Gillian was not yet seventeen, and had lived a home life totally removed
from gossip, so that she had no notion that she was doing a more awkward
or remarkable thing than if she had been teaching a drummer-boy. She
even deliberated whether she should mention her undertaking to her
mother, or produce the grand achievement of Alexis White, prepared for
college, on the return from India; but a sense that she had promised to
tell everything, and that, while she did so, she could defy any other
interference, led her to write the design in a letter to Ceylon, and
then she felt ready to defy any censure or obstructions from other
Quarters.
Mystery has a certain charm. Infinite knowledge of human nature was
shown in the text, ‘Stolen waters are sweet, and bread eaten in
secret is pleasant’; and it would be hard to define how much Gillian’s
satisfaction was owing to the sense of benevolence, or to the pleasure
of eluding Aunt Jane, when, after going through her chapter of Katharine
Ashton, in a somewhat perfunctory manner, she hastened away to Miss
White’s office. This, being connected with the showroom, could be
entered without passing through the gate with the inscription--‘No
admittance except on business.’ Indeed, the office had a private door,
which, at Gillian’s signal, was always opened to her. There, on the
drawing-desk, lay a Greek exercise and a translation, with queries upon
the difficulties for Gillian to correct, or answer in writing. Kalliope
had managed to make that little room a pleasant place, bare as it was,
by pinning a few of her designs on the walls, and always keeping a
terracotta vase of flowers or coloured leaves upon the table. The lower
part of the window she had blocked with transparencies delicately
cut and tinted in cardboard--done, as she told Gillian, by her little
brother Theodore, who learnt to draw at the National School, and had
the same turn for art as herself. Altogether, the perfect neatness
and simplicity of the little room gave it an air of refinement, which
rendered it by no means an unfit setting for the grave beauty of
Kalliope’s countenance and figure.
The enjoyment of the meeting was great on both sides, partly from the
savour of old times, and partly because there was really much that was
uncommon and remarkable about Kalliope herself. Her father’s promotion
had come exactly when she and her next brother were at the time of life
when the changes it brought would tell most on their minds and manners.
They had both been sent to schools where they had associated with
young people of gentle breeding, which perhaps their partly foreign
extraction, and southern birth and childhood, made it easier for them to
assimilate. Their beauty and brightness had led to a good deal of kindly
notice from the officers and ladies of the regiment, and they had thus
acquired the habits and ways of the class to which they had been raised.
Their father, likewise, had been a man of a chivalrous nature, whose
youthful mistakes had been the outcome of high spirit and romance, and
who, under discipline, danger, suffering, and responsibility, had become
earnestly religious. There had besides been his Colonel’s influence on
him, and on his children that of Lady Merrifield and Alethea.
It had then been a piteous change and darkening of life when, after the
crushing grief of his death, the young people found themselves in such
an entirely different stratum of society. They were ready to work, but
they could not help feeling the mortification of being relegated below
the mysterious line of gentry, as they found themselves at Rockquay, and
viewed as on a level with the clerks and shop-girls of the place. Still
more, as time went on, did they miss the companionship and intercourse
to which they had been used. Mr. Flight, the only person in a higher
rank who took notice of them, and perceived that there was more in them
than was usual, was after all only a patron--not a friend, and perhaps
was not essentially enough of a gentleman to be free from all airs of
condescension even with Alexis, while he might be wise in not making too
much of an approach to so beautiful a girl as Kalliope. Besides, after
a fit of eagerness, and something very like promises, he had apparently
let Alexis drop, only using him for his musical services, and not doing
anything to promote the studies for which the young man thirsted, nor
proposing anything for the younger boys, who would soon outgrow the
National School.
Alexis had made a few semi-friends among the musical youth of the place;
but there was no one to sympathise with him in his studious tastes, and
there was much in his appearance and manners to cause the accusation of
being ‘stuck-up’--music being really the only point of contact with most
of his fellows of the lower professional class.
