IV

The road was a little muddy, but not much; and it was quite possible by

taking a little trouble in walking to keep your boots quite clean. Under

the trees in the avenue this was not so easy, for it was more sheltered,

and the wind could not get in to sweep through and through every

opening. There is a pond, or lake, in the grounds, as everybody knows,

which had been the delight of the neighbourhood for the skating in

winter, all the long time the Swinfords had been absent.

‘I wonder if they will still let us skate now they are at home,’ said

Emily, as they walked round the bank over the crisped and extremely

living water, which did not look under the breeze as if it had ever been

bound by chains of frost.

‘Winter is a long way off,’ said Mrs. Plowden, who was a little blown by

her walk. She desired her companions to pause a little and look at the

view. ‘I don’t want,’ she said, panting, ‘to go in out of breath. These

sort of people have quite advantage enough over one in their fine houses

without going in panting like a washer-woman.’ She added, ‘Winter’s a

long way off, and, as we never knew whether they gave permission at all,

or if it was only Howell at the gate, I wouldn’t say anything about it,

Emmy, if I were you.’

Mrs. Plowden’s loss of breath partly proceeded from the fact that she

had been talking all the way. She had no want of subjects: the past

history of Mrs. Swinford, whom they were going to visit, which she did

not know; but that made little difference; and the character of her son,

which nobody in Watcham knew; and the precautions to be taken in

arranging their intercourse with the family so as to get all that might

be advantageous out of that intercourse without in any way compromising

themselves in respect to that which might be unsatisfactory. ‘If there

should be any matrimonial entanglement,’ said Mrs. Plowden, ‘or that

sort of thing, of course it would be for the girl’s family to make

every inquiry. But I daresay as he’s half a Frenchman, and not at all

one of our sort, nothing of that kind will happen: and it is time enough

to take it into consideration when it does.’

‘Quite time enough,’ said Lady William, very decidedly, ‘especially as

nothing can be more unlikely.’

‘That is just what I say. Of course when young people are thrown

together one never knows what may happen: and it is to be hoped that Mr.

Swinford may see how much better it would be to settle down with a nice

English wife than to bring over a French mademoiselle, who never would

understand English ways. But it will be time enough, don’t you think so,

Emily? for I always acknowledge you know better than me when it is

anything French that is in question--with your languages, you know, and

all that.’

‘My languages won’t help me much with Leo Swinford, who is just as

English as I am--nor with his mother, who is cosmopolitan, and of no

country at all.’

‘That’s just one of your sayings, Emily, for how could a woman be of no

country at all? What I’m most concerned for is whether they will come to

church: and I can see it’s much on James’s mind, though he never says

anything; for a great house like that, almost the only great house in

the parish, sets such a dreadful example if they don’t go to church. One

hears of it all through the place. If the people at the Hall don’t go,

why should we? I tell them it’s quite different--that the people at the

Hall have many opportunities, and are deeply interested all the same,

and all that; whereas if poor people don’t pay attention to their

religious duties, what is to become of them? But often they don’t seem

to see it.’

‘I shouldn’t see it if I was in their place. I thought that in

Christianity there was no respect of persons.’

‘Oh! my dear Emily, you ought to know better than to bring up that

common argument against us, and your brother the Rector of the parish.

Of course there’s no respect of persons! But if Mrs. Swinford comes to

church she will be shown into the Hall pew, and old Mrs. Lloyd will just

find a place for herself, if she is early enough, in the free seats. How

could anybody do otherwise? We must be practical. Old Mary Lloyd would

be very uncomfortable if she were to sit down with you or me. She is

much more at home in the free seats. And with the poor people it is only

their individual selves that are in question, whereas the great lady

sets such an example: and there are all the servants and the servants’

families, and one doesn’t know how many----’

‘I think you may set your mind at ease, Jane. Mrs. Swinford will come to

church.’

‘You take a load off my mind, Emily; but it is many, many years since

you have seen her, and people change a great deal. I sometimes feel even

myself, you know, an inclination to stay in bed on Sunday mornings. It

is a thing to be crushed in the bud. If you give in to a headache once,

there is no telling where it may land you in the end.’

‘But, mamma dear,’ said the sympathetic Emmy, ‘your headaches are so

bad!’

