Читать книгу Robin Redbreast: A Story for Girls - Molesworth Mrs. - Страница 1

It stood not very far from the corner – the corner where the lane turned off from the high-road. And it suited its name, or its name suited it. It was such a pretty, cosy-looking house, much larger really than it seemed at the first glance, for it spread out wonderfully at the back.

It was red too – the out-jutting front, where the deep porch was, looking specially red, in contrast with the wings, which were entirely covered with ivy, while this centre was kept clear of any creepers. And high up, almost in the roof, two curious round windows, which caught and reflected the sunset glow – for the front was due west – over the top of the wall, itself so ivy grown that it seemed more like a hedge, might easily have been taken as representing two bright, watchful eyes. For these windows were, or always looked as if they were, spotlessly clean and shining.

'What a quaint name! how uncommon and picturesque!' people used to say the first time they saw the house and heard what it was called. I don't know if it will spoil the prettiness and the quaintness if I reveal its real origin. Not so very long ago, the old house was a queer, rambling inn, and its sign was the redbreasted bird himself; somewhere up in the attics, the ancient board that used to swing and creak of a windy night, was still hidden – it may perhaps be there to this day! And somebody (it does not matter who, for it was not any somebody that has to do with this story) took a fancy to the house – fast growing dilapidated, and in danger of sinking from a respectable old inn into a very undesirable public-house, for the coaches had left off running, and the old traffic was all at an end – and bought it just in time to save it from such degradation.

This somebody repaired and restored it to a certain extent, and then sold it again. The new owner enlarged and improved it, and built the high wall which now looked so venerable; for already this was many, many years ago. The present owner of Robin Redbreast was the daughter of this gentleman – or nobleman rather – and she had lived in it ever since the death of her husband, fully twenty years ago.

She was an old woman now. Her name was Lady Myrtle Goodacre. The Goodacres, her husband's family, belonged to a distant county, and when her Mr Goodacre died, her connection with his part of the country seemed to cease, for she had no children, and her thoughts turned to the neighbourhood of her own old home, and the pretty quaint house not very far from it, which had been left her by her father, the late earl. And thither she came. But she was not exactly a sociable old lady, and few of the Thetford people knew her. So that there grew to be a slight flavour of mystery about Robin Redbreast.

The lane was about three-quarters of a mile from the little town of Thetford. Not that it was a little town in its own estimation; like many small things, it thought itself decidedly important. It was a pleasant, healthy place, and of late years it had wakened up a good deal in some directions, of which education was one, so that several families with boys and girls in want of schooling came and settled there. For the grammar-school was now prospering under an excellent and energetic head-master, and there was talk of a high-school for girls.

But this latter institution was still in the clouds or the air, and so far, the girls of Thetford families had to content themselves with the teaching to be obtained at two steady-going, somewhat old-fashioned private schools, of which the respective heads were, oddly enough, the Misses Scarlett and the Misses Green. There were three Misses Scarlett and two Misses Green (I fear they were more often described as 'The Miss Scarletts' and 'The Miss Greens'), and all five were ladies of most estimable character.

There was no rivalry between the two schools. Each had and held its own place and line. Ivy Lodge and Brook Bank were perfectly distinct, so distinct that neither trod on the other's toes. The former, that presided over by the Scarlett sisters, was recognisedly for the daughters of the Thetford upper ten thousand; Brook Bank existed for the little maidens belonging to the shopkeepers and small farmers of and near the town. Nowadays a high-school would ignore such distinctions and absorb them all – whether for better or worse is a matter of opinion. But as things were, I don't think any harm came from the division of classes; thanks in great measure, very probably, to the good sense and feeling of the heads of the two schools. On the rare occasions on which the Misses Scarlett met the Misses Green – at great parish entertainments or fancy fairs – the latter gave precedence to the former with ready and smiling deference, sure to be graciously acknowledged by old white-haired Miss Scarlett with a kindly hand-shake or 'Many thanks, Miss Green;' the younger sisters following suit. For the Scarletts were well-born, much better born, indeed, than some of their pupils, and the Greens had got themselves educated with difficulty, and in their present position were higher on the social ladder than any of their progenitors had ever been – higher socially and more successful practically than they themselves had in past days dared to hope to be. Financially speaking, it was well known in Thetford that the Greens had made a much better thing of their school than the Scarletts. The Scarletts were inclined to be too liberal and too generous. Their boarders were in many instances the children of former friends or connections, who found it convenient to trade upon such ties when the questions and difficulties of education arose, and to suggest that their daughters might be taken on a different footing.

