Read Ebook: Our Sentimental Garden by Castle Agnes Castle Egerton Robinson Charles Illustrator

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What do you think! Uncle took me into the parlor after dinner to-night and told me that he wasn't going to Paris with the rest. He says he didn't come abroad to scurry around like a wild rabbit, and that he's going to stop in Havre for a day or two. He says Edna and I had better stay with him, as he can't think of our traveling with Mr. Edgar and Mr. Chopstone alone. I said, "But there's Mrs. Clary." And he said, "Yes; but you forget Sibbilly." I do think Uncle's logic is so remarkable.

Everybody is getting their trunks in from the baggage-room and running to the rail to look at ships. Uncle won the pool again to-day; he says this is one of the pleasantest trips he ever made, and he shook hands with M. Sibilet when he met him on deck this morning.

Mrs. Clary is awfully upset over our staying in Havre, and she says if Lee is in Paris he won't like it, either. We expect a mail in Plymouth.

The mail came, and I had a letter from Lee. He is going to Russia for a week, and he folded in an extra piece, saying to give Uncle the letter. It was a funny kind of letter, but of course it had to be a funny kind of letter if I was to give it to Uncle. I gave it to Uncle, and he said, "Hum!" and that was all. He says if Mr. Edgar or Mr. Chopstone stay in Havre he'll know the reason why. I do think Uncle might be more reasonable. Edna has been crying. She doesn't want to stay in Havre; she wants to go to Paris when Harry goes.

Yours with love, as ever, YVONNE.

UNCLE JOHN IN ROUEN

"I declare, but this fresh, free atmosphere is refreshing! As soon as you get outside of your bedroom door you begin to get the full benefit of the Continental climate. I presume, if you're poor, you get it as soon as you get outside of your bed clothes. Rather a medieval staircase, eh? And four orange-trees at the bottom to try and fool us into feeling balmy. However, I don't mind little discomforts: all I mind is being shut up on a ship with a darned fool like that man Sibbilly. I shouldn't wonder if his mother was his wife, after all. I could believe anything of him. I didn't like him.

"We'll go to take in the cathedral first; it isn't far, and I've got it all by heart. Thirteenth century and unsymmetrical--you must remember that. There, that's it ahead there--with the scaffolding. They're bolstering it up somewhat, so as to keep on hooking tourists, I presume. The biggest tower is the Butter Tower, built out of paid-for permissions to eat butter in Lent. Rather a rough joke, its being so much the biggest, isn't it? The whole cathedral's lopsided from eating butter, so to speak. I believe it's the thing to stop in front and act as if you were overcome; so we'll just call a halt here and take in the general effect of the scaffolding.

"Now we'll walk around the whole thing. I haven't come abroad to take life with a hop, skip, and jump; I've come to be thorough, and I want you girls to form the habit of being thorough, too. What I didn't like about that fellow Edgar was his not being thorough. When he went down to look at the ship's machinery he only stayed an hour. Now, I didn't go at all; but if I had gone, I should have stayed more than an hour. Good job of scaffolding, isn't it? You see, they make the scaffolding out of young trees withed together, and use them over and over. Economical. Just about what you'd expect of Sibbilly. Those gargoyles and saints around the top stick their heads out pretty interested-like, don't they? But their view is for the most part blocked. Now this cheerful old jail at the back is the palace of the archbishop. I wish, young ladies, that you would note those little bits of high windows and the good thick bars across them as illustrating the secure faith that the dead and gone archbishops had in their loving people. I'll bet there's been plenty of battering and rioting around under these walls, first and last; plenty of fists and sticks and stones. It's big, isn't it? Big as half a block, and things look so much bigger here than they do at home. They slide a roof up slanting and cock it full of little crooked windows, and you feel as if you must tip over backward to take in the top. I vow, I don't just see how it's done; but--oh, here's where we go in. This dark, damp little stone-paved alley is the celebrated 'Portail des Libraires,' so called because those arcades used to be full of book-stalls. We go along on the cobble-stones, throw ourselves hard against this little swinging door; it creaks, it yields, we enter--hush!

"Well, where can we get a Swiss? I should think he'd be more handy than he appears to be. There's another man looking for him, too. He--Great Scott! if it isn't--no, that is impossible. Yes, it is!

"I beg your pardon, sir, but is your name Porter? Yes? Robert Porter--Bobby Porter that went to the Washington School? Bob, do you remember me? Well, of all the larks!

