Chapter XIX: News for Gretta

“Just think!” said Josy, stretching luxuriously in her bed, as she made up her mind for the fiftieth time that it was her duty to rise. “The match is over, and _well_ over--hurrah for Helen!--the dormer-feast’s all eaten, and I jolly well feel as though I’d had the whole of it; we’ve got past half-term, and now--well, what _is_ there to look forward to?” She gazed appealingly at her two companions, who, both in different stages of undress, were flying through their Sunday toilet.

“Well, I should think you’re half asleep still if you’ve forgotten the Hope-Scott Shield,” declared Margot, emerging from a basin of cold water. “Do hurry, Josy, or nurse will be simply wild!”

“Forget it! Who could forget it?” grumbled Josy. “It’s on the tips of my fingers to do something brave every day of my life, and I’ve never done anything yet.” She scrambled out of bed as she spoke, and, in the intervals of dressing, continued her remarks: “I’ve a jolly good mind to get Stella to pretend to drown next time we’re in the baths. Her pigtail’s long enough to rescue her by, and _then_----!”

“Josy, you’re simply frightful!” laughed Gretta. “You’d never get it for _that_! Margot _might_, now, for yesterday; do you think she _could_?” She gazed admiringly at her cousin, who stood in her petticoats, transfixed with amazement at the suggestion.

“_Me!_ I like that! It’s plain you never heard what Miss Slater said to me last night when I got back. She made me feel jolly small, I can tell you--about going off like that.” Margot brushed her hair vigorously, looking rather shamefaced.

“Then there’s only Gretta left of our dormer to get it,” said Josy sadly; “and, somehow, you know, Gretta, you’re not the sort. You’re so frightfully quiet, and ‘Ne evill thing she feard’; no, that _isn’t_ like you. Not that you’re not awfully clever at music, and all that; but--as far as bravery goes----! Well, you don’t mind, do you?” and the tactless speaker turned an inquiring face. “I was only thinking it out.”

“You’d better shut up with your ‘thinking out!’” burst in Margot angrily. “If Gretta’s not frightfully good at games and things like that, you should just hear what mother thinks about her fiddle! And it’s not only _mother_.’”

“Do be quiet, Margot,” begged Gretta. “I know what Josy means; I’m not the sort to be brave about things. The shield’ll go to Helen, or someone like that. And, as far as this dormer goes, there’s Stella, you know.” The clanging of the first breakfast-bell terrified them all into silence, and it was not until the dining-hall was reached that the three friends had time to speak to each other again.

“Hurrah!” exclaimed Margot, then, pouncing upon a fat letter that lay on her plate. “Look here, Gretta!”

“Is it from auntie?” inquired her cousin. “Oh, if so, _do_ keep it till afterwards and read it in the playground.”

As it was Sunday, and free time, therefore, being less limited than usual, Margot agreed, and half an hour later the couple were to be seen, arm-in-arm, pacing the hockey field, the letter held aloft in Margot’s disengaged hand.

“Oh, if _only_ she tells me about what happened in the ‘Little House’ yesterday!” she began.

“Read it yourself first,” suggested Gretta, “in case there’s anything private.”

“Pooh!” laughed Margot, acting on her cousin’s suggestion nevertheless, until, after reading for a page or two, she gave a great gasp. “Oh, I--_say_!”

“Whatever is it?” begged her companion.

“Well, _read_ it; that’s all I can say!”

Together the pigtailed heads bent over the open page; stock-still as statues stood the pair as they took in the exciting contents of Mrs. Fleming’s missive.

“DARLING MARGOT,” wrote her mother, “I have just got back to York, and want to send a line so that you may get it to-morrow, for I know you will be anxious to hear of the poor old man in your ‘Little House.’ I was with him until the doctor came, and then left Long Jake there; _he_ will stay as long as he is needed, but the old man is very ill, and will not want him long.

