HETTY AND HER "COUSINS"
One cool fresh evening in October Mrs. Rushton, Hetty, Grant the maid,
and an old man-servant who followed his mistress everywhere, arrived at
the railway-station near Wavertree, and were driven along the old
familiar country road with the soft purpled woods on one side, and the
green plains and distant view of the sea on the other. They arrived at
Amber Hill just as lights began to spring up in the long narrow windows
of the comfortable old gray house, lights more near and bright than the
stars burning dimly above the ancient cedar-trees in the avenue.
Hetty, dressed in a costly pelisse trimmed with fur, leaned forward,
looking eagerly for the first glimpse of her new home. The child had now
only faint recollections of Wavertree, and of her life with Mrs. Kane in
the village, and except for Grant's ill-natured remarks from time to
time she would have forgotten them altogether and imagined herself to be
Mrs. Rushton's niece, as that lady called her when speaking of her to
strangers. Hetty hated Grant, who always took a delight in lowering her
pride, for by this time, it must be owned, pride had become Hetty's
besetting sin.
Mrs. Rushton had perceived Grant's disposition to snub and annoy the
child, and with her usual determination to uphold and justify her own
conduct and disappoint those who disapproved of her views, she had put
down the maid's impertinence with a high hand, and had grown more and
more careful of late to protect Hetty's dignity before the servants.
"I hope Miss Gray's room is as nice as I desired you to make it," she
said to the housekeeper who was welcoming her in the hall. "I hope you
have engaged a maid from the village to attend on her. I require all
Grant's attentions now myself," she added wearily, falling into a chair
in a state of exhaustion. "Hetty, my love, give me a kiss, and go and
have a pretty frock put on for dinner."
Polly, the new maid, had already unpacked the little girl's trunks and
was waiting in her room to dress her in white muslin and lace and
arrange her soft dark curls in a charming wreath round her head. Hetty's
room was an exquisite little nest draped in pale blue chintz covered
with roses, and with fantastic little brackets here and there bearing
pretty statuettes and baskets of flowers. The housekeeper had not indeed
neglected Mrs. Rushton's instructions with regard to the decoration of
this apartment.
"My, miss, but you have grown a fine tall girl!" said Polly admiringly;
"and won't Mrs. Kane be glad to see you again? I suppose you will be
going to see her to-morrow?"
"I am not sure," said Hetty; "I don't remember Mrs. Kane."
"Don't you, miss? Then you ought to, I am sure, for it was she that took
care of you before Mrs. Rushton had you."
"Yes, I believe so," said Hetty frowning, for she dreaded that Polly was
going to make a practice of taunting her with being a foundling, just as
Grant had always done.
"And you ought to be very thankful to her," persisted Polly, "although
you are such a grand young lady now."
"Please to mind your own business," said Hetty proudly; "you were
engaged by Mrs. Rushton to dress me and not to give me lectures."
Polly was astonished and aggrieved. She did not know how Hetty had been
goaded on the subject of her past life by Grant, and had fancied that as
she had only a child to deal with she could say anything she chose quite
freely. But though Hetty was only nine, her experiences of the world had
made her old beyond her years. Polly only thought her a hard-hearted,
haughty little wretch, too proud to be grateful to those who had been
good to her.
"Far be it from me to think of lecturing you, Miss Hetty," she said;
"but mind, I tell you, pride always gets a fall."
"Be silent!" cried Hetty, stamping her small foot imperiously; "if Mrs.
Rushton knew of your impertinence she would send you away to-night."
It was thus that poor Hetty already began to make enemies, while much
requiring friends.
Next morning Mrs. Rushton and Hetty drove over to Wavertree to spend a
few days at the Hall, and on the way the lady stopped at Mrs. Kane's
door in the village, and bade Hetty alight and go in to pay a visit to
her old protectress. With Grant's taunts rankling in her memory and
Polly's reproaches fresh in her mind, Hetty got out of the carriage
reluctantly and went up to the door with a slow step.
Mrs. Kane was busy over a tub in her little wash-house, and came out
into the kitchen on hearing some one at the door. She wore a print
short-gown and petticoat, and a poky sun-bonnet; and her bare arms were
reeking with soap-suds. Hetty shrank from her a little, and could not
realize that she had ever belonged to a person with such an appearance
as this.
Poor Mrs. Kane looked at her young visitor with a stare of wonder, and
could never have guessed it was Hetty had she not espied Mrs. Rushton's
face through the open doorway, nodding pleasantly at her from the
carriage.
"Why, little miss, you're never my little Hetty?" cried the good woman,
wiping her hands in her apron.
"My name is Hetty Gray," said the little girl, holding up her pretty
head adorned with a handsome hat and feathers.
"And don't you remember me, my darling?" said Mrs. Kane, extending her
arms; "me that used to nurse you and take care of you like my own! Oh,
don't go to say you forget all about your poor old mammy!"
