Rosa Nouchette Carey

“ Nan, who was looking beautiful, met him with her usual unconsciousness: though neither of them knew it, it was this very unconsciousness that was fast healing the wound. One cannot mourn long after a lost dream, and there had never been any reality in it. Not one of Nan’s thoughts had ever belonged to him for a moment: his existence, his individuality had never grazed the outer edge of her susceptibilities. Dick had encased her from childhood in armor of proof against all manhood. Archie felt this even as he touched her hand, and his lips gave her welcome. ”

“ Phillis’s cheerfulness was a little forced, and for some time after they had left the Friary—with Grace and Archie waving their farewells from the road—she was very silent.
But no sooner had they crossed the threshold of Glen Cottage than their girlhood asserted itself. The sight of the bright snug rooms, with their new furniture, the conservatory, with its floral treasures, and Sir Harry’s cheery welcome, as he stood in the porch with Mrs. Mayne, was too much even for Phillis’s equanimity. In a few minutes their laughing faces were peering out of every window and into every cupboard. ”

“ Nan testified her pleasure on more than one occasion: jealousy never found a resting-place in a corner of her heart.
“I am so glad, Phillis,” she observed, once, “that you and Grace Drummond like each other so much. You have never found any girl equal to you yet; and I was always too stupid to give you what you wanted.”
“Oh, Nannie, as though I would change you for a dozen Grace Drummonds!” returned Phillis, stanch as ever to her domestic creed, that there never was and never could be such another as Nan. ”

“ And now there had suddenly started up, like a piece of gilded clap-trap, this amazing man of inches, calling himself their cousin, Sir Henry Challoner; a man who was absolutely tired of making money,—who called Gilsbank, a far finer house than Longmead, a tidy little place, and who could throw in Glen Cottage, that bijou residence, as a sort of dower-house for widowed Challoners; a man who would soon be talked about in Hadleigh, not because he was rich,—most of the Hadleigh families were rich,—but because he was restoring an ancient name to something of its old respectability. ”

“ I am afraid I know very little about the four youngest, except that they are working Grace to death. Just fancy, Miss Challoner!” he continued, addressing Nan, and quite disregarding Phillis’s sympathetic looks. “Grace has actually no life of her own at all; she teaches those girls, sits with them, walks with them, helps them mend their clothes, just like a daily or rather a nursery governess, except that she is not paid, and has no holidays. I cannot think how my mother can find it in her heart to work her so hard!” finished Archie, excited to wrath at the remembrance of Grace’s wrongs. ”

“ And though poor Mattie winced with pain under that cordial grasp, she hid it manfully.
“Did they tell you at Oldfield how poor they are?” she said, when this ceremony had been performed, and Sir Harry’s face looked more like a sunset than ever with that benevolent glow on it.
“Oh, yes,” he returned, indifferently; “but all that is over now.”
“You know they have to work for their living; the girls are dressmakers,” bringing out the news rather cautiously, for fear he should be shocked; a baronet must be sensitive on such points. But Sir Harry only laughed. ”

“ Thinking of each other gives us strength to go through with it all. This evening trying to cheer you up has done me good. I do not feel the least afraid of people to-night. Looking at that sea and sky makes one feel the littleness and unreality of all these worries. What does it matter—what does anything matter—if we only do our duty and love each other, and submit to the Divine will?” finished Nan, reverently, who seldom spoke of her deeper feelings, even to Phillis. ”

“ Challoner sat among a few chosen spirits knitting and talking in her pleasant low-toned voice, quite content that the burden of responsibility should rest upon her daughters.
Mrs. Challoner always smiled when people told her that she ought to be proud of her girls. No daughters were ever so much to their mother as hers; she simply lived in and for them; she saw with their eyes, thought with their thoughts,—was hardly herself at all, but Nan and Phillis and Dulce, each by turns. ”

“ Thank you, my dear. You have done that beautifully, I am sure. Never mind what an old woman says. When people are in trouble like that, they are often ill to live with. Magdalene has her moods; so have we all, my dear, though you are too young to know that; but no one understands her better than her old Bathsheba; that is my name, and a funny old name too, is it not?” continued Miss Mewlstone, blinking at Phillis with her little blue eyes. “The worst of having such a name is that no one will use it; even father and mother called me Barby, as Magdalene does sometimes still.” ”

“ Such prayers might stretch like an invisible shield before the countless foes that environ such a one; fiery darts may be caught upon it; a deadly thrust may be turned away. What if the blessing would never reach the ear of the loved one, who goes out unconscious of sympathy? His guardian angel has heard it, and perchance it has reached the very gate of heaven.
Nan came down, smiling and radiant, to find Dick waiting for her in the veranda and chattering to Phillis and Dulce. ”

“ And she really believed what she said.
“Mother, you must trust us,” replied Phillis, touched by this victory she had won. “Do you know what I said to Dulce? Work cannot degrade us. Though we are dressmakers, we are still Challoners. Nothing can make us lose our dignity and self-respect as gentlewomen.”
“Other people will not recognize it,” returned her mother, with a sigh. “You will lose caste. No one will visit you. Among your equals you will be treated as inferiors. It is this that bows me to the earth with shame.”
“Mother, how can you talk so?” cried Nan, in a clear, indignant voice. ”