“I could not explain to you yesterday all that there was to know, but now I have asked Long Jake, and he is willing for you to understand. You remember that, when he came out to us in the Bush years ago, he was in trouble? That, I think, was all you knew at the time. The fact was that he had been charged during his college days with forging the name of his uncle--who was the Earl of Carflick--on a cheque, and he had been convicted of this and consequently punished. I need not tell you that the conviction was a mistake; all the while--though he told no one--he knew that the forgery had been committed by an old servant in his uncle’s house--a butler who had been in the family for many years, and of whom, since boyhood, our Long Jake had been very fond. We both knew him well enough to be sure that he would suffer punishment of any kind rather than throw light on the wrong-doing of another, and he went to prison for that reason. When he was free again his uncle was dead, the old servant had disappeared, and Long Jake came out to Australia to ‘make a man of himself’ again, as he used to say. He stayed out there until he had put together a sum of money; then, with this in his possession, he came back to England last week to look for the old butler, whom he had always felt sure would never have committed this crime had he not been in great difficulties. He meant to help him look life in the face again.

“Then, darling Margot, comes the strange and wonderful part of the story; it was in the ‘Little House’ that he found the old servant; he was ill and dying, but he was longing to make a confession before he died, and to declare that it was _he_ who had been guilty of the forgery. It seems almost impossible to believe, but it is true, that, just as he was beginning to tell the rector all this--just at that moment you and Long Jake knocked at the door.

“Since then Jake has not left the old man. You need not be unhappy, Margot, for he is quite peaceful and at rest now, and he will not be left alone again until the end. I think you may tell this to Gretta and Josy, as you have all been so much interested in the ‘Little House.’ Stella will, no doubt, hear something of it from her father, and as Long Jake will be returning to Australia again almost at once--for he has nothing now to keep him here--there is no reason for his sake why the story should be kept secret. This is a long letter; I must arrange very soon to see Gretta, and will write to Miss Slater about this. We have given up the car, so I may come over by train.”

It was at this point that both heads were raised simultaneously. Both the girls’ eyes looked remarkably moist. “Oh, Margot!” burst in Gretta almost impetuously. “What an awfully brave man that Long Jake is! Fancy bearing all that!”

“And our poor old man!” said her cousin. “Oh, I’m so glad he’s happy now. It’s the most wonderful story I ever heard. But _I’m_ not surprised at anything brave Long Jake would do!”

The letter, being re-read to Josy in the dormitory before church, provoked louder if not more heart-felt adulation. “Whether that Long Jake of yours is at school or whether he _isn’t_, he ought to have the shield,” announced that damsel. “Why, the motto simply fits him _exactly_; he’s the most utterly downright ripping man I ever heard of in my life!”

“It’s funny to think that if it hadn’t been for Sybil----” began Gretta.

“Talking about Sybil,” interrupted Margot vehemently, “there’s one thing I’ve made up my mind to. I’m going to see that she has a decenter time. She _can’t_ like chattering to Adela all day. Josy, let’s take her in hand; we’ll _make_ her keen on hockey. We could easily do it; she’s as good and better at it than any of her dormer, and she’s only six months younger than me. I believe she’d be as keen as mustard in no time.”

“It’s the very thing!” Gretta was beginning, her eyes sparkling, just as nurse appeared at the dormitory door, looking remarkably brisk and business-like. “Gretta,” she announced, “you’re to go to Miss Slater’s study. No, don’t wait a moment. Go down at once!”

But it was Mrs. Fleming’s voice that called “Come in,” in answer to the girl’s timid knock, and Auntie Tib herself rose from a comfortable chair to greet her.

“Oh, auntie! How lovely! And on Sunday, too. Margot, though--shan’t I go and tell her that you’re here?”

“No, dear; it’s _you_ I’ve come to see this time, and for two reasons. Miss Slater has kindly given me the use of her room. You got my message, didn’t you, in Margot’s letter?”

“Oh, yes.” Something in her aunt’s manner caused Gretta to feel uneasy. “What is it, auntie?” she ventured. “It’s nothing that I’ve done, is it?”

“Darling, _no_. But it’s rather difficult to tell.” Mrs. Fleming cleared her throat, while Gretta waited in suspense; then came the deluge!

“Gretta, I’ve something to tell you. You know how delighted I was when your father allowed us the great pleasure of sending you and Sybil to school with Margot?”

“Yes?” Gretta’s tone sounded as bewildered as she felt.

“Well, dear, to cut a long story short, things have happened that we in no way expected. Uncle Bob is not the rich man that he was. I needn’t trouble you with details, child, but we are just now in rather a difficult position.”

Gretta gazed up without speaking, only half understanding the importance of her aunt’s words.

