Bessie Fairfax and Janey Fricker attended vespers regularly on Sunday afternoons at the church of St. Jean; but they were not amongst the fair penitents who whispered their peccadilloes once a fortnight in the curé's ear—he secluded in an edifice of chintz like a shower-bath, they kneeling outside the curtain with the blank eyes of the Holy Mother upon them, and the remote presence of a guardian-teacher out of hearing. But he took an interest in them. No overt act of proselytism was permitted in the school, but if an English girl liked vespers instead of the second service at the Temple, her preference was not discouraged. Bessie attended the Protestant ordinances at stated seasons, and went to vespers and benediction besides. The curé approved of her ingenuous devotion. Once upon a time there had been Fairfaxes faithful children of the Church: this young lady was an off-set of that house, its heiress and hope in this generation; it would be a holy deed to bring her, the mother perhaps of a new line, within its sacred pale.
Madame Fournier heard his communication with alarm. Already, by her ex-teacher Mrs. Wiley, this young Musgrave had been spoken against with voice of warning. Madame returned to Caen with her worthy pastor. The enterprising lover was just flown. Bessie had a sunshine face. Mademoiselle Adelaide wept that night because of the reproaches madame made her, and the following morning Bessie was invited to resume her lessons, and was mulcted of every holiday indulgence. Janey Fricker suffered with her, and for nearly a week they were all en penitence. Then Miss Foster came; madame vanished without leave-taking, as if liable to reappear at any instant, and lessons lapsed back into leisure. Bessie felt that she had been an innocent scapegrace, and Harry very venturesome; but she had so much enjoyed her "treat," and felt so much the happier for it, that, all madame's grave displeasure notwithstanding, she never was properly sorry.
Harry Musgrave returned to England as jubilant as he left Bessie. The trip, winter though it was, exhilarated him. But it behooved him to be serious when Mr. Carnegie was angry, and Mrs. Carnegie declared that she did not know how to forgive him. If his escapade were made known to Mr. Fairfax, the upshot might be a refusal to let Bessie revisit them at Beechhurst throughout the whole continuance of her school-days. And that was what came of it. Of course his escapade was communicated to Mr. Fairfax, and Madame Fournier received a letter from Abbotsmead with the intimation that the youth who had presented himself in the Rue St. Jean as a cousin of Miss Fairfax was nothing akin to her, and that if she could not be secured from his presumptuous intrusions there, she must be removed from madame's custody. They had associated together as children, but it was desirable to stay the progress of their unequal friendship as they grew up; for the youth, though well conducted and clever, was of mean origin and poor condition; so Mr. Fairfax was credibly informed. And he trusted that Madame Fournier would see the necessity of a decisive separation between them.
Madame did see the necessity. With Mr. Fairfax's letter came to her hand another, a letter from the "youth" himself, but addressed to his dear Bessie. That it should ever reach her was improbable. There was the strictest quarantine for letters in the Rue St. Jean. Even letters to and from parents passed through madame's private office. She opened and read Harry Musgrave's as an obvious necessity, smiled over its boyish exaggeration, and relished its fun at her own expense, for madame was a woman of wisdom and humor. Little by little she had learnt the whole of Bessie's life and conversation from her own lips; and she felt that there was nothing to be feared from a lover of young Musgrave's type, unless he was set on mischief by the premature interposition of obstacles, of which this denial to Bessie of her Christmas holiday was an example.
However, madame had not to judge, but to act. She returned Harry Musgrave his letter, with a polite warning that such a correspondence with a girl at school was silly and not to be thought of. Harry blushed a little, felt foolish, and put the document into the fire. Madame made him confess to himself that he had gone to Caen as much for bravado as for love of Bessie. Bessie never knew of the letter, but she cherished her pretty romance in her heart, and when she was melancholy she thought of the garden at Brook, and of the beeches by the stream where they had sat and told their secrets on their farewell afternoon; and in her imagination her dear Harry was a perfect friend and lover.
That episode passed out of date. Bessie gave her mind to improvement. Discovery was made that she had a sweet singing voice, and, late in the day as it seemed to begin, she undertook to learn the piano, on the plea that it would be useful if she could only play enough to accompany herself in a song. She had her dancing-lessons, her drawing-lessons, and as much study of grammars, dictionaries, histories, geographies, and sciences-made-easy as was good for her, and every day showed her more and more what a dunce she was. Madame, however, treated her as a girl who had des moyens, and she was encouraged to believe that when she had done with school she would make as creditable a figure in the world as most of her contemporaries.
How far off her début might be no one had yet inquired. Since her late experiences there was little certainty in Bessie's expectations of going to Beechhurst for the long vacation which began in July. And it was salutary that she entertained a doubt, for it mitigated disappointment when it came. About a fortnight before the breaking up madame sent for her one evening in to the salon, and with much consideration informed her that it was arranged she should go with her to Bayeux and to the sea, instead of going to England. Bessie had acquired the art of controlling her feelings, and she accepted the fiat in silence. But she felt a throb of vindictive rage against her grandfather, and said in her heart that to live in a world where such men were masters, women ought to be made of machinery. She refused to write to him, but she wrote home to Beechhurst, and asked if any of them were coming to see her. But the loving joint reply of her father and mother was that they thought it better not.
Madame Fournier was indulgent in holiday-time, and Bessie was better pleased at Bayeux than she had thought it possible to be. The canon proved to be the most genial of old clergymen. He knew all the romance of French history, and gave Bessie more instruction in their peripatetic lectures about that drowsy, ancient city than she could have learnt in a year of dull books. Then there was Queen Matilda's famous tapestry to study in the museum, a very retired, rustic nook, all embowered in vines. Bessie also practised sketching, for Bayeux is rich in bits of street scenery—gables, queer windows, gateways, flowery balconies. And she was asked into society with madame, and met the gentlefolks who kept their simple, retired state about the magnificent cathedral. Before Bayeux palled she was carried off to Luc-sur-Mer, the canon going too, also in the care of madame his niece.
Bessie's regret next to that for home was for the loneliness of Janey Fricker, left with Miss Foster in the Rue St. Jean. She wished for Janey to walk with her in the rough sea-wind, to bathe with her, and talk with her. One morning when the sun was glorious on the dancing waves, she cried out her longing for her little friend. The next day Janey arrived by the diligence. Mr. Fairfax had given madame carte blanche for the holiday entertainment of his granddaughter, and madame was glad to be able to content her so easily. Luc-sur-Mer is not a place to be enthusiastic about. Its beauty is moderate—a shelving beach, a background of sand-hills, and the rocky reef of Calvados. The canon took his gentle paces with a broad-brimmed abbé from Avranches, and madame was happy in the society of a married sister from Paris. The two girls did as they pleased. They were very fond of one another, and this sentiment is enough for perfect bliss at their age. Bessie had never wavered in her protecting kindness to Janey, and Janey served her now with devotion, and promised eternal remembrance and gratitude.
When a fortnight came to an end at Luc-sur-Mer, Bessie returned to Bayeux, and Janey went back to the Rue St. Jean. Before the school reopened came into port at Caen the Petrel, and John Fricker, the master-mariner, carried away his daughter. Janey left six lines of hasty, tender adieu with Miss Foster for her friend, but no address. She only said that she was "Going to sail with father."