It was a pleasant time of day and Mrs. Skelton re-
flected as she beat up some eggs in a bowl, her daughter
Sarah, Mrs. Oughtenshaw, who was paying her a visit
of a week for a change of air, would soon be oop over
from her visit of inspection to the shop on the Green.
Sarah would be sure to bring all t' Warcop news, and they
would have a good talk after supper. At that point in
her reflections, the post-office door opened with a sharp
tinkle of its pendant bell, and someone came in. Mrs.
Skelton took off her apron and went behind the counter.
"Good evening," she began civilly, to break off in sur-
prise. "Why, it's Miss Effie! Lord, save us, Miss Effie,
'as anything 'appened?"
Miss Effie, who wore a black woollen scarf over her
hat and had turned up the collar of her coat, shook her
head.
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
"No, Mary, nothing at all. I just want to send a tele-
gram '
Mrs. Skelton produced the forms and the usual richly-
encrusted pens of country post-offices, and said no more.
She was burning with curiosity, however. Never in her
life had Miss Effie sent a telegram from Flaye. Moreover,
Flaye was a good five miles from Roseroofs whereas from
Roseroofs to Warcop it was barely a mile a heavy rain
was beating down and it was black as night, but Miss
Effie's grim face did not invite questions.
Miss Effie wrote out her message slowly, with the great
distinctness of people who rarely send telegrams. Then
she waited while Mrs. Skelton counted the words, and
paid, and the good woman suggested her coming into the
kitchen and standing a moment by the fire.
"You're wet through, Miss Effie." But Miss Effie
wouldn't stay ; she was in a hurry.
Mrs. Skelton held the door open while Miss Effie put
up her umbrella, and the two women shouted a final good-
night to each other against the great voice of the gale.
Then Miss Effie was swallowed by the darkness.
Mrs. Skelton closed the door, took a look at the baby
to see that it was still manipulating the comforter prop-
erly, and then went back to the office to send the tele-
gram. She had just got Middleton Post Office on the
telephone when the door again opened, this time with such
a bang that the startled woman dropped the receiver.
"Good evening, Mary. It's only me, Miss Flora ; did I
frighten you?"
Miss Flora pulled the dripping blue veil from her face
and took off her gloves.
"It's about the wire Miss Effie just sent. We've de-
cided to change it a little," and she held out her hand.
"Oh, Miss Flowra, it's against flaw. Couldn't I just
go and call Miss Effie back? Tommy could go "
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
"Miss Effie is half-way across the moor by now,
Tommy could never find her. Come, Mary, don't be
foolish!"
"But it's against flaw, Miss Flowra."
Miss Flora waved her hands. "The wire's to our sister,
Lady Fabricius," she said, with a most un-Flora-like
hauteur, "and we wish to alter it a little. Give it me,
Mary, unless you wish me to catch my death of cold stand-
ing here," and Mrs. Skelton obeyed.
Lady Fabricius, 65B, South Audley Street, London, W.
Please allow us to tell Cuckoo immediately that she is to come
to you in the Spring. Urgent.
EUPHEMIA.
Miss Flora read it slowly.
"Won't it be delightful, Mary," she said, smiling, as
she took up the pen, "for Miss Cuckoo to be presented to
the dear Queen?"
"Oo-aye, Miss Flowra! You ain't going to alter it
much?" she asked anxiously, her spare little form leaning
across the counter.
"Oh, dear, no, Mary, only a few words." Miss Flora
crossed out several words and printed her alterations
neatly above them.
"There, can you read that, Mary? I'm sure you can;
you're so clever "
Obliged tell Cuckoo your generous plans for Spring.
Strongly advise your having her immediately if possible. Very
important.
EUPHEMIA.
Mrs. Skelton read this message aloud, dismay on her
face.
"But it isn't t'same message at all, Miss Flowra."
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
Miss Flora smiled confidentially.
"Oh, the change is very unimportant, my dear Mary.
You see, between you and me, Miss Cuckoo is getting
a little tired of being always alone with just us. Not
that she doesn't love us, you know but oh, well,
she's eighteen, and I, Miss Effie and I, decided that it
would be well for her not to have to wait till Spring for
a little change of scene."
To Miss Flora's surprise, Mary Skelton looked at her
for a long moment, eye to eye, thoughtfully, as if in her
mind some idea were working.
"Do you understand?" Miss Flora asked.
"Aye, aye, Miss Flora, I understand. I'll send t'tele-
gram," the woman answered slowly.
