at the end of june morland came home on leave. he looked well in his khaki. military training and camp-life had already worked wonders with his physique; his lanky, overgrown aspect had disappeared, his chest measure had increased, and he proudly showed the muscle in his arm. his father, always with an eye to artistic effects, wished to sketch him for a picture of hector, and indeed, with his classic profile and short, crisp, curly, golden hair, he would have made a capital representation of that trojan hero. but morland absolutely struck at the suggestion of sitting as model, declaring that he meant to enjoy himself during his brief leave, and should not even show his nose inside the studio.
"dad must paint the kids," he confided to claudia. "i'm fed up with portraits. don't even mean to have my photo taken if i can help it. you remember that picture of me when i was about five—'grannie's darling'? it came out as a coloured christmas supplement, and was stuck up in everybody's nursery. well, they got to know at the camp that i was the original of it, [244]and they led me a life i can tell you! they've christened me 'grannie's darling'! i'm not going to be 'hector' or anybody else! it isn't good enough! i sometimes wish i were as dark as a gipsy and had a broken nose! they couldn't call me 'my lady's lap-dog' then! do you know, they caught me once and held me down and tied a blue ribbon round my neck! i gave them something back though, for ragging me! they didn't get it all their own way. lap-dog indeed! wait till i'm out at the front, and i'll show them who's the bull-terrier!"
"poor old boy, it seems to rankle!" consoled claudia laughingly. "i should think it's probably envy on their part. they wish they could send as good-looking a photo home to be put in a locket! just forget them while you're on leave. we'll try to do something jolly. what would you like best? it's saturday to-morrow, so i'm at your disposal. shall we go for a picnic somewhere?"
"yes, if the kids don't trail after us! i don't bargain to take beata, romola, madox, lilith, constable, perugia and perhaps the baby in its pram!"
"you shan't! i'll see to that. just landry and i'll go, and we won't tell the small fry we're off."
"how about the grotto?"
"a1! i'll ask lorraine to come with us. the tide will be just right to get round the rocks, so we'll take our lunch and eat it there."
lorraine, shamelessly regardless of appointments [245]at the dentist's and dressmaker's, accepted the invitation, and joined the party with a picnic-basket. it was an ideal day for the excursion; the warm sunshine was tempered by a cool breeze blowing in straight from the atlantic; the sea had assumed its summer hue of intense blue-green, and the cliffs were covered with the beautiful crimson wild geranium.
the young people loitered along in no particular hurry, looking out to sea at the vessels, picking flowers or wild strawberries, or even a few early dewberries. as they wound up the path by the coast-guard station they heard voices behind them, and a little party consisting of an officer and two ladies passed them, walking briskly in the direction of the moors. morland, who had saluted, turned to the girls with an eloquent face.
"it's blake, our captain," he explained. "i saw him travelling down on thursday, and i believe he's staying at the 'george'."
"do you like him?" asked claudia.
"like him? if there's one man on the face of the earth whom i abhor it's that fellow! thinks he's the shah of persia and we're dirt under his feet! he's not popular, i can tell you. he makes my blood boil sometimes!"
"he's dropped something," said lorraine, bending down and picking up a small leather dispatch case that was lying by the side of the pathway. she handed it to morland.
"could you run after him and give it to him?" suggested claudia to her brother.
[246]"i shan't trouble myself. he's gone too far."
"we can leave it at his hotel afterwards then."
"i suppose we can, though if he flings his things about like this he doesn't deserve to have them returned to him, the blighter!" groused morland, pocketing the case with a frown. "i wish blake was taking his leave somewhere else. i'd rather not breathe the same air with him!"
"is it as bad as all that?" asked claudia.
"worse!" said morland gloomily. "but i don't want to talk about him—he's the skeleton at the feast—the crumpled rose-leaf—the snake in the paradise—the anything else you like that spoils my enjoyment!"
"rather mixed similes," laughed lorraine. "but never mind! we'll forget him if you like. he certainly didn't look at all attractive in my opinion."
morland pulled a face and shook a fist in the direction in which his officer had disappeared, then declared himself better and ready to jog along.
they found their special property—the cave—still uninvaded. no visitors had yet happened to come across it. the table and seats and the little cupboard at the end were just exactly as they had left them last time. they collected some driftwood, lighted a fire on the rocks below, and boiled their kettle. it was delightful to have a picnic again in the grotto. as they sat chatting afterwards, morland pulled from his pocket the leather case which captain blake had dropped on the path. he turned it over thoughtfully.
[247]"i've a score or two to settle with the owner of this," he remarked. "i'm not going to let him have it back too easily. i vote we just give him a scare about it. let him think he's lost it altogether."
"is it anything important, i wonder?" asked claudia.
"the more important the better—serve him right for losing it. i say—i'm going to stow it away here in the cupboard. it'll be quite safe, but he won't know that, and i hope he'll be in a jolly state of mind about it. we'll give him a fortnight to get excited in, then you girls can come and fetch it, make it into a parcel, and leave it at the 'george', and ask them to send it on to him at the camp."
"it would really serve him right," sympathised claudia; "only i don't quite know——"
"i do know!" chuckled morland. "it's the best rag i've ever had the chance of playing on him, and you bet i'll take it."
"suppose he finds out?" suggested lorraine.
"he won't find out. how could he? you girls will just leave the parcel at the 'george', and say someone who picked it up had handed it over to you, and will they please forward it to the officer who was staying there. nothing could be simpler."
"are those the papers that send morland to the war?" asked landry suddenly.
"don't you worry your head about them," answered claudia soothingly. "they're nothing to do with you, landry."
[248]"i don't want morland to fight!" persisted the boy. "morland shan't go to the war!"
"i'll be off some day, old sport!" laughed morland.
"to-morrow?"
"no, no, not to-morrow; but before so very long, i hope."
"will the germans shoot at you?"
"you jolly well bet they will!"
"don't excite him, morland," interfered claudia; for when landry once woke out of his usual stolid calm and began to trouble his poor dull brains with questions, he was apt to get peevish and troublesome. "no, no, landry dear; morland is quite safe at present, and we won't let the germans get him. take this basket down to the beach and find me some more shells. i want some yellow ones to finish the pattern i was making on the ledge here."
claudia was an adept at managing landry, and could keep the boy quiet and change the current of his impulses when others only irritated him. she put a basket in his hand and a yellow shell for a pattern, led him by the arm to the mouth of the grotto, and showed him the spot on the beach where he would be likely to find more. to her relief, he departed quite happily on the errand. she had been afraid he was on the verge of a burst of temper. she turned to her other brother.
"i'd a great deal rather you took that officer's case back to him right at once, morland!"
but morland was in a don't-care mood.
[249]"he's not to have it for a fortnight. if i don't leave it in the cupboard here, i shall just chuck it into the sea, so i give you full and fair warning! be a sport, claudia! here's lorraine ready to see the fun of it. aren't you, lorraine?"
neither of the girls was really quite easy about the propriety of thus hiding the officer's papers, but to please morland they consented to do as he wished, and to come again in a fortnight to fetch them. after all, it seemed only a sort of practical joke, and, to judge from morland's accounts, ragging was very much in fashion at his camp, among the tommies at any rate. so long as captain blake did not find out who had kept the leather case there would be no trouble, and they thought he deserved some punishment for his arrogant behaviour towards his men.
it was a concession which they afterwards deeply regretted.
