Hollowmell Part 1

Hollowmell.

by E.R. Burden.

CHAPTER I.

MINNIE'S PLAN.

"Why, wherever _can_ my books be?" exclaimed Minnie Kimberley in a vexed tone, as she hunted up and down the schoolroom, opening now one cupboard, then another, now a desk, and again diving down to peer under some out-of-the-way table or form; for places which one would think the most unlikely, were certain to be the places where Minnie's books would at length be discovered.

"I can't make it out," she continued, her bright face clouded over with vexation, "somehow or other my books always _do_ manage to get lost."

"Perhaps if you could manage to put them back in your desk when you had done with them, instead of leaving them lying just wherever you happen to be, they might manage to stay there," suggested Mona Cameron, a tall young lady, who sat near the window sewing, and who had more than once been disturbed by Minnie's voyage of discovery.

"Oh, I've found two of them!" cried Minnie, emerging from beneath a distant table, her hands black with dust, and herself nothing abashed by Mona's rather sarcastic speech. "I wonder, now, whether I shall be able to hunt up the others before Mab finishes her music!"

"O, Mabel Chartres is away," volunteered one of the other girls, "I heard her come down fully ten minutes ago."

"That can't be," replied Minnie, "she must have come in here for her things before she went away."

"Not at all, seeing she carried them up to the music-room with her that she might save time; I heard her say she wanted away soon."

Minnie flew to the corner where Mabel's hat and jacket usually hung, and sure enough both were gone. She sat down for a minute ready to cry with disappointment, but recovering herself immediately, she choked back the tears, and proceeded with the search for her books, though in a rather more subdued manner, and with a great deal less bustle and talkativeness. At length they were all collected from their various hiding-places, and Minnie was ready to depart, but she seemed in no hurry to go. She stood leaning against the desk, with a rather irresolute look on her face, as if trying to make up her mind to something. More than once she moved as if to go, but something seemed to arrest her step.

At last she turned to where Mona Cameron still sat at work, and said in a clear voice which could be distinctly heard by all the girls in the room, "I _will_ try, Mona, to take your advice about putting my books back in my desk; I know I'm horribly careless, and I thank you for reminding me how I can mend it if I try."

All the girls looked up amazed--Mona herself as amazed as any and also a little confused--but Minnie did not wait to see what effect her words would produce, she walked straight out after she had spoken, and was not a little astonished, and perhaps a little perturbed, to find Miss Elgin, the English governess, in the dressing-room where she could not choose but hear what had pa.s.sed. Her face flushed, and she tried to hurry out without attracting her notice, but Miss Elgin stopped her as she pa.s.sed the desk at which she sat, and drawing the bright face down to the level of her own, kissed her on the forehead with a whispered "That was bravely spoken, Minnie," and let her go.

Minnie rushed out into the cool air with a flushed and happy face, and her heart beating high with the joy of victory, and the gratification of knowing that her effort was appreciated. She ran home without once thinking of her disappointment in missing Mabel, but she did not forget to seek her own room the first thing when she got in, and pour out her thanksgiving for her recent triumph--even although she did find herself stopping more than once in the midst of it to go over again in her own mind the scene in the dressing-room afterward. After dinner she was occupied with her lessons, and she found it just a little difficult to settle down to them after the excitement of the afternoon.

She was a girl of a very warm and impulsive temperament, and little things were apt to upset her in a way that many people would characterize as absurd, but which was, so far from being absurd, simply natural and unavoidable in an emotional nature such as hers. It was not, therefore, through one cause and another, till she was in bed that she recollected how she had wished to speak to Mabel so particularly, and what it was she had to speak about. She felt just a little ashamed of herself for allowing what had, only that morning, seemed to her a thing of the first importance, to be crushed out, and for the moment annihilated, by the occurrence of the afternoon. However, she decided to make up for it on the morrow, and satisfied with this resolve, she fell fast asleep.

Next morning, true to her resolution, she was early at the school so as to be able to see Mabel Chartres, her most particular friend and constant companion, before the day's work began. Mabel was a little late, so Minnie could only whisper to her to wait when school was over, and then they were called to their different places, for Minnie, though younger by almost a year than Mabel, occupied an advanced position in the first cla.s.s, while Mabel was only in the second, and even there was not of much account. Minnie, indeed in most things divided the laurels of the school with Mona Cameron who was the oldest pupil, and the emulation of the two kept the school in a perpetual state of effervescence; Mona being sharp, and at times rather acrid, and Minnie bright and sparkling and excitable, the contact of the two natures was more than calculated to produce such a result. But on this particular day it seemed as if some of the ingredients were wanting, for the morning and afternoon pa.s.sed, to the astonishment of all, without a single "phiz" as the girls were wont somewhat felicitously to call the frequent pa.s.sages of arms in which the two girls considered it their peculiar privilege to indulge.

