Three Girls from School

“We never will,” said Parker. “It’s a dreadful bit of business. Her ladyship will be wild. She does so hate it when anything is stolen. But there are lots of robberies taking place on the railways of late. It is a perfect disgrace. Even the registering of your goods seems not to secure things. Of course I always carry the jewels in my own hand; it’s the only safe way. Miss Mabel must have been mad to put a valuable necklace such as her ladyship described into that old trunk.”

“It wasn’t nearly so valuable as Lady Lushington supposed; that is the only comfort,” said Annie.

“But, miss, I don’t understand. I thought it was you who urged her ladyship to get it, and that you had quite a knowledge of gems.”

“I found out afterwards – I will tell you the secret, Parker, and you can break it to her ladyship when I am gone – I found out afterwards that I had made a slight mistake. The necklace was worth, say, about twenty pounds, but no more, for some of the pearls were quite worthless. I happened to show it to a gentleman I knew very slightly at the Belle Vue Hotel, and he deals in that sort of thing. He disappointed me in his estimate of the necklace; but that doesn’t matter. It is terrible that it should be lost. Still, you might tell Lady Lushington what he said. There is no use in telling Mabel. She doesn’t care twopence about it, poor child, at the present moment; she is so broken down at my leaving.”

“Well, miss, I must be off to do the packing. I will make the best of things and never forget how pleasant you have been during your visit, miss. I will see, too, that you have a basket of sandwiches and some wine packed for your journey.”

Parker went off. The moment she did so Annie went into the corridor and fetched Mabel in.

“Oh, you goose of all geese!” she said. “Now the worst is over; I tell you the worst is over. You don’t suppose for a single moment your aunt, Lady Lushington, will think that you stole the necklace or that I stole it. She will suppose, most assuredly, that it was stolen on the journey between Interlaken and Zermatt. Parker is convinced on the subject and I have let Parker understand that it was not nearly as valuable as I supposed. Lady Lushington won’t trust me to manage a bargain for her again; that is the worst that can happen. Now, May, do cheer up. You are all right. I will manage things for you when Priscilla’s Christmas bill comes round. You will see plenty of me, I fancy, between now and then. Dry your eyes, darling. I know you are sorry to part from me.”

“I can’t go on being wicked without you; that’s the principal thing,” said Mabel. “I know I’ll give in.”

“Think what injury you’ll do me; and do you really want to go back to that horrid school?”

“I don’t think I’d mind so very much; it was peaceful, at least at school.”

“You would soon be sick of that sort of peace.”

“I suppose I should,” said Mabel.

She had already wiped her eyes, and she began slightly to cheer up.

“Annie,” she said eagerly, “is your uncle really dying?”

“John Saxon says so; otherwise, of course, he would not have come,” said Annie.

“If,” said Mabel, trembling a good deal – “if afterwards you could come back – ”

Annie’s heart bounded.

“I can’t talk of it,” she said; “don’t speak of it now. When the time comes, if you – were – to write I will write to you, that is, if I have strength to write to any one. You have my address. You know how deeply I shall always love you. You know there is no good turn I would not do for you.”

“I want you to help me until Priscilla’s year at school is out,” was Mabel’s matter-of-fact retort. “Of course, dear, of course; and I will. Your Annie will never forsake you. But now perhaps we had better go downstairs.”

The girls made a quite picturesque appearance as they went slowly down the broad staircase. Mabel had not cried enough to look ugly, and Annie’s few tears and pallor and evident distress gave to her face the depth of expression which in her lighter moments it had lacked.

John Saxon was seated close to Lady Lushington. Lady Lushington had recognised him as a friend and a favourite. He rose when the girls appeared, and Lady Lushington went at once up to Annie.

Her manner was very cold and distant. “You did not give me the slightest idea, Miss Brooke, how ill your uncle was when you received your cousin’s letter.”

“I didn’t know that he was especially ill,” said Annie.

Lady Lushington looked full at her. It seemed at that moment that a veil had fallen away from Annie’s face, and that the gay, proud, and selfish woman of the world saw the girl for the first time as she was.

Lady Lushington, with all her faults – the faults of her class and her manner of life – was exceedingly good-natured, and could be remarkably kind. She was thoroughly angry with Annie for concealing the truth with regard to John Saxon’s letter. She could, and would, forgive much to any young girl who was enjoying herself and who wanted to continue the good time which had fallen to her lot; but to forget one who stood in the place of a father, to let him long for her in vain, was more than Lady Lushington could stand.

“I don’t appreciate that sort of thing,” she said to herself. “It is, somehow, beneath me. I don’t understand it.”

She made up her mind on the spot, that, as far as Mabel was concerned, the friendship between the two girls was to terminate there and then. Never would she have anything farther to do with Annie Brooke. As that was the case, she did not consider it necessary to correct her.

