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diff --git a/26310-8.txt b/26310-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0828f6c --- /dev/null +++ b/26310-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,5246 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of My New Home, by Mary Louisa Molesworth + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: My New Home + +Author: Mary Louisa Molesworth + +Illustrator: L. Leslie Brooke + +Release Date: August 14, 2008 [EBook #26310] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY NEW HOME *** + + + + +Produced by Chris Curnow, Annie McGuire, Lindy Walsh and +the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + + + + + + + + + +------------------------------------------+ + | Transcriber's Note | + |Spelling, punctuation and inconsistencies | + |in the original book have been retained. | + +------------------------------------------+ + + + + +[Illustration: Book Cover] + + + + + MY NEW HOME + +[Illustration: 'I'd like to know your sisters that are as little as me's +names.'--p. 39.] _Front._ + + + + +[Illustration: Title Page] + + + MY NEW HOME + + by Mrs Molesworth + + Illustrated by + L Leslie Brooke + + Macmillan and Co + London: 1894 + + + + +CONTENTS + + CHAPTER I PAGE + + WINDY GAP 1 + + CHAPTER II + + AT THE FOOT OF THE LADDER 15 + + CHAPTER III + + ONE AND SEVEN 28 + + CHAPTER IV + + NEW FRIENDS AND A PLAN 43 + + CHAPTER V + + A HAPPY DAY 58 + + CHAPTER VI + + 'WAVING VIEW' 71 + + CHAPTER VII + + THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLES 83 + + CHAPTER VIII + + TWO LETTERS 96 + + CHAPTER IX + + A GREAT CHANGE 111 + + CHAPTER X + + NO. 29 CHICHESTER SQUARE 125 + + CHAPTER XI + + AN ARRIVAL 139 + + CHAPTER XII + + A CATASTROPHE 153 + + CHAPTER XIII + + HARRY 168 + + CHAPTER XIV + + KEZIA'S COUNSEL 183 + + CHAPTER XV + + 'HAPPY EVER SINCE' 195 + + + + +ILLUSTRATIONS + + + 'I'd like to know your sisters that are as little as me's + names.' _Frontispiece_ + + Grandmamma's chair was still waiting to be decorated, + so the next hour was spent very happily. 67 + + 'I do wonder why they are so late'. 82 + + A nice-looking oldish man came forward and bowed + respectfully to grandmamma. 126 + + It was the portrait of a young girl. 139 + + Up rushed two or three ... men, Cousin Cosmo the + first. 160 + + It was all uphill too. 173 + + + + +CHAPTER I + +WINDY GAP + + +My name is Helena, and I am fourteen past. I have two other Christian +names; one of them is rather queer. It is 'Naomi.' I don't mind having +it, as I am never called by it, but I don't sign it often because it is +such an odd name. My third name is not uncommon. It is just 'Charlotte.' +So my whole name is 'Helena Charlotte Naomi Wingfield.' + +I have never been called by any short name, like 'Lena,' or 'Nellie.' I +think the reason must be that I am an only child. I have never had any +big brother to shout out 'Nell' all over the house, or dear baby sisters +who couldn't say 'Helena' properly. And what seems still sadder than +having no brothers or sisters, I have never had a mother that I could +remember. For mamma died when I was not much more than a year old, and +papa six months before that. + +But my history has not been as sad as you might think from this. I was +very happy indeed when I was quite a little child. Till I was nine years +old I really did not know what troubles were, for I lived with +grandmamma, and she made up to me for everything I had not got: we loved +each other so very dearly. + +I will tell you about our life. + +Grandmamma was not at all the sort of person most children think of when +they hear of a grandmother in a story. She was not old, with white hair +and spectacles and always a shawl on, even in the house, and very +old-fashioned in her ways. She did wear caps, at least I _think_ she +always did, for, of course, she was not _young_. But her hair was very +nicely done under them, and they were pretty fluffy things. She made +them herself, and she made a great many other things herself--for me +too. For, you will perhaps wonder more than ever at my saying what a +happy child I was, when I tell you that we were really _very_ poor. + +I cannot tell you exactly how much or how little we had to live upon, +and _most_ children would not understand any the better if I did. For a +hundred pounds a year even, sounds a great deal to a child, and yet it +is very little indeed for one lady by herself to live upon, and of +course still less for two people. And I don't think we had much more +than that. Grandmamma told me when I grew old enough to understand +better, that when I first came to live with her, after both papa and +mamma were dead, and she found that there was no money for me--that was +not poor papa's fault; he had done all that could be done, but the money +was lost by other people's wrong-doing--well, as I was saying, when +grandmamma found how it was, she thought over about doing something to +make more. She was very clever in many ways; she could speak several +languages, and she knew a lot about music, though she had given up +playing, and she might have begun a school as far as her cleverness +went. But she had no savings to furnish a large enough house with, and +she did not know of any pupils. She could not bear the thought of +parting with me, otherwise she might perhaps have gone to be some grand +sort of housekeeper, which even quite, _quite_ ladies are sometimes, or +she might have joined somebody in having a shop. But after a lot of +thinking, she settled she would rather try to live on what she had, in +some quiet, healthy, country place, though I believe she did earn some +money by doing beautiful embroidery work, for I remember seeing her make +lovely things which were never used in our house. This could not have +gone on for long, however, as granny's eyes grew weak, and then I think +she did no sewing except making our own clothes. + +Now I must tell you about our home. It was quite a strange place to +grandmamma when we first came there, but _I_ can never feel as if it had +been so. For it was the first place I can remember, as I was only a year +old, or a little more--and children very seldom remember anything before +they are three--when we settled down at Windy Gap. + +That was the name of our cottage. It is a nice breezy name, isn't it? +though it does sound rather cold. And in some ways it _was_ cold, at +least it was windy, and quite suited its name, though at some seasons of +the year it was very calm and sheltered. Sheltered on two sides it +always was, for it stood in a sort of nest a little way up the +Middlemoor Hills, with high ground on the north and on the east, so that +the only winds really to be feared could never do us much harm. It was +more a nest than a 'gap,' for inside, it was so cosy, so very cosy, +even in winter. The walls were nice and thick, built of rather +gloomy-looking, rough gray stone, and the windows were deep--deep enough +to have window-seats in them, where granny and I used often to sit with +our books or work, as the inner part of the rooms, owing to the shape of +the windows, was rather dark, and the rooms of course were small. + +We had a little drawing-room, which we always sat in, and a still +smaller dining-room, which was very nice, though in reality it was more +a kitchen than a dining-room. It had a neat kitchen range and an oven, +and some things had to be cooked there, though there was another little +kitchen across the passage where our servant Kezia did all the messy +work--peeling potatoes, and washing up, and all those sorts of things, +you know. The dining-room-kitchen was used as little as possible for +cooking, and grandmamma was so very, very neat and particular that it +was almost as pretty and cosy as the drawing-room. + +Upstairs there were three bedrooms--a good-sized one for grandmamma, a +smaller one beside it for me, and a still smaller one with a rather +sloping roof for Kezia. The house is very easy to understand, you see, +for it was just three and three, three upstairs rooms over three +downstairs ones. But there was rather a nice little entrance hall, or +closed-in porch, and the passages were pretty wide. So it did not seem +at all a poky or stuffy house though it was so small. Indeed, one could +scarcely fancy a 'Windy Gap Cottage' anything but fresh and airy, could +one? + +I was never tired of hearing the story of the day that grandmamma first +came to Middlemead to look for a house. She told it me so often that I +seem to know all about it just as if I had been with her, instead of +being a stupid, helpless little baby left behind with my nurse--Kezia +was my nurse then--while poor granny had to go travelling all about, +house-hunting by herself! + +What made her first think of Middlemead she has never been able to +remember. She did not know any one there, and she had never been there +in her life. She fancies it was that she had read in some book or +advertisement perhaps, that it was so very healthy, and dear +grandmamma's one idea was to make me as strong as she could; for I was +rather a delicate child. But for me, indeed, I don't think she would +have cared where she lived, or to live at all, except that she was so +very good. + +'As long as any one is left alive,' she has often said to me, 'it shows +that there is something for them to be or to do in the world, and they +must try to find out what it is.' + +But there was not much difficulty for grandmamma to find out what _her_ +principal use in the world was to be! It was all ready indeed--it was +poor, little, puny, delicate, helpless _me_! + +So very likely it was as she thought--just the hearing how splendidly +healthy the place was--that made her travel down to Middlemead in those +early spring days, that first sad year after mamma's death, to look for +a nest for her little fledgling. She arrived there in pretty good +spirits; she had written to a house-agent and had got the names of two +or three 'to let' houses, which she at once tramped off from the station +to look at, for she was very anxious not to spend a penny more than she +could help. But, oh dear, how her spirits went down! The houses were +dreadful; one was a miserable sort of genteel cottage in a row of others +all exactly the same, with lots of messy-looking children playing about +in the untidy strips of garden in front. _That_ would certainly not do, +for even if the house itself had been the least nice, grandmamma felt +sure I would catch measles and scarlet-fever and hooping-cough every +two or three days! The next one was a still more genteel 'semi-detached' +villa, but it was very badly built, the walls were like paper, and it +faced north and east, and had been standing empty, no doubt, for these +reasons, for years. _It_ would not do. Then poor granny plodded back to +the house agent's again. He isn't only a house agent, he has a +stationer's and bookseller's shop, and his name is Timbs. I know him +quite well. He is rather a nice man, and though she was a stranger of +course, he seemed sorry for grandmamma's disappointment. + +'There are several very good little houses that I am sure you would +like,' he said to her, 'and one or two of them are very small--but it is +the rent. For though Middlemead is scarcely more than a village it is +much in repute for its healthiness, and the rents are rising.' + +'What are the rents of the smallest of the houses you speak of?' +grandmamma asked. + +'Forty pounds is the cheapest,' Mr. Timbs answered, 'and the situation +of that is not so good. Rather low and chilly in winter, and somewhat +lonely.' + +'I don't mind about the loneliness,' said grandmamma, 'but a low or +damp situation would never do.' + +Mr. Timbs was looking over his lists as she spoke. Her words seemed to +strike him, and he suddenly peered up through his spectacles. + +'You don't mind about loneliness,' he repeated. 'Then I wonder----' and +he turned over the leaves of his book quickly. 'There _is_ another house +to let,' he said; 'to tell the truth I had forgotten about it, for it +has never been to let unfurnished before; and it would be considered too +lonely for all the year round by most people.' + +'Are there no houses near?' asked grandmamma. 'I don't fancy Middlemead +is the sort of place where one need fear burglars, and besides,' she +went on with a little smile, 'we should not have much of value to steal. +The silver plate that I have I shall leave for the most part in London. +But in case of sudden illness or any alarm of that kind, I should not +like to be out of reach of everybody.' + +'There are two or three small cottages close to the little house I am +thinking of,' said Mr. Timbs, 'and the people in them are very +respectable. I leave the key with one of them.' + +Then he went on to tell grandmamma exactly where it was, how to get +there, and all about it, and with every word, dear granny said her +heart grew lighter and lighter. She really began to hope she had found +a nest for her poor little homeless bird--that was _me_, you +understand--especially when Mr. Timbs finished up by saying that the +rent was only twelve pounds a year, one pound a month. And she _had_ +made up her mind to give as much as twenty pounds if she could find +nothing nice and healthy for less. + +She looked at her watch; yes, there was still time to go to see Windy +Gap Cottage and yet get back to the station in time for the train she +had fixed to go back by--that is to say, if she took a fly. She has +often told me how she stood and considered about that fly. Was it worth +while to go to the expense? Yes, she decided it was, for after all if +she found nothing to suit us at Middlemead she would have to set off on +her travels again to house-hunt somewhere else. It would be penny wise +and pound foolish to save that fly. + +Mr. Timbs seemed pleased when she said she would go at once--I suppose +so many people go to house agents asking about houses which they never +take, that when anybody comes who is quite in earnest they feel like a +fisherman when he has really hooked a fish. He grew quite eager and +excited and said he would go with the lady himself, if she would allow +him to take a seat beside the driver to save time. And of course granny +was very glad for him to come. + +It was getting towards evening when she saw Windy Gap for the first +time, and it happened to be a very still evening--the name hardly seemed +suitable, and she said so to Mr. Timbs. He smiled and shook his head and +answered that he only hoped if she did come there to live that she would +not find the name _too_ suitable. Still, though there was a good deal of +wind to be _heard_, he went on to explain that the cottage was, as I +have already said, well sheltered on the cold sides, and also well and +strongly built. + +'None of your "paper-mashy," one brick thick, run-up-to-tumble-down +houses,' said Mr. Timbs with satisfaction, which was certainly quite +true. + +The end of it was, as of course you know already, that grandmamma fixed +to take it. She talked it all over with Mr. Timbs, who 'made notes,' and +promised to write to her about one or two things that could not be +settled at once, and then 'with a very thankful heart,' as she always +says when she talks of that day, she drove away again off to the +station. + +The sun was just beginning to think about setting when she walked down +the little steep garden path and a short way over the rough, hill +cart-track--for nothing on wheels can come quite close up to the gate of +Windy Gap--and already she could see what a beautiful show there was +going to be over there in the west. She stood still for a minute to look +at it. + +'Yes, madam,' said old Timbs, though she had not spoken, 'yes, that is a +sight worth adding a five pound note on to the rent of the cottage for, +in my opinion. The sunsets here are something wonderful, and there's no +house better placed for seeing them than Windy Gap. "Sunset View" it +might have been called, I have often thought.' + +'I can quite believe what you say,' grandmamma replied, 'and I am very +glad to have had a glimpse of it on this first visit.' + +Many and many a time since then have we sat or stood together there, +granny and I, watching the sun's good-night. I think she must have begun +to teach me to look at it while I was still almost a baby. For these +wonderful sunsets seem mixed up in my mind with the very first things I +can remember. And still more with the most solemn and beautiful thoughts +I have ever had. I always fancied when I was _very_ tiny that if only we +could have pushed away the long low stretch of hills which prevented +our seeing the very last of the dear sun, we should have had an actual +peep into heaven, or at least that we should have seen the golden gates +leading there. And I never watched the sun set without sending a message +by him to papa and mamma. Only in my own mind, of course. I never told +grandmamma about it for years and years. But I did feel sure he went +there every night and that the beautiful colours had to do with that +somehow. + +Grandmamma felt as if the lovely glow in the sky was a sort of good omen +for our life at Windy Gap, and she felt happier on her journey back in +the railway that evening than she had done since papa and mamma died. + +She told Kezia and me all about it--you will be amused at my saying she +told _me_, for of course I was only a baby and couldn't understand. But +she used to fancy I _did_ understand a little, and she got into the way +of talking to me when we were alone together especially, almost as if +she was thinking aloud. I cannot remember the time when she didn't talk +to me 'sensibly,' and perhaps that made me a little old for my age. +Granny says I used to grow quite grave when she talked seriously, and +that I would laugh and crow with pleasure when she seemed bright and +happy. And this made her try more than anything else to _be_ bright and +happy. + +Dear, dear grandmamma--how very, exceedingly unselfish she was! For I +now see what a really sad life most people would have thought hers. All +her dearest ones gone; her husband, her son and her son's wife--mamma, I +mean--whom she had loved nearly, if not quite as much, as if she had +been her own daughter; and she left behind when she was getting old, to +take care of one tiny little baby girl--and to be so poor, too. I don't +think even now I quite understand her goodness, but every day I am +getting to see it more and more, even though at one time I was both +ungrateful and very silly, as you will hear before you come to the end +of this little history. + +And now that I have explained as well as I can about grandmamma and +myself, and how and why we came to live in the funny little gray stone +cottage perched up among the Middlemoor Hills, I will go on with what I +can remember myself; for up till now, you see, all I have written has +been what was told to me by other people, especially of course by +granny. + + + + +CHAPTER II + +AT THE FOOT OF THE LADDER + + +No, perhaps I was rather hasty in saying I could now go straight on +about what I remember myself. There are still a few things belonging to +the time before I can remember, which I had better explain now, to keep +it all in order. + +I have spoken of grandmamma as being alone in the world, and so she +was--as far as having no one _very_ near her--no other children, and not +any brothers or sisters of her own. And on my mother's side I had no +relations worth counting. Mamma was an only child, and her father had +married again after _her_ mother died, and then, some years after, he +died himself, and mamma's half-brothers and sisters had never even seen +her, as they were out in India. So none of her relations have anything +to do with my story or with _me_. + +But grandmamma had one nephew whom she had been very fond of when he +was a boy, and whom she had seen a good deal of, as he and papa were at +school together. His name was not the same as ours, for he was the son +of a sister of grandpapa's, not of a brother. It was Vandeleur, Mr. +Cosmo Vandeleur. + +He was abroad when our great troubles came--I forget where, for though +he was not a soldier, he moved about the world a good deal to all sorts +of out-of-the-way places, and very often for months and months together, +grandmamma never heard anything about him. And one of the things that +made her still lonelier and sadder when we first came to Windy Gap was +that he had never answered her letters, or written to her for a very +long time. + +She thought it was impossible that he had not got her letters, and +almost more impossible that he had not seen poor papa's death in some of +the newspapers. + +And as it happened he had seen it and he had written to her once, +anyway, though she never got the letter. He had troubles of his own that +he did not say very much about, for he had married a good while ago, and +though his wife was very nice, she was very, _very_ delicate. + +Still, his name was familiar to me. I can always remember hearing +grandmamma talk of 'Cosmo,' and when she told me little anecdotes of +papa as a boy, his cousin was pretty sure to come into the story. + +And Kezia used to speak of him too--'Master Cosmo,' she always called +him. For she had been a young under-servant of grandmamma's long ago, +when grandpapa was alive and before the money was lost. + +That is one thing I want to say--that though Kezia was our only servant, +she was not at all common or rough. She turned herself into what is +called 'a maid-of-all-work,' from being my nurse, just out of love for +granny and me. And she was very good and very kind. Since I have grown +older and have seen more of other children and how they live, I often +think how much better off I was than most, even though my home was only +a cottage and we lived so simply, and even poorly, in some ways. +Everything was so open and happy about my life. I was not afraid of +anybody or anything. And I have known children who, though their parents +were very rich and they lived very grandly, had really a great deal to +bear from cross or unkind nurses or maids, whom they were frightened to +complain of. For children, unless they are _very_ spoilt, are not so +ready to complain as big people think. I had nothing to complain of, but +if I had had anything, it would have been easy to tell grandmamma all +about it at once; it would never have entered my head not to tell her. +She knew everything about me, and I knew everything about her that it +was good for me to know while I was still so young--more, perhaps, than +some people would think a child should know--about our not having much +money and needing to be careful, and things like that. But it did not do +me any harm. Children don't take _that_ kind of trouble to heart. I was +proud of being treated sensibly, and of feeling that in many little ways +I could help her as I could not have done if she had not explained. + +And if ever there was anything she did not tell me about, even the +keeping it back was done in an open sort of way. Granny made no +mysteries. She would just say simply-- + +'I cannot tell you, my dear,' or 'You could not understand about it at +present.' + +So that I trusted her--'always,' I was going to say, but, alas, there +came a time when I did not trust her enough, and from that great fault +of mine came all the troubles I ever had. + +_Now_ I will go straight on. + +Have you ever looked back and tried to find out what is really the very +first thing you can remember? It is rather interesting--now and then the +b--no, I don't mean to speak of them till they come properly into my +story--now and then I try to look back like that, and I get a strange +feeling that it is all there, if only I could keep hold of the thread, +as it were. But I cannot; it melts into a mist, and the very first thing +I _can_ clearly remember stands out the same again. + +This is it. + +I see myself--those looking backs always are like pictures; you seem to +be watching yourself, even while you feel it is yourself--I see myself, +a little trot of a girl, in a pale gray merino frock, with a muslin +pinafore covering me nearly all over, and a broad sash of Roman colours, +with a good deal of pale blue in it (I have the sash still, so it isn't +much praise to my memory to know all about _it_), tied round my waist, +running fast down the short steep garden path to where granny is +standing at the gate. I go faster and faster, beginning to get a little +frightened as I feel I can't stop myself. Then granny calls out-- + +'Take care, take care, my darling,' and all in a minute I feel +safe--caught in her arms, and held close. It is a lovely feeling. And +then I hear her say-- + +'My little girlie must not try to run so fast alone. She might have +fallen and hurt herself badly if granny had not been there.' + +There is to me a sort of parable, or allegory, in that first thing I can +remember, and I think it will seem to go on and fit into all my life, +even if I live to be as old as grandmamma is now. It is like feeling +that there are always arms ready to keep us safe, through all the +foolish and even wrong things we do--if only we will trust them and run +into them. I hope the children who _may_ some day read this won't say I +am preaching, or make fun of it. I must tell what I really have felt and +thought, or else it would be a pretence of a story altogether. And this +first remembrance has always stayed with me. + +Then come the sunsets. I have told you a little about them, already. I +must often have looked at them before I can remember, but one specially +beautiful has kept in my mind because it was on one of my birthdays. + +I think it must have been my third birthday, though granny is half +inclined to think it was my fourth. _I_ don't, because if it had been my +fourth I should remember _some_ things between it and my third +birthday, and I don't--nothing at all, between the running into granny's +arms, which she too remembers, and which was before I was three, there +is nothing I can get hold of, till that lovely sunset. + +I was sitting at the window when it began. I was rather tired--I suppose +I had been excited by its being my birthday, for dear granny always +contrived to give me some extra pleasures on that day--and I remember I +had a new doll in my lap, whom I had been undressing to be ready to be +put to bed with me. I almost think I had fallen asleep for a minute or +two, for it seems as if all of a sudden I had caught sight of the sky. +It must have been particularly beautiful, for I called out-- + +'Oh, look, look, they're lighting all the beauty candles in heaven. +Look, Dollysweet, it's for my birfday.' + +Grandmamma was in the room and she heard me. But for a minute or two she +did not say anything, and I went on talking to Dolly and pretending or +fancying that Dolly talked back to me. + +Then granny came softly behind me and stood looking out too. I did not +know she was there till I heard her saying some words to herself. Of +course I did not understand them, yet the sound of them must have stayed +in my ears. Since then I have learnt the verses for myself, and they +always come back to me when I see anything very beautiful--like the +trees and the flowers in summer, or the stars at night, and above all, +lovely sunsets. + +But all I heard then was just-- + + 'Good beyond compare, + If thus Thy meaner works are fair'-- + +and all I _remembered_ was-- + + '... beyond compare, + ... are fair.' + +I said them over and over to myself, and a funny fancy grew out of them, +when I got to understand what 'beyond' meant. I took it into my head +that 'compare' was the name of the hills, which, as I have said, came +between us and the horizon on the west, and prevented our seeing the +last of the sunset. + +And I used to make wonderful fairy stories to myself about the country +beyond or behind those hills--the country I called 'Compare,' where +something, or everything--for I had lost the words just before, was +'fair' in some marvellous way I could not even picture to myself. For I +soon learnt to know that 'fair' meant beautiful--I think I learnt it +first from some of the old fairy stories grandmamma used to tell me when +we sat at work. + +That evening she took me up in her arms and kissed me. + +'The sun is going to bed,' she said to me, 'and so must my little +Helena, even though it is her birthday.' + +'And so must Dollysweet,' I said. I always called that doll +'Dollysweet,' and I ran the words together as if it was one name. + +'Yes, certainly,' said granny. + +Then she took my hand and I trotted upstairs beside her, carrying +Dollysweet, of course. And there, up in my little room--I had already +begun to sleep alone in my little room, though the door was always left +open between it and grandmamma's--there, at the ending of my birthday +was another lovely surprise. For, standing in a chair beside my cot was +a bed for my doll--_so_ pretty and cosy-looking. + +Wasn't it nice of granny? I never knew any one like her for having _new_ +sort of ideas. It made me go to bed so very, very happily, and that is +not always the case the night of a birthday. I have known children who, +even when they are pretty big, cry themselves to sleep because the +long-looked-for day is over. + +It did not matter to me that my dolly's bed had cost nothing--except, +indeed, what was far more really precious than money--granny's loving +thought and work. It was made out of a strong cardboard box--the lid +fastened to the box, standing up at one end like the head part of a +French bed. And it was all beautifully covered with pink calico, which +grandmamma had had 'by her.' Granny was rather old-fashioned in some +ways, and fond of keeping a few odds and ends 'by her.' And over that +again, white muslin, all fruzzled on, that had once been pinafores of +mine, but had got too worn to use any more in that way. + +There were little blankets, too, worked round with pink wool, and little +sheets, and everything--all made out of nothing but love and +contrivance! + +It was so delightful to wake the next morning and see Dollysweet in her +nest beside me. She slept there every night for several years, and I am +afraid after some time she slept there a good deal in the day also. For +I gave up playing with dolls rather young--playing with _a_ doll, I +should say. I found it more interesting to have lots of little ones, or +of things that did instead of dolls--dressed-up chessmen did very well +at one time--that I could make move about and act and be anything I +wanted them to be, more easily than one or two big dolls. + +Still I always took care of Dollysweet. I never neglected her or let her +get dirty and untidy, though in time, of course, her pink-and-white +complexion faded into pallid yellow, and her bright hair grew dull, and, +worst of all--after that I never could bear to look at her--one of her +sky-blue eyes dropped, not out, but _into_ her hollow head. + +Poor old Dollysweet! + +The day after my third birthday grandmamma began to teach me to read. +_I_ couldn't have remembered that it was that very day, but she has told +me so. I had very short lessons, only a quarter of an hour, I think, but +though she was very kind, she was very strict about my giving my +attention while I was at them. She says that is the part that really +matters with a very little child--the learning to give attention. Not +that it would signify if the actual things learnt up to six or seven +came to be forgotten--so long as a child knows how to learn. + +At first I liked my lessons very much, though I must have been a rather +tiresome child to teach. For I would keep finding out likenesses in the +letters, which I called 'little black things,' and I wouldn't try to +learn their names. Grandmamma let me do this for a few days, as she +thought it would help me to distinguish them, but when she found that +every day I invented a new set of likenesses, she told me that wouldn't +do. + +'You may have one likeness for each,' she said, 'but only if you really +try to remember its name too.' + +And I knew, by the sound of her voice, that she meant what she said. + +So I set to work to fix which of the 'likes,' as I called them, I would +keep. + +'A' had been already a house with a pointed roof, and a book standing +open on its two sides, and a window with curtains drawn at the top, and +the wood of the sash running across half-way, and a good many other +things which you couldn't see any likeness to it in, I am sure. But just +as I was staring at it again, I saw old Tanner, who lived in one of the +cottages below our house, settling his double ladder against a wall. + +I screamed out with pleasure-- + +'I'll have Tan's ladder,' I said, and so I did. 