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Chapter I The Pupil-teacher

MRS. AND THE MISSES HARPER.

SELECT ESTABLISHMENT

FOR

YOUNG LADIES.

The above, engraved in bold characters on a highly -polished brass plate, may be read on the gate of an imposing mansion situated in the farspreading suburbs of Riverside, one of the principal mercantile towns in England. “Harperton’’ is a solid and secluded residence, standing in its own grounds (of two acres, one perch). It is planned to resemble a country house of some pretensions, but the symmetry of its proportions is spoiled by a long, low building jutting out at the side, that may be taken for anything from a stable to a billiard-room, but is, in fact, the scene of Mrs. Harper’s scholastic labors, erected

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at her own cost — in other words, the schoolroom. This apartment is illuminated by six windows, the lower halves of which are, of coarse, of muffled glass. The floor is carpeted here and there, as it were, in squares or plots, and in the midst of each square there is a desk and a comfortable cushioned chair. These indicate the localities of the various classes. The schoolroom walls are covered with maps, book cases, lists of rules and practicing hours, and lined with narrow desks and benches. A worn piano, a prim, white-faced clock, and a high wire fender comprise most of the furniture — ornamental and otherwise; unless we include the two young ladies who are sitting at one of the far desks, making the most of their time while the boarders are out for their usual walk. One of these damsels has mendaciously pleaded earache in order to escape the hateful daily promenade. The other — that nondescript character, a pupil-teacher — is fulfilling a part of her duties, and diligently darning the ‘Tittle ones’ ” stockings, while her companion, with both elbows on the desk, and both hands in her ruffled hair, watches her and talks

“This must be perfectly awful for you, Maddie dear,” she was saying. “Don't you loathe it all, and wish you could run away? 1 should, if I were in your shoes.”

“Run avray! What nonsense, Flo! Where could I run to, even supposing such an insane idea had entered my head, which it never has done? You forget that I have no friends in

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England ; and, after all, I am not such an object of pity as you seem to imagine,’’ darning steadily all the time.

“If you are not, I should like to know who is!” demanded her schoolfellow, emphatically. “You are one day at the top of the tree, the head of the first class, the best pupil Herr Kroot ever had, adored by the Harpies” — here Miss Blewitt alluded to her respected instructress and daughters— “always exquisitely dressed, with heaps of pocket-money, sleeping in the best room, allowed a fire in winter, every extra — claret and coffee — and I don’t know what! After years and years of this style of thing, and when you are seventeen, and almost finished, your father suddenly stops supplies, you are not paid for for three whole terms, and the hateful Harpies make you into a regular drudge — a pupil-teacher, a nursery governess, a servant! You sleep in the attic with those odious little Smiths — wash, dress, and teach them ; you go messages to the shops, and even into Riverside — you, who were never allowed to stir one yard alone ; you mend and darn and teach.”

She paused, not from lack of words, but from want of breath.

“And a very good thing that I can do something to pay for my living,” remarked the other, with composure. “If I could not sew and mend and teach, what would become of me, I should be glad to know? I could scarcely expect the Harpers to go on keeping me at their own expense; and now I take the fifth class, the little

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ones’ music, and I save a servant for those Indian children, I work for my bread — and I am worth it.”

‘‘I should rather think you were,” rejoined her listener, sarcastically. “You are worth a hundred a year to them as teacher, besides being dressmaker and nursery- maid. It makes me wild — I feel quite crazy— when I see all that they get out of you^ early and late, and the shameful way they treat you I Once upon a time you were ‘darling Madeline’ — their ‘dear, bright-faced girl, ’ their ‘model pupil,’ now you are ‘Madeline West,’ or ‘Miss West,’ and you are ‘slow,’ ‘awkward,’ ‘lazy,’ and ‘impertinent.’ Oh, dear me! dear me! sometimes I feel as if I should like to fly at Miss Selina and bite a piece out of her, I am so savage.”

