Kate rushed upstairs to her own room when she reached the Hall; she was
wild with mortification and the sense of downfall. It was the first time
she had come into collision with her fellow-creatures of a class equal
to her own. Servants and poor people in the village had been impertinent
to her ere now; but these were accidents, which Kate treated with the
contempt they deserved, and which she could punish by the withdrawal of
privileges and presents. She could scold, and did so soundly; and she
could punish. But she could neither scold nor punish in the present
case. Her Uncle Courtenay would only look at her in that exasperating
way, with that cool smile on his face, as if she were a kitten; and this
new being, with whom already she felt herself so well acquainted--Bertie
would laugh, and be kind, and sorry for her. ‘Poor child!--poor little
thing!’ These were the words he had dared to use. ‘Oh!’ Kate thought, I
would like to kill him! I would like to----’ And then she asked herself
what would he say at home? and writhed on the bed on which she had
thrown herself in inextinguishable shame. They would laugh at her; they
would make fun of her. ‘Oh! I would like to kill myself,’ cried Kate, in
her thoughts. She cried her eyes out in the silence of her room. There
was no Bertie to come there with sympathetic eyes to ask what she was
doing. Miss Blank did not care; neither did any one in the house--not
even her own maid, who was always about her, and to whom she would talk
for hours together. Kate buried her head in her pillow, and tried to
picture to herself the aspect of the Rectory. There would be the
mother--who, Bertie said, understood everybody--seated somewhere near
the table; and Edith and Minnie in the room--one of them, perhaps, doing
worsted-work, one at the piano, or copying music, or drawing, as young
ladies do in novels. Now and then, no doubt Mrs. Hardwick would give
them little orders; she would say, perhaps, ‘Play me one of the Lieder,
Minnie,’ or ‘that little air of Mozart’s.’ And she would say something
about her work to Edith. Involuntarily that picture rose before lonely
Kate. She seemed to see them seated there, with the windows open, and
sweet scents coming in from the garden. She heard the voices murmuring,
and a soft little strain, _andante pianissimo_, tinkling like the soft
flow of a stream through the pleasant place. Oh! how pleasant it must
be--even though she did not like the Rectory people, though Mr. Hardwick
had been so rebellious, though they did not believe in her (Kate’s)
natural headship of Church and Slate in Langton-Courtenay.
She sobbed as she lay and dreamed, and developed her new imagination.
She had wondered, half angrily, half wistfully, about the Rectory people
before, but Bertie seemed to give a certain reality to them. He was the
brother of the girl whom Kate had so often inspected with keen eyes, but
did not know; and he said ‘Mamma’ to that unknown Mrs. Hardwick.
‘Mamma!’ What a curious word it was, when you came to think of it! Not
so serious, nor full of meaning as mother was, but soft and
caressing--as of some one who would always feel for you, always put her
arm round you, say ‘dear’ to you, ask what was the matter? Miss Blank
never asked what was the matter! She took it for granted that Kate was
cross, that it was ‘her own fault,’ or, as the very kindest hypothesis,
that she had a headache, which was not in Kate’s way.
She lay sobbing, as I have said; but sobbing softly, as her emotion wore
itself out, without tears. Her eyes were red, and her temples throbbed a
little. She was worn out; she would not rouse herself and go downstairs
to tempt another conflict with her uncle, as, had it not been for this
last event, she would have felt disposed to do. And yet, poor child, she
wanted her tea. Dinner had not been a satisfactory meal, and Kate could
not help saying to herself that if Minnie and Edith had been suffering
as she was, their mamma would have come to them in the dark, and kissed
them, and bathed their hot foreheads, and brought them cups of tea. But
there was no one to bring a cup of tea, without being asked, to a girl
who had no mother. Kate had but to ring her bell, and she could have had
whatever she pleased; but what did that matter? No one came near her, as
it happened. The governess and her maid both supposed her to be with her
uncle, and it was only when Maryanne came in at nine o’clock to prepare
her young mistress’s hair-brushes and dressing-gown, that the young
mistress was found, to Maryanne’s consternation, stretched on her bed,
with a face as white as her dress, and eyes surrounded with red rings.
