Kitabı oku: «The Girls of St. Wode's», sayfa 4

CHAPTER VII – THE FATE OF THE GIRLS

Belle Acheson was a young woman who never let the grass grow under her feet. Having rushed downstairs at a headlong speed, she now presented herself in the drawing-room.

“I have just examined the frontal developments of Marjorie’s and Eileen’s heads,” she said, speaking in a loud, rapid voice, and glancing in the direction where Mrs. Chetwynd and Mrs. Acheson were seated together on a sofa. “I have examined the frontal developments of the two girls, and I am glad to tell you that they both show marked intellectuality. I have recommended them to join me at St. Wode’s College, Wingfield, immediately. Will you, therefore, Mrs. Chetwynd, kindly take the necessary steps to see that this is carried out? You must write to our principal, Miss Lauderdale, asking her to give you all particulars as to the necessary steps to be taken for admission. If the girls have not already passed some public examination, they must pass Responsions. The subjects are Latin, Greek, mathematics. But if they have already passed the London Matriculation, or the Cambridge Higher Local, or the – ”

“My dear, my dear!” cried Mrs. Acheson, “you are positively bewildering my dear friend. What are you driving at?”

“I am driving at nothing,” said Belle, in a voice of dignity. “I am stating facts. The girls wish to enter St. Wode’s. To do so they must have passed, or will have to pass, certain examinations; but the main thing is to write to Miss Lauderdale. Her address is Miss Lauderdale, Principal of St. Wode’s College, Wingfield. Did you speak, Mrs. Chetwynd?”

“I did not,” replied Mrs. Chetwynd, in an angry voice. “Will you take a chair, please? Can I give you a cup of tea?”

“Tea?” cried Belle. “I never take tea, thank you; but I should like a glass of water, please, for my throat is quite dry with all the talking I have been obliged to go through. Don’t you know, Mrs. Chetwynd, that tea is decidedly bad for the brain, and also for the coats of the stomach. Oh, it has a shocking effect. Our best tutors at St. Wode’s never countenance tea. Coffee, strong black coffee, one is obliged to take now and then, particularly when one has to sit up at night before an exam. for honors. Coffee and a wet towel; but tea – no, thank you. Will you permit me to ring for a glass of water? I was giving the girls a lecture upstairs; they have a great deal to learn.”

Belle did not wait for Mrs. Chetwynd’s most unwilling permission. She sounded the electric bell by the fireplace, and presently the footman appeared. Water was supplied, and the young lady took a copious draught.

“That is refreshing,” she cried as she placed her glass on the tray. “Now, then, mother, we must be off. Come, we have no more time to waste. I have promised Anne Morrison to call on her before dinner to-day; she wants me to look over some of her matriculation papers, and I must on no account fail her.”

“But, my dear Belle, Anne Morrison lives at the south side of London, and I am so tired,” said poor Mrs. Acheson.

“Dear me, mother; have not you strength enough for that much! We will take a bus at the corner and get to Norland Square in no time. Come, don’t you think you have had quite as much frivolous conversation as is good for you? Now, Mrs. Chetwynd, don’t forget to write. The address is Miss Lauderdale, Principal of St. Wode’s College, Wingfield. Come along, mother. By-by, Mrs. Chetwynd.”

Poor Mrs. Acheson cast anxious eyes of misery and commiseration at her friend, and was hurled out of the room by the emphatic Belle. A moment or two later the hall-door was shut behind the pair.

“Thank goodness, they are gone at last!” cried Mrs. Chetwynd. “My dear Lettie, is that you? Come here, child, come here. Now, tell me, what did that awful girl say to the children?”

“Here are the children coming down to answer for themselves,” said Marjorie, springing lightly into the room accompanied by Eileen.

“Oh, darling little mammy, what is the matter?” cried Marjorie. She ran up to her mother and kissed her. “Why, you look quite worried, you dear old thing. Let me smooth out those furrows on your dear brow! Ah! you look more like yourself now. Come, sit here, and I will sit near you. I will pet you, and you will soon forget all your worries. Is it not good, mammy dear, to have a grown-up daughter on whom to lean?”

“But if the grown-up daughter won’t be leant on,” cried poor Mrs. Chetwynd. “Oh, my child, everything seems to be topsy-turvy; and that appalling girl, for there is no other word for her – ”

“Of course the world did turn topsy-turvy twenty years ago,” said Eileen. “For women everything is completely changed. We who were so low are now in the ascendant. It is men who are nowhere. You, dear mammy, must be guided by us for the remainder of your days. You will live here, of course, or anywhere else you fancy, and we will spend our vacations with you.”

