Princess Puck

Polly may have been a clever woman, as Mr. James Brownlow had said she was, but in his catalogue of her abilities he omitted to mention her one great gift, her undeniable talent for getting things. She was a true collector and picker-up of trifles; she had brought this too little appreciated art to a rare perfection, and she never went anywhere without acquiring something, never came home completely empty-handed, never declined or passed by a single article or opportunity however trivial or cumbersome. Her motto was It might be useful. “If she went to the Sahara,” Bill said, “she would bring home sand for the chickens’ run.” But besides the collectors’ art Polly possessed the true genius for getting, not begging nor demanding, but annexing calmly as by right divine, or acquiring gracefully as bestowing a favour in accepting one. “I don’t ask for things,” she used to say; “people always offer them to me. I am sure I don’t know how it is, but they do, and it looks so rude to refuse.”

So she never refused, and seldom went anywhere or met anyone without directly or indirectly turning the occasion to profit. Bymouth did not promise a very likely field for her abilities, but even here she found and seized an opportunity. It was late in the visit certainly, not till after their fellow-lodgers had gone. This took place on Tuesday, the day on which Bill told Kit Harborough of the claim.

The drawing-room family left at one o’clock, the cousins watching them go. They drove to Bybridge in a small wagonette, and it was interesting to see them getting into it, for the family was large, far too large for the wagonette.

“They will never do it,” Bella said as she watched them.

“After the way in which they packed into that bedroom,” Polly remarked severely, “I should say they could go anywhere or anyhow.”

“They had two bedrooms,” Bill said; “there was another up the yard.”

“I call it positively indecent,” was Polly’s opinion, but Bill asked: “Where is the indecency? The girls were in one and the boys in the other. Mrs. looked after the girls and Mr. after the boys; they had more space apiece than we three have, and I am sure we are all right.”

Polly explained that their own arrangement was quite different and much better, but Bill, who had now joined Bella at the window, did not pay any attention to her.

“Oh, do come and look, Polly,” she said; “they have nearly done it. They would do it easily if it were not for the luggage; they ought to have a cart for that.”

“They are far too stingy,” Polly observed contemptuously.

“The mother will nurse the baby,” Bill went on, “and the father the next-sized one, and the little girl that big bundle. They have left one box out.”

“Where will they put it?” Bella said.

“They can’t get it in front,” was Bill’s opinion; “the coachman can hardly see round the rampart of luggage as it is. They are going to try though. If they would put it inside it could be managed. There it goes! I knew it would fall off the front! If you were to put it—”

“Come in, Bill!” Polly seized Bill’s arm. “Come in at once! It is no business of yours; let people manage their own concerns. I am ashamed of you!”

But Bill was not ashamed of herself; she was far too much absorbed in the difficulties of the family to care for Polly, and when someone in the wagonette below having heard her voice called up to know what she had said, she leaned out of the window again and told them. “Put it inside; I believe you could do it then,—not that way, small end down. You don’t mind me suggesting it, do you? It would have been such a pity” (“Bill!”) “if you couldn’t all get in. That’s right; now” (“Bill! Shut that window, Bella.”) “if the two little boys sit on it and the biggest one stands on the step—that’s splendid!”

“Shut that window, Bella!”

Bella shut the window almost on to Bill’s neck, leaving her no choice but to draw her head in. The family, who did not appear to resent her interference, shouted their thanks to where she had been, while Bella, who had been as much annoyed as Polly by Bill’s behaviour, joined the elder cousin in telling the culprit so.

But Bill did not mind much. “It would have been such a pity if they had not managed it,” she said, “and I don’t believe they could any other way.”

“It was no affair of yours,” Bella said; “I don’t see why you wanted to make such an exhibition of yourself. There were people passing too, one of those shooting men from the River House had just come out of the post-office; he did stare at you, and no wonder!”

