a year after Mr. Edward Flower lost his life in the wreck of the
Wizard Queen, his elder brother, Mr. John Flower, was killed in the
hunting-field. By the death of Sir Richard Flower, which occurred
last November, Lady Flower inherited the whole of his property and
she is no doubt anxious to provide suitably for the youngest and
only surviving member of the family._
_Yours faithfully,
Hepper and Philcox._
Mrs. Fawcus went across to where her husband was still sitting with
bowed head.
"William!" she murmured. It was the first time in thirty-five years of
married life that she had dared to call him simply that.
"William!" she repeated more confidently, for the outward semblance
of things had not been changed by her daring address. "You must write
_them_ a letter."
"It would be useless, my dear," he muttered without raising his head.
"Useless, utterly and completely useless. A labor of Sisyphus, my love."
Nevertheless, Mr. Fawcus was persuaded to try, and he composed the
following letter to Messrs. Hepper and Philcox:
c/o Messrs. Holland and Brown,
Publishers,
95 Paternoster Row,
London, E.C.,
_March 25, 1870_.
_Dear Sirs_,
_Your communication of the 24th inst. with kind enclosures was duly
received. For the moment I am too much disturbed by the situation
thus created to express worthily my repugnance to the notion of
losing Miss Mary Flower. I should esteem it a favor if you would, so
far as the emotions of a suppositious father can be suitably conveyed
through the medium of legal phraseology, convey to Her Ladyship that
my good wife and myself are most anxious not to part with the child
whom we literally snatched from the angry deep. With all respect
I venture to observe that until this moment none of her relatives
has shown the slightest concern for the child's welfare beyond the
quarterly allowance of £25 sterling. Mrs. Fawcus and myself on the
other hand have never felt anything but the profoundest affection
for her, and I can assure you that we would have left ourselves with
nothing more than the bare necessities of life rather than that she
should have wanted for the least thing._
_In the hope of shortly receiving from you a favorable reply to my
request_,
_I am, Gentlemen,
Your obedient servant,
William Axworthy Fawcus_.
It was settled not to say anything to Mary until the lawyers wrote
again:
151 Lamb's Conduit Street, W.C.
_April 3, 1870._
_Dear Sir_,
_We have to say in answer to your letter of the 25th ult. that we
have communicated the substance of your request to Lady Flower,
and that she is unable to agree to your suggestion that Miss Mary
Flower should remain in your care. We take this opportunity to point
out that when in March, 1860, the late Sir Richard Flower invited
you to look after his granddaughter he made it clear that such an
arrangement was for ten years, at the end of which time he gave you
to understand the future of the child would once more come up for
discussion._
_Hoping that we shall hear from you in the course of a day or two,
appointing a time to call upon us_,
_We are,
Yours faithfully,
Hepper and Philcox_.
"Who's to tell Mary?" Mrs. Fawcus asked with fear in her voice.
"Well, I had thought of your telling her," Mr. Fawcus admitted. "But
perhaps the most equitable way would be for us both to tell her."
The worst of it was that, when they did brace themselves to tell her
and were prepared at whatever cost to themselves to alleviate in every
possible way her grief, Mary herself jumped for joy at the notion of
visiting her grandmother in France.
"She doesn't mean to be cruel," said Mrs. Fawcus, patting her husband's
arm reassuringly.
"No, no, certainly not," he agreed. "It's just the heedlessness of
youth."
Mrs. Fawcus sighed.
"We were young once ourselves, Mr. Fawcus." The imminent departure of
Mary made "Uncle William" sound ridiculous now, and Mrs. Fawcus went
back to her time-honored mode of address.
"Many years ago, my love," he said, shaking his head. "And I'm afraid
that you've had much to put up with since then. I have wasted my
opportunities sadly. I ought to have been in a superb position by now."
"I'm sure I don't wish for anything better than what we've got," Mrs.
Fawcus declared, trying to sound cheerful. "I'm sure as basements go,
one couldn't wish for a nicer basement. It's so lovely and light for
one thing."
"If I were to die, my dear, I'm convinced that Holland and Brown would
offer you the refusal of my post."
"Oh, don't talk like that, Mr. Fawcus. Die? What ever next, to be sure?"
"_Tempora, mutantur nos et mutamur in illis._ It won't be the same
without our Mary."
"You're going to make me cry if you keep on keeping on so." Mrs. Fawcus
uttered a few warning sniffles.
At that moment she, who by her reception of the news had added the last
bitterness to the separation, came dancing back from her dolls to whom
as a great secret she had been telling about her departure.