Hetty hung her head. "I don't remember you at all," she said in a low
trembling voice. Her pride was stung to the quick at the thought that
she had belonged to this vulgar person.
"Well, well! you were only a baby, to be sure, when you were taken away
from me. But oh, my dear, I loved you like my own that went to heaven,
so I did. And my John, he loved you too. Come in here till I show you
the bed you used to sleep in; and always you would be happier if you had
a jugful of flowers on the window-sill to look at, falling asleep and
coming awake again in the morning. To think of it being full five years
ago, my pretty; and you turned into an elegant young lady in the time!"
"Did I really ever live here?" asked Hetty; "really ever sleep in that
bed?"
"That you did; and slept well and were happy," said Mrs. Kane, beginning
to feel hurt at the child's coldness. "Come now, have you never a kiss
to give to the poor old mammy that nursed you?"
Hetty held up her round sweet face, as fair and fresh as a damask rose,
to be kissed, and submitted to Mrs. Kane's caresses rather from
consciousness that she ought to do so, than from any warmth of gratitude
in her own heart. So far from being grateful to the homely sun-burned
woman who hugged her, she felt a sort of resentment towards her for
finding her on the sea-shore and making a cottage child of her. It ought
to have been Mrs. Rushton who found her, and perhaps she might have done
so if Mrs. Kane or her husband had not been in such a hurry to take her
in. Then Grant could not have taunted her with being a village
foundling, and nobody could have declared she was not intended to be a
lady.
After her one embrace Mrs. Kane wiped her eyes and led the child out of
the cottage to the carriage door.
"Ah, Mrs. Rushton!" she said, "this is your Hetty now and not mine any
more. What does a fine young lady like this want to know of a poor old
mammy like me? I gave her to you, body and soul, five years ago, and may
the good God grant that I did right! My little Hetty, that loved the big
moon-daisies and the field-lilies like her life, is as dead as my other
children who are in heaven. It lies in your hands, ma'am, to make good
or bad out of this one."
"You are a curious woman, Mrs. Kane. I thought you would have been
delighted to see what a little queen I have made of her."
"Queens require kingdoms, ma'am, and I make free to wish that your
little lady may sit safe on her throne. And after that I can only hope
that she has more heart for you than for me."
"Come, come, Mrs. Kane! you must not expect memory from a baby. Hetty
will soon renew her acquaintance with you, and you and she will be
excellent friends."
But Mrs. Kane was not slow to read the expression of Hetty's large
dark-fringed eyes, which, with all the frankness of childhood, betrayed
their owner's thoughts; and she knew that Hetty would find no pleasure
in learning to recall the inglorious circumstances of her infancy.
Hetty had still less recollection of the Enderby family than of Mrs.
Kane, but she felt very much more willing to be introduced to its
members than to the cottage woman. Looking upon herself as Mrs.
Rushton's only child, she considered the Wavertree children as her
cousins and their father and mother as her uncle and aunt. Mrs. Rushton
had always talked to her of them in such a way as to lead her to regard
them in this light. Occasionally a strange little laugh or a few
sarcastic words from Mrs. Rushton had grated on the child's ear in the
midst of her foster-mother's pleasantly expressed anticipations of
Hetty's future intercourse with her own relations; and the little girl
had, on such occasions, felt a chill of vague fear, and a momentary pang
of anxiety as to the reception she might possibly meet with from these
people, none of whom had ever been found by a poor labouring man alone
on a wild sea-shore, or had lived with a humble woman in a cottage. That
the "disgrace" of such a past clung round herself, Grant's disagreeable
eyes would never allow her to forget. Such were poor Hetty's disordered
ideas with regard to herself and her little world, when Mrs. Rushton's
carriage drew up that day before the door of Wavertree Hall.
Mrs. Enderby was seated at her embroidery in the drawing-room beside her
small elegant tea-table, and looked the very ideal of an English
gentlewoman in her silver-gray silk and delicate lace ruffles, and with
her fair, almost colourless hair twisted in neat shining braids round
the back of her head. With her own faint sweet smile she welcomed her
sister-in-law and inquired kindly for her health; and then she turned to
Hetty, who stood gazing steadily in her face, utterly unconscious of her
own look of anxious inquiry.
Mrs. Rushton had taken pains to make the most of Hetty's uncommon beauty
on this occasion, determined to take her friends by surprise and force
them into an acknowledgment of the superiority of her own taste in
adopting such a child. Hetty was dressed in a dark crimson velvet frock,
trimmed with rich old yellow lace, which enhanced the warmth and
richness of her complexion, and gave a reflected glow to her dark and
deep-fringed eyes. A crop of crisp short curls of a dusky chestnut
colour was discovered when her hat was removed. No ungenerous prejudice
prevented Mrs. Enderby from acknowledging at the first glance that Hetty
had a most charming countenance.
