The Rectory Children Part 4

Mrs. Vane shivered a little.

'I do hope your father and Randolph will be in soon,' she said. 'It may be very mild here, but it strikes me as chilly all the same. I really don't think it is wise to stay out so late, and it has been so almost unnaturally still all day, I shouldn't wonder if it was setting in for stormy weather.'

Biddy's eyes sparkled.

'I would so like,' she was beginning, but she suddenly checked herself.

'Are there always shipwrecks when there's storms?' she asked.

'I fear so,' her mother replied.

'Then I mustn't like storms, I suppose,' said the child. 'It's very tiresome--everything's made the wrong way.'

'Bridget, take care what you're saying,' Mrs. Vane said almost sternly.

Biddy's face did not pucker up, but a dark look came over it, taking away all the pleasant brightness and the merry eagerness of the gray eyes. She did not often look like that, fortunately, for it made her almost ugly. And though her face cleared a little after a while, still it was gloomy, like the darkening sky outside, when she followed Alie downstairs to tea, after they had taken off their things and the torn frock had been changed.

Things had hardly got into their regular order yet at Seacove Rectory.

The Vanes had only been there three days, and every one knows that the troubles of a removal, especially to a considerable distance, are very much aggravated when it takes place in midwinter. It was not to be wondered at that 'mamma' felt both tired and rather dispirited. She was a little homesick too, for mammas can feel homesick as well as both boys and girls; and indeed I would not take upon myself to say that 'papas'

are quite above this weakness either. Christmas time had been spent at Mrs. Vane's old home, a warm, cheery, old-fashioned country-house, where grandpapa and grandmamma were still hale and hearty, and never so happy as when surrounded by their grandchildren. This old home of mamma's was within easy access of London too; no wonder, therefore, that the remote seaside rectory seemed a kind of exile to Mrs. Vane, though the reasons that had made Mr. Vane accept the offer of Seacove had been very important ones.

Rosalys, and Randolph too, though in a less thoughtful way, understood all this, and both of the elder children were anxious to help and cheer their parents to the best of their ability. And as all children love change, and most children enjoy, for a time at least, the freedom and independence of the country, it was much less trying for them than for their father and mother. To Bridget the idea of coming to live altogether at the seaside was one of unmixed pleasure. She dearly loved the sea, and all she had hitherto known of it was in pleasant summer weather, and at a bright amusing little place called Rockcliffe.

Seacove was certainly not exactly what she had expected; still, sand-hills and a great stretch of splendid sh.o.r.e were not to be despised. I feel sure, however, that young as she was she would have sympathised with her mother, and tried 'extra' hard not to vex her, had she known more about it all. But very little had been explained to her; indeed, Rosalys had been forbidden to say much about the reasons for the change to her little sister. 'She is such a baby for her age, and so heedless,' said Mrs. Vane. In treating Bride thus, I think her mother made a mistake.

The children's tea was laid out in the dining-room, for the schoolroom was still in a chaotic state, and Miss Millet, the governess, was not coming back for another week yet. And in the meantime mamma, and papa too, sometimes had tea with the little girls and Randolph.

The fire was burning brightly and the table looked inviting when Mrs.

Vane came downstairs. Alie had hurried down to see to it all; she knew what a difference a little care makes sometimes--how a crumpled-looking table-cloth or untidily placed dishes will add to low spirits when any one is not feeling as bright and cheerful as usual. There were still some of grandmamma's good things, which she had had packed in a hamper for the first start at the new rectory--home-made cakes and honey and fresh b.u.t.ter, the very sight of which made one hungry!

Rosalys glanced at her mother, and was pleased to see that the sweet face looked rather brighter and less anxious as she stood for a moment at the fire warming her hands.

'There is one comfort in this house, inconvenient though it is in many ways,' said Mrs. Vane, 'the chimneys don't smoke. And close to the sea as it is, one could scarcely have wondered if they had done so. If only it really does your father as much good as the doctors said, I am sure I shall get to like it.'

'Yes indeed,' Alie agreed. 'Mamma dear, won't you sit down and let me pour out your tea?'

'The wind is really rising,' said Mrs. Vane. 'I wish they would come in--papa and Rough. It would be such a pity if he caught cold,' she added with a little sigh.

Something in the tone and the sigh caught Biddy's attention. She was sitting at the table more silent than usual, very much absorbed, in fact, with her own grievances. What did mamma mean?

'Is papa ill?' she asked abruptly.

Alie glanced at her, frowning slightly. Her mother turned quickly.

'What a strange question to ask, Bride,' she said; 'it is just like you--you cannot but know that papa is not at all strong.'

Biddy looked puzzled. 'Strong' to her meant vaguely being able to lift heavy weights, or things of that kind.

