CHAPTER VIIBERYL
A bell tinkling somewhere in the house wakened Robin the next morning. Through the flowered chintz curtains of her window the sun shone with a warmth out of all keeping with the time of the year, throwing such a joyous glow about everything in the room that she rubbed her eyes to be sure she was not dreaming.
The evening before, everything had seemed so strange that Robin had not been able to take in small things; now an immense curiosity to explore Gray Manor, and the grounds that were like Central Park, and the little town, and the hills around it, seized her. She slipped her feet out of bed and into the satin slippers which had been one of Miss Effie's purchases. She dressed with feverish haste, rebuking herself for having slept so late, for her new wrist watch told her it was after ten o'clock.
Ten o'clock—why, on Patchin Place the morning was almost over at that hour, the streets about thundering with the work of the day. And here it was as still as night, or as—a church on a weekday, Robin thought.
Dressed, she opened the door of her room very quietly and peeped curiously out. And there in thewide hall, dusting an old highboy, was the girl with the dark hair.
"Hullo!" exclaimed Robin, delighted at the encounter.
The girl stared for a moment. She was tall and thin; her eyes so intensely blue as to look black and startling in their contrast to the whiteness of her skin. They were brooding, smoldering eyes and a too frequent scowl was making tiny lines between the straight black eyebrows.
"Isn't this the wonderfulest morning?" Robin advanced, stepping nearer. "What is your name? I'm Robin—I mean Gordon Forsyth."
"I know that. My name's Beryl but I guess it doesn't make much difference to you what I'm called. The man who came with you's waiting downstairs."
In spite of this rebuff Robin lingered for a moment, hopeful of a pleasanter word. But the girl Beryl shouldered her duster and marched off, head high.
"I'm going to find out more about her right off," determined Robin as she went in search of her guardian.
The big rooms below, like her own room, looked very different in the morning light, even cheery. Mr. Allendyce greeted her with a smile and Harkness' "Good-morning, Miss Gordon," had pleasant warmth. It was fun to sit in the high-backed chair before the shining silver and the flowers and to choosebetween grapefruit and frosted orange juice. So fascinated was Robin that she forgot for the time, her interest in the girl she had encountered upstairs.
"Well, what do you think of Gray Manor in daylight?" asked Mr. Allendyce as the two walked into the library.
"Oh, it's more like a great castle than ever. But it isn't—half as bad as I thought it was." When Robin caught the amused twinkle in her guardian's eye she added hastily: "I mean, it isn't gloomy and sad at all. It's so beautiful—and I love beautiful things."
Mr. Allendyce thought suddenly that it was the first time for a long timehehad seen these rooms when they had not seemed overhung with melancholy. But he checked any expression of the thought; instead he took Robin on a tour through the library and drawing rooms, pointing out to her the treasures which had been brought from every corner of the world. There were rare tapestries and bronzes, and tiny ivory carvings and tables inlaid with bright jade and old crystal candelabra, and quaint chests and wonderful paintings and rare old books. As he told the story of each, Cornelius Allendyce marvelled at the girl's quick appreciation and intelligent interest. Her Jimmie had evidently gathered travelled people about him and Robin had been always a sharp listener.
Then Harkness interrupted their pleasant occupationby appealing to Robin for "his orders" with such a comical solemnity that Robin had difficulty suppressing a nervous giggle. Her guardian came to her rescue with the suggestion that they drive about the town and the mills, have an early tea and an early dinner and dispense with luncheon.
"Must I tell him every day just what I want?" thought Robin, in dismay.
The girl's active imagination could well picture the imposing motor which came to the door as a coach-and-four, resplendent with regal trappings. And, cuddled in the wolf-skin robes, flying over the frosty roads which wound through the hills, it was very easy to feel like a princess from one of her own stories.
Only the mills spoiled her lovely day. The evening before they had loomed obscurely and interestingly but in broad daylight they were ugly. The great chimneys belched black smoke into the beautiful blue of the sky; the monotonous drone of many machines jarred the hillside quiet. Everything was so dusty and dirty—even the tiny houses where the men lived. Robin, brought up though she had been in Patchin Place, turned in disgust from the dreary ugliness about her.
"Does it have to be like that?" she asked her guardian.
"Like what?"
"Oh—dirty. And so dreary. And noisy."
Her guardian laughed. "I'm afraid it does. Work is mostly always drab—like that. And you see it has grown like a giant. There—there's the giant for your fairy story, my dear. And giants are usually ugly, aren't they?"
"Yes, always." Robin spoke with conviction. As they rode on she looked back over her shoulder. "I'm glad we can't stop today. This ride has been so lovely that I'd hate to spoil it by—seeing the Giant up close."
"Giants are very powerful. And usually very rich." Cornelius Allendyce enjoyed the fancy.
