Chapter IV: Part 4

Esther had followed, her face' shining with gladness. "Mr. Burnham is here," she said, "and----"

"Bunty never did it, 'twath Bully Hawkinth!" burst out Peter, pushing Nellie aside, and actually trying to kiss his injured brother in his excitement.

Bunty rose to his feet, pale, trembling.

"What is it, Esther?" he said. "Nellie--tell me!"

"Only it _was_ young Hawkins after all who took the money," said Esther, in tones that trembled with gladness for the news, and grief for the poor boy's unmerited sufferings. "He broke his collar bone at football yesterday, and he thought at first he was going to die; he confessed it to his mother, and made her send word to school. Mr. Burnham has come straight here with the news, and says he can never forgive himself for all you have suffered over it."

"Oh, Bunty! how hateful we were not to believe you," said Nellie, wiping her eyes; "we don't deserve for you to speak to us."

But Bunty put his poor rough head down on the cushions again, and great hard sobs broke from him, sobs that he was bitterly ashamed of, but that he had absolutely no strength to restrain.

No one would ever know quite how wretched this thing had made him. However warm the welcome home had been, there would always have been that cloud.

The relief was almost too much for him in his weak state.

At night, when Meg was tucking Poppet up in bed, the little girl sat up suddenly.

"Meg, that is the most wonderfullest tree in the world," she said in a low, almost reverential tone.

Meg asked her to explain, and she told how she and Martha had walked backwards three times, around the "wishing-tree" in the Botanical Gardens.

Meg stooped down and kissed the dear little face; how she envied Poppet to-day! she was the only one who had had faith all the time.

"What did you wish?" she asked, though she knew without telling.

"That Bunty might be found this vewy day, and that they might find out about the money."

"But I think I know a little girl who has said that in her prayers every day for five months," whispered Meg. "Which do you think answered, God or the tree?"

The little girl was quiet for a minute, then she knelt up on her pillow and drooped her sweet, grave face with its closed eyelids over her two small hands.

When she cuddled down among the clothes again, she drew Meg's bright head down to her.

"I was thanking Him," she said.

*CHAPTER XIII.*

*PARNASSUS AND PUDDINGS.*

"When for the first time Nature says plain 'No
To some 'Yes' in you, and walks over you
In gorgeous sweeps of scorn."

Pip had not spoken to Meg for over three weeks. There had been one fiery outbreak consequent upon Miss Jones' dismissal of him. When he learnt Meg had been to her he had accused his sister of treachery, of trying to ruin his happiness; he had been willing, he said, to put off the question of marriage for a year or two, but no power on earth would have made him promise to give Mabelle up.

And she had given him up! Put him aside as if he had been a schoolboy, or a worn-out glove! And with astonishing firmness. He had even seen her already walking out with a man who sold saucepans and kettles and fire-grates in the one business street of the suburb.

No wonder his cup of bitterness seemed running over; no wonder he felt Meg had sinned beyond forgiveness in thus interfering.

His last examination had not, it was found, been hopelessly bad, and he had been granted a "_post mortem_." But even then he did not attempt to work. He used certainly, to stay in his bedroom, where his table stood with its wild confusion of books and papers, but he would sit hour after hour staring moodily in front of him, with never a glance at the Todhunter or Berkeley that so urgently required his attention. Or he would read poetry, lying full length on his bed,--Keats, Shelley, and Byron, tales of blighted passion and hopeless grief, till his eyes would ache with the tears his young manhood forbade to fall, tears of huge self-pity and misery.

Surely since the creation there had been no one quite so wretched, so utterly bereft of all that made life worth living! How grey and monotonous stretched out the future before him! The probable length of his life made him aghast. The sheer uselessness of living, the hollow mockery of the sunshine and laughter and birds' songs, and the intolerable length of hours and days, seemed each day to strike him with fresh force.

After a certain time his mood induced poetic outpourings. He thought himself just as wretched,--even more so, indeed; but the mere fact that his feelings were able to relieve themselves in this way showed the first keenness was passing.

Sheet after sheet of University paper was covered with wild, impassioned addresses in the shape of sonnets and odes, or, when the pen was too full for studied forms, of eloquent blank verse.

For instance, the following poem struck him as exceptionally fine. He composed it at midnight, after eating his heart out in misery all the day. It was written in his blackest writing, as might be expected, and upon a sheet of grey note paper,--the University buff had suddenly offended his sense of fitness.

"Oh, what is life when all its joys are fled!
I am in love with Death's long dreamful ease.
Over my head I hear th' unwelcome tread
Of future years; my aching eye still sees
New suns arise and set, and seasons wane.
I would take arms against this sea of pain,
I would embrace Earth's sea and sink to rest,
For ever lulled upon her soothing breast!
I would fling off this gift of Life, as you,
O bitter Love, flung me aside, your you!
O Love, O Love, O bitter, beauteous Love,
Heartless and cold, but still my one fair dove!
What is this life that some find strangely fair,
When but to think brings sorrow and despair?
What is this life when love, your love, lies dead,
And mine, too much alive, slays me instead?
I will give up, go down,--there is a sea,
A winding sheet, kept cool and green for me.
I will give up, go down! Yet, Love, but smile,
But stretch to me that hand so soft and white,
That seemed my own, that sad, sweet little while,
And all grows day, for ever dead the night."

He was not at all sure when he read it the eighth or ninth time that the mantle of the "Sun-treader" had not fallen upon him, that Helicon's drying fount would not spring up afresh at his bidding.

