Chapter Nineteen.
Maria Causes Trouble.
“For two pins I’d have our things packed up and go back at once, Dan; that I would,” cried Saxa Lydon, as she stood before the long cheval glass in the best bedroom at the Elthornes’. “Here, you, give me that pin off the dressing table.”
The first words were in a low tone to her sister, the latter to Maria Bell, who was playing the part of lady’s maid to the two visitors dressing for dinner; but from a keen interest in the state of affairs, Maria’s ears were preternaturally sharp, and she heard the first words as well.
A handsome diamond pin was fetched and handed to the speaker, who thrust it into the knot of abundant hair, where it glistened like so much dew.
“The place doesn’t seem the same,” said Dana, who had finished dressing and lay back in a chair, arranging and rearranging the folds of her dress.
“Hold your tongue,” whispered her sister. “We don’t want everyone to know.”
She looked significantly at the maid, who, with a most discreet air, ignored everything and went on folding and hanging up dresses in the wardrobe.
“I don’t care who hears!” said Dana. “I’m sick of it. I wouldn’t have come if it hadn’t been for the poor old man.”
“Nor I,” said Saxa, whose anger was getting the better of her discretion. “Anyone would think we were perfect strangers; why, Burwood is ten times as attentive.”
“To you,” said Dana spitefully.
“No, he is not; it is to you. If I were you, I’d give Master Alison such a lesson to-night! I’d flirt with Burwood till I made him half mad with jealousy.”
“That’s the advice I was thinking of giving you,” said Dana with a sneer. “He is always at your heels, or wanting to help you mount or dismount.”
“Oh, come, I like that,” said Saxa, whose face was now scarlet, and she frowned as she gazed at her sister’s reflection in the glass instead of at her own and the bracelets she was attaching to her well-shaped arms. “He was riding by your side all day yesterday.”
“Look here,” said Dana coldly, “if you want to quarrel send away the maid. I don’t want Burwood. You can have him.”
“Thank you. But you might tell the truth.”
“Don’t be a fool!” said Dana, and then, hurriedly, “Hush! don’t let’s quarrel here. But it’s too bad; anyone would think we were nobody at all, and that the boys were not at home.”
“Don’t be a fool yourself,” whispered Saxa, leaning forward and offering a cut glass bottle. Then, aloud, “Scent?” and again, in a low voice, “That minx’s ears are like a fox’s.”
“Thanks,” said Dana, taking the bottle and using it liberally. “Here, what’s-your-name? Maria, have a drop of scent?”
“Oh, thank you, miss,” cried the maid eagerly. “No; don’t take it now,” said Saxa, replacing the scent on the table. “You may empty the bottle when you pack up our things to-morrow.”
“Oh, thank you, Miss Lydon.”
“Got quite well and strong again?”
“Yes, miss, quite, thank you.”
“It was this nurse who attended you, wasn’t it—at the hospital?”
“Yes, miss,” said Maria, tightening her lips and looking vicious.
“Hallo!” said Dana, laughing boisterously. “Look at her, Saxa. I say, used she to drink your port wine and eat your new laid eggs?”
“Oh, I don’t know what she did, miss,” said Maria, in a tone of voice which seemed to say, “Ask me a little more.”
“There, I’m nearly ready,” said Saxa, examining herself in the glass. “I suppose the dinner bell will go directly. Maria doesn’t like nurse. She’s too much of the fine madam—eh, ’Ria?”
“Yes, miss, a deal too much for me.”
“Never mind; she made a better job of you than of the old man. He gets well very slowly.”
“Perhaps nurse knows when she is in a comfortable place, and doesn’t want to go back to London,” said Maria tartly.
“Very likely,” said Saxa coolly. “No love lost between you two, I see.”
“No, Miss Lydon, indeed there is not.”
“Pity,” said Saxa laconically. “Servants ought to be very happy together.”
“I don’t look upon Nurse Elisia as a fellow-servant, miss, and I’m sure she doesn’t as to me.”
“Likely enough. Thinks she is too pretty. There, ’Ria, shall I do?” and Saxa spread out her dress, and swept across the room and back.
“Well done, female peacock!” cried Dana sneeringly.
“You look lovely, miss,” cried Maria. “Pretty?” she continued. “Her pretty? P-f-f! Why, she’s nothing to you two young ladies, only I suppose some people think differently.”
“Eh?” said Dana sharply. “What do you mean by that?”
“Oh, nothing, miss; only I do say it’s a pity some people think so much of white faced nurses.”
“’Ria has a sweetheart, and he has been making eyes at the nurse and wishing he was an interesting invalid,” said Saxa merrily.
“Oh, no indeed, miss,” cried Maria viciously; “but if I had, it isn’t me as would have such goings on.”
“Ah, well, it isn’t my business,” said Saxa carelessly. “Somebody has been paying her attentions then, I suppose; and nurses like them as other people do.”
Maria tightened her lips and said nothing, but Dana looked flushed and excited.
