BY
O. DOUGLAS
AUTHOR OF "THE SETONS," "PENNY PLAIN," ETC.
NEW YORK
GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
COPYRIGHT, 1922,
BY GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY
ANN AND HER MOTHER. I
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To
ISOBEL CUNNINGHAM
"To whatsoever things are fair
We know, through you, the road;
Nor is our grief the less thereby;
O swift and strong and dear, Good-bye."
"In this age of opulence and refinement whomcan such a character please? Such as arefond of high life will turn in disdain from thesimplicity of a country fireside. Such asmistake ribaldry for humour will find no wit inthis harmless conversation: and such as havebeen taught to deride religion will laugh atone whose chief stores of comfort are drawnfrom futurity."
OLIVER GOLDSMITH.
Mrs. Douglas and her daughter Ann sattogether in their living-room one Novembernight.
It was a wonderfully comfortable room, brightlyyet softly lit, and warmed by a noble fire. Therewas a pleasant space and emptiness about it, anabsence of ornaments and irrelevant photographs;each piece of furniture, each of the few pictures,was of value.
Mrs. Douglas had a book in her lap and in herhand a half-finished stocking, for she consideredthat she was wasting time if she did not knit whilereading.
Ann sat on a stool by the fire, poring over aseedsman's catalogue, a puzzled frown on her brow.
"I wish," she said, without looking up, "I dowish I knew more about gardening. I can't makeout from this what will grow best with us....Don't you think, Mother, it is almost lèse-majestéto call a rose Queen Mary, and describe it as 'agross feeder? Oh, and this! Mr. Asquith, 'verycompact in form, rosy in colour.' What humouriststhe compilers of seedsmen's catalogues are! Andwhat poets! Where was it we read that articleabout catalogues? It said that the very names werelike a procession of princes—'amber and carmineQueens, and Princes' Feathers, and Cloth of Gold.' Thenames tempt one simply by the glory of thesound. 'Love-in-a-Mist ... Love-Fire, a richcream with a faint suggestion of apricot primrose inpetal'—and with a drop one learns that this beautycan be bought for the sum of tuppence! ... Delphiniumswe must have—dozens of them. Ican picture us next summer lying on the lawn indeck-chairs on hot, sunny days, looking betweentall, blue delphiniums to green hilltops. Won't itbe lovely, Mother?"
"H'm," said her mother in a dry voice, "at presentyou have only the hilltops. I haven't imaginationenough to picture the hot sun and the lawnand the blue delphiniums."
"Mother!" said Ann, wheeling round on herstool and facing her parent, who was knitting withprovoking calm, "there's nothing sporting about youat all. It always rains in November, but that'snobody's fault, and you might at least try to look asif you didn't mind. Nobody ever said a glen wasa cheery place in winter, but, myself, I like itfrightfully. When Uncle Bob left me the GreenGlen for my very own I determined that somehowor other I would manage to build a house in it—alittle white-faced house among the heather. Notbig, but big enough to hold us all—six goodbedrooms, one big living-room, a h