‘Hum!’ said Mrs. Plowden doubtfully. ‘Yes, my headaches are bad

sometimes: but it is a thing that one should set one’s face against. It

ought to be crushed in the bud--on Sundays, I mean; it does not matter

so much on other days. And Mr. Swinford, Emily. I hear that you have

seen him already. Now, I wonder what made him go to see you----’

‘Why shouldn’t he?’ said Lady William, with a laugh.

‘Oh, well, you know! I should have thought a gentleman would have looked

up the Rector, or the Archdeacon, or the General, instead of a lady just

living in a small way by herself, like you.’

‘Mamma, you forget Aunt Emily’s rank,’ Emmy said in dismay.

‘Oh, I never forget her rank!’ cried Mrs. Plowden, with a little

irritation. ‘I hear enough of it, I am sure.’

‘The Rector and the Archdeacon and the General are all very important

persons. The only thing is that Leo Swinford did not know them, and he

knew me.’

‘I have always observed that people in that sort of position know

everybody,’ said Mrs. Plowden, ‘and, my dear Emily, I don’t want to seem

censorious, but do you think it is quite _nice_ to talk of a young man

like that by his Christian name? _I_ don’t even know his Christian name.

It may be Leonard or it may be Lionel, or it may be----’

‘Oh! Leopold, mamma!’

‘I don’t see what you have got to do with it, Emmy. If your aunt knows

him so well as that, _you_ don’t know him--and perhaps never will if he

is that kind of man!’

‘Don’t you think,’ said Lady William, with that perfect composure of

which she was mistress, ‘that we might stop for a moment again and look

at the view----’

‘Oh, if you feel the hill, Emily--it is a little steep--I don’t mind

sitting down for a moment, if you feel you want it. It is very pretty

here,’ said Mrs. Plowden, panting; ‘the water--through the trees--and

the lodge--in the distance--with the wisteria just beginning to shoot.’

The pause made here was a few minutes in duration, for Mrs. Plowden had

heated herself much by her argument and by clambering up the

ascent--which was, indeed, only a very gentle ascent. At last, however,

the party reached the door. As they came up sounds were audible inside,

which disclosed themselves, when the door was hastily opened, as

produced by a game of billiards, played by Mr. Leo Swinford, and--oh!

terrible sight--his butler: though for the first moment Mrs. Plowden’s

eager intelligence had not taken in this fact. She said, politely, that

she was afraid they had driven the gentleman away----

‘Oh!’ said Leo with a laugh, ‘it’s only Morris--let me fulfil his

functions and take you to my mother.’ He offered the Rector’s wife his

arm, but she drew modestly back.

‘My sister-in-law, Mr. Swinford. Oh, I hope I know what is

_comme-il-faut_. I could not go before Lady William.’ Mrs. Plowden had a

flash of exultation in thinking of that word--_comme-il-faut_. It was

something like an inspiration that brought it to her lips in the very

nick of time.

The drawing-room at the Hall was a large room in three divisions,

divided with pillars of sham marble with gilded capitals. It was too

bright, notwithstanding the heaviness of the decorations. Large windows

almost from the roof to the floor poured in floods of afternoon light,

and shone pitiless upon the lady who rose languidly to meet her

visitors, keeping her back to the light. She was a tall woman,

exceedingly worn and thin, but with a great deal of grace in her

movements, though she was old. Her age was the first thing which the

eager rural visitors noted, for it was a sort of age which had never

come under their observation before. She was dressed picturesquely in

dark velvet with such folds and cunning lines as they had never dreamed

of, and which plunged them into anxious questioning whether that might

be the latest fashion. If so, it was unlike anything that Miss Singer

had in her books and papers, or even Madame Mantz, who was Miss Singer’s

great example in town; and her hair, which had not a white thread in it,

was uncovered. No cap on her head! and approaching seventy, Mrs. Plowden

thought, making a rapid calculation upon the facts she knew. Mrs.

Swinford stepped forward a little with a faint cry of ‘Emily’ when Lady

William appeared, and took her, with every appearance of cordiality,

into her arms, and they kissed, or at least Mrs. Swinford touched Lady

William’s cheeks one after the other, while the Plowdens made a

respectful circle round and looked on. ‘This is indeed kind,’ Mrs.