Bill said she did not care, which was true; but she did not know that the man described the incident, inclusive of her and her directions, in Kit Harborough’s hearing that evening. Kit recognised her from the description, as Gilchrist had done when his lawyer-friend Ferguson described her, and Kit, like Gilchrist, did not betray her identity. He said even less about her than did Gilchrist, though he experienced a youthful desire to knock the informant down when he announced an intention of finding out who the girl was. But the pugilistic wish was restrained, Kit reflecting that, as Bill was leaving the day after to-morrow, it was most unlikely the fellow would find out anything about her; and, after all, that he should wish to do so was, in Kit’s opinion, quite natural and only what was to be expected. It was also, in the same opinion, quite natural that Bill should assist the family in the wagonette with her advice, quite natural and quite right; indeed, so right that Kit never questioned its propriety at all, possibly because she did it; though in his defence it must be said that he troubled less about the correctness of an action than did Gilchrist, thinking not at all of “how it looked.” He had been brought up among people who, being quite sure of themselves and their public, never troubled as to how a thing might look.

Polly had not been so brought up, and, conscious that her actions would not always bear investigation, she was most anxious that appearances should, when possible, be beyond reproach. She lectured Bill proportionately, and was, as usual, listened to with indifference; but when at last Polly brought her remarks to a close with, “It was like everything else you do, most unladylike,” Bill said rather wistfully: “I suppose I am unladylike, Polly?”

“Hopelessly,” was the crushing answer.

“I should like to be better,” the voice was a shade more wistful; “I would try if I knew what to do.”

“Don’t lean out of the window to give advice to strangers,” Polly said, and Bill making no reply, she began to perceive that her young cousin was in an unusually pliant mood. Seeing this she seized the opportunity, the first that had offered, of speaking to her on her behaviour to Gilchrist. As a preliminary she heaved a deep sigh, and, after a quick glance at the girl, began with chastened mildness.

“After all,” she said, “to lean out of the window like that is only a small thing, but it is an illustration of your ways. Your ways often trouble me, Bill, do you know that? Sometimes I feel as if I shall give you up entirely, and then again sometimes I think you really are ignorant and would try to do better if you only knew how your behaviour looked.”

Bill twisted restively, Polly’s voice having taken on the melancholy semi-nasal drawl which belonged to her part of the grieved guardian. Bill did not believe in her at any time, and that afternoon the manner irritated instead of amusing. But she was sincerely convinced of her own shortcomings, and though she had no great opinion of Polly, there was no one else to whom she could go; so she said: “Tell me what I do wrong; you need not put in all that about being sorry and the rest; I know how that goes, and can fill it in for myself.”

“Thank you, Bill,” Polly said with dignity; but quickly seeing the girl’s attitude of mind and the precariousness of her own opportunity, she shortened her part and, after a brief remark on her cousin’s impoliteness and her own forbearance, got to business without further delay.

“You want to know where I think you wrong? I will tell you one or two things,”—she spoke as one who has a wide range of examples from which to choose. “There is your behaviour to Gilchrist to begin with; you do not behave at all nicely to him.”

“To Theo!” Bill exclaimed in astonishment, “to him! What do I do wrong to him?”

“You call him Theo for one thing; he objects to it and it is ridiculous; all nicknames are ridiculous.”

“All?”

“Yes, all; and abbreviations of names are almost as bad.—I don’t see why you should not be called Wilhelmina instead of Bill. It does not suit you, it is true, but I am sure he would prefer it, besides Bill is vulgar; don’t you think so yourself?”

“He can call me Wilhelmina if he likes,” Bill said in a subdued voice. “And as for Theo, that is easily altered; He can be Gilchrist if he wishes it, though I think it is quite as unsuitable as Wilhelmina for me.”

“My dear Bill,”—Polly was delighted to have made so much impression—“it is not a question of what you think but of what he wishes. You ought to consider his wishes; you ought to try to please him and consult his tastes; remember, he is proposing to give you a great deal, and as you can give him nothing in return except a little consideration, it is hardly right to withhold that as you do.”

“What do you mean?” Bill’s voice, quiet and cold, was almost like that of one who faces an unexpected shock.

Polly, really in her element now, enumerated a list of the things Bill had done wrong, or might have done right, concluding her remarks with,—“Try to be pleasant to him, talk seriously when he wants you to, be cheerful and lively when he is in the humour for it, put on your best dress and try to make yourself nice when he comes. It is your duty, you know, you owe it to him. Make the most of yourself; don’t set him to water the garden and so on, but talk to him and be pleasant.”

