Notwithstanding. Mary Cholmondeley
with, a very uncertain quantity. She did not know how he would regard that miserable episode, and she decided that she would not take the responsibility of throwing him and Annette together.
Then what was to be done? Mrs. Stoddart had got through her own troubles with such assiduous determination earlier in life that she was now quite at liberty to attend to those of others, and she gave a close attention to Annette's.
She need not have troubled her mind, for Annette was coming towards her up the steep path between the high hedges of flowering geraniums with a sheaf of letters in her hand, and her future neatly mapped out in one of them.
She sat down at Mrs. Stoddart's feet in the dappled shade under the scarlet-flowering pomegranate tree, and they both opened their letters. Annette had time to read her two several times while Mrs. Stoddart selected one after another from her bundle. Presently she gave an exclamation of surprise.
"Mark is on his way here. He will be here directly. Let me see, the Fürstin is due to-morrow or next day. He sends this by the English mail to warn me. He has not been well, overworked, and he is coming out for the sake of the sea-journey and to take me home."
Mrs. Stoddart's shrewd eyes shone. A faint colour came to her thin cheeks.
"Then I shall see him," said Annette. "When he did not come out for Christmas I was afraid I should miss him altogether."
"Does that mean you are thinking of leaving me, Annette?"
"Yes," said Annette, and she took her friend's hand and kissed it. "I have been considering it some time. I am thinking of staying here and setting up as a dressmaker."
"As a dressmaker!" almost gasped Mrs. Stoddart.
"Yes. Why not? My aunt is a very good dressmaker in Paris, and she would help me—at least, she would if it was worth her while. And there is no one here to do anything, and all that exquisite work the peasant women make is wasted on coarse or inferior material. I should get them to do it for me on soft fine nainsook, and make a speciality of summer morning gowns and children's frocks. Every one who comes here would buy a gown of Teneriffe-work from me, and I can fit people quite well. I have a natural turn for it. Look how I can fit myself. You said yesterday that this white gown I have on was perfect."
Mrs. Stoddart could only gaze at her in amazement.
"My dear Annette," she said at last, "you cannot seriously think I would allow you to leave me to become a dressmaker! What have I done that you should treat me like that?"
"You have done everything," said Annette—"more than anyone in the world since I was born—and I have accepted everything—haven't I?—as it was given—freely. But I felt the time was coming when I must find a little hole of my own to creep into, and I thought this dressmaking might do. I would rather not try to live by my voice. It would throw me into the kind of society I knew before. I would rather make a fresh start on different lines. At least, I thought all these things as I came up the path ten minutes ago. But these two letters have shown me that I have a place of my own in the world after all."
She put two black-edged letters into Mrs. Stoddart's hand.
"Aunt Catherine is dead," she said. "You know she has been failing. That was why they went to live in the country."
Mrs. Stoddart took up the letters and gave them her whole attention. Each of the bereaved aunts had written.
"My dear Annette (wrote Aunt Maria, the eldest)—I grieve to tell you that our beloved sister, your Aunt Catherine, died suddenly yesterday, from heart failure. We had hoped that the move to the country undertaken entirely on her account would have been beneficial to her, entailing as it did a great sacrifice on my part who need the inspiration of a congenial literary milieu so much. She had always fancied that she was not well in London, in which belief her doctor encouraged her—very unwisely, as the event has proved. The move, with all the inevitable paraphernalia of such an event, did her harm, as I had feared it would. She insisted on organizing the whole affair, and though she carried it through fairly successfully, except that several of my MSS have been mislaid, the strain had a bad effect on her heart. The doctor said that she ought to have gone away to the seaside while the move was done in her absence. This she declared was quite impossible, and though I wrote to her daily from Felixstowe begging her not to over-fatigue herself, and to superintend the work of others rather than to work herself, there is no doubt that in my absence she did more than she ought to have done. The heart attacks have been more frequent and more severe ever since, culminating in a fatal one on Saturday last. The funeral is to-morrow. Your Aunt Harriet is entirely prostrated by grief, and I may say that unless I summoned all my fortitude I should be in the same condition myself, for of course my beloved sister Catherine and I were united by a very special and uncommon affection, rare even between affectionate sisters.
"I do not hear any more of your becoming a professional singer, and I hope I never shall. I gather that you have not found living with your father quite as congenial as you anticipated. Should you be in need of a home when your tour with Mrs. Stoddart is over, we shall be quite willing that you should return to us; for though the manner of your departure left something to be desired, I have since realized that there was not sufficient scope for yourself and Aunt Catherine in the same house. And now that we are bereaved of her, you would have plenty to occupy you in endeavouring, if such is your wish, to fill her place.—Your affectionate aunt, Maria Nevill."
Mrs. Stoddart took up the second letter.
"My dear Annette—How can I tell you—how can I begin to tell you—of the shattering blow that has fallen upon us? Life can never be the same again. Death has entered our dwelling. Dearest Cathie—your Aunt Catherine—has been taken from us. She was quite well yesterday—at least well for her—at quarter-past seven when she was rubbing my feet, and by seven-thirty she was in a precarious condition. Maria insisted on sending for a doctor, which of course I greatly regretted, realizing as I do full well that the ability to save life is not with them, and that all drugs have only the power in them which we by wrong thought have given to them. However, Maria had her way as always, but our dear sister succumbed before he arrived, so I do not in any way attribute her death to him. We were both with her, each holding one of her dear hands, and the end was quite peaceful. I could have wished for one last word of love, but I do not rebel. Maria feels it terribly, though she always has great self-control. But of course the loss cannot be to her, immersed in her writing, what it is to me, my darling Cathie's constant companion and adviser. We were all in all to each other. What I shall do without her I cannot even imagine. Maria will naturally expect—she always has expected—to find all household matters arranged without any participation on her part. And I am, alas! so feeble that for many years past I have had to confine my aid to that of consolation and encouragement. My sofa has indeed, I am thankful to think, been a centre from which sympathy and love have flowed freely forth. This is as it should be. We invalids live in the lives of others. Their joys are our joys. Their sorrows are our sorrows. How I have rejoiced over your delightful experiences at Teneriffe—the islands of the blest! When it has snowed here, how often I have said to myself, 'Annette is in the sunshine.' And now, dear Annette, I am wondering whether, when you leave Teneriffe, you could make your home with us again for a time. You would find one very loving heart here to welcome you, ever ready with counsel and support for a young girl's troubles and perplexities. I never blamed you for leaving us. I know too well that spirit of adventure, though my lot bids me sternly silence its voice. And, darling child, does it not seem pointed out for you to relinquish this strange idea of being a professional singer for a life to which the call of duty is so plain? I know from experience what a great blessing attends those who give up their own will to live for others. The surrender of the will! That is where true peace and happiness lie, if the young could only believe it.
I will say no more.—With fondest love, your affectionate Aunt Harriet."
"H'm!" said Mrs. Stoddart, "and so the only one of the