My Little Lady Part 35

Madge, meanwhile, stood and looked at her. She had fairly fallen in love with this new cousin of hers; her beauty, and gracious ways, her foreign accent, and now her experiences of nuns and convents had come like a revelation to the little English girl in her downright, everyday life. With a comical incongruity, she could compare her in her own mind to nothing but an enchanted princess in some fairy tale; and she stood gazing first at her and then at the gla.s.s, where soft wavy brown hair and red and white daisies were reflected.

"What are you thinking of?" said Madelon, looking up suddenly.

"I--I don't know," replied Madge, quite taken aback, colouring and stammering; and then, as if she could not help it--"Oh!

Cousin Madelon, you are so pretty."

"It is very pretty of you to say so," said Madelon, laughing and blushing too a little; then holding out both hands she drew Madge towards her, and kissed her on her two cheeks. "I think you and I will be great friends; will we not?" she said.

"Yes," says unresponsive Madge shortly, looking down and twisting her fingers in her awkward English fashion.

"I would like you to be fond of me," continued Madelon, "for I think I shall love you very much; and I like you to call me Madelon--n.o.body else calls me so--except--except your Uncle Horace."

"It was Uncle Horace told me to," cried Madge. "I asked him what I should call you, and he said he thought Cousin Madelon would do."

"I think it will do very well," said Madelon, rising. "To- morrow will you take me to your garden? I should like to see your daisies growing."

After this Madge and Madelon became great friends; and when the former was at her lessons, there was a nurseryfull of younger children to pet and play with, if Madelon felt so disposed. Sometimes in the morning, when she was sitting alone in the drawing-room, little feet would go scampering along the floor upstairs, shrill little voices would make themselves heard from above, and then Madelon, throwing down book or work, would run up to the big nursery, where, whilst the two elder children were in the school-room with their mother, three round, rosy children kept up a perpetual uproar. It was quite a new sensation to our lonely Madelon to have these small things to caress, and romp with, and fondle, and she felt that it was a moment of triumph when they had learnt to greet her entrance with a shout of joy. Down on the floor she would go, and be surrounded in a moment with pet.i.tions for a game, a story, a ride.

Graham came up one day in the midst of a most uproarious romp.

"Nurse," he said, putting his head in at the door, "I do wish you would keep these children quiet--" and stopped as suddenly as the noise had stopped at his appearance. Madelon, all blushing and confused, was standing with the youngest boy riding on her back, whilst the little girls, Lina and Kate, were holding on to her skirts behind; they had pulled down all her hair, and it was hanging in loose waves over her shoulders.

"I beg your pardon, Madelon," said Graham, coming in, and smiling at her confusion. "I had no idea that you were here, and the instigator of all this uproar; where is nurse? I shall have to ask her to keep you all in order together."

"Nurse has gone downstairs to do some ironing," says Lina.

"Oh, Uncle Horace, we were having such fun with Cousin Madelon."

"Uncle Horace, will you give me a ride? You give better rides than Cousin Madelon," cries Jack, slipping down on to the ground.

"Uncle Horace, Cousin Madelon has been telling us about South America, and we have been hunting buffaloes."

"I am sorry," says Madelon; "I quite forgot how busy you are, Monsieur Horace, and that you could hear all our noise. We will be quieter for the future, and not hunt buffaloes just over your head."

He looked at her without answering; there was a flush on her pale cheeks under the shadow of the heavy waves of hair, a smile in her eyes as she looked at him with one of her old, shy, childish glances, as if not quite sure how he would take her apology. He could not help smiling in answer, then laughed outright, and turned away abruptly.

"Come here, then Jack, and I will give you a ride," he said, lifting the boy on to his shoulder. "This is the way we hunt buffaloes."

Half-an-hour later, Maria, just come in from the village, looked into the nursery, attracted by the shouts and laughter.

"It is really very odd," she said afterwards to Mrs. Vavasour, in a somewhat aggrieved tone, "that when Horace always declares he cannot find time to walk with me, or even to talk to me, he should spend half his morning romping with the children in the nursery." And Mrs. Vavasour, who had also gone upstairs with Madge and Harry when they had finished their lessons, had not much to say in answer.

CHAPTER IV.

Ich kann nicht hin!

One day, Madelon said to Mrs. Vavasour, "Please let me have all the children for a walk this afternoon."

"What, all! my dear girl," said Mrs. Vavasour; "you don't know what you are undertaking."

"Oh, yes, I do," Madelon answered, smiling; "they will be very good, I know, and Madge will help me."

