“No, of course mother didn’t. As if we were going to take things from relations, like the Browns!” cried Harry, with a flush of scorn. Harry was a very proud boy, who suffered by reason of the short sleeves of his jacket and the short legs of his trousers, as none of the rest did. Mary shook her head at this, and said there was nothing wrong in taking things from relations when they were kind.
“But I never did,” she said. “Sometimes I have thought I ought to have done it; but I never did. He married, and I never heard anything of him afterwards, and she was a stranger to me. It was that chiefly that kept me back. I have not heard anything of him for about a dozen years. And whether he has sold Horton, or what has become of it, I don’t know. It is such a wrong thing not to write,” she said, returning to her moral; “be sure you always keep up the habit of writing whenever you go away.”
This, however, has kept us a long time from Hetty’s birthday. Mr. Asquith had quite recently settled at Summerfield, the western suburb of Rollinstock, at the time when Hetty completed her sixteenth year. I say settled, for it was only now that our curate ceased to be a curate, and became, not, alas! rector or vicar, but incumbent of the new district church lately built in that flourishing place. It was a flourishing church also, and everything promised well; but as the endowment was very small, and the incumbent’s income was dependent upon a precarious addition of pew-seats, offertories, etc., it was not a very handsome one for the moment, though promising better things to come. And the fact that he was independent, subject to no superior in his own parish, was sweet to a man who had been under orders so long. This beginning was very hopeful in every way. And Mr. Asquith had the character of being a very fine preacher, likely to bring all the more intellectual residents of the place, the great railway people—for the town was quite the centre of an immense railway system—and all the engineers and persons who thought something of themselves, to his church. This prospect encouraged them all, though perhaps the income was not very much better than that of a curacy. And there were good schools for the boys. The one thing that Mary sighed after was something of the higher education, of which everybody talks nowadays, for Hetty. But perhaps it is wrong to call it the higher education. No Greek nor even Latin did Mary desire for her daughter—these things were incompatible with her other duties—but a little music, a little of what had been called accomplishments in Mary’s own day! In all likelihood these things would have done Hetty no manner of good,—no, nor the Latin either, nor even Greek. There are some people to whom education, in the common sense of the word, is unnecessary. But Mary had a mother’s little vanity for her child. Hetty was but a poor performer on the piano; and her mother thought she had a great deal of taste, if it could but be cultivated. But music lessons are dear, especially in a town where rich mercantile folk abound. Alas! the boys’ education was a necessity; the girls had to go to the wall.
The schoolroom tea was a very magnificent meal on Hetty’s birthday. Sixteen seemed a great age to the children. It was as if she had attained her majority. Mary had got her a new white frock for the occasion made long. It was her first long dress, her toga, her robe of womanhood. And there was a huge cake, largely frosted over with sugar, if not very rich inside, out of regard for the digestion of the little ones. And they were all as happy over this tea as if it had been a sumptuous meal, with champagne flowing. They had not finished when Mr. Rossmore was announced, who was the Vicar of Rollinstock and a great personage. Mr. Rossmore was very kind; he was fond of children, and liked, as he said, to see them happy. And he sent a message from the drawing-room (in which there were still lingerings of the old Horton furniture), into which he had been ushered solemnly, to ask if he might be allowed to share the delights of the children’s tea. He looked round upon them all with eyes in which there were regrets (for he was that strange thing a clergyman without any children of his own), and at the same time that wonder, which is so general with the spectators of such a sight, how it was that they could be happy on so little, and how the parents could look so lighthearted with such a burden on their shoulders—ten children, and the eldest sixteen to-day!
“It is very appropriate that it should be Miss Hetty’s little fête,” said Mr. Rossmore, “for it is to her, or at least to you about her, that my visit really is intended.”
“To Hetty!” her mother cried, with a voice which was half astonishment and half dismay, Mr. Rossmore was a widower, and the horrible thought crossed Mary’s mind, Could he have fallen in love with the child? could he mean to propose to her? Awful thought! A man of fifty! She looked at him with alarmed eyes.
“For Hetty?” said Mr. Asquith tranquilly. He thought of parish work, of schools, or some of the minor charities, in which the Vicar might wish Hetty to take a part. And the children, feeling in the midst of their rejoicings that something grave had suddenly come in, looked up with round eyes. Janey edged to the end of the table to listen; for whatever was going on, Janey was always determined to know.
“Perhaps,” said Mary tremulously, “it would be better to bring Mr. Rossmore his cup of tea to the drawing-room, now that he has seen you all in the midst of your revels. For this noise is enough to make any one deaf who is not used to it, like papa and me.”
