Squib and His Friends

“The master said so himself,” the groom told Squib, when he came down to loose him for his morning’s run. Czar was by this time a dog of mature years, and he had tamed down wonderfully. Indeed, he was often left loose during the day, and was allowed to lie on the terrace or patrol the gardens. But he lived in his house at night, and several of the men still stood in some awe of him: yet he was thoroughly under control now, and a very valuable watch-dog and guard. He was still devoted to Squib, and would obey him at a word or a look; but by this time he was attached to all the family; and whenever the master of the house was away, he slept indoors at the foot of the great staircase; and Lady Mary always said that she never felt nervous when she knew that Czar was on guard.

“You see, sir,” the groom added in explanation, “them furrain parts is none too safe, what with all these bombs and one thing and another; and the master says as hell feel more happy like to have the dog with him. If so be as he were to go off hunting wolves or boars, or whatever they may have over yonder, or leastways climbing mountains, where her ladyship couldn’t go, he’d like to leave the dog behind to look after the house; and so it’s all fixed now that Czar is to go.”

This was great news for Squib, who quickly found his way indoors to make sure of it. Uncle Ronald was in the hall looking at his guns, and he gave Squib a friendly smile.

“Oh yes, that’s all right enough,” he answered in response to the eager inquiry. “You see we’ve heard of a chalet that will just suit your mother, right up in one of those thals as they call them, out of the way of regular tourists, where the air is almost enough to keep you going without the superfluities of meat and drink. It’s furnished comfortably, too, which is a consideration; and there’s an old servant you once had who will come and act maid to your mother, and help her with the foreign ways of housekeeping – ”

“What! Lisa?” asked Squib breathlessly.

“I think that was the name – anyway she was the girl who was your nurse so many years. She’s going to come to be with you, and Mr. and Mrs. Lorimer are going to come out with us and share the chalet. You know who the Lorimers are, I suppose?”

“Yes – they come every year to stay here. They are very nice. Mrs. Lorimer is mother’s very great friend, I think. We all like her very much.”

“That’s all right. I’ve heard as much myself. Well, Mr. Lorimer is a great Alpine Club man, and no end of a mountaineer, and knows all the passes and the peaks and the guides, and the ways of things; and we shall go off from time to time with him and do some climbing, and then your mother and Mrs. Lorimer will be left at the chalet with you for their protector, and we thought that a dog like Czar would be a good addition to the party; so it’s settled that he’s to go. That’s just about how it is, you see.”

“I see,” answered Squib, looking very thoughtful and contemplative, and after a long pause he asked tentatively, “I suppose we couldn’t take Charger with us too?”

“I’m afraid not, old chap. Charger would be rather a large order; and I don’t think we’d get him up to the chalet without a steam crane or some trifle of that sort. Swiss Alps aren’t just cut out for English horses. I’m afraid Charger must stay at home.”

However, to have Czar was much, and Squib was very well content. Czar, he had felt sure, would miss him more than Charger, for he was more with him; and Charger had friends amongst all the stable hands, whilst Czar was regarded with more fear than love in many quarters. It also pleased Squib greatly to be told that on the journey Czar was to be his special care. The party would travel leisurely and easily on account of Lady Mary, and there would be a good many stoppages at various places before they reached their destination. As they would have a carriage to themselves almost invariably, it was probable the dog would be able to share it with them; but at the stations and all such places Squib was instructed to look after the creature, and have him upon his mind, as there would be other things for the gentlemen of the party to think of. Squib felt a great pride and satisfaction in this charge, and confided all the arrangements to Czar, who heard them with great gravity.

Time flew by so quickly that Squib was almost surprised to awake one morning and find that it was really the day of departure. The start was to be made in the morning. They were to go to London first, and lunch there, and then take the train to Folkestone, where they would sleep and be ready for the boat the next day.