'A' was always Tan's +ladder after that. And a year or two later, when I heard some one speak +of the 'ladder of learning,' I felt quite sure it had something to do +with the opened-out ladder with the bar across the middle. + +After all, I have had to get grandmamma's help for some of these baby +memories. Still, as I _can_ remember the little events I have now +written down, I suppose it is all right. + + + + +CHAPTER III + +ONE AND SEVEN + + +I will go on now to the time I was about seven years old. 'Baby' stories +are interesting to people who know the baby, or the person that once was +the baby, but I scarcely think they are very interesting to people who +have never seen you or never will, or, if they do, would not know it was +you! + +All these years we had gone on quietly living at Windy Gap, without ever +going away. Going away never came into my head, and if dear grandmamma +sometimes wished for a little change--and, indeed, I am sure she must +have done--she never spoke of it to me. Now and then I used to hear +other children, for there were a few families living near us, whose +little boys and girls I very occasionally played with, speak of going to +the sea-side in the summer, or to stay with uncles and aunts or other +relations in London in the winter, to see the pantomimes and the shops. +But it never struck me that anything of that sort could come in my way, +not more than it ever entered my imagination that I could become a +princess or a gipsy or anything equally impossible. + +Happy children are made like that, I think, and a very good thing it is +for them. And I was a very happy child. + +We had our troubles, troubles that even had she wished, grandmamma could +not have kept from me. And I do not think she did wish it. She knew that +though the _background_ of a child's life should be contented and happy, +it would not be true teaching or true living to let it believe any life +can be without troubles. + +One trouble was a bad illness I had when I was six--though this was +really more of a trouble to granny and Kezia than to me. For I did not +suffer much pain. Sometimes the illnesses that frighten children's +friends the most do not hurt the little people themselves as much as +less serious things. + +This illness came from a bad cold, and it _might_ have left me delicate +for always, though happily it didn't. But it made granny anxious, and +after I got better it was a long time before she could feel easy-minded +about letting me go out without being tremendously wrapped up, and +making sure which way the wind was, and a lot of things like that, which +are rather teasing. + +I might not have given in as well as I did had it not happened that the +winter which came after my illness was a terribly severe one, and my own +sense--for even between six and seven children _can_ have some common +sense--told me that nothing would be easier than to get a cough again if +I didn't take care. So on the whole I was pretty good. + +But those months of anxiety and the great cold were very trying for +grandmamma. Her hair got quite, _quite_ white during them. + +These severe winters do not come often at Middlemoor; not very often, at +least. We had two of them during the time we lived there, 'year in and +year out,' as Kezia called it. But between them we had much milder ones, +one or two quite wonderfully mild, and others middling--nothing really +to complain of. Still, a very tiny cottage house standing by itself is +pretty cold during the best of winters, even though the walls were +thick. And in wet or stormy days one does get tired of very small rooms +and few of them. + +But the year that followed that bitter winter brought a pleasant little +change into my life--the first variety of the kind that had come to me. +I made real acquaintance at last with some other children. + +This was how it began. + +I was seven, a little past seven, at the time. + +One morning I had just finished my lessons, which of course took more +than a quarter of an hour now, and was collecting my books together, to +put them away, when I heard a knock at the front door. + +I was in the drawing-room--_generally_, especially in winter, I did my +lessons in the dining-room. For we never had two fires at once, and for +that reason we sat in the dining-room in the morning if it was cold, +though granny was most particular always to have a fire in the +drawing-room in the afternoon. I think now it was quite wonderful how +she managed about things like that, never to fall into irregular or +untidy ways, for as people grow old they find it difficult to be as +active and energetic as is easy for younger ones. It was all for my +sake, and every day I feel more and more grateful to her for it. + +Never once in my life do I remember going into the dining-room to dinner +without first meeting grandmamma in the drawing-room, when a glance +would show her if my face and hands had been freshly washed and my hair +brushed and my dress tidy, and upstairs again would I be sent in a +twinkling if any of these matters were amiss. + +But this morning I had had my lessons in the drawing-room; to begin +with, it was not winter now, but spring, and not a cold spring either; +and in the second place, Kezia had been having a baking of pastry and +cakes in the dining-room oven, and granny knew my lessons would have +fared badly if my attention had been disturbed every time the cakes had +to be seen to. + +I was collecting my books, I said, to carry them into the other room, +where there was a little shelf with a curtain in front on purpose for +them, as we only kept our nicest books in the drawing-room, when this +rat-a-tat knock came to the door. + +I was very surprised. It was so seldom any one came to the front door in +the morning, and, indeed, not often in the afternoon either, and this +knock sounded sharp and important somehow. Though I was still quite a +little girl I knew it would vex grandmamma if I tried to peep out to see +who it was--it was one of the things she would have said 'no lady should +ever do'--and I could not bear her to think I ever forgot how even a +very small lady should behave. + +The only thing I could do was to look out of the side window, not that I +could see the door from there, but I had a good view of the road where +it passed the short track, too rough to call a road, leading to our own +little gate. + +No cart or carriage could come nearer than that point; the tradesmen +from Middlemoor always stopped there and carried up our meat or bread or +whatever it was--not very heavy basketfuls, I suspect--to the kitchen +door, and I used to be very fond of standing at this window, watching +the unpacking from the carts. + +There was no cart there to-day, but what _was_ there nearly took my +breath away. + +'Oh, grandmamma,' I called out, quite forgetting that by this time Kezia +must have opened the door; 'oh, grandmamma, do look at the lovely +carriage and ponies.' + +Granny did not answer. She had not heard me, for she was in the +dining-room, as I might have known. But I had got into the habit of +calling to her whenever I was pleased or excited, and generally, somehow +or other, she managed to hear. And I could not leave the window, I was +so engrossed by what I saw. + +There was a girl in the carriage, to me she seemed a grown-up lady. She +was sitting still, holding the reins. But I did not see the figure of +another lady which by this time had got hidden by the house, as she +followed the little groom whom she had sent on to ask if Mrs. Wingfield +was at home, meaning at first, to wait till he came back. I heard her +afterwards explaining to grandmamma that the boy was rather deaf and she +was afraid he had not heard her distinctly, so she had come herself. + +And while I was still gazing at the carriage and the ponies, the +drawing-room door, already a little ajar, was pushed wide open and I +heard Kezia saying she would tell Mrs. Wingfield at once. + +'Mrs. Nestor; you heard my name?' said some one in a pleasant voice. + +I turned round. + +There stood a tall lady in a long dark green cloak, she had a hat on, +not a bonnet, and I just thought of her as another lady, not troubling +myself as to whether she was younger or older than the one in the +carriage, though actually she was her mother. + +I was not shy. It sounds contradictory to say so, but still there is +truth in it. I had seen too few people in my life to know anything about +shyness. And all I ever had had to do with were kind and friendly. And I +remembered 'my manners,' as old-fashioned folk say. + +I clambered down from the window-seat, and stroked my pinafore, which +had got ruffled up, and came forward towards the lady, holding out my +hand. I had no need to go far, for she had come straight in my +direction. + +'Well, dear?' she said, and again I liked her voice, though I did not +exactly think about it, 'and are you Mrs. Wingfield's little girl?' + +'My name is Helena Charlotte Naomi Wingfield,' I said, very gravely and +distinctly, 'and grandmamma is Mrs. Wingfield.' + +Mrs. Nestor was smiling still more by this time, but she smiled in a +nice way that did not at all give me any feeling that she was making fun +of what I said. + +'And how old are you, my dear?--let me see, you have so many names! +which are you called by, or have you any short name?' + +I shook my head. + +'No, only "girlie," and that is just for grandmamma to say. I am always +called "Helena."' + +'It is a very pretty name,' said my new friend. 'And how old are you, +Helena?' + +'I am past seven,' I said. 'My birthday comes in the spring, in March. +Have you any little girls, and are any of them seven? I would like to +know some little girls as big as me.' + +'I have lots,' said Mrs. Nestor. 'One of them is in the pony-carriage +outside. I daresay you can see her from the window.' + +I think my face must have fallen. + +'Oh,' I said, disappointedly. 'She's a lady.' + +'No, indeed,' said Mrs. Nestor, now laughing outright; 'if you knew her, +or when you know her, as I hope you will soon, I'm afraid you will think +her much more of a tomboy than a lady. Sharley is only eleven, though +she is tall. Her name is Charlotte, like one of yours, but we call her +Sharley; we spell it with an "S" to prevent people calling her +"Charley," for she is boyish enough already, I am afraid. Then I have +three girls younger--nine, six, and three, and two boys of----' + +I was _so_ interested--my eyes were very wide open, and I shouldn't +wonder if my mouth was too--that for once in my life I was almost sorry +to see grandmamma, who at that moment opened the door and came in. + +'I hope Helena has been a good hostess?' she said, after she had shaken +hands with Mrs. Nestor, whom she had met before once or twice. 'We have +been having a cake baking this morning, and I was just giving some +directions about a special kind of gingerbread we want to try.' + +'I should apologise for coming in the morning,' said Mrs. Nestor, but +grandmamma assured her it was quite right to have chosen the morning. +'Helena and I go out in the afternoon whenever the weather is fine +enough, and I should have been sorry to miss you. Now, my little girl, +you may run off to Kezia. Say good-bye to Mrs. Nestor.' + +I felt very disappointed, but I was accustomed to obey at once. But Mrs. +Nestor read the disappointment in my eyes: that was one of the nice +things about her. She was so 'understanding.' + +She turned to grandmamma. + +'One of my daughters is in the pony-carriage,' she said. 'Would you +allow Helena to go out to her? She would be pleased to see your garden, +I am sure.' + +'Certainly,' said grandmamma. 'Put on your hat and jacket, Helena, and +ask Miss'--she had caught sight of the girl from the window and saw that +she was pretty big--'Miss Nestor to walk about with you a little.' + +I flew off--too excited to feel at all timid about making friends by +myself. + +'Call her Sharley,' said Mrs. Nestor, as I left the room. 'She would not +know herself by any other name.' + +In a minute or two I was running down the garden-path. When I found +myself fairly out at the gate, and within a few steps of the girl, I +think a feeling of shyness _did_ come over me, though I did not myself +understand what it was. I hung back a little and began to wonder what I +should say. I had so seldom spoken to a child belonging to my own rank +in life. And I had not often spoken to any of the poorer children about, +as there happened to be none in the cottages near us, and grandmamma was +perhaps a little _too_ anxious about me, too afraid of my catching any +childish illness. She says herself that she thinks she was. But of +course I am now so strong and big that it makes it rather different. + +I had not much time left in which to grow shy, however. As soon as the +girl saw that I was plainly coming towards her she sprang out of the +carriage. + +'Has mother sent you to fetch me?' she said. + +I looked at her. Now that she was out of the carriage and standing, I +could see that she was not as tall as grandmamma, or as her own mother, +and that her frock was a good way off the ground. And her hair was +hanging down her back. Still she seemed to me almost a grown-up lady. + +I am afraid her first impression of _me_ must have been that I was +extremely stupid. For I went on staring at her for a moment or two +before I answered. She was indeed opening her lips to repeat the +question when I at last found my voice. + +'I don't know,' I said. And if she did not think me stupid before I +spoke, she certainly must have done so when I did. + +'I don't know,' I repeated, considering over what her question exactly +meant. 'No, I don't think it was fetching you. I was to ask you--would +you like to walk round our garden? And p'raps--your mamma was going to +tell me all your names, but grandmamma told me to run away. I'd like to +know your sisters that are as little as me's names.' + +I remember exactly what I said, for Sharley has often told me since how +difficult it was for her not to burst out laughing at the funny way I +spoke. But tomboy though she was in some respects, she had a very tender +heart, and like her mother she was quick at understanding. So she +answered quite soberly-- + +'Thank you. I should like very much to walk round your garden--though +running would be even nicer. I'm not very fond of walking if I can run, +and you have got such jolly steep paths and banks.' + +I eyed the steep paths doubtfully. + +'You hurt yourself a good deal if you run too fast down the paths,' I +said. 'The stones are so sharp.' + +Sharley laughed. + +'You speak from experience,' she said. 'That grass bank would be lovely +for tobogganing.' + +'I don't know what that is,' I replied. + +'We'll show you if you come to see us at home,' she said. 'But I suppose +I'd better not try anything like that to-day. You want to know my +sisters' names? They are Anna and Valetta and Baby----' + +'Never mind about Baby,' I interrupted, rather abruptly, I fear. 'How +big is Anna, and--the other one?' + +Sharley stood still and looked me well over. + +'Do you really mean "big"?' she said, 'or "old"? Anna is nine and Val is +six; but as for bigness--Anna is nearly as tall as I am, and Val is a +good bit bigger than you.' + +I felt and looked nearly ready to cry. + +'And I'm past seven,' I said, 'I wish I wasn't so little. It's like +being a baby, and I don't care for babies.' + +'Never mind,' replied Sharley consolingly, 'you needn't be at all +babyish because you're little. One of our boys is very little, but he's +not a bit of a baby. I'm sure Val will like to play with you, and so +will Anna--and all of us, for that matter.' + +I began to think Sharley a very nice girl. I put my hand in hers +confidingly. + +'I'd like to come,' I said, 'and I'd like to play that funny name down +the grass-bank here, if you'll show me how.' + +'All right,' she said. 'We'll have to ask leave, I suppose. But you +haven't told me your name yet. The children are sure to ask me.' + +I repeated it--or them--solemnly. + +'"Charlotte"--that's my name,' Sharley remarked. + +'I'm never called it,' I said. 'I'm always called Helena.' + +Sharley looked rather surprised. + +'Fancy!' she said. '_We_ all call each other by short names and +nicknames and all kinds of absurd names. Anna is generally Nan, and the +boys are Pert and Quick--at least those are the names that have lasted +longest. I daresay it's partly because they are just a little like their +real names--Percival and Quintin.' + +'What a great many of you there are!' I said, but Sharley took my remark +in perfectly good part, even though I went on to add--'It's like the +baker's children--I counted them once, but I couldn't get them right; +sometimes they came to nine and sometimes to eleven.' + +'Do you mean the baker's on the way to High Middlemoor?' said Sharley. +'Oh yes, it must be them--papa calls them the baker's dozen always. No, +we're not as many as that. We are only seven--us four girls, and Pert +and Quick, and Jerry, our big brother, who's at school. Dear me, it must +be dull to be only one!' + +Just then we heard the voices of grandmamma and Sharley's mother coming +towards us. And a minute or two later the pony-carriage drove away +again, Sharley nodding back friendly farewells. + + + + +CHAPTER IV + +NEW FRIENDS AND A PLAN + + +I stood looking after it as long as it was in sight. I felt quite +strange, almost a little dazed, as if I had more than I could manage to +think over in my head. Grandmamma, who was standing behind me, put her +hand on my shoulder. + +I looked up at her, and I saw that her face seemed pleased. + +'Is that a nice lady, grandmamma?' I said. + +I do not quite know why I asked about Sharley's mother in that way, for +I felt sure she was nice. I think I wanted grandmamma to help me to +arrange my ideas a little. + +'Very nice, dear,' she said. 'Did you not think she spoke very kindly?' + +'Yes, I did, grandmamma,' I replied. I had a rather 'old-fashioned' way +of speaking sometimes, I think. + +'And her little girl--well, she is not a little girl, exactly, is +she?--seems very bright and kind too,' grandmamma went on. + +'Yes,' I replied, but then I hesitated. Grandmamma wanted to find out +what I was thinking. + +'You don't seem quite sure about it?' she said. + +'Yes, grandmamma. She is a very kind girl, but she made me feel funny. +She has such a lot of brothers and sisters, and she says it must be so +dull to be only one. Grandmamma, is it dull to be only one?' + +Grandmamma did not smile at my odd way of asking her what I could have +told myself, better than any one else. A little sad look came over her +face. + +'I hope not, dear,' she answered. 'My little girl does not find her life +dull?' + +I shook my head. + +'I love you, grandmamma, and I love Kezia, but I don't know about "dull" +and things like that. I think Sharley thinks I'm a very stupid little +girl, grandmamma.' + +And all of a sudden, greatly to dear granny's surprise and still more to +her distress, I burst into tears. + +She led me back into the house, and was very kind to me. But she did not +say very much. She only told me that she was sure Sharley did not think +anything but what was nice and friendly about me, and that I must not be +a fanciful little woman. And then she sent me to Kezia, who had kept an +odd corner of her pastry for me to make into stars and hearts and other +shapes with her cutters, as I was very fond of doing. So that very soon +I was quite bright and happy again. + +But in her heart granny was saying that it would be a very good thing +for me to have some companions of my own age, to prevent my getting +fanciful and unchildlike, and, worst of all, too much taken up with +myself. + +A few days after that, grandmamma told me that the three Nestor girls +were coming twice a week to read French with her. I think I have said +already that grandmamma was very clever, very clever indeed, and that +she knew several foreign languages. She had been a great deal in other +countries when grandpapa was alive, and she could speak French +beautifully. So I wasn't surprised, and only very pleased when she told +me about Sharley and her sisters. For I was too little to understand +what any one else would have known in a moment, that dear granny was +going to do this to make a little more money. My illness and all the +things she had got for me--even the having more fires--had cost a good +deal that last winter, and she had asked the vicar of our village to let +her know if he heard of any family wanting French or German lessons for +their children. + +This was the reason of Mrs. Nestor's call, and it was because they were +going to settle about the French lessons that grandmamma had sent me out +of the room. It was not till long afterwards that I understood all about +it. + +Just now I was very pleased. + +'Oh, how nice!' I said, 'and may I play with them after the lessons are +done, do you think, grandmamma? And will they ask me to go to their +house to tea sometimes? Sharley said they would--at least she nearly +said it.' + +'I daresay you will go to their house some day. I think Mrs. Nestor is +very kind, and I am sure she would ask you if she thought it would +please you,' said grandmamma. But then she stopped a little. 'I want you +to understand, Helena dear, that these children are coming here really +to learn French. So you must not think about playing with them just at +first, that must be as their mother likes.' + +Grandmamma did not say what she felt in her own mind--that she would not +wish to seem to try to make acquaintance with the Nestors, who were very +rich and important people, through giving lessons to their children. For +she was proud in a right way--no, I won't call it proud--I think +dignified is a better word. + +But Mrs. Nestor was too nice herself not to see at once the sort of +person grandmamma was. She was almost _too_ delicate in her feelings, +for she was so afraid of seeming to be in the least condescending or +patronising to us, that she kept back from showing us as much kindness +as she would have liked to do. So it never came about that we grew very +intimate with the family at Moor Court--that was the name of their +home--I really saw more of the three girls at our own little cottage +than in their own grand house. + +But as I go on with my story you will see that there was a reason for my +telling about them, and about how we came to know them, rather +particularly. + +The French lessons began the next week. Sharley and her sisters used to +come together, sometimes walking with a maid, sometimes driving over in +a little pony-cart--not the beautiful carriage with the two ponies; +that was their mother's--but what is called a governess-cart, in which +they drove a fat old fellow called Bunch, too fat and lazy to be up to +much mischief. When they drove over they brought a young groom with +them, but their governess very seldom came. I think Mrs. Nestor thought +it would be pleasanter for granny to give the lessons without a grown-up +person being there, and Sharley said their governess used that time to +give the two boys Latin lessons. Mrs. Nestor would have been very glad +if grandmamma would have agreed to teach Pert and Quick French too, but +granny did not think she could spare time for it, though a year or two +later when Percival had gone to school she did let Quick join what we +called the second class. + +I should have explained that though I could not read or write French at +all well, I could speak it rather nicely, as grandmamma had taken great +pains to accustom me to do so since I was quite little. + +I think she had a feeling that I might have to be a governess or +something of the kind when I was grown-up, and that made her very +anxious about my lessons from the beginning of them. And though things +have turned out quite differently from that, I have always been _very_ +glad that I was well taught from the first. It is such a comfort to me +now that I am really growing big to be able to show grandmamma that I am +not far back for my age compared with other girls. + +Sharley was the first class all by herself, and Nan and Vallie were the +second. I did not do any lessons with them, but after each class had had +half an hour's teaching we had conversation for another half hour, and +when the conversation time began I was always sent for. Grandmamma had +asked Mrs. Nestor if she would like that, and Mrs. Nestor was very +pleased. + +We had great fun at the 'conversation.' You can scarcely believe what +comical things the little girls said when they first began to try to +talk. Grandmamma sometimes laughed till the tears came into her eyes--I +do love to see her laugh--and I laughed too, partly, I think, because +she did, for the funny things they said did not seem quite so funny to +me, of course, as to a big person. + +But altogether the French lessons were very nice and brought some +variety into our lives. I think granny and I looked forward to them as +much as the Nestor children did. + +Grandmamma's birthday happened to come about a fortnight after they +began. I told Sharley about it one day when she was out in the garden +with me, while her sisters were at their lesson. We used to do that way +sometimes, only we had to promise to speak French all the time, so that +I really had a little to do with teaching them as well as grandmamma, +and to tease me, on these occasions Sharley would call me +'mademoiselle,' and make Nan and Vallie do the same. They used in turn, +you see, to be with me while Sharley was with granny. + +It was rather difficult to make her understand about grandmamma's +birthday, I remember, for she could scarcely speak French at all then, +and at last she burst out into English, for she got very interested +about it. + +'I'll tell Mrs. Wingfield we have been talking English,' she said, 'and +I'll tell her it was all my fault. But I must understand what you are +saying.' + +'It's about grandmamma's birthday,' I said. 