CHAPTER VIII

MATINS AND BREAKFAST

When Nancy and Mavis awoke the following morning it was almost eight o'clock by the latter's watch. Eight o'clock! How strange to sleep so late. Usually they were up and dressed soon after seven. Yet how sleepy they still felt. They did not understand that such a day as yesterday--the fresh air, the tramping, and the various excitements that had followed one after another--such a day demands extra hours of sleep for tired little brains and bodies.

They lay for a little while looking drowsily round Dorothy's room. Last night they had fallen asleep almost as soon as their heads had touched the pillow, and the room, though attractive even to two weary little girls, had not revealed itself to them as it did now, with the sunlight pouring in through the windows. How Dorothy must have loved it. What pretty pictures; one, a range of snow-capped Indian mountains particularly attracted them.

"Why, p'raps Dorothy lived in India when she was a tiny girl," Nancy exclaimed. "How interesting."

They were longing to see the world beyond those hills they could see as they lay in bed; Dorothy, perhaps, had seen the world beyond those towering, snowy ranges.

They thought a great deal about Dorothy and Dorothy's treasures as they scrambled into their clothes. To have had all this, to have had this beautiful room with its books and toys and dolls--dolls that certainly were not bought in England--and then one winter's day to have gone out lightheartedly and never to have returned. Nancy shuddered as, in her imagination, she saw the laughing, joyous, eager face of the child in the photograph downstairs, saw her flying after the hounds and then--the accident and never, never any more sparkle in the closed eyes. It was the nearest she had ever come to Death, at least as regarded anyone young (old people, she thought, were different), and her sensitive spirit recoiled from the cruelty of it.

"Poor, poor Dorothy," she thought. "_Why_ did it have to happen?"

And then she thought of the Prior, who evidently cared so much for children. How he must have missed Dorothy. Ah, they would have to love him very dearly to make up to him for his loss. When they got home again he must come very, very often to visit them.

A few minutes later they were startled by the solemn clanging of a bell.

"The chapel bell!" they cried together, and a delightful thrill of awe and expectation swept over them. The bell sounded so exactly like what one imagined a priory or monastery bell should be. And at last they would see all the monks, proper gowned monks! Matins and monks! Feeling that they were stepping into a world absolutely remote from the ordinary everyday world they ran hand in hand down the corridor and found the boys coming to meet them. Billy, as they descended the stairs, told them of the arrival of the new boarder.

"We shall see him at matins," he said. "Hope he's a decent sort."

The Prior, who was waiting for them in the great hall, came forward to meet them, but there was no sign of the new boarder. He conducted them down a corridor and across an open quadrangle, beyond which was the chapel.

"Visitors are not allowed in the chapel itself," he said, as they approached the beautiful building, "you will listen behind the grating."

The grating? Ah, yes, yesterday he had said something about a grating, but they had given no further thought to it. What was a grating, and why were they not allowed in the chapel? Oh, certainly they were getting far, far, beyond the confines of the everyday world.

Feeling decidedly mystified they followed the Prior through a tiny door in the north wall and along a narrow passage that led to a tiny chamber, where they found Mrs. White awaiting them. She rose to receive them and the Prior hurried away with his usual impetuous stride.

The children were puzzled. Could this tiny room possibly be part of a chapel? A nuns' grating, the Prior had mentioned yesterday. Used there to be nuns here as well as monks, and had they to squeeze into this bit of a place? Why, there was scarcely room for themselves and Mrs. White. If the other boarder should turn up, it certainly would be a tight squeeze.

The grating was so high in the wall that although Mrs. White, if she had wished, could have seen into the chapel quite easily it was impossible for any of the children to do so, unless they had stood on chairs, and, with Mrs. White there, they hardly liked to do that. How tiresomely sedate and unthrilled she looked, thought Nancy. Did nothing ever excite her? Didn't she understand the romance of listening to the distant singing of monks in a priory chapel--had she no imagination?

