CHAPTER XXV.“YOU ARE NOT TO TELL.”
Pauline was certainly better, although she was not what she was before. In body she was to all appearance quite well. She ate heartily, took long walks, and slept soundly at night; but she was dull. She seldom laughed; she took little interest in anything. As to the sea, she had a positive horror of it. When she went out for walks she invariably chose inland directions. She liked to walk briskly over the great moors which surround Easterhaze, and to sit there and think, though nobody knew what she was thinking about. Her face now and then looked pathetic, but on the whole it was indifferent. Miss Tredgold was much concerned. She made up her mind.
“The seaside is doing the child no good,” she thought. “I will take her straight back home. She is certainly not herself; she got a much greater shock than we knew of or had any idea of. When she gets home the sight of the other children and the old place will rouse her. She is not consumptive at the present moment. That is one thing to be thankful for. I shall take her to London for the winter. If going back to The Dales does not arouse her, she must go somewhere else, for roused she certainly must be.”
Miss Tredgold, having made up her mind, spoke to Verena.
“We are going home to-morrow, Verena,” she said.
“And a very good thing,” answered the young girl.
“Do you really think so?”
“I do, Aunt Sophy. Pauline has got all she can get out of the sea at present. She does not love the sea; she is afraid of it. She may be better when she is home.”
“And yet she is well,” said Miss Tredgold. “The doctor pronounces her in perfect health.”
“In body she is certainly well,” said Verena.
“Oh, then, you have observed it?”
“Yes, I have,” replied Verena slowly. “There is some part of her stunned. I can’t make out myself what ails her, but there is undoubtedly one part of her stunned.”
“We will take her home,” said Miss Tredgold.
The good lady was a person of very direct action and keen resource. She had whisked Pauline and Verena off to the sea almost at a moment’s notice, and quite as quickly she brought them back. They were all glad to go. Even Pen was pleased. Pen looked very still and solemn and contented during these days. She sat close to Pauline and looked into her eyes over and over again; and Pauline neverresented her glance, and seemed to be more pleased to be with Penelope than with anybody else.
The nice landau which Miss Tredgold had purchased met the travellers at Lyndhurst Road, and the first piece of news which Briar, who had come to meet them, announced was that the ponies had arrived.
“Peas-blossom and Lavender are so sweet!” she said. “They came yesterday. We are quite longing to ride them. As to Peas-blossom, he is quite the dearest pony I ever looked at in my life.”
“Peas-blossom will be Pauline’s special pony,” said Miss Tredgold suddenly. “Do you happen to know if the sidesaddles have arrived?”
“Oh, yes, they have; and the habits, too,” said Briar. “It is delicious—delicious!”
“Then, Pauline, my dear, you shall have a ride to-morrow morning.”
Pauline scarcely replied. She did not negative the idea of the ride, but neither did she accept it with any enthusiasm.
There was a wild moment when the entire family were reassembled. All the girls surrounded Pauline, and kissed her and hugged her as though she had come back from the dead.
“You quite forget,” said Penelope, “that I was nearly drownded, too. I was very nearly shutting up of my eyes, and closing of my lips, and stretching myself out and lying drownded and still on the top of the waves. I was in as big a danger as Pauline, every bit.”
“But you didn’t get ill afterwards, as Paulie did,” said the other girls.
They kissed Pen, for, being their sister, they had to love her after a fashion; but their real adoration and deepest sympathy were centred round Pauline.
Meanwhile Pen, who never cared to find herself neglected, ran off to discover nurse.
“Well,” she said when she saw that worthy, “here I am. I’m not pale now. I am rosy. The seaside suits me. The salty waves and the sands, they all agrees with me. How are you, nursey?”
“Very well,” replied nurse, “and glad to see you again.”
“And how is Marjorie? Kiss me, Marjorie.”
She snatched up her little sister somewhat roughly.
“Don’t make the darling cry,” said nurse.
“All right,” replied Pen. “Sit down, baby; I have no time to ’tend you. Nursey, when I was at the sea I was a very ’portant person.”
“Were you indeed. Miss Pen? But you always think yourself that. And how is Miss Pauline?”
“Paulie?” said Penelope. “She’s bad.”
“Bad!” echoed nurse.
“Yes, all-round bad,” said Penelope.
As she spoke she formed her mouth into a round O, and looked with big eyes at nurse.
“The seaside didn’t agree with her,” said Pen. “Nor does the fuss, nor the petting, nor the nice food, nor anything else of that sort. The only thing that agrees with Paulie is me. She likes to have me with her, and I understand her. But never mind about Paulie now. I want to ask you a question. Am I the sort of little girl that lions would crunch up?”
“I never!” cried nurse. “You are the queerest child!”
“But am I, nursey? Speak.”
“I suppose so, Miss Pen.”
“I thought so,” answered Pen, with a sigh. “I thought as much. I am bad through and through, then. They never eat good uns. You know that, don’t you, nursey? They wouldn’t touch Marjorie, though she is so round and so white and so fat; and they wouldn’t look at Adelaide or Josephine, or any of those dull ones of the family; but they’d eat me up, and poor Paulie. Oh! they’d have a nice meal on Paulie. Thank you, nursey. I am glad I know.”