“My dear, dear Eileen, you don’t know what you are talking about. That terrible girl has inoculated you with her democratic views. She is a fearful creature, a sort of monster; and the queer, extraordinary things she said, and the way she hurled her poor mother out of the room, I have really no words to describe. I do pity Mrs. Acheson; but if you think for a single moment, Eileen, that I am going to submit to you and Marjorie having the upper hand and managing your own lives, you are mistaken.”

Eileen uttered a deep sigh.

“It will be troublesome,” she said slowly, “and we would much rather not be troublesome; it would worry you, and we would much rather not worry you. Mammy, why don’t you give in at once? It would be so much more graceful of you, mammy; it would really.”

“Yes, mother; I wish you would,” said Marjorie.

“But what am I to give in about?” said Mrs. Chetwynd. – “Letitia, have you nothing to say? You have lived with us since you were a baby; in every respect you have been treated as a daughter of the house. Can’t you speak, can’t you show these insubordinate, wicked girls how dreadfully they are acting?”

“It is useless,” said Lettie, shrugging her shoulders; “they are determined to have their own way. I am afraid you must bear it, Aunt Helen.”

Mrs. Chetwynd burst into tears. Marjorie and Eileen looked at her with eyes full of pity.

“I wish it was not necessary,” said Eileen. “I do wish we could comfort you, dear old mammy. I do wish we could say that we would be presented to Her Majesty, and go into society six evenings out of the seven; but you see we just can’t, and it would be the maddest weakness to yield.”

“Go into society I will not,” said Marjorie. “I have made up my mind. I also think what Belle said is excellent; and after two or three years of that splendid training, I am – ”

“Yes, yes, yes. I too have made up my mind,” interrupted Eileen. “Mother, dear, you will write to-night?”

“To Miss Lauderdale?” said poor Mrs. Chetwynd; “that awful girl gave me the name. What in the wide world am I to write to her about?”

“To get all the necessary particulars, as we want to go to St. Wode’s at the beginning of term.”

“Oh, my child, I cannot permit it,” said Mrs. Chetwynd.

“But, mother dear, do listen,” said Marjorie. She sat down by her mother and began to speak. Eileen took her mother’s other hand. The girls could talk well; they had plenty of intellect, and they could expound their views in a simple and yet telling manner. Now, Mrs. Chetwynd could never answer any argument which required a logical deduction. She was therefore completely worsted by her clever and modern daughters. Each of her little excuses, each of her small efforts to get the girls to remain at home with her, to go into society, to lead the ordinary life of the ordinary young woman, were quietly and politely demolished by both Eileen and Marjorie. Finally, Mrs. Chetwynd found herself saying she would think about the matter. All three girls knew well that when Mrs. Chetwynd went as far as that the thing was accomplished.

“Don’t worry the mammy any more now,” said Eileen. “Lie back in your chair, dear mammy. Lettie, run upstairs for mother’s eau de Cologne; we will put some on her forehead. Poor dear darling, she’s the sweetest mother in all the world; isn’t she, Marjorie?”

“A perfect angel,” said Marjorie.

She stooped and kissed her mother. Eileen also kissed her. There they stood in their shabby dresses, a little piece of Eileen’s petticoat peeping below her skirt, their short hair pushed up from their foreheads, their handsome faces alight with fire and excitement.

Mrs. Chetwynd glanced at them, and despair entered her soul. She had not the slightest chance against them; and she knew it.

The girls left the room, and only Letitia remained behind.

“Well, Lettie, you at least will remain with me,” said Mrs. Chetwynd. “It is terrible to feel that I have brought girls like Marjorie and Eileen into the world. My only comfort is that their poor dear father – such a kind, scholarly, soldierly man – is not here to witness their base ingratitude.”

“But really, Aunt Helen, I don’t think they are base nor ungrateful. They are just modern, you see – terribly modern, the reverse of archaic. They must keep with the times; that they have determined on. There is no use whatever in opposing them. Doubtless life will teach them its own lesson, and they will be delightful when they return from St. Wode’s.”

“How long must they stay there?” asked Mrs. Chetwynd. She took up her handkerchief as she spoke, to wipe away the tears from her eyes.

“I believe the usual course is three years,” said Lettie. “You cannot get your certificate, which is equivalent to a degree, under that time.”

