The household at the vicarage was astir earlier than usual next morning,
which was altogether unnecessary, for Jane did not leave Clover till
after twelve o’clock; but that was a kind of tribute to the excitement
in which everybody had a part. The morning was spent in investigations
as to whether anything was wanting in Janet’s little travelling
work-case, where she kept (by special provision of Mrs. Bland) a reel of
black silk and one of white cotton, needles, thimble, and scissors; or
in her little writing-case, where (supplied by the vicar) she had two
sheets of notepaper, two envelopes, two post-cards, the same of postage
stamps, a pen on an ivory-holder, and a small travelling inkbottle.
These little articles were quite independent of the handsome work-box
and writing-case, severally given her by her kind friends, and were
intended solely for the necessities of the journey, though, perhaps, as
it was only three hours by railway to London such careful provisions
were scarcely necessary.
Janet’s box was not locked till ten o’clock, in case some one might
recollect something that had been forgotten; but after every precaution
had been taken, the last strap fastened, her railway rug and cloak
neatly, nay, almost more than neatly, put up, her own hat put on, and
her coat buttoned to the throat, not one detail left which had not been
attended to, there was still one hour to spare before the train left.
They went out into the wintry garden, where everything was bare, and
strolled round the walks--the three together, the vicar in his
greatcoat, prepared to accompany Janet to the railway, and Mrs. Bland
with a large white shawl over her cap. It was a beautiful morning, the
sun shining red through the mist, and everything so warmed in color and
sentiment by those ruddy rays that it was almost impossible to believe
that it was a cold November day.
“I wish now,” said the vicar, “that I had insisted, as I always wished,
on going up with Janet to town, and seeing her safe in Mrs. Harwood’s
hands.”
“I almost wish you had, dear,” said Mrs. Bland.
“But I don’t,” cried Janet. “Oh, please don’t think of such a thing! How
am I to learn to manage for myself if you pet me like this, as if I
could do nothing? No, dear vicar, I should so much prefer to part with
you here, in our own dear Clover, and to keep the--image quite
unbroken.”
Janet was a little at a loss how to finish her sentence, but felt very
successful when she thought of these words.
Mrs. Bland put up her handkerchief to her eyes.
“There’s something in that,” she said, “to leave us just as I hope you
will find us when you come back. And always do remember, Janet, if any
difficulty should arise, that here we are, always so happy to have
you--only sorry that we can’t keep you altogether.”
“Always delighted to have you,” echoed the vicar, “and sorry above
measure----”
“But I hope no difficulty will arise,” said Janet, very briskly; “I
don’t intend there should. I am not quite like a little novice, am I? I
have seen a little of the world. I remember watching how the governess
at the Grange got on, or rather how she didn’t get on, and thinking had
I been in her place--! So you see I am not unprepared. And then it will
be everything to know I may come back here for my holidays, when I have
any.”
“We ought to have made a condition about that,” said the vicar. “I have
been thinking so for some time. We should have put it down in black and
white, so many weeks at a certain time, say Christmas or Easter,
instead of leaving it to chance as we have done.”
“Not Christmas,” said Mrs. Bland, “nor Easter either, for that would not
be so convenient; but in August, when every child has holidays.”
“Only then,” said the vicar--“for I thought of that--they might be going
abroad, or to the seaside, or somewhere where it would be nice for Janet
to go.”
“People very seldom take the governess with them when they go abroad,”
said Mrs. Bland, shaking her head.
“But, dear Mrs. Bland,” said Janet, “you always used to say one should
not think of holidays till one had done some work. And it will come all
right about that. The grand thing is having a place to come to when one
is free; a place,” she said, with a little moisture springing into a
corner of her bright eyes--a little real moisture, which Janet was quite
pleased and almost proud to feel, as it carried out every necessity of
her position--“which will feel like home.”
“In every way, I hope, my dear child,” said Mrs. Bland, with a sob,
enfolding Janet in her arms and her white shawl, which were both
motherly, warm, and ample, like her heart. The vicar put his hand upon
her shoulder, and patted it tenderly as she was held against his wife’s
breast.
When the girl freed herself (and a dreadful thought about her hat darted
into her mind as she did so, for it is so easy to crush crape) she gave
a little laugh, and cried,
“You must not spoil me too much. I can’t go away crying; it would not be
lucky. Dear vicar, there is one bud left in the china vase beside your
study window. Do get it for me to put in my coat, and that will be the
last thing, and a cheerful thing: for it is nearly time for the train,
and I must go now.”
Janet kept her point, and pinned the rose to her breast, after she had
given Mrs. Bland her farewell kiss, and went away, looking back smiling
and waving her hand till she was out of sight from the vicarage gate.
“Bless her, she do have a spirit to keep up like that,” said the
vicarage cook, who stood behind her mistress to see the last of Miss
Janet.
“It’s all excitement,” said Mrs. Bland, drying her eyes. “I know she’ll
break down dreadfully as soon as she gets into the railway carriage by
herself.”
* * * * *
“Now, Janet, you are sure you would not wish me to go with you: for
there is time enough yet to get a ticket, and send Mrs. Bland a
message?” said the vicar, at the carriage door.
“No, no. No, indeed. It is far better to begin at once--to begin when I
am not forced to do it,” said Janet. “And perhaps next time I travel
alone it will be to come home, which will make everything delightful.
Good-bye and, oh, thank you, thank you, a thousand times!”
“God bless you, my dear child.”
