“Clare,” said her step-father, “I am about to entrust thee with a weighty matter. Are thy shoulders strong enough to bear such burden?”
“I will do my best, Father,” answered Clare, whose eyes bespoke both sympathy and readiness for service.
“I think thou wilt, my good lass. Go to, then:—choose thou, out of thine own and Blanche’s gear, such matter as ye may need for a month or so. Have Barbara to aid thee. I would fain ye were hence ere supper-time, so haste all thou canst. I will go and speak with Master Tremayne, but I am well assured he shall receive you.”
A month at the parsonage! How delightful!—thought Clare. Yet something by no means delightful had evidently led to it.
“Clare!” her mother called to her as she was leaving the room,—“Clare! have a care thou put up Blanche’s blue kersey. I would not have her in rags, even yonder; and that brown woolsey shall not be well for another month. And,—Blanche, child, go thou with Clare; see thou have ruffs enow; and take thy pearl chain withal.”
Blanche was relieved by being told to accompany her sister. She had been afraid that she was about to be put in the dark closet like a naughty child, with no permission to exercise her own will about anything. And just now, the parsonage looked to her a dark closet indeed.
But Sir Thomas turned quickly on hearing this, with—“Orige, I desire Blanche to abide here. If there be aught she would have withal, she can tell Clare of it.”
And, closing the door, he left the three together.
“Oh!—very well,” said Lady Enville, rather crossly. Blanche sat down again.
“What shall I put for thee, Blanche?” asked Clare gently.