“It’s like this, darling. Uncle Bob and I are going back to Australia by the next boat; we start early in the week. We mean to leave Margot here, for we _can_ afford that; also, Uncle Bob says that he wants either you _or_ Sybil to stay, but to keep you _both_ here after the end of this term is not possible. I went to see your father on Friday, and yesterday--before there was the sudden excitement of Sybil’s absence--I spoke to Miss Slater.”

“Then----?” It seemed to Gretta as though in one moment all her castles of happiness were tottering; school-life in future was to be either for her or for Sybil; school-life to which she had so much looked forward, and which had surpassed her wildest dreams; which had brought her the longed-for music lessons, and the friends that had meant so much to her. She gazed at her aunt in a bewildered, terrified way. “Oh, auntie!” she said in a whisper. “Which of us is it to be?”

“Gretta,” said Mrs. Fleming. “Look at me. Does it mean so _very_ much to you?”

A flood of ideas seemed literally to rush into Gretta’s mind; she thought of home as it had been, dull and lonely; she thought of school as it was; could she bear to leave it after such a short, short taste of all the joys it held? She turned her eyes appealingly towards her aunt, and tried to speak.

“Gretta,” said Mrs. Fleming again. “If I _could_ have managed it, both of you should have stayed; but it _must_ be only one.”

And then, quite suddenly, Gretta realized that, as a Cliff School girl, she must play the game. Sybil must stay, of _course_; there was no other way; her choice was made. She held her head as straight as she could, and gave a crooked, but courageous, little smile. “It just _has_ to be me,” she said. “And perhaps I’ll get music lessons again some day, and, anyhow, I know enough to practise better. Auntie, you’ve been most awfully kind, and you must have had a _frightful_ time yourself!”

“Well, the worst’s over now,” said Mrs. Fleming bravely. “I dreaded telling you, dear, more than anything. We’ve given up the car. I hoped by telling Margot that in my letter, that the way might be paved to letting her know the rest.”

“Poor Margot!” said Gretta.

“Not ‘poor Margot’ at all,” said that girl’s mother cheerfully. “Her schooling’s assured, and it will do us all good to put our shoulders to the wheel again. It’s _you_, dear.”

“But I’ve the rest of the term, you know.” Gretta, until she had voiced the words, hardly realized herself how she was clinging to the comfort of those last few weeks.

“But”--her aunt’s voice was stranger than ever, and the girl looked up apprehensively--“I said, didn’t I, that I had _two_ things to tell you, dear? I did not know the second until this morning, and then, at breakfast-time, I had a letter from your father’s partner. He is ill--your father, I mean--and Ann is not proving very competent. A nurse would be a greater luxury than we can afford just now, as things have turned out. Besides, there is not real need for one, and Miss Slater has agreed with me that, as he must have someone just now, and as Uncle Bob and I can be of no use--for we sail on Tuesday--it will be well for you to go home for a time.”

Very deep in Gretta’s nature was rooted her love for her father; she forgot her woes entirely now in this new complication. “Auntie, _how_ ill is he?” she broke out passionately. “He’s not dying?”

“Darling, no. A very deeply seated chill; he must be kept in bed and looked after. Dr. Moore says you have more than once nursed him well through a similar attack, and he misses you. Nurse is packing your box; of course, you _may_ be back again for a week or two but----”

“Oh, auntie, when can we start?”

“I’m going to take you now, dear. Not because there’s the least danger, but because it’s the last chance I have, before sailing, to see him again; and Miss Slater suggested that you should come, too. We don’t want to leave him an hour longer than we need to the care of Ann; and there is a train in less than an hour’s time.”

It was not in this way that Gretta had expected to leave the Cliff. No good-byes could be said, as by this time all the girls were at church, and, after a hurried rush and scramble, she found herself seated in the fly, opposite to Mrs. Fleming, with her little box by her side, waving her hand bravely to Miss Slater, who herself stood at the school entrance to see the travellers off.

“I wonder if I’ll ever be back,” she thought to herself, but she did not say it aloud. Auntie must not know how much she minded; and, in the rush at the station, the quick journey, with its hurried change at York, and the jolting drive at the other end, she lost sight for a time of the dreadful change that was coming, and thought only of her father. If the doctor’s house looked dingy as the travellers drew up outside, Gretta didn’t notice it, for Ann stood at the door with her cap all awry, but with welcome in her eyes.

“Oh, Mrs. Fleming, ma’am! And _you_, Miss Gretta! Oh, _won’t_ the master be pleased! ’E was just saying ’e didn’t know ’ow ’e’d get on without you.”