Girls of the True Blue

“I am awfully angry with myself, Nancy. I know I ought not to have spoken to you as I did. I hope you will forgive me and let bygones be bygones.”

Nancy was naturally of a forgiving temperament; she looked up at Augusta now, and said in a low tone:

“Why do you say such dreadful things to me? Why must I keep my conscience burdened because of you?”

“Now, listen, Nancy,” said Augusta; “I am speaking quite frankly to you. I will be as open to you as you are to me.”

“Well, what are you going to say?” asked Nancy.

“This: it might do me great harm if you were to tell now, but if you will only wait until the holidays are over and we are back in town, why, I will give you leave to say anything you please.”

“Why would my telling now injure you? I need not mention your name. I just want to tell dear, kind Mrs. Richmond about my own part. And of course I want to tell Uncle Peter. It is so dreadful to look into his eyes and to know that I am not what he thinks me! May I not tell my part and leave yours out? Please – please let me, Gussie. You can’t know the pain of the burden I am bearing, and how miserable I am.”

“You couldn’t tell your part without telling mine,” said Augusta, “and I don’t wish mine spoken about at present. You will have to be silent. But never mind, Nancy; you – shall tell, as I promised you, when we get back to London. Won’t you be kind to me and keep the secret until then?”

“And may I positively – certainly – tell when we get back to London?” asked the child.

“Yes; have I not said it? And now, let us talk no more of the matter.”

“But, Augusta,” said Nancy, rising, “will you do something for me – if I agree to this, will you do something definite?”

“Oh, what a queer child you are!” said Augusta. “What am I to do?”

“Will you write it down?”

“I write it down! Why should I do that?”

“Will you give me the words in writing? Nancy may tell when she gets back to town: just those words, and sign them ‘Augusta’.”

Augusta had her own reasons for wishing to please the little girl.

“And here is some paper,” said Nancy, “and here is a pencil. Write the words down, Augusta, and let me keep the paper.”

“You will never show any one?” said Augusta.

“Indeed – indeed I won’t.”

“And if I do this for you, will you do something for me?”

“If I can.”

“Very well.” Augusta spoke in quite a cheerful tone. “I will do what you wish and sign the paper, and you can keep it and show it to me to remind me of my promise when we get back to London. In the meantime you mustn’t talk any more of this nonsense. You mustn’t worry me from morning to night as you have been doing ever since I have had the pleasure of knowing you. And there is still something more.”

“I won’t talk of it; and I’ll be very, very grateful,” said Nancy.

“Well; child, so far so good; but now for my real condition. Do you know, Nancy, that you – you little wretch! – have just got me into a most horrible scrape?”

“How?” asked Nancy, fixing her wondering eyes on Augusta’s face.

“You have, you monkey – you have. This is what you have done. When I was talking to you just now in the shrubbery, and giving you some plain words with regard to your conduct, you put on the airs of a martyr, and, lo and behold, little Miss Martyr! somebody listened, and somebody was very angry.”

“Whom?” asked the child.

“No less a person than my aunt Jessie. You ran away in one of your fits of passion and left me to face the brunt of the storm. Didn’t I get it, too? Oh, Aunt Jessie was in a rage! She spoke of you as if you were a poor, half-murdered angel. I declare it was sickening to hear her. And there is worse to follow. You know what we all think of Uncle Peter and his scheme, and how anxious we are to get the best that he can give us; and I want the Royal Cross that he has promised to the most victorious.”

“Oh no, Augusta,” said Nancy, with a faint and quickly suppressed smile; “you can’t mean that you are going in for that.”

“And why not, miss? I mean to go in for it.”

“Well, but the Royal Cross is for valour and noble conduct, and – Augusta, you can’t mean it.”

“You are a nice child!” said Augusta, her eyes flashing with fury. “How dare you speak to me like that, you poor little charity-girl, kept here by Aunt Jessie – kept here out of kindness” —

“Oh, don’t! You dare not say that! It is not true.”

