Never, till that dreadful time, did I thoroughly appreciate what it means about not leading us into temptation. It would be quite easy to say nothing. They were my twelve stamps which I had sent; and the sentence on the piece of paper was my property. Really, if you looked at it from one point of view, the hundred pounds belonged to me as much as to anybody else. I had only to keep my own counsel and it was impossible that anyone should even guess that there was anything the least bit odd about the matter. Of course, I knew what I knew; and the misfortune was that I did know. If I had only never looked inside that horrid envelope, and never found out what had happened, how much happier I should have been.

I laid my head straight down upon the table, and I did cry.

While I was in the very middle of enjoying myself--like a great overgrown baby!--someone came into the room, and a voice said, a voice which I knew well--

"Miss Boyes!--I beg your pardon, but I knocked at the door, and when no one answered I thought I would come in to see if there was anyone about."

It was Mr Sanford! It only wanted him to find me going on like that to finish everything. As usual, all the luck was on my side.

I was perfectly aware that the slightest sc.r.a.p of crying makes me look an object; and here I had been howling myself inside out for goodness alone knew how long. I dabbed at my eyes with my pocket-handkerchief--though I knew I made a fresh smear every time I touched myself, because I had the best of reasons for knowing that tears made me positively grimy--and I tried to pretend that I was not yearning to sink into the ground. He seemed concerned.

"I hope there's nothing wrong?--that the Ogre has been giving you no further trouble?"

I did manage to gasp out something.

"No--thank you--he's--been--giving--us--no--trouble."

He apparently concluded that it might be advisable to seem not to notice that there was anything strange in my demeanour.

"I am the bearer of good news."--We wanted some, badly. I know I did.--"You have been good enough to allow me to examine somewhat closely into the condition of your affairs."--We had been good enough to allow him! As if it had not been perfectly splendid of him to do it; he being, not only Betty's cousin, but a barrister.--"Your mother appears to have managed everything herself--and very well she seems to have done it too; but the fact makes it somewhat difficult for a stranger to probe quickly to the bottom of everything; and the Ogre's proceedings have not made it easier. But so far as I have gone, I have ascertained beyond all doubt that instead of being in fear of the workhouse--as someone suggested--you are very comfortably off. As time goes on I shall not be surprised if you find yourselves--financially--in a still better position."--It was a consolation to know so much. That hundred pounds would not be wanted--"By-the-bye, I saw my cousin Hetty yesterday, and she entrusted me with what she called a note to you. I fancy you will find that it extends to about six sheets of paper."

It is not necessary to tell me it was ill-manners; I knew it was; but I felt that I must do something to avoid meeting his eyes; so I opened the envelope, and started reading Hetty's letter then and there. The opening words seemed to leap up off the paper and strike me in the face.

"My very own dearest little Molly!"--she always would call me little, though I was every bit as big as she was--"What do you think? You remember Miss Winston? She's starving! And she's not only starving, but she's dying of consumption. I've only just found it out by the merest accident. It seems that she's living in a little cottage at a place called Angmering, somewhere near Worthing. She's been ill ever so long, and able to do no work, or earn a penny. So that she has absolutely no money to buy herself food, or even to pay her rent. If someone doesn't come to her help soon they'll have to take her to the workhouse--to die! Poor Miss Winston! And she such a darling! Isn't it dreadful to think of?"

It was. So dreadful, that I could not bear to think. I hope it was not wicked, but I almost felt as if that letter must have dropped out of heaven. It did seem a miracle that it should have come to me at that very moment. Penniless! Starving! And there was that hundred pounds--her hundred pounds--lying on the table. Was it possible that I had even remotely contemplated the possibility of--of doing what? My conscience so rose up at me that, whether Mr Sanford was or was not there, I had to hide my face with my hands and start crying all over again. My behaviour seemed to positively frighten him.

"I hope that Hetty has not said anything disagreeable--nothing to cause you pain. I a.s.sure you that nothing was further from her intention, and that the letter was accompanied by all sorts of loving messages."

Then I felt that I must tell him everything. So I did--every morsel, right from the beginning. He was so patient, so full of understanding and of sympathy; indeed, he was much more sympathetic than I deserved.

Still, even if you are not deserving of sympathy, it is a comfort to receive it, particularly if it is nicely offered.

I do not wish to breathe a word against my own family. I am perfectly certain that no one could be fonder of Nora and the boys than I am.

Yet I am inclined to think that there are times, when if one must confess, it is just as well to do it to someone who is not exactly a relation. One's relatives are apt to take such a narrow view. I am convinced that no one could have taken a broader view than Mr Sanford did; and he never laughed once. That, in itself, was an immense relief. I have noticed in Nora, even when I have been confiding to her the most serious things, a tendency to treat me as if I was not quite in earnest. There was nothing of that sort about Mr Sanford, not a trace; or, at least, if he did show some faint sign of my having afforded him amus.e.m.e.nt, he did not do it in a brutal way.

"Poor little soul!" he said, when I had finished. "Poor little soul!"--I was not certain that I liked him to address me in quite that form of words. But there was something so extremely soothing in his manner that I let it pa.s.s.--"And so this has been the cause of the trouble." He picked up the copy of the sentence which I had meant to send to the paper. "I see no reason why this should not have succeeded in winning the prize. If you will forgive me for posing as an expert, this handwriting is eminently characteristic."