Swinford said. The ladies were so bent upon the aspect of the mistress

of the Hall that they did not observe how pale Lady William was, or how

little part she took in the embrace. ‘And though, of course, she could

not take us into her arms,’ Mrs. Plowden said after, ‘never having set

eyes on us before, she was quite as cordial, and hoped she would see a

great deal of us, and that it was so nice to feel that one was coming

among people who felt like old friends.’ ‘I have heard so much of you

through Emily,’ was what Mrs. Swinford really did say; to which Emily

was so disagreeable as to make no reply. And then they all sat down, and

Mrs. Plowden began to make conversation, as in duty bound.

‘We are so glad to see you in your own house, Mrs. Swinford. The Rector

has always said it was so cold like to feel that there was no one in the

Hall. A squire’s house makes such a difference. The poor people think so

much of it, and the middle people are always looking out for an example;

and of course the higher class, it is yourself--so you being here is, if

I may say so, of the greatest consequence to everybody, and I do hope it

will be agreeable to you.’

‘You are very good,’ said Mrs. Swinford, with a motion of her head. ‘It

never occurred to me that it could be of any importance except to

ourselves.’

‘Oh, I assure you it is of the greatest consequence. What we want in

England is the higher classes to set a good example, to keep back those

horrid democratic ways, and show us how we ought to behave. We are very

loyal to a good example in England, Mrs. Swinford. You have been so long

away, perhaps you may not remember how in a well-ordered parish the

people are taught to look up to those who are above them----’

‘But suppose we do not set a good example?’ said the lady, with a

languid smile. She was looking at Lady William, who sat by, saying

little, and who was in the full flood of the light, which she was quite

able to bear. The elder woman, who was not, bestowed an interested

attention upon the friend whom she had greeted so warmly--not even a

look or movement, nor even a fold of the very plain black dress, which

showed how little means of adornment the other possessed, yet how little

it mattered to her whether she was adorned or not, escaped her. Mrs.

Swinford was very deeply learned in all these arts, in all that tended

to preserve beauty and enhance it. She had been a beauty herself in her

day, and was very reluctant to part with it. She looked at her old

friend with an eager, yet veiled attention, observing all that was in

her favour, and the few things against her. Poorly dressed, but looking

none the worse, the black being in its way a kind of veil even of its

own imperfections: the charm of the face enhanced by sorrow and trouble

and many experiences, the outlines uninjured, the cheek almost as purely

oval as in youth, the eyes as sweet, the hair--it had a touch of gray,

perhaps, but that is no harm to such a woman, a woman not standing upon

her appearance, perhaps not thinking much of it--at least, giving

herself the air of not thinking of it at all. Mrs. Swinford did not

believe that any woman was ever indifferent to her appearance, or not

thinking of it. It did not matter much to herself at the present moment,

when there was no one she cared to affect or charm, no one worth the

lifting of a finger; and yet she was not indifferent to her own aspect,

and why should Lady William be? Lady William? A strange smile crossed

the elder lady’s face as she remembered what was now Emily Plowden’s

name. She said to her in the middle of Mrs. Plowden’s speech, to which

she paid no attention, with a way that women of the world have, ‘How

strange it is to think of you, Emily, by that name!’

The entire company pricked up its ears. Mrs. Plowden stopped short, much

discomfited, in her explanation of what was the Rector’s opinion, in

which Mrs. Swinford had interrupted her with such absolute indifference

as to what she was saying. And Emmy raised her long neck, remembering

always keenly that it was she who was now Emily Plowden; and even young

Mr. Swinford, who had been talking to Lady William, raised his head with

sudden attention, glancing from her to his mother. Lady William herself

coloured suddenly, and with an unusual air asked, ‘What name?’

‘What but your married name, my dear?’ Mrs. Swinford said, and laughed

low, but very distinctly, with her eyes fixed upon her guest.

‘Ah, yes,’ said Lady William, returning the look, ‘you are more used to

my husband’s name than mine.’

Nobody had the least idea what this passage of arms meant--not even Mr.