'I do so want to make a plan +for it.' + +Sharley's eyes sparkled. She loved making plans, and so did Vallie, who +was very quick and bright about everything, while Nan was rather a +sleepy little girl, though exceedingly good-natured. I don't think I +_ever_ knew her speak crossly. + +'I heard something about "fête,"' said Sharley, 'about fête and +grandmamma. Why do you call her birthday her "fête"?' + +'I didn't,' I replied. '"Fête" doesn't generally mean birthday--it means +something else, something about a saint's day. I said I wanted to +"fêter" dear granny on her birthday, and I wondered what I could do. +Last year I worked a little case in that stiff stuff with holes in, to +keep stamps in, and Kezia made tea-cakes. But I can't think of anything +I can work for her this year, and tea-cakes are only tea-cakes,' and I +sighed. + +'Don't look so unhappy,' said Sharley, '_we'll_ plan. We're rather short +of plans just now, and we always like to have some on hand for first +thing in the morning--Val and I do at least. Nan never wakes up +properly. Leave it to us, Helena, and the next time we come I'll tell +you what we've thought of.' + +I had a good deal of faith in Sharley's cleverness in some things, +already, though I can't say that it shone out in speaking French. So I +promised to wait to see what she and Vallie thought of. + +When we went in we told grandmamma that we had been speaking English. I +made it up into very good French, and Sharley said it, which pleased +granny. + +'And what was it you were so eager about that you couldn't wait to say +it, or hear it in French?' she asked Sharley. + +We had not expected this, and Sharley got rather red. + +'It's a secret,' she blurted out. + +Grandmamma looked just a little grave. + +'I am not very fond of secrets,' she said. 'And Helena has never had +any.' + +'Oh yes, I have, grandmamma,' I said. I did not mean to contradict +rudely, and I don't think it sounded like that, though it looks rather +rude written down. 'I had one this time last year--don't you +remember?--about your little stamp case.' + +Granny's face brightened up. It did not take very quick wits to put two +and two together, and to guess from what I said that the secret had to +do with her birthday. And Sharley was too anxious for grandmamma not to +be vexed, to think about her having partly guessed the secret. + +'Ah, well!' said granny, 'I think I can trust you both.' + +'Yes, indeed, you may,' said Sharley. 'There's nothing about mischief +in it, and the only secrets mother's ever been vexed with me about had +to do with mischief.' + +'Sharley dressed up a pillow to tumble on Pert's head from the top of +his door, once,' said Nan in her slow solemn voice, 'and he screamed and +screamed.' + +'It was because he was such a boasty boy, about never being frightened,' +said Sharley, getting rather red. 'But I never did it again. And this +secret is quite, quite a different kind.' + +I felt very eager for the next French day, as we called them, to come, +to hear what Sharley had thought of. I told Kezia about it, and then I +almost wished I had not, for she said she did not know that grandmamma +would be pleased at my talking about her birthday and 'such like' to +strangers. + +I think Kezia forgot sometimes how very little a girl I still was. I did +not understand what she meant, and all I could say was that the three +girls were not strangers to me. Afterwards I saw what Kezia was thinking +of, she was afraid of the Nestors sending some present to grandmamma, +and that, she would not have liked. + +But Mrs. Nestor was too good and sensible for anything of that kind. + +When Sharley and Nan and Vallie came the next time, I ran to meet them, +full of anxiety to know if they had made any 'plans.' They all looked +very important, but rather to my disappointment the first thing Sharley +said to me was-- + +'Don't ask us yet, Helena. We've promised mother not to tell. She's +going to come to fetch us to-day, and she's made a lovely plan, but +first she has to speak about it to your grandmamma.' + +'Then it won't be a surprise,' I began, but Vallie answered before I had +time to say any more. + +'Oh yes, it will. There's to be a surprise mixed up with it, and we're +to settle that part of it all ourselves--you and us.' + +I found it very difficult to keep to speaking French that day, I can +tell you. And it seemed as if the hour and a half of lessons spread out +to twice as much before Mrs. Nestor at last came. + +We all ran out into the garden while she went in to talk to grandmamma. +They were very kind and did not keep us long waiting, and soon we heard +granny calling us from the window. Her face was quite pleased and +smiling. I saw in a moment that she was not going to say I should not +have spoken of her birthday to the little girls. + +'Mrs. Nestor is thinking of a great treat for you--and for me, Helena,' +she said. 'And she and I want you to know about it at once, so that you +may all talk about it together and enjoy it beforehand as well. Some +little bird, it seems, has flown over to Moor Court and told that next +Tuesday week will be your old granny's birthday, and Mrs. Nestor has +invited us to spend the afternoon of it there. You will like that, will +you not?' + +I looked up at grandmamma, feeling quite strange. You will hardly +believe that I had never in my life paid even a visit of this simple +kind. + +'Yes,' I whispered, feeling myself getting pink all over, as I knew that +Mrs. Nestor was looking at me, 'yes, thank you.' + +Then dear little Vallie came close up to me, and said in a low voice-- + +'Now we can settle about the surprise. Come quick, Helena--the surprise +will be the fun.' + +And when I found myself alone with the others again, all three of them, +even Nan, chattering at once, I soon found my own tongue again, and the +strange, unreal sort of feeling went off. They were very simple unspoilt +children, though their parents were rich and what I used to call +'grand.' It is quite a mistake to think that the children who live in +very large houses and have ponies and lots of servants and everything +they can want are sure to be spoilt. Very often it is quite the +opposite. For, if their parents are good and wise, they are _extra_ +careful not to spoil them, knowing that the sort of trials that cannot +be kept away from poorer children, and which are a training in +themselves in some ways, are not likely to come to _their_ children. I +even think now, looking back, that there was really more risk of being +spoilt, for me myself, than for Sharley and her brothers and sisters. + +Being allowed to be selfish is the real beginning and end of being +spoilt, I am quite sure. + +The 'surprise' they had thought of was a very simple one, and one that I +knew grandmamma would like. It was that we should have tea out-of-doors, +in an arbour where there was a table and seats all round. And we were to +decorate it with flowers, and a wicker arm-chair was to be brought out +for granny, and wreathed with greenery and flowers, to show that she was +queen of the feast. + +'So it will be a "fête," after all, Helena,' said Sharley. + +They were nearly as eager and pleased about it as I was myself, for +they had already learnt to love my grandmamma very dearly. + +'There's only one thing,' we kept saying to each other every time we met +before the great day, 'it _mustn't_ rain. Oh, do let us _hope_ it will +be fine,--beautifully fine.' + + + + +CHAPTER V + +A HAPPY DAY + + +And it _was_ a fine day! Things after all do not always go wrong in this +world, though some people are fond of talking as if they did. + +That day, that happy birthday, stands out in my mind so clearly that I +think I must write a good deal about it, even though to most children +there would not seem anything very remarkable to tell. But to me it was +like a peep into fairyland. To begin with, it was the very first time in +my life that I had ever paid a visit of any kind except once or twice +when I had had tea in rather a dull fashion at the vicarage, where there +were no children and no one who understood much about them. Miss Linden, +the vicar's sister, a very old-maid sort of lady, though she meant to be +kind, had my tea put out in a corner of the room by myself, while she +and grandmamma had theirs in a regular drawing-room way. They had +muffins, I remember, and Miss Linden thought muffins not good for little +girls, and my bread-and-butter was cut thicker than I ever had it at the +cottage, and the slice of currant-bread was not nearly as good as +Kezia's home-made cake--even the plainest kind. + +No, my remembrances of going out to tea at the vicarage were not very +enlivening. + +How different the visit to Moor Court was! + +It began--the pleasure of it at least to me--the first thing when I +awoke that morning, and saw without getting out of bed--for my room was +so little that I could not help seeing straight out of the window, and I +never had the blinds drawn down--that it was a perfectly lovely morning. +It was the sort of morning that gives almost certain promise of a +beautiful day. + +In our country, because of the hills, you see, it isn't always easy to +tell beforehand what the weather is going to be, unless you really study +it. But even while I was quite a child I had learnt to know the signs of +it very well. I knew about the lights and shadows coming over the hills, +the gray look at a certain side, the way the sun set, and lots of things +of that kind which told me a good deal that a stranger would never have +thought of. I knew there were some kinds of bright mornings which were +really less hopeful than the dull and gloomy ones, but there was nothing +of that sort to-day, so I curled myself round in bed again with a +delightful feeling that there was nothing to be feared from the weather. + +I did not dare to get up till I heard Kezia's knock at the door--for +that was one of grandmamma's rules, and though she had not many rules, +those there _were_ had to be obeyed, I can assure you. + +I must have fallen asleep again, for the next thing I remember was +hearing grandmamma's voice, and there she was, standing beside my bed. + +'Oh, granny!' I called out, 'what a shame for you to be the one to wake +me on _your_ birthday.' + +'No, dear,' said grandmamma, 'it is quite right. Kezia hasn't been yet, +it is just about her time.' + +I sprang up and ran to the table, where I had put my little present for +grandmamma the night before, for of course I had got a present for her +all of my own, besides having planned the treat with the Nestors. + +I remember what my present was that year. It was a little box for +holding buttons, which I had bought at the village shop, and it had a +picture of the old, old Abbey Church at Middlemoor on its lid. +Grandmamma has that button-box still, I saw it in her work-basket only +yesterday. I was very proud of it, for it was the first year I had saved +pennies enough to be able to _buy_ something instead of working a +present for grandmamma. + +She did seem so pleased with it. I remember now the look in her eyes as +she stooped to kiss me. Then she turned and lifted something which I had +not noticed from a chair standing near. + +'This is my present for my little girl,' she said, and though I was +inclined to say that it was not fair for her to give me presents on her +birthday, I was so delighted with what she held out for me to see that I +really could scarcely speak. + +What do you think it was? + +A new frock--the prettiest by far I had ever had. The stuff was white, +embroidered by grandmamma herself in sky-blue, in such a pretty pattern. +She had sat up at night to do it after I was in bed. + +'Oh, grandmamma,' I said, 'how beautiful it is! Oh, may I--' but then I +stopped short--'may I wear it to-day?' was what I was going to say. But, +'oh no,' I went on, 'it might get dirtied.' + +'You are to wear it to-day, dear,' said grandmamma, 'if that is what you +were going to say, so you needn't spoil your pleasure by being afraid of +its getting dirtied; it will wash perfectly well, for I steeped the silk +I worked it in, in salt and water before using it, to make the colour +quite fast. I will leave it here on the back of the chair, and when the +time comes for you to get ready I will dress you myself, to be sure that +it is all quite right.' + +I kept peeping at my pretty frock all the time I was dressing; the sight +of it seemed the one thing wanting to complete my happiness. For though +Sharley and Nan and Vallie were never too grandly dressed, their things +were always fresh and pretty, and I _had_ been thinking to myself that +none of my summer frocks were quite as nice or new-looking as theirs. + +And to-day, though only May, was really summer. + +Grandmamma wouldn't let me do very much that morning, as she did not +want me to be tired for the afternoon. + +'Is it a very long walk to Moor Court?' I asked her. + +Grandmamma smiled, a little funnily, I thought afterwards. + +'Yes,' she said, 'it is between two and three miles.' + +'Then we must set off early,' I said, 'so as not to have to go too fast +and be tired when we get there. I don't mind for coming back about being +tired; there'll be nothing to do then but go to bed, it'll all be over!' +and I gave a little sigh, 'but I don't want to think about its being +over yet.' + +'We must start at half-past two,' said grandmamma. 'That will be time +enough.' + +Long before half-past two, as you can fancy, I was quite ready. My frock +fitted perfectly, and even Kezia, who was rather afraid of praising my +appearance for fear of making me conceited, said with a smile that I did +look very nice. + +I quite thought so myself, but I really think all my pride was for +grandmamma's frock. + +I settled myself in the window-seat looking towards the road, as I have +explained. + +'Stay there quietly,' grandmamma said to me, 'till I call you.' + +And again I noticed a sort of little twinkle in her eyes, of which +before long I understood the reason. I must have been sitting there a +quarter of an hour at least when I thought I heard wheels coming. It +wasn't the usual time for the butcher or baker, or any of the +cart-people, as I called them, and wheels of any other kind seldom came +our way. So I looked out with great curiosity to see what it could be. + +To my astonishment, there came trotting along the short bit of level +road leading to our own steep path the two ponies and the pretty +pony-carriage that had so delighted me the first time I saw them. + +Sharley was driving, the little groom behind her. But this time my first +feeling was certainly not one of pleasure. On the contrary I started in +dismay. + +'Oh dear,' I thought, 'there's something the matter, and Sharley has +come herself to say we can't go.' + +I rushed upstairs, the tears already very near my eyes. + +'Granny, granny,' I exclaimed, 'the pony-carriage has come and Sharley's +there! I'm sure she's come to tell us we can't go.' + +My voice broke down before I could say anything more. Grandmamma was +coming out of her room quite ready, and even in the middle of my fright +I could not help thinking how nice she looked in her pretty dark gray +dress and black lace cloak, which, though she had had it a great, great +many years, always seemed to me rich and grand enough for the Queen +herself to wear. + +'My dear little girl,' she said, 'you really must not get into the way +of fancying misfortunes before they come. It is a very bad habit. Why +shouldn't Sharley have come to fetch us? Don't you think it would be +nicer to drive to Moor Court than to walk all that way along the dusty +road?' + +'Oh, granny,' I cried, and my tears, if they were there, vanished away +like magic. 'Oh, granny, that would be too lovely. But are you quite +sure?' + +'Quite,' said grandmamma, 'I promised to keep it a secret to please +Sharley, as she is so fond of surprises. Run down now to meet her and +tell her we are quite ready.' + +How perfectly delightful that drive was! I sat with my back to the +ponies, on the low seat opposite grandmamma and Sharley. + +'Vallie wanted to come too,' said Sharley, 'but that seat isn't very +comfortable for two.' + +It was very comfortable for one, at least I found it so. I had hardly +ever been in a carriage before, and Sharley drove so nice and fast; she +was very proud of being allowed to drive the two ponies. But they were +so good, they seemed, like every one and everything else, determined to +make that day a perfectly happy one. + +When we got to the lodge of Moor Court Sharley began to drive more +slowly, and looked about as if expecting some one. + +'The others said they would come to meet us,' she explained, 'and +sometimes Pert is rather naughty about startling the ponies, even though +he can't bear being startled himself. Oh, there they are!' + +As she spoke the four figures appeared at a turn in the drive. Nan and +Vallie in the pretty pink frocks, which no longer made me feel +discontented with my own, as nothing could be prettier, I was quite +firmly convinced, than grandmamma's beautiful work, which Sharley had +already admired in her own pleasant and hearty way. + +We two got out of the pony-carriage, leaving grandmamma to be driven up +to the house by the groom, the little girls saying that their mother was +waiting for her on the lawn in front. + +I had never seen the boys before. Percival seemed to me quite big, +though he was one year younger than Sharley and smaller for his age. +Quintin was more like Nan, slow and solemn and rather fat, so his +nickname of Quick certainly didn't suit him very well. But they were +both very nice and kind to me. I am quite sure Sharley had talked to +them well about it before I came, though it was easy to see that when +Pert was not on his best behaviour he was very fond of playing tricks. + +I felt very happy, and not at all strange or frightened as I walked +along between Sharley and Val, each holding one of my hands and +chattering away about all we were going to do, though I had a queer, +rather nice feeling as if I must be in a dream, it all seemed so pretty +and wonderful. + +And indeed many people, far better able to judge of such things than I, +think that Moor Court is one of the loveliest places in England. I did +not see much of the inside of the house that day, though I learnt to +know it well afterwards. It was very old and very large, and everything +about it seemed to me quite perfect. But on this day we amused ourselves +almost altogether out of doors. + +[Illustration: Grandmamma's chair was still waiting to be decorated, so +the next hour was spent very happily.--p. 67.] + +The children had already done a good deal to the arbour where we were to +have tea; but grandmamma's chair was still waiting to be decorated, so +the next hour was spent very happily in gathering branches of ivy and +other pretty green things to twine about it, with here and there a bunch +of flowers, which Mrs. Nestor had told the gardener we were to have. + +Vallie was very anxious to make a wreath for grandmamma, but though I +thought it a very nice idea, I was afraid it would look rather funny, +and when Sharley reminded us that wreaths couldn't be worn very well +above a bonnet, we quite gave it up. + +But we did make the table look very pretty, and at last everything was +ready, except the tea itself and the hot cakes, which of course the +servants would bring at the very end. + +By the time we had finished it was nearly four o'clock, and we were not +to have tea till half-past, so there was time for a nice game of +hide-and-seek among the trees. I don't think I ever ran so fast or +laughed so much in my life. They were all such good-natured children, +even if they did have little quarrels they were soon over, and then I +think they were all especially kind to me. I suppose they were sorry for +me in some ways that did not come into my own mind at all. + +Then we all went to the house to be made tidy for tea, and in spite of +what grandmamma had said about not minding if my frock was dirtied I was +very pleased to find that it was perfectly clean. + +Grandmamma and Mrs. Nestor were waiting for us in the drawing-room; and +we all went back to the arbour together, Sharley walking first with +grandmamma, which was quite right, as the plan about tea had been all +her own. + +Grandmamma _was_ pleased. I think she liked to see how fond these +children had already got to be of her, though perhaps it would have been +as well if Quick had not informed us in the middle of tea that he liked +her a great, great deal better than his real grandmamma, whose nose was +very big and her hair quite black. + +'But she's very kind to us too,' said Sharley, 'only I don't think she +cares much for little boys.' + +'Nor for tomboys either,' said Pert, who did love teasing Sharley +whenever he had a chance. + +'Jerry's her favourite,' said Nan. + +'And I think he deserves to be,' said her mother. + +'I wish he was here to-day, I know that,' said Sharley. 'It's such a +long time to the holidays, and it won't be so nice this year when they +do come, as most likely a boy's coming with Jerry.' + +'Two boys,' corrected Pert, 'their name's Vandeleur, and they're his +greatest friends.' + +'Vandeleur?' said grandmamma. 'I wonder if----' and then she stopped. 'I +have relations of that name,' she said, 'but I don't suppose they belong +to the same family.' + +'It is not a common name,' said Mrs. Nestor. 'But these boys are, I +believe, orphans. Both their father and mother are dead, are they not, +Sharley? Sharley knows the most about them,' she went on, 'for Gerard +and she write long letters to each other always, and she hears all about +his school friends and everything he is interested in.' + +'Yes,' said Sharley, 'they are orphans. They have an old aunt or some +relation who takes care of them. But I think they are rather lonely. +They often spend all their holidays at school--that was why Jerry +thought it would be nice to invite them here. I daresay it will be very +nice for _them_, but _I_ think it will quite spoil the holidays for +_us_.' + +'Come, Sharley,' said her mother, 'you must not be selfish.' + +'What are the boys' Christian names?' asked grandmamma. + +'Harry and Lindsay,' Sharley replied. + +Grandmamma shook her head. + +'No,' she said, as if thinking aloud, 'I never heard those names in the +branch of the Vandeleurs I am connected with.' + + + + +CHAPTER VI + +'WAVING VIEW' + + +I was only eight years old at the time we made the acquaintance of the +family at Moor Court. It may seem strange and unlikely that I should +remember so clearly all that happened when we first got to know them, +but even though I was so young at the time I _do_ recollect all about it +very well. + +For it was so new to me that it made a great impression. + +Till then I had never had any real companions; as I have said already, I +had scarcely ever had a meal out of our own house. It was like the +opening of a new world to me. + +But I have asked grandmamma about a few things which she remembers more +exactly than I do. Especially about the Vandeleur boys, I mean about +what was said of them. But for things that happened afterwards I daresay +I should never have thought of this again, though grandmamma did not +forget about it. She told me over quite lately everything that had +passed at that birthday tea. + +The months, and indeed the years that followed that first happy day at +Moor Court seem to me now, on looking back upon them, a good deal mixed +up together--till, that is to say, a change, a melancholy one for me, +came over my happy friendship with the Nestor children. + +This change, however, did not come for fully three years, and these +three years were very bright and sunny ones. Sharley and her sisters +continued all that time to be my grandmamma's pupils--winter and summer, +all the year round, except for some weeks of holiday at Christmas, and a +rather longer time in the autumn, when the Nestors generally went to the +sea-side for a change; unless the weather was terribly bad or stormy, +twice a week they either walked over with a maid, or the governess-cart +drawn by the fat pony made its appearance at the end of our path. +Sometimes the little groom went on into the village if there were any +messages, sometimes if it was cold he drove as far as the farm at the +foot of the hill, where it was arranged that he could 'put up' for an +hour or two, sometimes in warm summer days the pony-cart just waited +where it was. + +Often, once a fortnight or so at least, in the fine season, I made one +of the party on the little girls' return home. How we all managed to +squeeze into the cart, or how old Bunch managed to take us all home +without coming to grief on the way, I am sure I can't say. + +I only know we _did_ manage it, and so did he. For he is still alive and +well, and no doubt 'ready to tell the story,' if he could speak. + +We never seemed to be ill in those days. The Nestor children were no +doubt very strong, and I grew much stronger. Then Middlemoor is such a +splendidly healthy place. + +I have some misty recollections of Nan and Vallie having the measles, +and a doubt arising as to whether I had not got it too. But if it was +measles it did not seem worse than a cold, and we were soon all out and +about again, as merry as ever. + +And grandmamma seemed to grow younger during those years. Her mind was +more at rest for the time, for the steady payment she received for the +girls' French lessons made all the difference in our little income, +between being comfortable, with a small extra in case of need, and +being only _just_ able to make both ends meet with a great deal of +tugging. And grandmamma was happy about taking the money, for it was +well earned; Sharley and the others made such good progress in French +and after a little while in German also, even though Nan was by nature +rather slow and Vallie dreadfully flighty, and not at all good at giving +her attention. + +But she _was_ so sweet! I never saw any one so sweet as Vallie, when she +had been found fault with and was sorry; the tears used to come up into +her big brown eyes very slowly and stay there, making them look like +velvety pansies with dewdrops in them. + +Somehow Sharley always seemed the _most_ my friend, though she was a +good deal older. Perhaps it was through having known her the first, and +partly, I daresay, because in _some_ ways I was old for my age. + +The big brother Gerard came home for his holidays three times a year. He +was a very nice boy, I am sure, but I did not get to know him well, and +I had rather a grudge at him. For when he was at Moor Court I seemed to +see so much less of Sharley. It wasn't her fault. She was not a +changeable girl at all, but Jerry had always been accustomed to having +her a great deal with him in his holidays, as she took pains to explain +to me. So of course if she had given him up for me she _would_ have been +changeable. + +She did her best, I will say that for her. She told Gerard all about me, +and he was very nice to me. But it was in rather a big boy way, which I +did not understand. I thought he was treating me like a baby when _he_ +only meant to be kind and brotherly. I remember one day being so +offended at his lifting me over a stile, that it was all I could do not +to burst into tears! + +So it came to be the way among us, without anything being actually said +about it, that during Jerry's holidays I was mostly with the four +others--Nan and Vallie and the two younger boys. + +And I daresay it was a good thing for me. For none of them were at all +old for their age; they were just hearty, healthy, regular _children_, +living in the present and very happy in it. And if I had been altogether +with the older ones I might have grown more and more 'old-fashioned.' +For Gerard was a very serious and thoughtful boy, and Sharley, though in +outside ways she seemed rather wild and hoydenish, was really very +clever and very wise, to be only the age she was. I never quite took in +that side of her character till I saw her with Jerry--she seemed quite +transformed. + +One thing came to pass, however, which was a great pleasure to the two +people it chiefly concerned and to Sharley. As for me, I don't think I +gave much attention to it, and I am not sure that if it had at all +interfered with my own life I should not have been rather jealous! + +This was a close friendship between Gerard Nestor and grandmamma. + +And it is necessary to speak about it because it was the beginning of +things which brought about great changes. + +Grandmamma loved boys and she was one of those women that are well +fitted to manage them. She used to say that till she got _me_, she had +never had anything to do with _girls_. For her own children were both +boys--papa was the elder, and the other was a dear boy who died when he +was only sixteen, and whom of course I had never seen, though grandmamma +liked me to speak of him as 'Uncle Guy.' Then, too, she had had some +charge of her nephew, Mr. Cosmo Vandeleur. + +Her friendship with Jerry came about by his reading French and German +with her in the holidays. He had never been out of England and he was +anxious to improve his 'foreign languages,' as he was backward in them, +besides having a very bad accent indeed. + +Granny has often said she never had so attentive a pupil, and it was in +talking with him--for 'conversation' was a very important part of her +teaching--that she got to know so much of Gerard, and he so much of her. + +She used to tell him stories of her own boys, Paul--Paul was papa--and +Guy, in French, and he had to answer questions about the stories to show +that he had understood her. And in these stories the name of Cosmo +Vandeleur came to be mentioned. + +The first time or so he heard it I don't think Jerry noticed it. But one +day it struck him just as it had struck grandmamma that first day--the +birthday-tea day--at Moor Court. + +'Vandeleur,' said Jerry--it was one day when he had come over for his +lesson, and as it was raining and I could not go out, I was sitting in +the window making a cloak or something for my doll. 