Squib had never been to London even, and his sisters, who had once spent a week there, thought it a pity he would not be able to see the Zoological Gardens, and the Tower, and Madame Tussaud’s. But Squib had no room for regret on this score, he was in such a fever to see Switzerland and Lisa again, and the mountains and glaciers and all the wonders of his dreams. He felt very grand, dressed in his new travelling suit of tan-coloured homespun – jacket, knickerbockers, cap, and waistcoat all to match – and strong new stockings of the same shade, with new boots strong enough for mountain scrambling. His sisters had joined together in the purchase of a whistle on a chain, which they thought would be very useful for calling Czar, if he should wander away in a new place; and Squib wore it for the first time this morning, and felt wonderfully grown up in doing so, for the steel chain looked like a watch chain, and he almost felt as if he were wearing a watch all the time.

The good-byes were rather hard to make, for the little girls all cried, and Squib’s own eyes got very moist, and there was a great lump in his throat which half-choked him, whilst everything looked misty and blurred as he went about from one to another, promising to bring all sorts of treasures back with him, and leaving last messages with almost everybody. It made it all the harder because mother was almost crying too as she kissed her little daughters, and left all sorts of last charges with kind Mademoiselle; but Uncle Ronald went about laughing and making jokes, telling his little nieces that they ought to be sent off to India for an indefinite number of years to know what saying good-bye was like; and as for getting up the waterworks because mother was going for a few weeks to Switzerland, why, they were just little geese – he couldn’t call them any better name than that!

Uncle Ronald always made people laugh, and so the good-byes were got over at last between smiles and tears, and then the party found themselves skimming along the road to the station, with Czar running silently along behind, more excited than usual, because he knew quite well that something unwonted was afoot, although perhaps he had not realized quite as clearly as Squib believed that he was on his way to Switzerland.

Squib’s first sight of the sea was at Folkestone, and very wonderful he thought it. There was just enough breeze blowing to make the waves turn over in great green breakers, and come crashing down on the shingle with that strange sound which is like nothing else in the world. Colonel Rutland indulged his little son with a ramble along the beach after tea, and Squib enjoyed it greatly, especially sending Czar into the water after his father’s stick, and his indignant barking at the crested wave, which would not stop for all his barking, nor give back for a second when he flew savagely at it. Other people besides Squib were entertained by the conduct of the great handsome dog, and Squib was very well satisfied with his first day’s travel.

But the next one was far more exciting.

They were actually to cross the water in the steamboat which was lying moored alongside the great stone pier. Uncle Ronald took Squib down to look at it some short time before they were allowed on board, and Squib thought it a very wonderful vessel indeed, although Uncle Ronald laughed and called it a “poor little tub,” which seemed a very disrespectful way of speaking about it, Squib thought.

When he was once safely on board, he made friends with the sailors, and asked them a number of questions, and then went and looked down at the great throbbing engines, and talked to a smutty man who seemed to know a great deal about them, and who explained a great deal to him very good-naturedly – only, unfortunately, Squib did not understand much better at the end than he had done at the beginning. However, the man admired Czar very much, and said it wasn’t often they saw such a fine dog as that in foreign parts, he was sure; and that pleased Squib very much. So he told his new friends all about his home and his sisters and Charger, and how he was going to Switzerland for two months to take care of his mother when his father went up mountains; and altogether the time passed so quickly and pleasantly that he was quite surprised when the train came puffing up, and everybody got busy, and he was taken away by his uncle to watch the new people coming on board.

Mr. and Mrs. Lorimer were amongst these, and Squib soon picked them out. He did not, however, quit his post of vantage till he had seen all the luggage swung on board by the great crane, which he thought very interesting; and then he went to the very back of the boat where he had seen a nice coil of rope lying, and scrambling up on this he found that he was able to make a fine perch for himself, where he could see the water and have a fine view of the boat, and watch the shore as it seemed to slip away astern.

There was rather a stiff breeze blowing when they got into mid-channel, and the vessel rocked and rolled as the big green waves lifted her up and let her down. Squib thought it better than any rocking-chair or rocking-horse he had ever been on, but he noticed that some of the people began to look very queer. A sort of green hue overspread their faces, and then they generally retired from the scene, and he wondered where they all went. Poor Czar, too, grew rather restless and unhappy, and got up from beside Squib, and took a turn or two and then came and lay down again, and looked up pitifully at his little master, as if asking for sympathy. He did not seem able to get comfortable, and Squib wondered what was the matter.