"Do you think my granny will be like a fairy god-mother?" Mary asked.
"Because if she is I shall ask her to wave her magic wand and bring my
dear Uncle William and my dear Aunt Lucy to France."
"Will you, Mary, will you? But I'm too old and fat to be waved by fairy
godmothers," said Mr. Fawcus sadly.
Mary began to understand at last that her going away was a grief to
her kind guardians, and as she had often done before, when it seemed
advisable to propitiate Uncle William, or when Uncle William came
downstairs very angry over some new task that Holland and Brown had
laid upon him, she asked him a question.
"How big is France, Uncle William?" And folding her hands across her
clean pinafore she composed herself to listen more attentively to a
long account of France than she had ever listened to any of Uncle
William's exegetical discourses before.
But Uncle William did not answer, and Mary, horrified at his silence,
began to cry.
"For goodness' sake, child, don't wipe your eyes on your clean
pinafore," Mrs. Fawcus sharply adjured her. It was like Mrs. Fawcus to
have put Mary into a clean pinafore just to learn that she was to be
taken from them.
A shaft of sunlight, the first of the year to reach the basement,
came glancing through the geraniums in the window and lit up the cosy
kitchen; but it was a cruel shaft, for it lit up also the weary lines
and the baggy eyes of Mr. Fawcus: it lit up the crows-feet and the
wrinkles of his wife; and most cruelly of all it lit up Mary's auburn
hair, reminding the old couple that, though the sun might shine all the
summer through, here it would never shine again upon that auburn hair.
The next fortnight went by for Mary in such a whirl of exciting new
experiences as no child of ten could be expected not to enjoy, and she
was hardly to be blamed if she did appear hard-hearted in her behavior
on the verge of parting with her guardians. She could hardly be blamed
for not realizing how unlikely it was that she would ever see either
of them again, and in justice to the old couple it must be said that
neither of them tried to gratify their emotion at Mary's expense. Once
the first shock had passed, they did their best to prepare her for a
worthy entrance upon the new scene, at whatever cost to themselves. A
number of dresses were bought, each one more outrageous than the last,
and each one seeming as much more beautiful to Mary.
"I feel like Cinderella going to the ball," she told Mrs. Fawcus.
"Ah, my dear, you'll find that life isn't quite such a fairy story as
you think it is now," replied Mrs. Fawcus.
And this was as near as she got to a hint of cynicism in her advice to
the little girl.
For the visit to the lawyers Mr. Fawcus arrayed himself in a black
suit he had not worn for eleven years, in fact, not since the annual
prize-giving at the last school he owned. It had been packed in the
bottom of a large trunk to go to Australia, where it was intended to
be worn at the ceremonious welcomes that Mr. Fawcus hoped to receive
in his new country. By good fortune this trunk had missed being put on
board the _Wizard Queen_, and both Mr. and Mrs. Fawcus had been able to
live for ten years on the clothes it had contained.
Mr. Hepper and Mr. Philcox were even more desiccated than Mr. Bristowe
of Holland and Brown's. Both their waistcoats were dusty with snuff, so
dusty that if Mr. Philcox had not happened to prick his finger while he
was talking to Mary and displayed on the tip of it an infinitesimal but
withal definitely recognizable drop of blood Mary might have thought
that they were stuffed with sawdust like her own dolls.
"And what arrangements have you made for conveying Miss Flower to her
grandmother?" asked Mr. Hepper.
"Mrs. Fawcus will conduct her to Paris," said Mr. Fawcus. "I should
have taken her myself if I had not recorded a solemn vow on Dover Quay
ten years ago never to cross the sea again."
"Ah, that would be after you were wrecked, no doubt," said Mr. Philcox.
"Yes--um--ah! I've never been wrecked myself, Mr. Fawcus."
"It is an experience which happily falls to the lot of few," said Mr.
Fawcus.
"Yes--um--ah! Then I may take it as definite that this young lady will
leave by the Dover packet on Wednesday next. How is the glass, Mr.
Hepper?"
"The glass is steady, Mr. Philcox."
"The glass augurs well for the voyage across, Mr. Fawcus. You hear what
Mr. Hepper says."
"Is there anything more you wish to tell me?" Mr. Fawcus inquired,
bowing to each of the partners in turn.
Mr. Hepper looked at Mr. Philcox, who shook his head.
"Nothing more, thank you, Mr. Fawcus," they declared in unison.
Mr. Fawcus was about to take his leave, when Mr. Philcox held up his
hand.
