The Adventures of an Ugly Girl

by Mrs. George Corbett

The rest of the day was chiefly taken up with explorations and consultations, and a good many new arrangements were made. Jerry, I was sorry to hear, was to be sent off to a French boarding school at the beginning of the next term. But when I heard that he was to spend all his holidays at home, just as if he were in an English school, I felt reconciled to the temporary absences of the bright, clever child who liked his ugly sister best. Jerry himself was quite overjoyed at the programme cut out for him, and promised to write us each and all a French letter from the first week of his residence in France.

Belle, who was now twenty, was enraptured by the promise of next season in town, while I was so delighted to hear that I was to have efficient instruction on my favorite instrument, the violin, that I burst into tears, and ran hastily up to my own room, where I might vent my emotion unrestrainedly. You see, my tastes had met with so little sympathy heretofore that I required some time to get used to unwonted indulgences. I was not sure that my happiness would not yet take unto itself wings and fly away, or that I was not dreaming; for I had never heard of the arrival of a stepmother being so conducive to the welfare of the junior branches of the family as promised to be the case with us.

My father, I noticed during the next few days, was so supremely contented and so happy in the society of his wife, that I contrasted the coldly conventional manner in which he had always comported himself in my poor mother’s presence, and was able to see that the feeling he had borne for her was but poor stuff compared to the love he felt for Lady Elizabeth. I remember also having heard that these two were lovers in their youth, and it amazed me to think that they could have deliberately thrown aside the heart’s most sacred feelings in order to make a worldly marriage.

I have since then become thoroughly conversant with the fact that Mammon is infinitely the more powerful god of the two, when it comes to a tussle with Cupid, and that even very estimable people lose their judgment when called upon to choose between them. And yet, how can they honestly utter their marriage vows, when the heart is given away from the one they are marrying? Truly, life has many mysteries, which it were unprofitable work to attempt to solve!

In a day or two quite an assortment of new clothes came for me, and it was astonishing to see how different I looked in the reds and yellows which I now wore. I was still the ugly girl of the family, but it was quite possible for strangers to overlook the unpleasant fact for a while, and I even caught myself hoping that I looked rather nice than otherwise, especially when callers began to pay their respects to the newly-married couple.

Both Belle and I were introduced to nearly all our visitors, among the first of them being the Earl of Greatlands. I was rather disposed to like him, until he put his eyeglass up, quizzed me attentively, and remarked: “You are unfortunately very like your mother, Miss Dora, though I believe she had much finer hair and eyes than you have. But everybody improves in the hands of my daughter, and I have no doubt you will be as handsome as your sister by the time you are her age.”

“I am only just twenty,” said Belle stiffly.

“So I suppose, my dear,” rejoined the earl. “But you will find in a year or two that even the slight margin of age there is between the two of you will land you considerably on the weather-side, in other people’s opinion.”

Belle flashed an angry glance from her beautiful eyes, being careful, however, not to let the earl see it, for did she not desire an invitation to Greatlands Castle? As for me, I felt nothing less than enraged, although I could not quite decide whether the old gentleman was deliberately rude, or only gifted with an unfortunate knack of making mal-à-propos speeches. But he did not notice that he had hurt the feelings of either of us, having turned his attention to Jerry, who, faultlessly dressed in a new black velvet suit, was being introduced to his stepmother’s father.

“Ah! a very pretty boy,” he said. “But a perfect imp of mischief, I know. Boys who look like him always are. How many times have you gone out ratting?”