Chapter 20 A Very Naughty Girl by L. T. Meade
“NOT GOOD NOR HONORABLE.”
It was very late indeed when Sylvia got home. On this occasion she was not allowed to return to The Priory unaccompanied; Lady Frances insisted on Read going with her. Read said very little as the two walked over the roads together; but she was ever a woman of few words. Sylvia longed to question her, as she wanted to take as much news as possible to Jasper, but Read’s face was decidedly uninviting. As soon as the woman had gone, Sylvia slipped round to the back entrance, where Jasper was waiting for her. Jasper had the gate ajar, and Pilot was standing by her side.
“Come, darling – come right in,” she said. “The coast is clear, and, oh! I have a lot to tell you.”
She fastened the back gate, making it look as though it had not been disturbed for years, and a moment later the woman and the girl were standing in the warm kitchen.
“The door is locked, and he will not come,” said Jasper. “He is quite well, and I heard him go up-stairs to his bed an hour ago.”
“And did he eat anything, Jasper?”
“Oh, did he not, my love? Oh, I am fit to die with laughter when I think of it! He imagines that he has demolished one quarter of the scraggiest hen in the hen-house.”
“What! old Wallaroo?” replied Sylvia, a smile breaking over her face.
“Wallaroo, or whatever outlandish name you like to call the bird.”
“Please tell me all about it.”
Sylvia sank down as she spoke into a chair. Jasper related her morning’s adventure, and the two laughed heartily.
“Only it seems a shame to deceive him,” said Sylvia at last. “And so Wallaroo has really gone! Do you know, I shall miss her; I have stood and watched her antics for so many long days. She was the most outrageous flirt of any bird I have ever come across, and so indignant when old Roger paid the least attention to any of his other wives.”
“She has passed her flirting days,” replied Jasper, “and is now the property of little Tim Donovan in the village; perhaps, however, she will get more food there. My dear Miss Sylvia, you must make up your mind that each one of those birds has to be disposed of in secret, and that I in exchange get in sleek and fat young fowls for your father’s benefit. But now, that is enough on the subject for the present. Tell me all about Miss Evelyn; I am just dying to hear.”
“She will meet you on Tuesday evening at nine o’clock by the turnstile in the shrubbery,” replied Sylvia.
“That is right. What a brave, dear, plucky pet she is!”
Sylvia was silent.
“What is the matter with you, Miss Sylvia? Had you not a happy day?”
“I had – very, very happy until just before dinner.”
“And what happened then?”
“I will tell you in the morning, Jasper – not to-night. Something happened then. I am sorry and sad, but I will tell you in the morning. I must slip up to bed now without father knowing it.”
“Your father thinks that you are in bed, for I went up, just imitating your step to perfection, an hour before he did, and I went into your room and shut the door; and when he went up he knocked at the door, and I answered in your voice that I had a bit of a headache and had gone to bed. He asked me if I had had any supper, and I said no; and he said the best thing for a headache was to rest the stomach. Bless you! he is keen on that, whatever else he is not keen on. He went off to his bed thinking you were snug in yours. When I made sure that he was well in his bed, which I could tell by the creaking of the bedstead, I let myself out. I had oiled the lock previously. I shut the door without making a sound loud enough to wake a mouse, and crept down-stairs; and here I am. You must not go up to-night or you will give me away, and there will be a fine to-do. You must sleep in my cozy room to-night.”
“Well, I do not mind that,” replied Sylvia. “How clever you are, Jasper! You really did manage most wonderfully; only again I must say it seems a shame to deceive my dear old father.”
“It is a question of dying in the cause of your dear old father or deceiving him,” replied Jasper in blunt tones. “Now then, come to bed, my love, for if you are not dead with sleep I am.”
The next morning Mr. Leeson was in admirable spirits. He met Sylvia at breakfast, and congratulated her on the long day she had spent in the open air.
