"It's such a delight to me to have found a real friend!" said Mabel one day. "I've told Mother about you, and she wrote that she was so glad. I think I must read you a little scrap of her letter. She says: 'Your description of Aldred Laurence pleased me very much—she seems just the kind of high-minded girl with whom I should wish you to be associated; and though I stipulated for you to have a bedroom to yourself, I do not object to your sharing it with her, if you like. Our friends naturally exercise a great influence over our characters, so I am glad you have made such a good choice. I am sure that, knowing our home standards, I can rely upon your judgment, and that you would not allow yourself to be intimate with anyone who is not thoroughly worthy of your confidence.' You needn't turn so red!" continued Mabel, who misunderstood the cause of Aldred's blushes. "Of course, Mother is extremely particular, but she seems quite satisfied. I hope she'll see you some day, and then she'll love you on her own account."
"Suppose she didn't?" hazarded Aldred.
"She couldn't help it. Mother and I have just the same tastes; we admire courage and spirit, and people who do things in the world. Nearly all Mother's friends are interesting in some way. Mr. Joyce is an explorer, and Mr. Hall has done grand temperance work; Miss Abercombie is an artist, and Miss Verney is helping to run a settlement in the slums. Mother says it does her good to know them, and spurs her on to try to do more herself."
"What does she do?"
"Oh, heaps! No one could live a busier life than Mother. She's president of ever so many societies and guilds! She looks after poor girls, and finds employment for them, and sends them to the country when they need holidays. Then, in our own village there are the Orphanage and the Cottage Hospital to visit, and the district nurse and the deaconess to help, and clothing clubs and local charities to manage. She opens bazaars, and gives the prizes at schools, and acts as judge at flower shows. When Father was in Parliament it was really dreadful; Mother could hardly get through her enormously long list. But he lost his seat at the last election, and she has had a little easier time since then."
"But need she do it, if she doesn't like it?" objected Aldred.
There was a puzzled look on Mabel's face as she answered: "You, of all people, to ask such a question! Of course, she feels bound to give what help she can. She says her social influence is her one talent, and she must use it wherever a good cause needs a champion. She would be terribly missed, if she stopped supporting those various societies. It's what I'm to take up myself when I leave school. You, I expect, will go in for some splendid work, like Florence Nightingale, or Sister Dora. I have a presentiment that your name will be handed down to fame."
The idea of devoting her life to such self-sacrifice absolutely staggered Aldred. She did not attempt, however, to shatter Mabel's dreams for her future, but only gave an ambiguous reply. When her friend was in this exalted mood, she evidently did not like to be checked, and the least hint that her high ideals were not shared would make a little rift within the lute, and destroy her confidence.
Now that she had secured what she considered her rightful place at Birkwood, Aldred was thoroughly happy in her new life. The Grange was a very up-to-date school, and Miss Drummond was an exceedingly enterprising and go-ahead principal, who kept in touch with all the latest educational methods, and was ever ready to give some fresh system a trial. This term she was devoting herself to an experiment which found great favour among her pupils. It was one of her pet theories that every woman, whether rich or poor, ought to have a thoroughly practical acquaintance with all the details of housekeeping, and she was determined to put this into operation. She had had a small cottage built in one corner of the grounds, and classes were held there regularly for cookery and still-room lore. The girls were taught to mix puddings, bake bread, make light pastry, and concoct many old-world salves and cordials. Miss Drummond would wax both enthusiastic and didactic when she aired her views on the subject.
"We can very well emulate our great grandmothers in this respect," she would say, "and thus make a happy combination of ancient and modern. Because you are studying French and algebra is no reason at all why you should not also know how to fry an omelette or boil a potato. A cultivated brain ought surely to be able to grasp domestic economy better than an untrained one, and an educated woman who is really helpful is worth more than an ignorant one. Even if you are never called upon to do things yourselves at home, you ought at least to know how they should be done, so that you need not set your maids unreasonable tasks, and expect impossibilities in the way of service. I think, also, that a great future for many of our English girls lies in the Colonies, where domestic help is often at a premium, and the most delicately nurtured lady must sometimes set to work, and be her own cook and laundress. If you profit by the classes you attend at the cottage, you will have an invaluable accomplishment, and one which may in some emergency prove more useful than anything else you have learnt."