science, and make some great discovery. If I could only go and study at Halle, instead of going on droning here.'
'Oh! boys can always get educated if they choose. You are going to Eton or Winchester after this term.'
'Not if I can get any sense into mother. I don't want to waste my time on those stupid classics and athletics. I say, Janet, it's time to see whether the precipitation has taken place.'
The two used to try experiments together, in Bobus's end of the attic, to an extent that might make the presence of a strange child in the house dangerous to herself as well as to everyone else.
Mrs. Gould herself brought the little girl, trying to impress on Mrs. Brownlow that if she was indocile it was not her fault, but her grandfather could not bear to have her crossed.
The elders did not wonder at his weakness, for the creature was wonderfully lovely and winning, with a fearless imperiousness that subdued everyone to her service. So brilliant was she, that Essie and Ellie, though very pretty little girls, looked faded and effaced beside this small empress, whose air seemed to give her a right to bestow her favours.
'I am glad to be here!' she observed, graciously, to her hostess, 'for you are my cousin and a lady.'
'And pray what are you?' asked Janet.
'I am la Senora Dona Elvira Maria de Guadalupe de Menella,' replied the damsel, with a liquid sonorousness so annihilating, that Janet made a mocking courtesy; and her mother said it was like asking the head of the house of Hapsburg if she were a lady!
With some disappointment at Allen's absence, the little Donna motioned Bobus to sit by her side at dinner- time, and when her grandfather looked in somewhat later to wish her good-bye, in mingled hope and fear of her insisting on going home with him, she cared for nothing but his admiration of her playing at kings and queens with Armine and Barbara, in the cotton velvet train of the dressing up wardrobe.
'No, she did not want to go home. She never wanted to go back to River Hollow.'
Nor would she even kiss him till she had extorted the assurance that he had been shaved that morning.
The old man went away blessing Mrs. Brownlow's kindness to his child, and Janet was universally scouted for muttering that it was a heartless little being. She alone remained unenthralled by Elvira's chains. The first time she went to Kencroft, she made Colonel Brownlow hold her up in his arms to gather a bough off his own favourite double cherry; and when Mother Carey demurred, she beguiled Aunt Ellen into taking her on her own responsibility to the dancing lessons at the assembly rooms.
There she electrified the dancing-master, and all beholders, seeming to catch inspiration from the music, and floating along with a wondrous swimming grace, as her dainty feet twinkled, her arms wreathed themselves, and her eyes shone with enjoyment.
If she could only have always danced, or acted in the garden! Armine's and Babie's perpetual romantic dramas were all turned by her into homage to one and the same princess. She never knew or cared whether she were goddess or fairy, Greek or Briton, provided she had the crown and train; but as Babie much preferred action to magnificence, they got on wonderfully well without disputes. There was a continual performance, endless as a Chinese tragedy, of Spenser's Faery Queene, in which Elfie was always Gloriana, and Armine and Babie were everybody else in turn, except the wicked characters, who were represented by the cabbages and a dummy.
'Reading was horrid,' Elvira said, and certainly hers deserved the epithet. Her attainments fell far behind those of Essie and Ellie, and she did not mean to improve them. Her hostess let her alone till she had twice shaken her rich mane at her grandfather, and refused to return with him; and he had shown himself deeply grateful to Mrs. Brownlow for keeping her there, and had said he hoped she was good at her lessons.
The first trial resulted in Elvira's going to sleep over her book, the next in her playing all sorts of ridiculous tricks, and sulking when stopped, and when she was forbidden to speak or go out till she had repeated three answers in the multiplication table, she was the next moment singing and dancing in defiance in the garden. Caroline did not choose to endure this, and went to fetch her in, thus producing such a screaming, kicking, rolling fury that Mrs. Coffinkey might have some colour for the statement that Mrs. Folly Brownlow was murdering all her children. The cook, as the strongest person in the house, was called, carried her in and put her to bed, where she fell sound asleep, and woke, hungry, in high spirits, and without an atom of compunction.