“What is the child driving at?” thought nurse as Penelope marched away. “Would lions crunch her up, and would they crunch up Miss Paulie? Mercy me! I wouldn’t like any of us to be put in their way. I do hope Miss Pen won’t go off her head after a time; she is too queer for anything. But what is wrong with Miss Pauline? I don’t like what she said about Miss Pauline.”
When nurse saw Pauline she liked matters even less. For though her dearly beloved young lady looked quite well in health, her eyes were no longer bright, and she did not take the slightest interest in the different things which the children had to show her. When asked if she would not like to visit the stables, now in perfect restoration, and see for herself those darling, most angelic creatures that went by the names of Peas-blossom and Lavender, she said she was tired and would rather sit in the rocking-chair on the lawn.
The others, accompanied by Aunt Sophia, went off to view the ponies; and then at the last moment Pen came back. She flung herself on the ground at Pauline’s feet.
“I has quite made up my mind for ever and ever,” she said. “Not even lions will drag it from me.”
“What?” asked Pauline.
“Why, all that I know: about who stole the thimble, and about the picnic on the birthday, and about what Briar and Patty did, and about you, Paulie, and all your wicked, wicked ways. I meant to tell once, but I will never tell now. So cheer up; even lions won’t drag it from me.”
Pauline put her hand to her forehead.
“I keep having these stupid headaches,” she said. “They come and go, and whenever I want to think they get worse. I suppose I have been very bad, and that all you say is right, but somehow I can’t think it out. Only there is one thing, Pen—if I were you I wouldn’t do wrong any more. It isn’t worth while.”
“It is quite worth while getting you cheered up,” said Pen, “so I thought I’d let you know.”
That same evening Briar and Patty held a consultation in their own room.
“We must do it after breakfast to-morrow,” said Patty.
Just then there was a slight rustle. Briar paused to listen.
“Those horrid mice have come back again,” she said. “We must get Tiddledywinks to spend a night or two in this room.”
“Oh, bother the mice!” was Patty’s response. “Let us arrange when we must see her.”
“I have planned it all out,” said Briar. “We must tell her just everything we know. She won’t be so terribly angry with Paulie, because poor Paulie is not well. But I suppose she will punish us terribly. I have been thinking what our punishment ought to be.”
“What?” asked Patty.
“Why, not to ride either of the ponies until after Christmas.”
“Oh! don’t tell her to do that,” said Patty, in some alarm. “I have been so pining for my rides.”
“There’s that mouse again,” said Briar.
The children now looked under the little beds, and under the farther one there was something which would certainly have preferred to be thought an enormous mouse. On being dragged to the front, the stout, dishevelled figure of Penelope Dale was discovered.
“I comed a-purpose,” said Pen, who did not look the least taken aback. “I saw by your faces that you were up to fun, and I thought I’d like to be in it. It is well I comed. I am willing to talk to you about everything. Call me a mouse if you like. I don’t care. I meant to listen. I am glad I comed.”
“You are too mean for anything,” said Briar. “You are the horridest girl I ever came across. Why did you dare to hide under my bed in order to listen to what I had to say to Patty?”
“I knew it all afore,” said Penelope, “so that wasn’t why I comed. I comed to keep you from doing mischief. What are you going to tell to-morrow?”
“That isn’t your business,” said Briar.
“But I am going to make it my business. What you have to tell isn’t news to me. You are going to ’fess ’cos of the pain in your little hearts. You must keep your pain,and you must not ’fess. You are going to tell Aunt Sophy about that wicked, wicked birthday night—how you stole away in the dark across the lawn, and wore your Glengarry caps, and how you didn’t come back until the morning. But you mustn’t tell. Do you hear me, Briar and Patty?”
“But why not? Why should you talk to us like that?” asked Patty. “Why shouldn’t we say exactly what we like?”
“You mustn’t tell ’cos of Paulie. She is ill—more ill than you think. She mustn’t be punished, nor fretted, nor teased, nor worrited. If you tell it will worrit her, so you mustn’t tell. Why do you want to tell? You have kept it dark a long time now.”
“Because we are unhappy,” said Patty then. “We haven’t got hard hearts like yours. My heart aches so badly that I can’t sleep at nights for thinking of the lies I’ve told and how wicked I am.”
“Pooh!” said Penelope. “Keep your achy hearts; don’t worrit.”
“But it’s past bearing,” said Briar. “What we feel is remorse. We must tell. The Bible is full of the wickedness of people not confessing their sins. We can’t help ourselves. We are obliged to tell.”
“Just because you have a bit of pain,” said Pen in a tone of deepest contempt. “I suppose you think I never have any pain. Little you know. I have done a lot of wicked things. I consider myself much the most desperate wicked of the family. Your little pains is only pin-pricks compared to mine. It would relieve me to tell, but I love Paulie too much, so I won’t. We have all got to hold our tongues for the present. Now good-night. I am not a mouse, nor a rat, nor a ferret. But I mean what I say. You are not to tell.”
CHAPTER XXVI.DECEITFUL GIRLS.
Miss Tredgold was dreadfully puzzled to know what to make of the girls. The time was autumn now; all pretense of summer had disappeared. Autumn had arrived and was very windy and wet, and the girls could no longer walk in twos and twos on the pretty lawn. They had to keep to the walks, and even these walks were drenched, as day after day deluges of rain fell from the heavens. The Forest, too, was sodden with the fallen leaves, and even the ponies slipped as they cantered down the glades. Altogetherit was a most chilling, disappointing autumn, winter setting in, so to speak, all at once. Verena said she never remembered such an early season of wintry winds and sobbing skies. The flowers disappeared, several of the Forest trees were rooted up in consequence of the terrible gales, and Miss Tredgold said it was scarcely safe for the children to walk there.