Mona had slightly sneered at what she termed Minnie's latest "crank," on the preceding evening, but she had been a good deal impressed by the courage and simplicity of Minnie's conduct, and in reality admired it, while she felt she could never emulate it. She was honest with herself whatever she might be with others, and felt in a vague sort of way that she might be doing a thing almost as admirable, if not as likely to excite admiration, if she could even only for one day keep her sharp tongue under control, and refrain from such exercises of the vein of sarcasm which was her peculiar characteristic, as at other times she held it almost necessary to perform. Thus it was that the school was particularly quiet that day, for Minnie was also in a subdued mood, and so when school was over and she was at liberty to walk off with Mabel, she felt just in the frame of mind for the discussion to which she had been looking forward all day.

She felt, however, that she could not proceed with it at present, on the way home where they would be liable to interruption at almost every turn, so she persuaded Mabel to come home with her. This was no very difficult matter, any more than it was an infrequent occurrence, for Minnie and Mabel were never very long separate, and having had to leave without her friend on the previous evening, had been as much a disappointment to Mabel as it had been to Minnie.

It was a remarkable feature in the friendship which existed between them, that it was, and always had been free from that species of quarrel called "huffs." In the case of nine girls' friendships out of ten, the fact of one going off in the way Mabel had done, without an explanation afterwards or an intimation before hand, would have formed a very strong foundation whereon to raise a structure of evidence to prove that something was amiss, which few girls could have resisted. But no such idea entered Minnie's head. She simply concluded that something very pressing had compelled Mabel to leave earlier than usual, and trusted her too completely to connect it in any way with herself.

After dinner they proceeded with their lessons, which seemed to be got over in a much shorter time when the two worked together, than when they each worked separately, so that they were soon free to settle down before the fire in Minnie's room, and begin the subject which had been on Minnie's mind for almost four days now.

"Well, Minnie, what is it?" asked Mabel at last, for Minnie seemed to be at a loss how to begin, now that the time had come. She walked over and sat down on the rug, leaning her head on Mabel's knee, and began, "you know, Mab, dear, that it isn't very long since I found out that there was anything better in life than laughing and dancing and enjoying one's self in the way the world calls enjoyment. I told you all about it before, how Mr. Laurence told me about the happiness of being a Christian, and living for something beside my own pleasure, and how since that I have felt that great happiness myself. I can't talk very much about it, because it is so new--and so--I can't find a word for it, but I think you'll know what I mean--that I don't quite understand it myself, but I feel it all the same, and it has made me another creature.

I don't think anybody would believe that who only sees the outside of me, but it is quite true; I have different thoughts and feelings and wishes about everything, and feel altogether as if I had newly awakened and could never go to sleep again."

Minnie had rattled on in her usual impulsive fashion, and now pulled up suddenly, for Mabel's arm tightened round her arm with a convulsive clasp, and her head dropped on her shoulder in a perfect agony of weeping.

Minnie felt a good deal of surprise as well as alarm at this sudden outburst, for she had never seen Mabel so much overcome before, and just now it seemed so altogether unaccountable; she concluded, however, that it would be useless to attempt any solution of the mystery until the storm had somewhat spent itself; she did not, therefore, trouble her with any questions or attempts at consolation, but allowed her to cry on unrestrainedly, only changing her position, that she might the better render her all the support in her power, and convey to her by every means but that of speech her sympathy and concern. At length her sobs began to be less convulsive, and her tears to come less freely, and soon she was able to speak and a.s.sure her friend that she need not be under any apprehension concerning her, and that she would soon be able to tell her the cause of her grief.

Minnie waited with great patience for some minutes before she would allow Mabel to speak again, and then, Mabel protesting that it was all over, and that she was quite calm again, began with br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes, notwithstanding her protest. "It must have been the narration of your happiness that caused me to lose control of myself, I felt the contrast between it and my own state of mind so keenly, that I was quite overcome--Oh, Minnie, I would give every drop of mere earthly happiness to feel for one hour, what you have described!"

Minnie looked at her in astonishment. "Why, Mabel, of course you never needed to feel such a thing--you have known about these things all your life!"

"Ah, yes!" replied Mabel, "I have known _about_ them, as you say, but I have never _known_ them. You know one may know all about a thing or person, and yet never know it or him by direct experience."

"That is true," said Minnie, reflectively. "But why did you always try to interest me in them, when you really felt no good effect from them yourself?"