“I hope to goodness you will restrain your feelings,” said Madeline, with a smile, as she threaded a long needleful of black wool, and commenced on a gaping heel. “The Harpers are only human, after all! It was very hard on them, my father having failed; and all my music-lessons, and painting, and singing, and German, for two terms, had to be paid for out of their own pockets. Signor Squaletti charges half a guinea an hour. Then there were my clothes. I feel hot all over when I remember the quantity of money I laid out, believing that it would be all settled, as usual, by father’s check at Christmas. There was that white dress for the breaking-up party — ”

“In which you made such an impression on

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the Wolfertons’ friend, young Mr. Wynne,” interrupted Florence, with a meaning nudge. ‘‘Oh, yes, I remember the white dress!”

“Don’t, Flo! Your elbow is like a knife,” expostulated her friend, with some discernible increase of color. “As to Mr. Wynne, what you say is nonsense, and you know Mrs. Harper forbids us to speak of — of— such things.”

“I know that Mrs. Harper was most uneasy in her mind when she saw him dancing four times with you running — yes, dance after dance — and she came up and introduced him to Julia Flowers’ two red-haired sisters, and said that gentlemen were so scarce, and her girls were not out^ and all that sort of rubbish; and she sent him down to supper with old Mrs. Browne, and she sent you to bed because you looked pale ! Oh, yes, I saw it all — all. I saw that Mr. Wynne never danced again, but stood with his back to the wall for the rest of the evening, looking as cross as two sticks. Very likely he would never have given you a thought, if you had not been so plainly and openly banished : absence makes the heart grow fonder! Mrs. Harper put the idea into his head by making such a stupid fuss — and she has only herself to thank. He sent you those flowers, he came to our church, and Miss Selina took it all to herself — the ridiculous old cat! As if he would look at her! She closed on the floAvers : much good may they do her !”

“Now, Flo, how do you know that they were not for her?” asked her companion with a smile.

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“But, don’t let us talk about them. It is an old story.”

“But I ivill talk about them,” persisted Flo, angrily. “I’ll talk about your nice green tailor-made, and your winter coat trimmed with fur, and your opera cloak, and your white dress — the white dress, which they took away from you !”

“Well, they had paid for them, you see,” rejoined Madeline quietly. “I am glad they did take them — I owe them the less.”

“Thank goodness your gloves and boots were too small,” continued Flo, in a tone of fervent congratulation, “otherwise they would have gone also. They are rather different from the Harpers’ chaussure, which is of the canal- boat type and size. Now I know what pedestrians mean when they talk of ‘covering’ miles of ground.”

“Well, my dear excited Flo, they did not make their own feet,” said the other coolly.

“How philosophical you are becoming! Quite an old head on young shoulders! Who made their tempers, I should be glad to know? — or their tongues? Thank goodness, this is my last half! Good-by to early rising, lectures, scoldings, resurrection pies, milk and water* and rice puddings. Good-by to Harperton — penitentiary and prison. Good-by to Harpies, and hurrah for home!” — throwing, as she spoke, a dictionary up to the ceiling; failing to catch which, it fell open, face downward, with a bang.

“That is May’s dictionary, Flo,” remonstrated the other. “You will not improve its poor back. ”

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‘‘If you stay here long, Madeline, you will certainly become just as preaching and particular as one of the Harpies themselves. You are tremendously. sobered as it is. Who would think, to look at you darning away so industriously? that this time last year you were the queen and moving spirit of the school; always getting up charades, dances, and concerts, and carrying your point on every question, and figuratively snapping your fingers at the Harpies if they interfered with your schemes — which, to do them justice, was very seldom! Ah! my poor Maddie, since then what a change has come o’er the spirit of your dream ! It is terrible. If you had always been a pupil-teacher it would be another matter, or if you had gone to another school, where no one knew that you had fallen from your high estate; but here, the scene of your triumphs, to make the descent to the very foot of the ladder, is — is frightful. I often wonder how you can bear it so well.”

“I often wonder too,” said Madeline shortly, winking her tears back with a great effort. “You are not going the best way to work to help me to endure my lot, Flo, raking up all these things. Bad or good, I must submit. I have no alternative — nowhere to go, until my father comes home. The best thing I can do is to be patient, and try and repay the Harpers for some of the money they have expended on me.”