“Well, I won’t. But really, Nancy, you have the power of nearly driving me mad; a more irritating creature I have never come across. But now, what I want you to do is this. Aunt Jessie is angry, and she is going to give me a bad mark to-night in the orderly-book; and if I get it I am done for, for a bad mark for conduct will be talked about and commented on, and my chances of the great prize will be practically nil. Now, I want you, Nancy, to tell her that I was not to blame this morning, or at least scarcely to blame; that you were very naughty and irritating, and it was no wonder I got cross. You must do everything in your power to prevent her giving me a bad mark. And remember another thing, Nancy; if she asks you what was the matter, you are not to let out anything. Simply say: ‘Augusta is rather quick-tempered, and I worried her and talked nonsense. I was to blame, and not Augusta, and she ought not to have a bad mark.’ Do you promise? Surely you can do nothing else when you have got me into this horrid scrape.”

Nancy thought hard for a minute.

“I do want to get that paper signed!” she said to herself. “It will make things quite right when we get back to London, for Gussie cannot go back from her own written promise; and then, too, I need tell no lie to Mrs. Richmond.” So after a moment she said:

“Very well; I will do my best. Of course, I can’t promise to succeed, but I will do my best.”

“That is all right,” said Augusta. “Here, give me that half-sheet of paper.”

Nan did so.

Augusta wrote quickly, finishing with a dashing signature.

“There!” she said; “keep it carefully. Don’t, for goodness’ sake, let any one see it. And now, run off as fast as you can and find Aunt Jessie.”

CHAPTER XIX. – THE ASPRAYS

Mrs. Richmond had just finished lunch, and was preparing to go out for a drive, when Nancy, her cheeks flushed and her eyes very bright, rushed into the room.

“Well, my dear child,” said the good lady, drawing the little girl towards her, “and what do you want now? I am so glad to see my dear little Nancy with that bright face! I was sorry that you were troubled this morning, my dear. I have promised Augusta not to say anything about it, nor will I; but I conclude from your face now that the trouble, whatever it was, is over.”

“Yes,” said Nancy, “it is quite over.”

“And you are really happy, my darling?”

“I am, Mrs. Richmond. I cannot help it; you are so kind to me.”

“Come close to me, dear; I want to say something to you.” As Mrs. Richmond spoke she drew Nancy to her side, and put her arm round the little girl’s waist and kissed her. “Why do you call me Mrs. Richmond?” she said. “I want to be as a mother to you.”

“Oh!” said Nancy, with a gasp.

“I know, dear, that your own dear and sweet mother is no longer here. But my wish is, as far as possible, to take her place. I cannot really take her place, I know, Nancy, but I can at least be to you a good and kind and loving aunt. Now, Nancy, what I wish is this – I want you to promise to call me Aunt Jessie. Will you, dear?”

“I will if I may,” said Nancy, with her eyes shining; “I’d like to just awfully.”

“That is all right. And will you give your Aunt Jessie a kiss?”

Nancy flung her arms round Mrs. Richmond’s neck.

“How much I love you! How very, very good you are to me?” she said.

“What is it you specially want to say to me, Nancy?”

“It is about Augusta,” said the child. “I think perhaps I made too much fuss this morning. I know Augusta was – I mean that it sounded cruel, but – I don’t know how to express it. If you would not mind, Aunt Jessie, just quite forgiving her.”

“What do you mean by quite forgiving her, little woman?”

“She is in great trouble. She spoke to me about it. We are good friends now, she and I. She spoke to me, and I told her I would come and plead for her. If, Aunt Jessie, you would quite forgive her!”

“Well, dear child, I have quite forgiven her; we will let bygones be bygones.”

“If that is the case, you won’t give her a bad mark in the orderly-book?”

A look of great surprise came over Mrs. Richmond’s face when Nancy said this. She rose and said hurriedly:

“I am going for a drive, and cannot talk any more; but tell Augusta she ought not to have sent you.”

