MARGARET. “For this reason I should wish never to be
       in love all the days of my life. The loss would
       grieve me to death.”
MEPHISTO. “Joy must have sorrow, sorrow joy.”
 
HAYWARD’S FAUST.
 
 
 
THE lessons went on fairly enough. There were days on which Lotty’s conduct could not be truthfully described as “obedient and attentive;” days, too, on which poor Sybil was provokingly absent and dreamy. Still there was nothing of sufficient importance to risk the children’s forfeiture of the promised treat.
 
Sybil, indeed, was not deserving of blame for the sleepy, stupid moods that occasionally over-powered her. As Marion learnt to know her better, she found that these always preceded periods of sharp suffering for the poor child. Some hours of headache, almost maddening in its intensity, and invariably followed by prostration and weakness painful to witness. It seemed to Marion, anxious for the child’s peace and comfort, that there must be some cause for these attacks, for they evidently had to do greatly with her mental and nervous condition at the time. She tried gradually to gain the little girl’s confidence, for that there was something to tell she felt convinced; but whenever she thought that Sybil was on the verge of disclosing her secret distress, the child seemed to grow frightened again, and would say no more.
 
The days passed on smoothly and pleasantly.
 
The acquaintances Mrs. Archer had already made, were increased by a few more, so that every day brought its own little plan or amusement. Some one to call on, the band playing on the “Place,” and on Fridays their own miniature reception on the terrace. Captain Berwick was as good as his word, and unfailingly made his appearance. He asked and obtained Mrs. Archer’s permission to introduce to her his friend, Mr. Chepstow, who was certainly fully deserving of the epithet of “the most good-natured fellow living.” Notwithstanding his condition of inconsolable widowhood, he managed to get on very comfortably, every house in Altes was open to the reputed millionaire; whose endless variety of carriages and horses was always at the disposal of his friends. He entreated Mrs. Archer to consider as her own a charming pony-carriage, which she was one day rash enough to admire. The offer was made in all sincerity and kind-heartedness, but Cissy had too much good sense to avail herself of it to any great extent. Not so, Sophy Berwick. She, notwithstanding her brother’s remonstrations, drove Mr. Chepstow’s ponies, rode Mr. Chepstow’s horses, whenever the inclination seized her for either of these amusements. And this at the very time that she was making fun of him in all directions.
 
“Vulgar old cotton-spinner, that he is,” she said one day to Marion, when they happened to meet at Mrs. Fraser’s, “Frank is always going on at me as if one should be as particular with those sorts of people as with one’s equals. He is certainly very good-natured, otherwise I would not put myself under an obligations to him. But seriously, he may be very much obliged to me for exercising his horses. He is so fat, the pony-carriage would break down if he got into it, and he is far too frightened to attempt to ride. Don’t you agree with it Miss Freer?”
 
“I would, much rather you did not ask me, Miss Berwick,” replied Marion.
 
“As if I didn’t know what that means!” exclaimed Sophy; “I can see you don’t like me, Miss Freer. I am too noisy and rattling for you. But truly I am very good-tempered, and I would really like you to tell me what you think. I won’t be a bit offended, I assure you.”
 
“Well, then, if you will have, it, Miss Berwick,” said Marion, “I do think your brother is quite right. In the first place it would to me be very disagreeable to put myself tinder an obligation to any one, a gentleman especially, who was not much more to me than a mere acquaintance. And in the second place it would be to me not merely disagreeable, but actually impossible, to receive benefits from a person whom I looked upon with the contempt which you appear to feel for Mr. Chepstow. More than contempt. You ridicule and deride him constantly, make fun even of his personal peculiarities on all occasions. I don’t like it at all, Miss Berwick, though I should never have said this unless you had asked me.”
 
Marion spoke indignantly, for she really felt so.
 
“Vulgar,” Sophy had called Mr. Chepstow. Strange perversion, that she should be so sharp to perceive the outward deficiencies in speech or manner of the honest, good-hearted millionaire, and yet be so utterly blind to the far more repulsive vulgarity of her own speech and behaviour.
 
