Robin Redbreast: A Story for Girls

'It's so beautifully neat,' she said to Lady Myrtle. 'I like a house to be almost primly neat. Frances says she's sure I shall be an old maid, and I daresay I shall be. I shouldn't mind, if I had a house of my own like this to live in.'

Lady Myrtle glanced at her with one of her peculiar but approving smiles.

'That is another point in common between us,' she said. 'I have always felt like you, and when – let me see, it must be fully twenty years ago now – when, for the first time I really was perfectly free to furnish a house to suit myself, you see I carried out my own ideas.'

'Oh, I thought Robin Redbreast was really old – furniture and all,' said Jacinth with a slight tone of disappointment.

'So it is,' said Lady Myrtle. 'A good deal of it was here in the house, and I had it done up – and some things I brought from Goodacre. My brother-in-law who succeeded there kindly let me choose out things of my favourite date. And they did not suit Goodacre, which is very grand and heavy, and, to my mind, ugly.'

'I know what you mean,' said Jacinth, eagerly – 'enormous mirrors with huge gilt frames, and enormous gilt cornices over the window curtains, and great big patterns on the carpets. There was a house near Stannesley like that. It was interesting, something like an old palace, and grand; but I shouldn't like to live in a house of that kind.'

'No, there seems nothing personal about it. One's own little self makes no impression; you feel that you are just passing through it for the time. Elvedon was rather like that, though the present tenants have managed to lighten it a good deal. But our other place – I mean my own family's place, up in the north, where I knew your dear grandmother – though not so grand, is much more homelike than Elvedon. My nephew and his wife live there when they are not in London. It is not so expensive as the place here.'

Jacinth grew a little nervous and said exactly what she did not mean to say.

'Are they not very rich, then?' and instantly blushed crimson, which Lady Myrtle took as an expression of fear lest she had been indiscreet. And she hastened to answer so as to put the girl at ease again.

'No,' she said; 'far from it. But they will be better off some day, and it has been for their good that they have not been rich hitherto. The sins of the fathers are visited on the children, as you cannot fail to see for yourself, my dear, when you come to know more of life.' Lady Myrtle sighed. 'My poor brother Elvedon was very weak and foolish, led into all kinds of wild extravagance by – by another, much, much worse than he;' and here the old lady's face hardened. 'And naturally,' she went on, 'we – my father and I – dreaded what his son might turn out. Poor Elvedon, my nephew I mean, is far from a clever man, but he is sensible and steady, and so are his two sons. So, as I was saying, some day they will be better off.'

Jacinth listened with the utmost attention. She was much gratified by her hostess's confidence, and relieved, too, that no mention had been made of any other Harper relatives.

'Bessie and Margaret are not Lord Elvedon's daughters, of course,' she said to herself, 'so it does not seem as if they were near relations; perhaps, after all, they are not relations at all. So I don't see that I need bother my head about them; I might have mentioned them to Lady Myrtle among the girls at school without her noticing it, I daresay.'

'This is too old talk for you, my dear,' said the old lady, after a little silence.

'No, no indeed,' said Jacinth eagerly. 'I am so pleased you don't treat me as a child, dear Lady Myrtle. And I love to think of you and my grandmother long ago, when your families were almost relations, weren't they?'

'Yes, truly – Jacinth and I often said we loved each other more than if we had been sisters. That reminds me, my dear, that nice little sister of yours must come to see me some day soon, and the boy too, the next time you come. When shall that be?'

'Whenever you like, dear Lady Myrtle,' Jacinth replied.

'Well then, supposing you come again in a fortnight – next Saturday week, that is to say. I will send for you as before, and the two children must come with you and stay till six or seven; then I will send them home again and you will remain with me till Monday morning. I must not be selfish, otherwise I would gladly have you every week. But that would not be fair to your aunt.'

'It wouldn't matter so much for Aunt Alison,' said Jacinth; 'I really don't think she would mind. But Francie and Eugene would not like me to be away every Sunday.'

'Then let us try to make it every other,' said Lady Myrtle. 'My dearest child,' and she pressed the girl's hand, 'how I wish I could have you with me altogether. But no, that would not do – it would not be a right life for her' – she seemed as if she were speaking to herself. 'Tell me, dear,' she went on, 'you do feel already at home at Robin Redbreast? I want you to learn to love the little place as well as its old owner – who can't be its owner for ever,' she added in a lower voice, so that less quick ears than Jacinth's would scarcely have caught the words.

