Two days later, Miss Haredale came back from her visit to Cleverley, and
reached her pretty cottage at Silverfold with a sad heart and many
misgivings.
How gay the garden was, with its spring flowers, how successful her
hyacinths and tulips, how comfortable her little drawing-room as she sat
down by the fire! There would be no more little floral triumphs for her
now, the cheerful home would be beyond her means, and her peaceful,
useful life in it must be given up.
And Amethyst, who had been at her school during her aunt's absence, had
still to be told of what had happened, of the new life in store for her.
How could the fond aunt bring herself to tell her darling that their
life together must end?
A rapid footfall came along the garden and across the hall, and Amethyst
burst into the room.
"Auntie, auntie! The list has come from Cambridge.--And what do you
think?"
As she dropped on her knees on the rug at her aunt's feet, waving a
pamphlet before her eyes, Miss Haredale looked at her, but in a
preoccupied, inattentive way.
"What list, my dear?"
"What list, auntie! Why, the Cambridge Examination list, of course.
And I'm in it! And I have a class--a second class; and, auntie--I'm
`distinguished in literature.' There! Oh the relief to one's mind!
Did you ever know anything so delightful?"
"It won't make any difference, my dear, I'm afraid, to the trouble that
has come upon us," said Miss Haredale, too deeply disturbed even to
think of how she was dashing a pleasure, which seemed to her to bear
little more relation to the realities of life than if Amethyst had shown
her a new doll.
"What is the matter?" said the girl, startled. "Is anything wrong?
Father--or mother?"
"No, my dear. But--but I have fallen into great misfortune; I would not
tell you while there seemed a chance of its being a mistake. I hope I
shall be enabled to bear it,--but it is more than I can face now."
"What--what, auntie?" cried Amethyst, pressing close to her aunt's knees
and seizing the trembling hands clasped on them.
It took some talking and explaining before Amethyst could be made to
comprehend the situation; but when she did understand how entirely the
circumstances of their two lives were altered, her young soft face
assumed a resolute expression. She stood up by the fireplace, and once
more took the examination list in her hand.
"Auntie," she said, "it is very sad, of course, but it would have been
much worse yesterday. _Now_, I don't think you need be anxious about
me, at any rate. I am worth something now. I shall go to Miss
Halliday; I think she will let me have Miss Hayne's situation at Saint
Etheldred's. At least, I know that a girl, with so good a certificate
as _this_, can always get employment. So, dear auntie, _I_ can do for
myself, and help you perhaps a little too."
"Be a school-teacher?" exclaimed Miss Haredale, in horror. "You, at
your age! with your family, and your appearance!--Perfectly impossible."
"I could begin as a student-teacher, if I'm too young," said Amethyst
coolly. "And it would be no disgrace to a princess to earn her living,
if she was poor. And, as for looks,--it's a great advantage, auntie, to
be rather nice-looking. It makes the girls like one."
"My dear, don't talk of it," said her aunt. "You have a right to the
advantages and opportunities of other girls, and you _must_ have them.
Besides, it is settled otherwise."
"Of course," said Amethyst, "I should have liked the balls and
everything very much. But I hope you don't think, dear auntie, that I'm
such a selfish girl as to think of that when you are in trouble.
Besides, if we can't afford them, it would be wrong of course to go in
for them. I like teaching, I shouldn't be dull. There would be
garden-parties in the holidays. My cream muslin will do all this
summer. And as for opportunities--if you mean about marrying--I'm sure,
auntie, I've heard you say, over and over again, that if they are to
come, they will come, wherever one may be. And if not--why, I can be
quite happy as I am."
As the girl spoke, in her fresh cool young voice, Miss Haredale felt
that her line of education had been very successful since Amethyst could
think thus, and also that it was incumbent on Amethyst's guardians to
think otherwise.
She did not much enjoy, nor greatly value beauty. She had deep reasons
for distrusting the kind of beauty which Amethyst inherited. But she
was perfectly aware that her young niece was beautiful, and that,
whatever Amethyst might think at eighteen, the matter would look very
different to her at eight and twenty.
"My dear," she said, "it can't be. Your parents would never consent,
and you don't know what you are talking of. There's only one right
thing to do. As I can no longer do my duty by you, or give you proper
advantages, I--I--must give you up, and let you go home. Indeed, I have
agreed to do so."
Miss Haredale turned her face away in the struggle to control her tears,
so that she did not see the look that was not sorrow on Amethyst's face.
But in another moment the girl's arms were round her neck.
"No--no, auntie," she said, "that would not be right at all. You often
say how poor my father is for his position, and how he let me go because
there were so many girls to provide for. It wouldn't be at all right
for me to go back on his hands now, and to leave you in your trouble. I
won't do it, auntie."
"My dear," said Miss Haredale, "you will be a great deal more on his
hands if you don't get a chance of settling yourself. If only I knew
better--if only I thought that all was as it should be! You are a dear
good affectionate child, and I've kept you too innocent and ignorant.