So they all set out for their walk, through the garden, and out at the gate that led at once into the fields which stretched beyond. They walked one by one along the narrow track between the springing corn, a little flock of brown- holland children, and Madelon last of all, in her fresh grey spring dress. Harry had a drum, and marched on in front, drubbing with all his might; and Jack followed, brandishing a sword, and blowing a tin trumpet. Madge would have stopped this horrible din, which indeed scared away the birds to right and left, but Madelon only laughed and said she liked it.

Graham, coming across the fields in another direction, saw the little procession advancing towards him, and waited on the other side of a stile till it should come up. The children tumbled joyfully over into Uncle Horace's arms, and were at once ready with a hundred plans for profiting by the unwonted pleasure of having him for a companion in their walk; but he distinctly declined all their propositions, and sending them on in front with Madge, walked along at Madelon's side.

"Why do you plague yourself with all these children," he said, "instead of taking a peaceable walk in peaceable society?"

"I like the children," she answered, "and I should have found no society but my own this afternoon, for Mrs. Vavasour was going to pay visits, she said, and Maria went out directly after lunch."

"And you think your own society would have been less peaceable than that of these noisy little ruffians?"

"I don't know," she answered; "I like walking by myself very much sometimes, but I like the children, too, and Madge and I are great friends."

"I think Madge shows her sense--she and I are great friends, too," said Graham, laughing.

"Madge thinks there is no one in the world like Uncle Horace-- she is always talking about you," said Madelon, shyly.

"That is strange--to me she is always talking about you--she looks upon you as a sort of fairy princess, I believe, who has lived in a charmed world as strange to her as any she reads about in story-books. Madge's experiences are limited, and it does not take much to set her little brain working. If Maria and I are abroad next winter, I think I must get Georgie to spare her to me for a time."

"Are you going abroad again?" said Madelon; and as she asked the question, a chill shadow seemed to fall upon the bright spring landscape.

"It is possible-- I have heard of an opening."

He paused for a moment, and then went on,--

"I don't know why I should not tell you all about it, Madelon, though I have said nothing about it to any one yet--but it will be no secret. I had a letter this morning telling me that there is an opening for a physician at L----, that small place on the Mediterranean, you know, that has come so much into fashion lately as a winter place for invalids. Dr. B----, an old friend of mine, who is there now, is going to leave it, and he has written to give me the first offer of being his successor."

"And shall you go?" asked Madelon.

"Well, I should like it well enough for a good many reasons, for the next two or three years, at any rate. It is a lovely place, a good climate, and I should not feel myself tied down if anything else turned up that suited me better; but there are other considerations--in fact, I cannot decide without thinking it well over."

"But at any rate, you would not go there till next winter, would you?" said Madelon, with a tremor in her voice which she vainly tried to conceal.

"Not to stop; but if I accept this offer, I should go out immediately for a week or two, so as to get introduced to B---- 's patients before they leave. A good many will be returning next winter probably, and it would be as well for me, as a matter of business, to make their acquaintance; you understand?"

"Yes, I understand--but then you would have to go at once, Monsieur Horace, for it is already April, and the weather is so warm that people will be coming away. I remember how they used to fly from Nice and Florence--every one that we knew as soon as it began to get hot."

"Yes, I have not much time to lose, and if I decide to go at all, I shall start at once. But it is very doubtful."

They had reached the end of the field whilst talking; a heavy gate separated it from a lane beyond, and the children, unable to open it, had dispersed here and there along the bank, hunting for primroses.

"Shall we go on?" said Graham, "or would you like to turn back now? You look tired."

Madelon did not answer; what was the use of going on? What did it matter? Everything came to the same end at last--a sense of utter discouragement and weariness had seized her, and she stood leaning against the gate, staring blankly down the road before her. There were about twenty yards of shady, gra.s.sy lane, and then it was divided by a cross-road, with a cottage standing at one of the angles. Graham, who was looking at Madelon, saw her face change suddenly.

"Why, there are----" she began, and then stopped abruptly, colouring with confusion.

Graham looked; two figures had just appeared from one of the cross-roads, and walking slowly forward, had paused in front of the cottage; they were Mr. Morris the curate and Maria Leslie. The clergyman stood with his back to Graham and Madelon, but they could see Maria with her handkerchief to her eyes, apparently weeping bitterly. The curate was holding one of her hands in both his, and so they stood together for a moment, till he raised it to his lips. Then she pulled it away vehemently, and burying her face completely in her handkerchief, hurried off in a direction opposite to that by which she had come. Mr. Morris stood gazing after her for a moment, and then he also disappeared within the cottage.