Three Girls from School

The blue eyes filled with tears. They looked very pretty as they brimmed over and the tears rolled down the smooth young cheeks. Annie could cry just a little without her appearance being at all spoiled thereby. On the contrary, a few tears added to a certain pathos which came at such times into her face. John Saxon found himself looking at the tears and accepting Annie’s view of the matter as quite plausible.

“It is very good of you to give me a little of your confidence,” he said.

“I do!” she answered resolutely; “for I want you to help me.”

“Anything in my power that is not wrong I will do,” he replied.

The firm tone of his voice, and the way in which he said, “Anything that is not wrong,” damped Annie’s hopes for a minute. Then she continued:

“I spoke to Uncle Maurice, not telling him, of course, anything about Priscie, but simply expressing a desire to accept the invitation, and he said that I should go and he would find the money if Lady Lushington was all right.”

“What does that mean?” asked Saxon.

“Oh, really, John, it was too bad. You know Uncle Maurice is very narrow-minded. He wanted to write first to Mrs Lyttelton to discover what sort of person Lady Lushington was, whether she was worldly or not; but, you see, there is no time, for if I don’t join Mabel and Lady Lushington on Tuesday night in Paris I shall not be able to join them at all, for they begin their travels on Wednesday morning, and I have not the slightest idea where I can pick them up. Besides, I don’t know foreign countries. I could perhaps get to Paris, where I should be met; but I couldn’t manage Switzerland or any place farther afield. Don’t you see that for yourself?”

“I do.”

“Well, John,” continued Annie, imperceptibly coming a little nearer to him, “I want you to do this for me. I want to go to Paris, but only for a day or two. I want to see Mabel and put that thing right with regard to poor, dear, clever Priscie; and then, if Uncle Maurice is really ill, I will come back. I know he would let me go if you persuaded him; and I want you to do so, dear John; and as he must not be worried in any way, will you lend me twenty pounds until Uncle Maurice is well enough to be troubled?”

“But you cannot go without telling him, Annie. Of course, my dear, I could and would lend you the money, but even your friend is not so important just now as your uncle. He loves to have you near him. I wish you could have heard how he spoke of you to me. You were his sunshine, his darling, the joy of his heart.”

“I know I am,” said Annie; “and it is what I want to be, and love to be,” she added. “But you are here, and there is my dear friend, oh! in such trouble; and she trusts me, and I can put everything right for her. Oh! if you would only lend me twenty pounds – and – and – tell Uncle Maurice yourself that I am going away for a few days and will be back again very soon. Won’t you lend it to me, John – just because we are cousins, and you have come all the way across the seas – the wide, wide seas – to help me at this pressing moment?”

“You affect me, Annie,” said the young man.

“You speak very strongly. I did not know schoolgirls desired things so badly as all this. Twenty pounds – it is nothing; it is yours for the asking. Here, I will give it to you now.”

He put his hand into his pocket and took out four five-pound notes.

“Here,” he said, “if this will make you happy and save your friend from the fate of being a village dressmaker, take it, and welcome.”

“I don’t know how to thank you,” said Annie, trembling all over. “Oh! I don’t know how.”

“Don’t thank me,” he replied a little stiffly. “The thing is a mere bagatelle.”

“You shall have it back as soon as possible,” said Annie.

“At your convenience,” he replied. He still spoke stiffly.

She folded up the money and pushed the notes inside her gloves. Her whole face had changed, and to John Saxon, who watched her, it had not changed for the better. The pathos and entreaty had gone out of it. It was a hard little face once more; and again he noticed that want of candour and that inability to look any one straight in the face which he had already observed in her eyes. He wondered uneasily if he had done wrong in lending her the money; but what was he to do? She must really want it, poor little thing! and after all, to Saxon, who was accustomed to great journeys taken at a moment’s notice, and who had visited America and most of the habitable globe – although this was his first visit to England – a little trip to Paris meant less, than nothing.

“When do you propose to go?” he said to the girl when they presently rose to their feet.

