Chapter 14 The Children of Wilton Chase by L. T. Meade
I SERVE
"Maggie," said her governess, early the next morning, "Maggie, dear, wake up at once."
Marjorie opened her sleepy gray eyes with a start, sprang up in bed, and began to rub them violently.
"Oh, Miss Nelson, is that you? What is the matter?"
"I want you to get up, and not to wake Ermengarde. Dress as quickly as possible, and then come to me to my room."
"What can be the matter? Isn't it awfully early? Aren't we going to Glendower to-day?"
"It is half-past six. Yes, you are going to Glendower by and by. Now dress, and come to me at once."
Miss Nelson left the room. Marjorie tumbled into her clothes in a most untidy manner, and joined her governess, looking what she was, very unkempt and tumbled.
"I have been quick, haven't I, Miss Nelson?"
"Yes, dear. Come over, my love, and sit by me on the sofa. Maggie, my dear, do you know that Basil is in trouble?"
"Basil!" exclaimed Marjorie. "How? Has he hurt himself?"
"He brought me back my miniature last night, Maggie, broken – injured; don't start so, my dear, dear child. He would not tell how it was broken, nor how it got into his possession, and your Aunt Elizabeth happened most unfortunately to come into the room at the moment, and she made a great fuss, and fetched your father; and the end of it is that they both believe Basil to have done something very wrong – in short, that he had something to say to the disappearance of the miniature, and he – he is in disgrace."
"Oh, Miss Nelson, how can father and Aunt Elizabeth be so cruel and unjust?"
"Hush, dear! whatever your father does, you must not speak of him so."
"But don't they both know him better? Did he ever in all his life do anything dishonorable or mean?"
"Maggie, I fully believe in him."
"Of course you do, dear darling Miss Nelson."
"I wish," continued Miss Nelson, "that we could really find out who took the miniature."
Miss Nelson was looking at Marjorie while she spoke, and now she was surprised to see a wave of crimson slowly dye the child's cheeks, and cover her brow.
"Why do you look like that, Maggie?" asked the governess. "Do you suspect anything?"
Maggie was silent for a moment. Then she looked up in her frank way.
"I don't really know anything," she said.
"But you have a suspicion."
"I'm not even sure that I have."
"Maggie dear, I would far rather never recover the miniature than get Basil into trouble. My conviction is that he is concealing some knowledge which has come to him for the sake of another. He is making a mistake, of course, but his motives are good. If you can help him, Maggie, if you have any clew by which we can get at the real truth, use it, and quickly, dear child."
Marjorie put on that little important air which sometimes made her brothers and sisters call her goody-goody.
"It seems a pity that I should be going away to-day," she said.
"Oh, you must not be disappointed, Maggie," said her governess. "You don't often get a treat, and you have been so looking forward to spending a few days with Lilias Russell."
"I do love Lily," replied Marjorie. "Only Ermengarde said – " then she stopped.
"What is it, dear?"
"I don't think I'll tell, Miss Nelson, please. I'm afraid, when Ermie said it, she was feeling awfully disappointed. I'll try to forget it. Now, Miss Nelson, what shall I do?"
"Put your wise little brains to work. Try to think how you can clear Basil from suspicion without doing anything shabby or underhand. I know your father is fearfully hurt with him. Much more hurt with him than with Ermengarde, for he has always had such a very high opinion of Basil. Now run away, Maggie, dear, and do your best; but remember I do not wish you to give up your visit. I called you early on purpose that you should have time to think matters over."
Miss Nelson kissed Marjorie, who went solemnly back to her own room.
The sun was now streaming in through the closed blinds, and some of his rays fell across the white bed where Ermengarde lay. The little girl was still fast asleep; all her long hair was tossed over her pillow, and one hand shaded her cheek. Ermengarde was a very pretty girl, and she looked lovely now in the innocent sweet sleep which visits even naughty children.
Marjorie went and stood at the foot of the bed.
