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Read Ebook: J. Comyns Carr: Stray Memories by His Wife by Carr Alice Vansittart Strettel
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Ebook has 77 lines and 4749 words, and 2 pages
THE OLDEST OF THE ARTS.
"First he must learn to be a sailor.... Stepping in a small coasting craft, he put his shoulder to the wheel, determining, as many a boy has done before and since, to get to the top of the tree by plodding and perseverance."
We don't recommend this as a beginning, however. Very often the captain, who wants to steer himself, resents an additional shoulder at the wheel--and invites you to the top of the masthead.
THE MOON.
A SUPER-PSYCHOLOGICAL DRAMA IN ONE ACT.
"Cresswell sustained an injury, and took no risks, but R. M. Morton would have risked going at a battalion of dragoons with bayonets drawn."
There must be moments in these peaceful journalistic days of his retirement when that grand old soldier, "Brigadier," wishes he were once more charging at the head of his dragoons, with a drawn bayonet in his hand.
ORANGES AND LEMONS.
I found Myra in the hammock at the end of the loggia.
"Hallo," I said.
"Hallo." She looked up from her book and waved her hand. "Mentone on the left, Monte Carlo on the right," she said, and returned to her book again. Simpson had mentioned the situation so many times that it had become a catch-phrase with us.
"Fancy reading on a lovely morning like this," I complained.
"But that's why. It's a very gloomy play by IBSEN, and whenever it's simply more than I can bear I look up and see Mentone on the left, Monte Carlo on the right--I mean, I see all the loveliness round me, and then I know the world isn't so bad after all." She put her book down. "Are you alone?"
I gripped her wrist suddenly and put the paper-knife to her throat.
"Help! Help!" whispered Myra. She hesitated a moment; then swung herself out of the hammock and went in for her hat.
We climbed up a steep path which led to the rock-village above us. Simpson had told us that we must see the village; still more earnestly he had begged us to see Corsica. The view of Corsica was to be obtained from a point some miles up--too far to go before lunch.
"However, we can always say we saw it," I reassured Myra. "From this distance you can't be certain of recognising an island you don't know. Any small cloud on the horizon will do."
"I know it on the map."
We had just passed the narrow archway leading into the courtyard of the village and were following the path up the hill. But in that moment of passing we had been observed. Behind us a dozen village children now trailed eagerly.
"Oh, the dears!" cried Myra.
"But I think we made a mistake to bring them," I said severely. "No one is prouder of our--one, two, three ... I make it eleven--our eleven children than I am, but there are times when Father and Mother want to be alone."
"I'm sorry, dear. I thought you'd be so proud to have them all with you."
"Have you any coppers?" asked Myra suddenly. "You forgot their pocket-money last week."
"Ten." She took a franc from me and gave it to the biggest girl. Rapidly she explained what was to be done with it, Anne-Marie's look of intense rapture slowly straightening itself to one of ordinary gratitude as the financial standing of the other nine in the business became clear. Then we waved farewell to our family and went on.
High above the village, a thousand feet above the sea, we rested, and looked down upon the silvery olives stretching into the blue ... and more particularly upon one red roof which stood up amid the grey-green trees.
"That's the Cardews' villa," I said.
Myra was silent.
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