"Yes—and they crush and kill, too."
"But didn't a Jack climb something or other and overcome one of them in his lair?"
At this Robin laughed and then forgot, for the time being, the mills and the dirty houses; when Mr. Allendyce hoped Mrs. Budge would give them a very big tea party, she realized she was hungrier than she had ever been before.
So full had been each moment of her first day at Gray Manor that it was not until she sat curled in the big divan before the library fire, a book of colored plates of Italian gardens across her lap that she thought of her determination to know more of the girl who had called herself Beryl.
Harkness stood at the long table putting it in order. Harkness seemed always moving thingsabout just so as to put them back in place again.
"Mr. Harkness."
"Yes, Miss Gordon."
"Do I know everybody here?"
"Why—I'm sure—What do you mean, Miss Gordon?"
"I saw a young girl last night. And I met her in the hall today. Who's she?"
"That's a person from the village, Miss Gordon. I don't know as I've heard her name. Budge mostly calls her a piece. I don't think Budge is satisfied with her."
"You mean she works here?"
"Yes, Miss Gordon. At least now. She helps Budge. Budge is getting on, you see. I don't know as I've heard the miss' name. Is there anything more, Miss Gordon?"
Harkness had a warm heart under his faded livery and it went out now to Robin because she looked very small and very much alone in the big room. He had heard Mrs. Budge's hostile sputter and he knew the lawyer man was going the next day; little Miss Gordon would be quite without friends at Gray Manor. So he stepped closer to the divan and in a very human, friendly way he added: "Excuse me if I'm so bold as to say, you just count on old Harkness if you want anything, missy."
Robin caught the kindliness in the man's voice. "Oh, thank you, Mr. Harkness. I'll be so glad tohave you for a friend. And won't you please call me Robin? You see everyone who's ever liked me real well called me that and it'll make me feel homey here."
"Well, just betweenus, Miss—Robin." And the old man went off with a mysterious smile that even Budge's sour face could not dispel.
The house was very still. Mr. Allendyce was in his room writing some letters. The early dinner had been over for sometime. Robin wondered what Beryl was doing now and where she was—probably upstairs somewhere.
"I'll go and find her!"
This was more easily said than done for Gray Manor had wiggly wings and corridors turning in every direction and little stairs here and there so that one first went up and then down and then up again. Robin had almost given up her search and had just about decided she was lost, for turn whichever way she might, nothing seemed familiar, when she heard the harsh, scraping strains of a violin, vibrant with stormy feeling.
"I'll find that and then maybe it'll be someone who can tell me how to get back to the library," she thought, laughing silently at the ridiculousness of being lost in a house, anyway.
She traced the music to a turning which led into a narrow hallway. At its end a door stood ajar and from it a light streamed. Robin approachedthe door on tip toe that she might not disturb the music, then stood still on its threshold in delighted amazement for the violin player was the girl for whom she was seeking.
At sight of Robin the girl flung the violin upon the bed.
"Oh, please don't stop. May I come in? I was hunting for you."
It was an absurdly small room as compared to the great rooms below, and very bare. There was one chair which Beryl, scowling, pushed forward, at the same time sitting upon the bed. Her eyes said plainly: "What do you want?"
Robin ignored her unfriendliness. She sat down on the edge of the bed, close to Beryl.
"I'm awfully glad I found you," she ventured. "You see you're the only otheryoungperson in this house. Though I never had any chums like most girls do, Jimmie always seemed young and the birds and the flowers and the Farri children made it—" Robin stopped suddenly, for Beryl was staring at her with rude amusement. "I—I thought it would be so nice if you—and I—could be—sort of chums," she managed to finish.
Beryl tossed her head as she moved away, shutting the violin in its case with an angry little slam.
"I guess itwouldbe sort of," she mocked.
"What do you mean?" Poor Robin's heart beat furiously; it had taken all the courage she couldmuster to force her advance upon this girl and Beryl's rebuff hurt her deeply. She flushed at Beryl's scornful laugh.
"Why—we're as far apart as the poles," Beryl answered. "You're—Gordon Forsyth. And I'm just Beryl Lynch."
Robin's eyes were like a baby's in their lack of understanding.
"I don't see—" she began but Beryl would not let her go on. Beryl's whole soul went out in resentment at what she suspected was "patronizing." "Not me!" she cried in her heart. And aloud: "Oh, you justsayyou can't see. Why I'm like a servant here. Though I won't be that way long with that old crank as uncivil as she is. Mother didn't want me to do it. But I wanted the money. And I'm going to stick it out, much as I hate it—"
Robin watched the other girl's stormy face in an ecstasy of delight. Here was a creature different from anyone she had ever known; almost her own age, too, full of the fire and spirit and daring which she longed to possess and knew she did not; beautifully straight and tall.