Kalliope had less time, but she had, on principle, cultivated kindly
terms with the young women employed under her. Her severe style of
beauty removed her from any jealousy of her as a rival, and she was
admired--almost worshipped--by them as the glory of the workshop.
They felt her superiority, and owned her ability; but nobody there was
capable of being a companion to her. Thus the sister and brother had
almost wholly depended upon one another; and it was like a breath from
what now seemed the golden age of their lives when Gillian Merrifield
walked into the office, treating Kalliope with all the freedom of an
equal and the affection of an old friend. There was not very much time
to spare after Gillian had looked at the exercises, noted and
corrected the errors, and explained the difficulties or mistakes in the
translation from Testament and Delectus, feeling all the time how much
more mastery of the subject her pupil had than Mr. Pollock’s at home had
ever attained to.
However, Kalliope always walked home with her as far as the opening of
Church Cliff Road, and they talked of the cleverness and goodness of the
brothers, except Richard at Leeds, who never seemed to be mentioned; how
Theodore kept at the head of the school, and had hopes of the drawing
prize, and how little Petros devoured tales of battles, and would hear
of nothing but being a soldier. Now and then, too, there was a castle in
the air of a home for little Maura at Alexis’s future curacy. Kalliope
seemed to look to working for life for poor mother, while Theodore
should cultivate his art. Oftener the two recalled old adventures and
scenes of their regimental days, and discussed the weddings of the two
Indian sisters.
Once, however, Kalliope was obliged to suggest, with a blushing apology,
that she feared Gillian must go home alone, she was not ready.
‘Can’t I help you? what have you to do?’
Kalliope attempted some excuse of putting away designs, but presently
peeped from the window, and Gillian, with excited curiosity, imitated
her, and beheld, lingering about, a young man in the pink of fashion,
with a tea-rose in his buttonhole and a cane in his hand.
‘Oh, Kally,’ she cried, ‘does he often hang about like this waiting for
you?’
‘Not often, happily. There! old Mr. Stebbing has come out, and they are
walking away together. We can go now.’
‘So he besets you, and you have to keep out of his way,’ exclaimed
Gillian, much excited. ‘Is that the reason you come to the garden all
alone on Sunday?’
‘Yes, though I little guessed what awaited me there,’ returned Kalliope;
‘but we had better make haste, for it is late for you to be returning.’
It was disappointing that Kalliope would not discuss such an interesting
affair; but Gillian was sensible of the danger of being so late as to
cause questions, and she allowed herself to be hurried on too fast for
conversation, and passing the two Stebbings, who, no doubt, took her for
a ‘hand.’
‘Does this often happen?’ asked Gillian.
‘No; Alec walks home with me, and the boys often come and meet me. Oh,
did I tell you that the master wants Theodore to be a pupil-teacher? I
wish I knew what was best for him.’
‘Could not he be an artist?’
‘I should like some one to tell me whether he really has talent
worth cultivating, dear boy, or if he would be safer and better in an
honourable occupation like a school-master.’
‘Do you call it honourable?’
‘Oh yes, to be sure. I put it next to a clergyman’s or a doctor’s life.’
‘Not a soldier’s?’
‘That depends,’ said Kalliope.
‘On the service he is sent upon, you mean? But that is his sovereign’s
look-out. He “only has to obey, to do or die.”’
‘Yes, it is the putting away of self, and possible peril of life, that
makes all those grandest,’ said Kalliope, ‘and I think the schoolmaster
is next in opportunities of doing good.’
Gillian could not help thinking that none of all these could put away
self more entirely than the girl beside her, toiling away her beauty and
her youth in this dull round of toil, not able to exercise the instincts
of her art to the utmost, and with no change from the monotonous round
of mosaics, which were forced to be second rate, to the commonest
household works, and the company of the Queen of the White Ants.
