HETTY'S CONSTANCY.
"I hope Hetty is getting on better in the school-room now," said Mrs.
Enderby to Phyllis one day; "I have not heard any complaints for some
time."
"I think she is doing pretty well, mother; at least she behaves better
to Miss Davis. As for me, I have very little to do with her. I notice,
however, that she has quarrelled with Mark. He and she used to be great
friends, because she is such a romp and ready for any rough play. But
now he does not speak to her."
"That does not matter much," said Mrs. Enderby smiling; "she will be
better with Miss Davis and you. You must continue to take an interest in
the poor child, dear Phyllis. I wish she gave as little trouble as you
do."
Phyllis was one of those girls for whom mothers ought to be more uneasy
than for the wilder and naughtier children who cause them perpetual
annoyance. She was so proper in all her ways, and so well-behaved as
never to seem in fault. Her reasons for everything she said and did were
so ready and so plausible, that it required a rather clever and
far-seeing person to detect the deep-rooted pride and self-complacency
that lay beneath them. To manage all things quietly her own way, to be
accounted wise and good, and greatly superior to ordinary girls of her
age, was as the breath of life to Phyllis. To have to stand morally or
actually in the corner with other naughty children was a humiliation she
had unfortunately never experienced, but was one which would have done
her a world of good. All those early storms of remorse, repentance,
compunction, which do so much to prepare the ground for a growth of
virtue in children's hearts, were an unknown experience to her. She
believed in herself, and she expected others, young and old, to believe
in her. Such characters, if not discovered and humbled in time, are
likely to have a terrible future, and to grow up the unconscious enemies
of their own happiness and that of the people who live around them.
Mark kept up his indignation towards Hetty for a week. He did not grieve
over the quarrel as she did, but he missed her sadly in his games.
However, an accident soon occurred which made them friends again.
Mark had had a piece of land given to him in a retired part of the
grounds, and he was full of the project of making a garden of his own,
according to his own particular fancy. His father was pleased to allow
him to do this, being glad of anything that would occupy the restless
lad while at home for his holidays.
"I will draw all the beds geometrically myself," said Mark, "and make
it quite different from anything you have ever seen. And then I will
build a tea-house all of fir, and line it with cones, and it will have a
delightful perfume."
Then he said to himself that if Hetty had not turned out so badly he
would have asked her to make tea very often in his nice house among his
flowers. But, of course, he could not ask a tell-tale duffer of a girl to
do anything for him.
He set to work to plan his beds, and one afternoon was busy marking off
spaces with wooden pegs and a long line of cord. After working some time
he came to the end of his pegs, and was annoyed to find that he had not
enough to finish the particular figure he was planning. He did not like
to drop his line to go for more pegs, as he feared his work was not
secure enough, and would fall astray if the string was not held taut
till the end should be properly secured.
Just as he looked around impatiently, not knowing what to do, he saw
Hetty coming along the path above him, walking slowly and reading. She
was very often reduced to the necessity of taking a story-book as
companion of her leisure hours, now that Mark would have nothing to do
with her. This afternoon Phyllis and Nell were out driving with their
mother, and Miss Davis had seized the opportunity to write letters.
Hetty was therefore thrown on her own resources and was roaming about
with a book. She would have rushed away to Mrs. Kane's at once, but she
knew that this was John Kane's dinner hour. But half an hour hence she
would set off for the village, and have a nice long chat with her
foster-mother.
Hetty descended the winding path with her eyes on her book, and before
she saw him, nearly stumbled against Mark.
"Do you mean to walk over a fellow?" said Mark in an aggrieved tone.
"Oh, Mark, I beg your pardon. I did not know you were here. Now," she
added, looking round wistfully, "if you wouldn't be cross with me what a
nice time we could have working at your garden together."
"If you weren't disagreeable, I suppose you mean. Well, yes, we could.
But you see we're not friends."
"And you won't, won't be?" said Hetty anxiously.
"Well, look here, if you hold this string for me a bit I'll think about
it. My pegs are shaky until the string is fastened up tight, and I can't
drop it, and I must go to the stable-yard for some more pegs. If you
hold this string till I come back, perhaps I will forgive you."