Other men in love, he knew, had made verses, but they were of the mawkish, sentimental kind his more fastidious taste rejected, the kind that generally began something like--

"Oh, Star of Beauty, all the night
Thou shinest in the sky;
For thee the dark doth grow quite bright--
Oh, hear my plaintive sigh!"

His, he felt, were strong with the strength born of fathomless misery, and sweet with the bitter-sweet of undying and spurned love.

One day he met Mabelle; she was walking to church with her fat, honest old mother, who preferred a man of saucepans with money far before one of irreproachable shirt cuffs and empty pockets.

She smiled at him from her brown, beautifully lashed eyes, a kind of for-goodness-sake-try-to-make- the-best-of-it-and-don't-look-so-tragic smile, but he interpreted it as a sign of softening. When he got home he sent her the poem,--if anything in the wide world could touch her beautiful, stony heart he thought that would.

He entrusted it to the common post, and waited with an undisciplined heart for the answer.

It came on a Monday morning. Poppet took it from the postman and carried it up to him, but she was too busy with a scheme of Bunty's to notice how white he turned, and how his hand trembled.

It was painfully short and to the point:--

"What's the use of writing poetery to me when all's up and done with? I showed it to Ma and Pa and some one else, and they thort it very fine; but said you oughtent to write it as some one else writes poetery for me now. I think it's very nice of course and I'll keep it this time but don't send any more.

"Your friend only and nothing more,
"Miss JONES (not Mabelle).

"P.S.--I suppose I may as well tell you as I'm engaged to be married to Mr. Wilkes."

That was Pip's death-blow, and, if a paradox may be allowed, from that minute he began to live again.

The thought that his cherished poem had been submitted to the critical gaze of a man who sold frying pans and wrote "poetery" himself, stung him to madness. He sat down and attacked his hydrostatics with savage frenzy to prevent himself doing anything desperate.

He even played in a football match the next week, a thing he had not done for a long time; and he took food less under protest.

But Meg he could not forgive; his manner to her, if compelled to speak, was cold and contemptuous; when possible he totally ignored her presence.

The girl found such conduct very hard indeed to bear from her favourite brother, especially as it was only her keen anxiety for his welfare that had made her act as she had done; she bore it in silence, however, and without reproaching him. Some day, she knew, he would thank her from his heart, and for the present she must content herself to lie under the ban of his displeasure.

To solace herself she took to making puddings, learning the technicalities of meat cooking, and concocting queer-smelling bottles of stuff she labelled mushroom ketchup, tomato sauce, and Australian chutnee in her neatest hand.

Esther smiled a little when first these operations began. Meg had hitherto expressed the frankest dislike for culinary engagements.

Nellie laughed openly.

"Her 'prentice hand she tried on us,
And then she cooked for Alan, oh!"

she said one day, shaking her head as she eyed a surprisingly queer-looking conglomeration Meg called amber pudding.

"Many thanks, but no, Meg dearest; I think I will finish with honest bread and cheese!"

"Esther?" said Meg, pausing with uplifted tablespoon, and taking no notice of Nell's sarcasm beyond blushing finely. "You'll try a little, won't you? I'm sure it's very nice."

But even Esther looked dubious; the frothed icing on top had an elegant appearance certainly, but underneath was a mass of strange colour and consistency.

"Dear Meg," she said, "I am like the French lady, you know,--I eat only my acquaintances. Nellie, pass me the cheese."

But this sort of thing did not damp Meg's spirits, not at least for more than a day or two.

Perhaps the next three or four puddings would be long-established favourites that no one could take exception to, but after that there would appear one or two of French title and unknown quantities. Now and again indeed they turned out brilliant successes, that every one praised and longed for more of; but most often, it must be confessed, they were failures, very trying to the tempers and digestions of all who ventured on a helping.

"It was well to be Alan," Nellie said, "with nine innocent people submitting themselves daily to the dangers of poisoning or lifelong indigestion, just that in future he might escape and have his palate continually pleased."

"If I can't practise on my own family," demanded Meg, smiling however, "how am I to get experience? All of you have excellent digestions, so it will not do you any real harm."

And she persevered with so much determination that they only groaned inwardly when a "confection a la Marguerite," as Nellie called it, took the place of old favourites, such as plum puddings, apple pies, roly-polys and Queens. Every one accepted their portion in meekness, and really tried to say encouraging things, especially if her face was hot and anxious.

Bunty was just beginning to find his place in the family again. But he was a changed boy. No one could doubt that those five hard months had had the most beneficial effect on his character, although they had made him so white and hollow-cheeked. He was stronger morally, more self-reliant. The rough usage he had received seemed to have quite dissipated his cowardice, and with it the inclination to falsehood. He was almost pitifully careful not to make the slightest untrue statement about anything; and now the barriers of reserve between himself and Meg were broken down, she was able to help him more, and put herself more in his place.

Poppet was as much as ever his faithful little companion; there was absolutely nothing the child would not have done for this dear, recovered brother. She even consulted Meg as to the practicability of learning Latin, just that she might look up his words for him every evening in the dictionary.

But as three-syllabled words in her own language made her pucker up her poor little brows, and as English grammar still had power to draw weary, dispirited tears, Meg advised a short postponement.

*CHAPTER XIV.*

*MUSHROOMS.*

"In what will all this ostentation end?"

A new house had been built lately not very far from Misrule, a grand, showy-looking place, or red brick, in the Elizabethan style, which the suburbs of Sydney are just beginning to affect largely.

