Girls of the Forest Part 41

Josephine put on a supercilious face; Lucy sniffed; Helen and Adelaide went on with their breakfast as though nothing had happened.

Penelope came a little nearer.

"Must I speak up?" she said. "Must I ask again? Is you all deaf? I am going to Easterhaze to Aunt Sophy. Darling aunty can't do without me. She has sent for me as she wants me so badly. I'm going by the first train. I am much the most 'portant person in the house, and I's won my bet. I like betting. A penny from you all if you please."

The girls were excited and amazed at Pen's news.

"You are clever," said Briar. "How in the world did you get her to do it?"

"Tum-tum and sore froat," said Penelope bluntly. "Oh! and vinegar and paling down."

"You are really such an incomprehensible child that I am glad Aunt Sophy is going to manage you," was Patty's remark. "Here are your pence. Shall we help you to pack your things?"

"They are a'most packed. I did some myself last night. I took your new little trunk, Briar. I don't 'uppose you'll mind."

Briar did mind, but she knew it was useless to expostulate.

By eleven o'clock Penelope was off to Lyndhurst Road station. By twelve o'clock she was in charge of a red-faced old lady. In five minutes' time she was _en route_ for Easterhaze. The old lady, whose name was Mrs.

Hungerford, began by considering Pen a plain and ordinary child; but she soon had reason to change her views, for Pen was not exactly plain, and was certainly by no means ordinary. She stared fixedly at the old lady, having deliberately left her own seat and planted herself on the one opposite.

"Vinegar will do it," she said.

"What are you talking about, child?" asked Mrs. Hungerford.

"You are so red--such a deep red, I mean--much the same as chocolate.

Vinegar will do it. Take three small gla.s.ses a day, and pay your Betty with vulgar sort of things out of an old bandbox."

"The unfortunate child is evidently insane," was Mrs. Hungerford's thought. She spoke, therefore, in a rea.s.suring way, and tried to look as though she thought Pen's remarks the most natural in the world.

Pen, however, read through her.

"You don't believe me," she said. "Now you listen. I look a pale little girl, don't I? I am nearly eight years old. I don't see why a girl of eight is to be trampled on; does you? I wanted to go, and I am going.

It's tum-tum-ache and sore froat and paling cheeks that has done it. If you want to get what you don't think you will get, remember my words.

It's vinegar does it, but it gives you tum-ache awful."

The old lady could not help laughing.

"Now, I wonder," she said, opening a basket of peaches, "whether these will give tum-ache."

Penelope grinned; she showed a row of pearly teeth.

"Guess not," she said.

The old lady put the basket between Penelope and herself.

"I have also got sandwiches--very nice ones--and little cakes," she said.

"Shall we two have lunch together, even if my face is like chocolate?"

"It's a beauty face, even if it is, and I love you," said Penelope. "I think you are quite 'licious. Don't you like to look like chocolate?"

The old lady made no answer. Penelope dived her fat hand into the basket of peaches and secured the largest and ripest.

"It is the best," she said. "Perhaps you ought to eat it."

"I think I ought, but if you don't agree with me you shall have it."

Penelope hesitated a moment.

"You wouldn't say that if you didn't mean me to eat it," she said. "Thank you."

She closed her teeth in the delicious fruit and enjoyed herself vastly.

In short, by the time Mrs. Hungerford and her curious charge reached Easterhaze it seemed to them both that they had known each other all their days.

Miss Tredgold, Verena, and Pauline met the train. The girls looked rosy and sunburnt. This was an ideal moment for Penelope. She almost forgot Mrs. Hungerford in her delight at this meeting with her relatives. But suddenly at the last moment she remembered.

"How are you, Aunt Sophy? I am scrumptiously glad to see you. How are you, Verena? How are you, Paulie? Oh! please forgive me; I must say good-bye to the chocolate old lady."

And the chocolate old lady was hugged and kissed several times, and then Pen was at liberty to enjoy the delights of the seaside.

The lodgings where Miss Tredgold was staying were quite a mile from the station. Pen enjoyed her drive immensely. The look of the broad sea rolling on to the sh.o.r.e had a curious effect upon her strange nature. It touched her indescribably. It filled that scarcely awakened little soul of hers with longings. After all, it might be worth while to be good. She did not know why the sea made her long to be good; nevertheless it did.

Her face became really pale.

"Are you tired, dear?" asked Miss Tredgold, noticing the curious look on the expressive little face.

"Oh, no, not that," replied Pen; "but I have never seen the sea before."

Miss Tredgold felt that she understood. Pauline also understood. Verena did not think about the matter. It was Verena's habit to take the sweets of life as they came, to be contented with her lot, to love beauty for its own sake, to keep a calm mind and a calm body through all circ.u.mstances. She had accepted the sea as a broad, beautiful fact in her life some weeks ago. She was not prepared for Pen's emotion, nor did she understand it. She kept saying to herself:

"Nurse is right after all; it was not mere fancy. Little Penelope is not well. A day or two on the sands in this glorious air will soon put her straight."

Pauline, however, thought that she did understand her little sister. For to Pauline, from the first day she had arrived at Easterhaze, the sea had seemed to cry to her in one incessant, reiterating voice:

"Come, wash and be clean. Come, lave yourself in me, and leave your naughtiness and your deceits and your black, black lies behind."

And Pauline felt, notwithstanding her present happiness and her long days of health and vigor and glee, that she was disobeying the sea, for she was not was.h.i.+ng therein, nor getting herself clean in all that waste of water. The old cry awoke again in her heart with an almost cruel insistence.

"Come, wash and be clean," cried the sea.

"I declare, Pauline, you are looking almost as pale as your sister," said Miss Tredgold. "Well, here we are. Now, Pen," she added, turning to Penelope, "I hope you will enjoy yourself. I certainly did not intend to ask you to join us, but as nurse said you were not well, and as your own extremely funny letter seemed to express the same thing, I thought it best to ask you here."

"And you did quite right, Aunty Sophy," said Penelope.

Then the look of the sea faded from her eyes, and she became once again a suspicious, eager, somewhat deceitful little girl. Once again the subtle and naughty things of life took possession of her. At any cost she must keep herself to the front. At any cost she must a.s.sume the power which she longed for. She was no longer a nursery child. She had won her way about coming to the seaside; now she must go still further. She must become a person of the greatest moment to Aunt Sophia. Aunt Sophia held the keys of power; therefore Penelope determined to devote herself to her.

The lodgings were extremely cheerful. They were in a terrace overhanging the sea. From the big bay-windows of the drawing-room you could see the sunsets. There was a glorious sunset just beginning when Penelope walked to the window and looked out. Miss Tredgold had secured the best rooms in this very handsome house, and the best rooms consisted of a double drawing-room, the inner one of which was utilized as a dining-room; a large bedroom overhead in which Verena and Pauline slept; and a little room at the back which she used for herself, and in which now she had ordered a cot to be placed for Penelope.

Penelope was taken upstairs and shown the arrangements that had been made for her comfort. Her eyes sparkled with delight when she saw the little cot.