'Vandeleur,' he +repeated. 'I wonder, Mrs. Wingfield, if your nephew is any relation to +some boys at my school. They are great chums of mine--they were to have +come home with me for the summer holidays'--it was the Christmas +holidays now,--'but their relations had settled something else for them +and wouldn't let them come. I think their relations must be rather +horrid.' + +'I remember Sharley--I think it was Sharley--speaking of them,' said +grandmamma. 'They are orphans, are they not?' + +'Yes,' said Gerard. 'They've got guardians--one of them is quite an old +woman. Her name is Lady Bridget Woodstone. They don't care very much for +her. I think she must be very crabbed.' + +'I do not think they can be related to my nephew,' said grandmamma. 'I +never heard of any orphan boys in his family, and I never heard of Lady +Bridget Woodstone. But Mr. Cosmo Vandeleur is only my nephew, because +his mother was my husband's sister--so of course he _may_ have relations +I know nothing of. He always seemed to me very near when he was a boy, +because he was so often with us.' + +She sighed a little as she finished speaking. Thinking of Mr. Vandeleur +made her sad. It did seem so strange that he had never written all these +years. + +And Jerry was very quick as well as thoughtful. He saw that for some +reason the mention of the name made her sad, so he said no more about +the Vandeleur boys. Long afterwards he told us that when he went back to +school he did ask Harry and Lindsay Vandeleur if they had any relation +called Mr. Cosmo Vandeleur, but at that time they told him they did not +know. They were quite under the care of old Lady Bridget, and she was +not a bit like granny. She was the sort of old lady who treats children +as if they had no sense at all; she never told the boys anything about +themselves or their family, and when they spent the holidays with her, +she always had a tutor for them--the strictest she could find, so that +they almost liked better to stay on at school. + +The three years I have been writing about must have passed quickly to +grandmamma. They were so peaceful, and after we got to know the Nestors, +much less lonely. And grandmamma says that it is quite wonderful how +fast time goes once one begins to grow old. She does not seem to mind +it. She is so very good--I cannot help saying this, for my own story +would not be true if I did not keep saying _how_ good she is. +But I must take care not to let her see the places where I say it. +She loves me as dearly as she can, I know--and others beside me. +But still I try not to be selfish and to remember that when the +dreadful--dreadful-for-_me_--day comes that she must leave me, it will +only for _her_ be the going where she must often, often have longed to +be--the country 'across the river,' where her very dearest have been +watching for her for so long. + +To me those three years seem like one bright summer. Of course we had +winters in them too, but there is a feeling of sunshine all over them. +And, actually speaking, those winters were very mild ones--nothing like +the occasional severe ones, of another of which I shall soon have to +tell. + +I was so well too--growing so strong--stronger by far than grandmamma +had ever hoped to see me. And as I grew strong I seemed to take in the +delightfulness of it, though as a very little girl I had not often +_complained_ of feeling weak and tired, for I did not understand the +difference. + +Now I must tell about the change that came to the Nestors--a sad change +for me, for though at first it seemed worse for them, in the end I +really think it brought more trouble to granny and me than to our dear +friends themselves. + +It was one day in the autumn, early in October I think, that the first +beginning of the cloud came. Gerard had not long been back at school and +we were just settling down into our regular ways again. + +'The girls are late this morning,' said grandmamma. 'You see nothing of +them from your watch-tower, do you, Helena?' + +Granny always called the window-seat in our tiny drawing-room my +'watch-tower.' I had very long sight and I had found out that there was +a bit of the road from Moor Court where I could see the pony-cart +passing, like a little dark speck, before it got hidden again among the +trees. After that open bit I could not see it again at all till it was +quite close to our own road, as we called it--I mean the steep bit of +rough cart-track leading to our little garden-gate. + +I was already crouched up in my pet place, when grandmamma called out to +me. She was in the dining-room, but the doors were open. + +'No, grandmamma,' I replied. 'I don't see them at all. And I am sure +they haven't passed Waving View in the last quarter-of-an-hour, for I +have been here all that time.' + +'Waving View,' I must explain, was the name we had given to the short +stretch of road I have just spoken of, because we used to wave +handkerchiefs to each other--I at my watch-tower and Sharley from the +pony-cart, at that point. + +Grandmamma came into the drawing-room a moment or two after that and +stood behind me, looking out at the window. + +[Illustration: 'I do wonder why they are so late.'--P. 82.] + +'Not that I could see them coming,' she said, 'till they are up the hill +and close to us. But I do wonder why they are so late--half an hour +late,' and she glanced at the little clock on the mantelpiece. 'I hope +there is nothing the matter.' + +I looked at her as she said that, for I felt rather surprised. It was +never granny's way to expect trouble before it comes. I saw that her +face was rather anxious. But just as I was going to speak, to say some +little word about its not being likely that anything was wrong, I gave +one other glance towards Waving View. This time I was not disappointed. + +'Oh, granny,' I exclaimed, 'there they are! I am sure it is them--I know +the way they jog along so well--only, grandmamma, they are not waving?' + +And I think the anxious look must have come into my own face, for I +remember saying, almost in a whisper, 'I do hope there is nothing the +matter'--granny's very words. + + + + +CHAPTER VII + +THE BEGINNING OF TROUBLES + + +Grandmamma was the one to reassure me. + +'I scarcely think there can be anything wrong, as they are coming,' she +said. 'You did not wave to them, either?' + +'No,' I said, 'I _did_ wave, but I got tired of it. And it's always they +who do it first. You see there's no use doing it except at that place.' + +'Well, they will be here directly, and then I must give them a little +scolding for being so unpunctual,' said grandmamma, cheerfully. + +But that little scolding was never given. + +When the governess-cart stopped at our path there were only two figures +in it--no, three, I should say, for there was the groom, and the two +others were Nan and Vallie--Sharley was not there. + +I ran out to meet them. + +'Is Sharley ill?' I called out before I got to them. + +Nan shook her head. + +'No,' she was beginning, but Vallie, who was much quicker, took the +words out of her mouth--that was a way of Vallie's, and sometimes it +used to make Nan rather vexed. But this morning she did not seem to +notice it; she just shut up her lips again and stood silent with a very +grave expression, while Vallie hurried on-- + +'Sharley's not ill, but mother kept her at home, and we're late because +we went first to the telegraph office at Yukes'--Yukes is a _very_ tiny +village half a mile on the other side of Moor Court, where there is a +telegraph office. 'Father's ill, Helena, and I'm afraid he's very ill, +for as soon as Dr. Cobbe saw him this morning he said he must telegraph +for another doctor to London.' + +'Oh, dear,' I exclaimed, 'I am so sorry,' and turning round at the sound +of footsteps behind me I saw grandmamma, who had followed me out of the +house. 'Granny,' I said, 'there _is_ something the matter. Their father +is very ill,' and I repeated what Vallie had just said. + +'I am very grieved to hear it,' said grandmamma. Afterwards she told me +she had had a sort of presentiment that something was the matter. 'I am +so sorry for your mother,' she went on. 'I wonder if I can be of use to +her in any way.' + +Then Nan spoke, in her slow but very exact way. + +'Mother said,' she began, 'would you come to be with her this afternoon +late, when the London doctor comes? She will send the brougham and it +will bring you back again, if you would be so very kind. Mother is so +afraid what the London doctor will say,' and poor Nan looked as if it +was very difficult for her not to cry. + +'Certainly, I will come,' said grandmamma at once. 'Ask Mrs. Nestor to +send for me as soon as you get home if she would like to have me. I +suppose--' she went on, hesitating a little, 'you don't know what is the +matter with your father?' + +'It is a sort of a cold that's got very bad,' said Vallie, 'it hurts him +to breathe, and in the night he was nearly choking.' + +Granny looked grave at this. She knew that Mr. Nestor had not been +strong for some time, and he was a very active man, who looked after +everything on his property himself, and hunted a good deal, and thought +nothing about taking care of himself. He was a nice kind man, and all +his people were very fond of him. + +But she tried to cheer up the little girls and gave them their lesson as +usual. It was much better to do so than to let them feel too unhappy. +And I tried to be very kind and bright too--I saw that grandmamma wanted +me to be the same way to them that she was. + +But after they were gone she spoke to me pretty openly about her fears +for Mr. Nestor. + +'Dr. Cobbe would not have sent for a London doctor without good cause,' +she said. 'All will depend on his opinion. It is possible that I may +have to stay all night, Helena dear. You will not mind if I do?' + +I _did_ mind, very much. But I tried to say I wouldn't. Still, I felt +pretty miserable when the Moor Court carriage came to fetch grandmamma, +and she drove away, leaving me for the first time in my life, or rather +the first time I could remember, alone with Kezia. + +Kezia was very kind. She offered me to come into the kitchen and make +cakes. But I was past eleven now--that is very different from being only +eight. I did not care much for making cakes--I never have cared about +cooking as some girls do, though I know it is a very good thing to +understand about it, and grandmamma says I am to go through a regular +course of it when I get to be seventeen or eighteen. But I knew Kezia's +cakes were much better than any I could make, so I thanked her, but said +no--I would rather read or sew. + +I had my tea all alone in the dining-room. Kezia was always so +respectful about that sort of thing. Though she had been a nurse when I +was only a tiny baby, she never forgot, as some old servants do, to +treat me quite like a young lady, now I was growing older. She brought +in my tea and set it all out just as carefully as when grandmamma was +there, even more carefully in some ways, for she had made some little +scones that I was very fond of, and she had got out some strawberry jam. + +But I could not help feeling melancholy. I know it is wrong to believe +in presentiments, or at least to think much about them, though +_sometimes_ even very wise people like grandmamma cannot help believing +in them a little. But I really do think that there are times in one's +life when a sort of sadness about the future does seem _meant_. + +And I had been so happy for so long. And troubles must come. + +I said that over to myself as I sat alone after tea, and then all of a +sudden it struck me that I was very selfish. This trouble was far, far +worse for the Nestors than for me. Possibly by this time the London +doctor had had to tell them that their father would never get better, +and here was I thinking more, I am afraid, of the dulness of being one +night without dear granny than of the sorrow that was perhaps coming +over Sharley and the others of being without their father for always. + +For I scarcely think my 'presentiments' would have troubled me much +except for the being alone and missing granny so. + +I made up my mind to be sensible and not fanciful. I got out what I +called my 'secret work,' which was at that time a footstool I was +embroidering for grandmamma's next birthday, and I did a good bit of it. +That made me feel rather better, and when my bedtime came it was nice to +think I had nothing to do but to go to sleep and stay asleep to make +to-morrow morning come quickly. + +I fell asleep almost at once. But when I woke rather with a start--and I +could not tell what had awakened me--it was still quite, quite dark, +certainly not to-morrow morning. + +'Oh, dear!' I thought, 'what a bother! Here I am as wide awake as +anything, and I so seldom wake at all. Just this night when I wanted to +sleep straight through.' + +I lay still. Suddenly I heard some faint sounds. Some one was moving +about downstairs. Could it be Kezia up still? It must be very +late--quite the middle of the night, I fancied. + +The sounds went on--doors shutting softly, then a slight creak on the +stairs, as if some one were coming up slowly. I was not exactly +frightened. I never thought of burglars--I don't think there has been a +burglary at Middlemoor within the memory of man--but my heart did beat +rather faster than usual and I listened, straining my ears and scarcely +daring to breathe. + +Then at last the steps stopped at my door, and some one began to turn +the handle. I _almost_ screamed. But--in one instant came the dear +voice-- + +'Is my darling awake?' so gently, it was scarcely above a whisper. + +'Oh, granny, dear, dear granny, is it you?' I said, and every bit of me, +heart and ears and everything, seemed to give one throb of delight. I +shall never forget it. It was like the day I ran into her arms down the +steep garden-path. + +'Did I startle you?' she went on. 'Generally you sleep so soundly that I +hoped I would not awake you.' + +'I was awake, dear grandmamma,' I said, 'and oh, I am so glad you have +come home.' + +I clung to her as if I would never let her go, and then she told me the +news from Moor Court. The London doctor had spoken gravely, but still +hopefully. With great care, the greatest care, he trusted Mr. Nestor +would quite recover. + +'So I came home to my little girl,' said grandmamma, 'though I have +promised poor Mrs. Nestor to go to her again to-morrow.' + +'I don't mind anything if you are here at night,' I said, with a sigh of +comfort. + +And then she kissed me again and I turned round and was asleep in five +minutes, and when I woke the next time it _was_ morning; the sunshine +was streaming in at the window. + +There were some weeks after that of a good deal of anxiety about Mr. +Nestor, though he went on pretty well. Grandmamma went over every two or +three days, just to cheer Mrs. Nestor a little--not that there was +really anything to do, for they had trained nurses, and everything money +could get. The girls went on with their lessons as usual, which was of +course much better for them. But in those few weeks Sharley almost +seemed to grow into a woman. + +I felt rather 'left behind' by her, for I was only eleven, and as soon +as the first great anxiety about Mr. Nestor was over I did not think +very much more about it. Nor did Nan and Vallie. We were quite satisfied +that he would soon be well again, and that everything would go on as +usual. Only Sharley looked grave. + +At last the blow fell. It was a very bad blow to me, and in one +way--which, however, I did not understand till some time later--even +worse to grandmamma, though she said nothing to hint at such a thing in +the least. + +And it was a blow to the Nestor children, for they loved their home and +their life dearly, and had no wish for any change. + +This was it. They were all to go abroad almost immediately, for the +whole winter at any rate. The doctors were perfectly certain that it was +necessary for Mr. Nestor, and he would not hear of going alone, and Mrs. +Nestor could not bear the idea of a separation from her children. +Besides--they were very rich, there were no difficulties in the way of +their travelling most comfortably, and having everything they could want +wherever they went to. + +To me it was the greatest trouble I had ever known--and I really do +think the little girls--Sharley too--minded it more on my account than +on any other. + +But it had to be. + +Almost before we had quite taken in that it was really going to be, they +were off--everything packed up, a courier engaged--rooms secured at the +best hotel in the place they were going to--for all these things can be +done in no time when people have lots of money, grandmamma said--and +they were gone! Moor Court shut up and deserted, except for the few +servants left in charge, to keep it clean and in good order. + +I only went there once all that winter, and I never went again. I could +not bear it. For in among the trees where we played I came upon the +traces of our last paper-chase, and passing the side of the house it was +even worse. For the schoolrooms and play-room were in that wing, and +above them the nurseries, where Vallie used to rub her little nose +against the panes when she was shut up with one of her bad colds. Some +cleaning was going on, for it was like Longfellow's poem exactly-- + + 'I saw the nursery windows + Wide open to the air, + But the faces of the children, + They were no longer there.' + +I just squeezed grandmamma's hand without speaking, and we turned away. + +It _is_ true that troubles do not often come alone. That winter was one +of the very severe ones I have spoken of, that come now and then in that +part of Middleshire. + +For the Nestors' sake it made us all the more glad that they were safely +away from weather which, in his delicate state, would very probably have +killed their father. I think this was our very first thought when the +snow began to fall, only two or three weeks after they left, and went on +falling till the roads were almost impassable, and remained lying for I +am afraid to say how long, so intense was the frost that set in. + +I thought it rather good fun just at the beginning, and wished I could +learn to skate. Grandmamma did not seem to care about my doing so, which +I was rather surprised at, as she had often told me stories of how fond +she was of skating when she was young, and how clever papa and Uncle Guy +were at it. + +She said I had no one to teach me, and when I told her that I was sure +Tom Linden, a nephew of the vicar's who was staying with his uncle and +aunt just then, would help me, she found some other objection. Tom was a +very stupid, very good-natured boy. I had got to know him a little at +the Nestors. He was slow and heavy and rather fat. I tried to make +granny laugh by saying he would be a good buffer to fall upon. I saw she +was looking grave, and I felt a little cross at her not wanting me to +skate, and I persisted about it. + +'Do let me, grandmamma,' I said. 'I can order a pair of skates at +Barridge's. They don't keep the best kind in stock, but I know they can +get them.' + +'No, my dear,' said grandmamma at last, very decidedly. 'I am not at all +sure that it would be nice for you--it would have been different if the +Nestors had been here. And besides, there are several things you need to +have bought for you much more than skates. You must have extra warm +clothing this winter.' + +She did not say right out that she did not know where the money was to +come from for my wants--as for her own, when did the darling ever think +of _them_?--but she gave a little sigh, and the thought did come into my +head for a moment--was grandmamma troubled about money? But it did not +stay there. We had been so comfortable the last few years that I had +really thought less about being poor than when I was quite little. + +And other things made me forget about it. For a very few days after +that, most unfortunately, I got ill. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +TWO LETTERS + + +It was only a bad cold. Except for having to stay in the house, I would +not have minded it very much, for after the first few days, when I was +feverish and miserable, I did not feel very bad. And like a child, I +thought every day that I should be all right the next. + +I daresay I should have got over it much quicker if the weather had not +been so severe. But it was really awfully cold. Even my own sense told +me it would be mad to think of going out. So I got fidgety and +discontented, and made myself look worse than I really was. + +And for the very first time in my life there seemed to come a little +cloud, a little coldness, between dear grandmamma and me. Speaking about +it since then, _she_ says it was not all my fault, but _I_ think it was. +I was selfish and thoughtless. She was dull and low-spirited, and I had +never seen her like that before. And I did not know all the reasons +there were for her being so, and I felt a kind of irritation at it. Even +when she tried, as she often and often did, to throw it off and cheer me +up in some little way by telling me stories, or proposing some new game, +or new fancy-work, I would not meet her half-way, but would answer +pettishly that I was tired of all those things. And I was vexed at +several little changes in our way of living. All that winter we sat in +the dining-room, and never had a fire in the drawing-room, and our food +was plainer than I ever remembered it. Granny used to have special +things for me--beef-tea and beaten-up eggs and port-wine--but I hated +having them all alone and seeing her eating scarcely anything. + +'I don't want these messy things as if I was really ill,' I said. 'Why +don't we have nice little dinners and teas as we used?' + +Grandmamma never answered these questions plainly; she would make some +little excuse about not feeling hungry in frosty weather, or that the +tradespeople did not like sending often. But once or twice I caught her +looking at me when she did not know I saw her, and then there was +something in her eyes which made me think I was a horridly selfish +child. And yet I did not _mean_ to be. I really did not understand, and +it was rather trying to be cooped up for so long, in a room scarcely +bigger than a cupboard, after my free open life of the last three years +or so. + +Dr. Cobbe came once or twice at the beginning of my cold and looked +rather grave. Then he did not come again for two or three weeks--I think +he had told grandmamma to let him know if I got worse. + +And one day when I had really made myself feverish by my fidgety +grumbling, and then being sorry and crying, which brought on a fit of +coughing, grandmamma got so unhappy that she tucked me up on the sofa by +the fire, and went off herself, though it was late in the afternoon, to +fetch him herself. She would not let Kezia go because she wanted to +speak to him alone; I did not know it at the time, but I remember waking +up and hearing voices near me, and there were the doctor and grandmamma. +She was in her indoors dress just as usual, for me not to guess she had +been out. + +I sat up, feeling much the better for my sleep. Dr. Cobbe laughed and +joked--that was his way--he listened to my breathing and pommelled me +and told me I was a little humbug. Then he went off into Kezia's +kitchen, where there _had_ to be a tiny fire, with grandmamma, and a few +minutes later I heard him saying good-bye. + +Grandmamma came back to me looking happier than for some time past. The +doctor, she has told me since, really did assure her that there was +nothing serious the matter with me, that I was a growing child and must +be well fed and kept cheerful, as I was inclined to be nervous and was +not exactly robust. + +And the relief to grandmamma was great. That evening she was more like +her old self than she had been for long, even though I daresay she was +awake half the night thinking over the doctor's advice, and wondering +what more she _could_ do to get enough money to give me all I needed. + +For some of her money-matters had gone wrong. That I did not know till +long afterwards. It was just about the time of Mr. Nestor's illness, and +it was not till the Moor Court family had left that she found out the +worst of it--that for two or three years _at least_ we should be thirty +or forty pounds a year poorer than we had been. + +It _was_ hard on her--coming at the very same time as the extra money +for the lessons left off! And the severe winter and my cold all added to +it. It even made it more difficult for her to hear of other pupils, or +to get any orders for her beautiful fancy-work. No visitors would come +to Middlemoor _this_ winter, though when it was mild they sometimes did. + +Still, from the day of Dr. Cobbe's visit things improved a little--for +the time at least. And in the end it was a good thing that grandmamma +was not tempted to try her eyes with any embroidery again, as she really +might have made herself blind. It had been such a blessing that she did +not need to do it during the years she gave lessons to Sharley and her +sisters. + +I went on getting better pretty steadily, especially once I was allowed +to go out a little, though, as it was a very cold spring, it was only +for some time _very_ little, just an hour or so in the best part of the +day. And grandmamma followed Dr. Cobbe's advice, though I never shall +understand how she managed to do so. She was so determined to be +cheerful that when I look back upon it now it almost makes me cry. I had +all the nourishing things to eat that it was possible to get, and how +thoughtless and ungrateful I was! My appetite was not very good, and I +remember actually grumbling at having to take beef-tea, and beaten-up +eggs, and things like that at odd times. I scarcely like to say it, but +in my heart I do not believe grandmamma had enough to eat that winter. + +About Easter--or rather at the time for the big school Easter holidays, +which does not always match real Easter--we had a pleasant surprise. At +least it was a pleasant surprise for grandmamma--I don't know that I +cared about it particularly, and I certainly little thought what would +come of it! + +One afternoon Gerard Nestor walked in. + +Granny's face quite lighted up, and for a moment or two I felt very +excited. + +'Have you all come home?' I exclaimed. 'I haven't had a letter from +Sharley for ever so long--perhaps--perhaps she meant to surprise me,' I +had been going to say, but something in Jerry's face stopped me. He +looked rather grave; not that he was ever anything but quiet. + +'No,' he said, 'I only wish they _were_ all back, or likely to come. I'm +afraid there's no chance of it. The doctors out there won't hear of it +this year at all. Just when father was hoping to arrange for coming back +soon, they found out something or other unsatisfactory about him, and +now it is settled that he must stay out of England another whole year at +least. They are speaking of Algeria or Egypt for next winter.' + +My face fell. I was on the point of crying. Gerard looked very +sympathising. + +'I did not myself mind it so much till I came down here,' he said. 