The grounds were laid out by a landscape gardener, and there were velvet lawns, carpet beds, and terraces reaching down to the river, where at Misrule there was only a wilderness of a garden with broken palings, and a couple of sloping paddocks where long rank grass and poppies flourished. Then the carriage drive,--such a grand, smooth, red sweep, serpentining up to the great porch. The Misrule drive was hardly red at all; the gravel had mostly vanished, the dead leaves were generally of Vallambrosian thickness, and weeds raised cheerful heads at intervals. The name of the people who had built the new house was Browne,--Fitzroy-Browne, with a hyphen and an e.

Mr. Fitzroy-Browne was a railway contractor, and had builded himself an ample fortune out of a Government that not yet had need to cheese-pare.

There were three or four Misses Fitzroy-Browne, that fashionable boarding-schools, dressmakers, and several seasons had done their best for. There was a Mr. Fitzroy-Browne junior, who waxed his moustache, wore clothes of chessboard device, and kept racehorses. And there was Mamma Fitzroy-Browne, who was fat and good-natured, and said "Bless yer 'art" with a cheeriness refreshing in these days of ceremony, and then pulled herself up short and looked unhappy.

Poor Mamma Browne! who sometimes thought wistfully of the long-dead days when Papa had been only an honest navvy, and her little girls and boy too small to snub and suppress her, and order her about.

Mamma Browne, who had liked her little old "best" room, with its big round table, holding the Bible, three gilt-edged books, and some wax grapes under a glass shade, far better than her grand new drawing-room, that was like a furniture show-place, all mirrors and cabinets, and green and gold.

How many Mamma Brownes there are in Australia! It is quite pitiful. Good dear creatures, with their bones too set to adapt themselves to the change the golden days have brought; poor simple-minded things, who, having consistently left "h" out of their language for forty or fifty years, cannot remember it now till an embarrassed cough or a blush and sneer from a Miss Hyphen Browne makes their old hearts ache for shame of themselves.

Dear housewives, who wasted not their husbands' substance in the old days, and now bring down vials of contempt from the daughters for anxious watchfulness over reckless servants! Sociable old bodies, to whom a cup of tea in the kitchen with a gossiping friend had been happiness, but "At Homes," thronged with stylish people whose speech fairly bristled with h's and g's, bewildering misery.

Comfortable women who have weaknesses for violet, crimson, and bright brown, with large bonnets heavily trimmed, and are sternly arrayed in fashionable no colours, and for bonnets forced to wear a bit of jet, a flyaway bow and strings, that they say piteously feels as if they had no head covering at all.

I should like to build a Home for them, these dear, fat, snubbed orphans of society that is altogether too fine for them--I said _fat_, because if you notice it is always the fat ones who get into trouble: the thin ones can shape themselves into place better,--to build a Home full of small cosy rooms, with centre tables, and chairs, not artistically arranged but set straight against the walls, with vases (pronounced vorses) in pairs everywhere, waxen fruit and flowers under glass, and china animals that never were on sea or land. There should always be a tea-pot, warmly cosied, cups big enough to hold more than one mouthful and not sufficiently precious to make one uncomfortable, plates of cake, cut, not in finikin finger strips, but in good hearty wedges.

These to be in readiness for all the dear old vulgar friends who had not got to fortune yet and loved to "drop in."

And if I had a uniform at all for my orphans it should be of a good warm purple, with plenty of fringe and plush and buttons; and the standard weight of the bonnets should be thirteen ounces.

All this because of Mrs. Fitzroy-Browne!

Captain Woolcot had told Esther she need not call when the new people came to the district: he said he "hated mushroom growths, especially when they were so pretentiously gilt-edged,"--which was rather a mixed metaphor, by the way but no one could tell him so.

For some time therefore all the young Woolcots saw of the "mushrooms" was on Sundays, when a pew that had belonged to two sweet old maids--grey-clad always, sisters and lovers, never apart even in their recent deaths--blossomed out into a gay dressmaker's showroom, from which all the congregation could during sermon time take useful notes for the renovation of their wardrobes.

Nellie's hats were good signs of the times. The boys chaffed and scorned her unmercifully, but the poor child had such a weakness for having things "in fashion" that for her very life, when the Misses Fitzroy-Browne's trimmings were all severely at the back of their hats, she could not leave hers at the front. Or if their frills crept up into the middle of their skirts and had an insertion heading, how could she be strong-minded enough to let hers remain on the hem with only a gathering thread at the top?

Poor Nellie! she had a great, secret hankering for the flesh-pots of Egypt. The love of pretty things amounted to a passion with her, and the shabby carpets, scratched furniture, and ill-kept grounds of Misrule were a source of real trouble to her.

Privately, she took a great interest in the rich Brownes, and envied them not a little. Their grand house and beautiful grounds, their army of trained servants, their splendid carriages and horses, and their heaps of dresses and jewellery seemed to the half-grown girl the most desirable things on earth.

But if you had put it to the test whether she would change Esther's beautiful, quiet grace of manner for Mrs. Browne's nervous fussiness; her soldierly, upright father for little, mean-looking Mr. Browne; handsome, careless Pip, who looked like a king in his flannels and old cricket cap, for Mr. Theodore Fitzroy-Browne of the careful toilets and bold eyes; or sweet, gracious Meg, who always said the right thing at the right time, for one of the over-dressed, gushing Miss Brownes, I think--even with all the money thrown in--she would have clung to Misrule.

