‘Old fool of a fellow! Why couldn’t my father have made me your guardian, and then there would have been none of this row! One would think I had had her down to act barmaid to the fellows. And you never spoke to one, did you, Phœbe?’
‘Only now and then to Mr. Hastings. I could not help it after the day he came into the study when I was copying for you.’
‘Ah, well! that is nothing—nobody minds old Jack. I shall let them all know you were as safe as a Turk’s wife in a harem, and maybe old Crabbe will hear reason if we get him down here alone, without a viper at each ear, as he had last time.’
With which words Mervyn departed, and Miss Fennimore exclaimed in some displeasure, ‘You can never think of remaining, Phœbe.’
‘I am afraid not,’ said Phœbe; ‘Mervyn does not seem to know what is proper for us, and I am too young to judge, so I suppose we must go. I wish I could make him happy with music, or books, or anything a woman could do! If you please, I think I must go over to the Holt. I cannot settle to anything just yet, and I shall answer my letters better when I have seen Miss Charlecote.’
In fact Phœbe felt herself going to her other guardian; but as she left the room, Bertha came hurriedly in from the garden, with a plaid thrown round her. ‘What—what—what’s the matter?’ she hastily asked, following Phœbe to her room. ‘Is there an end of all these mysteries?’
‘Yes,’ said Phœbe, ‘Miss Fennimore is ready for you.’
‘As if that were all I wanted to know. Do you think I did not hear Mervyn storming like a lion?’
‘I am sorry you did hear,’ said Phœbe, ‘for it was not pleasant. It seems that it is not thought proper for us to live here while Mervyn has so many gentleman-guests, so,’ with a sigh, ‘you will have your wish, Bertha. They mean us to go away!’
‘It is not my wish now,’ said Bertha, pulling pins in and out of Phœbe’s pincushion. ‘I am not the child I was in the summer. Don’t go, Phœbe; I know you can get your way, if you try for it.’