A City Schoolgirl and Her Friends

This may have helped to make her manner colder than usual; for Mrs. Montague Jones almost made up her mind to give up any further attempts to be friendly with this unfriendly girl. However, she had strong reasons besides kind-heartedness for persevering, and persevere she did. Fortunately Stella, who, to do her justice, was quite unaware of her cold manner, remembered that it was to Mrs. Jones's kind thoughtfulness that she had that pretty sitting-room, and she hastened to thank her.

'Indeed we were only too glad for you to have it, as we have plenty of sitting-rooms besides that, and we had settled, my husband and son and I, that we would not use your rooms at Lomore – yours and Vava's,' said Mrs. Jones.

The Joneses were showing very kindly feeling, which surprised Stella, who answered lamely, 'You are very kind; but it does not matter, as they are not our rooms now.'

'But we hope to see you there some day; in fact, you will always be most welcome to occupy them. At any rate, my son would not have them used, and insisted on the furniture being sent down here,' said Mrs. Jones.

'It is very kind of your son; but please explain to him that the place is no longer ours, nor have we any connection with it now, and that we are never likely to see it again. I hope you will not think me rude, Mrs. Jones, but I could never go to Lomore again,' Stella said; and she could not help the tears rising to her eyes, much to her annoyance.

'Indeed I understand that, and I feel that you must hate us, and if it were not that my husband is so taken with Vava and with you, if you will forgive my saying so, I would not intrude my acquaintance upon you; but I must give you his message. He wants me to ask if you and your sister will not come home with us and dine after the breaking-up at the City school on Friday week, and let us go and see Henry VIII. acted afterwards; Vava is studying it at school. My husband has to take the chair and make a speech at the breaking-up, and I shall have to go with him. You are going of course?'

'I do not know, but I dare say I shall be able to get away from the office. I am not a free agent, you know; but I will ask my employer's leave to have the afternoon off,' said Stella.

'Of course you can have the afternoon, and you will come back and dine with us, won't you – you and your sister? I should like you to know my son better,' Mrs. Jones begged her.

Stella thought this rather an odd way of speaking, as she did not know the aforesaid son, 'better or worse,' nor had she any desire to know him, and was sure that she could picture him as a young edition of his bullet-headed, commonplace-looking father; but she felt that she could not refuse the invitation to dinner, and accepted it with her pretty smile, which made Mrs. Jones forgive a good deal.

'My son will be very pleased,' was her reply, which made Stella almost repent of her acceptance, and she was surprised at Mrs. Jones's continual and tactless references to her son and heir, as Stella bitterly felt. She understood, or thought she understood, that in a way Mrs. Jones and this son felt that they had ousted her from her inheritance, and wanted to make amends to her. 'As if they could!' she said with some scorn.

However, it was impossible to remain untouched by such kindness, and when Mrs. Morrison brought in hot scones she said quite friendlily, 'This is in your honour, Mrs. Jones; nursie does not make scones for every one, and I don't think I should have been favoured this afternoon, as Vava is out.'

So Mrs. Jones went away quite satisfied with her visit, and told her husband, with a sigh of relief, 'She's actually coming; but upon my word, Monty, I doubt if the game's worth the candle. It's more exhausting to try and get on with that young woman than any number of haughty dowagers, and really I should be sorry for our boy to fall in love with her; it would be slow work having a statue for a wife.'

'She would not be a statue if she were a happy wife; the City has petrified her,' said Mr. Jones.

'I don't remember that she was particularly unbending at Lomore before the City had time to chill her,' said Mrs. Montague Jones dryly.

'No, but adversity had done that,' her husband reminded her; and he was as pleased as his wife at Stella's acceptance of their invitation.

But this was nothing to Vava's delight. 'And you actually are going? I am so glad, and you are going to see Henry VIII. also! Nursie must make haste and finish my black embroidered silk, and I must finish reading the play. Mr. Jones says it's splendidly staged!' she exclaimed.

'When did you see Mr. Jones?' inquired Stella.

'In the office yesterday, when I came to fetch you. He told me where to go botanising this afternoon,' explained Vava.

'Oh,' said Stella, 'that Mr. Jones!' and it flashed across her mind that the two Joneses certainly knew each other, and very probably were related, and that, also very probably, at the office Mr. Jones had mentioned the fact of Vava's interest in Henry VIII. and that she was going botanising without her (Stella), who would consequently be at home alone. Well, after all, it did not matter; they meant to be kind, and she would accept their kindness in the spirit it was given.

'Do you know life's very funny? I mean, the way things happen are funny,' observed Vava, breaking in upon her sister's thoughts.

'What is that apropos of?' inquired her elder sister, smiling.

