Countess Kate by Charlotte M. Yonge (page 3)

think of returning till they should all meet in London on the 1st of October.

But before that 1st, poor Mrs. Lacy wrote again, with great regret and many excuses for the inconvenience she was causing. Her son and her doctor had insisted on her resigning her situation at once; and they would not even allow her to go back until her place could be supplied.

“Poor thing!” said Lady Jane. “I always thought it was too much for her. I wish we could have made her more comfortable: it would have been such a thing for her!”

“So it would,” answered Lady Barbara, “if she had had to do with any other child. A little consideration or discretion, such as might have been expected from a girl of eleven years old towards a person in her circumstances, would have made her happy, and enabled her to assist her son. But I have given up expecting feeling from Katharine.”

That speech made Kate swell with anger at her aunt’s tone and in her anger she forgot to repent of having been really thoughtless and almost unkind, or to recollect how differently her own gentle Sylvia at home would have behaved to the poor lady. She liked the notion of novelty, and hoped for a new governess as kind and bright as Miss Oswald.

Moreover, she was delighted to find that Mrs. George Wardour was going to live in London for the present, that Alice might be under doctors, and Sylvia under masters. Kate cared little for the why, but was excessively delighted with plans for meeting, hopes of walks, talks, and tea-drinkings together; promises that the other dear Sylvia should come to meet her; and above all, an invitation to spend Sylvia Joanna’s birthday with her on the 21st of October, and go all together either to the Zoological Gardens or to the British Museum, according to the weather.

With these hopes, Kate was only moderately sorry to leave the sea and pine-trees behind her, and find herself once more steaming back to London, carrying in her hand a fine blue and white travelling-bag, worked for her by her two little friends, but at which Lady Barbara had coughed rather dryly. In the bag were a great many small white shells done up in twists of paper, that pretty story “The Blue Ribbons,” and a small blank book, in which, whenever the train stopped, Kate wrote with all her might. For Kate had a desire to convince Sylvia Joanna that one was much happier without being a countess, and she thought this could be done very touchingly and poetically by a fable in verse; so she thought she had a very good idea by changing the old daisy that pined for transplantation and found it very unpleasant, into a harebell.

A harebell blue on a tuft of moss
In the wind her bells did toss.

That was her beginning; and the poor harebell was to get into a hot- house, where they wanted to turn her into a tall stately campanula, and she went through a great deal from the gardeners. There was to be a pretty fairy picture to every verse; and it would make a charming birthday present, much nicer than anything that could be bought; and Kate kept on smiling to herself as the drawings came before her mind’s eye, and the rhymes to her mind’s ear.

So they came home; but it was odd, the old temper of the former months seemed to lay hold of Kate as soon as she set foot in the house in Bruton Street, as if the cross feelings were lurking in the old corners.

She began by missing Mrs. Lacy very much. The kind soft governess had made herself more loved than the wayward child knew; and when Kate had run into the schoolroom and found nobody sitting by the fire, no sad sweet smile to greet her, no one to hear her adventures, and remembered that she had worried the poor widow, and that she would never come back again, she could have cried, and really had a great mind to write to her, ask her pardon, and say she was sorry. It would perhaps have been the beginning of better things if she had; but of all things in the world, what prevented her? Just this–that she had an idea that her aunt expected it of her! O Kate! Kate!

So she went back to the harebell, and presently began rummaging among her books for a picture of one to copy; and just then Lady Barbara came in, found half a dozen strewn on the floor, and ordered her to put them tidy, and then be dressed. That put her out, and after her old bouncing fashion she flew upstairs, caught her frock in the old hitch at the turn, and half tore off a flounce.

No wonder Lady Barbara was displeased; and that was the beginning of things going wrong–nay, worse than before the going to Bournemouth. Lady Barbara was seeking for a governess, but such a lady as she wished for was not to be found in a day; and in the meantime she was resolved to do her duty by her niece, and watched over her behaviour, and gave her all the lessons that she did not have from masters.

Whether it was that Lady Barbara did not know exactly what was to be expected of a little girl, or whether Kate was more fond of praise than was good for her, those daily lessons were more trying than ever they had been. Generally she had liked them; but with Aunt Barbara, the being told to sit upright, hold her book straight, or pronounce her words rightly, always teased her, and put her out of humour at the beginning. Or she was reminded of some failure of yesterday, and it always seemed to her unjust that bygones should not be bygones; or even when she knew she had been doing her best, her aunt always thought she could have done better, so that she had no heart or spirit to try another time, but went on in a dull, save-trouble way, hardly caring to exert herself to avoid a scolding, it was so certain to come.

It was not right–a really diligent girl would have won for herself the peaceful sense of having done her best, and her aunt would have owned it in time; whereas poor Kate’s resistance only made herself and her aunt worse to each other every day, and destroyed her sense of duty and obedience more and more.

Lady Barbara could not be always with her, and when once out of sight there was a change. If she were doing a lesson with one of her masters, she fell into a careless attitude in an instant, and would often chatter so that there was no calling her to order, except by showing great determination to tell her aunt. It made her feel both sly and guilty to behave so differently out of sight, and yet now that she had once begun she seemed unable to help going on and she was sure, foolish child, that Aunt Barbara’s strictness made her naughty!

Then there were her walks. She was sent out with Josephine in the morning and desired to walk nowhere but in the Square; and in the afternoon she and Josephine were usually set down by the carriage together in one of the parks, and appointed where to meet it again after Lady Jane had taken her airing when she was well enough, for she soon became more ailing than usual. They were to keep in the quiet paths, and not speak to anyone.

But neither Josephine nor her young lady had any turn for what was “triste.” One morning, when Kate was in great want of a bit of India-rubber, and had been sighing because of the displeasure she should meet for having lost her own through using it in play-hours, Josephine offered to take her–only a little out of her way–to buy a new piece.

Kate knew this was not plain dealing, and hated herself for it, but she was tired of being scolded, and consented! And then how miserable she was; how afraid of being asked where she had been; how terrified lest her aunt should observe that it was a new, not an old, piece; how humiliated by knowing she was acting untruth!

And then Josephine took more liberties. When Kate was walking along the path, thinking how to rhyme to “pride,” she saw Josephine talking over the iron rail to a man with a beard; and she told her maid afterwards that it was wrong; but Josephine said, “Miladi had too good a heart to betray her,” and the man came again and again, and once even walked home part of the way with Josephine, a little behind the young lady.

Kate was desperately affronted, and had a great mind to complain to her aunts. But then Josephine could have told that they had not been in the Square garden at all that morning, but in much more entertaining streets! Poor Kate, these daily disobediences did not weigh on her nearly as much as the first one did; it was all one general sense of naughtiness!

Working at her harebell was the pleasantest thing she did, but her eagerness about it often made her neglectful and brought her into scrapes. She had filled one blank book with her verses and pictures, some rather good, some very bad; and for want of help and correction she was greatly delighted with her own performance, and thought it quite worthy of a little ornamental album, where she could write out the verses and gum in the drawings.

“Please, Aunt Barbara, let me go to the Soho Bazaar to-day?”

“I cannot take you there, I have an engagement.”

“But may I not go with Josephine?”

“Certainly not. I would not trust you there with her. Besides, you spend too much upon trumpery, as it is.”

“I don’t want it for myself; I want something to get ready for Sylvia’s birthday–the Sylvia that is come to London, I mean.”

“I do not approve of a habit of making presents.”

“Oh! but, Aunt Barbara, I am to drink tea with her on her birthday, and spend the day, and go to the Zoological Gardens, and I have all ready but my presents! and it will not be in time if you won’t let me go to-day.”

“I never grant anything to pertinacity,” answered Lady Barbara. “I have told you that I cannot go with you to-day, and you ought to submit.”

“But the birthday, Aunt Barbara!”

“I have answered you once, Katharine; you ought to know better than to persist.”

Kate pouted, and the tears swelled in her eyes at the cruelty of depriving her of the pleasure of making her purchase, and at having her beautiful fanciful production thus ruined by her aunt’s unkindness. As she sat over her geography lesson, out of sight of her own bad writing, her broken-backed illuminated capitals, her lumpy campanulas, crooked-winged fairies, queer perspective, and dabs of blue paint, she saw her performance not as it was, but as it was meant to be, heard her own lines without their awkward rhymes and bits like prose, and thought of the wonder and admiration of all the Wardour family, and of the charms of having it secretly lent about as a dear simple sweet effusion of the talented young countess, who longed for rural retirement. And down came a great tear into the red trimming of British North America, and Kate unadvisedly trying to wipe it up with her handkerchief, made a red smear all across to Cape Verd! Formerly she would have exclaimed at once; now she only held up the other side of the book that her aunt might not see, and felt very shabby all the time. But Lady Barbara was reading over a letter, and did not look. If Kate had not been wrapt up in herself, she would have seen that anxious distressed face.

There came a knock to the schoolroom door. It was Mr. Mercer, the doctor, who always came to see Lady Jane twice a week, and startled and alarmed, Lady Barbara sprang up. “Do you want me, Mr. Mercer? I’ll come.”

“No, thank you,” said the doctor, coming in. “It was only that I promised I would look at this little lady, just to satisfy Lady Jane, who does not think her quite well.”

Kate’s love of being important always made her ready to be looked at by Mr. Mercer, who was a kind, fatherly old gentleman, not greatly apt to give physic, very good-natured, and from his long attendance more intimate with the two sisters than perhaps any other person was. Lady Barbara gave an odd sort of smile, and said, “Oh! very well!” and the old gentleman laughed as the two bright clear eyes met his, and said, “No great weight there, I think! Only a geography fever, eh? Any more giddy heads lately, eh? Or only when you make cheeses?”

“I can’t make cheeses now, my frocks are so short,” said Kate, whose spirits always recovered with the least change.

“No more dreams?”

“Not since I went to Bournemouth.”

“Your tongue.” And as Kate, who had a certain queer pleasure in the operation, put out the long pinky member with its ruddier tip, quivering like an animal, he laughed again, and said, “Thank you, Lady Caergwent; it is a satisfaction once in a way to see something perfectly healthy! You would not particularly wish for a spoonful of cod-liver oil, would you?”

Kate laughed, made a face, and shook her head.

