Wee Wifie Part 16

THAT ROOM OF MRS. WATKINS'S.

Soft hair on which light drops a diadem.

GERALD Ma.s.sEY.

With hands so flower-like, soft and fair, She caught at life with words as sweet As first spring violets.

_Ibid._

No, it was not a bad room, that room of Mrs. Watkins's, seen just now in the November dusk, with its bright fire and neat hearth, with the kettle gossiping deliciously to itself; there was at once something comfortable and homelike about it; especially as the red curtains were drawn across the two windows that look down into High Street, and the great carts that had been rumbling underneath them since daybreak had given place to the jolting of lighter vehicles which pa.s.sed and repa.s.sed at intervals.

The room was large, though a little low, and was plainly but comfortably furnished; an old-fashioned crimson couch stood in one corner; some stained book-shelves contained a few well-bound books; and one or two simple engravings in cheap frames adorned the wall. In spite of the simplicity of the whole there were evidences of refined taste--there were growing ferns in tall baskets; some red leaves and autumn berries arranged in old china vases; a beautiful head of Clytie, though it was only in plaster of Paris, on the mantel-piece.

The pretty tea service on the round table was only white china, hand-painted; and some more red leaves with dark chrysanthemums were tastefully arranged in a low wicker-basket in the center.

One glance would have convinced even a stranger that this room was inhabited by people of cultured taste and small means; and it was so pleasant, so home-like, so warm with ruddy fire-light, that grander rooms would have looked comfortless in comparison. There were only two people in it on this November evening--a girl lying back in a rocking-chair, with her eyes fixed thoughtfully on the dancing flames, and a child of ten, though looking two or three years younger, sitting on a stool before the fire, with a black kitten asleep on her lap, and her arms clasped round her knees.

An odd, weird sort of child, with a head running over with little dark curls, and large wondering eyes--not an ordinary child, and certainly not a pretty one, and looking, at the present moment, with her wrinkled eyebrows and huddled-up figure, like a little old witch in a fairy tale.

"I am that tired," observed the child, apparently apostrophising the kettle, "that not all the monkeys in the Zoological Gardens could make me laugh; no, not if they had the old father baboon as their head. I wish I were a jaguar!"

"Why, Fluff?" exclaimed a pleasant voice from the rocking-chair. "Why, Fluff?"

"I wish I were a jaguar," repeated the child, defiantly; "not a bison, because of its hump, nor a camel either. Why, those great spotted cats had their b.a.l.l.s to amuse them, and polished ivory bones as well; and the brown bear climbed his pole, and eat buns; no one's mother left it in the dark before the fire, with no one to tell it tales, and only a kettle to talk to a person;" and Fluff curled herself up on her stool with an affronted air.

The elder girl made no answer, but only stooped down and smilingly lifted the child and kitten on her lap--she was very small and light for her age--whereupon Fluff left off sighing, and rubbed her curly head against her sister's shoulder with a contented air.

The sisters were certainly very unlike, Fluff being very small and dark, while Fern was tall and fair; without being exactly gifted with her mother's beauty, she had a charming face, soft gray eyes, and hair of that golden-brown that one sees so often in English girls.

There were few people who did not think Fern Trafford decidedly pretty; her features were not exactly regular, but her coloring was lovely, and there was a joyousness and brightness about her that attracted old and young; every one loved Fern, and spoke well of her, she was so simple, so unselfish, so altogether charming, as they said.

Fern never complained of the narrowness of her life, never fretted because their poverty excluded her from the pleasures girls of her age generally enjoyed. From her childhood she had known no other life.

There were times when she remembered that she had gone to bed hungry, times when her mother's face looked pinched and miserable--when her father was dying, and they thought Baby Florence would die too.

Somehow Fern never cared to think of those days.

Fern was devoted to her mother, she clave to her with innocent love and loyalty. Percy's defection had been the bitterest trouble of her life. The girl nearly broke her heart when Percy left them. She grew thin and pale and large-eyed, as girls will when they are fretting and growing at the same time. Nea's motherly heart was touched with compa.s.sion for her child. She wished, if possible, to suffer alone; if it were in her power she would prevent the faintest shadow touching that bright young life.