'Why, this afternoon. I thought it was going to be spoilt for me because Eva was coming with us for our walk, and then I come home and find a delightful invitation waiting for me – a motor drive, a dinner-party, and the theatre; and I dare say we shall go and have ices at some nice restaurant afterwards. Mr. Jones knows I love ices,' observed Vava.

'Don't be greedy, Vava; I think you are getting spoilt. Why should Eva's going with you spoil your walk? I hope Doreen is not making mischief between you? You liked Eva at first, I thought?' said Stella in a tone of reproof.

'Doreen is above such a thing; it's Eva's own fault; besides, I do like her, only I don't always like the way she talks,' said Vava rather hotly.

'She talks a great deal better than Doreen, as a matter of fact. What has she done to offend you? You had better tell me, for I think she feels that you avoid her, and it is very unkind unless you have some good reason,' persisted Stella.

'I haven't anything against her; it is just that Doreen and I don't approve of her,' announced Vava.

'Pray, what business have you and Doreen to judge other people?' exclaimed Stella. 'What do you disapprove of? I insist upon knowing.'

'You don't approve of her yourself, Stella,' said Vava.

'I don't remember ever having said so.'

'You said you did not approve of her buying that suite of furniture,' Vava reminded her.

'I beg your pardon, I said I did not approve of getting furniture on the hire-system for myself; but I never criticised Eva. I know nothing of her private affairs, nor do I wish to pry into them, and you and Doreen have nothing to do with them either; so if that is all you have against her you had better put it out of your mind.'

'It isn't only that. She never goes to church' – began Vava.

'Vava, I am ashamed of you! Eva may well say that churchgoing does not seem to make people better. What right have you to set yourself up to judge other people in that pharisaical manner? It is a most unchristian spirit. I know I am not a very good example, for I am not at all humble; but I think if we want Eva to go to church and be better we shall only do it by being very nice to her, and not by treating her unkindly and making her feel that we think ourselves superior,' said Stella very gravely.

Vava listened with equal gravity, but made no reply. If she had spoken what was in her mind she would have said that those were not the only two reasons for disapproving of Eva; but she abstained, and when she saw Doreen that evening she informed her that she was going to be nice to Eva.

'I think we are nice to her; we took her for a walk with us on Saturday, though she doesn't care a bit about botany, and wanted to be at the skating-rink or the pictures, and talked bosh.' She paused, and then added, 'By the way, does your sister know what silly stuff she talks?' she asked.

'No, I did not tell her. Stella is particular, and if she knew some of the things Eva says she would be very angry; in fact, she would probably not let me speak to her at all; and then I don't know what would happen, for we could not go on living in the same house like that,' remarked Vava.

'Anyway, I don't believe my mother would let me be friendly with her if she knew. I don't know what to do,' said Doreen.

'We must reform her,' announced Vava.

Doreen laughed. 'I don't think we should have much influence upon her. She thinks she's very clever because she has read some silly books which say that one should get all the enjoyment one can out of this life because it's all that's certain, and you can't argue with a person like that, who says you have a right to be happy, and that things are right that you know quite well are wrong, only you can't prove it. Father would be horrified if he heard her; he'd say she was dangerous.'

'She's only silly,' said Vava in a superior tone. Then they were both silent, until she exclaimed suddenly, 'Doreen, I have it. I'll tell nursie all about it!'

'She'll be worse than father; she's awfully strait-laced,' protested Doreen.

'Yes, but she's very charitable too, and she likes Eva. If any one can do anything with Eva, nursie can,' declared Vava.

'Well, tell Mrs. Morrison, then, because I think some one ought to know, and to tell her that she ought not to talk to us like that; we don't like it, and it muddles one up,' said Doreen with a laugh.

'It does not muddle me; it's against the Bible, and I'd rather go by that than by Eva,' said Vava; and that ended the conversation.

CHAPTER XXI.

EVA'S CONDUCT AND ITS SAD EFFECTS

But when Vava told the old housekeeper of Eva's unorthodox views and sayings she did not seem at all shocked, or even impressed, by the information.

'Says we are put into this world to enjoy ourselves, does she? Well, so we are, and so we shall if we do what is right,' she observed cheerfully.

'But, nursie, you don't think Eva is doing what is right, do you?' inquired Vava, who was quite put out at this way of taking what the girl had been half-afraid to tell her, for fear the old woman should refuse to have anything more to do with Eva.

She was to be yet further surprised, for the housekeeper turned on her severely. 'And who am I, to say whether the poor young lady is doing right or wrong? As for what she says about religion, we know she is mistaken; but all you have to do is to refuse to talk about it. I never knew any good come of arguing on such matters, especially amongst young people. You can say a prayer for Miss Eva, and that's all you have to say,' she said, and turned to poke the fire.