Читать книгу Maid of the Abbey - Elsie Jeanette Dunkerley - Страница 5

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Maidlin di Ravarati sat on the steps which led from the terrace to the drive before the Hall, her eyes on the beech avenue. Which of her expected guests would arrive first?

“I hope it will be the girls,” she said to herself. “If I’d given them tea and sent them off to unpack I could take the others into the Abbey. But if the car from town comes first I shall have to wait for these Bellannes. It’s an odd name, and ‘Anne Bellanne,’ who seems to be the grown-up one, is odder still. What was it Nancy said about her?”

She had read Ann Rowney’s letter carefully several times, but she glanced through it again.

“My mind’s still rather full of Manchester,” she thought. “Odd that the girls come from there! I might have met them and brought them back with me; but as I was with the Robertsons, of course that wouldn’t have been possible. How kind Mrs. Robertson was! She took care of me like a mother in that hotel. Now what does Nancy say about Anne Bellanne?”

She read the letter thoughtfully.

“ ‘Dear Maid,—Could you be good to a nice girl who’s just had ’flu? I’ve had her here for two weeks, but it’s been bitterly cold—we had snow while she was here—and she really wasn’t much the better for it.’ ”

“I remember all that part.” Maidlin turned a page. “It was something Nancy said at the end. This was it! ‘I’m sure she has some trouble on her mind, but I couldn’t get her to open out to me. I tried, but I really hadn’t much time; I was busy preparing for the workmen, and I feel I failed with this girl. I can usually coax girls to tell me their troubles, and sometimes I think I help them a little.’ I’m sure she does!” Maidlin interrupted herself. “Nancy would help anybody. But this girl evidently didn’t respond. I wonder why she thinks I can do it, when she couldn’t. It’s all in this last sentence, of course. ‘Maid, I sometimes feel you’ve absorbed something from the Abbey, its history or atmosphere, that makes you able to help people. You seem to have a big share of its spirit, and now that the others have all married and gone away, I believe you try to do your turn of helping people who come there in need. Do you do it consciously, or is it just chance? Anyway, do help Anne Bellanne, if you can! Get out of her what the trouble is; even if you can’t advise her, it will do her good to talk. She looked as if she was carrying a burden. Pretend you’re the Father Abbot of the Abbey, and coax her to confess to you! She’ll go away happier, as well as better in health. Perhaps she needs comforting. The little sister may be the difficulty. Mary Devine could help, in that case; she had trouble enough with her young sister, I believe. I know you’ll be a good angel to the Bellanne girls! I shall listen when you sing The Angel in the Free Trade Hall.’ Some day I shall have to tell Nancy what Rosamund and I feel about the Abbey.” Maidlin folded the letter, looking thoughtful. “There’s nothing unconscious about it! I try fearfully hard to carry on as the others used to do. That’s partly why I asked these girls to come here, when the measles happened; I don’t see what else I could have done, but Nancy’s letter made it seem really necessary. If this Anne is in trouble—well, isn’t that why people used to come to the Abbey? For help and refuge and comfort; I wonder if I’ll be able to help!”

She sat up and listened. “That’s a car in the avenue. Now am I going to have a muddle of people all at once? Oh, it’s Frost! Good! That’s one problem solved.”

She ran up the steps and called into the house. “Tea for three, Edith, please!” Then she stood by the stone balustrade watching the car, which she had sent to the station to meet the strangers.

Their first sight of her, as Frost drew up, was of a slight figure in rich blue against the old grey stone of the Hall; dark eyes gazing at them quietly, blue-black hair coiled on her neck. Then, with a start, she ran down the shallow steps to greet them.

“Do forgive me! I’ve been wondering so much what you were like! I went off into a dream; it’s a bad habit I have. I’m so glad to see you! Did you have a nice journey? You must be Miss Bellanne, but I haven’t heard any name for you—you’re just the little sister!” and the dark eyes smiled at Lindy. “Don’t you have a name?”

“I’m Linda—or Lindy—or Lin.” Lindy’s eyes were devouring her in rapture.

“Oh! But that’s queer. What is it short for? I shall call you Lindy; it fits you. Frost will take your things in; we’re going to have tea out here in the sunshine—at once, if you don’t mind.” And Maidlin plunged into an eager apology as she led them up to the terrace. “I’m expecting other visitors; I’m so sorry they chose the day you were arriving. They won’t be able to stay very long; Mrs. Robertson has a dinner engagement to-night. Dr. Robertson asked if he might bring his sister and his nephew to see our Abbey—well, sister-in-law, I suppose! They’re all Robertsons. They’d been so very good to me that I didn’t want to put them off.”

