‘Hear I a cannon or a rifle,That is an unessential trifle!’
‘What nonsense boys do talk!’ said Gillian, turning her back on them with regret; for much as she loved her class, she better loved a walk with Jasper, and here was Dolores on her hands in a state of exasperation, believing her to have broken her promise, and muttering,
‘You set him on.’
‘No, indeed I never did! You know I promised.’
‘There are plenty of ways of getting out of a promise.’
‘Speak for yourself, Dolores.’
There were ten minutes of offended silence, and then Gillian said, ‘This is nonsense! You may believe me, I was sorry I laughed at the first verses you showed me, and mamma said I ought not. We never spoke of it, but Miss Hacket has been giving mamma all the poems, and Jasper must have got at them. Don’t you see?’
‘Oh yes, you say so,’ said Dolores, sulkily.
‘You don’t believe me!’
‘You promised that your brothers should never hear of it.’
‘I promised for myself. I couldn’t promise for what was put into a newspaper and trumpeted all over the place,’ said Gillian, really angry now.
Dolores could not deny this, but she was hurt by the word trumpeted; and besides, her own slippery behaviour was weakening her trust in other people’s sincerity, and she only gave a kind of grunt; but Gillian, recovering herself a little, and remembering her mother’s words, proceeded to argue. ‘Besides, it was me whom Jasper meant to tease, not you.’
‘I don’t care which it was. He is as bad as the rest of them!’
Gillian attempted no more conciliation, and they arrived in silence at the Casement Cottages, where Constance was awaiting her friend in the greatest excitement; for she had despatched ‘The Waif of the Moorland’ to Mr. Flinders in the course of the week, and had received a letter from him in return, saying that a personal interview with the gifted authoress would be desirable.
‘And I do long to see him; don’t you, darling?
‘It is very hard that he should be kept away from me,’ said Dolores, trying to stir up some tender feelings.
‘That it is, my poor sweet! I thought whether he could come to me for a merely literary consultation without Mary’s knowing anything further about it, and then we could contrive for you to come down and meet him; but there are so many horrid prejudices that I suppose it would not be safe.’
‘I don’t see how I could come down here without the others. Aunt Lily won’t let me come alone, and though it is holiday time, that is no good, for those horrid boys are always about, and I see that Jasper is going to be worse even than Wilfred.
Various ways and means were discussed, but no excuse seemed available for either Constance’s going to Darminster, or for Mr. Flinders coming to Silverton, without exciting suspicion.
‘The Christmas-tree! Oh, mamma, do let it be the Christmas-tree. It is quite well. We’ve been to look at it.’
‘Christmas-trees have got so stale, Val,’ said Gillian.
‘Rot!’ put in Jasper.
‘Oh, please, please, mamma,’ implored Valetta, ‘please let it be the dear old Christmas-tree! You said I should choose because it will be my birthday.’
‘There is no need to whine, Val; you shall have your tree.’
‘I’m so glad!’ cried Mysie. ‘The dear old tree is best of all. I could never get tired of it if I lived to be a hundred years old.’
‘Such are institutions,’ said their mother. ‘I never heard of a Christmas-tree till I was twice your age.’
‘Oh, mamma! How dreadful! What did you do?’
‘I suppose it is all very well for you kids,’ said Jasper, loftily, putting his hands in his pockets.
‘Perhaps something may be found interesting eve: to the high and mighty elders,’ observed Lady Merrifield.
‘Oh! What, mamma?’
Mamma, of course, only looked mysterious.
‘And,’ added Val, ‘mayn’t we all go on a secret expedition and buy things for it?’
‘We’ve all been saving up,’ added Mysie; ‘and everybody knows every single thing in all the shop at Silverton.’
‘Besides,’ added Gillian, ‘the sconces will none of them hold, and almost all the golden globes got smashed in coming from Dublin, and one of the birds has its head off, and another has lost its spun-glass tail, and another its legs.’
‘A bird of Paradise,’ said Lady Merrifield, laughing; ‘but wasn’t there a tree at Malta decked with no apparatus at all?’
‘Yes, but Alley and Phyl can do anything!’
‘I think we must ask Aunt Jane—-’
There was a howl. ‘Oh, please, mamma, don’t let Aunt Jane get all the things! We do so want to choose.’
‘You impatient monsters! You haven’t heard me out, and you don’t deserve it.’
‘Oh, mamma, I beg your pardon!’ ‘Oh, mamma, please!’ ‘Oh, mamma, pray!’ cried the most impatient howlers, dancing round her.
‘What I was about to observe, before the interruption by the honourable members, was, that we might perhaps ask Aunt Jane and Aunt Ada to receive at luncheon a party of caterers for this same tree.’
‘Oh! oh! oh!’ ‘How delicious!’ ‘Hooray!’ ‘That’s what I call jolly fun!’
‘And, mamma,’ added Gillian, ‘perhaps we might let Miss Hacket join. I know she wants to get up something for a G.F.S. class; but mamma was attending to Primrose, and the brothers burst in.
‘There goes Gill, spoiling it all!’ exclaimed Wilfred.
‘That’s always the way,’ said Jasper. ‘Girls must puzzle everything up with some philanthropic Great Fuss Society dodge.’
‘I am sure, Jasper,’ said Gillian, ‘I don’t see why it should spoil anything to make other people happy. I thought we were told to make feasts not only for our own friends—’
‘Gill’s getting just like old Miss Hacket,’ said Wilfred.
‘Or sweet Constance,’ put in Jasper. ‘She’ll be writing poems next.’
‘Hush! hush! boys,’ said Lady Merrifield. ‘I do not mean to interfere with your pleasure, ‘but I had rather our discussions were not entirely selfish. Suppose, Gillian, we walked down to Casement Cottages, and consulted Miss Hacket.’
This was done, in the company of all the little girls, for Miss Hacket’s cats, doves, and gingerbread were highly popular; moreover, Dolores was glad of a chance sight of Constance.
‘My dear,’ said Lady Merrifield, as Gillian walked beside her, ‘you must be satisfied with giving Miss Hacket the reversion of our tree, and you and Mysie can go and help her. It will not do to make these kind of works a nuisance to your brothers.’
‘I did not think Jasper would have been so selfish as to object,’ said Gillian, almost tearfully.
‘Remember that boys have a very short time at home, and cannot be expected to care for these things like those who work in them,’ said Lady Merrifield. ‘It will not make them do so, to bore them, and take away their sense of home and liberty. At the same time, they must not expect to have everything sacrificed to them, and so I shall make Jasper understand.’
