CHAPTER XX.

BECKY.

Just as Lady Woodhouse is about to take her departure two days later, the new domestic, Becky Phips, arrives, accompanied by her "gra'm'ther," who assists in carrying her small box and a mysterious brown paper bag on which much care is lavished by Becky, and which afterwards turns out to contain nothing more nor less than that young person's "best 'at."

Aunt Sophia, who is standing on the steps peering up and down the road in search of the fly, now due, which is to convey her to the station, catches sight of the girl as she goes round to the back entrance, and raising her hands and eyes at the same time turns to Honor, exclaiming--

"Good gracious, child! Where did you pick up such an eccentric-looking piece of goods as that? Did anyone ever see such a remarkable head! My dear Honor, mark my words: that girl will either turn out extraordinarily clever or surprisingly stupid. She could be nothing between the two with a head like that, you know. Let me know, child, which she proves to be. I shall quite look forward to hearing whether she is an unsurpassable treasure, or whether she drives you all to despair and madness by her outrageous stupidity. Ah, here's the fly! That's right. Now, Honor, don't forget. All right, driver." And away goes Aunt Sophia, nodding her head out of the window until a bend in the road hides the fly from view, and the girls go indoors again to interview Becky. Certainly she is a remarkable-looking young person; and many a grave discussion is held as to the phrenological meaning of the enormous bumps on either side of her head. To Becky herself they chiefly mean that not all the bonnet-pins and hair-pins in the world will keep her cap straight; if it is not leaning over too much on one side, it is sure to be on the other. This imparts a rakish sort of air to the girl, which is trying in the extreme to Mrs. Merivale.

At last Dick settles the matter off-hand one day, by announcing once for all that they are the bumps of hunger--the girl proving to have an insatiable appetite, and the consumption of bread, potatoes, and anything in the nature of pudding being truly astonishing--not to say alarming--since her arrival at the Rookery. It does not take Honor long to make up her mind as to what will be the report to her aunt regarding the girl's possible cleverness or stupidity, for she presently developes such an apparently inexhaustible fund of the latter commodity as often to reduce the entire family to the verge of frenzy. There are only two things which Becky appears capable of doing with any regularity or determination, and these are "swilling" the back-yard and letting the kitchen fire go out. Thus little scenes are constantly taking place as follows: Mrs. Merivale expresses a wish to have a cup of tea somewhat earlier than usual. Honor goes into the kitchen. Kettle ostentatiously placed over what was once a fire, but is now a depressing collection of black cold cinders.

Honor--"I thought I told you, Becky, _always_ to have the kettle boiling by three o'clock. Just look at it."

Becky (with cap awry)--"Ain't it boiling, miss? Why, I put it on nigh two hours ago. I'm _sure_ I did!"

Honor (desperately)--"What is the use, Becky, of putting the kettle over a fire that has gone out. Oh, dear! oh, dear! I don't believe I shall ever be able to teach you anything; I really don't!"

Becky (resignedly)--"No, miss."

Then perhaps Doris, in an unusually domestic frame of mind, will come rushing into the sitting-room one morning, her arms full of the little light muslin draperies with which, at small cost, she and her sisters have so smartened up the scantily furnished bedrooms.

"Now, girls," she cries, "anything in this line that you want washed? Mother has actually trusted me with her lawn collars and cuffs. She remarked (in a not very complimentary manner, I think), 'that at least I could hardly do them _worse_ than old Mrs. What's-her-name does them.' Yes, do you know, I really think I _shall_ develop a talent for washing and ironing--so long as it is something light and pretty--laces or muslins, or something. I feel that it is _in_ me somehow. Now, don't laugh! I'm going to _dare_ Becky to let the fire out, on pain of death or instant dismissal."

All goes well and merrily for some time. The fire burns brightly, the kettle sings, the boiler hisses; and Doris, also singing, and attired in a big coarse white apron, stands over a small tub, her pretty arms plunged up to the elbows in soap-suds.

In the afternoon, however, loud and wrathful lamentations rend the air when Doris, having enjoyed a well-merited lounge in the only comfortable chair in the sitting-room, goes into the kitchen to commence her ironing, and finds--a plentiful supply of irons indeed, but carefully arranged before a fire which has been out a good hour or more! Doris does not take these little _contre-temps_ so quietly as Honor, so there ensues a stormy torrent of scolding on her side, and mild protestations and feeble efforts at self-justification on Becky's, until the latter finally retires in floods of tears into the scullery, and Doris, being remonstrated with by Honor, rushes up to their bed-room in a fit of the sulks and locks herself in.

On the first Sunday that comes round, however, the whole family is electrified by an unexpected talent, not to say genius, for boot-cleaning, which Becky suddenly proves herself to possess.

It has been noticed that from the neighbourhood of the wood-cellar where she keeps all the paraphernalia of brushes and blacking, sounds of one of Moody and Sankey's hymns have been issuing, pitched in an unusually high key, and when, a little later, Becky places all the boots in a row at the foot of the stairs, saying with pride, "There, miss; I think I've made them look proper!" the girls feel that the joyful sounds are accounted for.

Indeed, as Honor, Molly, Dick, Daisy, and Bobby are all seated afterwards in the little village church, on a conspicuous bench without any front, and right under the reading-desk, the eyes of the eldest girl travel proudly down the row of neat-looking boots and shoes, till they reach Bobby's little high-lows, when her pride receives a sudden shock, for right across the left one she notices for the first time an ugly-looking crack, which will of a surety develop into a split in a day or two. It is to be feared that poor Honor's attention wanders from the sermon more than once that morning, her mind being harassed and distracted with the constantly recurring thought, that unless Bobby is to go almost barefoot he will certainly have to be re-shod before that week is out.