Chapter Fourteen.
Monsieur Bergeret’s Letter.
The millinery lessons were begun and steadily carried on without the interest of either of the sisters flagging. For, in spite of Stasy’s capriciousness, there was a good of real material in her: she would have despised herself for not carrying out any plan she had formed. And she was not disappointed in her expectation of getting some “fun” out of this new pursuit. It was a pleasure to her to find how deft and neat-handed a little practice made her. Taste in harmonising and blending colours, and a quick eye for graceful form, she had by nature.
Miss Halliday was full of admiration.
“There’s nothing more I can teach you, young ladies,” she said, at the end of a fortnight, during which time they had had about half-a-dozen lessons. “Miss Stasy—if it wasn’t impertinent to say so—I would call you a born milliner. Now, I never would have thought of putting violets with that brown velvet, never! And yet there’s no denying they go most beautifully, and you do make the ribbons and trimmings go so far, too. I’ve always been told it was the best of French work that it’s so light—never overloaded.—And Miss Derwent, you are so neat; indeed, if I might say so, almost too particular.”
Blanche smiled.
“I haven’t got such fairy fingers as Stasy, I know,” she said admiringly, “though perhaps I could beat her at plain-sewing. Yes, I have run on that lace too heavily, I see. Well, and so you think we’re ready now to teach our girls, Miss Halliday, do you?”
“Indeed, yes, Miss; and I shall be so pleased to order the hats you want for you at any time, charging you, of course, just what I pay for them myself.”
“No indeed,” said Blanche; “that wouldn’t be fair; you must charge a little commission. I’ve made out a short list of the things we want to begin with. We’re thinking of having our first millinery class next Wednesday evening. We can’t have more than one a week, for Miss Wandle and Miss Bracy have two other evening classes, and we don’t want the mothers to think the girls are too much away from home.”
“I’m sure it’s better for them than idling about the lanes,” said Miss Halliday, “and that’s what they mostly spend their evenings in at this time of year.”
“Have you got anything settled about your own plans, Miss Halliday?” asked Stasy.
The milliner shook her head, and gave a little sigh.
“Not yet, Miss Stasy,” she replied; “and unless I can find a partner who could put a little money into the concern, I’m afraid I must make shift to go on alone for some time to come. I’ve got so behind with what I owe, for the first time in my life, all through that disappointment about Miss Green.”
“I really think she should have paid you something,” said Stasy. “I’m afraid you’re too good-natured, Miss Halliday. And now you’re going to be good-natured to us, and let us come in two or three times a week to help you a little.”
“You’re really too kind, Miss Stasy,” said Miss Halliday. “I don’t feel as if I could let you do such a thing. And what would your dear mamma think of it?”
“She’s quite pleased,” said Blanche; “she’s always glad for us to be of any use we can.”
“And really I have nothing to do now,” said Stasy. “The dancing class and the gymnastics are given up for the summer, and my lessons don’t take up long at all. I’ve got in the way of coming to Blissmore every day with Herty; it would be dreadfully dull to stay always at Pinnerton.”
So it was settled that the sisters should come two or three mornings a week to help poor Miss Halliday as much as possible, though, of course, the arrangement was to be kept perfectly private.
It certainly did Stasy a great deal of good to have more to do and some feeling of responsibility. She became more cheerful and more equable in temper than she had yet been in their new home. She was even amiable enough to offer no objection to Blanche’s consent to Florry Wandle’s eager, though modest, request that she and her cousin might be allowed to join the millinery class.
“I scarcely see that we have any right to refuse them,” Miss Derwent had said, “seeing that they actually belong to the guild. Anyway, it would be most ill-natured to do so, as they are good, nice girls.”
“I don’t mind,” said Stasy, “if you and mamma think it right. So long as we are not obliged to go to their houses in return, that’s to say.”
But what Stasy really enjoyed was the amateur apprenticeship to Miss Halliday. It gave her the profoundest pleasure to stroll down the High Street and glance in at the milliner’s window, where hats and bonnets of her own creation were displayed to the admiring gaze of the passers-by. And never had Miss Halliday’s stock-in-trade changed hands so quickly. Orders multiplied with such rapidity that the milliner was scarcely able to execute them, and many were the compliments she received on the improved taste and excellent finish of her handiwork.
“You’ve surely got a very good assistant now,” said Mrs Burgess one day. “I don’t think I’ve seen any prettier bonnets even in Paris than some of those you’ve had this year.”
For Mrs Burgess had now returned from her visit to the Continent, and was very full of allusions to her travels.
Miss Halliday smiled as she replied: “Yes, she thought she had been very fortunate.”
But she kept her secret well, and so did her little servant. And no one noticed the frequency of the Misses Derwent’s visits, as they came in and out by the long garden at the back of Miss Halliday’s house, whence a door opening into the lane cut off the necessity of their passing through the entrance to the town, and somewhat shortened their walk.
Summer was advancing by this time with rapid strides. The spring had been a late one, but when the fine sunny weather did come, the delay was amply compensated for. Sunshine, blossoms, and flowers came with a burst. One could almost see everything growing. Mrs Derwent, who was keenly sensitive to such things, enjoyed this first spring in England, after her many years’ absence, intensely, though quietly, all the more so that Stasy, her chief source of anxiety, was now so much more cheerful.
“Things must come right for them both,” thought the mother to herself. “They are really so good! Very few girls would make themselves happy in so monotonous and isolated a life.”
