Christie, the Kings Servant

Christie, the King's Servant, by
Mrs. O. F.

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F. Walton
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Title: Christie, the King's Servant
Author: Mrs. O. F. Walton
Release Date: January 16, 2004 [eBook #10728]
Language: English
Character set encoding: US-ASCII
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THE KING'S SERVANT***
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CHRISTIE, THE KING'S SERVANT

A Sequel to 'Christie's Old Organ'
By MRS. O.F. WALTON
AUTHOR OF 'CHRISTIE'S OLD ORGAN' 'A PEEP BEHIND THE
SCENES' 'THE KING'S CUPBEARER' 'SHADOWS' ETC ETC

[Illustration]

Contents
CHAPTER
I
RUNSWICK BAY II LITTLE JOHN III STRANGE MUSIC IV
WHAT ARE YOU? V THE RUNSWICK SPORTS VI THE TUG OF
WAR VII OVER THE LINE VIII A NIGHT OF STORM IX ASK
WHAT YE WILL X WE KNOW XI LITTLE JACK AND BIG JACK
XII WHERE ARE YOU GOING?

[Illustration]
Chapter I
RUNSWICK BAY
It was the yellow ragwort that did it! I have discovered the clue at last.
All night long I have been dreaming of Runswick Bay. I have been
climbing the rocks, talking to the fishermen, picking my way over the
masses of slippery seaweed, and breathing the fresh briny air. And all
the morning I have been saying to myself, 'What can have made me
dream of Runswick Bay? What can have brought the events of my
short stay in that quaint little place so vividly before me?' Yes, I am

convinced of it; it was that bunch of yellow ragwort on the mantelpiece
in my bedroom. My little Ella gathered it in the lane behind the house
yesterday morning, and brought it in triumphantly, and seized the best
china vase in the drawing-room, and filled it with water at the tap, and
thrust the great yellow bunch into it.
'Oh, Ella,' said Florence, her elder sister, 'what ugly common flowers!
How could you put them in mother's best vase, that Aunt Alice gave
her on her birthday! What a silly child you are!'
'I'm not a silly child,' aid Ella stoutly, 'and mother is sure to like them; I
know she will. She won't call them common flowers. She loves all
yellow flowers. She said so when I brought her the daffodils; and these
are yellower, ever so much yellower.'
Her mother came in at this moment, and, taking our little girl on her
knee, she told her that she was quite right; they were very beautiful in
her eyes, and she would put them at once in her own room, where she
could have them all to herself.
And that is how it came about, that, as I lay in bed, the last thing my
eyes fell upon was Ella's bunch of yellow ragwort; and what could be
more natural than that I should go to sleep and dream of Runswick
Bay?
It seems only yesterday that I was there, so clearly can I recall it, and
yet it must be twenty years ago. I think I must write an account of my
visit to Runswick Bay and give it to Ella, as it was her yellow flowers
which took me back to the picturesque little place. If she cannot
understand all I tell her now, she will learn to do so as she grows older.
I was a young man then, just beginning to make my way as an artist. It
is slow work at first; until you have made a name, every one looks
critically at your work; when once you have been pronounced a rising
artist, every daub from your brush has a good market value. I had had
much uphill work, but I loved my profession for its own sake, and I
worked on patiently, and, at the time my story begins, several of my
pictures had sold for fair prices, and I was not without hope that I might

soon find a place in the Academy.
It was an unusually hot summer, and London was emptying fast. Every
one who could afford it was going either to the moors or to the sea, and
I felt very much inclined to follow their example. My father and mother
had died when I was quite a child, and the maiden aunt who had
brought me up had just passed away, and I had mourned her death very
deeply, for she had been both father and mother to me. I felt that I
needed change of scene, for I had