‘You won’t scold him, mamma?’
‘Can’t you, any of you, trust me, Gill?’
‘Oh! mamma! Only I didn’t want him to think. I wouldn’t do everything he liked, except that I don’t want him to be unkind about those poor girls.’
Miss Hacket was perfectly enraptured at the offer of the reversion of the Christmas-tree and its trapping. Valetta’s birthday was on the 28th of December and the tree was to be lighted on the ensuing evening for G.F.S. Moreover, the party would go to Rockstone as soon as an appointment could be made with Miss Mohun, to make selections at a great German fancy shop, recently opened there, and in full glory; and the Hacket sisters were invited to join the party, starting at a quarter to eight, and returning at a few minutes after seven, the element of darkness at each end only adding to the charm in the eyes of the children, and Valetta, with a little leap, repeated that it would be a real secret expedition.
‘Very secret indeed,’ said her mother, ‘considering how many it is known to—’
‘Yes, but it is, mamma, for everybody has a secret from everybody.’
The words made Constance and Dolores look round with a start from their colloquy under the shade of the window-curtains, but no one was thinking of them. Just as the plans were settled, Constance came forward, saying, ‘Lady Merrifield, may I have dear Dolores to spend the day with me? We neither of us wish to join your kind party to Rockstone, and we should so enjoy being together.’
‘I had much rather stay,’ added Dolores.
‘Very well,’ said Lady Merrifield, reflecting that her sisters would be grateful for the diminution of the party, and that it would be easier to keep the peace without Dolores.
The defection was hailed with joy by her cousins, though they were struck dumb at her extraordinary taste in not liking shopping.
Jasper did look rather small when his mother assured him in private he might have trusted her to see that he was not to be incommoded with Gillian’s girls, and he only observed, in excuse for his murmurs, that it made a man mad to see his sisters always off after some charity fad or other.
“‘Always’ being a few hours once a week,” she said.
‘Just when one wants her.’
‘Look here, my boy,’ she said, ‘you don’t want your sisters to be selfish, useless, fine ladies—never doing any one any good. If they take up good works, they can’t drop them entirely to wait on you. Gillian does give up a great deal, and it would be kinder to forbear a little, and not treat all she does as an injury to yourself.’
‘I only meant to get a rise out of her.’
‘You are quite welcome to do that, provided it is done in good nature. Gill is quite sound stuff enough to be laughed at! But, I say, my Japs, I should prefer your letting Dolores alone; she has not learned to be laughed at yet, and has not come even to the stage for being taught to bear it.’
‘She looks fit to turn the cream sour,’ observed Jasper. ‘I say, mamma, you don’t want me to go on this shopping business, do you?’
‘Not by any means, sir.’
Happily, the chance of a day’s rabbit shooting presented itself at a warren some miles off, and Harry undertook the care of Wilfred, who gave his word of honour to obey implicitly and take no liberties with the guns. Fergus would gladly have gone with them, but he was still young enough to be sensible of the attractions of toy-shops. Only Primrose had to be left to the nursery, and there was no need to waste pity on her, for on such an occasion Mrs. Halfpenny would relax her mood, and lay herself out to be agreeable, when she had exhausted her forebodings about her leddyship making herself ill for a week gaun rampaging about with all the bairns, as if she was no better than one herself.
‘I shall let Miss Mohun do most of the rampaging, nurse; but, if it is fine, will you take Miss Primrose into the town and let her choose her own cards. I have given her a florin, and if you make the most of that for her, she will be as happy as going with us.’
‘That I will, my leddy. Bairns is easy content when ye ken how to sort ‘em.’
‘And, nurse, I believe there will be a box from Sir Jasper at the station. It may come home in the waggonette that takes us. Will you and Macrae get it safe into the store-room, for I don’t want the children to see it too soon?’
There was nothing but satisfaction in the house on the morning of the expedition. The untimely candle-light breakfast was only a fresh element of delight, and so was the paling gas at the station, the round, red sun peeping out through a yellow break between grey sky and greyer woods; the meeting Miss Hacket in her fur cloak, the taking of the tickets, the coughing of the train, the tumbling into one of the many empty carriages, the triumphant start,—all seemed as fresh and delicious as if the young people had never taken a journey before in all their lives. The fog in the valleys, the sleepy villages, the half-roused stations, all gave rise to exclamations, and nothing was regretted but that the windows would get clouded over.
Even the waiting at the junction had its charms, for it was enlivened by a supplementary breakfast on rolls and milk! and at a few minutes past eleven the train was drawing up at Rockstone, and Aunt Jane, sealskins and all, was beckoning from the platform, hurrying after the carriage as it swept past, and holding out a hand to jump the party from the door.
There she was, ready to take them to the most charming and cheapest shops, where the coins burning in those five pockets would go the furthest. Go in a cab? No, I thank you, it is far more delightful to walk. So mamma and Miss Hacket were stowed away in the despised vehicle, to make the purchases that nobody cared about, or which were to be unseen and unknown till the great day; while Aunt Jane undertook to guide the young people through the town, for her house was at the other end of it securing the Christmas-cards on the way, if nothin’ else. For, though all the cards and gifts to mamma, and a good many besides, were of domestic manufacture, some had to be purchased, and she knew, this wonderful woman, where to get cards of former seasons at reduced prices to suit their youthful finances.
Considerable patience was requisite before all the choices were made, and the balance cast between cards and presents, and Miss Mohun got her quartette past all the shop windows, to the seaside villa, shut in by tamarisks, which Aunt Adeline believed to be the only place that suited her health. Mamma and Miss Hacket had already arrived, and filled the little vestibule with parcels and boxes.
Then the early dinner! The aunts had anticipated their Christmas turkey for that goodly company to help them eat it, but afterwards there was only time for a mince pie all round; for more than half the work remained to be done by all except mamma, who would stay and rest with Aunt Ada, having finished all that could not be deputed.
However, first she had a conference in private with Aunt Jane, who undertook therein to come to Silverton for Valetta’s birthday, and add astonishment and mystery sufficient to satisfy such of the public as were weary of Christmas-trees. She added, however, ‘You will think I am always at you. Lily, but did you know that Flinders is living at Darminster?’
‘No; but it is five and twenty miles off, and he has never troubled us.’
‘Don’t be too secure. He is in connection with that low paper—the Politician—which methinks, is the place where those remarkable poems of Miss Constance’s have appeared.’
