Kensington Museum, and Alice is one of them, and Edgar is about there. I'm sure Miss Fulmort ought not to be deceived as they are doing; it's all nonsense about school-mistresses being designed by nature to be hoodwinked. It makes me so miserable, I don't know what to do; and when I heard you were come, it was as if you had been sent on purpose to help me.'
'Poor child!' said Felix, with a heavy sigh. 'You have kept this all to yourself.'
'I could not tell any one. I could have told Miss Lyveson, because she is one's friend; but it would only be being a tell-tale and informer here. And one's own brother, too! And I could not write, for they look over all the letters that are not to fathers and mothers.
'They must make an exception for me!' said Felix, in an indignant tone.
'I knew you would say so. O Felix, tell them so! I do feel like having Papa now I have you.'
'If you only had!' sighed Felix. 'My poor Bob, it is a grievous business, but you have been very upright and considerate, as far as I can see.'
'I'm so glad you don't want me to have told!' she said, with a sigh of relief, as unlike his as that of one who throws off a burden is to that of him who takes it up.
'Not if it can be helped. It would be a mischievous and cruel exposure, and would be hard on one who has been led into it,' he said, with breaks and pauses, half for breath, half for considering. 'It is most reckless, most unjustifiable, in Edgar!' He knit his brows, so that she gazed at him in awe and wonder, as having something in his countenance that she did not comprehend. Then, after a silence, he said, 'Robin, I will speak to Edgar, and if you do not find that this is stopped after one communication, which of course there must be, write to me. These ladies must make an exception in favour of such as we are!'
'O Felix, it is so nice to hold you and feel you! Only I wish I had not had to grieve you so much!'
'Dishonourable conduct is not what I was prepared for!' he said, setting his teeth.
'And will you speak to Angel? I hear them coming in,' said Robina.
'Yes. Let me have her alone at first. Come back in ten minutes' time.'
He was still sitting on the bench, with his elbows on his knees, and his hands over his brow, when Angela came towards him. She was of the same long-limbed make as Clement, was nearly as tall as the square sturdy Robina nearly three years older, and had Clement's small, almost baby mould of features, relieved only by such arch deep blue eyes as shone in Edgar's face. She looked such a mere child, that when her step and exclamation caused Felix to raise his head, it seemed absurd to imagine her to be knowingly engaged as go-between in a clandestine correspondence, and with a sort of pity and compunction for the blame he had intended, he held out his arms to her.
'O Felix, how cold you are! Your face is like marble. Now if I was to sit there, in this weather, wouldn't they be at me like wild cats?'
Thus reminded, Felix rose, and certainly shivered after the exercise of his privilege. 'Are you happy here, Angel?' he asked in a constrained tone.
'Yes, it is jollier than Miss Pearson's. There are more girls, and we do have such fun!'
'I hope you are good and steady, and very careful of all the rules.'
Angela fidgeted, as if she didn't like the style of the conversation.
'You know,' he continued, 'there may be rules that you may not see the use of, but that must be obeyed for all that.'
'What a tiresome dry old Blunderbore you are!' broke out Angela, with ill-assured sauciness; 'this isn't the way Edgar goes on when he comes to see us.'
Felix could not check a sort of groan or grunt; and Angela, whose pertness was defensive, quailed a little. She had driven him out of the due sequence of his discourse, but he resumed it. 'Angel, I must tell you; if anybody asks you to break rules-by giving letters-you must not'
Angela kicked pebbles about.
'Have you ever been asked to do so?'
She hung her head, and a pout came over her face.
'Angel,' he said, in a voice from the sadness of his heart, 'I will not ask any questions, in case you have made promises not to betray secrets; but you must never make such promises again. Tell me you will never do-this thing again.'
She was silent.
'Angela!' he said, reprovingly.
'I don't know why I should promise you more than Edgar,' broke out Angela, petulantly. 'He is my brother too, and he isn't cross; and I love him, and
Between this flat defiance of his authority, and his scruple about interfering with the child's sense of honour, Felix was in no slight perplexity even as to this interview with his little sister. His disclaimer came first. 'I ask about no one's secret,' he said, 'but, Angel, I must have you understand this. If you break the rules that forbid the giving of notes from any person outside the school, it will be doing more harm than you can understand. I shall put a stop to it at once, and most likely you will be sent away in disgrace.'
She was somewhat awed, but she did not speak.
'Whatever any one may say to you,' said Felix, 'recollect that it is dishonesty and treachery to do anything underhand, and the greatest possible mischief to those you wish to be kind to. Don't you see, it is no kindness to help any one to do wrong?'
She began to cry. 'They don't want to do wrong. It is very nasty and mean of Bobbie to have told.'
'You will know some day how good and trustworthy it is in Bobbie,' said her elder brother. 'You cannot understand the rights and wrongs in such a manner as this, at your age, Angel.' (To tell the child this was a mistake, if he had but known it.) 'You must be satisfied with knowing that whatever breaks rules and must be kept secret is necessarily disobedient and deceitful, and may have terrible consequences. Do you believe me? Then give me your word to have no more to do with it.'
She muttered something among her tears like 'I won't,' and Felix was satisfied, for the exaction of promises had necessarily been the chief mode of government with the two youthful pillars of the house, who spent so much time apart from their dominions; and it was almost unprecedented that such a promise was not observed.
Robina was lingering near, and as they joined her Felix found that his time was up. He was taken back to the drawing-room, where he found himself in presence of the lady he had seen, and of a much younger smaller person, with a slight cast in her eye, and a peculiar jerking manner such as he could well believe would frighten away a young girl's confidence. When he made his request for free correspondence from his little sisters, there was no demur; only Miss Fulmort said, half vexed, 'It ought to have been mentioned before; she did not know why the children had not told her.' And then she made a point of ascertaining Felix's individual address; for she said, 'A great deal of undesirable stuff may be scribbled to brothers and sisters.'
Felix possessed no card, unless such might be reckoned the announcement of photographs and stationery, etc., which was wont to be put up with parcels for strangers; and when he tried to write 'Mr. F. C. Underwood,' the shivering chill so affected his fingers that he could hardly guide the pencil. He took leave, and soon found the assiduous Ferdinand, who presently asked, shyly, 'What the little ones thought of it?'
Felix bethought himself. 'Really, Fernan, it was put out of my head; and, moreover, perhaps it had better not be known more widely than needful.'
'You do not doubt-'
All the ground that had been gone over before was argued out once again by the eager Mexican before they reached the National Gallery, the appointed place of meeting with Edgar. He was not within, but without, and, throwing away his cigar, hailed them as Fernan drew up his horse.
'At last! The storm must have been pitiless, to judge by the effects! You are blue with cold, Felix.'
'Ferdinand, thank you,' said Felix, getting out. 'I am sorry, but I must have Edgar alone a little while.'
'Look here, Travis,' said Edgar, seeing his blank look, 'we'll give you the honour of giving us a spread. You go on and order it at -'s, and I'll walk this fellow there. Curry soup that will astonish him, and warm the cockles of his heart, mind.'
Ferdinand nodded, and drove off, perfectly satisfied with this compensation.
'Let's see if we can walk a little life into you,' said Edgar, taking his brother's arm. 'Bless thy five wits, Tom's a cold! Was it Madame! I always thought she could not be many generations from Billingsgate.'
'I have been to Brompton.'