“Oh, Lor’ bless you, little master, he’s only a bit sea-sick, just the same as Christian folks!” said the kindly sailor whose acquaintance Squib had made previously, and who chanced to pass along at that time. “Like enough he’ll just be a bit sick, like the other folks, and then be right again. It’s a queer thing when you come to think of it, sea-sickness. But Lor’ bless you, nine-tenths of the folks as comes aboard in bad weather can’t stand up against it. You don’t seem no worse yourself though, little master.”

“Oh no; I like it. I didn’t know what made them all look so queer. I heard mother saying she was afraid it would be rough crossing, and that she would be ill. I hope she isn’t.”

Poor Czar, however, did not escape, and was very unhappy for a time, and then quite ill; but the passage was quickly made, and once on firm ground again he thought no more of his troubles.

It amused Squib very much suddenly to hear everybody talking French, and to see the men in their blue blouses, and the fisherwomen in their white caps.

“I wish they wore pretty things like that in England,” he thought as he looked curiously about him, “and what a noise they do make; and how they jabber, and laugh, and move their hands about – just like Mademoiselle when she wants to make us understand. Oh, Uncle Ronald, are we going off already? It is such fun watching the people! I think France is a very pretty, funny country. Are we going to the Douane now? Mademoiselle told me all about that. And shall I have to ‘declare’ Czar? Is he contraband?”

“I don’t think so, but you can ask if you like,” answered Uncle Ronald, laughing. “Come along this way if you want to see the business. Your father is going to the train with the ladies, and Mr. Lorimer will see to the luggage.”

“I should like to go too,” said Squib, keenly interested in the proceedings; and accordingly his uncle led him into a great bare room where luggage was being brought in on the shoulders of blue-bloused men, and where officials were gravely asking questions over the counter on which it was placed, and marking off with white chalk the piles of luggage passed. Squib was greatly amused, especially when one man was detected smuggling tobacco under a lot of books. They could not stay to the end of the altercation, but the gestures of the French official amused the child exceedingly, as well as the laborious efforts of the Englishman to follow, and hold his own in conversation.

Then there was a rush for the train, a confabulation with the authorities about Czar, who was finally permitted to go in the carriage with the party, Uncle Ronald feeling sure that the balance in his favour was turned by Squib’s pretty childish pleading in French, and his confidence that everybody must see the many perfections of his four-footed friend. Perhaps the guard did not particularly desire the companionship of the great hound; perhaps Colonel Rutland’s air of milord Anglais had due effect. Anyway, Czar travelled peacefully to Paris with his owners, and was accorded a like privilege almost the whole way through.

Paris was very gay as the travellers drove through the streets to the hotel in the Rue Rivoli, where Colonel Rutland always stayed. Lady Mary was by this time very tired, and went at once to her room; but Squib was immensely excited by everything, and very anxious to see at least one or two of those sights of Paris over the description of which Mademoiselle had so often grown excited; so Uncle Ronald good-naturedly volunteered to pilot him, provided he would do the talking, to which Squib readily agreed.

First they had some lunch in the Champs Elysées under the trees, which seemed to Squib such a superior arrangement, that he wondered why people ever went indoors to eat. Then they visited the Louvre and spent an hour there, after which a fiacre was chartered to take them to Notre Dame and one or two other places of interest, which Squib felt much elevated by having seen. But the real excitement of the day was when, in returning, Uncle Ronald took him into a shop such as only Paris seems able to produce, and after a great deal of laughing and chaffering with a bright-faced French saleswoman, who was equally amused at Uncle Ronald’s bad and Squib’s good French, a small silver hunting-watch was purchased, together with a silver chain, and presented to the astonished Squib by his young uncle.

“Something to remember your first visit to Paris by, old chap,” he said, as he led him back to the hotel, “and to tell you the time when you get out amongst the mountains, and have nobody to remind you of it, and no big gong carrying a mile to ring you in.”