Gillian perceived enough of the nobleness of such a life to fill
her with a certain enthusiasm, and make her feel a day blank and
uninteresting if she could not make her way to the little office.
One evening, towards the end of the first fortnight, Alexis himself came
in with a passage that he wanted to have explained. His sister
looked uneasy all the time, and hurried to put on her hat, and stand
demonstratively waiting, telling Gillian that they must go, the moment
the lesson began to tend to discursive talk, and making a most decided
sign of prohibition to her brother when he showed a disposition to
accompany them.
‘I think you are frightfully particular, Kally,’ said Gillian, when they
were on their way up the hill. ‘Such an old friend, and you there, too.’
‘It would never do here! It would be wrong,’ answered Kalliope, with the
authority of an older woman. ‘He must not come to the office.’
‘Oh, but how could I ever explain to him? One can’t do everything in
writing. I might as well give up the lessons as never speak to him about
them.’
There was truth in this, and perhaps Alexis used some such arguments on
his side, for at about every third visit of Gillian’s he dropped in with
some important inquiry necessary to his progress, which was rapid enough
to compel Gillian to devote some time to preparation, in order to keep
ahead of him.
Kalliope kept diligent guard, and watched against lengthening the
lessons into gossip, and they were always after hours when the hands had
gone away. The fear of being detected kept Gillian ready to shorten the
time.
‘How late you are!’ were the first words she heard one October evening
on entering Beechcroft Cottage; but they were followed by ‘Here’s a
pleasure for you!’
‘It’s from papa himself! Open it! Open it quick,’ cried Valetta, dancing
round her in full appreciation of the honour and delight.
Sir Jasper said that his daughter must put up with him for a
correspondent, since two brides at once were as much as any mother could
be supposed to undertake. Indeed, as mamma would not leave him, Phyllis
was actually going to Calcutta, chaperoned by one of the matrons of the
station, to make purchases for both outfits, since Alethea would not
stir from under the maternal wing sooner than she could help.
At the end came, ‘We are much shocked at poor White’s death. He was an
excellent officer, and a good and sensible man, though much hampered
with his family. I am afraid his wife must be a very helpless being. He
used to talk about the good promise of one of his sons--the second, I
think. We will see whether anything can be done for the children when
we come home. I say we, for I find I shall have to be invalided before
I can be entirely patched up, so that mamma and I shall have a sort of
postponed silver wedding tour, a new variety for the old folks “from
home.”’
‘Oh, is papa coming home?’ cried Valetta.
‘For good! Oh, I hope it will be for good,’ added Gillian.
‘Then we shall live at dear Silverfold all the days of our life,’ added
Fergus.
‘And I shall get back to Rigdum.’
‘And I shall make a telephone down to the stables,’ were the cries of
the children.
The transcendent news quite swallowed up everything else for some time;
but at last Gillian recurred to her father’s testimony as to the White
family.
‘Is the second son the musical one?’ she was asked, and on her
affirmative, Aunt Jane remarked, ‘Well, though the Rev. Augustine Flight
is not on a pinnacle of human wisdom, his choir practices, etc., will
keep the lad well out of harm’s way till your father can see about him.’
This would have been an opportunity of explaining the youth’s aims and
hopes, and her own share in forwarding them; but it had become difficult
to avow the extent of her intercourse with the brother and sister, so
entirely without the knowledge of her aunts. Even Miss Mohun, acute as
she was, had no suspicions, and only thought with much satisfaction that
her niece was growing more attentive to poor Lilian Giles, even to the
point of lingering.
‘I really think, she said, in consultation with Miss Adeline, ‘that we
might gratify that damsel by having the White girls to drink tea.’
‘Well, we can add them to your winter party of young ladies in
business.’
‘Hardly. These stand on different ground, and I don’t want to hurt their
feelings or Gillian’s by mixing them up with the shopocracy.’
‘Have you seen the Queen of the White Ants?’