“The best cure for weather of this sort,” she said to herself, “is to give the young people plenty to do indoors.”
Accordingly she reorganized lessons in a very brisk and up-to-date fashion. She arranged that a good music-master was to come twice a week from Southampton. Mistresses for languages were also to arrive from the same place. A pretty little pony-cart which she bought for the purpose conveyed these good people to and from Lyndhurst Road station. Besides this, she asked one or two visitors to come and stay in the house, and tried to plan as comfortable and nice a winter as she could. Verena helped her, and the younger girls were pleased and interested; and Pen did what she was told, dashing about here and there, and making suggestions, and trying to make herself as useful as she could.
“The child is improved,” said Miss Tredgold to Verena. “She is quite obliging and unselfish.”
Verena said nothing.
“What do you think of my new plans, Verena?” said her aunt. “Out-of-door life until the frost comes is more or less at a standstill. Beyond the mere walking for health, we do not care to go out of doors in this wet and sloppy weather. But the house is large. I mean always to have one or two friends here, sometimes girls to please you other girls, sometimes older people to interest me. I should much like to have one or twosavantsdown to talk over their special studies with your father; but that can doubtless be arranged by-and-by. I want us to have cheerful winter evenings—evenings for reading, evenings for music. I want you children to learn at least the rudiments of good acting, and I mean to have two or three plays enacted here during the winter. In short, if you will all help me, we can have a splendid time.”
“Oh, I will help you,” said Verena. “But,” she added, “I have no talent for acting; it is Paulie who can act so well.”
“I wish your sister would take an interest in things, Verena. She is quite well in body, but she is certainly not what she was before her accident.”
“I don’t understand Pauline,” said Verena, shaking her head.
“Nor do I understand her. Once or twice I thought I would get a good doctor to see her, but I have now nearly resolved to leave it to time to restore her.”
“But the other girls—can you understand the other girls, Aunt Sophy?” asked Verena.
“Understand them, my dear? What do you mean?”
“Oh, I don’t mean the younger ones—Adelaide and Lucy and the others. I mean Briar and Patty. They are not a bit what they were.”
“Now that you remark it, I have noticed that they are very grave; but they always do their lessons well, and I have nothing to complain of with regard to their conduct.”
“Nor have you anything to complain of with regard to Paulie’s conduct,” said Verena. “It isn’t that.”
“Then what is it, my dear?”
“It is that they are not natural. There is something on their minds. I am certain of it.”
“Verena,” said her aunt gently, “I wonder if I might confide in you.”
Verena started back; a distressed look came over her face.
“If it happens to be anything against Paulie, perhaps I had better not hear,” she said.
“I do not know if it is for her or against her. I am as much in the dark as you. I have not spoken of it yet to any one else, but I should like to mention it to you. It seems to me that light ought to be thrown on some rather peculiar circumstances or your sister will never get back her old brightness and gaiety of heart.”
“Then if you think so, please tell me, Aunt Sophy,” said Verena.
She got up as she spoke and shut the door. She was a very bright and pretty-looking girl, but her face sometimes wore too old a look for her age. Her aunt looked at her now with a mingling of affection and compassion.
“Come,” she said, “sit on this sofa, darling. We can understand each other better when we are close together. You know how much I love you, Renny.”
“There never, never was a better aunt,” said the girl.
“I am not that. But I do love you. Now, dear, I will tell you. You remember when first I came?”
“Oh, don’t I? And how angry we were!”
“Poor children! I don’t wonder. But don’t you think, Verena, I was a very brave woman to put myself into such a hornet’s nest?”
“Indeed you were wonderful. It was your bravery that first attracted me. Then I saw how good you were, and how kindly you meant, and everything else became easy.”
“But was it equally easy for Pauline?”
“I—I don’t know. I am sure I do know, however, that now she loves you very much.”
“Ah! now,” said Miss Tredgold. “But what about the early time?”
“I don’t quite know.”
“Verena, if I am to be frank with you, you must be frank with me.”
“I think perhaps she was not won round to you quite as easily as I was.”
“You are right, my dear. It was harder to win her; but she is worth winning. I shall not rest until I bring her round altogether to my side. Now, little girl, listen. You know what a very odd child we are all forced to consider your sister Pen?”
“I should think so, indeed.” Verena laughed.
“Well, your sister found out one day, not very long after I came, that I had lost a thimble.”
“Your beautiful gold thimble? Of course we all knew about that,” said Verena. “We were all interested, and we all tried to find it.”
“I thought so. I knew that Pen in particular searched for it with considerable pains, and I offered her a small prize if she found it.”
Verena laughed.
“Poor Pen!” she said. “She nearly broke her back one day searching for it. Oh, Aunt Sophy! I hope you will learn to do without it, for I am greatly afraid that it will not be found now.”
“And yet, Verena,” said Miss Tredgold—and she laid her hand, which slightly shook, on the girl’s arm—“I could tell you of a certain person in this house to whom a certain dress belongs, and unless I am much mistaken, in the pocket of that dress reposes the thimble with its sapphire base, its golden body, and its rim of pale-blue turquoise.”