In a side-street running out of the market-place stood a few well-built, old, red-brick houses, which were considered among the 'best' residences in Thetford. No two of them were exactly alike: some were nearly twice as large as the others; one was high and narrow, its neighbour short and broad. They were only alike in this, that they all opened straight on to the wide pavement, and had walled-in, sunny gardens at the back.

In one of the smaller of these houses – a prim, thin-looking house, too tall for its breadth – lived a maiden lady, well known by some of the Thetford folk, not indeed unknown to any, for she had made her home in the town for many years. Her name was Miss Mildmay, or to be quite correct, Miss Alison Mildmay. For the actual Miss Mildmay was her niece, a very young girl whom you will hear more about presently.

Miss Alison Mildmay was a very old friend of the Misses Scarlett.

At Number 9 Market Square Place – that was the name of the short row of houses I have described – some six months or so before the date at which I think this story may really be said to begin, there had been an arrival one evening.

It was late October: the days were drawing in; it was almost dark when the fly from the two-miles-off railway station – I should have explained that there was no station at Thetford; the inhabitants had petitioned against the railway coming near them, and now their children had to suffer the inconvenience of this shortsightedness as best they might – drew up at Miss Mildmay's door, and out of it stepped four people – three children, and a young man scarcely more than a boy. There were two girls, looking about twelve and fourteen, a little fellow of six or seven, and the young man.

They were all in mourning, and they were all very silent, though in the momentary delay before the door was opened, the eldest member of the party found time to whisper to the girls a word or two of encouragement.

'Try to be cheery, darlings,' he said. 'There's nothing to be afraid of, you know.'

'I'm not afraid, Uncle Marmy,' replied the elder; 'I'm only awfully dull. If – oh, if Francie and I were old enough for you to be going to take us out to papa and mamma. Oh, if only' – 'Hush,' whispered Uncle Marmy. He looked young to be an uncle, younger still to be, as he was, a full-fledged lieutenant in the 200th. 'Hush, dear,' as the door opened.

Miss Mildmay was at home – it would have been strange had she not been so, considering that she had known for quite a week the exact day and hour at which her guests were expected. But it would have seemed less strange and more natural had she been there in the hall, hurrying forward to meet them, instead of waiting, to all appearance calmly enough, in the long bare drawing-room, into which the parlour-maid at once ushered them. She was a small woman, neat and pleasing in appearance, and her manner was sufficiently cordial as she came forward; though the reverse of demonstrative, it was dry rather than cold.

'You are very punctual,' she said as she kissed the children and shook hands with their young escort, saying as she did so, 'Mr Denison, I presume?'

'Yes,' he replied; adding in a cheerful tone, 'it is a case of introducing ourselves all round. You have never seen my – "our" I may say – nieces and nephew before?'

'No,' said Miss Mildmay. 'I am a very, an exceedingly busy person, and I rarely leave home, and never have visitors. So, though my brother's children have been so many years in England, they might have been as many more without our meeting, but for – these unforeseen circumstances.'

It seemed as if some less vague expression had been on her lips, but glancing round, she had caught sight of a tremulous flutter amidst the black garments of the two girls seated beside her – the elder stretching out her hand to clasp her sister's. Miss Alison Mildmay dreaded 'scenes' of all things; possibly, too, she felt conscious that her words sounded harsh. For she added quickly, 'Of course, I don't count these young folk as visitors. I hope they will very soon feel quite at home here, and no doubt we shall fall into each other's ways nicely.'

The little speech cost her an effort; but she was rewarded for it. Marmaduke Denison could not restrain an audible sigh of relief.

'Thank you,' he said, with what sounded almost exaggerated fervour, 'thank you so much. It is – it has been very good of you to – to arrange as you have done. I assure you my sister and Mildmay appreciate it thoroughly.'

A shade of stiffness returned again to her manner.

'I quite understand my brother,' she said coldly. And though Uncle Marmy was too deeply in earnest to mind the snub, he wished he had answered less effusively.