Swinford, who kept looking from his mother to Lady William with a

questioning look. As for the other ladies, they stared severely, and did

not attempt to understand. Mrs. Swinford was a little rude, and so was

Lady William. They did not show the fine manners which ought to belong

to fine ladies. On the whole, Mrs. Plowden thought it might have been

better for her to make her first call alone. Mrs. Swinford had talked to

her quite sweetly, she said afterwards, but Emily and she did not seem

to be on such good terms. It is always a mistake, Mrs. Plowden thought,

to depend upon any one else in the way of introduction. The Rector’s

wife in her own parish is the equal of any one. And as for French, in

which Emily was believed to be so superior, French was no more wanted,

she reported to the Rector, ‘than between you and me.’

‘I daresay,’ she said, when this little sensation was over, ‘that you

find our poor Emily much changed. Such a difference for her to come from

the society in which she was, and everybody so superior, to our little

village again: but, of course, all these things are little to the loss

of a dear husband, which is the greatest a woman can have to bear----’

‘You speak most eloquently, Mrs. Plowden,’ said Mrs. Swinford, ‘the very

greatest a woman can be called upon to bear.’

‘It is very kind of you,’ said Lady William, ‘to feel so much for me.’

‘Yes, yes, the very greatest: and she has taken it so well. But

naturally it makes a great difference. My daughter Emmy is considered by

everybody to be extremely like her aunt,’ said Mrs. Plowden, directing

with a look the attention of the party to Emmy, who bridled and drew up

her long neck with that little forward movement which was like a peck,

but did not at all mean anything of the kind.

Mrs. Swinford gave poor Emmy a look--one of those full, undisguised

looks which again women of the world alone permit themselves; but she

made no remark--which was very eloquent, more so than many remarks. She

said, after a time, with the air of a person who has been puzzling her

brains to keep up a conversation:

‘You have other daughters?’ adding to her question a smile of great

sweetness, as if there was nothing in the world she was more interested

in.

‘One,’ said Mrs. Plowden, much gratified, ‘Florence, named after another

aunt, and more like my side of the house. And I have a son, who we hoped

would have gone into the Church; but he is like so many young men of the

present day, he has religious difficulties. And the Rector thinks it is

not right to force his inclinations, especially into a sacred

profession. I have great confidence in my husband’s judgment, but I

don’t quite agree with him on this point; for I think if you only use a

little pressure upon them when they are young, they are often most truly

grateful to you afterwards, when they begin to understand the claims of

life. I wonder,’ said Mrs. Plowden, with a glance at Leo, who was once

more leaning over Lady William’s chair, ‘whether you agree with me? I

should like to have the support of your opinion, for you must have

experience in dealing with the young.’

Mrs. Swinford had delicately intimated her entire indifference to the

homily of the clergyman’s wife for some time past, but she was recalled

by this appeal, which amused her.

‘Yes,’ she said, ‘I have a son; but I do not think I have attempted to

force his inclinations,’ she added, after a pause.

‘Ah, then you would agree with James! I am sorry, for it would have been

a great support to me; but we must all judge for ourselves in these

matters--and in such a question as entering a sacred profession----’

‘Leo,’ said Mrs. Swinford, ‘we are forgetting: our habits are not yet

quite English. Offer Lady William some tea.’

‘Oh,’ said Mrs. Plowden, with a start, ‘let me pour it out! Or Emily

will do so, I am sure, with pleasure, if you will permit. It is so

awkward for a gentleman----’

‘Pray do not trouble yourself. Leo can manage it very well, or he can

ring for some one if he wants help. And you, Emily, have a daughter,

too?’

‘Yes, I have a daughter.’

‘Quite young? She can scarcely be grown up. I do not remember many

dates, but there are two or three---- Eighteen perhaps, or a little

less, or more?’

‘She will not be eighteen for some months.’

‘And pretty? Like you? Do you see anything of the family? Do they take

any notice of the child?’

‘To tell the truth,’ said Lady William, ‘my child and I have been very

happy in our cottage, and we have not thought much of any family--save

our own very small family of two.’

She had flushed with suppressed anger, but with an evident desire to

keep her feelings concealed, answered the questions very deliberately

and in a tone of studied calm.

‘Ah, I recognise you in that! always proud: but not prudent. One must

not despise a family, especially when it has a fine title. You ought to

consider, my dear Emily, how important it may be for the child; your

excellent sister-in-law,’ said Mrs. Swinford, turning with her wonted

smile to Mrs. Plowden, ‘thoroughly recognises that.’