“And you look all the better for it,” he said. “I was too busy to think about you at tea-time; indeed, I did not have any tea, having consumed a most admirable luncheon some time before one o’clock. I was so very busy attending to my accounts all the afternoon that I quite forgot my dear little girl. Well, I have made arrangements, dearest, to buy shares in the Kilcolman Gold-mines. The thing may or may not turn up trumps, but in any case I have made an effort to spare a little money to buy some of the shares. That means that we must be extra prudent and careful for the next year or so. You will aid me in that, will you not, Sylvia? You will solemnly promise me, my dear and only child, that you will not give way to recklessness; when you see a penny you will look at it two or three times before you spend it. You have not the least idea how careful it makes you to keep what I call close and accurate accounts, every farthing made to produce its utmost value, and, if possible – if possible, my dear Sylvia – saved. It is surprising how little man really wants here below; the luxuries of the present day are disgusting, enervating, unnecessary. I speak to you very seriously, for now and then, I grieve to say, I have seen traces in you of what rendered my married life unhappy.”
“Father, you must not speak against mother,” said Sylvia. Her face was pale and her voice trembled. “There was no one like mother,” she continued, “and for her sake I – ”
“Yes, Sylvia, what do you do for her sake?”
“I put up with this death in life. Oh father, father, do you think I really – really like it?”
Mr. Leeson looked with some alarm at his child. Sylvia’s eyes were full of tears; she laid her hands on the table, bent forward, and looked full across at her father.
“For mother’s sake I bear it; you cannot think that I like it!” she repeated.
Mr. Leeson’s first amazement now gave place to cold displeasure.
“We will not pursue this topic,” he said. “I have something more to tell you. I made a pleasant discovery yesterday. During your absence a strange thing occurred. A gipsy woman entered the avenue and walked up to the front door, unmolested by Pilot. She seemed to have a strange power over Pilot, for the dog did not bar her entrance in the least. I naturally went to see what she wanted, and she told me that she had come, thinking I might have some fowls for sale. Now, you know, my dear, those old birds in the hen-house have long been eating their heads off, and I rather hailed an opportunity of getting rid of them; they only lay eggs – and that but a few – in the warm weather, and during the winter we are at a loss by our efforts to keep them alive.”
“I know plenty about fowls,” said Sylvia then. “They need hot suppers and all sorts of good things to make them lay eggs in cold weather.”
“We can do without eggs, but we cannot afford to give the fowls hot suppers,” said Mr. Leeson in a tone of great dignity. “But now, Sylvia, to the point. The woman offered a ludicrous price for the birds, and of course I would not part with them; at the same time she incidentally – silly person – gave herself away. She let me understand that she wanted the fowls to stew down in the gipsy pot. Now, of late, when arranging my recipes for publication, I have often thought of the gipsies and the delicious stews they make out of all sorts of things which other people would throw away. It occurred to me, therefore, to question her; and the result was, dear, not to go too much into particulars, that she killed one of the fowls, and in a very short time brought me a delicious stew made out of the bird, really as tasty and succulent as anything I have ever swallowed. I paid her a trifle for her services, and the remainder of the fowl is at the present moment lying in the cupboard in our sitting-room. I should like it to be warmed up for our midday repast; there is a great deal more there than we can by any possibility consume, but we can have a dainty meal out of part of the stew, and the rest can be saved for supper. I have further decided that we must get some one to kill the rest of the birds, and we will have them one by one on the table. Do you ever, my dear Sylvia, in your perambulations abroad, go near any of the gipsies? – for, if so, I should not mind giving you a shilling to purchase that woman’s recipe.”
Sylvia at this juncture rose from the table. She had with the utmost difficulty kept her composure while her father was so innocently talking about the gipsy’s stew.
“I will see – I will see, father. I quite understand,” she said; and the next instant she ran out of the room.
“Really,” thought Mr. Leeson when she had gone, “Sylvia talks a little strangely at times. Just think how she spoke just now of her happy home! Death in life, she called it – a most wrong and exaggerated term; and exaggeration of speech leads to extravagance of mind, and extravagance of mind means most reckless expenditure. If I am not very careful my poor child will soon be on the road to ruin. I doubt if I ought to feed her up with dainties – and really that stewed fowl made a rare and delicious dish – but it is the most saving thing I can do; there are enough birds in the hen-house to last Sylvia and me for several weeks to come.”
Meanwhile Sylvia had rushed off to Jasper.
“Oh Jasper!” she said, “I nearly died with laughter, and yet it is horrid to deceive him. Oh! please do not kill any more of the birds for a long time; it is more than I can stand. Father is so delighted; and he has offered me a shilling to buy the recipe from you.”
