“Well, I must say, Miss Ruth, you haven’t had much time … ”
“Jibbooms, bobstays and battleaxes,” exclaimed Nancy. “If you call me Ruth again … ”
“All right, Miss Nancy … though Ruth’s a nice name, I must say.”
“Not for a pirate,” said Nancy. “And you know the only person who calls me Ruth now is the Great Aunt, and she doesn’t count. She even calls Peggy, Margaret.”
“I don’t, what you might say, see eye to eye with your Aunt Maria,” said Cook.
“We none of us do,” said Nancy. “Not even Mother or Uncle Jim.”
“Well, Miss Nancy,” said Cook. “With you doing the housekeeping, if you can take your mind off them death’s heads, you’d best be coming into the kitchen like your mother to talk to me about the day’s meals. There’s that bit of roast mutton, cold. There’s the brawn, and I was thinking of a treacle pudding … ”
“Oh bother,” said Nancy. “I won’t start housekeeping till tomorrow. Ask Peggy. Or, you do just as you like. Only no tapioca. Or sago. Never. We can’t stand them and I expect Dick and Dot hate them just as much as we do.”
Peggy came across the landing with paper for more skulls and crossbones.
“Here you are,” she said. “Come and look at Dick’s room. The skull and crossbones looks fine over Uncle Jim’s bed. I wonder he never thought of it himself. And I’ve put the big telescope on the table by the window. Dick’ll feel at home right away.”
“You will do the painting in the garden, won’t you?” said Cook. “I’ll have to put on a new pillowslip as it is.”
“No need,” said Nancy. “Dot won’t mind. I’ll tell her it’s a drop of blood gone black.”
“She won’t thank you,” said Cook and went off downstairs to her kitchen.
Influenza was the reason that Nancy and Peggy were alone with Cook at Beckfoot. Examination papers was the reason that they were expecting Dick and Dorothea Callum to join them. Mrs. Blackett had had influenza very badly and had been ordered to go away for a complete rest. Her brother Jim, generally known as Captain Flint, had taken her off for a sea voyage and a cruise round the coasts of Scandinavia. It meant being away for the first ten days of the summer holidays and Mrs. Blackett at first had refused even to think of it. But Captain Flint had pointed out that that was much better than spoiling the whole holidays by having a break-down and in the end she had agreed that it would not do Nancy and Peggy any harm to manage by themselves at Beckfoot. “Jolly good for them to have a chance,” Captain Flint had said. “And old Cook’ll see they’re properly fed, and Timothy Stedding’ll be hanging on in the houseboat and going to and fro to the mine. He’s got a job to do in my den. He’ll be looking in on them every other day. They’ll be right as rain.” Then had come the news that Dick and Dorothea Callum could not be taken in at Dixon’s Farm, because it was full up with other visitors, and Professor Callum had to be busy for a fortnight in London correcting examination papers. So Mrs. Blackett had invited Dick and Dorothea to join Nancy and Peggy. “Dick’s a sensible chap,” said Captain Flint, “and Dorothea’s got some sort of head on her shoulders. They’ll be ballast for the party even if they are a bit younger, and that young Dick can give Timothy a hand.” Before leaving, Mrs. Blackett had visited Nancy and Peggy at their school. “No wildnesses,” she had said doubtingly. “If I thought there was any risk of your getting into trouble, I’d much rather stay at home. I don’t know what Aunt Maria would say if she knew I was leaving you alone.” “As tame as tame can be,” Nancy had promised. “You go off and get well. We’ll be so jolly good nobody’ll know us. And then, when you come back, we’ll have a lot of wildness stored up, and we’ll fairly take it out of Uncle Jim.” And now they were back from school and looking forward to being model hostesses. Not one single thing was to be allowed to happen that would make their mother wish she had not trusted them to run the house themselves.
They came in to their midday dinner, leaving the two new specimens of skull and crossbones spread on the lawn, with stones to keep them from blowing away, while they dried in the hot August sunshine. They were talking of the boat which Professor Callum had asked their uncle to order for Dick and Dorothea, and were hoping it was ready so that its crew could get the hang of it before the Swallows turned up, who were coming in a fortnight’s time to stay at Holly Howe on the other side of the lake.
“Timothy said yesterday he didn’t think it would be done by to-day,” said Peggy.
“We’ll go and look at it on the way from the station,” said Nancy.
“They’ll be bursting to see it,” said Peggy. “I say, Nancy, is a boat she or it before it’s launched?”
Nancy never answered. The telephone bell was ringing in the hall.
“Who’s that?”
“Somebody for Cook, probably. Butcher, perhaps.”
They heard a clatter as Cook put down the pudding dish on the table in the hall. Then they heard her at the telephone. “Hullo … Hullo … Telegram, did you say? … Eh? … Mrs. Blackett is away … Miss Ruth Blackett … Wait a minute … Hold on, please. I’ll call her … ”
Nancy had already jumped up from her chair.
“It’s a telegram for you, Miss Ruth … ”
Even in that moment, Nancy shook her fist at Cook.
“Miss Ruth Blackett,” said Cook firmly. “That’s what they said.”
Nancy was already at the telephone in the hall.
“Yes … Peggy, don’t make such a row with your hoofs! I can’t hear … Wait a minute while I get a pencil … Hi! … Pencil! Peggy! … All right now … Ready … Go on … Reply paid … I heard that … Never mind about the address … ‘Are … you … alone … at … Beckfoot … when … does … your … mother … return … Maria Turner … ’ Gosh! Sorry. Nothing. I was talking to somebody else. Yes … That’s all right. I’ll send the answer in a minute or two. Thank you.” She hung up the receiver. “Gosh!” she said again. “Giminy! It’s the Great Aunt. She’s found out about Mother being away.”
“What business is it of hers?” said Cook. “You come along and eat your pudding. No call for you to get worried. Miss Turner’s far enough from here. And she can’t stop your mother now.”
“We’ve got to send an answer,” said Nancy. “It was reply paid.”
“Time enough for that,” said Cook.
Nancy, while eating her pudding, scribbled between mouthfuls. She covered a sheet of notepaper with possible telegrams, not one of which seemed fit to send. “The main thing is to quiet her down,” she said. “How can we squash her in twelve words?”
“We can’t,” said Peggy.
“We couldn’t in twelve thousand,” said Nancy. “But we’ve got to do something. Don’t you see? It’s Mother she’s getting at, not us. ‘Are you alone at Beckfoot?’ She’s prickly with disapproval.”
“We aren’t alone,” said Peggy. “Tell her Cook’s here.”
“Twelve words,” said Nancy. “And the address takes four. That’s eight for what we’ve got to say.” She crossed out a few words on her last draft, added three more, and read the result. “No. Cook is here. Mother comes back thirteenth. Nancy.”
“You could say ‘returns’ instead of ‘comes back’,” said Peggy. “And, I say, won’t you have to sign