"Girls, this man and I went to school side by side for eight years, and he's the finest--my nieces, Bob. That's Edna and this is Yvonne, and--you don't say he's your son? Didn't know you ever married. Oh, I'll take your word for it, of course; but, I say, Bob, you've got to come and dine with us to-night. You must; I won't have it any other way. You and I'll have to just sit down and overhaul all our old memories together. Do you remember--but how do you come to be in Europe, anyhow; and what liner did you line up on? We had a beastly trip,--only came from Havre last night,--and, by the way, how in thunder can we get hold of the man who opens these iron gates? Everything in the place is back there.

"Is that a Swiss--that splendid circus-chariot driver? Give you my word, I thought he was a cardinal! How much of a tip is that much gold lace going to look forward to getting? I wish he was plainer, somehow. I'll tell you, Bob; you pay, and I'll settle up later. I certainly am glad to see the gates open; I felt more like a serpent shut out of paradise than I ever expected to feel in all my life.

"Well, now we begin. Who's buried here? Henry II of England, eh? I can't read Latin, so Henry's virtues and dates are all one to me. Which Henry was he, anyhow--the one with six wives or the one who never shed a smile? Either way, let's move on.

"What comes next? Richard-Coeur-de-Lion--petrified, eh? Oh, only a statue of him; that's less interesting. I thought at last I was looking at Richard when he was himself again. What is our Swiss friend hissing about? Heart buried underneath? Whose heart?--Richard's? Ask if it's his bona fide heart or only a death-mask of it? Strikes me as a pretty big statue to put up to a heart, don't you think, Bob? But come on; I want to be looking at something else.

"So this is the tomb of the husband of Diana of Poitiers? I didn't know she ever had a husband--thought she only had a king. I've never been brought up to think of Diana of Poitiers mourning a husband. But maybe she did, maybe she did. They say you must check your common sense at the hotel when you set out to inspect Europe, and I believe it--I believe it. It's a nice tomb, and if they kneel and mourn in a gown with a train, she certainly is doing it up brown. However, let's go on.

"Two cardinals of Amboise kind of going in procession on their knees over their own dead bodies--or maybe it's only hearts again. Well, Bob, the Reformation was a great thing, after all, wasn't it? Must have felt fine to straighten up for a while. Stop a bit; the guide-book said there was something to examine about these two--wait till I find the place. Oh, well, never mind; I dare say a guide-book's very handy, but I move we quit this damp old hole, anyway. I wouldn't bother to come again. That's a sad thing about life, Bob; as soon as you get in front of anything and get a square look at it, you're ready to move on--at least I am.

"Come on; I'm tired of this old church. I move that we go out and look at the place where they burned Joan of Arc, or something else that is bright and cheerful. What's he saying? No, I don't want to see any treasury; I've done enough church-going for one week-day. Give him his money, Bob, and let's get out. You tell us where to go next; you must know everything, if you were here all day yesterday. I want to see that double-faced clock and those carvings of the Field of the Cloth of Gold. They're all over in the same direction.

"So that's the clock! Well, it's a big one, surely--almost as wide as the street, although candor compels us to own that the street is about the narrowest ever. All right, I'm done; a clock is a clock, and one look in its face always tells me all I want to know. Come on; we can't stand dilly-dallying if we're to get through Rouen to-day, and I must say I consider a day to a town as quite enough in Europe. I know, when I was young and traveled for wholesale shoes, I used often and often to do three towns a day and never turn a hair. I tell you, Bob, when I was--

"Is that the fountain? Hold on; we want to see that! The guide-book has it in italics. I don't see anything to underline, though; looks foreign to me. Come on; we've got to be getting somewhere, or I shall feel I was a fool to stop off at Rouen. Not that I'm not glad to have met you again, Bob; but that could have happened anywhere else just as well, you know. When did you come over? Last year! Great Scott, what are you staying so long for? I bet I get enough in six weeks; I feel as if I'd got pretty close to enough now. Not that time ever hangs heavy on my hands, you know. No, not by a long shot. I'm the kind of man that can always amuse himself. Give me a fair show,--off a ship, of course,--and I'll defy any one to get on better. Take the day we landed, for instance, there in Havre,--rainy, not a thing to do, and every one else off for Paris. You might have looked for me to be a little disgusted, naturally; but not a bit of it. The day went like the wind. We landed at noon, I slept all the afternoon, and in the evening I took a bath. I tell you, Bob, a fellow with brains can get on anywhere. I never know what it is to feel bored.

