Rewards and Fairies - Penn State University

Rewards and Fairies
cope—I think. Then Sir Arthur said, “Quite right, Bucksteed. Dad saying, ‘“‘Pon my honour, Arthur, I can’t account for
Not another word! They are both gentlemen.” And he took it!” Oh, how my cheeks tingled when I reached my room!
off his cocked hat to Doctor Break and Rene.
But Cissie had laid out my very best evening dress, the white
‘But poor Dad wouldn’t let well alone. He kept saying, satin one, vandyked at the bottom with spots of morone
“Philadelphia, what does all this mean?”
foil, and the pearl knots, you know, catching up the drapery
‘“Well, sir,” I said, “I’ve only just come down. As far as I from the left shoulder. I had poor mother’s lace tucker and
could see, it looked as though Doctor Break had had a sud- her coronet comb.’
den seizure.” That was quite true—if you’d seen Rene seize ‘Oh, you lucky!’ Una murmured. ‘And gloves?’
him. Sir Arthur laughed. “Not much change there, Bucksteed,” ‘French kid, my dear’—Philadelphia patted her shoulder—
he said. “She’s a lady—a thorough lady.”
‘and morone satin shoes and a morone and gold crape fan.
‘“Heaven knows she doesn’t look like one,” said poor Dad. That restored my calm. Nice things always do. I wore my
“Go home, Philadelphia.”
hair banded on my forehead with a little curl over the left ear.
‘So I went home, my dear—don’t laugh so! —right under And when I descended the stairs, en grande tenue, old Amoore
Sir Arthur’s nose—a most enormous nose—feeling as though curtsied to me without my having to stop and look at her,
I were twelve years old, going to be whipped. Oh, I beg your which, alas! is too often the case. Sir Arthur highly approved
pardon, child!’
of the dinner, my dear: the mackerel did come in time. We
‘It’s all right,’ said Una. ‘I’m getting on for thirteen. I’ve had all the Marklake silver out, and he toasted my health, and
never been whipped, but I know how you felt. All the same, he asked me where my little bird’s-nesting sister was. I know
it must have been funny!’
he did it to quiz me, so I looked him straight in the face, my
‘Funny! If you’d heard Sir Arthur jerking out, “Good Ged, dear, and I said, “I always send her to the nursery, Sir Arthur,
Bucksteed!” every minute as they rode behind me; and poor when I receive guests at Marklake Hall.”’
68