it was not until after breakfast on the following morning that miss tredgold said anything to pauline about the ugly shirt she had chosen to wear on the previous evening.
“my dear,” she said then, very gently, “i did not remark on your dress last night; but for the future remember that when i say a thing is to be done, it is to be done. i had a pretty, suitable blouse put into your room for you to appear in last night. why did you wear that ugly torn shirt?”
“i couldn’t help myself,” said pauline.
“that is no reason.”
pauline was silent. she looked on the ground. miss tredgold also was silent for a minute; then she said decisively:
“you will wear the new blouse to-night. remember, i expect to be obeyed. i will say nothing more now about your forgetting my orders last evening. do better in the future and all will be well.”
it was with great difficulty that pauline could keep the tears from her eyes. what was to become of her. she did not dare expose her burnt arm; she could not possibly wear a blouse with sleeves that reached only to the elbow without showing the great burn she had received. if miss tredgold found out, might she not also find out more? what was she to do?
“what am i to do, verena?” she said on the afternoon of that same day.
“what do you mean, paulie? your arm is better, is it not?”
“yes; it doesn’t hurt quite so much. but how can i wear the new blouse to-night?”
“would it not be wiser,” said verena, “if you were to tell aunt sophy that you have burnt your arm? it is silly to make a mystery of it.”
“but she will make me tell her how i did it.”88
“well?”
“i daren’t tell her that. i daren’t even tell you.”
“what am i to think, paulie?”
“anything you like. you are my own sister, and you must not betray me. but she must never know. can’t you think of something to get me out of this? oh, dear! what is to be done?”
verena shook her head.
“i don’t know what is to be done,” she said, “if you haven’t the courage to speak the truth. you have probably got into some scrape.”
“oh! i——”
“i am sure you have, paulie; and the sooner you tell the better. the longer you conceal whatever it is, the worse matters will grow.”
pauline’s face grew crimson.
“i am exceedingly sorry i told you,” she said. “you are not half, nor quarter, as nice a sister as you used to be. don’t keep me. i am going into the shrubbery to help penelope to look for aunt sophy’s thimble.”
verena said nothing further, and pauline went into the shrubbery.
“i seem to be getting worse,” she said to herself. “of course, i don’t really want to help penelope. how should i, when i know where the thimble is? there she is, hunting, hunting, as usual. what a queer, unpleasant child she is growing!”
penelope saw pauline, and ran up to her.
“you might tell me everything to-day,” said the child. “where did you put it?”
“i have come to help you to look for it, pen.”
“don’t be silly,” was penelope’s answer.
she instantly stood bolt upright.
“there’s no use in my fussing any longer,” she said. “i’ve gone round and round here, and picked up leaves, and looked under all the weeds. there isn’t a corner i’ve left unpoked into. where’s the good of troubling when you have it? you know you have it.”
“i know nothing of the kind. there! i will tell you the simple truth. i have not got the thimble. you may believe me as much as you like.”
“then i’ll believe just as much as nothing at all. if you haven’t got the thimble, you know where it is. i’ll give you until this time to-morrow to let me have it, and if you don’t i’ll go straight to aunt sophy.”
“now, pen, you are talking nonsense. you have no proof whatever that i have touched the thimble; and what will aunt sophia say to a little child who trumps up stories about her elder sister?”
“perhaps she’ll be very glad,” said penelope. “i have often thought that with such a lot of you grown-up girls, 89and all of you so very rampagious and not a bit inclined to obey or do your lessons nicely, poor aunt sophy, what is really a dear old duck of a thing, wants some one like me to spy round corners and find out what goes on ahind her back. don’t you think so? don’t you think her’ll love me if i tell her always what goes on ahind of her back?”
“if she’s a bit decent she’ll hate you,” said pauline. “oh, pen, how were you made? what a queer, queer sort of child you are! you haven’t ideas like the rest of us.”
“maybe ’cos i’m nicer,” said penelope, not at all impressed by pauline’s contempt. “maybe i shouldn’t like to be made same as all you others are. there is something wrong about aunt sophy’s thimble, and if i don’t get it soon i’ll be ’bliged to tell her.”
penelope’s eyes looked like needles. she walked away. pauline gazed after her; then she went into the house.