“We’ll keep out of your way while you entertain them.” Anne took the basket-chair offered her rather wearily. “It’s more than kind of you to let us come here, Miss di Ravarati. What a lovely place! Is it your home?” Her eyes rested on the velvet lawn, the old trees just beginning to bud, some almonds and prunus in flower, and the borders of daffodils and narcissus.

“I’ve lived here for eleven years, since I was fourteen. But, please, you mustn’t call me by my long name! I keep that for business purposes.”

“Programmes?” Lindy’s eyes sparkled. “Oh, Miss—Miss Angel! We heard you sing on Thursday—it was my birthday treat. It was too gorgeous for words!”

Maidlin raised her dark brows. “You were in the Free Trade Hall? I didn’t know I was singing to you. I’d been longing to take part in Gerontius for ages. It was after the concert that Dr. Robertson asked if they might come to see the Abbey.”

“What Abbey? We didn’t know there was one.”

“Ruins, in our garden.” Maidlin was busy with her cups and the teapot. “I’m going to show the Robertsons round; I’ll take you later and tell you all the stories. But please don’t call me Miss Angel! I’ve had quite enough teasing already. I’m Maidlin, or Maid; it’s a North-country form of Madeline or Magdalene, and I lived in the North as a child.”

“Oh, how pretty!” Anne exclaimed. “May we really say Miss Maidlin?”

“It sounds more friendly. As Lindy says, my whole name is for programmes. What is her name short for?” Maidlin carried a cup to Anne.

“Belinda,” Lindy said ruefully. “Isn’t it terrible? It’s one of our family names.”

Maidlin stood holding a plate of scones and laughed down at her. “Not Belinda Bellanne? Really? Oh, that’s fascinating! You ought to be proud of a name like that.”

“In a way I am, but Belinda is frightfully heavy, isn’t it?”

“Not if you make it Lindy for ordinary use! I thought your sister’s name was charming—Anne Bellanne. But yours is just as nice. How clever of your parents!”

“We’re supposed to have had a very beautiful ancestor called Anne, in the fifteenth century,” Anne explained. “Somehow the family came to be called by her name.”

“La belle Anne! I see. And I suppose you always have one girl called Anne, after her?”

Anne assented. “But I’m more often called Nan. Is that a bit of your ruin, that grey wall behind the trees?”

“That’s part of the refectory roof. We can only see it before the leaves come on those beech trees. The Abbey is beautiful, and in a queer way it seems part of our life; you’ll understand when you’ve been in it. How are you, Miss Bellanne? Nancy said you’d had ’flu; you don’t look very fit yet. You must rest for the first few days, and you’ll soon be all right.”

“Do you have this glorious sunshine all the time? A day or two of it will put me right,” Anne said wistfully. “It’s what I need. We’ve had such a long winter, and The Grange was so cold.”

“You went at the wrong time. In another month the moors will be lovely. We often go to The Grange.”

“Oh, I know! We love the moors. But not in snow!”

“I could sunbathe,” Lindy said. “Fancy having tea out of doors! We seemed months away from that at home. Do you ever have sunstroke?”

Maidlin rose and went in by the big front door. As her guests watched with startled eyes, she came out again wearing a garden hat of very light straw, with a brim almost the size of a cartwheel. It had a blue ribbon, to suit her frock, and was of golden straw which matched the bold patterns woven into the hem and side panels of her dress. In her hand she carried a pyramid of huge hats in all colours.

“Choose! We keep them for visitors.”

Lindy hurled her travelling hat aside. “Oh, a green one, please! What a marvellous idea! Here, Nan! Bright pink for you! Now we look like a rainbow having tea!”

“Why, what’s the matter, Anne Bellanne?” Maidlin spoke with mock severity.

Anne was laughing almost hysterically. “The difference! Do you know what I saw as soon as I reached The Grange? A row of snow-boots and Wellingtons. They keep them for visitors! And you offer us sun hats!” She threw off her felt and crammed a rose-pink hat on her dark head. “There, Miss Madalena!”

