A Red Wallflower

'Don't you think that is being happy?'

'It do sound so, mum.'

'I can tell you it feels so, Barker. "Blessed are all they that put their trust in Him." And that is, they are happy. And I trust in Him; and I love Him; and I know my sins are forgiven and covered; and my strength is in Him – all my strength. But that makes me strong.'

She went away with that from the window and the room, leaving the housekeeper exceedingly confounded; much as if a passing angel's wings had thrown down a white light upon her brown pathway. And from this time, it may be said Mrs. Barker regarded her young lady with something like secret worship. She had always been careful and tender of her charge; now in spirit she bowed down before her to the ground. For a while after Esther had left the room she stood very still, like one upon whom a spell had fallen. She was comparing things; remembering the look Mrs. Gainsborough had used to wear – sweet, dignified, but shadowed; then the face that at one time was Esther's face, also sweet and dignified, but uneasy and troubled and dark; and now – what was her countenance like? The housekeeper was no poet, nor in any way fanciful; otherwise she might have likened it to some of the fairest things in nature; and still the comparison would have fallen short. Sweet as a white rose; untroubled as the stars; full of hope as the flush of the morning. Only, in the human creature there was the added element oflife, which in all these dead things was wanting. Mrs. Barker probably thought of none of these images for her young mistress; nevertheless, the truth that is in them came down upon her very heart; and from that time she was Esther's devoted slave. There was no open demonstration of feeling; but Esther's wishes were laws to her, and Esther's welfare lay nearest her heart of all things in the world.

CHAPTER XX

SCHOOL

After much consideration the colonel had determined that Esther should be a sort of half boarder at Miss Fairbairn's school; that is, she should stay there from Monday morning to Saturday night. Esther combated this determination as far as she dared.

'Papa, will not that make me a great deal more expense to you than I need be?'

'Not much difference, my dear, as to that. If you came back every night

I should have to keep a horse; now that will not be necessary, and

Christopher will have more time to attend to other things.'

'But, papa, it will leave you all the week alone!'

'That must be, my child. I must be alone all the days, at any rate.'

'Papa, you will miss me at tea, and in the evenings.'

'I must bear that.'

It troubles me, papa.'

'And that you must bear. My dear, I do not grudge the price I pay. See you only that I get what I pay for.'

'Yes, papa,' Esther said meekly. She could go no further.

Miss Fairbairn was a tall woman, but not imposing either in manner or looks. Her face was sensible, with a mixture of the sweet and the practical which was at least peculiar; and the same mixture was in her manner. This was calm and gentle in the utmost degree; also cool and self-possessed equally; and it gave Esther the impression of one who always knew her own mind and was accustomed to make it the rule for all around her. A long talk with this lady was the introduction to Esther's school experience. It was a very varied talk; it roved over a great many fields and took looks into others; it was not inquisitive or prying, and yet Esther felt as if her interlocutor were probing her through and through, and finding out all she knew and all she did not know. In the latter category, it seemed to Esther, lay almost everything she ought to have known. Perhaps Miss Fairbairn did not think so; at any rate her face expressed no disappointment and no disapproval.

'In what way have you carried on your study of history, my dear?' she finally asked.

'I hardly can tell; in a box of coins, I believe,' Esther answered.

'Ah? I think I will get me a box of coins.'

Which meant, Esther could not tell what. She found herself at last, to her surprise, put with the highest classes in the English branches and in Latin.

Her work was immediately delightful. Esther was so buried in it that she gave little thought or care to anything else, and did not know or ask what place she took in the esteem of her companions or of her teachers. As the reader may be more curious, one little occurrence that happened that week shall serve to illustrate her position; did illustrate it, in the consciousness of all the school family, only not of Esther herself.

It was at dinner one day. There was a long table set, which reached nearly from the front of the house to the back, through two rooms, leaving just comfortable space for the servants to move about around it. Dinner was half through. Miss Fairbairn was speaking of something in the newspaper of that morning which had interested her, and she thought would interest the girls.

'I will read it to you,' she said. 'Miss Gainsborough, may I ask you to do me a favour? Go and fetch me the paper, my dear; it lies on my table in the schoolroom; the paper, and the book that is with it.'

There went a covert smile round the room, which Esther did not see; indeed, it was too covert to be plain even to the keen eyes of Miss Fairbairn, and glances were exchanged; and perhaps it was as well for Esther that she did not know how everybody's attention for the moment was concentrated on her movements. She went and came in happy ignorance.

Miss Fairbairn received her paper, thanked her, and went on then to read to the girls an elaborate account of a wonderful wedding which had lately been celebrated in Washington. The bride's dress was detailed, her trousseau described, and the subsequent movements of the bridal party chronicled. All was listened to with eager attention.

'What do you think of it, Miss Dyckman?' the lady asked after she had finished reading.

'I think she was a happy girl, Miss Fairbairn.'

'Humph! What do you say, Miss Delavan?'

'Uncommonly happy, I should say, ma'am.'

'Is that your opinion, Miss Essing?'

'Certainly, ma'am. There could be but one opinion, I should think.'

'What could make a girl happy, if all that would not?' asked another.

'Humph! Miss Gainsborough, you are the next; what are your views on the subject?'

Esther's mouth opened, and closed. The answer that came first to her lips was sent back. She had a fine feeling that it was not fit for the company, a feeling that is expressed in the admonition not to cast pearls before swine, though that admonition did not occur to her at the time. She had been about to appeal to the Bible; but her answer as it was given referred only to herself.

'I believe I should not call "happiness" anything that would not last,' she said.

There was a moment's silence. What Miss Fairbairn thought was not to be read from her face; in other faces Esther read distaste or disapprobation.

'Why, Miss Fairbairn, nothing lasts, if you come to that,' cried a young lady from near the other end of the table.

'Some things more than others,' the mistress of the house opined.

'Not what you call "happiness," ma'am.'

'That's a very sober view of things to take at your age, Miss Disbrow.'

'Yes, ma'am,' said the young lady, tittering. 'It is true.'

'Do you think it is true, Miss Jennings?'

There was a little hesitation. Miss Jennings said she did not know.

Miss Lawton was appealed to.

'Is there no happiness that is lasting, Miss Lawton?'

'Well, Miss Fairbairn, what we call happiness. One can't be married but once,' the young lady hazarded.

That called forth a storm of laughter. Laughter well modulated and kept within bounds, be it understood; no other was tolerated in Miss Fairbairn's presence.