"Poor Ermie," she said to herself, "I don't want to think that she could be mean, and yet – and yet – she was in Miss Nelson's room the day the miniature was stolen, and she did seem in a desperate state of trouble that time when she asked me to make an excuse for her to go back to the house. And then what funny words Susy did use that day in the cottage, although she explained them all away afterward. Dear, dear, dear, it's horrid to think that Ermie could do anything wrong. And she looks so sweet in her sleep. I wish Miss Nelson hadn't woke me, and told me to be a sort of spy. But oh, poor Basil! I'd do anything in all the world – I'd even be mean, to help Basil."
Marjorie sat down on her own little bed, which was opposite to Ermengarde's. The motto which her mother had given her long ago, the old sacred and time-honored motto, "I serve," floated back to her mind.
"It will be horrid if I have to give up going to Glendower," she whispered under her breath. "I am unlucky about treats, and I do love Lily. Still, I remember what mother said, 'When you are a servant to others, you are God's servant, Marjorie.' Mother died a week afterward. Oh dear, oh dear, I can't forget her words; but I should dearly like to go to Glendower all the same."
As Marjorie sat on her little bed, she was kicking her feet backward and forward, and not being a particularly gentle little mortal, she knocked over a box, which effectually wakened Ermengarde.
"What are you doing there?" asked the elder sister. "What in the world are you dressed for, Maggie? It surely is not seven o'clock yet?"
"Yes, it is; it's a quarter-past seven," replied Marjorie.
"Oh, I suppose you are so excited about your stupid old Glendower."
"I'm thinking about it but I'm not excited," answered Marjorie a little sadly.
"Well, for goodness' sake don't put on that resigned, pious, martyr sort of air. You are going to have your treat, and take it cheerfully. You know you are dying to go, and your heart is going pit-a-pat like anything."
"I wish you wouldn't be so cross with me, Ermie."
"Oh, of course, I'm always cross; no one ever has a good word for me. Now, Maggie, don't begin to argue the point. I wish to goodness you would stay in bed until it is your proper time to rise, and not wake me up before it is necessary. I might have had a quarter of an hour's more sleep if it had not been for you."
"I could not help myself this morning," answered Marjorie. "Miss Nelson came and woke me soon after six o'clock."
"Miss Nelson?" Ermengarde was suddenly aroused to interest. "Whatever for?"
"Oh, Ermie, you must hear about it – poor Basil."
Ermengarde half sat up in bed.
"I wish you'd speak right out, Maggie. Has Basil hurt himself? Is he ill? What is wrong?"
"Basil isn't ill in body, Ermie, only – oh, it's so dreadful. He found the miniature."
Ermengarde flung herself back again on her bed.
"How sick I am of that stupid miniature!" she muttered.
"Well, Ermie, you want to hear the story about it, don't you? Basil found it, and it had got cracked across, and the poor little sister, she does squint so fearfully now, and she – "
"Oh, never mind about that," retorted Ermengarde. With all her care there was a sort of breathless earnestness in her voice. "What did Basil do?"
"He gave the miniature back to Miss Nelson, and of course Miss Nelson was awfully cut up about it being broken, and just at the minute who should come in but Aunt Elizabeth! and she got into a rage, and she asked Basil how he had got the miniature, and how it was broken, and Basil refused to tell, and there was such a fuss, and father was sent for, and father asked Basil to tell, and Basil refused even to tell father, and father took Basil away to his study, and Miss Nelson doesn't know what happened there, only that dear darling Basil is in disgrace."
"Of course he didn't do it," murmured Ermengarde.
"Do it, Ermie! Basil wouldn't hurt a fly, let alone do such a shabby, shabby, cruel, mean thing as to take away Miss Nelson's dear picture. O Ermie, I thought you at least loved Basil more than anybody, more even than I love him."
"Yes, I do," said Ermengarde; "I love him more than anybody else in the world. Now Maggie, if you don't mind leaving the room, as you happen to be dressed, I'll get up."
"Yes," answered Marjorie, "I'll go away at once." She trotted out of the room.
"I must make up my mind to do it," she said to herself when she reached the landing. "Perhaps Ermie will believe then that I love her a little bit. There's no help for it at all. It's just a plain case of horrid duty, and there's no getting out of it."
