The Maidens' Lodge Part 13

Rhoda had walked away.

"But I shall not!" answered Phoebe, softly.

"Deary me, child!" said Betty, turning to look at her, "don't you go for to fret over that. Why, if a bit of a thing like that'll trouble you, you'll have plenty to fret about at White-Ladies. Mrs Rhoda, she's on and off with you twenty times a day; and you'd best take no notice. She don't mean anything ill, my dear; 'tis only her phantasies."

"Oh, Mrs Betty! I wish--"

"Phoebe!" came up from below. "Fetch my cloak and hood, and bring your own--quick, now! We are about to drive out with Madam."

"Come, dry your eyes, child, and I'll fetch the things," said Betty, soothingly. "You'll be the better of a drive."

Rhoda's annoyance seemed to have vanished from her mind as well as from her countenance; and Madam took no notice of Phoebe's disturbed looks.

The Maidens' Lodge, was first visited, and a messenger sent in to ask Lady Betty if she were inclined to take the air. Lady Betty accepted the offer, and was so considerate as not to keep Madam wailing more than ten minutes. No further invitation was offered, and the coach rumbled away in the direction of Gloucester.

For a time Phoebe heard little of the conversation between the elder ladies, and Rhoda, as usual in her grandmother's presence, was almost silent. At length she woke up to a remark made by Lady Betty.

"Then you think, Madam, to send for Gatty and Molly?"

"That is my design, my Lady Betty. 'Twill be a diversion for Rhoda; and Sir Richard was so good as to say they should come if I would."

"Indeed, I think he would be easy to have them from home, Madam, till they may see if Betty's disorder be the small-pox or no."

"When did Betty return home, my Lady?"

"But last Tuesday. 'Tis not possible that her sisters have taken aught of her, for she had been ailing some days ere she set forth, and they have bidden at home all the time. You will be quite safe, Madam."

"So I think, my Lady Betty," replied Madam. "Rhoda, have you been listening?"

"No, Madam," answered Rhoda, demurely.

"Then 'tis time you should, my dear," said Madam, graciously. "I will acquaint you of the affair. I think to write to Lady Delawarr, and ask the favour of Mrs Gatty and Mrs Molly to visit me. Their sister Mrs Betty, as I hear, is come home from the Bath, extreme distempered; and 'tis therefore wise to send away Mrs Gatty and little Mrs Molly until Mrs Betty be recovered of her disorder. I would have you be very nice toward them, that they shall find their visit agreeable."

"How long will they stay, Madam?" inquired Rhoda.

"Why, child, that must hang somewhat on Mrs Betty's recovering. I take it, it shall be about a month; but should her distemper be tardy of disappearing, it shall then be something longer."

"Jolly!" was the sound which seemed to Phoebe to issue in an undertone from the lips of Rhoda. But the answer which reached her grandmother's ears was merely a sedate "Yes, Madam."

"I take it, my Lady Betty," observed Madam, turning to her companion, "that the sooner the young gentlewomen are away, the better shall it be."

"Oh, surely, Madam!" answered Lady Betty. "'Tis truly very good of you to ask it; but you are always a general undertaker for your friends."

"We were sent into this world to do good, my Lady Betty," returned Madam, sententiously.

Unless Phoebe's ears were deceived, a whisper very like "Fudge!" came from Rhoda.

The somewhat solemn drive was finished at last; Lady Betty was set down at the Maidens' Lodge; inquiries were made as to the health of Mrs Marcella, who returned a reply intimating that she was a suffering martyr; and Rhoda and Phoebe at last found themselves free from superveillance, and safe in their bedroom.

"Now that's just jolly!" was Rhoda's first remark, with nothing in particular to precede it. "Molly Delawarr's a darling! I don't much care for Gatty, and Betty I just hate. She's a prig and a fid-fad both.

But Molly--oh, Phoebe, she's as smart as can be. Such parts she has!

You know, she's really--not quite you understand--but really she's almost as clever as I am!"

Phoebe did not seem overwhelmed by this information; she only said, "Is she?"