When he had said these last words, the vicar turned right round and
walked away, for his eyes were full; and I am glad to say that Janet too
saw his back, as for the first time he turned it upon her, through a
tear. It was an old back, in a somewhat rusty black coat, and with
stooping shoulders, and there was a slight quiver of emotion in it as he
turned away. Poor child! poor little thing, setting out upon that world
which is so cruel, which makes so small account of soft things and
little things like a bit of a girl, carrying them away upon its stream,
drifting them into corners, taking all the courage and the happiness out
of them. “God bless her! God help her!” the vicar said within himself as
he hurried away.
Janet had been deposited in a first-class carriage alone, with all her
little properties carefully arranged about her. Henceforward probably
she would have to travel by second or even third-class; but Mr. Bland
had got her ticket for this last occasion regardless of expense, and had
fee’d the guard to take care of her, and done everything for her as if
she had been a princess. And I am happy to state that for the first mile
or two Janet saw the familiar landscape all dilated and out of drawing
through the medium of tears. They were not many, nor were they bitter,
but at least they were genuine.
“Poor old vicar,” she said to herself; “poor Mrs. Bland; poor Aunt
Mary----”
Even at that moment it was not herself she pitied, but those whom she
left behind. She added at the end of a minute,
“Poor old doctor,” and burst into a laugh: and her heart jumped up again
after its momentary sympathetic depression, and the tears dried of
themselves. Her heart jumped up with a throb almost of exultation. At
last she had fairly escaped--got away from the village and all the
enveloping kindness and cares that had been lavished upon her.
Janet was not ungrateful any more than youth in the abstract is
ungrateful, but the first sensation of freedom had something
intoxicating in it! Setting out to face the world! She had been told
all her life that she would have to do it some day; and though that
eventuality had always been held before her as a dreadful though
inevitable prospect, it had lost all its terrors as contrasted with the
monotony of the village life, which she knew by heart, and all the quiet
evenings and dull days in which Janet had often felt as if her young
activity and energy of mind must burst the very walls of the dainty
decorous cottage where it was so happy for her, so fortunate to have
found a home. How often had she felt there as if she would like to take
hold of the posts as Samson did, and shake it till it toppled down about
her ears, not with any ill meaning, but for sheer need of movement,
mischief, something to happen. To face the world! She looked it in the
face with a smile of triumph and delight, as a sea-boy faces the smiling
ocean that is in time to be his grave, as it had been his father’s
before him.
Janet was not afraid. The world’s mine oyster. Her feeling was even more
buoyant than that of the young man who goes up to London to seek his
fortune, as being more entirely ignorant, visionary, and without
foundation. A young man can at least amuse himself for his day, even if
he is to be swept off upon the dark waters of ruin to-morrow; but a
girl, a little governess, going to a house in St. John’s Wood! What
amazing folly, what wonderful self-delusion, what a little dauntless,
unforeboding, almost heroic heart! the ideal of a governess is very
different, but Janet felt no regrets, no alarms. She was going to
conquer fate. What she would have liked would have been to have had a
longer journey before her, to have travelled the whole day in order to
have been able to _savourer_ her release, her freedom, the novelty of
everything. She would have liked to arrive in her new sphere when it was
dark, when she could only have a mysterious glimpse of the life before
her, so as to save up a sensation for the next day, which would bring a
full discovery of all her surroundings. But as things were she was very
well content.
And then Janet began to think what sort of a person Mrs. Harwood would
be. Would she be the nice sweet motherly person who sometimes in a novel
took the young governess to her heart and made her feel at home at once?
Janet almost hoped not, for that would be too easy, too commonplace and
unexciting--to go from one kind home to another, and find everything
made smooth for her on every side. Or would she be the purse-proud rich
woman who would consider the governess as beneath her notice, with a
footman who would ask “Any name?” as was done to Tom Pinch in
“Chuzzlewit” when he went to look after his sister. Foolish Janet, in
the exuberance of her life and untried power, thought it would be
“rather fun” to have to do with such a specimen of the employer. She
felt with delight that she would be able to hold her own, that no person
of the kind should overcome her, and that the fight would be rather
exhilarating than otherwise. Or would she perhaps be a fine lady, too
fine to be rude, who would take as little notice as possible of the
young stranger, ignore her existence, and consider her only as a medium
to grind a little knowledge into her children? All of these types Janet
had beheld in veracious fiction, which holds the mirror up to nature:
which of them should she encounter? She was not afraid of any, but the
consciousness that a battle of one kind or other would soon declare
itself gave excitement to her mind and light to her eye.
There were several other points in which Janet, I fear, took the vulgar
and superficial view. She felt with an instinctive certainty that the
men of the house, if there were any, would be on her side, and that the
visitors who ought to admire the young lady of the house would probably
find the governess more attractive. She had an expectation, almost going
the length of a certainty, that she would be fallen in love with by two
or more very eligible persons at the least, and that whenever she was
visible in the room, and, most of all, if she were conspicuously
neglected, the eye of “the gentlemen” would pick her out, and that they
would make flattering comparisons between her and the other young ladies
in a happier position, and comment upon the feminine spite and jealousy
that kept her in the background. This she considered to be one of the
recognized certainties of her future existence, and that assurance of
being preferred and vindicated gave her a great deal of pleasure. But to
do her justice this conviction did not occupy a very great part of her
thoughts.
Thus Janet rattled on through all the brightest hours of the day towards
her fate.