"I asked old Budge for the place. I heard she wanted someone to help her and it was work anyone could do. Mother felt dreadfully—she said I'd hate it. I don't mind the work but I hate—oh, feeling I'm not as good as anyone here. When Mrs. Budge told me to put on a clean uniform—ugh, how I hatethose uniforms—and go down to the hall to meet you, I told her I wouldn't. She 'most sent me off then and there."
"You did go, though. I saw you," Robin broke in.
"Oh, yes, I went but I wouldn't change my dress just to spite her. And I was curious to see the boy they were all making such a fuss about. You just ought to know how upset they were whenyoucame! Why, old Budge talked as though it were a disgrace for a Forsyth to be a girl. I was glad—because it fooled her." Beryl realized suddenly that she was growing friendily confidential. She sharpened her tone. "You'dbetter go down before the old snoop catches you here."
"I wish you wouldn't talk like that," pleaded Robin.
"Like what?"
"Oh, as though we weren't—well just girls alike and couldn't be friends. We might have such good times—"
"Youarea funny little kid, aren't you? And you certainly don't know how things are run in stiff houses like this. If old Budge could hear you! I don't mind telling you that the old cat keeps saying she's going to watch you to see if you act like a Forsyth. So you'd better not let her hear you asking to be friends with me."
Robin slowly rose to her feet, two bright spots of color flaming in her cheeks.
"Why, I'll—" Her anger died suddenly and a quaint little dignity fell upon her. She straightened her slender figure and held her head very high. "I am a Forsyth and I shall act just as I think a good Forsyth should and not as Mrs. Budge thinks. And please don't think I'm the least bit afraid of this Mrs. Budge."
Beryl laughed so gleefully at Robin's defiance that Robin joined in with her and the friendship for which she sought sprang into being—all because of an unspoken alliance against the hostile housekeeper.
"I'll go back now—if you'll show me the way."
"Theyoughtto have signs at every turning."
"Oh, what a funny thought!" And giggling, the two tiptoed through the winding corridors and down the stairs which led to the second floor.
"I'll see you tomorrow," whispered Robin at parting.
"It won't do—you'll see it won't do!" warned Beryl. "I haven't been in this house two whole days without knowing what it's like!"
CHAPTER VIIIROBIN ASSERTS HERSELF
The coming of Percival Tubbs to Gray Manor added the one sweet drop to poor Mrs. Budge's cup of bitterness. Though he brought vividly back heartbreaking memories of young Chistopher the Third's school days, when she had waited each day for the lad's boisterous charge upon the kitchen after the "bite" which was his and her little secret, she hoped to find in him an ally.Hewould see how ridiculous it was to have a Forsyth girl, anyway, and especially a girl who limped around the house like a scared rabbit, afraid to ask for a crumb. If this Gordon had been a boy, as they had planned, another comely, happy youth, why, she could have soon learned to love him. But a girl—how would she look sitting at Master Christopher's desk, in his chair! Something was all wrong somewhere, but Percival Tubbs would find out and say what's what.
With this hope strong in her breast she made excuse to go into the Chinese room, for the Chinese room was only separated from the library by heavy curtains through which voices could be easily overheard. And Harkness had said the lawyer and the tutor were talking in the library.
Robin's guardian had given much thought to this interview with the tutor. Robin's fate worried himnot a little. He had, in the few days, grown very fond of Robin, and he hated to leave her with Harkness and Budge and this Percival Tubbs, a poor sort of companionship where a fifteen-year-old girl's happiness was concerned.
"I must make Tubbs see that the child is different—" he was thinking just as Mrs. Budge tiptoed into the Chinese room.
"Miss Gordon is not like other children and you'll have to plan your school work a little differently with her," he began, speaking slowly. "She's bright enough and knows much more about some things than most girls her age—and nothing at all about others. What I want you to do is to go easy; easy, that's it. I rather imagine she's always taken a lot on her own shoulders and I don't believe she's ever thought much of herself. If you can develop a little assertiveness in her—she'll need it, here—"
"Yes. She'll need it here," echoed the tutor, because he thought he ought to say something. He was a tall, lanky man whose shoulders sagged as though something about them had broken under the strain of being dignified; his face narrowed from an impressive dome of a forehead to a straggling Van Dyke beard which he always stroked with the fingers of his left hand. He was the old type of schoolmaster whom the rapid forward stride of education had left far behind. His summons to Gray Manor had come rather in the way of a life-saver and he didnot intend to allow the fact that the Forsyth heir had turned out to be a girl, perturb him in the least. And so long as his rooms at the Manor were comfortable, his food good and his salary certain, he could adapt himself to any fool theory this lawyer guardian might care to advance.