“I should like to go to-morrow; in fact. I must if I am to meet Mabel and Lady Lushington.”

“Then perhaps it would do if I broke the information to your uncle to-morrow morning?”

“Yes; that will do quite beautifully. Oh! I don’t really know how to thank you.”

“Effect your worthy object, Annie, and I shall have obtained all the thanks I need,” was the young man’s reply.

Chapter Fourteen

“It Relates to your Niece Annie.”

It seemed to Annie that she had got quite close to John Saxon when he and she sat together on that boulder overhanging the valley below. But when they returned to the Rectory a barrier was once again erected between them.

She had little or nothing to say to her cousin, and he had little or nothing to communicate to her. Mr Brooke was better. He was awake and inclined for company. Annie and Saxon both sat with him after supper. He asked Annie to sing for him. She had a sweet though commonplace voice.

She sat down by the little, old piano, played hymn tunes, and sang two or three of the best-known hymns. By-and-by Saxon took her place. He had a lovely tenor voice, and the difference between his singing and Annie’s was so marked that Mrs Shelf crept into the room to listen, and the old clergyman sat gently moving his hand up and down to keep time to the perfect rhythm and the exquisite, rich tones of the singer.

“Nearer, my God, to Thee,” sang John Saxon.

Mr Brooke looked at Annie. Her head was bowed. Instinctively he put out his hand and laid it on her shoulder. “E’en though it be a cross that raiseth me,” sang the sweet voice.

“A cross that raiseth me,” murmured old Mr Brooke. His hand rested a little heavier on the slim young shoulder. Annie felt herself trembling. Her worldly thoughts could not desert her even at that sacred moment.

She had escaped a terrible danger, for even she, bad as she was, would not jeopardise the life of the old man who loved her best in the world. All fear of that was over now, and she would win a delightful time in Paris into the bargain. She was quite sure that John could manage her uncle.

The next morning the strange attack which had rendered Mr Brooke’s condition one of such anxiety had to all appearance? passed away. He was a little weak still, and his head a trifle dizzy; but he was able to potter about the garden leaning on John Saxon’s arm.

Annie, who was anxious to go as soon as possible to Rashleigh, ran up to John for a minute.

“I have to ride to Rashleigh to get some things for Mrs Shelf,” she said. “While I am away tell him – I know you will do it beautifully – tell him how necessary it is, and that I shall come back whenever he sends for me. Do it now, please; for you know that I must leave here this afternoon.”

Accordingly, while Annie was trotting on horseback in to Rashleigh with that money which was to be exchanged for the necessary receipt from Dawson, Saxon broached the subject of Paris to the old man.

“There is a little matter, sir,” he said, “which I should like to speak to you about.”

“And what is that, John?”

“It relates to your niece Annie.”

“Ah, dear child!” said the old man; “and what about her?”

“She seems to be in distress,” continued Saxon. “Oh, please don’t worry, sir; her great anxiety is to prevent your worrying.”

“Dear, dear child! So thoughtful of her,” murmured the clergyman.

“You were rather bad, you know, yesterday, and she and I took a walk together while you were having your sleep. It was then she confided to me that she has been invited to Paris.”

“I know, John,” said old Mr Brooke, turning and looking fixedly at the young man; “and I am the last to prevent her going; but, naturally, I want to know something about the woman who has invited her – a certain Lady Lushington. I never heard her name before. Annie tells me that Lady Lushington’s niece is her greatest school friend; and I feel assured that my Annie would not have a school friend who was not in all respects worthy – that goes without saying; nevertheless, a young girl has to be guarded. Don’t you agree with me, John?”

“Certainly I do, sir. Still, if you will permit me to say so, Annie seems very sensible.”

“She is wonderfully so; my Annie’s little head is screwed the right way on her shoulders – not a doubt whatever on that point. But the thing is this. I can inquire of Mrs Lyttelton what she knows with regard to Lady Lushington. If matters are favourable the child shall go. Can anything be more reasonable?”

“In one sense, sir, nothing can be more reasonable; but in another, your making this condition forces poor Annie practically to give up her invitation.”