Turquoise and Ruby

“No, no, my dear girl: I will sit up for you myself with pleasure. Of course you shall go.”

“Thank you,” said Brenda: “you are more than kind.” She fidgeted a little, then continued: “It will be a very gay party, and people from many parts of England will assemble there to witness the different events of the day. Tennyson’s ‘Dream of Fair Women’ is, I believe, to take the most distinguished place in the day’s proceedings and, in short, sir – I want to be suitably dressed.”

“Of course – of course,” said Mr Amberley, looking a little confused, as he always was when the subject of money was even approached. “Eh – a neat cotton, eh?”

“Well, sir – it must be something rather better on this occasion; but if I might ask for my quarter’s salary, I have no doubt I can manage.”

“My poor, dear girl! have I forgotten it? How long is it due?”

“It won’t be due for a fortnight, sir; but I thought, under the circumstances, that you might – I mean that you would be so kind – ”

“You shall have a cheque immediately. Let me see – your salary is thirty pounds a year, that means seven pounds ten a quarter. I will write you a cheque for the amount; you can cash it at the bank. Get a pretty cool-looking cotton, my dear Miss Carlton – something with rosebuds on it: you are – so like a rosebud yourself.”

“One minute please, sir. I cannot get the sort of dress I want at Harroway. I must go to Rocheford to make my purchase and I think it would be a good opportunity to get the girls’ dresses for the seaside at the same time.”

“Oh dear, dear, dear!” said Mr Amberley. “Haven’t they got enough dresses from last year?”

“Oh, no!” said Brenda, shaking her head. “They are growing so quickly; you quite forget that.”

“I only know that my funds are very low and that there are a great many sick people in the parish,” said the rector.

“Still your children must be clothed,” said Brenda, putting on a severe air. “You have taken lodgings for them at the sea, and I can’t walk about with girls who are not presentable. I would rather, painful as it seems, resign my post – though of course I don’t really mean to do it, but – ”

The rector looked really terrified.

“You must not neglect my poor orphans! What would my children do without you? But what is necessary? What do you think each will require?”

“I can manage with three pounds for each: that is, nine pounds for the three and seven pounds ten for myself. I know it seems a great deal of money, but you cannot imagine how careful I will be.”

“I am sure – I am certain you will.”

Mr Amberley drew a cheque for the amount. He could not help sighing more than once as he did so. It represented a very large sum to him, and would preclude the possibility of his taking any holiday himself; for little Joe Hoskins and Mary Miller must go to the seaside at any cost. Nevertheless, the picture of his home without Brenda Carlton, and his three orphans neglected and forsaken, was greater than his patience could abide; and he made up his mind to do what Brenda wished, let the consequences be what they might. She had her way also with regard to the horse and trap and returned to her pupils with a cheque in her hand for sixteen pounds ten and a most triumphant expression on her pretty face.

Not the most remote idea had she of spending three pounds on each girl; but she could get them a flimsy muslin each, some brown shoes to wear on the sands, and a cheap hat for each sandy-covered head, which would delight their small minds. The rest of the money would be her own. Thus she would be able to make herself look distinguished, and yet not touch the twenty pounds which Penelope had sent her from school.

“Hurrah!” she cried, as she joined her pupils. “The good little papa has come up to the scratch. You shall have your pink muslins, and hats, and gloves, and shoes besides. Only the muslins must be made at home, and I myself will trim the hats. Now then – prepare for a happy holiday. The pony trap will be at the door by twelve o’clock. Nina, run to cook, and tell her to make up some sandwiches for us and a bottle of lemonade. We need not spend our precious fairings at the confectioner’s if we take home-made provisions with us.”

Nina, in rapture at the happy time which she felt was before her, flew off to obey Brenda’s behests and, sharp at twelve, the little party left the old rectory and drove down through the shady village street.

Brenda drove. She was a capital whip, and never looked better than when she was so employed. More than one person turned to gaze with admiration at the handsome showy girl, and her heart swelled within her with pride and satisfaction as she noticed this fact. At the bank she changed the cheque, taking care that her pupils did not see the amount which swelled her little purse.