'Do you think Eugene is like his father?' he said quietly, drawing forward the little fellow, who had been standing somewhat in the background.

The aunt's face softened again. And truly the boy was a pleasant object for her eyes to rest upon. He was very fair as to hair and complexion, though his eyes were dark and wistful; he was an extremely pretty child.

'Yes,' she said more cordially than she had yet spoken. 'He is like Frank, but he has his mother's eyes.'

Again the feeling of relief stole over the young man.

'She can't be so cold as she seems,' he reflected. 'I fancy I could get on with her, and I daresay Francie and Eugene will. It is Jacinth I am anxious about.' And he glanced at the elder girl, as the thought passed through his mind. So far neither she nor her sister had spoken. Jacinth sat there with a grave, almost expressionless face, her lips compressed in a way which her uncle knew well. And suddenly he became aware of a curious thing. It almost made him smile. This was an undoubted resemblance between his elder niece and her aunt!

'I wonder how that will work,' he thought. 'I wonder if it is only superficial or if it goes deeper? If so, I hope poor Jass will have a wider life than has evidently fallen to the lot of this good lady.' And then, as it struck him that they were all sitting silent in most constrained discomfort, he thrust aside his reflections and forced his attention to return to the present.

'Perhaps I had better be looking up my quarters at the inn,' he said, rising. 'I found I could get up to town practically almost as early by the morning's express as by a night train. So if you will allow me, Miss Mildmay, I will look in first thing to-morrow for another glimpse of these little people.'

'But you will return to dine – at least not to dine, but – well, call it high tea or supper, whichever you like,' said his hostess, cordially. 'Unless, of course, you prefer' – Marmaduke stood irresolute. He was desperately afraid of annoying Miss Mildmay.

'Oh no, of course not,' he began, 'but I'm' – A sudden impulse seized Jacinth. She felt as if she must do something – if she sat still a moment longer she would burst into tears. She sprang to her feet and caught her uncle's arm. 'Oh, do come back, Marmy,' she said. 'You don't know. – Aunt Alison, do say he must.'

'Of course he must,' said Miss Mildmay. 'I am not going out this evening as I usually do. I have given myself a holiday in honour of your arrival, so pray come back as soon as you have ordered your room at the Swan, Mr Denison,' And Marmaduke smilingly consented.

This little incident seemed to have thawed them all.

'I will show you your rooms now,' said Miss Mildmay, when, the young man had gone. 'You two girls are to be together of course, and Eugene's little room is on the next floor.'

Eugene, who was following with his sister Frances, whose hand he held, here squeezed it while he looked up in her face with anxiety.

'Never mind,' she whispered. 'It's quite a little house compared to granny's, Eugene. You can't be far away. Very likely you'll be just overhead, and so if you want us in the night you can knock on the floor.'

This seemed to satisfy the child, and the sight of his room, which though small was bright and cheerful, went still further to reassure him.

'It will be nice to have a room of my own,' he said bravely. 'At granny's I slept in the night nursery with nurse.'

'But you're a big boy now, you know,' said Jacinth, hastily, as if afraid of her aunt thinking him babyish.

'Yes, of course,' agreed Miss Mildmay. 'I cannot promise you that you will find everything here the same as at your poor grandmother's. You always called her your grandmother, I suppose,' she went on, turning to Jacinth, 'though she was not really any blood relation.'

The girl's lip quivered, but she controlled herself. 'We – we never thought about that,' she said. 'And then, of course, she was Uncle Manny's own mother, and we are so very fond of him.'

'Ah! he seems a nice young fellow, but so very young, and Mrs Denison was quite elderly. But she was more than middle-aged when she married, of course,' said Miss Mildmay.

There was a slight, almost indescribable tone of condescension or disparagement in her voice, the reason of which I will explain. Both the girls were conscious of it, but it affected them in different ways.

'Ye – es,' began Jacinth, hesitatingly, 'I know' – But Frances here broke in eagerly.

'You are not explaining it properly to Aunt Alison, Jacinth. You know you're not. It wasn't only or principally for Uncle Marmy's sake that we loved dear granny. She was as sweet and good to us as she could be, and I'd have loved her awfully if she hadn't been – been any relation – at all;' but here the little girl ignominiously burst into tears.

Miss Mildmay the elder glanced at her with scant sympathy.

