Grace hesitated for a moment. She thought Archie would have included Mattie in his invitation; but he did nothing of the kind, and she knew him too well to suggest such a thing.
"Good-bye, Mattie dear. I hope you will have some tea ready for us when we come back," she said, kissing her sister affectionately; but they neither of them noticed the pained wistfulness of Mattie"s look as the door closed upon them.
They were going out without her; and on Grace"s first day, too. Archie was going to show her the church, and the schools, and the model cottages where his favorite old women lived,--all those places that Mattie had visited and learned to love during the eight months she had lived with her brother. In a few weeks she must say good-bye to them all, and go back to the dull old house at Leeds, to be scolded by her mother for her awkward ways, and to be laughed at and teased by her brothers and sisters. Archie was bad enough sometimes, but then he was Archie, and had a right to his bad humors; but with the boys and girls it was less endurable. It was, "Oh, you stupid old Matt! Of course it was all your fault;" or, "Mattie, you goose!" from Fred; or, "You silly child, Mattie" from her father, who found her a less amusing companion than Grace; and even Dottie would say, "Oh, it is only Mattie: I never care if she scolds me."
The home atmosphere was a little depressing, Mattie thought, with a sigh, dearly as she loved her young torments. She knew she would find it somewhat trying after these eight months of comparative freedom.
True, Archie had snubbed her and kept her in order; but one tyrant is preferable to many. At home the thirty-years-old Mattie was only one of the many daughters,--the old maid of the family,--the unattractive little wall-flower who was condemned to wither unnoticed on its stalk.
Here, in her brother"s vicarage, she had been a person of consequence, whom only the master of the house presumed to snub.
The maids liked their good-natured mistress, who never found fault with them, and who was so bustling and clever a little housekeeper.
The poor people and the school-children liked Mattie too. "Our Miss Drummond" they called her for a long time, rather to Grace"s discomfiture. "Ah, she is a rare one, when a body is low!" as old Goody Saunders once said.
And Archie"s friends respected the little woman, in spite of her crudities and decidedly odd ways. Miss Middleton and the Challoners were quite fond of her. So no wonder Mattie grew low at the thought of leaving her friends.
Grace had come to take her place. Nevertheless, she had welcomed her on the previous evening with the utmost cheerfulness and unselfishness. She had shown her the house; she had introduced her to the Challoners; she had overwhelmed her with a thousand little attentions; and Grace had not been ungrateful.
"I am afraid this is hard for you, Mattie," Grace had said to her, as the sisters were unpacking late the previous night. "I ought not be so happy to come, when I know I am turning you out." And Mattie had winked away a tear, and answered, quite cheerily,--
"Oh, no, Grace; you must not feel that. I have had a nice time, and enjoyed myself so much with dear Archie, and now it is your turn; and, you know, he has always wanted you from the first."
"Poor dear fellow!" murmured Grace; "but he looks thin, Mattie.
Perhaps I ought to be here, as he wants me; but I shall never keep his house as beautifully as you have done. Mother would be astonished if she saw it." And this piece of well-deserved praise went far to console Mattie that night.
But she began to feel just a little sore at breakfast-time. Once or twice, Archie decidedly ignored her, and turned to Grace; he even brought her his gloves to mend, though Mattie had been his faithful mender all these months.
"Come into the study, and we will have a talk, Grace," he had said, and as Grace had involuntarily waited for her sister to accompany them, he had-added, hastily: "Oh, Mattie is always busy at this time with butchers and bakers! Come along, Grace:" and, though Mattie had no such business on her hands, she dared not join them.
It was only when a parish meeting called the young vicar away that Mattie bethought herself of the Challoners.
Poor Mattie! Low spirits were not much in her line. She had never thought enough of herself to indulge in the luxury of wounded susceptibility,--the atmosphere that surrounded her had been too rough and bracing for that; but nevertheless this afternoon she longed to indulge in a good cry. Happily, however, before the first tear had begun to redden her eyelids--indeed, she hardly got her mouth into the proper pucker--a vigorous pull at the bell warned her of an impending visitor, and immediately afterwards Sir Harry marched into the room, looking ruddier than ever with the cold air and exercise, his warm coloring kindling a glow in the room.
His heavy footsteps shook the old flooring of the vicarage; but as he greeted Mattie he looked round him, as though somewhat surprised to find her alone.
"How do you do, Miss Mattie? Why, what have you done with your sister?" he asked, in rather a disappointed tone. "I came to have a chat with you both."
Another little sting for Mattie: he had only come to see Grace.
"She has gone out with Archie," she returned, in a subdued voice. "He is showing her the church and the schools."
"I was up at the Friary just now," he said, carelessly, "and they were all talking about your sister, praising her up to the skies. What an odd capacity women have for falling in love with each other at first sight! Phillis especially seemed very far gone. So I told them I would just come and have a good look at this paragon: one cannot judge of a person in a hat and veil."
"I am sure you will like Grace," replied Mattie, reviving a little at the idea of her sister"s perfections. "She is not pretty, exactly, though Archie and I think her so; but she is so nice and clever. Oh, you should hear those two talk! it is perfectly wonderful to listen to them!"
