Hetty Gray Part 14

"Then I must go back to the Hall?" said Hetty.

"I am sorry you look on it as a hards.h.i.+p, Hetty. Mr. Enderby and I think it will be more for your good than staying here."

"I am only afraid of being bad," said Hetty simply.

"Oh! come, you will say your prayers and learn to be a good child," said Mrs. Enderby cheerfully; and then she went away, having settled the matter. She was more than ever convinced that Hetty's was a curious and troublesome nature; but she had not sounded the depths of feeling in the child, nor did she guess how ardently she desired to be good and worthy of love, how painfully she dreaded a relapse into the old state of pride and wilfulness which seemed to shut her out from the sympathies of others.

After Mrs. Enderby was gone, Hetty sat for a long time with her chin in her little hand looking out of the cottage door, and seeing nothing but her own trouble. How was she to try and be like other children? Could she ever learn to be like Phyllis, always cold and well-behaved, and never the least hot about anything; or could she grow quiet and sweet and so easily silenced as Nell? How was she to hinder her tongue from saying out things just in the words that came to her? She wished she could say things differently, for people so seldom seemed to understand what she meant. Tears began to drip down her cheeks as she thought of returning to her corner in the stately Hall, where she felt so chilled and lonely, of sitting no more at the snug homely hearth where there was always a spark of love burning for her.

As she wiped her eyes a gleam of early spring suns.h.i.+ne struck upon an old beech-tree at the lower end of the garden, and turned all its young green into gold. The glorified bough waved like a banner in the breeze, and seemed to bring some beautiful message to Hetty which she could not quite catch. The charm of colour fascinated her eye, the graceful movement had a meaning for her. Springing up from her despondent att.i.tude she leaned from the doorway, and felt a flush of joy glow in her heavy little heart. The same thrill of delight that had enraptured her when, as a babe not higher than the flag leaves, she stretched her hands towards the yellow lilies, pierced her now, but with a stronger, more conscious joy.

When Mrs. Kane returned she found her ready to take a more hopeful view of the future that was at hand.

"I have got to go," she said; "and I am going. But I may come to you when I like. And when the pride gets bad I will always come."

Mrs. Kane promised to keep Scamp for her own, and so Hetty could see all her friends at once when she visited the cottage.

CHAPTER XIII.

A TRICK ON THE GOVERNESS.

Two years pa.s.sed over Hetty's head, during which she had plenty of storms and struggles, with times of peace coming in between. There were days when, but for Mrs. Kane's good advice, she would have run away to escape from her trials; and yet she had known some happy hours too, and had gained many a little victory over her temper and her pride. The pleasantest days had been those when Mark Enderby, brother of Phyllis and Nell, was at home for his holidays, for he always took Hetty's part, not in an uncertain way like Nell's, but boldly and openly, and often with the most successful results. He was the only boy Hetty had ever known, and she thought him delightful; though like most boys he would be a little rough sometimes, and would expect her to be able to do all that he could do, and to understand all that he talked about. He sometimes, indeed, got her into trouble; but Hetty did not grudge any little pain he cost her in return for the protection which he often so frankly afforded her.

Not that anyone meant to be unkind to her. Mr. and Mrs. Enderby continued to take a friendly interest in everything that concerned her, though strictly following their well-meant plan of not showing her any particular personal affection. "We must not bring her up in a hothouse,"

they said, "only to put her out in the cold afterwards." In this they thought themselves exceptionally wise people; and who shall say whether they were or not? It suited Phyllis admirably to follow in the footsteps of her father and mother; but what was merely prudence on the part of her elder benefactors often appeared something much more unamiable when practised towards Hetty by a girl not many years her senior. Miss Davis, who was a rigid disciplinarian and trusted as such by her employers, thought chiefly of breaking down the pride and temper of the child, and of bending her character so as to fit her for the hard life that was before her; a life whose difficulties and trials had been bitterly experienced, and not yet all conquered or outlived by the conscientious governess herself. Nellie, who was Hetty's only comfort in the great and, as it seemed to her, unfriendly house, too often showed her sympathy in a covert way which made Hetty feel she was half ashamed of her affection; and this deprived such tenderness of the value it would otherwise have had.

Hetty, now above eleven years old, was very much grown and altered. Her once short curly hair was long, and tied back from her face with a plain black ribbon. Her face was singularly intelligent, her voice clear and quick, her eyes often much too mournful for the eyes of a child, but sometimes flas.h.i.+ng with fun, as, for instance, when Mark engaged her in some piece of drollery. Then the old spirit that she used to display when she performed her little mimicries for Mrs. Rushton's amus.e.m.e.nt would spring up in her again, and she would take great delight in seeing Mark roll about with laughing, and hearing him declare that she was the jolliest girl in the world.