When called to lessons she replied-'No, I'm going back to grandpapa.'
'Very well,' was all Caroline answered, thinking wholesome neglect the best treatment.
In an hour's time Mr. Gould made his appearance with his grandchild. She had sought him out among the pigs in the market-place, pulled him by the coat, and insisted on being taken home.
His politeness was great, but he was plainly delighted, and determined to believe that her demand sprang from affection, and not naughtiness. Elvira stood caressing him, barely vouchsafing to look at her hostess, and declaring that she never meant to come back.
Not a fortnight had passed, however, before she burst upon them again, kissing them all round, and reiterating that she hated her aunt, and would live with Mother Carey. Mr. Gould had waited to be properly ushered in. He was distressed and apologetic, but he had been forced to do his tyrant's behest. There had been more disturbances than ever between her and her aunt, and Mrs. Gould had declared that she would not manage the child any longer, while Elvira was still more vehement to return to Mother Carey. Would Mrs. Brownlow recommend some school or family where the child would be well cared for? Mrs. Brownlow did more, offering herself to undertake the charge.
Spite of all the naughtiness, she loved the beautiful wild creature, and could not bear to think of intrusting her to strangers; she knew, too, that her brother and sister-in-law had no objection, and it was the obvious plan. Mr. Gould would make some small payment, and the child was to be made to understand that she must be obedient, learn her lessons, and cease to expect to find a refuge with her grandfather when she was offended.
She drew herself up with childish pride and grace saying, 'I will attend to Mrs. Brownlow, for she is my cousin and my equal.'
To a certain degree the little maiden kept her word. She was the favourite plaything of the boys, and got on well with Babie, who was too bright and yielding to quarrel with any one.
But Janet's elder-sisterly authority was never accepted by the newcomer. 'I couldn't mind her, she looked so ugly,' said she in excuse; and probably the heavy, brown, dull complexion and large features were repulsive in themselves to the sensitive fancy of the creature of life and beauty. At any rate, they were jarring elephants, as said Eleanor, who was growing ambitious, and sometimes electrified the public with curious versions of the long words more successfully used by Armine and Babie.
Caroline succeeded in modelling a very lovely profile in bas-relief of the exquisite little head, and then had it photographed. Mary Ogilvie, coming to Kenminster as usual when her holidays began in June, found the photograph in the place of honour on her brother's chimney-piece, and a little one beside it of the artist herself.
So far as Carey herself was concerned, Mary was much better satisfied. She did not look so worn or so flighty, and had a quieter and more really cheerful tone and manner, as of one who had settled into her home and occupations. She had made friends, too-few, but worth having; and there were those who pronounced the Folly the pleasantest house in Kenminster, and regarded the five o'clock tea, after the weekly physical science lecture at the school, as a delightful institution.
Of course, the schoolmaster was one of these; and when Mary found how all his paths tended to the Pagoda, she hated herself for being a suspicious old duenna. Nevertheless, she could not but be alarmed by finding that her project of a walking tour through Brittany was not, indeed, refused, but deferred, with excuses about having work to finish, being in no hurry, and the like.
'I think you ought to go,' said Mary at last.
'I see no ought in the case. Last year the work dragged, and was oppressive; but you see how different it has become.'
'That is the very reason,' said Mary, the colour flying to her checks. 'It will not do to stay lingering here as we did last summer, and not only on your own account.'
'You need not be afraid,' was the muttered answer, as David bent down his head over the exercise he was correcting. She made no answer, and ere long he began again, 'I don't mean that her equal exists, but I am not such a fool as to delude myself with a spark of hope.'
'She is too nice for that,' said Mary.
'Just so,' he said, glad to relieve himself when the ice had been broken. 'There's something about her that makes one feel her to be altogether that doctor's, as much as if he were present in the flesh.'
'Are you hoping to wear that out? For I don't think you will.'
