Blanche: A Story for Girls

“Yes; it really does you great credit. I like it better than any bonnet I’ve had in London this year. You have so thoroughly carried out all my suggestions – that is a great point for young beginners.”

“And, of course, we have the benefit of Miss Halliday’s experience, too,” said Blanche, glancing towards their good little friend, who, she was determined, should not be left altogether out in the cold.

Miss Halliday smiled back to her. It was a proud day for the milliner when a woman of Lady Harriot’s position patronised her shop, but she was well content that all the honour and glory should fall to the sisters’ share.

“Ah yes, of course,” Lady Harriot replied civilly. “Now, my dear Miss Derwent, I shall make a point of wearing this bonnet everywhere. I wish my nephew could see me in it. He is very particular about what I wear, and he’s really quite rude about my bonnets sometimes. I must get my winter ones from you, and then he will see them, for he is out of England just now for some time. – Is Mrs Derwent at home this afternoon?” she went on. “Do you think she could see me?”

“I am sure she would be very pleased,” said Blanche readily. “She is in the drawing-room,” and as she spoke she led the way thither.

Lady Harriot exerted herself to be more than agreeable, and Mrs Derwent was really won over, by her visitors praise of her daughters, to meet her present cordiality responsively.

“By-the-bye,” said Lady Harriot, as she rose to take leave, “I expect a few neighbours the day after to-morrow at afternoon tea. I shall have some people staying in the house by then, and we like to have tea in the garden in this lovely weather. Couldn’t you manage to come over?”

Blanche glanced at her mother doubtfully.

“We are really very busy,” Blanche began; but her mother interrupted her.

“I think you might give yourselves a holiday for once,” she said, and the old lady hastened to endorse this.

“Yes, indeed,” she said good-naturedly. “All work and no play. Oh dear, I forget the rest, but I’m sure it meant it wasn’t a good thing. Won’t you bring them yourself, Mrs Derwent? Your younger daughter is not out, I suppose; but you know this sort of thing doesn’t count, does it?”

Mrs Derwent smiled.

“We can’t think much about questions of that kind, now,” she said. “But I shall be very glad to bring Stasy too.”

“That’s right,” said Lady Harriot, increasingly pleased with them because she was feeling so very pleased with herself. “Then I shall expect you between four and five. You may like to walk about the grounds a little if you come early,” she added to Mrs Derwent, “as you used to know the place so well. – And remember, my dear,” she said to Blanche in conclusion, “that whomever I introduce you to, it will be done with a purpose. It will be an excellent thing for you to see some of the people about, especially as I shall make a point of wearing my bonnet.”

Blanche’s face looked very grave when their visitor had taken leave, and her mother glanced at her anxiously, fearing that Lady Harriot’s eminently clumsy remarks at the end had annoyed her.

“You mustn’t mind it, dear,” she said. “She is a stupid, awkward woman, but she means to be kind now, and we must really take people as we find them, to some extent.”

Blanche started as if recalling her thoughts, which had, indeed, been straying in a perfectly different direction.

“Of course we must,” she said cheerfully. “I don’t mind what she said in the very least. I don’t particularly care about going there, it is true; but if it amuses Stasy, and if you don’t mind it, mamma, I daresay I shall like it very well. We may see Miss Milward, and hear about poor Lady Hebe.” And then for the moment the subject was dismissed, though Mrs Derwent had her own thoughts about it.

“It is strange,” she said to herself, “how things come about. To think that our first invitation of any kind from the people I used to be one of, should have come in this way – almost out of pity.”

Chapter Twenty One

Mrs Burgess’s Caps

Blanche’s hope or expectation of meeting Miss Milward at Alderwood was not fulfilled. She had not, however, been there many minutes before she caught sight of Mrs Harrowby, the wife of the Pinnerton vicar, among the guests, and of her she made inquiry as to Rosy’s absence.

She was away, paying visits, for a few weeks, Mrs Harrowby replied; and something in her manner made Blanche feel that it was better to hazard no further inquiry, as she had been half-intending to do, about Lady Hebe herself. For some slight allusion to the East Moddersham family only drew forth the remark that the Marths were expected back some time in October.

“Either,” thought Blanche, “she doesn’t know how bad it is, or she has been asked not to speak of it.”

“The guild girls are getting on wonderfully well,” volunteered the vicars wife, “thanks to Adela Bracy and her cousin, though, in the first place, thanks to you. They miss you very much – indeed, we all do, at Pinnerton. Adela says you have been most kind in allowing her to apply to you about some little difficulties that occurred;” as was the case.

“I was so sorry to have to give it up,” said Blanche simply. “I only wish I could help Miss Bracy more.”

Just then Lady Harriot appeared with some of the numerous members of the Enneslie family in tow, to whom Miss Derwent was introduced with great propriety. Some irrepressible allusions to the bonnet followed on the good hostess’s part, which Blanche minded very much less than the Misses Enneslie minded them for her. They were nice girls, ready to be almost enthusiastic in their admiration of Blanche and of her sister, whom the youngest of them took under her wing, with the evident intention of making her enjoy herself. And the sight of Stasy’s brightening face was enough to make her sister’s spirits rise at once, more especially when she saw how, on her side, her mother was enjoying a tour of the grounds under old Mr Dunstan’s escort.

