MILLY'S VISITOR.
It was not often that I had a half-holiday to myself, for Miss Susan
Bagshot seemed to take a delight in finding me something to do on these
occasions; but whenever I had, I spent it with Milly Darrell, and on
these rare afternoons I was perfectly happy. I had grown to love her as
I did not think it was in me to love any one who was not of my own
flesh and blood; and in so loving her, I only returned the affection
which she felt for me.
I am sure it was the fact of my friendlessness, and of my subordinate
position in the school, which had drawn this girl's generous heart
towards me; and I should have been hard indeed if I had not felt
touched by her regard. She soon grew indescribably dear to me. She was
of my own age, able to sympathize with every thought and fancy of mine;
the frankest, most open-hearted of creatures; a little proud of her
beauty, perhaps, when it was praised by those she loved, but never
proud of her wealth, or insolent to those whose gifts were less than
hers.
I used to write my home-letters in her room on these rare and happy
afternoons, while she painted at an easel near the window. The room was
small, but better furnished than the ordinary rooms in the house, and
it was brightened by all sorts of pretty things,--handsomely-bound
books upon hanging shelves, pictures, Dresden cups and saucers,
toilet-bottles and boxes, which Miss Darrell had brought from home.
Over the mantelpiece there was a large photograph of her father, and by
the bedside there hung a more flattering water-coloured portrait,
painted by Milly herself. It was a powerful and rather a handsome face,
but I thought the expression a little hard and cold, even in Milly's
portrait.
She painted well, and had a real love of art. Her studies at Albury
Lodge were of rather a desultory kind, as she was not supposed to
belong to any class; but she had lessons from nearly half-a-dozen
different masters--German lessons, Italian lessons, drawing lessons,
music and singing lessons--and was altogether a very profitable pupil.
She had her own way with every one, I found, and I believe Miss Bagshot
was really fond of her.
Her father was travelling in Italy at this time, and did not often
write to her--a fact that distressed her very much, I know; but she
used to shake off her sorrow in a bright hopeful way that was peculiar
to her, always making excuses for the dilatory correspondent. She loved
him intensely, and keenly felt this separation from him; but the
doctors had recommended him rest and change of air and scene, she told
me, and she was glad to think he was obeying them.
Upon one of these half-holidays, when midsummer was near at hand, we
were interrupted by an unwonted event, in the shape of a visit from a
cousin of Milly's; a young man who occupied an important position in
her father's house of business, and of whom she had sometimes talked to
me, but not much. His name was Julian Stormont, and he was the only son
of Mr. Darrell's only sister, long since dead.
It was a sultry afternoon, and we were spending it in a rustic
summer-house at the end of a broad gravel that went the whole length of
the large garden. Milly had her drawing materials on the table before
her, but had not been using them. I was busy with a piece of fancy-work
which Miss Susan Bagshot had given me to finish. We were sitting like
this, when my old acquaintance Sarah, the housemaid, came to announce a
visitor for Miss Darrell.
Milly sprang to her feet, flushed with excitement.
'It must be papa!' she cried joyfully.
'Lor', no, miss; don't you go to excite yourself like that. It isn't
your pa; it's a younger gentleman.'
She handed Milly a card.
'Mr. Stormont!' the girl exclaimed, with a disappointed air; 'my cousin
Julian. I am coming to him, of course, Sarah. But I wish you had given
me the card at once.'
'Won't you go and do somethink to your hair, miss? most young ladies
do.'
'O yes, I know; there are girls who would stop to have their hair done
in Grecian plaits, if the dearest friend they had in the world was
waiting for them in the drawing-room. My hair will do well enough,
Sarah.--Come, Mary, you'll come to the house with me, won't you?'
'Lor', miss, here comes the gentleman,' said Sarah; and then decamped
by an obscure side-path.
'I had better leave you to see him alone, Milly,' I said; but she told
me imperatively to stay, and I stayed.
She went a little way to meet the gentleman, who seemed pleased to see
her, but whom she received rather coldly, as I thought. But I had not
long to think about it, before she had brought him to the summer-house,
and introduced him to me.
'My cousin Julian--Miss Crofton.'
He bowed rather stiffly, and then seated himself by his cousin's side,
and put his hat upon the table before him. I had plenty of time to look
at him as he sat there talking of all sorts of things connected with
Thornleigh, and Miss Darrell's friends in that neighbourhood. He was
very good-looking, fair and pale, with regular well-cut features, and
rather fine blue eyes; but I fancied those clear blue eyes had a cold
look, and that there was an expression of iron will about the mouth and
powerful prominent chin. The upper part of the face was thoughtful, and
there were lines already on the high white forehead, from which the
thin straight chestnut hair was carefully brushed. It was the face of a
very clever man, I thought; but I was not so sure that it was the face
of a man I could like, or whom I should be inclined to trust.
