Tom and Some Other Girls Part 16

"You will probably find when the full report comes out that you have done better in most respects, but that it is the preliminaries which have caused your failure. But Rhoda, Rhoda, how would it help you to know that another poor girl had failed, and was as miserable as yourself? Would you be _glad_ to hear that Dorothy was sitting crying at home, and Kathleen bearing her parents' grief as well as her own?

You could not possibly be so selfish. I know you too well. You are far too kind and generous."

"I'm a pig!" said Rhoda contritely, and the tears trickled dismally off the end of her nose, and splashed on to the wooden table. "I should like to be a saint, and resigned, and rejoice in the good fortunes of my companions like the girls in books, but I can't. I just feel sore, and mad, and aching, and as if they were all in conspiracy against me to make my failure more bitter. You had better give it up, Evie, and leave me to fight it out alone. I'll come to my senses in time, and write pretty, gushing letters to say how charmed I am--and make funny little jokes at the end about my own collapse. This is Monday--perhaps by Wednesday or Thursday--"

"I expect it will be Tuesday, and not an hour later. You are letting off such an amount of steam that you will calm down more quickly than you think. And now, hadn't we better go indoors, and bathe those poor red eyes before lunch? Your mother will think I have been scolding you, and I don't want to be looked upon as a dragon when I'm out of harness, and posing as an innocent, unprofessional visitor. Come, dear, and we'll talk no more of the horrid old exam., but try to forget it and enjoy ourselves!"

Rhoda's sigh was sepulchral in its intensity, for, of course, happiness must henceforth be a thing of the past, so far as she was concerned; but as she did not appreciate the idea of appearing at lunch with a tear- stained face, she followed meekly to the house, and entering by a side door, led the way upstairs to her own luxurious bedroom.

Half an hour of chastened enjoyment followed as she sat sponging her eyes, while Evie strolled round the room, exclaiming with admiration at the sight of each fresh treasure, and showing the keenest interest in the jugs and their histories. She admired Rhoda's possessions, and Rhoda admired her, watching the graceful figure reflected in the mirrors; the pretty dress, so simple, yet so becoming; the dark hair waving so softly round the winsome face. Evie was certainly one of the prettiest of creatures, and Rhoda felt a sort of reflected glory in taking her downstairs and exhibiting her to her family.

If the tear marks had not altogether disappeared, no one appeared to notice them, and despite her own silence, lunch was a cheery meal. Evie chattered away in her gayest manner; Mrs Chester agreed with every word she said, and called her "dear" as if she were a friend of years'

standing. Mr Chester beamed upon her with undisguised, fatherly admiration, and Harold looked more animated than Rhoda had seen him for many a long day. The brisk, bright way in which Evie took up his drawling sentences, and put him right when he was mistaken in a statement, would have made him withdraw into his sh.e.l.l if attempted by a member of the household, but he did not seem in the least annoyed with Evie. He only smiled to himself in amused fashion, and watched her narrowly out of the corners of his eyes.

When dessert was put upon the table, Mrs Chester looked wistfully at Rhoda's white face, lighted into a feeble smile by one of her friend's sallies, and was seized with a longing to keep this comforter at hand.

"I suppose you must go back to D-- this afternoon, dear," she said, "but couldn't we persuade you to come back and pay us a visit before you leave this part of the world? It would be a great pleasure to Rhoda, and to us all, and any time would suit us. Just fix your own day, and--"

"Oh, Evie, do!" cried Rhoda eagerly, and both the men joined in with murmurs of entreaty; but Miss Everett shook her head, and said regretfully:

"I'm so sorry, but it's impossible. I have already been away longer than I intended, and cannot spend another day away from home. My mother is busier than usual, for a sister who used to teach has had a bad illness and is staying with us for six months, to rest and be nursed up.

It would not be fair to stay away any longer."

"I should think you might be allowed to rest in your holidays. You work hard enough for the rest of the year, and I need you more than the old aunt, I'm sure I do. You must come, if only for a week!"

"I wish I could, Rhoda, but it is not possible. I'll tell you, however, who I believe _could_ come, and who would do you more good than I, and that is Tom Bolderston! She is in no hurry to return home, and as it is decided that she is not to come back to Hurst Manor, but go on straight to Newnham, it will be your last opportunity of seeing her for some time. You would enjoy having Tom, wouldn't you, Rhoda?"

