第13章 Miss Westerfield's Education(13)
The child obeyed, trembling.
"You are to go away with me," the school-mistress proceeded, "and to be taught to make yourself useful under my roof."
Syd seemed to be incapable of understanding the fate that was in store for her. She sheltered herself behind her merciless mother.
"I'm going away with you, mamma," she said--"with you and Rick."
Her mother took her by the shoulders, and pushed her across the room to her aunt.
The child looked at the formidable female creature with the man's voice and the green spectacles.
"You belong to me," said Miss Wigger, by way of encouragement, "and I have come to take you away." At those dreadful words, terror shook little Syd from head to foot. She fell on her knees with a cry of misery that might have melted the heart of a savage. "Oh, mamma, mamma, don't leave me behind! What have I done to deserve it? Oh, pray, pray, pray have some pity on me!"
Her mother was as selfish and as cruel a woman as ever lived. But even her hard heart felt faintly the influence of the most intimate and most sacred of all human relationships. Her florid cheeks turned pale. She hesitated.
Miss Wigger marked (through her own green medium) that moment of maternal indecision--and saw that it was time to assert her experience as an instructress of youth.
"Leave it to me," she said to her sister. "You never did know, and you never will know, how to manage children."
She advanced. The child threw herself shrieking on the floor.
Miss Wigger's long arms caught her up--held her--shook her. "Be quiet, you imp!" It was needless to tell her to be quiet. Syd's little curly head sank on the schoolmistress's shoulder. She was carried into exile without a word or a cry--she had fainted.
10.--The School.
Time's march moves slowly, where weary lives languish in dull places.
Dating from one unkempt and unacknowledged birthday to another, Sydney Westerfield had attained the sixth year of her martyrdom at School. In that long interval no news of her mother, her brother, or her stepfather had reached England; she had received no letter, she had not even heard a report. Without friends, and without prospects, Roderick Westerfield's daughter was, in the saddest sense of the word, alone in the world.
The hands of the ugly old clock in the school-room were approaching the time when the studies of the morning would come to an end. Wearily waiting for their release, the scholars saw an event happen which was a novelty in their domestic experience.
The maid-of-all-work audaciously put her head in at the door, and interrupted Miss Wigger conducting the education of the first-class.
"If you please, miss, there's a gentleman--"
Having uttered these introductory words, she was reduced to silence by the tremendous voice of her mistress.
"Haven't I forbidden you to come here in school hours? Go away directly!"
Hardened by a life of drudgery, under conditions of perpetual scolding, the servant stood her ground, and recovered the use of her tongue.
"There's a gentleman in the drawing-room," she persisted. Miss Wigger tried to interrupt her again. "And here's his card!" she shouted, in a voice that was the louder of the two.
Being a mortal creature, the schoolmistress was accessible to the promptings of curiosity. She snatched the card out of the girl's hand.
_Mr. Herbert Linley, Mount Morven, Perthshire._ "I don't know this person," Miss Wigger declared. "You wretch, have you let a thief into the house?"
"A gentleman, if ever I see one yet," the servant asserted.
"Hold your tongue! Did he ask for me? Do you hear?"
"You told me to hold my tongue. No; he didn't ask for you."
"Then who did he want to see?"
"It's on his card."
Miss Wigger referred to the card again, and discovered (faintly traced in pencil) these words: "To see Miss S.W."
The schoolmistress instantly looked at Miss Westerfield. Miss Westerfield rose from her place at the head of her class.
The pupils, astonished at this daring act, all looked at the teacher--their natural enemy, appointed to supply them with undesired information derived from hated books. They saw one of Mother Nature's favorite daughters; designed to be the darling of her family, and the conqueror of hearts among men of all tastes and ages. But Sydney Westerfield had lived for six weary years in the place of earthly torment, kept by Miss Wigger under the name of a school. Every budding beauty, except the unassailable beauty of her eyes and her hair, had been nipped under the frosty superintendence of her maternal aunt. Her cheeks were hollow, her delicate lips were pale; her shabby dress lay flat over her bosom. Observant people, meeting her when she was out walking with the girls, were struck by her darkly gentle eyes, and by the patient sadness of her expression. "What a pity!" they said to each other. "She would be a pretty girl, if she didn't look so wretched and so thin."
At a loss to understand the audacity of her teacher in rising before the class was dismissed, Miss Wigger began by asserting her authority. She did in two words: "Sit down!"
"I wish to explain, ma'am."
"Sit down."
"I beg, Miss Wigger, that you will allow me to explain."
"Sydney Westerfield, you are setting the worst possible example to your class. I shall see this man myself. _Will_ you sit down?"
Pale already, Sydney turned paler still. She obeyed the word of command--to the delight of the girls of her class. It was then within ten minutes of the half hour after twelve--when the pupils were dismissed to the playground while the cloth was laid for dinner.
What use would the teacher make of that half hour of freedom?