Part 22 (1/2)
Breakfast pa.s.sed over without anything being said on the subject of the great discovery; but after the meal was finished, Miss Davis desired Hetty to fetch her her drawings that she might see them. Hetty went to her own room immediately, and returned bringing about a dozen drawings in a very primitive portfolio made of several newspapers gummed together.
Miss Davis was no artist, but she felt that the designs were good, and remarkable as having been executed by a girl so untaught as Hetty. They increased her opinion of her pupil's abilities, yet she looked on them chiefly from the point of view Phyllis had suggested to her, and considered them in the light of follies upon which valuable time had been expended.
”My dear,” she said, ”these are really very pretty, and I am sure they have given you a great deal of pleasure. But I cannot countenance your going on with this sort of employment. Think of how usefully you might have employed at your books the hours you have spent upon these trifles.
I presume you were aware of this from the first yourself, and that this is why you have been so silent as to your new accomplishment.”
”No,” said Hetty decidedly; ”I did not feel that I was wasting time. On the contrary, my drawing gave me better courage to work at my lessons.
The hours I spent were taken from my sleep. I was always at my books before Phyllis was at hers.”
”Phyllis is not to be made a rule for you, my dear. She has not the same necessity to exert her powers to the utmost. If you can do without part of your sleeping time, you ought to devote it to your books. And pray, if you did not think you were committing some fault, why did you say nothing to anyone of what you were about?”
”I cannot tell you that, Miss Davis,” said Hetty, her eyes filling with tears; ”I mean I cannot explain it properly. I could not bring myself to show what I had done; but I had no idea of _wrongness_ about the matter.”
”Well, my dear, we will say no more about it. Take the drawings away; and in future work at your lessons every moment of your time. I will put you on your word of honour, Hetty, not to do any more of this kind of thing.”
”Do not ask me to give you such a promise, Miss Davis.”
”But Hetty, I must, and I do.”
”Then, Miss Davis, I will speak to Mr. Enderby.”
The governess and her two pupils gazed at Hetty in amazement.
”I mean,” Hetty went on, ”that I hope he will think drawing a useful study for me. Will you allow me to speak to him this evening, Miss Davis?”
”Certainly, my dear,” said Miss Davis stiffly. ”There is nothing to hinder you from consulting Mr. Enderby on any subject. I am sure he will be kind enough to give you his advice. Only I think I know what it will be beforehand; and I would rather you had shown more confidence in me.”
Hetty could not give her mind to her lessons that day, nor get rid of the feeling that she was in disgrace. When evening came, the hour when Mr. Enderby was usually to be found in his study, she asked Miss Davis's permission to go to him, and with her portfolio in her hand presented herself at his door.
”Come in, Hetty,” said Mr. Enderby; ”what is this you have got to show me? Maps, plans, or what? Why, drawings!”
Hetty's mouth grew dry, and her heart beat violently. The tone of his voice betrayed that the master of Wavertree had no more sympathy for art, or anything connected with it, than had Miss Davis. He was an accurate methodical man with a taste for mathematics, who believed in the power conferred by knowledge on man and woman; but who had little respect for those who concerned themselves with only the beauties and graces of life. Art was to him a trifle, and devotion to it a folly.
Therefore Hetty with her trembling hopes was not likely to find favour at his hands.
”My child, I am sure they are very pretty; but this sort of thing will not advance you in the world.”
”But, Mr. Enderby,--I have been thinking--artists get on as well as governesses. I do these more easily than I learn my dates. If I could only learn to be an artist.”
Mr. Enderby put his eye-gla.s.s to his eye, and gazed at her a little pityingly, a little severely, with a look that Hetty knew.
”You would like to become an artist? Well, my girl, I must tell you to put that foolish idea out of your head. In the first place, you are not to imagine that because you can sketch a flower prettily, you have therefore a genius for painting; and such fancies are only calculated to distract your mind from the real business of your life. Besides, remember this, I have given, am giving, you a good education as a means of providing for you in life. Having bestowed one profession upon you already, I am not prepared to enter into the expense and inconvenience of a second. So run away like a sensible girl and stick to your books.
You had better leave these drawings with me and think no more about them.”
Saying this, Mr. Enderby opened a drawer and locked up Hetty's designs within it; and, humbled and despairing, Hetty returned to the school-room.
Her face of grief and her empty hands told sufficiently what the result of her errand had been. No remark was made by Miss Davis or the girls, though Nell, who thought the drawings wonderfully pretty, was impatient to know what her papa had said of them. She was too much in awe of Miss Davis to seek to have her curiosity gratified just then; and the evening study went on as if nothing had happened.