"Only kept your eyes fixed upon me from the moment you sat down until now. It is most ill-bred to stare in that undisguised manner. Pray, is there anything extraordinary in my appearance that you find it so impossible to look at anyone else?"

The blood rushed into Mildred's cheeks, but she made no reply.

"Is there anything extraordinary in my appearance, I ask you?" repeated Lady Sarah shrilly.

It was impossible to avoid answering a second time, but while the listeners were trembling at the thought of what might happen next, Mildred raised her head, and answered, with suddenly-regained composure:

"I did not know I was staring. I hope you will forgive me--I am very sorry if I have been rude."

She spoke with a certain grave dignity, which sat well upon her, and Lady Sarah could not do otherwise than accept an apology so gracefully offered. Nevertheless the marked way in which the girl had avoided answering her question was, if possible, more galling than the original offence, and the glances which she sent across the table were the reverse of friendly.

From this time forth it seemed impossible for Mildred to do anything right in Lady Sarah's eyes. Bertha and Lois were allowed to go on their way undisturbed, while the sharp tongue, which had been wont to vent its spleen upon them half a dozen times a day, found occupation in criticising their friend.

She was rough, clumsy, awkward, Lady Sarah declared. She came into a room like a whirlwind; she ran up and downstairs more like a schoolboy than a young lady. As to her hair--that cloudy, golden hair which the others so much admired,--there was no end to the lectures poor Mildred received on this subject. It was disgracefully untidy--such a head of hair as no lady could possibly reconcile herself to possessing. In vain Mildred protested that the so-called untidiness was natural, and that no amount of brushing or damping could reduce those rebellious waves to order. Lady Sarah arched her eyebrows, and wished she might only have a chance of trying. She would guarantee to make it smooth enough.

Mildred bit her lip and flushed indignantly. It was on the tip of her tongue to say that she would be happy to grant the opportunity, run upstairs for her brushes, and force the old lady to prove the fallacy of her statements; but she restrained herself, and felt more than repaid for the effort when Mrs Faucit followed her out of the room a few moments later, and said:

"I was so glad to see you keep your temper just now, dear. It was trying for you, for of course we all know that what you said was perfectly true. You couldn't possibly make your hair smooth, and it would be a pity if you could--it is far prettier as it is, but I don't want you to think too hardly of poor Lady Sarah. You must remember that she is old and ailing, and has had a lonely life in spite of all her riches. It is difficult to be amiable when one is old and frail, but it is very easy when you are young and happy. Isn't it, Mildred?"

"I don't know," said Mildred slowly. "It isn't for me, because I am so quick-tempered. You don't know how dreadful I feel when anyone vexes me like that. My blood all goes fizz! It seems as if I couldn't help answering back."

"Well, that makes it all the better when you do control yourself!" Mrs Faucit answered, laughing a little in her gentle, amused fashion; and Mildred ran upstairs, feeling delightfully virtuous.

At that moment she was prepared to declare that no amount of aggravation on the part of Lady Sarah should ever induce her to answer hastily in return.

CHAPTER EIGHT.

AN EXCITING PROSPECT.

When Mildred had been staying for a fortnight at the Deanery, a letter arrived one morning which filled Bertha and Lois with delight, inasmuch as it contained an invitation to what they exultantly described as "the picnic of the year."

The girls had already attended several tennis parties, and had organised small excursions on their own account, driving off in the pony carriage to spend an afternoon in the country in charge of the children's governess, but this picnic was to be on a very different scale. Mrs Newland, it appeared, gave one every summer, and understood how to do things in proper style. Her guests were to a.s.semble at the station at a certain hour, as the first stage of the journey was by rail, but a couple of coaches were to be in readiness to convey them the remainder of the way.

Their destination was a lovely little village, nestled among the hills, where a river wound in and out, and there were woods, and dells, and waterfalls, and caverns; everything in fact that the most exacting mind could desire for a well-regulated picnic.

"And such delightful people--quite grown up! You must not imagine that it is a children's picnic," explained Bertha anxiously. "We are always the youngest there. We would not be allowed to go at all except that the Newlands are very old friends, and that Mother chaperones us herself. Mrs Newland takes two or three of the servants with her, and they carry hampers, and clear away the things while we amuse ourselves.

We sit on the rocks in the middle of the river, and come home late at night, singing part songs on the top of the coach, with mandolin and guitar accompaniments. Oh, it's lovely! You will enjoy yourself, Mildred!"

There was no question about that, for Mildred had the faculty of enjoying every little pleasure which came in her way, and that with a whole-heartedness and forgetfulness of drawbacks which would have been shared by few girls of her age.

Bertha and Lois had a private consultation the first time they found themselves alone after the arrival of the invitation.

"I am so glad Mil is to be with us for Mrs Newland's picnic," said the former. "I want her to see all the people, and I want them to see her.

She will chatter away and not be in the least shy, and they will be charmed with her, for she does say such funny things! Even Father has to laugh sometimes. Er--Lois! I wonder what she is going to wear."

"So do I!" said Lois calmly. "I've been wondering about that ever since the invitation came, and yet I don't see why we should, for she has nothing with her but the old school dresses, so how can there be any choice? She is certainly very shabby. It must be horrid to have no pretty clothes. I suppose they are very poor."