"Oh yes, I will hold it," said Hetty; and down went her book on the
grass, and she took the cord and held it as Mark directed.
"Be sure to keep steady till I come back," he said; "and you mustn't
mind if I am kept a little while. I may have to look for Jack, who has
the key of the storehouse where the pegs are kept."
And off he went.
When he got to the stable-yard he met a groom who was coming to look for
him, saying that his father wanted him to go out riding. Mr. Enderby was
already in the saddle, and Mark's pony was waiting beside him at the
door. Mark, who loved a ride, especially in company with his father, at
once vaulted on the pony's back and was soon trotting out of the gates,
laughing and chatting with his papa. He had completely forgotten Hetty,
and the pegs, and the cord that had to be held taut till he should come
back.
In the meantime Hetty was standing just where he had left her, looking
in the direction from which he was to return. A quarter of an hour
passed, and her finger and thumb, which held the string exactly as Mark
had directed, were a little stiff. Another quarter passed, and lest the
cord should relax she changed it from one hand to the other.
"Jack must have gone out," she thought, "and Mark is waiting for him. I
wish he would come back, for I do want to see Mrs. Kane."
However, another quarter passed and Mark did not appear. Hetty was very
cold, for it was damp wintry weather with a sharp wind, and one gets
chilly standing perfectly still so long in the open air. She felt
tempted to put down the string and go to look for Mark, but on
reflection thought it would be disloyal to do so. He should not be
disappointed in her again. Something extraordinary had happened to keep
him away, but he should find her at her post when he came back. Then he
would be sure to forgive her, and she would be happy again.
Another half-hour passed and her toes were half-frozen, and her fingers
and her little nose pinched and red. She wished she had put on her
gloves before she took the cord in her hands. Now she could not drop it
to put them on. The jacket she wore was not a very warm one. Oh, why did
not Mark come back? It occurred to her that perhaps he might be playing
a trick to punish her; but she could not believe he would be so cruel.
Should she drop the string at last, and tell him afterwards that she had
held it as long as she could endure the cold? No, she would go on
holding it. He should see that she could bear something for his sake.
Hetty had been about an hour shivering at her post when Mark, riding
gaily along the road many miles from home, suddenly remembered Hetty and
the cord. He felt greatly startled and shocked at his carelessness. "I
ought to have sent Jack with the pegs to finish the work, and to tell
her I was going to ride," he reflected; "but it can't be helped now. She
will never be such a goose as to stay there long." And he felt more
sorry thinking of how the string would be lying slack until his return
than for treating Hetty so inconsiderately. Trying to put the whole
thing out of his head he began to chatter to his father about something
that had happened at school, and thought no more about the matter till
he had returned home an hour later.
Then he sprang from his pony and ran off to his garden to see if he
could tighten up the string before it became quite dark night. Could he
believe his eyes? There was Hetty holding the string as he had left her.
"Do you mean to say you have been there ever since?" he said in utter
amazement.
"Yes," said Hetty, trying to keep her teeth from chattering. "You told
me not to mind if you were kept a while. And I did not mind."
"But do you know that I have been two hours away, and have had a long
ride with father?" said Mark.
"It seemed a long time," said Hetty; "but I did not know what you were
doing. I promised to stay and I stayed."
"Well, you were a precious goose," he said, taking the string out of her
hand. "Nobody but a stupid of a girl would do such a thing."
Hetty said nothing, but slapped her hands together, and tried to keep
the tears of disappointment from coming into her eyes.
"Here, hold the string a moment longer while I put this peg properly
into the ground. Can't you catch it tight? Oh, your fingers are stiff.
There, that will do for to-night Now, come home and get warm again."
They walked up to the house together. Hetty was too cold, and tired, and
hurt to speak again, and Mark was too much annoyed at his own
carelessness, and what he called Hetty's stupidity, to be able to thank
her, and offer to make friends with her. Hetty went up to her own room
to take off her things, and when she came down to the school-room she
found that the tea was over and she was in disgrace for staying out so
long. Phyllis cast a disapproving glance at her as she entered.
Punctuality was one of Phyllis's virtues. Miss Davis rebuked Hetty for
staying out alone so late.