'But +it is so lonely and dull at Moor Court. I hope you will let me come here +a great deal, Mrs. Wingfield. I mean to work hard at my foreign +languages these holidays--it will give me something to do. You see it +wasn't worth while my going out to Hyères for only three weeks, and I +hoped even they might be coming back. So I asked to come down here. I +didn't think it could be so dull.' + +'You are all alone at home?' said grandmamma. 'Yes, it must be very +lonely. I shall be delighted to read with you as much as you like. I am +not very busy.' + +'Thank you,' said Gerard. 'Well, I only hope you won't have too much of +me. May I stay to tea to-day?' + +'Certainly,' said grandmamma. But I noticed--I don't think Gerard +did--that her face had grown rather anxious-looking as he spoke. 'If +you like,' she went on, 'we can glance over your books, some of them are +still here, and settle on a little work at once.' + +'All right,' said he. But then he added, rather abruptly, 'You are not +looking well, Mrs. Wingfield? I think you have got thinner. And Helena +looks rather white, though she has not grown much.' + +I felt vexed at his saying I had not grown much. + +'It's no wonder I am white,' I said in a surly tone. 'I have been mewed +up in the house almost ever since Sharley and all of them went away.' + +And then grandmamma explained about my having been ill. + +'I'm very sorry,' said Jerry, 'but you look worse than Helena, Mrs. +Wingfield.' + +I felt crosser and crosser. I fancied he meant to reproach me with +grandmamma's looking ill, even though it made me uneasy too. I glanced +at her--a faint pink flush had come over her face at his words. + +'_I_ don't think granny looks ill at all,' I said. + +'No, indeed, I am very well,' she said, with a smile. + +Gerard said no more, but I know he thought me a selfish spoilt child. +And from that moment he set himself to watch grandmamma and to find out +if anything was really the matter. + +He _did_ find out, and that pretty quickly, I fancy, that we were much +poorer. But it was very difficult for him to do anything to help +grandmamma. She was so dignified, and in some ways reserved. She got a +letter from Mrs. Nestor a few days later, thanking her for reading with +Jerry again, and saying that of course the lessons must be arranged +about as before. And it vexed her a very little. (She has told me about +it since.) Perhaps she was feeling unusually sensitive and depressed +just then. But however that may have been, she wrote a letter to Mrs. +Nestor, which made her really _afraid_ of offering to pay. It was not as +if there was time for a good many lessons, granny wrote--would not Mrs. +Nestor let her render this very small service as a friend? + +And Jerry did not know what he _could_ do. It was not the season for +game, except rabbits--and he did send rabbits two or three times--and I +know now that he scarcely dared to stay to tea, or _not_ to stay, for if +he refused granny seemed hurt. + +On the whole, nice as he was, it was almost a relief when he went away +back to school. + +Still things were not so bad as in winter. I was really all right +again, and a little money come in to grandmamma about May or June that +she had not dared to hope for. We got on pretty well that summer. + +None of the Nestors came to Moor Court at all. Gerard joined them for +the long holidays in Switzerland. Mrs. Nestor wrote now and then to +granny, and Sharley to me, but of course there was not the least hint of +what Gerard had told them. I think they believed and hoped he had +exaggerated it--he was the sort of boy to fancy things worse than they +were if he cared about people, I think. + +And so it got on to be the early autumn again. I think it was about the +middle of September when the first beginning of the great change in our +lives came. + +It was cold already, and the weather prophets were talking of another +severe winter. Grandmamma watched the signs of it anxiously. She kept +comparing it with the same time last year till I got quite tired of the +subject. + +'Really, grandmamma,' I said one morning, 'what does it matter? If it is +very cold we must have big fires and keep ourselves warm. And one thing +I know--I am not going to be shut up again like last winter. I am going +to get skates and have some fun as soon as ever the frost comes.' + +I said it half jokingly, but still I was ready to be cross too. I had +not improved in some ways since I was ill. I was less thoughtful for +grandmamma and quite annoyed if she did not do exactly what I wanted, or +if she seemed interested in anything but me. In short, I was very +spoilt. + +She did not answer me about the skates, for at that moment Kezia brought +in the letters. It was not by any means every morning that we got any, +and it was always rather an excitement when we saw the postman turning +up our path. + +That morning there were two letters. One was for me from Sharley. I knew +at once it was from her by the foreign stamp and the thin paper +envelope, even before I looked at the writing. I was so pleased that I +rushed off with it to my favourite window-seat, without noticing +grandmamma, who had quietly taken her own letter from the little tray +Kezia handed it to her on and was examining it in a half-puzzled way. I +remembered afterwards catching a glimpse of the expression on her face, +but at the moment I gave no thought to it. + +There was nothing _very_ particular in Sharley's letter. It was very +affectionate--full of longings to be coming home again, even though she +allowed that their present life was very bright and interesting. I was +just laughing at a description of Pert and Quick going to market on +their own account, and how they bargained with the old peasant women, +when a slight sound--_was_ it a sound or only a sort of feeling in the +air?--made me look up from the open sheet before me, and glance over at +grandmamma. + +For a moment I felt quite frightened. She was leaning back in her chair, +looking very white, and I could almost have thought she was fainting, +except that her lips were moving as if she were speaking softly to +herself. + +I flew across the room to her. + +'Granny,' I said, '_dear_ granny, what is it? Are you ill--is anything +the matter?' + +Just at first, I think, I forgot about the letter lying on her lap--but +before she spoke she touched it with her fingers. + +'I am only a little startled, dear child,' she said, 'startled and----' +I could not catch the other word she said, she spoke it so softly, but I +think it was 'thankful.' 'No, there is nothing wrong, but you will +understand my feeling rather upset when I tell you that this letter is +from Cosmo--you know whom I mean, Helena, Cosmo Vandeleur, my nephew, +who has not written to me all these years.' + +At once I was full of interest, not unmixed--and I think it was +natural--with some indignation. + +'So he is alive and well, I suppose?' I said, rather bitterly. 'Well, +granny, I hope you will not trouble about him any more. He must be a +horrid man, after all your kindness to him when he was a boy, never to +have written or seemed to care if you were alive or dead.' + +'No, dear,' said grandmamma, whose colour was returning, though her +voice still sounded weak and tremulous--'no, dear. You must not think of +him in that way. Careless he has certainly been, but he has not lost his +affection for me. I will explain it all to you soon, but I must think it +over first. I feel still so upset, I can scarcely take it in.' + +She stopped, and her breath seemed to come in gasps. I was not a stupid +child, and I had plenty of common sense. + +'Granny, dear,' I said, 'don't try to talk any more just now. I will +call Kezia, and she must give you some water, or tea, or something. And +I won't call Mr. Vandeleur horrid if it vexes you.' + +Kezia knew how to take care of grandmamma, though it was very, very +seldom she was ever faint or nervous or anything of that kind. + +And something told me that the best _I_ could do was to leave dear +granny alone for a little with the faithful servant who had shared her +joys and sorrows for so long. + +So I took my own letter--Sharley's letter I mean, and ran upstairs to +fetch my hat and jacket. + +'I'm going out for a little, grandmamma,' I said, putting my head in +again for half a second at the drawing-room door as I passed. 'It isn't +cold this morning, and I've got a long letter from Sharley to read over +and over again.' + +'Take care of yourself, darling,' said granny, and as I shut the door I +heard her say to Kezia, 'dear child--she has such tact and +thoughtfulness for her age. It is for her I am so thankful, Kezia.' + +I was pleased to be praised. I have always loved praise--too much, I am +afraid. But my conscience told me I had _not_ been thoughtful for +grandmamma lately, not as thoughtful as I might have been certainly. +This feeling troubled me on one side, and on the other I was dying with +curiosity to know what it was granny was thankful about. The mere fact +of a letter having come from that 'horrid, selfish, ungrateful man,' as +I still called him to myself, though I would not speak of him so to +grandmamma, could not be anything to be so thankful about--at least not +to be thankful for _me_. What could it be? What had he written to say? + +I am afraid that Sharley's letter scarcely had justice done to it the +second time I read it through--between every line would come up the +thought of what grandmamma had said, and the wondering what she could +mean. And besides that, the uncomfortable feeling that I was not as good +as she thought me--that I did not deserve all the love and anxiety she +lavished on me. + + + + +CHAPTER IX + +A GREAT CHANGE + + +Perhaps here it will be best for me to tell straight off what the +contents of Mr. Vandeleur's letter were. Not, I mean, to go into all as +to when and how grandmamma told me about it, with 'she said's' and 'I +said's.' Besides, it would not be quite correct to tell it that way, for +as a matter of fact I did not understand everything _then_ as I do now +that I am several years older, and it would be difficult not to mix up +what I have since come to know with the ideas I then had--ideas which +were in some ways mistaken and childish. + +First of all, how do you think Cousin Cosmo, as I was told to call him, +had come to write again after all those years of silence? What had put +it into his head? + +The explanation is rather curious. It all came from Gerard Nestor's +being at Moor Court that Easter, and feeling so sorry for grandmamma +and so sure that she was in trouble. + +I have told, as we knew afterwards, that he had written to his people, +but that grandmamma's way of answering made them think, and hope, that +he had fancied more than was really the matter, and besides it was +difficult for the Nestors, who were not _relations_, to do anything to +help grandmamma, unless she had in some way given them her confidence. +At that time they were hoping to come home the following spring, and +then, probably, Mrs. Nestor would have found out more. + +But when Gerard first went back to school his head was full of it. He +had not been _told_ anything, it was only his own suspicions, so there +was no harm in his speaking of it, as he did, though quite privately, to +his great friend, Harry Vandeleur. + +And Harry gave him some confidences in return. Lady Bridget Woodstone, +the old lady who was guardian to him and his brother, had lately +died--the boys had spent their last holidays at school, but a new +guardian had now appeared on the scene. This was a cousin of theirs +whom, till then, they had never heard of, and this cousin was no other +than grandmamma's nephew, Mr. Cosmo Vandeleur. + +Gerard quite started when he heard the name, which he remembered quite +well. Harry said that Mr. Cosmo Vandeleur was grave and quiet, he and +Lindsay felt rather afraid of him, but they would know better what sort +of person he was when they had spent the holidays with him. + +'We are to go to his house, or at least to a house he has got in Devon, +near the sea-side, next August,' he told Gerard, and he promised that he +would ask his guardian if he had any relation called Mrs. Wingfield, and +if he found it was the same, he would tell him what Gerard had said, and +how all these years she had been hoping to hear from him. For granny had +told Gerard almost as much as she had told me of how strange it was that +'Cosmo' never wrote. + +Well now you--by 'you' of course I mean whoever reads this story, if +ever any one does--you begin to see how it came about. Harry Vandeleur +_did_ tell his guardian about us, or about grandmamma, and found out +that she _was_ his aunt. Mr. Vandeleur was very much startled, Harry +said, to hear about how very differently she was living now, and he +wrote down the address and told Harry he would make further enquiries. + +That was all Harry knew, for Mr. Vandeleur was very reserved, and Harry +and Lindsay did not feel as if they knew him any better after the +holidays than before. Mrs. Vandeleur was very ill, though they thought +she would have liked to be kind; they were always being told not to make +a noise, and so they stayed out-of-doors as much as they could. It was +rather dull (_very_ dull, I should think), and they hoped they would not +spend their next holidays there; they would almost rather stay at +school. + +It was August or September when Mr. Vandeleur heard about grandmamma. He +did not at once write to her; he made enquiries of the lawyer who had +for many years managed, grandpapa's and papa's affairs, and he found it +was only too true, that granny was _very_ badly off. But even then he +did not write immediately, for Mrs. Vandeleur got worse and for a little +while they were afraid she was going to die. + +He told granny this in his letter, but went on to say that Mrs. +Vandeleur was better, and the doctors hoped she might be moved home to +their house in London after the new year. In the meantime he was in +great difficulty what to do, he had to be in London a good deal, and it +was a pity to shut up the house, as they had made it all very nice, and +they had good servants. And even when Mrs. Vandeleur was much better +she must not be troubled about housekeeping or anything for a long time, +and besides this, there was a new responsibility upon him, which he +would tell granny about afterwards. He meant the care of the two boys, +but he did not speak of them then. + +Some part of this, grandmamma told me that very evening; she also told +me how sorry her nephew was about his long silence, though, as I think I +said before, he _had_ written and got no answer,--a letter which she had +never received. + +Here I find I must change my plan a little after all, and go into +conversation again. For as I am writing there comes back to me one part +of our talk that evening so clearly, that I think I can remember almost +every word. + +We had got as far as grandmamma telling me most of what I have now +written down, but still I did not see why the letter had so upset her or +why she had whispered something to herself about being 'thankful.' + +'Well,' I said, 'I am glad he has written if it pleases you, grandmamma. +But I don't think I want ever to see him.' + +'You must not be prejudiced, Helena dear,' she answered. 'I think it +very likely you will see him, and before very long. I have not yet told +you what he proposes. He wants us to go to--to pay him a long visit in +London. He says I should be a very great help to him and Agnes--Agnes is +his wife--as I could take charge of things for her.' + +'Of course you would be a great help,' I said. 'But I think it is rather +cool of him to expect you to give up your own home and go off there just +to be of use to them.' + +Grandmamma sighed. She did not want to tell me too much of her +increasing anxiety about money, and yet without doing so it was +difficult for her to make me understand how really kind Mr. Vandeleur's +proposal was, and how it had not come a day too soon. + +'There are more reasons than that for my accepting his invitation,' she +said. 'It will be of advantage to us in many ways not to spend the +coming winter here, but in a warm, large house. If we had weather like +last year I should dread it very much. London is on the whole very +healthy in winter, in spite of the fogs. And you are growing old enough +to take in new ideas, Helena, and to benefit by seeing something more of +life.' + +I felt very strange, almost giddy, with the thought of such a change. + +'Do you really mean, grandmamma,' I said, 'that--that you are thinking +of going there _soon_?' + +'Very soon,' she answered, 'almost at once. It may get cold and wintry +here any day, and besides that, my nephew is very anxious to settle his +own plans as quickly as possible.' + +I said nothing for a minute or two. In my heart I was not at all sorry +at the prospect of a winter in London, even though I naturally shrank +from leaving dear old Windy Gap, the only home I had ever known. But the +sort of spoilt way I had got into kept me from expressing the pleasure I +felt--that one side of me felt, anyway. + +'I don't believe he cares about us,' I said at last rather grumpily. 'I +am sure he is a very selfish man.' + +Grandmamma looked distressed, but she was wise, too. She saw I was +really inclined to be 'naughty' about it. + +'Helena, my dearest child,' she said, and though she spoke most kindly I +heard by her voice that she would be firm, 'you must not yield to +prejudice, and you must trust me. This invitation is the very best thing +that could have come to us at present, and I am deeply grateful for it. +It is rather startling, I know, but there should be a good deal of +pleasure for you in our new prospects. And I am sure you will see this +in a day or two. Now go to bed, my darling. To-morrow we shall have a +great deal to talk over, and you must keep well and strong so as to be +able to help me.' + +She kissed me tenderly, and I whispered 'Good-night, dear grandmamma,' +gently and affectionately. + +But as soon as I got upstairs and was alone in my own little room, I +burst into tears. I daresay it was only natural. Still, I see now that +my feelings were not altogether what they should have been. There was a +great deal of selfishness and spoiltness mixed up with them. + + * * * * * + +After that evening I have rather a confused remembrance of the next two +or three weeks. Things seemed to hurry on in a bewildering way, and of +course it was all the more bewildering to me, as I had never known any +change or uprooting of the kind in my life. + +Grandmamma was exceedingly busy. She had to write very often to Mr. +Vandeleur, and he replied in a most business-like way, generally, I +think, by return. It was no longer a great event for the postman to be +seen turning up our path, and as well as letters he sometimes now +brought parcels. + +For grandmamma was determined that we should both look nice when we +first went to London to live in her nephew's big house, where there were +so many servants. + +'We must do him credit,' she said to me, with a smile. I understood what +she meant, and I had a feeling of pride about it, too, and I was very +pleased to have some new dresses and hats and other things. But with me +there was no good feeling to my cousin mixed up in all this. I now know +that there was reason for grandmamma's wish to gratify him; he behaved +most generously and thoughtfully about everything, sending her more than +sufficient money for all we needed, and doing it in such a nice +way--just as a son who had grown rich might take pleasure in helping a +mother to whom he owed more than mere money could ever repay. + +But though grandmamma read out to me bits of his letters in which he was +always repeating how grateful he was to her for coming to his aid in his +difficulties, she did not tell me the whole particulars of her +arrangements with him. He would not have liked it, and I was really too +young to have been told all these money-matters. + +I did notice that there was never any mention of me in what she read to +me. And now I know that Mr. Vandeleur did _not_ particularly rejoice at +the prospect of my living with them too. He had proposed that I should +be sent to some very good school, for he knew nothing of children, +especially of little girls. I think he believed they were even more +tiresome and mischievous and bothering in every way than boys. + +Grandmamma would not listen for an instant to this proposal. Her first +and greatest duty in life was her granddaughter, 'Paul's little girl,' +and she would do _anything_ rather than be separated from me, especially +as I was delicate and required care. In reality I was not nearly as +delicate as she thought. But I daresay it did not add to my cousin's +wish to have me in his house to hear that I was considered so. + +Among the other things that grandmamma had to arrange about was what to +do with Windy Gap. In her heart I believe she thought it very unlikely +that it would ever be our home again, but she did not say anything of +this kind to me. She went off one day to Mr. Timbs to ask him to try to +let it as it was, with our furniture in. He promised to do his best, but +did not think it likely it would let in the winter. + +'And by the spring we shall be coming back again,' I said, when granny +told me this. I had not gone with her to Mr. Timbs; she had made some +little excuse for not taking me. + +To this she did not reply, and I thought no more about it, but I was +glad to hear that Kezia was to stay on in the cottage to keep it all +aired and in nice order. And I said to her secretly that if granny and I +were not happy in Chichester Square--that was the name of the gloomy, +rather old-fashioned square, filled with handsome gloomy houses, where +Mr. Vandeleur lived--it was nice to feel that we had only to drive to +the station and get into the train and be 'home' again in four or five +hours. + +Kezia smiled, though I think in her heart she was much more inclined to +cry, and said she hoped to hear of our being very happy indeed in +London, though of course she would look forward to seeing us again. + +I shall never forget the day we left our dear little cottage. It had +begun to be wintry, a sprinkling of snow was on the ground and the air +was quite frosty, though the morning was bright. I did feel so +strange--sorrowful yet excited, and as if I really did not know who I +was. And though the tears were running down poor Kezia's face when she +bade us good-bye at the window of the railway carriage, I could not have +cried if I had wished. We had a three miles' drive to the station. It +was only the third or fourth time in my life I had ever been there, and +I had never travelled for longer than half an hour or so, when granny +had taken me, and once or twice Sharley and the others, to one of the +neighbouring towns famed for their beautiful cathedrals. + +We travelled second class. I thought it very comfortable, and it was +very nice to have foot-warmers, which I had never seen before. My +spirits rose steadily and even grandmamma's face had a pinky colour, +which made her look quite young. + +'I should like to travel like this for a week without stopping,' I said. + +Granny smiled. + +'I don't think you would,' she said. 'You will feel you have had quite +enough of it by the time we get to London.' + +And after an hour or two, especially when the short winter afternoon +grew misty and dull, so that I could scarcely distinguish the landscape +as we flew past, I began to agree with her. + +'It will be quite dark when we get to Chichester Square,' said +grandmamma. 'You must wait for your first real sight of London till +to-morrow. I hope the weather will not be foggy.' + +'Will there be flys at the station?' I asked, 'or did you write to order +one?' + +Grandmamma smiled. + +'No, dear, that would not be necessary. There are always lots of +four-wheelers and hansoms. But Mr. Vandeleur is sending a footman to +meet us and he will find us a cab.' + +'Hasn't he got a carriage then?' said I. + +Grandmamma shook her head. + +'Not in London. Their carriages and horses are in the country still for +Mrs. Vandeleur. They will not be sent back to London till she comes.' + +'I hope that won't be for a good long while,' I said to myself, rather +unfeelingly, for I might have remembered that as soon as my cousin's +wife was well enough she was to return. So her staying away long would +mean her not getting well. + +Their being away--for Mr. Vandeleur was not in London himself just +then--was the part that pleased me the most of the whole plan. I thought +it would be great fun to be alone in London with grandmamma, and I had +been making lists of the things I wanted her to do and the places we +should go to see. It never struck me that she could have any one or +anything to think of but me myself! + + + + +CHAPTER X + +NO. 29 CHICHESTER SQUARE + + +It was quite dark when we arrived at Paddington Station, and long before +then, as grandmamma had prophesied, I had had much more than enough of +the railway journey at first so pleasant. + +I was tired and sleepy. It all seemed very, very strange and confusing +to me--the huge railway station, the dimly burning gas-lamps, the +bustle, the lots of people. For, as I have to keep reminding you, there +is scarcely ever nowadays a child who leads so quiet and unchangeful a +life as mine had been. I felt in a dream. If I had been less tired in my +body I daresay my mind and fancy would have been amused and excited by +it all. As it was, I just clung to grandmamma stupidly, wondering how +she kept her head, wondering still more, when I heard her suddenly +talking to some one--who turned out to be Mr. Vandeleur's footman--how +in the world she or he, or both of them, had managed to find each other +out in the crowd! + +I did not speak. After a while I remember finding myself, and granny of +course, safe in a four-wheeler, which seemed narrow and stuffy compared +to the Middlemoor flys, and jolted along with a terrible rattle and +noise, so that I could scarcely distinguish the words grandmamma said +when once or twice she spoke to me. I daresay a good deal of the noise +was outside the cab, and some of it perhaps inside my own head, for it +did not altogether stop even when _we_ did--that is to say when we drew +up at 29 Chichester Square. + +The house was very large--the hall looked to me almost as large as the +hall at Moor Court. It was not really so, but I could scarcely judge of +anything correctly that night. I was so very tired. + +[Illustration: A nice-looking oldish man came forward and bowed +respectfully to grandmamma.--P. 126.] + +A nice-looking oldish man came forward and bowed respectfully to +grandmamma. He was the butler. He handed us over, so to say, to a +nice-looking oldish woman, who was the head housemaid, and she took us +at once upstairs to our rooms, the butler asking grandmamma to leave the +luggage and the cab-paying to him--he would see that it was all right. +She thanked him nicely, but rather 'grandly'--not at all as if she +was not accustomed to lots of servants and attention, which I was +pleased at. It was a good thing for me that I had been so much with the +Nestors; it prevented my seeming awkward or shy with so many servants +about, which otherwise I might have been. Grandmamma of course _had_ +been used to being rich, but _I_ never had. + +There came a disappointment the very first thing. Hales, the housemaid, +threw open the door of a large, rather gloomy-looking bedroom, where a +fire was burning and candles already lighted. + +'Your room, ma'am,' she said. 'Missie's----' she hesitated. 'Miss +Wingfield's,' said granny. 'Miss Wingfield's,' Hales repeated, 'is on +the next floor but one.' + +Grandmamma looked uneasy. + +'Is it far from this room?' she said. + +'Oh no, ma'am, just the staircase--it is over this. Mr. Vandeleur +thought it was the best. It was Mrs. Vandeleur's when she was a little +girl.' For the house in Chichester Square had been left to Cousin Agnes +by her parents a few years ago; that was why it seemed rather +old-fashioned. 'All the rooms on this floor besides this one,' Hales +went on, 'are Mrs. Vandeleur's; and master's study, and the next floor +are spare rooms, except to the back, and we thought it was fresher and +pleasanter to the front for the young lady.' + +Grandmamma looked pleased at the kind way Hales spoke, but still she +hesitated. I gave her a little tug. + +'I don't mind,' I said, for I was not at all a frightened child about +sleeping alone and things like that. She smiled back at me. 