For their part, the Brownes took a great interest in the Woolcot family, and felt themselves much aggrieved that, with all their shabbiness, they had been too "stuck-up" to call upon them.

They would have liked Pip for their "At Homes" and dances; and the young, grave-faced doctor, who was always turning in at the Misrule gate; Meg, who looked "such a lady"; and Nellie, whose beautiful face would be so great an attraction to--at any rate--the masculine portion of their guests.

When, after some five or six months, no cards from Captain, Mrs., and Miss Woolcot had been deposited at the shrine of their wealth, they began to make overtures themselves.

Meg and Nellie had been helping to decorate the church one afternoon,--it was Easter-time,--when two of the Misses Browne came in, followed by a man in livery, bearing a great basket of exquisite white roses, and kosmea. Mrs. Macintosh, the clergyman's wife, introduced the girls to each other, since they were so close, and they hammered their fingers and exchanged civilities together for the next hour.

Miss Browne at the end of that time wanted to know if they were not passionately fond of tennis.

"Oh yes--very," said Nellie. "We love it!"

"Of course you have a court?"

"Only a chip one the boys made; but it does very well."

It was Meg's answer. Nellie grew red, and wondered why her sister could not have contented herself with "Yes, of course!" seeing there was small chance the Fitzroy-Brownes would ever be asked inside the gates of Misrule.

Miss Browne was silent a minute, then she said,--

"We have three beautiful grass courts. I wish, Miss Woolcot, you would come up and have a game with us sometimes--and your sister, of course; we should be glad to see your brother as well, if he would care to come."

Meg tried not to look surprised, and did her best to find "the right word for the right place."

"Thank you very much," she said; "but our afternoons are very much filled, I am afraid we should not be able to."

"Then come in the morning," urged Miss Browne. "We always practise in the morning--it fills the time, for, of course, there is nothing else for us to do."

"I am always busy in the morning, and my brother is at lectures," Meg said; "thank you all the same."

"Well, your sister," said Miss Browne. "Won't you come, Miss Nellie? You can't be busy as well."

Nell looked at Meg as much as to say, "Why can't we?" but Meg was somewhat annoyed at the persistency.

"I am very sorry, but Nellie still studies in the morning," she said, just a little stiffly; "she is not old enough to be emancipated yet."

"Well, I think it's very mean of you, you know," was Miss Browne's answer; but she had not taken offence, for Meg's tone had been pleasant. "Still, if ever you can find time, we shall be delighted to see you; we are always at home on Tuesdays and Fridays, evenings as well as afternoons; or if you just sent me a little note to say you were coming I would stay in."

Again Meg thanked her politely, if not warmly, and managed not to commit herself to a promise. She moved away, however, from the danger of it as soon as she could, and helped Mrs. Macintosh to decorate the chancel with kosmea and asparagus grass.

But the Misses Browne kept the not unwilling Nellie close to them, chattering to her, flattering her adroitly, altogether treating her as if she were quite grown up, instead of not yet sixteen.

She was much easier to get on with than Meg, although she was a little shy. They found out from her, by dint of much questioning, that the young man with earnest eyes was Dr. Alan Courtney, and that--"yes, he was engaged to Meg." They learnt that Pip was in his second year, and went out a great deal; also that he played tennis splendidly, and had won the singles tournament at the University, but that he liked football much better. That the thin boy with brown, rough hair was John, and the little bright-faced girl who wore big hats and always sat next to him was Winifred. How Poppet would have smiled to hear her baptismal name! That Pete--Rupert and Essie were the "second family," and that the tall, beautiful girl they at first had thought was the eldest Miss Woolcot was the step-mother. Meg intimated to Nellie it was glove-putting-on time, and tried to draw her away, but Mrs. Courtney came up at the moment and engaged her attention.

"I _wish_ you could have come to tennis," the eldest Miss Browne said, "or to our evenings; we have such awfully jolly ones."

Nellie admitted, half hesitatingly, that she should like to "very much indeed."

"It's a shame for a pretty girl like you to stay at home," Miss Isabel said. "It isn't fair to the poor men, my dear."

Nellie blushed exquisitely, and both the Misses Browne thought she was the sweetest-looking girl they had ever seen.

"I'm not out yet, of course," she said shyly. "I suppose I shall go to places when I'm as old as Meg."

But they seemed to think that was a very old-fashioned notion. When they were fifteen, and even younger, they said, _they_ had gone to parties and no end of things.

"I don't suppose you could just run up to us one day next week by yourself, and have a game with us?" insinuated Miss Browne, who would fain show the glories of Trafalgar House to this young girl, who was trying, unsuccessfully, to hide her well-worn gloves from their gaze.

Nellie was "afraid not," but the "not" was very dubious; she was wondering if she could not manage it in some way, and when Meg, released from Mrs. Courtney, came down the church for her, the first seeds of the intimacy had been sown.

*CHAPTER XV.*

*THE GOVERNMENT OF MEG.*

"Alas! how easily things go wrong."

A week later, cards, very thick, gilt-edged, and perfumed, arrived at Misrule, requesting the pleasure of the company of Mr. Philip and the Misses Woolcot's company at an "At Home" at Trafalgar House.

Pip said it was "fair cheek." Meg raised her eyebrows, but Nellie longed ardently to accept, and almost wept when a formal answer pleading regret and a prior engagement was sent in return.

A fortnight passed, and more cards arrived.

