Blanche: A Story for Girls

“That would be nice,” said Hebe. “I daresay Miss Derwent could help us. And we must have some treats for the girls when the weather is quite warm enough. Let us have a meeting, and talk it all over. You can ask Miss Wandle and Miss Bracy, and I will get Norman’s sister to come, though it is rather beyond their part of the country. For she might get leave to invite the guild to Crossburn. Yes, do let us have a nice afternoon-tea meeting here, and talk it over comfortably.”

Mrs Harrowby consented. There were not many people who could refuse Hebe anything she had set her heart upon. Besides, the vicars wife had no objection to the proposal. She was kind-hearted, if a trifle dictatorial, and not without a pleasant strain of humour, as well as a fair amount of sympathy.

So, on the appointed afternoon, Blanche and Stasy made their way to the vicarage.

“How pretty you look, Blanchie!” said Stasy, with a gush of sisterly enthusiasm. “I do think you are getting prettier and prettier. England suits you, I suppose,” with a little sigh.

Blanche laughed.

“Suits my looks, I suppose you mean?” she said lightly. Stasy’s admiration amused, but did not much impress her. Indeed she was not of the nature to be much impressed by any admiration. She knew she was “pretty,” as she called it to herself, but the subject never dwelt in her thoughts. And she was entirely without vanity. Many a girl of far less beauty, of no beauty at all, gives a hundred times more consideration to the question of outward appearance than would have been possible under any circumstances for Blanche Derwent.

There seemed to be quite a number of people in the vicarage drawing-room when they entered it. Stasy – who, to tell the truth, was feeling a trifle shy, though wild horses would not have drawn such a confession from her – had insisted on coming some minutes later than the hour at which they had been invited.

“I don’t want to seem so very eager about it,” she said to Blanche. “And if we go early, we are sure to be set down to talk to some of the Green people. It would be horrid.”

To some extent, she was caught in her own trap. A chair was offered her between two girls, neither of whom she had seen before, and who, she immediately decided, must belong to the neighbours she certainly had no reason to feel friendliness towards. For, whatever had been the motive, and though very possibly their staying away was from the social point of view more gratifying than their calling would have been, no kindliness of any kind had been shown or attempted by the good folk of Pinnerton Green to the little family who had come as strangers among them.

Stasy glanced cautiously at the girls beside her. One was plain, not to say ugly, and dressed with almost exaggerated simplicity. Her features were heavy and ill-assorted; her nose was large, and nevertheless seemed too short for the curious length of her face; her eyes – no, she was not looking Stasy’s way – her eyes could not be pronounced upon.

“She is really ugly,” thought Stasy; “I haven’t seen any English girl as ugly as she is. And how very plainly she is dressed: I wonder if it is because she knows she is ugly. It cannot be that she’s poor: all these common people here are rich. Her dress is only” – Stasy gave another covert glance at the cloth skirt touching her own – “only – no, it’s good of its kind, though so plainly made, and yet – ”

Yes, there was a “yet,” very decidedly, both as to dress, which was the very best of its kind, and, when the girl slowly turned to Stasy with some trivial remark, as to looks. For her eyes were beautiful, quite beautiful, with the touch of pathos in them which one sometimes sees in eyes which are the only redeeming feature of an undeniably plain face.

“Have a little indulgence for me – I cannot help myself,” such eyes seem to say, and Stasy, sensitive as quicksilver, responded at once to the unspoken appeal.

“Thank you,” she said gently, “I have plenty of room – no, I don’t mind being near the window,” and then she salved over to herself her suavity to “one of those Wandle or Bracy girls,” by reflecting that Blanche had said it would be very wrong indeed to show anything but perfect courtesy and kindliness at a party especially arranged for a charitable object, though a slight misgiving came over her when the owner of the beautiful eyes spoke again in an evidently less conventional and more friendly tone.

“That was your sister who came in with you, was it not? I am so glad to see her more distinctly. She is so – so very lovely.”

Stasy, gratified though she felt on one side, stiffened slightly. Miss Wandle should not comment upon Blanche’s appearance, however favourably.

“Yes,” she said, “every one thinks so. I do, I can’t deny.”