And in the dark, of all things in the world, in a place like
Langton-Courtenay, where it was well known the Blue Lady walked, and
turned folks to stone! At the first glance Maryanne felt certain that
the Blue Lady only could be responsible for the condition in which her
young mistress was found.
‘Oh! miss,’ she cried, ‘and why didn’t you ring the bell?’
‘It did not matter,’ said Kate, reproachful and proud.
‘Lying there all in the dark--and it don’t matter! ‘Oh! miss, I know as
you ain’t timorsome like me, but if you was once to see something----’
‘Hold your tongue!’ said Kate, peremptorily. ‘See something! The thing
is, in this house, that one never sees anything! One might die, and it
never would be known. You don’t care enough for one to come and look if
one is dead or alive.’
‘Oh! miss!’
‘Don’t say “Oh miss!” to me,’ cried Kate, indignantly, ‘or pretend----
Go and fetch me some tea. That is the only thing you can do. You don’t
forget your own tea, or anything else you want; but when I am out of
sorts, or have a--headache----’
Kate had no headache, except such as her crying had made; but it was the
staple malady, the thing that did duty for everything in Miss Blank’s
vocabulary, and her pupil naturally followed her example, to this
extent, at least.
‘Have you got a headache, miss? I’ll tell Miss Blank--I’ll go and fetch
the housekeeper.’
‘If you do, I will ask Uncle Courtenay to send you away to-morrow!’
cried Kate. ‘Go and fetch me some tea.’
But the tea which she had to order for herself was very different, she
felt sure, from the tea that Edith Hardwick’s mother would have carried
upstairs to her unasked. It was tea made by Maryanne, who was not very
careful if the kettle was boiling, and who had filled a large teapot
full of water, in order to get this one cup. It was very hot and very
washy, and made Kate angry. She sent away Maryanne in a fit of
indignation, and did her own hair for the night, and made herself very
uncomfortable. How different it must be with Edith and Minnie! If Kate
had only known it, however, Edith and Minnie, had they conducted
themselves as she was doing, would have been metaphorically whipped and
put to bed.
In the morning she came down with pale cheeks, but no one took any
notice. Uncle Courtenay was reading his paper, and had other things to
think of; and Miss Blank intended to ask what her pupil had been doing
with herself when they should be alone together in the school-room. They
ate their meal in a solemn silence, broken only now and then by a remark
from Miss Blank, which was scarcely less solemn. Uncle Courtenay took no
notice--he read his paper, which veiled him even from his companion’s
eyes. At last, Miss Blank, having finished her breakfast, made a sign to
Kate that it was time to rise; and then Kate took courage.
‘Uncle Courtenay,’ she said very softly, ‘you said you were going to
call--at--the Rectory?’
Uncle Courtenay looked at her round the corner of his paper. ‘Well,’ he
said, ‘what of that? Of course I shall call at the Rectory--after what
you have told me, I have no choice.’
‘Then please--may I go with you?’ said Kate. She cast down her eyes
demurely as she spoke, and consequently did not see the inquiring glance
that he cast at her; but she saw, under her eyelashes, that he had laid
down his paper; and this evidence of commotion was a comfort to her
soul.
‘Go with me!’ he said. ‘Not to give the Rector any further impertinence,
I hope?’
Kate’s eyes flashed, but she restrained herself. ‘I have never been
impertinent to any one, uncle. If I mistook what I had a right to, was
that my fault? I am willing to make it up, if they are; and I can go
alone if I mayn’t go with you.’
‘Oh! you can go with me if you choose,’ said Mr. Courtenay,
ungraciously; and then he took up his paper. But he was not so
ungracious as he appeared; he was rather glad, on the whole, to have
this opportunity of talking to her, and to see that (as he thought) his
reproof of the previous night had produced so immediate an effect. He
said to himself, cheerfully, ‘Come, the child is not so ungovernable
after all;’ and was pleased, involuntarily, by the success of his
operation. He was pleased, too, with her appearance when she was
dressed, and ready to accompany him. She was subdued in tone, and less
talkative a great deal than she had been the day before. He took it for
granted that it was his influence that had done this--‘Another proof,’
he said to himself, ‘how expedient it is to show that you are master,
and will stand no nonsense.’ He had been so despairing about her the
night before, and saw such a vista of troubles before him in the six
years of guardianship that remained, that this docility made him at once
complacent and triumphant now.