‘Not yet; but I mean to reconnoitre, and if I see no cause to the
contrary, I shall invite them for next Tuesday.’
‘The mother? You might as well ask her namesake.’
‘Probably; but I shall be better able to judge when I have seen her.’
So Miss Mohun trotted off, made her visit, and thus reported, ‘Poor
woman! she certainly is not lovely now, whatever she may have been;
but I should think there was no harm in her, and she is effusive in
her gratitude to all the Merrifield family. It is plain that the absent
eldest son is the favourite, far more so than the two useful children
at the marble works; and Mr. White is spoken of as a sort of tyrant,
whereas I should think they owed a good deal to his kindness in giving
them employment.’
‘I always thought he was an old hunks.’
‘The town thinks so because he does not come and spend freely here; but
I have my doubts whether they are right. He is always ready to do his
part in subscriptions; and the employing these young people as he does
is true kindness.’
‘Unappreciated.’
‘Yes, by the mother who would expect to be kept like a lady in idleness,
but perhaps not so by her daughter. From all I can pick up, I think
she must be a very worthy person, so I have asked her and the little
schoolgirl for Tuesday evening, and I hope it will not be a great
nuisance to you, Ada.’
‘Oh no,’ said Miss Adeline, good humouredly, ‘it will please Gillian,
and I shall be interested in seeing the species, or rather the variety.’
‘Var Musa Groeca Hibernica Militaris,’ laughed Aunt Jane.
‘By the bye, I further found out what made the Captain enlist.’
‘Trust you for doing that!’ laughed her sister.
‘Really it was not on purpose, but old Zack Skilly was indulging me with
some of his ancient smuggling experiences, in what he evidently views as
the heroic age of Rockquay. “Men was men, then,” he says. “Now they be
good for nought, but to row out the gentlefolks when the water is as
smooth as glass.” You should hear the contempt in his voice. Well, a
promising young hero of his was Dick White, what used to work for his
uncle, but liked a bit of a lark, and at last hit one of the coastguard
men in a fight, and ran away, and folks said he had gone for a soldier.
Skilly had heard he was dead, and his wife had come to live in these
parts, but there was no knowing what was true and what wasn’t. Folks
would talk! Dick was a likely chap, with more life about him than his
cousin Jem, as was a great man now, and owned all the marble works, and
a goodish bit of the town. There was a talk as how the two lads had
both been a courting of the same maid, that was Betsy Polwhele, and had
fallen out about her, but how that might be he could not tell. Anyhow,
she was not wed to one nor t’other of them, but went into a waste and
died.’
‘I wonder if it was for Dick’s sake. So Jem was not constant either.’
‘Except to his second love. That was a piteous little story too.’
‘You mean his young wife’s health failing as soon as he brought her to
that house which he was building for her, and then his taking her to
Italy, and never enduring to come back here again after she and her
child died. But he made a good thing of it with his quarries in the
mountains.’
‘You sordid person, do you think that was all he cared for!’
‘Well, I always thought of him as a great, stout, monied man, quite
incapable of romance and sensitiveness.’
‘If so, don’t you think he would have let that house instead of keeping
it up in empty state! There is a good deal of character in those
Whites.’
‘The Captain is certainly the most marked man, except Jasper, in that
group of officers in Gillian’s photograph-book.’
‘Partly from the fact that a herd of young officers always look so
exactly alike--at least in the eyes of elderly spinsters.’
‘Jane!’
‘Let us hope so, now that it is all over. This same Dick must have had
something remarkable about him, to judge by the impression he seems
to have left on all who came in his way, and I shall like to see his
children.’
‘You always do like queer people.’
‘It is plain that we ought to take notice of them,’ said Miss Mohun,
‘and it is not wholesome for Gillian to think us backward in kindness to
friends about whom she plainly has a little romance.’
