KATE rushed upstairs to her own room when she reached the Hall; she was wild with mortification and the sense of downfall. It was the first time she had come into collision with her fellow-creatures of a class equal to her own. Servants and poor people in the village had been impertinent to her ere now; but these were accidents, which Kate treated with the contempt they deserved, and which she could punish by the withdrawal of privileges and presents. She could scold, and did so soundly; and she could punish. But she could neither scold nor punish in the present case. Her Uncle Courtenay would only look at her in that exasperating way, with that cool smile on his face, as if she were a kitten; and this new being, with whom already she felt herself so well acquainted—Bertie would laugh, and be kind, and sorry for her. ‘Poor child!—poor little thing!’ These were the words he had dared to use. ‘Oh!’ Kate thought, I would like to kill him! I would like to——’ And then she asked herself what would he say at home? and writhed on the bed on which she had thrown herself in inextinguishable shame. They would laugh at her; they would make fun of her. ‘Oh! I would like to kill myself,’ cried Kate, in her thoughts. She cried her eyes out in the silence of her room. There was no Bertie to come there with sympathetic eyes to ask what she was doing. Miss Blank did not care; neither did any one in the house—not even her own maid, who was always about her, and to whom she would talk for hours together. Kate buried her head in her pillow, and tried to picture to herself the aspect of the Rectory. There would be the mother—who, Bertie said, understood everybody—seated somewhere near the table; and Edith and Minnie in the room—one of them, perhaps, doing worsted-work, one at the piano, or copying music, or drawing, as young ladies do in novels. Now and then, no doubt Mrs. Hardwick would give them little orders; she would say, perhaps, ‘Play me one of the Lieder, Minnie,’ or ‘that little air of Mozart’s.’ And she would say something about her work to Edith. Involuntarily that picture rose before lonely Kate. She seemed to see them seated there, with the windows open, and sweet scents coming in from the garden. She heard the voices murmuring, and a soft little strain, andante pianissimo, tinkling like the soft flow of a stream through the pleasant place. Oh! how pleasant it must be—even though she did not like the Rectory people, though Mr. Hardwick had been so rebellious, though they did not believe in her (Kate’s) natural headship of Church and Slate in Langton-Courtenay.
She sobbed as she lay and dreamed, and developed her new imagination. She had wondered, half angrily, half wistfully, about the Rectory people before, but Bertie seemed to give a certain reality to them. He was the brother of the girl whom Kate had so often inspected with keen eyes, but did not know; and he said ‘Mamma’ to that unknown Mrs. Hardwick. ‘Mamma!’ What a curious word it was, when you came to think of it! Not so serious, nor full of meaning as mother was, but soft and caressing—as of some one who would always feel for you, always put her arm round you, say ‘dear’ to you, ask what was the matter? Miss Blank never asked what was the matter! She took it for granted that Kate was cross, that it was ‘her own fault,’ or, as the very kindest hypothesis, that she had a headache, which was not in Kate’s way.
She lay sobbing, as I have said; but sobbing softly, as her emotion wore itself out, without tears. Her eyes were red, and her temples throbbed a little. She was worn out; she would not rouse herself and go downstairs to tempt another conflict with her uncle, as, had it not been for this last event, she would have felt disposed to do. And yet, poor child, she wanted her tea. Dinner had not been a satisfactory meal, and Kate could not help saying to herself that if Minnie and Edith had been suffering as she was, their mamma would have come to them in the dark, and kissed them, and bathed their hot foreheads, and brought them cups of tea. But there was no one to bring a cup of tea, without being asked, to a girl who had no mother. Kate had but to ring her bell, and she could have had whatever she pleased; but what did that matter? No one came near her, as it happened. The governess and her maid both supposed her to be with her uncle, and it was only when Maryanne came in at nine o’clock to prepare her young mistress’s hair-brushes and dressing-gown, that the young mistress was found, to Maryanne’s consternation, stretched on her bed, with a face as white as her dress, and eyes surrounded with red rings. And in the dark, of all things in the world, in a place like Langton-Courtenay, where it was well known the Blue Lady walked, and turned folks to stone! At the first glance Maryanne felt certain that the Blue Lady only could be responsible for the condition in which her young mistress was found.