“Well,” said the doctor as he released her, “I may set Lady Jane’s mind at rest. Nothing the matter there with the health.”

“Nothing the matter but perverseness, I am afraid,” said Lady Barbara, as Kate stole back to her place, and shut her face in with the board of her atlas. “It is my sister who is the victim, and I cannot have it go on. She is so dreadfully distressed whenever the child is in disgrace that it is doing her serious injury. Do you not see it, Mr. Mercer?”

“She is very fond of the child,” said Mr. Mercer.

“That is the very thing! She is constantly worrying herself about her, takes all her naughtiness for illness, and then cannot bear to see her reproved. I assure you I am forced for my sister’s sake to overlook many things which I know I ought not to pass by.” (Kate shuddered.) “But the very anxiety about her is doing great harm.”

“I thought Lady Jane nervous and excited this morning,” said Mr. Mercer: “but that seemed to me to be chiefly about the Colonel’s return.”

“Yes,” said Lady Barbara, “of course in some ways it will be a great pleasure; but it is very unlucky, after staying till the war was over, that he has had to sell out without getting his promotion. It will make a great difference!”

“On account of his son’s health, is it not?”

“Yes; of course everything must give way to that, but it is most unfortunate. The boy has never recovered from his wound at Lucknow, and they could not bear to part, or they ought to have sent him home with his mother long ago; and now my brother has remained at his post till he thought he could be spared; but he has not got his promotion, which he must have had in a few months.”

“When do you expect him?”

“They were to set off in a fortnight from the time he wrote, but it all depended on how Giles might be. I wish we knew; I wish there could be any certainty, this is so bad for my sister. And just at this very time, without a governess, when some children would be especially thoughtful and considerate, that we should have this strange fit of idleness and perverseness! It is very trying; I feel quite hopeless sometimes!”

Some children, as Lady Barbara said, would have been rendered thoughtful and considerate by hearing such a conversation as this, and have tried to make themselves as little troublesome to their elders as possible; but there are others who, unless they are directly addressed, only take in, in a strange dreamy way, that which belongs to the grown-up world, though quick enough to catch what concerns themselves. Thus Kate, though aware that Aunt Barbara thought her naughtiness made Aunt Jane ill, and that there was a fresh threat of the Lord Chancellor upon the return of her great- uncle from India, did not in the least perceive that her Aunt Barbara was greatly perplexed and harassed, divided between her care for her sister and for her niece, grieved for her brother’s anxiety, and disappointed that he had been obliged to leave the army, instead of being made a General. The upshot of all that she carried away with her was, that it was very cross of Aunt Barbara to think she made Aunt Jane ill, and very very hard that she could not go to the bazaar.

Lady Jane did not go out that afternoon, and Lady Barbara set her niece and Josephine down in the Park, saying that she was going into Belgravia, and desiring them to meet her near Apsley House. They began to walk, and Kate began to lament. “If she could only have gone to the bazaar for her album! It was very hard!”

“Eh,” Josephine said, “why should they not go? There was plenty of time. Miladi Barbe had given them till four. She would take la petite.”

Kate hung back. She knew it was wrong. She should never dare produce the book if she had it.

But Josephine did not attend to the faltered English words, or disposed of them with a “Bah! Miladi will guess nothing!” and she had turned decidedly out of the Park, and was making a sign to a cab. Kate was greatly frightened, but was more afraid of checking Josephine in the open street, and making her dismiss the cab, than of getting into it. Besides, there was a very strong desire in her for the red and gold square book that had imprinted itself on her imagination. She could not but be glad to do something in spite of Aunt Barbara. So they were shut in, and went off along Piccadilly, Kate’s feelings in a strange whirl of fright and triumph, amid the clattering of the glasses. Just suppose she saw anyone she knew!

But they got to Soho Square at last; and through the glass door, in among the stalls–that fairy land in general to Kate; but now she was too much frightened and bewildered to do more than hurry along the passages, staring so wildly for her albums, that Josephine touched her, and said, “Tenez, Miladi, they will think you farouche. Ah! see the beautiful wreaths!”

“Come on, Josephine,” said Kate impatiently.

But it was not so easy to get the French maid on. A bazaar was felicity to her, and she had her little lady in her power; she stood and gazed, admired, and criticised, at every stall that afforded ornamental wearing apparel or work patterns; and Kate, making little excursions, and coming back again to her side, could not get her on three yards in a quarter of an hour, and was too shy and afraid of being lost, to wander away and transact her own business. At last they did come to a counter with ornamental stationery; and after looking at four or five books, Kate bought a purple embossed one, not at all what she had had in her mind’s eye, just because she was in too great a fright to look further; and then step by step, very nearly crying at last, so as to alarm Josephine lest she should really cry, she got her out at last. It was a quarter to four, and Josephine was in vain sure that Miladi Barbe would never be at the place in time; Kate’s heart was sick with fright at the thought of the shame of detection.

She begged to get out at the Marble Arch, and not risk driving along Park Lane; but Josephine was triumphant in her certainty that there was time; and on they went, Kate fancying every bay nose that passed the window would turn out to have the brougham, the man-servant, and Aunt Barbara behind it.

At length they were set down at what the Frenchwoman thought a safe distance, and paying the cabman, set out along the side path, Josephine admonishing her lady that it was best not to walk so swiftly, or to look guilty, or they would be “trahies.”

But just then Kate really saw the carriage drawn up where there was an opening in the railings, and the servant holding open the door for them. Had they been seen? There was no knowing! Lady Barbara did not say one single word; but that need not have been surprising–only how very straight her back was, how fixed her marble mouth and chin! It was more like Diana’s head than ever–Diana when she was shooting all Niobe’s daughters, thought Kate, in her dreamy, vague alarm. Then she looked at Josephine on the back seat, to see what she thought of it; but the brown sallow face in the little bonnet was quite still and like itself–beyond Kate’s power to read.

The stillness, doubt, and suspense, were almost unbearable. She longed to speak, but had no courage, and could almost have screamed with desire to have it over, end as it would. Yet at last, when the carriage did turn into Bruton Street, fright and shame had so entirely the upper hand, that she read the numbers on every door, wishing the carriage would only stand still at each, or go slower, that she might put off the moment of knowing whether she was found out.

They stopped; the few seconds of ringing, of opening the doors, of getting out, were over. She knew how it would be, when, instead of going upstairs, her aunt opened the schoolroom door, beckoned her in, and said gravely, “Lady Caergwent, while you are under my charge, it is my duty to make you obey me. Tell me where you have been.”

There was something in the sternness of that low lady-like voice, and of that dark deep eye, that terrified Kate more than the brightest flash of lightning: and it was well for her that the habit of truth was too much fixed for falsehood or shuffling even to occur to her. She did not dare to do more than utter in a faint voice, scarcely audible “To the bazaar.”

“In direct defiance of my commands?”

But the sound of her own confession, the relief of having told, gave Kate spirit to speak; “I know it was naughty,” she said, looking up; “I ought not. Aunt Barbara, I have been very naughty. I’ve been often where you didn’t know.”

“Tell me the whole truth, Katharine;” and Lady Barbara’s look relaxed, and the infinite relief of putting an end to a miserable concealment was felt by the little girl; so she told of the shops she had been at, and of her walks in frequented streets, adding that indeed she would not have gone, but that Josephine took her. “I did like it,” she added candidly; “but I know I ought not.”

“Yes, Katharine,” said Lady Barbara, almost as sternly as ever; “I had thought that with all your faults you were to be trusted.”

“I have told you the truth!” cried Kate.

“Now you may have; but you have been deceiving me all this time; you, who ought to set an example of upright and honourable conduct.”

“No, no, Aunt!” exclaimed Kate, her eyes flashing. “I never spoke one untrue word to you; and I have not now–nor ever. I never deceived.”

“I do not say that you have TOLD untruths. It is deceiving to betray the confidence placed in you.”

Kate knew it was; yet she had never so felt that her aunt trusted her as to have the sense of being on honour; and she felt terribly wounded and grieved, but not so touched as to make her cry or ask pardon. She knew she had been audaciously disobedient; but it was hard to be accused of betraying trust when she had never felt that it was placed in her; and yet the conviction of deceit took from her the last ground she had of peace with herself.

Drooping and angry, she stood without a word; and her aunt presently said, “I do not punish you. The consequences of your actions are punishment enough in themselves, and I hope they may warn you, or I cannot tell what is to become of you in your future life, and of all that will depend on you. You must soon be under more strict and watchful care than mine, and I hope the effect may be good. Meantime, I desire that your Aunt Jane may be spared hearing of this affair, little as you seem to care for her peace of mind.”

And away went Lady Barbara; while Kate, flinging herself upon the sofa, sobbed out, “I do care for Aunt Jane! I love Aunt Jane! I love her ten hundred times more than you! you horrid cross old Diana! But I have deceived! Oh, I am getting to be a wicked little girl! I never did such things at home. Nobody made me naughty there. But it’s the fashionable world. It is corrupting my simplicity. It always does. And I shall be lost! O Mary, Mary! O Papa, Papa! Oh, come and take me home!” And for a little while Kate gasped out these calls, as if she had really thought they would break the spell, and bring her back to Oldburgh.

She ceased crying at last, and slowly crept upstairs, glad to meet no one, and that not even Josephine was there to see her red eyes. Her muslin frock was on the bed, and she managed to dress herself, and run down again unseen; she stood over the fire, so that the housemaid, who brought in her tea, should not see her face; and by the time she had to go to the drawing-room, the mottling of her face had abated under the influence of a story-book, which always drove troubles away for the time.

It was a very quiet evening. Aunt Barbara read bits out of the newspaper, and there was a little talk over them: and Kate read on in her book, to hinder herself from feeling uncomfortable. Now and then Aunt Jane said a few soft words about “Giles and Emily;” but her sister always led away from the subject, afraid of her exciting herself, and getting anxious.

And if Kate had been observing, she would have heard in the weary sound of Aunt Barbara’s voice, and seen in those heavy eyelids, that the troubles of the day had brought on a severe headache, and that there was at least one person suffering more than even the young ill- used countess.

And when bed-time came, she learnt more of the “consequences of her actions.” Stiff Mrs. Bartley stood there with her candle.

“Where is Josephine?”

“She is gone away, my Lady.”