Mr. Allendyce stared hard at the other, his face wrinkled in his effort to say the right thing.
"Oh, let her have her head," he finished finally. And he liked that idea so well that he repeated it. "Let her have her head. Do you understand me? Never mind what's in the old schoolbooks. If she'd rather take a walk than study Latin verbs, well, let her. I want her to be happy here—happy, that's most important. You've heard of flowers that bloom only in shelter and sunshine? This youngster isn't unlike—"
"Well, I never! No, Inever!... I never!" Mrs. Budge's gasp, rising in a crescendo, almost betrayed her presence. She gave a pillow a mighty jab. As though it were not bad enough to bring the girl to the house in the first place without paying a man a fancy price to teach her to have her own way! "Flowers! Humph! Old fools—" Unable to endure another word in silence she stalked off to her own quarters.
In the butler's pantry she found Beryl arranging real flowers in a squatty Bristol glass bowl and humming gaily as she did so. Now Beryl should have beep upstairs marking the new linen and she shouldnot be singing as though she owned the whole world. These two transgressions and the sight of the bright blossoms in the girl's hand brought the climax to the old woman's wrath. All Beryl's shortcomings tumbled off her tongue in an incoherent flow of ill-temper. A stormy scene resulted which left the old housekeeper spent and Beryl blazing with indignation.
Consequently, when poor Robin, depressed from her first hour with the tutor, trying not to feel that Gray Manor was going to be a prison instead of a castle, sought out her new friend she found her throwing her few possessions into a cheap suitcase that lay, opened, across her narrow bed.
"Oh, what are you doing?" cried Robin in alarm.
"I'm going—that's what. She fired me."
Robin's first thought upon awaking that morning had been of Beryl; she had suffered the keenest impatience all through the trying morning, longing to go in search of her new friend. She could not lose her now—for a hundred Budges.
"Oh, I won't let you go!"
"A lotyoucould do!" cried Beryl scornfully, tears very close. "I just can't please the old thing. But I hate to go home." She sat down, dolefully, on the edge of the bed. "I wanted to stay until I had earned two hundred dollars."
Two hundred dollars! That seemed such a very big amount of money to Robin that she sat silent, thinking about it.
Beryl, misinterpreting her quiet, tossed her head."I s'pose that doesn't mean much to you. But it does to me—'specially when I have to earn it." Then, with a flash of temper: "What do you know about wanting some one thing with all your whole heart and knowing just where you can get it and not having the money?"
Beryl made her tragedy very real and pouring out her troubles always brought her a grain of comfort.
"I've never had a thing in my life that I wanted," she finished.
"Oh, Beryl, I'm so sorry."
"Sorry! Why, a lucky little thing like you are can't even know what I'm talking about. That's why I said we couldn't be friends.I'vehad to work at home like a slave ever since I can remember. Pop's sick all the time and cross, and poor mother looks so tired and tries to be so cheerful and brave that your heart aches for her. And even when you're poor, a girl wants things, pretty things and to do things like other girls—and work as hard as you can you can't ever seem to reach them. I get just sick of it. I thought—if I could get this money—"
"Did you want it for your mother?" broke in Robin, sympathetically.
Beryl's face flushed redder. "Well, not exactly. That's the way it always is in books, but in life, when you're poor, it's each fellow for himself and there's not any time for your grand sounding self-sacrifice. I wanted it to buy a violin. That thing I've got'snothing but a cheap old fiddle. And I can play—IknowI can play, or could if I could get a good violin. I took lessons from an old Belgian who lived above us and I played once for Martini at the theatre and he said—but what's the use of caring? What's the use ofthinkingabout it? All a girl like me can do is just want big things!"
"Oh, Beryl," breathed Robin, a tremble on her lips. She wanted very much to make Beryl understand that she was not the "lucky thing" Beryl thought her; that she knew, too, what it was to want something and not to have it, though perhaps she had not known it as cruelly as Beryl had, for Jimmie had always contrived to cover their bleak moments with a makeshift contentment. "Oh, Beryl, honestly I know just how you feel. I wish I could help you. Maybe I can. My allowance seems awfully big and I can't ever spend it all—"
"Well, I'm not a beggar and I'm not hinting for your money," flared Beryl.
"I didn't mean—" Robin began, then faltered. Beryl had spoken with such real anger that she was frightened. Beryl, turning back to her packing, gathered up an armful of clothing on top of which lay an oblong bundle. Its wrappings were old and loose so that as Beryl flounced her burden toward the suitcase, the content of the package slipped out and down to the floor. Robin stared in amazement for there lay a doll in faded satin finery.
With a short, ashamed laugh, Beryl picked it up. "Thatold thing," she exclaimed, in half-apology.