“Your certificate, which is equivalent to a degree, Lettie! Oh, my child, not a man living will speak to the girls. They will never be married, Lettie; they will be old maids to the end of the chapter. It is fearful to think of it!”

“Well, they don’t actually take a degree, because it is not allowed,” said Lettie; “but they work for it, and they get the honor.”

“Worse and worse,” cried Mrs. Chetwynd. “You see how sternly the men disapprove of this fearful step on the part of modern women.”

Letitia suppressed a short sigh.

“The girls are modern, and nothing will make them anything else,” she said.

“And yet, my dear, they are the reverse of fashionable.”

“Oh, Aunt Helen, I think fashionable women are going out.”

“Going out, my dear! What can you mean?”

“I really do think so; there will be fewer and fewer as time goes on. We are so terribly earnest now, we have no time to think of mere ornamentation.”

“Thank goodness, Lettie, you at least will always dress neatly.”

“I should think so,” replied Lettie. “I honestly confess that I am quite fond of clothes, and I like to look smart.”

“Well, dear, it is a comfort that I shall have you to stay with me.”

“But, Aunt Helen, I am ever so sorry. I think you ought to let me go too.”

“You, Lettie? You go to St. Wode’s College? What do you mean?”

“I think I ought to go, if for no other reason than to watch those two poor dear girls through this eccentric phase of their existence. Think of them, Aunt Helen, alone with Belle Acheson!”

“There is something in what you say,” said Mrs. Chetwynd; “and as Mrs. Acheson intends to go on the Continent in the winter, and she wishes me to – oh, of course I pooh-poohed the idea; but I really think I shall do it now. I shall go about from one fashionable place to another and amuse myself, and try to forget that I have children. Oh, it is a cruel, a crushing disappointment.”

“You will live through it,” said Lettie. She bent and kissed Mrs. Chetwynd on her cheek.

“After all,” she continued, “there is no good in forcing Marjorie and Eileen into grooves which were never meant for them. You will write to Miss Lauderdale, will you not, to-night?”

“My dear child, have the goodness to write to her yourself, and I will sign the letter. I have not the faintest idea what I am to say to that woman.”

“I will write, then, at once,” said Lettie.

She skipped across the drawing-room to her aunt’s davenport, took out a sheet of paper, rapidly wrote a few words, and then brought her letter to Mrs. Chetwynd to sign. In less than an hour that letter was dropped into the nearest pillar-box.

Thus was the fate of the three girls quickly decided.

CHAPTER VIII – THE GILROYS

The Gilroys lived in a small house in West Kensington. The house was full to overflowing. There were a great many children, ranging from Leslie the eldest girl, aged nineteen, to little Dan, aged two. Mrs. Gilroy was one of the busiest women in London. She had a small income, not exceeding three hundred a year, and six children to maintain. When her husband died, a month before little Dan’s birth, the mother made up her mind not to skimp the children’s education, not to starve them on a mere pittance, but to add to her income by her own exertions. She was very clever and strong both in mind and body. All her children loved her passionately.

Mr. Gilroy, during his lifetime, had been sub-editor on a large London daily, and after his death Mrs. Gilroy got a post on the staff. She also did a good deal of other journalistic work, and occasionally wrote up-to-date articles in the magazines. Thus she added considerably to her income, and the children never wanted for anything.

The house was a model of neatness and order, although there was only one small servant; but then each child had been trained thoroughly, and each child did his or her appointed task without a murmur. The faces of all the young Gilroys were bright, all the pairs of eyes were frank and happy; but the mother had to work very hard. Often and often, when all the children were in bed, she sat up or went round from one editor’s office to another supplying the necessary items which would appear the next morning in the papers. She enjoyed her work and never complained; and Llewellyn and Leslie, the eldest boy and girl, sympathized heart and soul with her.

On the very day when Belle Acheson had visited the Chetwynds in their fashionable house in Belgravia, Mrs. Gilroy, coming in later than usual, found Llewellyn, a handsome lad of sixteen years of age, crouching over the fire in the little parlor, with his head in his hands.

“What is wrong, Lew?” said the mother.

“Nothing,” he answered. “I have only been thinking.”

“But what about, my boy?”

Mrs. Gilroy seldom petted her children, she seldom used loving words to them; but then her touch was a caress. She laid her hand now upon the lad’s shoulder; he looked up into her kindly firm face; and the shadow fell from his own.

