Chapter Seven.
Light Blue Silk.
During the days that elapsed between the purchase of the pale blue silk and the grand fête at Mrs Hazlitt’s school, it may well be supposed that Brenda Carlton was very busy. Not Penelope at school, not any of those girls who were to take the characters of Tennyson’s “Dream of Fair Women,” were as much occupied as this young woman. She had so much to think of and to do; for she had not only to see about her own toilette, which meant frequent visits to Madame Declassé’s, at Rocheford, and therefore frequent demands for the pony trap, but she had also to help the girls to make up their pink muslins.
She was sorry to have to dress her pupils in a colour she knew in her heart of hearts could not possibly suit them, but she argued with her own conscience that no possible dress that she could devise would make the Misses Amberley look well and, that being the case, they might just as soon be frightful as not. She had no pricks of conscience with regard to this matter. The little red-haired girls were useful to her for the time being. She intended to have a delightful outing at the seaside and, in order to effect this, she must keep the Reverend Josiah in the best of humours until her grand month was over.
This was quite easy to accomplish as long as the girls themselves were pleased. But Brenda was by no means a fool, and she judged by certain remarks of Nina’s, who was the most innocent of the confiding three, that already a few ugly little suspicions with regard to their governess were animating their small breasts. In short, they were the sort of girls who would very soon discover for themselves the wickedness of this wicked world. They were not specially amiable; there was nothing whatever attractive about them. When once they discovered Brenda, as Brenda really was, her position in the Reverend Josiah’s establishment would come to an end.
Well, she intended to secure another home before then. There was a certain rich young man whom she hoped to attract while at Marshlands-on-the-Sea. When once engaged to him, it mattered little to her what any of the Amberleys thought about her. Still, the present fortnight must be used to the best advantage, and Brenda took great care how she trimmed the white hate. She made them look exceedingly pretty and stylish, for she had wonderful fingers which could contrive and arrange the very simplest materials as though by magic. The pink muslin frocks were also made to suit each girl. It did not matter if they were a little skimpy; the girls were all young, and Nina, in particular, ought still to wear very short skirts.
“No, Nina,” said her governess, “I am not going to give you flounces, but I shall put a couple of false tucks upon the muslin skirt.”
“I’d much rather have flounces,” said Nina, who was nearly in tears. “I like little tiny frills, they are so pretty, and you have given them to Fanchon and to Josephine.”
“That is the very reason, chérie, why you must not have them,” was Brenda’s remark. “The washing will be altogether too expensive. Your poor, dear papa, who is taking no holiday himself, cannot possibly afford the laundry bills which I shall have to send him if all your dresses are flounced.”
This argument seemed conclusive, and Nina had to be satisfied—that is, she pretended to be, but there was her little scheme of vengeance working up in her small brain, and she intended to talk it over with her sisters on the eighth of July, that long, long, wonderful day when beautiful Brenda would not be with them, and when they could do exactly as they liked.
Clever as she was, Brenda could not guess the thoughts which filled her little pupil’s brain, and she was too much interested in her own affairs just then to trouble herself much about so insignificant a young person.
Meanwhile, time flew as it always does when one is busy, and Brenda’s own delicate and beautiful dress arrived at the rectory two days before she was to wear it. Now, Brenda did not want any of her pupils to see her in this dress, and above all things, she did not wish the Reverend Josiah to perceive that she—that absolutely dependent orphan—could leave his establishment attired in pale blue silk. She trusted much to the white serge coat, which she had ordered, to cover the silk. Nevertheless, she knew she must run some dangers. As a matter of fact, she had only spent about thirty shillings on each of her pupils, and had, therefore, purloined from the sum which had been given her for their clothes four pounds ten wherewith to line her own pockets. This she hoped would never be discovered, nor would it have been, had Nina not been quite so sharp, and Fanchon so really discontented with the quality of the muslin dress she was to wear at Marshlands-on-the-Sea.
“Please, please, Brenda,” said Fanchon, on the day before the great fête, “won’t you put on your pale blue silk, and let us see you in it? It has come, I know, for I was in the garden when the carrier arrived with that great box from Madame Declassé’s. Father was with us, and he asked what could be in the box.”
