CHAPTER XIX.

A VISIT FROM AUNT SOPHIA AND THE HORTON BOYS.

After a tolerably satisfactory interview with Mrs. Phips and her granddaughter Becky, Honor at length returns home, where she finds unusual excitement reigning, all sorts of unexpected things having happened in her absence.

The moment her hand touches the latch of the gate Molly comes flying down the garden to meet her, her eyes sparkling, her hair blown about, her apron all awry.

"Such news!" she cries breathlessly. "That nice clergyman has been here, and he wants his little girl to have music lessons; so now I've got a real live pupil, Honor! Isn't that _splendid_? To be sure they can't give very good pay," she adds, a little ruefully, "but it will all help, won't it?"

"Of course it will, dear!" says Honor, kissing her. "I am so glad--"

Molly cuts her short:

"But that isn't all," she says. "Aunt's here, sitting with her bonnet on as usual, though we've all had a try to make her take it off. And mother seems quite cheered up. Well, then Hugh and Regy arrived by the same train, Hugh nearly bursting with most important news. Come along in; you can go and talk to them all while Doris and I finish getting the tea. Oh, and give me the key of the store-cupboard; I want to get out some of that lovely jam the Mr. Talboys sent Daisy. The boys wanted to come and help in the kitchen, but I shut them out and locked the door. I do hope Doris hasn't let them in in my absence!"

And being tormented with doubt on this score Molly retires in haste, and Honor enters the drawing-room, where she finds Daisy, with the assistance of Miss Celestine Ermyntrude Talboys--as she has persisted in naming her doll,--gravely doing the honours to Hugh and Regy, while her mother and aunt are seated close together in earnest confidential conversation.

In due course tea is announced, and as Mrs. Merivale expresses her intention of joining them to-day, there is quite a large party when Dick and Bobby also arrive home from a long ramble they have been having in the woods.

Lady Woodhouse, it appears, has come down with the intention of having a good long chat with them all, and to see how things are going generally.

Hugh's important piece of news is that he, having "worked like a nigger" for the last few months with a "coach," has sent in his papers, and is awaiting the result anxiously, but hopefully too, his "coach" having spoken in the highest praise of his ability when once he had put his shoulder to the wheel.

They have a very merry tea, and when it is over and the visitors have returned to the drawing-room, Doris and Honor remain behind to clear away and wash up the tea-things, while Molly goes to look after the poultry. She is engrossed in trying to prevent Mr. Pincher and one or two of the greediest hens from snapping up the entire supply of maize and other luxuries, which she is scattering amongst them, before their more modest companions can get a chance, when she hears a clear tenor voice not far off ringing out the words--

"O, Molly Bawn, why leave me pining, All lonely waiting here for you, While stars above are brightly shining Because they've nothing else to do!"

Molly listens a moment, and then turning the basket upside down, and shaking out the last grains, she wheels about and faces Hugh as he comes round the corner and stands before her.

"It's a pity you have nothing to do but to go about singing such nonsense," she observes. "It may be all very well for the stars, perhaps--I don't know their ways and habits--but I should think _you_ might easily find something else to do."

"Well, so I can, and _do_ in fact, at least I have done lately," returns poor Hugh confusedly. "Come now, Molly," he pleads, "don't be hard on a fellow! I thought you would be so pleased with the news I brought down to-day."

"Well, so I am, of course; but," rather unkindly adds Molly, "you hav'n't passed yet, you know!"

Hugh looks a trifle hurt for a moment; but then he says quietly enough:

"No; you are right there, Molly. But if I fail this time I do think it will be my misfortune rather than my fault; for ever since you lectured me so on the subject of my work I _have_ worked with a vengeance, and chiefly, I believe, for your sake."

"Why, what nonsense, Hugh! Why in the world for my sake?"

"Well, it's hardly likely I would want you to think that all your words were thrown away on me--pearls before swine, you know, and all that sort of thing. No; but seriously, Molly, I have done my level best to deserve the little bit--the _very_ little bit, I'm afraid,--of good opinion you have of me. Though I don't mean to say that I hav'n't worked for my own sake too, and for mother's. But, upon my honour, I don't believe I ever saw the matter in a proper light until you put it so plainly before me, Molly. My mother has often said a few words to me on the subject, of course, but no one but you ever had the courage to tell me out to my face that I was fast drifting into an idle, useless vagabond; and--"

"I never said such a thing!" exclaims Molly, firing up indignantly. "How dare you say I said what I didn't!"

"Well, really, you know, you implied something of the sort. Now, didn't you? But you won't let a fellow finish what he is saying. I was going to add that no one had ever tried to show me what I might have drifted into but you; and I shall always feel that I owe you a debt of gratitude for it, whatever you may say to the contrary. And I tell you what, Molly dear, I have felt happier during these few months of hard work than I have for a long time past. It has roused me, and given me a taste for work, and made me feel that there is something worth living for beyond the little everyday pleasures of life. Ah! I shall often think of my little mentor and the _d-u-s-t_ she wrote on my books, when I am miles and miles away; that is if I go," he adds hastily, anticipating any incredulous remark which Molly may be about to make.

"Of course you will go away, if it depends on your passing your exam," says the girl quietly, as they go slowly back together by the laurel hedge, she pulling off a dead leaf here and there. "I always said that, if you remember; I mean that it rested with yourself, as it were. You see, too, what your 'coach' told you."

"Oh, hang the 'coach!'" exclaims Hugh disrespectfully. "I care a hundred times more for your opinion than for old Dobson's; though he's not a bad sort of fellow, and a perfect rattler at cramming."

"Of course," says Molly demurely, "I know my opinion is of exceeding great value; but, you see, I haven't been in the habit of _cramming_ a lot of young men for a good many years past, and therefore his experience may possibly be wider than mine. Now, come in, and talk to mother and aunt; your train will be going before long."

