The strange house or, A moment's mistake
But though she looked round on her cosy study, she did not feel it
enough her own, as yet, to indulge herself in even a thought towards
home.
She was just considering whether she should go to her own room, when
Susan appeared with a little tray with biscuits and lemonade, asking if
Miss Ashlyn would please to take some milk or anything more that she
could bring her.
"I am to be well cared for, at any rate in this way," said Gertrude to
herself. But she did not feel inclined to eat.
She cleared up her work, put the room straight, lowered the gas, and
ascended to her own room and shut herself in.
The moonlight streamed over the floor, making the little jet of gas
which was already lighted quite tiny in comparison. She went to her
window and looked out. How still it all was!—except for the occasional
sounds of music coming up from the neighbouring drawing-rooms.
Gertrude leant her head against the sash and buried her face in her
hands, for some one near was singing a song which Otto had sung only
last night—"When the mists have rolled in splendour." And after it was
over, they had stepped outside to look at the harvest moon rising over
the sea.
While they had stood there, he had asked her whether she had any
desires for things to be different from what they were, or whether she
were quite satisfied to do the will of God, just as she found it every
day?
And she had thought about it, watching the slow red moon rise and rise
out of the mist and enter a little cloud, till, after a few minutes'
eclipse, she had suddenly shone out triumphantly above it in the clear
deep blue.
And she had answered thoughtfully—
"I think my life feels something like that moon in the mist just now—"
"Uncertain as to its true duty and position?"
"Well, perhaps, Otto, but I don't know," she had answered.
"And then?" he had asked.
"I feel as if to-morrow were like that bit of dark cloud, which, after
all, in the wonderful fashioning of our Father's hand, may only serve
to brighten the light when it does shine out!"
"Yes," he said consideringly, "only it is so hard to wait so long in
the mist and in the cloud, Gertrude!"
"If that is our appointed path?" she had asked.
"It might all be clear sky if the mists did not come from earth," said
Otto.
"I see—self-made. Well, Otto, I don't know; all I can do is to ask God
to work in me what He wills. I can't see the way myself, or tell how to
act, sometimes."
"Nor I," he had answered in a low tone.
Then Phyllis's clear voice had called out from the front door, "Come,
you two, it is ever so late, and we have to be early to-morrow!"
Gertrude remembered it all, while still some beautiful tenor voice sang
over and over again—
"We shall know each other better
When the mists have rolled away!"
"Ah, but that is in heaven," she murmured. "It is not a song of earthly
things at all! To do our Father's will every day is our portion, and it
shall be mine to do it willingly, if He will help me!"
CHAPTER XI.
A SCRIMMAGE.
"DO you like Miss Ashlyn?" asked Randall of Hugh as they were being
dressed the next day.
"I don't know yet," said Hugh, "but I think I do."
"Daisy said yesterday she should not mind her, or do what she wished,
unless she chose," said Randall.
"Then Miss Daisy hadn't ought to," interposed nurse; "it was very
naughty of her."
Nurse spoke with such unusual energy that Hugh was quite surprised.
"I don't mean to either," nodded Randall.
"Well, you'll 'have' to," remarked Hugh, "so it is no good boasting. Of
course I am different; I go to school, and she's only got to help me
with my lessons."
Hugh and Randall both looked up suddenly, for there stood Gertrude
close to them asking nurse a question.
"I don't care," said Randall in a low, defiant tone; "she shouldn't
have come in—"
But Gertrude had received her answer from nurse and had turned away,
something in her face making Hugh sure that she had both heard and been
grieved by the tone in which the boys had spoken.
Hugh looked after her doubtfully, then he turned angrily upon Randall.
"I wish you would not behave so!" he exclaimed. "She was going to like
us, and now she won't."
"I don't care," said Randall, "whether she does or not."
"I do then," answered Hugh.
"Then you should not have said that about the lessons," retorted
Randall.
Hugh stood silent. What had he said? It had seemed nothing to him, and
yet somehow he was conscious that some slighting words had passed his
lips which he had hardly intended.
His dressing being finished, he went down-stairs slowly, wondering how
he could make Miss Ashlyn understand that he had meant to be kind, in
spite of what he had said in his haste.
She was coming out of her room as he passed the door.
Their eyes met. Something in the little boy's made her pause.
"I didn't 'mean'—" he said hesitatingly.
"Did not mean what, dear?"
"About my lessons—I ought not to have said you 'had' to!"
"I understand," said Gertrude, stooping to kiss him, "and I will help
you gladly."
Hugh looked anxiously in her face.
"They are hard sometimes," he said, "but I will be as industrious as I
can—"
"I shall not mind the hardness," said Gertrude, smiling. "This is the
dining-room, is it not?"
So they went in, to find Conway and Ned eating their breakfast in great
haste.
"Come on, Hugh, you will be late. What's the good of getting into hot
water the first day?"
Gertrude found that neither Mollie nor Daisy had yet appeared. And Mr.
and Mrs. Shaddock, she found, breakfasted after the rest had gone.
She sat down and waited, wondering what she was expected to do, and
presently Mollie came in looking pale and sleepy.
"Hullo, Moll!" said Ned. "One would think it was bedtime for you."
