Chapter Five
Ralph Hilchester had never felt better pleased in the whole course of his life than when he got Phyllis’s letter. That she should tell him that she was in trouble was more delightful to him than even a costly present would be – than even half-a-crown would be – and costly presents and half-crowns were rare treasures in the Rectory household.
His first determination was to tell his brother and sisters, but on second thoughts he resolved to keep to himself the delicious fact that Phyllis had written to him. He opened the blotted sheet of paper and looked at the words again:
“Come and save me; I am in the claws of a dragon.”
“I should think I just will,” thought Ralph; “it is exactly what I am made for. I always guessed there was something heroic about me. Fancy, in these prosaic days, having to deliver a princess from a dragon; I declare I feel exactly like Saint George of England.”
So Ralph held his head very high, and, with the precious letter reposing against his heart, entered the Rectory. There dismay and indignation met him on every side.
“Oh Ralph,” cried Rose, “what do you think? You know what a jolly afternoon we were all going to have!”
“Well?” said Ralph, his brown eyes dancing.
“Oh, you won’t look quite so happy when you know! The Squire’s little girl was nice enough yesterday, but she seems to have changed her mind. ‘Other matters to attend to’ – that is what that odious governess of hers said. Far too grand to notice us, of course.”
“I wish you would speak plain,” said Ralph. “I cannot get a scrap of sense out of that gabble of yours.”
“How rude you are!” said Susie. “You will be as gloomy as us when you know. Well, it is this: we are not to go to the Hall this afternoon. We are not to play with Phyllis. It was the governess who wrote – that odious woman; she signed herself ‘Josephine Fleet.’ She says that Phyllis had no right to invite us, and we are not to come. Pretty cheek, I call it. Well, if Phyllis does not want us, I’m sure we don’t want her.”
“But that is all very fine,” said Rosie; “I do want Phyllis. She promised me an old doll she had discarded, and she gave distinct hopes that we might have a baby-house of hers; and, anyhow, she is very jolly, and I did want to have a good time at the Hall. I call it horrid; I do indeed.”
“And so do I,” said Ned. “It is a precious big shame. But there, Ralph, we will go out rabbit-hunting this afternoon; I want to see if some of our snares have caught any.”
“You are horridly cruel about rabbits; you know you are,” said Rosie.
“Not at all; the sort of snare I have laid does not hurt any of them,” said Ned. “Come along, Ralph, won’t you?” But Ralph held back.
“Sorry I can’t,” he said; “other things to attend to.”
He spoke in a lofty tone, and the feel of the precious letter in his pocket made his heart throb.
The Hilchesters were not a patient family, and they fell upon Ralph tooth and nail. He was mean; he was shabby; he was hard-hearted; he did not care a bit for their disappointment; but nothing, nothing they could say altered the lad’s determination. They might amuse themselves: he had other fish to fry; he could not accompany any of them that afternoon. It was in vain to plead and catechise, and reproach and fight. Ralph stuck to his resolve. The early dinner at the Rectory was therefore a somewhat sorry affair, and Ralph was all too glad when it came to an end. He had now, if possible, to blind his very sharp sisters and brother. This was no easy matter. During dinner he made up his mind what he would do.
There were occasions when Ralph, all alone and unaccompanied, walked as far as Dartfield. Dartfield was five or six miles away. He announced gravely to the family that he was going on a long expedition, and then he went upstairs and brushed his hair, and washed his hands, and put on a clean collar.
“What can it mean?” said Rosie, who was watching him through the keyhole. “Ralph with clean hands! Something must be up!”
“Of course something is up,” whispered Susie. “Oh Rose! he hears us. He will be down upon us with a vengeance. Let’s fly!”
Just as Ralph opened the door they did fly, scrambling up to the attics, where they locked themselves in.
“They watched me, the monkeys. I must blind them,” thought Ralph.
So he started off quite in the opposite direction from the Hall, and gained the high-road. Ned now shouted to his sisters to come and help to search for rabbits, and the girls, in high discontent, saw nothing for it but to obey. But Ralph was generally the ringleader of all forms of fun and mischief, and his absence made the rest of the party doubly depressed.
Ralph ran a whole mile in the direction of Dartfield; then looking cautiously about him, he doubled back, got into the wood, skirted it, and presently came within measurable distance of the Hall. To his disgust, he heard his sisters’ and brother’s voices as they rambled about the wood.
Suppose by any chance Phyllis met them first; she scarcely knew one from the other of the Rectory children so far. If she saw them she would think they had come to save her, and would rush to them and tell them all about her trouble. Ralph would indeed then be out of it. He quickened his steps therefore, boldly entered the wood, which was on Squire Harringay’s property, and a moment later came face to face with the little girl.
