high-pitched voice, sweet as music to his sister's ears, despite his
ingratitude. "Please put me down," he went on, to the person who was
carrying him; "I'm sure I can walk now. I don't like to look like a
baby."
"I'm sure you can't walk, my little man," was the reply. "But you may
try for yourself if you like," and the person he addressed carefully
lowered the child to the ground, while Blanche, for the first time
turning her attention to him, recognised in Herty's bearer the young man
she had met twice before--at Alderwood, and since then at Pinnerton
Vicarage, and who had been introduced to her as Mr Archibald Dunstan.
"I beg your pardon," he said, lifting his cap as soon as his hand was
free. "I'm afraid we've given you a fright, but--"
"I _was_ frightened for a moment," said Blanche, half apologetically,
"but now I must thank you. Has Herty hurt himself? Where did you find
him?"
Mr Dunstan did not at once reply; he was looking at the child, who had
grown very white, and nearly fell.
"There now," he said. "It's all very well to be plucky, but I told you
you couldn't manage for yourself," and he put his arm round the little
fellow.--"Don't be alarmed, Miss Derwent," he went on; "it's only
slight, I think--a sprained ankle; but the pain would be worse if it
were bad. He was chatting quite cheerfully as we came along just now.
I think the best thing to be done is for me to carry him home, if you'll
allow me to do so."
"Thank you, oh thank you so much," said Blanche. "Our house is just on
the other side of the gate. I will run on and open it. We are rather
busy this afternoon--Lady Hebe's girls are having tea in the garden, and
I shouldn't like my mother to be frightened. So perhaps if you can
carry Herty straight to the house, that would be the best."
"Certainly," said Mr Dunstan, passing through the gate as she held it
open. "It _is_ unlucky that this should have happened when you're all
so busy."
But his tone was remarkably cheerful in spite of his expressions of
sympathy. And Herty, now comfortably ensconsed again on the young man's
shoulder, began his explanations.
"I was stretching up for a splendid spray of ivy," he said. "There was
a sort of ditch, and I lost my balance and rolled in. And when I tried
to get up, my foot hurt me so, I couldn't stand. So I had to lie down,
but I shouted a lot. And at last, after ever so long, _he_ came.--
Wouldn't it have been dreadful if you hadn't?" he went on, patting Mr
Dunstan affectionately: he had evidently taken a great fancy to his
rescuer. "Do you think I'd have had to stay there all night?"
"It _was_ lucky, indeed," said Blanche. "There is a short cut through
the woods from Alderwood to East Moddersham, isn't there? You live at
Alderwood, do you not? I suppose you were going to East Moddersham.
You can go back the other way round if you like."
She spoke quite simply, a little faster perhaps than was usual with her,
thanks to her late excitement and present relief. But there was no sort
of curiosity or _arriere pensee_ in her questions.
What then--or was it her fancy?--what made the young man's colour deepen
slightly as she put them to him? She was _almost_ sure it was so,
though he was rather sunburnt, which made it more difficult to judge.
"Thank you," he said. "Yes, I was bound for East Moddersham. That is
to say, not exactly--but--I promised to see Lady Hebe this afternoon,"
and as he looked up with the last words, Blanche caught a twinkle of fun
in his eyes.
They were very nice eyes--honest grey eyes; she had not noticed them
before. And after glancing at them, she turned her own away in some
perplexity.
"Lady Hebe is here," she said. "I don't think she can be expecting you.
It has been settled for some time that she was to come."
"Ah then, perhaps you--Mrs Derwent, that is to say--will allow me to
speak to her--Lady Hebe--in your garden. That will save my needing to
go to East Moddersham. Sir Conway is away, and my calls on Lady Marth
are never pressing."
"He is rather queer," thought Blanche. "I know he and Lady Hebe are
very old friends, but I really don't think she is expecting him this
afternoon."
Mr Dunstan, however, seemed quite satisfied. He spoke cheerfully to
Herty, asking him if his foot pained him still, and assuring him that it
would soon be all right again.
"Shall I have to have the doctor?" asked the boy. "I don't like
doctors. The old one at home made me stay in bed when it was _so_ hot.
I am sure it made me much iller."
"Oh, our doctors here aren't like that," said Archie. "They're very
jolly fellows. But perhaps you won't need one. I'll have a look at
your ankle if your sister will allow me. I'm a bit of a doctor myself."
Blanche did not speak.
