Clare Avery | Page 6

an even's revelling at Sir Christopher Marres his
house, and she bidden,--why, it might rain enough to drench you, but
her cloak was thick then, and her boots were strong enough, and her
cough was not to any hurt--bless her!"
The tone of Barbara's exclamation somewhat belied the words.

"Have a care, Bab, lest--" and Marian's glance at Clare explained her
meaning.
"Not she!" returned Barbara, looking in her turn at the child, whose
attention was apparently concentrated on one of Marian's kittens, which
she was stroking on her lap, while the mother cat walked uneasily
round and round her chair. "I have alway a care to speak above yon
head."
"Is there not a little sister?" asked Marian in a low tone.
"Ay," said Barbara, dropping her voice. "Blanche, the babe's name is [a
fictitious character.] Like Mrs Walter--never content with plain Nell
and Nan. Her childre must have names like so many queens. And I dare
say the maid shall be bred up like one."
The conversation gradually passed to other topics, and the subject was
not again touched upon by either sister.
How much of it had Clare heard, and how much of that did she
understand?
A good deal more of either than Barbara imagined. She knew that
Walter had been her father's name, and she was well aware that
"Mistress Walter" from Barbara's lips, indicated her mother. She knew
that her mother had married again, and that she lived a long way off.
She knew also that this mother of hers was no favourite with Barbara.
And from this conversation she gathered, that in the event of something
happening--but what that was she did not realise--she was to go and
live with her mother. Clare was an imaginative child, and the topic of
all her dreams was this mysterious mother whom she had never seen.
Many a time, when Barbara only saw that she was quietly dressing or
hushing her doll, Clare's mind was at work, puzzling over the
incomprehensible reason of Barbara's evident dislike to her absent
mother. What shocking thing could she have done, thought Clare, to
make Bab angry with her? Had she poisoned her sister, or drowned the
cat, or stolen the big crown off the Queen's head? For the romance of a
little child is always incongruous and sensational.

In truth, there was nothing sensational, and little that was not
commonplace, about the character and history of little Clare's mother,
whose maiden name was Orige Williams. She had been the spoilt child
of a wealthy old Cornish gentleman,--the pretty pet on whom he
lavished all his love and bounty, never crossing her will from the cradle.
And she repaid him, as children thus trained often do, by crossing his
will in the only matter concerning which he much cared. He had set his
heart on her marrying a rich knight whose estate lay contiguous to his
own: while she, entirely self-centred, chose to make a runaway match
with young Lieutenant Avery, whose whole year's income was about
equal to one week of her father's rent-roll. Bitterly disappointed, Mr
Williams declared that "As she had made her bed, so she should lie on
it;" for not one penny would he ever bestow on her while he lived, and
he would bequeath the bulk of his property to his nephew. In
consequence of this threat, which reached, her ears, Orige, romantic
and high-flown, fancied herself at once a heroine and a martyr, when
there was not in her the capacity for either. In the sort of language in
which she delighted, she spoke of herself as a friendless orphan, a
sacrifice to love, truth, and honour. It never seemed to occur to her that
in deceiving her father-- for she had led him to believe until the last
moment that she intended to conform to his wishes--she had acted both
untruthfully and dishonourably; while as to love, she was callous to
every shape of it except love of self.
For about eighteen months Walter and Orige Avery lived at Bradmond,
during which time Clare was born. She was only a few weeks old when
the summons came for her father to rejoin his ship. He had been gone
two months, when news reached Bradmond of a naval skirmish with
the Spaniards off the Scilly Isles, in which great havoc had been made
among the Queen's forces, and in the list of the dead was Lieutenant
Walter Avery.
Now Orige's romance took a new turn. She pictured herself as a
widowed nightingale, love-lorn and desolate, leaning her bleeding
breast upon a thorn, and moaning forth her melancholy lay. As others
have done since, she fancied herself poetical when she was only silly.
And Barbara took grim notice that her handkerchief was perpetually

going up to tearless