Part 21

On the polyanthus roots too I laid rescuing hands. They were not very good colours, but needing so much I dared not waste. The best of the lot I had noted, and now placed them down the shaded lime walk. They could grow where the primroses grew, and in spring I should welcome even their uncertain shades down amongst the bright green of the wild things. The beds were turned over well, and a little fresh soil and manure dug in; then, when neat, smooth and ready, I brought up the first detachment of small antirrhinums from the nursery for their adornment. These had grown to the height of from five to six inches, but had still a slender air. I think it would have helped their more rapid development had they been moved sooner from their first box. With seedlings, friend Ignoramus, you cannot be too particular. Never let them have the slightest check; keep them watered, cared for, and as they need it give them room. They will then reward you.

All one cool afternoon Jim and I planted out. We began in the centre and made rings round with an impromptu compass formed by a stick and string. In the rounds thus made the plantlets were steadily and firmly placed, eight inches apart, though eight inches seemed a great deal of spare room.

"They will grow," I persisted; "they are small for their age, but will soon need elbow room."

"I feel I am playing with little tin soldiers, don't you?" suggested Jim; "but they are strong little beggars and will grow bigger, won't they?"

"Oh, rather! over a foot, though they are the dwarf kind, you know; but they branch out like the wicked bay tree."

"Well, there's room for it," said Jim, and then we worked on steadily until tea-time.

"What are you sprinkling that bed with those tiny green twigs for?" asked one of the Others. "We want something a trifle cheering there, you must remember, Mary. We have to look at it all the summer."

"We don't want to have to regret Griggs's semi-red 'janiums," said another of the Others.

"They will be a blazing mass of colour," I answered confidently as I hurried over my tea. "Come, Jim, they must be got in."

"Remember it is for this summer," shouted the Other.

"And not to adorn our graves, my dear," came after us.

What had happened in my short absence? I saw with new eyes, the eyes not of the fond mother but of the critic.

"Jim!" and my whisper was awful.

"What's up? Have we done anything wrong?"

"Look at them!"

They looked absurd. They looked impossible. The bed so big and they so small, so like tiny tin soldiers, that my faith failed me. The Others would be confronted by little green twigs all the summer and regret Griggs's régime. It was hopeless! they could never rise to the occasion.

"They must come up, Jim."

"Oh, rot! Let's put 'em a bit thicker; they will flower all right, you said so half-an-hour ago."

"I don't know what I said half-an-hour ago; I feel sure now that they will take months to do anything! And what shall I do meanwhile? It's the pricking out; we were behind with that, you see. They must come up and go somewhere, where it won't matter so awfully. These beds must be a success, even if I spend every farthing I possess on buying ready-made plants."

We took them up. Jim was impressed with my sorrow. We planted those we had disturbed in the border in front as an edging.

"It won't matter so much here, they don't strike the eye, because other things are coming here in clumps, but for those two beds!"

I had nightmares of tiny tin soldiers dressed in green who marched round and round and disappeared, and then two bare brown beds loomed up like giant's eyes, and the Others all shouted,

"Isn't it hideous? What did you do it for? Oh, Mary, what a mess you have made of it!"

* * * * *

Next afternoon Jim and I, his Reverence and the Young Man--who also joined the Council--calculated exactly how many plants would be required to really fill those beds with a desirable effect. I could hardly believe it, the calculation ended in two hundred for each bed. I sat down on the grass and looked and looked as though looking would make the necessary quantity appear.

"It can't be done," I moaned in the bluest despair. "I don't possess four hundred of anything; so there!"

"You might make a kind of pattern," began the Young Man.

"I hate a kaleidoscopic effect," I growled.