"Please don't ask me that!" entreated Mabel, "It would be worse than useless for me to try to explain it, but it is a fact that I have never known such a change as you talk about--as what we call conversion must surely imply--so I have never been converted, and that is the reason, I suppose, why all my efforts to interest you were always vain. How could I hope to lead you to a Saviour I could not see myself?"

Minnie was silent. She could not understand Mabel's difficulty, and therefore did not feel able to discuss it. She could not say anything to comfort or console her either, from her own short experience, because she felt, notwithstanding all that she had just heard, that Mabel was years and years before her on the road--further by a long way than all the years of her life. She felt this but could not say it; it seemed to hover through her mind like a shadow, and she could not grasp it in order to put it into words.

Mabel saw how puzzled she was, and realized how dangerous it might be to her peace to communicate difficulties of such a nature in her present impressionable state; she therefore endeavoured to divert her mind into a safer channel by getting her to talk about herself.

"It is very silly of me," she said, "to speak thus to you who have so newly begun the race. What should you know of such things? Come, we won't talk about them, and I daresay I shall grow out of such morbid notions in time; tell me about yourself, I am sure it will do me good; you were telling me about how different you felt. Please do go on."

"But are you sure it won't affect you as it did before? I would like to tell you about it because of what it has led me to do, and because I would like you to feel as I do, if, as you say, you have never felt it."

And Minnie looked at her with great tears in her eyes, and with a great pity in her warm generous heart, wishing she could give half her happiness to her friend.

"Go on, dear," said Mabel, "you don't know how much good it will do me."

"Well, but I must tell you, Mabel, that although I am very happy, it sometimes troubles me to think how little I am changed outwardly, and how n.o.body but yourself would believe anything of all I have told you. I am sure Mona Cameron wouldn't"--she stopped suddenly, half inclined to interrupt herself in order to retail to Mabel the incident of the previous day, but thinking better of it, she resumed--"It does trouble me more than a little, sometimes, but I'm not going to lot it. I know about the difference, and you know about it, and better than all, G.o.d who wrought it knows about it, so what can it matter whether the world knows about it or not?"

"But, Minnie," interrupted Mabel, "I don't see that you are quite right there; it must be of consequence that we show to the world what side we are on."--"O, yes, of course," replied Minnie hastily, "I was just coming to that--I meant the school-girls particularly when I said the world just now, because I know it will take a long time to convince them of the reality of this--indeed I am inclined to think they won't be convinced, it won't suit their ideas--but there, I am again! judging them just in the very way I am condemning them for judging me. Oh, dear, what a long time it will take before I get out of my old way of speaking without thought, for which my new way of thinking rebukes me a thousand times a day!"

"Patience, dear," recommended Mabel, knowing well what a hard recommendation it was to follow, but feeling she must say something.

"Yes, Mabel," returned Minnie, "I _am_ learning patience--even I, who never knew what restraint meant all my life, am learning what true freedom is for the first time."

Mabel looked down at her wistfully, as if half inclined to say something, but remembering her danger she remained silent.

"And that just reminds me," continued Minnie, after a moment's pause, "that I have not yet told you the new idea I have been so longing to have your opinion upon, since ever it came into my head."

"Well, you must make haste," Mabel answered, "you see its quite late already.

"O, it won't take long! I'll just tell you about it, and we can go into it some other time, its only a project, you know, and of course I wanted to have your opinion and advice first, and your help afterwards."

"All of which you may count on," said Mabel smiling.

"Well, then, I must ask you in the first place, if you know the row of houses down beside the pit which papa built for the miners?"

"Yes, I pa.s.s it every day coming to school."

"Then you will probably have noticed how ill-kept and dirty the houses are, and how untidy the women and children are, who continually lounge and romp about the doors."

"Indeed I have," returned Mabel, "and I have often thought what a pity it was that those houses which might be made so beautiful, should be kept in such a state."

"That is just what papa was saying the other morning at breakfast. He said that he had had the houses built on the most approved principles, with every sort of convenience and facility for the promotion of health and order, and yet when he took a party of gentleman down to the pit last week, he was utterly ashamed to observe the squalor and misery of the place. He said that some of the worst slums of London could hardly be worse, except in the matter of light and air, and even these the people seemed to be doing their best to exclude, judging from the dust covered and tightly closed windows. It just occurred to me while he was speaking that perhaps I might be able to do something to remedy this terrible state of affairs. I am sure papa would be glad to do anything to help us. I have not said anything to him about it till I should hear your verdict, and because I haven't the least shadow of an idea what plan would be best to go upon. What do you think of it?"