The Heart of Una Sackville. Mrs. George de Horne Vaizey
I want to talk to you—I want to do just what you do when you are alone.”
“Scramble through the hedges, and jump the streams, and swing on the gates, and go bird’s-nesting in the hedges?”
She gave a gulp of dismay, but stuck to her guns.
“Y–es! At least, I could try—you could teach me. I’ve learned such a number of things in my life, but I don’t know how to play. That part of my education has been neglected.”
“Wherever did you go to school? What a dreadful place it must have been!”
“I never went to school; I had governesses at home, and I have no brothers nor sisters; I am very much interested in girls of my own age, especially poor girls, and try to work among them, but I am not very successful. They are afraid of me, and I can’t enter into their amusements; but if I could learn to romp and be lively, it might be different.”
It was such a funny thing to ask, and she looked so terribly in earnest over it, that I was simply obliged to laugh.
“Do you mean to say you want to learn to be lively, as a lesson—that you are taking it up like wood-carving or poker-work—for the sake of your class and your influence there?”
She blinked at me like an owl, and said—
“I think, so far as I can judge of my own motives, that that is a truthful statement of the case! I have often wished I knew someone like you—full of life and spirit; but there are not many girls in this neighbourhood, and I met no one suitable until you came. It is a great deal to ask, but if you would spend a little time with me sometimes I should be infinitely grateful.”
“Oh, don’t be grateful, please, until you realise what you have to endure. Nothing worth having can be gained without suffering,” I said solemnly. “I shall lead you a terrible dance, and you must promise implicit obedience. I’m a terrible bully when I get the chance.”
I privately determined that I’d teach her other things besides play, and we agreed to meet next morning at eleven o’clock to take our first walk. Mother was much amused when I told her of our conversation.
“You’ll soon grow tired of her, darling; she is impossibly dull, but a good creature who can do you no harm. You can easily drop her if she bores you too much.”
But I don’t expect to be bored, I expect it will be very amusing.
Next Day.
It was! She was there to meet me with a mushroom hat over her face, looking as solemn as ever, and never in all my life did I see a poor creature work so hard at trying to enjoy herself. She runs like an elephant, and puffs like a grampus; says, “One, two, three,” at the edge of the streams, then gives a convulsive leap, and lands right in the middle of the water. She was splashed from head to foot, and quite pink in the cheeks imagining she was going to be drowned, and in the next hedge her hat caught in a branch, and was literally torn from her head. Then we sat down to consider the situation, and to collect the fallen hairpins from the ground.
She has a great long rope of hair, and she twists and twists and twists it together like a nurse wringing out a fomentation, so I politely offered to fasten it for her, and loosened it out and pulled it up over her forehead, and you wouldn’t believe the difference it made. We found some wild strawberries, and ate them for lunch, and I wreathed the leaves round her head, and when her fingers were nicely stained with the juice, and she looked thoroughly disreputable, I held out the little looking-glass on my chatelaine, and gave her a peep at herself, and said—
“That’s the result of the first lesson! What do you think of the effect on your appearance?”
“I beg your pardon! I’m quite ashamed. What have I been doing?” she cried all in a breath, and up went both hands to drag her hair back, and tear out the leaves, but I caught them in time and held them down.
“Implicit obedience, remember! I like you better as you are. It’s such pretty hair that it’s a sin to hide it away in that tight little knot. Why shouldn’t you look nice if you can?”
That began it, and we had quite a solemn discussion, something like this—
Rachel, solemnly: “It does not matter how we look, so long as our characters are beautiful!”
Una: “Then why was everything on the earth made so beautiful if we were not intended to be beautiful too? How would you like it if everything was just as useful, but looked ugly instead of pretty? When you have the choice of being one or the other it’s very ungrateful to abuse your talent!”
“Beauty a talent! I have always looked upon it as a snare! How many a woman’s life has been spoiled by a lovely face!”
“That’s the abuse of beauty, not the use!” I said, and felt quite proud of myself, for it sounded so grand. “Of course, if you were silly and conceited, it would spoil everything; but if you were nice, you would have far more influence with people. I used to notice that with the pretty girls at school, and, of course, there’s mother—everyone adores her, and feels repaid for any amount of trouble if she will just smile and look pleased.”
“Ah, your mother! But there are not many like her. You spoke of having a choice, but in my own case, for instance, how could I—what could I do?”
“You could look fifty thousand times nicer if you took the trouble. I thought so the first time I saw you, and now I know it. Look in the glass again; would you know yourself for the same girl?”
She peered at herself, and gave a pleased little smirk just like a human being.
“It’s the enjoyment lesson, and the red cheeks—but oh, I couldn’t—I really couldn’t wear my hair like that! It looks so terribly as if I—I wanted to look nice!”
“Well, so you do, don’t you? I do, frightfully! I’d like to be perfectly lovely, and so charming that everyone adored me, and longed to be with me.”
“Ah, that’s different,” she said softly, and her eyes went shiny and she stared straight ahead at nothing, in the way people do who are thinking nice thoughts of their own which they don’t mean you to know. “To be loved is beautiful, but that is different from admiration. We love people for their gifts of mind and heart, not for their appearance.” She meandered on for quite a long time, but I really forget all she said, for I was getting tired of moralising, and wondering what excuse I could make to leave her and fly off home across the fields. Then suddenly came the sound of footsteps at the other side of the stile, and who should come jumping over just before our very faces but Will Dudley himself on his way home to lunch. He stared for a moment, hardly recognising the two hat-less, dishevelled mortals squatted on the grass, and then came forward to shake hands. The funny thing was that he came to me first, and said, “How do you do?” and then just shook hands with Rachel without ever saying a word. She didn’t say anything either, but I could see she was horribly embarrassed, thinking of her hair and the strawberry leaves, and he looked at her and looked again as if he could not understand what had happened.
I thought it would be fun to tell him all about it when we reached the cross-roads, and Rachel left us alone. I was glad she was going another way, because it’s rather a nuisance having a stranger with you when you want to talk, and I knew Mr. Dudley very well by this time. He would be so amused at the idea of the enjoyment lesson. I was looking forward to our talk; but oh, dear, what horrid shocks one does get sometimes! I shall never, never forget my feelings when we got to the corner, and he held out his hand to me—me—Una Sackville, and walked calmly off with Rachel Greaves.
It was not as if he had been going in her direction; his way home was with me, so why on earth should he choose to go off with her? Are they lovers, or friends, or what? Why did he take no notice of her at first, then suddenly become so anxious for her society? It’s not that I care a scrap, but it seemed so rude! I’ve been as cross as two sticks all day. Nothing annoys me more than to be disappointed in my friends!
Eleven o’clock.