Read Ebook: Three Girls from School by Meade L T Tarrant Percy Illustrator

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Ebook has 493 lines and 24794 words, and 10 pages

ing after a minute or two." Just then Parker tapped at the door.

"Shall I let her in?" whispered Mabel.

In reply to this, Annie herself went to the door, unlocked it, and flung it wide-open.

"Come in, Parker; come in," she said.

"Why, what is the matter with you, Miss Brooke?" said that astute woman.

"A great deal," replied Annie. "I have got to go home at once; my cousin, Mr Saxon, has come to fetch me. My dear, dear uncle is--is dying. He has been as a father to me. I must leave by the midnight train."

"So I heard downstairs," said Parker, putting on a certain sympathetic manner and trying to penetrate beneath Annie's apparent grief. "I will pack your things for you, of course, Miss Brooke; you need have no trouble on that score. I came up here to offer my services. What dress will you wear travelling, miss?"

"Oh, my dark-blue serge will be best; but it doesn't matter," said Annie.

"I will put in some of the pretty things you wore while you were here, miss," said Parker. "I know her ladyship would wish it. I don't suppose your trunks will quite hold them all, but I can get in a good many."

"Thank you, Parker; I don't care about them now. I am in dreadful trouble about dear uncle."

"Of course you must be, miss; but I am sure we are all sorry to lose you, for you do manage her ladyship in the most wonderful way, and I will say that you are as unselfish and pleasant-spoken a young lady as ever I came across. You will find the dresses and other things useful some time, miss, so I will get as many as ever I can into your trunks." Annie murmured something. She would love to keep her pretty dresses; they would be effective at school. She could think of school and her appearance there, and the looks of envy of her companions even at this supreme moment.

"Then I will go and pack at once," said Parker, preparing to leave the room.

She had nearly got as far as the door when she turned.

Mabel was silent. Her voice quite choked with the agony of the moment. Annie, however, took the initiative.

"Of course you can, Parker," she said. "It was awfully silly of Mabel not to give you the box that contained the necklace; it was the most idiotic thing I ever heard of.--I am sure, darling, I urged you to do so. But there, no doubt it is safe. You put it into the lid of your big trunk."

Mabel nodded. She could not bring herself to speak.

"Then we will find it immediately," said Annie. "Notwithstanding my own great sorrow, it will be a comfort to me to know that the necklace is safe under Parker's care before I leave; for the fact is, Parker, it was I who discovered it. I thought it was quite a valuable thing, but I am rather afraid now that Lady Lushington paid too much for it. However, that is neither here nor there; we have got to find it."

"Here are the keys of Miss Lushington's trunks," said Parker. She proceeded as she spoke to unlock the largest of the trunks, which happened to be a canvas one, and slightly the worse for travel.

"I am very sorry indeed, miss, you put it in here," said Parker. "Why, see how loose the cover is. A person could almost put his hand in between the cover and the inside of the trunk. Well, where did you put it, miss?"

"I will find it; I will find it," said Annie.

She stooped as she spoke and began that examination which she knew beforehand must be fruitless. Mabel stood with her back to the two, looking out of the window. Annie longed to shake her. Was not her very attitude giving the whole thing away?

"I really can't find it," said Annie after a moment's pause. "Do come and look yourself, May. Are you dazed? Have you lost your senses? Oh, I know, poor darling May! it is sorrow at parting with poor little me.-- Parker, Miss Mabel just adores me; don't you, precious one! Well, well, Parker will do all she can for you when I am gone."

"I can't take your place, Miss Brooke. I am really sorry you have to go.--But now, Miss Mabel, the best thing to do is just to empty the lid of the trunk. We'll get to the box that way without disarranging all your pretty things."

The lid of the trunk was speedily emptied, and of course no necklace was found.

"There!" said Annie. Her heart was beating so fast that the pallor of her face was far from assumed. The fear in her eyes, too, seemed only too natural.

Parker looked distinctly annoyed. Mabel stood stonily silent, apparently almost indifferent.

