Part 16 (1/2)

'You must eat your breakfast properly, Celestina, my dear,' said Mrs.

Fairchild to her little daughter one morning in the following week. 'You will be quite faint and tired before dinner-time if you don't, and that would be a bad beginning.'

Celestina on this set to work once more on her bread and milk. She was too excited to feel hungry; her pale cheeks had each a bright spot of colour and her eyes were s.h.i.+ning. It was the day on which she was to begin her lessons at the Rectory. Miss Neale was to call for her on her way there, and though she had three-quarters of an hour to wait till Miss Neale came, the little girl was sure she would not be ready in time.

'I never saw her so taken up with anything before,' said her mother; and Mr. Fairchild, who was sometimes disposed to take rather a gloomy view of things, said he hoped they should not regret having agreed to the arrangement, and that it would not lead to disappointment, on which Mrs.

Fairchild set to work, as she always did, to cheer him up.

'It will give Celestina a little experience,' she said; 'and even if there should be a little disappointment mixed up with it in any way, it will do her no harm, and Celestina is a reasonable child.'

She was very quiet but very happy as she set off with Miss Neale. It was a bright pleasant morning, 'quite spring-like,' said the young governess, and a walk at that early hour was of itself a pleasure to Celestina. She had not been inside the Rectory since the Vane family had replaced old Dr. Bunton and his wife, and scarcely was the door open when the little girl noticed a difference. The old, heavy, stuffy furniture was gone, and though it was still plain, the house looked lighter and brighter. The schoolroom was a nice little room looking towards the sea; there was a good strong table with a black oil-cloth cover and four hair-seated chairs, such as were much used at that time.

But there were two or three pretty pictures on the walls, and a cottage piano, and in the bookcase were a few bright-coloured tempting volumes as well as the graver-looking school-books. Everything was very neat, and there was a bright fire burning, and in a pot on the window-sill a geranium was growing and evidently flouris.h.i.+ng. To Celestina it was a perfect picture of a schoolroom, and she looked round with the greatest interest as she took off her hat and jacket, according to Miss Neale's directions, and hung them on a peg on the door.

'You must be very neat here, you know, my dear,' she said; to which Celestina meekly replied, 'Oh yes,' quite agreeing with Miss Neale.

In a moment or two the door burst open and in came Biddy. A very pleasant-looking Biddy, with a spotlessly clean ap.r.o.n, tidy hair, and smiling face, and just behind her appeared her mother.

'Good-morning, Miss Neale,' said Mrs. Vane. 'Here is Bridget, whom, you have not seen before. Good-morning, Celestina. I hope you will be two very happy and good little girls, and that Miss Neale will have no trouble with you.'

Then she went on to explain a little about the books Biddy used, saying that Rosalys would look out any that might possibly be missing, and after telling Miss Neale to keep up a good fire and one or two other small directions of the kind, she left the schoolroom.

Everything went on most smoothly. Miss Neale could hardly believe that Bridget was the child she had been warned that she would find 'tiresome and trying and requiring great patience.' For, for once Biddy really did her best. She was interested in finding out how much Celestina knew 'compared with me,' and anxious that neither her little friend nor her new teacher should think her stupid or backward. And though Celestina's habits of steady attention had made her memory better and her knowledge more thorough than Biddy's, still Miss Neale could hardly feel that either of her pupils was more satisfactory than the other; both were so obedient and attentive and intelligent.

So the morning pa.s.sed delightfully.

'And won't it be nice?' said Biddy, as she stood at the gate, whither she had accompanied Miss Neale and Celestina on their way home; 'the day after to-morrow Miss Neale will come back to take us a walk in the afternoon, and you may come too, mamma says, and stay to tea if your mamma will let you.'

How Celestina's eyes sparkled! To be invited to tea at the Rectory seemed to her far more enchanting than if she had received an invitation from the Queen of the Fairies to be present at one of her grandest festivals. She was _so_ delighted that she forgot to speak, and Miss Neale had to answer for her, and say that she would not forget to ask Mrs. Fairchild's consent.

'And some day, Celestina,' Biddy went on, 'I want you to ask your mamma to ask _me_ to tea, for I want to see your dolls.'

Celestina looked rather grave.

'I'll ask mother,' she said, but there was a little hesitation in her manner. This did not come from any false shame--Celestina did not know what false shame was--but from very serious doubts as to what her father and mother would think of it. She had never had any friend to tea in her life; father was always tired in the evening, and she was far from sure that a chattering child like Biddy would not annoy him and make his head ache. So poor Celestina was rather silent and grave on the way home; Biddy's thoughtless proposal had taken the edge off her happiness.

On her way back to the house Bridget met Rosalys.

'Well,' said Alie, 'and how did you get on, Biddy? How do you like your new governess?'

'_Ever_ so much better than Miss Millet,' Biddy replied. Her superhuman exertions had somewhat tired her; she felt rather cross now, and half inclined to quarrel. She knew that Alie was particularly fond of Miss Millet, and she glanced at her curiously as she made her speech. But Alie was a wise little woman.

'I'm so glad,' she said. 'So glad you like Miss Neale, I mean. Of course I knew you'd like Celestina.'

'I don't like her so very much as all that,' said Biddy contradictorily.

'I like her well enough to do lessons with, but she's not very nice about my going there to tea.'

'Going there to tea,' Alie repeated. 'What do you mean, Biddy?'

'Mean what I say. She's coming here to tea two times every week if it's fine, so I think they might 'avite me sometimes, and when I said to her just now I'd like to come, she looked quite funny and only said she'd ask her mother. Not a bit as if she'd like it.'