To-day, however, the disclosure had nothing to do with domestic revolutions, and Bridgie's tone in making her announcement held an unusual note of tragedy.

"d.i.c.k, guess what! You'll never guess! Pixie's grown-up!"

For a moment Captain Victor looked as was expected of him--utterly bewildered. He lay back in his chair, his handsome face blank and expressionless, the while he stared steadily at his wife, and Bridgie stared back, her distress palpably mingled with complacence. Speak she would not, until d.i.c.k had given expression to his surprise. She sat still, therefore, shaking her head in a melancholy mandarin fashion, which had the undesired effect of restoring his complacence.

"My darling, what unnecessary woe! It's astounding, I grant you; one never expected such a feat of Pixie; but the years _will_ pa.s.s--there's no holding them, unfortunately. How old is she, by the way? Seventeen, I suppose--eighteen?"

"_Twenty_--nearly twenty-one!"

Bridgie's tone was tragic, and d.i.c.k Victor in his turn looked startled and grave. He frowned, bit his lip, and stared thoughtfully across the room.

"Twenty-one? Is it possible? Grown-up, indeed! Bridgie, we should have realised this before. We have been so content with things as they were that we've been selfishly blind. If Pixie is over twenty we have not been treating her fairly. We have treated her too much as a child.

We ought to have entertained for her, taken her about."

Bridgie sighed, and dropped her eyelids to hide the twinkle in her eyes.

Like most husbands d.i.c.k preferred a quiet domestic evening at the end of a day abroad: like most wives Bridgie would have enjoyed a little diversion at the end of a day at home. Sweetly and silently for nearly half a dozen years she had subdued her preferences to his, feeling it at once her pleasure and her duty to do so, but now, if duty suddenly a.s.sumed the guise of a gayer, more sociable life, then most cheerfully would Irish Bridgie accept the change.

"I think, dear," she said primly, "it _would_ be wise. Esmeralda has said so many a time, but I took no notice. I never did take any notice of Esmeralda, but she was right this time, it appears, and I was wrong.

Imagine it! Pixie began bemoaning that she was not pretty, and it was not herself she was grieving for, or you, or _Me_!"--Bridgie's voice sounded a crescendo of amazement over that last p.r.o.noun--"but whom do you suppose? You'll never guess! Her future _lovers_!"

It was just another instance of the provokingness of man that at this horrible disclosure d.i.c.k threw himself back in his chair in a peal of laughter; he laughed and laughed till the tears stood in his eyes, and Bridgie, despite herself, joined in the chorus. The juxtaposition of Pixie and lovers had proved just as startling to him as to his wife, but while she had been scandalised, he was frankly, whole-heartedly amused.

"Pixie!" he cried. "Pixie with a lover! It would be about as easy to think of Patsie. Dear, quaint little Pixie! Who dares to say she isn't pretty? Her funny little nose, her big, generous mouth are a hundred times more charming than the ordinary pretty face. I'll tell you what it is, darling,"--he sobered suddenly;--"Pixie's lover, whoever he may be, will be an uncommonly lucky fellow!"

Husband and wife sat in silence for some moments after this, hand in hand, as their custom was in hours of privacy, while the thoughts of each pursued the same subject--Pixie's opening life and their own duty towards it.

On both minds was borne the unwilling realisation that their own home was not the ideal abode to afford the experience of life, the open intercourse with young people of her own age which it was desirable that the girl should now enjoy. As a means of adding to his income Captain Victor had accepted the position of adjutant to a volunteer corps in a northern city, and, as comparatively new residents, his list of acquaintances was but small.

Esmeralda, or to speak more correctly, Joan, the second daughter of the O'Shaughnessy family, as the wife of the millionaire, Geoffrey Hilliard, possessed a beautiful country seat not sixty miles from town, while Jack, the eldest brother, had returned to the home of his fathers, Knock Castle, in Ireland, on the money which his wife had inherited from her father, after he had become engaged to her in her character of a penniless damsel. Jack was thankful all his life to remember that fact, though his easy-going Irish nature found nothing to worry about in the fact that the money was legally his wife's, and not his own.

Both Esmeralda as a society queen, and Sylvia as chatelaine of Knock, had opportunities of showing life to a young girl, with which Bridgie in her modest little home in a provincial town could not compete.