"Of course you will, Mary," laughed Miss Flora, with
her characteristic, slightly artificial brightness, giving a
little skip.
But Mary Skelton, who had three daughters of her
own, didn't laugh.
"Girls get into mischief, Miss Flowra," she said gravely,
"if they are too much alone, even when they are lady-
girls
Supper was kept waiting nearly an hour that night,
for a boy came up with a message that Miss Flora was
dining at the Vicarage, and before this Miss Effie came in
looking very tired, saying that she had been at Barty
Raw's up toward Flaye.
"You know, Cuckoo? the one whose wife died last
Easter. It was pouring when I got there, and the old
man made me a cup of tea."
Cuckoo nodded. She was not at all interested in old
Barty Raw or in the singular fact that her aunts should
have chosen that particularly inclement afternoon for
a long walk.
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
Miss Flora got home about half-past nine, the Vicar
having had her driven up in his dog-cart, but she was
very wet, despite her umbrella and the rugs, and the sis-
ters parted almost at the door and went to bed.
Next afternoon little Bobby Christie came up the hill
with a telegram. Aunt Flora, Aunt Effie, and Cuckoo
were at tea, and when Nellie came in with her little salver
neither aunt showed the slightest interest in it.
"A telegram," said Miss Effie, pouring tea into her
cup.
"Oh, a wire," said Miss Flora, as if wires were common
enough in the house, but belonged to no one in particular,
like flies.
It is odd, however, that when Nellie, who liked living
in a house where telegrams came two days in succession,
held the salver to Cuckoo both old ladies should have
given a start of surprise.
The wire said :
Wish you to come immediately for a fortnight to see about
your presentation gown and prepare for the Season. Love to
your aunties.
AUNT MASCIA.
It was only on the death-bed of the first of the two
to go that the aunts ever told each other the story of
their having, unknown to each other, listened to Cuckoo's
mad crying that afternoon, and their resulting pilgrim-
ages through the storm to Flaye.
PART II
Two Years Pass
CHAPTER XV
THE old man leant on the counter, one elbow on a
little square of black velvet, and poked the string
of pearls about on another square.
"The little ones," he said, not more gutturally than
speak certain of the very great ones of the earth, "are
better suited to a pretty young throat."
"Yes, but think of the years when the pretty young
throat will be old and stringy like a drum-stick, when the
only pretty thing about it will be your pearls !"
He who passed his working hours among just such
scenes, except that the gentleman, though not older and
uglier than many of those who buy pearls for youg ladies,
was obviously only a parent of some kind, did not inter-
rupt the conversation. He was an elegant, princely
young man who wore an immaculate frock-coat and smelt
of eau-de-fougere.
The young lady, he thought, needed no assistance in
what was plainly her object, that of obtaining the best
possible pearls.
"These are ducks," she said, touching the string witn
a lingering hand. She had taken off her gloves, and the
jeweller's gentleman noticed that the uncut emerald on
her fourth finger was a fine one, only very slightly frosted.
"Shall I shall I try them on?"
The old man smiled, his face, frog-like to a remarkable
degree, softening charmingly as .he did so.
"You wretch ! That's why you wear no collar this icy
day."
She slipped the long necklet over her head without even
taking off her tiny black velvet toque.
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
"Am I becoming to them?" she demanded gently.
"You are, Cuckoo, you are, but they are yellowish;
not such a fine color as the smaller ones, are they?" he
returned, turning to the frock-coated expert.
"Not quite, sir, perhaps, but on the other hand they
are, if I may say so, possibly more becoming to the young
lady than the quite white ones. We find as a rule," he
went on, grandly proprietary, poor gentleman, on his
hundred and fifty pounds a year, "that only very pro-
nounced blondes really prefer quite white pearls "
Sir Adolph Fabricius gave his fat chuckle and said
quietly, his little eyes resting with a certain sharpness for
a moment on the speaker, "The large ones cost a hundred
and fifty pounds more. You are an excellent salesman,
and I trust that you get a good commission."
After a little more talk, the string of larger pearls
was decided upon, and Sir Adolph, producing a fat, gold,
heavily-chased fountain-pen and a book of dwarf checks,
wrote out a check for the amount.
The salesman, who was an observer by nature, was
surprised to see that the young lady watched the drawing
of the check as if making a mental note of its amount
rather than availing herself of one of the mirrors to ad-
mire herself in her new adornment. She was, he thought,
unlike a daughter; she was undoubtedly behaving like a
recent footlight success, one of those whose pearls are
worn with such unconsciousness of their being very visibly
and pitifully the exchange for the value of rubies.
