Part 5, Chapter XXXIII
Haunted
“And ghosts unseen
Crept in between
And marred our harmony.”
Part 5, Chapter XXXIV
School
“Ring out, wild bells, to the wild sky.”
The bells of Saint Michael’s Church were ringing a joyous peal as Violante set foot in Oxley. There had been a wedding in the morning, and the bells were honouring the bride with a final peal, as the sun sank low in the clear, cold sky and the wintry moon rose white against the rosy sunset. Below, people stamped through the street, and the horses’ hoofs sounded sharply on the hard road. The lamps flashed out one by one, the outlines of the buildings were still visible.
“That is the Bank,” said Flossy, as they drove past.
Violante looked, and saw the handsome white building, already closed for the night, and the dark red house beside it where one light showed in an upstair window. She was too much bewildered to care to speculate about it. They passed out of the town along the road, with its pretty villas with cheerful lights shining from the windows, past the nursery-gardens and scattered cottages, beyond which, the last house in the borough of Oxley, stood Oxley Manor.
“Here we are,” said Flossy, brightly. “We shall be just in time for some tea. Ah, how d’ye do, Anne,” to the servant that opened the door. “Yes; half-a-crown, that’s right. This is Miss Mattei’s luggage. Come in, signorina! Well, Mary, here she is.”
And Violante found herself warmly and kindly greeted and led into a pleasantly-lighted drawing-room, while Miss Venning enquired for her aunt and cousins.
“They are quite well, signora,” said Violante, in her soft, liquid voice. She felt shy, but then she was not expected to do anything but speak when she was spoken to, and, being confiding as well as timid, she warmed at once to a kind word.
“Give them some tea, Clarissa,” said Miss Venning. “They have had a very cold journey, and then Miss Mattei can take off her things before the school tea.”
“We arrived to the sound of wedding bells. For Ada Morrison, I suppose?” said Flossy.
“Yes; it has made quite an auspicious beginning for you, my dear,” to Violante.
“That is pleasant,” said Violante, shyly.
“Yes; a good beginning is half-way to a good ending. So remember that, my dear, in all your work,” said Miss Venning, sonorously.
“Now come with me,” said Florence, “and I will introduce you to Edith Robertson. She teaches the little ones English and drawing and learns the higher branches.”
Whether Violante had much idea of what fruit might grow in this lofty situation may be doubted, but she followed Flossy to a large room, brightly lit with gas, where, what Violante afterwards described to Rosa as “as many girls as there are singers in a chorus,” were enjoying the leisure of recent arrival after the holidays. There was a cry of “Miss Florence, Miss Florence!” and such a confusion of greetings and embraces ensued as made Violante quite dizzy; but presently Florence extricated from the crowd a short, plain, clever-faced girl of nineteen or twenty, introduced her as Miss Robertson, and told her to show Violante her room and to tell her a few of the ways of the house, while she returned to her sisters.
“Well,” she cried, as she came back into the drawing-room and sat down on the rug for a comfortable chat. “Isn’t she a little dear? She cried, and so did her sister, who looks a famous person; but she soon cheered up.”
“And, pray, do you expect her to be of any use?” asked Clarissa. “She looks about as much like a governess as – ”
“A public singer,” said Flossy.
“Yes,” said Miss Venning. “Mrs Grey was quite right in saying there was nothing unsuitable in her appearance.”
“Oh, nor in herself,” said Flossy. “She is a mere child, evidently; but, of course, she can speak her own language, and that is all we want. And it will be very interesting to study a mind that has had so different an experience from one’s own.”
“Always presupposing,” said Clarissa, “that she has a mind to study.”
“Now, Clarissa, you know I hate that idea that people must have a certain amount of stereotyped cleverness before they can be supposed to have any characters. No one is commonplace, or like anybody else, if one really understands them. They say even sheep are all different, and I’m sure girls are. The most unexpected developments – ”
“Well, Flossy, never mind all that,” said Miss Venning. “You shall do as you like with Miss Mattei, and I daresay you will make something of her.”
“Oh, I feel sure of it. But, now, how is everyone? Is there any news?”
“Yes; Mrs Crichton comes home next week; so I think Freddie will not come back as a boarder.”
“It will be very dull for her at home, poor child,” said Flossy, gravely.