“It’s just nothing,” he cried. “I ought to be ashamed of myself. Don’t ask me at the present moment, mother. I have a fit of the blues, that’s all.”

“Well, and I have a fit of the cheerfuls,” said Mrs. Gilroy.

“What do you mean, mother?” Llewellyn was all life and spirits in a moment. “Has anything good happened; have you got another post? Are you to be made sub-editor on one of the great dailies; that, you know, is your ambition, your great passionate ambition, little mother.”

“Nothing of the kind at present, Lew, dear. I am just where I always was. I have plenty of work, and I am paid fairly well; but I have good news all the same. I will tell you afterwards. It has to do with Leslie. It will be the finest thing in all the world for her, simply the making of her.”

Llewellyn’s face once more looked downcast. He did not want his mother to observe it, however, and he went slowly to the door.

“I had better let Kitty and Mabel know that you are in,” he said.

He went into the little hall and shouted his sisters’ names. The next moment two trim, neatly-dressed little girls, with long hair hanging down their shoulders, in dark-blue frocks and white pinafores, came tripping in.

“Mother’s come,” said Llewellyn; “she wants tea. Sound the gong when it is ready.”

He bounded up the narrow stairs three at a time to his own special den at the top of the house. There, big, handsome, overgrown boy that he was, he shed some tears. He was ashamed of his tears; they scalded right down into his heart.

“I wish I didn’t feel it so much,” he said to himself. “I just had a wild hope for a moment, when mother spoke about good news, that it had something to do with me. But it’s only Leslie. Well, dear old girl, why shouldn’t it be about her? What a brute I am to grudge it to her. She is mother’s right hand, and about the very best girl in the world. There, I shall hate myself if I give way another moment. I’ll just tell mother right out, and put an end to the thing. She’ll be a bit surprised, but I guess she’ll be only too glad to consent. It’s good-by to daydreams, that’s all; but a fellow can’t think of them when his mother is in the question.”

Meanwhile the girls downstairs were quickly preparing the tea. Kitty went to the kitchen to fetch the tray with the cups and saucers; Mabel laid the white cloth, which was made of the finest damask, on the center table. Kitty then knelt down before the fire to make an apparently unlimited supply of buttered toast; Mabel put the right amount of tea into the old teapot. There were many relics of bygone respectability, nay, of bygone wealth, in the Gilroys’ humble house. The silver teapot was one – it was real silver, not electroplate. It was very thin and of an antique shape, and the children were often heard to declare that nothing would induce them to have their tea made in anything else. The cups and saucers, too, were of rare old china and of a quaint pattern. They were neither cracked nor broken, because the girls themselves washed them and looked after them, and put them away in the little pantry.

The small maid of all work, Elfreda, was never allowed to go near the pantry. She only did the rough work under severe superintendence from Kitty; but the house was perfectly organized, and no one felt unduly fatigued.

The tea, when it was ready, consisted of fresh eggs, honey in the comb, hot cakes which Mabel had been secretly watching for the last half-hour, a pile of buttered toast, bread both brown and white, delicious country butter, tea, and even cream.

When everything was in order, Mabel sounded the gong, and Llewellyn came down.

He had scarcely taken his place at the table before there was the click of a latchkey in the hall door, and light steps, the steps of a young girl, were heard in the passage outside.

“There’s Leslie,” said Mrs. Gilroy. She was seated at the head of her table pouring out tea. She paused now, and a look of considerable expectancy filled her eyes. Llewellyn watched her; the others, engaged in their own chatter, took no special notice.

“Leslie, late as usual,” said Mabel. Just at that moment Leslie poked in her head.

“Oh, do just keep a nice hot cup of tea for me,” she called out. “I am starving. There has been such a cold wind blowing, and I had to walk half the way, as every omnibus was full. I’ll just run upstairs to tidy up. Please keep a right good tea for me; I’ll trust you, Mabel.”

“Yes, you may,” shouted out Mabel. “I am keeping back the crispest of the hot cakes, and there is buttered toast in a covered dish by the fire.”

Leslie’s steps were heard running quickly upstairs, and a minute or two later she entered the room. She was a tall girl, with quantities of golden-brown hair, large brown eyes, a complexion of cream and roses, and straight regular features. It needed but a glance to show that she was a beautiful girl, with beauty above the average; but it was not only the regularity of her features and the clearness of her complexion which made Leslie’s face so specially attractive. It was the marked and wonderful intelligence on her open brow, the speaking, thoughtful expression in her eyes, the firm, proud outline of her beautiful lips.

