MRS. DULCIMER MEANS BUSINESS.
WHEN a benevolent idea entered the mind of the good-natured Mrs. Dulcimer, there immediately began a process of incubation or hatching, as of a patient maternal hen intent on the development of her eggs. Like that domestic fowl, Mrs. Dulcimer gave her whole mind to the task, and, for the time being, thought of nothing else.
The notion of a marriage between Cyril Culverhouse and Bella Scratchell was now incubating. Bella, of whom Mrs. Dulcimer had not thought much hitherto, was now taken under her wing, a protégée whose provision in life was an actual duty.
Mrs. Dulcimer talked about her to the parlourmaid, while she was dusting the drawing-room china. The servants at the Vicarage were all old retainers, who by faithful service had become interwoven in the very fabric of the family life. The Vicar and his wife could hardly have believed that home was home with strange faces round them. Crisp, the man of all work, and Rebecca, the confidential maid, were as much an integral part of life as the dark ridge of moorland, and the gray church tower, the winding river, the Vicar’s library, and the faithful old pointer, Ponto, which had not stood to a bird for the last seven years, but held the position of friend and familiar, and lived in a land overflowing with milk and honey.
‘What a nice young lady Miss Scratchell is, Rebecca!’ said Mrs. Dulcimer, as she flecked a grain of dust off a Chelsea shepherdess with her feather-brush. The Vicar’s wife was rarely seen between breakfast and noon without a feather-brush in her hand. ‘Have you remarked it?’
‘She ain’t so handsome as Miss Harefield,’ answered Rebecca, frankly, ‘but she’s a deal affabler. They give her a very good character at the Park—always punkshall, and a great favourite with the children.’
‘She is just the sort of girl to do well in life, Rebecca. She ought to get a good husband.’
Rebecca gave a loud sniff, scenting mischief.
‘That’s as Providence pleases, ma’am,’ she retorted, rubbing the fender with her chamois leather; ‘marriages is made in heaven.’
‘Perhaps, Rebecca. But a poor man’s daughter like Bella Scratchell has a very poor chance of meeting an eligible person. Unless it is in this house, I don’t think she sees any one worth speaking of.’
‘There’s the Park, ma’am,’ suggested Rebecca, rubbing the fender almost savagely.
‘Oh! at the Park she is only a dependant—quite looked down upon, you may be sure; for though Mrs. Piper is a good creature, she is a thorough parvenue. Miss Scratchell never sees any of the Park visitors, you may be sure. She only lunches at the children’s dinners. They don’t even ask her to play the piano at their parties. They have a man from Great Yafford. Now don’t you think, Rebecca, that Mr. Culverhouse would be a nice match for Miss Scratchell?’
Rebecca wheeled round upon her knees and confronted her mistress.
‘Oh, ma’am, I wouldn’t if I was you!’ she exclaimed, energetically. ‘I wouldn’t have act or part in it. You won’t get no thanks for it. You never do. Nobody’s never thanked for that kind of thing. You didn’t get no thanks from Mr. Parker and Miss Morison, and look at the trouble you took about them. There isn’t an unhappier couple in Little Yafford, if all folks say is true, and I believe every time they quarrel your name comes up between ’em. “If it hadn’t been for Mrs. Dulcimer I shouldn’t have been such a fool as to marry you,” says he. “My wretchedness is all Mrs. Dulcimer’s doing,” says she, “and I wish I was dead.” That’s a dreadful thing to have on your conscience, ma’am, after taking no end of trouble to bring it about.’
‘Nonsense, Rebecca! Is it my fault the Parkers are quarrelsome? Mary Morison would have quarrelled with any husband.’
‘Then she ought never to have had one,’ ejaculated Rebecca, renewing her savage treatment of the fender. ‘But I recollect when you thought her perfection.’
‘I allow that I was deceived in Miss Morison, Rebecca,’ replied the Vicar’s wife, meekly. She was very fond of Rebecca, and not a little afraid of her. ‘But you see Miss Scratchell is quite another sort of person.’