“Always, do you mean?”

There was something very like consternation in Bill’s tone, but Polly did not know it, and answered readily,—“Yes, of course.”

“Always?” Bill dropped her hands on the table. “I can’t do it,” she said vehemently; “it is simply no use, Polly, I can’t do it; I shall have to throw it up.”

“Throw what up? What do you mean?”

“I can’t be respectable always; it is no use trying; he would be sure to find me out after we were married, if not before. He knew the sort of person I was when he asked me to marry him; if he did not like it why did he ask me?”

“You did not call him Theo before you were engaged,” Polly said, wisely attacking the details and not the mass of Bill’s protest. “And of course,” she went on, “people usually expect their fiancées will be nice to them. The average girl does it as a matter of course because she wishes to; it is because you do not seem to know what is expected of you, and never wish to do what is right, that I have had to speak to you.”

“It is part of the contract, you think?” Bill asked.

“Certainly not; there is no contract in the matter.”

So Polly said, but Bill took her meaning otherwise, as it was intended she should, and there was a long silence. Polly, feeling the subject was closed, rose and moved about the room, while Bill sat lost in thought. At last the younger cousin spoke. “I will try to do what is right,” she said, “I will really. I’ll write to Theo—to Gilchrist this afternoon, though I did write yesterday. I’ll take the letter out on the sands with me.”

Polly was very much pleased; here was an obvious sign of repentance, and one moreover which would keep Bill from wading for shrimps, an occupation she herself strongly disapproved of. She set off for the shore that afternoon with a really happy mind; she had settled Bill’s affairs, she had arranged for a good tea when she should come in, and the drawing-room family, a great source of annoyance to her, were gone. She felt very well pleased with the world in general and herself in particular as she sat watching Bill writing her letter, a grotesquely and pathetically polite letter it was too, if only she had known it. Polly felt that the stay at Bymouth had been most successful; before she finally left she was even more convinced of this, for while at the little seaside resort she achieved a piece of business which even astonished herself. “Fancy,” she used to say with complacency afterwards, “fancy meeting my future landlord at a little place like that!”

But this she did in the person of the old gentleman who came to the drawing-room floor on Tuesday evening. He only arrived on Tuesday, and Polly left on Thursday; but she made good use of her time and struck up a great friendship with him and his wife, sympathising with their ailments, recommending a butcher, telling them in the course of time something of her own difficulties. They were interested, pleased, favourably impressed. They gave her a good deal of advice,—this she asked for but did not necessarily take; they also eventually gave her a little help,—this she did not ask for but, true to her rule, took without hesitation.

The old gentleman had some house property in London, small houses Bayswater way, “a shrewd investment,”—Polly was sure of it. The tenants had been giving a great deal of trouble lately, “disgraceful,”—Polly was sympathetic. It was a capital place for apartments, and Polly could not do better than settle in that part when she made her “plucky venture;” that was the old gentleman’s advice. One of the houses was empty now, and before Polly left on Thursday, she was warmly pressed to take it on the most advantageous terms; that was the old gentleman’s offer.

Polly thanked him in her very best manner, saying she doubly appreciated his kindness since she was so much alone in the world. Mr. Brownlow had died during the summer, and Polly said at the time that it was convenient as they were already in mourning; she said it was convenient now, since she was consequently free to conduct her affairs without his advice and criticism. She did not say this to the old gentleman, but told him, after thanking him for his offer, that she must talk it over with her cousins before finally accepting it; adding that she was nearly sure of their approval, quite sure of their obligation on her behalf and their own for his kindness,—and so forth.

Polly was vastly pleased with herself and detailed the whole affair with much satisfaction to the two younger girls as they had a hurried lunch before starting on their walk to Bybridge station. Bella was not at all congratulatory; she did not like having the family affairs discussed with strangers, neither did she like posing as part of Polly’s responsibilities.

“I am not,” she said, “and I don’t see why you should say I am. I am only your cousin and that is no responsibility, and not such a wonderfully near relationship either.”

“No,” Polly retorted, “not when you are married to a rich man like Jack Dawson and I let lodgings in town for a bare living; the relationship will not be near then, I admit,” and Polly sniffed.