As for Squib, he hardly knew what to make of his good fortune, and his thanks were so long in coming that it seemed as if Uncle Ronald would have to go without them altogether; but, when they did come, it was with a “chiff and a rush,” as he described it afterwards, which was in itself enough to justify the sobriquet by which his small nephew went. Early upon the following morning, the party started for their long journey across France to Switzerland.

CHAPTER III.

THE CHALET IN THE HILLS

“I don’t call France pretty at all, though Mademoiselle does call it ‘La belle France,’” said Squib from his station at the carriage window, after some hours of silent study. “It’s all flat like a map, and the trees look as if somebody had gone round with an axe and taken all their heads off when they were little, and the rivers look like canals. I like the people and the animals. It’s nice of the cows to help in the fields and to draw the wagons; and the dogs help too, which is very kind of them; and I like the funny clothes the people wear. I should like a blue blouse myself, when I get to Switzerland. But I don’t call it pretty at all; not even the vineyards – and I always thought vineyards would be lovely. England is much prettier – but there’s something funny and queer about France, and that makes it interesting. I like the way they build their châteaux – with such queer little pepper-box towers, and such a lot of red roof. I should like to live in one of those little turrets myself, and have a lot of animals there to keep me company. But I don’t think there’s so very much in France that’s amusing.”

Squib was keenly interested in all he saw, but his longing all the while was for Switzerland, and the chalet in the hills of which he had heard so much, and Lisa, who was to be waiting for them there, with her stories of mountain-spirits and the water-fairies. He was almost sorry when he found that a few days were to be spent at Interlaken before they reached their final destination; yet as soon as they crossed the frontier the sense of interest and delight awoke within him, and he had no time for regrets or useless longings.

Even the railway travelling was more amusing now – the little queer carriages with a passage all down them, the blowing of horns when each station was reached or left behind, the costumes of the peasants as the travellers got more and more into the heart of the country, and the increasing beauty and wildness of the views from the carriage window.

It was dark when they reached Interlaken, and Squib had been for some time asleep, leaning against his father’s shoulder. He did not remember much about the arrival that night, nor how he got into that funny little narrow wooden bed, with its big square pillows and little white eider-down quilt. But after sleeping the sound, dreamless sleep of childhood for a number of hours, Squib suddenly woke up very wide to find the room bright with sunshine, and to realize, after a few moments of utter perplexity, that he was really in Switzerland at last. With a great throb of sudden excitement he got quickly out of bed and pattered across the cold polished floor to the window. A white curtain was drawn across it, but in a moment Squib had pulled this aside, and then he gave one great gasp and stood perfectly still – a little white figure, with a tumbled head of yellow-brown curls, and a pair of big grey eyes fixed immovably upon something outside that window, as though they would never be detached from the sight.

And what was it that Squib saw? A great white dazzling peak rising up in stately grandeur against the glorious blue of the summer sky. The sunlight bathed it in golden light. In that wonderful brilliant clearness of early morning, space seemed annihilated, and the grand snow-peak seemed to Squib to be strangely near – keeping silent watch and ward over the valley below and all the inhabitants of it. It was flanked and supported, as it were, by a whole range of rocky, snow-crowned mountains, yet seemed to stand alone, lifting its majestic head into the very heavens. Squib stood and gazed with wonder, awe, and rapture, until the scene was graven into his memory for ever. What Lisa had said about the spell of the snow-mountains was all true. He had begun already to feel it himself. He stood before the window lost to all sense of his surroundings, hearing none of the sounds about him, knowing nothing of where he was – eyes and heart and soul alike gone out to that lonely queen of the mountains, standing out in dazzling radiance against the brilliance of the morning sky. How long he thus stood he never knew, and he was only brought back to the things of the present by the sound of a laughing voice behind him.

“Hallo, old chap! – lost in the clouds already? Has the Jungfrau bewitched you altogether? Or are you ready for anything so sublunary as breakfast?”