Rhoda lifted her eyebrows with a comical expression. Tom here; Tom in Erley Chase! Tom sitting opposite to Harold and blinking at him with her little fish eyes--the thought was so comical that she laughed in spite of herself.

"I think I should. It would be very funny. If I may ask her, mother--"

"Of course, of course, darling! Ask whom you will, for as long as you like," cried the fond mother instantly. From what she had heard of Tom she had come to the conclusion that she was a very strange, and not entirely sane, young woman; but Rhoda wished it, Rhoda had laughed at the suggestion, and said it would be "funny," and that settled the question.

A letter of invitation was duly written and given into Miss Everett's hand when the time came for departure, and brother and sister escorted her to the station. Rhoda was insistent in her regrets at parting, and, wonderful to relate, Harold condescended to make still another plea. If it were impossible to arrange a visit, could not Miss Everett spare a few hours at least, come down by an early train, and spend a day on the river with himself and his sister? He urged the project so warmly that Evie flushed with mingled pleasure and embarra.s.sment.

"Don't tempt me! I should love it, but we are here only for four days, and I have been away for one already. It would not be courteous."

"She is so horribly conscientious, that's the worst of her!" said Rhoda, as she and Harold retraced their steps across the Park. "She is always thinking about other people. A day on the river would have been lovely."

"Yes, it's a pity. I thought we would ask Ella, and take up lunch and tea."

"Yes, of course, a very good idea. Then we should have been four, and I could have had Evie to myself--"

"Y-es!" drawled Harold slowly. Two minutes later Rhoda happened to look at his face, and wondered why in the world he was smiling to himself in that funny, amused fashion!

CHAPTER EIGHTEEN.

TOM ARRIVES.

Tom wrote by return to state that she considered Rhoda "a brick" for sending her such a "ripping" invitation; that it would be "great sport"

to see her at home, and that she would arrive by the twelve o'clock train on the next Monday.

"She isn't pretty," Rhoda explained anxiously to Harold, the fastidious; "in fact, she's plain, very plain indeed. I'm afraid you won't like her, but she likes _you_. She saw you on the platform at Euston, and said you were a `bee-ootiful young man,' and that she was broken-hearted that she couldn't stay to make your acquaintance."

"Good taste, evidently, though unattractive!" said Harold, smiling.

"I'm sorry she's not good-looking, but it can't be helped. No doubt she makes up for it in moral worth."

"Well, she does, that's perfectly true. I loathed and detested her at first, but I'm devoted to her now. She's just, and kind, and awfully clever, and so funny that you simply can't be in low spirits when she's about. All the girls adore her, but you won't. She says herself that men can't appreciate her, so she's going to devote her life to women, out of revenge. Men never care for women unless they are pretty and taking," cried Rhoda, with an air, and Harold protested sententiously.

"I'm the exception to the rule! I look beyond the mere exterior, to the n.o.bility of character which lies behind. Dear Tom's lack of beauty is nothing to me. I am prepared for it, and shall suffer no disillusion."

He changed his mind, however, when at the appointed time "dear Tom"

arrived, and stepped from the carriage on to the platform of the little station. When his eye first fell upon her, in response to Rhoda's excited, "There she is!" he felt a momentary dizzy conviction that there must be a mistake. This extraordinary apparition could never be his sister's friend, but yes! it was even so, for already the girls were greeting each other, and glancing expectantly in his direction. He went through the introduction with immovable countenance, saw the two friends comfortably seated in the pony carriage, and called to mind a message in the village which would prevent him from joining them as he had intended. He required a few minutes' breathing time to recover his self-possession, and the girls drove off alone, not at all sorry, if the truth were told, to be deprived of his company.

"Well, Fuzzy!" cried Tom.

"Well, Tom!" cried Rhoda, and stared with wondering eyes at the unaccustomed grandeur of her friend's attire. Thomasina had done honour to the occasion by putting on her very best coat and skirt, of a shade of fawn accurately matching her complexion, while on her head was perched that garment unknown at Hurst, "a trimmed hat." Fawn straw, fawn wings sticking out at right angles, bows of fawn-coloured ribbon wired into ferocious stiffness--such was the work of art; and complacent, indeed, was the smile of its owner as she met her companion's scrutiny.

"Got 'em _all_ on, haven't I?" she enquired genially. "Must do honour to the occasion, you know, and here's yourself all a-blowing, all a- growing, looking as fresh as a daisy, in your grand white clothes!"