"I must tell Mrs. Kane," she said, "not to keep you so late when you go
to see her."
Then Hetty was obliged to say that she had not been to see Mrs. Kane.
"Where, then, can you have been for two hours all alone?"
"I was all the time in the grounds," said Hetty.
She had made up her mind that she would not "tell" this time of Mark,
and the consciousness that she was in an awkward position made her
colour up and look as if guilty of some fault she did not wish to own.
Phyllis looked at her narrowly and glanced at Miss Davis, who had a
pained expression on her face, but who said nothing more at the time,
being willing to screen Hetty if she could.
"Hetty, I am sure you have got cold," said Nell after some time; "you
are all shivery-shuddery."
"My head is aching," said Hetty; "I don't feel well."
"I suppose you were sitting all the time reading a story-book," said
Phyllis, "that would give you cold in weather like this."
"No, I was not reading, at least not long," said Hetty.
"But were you sitting?"
"No."
"Walking?"
"No, not much."
"My dear, you must not cross-question like that," said Miss Davis.
"Perhaps Hetty will tell me by and by what she was doing."
A frown gathered on Phyllis's fair brows and she turned coldly to her
lesson book which she was studying for the next day. She could not bear
even so slight a rebuke as this, but she knew how to reserve the
expression of her displeasure to a fitting time. She herself believed
that she bore an undeserved reproof with dignity, but some day in the
future the governess would be made to suffer some petty annoyance or
disappointment in atonement for her misconduct in finding fault with
her pattern pupil. Hetty raised her eyes with a thankful glance at Miss
Davis, who saw that they were full of tears. A sudden warmth kindled in
Miss Davis's heart as she saw that Hetty trusted in her forbearance, and
she said presently:
"I think you had better go to bed now, Hetty. You look unwell; and bed
is the best place for a cold."
"May I go with her, and see that she is covered up warm?" said Nell.
"Yes," said Miss Davis, "certainly." And the two little girls left the
room together, Hetty squeezing Nell's hand in gratitude for her
kindness.
When they got up to Hetty's room Nell's curiosity could no longer
restrain itself.
"Oh, Hetty," she said, "will you tell me what you were doing? I can see
it is a great secret. And I won't tell anybody."
"Neither will I," said Hetty laughing; "but I was not hurting anyone,
nor breaking the laws."
"Now, you are making fun of me," said Nell; "it is too bad not to tell
me. And Phyllis will be cool with me to-night for running after you."
"Then why did you not stay in the school-room?" said Hetty sadly. "I
don't want to make coolness between you and Phyllis."
"I shouldn't mind Phyllis if you would let me have a secret with you. It
is so nice to have a secret, and it is so hard to get one. Everybody
knows all about everything."
"I don't agree with you; I hate secrets," said Hetty. "This is not much
of one, I think, but it is somebody else's affair, and I will not tell
it."
Having wrung so much as this from Hetty, Nell grew wildly excited over
the matter, and was so annoyed at not having her curiosity gratified
that she went away out of the room in a hurry without having seen
whether Hetty was warm enough or not. On her return to the school-room
she announced that Hetty could not tell anything about how she had
passed the afternoon, because it was somebody else's secret.
"Perhaps she has been bringing some village girl or boy into the
grounds," said Phyllis quietly.
"I will talk to her myself about this," said Miss Davis; "pray attend to
your studies."
Miss Davis on reflection thought Phyllis might be right, and that having
made acquaintance with some young companion in Mrs. Kane's cottage,
Hetty might have been induced to admit her or him to the grounds so as
to give pleasure. She knew how strongly the child was influenced by her
likings and lovings, and feared that this might be the case of Scamp
over again, with the important difference that Hetty was now a girl in
her twelfth year, and that her new favourite might prove to be a human
being instead of a dog.
The next day Hetty was seriously ill. She had caught a severe cold and
lay tossing feverishly in her bed. Miss Davis came up to see her in the
afternoon and sat at her bedside for half an hour.
"Hetty," she said, "I fear you must have been very foolish yesterday,
and that your cold is the consequence. Now that we are alone I expect
you will tell me exactly all that you did."
