by Susan Barrie
“Have you ever been north before?” he asked her.
She shook her head.
“No, never.”
“I take it that you are not very widely travelled?” with an odd smile.
“I’ve hardly even been away from Selbourne,” she confessed, “but I’ ve always wanted to get away from it badly. Whereabouts in the north does your sister live?”
“Westmorland,” he informed her. “Quite a beautiful bit of country to those who love the lakes. And the mountains, of course.”
“It sounds nice,” she said.
“It is nice,” he agreed. “And so is my sister. In fact, she’s quite extraordinarily nice.”
“Really?” she murmured, and a little of the tension seemed to have gone out of her clasped hands, and she was lying back against the seat instead of leaning impulsively forward.
“But do you actually mean to tell me that you never spent even a school holiday away from the Abbey?” he asked, with sudden curiosity. “Didn’ t any of your friends ever ask you to their homes?”
“Only once or twice,” she answered quietly. “You see,” she explained, “I was never in a position to be able to ask any of them back anywhere, and Miss Hardcastle was of the opinion that it might prove a little unsettling for me. And I was never really tremendously popular,” candidly, “because to be popular you have to take a terrific interest in all kinds of sports, and not only to be interested in them but to shine at them, and to have a rich father and mother to boast about and supply you with unlimited pocket money.”
“And you never had very much pocket money?”
“Not much. ”
“I see,” he said, rather a gentle note in his voice. “And it is not your ambition to become one of our future athletes?”
“I’m a duffer at all games,” she confessed. “I much prefer reading poetry, and taking long, lonely walks, and keeping a dog—I do hope I’ ll have a dog of my own one day! ” with almost fierce wistfulness.
“We’ll earmark that one for future consideration,” her guardian replied quietly. And then added: “I see you’ll fit in very well with Brown Furrows.”
“Is that the name of your sister’ s house?”
“Well, actually it’ s my house, but she runs it for me, and looks after me as well when I’ m not wandering abroad—which I seem to be doing very often! ”
A more hopeful expression crept into her face as she looked up at him, and he smiled a little.
“Then you are there sometimes?”
“Oh, yes—quite frequently. On other occasions I get bitten by a bug called the wanderlust, and off I go! ”
“That seems a pity,” she remarked, while her clear eyes studied him. “Especially as it’s such a nice name for a house.”
“You think so?” he asked. “Well, I think it’s a very nice house”—he seemed to be already affected by her preference for simple adjectives—”but it ought really to be called Lonely Furrows, because it’s so much off the beaten track. But if you don’t mind loneliness that’s all to the good. And it’s a very beautiful Elizabethan farmhouse, with a parcel of goodly acres adjoining.”
“Then you are a farmer?” she suggested. “Or, at least,” she added, “you are when you are at home?”
The idea seemed to cause him some faint amusement. “I’ ve never thought of myself in that light before,” he admitted. “But it might be a good plan to begin now.... He regarded her with a strange, subdued twinkle in his eyes. “A very good plan....”
She colored with swift embarrassment, afraid that he thought her naive.
“Oh, I see what you mean,” she said quickly. “Someone else farms it for you?”
“At the moment,” he agreed. “And in my father’s time— and, I believe, my grandfather’ s and great-grandfather’ s time— it was always somebody else who did the farming. But that’s no reason why we shouldn’ t some day introduce a change. In fact, I think it might be quite a good idea! ” The taxi had stopped outside the station, and they were about to be decanted from it and into the London train, which was actually just then steaming into the station. He helped her out while his eyes still twinkled a little, and she was glad of the excuse to hurry.
“My sister Meg is always wanting me to settle down,” he told her. “And perhaps one day I will! ”
CHAPTER THREE
CAROL awakened next morning to such an unaccustomed sensation of deep comfort that she almost went right off to sleep again. Until she realized that there was a chambermaid in the room, drawing back the curtains, and indicating a tea-tray on a little table beside the bed.
