That Stick ...

He triumphed a little when, during the few days spent in London, Constance wrote of a delightful evening when, while her uncle and aunt and Miss Morton had gone to an entertainment for Bertha’s match-box makers, she had been permitted to have Rose Rollstone to spend the time with her, the carriage, by their kind contrivance, fetching the girl both in going and coming.

The two young things had been thoroughly happy together.  Rose had gone on improving p. 126herself; her companions in the art embroidery line were girls of a good class, with a few ladies among them, and their tone was good and refined.  It was the fashion among them to attend the classes, Bible and secular, put in their way, and their employers conscientiously attended to their welfare, so that Rose was by no means an unfitting companion for the High School maiden, and they most happily compared notes over their very different lives, when they were not engaged in playing with little Cea, as the unwieldy name of Miss Morton’s protйgйe had been softened.  She was a very pretty little creature, with big blue eyes and hair that could be called golden, and very full of life and drollery, so that she was a treat to both; and when the housemaid, whose charge she was, insisted on her coming to bed, they begged to superintend her evening toilet, and would have played antics with her in her crib half the night if they had not been inexorably chased away.

Then they sat down on low stools in the balcony, among the flowers, in convenient proximity for the caresses they had not yet outgrown, and had what they called ‘a sweet talk.’

Constance had been much impressed with the beauty of the embroidery, and thought it must be delightful to do such things.

‘Yes, for the forewoman,’ said Rose, ‘but there’s plenty of dull work; the same over and over again, and one little stitch ever so small gone amiss throws all wrong.  Miss Grey told us to recollect it was just like our lives!’

‘That’s nice!’ said Constance.  ‘And it is for the Church and Almighty God’s service?’

p. 127‘Some of it,’ said Rose, ‘but there’s a good deal only for dresses, and furniture, and screens.’

‘Don’t you feel like Sunday when you are doing altar-cloths and stools?’ asked Constance reverently.

‘I wish I did,’ said Rose; ‘but I don’t do much of that kind yet, and one can’t keep up the being serious over it always, you know.  Indeed, Miss Grey does not wish us to be dull; she reads to us when there is time, and explains the symbols that have to be done; but part of the time it is an amusing book, and she says she does not mind cheerful talk, only she trusts us not to have gossip she would not like to hear.’

‘I wonder,’ said Constance, ‘whether I should have come with you if all this had not happened?  It must be very nice.’

‘But your school is nice?’

‘Oh yes.  I do love study, and those Saturdays and Sundays at Northmoor, they are delicious!  Uncle Frank reads with me about religion, you know.’

‘Like our dear Bible class?’

‘Yes; I never understood or felt anything before; he puts it so as it comes home,’ said Constance, striving to express herself.  ‘Then I have a dear little class at the Sunday school.’

‘I am to have one, by and by.’

‘Mine are sweet little things, and I work for them on Saturdays, while Aunt Mary reads to me.  I do like teaching—and, do you know, Rose, I think I shall be a High School teacher!’

‘Oh, Conny, I thought you were all so rich and grand!’

p. 128‘No, we are not,’ said Constance lazily; ‘we have nothing but what Uncle Frank gives us, and I can’t bear the way mamma and Ida are always trying to get more out of him, when I know he can’t always do what he likes, and nasty people think him shabby.  I am sure I ought to work for myself.’

‘But if Herbert is a lord?’

‘I hope he won’t be for a long long time,’ cried Constance.  ‘Besides, I am sure he would want all his money for himself!  And as to being a teacher, Aunt Mary was, and Miss Arden, who is so wise and good, is one.  If I was like them I think it would be doing real work for God and good—wouldn’t it, Rose?  Oh dear, oh dear, there’s the carriage stopping for you!’

p. 129CHAPTER XIX

THE DOLOMITES