Mrs. Gilroy just glanced up when her eldest daughter came into the room. That one glance showed that the girl was the mother’s special idol; that she loved her with a worship which was almost idolatry, that she was a shade more proud of her and dreamt more daydreams about her than about any of the others.

Llewellyn, who could read his mother like a book, who loved her passionately, saw all these thoughts now in her eyes. He suppressed a sigh, and attacked the loaf with vigor.

“Come, Leslie,” said her mother, “here is your place by me as usual. Now, have a good tea, my darling, for we have much to talk of afterwards. I want all of you children to be present too; you must all hear my good news.”

“Good news, mother. That’s cheering,” said Leslie. “I have had such a cross day.”

“Cross – what do you mean?” said Kitty. “Do tell us, Leslie, what can have happened. Didn’t you get on with your pupils?”

“No, they were contrary; they would play and would not learn. I didn’t seem to have any control over them. Mother, dear, I am sick of teaching!”

“What rot!” cried Llewellyn. “One must go on with a thing whether one is sick or not.”

“Oh, I know, Lew, dear old boy, and I really don’t mean to grumble; only I felt cross and I am owning to it. I don’t feel cross now,” added the girl.

She helped herself to brown bread and butter. Kitty put a quantity of honey on her plate. Tea came to an end presently, and then the children in orderly file began to remove the tea-things.

In less than a quarter of an hour the little parlor – they always sat in the parlor in the evenings – was looking as snug and comfortable as a room could look. The lamp, beautifully trimmed and burning clearly, stood on the center table, the red curtains were drawn round the windows; a fire, blazing merrily, gave a final touch of cheerfulness to the pleasant room.

“Now, then, mother, get into your own special chair and tell us the news,” said Leslie. – “Llewellyn, you are not going away, are you?”

“No,” said Llewellyn.

“But before you begin, mother, do wait for us,” cried Mabel. “Kitty and I must go upstairs to turn down the beds, and then I must see Elfreda in order to get her to put the fish in soak for to-morrow’s breakfast. She does forget things so dreadfully.”

“Yes, and I have got to wash the tea-things; it’s my turn, I’m sorry to say,” remarked Hester, a somewhat heavy-looking girl, the least attractive of the family.

“Well, dears, I will wait for you three for exactly twenty minutes,” said Mrs. Gilroy. “Be as quick as possible; bustle away, get the house into perfect order, and then you shall come down to hear my good news.”

The children ran off.

When the door closed behind them Leslie looked at her mother.

“Must you go out again to-night, mother?” she asked.

“No, my darling, not to-night. To-morrow I shall not be home until very late. I have to attend two big functions, and must take my copy afterwards to the Grapho and the Daily Post.”

Llewellyn fidgeted; he stood up and then sat down again. He looked at his mother as if about to speak, and then restrained himself.

“What’s the matter, Lew? What are you worrying about?” said his sister.

“It’s only the thought of mother doing this beastly grind night after night,” he said. “It drives me half-wild sometimes.”

“My dear boy, I enjoy it,” said the mother; “and you shall take my place all in good time. There is an excitement about the life which exactly suits me. I could never be a drone even if I wished it, Lew – not even to please you, dear old fellow.”

The mother bent forward as she spoke and gave the boy one of her rare caresses, just a touch on his white forehead. He sat down near her. Another boy would have held out his hand for his mother to clasp, but Llewellyn’s long hands hung between his knees. He was bending over the fire, looking into the blaze. The daydreams which he had so often seen in those flames were receding farther and farther away. His face was pale, and the expression of his gray eyes heavy.

But Mrs. Gilroy, too much interested in Leslie at present to notice her son’s depression, continued to talk cheerfully. By and by she would see it all and speak of it, but not just now.

Quite within the appointed time the three girls returned. They took up their work, for never for a moment in this family was idleness allowed, and sat down near the lamp.

“Now then, we are ready,” said Hester; “but I do wish, before mother begins, that you would show me, Kitty, how you turn this heel. I know I am doing it wrong.”

“I should think you are, you old goose,” said Kitty. “Well, I can’t show you at present. Just take the needles out and unravel a few rows, then put the needles in again, and I’ll be ready to give you a lesson before bedtime. But, remember, I am going to charge for it. It’s a farthing a lesson, and the money to go to the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children. Is not that a good idea, mother?” continued Kitty, looking up.