'That's +right,' she said, and I felt rewarded. + +My room was a nice one when I got there, but it did seem a tremendous +way up, and it looked rather bare and felt rather chilly, even though +there was a fire burning, which, however, had not been lighted very +long. The housemaid went towards it and gave it a poke, murmuring +something about 'Belinda being so careless.' Belinda, as I soon found +out, was the second housemaid, and it was she who was to wait upon me +and take care of my room. + +'You must ring for anything you want, miss,' said Hales, 'and if Belinda +isn't attentive perhaps you will mention it.' + +And so saying she left me. I felt rather lonely, even though grandmamma +was in the same house. There was a deserted feeling about the room as if +it had not been used for a very long time, and my two boxes looked very +small indeed. I felt no interest in unpacking my things, even though I +had brought my books and some of my little ornaments. + +'They will look nothing in this great bare place,' I thought. 'I won't +take them out, and then I shall have the feeling that we are not going +to be here for long.' + +A queer sort of home-sickness for Windy Gap and for my life there came +over me. + +'I do wish we had not come here; I'm sure I'm going to hate it. I think +grandmamma might have come up with me to see my room,' and I stood there +beside the flickering little fire, feeling far from happy or even +amiable. + +Suddenly, the sound of a gong startled me. I had not even begun to take +off my hat and jacket. I did so now in a hurry, and then turned to wash +my hands and face, somewhat cheered to find a can of nice hot water +standing ready. Then I smoothed my hair with a little pocket-comb I had, +as I dared not wait to take out any of my things. But I am afraid I did +not look as neat as usual or as I might have done if I hadn't wasted my +time. + +I hurried downstairs; a door stood open, and looking in, I was sure +that it was the dining-room, and grandmamma there waiting for me. A +table, which to me seemed very large, though it was really an +ordinary-sized round one, was nicely arranged for tea. How glad I was +that it was not dinner! + +'Come, dear,' said grandmamma, 'you must be very hungry.' + +'I couldn't change my dress, grandmamma,' I said, not quite sure if she +would not be displeased with me. + +'Of course not,' she replied, cheerfully, 'I never expected it this +first evening.' + +My spirits rose when I had had a nice cup of tea and something to +eat--it is funny how our bodies rule our minds sometimes--and I began to +talk more in my usual way, especially as, to my great relief, the +servants had by this time left the room. + +'Shall we have tea like this every evening, grandmamma?' I asked; 'it is +so much nicer than dinner.' + +Grandmamma hesitated. + +'Yes,' she said, 'while we are alone I think it will be the best plan, +as you are too young for late dinner. When your cousins come home, of +course things will be regularly arranged.' + +'That means,' I thought to myself, 'that I shall have all my meals +alone, I suppose,' and again an unreasonably cross feeling came over me. + +Grandmamma noticed it, I think, but she said nothing, and very soon +after we had finished tea she proposed that I should go to bed. She took +me upstairs herself to my room, and waited till I was in bed; then she +kissed me as lovingly and tenderly as ever, but, all the same, no sooner +had she left me alone than I buried my face in the pillow and burst into +tears. I had an under feeling that grandmamma was not quite pleased with +me. I know now that she was only anxious, and perhaps a little +disappointed, at my not seeming brighter. For, after all, everything she +had done and was doing was for my sake, and I should have trusted her +and known this by instinct, instead of allowing myself from the very +first beginning of our coming to London to think I was a sort of martyr. + +'I can see how it's going to be,' I thought, 'as soon as ever Mr. and +Mrs. Vandeleur come back I shall be nowhere at all and nobody at all in +this horrid, gloomy London. Cousin Agnes will be grandmamma's first +thought, and I shall be expected to spend most of my life up in my room +by myself. It is too bad, it isn't my fault that I am an orphan with no +other home of my own. I would rather have stayed at Windy Gap, however +poor we were, than feel as I know I am going to do.' + +But in the middle of all these miserable ideas I fell asleep, and slept +very soundly--I don't think I dreamt at all--till the next morning. + +When I opened my eyes I thought it was still the night. There seemed no +light, but by degrees, as I got accustomed to the darkness, I made out +the shapes of the two windows. Then a clock outside struck seven, and +gradually everything came back to me--the journey and our arrival and +the unhappy thoughts amidst which I had fallen asleep. + +Somehow, even though as yet there was nothing to cheer me--for what can +be gloomier than to watch the cold dawn of a winter's morning creeping +over the gray sky of London?--somehow, things seemed less dismal +already. The fact was I had had a very good night, and was feeling +rested and refreshed, so much so that I soon began to fidget and to wish +that some one would come with my hot water and say it was time to get +up. + +This did not happen till half-past seven, when a knock at the door was +followed by the appearance of Belinda--at least I guessed it was +Belinda, for I had not seen her before. She was a pleasant enough +looking girl, but with rather a pert manner, and she spoke to me as if I +were about six. + +'You'd better get up at once, miss, as breakfast's to be so early, and +I'm to help you to dress if you need me.' + +'No, thank you,' I said with great dignity, 'I don't want any help. But +where's my bath?' + +'I've had no orders about a bath,' she replied, 'but, to be sure, you +can't go to the bathroom, as it's next master's dressing-room. You'll +have to speak to Hales about it,' and she went away murmuring something +indistinctly as to new ways and new rules. + +In a few minutes, however, she came back again, lumbering a bath after +her and looking rather cross. + +'How different she is from Kezia,' I thought to myself. 'I would not +have minded anything as much if she had come with us.' + +Still, I was sensible enough to know that it was no use making the worst +of things, and I think I must have looked rather pleasanter and more +cheerful than the evening before, when I tapped at grandmamma's door and +went downstairs to breakfast holding her hand. + +_She_ had much more to think of and trouble about than I, and if I had +not been so selfish I was quite sensible enough to have understood this. +A great many things required rearranging and overlooking in the +household, for, though the servants were good on the whole, it was long +since they had had a mistress's eye over them, and without that, even +the best servants are pretty sure to get into careless ways. And +grandmamma was so very conscientious that she felt even more anxious +about all these things for Mr. and Mrs. Vandeleur's sake, than if it had +been her own house and her own servants. Besides, though she was so +clever and experienced, it was a good many years since she had had a +large house to look after, as our little home at Middlemoor had been so +very, very simple. Yes, I see now it must have been very hard upon her, +for, instead of doing all I could to help her, I was quite taken up with +my own part of it, and ready to grumble at and exaggerate every little +difficulty or disagreeableness. + +I think grandmamma tried for some time not to see the sort of humour I +was in, and how selfish and spoilt I had become. She excused me to +herself by saying I was tired, and that such a complete change of life +was trying for a child, and by kind little reasons of that sort. + +'I shall be rather busy this morning,' she said to me that first day at +breakfast, 'but if it keeps fine we can go out a little in the +afternoon, and let you have your first peep of London. Let me see, what +can you do with yourself this morning? You have your things to unpack +still, and I daresay you would like to put out your ornaments and books +in your own room.' + +'I don't mean to put them out,' I said, 'it's not worth while. I will +keep my books in one of the boxes and just get one out when I want it, +and as for the ornaments, they wouldn't look anything in that big, bare +room.' + +But as I said this I caught sight of grandmamma's face, and I felt +ashamed of being so grumbling when I was really feeling more cheerful +and interested in everything than the night before. So I changed my tone +a little. + +'I will unpack all my things,' I said, 'and see how they look, anyway. +Perhaps I'd better hang up my new frocks, I wouldn't like them to get +crushed.' + +'I should think Belinda would have unpacked your clothes by this time,' +said grandmamma, 'but no doubt you'll find something to do. But, by the +bye, they may not have lighted a fire in your room, don't stay upstairs +long if you feel chilly, but bring your work down to the library.' I +went upstairs. In the full daylight, though it was a dull morning, I +liked my room even less than the night before. There was nothing in it +bright or fresh, though I daresay it had looked much nicer, years +before, when Cousin Agnes was a little girl, for the cretonne curtains +must once have been very pretty, with bunches of pink roses, which now, +however, were faded, as well as the carpet on the floor, and the paper +on the walls, to an over-all dinginess such as you never see in a +country room even when everything in it is old. + +I sat down on a chair and looked about me disconsolately. Belinda had +unpacked my clothes and arranged them after her fashion. My other +possessions were still untouched, but I did not feel as if I cared to do +anything with them. + +'I shall never be at home here,' I said to myself, 'but I suppose I must +just try to bear it for the time, for grandmamma's sake.' + +Silly child that I was, as if grandmamma ever thought of herself, or her +own likes and dislikes, before what she considered right and good for +me. But the idea of being something of a martyr pleased me. I got out +my work, not my fancy-work--I was in a mood for doing disagreeable +things--but some plain sewing that I had not touched for some time, and +took it downstairs to the library. I heard voices as I opened the door, +grandmamma was sitting at the writing-table speaking to the cook, who +stood beside her, a rather fat, pleasant-looking woman, who made a +little curtsey when she saw me. But grandmamma looked up, for her, +rather sharply-- + +'Why, have you finished upstairs already, Helena?' she said. 'You had +better go into the dining-room for a few minutes, I am busy just now.' + +I went away immediately, but I was very much offended, it just seemed +the beginning of what I was fancying to myself. The dining-room door was +ajar, and I caught sight of the footman looking over some spoons and +forks. + +'I won't go in there,' I said to myself, and upstairs I mounted again. + +On the first landing, where grandmamma's room was, there were several +other doors. All was perfectly quiet--there seemed no servants about, so +I thought I would amuse myself by a little exploring. The first room I +peeped into was large--larger than grandmamma's, but all the furniture +was covered up. The only thing that interested me was a picture in +pastelles hanging up over the mantelpiece. It caught my attention at +once, and I stood looking up at it for some moments. + + + + +CHAPTER XI + +AN ARRIVAL + + +It was the portrait of a young girl,--a very sweet face with soft, +half-timid looking eyes. + +[Illustration: It was the portrait of a young girl.--P. 139.] + +'I wonder who it is,' I thought to myself, 'I wonder if it is Mrs. +Vandeleur. If it is, she must be nice. I almost think I should like her +very much.' + +A door in this room led into a dressing-room, which next caught my +attention. Here, too, the only thing that struck me was a portrait. This +time, a photograph only, of a boy. Such a nice, open face! For a moment +or two I thought it must be Cousin Cosmo, but looking more closely I saw +written in one corner the name 'Paul' and the date 'July 1865.' I caught +my breath, as I said to myself-- + +'It must be papa! I wonder if granny knows--she has none of him as young +as that, I am sure. Oh, dear, how I do wish he was alive!' + +But it was with a softened feeling towards both of my unknown cousins +that I stepped out on to the landing again. + +It did seem as if Mr. Vandeleur must have been very fond of my father +for him to have kept this photograph all these years, hanging up where +he must see it every time he came into his room. + +Unluckily, just as I was thinking this, Belinda made her appearance +through a door leading on to the backstairs. + +'What are you doing here, miss?' she said. 'I don't think Hales would be +best pleased to find you wandering about through these rooms.' + +'I don't know what you mean,' I said, frightened, yet indignant too. 'I +was only looking at the pictures. In grandmamma's house at home I go +into any room I like.' + +She gave a little laugh. + +'Oh, but you see, miss, you are not at your own home now,' she said, +'that makes all the difference,' and she passed on, closing the door I +had left open, as if to say, 'you can't go in there again!' + +I made my way up to my own room, all the doleful feelings coming back. + +'Really,' I said, as I curled myself up at the foot of the bed, 'there +seems no place for me in the world, it's "move on--move on," like the +poor boy in the play grandmamma once told me about.' + +And I sat there in the cold, nursing my bitter and discontented +thoughts, as if I had nothing to be grateful or thankful for in life. + +Grandmamma did not come up to look for me, as in my secret heart I think +I hoped she would. She was very, very busy, busier than I could have +understood if she had told me about it, for though he did not at all +mean to put too much upon her, Mr. Vandeleur had such faith in her good +sense and judgment, that he had left everything to be settled by her +when we came. + +I do not know if I fell asleep; I think I must have dozed a little, for +the next thing I remember is rousing up, and feeling myself stiff and +cramped, and not long after that the gong sounded again. I got down from +my bed and looked at myself in the glass; my face seemed very pinched +and miserable. I made my hair neat and washed my hands, for I would not +have dared to go downstairs untidy to the dining-room. But I was not at +all sorry when grandmamma looked at me anxiously, exclaiming-- + +'My dear child, how white you are! Where have you been, and what have +you been doing with yourself?' + +'I've been up in my own room,' I said, and just then grandmamma said +nothing more, but when we were alone again she spoke to me seriously +about the foolishness of risking making myself ill for no reason. + +'There _is_ reason,' I said crossly, 'at least there's no reason why I +shouldn't be ill; nobody cares how I am.' + +For all answer grandmamma drew me to her and kissed me. + +'My poor, silly, little Helena,' she said. + +I was touched and ashamed, but irritated also; grandmamma understood me +better than I understood myself. + +'We are going out now,' she said, 'put on your things as quickly as you +can. I have several shops to go to, and the afternoons close in very +early in London just now.' + +That walk with grandmamma--at least it was only partly a walk, for she +took a hansom to the first shop she had to go to,--and I had never been +in a hansom before, so you can fancy how I enjoyed it--yes, that first +afternoon in London stands out very happily. Once I had grandmamma quite +to myself everything seemed to come right, and I could almost have +skipped along the street in my pleasure and excitement. The shops were +already beginning to look gay in anticipation of Christmas, to +me--country child that I was, they were bewilderingly magnificent. +Grandmamma was careful not to let me get too tired, we drove home again +in another hansom, carrying some of our purchases with us. These were +mostly things for the house, and a few for ourselves, and shopping was +so new to me, that I took the greatest interest even in ordering brushes +for the housemaid, or choosing a new afternoon tea-service for Cousin +Agnes. + +That evening, too, passed much better than the morning. Grandmamma spoke +to me about how things were likely to be and what I myself should try to +do. + +'I cannot fix anything about lessons for you,' she said, 'till after +Cosmo and Agnes return, for I do not know how much time I shall have +free for you. But you are well on for your age, and I don't think a few +weeks without regular lessons will do you any harm, especially here in +London, where there is so much new and interesting. But I think you had +better make a plan for yourself--I will help you with it--for doing +something every morning while I am busy.' + +'But I may be with you in the afternoons, mayn't I?' I said. + +'Of course, at least generally,' said grandmamma, 'whenever the weather +is fine enough I will take you out. It would never do to shut you up +when you have been so accustomed to the open air. Some days, perhaps, we +may go out in the mornings. All I want you to understand now, is that +plans cannot possibly be settled all at once. You must be patient and +cheerful, and if there are things that you don't like just now, in a +little while they will probably disappear.' + +I felt pleased at grandmamma talking to me more in her old consulting +way, and for the time it seemed as if I could do as she wished without +difficulty. + +And for some days and even weeks things went on pretty well. I used to +get cross now and then when grandmamma could not be with me as much as I +wanted, but so far, there was no _person_ to come between her and me, it +was only her having so much to do; and whenever we were together she was +so sweet and understanding in every way, that it made up for the lonely +hours I sometimes had to spend. + +But in myself I am afraid there was not really any improvement, it was +only on the surface. There was still the selfishness underneath, the +readiness to take offence and be jealous of anything that seemed to put +me out of my place as first with grandmamma. All the unhappy feelings +were there, smouldering, ready to burst out into fire the moment +anything stirred them up. + +Christmas came and went. It was very unlike any of the Christmases I had +ever known, and of course it could not but seem rather lonely. +Grandmamma still had some old friends in London, but she had not tried +to see them, as she had been so busy, and not knowing as yet when Cousin +Agnes would be returning. It seemed a sort of waiting time altogether. +Now and then grandmamma would allude cheerfully to Cousin Cosmo and his +wife coming home, hoping that it would be soon, as every letter brought +better accounts of Mrs. Vandeleur's health. I certainly did not share in +these hopes, I would rather have gone on living for ever as we were if +only I could have had grandmamma to myself. + +I think it was about the 8th of January that there came one morning a +letter which made grandmamma look very grave, and when she had finished +reading it she sat for a moment or two without speaking. Then she said, +as if thinking aloud-- + +'Dear me, this is very disappointing.' + +'Is anything the matter?' I asked. 'Can't you tell me what it is, +grandmamma?' + +'Oh yes, dear,' she said, 'it is only what I have been looking forward +to so much--but it has come in such a different way. Your cousins are +returning almost immediately, but only, I am sorry to say, because poor +Agnes is so ill that the London doctor says she must be near him. They +are bringing her up in an invalid carriage the first mild day, so I must +have everything ready for them. It will probably be many weeks before +she can leave her room,' and poor grandmamma sighed. + +This news was far from welcome to me, but I am afraid what I cared for +had only to do with myself. I didn't feel very sorry for poor Cousin +Agnes. Partly, perhaps, because I was too young to understand how +seriously ill she was, but chiefly, I am afraid, because I immediately +began to think how much of grandmamma's time would be taken up by her, +and how dull it would be for me in consequence. And when grandmamma +turned to me and said-- + +'I'm sure I shall find you a help and comfort, Helena,' it almost +startled me. + +I murmured something about wishing there was anything I could do, and I +did feel ashamed. + +'I'm afraid there will not be much for you actually to do,' said +grandmamma, 'and I don't think you need warning to be very quiet in a +house with an invalid. You are never noisy,' and she smiled a little; +'but you must try to be bright and not to mind if for a little while you +have to be left a good deal to yourself. I must speak to Hales about +going out with you sometimes, for you must have a walk every day.' + +And within a week of receiving this bad news there came one morning a +telegram to say that Mr. and Mrs. Vandeleur would be arriving that +afternoon. + +'Oh, dear, dear,' I thought to myself when I heard it. 'I wish I +were--oh, anywhere except here!' + +I spent the hours till luncheon--which was of course my dinner--as +usual, doing some lessons and needlework. Hitherto, grandmamma had +corrected my lessons in the evening. + +'I don't believe she'll have time to look over my exercises now,' I +thought to myself, 'but I suppose I must go on doing them all the +same.' + +I have forgotten to say that I did my lessons at a side table in the +dining-room, where there was always a large fire burning. It did not +seem worth while to have another room given up to me while grandmamma +and I were alone in the house. + +I did not see grandmamma till luncheon, and then she told me that she +was obliged to go out immediately to some distance, as Mrs. Vandeleur's +invalid couch or table, I forget which, was not the kind ordered. + +'But mayn't I come with you?' I asked. + +Grandmamma shook her head. No, she was in a great hurry, and the place +she was going to was in the city, it would do me no good, and it was a +damp, foggy day. I might go into the Square garden for a little if I +would promise to come in at once if it rained. + +There was nothing very inviting in this prospect. I liked the Square +gardens well enough to walk up and down in with grandmamma, but alone +was a very different matter. Still, it was better than staying in all +the afternoon. And I spent an hour or more in pacing along the paths +enjoying my self-pity to the full. + +There were a few other children playing together; how I envied them! + +'If I had even a little dog,' I said to myself, 'it would be something. +But of course there's no chance of that--he would disturb Cousin Agnes.' + +I went back to the house an hour or so before the expected arrival. +Grandmamma had already returned. She was in her own room, I peeped in on +my way upstairs. + +'What do you want me to do, grandmamma?' I said. + +She glanced at me. + +'Change your frock, dear, and come down to the library with your work. +Of course Cosmo will want to see you, once Cousin Agnes is settled in +her room. Dear me, I do hope she will have stood the journey pretty +well!' + +I came downstairs again with mixed feelings. I should rather have +enjoyed making a martyr of myself by staying up in my own room. But, on +the other hand, I had a good deal of curiosity on the subject of my +unknown cousins. + +'I wonder if Cousin Agnes will be able to walk,' I thought to myself, +'or if they will carry her in. I should like to see what an invalid +carriage is like!' + +I think I pictured to myself a sort of palanquin, and eager to be on the +spot at the moment of the arrival I changed my frock very quickly and +hastened downstairs with my knitting in my hand--a model of propriety. + +'Do I look nice, grandmamma?' I asked. 'It is the first time I have had +this frock on, you know.' + +For besides the new clothes grandmamma had ordered from Windy Gap, she +had got me some very nice ones since we came to London. And this new one +I thought the prettiest of all. It was brown velveteen with a falling +collar of lace, with which I was especially pleased, for though my +clothes had been always very neatly made, they had been very plain, the +last two or three years more especially. So I stood there pleasantly +expecting grandmamma's approval. But she scarcely glanced at me, I doubt +if she heard what I said, for she was busy writing a note about +something or other which had been forgotten, and almost as I spoke the +footman came into the room to take it. + +'What were you saying, my dear?' she said quickly. 'Oh yes, very +nice---- Be sure, William, that this is sent at once.' + +I crossed the room and sat down in the farthest corner, my heart +swelling. It was not _all_ spoilt temper, I was really terribly afraid +that grandmamma was beginning to care less for me. But before there had +been time for her to notice my disappointment, there came the sound of +wheels stopping at the door, and then the bell rang loudly. Grandmamma +started up. If I had been less taken up with myself, I could easily have +entered into her feelings. It was the first time for more than twelve +years that she had seen her nephew, and think of all that had happened +to her since then! But none of these thoughts came into my mind just +then, it was quite filled with myself and my own troubles, and but for +my curiosity I think I would have hidden myself behind the +window-curtains. + +Grandmamma went out into the hall and I followed her. The door was +already opened, as the servants had been on the look-out. + +The first thing I saw was a tall, slight figure coming very slowly up +the steps on the arm of a dark, grave-looking man. Behind them came a +maid laden with shawls and cushions. They came quietly into the hall, +grandmamma moving forward a little to meet them, though without +speaking. + +A smile came over Cousin Agnes's pale face as she caught sight of her, +but Mr. Vandeleur looked up almost sharply. + +'Wait till we get her into the library,' he said. + +Evidently coming up those few steps had almost been too much for his +wife, for I saw her face grow still paler. I was watching with such +interest that I quite forgot that where I stood I was partially blocking +up the doorway. Without noticing who I was, so completely absorbed was +he with Cousin Agnes, Mr. Vandeleur stretched out his hand and half put +me aside. + +'Take care,' he said quickly, and before there was time for +more--'Helena, do get out of the way,' said grandmamma. + +That was the last straw for me. I did get out of the way. I turned and +rushed across the hall, and upstairs to my own room without a word. + + + + +CHAPTER XII + +A CATASTROPHE + + +No one came up to look for me; I don't know that I expected it, but +still I was disappointed and made a fresh grievance of this neglect, as +I considered it. The truth was, nobody was thinking of me at all, for +Cousin Agnes had fainted when she got into the library and everybody was +engrossed in attending to her. + +Afternoon tea time came and passed, and still I was alone. It was quite +dark when at last Belinda came up to draw down the blinds, and was +startled by finding me in my usual place when much upset--curled up at +the foot of the bed. + +'Whatever are you doing here, miss?' she said, sharply. 'There's your +tea been waiting in the dining-room for ever so long.' + +The fact was, she had been told to call me but had forgotten it. + +'I don't want any,' I said, shortly. + +'Nonsense, miss,' said the girl, 'you can't go without eating. And when +there's any one ill in the house you must just make the best of things.' + +'Mrs. Vandeleur didn't seem so very ill,' I said, 'she was able to +walk.' + +'Ah, but she's been worse since then--they had to fetch the doctor, and +now she's in bed and better, and your grandmamma's sitting beside her.' + +I did feel sorry for Cousin Agnes when I heard this, though the sore +feeling still remained that I wasn't wanted, and was of no use to any +one. I was almost glad to escape seeing grandmamma, so I went downstairs +quietly to the dining-room and had my tea, for I was very hungry. Just +as I had finished, and was crossing the hall to go upstairs again, a +tall figure came out of the library. I knew in a moment who it was, but +Cousin Cosmo stared at me as if he couldn't imagine what child it could +be, apparently at home in his house. + +'Who--what?' he began, but then corrected himself. 