Mrs. Plowden, thus unexpectedly referred to, was taken in an undignified

moment, when she had just begun to sip her first mouthful of very hot

tea. She had felt that a second interruption in the very midst of what

she had been saying was too much to be forgiven; but on being appealed

to in this marked manner she changed her mind, and perceived that it was

only Mrs. Swinford’s way. She swallowed the hot tea hastily, to her

great discomfort, in her haste to respond.

‘Indeed I do,’ she said fervently, coughing a little. ‘Indeed I do---- I

tell Emily often I would put my pride in my pocket, and insist on having

Mab invited to make acquaintance with her father’s family. And she’s

such a Pakenham, more like the Marquis than any daughter he has.’

‘Oh, she’s such a Pakenham!’ said Mrs. Swinford, with a faint laugh.

‘I think, Jane,’ said Lady William, ‘that you are forgetting we walked

here, and that it is time we were going back.’

‘Oh, please, let these dear ladies finish their tea. Leo, Miss Plowden

will take some cake. I am more interested than I can tell to hear that

your child does not take after you, but is like the Pakenhams.’ The

laugh was very soft, quite low, most ladylike, and, indeed, what is

called poetically, silver in tone. ‘What an ill-advised little mortal!’

she said.

V

‘Well,’ said Florence to Mab, ‘we two are left alone. We’re the young

ones, we have to keep out of the way. But I am sure the Swinfords would

rather have seen you and me than Emmy. We are the youngest and we are

the most amusing.’

‘Oh, please speak for yourself,’ said Mab, ‘I am not amusing at all.’

Florence looked at her with an air of consideration. ‘Well, perhaps that

is true,’ she said; ‘you have a turn-up nose, and you ought to be

lively, but appearances are very deceiving. I wonder what that army of

observation will do to-day? I call them our army of observation because

they have gone to spy out the land, and decide upon what are the proper

lines of strategy. It’s quite new to us in Watcham to have a squire’s

family: and then it is not even a common squire’s family. They are such

superior people, and their ways are so unlike ours. Shouldn’t you say it

would be a nice thing in Watcham to have people whose ways are not as

our ways?’

‘Oh, I don’t know,’ said Mab, with the indifference of extreme youth,

‘we are well enough as we are.’

‘It is easy for you to speak, with only Aunt Emily to think of, and your

own way--and seventeen,’ said Florry, with a sigh. ‘I would give

something to be seventeen again.’

‘Why?’ said Mab. ‘It is the most ridiculous age--too old to be a child,

too young to be anything else. One cares no more for dolls and that sort

of thing, and one doesn’t care either for what the old people talk

about. How they go on and on and talk! as if anybody minded.’

‘You shouldn’t listen,’ said Florry.

‘Sometimes one can’t help it. Sometimes there’s a bit of story in it,

and then it’s nice--only in that case they say, ‘You remember so-and-so:

what a tragedy that was!’ and then the other wags his or her head, and

they shut up, not reflecting that you’re dying to know.’

‘There’s something of that sort about Mrs. Swinford,’ said Florence;

‘there was quite a talk about calling before mamma made up her mind.

Mrs. FitzStephen came in about a week or two ago, and she said, “I have

come to know what you’re going to do?” And mamma said, without even

asking what she meant, “I am very much perplexed, and I don’t know in

the least.” And then papa, standing in front of the fire, with his

coat-tails on his arms, you know, grumbles out--“You had better let it

alone.” “Let what alone?” mamma called out quickly, and he just stared

and said nothing. At this mamma said, “They are sure to entertain a

great deal; they are people that can’t live without company.” And Mrs.

FitzStephen, she said, “Oh, I don’t care for such company.” And then

mamma replied, with her grand Roman matron air, “You have no young

people to think of, Mrs. FitzStephen.”’

Florence was a tolerable mimic, and she ‘did’ those characters, with

whom Mab was intimately acquainted, in an exceedingly broad style, and

with considerable effect.

‘Florry, you oughtn’t to take off your own father and mother.’

‘Who then?’ cried Florry. ‘I must take such as I have; I don’t know such

lots of people. Wait till the Swinfords come on the scene and I’ll do

them.’

