Chapter Fourteen.
The Castle.
Castle Beverley was even a more delightful place than Penelope had the least idea of before she arrived at it. She had her own vivid imagination, and had pictured the old castle, its suites of apartments, its crowds of servants, its stately guests, many and many a time before the blissful hour of her arrival. But when she did get to Castle Beverley, she found that all her pictures had been wrong.
It is true, there was an old castle, and a tower at one end of an irregular pile of building; but the modern part of the house, while it was large, was also unpretentious and simple.
The children who ran to meet the carriage were many of them Penelope’s schoolfellows. Mrs Beverley had a charming and placid face and a kindly manner. Mr Beverley was a round-faced, rubicund country squire, who made jokes about every one, and was as little alarming as human being could be. In short, it was impossible for Penelope not to feel herself at home. Her old schoolfellows welcomed her almost with enthusiasm. They had not cared for her greatly when at Hazlitt Chase, but they were just in the mood to be in the best temper with everything, and had been in raptures with her rendering of Helen of Troy. Honora, too, had pictured, very pathetically, the scene of the lonely girl afterwards weeping by herself in the wood, and the delightful inspiration which had come over her to give her some weeks’ holiday at Castle Beverley. Perhaps Cara Burt would have preferred her not being there, but Mary L’Estrange, who was also a visitor at the Castle, had quite forgiven Penelope for her desire to obtain five pounds. She put it down altogether, now, to the poor thing’s poverty, and hoped that the transaction would never be known. Annie Leicester had not yet arrived, but was expected. Susanna, the most to be feared, perhaps, of the four girls who had given Penelope the money, had gone abroad for the holidays.
Thus, all was sunshine on this first evening, and when Penelope found herself joking and repeating little bits of school news and some of the funny things which had occurred between herself and Mademoiselle, the others laughed heartily. Yes, that first evening was a golden one, long to be remembered by the somewhat lonely girl.
When she went to bed that night, she was so tired that she slept soundly until the morning. When the morning did arrive, and she was greeted by a smiling housemaid and a delicious cup of tea, she felt that, for the time at least, she was in the land of luxury.
“I’ll enjoy myself for once,” she thought, “I’ll forget about school and that I am very poor and that I am disappointed with Brenda, and that Brenda is staying at Marshlands, and Mademoiselle, too, is staying at Marshlands. I will forget everything but just that it is very, very good to be here.”
So she arose and dressed herself in one of the new white linen dresses which Mademoiselle had purchased for her out of Mrs Hazlitt’s money, and she came down to breakfast looking fresh and almost pretty.
“You do seem rested—I am so glad!” said Honora. “Oh, no, we are not breakfasting in that room. Father and mother and the grown-ups use the front hall for breakfast in the summer, and we children have the big old school-room to ourselves. You didn’t see it last night; we had so much to show you, but it is—oh—such a jolly room. Come now this way, you will be surprised at such a crowd of us.”
As Honora spoke, she took Penelope’s hand, and, pushing open a heavy oak door, led the way through a sort of ante-chamber and then down a corridor to a long, low room with latticed windows, over which many creepers cast just now a most grateful shade. There were several boys and girls in the room, and a long table was laid, with all sorts of good things for breakfast. Amongst the boys was Fred Hungerford and a younger brother called Dick, and there were three or four boys, brothers and cousins of Honora herself. There were altogether at least thirteen or fourteen girls. The two little Hungerfords flew up to Penelope when they saw her. They seemed to regard her as their special friend.
“Honora,” said Pauline, “may we sit one at each side of Penelope and tell her who every one is and all about everything? Then she’ll feel quite one of us and be—oh—so happy!”
“That’s an excellent idea, Pauline,” said Honora. “Here, Penelope, come up to this end of the table, and I’ll jog the children’s memories if they forget any one.”
So Penelope enjoyed her first breakfast at Castle Beverley, and could not help looking at Honora with a wonderful, new sensation of love in her eyes. Honora, whose dazzling fairness and stately young figure had made her appear at first sight such an admirable representative of the fair Helen of the past, had never looked more beautiful than this morning.
