So she went up. She did not eat much dinner; the steward's-room boy in attendance had his foolish heart moved to pity by seeing how poor an appetite she had, when he thought what he could have done in that line too.
Presently she asked the lad where was the nursery. The second door to the right. When all was quiet, she opened her door, and thought she would go and see the children asleep. At that moment the nursery-door opened, and a tall, handsome, quiet-looking man came out. It was Lord Hainault; she had seen him before.
"I like this," said she, as she drew back. "It was kind of him to go and see his brother's children before he went out;" and so she went into the nursery.
An old nurse was sitting by the fire sewing. The two elder children were asleep; but the youngest, an audacious young sinner of three, had refused to do anything of the kind until the cat came to bed with him. The nursery cat being at that time out a-walking on the leads, the nurserymaid had been despatched to borrow one from the kitchen. At this state of affairs Mary entered. The nurse rose and curtsied, and the rebel clambered on her knee, and took her into his confidence. He told her that that day, while walking in the square, he had seen a chimney-sweep; that he had called to Gus and Flora to come and look; that Gus had been in time and seen him go round the corner, but that Flora had come too late, and cried, and so Gus had lent her his hoop, and she had left off, &c., &c. After a time he requested to be allowed to say his prayers to her: to which the nurse objected on the theological ground that he had said them twice already that evening, which was once more than was usually allowed. Soon after this the little head lay heavy on Mary's arm, and the little hand loosed its hold on hers, and the child was asleep.
She left the nursery with a lightened heart; but, nevertheless, she cried herself to sleep. "I wonder, shall I like Lady Hainault; Charles used to. But she is very proud, I believe. I cannot remember much of her.—How those carriages growl and roll, almost like the sea at dear old Ravenshoe." Then, after a time, she slept.
There was a light in her eyes, not of dawn, which woke her. A tall, handsome woman, in silk and jewels, came and knelt beside her and kissed her; and said that, now her old home was broken up, she must make one there, and be a sister to her, and many other kind words of the same sort. It was Lady Hainault (the long Burton girl, as Madam Adelaide called her) come home from her last party; and in such kind keeping I think we may leave little Mary for the present.
CHAPTER XXXIV.
IN WHICH FRESH MISCHIEF IS BREWED.
Charles's duties were light enough; he often wished they had been heavier. There were such long idle periods left for thinking and brooding. He rather wondered at first why he was not more employed. He never was in attendance on the lieutenant, save in the daytime. One of the young men under him drove the brougham, and was out all night and in bed all day; and the other was a mere stable-lad from the country. Charles's duty consisted almost entirely in dressing himself about two o'clock, and loitering about town after his master; and, after he had been at this work about a fortnight, it seemed to him as if he had been at it a year or more.