While Uncle Geoffrey was speaking, Beatrice's operations with the holly had brought her a good deal nearer to them, and at the same time the church door opened, and a gentleman entered, whom the first glance showed Henrietta to be Mr. Franklin, the clergyman of the parish, of whom she had heard so much. He advanced on seeing Beatrice with the holly in her hand. "Miss Langford! This is just what I was wishing."

"I was just helping old Martha," said Beatrice; "we came in to show my cousin the church, and--"

By this time the others had advanced.

"How well the church looks this dark afternoon," said Uncle Geoffrey, speaking in a low tone, "it is quite the moment to choose for seeing it for the first time. But you are very early in beginning your adornments."

"I thought if I had the evergreens here in time, I might see a little to the arrangement myself," said Mr. Franklin, "but I am afraid I know very little about the matter. Miss Langford, I wish you would a.s.sist us with your taste."

Beatrice and Henrietta looked at each other, and their eyes sparkled with delight. "I should like it exceedingly," said the former; "I was just thinking what capabilities there are. And Henrietta will do it beautifully."

"Then will you really be kind enough to come to-morrow, and see what can be done?"

"Yes, we will come as soon as ever breakfast is over, and work hard,"

said Queen Bee. "And we will make Alex and Fred come too, to do the places that are out of reach."

"Thank you, thank you," said Mr. Franklin, eagerly; "I a.s.sure you the matter was quite upon my mind, for the old lady there, good as she is, certainly has not the best taste in church dressing."

"And pray, Mr. Franklin, let us have a step ladder, for I am sure there ought to be festoons round those two columns of the chancel arch. Look, papa, do you not think so?"

"You might put a twining wreath like the columns at Roslin chapel," said her papa, "and I should try how much I could cover the Dutch cherubs at the head of the tables of commandments."

"O, and don't you see," said Henrietta, "there in front of the altar is a s.p.a.ce, where I really think we might make the cross and 'I H S' in holly?"

"But could you, Henrietta?" asked Beatrice.

"O yes, I know I can; I made 'M.L.' in roses on mamma's last birthday, and set it up over the chimney-piece in the drawing-room, and I am sure we could contrive this. How appropriate it will look!"

"Ah!" said Mr. Franklin, "I have heard of such things, but I had always considered them as quite above our powers."

"They would be, without Henrietta," said Queen Bee, "but she was always excellent as wreath weaving, and all those things that belong to choice taste and clever fingers. Only let us have plenty of the wherewithal, and we will do our work so as to amaze the parish."

"And now," said Uncle Geoffrey, "we must be walking home, my young ladies. It is getting quite dark."

It was indeed, for as they left the church the sunlight was fast fading on the horizon, and Venus was already shining forth in pure quiet beauty on the clear blue sky. Mr. Franklin walked a considerable part of the way home with them, adding to Henrietta's list by asking counsel about a damp spot in the wall of the church, and on the measures to be adopted with a refractory farmer.

By the time they reached home, evening was fast closing in; and at the sound of their entrance Mrs. Langford and Frederick both came to meet them in the hall, the former asking anxiously whether they had not been lingering in the cold and damp, inspecting the clogs to see that they were dry, and feeling if the fingers were cold. She then ordered the two girls up stairs to dress before going into the drawing-room with their things on, and told Henrietta to remember that dinner would be at half-past five.

"Is mamma gone up?" asked Henrietta.

"Yes, my dear, long ago; she has been out with your grandpapa, and is gone to rest herself."

"And how long have you been at home, Fred?" said Queen Bee. "Why, you have performed your toilette already! Why did you not come to meet us?"

"I should have had a long spy-gla.s.s to see which way you were gone,"

said Fred, in a tone which, to Henrietta's ears, implied that he was not quite pleased, and then, following his sister up stairs, he went on to her, "I wish I had never come in, but it was about three, and Alex and Carey thought we might as well get a bit of something for luncheon, and thereby they had the pleasure of seeing mamma send her pretty dear up to change his shoes and stockings. So there was an end of me for the day.

I declare it is getting too absurd! Do persuade mamma that I am not made of sugar candy."

With Uncle Geoffrey's admonitions fresh in her mind, these complaints sounded painfully in Henrietta's ears, and she would gladly have soothed away his irritation; but, however convenient Judith might find the stairs for private conferences, they did not appear to her equally appropriate, especially when at the very moment grandpapa was coming down from above and grandmamma up from below. Both she and Fred therefore retreated into their mamma's room, where they found her sitting on a low stool by the fire, reading by its light one of the old childish books, of which she seemed never to weary. Fred's petulance, to do him justice, never could endure the charm of her presence, and his brow was as bright and open as his sister's as he came forward, hoping that she was not tired.

