Jacinth smiled.

'No,' she said, 'I don't think Francie _over_works, but she does very well. The being at school has really been a good thing for her, for she feels herself that she is the better for emulation.'

'And the Scarletts are gentlewomen, thorough gentlewomen,' said Lady Myrtle, musingly. 'That makes a difference. And I suppose a good many of the pupils are really nice--lady-like and refined?'

'Yes,' said Jacinth, readily. 'The boarders are all nice--some of them really as nice in every way as they can be, clever, too, and anxious to learn. I don't seem to know them quite as well as Frances does, for, somehow, I am not very quick at making friends,' and she looked up at Lady Myrtle with a slight questioning in her eyes. The confession did not sound very amiable. But the old lady nodded rea.s.suringly.

'Just as well or better that it should be so,' she said. 'Few friends and faithful has been my motto. Indeed, as for _great_ friends I never had but one, and you know who that was, and I verily believe she never had any one as much to her as I was.' She sighed a little. 'Your sister is quite a child--a very nice child, I am sure, but she is not a Moreland at all. I have heard of some girls at Miss Scarlett's--let me see, who were they? What are the names of the ones you like best?'

Jacinth hesitated.

'There are the--the Eves,' she said, 'two sisters, and the Beckinghams, and Miss Falmouth. She is almost too old for us.'

But the Harpers she did not name, saying to herself that her aunt had advised her not to do so. In this she deceived herself. Miss Mildmay would never have counselled her direct avoidance of mention of the two girls whom Frances--and she herself in her heart--thought the most highly of among their companions.

Lady Myrtle caught at the last name.

'Falmouth,' she repeated. 'Yes, it must have been of her I heard. I know her aunt. Very nice people.'

Then she went on to talk a little of Jacinth's own special tastes and studies, to ask what news the girls had last had from India, how often they wrote, and so on, to all of which Jacinth replied with her usual simple directness, for she felt perfectly at ease with her hostess. And the little reminiscences and allusions to the long-ago days when all the young interests of Jacinth Moreland and Myrtle Harper were shared together, with which the old lady's talk was so interspersed, in no way bored or wearied this girl of to-day, as it might have done some of her contemporaries. On the contrary, such allusions made Jacinth feel more on a level with her companion, and flattered her by showing her the confidence with which she was regarded.

'I don't suppose she would speak of those past times to _any one_ but me,' thought Jacinth proudly. 'Except, of course, perhaps to mamma.'

CHAPTER VIII.

DELICATE GROUND.

The two days at Robin Redbreast pa.s.sed most satisfactorily, and long before they came to an end Jacinth felt completely at home. It would have been almost impossible for her or for any girl not to feel grateful for Lady Myrtle's extreme kindness, but besides this, everything in the life suited Jacinth's peculiar character. She liked the perfect order, the completeness of the arrangements, just as--in very different surroundings--she liked and appreciated the same qualities in her aunt's sphere. Mere luxury or display would not have pleased her in the same way, and except in the one matter of flowers and all expenses connected with her garden, Lady Myrtle lived simply. The house itself, though in perfectly good taste, was decidedly plain; the furniture belonged to a severe and unluxurious date. The colouring was harmonious, but un.o.btrusive.

But Jacinth thought it perfection. Her own room--the one which the old lady had specially chosen for her, and which she impressed upon her she must think of as appropriated to her--was exactly what she liked. The chintz hangings--pale pink rosebuds on a white ground--the quaint spindle-legged dressing-tables and chairs, the comfortably s.p.a.cious but undecorated wardrobe of dark old mahogany, the three-cornered bookcases fitted in to the angles of the walls with their lozenge-paned gla.s.s doors--all was just as she liked.

'It's so beautifully _neat_,' she said to Lady Myrtle. 'I like a house to be almost primly neat. Frances says she's sure I shall be an old maid, and I daresay I shall be. I shouldn't mind, if I had a house of my own like this to live in.'

Lady Myrtle glanced at her with one of her peculiar but approving smiles.

'That is another point in common between us,' she said. 'I have always felt like you, and when--let me see, it must be fully twenty years ago now--when, for the first time I really was perfectly free to furnish a house to suit myself, you see I carried out my own ideas.'

'Oh, I thought Robin Redbreast was really old--furniture and all,' said Jacinth with a slight tone of disappointment.

'So it is,' said Lady Myrtle. 'A good deal of it was here in the house, and I had it done up--and some things I brought from Goodacre. My brother-in-law who succeeded there kindly let me choose out things of my favourite date. And they did not suit Goodacre, which is very grand and heavy, and, to my mind, ugly.'

'I know what you mean,' said Jacinth, eagerly--'enormous mirrors with huge gilt frames, and enormous gilt cornices over the window curtains, and great big patterns on the carpets. There was a house near Stannesley like that. It was interesting, something like an old palace, and grand; but I shouldn't like to live in a house of that kind.'

'No, there seems nothing personal about it. One's own little self makes no impression; you feel that you are just pa.s.sing through it for the time. Elvedon was rather like that, though the present tenants have managed to lighten it a good deal. But our other place--I mean my own family's place, up in the north, where I knew your dear grandmother--though not so grand, is much more homelike than Elvedon. My nephew and his wife live there when they are not in London. It is not so expensive as the place here.'

