I SERVE.
“Maggie,” said her governess,
early the next morning, “Maggie, dear, wake
up at once.”
Marjorie opened her sleepy gray eyes
with a start, sprang up in bed, and began to rub them
violently.
“Oh, Miss Nelson, is that you? What is
the matter?”
“I want you to get up, and not
to wake Ermengarde. Dress as quickly as possible,
and then come to me to my room.”
“What can be the matter?
Isn’t it awfully early? Aren’t we
going to Glendower to-day?”
“It is half-past six. Yes,
you are going to Glendower by and by. Now dress,
and come to me at once.”
Miss Nelson left the room. Marjorie
tumbled into her clothes in a most untidy manner,
and joined her governess, looking what she was, very
unkempt and tumbled.
“I have been quick, haven’t I, Miss Nelson?”
“Yes, dear. Come over,
my love, and sit by me on the sofa. Maggie, my
dear, do you know that Basil is in trouble?”
“Basil!” exclaimed Marjorie.
“How? Has he hurt himself?”
“He brought me back my miniature
last night, Maggie, broken-injured; don’t
start so, my dear, dear child. He would not tell
how it was broken, nor how it got into his possession,
and your Aunt Elizabeth happened most unfortunately
to come into the room at the moment, and she made
a great fuss, and fetched your father; and the end
of it is that they both believe Basil to have done
something very wrong-in short, that he
had something to say to the disappearance of the miniature,
and he-he is in disgrace.”
“Oh, Miss Nelson, how can father
and Aunt Elizabeth be so cruel and unjust?”
“Hush, dear! whatever your father
does, you must not speak of him so.”
“But don’t they both know
him better? Did he ever in all his life do anything
dishonorable or mean?”
“Maggie, I fully believe in him.”
“Of course you do, dear darling Miss Nelson.”
“I wish,” continued Miss
Nelson, “that we could really find out who took
the miniature.”
Miss Nelson was looking at Marjorie
while she spoke, and now she was surprised to see
a wave of crimson slowly dye the child’s cheeks,
and cover her brow.
“Why do you look like that,
Maggie?” asked the governess. “Do
you suspect anything?”
Maggie was silent for a moment.
Then she looked up in her frank way.
“I don’t really know anything,”
she said.
“But you have a suspicion.”
“I’m not even sure that I have.”
“Maggie dear, I would far rather
never recover the miniature than get Basil into trouble.
My conviction is that he is concealing some knowledge
which has come to him for the sake of another.
He is making a mistake, of course, but his motives
are good. If you can help him, Maggie, if you
have any clew by which we can get at the real truth,
use it, and quickly, dear child.”
Marjorie put on that little important
air which sometimes made her brothers and sisters
call her goody-goody.
“It seems a pity that I should
be going away to-day,” she said.
“Oh, you must not be disappointed,
Maggie,” said her governess. “You
don’t often get a treat, and you have been so
looking forward to spending a few days with Lilias
Russell.”
“I do love Lily,” replied
Marjorie. “Only Ermengarde said-”
then she stopped.
“What is it, dear?”
“I don’t think I’ll
tell, Miss Nelson, please. I’m afraid, when
Ermie said it, she was feeling awfully disappointed.
I’ll try to forget it. Now, Miss Nelson,
what shall I do?”
“Put your wise little brains
to work. Try to think how you can clear Basil
from suspicion without doing anything shabby or underhand.
I know your father is fearfully hurt with him.
Much more hurt with him than with Ermengarde, for
he has always had such a very high opinion of Basil.
Now run away, Maggie, dear, and do your best; but remember
I do not wish you to give up your visit. I called
you early on purpose that you should have time to
think matters over.”
Miss Nelson kissed Marjorie, who went
solemnly back to her own room.
The sun was now streaming in through
the closed blinds, and some of his rays fell across
the white bed where Ermengarde lay. The little
girl was still fast asleep; all her long hair was tossed
over her pillow, and one hand shaded her cheek.
Ermengarde was a very pretty girl, and she looked
lovely now in the innocent sweet sleep which visits
even naughty children.
Marjorie went and stood at the foot of the bed.
“Poor Ermie,” she said
to herself, “I don’t want to think that
she could be mean, and yet-and yet-she
was in Miss Nelson’s room the day the miniature
was stolen, and she did seem in a desperate state of
trouble that time when she asked me to make an excuse
for her to go back to the house. And then what
funny words Susy did use that day in the cottage,
although she explained them all away afterward.