“And what did you say, dear?”
“I said it was a box full of pots for making jam—that you had bought the pots the day we were at Rocheford, as you thought it would be such a good thing for cook to turn all the gooseberries into jam while we were at the seaside.”
“What a very clever little Fanchon you are!” said Brenda, looking very attentively at her pupil. “And what did papa say—dear innocent papa?”
“Oh, he was ever so pleased—he loves gooseberry jam, and said that we must on no account strip the trees beforehand, so as to leave plenty for cook to boil down to put into the pots.”
“What a mercy he didn’t feel the box!” was Brenda’s remark. “I do think, Fanchon, you are very clever—very wicked, of course, and I suppose you ought to be punished. But there—you meant well, didn’t you?”
“I suppose I did,” said Fanchon, raising her pale blue eyes and fixing them on her governess’ face.
Brenda looked back at the girl. She heartily wished that Fanchon was two years younger and five years stupider, and even a little more ugly; but, such as she was, she must make the best of her.
“Of course,” continued Fanchon, who seemed to divine her governess’ thoughts, “if you really think that I told a wicked story, I can go to father now and tell him that I made a mistake, and that the box contained your blue silk dress, and—and—other things of yours—and not the jam pots. Shall I, Brenda? shall I?”
“You goosey! you goosey!” said Brenda. She squeezed Fanchon’s arm and began to pace up and down the terrace walk with her pupil by her side. “You know,” she said, lowering her voice and speaking in the most confiding and enthralling way, “you are older than the others, and I can confide in you. It is wrong to tell lies—very, very wrong—and whatever possessed you, you silly girl, to think of jam pots? I am sure nothing was further from our heads on that auspicious day. But I don’t want your dear father to see the dress that I am going to the fête in, and I will tell you why.”
“Please do,” said Fanchon, “for to tell the truth, Brenda, neither Nina, nor Josephine, nor I understand you always.”
“Well, dears, is it likely that you should? I am, let me see, between twenty-two and twenty-three years of age, although I don’t look it by any means.”
“I don’t know what that age looks like, so can’t say,” was Fanchon’s remark.
“Well, dear—it is a very beautiful age, and very young. It is the age when a girl comes—so to speak—to her prime, and when she thinks of—of,”—Brenda lowered her voice—“getting married.”
“Oh!” said Fanchon, colouring crimson. “You don’t mean to say—”
“I don’t mean to say anything at all, I have nothing to confide, so don’t imagine it for a single moment. But at the seaside, where the gay people will be, and the band will play, and there’ll be no end of tea out of doors and all sorts of fun of one sort and another, it may happen that—that—somebody may see your Brenda and—oh, Fanchon, need I say any more!”
“I don’t suppose you need,” was Fanchon’s answer. She felt immensely flattered.
“Think what it would mean to me,” continued Brenda. “A prince might come along, who would fall in love with the beggar maid.”
“But you—with your blue silk dress, to be called a beggar maid! That name might suit poor Nina, who can’t have flounces, even, to her pink muslin dress that only cost sixpence three farthings a yard.”
Brenda was startled at Fanchon’s memory with regard to the price of the muslin.
“No,” continued that young lady, “you’re not a bit like the beggar maid.”
“Ah, but—my dear girl—I am the beggar maid, and I am waiting for the king to come along who will raise me to sit on his throne, and—in fact—I am going to whisper a great secret to you, Fanchon—”
“What is it?” said Fanchon, who was at once fretful and disgusted, overpowered with curiosity, and yet heartily wishing that Brenda would not confide in her.
“Well—I will tell you,” said Brenda. “I have been left a little money—just the merest little trifle, and I am spending a little of it on my blue silk, and I don’t want any one to know but just my own darling Fanchon; my eldest pupil—who loves me so well! Perhaps, my chérie, I may buy you a pretty gift out of some of the money. What do you say to a little gold bracelet—a bangle, I mean?”
Brenda remembered that she could get a silver gilt bracelet for a couple of shillings at a shop she knew of at Rocheford, and that it would be worth her while to purchase Fanchon’s sympathy at that price.
“Oh—but I should love it!” said the young lady, looking at her sunburnt and badly formed wrist.
