The Tree of Knowledge Part 9

"I suppose it's hidden among the gra.s.s," said Mr. Cranmer, after a moment's thought. "Let us go and look. Is your mother sure it was not brought here, Clara?"

"Certain sure, sir. n.o.body carried away anything but mother, who took the peecture, an' you as carried the box and easel."

"Could Miss Brabourne's servant have taken it?" suggested Claud.

"Nay, sir, a think not," said Clapp, "for a stopped to speak to my missus, and she would ha' gi'en her the things if she had 'em."

"Let's go and look!" cried Claud, seizing his hat again.

The sun had set at last--what a long lime it seemed to have taken to-night! The rosy afterglow dyed all the heavens, and the trees were outlined black against it. As they hurried through the Waste, it seemed to the young man as if he had known the neighborhood for years; ages appeared to have elapsed since the afternoon, when he had been soberly driving with Mab along the coach-road, accomplishing the last stage in their pleasant, uneventful ten days' driving-tour. How little he had thought, when he planned that driving-tour for Mab, who had been thoroughly wearied out with an epidemic of whooping-cough in her nursery, that it would lead to consequences such as these. He was profoundly interested in the mysterious circ.u.mstances of this affair in which, somehow, he had been made to play such a prominent part. Come what might, he must stay and see it out. Mab might go home if she liked--in fact, he thought she had better telegraph to Edward to come and fetch her. The children were all at Eastbourne with the nurses, and she would have a chance of quiet if she went for a few days to the "mater's" inconvenient dark little house in Provost Street, Park Lane; and----

"Here you are, sirr," said William Clapp, in his broad Devon. "Where's the missus's dishclout?"

In fact, it was not to be seen. They searched for it high and low, in vain. Mr. Cranmer felt as if he were in the toils of that mixture of the ghastly and the absurd which we call nightmare. This last detail was too ridiculous! That a gentleman should be waylaid and murdered on the king's highway, and all for the sake of a blue handkerchief and a pudding-basin! In his mingled feelings of amus.e.m.e.nt and annoyance, he did not know whether to laugh or be angry--the whole thing was too incredible, too monstrous.

CHAPTER VIII.

"Thy steps are dancing towards the bound Between the child and woman, And thoughts and feelings more profound And other years are coming; And thou shalt be more deeply fair, More precious to the heart, But never canst thou be again The lovely thing thou art."

SIDNEY WALKER.

"My dear, I cannot understand it!" said Miss Charlotte Willoughby.

"It is most strange--you don't think Mrs. Battishill can have kept them to tea?" hazarded Miss f.a.n.n.y, in her gentle way.

Miss Charlotte crushed her, as usual.

"Jane stay out to tea without leave? She has never done such thing a before."

"It's very warm. They may be lingering on account of the heat," put in Miss Ellen's quiet voice.

"The heat is not too great for any healthy girl," said Miss Emily, with decision. "I have noticed lately in Elaine a very languid and dawdling way of doing things. I shall speak to her on the subject. I don't know what she has to occupy her thoughts, but she evidently is never thinking of what she is doing."

"She is a dear good child, on the whole," said Miss f.a.n.n.y, comfortably.

"I cannot help thinking that she sometimes finds her life dull," said Ellen.

"Dull!" cried the three ladies in chorus; and Charlotte added, in high and amazed tones:

"Why, she is occupied from morning till night!"

"It was only to-day I let her off a quarter-of-an-hour practising on account of the heat," continued f.a.n.n.y.

"If you think she might devote more time to her calisthenics----" began Emily.

"It was not that I meant at all," said Ellen, when she could get a hearing. "I do not complain of want of occupation for hers, but want of amus.e.m.e.nt."

"I was always taught to consider," said Charlotte, in a tone of some displeasure, "that those who were fully employed need never complain of _ennui_. Occupation is amus.e.m.e.nt."

"Then, to follow on your argument," said Ellen, half playfully, "the convicts who are sentenced to hard labor must have a most amusing time of it."

