It was between three and four in the afternoon when Janet arrived at her destination. She knew London well enough as country young ladies know it—the parks and Belgravia, Piccadilly and the exhibitions; but St. John’s Wood was as unknown to her as if it had been a country town in the depths{15} of the shires. She thought it looked like a country town as she drove along the quiet road between garden walls with trees looking over them, and stopped at the door in the wall which was all the entrance. That it had no carriage entrance was rather a trouble to the young people in the house, but they had been used to it all their lives. The door when it was opened showed a paved line of pathway to the house, covered by a light permanent awning, supported on slight iron pillars, which were covered by strong climbing roses, now almost bare of leaves. The house door was also open, and showed rather a pleasant vista, for the red of the setting sun was in a long window at the back of the house, and lighted up an old-fashioned hall and winding staircase with a warm and comfortable light. Janet had all her wits about her, though her heart was beating loudly in her ears. She noted that it was only a parlor-maid who came to the door, with momentary discouragement—but was slightly relieved when a man came round the corner of the house to take her boxes. These perceptions and variations of feeling occurred in about a minute of time, during which she paid her cabman, and turned to follow the parlor-maid into the house. The garden looked pleasant and sheltered within its walls, and there was still a scent of late mignonette in the air of the November afternoon, though scarcely any mignonette was left at Clover. Janet walked in with her firm little step, not at all bold, but neither was she abashed. She had come now to a very critical moment, and was about to have her first look at fate.
If this was fate, it was not alarming. The room into which she was shown was evidently one which occupied the whole breadth of the house, though it was divided unequally by a large curtained doorway, through which, where the curtains hung open, came the same gleam of red sunset color which had lighted up the hall. But it was twilight in the other end to which Janet was introduced, except for a bright circle of firelight coming from an old-fashioned high grate of glimmering steel and brass, which threw forth the most brilliant reflections, and made all the shadows warm. By its side sat an old lady in a large chair—that is, a lady whom Janet took to be very old, with white hair, a white cap, and a white shawl over her shoulders, a very pleasing piece of light and suggested color, in the pleasant gloom.
“Is it Miss Summerhayes?” said this lady, in a soft voice, holding out her hand. “Gussy! My dear, I am very glad to see you, though I scarcely can see you in this faint light.{16} Don’t think me rude for not getting up. The fact is I can’t get up, except with difficulty. Gussy! Priscilla, call Miss Gussy and Miss Julia; tell them I want them at once, and give Miss Summerhayes a chair. Come near the fire, you must be cold after your journey. It’s grown very cold this afternoon, don’t you think?”
“Oh, no,” said Janet, whose heart had stopped that unnecessary racket, and dropped down quite comfortably into its usual place of beating. “It is not so cold at all; it looks so warm and cheerful here.”
“Do you think so, my dear?” cried the old lady; “indeed, I am very glad to hear you say so, and it is a pretty thing to say. I fancied everything would be dismal to you, your first coming out into the world. Oh, here is Gussy at last. Gussy, this is Miss Summerhayes.”
Janet could not well make out the appearance of the figure which came out quickly from within the curtained doorway, and held out a hand to her. The daughter of the house was taller than herself, very slim, clothed in a dress rather too light for the season, and with hair which seemed very light also. She, too, had a soft, long hand which clasped Janet’s lightly, and a soft voice, which said, “I am very glad to see you.” Altogether, a more genial pleasant welcome could not have been desired.
“Miss Summerhayes thinks it is not at all cold and that we look very warm and cheerful,” said Mrs. Harwood, “which is very nice of her, and I hope she will always find us cheerful and comfortable, Gussy. Where is your sister? for after all she must want most to see Ju.”
“Don’t trouble about Ju all at once, mamma,” said Miss Gussy, “there is plenty of time, and we are just going to have tea. Won’t you take off your boa, Miss Summerhayes? Mamma’s room is always too warm, I think. Have you had a long journey? We could not quite make out how far it was.”
“Only since twelve o’clock,” said Janet; “it is not so very far.”
“Gussy! the poor child can have had no proper lunch. Tell Priscilla to bring some sandwiches with the tea.”
“Oh, no, please! I have had sandwiches and everything I could want. I came from the kindest friends, who could never do enough for me,” said Janet. She felt, and was pleased with herself for feeling, that at thought of the kind vicar and his wife a little water had come into her eyes.
“Well, that is very pleasant to know of,” said Mrs. Har{17}wood. “I always like to hear that people with whom I am connected have kind friends, for those who have very kind friends are generally nice themselves; and it is a great quality to be able to appreciate kindness. I am sorry to hear that you are an—an orphan, Miss Summerhayes.”
“Yes,” said Janet, “but I must not claim too much sympathy on that account, for I have never known anything different. I have been an orphan all my life.”
“Oh,” said Mrs. Harwood, slightly checked in the flow of ready feeling. “But you have lost a—a—dear relation; a—a—some one who has filled up the place?”