For even Mrs Harrowby had gone to stay with her own relations in London for a time; and Rosy Milward, who had come over to Pinnerton now and then on guild business, had taken flight, like the rest of the world.
The charms of outside nature, the peace and quiet happiness of their own home, and a fair amount of interesting occupation, made the next few weeks pass pleasantly. Afterwards, Blanche felt glad that it had been so. There was a satisfaction in looking back upon this little space of time as bright and cheerful.
“I really think,” said Stasy one day, when she and Blanche were walking back together from Blissmore, “that we are getting acclimatised at last, Blanchie, or rather I should say, I am, for I’m sure you’ve never been anything but contented. I can look forward now to going on living here with mamma and you for—oh! for ever so long, even if nothing more exciting comes into our lives.”
“I’m so glad,” said Blanche heartily. “Yes, we’ve been very happy lately, haven’t we?”
“But some day,” Stasy went on again, “some day, Blanchie, you must marry. Though I can’t, even in my wildest dreams, picture anyone good enough for you. But you are far too pretty to be an old maid!”
“I can’t imagine marrying,” said Blanche musingly; “that’s to say, I can’t imagine any one caring enough for me, or my caring enough for any one! And I can’t imagine marrying without plenty of caring.”
“Of course not,” said Stasy. They walked on in silence for a little, till almost in sight of their own gate.
“I thought mamma would have come to meet us, perhaps, as she often does,” said Blanche. “But let’s hurry on a little, Stasy, and make her come out in the wood before tea.”
“And we might have tea in the garden, don’t you think?” said Stasy. “We’ve not had it out of doors once this week, the afternoons have been so showery.”
So talking, they crossed their own lawn, entering the house by one of the French windows of the drawing-room, where they half expected to find their mother.
She was not there, however, nor was she in the library.
“I hope she hasn’t gone out alone,” said Blanche. “Run up-stairs, Stasy dear, and see if she is in her room.”
Stasy did so, Blanche remaining at the foot of the staircase.
She heard Stasy’s step along the passage, a door opening, and the young girls cheerful “Are you there, mamma dear?” Then—or was it her fancy?—a sort of muffled exclamation, and the slamming to of the door, as there was a good deal of wind that afternoon, and for a moment or two nothing more.
Blanche grew slightly impatient, which was not usual with her. Was there a touch of instinctive anxiety in the impatience?
“Stasy might be quick,” she said to herself. “If mamma is out, we—”
But just then came Stasy’s voice.
“Blanche,” it said, “come up at once. I can’t leave mamma: there is something the matter.”
Blanche flew up-stairs, her imagination, even in that short space of time, picturing to itself a dozen terrible possibilities. “Something the matter!” What suggestions in the simple words.
It was a relief, on entering the room, to see her mother seated on her usual chair. Pale, very pale, and looking all the more so from the reddened eyelids which told of recent and prolonged weeping. Stasy was kneeling on the floor beside her.
“Mamma, dearest,” said Blanche, “what is wrong? You are not ill? No, thank God—then it can’t be anything very dreadful.”
For there was a strange side of comfort in the isolated position of the little family. When they were all together and well—they had caught sight of Herty playing happily in the garden—nothing, as Blanche had said, “very dreadful” could be the matter. Still, something grievous and painful it must be, to have thus affected the usually cheerful mother; and again, before Mrs Derwent had time to reply, Blanche’s fancy had pictured every kind of possible and impossible catastrophe, except the actual fact.
Mrs Derwent tried to smile.
“You are right, Blanchie,” she said; “it is ‘Thank God,’ as we are all together. But read this.”
She held out a thick foreign letter, closely written in a clerkly hand which Blanche knew well. It was that of the lawyer at Bordeaux, Monsieur Bergeret, and though couched in a good deal of legal technicality, the general sense was not difficult to gather. The old and honourable house of “Derwent and Paulmier” was bankrupt—hopelessly ruined. Monsieur Bergeret, while expressing his deepest sympathy, held out no hopes of any retrieval of the misfortune.
“Mamma,” said Blanche, looking up with startled eyes, “what does it mean? How does it affect us?”
For she knew that, besides any practical bearing on themselves, the blow to her mother would be severe. Her husband’s and her father-in-law’s universally respected position had for more than half her lifetime been a source of natural pride to Mrs Derwent, and even now, though they were dead, their honourable name must be lowered.
But alas! it was worse than this.
“It means,” the mother replied quietly—“it means, my darlings, that we are ruined too. Our money had not been paid out. You remember my telling you that I was a little anxious about the delay; but nothing would have made any difference: they had not got it to pay. If Monsieur Bergeret had pressed them, it would only have hastened the declaration of insolvency. I understand it all. I have read the letter over and over again, since it came by the afternoon post. Dear me,” and she glanced at the pretty, quaint little French clock on the mantelpiece—“can it be only an hour ago? It came at three, and it is only just four. It seems years—years.”
Her voice seemed faint and dreamy. Blanche looked at her in some alarm. She was utterly exhausted for the moment.
“Mamma dear,” said Stasy, “it is impossible to take it all in at once; we must get used to it gradually. The first thing to attend to just now is you. You mustn’t make yourself ill about it, mamma.”
Blanche glanced at Stasy admiringly.
“Yes,” she said, “that is the first thing to care about. I am going down-stairs to see if tea is ready. Will you come down, mamma, or shall I bring you a cup up here?”
“I will come down,” said Mrs Derwent, adding to herself, in a voice which she tried to make firm: “I must begin to get used to it at once.”