'Come, come, Dods!' I cried, setting off as I spoke, 'let's run to meet her. Oh, Taisy, Taisy, you funny girl! Oh, how delighted I am!'

We ran so fast that we reached the waggon almost before the driver and horses--there were two--seemed fairly launched on the side road, and in time to hear an eager voice from within calling out, 'All right, straight on, now. There is plenty of room.'

It was Theresa of course, but just at first she did not see us. She was leaning out on the other side to make the driver hear. But she turned, fast enough, when our shouts reached her, though she did not jump down, as we half expected.

[Ill.u.s.tration: 'I CAN'T VERY WELL GET OUT,' SHE SAID.]

'I can't very well get out,' she said. 'I'm so packed in, and there are some breakable things. But I'll manage it in a minute. Yes, yes--it's I myself! I've come to stay with you, though I have not been invited.

And--you'll understand directly, I've brought my house--or rather my room--with me like a snail, so auntie can't turn me away again.'

She was so excited and delighted with herself, and we were so excited and delighted too, that we could scarcely speak for laughing. We did not let her get out; she _was_ so packed in, as she said, but we walked by the door, she talking as hard as she could, for her vehicle was lumbering along at a foot's pace.

'Yes,' she said, in answer to our eager questions; 'I've been travelling like this since ten o'clock. No, not _quite_ like this--we did trot on the high road. The waggonette----'

'Waggonette,' interrupted George, 'I should call it a--waggon and a half!'

'Well, never mind about that. Call it an omnibus if you like. Anyway, _it_ started yesterday, and spent the night at Wetherford. Granny wanted me to come all the way to Kirke by train and to write to tell you, which would have spoilt the fun. So I got her to let me '('to _let_ you indeed, Miss Taisy,' thought I to myself, though I did not say so; 'I know better. You said sweetly, "Granny, dear, I just must;" and she said, "Well, well, my darling, if you must, you must, I suppose")--'to let me come to Wetherford this morning with her maid, and to meet old Dawson' (the driver) 'there, and come on as you see. I had hard work to find room for myself inside, and I did begin to think we should never get here! But the evenings are long now, and it's been a lovely day; everything's dry and ready--bedding and all. There'll be plenty of time to unpack, and Dawson is to stay the night at Kirke, and ride home on one horse, leading the other.'

'And leaving the waggon,' I said, rather stupidly I must own; I think I was really feeling rather bewildered with the excitement and laughing and Taisy's flow of explanation.

She burst out laughing again at this.

'Of course,' she said. 'If I didn't keep my house, I might as well go back again. But do let us hurry on to tell auntie all about it.'

I think in her heart of hearts poor Taisy was feeling a tiny atom anxious as to what mamma would think of it all. But she need not have done. Mamma understood her so well and trusted her good sense as well as her affection, in spite of dear Taisy's _rather_ wild ways sometimes.

She--mamma, I mean--was sitting quietly where we had left her, reading, in the new chair. And it was nice to see the bright look of pleasure which came over her face when she realised that it was Taisy, really Taisy, and not an 'optical illusion,' who stood before her and then hugged and kissed her as no illusion could have done.

'But, my child,' said she, 'where----'

'Where are you going to put me?' interrupted our new guest; 'look, auntie, look up and see,' and she pointed to the van, which was just coming in sight again. 'I have brought my house with me.'

Mamma's face looked completely puzzled now.

'I will explain,' Theresa went on, and indeed George and I wanted this part of it explained as much as mamma did. 'That lovely old thing that's lumbering along is Granny's discarded luggage-waggonette. It hasn't been used for centuries; it is really a small omnibus more than a waggonette.

I ferreted it out in one of the coach-houses, where I was poking about with a vague idea that I might find something of the kind to make it possible for me to come to you after all. And I got the coachman to help me. We had it thoroughly dried and aired, and the seats at one side taken out--and a friend of the coachman's, who is a clever carpenter, has fitted it up. You will see. There is a table that slips down when not wanted, and a frame in one corner to hold a basin and ewer, and hooks for hanging things, and a tray like a deep drawer under the seat that's to be the bed. Oh, it's lovely! and really as good as a cabin on board ship,' and Taisy stopped to take breath.

'And did Aunt Emmeline know about it?' asked mamma.

'She gave me leave to do what I liked with the old thing,' said Taisy; adding candidly, 'I did not tell her _what_ I was doing till it was all ready. She thought I was fixing it up for photographing, I think. But in the end she was nearly as excited about it as I was, and she gave me all sorts of things--blankets and pillows and crockery and little curtains.

It's just stuffed with things--inside and out--though I brought as few personal things--clothes, I mean--as possible, for I don't want to crowd _you_ up, you see. I shall have room for everything when it's all unpacked, you will see,' she added, with a touch of apology in her voice.

'Dearest child,' said mamma, 'as if we would mind that, if _you_ were comfortable.'

Taisy's eyes beamed.

'Comfortable,' she repeated; 'that is no word for what I am going to be.'

'And how long may you stay?' asked Geordie.

'As long as you like to have me,' was the reply. 'Granny is expecting her old friend to-morrow, and I _know_ they will be much happier without me. I have a letter from Granny for you, auntie, explaining her plans.

But there's no hurry about that. I want to begin unpacking. And what a lovely arrangement all this is!' she went on admiringly, touching the arm of mamma's chair as she spoke, 'nearly as beautiful as my waggon!'

