Part 6

Jane-Anne murmured something unintelligible and passed out with bent head, the pie-dish effectually concealing her face. Edmund locked the door behind her and ran back to the house.

Outside the garden, in Saville Road, it was very quiet. It is true there was a distant rumble of carts from Holywell and a thrush was singing in one of Mr. Wycherly's apple-trees, but of human kind there wasn't a sign.

Jane-Anne went down on her knees, her shoulder pressed close against the garden door.

"Dear God," she prayed, "I do so want to be precious too. Please let me be precious to somebody. Please do."

*CHAPTER VI*

*MR. WYCHERLY ADDS TO HIS RESPONSIBILITIES*

"Some cheeses are made o' skim milk and some o' new milk, and it's no matter what you call 'em, you may tell which is which by the look and the smell." _Adam Bede_.

Next day Mrs. Methuen took the boys out on the river for the whole afternoon. She invited Mr. Wycherly to go too, but the previous day had been his first experience of his wards as oarsmen, and he came to the conclusion that he preferred their society on land.

He was sitting at his writing-table in his study. The great oriel window was open and he could see that there were already patches of pink on the largest apple-tree, while the pear-trees had shed their snowy blossoms and shone brilliantly green against the blue and cloudless sky.

It was a pleasant prospect from the study window: the long irregular strip of garden, with smoothly shaven lawn in the centre and winding paths among borders where vegetables, fruit and flowers grew side by side in perfect amity.

The afternoon was singularly quiet, and, knowing Mr. Wycherly's habits, one would have felt that here was an excellent opportunity for his great work on the Nikomachean ethics which had been sadly neglected during the last strenuous weeks. Yet he neither took up the pen nor did he open any of the fat, calf-bound books piled one upon another at his elbow.

He sat very still, his long white hands resting idly on the arms of his chair, his kind eyes dreamy, his whole attitude eloquent of contented tranquillity.

Presently there came a modest tap at the study door, followed by the entrance of Mrs. Dew with her small round tray, and on it a rather dirty piece of paper which she presented to Mr. Wycherly with the announcement: "A young person to see you, sir."

Mr. Wycherly, roused from his agreeable reverie, looked bewildered.

"A young person?" he repeated vaguely, "to see me. What sort of a young person, Mrs. Dew?"

Mrs. Dew's face preserved the non-committal expression of one who has seen service in really good families, as she replied: "A young woman, sir, from the Registry Office, I should suppose."

Mr. Wycherly took the piece of paper off the tray and read as follows:

"_M. Fairfield exp.: general character six months twelve months plain cooking age 23 very respectable._"

There were no stops.

He looked beseechingly at Mrs. Dew, but her eyes were bent upon the carpet and she waited his pleasure a perfect monument of respectful detachment. Poor Mr. Wycherly had forgotten all about his search for the accomplished general. Somewhere in the back of his brain there lurked the consciousness that Mrs. Dew was only a temporary blessing, really there "to oblige Mrs. Methuen," till such time as a suitable and permanent servant should be obtained; but she fitted into her niche so perfectly, her sway was so benevolent, if a trifle despotic, that he began to look upon her as part of the established order of things, and, since his one visit to the High Class Registry Office, had made no effort of any kind to find her successor.

"Couldn't you see her for me, Mrs. Dew?" he entreated almost abjectly. "You could judge of her capabilities far better than I can."

Mrs. Dew raised her eyes and looked Mr. Wycherly full in the face, shaking her head the while: "No, sir, I think not, sir; it would be more satisfactory for all parties if you was to see the young person yourself."

Mr. Wycherly sighed heavily. "Do you think she seems likely to be suitable?"

Mrs. Dew's wholesome, good-natured face once more became sphinx-like. "I really couldn't say, sir. The appearance of the young women of the present day is often very much against them. We can only hope they're better servants than they look. Shall I show her up here, sir?"

"Please, Mrs. Dew, but I do wish you could have interviewed her for me--wait one moment. Could you kindly suggest some of the questions I ought to ask her?"

Mr. Wycherly's voice betrayed his extreme perturbation and he swung round in his revolving chair almost as though he had thoughts of laying violent hands on Mrs. Dew to prevent her departure.