"Stop a minute," cries Hugh, catching her hand and detaining her before she opens the door; "will you write to me if I _do_ go away, Molly?"

"Oh, yes," she replies graciously; "I'll write. And, look here, Hugh, if you should go _very_ far away, say to China, or New Zealand, or--or--Kamtchatka--I'll work you a pair of slippers--there!" And with a grave, emphatic nod, she pushes open the door and runs into the house.

In the meantime Lady Woodhouse has been hearing all the news from Doris and Honor, the former of whom is seated on a footstool at her aunt's feet, her chin resting in her hands, and with a generally doleful sort of air about her.

"No, it's no use, aunt," she is saying. "I hate domesticating, and that's all about it. I've tried my hand at everything pretty nearly, and I think each has failed in an equally successful manner. A beef-steak pudding is a thing to be spoken of with bated breath in this house, ever since I made one, not long after we settled here. I believe the whole family suffered from violent indigestion for a week and more; and now if it is proposed to have a pudding for dinner, someone--generally Dick or Molly--inquires in a most pointed manner, 'Who's going to make it?' I tried a treacle pudding one day, when they had well recovered from the other; but I was so flurried with thinking how in the world I should prevent the treacle from running out at the ends that I forgot the lard altogether; so no one suffered from the richness of the paste that day, because it was simply flour and water. It doesn't seem to matter _what_ it is," poor Doris goes on after a pause; "I even failed in boiling some potatoes the other day, for the water all boiled away (I suppose I didn't put enough), and I found the potatoes all stuck to the bottom of the pot, and burnt horribly! And it's just the same in other things. If I feed the chickens in the evening one of them is sure to be found either dead or dying the next morning. The very milk goes sour if _I_ by chance put it away!"

"Hum--that's because you don't put it in the right place, I suspect," remarks Aunt Sophia grimly.

"Very likely; but that doesn't alter the fact that it _does_ go sour, and that everything I have to do with is bound to go wrong in some way or other. Now, aunt, _do_ take off your bonnet!"

"I tell you I'm not going to, child," says Lady Woodhouse, holding on to it with both hands. "You know very well that until my trunk is unpacked I cannot get a cap, and sit bareheaded I will not. But if you are so very anxious upon the subject you can take my keys and go and find one."

Molly, who has just entered, volunteers to do this, and after this little interruption Lady Woodhouse says abruptly:

"Well then, Miss Doris, I take it that you are not of very much use in this establishment, eh?"

"No, I am afraid not," answers Doris, looking rather crestfallen. "The only thing I can do decently is needlework, and I _am_ of use in that sometimes. Am I not, Honor?"

"You are lots of use in all sorts of ways, Doris; only you allow yourself to be so easily discouraged. But she does do plain needlework beautifully, aunt; and, oh, there has been _such_ a lot of mending and darning to do in the house linen since we came here. We only brought what was very old. The best was all included in the sale."

"I don't believe it need have been," grumbles Doris in an undertone; "but you know, aunt, Honor became quite _aggressively_ conscientious by the time we were actually leaving. I declare I wonder she allowed us to keep our own hair!"

"_Doris!_" exclaims Honor, in the midst of a general laugh.

"Very well, then," resumes Aunt Sophia, quite regardless of the interruption, "you would not, I suppose, be missed from home so much as one of the others. Now, how do you think you would like to go abroad with your uncle and me for a time? Mind you," she adds quickly, "it would not be a _short_ time probably; our travels might possibly extend over a year, or even more. Now, the question is, can your mother and sisters and these boys spare you--and can you spare them?"

Doris gasps. Poor girl! to travel is always what she has so greatly longed to do. And her father had promised her that "he would think about it one fine day." And now to have the chance after all, when she had fancied it had gone for ever! No wonder Doris gasps with delight as she looks eagerly round to read in the others' faces their ideas on the subject.

"I don't know yet when we shall be going," continues Lady Woodhouse, without waiting for anyone to speak. "Your uncle has some law business on hand, and he can't leave till that is settled; and goodness knows when that will be. However, you'll want a little time to get ready, won't you? And I think you might decrease your mourning now, Honor, or certainly in another month. People don't now wear the heavy crêpe that they used, even for a parent. Oh, my cap? Thank you, Molly."

"I hope it is the right one, aunt," says the girl as she stands waiting for the bonnet.

"It can't very well be the wrong one, child, since I only brought one with me. Did you think I would bring a dozen for a visit of two days?"

So at length, after a good deal of argument for and against, it is settled that Doris is to hold herself in readiness to accompany her uncle and aunt whenever they feel disposed to summon her.

Honor does not disguise the fact that she will miss her sister not a little.

"Of course it is all nonsense Doris saying she is of no use," she remarks, stroking Vic's soft drooping ears. "She has for one thing taken Daisy and Bobby regularly to their lessons lately, and even Dick has joined them sometimes, but somehow he and Doris don't pull very well together on the subject of study, and I'm afraid just lately it has been dropped altogether. Of course, when Doris goes this will fall to me or Molly, but Molly would be as sorry as I should to let poor Doris miss such an opportunity; and for aunt's sake too we shall be glad for her to go. It is the least we can do after all her goodness to us."

"Tut, child," says Lady Woodhouse, "that is nothing; you are all good girls, and I am glad to do anything I _can_ for you. But it seems to me that Doris is the best, taking her altogether, to come with us to see something of the world; and then, of course, she is the eldest."

"Yes!" cries Doris, jumping up and clapping her hands; "and, who knows, I may marry a duke yet!"

"Marry a fiddlestick!" snaps Lady Woodhouse; and there the subject drops for the present.