But you will be a good girl, Amethyst, wherever you may be. I am sure I
could trust you."
"Oh yes, auntie, I think you could," said Amethyst, simply. "But I
should be helped to be good if I went on at Saint Etheldred's."
"I will talk to you presently," said Miss Haredale, after a tearful
pause. "Run away, my darling, and leave me to compose myself."
Amethyst, with the despised list in her hand, went away into her own
bedroom, and sat down by the window to think on her own account. She
had been taken from her home at seven years old, and since then, her
intercourse with it had been confined to short visits on either side,
and even these had ceased of late years, as Lord and Lady Haredale had
lived much on the continent. She knew that her father's affairs were
involved, that the heir, her half-brother, was in debt, and, as Miss
Haredale put it, "not satisfactory, poor dear boy." She knew also that
her half-sister, Lady Clyste, lived abroad apart from her husband, and
that her own younger sisters had travelled about and lived very
unsettled lives. But what all these things implied, she did not know at
all. She thought her little-known mother the loveliest and sweetest
person she had ever seen, and when she heard that her family were going
to settle down for a time at a smaller place belonging to them not far
from London, she had been full of hope of closer intercourse.
And now, the thought of going into society with her mother was full of
dazzle and charm. She had had a very happy life. Her home with her
aunt had been made bright by many little pleasures, and varied by all
the interests of her education. The Saint Etheldred's of which she had
spoken was a girls' school in the neighbourhood of Silverfold, founded
and carried on with a view to uniting the best modern education with
strict religious principles. Amethyst and a few other girls attended as
day scholars. She had been thoroughly well taught; her nature was
susceptible to the best influences of the place, and she was popular and
influential with her school-fellows.
By far the prettiest girl in the school, among the cleverest, and the
only one with any prestige of rank, she had grown up with a considerable
amount of self-confidence. She did not feel herself ignorant of life,
nor was she of the exclusive high-toned life in which she had been
reared. She had helped to manage younger girls, she had been a very
important person at Saint Etheldred's, and she honestly believed herself
capable of taking her aunt's burden on her shoulders and of carrying it
successfully. She also thought herself capable of cheerfully
sacrificing the gaieties of the great world for this dear aunt's sake.
She felt quite convinced that work was a nobler thing than pleasure, and
that a Saint Etheldred's teacher would be happier than an idle young
lady. She did not give in to her aunt's arguments. She was not so
young and foolish as auntie supposed. She felt quite grown-up, surely
she looked so. She turned to the looking-glass to settle the point.
She saw a tall girl, slender and graceful, holding her long neck and
small head with an air of dignity and distinction; which, nevertheless,
harmonised perfectly with the simplicity and modesty of her expression.
"Grown-up," in her own sense she might be, but she had the innocent look
of a creature on whom the world's breath had never blown; and though
there was power in the smooth white brow, and spiritual capacity in the
dark grey eyes, there was not a line of experience on the delicate face;
the full red lips lay in a peaceful curve, and over the whole face there
was a bloom and softness that had never known the wear and tear of
ill-health, or ill feelings.
"I don't look like a child," she said to herself, "and I know so much
more of the world than the girls who are always shut up in school, and
never see a newspaper or read a novel. I should be fit for a teacher, I
might go home for one season and be presented, if mother likes, and then
come back and help auntie. I should like to know my sisters. It
strikes me I do know very little about them all. Yes, I _should_ like
to go home."
Amethyst's eyes filled with tears, as a sudden yearning for the home
circle from which she had been shut out possessed her. The affections
of a child taken out of its natural place cannot flow in one smooth
unbroken stream, and Amethyst felt that there was a contention within
her. Her heart went out to the unknown home, and though she went
down-stairs again, prepared to urge her scheme of self-help upon her
aunt, it was already with a conscious sense of self-conquest that she
did so.
Miss Haredale stopped the girl's arguments at once.
"No, my child, my mind is made up, and your parents' too. What you
propose is perfectly out of the question. But, remember, you may always
come back to me, I will always make some sort of home for you if you
really need it, and you will try to be a good girl; for--for I don't
like all I hear of fashionable life. There will be great deal of gaiety
and frivolity."
"But mother will tell me what is right," said Amethyst. "I can always
ask her, and I'll always do what she thinks best."
"Oh, my dear child," cried Miss Haredale, with agitation inexplicable to
Amethyst, "no earthly guide is always enough."
"Of course I know that," said Amethyst, simply, and with surprise. "But
I can't go away from that other guidance, you know, auntie. That is the
same everywhere. If one really wishes to know what is right, there is
never any doubt about it. There is always a way out of a puzzle at
school; and of course things there _are_ sometimes puzzling."
The words were spoken in the most matter-of-course way, as by one who
believed herself to have found by experience the truth of what she had
been constantly taught, and who did not suppose that any one else could
doubt it.
Miss Haredale said nothing; but whether rightly or wrongly, she never
gave Amethyst a clearer warning, or more definite advice than this.