Etheldreda the Ready | Page 8

and prepared to talk in comfort. They made a pretty picture as the leaping flame lighted up their fair blond faces, but for the moment the general expression was far from cheerful. The twins were all eyes and gaping mouths, devoured with curiosity to hear what their elders might have to say with regard to the thrilling intelligence just given; the two schoolboys looked cross and thundery, and it was difficult to say which was the more exasperating to beholders--Rowena's angry frown or Dreda's artificial smiles.
Gurth stamped a smoking cinder into the hearthrug, taking a malicious pleasure in the scorch and smell which ensued. He was never too patient, and this afternoon he felt that he had reached the end of his tether.
"Oh, chuck it, Rowena!" he cried savagely. "What's the use of sitting there looking like a tragedy queen? A jolly example you set, for the eldest of a family. You look as if the whole thing was got up on purpose to annoy you, and nobody had a right to be pitied except your precious self. I don't see it a bit! I think you come off best of all. Your education is finished, so you're bound to be all right!"
"Education!" echoed Rowena, in the tone of ineffable scorn natural to a young woman who for months past had been basking in the prospect of a presentation at court. "Education, indeed! Who cares for education? If it is finished, what has it all been intended for, pray? To prepare me for a life which I am not to have! Other girls have the best time of their lives when they come out. They are taken about to see everything and do everything which they have longed for all the time they have been shut up at school. It's no wonder I feel bad at coming home to find I have only escaped one prison for another. To live here all the year long! What a prospect! There isn't a decent neighbour nearer than five miles.--If this could only have happened a year or two later, after I had had a little fun!"
"Rowena, how selfish! You think only of yourself, and not a bit of anyone else--father or mother, or the boys, or--or Me!" cried Dreda, smiting herself on the breast with dramatic empressement as she uttered the last all-important word. "It won't be a bit easier for me when the time comes, but I do hope and believe that I shall bear it bravely, and try to be an example to the rest. It's our duty, you know, as the eldest daughters of the house!"
"Oh, Dreda, stop preaching! It's too ridiculous. You to lecture me! For that matter, you need not wait until you are finished to set me an example. You can begin this very minute, for I don't believe for a moment that father will be able to afford to send you to Madame Clerc's. It's a frightfully expensive school, and he used to grumble at the way my extras ran up, even before, when he was rich. I expect you will have to finish at home with the Spider, and then she will go, and you will have to set to work to teach Maud!"
"I shan't!" shrieked Dreda, and flamed a sudden violent red.
"She shan't!" shrieked Maud, at one and the same moment, her fair, placid face flushing to the same crimson hue.
They faced each other like two infuriated turkey cocks--heads erect, feathers ruffled, bodies swaying to and fro with indignation.
"As if I should!"
"As if I'd let you!"
"Teach her!"
"Teach me!"
"The very idea!"
"I'm 'stonished you should talk such nonsense, Rowena!"
Rowena laughed softly. It was the first time she had unbent since the telling of the dread news. She put her head on one side and stared at Dreda's furious face with an "I told you so!" expression which that young lady found infinitely exasperating.
"Our dear Dreda, as usual, finds preaching easier than practice. You see, my dear, when it comes to the point, you are not a bit more resigned than I am myself. It's worse for me to give up all the fun of my first season than for you to stay at home instead of going to school; the only difference is that I have sense enough to realise what is before me, while you are so taken up with sentiment and--"
"Oh, shut up, girls! Stop wrangling, for pity's sake!" cried Hereward, impatiently. "Things are bad enough as they are, without making them worse. If you are going to nag, we'll go downstairs and leave you to yourselves. It's such bad form to kick up a fuss; but girls are all alike. You wouldn't find a boy going on like that--"
Rowena turned upon him with wide, challenging eyes.
"Wouldn't I? Are you so sure? Suppose