But Mrs. Gilroy was not listening. She had something important to say, and the mere idle chatter of this happy family passed over her ears unnoticed.

“Leslie,” she said laying her hand on her eldest girl’s arm, “my news has to do with you; but, as we have no secrets in our family, I will tell it before the rest of the children.”

Leslie looked eager and excited. Even Llewellyn dropped his despondent air and stood up, big and manly, five feet ten, on the hearthrug.

His mother glanced at him, noticed, without really noticing it, the marked look of power on his intellectual face, and then turned to her favorite child.

“I was in my usual place at the office of the Grapho to-day,” she began. “I was busily engaged preparing copy for to-morrow’s issue when a gentleman, an old friend of your father’s, a certain Mr. Parker, came in.”

“Mr. Parker! A friend of father’s! I never heard of him before,” said Leslie.

“He has been in Australia for the last twelve years, but has just returned home. He sent in his card and begged to see me. As soon as ever I saw him I remembered that your dear father had constantly spoken of him. Well, he wishes to do something for – for the sake of his old friend.”

Mrs. Gilroy’s voice faltered.

“He is quite a gentleman,” she continued, “though a little rough; but a capital good fellow at bottom. He spoke to me most frankly, and finally ended by making me an offer. The offer has to do with you, Leslie.”

“With me?” said Leslie.

“Yes, darling. He asked me all about our means. He was not at all prying; he was good and kind and oh! so generous at heart. I hated to tell him, and yet I felt obliged to. He was shocked; he thought your father would have left us better off.”

“He had no right to ask about our father’s means,” grumbled Llewellyn. “No one could have worked harder than our father did.”

“No one, truly,” echoed Leslie.

“And no one ever led a more upright, exemplary, splendid life,” said the widow. Her voice trembled; she paused for a moment.

Kitty and Mabel laid down their needlework.

“But, all the same,” continued the mother, “you must not blame Mr. Parker. He and your father had not met for many years, and in Australia they lead a different life. When a man is lucky there he is very lucky; and Mr. Parker has been one of the lucky ones. He took shares in some gold-mines, and explained to me that he is now a man of great wealth.”

“He must have interrupted your work a good bit,” began Llewellyn, then he checked himself. His mother glanced at him, took no notice of his speech, and continued with her story.

“The result of our interview is this,” she said, looking round at her children and laying her hand on Leslie’s arm. “Leslie is to have a chance, a right good chance in life.”

“Mother, what do you mean?” said Leslie. She opened her pretty eyes wide, and the color rushed into her face.

“Mr. Parker is a man of peculiar views,” said the mother. “He does not want to help boys, he says; they must stand or fall on their own merits. But for girls he has a peculiar feeling, an unbounded pity. The fact is, poor fellow, he had a wife of his own, and a daughter, and if the daughter were alive she would be your age, Leslie. I have not the slightest doubt that accounts for his prejudice in favor of girls. Now, my darling, he has offered to pay all your expenses either at Newnham or at that other great college, St. Wode’s, Wingfield. He wants you to give up your present employment immediately, and to go to either of these places at the beginning of term. You are to have every advantage that is possible. When you have completed your university education he will take further steps to insure your commanding an excellent living. The money is to be paid direct to me as required, and he has now given me a check for fifty pounds to buy the necessary outfit which you will require for your new life. I have taken the check and have accepted the offer. That is my news. It is a great chance for you, Leslie; it is a great chance. You go away from us, I know, my darling, and I shall miss you terribly; but it is a great chance.”

“And you have really accepted it, mother?”

“I have. I could not allow you to throw it away. Mr. Parker is such an old friend of your father’s that I am willing to put myself under this supreme obligation. He has even hinted that by and by he will do great things for Kitty and for Mabel.”

“And what about poor Hester?” said that individual, dropping her stocking and looking with piteous eyes at her mother.

“You are to be my home-bird, darling.” Then Hester rose and knelt by her mother, and put her strong young arms round her waist and kissed her.

“Yes; I for one would never leave you, mammy; and I don’t care a pin about being learned. I want just to be useful, although I am afraid I am a bit of a failure all round. There always is a failure in every family, isn’t there, mother; so it’s just as well that I should be the one.”

“We mean to have no failures in this family,” said Mrs. Gilroy. “Now, then, you young ones, it is time for bed; off you go at once. I have much to say to Leslie and to Llewellyn by themselves.”