They arrived at Rocheford in about an hour, and there a silk of the palest shade of blue was chosen with soft French lace for trimming. Nina was absolutely open-mouthed with admiration as she saw the exquisite fabric being told off in yards by the shopman. After the dress was bought, Brenda purchased very pretty pink muslins for her pupils, and white hats which she meant to trim with cheap white muslin.

They then went to a shoemaker’s where they got shoes, and to another shop for gloves, and finally to interview that modiste of great fame, as Madame Declassé described herself. But here disappointment awaited the little girls, for Brenda insisted on entering the apartment all alone.

“You, Fanchon,” she said, “must hold the pony’s reins. Don’t hold them too tight – just like this; see, mon enfant– do attend to my directions. Now then, I shan’t be very long.”

“But may not two of us come with you?” asked Josephine. “We should love to see the pretty things in Madame Declassé’s show-room.”

“No, no; I must see her alone; she will do it cheaper for me if I am alone.”

Brenda skipped away, and the girls were left in charge of the dull, over-worked little pony with the western sun beating down upon them. They had certainly passed an exciting day, but, on the whole, they were not quite satisfied. There was a mutinous feeling in each small breast which only needed the match of suspicion to set it on fire. It was Nina who, in the most casual voice, applied that match.

“I am looking at myself,” she said, “in the mirror let into the pony trap just facing us; and I am awfully red.”

“Of course you are, Nina,” laughed both her sisters.

“My face is red,” continued Nina, “and so is my hair; and my eyes are not at all big. Do you think I am really pretty, or am I ugly?”

She gave an anxious glance at Josephine and Fanchon.

“Ugly – of course,” laughed Fanchon.

“Very ugly – a little fright,” said Josephine.

“Then if I am a fright,” said Nina, becoming a more vivid crimson, “so are you, too, for you are red also, and your hair is sandy, and you have very small eyes.”

“Oh, do shut up,” said Fanchon.

Nina turned restlessly on her hot seat. “I wish I was like Brenda,” she said, after a minute’s pause.

“Well, you are not, and all the wishing in the world won’t make you so,” was Josephine’s answer.

“I suppose she is quite beautiful,” said Fanchon, with a sigh.

“Oh, yes – there isn’t a doubt of it,” continued Nina. “How the men do stare at her.”

“It’s very rude of men to stare,” said Josephine. “It is not at all to be admired.”

“But Brenda likes it, all the same,” said Nina. “I know she does, for she nudges me sometimes as we are on the way to church. What a long time she is with Madame Declassé!”

“Nina,” said Fanchon, “if you don’t sit still, you will startle Rob, and he may take it into his head to run away.”

“Rob run away! He knows better,” answered Nina. “Why, he has hardly a kick in him – poor old dear! You wouldn’t run away, would you, Rob?”

Rob flicked his ears, and gave a slight movement to his tail. This he considered sufficient answer to Nina’s tender enquiry.

“I wish Brenda was not quite so long,” she said. “Why, of course she is a long time. She has got to have her lovely blue silk made up. Fancy Brenda in silk! How astonished father will be! Silk is the dream of his life. He said when he married mother, she wore silk. She never, never wore it since – he said – she could not afford it, only very rich people could. There was a time when I thought of keeping silkworms, and winding off the silk from the cocoons until I had enough to make a dress; but Brenda laughed me out of that.”

“Well – she’s got her deserts. She must have spent a lot of money on the dress,” said Fanchon.

“She didn’t spend much on ours, that I know,” said Nina. “Those pink muslins were only sixpence three farthings the yard, and she wouldn’t get an extra yard for me, although I did so want mine to have little flounces – I think little flounces are so stylish. Oh dear, dear! I wish she would come!”

Here Nina took up a carefully folded parcel which contained the material for the girls’ pink muslin dresses.

“Let’s look at it,” she said – “let’s see it in the broad light. It’ll be something to amuse us.”

“Oh, but we never can pack it up again,” exclaimed Josephine.

“Have you got your pocket knife with you, Fanchon?” asked Nina.

Fanchon declared that she had.

“Well, give it to me, and I will cut a wee hole in the paper, just enough for us to see our darling gowns.”

This was too fascinating a proposal to be lightly refused, and in the end the girls had removed enough of the brown paper wrapping to disclose a certain portion of the delicate pink muslin which lay folded beneath.