"Blanchie, don't you hear?" said Herty, with a touch of querulousness.
"It would be much nicer not to have a proper doctor."
"Very well, dear, we'll see," she replied tranquilly. "Mr Dunstan is
very kind."
CHAPTER THIRTEEN.
MILLINERY.
She had spoken in rather a conventional tone, but she was really touched
when they got to the house, by Mr Dunstan's extreme gentleness and
concern for the boy. He put Herty on the couch in the library, which
they found unoccupied, and got his boot and stocking off as skilfully as
a surgeon could have done. It was not very bad, but it was a sprain,
undoubtedly; and after Blanche, under Archies directions, had applied
cold water bandages, and obtained Herty's promise to lie perfectly
still, she went out to the garden, followed by Mr Dunstan, to explain to
her mother and Stasy what had happened.
"I will send Aline in, to look after you, Herty," she said, "if she can
possibly be spared."
Tea was about coming to an end when the two left the house. After all,
Blanche had scarcely been missed, for all that had passed since she went
to the wood gate to look for her little brother, had taken but a short
time, and everybody in the garden was very busy.
But now there came a breathing-space, and more than one began to ask
what had become of Miss Derwent.
"I wonder if she has gone off to look for Herty, and indeed I wonder
what can have happened to him," said Stasy, with sudden anxiety. For in
the bustle she had forgotten about her little brother.
She was standing beside Hebe as she spoke, and Hebe looked up to answer
her.
"I hope--" she began, then stopped abruptly.
"There is your sister," she said, but a curious expression came over her
face, as she went on, "and--Archie Dunstan.--What an intrusion! How
dared he?" she went on, to herself, in a lower tone. Stasy did not
catch the words. She only saw the annoyance, almost indignation, on
Hebe's face.
But the next few minutes cleared up a good deal. Blanche hastened to
her mother to tell of Herty's accident and Mr Dunstan's kindness, and
Mrs Derwent was, naturally, eager in her thanks. Then she hurried in to
see her boy for herself, and Blanche turned to Mr Dunstan.
"You said you wanted to see Lady Hebe; she is over there--standing by
the other table."
"Oh yes, thank you," he answered. But he did not seem in any desperate
hurry to speak to his old friend.
"I was thinking," he began again, "that I might perhaps be of use about
the doctor. It may be erring on the safe side to let him have a look at
the boy's ankle. I am driving home from East Moddersham, so I could
easily stop at Blissmore on the way."
"Thank you," said Blanche. "I will see what my mother says."
"Does she want to get rid of me?" thought Archie to himself.
However that may have been, Miss Derwent certainly gave him no excuse
for lingering near her, so he strolled across to where Hebe was standing
alone for the moment, as the girls had again dispersed.
She would not refuse to shake hands with him, but her usually sunny eyes
were sparkling with indignation.
"Archie," she said, before he had time to speak, "I could not have
believed this of you. If you call it a good joke, I don't!"
Archie looked at her calmly.
"My dear little lady," he said, with kindly condescension, "it is not
like you to pass judgment on a matter which you know nothing about."
"I do know about it," said Hebe. "I know what you said to me--that by
hook or by crook you would manage to get here to-day. How you have
managed it, I don't know. I only know that you were not justified in
doing anything of the kind."
"I don't allow that," said Archie, nettled in spite of his coolness.
"As it happens, _my_ relation, at whose house I am staying, is the only
person who has been decently civil to the Derwents at all."
The colour mounted to Hebe's face.
"You needn't taunt me with that," she said quickly. "I am not
responsible, as you well know, for what Josephine does or does not do."
"Did I say you were?" he replied, raising his eyebrows. "Nor do I take
my own stand on my aunt's behaviour in the matter. If you'll be so good
as to listen, I will tell you how I have come to be here to-day," and he
quickly related what had happened.
Hebe's face relaxed.
"It is very extraordinary," she said, half to herself. "And what were
you doing prowling about the woods, pray?" she said, unable altogether
to suppress a smile.
"Waiting for what fate might throw in my way," he answered calmly.
Just then they caught sight of Mrs Derwent's figure coming towards them.
Archie started forward.
"If I thought he was in earnest!" thought Hebe to herself, as she
followed him more deliberately.
Mr Dunstan's offer of sending the doctor was accepted, as Herty still
seemed in considerable pain, and soon after the whole party dispersed;
Archie accompanying Hebe and Miss Milward to East Moddersham, where he
had ordered his dog-cart to meet him.