"Don't be horrid!"

"Such is not my intention. I am not suggesting that the character given in the paper is particularly applicable to this."

"I know it isn't!"

"But it does not follow that this does not hint at something equally fine, though in a different way."

"Mr Sanford!"

"I must ask you to forgive me if I annoy you by the expression of my opinion. In any case, you are to be congratulated on what you have done."

"How do you make that out? When I have been winning other people's money with somebody else's writing?"

"Precisely. Though I should not phrase it quite like that. Hetty informs me that this lady is in sore straits. Well, you have gained for her what, in her position, she will regard as a fortune--which she never could have done for herself."

"I never meant to."

"Which actually makes it more delightful. Because, while you have been trying to do a good deed, you have really done a better." He had a very nice way of putting things. "I would suggest that you yourself take the money to this lady at once. Her pleasure at seeing it will only be eclipsed by her delight at seeing you. And I shall be only too proud and happy if you will allow me to accompany you on your errand of mercy."

That was what did happen. Scarcely had he stopped speaking than Harris appeared at the window.

"If you please, Miss Molly, Miss Nora and the young gentlemen asked me to tell you that they've gone off for the day, and won't be back till the evening."

"We also," observed Mr Sanford, "will go off for the day. You see, the stars in their courses are on the side of Miss Winston. I came over on my machine; if you'll jump on yours we'll be off!"

He seemed to imagine that I could rush off to the other side of the county just as I was. Masculine persons do have such curious notions--even when they are grown up. I had to scrub my face to make it clean. The condition of my hair was frightful. I seemed to have cried it into a tangled ma.s.s. Just as I was struggling with it his voice came up the stairs.

"I don't know, Miss Boyes, if you are aware that you have been five-and-thirty minutes. If you can get down inside the next five we may catch the train; but if you can't, I'm afraid we sha'n't."

Of course after that I simply flew. I left my hair nearly as it was; jammed my hat on anyhow; and bounded down the stairs.

"I hope I haven't kept you waiting," I remarked.

"I'm used to it," he said. "I have two sisters."

I do not know what he meant. It sounded very rude. Almost like one of my own relations.

We caught the train; and, after changing at Chichester, reached Angmering at last. By that time I had come to the conclusion that Mr Sanford was one of the most delightful persons I had ever encountered.

And so intellectual. A trifle dogmatic perhaps, and a little inclined to regard me as younger than I was. We had a long and most interesting discussion about women in politics. A subject of which I knew absolutely nothing. But it was not necessary, on that account, that he should hint as much. Which he very nearly did. Yet, on the whole, I could not but regard him as the kind of cousin to do one credit. And, at the risk of making her conceited, almost made up my mind to tell Hetty so next time I wrote to her.

Dear Miss Winston! We found her, looking like the shadow of her former self, lying on such a hard old couch, in such a poor little room. Had I been an angel she could not have seemed more glad to see me. As I told her all about it she was so sweet. And when I gave her the twenty five-pound notes for which Mr Sanford had changed the cheque at Chichester, the way in which she thanked me did make me feel so strange. As if I had done anything to deserve her thanks. I never knew how happy it made one to be the bearer of good news until that day. As I came away I almost felt as if I had been in the presence of something sacred.

On our way home Mr Sanford and I had a warm argument about old-age pensions, which nearly ended in a tiff. After we had been talking about them for more than half an hour he as good as said that he did not believe that I knew what an old age-pension was. Even if that was true--and it was, perfectly--I did not propose to allow him--almost a stranger--to accuse me of downright ignorance; as if I were an untutored savage. He might know something about everything; and anyone could see that he was awfully clever, while I might know nothing about anything,--which possibly was the case. Still, it was not civil for him to remark on it. The fact was, that he would persist in regarding me--I could see quite plainly what was in his mind--as if I were a mere child. Which, at sixteen, one emphatically is not. I do not hesitate to admit that I snubbed him in order to let him see that I resented his quite intolerable airs of superior wisdom.

Which made it the more singular that he should have told me, as we were entering the drive, that he had to thank me for one of the pleasantest days he had spent in his life. Considering that I had been metaphorically sitting upon him for ever so long, I did not at all understand what he had to thank me for.

When I got out my desk, to commence a letter to Hetty, my copy of Miss Winston's sentence was nowhere to be found. I could not think what had become of it. I distinctly remembered Mr Sanford taking it off the table, and making some uninvited comments on the writing--he seemed fond of criticising other people. But I did not recall what had happened to it afterwards. He could not have put it into his pocket by mistake. It seemed such a very odd thing for him to have done. And so excessively careless.

V

THE PEOPLE'S STOCK EXCHANGE

Although we were not paupers, for ever so long after mother's death we lived pretty much as if we were. We hated the idea of living in a town; especially London, and we could not get a servant to stop at The Chase. Considering that the family consisted of d.i.c.k and me, and the four children, who all of them insisted on doing exactly as they pleased, it really was no wonder. The consequence was, that we generally had to do everything for ourselves, and the way in which things were done was beyond description. A stranger dropping in suddenly would have supposed himself to have wandered into something between a lunatic asylum and a workhouse.

Of course, as the head of the family, this state of things occasioned me much concern. I knew that it was not what mother would have wished.