“I wonder now,” said Nina – she raised her flushed face and looked at her red little person in the tiny square of glass – “I wonder why she makes us wear pink. Do you think, Fanchon – do you think, Josephine, that it suits us?”

The two elder girls were quite silent, but a horrified expression crept over Fanchon’s face. She was older than the others, and had once heard it said that a girl with red hair – however pretty she might be – ought not to wear pink. A sense of revolt filled her soul.

“Why don’t you speak?” said Nina.

“I – I am thinking,” she said, crossly. “Don’t worry me.”

She was thinking to good purpose. The other two seemed to divine her thoughts. They all sat silent and moody.

“I shall do a sum in arithmetic to-night,” thought Josephine. “I know exactly how many yards of that horrid pink muslin she bought and what the hats cost, and those little cheap shoes, and those gloves.”

But Josephine did not say the words aloud. After a little time Nina said:

“I saw a quantity of gold in Brenda’s purse. It seems so odd that she should spend a lot of father’s money on herself, and so very, very little on us – doesn’t it? I don’t understand it – do you, girls?”

But before the girls could reply, Brenda, looking fresh and captivating, as usual, appeared by their side.

“Now, then,” – she said – “home we go. Oh, I am glad to get out of this heat. I think we’ll have supper in the garden to-night. It will be lovely under the mulberry tree. What do you say, petites? What dear, pretty little darlings you are!”

But the pretty little darlings were not in the best of tempers, and Brenda had some trouble in getting them back to good humour. She herself was in excellent spirits, for she had employed Madame Declassé not only to make the dress in a way so sweet as to take the hearts of all who saw her by storm, but was she not also to make her a long white serge dust coat, very fashionable looking and very, very smart, and a little white hat, which would exactly finish off the pale blue costume? and was not Madame Declassé to supply a parasol and gloves, all suited to that distinguished looking young lady, Miss Brenda Carlton?

But these small matters Brenda kept to herself. It would never do for the sandy-haired daughters of the Reverend Josiah Amberley to know about them. Her object was to humour them to the very top of their bent until she got them away with her to the seaside, and then – behold! what twenty pounds still quite unspent might not achieve! For the blue silk dress was paid for, and Madame Declassé would not charge for the making up, nor for the parasol, nor the white serge coat, nor the pretty white hat, for a long, long time. It really did not matter to Madame when her little bills were paid. She was quite willing and ready to accommodate her customers.

As the little party were driving in by the tumble-down gates, Nina, however, made a remark. She raised her light blue eyes and looked full at Brenda and said, in a tone of question and some alarm:

“Do you really, really think, Brenda, that pink muslin is the most suitable sort of dress for red girls like us?”

“Of course she doesn’t,” said Fanchon.

Josephine was silent. Brenda looked hastily from one of her pupils to the other.

“Listen,” she said, “I have considered the subject of your toilettes with the utmost care. Your good father can allow very little for your clothes. He imagines that you will wear stout cotton dresses during your sojourn at Marshlands-on-the-Sea, but I do not intend you to appear in anything so gauche. I have, therefore, bought delicate muslin, which will be made up to suit you. Of course pink muslin will suit you; it is the colour for blondes like yourselves.”

“Blondes, are we?” said Nina – “I thought we were reds!”

“You little goose!” exclaimed Brenda, bending forward and kissing Nina with affection. “Haven’t you just the darlingest little face, and who loves you if your own Brenda does not? But talk to your father on the subject if you wish, and I will change the pink muslins for cottons to-morrow – I can easily do so.”

“Oh, no – no,” said Fanchon.

Josephine shut her lips. Nina nestled up to her governess in an ecstasy of love and affection. If indeed she was a blonde – that lovely word – why, the pink muslin must suit her!

Chapter Seven

Light Blue Silk

During the days that elapsed between the purchase of the pale blue silk and the grand fête at Mrs Hazlitt’s school, it may well be supposed that Brenda Carlton was very busy. Not Penelope at school, not any of those girls who were to take the characters of Tennyson’s “Dream of Fair Women,” were as much occupied as this young woman. She had so much to think of and to do; for she had not only to see about her own toilette, which meant frequent visits to Madame Declassé’s, at Rocheford, and therefore frequent demands for the pony trap, but she had also to help the girls to make up their pink muslins.