“I am sorry,” she said briefly, “that you did not interpret very plain English in the manner in which it was intended. I don’t think for a single moment that your cousin meant to complain of you to me, but he simply quoted some words of his letter, and seemed altogether astonished that you did not start for England the day before yesterday. However, I trust you will find your dear uncle alive when you get home. I have desired Parker to pack your things, and now you would doubtless like to go up and change your dress.”

“Thank you,” said Annie very meekly. She glanced in Mrs Ogilvie’s direction; but Mrs Ogilvie took no notice of her.

“Mabel, come and sit here near Mrs Ogilvie,” said Lady Lushington as Annie once again disappeared. “You can say good-bye to your friend presently; there is no necessity for you to spend the whole evening upstairs.”

Chapter Twenty Four

Home No More

It was all over – the fun, the gaiety, the good things of life, the delights of fine living, the charm of being with rich friends. It is true that Annie Brooke returned to England with a little private fund of her own in her pocket; but John Saxon insisted on her returning him the two five-pound notes he had enclosed to her. Out of these he paid for her ticket back to England.

John Saxon was a very cold, silent, and unsympathetic fellow-traveller. He sat moodily in a corner, wrapped in his greatcoat, the collar of which he turned up; a travelling-cap came well down over his head, so that Annie could see little or nothing of his face. He had done what he could to make her comfortable, and had wrapped her round with warm things. Then he had taken no further notice of her.

On the whole, Priscilla Weir had a far more interesting journey to England than had that spoiled child of fortune Annie Brooke. Annie, however, was glad to be left alone. She did not want to talk to that odious man, Cousin John Saxon. But for him, life would not have been suddenly spoiled for her. She would not have been found out. She was far too clever not to be sure that Lady Lushington had found her out. Not that Lady Lushington had discovered any serious crimes to lay at her door, but then she had read her character aright, and that character was of the sort which the great lady could not tolerate. Therefore Annie was – and she knew it well – shut away from any further dealings with Mabel Lushington.

Poor Mabel! How would she provide the money for Priscilla’s two remaining terms at school? How would she go through a stern catechism with regard to the necklace when Annie was no longer by her side?

“Everything will be discovered,” thought Annie Brooke. “There is no help for it. What shall I do? And I’d managed so well and so – so cleverly. There isn’t a bit of good in being clever in this world. It seems to me it’s the stupid people that have the best times. Of course that idiotic old Mabel will let out the whole story before many hours are over. And then there’ll be a frightful to-do, and perhaps Mabel will be sent back to Mrs Lyttelton’s school – that is, if Mrs Lyttelton will receive her, which fact I very much doubt. As to me – oh, well, I’ll have to hide somewhere. I hope to goodness Mr Manchuri will never tell anybody about the necklace; he faithfully promised he wouldn’t and he seemed an honourable sort of man. But then, ought I to expect any one to be honourable in his dealings with me? I don’t know; the world seems coming to pieces. Horrid John Saxon! How I detest him! Oh, I feel as though I could go mad!”

Annie started up impatiently. She went across the carriage and opened one of the windows, putting her head out at the same time. She hoped Saxon would take some notice. She wanted him to speak to her. His silence, his apparent indifference to her, were just the sort of thing to madden the girl in her present mood.

Saxon was seated facing the engine, and, in consequence, when Annie opened the window wide he was exposed to a tremendous draught. He bore it for a minute or two; then, rising, he said very quietly:

“Will you excuse me? I don’t think the night air is good for you, and it is certainly bad for me. I will, therefore, with your permission, shut the window; it is cold.”

“I am suffocating,” said Annie.

“I will open it again in a few minutes so that you can have fresh air from time to time.”

“Oh!” said Annie, with a sudden burst of passion, beating one small hand over the other, “why have you been so cruel to me?”

Saxon glanced at her. There was only one other occupant of the carriage – an old gentleman, who was sound asleep and snoring loudly.

“Won’t you speak?” said Annie. “Why do you sit so silent, so indifferent, when you have spoiled my life?”

“We have different ideas on that point,” he said. “You can do exactly as you please with your life, as far as I am concerned, by-and-by. At present you are under the care of your uncle, the Rev. Maurice Brooke. While he lives you have to do his wishes, to carry them out according to his views. I am helping him in this matter, not you. Afterwards, we will discover by your uncle’s will what he wishes to have done with you. You are only seventeen; you must yield to the directions and the will of those who are older than yourself and who are placed by God in authority over you.”

“Oh, how I hate you when you preach!”

“Then perhaps you will not speak to me. I am exceedingly tired; a journey to Zermatt and back again without any rest makes a man inclined for slumber. I will sleep, if you have no objection. In the morning perhaps we shall both be in a better temper than we are at present.”

“I wish,” said Annie, speaking in sudden passion, “that I could fling myself out of that window. You have destroyed every prospect I ever had in life.”

“You talk in an exceedingly silly way,” said Saxon. “Now do try and be quiet, if you please.”