Chapter II: A Relation

"Her presence
Fell on their hearts like a ray of the sun on the walls of a
prison."
LONGFELLOW.

"HEATHER, is your religion real to you?"

This startling question was asked by Bluebell the next morning as she was conning over her morning chapter in the Bible, before going down to breakfast.

Heather was rolling up her curly hair in front of her glass, but her eyes were not on her reflected image. They were straying out of the window into the sunny meadows below. She turned round with a start. The sisters were peculiarly reserved about their deepest feelings. They never failed in performing their devotional duties, which had been prescribed and enforced by their Quaker grandmother from their earliest childhood. In fact, they would as soon have thought of omitting to brush their hair as to omit their daily Bible reading before breakfast.

"My religion!" said Heather. "Of course it is real. I am not a hypocrite!"

"How far does it go?"

Bluebell's merry eyes were soft and grave as she put the question.

"I don't know what you mean."

"I have just been reading this verse:

"'Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world.'

"We have been talking so much of seeing more of the world, that I have been wondering if our longing after it is not wrong!"

"I don't see that it is wrong," said Heather, slowly, "as long as we don't let it take the place of God Himself. Knowing it and seeing it is not loving it."

"But that may lead to our loving it!"

"I don't expect we shall ever have that chance," said Heather, carelessly.

Bluebell gazed at her verse thoughtfully.

"I think I want to be real," she said, "but we have never had our religion tested, Heather."

"No, that is true. Our lives are so even and monotonous. Do you remember our naughty days when we were children? How we used to escape Abigail's clutches, and knowing the punishment that would follow, how we would revel in wickedness till she caught us? We have steadied down now, she would tell us. But I don't know. This time of perfect freedom sets all the pulses in me throbbing and tingling for action. And I do not think our religion condemns us to this narrow, fettered life. I do not believe it is right for us two young girls to be shut away from all society and friendship, and have no one to talk to but our inferiors. It is not right; I feel it is not. I shall pray hard that we may be taken out of it."

Bluebell shut up her Bible, and said no more. She danced downstairs with as light a heart as if no serious thoughts had ever troubled her. She had the old-fashioned urn brought in, and made the tea, and when Heather came in, she chattered away as usual about her plans for the day.

"I shall do some gardening this morning. And now the spring is coming on, old Peter must come oftener than once a week, Heather. I think I had better walk over to the village this afternoon. I want to see some of my children, and I can see him at the same time, and tell him to come and bed out some seedlings."

"You might take some jelly to Mrs. Wick's little girl. Abigail says she is ill again, poor child. Why, here is old Watty coming up the drive! How exciting! Now, who can the letter be from?"

Bluebell darted out into the hall at once, and soon returned, holding a letter in her hand.

"It is addressed to Miss Fotheringay, and it is quite a strange hand. Let us open it."

They read it with their curly heads close together, and certainly the contents filled them with a dazed kind of wonder.

"Park Lane, W.

"MY DEAR COUSIN,—I am an unknown quantity to you, but Mr. Brody, your grandmother's lawyer, has been to me, and has enlisted my sympathy on your behalf. He tells me you and your sister are left all alone, and are young enough to need a chaperon. I feel, as I am your second cousin, that I ought to do something for you, so propose to come and pay you a little visit. If we like each other, we may hit upon some plan that will be agreeable to all of us. I feel sure that you will be able to put me up, so hope to be with you on Friday afternoon. I shall leave my maid behind, and come quite by myself, so do not make any extra preparations for me. Your affectionate cousin,—

"IDA CARTER."

"Isn't it extraordinary," said Heather, "that while we were talking about having no relations, she should be writing to us? She must be the cousin, Abigail told me of yesterday. Coming here on Friday! I can't believe it."

"So our lives are going to widen out at once! I like her letter. How I hope we shall like her. And what will Abigail say?"

They had not much appetite for their breakfast. At half-past nine, Abigail, Rachael, and Johnnie, the small boy who cleaned the knives and boots and made himself generally useful, filed in to prayers. Heather read and prayed with an abstracted mind.

When it was over, Abigail began to remove the breakfast things.

