The Governess Part 4

Meanwhile Nan had gone to her own room and shut and locked the door.

Her next move was to take her night-dress from its hook and slip it over her head.

"Now I'm going to rehea.r.s.e," she announced to her reflection in the gla.s.s. "First I must get my eyes to seem kind of wide and starey. No!

not this way. They must look like licorice-drops in milk. There!

that's better! All expressionless, and that kind of thing. I s'pose I might shut 'em, some somnabulists do; but then I'd be sure to trip over the furniture and stub my toes, and give the whole business away. No, I must keep my eyes open; that's certain. Then I must glide when I walk. My step must be light and ghostly and noiseless. I must be sure to have it ghostly and noiseless. Now--eyes staring--one, two, three--step ghostly and noiseless--Oh, bother! What business had that footstool in my way? If I knock things over like that I'll wake the house, and Delia would know in a minute what I was up to. There! get into the corner, you old thing! Now again! Eyes staring--step ghostly--and noiseless--voice low and mournful, but I must manage to make her understand every word. Now once more--voice low and mournful--

"Alas! alas! why did she come?--why did she come? (No, I can't say that! It sounds too much like 'Why did he die! Why did he die?' But the alas is good! That sounds real creepy and weird.) Now then--Alas!

alas! This is the worst thing that ever happened to me in all my life!

My dear, old home! To think that anybody who isn't wanted should come and push herself like this into my dear, old home! O father! father!

come home from Bombay, and save me from this awful woman. Turn her out of the house! Make her go back where she came from! Her hated form haunts me in my sleep, and I dream all night of her as I see her in the daytime--tall--and thin--and lanky--with her hair all dragged into that ugly little k.n.o.b behind at the back of her head! O father! father! her eyes are like needles! They p.r.i.c.k me when she looks. Save me!--save me! My heart will break if some one doesn't come and rescue me from this terrible person. Take her away--take her away! Ah--I see her! I see her! Get away--get away! You awful creature! Don't you know you are causing an innocent girl to perish in her youth? Alas, she won't go! Then listen, reckless woman! and remember this warning--'the way of intruders is hard!'

"There! that ends it off with a sort of threatening dreadfulness that ought to scare her stiff. After I've said that in a whisper to freeze her blood, I'll turn silently from her bedside and glide noiselessly from the room, wringing my hair and tearing my hands; no, I mean just the other way, and if that doesn't fix her, why--I'll have to go over it all again, of course, so I won't forget. Perhaps it would be a good idea to write it down and learn it off by heart."

The idea in fact recommended itself so thoroughly to her that she followed her own suggestion without further delay and wrote off the entire harangue at once, making it, if possible, even more eloquent and harrowing than it had been in the original. It seemed a very long, wearisome task, to commit it all to memory, but she did not grudge the trouble. She had never attempted anything that looked like study with so much willingness. The afternoon slipped away like a dream, and as soon as dinner was over she set to work again, and by bed-time had the thing pretty well under control. Whenever she halted or stumbled she went over it all again with the most patient perseverance.

"I suppose if I had stuck to things at school like this I'd have been at the head of the cla.s.s," she said to herself with a whimsical sense of her own perversity.

Delia was completely nonplused. She could not imagine what "that child was up to." There were no evidences anywhere of the means she was going to employ in the governess' initiation. Her room was in perfect order, and in Nan's own chamber nothing was unusually amiss. She got no satisfaction from the girl herself, who kept her lips tightly closed, except when she was mumbling over her harangue. It was terribly perplexing--and ominous.

"Good land!" thought Delia in real anxiety, "I only hope she ain't going to do anything too dreadful. I declare, if it weren't that I'm so soft where Nannie is concerned I'd say I'd be glad that some one's coming who may be up to managin' her. I'm free to confess I ain't. If only her mother had lived! Or, if only my dear Miss Belle hadn't gone off to the ends of the earth--! Miss Belle could have managed her! No one could resist Miss Belle, bless her! Ah, dear me, dear me! It's fifteen years, and to think, I'll never see her face again!"

CHAPTER IV

THE GOVERNESS

The morning of the expected governess' arrival dawned cold and dreary.

Rain fell in torrents, and the streets were drenched and slippery with slush. All day Nan moped in unhappy expectation of her antic.i.p.ated thralldom. At every sound of rumbling wheels before the door she would fly to the window, torturing herself with the belief that this was the hack which was conveying the tyrant-governess to the victim-pupil, and she felt a curious sort of disappointment when no such vehicle appeared and no such personage arrived, for always the rumbling wheels belonged to some grocer's cart or butcher's wagon, and by evening the invader had still not appeared. Then Nan plucked up courage.

"I shouldn't wonder if she had been switched off the road," she said to Delia, inclining to be quite jolly at the mere thought of such a grateful possibility. And she pictured to herself an accommodating engine whizzing the unwelcome guest off into some remote region from which she would never see the desirability of returning. Nan wished her no ill, but she did not wish herself ill either. She ate her dinner quite contentedly, and was just going to settle down comfortably to some thrilling tale of adventure when Br--r--r! went the bell, and she knew her fate had descended upon her.

She flew to the parlor and hid behind the folding-door. She heard Delia ascend the bas.e.m.e.nt stairs. She heard her come along the hall, and then--it was very strange, but Nan really thought she heard her give a smothered exclamation that was instantly followed by the word of warning, "Hush!"--but she must have been mistaken, for it was only Mr.

