No one would have supposed that Annie Brooke, brought up so carefully by
such an uncle as the Rev Maurice Brooke, would so easily yield to one
temptation after another. But it is one of the most surprising and true
things in life that it is the first wrong-doing that counts. It is over
the first wrong action that we struggle and hesitate. We shrink away
then from the edge of the abyss, and if we do yield to temptation our
consciences speak loudly.
But conscience is of so delicate a fibre, so sensitive an organisation,
that if she is neglected her voice grows feeble. She ceases to reproach
when reproach is useless, and so each fall, be it great or little, is
felt less than the last.
A few months ago, even in her young life, Annie would not have believed
it possible that she could have brought herself to open her uncle's
letter. Nevertheless, a mile out of Rashleigh she did so. Within the
letter lay a cheque. It was an open cheque, payable to bearer and
signed by the rector. The cheque was for twenty pounds. A bill of the
butcher's lay within. This bill amounted to twenty pounds. The rector,
therefore, was sending Dawson, the well-known village butcher, a cheque
for twenty pounds to pay the yearly account. It was the fashion at
Rashleigh for the principal trades-people to be paid once a year. This
twenty pounds, therefore, stood for the supply of meat of various sorts
which was used at the Rectory during the year.
Twenty pounds! Annie looked at it. Her eyes shone. "Take this, and
you are all right," whispered a voice. "With this you can easily get
off to London, and from there to Paris. All you want is money. Well,
here is money. You must write to your uncle when you get to Paris, and
confess to him then. He will forgive you. He will be shocked; but he
will forgive you. Of course he will."
Annie considered the whole position. "I have done a lot of
uncomfortable things," she thought. "I managed that affair of the
essays, and I used poor Susan Martin's poems for my purpose; and--and--I
have got Mabel into no end of a scrape; it is my duty to see poor Mabel
through. This thing is horrid! I know it is. I hate myself for doing
it; but, after all, the money has been thrown in my way. Twenty pounds!
I can buy some little articles of dress, too. Dawson will cash this
for me; oh, of course he will. It does seem as if I were meant to do
it; it is the only way out. Uncle Maurice is terrible when he takes, as
it were, the bit between his teeth. Yes, I must do it; yes, I will. It
is the only, only way."
Before Annie and her pony had gone another quarter of a mile Dawson's
bill had been torn into hundreds of tiny fragments, which floated away
on the summer breeze, and the open cheque in the old rector's
handwriting, with his signature at the bottom and his name endorsing it
behind, was folded carefully up in Annie's purse.
It was a pretty-looking girl--for excitement always added to Annie's
charms--who rode at last into the little village. She went straight to
Dawson's, sprang off her pony, and entered the shop.
Old Dawson, who had known her from her babyhood, welcomed her back with
effusion.
"Dear me, now, miss," he said, "I am that glad to see you! How I wish
my missis was in! Why, you have grown into quite a young lady, Miss
Annie."
"Of course," replied Annie, "I am grown up, although I am not leaving
school just yet. Please, Mr Dawson, I want you to give me--"
She took a piece of paper from her pocket and laid it on the counter.
The man glanced at Mrs Shelf's orders, and desiring a foreman to attend
to them, returned to talk to Annie.
"And please," continued the girl, her heart now jumping into her mouth,
"uncle would be so much obliged if you could cash this for him."
Dawson glanced at the cheque.
"Of course, miss," he said. "How will you have it?"
"In gold, please," said Annie.
"I can give you fifteen pounds in gold, miss. Will you take the rest in
a five-pound note?"
Annie agreed. Two or three minutes later, with her little parcel of
meat put into a basket for her, and twenty pounds in her pocket, she was
riding towards the post-office.
There she dismounted, and asking for a sheet of the best note-paper,
wrote a line to Lady Lushington. It ran as follows:
------------------------------------------------------------------------
"Dear Lady Lushington,--Thank you ever so much for your most kind
invitation, which I take pleasure in accepting. My uncle is so glad
that you have asked me, and I thank you now in his name as well as my
own. I shall be in Paris on Tuesday night, so will you kindly send your
maid, as you suggest, to meet me at the railway station? Please give my
love to Mabel.--Yours very sincerely and gratefully, Annie Brooke."
When the letter was finished it was put into a separate envelope from
the one which had already been written to Mabel, and then the two were
addressed and stamped and dropped by Annie's own hand into the box of
the village post-office. How excited she felt, and how triumphant!