"But wait a minute. Dear me, we have forgotten something. Yes--um--ah!
Lady Flower instructed us that if on inquiries we should find that you
had suitably performed your duty towards her granddaughter we should
offer you this handsome token of appreciation."
Mr. Philcox flourished an envelope.
"I am happy to say, Mr. Fawcus, that our inquiries have proved
perfectly satisfactory, and so perhaps you will take a little peep
inside and also, I think, Mr. Hepper, it might be more in order if Mr.
Fawcus were to sign this little receipt."
"Please thank her ladyship from me," said Mr. Fawcus grandly, putting
the envelope down on the lawyer's table. "But the only token of
her appreciation that I or Mrs. Fawcus should esteem would be an
occasional communication from her lawyers if she does not care to write
herself letting us know that--er--this young lady is well and happy. I
wish you a very good morning, gentlemen." Mr. Fawcus made a bow, and
left the office with Mary.
A few days later Mr. Fawcus, from the gliding shore, was waving
farewell to the little girl.
"Don't forget to water my sweet sultans, Uncle William," Mary cried
above the turmoil of the paddles.
"The less you say about water to poor Uncle William," Mrs. Fawcus
commented almost sharply, "the better. It must have been just here that
he carried you ashore in his arms ten years ago."
The steamer backed and brought poor Uncle William within earshot again.
"I was telling Mary that just about here you carried her ashore," Mrs.
Fawcus called to her husband.
"_Sunt lacrimæ rerum_," he chanted, and, when this time the paddles
churned up the water in earnest, Mr. Fawcus buried his face in a
bandana handkerchief and waved a limp glove from the receding shore, a
limp glove that pathetically expressed the condition of mind and body
to which its owner was by now reduced.
The journey was too full of excitement for Mary to be long saddened
by the vision of Mr. Fawcus on the quay. Most children remember their
first Channel crossing; but this great event in Mary's case was made
doubly noteworthy from its being the only adventure of any importance
she had ever known, so placid had been her life in that Paternoster Row
basement.
"Ah, you wouldn't be dancing about quite so gaily, Miss, if you could
remember the first time you was on the sea," said Mrs. Fawcus. "Still,
I'm bound to say you behaved very well then, all considering. Though
why you didn't die of that perishing wind I'm sure I don't know, and
that's a fact."
"Shall we be wrecked to-day, Aunt Lucy?"
"For the love of mercy, don't talk of such things," Mrs. Fawcus begged.
"If you feel sick, chew a bit of lemon peel and let it come. Don't be
afraid. Them as manages this boat have seen thousands of people sick.
They don't consider it any more than blowing the nose, as you might
say."
But Mary was not sick, and when Mrs. Fawcus came back to Paternoster
Row she told her husband of this convincing indication of a mysterious
bond between Mary and the sea.
"If I have a window-box in Paris," said Mary, when the chalk cliffs of
England were become ghosts in the mist, "I shall plant sweet williams,
because Uncle William is sweet, isn't he, Aunt Lucy?"
"Bless your heart, my little treasure," Mrs. Fawcus exclaimed as she
clasped Mary to her heart. "It'll be meat and drink to poor Uncle
William to hear that."
When the various difficulties of customs and porters and trains and
cabs had been surmounted, and Mary holding tightly to the hand of Mrs.
Fawcus was standing on the steps of her grandmother's house in the
Avenue de Wagram, she felt a sudden desire to turn round and go back to
the basement in Paternoster Row. So far it had all been a delightful
adventure, but now she was tired of the adventure and was thinking
about her thrush which always sang so sweetly in the month of April.
"Oh dear, I wish it _was_ really a dream and that I was going to wake
up now," she whispered to Mrs. Fawcus; but just then the door opened,
and in a moment Mary was inside her grandmother's house.
She was vaguely aware, when she was stumping upstairs behind the
footman, of tiger-skins and dark paneled walls and soft carpets; but
before she had time to look round, two great doors had been flung
open, and while Mrs. Fawcus drew back she had to walk over an immense
slippery floor to where in a kind of inner room her grandmother was
reading a yellow book by the fire. She heard from far away in that vast
outer room the sharp whisper of Aunt Lucy: "Run along quick and give
your grandmother a nice kiss." However, Mary did not dare to run, but
stepped very carefully over the head first of a polar bear and then of
a black bear until she stood before her grandmother's chair.
"I've come to see you, Grandmamma," she announced.
Lady Flower rose from her chair and looked critically at the little
girl for a moment before she bent over and kissed her cheek.
"And is this good woman Mrs. Fawcus?" she asked.
