Page:The Lark - E Nesbit, 1922.djvu/201



the Pigs so happily gone, and Mrs. Doveton still filling with admirable contrast the gap left by Mrs. Adela Dadd, with the mature maids doing their work as by well-oiled machinery, with Gladys to see to the shop and Mr. Dix to see to the garden, a spell of peace settled on Cedar Court, and Jane and Lucilla tasted for a few days the habitual calm and leisure of the really well-to-do.

They advertised anew for paying guests and for a cook.

"And until we get answers," said Jane, "we may as well enjoy ourselves. Let's pretend we're the idle rich."

"I should like to be rich," said Lucilla, "and I daresay I could manage to be idle, though I believe it's more difficult than you'd think; but I certainly shouldn't ever be rich and idle. Doesn't it make you want to hang people to lamp-posts when you see them with bags of money and not the faintest idea what to do with it? The only thing they seem to think of are motors . . ."

"And guzzling," said Jane.

"I don't blame them for having nice things to eat," said Lucilla firmly. "I should do that myself. What I blame them for is not enjoying things. They have everything they want, every day—and, of course, a peach is just dessert to them and not the fruit of Paradise,"

"If you ever write poetry," said Jane with conviction, "it'll be about things to eat."

"No," insisted Lucilla; "but if I were rich I'd live just nicely—like this—and every now and then I'd have something sudden and splendid—six peaches for breakfast, or