‘Is it not the way of poetry of that calibre to see the light in county papers?’
‘This seems to me of a lower calibre than is likely to get in without private interest.’
‘But to my certain knowledge the child has neither written to, nor heard of the man all this time.’
‘You don’t know what goes on with her bosom friend.’
‘I am certain Miss Hacket would connive at nothing underhand. Besides, I have never seen any thing sly or deceitful in poor Dolores. She will not make friends with us, that is all, and that may be our fault.’
‘I only say, look out, you unsuspicious dame!’
‘Now, Jenny, satisfy my curiosity as to how you know all this. I am sure I never showed you those effusions. We have had trouble enough about them, for the children cut them up in a way Dolores has never forgiven.’
‘Oh! Miss Hacket sent them to me, to ask if ‘Mollsey to her Babe’ and ‘The Canary’ might not be passed on to Friendly Leaves. And as to Flinders, when I went to the G.F.S. Conference at Darminster I met the man full in the street, and, of course, I inquired afterwards how he came there. So there’s nothing preternatural about it.’
‘It is well you did not live two hundred years ago, or you would certainly have been burnt for a witch.’
‘See what a witch I shall make on the 28th! But I hear those unfortunate children dancing and prancing with impatience on the stairs. I must go, before they have driven Ada distracted.’
What would the two aunts have said, could they have seen Dolores and Constance, at that moment partaking of the most elaborate meal the Darminster refreshment-room could supply, at a little round marble table, in company with Mr. Flinders! They had not been obliged to start nearly so early as the other party, as the journey was much shorter, and with no change of line, so they had quietly walked to the station by ten o’clock, arrived at Darminster at half-past eleven, and have been met by the personage whom Dolores recognized as Uncle Alfred. Constance was a little disappointed not to see something more distinguished, and less flashy in style, but he was so polite and complimentary, and made such touching allusions to his misfortunes and his dear sister, that she soon began to think him exceedingly interesting, and pitied him greatly when he said he could not take them to his lodgings—they were not fit for his niece or her friend, who had done him a kindness for which he could never be sufficiently grateful, in affording him a glimpse of his dear sister’s child. It made Dolores wince, for she never could bear the mention of her mother, it was like touching a wound, and the old sensation of discomfort and dislike to her uncle’s company began to grow over her again, now that she was not struggling against Mohun opposition to her meeting him. He lionized them about the town, but it was a foggy, drizzly day, one of those when the fringe of sea-coast often enjoys finer weather than inland places; the streets were very sloppy, and Dolores and Constance did not do much beyond purchasing a few cards and some presents at a fancy shop, as they had agreed to do, to serve as an excuse for their expedition in case it could not be kept a secret, and most of the visit was made in the waiting-room at the station, or walking up and down the platform. As to the grand point, Mr. Flinders told Constance that her tale was talented and striking, full of great excellence; she might hope for success equal to Ouida’s—but that he had found it quite impossible to induce a publisher to accept a work by an unknown author, unless she advanced something. He could guarantee the return, but she must entrust him with thirty pounds. Poor Constance! it was a fatal blow; she had not thirty pounds in the world; she doubted if she could raise the sum, even by her sister’s help. Then Mr. Flinders sighed, and thought that if he represented the circumstances, the firm might be content with twenty—nay, even fifteen. Constance cheered up a little. She did think she could make up fifteen, after the 21st, when certain moneys became due, which she shared with her sister. She would be left very bare all the spring—but what was that to the return she was promised? Only Mr. Flinders impressed on her the necessity of secrecy—even from her sister—since, he said, if he were once known to have obtained such terms for a young authoress, he should be besieged for ever!
‘But, Uncle Alfred,’ said Dolores, ‘surely my father and mother, and all the other people I have known, did not pay to get their things published.’
‘My dear niece, you speak as one who has been with persons of high and established fame—the literary aristocracy, in fact. The doors once opened, Miss Hacket will, like them, make her own terms; but such doors, like many others, are only to be opened by a silver key.’
There were other particulars which he talked over with the authoress in a promenade on the platform while Dolores was left in the waiting-room; but afterwards he indulged his niece with a tete-a-tete, asking her father’s address, and mourning over the length of time it would take to obtain an answer from Fiji. Mr. Mohun had promised to help him, solemnly and kindly promised, for the sake of her whom they had both loved so much, and here he was, cut off and quite in extremity. Unfortunate as usual, through his determined enemies, a company in which he had shares had collapsed, he was penniless till his salary from the Politician became due in March. Meanwhile, he should be expelled from his lodging and brought to ruin if he could not raise a few pounds—even one.
Dolores had nearly two pounds in her purse. Her father had left her amply provided, and she had not much opportunity of spending. She knew he had seen the gold when she was shopping, and when she had paid for the refreshments, which of course she had found she had to do. With some hesitation she said, ‘If thirty shillings would be of any good to you—’
‘My dear, generous child, your dear mother’s own daughter! It will be the saving of me temporarily! But among all your wealthy relatives, surely, considering your father’s promise, you could obtain some advance until he can be communicated with!’
‘If he is still in New Zealand, we could telegraph, and hear directly. He did not know how long he should be there, for the ship had something to be done to it.’
This did not suit Mr. Flinders. Such telegrams were very expensive, and it was too uncertain whether Mr. Mohun would be at Auckland. Surely, Lady Merrifield, whose husband was shaking the pagoda tree, would make an advance if she knew the circumstances.
‘I don’t think she would,’ said Dolores, ‘I don’t think they are very rich. There is only one horse and one little pony, and my cousins have such very tiny allowances.’
‘Haughty and poor! Stuck up and skimping. Yes, I understand. But I am not asking from her, only an advance, on your father’s promise, which he would be certain to repay. Yes, quite certain! It is only a matter of time. It would save me at the present moment from utter ruin and destruction that would have broken your dear mother’s heart. Oh! Mary, what I lost in you.’ Then, as perhaps he saw reflection on Dolores’s face, he added, ‘She is gone, the only person who took an interest in me, so it matters the less, and when you hear again of your unhappy uncle you will know what drove him—’
‘If it was only an advance—I have a cheque,’ began Dolores. ‘If seven pounds would do you any good—’
‘It would be salvation!’ he exclaimed.
‘Father left it with me,’ pursued Dolores, considering, ‘in case Professor Muhlwasser went on with his great book of coloured plates of microscopic marine zoophytes, and sent it in. I was to keep this and pay with it—’
‘Oh! Muhlwasser! you need not trouble about him. I saw his death in the paper a month ago.’
