Boardinghouses -- Juvenile fiction; London (England) -- Juvenile fiction; Love stories; Mothers and daughters -- Juvenile fiction
The Duchess and the Duke both went to the funeral, which made a great
impression on all the guests in the boarding-house; and Lady Thesiger
went; I saw her at a little distance, as I stood close to mother's
grave; but all these things were over, and father and mother were
together again. That was my only comfort, and I sat in the little
room, and was glad that I could not suffer much more.
Into the midst of my meditations there came a brisk voice, the door
was opened suddenly, there was a waft of fresh air, and Lady Thesiger
stood near me.
"You are to come with me at once, Westenra," she said, "the carriage
is at the door, and Miss Mullins, and that good soul, Mrs. Fanning,
are packing your things. You are to come right away from here
to-night."
I did not want to go.
I said, "Please leave me, Jasmine, I cannot talk to you now."
"You need not talk," said Jasmine Thesiger, "but come you must."
I opposed her as best I could; but I was weak and tired, and half
stunned, and she was all life and energy; and so it came to pass, that
in less than an hour, I found myself driving away in her luxurious
little brougham to her house in Mayfair. She gave me a pretty room,
and was very kind to me.
"I'll leave you alone, you know," she said; "I don't want to worry you
in any way, but you must not stay at the boarding-house any longer.
Your mother is dead, and you must come back to your own set."
"I can never come back to my own set," I answered; "or rather, my set
is no longer yours, Jasmine; I have stepped down for ever."
"That is folly, and worse than folly," she replied.
She came and sat with me constantly and talked. She talked very well.
She did her utmost, all that woman could possibly do, to soothe my
trouble, and to draw me out, and be good to me; but I was in a queer
state, and I did not respond to any of her caresses. I was quite dazed
and stupid. After a fortnight I came downstairs to meals just as
usual, and I tried to speak when I was spoken to, but the cloud on my
spirit never lifted for a single moment.
It was now the middle of July, and Jasmine and her husband were
talking of their summer trip. They would go away to Scotland, and they
wanted me to go with them. I said I would rather not, but that fact
did not seem to matter in the very least. They wanted me to go; they
had it all arranged. I declared that I must go back to Jane to the
boarding-house, but they said that for the present I belonged to them.
I thought to myself with a dull ache, which never rose to absolute
pain, how soon they would give me up, when they knew that I was
engaged to Albert Fanning. I had not mentioned this fact yet, though
it was on the tip of my tongue often and often. Still I kept it to
myself. No one knew of our engagement but Jane Mullins, who, of
course, guessed it, and Mrs. Fanning and Albert himself. I respected
the Fannings very much for keeping my secret so faithfully, and I
respected them still more for not coming to see me.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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