“that thimble is really a very trifling matter,” she said to herself, “but even that at the present moment annoys me. nancy has promised to bring it back to me this evening, and i will just put it somewhere where pen is sure to find it. then she’ll be in raptures; she’ll have her penny, and that matter will be set at rest. oh, dear! it is almost time to go and meet nancy. she must not keep me long, for now that that horrid dressing for dinner has begun, it takes quite half an hour to get properly tidy. but what am i to do? how can i wear that blouse?”
pauline waited her chance, and slipped out at the wicket-gate without even penelope’s sharp eyes watching her. she found nancy pacing up and down at the other side. nancy was decidedly cross.
“why did you keep me waiting?” she said. “it is five minutes past six, and i have barely another five minutes to stay with you, and there’s a lot to talk over.”
“i’m in great luck to be able to come at all, nancy. i didn’t think i could ever slip away from the others. as to the midnight picnic, we must give it up. it is quite impossible for me to come. and i know the others won’t; they’re all getting so fond of aunt sophy. what do you think? she has given us ponies, and we’re to have carriage-horses presently; and we are obliged to dress for dinner every evening.”
“oh, you are turning aristocratic, and i hate you,” said nancy, with a toss of the head.
she looked intensely jealous and annoyed. she herself was to ride soon, and her habit was already being made. she had hoped against hope that miss tredgold would be impressed by seeing her gallop past in an elegant habit on a smart horse.
“oh, nancy!” said pauline, “don’t let us talk about ponies and things of that sort now; i am in great, great trouble.”
“i must say i’m rather glad,” said nancy. “you know, 90paulie, you are in some ways perfectly horrid. i did a great deal for you the other night, and this is all the thanks i get. you won’t come to the midnight picnic, forsooth! and you won’t have anything more to do with me, forsooth! you’ll ride past me, i suppose, and cut me dead.”
“i shall never do anything unkind, for i really do love you, nancy. i have always loved you, but i can’t get into fresh scrapes. they’re not worth while.”
“you didn’t talk like that when you were mad and starving the other day.”
“no, i didn’t; but i do now. i have been miserable ever since i came back; and, oh, my arm has pained me so badly! you can imagine what i felt last evening when we were desired to wear pretty new blouses with elbow-sleeves; such sweet little dears as they all were. mine was cream-color—just what suits me best—but of course i couldn’t appear in it.”
“why not?”
“with my burnt arm! how could i, nancy?”
nancy burst out into a roar of laughter.
“what a lark!” she cried. “well, and what did the poor little miss misery do?”
“i had to put on an old dirty shirt, the only one i could find. aunt sophia gave me no end of a lecture this morning. she says i am to wear my new blouse to-night or she’ll know the reason why. of course, i can’t wear it.”
“then you can’t have any dinner?”
“i am absolutely beside myself to know what to do,” said pauline. “sometimes i think i’ll go to bed and pretend i have got a headache. oh, dear, what a bad girl i am turning into!”
nancy laughed again.
“it is sometimes very tiresome to develop a conscience,” she said. “you were a much nicer girl before that grand aunt of yours arrived to turn things topsy-turvy. as to the midnight picnic, you must come. i have made a bet on the subject. jack and tom say you won’t come—that you will be afraid. ‘pauline dale afraid! that’s all you know about her,’ says i. i have assured them that you will come whatever happens, and they have said you won’t. so the end of it is that tom, jack, and i have made a bet about it. it is ten shillings’ worth either way. if you come, i get three beautiful pairs of gloves. if you don’t come, i give the boys ten shillings. now you see how important it is. why, paulie, of course you will come! we are going to have a right-down jolly time, for father is so tickled with the notion that he is coming, too; and he says he will give us a real good lark. and we are going to friar’s oak, eight miles away; and we are to take hampers full of dainties. and fiddler joe will come with us to play for us; and there’s a beautiful green-sward just under the beech-trees 91by friar’s oak, and there we’ll dance by the full light of the moon. oh, you must come! i told father you were coming, and he was awfully pleased—as pleased as punch—and he said:
“‘that’s right, my girl; that’s right, nancy. if the dales stick to me through thick and thin, i’ll stick to them.’
“you know, pauline, you have always been at our fun before; so, aunt or no aunt, you can’t fail us now.”
“i’d like to go beyond anything,” said pauline, who felt intensely tempted by this description. “it is so horrible to be pulled up short. but i know i can’t, so there’s no use thinking about it.”
“you needn’t answer me now. i’ll come back again. this is friday night. i’ll come back on monday night. the picnic is arranged for wednesday night. listen, paulie; you will have to change your mind, for if you don’t—well!”
“if i don’t?”
“i can make it very hot for you.”
“what do you mean?”
“i’ll come and have a talk with your aunt. there!”
“oh, nancy. what about?”
