that is a word of Hoskins's which I think very expressive) she was, and not

ting this story about, would have been much duller

had come upon us so suddenly, and I did want to be quiet and talk sensibly. It was a little papa's fault too, I must say. He is sometimes rather like a boy still, though he has f

r too grave, for, after a li

y; you almost make me wish we had not told

hisper too, 'or-or,' as I happened just then to catc

a real merry laugh, which, in spite o

at we are all thinking about. He was the solemnest baby even that ever was seen, though many babies are solemn. I used to feel quite

ved to choke down, or at least to hide, my sadness-and still more the sort of crossness I had been feeling. It was not exactly real ill-tempered crossness, but the kind of hating be

l more, I think, after her hearty laugh. Her laughing always seems to dri

nt that somewhere or somehow there was a way out of our troubles, or rather out of one part of them, and that I was going to find it before long. And I am quite sure that sometimes the thinking a thing out is more than half done by our brains before we know it-much in the same way that we-Dods and I-are quite sure that putting

e beginning to float about in my brain into a real touchable or speakable plan, befor

nk George was feeling so very bad after all, for the last thing he said to me that evening