Herty's sprain proved no very serious matter; but during the next
fortnight or so, it formed a plausible excuse for Mr Dunstan's calling
now and then to inquire how he was, and to bring him once or twice books
or toys to amuse him while he had to lie still.
Mrs Derwent took a great liking to the young man, and so did Stasy, but
he did not seem to get to know Blanche any better. Indeed, on one or
two occasions he came and went without seeing her at all. Still, his
visits made a little break in the monotony of life at Pinnerton Lodge.
During the week or two, also, which preceded the East Moddersham
family's removal to town for the season, there were occasional meetings
with Hebe at the vicarage, to discuss guild matters, into which Blanche
threw herself with great thoroughness. Mrs Derwent, always sanguine,
began to feel more cheerful as to things in general brightening by
degrees.
But when Lady Hebe had left, and Mr Dunstan had no longer any excuse for
lingering--Alderwood also being shut up--life seemed to return much to
what it had been.
"I really don't know what I shall do with myself," said Stasy one day,
"when the time comes for me to give up my regular lessons. I almost
wish you were not so contented, Blanche; it is really rather irritating.
If you would grumble too, things wouldn't seem so bad."
Blanche laughed.
"Do you know, I really don't feel inclined to grumble," she said,
"especially now that I've got more to do I do find looking after these
girls very interesting indeed."
"You're a prig," said Stasy--"a prig or a saint; I've not yet made up my
mind which."
Blanche took no notice.
"Stasy," she said, "I have got an idea in my head. It's not quite a new
one; some one proposed it before; but I can't manage it unless you'll
help me, you're so much cleverer about that sort of thing than I am."
"What sort of thing?" said Stasy.
"Things that require neat-handedness and taste. It's a millinery class
for the girls I'm thinking of. It would be such a surprise to Lady Hebe
when she comes back, to see them with neat, pretty hats. It is just the
time they're getting their summer ones, and they do wear such awful
things."
"And I daresay they pay a lot for them, too," said Stasy.
"No doubt they do," said Blanche; "and I don't suppose one of them has
the slightest idea of trimming anything neatly."
Stasy was silent for a moment; then she said, with a little hesitation:
"You're very complimentary about my taste, Blanchie. But as to the
actual work, I'm afraid I should not be much good. I know nothing about
what may be called the `technique' of the business. I couldn't line or
bind a hat neatly, for instance."
"I've thought of that," said Blanche eagerly; and, indeed, a great part
of her interest in this new idea had to do with the occupation and
amusement she had hoped it would give her sister. "I've thought about
that, and I feel pretty sure that little Miss Halliday would help us.
I'm going to Blissmore this afternoon, and I mean to ask her if she
would teach us a little. Two or three lessons would give us all we
need."
Stasy brightened up.
"That would really be great fun," she said. "Do let me go with you,
Blanchie. Can we pay her for teaching us, do you think? Won't it be at
all like poaching on her manor?"
"Oh no," said Blanche. "These girls are not the class who would ever
get things from her; and, of course, however clever we become, we
mustn't leave off giving her our own work. That is to say, everything
we don't get from London. She will quite enter into it, I feel sure."
And that very afternoon Blanche's idea was carried out. They walked
into Blissmore, and went to see Miss Halliday, who was always delighted
to have a glimpse of them; and when Blanche unfolded her plan, the
little milliner entered into it heartily.
"Of course," said Blanche, "you must count it as if you were really
giving us lessons. It would be quite unfair to take up your time for
nothing."
Miss Halliday hesitated, grew rather pink and nervous.
"I wish, I am sure, I could refuse any payment," she said at last. "But
to tell you the truth, Miss Derwent, things have not been going very
well with me lately. There is a great increase of work in Blissmore, as
new families keep coming, and, rather than lose the chance of increasing
my customers, I had made up my mind to take a partner. After a great
deal of inquiry and writing about it, I found what seemed the very
person, unexceptionable in every way. She was to put a little money
into the concern, and, above all, was said to be extremely clever and
tasteful. Just what I wanted! For, you see, there is no denying that I
may be getting a little old-fashioned; though I do think my work is
always neat, and I use good materials. So I had my shop enlarged a
little, and fresh painted, and a new mirror, and altogether went to a
good deal of expense, when, just at the last moment, this poor girl--I
can't find it in my heart to blame her--had a sudden call to Australia,
owing to some family troubles. I could have held her to the bargain, or
made her pay up, but it went against me to do it, so I let her off.