“Aunt Sophy! What do you mean?”
Verena’s eyes were wide open, and a sort of terror filled them.
“Don’t start, dear. That person is your sister Pauline.”
“Oh! Pauline! Impossible! Impossible!” cried Verena.
“It is true, nevertheless. Do you remember that day when she was nearly drowned?”
“Can I forget it?”
“The next morning I was in her room, and the servant brought in the dark-blue serge dress she wore, which had been submerged so long in the salt water. It had been dried, and she was bringing it back. The girl held in her hand the thimble—the thimble of gold and sapphire and turquoise. She held the thimble in the palm of her hand, and said, ‘I found it in the pocket of the young lady’s dress. It is injured, but the jeweller can put it right again.’ You can imagine my feelings. For a time I was motionless, holding the thimble in my hand. Then I resolved to put it back where it had been found. I have heard nothing of it since from any one. I don’t suppose Pauline has worn that skirt again; the thimble is doubtless there.”
“Oh, may I run and look? May I?”
“No, no; leave it in its hiding-place. Do you think the thimble matters to me? What does matter is this—that Pauline should come and tell me, simply and quietly, the truth.”
“She will. She must. I feel as if I were in a dream. I can scarcely believe this can be true.”
“Alas! my dear, it is. And there is another thing. I know what little trinkets you each possess, for you showed them to me when first I came. Have you any reason to believe, Verena, that Pauline kept one trinket back from my knowledge?”
“Oh, no, Aunt Sophy; of course she did not. Pauline has fewer trinkets than any of us, and she is fond of them. She is not particularly fond of gay clothes, but she always did like shiny, ornamenty things.”
“When she was ill I saw round her neck a narrow gold chain, to which a little heart-shaped locket was attached. Do you know of such a locket, of such a chain?”
“No.”
Miss Tredgold rose to her feet.
“Verena,” she said, “things must come to a climax. Pauline must be forced to tell. For her own sake, and for the sake of others, we must find out what is at the back of things. Until we do the air will not be cleared. I had an idea of taking you to London for this winter, but I shall not do so this side of Christmas at any rate. I want us all to have a good time, a bright time, a happy time. We cannot until this mystery is explained. I am certain, too, that Pen knows more than she will say. She always was a curious, inquisitive child. Now, until the time of the accident Pen was always pursuing me and giving me hints that she had something to confide. I could not, of course, allow the little girl to tell tales, and I always shut her up. But from the time of the accident she has altered. She is now a child on the defensive. She watches Pauline as if she were guarding her against something. I am not unobservant, and I cannot help seeing. From what you tell me, your sisters Briar and Patty are also implicated. My dear Verena, we must take steps.”
“Yes,” said Verena. “But what steps?”
“Let me think. It has relieved my mind to tell you even this much. You will keep your own counsel. I will talk to you again to-morrow morning.”
Verena felt very uncomfortable. Of all the Dales she was the most open, in some ways the most innocent. She thought well of all the world. She adored her sisters and her father, and now also her aunt, Miss Tredgold. She was the sort of girl who would walk through life without a great deal of sorrow or a great deal of perplexity. The right path would attract her; the wrong would always berepellent to her. Temptation, therefore, would not come in a severe guise to Verena Dale. She was guarded against it by the sweetness and purity and innocence of her nature. But now for the first time it seemed to the young girl that the outlook was dark. Her aunt’s words absolutely bewildered her. Her aunt suspected Pauline, Pen, Briar, and Patty of concealing something. But what had they to conceal? It is true that when Aunt Sophia first arrived they had felt a certain repugnance to her society, a desire to keep out of her way, and a longing for the old wild, careless, slovenly days. But surely long ere this such foolish ideas had died a natural death. They all loved Aunt Sophia now; what could they have to conceal?
“I dare not talk about it to the younger girls. I don’t want to get into Pen’s confidence. Pen, of all the children, suits me least. The people to whom I must appeal are therefore Briar or Patty, or Pauline herself. Patty and Briar are devoted to each other. The thought in one heart seems to have its counterpart in that of the other. They might even be twins, so deeply are they attached. No; the only one for me to talk to is Pauline. But what can I say to her? And Pauline is not well. At least, she is well and she is not well. Nevertheless I will go and see her. I will find her now.”
Verena went into the nursery. Pauline was sometimes there. She was fond of sitting by the cosy nursery fire with a book in her hand, which of late she only pretended to read. Verena opened the nursery door and poked in her bright head and face.
“Come in, Miss Renny, come in,” said nurse.
“I am not going to stay, nurse. Ah, Marjorie, my pet! Come and give me a sweet kiss.”
The little baby sister toddled across the floor. Verena lifted her in her arms and kissed her affectionately.
“I thought perhaps Miss Pauline was here, nurse. Do you happen to know where she is?”
“Miss Pauline has a very bad headache,” said nurse—“so bad that I made her go and lie down; and I have just lit a bit of fire in her bedroom, for she is chilly, too, poor pet! Miss Pauline hasn’t been a bit herself since that nasty accident.”
“I am sure she hasn’t; but I did not know she was suffering from headache. I will go to her.”
