"It wouldn"t be us spoiling her trip," Nesta objected; "it would be Brenda"s and Herbert"s faults, because they are so disagreeable."
"It would be because of us," Eustace held out, "and I"ll never forgive you if you go whining about it to mother or any one. We can bear it for a year, or we aren"t worth anything."
But even Eustace"s courage received a check one evening when he and Nesta were called into their mother"s room for a talk before she dressed for dinner. Her face was aglow with some pleasant thoughts, yet she was very serious--a strange mixture that immediately struck the twins as portending something very big and out of the way.
"Chicks," she said, drawing them down on each side of her on the sofa, "I have got something very special to say to you to-day--something I scarcely know whether to be most glad or sorry about, for it cuts two ways. It fulfils the ambition of my life for you, and at the same time it costs me my twins."
There was a breathless, expectant silence.
"I think for you the happiness will outweigh the pain," she went on gently, "because it means new interests, new life, everything you must most desire. And, dears, we have to thank grandfather for it; he insists on sending you both to school."
"To school!" shouted the twins simultaneously.
"Yes," Mrs. Orban said, "actually to school. He wishes you to have exactly the same advantages as Brenda and Herbert. Won"t it be splendid for you?"
There was dead silence. Mrs. Orban glanced from one grave face to the other. Nesta"s was crumpled and bewildered; Eustace"s very white, and his expression sadly strained.
"Why, darlings," Mrs. Orban said, "you have always wanted to go to school. Hasn"t it nearly made me cry again and again to hear you craving for a thing we could not give you? And now your wishes have been granted as it were by magic, I do believe you are not glad after all."
There was such a ring of disappointment in their mother"s voice that even Nesta was roused.
"We"ve wanted it awfully," stammered Eustace awkwardly, "but we--we didn"t think of it coming quite so soon."
"Oh, is that it, you dears?" Mrs. Orban said in a tone between laughter and tears. "I was afraid something much worse was the matter--that you had changed your minds, for instance, or that you didn"t like England after all; but of course that couldn"t be."
She spoke with such perfect certainty that the twins were dumb; they could think of nothing to say.
"There really is rather a blessing in disguise in your going to school at once, though I can"t bear parting with you," Mrs. Orban went on after a little silence. "I shall be quite close to you while you are still feeling strange in your new life; I shall hear all about everything from you by word of mouth in the holidays; and I shall go away next year feeling content that you are settled down, and likely to be nothing but a tiny bit mammy-sick at my departure."
Eustace rubbed his head against her shoulder.
"More than a tiny bit, mummie," he said.
"We needn"t think about that yet, though," said Mrs. Orban cheerily; "it is a long way off, with plenty of lovely times between. I only wish father had not to go so soon."
"How soon?" queried Nesta sharply.
"He says he must be off the end of this month," was the answer; "that is why the school-going has had to be settled so hurriedly.
But he has a lovely dream for the future: before you have left school he hopes to be able to come to England for good and settle down here."
"How long would it be before that, mother?" Eustace asked.
"Oh, four or five years, perhaps," said Mrs. Orban.
"But shan"t we ever go back to Australia again?" Nesta said with a gulp.
"You won"t want to, my dear, once you get used to England," said her mother gently. "Of course it would not be possible for you to come home all that distance for holidays, but you will soon learn not to mind if you have our home-coming to look forward to. Now I will tell you a little about the schools you are going to."
It was easy to listen with apparent interest to this, to put in a question here and there and glean all the information possible. But when the pair left the room Nesta suddenly gripped her brother"s arm.
"Eustace," she said huskily, "I--I can"t bear it."
"You just must," said the boy st.u.r.dily. "I guess there is nothing else to do."
The words were so hopeless that Nesta"s tears began to fall thick and fast, and he drew her almost roughly down the pa.s.sage out of earshot. They reached the picture gallery, and sat down in a deep window-seat overlooking the front drive and the beautiful park beyond. Here Nesta buried her face in her hands and fairly sobbed.
Eustace bore it for some seconds, then,--
"Look here, old girl," he said, "don"t be silly. You"ll have a red nose for dessert."
"I don"t care," Nesta blurted out.
"But you must care," Eustace said a little impatiently, "because then mother will see you have been crying and find out we"re miserable."
"I don"t care," sobbed Nesta again. "I can"t hide it any more, and I don"t want to. I shall ask father to let me go home with him.
Nothing will make me stay here with these--these horrid people."
"Nesta!" Eustace exclaimed.
"Well, I can"t help it; they are horrid, even if they are our people. I never thought of them being anything like this. And I can"t--I won"t stay with them."
"Rot," said Eustace angrily. "You know we can"t help staying if every one says we are to."
"Then," said Nesta, drawing herself up with a sudden attempt at dignity, "I shall run away."
"Silly!" Eustace exclaimed irritably.
"You"ll see it isn"t silly when I do it," said Nesta gloomily. "I shall tell father and mother everything about how horrid it is for us, and then if they won"t take us home--"
She stopped dramatically, leaving Eustace to fill in the threat for himself.
"You really will tell mother, and spoil everything for her?" he asked in a low, angry tone.
Nesta nodded defiantly.
"Then you are a little beast," said Eustace furiously--"a cruel little beast."
Nesta rose with her nose very high in the air.
"Thank you," she said; "you are most awfully polite. I shall take care not to tell you anything ever again."
Eustace knelt up on the seat, and leant out of the open window into the soft evening air. He was too angry to speak coherently, too bewildered to know what to say. With a toss of her head Nesta turned and left him.
He heard her determined footsteps die away down the gallery, and knew he was meant to understand he had her sincerest disapproval. A few months earlier, he would presently have thrown off his sense of irritation and laughed at Nesta"s little airs of importance.
To-night he had no heart for the funny side of it. He was vexed to have lost his influence over Nesta, and worried at the thought of what an upset her headstrong course would make. Let alone his mother"s disappointment, there would be the grandparents"
indignation to reckon with, and Herbert"s and Brenda"s scornful surprise. They would indeed think them wild Bush children, and be justified in their present att.i.tude of cool unfriendliness.
Yet to be left in these uncongenial surroundings for a s.p.a.ce of time that seemed like an eternity to a lad of fourteen; to be forced to remain with these unsympathetic companions for the next four or five years, with no one to turn to and without a home, meant desolation as complete for Eustace as for Nesta.