“Are you angry?” asked Nancy.

“Not with you, but with Augusta.”

“Then you won’t do what I ask” —

“I cannot, and Augusta knows the reason why. When you four girls enrolled yourselves as soldiers in Captain Richmond’s battalion you were in earnest; it was not a joke. Augusta behaved badly to-day, and she deserves the punishment which a bad mark in the orderly-book will bestow. Say no more about it, Nancy. Run away and play; you are looking quite pale and ill.”

As Mrs. Richmond uttered the last words she left the room.

Nancy stood still for a moment with her hands clasped; then she went very slowly in the direction of the seashore. The children were to have tea in the tent this afternoon, and Kitty and Nora were busy bringing down baskets of picnic things: cups and saucers, plates, knives and forks, cakes innumerable, jam, bread and butter, &c. When they saw Nancy they shouted to her to come and help them. The three children went quickly down the steep path through the shrubbery, and soon found themselves by the sea. The tide was half out, and the whole place looked perfect. There was a gay town not far from Fairleigh, and at this time of the year the sands were strewn with children and nurses – in short, with the usual holiday folks. But the part of the shore just beside Mrs. Richmond’s place was considered more or less to belong to her young people, and as a rule no other children came there to play. To-day, however, as the girls, heavily laden with the materials for their afternoon picnic, approached, they saw Augusta talking to two rather showily dressed girls, whose long golden hair hung down their backs. Augusta seemed in high spirits, and her gay laughter floated on the breeze.

“Who can she be talking to?” said Kitty. “I never knew such a girl for picking up friends.”

“Well, don’t mind her now,” said Nora, going into the tent and making preparations. “We are going to boil the kettle on the sands and have real, proper tea. – Nancy, if you have nothing better to do, you might go along by the shore and pick up bits of firewood.”

Nancy ran off immediately.

“What can be the matter with her?” Nora said. “Her eyes look as if she had been crying. I wonder if Gussie has been worrying her again.”

Before Kitty had time to reply, Gussie was seen coming towards them. “Kitty,” she said, raising her voice, “I want to introduce Miss Aspray and her sister. They are so anxious to know us, and they seem so very nice! You know, of course, who they are – the Americans who live at the corner of our street.”

“But what would mother say?” asked Nora. “You know, Augusta, she doesn’t want us ever to make acquaintance with people that she herself does not know.”

“Oh! I can’t help that now,” said Augusta. “Here they are coming to meet us. Don’t you think we might ask them to tea?”

The two girls now approached the tent. Flora, the elder, looking prettier and more full of spirit than any one Kitty had seen for a long time, held out her hand.

“How do you do, Miss Richmond?” she said. “Constance and I know you quite well by sight. We have often looked at you four girls with great envy; and just now, when we found Miss Duncan standing by herself on the sands, it seemed almost too good to be true. She seemed to us, in this outlandish, out-of-the-way spot, to be quite an old friend. May we join you; or will you join us? Mother is having a grand picnic on the rocks round the other side of the bay, and I know she will be delighted to see you all. Will you come or not?”

Augusta’s eyes were sparkling, and she evidently longed to accept the Asprays’ invitation. But Nora, drawing herself up, said in her very quiet tone, “We shall be pleased if you will join us. We are just having tea on the sands; it is not a regular picnic.”

“But quite too lovely!” said Constance. “Of course we will stay – only too glad. And is this your tent? How charming!” As she spoke she entered the tent, and flung herself down on a large cushion covered with an Oriental brocade. “Dear, dear!” she said, “you do seem to enjoy things.”

“Of course we do,” said Kitty, viewing her with some disfavour. “Why else should we come to the seashore?”

“Do you live in that nice place which I see through the trees?”

“Yes,” answered Nova. “It is our own place. We come here every year.”