Robin caught her arm. "Wait—oh, wait—let me see it!"
"It's just an old doll I've kept."
"It—it looks like my Cynthia. Oh,pleasejust let me look at it. It's like a doll—I lost, once, ever so long ago." She examined the pretty clothing.
Now Beryl stared at Robin as though to find in her face a likeness to the little girl who had deserted her doll.
"Lost? And I found it in Sheridan Square. A little girl went off and left it. I waited awhile, then I took the doll home."
"Oh, how funny! Howfunny! It was me, Beryl. I'd been playing and Mr. Tony called to me to hurry and I forgot—and you found it. Why, I cried myself to sleep night after night thinking poor Cynthia was unhappy somewhere."
"And I called her my orphan doll and loved her because I thought she missed her real mother—"
"She was the loveliest dolly I ever had!"
"She was the loveliest dolly I ever saw!"
Both girls burst into a peal of laughter. They sat on the edge of the bed, the doll between them, the packing forgotten.
Robin clapped her hands. "And to think we find each other now. It's like a story. I went back to the park all alone that evening and would have beenlost if it hadn't been for my—" she broke off short and flushed. She was going to tell Beryl about her play-prince but then, Beryl might laugh and she did not want that.
Beryl's face suddenly grew grave as she smoothed out a fold of the doll-garment.
"I always kept the doll put away. I never played with it because—" She hesitated a moment. "That night that I found the doll was a dreadful night. I wasn't quite six but I'll always remember it. At first mother and I were so happy, over finding the doll and because Pop had just gotten a raise. It seemed as though everything were going to be wonderful and we felt as rich as could be. We called the doll a lucky doll. And mother dressed me up in her green beads that Father Murphy, back in Ireland, had given her when she told him she was going to marry Pop. And we had dumplings—ugh, I've hated dumplings ever since. And then—"
"What happened?"
"They came for Mom, some man from the hospital. Pop had been terribly hurt. And, well—nothing's been lucky since. It's just as I said; mother's had to work and Dale's had to work and Pop just sits in a chair and scolds and—well, I never wanted to take the doll out when mother could see it—after all that."
Robin made no effort to conceal how deeply Beryl's story had moved her. "Oh, Beryl, I'm sosorry. But maybe things will change. They'll have to—Jimmie always said, it's a long lane that has no turning. I'm so glad it was you who found my Cynthia. It might have been some one who wouldn't have loved her at all."
"I s'pose you ought to have her now."
"Oh, no, no. She's yours. Anyway, that doesn't matter," and Robin added triumphantly, "because we're really truly friends now, no matter what you say. Cynthia has brought us together."
Beryl shook her head.
"That old crank—" she began.
Robin stamped her foot in impatience. "I don't care a bit about Mrs. Budge. My guardian told me that I could have anything I wanted here just for the asking and he's made me the silliest big allowance that three girls couldn't spend. Oh, I've a plan! Ought not a girl like me have a companion? Don't they most always in books? You shall stay here at Gray Manor as my—chum."
Beryl still looked doubtful. "I'm too young—"
"That's just why I want you. Oh, I just can't bear to think of my guardian going away and leaving me here alone. You see I promised myself that I'd be happy while Jimmie's having his chance—that's why I came, you know. But this house is so big and so old and Mr. Harkness and Mrs. Budge are so old that I know it's going to be hard not to think of Jimmie and our lovely home and the birds. Butif you'd stay it would be easier. Oh, say you will, say you will."
Beryl stared at Robin with a suspicious scrutiny. She firmly believed that rich people never did anything except for themselves and Robin, no doubt, was like all the others. Yet she was such a queer little thing that perhaps shewastrying to be "nice" to her and make a soft place for her. And Beryl would not allowthatfor a moment.
"You can study with me, too. That Mr. Tubbs isn't so very bad. And we'll read together out of all those books in the library. And play—I never had a real chum because Jimmie thought the girls and boys who went to the school I did, might make fun of my being lame. Poor Jimmie, he always minded my being lame much more than I did because he's an artist and shivers when anything isn't perfect. You shall have a bed in my room—there's ever so much space. Oh, say you will."
Beryl frowned, uncertainly. "I don't want a penny I don't earn. But if I can reallydothings for you—"
"Oh, of course you can, lots of things. But you shan't wear those uniforms—for then you wouldn't be a girl like me. Oh, we'll havesuchfun. Let's take this stuff right down."
It took the girls only a very little time to transfer Beryl's belongings and to establish them in Robin's room, Beryl working mechanically, unable to believeher good fortune. Then, at Robin's command, she followed her while she went in search of her guardian.
Cornelius Allendyce and Percival Tubbs, sitting in a blue cloud of cigar smoke, were pleasantly discussing the pros and cons of the tariff question upon which they agreed, when Robin interrupted them.