Squib turned round with a jump to find that Uncle Ronald had come in from his room next door, and to feel that his own cheeks were wet, just as if he had been crying, and he was quite positive he had not even been thinking of anything so silly!

“Come, hurry up, youngster! You are late already; and we mean to go off to Grindelwald after breakfast, so you must look sharp! Yes, she’s a grand lady is the Jungfrau – she gets at all of our hearts in a fashion; but hurry up now and come down to the breakfast-room. Mountain air gives one a fine appetite, as you’ll find out before long.”

Squib woke out of his dream only to find himself in a country of enchantment. He hurried through his toilet, and descended to find his party (with the exception of his mother, who was keeping to her room to recover from the fatigues of the journey) seated at one end of a very long table, of which they were the only occupants, and was soon seated beside them discussing omelette and cutlet with fried potato chips, queer curly rolls, and golden honey, with all the zest of a growing boy and of a mountain traveller. Meantime he gleaned from the talk of his companions that they were about to drive into the heart of some of those mysterious regions of which he had hitherto dreamed, without daring to hope to see them. The glacier at Grindelwald, the wonderful fall of the Staubbach, the Wengern Alp, Lauterbrunnen and Mürren! He heard the names in a vague and dreamlike fashion, but hardly knew what was settled, and did not trouble to ask. What did it matter where they went in such a region of wonders? Wherever they went, that great towering peak must be near at hand, and if he had that to look at he felt he need ask no more.

Three or four wonderful days were passed by Squib in this fairy region. Each day the same carriage came to the door, with the same two strong, small, but willing and active little horses. He was set on the box beside the broad-faced driver, with whom he soon established terms of mutual intimacy, and after a little while he found himself able to exchange ideas with him with perfect freedom. He talked very much the same odd guttural language that Lisa had spoken when she was excited and in earnest, and in a very short time all Squib’s old fluency came back to him. He was interpreter to the whole party, and not a little proud of his position in that respect; but what he enjoyed even more was getting Johann to tell him all about the mountains, the people who lived amongst them, what they did in the long, dark winter months, when the snow came down and shut them in week after week and month after month; how the men in summer went out as guides and porters, and took travellers across the passes and up the great white peaks; and how the women stayed at home and tilled the land, and made provision against the winter season, driving their flocks of goats out into the green hills, and making quantities of cheese, some to sell and some to lay by to be consumed when the dark, cold season set in.

Johann had once been a guide himself, till a slight accident had hindered him from any more mountaineering, and had obliged him to take to the less exciting life of a driver during the busy summer season. But Squib learned, to his deep excitement and delight, that his new friend had twice made the ascent of the Jungfrau, and he made him give him every detail of the climb, and listened with breathless interest to the story each time it was related.

Another friend Squib made at this time was an old man who stood at a certain place in the roadway, where was a wonderful echo, and blew an immense long horn whenever visitors passed, so that they could hear the echoes reverberating and resounding backwards and forwards amongst the hills, till it seemed as if there were hundreds of voices all answering each other in weird cries. Squib could have listened to these echoes for ever, and also to the stories the old man had to tell about the caves in the hills, and the wonders of torrent and valley. He twice spent an hour with him whilst others of the party were resting or sketching, and having won the old man’s confidence, both by his talk and by the gift of sundry coins, he was allowed to blow the great horn himself once or twice, a thing which filled him with delight, although he did not find himself very successful in bringing out the deeper and more powerful notes as the old man was able to do.

Of his wonder and awe at the sight of the great glacier and its blue caves, or of those feelings which the sight of the dazzling snow-peaks awoke within him, Squib never tried to speak. Those about him were not even sure whether any very deep impression was made by them; but his observations on the manners and customs of the country would come out at intervals with a sudden rush, as when sitting at dinner on the eve of their departure for the chalet, he suddenly broke out, —

“I shall be sorry to go away for some things,” – this in answer to a question from his mother – “though I want to get to the chalet very much. But everything here is very funny and very interesting. I shall be sorry not to have Johann and the horses any more. Will everything be as funny up there as it is here?”

“How is it all funny?” asked Uncle Roland.