A Plucky Girl

"I must tell you the truth," I answered, "for I know you will guess it. Your son has been kind enough to ask me to marry him. You knew he meant to ask me, did you not? but I – I have refused him. No, I don't want any tea; I don't want even to go back in the brougham. I can never, never marry your son, Mrs. Fanning; and you must have known it – and it was very unkind of you to bring me here without saying anything about it." And then I sank on the nearest chair, and sobbed as if my heart would break.

CHAPTER XVIII

BUTTERED BREAD

Mrs. Fanning let me cry for a moment or two without interrupting me. I think in her way she had plenty of heart; for once when I raised my head, feeling relieved from the bitter flow of those tears, I found that she was looking at me with a quizzical, but by no means unkindly glance.

"We'll say nothing about this at present," she exclaimed; "you shan't be plagued, my dear. I'll talk to Albert, and say that you are not to be worried; but whether you take him in the long run or not, you want your tea now. Come, child, drink up this nice cup of hot tea."

As she spoke she squeezed herself on to the sofa by my side; and gave me tea according to her taste, and insisted on my drinking it; and I could not refuse her, although my sobs were still coming heavily.

"Ah, you're a proud young girl," she said, "you're one of those who do not know which side their bread is buttered; but you will some day, the knowledge will come to you, and soon, I'm thinking, soon."

Here she looked intensely mysterious, and nodded her head emphatically.

"And there's not a better fellow in the length and breadth of England than my son, Albert," she continued; "there's no one who would give his wife a better time. Kind, he would be to her; firm, he would be no doubt too. He would make her obey him, but he would make her love him too. You will know all about it by-and-by, my dear, all about it by-and-by. For the present we'll say nothing more. Albert shan't drive with us back in the brougham, although I know he meant to do so. Poor fellow! could love go further; his legs cramped up on that little seat at the back, but love feels no pain, dear; no more than pride feels pain. It's a bit of a shock to you, I know. Proposals always are; that is, to modest girls. I felt terribly flustered when Albert's father asked me to marry him. I assure you, my love, I could not bear the sight of him for the next fortnight. I used to say, whenever he entered a room, 'I'm going out, Albert, if you're coming in. Get right away now, if you don't want me to hate you for ever,' but, in the end, my dear love, I was head over ears in love with him. There never was a better husband. He would be masterful as a good man should; but, dear, I worshipped the ground he trod on, and it was he who made the beginning of that fortune which Albert has turned into so big a thing. Well, my love, you have seen the house, and you have gone over the grounds, and you have done something else. You have looked into the great good heart of my son, Albert; and after a time, I have no doubt, you will creep into that heart, and take refuge; but mum's the word at present, mum's the word."

The idea of my creeping into Albert's heart as a final cave of refuge was so funny, that I could scarcely keep back my smiles; and I almost became hysterical between laughing and crying, so much so, that Mrs. Fanning had to put her arms round me and hug me, and call me her dear little girl.

I was very glad she did not say, "dear little thing." By-and-by she ordered the carriage, and we went back to town. She was most affectionate to me. She assured me many times that she quite understood; that she had gone through precisely the same phases with regard to Albert Fanning the first but that it had all come right, and that her passion for the godly man had been very strong by-and-by. I should feel just the same with regard to Albert the second. It was the way of girls; that is, nice girls.

"Don't talk to me about that Miss Marion Armstrong," she said. "The ways of that girl turn me sick. It is the contrast you make to Marion Armstrong which has done the business more than anything else, my dear Miss Wickham. But there, dear, there we'll turn the conversation."

"I earnestly wish you would," I said

"Ah," she said, "how history repeats itself. I used to feel as if I would like to box any one in the face who talked to me about my dear Albert long ago. But oh, how I loved him before all was over, how I loved him!"

She almost shed tears at the recollection. In short, I had a most unpleasant drive home. At last it was over. I got out of the brougham, with its red body and chocolate wheels, and staggered rather than walked into the house. I did not dare to see mother until all traces of emotion had left my face, but I made straight for Jane's sanctum.

"Jane," I said the moment I found myself there, "the Fannings must go away; they must, Jane, they must."

"Why so?" asked Jane.

"I will tell you what has just happened. Mother must never know, but I must tell some one. Mrs. Fanning took me into the country in their new brougham. We went to Highgate; they have a house there. Mr. Fanning was there to meet us. He called me a little thing, and he took me over the house and over the grounds, and told me, on pain of his direst displeasure, that I was never to give him salad without onions, and then he asked me to marry him. O Jane! what is to be done?"

"But didn't you always know that he was going to ask you?" inquired Jane in a low voice.

"Ask me to marry him! How could I suppose anything so preposterous?" I exclaimed.

"Well, dear, I know it goes very sore with you, and I hope, with all my heart and soul, that it may not be necessary."

"Necessary!" I said, "what do you mean? O Jane! don't talk in that way, you'll drive me mad. I cannot stay in the house with the Fannings any more."

"Let me think for a moment," answered Jane. She looked very careworn and distressed, her face had grown thin and haggard. She looked years older than before we had started the boarding-house. I was quite sorry to see the change in her face.

"Our life does not suit you," I said.

"Oh, it suits me well enough," she replied, "and I never leave a sinking ship."

"But why should this ship be sinking? I thought we were doing so well, the house is almost always full."

"It is just this," said Jane: "we charged too little when we started. If the house was choke-full, all the attics and the three different floors let, we could not make the thing pay, that's the awful fact, and you ought to know it, Westenra. We should have begun by charging more."