Then she turned to her neighbour on the right. She was a pretty girl, with wavy brown hair, and a charming rosebud of a face. But her dress, though much more studied than the austere but perfectly fitting tweed, jarred at once on Stasy’s correct instincts. So did her voice, when in reply to the inquiry as to whether any guild business had yet been transacted, she said:

“Oh no, we always have tea first. Mrs Harrowby says it makes us feel more at” – was there or was there not a suspicion of the absence of the aspirate, instantaneously and almost obtrusively corrected? – “at – at home; not so shy about speaking out, you know.”

“Oh indeed,” said Stasy.

Then she turned again to the heavy face and the luminous eyes, in whose depths she now read a twinkle of fun.

“I like you, whoever you are,” she thought. And as at that moment Hebe came up with outstretched hand and cordial “How do you do? You found your way the other day, I hope?” an irrepressible little burst of enthusiasm made its way through her caution.

“Is she not charming? She is always so perfectly sweet and happy,” she said.

“Yes indeed,” her neighbour replied, and the bright responsive smile on her face made one forget everything except the eyes. “She is —perfectly charming. I like to see that she gives the same impression to strangers as to those who have known her long. I can remember her nearly all my life, and yet every time I see her there seems something new. She is – I daresay you know? – she is going to be married to my brother Norman. Won’t it be delightful to have her for a sister?”

And again the beautiful eyes gleamed with something brighter than their ordinary expression of appeal.

Stasy gasped. Who, then, was this girl? For an instant, a wild, ridiculous idea rushed through her mind that Lady Hebe must be going to marry one of the Wandles or Bracys, so prepossessed was she with her first guess about her plain-featured neighbour. But she dismissed it at once, and she began to feel shocked at her own want of discernment.

The colour mounted into her face as she replied to her companions question.

“I didn’t know; at least,” hesitatingly, “I am not sure. I think I did hear something, but I can’t remember. I – Please don’t think me rude, but I don’t know your name.”

“I am Rosy Milward. We live at Crossburn, the dearest old, old house in the world,” said the girl.

“Oh!” said Stasy. “Yes, I have heard your name. It will be delightful to have Lady Hebe for your sister.”

But her tone was slightly melancholy. She had been cherishing, half unconsciously perhaps, dreams of special friendship, romantic friendship, between Lady Hebe and herself (though she called it “us,” reluctant to leave out Blanche from anything so charming). And now her dreams seemed shattered. She – Hebe – was going to be married, and here was a sister-friend all ready made for her. It was much better never to expect to see or know any more of the future wife of Mr Norman Milward.

Rosy was conscious of the underlying disappointment, though she could not have defined it.

“I wish I could invite them to come to Crossburn,” she thought to herself. “I don’t like to see such a young girl so subdued and almost sad. But unless grandmamma would call, of course I can’t, and I’m afraid there is no use in trying for that.”

The Milwards had no mother, and their father’s mother, who had to some extent brought them up, was old, and naturally disinclined to make new acquaintances without strong motives for doing so; somewhat narrow and exclusive she was, too, in her ideas, and in this a great contrast to the old friend, with whom, nevertheless, she had much in common – Mrs Selwyn.

Just as Miss Milward was feeling about for some other topic of conversation which might interest her companion, Stasy bent towards her.

“Would you mind telling me who the girl is on my other side – she can’t hear, she is speaking to some one else?”

Rosy glanced across Stasy: she had forgotten for the moment who was sitting there.

“Oh yes,” she said; “that is – let me see. I often confuse the two families: they are cousins. Oh yes; that is Miss Wandle – Florry Wandle, Mrs Harrowby calls her. She helps a good deal with the guild. She has a nice, pretty face, hasn’t she?”

“Very pretty,” Stasy agreed, and she meant what she said, and something in Miss Milward’s tone gratified her. There was a tacit and tactful taking for granted that their little commentary on Miss Wandle was from the same point of view: there was no touch of surprise that Stasy did not already know the girl, or that the Pinnerton Green folk were not of the Derwents’ “world.”

Then they went on to talk a little of the guild and its interests, till a summons to Miss Milward to help at the tea-table interrupted the tête-à-tête. But Stasy’s mercurial spirits had risen again, and they rose still higher, when, encouraged by an almost imperceptible signal from Lady Hebe, she ventured to leave her place, and, as one of the youngest present, volunteered her services in handing about bread and butter and cakes.

And Blanche, meanwhile? On entering, she had at once been led over to the other end of the room, which was a long one, by Mrs Harrowby, and ensconsed in a corner beside Lady Hebe.