'I love it already dearly,' she replied. 'For your sake first of all, of course, but for its own too. I couldn't imagine a more perfect old house than it is.'

They were walking in the garden, for the weather was mild and Lady Myrtle had been able to go to church that morning. It was Sunday and late afternoon. The long level rays of the evening sun fell on the large lawn – smooth and even as a bowling-green – along one side of which, on the broad terrace, the two were pacing up and down. Lady Myrtle stopped short, she was holding the girl's arm, and looked up at the windows, glinting cheerily in the red glow beginning to be reflected from the sky.

'Yes,' she said, 'it really is a dear old place. And for any one who cared to fit it for a larger family there is plenty of space and convenience for extending it.'

'It seems a very good size already,' said Jacinth, 'though of course I cannot judge very well.'

'You must see it all,' said Lady Myrtle; 'the next time you come I hope I shall be quite well and able to show you all over it. No, it would scarcely need building to; but there are several rooms at the other side in rather an unfinished condition, because I really had no use for them. The last tenant was on the point of completing them when he left. He had a large family, and it was getting too small for them, but he unexpectedly came into a property elsewhere, and then my father gave me this place. There are some very nice rooms you have not seen. Have you been in the one where my old pensioners come for their dinner every Saturday?'

Jacinth shook her head.

'That would make a capital billiard room,' Lady Myrtle went on, Jacinth listening to all she said with the greatest interest. 'Indeed, Robin Redbreast has everything needed for a comfortable roomy house. It is too large for me, unless I had a good many visitors. When your father and mother come from India, Jacinth, I must have you all to stay with me.'

Jacinth's eyes sparkled.

'Oh how delightful that would be!' she said. 'I have often thought how they will miss Stannesley when they come home. For it is let for a long time. And wasn't it funny, Lady Myrtle, that last morning when we were saying good-bye to Uncle Marmy at the gate, we looked in at this garden, and said how lovely it would be if papa and mamma had come home, and we were all living together in a house like this! And to think it may come true, if you ask us all to stay with you.'

Lady Myrtle stroked Jacinth's hand fondly.

'Yes, dear,' she said, 'it may come true, and I trust it will.'

This conversation took place, as I said, on the Sunday afternoon. Very early the next morning the brougham took Jacinth back to Market Square Place, in time for her to start for school with Frances at their usual hour.

Frances did not receive with rapturous delight the news of her invitation to Robin Redbreast.

'Must I go?' she said. 'Wouldn't it do for just Eugene to go with you, Jacinth? He would enjoy it.'

'Yes, I should,' said Eugene, 'pertickerly if we have some of those little brown cakes for tea.'

'Eugene,' said Frances in a tone of disgust, 'I'm sure Lady Myrtle would not have asked you if she had known you were such a greedy little boy.'

They were in the dining-room waiting for their aunt, who, for once, was a few minutes late for dinner. Just then she came in. She greeted Jacinth pleasantly, and seemed glad to hear that she had enjoyed herself. Then she was told of the invitation for the following week, and Frances appealed to her to say she 'needn't go.' But Frances's hopes were speedily disappointed.

'Not go!' said Miss Mildmay; 'of course you must go. It would be most ungrateful to Lady Myrtle, and would, besides, put Jacinth in a very disagreeable position. You are the grand-daughter of Lady Myrtle's old friend as well as Jacinth, even though her special interest may be in Jacinth.'

'It would make me look so selfish too,' said Jacinth, who, now that she felt sure of her own place with the old lady, was far from wishing to deprive Frances of her share in the pleasures and advantages of their acquaintance with Robin Redbreast.

So Frances had to give in.

And when the day came she enjoyed the visit, on the whole, very much.

'If only,' she said to herself before starting, 'if only I could have got mamma's letter in answer to mine before going. I would have known then exactly how to do about the Harpers. Of course I can't tell stories, and they would never have wanted me to do that. I only hope nothing will be said about school or about anything to do with them.'

Then she tried to recall the exact words of Camilla Harper's letter, by this time two-thirds on its way to India to her mother.

Jacinth said nothing at all about the Harpers in connection with Lady Myrtle, and Frances began to think her sister had forgotten all about the question of their possible relationship, which in the meantime at least the younger girl was not sorry for.