“Well, Mrs Crichton writes, in her usual energetic way, that she thinks it a duty to keep the house as cheerful as possible; and she means to ask a friend Freddie has made at Bournemouth to stay with her. She hopes, too, that Hugh will live at home as usual.”
“He will not be an element of cheerfulness,” said Clarissa. “I met him riding yesterday, and I never saw so gloomy a face.”
“And Arthur?” said Flossy.
“I don’t think his plans are settled yet; but Mrs Crichton says he writes cheerfully.”
“I don’t think much of those cheerful letters,” said Flossy, sadly. “What can he say? How will one ever go to Redhurst? Ah, there’s a ring! That’s the Pembertons, no doubt. I must get ready for tea.”
At six o’clock Violante found herself sitting at tea in a large, cheerful room, and gradually took courage to make her observations on the new scene before her. She was placed among the elder girls, who were exceedingly polite to her, for Flossy’s genial influence told in the tone of the school; but she felt more attracted towards a row of long-haired lesser ones, for whom Miss Robertson was making tea. “I should like to do that,” she thought; “I hope they will love me.” There was a grand French governess, who looked formidable; and who, to tell the truth, was the only person of whom Miss Florence stood in awe, and who regarded her merely as a big girl and not as a theorist in education. There was also a younger and quieter-looking German, and about thirty pupils. There was a good deal of conversation, and plenty to eat. Violante occupied at night the same room with Miss Robertson, a pleasant one enough. Her companion pretended not to notice the tears which the longing for Rosa’s good nights could not fail to bring. She had seen a good many school-girls cry, since she had been sent to an orphanage for clergymen’s daughters at eight years old; and she thought everyone ought to appreciate their good luck in being at Oxley Manor – certainly a little ignorant foreigner, who was, besides, too old and too tall to be legitimately homesick. She must learn not to be a helpless child. But Violante’s beauty and fascinating sweetness were a magic armour with which to face this new world. Everyone, even her stern young judge, was kindly disposed towards her and ready to make allowance for her ignorance and helplessness.
Miss Venning, however much licence she might allow to Florence, was very really the mistress of her school. The girls, Flossy included, read the Bible to her every morning – a ceremony almost as alarming to Violante as standing up to sing. When this was over Miss Venning called her, and said:
“Now, my dear, tell me what you can do?”
“I cannot do anything, signora. I am very stupid,” faltered Violante. “I will try.”
“What have you learnt?”
“English. I know English, and just a little French and music.”
“Have you read much of your own literature – Dante or Tasso?”
“No, signora.”
“Read me a piece of this,” said Miss Venning, putting a volume of Italian poetry into her hands that she might judge of her accent. Frightened as Violante was, and little as she had responded to her long technical training, she declaimed the verses in a very much more vigorous style than Miss Venning expected.
“That is very well,” she said. “You must read Italian with Miss Florence, and help her to teach her class.”
“Signora,” said Violante, emboldened by the praise, “I can knit and sew and embroider. I could teach these to the young ladies.”
“And you shall,” said Flossy, who was standing close by. “Sister, we’ll make needlework popular.”
“They are very pleasant occupations,” said Miss Venning. “Now, let me hear you play; for it will be part of your duty to overlook the little girls at their music.”
Violante played very prettily, though her fingers had comparatively been little cultivated; but she refused even to attempt to sing, flushing and trembling in a way quite inexplicable, if the Miss Vennings had known nothing of her former history.
“Well, my dear,” said Miss Venning, “you have a great deal to learn, and a little to teach. We will do our best to make you happy among us, and you on your part will, no doubt, be industrious and obedient.”
“Yes, signora,” said Violante, a good deal impressed by the profundity of Miss Venning’s manners.
“And one thing I wish you to notice. As you make friends with your companions, do not make the details of your former life a matter of conversation. You have no need to be ashamed of it; but it would excite great curiosity, and you might be questioned in a way you would not like.”
“It is only silly girls who wish to talk,” said Violante, quoting a sentiment of Rosa’s, and looking slightly hurt.
“Then do you be wise,” said Miss Venning, rather amused. “Now go to your lessons.”