‘Ah, he’s not so easy to do. The others you’ve known all your life, and

they are all the same kind of people: but you never saw any one

like--_that_ gentleman. The General would give you no clue to him, nor

anybody you know here. He is like nobody you ever saw; he is--I don’t

know what to say.’

‘You are always thinking of that fur coat of his and patent leather

shoes. I wonder if they will see him to-day? They had much better have

taken you and me, Mab. Emmy may be the eldest, but she will never make

any impression. A man like that will never look twice at her.’

‘Why should he?’ said Mab, raising her eyebrows, ‘or what does it matter

whether he does or not?’

‘Oh, Mab, you silly little thing,’ said Florence, ‘you must know,

however silly you may be, that it matters a great deal. Think only what

it would matter! To have a girl settled like that--rich, able to do what

she pleased, one’s sister; only think; or still more if it was one’s

self. We’ve got twenty pounds a year each for our clothes, fancy! And

Mrs. Swinford will have hundreds--she will have just as much as she

likes, and whatever she likes, and a grand house where she could ask

the Queen herself: and power--power to get Jim settled somehow, to make

him sure of his living: perhaps to get something better for papa, and

save mamma some of the anxiety she has. And if anything happened to

_them_, why, there would be a home for--for--the other one, don’t you

see? Oh!’ said Florence, with a deep-drawn breath that seemed to come

from the very depth of her being, ‘it would matter so much that it is

wicked, it is dreadful, to think that a man could make such a change in

another creature’s life only by looking at her and throwing his

handkerchief. It’s immoral to dangle a chance like that under a poor

girl’s very nose.’

Mab was not unimpressed with this terrible truth. She felt also that to

contemplate the differences that might ensue if one of the daughters of

the Rectory became Mrs. Swinford of the Hall was more than words could

say. The very possibility caught at her breath. She made a momentary

pause of awe, and then she said, ‘But he never will, he never will!’

‘Emmy, no,’ said Florence; ‘no--she’s too--she’s not enough--oh! she’s

impossible, and I can see that very well for myself. Emmy is--she’s

one’s sister, and she is as nice as ever was. You know she is a nice

girl! But she was never made for that; whereas if they had taken you and

me----’

‘Don’t say me, please,’ said Mab, reddening all over that blunt-featured

and irregular little face, which was unfortunately so like the

Pakenhams. The flush was quite hot, and discomposed her. ‘I’m

impossible, too--much more impossible,’ she said.

‘Oh! you stand upon your family,’ said Florence, ‘and upon your mother’s

position, and all that; but you may take my word for it, that if you

were the Marquis’s own daughter instead of a disrep---- I mean instead

of his brother’s, you would have to do the very same thing. If it is

because you’re not pretty, that’s true enough; but there’s never any

telling what may take a man like that, and you’ve got plenty of “go” in

you, Mab, though I don’t want to flatter you: and even in looks a year

or two may make a great difference----’

‘Will you stop! will you stop, please!’ said Mab; ‘Florry, stop! You

make me ashamed. You make me feel as if----’

‘You were going in for it, too?’ said Florence calmly. ‘It makes me

crazy, too, sometimes to think that---- But so long as girls are poor,

and a man, just because they please him, can change everything for

them--how can we help it? Even if you were to work, as people say, what

difference would it make? I could perhaps make my living--and Emmy----

But dear, dear, to think of the Hall beside any little breadwinning of

ours----’

‘Don’t talk so, _please_,’ cried Mab, with a shiver. She was not a

visionary at all, nor had she any sentiment to speak of. But she was

very young, still something between a girl and a boy, and ashamed to

hear those revelations which she only half understood; or, rather, did

not understand at all.

‘Well, one needn’t talk,’ said Florry, with a slight emphasis on the

word. ‘But though you mayn’t talk of it, you can’t stop a thing from

being true.’

‘Let’s go out for a walk,’ said Mab, ‘a long walk, down by the Baron’s

Wood and up by Durham Hill; or let’s go out on the river for a pull. Let

us do something--one can’t stay quiet all this bright afternoon.’

‘I want so much to see them when they come back,’ said Florry. ‘I want

to know what they think of him--if they saw him: and whether Emmy made

any impression, and what happened.’

‘What could happen? Do you expect her to come home engaged to him?’ said

Mab. ‘However well things may go, they could not go so quickly as that.’