‘Oh! miss,’ she cried, ‘and why didn’t you ring the bell?’
‘It did not matter,’ said Kate, reproachful and proud.
‘Lying there all in the dark—and it don’t matter! ‘Oh! miss, I know as you ain’t timorsome like me, but if you was once to see something——’
‘Hold your tongue!’ said Kate, peremptorily. ‘See something! The thing is, in this house, that one never sees anything! One might die, and it never would be known. You don’t care enough for one to come and look if one is dead or alive.’
‘Oh! miss!’
‘Don’t say “Oh miss!” to me,’ cried Kate, indignantly, ‘or pretend—— Go and fetch me some tea. That is the only thing you can do. You don’t forget your own tea, or anything else you want; but when I am out of sorts, or have a—headache——’
Kate had no headache, except such as her crying had made; but it was the staple malady, the thing that did duty for everything in Miss Blank’s vocabulary, and her pupil naturally followed her example, to this extent, at least.
‘Have you got a headache, miss? I’ll tell Miss Blank—I’ll go and fetch the housekeeper.’
‘If you do, I will ask Uncle Courtenay to send you away to-morrow!’ cried Kate. ‘Go and fetch me some tea.’
But the tea which she had to order for herself was very different, she felt sure, from the tea that Edith Hardwick’s mother would have carried upstairs to her unasked. It was tea made by Maryanne, who was not very careful if the kettle was boiling, and who had filled a large teapot full of water, in order to get this one cup. It was very hot and very washy, and made Kate angry. She sent away Maryanne in a fit of indignation, and did her own hair for the night, and made herself very uncomfortable. How different it must be with Edith and Minnie! If Kate had only known it, however, Edith and Minnie, had they conducted themselves as she was doing, would have been metaphorically whipped and put to bed.
In the morning she came down with pale cheeks, but no one took any notice. Uncle Courtenay was reading his paper, and had other things to think of; and Miss Blank intended to ask what her pupil had been doing with herself when they should be alone together in the school-room. They ate their meal in a solemn silence, broken only now and then by a remark from Miss Blank, which was scarcely less solemn. Uncle Courtenay took no notice—he read his paper, which veiled him even from his companion’s eyes. At last, Miss Blank, having finished her breakfast, made a sign to Kate that it was time to rise; and then Kate took courage.
‘Uncle Courtenay,’ she said very softly, ‘you said you were going to call—at—the Rectory?’
Uncle Courtenay looked at her round the corner of his paper. ‘Well,’ he said, ‘what of that? Of course I shall call at the Rectory—after what you have told me, I have no choice.’
‘Then please—may I go with you?’ said Kate. She cast down her eyes demurely as she spoke, and consequently did not see the inquiring glance that he cast at her; but she saw, under her eyelashes, that he had laid down his paper; and this evidence of commotion was a comfort to her soul.
‘Go with me!’ he said. ‘Not to give the Rector any further impertinence, I hope?’
Kate’s eyes flashed, but she restrained herself. ‘I have never been impertinent to any one, uncle. If I mistook what I had a right to, was that my fault? I am willing to make it up, if they are; and I can go alone if I mayn’t go with you.’
‘Oh! you can go with me if you choose,’ said Mr. Courtenay, ungraciously; and then he took up his paper. But he was not so ungracious as he appeared; he was rather glad, on the whole, to have this opportunity of talking to her, and to see that (as he thought) his reproof of the previous night had produced so immediate an effect. He said to himself, cheerfully, ‘Come, the child is not so ungovernable after all;’ and was pleased, involuntarily, by the success of his operation. He was pleased, too, with her appearance when she was dressed, and ready to accompany him. She was subdued in tone, and less talkative a great deal than she had been the day before. He took it for granted that it was his influence that had done this—‘Another proof,’ he said to himself, ‘how expedient it is to show that you are master, and will stand no nonsense.’ He had been so despairing about her the night before, and saw such a vista of troubles before him in the six years of guardianship that remained, that this docility made him at once complacent and triumphant now.