“I didn’t mean that!” Bella cried; “Oh, you are unkind! I don’t look down on you and I never shall; it is with your cadging ways that I hate to be mixed up.”

“Polly is a born cadger,” Bill said resignedly, “and we are part of her stock in trade. She is like a beggar-woman singing in the street and never asking for pennies, but always getting them. I am her hired baby and you are her imitation cough; she would not get on nearly so well without us.”

“Well, at all events you reap the benefit of what I get,” Polly said.

“Oh, yes,” Bill agreed readily.

“And I don’t think, Bill, that you will ever despise me.” Polly’s tone was becoming highly moral. “It is a great comfort to me to think that when you leave me and marry you will never look down on or ignore me. It is true you will never have Bella’s temptation, but I am sure you would not do it.”

“You are unkind!” Bella repeated. But Bill’s face had suddenly hardened; she was thinking of Gilchrist and Wood Hall and the county who were going to be compelled to recognise him and his wife,—his wife who would have to reform and perhaps forget.

“No,” she said suddenly, almost passionately; “I will never forget you, Polly, never look down on you, never, no matter where I am, nor what I become. If I lived in a palace you should come and stay with me; if I married a king he should receive you and take you in to dinner, and all the silly courtiers should bow down to you because you were mine. You are an old fraud, Polly, and a cadger, and a bit of a humbug too, but I am fond of you all the same. We are not swells, you and I, but we will stand by each other, and I will never, never forget!”

“That is a very nice spirit,” Polly said impressively and very much through her nose.

“Do you think I would forget?” Bella asked rather hurt. “You seem to think I am a horrid creature.”

“No, we don’t,” Bill answered her, “of course we don’t; we know really that you never would be ashamed of your grubby relations. Don’t let us talk any more nonsense about it.”

So peace was restored, and Polly began cutting slices of the cold shoulder of mutton while the younger girls finished their lunch.

“If you married a king,” Bella said to Bill laughing, “he might object to Polly walking up to the palace with a nosebag of apples sticking out of the middle of her mackintosh.”

“Not if he had married me; he would have got used to that sort of thing.”

Bella laughed again. “It is a good thing your Theo is not very particular about appearances.”

“You don’t know very much about Theo,” Bill answered quietly.

“I know this much,” Bella replied; “he will not let you do just as you like if it happens to be something he does not like and has good reason to think wrong.”

“There may be difficulties,” Bill admitted with the glimmer of a smile, her war-smile which Polly knew to her cost.

“Bill is very easy to manage when you understand her,” that lady said as she sharpened her knife. “Gilchrist will find out how to do it in time; at least he may.”

She added the last words under her breath, neither of the others hearing her, for Bella was asking in astonishment: “You would never really oppose a man you loved, would you, Bill?”

Bill debated the question for a moment looking straight before her. “No,” she said at last, “I suppose I should not.” Then she changed the subject abruptly: “What is that meat for, Polly?”

“To take home with us. I am not going to leave all that good meat behind; there is quite enough now on the bone to look decent, and it would be a great pity to leave all this.”

Bella did not approve of this proceeding, but Polly, untroubled by her objections, packed the meat up. “There,” she said, giving the parcel a final pat, “it will come in very nicely for our supper when we get home, and I am sure there is quite a lot on the joint still.”

Bill examined it gravely. “There is enough for our cat here,” she said: “it seems a pity to leave that. Let’s take it; we haven’t time to scrape it off, but you might put the bone in your hat-box; it would go in if I broke it in half.”

“Don’t be ridiculous, Bill,” Polly said with dignity, “ridiculous and mean. I don’t see anything to laugh at, Bella.”

Apparently Bella did, but Polly never minded being laughed at, and it was in a friendly fashion that the three cousins started for home. In the main the three agreed admirably; Bella seldom opposed Polly, and Bill, since she had developed an opposing individuality, had been little with them; moreover, she was of a nature with which it was not easy to quarrel. Polly, however, having a respect for her ability to give trouble on occasions, sent her back to Theresa at Ashelton two days after their return to Wrugglesby. “I have got a lot of things to settle,” she explained to Bella, “and I can do them better without her.”