One Maid's Mischief. Fenn George Manville

me! I was anxious to get down, I suppose.”

      “What we are to do for dinner I don’t know!” exclaimed Miss Mary. “The butcher won’t kill till the day after to-morrow.”

      “Chickens,” suggested her brother.

      “You can’t feed men always on chickens, Arthur.”

      “No, no, my dear; but Henry Bolter has been a great deal in the East; and you might do a deal with chickens.”

      “Oh, I know, Arthur,” said the little lady, pettishly. “Roast and boiled.”

      “And curried! Bolter is sure to like curry.”

      “And then grumble at it, and say it is not as good as he gets abroad. You never have anything in the garden either!”

      “I have some very fine asparagus, my dear Mary.”

      “Ah, well, that’s something.”

      “And some forced rhubarb.”

      “I could use that too. But really it is too bad to take one so by surprise. Men are so unreasonable!”

      The Reverend Arthur Rosebury took a turn or two up and down the room, with a troubled look in his face, ending by stopping short before his sister.

      “I – I am very sorry, my dear Mary,” he said. “Can I help you a little?”

      “What by getting in the way, Arthur?” said the little lady, pettishly. “Nonsense! stuff!”

      He smoothed his long, thin, closely-shaven face with one hand, gazing pensively at his sister.

      “I – I used to be very fond of Henry Bolter,” he said, in a hesitating way.

      “Why?” she said sharply. “I don’t believe in these very warm friendships between men!”

      “It was when our father died, Mary, more than twenty years ago; and for want of a hundred pounds I thought I should have to leave college.”

      “Yes?” said the little lady, sharply.

      “Henry Bolter found it out, and he forced the money into my hand.”

      “He did?”

      “Yes, my dear Mary, and he never would let me pay it back again.”

      “But didn’t you try, Arthur?”

      “Four times over, my dear Mary; but he always sent the money back to me in a letter with only one word in it.”

      “And what was that?”

      There was a dry, half-pitiful smile in the Reverend Arthur’s face as he replied, gazing fixedly the while at his sister:

      “‘Beast!’”

      “What, Arthur?”

      “He said ‘beast.’ He met me afterwards, and vowed he would never speak to me again if I alluded to the money, which he said was a gift; and it has never been repaid to this day.”

      “Beast!” ejaculated Miss Mary, thoughtfully.

      “Yes, my dear Mary, but I have that sum put away, ready for him to take when he will.”

      “Of course,” said Miss Rosebury thoughtfully.

      “And I should like to give Harry Bolter a warm welcome when he comes, Mary; not a welcome of corn and wine, oil, olive and honey, Mary – but a welcome from the heart, such as would please him more.”

      “My dear Arthur,” cried the little lady, throwing her arms round her brother’s lank, spare form, “you mustn’t notice my crotchety ways, I’m getting an old woman – a fidgety old maid. Dr Bolter shall have as warm a welcome as I can give.”

      “I knew it sister,” he said tenderly embracing her; and it was very foolish, but the eyes of both were wet with tears as the little lady snatched herself away.

      “There, Arthur, now go, and don’t you come near me again except to bring me the asparagus and rhubarb, for I shall be as busy as a bee. There’s the doctor’s room to prepare.”

      “No; let him have mine.”

      “What, with all that litter of dried plants and flies?”

      “Just what he would like.”

      “There, go away.”

      The Reverend Arthur Rosebury was about to say something more, but his sister checked him, and in a thoughtful dreamy way, he went slowly out into the garden, where at the end of ten minutes he had forgotten rhubarb, asparagus, even the coming of Dr Bolter, for the sun had shone out very hot, and the bees in the fourth hive beginning from the top were threatening to swarm.

      Volume One – Chapter Three.

      The Young Ladies

      “The Firlawns, Mayleyfield, educational establishment for the daughters of officers and gentlemen in the Indian civil service, conducted by the Misses Twettenham,” as it said in the old circulars, for none were ever issued now. Thirty years of the care of young people, committed to their charge by parents compelled to reside in the East, had placed the Misses Twettenham beyond the need of circular or other advertising advocate. For it was considered a stroke of good fortune by Indian and other officials if vacancies could be found at the Firlawns for their daughters; in fact the Misses Twettenham might have doubled their numbers and their prices too, but they were content to keep on in their old conservative way, enjoying the confidence of their patrons, and really acting the parts of mothers to the young ladies committed to their charge.

      It was a difficult task as well as an onerous one, this care of girls from the ages of ten or twelve up to even twenty and one-and-twenty, especially when it is taken into consideration that, whatever the emergency, the parents would be in India, China, or the Eastern islands – one or two months’ distance by letter, sometimes more.

      It was not often that there were troubles, though, at the Firlawns, for the Misses Twettenham’s was a kindly as well as rigid rule. Sickness of course there was from time to time. Sadder still, they had had deaths; but there were times when some young lady of more than ordinary volatility would try to assert herself and resent the bonds that the elderly sisters insisted upon tying round her and keeping her back.

      There were occasionally handsome curates at Mayleyfield. There was a particularly good-looking young doctor’s assistant once in the town; and at times Squire Morden’s soldier and sailor sons would return home for a short stay, when a misguided pupil would form a most hopeless attachment, and even go so far as to receive a smuggled note.

      Woe be to her if she did! It was sure to be discovered; and if such a course was persisted in the doom was certain. Transportation was the sentence. Word was sent to mamma and papa in India, China, or wherever they might be, and Miss Rebellious had to leave the school.

      These were very, very rare cases, for there was scarcely a girl who did not look upon the elderly sisters as their best of friends; but such accidents had occurred, and there was trouble at the Firlawns now.

      “Never,” said Miss Twettenham to her sisters twain – “never, my dear Julia – never, my dear Maria, in the whole course of my experience, have I met with so determined, so obstinate a girl!”

      “She is very beautiful,” said Miss Julia.

      “And it promises to be a fatal gift,” said Miss Maria.

      “Yes,” said the eldest Miss Twettenham; “and if it were not for the letter we have received saying that Dr Bolter was coming to fetch her away, I should certainly have been compelled to insist upon her being recalled.”

      “I don’t think she means harm, dear Hannah,” said Miss Maria.

      “No young lady brought up here could mean harm, Maria,” said Miss Twettenham, severely; “but to witness in her such a terrible display of – of – of – I really cannot find a word.”

      “Coquetry,” suggested Miss Julia.

      “Well, coquetry,” said Miss Twettenham, taking the word unwillingly,