Yes--oh yes--she had surmounted every difficulty now, for long before
her theft with regard to the cheque had been discovered she would have
left the country. She could be agreeable now to every one. She could
smile at her neighbours; she could talk to the village children; and,
above all things, she could and would be very, very nice to Uncle
Maurice.
When she arrived back at the Rectory such a rosy-faced, bright-eyed,
pretty-looking girl walked into Mrs Shelf's presence that that good
woman hardly knew her. The sulky, disagreeable, selfish Annie of that
morning had vanished, and a girl who was only too anxious to do what she
could for every one appeared in her place.
"I met Dr Brett, Mrs Shelf--wasn't it a piece of luck?--and sent him on
to see Uncle Maurice. Has he been, Mrs Shelf?"
"Oh yes, my dear, he has; and I am glad to tell you he thinks that your
dear uncle, with care and quiet, will soon be himself again. The doctor
thinks a great lot of your being here, Annie, and says that your company
will do your uncle more good than anything else in the world. He wants
cheering up, he says, and to have his mind distracted from all his
parish work. I know you will do what you can--won't you?"
"Of course I shall," said Annie. "And here are the things from the
butcher's," she added.
"It was very thoughtful of you, Annie, to ride on to Rashleigh," said
Mrs Shelf. "I did want these sweetbreads. I mean to make a very
delicate little stew out of them for your uncle's dinner. The doctor
says that he wants a lot of building up. He is an old man, my dear, and
if we are not very precious of him, and careful of him, we sha'n't keep
him long. There are few of his like in this world, Annie, and it will
be a sad day for many when the Lord calls him."
"Oh, but that won't be for years and years," said Annie, who disliked
this sort of talk immensely. "Well," she added, "I will go and sit with
uncle now for a bit, and will make his tea for him presently; I know
just how he likes it."
"Do, my dear. You know where his favourite cups and saucers are, and I
am baking some special tea-cakes in the oven; and you can boil the
kettle yourself, can't you, Annie? for I shall be as busy as a bee
looking after Peggie and the churning. That wench would try any one;
she hasn't a bit of head on her shoulders. And, by the way, Annie, what
about the receipt? You paid Dawson, didn't you?"
Annie was leaving the kitchen. She turned her head slightly. "Dawson
will send the receipt," she said. "To tell you the truth, I was in such
a hurry to get back that I didn't wait for it."
"Well, my dear," said Mrs Shelf, "that is all right; I expect it will
arrive on Monday. The cart won't be here before then, for we've got our
week's supply of meat in. It came this morning."
"Splendid," thought Annie. "By Monday I shall be away."
She almost skipped into her uncle's study. The old man was better
already. He was lying back in his chair, and was reading a paper which
had come by the afternoon's post.
"Ah, here you are, my love!" he said.
"Here I am, uncle. I am so glad I met Dr Brett; he has made you better
already."
"He has, child; he always does me good." Annie drew a chair forward,
and pushed her hair back from her forehead. The impatient look had left
her face. It looked tranquil and at its best.
"By the way, child," said Mr Brooke, "you will want me to write that
letter for you."
"You must not worry about it now, really, uncle," said Annie, laying her
hand on his.
"It will do quite well to-morrow--quite well," she added. "You know
that whatever your Annie is, she would do nothing to make you worse."
"My dear little girl," said the old man, deeply affected by what he
considered such thoughtfulness, "you may be sure that all my thoughts
with regard to you are prompted by real love for you. I don't pretend
that I have not looked forward very much indeed to these holidays.
Nevertheless, I cannot forget that I am old, my love, and you are young.
The young must have their day, dear, and the pleasure of the old is to
watch them enjoying it. While you were out I have been thinking over my
little money matters, and I think I can quite manage to give you a few
extra pounds over and above your fare to Paris--a ten-pound note,
perhaps, to buy some pretty little articles of dress."
"Thank you so much, uncle," said Annie, speaking in her sweetest tone.
"But my dear child, this will depend altogether on what Mrs Lyttelton
says. But I expect the best, dear; for all her girls are nice, and you
say that Miss Lushington is your special friend."
"My very greatest," said Annie--"a sweet girl--a poetess!"
"Indeed, Annie? She shows gifts at this early age? How very
interesting! I am always impressed by young efforts; I like to
encourage them. You have not by chance any of her little effusions by
you?"
