A Little Rebel - Margaret Wolfe Hungerford (free children's ebooks online TXT) 📗

if you don't take care," says she.

A ghost of a little smile warms her sad lips as she says this, and lights up her shining eyes like a ray of sunlight. Then it fades, and she grows sorrowful again.

"Well, _I_ can't study," says she.

"Why not?" demands the professor quickly. Here he is on his own ground; and here he has a pupil to his hand--a strange, an enigmatical, but a lovely one. "Believe me knowledge is the one good thing that life contains worth having. Pleasures, riches, rank, _all_ sink to insignificance beside it."

"How do you know?" says she. "You haven't tried the others."

"I know it, for all that. I _feel_ it. Get knowledge--such knowledge as the short span of life allotted to us will allow you to get. I can lend you some books, easy ones at first, and----"

"I couldn't read _your_ books," says she; "and--you haven't any novels, I suppose?"

"No," says he. "But----"

"I don't care for any books but novels," says she, sighing. "Have you read 'Alas?' I never have anything to read here, because Aunt Jane says novels are of the devil, and that if I read them I shall go to hell."

"Nonsense!" says the professor gruffly.

"You mustn't think I'm afraid about _that,"_ says Perpetua demurely; "I'm not. I know the same place could never contain Aunt Jane and me for long, so _I'm_ all right."

The professor struggles with himself for a moment and then gives way to mirth.

"Ah! _now_ you are on my side," cries his ward exultantly. She tucks her arm into his. "And as for all that talk about 'knowledge'--don't bother me about that any more. It's a little rude of you, do you know? One would think I was a dunce--that I knew nothing--whereas, I assure you," throwing out her other hand, "I know _quite_ as much as most girls, and a great deal more than many. I daresay," putting her head to one side, and examining him thoughtfully, "I know more than you do, if it comes to that. I don't believe you know this moment who wrote 'The Master of Ballantrae.' Come now, who was it?"

She leans back from him, gazing at him mischievously, as if anticipating his defeat. As for the professor, he grows red--he draws his brows together. Truly this is a most impertinent pupil! 'The Master of Ballantrae.' It _sounds_ like Sir Walter, and yet--The professor hesitates and is lost.

"Scott," says he, with as good an air as he can command.

"Wrong," cries she, clapping her hands softly, noiselessly. "Oh! you _ignorant _man! Go buy that book at once. It will do you more good and teach you a great deal more than any of your musty tomes."

She laughs gaily. It occurs to the professor, in a misty sort of way, that her laugh, at all events, would do _anyone_ good.

She has been pulling a ring on and off her finger unconsciously, as if thinking, but now looks up at him.

"If you spoke to her again, when she was in a better temper, don't you think she would let you take me to the theatre some night?" She has come nearer, and has laid a light, appealing little hand upon his arm.

"I am sure it would be useless," says he, taking off his glasses and putting them on again in an anxious fashion. They are both speaking in whispers, and the professor is conscious of feeling a strange sort of pleasure in the thought that he is sharing a secret with her. "Besides," says he, "I couldn't very well come here again."

"Not come again? Why?"

"I'd be afraid," returns he simply. Whereon Miss Wynter, after a second's pause, gives way and laughs "consumedly," as they would have said long, long years before her pretty features saw the light.

"Ah! yes," murmurs she. "How she did frighten you. She brought you to your knees--you actually"--this with keen reproach--"took her part against me."

"I took her part to _help_ you," says the professor, feeling absurdly miserable.

"Yes," sighing, "I daresay. But though I know I should have suffered for it afterwards, it would have done me a world of good to hear somebody tell her his real opinion of her for once. I should like," calmly, "to see her writhe; she makes me writhe very often."

"This is a bad school for you," says the professor hurriedly.

"Yes? Then why don't you take me away from it?"

"If I could----but---- Well, I shall see," says he vaguely.

"You will have to be very quick about it," says she. Her tone is quite ordinary; it never suggests itself to the professor that there is meaning beneath it.

"You have _some_ friends surely?" says he.

"There is a Mrs. Constans who comes here sometimes to see Aunt Jane. She is a young woman, and her mother was a friend of Aunt Jane's, which accounts for it, I suppose. She seems kind. She said she would take me to a concert soon, but she has not been here for many days. I daresay she has forgotten all about it by this time."

She sighs. The charming face so near the professor's is looking sad again. The white brow is puckered, the soft lips droop. No, she cannot stay _here,_ that is certain--and yet it was her father's wish, and who is he, the professor, that he should pretend to know how girls should be treated? What if he should make a mistake? And yet again, should a little brilliant face like that know sadness? It is a problem difficult to solve. All the professor's learning fails him now.