Just then Nancy appeared, holding a lot of brushwood in the skirt of her frock. She coloured and started when she saw the Asprays, who had now both taken possession of the tent.

“Nancy,” said Kitty, going up to the little girl and putting her arm round her waist, “Augusta has met the two Miss Asprays, and has invited them to tea here. – Miss Aspray, may I introduce my great friend, Nancy Esterleigh?”

The elder Miss Aspray coloured brightly when Kitty made this remark. The younger shrugged her shoulders and poked her sister in the side. Augusta’s eyes sparkled, and Nancy turned very white.

“How do you do?” she said in a low voice.

“Why, if it isn’t – Yes, it is, Constance.”

“It is what?” said Constance. “I do wish you would mind your manners, Flora.”

“But it is quite too funny!” said Flora. – “Why, little girl, don’t you remember us? How is your dog? Does he bite as well as ever? Is he as vindictive as he was on a certain day in a florist’s shop? Oh, if you only knew how poor Constance’s ankle ached after his very gentlemanly attentions! And you, my dear, were not quite as sympathetic as might have been expected.”

“Explain – explain!” cried Augusta. “This sounds most interesting.”

“Let me tell,” said Nancy. She turned suddenly, faced the group, and told her little story. “I was sorry,” she said in conclusion, “and I would have said so, only you were both so terribly angry, and you seemed to think – But there! I won’t say any more.”

“No, no,” said Kitty; “of course you won’t say any more. And the Miss Asprays are our guests, remember. – Now then, let us hurry with tea.”

The girls, their party augmented to six, had on the whole a jolly time. Nancy was only too glad to bustle about in order to keep her excited heart quiet. Were these the girls with whom she might have to spend her life? Were these the girls whose father had a right to maintain her and adopt her as his own child? Oh, how thankful she was that Mrs. Richmond had already adopted her!

“I would rather be a charity-child with Mrs. Richmond,” thought the little girl, “than have the greatest right in the world to live with the Asprays, for, oh dear! I don’t like them a bit – no, not a bit. What a comfort it is that I have got that promise in writing from Augusta! – for now I need never leave my darling Aunt Jessie. Yes, she asked me to call her Aunt Jessie; and how much I do love her!”

While these thoughts were passing through Nancy’s head, she was busy spreading bread and butter and opening pots of jam. She was kneeling on the sands to perform these offices, and happened to be a little away from the rest of the party.

Suddenly Augusta approached with the excuse of wanting to borrow a knife from her.

“Well,” she said in a whisper, “and what do you think of them? You would like awfully to live with them, wouldn’t you?”

“No, no,” said Nancy, shaking her head.

“No, no,” echoed Augusta, mimicking her. “And why not, my little beauty?”

“Don’t tease me, Gussie; you know what I mean.”

“No, indeed, I don’t. I like the Asprays immensely. How stylish and handsome they both are, and so well dressed! I trust we shall see a great deal of them. They are going to stay at Fairlight for a month, and they say a great many friends are going to be with them – American friends – gentlemen and ladies also. I know that they mean to see a good deal of us – of me in especial. So, little Nancy, as you are my special friend, you must be extremely nice to Flora and Constance Aspray, and pay them a considerable amount of attention.”

“What do you mean, Gussie?”

“What I say, little woman. Now, for instance, when we are all taking tea in the tent, you are to see that Constance and Flora get the strongest cups of tea, the most cream, and the most richly buttered of the scones, and the thickest pieces of cake. I am rather famous for reading character, and I am positively sure that these two girls are possessed by greediness. You will remember my injunctions, won’t you, Nancy?”

“I don’t mind helping them to the nice things if they really want them, Augusta. But, oh! please, Gussie, you won’t say anything about me – I mean anything special?”

Augusta laughed. “I am not at all sure,” she said; “it all depends on your behaviour. And, oh, by the way, have you seen Aunt Jessie?”

“Yes – yes, I have; and I am ever so sorry!”