"I wish it were," said Mollie. "Miss Ashlyn, are you not going to have
some breakfast?"
"I was waiting for you, Mollie."
"Oh, don't another time," said Mollie.
"Moll is often late," remarked Ned, "or she has a book to finish before
she gets up, or something."
"Yes," said Mollie, "so long as I am ready for school by half-past
nine, it does not matter to any one what time I get up."
Gertrude felt that the "any one" included her, though Mollie spoke very
unconcernedly, and took her seat at the table and began her breakfast
as if she were the only person in the room. Then she looked round at
the tea-tray and said—
"Oh, Miss Ashlyn, do you mind pouring out? Miss Halling always did, and
the boys could never get off without your help."
So Gertrude took her place at the urn, and Conway looked up to pass her
some bacon, immediately after burying himself again in a book he was
reading.
Daisy appeared when the rest had begun to move, wished Gertrude a
rather abrupt good morning, and then seated herself by Hugh and began
to whisper to him.
Soon there began a commotion, such as Gertrude in her quiet life had
never imagined.
As the time for the train drew near, there were calls for boots, books,
pencils, caps and straps, and Daisy was sent hither and thither to find
what was wanted.
Mollie condescended to do one thing for Ned, after which she took
herself off up-stairs. While Daisy waited close to Hugh, chiefly to
protect him from the jeers and cuffs of his brothers, and from the
more pungent taunts of little Randall, who took evident delight in
irritating his sensitive little brother.
At last they were off, and Gertrude, with a sigh which sounded quite
ponderous, turned and met Daisy's eyes fixed on her face.
CHAPTER XII.
MARMALADE.
"YOU'LL get used to it, Miss Ashlyn," she said, looking down the road
after her brothers.
"Shall I?" asked Gertrude, as she turned away with a heavy heart.
She went to her room, closed the door, and sat down by the window,
feeling unutterably desolate.
Were all of them going their own way without reference to her? Only
speaking to her when they must, only asking her help when they could
not possibly do without it?
Why had she left her happy home for this? It was true she had found
it difficult to get anything to do in Camptown; it was true that her
mother's income was insufficient for them without her help; it was true
that she had her own reasons for wanting a change, which she had hardly
acknowledged to herself. But for all that, now she was really away, the
home-sickness and loneliness seemed more than she could bear, and she
felt sick at heart as she reviewed the difficulties in her path.
She buried her face in her hands, too utterly despairing to cry, but
certainly more desolate than she had ever been before. Perhaps the
bitterest drop in her cup was little Randall, with his handsome face
and sharp tongue.
She was roused from her reverie by the thought that school-time would
quickly be there, and that she could not begin her duties with such a
burden on her heart.
She rose from her seat and knelt down by the bed, not able to form any
words of prayer, but still with an earnest uplifting of her heart for
help.
"I asked to be guided about coming here," she thought, "and if my
Father in heaven has sent me here—"
Then the tears came at last as a relief, and she laid her head down on
her arms and wept heartily, praying for submission and faith and help,
as she had never prayed before, perhaps.
"If He sent me, He has something for me to do here," she thought, "and
I must set about the doing of it at once. Oh, how wrong I have been to
repine or be afraid!"
What had her text been that morning? "Certainly I will be with thee."
What could she want more than that assurance?
She rose from her knees and found that the burden with which she had
knelt down was all gone. Nothing remained but a thankfulness that she
was so loved and so protected that such promises could indeed be hers
in Christ Jesus. She had only just bathed her eyes when a knock came at
the door, and on opening it, she found Daisy standing waiting.
"We are ready for school, Miss Ashlyn," she said.
"Is it half-past nine?" asked Gertrude, surprised.
"Yes; it is later than that—"
"Then my watch has played me a trick," she said, turning to the
dressing-table to take it up. "It usually goes so well, but it says
twenty past nine now."
Daisy looked soberly at her, as if her watch being fast or slow was not
of much interest.
Gertrude put it in her dress hastily, anxious to go down-stairs, and as
she did so she discovered that her fingers were sticky.
"How strange!" she said.
"What?" asked Daisy.
"I had but that moment washed my hands, and yet they are sticky!"
Daisy suggested washing them again, and went down to tell the others
Miss Ashlyn was coming, while Gertrude turned back to the table to put
down her basket again.
Just where her watch had lain, there was a little mark on the toilet
cover as if a finger had been drawn along it to remove some stain, and
on looking closer she found a little streak of marmalade had been left
behind too.
"I wish I had not left my watch there all breakfast-time," she said to
herself, as she went down-stairs; "it was careless of me."
Seated at the table in very good order were her three pupils.
"It's jolly late," said Randall.
"Never mind," interposed Mollie; "what if it is? Miss Ashlyn, what
shall we do first? Miss Halling always—"
"I have written out this rough time-table, Mollie, which your mother
approves. I think we shall find it work well. Daisy and Randall can
write, while you and I have a history lesson."
"Oh, but—" began Mollie.
"Wait, however, an instant," continued Gertrude calmly, "till I have
settled the other two. That is right, Daisy, you have your book ready.
Is this yours, Randall? I see you both write very well."