She refrained from uttering a suspicion inspired by her visit that there
had been more ‘kindnesses’ on her niece’s part than she could quite
account for. Yet she believed that she knew how all the girl’s days
were spent; was certain that the Sunday wanderings never went beyond the
garden, and, moreover, she implicitly trusted Lily’s daughter.
Gillian did not manifest as much delight and gratitude at the invitation
as her aunts expected. In point of fact, she resented Aunt Jane’s making
a visit of investigation without telling her, and she was uneasy lest
there should have been or yet should be a disclosure that should make
her proceedings appear clandestine. ‘And they are not!’ said she to
herself with vehemence. ‘Do I not write them all to my own mother? And
did not Miss Vincent allow that one is not bound to treat aunts like
parents?’
Even the discovery of Captain White’s antecedents was almost an offence,
for if her aunt would not let her inquire, why should she do so herself,
save to preserve the choice morceau for her own superior intelligence?
Thus all the reply that Gillian deigned was, ‘Of course I knew that
Captain White could never have done anything to be ashamed of.’
The weather was too wet for any previous meetings, and it was on a
wild stormy evening that the two sisters appeared at seven o’clock at
Beechcroft Cottage. While hats and waterproofs were being taken off
upstairs, Gillian found opportunity to give a warning against mentioning
the Greek lessons. It was received with consternation.
‘Oh, Miss Merrifield, do not your aunts know?’
‘No. Why should they? Mamma does.’
‘Not yet. And she is so far off! I wish Miss Mohun knew! I made sure
that she did,’ said Kalliope, much distressed.
‘But why? It would only make a fuss.’
‘I should be much happier about it.’
‘And perhaps have it all upset.’
‘That is the point. I felt that it must be all right as long as Miss
Mohun sanctioned it; but I could not bear that we should be the means of
bringing you into a scrape, by doing what she might disapprove while you
are under her care.’
‘Don’t you think you can trust me to know my own relations?’ said
Gillian somewhat haughtily.
‘Indeed, I did not mean that we are not infinitely obliged to you,’ said
Kalliope. ‘It has made Alexis another creature to have some hope, and
feel himself making progress.’
‘Then why do you want to have a fuss, and a bother, and a chatter? If my
father and mother don’t approve, they can telegraph.’
With which argument she appeased or rather silenced Kalliope, who could
not but feel the task of objecting alike ungracious and ungrateful
towards the instructor, and absolutely cruel and unkind towards her
brother, and who spoke only from a sense of the treachery of allowing a
younger girl to transgress in ignorance. Still she was conscious of not
understanding on what terms the niece and aunts might be, and the
St. Kenelm’s estimate of the Beechcroft ladies was naturally somewhat
different from that of the St. Andrew’s congregation. Miss Mohun was
popularly regarded in those quarters as an intolerable busybody, and
Miss Adeline as a hypochondriacal fine lady, so that Gillian might
perhaps reasonably object to put herself into absolute subjection; so,
though Kalliope might have a presentiment of breakers ahead, she could
say no more, and Gillian, feeling that she had been cross, changed the
subject by admiring the pretty short curly hair that was being tied back
at the glass.
‘I wish it would grow long,’ said Kalliope. ‘But it always was rather
short and troublesome, and ever since it was cut short in the fever, I
have been obliged to keep it like this.’
‘But it suits you,’ said Gillian. ‘And it is exactly the thing now.’
‘That is the worst of it. It looks as if I wore it so on purpose.
However, all our hands know that I cannot help it, and so does Lady
Flight.’
The girl looked exceedingly well, though little Alice, the maid, would
not have gone out to tea in such an ancient black dress, with no relief
save a rim of white at neck and hands, and a tiny silver Maltese cross
at the throat. Maura had a comparatively new gray dress, picked out with
black. She was a pretty creature, the Irish beauty predominating over
the Greek, in her great long-lashed brown eyes, which looked radiant
with shy happiness. Miss Adeline was perfectly taken by surprise at the
entrance of two such uncommon forms and faces, and the quiet dignity
of the elder made her for a moment suppose that her sister must have
invited some additional guest of undoubted station.
