CHAPTER VII.
A MORNING WALK
But they slept well in their strange beds, and by morning all their little troubles had disappeared. It was impossible not to suppose that the pets "at home" were making themselves happy, seeing how the sun shone and the sea breezes blew; and Dan, who had reached years of discretion, was evidently disposed to submit himself to circumstances. Having a good view of the back yard, they could see him lolling luxuriously on the warm asphalte, as if he had been accustomed to be chained up, and liked it. Concerning their most pressing anxiety – the rapid manner in which money seemed to melt away, leaving so little to show for it – it was pointed out that at least half the sum expended was for a special purpose, and chargeable to the reserve fund and not to their regular income, from which at present only five pounds had been taken, which was to provide all their living for a week to come.
So they went downstairs in serene and hopeful spirits, and gladdened the eyes of the gentlemen boarders who were standing about the dining-room, devouring the morning's papers while they waited for breakfast. There were three of them, and each placed a chair promptly, and each offered handsomely to resign his newspaper. Elizabeth took an Argus to see what advertisements there were of houses to let; and then Mrs. M'Intyre came in with her coffee-pot and her cheerful face, and they sat down to breakfast. Mrs. M'Intyre was that rare exception to the rule, a boarding-house keeper who had private means as well as the liberal disposition of which the poorest have their share, and so her breakfast was a good breakfast. And the presence of strangers at table was not so unpleasant to our girls on this occasion as the last.
After breakfast they had a solemn consultation, the result being that the forenoon was dedicated to the important business of buying their clothes and finding their way to and from the shops.
"For we must have bonnets," said Patty, "and that immediately. Bonnets, I perceive, are the essential tokens of respectability. And we must never ride in a cab again."
They set off at ten o'clock, escorted by Mrs. M'Intyre, who chanced to be going to the city to do some marketing. The landlady, being a very fat woman, to whom time was precious, took the omnibus, according to custom; but her companions with one consent refused to squander unnecessary threepences by accompanying her in that vehicle. They had a straight road before them all the way from the corner of Myrtle Street to the Fishmarket, where she had business; and there they joined her when she had completed her purchases, and she gave them a fair start at the foot of Collins Street before she left them.
In Collins Street they spent the morning – a bewildering, exciting, anxious morning – going from shop to shop, and everywhere finding that the sum they had brought to spend was utterly inadequate for the purpose to which they had dedicated it. They saw any quantity of pretty soft stuffs, that were admirably adapted alike to their taste and means, but to get them fashioned into gowns seemed to treble their price at once; and, as Patty represented, they must have one, at any rate, that was made in the mode before they could feel it safe to manufacture for themselves. They ended by choosing – as a measure of comparative safety, for thus only could they know what they were doing, as Patty said – three ready-made costumes that took their fancy, the combined cost of which was a few shillings over the ten pounds. They were merely morning dresses of black woollen stuff; lady-like, and with a captivating style of "the world" about them, but in the lowest class of goods of that kind dispensed in those magnificent shops. Of course that was the end of their purchases for the day; the selection of mantles, bonnets, gloves, boots, and all the other little odds and ends on Elizabeth's list was reserved for a future occasion. For the idea of buying anything on twenty-four hours' credit was never entertained for a moment. To be sure, they did ask about the bonnets, and were shown a great number, in spite of their polite anxiety not to give unprofitable trouble; and not one that they liked was less than several pounds in price. Dismayed and disheartened, they "left it" (Patty's suggestion again); and they gave the rest of their morning to the dressmaker, who undertook to remodel the bodices of the new gowns and make them fit properly. This fitting was not altogether a satisfactory business, either; for the dressmaker insisted that a well-shaped corset was indispensable – especially in these days, when fit was everything – and they had no corsets and did not wish for any. She was, however, a dressmaker of decision and resource, and she sent her assistant for a bundle of corsets, in which she encased her helpless victims before she would begin the ripping and snipping and pulling and pinning process. When they saw their figures in the glass, with their fashionable tight skirts and unwrinkled waists, they did not know themselves; and I am afraid that Patty and Eleanor, at any rate, were disposed to regard corsets favourably and to make light of the discomfort they were sensibly conscious of in wearing them. Elizabeth, whose natural shape was so beautiful – albeit she is destined, if the truth must be told, to be immensely stout and heavy some day – was not seduced by this specious appearance. She ordered the dressmaker, with a quiet peremptoriness that would have become a carriage customer, to make the waists of the three gowns "free" and to leave the turnings on; and she took off the borrowed corset, and drew a long breath, inwardly determining never to wear such a thing again, even to have a dress fitted – fashion or no fashion.