“The bangle would give you good style,” said Brenda. “Well, we’ll say nothing about it now—but—well, as I have given you my confidence, you won’t repeat it.”
“I suppose not, but I do want to see your blue silk.”
“All right, you shall, but not the others—I draw the line at the others. You can slip out of bed to-night and come to me, and I will put it on and show myself. I am going away early in the morning before any of you are up.”
“But I am certain father will be up, for he said so, and he’s going to let you in afterwards.”
Brenda considered for a moment—
“I can’t help his letting me in, but he shan’t see me off,” she said—“no one need do that. Well, now—go and join your sisters. Go to bed at the usual hour, and come to me at ten o’clock; then I will put on the dress and you shall judge of the effect.”
The thought of seeing the wonderful dress and of possessing a real gold bangle were two circumstances enough to turn the slight brain of Fanchon Amberley. She did not confide to her sisters what her conversation had been, and managed that evening to elude them and to present herself at Brenda’s door as the clock struck ten. The other two were sound asleep, so she had little difficulty in getting away from them, and, as Brenda was on the watch, she let her pupil in at once, immediately locking the door as soon as Fanchon got inside.
“Now then,” she said, “you just hop on to my bed, for I don’t want you to catch cold. See—here’s the dress.”
Madame Declassé was really an excellent dressmaker, and the pale blue silk would have looked lovely to any eyes, but the unaccustomed ones of Fanchon Amberley fairly blinked as they gazed at it.
“I never imagined anything so lovely!” she cried. “But you must put it on—you promised.”
Brenda obeyed. She was gratified by the curious mixture of vanity and greed, envy and admiration which filled poor Fanchon’s face, and she attired herself, not only in the dress, which gave her little figure such a “chic” appearance, but also put on the white hat and the dainty white lace scarf, and drew the long white gloves upon her slender arms. Finally, she slipped into the white serge coat which was to cover the finery, lest the Reverend Josiah should catch sight of it.
“He won’t see me to-morrow morning,” she said, “and when I come back in the evening, he’ll think that I am wearing a cotton dress underneath the serge. There now, Fanchon, you have seen everything, and you may rest satisfied that I shall have plenty to tell you when I return.”
“I am bewildered,” said Fanchon. “Of course you look beautiful; of course the prince or the king, whenever either of them comes along, will fall in love with you, for you look like a princess or a queen yourself! I wish I were beautiful too. I hate—yes—I hate being ugly!” and the poor child gave a sob of pain and disappointment.
“Now listen, Fanchon. You won’t be ugly when you are grown up. It doesn’t matter a bit how you look now, for you are only a little girl. What you have to do now is to help me all you can, and then, when you come to be eighteen or nineteen years of age—I will help you, petite, and get you a good husband, and drew you in the colours that will make you look—oh—marvellous! Keep me as your friend and you will be a wise little girl: do the reverse, and you will rue it.”
Fanchon shed a few more tears, but finally yielded to Brenda’s seductions and clasped her arms round her neck and kissed that young person’s cool cheek with her own hot lips; then went to bed to dream of that wonderful vision in blue silk and the prince who was surely going to find her.
The next morning, at a very early hour, Brenda took her departure, having successfully avoided the Reverend Josiah, who had gone to bed with the full intention of getting up to see his dear young governess off and to tell her that he would assuredly sit up and have something hot for supper when she came back in the evening. He had not yet thanked her for her consideration in buying the jam pots.
“The dear girl must have got them out of her own money,” he said to himself. “She really is a treasure, and I am so fond of gooseberry jam. One can have so few indulgences—what with the sick of the parish and my very small stipend. But when I think of that poor young creature, and of what she is doing for me and my children, I cannot be too thankful. I will certainly thank her in suitable words when she returns, and I will see her off in the morning.”
But, alack and alas! the Reverend Josiah was tired, for he had had a very long and fatiguing day, and Brenda’s footsteps were light as the falling of snow, and she had left the house and gone out to the stables and got the pony put to the cart. She had also awakened Jock—universally known as “the boy,” and had given him fourpence to drive her to Harroway station. All these things had been done, and Brenda was away—yes, away for her day’s holiday before the Reverend Josiah opened his eyes on that summer morning.