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Updated: June 6, 2025
It was a mercy he had it, for there was no known work at which he could have earned sixpence, unless perhaps it was road scraping under a not too exacting District Council. He was a harmless enough person, but when he took it into his head to leave his lodgings in town for others, equally cheap and nasty, at Marbridge, Mrs. Polkington felt fate was hard upon her.
He was also shocked at her determination to go and live a farm labourer's life in a farm labourer's cottage. He was truly sorry for Mrs. Polkington, between whom and himself there existed a mutual affection and admiration.
It was not a hiding-place; the bush beside did not half conceal Captain Polkington, yet he stood dark and unobtrusive against it and so close to the door that in looking out for him one naturally looked beyond him.
"Good-bye," he repeated; "good-bye for the present, brave little comrade." Captain Polkington was watching a pan of jam. It was the middle of the day and warm; too warm to be at work out of doors, as Johnny was, at least so the Captain thought.
Polkington, not the Captain; it assisted her in recognising that the end of the campaign had arrived. It said several unpleasant things, and it said them plainly; not the most pleasant to the reader was the announcement that the writer would himself come to Marbridge to look into matters one day that week or the next.
"And that end one is the red tulip with the black middle; it is supposed to be very good; and that other is the double blue hyacinth from down by the gate; we are going to try it in a pot in the house next year and have it bloom early." Captain Polkington nodded, but did not show much interest. "Did you put these here, or did she?" he asked. "She did," Johnny answered.
"Is he in the dining-room?" she said. "I hope you lighted the heater, Mary." Mary said she had, and Mrs. Polkington returned to her interesting subject, only pausing to remark, "How tiresome that your father is not back yet!" For a little none of the three girls moved, then Julia rose. "Are you going down to Mr. Gillat?" her mother asked.
One reason of this, no doubt, lay in the fact that Captain Polkington had not brought his purchase home with him that evening. He had meant to; when the carrier set him and his property down just outside Halgrave, he had fully meant to carry it to the cottage. But he found it so heavy and cumbersome in his weak and dejected state that he had to give it up.
"He paid five pounds for the bulb," he persisted; "he said it was worth no more to him." "Very likely not, if he could get it for that," Julia said; "but if he could have been sure of it, it would have been worth two hundred pounds." "Two hundred!" Captain Polkington gasped, turning rather white. Julia nodded. "With my guarantee," she said.
Ponsonby to say, considering what an annoyance the Polkington family had been to him, how not without wisdom he had set his face against letting them into his house for more than twenty-four hours at a stretch, and how much this particular member had thwarted and exasperated him at their last meeting. Julia recognised this and recognised also the kindness of the brusque suggestion.
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