BELLA GOES ON A VISIT.
‘HERE’S a fine chance for Bella!’ exclaimed Mr. Scratchell, after reading his patron’s curt epistle. ‘She is to go and spend Christmas at the Water House.’
‘My word, won’t she have a blow out of mince pies,’ exclaimed the youthful Adolphus, who, from being somewhat restricted as to the good things of this life, was apt to take a material view of pleasure.
‘Bella doesn’t care twopence for mince pies,’ said Clementina. ‘She likes dresses and bonnets. She would live on bread and water for a month for the sake of a pretty dress.’
Bella herself was not enthusiastic about the invitation to the Water House.
‘I don’t see how I can go, papa,’ she said. ‘Mrs. Piper wants me to look after the housekeeping, and to see to the children’s early dinner. Mr. Piper hates carving for so many.’
‘Mrs. Piper must do without you. She’ll know your value all the better if she loses your services for a week or two.’
‘You ought not to refuse such an invitation, Bella,’ said Mrs. Scratchell. ‘Christmas time and all—Mr. Harefield will be sure to give you a handsome present.’
‘I might run across to the Park every morning, perhaps, even if I were staying at the Water House,’ Bella suggested presently. She had been thinking deeply for the last few minutes.
‘Of course, you might,’ answered her father. ‘It’s not ten minutes’ walk, through the fields.’
So Mr. Harefield’s letter was answered to the effect that Bella would be delighted to stay with her dear Miss Harefield, and would be with her that evening. And all day long there was a grand starching and ironing of cuffs, collars, and petticoats, at which the younger Miss Scratchells assisted.
‘I shall find out all about Cyril,’ thought Bella. ‘What a secret nature Beatrix must have to be able to hide every thing from me so long. I have seen her look shy and strange when she met him, and have half-suspected—but I could not think that if she really cared for him she would hide it from me.’
Bella and her worldly goods arrived at the Water House after dark on that December evening—Bella walking, under the escort of her brother Herbert, the worldly goods accompanying her in a wheelbarrow.
Bella found Beatrix alone in the upstairs sitting-room, which had been called the schoolroom ever since Miss Scales had been paramount at the Water House. It was a large panelled room, with old oak furniture of the Dutch school that had been there since the days of William and Mary; old blue and white Delft jars, and old pictures that nobody ever looked at; a high carved oak mantel piece, with a shelf just wide enough to carry the tiny teacups of the Queen Anne period; an old-fashioned fireplace, set round with blue and white tiles; a sombre Turkey carpet, with a good deal of yellow in it; and thick woollen curtains of a curious flowered stuff. To Bella it was simply one of the handsomest rooms in the world, and she felt angry with Beatrix for her want of gratitude to a Providence that had set her in the midst of such surroundings.
Beatrix received her old playfellow affectionately. She was more cheerful this evening than she had been since her father had forbidden her visits to the vicarage.
‘A most wonderful thing has happened, Bella,’ she said, when they had kissed. Bella had taken off her hat, and was comfortably seated in an arm chair by the fire. ‘Miss Scales has gone for a fortnight’s holiday, and you and I are to be our own mistresses all Christmas time.’
‘How nice!’ cried Bella.
‘Isn’t it? My father did not at all like it, I believe. But an old aunt of Miss Scales—an aunt who is supposed to have money—has been so kind as to get dangerously ill, and Miss Scales has been sent for to attend her sick bed. She lives in some unknown corner of Devonshire, quite at the other end of the map, so less than a fortnight’s leave of absence would hardly have been any use, and papa was compelled to give it. I am to pay no visits, but I may drive where I like in the pony carriage on fine days—and ride as often as Jarvis will let me.’
Jarvis was the groom who had taught Beatrix to ride her pony ten years ago, when Mr. Namby had suggested riding as a healthy exercise for the pale and puny child.
‘It will be very nice,’ said Bella.
‘Very nice for me. But I’m afraid it will be a dreadfully dull Christmas for you, Bella. You will wish yourself at home. Christmas must be so cheerful in a large family.’