‘Company manners,’ said Rebecca, scornfully. ‘They’ve all got ’em. It’s the outside crust. You can’t tell what’s inside the pie.’
‘I am sure Miss Scratchell is a good girl. See how she has been brought up. The Scratchells have to study every sixpence.’
‘Does that make people good?’ inquired Rebecca, speculatively, gathering up her brushes and leathers into her box. ‘I don’t think it would improve my disposition. I like the sixpences to come and go, without my thinking about ’em.’
‘Ah, but, Rebecca, consider what a good wife a girl brought up like that would make for a poor man. Mr. Culverhouse has nothing but his curacy, you know.’
‘I should ha’ thought a rich young woman would ha’ suited him better. There’s Miss Harefield, with her large fortune, would be just the thing.’
‘Nonsense, Rebecca! Mr. Harefield would never consent to such a marriage. Sir Kenrick is the proper husband for Miss Harefield; he can make her mistress of one of the finest places in Hampshire.’
‘Oh, that’s it, is it?’ said Rebecca, with something approaching a groan. ‘Sir Kenrick and Miss Harefield, and Mr. Culverhouse and Miss Scratchell! Ladies’ chain and set to partners—like the first figure in a quadrille. You’ve got your hands full, ma’am, and I suppose it’s no use my talking; but if you wasn’t too wise a lady to take a fool’s advice, I should say don’t have nothink to do with it.’
And with this oracular speech Rebecca took up her box, with all her implements of war, and left the drawing-room.
‘Rebecca is a good creature, and an original, but dull,’ thought Mrs. Dulcimer. ‘I never can make her see things in a proper light.’
After the early dinner, and the Vicar’s departure for his daily round among his parishioners—a sauntering, easy-going visitation at all times—Mrs. Dulcimer set out in her best bonnet and sable-bordered mantle to make some calls. The sable mantle was well known in Little Yafford as a kind of insignia of office. When Mrs. Dulcimer wore it she meant business, and business with Mrs. Dulcimer meant the business of other people. Her bonnets were known also, with their different grades of merit. She had a bonnet for the landed gentry, and a second best bonnet for the tradespeople, and last year’s bonnet, done up by Rebecca, for her visits amongst the poor.
To-day she wore her landed gentry bonnet, and her first visit was to the Park.
Whether a man who has made his money in trade, and has taken somebody else’s mansion and park, can be considered to belong to the landed gentry, is an open question; but Little Yafford gave Mr. Piper the benefit of the doubt, and as there were not many rich people in the village, he ranked high.
Mrs. Piper was at home, and delighted to see her dear Mrs. Dulcimer. There is no more lively companion than a good-natured busybody, except an ill-natured one. Mrs. Dulcimer’s conversation lacked the pungency and acidity, the cayenne and lemon with which your cynical gossip flavours his discourse, but she was always well posted in facts, and, if too much given to pity and deplore, had at least plenty to tell.
The two matrons had the drawing-room all to themselves—a large and splendid apartment, furnished in the ugliest style of the later Georges, but glorified by the Piper family with Berlin woolwork and beaded cushions, ormolu inkstands, Parian statuettes, Bohemian vases, malachite envelope-boxes, and mother-o’-pearl albums in great profusion.
Mrs. Piper was a devoted mother, and, on the children being inquired for, began a string of praises.
‘Elizabeth is getting on splendidly with her music,’ she said; ‘you’ll be quite surprised. She and Mary play the overture to “Zamper.” You’d be delighted.’
‘Miss Scratchell taught them, I suppose?’
‘Oh dear no! Miss Scratchell superintends their practice; but they have a master from Great Yafford, Mr. Jackson, the organist—a very fine musician. Isabella is a very nice player,’ said Mrs. Piper, with a patronizing air. She had never got beyond ‘Buy a Broom’ and ‘The Bird Waltz’ in her own day, but was severely critical now. ‘But I couldn’t think of having my girls taught by a lady. They don’t get the touch, or the style, or the execution.’
