AT THE DEANERY
“This _is_ delightful!” Sydney cried, as she sat down beside the bright
fire in the pretty bedroom near Katharine’s, which had been allotted to
her at the Deanery. “It is quite too lovely of you to ask me, and it
is quite too lovely of them to let me come! I never thought I should
be allowed to, and Lady Frederica said ‘No’ at first, and I mustn’t go
visiting because of not being ‘out’; but St. Quentin stood by me, and
said everyone had holidays at Christmas-time, and I _should_ go if I
wanted. You can guess how much I did want; even now it seems too good to
be true!”
“Well, I am very pleased to have you, dear,” Katharine said, smiling
across at the girl, “though I wish it were for longer than two days.
There is so much I want to hear. I miss the calisthenic class now that
there are Christmas holidays for everybody. How did you spend Christmas,
and how is your cousin?”
“I hoped he might be better because he didn’t seem getting worse,” Sydney
said a little sadly; “but Dr. Lorry doesn’t seem to think so. He says St.
Quentin must get weaker, and that it is only his splendid constitution
makes him fight so long.”
There was silence for a few minutes in the pretty room.
“Well, you haven’t told me yet how you spent Christmas?” Katharine asked,
rousing herself with an effort.
“Sir Algernon was with us——” began Sydney, but was interrupted.
“Whom did you say?”
“Sir Algernon Bridge; he is a friend, I think, of Cousin St. Quentin’s.”
“And he is at the Castle now? Sydney dear, promise me, don’t have more to
do than you can help with that man!”
Sydney hardly knew the quiet girl; her eyes were flashing, and there was
a bright colour in her face.
“I can’t bear him!” she said; “and I don’t see a great deal of him—at
least, I did not, but since Christmas Day he has been more with Miss
Osric and me.”
“Have as little to do with him as possible,” said Katharine earnestly.
“Your cousin ought not to allow him to be with you. I will tell you
something about him, Sydney, and then you will see what I mean.”
She played nervously for a minute with the fire-screen on her knee, then
began, speaking low.
“It is a story about a girl, not very much older than you are, whose life
was spoiled because she listened to him. This girl cared for a man very
much indeed, and he cared for her; only she would not be engaged, because
the man did not care enough to give up his faults and extravagances for
her sake.
“But she did care, more than you can understand! Sir Algernon knew her,
and one day he asked her to marry him. She said ‘No,’ of course, and he
was angry, for he guessed about this other man.... Then—I don’t know how
to tell you, Sydney dear—a very dreadful thing happened.... The man she
cared for was suspected of doing an exceedingly dishonourable action. The
girl was away from home when this—thing—happened, so she knew nothing
till she came back. The first thing she did when she heard, was to
snatch up pen and paper and write a letter to the man she loved, telling
him that she did not believe a word against him, and only cared for him
more if possible than she had done before....”
“That’s the kind of thing you would have done!” cried Sydney; “please go
on. Wasn’t the man very, very pleased to get the letter?”
Katharine knelt down to stir the fire, although it did not stand in any
need of stirring.
“She never sent the letter, Sydney dear.... She had just addressed it
when Sir Algernon came in. He told her he had come to ask for her advice.
He had had a letter, seeming to come from some poor woman in distress, he
said, and asking for his help. Knowing the girl was interested in such
cases, he asked her if she would read the letter, and tell him if she
thought the case one suited for his help....
“Of course the girl said ‘Yes,’ and he gave her a dirty envelope, looking
very carefully inside it first, she saw, though she hardly noticed at the
time. He told her, as he gave it to her, that she would need to read it
very carefully and slowly, as the woman was exceedingly illiterate.... It
was written in a cramped, odd hand-writing, but it was quite correctly
spelled. When the girl had read about half, she saw that the letter was
from no poor woman ... but from the man she cared for, and oh, Sydney!
it seemed to show beyond possibility of doubt that he was guilty of
this dreadful meanness in which the girl had refused to believe.... Sir
Algernon pretended to be dreadfully distressed when the girl gave him
back the half-read letter, and said he must have put this by mistake
into the wrong envelope, and he never should forgive himself, for he had
promised to suppress the man’s letter, because they had been friends. And
the girl thought he was very generous!