'Oh, to be sure,' he +added, holding out his hand, 'you're Helena of course. I wasn't sure if +you were at school or not.' + +'At school,' I repeated, 'grandmamma would never send me to school.' + +He smiled a little, or meant to do so, but I thought him very grim and +forbidding. + +'I don't wonder at those boys not liking him for their guardian,' I said +to myself as I looked up at him. + +'Ah, well,' he replied, 'so long as you remember to be a very quiet +little girl, especially when you pass the first landing, I daresay it +will be all right.' + +I didn't condescend to answer, but walked off with my most dignified +air, which no doubt was lost upon my cousin, who, I fancy, had almost +forgotten my existence before he had closed the hall door behind him, +for he was just going out. + +I did not see grandmamma that evening, and I did not know that she saw +me, for when she at last was free to come up to my room, I was in bed +and fast asleep, and she was careful not to wake me. She told me this +the next morning, and also that Belinda had said I had had my tea and +supper comfortably. But--partly from pride, and partly from better +motives--I did not tell her that I had cried myself to sleep. + +I need not go into the daily history of the next few weeks, indeed I +don't wish to do so. They were the most miserable time of my whole life. +Now that all is happy I don't want to dwell upon them. Dear grandmamma +says, whenever we do speak about that time, that she really does not +think it was _all_ my fault, and that comforts me. It was certainly not +her fault, nor anybody's in one way, except of course mine. Things +happened in a trying way, as they must do in life sometimes, and I don't +think it was wrong of me to feel unhappy. We _have_ to be unhappy +sometimes; but it was wrong of me not to bear it patiently, and to let +myself grow bitter, and worst of all, to do what I did--what I am now +going to tell about. + +Those dreary weeks went on till it was nearly Easter, which came very +early that year. After my cousins' return home the weather got very bad +and added to the gloom of everything. + +It was not so very cold, but it was _so_ dull! Fog more or less, every +day, and if not fog, sleety rain, which generally began by trying to be +snow, and for my part I wished it had been--it would have made the +streets look clean for a few hours. + +There were lots of days on which I couldn't go out at all, and when I +did go out, with Belinda as my companion, I did not enjoy it. She was a +silly, selfish girl, though rather good-natured once she felt I was in +some way dependent on her, but her ideas of amusing talk were not the +same as mine. The only shop-windows she cared to look at were milliners' +and drapers', and she couldn't understand my longing to read the names +of the tempting volumes in the booksellers, and feeling so pleased if I +saw any of my old friends among them. + +Indoors, my life was really principally spent in my own room, where, +however, I always had a good big fire, which was a comfort. There were +many days on which I scarcely saw grandmamma, a few on which I actually +did not see her at all. For all this time Cousin Agnes was really +terribly ill--much worse than I knew--and Mr. Vandeleur was nearly out +of his mind with grief and anxiety, and self-reproach for having brought +her up to London, which he had done rather against the advice of her +doctor in the country, who, he now thought, understood her better than +the great doctor in London. And grandmamma, I believe, had nearly as +much to do in comforting him and keeping him from growing quite morbid, +as in taking care of Cousin Agnes. All the improvement in her health +which they had been so pleased at during the first part of the winter +had gone, and I now know that for a great part of those weeks there was +very little hope of her living. I saw Cousin Cosmo sometimes at +breakfast but never at any other hour of the day, unless I happened to +pass him on the staircase, which I avoided as much as possible, you may +be sure, for if he did speak to me it was as if I were about three years +old, and he was sure to say something about being very quiet. I don't +think I could have been expected to like him, but I'm afraid I almost +hated him then. It would have been better--that is one of the things +grandmamma now says--to have told me more of their great anxiety, and it +certainly would have been better to send me to school, to some +day-school even, for the time. + +As it was, day by day I grew more miserable, for you see I had nothing +to look forward to, no actual reason for hoping that my life would ever +be happier again, for, not knowing but that poor Cousin Agnes might die +any day, grandmamma did not like to speak of the future at all. + +I never saw her--Cousin Agnes I mean--never except once, but I have not +come to that yet. At last, things came to a crisis with me. One day, one +morning, Belinda told me that I must not stay in my room as it was to be +what she called 'turned out,' by which she meant that it was to undergo +an extra thorough cleaning. She had forgotten to tell me this the night +before, so that when I came up from breakfast, which I had had alone, +intending to settle down comfortably with my books before the fire, I +found there was no fire and everything in confusion. + +'What am I to do?' I said. + +'You must go down to the dining-room and do your lessons there,' said +Belinda. 'There will be no one to disturb you, once the breakfast things +are taken away.' + +'Has Mr. Vandeleur had his breakfast?' I asked. + +'I don't know,' said Belinda, shortly, for she had been told not to tell +me that Cousin Agnes had been so ill in the night that the great doctor +had been sent for, and they were now having a consultation about her in +the library. + +'I'll help you to get your things together,' she went on, 'and you must +go downstairs as quietly as possible.' + +We collected my books. It made me melancholy to see them, there were +such piles of exercises grandmamma had never had time to look over! +Belinda heaped them all on to the top of my atlas, the glass ink-bottle +among them. + +'Are they quite steady?' I said. 'Hadn't I better come up again and only +take half now?' + +'Oh, dear, no,' said Belinda,'they are right enough if you walk +carefully,' for in her heart she knew that she should have helped me to +carry them down, herself. + +But I had got used to her careless ways, and I didn't seem to mind +anything much now, so I set off with my burden. It was all right till I +got to the first floor--the floor where grandmamma's and Cousin Agnes's +rooms were. Then, as ill luck would have it--just from taking extra +care, I suppose--somehow or other I lost my footing and down I went, a +regular good bumping roll from top to bottom of one flight of stairs, +books, and slate, and glass ink-bottle all clattering after me! I'm +quite sure that in all my life before or since I never made such a +noise! + +[Illustration: Up rushed two or three ... men, Cousin Cosmo the +first.--P. 160.] + +I hurt myself a good deal, though not seriously; but before I had time +to do more than sit up and feel my arms and legs to be sure that none of +them were broken, the library door below was thrown open, and up rushed +two or three--at first sight I thought them still more--men! Cousin +Cosmo the first. + +'In heaven's name,' he exclaimed, though even then he did not speak +loudly, 'what is the matter? This is really inexcusable!' + +He meant, I think, that there should have been some one looking after +me! But I took the harsh word to myself. + +'I--I've fallen downstairs,' I said, which of course was easy to be +seen. There was a dark pool on the step beside me, and in spite of his +irritation Cousin Cosmo was alarmed. + +'Have you cut yourself?' he said, 'are you bleeding?' and he took out +his handkerchief, hardly knowing why, but as he stooped towards me it +touched the stain. + +'Ink!' he said, in a tone of disgust. 'Really, even a child might have +more sense!' + +Then the older of the two men who were with him came forward. He had a +very grave but kind face. + +'It is very unfortunate,' he said,'I hope the noise has not startled +Mrs. Vandeleur. You must really,' he went on, turning to Cousin Cosmo, +but then stopping--'I must have a word or two with you about this before +I go. In the meantime we had better pick up this little person.' + +I got up of myself, though something in the doctor's face prevented my +feeling vexed at his words, as I might otherwise have been. But just as +I was stooping to pick up my books and to hide the giddy, shaky feeling +which came over me, a voice from the landing above made me start. It was +grandmamma herself; she hastened down the flight of stairs, looking +extremely upset. + +'Helena!' she exclaimed, and I think her face cleared a little when she +saw me standing there,'you have not hurt yourself then? But what in the +world were you doing to make such a terrific clatter? I never knew her +do such a thing before,' she went on. + +'Did Agnes hear it?' said Cousin Cosmo, sharply. + +'I'm afraid it did startle her,' grandmamma replied, 'but fortunately +she thought it was something in the basement. I must go back to her at +once,' and without another word to me she turned upstairs again. + +I can't tell what I felt like; even now I hate to remember it. My own +grandmamma to speak to me in that voice and not to care whether I was +hurt or not! I think some servant was called to wipe up the ink, and I +made my way, stiff and bruised and giddy, to the dining-room--I had not +even the refuge of my own room to cry in at peace--while Cousin Cosmo +and the doctors went back to the library. And not long after, I heard +the front door close and a carriage drive away. + +I thought my cup was full, but it was not, as you shall hear. I didn't +try to do any lessons. My head was aching and I didn't feel as if it +mattered what I did or didn't do. + +'If only my room was ready,' I thought, half stupidly, 'I wouldn't mind +so much.' + +I think I must have cried a good deal almost without knowing it, for +after a while, when the footman came into the room, I started up with a +conscious feeling of not wanting to be seen, and turned towards the +window, where I stood pretending to look out. Not that there was +anything to be seen; the fog was getting so thick that I could scarcely +distinguish the railings a few feet off. + +The footman left the room again, but I felt sure he was coming back, so +I crept behind the shelter of the heavy curtains and curled myself up on +the floor, drawing them round me. And then, how soon I can't tell, I +fell asleep. It has always been my way to do so when I've been very +unhappy, and the unhappier I am the more heavily I sleep, though not in +a nice refreshing way. + +I awoke with a start, not knowing where I was. I could not have been +asleep more than an hour, but to me it seemed like a whole night, and as +I was beginning to collect my thoughts I heard voices talking in the +room behind me. It must have been these voices which had awakened me. + +The first I heard was Mr. Vandeleur's. + +'I am very sorry about it,' he was saying, 'but I see no help for it. I +would not for worlds distress you if I could avoid doing so, for all my +old debts to you, my dear aunt, are doubled now by your devotion to +Agnes. She will in great measure owe her life to you, I feel.' + +'You exaggerate it,' said grandmamma, 'though I do believe I am a +comfort to her. But never mind about that just now--the present question +is Helena.' + +'Yes,' he replied, 'I can't tell you how strongly I feel that it would +be for the child's good too, though I can quite understand it would be +difficult for you to see it in that light.' + +'No,' said grandmamma, 'I have been thinking about it myself, for of +course I have not been feeling satisfied about her. Perhaps in the past +I have thought of her too exclusively, and it is very difficult for a +child not to be spoilt by this. And now on the other hand----' + +'It is too much for you yourself,' interrupted my cousin, 'she should be +quite off your mind. I have the greatest confidence in Dr. Pierce's +judgment in such matters. He would recommend no school hastily. If you +will come into the library I will give you the addresses of the two he +mentioned. No doubt you will prefer to write for particulars yourself; +though when it is settled I daresay I could manage to take her there. +For even with these fresh hopes they have given us, now this crisis is +passed, I doubt your being able to leave Agnes for more than an hour or +two at a time.' + +'I should not think of doing so,' said grandmamma, decidedly. 'Yes--if +you will give me the addresses I will write.' + +To me her voice sounded cold and hard; _now_ I know of course that it +was only the force she was putting upon herself to crush down her own +feelings about parting with me. + +It was not till they had left the room that I began to understand what a +dishonourable thing I had been doing in listening to this conversation, +and for a moment there came over me the impulse to rush after them and +tell what I had heard. But only for a moment; the dull heavy feeling, +which had been hanging over me for so long of not being cared for, of +having no place of my own and being in everybody's way, seemed suddenly +to have increased to an actual certainty. Hitherto, it now seemed to me, +I had only been playing with the idea, and now as a sort of punishment +had come upon me the reality of the cruel truth--grandmamma did _not_ +care for me any longer. She had got back the nephew who had been like a +son to her, and he and his wife had stolen away from me all her love. +Then came the mortification of remembering that I was living in Cousin +Cosmo's house--a most unwelcome guest. + +'He never has liked me,' I thought to myself; 'even at the very +beginning, grandmamma never gave me any kind messages from him. And +those poor boys Gerard told me of couldn't care for him--he must be +horrid.' + +Then a new thought struck me. 'I _have_ a home still,' I thought; 'Windy +Gap is ours, I could live there with Kezia and trouble nobody and hardly +cost anything. I won't stay here to be sent to school; I don't think I +am bound to bear it.' + +I crept out of my corner. + +'Surely my room will be ready by now,' I thought, and walking very +slowly still, for falling asleep in the cold had made me even stiffer, +I made my way upstairs. + +Yes, my room was ready, and there was a good fire. There was a little +comfort in that: I sat down on the floor in front of it and began to +think out my plans. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +HARRY + + +In spite of all that was on my mind I slept soundly, waking the next +morning a little after my usual hour. Very quickly, so much was it +impressed on my brain, I suppose, I recollected the determination with +which I had gone to bed the night before. + +I hurried to the window and drew up the blind, for I had made one +condition with myself--I would not attempt to carry out my plan if the +fog was still there! But it had gone. Whether I was glad or sorry I +really can't say. I dressed quickly, thinking or planning all the time. +When I got downstairs to the dining-room it was empty, but on the table +were the traces of some one having breakfasted there. + +Just then the footman came in-- + +'I was to tell you, miss,' he said, 'that Mrs. Wingfield won't be down +to breakfast; it's to be taken upstairs to her.' + +'And Mr. Vandeleur has had his, I suppose?' I said. + +'Yes, miss,' he replied, clearing the table of some of the plates and +dishes. + +I went on with my breakfast, eating as much as I could, for being what +is called an 'old-fashioned' child, I thought to myself it might be some +time before I got a regular meal again. Then I went upstairs, where, +thanks to Belinda's turn-out of the day before, my room was already in +order and the fire lighted. I locked the door and set to work. + +About an hour later, having listened till everything seemed quiet about +the house, I made my way cautiously and carefully downstairs, carrying +my own travelling-bag stuffed as full as it would hold and a brown paper +parcel. When I got to the first bedroom floor, where grandmamma's room +was, a sudden strange feeling came over me. I felt as if I _must_ see +her, even if she didn't see me. Her door was ajar. + +'Very likely,' I thought, 'she will be writing in there.' + +For, lately, I knew she had been there almost entirely, when not +actually in Cousin Agnes's room, so as to be near her. + +'I will peep in,' I said to myself. + +I put down what I was carrying and crept round the door noiselessly. At +first I thought there was no one in the room, then to my surprise I saw +that the position of the bed had been changed. It now stood with its +back to the window, but the light of a brightly burning fire fell +clearly upon it. There was some one in bed! Could it be grandmamma? If +so, she must be really ill, it was so unlike her ever to stay in bed. I +stepped forward a little--no, the pale face with the pretty bright hair +showing against the pillows was not grandmamma, it was some one much +younger, and with a sort of awe I said to myself it must be Cousin +Agnes. + +So it was, she had been moved into grandmamma's room a day or two before +for a little change. + +It could not have been the sound I made, for I really made none, that +roused her; it must just have been the _feeling_ that some one had +entered the room. For all at once she opened her eyes, such very sweet +blue eyes they were, and looked at me, at first in a half-startled way, +but then with a little smile. + +'I thought I was dreaming,' she whispered. 'I have had such a nice +sleep. Is that you, little Helena? I'm so glad to see you; I wanted you +to come before, often.' + +I stood there trembling. + +What would grandmamma or Mr. Vandeleur think if they came in and found +me there? But yet Cousin Agnes was so very sweet, her voice so gentle +and almost loving, that I felt I could not run out of the room without +answering her. + +'Thank you,' I said, 'I do hope you are better.' + +'I am going to be better very soon, I feel almost sure,' she said, but +her voice was already growing weaker. 'Are you going out, dear?' she +went on. 'Good-bye, I hope you will have a nice walk. Come again to see +me soon.' + +'Thank you,' I whispered again, something in her voice almost making the +tears come into my eyes, and I crept off as quietly as possible, with a +curious feeling that if I delayed I should not go at all. + +By this time you will have guessed what my plan was. I think I will not +go into all the particulars of how I made my way to Paddington in a +hansom, which I picked up just outside the square, and how I managed to +take my ticket, a third class one this time, for though I had brought +all my money--a few shillings of my own and a sovereign which Cousin +Cosmo had sent me for a Christmas box--I saw that care would be needed +to make it take me to my journey's end. Nor, how at last, late in the +afternoon, I found myself on the platform at Middlemoor Station. + +I was very tired, now that the first excitement had gone off. + +'How glad I shall be to get to Windy Gap,' I thought, 'and to be with +Kezia.' + +I opened my purse and looked at my money. There were three shillings and +some coppers, not enough for a fly, which I knew cost five shillings. + +'I can't walk all the way,' I said to myself. 'It's getting so late +too,' for I had had to wait more than an hour at Paddington for a train. + +Then a bright idea struck me. There was an omnibus that went rather more +than half-way, if only I could get it I should be able to manage. I went +out of the station and there, to my delight, it stood; by good luck I +had come by a train which it always met. There were two other passengers +in it already, but of course there was plenty of room for me and my bag +and my parcel, so I settled myself in a corner, not sorry to see that my +companions were perfect strangers to me. It was now about seven in +the evening, the sky was fast darkening. Off we jogged, going at a +pretty good pace at first, but soon falling back to a very slow one as +the road began to mount. I fancy I dozed a little, for the next thing I +remember was the stopping of the omnibus at the little roadside inn, +which was the end of its journey. + +I got out and paid my fare, and then set off on what was really the +worst part of the whole, for I was now very tired and my luggage, small +as it was, seemed to weigh like lead. I might have looked out for a boy +to carry it for me, but that idea didn't enter my head, and I was very +anxious not to be noticed by any one who might have known me. + +[Illustration: It was all uphill too.--P. 173.] + +I seemed to have no feeling now except the longing to be 'at home' and +with Kezia. I almost forgot why I had come and all about my unhappiness +in London; but, oh dear! how that mile stretched itself out! It was all +uphill too; every now and then I was forced to stop for a minute and to +put down my packages on the ground so as to rest my aching arms, so my +progress was very slow. It was quite dark when at last I found myself +stumbling up the bit of steep path which lay between the end of the road +where Sharley's pony-cart used to wait and our own little garden-gate. +If I hadn't known my way so well I could scarcely have found it, but at +last my goal was reached. I stood at the door for a moment or two +without knocking, to recover my breath, and indeed my wits, a little. It +all seemed so strange, I felt as if I were dreaming. But soon the fresh +sweet air, which was almost like native air to me, made me feel more +like myself--made me realise that here I was again at dear old Windy +Gap. More than that, I would not let my mind dwell upon, except to think +over what should be my first words to Kezia. + +I knocked at last, and then for the first time I noticed that there was +a light in the drawing-room shining through the blinds. + +'Dear me,' I thought, 'how strange,' and then a terror came over +me--supposing the house was let to strangers! I had quite forgotten that +this was possible. + +But before I had time to think of what I could in that case do, the door +was opened. + +'Kezia,' I gasped, but looking up, my new fears took shape. + +It was not Kezia who stood there, it was a boy; a boy about two or three +years older than I, not as tall as Gerard Nestor, though strong and +sturdy looking, and with--even at that moment I thought so to +myself--the very nicest face I had ever seen. He was sunburnt and ruddy, +with short dark hair and bright kind-looking eyes, which when he smiled +seemed to smile too. I daresay I did not see all that just then, but it +is difficult now to separate my earliest remembrance of him from what I +noticed afterwards, and there never was, there never has been, anything +to contradict or confuse the first feeling, or instinct, that he was as +good and true as he looked, my dear old Harry! + +Just now, of course, his face had a very surprised expression. + +'Kezia?' he repeated. 'I am sorry she is not in just now.' + +It was an immense relief to gather from his words that she was not away. + +'Will she be in soon?' I said, eagerly; 'I didn't know there was any one +else in the house. May I--do you mind--if I come in and wait till Kezia +returns?' + +'Certainly,' said the boy, and as he spoke he stooped to pick up the bag +and parcel which his quick eyes had caught sight of. 'My brother and I +are staying here,' he said, as he crossed the little hall to the +drawing-room door. 'We are alone here except for Kezia; we came here a +fortnight ago from school, it was broken up because of illness.' + +I think he went on speaking out of a sort of friendly wish to set me at +my ease, and I listened half stupidly, I don't think I quite took in +what he said. A younger boy was sitting in my own old corner, by the +window, and a little table with a lamp on it was drawn up beside him. + +'Lindsay,' said my guide, and the younger boy, who was evidently very +well drilled by his brother, started up at once. 'This--this young +lady,' for by this time he had found out I was a lady in spite of my +brown paper parcel, 'has come to see Kezia. Put some coal on the fire, +it's getting very low.' + +Lindsay obeyed, eyeing me as he did so. He was smaller and slighter than +his brother, with fair hair and a rather girlish face. + +'Won't you sit down?' said Harry, pushing a chair forward to me. + +I was dreadfully tired and very glad to sit down, and now my brain began +to work a little more quickly. The name 'Lindsay' had started some +recollection. + +'Are you--' I began, 'is your name Vandeleur; are you the boys at school +with Gerard Nestor?' + +'Yes,' said Harry, opening his eyes very wide, 'and--would you mind +telling me who you are?' he added bluntly. + +'I'm Helena Wingfield,' I said. 'This is my home. I have come back +alone, all the way from London, because----' and I stopped short. + +'Because?' repeated Harry, looking at me with his kind, though searching +eyes. Something in his manner made me feel that I must answer him. He +was only a boy, not nearly as 'grown-up' in manners or appearance as +Gerard Nestor; there was something even a little rough about him, but +still he seemed at once to take the upper hand with me; I felt that I +must respect him. + +'Because--' I faltered, feeling it very difficult to keep from +crying--'because I was so miserable in London in your--in Cousin Cosmo's +house. He is my cousin, you know,' I went on, 'though his name is +different.' + +'I know,' said Harry, quietly, 'he's our cousin too, and our guardian. +But you're better off than we are--you've got your grandmother. I know +all about you, you see. But how on earth did she let you come away like +this alone? Or is she--no, she can't be with you, surely?' + +'No,' I replied, 'I'm alone, I thought I told you so; and grandmamma +doesn't know I've come away, of course she wouldn't have let me. Nobody +does know.' + +Harry's face grew very grave indeed, and Lindsay raised himself from +stooping over the fire, and stood staring at me as if I was something +very extraordinary. + +'Your grandmother doesn't know?' repeated Harry, 'nobody knows? How +could you come away like that? Why, your grandmother will be nearly out +of her mind about you!' + +'No, she won't,' I replied, 'she doesn't care for me now, it's all quite +different from what it used to be. Nobody cares for me, they'll only be +very glad to be rid of the trouble of me.' + +The tears had got up into my eyes by this time, and as I spoke they +began slowly to drop on to my cheeks. Harry saw them, I knew, but I +didn't feel as if I cared, though I think I wanted him to be sorry for +me, his kind face looked as if he would be. So I was rather surprised +when, instead of saying something sympathising and gentle, he answered +rather abruptly-- + +'Helena, I don't mean to be rude, for of course it's no business of +mine, but I think you must know that you are talking nonsense. I don't +mean about Mr. Vandeleur, or any one but your grandmother; but as for +saying that she has left off caring for you, that's all--perfectly +impossible. _I_ know enough for that; you've been with her all your +life, and she's been most awfully good to you----' + +'I know she has,' I interrupted, 'that makes it all the worse to bear.' + +'We'll talk about that afterwards,' said Harry, 'it's your grandmother +you should think of now--what do you mean to do?' + +I stared at him, not quite understanding. + +'I meant to stay here,' I said, 'with Kezia. If I can't--if you count it +your house and won't let me stay, I must go somewhere else. But you +can't stop my staying here till I've seen Kezia.' + +Harry gave an impatient exclamation. + +'Can't you understand,' he said, 'that I meant what are you going to do +about letting your grandmother know where you are?' + +'I hadn't thought about it,' I said; 'perhaps they won't find out till +to-morrow morning.' + +And then in my indignation I went on to tell him about the lonely life I +had had lately, ending up with an account of my fall down the stairs +and what I had overheard about being sent away to school. + +'Poor Helena,' said Lindsay. + +Harry, too, was sorry for me, I know, but just then he did not say much. + +'All the same,' he replied, after listening to me, 'it wouldn't be right +to risk your grandmother's being frightened, any longer. I'll send a +telegram at once.' + +The village post and telegraph office was only a quarter of a mile from +our house. Harry turned to leave the room as he spoke. + +'Lindsay, you'll look after Helena till I come back,' he said. 'I +daresay Kezia won't be in for an hour or so.' + +I stopped him. + +'You mustn't send a telegram without telling me what you are going to +say,' I said. + +He looked at me. + +'I shall just put--"Helena is here, safe and well,"' he replied, and to +this I could not make any reasonable objection. + +'I may be safe, but I don't think I am well,' I said grumblingly when he +had gone. 