Now Annie had brought poor Susan Martin's manuscript book with her to
the Rectory. She thought for a minute. Would it be safe to show these
verses to the Rector? After a minute she said:
"I think I have. I will look in my trunk after tea."
"Do, my love; I shall be much interested. I used to indulge in verses
when I was young myself, dear. Ah, those far-off days! And I had my
dreams of greatness too. We all have our little ambitions when we are
young. I wonder what yours are, my little Annie."
"Oh, I don't want to be clever at all," said Annie; "I just want to have
a good time--and to make you happy," she added as an afterthought,
putting out her small hand and laying it on his.
"Bless you, my darling--bless you! You are the sunshine of my life.
Yes--thank God, I am much better this afternoon; that horrid feeling in
my head has passed away. It gives me anxiety now and then, but only on
your account, my child. As far as I am concerned, I am ready and
waiting--only waiting to obey. I have had my warning--most old people
have, dear; but for your sake I would live a little."
"Of course you will live for many, many years longer, Uncle Maurice,"
said Annie, rising and kissing him. "And now you are not going to be
dismal, or to talk horrid things about--about dying. I am going to give
you your tea; you always love the tea that Annie makes for you."
She flitted out of the room. She was the gayest of the gay during the
rest of that evening. She chatted, and laughed, and made herself
pleasant to every one; and when Uncle Maurice went to bed, feeling
almost quite well again, he thanked God on his knees for having given
him so bonny a creature as Annie to be the light and joy of his old age.
Meanwhile Annie herself, seated by her open window, with the moonlight
falling full upon her, was counting her money--that money which she had
stolen from the faithful and affectionate old man. She put it in rows
before her on the table. Fifteen beautiful, bright golden sovereigns;
and there was also a five-pound note! The note looked a little dirty
and as though it had passed through many hands.
Annie sat by the window and made her plans. Whether her conscience
would prick her by-and-by remained to be proved; but on the present
occasion it was quite tired out, stupefied by all those things which
miserable Annie had done to try it. She felt, therefore, quite at her
ease, and made her arrangements with care.
It would not do for her to arrive in Paris before the appointed evening.
She had, therefore, the whole of to-morrow to spend at the Rectory, and
also the whole of Sunday. Monday, too, might be spent there; and she
would have done this but for the fact that the butcher's cart called on
Monday morning, and that Mrs Shelf would notice the absence of Dawson's
receipt. At first, of course, she would not be greatly surprised, and
would content herself with writing him a note demanding it. It might be
possible, however, that she would go to Rashleigh to see him. In great
astonishment, he would ask many questions of Mrs Shelf, and would
naturally tell her that Annie had cashed the cheque for twenty pounds.
Annie was positively sure that her uncle would forgive her even so great
a sin as this, but she did not want to be in the house when he knew of
her guilt. She resolved, therefore, to leave the Rectory on Monday
morning, of course first writing a little note to her uncle telling him
what she had done--in fact, making her confession to him, and begging
him to forgive her.
"There is nothing else for it," she thought. "I know the dear old man
will be dreadfully disappointed, but he will forgive me; I know he
will."
That evening Annie neglected even to say that semblance of prayer which
she was accustomed to utter before she laid her head on her pillow.
Somehow, she dared not pray.
The next morning she was up, bright and early, singing gaily about the
house. Mr Brooke had quite recovered. He came to meet her as she ran
down into the garden.
"Why, Uncle Maurice!" cried the girl. "Oh, you are naughty!"
"I am quite well," he answered, "and I have good news for you. Who do
you think is coming to stay here to-day?"
"Whom?" asked the girl. "My cousin's son from Australia--John Saxon. I
have not seen him since he was a baby. You will have some fun now,
Annie, with a young person in the house."
"Is he really young?" said Annie.
"Young, my dear? I should think so; about five or six and twenty. He's
as good a lad as ever walked. I had a long letter from his mother. She
says he is going to pay me a visit, and I may expect him--yes, to-day.
You will have something to look forward to now, Annie, if Lady
Lushington's character as a worldly-minded woman prevents my sending you
to Paris."
"But I think I shall go to Paris," said Annie. She looked very pretty
and expectant. The rector uttered a slight sigh.
"Come in, uncle; I must give you your breakfast, even if fifty John
Saxons are coming to pay you a visit. Oh yes, of course I am glad."
But she did not feel so; she had a dim sort of idea that this young man
might interfere with her own plans.