It was half-past twelve by this time, and at one o'clock Mrs. M'Intyre would expect them in to lunch. They wanted to go home by way of those green enclosures that Paul Brion had told them of, and of which they had had a glimpse yesterday – which the landlady had assured them was the easiest thing possible. They had but to walk right up to the top of Collins Street, turn to the right, where they would see a gate leading into gardens, pass straight through those gardens, cross a road and go straight through other gardens, which would bring them within a few steps of Myrtle Street – a way so plain that they couldn't miss it if they tried. Ways always do seem so to people who know them. Our three girls were self-reliant young women, and kept their wits about them very creditably amid their novel and distracting surroundings. Nevertheless they were at some loss with respect to this obvious route. Because, in the first place, they didn't know which was the top of Collins Street and which the bottom.
"Dear me! we shall be reduced to the ignominious necessity of asking our way," exclaimed Eleanor, as they stood forlornly on the pavement, jostled by the human tide that flowed up and down. "If only we had Paul Brion here."
It was very provoking to Patty, but he was there. Being a small man, he did not come into view till he was within a couple of yards of them, and that was just in time to overhear this invocation. His ordinarily fierce aspect, which she had disrespectfully likened to that of Dan when another terrier had insulted him, had for the moment disappeared. The little man showed all over him the pleased surprise with which he had caught the sound of his own name.
"Have you got so far already?" he exclaimed, speaking in his sharp and rapid way, while his little moustache bristled with such a smile as they had not thought him capable of. "And – and can I assist you in any way?"
Elizabeth explained their dilemma; upon which he declared he was himself going to East Melbourne (whence he had just come, after his morning sleep and noontide breakfast), and asked leave to escort them thither. "How fortunate we are!" Elizabeth said, turning to walk up the street by his side; and Eleanor told him he was like his father in the opportuneness of his friendly services. But Patty was silent, and raged inwardly.
When they had traversed the length of the street, and were come to the open space before the Government offices, where they could fall again into one group, she made an effort to get rid of him and the burden of obligation that he was heaping upon them.
"Mr. Brion," she began impetuously, "we know where we are now quite well – "
"I don't think you do," he interrupted her, "seeing that you were never here before."
"Our landlady gave us directions – she made it quite plain to us. There is no necessity for you to trouble yourself any further. You were not going this way when we met you, but exactly in the opposite direction."
"I am going this way now, at any rate," he said, with decision. "I am going to show your sisters their way through the gardens. There are a good many paths, and they don't all lead to Myrtle Street."
"But we know the points of the compass – we have our general directions," she insisted angrily, as she followed him helplessly through the gates. "We are not quite idiots, though we do come from the country."
"Patty," interposed Elizabeth, surprised, "I am glad of Mr. Brion's kind help, if you are not."
"Patty," echoed Eleanor in an undertone, "that haughty spirit of yours will have a fall some day."
Patty felt that it was having a fall now. "I know it is very kind of Mr. Brion," she said tremulously, "but how are we to get on and do for ourselves if we are treated like children – I mean if we allow ourselves to hang on to other people? We should make our own way, as others have to do. I don't suppose you had anyone to lead you about when you first came to Melbourne" – addressing Paul.
"I was a man," he replied. "It is a man's business to take care of himself."
"Of course. And equally it is a woman's business to take care of herself – if she has no man in her family."
"Pardon me. In that case it is the business of all the men with whom she comes in contact to take care of her – each as he can."
"Oh, what nonsense! You talk as if we lived in the time of the Troubadours – as if you didn't know that all that stuff about women has had its day and been laughed out of existence long ago."
"What stuff?"