‘I am not a fool,’ said Florry, with indignation. She stood at the

little gate looking out wistfully along the road by which the ladies had

gone. The great trees hung over the wall which bounded there the nearest

corner of the demesne of the Swinfords; the lodge and gate were just

round the corner out of sight. It was too soon to expect them to come

back. ‘Unless Mrs. Swinford had been out,’ said Florry. ‘She might be

out, you know, and then they’d be back directly.’

‘She never goes out,’ said Mab; ‘it’s too cold for her here.’

‘Or she might not receive them very well, and then they would only stay

a few minutes. You are so indifferent, you don’t care a bit what has

happened: and I am on pins and needles till I know.’

‘Then I shall go for a walk by myself.’

‘Don’t do that,’ said Florry, putting out her hand to stay her cousin.

She stood thus for a moment with her head turned towards the Hall, but

her hand clutching Mab, gazing in one direction while her person

inclined towards the other. She drew a long breath, and turned at last

from her fixed gaze. ‘They must,’ she said, sighing again, ‘have stayed

to tea. Yes, I’ll go on the river if you like; but let us go round home

on the way and fetch Jim.’

‘Jim!’ said Mab. ‘He’ll want to scull, and I prefer to scull myself.’

‘Oh, he doesn’t mind. He is as lazy as---- He’ll steer and let us pull

as long as ever you please. I don’t know anybody so lazy as Jim.’

‘We should be better by ourselves,’ said Mab; ‘not that heavy weight in

the stern of the boat. When we go by ourselves it’s no weight at all.’

‘He’ll steer,’ said Florry; ‘it’s better to have some one to steer. And

don’t you see it will keep him out of mischief for one afternoon.’

‘You have always another reason behind,’ said Mab. ‘It never is just the

thing you think of, but something at the back of it.’

‘Well,’ said Florry soothingly, ‘it’s always so, don’t you know, where

there’s a family. You are so lonely, you have no brothers and sisters.

If you do well, then everything is all right. But our being right

depends upon so many things: First, if papa is in good humour, and if

Jim is going straight. Emmy and I have little questions between

ourselves, of course, but these are the chief ones. Now, you have only

Aunt Emily to think of, and she neither gets into rages nor goes wrong.’

‘I should hope not,’ said Mab, indignantly.

‘It is all very well for you to throw up your head like that; but we

cannot do it. We must manage the best we can. Mab, I do often wish there

could be a change.’

This was said when she had at last torn herself away from the road to

the Hall, and the two girls were walking towards the Rectory and the

river.

‘What sort of change?’

‘Oh! anything. That Jim should go away, or that he should do something

dreadful that couldn’t be forgiven--or that Emmy should marry. I would

even marry myself--any one! to make a change in the family and get

away.’

‘I should think, however bad things may be, that they would be worse if

you were all separated and not knowing what happened to each other. And

what is there so very bad? You are all happy enough for anything one can

see.’

‘That is the worst of it,’ said Florry, ‘we are all pretending about

everything. It’s just one big lie all round--and it isn’t right to tell

lies, or at least the Bible says so. There is papa breaks every one of

the commandments, you know.’

‘Florry, don’t tell stories of Uncle James; I am very fond of him, and I

won’t have it.’

‘It’s true all the same. I don’t say it’s his fault, it’s Jim’s fault.

Papa swears--he does, he can’t help it, at Jim, and then pretends it’s

something else--the gardener, or the overseer, or the poor people, or

even poor Dash--that makes him so angry. Isn’t that lying? Then mamma

pretends Jim has doubts and won’t go in for the Church because of them,

when she knows very well what it is really he has been sent down for.

And Jim pretends that he is going back to Cambridge next term, and that

he is quite friendly with all the dons, and came down to read--I’ve

heard him say that.’

‘It may not be true,’ said Mab, doubtfully, ‘but I shouldn’t call that

lying--why should we all go and tell that poor Jim has not been good?

What have the other people to do with it? Mother says we’re not called

upon to give them any information--and she just says the same as you do:

but that is not to lie.’

‘We are all pretending, every one,’ said Florry. ‘Emmy and I are by way

of knowing nothing at all. I believe Jim thinks we don’t know anything.

