'I can't help that! I cannot do this while she could feel I was conniving at what she might not like. Indeed, I cannot. I beg your pardon, but it goes against me. When shall you be able to hear from Lady Merrifield?'

'I wrote three weeks ago. I suppose I shall hear about half-way through December, and you know they could telegraph if they wanted to stop it, so I think you might be satisfied.'

Still Kalliope could not be persuaded, and finally, as a sort of compromise, Gillian decided on saying that she would think about it and give her answer at Christmas; to which she gave a reluctant a.s.sent, with one more protest that if there were no objection to the lessons, she could not see why Miss Mohun should not know of them.

Peace was barely restored before voices were heard, and in came Fergus, bringing Alexis with him. They had met on the beach road in front of the works, and Fergus, being as usual full of questions about a crane that was swinging blocks of stone into a vessel close to the little pier, his aunt had allowed him to stay to see the work finished, after which Alexis would take him to join his sister.

So it came about that they all walked home together very cheerfully, though Gillian was still much vexed under the surface at Kalliope's old-maidish particularity.

However, the aunts were not as annoyed at the delay as she expected.

Miss Mohun said she would look out some papers that would be convincing and persuasive, and that it might be as well not to enrol Miss White too immediately before the Christmas festivities, but to wait till the books were begun next year. Plans began to prevail for the Christmas diversions and entertainments, but the young Merrifields expected to have nothing to do with these, as they were to meet the rest of the family at their eldest uncle's house at Beechcroft; all except Harry, who was to be ordained in the Advent Ember week, and at once begin work with his cousin David Merrifield in the Black Country. Their aunts would not go with them, as Beechcroft breezes, though her native air, were too cold for Adeline in the winter, and Jane could leave neither her, nor her various occupations, and the festivities of all Rockstone.

It is not easy to say which Gillian most looked forward to: Mysie's presence, or the absence of the supervision which she imagined herself to suffer from, because she had set herself to shirk it. She knew she should feel more free. But behold! a sudden change, produced by one morning's letters.

'It is a beastly shame!'

'Oh, Fergus! That's not a thing to say,' cried Valetta.

'I don't care! It is a beastly shame not to go to Beechcroft, and be poked up here all the holidays.'

'But you can't when Primrose has got the whooping-cough.'

'Bother the whooping-cough.'

'And welcome; but you would find it bother you, I believe.'

'I shouldn't catch it. I want Wilfred, and to ride the pony, and see the sluice that Uncle Maurice made.'

'You couldn't if you had the cough.'

'Then I should stay there instead of coming back to school! I say it is horrid, and beastly, and abominable, and--'

'Come, come, Fergus,' here put in Gillian, 'that is very wrong.'

'You don't hear Gill and me fly out in that way,' added Valetta, 'though we are so sorry about Mysie and Fly.'

'Oh, you are girls, and don't know what is worth doing. I _will_ say it is beast--'

'Now don't, Fergus; it is very rude and ungrateful to the aunts. None of us like having to stay here and lose our holiday; but it is very improper to say so in their own house, and I thought you were so fond of Aunt Jane.'

'Aunt Jane knows a thing or two, but she isn't Wilfred.'

'And Wilfred is always teasing you.'

'Fergus is quite right,' said Miss Mohun, who had been taking off her galoshes in the vestibule while this colloquy was ending in the dining-room; 'it is much better to be bullied by a brother than made much of by an aunt, and you know I am very sorry for you all under the infliction.'

'Oh, Aunt Jane, we know you are very kind, and--' began Gillian.

'Never mind, my dear; I know you are making the best of us, and I am very much obliged to you for standing up for us. It is a great disappointment, but I was going to give Fergus a note that I think will console him.'

And out of an envelope which she had just taken from the letter-box she handed him a note, which he pulled open and then burst out, 'Cousin David! Hurrah! Scrumptious!' commencing a war-dance at the same moment.

'What is it? Has David asked you?' demanded both his sisters at the same moment.

'Hurrah! Yes, it is from him. "My dear Fergus, I hope"--hurrah--"Harry, mm--mm--mm--brothers, 20th mm--mm. Your affectionate cousin, David Merrifield."'

'Let me read it to you,' volunteered Gillian.