“Repay them!” echoed Miss Blewitt, scornfully. “They made a very good thing out of you for nine years — large profits and quick re-

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turns. Now, although your father has not sent his usual remittance — is not that the word? — and they have heard that he is in business difficulties, yet I think they might have given you a little more law — a longer day. They might have exercised some patience. You have not heard of your father for more than a year, have you?” she added bluntly.

“No, not for sixteen months,” answered the pupil-teacher.

“But even if he were dead,” proceeded Flo, with a fine disregard of her friend’s feelings, and an open defiance of the laws of good breeding, such as is occasionally to be found in girls of her age, “you could not honestly pretend to be very much cut up! You have not seen him since you were a small child. You left Australia when you were seven years old. He is a stranger to you.”

“A stranger, certainly, in one way; but still he is my father, and I have a presentiment that we shall meet again, and before long,” rolling up a pair of stockings as she spoke, and averting her eyes from her outspoken schoolfellow.

“Pooh! I don’t believe in presentiments. 1 had a presentiment that father was going to give me a cart and cob last holidays, and it ended in smoke. If your father had been in the land of the living, surely you would have heard. I know I am saying this very baldly and plainly, but there is no use in beating about the bush — is there? You must face the position sooner or later.”

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‘‘You mean the position of being an orphan?’’ said Madeline, tremulously. “But I refuse to accept that until I have not one grain of hope left. It is easy for you, who have your father and mother and five brothers at home, to talk in this way. Remember, I have only one relation in the world, and when I lose him I lose all.”

“Well, all I can say is, that I hope your presentiment will turn out better than mine ! Oh, here are the girls coming back!” she exclaimed peevishly, as along file of figures appeared, passing the windows two' and two. “What a bore they are ! They seem to have only been out a quarter of an hour, and here they come marching in, disturbing our nice comfortable little talk.”

Florence Blewitt, who so successfully practiced the art of plain speaking and trampling on other people’s susceptibilities — people were welcome to trample on hers, she declared ; she had none — was a short, squarely-built girl of sixteen, with a sharp nose, thick brown hair, intelligent gray eyes, and a very dark skin — a skin that betrayed no soiipg07i of foreign blood, but was, nevertheless, more brown than white. She was brusk, eccentric, clever, and indolent. Florence could — if she would — but she so seldom would. She preferred the ease of an undisturbed seat at the very bottom of the class to ambitious battlings and feverish strivings for the first place. She was the spoiled only daughter of a wealthy merchant and shipowner, and, being deferred to and made much of at home, was disposed to be both

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arbitrary and independent at school. Moreover, she was selfish, which is not a taking trait in a young woman’s character, and was anything but a popular idol. She would borrow readily, but hated to lend; and the only thing with which she was generous was her advice; the sole present she was ever known to make was her opinion — gratis. Few were honored by her liking, and if she had a friend at Harperton, it was the girl who sat beside her, conscientiously mending a basketful of most hopeless looking stockings.

“I wonder what your fate will be, Maddie?’^ said Flo, staring at her meditatively, and studying her delicate profile, her penciled eyebrows, her shining hair.

‘‘I wonder, too,” echoed Madeline, with a profound sigh.

Madeline West had been born in Melbourne, and sent home at the age of seven to Mrs. Harper’s establishment, where she had remained for ten years. From a skinny, elf-like, wildly excitable child, she had grownup into an extremely pretty girl, with what the drawing- mas ter termed “wonderful coloring.” Her hair, eyebrows, and lashes were dark, her eyes two shades lighter, but it was in her complexion and the exquisite modeling of her head and features that her chief beauty lay. Her head was small, and beautifully set upon her shoulders; her skin was of creamy fairness, with a faint shade of carmine in her cheeks— a color so delicate that it went and came at a look or word. She was tall, slight, and wonderfully graceful; full of vivacity, ac-

