The Two Sides of the Shield Part 47

'Yes, it is a terrible punishment, especially as she has a certain affection for her step-uncle, or whatever he should be called, for her mother's sake. It really was a perplexed situation.'

'But why did she not consult you?'

'Do you know, I think I have found out. She held aloof from us all, and treated us--especially me--as if we were her natural enemies, and I never could guess what was the reason till the other day; she voluntarily gave me up all her books to be looked over and put into the common stock, which you saw in the schoolroom.'

'You look over all the children's books?'

'Yes. While we were wandering, they did not get enough to make it a very arduous task, and now I find that they want weeding. If children read nothing but a mult.i.tude of stories rather beneath their capacity, they are likely never to exert themselves to anything beyond novel reading.'

'That is quite true, I believe.'

'Well, among this literature of Dolly's I found no less than four stories based on the cruelty and injustice suffered by orphans from their aunts. The wicked step-mothers are gone out, and the barbarous aunts are come in. It is the stock subject. I really think it is cruel, considering that there are many children who have to be adopted into uncles' families, to add to their distress and terror, by raising this prejudice. Just look at this one'--taking up Dolly's favourite, 'Clare; or No Home'--'it is not at all badly written, which makes it all the worse.'

'Oh, Aunt Lilias,' cried Bessie, whose colour had been rising all this time. 'How shall I tell you? I wrote it!'

'You! I never guessed you did anything in that line.'

'We don't talk about it. My father knows, and so does grandmamma, in a way; but I never bring it before her if I can help it, for she does not half like the notion. But, indeed, they aren't all as bad as that! I know now there is a great deal of silly imitation in it; but I never thought of doing harm in this way. It is a punishment for thoughtlessness,' cried poor Bessie, reddening desperately, and with tears in her eyes.

'My dear, I am so sorry I said it! If I bad not one of these aunts, I should think it a very effective story.'

'I'm afraid that's so much the worse! Let me tell you about it, Aunt Lilias. At home, they always laughed at me for my turn for dismalities.'

'I believe one always has such a turn when one is young.'

'Well, when I went to live with grandmamma, it was very different from the houseful at home, I had so much time on my hands, and I took to dreaming and writing because I could not help it, and all my stories were fearfully doleful. I did not think of publis.h.i.+ng them for ever so long, but at last when David terribly wanted some money for his mission church, I thought I would try, and this Clare was about the best. They took it, and gave me five pounds for it, and I was so pleased and never thought of its doing harm, and now I don't know how much more mischief it may have done!'

'You only thought of piling up the agony! But don't be unhappy about it.

You don't know how many aunts it may have warned.'

'I'm afraid aunts are not so impressionable as nieces. And, indeed, among ourselves story-books seemed quite outside from life, we never thought of getting any ideas from them any more than from Bluebeard.'

'So it has been with some of mine, while, on the other hand, Dolores seemed to Mysie an interesting story-book heroine--which indeed she is, rather too much so. But you have not stood still with Clare.'

'No, I hope I have grown rather more sensible. David set me to do stories for his lads, and, as he is dreadfully critical, it was very improving.'

'Did you write 'Kate's Jewel'? That is delightful. Aunt Jane gave it to Val this Christmas, and all of us have enjoyed it! We shall be quite proud of it--that is--may I tell the children?'

'Oh, aunt, you are very good to try to make me forget that miserable Clare. I wonder whether it will do any good to tell Dolores all about it. Only I can't get at all the other girls I may have hurt.'

'Nay, Bessie, I think it most likely that Dolores would have been an uncomfortable damsel, even if Clare had remained in your brain. There were other causes, at any rate, here are three more persecuted nieces in her library. Besides, as you observed, everybody does not go to story-books for views of human nature, and happily, also, homeless children are commoner in books than out of them, so I don't think the damage can be very extensive.'

'One such case is quite enough! Indeed, it is a great lesson to think whether what one writes can give any wrong notion.'

'I believe one always does begin with imitation.'

'Yes, it is extraordinary how little originality there is in the world. In the literature of my time, everybody had small hands and high foreheads, the girls wanted to do great things, and did, or did not do, little ones, and the boys all took first cla.s.ses, and the fas.h.i.+on was to have violet eyes, so dark you could not tell their colour, and golden hair.'

'Whereas now the hair is apt to be bronze, whatever that may be like.'

'And all the dresses, and all the complexions, and all the lace, and all the roses, are creamy. Bessie, I hope you don't deal in creaminess!'

'I'm afraid skim milk is more like me, and that you would say I had taken to the goody line. I never thought of the responsibility then, only when I wrote for David's cla.s.ses.'

'It is a responsibility, I suppose, in the way in which every word one speaks and every letter one writes is so. And now--here is Gillian finis.h.i.+ng her piece. How far is it a secret, my dear.'