For the chanting or singing had started soon after their arrival. It had a curiously muffled sound coming through the narrow grating, and the children could not be sure whether the words were English or Latin. To be sure the tunes sounded familiar, but, after all, was that anything extraordinary? The Prior, if he liked a tune, was not the person to reject it because it was sung in the Church of England. Ah, there were boys singing, too; probably acolytes. It was just a little disappointing not to be able to see; a wall was not the most interesting thing to gaze at, at the best of times, and when it was shutting out monks and acolytes it was certainly very annoying. And the Prior would be wearing his gown. Ah, someone was praying. Was it the Prior? The voice sounded like his--oh, what a troublesome rule this was, that shut you up in a little box where you could see nothing! But, after all, was it not the very first rule that had been even a little disagreeable? They felt somewhat ashamed as they thought of the heaped-up kindnesses they had received at the Priory. But Mrs. White was speaking.

"Matins are over." She rose as she spoke. "The offertory bag," she added, "is on that table behind you."

Was there just the suspicion of a smile hovering round the usually sedate mouth?

Billy passed the bag first to Mrs. White and then to the children.

"Shall I put it back on the table?" he whispered, after he had added his own small offering, wishing with all his heart that it could have been bigger. It was so absurdly disproportionate to all they had received.

"No, I will give it to--to the Prior presently. He sets special store by these offerings, he says."

"Do they--do they help keep up the Priory?" Nancy asked as they left the chapel. It must cost so much, she thought, to keep up this huge place. And then there was the food for all the monks.

"Not exactly," was Mrs. White's evasive reply; "the Prior has a special use for them."

Crossing the quadrangle, Mavis ventured to enquire whether Mrs. White had known Lionel and Dorothy. Imagine their delight when they learned that not only had she known them, but that she had been their nurse. Such questions then had they to ask her about the childhood of her charges. And did she know that her "Master Lionel" was their uncle's special friend, that probably at this very moment they were together?

The Prior and breakfast awaited them on the beech lawn. The boarder they decided must have been allowed to break yet another rule, for the table was laid for only five people.

They seated themselves, Nancy again presiding, and the Prior again entertaining them with delightful stories. They had not quite finished their bacon and eggs when Monk appeared with a telegram for the Prior. The latter opened it eagerly, and, as he read, a look of pleasure settled on his face.

"No answer, Monk, thank you," he said, and then turned to his young guests with an apology.

"Excuse me, my dears, but the telegram, I knew, referred to an important matter. Arranging other people's affairs," he added, passing his cup for more coffee, "is a terrible responsibility."

"I s'pose a Prior has lots to do for other people," Nancy remarked. "Does it worry you?"

"Sometimes, my child. But in this case the pleasure I have experienced in arranging for the happiness of certain--certain people in whom I am interested has far outweighed any trouble their affairs have occasioned me."

"Does a Prior have to look after everybody and make them happy?" asked Mavis.

The Prior laughed.

"It's his _privilege_ to dispense happiness, my darling."

Montague, after he had helped himself to honey, regarded the Prior thoughtfully.

"Does a Prior like everybody?" he asked. "Does he have to?"

The Prior shook his head.

"No, no, my boy, he doesn't have to. Usually, however, he is too busy to bother about the people who are--well, antipatica."

"Oh, what is 'antipatica'?" asked Nancy, interested at once in the new word.

The Prior beamed on her.

"A new word that, eh, Nancy? You, I think, have not experienced the meaning of it yet. It means someone you cannot get in contact with, someone, in fact, who rubs you up the wrong way."

"Aunts is anti--antipatica," growled Montague, stumbling a little over the long word, "They do lots of rubbing. They wake up in the morning, with rub, rub, rub, in their minds, and it goes on all day steady." He paused to take a bite of bread and honey. Nobody spoke, for they felt there was more to come, for, once Montague got started, he seemed to have to get quite to the end of his subject before he could break off. "They've got wide-open beady eyes," he continued, "all round their heads they've got 'em, an' the eyes help them to rub. Rub? I tell you it's nothing but rub, rub, rub till, if you're a boy an' you live with them, you kind of feel as though you're sore inside--just the same as if sheets and sheets of emery paper had been used on you. Aunts," he added gravely, "aunts is best living alone, then they couldn't be--be, well, that word you said."

A giggle broke from Billy. Montague looked up sharply.

"What cher laughing at?" he growled ominously, but Billy, far from being intimidated, giggled again, and the two little girls and even the Prior seemed decidedly amused. Montague was hurt. "_You'd_ all think aunts was that if you lived with one, least, if she was like the aunt I know," he added, remembering that the children's experience of an aunt seemed to differ from his own.