As they turned to go, the salesman stopped them by
leaning over the counter. "I have here," he said, in an
imposing whisper, "a very curious and unusual jewel
that it may interest the young lady to see."
"I am buying no more today," said Sir Adolph, fearful
,of an attempt on his purse by the skillful one.
"Oh, sir, no one could buy this jewel," the man re-
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
turned, with an odd look of vicarious pride. "It is an
heirloom, in our hands for a few days for some slight re-
pairs."
"Oh, yes, Uncle Adolph, do let us look at it," inter-
jected Cuckoo.
The salesman, with an officiating air, bade them sit
down again, and, after a moment, produced a shabby old
leather case and laid it on one of his sacramental velvet
squares.
"H'm," said Sir Adolph. Cuckoo drew a long
breath. It was a long chain of beautiful diamonds, deli-
cately, almost invisibly, set in either platinum or silver
with marvellous flexibility. On it hung an odd, appar-
ently valueless jewel. It was a kind of pale gold bag
about six inches long, flexibly and beautifully wrought
and closely studded with topazes. The string to the bag
was a band of diamonds with seed-pearl tassels. The
little jewel was delicately pretty and very old, but as a
pendant to such a chain it was strikingly inadequate.
"What a funny thing!" Cuckoo burst out. "What is
in the bag?"
The salesman smiled and held it out.
"Smell it," he said, unexpectedly.
Cuckoo took the chain and filtered it through her
fingers till the bag lay in her hand.
"What is it? It's sage, or thyme I don't know "
Sir Adolph took it.
"It's it's well, I don't know. It's used in cooking,
but I can't name it."
The young man beamed, as if he had, at one stroke,
achieved great personal distinction.
"You are right, sir," he said, "it is used in cooking;
it's saffron. I of course, I can't tell you to whom it
belongs, but it is saffron you smell. Odd thing, isn't it?"
As they went out of the shop, Cuckoo was frowning
THE BAG OF SAFFRON
thoughtfully. Saffron, she thought, a bag of saffron.
Now where had she heard of that? Suddenly she remem-
bered and told her uncle.
"Oh, that fellow's, is it? Janeways? Yes, I have heard
of it. I remember your aunt told me about it one day.
It's famous in its way a kind of luck, you know. I
believe several women have tried to make him give it to
them H'm, h'm," he broke off abruptly.
Cuckoo nodded.
"Yes, Rachel told me, Rachel Jackson. What a
strange thing it is, but very ugly, don't you think?"
Cuckoo, very slim and smart in her blue coat and skirt,
took her uncle's arm and gave it a little squeeze.
"It was darling of you, Onkelchen," she whispered.
"You were a dear to give them to me."
The old man beamed, and there was something child-
like and almost touching in the quality of his smile.
"I am very glad I am a rich man," he said, "it's so
easy to make nice people happy. Have you spent the
money I gave you for your pretty friendt?" he added.
"Yes, I went to such a heavenly shop in South Moulton
Street," she returned, "and I got such loves of things.
The bassinette is an absolute angel, and the little woollies
oh, Uncle, such dears!"
They had got into the gray-lined limousine, a car as
big, it pleased Cuckoo to think, as some people's drawing-
rooms, and the old man turned to her.
"Mind," he said, laughing, but with a look in his eyes
that she knew, but never spoke of, "not a word of that
to your Auntie."
"Never, Uncle dear. I don't think," she went on, "she
will mind about the pearls, do you? My birthday and
Christmas gift"
He chuckled. "She never knew about the other birth-
day present, did she?"
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
Cuckoo frowned. "No. There was, you know, nothing
to show for it. It wasn't likely I'd tell her about that
beastly Bridge."
Sir Adolph looked at her. "You kept your promise,
Cuckoo?"
She showed no resentment at the question, but told him,
with a lightness betrayed by the look in her eyes, that she
had kept her promise.
"Don't you trust me?"
Old Adolph Fabricius, "Old Fab," as he was called in
the City, looked grave.
"Not quite, mein kukuchen" She was silent, and after
a moment he went on, as if apologizing to her for his
perfectly just suspicion. "You remember about the young
man, my dear?"
She drew one of the deep, sobbing breaths that always
disturbed her in moments of emotion.
"Uncle Adolph listen a moment; that was nearly two
years ago. Our engagement had only been broken four
months, and, well, I couldn't help it; he was ill, and I just
had to go when he sent for me. Are you always going
to remember it ?"