‘I can endure the loss of a home Christmas with exemplary resignation,’ replied Bella, with a graceful little shrug of her pretty shoulders. ‘I think if there is one time more trying than another in our house, it is Christmas. The children have a vague idea that they are going to enjoy themselves—and it shows a wonderful gift of blind faith that they can have such an idea after so many disappointments. They make the parlours uncomfortable with holly and laurel, and club together for a bunch of mistletoe to hang in the passage—they make poor ma promise them snapdragon and hot elder wine—and then on Christmas Eve one of the boys contrives to break a window—or to upset papa’s office inkstand, which holds about a quart, and then the whole family are in disgrace. Papa and mamma have words—the beef is underdone on Christmas day, and papa uses awful language about the housekeeping—the boys go out for an afternoon walk to avoid the storm indoors, and perhaps get caught in the rain out of doors and spoil their best clothes. After tea pa and ma have a long talk by the fire, while we young ones squabble over ‘vingt et un’ at the table, and we know by their faces that they are talking about the new year’s bills, and then we all go to bed feeling miserable, without exactly knowing why.’
‘Poor Bella,’ said Beatrix compassionately. ‘It does seem very hard that some people should have more money than they know what to do with, and others so much too little. It’s quite puzzling. The trees and flowers have everything equally, sun and rain, and dew and frost.’
‘No, they don’t,’ said Bella. ‘The trees see life from different aspects. Some have all the southern sun, and others all the northern blasts. You are like a carefully trained peach tree on a south wall, and I am a poor little shrub in a gloomy corner facing the north.’
‘Bella,’ cried Beatrix, ‘do you seriously believe that there is much sunshine in my life?’
‘Plenty,’ answered Bella. ‘You have never known the want of money.’
‘But money cannot make happiness.’
‘Perhaps not, but it can make a very good imitation; and I know that the want of money can make very real unhappiness.’
‘Poor Bella!’ sighed Beatrix again.
‘Oh! as for me,’ said Bella, ‘I am very well off, since I’ve been at the Pipers. And then you have always been so kind to me. I am the favoured one of the family. But it is trying to see how my poor mother is worried, and how she worries every one else, in the struggle to make both ends meet. And now tell me about yourself, Beatrix. Papa said you had been ill.’
‘Miss Scales and Mr. Namby have made up their minds that I am ill,’ answered Beatrix indifferently, ‘but except that I can’t sleep, I don’t think there’s much the matter.’
‘But that is very dreadful,’ exclaimed Bella. ‘Do you mean to say that you are not able to sleep at all?’
‘Very little. Sometimes I lie awake all night—sometimes I get up and walk about my room, and stare out of the window at the moor and the river. They look so strange and ghostlike in the dead of the night—not a bit like the moor and river we know by day. Sometimes I light my candle and read.’
‘And you never sleep?’
‘Towards the morning I sometimes drop off into a doze, but I always wake with a start, just as if the surprise of finding myself asleep had awakened me.’
‘And hasn’t Mr. Namby given you anything to make you sleep?’ asked Bella.
‘No. He is giving me tonics, and he says when I get strong the sleeplessness will leave me. He has refused to give me an opiate, though I begged very hard for something that would send me to sleep.’
‘That seems cruel,’ said Bella, ‘but I suppose he is right. I think he is a very clever little man. Mrs. Piper has more confidence in him than in Dr. Armytage, who has a big fee every time he comes over from Great Yafford, and who never seems to do anything but approve of what Mr. Namby is doing. Or perhaps he makes some slight alteration in the diet—recommends sago instead of tapioca—or madeira instead of sherry.’
‘Is Mrs. Piper very ill?’
‘Dreadfully ill, poor thing. It is an internal complaint that is killing her. She struggles against it, but I think she knows that it must be fatal.’
‘How sad for her children.’
‘Yes, poor little things. She is a very good mother—perhaps a little too strict, but most careful of her children. They will miss her dreadfully. I’m afraid Mr. Piper is the sort of man to marry again.’
‘Oh, surely not?’ cried Beatrix, ‘that fat red-faced man—with a figure like a barrel. Who would marry him.’
‘Who would refuse him—and his money?’
‘Oh, Bella! Now surely you would not marry such a man as that—for all the money in the world?’
‘I would not, well as I know the value of money. But I have no doubt there are plenty of girls who would. And now, Beatrix, tell me why you never go to the Vicarage now.’
‘Simply because my father has forbidden me.’
‘How unkind! But he must have some reason for such a step.’
‘He has his reasons no doubt.’
‘And has he not told you what they are?’
‘Don’t let us talk about it, please, Bella dear. I had rather speak of anything else.’
‘Of course,’ thought Bella, ‘the whole thing is quite clear.’