“ Now Nan has lost them, and puts Laddie down and prepares to follow. In spite of her staidness, she would have dearly loved a run too; only she thinks of Dick, and forbears.
Dulce, who is out of breath, fears she must give up the race, and begins to pant and drop behind in earnest, and to wish salt water were fresh, and then to dread the next breakwater as a hopeless obstacle; but Phillis, who is still as fresh as possible, squares her elbows as she has seen athletes do, and runs lightly up to it, unmindful and blissfully ignorant of human eyes behind a central hole. ”

“ Archie could not emulate her ease: a man is always at a disadvantage in such a case. His interest had sustained no shock: it was even stimulated by what he had just heard; but his sympathy seemed all at once congealed, and he could find no vent for it. In spite of his best efforts his manner grew more and more constrained every moment.
Nan looked at him more than once with reproachful sweetness. She thought they had lost caste in his eyes; but Phillis, who was shrewd and sharp-set in her wits, read him more truly. ”

“ Would people ever dare to ask her to work for them? Would they not beg her pardon, and cry shame on themselves for entertaining such a thought for a moment? Phillis almost envied Nan, who was shedding salt tears on her prayer-book. She thought she was absorbed in her devotions, while her own thoughts would wander so sadly; and then a handsome face in the opposite pew attracted her attention. Surely that must be Mrs. Cheyne, who lived in the White House near them, of whom Nan had talked,—the poor woman who had lost husband and children and who lived in solitary state. ”

“ Now and then, chance words fell on her ear,—“Magdalene” over and over again; and “Janie” and “Bertie,”—always in the voice she had so admired. By and by she heard her own name, and rose at once, and found them looking for her.
“Here is my good angel, Barby,” observed Mr. Cheyne, as she came up smiling. “Not one girl in a thousand would have acted as bravely and simply as she has done. We are friends for life, Miss Challoner, are we not?” And he stretched out his hand to her, and Phillis laid her own in it. ”

“ Mrs. Challoner was weeping for joy, and Dulce was keeping her company; but Phillis walked up to her cousin with a shamefaced look:
“I am sorry I called you a Goth, Harry. I ought to have remembered Alcides. You are as good as gold. You are a dear generous fellow. And I love you for it; and so do Nan and Dulce. And I was not a bit cross, really; but you did look such a great goose, turning out that wardrobe.” But, though she laughed at the remembrance, the tears were in Phillis’s eyes. ”

“ Nan, who was looking out to sea rather dreamily, intent on her usual vision, Dick, roused herself at this, and began to smile in a lofty way.
“You think yourself very clever, Phillis, and so do I; but sermons are hardly in your province, my dear.”
Phillis shook her head gravely. She dissented from this view of the case.
“Common sense is in every one’s province,” she persisted. “I am a practical woman, and some of my hints would be valuable. Sermons are failures, Nan. They go over people’s heads like a flight of badly-shot arrows. ”

“ I have not forgotten the scissors,” went on Nan, with such surprising cheerfulness that Phillis saw through it, and was down on her in a moment.
“No, Nan; there! I declare I will not be such a goose. I am not nervous,—not one bit; it is pure fun, that’s what it is. Dulce, what a naughty child you are to oversleep yourself this morning, and I had not the heart to wake you, you looked so like a baby: and we never wake babies because they are sure to squall!” ”

“ Challoner almost pushed her away.
“Hush, children! Do be quiet, Nan; I cannot talk to you. I cannot answer questions to-night.” And then she shivered, and drew her shawl closer round her, and put away Nan’s caressing hands, and looked at them all with a face that seemed to have grown pinched and old all at once, and eyes full of misery.
“Mammie, you must speak to us,” returned Nan, not a whit daunted by this rebuff, but horribly frightened all the time. “Of course, Dorothy told us that Mr. Trinder has been here, and of course we know that it is some trouble about money.” ”

“ Sir Francis Challoner had been a black sheep,—a very black sheep indeed: one who had dyed himself certainly to a most sable hue; and though, for such prodigals, there may be a late repentance and much killing of fatted calves, still Mrs. Challoner was right in refusing to intrust herself and her children to the uncertain mercies of such a sinner.
Now, Nan knew nothing about the sin; but she did think that an uncle who was a baronet threw a certain reflected glory or brightness over them. Sir Francis might be that very suspicious character, a black sheep ”

“ But Laura and Susie and Clara had not yet found out that their mother loved them and wished to be their friend; they were timid and reserved with her, and took all their troubles to Grace. Even Mattie, who was her first-born, and who was old enough to be her mother’s companion, quailed and blushed like a child under the dry caustic speeches at which Clyde and Fred only laughed.
“You don’t understand the mother. Her bark is worse than her bite,” Clyde would say to his sister sometimes. “She is an awfully clever woman, and it riles her to see herself surrounded by such a set of ninnies. ”