“What! you have not succeeded?”

Nancy shook her head.

Augusta’s face grew black with anger; she also looked seriously alarmed.

“You must talk to her again,” she said. “I cannot have that bad mark entered in the orderly-book. Do you hear? I cannot!”

“I am very sorry, Augusta. You had better speak to Aunt Jessie yourself, for I can do nothing.”

“I don’t believe you have pleaded with her. You had got what you wanted, and did not care twopence for me and my fate. It is just like you – just.”

“No; that is not true,” answered Nancy. “I did my very, very best; and I am terribly sorry. I tell you what it is, Gussie, I would take that bad mark for myself – I would gladly – if only you need not have it.”

“Oh! it is all very fine to talk,” said Augusta; “but acts tell more than words.”

“What are you two chattering about?” suddenly burst from Nora’s lips. “The kettle has boiled, and the tea is made, and we are all waiting for the bread and butter.”

Nancy rose at once, and Augusta followed her. The picnic tea commenced, and no one noticed in the general mirth that one girl was looking perturbed, cross, and anxious, and that another was strangely silent and depressed. The Asprays, whatever their faults, were the gayest of the gay, and very merry and witty. Nora was not inclined to be too cordial to girls whom her mother did not know, but Kitty quickly succumbed to their charm. The picnic tea came to an end, and when the Asprays took leave, it was with warm assurances that they would soon come again, and that their mother should call on Mrs. Richmond if Mrs. Richmond did not first call on her – in short, that during their stay at Fairlight, the Richmonds of Fairleigh and they themselves must be bosom friends.

CHAPTER XX. – THE ORDERLY-BOOK

The children returned to the house only just in time to dress for late dinner, for while in the country Mrs. Richmond had the four young people to dine with her. As they walked up through the shrubbery the one topic of conversation was the guests who had just picnicked with them.

“I don’t believe mother will like it,” said Nora. “We ought not to have done it without asking her permission. It was your fault, Augusta; you should not have done it.”

“Nonsense!” said Augusta. “I could not help myself. Americans are not so frightfully formal and stuck-up as we English. For my part, I think the Asprays are the most charming girls? Nancy, don’t you agree with me?”

“I don’t know anything about them,” replied Nancy.

“Well, dear, you can know all about them if you like,” said Augusta in a very marked tone.

Kitty opened her eyes in bewilderment. What did Augusta mean? Nancy was colouring again painfully. As they reached the house the first thing they saw was a pile of travelling-cases in the hall.

“Uncle Peter must have come,” cried Kitty. “Now everything will be all right. How glad I am!” But the next moment she saw her mother, whose face was very grave and disturbed.

“My darlings,” she said, “since you went out I have had a telegram from my special friend in the north, Mrs. Rashleigh. She has just lost her only son, and is in the most terrible grief. She has begged me to go to her. I shall have to go up to town to-night, and shall go down to Yorkshire to-morrow. I am terribly sorry to leave you four to your own devices, particularly as Miss Roy is away. But fortunately Uncle Peter arrives in the morning, and I have no doubt that you will all be as good as possible under your uncle’s care.”

“Isn’t Uncle Peter coming to-night?” said Nancy, speaking very slowly, and with great anxiety in her tone.

“Oh, you thought so because his luggage has arrived!” said Mrs. Richmond. “No. I have had a wire from him. He has sent his luggage on, but is staying with an old friend at Tiverton till the morning.”

“Oh mother, how we shall miss you!” here exclaimed Kitty.

“And I you, my darlings; but I am so shocked at my dear friend’s trouble that I cannot really stay away from her. Now, my own two little girls, will you come upstairs and help mother to finish her packing?”

Kitty and Nora both quickly complied. Their mother’s room was in a great state of confusion. Her maid was strapping boxes and writing labels, and looking very much put out. Mrs. Richmond tied on her bonnet; then she turned to the girls.

