The Girls of Chequertrees. Marion St. John Webb
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for a long time (or so it seemed to Pamela) the cab jogged along on level ground. The slow pace at which the cab moved along, the impossibility of seeing anything through the windows, and her impatience to reach her journey's end, made it seem a very long mile and a half from the station.
All at once the cab stopped with a violent jerk. And here was Chequertrees, at last. Tom Bagg clambered down from his seat and held the cab door open while Pamela got quickly out. He smiled genially down at her, and then pulled the iron bell-chain outside the gate of the house.
While Tom Bagg got her boxes down from the cab Pamela gazed at the house which was to be her home for the next six months. She could not see very much of the house from the gate—a tall iron-barred gate set into a high wall topped with ivy. There was a long and wide gravel path up to the front door, and Pamela could see that the house was covered with ivy and had many windows. The garden struck her as being a lovely place for hide-and-seek, on account of its thick bushes and number of big trees. As she passed through the gate and made her way along the path, the cabman following with her luggage, she saw that there was a light in one of the windows behind a red blind.
She had no time to notice anything else before the front door was opened by a middle-aged servant in white cap and apron.
"Oh, I'm Miss Heath—Pamela Heath," said Pamela, as the maid waited silently.
"Oh, please come in, miss," said the maid. "Miss Crabingway told us to expect you."
Pamela stepped in, then turned to the cabman, remembering his fare; but she was told that he had already been paid by Miss Crabingway, and was going back to meet the next down train and fetch another young lady to the house—"What I was told you was expecting here," he said to the maid.
"That's right," she replied. "Two more young ladies we are expecting to-night."
"Oh, aye. Two it might be—one for certain. I remember. Good evenin', miss." And depositing Pamela's boxes in the hall the cabman took his departure.
Pamela then became aware that another white-aproned servant was standing at the back of the hall, waiting to receive her; she was quite an elderly woman with white hair. Directly Pamela caught sight of her kind, motherly old face, the feeling of depression that had been with her ever since she had got out at Barrowfield station fell away from her, and she felt at home. This was Martha, she learnt, and Ellen it was who had opened the front door. In the few minutes' talk Pamela had with them before being shown upstairs to her bedroom to take off her outdoor things and have a wash, she gathered that Miss Crabingway had departed yesterday morning, and had left word that all orders were to be taken from Miss Pamela, "just as if it was Miss Crabingway herself that was telling us what to do," volunteered Ellen. It made Pamela feel awfully young and inefficient and responsible to hear these two elderly, experienced housekeepers asking her for orders.
"Oh, you'll please go on just as usual, won't you? … It's all so strange and new to me—I do hope you'll help me to do things right. I'll have to come and talk things over with you presently," she said.
And though Ellen declared in tones of great solemnity that anything that she could do to be of use to Miss Pamela would be done with pleasure, yet it was the kindly smile in Martha's eyes that comforted Pamela. Things would be all right, she felt, so long as Martha was there.
Pamela felt a great liking for Martha from the first—she seemed such a sensible, cheerful soul; and the more Pamela got to know about her afterward the more she respected and trusted her. Ellen she was not so sure about, though she grew to like her later on, in spite of her melancholy expression and tone of voice. Pamela was not long in discovering that Ellen had grown to enjoy her melancholy as other people enjoy their happiness. It was an art in which Ellen certainly excelled. She could relate at great length, when in the mood, all the various strokes of bad fortune that had fallen on her numerous relatives and acquaintances, and all the illnesses they had suffered from, and died of, and her favourite recreation was wandering round old churchyards and exclaiming over the early age at which numbers of people died.
But though Martha and Ellen might be opposite temperamentally, yet they certainly united in making Pamela very welcome on her arrival at Chequertrees, and she found them most kind and willing and anxious to make her comfortable. Ellen carried her boxes up to the bedroom, while Martha bustled about, getting hot water for her to wash, and pulling down blinds and lighting the gas.
As soon as Pamela was left alone in her bedroom she threw off her hat and sat down on a chair and looked about her, taking stock of her new surroundings. Of course she had not had time to notice much so far, but as she had passed through the square hall and up the soft-carpeted stairs to her bedroom, which was on the first floor landing, she had got an impression of a house well furnished, but sombre. There were a great many thick plush curtains hanging over doors and at windows, and the walls were crowded with pictures, most of them having heavy dark frames. And now, this room, which Miss Crabingway had said was to be Pamela's bedroom—well, it was handsomely furnished and clean, but to Pamela's eyes, used to her airy, sparsely furnished little room at home with its fresh white paint, oak furniture, and plain green linoleum, this room seemed dark and overcrowded. The bedroom suite was dark mahogany, and had as one of its pieces a huge wardrobe with two glass doors which filled almost the entire length of one wall; it was evidently intended, originally, for a much larger room than the one it was in at present; here it towered over the other furniture like a bullying giant. The bedstead, dressing-table, and washstand, although they were of dark mahogany, were evidently not of the same set as the wardrobe. Pamela observed that the wallpaper was an all-over floral design in various shades of green and raised gold roses; the gloomy, old-fashioned fireplace, with its marble mantelpiece, on which were arranged a score of old china ornaments and photo frames, and a massive marble clock, was the chief feature of the wall opposite the wardrobe. The window-curtains, the duchess set on the dressing-table, and the coverlet on the bed were the only touches of white to relieve the general sombreness that prevailed. Pamela was sorry to see that there was a thick soft carpet on the floor—she hated carpets in bedrooms. As she wandered round the room she was to occupy for many a day to come, becoming acquainted with it from various angles, she sighed; everything looked solid, expensive, and subdued, but it did not please her eye at all (though she had to admit to herself that everything seemed very comfortable nevertheless).
The clothes you choose, and the furniture you choose to surround yourself with, are an index of your character to a stranger. To Pamela, who could not remember ever seeing Miss Crabingway, this room was an introduction. Of Miss Crabingway's character she knew nothing, but in her mind's eye she pictured Miss Crabingway fond of solid, expensive things, as large and dark, with rich, black, rustling dresses, and gold brooches, and a lot of thick gold rings set with large stones on her fingers. Her face she could not imagine—except that it would be massive and well preserved. Pamela never could imagine people's faces, in her mind's eye; she could conjure up people's figures and movements clearly—but the faces were always dim and misty. It sometimes worried her that even her mother's face or Michael's refused to be clearly recalled when she was away from them. Of course she knew their features by heart, and every twist and turn of their heads—but she could not see their features in her mind's eye.
Having imagined Miss Crabingway, therefore, as well as she was able, she hastily flung off her outdoor things, washed her hands and face and brushed her hair, and prepared to go downstairs. She was wearing her artistic, dark green frock, and as she stood a moment with her hand on the door knob taking a final glance round the room, she looked as fresh and clear-eyed a specimen of girlhood as one could wish to see.
She made her way downstairs, and seeing an open door and a lighted room on the left of the hall, she entered. It was, as she had expected, the dining-room. Dark, sombre furniture again, and rich hangings; there was a cheerful fire burning in the grate, and a white cloth, and cups and saucers on the table hinted at tea in the near future.
Pamela had come in silently, her footsteps making no sound on the thick carpet, and it was not until she had been standing for a few seconds inside the doorway that she noticed that there was some one already in the room—some one who had evidently not seen, nor heard, Pamela enter.
Crouching by the fire, and almost hidden by a big arm-chair that stood on the rug, was a girl; she had her back to the door and did not