Verena ran along the passage. Her own room faced south; Pauline’s, alongside of it, had a window which looked due east. Verena softly opened the door. The chamber was tiny, but it was wonderfully neat and cheerful. A bright fire burned in the small grate. Pauline was lying partly over on her side; her face was hidden. Her dark hair was tumbled about the pillow.
“Paulie, it is I,” said Verena. “Are you awake?”
“Oh, yes,” said Pauline.
She turned round almost cheerfully. A cloud seemed to vanish from her face.
“I am so glad you have come, Renny,” she said. “I see so little of you lately. Get up on the bed, won’t you, and lie near me?”
“Of course I love to be with you, but I thought——”
“Oh! don’t think anything,” said Pauline. “Just get on the bed and cuddle up close, close to me. And let us imagine that we are back in the old happy days before Aunt Sophy came.”
Verena did not say anything. She got on the bed, flung her arms round Pauline’s neck, and strained her sister to her heart.
“I love you so much!” she said.
“Do you, Renny? That is very, very sweet of you.”
“And you love me, don’t you, Paulie?”
“I—I don’t know.”
“Pauline! You don’t know? You don’t know if you love me or not?”
“I don’t think that I love anybody, Renny.”
“Oh, Paulie! then there must be something dreadfully bad the matter with you.”
Pauline buried her face in Verena’s soft white neck and lay quiet.
“Does your head ache very badly, Paulie?”
“Pretty badly; but it is not too bad for us to talk—that is, if you will keep off the unpleasant subjects.”
“But what unpleasant subjects can there be? I don’t understand you, Paulie. I cannot think of anything specially unpleasant to talk of now.”
“You are a bit of a goose, you know,” replied Pauline with a smile.
“Am I? I didn’t know it. But what are the subjects we are not to talk about?”
“Oh, you must know! Aunt Sophia, for instance, and that awful time at Easterhaze, and the most terrible of all terrible days when I went to the White Bay, and Nancy King, and—and my birthday. I can’t talk of these subjects. I will talk of anything else—of baby Marjorie, and how pretty she grows; how fond we are of nurse, and of father, and—oh!”
Pauline burst into a little laugh.
“Do you know that John is courting Betty? I know he is. He went up to her the other day in the garden and put his hand on her shoulder, and when he thought no one was by he kissed her. I hid behind the hedge, and I had the greatest difficulty to keep back a shout of merriment. Isn’t it fun?”
“I suppose so,” said Verena. “But, Pauline, what you say makes me unhappy. I wish I might talk out to you.”
Pauline raised herself on her elbow and looked full into Verena’s face.
“What about?” she asked.
Verena did not speak for a minute.
“Where are your dresses?” she asked suddenly.
“My dresses! You silly girl! In that cupboard, of course. I am getting tidy. You know I would do anything I possibly could to please Aunt Sophy. I can’t do big things to please her—I never shall be able to—so I do little things. I am so tidy that I am spick-and-span. I hate and loathe it; but I wouldn’t leave a pin about for anything. You open that door and look for yourself. Do you see my skirts?”
Verena got off the bed and opened the cupboard door. Pauline had about half-a-dozen skirts, and they all hung neatly on their respective hooks. Amongst them was the thick blue serge which she had worn on the day when she had gone to the White Bay. Verena felt her heart beating fast. She felt the color rush into her cheeks. She paused for a moment as if to commune with her own heart. Then her mind was made up.
“What are you doing, Renny?” said her sister. “How funny of you to have gone into the cupboard!”
For Verena had absolutely vanished. She stood in the cupboard, and Pauline from the bed heard a rustle. The rustling grew louder, and Pauline wondered what it meant. A moment later Verena, her face as red as a turkey-cock, came out.
“Paulie,” she said—“Paulie, there is no good going on like this. You have got to explain. You have got to get a load off your mind. You have got to do it whether you like it or not. How did you come by this? How—did—you—come—by—this?”
As Verena spoke she held in her open palm the long-lost thimble. Poor Pauline had not the most remote idea that the thimble was still in the pocket of the blue serge dress. She had, indeed, since the day of her accident, forgotten its existence.
“Where did you get it?” she asked, her face very white, her eyes very startled.
“In the pocket of the dress you wore on the day you were nearly drowned in the White Bay.”
“I told you not to mention that day,” said Pauline. Her whole face changed. “I remember,” she said slowly, but she checked herself. The words reached her lips, but did not go beyond them. “Put it down, Verena,” she said. “Put it there on the mantelpiece.”
“Then you won’t tell me how you got it? It is not yours. You know it belongs to Aunt Sophy.”
“And it is not yours, Renny, and you have no right to interfere. And what is more, I desire you not to interfere.I don’t love anybody very much now, but I shall hate you if you interfere in this matter.”
Verena laid the thimble on the mantelpiece.
“You can leave me, Renny. I am a very bad girl; I don’t pretend I am anything else, but I won’t talk to you now.”
“Oh!” said poor Verena. “Oh!”
Before she reached the door of the room she had burst into tears. Her agony was so great at Pauline’s behavior to her that her tears became sobs, and her sobs almost cries of pain. Pauline, lying on the bed, did not take the least notice of Verena. She turned her head away, and when her sister had left the room and shut the door Pauline sprang from the bed and turned the key in the lock.
“Now, I am safe,” she thought. “What is the matter with me? There never was anything so hard as the heart that is inside me. I don’t care a bit whether Renny cries or whether she doesn’t cry. I don’t care a bit what happens to any one. I only want to be let alone.”