Valetta, who had grown fond of Maura in their school life, and who
dearly loved patronising, pounced upon her guest to show her all manner
of treasures and curiosities, at which she looked in great delight; and
Fergus was so well satisfied with her comprehension of the principles
of the letter balance, that he would have taken her upstairs to be
introduced to all his mechanical inventions, if the total darkness and
cold of his den had not been prohibitory.
Kalliope looked to perfection, but was more silent than her sister,
though, as Miss Mohun’s keen eye noted, it was not the shyness of a
conscious inferior in an unaccustomed world, but rather that of a grave,
reserved nature, not chattering for the sake of mere talk.
Gillian’s photograph-book was well looked over, with all the brothers
and sisters at different stages, and the group of officers. Miss Mohun
noted the talk that passed over these, as they were identified one by
one, sometimes with little reminiscences, childishly full on Gillian’s
part, betraying on Kalliope’s side friendly acquaintance, but all in as
entirely ladylike terms as would have befitted Phyllis or Alethea. She
could well believe in the words with which Miss White rather hastened
the turning of the page, ‘Those were happy days--I dare not dwell on
them too much!’
‘Oh, I like to do so!’ cried Gillian. ‘I don’t want the little ones ever
to forget them.’
‘Yes--you! But with you it would not be repining.’
This was for Gillian’s ear alone, as at that moment both the aunts were,
at the children’s solicitation, engaged on the exhibition of a
wonderful musical-box--Aunt Adeline’s share of her mother’s wedding
presents--containing a bird that hovered and sung, the mechanical
contrivance of which was the chief merit in Fergus’s eyes, and which had
fascinated generations of young people for the last sixty years. Aunt
Jane, however, could hear through anything--even through the winding-up
of what the family called ‘Aunt Ada’s Jackdaw,’ and she drew her
conclusions, with increasing respect and pity for the young girl over
whose life such a change had come.
But it was not this, but what she called common humanity, which prompted
her, on hearing a heavy gust of rain against the windows, to go into the
lower regions in quest of a messenger boy to order a brougham to take
the guests home at the end of the evening.
The meal went off pleasantly on the whole, though there loomed a storm
as to the ritual of St. Kenelm’s; but this chiefly was owing to the
younger division of the company, when Valetta broke into an unnecessary
inquiry why they did not have as many lights on the altar at
St. Andrew’s as at St. Kenelm’s, and Fergus put her down with
unceremoniously declaring that Stebbing said Flight was a donkey.
Gillian came down with what she meant for a crushing rebuke, and the
indignant colour rose in the cheeks of the guests; but Fergus persisted,
‘But he makes a guy of himself and a mountebank.’
Aunt Jane thought it time to interfere. ‘Fergus,’ she said, ‘you had
better not repeat improper sayings, especially about a clergyman.’
Fergus wriggled.
‘And,’ added Aunt Ada, with equal severity, ‘you know Mr. Flight is a
very kind friend to little Maura and her sister.’
‘Indeed he is,’ said Kalliope earnestly; and Maura, feeling herself
addressed, added, ‘Nobody but he ever called on poor mamma, till Miss
Mohun did; no, not Lady Flight.’
‘We are very grateful for his kindness,’ put in Kalliope, in a
repressive tone.
‘But,’ said Gillian, ‘I thought you said he had seemed to care less of
late.’
‘I do not know,’ said Miss White, blushing; ‘music seems to be his chief
interest, and there has not been anything fresh to get up since the
concert.’
‘I suppose there will be for the winter,’ said Miss Mohun, and therewith
the conversation was safely conducted away to musical subjects, in which
some of the sisters’ pride and affection for their brothers peeped out;
but Gillian was conscious all the time that Kalliope was speaking with
some constraint when she mentioned Alexis, and that she was glad rather
to dwell on little Theodore, who had good hopes of the drawing prize,
and she seriously consulted Miss Mohun on the pupil-teachership for him,
as after he had passed the seventh standard he could not otherwise go
on with his education, though she did not think he had much time for
teaching.
