Tom and Some Other Girls | Page 2

house into that stately old pile! The suggestion appalled him,
and yet why not? His lawyer assured him that he could afford it; his
children were growing up, and he had their future to consider. He
thought of his handsome boys, his curly-headed girl, and decided
proudly that nothing was too good for them; he looked into the future,
and saw his children's children reigning in his stead, and the name of
Chester honoured in the land. So Erley Chase was bought, and little
Mrs Chester furnished it, as we have seen, to her own great
contentment and that of the tradespeople with whom she dealt; and in
the course of a few months the family moved into their new abode.
At first the country people were inclined to look coldly on the new-
comers, but it was impossible to keep up an unfriendly attitude towards
Mr and Mrs Chester. They were utterly free from affectation, and, so
far from apeing that indifference to wealth adopted by most nouveaux
riches, were so frankly, transparently enchanted with their new
possessions that they were more like a couple of children with a new
toy than a steady-going, middle-aged couple. They won first respect,
and then affection, and were felt to be a decided acquisition to the well-
being of the neighbourhood, since they were never appealed to in vain
in the cause of charity.
In the days of her own short means, when she had been obliged to look
helplessly at the trials of her neighbours, Mrs Chester had solaced
herself by dreaming of what she would do if she had money and to

spare, and to her credit be it said, she did not forget to put those dreams
into execution when the opportunity arose. The days are past when
fairy godmothers flash suddenly before our raptured eyes, clad in
spangled robes, with real, true wings growing out of their shoulders,
but the race is not dead; they appear sometimes as stout little women, in
satin gowns and be-feathered bonnets, and with the most prosaic of red,
beaming faces. The Chester barouche was not manufactured out of a
pumpkin, nor drawn by rats, but none the less had it spirited away
many a Cinderella to the longed-for ball, and, when the Prince was
found, the fairy godmother saw to it that there was no lack of satin
gowns, or glassy slippers. Dick Whittingtons, too, sitting friendless by
the roadside, were helped on to fortune; and the Sleeping Beauty was
rescued from her dull little home, and taken about to see the world. It is
wonderful what fairy deeds can be accomplished by a kind heart and a
full purse, and the recipients of Mrs Chester's bounty were relieved
from undue weight of obligation by the transparent evidence that her
enjoyment was even greater than their own!
Harold went to Eton and Oxford, and Jim to Sandhurst; but Rhoda
stayed at home and ruled supreme over her mother, her governesses,
and the servants of the establishment. Her great-uncle's wish had been
fulfilled, inasmuch as she grew up tall and straight, with a mane of
reddish-gold hair and more than an average share of good looks. She
was clever, too, and generous enough to have acknowledged her faults
if it had for one moment occurred to her that she possessed any; which
it had not. It was one of Mrs Chester's articles of faith that her daughter
was the most beautiful, the most gifted, and the most perfect of created
beings, and Rhoda agreeably acquiesced in the decision, and was pitiful
of other girls who were not as herself. Every morning when she had not
a headache, and did not feel "floppy" or "nervey," she did lessons with
Fraulein, who adored her, and shed tears behind her spectacles when
obliged to point out a fault. Then the two would repair together to the
tennis courts and play a set, the pupil winning by six games to love; or
go a bicycle ride, when Rhoda would practise fancy figures, while her
good, but cumbersome, companion picked herself up from recumbent
positions on the sidewalk, and shook the dust from her garments. At
other times Rhoda would put on her riding habit and go a ride round the

estate, taking care to emerge from the west gate at the moment when
the village children were returning from school. The little girls would
"bob" in old-fashioned style, and the boys would pull off their caps,
and Rhoda would toss her flaxen mane and acknowledge their
salutations with a gracious smile and a wave of the little gloved hand.
The children thought she looked like a fairy princess, and no more
dreamt that she was of the same flesh and blood as themselves than did
Miss Rhoda herself. Then