Blanche: A Story for Girls

“Yes indeed,” agreed Archie, almost too evidently eager to endorse whatever Blanche said. “I quite agree with you. They are really beautiful eyes, because there’s no sham about them. She is as good as they would lead you to believe.”

Again the same bright smile of approval came over Blanche’s face, and Mr Dunstan felt himself rewarded. Just then Aline appeared at the door.

“Mademoiselle,” she said; then coming closer, she spoke to Blanche in a lower voice, though unluckily Mr Dunstan was so near that he could not but overhear what she said.

“Some ladies are in the shop. Miss Halliday is very sorry, but she fears you must come.”

“Of course,” said Blanche, springing to her feet – for the moment, she had begun to forget the present facts of her daily life, and she gave herself a sort of mental shake – “of course,” she repeated, “I’ll come at once. – Mr Dunstan, will you excuse me?” and she held out her hand, as if in farewell.

The young man’s face had grown visibly redder.

“Good-bye,” he said, repressing the effect that Alines words had had upon him.

Then turning to Mrs Derwent:

“Will you allow me to call again?” he said very clearly. “I intend to stay at Alderwood for two or three days longer.”

“Oh, certainly, if you happen to be anyway near,” she replied simply.

Then a bright idea struck Archie, as his glance fell on Herty.

“I wish you’d allow this young man to spend a day with me,” he said. “I’d take good care of him, and it is holidays just now, I know. I shall be driving in to-morrow morning in my dog-cart, and I will call for him, if he may come.”

“Oh mamma, mamma,” said Herty, ecstatically, “do say I may!”

It would have required a heart of stone to refuse the poor little fellow, and Mrs Derwent’s heart was by no means of that material.

“It is very good indeed of you, Mr Dunstan,” she replied; “and I am sure Herty would enjoy it immensely. Of course he has not nearly so much to amuse him here as at Pinnerton.”

“Then I will call for him at – let me see – shall we say eleven o’clock? and I’ll bring him safe back in the afternoon. Between four and five, if that will do?”

“Perfectly,” said Mrs Derwent, and then Mr Dunstan left taking care not to glance into the shop as he passed its open door on his way out.

Herty was ready the next morning betimes. Long before eleven had struck he was fidgeting about, asking every one half-a-dozen times in a minute what o’clock it was, so that it was a relief to everybody when the dog-cart drew up to the door and Herty was safely hoisted up to his seat beside his friend.

“I was so afraid it would rain or something, and that perhaps you wouldn’t come,” said the little boy.

“I would have come all the same if it had rained,” said Archie. “I could have wrapped you up in a mackintosh, and I daresay we’d have found something to amuse you at Alderwood.”

“These holidays are very dull,” said Herty with a sigh. “I have got no rabbits, nor nothing like I had at Pinnerton. I’d almost rather go back to France.”

“There’s no chance of that?” said Mr Dunstan quickly.

“Oh no,” said Herty. “Blanchie says we must stay here for – always, I suppose. Anyway, till I’m a man; and then I mean to make money for them. You know we’ve got no money now, at least scarcely any except what they make with having a shop. It’s rather horrid, don’t you think?”

“Yes,” agreed Archie, somewhat incautiously; “I think it’s exceedingly horrid. And I can quite understand that you feel in a great hurry to be a man, so as to be able to help them.”

“It’ll take a good while, though,” said Herty prudently, and then he began talking about the horse, extracting a promise from Archie that he would let him hold the reins when they got to a perfectly quiet part of the road.

But with some skill Mr Dunstan managed to bring him back to the subject they had been discussing.

“Do you think your sister minds much?” he asked, when Herty had been retailing some of his own grievances.

Herty considered.

“Well,” he said, “she hadn’t any rabbits, you see, and I think she likes making bonnets. They made them for the girls at Pinnerton, you know. But I think she does rather mind not having such a nice garden; she minds it for mamma, you see. And Stasy gets awfully cross sometimes! I heard Blanche speaking to her one day about being cross to the people in the shop.”

“And is Blanche never cross?” inquired Mr Dunstan, with great interest.

“Not like Stasy,” said Herty. “But she was very angry with me once when I was little. It was when I cut some hairs off Flopper’s tail. Flopper was grandpapa’s dog, an English dog, and those hairs are very particular, and then – and then,” said Herty, very slowly, “I said I hadn’t done it. It was that made Blanchie so cross. Telling a story, you know.”

“Yes,” said Archie, with preternatural gravity. “But that was a long time ago; of course you know better now,” he went on, cheerfully. “You never vex your sister now.”

“No, not as badly as that,” said Herty. “But one day, not long ago, I did see her crying. It wasn’t my fault, but I was very sorry; I think she had a headache, perhaps.”

The horse gave a spring forward at that moment, nearly dislodging Master Herty from his seat.

“I say, Mr Archie,” he exclaimed reproachfully, “what are you whipping him for? He’s going along quite nicely! I nearly tumbled out, I really did.”

“I beg your pardon, Herty,” said Mr Dunstan. “I’ll be more careful in future. I suppose I wasn’t thinking.”

Herty’s visit was a great success, the day passing to his complete satisfaction; and between four and five that afternoon the pair of friends found themselves at Miss Halliday’s door. Not this time in the dog-cart, for Mr Dunstan had left it at the “George,” a little way down the High Street.

“I won’t come in, I think, Herty,” he said, as Aline appeared in answer to the bell.

But Herty clung on to him.

“Oh, you must, just for a minute,” said the child. “I’m sure mamma would like to see you.”

“Madame is in the drawing-room,” put in Aline discreetly.

So, between the two, Archie allowed himself to be over-persuaded.

As Mr Dunstan, an hour later, passed the post-office on his way to the “George,” it suddenly struck him that he might call for the afternoon letters. There were two for himself, forwarded from his club – one of no special interest; the other a few hurried words from Norman Milward, whom he had not seen for a considerable time. “Hebe wants to see you,” he wrote. “She is back in London, but we have been in great anxiety lately. She wants to tell you about it herself. Do come as soon as you can.”

Chapter Nineteen

Something Important

The very next afternoon found Mr Dunstan standing at the door of the Marths’ house in London.

“Is Lady Hebe at home?” he inquired at once when it was opened, glancing up with some anxiety as he asked the question.

But nothing was to be learned from the man-servant’s impassive face, though – yes, it was surely unusually grave, for Archie was no stranger to him.

Her ladyship was at home, he replied, and expecting Mr Dunstan. For Archie had telegraphed that he would call at a certain hour.

Then he was ushered up-stairs to Hebe’s own little sitting-room, where many a happy half-hour had been spent by the circle of young “old friends.”