‘What a sweet girl Bella is!’ exclaimed Mrs. Dulcimer, who had come to the Park on purpose to talk about Miss Scratchell.
She was not going to work blindly this time, or to lay herself open to such reproaches as Rebecca had assailed her with on account of the Parker and Morison marriage. She would find out all about Bella before she set to work; and who so well able to inform her as Bella’s employer?
‘Yes,’ replied Mrs. Piper, ‘I am very well satisfied with Bella Scratchell. She’s the first governess I’ve had that has given me satisfaction—and I’ve had seven since we’ve lived at Little Yafford. She’s very young for such a position—with clever girls like mine, who are much beyond their years, especially; and when Mr. Scratchell first applied for the situation I felt I couldn’t entertain his proposal. “Give her a trial, Mrs. Piper,” he said, “you don’t know how she’s been educated. She’s had all the advantages Miss Harefield has had, and she’s known a great deal better how to value them.” So I thought it over, and I agreed to give Bella a trial. She couldn’t well be worse than the others had been, I considered, and I gave her the chance. Of course it would be a great opening in life for her to come here. Not that we make our governess one of the family. I don’t hold with that, no more does Piper. Miss Scratchell comes and goes quietly, and keeps her place. She is very useful and domesticated, and when I’ve been ill I’ve found her a great comfort in looking after the servants for me, and helping me to go over the tradesmen’s books; for you know what poor health I’ve had of late years, Mrs. Dulcimer, and what trouble I’ve had with my servants.’
Mrs. Dulcimer sighed a sympathetic assent.
‘If I’m alone she stops to luncheon with me; if I’m not, Bella superintends the children’s dinner, and after that she can go home as soon as she likes. The rest of the day is her own.’
‘It must be rather dull for a young girl like her, never seeing any society,’ suggested Mrs. Dulcimer.
‘I shouldn’t think Mr. Scratchell had brought up his daughters to expect society, if you mean parties and that sort of thing,’ replied Mrs. Piper, severely. ‘My children ought to be society enough for a young woman in Bella’s position.’
‘Of course. She would naturally be very fond of them,’ assented the Vicar’s wife. ‘But I was thinking with regard to her marrying; a girl who has nothing to expect from her father ought to marry.’
Mrs. Piper was averse from match-making. She had married well herself, and was rather inclined to regard matrimony as a luxury intended for the favoured few—like a cockade on a coachman’s hat, or a range of glass houses in one’s garden.
‘I hope Bella is not thinking of a husband,’ she said, disapprovingly. ‘For my part, when a young woman begins husband-hunting, I always think her useless for everything else. I should be very sorry to have Elizabeth taught by a governess who was thinking of husbands. The dear child would get ideas, and, with her intelligence——’
Mrs. Dulcimer’s good nature took fright immediately.
‘Oh, I do not believe Bella has ever given a thought to such a thing,’ she exclaimed. ‘She is quite wrapped up in her teaching, and so fond of your dear girls. But I rather think that Mr. Culverhouse admires her very much, and you must allow that it would be a suitable match.’
‘I should have thought Mr. Culverhouse had more sense. Why, he could no more afford to marry than his brother can afford to live at Culverhouse Castle.’
‘He has talent and energy, and is sure to succeed, and with such a well-trained economical wife as Bella——’
‘Well, I am sorry to find that Bella has got marriage and love-making into her head. I shall expect to see a difference in her with the children——’
‘Oh, but I assure you——’
In vain did poor Mrs. Dulcimer protest. Mrs. Piper had a fixed idea that a governess ought to have nothing to do with the tender passion. Had she not turned away Miss Green for no other reason than because that unfortunate young person wrote long letters to a young man in New Zealand, to whom she had been engaged for seven years, and to whom she expected to be engaged for seven years more, before he would be rich enough to marry her?
‘It was such a distraction to her mind, you see, my dear,’ Mrs. Piper told her intimate friends. ‘I couldn’t possibly allow it.’
Mrs. Dulcimer left the Park, after having done her protégée some injury, with the best intentions. From the Park she went to the village, and stopped at Mr. Scratchell’s door.