She was leaning against the stile waiting for him. It had not occurred to her that he would come alone, but when she saw him, and noticed how tall and manly he looked, and how strong and well developed, her heart gave a bound of rapture. She ran to him, took both his hands, and laughed aloud in her glee.
“Here I am,” said Ralph. “Of course I mean to save you; you were right to trust me.”
“I thought I was,” said Phyllis; “I felt that somehow yesterday. But where are the others?”
“Oh! the others,” said Ralph. “I thought you wanted me alone.”
“It is ever so good of you to come, but I should like you all best,” answered the little girl. “But there, you have come, and I will tell you everything. Let us walk round by the back of the stables. If she sees us I am lost.”
“She in other words is the dragon,” said Ralph.
“Yes – Miss Fleet; and I quite, quite hate her now.”
“Tell me all about it,” said Ralph, and he tucked Phyllis’s hand through his arm, and they sauntered slowly in the direction of the field which led to the back of the stables.
Meanwhile Miss Fleet, in dismay and indignation, drove straight to the Rectory. Mrs Hilchester happened to be at home. She was in a room which was very plainly furnished. At a large centre table the Rector’s wife had spread bales of red flannel and coarse grey serge and unbleached calico, and was busy cutting out garments which were to be made up immediately for the poor of the parish. When she heard Miss Fleet’s step, she did not trouble even to look round.
“Is that you, my dear?” she said.
“And have you come to help me? But you are very late.”
“I don’t know what you mean by ‘my dear,’” answered the indignant governess, “but I have certainly never had the pleasure of speaking to you before, and I may as well emphatically say I have not come to help you.”
Mrs Hilchester dropped her large cutting-out scissors, and turned and faced her visitor.
“I am sorry,” she said abruptly; “I thought you were Mildred Jones; she promised to look in and do what she could. I have a heavy pile to get through before nightfall. As you are here, do you mind holding this unbleached calico while I divide it into yards?”
“Really,” – began Miss Fleet.
But indignant looks and even words were absolutely thrown away on the busy Rector’s wife.
“Catch,” she said, “and hold tight. If you have anything to say, you can say it while we are busy. No one who ever comes to the Rectory is allowed to waste time or to be idle. Thank you very much.”
It was impossible for Miss Fleet not to hold the unbleached calico, and it was difficult for her to be quite as indignant and as dignified as she had intended to be in such a position.
“Why, really, this is most extraordinary,” she said.
“Oh! pray, don’t let go, or I shall have all my trouble over again.”
Miss Fleet held tight to the calico, which got heavier and heavier as more and more yards were measured off.
“Now, for goodness’ sake lay it gently on the table. Thanks; that is a help. Now, my good friend, what is your business? If I can help you I shall be pleased to do so; at present I don’t even know your name.”
“My name is Josephine Fleet.”
“Ah, you are little Phyllis Harringay’s governess. I received a somewhat extraordinary note from you before dinner.”
“I am puzzled to know why you should think it extraordinary. Phyllis asked your children to spend the afternoon with her. I did not find it convenient to have them. I wrote to you plainly on the subject. You seem to be a frank sort of person yourself; you cannot, therefore, object to frankness in others.”
“On the contrary, I admire it. Pray push that bale of red flannel across the table. Thank you.”
“Oh! I cannot help to measure the flannel into yards,” ejaculated the angry Miss Fleet.
“I don’t require you to. Have you come here because you have changed your mind and wish the children to go to the Hall? But I am afraid I cannot find them now; they have dispersed. I always turn them out of doors, whatever the weather, in the afternoon. Pray, do tell me what you want, and – don’t mind my being a little brusque – go – ”
“You really are,” began Miss Fleet, but she checked herself. “I have come here,” she continued, “to ask you a question. Phyllis is not to be found anywhere. Is she – Mrs Hilchester – is she at the Rectory?”
“The Squire’s little girl? Most certainly not. Do you suppose we would have her here against your will?”
“Well, I hope not. Where can she be?”
“My dear, good creature, how can I tell you? I have never set eyes on the child. Pass those scissors, please, and – yes, and that basket with the cottons. Thank you so much. Would you like to sew up a seam while we are discussing where the little girl can be? Ah, I see you are not willing to help. Well, well! good-afternoon.”
Chapter Six
There never was a more angry woman than Miss Fleet as she left the Rectory that afternoon.
Certainly, Mrs Hilchester had not been sympathetic. It is true she had followed her visitor into the hall, and had said by way of reassuring her:
“You need not be at all alarmed about your little girl – my children are often out hours and hours at a time, and I assure you that I never dream of fidgeting; they eventually come home, grubby perhaps, and with their clothes in disorder, but otherwise safe and sound. Naturally, in the country your little girl will do as others do. Sorry you cannot stay to help me with my cutting-out, but as you cannot, good-afternoon.”