So we have to pretend not only to other people, but to him in our very

own house, and papa too. I have heard papa say, “Thank Heaven, the girls

at least know nothing,” and mamma, the dreadful, dreadful liar that she

is, thanks Heaven too, though she knows very well that we knew as soon

as she did, and that she couldn’t keep anything from us two. If you

think of that, Mab, and just imagine how we go on pretending to each

other, and to everybody.

‘Now, if Jim were to go off to a ranche, as people advise, we should all

be very wretched, and probably it would be his ruin, but it would be a

little relief all the same. Or if Emmy were to get hold of this man--oh,

it may be odious, and you may cry out, but it would be a great relief.

There would be her wedding to think about, and her things, and

altogether it would be a change for everybody; and then she could do

something for Jim.’

‘Her husband could, you mean?’

‘It is the same thing: he would, for his own sake, not to have an idle

brother always about. It is killing all of us. One could bear it,

perhaps; but four all bearing it--all pretending something different, as

I tell you; Emmy and I not to know; mamma and papa that it’s another

thing altogether that vexes them. Oh! we get exasperated sometimes to

that degree, we could tear each other to pieces just to make a change.’

‘You are so exaggerated, Florry; mother always says so. You make a

mountain out of a molehill.’

‘I just wish Aunt Emily had our molehill for a little while--just for a

little while--to see how she liked it. What a lucky woman she is to have

only a girl! Nothing very bad can ever happen to you, Mab, or come to

her through you. You may be dull, perhaps, just two women, one opposite

to the other----’

‘Dull! mother and I? Never. We don’t know what it is to be dull!’

‘Ah, that’s very well just now,’ said Florence, ‘you’re only seventeen;

but wait a bit till you are older, especially if you don’t marry, and

year goes on after year, and nothing ever happens. See whether you are

not dull then. I don’t know which is worst,’ she added thoughtfully, ‘to

have men in the family that make you miserable, or to have no men at all

about to make any variety, but just women together, who never do any

harm, but kill you with dulness. I really don’t know which is the

worst.’

Mab was a little overwhelmed by this point of view. She was at the same

time still indignant and resentful of the unexpected accusation. ‘When

we begin to be dull,’ she said, ‘I’ll let you know--but I don’t see any

reason for being so miserable. Poor Jim has never done anything so very

bad. Sometimes he is silly----’

‘There you are quite wrong,’ said Florence, with great decision--‘he is

not silly: I wish he were, then one might think he didn’t know any

better; but even papa allows he is very clever. It is not from want of

brains or sense either, if he would only be as good as he knows how----

’

‘Oh, if that is your opinion! Mother thinks he is only weak, and does

what people ask him.’

‘Aunt Emily is just as far out of it as you are. Does he ever do

anything that _we_ ask him? There is papa at him for ever--is he any the

better for it? Weak! that is what people say, thinking it’s a kind of an

excuse. I call it strong--to resist everything you ought to attend to,

and take up everything you ought not. How can that be weak?’

‘I am sure I don’t know,’ said Mab; ‘I don’t understand about boys. Jim

is the only one I ever knew intimately. But mother thinks if some one

were to get hold of him in the right sort of way----’

‘What is the right sort of way? I suppose Aunt Emily thinks papa doesn’t

know--nor any of us who have it to do; that is just the way with people.

You are always thinking of a thing, thinking, and puzzling, and

troubling: and then somebody comes in who has never spent ten minutes on

it altogether, and says you are not taking the right way! Perhaps we

are not; but who are they to pretend to know better? and since they are

so wise, why don’t they tell us which is the right way?’

‘I am sure,’ cried Mab, ‘I never meant to make you angry, and mother is

not one to interfere. She only said it to me. But since you’re so full

of this, Florry, I think I had better go, and not trouble you any more,

for I only wanted some fun, and you are thinking of nothing but trouble.

I’ll run down to the water, and jump into a boat and have a little spin

by myself.’

‘Oh, Mab, don’t,’ cried Florence, clutching her once more. ‘Here we are

at our gate, just come in and ask him. He will come far more readily for

you than for me.’

But it was with an ill grace that Mab followed her cousin through the

Rectory kitchen garden, between the borders which veiled the lines of

potatoes and cabbages. It might be flattering to suppose her capable of

it, but she had not any desire to fill the place of missionary and

guiding influence to her cousin Jim.