LITMIR.BIZ

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Folks say she does not let even Master Wayland kiss aught but her hands for fear of her fine colours. A plague on such colours, I say.”

      “Poor little things!” whispered Aurelia.

      “You’ll be good to them, won’t you miss?”

      “Indeed I hope so! I am only just come from home, and they will be all I have to care for here.”

      “Ay, you must be lonesome in this big place; but I’m right glad to have seen you, miss; I can part with the little dear with a better heart, for Mrs. Aylward don’t care for children, and Jenny Bowles is a rough wench, wrapped up in her own child, and won’t be no good to the others. Go to the lady, my precious,” she added, trying to put the little girl into her cousin’s lap, but this was met with struggles, and vehement cries of—

      “No; stay with mammy!”

      The little sister, who had not brought her nurse, was, however, well contented to be lifted to Aurelia’s knee, and returned her caresses.

      “And have you not a name, my dear? We can’t call you all missie.”

      “Fay,” the child lisped; “Fayfiddly Wayland.”

      “Lawk-a-daisy!” and Mrs. Wheatfield fell back laughing. “I’ll tell you how it was, ma’am. When no one thought they would live an hour, Squire Wayland he sent for parson and had ‘em half baptised Faith, Hope, and Charity. They says his own mother’s was called Faith, and the other two came natural after it, and would do as well to be buried by as aught. So that’s what she means by Fay, and this here is Miss Charity.”

      “She said something besides Faith.”

      “Well, when my lady got about again, they say if she was mad at their coming all on a heap, she was madder still at their name. Bible wasn’t grand enough for her! I did hear tell that she throwed her slipper at her husband’s head, and was like to go into fits. So to content her he came down, and took each one to Church, and had a fine London name of my Lady’s choosing tacked on in parson’s register for them to go by; but to my mind it ain’t like their christened name. Mine here got called for her share Amoretta.”

      “A little Love,” cried Aurelia. “Oh, that is pretty. And what can your name be, my dear little Fay? Will you tell me again?”

      When repeated, it was plainly Fidelia, and it appeared that Hope had been also called Letitia. As to age, Mrs. Wheatfield knew it was five years last Michaelmas since the child had been brought to her from whom she was so loth to part that she knew not how to go when her husband came for her in his cart. He was a farmer, comfortably off, though very homely, and there were plenty of children at home, so that she had been ill spared to remain at the Park till Aurelia’s arrival. Thus she took the opportunity of going away while the little one was asleep.

      Aurelia asked where she lived now. At Sedhurst, in the next parish, she was told; but she would not accept a promise that her charge should soon be brought to visit her. “Better not, ma’am, thank you all the same, not till she’s broke in. She’ll pine the less if she don’t see nor hear nothing about the old place, nor Daddy and Sally and Davie. If you bring her soon, you’ll never get her away again. That’s the worst of a nurse-child. I was warned. It just breaks your heart!”

      So away went the good foster-mother sobbing; and Aurelia’s charge began. Fay claimed her instantly to explore the garden and house. The child had been sent home alone on the sudden illness of her nurse, and had been very forlorn, so that her cousin’s attention was a great boon to her. Hope was incited to come out; but Jenny Bowles kept a jealous watch over her, and treated every one else as an enemy; and before Aurelia’s hat was on, came the terrible woe of Amoret’s awakening. Her sobs and wailings for her mammy were entirely beyond the reach of Aurelia’s soothings and caresses, and were only silenced by Molly’s asseveration that the black man was at the door ready to take her into the dark room. That this was no phantom was known to the poor child, and was a lurking horror to Aurelia herself. No wonder that the little thing clung to her convulsively, and would not let her hand go for the rest of the day, every now and then moaning out entreaties to go home to mammy.

      With the sad little being hanging to her hand, Aurelia was led by Fay round their new abiding place. The house was of brick, shaped like the letter H, Dutch, and with a tall wing, at each end of the main body, projecting, and finishing in fantastic gables edged with stone. One of these square wings was appropriated to Aurelia and her charges, the other to the recluse Mr. Belamour. The space that lay between the two wings, on the garden front, was roofed over, and paved with stone, descending in several broad shallow steps at the centre and ends, guarded at each angle by huge carved eagles, the crest of the builder, of the most regular patchwork, and kept, in spite of the owner’s non-residence, in perfect order. The strange thing was that this fair and stately place, basking in the sunshine of early June, should be left in complete solitude save for the hermit in the opposite wing, the three children, and the girl, who felt as though in a kind of prison.

      The sun was too hot for Aurelia to go out of doors till late in the day, when the shadow of the house came over the steps. She was sitting on one, with Amoret nestled in her lap, and was crooning an old German lullaby of Nannerl’s, which seemed to have a wonderful effect in calming the child, who at last fell into a doze. Aurelia had let her voice die away, and had begun to think over her strange situation, when she was startled by a laugh behind her, and looking round, hardly repressed a start or scream, at the sight of Fay enjoying a game at bo-peep, with—yes—it actually was—the negro—over the low-sashed door.

      “I beg pardon, ma’am,” said Jumbo, twitching his somewhat grizzled wool; “I heard singing, and little missy—”

      Unfortunately Amoret here awoke, and with a shriek of horror cowered in her arms.

      “I am so sorry,” said Aurelia, anxious not to hurt his feelings. “She knows no better.”

      Jumbo grinned, bowed, and withdrew, Fay running after him, for she had made friends with him during her days of solitude, being a fearless child, and not having been taught to make a bugbear of him. “The soot won’t come off,” she said.

      Aurelia had not a moment to herself till Fay had said the Lord’s prayer at her knee, and Amoret, with much persuasion, had been induced to lisp out—

                        “Matthew, Mark, Luke, and John,

                         Bless the bed I sleep upon;

                         Four corners to by bed,

                         Four angles round my head,

                         One to read and one to write,

                         And two to guard my soul at night.”

      Another agony for mammy ensued, nor could Aurelia leave the child till sleep had hushed the wailings. Then only could she take her little writing-case to begin her letter to Betty. It would be an expensive luxury to her family, but she knew how it would be longed for; and though she cried a good deal over her writing, she felt as if she ought to make the best of her position, for had not Betty said it was for her father’s sake? No, her tears must not blot the paper, to distress those loving hearts. Yet how the drops would come, gathering fast and blinding her! Presently, through the window, came the sweet mysterious strains of the violin, not terrifying her as before, but filling her with an inexpressible sense of peace and calmness. She sat listening almost as one in a dream, with her pen suspended, and when the spell was broken by Molly’s entrance with her supper, she went on in a much more cheerful strain than she had begun. It was dull, and it was a pity that her grand wardrobe, to say nothing of Betty’s good advice, should be wasted, but her sister would rejoice in her seclusion from the grand, fashionable world, and her heart went out to the poor little neglected children, whose mother could not bear the sight of them.

      CHAPTER IX. THE TRIAD

          “I know sisters, sisters three.”

      Ere

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