awfully old to call yourself Birdie!’ For Birdie had been a pet name of Rose Rollstone; and Bertha Morton, though slim and curly-headed, had a worn look about her eyes, and a countenance such as to show her five-and-thirty years, and to the eyes of fourteen was almost antediluvian; indeed, older observers might detect a worn, haggard, strained look. He was somewhat disgusted, too, at the thin rolls of bread-and-butter on the low table, whence she proceeded to hand teacups, as he thought of the substantial meals at home. When they had been conducted to their rooms, and his uncle followed to his, he broke out with his perpetual, ‘I say, uncle, is this all the grub great swells have? I’m awfully peckish!’
‘That’s early tea, my boy,’ was the answer, with a smile. ‘There’s dinner to come, and I hope you will behave yourself well, and not use such expressions.’
‘Dinner! that’s not such a bad hearing, but I suppose one must eat it like a judge?’
‘Certainly; I am afraid I am not a very good model, but don’t you do anything you don’t see me do. And, Herbert, don’t take wine every time the servants offer it.’
At which Herbert made a face.
‘Have you got any evening shoes? No! If I had only known that the lady was here! It can’t be helped to-day, only wash your face and hands well; there’s some hot water.’
p. 56‘Why, they ain’t dirty,’ said the boy, surveying them as one to whom the remains of a journey were mere trifles, then, with a sigh, ‘It’s no end of a place, but you swells have a lot of bores, and no mistake!’
Upstairs Herbert roamed about studying with great curiosity the appliances of the first bedchamber he had ever beheld beyond the degree of his mother’s ‘first floor,’ but downstairs, he was in the mood of the savage, too proud to show wonder or admiration or the sense of awe with which he was inspired by being waited on by the very marrow of Mr. Rollstone, always such grand company at home. This daunted him far more than the presence of the lady, and though his was a spirit not easily daunted, he almost blushed when that personage peremptorily resisted his endeavour to present the wrong glass for champagne, which fortunately he disliked too much at the first taste to make another attempt. Lord Northmoor, for the first time at the foot of his own table, was on thorns all the time, lest he should see his nephew commit some indiscretion, and left most of the conversation to Miss Morton and Mr. Hailes, the solicitor, a fine-looking old gentleman, who was almost fatherly to her, very civil to him, but who cast somewhat critical eyes on the cub who might have to be licked into a shape befitting the heir.
They tried to keep their host in the conversation, but without much success, though he listened as it drifted into immediate interests and affairs of the neighbourhood, and made response, as best he could, to the explanations which, like well-bred people, p. 57they from time to time directed to him. He thus learnt that Lady Adela with her little Amice had been carried off ‘by main force,’ Bertha said, ‘by her brother. But she will come back again,’ she added. ‘She is devoted to the place and her graves—and the poor people.’
‘I do not know what they would do without her,’ said Mr. Hailes.
‘No. She is lady-of-all-work and Pro-parsoness—with all her might’; then seeing, or thinking she saw, a puzzled look, she added, ‘I don’t know if you discovered, Northmoor, that our Vicar, Mr. Woodman, has no wife, and Adela has supplied the lack to the parish, having a soul for country poor, whereas they are too tame for me. I care about my neighbours, of course, after a sort, but the jolly city sparrows of the slums for me! I long to be away.’
What to say to this Lord Northmoor knew as little as did his nephew, and with some difficulty he managed to utter, ‘Are not they very uncivilised?’
‘That’s the beauty of it,’ said Bertha; ‘I’ve spotted my own special preserve of match-girls, newsboys, etc., and Mr. Hailes is going to help me to get a scrumptious little house, whence I can get to it by underground rail. Oh, you may shake your head, Mr. Hailes, but if you will not help me, I shall set my unassisted genius to work, and you’ll only suffer agonies in thinking of the muddle I may be making.’
‘What does Lady Adela say?’ asked Mr. Hailes.
‘She thinks me old enough to take care of myself, p. 58whatever you do, Mr. Hailes; besides, she knows I can come up to breathe! I long for it!’
The dinner ended by Bertha rising, and proposing to Herbert to come with her. It was not too dark, she said, to look out into the Park and see the rabbits scudding about.
‘Ah!’ said Mr. Hailes, shaking his head as they went, ‘the rabbits ought not to be so near, but there has been sad neglect since poor Mr. Morton’s death.’
It was much easier to get on in a
‘But,’ said Mr. Hailes, ‘Miss Morton will be a very good adviser to you on that head.’
p. 59‘She is very good-natured to him,’ said Frank.
‘No one living has a better heart than Miss Morton,’ said Mr. Hailes heartily; ‘a little eccentric, owing to—to circumstances. She has had her troubles, poor dear; but she has as good a heart as ever was, as you will find, my Lord, in all arrangements with her.’
Nevertheless, Lord Northmoor’s feelings towards her might be startled the next morning, when he descended to the dining-room. A screen cut off the door, and as he was coming round it, followed by his nephew, Bertha’s clear voice was heard saying, ‘Yes, he is inoffensive, but he is a stick. There’s no denying it, Mr. Hailes, he is a dreadful stick.’
Frank was too far advanced to retire, before the meaning dawned on him, partly through a little explosion of Herbert behind him, and partly from the guilty consternation and colour with which the other two turned round from the erection of plants among which they were standing.
Yet it was the shy man who spoke first in the predicament, like a timid creature driven to bay.
‘Yes, Miss Morton, I know it is too true; no one is more sensible of it than myself. I can only hope to do my best, such as it is.’