“Bless you, dear!” replied Jasper, “and I think what I am doing for your father is well worth a shilling, so you had better give it to me.”
“I have not got it yet,” replied Sylvia. “You must live on trust, Jasper; but, oh, it is quite too funny!”
“Now, you sit down just there,” said Jasper, “and tell me what troubled you last night.”
Sylvia’s face changed utterly when Jasper spoke.
“It is about Eve,” she said. “She has done very wrong – very wrong indeed.” And then Sylvia related exactly what had occurred at school.
Jasper stood and listened with her arms akimbo; her face more than once underwent a curious expression.
“And so you blame my little Eve very much?” she said when Sylvia had ceased speaking.
“How can I help it? To get the whole school accused – to tell a lie to do it! Oh Jasper, how can I help myself?”
“You were brought up so differently,” said Jasper. “Maybe if I had had the rearing of you and the loving of you from your earliest days I might have thought with you; as it is, I think with Eve. I could not counsel her to tell. I cannot but admire her spirit when she did what she did.”
“Jasper! Jasper!” said Sylvia in a tone of horror, “you cannot – cannot mean what you are saying! Oh, please unsay those dreadful words! I was hoping – hoping – hoping that you might put things right. What is to be done? There is going to be a great fuss – a great commotion – a great trouble at Miss Henderson’s school. Evelyn can put it right by confessing; are you not going to urge her to confess?”
“I urge my darling to lower herself! Miss Sylvia, if you say that kind of thing to me again, you and I can scarcely be friends.”
“Jasper! Jasper!”
“We won’t talk about it,” said Jasper, with decision. “I love you, miss, and what is more, I respect and admire you, but I cannot rise as high as you, Miss Sylvia; I was not reared so. I do not think that my little Eve could have done other than she did when she was so tempted.”
“Then, Jasper, you are a bad friend to Evelyn – a very bad friend; and what is more, if there is great trouble at the school, and if Audrey gets into it, and if Evelyn herself will never tell, why, I must.”
“Oh, good gracious! you would not be so mean as that; and the poor, dear little innocent confided in you!”
“I do not want to be so mean, and I will not tell for a long, long time; but I will tell – I will – if no one else can put it right, for it is quite too cruel.”
Jasper looked long and full at Sylvia.
“This may mean a good deal,” she said – “more than you think. And have you no sense of honor, miss? What you are told in confidence, have you any right to give to the world?”
“I will not tell if I can help myself, but this matter has made me very unhappy indeed.”
Then Sylvia put on her shabby hat and went out. She passed the fowl-house, and stood for a moment, a sad smile on her face, looking down at the ill-fed birds. Then she went along the tiny shrubbery to the front entrance, and, accompanied as usual by her beloved Pilot, started forth. She was in her very shabbiest and oldest dress to-day, and the joy and brightness of her appearance of twenty-four hours ago had absolutely left her young face. It was Sunday morning, but Sylvia never went to church. She heard the bells ringing now. Sweetly they pealed across the valley, and one little church on the top of the hill sent forth a low and yet joyful chime. Sylvia longed to press her hands to her ears; she did not want to listen to the church bells. Those who went to church did right, not wrong; those who went to church listened to God’s Word, and followed the ways – the good and holy ways – of religion.
“And I cannot go because of my shabby, shabby dress,” she thought. “But why should I not wear the beautiful dress I had yesterday and venture to church?”
No sooner had the thought come to her than she returned, dashed in by the back entrance, desired Pilot to stay where he was, flew up-stairs, dressed herself recklessly in her rich finery of yesterday, and started off for church. She had a fancy to go to the church on the top of the hill, but she had to walk fast to reach it. She did arrive there a little late. The verger showed her into a pew half-way up the church. One or two people turned to stare at the handsome girl. The brilliant color was in her cheeks from the quickness of her walk. She dropped on her knees and covered her face; all was confusion in her mind. In the Squire’s pew, a very short distance away, sat Audrey and Evelyn. Could Evelyn indeed mean to pray? Of what sort of nature was Evelyn made? Sylvia felt that she could not meet her eyes.
“Some people who are not good, who are not honorable, go to church,” she thought to herself. “It is very sad and very puzzling.”