'It need not be so here, Aunt Lilias. Only my people are rather old-fas.h.i.+oned, you know, and are inclined to think it rather shocking of me, so it ought not to go beyond the family, and especially don't 'let her,' indicating her grandmother, 'hear about it. She knows I do such things--it would not be honest not to tell her--but it goes against the grain, and she has never heard one word of it all.'

It appeared that Bessie daily read the psalms and lessons to grandmamma, followed up by a sermon. Then, with her wonderful eyes, Mrs. Merrifield read the newspaper from end to end, which lasted her till luncheon, then came a drive in the brougham, followed by a rest in her own room, dinner, and then Bessie read her to sleep with a book of travels or biography, of the old book-club cla.s.s of her youth. Her principles were against novels, and the tale she viewed as only fit for children.

Lady Merrifield could not help thinking what a dull life it must be for Bessie, a woman full of natural gifts and of great powers of enjoyment, accustomed to a country home and a large family, and she said something of the kind. 'I did not like it at first,' said Bessie, 'but I have plenty of occupations now, besides all these companions that I've made for myself, or that came to me, for I think they come of themselves.'

'But what time have you to yourself?'

'Grandmamma does not want me till half-past ten in the morning, except for a little visit. And she does not mind my writing letters while she is reading the paper, provided I am ready to answer anything remarkable.

I am quite the family newsmonger! Then there's always from four to half-past six when I can go out if I like. There's a dear old governess of ours living not far off, and we have nice little expeditions together. And you know it is nice to be at the family headquarters in London, and have every one dropping in.'

'Oh dear! how good you are to like going on like that,' said Gillian, who had come up while this was pa.s.sing; 'I should eat my heart out; you must be made up of contentment.'

Elizabeth held up her hand in warning lest her grandmother should be wakened, but she laughed and said, 'My brothers would tell you I used to be Pipy Bet. But that dear old governess. Miss Fosbrook, was the making of me, and taught me how to be jolly like Mark Tapley among the rattlesnakes,' she finished, looking drolly up to Gillian.

'And, Gill, you don't know what Bessie has made her companions instead of the rattlesnakes,' said Lady Merrifield. 'What do you think of "Kate's Jewel?"'

Gillian's astonishment and rapture actually woke grandmamma; not that she made much noise, but there was a disturbing force about her excitement; and the subject had to be abandoned.

As the great secret might be shared with Dolores, though not with the younger ones, whose discretion could not be depended upon, Gillian could enter upon it the more freely, though she was rather disappointed that an author was not such an extraordinary sight to Dolly as to herself.

But it was charming to both that Bessie let them look at the proofs of the story she was publis.h.i.+ng in a magazine; and allowed them as well as mamma, to read the ma.n.u.script of the tale, romance, or novel, whichever it was to be called, on which she wished for her aunt's opinion.

Bessie took care, when complying with the girls' entreaty, that she would tell them all she had written; to observe that, she thought 'Clare' a very foolish book indeed, and that she wished heartily she had never written it. Gillian asked why she had done it?

'Oh,' said Dolores, 'things aren't interesting unless something horrid happens, or some one is frightened, or very miserable.'

'I like things best just and exactly as they really are--or were,' said Gillian.

'The question between sensation and character,' said Bessie to her aunt.

'I suppose that, on the whole, it is the few who are palpably affected by the ma.s.s of fiction in the world; but that it is needful to take good care that those few gather at least no harm from one's work--to be faithful in it, in fact, like other things.'

And there was no doubt that Bessie had been faithful in her work ever since she had realized her vocation. Her lending library books, written with a purpose, were excellent, and were already so much valued by Miss Hacket, that Gillian thought how once she should have felt it a privation not to be allowed to tell her whence they came; but to her surprise on the Sunday, instead of the constraint with which of late she had been treated at tea-time, the eager inquiry was made whether this was really the auth.o.r.ess, Miss Merrifield?

Secrets are not kept as well as people think. The Hackets' married sister was a neighbour of Bessie's married sister, and through these ladies it had just come round, not only who was the author of 'Charlie's Whistle,' etc., but that she wrote in the ---- Magazine, and was in the neighbourhood.

All offences seemed to be forgotten in the burning desire for an introduction to this marvel of success. Constance had made the most of her opportunities in gazing at church; but if she called, would she be introduced?

'Of course,' said Gillian, 'if my cousin is in the room.' She spoke rather coldly and gravely, and Miss Hacket exclaimed--

'I know we have been a little remiss, my dear, I hope Lady Merrifield was not offended.'

'Mamma is never offended,' said Gillian--'but, I do think, and so would she and all of us, that if Constance comes, she ought to treat Dolores Mohun--as--as usual.'