"No, I didn't. At least I mustn't tell just yet. I'm going to read the last one now.

"TO PRISSIE

"I am not sentimental, please, I cannot write in rhyme, I beg you'll all ecstatics leave Until another time.

"But if I'm lacking in romance, At least my heart is true, And in its own prosaic way, It only beats for you.

"'Mong damsels all I think you are The nicest little Missie, And beg to have for Valentine That sweetest maid, Miss Prissie."

"Author! Author!" cried Prissie. "It's Lilias, I do believe!"

"Guessing's been horribly wrong!" said Gowan. "Only about one of you was right. Shall I read the list?

"To Phillida by Dulcie.

To Lilias by Noreen.

To Gowan by myself.

To Bertha by Phillida.

To Noreen by Prissie.

To Dulcie by Bertha.

To Edith by Lilias.

To Prissie by Edith."

"So you wrote your own, Gowan! What a humbug you are! You quite put us off the scent!"

"Well, I drew my own name, you see. I had to write something! Bertha ought to have a prize for guessing right, only we've nothing to give her. Shall we play something else?"

"Prissie's brought a pack of cards, and she says she'll tell our fortunes," proclaimed Edith.

"I learnt how in the holidays," confessed Prissie. "A girl was staying with us who had a book about it. We used to have ripping fun every evening over it. Whose fortune shall I tell first? Oh, don't all speak at once! Look here, you'd better each cut, and the lowest shall win."

Dulcie, who turned up an ace, was the lucky one, and was therefore elected as the first to consult the oracle. By Prissie's orders she shuffled the cards, then handed them back to the sorceress, who laid them out face upward in rows, and after a few moments' meditation began her prophecies.

"You're fair, and therefore the Queen of Diamonds is your representative card--all the luck's behind you instead of facing you. I see a disappointment and great changes. A dark woman is coming into your life.

She's connected somehow with money, but there are hearts behind her.

You'll take a journey by land, and find trouble and perplexity."

"Haven't you anything nicer to tell me than that?" pouted Dulcie. "Who's the dark woman?"

"She seems to be a relation, by the way the cards are placed."

"I haven't any dark relations. They're all as fair as fair--the whole family."

"It's silly nonsense! I don't believe in it!" declared Lilias emphatically.

"I dare say it is, but it's fun, all the same. Do tell mine now, Prissie!" urged Noreen, gathering up the cards and reshuffling them.

Before the fates could be further consulted, however, the big bell clanged for preparation, and the magician was obliged to pocket her cards, hurry downstairs, get out her lesson books, and write a piece of French translation, while the inquirers into her mysteries also separated, some to practise piano or violin, and some to study.

"A dark woman!" scoffed Dulcie, spilling the ink in her scorn as she filled her fountain pen. "Any gypsy would have told me a fortune like that. I'll let you know when she comes along, Prissie!"

"All serene! Bring her to school if you like!" laughed Prissie. "You didn't let me finish, or I might have gone on to something nicer. There were other things on the cards as well as those."

"What things?"

"Oh, I shan't tell you now, when you only make fun of them! Sh! sh!

Here's Miss Herbert!"

And Prissie, turning away from her comrade, opened her French dictionary and plunged into the difficulties of her page of translation from Racine.

CHAPTER IV

Disinherited

Valentine's Day had brought early flowers, and the song of the thrush and glints of golden sunshine, but the bright weather was too good to last, and winter again stretched out an icy hand to check the advance of spring. Green daffodil buds peeped through a covering of snow, and the yellow jessamine blossom fell sodden in the rain. The playing-field was a quagmire, and the girls had to depend upon walking for their daily exercise. Their tramps were somewhat of an adventure, for in places the swollen brooks were washing over the tops of their bridges, and they would be obliged to turn back, or go round by devious ways. The river in the valley had overflowed its banks and spread over the low-lying meadows like a lake. Tops of gates and hedges appeared above the flood, and sea-gulls, driven inland by the gales, swam over the pastures.

Flocks of peewits, starlings, and red-wings collected on the uplands, and an occasional heron might be seen flitting majestically across the storm-flecked sky.

As a rule the school sallied forth in waterproofs and thick boots, regardless of drizzle or slight snow, but on days of blizzard there was Swedish drill or dancing in the big cla.s.s-room, to work off the superfluous energy acc.u.mulated during hours of sitting still at lessons.