Sophy did not answer. Marion began to fear she had really offended her, when looking up she saw that the girl’s face, though grave, bore by no means an angry expression.
 
“Miss Freer,” she said at last, “I think I deserve what you say. I have got into reckless, careless sort of way of going on. To tell you the truth, I am not very happy at home, and so long as I can get something to amuse me; riding or driving, or making fun of people, it does not much matter which, I fear I think very little about how I get it. Frank is the only person who cares about me at all, and even he gives me credit for very little good. One thing I will promise you, and that is, to leave of making fun of poor old Chepstow, so long, at all events, as I continue to use his horses. There now, Miss Freer, isn’t it true that I am good-tempered?”
 
“Yes, indeed it is,” said Marion heartily.
 
“And even more amiable than you think,” Sophy went on; “I don’t believe any other girl with a favourite brother would have tried to make friends with a girl that same brother is always praising up to the skies, and holding up as an example sister to follow! You will let me make friends with you, Miss Freer, won’t you?”
 
“Don’t you think I have done so already?” asked Marion. “I assure you I wonder at myself for speaking so plainly as I did. I could not have done so to a person I had not a friendly feeling for.”
 
“Thank you,” said Sophy, “that is a very pretty way of taking out the sting of your very decided home-thrust.”
 
And then, girl-like, they rambled on to other subjects. The excursion to Berlet, in which the Berwicks were to join, the balls Sophy was anticipating, and some few allusions to the home-troubles she had hinted at. Her father’s irritability, her mother’s overweening partiality for Blanche, Blanche herself, with her everlasting ailments:
 
“And yet with all, I think I could be very fond of her if she would let me,” said Sophy “she is really sensible and satisfactory when she chooses; and long ago, Miss Freer, she was so pretty.”
 
“So I have heard,” said Marion, not however encouraging further revelations of Sophy’s home secrets.
 
The girl was really not without many good qualities. Wanting in delicacy no doubt, far too self-confident and pronou?ée; but affectionate, and open to good impressions. And above all thoroughly honest and true. This was the reason of the liking Marion felt for her. This was why she so much preferred Sophy, rough, and even in a sense unrefined, to the graceful, faultlessly lady-like Florence.
 
Sir Ralph’s call was not repeated for some little time. Cissy and Marion met him one day, and when the former reproached him for not having come again to see her, he confessed that he had been on his way thither the Friday previous, but meeting Captain Berwick and hearing from him that this was “Mrs. Archer’s day,” had thought better (“or worse,” Cissy suggested) of it, and turned back.
 
“Well, then, I think you very silly and provoking,” was all the sympathy he got Cissy.
 
“Particularly provoking,” she added, “for we had quite a little concert, and I know you like music. Indeed a little bird once told me you sang yourself. Bye-the-by, we are short of a gentleman’s voice for that pretty glee, Marion,” turning to her; “I wonder if Sir Ralph would take that part.”
 
Sir Ralph looked any thing but inclined to do so:
 
“Truly, Mrs. Archer,” he said, “you give me credit for powers I do not possess. Little birds at Altes, I am sorry to say, as well as in England, tell a great many stories. My singing is a thing of the past, not that it ever was much of a thing at all.” And then, as if anxious to change the subject, he turned abruptly to Marion. “Do you sing then, Miss Freer?” he asked.
 
“A little,” replied she, and then smiling at herself, she added, “you must not laugh at my very young-lady-like answer. In my case it is simply the truth.”
 
“I should like to hear you, and then I can judge,” he said.
 
And without giving Cissy time to invite him to come to her house, for the purpose of criticising her guest’s singing, he exclaimed hurriedly, “I really must not keep you standing. Good morning, Mrs. Archer, I am sorry I have forfeited your good opinion.” And so left them.
 
“Well, Marion,” said Cissy, “though I thought him so nice the other day, I cannot say that I think so now. He is very rough and ill-tempered.”
 
