Chapter 23

LITTLE BESSIE.

"Oh, Archie, isn't it a poky old place, and doesn't it smell of rats and must?" Daisy said, as with her husband she went through the great rooms, whose only ornament consisted in the warm fires on the hearth and the pots of chrysanthemums and late roses which Dorothy had put here and there by way of brightening the house up a bit and making the home-coming more cheerful for the young people.

But it needed more than roses, and chrysanthemums, and fires to satisfy Daisy, who, forgetting the little back room in the dressmaker's shop whence she came, and remembering only the delights of the Continent and the excitement of Monte Carlo, and the honor, as she thought it, of having a real live earl in her party, tossed her head a little and said she wished she was back in Paris.

But Archie did not share her feelings. It had not been pleasant for him to see Daisy ogled and admired by men he wanted to knock down, nor had he quite liked the escapade at Monte Carlo, for, aside from the fear lest the fraud should be discovered, there was always before him a dread of what his Uncle John and the Lady Jane would say, should the affair ever reach their ears, as it might, for Lord Hardy was not very discreet, and was sure to tell of it sometime.

As to the playing, could he have had his choice he would far rather have played himself than to stand by and see Daisy do it. But his vow to his father could not be broken, and so he was tolerably content, especially as the result was so far beyond his expectations. Fifteen hundred pounds was the sum total of the gains, and Daisy, who held the purse and managed everything, played the lady of Stoneleigh to perfection, and made enemies of all her former friends, her mother included, and was only stopped in her career of folly by the birth of her baby, who was not at all welcome to the childish mother.

It was the latter part of March, and the crocuses and hyacinths were just beginning to blossom in the garden at Stoneleigh, when the baby Bessie first lay in the cradle which had rocked Archie in his infancy. They did not call her Bessie at first; for there were many discussions with regard to the name, Archie wishing her called Dora for his mother, and Daisy inclining to Blanche, or Beatrice.

"I'll tell you what, Archie," she said one day. "There's that old maid aunt of yours in America, with piles of money, they say. Let's name the baby for her, and so get some of her filthy lucre."

"Call our baby Betsey? Are you crazy?" Archie asked. But Daisy was in earnest, and carried her point, as she always did; and when at Easter Lord Hardy stopped at Stoneleigh, on his way to his home in Ireland, he was one of the sponsors for the child, who was christened _Betsey_.

"If I dared, I would add _Jane_ to it, for her Ladyship, which would make her _Betsey Jane_; but that would be too much," Daisy said to Lord Hardy, adding: "We shall call her Bessie, of course, and never Betsey. We only give her that abominable cognomen for the sake of wheedling something out of that old woman in America. Archie is to write and tell her."

So Archie wrote the best letter he could concoct, and said he had named his little daughter Betsey, which he hoped would please his aunt. This he took for approval to Daisy, who said it was very well, but insisted that he should add a P.S. that if his aunt had fifty pounds or so of ready money, he would like to borrow it for a time, as his expenses were heavy, and Stoneleigh needed so much repairing. At first Archie refused utterly; it looked so much like begging, he said, but he was overruled and added the P.S., which made Miss McPherson furious and steeled her heart against the innocent baby who bore her name.

The request for money overmastered every gentler feeling, and the letter was consigned to the flames and never answered.

"Never mind, Archie," Daisy said, as weeks went by and there came no message from America. "The old miser means to cut us off. Well, let her, I can manage without her, and our fifteen hundred pounds will last awhile. After that is gone, trust me for more."

And Archie, who was too indolent to exert himself, did trust her, and, parting with every vestige of manhood and manliness, did what she bade him do and went where she bade him go; sometimes to the most expensive hotels, where, while the money lasted they lived like princes, and when it was gone, like rats in a hole; sometimes to Monte Carlo, where Daisy was generally successful; sometimes to Hamburg and Baden Baden, sometimes to Epsom, where she bet with Lord Hardy on the races, and got her money, whether she lost or won, for the kind-hearted Ted could never withstand her tears; and sometimes into the houses to which she managed to get invited, and where she staid as long as possible, or until some other house was open to her.

Meanwhile little Bessie grew into a child of wonderful loveliness. Possessing her mother's beauty of feature and complexion and her father's refinement of feeling, she added to them a truthful simplicity and frank ingenuousness of manner which won all hearts to her. Much as they might despise her mother, everybody loved and pitied Bessie, whose life was a kind of scramble, and who early learned to think and act for herself, and to know there was a difference between her father and her mother. She learned, too, that large hotels, where prices were high, meant two rolls and a cup of milk for breakfast, a biscuit or apple for lunch, and nothing for dinner except what her mother could surreptitiously convey into her pocket at _table d'hote_. And still, there was no merrier, happier child playing upon the sands at Aberystwyth than Bessie McPherson on the summer morning when Miss Betsey McPherson first saw her and called out:

"Betsey McPherson, is that you?"

Leaving her companions she went to the tall, peculiar looking woman sitting so straight and stiff upon the bench, and laying her soft white hands on her knee, looked curiously and fearlessly into her face, with the remark:

"I am _Bessie_, not _Betsey_. I think that is a horrid name."