It was again a lovely day – the weather seemed to favour the visits to Robin Redbreast – even milder than the Saturday of Jacinth's first stay there. And this time, instead of the brougham, a large roomy pony carriage came to fetch them, a spring cart having already called for Jacinth's portmanteau that morning.

'How lovely!' said Frances, as she and Eugene took their seats with great satisfaction opposite her sister and the coachman; 'I am so glad it is an open carriage. I wish Lady Myrtle would send us home in it again this evening: don't you, Eugene?'

'I'm sure her ladyship will be quite pleased to do so, miss, if you just mention that you would like it,' said the man, a staid unexceptionable old servant, though many years younger than Thornley.

'Oh well, I will. I may, mayn't I, Jass?' said Frances, her eyes sparkling with pleasure, only damped by Jacinth's grave expression. Did Jass think she was chattering too much already? High spirits were Francie's native air: it was very difficult for her to be quiet and subdued for long together. But Jacinth really loved to see Frances happy, and she knew that Lady Myrtle would feel the same.

'She thinks her such a mere child,' thought the elder girl. So she smiled reassuringly as she replied: 'Of course, dear, you can ask Lady Myrtle. I am sure she won't mind if it keeps fine; and there is no sign of rain, is there?' she said turning to the coachman.

'No indeed, ma'am,' he replied. 'We shall have no rain just yet a bit.'

'It's a perfect day,' said Frances. 'I really sometimes think I like autumn as well as spring.'

'I have always liked it much better,' said Jacinth calmly.

Lady Myrtle was walking up and down the terrace, waiting for them. She was much better – for her, indeed, quite well – she said, and her face lighted up with pleasure as she kissed Jacinth tenderly. Then she turned to the younger ones and kissed them too.

'I must have a good look at you, Frances,' she said. 'No – you are not a Moreland, and yet – yes, there is a slight something– in spite of your blue eyes and shaggy hair,' and she patted Frances's head. 'And you, my boy;' and she examined Eugene in his turn. 'His eyes are more like his grandmother's; nothing approaching your eyes, Jacinth, but still they are more of the colour.'

'Eugene is very like mamma,' said Frances eagerly. 'Everybody says so.'

'And I'm called after her,' added Eugene.

'So that's quite as it should be,' said Lady Myrtle. 'And some day I hope I may have the great pleasure of comparing mamma and her boy together. Now dears, listen to my plan – would you like to go a drive this afternoon, or would you rather play about the garden and the little farm? I mean Frances and Eugene – Jacinth, of course, is quite at home here.'

The two younger ones looked at each other.

'Oh please,' said Frances, 'if we may go home in the open carriage, I think that would be enough driving. And – it's so long since we've had a nice big place to run about in, and – pigs and cows, you know, like at home? Wouldn't you like that best, Eugene?'

'May we see the cows milked?' said Eugene, prudently making his conditions, 'and, oh please, if we find any eggs, might we take one home for breakfast to-morrow?'

Lady Myrtle looked much amused.

'I will put you under Barnes's charge,' she said. 'Barnes is the under-gardener, and whatever he lets you do will be quite right. You and I, Jacinth, will have a long drive to-morrow, as I always go to Elvedon church once a month, and to-morrow is the day. So I daresay you will manage to entertain yourself at home to-day. We can go through the houses in the afternoon.'

'Yes, thank you,' said Jacinth. 'And the house – you said you would show me all over the house, dear Lady Myrtle.'

'Of course; that will amuse Frances and Eugene too, I daresay, when they have had enough running about. Now your sister will go with you to your room to take her things off;' and as the two set off, she added playfully, 'Jacinth has a room of her very own here, you know, Frances.'

The younger girl was breathless with interest and pleasure, and the first sight of the interior of the quaint old house – above all, of the lovely conservatory, past which Jacinth took care to convoy her – impressed her as much as her sister.

'Oh Jass,' she said, when they found themselves in the pleasant, rather 'old-world-looking' bedroom, where a tiny wood-fire sparkling in the grate gave a cheery feeling of welcome as they entered – 'Oh Jass, isn't it like a dream? That we should really be here in this dear old house, treated almost as if we were Lady Myrtle's own grandchildren, and you staying here, and this called your room, and – and' —

She stopped, at a loss for words to express her feelings.