'I suppose she is over-tired, poor child,' she said to Jacinth. 'I will leave you to take off your things. Come down as soon as you can; you will feel better when you have had something to eat;' and she turned to go. They were standing in the girls' own room. But at the door she paused a moment. 'Shall I send up Phebe?' she said. 'That is the young girl I have engaged to wait upon you three. No, perhaps,' as her eyes fell on the still weeping Frances, 'it would be better to wait a little. Just take off your outdoor things. The trunks will be brought up while we are at tea, and then Phebe can begin to unpack.'

She was scarcely out of hearing when Jacinth turned upon her sister. 'I'm ashamed of you, Frances,' she said. 'Crying and sobbing like that, when you can see Aunt Alison isn't the sort of person to have any patience with silliness! Such a beginning to have made! And it isn't as if it was really about – about poor granny.' Here it must be owned her voice faltered. 'It was just that you were vexed with me.'

'Well, and if I was,' replied Frances, drying her eyes and swallowing down her sobs. 'I don't like you to speak coldly of granny, for you did love her in your heart, I know, dearly. Aunt Alison looks down upon her, just because she wasn't quite – no, she was quite a lady – but because she wasn't at all grand. And there's some excuse for her, because she didn't know her. But for us it would be too horrid, when she was so good to us, even all those years she was so suffering and feeble. And then, for Uncle Manny's sake too.'

'There now,' said Jacinth, not sorry to turn aside the reproach which conscience told her she had merited. 'You are saying the very thing you blamed me for – but truly, Francie, I didn't mean anything not nice to dear granny. I felt that Aunt Alison couldn't understand what she was; and – and – it was no use seeming to take up the cudgels for our other relations the moment we came.'

There was something in this, and no doubt a reluctance to discuss their grandmother with a stranger, and a prejudiced stranger, had mingled with Jacinth's desire to propitiate her aunt. So the sisters kissed and made friends, and when a few minutes afterwards they went down-stairs, and Mr Denison made his appearance again, the traces of tears had all but vanished from Frances's fair face.

The two girls had been five years in England, little Eugene three; and during all these years, owing to exceptional circumstances and unlucky coincidences, they had never seen their parents. Nor was there any prospect of their doing so for three or four years to come. All this time had been spent under the care of their mother's step-mother, Mrs Denison, whose recent death had thrown them again, in a sense, on the world, and the best Colonel Mildmay could arrange for them was the somewhat unwilling guardianship of his elder sister Alison. She was an honourable and well-meaning woman, who had found her own sphere in active good works among the poor of Thetford. But she did not understand or care for children, and the charge of her nieces and nephew she only accepted as a duty.

'I will do my best,' she wrote to the parents in India, 'but I dare not promise that it will be all you could wish. Still there are undoubtedly advantages here, in the way of schools, and the place is healthy. I will give what time I can to the children, but I cannot give up all my present responsibilities and occupations. You would not expect it. I fear the children may find my rules strict, for – owing to Mrs Denison's long ill-health and peculiarly gentle character – I think it scarcely to be expected that they are not somewhat spoilt.'

She was right. It scarcely was to be expected. It was marvellous that the girls and their little brother were not more 'spoilt.' Mrs Denison adored them, and could see no fault in them. Nor was she in any sense a clever or strong-minded woman. Of inferior birth to her late husband – the daughter of merely the village doctor – she had married him when she was nearly forty, making the kindest of stepmothers to his only child, now Mrs Mildmay; loving her in no sense less devotedly than she loved her own son, Marmaduke, the child of Mr Denison's old age – the Uncle Marmy, who was more like an elder brother than an uncle to the little trio sent home to his mother's care.

But Mrs Denison was so essentially good, so single-minded and truthful, that her influence, even her too great unselfishness for their sake, had not radically injured her grandchildren. Her death had been preceded by a slow and gradual decline – none of those about her suspected the extent of the sufferings she hid so resolutely under a calm and cheerful exterior – and the end came gently with no bitterness or shock. Even to Marmaduke, though he loved her devotedly, she had seemed more like a grandmother than a mother, and her gradual enforced withdrawal from the family life had prepared him and the girls for what had to be.

