My Heart's in the Highlands
Copyright© 2024 by Amy Le Feuvre
Chapter 2: A New Friend
“Is not making others happy the best happiness?”
Amiel.
“MY dear Geraldine, what is the matter? Your face is a yard long. Have you had bad news?”
Mrs. Arbuthnot looked up from her letters and sighed.
She and Rowena were at breakfast. It was a lovely morning in June. The windows were open, a sweet brier bush outside was scenting the room with its fragrance.
“Madge is going to be married almost immediately.”
“Three cheers for Madge! If I had a sister, and a sister who has been engaged for five years, I should be overjoyed at the event.”
“Oh, I am glad for her sake, of course; but I have had four sheets from her showing me how impossible it is for mother to live alone, and imploring me to take the children and make Whitecroft my home.”
“A most sensible arrangement. It is a roomy old house, and nearer town than this is. You will be very happy there, my dear!”
“I like a house of my own. I have always had it.”
“Yes, but your mother is a dear, gentle, old lady. Madge always ran the house, and you can do the same.”
Geraldine sighed again.
“I hate changes, and Madge is going to be married in a fortnight and going straight out to the Cape with Frank, and she wants me to pack up my things and go to mother the end of this month.”
“Sir Arthur will let you off the rent of this, and nowadays he will have no trouble in getting another tenant. I would take it on myself if I had enough money.”
“But you will be with us, of course.”
Mrs. Arbuthnot raised a startled face to her sister-in-law.
Rowena swung herself up on the low window-ledge, and sat there with her hands in her pockets, and her feet swinging to and fro. She whistled softly to herself, but did not speak for a minute, and Mrs. Arbuthnot repeated her words:
“You will come with us? I am not going to part with you.”
“My dear Geraldine, leave me out of the question. Your first thought is your mother, and being what she is, and having no other children to look after her, I consider it is your bounden duty to go to her. Make up your mind to it. Whitecroft is a sweet home, and it is your mother’s own, and too big for her to live in alone. That point is quite clear, and now when is the wedding, and what are you going to wear?”
The question of clothes brought a smile to Mrs. Arbuthnot’s lips. She began to see sunshine again; and after she was thoroughly reconciled to her duty which lay before her, Rowena left her to write her letters, and went off out of the house and along the lanes with swift light steps.
Once she knitted her brows, and murmured:
“It’s a game of see-saw. Geraldine will go up, as far as comfort in her surroundings go, and I shall go down. What a darling Ted was to leave me enough to stave off starvation! But it won’t give me a home. And I must have a roof over my head. And to think that only a few weeks ago I scoffed in my heart at Mrs. Burke’s offer. The bread of dependence is not palatable, but it must be munched and eaten by you, my dear Rowena, and the sooner you settle it the better.”
The three miles to Minley Court seemed of no account to Rowena. She was a good walker, and was too deep in thought to notice any details by the way. She found Mrs. Burke in her morning-room, and it was a propitious moment for her request. The impatient lady was seated at her writing-desk; letters and papers were fluttering all round her, and as she turned to greet Rowena, she swept a packet of papers upon the carpet with her elbow.
“Thank goodness, somebody has arrived to distract me from this chaos! Come out upon the terrace, and I will enjoy a cigarette if you will not join me. I have the car coming round in half an hour, I am going to the Fletchers. May I take you with me? They’re charming people, and you ought to know them. He’s a retired admiral, and she’s a daughter of Lord Gallway.”
“I’m afraid I must return home quickly. I have come on business this time, and will get to it at once. Do you remember you were good enough to ask me the other day if I would be your companion-secretary, and I told you how impossible it was for me to leave my sister-in-law and her children? Well, circumstances are changed. She is giving up her house and going to live with her mother in Berkshire, and I am not going with her. I couldn’t: a mixed household is a mistake, so I am on my own, and able to do what I like. If your offer still holds good, I would like to accept it.”
“You will? My dear girl, that’s the best bit of news I have had for a long time! I shall be enchanted to have you. I feel inclined to plant you at my desk now, and start you at that infernal—well, we’ll say unpleasant—mass of letters and bills. It’s an accumulation of a couple of months. I never can overtake it. Why is the art of begging, and dunning, and boring, made so easy to all of us? When will you come to me? To-morrow?”
“Indeed no, but in another week or two.”
“I suppose I shall have to wait your time. Now we must settle your salary. Will two hundred pounds suffice? Remember, it will be an arduous post, for I drive every one about me they say. My days are overfull, and I shall expect you to be at my beck and call for a good many hours I am afraid.”
Rowena laughed.
“Your salary is munificent, and I am not afraid of work. I shall get a little quiet time to myself in and out. Thank you very much. Then it is settled. I should love to tidy up your papers to-day, but I must be getting back. Will you expect me this day fortnight?”
“You’re too good for the post,” said Mrs. Burke, putting her hand on her shoulder affectionately. “I shall pretend you’re a sort of daughter, but daughters nowadays wouldn’t do their mother’s dirty work, would they? Oh, I’m delighted to have you. There’s something so restful and dependable in your face, and you do enjoy a joke! I hate these stuffy solid folk who open their eyes widely, and think one a lunatic if one indulges in a bit of fun. Good-bye, if you must go, and I’ll give you the second best spare room; it’s sunny, and bright, like yourself.”