"It's not the aunt, Mont," Billy explained, "it's you. You're so funny with your 'rub, rub, rub.'"

"Well, being rubbed by aunts isn't a bit funny, _I_ can tell you."

"Oh, we know, Monty dear," Nancy exclaimed. "We think she's horrid. It's only the way you looked and the way you said it all."

The Prior wore a somewhat inscrutable expression. The boy was evidently from his own showing a handful, and probably it was his, the Prior's, duty to point out to him the necessity for such as he to undergo a certain amount of discipline.

"Discipline tempered by love, yes," he mused, "but discipline dispensed by an acidulated aunt----"

And so he delivered no homily to the small volcanic person seated at his table, but led the conversation away from the things that hurt. Why, when life was so short, when summer was in its prime, let the happy hours of sunlight slip away darkened by hurts that are best forgotten? In a very little while he had the children laughing and joking together over delightful nothings. He seemed to throw out sparkles of fun and joy and the children picked them up and tossed them to each other. Montague's dark eyes lost their brooding sorrows, and the small face expanded with laughter.

And there were more stories. Stories of earthquakes in India, of moonlight picnics in the West Indies, of canons ablaze with flowers in South America. Stories, too, of Lionel and Dorothy's childhood. Yes and most of it _had_ been spent in India; Dorothy _had_ seen behind those towering ranges. Oh, the wonder and the bigness of the childhood of those two; surely no day could ever have been just ordinary everyday. And could either of them _ever_ have found time, with adventure heaped all about them, to even think of doing those things that, to grown-ups, were known as "being naughty"; to yourself, as "just wanting to know--just finding out." Surely the days had just slipped away, just as now in the Priory garden, time was slipping away unheeded.

"Boys," said Montague thoughtfully, when, at last, they rose from the table, "boys could always be good if a Prior told them stories all day--an' if a little girl with gold hair could be there listening too. B'lieve it's _work_ that makes them do things aunts hate."

The Prior put his head on one side and regarded Montague with a smile.

"It is quite possible," he said, "that if a small boy lived with me _I_ might ask him to work. I might find quite a number of things that I should like nobody but the small boy to do for me. And the results, if I ventured to ask him, you think would prove disastrous?"

"There wouldn't be _no_ disaster," Montague replied decidedly. You might loathe hoeing for an aunt who continually rubbed you up the wrong way, but to work for the Prior--Montague got excited. "Why, I could do _lots_ of things for you," he continued eagerly. "I know how to make things and I could mend anything. My guardian he calls me 'The Flaming Tin-man' (that's somebody in a book), 'cos I can tinker. Me and the blacksmith's son tinker together. I can use a saw; I wouldn't hurt it if you'd lend me one, and I'd make you a table or a thing to hold your pipes. Work sometimes," he concluded, "is _nice_."

"Well, some day you shall come and stay here, and we will work together. How about that?"

Montague's face expressed his approval. He would have discussed the happy prospect further, but Billy was getting restless. Could he, he enquired, go and get Modestine ready now?

The Prior looked at him tentatively.

"The rules of the Priory," he said, "would permit you all to stay to luncheon."

Ready acceptance was written on three small faces, but Billy hesitated.

"Why not," the Prior continued, "explore the country round here? Take lunch with you and come back to tea and stay the night. Yes, another night would be allowed; even a week or more in special cases. Why not do this, unless of course," he added, "you have some settled plans that must be carried out."

Montague and the girls looked at Billy for, somehow, they felt that it was for him to decide. A troubled look crossed his face. What the Prior offered sounded so jolly, and yet, and yet hadn't they said they wanted to see beyond the hills, and this, after all, was merely the beginning of the hills?

"I'd like to stay awfully," he said slowly, "but we _did_ have a settled plan an'--an' I think we'd better go on, thank you. You won't mind, will you, or think we don't _want_ to stay?"

The Prior, knowing Billy, understood.

"But remember," he said, "if anything should happen to prevent you carrying out your plans, or if at any time you need a night's rest, the Priory gates are always open to you. You won't forget?"

"Indeed we won't," Billy replied warmly, "and we're ever so grateful to you."

The Prior brushed away their thanks.

"Now run and ask Monk to help you saddle Modestine while I see Mrs. White. I believe she wants to replenish that basket of yours."