“such an interesting story, darling! all about our fun that night when you burnt your arm—all about our gaiety, and the fireworks, and your stealing away as you did, and your stealing back as you did. oh! i shall have a jolly story to tell; and i will tell it, too. she’ll turn me away, and tell me she’ll never see me any more; but what of that? she’s done that already. i will have my fun; you will have your punishment. that’s fair enough, isn’t it? you don’t desert nancy king for nothing, remember that, pauline, so you had better say at once that you will come. now, my love, i think that is about all.”
nancy’s face was very red. she was feeling thoroughly angry. pauline’s manner annoyed her past description. she really imagined herself to be extremely kind and good-natured to pauline, and could not endure the little girl taking her present high stand.
“i must be going now,” she said.
she gave pauline a nod which was scarcely friendly, but was, at the same time, very determined, and was about to run home, when pauline called her.
“don’t go for a minute, nancy. there’s something else. have you brought me back aunt sophia’s thimble?”
“no, i have not. i have a story to tell you about that, and i was just forgetting it. i do hope and trust you won’t really mind.”
“oh, what is it? you know i am quite likely to get into a scrape about that horrid thimble as well as everything else. what is the story? the thimble isn’t yours. you surely haven’t lost it!”
“nothing of the kind. you look as though you thought i 92had stolen it. mean as i am, i am not quite so bad as that. now let me tell you. becky, poor old girl! saw it. she’s always mad about finery of any sort, and her people are rich as rich. i had the thimble in my pocket, and she was snuggling up close to me in her nice, engaging little fashion, and she felt the thimble hard against my side, much as i felt it when it was in your pocket. in she slipped her little bit of a white hand and drew it out. i never saw any one so delighted over a toy of the sort in all my life. it fitted her little finger just to a nicety.
“‘why,’ she exclaimed, ‘i never, never saw a thimble like this before; did you, nancy?’
“‘guess not,’ i answered. ‘it’s a cunning one, isn’t it?’
“she kept turning it round and round, and looking at it, and pressing it up to her cheek, and trying to see her own reflection in that wonderful sapphire at the bottom of the thimble. then what do you think happened? i own it was a little sharp of her, but of course you can’t be so unfriendly as to mind. she took the precious little toy and put it into a dear, most precious little box, and covered it over with soft, soft cotton-wool, and placed a sweet little lid on the top. dear me, pauline! you needn’t open your eyes any wider. and when she had secured the little box, she wrapped it in brown paper, and twined it, and sealed it, and addressed it to her sister josephine in london.”
“then she stole it,” said pauline.
“not a bit of it. what a narrow-minded girl you are! just hear my story out. becky sent the thimble to josephine to their house in bayswater, with directions that josephine was to take it to their jeweller, paxton, and ask him to make another in all particulars precise ditto the same. you understand? precise ditto the same—sapphire, gold, turquoise, and all. and this beautiful thimble is to be worn on the dear little middle finger of becky’s dear little white hand. when it is faithfully copied you will have the original thimble back, my love, but not before. now, then, ta-ta for the present.”
nancy ran off before pauline had time to reply. she felt stunned. what did everything mean? how queer of nancy to have suddenly turned into a perfectly awful girl—a sort of fiend—a girl who had another girl completely in her power; who could, and would if she liked, make that other girl wretched; who could and would ruin that other girl’s life. there was a time when the midnight picnic seemed the most delightful thing on earth; but it scarcely appeared delightful now to poor pauline, whose head ached, whose arm ached, and whose whole body ached. what was she to do?
when she re-entered the shrubbery, her unhappy feelings were by no means lightened to see that penelope was waiting for her. penelope stood a little way off, her feet firmly 93planted a little apart, her straw hat pushed back from her sunburned face, her hands dropped straight to her sides.
“i didn’t eavesdrop,” she said. “i could have easy. there was a blackberry briar, and i could have stole under it and not minded the scratches, and i could have heard every single word; but i didn’t, ’cos i’m not mean. but i saw you talking to nancy, what kind aunt sophy says you’re not to talk to. perhaps, seeing you has done what is awful wrong, you’ll give me a penny instead of aunt sophy; then i needn’t tell her that you were talking to nancy when you oughtn’t, and that i think you have got the thimble. will you give me a penny or will you not?”
pauline put her hand into her pocket.
“you are a most detestable child,” she said.
“think so if you like,” said penelope. “oh, here’s my penny!”
she snatched at the penny which was reposing on pauline’s palm.
“now i’ll go straight off and get john to bring me in some cookies,” she exclaimed.
