As it was now four o’clock and getting chilly the whole party went back by the field-path, through the garden door, down the long garden to Arcot House, where they found Mrs. Belton with Mr. Carton who was at home for the week-end and Miss Sparling, who had escaped from her Governors and come across the park.
Tea was laid in the dining-room. The Rajah Café, on hearing that Mrs. Belton was having some of the girls from the Park to tea, gave her, or rather allowed her to buy, an extra cake which they had not quite exactly promised to Mrs. Hunter. Cook and Wheeler had performed wonders with oatcakes and scones, there was honey in the comb and mulberry jam and cream, and a large fruit cake sent by a naval friend of Commander Belton’s from he wasn’t allowed to say where, though as everyone kne
