The Rocks of Valpré | Page 9

inability to cope adequately with her
threefold responsibility, being moreover worn out by her gallant
struggle to do so, was inclined to shortness of temper and a severity of
judgment that bordered upon injustice.

If Chris would persist in flying about the shore in that wild fashion with
her hair loose--that flaming hair which Mademoiselle considered in
itself to be almost indecent--what could be expected but that some
contretemps must of necessity arrive? It was useless for Chris to protest
that it was not her hair that had got her into difficulties, that she had
only left it loose to dry it after her bathe, that there had been no one to
see--at least, no one that mattered--and that the cut on her foot was
solely due to the fact that she had taken off her sand-shoes to climb
over the rocks. Mademoiselle only shook her head with pursed lips.
Chris _était méchante--très méchante_, and no amount of arguing
would make her change her opinion upon that point.
So Chris abandoned argument while the worried little Frenchwoman
bathed and bandaged her foot anew. She would not be able to bathe
again for at least a week, and this fact was of itself sufficient to depress
her into silence. Yet, after a little, when Mademoiselle was gone, a
cheery little tune rose to her lips. It was not her nature to be depressed
for long.
Mademoiselle Gautier would have been something less than human if
she had not yielded now and then under the perpetual strain in which,
for many days past, she had lived. She had come to Valpré in charge of
Chris and her two young brothers, both of whom had developed
diphtheria within a day or two of their arrival. The children's father was
absent in India; his only sister, upon whom the cares of his family were
supposed to rest, was entertaining Royalty, and was far too important a
personage in the social world to be spared at short notice. And so the
whole burden had devolved upon poor Mademoiselle Gautier, who had
been near her wits' end with anxiety, but had nobly grappled with her
task.
The worst of the business, speaking in a physical sense, was now over.
Both her patients--Maxwell, who was Chris's twin, and little Noel, the
youngest of the family, aged twelve--had turned the corner and were
progressing towards convalescence. Over the latter she still had qualms
of uneasiness, but the elder boy was rapidly picking up his strength and
giving more trouble than he had ever given before in the process.

By inexorable decree Chris was kept away from the two over whom
Mademoiselle, aided by a convent nurse, still watched with unremitting
care; and it did seem a little hard in the opinion of the harassed
Frenchwoman that her one sound charge could not be trusted to
conduct herself with circumspection during her days of enforced
solitude. Chris Wyndham, however, had been a tomboy all her life, and
she could scarcely be expected to reform at such a juncture. She was
not accustomed to solitude, and her restless spirit chafed after
distraction.
The conventions had never troubled her. Brought up as she had been
with three unruly boys, running wild with them during the whole of her
childhood, it was scarcely to be wondered at if her outlook on life was
more that of a boy than a girl. She had been in Mademoiselle Gautier's
charge during the past three years, but somehow that had not sobered
her very materially. She was spoilt by all except her aunt, who was
wont to remark with some acidity that if she didn't come to grief one
way or another, this would probably continue to be the case for the
term of her natural life. But it was quite plain that Aunt Philippa
expected her to come to grief. Girls like Chris, unless they married out
of the schoolroom, usually played with fire until they burnt their fingers.
The fact of the matter was Chris was far too attractive, and though as
yet sublimely unconscious of the fact, Aunt Philippa knew that sooner
or later it was bound to dawn upon her. She did not relish the prospect
of steering this giddy little barque through the shoals and quicksands of
society, being shrewdly suspicious that the task might well prove too
much for her. For with all her sweetness, Chris was undeniably wilful,
a princess who expected to have her own way; and Aunt Philippa had a
daughter of her own, Chris's senior by three years, as well as a son in
the Guards, to consider.
No, she did not approve of Chris, or indeed of any of the family,
including her own brother, who was its head. She had not approved of
his gay