At dinner-time Pauline appeared, and tried to look as though nothing had happened. The other girls looked neat and pretty. They had not the least idea through what a tragedy Verena and Pauline were now living. Verena showed marks of her storm of weeping, and her face was terribly woebegone. Miss Tredgold guessed that things were coming to a crisis, and she was prepared to wait.
Now, Miss Tredgold was a very good woman; she was also a very wise and a very temperate one. She was filled with a spirit of forbearance, and with the beautiful grace of charity. She was all round as good a woman as ever lived; but she was not a mother. Had she been a mother she would have gone straight to Pauline and put her arms round her, and so acted that the hard little heart would have melted, and the words that could not pass her lips would have found themselves able to do so, and the misery and the further sin would have been averted. But instead of doing anything of this sort, Miss Tredgold resolved to assemble the children after breakfast the next day, and to talk to them in a very plain way indeed; to assemble all before her, and to entreat the guilty ones to confess, promising them absolute forgiveness in advance. Having made up her mind, she felt quite peaceful and happy, and went down to interview her brother-in-law.
Mr. Dale still continued to like his study. He made no further objection to the clean and carefully dusted room. If any one had asked him what was passing in his mind, he might have said that the spirits of Homer and Virgil approached the sacred precincts where he wrote about them and lived for them night after night, and that they put the place in order. He kept the rough words which he had printed in large capitals on the night when he had returnedto his study still in their place of honor on the wall, and he worked himself with a new sense of zest and freedom.
Miss Tredgold entered the room without knocking.
“Well, Henry,” she said, “and how goes the world?”
“The world of the past comes nearer and nearer,” was his reply. “I often feel that I scarcely touch the earth of the nineteenth century. The world of the past is a very lovely world.”
“Not a bit better than the world of the present,” said Miss Sophia. “Now, Henry, if you can come from the clouds for a minute or two——”
“Eh? Ah! What are you saying?”
“From the clouds, my dear brother, right down to this present prosaic and workaday world. Can you, and will you give me five minutes of your attention?”
“Eh? Yes, of course, Sophia.”
Mr. Dale sat very still, drumming with his right hand on his pad of blotting-paper. Miss Tredgold looked at him; then she crossed the room, took away the pad, his pen and ink, the open volume of Homer, and removed them to another table.
“Sit with your back to them; keep your mind clear and listen to me, Henry.”
“To be sure.”
“I want you to come into the schoolroom after breakfast to-morrow morning.”
“To the schoolroom?”
“I have a reason. I should like you to be present.”
“But it is just my most important hour. You commence lessons with the girls—when, Sophia?”
“We sit down to our work at nine o’clock. Prayers take ten minutes. I should like you to be present at prayers—to conduct Divine worship in your own house on that occasion.”
“Oh, my dear Sophia! Not that I have any objection—of course.”
“I should hope you have no objection. You will take prayers, and afterwards you will assist me in a most painful task which lies before me.”
“Painful, Sophia? Oh, anything I can do to help you, my dear sister, I shall be delighted to undertake. What is it? I beg of you to be brief, for time does fly. It was only a quarter of an hour ago that I found Homer——”
“I could say a very ugly word about Homer,” said Miss Tredgold. “Sometimes I wish that I were a man in order that I might swear hard at you, Henry Dale. As I am a woman I must refrain. Do you know that your daughter Pauline, your daughter Briar, your daughter Patty, and your extraordinary daughter Penelope are all of them about as naughty children as they can be. Indeed, in the caseof Pauline I consider her worse than naughty. What she has done I don’t know, and I don’t know what the others have done; but there is a weight on their minds, and those four girls must be got to confess. And you must be present, and you must speak as a father to them. Now do you understand?”
“I am to be in the schoolroom to-morrow,” said Mr. Dale, “and four of my girls are turning wicked, and I am not to know what they have done. I will be in the schoolroom at nine o’clock to-morrow, Sophia. May I thank you to hand me back my blotting-pad, my pen and bottle of ink, and my beloved Homer? Take care of the volume. Take it tenderly. Put both hands under the binding. Ah! that is so. You will have the goodness to leave me now, Sophia. To-morrow morning at nine o’clock precisely.”
Miss Tredgold went out of the room.
“How my poor dear sister ever brought herself to marry that man,” she whispered under her breath, “I know not. But he is capable of being roused, and I rather fancy I shall manage to rouse him to-morrow.”
CHAPTER XXVII.PAULINE IN DISTRESS.
When Pauline went up to her room late that evening she gave Verena a very cold good-night. Her little fire was still burning, for nurse had taken care of it. Verena heard her lock the door. Had she not done so her sister would have gone to her, and begged and prayed, as such a sweet girl might, for the confidence of Pauline. Verena had to get into bed feeling lonely and unhappy. Just as she was doing so she heard a firm step walking down the corridor. A hand turned the handle of Pauline’s door, and Verena heard Pen’s voice say:
“It’s me, Paulie. It’s me. Let me in, Paulie.”
Verena instantly opened her own door.
“Go away, Pen,” she said. “Go straight back to your bed. You are not to go near Pauline to-night.”
“Yes, but I want her,” said Pauline, opening the door and putting out her head.
“Very well,” said Verena. “You shall see her with me. I will ring the bell and ask nurse to fetch Aunt Sophy.”