"That we are helpless imbeciles – a sort of angelic wax baby, good for nothing but to look pretty. As if we were not made of the same substance as you, with brains and hands – not so strong as yours, perhaps, but quite strong enough to rely upon when necessary. Oh!" exclaimed Patty, with a fierce gesture, "I do so hate that man's cant about women – I have no patience with it!"
"You must have been severely tried," murmured Paul (he was beginning to think the middle Miss King a disagreeable person, and to feel vindictive towards her). And Eleanor laughed cruelly, and said, "Oh, no, she's got it all out of books."
"A great mistake to go by books," said he, with the air of a father. "Experience first – books afterwards, Miss Patty." And he smiled coolly into the girl's flaming face.
CHAPTER VIII.
AN INTRODUCTION TO MRS. GRUNDY
Patty and her sisters very nearly had their first quarrel over Paul Brion. Patty said he was impertinent and patronising, that he presumed upon their friendless position to pay them insulting attentions – that, in short, he was a detestable young man whom she, for one, would have nothing more to do with. And she warned Elizabeth, in an hysterical, high-pitched voice, never to invite him into their house unless she wished to see her (Patty) walk out of it. Elizabeth, supported by Eleanor, took up the cudgels in his defence, and assured Patty, kindly, but with much firmness, that he had behaved with dignity and courtesy under great provocation to do otherwise. They also pointed out that he was his father's representative; that it would be ungracious and unladylike to reject the little services that it was certainly a pleasure to him to render, and unworthy of them to assume an independence that at present they were unable to support. Which was coming as near to "words" as was possible for them to come, and much nearer than any of them desired. Patty burst into tears at last, which was the signal for everything in the shape of discord and division to vanish. Her sisters kissed and fondled her, and assured her that they sympathised with her anxiety to be under obligations to nobody from the bottom of their hearts; and Patty owned that she had been captious and unreasonable, and consented to forgive her enemy for what he hadn't done and to be civil to him in future.
And, as the days wore on, even she grew to be thankful for Paul Brion, though, of course, she would never own to it. Their troubles were many and various, and their helpless ignorance more profound and humiliating than they could have believed possible. I will not weary the reader by tracing the details of the process by which they became acquainted with the mode and cost of living "as other people do," and with the ways of the world in general; it would be too long a story. How Patty discovered that the cleverest fingers cannot copy a London bonnet without some previous knowledge of the science of millinery; how she and her sisters, after supplying themselves grudgingly with the mere necessaries of a modern outfit, found that the remainder of their "furniture money," to the last pound note, was spent; how, after weary trampings to and fro in search of a habitable house in a wholesome neighbourhood, they learned the ruinous rates of rent and taxes and (after much shopping and many consultations with Mrs. M'Intyre) the alarming prices of furniture and provisions; how they were driven to admit, in spite of Patty, that that landlady on the premises, whom Eleanor had declared was not to be thought of, might be a necessary safeguard against worse evils; and how they were brought to ask each other, in surprise and dismay, "Is it possible that we are poor people after all, and not rich, as we supposed?" – all these things can be better imagined than described. Suffice it to say, they passed through much tribulation and many bitter and humbling experiences during the early months of their sojourn in Melbourne; but when at last they reached a comparatively safe haven, and found themselves once more secure under their own control, able to regulate their needs and their expenditure, and generally to understand the conditions and possibilities of their position, Elizabeth and Eleanor made a solemn declaration that they were indebted for this happy issue to the good offices and faithful friendship of Paul Brion alone, and Patty – though she turned up her nose and said "Pooh!" – though she hated to be indebted to him, or to anybody – agreed with them.