'I'm starving, to begin with. I've had nothing to eat all day +except two buns I bought at Paddington Station, and my head's aching +dreadfully.' + +'Oh, dear,' said Lindsay, who was a soft-hearted little fellow, and most +ready to sympathise, especially in those troubles which he best +understood, 'you must be awfully hungry. We had our tea some time ago, +but Kezia always gives us supper. Come into the kitchen and let's see +what we can find--or no, you're too tired--you stay here and I'll forage +for you.' + +He went off, returning in a few minutes with a jug of milk and a big +slice of one of Kezia's own gingerbread cakes. I thought nothing had +ever tasted so good, and my headache seemed to get better after eating +it and drinking the milk. + +I was just finishing when Harry came in again. + +'That's right,' he said, 'I forgot that you must be hungry.' + +Then we all three sat and looked at each other without speaking. + +'Lindsay,' said Harry at last, 'you'd better finish that exercise you +were doing when Helena came in,' and Lindsay obediently went back to the +table. + +I wanted Harry to speak to me. After all I had told him I thought he +should have been sorry for me, and should have allowed that I had right +on my side, instead of letting me sit there in silence. At last I could +bear it no longer. + +'I don't think,' I said, 'that you should treat me as if I were too +naughty to speak to. I know quite well that you are not at all fond of +Mr. Vandeleur yourself, and that should make you sorry for me.' + +'I suppose you're thinking of what Gerard Nestor said,' Harry replied. +'It's true I know very little of Mr. Vandeleur, though I daresay he has +meant to be kind to us. But what I can't make out is how you could treat +your grandmother so. Lindsay and I have never had any one like what +she's been to you.' + +His words startled me. + +'If I had thought,' I began, 'that she would really care--or be +frightened about me--perhaps I--' but I had no time to say more, there +came a knock at the front door and Lindsay started up. + +'It's Kezia,' he said, 'she locks the back-door when she goes out in the +evening and we let her in. She's been to church,' so off he flew, eager +to be the one to give her the news of my unexpected arrival. + +But I did not rush out to meet her, as I would have done at first. +Harry's words had begun to make me a little less sure than I had been as +to how even Kezia would look upon my conduct. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +KEZIA'S COUNSEL + + +The sound of low voices--Lindsay's and Kezia's, followed by an +exclamation, Kezia's of course--reached Harry and me as we stood there +in silence looking at each other. + +Then the door was pushed open and in hurried my old friend. + +'Miss Helena!' she said breathlessly. 'Miss Helena, I could scarce +believe Master Lindsay! Dear, dear, how frightened your grandmother will +be!' + +I could see that it went against her kindly feelings to receive me by +blame at the very first, and yet her words showed plainly enough what +she was thinking. + +'Grandmamma will not be frightened,' I said, rather coldly. 'Harry has +sent her a telegram, and besides--I don't think she would have been +frightened any way. It's all quite different now, Kezia, you don't +understand. She's got other people to care for instead of me.' + +Kezia took no notice of this. + +'Dear, dear!' she said again. 'To think of you coming here alone! I'm +sure when Master Lindsay met me at the door saying: "Guess who's here, +Kezia," I never could have--' but here I interrupted her. + +'If that's all you've got to say to me I really don't care to hear it,' +I said, 'but it's a queer sort of welcome. I can't go away to-night, I +suppose, but I will the very first thing to-morrow morning. I daresay +they'll take me in at the vicarage, but really--' I broke off +again--'considering that this is my own home, and--and--that I had no +one else to go to in all the world except you, Kezia, I do think--' but +here my voice failed, I burst into tears. + +Kezia put her arms round me very kindly. + +'Poor dear,' she said, 'whatever mistakes you've made, you must be tired +to death. Come with me into the dining-room, Miss Helena, there's a +better fire there, and I'll get you a cup of tea or something, and then +you must go to bed. Your own room's quite ready, just as you left it. +Master Lindsay has the little chair-bed in Mr. Harry's room--your +grandmamma's room, I mean.' + +She led me into the dining-room, talking as she went, in this +matter-of-fact way, to help me to recover myself. + +Harry and Lindsay remained behind. + +'I have had--some--milk, and a piece of--gingerbread,' I said, between +my sobs, as Kezia established me in front of the fire in the other room. +'I don't think I could eat anything else, but I'd like some tea very +much.' + +I shivered in spite of the beautiful big fire close to me. + +'You shall have it at once,' said Kezia, hurrying off, 'though it +mustn't be strong, and I'll make you a bit of toast, too.' + +Then I overheard a little bustle in the kitchen, and by the sounds, I +made out that Harry or Lindsay, or both of them perhaps, were helping +Kezia in her preparations. + +'What nice boys they are,' I thought to myself, and a feeling of shame +began to come over me that I should have first got to know them when +acting in a way that they, Harry at least, so evidently thought wrong +and foolish. + +But now that, in spite of her disapproval, I felt myself safe in Kezia's +care, the restraint I had put upon myself gave way more and more. I sat +there crying quietly, and when the little tray with tea and a tempting +piece of hot toast (which Harry's red face showed he had had to do with) +made its appearance I ate and drank obediently, almost without speaking. + +Half an hour later I was in bed in my own little room, Kezia tucking me +in as she had done so very, very often in my life. + +'Now go to sleep, dearie,' she said, 'and think of nothing till +to-morrow morning, except that when things come to the worst they begin +to get better.' + +And sleep I did, soundly and long. Harry and Lindsay had had their +breakfast two hours before at least, when I woke, and other things had +happened. A telegram had come in reply to Harry's, thanking him for it, +announcing Mr. Vandeleur's arrival that very afternoon, and desiring +Harry to meet him at Middlemoor Station. + +They did not tell me of this; perhaps they were afraid it would have +made me run off again somewhere else. But when my old nurse brought up +my breakfast we had a long, long talk together. I told her all that I +had told Harry the night before, and of course in some ways it was +easier for her to understand than it had been for him. I could not have +had a better counsellor. She just put aside all I said about +grandmamma's not caring for me any longer as simple nonsense; she didn't +attempt to explain all the causes of my having been left so much to +myself. She didn't pretend to understand it altogether. + +'Your grandmamma will put it all right to you, herself, when she sees +well to do so,' she said. 'She has just made one mistake, Miss Helena, +it seems to me--she has credited you with more sense than perhaps should +be expected of a child.' + +I didn't like this, and I felt my cheeks grow red. + +'More sense,' repeated Kezia, 'and she has trusted you too much. It +should have pleased you to be looked on like that, and if you'd been a +little older it would have done so. The idea that you could think she +had left off caring for you would have seemed to her simply impossible. +She has trusted you too much, and you, Miss Helena, have not trusted her +at all.' + +'But you're forgetting, Kezia, what I heard myself, with my own ears, +about sending me away to school, and how little she seemed to care.' + +Kezia smiled, rather sadly. + +'My dearie,' she said, 'I have not served Mrs. Wingfield all the years I +have, not to know her better than that. I daresay you'll never know, +unless you live to be a mother and grandmother yourself, what the +thought of parting with you was costing her, at the very time she spoke +so quietly.' + +'But when I fell downstairs,' I persisted, 'she seemed so vexed with me, +and then--oh! for days and days before that, I had hardly seen her.' + +Kezia looked pained. + +'Yes, my dear, it must have been hard for you, but harder for your +grandmamma. There are times in life when all does seem to be going the +wrong way. And very likely being so very troubled and anxious herself, +about you as well as about other things, made your grandmamma appear +less kind than usual.' + +Kezia stopped and hesitated a little. + +'I think as things are,' she said, 'I can't be doing wrong in telling +you a little more than you know. I am sure my dear lady will forgive me +if I make a mistake in doing so, seeing she has not told you more +herself, no doubt for the best of reasons.' + +She stopped again. I felt rather frightened. + +'What do you mean, Kezia?' I said. + +'It is about Mrs. Vandeleur. Do you know, my dear Miss Helena, that it +has just been touch and go these last days, if she was to live or die?' + +'Oh, Kezia!' I exclaimed; 'no, I didn't know it was as bad as that,' and +the tears--unselfish, unbitter tears this time--rushed into my eyes as I +remembered the sweet white face that I had seen in grandmamma's room, +and the gentle voice that had tried to say something kind and loving to +me. 'Oh, Kezia, I wish I had known. Do you think it will have hurt her, +my peeping into the room yesterday?' for I had told my old nurse +_everything_. + +She shook her head. + +'No, my dear, I don't think so. She is going to get really better now, +they feel sure--as sure as it is ever _right_ to feel about such things, +I mean. Only yesterday morning I had a letter from your grandmamma, +saying so. She meant to tell you soon, all about the great anxiety there +had been--once it was over--she had been afraid of grieving and alarming +you. So, dear Miss Helena, if you had just been patient a _little_ +longer----' + +My tears were dropping fast now, but still I was not quite softened. + +'All the same, Kezia,' I said, 'they meant to send me to school.' + +'Well, my dear, if they had, it might have been really for your +happiness. You would have been sent nowhere that was not as good and +nice a school as could be. And, of course, though Mrs. Vandeleur has +turned the corner in a wonderful way, she will be delicate for +long--perhaps never quite strong, and the life is lonely for you.' + +'I wouldn't mind,' I said, for the sight of sweet Cousin Agnes had made +me feel as if I would do anything for her. 'I wouldn't mind, if +grandmamma trusted me, and if I could feel she loved me as much as she +used. I would do my lessons alone, or go to a day-school or anything, if +only I felt happy again with grandmamma.' + +'My dearie, there is no need for you to feel anything else.' + +'Oh yes--there is _now_, even if there wasn't before,' I said, +miserably. 'Think of what I have done. Even if grandmamma forgave me for +coming away here, Cousin Cosmo would not--he is _so_ stern, Kezia. He +really is--you know Harry and Lindsay thought so--Gerard Nestor told us, +and though Harry won't speak against him, I can see he doesn't care for +him.' + +'Perhaps they have not got to know each other,' suggested Kezia. 'Master +Harry is a dear boy; but so was Mr. Cosmo long ago--I can't believe his +whole nature has changed.' + +Then another thought struck me. + +'Kezia,' I said, 'I think grandmamma might have told me about the boys +being here. She used to tell me far littler things than that. And in a +sort of a way I think I had a right to know. Windy Gap is my home.' + +'It was all settled in a hurry,' said Kezia. 'The school broke up +suddenly through some cases of fever, and poor Mr. Vandeleur was much +put about to know where to send the young gentlemen. He couldn't have +them in London, with Mrs. Vandeleur so ill, and your grandmamma was very +glad to have the cottage free, and me here to do for them. No doubt she +would have told you about it. I'm glad for your sake they are here. +They'll be nice company for you.' + +Her words brought home to me the actual state of things. + +'Do you think grandmamma will let me stay here a little?' I said. 'I'm +afraid she will not--and even if _she_ would, Cousin Cosmo will be so +angry, _he_'ll prevent it. I am quite sure they will send me to +school.' + +'But what was the use of you coming here then, Miss Helena,' said Kezia, +sensibly, 'if you knew you would be sent to school after all?' + +'Oh,' I said,'I didn't think very much about anything except getting +away. I--I thought grandmamma would just be glad to be rid of the +trouble of me, and that they'd leave me here till Mrs. Vandeleur was +better and grandmamma could come home again.' + +Kezia did not answer at once. Then she said-- + +'Do you dislike London so very much, then, Miss Helena?' + +'Oh no,' I replied. 'I was very happy alone with grandmamma, except for +always thinking they were coming, and fancying she didn't--that she was +beginning not to care for me. But--I _am_ sorry now, Kezia, for not +having trusted her.' + +'That's right, my dear; and you'll show it by giving in cheerfully to +whatever your dear grandmamma thinks best for you?' + +I was still crying--but quite quietly. + +'I'll--I'll try,' I whispered. + +When I was dressed I went downstairs, not sorry to feel I should find +the boys there. And in spite of the fears as to the future that were +hanging over me I managed to spend a happy day with them. They did +everything they could to cheer me up, and the more I saw of Harry the +more I began to realise how very, very much brighter a life mine had +been than his--how ungrateful I had been and how selfish. It was worse +for him than for Lindsay, who was quite a child, and who looked to Harry +for everything. And yet Harry made no complaints--he only said once or +twice, when we were talking about grandmamma, that he did wish she was +_their_ grandmother, too. + +'Wasn't that old lady you lived with before like a grandmother?' I +asked. + +Harry shook his head. + +'We scarcely ever saw her,' he said. 'She was very old and ill, and even +when we did go to her for the holidays we only saw her to say +good-morning and good-night. On the whole we were glad to stay on at +school.' + +Poor fellows--they had indeed been orphans. + +We wandered about the little garden, and all my old haunts. But for my +terrible anxiety, I should have enjoyed it thoroughly. + +'Harry,' I said, when we had had our dinner--a very nice dinner, by the +bye. I began to think grandmamma must have got rich, for there was a +feeling of prosperity about the cottage--fires in several rooms, and +everything so comfortable. 'Harry, what do you think I should do? Should +I write to grandmamma and tell her--that I am very sorry, and that--that +I'll be good about going to school, if she fixes to send me?' + +The tears came back again, but still I said it firmly. + +'I think,' said Harry, 'you had better wait till to-morrow.' + +He did not tell me of Mr. Vandeleur's telegram--for he had been desired +not to do so. I should have been still more uneasy and nervous if I had +known my formidable cousin was actually on his way to Middlemoor! + + + + +CHAPTER XV + +'HAPPY EVER SINCE' + + +Later in the afternoon--about three o'clock or so--Harry looked at his +watch and started up. We were sitting in the drawing-room talking +quietly--Harry had been asking me about my lessons and finding out how +far on I was, for I was a little tired still, and we had been running +about a good deal in the morning. + +'Oh,' I said, in a disappointed tone, 'where are you going? If you would +wait a little while, I could come out with you again, I am sure.' For I +felt as if I did not want to lose any of the time we were together, and +of course I did not know how soon grandmamma might not send some one to +take me away to school. + +And never since Sharley and the others had gone away had I had the +pleasure of companions of my own age. There was something about Harry +which reminded me of Sharley, though he was a boy--something so strong +and straightforward and _big_, no other word seems to say it so well. + +Harry looked at me with a little smile. Dear Harry, I know now that he +was feeling even more anxious about me than I was for myself, and that +brave as he was, it took all his courage to do as he had determined--I +mean to plead my cause with his stern guardian. For Mr. Vandeleur was +almost as much a stranger to him as to me. + +'I'm afraid I must,' he said, 'I have to go to Middlemoor, but I shall +not be away more than an hour and a half. Lindsay--you'll look after +Helena, and Helena will look after you and prevent you getting into +mischief while I'm away.' + +For though Lindsay was a very good little boy, and not wild or rough, he +was rather unlucky. I never saw any one like him for tumbling and +bumping himself and tearing his clothes. + +After Harry had gone, Lindsay got out their stamp album and we amused +ourselves with it very well for more than an hour, as there were a good +many new stamps to put into their proper places. Then Kezia came in-- + +'Miss Helena,' she said, 'would you and Master Lindsay mind going into +the other room? I want to tidy this one up a little, I was so long +talking with you this morning that I dusted it rather hurriedly.' + +We had made a litter, certainly, with the gum-pot and scraps of paper, +and cold water for loosening the stamps, but we soon cleared it up. + +'Isn't it nearly tea-time?' I said. + +'Yes, you shall have it as soon as Master Harry comes in,' said Kezia, +'it is all laid in the dining-room.' + +'Oh, well,' said Lindsay, 'we won't do any more stamps this afternoon; +come along then, Helena, we'll tell each other stories for a change.' + +'You may tell me stories,' I said--'and I'll try to listen,' I added to +myself, 'though I don't feel as if I could,' for as the day went on I +felt myself growing more and more frightened and uneasy. 'I wish Harry +would come in,' I said aloud, 'I think I should write to grandmamma +to-day.' + +'He won't be long,' said Lindsay, 'Harry always keeps to his time,' and +then he began his stories. I'm afraid I don't remember what they were. +There were a great many 'you see's' and 'and so's,' but at another time +I daresay I would have found them interesting. + +He was just in the middle of one, about a trick some of the boys had +played an undermaster at their school, when I heard the front door open +quietly and steps cross the hall. The steps were of more than one +person, though no one was speaking. + +'Stop, Lindsay,' I said, and I sat bolt up in my chair and listened. + +Whoever it was had gone into the drawing-room. Then some one came out +again and crossed to the kitchen. + +'Can it be Harry?' I said. + +'There's some one with him if it is,' said Lindsay. + +I felt myself growing white, and Lindsay grew red with sympathy. He _is_ +a very feeling boy. But we both sat quite still. Then the door opened +gently, and some one looked in, but it wasn't Harry, it was Kezia. + +'Miss Helena, my love,' she said, 'there's some one in the drawing-room +who wants to see you.' + +'Who is it?' I asked, breathlessly, but my old nurse shook her head. + +'You'll see,' she said. + +My heart began to beat with the hope--a silly, wild hope it was, for of +course I might have known she could not yet have left Cousin Agnes--that +it might be grandmamma. And, luckily perhaps, for without it I should +not have had courage to enter the drawing-room, this idea lasted till I +had opened the door, and it was too late to run away. + +How I did wish I could do so you will easily understand, when I tell you +that the tall figure standing looking out of the window, which turned as +I came in, was that of my stern Cousin Cosmo himself! + +I must have got very white, I think, though it seemed to me as if all +the blood in my body had rushed up into my head and was buzzing away +there like lots and lots of bees, but I only remember saying 'Oh!' in a +sort of agony of fear and shame. And the next thing I recollect was +finding myself on a chair and Cousin Cosmo beside me on another, and, +wonderful to say, he was holding my hand, which had grown dreadfully +cold, in one of his. His grasp felt firm and protecting. I shut my eyes +just for a moment and fancied to myself that it seemed as if papa were +there. + +'But it can't last,' I thought, 'he's going to be awfully angry with me +in a minute.' + +I did not speak. I sat there like a miserable little criminal, only +judges don't generally hold prisoners' hands when they are going to +sentence them to something very dreadful, do they? I might have thought +of that, but I didn't. I just squeezed myself together to bear whatever +was coming. + +This was what came. + +I heard a sort of sigh or a deep breath, and then a voice, which it +almost seemed to me I had never heard before, said, very, very gently-- + +'My poor little girl--poor little Helena. Have I been such an ogre to +you?' + +I could _scarcely_ believe my ears--to think that it was Cousin Cosmo +speaking to me in that way! I looked up into his face; I had really +never seen it very well before. And now I found out that the dark, +deep-set eyes were soft and not stern--what I had taken for hardness and +severity had, after all, been mostly sadness and anxiety, I think. + +'Cousin Cosmo,' I said, 'are you going to forgive me, then? And +grandmamma, too? _I am_ sorry for running away, but I didn't understand +properly. I will go to school whenever you like, and not grumble.' + +My tears were dropping fast, but still I felt strangely soothed. + +'Tell me more about it all,' said Mr. Vandeleur. 'I want to understand +from yourself all about the fancies and mistakes there have been in your +head.' + +'Would you first tell me,' I said, 'how Cousin Agnes is? It was a good +deal about her I didn't understand?' + +'Much, much better,' he replied, 'thank God. She is going to be almost +well again, I hope.' + +And then, before I knew what I was about, I found myself in the middle +of it all--telling him everything--the whole story of my unhappiness, +more fully even than I had told it to Harry and Kezia, for though he did +not say much, the few words he put in now and then showed me how +wonderfully he understood. (Cousin Cosmo _is_ a very clever man.) + +And when at last I left off speaking, _he_ began and talked to me for a +long time. I could never tell if I tried, _how_ he talked--so kindly, +and nicely, and rightly--putting things in the right way, I mean, not +making out it was _all_ my fault, which made me far sorrier than if he +had laid the whole of the blame on me. + +I always do feel like that when people, especially big people, are +generous in that sort of way. One thing Cousin Cosmo said at the end +which I must tell. + +'We have a good deal to thank Harry for,' it was, 'both you and I, +Helena. But for his manly, sensible way of judging the whole, we might +never have got to understand each other, as I trust we now always shall. +And more good has come out of it, too. I have never known Harry for what +_he_ is, before to-day.' + +'I am so very glad,' I said. + +'Now,' said Mr. Vandeleur, looking at his watch, 'it is past five +o'clock. I shall spend the night at the hotel at Middlemoor, but I +should like to stay with you three here, as late as possible. Do you +think your good Kezia can give me something to eat?' + +'Of course she can,' I said, all my hospitable feelings awakened--for I +can never feel but that Windy Gap is my particular home--'Shall I go and +ask her? Our tea must be ready now in the dining-room.' + +'That will do capitally,' said Cousin Cosmo. 'I'll have a cup of tea now +with you three, in the first place, and then as long as the daylight +lasts you must show me the lions of Windy Gap, Helena. It _is_ a quaint +little place,' he added, looking round, 'and I am sure it must have a +great charm of its own, but I am afraid my aunt and you must have found +it very cold and exposed in bad weather?' + +'Sometimes,' I said; 'the last winter here was pretty bad.' + +'Yes,' he answered, 'it is not a place for the middle of winter,' but +that was all he said. + +I was turning to leave the room when another thought struck me. + +'Cousin Cosmo,' I asked timidly, 'will grandmamma want me to go to +school very soon?' + +He smiled, rather a funny smile. + +'Put it out of your mind till I go back to London, and talk things +over,' he replied. 'I want all of us to be as happy as possible this +evening. Send Harry in here for a moment.' + +I met Harry outside in the hall. + +'Is it all right?' he said, anxiously. + +'Oh, Harry,' I said, 'I can scarcely believe he's the same! He's been so +awfully kind.' + +That evening _was_ a very happy one. Cousin Cosmo was interested about +everything at Windy Gap, and after supper he talked to Harry and me of +all sorts of things, and promised to send us down some books, which +pleased me, as it did seem as if he must mean me to stay where I was +for a few days at any rate. + +Still, I did not feel, of course, quite at rest till I had written a +long, long letter to grandmamma and heard from her in return. I need not +repeat all she said about what had passed--it just made me feel more +than ever ashamed of having doubted her and of having been so selfish. + +But what she said at the end of her letter about the plans she and +Cousin Cosmo had been making was almost too delightful. I could scarcely +help jumping with joy when I read it. + +'Harry,' I called out, 'I'm not to go to school at all, just fancy! I'm +to stay here with you and Lindsay till you go back to school--till a few +days before, I mean, and we're to travel to London together and be all +at Chichester Square. Cousin Agnes and grandmamma are going away to the +sea-side now immediately, but they'll be back before we come. Cousin +Agnes is so much better!' + +Harry did not look quite as pleased as I was--about the London part of +it. + +'I'm awfully glad you're going to stay here,' he answered; 'and I do +want to see your grandmother. I suppose it'll be all right,' he went +on, 'and that they won't find Lindsay and me a nuisance in London.' + +I was almost vexed with him. + +'Harry,' I said, 'don't _you_ begin to be fanciful. You don't _know_ how +Cousin Cosmo spoke of you the other day.' + +And after all it did come all right. My story finishes up like a +fairy-tale--'They lived happy ever after!' + +Well no, not quite that, for it is not yet four years since all this +happened, and four years would be a very short 'ever after.' + +But I may certainly say we have lived most happily ever since that time +till now. + +Cousin Agnes is much, much better. She never will be quite strong--never +a very strong person, I mean. But she is _so_ sweet, our boys and I +often think we should scarcely like her to be any different in any way +from what she is, though of course not really ill or suffering. + +And 'our boys'--yes, that is what they are--dear brothers to me, just +like real ones, and just like grandsons to dear, dear grandmamma. They +come to Chichester Square regularly for their holidays--it is their +'new home,' as it is mine. But we have another home--and it is not much +of the holidays except the Christmas ones that we--grandmamma and we +three--spend in London. + +For Windy Gap is still ours--and Kezia lives there and is always ready +to have us--and Cousin Cosmo has built on two or three more rooms, and +our summers there are just _perfect_! + +The Nestors came back to Moor Court long ago, and I see almost as much +of them as in the old days, as they now come to their London house every +year for some months, and we go to several classes together, though I +have a daily governess as well. + +Next year Sharley is to 'come out.' Just fancy! I am sure every one will +think her very pretty. But not many can know as well as I do that her +face only tells a very small part of her beauty. She is so very, very +good. + +I daresay you will wonder how Cousin Cosmo--grave, stern Cousin +Cosmo--likes it all. His quiet solemn house the home of three adopted +children, who are certainly not solemn, and not always 'quiet' by any +means. + +I can only tell you that he said to grandmamma not very long ago, and +she told me, and I told Harry--that he had 'never been so happy since he +was a boy himself,' all but a son to her and a brother to 'Paul'--that +was my father, you know. + + +THE END + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of My New Home, by Mary Louisa Molesworth + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MY NEW HOME *** + +***** This file should be named 26310-8.txt or 26310-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/2/6/3/1/26310/ + +Produced by Chris Curnow, Annie McGuire, Lindy Walsh and +the Online Distributed Proofreading Team at +https://www.pgdp.net + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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