She paused on the threshold and an imaginative person might perhaps have discovered a trace of pity in the glance she bent on Mr. Wycherly's agitated figure.

"The usual questions, sir, will, I should think, be quite sufficient."

And she shut the door behind her.

"The usual questions."

But what on earth were the usual questions? Mr. Wycherly could only think of those in the church Catechism. He picked up the dirty scrap of paper and read it again. "Exp." conveyed nothing to his mind. They were coming upstairs and he had no plan of campaign arranged. He felt absolutely forlorn and helpless. Suppose the young person didn't go away of her own accord? How could he ever suggest to her that the interview was at an end? He found himself longing for the moral support of Edmund, who at all events, never lacked the power of asking questions; and no sort of young person, or, for the matter of that, old person either, could inspire him with the unreasoning terror his guardian felt at the prospect of the _tete-a-tete_ thus imminent.

Mrs. Dew opened the door.

"The young person," she announced, and her disapproving expression changed to one of downright horror as Mr. Wycherly rose to his feet to receive his visitor.

She was a short, stout young woman, dressed in a bright blue coat and skirt of the shade known by drapers as "Royal." Her hat was large and was trimmed with tumbled pink roses. Her hair was frizzy and flamboyant and her boots creaked--Mr. Wycherly thought to himself--infernally.

"Pray be seated," he said courteously.

The young woman selected a chair as far off as possible and giggled affably.

"I understand," he began in a faint voice, "that you think you would be able to undertake the duties of--er--thorough general servant--that I believe is the correct term?"

"I always 'ave been general," the young woman replied, "though I did think of betterin' myself, but Mrs. Councer she said as yours was a heasy place with no missus naggin' at you an' I thought it might suit me so I come along to have a look at things. It's a largish 'ouse for one but I suppose you don't 'ave much cookin' and waitin'."

"But there are three of us," Mr. Wycherly interposed eagerly. "I'm afraid that you would find it too much. You are rather young to undertake the entire management of this household. You see there would be the housekeeping to do--ordering, books to pay and so on, as well as the actual work."

"Oh, I could do all that," she replied confidently. "I'll do the shoppin' meself. I likes a run out between my reg'lar times, an' I'd see they didn't cheat you in the books, puttin' down things you've never 'ad."

Miss Fairfield smiled happily at Mr. Wycherly. She liked his looks. She was sure he would be easy to live with and probably would be unaware of the existence of the followers. In common with every woman ever brought into personal relations with him, she was certain that he was in need of protection from the others, and decided there and then that it was her mission to see that he wasn't put upon by anybody else.

"When will you be requirin' my services?" she asked.

Mr. Wycherly gasped. "I should require to consider the question," he said feebly, "and it is usual, is it not, to give some----"

"My last mistress'll give me a character. I was there six months and she almost went down on 'er knees for me to stop; but I couldn't, it was such an 'eavy place."

"Are you a good plain cook?" Mr. Wycherly asked, feeling here indeed was a leading question; some of Lady Alicia's instructions were gradually recurring to his mind. "Can you--er--do fish?"

"Fry fish, why bless you, sir, my last place was a fried-fish shop, that's why I left. One gets tired of frying morning, noon and night. I can do plain roast and boiled and milk puddin's an' that, but I don't profess to do pastry."

"Thank you," said Mr. Wycherly, and paused. To get rid of her, he was on the point of saying that he would consider her qualifications and let her know his decision later, when his delicate sense of honour pointed out that such a course would not be quite straightforward dealing. She was a terrible young woman and his fastidious soul revolted from the very thought of the fried-fish shop, but she was young and she was a woman; it would not be fair to let her depart with the impression that she was a likely applicant when nothing on earth could induce him to employ her.

"I fear," he added gently, "that you are not quite experienced enough for us here, and therefore I will not trouble your late mistress with inquiries. I am sorry you should have had to come in vain--were you to put any expense?"

The girl gave a short laugh. "I've only come about half a mile," she said. "I'm sorry I don't suit you; I think I could be very 'appy in your situation."

Poor Mr. Wycherly looked most unhappy. He rose and rang the bell, saying:

"Mrs. Dew will show you the way out." He opened the door for her with the gravest courtesy and she creaked downstairs, wondering why she had not demanded at least "'arf a crownd" for expenses. "I'd 'a' got it too," she thought to herself, "but it never entered me 'ead to say nothin' to 'im but the plain truth an' 'im so civil and affable."