“It suits you,” Maidlin said. “The Grange visitors are usually hardy young things who want to tramp the moors in all weathers. Nancy’s had to fit them out so often that she keeps a selection of Wellingtons ready. We like to go without hats here, and it isn’t really hot enough for these yet, but there are times when the sun just blazes on this terrace, and if you want to bask in it and read or go to sleep, you simply must have either a hat or a headache. People won’t go upstairs to fetch proper hats, but they don’t mind sticking on one of these, as they’re so light to wear and yet so shady.”

“And such lovely colours!” Anne added. “Yours matches the pattern on your dress perfectly.”

“Your frock’s a gorgeous blue,” Lindy exclaimed. “How do you get those marvellous gold and orange patterns on it, Miss Maidlin? Are they done by hand?”

“Exactly what I was wanting to ask, but I hadn’t the cheek,” Anne remarked. “Lindy, you haven’t been here half an hour. How can you?”

“Haven’t I? Well, I feel that I’ve been here for a week. Miss Maidlin’s made us so much at home with her huge cartwheel hats. And she talked about our names!” Lindy protested.

Maidlin’s colour rose. “I do want you to feel at home. My frock’s hand-woven, Belinda Bellanne; my best pal has a loom and she wove it for me. There’s not another piece in the whole world exactly like mine. Now do please go on with your tea! The other car may arrive at any moment.”

“And we ought to be out of the way so that you can attend to them.” Anne grasped the situation. “We’ll go and unpack.”

“And then wander about the garden. The orchard is over there, and the daffodils under the trees are a wonderful sight.”

“Is it the man who conducted at the concert? May I peep at him from a window?” Lindy begged.

“Dr. Robertson. Mrs. Robertson—his sister-in-law—took care of me in Manchester; we had to stay the night there, of course. I didn’t need to be taken care of in the least,” Maidlin smiled, as she poured out second cups of tea. “I’m used to travelling; I go to Italy every year. But Dr. Robertson wouldn’t believe that, so he made his sister go to look after me. She was very kind, and it was much jollier to be with a party than to be alone in a strange town.”

“Were you nervous?” Lindy’s eyes were full of adoration.

“Have another scone! Just a little; I always am. But it goes as soon as I begin to sing; I forget everything but the lovely music. If you go exploring you may meet the family,” and Maidlin turned the conversation from herself. “Mary Devine has taken the twins for a picnic, so that I’d have a clear field for all my visitors. Mary is Joy’s secretary; Joy is Lady Quellyn, and this is her house, but she’s in New York. Mary also writes books for girls, so she’s kept busy. The twins are Lady Quellyn’s children; some day she’ll take them to the States with her, but at present they’re left with Mary and me. Next door, at Marchwood Manor, there’s a crowd of small cousins—three boys, a girl, and a baby who is another girl. The Grange was their mother’s home before she married,” and she looked at Anne. “She turned her old house into a holiday hostel and asked Nancy Rowney to take care of her guests.”

“It’s a lovely idea! I hope you don’t think I’ve been ungrateful about my time there,” Anne said anxiously. “I felt the invitation, to a complete stranger, was just too kind for words. It’s a beautiful way to use her old home. I didn’t mean to criticise. And Miss Rowney was so very kind.”

“But you were cold,” Maidlin agreed. “You went there too soon after your illness; you weren’t ready to be braced up. Oh, I understand! You should have come here to bask in sunshine first; then you’d have been fit for the moors. We all go to The Grange when we want bracing air. Now I think—yes, I hear a car. Do you mind?” She rang a tinkly cowbell, and the maid came to take the cups and plates.

Lindy sprang up. “We’ll skip out of sight. But I shall peek at Dr. Robertson from upstairs.”

Anne rose hastily. “Thanks for the tea and a lovely rest! I feel better already.”

Maidlin was looking at the car which had appeared at the end of the beech avenue. “Yes, it is the Robertsons’ car. You’ll take Miss Bellanne upstairs, won’t you, Edith?”—to the maid.

There was a sudden touch of colour in her face as she went down the terrace steps to greet the new guests, the big golden hat like a halo still on her dark head.

“She wants to see one of them rather extra specially much,” Anne said to herself. “Now which is it? The young man or the older one? Not the elderly lady, I think! What a thrill! Lindy hasn’t noticed; I’ll keep my suspicions to myself, but if The Angel of Gerontius isn’t a little bit interested in one of those visitors, I’m not Anne Bellanne!”