“ Let them settle it between them,—money-bags and all. Dick is Dick, and after all, I am not afraid!” And Nan marched back to the company, with her head higher, and a great assumption of cheerfulness, and a little gnawing feeling of discomfort at her heart, to which she would not have owned for worlds.
Nan was the gayest of the gay that evening, but she would not dance again with Dick: she sent the poor boy away from her with a decision and peremptoriness that struck him with fresh dismay.
“You are not tired now, Nan; and have been waltzing ever so long with Cathcart and Hamilton.” ”

“ A clergyman has more privileges than other men: perhaps she was wrong to suspect him. He might not wish his sister to visit them, except in a purely business-like way; but with him it was different. Most likely he had tea with Mrs. Trimmings sometimes, just to show he was not proud; he might even sit and chat with Mrs. Squails, and not feel compromised in the least. Oh, yes! how stupid she was to think he admired Nan, because she had intercepted a certain glance! That was her mania, thinking every one must be after Nan. ”

“ It was impossible for these young girls to see that their ordinary language was not humble enough for their new circumstances. They would make mistakes at every turn, like Dorothy, who got out the best china and brewed her tea in the melon-shaped silver teapot.
Phillis opened her eyes rather widely at this. Nan was not often so observant. It was true: self-consciousness was a torment to Archibald Drummond, a Frankenstein of his own creation, that had grown imperceptibly with his growth to the fell measure of his manhood, as inseparable as the shadow from the substance. ”

“ As Miss Mewlstone paused a moment to wipe the tears that were flowing over her old cheeks, Phillis’s voice came to her relief.
“Oh, can you doubt it?” she said, in much agitation. “Dear Mrs. Cheyne, can you have an instant’s doubt? Do you think the dead carry all these paltry earthly feelings into the bright place yonder? Forgive you—oh, there is no need of forgiveness there; he will only be loving you,—he and the children too.” ”

“ But Nan grew shy all at once, and would not answer.
“I am serious, Sir Henry Challoner,” replied Phillis, pompously. “The path of true love is impeded. Poor Dick is pining in his rooms at Oxford; and Nan—well, I am afraid her looks belie her; only you know appearances are sometimes deceitful.” And indeed Nan’s pink cheeks and air of placid contentment scarcely bore out her sister’s words.
The newly found cousin sat in silent perplexity staring at them both. Love-affairs were not much in his way; and until now he had never been thrown much with his equals in the other sex. ”

“ Nan said, “Why, what has made you play truant, Dick?” in a slightly injured voice. But Mrs. Challoner merely smiled at him, and said nothing; young men were her natural enemies, and she knew it. She was civil to them and endured their company, and that was all.
Dick Mayne was not a formidable-looking individual; he was a strong, thick-set young fellow, with broad shoulders, not much above middle height, and decidedly plain, except in his mother’s eyes; and she thought even Dick’s sandy hair beautiful. ”

“ Poor Mattie! she had many a good cry in secret before that Tuesday. She could hardly help feeling pained to see how all-in-all those two were to each other, and the glad eagerness Grace threw into her work, knowing the reward of commendation she would reap. “It must be so strange never to be snubbed or scolded,—to do everything right,” Mattie thought.
Grace felt very sorry for her, and petted her a good deal. The dark little face had always a pained wistfulness on it now that touched her. She spoke kindly of Mattie to her brother on all possible occasions. ”

“ Drummond, you must do nothing of the kind,” replied Phillis, in an alarmed voice: “the poor dear mother must not be disturbed by any such talk! You mean it kindly, but we have made up our own minds, Nan and I: we mean to do without the world and live in one of our own; and we mean to carry out our plan in defiance of everything and everybody; and, though you are our clergyman and we are bound to listen to your sermons, we cannot take your advice in this.” ”

“ But this did not mend matters, and Nan’s laugh still rang merrily in the darkness.
“What are those two doing?” asked Phillis, trying to peep between the lilac-bushes, but failing to discover more than the white glimmer of Nan’s shawl.
Nan’s laugh, though it was full of sweet triumph, only irritated Dick; the lord of the evening was still too sore and humiliated by all these rebuffs and repulses to take the fun in good part.
“What is it that amuses you so?” he asked, rather crossly. “That is the worst of you girls; you are always so ready to make merry at a fellow’s expense. ”

“ His eyes challenged hers boldly, and it was Phillis who flushed and looked conscious.
It was as though he said to her, “Ah! you think you know all about it. But you need not trouble yourself to be sorry for me; you do not know what a man’s strength can do. And I am determined to bear this by myself, and to myself; for in silence there is power.”
It certainly seemed as though a new strength had come to Archie. He had been a man who was prone to speak much of his feelings. Irritable and sensitive, he had demanded much sympathy from his womankind. ”

“ Clyde had been articled to a lawyer, an old friend of Mr. Drummond’s, and had won golden opinions from his chief, who pronounced him an intelligent, likely lad, and as sharp as a needle. Fred had lately obtained a clerkship in an old-established house in Leeds, and was also doing well, and his salary was a great boon to the straitened household. Grace, too, was doing her duty vigorously, and no longer vexed her mother’s soul by her drooping looks of uncomplaining discontent,—that silent protest of many, that is so irritating to the home-rule. ”