‘Then I really think I might send you the cheque, and write to my father why I did so.’
‘Ah! Dolly, I knew that your mother’s daughter could never desert me.’
More followed of the same kind, tending to make Dolores feel that she was doing a heroically generous thing, and stifling the lurking sense in her mind that she had no right to dispose of her father’s money without his consent. The December day began to close in, the gas was lighted, Constance was seen disconsolately peeping out at the waiting-room door to see whether the private conference were over. They joined her again, and Mr. Flinders discoursed about the envy and jealousy of critics, and success being only attained by getting into a certain clique, till she began to look rather frightened; but reassured by the voluble list of names and papers to which he assured her of recommendations. Then he began to be complimentary, and she, to put on the silly tituppy kind of face and tone wherewith she had talked to the curates at the festival. Dolores began to find this very dull, and to feel neglected, perhaps also cross, and doubts came across her whether she might not get into a dreadful scrape about the money, which she certainly had no right to dispose of. She at last broke in with, ‘Uncle Alfred, are you quite sure Professor Muhlwasser is dead?’
‘Bless your heart, child, he’s as dead as Harry the Eighth,’ said Mr. Flinders in haste;’ died at Berlin, of fatty degeneration of the heart! Well, as I was saying, Miss Constance—’
‘But, uncle, I was thinking—’
‘Hush!’ as a couple of ladies and a whole train of nurses and children invaded the waiting-room, ‘it won’t do to talk of such little matters in public places, you know. Would you not like a cup of tea, Miss Constance. Will you allow me to be your cavalier?’
People were beginning to arrive in expectation of the coming train, and talk was not possible in the throng; at least, Mr. Flinders did not make it so. At last the train swept up, and he was hurrying to find places for the ladies, when there was a moment’s glimpse of a handsome moustached face at a smoking-carriage window. Dolores started, and had almost exclaimed, ‘Uncle Reginald;’ but before the words were out of her mouth, Mr. Flinders had drawn her on swiftly, among all the numbers of people getting out and getting in, hurled her into a distant carriage, handed Constance in after her, and muttering something about forgetting an appointment, he vanished, without any of the arrangements about foot-warmers that he had promised.
‘Uncle Reginald!’ again exclaimed Dolores, ‘I am sure it was he!’
‘Oh dear! What an escape!’ answered Constance, breathless with surprise, and settling herself with disgust and difficulty next to a fat old farmer, as three or four more people entered and jammed them close together.
‘Who is he?’ she presently whispered.
‘Colonel Mohun. His regiment is at Galway. I know he talked of getting over this winter if he possibly could; but Aunt Lily went away before the post was come in.’
‘We shall have to take great care when we get out.’
Here the train started, and conversation in undertones became impossible, more especially as two of the farmers in the carriage were coming back from the Smithfield Cattle Show, and were discussing the prize oxen with all their might. It was very stuffy and close. Constance looked ineffably fastidious and uncomfortable, and Dolores gazed at the clouded window, and dull little lamp overhead, put in to enliven the deepening twilight. This avoiding of Uncle Reginald brought more before her mind a sense of wrong-doing than anything that had gone before. She was fond of this uncle, who always made her father’s house his headquarters when in London, and used to play with her when she was a small child, and always to take her to the Zoological Gardens, till she declared she was too old to care for such a childish show, and then he and her father both laughed at her so much that she would never have forgiven anybody else; and she found he enjoyed it for his own sake far more than she did. However, he always did take her out for walks and sights that were sure to be amusing with him. Father, too, was quite bright and alive when he was in the house, and thus Dolores had nothing but pleasant associations connected with this uncle, and had heard of the chances of his coming like a ray of light, though without much hope, since the state of Ireland had prevented him from being able even to run over to take leave of her father. And now he was come, she must hide from him like a guilty thing! There was no spirit of opposition against him in her mind, and thus she could feel that she was doing something sad and strange. Moreover, she began to feel that her promise about the cheque had been a rash one, and the echo of her father’s voice came back on her, saying, ‘Surely, Mary, you know better than to believe a word out of Flinders’s mouth.’
But then she thought of her mother’s rare tears glistening in her eyes, and the answer, ‘Poor Alfred! I cannot give him up. Everything has been against him.’
It was quite dark before Silverton was reached, at half-past five, with three quarters of an hour to spare before the other travellers were expected. Most of their fellow passengers had got out at previous stations, so that Constance was able to open the door and jump out so perilously before the train had quite stopped, that a porter caught her with a sharp word of reproof. She grasped Dolores’s hand and scudded across the platform, giving the return tickets almost before the collector was ready. A cautious guard even exclaimed, ‘What’s those two young women up to?’ but was answered at once, ‘They’re all right! That’s nought but one of the old parson’s daughters, as have been out with a return to Darminster.’
‘A sweetheartin’?’ demanded one of the bystanders, and there was a laugh.
Constance heard the tones and vulgar laugh, though not the words, and she was in such a panic as she hurried down the steps that she did not stop to look out for a cab. The place was small, and they were not very plentiful at any time, and she was mortally afraid, though she hardly knew why, of being over-taken and questioned by Colonel Mohun, who might know his niece, though he would not know her; but Dolores was tired, and had a headache, and did not at all like the walk in the dirt, and fog, and dark, after turning from the gas lit station.
‘We were to have a cab, Constance.’
‘We can’t,’ was the answer, still hurrying on. ‘He would come out upon us.’
‘He is much more likely to overtake us this way!’ said Dolores, thinking of her uncle’s long strides.
‘Well, we can’t turn back now!’ said Constance, getting almost into a run, which lasted till they were past the paddock gate. Dolores, panting to keep up with her, had half a mind to turn up there and go straight home; but there might be any number of oxen in the way, and almost worse, she might meet Jasper and Wilfred, or if Uncle Reginald overtook her, what would he think?
The pair slackened their pace a little when they had satisfied themselves that the break in the dark hedge beside them was the gate. They heard wheels, and presently saw the lamps of a cab, bearing down, halt at the gate they had left behind, and turn in.
‘We should have been off first,’ said Dolores.
‘If we could have got a cab in time?’
‘One can always get cabs.’
‘Oh! no, not at all for certain.’
‘This is a nasty, stupid, out-of-the-way place,’ said Dolores, wanting to say something cross.
‘It isn’t a vulgar place, full of traffic,’ returned Constance, equally cross.
