The Pillars of the House, vol 1 | Page 5

The four eldest were day-scholars at the city grammar-school; but
Lancelot, a bright-faced little fellow in knickerbockers, was a pupil of
whoever would or could teach him at home, as was the little girl who
was clinging to his leg, and whose name of Robina seemed to have
moulded her into some curious likeness to a robin-redbreast, with her
brown soft hair, rosy cheeks, bright merry eyes, plump form, and quick
loving audacity. Above her sat a girl of fifteen, with the family features
in their prettiest development--the chiseled straight profile, the clear
white roseately tinted skin, the large well-opened azure eyes, the
profuse glossy hair, the long, slender, graceful limbs, and that pretty
head leant against the knees of her own very counterpart; for these were
Wilmet and Alda, the twin girls who had succeeded Felix, and whose
beauty had been the marvel of Vale Leston, their shabby dress the scorn
of the day school at Bexley. And forming the apex of the pyramid,
perched astride on the very shoulders of much-enduring Wilmet, was
three years old Angela--Baby Bernard being quiescent in a cradle near
mamma. N.B.--Mrs. Underwood, though her girls had such masculine
names, had made so strong a protest against their being called by
boyish abbreviations, that only in one case had nature been too strong
for her, and Robina had turned into Bobbie. Wilmet's second name
being Ursula, she was apt to be known as 'W.'W.
'Make haste, Felix, you intolerable boy! don't be so slow!' cried Alda.
'Is there a letter?' inquired Wilmet.
Yes, more's the pity!' said Felix. 'Now I shall have to answer it.'
'I'll do that, if you'll give me what's inside,' said Edgar.
'Is it there?' exclaimed Cherry, in a tone of doubt, that sent an electric
thrill of dismay through the audience; Lance nearly toppling over, to
the horror of the adjacent sisters, and the grave rebuke of Clement.
'If it should be a sell!' gasped Fulbert.

'Suppose it were,' said Felix gravely.
'Then, said Edgar, 'you can disown the old rogue Chester.'
'What stuff!' interposed Clement.
'I'd cut him out of my will on the spot,' persisted Edgar.
'But it is all right,' said Cherry, looking with quiet certainty into her
brother's face; and he nodded and coloured at the same time.
'But it is not a pretty one,' said little Robina. 'Last year it was green, and
before that red; and this is nasty stupid black and white, and all thin
crackling paper.'
Felix laughed, and held up the document.
'What!' cried Fulbert. 'Five! Why, 'tisn't only five shillings! the horrid
old cheat!'
'It's a five-pound note!' screamed Cherry. 'I saw one when Papa went to
the bank! O Felix, Felix!'
A five-pound note! It seemed to take away the breath of those who
knew what it meant, and then an exulting shout broke forth.
'Well,' said Edgar solemnly, 'old Chester is a brick! Three cheers for
him!'
Which cheers having been perpetrated with due vociferation, the cry
began, 'O Felix, what will you do with it?'
'Buy a pony!' cried Fulbert.
'A rocking-horse,' chirped Robina.
'Punch every week,' shouted Lance.
'A knife apiece,' said Fulbert.
'How can you all be so selfish?' pronounced Clement. 'Now a
harmonium would be good to us all.'
'Then get some cotton, for our ears into the bargain, if Tina is to play
on it,' said Edgar.
'I shall take the note to mother,' said the owner.
'Oh!' screamed all but Wilmet and Cherry, 'that's as bad as not having it
at all!'
Maybe Felix thought so, for it was with a certain gravity and solemnity
of demeanour that he entered the drawing-room, causing his father to
exclaim, 'How now? No slip between cup and lip? Not infelix, Felix?'
'No, papa, but it's this and I thought I ought to bring it.'
The dew at once was in the mother's eyes, as she sprang up and kissed
the boy's brow, saying, 'Felix, dear, don't show it to me. You were

meant to be happy with it. Go and be so.'
'Stay,' said Mr. Underwood, Felix will really enjoy helping us to this
extent more than any private expenditure. Is it not so, my boy? Well
then, I propose that the sovereign of old prescriptive right should go to
his menus plaisirs, and the rest to something needful; but he shall say to
what. Said I well, old fellow?'
'Oh, thank you, thank you!' cried Felix ardently.
'Thank me for permission to do as you will with your own?' smiled Mr.
Underwood.
'You will choose, then, Felix?' said his mother wistfully, her desires
divided between port wine for papa and pale ale for Geraldine.
'Yes, mamma,' was the prompt answer. 'Then, please, let Wilmet and
Alda be rigged out fresh for Sundays.'
'Wilmet and Alda!'