Bluebell stood on the hearthrug with nervously clasped hands. She glanced at Heather, who sat down on the arm of a leather chair, and, assuming a careless attitude, hummed the air of an old song.

Abigail looked at them both a little sharply.

"Who has written to you?" she demanded.

Heather resolved to show a brave front.

"Oh, you saw the postman, did you, Abigail? We have heard from our cousin, Mrs. Carter, and she is coming to stay with us next Friday. The spare room must be got ready for her."

Her tone was dignified. Abigail was so startled at the news that she forgot her good manners, and, placing her arms akimbo, ejaculated, "Now may the good Lord deliver us from the wolf coming down upon the fold! Give me the letter, Miss Heather; let me see it. Who has told her about you, I should like to know?"

For a moment, Heather hesitated. She was longing to assert her authority, but the habits of a lifetime were too strong for her, and she meekly put the letter into Abigail's hand. That good woman whipped out her spectacles from her capacious pocket, read it and re-read it, and then gave a contemptuous sniff.

"I should like to give Mr. Brody a piece of my mind! 'Young enough to need—' what's this word? 'Chaper—chaperon!' some French nonsense, I suppose! You need nothing, and will need nothing as long as I am with you; and I will give Mrs. Carter my word for that as soon as she enters this house."

Rarely had the girls seen Abigail so moved.

Bluebell said timidly—

"It is very kind of her, Abigail, to think of us at all; we have been longing to know some of our relations, and it will be a great pleasure to see her."

"Oh, you poor little creatures!"

No one but Abigail could have put such contemptuous pity in her tone. She took up a covered dish, and went out of the room, as if she were afraid to trust herself further.

Heather's cheeks were scarlet, and her grey eyes flashed angrily.

"She treats us like babies! I am thankful we shall have some one who will make her remember her proper place. Since grandmother's death, she has got worse and worse. I should like to be free from her!"

"We shall be!" exclaimed Bluebell, dancing lightly round the room. "We shall go to London with Mrs. Carter, and see the world at last."

"I wonder if it is an answer to my prayer this morning," said Heather, thoughtfully, her ire dying away as suddenly as it came. "I have been longing so for something to happen, but I never expected the change to come so soon."

"Miss Heather," said Abigail, entering the room again, and speaking in her usually quiet, grave tone, "Rachael is waiting to have the stores given out, and there is some of last year's jam that needs to be freshly covered. Perhaps you can do that this morning."

Heather seized her housekeeping keys, and ran out to the kitchen.

It was a relief to hear Rachael's view of things.

"There, my dear Miss Heather, of course Abigail is a bit upset. The mistress was so anxious you should grow up steady, good young women, and keep out of all the world's temptations, but I've been sayin' the Lord will take care of His own. And if this Mrs. Carter be what we fears, a giddy, worldly woman, well, she won't be allowed to harm you, and you have a good head on your shoulders, and won't let your early training be all brought to nought. 'Tis dull for you two young girls, as I have been sayin' to Abigail, and any one belongin' to one's own flesh and blood is very welcome. We'll hope for the best, and I think I shall walk into town to-morrow, and order a few necessary additions to the list we made yesterday. I'll do the best for my dear departed mistress's credit to give the lady good meals while she is here, and I'll have a couple of the young spring chickens killed at once!"

The next two days were very busy and pleasant ones. The garden, the greenhouse, every room was looked over, and adorned afresh.

For the first time, the twins began to wonder if their country-made black dresses were correct in style. They were keenly anxious that their visitor should be favourably impressed.

When Friday came, they wandered up and down the house, longing for, yet dreading her advent. Dusk set in before she arrived. They went up to the spare bedroom, put flowers on the toilet-table, lit up the massive silver candlesticks, and looked round with a critical eye. It was a gloomy room, but the linen was of the finest, the green damask curtains round the four-post bed had all been freshly shaken and hung, and the bright wood fire that Abigail had grudgingly lighted shed its ruddy light over all the dark corners.

"I think she will be comfortable," said Bluebell. "Oh, I hope she will like it here."

"I don't want her to think us incompetent," said Heather, with a little toss of her head. "We have never had a guest before, but I shall make a point of seeing to her comfort. And now will be our time for shaking off Abigail's yoke. I mean to have a good try."