She was sorry to have to dress her pupils in a colour she knew in her heart of hearts could not possibly suit them, but she argued with her own conscience that no possible dress that she could devise would make the Misses Amberley look well and, that being the case, they might just as soon be frightful as not. She had no pricks of conscience with regard to this matter. The little red-haired girls were useful to her for the time being. She intended to have a delightful outing at the seaside and, in order to effect this, she must keep the Reverend Josiah in the best of humours until her grand month was over.

This was quite easy to accomplish as long as the girls themselves were pleased. But Brenda was by no means a fool, and she judged by certain remarks of Nina’s, who was the most innocent of the confiding three, that already a few ugly little suspicions with regard to their governess were animating their small breasts. In short, they were the sort of girls who would very soon discover for themselves the wickedness of this wicked world. They were not specially amiable; there was nothing whatever attractive about them. When once they discovered Brenda, as Brenda really was, her position in the Reverend Josiah’s establishment would come to an end.

Well, she intended to secure another home before then. There was a certain rich young man whom she hoped to attract while at Marshlands-on-the-Sea. When once engaged to him, it mattered little to her what any of the Amberleys thought about her. Still, the present fortnight must be used to the best advantage, and Brenda took great care how she trimmed the white hate. She made them look exceedingly pretty and stylish, for she had wonderful fingers which could contrive and arrange the very simplest materials as though by magic. The pink muslin frocks were also made to suit each girl. It did not matter if they were a little skimpy; the girls were all young, and Nina, in particular, ought still to wear very short skirts.

“No, Nina,” said her governess, “I am not going to give you flounces, but I shall put a couple of false tucks upon the muslin skirt.”

“I’d much rather have flounces,” said Nina, who was nearly in tears. “I like little tiny frills, they are so pretty, and you have given them to Fanchon and to Josephine.”

“That is the very reason, chérie, why you must not have them,” was Brenda’s remark. “The washing will be altogether too expensive. Your poor, dear papa, who is taking no holiday himself, cannot possibly afford the laundry bills which I shall have to send him if all your dresses are flounced.”

This argument seemed conclusive, and Nina had to be satisfied – that is, she pretended to be, but there was her little scheme of vengeance working up in her small brain, and she intended to talk it over with her sisters on the eighth of July, that long, long, wonderful day when beautiful Brenda would not be with them, and when they could do exactly as they liked.

Clever as she was, Brenda could not guess the thoughts which filled her little pupil’s brain, and she was too much interested in her own affairs just then to trouble herself much about so insignificant a young person.

Meanwhile, time flew as it always does when one is busy, and Brenda’s own delicate and beautiful dress arrived at the rectory two days before she was to wear it. Now, Brenda did not want any of her pupils to see her in this dress, and above all things, she did not wish the Reverend Josiah to perceive that she – that absolutely dependent orphan – could leave his establishment attired in pale blue silk. She trusted much to the white serge coat, which she had ordered, to cover the silk. Nevertheless, she knew she must run some dangers. As a matter of fact, she had only spent about thirty shillings on each of her pupils, and had, therefore, purloined from the sum which had been given her for their clothes four pounds ten wherewith to line her own pockets. This she hoped would never be discovered, nor would it have been, had Nina not been quite so sharp, and Fanchon so really discontented with the quality of the muslin dress she was to wear at Marshlands-on-the-Sea.

“Please, please, Brenda,” said Fanchon, on the day before the great fête, “won’t you put on your pale blue silk, and let us see you in it? It has come, I know, for I was in the garden when the carrier arrived with that great box from Madame Declassé’s. Father was with us, and he asked what could be in the box.”

“And what did you say, dear?”

“I said it was a box full of pots for making jam – that you had bought the pots the day we were at Rocheford, as you thought it would be such a good thing for cook to turn all the gooseberries into jam while we were at the seaside.”

“What a very clever little Fanchon you are!” said Brenda, looking very attentively at her pupil. “And what did papa say – dear innocent papa?”

“Oh, he was ever so pleased – he loves gooseberry jam, and said that we must on no account strip the trees beforehand, so as to leave plenty for cook to boil down to put into the pots.”

“What a mercy he didn’t feel the box!” was Brenda’s remark. “I do think, Fanchon, you are very clever – very wicked, of course, and I suppose you ought to be punished. But there – you meant well, didn’t you?”

