Elsie's scholarship

by Emma Leslie

"I don't think she has had any communication with her friends for years; and it was only at my husband's persuasion, and for the sake of her children, that she consented to write and let this sister know of her great distress."

"What shall you say, mother, when we get to the cottage? Shall you leave us outside, and go and tell Mrs. Winn a stranger had come to see her?" said practical Edward, for they were close to the village now.

Mrs. Perceval paused for a minute, to think what would be best; and she decided to take both lads with her. Edward was well-known, and she would introduce Herbert as his friend, and see whether there was any recognition on either side. And it must be confessed that the lady was a little disappointed, and so was Herbert, for he could see no trace of his mother in the worn, faded looking woman, who ushered them into the sitting room.

There he and Edward were left to themselves; and, before Mrs. Perceval came back, the question that had been like a nightmare to him for the last few weeks had been answered.

On the mantelpiece was a small miniature of a lady, and he recognised this as the companion to one his mother wore as a brooch, set with very fine pearls. This was in a cheap frame; and when the two ladies came into the room, he had it in his hand. "Pardon me," he said, looking at Mrs. Winn, "but was not this in a brooch once?"

"Yes, it is the portrait of my mother," said Mrs. Winn, staring at Herbert.

"And it is my grandmother!" said the boy, joyfully. "And so you must be my lost aunt Elsie, whom my mother has been trying to find!" As he spoke, Herbert went to meet her with outstretched hands, and kissed her, as though she had been his own mother, in his gladness at having found these unknown relatives at last.

Mrs. Winn was simply overpowered, and could not resist, although she had been prepared by Mrs. Perceval to find in this stranger her sister's son. Still, that any son of Herbert Milner could welcome her so gladly, in spite of her poverty, was something for which she was altogether unprepared. And when, a little later, she heard that the man she so greatly disliked had left her a sum of money in the bank, in case she should ever need it, she felt that she must have misjudged her sister's husband as well as her sister, and that he could not have been the hard, unfeeling man she had always thought him.

"I must see my cousin Elsie," Herbert said, when he and Mrs. Winn had exchanged various confidences. "You see, I might never have found you, if it had not been for Elsie giving up her scholarship, and that seemed such a plucky thing to do, that when mother told me about having a sister of that name, we made up our minds to try and find her, and sent to our lawyer about it; but I think lawyers are muffs very often. Old Capon has proved he is over this; for you see I have found you, aunt, and I don't mean to lose you again."

Herbert seemed likely to lose his head in his delight; and he had to be warned more than once that Elsie was ill and very weak, and that if he went upstairs to see her he must not talk much. Mrs. Perceval undertook to introduce him to the invalid, who had been told something of the wonderful news.