Kate had been silent so long, that her tongue was ready for exertion; and she began to chatter forth all the events of the journey, without heeding much whether she were listened to or not, till having come to the end of her breath, she saw that Mrs. Lacy was leaning back in her chair, her eyes fixed as if her attention had gone away. Kate thereupon roamed round the room, peeped from the window and saw that it looked into a dull black-looking narrow garden, and then studied the things in the room. There was a piano, at which she shook her head. Mary had tried to teach her music; but after a daily fret for six weeks, Mr. Wardour had said it was waste of time and temper for both; and Kate was delighted. Then she came to a book-case; and there the aunts had kindly placed the books of their own younger days, some of which she had never seen before. When she had once begun on the “Rival Crusoes,” she gave Mrs. Lacy no more trouble, except to rouse her from it to drink her tea, and then go and be dressed.
The maid managed the white muslin so as to make her look very nice; but before she had gone half way down-stairs, there was a voice behind—“My Lady! my Lady!”
She did not turn, not remembering that she herself must be meant; and the maid, running after her, caught her rather sharply, and showed her her own hand, all black and grimed.
“How tiresome!” cried she. “Why, I only just washed it!”
“Yes, my Lady; but you took hold of the balusters all the way down. And your forehead! Bless me! what would Lady Barbara say?”
For Kate had been trying to peep through the balusters into the hall below, and had of course painted her brow with London blacks. She made one of her little impatient gestures, and thought she was very hardly used—dirt stuck upon her, and brambles tore her like no one else.
She got safely down this time, and went into the drawing-room with Mrs. Lacy, there taking a voyage of discovery among the pretty things, knowing she must not touch, but asking endless questions, some of which Mrs. Lacy answered in her sad indifferent way, others she could not answer, and Kate was rather vexed at her not seeming to care to know. Kate had not yet any notion of caring for other people’s spirits and feelings; she never knew what to do for them, and so tried to forget all about them.
The aunts came in, and with them Mr. Wardour. She was glad to run up to him, and drag him to look at a group in white Parian under a glass, that had delighted her very much. She knew it was Jupiter’s Eagle; but who was feeding it? “Ganymede,” said Mr. Wardour; and Kate, who always liked mythological stories, went on most eagerly talking about the legend of the youth who was borne away to be the cup-bearer of the gods. It was a thing to make her forget about the aunts and everybody else; and Mr. Wardour helped her out, as he generally did when her talk was neither foolish nor ill-timed but he checked her when he thought she was running on too long, and went himself to talk to Mrs. Lacy, while Kate was obliged to come to her aunts, and stood nearest to Lady Jane, of whom she was least afraid.
“You seem quite at home with all the heathen gods, my dear,” said Lady Jane; “how come you to know them so well?”
“In Charlie’s lesson-books, you know,” said Kate; and seeing that her aunt did not know, she went on to say, “there are notes and explanations. And there is a Homer—an English one, you know; and we play at it.”
“We seem to have quite a learned lady here!” said aunt Barbara, in the voice Kate did not like. “Do you learn music?”
“No; I haven’t got any ear; and I hate it!”
“Oh!” said Lady Barbara drily; and Kate seeing Mr. Wardour’s eyes fixed on her rather anxiously, recollected that hate was not a proper word, and fell into confusion.
“And drawing?” said her aunt.
“No; but I want to—”
“Oh!” again said Lady Barbara, looking at Kate’s fingers, which in her awkwardness she was apparently dislocating in a method peculiar to herself.
However, it was soon over, for it was already later than Kate’s home bed-time; she bade everyone good-night, and was soon waited on by Mrs. Bartley, the maid, in her own luxurious little room.
But luxurious as it was, Kate for the first time thoroughly missed home. The boarded floor, the old crib, the deal table, would have been welcome, if only Sylvia had been there. She had never gone to bed without Sylvia in her life. And now she thought with a pang that Sylvia was longing for her, and looking at her empty crib, thinking too, it might be, that Kate had cared more for her grandeur than for the parting.
Not only was it sorrowful to be lonely, but also Kate was one of the silly little girls, to whom the first quarter of an hour in bed was a time of fright. Sylvia had no fears, and always accounted for the odd noises and strange sights that terrified her companion. She never believed that the house was on fire, even though the moon made very bright sparkles; she always said the sounds were the servants, the wind, or the mice; and never would allow that thieves would steal little girls, or anything belonging to themselves. Or if she were fast asleep, her very presence gave a feeling of protection.
But when the preparations were very nearly over, and Kate began to think of the strange room, and the roar of carriages in the streets sounded so unnatural, her heart failed her, and the fear of being alone quite overpowered her dread of the grave staid Mrs. Bartley, far more of being thought a silly little girl.
“Please please, Mrs. Bartley,” she said in a trembling voice, “are you going away?”
“Yes, my Lady; I am going down to supper, when I have placed my Lady Jane’s and my Lady Barbara’s things.”
“Then please—please,” said Kate, in her most humble and insinuating voice, “do leave the door open while you are doing it.”
“Very well, my Lady,” was the answer, in a tone just like that in which Lady Barbara said “Oh!”
And the door stayed open; but Kate could not sleep. There seemed to be the rattle and bump of the train going on in her bed; the gas-lights in the streets below came in unnaturally, and the noises were much more frightful and unaccountable than any she had ever heard at home. Her eyes spread with fright, instead of closing in sleep; then came the longing yearning for Sylvia, and tears grew hot in them; and by the time Mrs. Bartley had finished her preparations, and gone down, her distress had grown so unbearable, that she absolutely began sobbing aloud, and screaming, “Papa!” She knew he would be very angry, and that she should hear that such folly was shameful in a girl of her age; but any anger would be better than this dreadful loneliness. She screamed louder and louder; and she grew half frightened, half relieved, when she heard his step, and a buzz of voices on the stairs; and then there he was, standing by her, and saying gravely, “What is the matter, Kate?”
“O Papa, Papa, I want—I want Sylvia!—I am afraid!” Then she held her breath, and cowered under the clothes, ready for a scolding; but it was not his angry voice. “Poor child!” he said quietly and sadly. “You must put away this childishness, my dear. You know that you are not really alone, even in a strange place.”
“No, no, Papa; but I am afraid—I cannot bear it!”
“Have you said the verse that helps you to bear it, Katie?”
“I could not say it without Sylvia.”
She heard him sigh; and then he said, “You must try another night, my Katie, and think of Sylvia saying it at home in her own room. You will meet her prayers in that way. Now let me hear you say it.”
Kate repeated, but half choked with sobs, “I lay me down in peace,” and the rest of the calm words, with which she had been taught to lay herself in bed; but at the end she cried, “O Papa, don’t go!”
“I must go, my dear: I cannot stay away from your aunts. But I will tell you what to do to-night, and other nights when I shall be away: say to yourself the ninety-first Psalm. I think you know it—‘Whoso abideth under the defence of the Most High—’”
“I think I do know it.”
“Try