‘Well, I never meant to walk home in this way! I’m sure my feet are wet. I wish I had waited and gone with Uncle Regie.’
‘Now, Dolly, what do you mean? You would not have it all betrayed?’
‘I’ve a great mind to tell Uncle Regie all about it.’
‘Now, Dolly! When you said so much about the Mohun pride and scorn of your poor, dear uncle.’
‘Uncle Regie is not proud. And he would know what to do.’
‘But,’ cried Constance, in a fright, ‘you would never tell him! You promised that it should be a secret, and I should be in such a dreadful scrape with Lady Merrifield and Mary.’
‘Well! it was your doing, and you had all the pleasure of it, flourishing about the platform with him.’
‘How can you be so disagreeable, Dolores, when you know it was all on business. Though I do think he is the most interesting man I ever did see.’
‘Just because he flattered you.’
However, there is no need to tell how many cross and quarrelsome things the two tired friends said to each other. They were sitting on opposite sides of the fire, one very gloomy, and the other very pettish, when the waggonette stopped at the gate, to put out Miss Hacket and take up Dolores. Hands pulled her up the step, and a hubbub of merry voices received her in the dark.
‘Good girl, not to keep us waiting.’
‘Oh, Dolly, Dolly, Macrae says Uncle Regie’s come!’
‘Oh, Dolly, it has been such fun!’
‘Take care of my parcel!’
‘Ah, ha! you don’t know what is in there.’
‘Here’s something under my feet!’
‘Oh! take care! ‘Tisn’t my—’
‘Hush, hush, Val—’
And so it went on till on the steps was seen in full light among the boys, Uncle Reginald, ready to lift every one out with a kiss.’
‘Ha! Dolly, is that you?’ he said, as they came into the hall. ‘I saw such a likeness of you at one station that I was as near as possible jumping out to speak to her. She had on just that fur tippet!’
‘That comes of living in Ireland, Regie,’ said Aunt Lily. ‘Once in a shop at Belfast, a lady darted up to me with “And it’s I that am glad to see you, me dear. And how’s me sweet little god-daughter? Oh! and it isn’t yourself. And aren’t you Mrs. Phelim O’Shaugnessy?’” And under cover of this, Dolores retreated to her own room. She took off her things, and then looked at the cheque.
Professor Muhlwasser was a clever German, always at work on science, counting, in the most minute and accurate manner, such details as the rays in a sea anemone’s tentacles, or the eggs in a shrimp’s roe. He was engaged on a huge book, in numbers, of which Mr. Maurice Mohun had promised to take two copies—but whereas extravagances upon peculiar hobbies were apt not to be tolerated in the family, and it was really uncertain whether the work would ever be completed, Mr. Mohun had preferred leaving a cheque for the payment in his little daughter’s hand, rather than entrust it to one of the brothers, who would have howled and growled at such a waste of good money on such a subject. Thus he had told Dolores to back the draft, get it changed, and send the amount by a postal order to Germany, if the books and account should come, which he thought very doubtful.
And now the professor was dead, Dolores looked at the cheque, and supposed she could do as she pleased with it. Mother helped Uncle Alfred. Yes, but mother earned all she sent him herself! Perhaps he would not ask again. How much more he had talked to Constance than to herself. Dolly wished she had not seen him to get into this difficulty. She was tired, cold, and damp. Oh! if she had never gone, and not been half caught by Uncle Regie!
Dolores was glad to recollect, when she awoke, that Uncle Reginald was in the house. It was as if she had a friend of her own there who might enter into all the ill-usage she suffered, and whom she could even consult about Uncle Alfred, so far as she could do so without disclosing all the underhand correspondence. She called doing so betraying Constance, but, in truth, she shrank more from shocking him with what he might think very wrong—since, after all, he belonged to that hard-hearted generation of grown-up people who had no feeling nor understanding of one’s troubles.
As she went downstairs she was aware of an increasing hubbub, and frequently looking over the balusters, perceived the top of Primrose’s wavy head above the close-cropped one of Uncle Regie, as, with her mounted on his shoulder, he careered round the hall, with a pack of others vociferating behind him.
There was a lull, for Lady Merrifield came out of her room just as Dolores had paused; Primrose was put down, the morning salutations took place, and Dolores had her full share of them. She was even allowed to sit next her uncle at breakfast; but her rasher of bacon had not been half eaten, before she had perceived that, as to possessing him as she used to do at home, he was just as much everybody else’s Uncle Regie as hers, for during the time of their being stationed at Belfast, he had been so often with them, that he was quite established as the prince of playfellows.
‘Uncle Regie, will you have a crack at the rabbits tomorrow? Brown said we might have a day, and we have been keeping it for you.’
‘Uncle Regie, the hounds meet at the Bugle this morning, won’t you come and see them throw off?’
‘Oh, let me come too!’ ‘And me!’ ‘And me!’
‘My dear children,’ exclaimed their mother, ‘I can’t have the whole tribe of little ones and girls going galloping after your uncle. You will only hinder him.’
‘No, no, Lily! the more Merrifields, the merrier the field. I’ll drill them well. How far off is this Bugle?’
‘Not two miles over Furzy Common.’
‘Oh! not so far, Hal!’
‘That’s nothing. Who is coming?’
A general outbreak of ‘Me’s’ ensued, but mamma laid an embargo on Primrose, who must stay at home and ‘help her,’ while Gillian looked wistful and doubtful, knowing that more efficient help than the little one’s might be desirable.
‘You had better go, my dear,’ said her mother, ‘if you are not tired. I don’t like to send Mysie and Val without some one to turn back with them if your uncle and the boys want to go further.’
But whereas it was not nearly time to start, Uncle Reginald was dragged down to inspect all the live stock in the stable-yard, at their feeding-time, and went off with Val and Primrose clinging to his hands, and the general rabble surrounding him.
Nothing could have been more alien to Dolores’s taste than going out to a meet on foot through mud and mire—she who hated the being driven out to take a constitutional walk on the gravel road or the paved path! But she had some hope that while all the others ran off madly, as was their wont, she might secure a little rational conversation with Uncle Reginald. So she came down in hat and ulster, and was rewarded with ‘That’s right, Doll; I’m glad to see they have taught you to take country walks.’
‘It is all compliment to you, Uncle Regie,’ said Gillian. ‘She hates them generally.’
‘Are we all ready? Where are Japs and Will?’
‘Gone to shut up the dogs; and Hal is not coming.’
‘Beneath his dignity, eh?’