That was nearly two months ago, and here have I been ever since trying
to find some one else. The season getting on too, more work coming in
than I can manage, not daring to refuse any, for fear of it getting
about, and leading to some other milliners starting!"
And Miss Halliday wiped away a tear which she could not altogether
repress.
The sisters were full of sympathy.
"Poor Miss Halliday!" said Blanche, "I am so sorry."
"I wish we could help you," said Stasy impulsively. "Perhaps if you
find us very clever, after you've taught us a little, we might come down
now and then and help you, as if we were apprentices, you know!
Wouldn't it be fun, Blanchie?"
"Bless you, my love," said the old maid, wiping away another tear. "It
is good of you to have such a thought, though, of course, I couldn't so
presume. I'm sure you'll learn very quickly, having been brought up in
France, where, they say, good taste comes with the air. Indeed, I have
been thinking of trying for a French young person as a partner, and I
once thought of consulting your dear mamma about it."
"I can tell her what you say," said Blanche. "But I scarcely think she
would advise it. It's a risk to bring any one so far, and as for what
you say of French taste--well, I don't know--in Paris, perhaps; but one
sees plenty of vulgar ugliness in the provinces."
"Indeed, Miss," said the milliner, considerably impressed. "Well, I
might be safer with an English girl, after all. And thank you, more
than I can say, for your kind sympathy. Your visit has quite cheered
me--it has indeed. You'll let me make you a cup of tea before you go.
It'll be ready directly in your own parlour--we always call the
drawing-room your own room since you were here, we do indeed." And the
little woman started up in her eager hospitality.
"We'll stay to tea on one condition, Miss Halliday," said Stasy--"that
is, that if you do find us clever, you'll promise to let us come and
help you after our lessons with you are over."
"My dear Miss Anastasia," began Miss Halliday.
"Oh, but you must promise," said Stasy. "It's not all out of kindness
that I want it! It would be something to do--some fun! I only wish
you'd let me serve in the shop a little, it's so dreadfully dull at
Pinnerton, you don't know."
Miss Halliday's face expressed commiseration.
"I'm sorry for that," said she. "I was hoping that, when you got
settled down, you'd feel quite at home, and find it more lively. But,
of course, about now most of the families are going up to London."
"That doesn't make much difference to us," said Stasy. "If you want to
know, Miss Halliday, I think English people are horribly unfriendly and
disagreeable."
The milliner looked uncomfortable; she had delicacy enough to know that
any distinct expression of sympathy in such a case would be an
impertinence.
"You may find it pleasanter in the winter," she said. "There are some
nice young ladies in your neighbourhood--Lady Hebe Shetland at East
Moddersham, now! She is a sweet young lady."
"Yes," said Blanche, speaking for the first time. "We know her a
little, but still it is quite different from what it used to be when
mamma was a girl here."
"Well yes, to be sure," said Miss Halliday, "for it was your dear
mamma's home; and no one was more respected in all the country-side, as
I've heard my aunt say, than your dear grandpapa, the late Mr Fenning.
It was quite a different thing in the next vicars time; his wife and
daughters were not, so to say, in the county society at all."
"Do you mean the Flemings?" asked Blanche; "yes, I have heard of them.
I hope people don't confuse mamma with them; sometimes I've been afraid
they may do."
Miss Halliday grew a little pink again.
"Well, Miss, as you've mentioned it," she said, "though I wouldn't have
made free to speak of it myself, I'm afraid there may have been some
mistake of the kind in one or two quarters, and seeing that it was so, I
made bold to set it right; telling those that had made the mistake, that
your dear mamma came of a very high family indeed, as my dear aunt has
often told me, and that on both sides."
Blanche could not help smiling, though she was touched by the little
milliner's loyalty.
"Thank you, Miss Halliday," she said. "I should certainly be sorry for
mamma's family to be confused with the Flemings, not so much because
they were--well, scarcely gentlepeople by birth--but because they were
not particularly nice in themselves. It is misleading that the two
names are so like, and I am glad you explained it."
"I won't mention names," said Miss Halliday, beaming with satisfaction;
"but it will all come right in the end, you will see, my dear young
ladies. And now I think tea must be ready in the drawing-room, if
you'll be so good as to step that way."