'I didn't know he was _ill_,' she replied. 'I didn't know big people were ill except for going to die, like our 'nother grandmamma. Papa's had the measles and chicken-pox when he was little, hasn't he? I thought it was only children that could be ill to get better like that.'

Mrs. Vane glanced at Rosalys in a sort of despair. But before Alie could say anything to smooth matters, her mother called Bridget from her seat and made her stand before her.

'Bridget,' she said, 'I don't know what to say to you. Have you no heart or feeling at all? How _can_ you say such things. I do not believe in your not understanding; you can understand when you choose, and you are nearly eight years old. You must know how miserably anxious I have been and still am about your father; you _must_ know it is for his health we have come to this strange, dreary place, away from every one we care for, and you can talk in that cold-hearted, cold-blooded way about dying and not getting better and--and----' Mrs. Vane's voice trembled and quivered. She seemed almost as if she were going to cry. Alie came and stood beside her, gently putting her arm round her mother and looking daggers at Bride. Mamma was nervous and over-tired, she knew; she had had so much to go through lately. How could Biddy be so naughty and unfeeling? And yet, as the words pa.s.sed through her mind, Rosalys hesitated. Biddy was not really unfeeling--it was not the word for her.

It was more as if she would not take the trouble to feel or to understand anything that was not her own special concern; there was a queer kind of laziness about her, which led to selfishness. It was as if her mind and heart were asleep sometimes.

But she could feel. Her face was all puckered up now; there was no temper or sullenness about it, but real pale-faced distress.

'Mamma,' she said brokenly, 'I didn't, oh, truly, I didn't mean it that way. I know papa isn't old enough to die; but I thought he was too big to be ill like that.'

'Biddy,' said Alie sternly, 'you are talking nonsense again. You know big people are ill often, and sometimes they get better and sometimes they die. Don't you remember Mrs. Hay--Meta Hay's mamma? She was ill and----'

'Yes, I quite forgot,' exclaimed Biddy eagerly; 'I didn't think. Yes, Meta's mamma was very ill, and she died. I wish I'd remembered; and she wasn't at all old like Grandmamma Vane.'

She spoke almost cheerfully. Again Mrs. Vane glanced at her elder daughter.

'It's no use,' she was beginning, but Alie interrupted. How she wished the unfortunate Mrs. Hay had not been the first instance to occur to her!

'_Children_ get ill and die too sometimes,' Alie went on, 'and big people very often get better. There was Captain Leonard next door to us at home----'

'And--I know--the boy-that-brought-the-potatoes' papa,' cried Biddy. 'I _am_ so glad I thought of him. I was in the kitchen one morning fetching sand for Tweetums's cage and he came in, and cook asked how was his papa, and he said, "Finely better, I thank ye, mum." I think cook said he was a _Hirish_ boy,' Bridget hurried on in her excitement--and when she was excited I am afraid her 'h's' were apt to suffer--Mrs. Vane gasped! 'I am _so_ glad I thought of him. Papa will get better like the potato boy's father. I'll say it in my prayers. Dear mamma, I won't forget. And I _will_ try to be good and not tear my frocks nor speak without thinking.'

The tears were coming now, but Biddy knew mamma did not like her to begin to cry, and truly it was no wonder, for once she began it was by no means easy to say when she would leave off! She choked them down as well as she could. And the little face, hot and flushed now, was timidly raised to her mother's for a kiss of forgiveness.

It was not refused, but a sigh accompanied it, which went to the child's heart. But there was no time for more, as at that moment the hall door was heard to open and Mr. Vane's and Rough's voices sounded outside.

Quite subdued, desperately penitent, Bridget went back to her place. Her head was full as well as her heart. She had so many things to think over that she felt as if she could not eat. First and foremost was the strange newly awakened anxiety about her father. She looked at him as he came in as she had never looked at him before, almost expecting to see some great and appalling change in his appearance. But no--he seemed much as usual--his face was indeed reddened a little by his brisk walk in the chill air, and his voice was as cheery as ever. Biddy gave a loud, most audible sigh of relief. Mr. Vane started and interrupted himself in the middle of a lively account of the adventures he and Randolph had met with in their walk.

'My dear Biddy,' he said. 'What _can_ you have to sigh about in that appalling way?'

Bridget opened her mouth as if to speak, but Rosalys, trembling as to what she might not be going to say, interrupted.

'Please, papa, don't ask her just now,' she said; 'do go on telling us about what sort of a place Seacove is,' and she added in a whisper, as she gave a little private tug to his sleeve, 'Biddy's been rather--tiresome, and if she begins to cry----'

CHAPTER IV

BIDDY HAS SOME NEW THOUGHTS

'O, children take long to grow.'

JEAN INGELOW.

Mr. Vane nodded in token of comprehending Alie's hint.

'You must walk to Seacove to-morrow and see it for yourselves,' he said.

'That is to say if it is fine,' said Mrs. Vane. 'Doesn't it look stormy to-night?'