'Wouldn't you like it?'

'How can you be so silly, Ferg? You can't read it yourself. You don't know whether he really asks you.'

Fergus made a face, and bolted upstairs to gloat, and perhaps peruse the letter, while Valetta rushed after him, whether to be teased or permitted to a.s.sist might be doubtful.

'He really does ask him,' said Aunt Jane. 'Your cousin David, I mean. He says that he and Harry can put up all the three boys between them, and that they will be very useful in the Christmas festivities of Coalham.'

'It is very kind of him,' said Gillian in a depressed tone.

'Fergus will be very happy.'

'I only hope he will not be bent on finding a coal mine in the garden when he comes back,' said Aunt Jane, smiling; 'but it is rather dreary for you, my dear. I had been hoping to have Jasper here for at least a few days. Could he not come and fetch Fergus?'

Gillian's eyes sparkled at the notion; but they fell at once, for Jasper would be detained by examinations until so late that he would only just be able to reach Coalham before Christmas Day. Harry was to be ordained in a fortnight's time to work under his cousin, Mr. David Merrifield, and his young brothers were to meet him immediately after.

'I wish I could go too,' sighed Gillian, as a hungry yearning for Jasper or for Mysie took possession of her.

'I wish you could,' said Miss Mohun sympathetically; 'but I am afraid you must resign yourself to helping us instead.'

'Oh, Aunt Jane, I did not mean to grumble. It can't be helped, and you are very kind.'

'Oh, dear!' said poor Miss Jane afterwards in private to her sister, 'how I hate being told I am very kind! It just means, "You are a not quite intolerable jailor and despot," with fairly good intentions.'

'I am sure you are kindness itself, dear Jenny,' responded Miss Adeline.

'I am glad they own it! But it is very inconvenient and unlucky that that unjustifiable mother should have sent her child to the party to carry the whooping-cough to poor little Primrose, and Mysie, and Phyllis.'

'All at one fell swoop! As for Primrose, the worthy Halfpenny is quite enough for her, and Lily is well out of it; but Fly is a little shrimp, overdone all round, and I don't like the notion of it for her.'

'And Rotherwood is so wrapped up in her. Poor dear fellow, I hope all will go well with her.'

'There is no reason it should not. Delicate children often have it the most lightly. But I am sorry for Gillian, though, if she would let us, I think we could make her happy.'

Gillian meantime, after her first fit of sick longing for her brother and sister, and sense of disappointment, was finding some consolation in the reflection that had Jasper discovered her instructions to Alexis White, he would certainly have 'made no end of a row about it,' and have laughed to scorn the bare notion of her teaching Greek to a counting-house clerk! But then Jasper was wont to grumble and chafe at all employments--especially beneficent ones--that interfered with devotion to his lordly self, and on the whole, perhaps he was safer out of the way, as he might have set on the aunts to put a stop to her proceedings. Of Mysie's sympathy she was sure, yet she would have her scruples about the aunts, and she was a st.u.r.dy person, hard to answer--poor Mysie, whooping away helplessly in the schoolroom at Rotherwood! Gillian felt herself heroically good-humoured and resigned.

Moreover, here was the Indian letter so long looked for, likely by its date to be an answer to the information as to Alexis White's studies.

Behold, it did not appear to touch on the subject at all! It was all about preparations for the double wedding, written in sc.r.a.ps by different hands, at different times, evidently s.n.a.t.c.hed from many avocations and much interruption. Of mamma there was really least of all; but squeezed into a corner, scarcely legible, Gillian read, 'As to lessons, if At. J. approves.' It was evidently an afterthought; and Gillian _could_, and chose to refer it to a certain inquiry about learning the violin, which had never been answered--for the confusion that reigned at Columbo was plainly unfavourable to attending to minute details in home letters.

The longest portions of the despatch were papa's, since he was still unable to move about. He wrote:--'Our two "young men" think it probable you will have invitations from their kith and kin. If this comes to pa.s.s, you had better accept them, though you will not like to break up the Christmas party at Beechcroft Court.'

There being no Christmas party at Beechcroft Court, Gillian, in spite of her distaste to new people, was not altogether sorry to receive a couple of notes by the same post, the first enclosed in the second, both forwarded from thence.