Carol struggled up into a sitting position, and the
chambermaid smiled at her.
“The gentleman told me not to wake you too early, but it’s close on ten o’clock, and I thought perhaps you’d like to be stirring.”
“Goodness, I should think so!” exclaimed Carol in horror. The early rising bell at the Abbey went at seven o’ clock each morning, and breakfast was at a quarter to eight, and here she was still in bed at this appallingly late hour. “I must have been terribly tired last night, or I overslept, or something,” she apologized.
She scrambled out of bed and into her red candlewick dressing gown—the only thing at variance with the quiet luxury of the room—and the chambermaid offered to turn on her bath water for her.
“And then I’ll bring you your breakfast,” she said, “or you won’t get any!”
It was a fine morning—one of those mornings when London is almost beautiful because of the sunlight gilding the streets, and an almost Neapolitan touch in the blueness of the sky. It was Carol’ s first visit to London—her first visit to the heart of any great and thriving built-up area—and the unaccustomed noises which came in at her open window excited her and filled her with curiosity.
She had never slept so long in her life before. But then she had never lived through such a period of emotional upheaval and disturbance—as well as the acute anxiety which had beset her at times—as on the day before, when she had been waiting for her guardian to arrive. And the knowledge that she could all at once relax had resulted in her being overcome by such a sensation of weariness—largely a weariness of the mind, behind which was a tremendous, spreading sensation of relief—that she had not been able to fight against it, and sleep had engulfed her and taken possession of her for hours.
But she was fresh enough this morning, and her major worry was what to wear once she had discarded the red candlewick dressing-gown. The severe tailored suit chosen by Miss Mackintosh, which, despite the obvious excellence of its cloth, was somehow not quite right, was also a trifle heavy for a fine summer morning in London. And apart from a solitary summer-weight dress, which had actually been bought as a party dress, and ran slightly to frills and furbelows, she had nothing but her school uniform in which to make her appearance downstairs in the dignified hotel lounge which had seemed to her on the previous evening to be full of starched elderly gentlemen and
disapproving elderly ladies.
In the end the suit won, for, as Miss Mackintosh had pointed out, it was, at least, essentially lady-like, and the plain little white blouse she wore with it, with its prim little turned-down collar, was quite attractive in its puritan neatness. Her figure was almost childishly slender, and the suit did somewhat tend to angularize her proportions, particularly as the skirt was unfashionably short, and displayed a length of colt-like leg. But she carried herself with a slim uprightness, and had a certain rather timid grace. And her head was set gracefully on her slender shoulders, and her fair curls required only a quick, upward movement of the comb to lie in the way she wanted them.
She hesitated over applying an inexperienced dab of powder to her nose, and in the end used only the merest trace of lipstick. But it was not exactly the right shade of lipstick, although it had been heartily recommended by the young lady in the chemist’ s shop at Selbourne.
When she found her way to the lift the lift-man eyed her w
ith a mixture of approval and something slightly more paternal in his regard, and then whisked her straight away to the ground floor, where her guardian was conducting a conversation with the young lady behind the reception desk.
Carol approached him rather shyly, and he turned as she drew near to his elbow.
“Hullo,” he said. “You look as if you’d slept well.”
He drew her over to a corner of the lounge and, seating her in an arm-chair facing him, asked her what she would like to do with herself that day.
“I don’t mind,” she confessed, conveying the impression that anything new was an adventure. “But first of all I would like to apologize for sleeping so terribly late this morning. I can’ t ever remember doing such a thing before. I don’t know what you must think of me.... And having my breakfast brought up to me! Miss Hardcastle would be horrified.”
“If I were you,” he advised, “I would begin to forget all about Miss Hardcastle, and I certainly wouldn’ t worry my head over what she would think about anything you do, or are likely to do. Miss Hardcastle belongs to a section of your life which is behind you now, and she is certainly not concerned with your future. The present is something which concerns yourself.”
