Part 13 (1/2)
”Oh, keep me here with you!” she cried. ”I am tired of being grand. I will stay with you and learn to be a useful girl, if only you will love me.”
Mrs. Kane heaved a long sigh as Hetty's arms fastened round her neck.
Now she felt rewarded for all the love and care she had poured out on the child during the three years she had had her for her own. A little bit of hard ice that had always been lying at the bottom of her heart ever since Hetty had left her, now melted away, and she said, half laughing and half crying:
”Come now, deary, don't be talking nonsense. Nice and fit you'd be to bear with a cottage life after all you've been seeing. Don't you think the gentlefolks would give you up so easily as that. But whenever you want a word of love and a heart to rest your bit of a head upon like this, mind you remember where they're always waiting for you, Hetty.”
Hetty sobbed and clung to her more closely, and it was some time before she could be induced to eat and drink. When she did so the homely meal set before her seemed to her the most delicious she had ever tasted.
”Oh I am so glad I have found my way back to you,” she said; ”I never should have done it if I hadn't got into such trouble. Oh, you don't know how proud and bad I have been! I know I've been bad, now that you are so good to me.”
After about an hour John Kane came back. He had been obliged to wait to put up his horses and see to their wants for the night before he could come home. The message he brought from the Hall was that Hetty must stay where she was till her foot was better, as moving about was so bad for a sprain. Mrs. Enderby would see Mrs. Kane about her to-morrow.
The tiny whitewashed room where she slept that night was the one in which she had slept when a toddling baby, and Hetty wondered at herself as she looked round it thankfully. A patchwork quilt covered the bed, and a flower-pot in the one small window, and some coloured prints on the wall, were its only adornments. But it was extremely clean and neat, and, in spite of the pain in her foot, Hetty felt more content as she laid her head on the coa.r.s.e pillow than she had felt for a great many weeks past.
CHAPTER XII.
A COTTAGE CHILD AGAIN.
Some time pa.s.sed before Hetty saw any of the family at the Hall again.
Mr. Enderby was much displeased at her escapade, and resolved she should be punished. He thought the best way to punish her was to leave her in the care of Mrs. Kane. The hard and lowly living she would have to endure there would, he thought, subdue her pride and teach her to be meek and grateful on her return to a more comfortable home. By his desire Mrs. Enderby refrained from going to see the child. Mrs. Kane was sent for to the Hall and directed to take every care of her charge; but on no account whatever to pamper her.
At first Hetty was startled to find how very ready they were at the Hall to let her completely drop out of their lives, and at times she repined, but on the whole she was happier, and every day seemed to arouse her more and more to a better sense of the duties that lay round her in life, While seated on her old settle she watched Mrs. Kane sweeping and was.h.i.+ng the floor, polis.h.i.+ng up the windows and bits of furniture, and making the humble home s.h.i.+ne. Hetty longed to be able to take broom and scrubbing-brush from her hands and help her with the troublesome work.
When she found that by learning to hold her needle she could help to darn and mend for her dear friend, she eagerly gave her mind to acquiring the necessary knowledge. Books were scarce in John Kane's house, but Hetty did not miss them. At this time of her life all books, except stories, were hateful to her, and she thought she had read enough stories. It became a perfect delight to her to see Mrs. Kane shake out an old flannel jacket and hold it up to the light and declare that Hetty had mended it as well as she could have done it herself. ”And that will save my eyes to-night,” she would say, to Hetty's intense pleasure, who, now for the first time in her young life, tasted the joy of being useful to others.
When her foot was sufficiently better to allow her to limp about, John Kane made her a crutch, and Hetty felt more gladness at receiving this present than Mrs. Rushton's expensive gifts had ever given her. After this she used to hop about the cottage, dusting and polis.h.i.+ng, and doing many little ”turns” which were a great help to Mrs. Kane. She soon knew how to cook the dinner and make the tea, and when Mrs. Kane was busy or had to go out, it was Hetty's delight to have everything ready for her return. To save her black frock from being spoiled by work she had learned to make herself a large gingham blouse, in which she felt free to do anything she pleased without harming her clothes.
In this simple active life Hetty developed a new spirit which surprised herself as much as it astonished her humble friends. She worked in the garden and tended the poultry, besides performing various tasks which she took upon herself indoors. And in this sort of happy industry several weeks flew, almost uncounted, away.
One evening Mrs. Kane and Hetty were sitting at the fire waiting for John to come in. They were both tired after their day's work. Mrs. Kane was sitting in a straw arm-chair and Hetty rested with her feet up on the settle. The little brown tea-pot was on the red tiles by the hearth, and the firelight blinked on the tea-cups.
”Mrs. Kane,” said Hetty, ”will you let me call you mammy?”
”Will I?” said Mrs. Kane. ”To be sure I will, darling, and glad to hear you. But wouldn't mother be a prettier word in your mouth?”
”Phyllis calls Mrs. Enderby mother,” said Hetty, ”and it sounds cold.
Mammy will be a little word of our own.”
”And when you go back to the Hall you will sometimes come to see your old mammy?”
”I think I am going to ask you to let me stay here always,” said Hetty.
”Nay, dear, that wouldn't be right. You've got to get educated and grow up a lady.”
”I could go to the village school,” said Hetty; ”I'm not clever at books, and they could teach me there all I want to learn. When I grow up I might be the village teacher. And you and Mr. Kane could live with me in the school-house when you are old.”
”Bless the child's heart! How she has planned it all out. But don't be thinking of such foolishness, my Hetty. Providence has other doings in store for you.”
One of the happiest things about this time was that Scamp was as welcome in the cottage as Hetty was herself. He slept by the kitchen fire every night, and shared all Hetty's work and play during the daytime. Indeed, nothing could be more satisfactory than the child's life in these days with Mrs. Kane. What in the meantime had become of her extraordinary pride? Love and service seemed to have completely destroyed it.