Chapter 53 The Palace Beautiful: A Story for Girls by L. T. Meade
TELEGRAPH WIRES
Daisy was quite right when she said that Hannah was not subject to nervous attacks. Hannah scorned nerves, and did not believe in them. When she was told that the human body was as full of nerves as an electric battery was full of electricity, that nerves, in short, were like numberless telegraphic-wires, prevailing the whole human frame, she stared at the speakers, and pronounced them slightly daft.
Yet Hannah went out of her own little sitting-room on that summer afternoon with, as she expressed it, trembling sensations running down her back, and causing her fingers to shake when she handled her cups and saucers.
"Dear, dear," she said to herself, "one would think I had some of those awful telegrams in me which Miss Primrose said was the nervous system. Why, I'm all upset from top to toe. I never had a good view of him before, for I didn't pay no heed to nobody when my dear little Miss Daisy was so ill; but I do say that the cut of the hand and the turn of the head is as like—as like as two peas. Now I do wonder—no, no, it can't be. Well, anyhow, my name ain't Hannah Martin if I don't find out where he comes from, and who he really is. Well, well, well—why this trembling won't leave me, and I don't dare go back into the room. I suppose I have got a few telegraphs, and I mustn't never laugh at poor little Miss Daisy again when she says she's nervous."
Hannah sat and rested for about half an hour—then she drank off a glass of cold water—then she washed her face and hands—then she said aloud that the telegrams should not get the better of her, and then she prepared as nice a little dinner as she could for Noel and the two sisters.
That evening, after Daisy was in bed, she came into the room where Primrose was quietly reading.
"You haven't never come across no one the least like that brother of yours in the London streets, Miss Primrose?" she asked. "London's a big place, and strange things happen there—yes, very, very strange things."
"Oh, Hannah, how you startle me!" said Primrose. "I come across my poor little brother Arthur? How could I? Why, he must be dead for many and many a year."
"Not a bit of him," said Hannah; "I don't believe he's dead. He was a fine, hearty, strong child, and nothing ever seemed to ail him. Oh, it rises up before me now what a beautiful picture he made when he stood in his little red velvet dress by your mamma's knee, and she so proud of him! There's no mistake, but he was the very light of her eyes. She took him up to London, and a nursemaid—not me, you may be quite sure—took him out. She went into a big shop, and the child was by her side. She kept him standing by her as she ordered some things across the counter, and, I suppose, she turned her head for a minute, for when she looked round again he was gone. From that day to this he was never heard of, though everything you can think of was done. Oh, my poor, poor mistress, what she did suffer!"
"Hannah, how excited you look!" said Primrose. "Why, you are all trembling. It is a terrible story, but as I say to Daisy about Mr. Dove, don't let us think of it."
"Right you are, honey," said Hannah; "what can't be cured, you know. If you don't mind, Miss Primrose, I'll just sit down for a minute. I'm not to say quite myself. Oh, it ain't nothing, dearie; just a bit of the trembles, and to prove to old Hannah that she is getting on in years. I nursed you all, darling—him, my beautiful boy, and you three. Miss Primrose, dear, how old would you say that Mr. Noel was. I didn't have a fair look at him until to-day, and he seems quite a young sort of man."
"Miss Egerton says that he is twenty-six, Hannah."
"Twenty-six," answered Hannah; "don't interrupt me for a minute, dear. I'm comparing dates—twenty-six—twenty-six. Law, goodness gracious me! You haven't never noticed, Miss Primrose, that he have a kind of a mole—long-shaped, and rather big, a little way up his left arm? Have you, now, dearies?"
"No, really, Hannah, I've never seen Mr. Noel's arm without his coat-sleeve. How very queerly you are speaking, Hannah."
"Not at all, dearie; it's only because I've got the trembles on me. Well, love, and so you don't want to be under no compliments to that Mrs. Ellsworthy, who never took no notice of your poor dear ma?"
Primrose sighed.
"I feel sore about it, Hannah," she said. "But I must try not to be too proud. I will ask God to help me to do what is really right in the matter."
"That's it, honey, and maybe you won't have to do it after all. I wonder, now, dear, if Mr. Noel is well off."
"Really, Hannah, I think you have got Mr. Noel on the brain! Yes, I have heard Miss Egerton say that he is a rich man. He was the adopted son of a very wealthy person, who left him all his property."
"Adopted, was he?" said Hannah. "On my word, these tremblings are terrible! Miss Primrose, dear, I have come in to say that I may be going a little journey in the morning. I'll be off by the first dawn, so as to be back by night, and the shop needn't be opened at all to-morrow. There's a nice cold roast fowl for you and Miss Daisy, and a dish of strawberries which I gathered with my own hands not an hour back, so you'll have no trouble with your dinner. You see that Miss Daisy eats plenty of cream with her strawberries, dear, for cream's fattening; and now good-night."