The girls left the room without a word. Miss Tredgold then went up to Mr. Dale.
“Go back to your study and your Virgil,” she said. “Don’t waste your precious time.”
He looked exactly as though some one had whipped him, but he took her at her word and returned to his study.
The music was henceforth a great feature in the establishment. Miss Tredgold enhanced its value by being chary in regard to it. She only played as a special treat. She would by no means give them the great pleasure of her singing and playing every night.
“When you have all had a good day I will sing and play to you,” she said to the girls; “but when you neglect your work, or are idle and careless, or cross and sulky, I don’t intend to amuse you in the evenings. I was brought up on a stricter plan than the girls of the present day, and I mean while I am with you to bring you up in the same way. I prefer it to the lax way in which young people are now reared.”
For a time Miss Tredgold’s plans went well. Then there came a day of rebellion. Pauline was the first to openly rebel against Aunt Sophia. There came a morning when Pauline absolutely refused to learn her lessons. She was a stoutly built, determined-looking little girl, very dark in complexion and in eyes and hair. She would probably be a handsome woman by-and-by, but now she was plain, with a somewhat sallow face, heavy black brows, and eyes that could scowl when anything annoyed her. She was the next eldest to Verena, and was thirteen years of age. Her birthday would be due in a fortnight. Even at The Dales birthdays were considered auspicious events. There was always some sort of present, even though it was worth very little in itself, given by each member of the family to the possessor of the birthday. Mr. Dale generally gave this happy person a whole shilling. He presented the shilling with great pomp, and invariably made the same speech:
“God bless you, my dear. May you have many happy returns of the day. And now for goodness’ sake don’t detain me any longer.”
A shilling was considered by the Dale girls as valuable as a sovereign would be to girls in happier circumstances. It was eked out to its furthest dimensions, and was as a rule spent on good things to eat. Now, under Miss Tredgold’s reign, Pauline’s birthday would be a much more important event. Miss Tredgold had long ago taken Verena, Briar, Patty, Josephine, and Adelaide into her confidence. Pauline knew quite well that she was talked about. She knew when, the girls retired into corners that she was the object of their eager conversations. The whole thing was most agreeable to her sense of vanity, and when she suddenly appeared round a corner and perceived that work was put out of sight, that the eager whisperers started apart, and that the girls looked conscious and as if they wished her out of the way, she quite congratulated herself on the fact that hers was the first birthday in the immediate future, and that on that day she would be a very great personage indeed. As these thoughts came to her she walked with a more confident stride, and thought a great deal of her own importance. At night she lay awake thinking of the happy time, and wondering what this coming birthday, when she would have been fourteen whole years in the world, would bring forth.
There came a lovely morning about a week before the birthday. Pauline had got up early, and was walking by herself in the garden. She felt terribly excited, and almost cross at having to wait so long for her pleasure.
“After all,” thought Pauline, “Aunt Sophia has done something for us. How horrid it would be to go back to the old shilling birthdays now!”