Rowena marched home feeling she had burnt her boats, and wondering why she had such pride of heart as to mentally squirm at the thought of her future.
“An empty purse and high head don’t harmonize,” she said to herself. “I must consider that I’m benefiting one of my fellow-creatures by becoming one of her dependants, and I shall have a chance of getting beneath her outer crust. There’s something I don’t understand in her composition. She’s too sensible to be so frivolous.”
When Mrs. Arbuthnot was informed of Rowena’s plans, she was very perturbed and vexed.
“I have a great mind to refuse to go to mother. What shall I do without you? It’s cruel of you! You’re like a bit of Ted left to me—and the house is big enough for you, and mother would be charmed to have you.”
“It can’t be done,” said Rowena firmly. “Ask me to pay you a visit sometimes.”
“Oh, if Mrs. Burke gets you into her clutches, she will never let you go! I wish you had never met her. She’s like an octopus for drawing all the best into her nets. I cannot see her attractiveness. To me she’s thorough bad style, and you’ll lead a most rackety life, and will never be able to call a moment your own!”
Rowena could not comfort her. Happily, there was so much to do and arrange that it took away her thoughts from their parting. She arranged to go to her mother before the wedding, and the little house was dismantled and bare within the prescribed fortnight. Rowena was the last to leave it, and when she eventually drove off to Minley Court in the car sent for her with her luggage packed up behind, she felt as if this second rooting up of her life was a very black and gloomy performance. But she arrived at her new home with a cheerful countenance. She found Di and Vi Dunstan with Mrs. Burke.
“We feel so deadly when the hunting is off,” said Vi. “Mrs. Burke is our only cheer. We are trying to concoct a few new games for her next garden-party. Come and help us with your wit!”
“You’re going to have diggings here, aren’t you?” questioned Di. “Good for you. I’d like the job myself.”
“Miss Arbuthnot’s job is not going to be an easy one,” said Mrs. Burke with her jolly laugh. “She’s going to supply all my deficiencies, and run me and my household in a more orthodox fashion.”
“Oh, dash orthodoxy!” cried Vi. “How I loathe the word, as bad as conventionality and propriety, and all the rest of the prudisms and prisms!”
Rowena had to sit down then and there and discuss seriously whether a game of hare and hounds, in which the hare was to trail the contents of scent sachets or scent bottles behind him, could take place in the grounds of Minley Court.
“We’ll have six hares, all men, and ladies must be the hounds, and one might use pepper as his scent, and another onions; and another might scatter rose-leaves behind him—nothing like variety! It will be topping!”
It was difficult for Rowena to show much interest in their childishness, but Mrs. Burke took pity on her. “Come on up to your room, and we’ll leave you in peace till tea comes. Vi and Di are quite equal to organizing their own schemes.”
So Rowena followed Mrs. Burke up the old staircase along a very broad corridor, until they came to the room prepared for her.
It was, as Mrs. Burke had told her, one of the brightest rooms in the house, and looked, in its dainty dimity coverings, very cool and sweet.
Rowena glanced at the comfortable chairs and couch, and at the charming writing-table in one window.
“My dear Mrs. Burke,” she said gaily, “how can I thank you for indulging me so? I hope this luxury will not unfit me for my duties.”
“Duty is never mentioned in my house,” said Mrs. Burke, putting her hands on both her shoulders and suddenly stooping and giving her a quick warm kiss on her cheek. “We slip along as we like, and pick up what fragments of necessary work we can, just to prevent the house tumbling to pieces. You’ll work, and I’ll continue to play, but I shan’t work you hard, and I warn you that you must suffer gladly continual interruption. To-day you are to be my guest; to-morrow you can tackle my correspondence.”
“Thank you, then I’ll take this hour before tea to settle my belongings, and congratulate myself upon such a role!”
Mrs. Burke left her. When she joined her young friends again, she said:
“I’m in luck’s way at last. I can’t think why she has not married!”
“There’s time yet,” said Di laconically; “there’s a reaction set in, now there are no more embryo heroes to be wed. There aren’t many sound able men just now, plenty of boys, but they’ll keep.”
“You always go for a fresh pal like hot bricks!” said Vi. “She isn’t a bad sort, this Miss Arbuthnot, but she’s hardly one of us. I see something more solid in her face than her first appearance would warrant. Her eyes make you think she’s out for larks, but there’s a twist to her lips that shows she’s a quizzer!”
“I like her,” Mrs. Burke asserted stoutly, “and you’ll like her too when you know her better.”
Rowena was relieved when she came down to tea to find that the Miss Dunstans had taken their departure. She and Mrs. Burke were alone, and they had tea under the rose pergola at the end of the terrace.
“There’s one thing I want to ask you,” said Rowena presently; “and that is if I may have Sunday to myself? I don’t care how hard I work in the week, but I should like to feel free on Sunday.”
Mrs. Burke looked at her rather curiously.
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