MR. AND MRS. FITZROY-BROWNE.
_The Misses Woolcot,_
FRIDAY EVENING.
_Dancing. R.S.V.P._

Meg left out the "prior engagement" this time in her reply, and merely "regretted the Misses Woolcot could not have the pleasure, etc."

But the girls gushed over Nellie just as much whenever they met her. She used to go occasionally to the Parsonage to play mild tennis with Mr. Macintosh's delicate son, who had been ordered the exercise. The Misses Browne also went there at times; they considered that to visit there on equal terms was a hall mark of gentility, and persevered therefore, even though they yawned afterwards all through the drive home.

They always drove wherever they were going, they seemed to think foot exercise below them. It was even said that when they went to return a call of the Macarthys who lived two doors off, they went in their great open carriage, with high-stepping horses, coachman, and footman complete. So, also, whenever they went to the little homely Parsonage on the hill top, the imposing equipage took them there, the footman stood in petrified state while they alighted, and afterwards handed the two racquets out with as much ceremony as if he was assisting in some public function.

Innate good taste sometimes whispered to Nellie that these things ought not to be so, but she generally chose to be conveniently blind.

How could she find fault with them when they petted her and flattered her till her silly little head was swimming? when they pressed gifts upon her,--a gold bangle that one of them wore and she had admired, a brooch with a tiny chrysophrase heart, even a parasol composed of billowy chiffon. She had the good sense certainly to refuse the presents, though she looked at them with longing eyes, but none the less she admired and envied girls who had it in their power to make the offers.

"Your people seem determined not to come to our house," Miss Isabel said one day on the Parsonage tennis ground.

"They--they have so many engagements," said Nellie, with hesitating mendacity and a blush of distress. What would they say if they knew the contempt the cards met with at Misrule?

Miss Browne spoke of the great ballroom at Trafalgar House, of illuminated grounds, of the throngs of guests; to Nellie, who had not yet been allowed more harmful dissipation than tea-parties, picnics, and children's romps, it sounded entrancing. "Yes, I should love to come," she said wistfully, as they once again regretted she should not give the world an opportunity to see her beauty.

The child naturally was flattered that two grown-up young ladies should take so much notice of her, and tell her so frequently of her good looks; it seemed strange, even to her, that with all their money and friends they should trouble to make much of a girl of her age who never wore anything more expensive than muslin, crepon or serge, and always trimmed her own hats.

The reason was that the Misses Browne, though they had really taken a genuine liking to the shy, beautiful-faced child, had a great respect for the name of Woolcot, the high esteem in which the family was held, peccadilloes notwithstanding, and envied greatly their unquestioned entry into the society that, strive as they would, opened not its doors for them. And they thought, if they could once get on to a friendly footing at Misrule, other people in the neighbourhood who had looked coldly on them hitherto would immediately hold out hands of friendship, and come to their doors with the magic bits of pasteboard they so desired.

The best means to this end they considered would be to dazzle the eyes of the family with the luxury and unstinted wealth at Trafalgar House.

But Nellie was the only one they could get hold of, so they fed her young vanity without stint, and tried to lure her up to the great red mansion.

"Yes, I should love to come," she had said on this occasion. They were standing on the Parsonage court after a sett, Nell in a pink cambric blouse and well-worn serge skirt, the Misses Browne in elaborate costumes of Liberty silk with crossed tennis racquets worked all round the skirts.

"Well, _come_," they said,--"don't wait for the others; we want _you_,--why can't you come even if they won't?"

"Oh," said Nell, who had not dreamed of independent action, "how could I if Esther and Meg don't?"

Miss Browne gave a little laughing sneer.

"What a good little girl it is! Does it always ask permission for everything, and do exactly as it's told? Why, when we were your age we never dreamt even of consulting our parents where we went, and they never dreamt of interfering. Why, it's a very old-fashioned notion to be in bondage like that to your parents."

Nell flushed half-shamefacedly.

She began to believe that she really gave in too much to her elders, that she ought to have more freedom, and be more independent, now she was nearly "grown up."

"Perhaps I will come some day," she said a little uncertainly.

"Just show them a few times that you are not a child, to be dictated to as they wish," advised Miss Isabel; "after that it will be quite easy. Why, I'd just like to hear ma or pa say we shouldn't go here or mustn't go there, shouldn't you, Beatrice?"

Beatrice's laugh of utter scorn was sufficient answer. "Why, it's just the other way," she said: "we tell ma what to do."

"Some day" Nellie had said, but had not imagined how soon the day would be offered to her.

General Blaxland, the head of the forces in New South Wales, had decided to send a certain Lieutenant Holloway and Captain Birsted to India, with a view to gaining information from the forces there about several reforms he wished to introduce into the colony.

Just at the last Lieutenant Holloway fell ill, and the General had asked our Captain whether he could manage to tear himself away from the bosom of his family for the time required, or whether they must send one of the younger lieutenants. The Captain had asked for a day to think it over, hastened home to Misrule, and told Esther if she would go with him he would accept, for it would be a delightful holiday for both.

Esther was charmed with the idea. India had always seemed a kind of beautiful enchanted country to her, where Arabian Night kind of entertainments went on from morning to night. She begged for small Essie's company, but the Captain would not hear of such a tie. So as they would only be away four months Esther at length consented, and delivered her baby into Meg's care with numberless injunctions.