"That's Aunt Lucy," said Mary.
Lady Flower frowned slightly.
"I expect you'll like a cup of tea after your journey, Mrs. Fawcus,"
she said, pulling a big purple bell-rope that hung before the fireplace.
"Oh, no, thank you, my lady. Nothing at all, thank you. I think I ought
to be getting back to Mr. Fawcus as soon as possible."
"Is your husband waiting outside?" Lady Flower inquired.
"Oh, no, thank you, my lady. He sent many apologies for not coming too,
but he's never been to sea since he was wrecked."
The footman came in at this moment, and Lady Flower told him to take
Mrs. Fawcus downstairs for a cup of tea.
"Oh, no, thank you, my lady. Too kind of you, I'm sure, but I'd really
rather be going, now that I've seen Mary safely here. I've arranged to
go back to Calais and wait there the night. Mr. Fawcus thought he'd be
less anxious that way than if I was to stay in Paris all by myself.
We shall miss Mary most terribly, my lady. If I might just kiss her
good-by and be off? I'm sure it's a pity Mr. Fawcus couldn't have
come. He's much superior to me in every way."
"Well, if you insist on going back at once," said Lady Flower, who
was beginning to think that after all she had nothing to say to Mrs.
Fawcus, and who would have cut out her tongue rather than ask the one
question she wanted to ask about the death of her son.
"Yes, indeed I think I will, my lady, and thank you kindly, I'm sure,
for the offer of tea."
Mrs. Fawcus darted forward, kissed Mary passionately several times, and
seemed to slide out of the room across the parquet and out of her life
forever.
When Lady Flower was alone with her granddaughter she was more at ease.
She was little changed by ten years; she was still the same delicately
ivorine creature as when she banished this child's father from her
heart with words of contempt for this child's mother. Not that she
ever really did banish Edward; the death of her elder son with all
his valor and renown did not touch her half so deeply as the loss of
Edward. If it had not been for Sir Richard's determination to ignore
Edward's offspring she might long ago have sent for Mary. Her husband's
bitterness against Edward, drowned dead though he was by that time,
was intensified when John was killed in the hunting-field. He declared
fiercely to his wife that he was glad Edward had not left a son, for
that he would rather the name and title of the Flowers should perish
utterly than that the fruit of his son's disgraceful alliance with one
of his own tenants should carry on both.
Mary was astonished to find how young her grandmother was. She
had expected a very old lady--almost she had pictured her with a
spinning-wheel and wearing a steeple-crowned hat--who would be bent
double and talk in a high, cracked voice. Instead of that she found
some one who looked much younger than Aunt Lucy.
"You'll have to go to school, you know," her grandmother was saying.
"You'll have a great deal to learn. Let me look at your hands, child.
Dear me, I believe you're going to have hands like mine. But your nails
are a little grubby."
"That's because I've been gardening all last week."
"Gardening? Where did you garden in London?"
"In the attic. Mr. Bristowe let me garden there."
"No wonder your nails are grubby. And who is Mr. Bristowe?"
"He was the manager of Holland and Brown, where Uncle William was
caretaker."
Lady Flower shuddered.
"Listen, Mary. I would rather you gave up calling Mr. and Mrs. Fawcus
uncle and aunt. They are not any relation to you, and now that you are
getting older you must learn to speak of them as Mr. Fawcus and Mrs.
Fawcus."
"But I always called them Uncle William and Aunt Lucy."
Lady Flower tapped her foot impatiently.
"I know that, and that is why I want you to break yourself of the habit
of calling them uncle and aunt. They are good and worthy people, but
you are going to lead quite a different kind of life nowadays, and it
wouldn't do...."
Lady Flower hesitated. Worldly woman though she was, she hesitated
almost shamefacedly to tell this child gazing up at her with astonished
eyes that Mr. and Mrs. Fawcus were common. She decided to let her
granddaughter learn gradually to be ashamed of the lowly couple who had
watched over her from infancy to girlhood.
"You have my hands, and you have your father's eyes," said Lady Flower,
changing the subject.
"And my mother's hair, Aunt Lucy said."
"Yes, and now I think you'd better go and take off your things. We'll
go shopping to-morrow, and when you're equipped I'll take you myself
to the school where you're going to learn...." Once again Lady Flower
broke off. She had been on the point of saying: "To forget all about
your life in London." Perhaps if she had known that Mary had lived
in a basement she would not have been able to refrain, for life in a
basement would have seemed to Lady Flower unimaginably squalid.