So she spoke to her in her calm, sensible way, for Nea was always gentle with her children, and Fern was very dear to her--she had her father's eyes, and Maurice's pure upright nature seemed transmitted to his young daughter.

"Fern," she said, one evening when they were sitting together in the twilight, "you must not add to my burdens; it makes me still more unhappy to see you fretting; I miss my little daughter's brightness that used to be such a comfort to me."

"Am I a comfort to you, mother?" asked Fern, wistfully, and something in those earnest gray eyes thrilled the widow's heart with fresh pangs of memory.

"You are my one bit of sunshine," she answered, fondly, taking the girl's face between her hands and kissing it almost pa.s.sionately.

"Keep bright for your poor mother's sake, Fern."

Fern never forgot this little speech. She understood, then, that her mission was to be her mother's comforter; and with the utmost sweetness and unselfishness she put aside her own longings for her brother, and strove to make up for his loss. So Fern bloomed in her poor home like some lovely flower in a cottage garden, growing up to womanhood in those rooms over Mrs. Watkins's.

Fern had long since finished her education, and now gave morning lessons to the vicar's little daughters. In her leisure hours she made her simple gowns and Fluff's frocks, and taught the child the little she could be persuaded to learn, for Fluff was a spoiled child and very backward for her age; and one or two people, Mrs. Watkins among them, had given it as their opinion that little Florence was not all there, rather odd and uncanny in fact.

Fern was quite contented with her life. She was fond of teaching and very fond of her little pupils. Her pleasures were few and simple; a walk with Crystal or Fluff to look at the shops, perhaps an omnibus journey and an hour or two's ramble in the Park or Kensington Garden, a cozy chat with her mother in the evening, sometimes, on grand occasions, a shilling seat at the Monday or Sat.u.r.day Popular.

Fern loved pretty things, but she seemed quite satisfied to look at them through plate gla.s.s; a new dress, a few flowers, or a new book were events in her life. She would sing over her work as she sat sewing by the window; the gay young voice made people look up, but they seldom caught a glimpse of the golden-brown head behind the curtain. Fern had her dreams, like other girls; something, she hardly knew what, would happen to her some day. There was always a prince in the fairy stories that she told Fluff, but she never described him.

"What is he like?" Fluff would ask with childish impatience, but Fern would only blush and smile, and say she did not know. If, sometimes, a handsome boyish face, not dark like Percy, but with a fair, budding mustache and laughing eyes, seemed to rise out of the mist and look at her with odd wistfulness, Fern never spoke of it; a sort of golden haze pervaded it. Sometimes those eyes were eloquent, and seemed appealing to her; a strange meaning pervaded the silence; in that poor room blossomed all sorts of sweet fancies and wonderful dreams as Fern's needle flew through the stuff.

As Fluff rubbed her rough head confidingly against her shoulder, Fern gave a musical little laugh that was delicious to hear. "You absurd child," she said, in an amused tone, "I really must tell Mr. Erle not to take you again to the Zoological Gardens; you talk of nothing but bears and jaguars. So you want a story, you are positively insatiable, Fluff; how am I to think of one with my wits all wool-gathering and gone a-wandering like Bopeep's sheep? It must be an old one. Which is it to be? 'The Chocolate House,' or 'Princess Dove and the Palace of the Hundred Boys.'"

"Humph," returned Fluff, musingly; "well, I hardly know. 'The Chocolate House' is very nice, with its pathway paved with white and pink sugar plums, and its barley-sugar chairs; and don't you remember that, when Hans was hungry, he broke a little brown bit off the roof; but after all, I think I like 'Princess Dove and the Palace of the Hundred Boys' best. Let us go on where you left off."

"Where we left off?" repeated Fern, in her clear voice. "Yes, I recollect. Well, when Prince Happy-Thought--"

"Merrydew," corrected the child.

