“Tell me all about it!” she said suavely. “I know nothing about teachers. Shocking, isn’t it? They alarm me too much. I have a horror of clever women. You don’t look at all clever. I mean that as a compliment—far too pretty and smart, but I suppose you are dreadfully learned, all the same. What are you going to teach?”
“French. I am almost as good as a Frenchwoman, for I’ve talked little else for sixteen years. Mother and I spoke English together, or I should have forgotten my own language. It seems, from a scholastic point of view, that it’s a useful blend to possess—perfect French and an English temperament. ‘Mademoiselle’ is not always a model of patience!”
“And you think you will be? I prophesy differently. You’ll throw the whole thing up in six months, and fly off to mamma in India. You haven’t the least idea what you are in for, but you’ll find out, you’ll find out! Where is this precious school? In town, did you say? Shall you live in the house or with friends?”
“I have no friends in London except Miss Farnborough, the head mistress, but there are fifteen other mistresses besides myself. That will be fifteen friends ready-made. I am going to share lodgings with one of them, and be a bachelor girl on my own account. I’m so excited about it. After living in countries where a girl can’t go to the pillar-box alone, it will be thrilling to be free to do just as I like. Please don’t pity me! I’m going to have great fun.”
Mrs. Fanshawe hitched herself still further into her corner and smiled a lazy, quizzical smile.
“Oh, I don’t pity you—not one bit! All young people nowadays think they are so much wiser than their parents; it’s a wholesome lesson to learn their mistake. You’re a silly, blind, ridiculous little girl, and if I’d been your mother, I should have insisted upon taking you with me, whether you liked it or not. I always wanted a daughter like you—sons are so dull; but perhaps it’s just as well that she never appeared. She might have wanted to be independent, too, in which case we should have quarrelled.—So those fifteen school-mistresses make up your whole social circle, do they? I wouldn’t mind prophesying that you’ll never want to speak a word to them out of school hours! I have a friend living in town, quite a nice woman, with a daughter about your age. Shall I ask her to send you a card? It would be somewhere for you to go on free afternoons, and she entertains a good deal, and has a craze for the feminist movement, and for girls who work for themselves. You might come in for some fun.”
Claire’s flush of gratification made her look prettier than ever, and Mrs. Fanshawe felt an agreeable glow of self-satisfaction. Nothing she liked better than to play the part of Lady Bountiful, especially when any effort involved was shifted onto the shoulders of another, and in her careless fashion she was really anxious to do this nice girl a good turn. She made a note of Claire’s address in a dainty gold-edged pocket-book, expressed pleasure in the belief that through her friend she would hear reports of the girl’s progress, and presently shut her eyes, and dozed peacefully for the rest of the ride.
Round London a fine rain was falling, and the terminus looked bleak and cheerless as the train slowed down the long platform. Mason, still haggard, roused herself to step to the platform and look around as if expecting to see a familiar face, and in the midst of collecting her own impedimenta Claire was conscious that Mrs. Fanshawe was distinctly ruffled, when the familiar figure failed to appear. Once more she found herself coming to the rescue, marshalling the combined baggage to the screened portion of the platform where the custom-house officials went through the formalities incidental to the occasion, while the tired passengers stood shiveringly on guard, looking bleached and grey after their night’s journey. The bright-haired, bright-faced girl stood out in pleasant contrast to the rest, trim and smart and dainty as though such a thing as fatigue did not exist. Mrs. Fanshawe, looking at her, stopped short in the middle of a mental grumble, and turned it round, so that it ended in being a thanksgiving instead.
“Most neglectful of Erskine to fail me after promising he would come … Perhaps, after all, it’s just as well he did not.”
And at that moment, with the usual contrariety of fate, Erskine appeared! He came striding along the platform, a big, loosely-built man, with a clean-shaven face, glancing to right and left over the upstanding collar of a tweed coat. He looked at once plain and distinguished, and in the quizzical eyes and beetling eyebrows there was an unmistakable likeness to the grande dame standing by Claire’s side. Just for a moment he paused, as he came in sight of the group of passengers, and Claire, meeting his glance, knew who he was, even before he came forward and made his greeting.
“Holla, Mater! Sorry to be late. Not my fault this time. I was ready all right, but the car did not come round. Had a good crossing?”
“My dear, appalling! Don’t talk of it. I was prostrate all night, and Mason too ill to do anything but moan. She’s been no use.”
“Poor beggar! She looks pretty green. But—er—” The plain face lighted with an expectant smile as he turned towards the girl who stood by his mother’s side, still holding the precious bag. “You seem to have met a friend …”
“Oh—er—yes!” With a gesture of regal graciousness Mrs. Fanshawe turned towards the girl, and held out her gloved hand. “Thank you so much, Miss Gifford! You’ve been quite too kind. I’m really horribly in your debt. I hope you will find everything as you like, and have a very good time. Thank you again. Good-bye. I’m really dropping with fatigue. What a relief it will be to get to bed!” She turned aside, and laid her hand on her son’s arm. “Erskine, where is the car?”
Mother and son turned away, and made their way down the platform, leaving Claire with crimson cheeks and fast-beating heart. The little scene which had just happened had been all too easy to understand. The nice son had wished for an introduction to the nice girl who a moment before had seemed on such intimate terms with his mother: the mother had been quite determined that such an introduction should not take place. Claire knew enough of the world to realise how different would have been the proceedings if she had announced herself as a member of the “idle rich,” bound for a course of visits to well-known houses in the country. “May I introduce my son, Miss Gifford? Miss Gifford has been an angel of goodness to me, Erskine. Positively I don’t know what I should have done without her! Do look after her now, and see her into a taxi. Such a mercy to have a man to help!” That was what would have happened to the Claire Gifford of a week before, but now for the first time Claire experienced a taste of the disagreeables attendant on her changed circumstances, and it was bitter to her mouth. All very well to remind herself that work was honourable, that anyone who looked down on her for choosing to be independent was not worth a moment’s thought, the fact remained that for the first, the very first time in her life she had been made to feel that there was a barrier between herself and a member of her own class, and that, however willing Mrs. Fanshawe might be to introduce her to a casual friend, she was unwilling to make her known to her own son!
Claire stood stiff and poker-like at her post, determined to make no movement until Mrs. Fanshawe and her attendants had taken their departure. The storm of indignation and wounded pride which was surging through her veins distracted her mind from her surroundings; she was dimly conscious that one after another, her fellow-passengers had taken their departure, preceded by a porter trundling a truck of luggage; conscious that where there had been a crowd, there was now a space, until eventually with a shock of surprise she discovered that she was standing alone, by her own little pile of boxes. At that she shook herself impatiently, beckoned to a porter and was about to walk ahead, when an uneasy suspicion made itself felt. The luggage! Something was wrong. The pile looked smaller than it had done ten minutes before.