"It was brecisely one year and seven months ago, and
the fact that the young man was ill had nothing to do
with the case." He nodded. "However, as you say, it's
past and done. And about de Britch. I do believe you,
but I must just ask you, once in a while."
She knew from long experience that it was utterly use-
less to try to make the old man conform to the usual rules
of politeness. Most people, she knew, would have gone
on disbelieving her after her deliberate breaking of her
promise about George, or have forgiven her and wiped
the memory, to all appearances, from their minds. But
the old Jewish banker did neither. He loved her very
dearly, and his indulgence was great, but because she had
191
THE BAG OF SAFFRON
failed him once, he took his own little measures from time
to time of testing her, and nothing could stop this.
As the car glided along Park Lane, he spoke again.
"Cuckoo."
"Yes, Uncle Adolph?"
"Have you seen that young man again?"
Between her black hat and her black furs her little
biscuit-colored face looked very pale, but she answered
quietly.
"Twice."
"When?"
"Once about a year ago, at the play; he was in the
stalls; and one day in September when I came up from
Planings to take Kitty to the dentist."
"Did you speak to him?"
After a pause, she answered. "Yes, that time in St.
James's Street I did. Kitty was with me."
"What did you say, Cuckoo?"
As if something in his ugly, unimposing little face was
forcing her, she answered :
"I said oh, I said, 'Hallo, George, what are you doing
in town in September?' ' She laughed, but Sir Adolph
went on slowly, inexorably in his interrogatory.
"What did he say?"
"Uncle Adolph," she burst out angrily, "it's too bad
of you. I told you little Kitty Poole was with me. She's
nine and very intelligent. What could he have said before
her?"
"I am not asking you," pursued the old man, unmoved,
his confusion between d's and t's more marked as he went
on, "what he could say, I am asking you what he did say.
Tell me, Cuckoo."
The car had stopped at the old Georgian house that Sir
Adolph had bought some years before from an impover-
ished nobleman, and the footman stood at the door of the
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
car, ready to open it. The old man held up his left hand
large, flat, flabby. The man touched his hat, drew
back, and waited.
"Tell me, Cuckoo."
"Very well. He asked me why I wasn't married yet,
if you must know." Seeing the hopelessness of resist-
ance, she told him the exact truth, and he was satis-
fied.
"Ach so, and did you tell him why?"
"No, Uncle. What," she added, suddenly smiling, so
that her one dimple played in her cheek, "what would you
have told him if he had asked you ?"
The great banker looked at her a little sadly.
"I should have told him," he said, "that it was because
no one rich enough had asked me."
He then motioned to the footman to open the door, and
they went into the house.
Number 65s was one of the old houses with a TTOW of
windows on either side of the door, that give to South
Audley Street its ample, leisured aspect. The staircase, a
very beautiful one of carved chestnut, sprang upward
from a handsome, black-and-white marble floor, and sepa-
rated into two branches half-way up, landing in opposite
corners of the first floor. The walls were hung with the
portraits of the very fine collection that was the old bank-
er's greatest pride, and on the second floor, stretching
magnificently the full breadth of the house, was the pic-
ture-gallery, to which, once a month, those art-loving
members of the public who had provided themselves with
tickets from Sir Adolph's private secretary, were allowed
to make their way under that urbane young gentleman's
very perfunctory guidance.
Cuckoo went straight to her room and took off her hat
and furs. Then she stood for a moment looking at her-
self in the pier-glass that had been her first purchase with
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
her first quarter's allowance, given to her the day of her
arrival in London nearly two years before.
"I hope," her aunt had said, when this acquisition
arrived, "that you are not vain."
Cuckoo looked at her with her funny, crooked
smile.
"You mean, Aunt Marcia," she answered pleasantly,
"that I have no occasion to be. You need not worry; I
know I am not pretty. That glass simply means that I
am going to make the best of myself," and this she had
learned in a really pre-eminent way to do.
Lady Fab, as most of her friends and acquaintances
called her behind her back, gave a fleeting thought to this
fact that November day as her niece came into the morn-
ing-room before lunch. Cuckoo was still too slim, and
her frocks had to be arranged with care to conceal an
incontrovertible flatness where she would fain have had
roundness, but her blouse and skirt were perfect and her
little head brushed and cared for until, thick and dry as
her hair was, it yet was lustrous and smooth, and as with-
out excrescences as a boy's, so closely was it packed away ;
and the odd little face, with its long chin and its scarlet
mouth had, for those who liked it at all, a very strong
charm.