"What's our Goddess of Liberty doing up there? What's that Indian beadwork around her feet for? Who? You don't mean to tell me that's Joan of Arc? Well, all I can say is, I never imagined her like that. But what are the beads? French funeral wreaths! Great Scott! do they keep Charlemagne wreathed, too, or is five hundred years the bead-wreath limit? Pretty idea, to put up a fountain where they burnt her--keep her memory damp at all events, eh? What's the moral of her train turning into a dolphin? Just to bring the mind gradually down to the level of the fact that it is a fountain, after all, I suppose.

"She wasn't burnt here, anyhow, the book said. The book said she was burnt farther over. Smart people here--have two places where she was burnt, so people must trot through the whole market if they try to be conscientious. Look at that woman, with her bouquet of live chickens--novel effect in chickens, eh, Bob? Strikes me it was an enterprising idea to burn Joan in the market, anyhow--good business for the market. Folks come to see the statue, and incidentally buy some peanuts.

"Well, where can we go now? I say to set out and have a look at the tower where she was imprisoned. Pulled down! It isn't, either; it's starred in the book. What's that? This tower named for her, and hers pulled down! Well, there's French honor for you again. What do you think of Sibbilly now, Edna? I don't want to see the tower if it ain't the real one. I want to see the bas-reliefs of the Field of the Cloth of Gold, and then I want to go back to the hotel to lunch. I tell you, this sight-seeing is a great appetizer. The more old ruins and burnings I look over, the hungrier I get.

"Is this the place? Makes me think of a sort of glorified gate to a woodyard. What is it, now? Well, ask somebody! A bank, eh? Are those the famous bas-reliefs? Those! Them! Well, well, I must say the touring public is easy game. They're all worn off. What's the tin overhead for? To keep the rain from damaging them, eh? Pretty bit of sarcasm, eh, Bob? Great pity they didn't think to put it four or five hundred years sooner. I don't see a man with a head or a horse with a leg from here. It lacks character, to my idea. Let's go home. Come on. I've racked around Rouen all I care to for one day."

YVONNE TO HER MOTHER

We are going to Jumi?ges to-morrow, Uncle says. Lee says he must take the early train for Havre. He's just been in to say good-by. He brought a cherry-tart and his shoe-horn, and we had ours, and so we had no trouble at all in eating it.

It has raised my spirits lots, seeing Lee. It seemed so terrible for him to go off to Russia like that. Uncle spoke of it yesterday. He said he was glad to have one worry off his mind and safe in Russia. The wardrobe squeaked merrily.

Now good-by.

Love from YVONNE.

YVONNE TO HER MOTHER

Dear Mama: Lee is gone. I do wish he could have stayed longer, but he thought it was risky. Uncle John was sure he smelt cigarette smoke in my room, and although it wasn't true at all, Edna cried and said the wardrobe was getting on her nerves, and Lee said he reckoned he'd take his button-hook and move on. We had an awful time bidding him good-by, for Uncle came in three times, and the second time he had lost his umbrella and thought it must be in our wardrobe. I never was so frightened in all my life; for, you know, if Uncle had been hunting for his umbrella and had found Lee, he wouldn't have liked it at all. Edna volunteered to look in the wardrobe, and I know I must have looked queer, for Uncle asked if I'd taken cold. You know how much I think of Lee, but I couldn't help being relieved when he was gone. It is such a responsibility to have a man in your wardrobe so much of the time. He said that I must try to steer Uncle toward Brittany, because he'll be yachting all around there. He says I must mark places in the Baedeker with strips of paper. He says that's a fine way to make any one go anywhere, and that if Edna and I will talk Italy and mark Brittany, Uncle is almost sure to wind up in the Isle of Jersey. Lee says he wishes he'd been kinder to Uncle in America, and then he'd like him better in Europe. He's afraid Uncle will never forgive him for taking him bobbing that time and dumping him off in the snow. It was too bad.

We went to Jumi?ges to-day. Uncle found it in the guide-book, and we took an eleven-o'clock train. Mr. Porter and his son were late, and just had time to get into the rear third-class coach. Uncle was much distressed until we came to Yainville, where the train stopped, and they got out. Uncle wanted them to get in with us, and he talked so forcibly on the subject that the train nearly started again before Mr. Porter could make him understand that Yainville is where you get off for Jumi?ges.