"I hope she will remember. Oh! she _must,_" declares he, gazing at Perpetua. "You know I would do what I could for you, but your aunt--you heard her--she would not let you go anywhere with me."

"True," says Perpetua. Here she moves back, and folds her arms stiffly across her bosom, and pokes out her chin, in an aggressive fashion, that creates a likeness on the spot, in spite of the youthful eyes, and brow, and hair. "'Young _gentle_women in _our_ time, Mr. Curzon, never went out walking, _alone,_ with _A Man!'"_

The mimicry is perfect. The professor, after a faint struggle with his dignity, joins in her naughty mirth, and both laugh together.

_"'Our'_ time! she thinks you are a hundred and fifty!" says Miss Wynter.

"Well, so I am, in a way," returns the professor, somewhat sadly.

"No, you're not," says she. _"I_ know better than that, I" patting his arm reassuringly, "can guess your age better than she can. I can see _at once,_ that you are not a day older than poor, darling papa. In fact you may be younger. I am perfectly certain you are not more than fifty."

The professor says nothing. He is staring at her. He is beginning to feel a little forlorn. He has forgotten youth for many days, has youth in revenge forgotten him?

"That is taking off a clear hundred at once," says she lightly. "No small account." Here, as if noticing his silence, she looks quickly at him, and perhaps something in his face strikes her, because she goes on hurriedly. "Oh! and what is age after all? I wish _I_ were old, and then I should be able to get away from Aunt Jane--without--without any _trouble."_

"I am afraid you are indeed very unhappy here," says the professor gravely.

"I _hate_ the place," cries she with a frown. "I shan't be able to stay here. Oh! _why_ didn't poor papa send me to live with you?"

Why indeed? That is exactly what the professor finds great difficulty in explaining to her. An "old man" of "fifty" might very easily give a home to a young girl, without comment from the world. But then if an "old man of fifty" _wasn't_ an old man of fifty---- The professor checks his thoughts, they are growing too mixed.

"We should have been _so_ happy," Perpetua is going on, her tone regretful. "We could have gone everywhere together, you and I. I should have taken you to the theatre, to balls, to concerts, to afternoons. You would have been _so_ happy, and so should I. You would--wouldn't you?"

The professor nods his head. The awful vista she has opened up to him has completely deprived him of speech.

"Ah! yes," sighs she, taking that deceitful nod in perfect good faith. "And you would have been good to me too, and let me look in at the shop windows. I should have taken such _care_ of you, and made your tea for you, just" sadly, "as I used to do for poor papa, and----"

It is becoming too much for the professor.

"It is late. I must go," says he.

It is a week later when he meets her again. The season is now at its height, and some stray wave of life casting the professor into a fashionable thoroughfare, he there finds her.

Marching along, as usual, with his head in the air, and his thoughts in the ages when dates were unknown, a soft, eager voice calling his name brings him back to the fact that he is walking up Bond Street.

In a carriage, exceedingly well appointed, and with her face wreathed in smiles, and one hand impulsively extended, sits Perpetua. Evidently the owner of the carriage is in the shop making purchases, whilst Perpetua sits without, awaiting her.

"Were you going to cut me?" cries she. "What luck to meet you here. I am having such a _lovely_ day. Mrs. Constans has taken me out with her, and I am to dine with her, and go with her to a concert in the evening."

She has poured it all out, all her good news in a breath, as though sure of a sympathetic listener.

He is too good a listener. He is listening so hard, he is looking so intensely, that he forgets to speak, and Perpetua's sudden gaiety forsakes her. Is he angry? Does he think----?

"It's _only_ a concert," says she, flushing and hesitating. "Do you think that one should not go to a concert when----"

"Yes?" questions the professor abstractedly, as she comes to a full stop. He has never seen her dressed like this before. She is all in black to be sure, but _such_ black, and her air! She looks quite the little heiress, like a little queen indeed--radiant, lovely.

_"Well_--when one is in mourning," says she somewhat impatiently, the color once again dyeing her cheek. Quick tears have sprung to her eyes. They seem to hurt the professor.

"One cannot be in mourning always," says he slowly. His manner is still unfortunate.

"You evade the question," says she frowning. "But a concert _isn't_ like a ball, is it?"

"I don't know," says the professor, who indeed has had little knowledge of either for years, and whose unlucky answer arises solely from inability to give her an honest reply.

"You hesitate," says she, "you disapprove then. But," defiantly, "I don't care--a concert is _not_ like a ball."

"No--I suppose not."

"I can see what you are thinking," returns she, struggling with her mortification. "And it is very _hard_ of you. Just because _you_ don't care to go anywhere, you think I oughtn't to care either. That is what is so selfish about people who are old. You," wilfully, "are just as bad as Aunt Jane."

The professor looks at her. His face is perplexed--distressed--and something more,