This remark, savoring dangerously of irony, was received by the three sisters with utter silence, and Charlotte thought, as she often did, what a pity it was that Ellen read so many books; really it quite warped her judgment.

"Of course everything should be in moderation," she said frigidly, after a pause; "too severe labor would be as bad for the body as too little is for the mind."

This speech sounded rather well, and Charlotte's temper was somewhat soothed by the feeling that she had made a hit.

Miss Ellen sighed. She felt that nothing could be done on Elaine's behalf, if she began by setting up the backs of the entire council of education. Yet so narrow had the minds of these excellent women grown, by living so perpetually in one groove, that it seemed impossible even to hint that they were mistaken without putting them out of temper.

"Of course I know that occupation is most necessary," said she, "and I agree with you that every woman should be well employed; but I only wanted to suggest that perhaps a little more variety than we find necessary might be good for the young. We are glad to live our quiet, untroubled days through; but for Elaine,--don't you think that some diversion now and then would be beneficial? Remember, as girls, we went to London for a month each spring, our dear father always gave us that treat; and I know that I, at least, used to get through my work here with all the greater zest because of looking forward to that month's enjoyment."

"And what is the result?" burst out Miss Charlotte, with quite unusual energy. "What is the result of all this going to London, pray? I am sure I heartily wish, and f.a.n.n.y for one agrees with me, that we had never gone near the place! If we had not gadded about to London our poor pretty Alice would never have met that vile Valentine Brabourne with his deceitful face, and the family tragedy would never have taken place----"

"And we should never have had Elaine to brighten our home and give us something to care for," said Ellen, speaking bravely, though the remembrance of her favorite sister brought the color to her wan face, and dimmed her eyes.

"You know the reason we never took Elaine to London was to keep her as much as possible dissociated from her step-mother and step-brother,"

went on Miss Charlotte, combatively.

"Yes, I know," answered her sister, quietly, "and that is where I think we have been so wrong. Because, much as we may have disliked Mrs.

Brabourne, she was Valentine Brabourne's wife, and we had no right to allow Elaine to grow up quite estranged from her brother."

This took Charlotte's breath quite away. It was rare to hear Ellen a.s.sert herself at all, but to hear her deliberately say that Charlotte was wrong----!

"I am much more to blame than any of you," went on Ellen, "because I will admit that, at the time Elaine came to us, I was very, very sore at the conduct of Mrs. Brabourne and her relations, and I was only eager to get possession of the child and keep her from them all; but I was quite wrong, Charlotte. Think what an interest her little brother would have been to her."

"Well, I do think, Ellen, you cannot quite reflect on what you are saying," said Charlotte, her tongue loosed at last in a perfect torrent of words. "I have always said you read too many books, and I suppose you have some romantic notion of reconciliation in your head now. I have every respect for you, Ellen, as the head of this family, but you must allow me to say that, invalid as you are, and always confined to the house, you are apt to be taken hold of by crotchets and fancies. Let us look for a moment at the facts of the case: do you consider that Mrs.

Brabourne was a fit person to have the bringing-up of Elaine?"

"No, I frankly say I do not. I am not suggesting that Mrs. Brabourne should have brought her up."

"Do you consider that the Ortons would be a nice house for Elaine to be constantly visiting at?"

"No, Charlotte, I cannot say I do."

"Do you imagine it at all likely that we could have been on terms of any intimacy with Mrs. Brabourne and her brother _without_ allowing Elaine to visit there?"

"It might have been difficult," Miss Ellen, with rising color was constrained to admit; "but I was not advocating intimacy exactly; only that Elaine should be on friendly terms with little G.o.dfrey."

"Is she _not_ on friendly terms? I am sure then it is not my fault. She sends him a card every Christmas and a present every birthday, and always writes to her step-mother once a year. I really do not see how one could go much further without the intimacy which you admit is undesirable," cried Charlotte, in triumph.

"I do not admit that it is undesirable for Elaine to be intimate with her brother," said Ellen, with firmness.

"And pray how is the brother to be separated from the Orton crew, with their Sunday tennis-parties, their actors and actresses, their racing and their betting?"