Jacinth grew a little nervous and said exactly what she did not mean to say.

'Are they not very rich, then?' and instantly blushed crimson, which Lady Myrtle took as an expression of fear lest she had been indiscreet.

And she hastened to answer so as to put the girl at ease again.

'No,' she said; 'far from it. But they will be better off some day, and it has been for their good that they have not been rich hitherto. The sins of the fathers are visited on the children, as you cannot fail to see for yourself, my dear, when you come to know more of life.' Lady Myrtle sighed. 'My poor brother Elvedon was very weak and foolish, led into all kinds of wild extravagance by--by another, much, much worse than he;' and here the old lady's face hardened. 'And naturally,' she went on, 'we--my father and I--dreaded what his son might turn out. Poor Elvedon, my nephew I mean, is far from a clever man, but he is sensible and steady, and so are his two sons. So, as I was saying, some day they will be better off.'

Jacinth listened with the utmost attention. She was much gratified by her hostess's confidence, and relieved, too, that no mention had been made of any other Harper relatives.

'Bessie and Margaret are not Lord Elvedon's daughters, of course,' she said to herself, 'so it does not seem as if they were near relations; perhaps, after all, they are not relations at all. So I don't see that I need bother my head about them; I might have mentioned them to Lady Myrtle among the girls at school without her noticing it, I daresay.'

'This is too old talk for you, my dear,' said the old lady, after a little silence.

'No, no indeed,' said Jacinth eagerly. 'I am so pleased you don't treat me as a child, dear Lady Myrtle. And I love to think of you and my grandmother long ago, when your families were almost relations, weren't they?'

'Yes, truly--Jacinth and I often said we loved each other more than if we had been sisters. That reminds me, my dear, that nice little sister of yours must come to see me some day soon, and the boy too, the next time you come. When shall that be?'

'Whenever you like, dear Lady Myrtle,' Jacinth replied.

'Well then, supposing you come again in a fortnight--next Sat.u.r.day week, that is to say. I will send for you as before, and the two children must come with you and stay till six or seven; then I will send them home again and you will remain with me till Monday morning. I must not be selfish, otherwise I would gladly have you every week. But that would not be fair to your aunt.'

'It wouldn't matter so much for Aunt Alison,' said Jacinth; 'I really don't think she would mind. But Francie and Eugene would not like me to be away every Sunday.'

'Then let us try to make it every other,' said Lady Myrtle. 'My dearest child,' and she pressed the girl's hand, 'how I wish I could have you with me altogether. But no, that would not do--it would not be a right life for her'--she seemed as if she were speaking to herself. 'Tell me, dear,' she went on, 'you do feel already _at home_ at Robin Redbreast?

I want you to learn to love the little place as well as its old owner--who can't be its owner for ever,' she added in a lower voice, so that less quick ears than Jacinth's would scarcely have caught the words.

'I love it already dearly,' she replied. 'For your sake first of all, of course, but for its own too. I couldn't imagine a more perfect old house than it is.'

They were walking in the garden, for the weather was mild and Lady Myrtle had been able to go to church that morning. It was Sunday and late afternoon. The long level rays of the evening sun fell on the large lawn--smooth and even as a bowling-green--along one side of which, on the broad terrace, the two were pacing up and down. Lady Myrtle stopped short, she was holding the girl's arm, and looked up at the windows, glinting cheerily in the red glow beginning to be reflected from the sky.

'Yes,' she said, 'it really is a dear old place. And for any one who cared to fit it for a larger family there is plenty of s.p.a.ce and convenience for extending it.'

'It seems a very good size already,' said Jacinth, 'though of course I cannot judge very well.'

'You must see it all,' said Lady Myrtle; 'the next time you come I hope I shall be quite well and able to show you all over it. No, it would scarcely need building to; but there are several rooms at the other side in rather an unfinished condition, because I really had no use for them.

The last tenant was on the point of completing them when he left. He had a large family, and it was getting too small for them, but he unexpectedly came into a property elsewhere, and then my father gave me this place. There are some very nice rooms you have not seen. Have you been in the one where my old pensioners come for their dinner every Sat.u.r.day?'

Jacinth shook her head.

'That would make a capital billiard room,' Lady Myrtle went on, Jacinth listening to all she said with the greatest interest. 'Indeed, Robin Redbreast has everything needed for a comfortable roomy house. It is too large for me, unless I had a good many visitors. When your father and mother come from India, Jacinth, I must have you all to stay with me.'

Jacinth's eyes sparkled.

'Oh how delightful that would be!' she said. 'I have often thought how they will miss Stannesley when they come home. For it is let for a long time. And wasn't it funny, Lady Myrtle, that last morning when we were saying good-bye to Uncle Marmy at the gate, we looked in at this garden, and said how lovely it would be if papa and mamma had come home, and we were all living together in a house like this! And to think it _may_ come true, if you ask us all to stay with you.'

Lady Myrtle stroked Jacinth's hand fondly.

'Yes, dear,' she said, 'it may come true, and I trust it will.'