‘I don’t want to be hard upon you, Kate,’ he said; ‘but you must
recollect that at present, in the eye of the law, you are a child, and
have no right to interfere with anything--neither parish, nor estate,
nor even house.’
‘But it is all mine, Uncle Courtenay.’
‘That has nothing to do with it,’ said her guardian, promptly. ‘The deer
in the park have about as much right to meddle as you.’
‘Is our park small?’ said Kate. ‘Do you know Sir Herbert Eldridge, Uncle
Courtenay? Where does he live?--and has he a very fine place? I can’t
believe that there are five hundred acres in his park; and I don’t know
how many there are in ours. I don’t understand measuring one’s own
places. What does it matter an acre or two? I am sure there is no park
so nice as Langton-Courtenay under the sun.’
‘What is all this about parks? You take away my breath,’ said Mr.
Courtenay, in dismay.
‘Oh! nothing,’ said Kate; ‘only that I heard a person say--when I was
out last night I met one of the Rectory people, Uncle Courtenay--it is
partly for that I want to go--his sister, he says, is the same age as
I----’
‘_His_ sister!--it was a he, then?’ said Mr. Courtenay, with that prompt
suspiciousness which is natural to the guardian of an heiress.
‘It was Bertie, the second son--of course it was a he. A girl could not
have jumped over the fence--one might scramble, you know, but one
couldn’t jump it with one’s petticoats. He told me one or two
things--about his family.’
‘But why did he jump over the fence? And what do you know about him? Do
you talk to everybody that comes in your way--about his family?’ cried
Mr. Courtenay, with returning dismay.
‘Of course I do, Uncle Courtenay,’ said Kate, looking full at him. ‘You
may say I have no right to interfere, but I have always known that
Langton was to be mine, and I have always taken an interest
in--everybody. Why, it was my duty. What else could I do?’
‘I should prefer that you did almost anything else,’ said Mr. Courtenay,
hastily; and then he stopped short, feeling that it was incautious to
betray his reasons, or suggest to the lively imagination of this
perverse young woman that there was danger in Bertie Hardwick and his
talk. ‘The danger’s self were lure alone,’ he said to himself, and
plunged, in his dismay, into another subject. ‘Do you remember what I
said to you last night about your Aunt Anderson?’ he said. ‘Shouldn’t
you like to go and see her, Kate? She has a daughter of your own age, an
only child. They have been abroad all their lives, and, I daresay, speak
a dozen languages--that sort of people generally do. I think it would be
a right thing to visit her----’
‘If it would be a right thing to visit her, Uncle Courtenay, it would be
still righter to ask her to come here.’
‘But that I forbid, my dear,’ said the old man.
Then there was a pause. Kate was greatly tempted to lose her temper,
but, on the whole, experience taught her that losing one’s temper seldom
does much good, and she restrained herself. She tried a different mode
of attack.
‘Uncle Courtenay,’ she said, pathetically, ‘is it because you don’t want
any one to love me that nobody is ever allowed to stay here?’
‘When you are older, Kate, you will see what I mean,’ said Mr.
Courtenay. ‘I don’t wish you to enter the world with any yoke on your
neck. I mean you to be free. You will thank me afterwards, when you see
how you have been saved from a tribe of locusts--from a household of
dependents----’
Kate stopped and gazed at him with a curious, semi-comprehension. She
put her head a little on one side, and looked up to him with her bright
eyes. ‘Dependents!’ she said--‘dependents, uncle! Miss Blank tells me I
have a great number of dependents, but I am sure they don’t care for
me.’
‘They never do,’ said Mr. Courtenay--this was, he thought, the one grand
experience which he had won from life.