Nevertheless, the heart of the tender elder sister was loath to part from her charge at the very moment when watchfulness and guidance were most important. She fought against the idea; a.s.sured herself that there was time, plenty of time. What, after all, was twenty-one? In two, three years one might talk about society; in the meantime let the child be! And Captain Victor, in his turn, looked into the future, and saw his Bridgie left sisterless in this strange town, bereft all day long of the society of the sweetest and most understanding of companions, and he, too, sighed, and asked himself what was the hurry. Surely another year, a couple of years! And then, being _one_ in reality as well as in name, the eyes of husband and wife met and lingered, and, as if at the sweep of an angel's wing, the selfish thoughts fell away, and they faced their duty and accepted it once for all.

Bridgie leaned her head on her husband's shoulder and sighed thankfully.

"I have you, d.i.c.k, and the children! 'Twould be wicked to complain."

And d.i.c.k murmured gruffly--

"I want no one but you," and held her tightly in his arms, while Bridgie sniffed, and whimpered, like one of her own small children.

"But if P-ixie--_if_ Pixie is unhappy--if any wretched man breaks Pixie's heart--"

"He couldn't!" d.i.c.k Victor said firmly. "No man could. That's beyond them. Heart's like Pixie's don't break, Honey! I don't say they, may not ache at times, but breaking is a different matter. Your bantling is grown-up: you can keep her no longer beneath your wing. She must go out into the world, and work and suffer like the rest, but she'll win through. Pixie the woman will be a finer creature than Pixie the child!"

But Bridgie hid her face, and the tears rushed into her eyes, for hers was the mother's heart which longed ever to succour and protect, and Pixie was the child whom a dying father had committed to her care. It was hard to let Pixie go.

CHAPTER FOUR.

THE INVITATION.

The immediate consequence of the Pixie p.r.o.nouncement was a correspondence between her two elder sisters, wherein Bridgie ate humble-pie, and Esmeralda rode the high horse after the manner born.

"You were right about Pixie, darling. It _is_ dull for her here in this strange town, where we have _so_ few friends; and now that she is nearly twenty-one it does not seem right to shut her up. She ought to go about and see the world, and meet boys and girls of her own age. And so, dear, would it be convenient to you to have her for a few months until you go up to town? Your life in the country will seem a whirl of gaiety after our monotonous jog-trot, and she has been so useful and diligent, helping me these last years with never a thought for her own enjoyment, that she deserves all the fun she can get. I am sad at parting from her, but if it's for her good I'll make the effort. She has two nice new frocks, and I could get her another for parties." Thus Bridgie.

Esmeralda's reply came by return--the big, slanting writing, plentifully underlined--

"_At last_, my dear, you have come to your senses. For a sweet-tempered person, you certainly have, as I've told you before, a surprising amount of obstinacy. In future do try to believe that in matters of worldly wisdom I know best, and be ruled by me!

"Pixie can come at once--the sooner the better, but for pity's sake, my dear, spare me the frocks. Felice can run her up a few things to last until I have time to take her to town. If I am to take her about, she must be dressed to please _me_, and do _me_ credit.

"We have people coming and going all the time, and I'll be thankful to have her. I wouldn't say so for the world, Bridgie, but you _have_ been selfish about Pixie! Never a bit of her have I had to myself; she has come for the regular Christmas visits, of course, and sometimes in summer, but it's always been with you and d.i.c.k and the children; it's only the leavings of attention she's had to spare for any one else. Now my boys will have a chance! Perhaps she can keep them in order--_I_ can't! They are the pride and the shame, and the joy and the grief, and the sunshine and the--thunder and lightning and earthquake of my life.

Bridgie, did you ever think it would feel like that to be a mother? I thought it would be all pure joy, but there's a big ache mixed in--

"Geoff was so naughty this morning, so disobedient and rude, and I prayed, Bridgie--I shut myself in my room and prayed for patience, and then went down and spoke to him so sweetly. You'd have loved to hear me. I said: 'If you want to grow up a good, wise man like father, you must learn to be gentle and polite. Did you ever hear father speak rudely to me?'--'Oh, no,' says he, quite simply, '_but I've often heard you speak rudely to him_!' Now, what was a poor misguided mother to say to that? Especially when it was True! You are never cross, so your youngsters can never corner you like that; but I am--often! Which proves that I need Pixie more than you do, and she'd better hurry along."

Pixie came lightly into the dining-room, just as Bridgie was reading the last words of the letter. She was almost invariably late for breakfast, a fact which was annoying to Captain Victor's soldierly sense of punctuality. He looked markedly at the clock, and Pixie said genially, "I apologise, me dear. The young need sleep!" Then she fell to work at her porridge with healthy enjoyment. She wore a blue serge skirt and a bright, red silk shirt, neatly belted by a strip of patent-leather. The once straggly locks were parted in the middle, and swathed round a little head which held itself jauntily aloft; her eyes danced, her lips curved. It was a bare eight o'clock in the morning, a period when most people are languid and half-awake. But there was no languor about Pixie; she looked intensely, brilliantly alive. A stream of vitality seemed to emanate from her little form and fill the whole room. The dog stirred on the rug and rose to his feet; the canary hopped to a higher perch and began to sing; d.i.c.k Victor felt an access of appet.i.te, and helped himself to a second egg and more bacon.

