And she was in her happiest and most cheerful mood, and all would have gone just as Jacinth wished, but for one unfortunate allusion, which came in the first place, strange to say, from considerate, cautious Miss Alison Mildmay herself.

Lady Myrtle and her new guest had a long talk by themselves in the first place. Then Jacinth, anxiously waiting, heard the boudoir-bell ring, and a message was brought to herself asking her to join them.

'Come in, my dear child,' said her old friend; 'your aunt and I have been enjoying a good talk. It is so pleasant when such things end in people quite agreeing with each other, is it not?' she added, turning to Miss Mildmay with a smile.

Jacinth's anxious face cleared.

'Then you do think Lady Myrtle's plan best, Aunt Alison?' she said.

'I think it a delightful one, for all concerned,' said Miss Mildmay. 'I have been explaining to Lady Myrtle all my--my conflicting feelings. For much as I should like to have your mother with me, I know it would not be as comfortable as I should wish, nor should I be able to see very much of her, unless'----

'Forgive my interrupting you, my dear Miss Mildmay,' interposed Lady Myrtle; 'but I wish you would not worry yourself about all these questions, now that they are settled and done with. Eugenia shall come straight to Robin Redbreast for as long as I can get her to stay, and that will be as long as she wishes. The children, as well as Jacinth, _my_ child'--and she glanced up affectionately at the young girl standing beside her--'shall be here to receive her, and you too, Miss Mildmay, if you will so far honour me. It will be about Easter probably; there are holidays then, I believe, which will be all the better. And there need never be any difficulty about sending you all three to school and fetching you, even when it is not holiday time. Then if Eugenia prefers to take a little house temporarily at Thetford, I shall leave her free to do so, though I may have my private _hopes_ on this matter.'

Lady Myrtle's eyes were quite sparkling, and there was a bright colour in her cheeks. It was very pleasant to see her so eager and happy.

Jacinth, in spite of her aunt's repressing presence, could not help stooping down and gently kissing the soft old face.

'And to look further forward still,' Lady Myrtle continued, holding Jacinth's hand which she had possessed herself of, 'your aunt and I are of accord on another point, my child. Your father must not return to India; he has had enough of it. And your mother too.'

'Then you think he should accept'----began Jacinth.

'We will not go into particulars,' she replied, patting Jacinth's hand.

'To begin with, Colonel Mildmay has not consulted me. He must first get to know me. But--no, of course that dreadful Barmettle is out of the question. You might almost as well be all in India, as far as I am concerned, for all I should see of you. But all that is some way off still. The first thing to do is to get your mother's promise to come straight here.'

'I am sure she will,' said Jacinth. 'I don't feel any anxiety about that.'

'Nor do I,' said her aunt.

Just then the luncheon gong sounded, and they all went down-stairs in the best of spirits. In the dining-room they were joined by Frances and Eugene, who thanks to the genial influences of the morning's news, ran up to Miss Mildmay, and kissed her much more effusively than was usual with them.

'How well you are both looking!' she said, and Lady Myrtle glanced round, pleased at the remark. 'I don't think his mother will recognise Eugene,' Miss Mildmay went on. 'Well, no, she could scarcely do that in any case. But I mean to say I think she will find it difficult to believe we are not cheating her altogether when she sees this great, strong, rosy fellow. He was such a poor little specimen!'

'He must have been brought home in time, however,' said Lady Myrtle.

'Ah, yes, our Indian possessions cost us dear in some ways. Though it is nothing to the old days; my people were soldiers for generations you know, so we had full experience of these difficulties. I and my brothers were born in India; my father was only captain in his regiment when he came into the Elvedon t.i.tle and property unexpectedly. He would have lived to be very distinguished, I feel sure, if he had not left the army;' and she sighed a little.

'But you have distinguished relatives in the army still,' said Miss Mildmay. 'The Captain Harper who was wounded at----after his most gallant conduct. He is a relation, is he not? I heard about him from Miss Scarlett: you know his daughters were at Ivy Lodge, and'----

'Indeed!' said Lady Myrtle, and a very strange expression came into her voice--not annoyance, not even constraint--more like a sort of repressed anxiety and painful apprehensiveness. 'Indeed! No, I do not remember--what were you going to say?'

For Miss Mildmay had stopped abruptly. She was seated opposite Jacinth, and as she got to her last words, some consciousness made her glance across the table at her elder niece. In an instant she saw her mistake, and recalled her own vague warnings to the girls to avoid allusions to Lady Myrtle's family history. But she was far from cowardly, and essentially candid. And in her mind there had been no mingling of any selfish motive; nothing but the desire to prevent any possible annoyance to their kind old friend had prompted her few words of advice to the girls. And now the strange look--a look almost of restrained anger--on Jacinth's face positively startled her.

'I may have been mistaken in my impression that the family in question was in any way related to you,' she said quietly. 'One should be more cautious in such matters.'

'Yes,' said Lady Myrtle, nervously, 'I think you must have been mistaken. I do not know anything of such people, and Harper is not a very uncommon name. By the way, that reminds me--was it you, my dear?'

and she turned somewhat abruptly to Frances--'was it not you who once mentioned some school-fellows of the name, and afterwards something was said which removed the impression that they could possibly be Elvedon Harpers? I am confused about it.'