"You'll never—never succeed," said Bluebell, laughing. "Abigail is too old to become different. Oh, Heather, listen! There are wheels! I feel quite shy. Shall we go down?"

They reached the hall, and in another moment were face to face with their guest. Abigail stood in the background, and felt that her worst fears were realized.

Mrs. Carter was a pretty, vivacious little woman. She was clad in a scarlet jacket trimmed with astrakan, a toque with scarlet wings was set jauntily over a quantity of dark frizzy hair, her dress was covered with costly trimming, and an atmosphere of scent and perfumes was about her.

She looked at the two girlish figures in their unbecoming dresses of black silk and crape, then embraced them warmly.

"So delighted to make your acquaintance, dears. What an out of the way place this is! Four miles from a railway station, and not a house did we pass during the drive. I'm afraid I should die of the dumps if I lived here."

"Will you come up to your room now?" asked Heather, feeling quite bewildered at such an apparition in their Quaker household.

"If you like, or shall I come into the drawing-room first—I am longing for a cup of tea."

"We shall be dining in half an hour," said Heather, with an uneasy glance at Abigail, "but if you would like a cup of tea, I will send it up to you."

"Thank you. I think I should. I had a very early lunch. How like you two girls are to each other! I shall never know the difference between you. Come along, both of you, and show me my room."

She rustled up the stairs, Heather leading the way, and she sank into the easy chair by her fire with a little sigh of content.

Looking at the two girls in front of her, she said—

"Now tell me your names. I do not even know those, and yet I am a cousin."

"Our baptismal names are Drusilla and Priscilla," said Bluebell, quickly, "but our mother could not bear them. She was Scotch, and did not belong to the Friends. So she called us Heather and Bluebell, and even grandmother got to call us so too. We try and forget that we were called anything else!"

"Very wise of you," laughed Mrs. Carter. "And now may I ask what time you dine? Surely not yet?"

"At six o'clock," Heather replied.

Mrs. Carter raised her eyebrows, but said nothing, and at this moment, a knock was heard at the door.

Heather looked round, and saw Abigail with a face like thunder.

"Have you brought Mrs. Carter a cup of tea?" Heather asked, lifting her little head up proudly.

She felt sure that Abigail was determined to prevent any confidences being exchanged between them and their cousin, and she resented it accordingly.

Abigail looked at her charges with a glance that made them quail beneath it.

"You will please to go downstairs, young ladies," she said sternly, "and I will attend upon the lady myself. I have something to say to her."

Mrs. Carter looked up quickly, and was about to speak, but checked herself. She nodded brightly to the girls as she saw them slipping from the room.

"I shall see you downstairs presently," she called out after them. And then she turned to Abigail—"I was not going to trouble you," she said very sweetly, "but since you have offered to attend upon me, perhaps you will unlace my boots for me. I miss my maid when I am away from her."

This was more than Abigail was prepared to do. But she went down on her knees at once, and Mrs. Carter continued pleasantly—

"I want to have a good talk with you soon about your young ladies, but I am tired to-night, so we will put off our chat till to-morrow."

Abigail, struggling on her knees with a refractory lace, felt herself at a disadvantage. She said nothing till her task was done, then she rose to her feet.

"I would like to give you a word of caution, mem," she said grimly. "I have been in this family for years, before you were born. I knew your mother when she was a slip of a girl, and my late mistress has given me a trust that I will be faithful to, cost me what it may. The young ladies have been brought up apart from the world, and into it they shall not go with my consent. I promised her I would look after them as long as I lived. She did not wish me to communicate with you, or I would have done so. You never came near her as long as she lived, and there is no need now to come putting foolish and sinful ideas into the poor children's heads. Perhaps you do not know that my mistress wished them to live on here with me?"

Mrs. Carter leant back in her chair and smiled. "Yes, I do know it, and Mr. Brody is their guardian, and I am sure you have their best interests at heart. Now, do not let me keep you any longer. Perhaps you will kindly unstrap my trunk before you go. Thank you. We will have our chat to-morrow."

Abigail went downstairs shaking her head solemnly. She felt she had met her match, and difficult times were ahead for them all.