I do wish it wasn't so hard to turn Uncle's ideas another way when he's got them all wrong.

Yainville has a red-brick depot on the edge of a pleasant, rolling prairie, but there is a little green omnibus to hyphenate it with Jumi?ges. We were a very tight fit inside, for of course we could only sit in Uncle's lap, and he didn't suggest it, so I had to hold Edna; and Mr. Porter and his son knew Uncle well enough not to suggest taking her. I thought that we should never get there; and it was so tantalizing, for the country became beautiful, and we could only see it in little triangular bits between shoulders and hats. Young Mr. Porter wanted to get out and walk, but Uncle said, "Young man, when you are as old as I am, you will know as much as I do," so he gave up the idea. I do believe we were cooped up for a solid hour before we finally rolled down a little bit of a hill into a little bit of a village, and climbed stiffly out into the open air.

We all had to cry out with wonder and admiration then, it was really so wonderful. On one side were the hills, with the Seine winding off toward Paris; and on the other side was the wood, with the ragged ruins of the abbey-church walls towering up out of the loftiest foliage. Uncle thought we had better go and see all there was to be seen directly, so we walked off down the little road with a funny feeling of being partly present and partly past, but very well content.

The story goes that one of the ancient French kings took two young princes of a rival house, crippled them, put them on a boat, and set them afloat at Paris. They drifted down the current as far as this spot, and here they were rescued. They founded a monastery in gratitude, and their tomb was in the church, which is now in ruins. Later we saw the stone, with their effigies, in the little museum by the gate. They were called "Les Deux Enerv?s," in reference to their mutilation. Uncle thought the word meant "nervous," and we heard him say to Mr. Porter, "Well, who wouldn't have been, under the circumstances?" The whole of the abbey is now the private property of a lady who lives in a nice house up over back beyond somewhere. She built the lodge, and also a little museum for relics from the ruins, and has stopped the wholesale carrying off of stones from the beautiful remnants of what must have once been a truly superb monument. I am sure I shall never in all my life see anything more grand or impressive than the building as it is to-day. It is much the same plan as the cathedral at Rouen, only that that has been preserved, and this has been long abandoned. It is so curious to think of the choir which we saw yesterday, with its chapels and stained glass, and then to compare it with this roofless and windowless one, out of the tops of the walls of which fir-trees--big ones--are growing. You don't know what a strange sensation it is to see trees growing out of the tops of ruined walls the foundations of which were laid by Charlemagne's relatives. Edna and I felt very solemn, and Uncle was quiet ever so long, and then only said, "I vow!" The grass is growing in the nave and transept, and the big carved pediments stick up through the turf here and there, with moss and lichen clinging to the shadowy sides. The rows of pillars are pretty even, and the set of big arches above are mostly all there still. There were a third and a fourth gallery above, and although they are fallen away in places, still you can see exactly how it used to be. When you look away up to the fourth tier of columns, the main walls of the nave are still soaring higher yet; and when you follow the sky-line of their vastness, you see the two mighty towers rising, rising, straight up toward heaven, with the rooks whirling and circling about them and screaming in the oddest, most awfully mournful manner. I'm sure I shall never feel the same way again, not even if I live to be a thousand years old myself. I felt overcome; I felt a way that I never felt before. I don't know what I felt.

Uncle is getting very nervous over Mr. Porter, Jr., because he walks around with Edna so much; so we were not allowed out of his sight during the visit, and didn't explore half as much as we wanted to. The little museum was really very interesting, and had the tombstone of one of Joan of Arc's judges. I feel very sorry for Joan's poor judges. They had to do as they were bid, and have been execrated for it ever since.

We came home late in the afternoon, and Mr. Porter found a telegram calling him to Brussels on business, so he and his son said good-by hurriedly and took a half-past-six train. Uncle said at dinner that it was a strange thing to see how, after forty-five years of seeing the world, a man could still be the same as when one had to do all his sums for him at school. We absorbed this luminous proposition in silence, and then Uncle looked severely at Edna and said that at the rate that things were progressing he wouldn't have been surprised to have had a John Gilpin in the family any day. We were struck dumb at this threat or prophecy or whatever was intended, and went meekly to bed. Edna had a letter from Lee and I had one from Harry. Lee didn't dare write me and Harry didn't dare write Edna because of Uncle. But they each sent the other their love.