Pauline gave a shrill laugh.
“It isn’t worth all that fuss. Go to bed, Pen. We shall have plenty of time for our chat to-morrow morning.”
Penelope looked disgusted. Verena stood in the passage until her stout little figure had disappeared. She thenturned, hoping that Pauline would speak to her; but Pauline had gone into her room and locked the door.
Now, Pauline Dale was at this time going through a curious phase. She was scarcely to be blamed for her conduct, for what she had lately lived through had produced a sort of numbness of her faculties, which time seemed to have no intention of restoring to her. To look at her face now no one would suppose her to be in the ordinary sense of the word an invalid; for she was rosy, her eyes were bright, her appetite was good, and she had plenty of strength. Nevertheless there was a certain part of her being which was numb and cold and half-dead. She was not frightened about anything; but she knew that she had behaved as no right-minded or honorable girl should have done. Verena’s words that afternoon had roused her, and had given her a slight degree of pain. She lay down on her bed without undressing. She left the blind up so that the moon could shine through her small window, and she kept repeating to herself at intervals through the night the words that had haunted her when she was at Easterhaze: “Wash and be clean.” It seemed to Pauline that the sea was drawing her. The insistent voice of the sea was becoming absolutely unpleasant. It echoed and echoed in her tired brain: “Wash—wash and be clean.” After her accident she had hated the sea while she was there, but now she wanted to get back to it. She dreaded it and yet she was hungry for it.
As she lay with her eyes wide open it seemed to her that she was looking at the sea. It seemed to her, too, that she really did hear the murmur of the waves. The waves came close, and each wave as it pressed nearer and nearer to the excited child repeated the old cry: “Wash and be clean.”
“Oh, if only I could get to the sea!” was her thought. She pressed her hand to that part of her forehead which felt numb and strange. All of a sudden the numbness and strangeness seemed to depart. She saw one vivid picture after another, and each picture revealed to her the sin which she had sinned and the wrong she had committed. At last she saw that fearful picture when she stood with her little sister in the White Bay, and the waves had so nearly drowned them. She sat up in bed. The idea of going straight to Aunt Sophia and of telling her everything did not occur to her. She wanted to get back to the sea. How could she manage this? She was not in the least afraid of Aunt Sophy; she was only afraid of the God whom she had offended. She got up, pushed back her black hair, tied it neatly behind her ears, and taking her little sailor-hat and her dark-blue serge jacket, she put them on. She would go back to the sea. She did not know exactly how she could manage it, but somehow she would. When she was dressed she opened a drawer. She must have money. Aunt Sophiawas liberal in the matter of pocket-money, but Pauline was careless and spent hers as she got it. All she possessed now was a shilling. She put the shilling into her pocket. Turning round, she saw the flash of the gold thimble as it rested on the mantelpiece. She slipped that also into her pocket. She then opened the window, and, as she had done on a previous night long ago, she got out and let herself down to the ground. She was now out all alone about midnight. Once again the numb feeling had come back to her; nevertheless her mind was made up. She would at any cost get back to the sea.
She walked across the grass. By-and-by she found herself at the wicket-gate. When she reached the gate she had a sudden overwhelming memory of Nancy King. During the last few weeks she had forgotten Nancy. Now she thought of her. Standing with one hand on the post of the wicket-gate, she reflected on an idea which presented itself to her. If she, Pauline, was wicked—if she had been a naughty girl from the first—surely Nancy was worse! If it was necessary for Pauline to wash and be clean, it was still more necessary for Nancy. Together they could visit the seaside; together lave themselves in the waves; together reach that beautiful state where sin did not trouble.
Pauline smiled to herself. She walked through the Forest in the dead of night, and presently reached Nancy’s home. Now, it would have been a very bad thing for Pauline, as it had very nearly been a bad thing for Penelope some weeks ago, had Lurcher been out. But Lurcher was ill, and had been sent to a neighboring vet.’s. And it also happened—just, as it were, in the nick of time—that Farmer King was returning very late from visiting a neighboring fair. He had been kept by a friend until past midnight, and had driven home through the woods. As Pauline got to the gate the farmer drew up his mare within a few feet of the tired girl. He saw a girl standing by the gate, and could not make out who she was or what she was doing. He said gruffly:
“You get out of this. What are you doing here at this time of night?”
Then Pauline raised a white face. He recognized the face, gave a smothered, hasty exclamation, sprang to the ground, flung the reins over the neck of the mare, and came towards the girl.
“Miss Pauline,” he said, “what in the name of all that is wonderful are you doing here at this hour?”
Pauline looked full up at him.
“You said you would help me. You said you would if ever the time came. I want to be helped—oh, so badly!—and I have come.”
“Because I said that?” exclaimed the farmer, his face flushing all over with intense gratification. “Then you be certain of one thing, my dear—sure and positive certain—thatwhen Farmer King says a thing he will do it. You come straight in with me, missy—straight in with me this blessed minute.”
Pauline gave him her hand. It was quite wonderful how he soothed her, how her fear seemed to drop away from her, how contented and almost happy she felt.
“You are very strong, aren’t you?” she said. “You are very, very strong?”
“I should about think I am. I can lift a weight with any man in England, cut up a sheep with any man in existence, run a race with any farmer of my age. Strong! Yes, you are right there, missy; I am strong—strong as they’re made.”
