Chapter VIII: In the Public Domain

Sunday again. The whole family rambling through the great public park. Mrs. Dashwood and the girls in heaven amongst the panoply of flowers, ferns, artistic nooks, and bowers and shapely shaven lawns. They dragged old John here, there, and everywhere, around this bed, down that path, and from hill-top to water’s edge. They searched for historical spots and monuments, for sights they had heard others talk of, and for sights they had never heard of at all.

Peter and James struck out on their own account. Flowers and ferns, with a gloomy weather-worn old monument or two thrown in, were not in their line. They became interested in the forms and types of humanity that were around them. And such forms, such types! Verily, it were as though all the freaks and misfortunes of nature had been gathered together from all parts of the earth and emptied into that domain. The blind, the stunted, the lame, the halt, the limbless, the lungless, the hopeless, the homeless, all were in evidence there. On every hand, at every turn, they were crouched beneath the spreading trees, unnoticed by the hordes of leisure seekers, as unregarded by the world in general as though they had never lived.

Aged and decrepid pensioners hobbled feebly about on sticks; careless nurse-girls, with other peoples’ infants hanging anyhow in their arms, loitered around; girlish wives, with boyish husbands at their sides, pushed the precious first-born along in its new gorgeous perambulator; crowds of merry children, let loose for the day, romped riotously over everything. From improvised platforms stump-orators shouted themselves hoarse for the benefit of jeering, cheering crowds that out of curiosity assembled to hear their mouthsport. Cricket pitches, tennis courts, and bowling greens were in full play. And as interested spectators of the latter James and Peter, in the course of an hour or so, found themselves seated at the butt of a large shade tree.

The rinks were sprinkled with tottering old grey-beards and grandfathers, big-bingied, stiff-backed old fogies who did nothing all the week but smoke cigars and pose as “leading citizens.” There were a hundred or more of him in short sleeves and flannels, and a faithful portrait of any one of him would have been a valuable asset in the days of the humorous valentine.

What the game was all about or what constituted the skill of it or what didn’t, James and Peter hadn’t the remotest idea, but they saw great fun in it, and sometimes laughed till they nearly hurt themselves.

“Look, look at the old cove in the middle, with the braces; watch _him_!” Peter cried, tugging hysterically at James.

James fixed his gaze on that “old cove” and followed his movements closely.

The “old cove,” with one withered hand supporting the bowl, the other pressed against his left hip, bent down, carefully and cautiously, till he was almost sitting or lying on the lawn. A blatant, breathless sort of individual of the larrikin class, standing in the vicinity of James and Peter, groaned a loud, satirical groan, in the interests of the feeble bowler, that added to the enjoyment of our two friends. They turned their attention to the larrikin. Delighted to find he was affording amusement to some one he lifted his voice a note or two higher and called: “Now, then, _Spofforth_!”

The hoary bowler bent some more, and, satisfied that his feet had a grip of the earth, and that his sight was correct, slowly extended the bowl to arm’s length.

“Now, then! ah-h!” bellowed the larrikin, and James and Peter broke into fresh merriment.

But the warrior didn’t deliver the bowl just then; he drew his hand back again until the bowl touched his side, then once more he pushed it to arm’s length, and for several moments repeated these movements until he seemed to be imitating a man with a saw. Finally the bowl slid from his palm and started off on a peaceful rolling excursion down the rink. As it travelled the old cove’s arms went out each side of him, his chin went forward, his eyes started to jump out of his head. The bowl started to deviate to the right. The aged sportsman resorted to will-power to guide it. He hung over his left side and strained all his shrunken sinews to haul that bowl to leeward. Instead of responding the bowl started to show symptoms of spent energy before it had travelled half way down the rink. It got down to snail pace and began to flounder. The old cove worked his head and hands up and down like a pump and “hooshed” it. The bowl wobbled, then made one more revolution and stubbornly lay down on the green and sulked. The old cove spun stiffly round on one leg and, in a hollow, broken voice, shouted:

“Ech! damn it a’!”

“Hoh! hoh! hoh! Poor old Daddy Christmas!” cried the larrikin, sympathetically, and, swinging round, walked abruptly away. James and Peter, having had their fill of excitement, followed his example.

“Well, I dunno!” James murmured, coming to a standstill, after they had explored the great park from end to end, “but it beats me where they can have got to!”

Peter, with tears in his eyes, gazed about like one abandoned to the heartlessness of the cruel world, and whined: “I’d know them if I saw them, though, by Maria’s red dress!”

They moved on, and strolled round the base of a drowsy old monument that never got tired of standing in the one place on the brow of a hill. Numbers of people of all kinds were lounging round, reading newspapers and feasting on fruit in the vicinity of that monument. James and Peter scanned the faces of them all, but no! there was no father, no mother, no Polly, no Tilly amongst them!

They were in the act of abandoning the search and returning to the hotel when Peter’s eyes suddenly lit up like the morning star, and he uttered a short, happy laugh.

“There they are! Ha! ha!” he said, pointing to a red dress, amongst a number of others, on a long rustic seat, and off he scampered. James followed him slowly. James always took his joy calmly, and suppressed all symptoms of excitement. Besides, James wasn’t so confident about the discovery as Peter. But Peter’s assurance increased as the distance between himself and the objects of his sudden happiness was reduced. Once he glanced round to see if James was following, then raced on again.

The female in the red dress sat with her back to Peter, so did her companions. They were talking about the next Government House Ball, and the lady in red had just remarked that she “was afraid Sir Thomas would be leaving for Japan,” when Peter, stealing up on tip-toe, and smiling like a picture, blindfolded her with his hot, clammy hands, and held her back hair firmly against his manly bosom. The lady gasped and strained and tried to rise, but Peter had a firm grip of her. Her friends on either side turned their heads and glanced up curiously at Peter. Peter, still smiling, glanced down at them. But instead of encountering the eyes of Polly and Tilly he beheld the faces of two absolute strangers. Peter nearly dropped dead. He staggered back several yards. He was still staggering when the outraged one, finding her feet, demanded to know why “he dared lay hand on her?”

“Call a policeman, Lady Fitzsmith!” one of her companions, both of whom were now facing Peter, excitedly advised.

Peter didn’t wait for any more. He bolted, and didn’t draw breath or look round till he reached the iron gates opening on to the busy street. There he waited until James came up. James, who had also deemed it advisable to run, came up with perspiration and a scowl on his face.

“Well, you are an idiot of a fellow,” he said, “an awful d— idiot!”

Peter sparred for wind, then gasped:

“By—by Jove, I thought she was” (puff) “_Maria_, didn’t you?”