Uncle wants to go to Gisors to-morrow.

P. S. I must add a line to tell you that Mrs. Braytree and the four girls have arrived. They saw Uncle on the stairs coming up, and all came straight to our room. They landed yesterday, and had a real good passage, only Eunice fell out of the berth and sprained her wrist. She has it in a sling. They had a hard time arranging about the dog, as the hotel didn't want him in the rooms. He is one of those dogs that look scratchy and whiny at the first glance. Mrs. Braytree has lost her keys, so she sat with us while the hotel people got a man to open her trunks. She says she's in no hurry to unpack, for she had so many bottles she's almost positive one cork at least must have come out. They entirely forgot to bring any hairpins and suffered dreadfully on shipboard on that account. They had trouble with one of their port-holes too, and Mrs. Braytree and Uncle are both going to carry crowbars at sea hereafter.

They are going to stay here a week. It's so nice to meet some one from home!

Always yours lovingly, YVONNE.

UNCLE JOHN EN ROUTE

"Come on, girls, this is quite an expedition. I vow I shook a little when Mrs. Braytree suggested coming, too. Seven women to one man would be too many for comfort as a general thing; but your Uncle John never shows the white feather, so I only drew the line at the dog. Why the devil five women want to travel with one dog and eight trunks I can't see; but if I was Mrs. Braytree, I'd probably know more about it. Curious little creature, the cross-eyed one, isn't she? And that Pauline--always wanting to be somewhere else. I told her pretty flatly at dinner that if she couldn't get any more fun out of Rouen than by wishing it was St. Augustine, she'd better have stayed in New York. Anything but these fault-finders.

"Well, ain't you ready? I've sent the luggage along, and it seems to me that we ought to be following its good example. Lord knows, two days is enough to waste in an old hole like Rouen; I was wondering last night what we ever came for. I never was so cold anywhere in my life, and sleeping on a slope with a pillow on your feet isn't my idea of comfort at night, anyhow. I don't understand the moral of the scheme, and the pillow keeps sliding, and I keep swearing, all night long. Also, I can't learn to appreciate the joy of standing on a piece of oil-cloth to wash. I must say that one needs to wear an overcoat and ear-muffs to wash here, anyhow. I was dancing under the bell-rope and ringing for hot water a good half-hour this morning. I'm going to write and have the asterisk subtracted from this hotel.

"Well, come on, if you're ready. Whose umbrella is that getting left by the door? Mine? I vow, I didn't remember putting it down. But no one can think of everything. Edna, is this soap yours? No? Well, I just asked. I seem to have left mine somewhere, and it's live and learn. Come on! come on!

"There, come on! come on! Squeeze through. Se--ven women and one man. Hurry! we want a compartment, here--no, there. Run, Edna, and get ahead of that old lady; here's two umbrellas to throw crossways, and then you can tell her there's no room, and the law will uphold you. You look surprised, Mrs. Braytree, but I learned that little trick coming from Havre. I tell you, by the time I get to Paris I'll be on to every kind of game going. I learn fast--take to Europe as a duck takes to water, so to speak.

"Well, we're off for Gisors. Great pleasure to have you with us, Mrs. Braytree; no more work to steer seven--Good Lord! there aren't but six here! Who isn't here? Edna's gone! What is it, Yvonne? I sent her ahead, did I? Oh, so I did, so I did. And of course she is waiting for us. Poor child! I hope she's not worried. As soon as we get out of the tunnel I'll hang out of the window and holler to her. Very convenient method of talking to your friends aboard, Mrs. Braytree; only I should think a good many would lose their heads as a consequence. However, as the majority of the heads would be foreigners', I don't suppose it would matter much in the long run.

"Speaking of Gisors, Mrs. Braytree, it's really a very interesting place--according to the guide-book. As far as I'm personally concerned, I'd be willing to take the time to go there to learn how to pronounce it. The workings of the mind which laid out the way to speak French don't at all jibe with the workings of the mind which laid out the way to spell it--not according to my way of thinking. There's that place which we've just left, for instance,--'Ruin' as plain as the nose on your--on anybody's face,--and its own inhabitants can't see it--pronounce the R in a way that I should think would make their tongues feel furry, and then end up as if, on second thought, they wouldn't end at all.

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