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tivity, versatility and resource, ready to throw herself warmly into any scheme for amusement or mischief — that was to say, twelve months previously. She was by far the most strikinglooking and admired of Mrs. Harper’s forty boarders, and, notwithstanding this drawback to feminine good-will, was a great favorite with pupils, teachers, and servants. Her popularity had even survived that terrible test of altered circumstances — that dire fall from the wealthy Australian heiress to the unpaid slavey of the establishment. She changed, of course, her ringing laugh and her happy air; her merry repartee and snatches of songs had disappeared with the pretty frocks and hats and shoes which she had loved so well. She was developing a staid, grown-up manner, according to her fellowpupils; she held back from their advances — abdicated of her own accord, and her place as queen of the school was filled, after a decent interregnum, by a rich Cockney, who was as lavish of her shillings as she was frugal in the matter of h’s, and who, according to Flo Blewitt, was ‘‘a harmless, good-natured, vulgar, poor creature.”

It must not be supposed that Madeline West did not keenly feel her altered position. Many a bitter tear she shed in secret; many a sleepless hour she lay awake, when all her comiianions — with only to-morrow’s lessons on their minds — were slumbering peacefully in the arms of Morpheus. Es^ery small indignity, every slighting speech and sharp glance entered as an iron into her soul, but she made no remonstrance or reply;

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her swiftly changing color was the sole index to her feelings, and what were a school-girl’s — a pauper school-girl’s — feelings to Mrs. Harper? To tell the truth, Madeline had never asserted herself even in her days of sunshine. She never could face an unpleasant situation; she put aside a crisis with a laugh or a gay word ; her sensi tive, luxurious nature shrank instinctively from all unpleasant things. She was a moral coward, though no one suspected it.

The present clouds on her sky had brought out, in an unexpected manner, unexpected depths in her character. Madeline, the humble semi-nursemaid, was an industrious, prudent, self-possessed person, who labored gravely, doggedly, from morning to night, a totally different girl to the extravagant, generous, easy-going Madeline, the butterfly who had fluttered the happy hours away for nine whole years. She was now at another seminary. Adversity is said to be an excellent, school, and offers a fine test of character. Anomalous as it sounds, Madeline West had 7'isen to the state of life into which she had fallen.

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Chapter II No News

Three months had passed, and still no sign or token from Mr. Robert West. How anxiously his daughter’s eyes followed Miss Selina’s skinny fingers, as they dealt out the letters every morning during breakfast time — these letters having previously been thoroughly turned over, examined, felt, and even smelled^ by that lady and her relatives. It was always the same in answer to Madeline’s unspoken appeal. ‘‘No, nothing for you, Madeline,” or, “No letter yet. Miss West,” according to the frame of mind in which Miss Selina found herself. And then Mrs. Harper, who was seated behind an immense copper tea apparatus, would peer round it, with her keen little eyes and bobbing gray curls, and shake her head at the pupil-teacher, in a manner which signified that she did not approve of her at all ! As if poor Madeline was not sick with hope deferred, and wild with a frenzied desire to get away and never pass another night under that lady’s roof-tree; only there was one big hiity

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one immense drawback to her own most eager wishes, she had nowhere else to go.

The Misses Harper, who were fully alive to Madeline’s value, were by no means equally anxious for her departure. She corrected exercises, ruled copy-books, relieved them of several distasteful duties, and took the little ones’ music — an agonizing ordeal. She really did as much as any two paid teachers, and — an ecstatic fact — for nothing! Moreover, they had the delicious sensation that they were performing a charitable action all the time, and looked primly self-conscious and benevolent when their friends exclaimed: “How good of you, you dear, kind, Christian. people, to keep that unfortunate Australian girl !”

Miss Selina, who was forty, with a complexion like that of a wax doll who has been left lying in the sun, would sigh softly and murmur the word “duty,” when perhaps at that very moment the unfortunate Australian was fulfilling the least agreeable of hers — putting those fretful, ungovernable, sickly little Anglo-Indians to bed — and to sleep.