Violante dropped into the routine of her new life with surprising quickness. She did not dislike it; but, as she wrote to Rosa: “There is so much that I do not understand.” She found herself, of course, very ignorant; but either her teachers found teaching her a pleasant task, or she had exaggerated her own dulness, for no one gave her up as hopeless. She even managed to exercise a sort of control on the few occasions when she was forced to assume authority. The little girls delighted in her, and her greatest pleasure was to do their hair for them, make them pretty things, teach them fancy-work, and be generally a slave to them. She was willing to assume any amount of the playtime responsibility generally considered so irksome, and, as Clarissa observed, would have been “all nursery, and no governess,” instead of sharing the prevailing tendency in the opposite direction. The elder ones were very fond of her, but, though she responded quickly to kindness, she did not bestow any depth of affection on anyone but Miss Florence, whom she regarded as a superior being. Flossy was a perpetual wonder to her. Rosa had been a fairly efficient and conscientious teacher; but, assuredly, she had not found it her greatest delight, nor rattled away even to such an uncomprehending listener as Violante of classes and examinations and the principles of education. She had not taken so vivid an interest in each one of her pupils, nor been so anxious to extend her sphere of labour, that she could scarcely, as Flossy’s sisters said, see a girl passing in the street without wanting to teach her, and had always a plea for extending some of the advantages of Oxley Manor “just this once” to some poor little outsider who stood just “next” in the social scale to those who already enjoyed them. And she could do so many things herself. The girls said Miss Florence was writing a book, and she certainly drew nearly as well as the master. She could make her dresses, too, not quite so well as the dressmaker, and was much prouder of them than of the drawing or the book either. Enthusiasm is infectious. Violante caught the prevailing tone and worshipped Miss Florence with innocent ardour. It was a somewhat dangerous atmosphere for Flossy, but she was more wrapped up in her occupations than in herself; she heartily loved her admiring pupils, and had her own enthusiasms in other directions.
There were two schoolrooms at Oxley Manor; and in the larger one, in the dusky firelight of a Saturday afternoon, the two young “pupil teachers,” for which simple name Flossy was wont to contend, sat learning some French poetry. Violante did not like learning her lessons, it reminded her too much of learning her parts; but, then, as she reflected, it did not matter nearly so much if she could not say them. She sat on a stool in a corner by the mantelpiece, her face framed in its softly-curling locks, in shadow, and the firelight dancing on her book and on her childish, delicate hands – hands that looked fit only to cling and caress, belying their fair share of deftness and skill. Miss Robertson sat on a chair, and held her book before her eyes, for she was short-sighted. She had chilblains, and occasionally rubbed her fingers. Her companion’s idleness was quite an interruption to her; she felt obliged to keep her in order.
“You don’t seem to get on with your poetry, signorina,” she said, giving the title which attached to Violante as a sort of Christian name.
“No, it is hard.”
“One must give one’s mind to it. I don’t think you take a sufficiently serious view of life, signorina.”
“A serious view?” repeated Violante.
“Well, of work, you know. Look at Miss Florence. What do you suppose makes her so energetic and useful?”
“I suppose,” said Violante, “that she is like my father, and has enthusiasm. And, perhaps, she has not much else to think of. She is very happy.”
“Do you mean that no one should work at what they don’t like?”
“Oh, yes; but it is much harder, especially when there is so much besides,” said Violante. She did not mean to turn the tables on her companion, but merely to state simple fact.
“I don’t see,” said Miss Robertson, “what can be more important than getting ready to earn one’s living.”
“Yes – we must do that – if we can,” said Violante.
“I assure you,” said Miss Robertson, “things would be very different here if it weren’t for Florence Venning. I’ve been at other schools and I know. You and I would not have such good times without her.”
“Oh, she is good and beautiful!” cried Violante. “I would learn lessons all day to please her. Where is she now?”
“She is gone to Redhurst?” said Edith, gravely.
“Redhurst?”
“Yes. Have none of the girls told you about poor Mysie Crofton?”
“No, who is she?”
“She used to come here to school, and – it happened last summer before I came; but they often talk of it – she was drowned.”
“Oh, how sad! Did she fall into the water?”
“She was going to be married, and her lover and his cousin were shooting, and they saw her standing on the lock, and Mr Crichton – ”
“Who?”
“Mr Hugh Crichton. He lives at Redhurst, don’t you know? She was going to marry his cousin, Mr Spencer. Well, they were shooting, and – it was very awful – but Mr Crichton’s gun frightened her, and she fell into the water and was drowned.”
Violante sat in the shadow. Her dead silence might have come from her interest in the story.