‘I don’t want to be hard upon you, Kate,’ he said; ‘but you must recollect that at present, in the eye of the law, you are a child, and have no right to interfere with anything—neither parish, nor estate, nor even house.’
‘But it is all mine, Uncle Courtenay.’
‘That has nothing to do with it,’ said her guardian, promptly. ‘The deer in the park have about as much right to meddle as you.’
‘Is our park small?’ said Kate. ‘Do you know Sir Herbert Eldridge, Uncle Courtenay? Where does he live?—and has he a very fine place? I can’t believe that there are five hundred acres in his park; and I don’t know how many there are in ours. I don’t understand measuring one’s own places. What does it matter an acre or two? I am sure there is no park so nice as Langton-Courtenay under the sun.’
‘What is all this about parks? You take away my breath,’ said Mr. Courtenay, in dismay.
‘Oh! nothing,’ said Kate; ‘only that I heard a person say—when I was out last night I met one of the Rectory people, Uncle Courtenay—it is partly for that I want to go—his sister, he says, is the same age as I——’
‘His sister!—it was a he, then?’ said Mr. Courtenay, with that prompt suspiciousness which is natural to the guardian of an heiress.
‘It was Bertie, the second son—of course it was a he. A girl could not have jumped over the fence—one might scramble, you know, but one couldn’t jump it with one’s petticoats. He told me one or two things—about his family.’
‘But why did he jump over the fence? And what do you know about him? Do you talk to everybody that comes in your way—about his family?’ cried Mr. Courtenay, with returning dismay.
‘Of course I do, Uncle Courtenay,’ said Kate, looking full at him. ‘You may say I have no right to interfere, but I have always known that Langton was to be mine, and I have always taken an interest in—everybody. Why, it was my duty. What else could I do?’
‘I should prefer that you did almost anything else,’ said Mr. Courtenay, hastily; and then he stopped short, feeling that it was incautious to betray his reasons, or suggest to the lively imagination of this perverse young woman that there was danger in Bertie Hardwick and his talk. ‘The danger’s self were lure alone,’ he said to himself, and plunged, in his dismay, into another subject. ‘Do you remember what I said to you last night about your Aunt Anderson?’ he said. ‘Shouldn’t you like to go and see her, Kate? She has a daughter of your own age, an only child. They have been abroad all their lives, and, I daresay, speak a dozen languages—that sort of people generally do. I think it would be a right thing to visit her——’
‘If it would be a right thing to visit her, Uncle Courtenay, it would be still righter to ask her to come here.’
‘But that I forbid, my dear,’ said the old man.
Then there was a pause. Kate was greatly tempted to lose her temper, but, on the whole, experience taught her that losing one’s temper seldom does much good, and she restrained herself. She tried a different mode of attack.
‘Uncle Courtenay,’ she said, pathetically, ‘is it because you don’t want any one to love me that nobody is ever allowed to stay here?’
‘When you are older, Kate, you will see what I mean,’ said Mr. Courtenay. ‘I don’t wish you to enter the world with any yoke on your neck. I mean you to be free. You will thank me afterwards, when you see how you have been saved from a tribe of locusts—from a household of dependents——’
Kate stopped and gazed at him with a curious, semi-comprehension. She put her head a little on one side, and looked up to him with her bright eyes. ‘Dependents!’ she said—‘dependents, uncle! Miss Blank tells me I have a great number of dependents, but I am sure they don’t care for me.’
‘They never do,’ said Mr. Courtenay—this was, he thought, the one grand experience which he had won from life.