Etheldreda the Ready | Page 3

teaches us a lesson in charity, does she not?" she
demanded blandly. That was all the response she deigned to make, but
it was enough to reduce her sister to a crimson confusion, and to rouse
Gurth to impatient anger.
"Oh, leave off nagging, you two!" he cried loudly. "If you don't drop it,
I'll be off into a smoker at the first stop. Fight it out to-night when you
are alone, if you can't agree; but let us off when we are caged up in the
same pen. Here! Let's have a game of `Roadside cribbage.' Bags I the
left side! Now then, Dreda, I choose you first. Hereward can take
Rowena. Buck up! We have got to win this time."
Etheldreda shot a glance of gratitude from the grey eyes which were
such eloquent exponents of her thoughts. To be so championed by
Gurth was worth far more than the temporary suffering inflicted by
Rowena's sharp tongue, and she set herself valiantly to be worthy of his
choice. "Roadside cribbage" was a game patronised for years by the
Saxon family on their railway journeys, and consisted merely in
dividing forces, staring steadily out of opposite windows, and scoring
for the various objects perceived, according to a quaint but well
understood method. Thus, a bridge over a river counted as five marks; a
quarry, ten; a windmill, twenty; a fire, fifty; a motor car, minus one;
while the ubiquitous bicycle was worth only three per dozen. These,
and other objects too numerous to repeat, mounted but slowly towards
the grand total of a hundred, but there remained one--just one rare
chance of winning success at a stroke, for the competitor who had the
luck to spy a cat looking out of a window might cry, "Game!" on the
instant, even if he had not so far scored a single point. It can easily be
understood that the best chances of spotting this valuable spectacle
came as the train slackened steam before entering a station. Then, as
one regarded the backs of dreary tenement houses, it really seemed

inevitable that some household cat should wish to take the air, or to
regard the world from the vantage of dusty, unwashed sills! Inevitable,
yet with the perversity of cat nature, it was extraordinary how seldom
this all-to- be-desired vision burst upon the view. "It's not fair!"
Rowena cried. "You have all the poor houses on your side, and poor
houses have always more cats than rich ones. A cat for every floor. We
ought to change sides between every station, like cricket!"
"Fudge! You've got the open country. Look out for pigs and quarries...
We've had no luck with cats for the last three journeys. On the whole, I
think yours is the best side."
"Why didn't you choose it yourself, then?"
"Charity!" answered Gurth, shortly, with a twinkling glance at his
partner, who happened to be at the same time his favourite sister,
despite her many and obvious faults. If he had been asked to describe
Dreda's character, he would have said in his easy schoolboy language
that she was a bit of a sham, perhaps, but then all girls were shams
more or less, and if you kept her off high falutin', she was a decent sort,
and always ready to do a fellow a good turn.
It was sad to note that even when speaking of his favourite sister, Gurth
should have felt it necessary to adopt this tone of patronage, but even
the stoutest champion of girls cannot but admit that the sense of honour
is in them less developed than in boys, and that in moments of irritation
they betray a petty spite, of which the more brutal male is incapable.
Gurth was conscious that he had faults of his own, but he regarded
them leniently as being on an altogether different level from those of
his sisters. He was a bit of a slacker, perhaps, but most "men" were
slackers, and yet pulled through all right by means of a spurt at the end.
His chiefs called him obstinate, but a fellow had to know his own mind
if he were to get on in the world, and he jolly well knew that he was
right as often as not Masters were awful muffs. On the other hand, he
hated gush like poison, and was invariably a hundred times better than
his word, whereas Dreda could hold forth as eloquently as a parson,
with the tears pouring down her cheeks, and her figure trembling with
emotion, and the next day forget the very cause of her emotion! The

girl was like a fire of shavings, quickly lighted, quickly extinguished,
and probably the greatest punishment which she could have sustained
would have been compelled to carry on one