“That’s not the worst. They say Arthur Spencer told him not to fire – and he did – ”
“Was he jealous?” suddenly cried Violante.
“Good gracious, signorina! What a horrid – what a ridiculous idea! How foreign! Of course not. He didn’t mean to hurt her. He was half mad with grief. I’m sure now he looks as if he couldn’t smile – and Mr Spencer has been abroad ever since it happened – last August.”
Violante sat in her corner, her heart beating, shivering, her face burning. “He is near – ” Then that wild foolish thought of the poor foreign opera-taught girl gave place to a pang of shame, and then, “He is unhappy.” She had forgotten herself – forgotten where she was; when Miss Florence came slowly into the room in her hat and jacket. She came and knelt down by the fire, looking much graver than usual.
“Frederica comes to school on Monday,” she said, in rather a strained voice.
“How were they, Miss Florence?” asked Edith.
“Oh, I don’t know. Mrs Crichton is very well. They are hardly settled.”
“I was telling signorina,” said Miss Robertson.
Flossy looked at Violante.
“Why, you have frightened her!” she said, “with our sad story.”
Violante could not speak; but something in Flossy’s trembling lips spoke to her heart. She pressed up close to her and hid her face on her shoulder.
“Why, my dear child, how you tremble!” cried Flossy, touched by the action and by the sympathy, as she thought it. “Hush, we have almost left off crying for her!”
“I never thought it would make you hysterical,” said Miss Robertson, rather severely.
“Let her alone,” said Florence, for all her tenderest strings were still quivering with the renewal of old associations, and somehow this girl, who cried for her dear Mysie, spoke to her heart as no one had done since Mysie’s star had set. Violante clung closer and closer, conscious of nothing but a sense of help and fellowship in the stormy sea that, had suddenly burst in on her. She had lost all sense of concealment, she forgot that Flossy did not know her secret; she was only silent because no words adequate to her bewildered horror suggested themselves. At last she half sobbed out:
“And he killed her – killed her?”
“Oh, no; you must not say that,” said Flossy. “It was a very sad accident, but poor Hugh could not help it, and Arthur never blamed him. She was so good, so sweet. But you must not cry, dear; why are you so startled?” she added, becoming aware that Violante’s agitation was excessive, though, on the score of her Italian actress-ship, she was not prepared to consider it unnatural.
Violante was slowly coming to herself. She sat up and pushed back her hair; while things began to arrange themselves in her mind. Hugh Crichton lived close at hand; she might see him, and he had been in a great storm of trouble – was that why she had heard nothing of him? Then Signor Arthur – she remembered how James Crichton had told Rosa that his cousin’s love was dead. Here was something she could say.
“Signora, I met Signor Arthur Spencer in Italy at Caletto. That was partly – ” She stumbled over the truth so like a lie; but Flossy broke in —
“Saw Arthur? Did you? Oh, tell me – how was he – what did he look like?”
“He was very sad – I knew that, though he used to come and talk and laugh with us. He was travelling. And when I knew we were coming to England I asked him what English girls were like? And, oh, Miss Florence, I knew he spoke of one he loved who was dead. But he told me to be brave. He is so!”
It did not strike Flossy at the moment to be surprised at Violante’s interest in Arthur and his story; the subject was too interesting to herself, but the fact dropped into her mind and was recalled in the future. Now she asked a few more questions about him, and in return told Violante a little of the circumstances of his trouble, till they were obliged to separate to dress for tea. Violante crept away to her room, and as she stood by herself in the dark she felt that she had in a manner deceived Miss Florence. “But,” thought she – “he shall say first he knows me – if he will. When shall I see him? How shall I see him? Oh, never – shut up here! Hugo – ah, Hugo mio!”
Yet she felt full of expectation, full of something like hope. “I will tell Rosa if I see Signor Arthur,” she thought; “but if I tell her who is near she will be angry and foolish and take me away. It will not hurt me.”
So, to excuse herself to her own conscience for thus concealing so important a fact from her sister, she found heart to go through her work as usual, teaching and learning, with one question ever before her, one expectation filling her life. She could tell Rosa when she could talk to her, she thought; but a letter would give a false impression, and make her sister anxious to no purpose.
Part 5, Chapter XXXV
Discords
“Those blind motions of the spring
That show the year has turned.”