Dear, dear, dear, it’s horrid to think that
Ermie could do anything wrong. And she looks
so sweet in her sleep. I wish Miss Nelson
hadn’t woke me, and told me to be a sort of
spy. But oh, poor Basil! I’d do anything
in all the world-I’d even be mean,
to help Basil.”
Marjorie sat down on her own little
bed, which was opposite to Ermengarde’s.
The motto which her mother had given her long ago,
the old sacred and time-honored motto, “I serve,”
floated back to her mind.
“It will be horrid if I have
to give up going to Glendower,” she whispered
under her breath. “I am unlucky about
treats, and I do love Lily. Still, I remember
what mother said, ’When you are a servant to
others, you are God’s servant, Marjorie.’
Mother died a week afterward. Oh dear, oh dear,
I can’t forget her words; but I should dearly
like to go to Glendower all the same.”
As Marjorie sat on her little bed,
she was kicking her feet backward and forward, and
not being a particularly gentle little mortal, she
knocked over a box, which effectually wakened Ermengarde.
“What are you doing there?”
asked the elder sister. “What in the world
are you dressed for, Maggie? It surely is not
seven o’clock yet?”
“Yes, it is; it’s a quarter-past
seven,” replied Marjorie.
“Oh, I suppose you are so excited
about your stupid old Glendower.”
“I’m thinking about it
but I’m not excited,” answered Marjorie
a little sadly.
“Well, for goodness’ sake
don’t put on that resigned, pious, martyr sort
of air. You are going to have your treat, and
take it cheerfully. You know you are dying to
go, and your heart is going pit-a-pat like anything.”
“I wish you wouldn’t be so cross with
me, Ermie.”
“Oh, of course, I’m always
cross; no one ever has a good word for me. Now,
Maggie, don’t begin to argue the point.
I wish to goodness you would stay in bed until it
is your proper time to rise, and not wake me up before
it is necessary. I might have had a quarter of
an hour’s more sleep if it had not been for
you.”
“I could not help myself this
morning,” answered Marjorie. “Miss
Nelson came and woke me soon after six o’clock.”
“Miss Nelson?” Ermengarde
was suddenly aroused to interest. “Whatever
for?”
“Oh, Ermie, you must hear about it-poor
Basil.”
Ermengarde half sat up in bed.
“I wish you’d speak right
out, Maggie. Has Basil hurt himself? Is he
ill? What is wrong?”
“Basil isn’t ill in body,
Ermie, only-oh, it’s so dreadful.
He found the miniature.”
Ermengarde flung herself back again on her bed.
“How sick I am of that stupid miniature!”
she muttered.
“Well, Ermie, you want to hear
the story about it, don’t you? Basil found
it, and it had got cracked across, and the poor little
sister, she does squint so fearfully now, and she-
“Oh, never mind about that,”
retorted Ermengarde. With all her care there
was a sort of breathless earnestness in her voice.
“What did Basil do?”
“He gave the miniature back
to Miss Nelson, and of course Miss Nelson was awfully
cut up about it being broken, and just at the minute
who should come in but Aunt Elizabeth! and she got
into a rage, and she asked Basil how he had got the
miniature, and how it was broken, and Basil refused
to tell, and there was such a fuss, and father was
sent for, and father asked Basil to tell, and Basil
refused even to tell father, and father took Basil
away to his study, and Miss Nelson doesn’t know
what happened there, only that dear darling Basil is
in disgrace.”
“Of course he didn’t do it,” murmured
Ermengarde.
“Do it, Ermie! Basil wouldn’t
hurt a fly, let alone do such a shabby, shabby, cruel,
mean thing as to take away Miss Nelson’s dear
picture. O Ermie, I thought you at least loved
Basil more than anybody, more even than I love him.”
“Yes, I do,” said Ermengarde;
“I love him more than anybody else in the world.
Now Maggie, if you don’t mind leaving the room,
as you happen to be dressed, I’ll get up.”
“Yes,” answered Marjorie,
“I’ll go away at once.” She
trotted out of the room.
“I must make up my mind to do
it,” she said to herself when she reached the
landing. “Perhaps Ermie will believe then
that I love her a little bit. There’s no
help for it at all. It’s just a plain case
of horrid duty, and there’s no getting out of
it.”
Marjorie ran off in the direction
of her father’s room. She had to push aside
the oak doors, and she had to go softly, for Aunt Elizabeth
was now at home, and the part of the house behind the
oak doors was no longer the children’s property.