"It strikes me you are a little left out in the cold, aren"t you, Miss Mattie?" asked Sir Harry, with one of his shrewd good-humored looks.
"Why did you not go out with them?"
"Oh, Archie never wants me when he has Grace," answered Mattie, with a sudden pang at the truthfulness of this speech. "They have always been so much to each other, those two."
"He would want you fast enough if Miss Grace--is that not her name?--were to marry and leave him to shift for himself," was the somewhat matter-of-fact answer.
But Mattie shook her head at this with a faint smile:
"Grace will never marry. She would not leave Archie."
"Oh, but that is nonsense, do you know?--sheer nonsense! Many girls talk like that, but they change their mind in the end. Why, the parson may marry himself. You don"t suppose a good looking fellow like that intends to be an old bachelor? And then what will Miss Grace do?"
"I don"t know. I am afraid she will miss him dreadfully."
"Oh, but she will get over it all right. It does not do to make a fuss over that sort of thing. Sentimentality between brothers and sisters is all very well in its way, but it won"t hold against a wife"s or husband"s claims. I never had any myself, so I don"t know; but I find it precious lonely without them. That is why I have adopted my cousins. A man must care for some one."
"Yes, indeed," echoed Mattie, with a sigh.
"I am afraid your people do not use you very well, Miss Mattie," he went on, with cheerful sympathy that was quite a cordial in its way.
"You look a bit down this afternoon; a fellow would call it in the blues, and he would be thinking of a cigar and brandy-and-soda. What a pity women don"t smoke! it is no end soothing to the spirits!"
"We have got afternoon tea," returned Mattie, beginning to smile at this.
"Well, why don"t you ring and order some?" he replied, quite seriously. "Do, please, Miss Mattie, if it will put a little heart into you. Why, I should like a cup myself uncommonly. There never was such a fellow for afternoon tea." And then Mattie did ring the bell, and, Sir Harry having stirred the fire into a cheerful blaze, and the little bra.s.s kettle beginning to sing cheerily on its trivet, things soon looked more comfortable.
"Now you are all right," he remarked, presently. "You look quite a different sort of body now. When I first came in you reminded me of Cinderella in a brown dress, sitting all alone, by a very black fire.
I do believe you were on the verge of crying. Now, weren"t you, Miss Mattie?" And Mattie, with much shame, owned to the impeachment.
"And what was it all about, eh?" he asked, with such a coaxing peremptoriness that Mattie confessed that she was rather dull at the thought that n.o.body wanted her, and that she must go home; and, on being further pressed and questioned, out it all came,--Mattie"s shortcomings, her stupid ways, and the provocation she offered to home criticism. Sir Harry listened and laughed, and every now and then threw in a jesting remark; but so encouraging was his manner and so evident his interest that Mattie found herself talking as she had never done to any one but Miss Middleton. Before she had finished, Sir Harry knew all about the household in Lowder Street, and had formed a tolerable estimate of every member of the family,--the depressed father; the care-worn and some what stern mother; the boys, clever and handsome and flippant; the girls in all stages of awkwardness; and the quiet, talented Grace, who was every one"s right hand, and who had come to the vicarage to dispossess Mattie.
"Come, now, I call that hard; I do, upon my word!" he repeated more than once at the end of Mattie"s little narrative. "Women have a lot put upon them. I dare say if I had had sisters I should have bullied them sometimes. Men are awful tyrants, aren"t they, Miss Mattie?"
Mattie took this literally.
"I do not think you would be a tyrant, Sir Harry," she returned, simply, and then wondered why he suddenly colored up to the roots of his hair.
"Oh, there is no knowing," he replied, in an embarra.s.sed tone. "I have never had any one to bully. I think I shall try my hand on Dulce, only she is such a little spit-fire. Well, I must be going," he went on, straightening himself. "By the bye, I shall not see you again until Tuesday; I have to run over to Oldfield about a lot of business I have in hand. Do you know Oldfield?"
"Oh, no; but Nan and Phillis have described it so often that I seem as though I have been there."
"It is a niceish place, and I am half inclined to settle there myself; there is a house going that would just suit me."
Mattie"s face lengthened: she did not like the idea of losing Sir Harry, he had been so good-natured and kind to her.
"One would never see you if you live at Oldfield," she said, a little sorrowfully; and again Sir Harry looked embarra.s.sed.
"Oh, but you will be at Leeds, so it won"t make much difference. But I do not want to be parted from Aunt Catherine and the girls: there is a great deal to arrange. Perhaps, before you go, I shall be able to tell you that things are settled. Anyhow, good-bye till Tuesday." And then he nodded to her in a friendly way, and Mattie returned to her fireplace refreshed and comforted.
Archie and Grace came in presently, bringing another current of cold air with them. They both looked bright and happy, as though they had enjoyed their walk. Grace"s pale cheeks had the loveliest tinge in them.
"Have we left you too long alone, Mattie dear?" she asked, as she took the cup of tea offered her. "How cosy this dear old room looks! and what a beautiful fire!"
"Sir Harry has been emptying the coal-scuttle!" laughed Mattie. "What a pity you missed him, Grace! he has been so amusing."
Grace smiled incredulously: