Jeremy - Hugh Walpole

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woman in the world, she had seen with a strange un-Christian pleasure the dog's advance upon the black trousers. Then Mr. Jellybrand had been obviously afraid. He fancied, perhaps, that she too had been afraid. He fancied, perhaps, that she was not mistress in her house, that she could be browbeaten by her sister and her nurse.

      She smiled at him. “There's no reason to be afraid, Mr. Jellybrand. … He's such a little dog.”

      Then the dog smiled at her.

      “Poor little thing,” she said. “He must have nearly died in the snow.”

      Thus Miss Maple, bitterest of spinsters, influenced, all unwitting, the lives not only of a dog and a curate, but of the entire Cole family, and through them, of endless generations both of dogs and men as yet unborn. Miss Maple, sitting in her little yellow-curtained parlour drinking, in jaundiced contentment, her afternoon's cup of tea, was, of course, unaware of this. A good thing that she was unaware—she was quite conceited enough already.

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      After that smiling judgment of Mrs. Cole's, affairs were quickly settled.

      “Of course it can only be for the night, children. Father will arrange something in the morning. Poor little thing. Where did you find him?”

      “We saw him from the window,” said Jeremy quickly, “and he was shivering like anything, so we called him in to warm him.”

      “My dear Alice, you surely don't mean—” began Aunt Amy, and the Jampot said: “I really think, Mum-,” and Mr. Jellybrand, in his rich voice, murmured: “Is it quite wise, dear Mrs. Cole, do you think?”

      With thoughts of Miss Maple she smiled upon them all.

      “Oh, for one night, I think we can manage. He seems a clean little dog, and really we can't turn him out into the snow at once. It would be too cruel. But mind, children, it's only for one night. He looks a good little dog.”

      When the “quality” had departed, Jeremy's mind was in a confused condition of horror and delight. Such a victory as he had won over the Jampot, a victory that was a further stage in the fight for independence begun on his birthday, might have very awful qualities. There would begin now one of the Jampot's sulks—moods well known to the Cole family, and lasting from a day to a week, according to the gravity of the offence. Yes, they had already begun. There she sat in her chair by the fire, sewing, sewing, her fat, roly-poly face carved into a parody of deep displeasure. Life would be very unpleasant now. No tops of eggs, no marmalade on toast, no skins of milk, no stories of “when I was a young girl,” no sitting up five minutes “later,” no stopping in the market-place for a talk with the banana woman—only stern insistence on every detail of daily life; swift judgment were anything left undone or done wrong.

      Jeremy sighed; yes, it would be horrid and, for the sake of the world in general, which meant Mary and Helen, he must see what a little diplomacy would do. Kneeling down by the dog, he looked up into her face with the gaze of ingenuous innocence.

      “You wouldn't have wanted the poor little dog to have died in the snow, would you, Nurse? … It might, you know. It won't be any trouble, I expect—”

      There was no reply. He could hear Mary and Helen drawing in their breaths with excited attention.

      “Father always said we might have a dog one day when we were older—and we are older now.”

      Still no word.

      “We'll be extra good, Nurse, if you don't mind. Don't you remember once you said you had a dog when you were a little girl, and how you cried when it had its ear bitten off by a nasty big dog, and how your mother said she wouldn't have it fighting round the house, and sent it away, and you cried, and cried, and cried, and how you said that p'r'aps we'll have one one day?—and now we've got one.”

      He ended triumphantly. She raised her eyes for one moment, stared at them all, bit off a piece of thread, and said in deep, sepulchral tones:

      “Either it goes, or I go.”

      The three stared at one another. The Jampot go? Really go? … They could hear their hearts thumping one after another. The Jampot go?

      “Oh, Nurse, would you really?” whispered Mary. This innocent remark of Mary's conveyed in the tone of it more pleased anticipation than was, perhaps, polite. Certainly the Jampot felt this; a flood of colour rose into her face. Her mouth opened. But what she would have said is uncertain, for at that very moment the drama was further developed by the slow movement of the door, and the revelation of half of Uncle Samuel's body, clothed in its stained blue painting smock, and his ugly fat face clothed in its usual sarcastic smile.

      “Excuse me one moment,” he said; “I hear you have a dog.”

      The Jampot rose, as good manners demanded, but said nothing.

      “Where is the creature?” he asked.

      The new addition to the Cole family had finished his washing; the blazing fire had almost dried him, and his hair stuck out now from his body in little stiff prickles, hedgehog fashion, giving him a truly original appearance. His beard afforded him the air of an ambassador, and his grave, melancholy eyes the absorbed introspection of a Spanish hidalgo; his tail, however, in its upright, stumpy jocularity, betrayed his dignity.

      “There he is,” said Jeremy, with a glance half of terror, half of delight, at the Jampot. “Isn't he lovely?”

      “Lovely. My word!” Uncle Samuel's smile broadened. “He's about the most hideous mongrel it's ever been my lot to set eyes on. But he has his points. He despises you all, I'm glad to see.”

      Jeremy, as usual with Uncle Samuel, was uncertain as to his sincerity.

      “He looks a bit funny just now,” he explained. “He's been drying on the rug. He'll be all right soon. He wanted to bite Mr. Jellybrand. It was funny. Mr. Jellybrand was frightened as anything.”

      “Yes, that must have been delightful,” agreed Uncle Samuel. “What's his name?”

      “We haven't given him one yet. Wouldn't you think of one, Uncle Samuel?”

      The uncle considered the dog. The dog, with grave and scornful eyes, considered the uncle.

      “Well, if you really ask me,” said that gentleman, “if you name him by his character I should say Hamlet would be as good as anything.”

      “What's Hamlet?” asked Jeremy.

      “He isn't anything just now. But he was a prince who Was unhappy because he thought so much about himself.”

      “Hamlet'll do,” said Jeremy comfortably. “I've never heard of a dog called that, but it's easy to say.”

      “Well, I must go,” said Uncle Samuel, making one of his usual sudden departures. “Glad to have seen the animal. Good-bye.”

      He vanished.

      “Hamlet,” repeated Jeremy thoughtfully. “I wonder whether he'll like that-”

      His attention, however, was caught by the Jampot's sudden outburst.

      “All of them,” she cried, “supporting you in your wickedness and disobedience. I won't 'ave it nor endure it not a minute longer. They can 'ave my notice this moment, and I won't take it back, not if they ask me on their bended knees—no, I won't—and that's straight.”

      For an instant she frowned upon them all—then she was gone, the door banging after her.

      They gazed at one another.

      There was a dreadful silence. Once Mary whispered: “Suppose she really does.”

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