She wore a dress of the palest shade of blue cambric and had a great bunch of forget-me-nots in her belt. Her face was like sunshine itself, and her wealth of golden hair was quite marvellous in its fairness. Her placid blue eyes seemed to be as mirrors in which one could see into her steadfast and noble mind. All her thoughts were those of kindness, and she was absolutely unselfish. In fact, as one girl said: “Honora is selfless: she almost forgets that she exists, so little does she think of herself in her thought for others.”
Now, Honora’s one desire was to make Penelope happy, and Penelope responded to the sympathetic manner and kindly words as a poor little sickly flower will revel in sunshine. But Pauline presently spoke in that rather shrill little voice of hers:
“We are happy here: even Nellie’s better, aren’t you, Nellie?”
“Yes, I suppose so,” said Nellie. She looked across the table at Pauline, and gave half a sigh and half a smile.
“Of course you are happy, Nellie,” said Honora. “You’re not thinking any more about that bracelet, are you?”
“I do wish I could get it back,” said Nellie, “but, all the same I am happy.”
“But please, Penelope, tell us about your sister,” said Pauline. “Oh, do you know—”
“Yes—do tell us that!” interrupted Nellie.
“Why, Fred saw her yesterday at Marshlands-on-the-Sea,” continued Pauline. “She’s quite close to us—isn’t it fun? Fred came back quite interested in her—he thinks her so very pretty!”
“Whom do I think pretty, Miss?” called out Fred from a little way down the table. “No taking of my name in vain—if you please.”
“You know, Fred,” said Pauline, in her somewhat solemn little voice, “that you think dear Penelope’s sister sweetly pretty.”
“I should think so, indeed!” said Fred, “and, by the way, she is at Marshlands. She had three of the funniest little girls out walking with her yesterday that you ever saw in your life. Did you know she was going to be at Marshlands, Miss Carlton?”
“Yes,” said Penelope, feeling not quite so happy as she did a few minutes ago.
“We’ll ask her up here some day to have a good time with us, dear, if you like,” said Honora.
“Thank you,” replied Penelope, but without enthusiasm.
“I spoke to her yesterday,” said Fred. “She really did look awfully nice; only they were the rummest little coves you ever saw in all your life—the children who are there.”
“They are her pupils; they’re the daughters of a clergyman,” said Penelope.
“I don’t care whose daughters they are, but they go about with your sister, and they do look so funny. I told her you were coming and she gave me her address. Would you like to go in to see her this morning?” Penelope trembled.
“Not this morning, please,” she said.
She felt herself turning pale. She felt she must have one happy day before she began to meet Brenda. She had a curious feeling that when that event took place, her peace, and delight in her present surroundings would somehow be clouded. Brenda was so much cleverer than she was, so gay, so determined, so strange in many ways. Oh, no; she would not go to see her to-day.
“If you like,” said Honora, observing Penelope’s confusion, and rather wondering at it, “I could send a note to your sister to come up to-morrow to spend the day here. We’re not going to do anything special to-morrow, and mother always allows me to ask any friends we like to the Castle. We have heaps of croquet courts and tennis courts, and the little girls could come with her, for of course she couldn’t leave them behind. How would that do, Penelope? Would that please you?”
“I don’t know,” said Penelope. Then she said, somewhat awkwardly:
“Oh, yes—yes—if you like—”
Honora had a curious sensation of some surprise at Penelope’s manner; but it quickly passed. She accounted for it by saying to herself that her friend was tired and of course must greatly long to see her only sister.
“She’s not absolutely and altogether to my taste,” thought Honora, “but I am just determined to give her the best of times, and we can have the sister up and the funny children for at least one day. What’s the good of having a big place if one doesn’t get people to enjoy it?”
It was just then that Nellie said:
“I do wish, Penelope, you had not done one thing.”