Mr. Stormont had a low pleasant voice and an agreeable manner of
speaking. His way of treating his cousin was half deferential, half
playful; but once, when I looked up suddenly from my work, I seemed to
catch a glimpse of a deeper meaning in the cold blue eyes--a look of
singular intensity fixed on Milly's bright face.
Whatever this look might mean, she was unconscious of it; she went on
talking gaily of Thornleigh and her Thornleigh friends.
'I do so want to come home, Julian,' she said. 'Do you think there is
any hope for me this midsummer?'
'I think there is every hope. I think it is almost certain you will
come home.'
'O Julian, how glad I am!'
'But suppose there should be a surprise for you when you come home,
Milly,--a change that you may not quite like, at first?'
'What change?'
'Has your father told you nothing?'
'Nothing, except about his journeys from place to place, and not much
about them. He has written very seldom during the last six months.'
'He has been too much engaged, I suppose; and it's rather like him to
have said nothing about it. How would you like a stepmother, Milly?'
She gave a little cry, and grew suddenly pale.
'Papa has married again!' she said.
Julian Stormont drew a newspaper from his pocket, and laid it before
her, pointing to an announcement in one column:
'On May 18th, at the English legation in Paris, William Darrell, Esq.,
of Thornleigh, Yorkshire, to Augusta, daughter of the late Theodore
Chester, Esq., of Regent's Park.'
He read this aloud very slowly, watching Milly's pale face as he read.
'There is no reason why this should distress you, my dear child,' he
said. 'It was only to be expected that your father would marry again,
sooner or later.'
'I have lost him!' she cried piteously.
'Lost him!'
'Yes; he can never be again the same to me that he has been. His new
wife will come between us. No, Julian, I am not jealous. I do not
grudge him his happiness, if this marriage can make him happy. I only
feel that I have lost him for ever.'
'My dear Milly, that is utterly unreasonable. Your father told me most
particularly to assure you of his unaltered affection, when I broke the
news of this marriage to you. He was naturally a little nervous about
doing it himself.'
'You must never let him know what I have said, Julian. He will never
hear any expression of regret from me; and I will try to do my duty to
this strange lady. Have you seen her yet?'
'No, they have not come home yet. They were in Switzerland when I heard
of them last; but they are expected in a week or two. Come, my dear
Milly, don't look so serious. I trust this marriage may turn out for
your happiness, as well as for your father's. Rely upon it, you will
find no change in his feelings towards you.'
'He will always be kind and good to me, I know,' she answered sadly.
'It is not possible for him to be anything but that; but I can never be
his companion again as I have been. There is an end to all that.'
'That was a kind of association which could not be supposed to last all
your life, Milly. It is to be hoped that somebody else will have a
claim upon your companionship before many years have gone by.'
'I suppose you mean that I shall marry,' she said, looking at him with
supreme indifference.
'Something like that, Milly.'
'I have always fancied myself living all my life with papa. I have
never thought it possible that I could care for any one but him.'
Julian Stormont's face darkened a little, and he sat silent for some
minutes, folding and refolding the newspaper in a nervous way.
'You are not very complimentary to your admirers at Thornleigh,' he
said at last, with a short hoarse laugh.
'Who is there at Thornleigh? Have I really any admirers there?'
'I think I could name half-a-dozen.'
'Never mind them just now. I want you to tell me all you know about my
stepmother.'
'That amounts to very little. All I can tell you is, that she is the
daughter of a gentleman, highly accomplished, without money, and
four-and-twenty years of age. She was travelling as companion to an
elderly lady when your father met her in a picture-gallery at Florence.
He knew the old lady, I believe, and by that means became acquainted
with the younger one.'
'Only four-and-twenty! only four years older than I!'
'Rather young, is it not? but when a man of your father's age makes a
second marriage, he is apt to marry a young woman. Of course this is
quite a love-match.'
'Yes, quite a love-match,' Milly repeated, with a sigh.
I knew she could not help that natural pang of jealousy, as she thought
how she and her father had once been all the world to each other. She
had told me so often of their happy companionship, the perfect
confidence that had existed between them.
Julian Stormont sat talking to her--and a little, a very little, to
me--for about half an hour longer, and then departed. He was to sleep
at Fendale, and go back to North Shields next morning. He was his
uncle's right hand in the business, Milly told me; and from the little
I had seen of him I could fancy him a power in any sphere.
'Papa has a very high opinion of him,' she said, when we were talking
of him after he had left us.
'And you like him very much, I suppose?'
'O yes, I like him very well. I have known him all my life. We are
almost like brother and sister; only Julian is one of those thoughtful
reserved persons one does not get on with very fast.'