"This is Wednesday," announced Pixie genially, "and it's fine. I love fine Wednesdays! It's a habit from the old school-time, when they were half-holidays, and meant so, much. ... I wonder what nice thing will happen to-day."

Husband and wife exchanged a glance. They knew and loved this habit of expecting happiness, and looking forward to the joys rather than the sorrows of the future, which had all her life, been characteristic of Pixie O'Shaughnessy. They realised that it was to this quality of mind, rather than to external happenings, that she owed her cheerful serenity, but this morning it was impossible not to wonder how she would view the proposed change of abode.

"I've had a letter from Esmeralda," announced Bridgie baldly from behind the urn, and, quick as thought, Pixie's sharp eyes searched her face.

"But that's not nice. It's given you a wrinkle. Take no notice, and she'll write to-morrow to say she's sorry. She's got to worry or die, but there's no reason why you should die too. Roll it up into spills, and forget all about it."

"I can't--it's important. And she's not worrying. It's very--" Bridgie paused for a moment, just one moment, to swallow that accusation of selfishness--"_kind_! Pixie darling, it's about _You_."

"Me!" cried Pixie, and dropped her spoon with a clang. Bridgie had already pushed back her chair from the table; Pixie pushed hers to follow suit. Such a prosaic affair as breakfast had plainly vanished from their thoughts, but Captain Victor had by no means forgotten, nor did it suit him to face emotional scenes to an accompaniment of bacon and eggs.

"_After_ breakfast, please!" he cried, in what his wife described as his "barracks" voice, and which had the effect in this instance of making her turn on the tap of the urn so hurriedly that she had not had time to place her cup underneath. She blushed and frowned. Pixie deftly moved the toast-rack so as to conceal the damage, and proceeded to eat a hearty breakfast with undiminished appet.i.te.

It was not until Captain Victor had left the room to pay his morning visit to the nursery, that Bridgie again referred to her sister's letter, and then her first words were of reproach.

"How you could sit there, Pixie, eating your breakfast, as calm as you please, when you knew there was news--news that concerned yourself!"

"I was hungry," said Pixie calmly. "And I love excitement; it's the breath of my nostrils. All the while I was making up stories, with myself as heroine. I'm afraid it will be only disappointment I'll feel when you tell me. Truth is so tame, compared to imagination. Besides, there was d.i.c.k!" She smiled a forbearing, elderly smile. "You can't live in the house with d.i.c.k without learning self-control. He's so--"

"He's not!" contradicted d.i.c.k's wife, with loyal fervour. "d.i.c.k was quite right; he always is. It was his parents who were to blame for making him English." She sighed, and stared reflectively out of the window. "We ought to be thankful, Pixie, that we are Irish through and through. It means so much that English people can't even understand-- seeing jokes when they are sad, and happiness when they are bored and being poor and not caring, and miserable and forgetting, and interested, and excited--"

"Every single hour!" concluded Pixie deeply, and they laughed in concert. In the contemplation of the advantages of an Irish temperament they had come near forgetting the real subject of discussion, but the sight of the letter on the table before her recalled it to Bridgie's remembrance. She straightened her back and a.s.sumed an air of responsibility, a natural dramatic instinct prompting her to play her part in appropriate fashion.

"d.i.c.k and I have been feeling, my dear, that as you are now really grown-up, you ought to be having a livelier time than we can give you in this strange town, and Esmeralda has been saying the same thing for years past. She feels we have been rather selfish in keeping you so much to ourselves, and thinks that it is her turn to have you to live with her for a time. We think so too, Pixie. Not for altogether, of course. For three or four months, say; and then you might go over to Knock, and come back to us again for Christmas. Of course, darling, you understand that we don't _want_ you to go!"

Pixie stared silently across the table. She had grown rather white, and her brows were knitted in anxious consideration.

"Bridget Victor," she said solemnly, "is it the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth you are telling me, or is it just an excuse to get me out of the way? If there's any trouble, or worry, or illness, or upset coming on, that you want to spare me because I'm young, you'd better know at once that it will only be the expense of the journey wasted, for on the very first breath of it I'd fly back to you if it was across the world!"