Miss Fleet scarcely touched the hand which the Rector’s good lady vouchsafed. She got into the pony-cart and drove rapidly away.
“What next, indeed!” she said to herself; “to compare Phyllis, who has been cossetted and petted all her life, to those wild, bearish children. I am certainly extremely sorry we have come to live at the Hall. If only the Squire were at home I should give him a piece of my mind; as it is it will be my duty to punish Phyllis most severely when she does return. Poor Phyllis! I don’t wish to be hard on her, but still discipline at any cost must be sustained. Of course, she has returned long before now; but to have upset all my plans – a mere child like that!”
Miss Fleet had now returned to the Hall, and her first eager question was: “Is Miss Phyllis in? Has any one seen her, or does any one know anything about her?”
Alas! Miss Phyllis had not come back; no one had seen her – no one knew anything about her.
Miss Fleet now began to be really alarmed. She had not, as a rule, a vivid imagination, but certainly horrors now began to crowd before her mental vision. There was that deep pond just beyond the shrubbery. There were some late water-lilies still to be found on its surface. Suppose – oh! suppose Phyllis had gone to it and had tried to drag in the lilies, and had – Miss Fleet turned quite white.
Or suppose she had gone right outside the fir plantation, and had been seen and appropriated by the gipsies who were camping in the field just beyond. Altogether poor Miss Fleet had a sad afternoon, while Phyllis, the naughty and the reckless, enjoyed herself immensely. It sometimes does happen like that even in the lives of naughty children: they have their naughty time, and they thoroughly like it for the present.
Phyllis had been very angry, and had determined to take her own way; and now she was having it, and her laugh was loud and her merriment excessive. For she had not been long in the field at the back of the stables, and Ralph had not long been enjoying the sweet pleasure of her society all to himself, when three heads appeared above the hedge and three gay voices uttered a shout, and Susie, Rosie, and Ned dashed across the field.
“Oh! oh! oh!” said Susie, “now we know why he was smartening himself up.”
“Didn’t he scrub his hands just,” cried Rosie, “and didn’t we watch him through the keyhole!”
“Oh, shut up, shut up!” said Ralph. “Now that you have come I suppose you must stay; but it was to me Phyllis wrote. – Was it not to me you wrote, Phyllis?”
“Well, yes,” said Phyllis. “Yours was the first name that I thought of, but I wanted you all. It is all of you I like best. Now you have come we will have a gay time.”
“But where?” asked Rosie. “Are we to come to the house after all?”
“I wish we could,” said Phyllis. “I do earnestly wish we could. Perhaps – perhaps it would be safe.”
She stood for a minute holding her finger to her lips; then a bright light filled her grey eyes and smiles wreathed her lips.
“Could you go up one of the back ways, and take off your shoes, and slip upstairs and up and up?” she said in a tremulous whisper.
“Oh, couldn’t we just!” said Rosie, her eyes nearly dancing out of her head.
“Then I think we can manage,” said Phyllis. “All my toys are upstairs in the big, very big, big attic; and there is the baby-house that I said perhaps you could have; and there are the dolls’ cups and saucers; and if only we could smuggle something to eat!”
“Something to eat!” cried Ned. “I can run back to the Rectory and bring a lot of things – a whole basketful. No one will know; Mother is at her cutting-out for the poor, and trumpets would not turn her attention. I can get the things – I can and I will.”
“We must not let Miss Fleet know; she’ll never, never think of looking for us in the attic,” said Phyllis, “and it is so big and so very far away from all the other rooms that we won’t be found; the only danger is your being seen when you bring the basket.”
“I will go straight away this very minute,” said Ned, “and you had better wait until I return.”
“I know something still better than that,” said Phyllis. “Why go to the Rectory? Why don’t you go to the village and buy things there – nice unwholesome curranty and doughy things?”
“Oh, I say, scrumptious!” cried Rosie. “I’ll go with him. No one will see us. But, oh, I say, Phyllis, we have not got a single brass farthing amongst us!”
Ralph’s face turned very red; he felt awfully ashamed of Rosie.
“But I have,” said Phyllis; “I always carry my purse about.” She opened it. “There is a five-shilling piece,” she said.
“And may we spend it all?” said Rosie, looking with almost reverence on the solid piece of money.
“Oh, rather! only do get very unwholesome things.”
“I know the kind, trust me,” said Rosie, and she and Ned set to running as fast as they could.
While they were away Susie and Ralph and Phyllis walked up and down, and talked in quite lady-like and gentlemanlike styles, and Phyllis described how Miss Fleet had brought in the dull lesson-books, and how she had tried to crush her bit of fun; and the other two laughed, and told stories on their own account, and said how cross they had been when that horrid letter had arrived.