‘I think he has some reading to do,’ said Gillian.
‘Now mind, Reginald,’ said Aunt Lily, coming on the scene, ‘you are not to let those imps drag you farther than you like. It is a very different thing, remember, children, from going out with the hounds like a gentleman.’
‘Yes, mamma,’ returned Fergus. ‘If you would only let me have the pony!’
‘And send home the girls as soon as you find them in the way,’ she added.
‘All right,’ answered he, and off plunged the party; but Dolores soon found that she was not to be allowed much of Uncle Reginald’s exclusive society. He did begin talking to her about her father’s voyage, last letters, and intended departure from Auckland, but Valetta kept fast hold of his other hand, and the others were all round, every moment pointing out something—to them noticeable—and telling the story of some exploit, delighted when their uncle capped it with some boyish tales of Beechcroft, or with some droll, Irish story.
With such talk, the strong, healthy young folk little heeded the surface mud or the lanes. Even Dolores when she heard her father’s name in the reminiscences,’ was interested for a time, and was always hoping that the others would fly off and leave her to her uncle; but she was much less used to country mud and stout boots than the others, and she had been very much tired by her expedition on the previous day, so that she had begun to find the way very long before they came out on an open green, with a few cottages standing a good way back in their gardens, and as their centre, one of the great old coaching inns of past days, now chiefly farmhouse, though a sign, bearing a golden bugle-horn upon a blue ground, stood aloft in front of it, over the heads of the speckled mass of tan, black, and white, pervaded with curved tails, over which the scarlet-coated whips kept guard, while shining horses, bearing red coats and black coats, boys, and a few ladies, were moving about, and carriages drew up from time to time.
There was a long standing about, and Colonel Mohun, being a stranger there himself, kept his flock on the outskirts, only Jasper plunging in, at sight of a mounted schoolfellow, while Gillian and Mysie told the names of the few they recognized. At last there was a move, and Jasper came back to point out the wood they were going to draw, close at hand. Should they not all go on and see it?
‘Oh! let us! do come, Uncle Regie,’ cried Mysie and Val.
‘Look here, Gill,’ said the uncle, ‘this child doesn’t look fit to go any farther.’
‘I’m very tired, and so cold,’ said Dolores.
‘Yes,’ said Gillian, ‘we ought to go home now.’
Not me! not me;’ cried the other two girls; ‘Uncle Regie will take care of us.’
‘I think you must come,’ said Gillian, ‘mamma said you had better come home when I do.’
‘Yes,’ said Wilfred, ‘we don’t want a pack of girls to go and get tired.’
‘We shall go into all sorts of places not fit for you,’ said Jasper; ‘you wouldn’t come back with a whole petticoat among you.’
‘And Val would be left stodged in a ditch for a month of Sundays,’ added Wilfred.
‘I am afraid we had better part company, Gill,’ said the colonel. ‘I would take you on a little further, but this poor little Londoner won’t have a leg to stand upon by the time she gets home.’
‘More shame for her to come out to spoil our fun,’ muttered Valetta, too low for her uncle to hear.
‘Mamma will think we have gone quite far enough, thank you, uncle,’ said the sage Gillian, ‘and I think Fergus had better come too.’
‘That he had,’ said Jasper. ‘Fancy him over Peat Hill.’
‘He’ll be left behind to be picked up as we come back,’ said Wilfred.
‘No, no, no! I can keep up better than you can, Wil! Take me, Uncle Regie.’ The little boy was so near a howl that good-natured Colonel Mohun’s heart was touched, and he consented to let him come on, though Jasper argued, ‘You’ll have to carry him, uncle.’
‘No, I’ll make you, master! Tell your mother not to wait luncheon for us, Gillian; we’ll pick up something somewhere.’
‘Hurrah!’ cried Wilfred and Fergus, to whom this was an immense additional pleasure.
The girls turned away into the lane, Valetta indulging in an outrageous grumble. ‘Why should Dolores have come out to spoil everything?’
Dolores did not speak.
‘Just our one chance,’ sighed Mysie, ‘and perhaps we should have seen the fox.’
‘We may do that yet,’ said Gillian; ‘he may come this way.’
‘I don’t care if he does,’ said Valetta. ‘I wanted to see them draw the copse. I believe Dolores did it on purpose to spoil our pleasure.’
‘Don’t be so cross, Val,’ said Mysie. ‘She can’t help being tired.’
‘Why did she come, then, when nobody wanted her?’
‘For shame, Val,’ said Gillian, ‘you know mamma would be very angry to hear you say anything so unkind.’
‘It’s quite true, though,’ muttered Valetta.
‘Never mind, Dolly, dear,’ said Mysie, shocked. ‘Val doesn’t really mean it, you know.’
‘Yes, she does,’ said Dolores, shaking her comforter off; ‘you all do! I wish I had never come here.’
Mysie tried in her own persevering way to argue again that Val was only put out, and disappointed at having to turn back, to which Valetta, in spite of Gillian’s endeavour to silence her, added, ‘So stupid of her to come out! What did she do it for?’
Dolores, who hardly ever cried, was tired into crying now. ‘You grudge me everything; you wouldn’t let me speak one single word to Uncle Regie, and kept bothering about! I’ll never do anything with you again! I won’t.’
‘Did you want to speak to Uncle Regie?’ asked Mysie.
‘To be sure I did! He is my uncle, that I knew ever so long before you did, and you never let him speak to me.’
‘Mrs. Halfpenny always put us on the high chair, with our faces to the wall when we were jealous,’ remarked Valetta.
‘But did you want to say anything to him in particular?’ said Mysie, revolving means of contriving a private interview.
‘That’s no business of yours! I wish you would let me alone!’ broke out Dolores, in a fretful fright lest any one should guess that she had anything on her mind.
‘To make up stories of us, of course,’ growled Valetta, but Gillian here interposed, declaring with authority that if she heard another word before they reached the paddock gate, she should certainly tell mother how disgracefully they had been behaving. When Gillian said such things she kept her word. Besides, by way of precaution, she marched down the muddy middle of the road, with Dolores limping along the footpath on one side, and Val as far off as possible on the border of the ditch, on the other; the more inoffensive Mysie keeping by her side. They were all weary, and Dolores was very footsore also, by the time they reached home, at the very moment that the two Misses Hacket appeared coming up the drive. Lady Merrifield, having the day before invited the elder, as the purchases needed to be looked over, and preparations set in hand, and she did not then know that her brother was coming.