"Quite the contrary, thank you, my dear," said she, smiling; "I enjoyed my walk exceedingly."

"A walk!" exclaimed Henrietta.

"A crawl, perhaps you would call it, but a delightful crawl it was with grandpapa up and down what we used to call the sun walk, by the kitchen garden wall. And now, p.u.s.s.y-cat, p.u.s.s.y-cat, where have you been?"

"I've been to Sutton Leigh, with the good Queen," answered Henrietta, gaily. "I have seen everything--Sutton Leigh, and the Pleasance, and the church! And, mamma, Mr. Franklin has asked us to go and dress the church for Christmas! Is not that what of all things is delightful? Only think of church-decking! What I have read and heard of, but I always thought it something too great and too happy for me ever to do."

"I hope you will be able to succeed in it," said her mamma. "What a treat it will be to see your work on Sunday."

"And you are to help, too, Fred; you and Alexander are to come and reach the high places for us. But do tell us your adventures."

Fred had been all over the farm; had been introduced to the whole live stock, including ferrets and the tame hedge-hog; visited the plantations, and a.s.sisted at the killing of a stoat; cut his name out on the bark of the old pollard; and, in short, had been supremely happy.

He "was just going to see Dumpling and Vixen's puppies at Sutton Leigh, when--"

"When I caught you, my poor boy," said his mamma; "and very cruel it was, I allow, but I thought you might have gone out again."

"I had no other thick shoes upstairs; but really, mamma, no one thinks of minding those things."

"You should have seen him, Henrietta," said his mother; "his shoes looked as if he had been walking through a river."

"Well, but so were all the others," said Fred.

"Very likely, but they are more used to it; and, besides, they are such st.u.r.dy fellows. I should as soon think of a deal board catching cold.

But you--if there is as much substance in you, it is all height; and you know, Fred, you would find it considerably more tiresome to be laid up with a bad cold."

"I never catch cold," said Fred.

"Boys always say so," said Mrs. Frederick Langford; "it is a--what shall I call it?--a puerile delusion, which their mammas can always defeat when they choose by a formidable list of colds and coughs; but I won't put you in mind of how often you have sat with your feet on the fender croaking like an old raven, and solacing yourself with stick-liquorice and Ivanhoe."

"You had better allow him to proceed in his pursuit of a cold, mamma,"

said Henrietta, "just to see how grandmamma will nurse it."

A knock at the door here put an end to the conversation, by announcing the arrival of Bennet, Mrs. Frederick Langford's maid; who had come in such good time that Henrietta was, for once in her life, full dressed a whole quarter of an hour before dinner time. Nor was her involuntary punctuality without a reward, for the interval of waiting for dinner, sitting round the fire, was particularly enjoyed by Mr. and Mrs.

Langford; and Uncle Geoffrey, therefore, always contrived to make it a leisure time; and there was so much merriment in talking over the walk, and discussing the plans for the Pleasance, that Henrietta resolved never again to miss such a pleasant reunion by her own tardiness.

Nor was the evening less agreeable. Henrietta pleased grandmamma by getting her carpet-work out of some puzzle, and by flying across the room to fetch the tea-chest: she delighted grandpapa by her singing, and by finding his spectacles for him; she did quite a praiseworthy piece of her own crochet purse, and laughed a great deal at the battle that was going on between Queen Bee and Fred about the hero of some new book.

She kept her list of Uncle Geoffrey's manifold applicants on the table before her, and had the pleasure of increasing it by two men, business unknown, who sent to ask him to come and speak to them; by a loud and eager appeal from Fred and Beatrice to decide their contest, by a question of taste on the shades of grandmamma's carpet-work, and by her own query how to translate a difficult German pa.s.sage which had baffled herself, mamma, and Fred.

However, Queen Bee's number, fifty, had not been attained, and her majesty was obliged to declare that she meant in a week instead of a day, for which reason the catalogue was written out fair, to be continued.

Mrs. Frederick Langford thought herself well recompensed for the pain her resolution had cost her, by the pleasure that Mr. and Mrs. Langford evidently took in her son and daughter, by the brightness of her two children's own faces, and especially when Henrietta murmured in her sleep something about "delightful," "bright leaves and red berries," and then, "and 'tis for my own dear papa."

And after all, in the attainment of their fondest wish, were Henrietta and Frederick as serenely happy as she was?

CHAPTER VI.