“Then you are what I want. You will help me.”
The farmer opened the hall door with his latch-key. Nancy had been in bed for an hour or more. The farmer unlocked the door which led into the kitchen.
“The parlor will be cold,” he said, “and the drawing-room will be sort of musty. We don’t use the drawing-room every night. But the kitchen—that will be all right. You come right into the kitchen, Miss Pauline, and then you’ll tell me.”
He took her into the kitchen, lit a big lamp which hung over the fireplace, and poked the ashes in the big stove.
“You do look white and trembly all over. Shall I call Nancy to see you, miss?”
“Please, please do.”
Farmer King went noisily upstairs.
“Nancy!” he called to his daughter. “I say, Nancy!”
Nancy was in her first sleep. She opened her eyes at the sound of the farmer’s voice, and said in a sleepy tone:
“Well, what now, dad? I wish you wouldn’t call me just because you come in late.”
“You get up, my girl. There’s trouble downstairs. Missy has come.”
“Missy? Miss Pen?”
“No, not Miss Pen; the other one—the one we love, both of us—the one who was our queen—Miss Pauline. She’s downstairs, and she’s shocking bad. She has come to me to help her.”
“Why, of course she’s bad, father,” said Nancy. “Don’t you know all that happened? Pauline was nearly drowned at Easterhaze, and they say she hasn’t been quite, so to say, right in her head ever since. I have been nearly mad about it.”
“Sane, you mean, to my way of thinking,” exclaimed the farmer; “for you never said a word to me about it, eating your meals as hearty and contented as you please, buying your winter finery, and talking about going to London for Christmas. Give me a friend who will think of me when I am in trouble. But the lass knows what’s what, and it isn’tto you she has come; it’s to me. She wants me to help her because I made her a promise, forsooth! But you come right down, for she will want a bit of cuddling from a girl like yourself. Come right down this minute and see her, for she badly wants some one to do something for her.”
Now, Nancy was really fond of Pauline, notwithstanding her father’s words, and she got up willingly enough and ran downstairs to the kitchen; and when she saw her little friend sitting by the fire, looking very white, her head dropped forward, and her big black eyes fixed with an almost vacant expression straight before her, a great lot of Nancy’s heart did go out to the sad and unhappy girl. She rushed to her side, threw her arms round her, and hugged her over and over again.
“Come,” said the farmer, “it’s a bit of something to eat she wants; then to go upstairs and share your bed with you, Nance. And in the morning, why, I am at her service.”
“Yes, that’s what you do want, isn’t it, Paulie?” said Nancy.
Pauline nodded. She felt almost incapable of speaking. So the farmer brought her food, and made her eat and drink. And then she went upstairs with Nancy, and Nancy made her he down by her side, and when they were both together in the dark, in the warm bed in the pretty room, Pauline flung her arms round Nancy and began to cry. It was really quite a long time since Pauline had cried. At first her tears came slowly and with great difficulty; but in a little they rained from her eyes more and more easily, until at last they came in torrents, and her tears hurt her and shook her little frame, and came faster, and yet faster, until from sheer exhaustion she dropped asleep. But when Pauline woke from that sleep it seemed to her that the numb part had greatly left her brain and that she could think clearly. Only, still she had no wish to go back to The Dales. She only wanted to wash and be clean.
“You are the queerest girl that ever lived,” said Nancy. “You come right downstairs and have breakfast. Of course, they are sure to look for you and try to find you, but you must come straight downstairs now and hear what father has got to say.”
Pauline got up willingly enough and went downstairs. There was a groaning breakfast on the board. On most occasions the farmers’ servants ate below the salt, but now only the farmer and his daughter Nancy were present.
“Here’s cake worth eating,” said the farmer, “and new-laid eggs worth taking; and here’s honey the like of which is not to be found anywhere else, even in the New Forest. And here’s chicken rissoles, and here’s cooked ham. Now, missy, fall to—fall to.”
Pauline ate very little, and then she turned to the farmer.
“And now you want me to help you?” he said.
“I want you to take me to the seaside. I want Nancy to come, too. I want to go where the waves are high, and where I can wash and be clean.”
“My word!” said the farmer, “what does the little lass say?”
“I don’t want to go home. I can’t go home. If I am alone with you and with Nancy I might get better. Don’t let me go home.”
“My lass, my lass, you have applied to Farmer King in your trouble, and Farmer King won’t desert you. I have not the most remote notion what trouble it can be that worrits a poor little lass, but, such as it is, Farmer King will be your friend. There is no doubt, my dear, that when they miss you at The Dales they will come to look for you here, and what am I to do?”
“Hide me! Oh, hide me! I can’t go home.”
“What a lark!” cried Nancy. “We could, couldn’t we, father?”
“And we won’t,” said the farmer, bringing his hand down with a great bang on the table. “What we do we’ll do above-board. We did wrong that time in the summer when we took miss to that picnic and got her into trouble. Now we’re bound to see her out of her trouble. It has to do with that night partly, hasn’t it, missy?”
“I have never been happy since,” said Pauline.
“Well, then, my dear, I said I would help you out if the time came, and I will. You shall stay here—I vow it—and I am just going to get on my horse Caesar, and I shall ride over to The Dales this blessed minute. You leave it to me. You leave it all to me, my dear.”