“Now, I want to talk to you very seriously, Miss Derwent,” said Blanche’s “girl with the happy face.”

“Mrs Harrowby and I are counting on your doing great things to help us. You see it is such a disadvantage in any little work of this kind for those who principally manage it to be so much away. And if you could take interest in it, it would be such a good thing for the girls. For I suppose” – and she glanced up with a touch of apology – “I suppose you will not be going to London for the season this year, as you have come here so lately?”

“No,” said Blanche simply, “we shall certainly stay here. I doubt if we shall ever go to London except for a day or two’s shopping: we have no friends there.”

“It will be different, of course, when you have been longer in England,” said Hebe. “And,” she added with a smile, “when your sister comes out, I scarcely think she would be satisfied with nothing more amusing than Pinnerton, however content you are.”

Blanche coloured a little.

“You think me better than I am,” she said. “I should enjoy – things – too, but if one can’t have them? But I think I should mind for Stasy more than for myself. She is naturally more dependent on outside life than I. She does feel it very dull and lonely here, and I wish she had some companions.” Hebe looked and felt full of sympathy.

“I hope your life here will brighten by degrees,” she said. “Don’t you think your sister would do something to help us, too? She seems so clever.”

“Yes, she is very quick, and she can be very amusing,” said Blanche. “We should both be glad to do anything we can. But have you not a good many helpers already? And those other ladies – the residents here —they don’t go away. Could not they take charge in your absence much better than a stranger like me?”

She glanced across the room to where Miss Adela Bracy, a small, capable-looking, dark girl, was at the moment saying something in a low voice to the rosebud-faced Florry Wandle. Lady Hebe’s eyes followed hers.

“They are very good, so far as they go,” she replied, “but they are not quite capable of taking the lead. And they have really as much to do as they can manage. It is some one to replace myself when I am away that I want to find. And I could explain it all to you so well, and get advice from you too, I have no doubt.”

“I am very ignorant about such things,” said Blanche.

“Yes, but you have a good head, and you” – here Hebe smiled and blushed a little – “well, you must know how I mean. It would be so different explaining things to you: you would see them from our point of view. These girls are very good-natured and nice, but I never feel sure that they perfectly understand.”

And then she went on to tell Blanche further details about the little work she had inaugurated and carried on – so simply, and yet earnestly, that Blanche’s full interest was quickly won, and they went on talking eagerly till tea and interruption came, as Hebe had to help Mrs Harrowby with her hostess duties.

After tea, some of the ladies drew a little closer together: they were the committee, I believe, and Mrs Harrowby read aloud, for the benefit of all present, a short report of the work that had been done during the last three months, and then some one else sketched out what they hoped to do during the summer, and what they were in want of to enable them to carry out these intentions. Then Lady Hebe announced Miss Milwards offer of a day’s entertainment for the girls at Crossburn House, and Miss Milward was duly thanked; and there was a good deal of practical and some very unpractical talk, during which Mrs Harrowby and Hebe managed to introduce the Misses Derwent as new members whose assistance would be of great value, Hebe going on to say that Miss Derwent had kindly consented to take her own place during her absence in London. Altogether, it was cheerful and informal, and, to Stasy especially, very amusing.

But just as the Derwents were beginning to feel more at home, and Blanche had been introduced to Rosy Milward, and Stasy was laughing at Miss Wandle’s despair about her girls’ insubordination at the singing class, which was her special charge, there fell a wet blanket on the little party. The door opened, and “Lady Marth” was announced.

Hebe’s face sobered. She had not expected her guardian’s wife to call for her, as she had promised to be back before the hour at which Lady Marth wished her to drive with her to Blissmore, and Hebe was a very punctual person.

“Josephine!” she exclaimed. “It is not late. You said you did not want me till – ”

“Oh no, you are not late,” said the new-comer, after shaking hands with Mrs Harrowby and one or two others. “I only came on because Archie” – and here she suddenly turned and looked round her – “where is he? I thought he was behind me – ”

“Who – Archie Dunstan?” said Hebe.

“Yes; he wanted to see you about something or other – fishing or something – and he did not venture to come on here alone, when he heard there was a meeting going on. But it’s over, isn’t it? It doesn’t look very solemn.”