They settled down to their housekeeping by very slow degrees. For some time they stayed with Mrs. M'Intyre, because there really seemed nothing else to do that was at all within their means; and from this base of operations they made all those expeditions of inquiry into city habits and customs, commercial and domestic, which were such conspicuous and ignominious failures. As the sense of their helplessness grew upon them, they grudgingly admitted the young man (who was always at hand, and yet never intruded upon or pestered them) to their counsels, and accepted, without seeming to accept, his advice; and the more they condescended in this way the better they got on. Gradually they fell into the habit of depending on him, by tacit consent – which was the more easy to do because, as his father had promised, he did not presume upon their confidence in him. He was sharp and brusque, and even inclined to domineer – to be impertinent, as Patty called it – when they did submit their affairs to his judgment; but not the smallest suspicion of an unauthorised motive for his evident devotion to their interests appeared in his face, or voice, or manner, which were those of the man of business, slightly suggesting occasionally the imperious and impartial "nearest male relative." They grew to trust him – for his father's sake, they said, but there was nothing vicarious about it; and that they had the rare fortune to be justified in doing so, under such unlikely circumstances, made up to them for whatever ill luck they might otherwise have seemed to encounter in these days. It was he who finally found them their home, after their many futile searches – half a house in their own street and terrace, vacated by the marriage and departure to another colony of the lady who played the piano that was out of tune. No. 6, it appeared, had been divided into flats; the ground floor was occupied by the proprietor, his wife, and servant; and the upper, which had a gas stove and other kitchen appliances in a back room, was let unfurnished for £60 a year. Paul, always poking about in quest of opportunities, heard of this one and pounced upon it. He made immediate inquiries into the character and antecedents of the landlord of No. 6, the state of the drains and chimneys, and paint and paper, of the house; and, having satisfied himself that it was as nearly being what our girls wanted as anything they would be likely to find, called upon Elizabeth, and advised her to secure it forthwith. The sisters were just then adding up their accounts – taking stock of their affairs generally – and coming to desperate resolutions that something must be done; so the suggested arrangement, which would deliver them from bondage and from many of their worst difficulties, had quite a providential opportuneness about it. They took the rooms at once – four small rooms, including the improvised kitchen – and went into them, in defiance of Mrs. M'Intyre's protestations, before they had so much as a bedstead to sleep upon; and once more they were happy in the consciousness that they had recovered possession of themselves, and could call their souls their own. Slowly, bit by bit, the furniture came in – the barest necessaries first, and then odds and ends of comfort and prettiness (not a few of them discovered by Paul Brion in out-of-the-way places, where he "happened" to be), until the new little home grew to look as homelike as the old one. They sent for the bureau and the piano, which went a long way towards furnishing the sitting-room; and they bought a comfortable second-hand table and some capacious, cheap, wickerwork chairs; and they laid a square of matting on the floor, and made some chintz curtains for the window, and turned a deal packing-case into an ottoman, and another into a set of shelves for their books; and over all these little arrangements threw such an air of taste, such a complexion of spotless cleanliness and fastidious neatness, as are only seen in the homes of "nice" women, that it takes nice people to understand the charm of.
One day, when their preparations for regular domestic life were fairly completed, Patty, tired after a long spell of amateur carpentering, sat down to the piano to rest and refresh herself. The piano had been tuned on its arrival in Melbourne; and the man who tuned it had stared at her when she told him that it had been made to her mother's order, and showed him the famous name above the key-board. He would have stared still more had he heard what kind of magic life she could summon into the exquisite mechanism boxed up in that poor-looking deal case. All the sisters were musicians, strange to say; taught by their mother in the noble and simple spirit of the German school, and inheriting from her the sensitive ear and heart to understand the dignity and mystery, if not the message (which nobody understands) of that wonderful language which begins where words leave off. To "play the piano" was no mere conventional drawing-room performance with them, as they themselves were no conventional drawing-room misses; a "piece" of the ordinary pattern would have shocked their sense of art and harmony almost as much as it might have shocked Mozart and Mendelssohn, and Schubert and Schumann, and the other great masters whose pupils they were; while to talk and laugh, either when playing or listening, would have been to them like talking and laughing over their prayers. But, of the three, Patty was the most truly musical, in the serious meaning of the word, inasmuch as her temperament was warmer than those of her sisters, her imagination more vivid, her senses generally more susceptible to delicate impressions than theirs. The "spirits of the air" had all their supernatural power over her receptive and responsive soul, and she thrilled like an Æolian harp to the west wind under the spell of those emotions that have no name or shape, and for which no imagery supplies a comparison, which belong to the ideal world, into which those magic spirits summon us, and where the sacred hours of our lives – the sweetest, the saddest, the happiest – are spent.
