declared himself as permanently devoted to the degrading iniquities of penny newspapers, she had thought it best to cast him off altogether. Now, thus late in life, she was going to make another venture, to try an altogether new mode of living,—in order, as she said to herself, that she might be of some use to somebody,—but, no doubt, with a further unexpressed hope in her bosom, that the solitude of her life might be relieved by the companionship of some one whom she might love. She had arrayed herself in a clean cap and her evening gown, and she went downstairs looking sternly, with a fully-developed idea that she must initiate her new duties by assuming a mastery at once. But inwardly she trembled, and was intensely anxious as to the first appearance of her niece. Of course there would be a little morsel of a bonnet. She hated those vile patches,—dirty flat daubs of millinery as she called them; but they had become too general for her to refuse admittance for such a thing within her doors. But a chignon, a bandbox behind the noddle,—she would not endure. And then there were other details of feminine gear, which shall not be specified, as to which she was painfully anxious,—almost forgetting in her anxiety that the dress of this young woman whom she was about to see must have ever been regulated by the closest possible economy.
The first thing she saw on entering the room was a dark straw hat, a straw hat with a strong penthouse flap to it, and her heart was immediately softened.
“My dear,” she said, “I am glad to see you.”
Dorothy, who, on her part, was trembling also, whose position was one to justify most intense anxiety, murmured some reply.
“Take off your hat,” said the aunt, “and let me give you a kiss.”
The hat was taken off and the kiss was given. There was certainly no chignon there. Dorothy Stanbury was light haired, with almost flaxen ringlets, worn after the old-fashioned way which we used to think so pretty when we were young. She had very soft grey eyes, which ever seemed to beseech you to do something when they looked at you, and her mouth was a beseeching mouth. There are women who, even amidst their strongest efforts at giving assistance to others, always look as though they were asking aid themselves, and such a one was Dorothy Stanbury. Her complexion was pale, but there was always present in it a tint of pink running here and there, changing with every word she spoke, changing indeed with every pulse of her heart. Nothing ever was softer than her cheek; but her hands were thin and hard, and almost fibrous with the working of the thread upon them. She was rather tall than otherwise, but that extreme look of feminine dependence which always accompanied her, took away something even from the appearance of her height.
“These are all real, at any rate,” said her aunt, taking hold of the curls, “and won’t be hurt by a little cold water.”
Dorothy smiled but said nothing, and was then taken up to her bedroom. Indeed, when the aunt and niece sat down to dinner together Dorothy had hardly spoken. But Miss Stanbury had spoken, and things upon the whole had gone very well.
“I hope you like roast chicken, my dear?” said Miss Stanbury.
“Oh, thank you.”
“And bread sauce? Jane, I do hope the bread sauce is hot.”
If the reader thinks that Miss Stanbury was indifferent to considerations of the table, the reader is altogether ignorant of Miss Stanbury’s character. When Miss Stanbury gave her niece the liver-wing, and picked out from the attendant sausages one that had been well browned and properly broken in the frying, she meant to do a real kindness.
“And now, my dear, there are mashed potatoes and bread sauce. As for green vegetables, I don’t know what has become of them. They tell me I may have green peas from France at a shilling a quart; but if I can’t have English green peas, I won’t have any.”
Miss Stanbury was standing up as she said this,—as she always did on such occasions, liking to have a full mastery over the dish.
“I hope you like it, my dear?”
“Everything is so very nice.”
“That’s right. I like to see a young woman with an appetite. Remember that God sends the good things for us to eat; and as long as we don’t take more than our share, and give away something to those who haven’t a fair share of their own, I for one think it quite right to enjoy my victuals. Jane, this bread sauce isn’t hot. It never is hot. Don’t tell me; I know what hot is!”
Dorothy thought that her aunt was very angry; but Jane knew Miss Stanbury better, and bore the scolding without shaking in her shoes.
“And now, my dear, you must take a glass of port wine. It will do you good after your journey.”
Dorothy attempted to explain that she never did drink any wine, but her aunt talked down her scruples at once.
“One glass of port wine never did anybody any harm, and as there is port wine, it must be intended that somebody should drink it.”
Miss Stanbury, as she sipped hers out very slowly, seemed to enjoy it much. Although May had come, there was a fire in the grate, and she sat with her toes on the fender, and her silk dress folded up above her knees. She sat quite silent in this position for a quarter of an hour, every now and then raising her glass to her lips. Dorothy sat silent also. To her, in the newness of her condition, speech was impossible.
“I think it will do,” said Miss Stanbury at last.
As Dorothy had no idea what would do, she could make no reply to this.
“I’m sure it will do,” said Miss Stanbury, after another short interval. “You’re as like my poor sister as two eggs. You don’t have headaches, do you?”
Dorothy said that she was not ordinarily affected in that way.
“When girls have headaches it comes from tight-lacing, and not walking enough, and carrying all manner of nasty smells about with them. I know what headaches mean. How is a woman not to have a headache, when she carries a thing on the back of her poll as big as a gardener’s wheelbarrow? Come, it’s a fine evening, and we’ll go out and look at the towers. You’ve never even seen them yet, I suppose?”
So they went out, and finding the verger at the Cathedral door, he being a great friend of Miss Stanbury’s, they walked up and down the aisles, and Dorothy was instructed as to what would be expected from her in regard to the outward forms of religion. She was to go to the Cathedral service on the morning of every weekday, and on Sundays in the afternoon. On Sunday mornings she was to attend the little church of St. Margaret. On Sunday evenings it was the practice of Miss Stanbury to read a sermon in the dining-room to all of whom her household consisted. Did Dorothy like daily services? Dorothy, who was more patient than her brother, and whose life had been much less energetic, said that she had no objection to going to church every day when there was not too much to do.
“There never need be too much to do to attend the Lord’s house,” said Miss Stanbury, somewhat angrily.
“Only if you’ve got to make the beds,” said Dorothy.
“My dear, I beg your pardon,” said Miss Stanbury. “I beg your pardon, heartily. I’m a thoughtless old woman, I know. Never mind. Now, we’ll go in.”
Later in the evening, when she gave her niece a candlestick to go to bed, she repeated what she had said before.
“It’ll do very well, my dear. I’m sure it’ll do. But if you read in bed either night or morning, I’ll never forgive you.”
This last caution was uttered with so much energy, that Dorothy gave a little jump as she promised obedience.
Chapter IX.
Shewing How the Quarrel Progressed Again
On one Sunday morning, when the month of May was nearly over, Hugh Stanbury met Colonel Osborne in Curzon Street, not many yards from