Chapter XXVI: Sent for

"MOTHER, shouldn't you think Uncle Harvey and Aunt Julia would soon be at home?"

"Really I don't know. Yes, most likely. What are you after with my work-basket?"

"I want to find some red silk. I'm making a pin-cushion for my Marjory."

"Well, another time you can ask my leave first. I have no red silk, so please stop all that fumbling."

Mittie desisted immediately, as she would not have done once upon a time.

"I do wish I had some red silk. Mother, are there any shops in East Bourne?"

"Of course there are—heaps."

"And can I get some red silk there?"

"Of course. What a silly question!"

"And can I send my pin-cushion to Marjory by post?"

"If you choose. What are you going to ask next, I wonder?"

"I do wish we weren't going to East Bourne, mother. I don't want to be such a great way from my Marjory."

"Really, Mittie, you are crazy about her. I am perfectly sick of the name. A good thing we are going, I say, if it is only to get some of that nonsense out of your head."

Mittie promptly inquired, "What nonsense?"

"You know. The sort of talk you have favoured me with lately."

"Marjory teaches me, mother."

"Yes. I wish people would mind their own business, and leave other folks alone."

"Marjory teaches me how to be good. Don't you like me to learn to be good?"

An embarrassing question, rather. Mrs. Trevor evaded it.

"I like you to be sensible, of course, child."

"And not good too?"

"You are perfectly demented, Mittie. What makes you ask such ridiculous questions? Yes, I like you to be good, but I don't want you to be always chattering about it."

"My Marjory doesn't never chatter."

"There you go again! Always that perpetual 'my Marjory.' I hate to have a person's name drummed into my ears. If you want to make me detest her, you are setting to work in the right way. Miss Fitzalan is all very well, but one may have too much of a good thing."

Mittie stood near the table, her little arms folded, and her drooping face hidden by its cloud of fair hair. She made no answer. A touch of compunction came over Mrs. Trevor.

"Well, I dare say I can find you some red silk after all, if it's an affair of such immense importance. Not in my work-basket. Get me that little Indian box from the side-table."

The child obeyed silently, keeping her face turned away.

"Here, you can fish out something from this tangle. I dare say it is not more than two or three needles-full that you want, and Miss Fitzalan will not be critical about the colours matching. Mittie, you goose!" at the sound of a sob. "What on earth is the matter now?"

Mittie could not have explained. She did not herself know what made the tears come so fast. It was only a child's nameless pain at hearing hard words spoken against one whom she loved, but a child's pain may be very keen while it lasts. Mrs. Trevor mentally resolved to pass no strictures on Marjory Fitzalan in the future. She never could endure to see Mittie cry.

"Do stop, child, pray! You'll make such an object of yourself. You are quite welcome to think what you choose of Miss Fitzalan, if it makes you happy. I am sure I don't care. I wish Julia and Harvey would come home, for the afternoon is perfectly endless. It is a mercy we are going away soon. I really think I should end by a fit of melancholy madness if this sort of thing lasted much longer. Now, Mittie, I won't have another tear. Just think what fun you are going to have down on the shore at East Bourne, picking up shells and digging in the sand. Yes, of course, there is sand—and shingles and rocks too."

This proved comforting, and Mittie was wiled out of her grief. Another hour passed, and still the absentees appeared not. Mrs. Trevor grew vexed, counting herself ill-used. But yet another hour went by before Slade entered the drawing-room and stood within the door.

"Somebody wanting Mr. Dalrymple, did you say?" Mrs. Trevor asked, waking up to a consciousness of his presence, and unaware that he had not spoken. Her faculties had been buried for the last twenty minutes in a yellow-backed novel. "Mr. Dalrymple is out still. I cannot understand his being so long."

"No, ma'am. There has been an accident," Slade's suppressed voice answered.

"An accident! Not to the dog-cart?"

"Yes, ma'am. It was not far from Captain Woodthorpe's, and Mr. and Mrs. Dalrymple have gone there. John has returned with a message. The horses ran away down a hill into a cart. Emperor is killed, and Prince—"

"And—and—" Mrs. Trevor could hardly speak in her impatience at his deliberate utterance. As if the horses mattered! She was angry at his putting them first, yet she knew that Slade was only trying to break his news gradually. Had he worse to tell?

"And my sister? And Mr. Dalrymple?"