And so the conversation commenced between the strange pair, and Bessie told of the stingy aunt in America for whom she was named, and who had never sent her a thing, and whom her mamma called "Old Sauerkraut." Bessie was very communicative, and Miss McPherson learned in a few minutes more of the Bohemian life and habits of her nephew and his wife than she had learned at her brother's house in London, where she had been staying for a few weeks, and where Mistress Daisy was not held in very high esteem. And all the time she talked, Bessie's little hands were busy with the folds of the black dress on the woman's knee, rubbing and smoothing it with the restlessness of an active, nervous child. But Miss McPherson would hardly have minded if the hands had worn holes in her dress, so interested was she in the little creature talking to her so freely.

"Would you like to go and live with me?" she asked at last. "You shall go to school with children of your own age, and have all you want to eat, good bread and milk, and muffins and sirup, and--"

"_Cheux fleur au gratin?_ Can I have that? I liked that best of all the day I went to _table d'hote_ in Paris with mamma," Bessie interrupted, and Miss McPherson replied:

"No, but you can have huckleberry pie in summer, and a sled in winter, to ride down hill."

At the mention of the sled Bessie opened her eyes wide, and after a moment's reflection, asked:

"Can papa go, too?"

"Yes, if he will," came hesitatingly from Miss McPherson, and the child continued:

"And mamma?"

"No, Heaven forbid!" was the response, spoken so decidedly that the restless hands were motionless, and into the blue eyes and about the sweet mouth there stole the troubled, half-grieved expression, which in after years became habitual to them.

"Don't you like my mamma?" the child said. "She is very nice and pretty, and Lord Hardy likes her, and so does papa, for he kisses her sometimes. Papa would not go without mamma, and I must not leave papa, so you see I cannot go, though I'd awfully like the sled and the pie. Where do you live?"

Miss McPherson did not reply directly to this, but said instead:

"I am going to America in a few days and shall see your Aunt Betsey. What shall I tell her for you?"

"Tell her to send me something," was the prompt reply, which made Miss Betsey's shoulders jerk a little.

"Send you what?" she asked, rather sharply, and Bessie, who had commenced the rubbing process again and was looking at her hands, replied:

"I want a turquois ring--five stones, with a pearl in the center; real, too. I don't like shams, neither does papa; but mamma don't care, if she gets the effect. If you'll never tell as long as you live and breathe, those solitaires in mamma's ears are nothing but paste, and were bought in the Palais Royal," and Bessie pursed up her lips so disdainfully that Miss McPherson burst into a laugh, and stooping down, kissed the little face as she said:

"That's right, child; never tolerate a sham; better the naked truth always."

In the distance Daisy, who had passed them ten minutes or so ago, was seen returning with young Hardy and rising to her feet, Miss Betsey said:

"I must go now, child; good-by. Try and be good and truthful and real, and stick to your father, and sometime, maybe, you'll see me again."

Then she walked swiftly away, and Bessie saw her no more, but for days she talked of the queer old woman on the terrace, who had called her Betsey and who had bade her be good and truthful and real and stick to her father.

Numerous were the questions put to her by her father and mother, relative to the stranger whose identity with the American aunt they scarcely doubted; and Archie was conscious of a bitter pang as he reflected that she had been so near to him and yet had not tried to find him. He had heard that she was expected in London, and he knew now how strong had been the hope that he should meet her, and that she would do something for him. He was so tired and so ashamed of the life he led--now here, now there, now on the first floor, now on the fifth floor back, now plenty now penury and absolute want, according to Daisy's luck. For Daisy managed everything and bade him take things easy and trust to her; but he would so much rather have staid quietly at Stoneleigh with but one meal a day and know how that meal was paid for, than to live what to his sense of propriety seemed a not very respectable life. But he had lost his chance. The one who might have made living at Stoneleigh possible had ignored him. She had been where he was, and had not sought him, and his face was very gloomy that evening as he sat in front of the hotel with Bessie in his lap, while Daisy walked on the terrace with Lord Hardy and told him of the old woman on the sands who must have been the American aunt.

One week later, there came a letter from old Anthony, saying he had received a small package by express from London, directed to Miss Betsey McPherson, care of Archibald McPherson. Should he keep it till his master returned, or should he forward it to Aberystwyth? Archie replied that he was to forward it, and two days after there came to him a small box, containing a lovely turquois ring, of five stones, unmistakably real, with a good sized pearl in the center, and on the gold band was inscribed, "Little Betsey, 18--"

That settled the question, of the donor, and Daisy laughed till she cried over what she called the old woman's spite.

"Nasty old cat," she said, "why didn't she send some money instead of this bauble, which is a deal too large for the child? She can't wear it in years. I must say, though, that it is very beautiful, and the old thing did herself justice when she bought it. Look, Archie, it fits me perfectly!" and she slipped it onto her finger, where it remained; for, as she said, Bessie could not wear it then, and it might as well do somebody some good.

Archie wrote at once to his aunt, inclosing a card on which Bessie had printed with infinite pains, "I got the ring; thank you ever so much."

By some fatality this letter, which was directed to Allington, Mass., U.S.A., went astray, and was never received by Miss McPherson, who half expected it, and who, with the memory of the blue-eyed child upon the sands fresh in her mind, was prepared to answer it. But no letter came to her, or went to Archie either, and so two people were disappointed, and the chasm widened between them, Archie imputing it to his aunt's peculiar nature, and she charging it all to that Jezebel, as she stigmatized Daisy, of whom she had heard most exaggerated accounts from her brother's wife, the Lady Jane.