There was one week of wild confusion at Misrule. The children had holidays from lessons; dressmaking and millinery seemed going on all over the house; trunks, cabin boxes, and portmanteaux stood gaping open in Esther's room, and the Captain had a fit of intense irritability all the time.

Monday, the day the _Orotava_ started, came at last, and Meg awoke from the confused dream she had been in all the week to find herself on the Quay waving a wet handkerchief to a boat almost out of sight, and only refraining from more tears by a hastily got up argument between Peter and Essie.

"Ze tissed me last," said Essie, trying to derive tearful superiority from the fact.

"The waved to me latht, tho there!" Peter said.

"Ze never!" said Essie.

"The did!" cried Peter.

Meg thought it time to put away her handkerchief and interpose herself between the two "grass orphans," or the quarrel would end in Essie slapping Peter, and Peter growing red and pushing her down on the ground.

Every one was looking a little grave and upset. It is impossible to see a great ship bearing our dear ones move slowly away toward the wide, terrible ocean without quickened heart-beatings, and serious if not misty eyes, even if they are only going for a very little time, and accidents are unheard-of things with such splendid ships.

Meg proposed an adjournment.

"Let's go and have tea and cakes or ice-creams at Quong Tart's" she said.

"Who'll pay?" asked Bunty the practical.

Meg waited a moment; she half hoped Pip would come with them, his own merry self again, and offer to "go halves," but he made no movement.

"I might take it out of the housekeeping money just this once," she said. "Seven of us,--that would be three-and-six; only, Peter, you mustn't ask for ice-cream too if you have a custard roll or anything; every one can only have one thing, or it makes it too expensive."

Pip moved away.

"Won't you come, Pip?" she said half beseechingly, and catching his coat sleeve.

But he gave her a cold look.

"No, thanks," he said, and walked off.

So only six of them went to drown their grief in tea and ice-cream.

There had been talk of asking Mrs. Hassal to come down and look after Misrule and its inmates for the four months; but then, what would have become of Yarrahappini?

Meg begged her father to have no one. Surely, she said, for that short time she was capable of being head of the house. The cook was a married woman, and would give an air of steadiness to the place; Martha was thoroughly reliable; and Pat had the virtue of doing as he was told. There would be herself and Pip in authority, with Nellie as aide-de-camp; Bunty was a changed character; and as to Poppet, Peter, and Essie, any one with a little tact could manage them.

So it was decided at last, and Meg picked up the reins of government with a pleasurable feeling of responsibility and no misgivings whatever.

Pip felt he had done his duty for the time when he spoke a word in season to Peter and threatened "hidings" innumerable if he waxed obstreperous.

But the aide-de-camp was tried and proved wanting,--all the trouble that followed came through her.

Meg, who desired everything to go on smoothly and pleasantly, made a point of consulting Nellie in many things, and treating her as an equal in age. As it happened, it was the worst policy she could adopt just then, for it strengthened the younger girl's growing ideas of independence.

A little firmness--a mother's firmness--and the enforcement of unquestioned authority at this juncture would have saved her from many a subsequent heartache. But alas! there was no mother, and Meg's rule was certainly not despotic, though it was firm in its way, and answered excellently with the young ones.

"Where are you going, Nell?" she said one afternoon, going up into the bedroom, and finding her young sister in the midst of as elaborate a toilet as her simple clothes would allow.

"Up to Trafalgar House for tennis, that's all!" Nell replied, in a tone whose studied nonchalance was somewhat overdone.

Meg fairly gasped. Was she going to have open rebellion among her subjects as soon as this?

"You are going to do nothing of the kind, I hope," she said, with considerable warmth in her tone. "What are you thinking of? Of course you can't accept hospitality from people we refuse to visit!"

"Oh, that's all nonsense!" Nellie replied, fluffing a strand of hair backward with the comb and pinning it up into a roll. "I consider Esther and you were very rude and unneighbourly not to call on them, and it's no reason I should be impolite as well!"

"But you can't do such an impossible thing!" Meg cried. "Don't be such a child, Nellie. Go to the Parsonage, or the Courtneys, or anywhere if you want a game; but, for goodness' sake, keep away from that horrid place!"

Nellie proceeded quietly with her dressing, the resolute light in her eyes not a whit diminished. She buttoned her blue tennis blouse, brushed some specks of dust off her skirt, and put a piece of clean belting in her silver waist-clasp.

"I can't believe you're in earnest," Meg began again; "why, you _must_ remember father expressly said we were not to go!"

"He did not tell me; he only said Esther needn't call,--that's not forbidding _me_!" Nell said calmly.

She put on her sailor hat, stuck the pins through with great care, and made a few little deft dabs at her fluffy side hair. Then she put on her very best gloves and picked up her racquet.

"Nellie, I _forbid_ you to go!" Meg cried, finding neither reasoning nor asking would answer. "Remember, I have been left here in charge of you all, and I absolutely _forbid_ you to go near those Brownes!"

"Pooh!" said Nellie, "I'm nearly as old as you--I'm too big to be forbidden. Give your orders to Peter and Poppet--I'm _going_!"

And she went.

*CHAPTER XVI.*

*MORE MUTINY.*

"Gently scan your brother man.
Still gentlier sister woman,
An' if they gang a trifle wrang
To step aside is human."

That was the first battle; another followed quickly on its heels; and then there came a long and sorrowful peace.

Meg had been exceedingly angry about it--and with justice. She marvelled, not only at Nellie's rebellion, but that she should care to mix with such "impossible" people, as she called them.