“That sounds just a little bit—thrilling,” Carol murmured with a subdued sparkle in her eyes.
“Well, it’ s true, don’ t forget and as for your former Headmistress, I have been through to her on the telephone this morning, and have explained yesterday afternoon’ s somewhat abrupt departure, and she is quite satisfied that you are in safe hands now. She sends you her very best wishes, and regrets missing an opportunity to make my acquaintance. But if she will take her baths at irregular hours what else can she expect? After all, you can’ t have everything in this world!”
Carol laughed suddenly—a low, bubbling, girlish laugh.
“I only said that I thought she might be taking a bath, but I couldn’ t be quite certain. But it must have struck you as rather funny.... A Headmistress in a bath!—”
“Instead of the more usual study! ”
His face reflected the amusement on hers.
“And Miss Hardcastle is so prim and correct she would simply hate you to think that she—that she really was—” She broke off, giggling afresh.
“Well, we won’ t embarrass Miss Hardcastle any further, for the time being at any rate,” he remarked, dismissing that lady with a wave of his hand. “And now let us get back to the subject of today?”
“There is one thing I really would like to do,” she confessed, after a moment, shyly.
“Pay a visit to the Zoo?” he suggested, returning her regard with a smile in his eyes.
“Oh, no!”
“Visit the National Gallery? Madame Tussaud’ s, the Houses of Parliament—?”
She shook her head.
“Not searching after intellectual satisfaction of that sort?” he teased her. “Well, what is it that you do want to do?”
“Visit the shops,” she said almost breathlessly. “I’ve never seen the London shops, although I’ve heard a lot about them. The girls used to rave about all the lovely things you can see, and buy if you’ve got the money, in the West-End stores, when they used to come back to Selbourne after a holiday in London with their parents. Some of them actually stayed in hotels like this, and went to theatres, and cinemas, and mannequin parades—”
“And unsettled the rest of you when they got back to school! ” Timothy Carrington shook his head deprecatingly. “I know the sort of thing that goes on in young ladies’ boarding establishments—seminaries, as they used to be called! I suppose it’s what is known as the ‘eternal Eve’ finding its way to the surface, determined to force a way out. But if that is what you want, my dear, then to the shops we will go! ”
“Oh, that is kind of you,” she told him, and there was no doubt about the gratitude in her voice.
“Not at all, my child. And since we’re going to the shops we’d better make up our minds to spend some money. Not much sense in looking at things and not buying them—at least, some of them. And while we’re on the subject of shopping, I do feel that we ought to do something about that hat of yours, the one you were wearing yesterday.”
“Why, didn’t you like it?” she asked, in surprise. “It’s a new hat.
Miss Mackintosh thought it was quite a good felt, and although it doesn’t seem to fit awfully well, it’s a good, serviceable color. At least, Miss Mackintosh said so.”
“Then Miss Mackintosh ought to be made to wear it. And I, personally, would like to see her wearing it! ” He stood up, smiling down at her bewildered face. “At a guess I should say that your Miss Mackintosh is short, fat, and forty, and that she always carries a waterproof and is never seen without her umbrella. Am I, or am I not, right?”
Carol sounded quite awed as she admitted:
“You are perfectly right.”
“And you, my dear,” he reminded her, stretching forth a hand to persuade her to her feet, “are only eighteen, not nearly as fat as you ought to be, and I don’t think I like you in grey. So shall we get started on our shopping expedition?”
“If—if you won’ t be bored—?” a little uncertainly.
“I am never bored, my dear—at least, not often. And in addition to the hat I think we must definitely look for something thinner for you to wear than that heavy suit. It doesn’ t suggest a warm July day to me at all. ”
“But I haven’ t got a great deal of money, I’ m afraid,” Carol confessed to him in anxiety. “I never had very much pocket-money, you know, and it cost me quite a lot to buy this costume. Clothes are so dreadfully expensive, aren’ t they?”