Kate asked no more, but shivered and trembled all over. She recollected that in telling the truth she had justified herself, and at Josephine’s expense. She knew Josephine would call it a blackness–a treason. What would become of the poor bright merry Frenchwoman? Should she never see her again? And all because she had not had the firmness to be obedient! Oh, loss of trust! loss of confidence! disobedience! How wicked this place made her! and would there be any end to it?

And all night she was haunted through her dreams with the Lord Chancellor, in his wig, trying to catch her, and stuff her into the woolsack, and Uncle Wardour’s voice always just out of reach. If she could only get to him!

CHAPTER XI.

The young countess was not easily broken down. If she was ever so miserable for one hour, she was ready to be amused the next; and though when left to herself she felt very desolate in the present, and much afraid of the future, the least enlivenment brightened her up again into more than her usual spirits. Even an entertaining bit in the history that she was reading would give her so much amusement that she would forget her disgrace in making remarks and asking questions, till Lady Barbara gravely bade her not waste time, and decided that she had no feeling.

It was not more easy to find a maid than a governess to Lady Barbara’s mind, nor did she exert herself much in the matter, for, as Kate heard her tell Mr. Mercer, she had decided that the present arrangement could not last; and then something was asked about the Colonel and Mrs. Umfraville; to which the answer was, “Oh no, quite impossible; she could never be in a house with an invalid;” and then ensued something about the Chancellor and an establishment, which, as usual, terrified Kate’s imagination.

Indeed that night terrors were at their height, for Mrs. Bartley never allowed dawdling, and with a severely respectful silence made the undressing as brief an affair as possible, brushing her hair till her head tingled all over, putting away the clothes with the utmost speed, and carrying off the candle as soon as she had uttered her grim “Good-night, my Lady,” leaving Kate to choose between her pet terrors–either of the Lord Chancellor, or of the house on fire–or a very fine new one, that someone would make away with her to make way for her Uncle Giles and his son to come to her title. Somehow Lady Barbara had contrived to make her exceedingly in awe of her Uncle Giles, the strict stern soldier who was always implicitly obeyed, and who would be so shocked at her. She wished she could hide somewhere when he was coming! But there was one real good bright pleasure near, that would come before her misfortunes; and that was the birthday to be spent at the Wardours’. As to the present, Josephine had had the album in her pocket, and had never restored it, and Kate had begun to feel a distaste to the whole performance, to recollect its faults, and to be ashamed of the entire affair; but that was no reason she should not be very happy with her friends, who had promised to take her to the Zoological Gardens.

She had not seen them since her return to London; they were at Westbourne Road, too far off for her to walk thither even if she had had anyone to go with her, and though they had called, no one had seen them; but she had had two or three notes, and had sent some “story pictures” by the post. And the thoughts of that day of freedom and enjoyment of talking to Alice, being petted by Mrs. Wardour and caressed by Sylvia, seemed to bear her through all the dull morning walks, in which she was not only attended by Bartley, but by the man-servant; all the lessons with her aunt, and the still more dreary exercise which Lady Barbara took with her in some of the parks in the afternoon. She counted the days to the 21st whenever she woke in the morning; and at last Saturday was come, and it would be Monday.

“Katharine,” said Lady Barbara at breakfast, “you had better finish your drawing to-day; here is a note from Madame to say it will suit her best to come on Monday instead of Tuesday.”

“Oh! but, Aunt Barbara, I am going to Westbourne Road on Monday.”

“Indeed! I was not aware of it.”

“Oh, it is Sylvia’s birthday! and I am going to the Zoological Gardens with them.”

“And pray how came you to make this engagement without consulting me?”

“It was all settled at Bournemouth. I thought you knew! Did not Mrs. Wardour ask your leave for me?”

“Mrs. Wardour said something about hoping to see you in London, but I made no decided answer. I should not have allowed the intimacy there if I had expected that the family would be living in London; and there is no reason that it should continue. Constant intercourse would not be at all desirable.”

“But may I not go on Monday?” said Kate, her eyes opening wide with consternation.

“No, certainly not. You have not deserved that I should trust you; I do not know whom you might meet there: and I cannot have you going about with any chance person.”

“O Aunt Barbara! Aunt Barbara! I have promised!”

“Your promise can be of no effect without my consent.”

“But they will expect me. They will be so disappointed!”

“I cannot help that. They ought to have applied to me for my consent.”

“Perhaps,” said Kate hopefully, “Mrs. Wardour will write to-day. If she does, will you let me go?”

“No, Katharine. While you are under my charge, I am accountable for you, and I will not send you into society I know nothing about. Let me hear no more of this, but write a note excusing yourself, and we will let the coachman take it to the post.”

Kate was thoroughly enraged, and forgot even her fears. “I sha’n’t excuse myself,” she said; “I shall say you will not let me go.”

“You will write a proper and gentlewoman-like note,” said Lady Barbara quietly, “so as not to give needless offence.”

“I shall say,” exclaimed Kate more loudly, “that I can’t go because you won’t let me go near old friends.”

“Go into the schoolroom, and write a proper note, Katharine; I shall come presently, and see what you have said,” repeated Lady Barbara, commanding her own temper with some difficulty.

Kate flung away into the schoolroom, muttering, and in a tumult of exceeding disappointment, anger, and despair, too furious even to cry, and dashing about the room, calling Aunt Barbara after every horrible heroine she could think of, and pitying herself and her friends, till the thought of Sylvia’s disappointment stung her beyond all bearing. She was still rushing hither and thither, inflaming her passion, when her aunt opened the door.

“Where is the note?” she said quietly.

“I have not done it.”

“Sit down then this instant, and write,” said Lady Barbara, with her Diana face and cool way, the most terrible of all.

Kate sulkily obeyed, but as she seated herself, muttered, “I shall say you won’t let me go near them.”

“Write as I tell you.–My dear Mrs. Wardour–“

“There.”

“I fear you may be expecting to see me on Monday–“

“I don’t fear; I know she is.”

“Write–I fear you may be expecting me on Monday, as something passed on the subject at Bournemouth; and in order to prevent inconvenience, I write to say that it will not be in my power to call on that day, as my aunt had made a previous engagement for me.”

“I am sure I sha’n’t say that!” cried Kate, breaking out of all bounds in her indignation.

“Recollect yourself, Lady Caergwent,” said Lady Barbara calmly.

“It is not true!” cried Kate passionately, jumping up from her seat. “You had not made an engagement for me! I won’t write it! I won’t write lies, and you sha’n’t make me.”

“I do not allow such words or such a manner in speaking to me,” said Lady Barbara, not in the least above her usual low voice; and her calmness made Kate the more furious, and jump and dance round with passion, repeating, “I’ll never write lies, nor tell lies, for you or anyone; you may kill me, but I won’t!”

“That is enough exposure of yourself, Lady Caergwent,” said her aunt. “When you have come to your senses, and choose to apologize for insulting me, and show me the letter written as I desire, you may come to me.”

And away walked Lady Barbara, as cool and unmoved apparently as if she had been made of cast iron; though within she was as sorry, and hardly less angry, than the poor frantic child she left.

Kate did not fly about now. She was very indignant, but she was proud of herself too; she had spoken as if she had been in a book, and she believed herself persecuted for adhering to old friends, and refusing to adopt fashionable falsehoods, such as she had read of. She was a heroine in her own eyes, and that made her inclined to magnify all the persecution and cruelty. They wanted to shut her up from the friends of her childhood, to force her to be false and fashionable; they had made her naughtier and naughtier ever since she came there; they were teaching her to tell falsehoods now, and to give up the Wardours. She would never never do it! Helpless girl as she was, she would be as brave as the knights and earls her ancestors, and stand up for the truth. But what would they do at her! Oh! could she bear Aunt Barbara’s dreadful set Diana face again, and not write as she was told!

The poor weak little heart shrank with terror as she only looked at Aunt Barbara’s chair–not much like the Sir Giles de Umfraville she had thought of just now. “And I’m naughty now; I did betray my trust: I’m much naughtier than I was. Oh, if Papa was but here!” And then a light darted into Kate’s eye, and a smile came on her lip. “Why should not I go home? Papa would have me again; I know he would! He would die rather than leave his child Kate to be made wicked, and forced to tell lies! Perhaps he’ll hide me! Oh, if I could go to school with the children at home in disguise, and let Uncle Giles be Earl of Caergwent if he likes! I’ve had enough of grandeur! I’ll come as Cardinal Wolsey did, when he said he was come to lay his bones among them–and Sylvia and Mary, and Charlie and Armyn–oh, I must go where someone will be kind to me again! Can I really, though? Why not?” and her heart beat violently. “Yes, yes; nothing would happen to me; I know how to manage! If I can only get there, they will hide me from Aunt Barbara and the Lord Chancellor; and even if I had to go back, I should have had one kiss of them all. Perhaps if I don’t go now I shall never see them again!”

With thoughts something like these, Kate, moving dreamily, as if she were not sure that it was herself or not, opened her little writing- case, took out her purse, and counted the money. There was a sovereign and some silver; more than enough, as she well knew. Then she took out of a chiffoniere her worked travelling bag, and threw in a few favourite books; then stood and gasped, and opened the door to peep out. The coachman was waiting at the bottom of the stairs for orders, so she drew in her head, looked at her watch, and considered whether her room would be clear of the housemaids. If she could once get safely out of the house she would not be missed till her dinner time, and perhaps then might be supposed sullen, and left alone. She was in a state of great fright, starting violently at every sound; but the scheme having once occurred to her, it seemed as if St. James’s Parsonage was pulling her harder and harder every minute; she wondered if there were really such things as heart-strings; if there were, hers must be fastened very tight round Sylvia.

At last she ventured out, and flew up to her own room more swiftly than ever she had darted before! She moved about quietly, and perceived by the sounds in the next room that Mrs. Bartley was dressing Aunt Jane, and Aunt Barbara reading a letter to her. This was surely a good moment; but she knew she must dress herself neatly, and not look scared, if she did not mean to be suspected and stopped; and she managed to get quietly into her little shaggy coat, her black hat and feather and warm gloves–even her boots were remembered–and then whispering to herself, “It can’t be wrong to get away from being made to tell stories! I’m going to Papa!” she softly opened the door, went on tip-toe past Lady’s Jane’s door; then after the first flight of stairs, rushed like the wind, unseen by anyone, got the street door open, pulled it by its outside handle, and heard it shut!