Marjorie ran softly down the long corridor, and when
she reached her father’s door, she put her ear
against the keyhole.
“I mustn’t go in until
he is up,” she said to herself. “I
must wait until I hear a little noise. Perhaps
when he’s shaving he’ll have time to listen
to me.”
Marjorie’s little heart was
now beating fast enough, for she was dreadfully afraid
that Aunt Elizabeth would come out of the bedroom at
the other side of the passage, and order her back to
the schoolroom regions.
“Oh, I do hope father won’t
be dreadfully lazy this morning,” she murmured.
At last welcome sounds from within reached her ears.
Mr. Wilton had evidently retired into his bath-room.
Presently steps were distinctly audible in the dressing-room;
now Marjorie could venture softly to turn the handle
of the great bedroom door, it yielded to her pressure,
and she somewhat timidly entered. Mr. Wilton was
in his dressing-room, the door of which was ajar,
and Marjorie had come some distance into the outer
room before he heard her.
“Who is there?” he asked suddenly.
“Please, father, it’s me; it’s Maggie.”
“Come along in, and say good-morning,
Maggie. I hope you are getting all your possessions
together for our visit to Glendower. I shall take
the twelve o’clock train. We’ll arrive
at four.”
“Yes, father.” Marjorie
was now standing by her father’s dressing-table.
He was shaving, and in consequence his sentences were
a little jerky.
“What a quiet Maggie,”
he said suddenly, looking down at her. “You’re
delighted to come, aren’t you, little one?”
“I was-I loved
it. Please, father, I don’t want to go now.”
“You don’t want to go?”
Mr. Wilton laid down his razor and looked almost severely
into Marjorie’s honest but now clouded face.
“You don’t want to go? Tut!”
he repeated. “Don’t talk nonsense-you
know you are all agog to be off!”
“So I was, but I’m not
now. I’ve changed my mind. That’s
why I’ve come in here, and why I’m bothering
you while you are shaving.”
“You don’t bother me,
Maggie; you’re a good little tot. But about
going to Glendower, it’s all settled. You’re
to come, so run away and get Hudson to put up your
finery.”
“Father, I want you to let Ermie go instead
of me.”
“No, that I won’t; she
has been a very disobedient girl. Run away, now,
Maggie; it’s all settled that you are to go.”
“But Ermie was asked in the first instance?”
“Yes, child, yes; but I’ve explained matters
to Lady Russell.”
“And Lilias is Ermie’s friend.”
“What a little pleader you are,
Maggie. Ermie should be a good girl, and then
she’d have the treats.”
“Father, couldn’t you
punish me instead of her? That is sometimes done,
isn’t it?”
“Sometimes, Maggie, But I think
Ermengarde would be all the better for going through
the punishment she richly merits.”
“Truly, father, I don’t
think so, and I know Ermie so well. I know, father,
she’s awfully unhappy, and she’s getting
so cross and hard, and perhaps this would soften her.
I can’t make out what’s up with her, but
I think this might soften her. Do try it, father;
do, please, father.”
“Come and sit by me for a moment
on this sofa, Maggie. I see you’re frightfully
in earnest, and you’re a dear good child.
Everyone speaks well of you, Maggie, so I’m
bound in honor to hear you out. You’ll
tell me the whole truth, whatever it is, won’t
you, Maggie?”
“Oh, won’t I just!
What a dear, darling father you are! Nearly as
nice as the birthday father!”
“Nearly, puss? Not
quite, eh? Well, you suit me uncommonly well,
and it is a comfort to have an honest outspoken child.
What with Ermengarde’s disobedience, and Basil’s
disgraceful want of openness, I scarcely know what
to do at times.”
“Father, Basil has done nothing wrong.”
“Oh, you take his part, eh?
You wouldn’t, if you had seen that obstinate
young dog last night. I see you know all about
it, and I may as well tell you, Maggie, that I am
deeply displeased with Basil. I am much more
angry with him than I am with Ermengarde, for somehow
or other I measured him by his mother’s standard,
and she often said that Basil couldn’t be underhand.”
“Mother was right,” said Marjorie; “he
couldn’t.”
“My dear Maggie, events have
proved the reverse. But now we won’t discuss
this matter. Here, pop under my arm; let’s
have a cozy five minutes while I listen to all your
wonderful reasons for not going to Glendower.”