“What is that?” asked Penelope, who had hardly got over the shock of having Brenda so soon with her.
“Why did you bring Mademoiselle to Marshlands? We don’t care for Mademoiselle, do we, Pauline?”
“No, indeed,” said Pauline, “and she took my hand yesterday and clutched it so tight and wouldn’t let it go before I pulled two or three times, and oh! I’m quite positive sure that she’ll find us out, and I wish she wouldn’t!”
“Frankly, I wish she wouldn’t too,” said Honora, “but I do not see,” she added, “why Penelope should be disturbed on that account—it isn’t her fault.”
“No, indeed it isn’t,” said Penelope, “and I wish with all my heart she hadn’t come with me to Marshlands-on-the-Sea.”
When breakfast was over, all the young people streamed out into the gardens with the exception of Honora and Penelope.
“One minute, Penelope dear,” said Honora. “Just write a little line to your sister and I will enclose one, in mother’s name and mine, inviting her to come up with the children to-morrow. Here are writing materials—you needn’t take a minute.”
Penelope sat down and wrote a few words to Brenda. For the life of her, she could not make these words cordial. She hardly knew her own sensations. Was she addressing the same Brenda whom she had worshipped and suffered for and loved so frantically when she was a little girl? Was it jealousy that was stealing into her heart? What could be her motives in wishing to keep this sister from the nice boys and girls who made Castle Beverley so charming? Or was she—was she so mean—so small—as to be ashamed of Brenda? No, no—it could not be that, and yet—and yet—it was that: she was ashamed of Brenda! The children she was now with belonged to the best of their kind. Penelope had lived with people of the better class for several months now and was discerning enough to perceive the difference between gold and tinsel. Oh, was Brenda tinsel; Brenda—her only sister? Penelope could have sobbed, but she must hide all emotion.
Her letter was finished. She knew how eagerly Brenda would accept and how cleverly she would get herself invited to the Castle again, and again, and again. Honora’s cordial little note was slipped into the same envelope. Penelope had to furnish the address, and, an hour later, Fred and his brothers, who were going to ride to Marshlands in order to bathe and to spend some hours afterwards on the beach, arranged to convey the invitation to Brenda which poor Penelope so dreaded.
“Now we have that off our minds,” said Honora, “and can have a real good time. What would you like to do, Penelope? You know you must make yourself absolutely and completely at home. You are one of us. Every girl who comes here by mother’s invitation is for the time mother’s own daughter and looked upon as such by her. She is also father’s own daughter and, I can tell you, he treats her as such, and the boys are exactly in the same position. We’re all brothers and sisters here, and we love each other, every one of us.”
“But would you love a girl, whatever happened?” asked Penelope, all of a sudden.
“Oh, I don’t know what you mean—whatever happened—what could happen?”
“Nothing—of course—nothing; only I wonder, Honora. I never seemed to know you at all when I was at school. I wonder if you could love a girl like me.”
“I love you already, dear,” said Honora. “And now, please, don’t be morbid; just let’s be jolly and laugh and joke; every one can do just what every one likes—this is Liberty Hall, of course. It’s a home of delight, of course. It’s the home of ‘Byegone dull Care’;—oh, it’s the nicest place in all the world, and I want you to remember it as long as you live. I am so glad mother allowed me to ask you! Now then, do see those youngsters, Pauline and Nellie, tumbling over the hay-cocks: how sunburnt they are! such a jolly little pair! I am sorry about Nellie’s bracelet; the loss of it makes her think too much of that sort of thing. I am quite afraid she will never find it now. What would you like to do, Penelope? You looked so happy when you came downstairs, but now you’re a little tired.”
“I think I am a little tired,” said Penelope. “I think for this morning I’d like a book best.”
“Then here we are—this is the school library: every jolly schoolgirl’s and schoolboy’s story that has ever been written finds its way into this room. Run in, and make your choice, and then come out. The grounds are all round you—shade everywhere, and pleasure, pleasure all day long.”