"It isn't as if they were merely homely and uneducated," she said; "but their vulgarity and pretentiousness are enough to make any one sick!"

However, as Nellie was very quiet--docile even--after the one outbreak, and as it was not possible to keep up an unfriendly spirit for ever, she thought she had better overlook it as a first and last offence; more especially as she remembered her own mad infatuation for Aldith MacCarthy, when she had been even older than Nell was now.

But she warned her with much resolution in her tone.

"You only leave me one course, Nellie," she said. "I have been left in charge, and if you won't obey orders--I'm sure I try to give as few as possible--I shall be compelled to write to Mr. Hassal and ask him either to send you to school till father comes back or else to let some one come here whose authority you will respect."

Then she softened, and put her arms round her sister.

"Don't make it so hard for me, Nell," she said, almost with tears in her eyes; "there's nothing in moderation I'd try to stop you, but you really must see I can't let you grow intimate with these people."

But Nellie had not responded with her usual sisterly hug and kiss. She wriggled away from the encircling arms and gave a little impatient toss of her head.

"What a fuss you make about things, Meg!" she said pettishly. "I do wish you'd leave me alone! I'm not a child, and I'm not going to be ordered about like one."

Then came the next war.

Cards for a dinner-party arrived from the "unsnubbable" Brownes--Bunty's adjective.

"Put them in the fire," Pip said. "No answer is the best for such people."

If there had been some pretty faces among the feminine portion of the Browne household Pip would not have been so scornful of the overtures, but the girls were each and all undeniably plain. For the days that intervened between the arrival of the cards and the date of the dinner-party Meg was exceedingly busy.

She had a dressmaker in the house making winter frocks for Poppet and Essie; that took up much of her time. Besides this, two great cases of quinces and apples had been sent to them from Yarrahappini, and, with Martha's help, she was converting them into jam and jelly.

Bunty also had been unwell, and from school a day or two, and Peter had one of his perverse fits upon him. She had not had time to give the Fitzroy-Brownes as much as a passing thought; and as the new daily governess made no complaint about Nellie's morning studies she concluded all was going on well.

Judge therefore her immeasurable amaze when, going up to the bedroom on the date of the dinner-party, and just after nursery tea was over, she discovered Nellie again in the act of making a "toilette." She had the white crepon dress on; it nearly touched the ground in front, and trailed a little behind. There was soft lace in the neck and sleeves of it, and on her bosom a cluster of the exquisite pink roses that climbed all over the tool-shed. She had white suede gloves and black pretty shoes, both new, as the gap in her small allowance testified.

Excitement had lent a brilliant colour to her cheeks; her eyes, with their thick, curled lashes, were like stars. For one second Meg paused, struck with the wondrous, exceeding beauty of her young sister; the next she realised what she was dressed for.

"Where are you going?" she said, merely as a matter of form--of course she knew.

"I'm going to the Fitzroy-Brownes at Trafalgar House for a small dinner-party,--seven to ten, carriages at half-past," Nellie said, with elaborate attention to detail. "Is there anything else you would like to know?"

Meg went a little white.

"You don't move from this house, Nellie!" she said, and her lips set themselves firmly. "You can take off that dress as soon as you like!"

Nellie twisted a long lace scarf round her beautiful shining head.

"It's no use making a bother," she said; "I've made up my mind to go, and I'm going!"

"I refused the invitation," Meg said, catching at a straw.

"But I accepted," was Nellie's answer. "I met Isabel yesterday and promised."

For ten long minutes did Meg argue, reason, coax, and appeal to Nellie's better judgment: the fear of Isabel's sneers, together with the thought of the cost of her shoes and gloves, were of more avail. The girl was quietly obdurate; Meg found she was not even listening to her.

"They are sending a brougham down to pick me up at the Bentleys," she said, when Meg was almost exhausted; "I shall miss them if I wait any longer." She moved to the door.

But a flame of righteous anger sprang up in Meg's eyes. She hastened down the corridor to Pip's room, and laid the case in a few words before him.

Offended as he was with his sister, he could not refuse to uphold her in a matter like this--especially as he had such a vast contempt for the "mushrooms."

He caught Nellie on the staircase.

"Don't be such a little idiot!" he said. "Go and take that frippery off at once!"

"Go and mind your own business, Philip Woolcot!" retorted Nellie.

"Well, of all little donkeys!" he said. "Do you actually mean to say, Meg, she was going off on her own hook, without you or me or any one?"

"I certainly do think she's losing her senses!" Meg said in exasperation.

Philip surveyed her in silence for a minute--her exquisite, childish, unformed beauty even appealed to his coldly fraternal eyes. He smiled almost benignly.

"Be a good little chicken," he said; "wait three or four years, and you shall revel in this sort of thing till you find it's all vanity."

Three or four years! Nellie's eyes flashed defiance at them both.

"I'm _going_," she said, in a low, very determined voice. She brushed past Meg and went down five stairs.

But "Are you, my lady?" quoth Pip. He jumped the steps, caught her, and held her fast.

She struggled violently--anger and excitement lent her unnatural strength--and she freed herself at length, and fled in wild, mad haste down the stairs and to the front door. Once in the brougham, which was only a little way off, and she knew she could bid defiance to all the Megs and Pips in the world!

But Pip's blood was up. He had no intention of letting a little chit like Nellie get the upper hand of him, even if there were no real object at stake. As it was, the thought of his pretty, innocent little sister in the company of the "off crowd" of men he had seen young Fitzroy-Browne take home, and the loud women with whom he felt instinctively the girls consorted, made him shudder.