"But you are going to have tea with us," said Stasy. "It would be no
fun if you didn't. And we have to settle the day for our first lesson;
and you've never been out to see our house yet, Miss Halliday. Mamma
sent a special message about that."
"What a good little soul she is!" said Blanche, as Stasy and she were
walking home together.
"Yes, isn't she?" said Stasy. "Blanche," she went on, thoughtfully,
after a moment's pause, "do you ever think how nice it would be to be
really very rich? Not just comfortable, as we are, but really rich,
with lots to give away. What nice things one could do for other people!
We could pay for a very clever assistant for Miss Halliday, for
instance, so that she might get to be quite a grand milliner, and the
people here would go to her for their bonnets instead of sending to
London."
Blanche laughed.
"We should have to frank her over to Paris also once or twice a year.
Fancy Miss Halliday in Paris!" she said. "However beautiful her bonnets
were, no one could believe in her unless she went to Paris. Yes, it
would be very nice to be able to do things like that. But, on the other
hand--" She stopped, and seemed to be thinking.
"What were you going to say?" asked Stasy.
"I was only thinking," Blanche replied, "how little we can realise what
it must be to be poor. To feel that one's actual daily bread--food and
clothes and common necessaries--depend on one's work. I suppose,
however, it does not seem hard or depressing to those who have always
been accustomed to it."
"I have thought of it sometimes," said Stasy. "I'm not sure that there
wouldn't be a sort of pleasure about it. It would be very interesting
and exciting. What _I_ dislike most is the being nobody in particular,
neither one thing nor the other, as we have rather felt ourselves here!
Nothing specially to do, and no feeling that it would matter if you
didn't do it. That is so dull."
"I suppose," said Blanche thoughtfully again, "that things to do, things
that you feel you could do better than any one else could do them,
always do turn up sooner or later if one really wants to use one's life
well."
"Oh," said Stasy, with a touch of impatience. "I don't look at things
in such a grand way as you do, Blanchie. I want to get some fun out of
life, and, after all, I'm not difficult to please. My spirits have gone
up ever so high, just with the idea of learning millinery and teaching
the girls, and perhaps helping good little Miss Halliday. Blanchie,
don't you think we might plan some kind of hats that the guild girls
would look very nice in--something that Lady Hebe would be sure to
notice when she comes back. Perhaps if we ordered a lot of them
untrimmed, you know, and got ribbon and things, we could let the girls
have them more cheaply than they could buy them. There'd be no harm in
that, would there? Of course, I know the guild isn't supposed to be at
all a charity--"
"We may be able to do something of the kind," said Blanche. "But it
wouldn't do to have them all the same, or even very like each other.
The girls wouldn't care for it, and it would make a sort of show-off of
the guild. We must think about it; and I want them to learn to trim
their mothers' bonnets and caps and their younger sisters' things, as
well as their own."
CHAPTER FOURTEEN.
MONSIEUR BERGERET'S LETTER.
The millinery lessons were begun and steadily carried on without the
interest of either of the sisters flagging. For, in spite of Stasy's
capriciousness, there was a good of real material in her: she would have
despised herself for not carrying out any plan she had formed. And she
was not disappointed in her expectation of getting some "fun" out of
this new pursuit. It was a pleasure to her to find how deft and
neat-handed a little practice made her. Taste in harmonising and
blending colours, and a quick eye for graceful form, she had by nature.
Miss Halliday was full of admiration.
"There's nothing more _I_ can teach you, young ladies," she said, at the
end of a fortnight, during which time they had had about half-a-dozen
lessons. "Miss Stasy--if it wasn't impertinent to say so--I would call
you a born milliner. Now, I never would have thought of putting violets
with that brown velvet, _never_! And yet there's no denying they go
most beautifully, and you do make the ribbons and trimmings go so far,
too. I've always been told it was the best of French work that it's so
light--never overloaded.--And Miss Derwent, you are so neat; indeed, if
I might say so, almost too particular."
Blanche smiled.
"I haven't got such fairy fingers as Stasy, I know," she said
admiringly, "though perhaps I could beat her at plain-sewing. Yes, I
have run on that lace too heavily, I see. Well, and so you think we're
ready now to teach our girls, Miss Halliday, do you?"
"Indeed, yes, Miss; and I shall be so pleased to order the hats you want
for you at any time, charging you, of course, just what I pay for them
myself."