“Well, I think we have discussed everything we had to settle,” said Mrs Harrowby, getting up again from the chair beside Lady Marth, which she had momentarily occupied. “I must say a word or two to Miss – Oh, here he is, Lady Marth – here is Mr Dunstan.”

Chapter Eleven

Ruffled Plumage

“Yes, here I am,” said the young man, as he entered the room and hastened up to Mrs Harrowby, no one suspecting that in his rapid transit he had managed to take in the fact of certain individuals’ presence. “Yes, here I am; and I should apologise, I know, but it is all Lady Marth’s fault. She dragged me here, and then left me in the lurch with the ponies at the door, quite forgetting I was not the groom. And then, no doubt, she has been wondering ‘what in the world has become of that Archie.’”

The few within hearing could not help laughing, he reproduced so cleverly Lady Marth’s coldly languid tones.

She laughed herself, and her laugh was a pleasant one.

“You are very impertinent,” she said. “And as for dragging you here – you know you were dying for an excuse to get in to see what one of Hebe’s meetings was like. He reminded me of the legendary female who exists in so many families, you know, whose husband was a Freemason, and she hid herself to overhear their secrets,” she went on, to Miss Milward, who happened to be nearest her, Mrs Harrowby by this time having crossed the room to Florry Wandle and her cousin.

“Well, my curiosity has not been rewarded – nor punished,” said Mr Dunstan.

And as he spoke he glanced at Blanche, who was standing a little behind Rosy. He had already shaken hands with her, in an unobtrusive, friendly, yet deferential way, which somehow gratified her, simple and un-self-conscious as she was.

“He is such a rattle of a young fellow,” she said to herself; “I wonder he remembers having met me before.”

“When will Hebe be ready?” said Lady Marth, with a sort of soft complaint, as if she had been kept waiting for hours. “Does she need to go on talking confidentially to all those bakers’ and brewers’ daughters whom she is so fond of? – Can’t you give her a hint to be quick, Rosy?”

She half turned, laying her hand on what she supposed to be Miss Milward’s arm; but, somehow, Rosy had moved away. The arm Lady Marth actually touched was Blanche’s.

Blanche started. She had been watching Archie.

“Can I – ” she began; but before she had time to say more, Lady Marth drew herself back.

“Where is Rosy?” she said haughtily. “I thought – I thought the meeting was over, and that we were only ourselves. I really must go,” and she stood up, drawing her cloak, which had partly slipped off, more closely round her shoulders.

Mr Dunstans face grew stern, all the boyishness died out of it, and he looked ten years older.

“Miss Derwent,” he said, in a peculiarly clear and most respectful tone, “I do beg your pardon. I did not notice till this moment that you were standing. If you are going, Lady Marth, you will allow me to move your chair,” and, as he spoke, he drew it forward a little.

Lady Marth gave him an icy glance over her shoulder, and moved away. Blanche simply accepted the courtesy.

“I want to go too,” she said quietly; “but I must see Lady Hebe for one moment, first.”

“Don’t hurry,” said Mr Dunstan; “she is saying good-bye to those girls now, and she is looking towards you. It will do Lady Marth good to be kept waiting for once, so pray be as deliberate as you like. No one asked her to come here, unless – unless, indeed, I did so myself. I don’t – She is quite odious, sometimes,” he went on, disconnectedly, looking, for once, not equal to the occasion.

Blanche lifted her serene eyes to his face.

“Did you think she was rude to me?” she said. “Please don’t mind. She does not know me, or anything about me, so what does it matter? I should mind if any one I knew or cared about was disagreeable or unkind; but when it is a perfect stranger it is quite different.”

The young man looked at her with a mixture of admiration and perplexity. Had she not taken in the covert impertinence of Lady Marth’s speech?

He smiled a little as he replied. “You are very philosophical and very sensible, Miss Derwent,” he said. “But still, I am afraid you must think English people have very bad manners.”

“I have not seen many; I can scarcely judge,” she said. “But I should not like to say so. I think Lady Hebe and that old lady, Mrs Selwyn, and Mrs Harrowby – oh, and others I could name – have charming manners.”

“Why don’t you include my aunt – by marriage only – at Alderwood?” he said maliciously.

Blanche laughed a little.

“Some people can’t help being awkward, I suppose,” she said. “She means to be kind, I think.”

Archie’s face brightened.