Mr. Wycherly went back to his chair and reached for a pamphlet dealing with the philosophy of Eubulides, which he thought might be soothing, but he had got no further than the statement that, "in Eubulides positive faith was superseded by delight in his own subtlety," when there came another knock at his door and again Mrs. Dew presented herself.

"I beg your pardon, sir, for venturing to intrude upon you," Mrs. Dew said respectfully, "but did you come to any arrangement with the young person?"

Mr. Wycherly laid down Eubulides. "Oh, dear, no," he groaned, "she was quite impossible. A most well-meaning girl, I am sure--but----"

"I feared so, sir, from her very flashy appearance, but one always hopes they may be better than their looks. Being only temporary I should like to know you'd found someone really suitable."

"Look here, Mrs. Dew," said Mr. Wycherly, suddenly taking heart of grace. "Why should you be only temporary? Could you not settle down with us? If you find the work too much when my wards are at home why not get a young girl to help you?"

"You're very kind, sir," said Mrs. Dew, fingering her apron and looking embarrassed, "but you see, I'm not without encumbrances. Husband I've none, children I've none, but what I have got is a niece and my bits of things. I'm bound to keep a little home for her in the holidays, that's why I can't take a permanent situation. You see, no one wants a child of twelve tacked on to a servant for weeks at a time."

"But listen, Mrs. Dew, there is the cottage--the little cottage off the kitchen where your bedroom is now--why not bring your things and furnish it and the housekeeper's room and there would be a home for your niece?"

Mrs. Dew turned very red. "It's most uncommon kind of you, sir," she said, "but I shouldn't like to take advantage of you. You see, it's just when the young gentlemen would be at home her holidays come, and perhaps----"

"That, surely, would be the very time when she could be of most use to you."

Mrs. Dew looked queerly at Mr. Wycherly, then, as though forcing herself to speak against her will, she said slowly: "You see, sir, I must be straightforward with you. If Jane-Anne was like some girls--like what I was myself--I shouldn't 'esitate to accept your very kind offer, for it would make a great difference to me. I hate choppin' and changin' and if I may make so bold, sir, you need a staid person here to look after things, but Jane-Anne's the sort of child what crops up continual. I _couldn't_ promise for 'er as she'd keep 'erself to 'erself like she ought. I'd do my best, sir, to keep her in our own part of the 'ouse, but----"

Mrs. Dew paused and shook her head. Whenever she was very much in earnest she dropped into the speech of her youth; the aitchless, broad-vowelled talk of the Cotswold country whence she came.

"But, I shall like to see your niece about the house," said Mr. Wycherly. "It will be pleasant to have a young girl growing up in our midst, good for me and for the boys."

Again Mrs. Dew gave Mr. Wycherly that queer look, half-scornful, half-admirative.

"You mustn't think, sir, that there's any real 'arm in Jane-Anne," she said earnestly. "There's nothing of the minx about her, I will say that; but--I don't know how to put it without being hard on the child, and yet it wouldn't be fair to you, sir, to let her come without telling you----"

Again Mrs. Dew paused and Mr. Wycherly looked rather anxious.

"She do make a sort of stir wherever she do go and that's the long and short of it." And Mrs. Dew relapsed into broadest Gloucestershire again as she blurted out this startling fact.

"Stir," Mr. Wycherly repeated, "stir. Do you mean that she is a particularly noisy child?"

"No, sir, not that. Jane-Anne isn't that; but she does things no other child ever thinks of doing and you can't seem to guard against it. The very first month she was at the asylum, she went and put 'er foot through a staircase window trying to see some soldiers as was passing. They had a board meeting about it."

Mr. Wycherly laughed. "It is unusual to put one's foot through a window, but surely that was an accident and not a moral offence?"

"It was a staircase window, as stretched all down one side of that wing," Mrs. Dew said solemnly, "and the bannisters was up against it, and Jane-Anne she leant over cranin' 'er 'ead to see them soldiers, and she lost 'er balance and swung back and drove 'er foot right through and cut 'er leg so it bled dreadful."