“But Cissy, you teazed him on purpose. I think you deserved what you got.”
 
“You are an impertinent little cats Miss Freer,” replied her cousin. After which relief to her feelings, Mrs. Archer recovered her good humour, and they spent an amicable evening. This was the day before Sybil’s birthday. There had been some slight discussion, consultation rather, between Lady Severn and her niece, as to the advisability of inviting the daily governess to make one of the party to Berlet. But as Lady Severn wished to pay some attention to Mrs. Archer, and it would have been awkward to invite that lady without the young girl whom she evidently looked upon as a valued friend and guest, it was decided that the invitation should include Miss Freer. The children would have rebelled had their dear Miss Freer been left out; indeed they would naturally enough have looked upon such an omission as a gross breach of promise, as their governess had been asked to make one of the previous expedition, which the weather had put a stop to.
 
“Still, dear aunt,” suggested Florence the sensible, “I think for every sake, her own especially, it is well to show that she is invited as the children’s governess. Of course, had she been governess to any one else, the mere fact of her staying in Mrs. Archer’s house would not have made it necessary for you to notice her.”
 
“Of course not, my dear,” replied Lady Severn; “but how can I draw the distinction? I quite agree with you about it but I don’t see how it is to be done.”
 
“It is difficult, certainly,” said Florence, “that is the worst part of a somewhat anomalous position, like Miss Freer’s. I am glad she is coming to-morrow, for I am anxious for the children’s sake to get to know her a little better. I have gone into the schoolroom now and then, but I am so afraid of seeming to interfere in any way.”
 
“It is very kind of you, my dear, to take such an interest in the children. Miss Freer could not possibly think any such kindness on your part, interference,” replied Lady Severn.
 
“Well, I don’t know. It is better not to risk it. Besides, I really think Lofty and Sybil are getting on very well with her. But do you know, aunt, I can’t quite make her out. She is inconsistent altogether. Her manners, her general appearance, her dress even, are not the least like what one expects in a girl brought up to be a governess.”
 
“I have not observed any inconsistency of the kind,” said Lady Severn, “but I dare say my eyes are not so quick as yours. The only time I can really say I had any conversation with her was the first day she called, when she appeared a gentle, modest young person. I understood her to say that her family had met with misfortunes, which had led to her becoming a governess. These things happen every day you know, my dear, in the middle classes. Rich one day and poor the next! But to return to our plans for to-morrow. What arrangement do you think will be best about Miss Freer?”
 
“I was thinking,” said Miss Vyse, “that it might be as well if Miss Freer were to come as usual, at half-past nine, and start from here in the same carriage as the children. You, dear aunt, might propose to call for Mrs. Archer on your way past her house, which would save her the fatigue of the walk here in the first place.”
 
“Yes,” said Lady Severn, “that will do very well. Knowing that Charlotte and Sybil are with their governess, I shall feel comfortable about them. I must consult with Ralph about the carriages. There are our own two, and Mr. Chepstow has offered any of his we like.”
 
For Mr. Chepstow had called at the Rue des Lauriers, and been graciously received by the dowager and her fascinating niece.
 
It was part of Florence’s worldly wisdom always to be civil to people in the first place. Time enough to snub and chill them if they turned out useless, or not worth cultivating further. Easier, far, to do this than to undo the prejudicial effects of a haughty or freezing manner on first introduction. And in the present case, that of Mr. Chepstow, if he were only half, or even a quarter, as rich as report said, he would still be well deserving of some judicious attentions—according to Miss Vyse’s scale of judgement on such matters.
 
Another little téte-à-téte conversation on the subject of the Berlet expedition took place this same Thursday evening between Mrs. Archer and her cousin. A note from Lady Severn, explaining the proposed arrangements for the morrow, brought the subject to Cissy’s mind.
 
“By-the-by, May,” she said, “what are you going to wear to-morrow?”
 
“I was thinking about it,” replied Marion, thoughtfully. “I should like to wear that gauzy dress; white, you know, with rosebuds. It is deliciously cool, and then my white bonnet matches it so beautifully.”
 