They were too young for school routine ; spoiled, fractious, disobedient, and mischievous, they were Madeline’s almost entire charge. Happy Madeline!

It is winter when we once more enter the schoolroom at Harperton, a bitterly cold day, and the small fire behind the wire screen does not half heat that great bare apartment, with its numerous doors and window^s. Those at a dis-

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tance are ‘‘out in the cold’' indeed; for a double file of girls is gathered closely round the fender, talking four at a time, and making noise enough for a rookery. This is the half-hour after tea, and exclusively their own; they are indemnifying themselves for many hours of silence and French— which almost amounts to the same thing. Their speech is vigorous and unpolished, for no teacher is present except Madeline — if teacher she can be called. She is standing at a remote desk, mounting a drawing by the light of a cheap little hand-lamp. The gas is never turned on in the schoolroom until half -past six, because the twilight is so delightful (so economical they meant), quoth the thrifty Misses Harper.

The coals, which have been angrily stirred up, throw a good blaze, and reveal the faces and figures of the fire-worshipers assembled round the screen, especially the face and figure of Isabella Jones, the present reigning potentate. She has hitched herself up on the edge of the fire-guard, holding on there by the mantel- piece, and from this elevated position is dispensing law, wit, snubs, and patronage. She is very tall and thin, stoops a good deal, and is the proprietor of a tiptilted nose, a pair of quick little brown e^^es, and millions of freckles. She is also the proprietor of a quantity of pretty dresses, of unlimited pocket-money, a vast amount of self-esteem, and the largest and reddest hands in the room

Mrs. Harper’s seminary is only intended for the offspring of wealthy folk. Izzie’s father has made his pile in margarine, and has desired that

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his daughter may have the best of everything — every accomplishment, every extra, just like a duchess. Izzie has, accordingly, a separate bedroom, and lessons from the most expensive masters; nevertheless, she is far— oh! very far — from being like a duchess. Her education was begun too late; she is naturally dull.

“Isay, girls,’’ she is screaming sociably, “isn’t it grand to think that in ten days more we shall all be at ’ome?

“ ‘ This day fortnight, where shall I be?

, Not in this academee,

Eating scrape and drinking tea.

This day fortnight, where shall I be?’ ”

She chanted in a sing-song voice, more or less through her nose.

“And there is the breaking-up dance,” put in one of her satellites; “I don’t want to go home till that is over.”

“Gracious! I should hope not. What fun it will be,” exclaimed Miss Jones. “I hope there will be lots of men this time. I ’inted as much to Miss Selina. What is the use of going to the expense of supper, and us all getting new dresses, just for the day boarders? That’s what 1 say.”

“What good, indeed!” put in Flo, sarcastically, as she elbowed her way to the very middle of the fire. “But pray do not make yourselves unhappy about the expense of the supper, my dear young friends. It will not concern us. I heard Mrs. Harper telling mademoiselle that they did not intend to have the girls in on this occa-

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]9 sion, gobbling up the ices and confectionery like so many locusts.’’

‘‘I did not know that locusts went in for confectionery,” remarked Isabella, with a sniff of scorn.

‘‘This marvelous discovery in natural history was Mrs. Harper’s, not mine,” said Flo, with swelling dignity. “However, the meaning is plain. We are not to sup. We are to ’ave” — mimicking her schoolfellow*— “buns and eggsandwiches ’anded round in tlxe schoolroom, while the company are carousing downstairs.”

The “take-off” was entirely lost on Isabella^ who was far too much impressed with the intelligence to be alive to Flo’s impertinence. A dead silence followed this disagreeable announcement, which was at length broken by Miss Jones, who, sliding from the top of the screen in the excitement of the moment, shrilly exclaimed :

“Well, I declare! I won’t stand it! I shall tell Mrs. H. so to her face. Why, our parents pay for the supper! Locusts, indeed! My father pays handsomely for extras and everj^- thing, breaking-up party and all; and to be put off wdth a bun! I think I see myself — I just do! Why” — warming with her theme — “supper is ’alf the fun! There are the crackers and mottoes and jokes, and every one taken down by a gentleman, arm-in-arm. I’ll go to supper for one, and stay up to the last. I did not get my new pink dress just to dance with girls, and eat an egg sandwich and go to bed. Rather not. Leave it to me, girls” — looking round on her

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companions with an air of friendly encouragement — ‘‘I shall have a word with Miss Selina. We shall all go to supper, or Isabella Jones will know the reason why.”

