nerve-racking occasion when she had forgotten to provide cakes for her At Home day, it rained heavily, spoiling the hay harvest, but keeping every visitor away.
Little things like that.
Each year, when her vegetable marrows or her gladioli received the coveted blue ticket—First Prize—at the local flower show, she would inhale the hot mashed-grass and fruit-laden atmosphere of the tent, as though it were incense compounded for her.
'My luck again,' she would declare to her disappointed competitors. 'Not your fault. Too bad—when you tried so hard.'
And then her hearty laughter would ring out, for she was genuine rather than tactful.
She was fortunate even over the circumstances in which she was orphaned. Her parents thoughtfully went on living until she was twenty-one and had finished her education and received proper dental attention. She was therefore spared the restrictions imposed upon a minor when they both died of epidemic influenza, just as the Local Authorities had passed the plans of a new by-pass road.
As these involved the sacrifice of the old family home, she received, in compensation, a sum higher than she could have hoped to get had the property come into the open market.
She was on the fringe of the leisured class and had a small private income; so she bought a well-built and comfortable residence—Pond House—which was too large and ambitious for her needs, and settled down to life in a select residential village in Kent.
Soon she was accepted as a fixture, together with her maid, her cat, her dog and everything that was hers. She was popular, for she entered into the social spirit of the community; and although she was younger than the majority of the residents, gardening and housework gave her the exercise she might have missed.
Yet, while she was friendly to all, she was intimate with none. In spite of her breezy good-nature, no one asked her personal questions, or called her by her Christian name. It was doubtful whether any one knew it, for she remained Miss Loveapple, of the Pond House.
On the sole occasion when she burst her sheath of reserve, it was a voluntary impulse. The revelation took place on a warm, wild All Hallows E'en, when a few ladies came to tea with her. Among them was a visitor from London, who brought with her a passport to popularity—a planchette.
She was a dark, skinny woman with the remnants of beauty and a suggestion of parched passion still lingering in her eyes. She wore an artistic gown of nasturtium-hued velvet and a long string of amber beads. Her personality was magnetic, so that the other women were excited to confidences as they sat in the firelight.
The windows of the drawing-room were open to the blue October twilight. Fallen beech-leaves rustled as the wind whirled them over the lawn, covering the violet-border. Witches and wonders were abroad.
'Ask the thingummy if I will get married,' invited a masculine-looking woman wistfully.
The planchette, although plainly anxious to please, had its record for accurate prediction to consider. It hesitated for a little time before it advised her 'not to give up hope.'
The inquirer, whose name was Miss Pitt, laughed in proof of sporting spirit.
'Optimistic beggar,' she said. 'But tactless. The standard of face value in the Spirit World seems much the same as ours.'
It was then that Miss Loveapple asked her question. 'I don't believe in it,' she declared positively. 'But—shall I get my wish?'
The London lady looked at her fine legs—generously displayed in the firelight—her admirable colouring and the firm moulding of her face. When she attempted to convey her own impression to the super-sensitive planchette, it proved instantly responsive.
'Yes,' it wrote firmly. Taking a chance, it added: 'Soon.'
'Wish I could bank on that,' said Miss Loveapple.
'Someone you know, or still a stranger?' hinted the London lady.
'My wish?' Miss Loveapple laughed heartily. 'It isn't a husband...No. I want to have three houses. One town, one country and one seaside.'
As the others stared at her, she spoke breathlessly in her excitement.
'I can't explain it, but it's been my great ambition ever since I can remember. Mother used to tell me about the Royal residences, so perhaps they set me going. Do you know I was furious when I heard that the family had given up Osborne House. Somehow it seemed to break the sequence, like losing a quin or quad...If ever I get hold of a lump sum, I shall have my three houses...Sounds mad, doesn't it?'
'Merely border-line,' said Miss Pitt generously.
All Hallows E'en...The wind blew down the chimney and burst through the window, in gusts of moist earthy air, faintly perfumed with violets. A slip of a moon—panic-stricken—dodged wildly amid the celestial traffic of racing clouds. Spirits drifted like mist from opening graves. The living mingled with the dead...
Not long afterwards, Miss Loveapple drew her horse in the Sweep. After her windfall had been duly pared, she received the sum of four thousand odd pounds. This was promptly put back into circulation by her purchase of two more houses—one in London and a bungalow on the south coast.
While her action was locally criticised, no one was authorised to offer advice. Only her lawyer hinted at the disadvantages.
'This property will prove a white elephant. Besides Rates, Insurance and upkeep, you have all these monthly instalments to pay on your furniture. You will be definitely crippled.'
'No,' said Miss Loveapple, 'my income will be as much as it is now. I've figured it all out. But I shall not cut my Charity list. That might be unlucky. My only worry is whether I am anti-social, having all these empty rooms when people are overcrowded in slums.'
Apparently she came to some working agreement with her conscience, for her three houses made her completely happy. She was now free from the restrictions of environment. Whenever she was bored with the landscape, she could exchange it for the spectacle of waves rolling over the beach. If she grew tired of looking at the wallpaper in her London bedroom, she had only to return to the Pond House.
But far stronger than the satisfaction obtained by scenic change, was the inflation of her sense of ownership. Whenever she moved, she opened her own front door—trod on her own carpet—broke her own china. The knowledge filled her with a consciousness of dormant power and placed her in the small company of maiden queens, dictators and hospital matrons.
At the same time, it endowed her with definite spinster status. Although the news of her engagement would create no real surprise—since she was of eligible age—no one in the village expected her to get married.
On the day when she was chosen for future newspaper publicity—consequent to a nasty experience in order to qualify as 'the victim'—Miss Loveapple was still on the right side of thirty. Those whose taste had not been impaired by the rationed beauty of the Screen would have considered her attractive. Fair-haired, with good features and colouring, she could have posed for a poster of a Britannia who had dieted sufficiently to compromise with modern dress.
On this special morning, after she had reminded herself of the luck of the London offer, she went over the list of her static blessings.
'I am well and strong. I don't owe a cent. The sun is shining. And I have my three houses.'
On