“Now you are better than sensible,” he said eagerly – “you are truly kind and charitable. And you are not mistaken. My aunt does mean to be kind, so far as she can understand it. A great many ugly things in this world come from ignorance, after all.”

“And from want of imagination,” said Blanche, thoughtfully. “Want of power to put one’s self in the place of another.”

She was beginning to think there was more in this young man, who had struck her at first as a mere boyish rattle; she was beginning to have a touch of the delightful suspicion that he was one who would “understand” her; and her face grew luminous, and her sweet eyes brighter, as she spoke.

He glanced at her again, with a smile in which there was no disappointment for her.

“Yes, I often think so; I have come to think so. But you are very young to have made such a discovery.”

Blanche could scarcely help laughing at his tone, she had so completely made up her mind that he was little, if any, older than she.

“Why,” she began, “I cannot be much – ” But here she suddenly caught sight of Stasy’s face looking across at her with a sort of indignant appeal.

“Do come away, Blanchie,” it seemed to say.

“Something has rubbed her the wrong way,” thought Blanche, and she moved forward at once. “I think my sister wants me,” she said, with a little movement of the head, as if in farewell.

Archie Dunstan followed her with his eyes; but he was not long left in peace.

“Can’t you get Hebe to come away?” said Lady Marth, in a tone that very little more would have rendered querulous. “Rosy has gone now. Everybody has gone. You are as bad as Hebe, Archie. What on earth could you find to talk to that Miss Wandle, or Bracy, or whoever she was, about?”

“She was neither a Miss Wandle nor a Miss Bracy, Lady Marth,” said Mr Dunstan. “I thought you had more discernment,” and he calmly walked away, entirely disregarding her request that he would summon Hebe.

Lady Marth was angry. She had known that the girl he was talking to was not one of the Pinnerton Green tradespeople’s daughters, and she had had a strong suspicion that she was Miss Derwent. But, of course, she was not going to allow this. She had taken one of her violent and unreasonable prejudices to the Derwents, whom she knew almost nothing about, and would not have felt the slightest interest in, had she not found out that Hebe had come across them, and meant or wished to be kind to them. And she was really very much attached to Hebe, and cared for her good opinion. It annoyed her that she had not been herself appealed to by her husband’s ward in the matter, little sympathy though she would have felt about it, as what she called “one of Hebe’s fads.”

Perhaps, on the whole, it had been a mistake on the girl’s part not to have made an effort to enlist Lady Marth’s interest in the Derwents. But she had been afraid to do so, knowing by experience how extraordinarily disagreeable “Josephine” could be to any one she considered beneath her. Still, her reticence had aroused deeper prejudice on Lady Marth’s side than need have been drawn out; and Mr Dunstan’s manner and tone increased it.

Blanche made her way somewhat anxiously to Stasy.

“Do let us go,” said the younger girl in a half-whisper. “I am sure mamma will be wondering why we are so long,” she added in a louder tone, for Mrs Harrowby’s benefit.

“I was only waiting because Lady Hebe wanted to say something to me,” said Blanche; and Hebe, who had said good-bye by this time to Miss Wandle and her cousin, came hurrying up.

“I won’t keep you any longer just now,” she said, for she had an instinctive dread of Lady Marth; “I am so sorry. Just tell me this – can you meet me here alone some afternoon to look over the account-books, so that it may all be quite clear to you?”

Blanche hesitated. Why should they meet “here?” She could understand Hebe’s not asking her to go to East Moddersham, considering that Lady Marth had not seen fit to call upon Mrs Derwent, but why should not Hebe offer to come to Pinnerton Lodge herself? She glanced up. Hebe was slightly flushed, her lips were parted, and she seemed a little anxious. The expression was new to Blanche on that usually untroubled face, and it touched her. Blanche’s dignity was too simple and true for her to think much about what was “due” to it.

“Yes,” she said, “I can easily do so.”

“Oh, thank you,” said Hebe in a tone of relief.

Then a day and hour were rapidly decided upon, and in another minute or two the sisters found themselves outside the vicarage, on their way home, after saying good-bye to Mrs Harrowby, cordially on Blanche’s part, most cordially on that of the vicar’s wife, somewhat stiffly on Stasys. Mr Dunstan held the door open for them as they passed out, and his markedly deferential bow somewhat smoothed the younger girl’s ruffled plumage.