It was done now! She was on the wide world–in the street! She could not have got in again without knocking, ringing, and making her attempt known; and she was far more terrified at the thought of Lady Barbara’s stern face and horror at her proceedings than even at the long journey alone.

Every step was a little bit nearer Sylvia, Mary, and Papa–it made her heart bound in the midst of its frightened throbs–every step was farther away from Aunt Barbara, and she could hardly help setting off in a run. It was a foggy day, when it was not so easy to see far, but she longed to be out of Bruton Street, where she might be known; yet when beyond the quiet familiar houses, the sense of being alone, left to herself, began to get very alarming, and she could hardly control herself to walk like a rational person to the cab-stand in Davies Street.

Nobody remarked her; she was a tall girl for her age, and in her sober dark dress, with her little bag, might be taken for a tradesman’s daughter going to school, even if anyone had been out who had time to look at her. Trembling, she saw a cabman make a sign to her, and stood waiting for him, jumped in as he opened his door, and felt as if she had found a refuge for the time upon the dirty red plush cushions and the straw. “To the Waterloo Station,” said she, with as much indifference and self-possession as she could manage. The man touched his hat, and rattled off: he perhaps wondering if this were a young runaway, and if he should get anything by telling where she was gone; she working herself into a terrible fright for fear he should be going to drive round and round London, get her into some horrible den of iniquity, and murder her for the sake of her money, her watch, and her clothes. Did not cabmen always do such things? She had quite decided how she would call a policeman, and either die like an Umfraville or offer a ransom of “untold gold,” and had gone through all possible catastrophes long before she found herself really safe at the railway station, and the man letting her out, and looking for his money.

The knowledge that all depended on herself, and that any signs of alarm would bring on inquiry, made her able to speak and act so reasonably, that she felt like one in a dream. With better fortune than she could have hoped for, a train was going to start in a quarter of an hour; and the station clerk was much too busy and too much hurried to remark how scared were her eyes, and how trembling her voice, as she asked at his pigeon-hole for “A first-class ticket to Oldburgh, if you please,” offered the sovereign in payment, swept up the change, and crept out to the platform.

A carriage had “Oldburgh” marked on it; she tried to open the door, but could not reach the handle; then fancied a stout porter who came up with his key must be some messenger of the Lord Chancellor come to catch her, and was very much relieved when he only said, “Where for, Miss?” and on her answer, “Oldburgh,” opened the door for her, and held her bag while she tripped up the steps. “Any luggage, Miss?” “No, thank you.” He shot one inquiring glance after her, but hastened away; and she settled herself in the very farthest corner of the carriage, and lived in an agony for the train to set off before her flight should be detected.

Once off, she did not care; she should be sure of at least seeing Sylvia, and telling her uncle her troubles. She had one great start, when the door was opened, and a gentleman peered in; but it was merely to see if there was room, for she heard him say, “Only a child,” and in came a lady and two gentlemen, who at least filled up the window so that nobody could see her, while they talked a great deal to someone on the platform. And then after some bell-ringing, whistling, sailing backwards and forwards, and stopping, they were fairly off–getting away from the roofs of London–seeing the sky clear of smoke and fog–getting nearer home every moment; and Countess Kate relaxed her shy, frightened, drawn-up attitude, gave a long breath, felt that the deed was done, and began to dwell on the delight with which she should be greeted at home, and think how to surprise them all!

There was plenty of time for thinking and planning and dreaming, some few possible things, but a great many more most impossible ones. Perhaps the queerest notion of all was her plan for being disguised like a school-child all day, and always noticed for her distinguished appearance by ladies who came to see the school, or overheard talking French to Sylvia; and then in the midst of her exceeding anxiety not to be detected, she could not help looking at her travelling companions, and wondering if they guessed with what a grand personage they had the honour to be travelling! Only a child, indeed! What would they think if they knew? And the little goose held her pocket- handkerchief in her hand, feeling as if it would be like a story if they happened to wonder at the coronet embroidered in the corner; and when she took out a story-book, she would have liked that the fly- leaf should just carelessly reveal the Caergwent written upon it. She did not know that selfishness had thrown out the branch of self- consequence.

However, nothing came of it; they had a great deal too much to say to each other to notice the little figure in the corner; and she had time to read a good deal, settle a great many fine speeches, get into many a fright lest there should be an accident, and finally grow very impatient, alarmed, and agitated before the last station but one was passed, and she began to know the cut of the hedgerow-trees, and the shape of the hills–to feel as if the cattle and sheep in the fields were old friends, and to feel herself at home.

Oldburgh Station! They were stopping at last, and she was on her feet, pressing to the window between the strangers. One of the gentlemen kindly made signs to the porter to let her out, and asked if she had any baggage, or anyone to meet her. She thanked him by a smile and shake of the head; she could not speak for the beating of her heart; she felt almost as much upon the world as when the door in Bruton Street had shut behind her; and besides, a terrible wild fancy had seized her–suppose, just suppose, they were all gone away, or ill, or someone dead! Perhaps she felt it would serve her right, and that was the reason she was in such terror.

CHAPTER XII.

When Kate had left the train, she was still two miles from St. James’s; and it was half-past three o’clock, so that she began to feel that she had run away without her dinner, and that the beatings of her heart made her knees ache, so that she had no strength to walk.

She thought her best measure would be to make her way to a pastry- cook’s shop that looked straight down the street to the Grammar School, and where it was rather a habit of the family to meet Charlie when they had gone into the town on business, and wanted to walk out with him. He would be out at four o’clock, and there would not be long to wait. So, feeling shy, and even more guilty and frightened than on her first start, Kate threaded the streets she knew so well, and almost gasping with nervous alarm, popped up the steps into the shop, and began instantly eating a bun, and gazing along the street. She really could not speak till she had swallowed a few mouthfuls; and then she looked up to the woman, and took courage to ask if the boys were out of school yet.

“Oh, no, Miss; not for a quarter of an hour yet.”

“Do you know if–if Master Charles Wardour is there to-day?” added Kate, with a gulp.

“I don’t, Miss.” And the woman looked hard at her.

“Do you know if any of them–any of them from St. James’s, are in to- day?”

“No, Miss; I have not seen any of them, but very likely they may be. I saw Mr. Wardour go by yesterday morning.”

So far they were all well, then; and Kate made her mind easier, and went on eating like a hungry child till the great clock struck four; when she hastily paid for her cakes and tarts, put on her gloves, and stood on the step, half in and half out of the shop, staring down the street. Out came the boys in a rush, making straight for the shop, and brushing past Kate; she, half alarmed, half affronted, descended from her post, still looking intently. Half a dozen more big fellows, eagerly talking, almost tumbled over her, and looked as if she had no business there; she seemed to be quite swept off the pavement into the street, and to be helpless in the midst of a mob, dashing around her. They might begin to tease her in a minute; and more terrified than at any moment of her journey, she was almost ready to cry, when the tones of a well-known voice came on her ear close to her–“I say, Will, you come and see my new terrier;” and before the words were uttered, with a cry of, “Charlie, Charlie!” she was clinging to a stout boy who had been passing without looking at her.

“Let go, I say. Who are you?” was the first rough greeting.

“O Charlie, Charlie!” almost sobbing, and still grasping his arm tight.

“Oh, I say!” and he stood with open mouth staring at her.

“O Charlie! take me home!”

“Yes, yes; come along!–Get off with you, fellows!” he added–turning round upon the other boys, who were beginning to stare–and exclaimed, “It’s nothing but our Kate!”

Oh! what a thrill there was in hearing those words; and the boys, who were well-behaved and gentlemanly, were not inclined to molest her. So she hurried on, holding Charles’s arm for several steps, till they were out of the hubbub, when he turned again and stared, and again exclaimed, “I say!” all that he could at present utter; and Kate looked at his ruddy face and curly head, and dusty coat and inky collar, as if she would eat him for very joy.

“I say!” and this time he really did say, “Where are the rest of them?”

“At home, aren’t they?”

“What, didn’t they bring you in?”

“Oh no!”

“Come, don’t make a tomfoolery of it; that’s enough. I shall have all the fellows at me for your coming up in that way, you know. Why couldn’t you shake hands like anyone else?”

“O Charlie, I couldn’t help it! Please let us go home!”

“Do you mean that you aren’t come from there?”

“No,” said Kate, half ashamed, but far more exultant, and hanging down her head; “I came from London–I came by myself. My aunt wanted me to tell a story, and–and I have run away. O Charlie! take me home!” and with a fresh access of alarm, she again threw her arms round him, as if to gain his protection from some enemy.

“Oh, I say!” again he cried, looking up the empty street and down again, partly for the enemy, partly to avoid eyes; but he only beheld three dirty children and an old woman, so he did not throw her off roughly. “Ran away!” and he gave a great whistle.

“Yes, yes. My aunt shut me up because I would not tell a story,” said Kate, really believing it herself. “Oh, let us get home, Charlie, do.”

“Very well, if you won’t throttle a man; and let me get Tony in here,” he added, going on a little way towards a small inn stable- yard.

“Oh, don’t go,” cried Kate, who, once more protected, could not bear to be left alone a moment; but Charlie plunged into the yard, and came back not only with the pony, but with a plaid, and presently managed to mount Kate upon the saddle, throwing the plaid round her so as to hide the short garments and long scarlet stockings, that were not adapted for riding, all with a boy’s rough and tender care for the propriety of his sister’s appearance.

“There, that will do,” said he, holding the bridle. “So you found it poor fun being My Lady, and all that.”

“Oh! it was awful, Charlie! You little know, in your peaceful retirement, what are the miseries of the great.”

“Come, Kate, don’t talk bosh out of your books. What did they do to you? They didn’t lick you, did they?”

“No, no; nonsense,” said Kate, rather affronted; “but they wanted to make me forget all that I cared for, and they really did shut me up because I said I would not write a falsehood to please them! They did, Charlie!” and her eyes shone.

“Well, I always knew they must be a couple of horrid old owls,” began Charlie.

“Oh! I didn’t mean Aunt Jane,” said Kate, feeling a little compunction. “Ah!” with a start and scream, “who is coming?” as she heard steps behind them.