Then the history of Miss Trevor's present had to be related, and all its wonderful perfections exhibited. And then Hoskins appeared with a cup of fresh tea for Miss Theresa, which she offered with a face all over smiles, for Taisy was a great favourite of hers. And 'Miss Theresa'

drank the tea, and devoured bread and b.u.t.ter and cake in a most gratifying way; and then she _had_ to run through the Hut, and see all that we had done to it.

So that, after all, it was rather late before we got to the unpacking of the waggon, though Hoskins and Margery and Dawson had already done a good deal.

CHAPTER IX

'THE KIND SEA, TOO, AUNTIE DEAR'

We _did_ get everything unpacked that night, but only in a rough-and-ready way. We should have liked to go on till midnight or later even, working by moonlight, for it was full moon and very clear weather just then, but this mamma would not hear of.

And Hoskins in her sensible way pointed out how much more nicely and neatly we could finish it all by daylight with the straw and packing cloths all tidied away, which she would 'see to' first thing in the morning.

She and mamma had already arranged for Taisy to sleep in my room that night, by Esme's sleeping with mamma, and by taking out the end of Esme's cot, to make it longer--long enough after a fashion, for _me_.

How we laughed, Taisy and I, though any other girl would have been tired after all she had done, and the tiresomely slow drive from Wetherford! Mamma was obliged to knock on the--wall, I was going to say--but of course it was not a wall, only a wooden part.i.tion, to tell us to be quiet. I never knew any one with such spirits as Taisy--not only high spirits, but _nice_ ones, for she was never boisterous, and she knew in a moment if you were not inclined for laughing or joking, though her fun was always there, ready to bubble up again at the right moment. She was full of sympathy too, in spite of her cheerfulness; no one could possibly have called her heartless.

Looking back, I can see what a _very_ good thing it was for us all that she came, even for mamma. We were in danger just then of being too much taken up with our own little life--the life of the Hut--which is one kind of selfishness.

And dear mamma in her _un_selfishness might have got too silent about all she was feeling; she was so afraid of making us young ones melancholy. But I have seen her sitting or standing, when she thought we did not notice, gazing at the sea--gazing, gazing, as if she could scarcely bear it and yet must look at it. The cruel sea, which had taken dear papa so far away! On fine, sunny days I almost think somehow it seemed worse. I know that feeling about the sea myself, as if it _were_ cruel really, below its loveliness and brilliance. And I am sure she said something of this to Taisy, the very day after Taisy came, for I heard _her_ say, though her eyes were full of tears--

'The _kind_ sea, too, auntie dear, which will bring him back again.'

And as for us children, it was just delightful past words to have Theresa. We had been very happy at the Hut already, very busy and interested, but the _fun_ of the life there came with Taisy. She was full of it, though the things we found so amusing are too trifling, even if they would not seem really silly, to write down.

The arranging of her 'house,' as she would call it, was the nicest part of all the arranging we had had to do. We pulled it close up to one side of one of our doors--the 'parish room' doors you understand, where there were no windows, so that the waggon was, so to say, protected by one of the iron walls--I don't know what else to call it, and which also gave the advantage of a tap in the night arousing us at once, _in case_ Taisy felt frightened, which she never did. But the tapping was very convenient all the same, as she could awaken me in the mornings when they got warm enough for very early bathing, without 'disturbing the whole house,' as Hoskins said. And I could tap to her, last thing at night, to wish her good-night.

You never saw a cosier place than we made of it; that first day after it was all arranged, we _couldn't_ leave off admiring it.

There was Taisy's bed along one side, rather a narrow one of course, though not worse than a berth at sea, and looking so bright with the lovely scarlet blankets Lady Emmeline had given her. And in one corner a little frame which held a ewer and basin, and in the other some hooks for hanging things with a red curtain that drew round, and short red curtains to the windows, and a _tiny_ chest of drawers; it was really one end of an old writing-table, or _secretaire_, to hold gloves and pocket-handkerchiefs and belts and small things like that. Then under the bed there was a long low trunk, what is called a cabin portmanteau, I believe, which held Taisy's best dresses, of which she had certainly not brought many, and hooks higher up than the hanging ones, for her hats. You wouldn't believe, unless you have ever been a long voyage--I _have_, since those days--all that was got into the old omnibus, by planning and ingenuity.

Taisy was as proud of it as if she had made or built, I suppose one should say, the whole carriage; indeed, I think we all were, once we had got everything perfectly arranged. Mamma carried off some of her _most_ crushable things, as she said she had really some spare room in her own cupboards or wardrobes; and I took her best hat, as it had lovely white feathers, which it would have been a thousand pities to spoil, and which there was plenty of s.p.a.ce for in the big box where Esme's and mine were.

And then Taisy declared she felt her house quite s.p.a.cious.

Lady Emmeline had sent several things for us, some especially for mamma herself, which I was particularly glad of, as dear mamma, never thinking of herself and anxious to leave the big house as pretty as usual, had left behind some little things that I am sure she missed. And old Aunt Emmeline and Taisy seemed to have guessed by magic what these were.

'How nice!' I exclaimed, when Taisy had got them unpacked. 'This screen is just like the one you have in the boudoir at home, and cushions--I _know_ you will be glad of some cushions, mamma, though you wouldn't bring any with you.'

'And a _couvre-pied_,' added Taisy; 'Granny was sure you hadn't got enough "wraps." Nothing will persuade her that it is not always as cold as winter down here.'

'It is most kind of her,' said mamma; 'and I really am very, very pleased to have these things. And--did you know, Ida?--Aunt Emmeline has also sent us two hampers full of all manner of good things to eat--chickens and a turkey, and a ham and pickled tongues, and I don't know all what.'