"Are you going to stay at home quietly?" he said, fire in his dark eyes as he caught her by the arms just as she was pulling the door handle back.

"No, I'm not!" she said stormily.

For answer he picked her right up in his arms as if she had been Poppet.

"Where shall I put her, Meg? I'm going to lock her up," he called breathlessly; she was not fragilely light.

Meg was a little startled at such a summary proceeding; then she decided rapidly it was the only thing to be done at the juncture.

"Here!" she cried, "in her own bedroom." She flung open the door, and he strode down the passage with his struggling burden in its dainty dress and sweet, crushed roses.

They left her the light. There was a shelf of books to occupy her if so she liked, also her work-basket, with a fleecy cloud she was crocheting; she would be able to fill the time. But they locked the door very carefully, and took the key downstairs with them.

"You must have been exceedingly careless, Meg, to let her get to know them," Pip said, with masculine inclination to locate blame.

Meg told of the introduction and subsequent meetings--how it seemed impossible to get the people to accept the frequent if delicately-conveyed hints that their acquaintance was not desired. She kept the tennis episode to herself, for she feared it would only make him more harsh and overbearing to Nellie, and do no good.

When they were separating some time later she looked wistfully up at him.

"Dear Pip, aren't you ever going to forgive me?" she said; "can't you see I only did it for your good? Do let us kiss and be friends again."

He looked at her very coldly and sternly; the old bitter curve showed at his mouth.

"No," he said, "I shall never forgive you while I live, Meg." Then he turned and went out of the room.

Meg went upstairs, tired, dispirited. Tears smarted in her eyes from her rebuff. Nellie, she knew, was thinking hard thoughts of her; Alan had not written to-day, for some reason or other; and all the world seemed wrong. She went into her room and sat down, with a sob and some splashing tears, in the dark by the window.

Such a great calm sky of pale, sweet stars; such a hushed, faint breath in the tall gum trees; such a low, soothing lapping of little river waves!

In an hour she was very strong again; her eyes were dry and calm and brave; there was a great, sweet peace in her heart.

She thought she would read for a little time, and grow still calmer. There was her Browning on the writing table--he had strengthened her often since she had begun to know him; and there were a couple of books Alan had lent her: "At the Roots of the Mountains," and something of Pierre Loti's. She fingered them a moment.

But first she would go and speak to Nellie, who would be calmer too by now,--poor pretty Nellie, with her childish defiance and longings for "other things." She went down the passage, softly, by Peter's room and Bunty's. The light was shining beneath Nellie's door; the poor little prisoner was not asleep, then.

She stopped and inserted the key with a flush of shame: how ignominious it must feel to be locked in!

"Dear Nell----" she began, and then stopped aghast.

The room was empty.

*CHAPTER XVII.*

*A DINNER PARTY.*

"Oh, would I were dead now,
Or up in my bed now,
To cover my head now
And have a good cry!"

Trafalgar House, if you please. Time, about eight o'clock. Dramatis personae some fifteen brilliantly-dressed ladies, and as many gentlemen in regulation evening attire.

A great long table, magnificently set, and ablaze with tiny electric lamps cunningly hidden among foliage and splendid flowers. At one end Mrs. Fitzroy-Browne in rich black satin, a truly astonishing cap, and twice as many glittering rings as she had fingers.

Mrs. Fitzroy-Browne, with a large fixed smile that only her fork or spoon ever disturbed--Mrs. Fitzroy-Browne, with one anxious eye on the waiting servants, one half frightened on her son and daughters, and only the large smile for the guests.

At the head Mr. Fitzroy-Browne, a small, neat man, with little eyes and a half-apologetic, half-assertive manner, as if he were begging your pardon for the great wealth that made you mere nobodies, and at the same time hugging himself mightily.

At intervals down the sides the Misses Fitzroy-Browne, in _decollete_ dresses of latest style.

Sandwiched with them and other females with large bare arms and rough, fashionally-coiffeured hair, net-covered, men of various sorts and conditions,--self-made men like their host, who came to approve the show money could make; a few of better position, who enjoyed the wines and good dinner and despised the vulgarity of the givers; a good-looking adventurer or two of higher society, remittance men, who, having almost outrun the constable, as a last resource came heiress-hunting.

In the middle of one side Mr. Adolphus Fitzroy-Browne, with a large expanse of white shirt front, a pink-edged tie, great diamond studs, and a red silk sash tied at one side instead of a waistcoat.

And away down near one end, a stout American Hebrew, dinner intent, on one side, a young man of the puppy order on the other, sat Nellie,--Nellie, looking like a little lonely field flower sprung up in a bed of gaudy dahlias,--Nellie, in a white, simple dress of home make, high-necked, long-sleeved, with the dying pink roses at her breast, and a silver "wish" bangle that cost half-a-crown for her only jewellery.

Poor little Nell! Never perhaps in all her fifteen years had she been so immeasurably miserable and uncomfortable.

In the drawing-room the women had stared her up and down in scorn, and rustled about in voluminous silken and velvet skirts; the thought of her own plain, high-necked dress made her cheeks burn. The Misses Browne had been too busy with entertaining to do more than give her a nod and a word or two as they introduced several of the men to her.

"Daughter of Captain John Woolcot," she overheard one of them whisper once,--"poor, but of very good family, related to a title; great friend of dear Isabel's; pretty little thing, yes; quite a charity to show her some life."