Turner who was speaking. He was asking for Nan herself. She slipped from behind the door with the hope at her heart that even now, at the last minute, the governess had "backed out." Certainly it looked as if she had, since she saw only the lawyer standing by the hat-stand. She held out her hand to him with a real smile of greeting when--he stepped aside and there stood the governess.

At first Nan thought it must be some little girl, so small and slender looked the figure beside that of the tall man. The eyes beneath the rain-soaked brim of the governess' hat were soft and dark; her hair was brown, and the damp wind had blown it into innumerable little curls and tendrils about her temples, where it took on a ruddy sheen in the gas light. Her nose was delicate and short; her mouth, which was not small, was fascinating from the fact that the parting lips disclosed two rows of perfect teeth. She had two dimples that came and went as she smiled, and in her chin was a small cleft that was quivering a little, Nan noticed. She thought the governess looked as if she were going to cry. Her eyes seemed somewhat "teary round the lashes," and there was no doubt about it--her chin was quivering.

"Pooh!" thought Nan. "I might have saved myself all that worry. She's as afraid as she can be. I guess I'll be able to manage her as easy as pie."

But now Mr. Turner was addressing her.

"Nan," he was saying, "this is Miss Blake. Can't you welcome her to her new home, my dear?"

Nan hung back in awkward silence, but the new governess did not give her the opportunity to make the moment an embarra.s.sing one. She stepped forward, and, taking the girl's hand in her own, said softly:

"Mr. Turner has told me all about you. I hope we shall be very happy together."

She did not attempt to kiss her.

Nan murmured an indistinct "Yes'm," and shrank back against the wall.

Delia stood beside the new governess with a very curious expression on her face. For a moment there was silence, and then Mr. Turner broke in upon it with:

"I think it would be well if Miss Blake were to be shown to her room at once. She is drenched with the rain and must be cold and hungry. Will you be good enough, Delia, to get her something to eat while Nan takes her upstairs?"

Nan started forward quickly at the note of rebuke in the lawyer's voice.

"Oh, won't you come to your room?" she asked.

She vaguely wondered what made Delia look so strange and act in such a dazed, uncertain fashion. She thought she must be a sad "'fraid-cat"

to be overawed by such a little personage as the new governess.

"Now I will say good-night," said Mr. Turner to Miss Blake, as she started to follow Nan above. "I hope," he added in an undertone, taking her hand, "that you will be happy. Don't become discouraged.

Send for me whenever you need me. I am always at your service."

She silently bowed her thanks. Somehow she found it difficult to speak just then. She had been tired and cold before she entered the house, but it seemed to her she had not known weariness or chill until now.

She felt herself shiver as she turned away from the lawyer and heard the door close behind him. He seemed to be leaving her alone with an enemy.

Nan certainly looked anything but amicable.

"Here's your room," she announced, as they reached the upper landing.

She flung open a door, and the new governess found herself stepping forth into utter darkness, where Nan herself was groping about for matches. The air of the place was cold and damp. It had the feel of a room that was unused. It was barren and cheerless. But in the second preceding Nan's discovery of the matches Miss Blake hoped that when the gas was lit it would seem more inviting. But it did not. It was bare and undecorated, and presented anything but an attractive appearance.

The stranger drew two long pins from her hat without saying a word.

Nan turned on her heel and made to leave the room.

"Will you please tell me where I can find some warm water?" inquired Miss Blake.

"Washstand in that little dressing-room. Left-hand faucet," announced Nan, curtly, and marched away.

The governess gently closed the door.

Perhaps if Nan had remained there to see she would have wondered if Miss Blake were quite in her right mind. Her behavior was certainly extraordinary. The tears rained down her cheeks, and she did not try to stop them. She just stood in the middle of the floor and gazed about at the awkwardly-placed furniture, the faded carpet, the bare walls, and the ugly mantel-piece as if she could not take her eyes from them. She turned slowly from one thing to another, and presently, in a sort of timid, hungry way, she stretched out her hand and touched each separate object with her caressing fingers, crying very hard the while and murmuring to herself in so low a voice that no one could have overheard.

Even Nan must have softened to her as she stood there crying softly and smiling through her tears at this bare and unfamiliar room. Even Nan must have been moved to wonder what Miss Blake had suffered that she was so glad to get into such an uninviting shelter as this.

But Nan was down stairs in the bas.e.m.e.nt watching Delia prepare a dainty supper for the governess, and scowling at her as she saw to what trouble she went to make it appetizing and delicate.

"There, Delia Connor!" she burst out resentfully, "you're the worst turn-coat I ever saw in my life! This very afternoon you looked black as thunder when you thought she had come, and now you are just dancing attendance on her, as if she was the best friend you ever had!"

"Perhaps she is," responded Delia, placing sprigs of parsley neatly about the sliced chicken and setting the coffee-pot on the range.

Nan tossed her head scornfully. "Well, I like that! I should think you'd be ashamed! A perfect stranger like her!"

Delia did not answer. She was crushing ice for the olives, and as Nan spoke she bent her face over the table and pounded away in silence.

But when she had finished, she lifted her head and said, amiably:

"Oh, you can't tell. By the looks of her I should think she is a good-natured little body. She has the true eyes. When you see eyes like that you can mostly be sure they've an honest soul behind 'em. I shouldn't wonder if she'd be a good friend to any one who'd let her."