A Young Mutineer Part 9

Judy had seen the Crown Derby service unpacked, and then, in the sober fashion which more or less characterized all her actions of late, she left the room.

She went up to the bedroom which she and Babs shared together, and sitting down by the window, rested her chubby cheek against her hand.

Babs was kneeling down in a distant corner, pulling a doll's bedstead to pieces for the express purpose of putting it together again.

"My doll Lily has been very naughty to-day," she said, "and I am going to put her to bed. She wouldn't half say her lessons this morning, and she deserves to be well punished. What are you thinking of, Judy, and why do you pucker up your forehead? It makes you look so cross."

"Never mind about my forehead. I have a lot of things to think of just now. I can't be always laughing and talking like you."

Babs paused in the act of putting a sheet on her doll's bed to gaze at Judy with great intentness.

"You might tell me what's the matter with you," she said, after a moment of silence; "you are not a bit interesting lately; you're always thinking and always frowning, unless at night when you are sobbing."

"Oh, don't!" said Judy. "Don't you see what it is, Babs--can't you guess?--it is only a week off now."

"What's only a week off?"

"Hilda's wedding. Oh, dear; oh, dear! I wish I were dead; I do wish I were dead."

Babs did not think this remark of poor Judy's worth replying to. She gravely finished making her doll's bed, tucked Lily up comfortably, and coming over to the window, knelt down, placed her elbows on the ledge, and looked out at the snowy landscape.

"Hasn't Hilda got lots and lots of presents?" she said, after a pause.

"Yes. I don't want to see them, though."

"Everyone is giving her a present," continued Babs, in her calm voice, "even Miss Mills and the servants. Susan told me that the schoolchildren were collecting money to buy her something, and--may I tell you a 'mendous big secret, Judy?"

Judy ceased to frown, and looked at Babs with a faint dawning of interest in her eyes.

"I has got a present for her too," said Babs, beginning to dance about.

"I am not going to give it till the day of the wedding. I buyed it my own self, and it's _quite_ beautiful. What are you going to give her, Judy?"

"Nothing. I haven't any money."

"I have half a sovereign in the Savings Bank, but I can't take it out until after I am seven. I wish I could, for I could lend it to you to give Hilda a wedding present."

"I wish you could," said Judy. "I'd like awfully to give her something.

You might tell me what you have got, Babs."

"It's some darning-cotton," said Babs in a whisper. "I buyed it last week with twopence-halfpenny; you remember the day I went with Mrs.

Sutton to town. She said it was a very useful thing, for Hilda will want to mend Jasper's socks, and if she hasn't darning-cotton handy maybe he'll scold her."

"He wouldn't dare to," said Judy, with a frown; "she _shan't_ mend his horrid socks. Why did you get such a nasty wedding present, Babs?"

A flush of delicate color spread all over Babs' little fair face. She winked her blue eyes hard to keep back the tears which Judy's scathing remarks were bringing to the surface, and said, after a pause:

"It's not a horrid present, it's lovely; and anyhow"--her voice becoming energetic as this happy mode of revenge occurred to her--"it is better than yours, for you has got nothing at all."

"Oh, I'll have something when the day comes," replied Judy, in a would-be careless tone.

"But you hasn't any money."

"Money isn't everything. I'll manage, you'll see."

From this moment Judy's whole heart and soul were absorbed in one fierce desire to give Hilda a present which should be better and sweeter and more full of love than anybody else's.

After two or three days of anxious thought and nights of troubled dreams, she made up her mind what her present should be. It should consist of holly berries and ivy, and these holly berries and that ivy should be picked by Judy's own fingers, and should be made into a bouquet by Judy herself; and the very center of this bouquet should contain a love-note--a little twisted note, into which Judy would pour some of her soul. It should be given to Hilda at the very last moment when she was starting for church; and though she was all in white from top to toe--all in pure white, with a bouquet of white flowers in her hand--yet she should carry Judy's bouquet, with its thorns and its crimson berries, as a token of her little sister's faithful love.

"She shall carry it to church with her," said Judy, with inward pa.s.sion.

"I'll make her promise beforehand, and I know she won't break her word to me. It will be a little bit of me she'll have with her, even when she is giving herself to that horrid Jasper."

The little girl quite cheered up when this idea came to her. She became helpful and pleasant once more, and allowed Babs to chatter to her about the insect world, which had now practically gone to sleep; and about the delights of the time when their chrysalides, which they had put away so carefully in the b.u.t.terfly-case, should burst out into living and beautiful things.

The day before the wedding came, and the whole house was in pleasant bustle and confusion. Nearly all the presents had arrived by this time.

The school children had come up to the Rectory in a body to present Hilda with a very large and gaudily decorated photographic alb.u.m; the Rectory servants had given the bride-elect a cuckoo-clock; Miss Mills had blushed as she presented her with a birth-day book bound in white vellum; "Carter Patterson's" people were tired of coming up the avenue with box after box; and Aunt Marjorie was tired of counting on her fingers the names of the different friends who were sure to remember such an important event as Hilda Merton's wedding.

But for Aunt Marjorie, Hilda would have given herself to Jasper in a very quiet and un.o.btrusive fashion. But this idea of a wedding was such intense grief to the old lady that Hilda and Jasper, rather against their wills, abandoned it, and Hilda was content to screen her lovely face behind a white veil, and to go to church decked as a bride should.

"It is positively economical to get a proper wedding dress," said Aunt Marjorie; "you'll want it for the parties you'll go to during your first season in town, Hilda. Of course Lady Malvern, Jasper's aunt, will present you, and the dress with a little alteration will do very well to go to the Drawing Room in. I shall desire the dressmaker to make the train quite half a yard extra, on purpose."

Aunt Marjorie had her way, and was sufficiently happy in her present life to forget the dull days which must follow, and to cease to think of the deserted house when Hilda, and wealth, and luxury, went away.

It was the evening before the wedding-day, when Babs came solemnly into the room where her sister was sitting, and presented her with her wedding gift.

"It's darning-cotton," said Babs, in her gentle, full, satisfied fashion. "Sutton said it would be useful, and that Jasper wouldn't scold you if you had it handy."

"What treason are you talking, Babs?" asked Quentyns, who was standing by Hilda's side.

He stooped down, and mounted her on his shoulder.

"Sutton says that husbands always scold their wives," said Babs.

"Nonsense, child! Sutton doesn't speak the truth. I would far rather scold myself than Hilda."

"Well, at any rate here's the cotton. I spent all my money on it except the ten shillings in the Savings Bank; and, Hilda, you _will_ use it when Jasper's socks get into holes."

"Of course I will, you dear little darling," said Hilda. "I think it is a perfectly sweet present. Give it to me; I was just packing my work-basket, and in it shall go this minute. I'll think of you every time I use a thread of this cotton, Babs."

"Babs, Miss Mills says it is quite time for you to go to bed," said Judy, who was standing at the back of Hilda's chair, softly touching her bright head from time to time with the tips of her little fingers.

Quentyns laughed when Judy spoke in her solemn voice.

"And what about Judy's time for going to bed?" he asked.

"Oh, I am much older than Babs, and Hilda said----"

"Yes, Jasper; I said Judy should have a little talk with me all by myself to-night," said Hilda, putting back her hand and drawing her little sister forward. "Here's a tiny bit of my chair for you to sit upon, Judy dearest."