Robert did lessons with Albert and me, and the three of us went our walks together. Uncle Simeon fawned on the new-comer and was by comparison sharper than ever with me; until, seeing that Robert did not like this, he pretended to treat me better. He did not want to offend Robert, who might write to his Uncle Vivian, and ask to be sent somewhere else. To make sure of keeping Robert's board money, he had to curb somewhat his dislike for me. Greed vanquished spite, or rather, while profit was a thing it must be his present endeavour to retain, spite would wait. For greed's sake he fawned sickeningly upon the boy; a few kicks in dark corners and pinches as he passed me on the stairs sufficed for the present as tribute to spite. Albert and Robert were on bad terms from the start; Albert disliked him as I did, for his better clothes and superior ways, and more bitterly, "for sneaking up to father." Robert despised Albert. Albert tried to win my alliance against him by treating me better. I accepted his advances while knowing their motive and value.
Master Robert and I had not much to say to each other. Despite my jealousy, I could see how much better and kinder-faced he was than Albert, but I could not like him, as he was "in" with Uncle Simeon. The very fact that his face was good made me despise him the more for liking Uncle Simeon; I felt he was a traitor. He could not be "very much of it" or he would show much more plainly than he did what he thought of Uncle Simeon's treatment of me. This I could see upset him, but he was too cowardly to say so. On the other hand, he knew nothing of the sly slaps and dark-corner kicks with which his dear friend favoured me. Jealousy was kept alive by the better treatment he got in the way of food and everything else, which he seemed to take for granted. Yet if the facts of the case were against him, instinct spoke on the other side. I knew that any one whose eyes looked at you in the same kind way as my Grandmother's must, like her, be kind and good. I argued that he was horrid, I felt that he was kind. I was as sure he did not treat me well as I was that I would like it if he did. Once he made friendly advances. I shied off; toady to a toady of Uncle Simeon's? Never! When I had rebuffed him, I began to reproach him with not making further efforts at friendliness. If he really wanted to, he would try again. If I had been a jolly little girl with fine clothes, curly hair and dark bright eyes, he would be trying all day long. Why were these allurements denied me, why had I no single attractive quality?
Now if ever in all recorded history there was a little girl ignorant of the bare existence of boy and girl sentiment and of all the normal notions that ordinary books, playmates and surroundings give to children, I was that little girl. Yet here at my first contact with a presentable young male of the human species, I was a-sighing for charms to lure him.
This struggle over the pros and cons of Master Robert raged within. We had little to say to each other. Uncle Simeon never left us alone together; watched us and made a careful third when Albert and Aunt Martha were not about. The first time we spoke to each other alone must have been two or three weeks after he came. Aunt and Uncle were both going out.
"Albert," he said, "don't you leave your cousin and Robert alone. Entertain them, you know, while one is out, you—ha ha!—are the master of the house."
As soon as Albert, leaning out of the window, had seen his father safely round the corner, he went out too, for communion I suppose with his unsaved friends.
"No sneaky tricks, mind!" he said to me, and looked the same injunction at Robert.
"Why does he talk like that?" said the latter, as soon as he was gone. We looked at each other. "Do—do you really like him?"
The implied tribute flattered me. I flung my new ally to the dogs.
"Not very much," I said.