"No, I didn't; I put it into the lid," said Mabel. "I won't say I put it anywhere else; the lid will do; I put it there. I won't be bothered about it!"

She marched out of the room, got as far as the wide landing, and burst out crying. Her queer conduct and queer words terrified Annie and amazed Parker.

Annie put her pretty, white hand on Parker's arm.

"Leave her alone with me for a little, please, Parker. Just go off and pack my things, like the jewel you are. She is awfully upset at my going--and you know I must, on account of my dear uncle."

Annie's voice quavered. Indeed, she herself was very nearly breaking down.

"We never will," said Parker. "It's a dreadful bit of business. Her ladyship will be wild. She does so hate it when anything is stolen. But there are lots of robberies taking place on the railways of late. It is a perfect disgrace. Even the registering of your goods seems not to secure things. Of course I always carry the jewels in my own hand; it's the only safe way. Miss Mabel must have been mad to put a valuable necklace such as her ladyship described into that old trunk."

"It wasn't nearly so valuable as Lady Lushington supposed; that is the only comfort," said Annie.

"But, miss, I don't understand. I thought it was you who urged her ladyship to get it, and that you had quite a knowledge of gems."

"I found out afterwards--I will tell you the secret, Parker, and you can break it to her ladyship when I am gone--I found out afterwards that I had made a slight mistake. The necklace was worth, say, about twenty pounds, but no more, for some of the pearls were quite worthless. I happened to show it to a gentleman I knew very slightly at the Belle Vue Hotel, and he deals in that sort of thing. He disappointed me in his estimate of the necklace; but that doesn't matter. It is terrible that it should be lost. Still, you might tell Lady Lushington what he said. There is no use in telling Mabel. She doesn't care twopence about it, poor child, at the present moment; she is so broken down at my leaving."

"Well, miss, I must be off to do the packing. I will make the best of things and never forget how pleasant you have been during your visit, miss. I will see, too, that you have a basket of sandwiches and some wine packed for your journey."

Parker went off. The moment she did so Annie went into the corridor and fetched Mabel in.

"Oh, you goose of all geese!" she said. "Now the worst is over; I tell you the worst is over. You don't suppose for a single moment your aunt, Lady Lushington, will think that you stole the necklace or that I stole it. She will suppose, most assuredly, that it was stolen on the journey between Interlaken and Zermatt. Parker is convinced on the subject and I have let Parker understand that it was not nearly as valuable as I supposed. Lady Lushington won't trust me to manage a bargain for her again; that is the worst that can happen. Now, May, do cheer up. You are all right. I will manage things for you when Priscilla's Christmas bill comes round. You will see plenty of me, I fancy, between now and then. Dry your eyes, darling. I know you are sorry to part from me."

"I can't go on being wicked without you; that's the principal thing," said Mabel. "I know I'll give in."

"Think what injury you'll do me; and do you really want to go back to that horrid school?"

"I don't think I'd mind so very much; it was peaceful, at least at school."

"You would soon be sick of that sort of peace."

"I suppose I should," said Mabel.

She had already wiped her eyes, and she began slightly to cheer up.

"Annie," she said eagerly, "is your uncle really dying?"

"John Saxon says so; otherwise, of course, he would not have come," said Annie.

"If," said Mabel, trembling a good deal--"if afterwards you could come back--"

Annie's heart bounded.

"I can't talk of it," she said; "don't speak of it now. When the time comes, if you--were--to write I will write to you, that is, if I have strength to write to any one. You have my address. You know how deeply I shall always love you. You know there is no good turn I would not do for you."

"I want you to help me until Priscilla's year at school is out," was Mabel's matter-of-fact retort. "Of course, dear, of course; and I will. Your Annie will never forsake you. But now perhaps we had better go downstairs."

The girls made a quite picturesque appearance as they went slowly down the broad staircase. Mabel had not cried enough to look ugly, and Annie's few tears and pallor and evident distress gave to her face the depth of expression which in her lighter moments it had lacked.

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