Perhaps the full realisation of their loss only came home to them, when the question of where they were all to go was decided by a letter from Colonel Mildmay, telling of his arrangement with his sister, and by Marmaduke's receiving orders to start almost at once for India.

'I'm glad they didn't come before,' he said. 'If only I could take you all out with me;' for his regiment was that of his brother-in-law.

'Yes indeed – if only!' said Jacinth, as she said again that first evening at Thetford.

Stannesley, the Denisons' old home, was to be let. Though not a very large place, it was expensive to keep up, and Marmaduke was somewhat short of ready money, and not as yet ambitious of the quiet life of a country squire. His father had been easy-going, his mother no specially endowed woman of business; things had suffered, and rents had gone down. It would need some years' economy before the young man could retire to live in the old liberal way. But he did not mind; the world was before him, and he loved his profession.

That first evening in Market Square Place passed on the whole more cheerfully than might have been expected. Miss Mildmay was practically kind – more self-denying than her guests realised, for out of consideration for them, she had renounced attendance that evening at a committee meeting of which she was the ruling spirit, and those who knew her well would have seen that to sit for two or three hours 'with her hands before her,' in her drawing-room, made her feel sadly like a fish out of water.

But the four new-comers were too preoccupied to observe her restlessness; the younger ones were tired too, and anxious for them to feel as cheerful as possible the next day, their uncle left early, advising Miss Mildmay to send them all off to bed.

'I am not leaving till twelve o'clock after all,' he said, 'so, if you have no objection I'll call in about half-past ten, and take these three young people a walk. I'd like to see something of Thetford: its looks so pretty.'

It was something to look forward to – another glimpse of the dear kind boyish face. And with the thought of the next morning's walk together, in their mind, the girls went to bed, and got up in good time for their aunt's early breakfast, trying to look and feel as cheerful as they could.

Marmaduke was more than punctual. It was barely ten o'clock when he rang at the door and came in briskly, saying it was such a lovely day he had thought it a pity to lose any of it.

It could not be anything but a sad walk, though they all tried to pretend it was not, and Uncle Marmy talked very fast and made all sorts of jokes, which Jacinth and Frances saw through, though they made Eugene laugh.

'Thetford's a very pretty place, really,' said Jacinth. 'There are lovely walks on every side, I should think. Do you suppose we shall go walks with the girls at our school, Uncle Marmy, or by ourselves with Phebe?'

'By yourselves, I should think. You are only to be at school till one o'clock,' he replied.

'Oh, that will be much nicer,' said both the girls; 'we shall explore the neighbourhood. Oh what a pretty lane!' for they were just then passing Robin Redbreast corner. 'Do let us go down it a little way, uncle,' added Frances, 'I see what looks like a gate into a garden.'

And a moment or two later, the four stood, breathless with admiration, in front of the great gates in the high ivy-covered wall I have described.

The clear spring sunshine was falling brightly on the quaint old house; what of the garden could be seen was exquisitely neat and trim; Robin Redbreast was looking charming.

'What a delicious old house!' said Jacinth. 'I wonder who lives here?' and she gave a little sigh. 'Now, Uncle Marmy, wouldn't it be perfectly lovely if papa's time was out, and he and mamma had come home and we were all going to live here – just fancy!'

'It's awfully pretty,' said Marmaduke, 'but when your father's time's up I want you all to come back to live at Stannesley with me.'

Jacinth laughed.

'No, that wouldn't do,' she said. 'You'd be getting married. No, it would be much the nicest for us to live here and you at Stannesley, and for us to pay each other lovely visits. Of course we'd always be together at Christmas and times like that. And your wife must be very, very nice – like a sort of elder sister to us, you know, and' – 'My darlings,' said poor Marmy, to whom it had suddenly occurred to look at his watch, 'time's up – or just about it. We must hurry back.'

'Let's say good-bye here,' said Frances. 'Let's kiss you here, darling uncle, not before Aunt Alison in her drawing-room. And, oh, I will try not to cry.'

So it came to pass that almost their first memory of their new home was associated for the three children with Robin Redbreast, the old house in the lane. Often as they passed it, it always brought back to them Uncle Marmy's sunburnt face and kind eyes, and again they seemed to hear his 'Good-bye, my darlings, good-bye,' which he strove hard to utter without letting them hear the break in his usually hearty and cheery voice.

Half-an-hour later he was gone.