Blanche: A Story for Girls

“Well, Hebe,” he said, as the door closed behind him, “here I am. I only got Norman’s letter yesterday afternoon, for I have been out of town for a few days. What an age it is since I have seen you!”

He had hardly as yet noticed her face, for the room was very dark; but as she came forward, holding out her hand, he almost started. She was unusually pale.

“You’ve not been ill, have you?” he said. “Its surely not that that has been the matter?”

“Then Norman did tell you something was the matter?” were her first words. “No, I have not been ill, at least not exactly. But, sit down, Archie, dear; I’ve a good deal to tell you.”

The young man drew a chair near her – she sat with her head to the light – with a feeling of increasing uneasiness.

“You make me feel quite frightened, Hebe,” he said. “What is this mysterious trouble?”

To his distress Hebe – happy Hebe – gave a little gasp that was almost like a sob.

“Archie,” she said, “it is a very great trouble that has come upon me, or rather upon us, for I am sure it is quite as bad or worse for Norman. Do you know there have been, there still are, grave fears that I am going blind? That is what I have been at Coblenz for. You know there is a very great oculist there.”

Archie’s bright, sunburnt face had paled visibly.

“Good heavens!” he exclaimed. “My poor child – my dear little Hebe. It can’t be true; those specialists are always alarmists as well.”

“No,” she said. “I will tell you all about it, for I quite understand. They’ve not hidden anything from me. My guardian has been very kind, and Josephine – I did not think there was so much tenderness in her. It is not hopeless. It has come on gradually. But till this summer I did not realise it at all; I have always been so strong and well, you know, in every way. Then the glare and the heat of London seemed to make it worse suddenly. I began to think it must be something more serious than short-sightedness.”

“You never were short-sighted,” Archie interrupted. “You had splendid sight.”

And indeed, as he looked at her eyes now, deep and lustrous, but with a sadness in their brown depths which he had never seen there before, it was difficult to believe that there could be anything wrong.

“Yes,” she agreed; “but for some time I have not seen so well, and I got in the way of thinking I must be short-sighted. But this summer pain began, very bad sometimes, and then we consulted our doctor, and he sent me to Coblenz.”

“And the opinion you got there was? – ”

“I will tell you exactly,” said Hebe, “for I know you care.”

And she gave him a rapid resumé of the whole. It had ended in an operation being decided upon, in the anticipation of which she was already under a course of treatment.

“We are going back to Germany in a fortnight,” she said. “It is to be in about a month or six weeks from now. The Marths can’t stay with me all the time, but when Josephine leaves, Aunt Grace will come; and if all goes well – or, indeed, in any case – I hope to be back at East Moddersham some time in October. But what I wanted to see you about. Archie, was to ask you to look after Norman. He is so miserable, and it is much better for us not to be together. It breaks my heart to see him, and he says it breaks his heart to see me.”

“What can I do?” said Archie.

“I thought,” said Hebe, with some hesitation – “I thought perhaps, if it didn’t interfere too much with your own plans, you might propose taking him off to Norway, or something like that.”

Archie did not at once reply.

“You are such very old friends, you know,” said Hebe. “I wouldn’t ask such a thing only for my own sake.”

There was just a touch of hurt feeling in her tone. She had been so sure of the heartiest response from him. She was changed – her happy, almost childlike confidence seemed to have deserted her, and as Archie glanced up at her pale face, he felt disgusted with himself for his even momentary hesitation.

“My dear Hebe,” he exclaimed, “as if I wouldn’t do far more than that, for you as well as for Norman! I was just considering if I could explain everything to you! But I can’t just yet. Of course you may count upon me for Norway. I will set about it at once, and plan it so that Norman shall not in the least suspect that you had suggested it.”

“Oh, thank you,” said Hebe, in a tone of great relief.

“Let’s see,” Archie went on. “We might start in ten days or so, and you’d like me to keep him away till after – ”

“Yes,” said Hebe calmly, “till after the operation. That is to say, till its result can be known. I am not afraid of the operation itself – nowadays those things are managed painlessly – but it is the afterwards. Oh Archie, I mustn’t cry, they say it is so bad for my eyes; but if I am going to be blind, I can’t marry Norman. He’s so young and full of life, it would be terrible for him to be tied to – ”

She drove the tears back bravely, but it was all Archie himself could do to reply cheerfully.

“He would never give you up, I feel convinced,” he said. “But I am quite certain that what we have all got to do just now is to be hopeful. I will see you again soon, Hebe, when I’ve got things into shape a little. Trust it all to me. I must go back to – the country again to-night, for a day or two.”

He rose as if preparing to go.

“Where are you staying?” said Hebe – “at Saint Bartram’s?”

“N-no, I’m at Alderwood,” he replied. “I had some things to see to about there.”

Hebe’s brown eyes looked at him curiously.

“At Alderwood,” she repeated. “Oh, by-the-bye,” and she sighed, “I am so sorry never to have replied to a letter I had from Blanche Derwent. It was a private letter, and I have not been allowed to write at all.”

“Yes,” said Archie coolly, “I know about it. She told me.”

“You know all about their troubles, then – their loss of money?” asked Hebe, with some surprise.

“Yes, I heard it when I went down there. And then I saw them. They have left Pinnerton; they are living at Blissmore. They – no, I hate talking about it – they’ve actually joined that funny old milliner there; they are working for their daily bread.”

Hebe gasped.

“Is it so bad as that?” she said. “But how splendid of them, how brave, and oh how horrid I must have seemed! Oh Archie, could you explain about me if you see them again? I can’t write myself, and there is really no one I can ask to do so, especially now, after what you’ve told me.”

“Certainly I can do so,” replied Archie briskly. “Nothing can be easier. I will make a point of seeing Miss Derwent as soon as possible.”

“Thank you very much,” said Hebe, but some amount of reservation crept into her tone; something in Archie’s voice and manner struck her, and revived her former misgivings.

“It was thoughtless of me to propose it,” she said to herself. “Archie,” she began again, “I – ”

“No,” interrupted Mr Dunstan, with some impatience. “Don’t ask me anything, Hebe, for if you do, I can’t answer. You blamed me before undeservedly, and I deserve it still less now.”

His words startled Hebe still more. She looked very grave.

“I didn’t blame you, Archie,” she said. “I only wanted you to be careful. You have always treated some things so lightly, it makes it difficult to believe you could be in earnest. And in this case – under the circumstances” – She did not like to say what was in her mind – that serious attentions on the part of the rich and much-made-of Archie Dunstan to Blanche Derwent, however charming personally, would appear in the eyes of the world highly improbable. Doubly so considering the change in the latter’s position. “I mean,” she went on hesitatingly, “you must be very careful.”

Archie smiled at this somewhat lame conclusion to her warning.

“You may trust me, dear Hebe,” he said, as he pressed her hand in farewell, and then he was gone.

But Hebe sat thinking deeply for some time after he had left her.

“What would Josephine say?” she thought to herself. “What a romantic goose she would think me. But I have never seen Archie quite like this before. And if such a thing came to pass – if I could be sure he is in earnest for once – it would be delightful in many ways. But” – and here a new view of the subject struck her – “I don’t believe Blanche would accept him,” she thought. “She is proud, rightly proud, and she has seen so little of him. She is not a girl to marry a man without thoroughly caring for him. No, I don’t believe she would accept him. But if he is in earnest now, he has certainly never been so before.”

Mr Dunstan returned to Alderwood that same evening, having already written to Norman Milward with some suggestion of the proposed plan, and promising to see him in London early the following week.