“I have lost the dear lady whom I lived with always. She was my mother’s cousin, but she let me call her my aunt. Nobody could be more good. I shall be grateful to her as long as ever I live,” said Janet, with a little emotion.
“My dear, I hope I have not recalled painful recollections; but one always likes to know. It is very pretty what you say about this good lady. Still, it is not the same thing as losing your mother, and I hope you will soon be able to look at things more cheerfully,” said Mrs. Harwood, feeling that this was a little out of the regular course, and not knowing what to say.
The tea had been apparently in the course of being carried in to the other end of the room while this conversation was going on, for there was a jingle of china and teaspoons, and a little movement of furniture, and a figure flitting across the opening from time to time. When this point had been reached a faint glow of light suddenly sprang up behind the curtains, and Gussy appeared once more.
“Are you going through your examination, Miss Summerhayes? We all have to do it—but mamma might have let you off for a little. Come into this room and have some tea. It is not so warm here. I’ll bring you yours directly, mamma.”
“Attend to the traveller first,” said the kind old lady, and Janet followed Gussy into the other room, where there was a lamp burning. The end of this room seemed all window, an ample bay, almost to the ground, though tempered by the shade of a veranda outside. The glow in the west had just died away, the definite contrasted domestic light came in. In the shining of this, which was reflected in a large mirror over the mantelpiece, and another opposite to it, Janet saw what Miss Harwood was like. She was very fair, hair scarcely more than flaxen, eyes blue but somewhat pale, soft features not too correct, with a little droop and sway of her tall figure when she moved which was not without grace, and suggested the soft swaying of a tall{18} flower in the air, though matter-of-fact people regarded it sometimes as a sign of weakness. She drew a chair near the tea-table for Janet, and poured out tea for her, and pressed all the good things on the table upon her acceptance—then disappeared for a moment to the other side of the curtain to take her share of these good things to her mother. Janet, with her quick ears, heard the whispered conversation between them which was only half put into words. “Yes, I like her”—“Don’t make too much”—“You are a nice one to say so, mamma!” This last phrase was distinct enough, and Janet with a smile acknowledged its truth. She also recognized the perfect justice of the observation, “Don’t make too much of her”—which, of course, was what had been said. No; it would be foolish really to make too much of her. She felt like a young lady coming on a visit—not in the least like a little governess without friends, arriving among strangers, to a new life. If this was all which was meant by going out to seek her fortune—going out to meet her fate!
Gussy came back and sat down and began to talk to the new-comer.
“This is where I always sit,” she said, “and where our visitors come, unless when they are mamma’s great friends. Mamma is not very strong, but it is only right to admit that she is lazy and won’t try to get up out of her chair.”
At this a voice came from the other side of the curtain, slightly affected by the fact that the mouth was full.
“Don’t forget, Gussy, that I hear every word you say.”
“Oh! I know that very well, mamma. She has had rheumatism, and she is stout, and she is lazy—oh, not in any other way; neither in talking, nor in working, nor in thinking. She manages everything at home, and she will be quite willing to manage all your affairs if you wish it; but she is lazy about moving. She won’t walk——”
“Gussy, how unkind, when you know I can’t!”
“That is all a delusion, Miss Summerhayes: but we need not discuss it. She has to be wheeled about in her chair, and nothing but a visit from the Queen will make her get out of it. Now we’ve disposed of mamma, I won’t say anything about myself, for you are forming your opinion of me all the while, as I talk. I don’t think I am very hard to get on with; but we must tell you, and that is the chief point of all, that the most difficult of the family is Ju.”
“And Ju is——?” said Janet.
“Of course your pupil. She is fourteen, and she is as obstinate as a pig. We can do nothing with her, mamma and{19} I—it is not that there is any harm in her. Perhaps if we did not think so much about it things would go better; but we think, and we consult, and we compare notes, and end by worrying ourselves very much—at least mamma worries herself. We hope that some one quite new, whom she is not accustomed to, who is a novelty to her, and whom she must be civil to, will produce quite a different effect.”
Janet felt a little thrill run over her at this description.
“I hope you know,” she said, somewhat faintly; “I hope Mr. Bland told you—that I have really no experience at all.”
“We think that is all the better,” said Gussy. “She is up to all the ways of the experienced people. We don’t like to say anything against governesses, but they run very much in grooves, like most other people, for that matter. Now you are not professional at all; you have not got into any of their dodges. Oh, don’t say anything, mamma; I must use the handiest word. You are just a girl, like any of us: I don’t see how she can be nasty with you—at least not at first,” said Gussy, reflectively, “and by the time she is familiar enough to begin her tricks we hope you will have got an ascendancy.”
Miss Harwood stopped for a moment and listened.
“Hush! don’t look as if we had been talking in particular; she is coming.”
Janet did not know what to expect. She listened, thinking of the whoop and crash of some young savage; but there was nothing of the kind, and she gave a little start in the most spontaneous manner, and rose up quickly, when Gussy said, in her soft voice:
“My sister Julia—Miss Summerhayes.”