"I can't indeed, Miss Davis."
"You disappoint me exceedingly. I had been thinking so much better of
you; I conclude you were not alone yesterday."
"Not all the time, but most of it."
"Who was with you when you were not alone?"
Hetty hesitated, and then said, "Mark."
"But Mark was out riding with his father."
"Yes."
"And you were alone all that time."
"Yes."
"And yet there is something behind that you will not tell. Hetty, I
always thought you frank till now. Why are you making a mystery?"
"I can't tell you, Miss Davis; I was not doing any harm."
"How am I to believe that?" said Miss Davis.
"Oh, my head!" moaned Hetty, as the pain seemed crushing it. She thought
that if she were to die for it she would not tell that Mark had treated
her badly.
Miss Davis went away hurt and displeased, and Hetty was very much alone
for several days, being too ill to leave her room, and too deeply in
disgrace to be petted by anyone. She was very unhappy, and lay wondering
how it was that with a strong desire to do right she seemed always going
wrong. If she had dropped the string, gone away to see Mrs. Kane as she
had been longing to do, and returned in good time to the school-room to
tea, Mark would perhaps have been better pleased with her than he
actually was. He had not guessed that she had meant to please him, to
make up for telling Miss Davis that they two had played her a trick. He
did not ask about her now she was ill, or notice that she was keeping
silence and allowing herself to be misunderstood in order that he might
not be blamed. If all were told he could not be much blamed, it was
true, for what was a mere piece of forgetfulness. But that carelessness
of his was a fault of which his father was very impatient, and which
always brought on him a severe reprimand.
"And I will not tell this time," said Hetty to herself, as her eyes
feverishly danced after the spots on the wall-paper. "When I told
before, it was to save Miss Davis from suffering, this time there is
nobody to suffer but myself."
In the meantime Mark was spending a few days with a school-fellow at a
distance of some miles, and had gone away without hearing about Hetty's
illness. As soon as he returned home he missed her, and learned that she
was shut up in her room.
He immediately went to inquire for her, and met Miss Davis on the
stairs.
"I'm sure I don't wonder she got a cold," he said, "but I never meant
her to do it."
"To do what?" asked Miss Davis.
"Why, did she not tell you?"
"I have not been able to get her to tell me what she was about that day
for two hours alone in the grounds. She has not behaved well, I am sorry
to say; she has been in disgrace as well as ill."
"Then it was a jolly shame!" burst forth Mark. "I left her to hold a
string for me, and I forgot all about her, and went away to ride. And
she stood holding the string for two hours in the cold. And I called her
a duffer for not running away and letting all my pegs go crooked in the
ground. Oh, I say, Miss Davis, it makes a fellow feel awfully ashamed of
himself."
"So it ought," said Miss Davis, who now understood the whole thing. "She
would not tell for fear of getting you blamed."
"And I called her a tell-tale before," said Mark, "because she told you
about the trick. I've been punishing her for weeks about that. Miss
Davis, can't I go in and see her and beg her pardon?"
"Certainly," said Miss Davis; "she is sitting at the fire, and her eyes
are red with crying. Come in with me and we will try to make her happy
again."
"Why, Hetty, you do look miserable!" cried Mark, coming into the room
and looking ruefully at her pale cheeks and the black shadows round her
eyes. "And to think of you never telling after all I made you suffer!"
"I wanted to show you that I am not a tell-tale, Mark; but oh, I am so
glad you have come. I thought you were never going to be friends with me
again."
"I was away four days," said Mark; "and of course I thought you knew.
But Hetty, you are a jolly queer girl I can tell you, and I can't half
understand you. Think of anyone standing two hours to be pierced through
and through with cold, rather than drop a fellow's string and run away!"
Hetty looked at him wistfully, recognizing the truth that he never could
understand the sort of feeling that led her into making, as he
considered, such a fool of herself. Miss Davis gazed at her kindly and
pityingly, thinking of how many hard blows she would get in the future,
in return for acts like that which had so puzzled Mark. And she resolved
that another time she would be slow in blaming any eccentric conduct in
Hetty, and would wait till she could get at the motive which inspired
it.