“Now, there you are!” said her aunt; “as impertinent as ever! Don’t—I beseech of you—make speeches of that sort to Malcolm Durrant. Now go up to your mother: she wants to see you. She thinks you are improved. I don’t; but the opinion of an old maid never signifies.”
“Oh, Aunt Felicia!”
Book Two—Chapter Five.
Harriet’s Jealousy is Rekindled.
It is all very well for a little girl to repent as Harriet Lane repented on that night when she followed Ralph to the gipsies’ hiding-place. Such repentances make a deep impression in life. They are never, as a rule, forgotten. They influence the character, and if they are followed by earnest resolve and patient determination to conquer in the battle, they in the end lead to victory. But let no one suppose who reads this story that a girl with such a nature as Harriet possessed could easily overcome her various faults. It is true she was now really attached to Ralph. She had never cared for a little child before; but there was something about Ralph that won her heart. At the same time this very affection of hers for the little boy added to her feelings of dislike and envy towards Robina. In her first agony of remorse for what she had done; in her terror with regard to little Ralph, and her fear that he was lost to her and to all her friends forever, she even thought gently and kindly of Robina. When Robina was made Ralph’s school-mother, and when she obtained the pony as her prize, Harriet submitted to her fate. Nevertheless, the thought of Robina rankled in her mind, and when the little girls met at Sunshine Lodge, it was Robina who was the first thorn in Harriet’s side.
Outwardly, it would have been impossible to find a merrier group than those eight girls when they arrived in a waggonette at Sunshine Lodge. Ample preparations had been made for their welcome. Arches of evergreen and flowers were put up over the gates and along the avenue; and over the front door “Welcome, Welcome” appeared in letters of flowers. In every direction smiling faces were to be seen—smiling faces at the lodge gates, smiling faces at the front door; and Mr Durrant, strong, self-reliant, holding Ralph by the hand, was the most delightful sight of all.
“Now, my children, you have come,” he said. “Ralph, greet all your little mothers. Ralph, my son, do the honours of the occasion. There are servants, my children, to show you to your rooms. We shall meet at tea-time. You will be best alone with Ralph for the time being.”
“Oh, my naughty, naughty, darling school-mother!” cried Ralph, flinging himself into Harriet’s arms. He did go to her first, he did cling round her neck, he did press his kisses to her thin cheek. Before anyone else, he was hers; her heart swelled with triumph. But the next minute, it sank with a feeling of ugly jealousy; for was not his clasp still tighter round Robina’s neck, and did he not whisper something into Robina’s ear, and did not Robina flush with pleasure? The other mothers also came in for a share of his rapture: but Harriet, keen to notice and observe, felt that notwithstanding the fact that he had come to her first of all, Robina must be his favourite.