Other introductions followed, several of them to families whose names were not altogether unfamiliar to the girl, for as they sat working together, Miss Halliday was not above beguiling the time by a little local gossip of a harmless kind. And Lady Harriot’s good offices did not stop with “the county.” Blanche was trotted out, so to say, for the benefit of some of the Alderwood house-party, her hostess challenging their admiration, not only of the chef d’oeuvre reposing on her own head, but of the charming “confections,” which she described as to be seen in the High Street at Blissmore.

“You must really drive in with me one day, before you leave,” she would exclaim to some special crony of her own. “You would think yourself in Paris, you really would. – And yet none of your things have come from there as yet, have they, Miss Derwent?”

“None of those you saw, I think,” Blanche replied, “though I did write for a few models to a shop we used to get our own things from. The hat I have on is copied from one of them.”

“I was just thinking how pretty it was,” said the mother of some daughters, standing beside her. “I should extremely wish to have one like it for each of my girls, if we may call some day soon. That’s to say, if you don’t mind our copying yours, Miss Derwent. It isn’t as if we lived in this neighbourhood; we’re only here for a few days.”

“I shall be delighted to make them for you,” Blanche replied pleasantly.

And the perfect good taste of her manner increased the favourable impression she had created.

Indeed, that afternoon at Alderwood bade fair to see her and her sister exalted into the rank of heroines. It was plain that “taking up” the Derwents was to be the fashion in the neighbourhood, and to a less entirely single-minded and well-balanced nature than Blanche’s, the position would not have been without its risks. But, without cynicism, she appreciated the whole at its just value. The neglect and indifference and stupid exclusiveness shown to them during their first few lonely months in England had been a lesson not lost upon her, all the more that she had in no way exaggerated its causes.

“There are lots of kind people in the world, I suppose,” she said to Stasy, whose head was much more in danger of being turned than her own. “But there are not many who go out of their way to make others happier, like dear Lady Hebe, or to help them practically, like kind Mrs Bracy; and the sort of attention that comes from ones being in any way prominent is really worth very little.”

“I know,” Stasy agreed. “People are very like sheep; still, Blanche, the Enneslies are very nice girls. You are not going to advise mamma not to let me go to see them, when they asked me so very kindly, and not at all in a patronising way. You have always wanted me to have nice companions.”

“Mamma can judge much better than I,” said Blanche. “I should not think of advising her one way or the other, though I hope she will let you go to spend a day with the Enneslies.”

“Really,” said Stasy, “if it’s to be made such a fuss about, I’d much rather not go; if I were a poor apprentice, I should be allowed ‘a day out’ now and then, I suppose.”

For Stasy’s temper just now was, to say the least, capricious. She was growing tired of the steady work required of her, now that the first blush of novelty and excitement had worn off. And this invitation to the Enneslies, a simple and informal affair, such as there could be no possible objection to for any girl of her age, was but the precursor of others, which, while they gratified Mrs Derwent to a certain extent, yet gave her cause for a great deal of consideration and some anxiety.

“Stasy is too young,” she said to Blanche, “too young and excitable to go out, even in this ungrownup way, as much as would now be the case if we laid ourselves out for it. And for her it would not be the simple sort of thing that it is for girls in an ordinary position. Wherever we go, you would just at present be more or less picked out for notice and attention, and however kindly that may be meant, it would not be good for Stasy.”

“Nor for me either, mamma,” said Blanche. “I dare say I should get very spoilt. I know I feel dreadfully lazy after these garden-parties and things of the kind, and disinclined to do anything at all.”

“My darling,” said her mother, “I can scarcely imagine anything spoiling you. The spoiling would go deeper with Stasy than in the common sense of the word, for immediately people began to make less of her, she would be exaggeratedly embittered and cynical.”

“We must save her from that,” said Blanche eagerly; “and it is just what would happen. Still, mamma, I think we should let her have all the change and recreation possible, for she does work so hard – harder than she needs. She throws herself so intensely into whatever she is doing. She gets as flushed and nervous over a hat as if her life depended upon it.”

“It is even better when she is doing some lessons,” said Mrs Derwent, “and the classes will be beginning again soon. We must just take things as they come, Blanchie, and do our best.”

So a great part of the invitations that were sent to them was courteously declined on the plea of want of time, none being accepted save such as it was desirable for Stasy to take part in, and which did not involve the expense of long drives or of much loss of working hours.

One day early in October, “business” – to use Miss Halliday’s expression – “being rather slack just then,” Mrs Burgess made her appearance in a great state of excitement. She wanted some caps at once, as she was going off unexpectedly on a visit.

It was late in the afternoon. Blanche had persuaded her mother to go out for a little stroll. Miss Halliday, in her corner of the shop, had, to confess the truth, been indulging in a little nap, and Stasy, some lace-frilling in her hands, which she was working at in a rather perfunctory way, glancing between times at a story of thrilling incident in a volume lent her by the Enneslies, was feeling unusually restful and contented.

“I do hope no one else will come to-day,” she thought to herself. “It is nice to have a little breathing-time before the winter season begins, which Miss Halliday expects to be such a success.”

Suddenly the shop door opened. Miss Halliday started up, looking and feeling very guilty.

“Good-afternoon, Miss Halliday,” said Mrs Burgess, the new-comer. “Dear me, what a colour you are! I hope you’re not going to get apoplectic! Where is Miss Derwent? I must see her at once;” and she proceeded to explain the reason of her visit, and the urgency of her wants.