Marjorie ran off in the direction of her father's room. She had to push aside the oak doors, and she had to go softly, for Aunt Elizabeth was now at home, and the part of the house behind the oak doors was no longer the children's property. Marjorie ran softly down the long corridor, and when she reached her father's door, she put her ear against the keyhole.
"I mustn't go in until he is up," she said to herself. "I must wait until I hear a little noise. Perhaps when he's shaving he'll have time to listen to me."
Marjorie's little heart was now beating fast enough, for she was dreadfully afraid that Aunt Elizabeth would come out of the bedroom at the other side of the passage, and order her back to the schoolroom regions.
"Oh, I do hope father won't be dreadfully lazy this morning," she murmured. At last welcome sounds from within reached her ears. Mr. Wilton had evidently retired into his bath-room. Presently steps were distinctly audible in the dressing-room; now Marjorie could venture softly to turn the handle of the great bedroom door, it yielded to her pressure, and she somewhat timidly entered. Mr. Wilton was in his dressing-room, the door of which was ajar, and Marjorie had come some distance into the outer room before he heard her.
"Who is there?" he asked suddenly.
"Please, father, it's me; it's Maggie."
"Come along in, and say good-morning, Maggie. I hope you are getting all your possessions together for our visit to Glendower. I shall take the twelve o'clock train. We'll arrive at four."
"Yes, father." Marjorie was now standing by her father's dressing-table. He was shaving, and in consequence his sentences were a little jerky.
"What a quiet Maggie," he said suddenly, looking down at her. "You're delighted to come, aren't you, little one?"
"I was – I loved it. Please, father, I don't want to go now."
"You don't want to go?" Mr. Wilton laid down his razor and looked almost severely into Marjorie's honest but now clouded face. "You don't want to go? Tut!" he repeated. "Don't talk nonsense – you know you are all agog to be off!"
"So I was, but I'm not now. I've changed my mind. That's why I've come in here, and why I'm bothering you while you are shaving."
"You don't bother me, Maggie; you're a good little tot. But about going to Glendower, it's all settled. You're to come, so run away and get Hudson to put up your finery."
"Father, I want you to let Ermie go instead of me."
"No, that I won't; she has been a very disobedient girl. Run away, now, Maggie; it's all settled that you are to go."
"But Ermie was asked in the first instance?"
"Yes, child, yes; but I've explained matters to Lady Russell."
"And Lilias is Ermie's friend."
"What a little pleader you are, Maggie. Ermie should be a good girl, and then she'd have the treats."
"Father, couldn't you punish me instead of her? That is sometimes done, isn't it?"
"Sometimes, Maggie, But I think Ermengarde would be all the better for going through the punishment she richly merits."
"Truly, father, I don't think so, and I know Ermie so well. I know, father, she's awfully unhappy, and she's getting so cross and hard, and perhaps this would soften her. I can't make out what's up with her, but I think this might soften her. Do try it, father; do, please, father."
"Come and sit by me for a moment on this sofa, Maggie. I see you're frightfully in earnest, and you're a dear good child. Everyone speaks well of you, Maggie, so I'm bound in honor to hear you out. You'll tell me the whole truth, whatever it is, won't you, Maggie?"
"Oh, won't I just! What a dear, darling father you are! Nearly as nice as the birthday father!"
"Nearly, puss? Not quite, eh? Well, you suit me uncommonly well, and it is a comfort to have an honest outspoken child. What with Ermengarde's disobedience, and Basil's disgraceful want of openness, I scarcely know what to do at times."
"Father, Basil has done nothing wrong."
"Oh, you take his part, eh? You wouldn't, if you had seen that obstinate young dog last night. I see you know all about it, and I may as well tell you, Maggie, that I am deeply displeased with Basil. I am much more angry with him than I am with Ermengarde, for somehow or other I measured him by his mother's standard, and she often said that Basil couldn't be underhand."
"Mother was right," said Marjorie; "he couldn't."
"My dear Maggie, events have proved the reverse. But now we won't discuss this matter. Here, pop under my arm; let's have a cozy five minutes while I listen to all your wonderful reasons for not going to Glendower."