“You will find the orderly-book,” she said, “in the chiffonier in the drawing-room; here is the key. I have just entered your marks for to-day. When Uncle Peter comes, give him the book. He will be responsible for it and for you until I come back. Now I hear the wheels of the carriage on the gravel. I must be off.”

“Oh mother! one word first,” said Nora.

“It must be a very brief word, then, Nora, or I shall miss my train” —

“We met the Asprays on the beach, mother.”

“The Asprays, dear? I don’t understand.”

“If you please, mum,” said the parlour-maid at this moment, “Harris says that unless you come at once you won’t catch your train.”

“I am quite ready,” said Mrs. Richmond. “Come, Merton, you cannot waste any more time over the packages. – Darlings, the Asprays, whoever they are, must keep. Good-bye, my pets – good-bye.”

In two minutes more the carriage was bowling down the avenue, Mrs. Richmond was gone, and the four girls looked at each other.

“It is most provoking,” said Nora. “She never told us anything about the Asprays. What are we to do?”

“To do!” said Augusta. “To take all the fun we can out of them. What else could we do?”

“All the same, I don’t think they are a bit the sort of girls that mother would like,” said Kitty. “But there! it doesn’t matter, for when Uncle Peter comes he will know what we ought or ought not to do.”

The rest of the evening passed somewhat sadly. Not only Kitty and Nora, but Nancy, too, missed the gentle presence of kind Mrs. Richmond. Augusta’s mind, too, was full of many things, and she was as silent as her cousins. Nancy was the first to suggest an early retirement to bed, and the others quickly followed her example.

Fairleigh was a large, rambling, old-fashioned house. It had belonged to the Richmonds for many generations, and had been added to and altered from time to time. The bedrooms were numerous but small. Augusta had been given a very tiny room leading out of Mrs. Richmond’s larger bedroom. Kitty, Nora, and Nancy had also bedrooms apiece, but their rooms were in the opposite wing of the house.

Augusta was tired and her head ached. The day through which she had just lived had been anything but to her taste. It is true there had been a certain amount of excitement, which had carried her through the long hours. But her mind was ill at ease. That bad mark in the orderly-book came between her and her rest. To receive a bad mark for conduct in Captain Richmond’s orderly-book would, she knew, be all but fatal for her chance of the Royal Cross. He was anxious and particular with regard to physical training and intellectual training, but first of all came conduct – conduct straight and conduct honourable. Augusta admired him very much, but at the same time she was afraid of him; for the Captain had a look in those blue eyes of his which caused her own to drop. She had an uncomfortable sensation when she saw him looking at her that he was reading right down into her heart. When he saw the bad-conduct mark he would not rest until he found out all particulars with regard to it. Mrs. Richmond, if she had given it at all, had given it for cruelty – for cruelty to Nancy, who was a special favourite of the Captain’s. But had Mrs. Richmond given that mark? That was the question which tormented Augusta and kept her from sleep. She got into bed, it is true, but instead of dropping off, as was her usual custom, into happy and healthy slumber, she tossed from side to side, thinking and thinking of Captain Richmond, and the bad mark. He would arrive in the morning, and would naturally inquire how his battalion was progressing – how his soldiers were conducting themselves. He would be very jolly, very agreeable, and a great acquisition, but at the same time he would come on Augusta at that moment of her career as a sort of Nemesis. “Notwithstanding all his agreeableness,” she said to herself, “I do wish he would not come just now. He is certain to make a fuss, too, about the Asprays; and from what Flora and Constance tell me, we are likely to have a splendid time with them – that is, I shall have a splendid time. Brilliant, handsome, gay sort of girls like Constance and Flora are not likely to meet with my painfully old-fashioned cousins’ approval. And as to Nancy, of course, she doesn’t count. But I should enjoy their society, and if Uncle Peter were not coming I should have it. Oh! I know they won’t suit him. Dear, dear! what a nuisance and worry everything is!”