The Rectory Children | Page 5

ago; she was in England with her husband, who had some business here. They had no children, and she was always asking mother to let her adopt me. But though there were so many of us, mother couldn't make up her mind to spare one.'
'Things would have turned out pretty different for you, Mary, if she had. You'd have been married to a French "mounseer" by now,' and he laughed a little, as if there was something exceedingly funny in the idea. Mr. Fairchild did not often laugh.
'Maybe,' his wife replied, smiling.
'I do hope they'll have a French governess,' said Celestina.
'Who? oh, the Miss Vanes,' said her father. 'Why, you are putting the cart before the horse, child! We don't even know that the new clergyman has any daughters--his family may be all boys. Besides, I don't know when you'd be likely to see them or their governess either.'
'They'd be sure to come to the shop sometimes, father,' Celestina replied eagerly. 'Even old Mrs. Bunton does--I've often seen her. And there's no other shop for books and stationery at Seacove.'
Mr. Fairchild smiled at the pride with which she said this.
'It would be a bad job for me if there were,' he said, 'for as it is there's barely custom for a shop of the kind,' and an anxious look came over his face. But Mrs. Fairchild reminded him that if they did not finish the chapter of Little Arthur quickly, it would be Celestina's bedtime, so the talk changed to the Black Prince and his exploits.
CHAPTER II
THOSE YOUNG LADIES
'Leave me alone--I want to cry; It's no use trying to be good.'--ANON.
Six weeks or so later--Christmas and New Year's day were past; it was the middle of January by this time--a little group of children might have been seen standing on the shore about half a mile from Seacove.
Though midwinter, it was not very cold. There is a theory that it never is very cold at the seaside. I cannot say that I have always found this the case, but it was so at Seacove. It lay in a sheltered position, out of the way of the east wind, and this was one reason why Mr. Vane had decided to make it for a time the home of himself and his family.
These were his children--the group on the seashore. Rumour had exaggerated a little in saying he had 'several.' There were but three of them, and of these three two were girls. So Celestina Fairchild's thoughts about them had some foundation after all.
'It looks just a little, a very little dreary,' said the eldest of the three, a girl of thirteen or so, slight and rather tall for her age, with a pretty graceful figure and pretty delicate features; 'but then of course it's the middle of winter. Not that spring or summer would make much difference here; there are so very few trees.'
She glanced round her as she spoke. It was a bare, almost desolate-looking stretch of country, down to the sea, which was still and gray-looking this morning. Yet there was a strange charm about it too--the land, though by no means hilly, was undulating. Not far from where the children stood there was a grand run of sand-hills, with coarse, strong grass and a few hardy thistles, and, in its season, bindweed with its white and pinky flowers, growing along their summit. Farther off was a sort of skeleton-like erection, looking not unlike the gaunt remains of a deserted sail-less ship: this was a landmark or beacon, placed there to point out a sudden turn in the coastline. And out at sea, a mile or so distant, stood a lighthouse with a revolving lantern; three times in each minute the bright light was to be seen as soon as night fell. A kind of natural breakwater ran out in a straight line to the lighthouse, so that in low tides--and the tides are sometimes very low at Seacove--it was difficult to believe but that you could get on foot all the way to the lighthouse rock.
But all these interesting particulars were not as yet known to Mr. Vane's children. They had arrived at Seacove Rectory only the night before.
The boy--he was next in age to his elder sister Rosalys--followed the direction of her glance.
'No,' he said, 'there's very few trees, certainly. But I think it's going to be very jolly all the same. When I get my pony I'll be all right any way; and on Saturdays, or odd half-holidays--there always are odd half-holidays at every school, you know--I'll take you girls out a drive in that funny little donkey-chaise, or whatever it is, that's standing in the coach-house.'
'I don't fancy there are many places to drive to,' Rosalys replied. 'Papa said there would be no use in