“I suppose I did,” said Fanchon, raising her pale blue eyes and fixing them on her governess’ face.

Brenda looked back at the girl. She heartily wished that Fanchon was two years younger and five years stupider, and even a little more ugly; but, such as she was, she must make the best of her.

“Of course,” continued Fanchon, who seemed to divine her governess’ thoughts, “if you really think that I told a wicked story, I can go to father now and tell him that I made a mistake, and that the box contained your blue silk dress, and – and – other things of yours – and not the jam pots. Shall I, Brenda? shall I?”

“You goosey! you goosey!” said Brenda. She squeezed Fanchon’s arm and began to pace up and down the terrace walk with her pupil by her side. “You know,” she said, lowering her voice and speaking in the most confiding and enthralling way, “you are older than the others, and I can confide in you. It is wrong to tell lies – very, very wrong – and whatever possessed you, you silly girl, to think of jam pots? I am sure nothing was further from our heads on that auspicious day. But I don’t want your dear father to see the dress that I am going to the fête in, and I will tell you why.”

“Please do,” said Fanchon, “for to tell the truth, Brenda, neither Nina, nor Josephine, nor I understand you always.”

“Well, dears, is it likely that you should? I am, let me see, between twenty-two and twenty-three years of age, although I don’t look it by any means.”

“I don’t know what that age looks like, so can’t say,” was Fanchon’s remark.

“Well, dear – it is a very beautiful age, and very young. It is the age when a girl comes – so to speak – to her prime, and when she thinks of – of,” – Brenda lowered her voice – “getting married.”

“Oh!” said Fanchon, colouring crimson. “You don’t mean to say – ”

“I don’t mean to say anything at all, I have nothing to confide, so don’t imagine it for a single moment. But at the seaside, where the gay people will be, and the band will play, and there’ll be no end of tea out of doors and all sorts of fun of one sort and another, it may happen that – that – somebody may see your Brenda and – oh, Fanchon, need I say any more!”

“I don’t suppose you need,” was Fanchon’s answer. She felt immensely flattered.

“Think what it would mean to me,” continued Brenda. “A prince might come along, who would fall in love with the beggar maid.”

“But you – with your blue silk dress, to be called a beggar maid! That name might suit poor Nina, who can’t have flounces, even, to her pink muslin dress that only cost sixpence three farthings a yard.”

Brenda was startled at Fanchon’s memory with regard to the price of the muslin.

“No,” continued that young lady, “you’re not a bit like the beggar maid.”

“Ah, but – my dear girl – I am the beggar maid, and I am waiting for the king to come along who will raise me to sit on his throne, and – in fact – I am going to whisper a great secret to you, Fanchon – ”

“What is it?” said Fanchon, who was at once fretful and disgusted, overpowered with curiosity, and yet heartily wishing that Brenda would not confide in her.

“Well – I will tell you,” said Brenda. “I have been left a little money – just the merest little trifle, and I am spending a little of it on my blue silk, and I don’t want any one to know but just my own darling Fanchon; my eldest pupil – who loves me so well! Perhaps, my chérie, I may buy you a pretty gift out of some of the money. What do you say to a little gold bracelet – a bangle, I mean?”

Brenda remembered that she could get a silver gilt bracelet for a couple of shillings at a shop she knew of at Rocheford, and that it would be worth her while to purchase Fanchon’s sympathy at that price.

“Oh – but I should love it!” said the young lady, looking at her sunburnt and badly formed wrist.

“The bangle would give you good style,” said Brenda. “Well, we’ll say nothing about it now – but – well, as I have given you my confidence, you won’t repeat it.”

“I suppose not, but I do want to see your blue silk.”

“All right, you shall, but not the others – I draw the line at the others. You can slip out of bed to-night and come to me, and I will put it on and show myself. I am going away early in the morning before any of you are up.”

“But I am certain father will be up, for he said so, and he’s going to let you in afterwards.”

Brenda considered for a moment —

“I can’t help his letting me in, but he shan’t see me off,” she said – “no one need do that. Well, now – go and join your sisters. Go to bed at the usual hour, and come to me at ten o’clock; then I will put on the dress and you shall judge of the effect.”