“You little donkey, you’ll be off! Who should it be but Armyn?”

For Armyn generally overtook his brother on a Saturday, and walked home with him for the Sunday.

Charles hailed him with a loud “Hollo, Armyn! What d’ye think I’ve got here?”

“Kate! Why, how d’ye do! Why, they never told me you were coming to see us.”

“They didn’t know,” whispered Kate.

“She’s run away, like a jolly brick!” said Charlie, patting the pony vehemently as he made this most inappropriate comparison.

“Run away! You don’t mean it!” cried Armyn, standing still and aghast, so much shocked that her elevation turned into shame; and Charles answered for her –

“Yes, to be sure she did, when they locked her up because she wouldn’t tell lies to please them. How did you get out, Kittens? What jolly good fun it must have been!”

“Is this so, Kate?” said Armyn, laying his hand on the bridle; and his displeasure roused her spirit of self-defence, and likewise a sense of ill-usage.

“To be sure it is,” she said, raising her head indignantly. “I would not be made to tell fashionable falsehoods; and so–and so I came home, for Papa to protect me:” and if she had not had to take care to steady herself on her saddle, she would have burst out sobbing with vexation at Armyn’s manner.

“And no one knew you were coming?” said he.

“No, of course not; I slipped out while they were all in confabulation in Aunt Jane’s room, and they were sure not to find me gone till dinner time, and if they are very cross, not then.”

“You go on, Charlie,” said Armyn, restoring the bridle to his brother; “I’ll overtake you by the time you get home.”

“What are you going to do?” cried boy and girl with one voice.

“Well, I suppose it is fair to tell you,” said Armyn. “I must go and telegraph what is become of you.”

There was a howl and a shriek at this. They would come after her and take her away, when she only wanted to be hid and kept safe; it was a cruel shame, and Charles was ready to fly at his brother and pommel him; indeed, Armyn had to hold him by one shoulder, and say in the voice that meant that he would be minded, “Steady, boy I–I’m very sorry, my little Katie; it’s a melancholy matter, but you must have left those poor old ladies in a dreadful state of alarm about you, and they ought not to be kept in it!”

“Oh! but Armyn, Armyn, do only get home, and see what Papa says.”

“I am certain what he will say, and it would only be the trouble of sending someone in, and keeping the poor women in a fright all the longer. Besides, depend on it, the way to have them sending down after you would be to say nothing. Now, if they hear you are safe, you are pretty secure of spending to-morrow at least with us. Let me go, Kate; it must be done. I cannot help it.”

Even while he spoke, the kind way of crossing her will was so like home, that it gave a sort of happiness, and she felt she could not resist; so she gave a sigh, and he turned back.

How much of the joy and hope of her journey had he not carried away with him! His manner of treating her exploit made her even doubt how his father might receive it; and yet the sight of old scenes, and the presence of Charlie, was such exceeding delight, that it seemed to kill off all unpleasant fears or anticipations; and all the way home it was one happy chatter of inquiries for everyone, of bits of home news, and exclamations at the sight of some well-known tree, or the outline of a house remembered for some adventure; the darker the twilight the happier her tongue. The dull suburb, all little pert square red-brick houses, with slated roofs and fine names, in the sloppiness of a grey November day, was dear to Kate; every little shop window with the light streaming out was like a friend; and she anxiously gazed into the rough parties out for their Saturday purchases, intending to nod to anyone she might know, but it was too dark for recognitions; and when at length they passed the dark outline of the church, she was silent, her heart again bouncing as if it would beat away her breath and senses. The windows were dark; it was a sign that Evening Service was just over. The children turned in at the gate, just as Armyn overtook them. He lifted Kate off her pony. She could not have stood, but she could run, and she flew to the drawing-room. No one was there; perhaps she was glad. She knew the cousins would be dressing for tea, and in another moment she had torn open Sylvia’s door.

Sylvia, who was brushing her hair, turned round. She stared–as if she had seen a ghost. Then the two children held out their arms, and rushed together with a wild scream that echoed through the house, and brought Mary flying out of her room to see who was hurt! and to find, rolling on her sister’s bed, a thing that seemed to have two bodies and two faces glued together, four legs, and all its arms and hands wound round and round.

“Sylvia! What is it? Who is it? What is she doing to you?” began Mary; but before the words were out of her mouth, the thing had flown at her neck, and pulled her down too; and the grasp and the clinging and the kisses told her long before she had room or eyes or voice to know the creature by. A sort of sobbing out of each name between them was all that was heard at first.

At last, just as Mary was beginning to say, “My own own Katie! how did you come–” Mr. Wardour’s voice on the stairs called “Mary!”

“Have you seen him, my dear?”

“No;” but Kate was afraid now she had heard his voice, for it was grave.

“Mary!” And Mary went. Kate sat up, holding Sylvia’s hand.

They heard him ask, “Is Kate there?”

“Yes.” And then there were lower voices that Kate could not hear, and which therefore alarmed her; and Sylvia, puzzled and frightened, sat holding her hand, listening silently.

Presently Mr. Wardour came in; and his look was graver than his tone; but it was so pitying, that in a moment Kate flew to his breast, and as he held her in his arms she cried, “O Papa! Papa! I have found you again! you will not turn me away.”

“I must do whatever may be right, my dear child,” said Mr. Wardour, holding her close, so that she felt his deep love, though it was not an undoubting welcome. “I will hear all about it when you have rested, and then I may know what is best to be done.”

“Oh! keep me, keep me, Papa.”

“You will be here to-morrow at least,” he said, disengaging himself from her. “This is a terrible proceeding of yours, Kate, but it is no time for talking of it; and as your aunts know where you are, nothing more can be done at present; so we will wait to understand it till you are rested and composed.”

He went away; and Kate remained sobered and confused, and Mary stood looking at her, sad and perplexed.

“O Kate! Kate!” she said, “what have you been doing?”

“What is the matter? Are not you glad?” cried Sylvia; and the squeeze of her hand restored Kate’s spirits so much that she broke forth with her story, told in her own way, of persecution and escape, as she had wrought herself up to believe in it; and Sylvia clung to her, with flushed cheeks and ardent eyes, resenting every injury that her darling detailed, triumphing in her resistance, and undoubting that here she would be received and sheltered from all; while Mary, distressed and grieved, and cautioned by her father to take care not to show sympathy that might be mischievous, was carried along in spite of herself to admire and pity her child, and burn with indignation at such ill-treatment, almost in despair at the idea that the child must be sent back again, yet still not discarding that trust common to all Mr. Wardour’s children, that “Papa would do ANYTHING to hinder a temptation.”

And so, with eager words and tender hands, Kate was made ready for the evening meal, and went down, clinging on one side to Mary, on the other to Sylvia–a matter of no small difficulty on the narrow staircase, and almost leading to a general avalanche of young ladies, all upon the head of little Lily, who was running up to greet and be greeted, and was almost devoured by Kate when at length they did get safe downstairs.

It was a somewhat quiet, grave meal; Mr. Wardour looked so sad and serious, that all felt that it would not do to indulge in joyous chatter, and the little girls especially were awed; though through all there was a tender kindness in his voice and look, whenever he did but offer a slice of bread to his little guest, such as made her feel what was home and what was love–“like a shower of rain after a parched desert” as she said to herself; and she squeezed Sylvia’s hand under the table whenever she could.

Mr. Wardour spoke to her very little. He said he had seen Colonel Umfraville’s name in the Gazette, and asked about his coming home; and when she had answered that the time and speed of the journey were to depend on Giles’s health, he turned from her to Armyn, and began talking to him about some public matters that seemed very dull to Kate; and one little foolish voice within her said, “He is not like Mrs. George Wardour, he forgets what I am;” but there was a wiser, more loving voice to answer, “Dear Papa, he thinks of me as myself; he is no respecter of persons. Oh, I hope he is not angry with me!”

When tea was over Mr. Wardour stood up, and said, “I shall wish you children good-night now; I have to read with John Bailey for his Confirmation, and to prepare for to-morrow;–and you, Kate, must go to bed early.–Mary, she had better sleep with you.”

This was rather a blank, for sleeping with Sylvia again had been Kate’s dream of felicity; yet this was almost lost in the sweetness of once more coming in turn for the precious kiss and good-night, in the midst of which she faltered, “O Papa, don’t be angry with me!”

“I am not angry, Katie,” he said gently; “I am very sorry. You have done a thing that nothing can justify, and that may do you much future harm; and I cannot receive you as if you had come properly. I do not know what excuse there was for you, and I cannot attend to you to-night; indeed, I do not think you could tell me rightly; but another time we will talk it all over, and I will try to help you. Now good-night, my dear child.”

Those words of his, “I will try to help you,” were to Kate like a promise of certain rescue from all her troubles; and, elastic ball that her nature was, no sooner was his anxious face out of sight, and she secure that he was not angry, than up bounded her spirits again. She began wondering why Papa thought she could not tell him properly, and forthwith began to give what she intended for a full and particular history of all that she had gone through.

It was a happy party round the fire; Kate and Sylvia both together in the large arm-chair, and Lily upon one of its arms; Charles in various odd attitudes before the fire; Armyn at the table with his book, half reading, half listening; Mary with her work; and Kate pouring out her story, making herself her own heroine, and describing her adventures, her way of life, and all her varieties of miseries, in the most glowing colours. How she did rattle on! It would be a great deal too much to tell; indeed it would be longer than this whole story!

Sylvia and Charlie took it all in, pitied, wondered, and were indignant, with all their hearts; indeed Charlie was once heard to wish he could only get that horrid old witch near the horse-pond; and when Kate talked of her Diana face, he declared that he should get the old brute of a cat into the field, and set all the boys to stone her.

Little Lily listened, not sure whether it was not all what she called “a made-up story only for prettiness;” and Mary, sitting over her work, was puzzled, and saw that her father was right in saying that Kate could not at present give an accurate account of herself. Mary knew her truthfulness, and that she would not have said what she knew to be invention; but those black eyes, glowing like little hot coals, and those burning cheeks, as well as the loud, squeaky key of the voice, all showed that she had worked herself up into a state of excitement, such as not to know what was invented by an exaggerating memory. Besides, it could not be all true; it did not agree; the ill-treatment was not consistent with the grandeur. For Kate had taken to talking very big, as if she was an immensely important personage, receiving much respect wherever she went; and though Armyn once or twice tried putting in a sober matter-of-fact question for the fun of disconcerting her, she was too mad to care or understand what he said.