"Mrs. Dalrymple was thrown out, ma'am; and at first she was not supposed to be hurt at all, but that is found to be a mistake. John does not know particulars. He was left behind when the horses ran away; and when he got to the spot he found Mr. Dalrymple unable to move, and Mrs. Dalrymple sitting on Prince's head to keep him down."

Mrs. Trevor exclaimed at this, knowing Julia's timidity with horses, "I always did say it was insane to keep such wild creatures," she added, with the instinctive desire to blame somebody which belongs to many people in trouble. "Mr. Dalrymple will believe me now! Is he very much hurt?"

"I am not sure, ma'am. Not so bad as was first thought," Slade answered dubiously. "I believe Mr. Dalrymple was very faint, and there's two ribs broken. But he's not, so to speak, in danger, and John's afraid as Mrs. Dalrymple is the worst. You see my mistress kept up, ma'am, and wouldn't give in, and nobody suspected it till, all of a sudden, she was took bad. She was so bad, Mrs. Ogilvie couldn't leave her to write to you, and John's brought a message asking if you could please go?"

"Yes, of course. I must go at once. Call John, if you please. I should like to speak to him. John does not know what is wrong with Mrs. Dalrymple, I suppose?"

"He does not precisely, ma'am." Slade's formal voice was lowered. "He believes it to be something internal—from what Mrs. Ogilvie said— but the doctor was in hopes."

"Poor dear Julia!" and Mrs. Trevor's eyes were filled with genuine tears. "Is John outside?"

She followed Slade to the door in her impatience. John appeared quickly, and he made some material additions to Slade's abstract. He described the accident more fully, with evident appreciation of his young mistress's courage, and he showed some natural gratification over his own foresight in having secured by the way three able-bodied men to go on with him to a possible scene of disaster.

Mr. Dalrymple had looked "terrible bad," John said, on their first arrival, and Mrs. Dalrymple, seated on Prince's head, not much better. Mrs. Dalrymple had, however, declared herself unhurt and all attention had been directed to Mr. Dalrymple and the horses. Emperor was found to be dying, nearly dead, and Prince also a good deal injured. Mr. Dalrymple appeared to suffer much from being moved, and having to be carried more than two miles on a hastily-improvised stretcher. One of the men stayed behind in charge of the horses, two of them carried Harvey, while his wife walked by his side, and John hastened on to give warning at the cottage of their approach. He was in hopes of bringing the pony-carriage to meet Mrs. Dalrymple, but Captain Woodthorpe had gone off for a drive, happily leaving Mrs. Ogilvie at home. She immediately despatched the gardener in quest of medical aid, and prepared for her visitors.

Ill as Mr. Dalrymple looked when he arrived, there could be no question that his wife looked much the worst of the two. Everybody had been startled by her appearance.

"The colour of a table-cloth, ma'am—only a sort of yaller too," John graphically explained. Yet she had kept up, resolutely refusing to be cared for, and bent upon doing everything for her husband. This lasted until the doctor came. An examination of Mr. Dalrymple resulted in the cheerful verdict, "Two ribs broken, but no danger!" and then in a moment, almost without warning, Julia failed. John could not tell particulars here. He only knew that Mr. and Mrs. Dalrymple were in different rooms, that Mrs. Ogilvie could not leave Mrs. Dalrymple, and that the doctor counted her state serious.

"Those horrible horses!" Mrs. Trevor reiterated, as a kind of vent for her own distress. "I always did think something dreadful would happen some day!" Then she inquired how she was to get to the cottage, shivered at the notion of the Captain's pony-carriage which had brought John, decided to put up at once small bag of requisites, and asked where was Miss Rivers.

Slade believed that Miss Rivers had not returned from the village.

"As usual!" murmured Mrs. Trevor. "And what am I to do about the child?"

She was assured that Mittie would be all right. Milton appeared on the scene, promising to take Miss Mittie under her own wing. Also Miss Rivers would see to everything.

"I hope to goodness she will!" sighed Mrs. Trevor, hastening towards the stairs. "Oh, what a thing it is!"

Before leaving, she loaded Mittie with injunctions how to behave, and how not to behave, the leading idea throughout being that she was "not to bother" Hermione. Mittie listened with a scared face.

"No, mother. I won't bother cousin Hermione. I'll go to Marjory for everything."