Jacinth smiled, well pleased.

'Yes,' she said, 'it really is like a fairy-tale. And' – She hesitated a little. 'You don't know, Francie, what more may not come. Do you remember our saying that morning to Marmy, how lovely it would be if some day we had a house like this for our home, and how he and we would pay visits to each other?'

Frances's face grew rather pink.

'Do you mean if,' she said, her voice growing lower and lower – 'if Lady Myrtle left it to us, to you? I don't like, Jass, to' —

'Oh, how matter-of-fact you are!' said Jacinth impatiently; 'I don't mean anything but what I say. Lady Myrtle says she is going to invite us all – papa and mamma and us three – to stay with her when they come home, and it's a very big house, and she has no relations she cares for. It might get to be almost like our home. And Lady Myrtle is the sort of person that often speaks of getting old and – and dying. I daresay she makes plans for what she'd like to be done with her things – I know I should – though I hope she'll live twenty years, and I daresay she will, dear old thing.'

Frances would have accepted this simply enough, and after all, Jacinth felt as she said. The thought that 'some day' Robin Redbreast might be her home would be quite enough for her, and she already loved her kind old friend sincerely. But one sentence in her sister's speech startled Frances with a quick sharp stab: 'No relations that she cares for.'

Somehow, in the pleasure and excitement of coming to Robin Redbreast, she had forgotten about the Harpers. Now all her old feelings of chivalry for them, and wishes that she could be the means of helping them, rushed back upon her, and she felt as if she had, in some queer way, been faithless, even though she was debarred from doing anything, debarred even from telling Jacinth all she knew. And Frances was unaccustomed to hide her feelings; her face at once grew grave and almost distressed looking.

'What is the matter, Frances?' said Jacinth. 'You are such a kill-joy. What are you looking so reproachful about?'

'I didn't mean – I'm not looking reproachful,' said Frances; 'it was only – oh, just something of my own I was thinking of.'

'Well then, I wish you would think of something cheerful, and not screw your face up as if you were going to cry. I don't want Lady Myrtle to think we've been quarrelling up here.'

Frances swallowed down a lump in her throat, which was far too apt to come there on small provocation.

'Of course Lady Myrtle would never think such a thing, or if she did, she would only think I was naughty or silly or something. She'd never dream of you being anything but perfect, Jass. I do like her for that,' said Frances.

'You should like her for everything. I'm sure she's as kind as she can possibly be,' said Jacinth.

'Yes,' said Frances, 'she is.'

Then they ran down-stairs again to the library, where Lady Myrtle had told them she would be. They found her improving her acquaintance with Eugene, who was chattering away in a most confiding and friendly fashion, even retailing to her his self-congratulation at having been the first cause of their making friends.

'For you see if I hadn't been so fir —wursty,' with a great effort, 'that day, and made Jacinth let me ask; no,' suddenly recollecting himself, 'she didn't let me, but you heard me over the wall, Lady Myrtle; that was it, wasn't it? So it did come of me being wursty, didn't it?'

'Yes, my dear, of course it did,' the old lady replied, with a smile.

But just then the luncheon gong sounded and they all made their way into the dining-room. All went well till about half-way through the meal, when a sudden thought struck Lady Myrtle.

'Oh Jacinth, my dear,' she said, 'I was forgetting to tell you. Your young friend at school, Honor Falmouth, is the niece of my friend. I was writing to her husband the other day about a business matter – he is one of my trustees – and I asked the question. I thought it would interest you to hear it.'

'Yes,' said Jacinth, 'of course it does. She is a very nice girl indeed, but she is a good deal older than I. She plays beautifully, and next term she is going somewhere – to Germany, I think – for the best music lessons she can have. Did you play the harp, when you were a girl, Lady Myrtle?' she went on rather eagerly. She was vaguely anxious to change the conversation, for she had still a half-nervous fear of Frances's indiscretion should the subject of their school-fellows be entered upon.

'The harp!' repeated Lady Myrtle, half-absently; 'no, my love, I never was very musical. But your grandmother sang charmingly.' And Jacinth, believing she was launched on long-ago reminiscences, began to breathe freely, when suddenly the old lady reverted to the former topic.

'How much older than you is Honor?' she inquired.

'About three years. I think she is eighteen, but I'm not quite sure,' said Jacinth.

