Nell, of Shorne Mills | Page 3

that you think me
exacting. This butter is anything but fresh."
"It was made this morning."
"Please, oh, please do not contradict me, Eleanor! If there is one
characteristic more plainly developed in me than another it is my
unerring taste. This butter is not fresh. But do not mind. I am not
complaining. Do not think that. I merely passed the remark. And if you
are really going to get me my usual quantity of cream, will you do so
now? Cold chocolate two mornings in succession would try my
digestion sadly."
The girl left the room quickly, and as she passed the dining-room door
she looked in to say hurriedly:
"Dry up, Dick. Mamma's been complaining of the noise."
"'Eleanor, I never complain,'" he murmured; but he put down the banjo,
rose and stretched himself, and left the room, pretending to slip as he
passed Nell in the passage, and flattening her against the wall.
She gave him a noiseless push and went for the remainder of the cream.
Mrs. Lorton received it with a sigh and a patient "I thank you, Eleanor;"
and while she sipped the chocolate, and snipped at the bread and
butter--she ate the latter as if it were a peculiarly distasteful medicine in
the solid--the girl tidied the room. It was the only really well-furnished
room in the cottage; Nell's little chamber in the roof was as plain as
Marguerite's in "Faust," and Dick's was Spartan in its Character; but a
Wolfer--Mrs. Lorton was a distant, a very distant connection by a
remote marriage of the noble family of that name--cannot live without a

certain amount of luxury, and, as there was not enough to go round,
Mrs. Lorton got it all. So, though Nell's little bed was devoid of
curtains, her furniture of the "six-guinea suite" type and her carpet a
square of Kidderminster, her stepmother's bed was amply draped,
possessed its silk eider-down and lace-edged pillows; there was an
Axminster on the floor, an elaborate dressing table furnished with a
toilet set, and--the fashionable lady's indispensable--a cheval glass.
"I think I will get up in half an hour, if you will be good enough to send
Molly up to me," said Mrs. Lorton, sinking onto her pillow as if
exhausted by her struggle with the chocolate.
"Yes, mamma," assented the girl. "What will you have for lunch?"
"Lunch!" sighed Mrs. Lorton, with an assumption of weary indifference.
"It is really of no consequence, Eleanor. I eat so little, especially in the
middle of the day. Perhaps if you could get me a sweetbread I might
manage a few morsels. But do not trouble. You know how much I
dislike causing trouble. A sweetbread nicely browned--on a small, a
very small piece of toast; quite dry, please, Eleanor."
"Yes, mamma, I know," said Eleanor; but she looked out of the window
rather doubtfully. Sweetbreads were not easily obtained at the only
butcher's shop in the village; and, when they were, they were dear; but
she had just paid the long-running bill, and----
"I'll go up to Smart's and see about it," she said. "Is there anything you
want in the village, mamma?"
Mrs. Lorton sighed again; she rarely spoke without a sigh.
"If you really want the walk and are going, Eleanor, you might ask Mrs.
Porter if she has got that toilet vinegar for me. She promised to get it
down from London quite a week ago. It is really too ridiculous! But
what can one expect in this hole, and living among a set of barbarians?
I know that I shall never grow accustomed to this life of savagery; my
memory of the past is too acute, alas! But I must stifle it; I must
remember that the great trial of my life has been sent for my good, and

I will never complain. Not one word of discontent shall ever pass my
lips. My dear Eleanor, you surely are not going to be so mad as to open
that window! And my neuralgia only just quiet!"
"I beg your pardon, mamma. The room seemed so hot, and I forgot. I've
closed it again; see! Let me draw the eider-down up; that's it. I won't
forget the toilet vinegar."
"I thank you, Eleanor; and you might get this week's Fashion Gazette.
It is the only paper I care for; but it is not unnatural that I should like to
see it occasionally. One may be cut off from all one's friends and
relations, may be completely out of the world of rank and refinement,
but one likes now and then to read of the class to which one belongs,
but from which one is, alas! forever separated."
"I'll get the Fashion Gazette if Mrs. Porter has it, mamma. I won't be
long,