"Nonsense, child. I don't mean that, of course. Nothing would offend Hermione more. But just keep out of her way as much as you can."

"Yes, mother. Must I keep out of everybody's way?" asked Mittie, in a forlorn tone.

"Oh, if you are dull you can run and talk to Milton. I don't expect to be away long."

"Will you come home to-morrow?" Mittie inquired.

"I don't know. It must depend on how your aunt is."

"John says Aunt Julia is so dreadful bad. He says perhaps she'll die." Mittie's eyes were full of tears.

"John had no business to say anything of the sort to you. He is a foolish fellow. You are not to listen to him, Mittie, or to talk to the servants—except Milton and Slade. I don't believe Aunt Julia is nearly so bad as John makes out. Mind you are a good child, and go to bed early, and don't be dull. It won't last long." Mittie held up her face for a kiss, trying to smile. She kept fairly bright until the pony-chaise drove off, carrying her mother and John. Then Mittie's self-command came to an end. She rushed away to a corner of her mother's room, and sobbed out her little heart in a flood of lonely tears.

But Hermione was not in the village, as Slade supposed.

She had gone that afternoon for a walk alone, towards the big house and grounds, nearly two miles distant, where dwelt the Dalton family, Mr. and Mrs. Dalton, and their one daughter, Anna.

She had not once seen the Daltons since that memorable afternoon when Harvey had just returned from abroad, and the three had dropped in for a long call. The Daltons were wealthy people. Mr. Dalton had made a large fortune in business, and had therewith purchased the property lying next to Westford, no long time back.

Hermione did not care much for these Daltons. She knew that her grandfather had not liked them, and she knew also that Harvey was by no means anxious for a closer acquaintance. There was a tinge of commonness about their speech and their manners which grated on her, so she could well understand Harvey's feeling; and they had few redeeming qualities. Mr. Dalton was counted a hard landlord; Mrs. Dalton was said to give herself airs; and Miss Dalton, though a good woman, was an universally-acknowledged bore in society. Hermione, however polite she might be to them in their presence, had fully concurred in these criticisms.

It was not in the least necessary that she should undertake a four miles' walk for the express purpose of a call on the Daltons. They had left their cards, it was true, one day lately, when she was out, but they would not expect to see her for a good while. Her sad loss was still very recent, and during the life of Mr. Dalrymple calls between Hermione and the Daltons had been carefully rendered few and far between by his particular wish. There was no reason now for a change, and six weeks later would have been soon enough.

Yet Hermione went, regardless of mud, saying nothing to anybody.

If she had mentioned her intention, Harvey would at once have proposed driving round thither, that she and Julia might call together. Hermione felt no doubt about this. However little Harvey might care for the acquaintance, he was irreproachable in his gentlemanly kindness to her where such matters were concerned. And she did not wish to go with Julia. She was bent upon paying the call alone.

For the East Bourne question remained still open. Mr. Fitzalan had not changed his mind; had not, as Hermione expected, offered after all to take her in. She was very much hurt at what, in her heart, she called "his unkindness;" so much so that for three whole days she had not been to the Rectory at all.

June was passing, and, unless she meant to accompany the others, something had to be arranged. Hermione was resolved against East Bourne. She had said she would not go, and go she would not. The mere fact of having once declared her will—even in a fit of passion—was enough to make Hermione stick to her own declaration. The question of right and wrong was subordinate to the question of having her own way—of not being "beaten" by Mrs. Trevor.

Hermione did not see in herself the contemptibleness of this small obstinacy—as she would have seen it in another.

She was seriously perplexed what to do. She had many acquaintances, but not many real friends. Her aim had been, unconsciously, rather to attract admiration than to win love; and the admiration had been hers, but not always the love. Mr. Dalrymple had encouraged real intimacy with very few families in the neighbourhood, and among these Hermione could think of no one who, from one reason or another, would be just then able to receive her.

The thought of the Daltons came up. As already said, Hermione cared little for them. They did not suit her, and she knew they had not suited her grandfather.

But she was bent upon some plan whereby the East Bourne trip might be escaped. Anything rather than to have to give in. Hermione felt little doubt of her own power to bring about an invitation to Dalton House, if she so willed. The Daltons would be only too delighted to push their acquaintance with the Dalrymples. As for what Harvey might think—

"I cannot help that; I must act for myself!" Hermione said, as she set off upon her lonely walk.