'I was wondering,' said Lady Myrtle, 'if she would like to come to luncheon some day when you are with me. Or is there any other among your friends you care more for?'

'No,' said Jacinth, 'I think I like Honor as much as any.'

Frances was listening with the greatest interest; her mouth half-open, her knife and fork suspended in their operations. Lady Myrtle caught sight of her absorbed face and smiled.

'Have you any friend you would like to ask to come here some day?' she said, kindly. 'If it were summer it would be different; we might have a strawberry feast.'

Frances grew crimson, painfully crimson.

'Oh how silly she is!' thought Jacinth.

'Thank you,' stammered Frances. 'I – I don't know. I don't think so.'

'Come, you must think it over,' said Lady Myrtle, imagining the child was consumed with shyness. 'Who are your favourite friends, or have you any special favourites?'

'Yes,' replied Frances, in an agony, increased by the consciousness of Jacinth's eye, but fully remembering, too, that in replying truthfully she was violating no confidence; 'yes, I'm much the fondest of Bessie and Margaret, but they mightn't come. I don't think it would be any use inviting any of them, except a big one like Honor, thank you.'

'Ah! well I know Miss Scarlett is strict, and rightly so, I daresay,' said the old lady. 'Who are these friends of yours – Bessie and Margaret what?'

'Bessie and Margaret Harper,' said Frances, bluntly; 'that's their name.'

A look of perplexity crossed Lady Myrtle's face. 'Harper,' she repeated. 'Bessie and Margaret Harper. No, I never heard of them. But still' – And the lines on her face seemed visibly to harden. 'Ah well, I will only ask Honor Falmouth then. You must see about it, Jacinth, and let me know when I should write to her or to Miss Scarlett.'

And then they talked of other things, Jacinth exerting herself doubly, to prevent Lady Myrtle's noticing Frances's silence and constraint. But afterwards, when they were by themselves for a moment, she took her sister to task.

'Why did you speak of the Harpers?' she said; 'and why, still worse, if you thought you shouldn't have named them, did you look so silly and ashamed as if you had done something wrong? I daresay you felt uncomfortable because, as Aunt Alison said, there have been such disagreeables in Lady Myrtle's family, and these Harpers may be some relations of hers. But – couldn't you have managed not to mention them?'

Frances looked quite as distressed as Jacinth could have expected – or more so. 'I'm sure I didn't mean to speak of them,' she said. Her meekness disarmed Jacinth.

'Well never mind,' she said reassuringly. 'I daresay Lady Myrtle didn't notice; at least, if she did, she couldn't have thought you knew anything about her family affairs. I don't want to hear about them; I'd rather not know what sort of relations the Harpers are, or if they're any. Don't think any more about them.'

And with this, Frances had to be or to appear content. But besides the little Jacinth knew, she had her own sorer feelings. Though Bessie and Margaret had scrupulously carried out the advice, Frances could see, they had received from home, and while as affectionate as ever to her, refrained from the very slightest allusion to family affairs or even to Robin Redbreast, yet, now that her eyes were opened as it were, Frances noticed many things that had not struck her before. As the season advanced and the weather grew colder, most of the girls appeared in new and comfortably warmer garments, for Thetford stands high and is a 'bracing' place. Well-lined ulsters, fur-trimmed jackets, muffs and boas, were the order of the day. But not so for Bessie and Margaret. They wore the same somewhat threadbare serges; the same not very substantial gray tweeds on Sundays, which had done duty since they came to school; the same little black cloth jackets out-of-doors, with only the addition of a knitted 'cross-over' underneath. And one day, admiring Frances's pretty muff, and congratulating her on the immunity from chilblains it must afford, poor little Margaret confided to her impulsively that she had never possessed such a treasure in her life.

'It is one of the things I have always wished for so,' she said simply, 'though these woollen gloves that Camilla knits us are really very good.'

Then on another occasion both sisters consulted their friend on a most important matter. It was going to be mother's birthday. They must send her something; they had never been away from her on her birthday before, and at home one could always make something or find out what she wanted a good while before, so as to prepare. Could Frances think of anything? She must be used to thinking of things that could go by post because of her mother being in India; only – and here Bessie's eager face flushed a little, and Margaret's grave eyes grew graver – 'you see it mustn't cost much; that's the worst of it.'