"Poor child," said Mr. Wycherly, "that's one thing she is quite safe from here. There will be no temptation for her to put her feet through any windows. Has she lost both her parents, Mrs. Dew?"

"That's another thing," said Mrs. Dew, dropping her voice mysteriously, "as I feel you ought to know, and that is, Jane-Anne's father was a Grecian."

"Really," Mr. Wycherly remarked, evidently quite unmoved by what Mrs. Dew considered a most damaging fact. "A Greek; how interesting! What was his name?"

"Staff rides," Mrs. Dew answered promptly. "At least that's what I call it, but he called it something longer. I've tried to English it as much as possible to match her really respectable Christian name."

"Do you happen to remember how it was spelt?" Mr. Wycherly asked.

"Yes, sir, S-T-A-V-R-I-D-E-S."

"Ah," Mr. Wycherly exclaimed; "now I've got it. Stavrides. Quite a common Greek name. What part of Greece did he come from?"

"Athens, sir, an' it was there he met my sister, who was lady's maid to Mrs. Methuen's cousin. She'd been schoolroom-maid first of all, then when the young ladies grew up, they had her taught dressmaking and hairdressin' and took her everywhere with them. And when Lady Lettice married she took my sister Jane with her, and they travelled a lot, an' in Athens there was a carriage accident and my sister was thrown out and stunned, and this young man was passing and he picked her up, and it seems he fell in love with her there and then, for all her eye was swole up with the bump she got--she was a very-good-looking girl was Jane--anyway, 'e never rested till 'e'd married 'er. He was, I suppose, in a rather better position than she was, though, from bein' with the young ladies so constant, my sister seemed to have caught their pretty ways, and spoke exactly like them. She wasn't a bit like me," said Mrs. Dew simply, "you'd never 'ave thought we was sisters."

"What was Stavrides?" Mr. Wycherly asked.

"A sort of writer, sir, for newspapers. When they got married he came to London, and he was correspondent for some paper, some Grecian paper. It isn't a trade I thinks much on, but he earned good money and he insured his life heavy. And then, just like him it was, he forgot to pay the premium, fell ill and died all of a hurry when Jane-Anne was but four-year-old, and my sister was left without anything at all but some forty pounds they 'ad in the bank."

"Poor thing," said Mr. Wycherly. "What did she do?"

"She did dressmaking, an' she took a lodger. Lady Lettice an' the young ladies 'elped her all they could, and she was doin' pretty well when she took an' died, an' she left Jane-Anne to me. My 'usban' was alive then--not as he was much use, an' I've done my best, but you see, I'm only a servant an' not being out reg'lar makes it harder. Lord Dursley, he got her a nomination for the asylum at Baresgill, but I don't know if she can stop there. It's very cold up there in Northumberland, an' she's got a delicate chest. She've been there fifteen months, but 'as 'ad a lot of illness, an' I don't know if she can keep on. They don't like it, you see, sir, such a lot of illness."

"I understand it is some kind of an orphanage. The boys, you know, spoke to me about your niece, Mrs. Dew. I quite look forward to making her acquaintance. Do they receive any special training where she is?"

"Oh, yes, sir, it's a most superior place where they train them for young servants. They get their education and their clothes and good, thorough training in household duties, and when they're seventeen they put them out in good families that they know about, where they take an interest in the servants and treat them well."

"It sounds an admirable institution," said Mr. Wycherly. "Are the children happy there?"

"Most of the girls, sir, are happy as birds. It's a really good place, sir, plenty of wholesome food, nice airy rooms--but there! Jane-Anne she frets something dreadful. Sometimes I fear she'll never make a good dependable servant. If it's book-learnin', now, she's on to it like a cat on to a mouse. There's never no complaint there--but you never know what flightiness Jane-Anne 'll be after."

"You see," Mr. Wycherly said indulgently, "she is only a child as yet. We must have patience. Anyway, Mrs. Dew, I hope that is settled. Send for your furniture and for Jane-Anne----"

"I am deeply obliged to you, sir," Mrs. Dew said earnestly, "and I will endeavour to serve you faithful. I will arrange with Miss Morecraft, her as I shares the 'ouse with, and I'll fetch Jane-Anne most thankfully when she can be moved----"

"Is she ill then?"