"Ah--true--well, when it came to Prince Merrydew's turn to throw up the golden ball, it went right over the moon and came down the other side, so Princess Dove proclaimed him victor, and gave him the sapphire crown; and the hundred boys--and--where was I, Fluff?"

"In the emerald meadow, where the ruby flowers grew," returned Fluff.

"Go on, Fern."

"So Princess Dove put on the crown, and it was so heavy that poor Prince Merrydew's head began to ache, and the wicked old fairy Do-nothing, who was looking on, hobbled on her golden crutches to the turquois pavilion, and--hush! I hear footsteps. Jump off my lap, Fluffy, dear, and let me light the candles." And she had scarcely done so before there was a quick tap at the door, and the next moment two young men entered the room.

Fluff ran to them at once with a pleased exclamation.

"Why, it is Percy and Mr. Erle; oh, dear, how glad I am."

"How do you do, Toddlekins," observed her brother, stooping to kiss the child's cheek, and patting her kindly on the head; "how are you, you dark-eyed witch," but as he spoke, his eyes glanced anxiously round the room.

"We never expected to see you to-night, Percy, dear," observed Fern, as she greeted him affectionately, and then gave her hand with a slight blush to the young man who was following him. "Mother will be so sorry to miss you; she was obliged to go out again. One of the girls at Miss Martingale's is ill, and Miss Theresa seems fidgety about her, so mother said she would sit with the invalid for an hour or two."

"I suppose Miss Davenport is out too"--walking to the fire-place to warm his hands.

"Yes, dear; there is a children's party at the Nortons'; it is little Nora's birthday, and nothing would satisfy the child until Crystal promised to go and play with them. It is only an early affair, and she will be back soon, so Fluff and I are waiting tea for her."

"You look very snug here, Miss Trafford," observed the other young man, whom Fluff had called Mr. Erle. By tacit consent his other name was never uttered in that house; it would have been too painful to Mrs. Trafford to hear him addressed as Mr. Huntingdon.

The young men were complete contrasts to each other. Percy Trafford was tall and slight, he had his mother's fine profile and regular features, and was a singularly handsome young man; his face would have been almost perfect, except for the weak, irresolute mouth, hardly hidden by the dark mustache and a somewhat heavily molded chin that expressed sullenness and perhaps ill-governed pa.s.sions.

The bright-faced boy, Nea's first-born and darling, had sadly deteriorated during the years that he had lived under his grandfather's roof. His selfishness had taken deeper root; he had become idle and self-indulgent; his one thought was how to amuse himself best. In his heart he had no love for the old man, who had given him the shelter of his roof, and loaded him with kindness; but all the same he was secretly jealous of his cousin Erle, who, as he told himself, bitterly, had supplanted him.

Percy's conscience reproached him at times for his desertion of his widowed mother. He knew that it was a shabby thing for him to be living in luxury, while she worked for her daily bread; but after all, he thought it was more her fault than his. She would have none of his gifts; she would not bend her proud spirit to seek a reconciliation with her father, though Percy felt sure that the old man had long ago repented of his harshness; and yet, when he had hinted this to his mother, she had absolutely refused to listen to him.

"It is too late, Percy. I have no father now," she had returned, in her firm, sad voice, and her face had looked like marble as she spoke.

Percy was rather in awe of his grandfather. Mr. Huntingdon had grown harder and more tyrannical as the years pa.s.sed on. Neither of the young men ventured to oppose his iron will. He was fond of his grandson, proud of his good looks and aristocratic air, and not disposed to quarrel with him because he was a little wild. "Young men would be young men," was a favorite saying of his; he had used it before in the case of Lord Ronald Gower.

But his nephew, Erle, was really dearer to the old man's heart. But then every one liked Erle Huntingdon, he was so sweet-tempered and full of life, so honest and frank, and so thoroughly unselfish.

He was somewhat short, at least beside Percy, and his pleasant, boyish face had no special claims to good looks. He had the ruddy, youthful air of a young David, and there was something of the innocence of the sheep-fold about him.