"Go shopping again?" echoed Mary in amazement. "Why, all these last
days I've been shopping with Aunt Lucy."
"Yes, I did not want you to arrive in rags."
Mary found that there were many other things her grandmother did not
want before she had been long in her new home. Accustomed to have her
ordinary behavior regarded with admiration and approval by Mr. and Mrs.
Fawcus, she could not understand that to her grandmother her manners
appeared uncouth, her habit of speech common. She was continually being
reproved for the way she held her knife and fork, or for using a spoon
naturally, that is by putting the narrow end into her mouth first.
"But if I drink my soup sideways I make a noise," she expostulated.
"And Aunt Lucy--I mean Mrs. Fawcus told me not to make a noise."
"I do not make a noise, do I?" Grandmamma asked with raised eyebrows.
Mary longed to tell her that she did make a noise sometimes and that,
when she was drinking, in the silence of the large dining-room it
sounded like pigeons cooing far away.
"And don't keep pulling up your stockings like that," Grandmamma would
say.
"But one of them keeps coming down."
"In that case go to Adèle and ask her to tighten your garter."
"But it's too tight already," Mary objected. "When I undress you can
see all crinkles where it was round my leg."
"And don't argue with people older than yourself," Grandmamma would
conclude.
At first Mary had rather enjoyed the ceremoniousness with which she was
treated by Lady Flower's servants, enjoyed being called Mademoiselle
and having doors flung open for her and never having to get up in the
middle of dinner and fetch clean plates. She felt like one of her own
fairy heroines who had sprung from goose-girl to princess in a night.
But all too soon grandeur began to be wearisome, and when she saw the
maids disappearing into what Lady Flower called "the lower regions" she
felt that she would like to disappear too.
A warm and cosy smell sometimes penetrated "the upper regions" from the
open door at the head of the staircase leading down to the kitchens,
and this emphasized the frigidity above. At first Mary liked her new
frocks and sashes and ribbons, but she never liked having her hair
brushed and combed by Adèle. And soon she grew to dislike her new
frocks, because they became associated with endless afternoons in the
_salon_, when numbers of ladies chattered French, ladies who either
smelled very strongly of scent or of being ladies and who had not that
pleasant soapy aroma of Aunt Lucy. At first Mary enjoyed walking in
the Parc Monceau with Grandmamma or driving with her to the Bois de
Boulogne; but soon these walks and drives became tiresome, for she
was continually being told to hold herself up or not to turn round
and stare or to talk without shouting. In the basement at Paternoster
Row she had never missed the company of other children; but here in
the Parc Monceau, which was full of children, Mary began to long for
playmates. She took to lingering behind Grandmamma on these walks, and
when she was reproved for doing so she always made the same excuse that
she had waited behind a moment to see what that little boy or that
little girl was doing. Lady Flower had enough sympathy and imagination
to realize that Mary was beginning to feel the need of companions, so
she arranged to have a children's party for her granddaughter. But Mary
did not enjoy this party at all. The little girls invited were so very
well behaved. Nobody romped or did any of the jolly things children
did in books. They treated Mary with grave courtesy, calling her
Mademoiselle, and except that the guests were in short frocks and wore
their hair down there was no difference between this party and one of
Grandmamma's crowded afternoons in the _salon_.
"I really must make up my mind to take you to Châteaublanc," Grandmamma
proclaimed after Mary had been in Paris for nearly two months. "Did you
tell me that Mr. Fawcus taught you to read and write?"
"Yes, and he said I learned very quickly."
"So I should think," Grandmamma commented dryly. "I'm afraid you'll
have a hard time at school."
Mary began to dread this school which was always being talked about,
and every time with some unpleasant addition to its already long list
of disagreeable potentialities.
"I didn't intend to go to Aix until late in the summer," said
Grandmamma. "And I had thought of keeping you with me until then, but
perhaps it's unwise to postpone your education any longer. So I'll take
you there next week. I've written to Mademoiselle Lucinge and suggested
that you should stay right on through the summer holidays, so that by
Christmas, when you'll be nearly eleven years old, won't you, I shall
expect to see quite a different Mary."
Perhaps Mary looked sad at the notion of the change that was to be
wrought in her by so many consecutive months of Mademoiselle Lucinge's
_Pension_. At any rate, Lady Flower became momentarily affectionate, as
she put her arm round Mary and said:
"It's not your fault, you poor little thing, and you mustn't think I'm
unkind. But I do want you to be able to get a great deal out of life,
and there's nothing that is so terribly able to prevent that as not
knowing exactly how to behave."