"She's managed to get a most fearful cold on 'er chest; 'ow I can't conceive, but so it is; she's that hoarse and croupy, Miss Morecraft's kep' 'er in bed, and what I really came to ask, sir, was if I might pop round after supper to see 'ow the child is."

"By all means, Mrs. Dew, and whenever she can be moved, bring her here. Then you can look after her yourself."

Mr. Wycherly was very exhausted after this long conversation. He lay back in his chair and closed his eyes with a sense of well-earned repose. Whatever this child--this window-breaking, "cropping-up," generally disturbing little girl might be, she could not be one half so dreadful as the sort of servant Mr. Wycherly saw himself a thrall to if Mrs. Dew deserted him. Besides, Mrs. Dew, herself, would be there to keep her in order.

"These domestic cares are very disorganising," he reflected. He felt a positive distaste for the Migrarian School of Philosophy just then. The pamphlet on Eubulides lay open at his elbow, but he ignored it. Instead, he went over to his book-case and took from it "Tristram Shandy," which he dearly loved. He opened it at random, standing where he was, and his eyes fell on this passage:

"_'I can't get out--I can't get out,' said the starling._

"_I stood looking at the bird; and to every person who came through the passage, it ran fluttering to the side towards which they approached it, with the same lamentation of its captivity. 'I can't get out,' said the starling. 'God help thee!' said I, 'but I'll let thee out, cost what it will.'_"

"I wonder now," Mr. Wycherly thought to himself, "if that poor little half-Greek girl feels like Sterne's starling."

*CHAPTER VII*

*JANE-ANNE SWEARS FEALTY*

"Minds lead each other in contrary directions, traverse each other in numberless points, and at last greet each other at the journey's end. An old man and a child would talk together; and the old man be led on his path and the child left thinking." JOHN KEATS.

Jane-Anne had managed to get an exceedingly bad cold. To run on wet grass in stockings, if one wears the stockings all the evening afterwards, is not a wise proceeding for a delicate person. And when, the next day, she went to keep her tryst with Edmund, she knew very well that her lung was at its old tricks again; and that, had she been "at the Bainbridge," matron would have sent for the doctor. He would have listened at her back with his funny indiarubber tube, and would then have muttered something mysterious about "crepitation."

Jane-Anne had her own idea of "crepitation," which she abbreviated to "the creppits." She always pictured this unfortunate lung as a bent and aged person sidling along "with legs that went tap-lapperty like men that fear to fall."

It was tiresome that lung; for whenever it began its tap-lapperty entertainment she felt so ill. Her head ached and her legs seemed to weigh tons; her throat was hot and painful, and something seemed to flutter in the palms of her hands like an imprisoned bird.

More dead than alive she crawled back from her meeting with the princess to the stuffy little house "down in St. Clement's" that her aunt shared with Miss Morecraft, knowing full well that bed would be her portion directly anyone noticed how ill she looked.

Miss Morecraft, a dressmaker of severely respectable and melancholy temperament, was not observant, and it happened that just then she was very busy, as her customers were nearly all servants, and a new dress at Whitsuntide is a matter of sacred ritual in that class.

She did, it is true, remark that Jane-Anne was "a dainty feeder" when the child left her dinner almost untasted, but she did not "hold with pampering children," and having eaten her own dinner with considerable relish, went back to her work, having pressed Jane-Anne into the service to do some basting.

It was not till the child nearly fainted during the afternoon that Miss Morecraft awoke to the fact that Jane-Anne was really ill. She was quite kind-hearted, and was rather shocked that she should have made the child sew when she was evidently unfit for any effort of the kind. She put her to bed, made her a cup of tea, and persuaded the milkman to call and tell Mrs. Dew how matters were.

During the evening, Mrs. Dew "popped round," took Jane-Anne's temperature, rubbed her with liniment, scolded her well, kissed her and tucked her up in bed, and left her unaccountably cheered and comforted.

Next morning a strange, new doctor came. He, too, listened at Jane-Anne's back with his funny double telephone. He, too, shook his head and murmured something about crepitation and congestion, just like the doctor at "Bainbridge's."

"Shall I be able to go back to school?" Jane-Anne croaked eagerly. She was hoarse as a raven.

"When does school begin?" asked the doctor.