“Now for your news,” said the captain, as he seated himself by his niece, while Vibert threw himself into an arm-chair. Vibert usually chose, as if by instinct, the most luxurious chair in the room.
“What would you say if papa were to throw up office, leave Summer Villa for ever and for aye, and carry us all off to be buried alive?” cried Vibert.
“In Labrador – or equatorial Africa?” inquired the captain.
“Not quite so bad as either of those distant deserts,” laughed Vibert. “Myst Hall is not a hundred miles from London, and Wiltshire is not quite beyond the pale of civilized life.”
“What has happened to make such a migration probable?” inquired Arrows. “You know that during our northern cruise I have had no letters, and that as regards home news, the last three months have been to me an absolute blank.”
“Our story is easily told,” said Emmie. “You will, I dare say, remember that papa had an aunt, Mrs. Myers, who lived in Wiltshire.”
“I recollect the name, but little besides,” replied Arrows.
“None of us knew much of Aunt Myers,” continued his niece. “Except a hamper of home-made preserves which came to us from Myst Court every Christmas, we had little to remind us of a relative who shut herself up from her family and friends for fifty long years.”
“But if we forgot the old dame, she did not forget us,” interrupted Vibert. “Aunt Myers died eight or nine days ago and there came a letter from her lawyer announcing her death, and informing my father that he is the old lady’s heir, executor, and the master of Myst Court, with all the fields, pleasure-grounds, cottages, copses, and I don’t know what else thereto appertaining.”
The captain did not look as much impressed by the announcement as his young informant expected that he would be.
“Papa, of course, went to his poor aunt’s funeral,” said Emmie, “and took Bruce with him to see what he thought of the place.”
“There was plenty of business to be transacted,” observed Vibert; “I fancy that there always is when landed property changes hands. My father asked for a week’s holiday from office-work. Perhaps he will give up his appointment altogether; all depends on whether he decide to live on his own estate, or to let it and take a new lease of Summer Villa.”
“You must have had letters from your father; to which decision does he appear to incline?” asked the captain, addressing himself to his niece.
“Papa has been very busy, and wrote but briefly,” said Emmie. “I believe that a good deal will depend on whether papa is satisfied with what he sees of a gentleman at S – , who has been highly recommended as a private tutor for my brothers. S – is but three miles from Myst Court, so that if we lived at that place, Vibert and Bruce could go over to Mr. Blair’s for study every week-day.”
“My father’s plan, now that Bruce and I have left Cheltenham,” interrupted Vibert, “is to keep us with him at home for a year or two, and have us prepared for Cambridge or some competitive examination by a private tutor, either in London, or at S – , if we go into Wiltshire.”
“What description does Bruce give of Myst Court?” inquired Captain Arrows.
“Bruce is a lazy dog with his pen, and seldom honours me with a scratch of it,” answered Vibert.
“Bruce wrote to me the day after he went into Wiltshire,” said Emmie. “He knew that I should be interested to hear of the place which may soon be our home. Bruce writes that the house is of the date of the reign of Queen Anne; that it is built of red brick, and looks rather formal, but has splendid trees around it. Myst Court stands quite by itself, with no other country-house near it, and has the reputation of being haunted.”
Arrows smiled at the gravity with which the young lady pronounced the last word.
“Myst Court must be a horridly dull place, at least for those who are not sportsmen!” cried Vibert. “Bruce and I may find a little liveliness at S – ; but for you, Emmie, it will be a case of —
‘And still she cried, “’Tis very dreary —
’Tis dreary and sad,” she said;
She said, “I am aweary, aweary;
I wish I were dead!”’”
Emmie laughed, but the laugh was rather a forced one.
“Your sister will never, I hope, echo the peevish complaint of an idle girl, who had not energy enough to nail up her peaches,” observed Captain Arrows. “If Emmie go to Wiltshire, it will be, I trust, to lead there an active, useful, and happy life.”
“I wonder on what course papa will decide,” said Emmie; “we are very anxious to know. A great deal will depend on what Bruce thinks desirable, – papa has such an opinion of the judgment of Bruce.”
“Bruce has a precious good opinion of his own,” said Vibert, with something like scorn.
“For shame! – how can you!” cried Emmie, in a tone of playful reproof.
“Here they are! here come my father and Bruce!” cried Vibert, rising from his easy-chair as he caught sight of two figures at the gate.
Emmie had started up, and was out of the room to receive the travellers, before Vibert had finished the sentence.
CHAPTER II.
COMING TO A DECISION
“Yes, I am satisfied in regard to educational advantages for my sons,” said Mr. Trevor, in reply to a question asked by the captain, when, a few minutes afterwards, the family were gathered together in the drawing-room. “The tutor, Mr. Blair, appears to be in every way qualified to do full justice to his pupils; I had a very satisfactory interview with him at S – .”
“But Myst Court itself, what do you think of the place?” inquired Vibert.
“The house was originally handsome, but it is now utterly out of repair,” replied Mr. Trevor.
“I don’t suppose that painter or glazier has entered the door for these last fifty years,” observed Bruce.
“The grounds are extensive,” continued Mr. Trevor; “but the trees are choking each other for lack of thinning; and the brushwood, through neglect, has thickened into a jungle.”
“A good cover for rabbits and hares,” observed Vibert, who had an eye to sport.
“I never before saw such wretched cottages,” said Bruce; “and there are sixty-one of them on the estate, besides two farms. The hovels are dotted in groups of threes and fours in every corner where one would not expect to find them. Some lean forward, as if bending under the weight of their roofs; some to one side, as if trying to get away from their neighbours; some cottages look as if they were tired of standing at all. I cannot imagine how the men and women, and swarms of bare-footed children, manage to live in such dirty dens.”
“Is there no one to look after the people?” asked Captain Arrows.
“There is no church or school-house nearer than S – ,” replied Mr. Trevor. “The people either work for the neighbouring farmers, or in a dyeing factory which stands about a mile from Myst Court. Wages are low in that part of the country; but that is not sufficient to account for the misery which we saw there. Ignorance prevails – ignorance more dense than I could have believed to have been found in any part of our favoured land. I doubt whether of the peasants one in four is able even to read. As a matter of course, drunkenness and every other vice spread as weeds over a field so neglected.”
“It is there that the labourer is called to lay his hand to the plough,” observed Captain Arrows.
Vibert gave an almost imperceptible shrug of his shoulders; Bruce as slight an inclination of his head. A very faint sigh