To-day she sat down, suddenly prompted by the feeling that she was fagged and tired, and began to play mechanically a favourite Beethoven sonata; but in five minutes she had played her nerves to rest, and was as steeped in dreams as the great master himself must have been when he conceived the tender passages that only his spiritual ears could hear. Eleanor, who had been sewing industriously, by degrees let her fingers falter and her work fall into her lap; and Elizabeth, who had been arranging the books in the new book-shelves, presently put down her duster to come and stand behind the music-stool, and laid her large, cool hands on Patty's head. None of them spoke for some time, reverencing the Presence in their quiet room; but the touch of her sister's palms upon her hair brought the young musician out of her abstractions to a sense of her immediate surroundings again. She laid her head back on Elizabeth's breast and drew a long sigh, and left off playing. The gesture said, as plainly as words could have said it, that she was relieved and revived – that the spirit of peace and charity had descended upon her.
"Elizabeth," she said presently, still keeping her seat on the music-stool, and stroking her cheek with one of her sister's hands while she held the other round her neck, "I begin to think that Paul Brion has been a very good friend to us. Don't you?"
"I am not beginning," replied Elizabeth. "I have thought it every day since we have known him. And I have wondered often how you could dislike him so much."
"I don't dislike him," said Patty, quite amiably.
"I have taken particular notice," remarked Eleanor from the hearthrug, "and it is exactly three weeks since you spoke to him, and three weeks and five days since you shook hands."
Patty smiled, not changing her position or ceasing to caress her cheek with Elizabeth's hand. "Well," she said, "don't you think it would be a graceful thing to ask him to come and have tea with us some night? We have made our room pretty" – looking round with contentment – "and we have all we want now. We might get our silver things out of the bureau, and make a couple of little dishes, and put some candles about, and buy a bunch of flowers – for once – what do you say, Nelly? He has never been here since we came in – never farther than the downstairs passage – and wouldn't it be pleasant to have a little house warming, and show him our things, and give him some music, and – and try to make him enjoy himself? It would be some return for what he has done for us, and his father would be pleased."
That she should make the proposition – she who, from the first, had not only never "got on" with him, but had seemed to regard him with active dislike – surprised both her sisters not a little; but the proposition itself appeared to them, as to her, to have every good reason to recommend it. They thought it a most happy idea, and adopted it with enthusiasm. That very evening they made their plans. They designed the simple decorations for their little room, and the appropriate dishes for their modest feast. And, when these details had been settled, they remembered that on the following night no Parliament would be sitting, which meant that Paul would probably come home early (they knew his times of coming and going, for he was back at his old quarters now, having returned in consequence of the departure of the discordant piano, and to oblige Mrs. M'Intyre, he said); and that decided them to send him his invitation at once. Patty, while her complaisant mood was on her, wrote it herself before she went to bed, and gave it over the garden railing to Mrs. M'Intyre's maid.
In the morning, as they were asking which of them should go to town to fetch certain materials for their little fête, they heard the door bang and the gate rattle at No. 7, and a quick step that they knew. And the slavey of No. 6 came upstairs with Paul Brion's answer, which he had left as he passed on his way to his office. The note was addressed to "Miss King," whose amanuensis Patty had carefully explained herself to be when writing her invitation.
"MY DEAR MISS KING, – You are indeed very kind, but I fear I must deny myself the pleasure you propose – than which, I assure you, I could have none greater. If you will allow me, I will come in some day with Mrs. M'Intyre, who is very anxious to see your new menage. And when I come, I hope you will let me hear that new piano, which is such an amazing contrast to the old one. – Believe me, yours very truly,
"PAUL BRION."
This was Paul Brion's note. When the girls had read it, they stood still and looked at each other in a long, dead silence. Eleanor was the first to speak. Half laughing, but with her delicate face dyed in blushes, she whispered under her breath, "Oh – oh, don't you see what he means?"
"He is quite right – we must thank him," said Elizabeth, gentle as ever, but grave and proud. "We ought not to have wanted it – that is all I am sorry for."
But Patty stood in the middle of the room, white to the lips, and beside herself with passion. "That we should have made such a mistake! – and for him to rebuke us!" she cried, as if it were more than she could bear. "That I should have been the one to write that letter! Elizabeth, I suppose he is not to blame – "
"No, my dear – quite the contrary."
"But, all the same, I will never forgive him," said poor Patty in the bitterness of her soul.