"You look very smart, my dear," the old lady announced
regally, looking her up and down. "That skirt's a great
success, but you've got too much black stuff on your
eyelashes."
Cuckoo took out her handkerchief, and going to the
looking-glass, removed the offending surplus of grease-
pencil. Making up her eyes was, however reprehensible
the practice may be considered, a great improvement to
her whole face, for she did it with care and skill, and it
made her eyes look larger and more lustrous than they
really were.
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
"Where Have you been?" her aunt continued, as the
butler announced lunch.
Cuckoo took from its corner a strong, gold-headed st'.ck
that of late years had been necessary to the old lady, and
helping her rise, assisted her in her slow and elephantine
progress to the dining-room. Lady Fabricius, who was
now nearly seventy-five, was enormously fat, and her small
feet, even when enjoying the luxury of heelless velvet
house-shoes, could, in sober reality, hardly .carry her.
"Where have we been?" echoed Cuckoo. "That's just
it, Auntie; you know it isn't only my birthday present
we have been buying, but my Christmas present as well."
"Considering," puffed her aunt, swinging like a huge
chest in a crane, slowly into her place at the table, "con-
sidering that your birthday is in September, and Christ-
mas five weeks off, I don't altogether see why you had any
present at all today." She spoke with unusual geniality,
but Cuckoo received at the same time a signal of distress
from her uncle and didn't quite know what to say.
"When, my angel," the old gentleman asked suddenly
(he had, since his wife's appearance, undergone a curious
change of demeanor), "when did you say Bertie was
coming?"
Under her complexion Lady Fabricius' skin took on a
faint pink color.
"Thursday night, Adolph ; only two days more."
Her little eyes, eyes ugly with the inevitable physical
ugliness of old eyes, and which held none of the thousand-
fold compensations of expressional beauty seen in the
eyes of the old whose lives have been good and gentle,
filled with tears. "I can hardly wait, Adolph," she said
tremulously.
The old man beamed. He was afraid of his wife but
he adored her, and to him she was still the imperious
beauty who had, to his never-ending amazement, conde-
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
scended over forty years ago to do him the honor of
marrying him for his money.
"My poor Marcia," he returned. "I am even gladder
for you than I am for myself. He should not have stayed
away so long from you. I wass very angry when he
decided to stay on in America."
The old lady set down her claret-glass and threw up
her head, her poor old head richly bedight with warm
auburn hair arranged in a bewildering pattern of plaits
and rolls and little curls like sausages.
"He was right, Adolph, quite right to stay in America.
Young men ought to travel ; it broadens their minds,"
Cuckoo, who was thinking of her pearls, caught the last
words.
"How old is Bertie?" she asked innocently.
Sir Adolph frowned.
"He is dear me," he answered hastily, in his most
broken English. "How dime does fly. It is odd that you
should only haf seen your cousin dat one dime, kukuchen.
He won't know you now, will he, Mammachen?" He
was allowed to call his lady "Mammachen" only, so to
speak, on high days, holidays, and bonfire-nights, and
Cuckoo realized that her aunt must, for some reason, be
in a propitious mood a mood not to be passed over
unimproved.
"Auntie dear," the girl said hurriedly, jerking the
pearls out from under her low collar, "look what Uncle
gave me to celebrate Bertie's return."
Sir Adolph gasped in a surprised way, and calling
Almond, the butler, broke his usual midday rule by having
a brandy-and-soda, but this precautionary measure was
unnecessary.
Lady Fabricius glared for a moment and asked the
price of the pearls in a voice heavy with portent; but on
Sir Adolph's raising his glass and drinking to the return
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THE BAG OF SAFFRON
of her peloved poy, she held up her claret glass and re-
turned the toast without any further discussion of the
gift.
Cuckoo shivered with relief for the row about her
emerald had been a serious one, and the ermine collar
on her opera cloak had nearly resulted in her being sent
back to Roseroofs. Not exactly ungenerous herself, Aunt
Marcia had a deep-rooted objection to her husband spend-
ing in useless gifts any of the money he had made with
his own brain, but from the first she had shown a dispo-
sition to be jealous of the old man's affection for Cuckoo.
"She's my niece, Adolph," she had said a dishearten-
ing number of times during the first months of Cuckoo's
stay with them, "no't yours." And the long-suffering
Adolph had bowed to the storm, thinking deep within his
old breast that things would indeed have been bad if
Linchen and Lenchen and das kleine Olgachen, his own
nieces, had by any evil chance been transported from
Ullheim to South Audley Street. Marcia, his angel, would
not have liked these solid young women, one of whom