All this time Frances's eyes had been fixed on her plate; she had scarcely dared to breathe since her aunt's allusion. Now she looked up, bravely, though her cheeks were flaming and her heart beating as if to choke her. An inner voice seemed to tell her that the moment had come for _something_ to be said--the something which even Camilla Harper in her letter had not debarred her from, which her own mother had hoped some opportunity might arise for.

And in spite of Jacinth's stony face, and her aunt's evident wish to change the subject which she herself had brought on to the _tapis_, Frances spoke out.

'Yes, Lady Myrtle,' she said clearly. 'It was I that spoke about Bessie and Margaret Harper. They were at school with us then, and before that, their big sister Camilla was there. But they've left now, I'm afraid,'

and her voice trembled a little. 'I think it's because their father's very ill, and it costs a lot, and they're not at all rich. They're the very nicest girls in the world; oh, they _are_ so good and nice.--You said so too, Jacinth?'

Lady Myrtle's eyes turned to Jacinth.

'Yes,' the elder girl replied coldly; 'I believe they are very nice girls. But I did not know them nearly as well as you, Frances. I do not care for making friends as you do.'

'No,' said Frances, rather lamely. 'I know you don't; but still I'd like you to tell Lady Myrtle how nice they are.'

'Why should it interest Lady Myrtle to hear about your school-fellows, my dear?' said Miss Mildmay, surprised and a little annoyed by Frances's rather pertinacious manner. 'These girls are very nice, I have no doubt; indeed I recollect Miss Scarlett speaking very highly of them; but no one doubts it. I think all your school-fellows must be nice girls--not only the Harpers. And the name may be a mere coincidence. I have never heard certainly that they were of the Elvedon family.'

Lady Myrtle had not seemed to be attending to what Miss Mildmay said.

She was speaking to herself.

'"Camilla,"' she murmured softly, '"Camilla" and "Margaret." Not "Bessie;" no I never heard of a Bessie, and "Margaret" is not uncommon.

But "Camilla"--yes, I suppose it must be.'

But just as she said this, Miss Mildmay's last words--the good lady had rather an emphatic way of speaking--rang out clearly: 'I have never heard certainly that they were of the Elvedon family.'

'That's just it,' said Frances, and by this time Lady Myrtle's attention was fully caught. 'Of course I don't mean to contradict you, Aunt Alison, but I _do_ know they're the same family, and so they are relations of Lady Myrtle's. And it's not only that I like them. I'm so very sorry for them, so _very_ sorry. They are all so good, and they have so very, very many troubles,' and here the irrepressible tears rose to poor Frances's eyes, and she turned her head away abruptly.

Lady Myrtle glanced at her and then at Jacinth. Jacinth's face was quiet and very grave.

'You are a very loyal friend, I see, Frances,' said the old lady; and rather to every one's surprise the words were accompanied by a little smile, and then she turned to Jacinth.

'I don't think you have ever named these--these Harpers--to me, have you, my dear?' she asked.

Jacinth looked up at once.

'No,' she said; 'I have not, and I have refrained from doing so on purpose. I--I did not think it concerned me, and you might not have liked it. I--I should be so sorry to vex you.'

The appeal in her eyes touched Lady Myrtle more than Frances's tears.

And in what she said, so far as it went, Jacinth was sincere. She did shrink from any possible allusion that could annoy or upset her kind friend; and the selfish motives underlying the prejudice, almost amounting to positive dislike, which she had allowed to take root in her feelings to the Harpers, she blinded herself to, or called by some other name.

Lady Myrtle was silent, but there was no resentment in her face. She only looked sad--very, very sad.

'You know these girls very much less well than Frances did,' said Miss Mildmay, whose sympathies were just now all with Jacinth. 'You see,' she went on, turning to her hostess, 'Frances has been in the habit of spending holiday afternoons at school--sometimes when you had kindly invited Jacinth here, on a Sat.u.r.day, for instance.'

Lady Myrtle started a little. Her thoughts had been far away. She leaned forward and took hold of Jacinth's hand--Jacinth was sitting next to her, and the servants had left the room--and patted it affectionately.

'Of course. I know Jacinth is very, very thoughtful for me,' she said.

'And I see that you understand it, my dear Miss Mildmay. Not that I am vexed with little Frances. I like children to be children, and of all things I like a loyal friend.'

Then she at once and with evident intention, which the others were quick to read, changed the subject of conversation. On the whole, vexed though she was with Frances's persistence--'self-willed obstinacy' as she called it to herself--Jacinth felt that the dreaded crisis had pa.s.sed off better than might have been expected, and in some things it was a relief. Things were on a clearer basis now.

'It was bound to come, I suppose,' she said to herself. 'Mamma seems almost as impulsive and quixotic as Frances--quite bewitched by these people. But at worst there's nothing more to tell now, and Lady Myrtle appreciates my feelings if no one else does.'

Frances, on her side, though her heart was still beating tumultuously, felt glad that she had had the courage and opportunity to say what she had. But for her dread of a private reprimand from Jacinth afterwards, the little girl would on the whole have had a somewhat lightened heart about her friends. For, as she said to herself, 'Lady Myrtle had certainly not seemed angry.'