“They certainly are,” he agreed. “But as I am to be your banker you needn’t worry about that side of the picture.” He turned to the hall porter, who was standing near. “Call me a taxi, will you please,” he ordered.
CHAPTER FOUR
CAROL never forgot that day. She never forgot the days which followed, and which amounted to close upon a week before a termination to their visit to London was discussed, and her first real taste of an existence apart from the ordered routine of school life brought to an end, but given a new angle.
They went everywhere—or it seemed to Carol that they went everywhere in those few days. All the places she had read about, and wondered about, and listened to secondhand accounts of. Westminster Abbey and St. Paul’s, the parks, Chelsea Embankment, Tower Bridge, Richmond Park. And of course the shops. Carol was completely charmed by the shops, but the various new articles of clothing she acquired were not obtained in the great West-End stores—although their windows delighted and bewildered her—but in tucked-away little shops in Bond Street, and salubrious thoroughfares of that sort.
Timothy Carrington said his sister, when she came to London, always dealt at these apparently modest little establishments, but Carol was frequently amazed when she saw the inside of them, and found herself walking on luxurious carpets and inhaling the perfume of exotic hothouse flowers. And the assistants were always so attentive—especially when they saw her escort—and they always had exactly the right thing that would suit her, or they took her measurements and she was assured of its being delivered within as short a time as possible.
The first evening frock she had ever possessed in her life came home on the night she was to be taken to her first theatre. Secretly Carol was a little appalled by the amount of money her guardian was expending on this new outfit of hers; she had no idea he was going to make their shopping expedition such a wholesale one. When she remonstrated with him in her shy fashion he was inclined to treat her remonstrance with amusement, and more than once he remarked that if a man, having acquired a ward, could not feel proud of the way she looked, then it would be much better for him if he had not acquired one! And he could never have felt proud of her in that grey pudding-basin she was wearing when he first caught sight of her!
Carol felt sure he was partly teasing, but she realized he had a critical eye fo
r female clothes, and he was not slow to let her know when a thing did not suit her. When a thing did suit her he merely nodded his head approvingly and his eyes twinkled a little.
“Yes; I think you look less like a fourth-former in that! We’d better have it,” he would instruct the saleswoman.
The evening frock was supplied by a woman who called herself Delphine, and whose little salon was done out in mauve and grey. She had had it on her hands for a few weeks, for it had been created for the young daughter of a customer, and then the order had been cancelled. It was a full-skirted creation in stiff ivory taffeta with tiny, ruched sleeves and an off-the-shoulder neckline, and a knot of narrow black velvet ribbons at the base of the brief corsage. There was nothing in the least sophisticated about it; on the contrary it had an enchanting air of rather prim picturesqueness, and a Romney-like touch of romantic simplicity.
Carol, with her spun-gold curls, her slender column of a throat, and her serene grey eyes with their brown, silky eyelashes, looked as if the dress had been made for her and never intended for anyone else.
When she wore it that night for the visit to the theatre her guardian looked at her for the first time with something like astonishment. Delphine had discreetly suggested a visit to a hairdresser, and a few hints on more skilful makeup, and Carol had certainly profited by this visit, without being in any way transformed or too noticeably improved in appearance.
To begin with, her hair was not the same, although it curled just as softly, and was still the same pale primrose gold. It was shorter, if anything, and there was a fascinating suggestion of a curling fringe lying like the ends of an ostrich feather on her wide, white forehead. It was quite obvious that her heart-shaped face, with its dimpled chin, was very skilfully made up, the feathery brown eyebrows darkened ever so slightly, although the eyelashes were untouched, and the full, not-so-childish-looking mouth glowed like a scarlet hibiscus. When her lips parted and she smiled up at her guardian her little teeth gleamed like the most perfect set of pearls, and there was a shy look in her eyes which invited his admiration.