‘Would not Mr. White help him further?’ asked Miss Mohun.
‘I do not know. I had much rather not ask,’ said Kalliope. ‘We are too
many to throw ourselves on a person who is no near relation, and he has
not seemed greatly disposed to help.’
‘Your elder brother?’
‘Oh, poor Richard, he is not earning anything yet. I can’t ask him. If
I only knew of some school I could be sure was safe and good and not
too costly, Alexis and I would try to manage for Theodore after the
examination in the spring.’
The Woodward schools were a new light to her, and she was eagerly
interested in Miss Mohun’s explanations and in the scale of terms.
Meantime Miss Adeline got on excellently with the younger ones, and when
the others were free, proposed for their benefit a spelling game. All
sat round the table, made words, and abstracted one another’s with
increasing animation, scarcely heeding the roaring of the wind outside,
till there was a ring at the bell.
‘My brother has come for us,’ said Kalliope.
‘Oh, but it is not fit for you to walk home,’ said Miss Mohun. ‘The
brougham is coming by and by; ask Mr. White to come in,’ she added, as
the maid appeared with the message that he was come for his sisters.
There was a confusion of acknowledgments and disclaimers, and word was
brought back that Mr. White was too wet to come in. Miss Mohun, who
was not playing, but prompting Fergus, jumped up and went out to
investigate, when she found a form in an ancient military cloak, trying
to keep himself from dripping where wet could do mischief. She had to
explain her regret at his having had such a walk in vain; but she had
taken alarm on finding that rain was setting in for the night, and
had sent word by the muffin-boy that the brougham would be wanted,
contriving to convey that it was not to be paid for.
Nothing remained to be said except thanks, and Alexis emerged from
the cloak, which looked as if it had gone through all his father’s
campaigns, took off his gaiters, did his best for his boots, and,
though not in evening costume, looked very gentleman-like and remarkably
handsome in the drawing-room, with no token of awkward embarrassment
save a becoming blush.
Gillian began to tremble inwardly again, but the game had just ended
in her favour, owing to Fergus having lost all his advantages in Aunt
Jane’s absence, besides signalising himself by capturing Maura’s ‘bury,’
under the impression that an additional R would combine that and straw
into a fruit.
So the coast being cleared, Miss Adeline greatly relieved her niece’s
mind by begging, as a personal favour, to hear the song whose renown
at the concert had reached her; and thus the time was safely spent in
singing till the carriage was announced, and good-nights exchanged.
Maura’s eyes grew round with delight, and she jumped for joy at the
preferment.
‘Oh!’ she said, as she fervently kissed Valetta, ‘it is the most
delightful evening I ever spent in the whole course of my life, except
at Lady Merrifield’s Christmas-tree! And now to go home in a carriage! I
never went in one since I can remember!’
And Kalliope’s ‘Thank you, we have enjoyed ourselves very much,’ was
very fervent.
‘Those young people are very superior to what I expected,’ said Aunt
Adeline. ‘What fine creatures, all so handsome; and that little Maura is
a perfect darling.’
‘The Muse herself is very superior,’ said Miss Mohun. ‘One of those home
heroines who do the work of Atlas without knowing it. I do not wonder
that the marble girls speak of her so enthusiastically.’
How Gillian might have enjoyed all this, and yet she could not, except
so far that she told herself that thus there could be no reasonable
objection made by her aunts to intercourse with those whom they so much
admired.
Yet perhaps even then she would have told all, but that, after having
bound over Kalliope to secrecy, it would be awkward to confess that she
had told all. It would be like owning herself in the wrong, and for that
she was not prepared. Besides, where would be the secrecy of her ‘great
thing’?