“Well and why shouldn’t you wear it?” asked Cissy; “it is a perfectly suitable dress.”
 
“Suitable, certainly, for Marion Vere, but I am by no means sure that it is equally so for Miss Freer,” replied Marion.
 
“What on earth do you mean, child?” asked Cissy.
 
“Just what I say. As long as I have to act, what you call my farce, I think I should do so as consistently as possible. And from some little things Lofty Severn has told me, I am afraid I have been careless. Miss Vyse, it appears, has remarked, in the children’s hearing, that my dress is unbecoming to my station; and, of all people in the world, I should least like her to begin making remarks about me.”
 
“Why ‘her of all people?’ ” asked Cissy.
 
“I don’t know,” replied Marion. “I don’t like her, and I don’t trust her, and that’s about all I can say. No doubt if she were finding out about who I really am, she might do me great mischief.”
 
“Of course she might,” said Cissy. “But one thing I must say, Marion: were it found out that you are not really Miss Freer, I should feel myself bound, in your defence, to tell the whole story from beginning to end. I could not consent to screen Harry’s part in it any longer.”
 
“Harry has had no part in it,” said Marion, eagerly. “You know this governessing scheme was most entirely my own. No one could be blamed for it but myself.”
 
“H—m,” was Cissy’s reply. “I am by no means sure of that. I should most strongly object to meeting Uncle Vere after he had learnt my part in it! However, I should bear that, and more too, rather than not let your conduct be seen in a proper light. But there’s no good talking about it. I trust, most devoutly, you may continue Miss Freer, as long as we are at Altes. I have only warned you what I should think it right to do, in case of any fuss.”
 
“Very well,” said Marion.
 
But the conversation was not without its result. With a girlish sigh of regret, she put away the pretty rosebud dress, and laid out for the morning’s wear an unexceptionably quiet and inexpensive costume of simply braided brown-holland.
 
But I question much if so attired, my Marion was any less winningly lovely than in the glistening, delicately-painted gauze. The grey eyes looked out as soft and deep from under the shade of the brown straw hat, as from among the flowers and fripperies of the dainty Paris bonnet. Still, she was not so much above the rest of her sex and age but that this called for some self-denial.
 
Friday morning was cloudlessly fine. The sky was of that same even, intense blue, which had so impressed Marion on her first arrival in the south; and as she walked to the Rue des Lauriers, the girl felt joyous and light-hearted. She found Lotty and Sybil watching for her. In their different ways the two children were full of delight at the prospect of the day’s treat, and Marion felt glad that lessons had formed no part of the morning’s programme, as such a thing as sitting still would have been quite beyond the power of her excited little pupils.
 
By ten o’clock the various carriages assembled. Lady Severn and two middle-aged friends of hers, the English clergyman at Altes and his wife, seated themselves in the first, and drove off to pick up Mrs. Archer. Marion, looking out from the schoolroom window, did not envy Cissy her long drive in such company! Then came Mr. Chepstow’s dog-cart, driven, in the height of his exhilaration, by that adventurous individual himself. Miss Vyse was invited to occupy one of the two vacant seats, but, in some graceful manner, succeeded in evading the honour. After a little consultation, Sophy Berwick, nothing loth, took her place, followed, somewhat unwillingly—(but then, in pleasure parties the wrong people always get together!)—by her, so gossips said, former admirer, the cynical Erbenfeld. Next appeared a larger, and evidently hired, carriage, already occupied by Papa and Mamma Berwick, and a pale, worn-looking girl, whom Marion rightly concluded to be the invalid Blanche. No one appearing ambitious of making a fourth in this vehicle, it drove on.
 
Now dashed up, what penny-a-liners call, a “perfectly appointed equipage,” driven by the handsome young Russian Nodouroff. Seated beside him was his tutor, Mr. Price, who, however, descended, leaving, two places to spare. Some discussion ensued as to who should occupy them, which was ended by ............