“Oh no! she never was allowed to do anything for herself. That was quite a rule, and very tiresome it was.”

“Like the King of Spain, you can’t move your chair away from the fire without the proper attendant.”

“I never do put on coals or wood there!”

“There may be several reasons for that,” said Armyn, recollecting how nearly Kate had once burnt the house down.

“Oh, I assure you it would not do for me,” said Kate. “If it were not so inconvenient in that little house, I should have my own man- servant to attend to my fire, and walk out behind me. Indeed, now Perkins always does walk behind me, and it is such a bore.”

And what was the consequence of all this wild chatter? When Mary had seen the hot-faced eager child into bed, she came down to her brother in the drawing-room with her eyes brimful of tears, saying, “Poor dear child! I am afraid she is very much spoilt!”

“Don’t make up your mind to-night,” said Armyn. “She is slightly insane as yet! Never mind, Mary; her heart is in the right place, if her head is turned a little.”

“It is very much turned indeed,” said Mary. “How wise it was of Papa not to let Sylvia sleep with her! What will he do with her? Oh dear!”

CHAPTER XIII.

The Sunday at Oldburgh was not spent as Kate would have had it. It dawned upon her in the midst of horrid dreams, ending by wakening to an overpowering sick headache, the consequence of the agitations and alarms of the previous day, and the long fast, appeased by the contents of the pastry-cook’s shop, with the journey and the excitement of the meeting–altogether quite sufficient to produce such a miserable feeling of indisposition, that if Kate could have thought at all of anything but present wretchedness, she would have feared that she was really carrying out the likeness to Cardinal Wolsey by laying her bones among them.

That it was not quite so bad as that, might be inferred from her having no doctor but Mary Wardour, who attended to her most assiduously from her first moans at four o’clock in the morning, till her dropping off to sleep about noon; when the valiant Mary, in the absence of everyone at church, took upon herself to pen a note, to catch the early Sunday post, on her own responsibility, to Lady Barbara Umfraville, to say that her little cousin was so unwell that it would be impossible to carry out the promise of bringing her home on Monday, which Mr. Wardour had written on Saturday night.

Sleep considerably repaired her little ladyship; and when she had awakened, and supped up a bason of beef-tea, toast and all, with considerable appetite, she was so much herself again, that there was no reason that anyone should be kept at home to attend to her. Mary’s absence was extremely inconvenient, as she was organist and leader of the choir.

“So, Katie dear,” she said, when she saw her patient on her legs again, making friends with the last new kitten of the old cat, “you will not mind being left alone, will you? It is only for the Litany and catechising, you know.”

Kate looked blank, and longed to ask that Sylvia might stay with her, but did not venture; knowing that she was not ill enough for it to be a necessity, and that no one in that house was ever kept from church, except for some real and sufficient cause.

But the silly thoughts that passed through the little head in the hour of solitude would fill two or three volumes. In the first place, she was affronted. They made very little of her, considering who she was, and how she had come to see them at all risks, and how ill she had been! They would hardly have treated a little village child so negligently as their visitor, the Countess –

Then her heart smote her. She remembered Mary’s tender and assiduous nursing all the morning, and how she had already stayed from service and Sunday school; and she recollected her honour for her friends for not valuing her for her rank; and in that mood she looked out the Psalms and Lessons, which she had not been able to read in the morning, and when she had finished them, began to examine the book- case in search of a new, or else a very dear old, Sunday book.

But then something went “crack,”–or else it was Kate’s fancy–for she started as if it had been a cannon-ball; and though she sat with her book in her lap by the fire in Mary’s room, all the dear old furniture and pictures round her, her head was weaving an unheard-of imagination, about robbers coming in rifling everything–coming up the stairs–creak, creak, was that their step?–she held her breath, and her eyes dilated–seizing her for the sake of her watch! What article there would be in the paper–“Melancholy disappearance of the youthful Countess of Caergwent.” Then Aunt Barbara would be sorry she had treated her so cruelly; then Mary would know she ought not to have abandoned the child who had thrown herself on her protection.

That was the way Lady Caergwent spent her hour. She had been kidnapped and murdered a good many times before; there was a buzz in the street, her senses came back, and she sprang out on the stairs to meet her cousins, calling herself quite well again. And then they had a very peaceful, pleasant time; she was one of them again, when, as of old, Mr. Wardour came into the drawing-room, and she stood up with Charles, Sylvia, and little Lily, who was now old enough for the Catechism, and then the Collect, and a hymn. Yes, she had Collect and hymn ready too, and some of the Gospel; Aunt Barbara always heard her say them on Sunday, besides some very difficult questions, not at all like what Mr. Wardour asked out of his own head.

Kate was a little afraid he would make his teaching turn on submitting to rulers; it was an Epistle that would have given him a good opportunity, for it was the Fourth Epiphany Sunday, brought in at the end of the Sundays after Trinity. If he made his teaching personal, something within her wondered if she could bear it, and was ready to turn angry and defiant. But no such thing; what he talked to them about was the gentle Presence that hushed the waves and winds in outward nature, and calmed the wild spiritual torments of the possessed; and how all fears and terrors, all foolish fancies and passionate tempers, will be softened into peace when the thought of Him rises in the heart.

Kate wondered if she should be able to think of that next time she was going to work herself into an agony.

But at present all was like a precious dream, to be enjoyed as slowly as the moments could be persuaded to pass. Out came the dear old Dutch Bible History, with pictures of everything–pictures that they had looked at every Sunday since they could walk, and could have described with their eyes shut; and now Kate was to feast her eyes once again upon them, and hear how many little Lily knew; and a pretty sight it was, that tiny child, with her fat hands clasped behind her so as not to be tempted to put a finger on the print, going so happily and thoroughly through all the creatures that came to Adam to be named, and showing the whole procession into the Ark, and, her favourite of all, the Angels coming down to Jacob.

Then came tea; and then Kate was pronounced, to her great delight, well enough for Evening Service. The Evening Service she always thought a treat, with the lighted church, and the choicest singing– the only singing that had ever taken hold of Kate’s tuneless ear, and that seemed to come home to her. At least, to-night it came home as it had never done before; it seemed to touch some tender spot in her heart, and when she thought how dear it was, and how little she had cared about it, and how glad she had been to go away, she found the candles dancing in a green mist, and great drops came down upon the Prayer-book in her hand.

Then it could not be true that she had no feeling. She was crying– the first time she had ever known herself cry except for pain or at reproof; and she was really so far pleased, that she made no attempt to stop the great tears that came trickling down at each familiar note, at each thought how long it had been since she had heard them. She cried all church time; for whenever she tried to attend to the prayers, the very sound of the voice she loved so well set her off again; and Sylvia, tenderly laying a hand on her by way of sympathy, made her weep the more, though still so softly and gently that it was like a strange sort of happiness–almost better than joy and merriment. And then the sermon–upon the text, “Peace, be still,”– was on the same thought on which her uncle had talked to the children: not that she followed it much; the very words “peace” and “be still,” seemed to be enough to touch, soften, and dissolve her into those sweet comfortable tears.

Perhaps they partly came from the weakening of the morning’s indisposition; at any rate, when she moved, after the Blessing, holding the pitying Sylvia’s hand, she found that she was very much tired, her eyelids were swollen and aching, and in fact she was fit for nothing but bed, where Mary and Sylvia laid her; and she slept, and slept in dreamless soundness, till she was waked by Mary’s getting up in the morning, and found herself perfectly well.

“And now, Sylvia,” she said, as they went downstairs hand-in-hand, “let us put it all out of our heads, and try and think all day that it is just one of our old times, and that I am your old Kate. Let me do my lessons and go into school, and have some fun, and quite forget all that is horrid.”

But there was something to come before this happy return to old times. As soon as breakfast was over Mr Wardour said, “Now, Kate, I want you.” And then she knew what was coming; and somehow, she did not feel exactly the same about her exploit and its causes by broad daylight, now that she was cool. Perhaps she would have been glad to hang back; yet on the whole, she had a great deal to say to “Papa,” and it was a relief, though rather terrific, to find herself alone with him in the study.

“Now, Kate,” said he again, with his arm round her, as she stood by him, “will you tell me what led you to this very sad and strange proceeding?”

Kate hung her head, and ran her fingers along the mouldings of his chair.

“Why was it, my dear?” asked Mr. Wardour.

“It was–” and she grew bolder at the sound of her own voice, and more confident in the goodness of her cause–“it was because Aunt Barbara said I must write what was not true, and–and I’ll never tell a falsehood–never, for no one!” and her eyes flashed.

“Gently, Kate,” he said, laying his hand upon hers; “I don’t want to know what you never WILL do, only what you have done. What was this falsehood?”

“Why, Papa, the other Sylvia–Sylvia Joanna, you know–has her birthday to-day, and we settled at Bournemouth that I should spend the day with her; and on Saturday, when Aunt Barbara heard of it, she said she did not want me to be intimate there, and that I must not go, and told me to write a note to say she had made a previous engagement for me.”

“And do you know that she had not done so?”

“O Papa! she could not; for when I said I would not write a lie, she never said it was true.”

“Was that what you said to your aunt?”

“Yes,”–and Kate hung her head–“I was in a passion.”

“Then, Kate, I do not wonder that Lady Barbara insisted on obedience, instead of condescending to argue with a child who could be so insolent.”

“But, Papa,” said Kate, abashed for a moment, then getting eager, “she does tell fashionable falsehoods; she says she is not at home when she is, and–“

“Stay, Kate; it is not for you to judge of grown people’s doings. Neither I nor Mary would like to use that form of denying ourselves; but it is usually understood to mean only not ready to receive visitors. In the same way, this previous engagement was evidently meant to make the refusal less discourteous, and you were not even certain it did not exist.”

“My Italian mistress did want to come on Monday,” faltered Kate, “but it was not ‘previous.'”

“Then, Kate, who was it that went beside the mark in letting us believe that Lady Barbara locked you up to make you tell falsehoods?”