"Oh, yes, I know they are! Mildred makes no secret of it. Poor dear!

it is hard for her, when she is so well-connected, too," returned the dean's eldest daughter, in her funny, consequential, little voice. "Her grandmother was the daughter of a very well-known man--I forget who he was, but she told me one day, and I know it was someone important. She married without her parents' consent, and they never acknowledged her afterwards. When Mildred's mother was grown up, one of the aunts wished to adopt her as a companion, but Mrs Moore refused to go, because she would have had to promise to have nothing more to do with her parents.

The old lady was dreadfully offended, and they have never heard of her since that day."

"And a good thing, too, if she was like some old ladies we could mention!" said Lois sharply, whereat her sister first laughed, and then sighed.

"Oh, well, it's no use saying anything about that! What were we talking about before--Mildred's dress? Well, there is one comfort--she always looks sweet. I dare say she will look one of the nicest there, though Mrs Newland's friends are so smart. Don't say anything to her about our new dresses. It might make her feel uncomfortable."

There were no signs of discomfiture in Mildred's manner, however, when the new dresses arrived from town a week later on. She had been romping with the children in the garden, and came dancing in through the open window of the library to find Mrs Faucit, Lady Sarah, and the two girls grouped round the table on which lay two large cardboard boxes. The lids were thrown open, the tissue paper wrappings strewn over the floor, and Mildred, looking at the contents, gave a cry of pleasure and comprehension.

"New dresses for the picnic! Oh, how lovely! Do let me look,"--and Lady Sarah's eye-gla.s.ses went up in horrified fashion as she swung herself on to the corner of the table in her anxiety to have a good view.

The new dresses were charming, everything that the heart of girlhood could desire for the occasion; soft, creamy white, with lemon-coloured ribbons arranged in the most Frenchified style, and with big leghorn hats to match. Even Lady Sarah smiled approval, but the exclamations of the other onlookers were feeble, as compared with Mildred's ecstatic rhapsodies.

"Oh, the darlings! Oh, the beauties! Aren't they sweet? Look at the ducky little bows at the elbows, and the little crinkly ruchings at the neck! And the sashes!--oh, goodness, what yards of ribbon!--and yellow silk frills round the bottom--oh-h! And the hats--Bertha, you will look an angel! If I had a dress like that I should sit up all night--I'm sure I should! I could never bring myself to take it off. Oh-h!"

Mrs Faucit looked at the fair, flushed face with mingled approval and pity. "Poor, dear child!" she said to herself as she left the room in answer to a summons from a servant; "very few girls of her age would be so entirely free from envy. I wish I had ventured to order a dress for her at the same time; but I was afraid she might not like it. I wonder what she is going to wear?"

The same question had occurred to another person, and not being possessed of the same delicacy of mind as the dean's wife, Lady Sarah saw no reason why her curiosity should not be gratified.

"And when is your dress to arrive?" she inquired. "What have you ordered for yourself, my dear?"

"I--I ordered!" Mildred fairly gasped. The idea of "ordering" anything was so supremely ridiculous. "I haven't ordered anything!"

"Indeed! You brought your dress with you, I presume. Still I think, Miss Mildred, that you might have honoured your hostess by making the same preparation for yourself which she thinks it necessary to make for her own daughters."

"Why, dear me," cried Mildred, still too much swallowed up with amazement at the extraordinary suggestion to have room for indignation.

"Why, dear me, I'd be only too delighted to order a dozen if I could; but where on earth should I get the money to pay for them? I never had a dress like that in my life. I don't suppose I ever shall have one!"

"Then what are you going to wear, if one may ask?"

Poor Mildred smoothed down the folds of the blue crepe dress. The romp in the garden had not improved its condition; it was looking sadly crumpled and out of condition, but it had been washed a dozen times, and had a delightful knack of issuing from the ordeal a softer and more becoming shade than before. With certain little accessories, already planned, she did not despair of a satisfactory result.

"Well, I thought Mrs Faucit would be so kind as to allow the laundress to get up this dress. It is the only suitable thing I have, and I was going to--"

"Suitable! That thing! Do you mean to say that you seriously intend to wear the dress you have on to a picnic given by Mrs Newland?"

Lois bit her lip and turned aside. Bertha began hastily to cover up the dainty white folds which showed the crumpled blue in such unfavourable contrast. Mildred drooped her eyelids, and answered with that smouldering calm which precedes a storm.

"I am. That is certainly my intention."

"And you mean to say you have no better dress than that in your possession?"

"This is my best dress. Yes! I have no better."

"And your mother actually allowed you to come away with such a wardrobe!

Preposterous, I call it! People who cannot provide for themselves respectably have no business to accept invitations, in my opinion!"

Now it happened that this morning Lady Sarah had risen with a bad headache, one of the consequences of which had been to make her even more fault-finding towards Mildred than usual. The old discussion about her hair had been resumed after breakfast; she had been reproved for leaving the door open; for shutting the door, for speaking too loudly; for mumbling so indistinctly that it was impossible to hear; for one imaginary offence after another, until finally she had run away in despair and taken refuge with the children in the garden. It was not only the present annoyance, therefore, it was the acc.u.mulated irritation of the morning, with which the girl had to fight at this moment, and the conflict was too hard for her strength.