Dolores scarcely knew whether she was glad to see Constance. She had many doubts and qualms about that cheque. And if she had spent any quiet time alone with her uncle, she might have laid enough of her trouble before him to get some advice or help; but to ask for an interview, especially when ‘everybody’ thought it was to make complaints, was too uncomfortable and alarming; and she was inclined to escape from thought of the whole subject altogether by taking action quickly.
Gillian gave her uncle’s message about not waiting; the dirty boots were taken off in the hall, and Constance followed her friend up to her room to take off her things.
Dolores sat on the side of her bed, too much tired at first to be willing to move, Constance’s pity elicited tears, and that they had all been so very unkind to her; they were angry at her getting tired, and they were jealous of her even speaking to Uncle Regie. Again this alarmed Constance, ‘You weren’t going to tell him about Mr. Flinders—you know you promised.’
‘He knows about him already, and he would tell me what to do.’
‘Oh! but that would never do, darling Dolly. You told me all the family were hard and unjust, and he would tell Lady Merrifield, and we should never be allowed to see each other again. And only think of my poor little secret! I didn’t think you would have turned from your poor relation in misfortune for the sake of this grand Colonel.’
The end of it was, that just as the gong was sounding, Dolores handed over to Constance an envelope directed to Mr. Flinders, and containing Mr. Maurice Mohun’s cheque. It was off her mind now, she thought, as she shuffled down to dinner, lookup so pale and uneasy that her aunt made her have a glass of wine and some gravy soup to begin with, and, when dinner was over, turned all the parcels off the school-room sofa, and made her lie upon it during the grand unpacking, which was almost as charming as the purchasing, perhaps more so, since there was no comparison with costlier articles.
There was not very much time. This was Friday and Christmas Day was on Monday, so there were only two more clear week-days before the birthday and Miss Hacket would be church-decorating on the morrow; but Lady Merrifield would not send her daughters to help, as there were plenty of hands without them, and they were too young to trust in a mixed set, who were not always sure to be reverent.
Dinner had rested and refreshed them; they rejoiced in the absence of the man-kind, and Primrose was sent out for her walk while the numerous boxes and packages were opened, and displayed sconces and tapers, gilt balls and glass birds, oranges and bon-bons, disguised in every imaginable fashion. There was a double set of the tapers, and two relays of devices in sweets, for the benefit of the party of the second night, a list of whom Miss Hacket had brought, that heads might be counted, and any deficiency supplied in time through Aunt Jane. For Lady Merrifield had commissioned Gillian to lay in—unknown to the good lady—a stock of such treasures as are valuable indeed to the little maid: shell pin-cushions, Cinderella slippers holding thimbles, cases of hair-pins, queer housewives, and the like things, wonderfully pretty for the price, and which filled the kind heart of Miss Hacket with rapture and gratitude at such brilliant additions to her own home-made contrivances in the way of cuffs, comforters, and illuminated workbags, all beautifully neat; I though it was hard to persuade her of what Lady Merrifield averred, that such things ought to be far more precious than brilliant, shop-bought, ready-made ware, ‘with no love-seed in it.’
‘It is very hard,’ she said; ‘how fancy shops try to spoil all one used to be able to do for one’s friends. The purses, and the penwipers, and the needle-cases that were one’s choicest presents in my youth, are all turned out now smart and tight and fashioned, but without a scrap of the honest old labour and love that went into them.’
‘But papa and mamma do care still,’ cried Gillian; ‘papa never will have any purse but the long ones mamma nets for him.’
‘And mamma always will have the old brown and blue carriage-bag that Aunt Phyllis worked,’ chimed in Mysie, ‘though Claude did say he would throw it into the sea when we crossed from Dublin for it looked like an old housekeeper’s.’
‘Claude was in a superfine condition then—in awe of an old Sandhurst comrade. He would be gild enough to see the old brown bag now, poor fellow,’ said Lady Merrifield, tenderly.
So it went on, with merry chat and a good deal of real preparation, till the early darkness came on, and a great noise in the haul announced the return of ‘the boys,’ among whom Lady Merrifield still classed her colonel brother. They were muddy up to the eyes, but they had seen a great deal more than was easy to understand in their incoherent accounts. Wilfed had rolled into a wet ditch, and been picked out by his uncle and hung up to dry at a little village inn, where—this seemed to have been the supreme glory—they had made a meal on pigs’-liver and bread-and-cheese before plodding home again—losing their way under Wilfred’s confident pilotage—finding themselves five miles from home—getting a cast in a cart for the two little boys just as Fergus was almost ready to cry—Colonel Mohun and Jasper walking alongside of the carter for two miles, and conversing in a friendly manner, though the man said he knew the soldier by his step, and thought it was a pool-trade. Finally, he directed them by a short cut, which proved to be through a lane of clay and pools of such an adhesive nature that Fergus had to be pulled out step by step by main force by his uncle, who deposited him on some stones at the other end, and then came back to assist the struggles of Wilfred, who was slowly proceeding with Jasper’s help.
‘And that’s the way we make you spend your Christmas holiday, Regie,’ said Lady Merrifield.
‘Never mind. Lily; mud was a congenial element to us both in old times, you know, so no wonder your brood take to it like ducks or hippopotamuses. I say, we ought to have come in by the rear. Couldn’t that imp of a buttons of yours come and scrape us before we go upstairs?’
‘You are certainly grown older, Regie. You never would have thought of that once.’
‘No more would you, Lily—so do yourself justice.’
However, when five o’clock tea was spread in the drawing-room, and the Hacket ladies came in, Constance beheld such a splendid vision of a fine, fair, though sunburnt face, long, light moustaches, and tall figure, that she instantly assumed her most affected graces, and did not wonder the less that the Mohuns were all so very high.
Dolores’s strong desire for a private interview with her uncle died away when Constance carried off the cheque. She knew he would tell her she had no right to give it, and she did not want to be told so, nor to have any special inquiries made. She was not sorry that an invitation from a neighbour kept him and Hal out shooting all Saturday, and, on the other hand, she so far shrank from Constance’s talk about Mr. Flinders as not to be vexed that it was too wet on Sunday afternoon for any going down to Casement Cottages.
It was on that wet afternoon, however, that Uncle Reginald, crossing the hall for once without his tail of followers, saw her slowly dragging downstairs with a book in her hand.
‘Well, Miss Doll,’ he said; ‘you don’t look very jolly! What’s the matter?’
‘Nothing, Uncle Regie.’