“Indeed, Papa, I did not say locked–Charlie and Sylvia said that.”

“But did you correct them?”

“O Papa, I did not mean it! But I am naughty now! I always am naughty, so much worse than I used to be at home. Indeed I am, and I never do get into a good vein now. O Papa, Papa, can’t you get me out of it all? If you could only take me home again! I don’t think my aunts want to keep me–they say I am so bad and horrid, and that I make Aunt Jane ill. Oh, take me back, Papa!”

He did take her on his knee, and held her close to him. “I wish I could, my dear,” he said; “I should like to have you again! but it cannot be. It is a different state of life that has been appointed for you; and you would not be allowed to make your home with me, with no older a person than Mary to manage for you. If your aunt had not been taken from us, then–” and Kate ventured to put her arm round his neck–“then this would have been your natural home; but as things are with us, I could not make my house such as would suit the requirements of those who arrange for you. And, my poor child, I fear we let the very faults spring up that are your sorrow now.”

“Oh no, no, Papa, you helped me! Aunt Barbara only makes me–oh! may I say?–hate her! for indeed there is no helping it! I can’t be good there.”

“What is it? What do you mean, my dear? What is your difficulty? And I will try to help you.”

Poor Kate found it not at all easy to explain when she came to particulars. “Always cross,” was the clearest idea in her mind; “never pleased with her, never liking anything she did–not punishing, but much worse.” She had not made out her case, she knew; but she could only murmur again, “It all went wrong, and I was very unhappy.”

Mr. Wardour sighed from the bottom of his heart; he was very sorrowful, too, for the child that was as his own. And then he went back and thought of his early college friend, and of his own wife who had so fondled the little orphan–all that was left of her sister. It was grievous to him to put that child away from him when she came clinging to him, and saying she was unhappy, and led into faults.

“It will be better when your uncle comes home,” he began.

“Oh no, Papa, indeed it will not. Uncle Giles is more stern than Aunt Barbara. Aunt Jane says it used to make her quite unhappy to see how sharp he was with poor Giles and Frank.”

“I never saw him in his own family,” said Mr. Wardour thoughtfully; “but this I know, Kate, that your father looked up to him, young as he then was, more than to anyone; that he was the only person among them all who ever concerned himself about you or your mother; and that on the two occasions when I saw him, I thought him very like your father.”

“I had rather he was like you, Papa,” sighed Kate. “Oh, if I was but your child!” she added, led on by a little involuntary pressure of his encircling arm.

“Don’t let us talk of what is not, but of what is,” said Mr. Wardour; “let us try to look on things in their right light. It has been the will of Heaven to call you, my little girl, to a station where you will, if you live, have many people’s welfare depending on you, and your example will be of weight with many. You must go through training for it, and strict training may be the best for you. Indeed, it must be the best, or it would not have been permitted to befall you.”

“But it does not make me good, it makes me naughty.”

“No, Kate; nothing, nobody can make you naughty; nothing is strong enough to do that.”

Kate knew what he meant, and hung her head.

“My dear, I do believe that you feel forlorn and dreary, and miss the affection you have had among us; but have you ever thought of the Friend who is closest of all to us, and who is especially kind to a fatherless child?”

“I can’t–I can’t feel it–Papa, I can’t. And then, why was it made so that I must go away from you and all?”

“You will see some day, though you cannot see now, my dear. If you use it rightly, you will feel the benefit. Meantime, you must take it on trust, just as you do my love for you, though I am going to carry you back.”

“Yes; but I can feel you loving me.”

“My dear child, it only depends on yourself to feel your Heavenly Father loving you. If you will set yourself to pray with your heart, and think of His goodness to you, and ask Him for help and solace in all your present vexatious and difficulties, never mind how small, you WILL become conscious of his tender pity and love to you.”

“Ah! but I am not good!”

“But He can make you so, Kate. Your have been wearied by religious teaching hitherto, have you not?”

“Except when it was pretty and like poetry,” whispered Kate.

“Put your heart to your prayers now, Kate. Look in the Psalms for verses to suit your loneliness; recollect that you meet us in spirit when you use the same Prayers, read the same Lessons, and think of each other. Or, better still, carry your troubles to Him; and when you HAVE felt His help, you will know what that is far better than I can tell you.”

Kate only answered with a long breath; not feeling as if she could understand such comfort, but with a resolve to try.

“And now,” said Mr. Wardour, “I must take you home to-morrow, and I will speak for you to Lady Barbara, and try to obtain her forgiveness; but, Kate, I do not think you quite understand what a shocking proceeding this was of yours.”

“I know it was wrong to fancy THAT, and say THAT about Aunt Barbara. I’ll tell her so,” said Kate, with a trembling voice.

“Yes, that will be right; but it was this–this expedition that I meant.”

“It was coming to you, Papa!”

“Yes, Kate; but did you think what an outrageous act it was? There is something particularly grievous in a little girl, or a woman of any age, casting off restraint, and setting out in the world unprotected and contrary to authority. Do you know, it frightened me so much, that till I saw more of you I did not like you to be left alone with Sylvia.”

The deep red colour flushed all over Kate’s face and neck in her angry shame and confusion, burning darker and more crimson, so that Mr. Wardour was very sorry for her, and added, “I am obliged to say this, because you ought to know that it is both very wrong in itself, and will be regarded by other people as more terrible than what you are repenting of more. So, if you do find yourself distrusted and in disgrace, you must not think it unjust and cruel, but try to submit patiently, and learn not to be reckless and imprudent. My poor child, I wish you could have so come to us that we might have been happier together. Perhaps you will some day; and in the meantime, if you have any troubles, or want to know anything, you may always write to me.”

“Writing is not speaking,” said Kate ruefully.

“No; but it comes nearer to it as people get older. Now go, my dear; I am busy, and you had better make the most of your time with your cousins.”

Kate’s heart was unburthened now; and though there was much alarm, pain, and grief, in anticipation, yet she felt more comfortable in herself than she had done for months. “Papa” had never been so tender with her, and she knew that he had forgiven her. She stept back to the drawing-room, very gentle and subdued, and tried to carry out her plans of living one of her old days, by beginning with sharing the lessons as usual, and then going out with her cousins to visit the school, and see some of the parishioners. It was very nice and pleasant; she was as quiet and loving as possible, and threw herself into all the dear old home matters. It was as if for a little while Katharine was driven out of Katharine, and a very sweet little maiden left instead–thinking about other things and people instead of herself, and full of affection and warmth. The improvement that the half year’s discipline had made in her bearing and manners was visible now; her uncouth abrupt ways were softened, though still she felt that the naturally gentle and graceful Sylvia would have made a better countess than she did.

They spent the evening in little tastes of all their favourite drawing-room games, just for the sake of having tried them once more; and Papa himself came in and took a share–a very rare treat;–and he always thought of such admirable things in “Twenty questions,” and made “What’s my thought like ?” more full of fun than anyone.

It was a very happy evening–one of the most happy that Kate had ever passed. She knew HOW to enjoy her friends now, and how precious they were to her; and she was just so much tamed by the morning’s conversation, and by the dread of the future, as not to be betrayed into dangerously high spirits. That loving, pitying way of Mary’s, and her own Sylvia’s exceeding pleasure in having her, were delightful; and all through she felt the difference between the real genuine love that she could rest on, and the mere habit of fondling of the other Sylvia.

“O Sylvia,” she said, as they walked upstairs, hand in hand, pausing on every stop to make it longer, “how could I be so glad to go away before?”

“We didn’t know,” said Sylvia.

“No,” as they crept up another step; “Sylvia, will you always think of me just here on this step, as you go up to bed?”

“Yes,” said Sylvia, “that I will. And, Katie, would it be wrong just to whisper a little prayer then that you might be good and happy?”

“It couldn’t be wrong, Sylvia; only couldn’t you just ask, too, for me to come home?”

“I don’t know,” said Sylvia thoughtfully, pausing a long time on the step. “You see we know it is sure to be God’s will that you should be good and happy; but if it was not for you to come home, we might be like Balaam, you know, if we asked it too much, and it might come about in some terrible way.”

“I didn’t think of that,” said Kate. And the two little girls parted gravely and peacefully; Kate somehow feeling as if, though grievous things were before her, the good little kind Sylvia’s hearty prayers must obtain some good for her.

There is no use in telling how sad the parting was when Mr. Wardour and the little Countess set out for London again. Mary had begged hard to go too, thinking that she could plead for Kate better than anyone else; but Mr. Wardour thought Lady Barbara more likely to be angered than softened by their clinging to their former charge; and besides, it was too great an expense.

He had no doubt of Lady Barbara’s displeasure from the tone of the note that morning received, coldly thanking him and Miss Wardour for their intelligence, and his promise to restore Lady Caergwent on Tuesday. She was sorry to trouble him to bring the child back; she would have come herself, but that her sister was exceedingly unwell, from the alarm coming at a time of great family affliction. If Lady Caergwent were not able to return on Tuesday, she would send down her own maid to bring her home on Wednesday. The letter was civility itself; but it was plain that Lady Barbara thought Kate’s illness no better than the “previous engagement,” in the note that never was written.

What was the family affliction? Kate could not guess, but was inclined to imagine privately that Aunt Barbara was magnifying Uncle Giles’s return without being a General into a family affliction, on purpose to aggravate her offence. However, in the train, Mr. Wardour, who had been looking at the Supplement of the Times, lent to him by a fellow-traveller, touched her, and made her read –

“On the 11th, at Alexandria, in his 23rd year, Lieutenant Giles de la Poer Umfraville, of the 109th regiment; eldest, and last survivor of the children of the Honourable Giles Umfraville, late Lieutenant- Colonel of the 109th regiment.”

Kate knew she ought to be very sorry, and greatly pity the bereaved father and mother; but, somehow, she could not help dwelling most upon the certainty that everyone would be much more hard upon her, and cast up this trouble to her, as if she had known of it, and run away on purpose to make it worse. It must have been this that they were talking about in Aunt Jane’s room, and this must have made them so slow to detect her flight.

In due time the train arrived, a cab was taken, and Kate, beginning to tremble with fright, sat by Mr. Wardour, and held his coat as if clinging to him as long as she could was a comfort. Sometimes she wished the cab would go faster, so that it might be over; sometimes– especially when the streets became only too well known to her–she wished that they would stretch out and out for ever, that she might still be sitting by Papa, holding his coat. It seemed as if that would be happiness enough for life!

