Regiment Of Women Part 16

"Read," she said briefly, and gave a little gurgle of antic.i.p.ation.

"All day long?"

"Oh, yes, Miss Hartill. I never get a chance in term time. There's such heaps to read. I'd like to live in a library."

"Yet a peep at the world outside beats all the books that were ever written."

"I wonder." Louise rubbed her chin meditatively against her knees before she delivered herself. "You know--I think the way things strike people is much more interesting than the things themselves. I like exploring people's minds. Do you know?"

"I know," said Clare. She laughed mischievously. "You mean--that what you think I am, for instance, is much more interesting than what I really am."

Louise protested mutely. Her black eyes glowed.

"I daresay you're right, Louise. You wear pink spectacles, you see. I'm quite sure you would be appalled if any one took them off. I'm a horrid person really."

Louise looked puzzled; then the twinkle in Miss Hartill's eyes enlightened her. Miss Hartill was teasing. She laughed merrily.

Clare shook her head.

"It's quite true. I'm an egoist, Louise!"

"It's not true," said Louise pa.s.sionately. She was on guard in an instant, ready to justify Miss Hartill to herself and the world.

It amused Clare to excite her.

"My good child--what do you know about it?"

"Lots," said Louise, with a catch in her voice. "You're not! You're not!"

"I am." Clare leaned forward, much tickled. She could afford to attempt to disillusion Louise.... Louise would not believe her, but she could not say later that she had not been warned. But at the same time, Clare warmed her cold and cynical self in the pure flame of affection her self-criticism was fanning. "I am," she repeated. "Why do you think I came round to see you to-day?"

Louise looked up at her shyly, dwelling on her answer as if it gave her exquisite pleasure.

"Because--because you knew I was alone, and you hated me to be miserable on Christmas Day."

"You?" Clare's eyebrows lifted for a second, but a glance into the child's candid eyes dispelled the vague suspicion.... Louise and conceit were incompatible. She listened with a touch of compunction to the innocent answer.

"Not me specially, of course. Any one who was down. Only it happened to be me. I think you can't help being good to people: you're made that way." Her eyes were full of wondering admiration.

Clare was touched. She sighed as she answered--

"I wish I were. You shouldn't believe in people, Louise. I came round because--yes, you were a lonely sc.r.a.p of a schoolgirl, certainly--but there were lots of other reasons. I wanted a walk and I wanted to be amused, and I wanted--and I wanted----" she moved restlessly in her chair, "All pure egoism, anyhow."

"But you came," said Louise.

"To please you, or to punish some one else? I don't know!"

Louise enjoyed her incomprehensibility. She stored up her remarks to puzzle over later. Yet she would ask questions if Miss Hartill were in a talking mood.

"Do I know them?" (She had an odd habit of using the plural when she wished to be discreet.) She wondered who had been punished, and why, and thrilled deliciously, as she did to a ghost story. She thought that it would be terrible to have offended Miss Hartill: yet immensely exciting.... She wondered if all her courage would go if Miss Hartill were angry? She had always despised poor Jeanne du Barrie: but Miss Hartill raging would be harder to face than a mob....

"What have they done?" asked Louise eagerly.

"They? It's your dear Miss Durand," said Clare, with a grim smile. "I'm very angry with her, Louise. She's been behaving badly."

Louise's eyes widened: she looked alarmed and distressed.

"Oh, but Miss Hartill--she hasn't! She couldn't! What has she done?"

"Shall I tell you?" Clare leaned forward mysteriously.

Louise nodded breathlessly.

"She wouldn't copy me and be an egoist. And I wanted her to, rather badly, Louise. There, that's all! You're none the wiser, are you? Never mind, you will be, some day. Don't look so worried, you funny child."

"Why do you call yourself such names? You're not an egoist? You can't be," cried Louise desperately.

Clare laughed.

"Can't I? Most people are. It's not a synonym for murderess! Stop frowning, child. Why, I don't believe you know what it means even. Do you know what an egoist is, Louise?"

"Sir Willoughby Patterne!" said Louise promptly.

Clare threw up her hands.

"What next? I wish I'd had charge of you earlier. You shouldn't try so hard to say 'Humph,' little pig."

"I don't." Louise was indignant.

"Then what possesses you to steer your c.o.c.kle-boat on to Meredith?

Well--what do you think of him? What have you read?"

"About all. He's queer. He's not d.i.c.kens or Scott, of course----" Her tone deprecated.

"Of course not," said Clare, with grave sympathy.

"But I like him. I like Chloe. I like the sisters--you know--'Fine Shades and Nice Feeling'----"

"Why?" Clare shot it at her.

"I don't know. They made me laugh. They're awfully real people. And I liked that book where the two gentlemen drink wine. 'Veuve' something."

"What on earth did you see in that?" Clare was amused.

"I don't know. I just liked them. Of course, I adore s.h.a.gpat."

"That I understand. It's a fairy tale to you, isn't it?"