Beechcroft at Rockstone | Page 6

'that is a shame. You know she is
an excellent mother.'
'Too excellent, that's the very thing,' muttered Aunt Jane. 'Well, Mysie's
fate is settled, and I dare say it will turn out for the best.'
So Mysie was to go with Mrs. Halfpenny and Primrose to Beechcroft,
whence the Rotherwoods would fetch her. If the lady's letter had been
much less urgent, who could have withstood her lord's postscript: 'If
you could see the little pale face light up at the bare notion of seeing
Mysie, you would know how grateful we shall be for her.'
Mysie herself heard her destiny without much elation, though she was
very fond of Lady Phyllis, and the tears came into her eyes at the
thought of her being unwell and wanting her.
'Mamma said we must not grumble,' she said to Gillian; 'but I shall feel
so lost without you and Val. It is so unhomish, and there's that dreadful
German Fraulein, who was not at home last time.'
'If you told mamma, perhaps she would let you stay,' returned Gillian. 'I
know I should hate it, worse than I do going to Rockstone and without
you.'
'That would be unkind to poor Fly,' said Mysie. 'Besides, mamma said
she could not have settling and unsettling for ever. And I shall see
Primrose sometimes; besides, I do love Fly. It's marching orders, you
know.'
It was Valetta who made the most objection. She declared that it was
not fair that Mysie, who had been to the ball at Rotherwood, should go
again to live with lords and ladies, while she went to a nasty day-school
with butchers' and bakers' daughters. She hoped she should grow
horridly vulgar, and if mamma did not like it, it would be her own
fault!
Mrs. Halfpenny, who did not like to have to separate Mysie's clothes
from the rest after they were packed, rather favoured this naughtiness

by observing: 'The old blue merino might stay at home. Miss Mysie
would be too set up to wear that among her fine folk. Set her up, that
she should have all the treats, while her own Miss Gillian was turned
over to the auld aunties!'
'Nonsense, nurse,' said Gillian. 'I'm much better pleased to go and be of
some use! Val, you naughty child, how dare you make such a fuss?' for
Valetta was crying again.
'I hate school, and I hate Rockstone, and I don't see why Mysie should
always go everywhere, and wear new frocks, and I go to the butchers
and bakers and wear horrid old ones.'
'I wish you could come too,' said Mysie; 'but indeed old frocks are the
nicest, because one is not bothered to take so much care of them; and
lords and ladies aren't a bit better to play with than, other people. In fact,
Ivy is what Japs calls a muff and a stick.'
Valetta, however, cried on, and Mysie went the length of repairing to
her mother, in the midst of her last notes and packings, to entreat to
change with Val, who followed on tip-toe.
'Certainly not,' was the answer from Lady Merrifield, who was being
worried on all sides, 'Valetta is not asked, and she is not behaving so
that I could accept for her if she were.'
And Val had to turn away in floods of tears, which redoubled on being
told by the united voices of her brothers and sisters that they were
ashamed of her for being so selfish as to cry for herself when all were
in so much trouble about papa.
Lady Merrifield caught some of the last words. 'No, my dear,' she said.
'That is not quite just or kind. It is being unhappy that makes poor Val
so ready to cry about her own grievances. Only, Val, come here, and
remember that fretting is not the way to meet such things. There is a
better way, my child, and I think you know what I mean. Now, to help
you through the time in an outer way, suppose you each set yourself
some one thing to improve in while I am away. Don't tell me what it is,

but let me find out when I come home.' With that she obeyed an urgent
summons to speak to the gardener.
'I shall! I shall,' cried little Primrose, 'write a whole copy-book in single
lines! And won't mamma be pleased? What shall you do, Fergus? and
Val? and Mysie?'
'I shall get to spin my peg-top so as it will never tumble down, and will
turn an engine for drawing water,' was the prompt answer of Fergus.
'What nonsense!' said Val; 'you'd better settle to get your long division
sums right.'
'That s girls' stuff,' replied Fergus; 'you'd better settle to leave off