‘I don’t believe in nothing. Here,’ sitting down on the stairs, with an arm round her, ‘tell me all about it, Dolly, we are old chums, you know. Have you got into a row?’
‘Oh no!’
‘Is there anything I can put straight?’
‘No, thank you, Uncle Regie.’
‘There’s something amiss!’ said the good-natured, puzzled uncle. ‘What is it? I should have thought you would have got on with these young folks like—like a house on fire.’
‘That’s all you know about it,’ thought Dolly. What she said was, ‘One never does.’
‘I don’t understand that generalization,’ answered her uncle; then, as she did not answer, he added, ‘I am sure your Aunt Lily is very anxious to make you happy. Have you anything to complain of?’
‘No,’ said Dolores, ‘I don’t complain of anything.’
She was thinking of Valetta’s notion that she wanted to ‘make up stories of them,’ and therefore she said it in a manner which conveyed that she had a good deal to complain of, if she would, though really she would have been a good deal puzzled to produce a grievance that a man like Uncle Reginald would understand, though she had plenty for sympathy like Constance’s.
However, it was not to be expected that a private conference should last long in that house, and Mysie appeared at that moment, looking for her cousin, to say that ‘Mamma was ready for her.’ Dolores went off with more alacrity than usual, and Uncle Reginald beckoned up his other niece, and observed: ‘I say, Mysie, what’s the matter with Dolly?’
‘She is always like that, uncle,’ answered Mysie.
‘Don’t you hit it off with her, then?’
‘I can’t, uncle,’ said Mysie, looking up, with a sudden wink now and then to stop her tears. ‘I thought we should have been such friends; but she won’t let me. I didn’t mean to be stupid and disagreeable, like the girls in ‘Ashenden Schoolroom,’ but she doesn’t care for anybody but Miss Constance and Maude Sefton.’
‘I hope you are all very kind to her,’ said Uncle Reginald, rather wistfully.
‘We try,’ said Mysie, who was not going to betray Wilfred and Valetta, and could honestly say so of herself and Gillian.
And there again came an interruption, in the shape of Gillian. ‘Mysie, mamma says we may finish up our sacred illuminated cards, for it will be Sunday work.’
‘Oh, jolly!’ cried Mysie, jumping up. ‘And will you give me one rub of your real good carmine Gilly-flower, dear.’
‘And of my ultramarine, too,’ responded Gillian, wherewith the two sisters disappeared, radiant with goodwill and gratitude; while poor Uncle Reginald, who had intended to devote this wet Sunday afternoon to writing to his brother that Dolores was perfectly happy and thriving in Lily’s care, and like a sister to his other favourite, Mysie, remained disappointed and perplexed, wondering whether the poor little maiden were homesick, or whether no children could be depended on for kindness when out of sight, and deciding that he should defer his letter till he had seen a little more, and talked to his sister Jane, who could see through a milestone any day.
It was understood that mamma preferred home-made cards to bought ones, so there was always a great manufacture of them in the weeks previous to Christmas, the comparative failures being exchanged among the younger members.
The presents were always reserved for Valetta’s birthday and the tree, and this rendered the circulation of the cards doubly interesting. In the immediate family alone, there were thirteen times thirteen, besides those coming from, and going to outsiders, so that it was as well that a good many should be of domestic manufacture, either with pencil and brush, or of tiny leaves carefully dried and gummed. And mamma had kept an album, with names and dates, into which all these home efforts were inserted, and nothing else! This year’s series began with a little chestnut curl of Primrose’s hair, fastened down on a card by Gillian, and rose to a beautiful drawing of a blue Indian Lotus lily, with a gorgeous dragon-fly on it, sent by Alethea. The Indian party had sent a card for every one—the girls, beautiful drawings of birds, insects, and scenery; the brother, a bundle of rice-paper figured with costumes, and papa, some clever pen-and-ink outlines of odd figures, which his daughters beguiled from him in his leisure moments!
As to the home circle, it is enough to say that their performances were highly satisfactory to the makers, and were rewarded by mamma’s kisses, and the text or verse she had secretly illuminated for each. She had no time to do more, and the series were infinitely prized and laid up as treasures. There were plenty of ornamental cards from without to be admired: the Brighton and Beechcroft aunts; the Stokesley cousins, and whole multitudes of friends pouring them in as usual; so that the entire review seemed to occupy all those free moments of the Christmas Day, when the young folks were neither at church, nor at meals, nor singing carols themselves, nor hearing the choir sing in the hall, nor looking over photograph books and hearing old family stories. This last occupation was received in the family as the regular evening pleasure, ending in all singing, ‘When shepherds watch their flocks by night.’
Dolores had a card from her aunt and each of her cousins, besides one of the parcel Uncle Reginald had brought. She did not think enough of the very bad drawing and smeared painting of the ambitious attempts she received, to feel at all disconcerted at having no reciprocity to offer. The only cards she had sent were to Constance Hacket, to Fraulein, and to Maude Sefton—the last with a sore sense of the long interval since she had heard.
However, there was a card from Maude, but it was a very poor one, looking very much like a last year’s possession, and the letter was not much better, being chiefly an apology for having been too busy to write. Maude was going to lectures with Nona Styles—Nona was such a darling girl—and breaking off because she was wanted to rehearse Cinderella with this same darling Nona.
It made Dolores’s heart go down farther, though there was a beautiful and unexpected card from Mrs. Sefton, one from her former servant, Caroline, also from Fraulein, and three or four from old friends of her mother, who had remembered the solitary girl. In truth, she had more beautiful ones than anybody else, but she kept these in their envelopes, and showed herself so much averse to free fingering and admiration of them that Lady Merrifield had to call off Valetta, remind her that her cousin had a right to her own cards, and hear in return that Dolores was so cross.
‘Dolly,’ said Uncle Reginald, in a low voice, since he was permitted to look over the cards with her, ‘I think I have found out part of your troubles.’
She looked at him in alarm.
He put his finger on a card bearing the words, ‘Goodwill to men.’
‘Umph,’ said she. ‘I don’t want everything of mine messed and spoilt.’
And as his eye fell on Fergus’s cards, he felt there was reason in what she said.
Aunt Lily had taken her for a quarter of an hour that morning, trying to infuse the real thought underlying the joy that makes it Christmas, not only yule-tide. But it all fell flat—it was all lessons to her—imposed on her on a day that she had not been used to see made what she called ‘goody.’ Last year her father had shut himself up after church, and she had spent the evening in noisy mirth with the Seftons.