Part 13 (1/2)
Lilith was unlucky enough to hesitate, ever so slightly. ”Oh, he's got plenty of money,” she a.s.serted.
”She doesn't like to say what he is!”
”I don't care whether I say it or not.”
”A butcher, p'raps, or an undertaker?”
”A butcher! He's got the biggest newspaper in Brisbane!”
”A newspaper! Great Scott! Her uncle keeps a newspaper!”
There was a burst of laughter from those standing round.
Lilith was scarlet now. ”It's nothing to be ashamed of,” she said angrily.
But Lucy of Toorak could not recover from her amus.e.m.e.nt. ”An uncle who keeps a newspaper! A newspaper! Well, I'm glad none of MY uncles are so rummy.--I say, does he leave it at front doors himself in the morning?”
Laura had at first looked pa.s.sively on, well pleased to see another than herself the b.u.t.t of young Lucy's wit. But at this stage of her existence she was too intent on currying favour, to side with any but the stronger party. And so she joined in the boisterous mirth Lilith's admission and Lucy's reception of it excited, and flung her gibes with the rest.
She was pulled up short by a hissing in her ear. ”If you say one word more, I'll tell about the embroidery!”
Laura went pale with fright: she had been in good spirits that day, and had quite forgotten her silly confidence of the night before. Now, the jeer that was on the tip of her tongue hung fire. She could not all at once obliterate her smile--that would have been noticeable; but it grew weaker, stiffer and more unnatural, then gradually faded away, leaving her with a very solemn little face.
From this night on, Lilith Gordon represented a powder-mine, which might explode at any minute.--And she herself had laid the train!
From the outset, Laura had been accepted, socially, by even the most exclusive, as one of themselves; and this, in spite of her n.i.g.g.ardly allowance, her ridiculous clothes. For the child had race in her: in a well-set head, in good hands and feet and ears. Her nose, too, had a very p.r.o.nounced droop, which could stand only for blue blood, or a Hebraic ancestor--and Jews were not received as boarders in the school.
Now, loud as money made itself in this young community, effectual as it was in cloaking shortcomings, it did not go all the way: inherited instincts and traditions were not so easily subdued. Just some of the wealthiest, too, were aware that their antecedents would not stand a close scrutiny; and thus a mighty respect was engendered in them for those who had nothing to fear. Moreover, directly you got away from the vastly rich, cla.s.s distinctions were observed with an exact.i.tude such as can only obtain in an exceedingly mixed society. The three professions alone were sacrosanct. The calling of architect, for example, or of civil engineer, was, if a fortune had not been acc.u.mulated, utterly without prestige; trade, any connection with trade--the merest bowing acquaintance with buying and selling--was a taint that nothing could remove; and those girls who were related to shopkeepers, or, more awful still, to publicans, would rather have bitten their tongues off than have owned to the disgrace.
Yet Laura knew very well that good birth and an aristocratic appearance would not avail her, did the damaging fact leak out that Mother worked for her living. Work in itself was bad enough--how greatly to be envied were those whose fathers did nothing more active than live on their money! But the additional circ.u.mstance of Mother being a woman made things ten times worse: ladies did not work; some one always left them enough to live on, and if he didn't, well, then he, too, shared the ignominy. So Laura went in fear and trembling lest the truth should come to light--in that case, she would be a pariah indeed--went in hourly dread of Lilith betraying her. Nothing, however, happened--at least as far as she could discover--and she sought to propitiate Lilith in every possible way. For the time being, though, anxiety turned her into a porcupine, ready to erect her quills at a touch. She was ever on the look-out for an allusion to her mother's position, and for the slight that was bound to accompany it.
Even the governesses noticed the change in her.
Three of them sat one evening round the fire in Mrs. Gurley's sitting-room, with their feet on the fender. The girls had gone to bed; it was Mrs. Gurley's night off, and as Miss Day was also on leave, the three who were left could draw in more closely than usual. Miss Snodgra.s.s had made the bread into toast--in spite of Miss Chapman's quakings lest Mrs. Gurley should notice the smell when she came in--and, as they munched, Miss Snodgra.s.s related how she had just confiscated a book Laura Rambotham was trying to smuggle upstairs, and how it had turned out that it belonged, not to Laura herself, but to Lilith Gordon.
”She was like a little spitfire about it all the same. A most objectionable child, I call her. It was only yesterday I wanted to look at some embroidery on her ap.r.o.n--a rather pretty new st.i.tch--and do you think she'd let me see it? She jerked it away and glared at me as if she would have liked to eat me. I could have boxed her ears.”
”I never have any trouble with Laura. I don't think you know how to manage her,” said Miss Chapman, and executed a little manoeuvre. She had poor teeth; and, having awaited a moment when Miss Snodgra.s.s's sharp eyes were elsewhere engaged, she surrept.i.tiously dropped the crusts of the toast into her handkerchief.
”I'd be sorry to treat her as you do,” said Miss Snodgra.s.s, and yawned.
”Girls need to be made to sit up nowadays.”
She yawned again, and gazing round the room for fresh food for talk, caught Miss Zielinski with her eye. ”Hullo, Ziely, what are you deep in?” She put her arm round the other's neck, and unceremoniously laid hold of her book. ”You naughty girl, you're at Ouida again! Always got your nose stuck in some trashy novel.”
”DO let me alone,” said Miss Zielinski pettishly, holding fast to the book; but she did not raise her eyes, for they were wet.
”You know you'll count the was.h.i.+ng all wrong again to-morrow, your head'll be so full of that stuff.”