One afternoon, when driving sleet and showers swept past the house, and an inclement sky hid every hint of sunshine, the twenty girls, clad in their gymnasium costumes, were hard at work doing Indian club exercises.

Dulcie, who stood in the vicinity of the window, could watch the raindrops splashing on the pane, and see the wet tree-tops waving about in the wind, and runnels of water coursing down the drive like little rivulets. It was the sort of afternoon when n.o.body who could help it would choose to be out, and a visitor to the Hall seemed about the most unlikely event on the face of the earth. Judge her surprise, therefore, when she heard the hoot of a motor-horn, and the next instant saw, coming up the drive, the well-known Daimler touring car from Cheverley Chase. In her excitement she almost dropped her clubs. Had Cousin Clare come over to see them? Or had Everard a holiday? She longed to communicate the thrilling news to Lilias, but the music was still going on, and her arms must move in time to it. She waited in a flutter of expectation, revolving all kinds of delightful possibilities that might occur. Cousin Clare would surely send a cake and a box of chocolates, even if she had not come herself. Five minutes pa.s.sed, then Davis, the parlor-maid, opened the door, and whispered a brief message to Miss Perkins. The mistress held up her hand and stopped the exercises.

"Lilias and Dulcie are wanted at once in the study," she said.

Amid the astonished looks of their companions, the two girls put down their clubs and left the room, Dulcie hastily telling her sister, as they hurried down the pa.s.sage, how she had seen the car from the window.

They tapped at the study door, and entered full of pleasant antic.i.p.ation. Miss Walters was standing by the fire, with a letter in her hand.

"Come in, girls," she said gravely. "I've sent for you because I have something very sad to tell you. Can you prepare your minds for a great shock? Your Grandfather was taken ill suddenly last night, and pa.s.sed away this morning. Your cousin has sent the car to fetch you both home.

Go at once and change your dresses, and Miss Harvey will help you to pack a few clothes. The chauffeur is having some tea, but you must not keep him waiting very long. I can't tell you how grieved I am. You must be brave girls and try to comfort every one else at home. It will be a sad loss for you all."

Lilias and Dulcie went upstairs almost dazed with the unexpected bad news. They could hardly believe that their grandfather, whom they had left apparently in the best of health and spirits, could have gone away into that other world where Father and Mother and a little sister had already pa.s.sed over before. They packed in a sort of dream, drank the cups of tea which Miss Walters, full of kind sympathy, pressed upon them in the hall, greeted Milner, who was starting his engine, and entered the waiting car. Owing to the floods, they took a roundabout route, but half an hour's drive through sleet and rain brought them to Cheverley Chase. It was strange to see the blinds all down as they drew up at the house. As they ran indoors, Winder, the old butler, came from his pantry into the hall. They questioned him eagerly. He shook his head as he replied:

"It's a sad business, Miss Lilias and Miss Dulcie. He was just as usual yesterday, then about nine o'clock Miss Clare rang the bell violently, and when I came into the drawing-room, there was Master lying on the floor in a kind of fit. I telephoned to the doctor, and we got him to bed, but he never recovered consciousness. He went at eleven this morning, as you'll see by the clock there. I stopped all the clocks at once. It's the right thing to do in a house when the master dies. Miss Clare's in her room. I'll let her know you've arrived."

"We'll go and find her, thank you," said Lilias, walking quietly upstairs.

The Ingleton children were truly grieved at the loss of the grandfather who, for so many years, had stood to them in the place of a parent. They went softly about the house and spoke in hushed voices. Everything seemed strange and unusual. A dressmaker came from London with boxes of mourning for Cousin Clare and the girls; beautiful wreaths and crosses of flowers kept arriving and were carried upstairs. Mr. Bowden, the lawyer, was constantly in and out, making arrangements for the funeral; neighbors left cards with "Kind sympathy" written across the corner.

Everard, who had arrived home shortly after his sisters, seemed to have grown years older. He walked with a new dignity, as of one who is suddenly called to fill a high position.

"I'll be a good brother to you all," he said to the younger ones. "You must always look upon the Chase as your home, of course. I'll do everything for you that Grandfather ever did, and more!"

"Will the Chase be yours now, then, Everard?" asked Bevis.

"I suppose so. I'm the eldest son, you see, and the property has always gone in the direct line. It was entailed until fifty years ago. I shan't make any changes. I've told the servants so, and they all said they wished to stay on. I wouldn't part with Winder or Milner for the world!

They're part of the establishment."