Here was Bruton Street; here the door that on Saturday had shut behind her! It was only too soon open, and Kate kept her eyes on the ground, ashamed that even the butler should see her. She hung back, waiting till Mr. Wardour had paid the cabman; but there was no spinning it out, she had to walk upstairs, her only comfort being that her hand was in his.

No one was in the drawing-room; but before long Lady Barbara came in. Kate durst not look up at her, but was sure, from the tone of her voice, that she must have her very sternest face; and there was something to make one shiver in the rustle of her silk dress as she curtsied to Mr. Wardour.

“I have brought home my little niece,” he said, drawing Kate forward; “and I think I may truly say, that she is very sorry for what has passed.”

There was a pause; Kate knew the terrible black eyes were upon her, but she felt, besides, the longing to speak out the truth, and a sense that with Papa by her side she had courage to do so.

“I am sorry, Aunt Barbara,” she said; “I was very self-willed; I ought not to have fancied things, nor said you used me ill, and wanted me to tell stories.”

Kate’s heart was lighter; though it beat so terribly as she said those words. She knew that they pleased ONE of the two who were present, and she knew they were right.

“It is well you should be so far sensible of your misconduct,” said Lady Barbara; but her voice was as dry and hard as ever, and Mr. Wardour added, “She is sincerely sorry; it is from her voluntary confession that I know how much trouble she has given you; and I think, if you will kindly forgive her, that you will find her less self-willed in future.”

And he shoved Kate a little forward, squeezing her hand, and trying to withdraw his own. She perceived that he meant that she ought to ask pardon; and though it went against her more than her first speech had done, she contrived to say, “I do beg pardon, Aunt Barbara; I will try to do better.”

“My pardon is one thing, Katharine,” said Lady Barbara. “If your sorrow is real, of course I forgive you;” and she took Kate’s right- hand–the left was still holding by the fingers’ ends to Mr. Wardour. “But the consequences of such behaviour are another consideration. My personal pardon cannot, and ought not, to avert them–as I am sure you must perceive, Mr. Wardour,” she added, as the frightened child retreated upon him. Those consequences of Aunt Barbara’s were fearful things! Mr. Wardour said something, to which Kate scarcely attended in her alarm, and her aunt went on –

“For Lady Caergwent’s own sake, I shall endeavour to keep this most unfortunate step as much a secret as possible. I believe that scarcely anyone beyond this house is aware of it; and I hope that your family will perceive the necessity of being equally cautious.”

Mr. Wardour bowed, and assented.

“But,” added Lady Barbara, “it has made it quite impossible for my sister and myself to continue to take the charge of her. My sister’s health has suffered from the constant noise and restlessness of a child in the house: the anxiety and responsibility are far too much for her; and in addition to this, she had such severe nervous seizures from the alarm of my niece’s elopement, that nothing would induce me to subject her to a recurrence of such agitation. We must receive the child for the present, of course; but as soon as my brother returns, and can attend to business, the matter must be referred to the Lord Chancellor, and an establishment formed, with a lady at the head, who may have authority and experience to deal with such an ungovernable nature.”

“Perhaps,” said Mr. Wardour, “under these circumstances it might be convenient for me to take her home again for the present.”

Kate quivered with hope; but that was far too good to be true; Lady Barbara gave a horrid little cough, and there was a sound almost of offence in her “Thank you, you are very kind, but that would be quite out of the question. I am at present responsible for my niece.”

“I thought, perhaps,” said Mr. Wardour, as an excuse for the offer, “that as Lady Jane is so unwell, and Colonel Umfraville in so much affliction, it might be a relief to part with her at present.”

“Thank you,” again said Lady Barbara, as stiffly as if her throat were lined with whalebone; “no inconvenience can interfere with my duty.”

Mr. Wardour knew there was no use in saying any more, and inquired after Lady Jane. She had, it appeared, been very ill on Saturday evening, and had not since left her room. Mr. Wardour then said that Kate had not been aware, till a few hours ago, of the death of her cousin, and inquired anxiously after the father and mother; but Lady Barbara would not do more than answer direct questions, and only said that her nephew had been too much weakened to bear the journey, and had sunk suddenly at Alexandria, and that his father was, she feared, very unwell. She could not tell how soon he was likely to be in England. Then she thanked Mr. Wardour for having brought Lady Caergwent home, and offered him some luncheon; but in such a grave grand way, that it was plain that she did not want him to eat it, and, feeling that he could do no more good, he kissed poor Kate and wished Lady Barbara good-bye.

Poor Kate stood, drooping, too much constrained by dismay even to try to cling to him, or run after him to the foot of the stairs.

“Now, Katharine,” said her aunt, “come up with me to your Aunt Jane’s room. She has been so much distressed about you, that she will not be easy till she has seen you.”

Kate followed meekly; and found Aunt Jane sitting by the fire in her own room, looking flushed, hot, and trembling. She held out her arms, and Kate ran into them; but neither of them dared to speak, and Lady Barbara stood up, saying, “She says she is very sorry, and thus we may forgive her; as I know you do all the suffering you have undergone on her account.”

Lady Jane held the child tighter, and Kate returned her kisses with all her might; but the other aunt said, “That will do. She must not be too much for you again.” And they let go as if a cold wind had blown between them.

“Did Mr. Wardour bring her home?” asked Lady Jane.

“Yes; and was kind enough to propose taking her back again,” was the answer, with a sneer, that made Kate feel desperately angry, though she did not understand it.

In truth, Lady Barbara was greatly displeased with the Wardours. She had always been led to think her niece’s faults the effect of their management; and she now imagined that there had been some encouragement of the child’s discontent to make her run away; and that if they had been sufficiently shocked and concerned, the truant would have been brought home much sooner. It all came of her having allowed her niece to associate with those children at Bournemouth. She would be more careful for the future.

Careful, indeed, she was! She had come to think of her niece as a sort of small wild beast that must never be let out of sight of some trustworthy person, lest she should fly away again.

A daily governess, an elderly person, very grave and silent, came in directly after breakfast, walked with the Countess, and heard the lessons; and after her departure, Kate was always to be in the room with her aunts, and never was allowed to sit in the schoolroom and amuse herself alone; but her tea was brought into the dining-room while her aunts were at dinner, and morning, noon, and night, she knew that she was being watched.

It was very bitter to her. It seemed to take all the spirit away from her, as if she did not care for books, lessons, or anything else. Sometimes her heart burnt with hot indignation, and she would squeeze her hands together, or wring round her handkerchief in a sort of misery; but it never got beyond that; she never broke out, for she was depressed by what was still worse, the sense of shame. Lady Barbara had not said many words, but had made her feel, in spite of having forgiven her, that she had done a thing that would be a disgrace to her for ever; a thing that would make people think twice before they allowed their children to associate with her; and that put her below the level of other girls. The very pain that Lady Barbara took to hush it up, her fears lest it should come to the ears of the De la Poers, her hopes that it MIGHT not be necessary to reveal it to her brother, assisted to weigh down Kate with a sense of the heinousness of what she had done, and sunk her so that she had no inclination to complain of the watchfulness around her. And Aunt Jane’s sorrowful kindness went to her heart.

“How COULD you do it, my dear?” she said, in such a wonderful wistful tone, when Kate was alone with her.

Kate hung her head. She could not think now.

“It is so sad,” added Lady Jane; “I hoped we might have gone on so nicely together. And now I hope your Uncle Giles will not hear of it. He would be so shocked, and never trust you again.”

“YOU will trust me, when I have been good a long time, Aunt Jane?”

“My dear, I would trust you any time, you know; but then that’s no use. I can’t judge; and your Aunt Barbara says, after such lawlessness, you need very experienced training to root out old associations.”

Perhaps the aunts were more shocked than was quite needful and treated Kate as if she had been older and known better what she was doing; but they were sincere in their horror at her offence; and once she even heard Lady Barbara saying to Mr. Mercer that there seemed to be a doom on the family–in the loss of the promising young man–and- -The words were not spoken, but Kate knew that she was this greatest of all misfortunes to the family.

Poor child! In the midst of all this, there was one comfort. She had not put aside what Mr. Wardour had told her about the Comforter she could always have. She DID say her prayers as she had never said them before, and she looked out in the Psalms and Lessons for comforting verses. She knew she had done very wrong, and she asked with all the strength of her heart to be forgiven, and made less unhappy, and that people might be kinder to her. Sometimes she thought no help was coming, and that her prayers did no good, but she went on; and then, perhaps, she got a kind little caress from Lady Jane, or Mr. Mercer spoke good-naturedly to her, or Lady Barbara granted her some little favour, and she felt as if there was hope and things were getting better; and she took courage all the more to pray that Uncle Giles might not be very hard upon her, nor the Lord Chancellor very cruel.

CHAPTER XIV.

A fortnight had passed, and had seemed nearly as long as a year, since Kate’s return from Oldburgh, when one afternoon, when she was lazily turning over the leaves of a story-book that she knew so well by heart that she could go over it in the twilight, she began to gather from her aunt’s words that somebody was coming.

They never told her anything direct; but by listening a little more attentively to what they were saying, she found out that a letter– no, a telegram–had come while she was at her lessons; that Aunt Barbara had been taking rooms at a hotel; that she was insisting that Jane should not imagine they would come to-night–they would not come till the last train, and then neither of them would be equal –

“Poor dear Emily! But could we not just drive to the hotel and meet them? It will be so dreary for them.”

“You go out at night! and for such a meeting! when you ought to be keeping yourself as quiet as possible! No, depend upon it they will prefer getting in quietly, and resting to-night; and Giles, perhaps, will step in to breakfast in the morning.”

“And then you will bring him up to me at once! I wonder if the boy is much altered!”

Throb! throb! throb! went Kate’s heart! So the terrible stern uncle was in England, and this was the time for her to be given up to the Lord Chancellor and all his myrmidons (a word that always came into her head when she was in a fright). She had never loved Aunt Jane so well; she almost loved Aunt Barbara, and began to think of clinging to her with an eloquent speech, pleading to be spared from the Lord Chancellor!