One Easter time, just two years after Hetty's return to the Hall, when Mark was at home for his holidays, he proposed to Hetty to play a trick on Miss Davis. Hetty's eyes danced at the thought of a trick of any kind. She did not have much fun as a rule, and Mark's tricks were always so funny.

"It isn't to be a bad trick, I hope," she said, however.

"Oh! no, not at all. Only to dress up and pretend to be people from her own part of the world coming to see her and to bring her news. We will be an old couple who know her friends, and are pa.s.sing this way."

"She will find us out."

"No; we must come in the twilight and go away very soon. She will be so astounded by what I shall tell her that she won't think about us at all."

"What will you tell her?"

"Oh! news about her old uncle. She has a rich uncle and she expects to be his heiress. Somebody told me of it. I will tell her he is married, and you will see what a state she will be in."

"I don't believe Miss Davis wants anybody's money," said Hetty; "she works hard for herself, and I think she supports her mother. _I_ shall have to work some day as she does, and I mean to copy her. Only I shall have no mother to support," said Hetty, swallowing a little sigh because Mark could not bear her to be sentimental.

"Oh! well, we shall have some fun at all events," said Mark; "and don't you go spoiling it, proving that Miss Davis is a saint."

"Where can we get clothes to dress up in?" asked Hetty.

"Farmer Dawson's son is going to bring them to me, and you will find yours in your room just at dusk. Hurry them on fast and I shall be waiting in the pa.s.sage."

That evening two rather puny figures of an old man and woman were shown up into the school-room where Miss Davis was sitting alone, looking into the fire and thinking of her distant home. Hetty was supposed to be arranging her wardrobe in her own room, and the other girls were with their mother. The governess was enjoying the treat of an hour of leisure alone, when she was informed that Mr. and Mrs. Crawford from Oldtown, Sheeps.h.i.+re, wished to see her.

"Show them up," said Miss Davis, and waited in surprised expectation.

"Who are they?" she thought; "I do not know the name. But any one from dear Sheeps.h.i.+re--ah, what a strange-looking pair!"

They were odd-looking indeed. Mark was tall enough to dress up as a man, and he wore a rough greatcoat, and a white wig, and spectacles. Hetty had little gray curls, and gray eyebrows under a deep bonnet, and was wrapped in a cloak with many capes. In the uncertain light their disguise was complete.

"I have not the pleasure--" began Miss Davis.

"No, you don't know us," said Mark, "but your friends do, and we know all about you. We were pa.s.sing this way and have brought you a message from your mother."

"Indeed!" said Miss Davis, and her heart sank. A letter she had been expecting all the week had not arrived. Her mother was sick and poor.

What dreadful thing had happened at home?

"Oh, she is not worse than usual," put in Hetty, in the shrill piping tone which she chose to give to Mrs. Crawford. "Don't be alarmed."

Miss Davis did not easily recover from her first shock of alarm. She remained quite pale, and Hetty wondered to see so much feeling in a person whom she had often thought to be almost a mere teaching-machine.

"The news is about your uncle," went on Mark. "Perhaps you have not heard that he is married."

"No, I had not heard," murmured Miss Davis; and she looked as if this indeed was a terrible blow to her. Hetty was immediately annoyed at her and disappointed in her. Was Mark right in his estimate of her character? Hetty had thought her a wonder of high-mindedness and independence of spirit, if very formal and cold. Was she now going to be proved mercenary and mean?

"Your mother did not write to you about it, fearing it would be a disappointment to you."

"My uncle has a right to do as he pleases," said Miss Davis, "and I hope he will be happy"; but her lips were trembling and she looked pained and anxious. "I thank you very much for your trouble in coming to tell me. I daresay my mother will write immediately."

Now Mark was not satisfied with the result of his trick. He had hoped that Miss Davis would have got very angry, and have said some amusing things. Her quiet dignity disappointed him, and with an impulse of wild boyish mischief he resolved to try if he could not startle her.

"I am sorry to say I have not told you everything," he blurted out suddenly. "I ought to prepare you for the worst, but I don't know how."

"Speak, I beg of you," faltered Miss Davis.

"Your uncle is dead, and has left all his fortune, every penny, to his wife."

A look came over Miss Davis's face which the children could not understand.

"My brother!" she said, "can you tell me what has become of my little brother?"

"Run away," said Mark, who had not known till this moment that she had a brother.

Miss Davis gasped and leaned her face forward on the table. The next moment they saw her slip away off her chair to the floor. She had fainted.

Mark was greatly alarmed, and struck with sudden remorse. Hetty sprang up crying, "Oh, Mark, how could you?"

"What are we to do?" said Mark in despair.