"Then why didn't we?" I said. "I left all those matters to you, Jane. I was very ignorant, and you came and – "

"I am not blaming you, my dear Westenra," said Jane; "only it is very, very hard to go on toiling, toiling all day and almost all night, and to feel at the same time that the thing cannot pay, that it can never pay."

"But why didn't we begin by charging more, and why can't we charge more now?"

"Because people who live in Bloomsbury never pay more," answered Miss Mullins, "that is it, dear. If we meant this thing to succeed we should have started our boarding-house in Mayfair, and then perhaps we might have had a chance of managing. Perhaps with a connection like yours we could have made it pay."

"Never," I said, "none of our friends would come to us, they would have been scandalised. It would never have done, Jane."

"Well, well, we have got ourselves into a trap, and we must get out the best way we can," was Jane's lugubrious answer.

"Oh, never mind about our being in money difficulties now," I cried, "do think of me, Jane, just for a moment, do make things possible for me. Remember that I am very young, and I was never accustomed to people of the Fanning type. Do, I beseech of you, ask them to go. Mr. Fanning's action to-day will make your request possible. Jane, if I went on my knees and stayed there all my life, I could not marry him, and the sooner he knows it the better."

"I will think things over," said Jane. I never saw anything like the look of despair which was creeping over her face.

"Things are coming to a crisis," she continued, "and I must confide in you fully, but not just now, we must get dinner over first. Your mother was ill while you were away, she won't come to dinner to-night."

"Mother ill! Anything serious?" I cried in alarm.

"Only a little faintness. I have got her comfortably to bed."

"Well, of course, I shan't dine to-night, I shall stay with mother."

"But you must, my love, it is absolutely necessary that you should appear at dinner, and you must be quite cheerful too in her room. She is quite herself now, and is looking over a new book, and when you go to her you will see that she has had a nice dinner, nourishing and suitable. Now go and change your dress, and make yourself look smart. Now that Mr. Randolph is gone, and your mother is too ill to be often in the drawing-room and dining-room, the affairs of the household rest upon you. You must make yourself smart; you must make yourself attractive. It must be done, Westenra, it must, and for your mother's sake."

Jane spoke with such determination that she stimulated my courage, and I went away to my own room determined to act on her advice.

At the other side of the wall I heard Mrs. Fanning's heavy steps as she walked about. She did not seem to be at all depressed at my refusal of her son Albert. On the contrary, she was in very good spirits. She had been in excellent spirits all the way back, and had kept on assuring me that I was only going on the usual tack of the modest maiden, the maiden who was worthy of such a man as her godly son Albert. Had not she herself hated Albert's father for a whole fortnight after his proposal, and had she not been glad, very glad, in the end to creep into his great heart for shelter? Did she suppose that I also would be glad to creep into Albert the second's great heart for shelter? Oh, it was all unbearable. But, nevertheless, there was a spirit of defiance in me. I had tried my ugly dresses in vain, I had tried being grave and distant in vain. I had tried everything, but nothing had availed; Mr. Fanning was determined to have me for his wife. I wondered if the man cared for me, perhaps he did after his fashion, but as no self-denials on my part had the effect of repulsing him, I would give way to my fancy and dress properly for dinner. I put on a very pretty pink dress which I had not yet worn, and ran downstairs.

At dinner I sat opposite Mr. Fanning. Mother's place was empty, and Mrs. Fanning called across the table to know what was the matter with her.

I said that she was tired and had gone to bed, whereupon Mrs. Armstrong immediately remarked, that it was a very good thing we had such an excellent housekeeper as Miss Mullins to look after things in my mother's serious state of health, otherwise the house would go to wreck and ruin, she said.

Mrs. Armstrong looked daggers at me for wearing my pink dress. She had never seen anything so stylish as that soft, graceful robe before, and between her jealousy at seeing me so attired, and her earnest wish to copy it for Marion, she scarcely knew what to do with herself. She darted angry glances at my face, and then tried to measure with her eye the amount of ribbon on the bodice, and the quantity of chiffon round the neck. But Mr. Fanning, to my great relief and delight, did not appear to take the slightest interest in me. I do not think he once glanced at my pretty evening frock. He absorbed himself altogether with Marion Armstrong. He talked to her all during dinner, and invited her in a loud voice to come and see him at his office on the following day.

"I told you, Miss Armstrong," he said, "that as a rule I am brutal to the people who come to me trying to sell their wares. Those silly folks who bring their useless manuscripts and their poor little amateur drawings to my office find that I make short work with them.

"'If you like to leave your manuscript or your drawings,' I say to them, 'you can do so, but as to the chance of their being accepted, well, look for yourselves. Do you see that pile? all that pile of manuscripts has to be read before yours. If you leave your manuscripts they go under the pile at the bottom; there will be nearly a ton of stuff on top of them. You take your chance. You had best go away at once with what you have brought, for I am not likely to require it.' They mostly do go away, Miss Armstrong, for I am brutal in my words and brutal in my tone. There is no use in buoying people up with false hopes." Here he gave a loud guffaw, which reached my ears at the further end of the table.

Captain Furlong bent across at that moment to say something to me, and I saw that he was much displeased at Mr. Fanning's loud, aggressive words. But Mr. Fanning, after all, was nothing to Mrs. Fanning. It was quite pleasant to me to see that he should turn his attentions to Miss Marion Armstrong, but Mrs. Fanning's winks were more than I could endure. They were just as much as to say, "Listen to him now; he is only doing that to draw you on." So plainly did her speaking eyes announce this fact, that I dreaded each moment her saying the awful words aloud, but fortunately she did not go quite so far as that.

When dinner was over Mrs. Armstrong came and sat near me.

"Have you seen any of Marion's drawings lately?" she asked.