"Indeed, then, I feel nothing of the kind, or it must be a very dejected daisy. You have heard the news, of course, and know that I am--"

"Plucked!" concluded Tom, p.r.o.nouncing the awful word without a quiver.

"Yes. Thought you would be; you were so cheap that arithmetic morning.

You can't do sums when you are on the point of fainting every second minute... Very good results on the whole."

"Yes, but--isn't it awful for me? Don't you pity me? I never in my life had such a blow."

"Bit of a jar, certainly, but it's over now, and can't be helped. No use whining!" said Tom calmly, and Rhoda gave a little jump in her seat.

After all, can anyone minister to a youthful sufferer like a friend of her own age? Tom's remarks would hardly have been considered comforting by an outsider, yet by one short word she had helped Rhoda more than any elderly comforter had been able to do. It was interesting and praiseworthy to grieve over such a disappointment as she had experienced, to be sorrowful, even heart-broken, but _to whine_! That put an entirely different aspect on her grief! To whine was feeble, childish, and undignified, a thing to which no self-respecting girl could stoop. As Rhoda recalled her tears and repinings, a flush of shame came to her cheeks, and she resolved that, whatever she might have to suffer in the future, she would, at least, keep it to herself, and not proclaim her trouble on the house-tops.

When the Chase was reached, Tom was taken into the drawing-room and introduced to Mrs Chester, who poured out tea in unusual silence, glancing askance at the fawn-coloured visitor who sat bolt upright on her chair, nibbling at her cake with a propriety which was as disconcerting to the kindly hostess as it was apparently diverting to her daughter. Rhoda had been accustomed to see Tom play a hundred sly tricks over this sociable meal, a favourite one being to balance a large morsel on the back of her right hand, and with an adroit little tap from the left send it flying into the mouth stretched wide to receive it, and it tickled her immensely to witness this sudden fit of decorum. She sat and chuckled, and Mrs Chester sat and wondered, until Tom politely declined a third cup of tea, and was dragged into the garden, with entreaties to behave properly, and be a little like herself, "I thought I was charming," she declared. "I tried to copy Evie, and look exactly as she does when she is doing the agreeable. Didn't you notice the smile? And I didn't stare a bit, though I was longing to all the time.

You _do_ live in marble halls, Fuzzy, and no mistake! We could get the whole of our little crib into that one room, and we don't go in for any ornaments or fal-lals. A comfortable bed to sleep in, and lots of books--that's all my old dad and I trouble about."

Rhoda thought of the dismal little study at Hurst Manor, with the broken chairs, and the gloves on the chimney-piece, and could quite imagine the kind of home from which the owner came; but she murmured little incredulities, as in politeness bound, as she led the way in the direction best calculated to impress a stranger. Tom did not pay much attention to the grounds themselves, but she raved over the horses, and made friends with all the dogs, even old Lion, the calf-like mastiff, who was kept chained up in the stable-yard because of his violent antipathy to strangers. When he beheld this daring young woman walking up to his very side, and making affectionate overtures for his favour, he showed his teeth in an alarming scowl, but next moment he changed his mind, and presently Tom was pinching and punching, and stroking his ears, with the ease of an old acquaintance.

"I've never met the dog yet that I couldn't master!" she announced proudly. "That old fellow would follow me all round the grounds as meekly as a lamb, if he had the chance!"

"We won't try him, thank you; he might meet a messenger-boy _en route_, and we should have to pay the damages. Come along now, and I will show you--" but at this opportune moment Harold came in view, sauntering round the corner of the stable, and Rhoda called to him eagerly, glad to be able to impress him with a sense of Tom's powers.

"Harold, look here! See what friends Tom has made with Lion already.

He lets her do anything that she likes. Isn't it wonderful?"

"By Jove!" exclaimed Harold, and looked unaffectedly surprised to see his gruff old friend submitting meekly to the stranger's advances.

"Tastes differ!" was the mental comment, but aloud he said suavely, "Lion is a good judge of character. He knows when he has found a friend."

"Yes, they all recognise me. I was a bulldog in my last incarnation,"

said Tom calmly, and by some extraordinary power which she possessed of drawing her mobile features into any shape which she chose, certain it is that she looked marvellously like a bulldog at that moment: twinkling eyes set far apart, heavy mouth, small, impertinent nose, all complete!