Redhurst was entirely unused to absenteeism. Mrs Crichton had scarcely ever spent five months together away from it in her life, and now she seemed to have taken with her all the movement and interest of the place. From the time when the little heiress had ridden out with her father on her long-tailed pony, all through the days of her bright, joyous young ladyhood, and happy, active wifehood, she had lived among her own people; and, as she was both an affectionate and conscientious woman, she had fulfilled her duties towards them well, and found and given much pleasure in the fulfilment. Moreover, besides the Rector, the Crichtons had been the only resident gentry in the parish, though there was a large neighbourhood beyond its bounds. Substantial benefits were not intermitted, and Hugh was far too conscientious to neglect his local duties; but kind words and gossip were missing. Mr and Mrs Harcourt seemed to have grown years older; the girls, who had been wont to admire Mysie’s hats and profit by her teaching missed both; and the old women had no one to recount their aches and pains to. Some excitement was, however, derived from the fact that Ashenfold, a large farm-house in the place, had been taken by a Colonel Dysart, in search of a country residence, who brought there a large family of girls and boys – active, helpful, and good-humoured. So the pathway through the fields was trodden by other girlish feet on their way to school; other hands hung up the Christmas wreaths in Redhurst Church; and Mysie’s duties were not altogether left undone. The new folks were grumbled at and sighed over; but they had stirred the dull waters, and on their side, of course, were ready to welcome eagerly the return of the family to the great house – none the less eagerly on account of their mournful story. There would be an acquaintance, for Mr Spencer Crichton had met Colonel Dysart in Oxley, and had left a card upon him. All business matters remaining in Hugh’s hands he had been obliged sometimes to go to Redhurst, and he hardly felt one place to be more dreary than another. Indeed, he was so tired of his self-imposed solitude that he felt glad to think that his mother was coming back again. Perhaps, things would be better, somehow. Still, he could not make up his mind to be there to receive them, but made some excuse of business for the first night, and then rode home the next day, after the banking hours were over, through the cold, frosty evening, as he had done all his life till the last few months, in secure expectation of finding warmth and light, girlish voices, and little bits of news, small matters to be decided, life and comfort; in one word – home. Ah, could that busy, troublesome, foolish home come back how sweet it would have been! What would he find now? His heart beat fast as he rode up to the door, which was quickly opened, and Hugh felt an odd sort of relief at sight of the bright hall fire burning; and in another moment he was in the drawing-room, and held his mother in his arms, in, perhaps, the fondest embrace he had ever given to her since he was a little school-boy.
“Oh, mother, I’m glad you’re come home!” he said. Frederica came up promptly to kiss him, and he felt that it was all very comfortable and pleasant, and much more cheerful than he had expected. He had retained the impression of the sorrowful faces and heavy mourning of their last parting. Now there was white about his mother’s dress, and Freddie’s hair was tied with violet ribbons. He could have dispensed with the presence of the two Miss Brabazons, whose acquaintance had been made at Bournemouth; but, perhaps, as Mrs Crichton had thought, they helped to fill up blank spaces. Hugh was not a very observant person, but as he glanced round the room he saw that it had a different aspect; the coverings were of another colour, the tables and sofas had been moved, the lamp stood in a new part of the room; there seemed to be no well-known corner or combination left.
“The place looks different,” said Hugh, who was not easily affected by externals.
“Ah, yes,” said his mother, “it was best to make a few changes.”
Hugh shivered, and seemed to see the old scene through the new.
“You don’t look very well, my dear,” said Mrs Crichton. “Have you been working too hard?”
“Oh, no, mother, thank you; I’m well enough. I’ll go now and dress for dinner.” The changes in the drawing-room had caused Hugh to look out for old associations; but his mother followed him upstairs.
“You see, Hugh,” she said, “for all the young ones’ sakes it was necessary to get over old impressions. You know this old door was shut up” – suddenly opening it – “and, by closing the other, and changing the furniture, there is nothing to recall our darling’s room.”
Hugh shrank back. He saw vaguely that it all looked very different; but he could not cross the threshold.
“Yes, mother, I daresay you’re right,” he said, hurriedly; “it may make a difference.”
“And, Hugh, we must not let the house be mournful. When Arthur comes back it will be much better for him to find us cheerful.”
Hugh made no reply. He could not contemplate the thought of Arthur’s return. How had any of them come back, he thought, as he dressed hastily and went downstairs. At dinner his mother asked him if he had seen anything of the new comers to Ashenfold.