‘‘Oh, you dear, good Izzy!” cried two voices simultaneously. And one continued, “You know you can do anything with Snappy, and if you ask, it will be all right. But about partners, I am afraid they will be few and far between; Snappy and Miss Harper keep the best for themselves and their friends. Anything is good enough for the girls. Last time I was thankful to dance all night with a little boy in a jacket; however, it was a shade better than sittingout.”

“There are the Wolfertons,” observed Flo, “and they generally bring two or three men. Last year there was Mr. Wynne, who was tremendously struck with Madeline. ’ ’ Then raising her voice, “Maddie, do you remember Mr. W ynne? Come over here, and let us see if you are blushing.”

“Mr. Wynne, Fred Wolferton’s friend !” cried Isabella, with great animation. “He is a barrister, and, of course, without a penny to jingle on a milestone — poor as Job. My father don’t approve of my getting to know these paupers. You know I’m an heiress” — giggling— “and father says — ”

“Oh, never mind your father!” broke in Flo, rudely. “You need not be alarmed; Mr. Wynne won’t look at you as long as Madeline is in the room — and perhaps he may not come. Who else

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are invited — the Sangsters, the Wallers, the Rays?”

“All common sort of people,” remarked the granddaughter of a baron. “Very worthy in their ivay^ and well enough for a girls’ school breaking up; but I should not dream of knowing them at home, or of bowing if I met them anywhere;” and she threw up her chin, and looked about her superciliously.

No one combated this dire announcement; they were all a little in awe of Miss De Ville and her ancestors — especially of the one who had fought in Palestine — and they were silent and impressed, being young. At length a word was whispered, which quickly set every tongue wagging. That magic word was “dress.” What were they all going to wear? One lacked new shoes, another gloves; a fan was lent — in prospect — in return for good offices in the hair-dressing line. Amid this gabble Isabella’s piercing voice was heard high and shrill above all, describing the body of her new pink dress. Madeline had joined the crowd, looking white and cold — and no wonder.

“Keep away your fingers, my dear, if they are sticky,” said Flo; “and, by the way, what are you going to adorn yourself in? Your white dress was taken by the Harpies, as most unsuitable to you now. ”

“I have nothing but my black cashmere,” she returned, “and this” — holding out a shabby serge sleeve.

“They really must give you something !” cried Isabella, impressively, “if only for the look of

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the thing. For the credit of the establishment, they can’t have you appear like an old ragpicker.” Madeline colored vividly. ‘‘I don’t mind giving you a dress myself, if you will take it.”

“Now, I call that a French compliment, Isabella Jones,’’ remarked Flo, with her usual candor, “and you know it. If Madeline has to wear the old black, so much the worse; but, whatever she wears, she will always look a — Zad^/,” accompanying the remark with a glance at Miss Jones that gave it point and significance, and made that young person feel that it would be a pleasure to take the big ink-bottle off the chimne3’’-piece and fling it at Florence Blewitt’s solid, square-looking head.

“You need not trouble about my dress, Flo^ nor need I,” said Madeline, trying to find room on the top of the screen for her benumbed fingers. “Miss Selina told me this morning to practice up my dance music. I am to plaj’ — ”

“Oh, what a shame!” chorused half-a-dozen voices. “Saving the usual piano-plaj^er, and a guinea — the skinflints!”

But human nature is human nature, and not a few of these fair creatures felt a conviction that Madeline and her prett}^ face were best at the piano — turned toward the wall — and that it was only fair to give others a chance, meaning their sweet, unsophisticated selves. They had a very distinct vision of the benefit that would accrue to them as a result of this economical arrangement on the part of the Harpers.