“I beg you will do nothing of the kind,” said Gertrude with asperity. “The world moves on, my dear Anne, while you sit dreaming in your cottage; and if you can’t raise a finger to help your own niece then don’t try to nullify the benevolent activities of those who can.”
“Of course, Gertrude, if you look at it in that way. But a governess!”
“I do look at it in that way; and allow me to tell you, Anne, that you dress her abominably, and I have advised her to revolt. And her hair! I spoke to her about it yesterday, and she said you liked her to plaster it down like that. The child has beautiful hair, very like mine at her age. It needs releasing. It is not necessary that she should imitate your severe coiffure.”
“Oh! Gertrude, I always brush my own hair back, and surely it is not too much to ask of my brother’s only child who owes everything to me to—” I became tearful.
“It is too much to ask. You are an egoist, Anne. The poor child looked quite frightened when I spoke to her yesterday. You mean well, but you have repressed her. I intend, on the contrary, to draw her out, to widen her narrowed, pinched existence.” Gertrude had said the same of Jimmy when she married him. Everyone had a pinched existence till she dawned on them, though it would have been difficult to say who had dared to pinch Jimmy.
Next day Dulcie came down half frightened, wholly delighted, to confer with me.
“My dear,” I said. “Do exactly what kind Mrs. Cross wishes about your hair and dress and general deportment. I can’t explain, it would take too long, and when I had explained you would not understand. You may now take back with you the lilac gown and the sun-bonnet. And, by the way, what is this Mr. Wilson like who is always coming over?”
“Very, very nice”—with fervour.
“And handsome?”
“Very, very handsome.”