“Yes, I have seen Colonel Dysart. He is a gentleman. There are a great many of them.”
“I must go and call. Didn’t you tell me, Freddie, that some of them were going to Miss Venning’s?”
“So Flossy said in her letter,” returned Freddie.
“They have been kind and helpful, I hear. It is a great thing to have that house occupied.”
“We did very well with the old Horehams,” said Hugh, “though Colonel Dysart is likely to be a good neighbour. Have you been to the Rectory?”
“Oh, yes, we went over at once. I think the dear old folks want us back again. You should have looked in on them now and then on a Sunday, Hugh.”
“It is you they want, not me,” he said. “I went to Oxley parish church generally. You have not seen the town yet, I suppose, Miss Brabazon?” he added, to change the conversation.
Before the evening was over, Hugh was doubtful whether the cheerfulness around him was not dearly bought by the effort to join in it. There was no want of affectionate feeling in Mrs Crichton; she missed Mysie every hour, and acknowledged their loss to the full; but she was determined that it should be regarded as nothing more than a loss, and that, as she phrased it, “no morbid feelings should be allowed to exist;” and she would not acknowledge that Hugh had any special occasion for sensitiveness. Being, with all her good-nature and easiness of discipline, a person of strong will she was determined to create external cheerfulness. Frederica, who had now, of course, become a more important element in the household, was reserved by nature, and, like many young girls, afraid of the force of her own emotions. She could not bear to speak or hear of Mysie, so she turned vehemently to other things; while, the more her high spirits regained their sway, the less she liked any infringement on them.
Hugh was away at the Bank on the day that Flossy came to see them: but she, too, nervous, and inwardly agitated, was glad to talk of external things – about the new people, and their girls coming to school, and the dear little signorina of whom she was growing so fond, and whose wonderful sweet face was like a poem or a picture.
“You must bring her to see us, Flossy, when Freddie asks some of her schoolfellows,” said Mrs Crichton.
So, little pleasant plans were made, and Redhurst came back into Flossy’s life. Yet, as she walked home through the cold afternoon, the tears rolled down her cheeks. It seemed cruel for the home to be regaining its cheerfulness while Arthur was away, solitary and unhappy. Yet she, herself, how full her life was; how fast the world went on!
“And we forget because we must And not because we will,” thought Flossy, and in this mood Violante’s tears had surely met with warm sympathy.
Colonel and Mrs Dysart were called upon, and the family proved to be what is called in country neighbourhoods an “acquisition.” They had done up their house. Colonel Dysart hunted and was anxious to get some shooting. There were four sons and five daughters, all between nine and twenty-eight, ready to be sociable. Two of the girls went to school with Freddie; one of the elder ones was useful in the village; some among them rode, sang, and drew – it was worth while being attentive to them; and a promising acquaintance began to spring up. Even old Mrs Harcourt found visits from the children enlivening to her, and liked to give them winter apples and Christmas roses. It was a good thing, too, to have someone to take an interest in the choir, and the curate, whom Mr Harcourt’s age had recently rendered necessary, found work for the young ladies; while they spoke together with a certain tender curiosity of her whose sweet life and sad fate was already becoming a tradition, to give to the scenery of the tragedy a certain mournful interest, and to make the touching of Mysie’s doings and the taking-up of her duties something of a rare privilege. So, new lives and new possibilities were springing up, slowly and naturally, as the snowdrops began to peep on Mysie’s grave.
Hugh did not see much of the new comers; he was away all day, and did not always come out from Oxley in the evening; and he paid so little attention to the talk going on around him that he neither discovered the names and ages of the Dysarts, nor heard anything of the charms of Freddie’s new Italian teacher, whose youth and gentleness excited her surprise and delight. But one sunny morning, as he rode into Oxley, a little incident occurred to him. He was passing Oxley Manor, riding slowly under its ivied wall and thinking of nothing less than of its inhabitants, when, from one of the upper windows that looked out close on the road, something fell on his horse’s neck, and then down into the dust at his feet. Hugh looked down – it was a little bunch of violets; then glanced carelessly up at the windows with a laugh. “Those girls must be very hard up! What would Flossy say?” he thought. But no one peeped out to see what had become of her violets, and he rode on, amused as he recalled various boyish pranks of Jem’s and Arthur’s, and left the violets lying in the dust.