“When he had gone, she put that loving letter in the fire, and wrote
another to the man she loved, not mentioning the letter she had seen, but
merely saying that she never wished to see or hear of him again! I think,
even then, she half hoped for some explanation from him, but none came.
She was very miserable, Sydney.”
“I think she deserved to be!” Sydney cried. “Why, if she really cared for
the man, how could she help believing in him?—all the more if things went
against him. I don’t believe she loved him!”
She wondered as she spoke why her friend looked so white, even in the
dancing fire-light.
“She did care, but not enough,” said Katharine Morrell, and there was a
pause.
“Did she ever get to know?” asked Sydney, after waiting in vain for her
to go on.
“Yes, by-and-by, when she had thought about it more, and grown older, and
heard more about Sir Algernon. She felt sure then that the man she loved
was innocent of that dishonourable action: that he could not have been
guilty of it. And she guessed that Sir Algernon had given her the note to
read on purpose that she might act as she did. He had set a trap for her,
but she would not have fallen into it if she had only had more love and
trust and patience.”
“When she knew, did she write to the man and tell him?” Sydney questioned
earnestly.
“No, dear, she couldn’t. The man had given up caring, for one thing, you
see. No, that is the end of the story! I am afraid there is no ‘lived
happily ever after’ to finish this. I only tell you of it, because I
want you to be warned against Sir Algernon.” There was a silence in the
pretty room; then Katharine rose a little wearily. “Good-night, dear;
don’t be worried by that girl’s story, which is all past and gone. Only
be warned, as I wish she had been warned, against Sir Algernon.”
Sydney thought a good deal of Katharine’s words during the busy, happy
day which followed, when she seemed plunged back for the time being into
the merry Sydney of home. There was a Christmas-tree at the Hospital, and
Sydney went with her friend and helped her take round the presents to the
patients, and made the acquaintance of Miss Osric’s father, and enjoyed
herself exceedingly.
And next day Miss Morrell entertained all the women of her working-party
at the Deanery, and Sydney and the little cousin Sylvia helped to wait on
them at tea and amuse them. Sydney quite made friends with a gentle-faced
woman, whose smile made her think a little bit of mother’s, and sat
beside her talking to her for a great part of the evening.
“Yes, this sewing-party it were Miss Morrell’s plan, miss,” said Mrs.
Carter, “and many’s the times as we’ve blessed her for it. You see, miss,
most of us here went out to service that early as we hadn’t time to learn
more sewing than the roughest kind, and patterns and things of that kind
don’t come much in the way of poor folk. Well, Miss Morrell she knew
that, so she went and learned herself how to make gowns and underwear
and children’s clothes and such-like, and then she has a working-party
once a week for to learn us. And we sits in her own morning-room, with
all her pretty things about, for all the world as if we was ladies, and
she has the rolls of stuff down cheaper from the big shops than we can
buy it, and lets us pay as we can. And she cuts out the things for us,
and learns us all about the making of ’em, talking or reading to us in
between, very sweet. And by-and-by we has tea; all served very dainty,
with Mr. Tomkins, the footman, handing round as polite as anything. I
can tell you, miss, it makes a real rest for us to sit and work in that
there pretty room, and it makes a sight of difference, too, to the way
that we dress the children. Why, mine was turned out as neat and nice as
anything, though I say it as shouldn’t, all through last winter, and at
half the cost of dressing ’em in them shop-made things, as comes all to
pieces before you know where to have ’em. Miss Morrell, she don’t hardly
let nothing interfere with our sewing-party. She’s a real young lady, she
is, bless her!”
“Katharine,” said Sydney that evening, when the guests had departed,
“I wish I were half as good as you are. Don’t you sometimes find that
work-party a great bother?”
“Oh, of course it is a little inconvenient sometimes,” she said; “but the
women are so nice and so grateful, and one is so glad to have something
one can do for them oneself. Papa is always very good in letting me
relieve special cases of trouble, but it is _his_ money, not mine, you
see. The best kind of giving is what one gives oneself, don’t you think?
And most of us can give our time and trouble, even if we can give nothing
else.”
Sydney took these words home with her next day, when reluctantly she had
bade good-bye to Katharine, and been put by the silver-haired Dean into
the charge of Miss Osric, who had come to Donisbro’ to fetch her.
“Most of us can give our time and trouble, even if we can give nothing
else.”