"DEAR MIDGETINA,--It is delightful to have your letters, and I am
ashamed of myself for not answering them before. But I will do so
the very moment there is a free hour. Would you please ask mother
with my love to send me some handkerchiefs, some stockings, and
some soap? My first are worn with weeping, my second with sitting
still, and my third is mottled--and similarly affects the
complexion. But Easter draws near, and I am sure I must long to be
home. Did you tell mother by any chance of your midnight astronomy
lesson? It has been most useful when all other baits and threats
have failed to teach the young idea how to shoot. Truly a poet's
way of putting it. Is Mr Crimble still visiting his charming
parishioner?
"I remain,
"Yours affec'ly,
"FANNY BOWATER."
Slowly, self-conscious word by word, lingering here and there, I read
these letters through--then through again. Then I lifted my eyes and
stared for a while over my left shoulder at empty Wanderslore. A medley
of emotions strove for mastery, and as if to reassure herself the "tiny,
round-headed pin" kissed the signature, whispering languishingly to
herself in the great garden: "I love you exceedingly. Oh, Fanny, I love
you exceedingly," and hid her eyes in her hands. The note-paper was very
faintly scented. My imagination wandered off I know not where; and
returned, elated and dejected. Which the more I know not. Then I folded
up the secret letter into as small a compass as I could, dragged back a
loose, flat stone, hid it away in the dry crevice beneath, and replaced
the stone. The other I put into my silk bag.
I emerged from these labours to see in my mind Mrs Bowater steadfastly
regarding me, and behind her the shadowy shape of Mr Crimble, with I
know not what of entreaty in his magnified dark eyes. I smiled a little
ruefully to myself to think that my life was become like a pool of deep
water in which I was slowly sinking down and down. As if, in sober fact,
there were stones in my pocket, or leaden soles to my shoes. It was more
like reading a story about myself, than _being_ myself, and what was to
be the end of it all? I thought of Fanny married to Mr Crimble, as my
mother was married to my father. How dark and uncomfortable a creature
he looked beside Fanny's grace and fairness. And would Mrs Crimble sit
in an arm-chair and watch Fanny as Fanny had watched me? And should I be
asked to tea? I was surprised into a shudder. Yet I don't think there
would have been any _wild_ jealousy in my heart--even if Fanny should
say, Yes. I could love her better, perhaps, if she would give me a
little time. And what was really keeping her back? Why did every word
she said or wrote only hide what she truly meant?
So, far from mocking at the Workbox, I was only helplessly examining its
tangled skeins. Nor was I criticizing Fanny. To help her--that was my
one burning desire, to give all I had, take nothing. In a vague, and
possibly priggish, fashion, I knew, too, that I wanted to help her
against herself. Her letter (and perhaps the long waiting for it) had
smoothed out my old excitements. In the midst of these musings memory
suddenly alighted on the question in the letter which was to be shown to
Mrs Bowater: about the star-gazing. There was no need for that now. But
the point was, had not Fanny extorted a promise from me _not_ to tell
her mother of our midnight adventure? It seemed as though without a
shred of warning the fair face had drawn close in my consciousness and
was looking at me low and fixedly, like a snake in a picture. Why, it
was like cheating at cards! Fascinated and repelled, I sank again into
reverie.
"No, no, it's cowardly, Fanny," cried aloud a voice in the midst of this
inward argument, as startling as if a stranger had addressed me. The
morning was intensely still. Sunbeams out of the sky now silvered the
clustered chimney shafts of Wanderslore. Where shadow lay, the frost
gloomed wondrously blue on the dishevelled terraces; where sun, a thin
smoke of vapour was ascending into the air. The plants and bushes around
me were knobbed all over with wax-green buds. The enormous trees were
faintly coloured in their twigs. A sun-beetle staggered, out among the
pebbles at my feet. I glanced at my hands; they were coral pink with the
cold. "I love you exceedingly--exceedingly," I repeated, though this
time I knew not to whom.
So saying, and, even as I said it, realizing that the _exceedingly_ was
not my own, and that I must be intelligent even if I was sentimental, I
rose from my stone, and turned to go back. I thus faced the worn, small,
stone house again. Instantly I was all attention. A curious feeling came
over me, familiar, yet eluding remembrance. It meant that I must be
vigilant. Cautiously I edged round to the other side of the angled wall,
where lay the fallen tree. Hard, dark buds showed on its yet living
fringes. Rather than clamber over its sodden bole, I skirted it until I
could walk beneath a lank, upthrust bough. At every few steps I shrank
in and glanced around me, then fixed my eyes--as I had learned to do by
my stream-side or when star-gazing--on a single object, in order to mark
what was passing on the outskirts of my field of vision. Nothing. I was
alone in the garden. A robin, with a light flutter of wing, perched to
eye me. A string of rooks cawed across the sky. Wanderslore emptily
stared. If, indeed, I was being watched, then my watcher was no less
circumspect than I. Soon I was skirting the woods again, and had climbed
the green knoll by which I had descended into the garden. I wheeled
sharply, searching the whole course of my retreat. Nothing.
When I opened my door, Mrs Bowater and Henry seemed to be awaiting me.
Was it my fancy that both of them looked censorious? Absently she stood
aside to let me pass to my room, then followed me in.
"Such a lovely morning, Mrs Bowater," I called pleasantly down from my
bedroom, as I stood taking off my cloak in front of the glass, "and not
a soul to be seen--though" (and my voice was better under command with a
hairpin between my teeth); "I wouldn't have minded if there had been.
Not now."
"Ah," came the reply, "but you must be cautious, miss. Boys will be
boys; and," the sound tailed away, "men, men." I heard the door open and
close, and paused, with hands still lifted to my hair, prickling cold
all over at this strange behaviour. What could I have been found out in
now?
Then a voice sounded seemingly out of nowhere. "What I was going to say,
miss, is--A letter's come."
With that I drew aside the curtain. The explanation was simple. Having
let Henry out of my room, in which he was never at ease, Mrs Bowater was
still standing, like a figure in waxwork, in front of her chiffonier,
her eyes fixed on the window. They then wheeled on me. "_Mr_ Bowater,"
she said.
I was conscious of an inexpressible relief and of the profoundest
interest. I glanced at the great portrait. "Mr Bowater?" I repeated.
"Yes," she replied. "Buenos Ayres. He's broken a leg; and so's fixed
there for the time being."
"Oh, Mrs Bowater," I said, "I _am_ sorry. And how terribly sudden."
"Believe me, my young friend," she replied musingly, "it's never in my
experience what's unprepared for that finds us least expecting it. Not
that it was actually his _leg_ was in my mind."
What was chiefly in _my_ selfish mind was the happy conviction that I
had better not give her Fanny's letter just then.
"I do hope he's not in great pain," was all I found to say.
She continued to muse at me in her queer, sightless fashion, almost as
if she were looking for help.
"Oh, dear me, miss," the poor thing cried brokenly, "how should your
young mind feel what an old woman feels: just grovelling in the past?"
She was gone; and, feeling very uncomfortable in my humiliation, I sat
down and stared--at "the workbox." Why, why indeed, I thought angrily,
why should I be responsible? Well, I suppose it's only when the poor
fish--sturgeon or stickleback--struggles, that he really knows he's in
the net.