"And this is Hetty! how she has grown!" said Mrs. Enderby, taking the
child's little hand between her own and looking at her in a friendly
manner. With a swift pain, however, Hetty remarked that she did not kiss
her; but she was not aware that Mrs. Enderby, though a kind, was not a
demonstrative woman, and that kisses were rarely bestowed by her on
anyone. If Hetty had put up her little face for a caress, Mrs. Enderby
would have been very well pleased to lay her own cool cheek against the
child's scarlet lips; but Hetty's was one of those natures that desire
tokens of love and are yet too proud to seek for them. She flushed to
her hair, therefore, with mortification as Mrs. Enderby dropped her hand
and turned away once more to her sister-in-law.
"How tired you are! you look quite faint. Allow me to take your bonnet;
and do lie down on this couch while I make you a cup of tea. Hetty must
amuse herself with a piece of cake till my little girls come in from
their walk. I have got such a nice governess for them, Amy. Mark, you
know, is gone to Eton."
The ladies continued to converse, and Hetty sat forgotten for the
moment, eating her cake. She ate it very slowly, anxious to make it last
as long as possible, for she felt that when it was finished she should
not know what to do with herself. When even the crumbs were gone she
folded her hands and counted the flowers on the wall-paper, and
discovered among them a grinning face which certainly had been no
acquaintance of the designer's, but had started suddenly out of the
pattern merely to make cruel fun of Hetty's uneasiness.
At last, after some time which seemed to the little girl quite a year at
least, Mrs. Enderby rang the bell and asked if the young ladies had come
in from walking. The servant said they were just going to tea in the
school-room, and Mrs Enderby turned to Hetty, saying:
"Go, my dear, with Peter, and he will show you the school-room. Tell
Phyllis and Nell that I sent you to play with them."
Hetty followed the servant; but as she went across the hall and up the
staircase she felt with a swelling heart that had she been the real
cousin of these children, and not an "upstart" (Grant's favourite word),
they would perhaps have been sent for to the drawing-room to be
presented to her.
Accustomed as she was to be alternately petted and snubbed, she had
acquired the habit of watching the movements of her elders with
suspicion, and now concluded that because no fuss was made about her she
must therefore be despised. A hard proud spirit entered into her on the
moment, and she resolved that though she had been humble in her
demeanour towards Mrs. Enderby she would hold her head high with girls
who were not very much older than herself.
Peter was a young footman who had been brought up in the village and
trained by the butler at the Hall, and who consequently knew all about
Hetty's history. He did not intend to do more than just show the little
girl which was the school-room door, and was amused and surprised when
the child said to him with great dignity,
"Please announce Miss Gray."
Peter hid his smile, and throwing open the door very wide he pronounced
her name, as she desired, in an unusually loud tone of voice.
Miss Davis, the governess, had just raised the tea-pot in her hand to
fill the cups, and her two pupils had each a thick piece of bread and
butter in hand, when the door was flung open as described and Hetty in
all her magnificence appeared on the threshold.
"My mamma has brought me to see you," said Hetty boldly, her chin very
high, "and Mrs. Enderby sent me here to you"; and she remarked as she
spoke that the Enderby girls wore plain holland dresses with little
aprons and narrow tuckers, no style or elegance whatever about their
attire.
Miss Davis looked in surprise at the young stranger, not knowing her
story, and thinking her a very handsome, but haughty looking little
girl, while Phyllis and Nell put down their bread and butter on their
plates, and rose slowly from their seats.
"How do you do?" they said, each just touching her hand, and then the
three girls stood looking at one another.
The words "my mamma" had already annoyed Phyllis, who was one of those
persons who even from childhood cherish an extraordinary degree of quiet
pride in their good birth. She was willing that Hetty should be treated
with kindness, but had often told herself that she would never be
persuaded to look upon her as her own cousin. Nell only thought of how
pretty their new playfellow was, and how nice it would be to have her
sometimes with them.
"I am very glad you have come," she said, looking at Hetty with
welcoming eyes.
"Nell, you ought not to speak before your elder sister," said Miss
Davis, who, though an excellent lady, was rather prim in her ways and
ideas.
"I hope you are quite well," said Phyllis politely; "will you take some
tea?"
"I have just had some," said Hetty, "thank you. Do you never have tea
with your mamma?"
"Oh, no," said the girls, with a smile of surprise.
"Little girls never do," said Miss Davis emphatically.
"I do always," said Hetty; she might have added, "except when she
forgets all about me," but she did not think of that now.
"I did not know you had any mamma," said Phyllis coldly, not exactly
meaning to be cruel, but feeling that Hetty was pretentious, and
therefore vulgar, and that she ought to be kept down.
"How odd that you should not know your own aunt," said Hetty, a warm
crimson rising in her cheeks, and her eyes kindling.
