Bernard wanted to see Sir Ferdinand, so made it an excuse for helping his sister on the way; and he did so effectively, for his knee and broad breast were Lena’s great resting-place; and his stories of monkeys and elephants were almost as good as kangaroos. Was there not a kangaroo to be seen in London, which she apparently thought would be a place of about the size of Albertstown?
Lady Underwood had insisted on receiving the travellers from Vale Leston in her house in Kensington; and there was her broad, kindly face looking out for them at the station, and her likewise broad and kindly carriage ready to carry them from it. How natural all looked to Angela, with all her associations of being a naughty, wild, mischievous schoolgirl, the general plague and problem!
“But always a dear,” said Marilda, with her habit of forgetting everybody’s faults. “Why didn’t you bring your wife, Bernard, and your little girl for this darling’s playfellow?”
“She is her best playfellow,” said Angela; “Adela’s Joan is too rough, and fitter for Adrian’s companion.”
“She is my playfellow,” said Bernard, holding her up. “Look out, Lena. Here’s Father Thames to go over.”
“And Fernan is so glad,” added Marilda.
For Bishop Robert Fulmort had, when Vicar of St. Wulstan’s, been the guide and helper of Ferdinand Travis’s time of trial and disappointment, as well as the spiritual father of Clement Underwood; he had known and dealt with Angela in her wayward girlhood, and aided her bitter repentance; and in these later days in Australia had been her true fatherly friend, counsellor and comforter in the trials and perplexities that had befallen her. Bernard read, in her lifted head and brightened eye, that she felt the meeting him almost a compensation for the distress and perplexity of this journey to London.
Bernard carried the little girl up to the room and laid her down to sleep off her fatigue, while Marilda waited on her and Angela with her wonted bustling affection, extremely happy to have two of her best beloved cousins under her roof.
Bernard went off to find Sir Ferdinand at his office, and quiet prevailed till nearly dinner time, when Lena awoke and would not be denied one sight of her godfather. So Angela dressed her in her white frock, and smoothed her thin yellow hair, and took her down to the great stiff handsome room that all Emilia’s efforts had never made to look liveable. Emilia Brown was there, very fashionably attired, but eager for news of Vale Leston, and the Merrifields soon arrived with, “Oh! here she is!” from the Captain, “Well! she looks better than I expected!”
“Poor little dear!” observed his wife, dressed in a low dress and thin fringe on her forehead in honour of what, to the country mind, was a grand dinner party, at which Angela’s plain black dress and tight white cap were an unbecoming sight. Elizabeth was there, kissing Angela with real sympathy; and Lena, who had grown a good deal more accustomed to strange relations, endured the various embraces without discourtesy.