"Well, nearly," said Rhoda. "She knows fourteen Latin words, Molly does; and she always brings them in."

"Into what?" asked Phoebe, with the little amused laugh which was very rare with her.

"Into her discourse, to be sure, child!" said Rhoda, loftily, "You don't know fourteen Latin words; how should you?"

"How should I, indeed," rejoined Phoebe, meekly, "if father had not taught me?"

"Taught you--taught you Latin?" gasped Rhoda.

"Just a little Latin and Greek; there wasn't time for much," humbly responded Phoebe.

"Greek!" shrieked Rhoda.

"Very little, please," deprecated Phoebe.

"Phoebe, you dear sweet darling love of a Phoebe!" cried Rhoda, kissing her cousin, to the intense astonishment of the latter; "now won't you, like a dear as you are, just tell me one or two Greek words? I would give anything to outshine Molly and make her look foolish, I would! She doesn't know one word of Greek--only Latin. Do, for pity's sake, tell me, if 'tis only one Greek word! and I won't say another syllable, not if Madam gives you a diamond necklace!"

Phoebe was laughing more than she had yet ever done at White-Ladies.

She was far too innocent and amiable to think of playing Rhoda the trick of which Melanie's father was guilty, in _Contes a ma Fille_, when, under the impression that she was saying in Latin, "Knowledge gives the right to laugh at everything," he cruelly caused her to remark in public, "I am a very ridiculous donkey." Phoebe bore no malice. She only said, still smiling, "I don't know what words to tell you."

"Oh, any!" answered Rhoda, accommodatingly. "What's the Greek for ugly?"

"I don't know," said Phoebe, dubiously. "Kakos means _bad_."

"And what is _good_ and _pretty_?"

"Agathos is _good_," replied Phoebe, laughing; "and _beautiful_ is kallios."

"That'll do!" said Rhoda, triumphantly. "'Tis plenty,--I couldn't remember more. Let me see,--kaks, and agathos, and kallius--is that right?"

Phoebe laughingly offered the necessary corrections. "All right!" said Rhoda. "I've no more to wish for. I'll take the shine out of Molly!"

At supper that evening, Madam announced that she had sent her note to Lady Delawarr by a mounted messenger, and had received an answer, according to which Gatty and Molly might be expected to arrive at White-Ladies on Wednesday evening. Madam appeared to be in one of her most gracious moods, for she even condescended to inform Phoebe that Mrs Gatty was two months older than Rhoda, and Mrs Molly four years her junior,--"two years younger than you, my dear," said Madam, very affably.

"Now, Phoebe, I'll tell you what we'll do," a.s.serted Rhoda, as she sat down before the gla.s.s that night to have her hair undressed by her cousin. "I'm not going to have Molly teasing about the old gentlewomen down yonder. I'll soon shut her mouth if she begins; and if Gatty wants to go down there, well, she can go by herself. So I'll tell you what: you and I will drink a dish of tea with Mrs Dolly to-morrow, and we'll make her finish her story. I only do wish the dear old tiresome thing wouldn't preach! Then I'll take you in to see Mrs Marcella, and we'll get that done. Then in the morning, you must just set out all my gowns on the bed, and I'll have both you and Betty to sew awhile I must have some lace on that blue. I'll make Madam give me a pair of new silver buckles, too. I can't do unless I cut out those creatures somehow. And the only way to cut out Gatty is by dress, because she hasn't anything in her,--'tis all on her. I cut out Molly in brains. But my Lady Delawarr likes to dress Gatty up, because she fancies the awkward thing's pretty. She isn't, you know,--not a speck; but _she_ thinks so."

Whether the last p.r.o.noun referred to Lady Delawarr or to Gatty, Rhoda was not sufficiently perspicuous to indicate. Phoebe went on disentangling her hair in silence, and Rhoda likewise fell into a brown study.

Of the nature of her thoughts that young lady gave but two intimations: the first, as she tied up her hair in the loose bag which then served for a night-cap,--

"I cannot abide that Betty!"

The second came a long while afterwards, just as Phoebe was dropping to sleep.