“Look here,” she said sharply, as if she were speaking to one of her grooms, “what does all this mean?”
“Oh, nothing, miss; it isn’t for me to say, only I don’t like to see such goings on.”
“What goings on?”
“Oh, nothing, miss.”
“But—”
“Let her alone, Dana. What is it to you?”
“But I want to know,” cried Dana sharply, for a faint suspicion had been in her brain for some weeks past consequent upon a sudden change she had noted in Alison; and this suspicion, increased by the maid’s words, was rapidly growing into a certainty.
“Well, want to know,” said her sister. “I say, why doesn’t that dinner bell ring? I’m hungry.”
“Look here, Maria; I’ve always been kind to you when I’ve come here,” said Dana excitedly.
“Yes, miss, always,” said Maria.
“And I always will be, and so will my sister.”
“That means half a sovereign, ’Ria,” said Saxa merrily. “Don’t you let her put you off with a paltry half crown.”
“Then tell me what you mean.”
“Oh, I couldn’t, miss; I couldn’t, indeed.”
“Then there is something,” said Dana, “and—you shall tell me,” she cried fiercely, as, in an Amazonlike fashion, she gripped the woman’s arm. “Now then, you tell me. It’s something about the nurse and—”
“Miss Dana, please don’t. I’m so weak still,” pleaded Maria.
“There, you as good as owned to it. What is it?”
“It’s nothing, miss. I only sus— fancied something.”
“Then speak out,” cried Dana, sharply. “I will know before you go out of this room. Then it was them I saw across the park,” she exclaimed excitedly.
Maria’s eyes twinkled.
“You were thinking something about Mr Alison?”
“O Dan, you ought to be ashamed of yourself!” cried Saxa.
“Ought I? Never mind. It was what I suspected, but I wouldn’t let myself believe it. Now, Maria, you speak out. I will know now.”
“I dursn’t, miss.”
“You tell me directly, or it will be the worse for you and for him.”
“I’m sure I don’t know nothing, miss,” said Maria, whimpering, “and you are hurting my arm.”
“And I’m sure you do,” cried Dana, loosening her grip and tearing off her glove. “There,” she said, taking off a ring set with good-sized pearls, “tell me everything and I’ll give you that.”
Maria turned pale with excitement, and her right hand opened and shut.
“I dursn’t, miss,” she whispered hoarsely. “It’s more than my place is worth.”
“If anything comes of what you tell you shall be maid to us, so speak out honestly. There, take the ring.”
“Dana, I’m ashamed of you,” whispered Saxa, as Maria’s fingers closed upon the valuable jewel. “It’s disgraceful.”
“I don’t care. He’s playing fast and loose with me, and I’m not going to put up with it, so I tell you. Now then, I’ll speak plainly, Maria, and you’ve got to speak plainly, too. Mr Alison has been making up to that nurse!”
“You won’t tell on me, miss?” whispered Maria, in whose palm the ring seemed to burn as if the chaste, pale pearls were fiery rubies.
“No; I’ll hold you safe.”
“Then it is true, miss. He’s always after her, and has been ever since she came.”
“You lying hussy!” cried Saxa hotly. “If I were my sister I’d lash you with my riding whip—I mean shake you till you went down on your knees and owned it was out of spite.”
“Lying hussy, am I?” cried Maria viciously, “when every word’s true, and that isn’t all, miss; Mr Neil’s as bad or worse.”
There was a sharp sound in the room, for Saxa had flashed up with rage and struck the woman sharply across the mouth with the back of her hand.
“A lie!” she cried. “Mr Neil Elthorne would not degrade himself by noticing such a woman.”
“A lie, is it?” cried Maria, with her hand to her lips. “Then you shall have it now without paying me for it. It’s a lie, I suppose, that he was going on with her all the time I was in hospital, and when he was down here and obliged to stay because of poor master’s hurt—plotted and planned to get her down here, too? That’s a lie, I suppose, miss? I’m not blind. I’ve seen a deal too much, and if that woman isn’t soon turned out of the house I’m not going to stop.”
“It—is—not—true,” cried Saxa hoarsely.
“And poor dear master lying there all helpless, and being cheated by ’em both. It’s shameful; and how you young ladies can put up with it—”
“It can’t be true,” said Saxa furiously.
“Very well, miss, you know best,” said Maria; “but I’m not going to stay here to be knocked about by the best lady as was ever born.”
“Stop!” cried Saxa fiercely; and she caught the malignant woman’s arm as she was making for the door. “I—I beg your pardon. Tell me, is all this true?”
“Yes, miss, it’s true enough,” said Maria, beginning to sob; and then, as her arm was loosened, she made for the door, trembling and frightened at what she had said in her bitter dislike to the woman who had almost saved her life.
“You had better go,” said Dana, who was startled at the change which had come over her sister’s face.
Maria waited for no more, but, repentant in her alarm, hurried out of the room, leaving the sisters alone.
Just then the great bell in the turret over the hall began to clang out its summons for dinner.