"Please excuse me, but this is very important." Her breathlessness startled the two men. "I've engaged Beryl to be my chum. I—I thought I might be lonely here at Gray Manor. I want her to study with me, too. And do everything. This is she."
Cornelius Allendyce's mouth had dropped open from sheer amazement; suddenly it broadened into a grin. Here was Miss Gordon taking her "head" at once, without so much as one lesson. He glanced at Percival Tubbs but that good gentleman was stroking his silky beard quite indifferently.
"I'd rather have Beryl than anyone else, 'cause she's almost my own age and we like each other. Shall I tell Mrs. Budge or—"
"Without so much as a by-your-leave!" murmured the guardian. He surveyed Beryl; she seemed like a wholesome, spirited sort and the idea of a little companion for Miss Gordon was not a bad one, not at all—strange he hadn't thought of it.
"Perhaps, Miss Gordon, you'd better tell her yourself. You must begin—holding your own, my dear. Don't forget—ever, that you are a Forsyth, and that name has great power over Hannah Budge."
Robin did not stop to ponder what he meant or why a twinkle shone in his eyes. She rang the bell as her guardian indicated, then waited with a resolute squaring of her small chin, for Harkness' coming.
"Please, Mr. Harkness, will you bring Mrs. Budge here? There's something I want to tell you both."
Mrs. Budge, as she hunted out a clean apron, grumbled at the unusual summons.
"The girl herself, you say?" she asked, as she followed Harkness to the library.
Her astonishment changed to white wrath when Robin, standing by her guardian's chair, spoke.
"I wanted to tell you that Beryl Lynch is going to stay here as my companion. I'm going to give her half of my room so that I won't be lonely and please set a place for her next to me at the table."
Once again Cornelius Allendyce caught the twinkle in the butler's eye which should not be in a Forsyth butler's eye at all. But there was no twinkle about Mrs. Budge; her cheeks puffed in her effort to speak without strangling.
"If that piece—" she began, but she was quickly interrupted from every side. Both Harkness and Cornelius Allendyce cried out, the one pleadingly, the other in warning: "Careful, Mrs. Budge." Then Robin stepped forward and slipped her hand through Beryl's arm.
"Please, Mrs. Budge, I have made Beryl promiseto stay. She didn't want to but I begged her. And if anyone is unkind to her it's just the same as being—unkind to me. That is all," she finished grandly, with an imperious little motion of her hand that waved the irate woman from the room before she knew she was moving.
"Now you can't say as that wasn't like a Forsyth," asserted Harkness, proudly, belowstairs. "If Missy wants a young lydy for a companion, well, she's a right to the kind of young lydy she wants." But Budge had escaped the reach of his voice.
In the library Cornelius Allendyce was patting Robin on the head.
"Well, you've won out in the first skirmish, my dear. But keep your weapons at hand."
CHAPTER IXTHE LYNCHS
The only thing that made the Lynch's cottage any different from the two hundred others at the mills, was that it stood at the end of a dreary row and therefore had a window on the side of its living room which overlooked the hills and the river.
This window was Moira Lynch's delight. Her poor, big Danny could sit in it all day long. And from it she herself could watch the setting sun flame over the crest of the hills and the narrow river shake off its workaday dress and go racing into the shadows of the woods. Poor Moira, years of heartbreaking work and worry had not changed her very much from the girl who had liked to lie in the deep sweet grass of her dear Ireland and let her fancy follow the winging birds into a land of dreams.
The other window of the tiny living room looked out directly upon the muddy road, across to the freight tracks.
It was to this window that Moira Lynch ran now, peering as far up the road as she could see.
"Beryl's late today," she said, with an anxious note.
"Well, what if she is? Things don't run by the clock," Danny Lynch answered testily. "You're always fussing. If it isn't the girl it's over Dale."
Mrs. Moira ignored the edge of crossness in her Danny's voice. She went to him, smoothed the spotless cushion at his back and put a fresh magazine on his table.
"It's a silly, worryin' hen I am," she laughed. (But, oh, her laugh was a tragic thing, for while her lips curved in a smile her eyes shadowed at their mockery).
"But things seem a bit different, today," she added, apologetically.
And just as Danny Lynch's retort of derision died away Beryl burst upon them.
Her mother needed only to give her one look to know that somethingwasdifferent.
"And what is it, my darlin'? It's that hungry I was getting to set my eyes on you. Two hours late you are, Beryl."
Beryl welcomed this reproach as it gave her an opportunity to impart her good news in an impressive way.
"I couldn't get away a minute sooner. I've a new position." She was going to say "job" but it did not seem fitting.
"What? Without so much as a word to your father and mother? And did the likes of that old housekeeper fire you?"