"My aunt never had a child," said Phyllis quietly.
"Not till she got Hetty," broke in Nell. "Phyllis, how can you be so
unkind?"
"My dear Nell, I am not unkind, I only meant to correct Miss Gray's
mistake."
"You had better go into the drawing-room and correct Mrs. Rushton's
mistakes," said Hetty angrily. "It is by her desire that I call her my
mother."
By this time Miss Davis knew who Hetty was, as she had heard something
about Mrs. Rushton's having adopted a village child.
"My dears," she said, "don't let us be unkind to each other. Come, we
must have our tea, and Miss Gray will be social and join us, even
though she has had some before." And she handed a cup to the little
visitor.
"Now, Hetty," continued Miss Davis, "I suppose I may call you Hetty,
instead of Miss Gray, as you are only a little girl?"
"Yes," said Hetty slowly, half liking Miss Davis, but feeling afraid she
was laughing at her.
Tea was finished almost in silence, not all Miss Davis's efforts making
Hetty and Phyllis feel at ease with each other. Nell, being rather in
awe of her elder sister, of whose general propriety of conduct and good
sense she had a high opinion, was not very successful in her attempts at
conversation. When the meal was over Miss Davis proposed a walk in the
garden before study time.
"Can you play lawn tennis?" asked Nell as they walked towards the
tennis-ground.
"No, I never play at anything," said Hetty sadly, "When not with--_my
mamma_," she said with a flash of the eyes at seeing Phyllis looking at
her, "I have always been alone."
Miss Davis glanced at the child with pity, but Hetty, catching her eye,
would not bear to be pitied.
"It is much pleasanter to be with grown people in the drawing-room," she
said. "I should not like at all to live as you do."
"Do you always wear such splendid frocks?" asked Phyllis, examining her
from head to foot with critical eyes.
"Yes," said Hetty. "I have much finer ones than this; I am always
dressed like a lady. How can you bear to be such a sight in that ugly
linen thing?"
"My dear, simple clothes are more becoming to children," said Miss
Davis, while Phyllis only curled her lip. "If you lived more among those
of your own age," continued the governess, "as I hope you will
henceforth do, you would find that little girls are much happier and
more free to amuse themselves when dressed suitably to their age. You
shall see how we enjoy ourselves at tennis, as we could not do in
dresses as rich as yours."
Miss Davis and her pupils began to play tennis, and Hetty tried to join;
but her dress was too warm and too tight to allow of her making much
exertion, and so she was obliged to stand by and watch the game. Seeing
the great enjoyment of the players, Hetty began to feel the spirit of
the game, and remembered how she had often longed to be one of the happy
children whom she had seen at play in other scenes than this. However,
her belief that Phyllis was unfriendly towards her prevented her
acknowledging what she felt. Had only Nell and Miss Davis been present
she would have begged the loan of a holland blouse and joined in the
game with all her heart. But Phyllis had a freezing effect upon her.
When the game was over they went indoors and Hetty was shown the pretty
room prepared for her. Polly had already unpacked her things, and on the
bed were laid the handsome gifts which Mrs. Rushton had bought for Hetty
to present to "her cousins."
Hetty was now glad to see these presents which she had for a time
forgotten, and thought she had now a good opportunity for making friends
with the two girls. She was really pleased to give pleasure to Nell,
whom she liked, and was not sorry that Phyllis would be obliged to
receive something from her hands.
The presents were both beautiful and both useful. One was a desk, the
case delicately inlaid, and the interior perfectly fitted up. The other
was an exquisitely carved and furnished work-box.
"Oh, give the desk to Phyllis; she is so much more clever than I am, and
writes so well. And I am fond of work. Oh, you are a dear to give me
such a charming present," said Nell affectionately, examining the
beautiful work-box with sparkling eyes.
Hetty was delighted.
"I chose them myself," she said with some pride; and then she took the
desk in her arms and asked Nell to show her the way to Phyllis's room.
"It is down at the end of this passage. I will show you. And you must
not mind Phyllis if she does not go into raptures like me. She is always
so well-behaved, and takes everything so quietly."
Phyllis looked greatly surprised, and not quite pleased, when, having
heard a knock at her door and said "Come in," she saw Hetty invade her
room. Her first thought was, "This foundling girl is going to be forward
and troublesome"; and Hetty was not slow to read her glance.
"I have brought you a present," she said, in quite a different tone from
that in which she had made her little speech to Nell.
Phyllis took the desk slowly, and looked at it as if she wished it had
not been offered.
"It is very handsome," she said, "and my aunt was very good to think of
it. Please give her my best thanks."
And then Phyllis deposited the present on a table, and turned away and
began to change her shoes.
Nell looked at Hetty, but could not see the expression of her face; for
she had turned as quickly as Phyllis and was already vanishing through
the door.