Beryl had no intention of telling of her ignominious fray with Mrs. Budge.
"I'm engaged to be a companion to Gordon Forsyth!" she answered, grandly.
At this Moira Lynch dropped a spoon with a loud clatter.
"A companion to—that new boy who's come to the Manor?"
Beryl, recognizing that her story needed detailed explanation, slipped off her outer wraps, threw them into a chair, kissed her father lightly on his cheek, perched herself on the old sofa and proceeded to tell the story of Gordon Forsyth's coming to Gray Manor while her mother listened with breathless interest.
"And it's a girl she is—a little lame girl!"
"The queerest kid you ever saw. Not a bit snippy or rich acting. She doesn't get at all excited over her new clothes and bossing those old fogeys around and ordering her motor any minute she wants it. She thinks the little place she lived in in New York is lots nicer than Gray Manor. When you look at her you think she's a baby and then when she talks, why—she seems older than I am! But she's funny like you, Mom; she's always pretending things are different from what they are and giving them names. She calls old Budge the wicked woman who wanted to eat the two children," Beryl giggled. "And she calls the Mills a Giant."
Moira Lynch's face beamed with joyous understanding. Here was a fellow-soul, "funny" like herself, Beryl described her; Beryl, for whom black was always and invariably black, and a spade a spade.
"Why, she even wanted to come down here with me," Beryl finished.
There were so many questions trembling on Moira's tongue that, for the moment, supper was neglected. Not long, however; the striking of the clock reminded her that in a very few minutes Dale would be home, hungry. Her mission in life, next to tending her big Danny, was feeding her two children. For tonight she had made Beryl's favorite dessert, a bread pudding, the eggs for which she had carefully hoarded during several days' denial. Beryl, keeping up a running fire of talk, spread the cloth on the centre table and brought the dishes from the cupboard.
"By'n by, you'll be too fine for the rest of us," broke in big Danny upon their chatter, the usual discordant tone in his voice.
"Well, I guess it won't be your fault if I am," Beryl flared. "Everything that I've gotten I've gotten for myself and I don't know of anyone ever trying to help me."
Like a flash the little mother was between the two, a soothing hand on the father's shoulder.
"Now don't you two be a-spoiling this night," she laughed a bit hysterically. "Of course our girl's going to be too fine for anyone, but it's always a-loving she'll be to her Dad and her Mommy." She declared it with an ardent triumph. This mother who had once dreamed things for herself dreamed them now for her boy and girl. From Beryl's infancy she had taught her to want "fine things."And Beryl wanted them with all her heart and, with youth's selfishness, wanted them for herself, alone.
After her father's taunt, Beryl, with sullen resentment, locked her lips on her other pleasant experiences. Nor would she tell now how Robin had written to her guardian to send down a real violin for her to practice upon, or what fun it was to study with Mr. Percival Tubbs, whose ears were distractingly like Brussels sprouts. And that she learned much, much faster than Robin did! Poor Robin was always wondering the why of everything.
Her mother suddenly exclaimed: "It's Father Murphy's beads you shall wear this night, my girl. Didn't the good soul, God rest him, give them with his blessing? Watch the potatoes while I get them."
Moira's beads had always played a significant part in her life. They marked what she called her "blessings." Without doubt the rare bright spots in her life shone like blessings for the dark of their background. Years ago, when her Danny had had his accident and her world had seemed to turn upside down until it rested, full-weight, upon her poor shoulders, her "blessing" had been Miss Lewis at the settlement. Miss Lewis had given her work so that she could earn money to feed her family; Miss Lewis had sent the chair to Danny; Miss Lewis had found cheaper lodgings and had helped her make them homelike. Another blessing had been Jacques Henri, the old Belgian who lived above them and whoseviolin had attracted Beryl as the magnet draws the iron. A lonely soul, he had found sweet company in the child and had gladly helped the eager fingers. Later he had come down to supper with them and Beryl had played a "piece" for her Pop, wearing the beads in honor of the occasion. When Beryl had graduated from the graded school she had stood as class prophet before an assemblage of fond relatives, among them Dale and herself—wearing the green beads. Moira had wished Father Murphy were there to see her girl.
She clasped them around the girl's neck now with fingers that trembled and eyes bright with the tears which were always close to them. During the little ceremony Dale burst in like a gust of strong, sweet air.
"Hullo, everybody! M'm'm, something smells good! What's for tonight, Mom? Salt pork and thick gravy? Fried potatoes? Good! Hullo, Sis. How goes it, Pop?" His greeting embraced everything and everyone in a rush, from the savory supper to the invalid father whose face had brightened at his coming.
"What're you getting all dolled up for, Sis?"
Beryl and her mother tried to tell the story at the same time. Dale did not seem at all impressed and Beryl was disappointed. He said he had heard in the mills that the newcomer at the Manor was agirl, and lame, too. He didn't know what difference it made to any of them, anyway. He scowled a little as he said it.
Dale had his father's strong body and his mother's face of a dreamer; his eyes were brooding like Beryl's but his mouth was wide and tender and might have seemed weak but for the strength in the square cut jaw.
Since that time, ten years back, when he had resolutely put behind him his precious ambitions and had taken the first job he could find, he had been the recognized head of the family. As such he turned to Beryl now.
"I suppose you'll let this rich little girl wipe her feet on you and you'll love it," he said with such scorn that Beryl turned hot and cold in speechless anger.
"Now, sonny, now, sonny. Let's wait until we know the poor little thing," begged his mother.
But for Beryl, except for the fun of wearing the beads, all joy for the moment had fled. She had particularly wanted to impress Dale with her good fortune. She had often, of course, heard Dale speak scathingly and bitterly of the "classes" and the "privileged few" and the unfairness of things in general, but she had paid little attention to it and could not, anyway, connect it with unassuming Robin. When he met Robin, he'd understand—andwhile Dale ate ravenously and talked to his father between mouthfuls, she planned how she would bring Robin to supper the very next time she came home, despite her vow that she would never let Robin see how humble and small her home was.
After supper Beryl helped her mother clear away and Dale brought out his "plaything" which was what he laughingly called the contrivance of strings and spools and little wooden wheels he had made and which he and his father "played with" each evening. Beryl had often wondered why Dale seemed to care so much about it; why he spent hours and hours drawing and figuring on bits of paper. Of course it amused the father, who, during the day, cut the spools into tiny wheels, with a sharp jack-knife; but it must be stupid for Dale to spend all of his evenings over the silly thing. Beryl often lounged on the back of his chair and listened to discover whether there was any part of the game she might like.
Tonight Dale's interest seemed forced.
"If I could just find out what's neededhere—" he growled, touching the delicate contrivance. "That's the way! While I'm racking my poor old nut, some other fellow's going to make the whole thing out!"
Danny Lynch's big hand trembled where it lay on the table. "If I had had the learning—" he began. "I could help, mebbe."
Dale hastened to comfort him. "You don't get that stuff from books, exactly, Pop. It comes here," touching his head. "If I only had the money to have the thing made in metal. Oh, well, what's the use of talking. The thing's got my goat, though. I'm thinking about it all the time. Say, Mom, can I bring Adam Kraus over to supper some night? He said he'd like to meet Pop and he's a good sort."
This Adam Kraus had only recently come to the Mills. He had at first impressed the neighborhood somewhat unfavorably, for he encouraged a suggestion of mystery, lived at the Inn, kept aloof from everyone, and seemed to have no family. Moira's own quick thought of him when Dale had pointed him out on the road in front of the Mill store was that "he looked too white for a working man." But he seemed to have singled Dale out for his advances; Dale thought he was a good sort and had met him more than half-way; Dale who had had to work too hard by day and study at night to make any close friendships. Whether she liked him or not, he should have the best she could offer.
"I'mgoing to bring Robin—I mean, Miss Forsyth, down here the next timeIcome," broke in Beryl.
"And of course you can. And Dale shall bring his friend, too."
"And you can wear your fine beads, Sis," finished Dale, teasingly.
"And it's a nice pot roast and cabbage salad we'll have, too. And a bit of the fruit cake with real butter sauce." Wasn't she going to get her check soon from the store to which she sent her lace?
So Beryl forgot her vexation and Dale his problem with his wooden toy in pleasant anticipation of the "dinner party," as Mrs. Moira grandly called it, out of respect to the pot roast and the fruit cake which Miss Lewis had sent them and which was hidden away in a huge crock in the shed.
"Mom, can't I take the beads back with me? They're so pretty and I haven't a thing that's nice," begged Beryl as the moment for her to return to the Manor came.
"The Princess and the Beggar-maid!" laughed Dale.
"My fine lady must have her jewels!" added big Danny.
Beryl flushed under their teasing but held her tongue, for didn't she always have that picture blazed in her heart of the moment when with her violin she would hold enthralled her unappreciative family and thousands of others?Thenthey would not laugh at her!
"I'll be ever so careful of them and only wear them once in a while," she promised.
Though Mrs. Moira would, of course, have given her children anything they wanted that was hers,she hesitated now, not from reluctance to part with her one "pretty" but because suddenly out of the silent past came the old father's words: "They are only beads. But they'll remind you of this day." She had been seventeen then—a slip of a girl. Beryl was almost sixteen now.
"The shame to me! Sure, it's only beads they are!" she laughed, with a little catch in her voice. "Of course you shall take them."