The Palace Beautiful: A Story for Girls, L. T. Meade [fun books to read for adults txt] 📗

We'll bring something nice in for tea, and Daisy will be so happy. I expect to have very good news to bring to my little sister to-night, Poppy."

"Oh, indeed, miss, I'm sure I'm gratified to hear that same. I think, Miss Jasmine, that the programme sounds sensible—the dull part first, and then the pleasure, and then the needed refreshment for our hungry bodies. All things considered, Miss Jasmine, seeing that I eats the bread of toil from morn to eve, and have a swimming head, owing to being Sarah with every other name tacked on, I think it might be best for me to be enlivened with the waxen figures, miss, and not to have my poor brain worrited with picters."

"All right, Poppy, we will certainly go to Madame Tussaud's—but you must not consider the first part of our day dull, dear Poppy—it is business, certainly, but you don't know what it means to me. To-day, Poppy, I am about to take my first soaring flight."

"Oh law! Miss Jasmine—I always knew you were clever, miss, and I suppose it is because I'm so worried in my business days that I've got that stupid that I can't see no meaning at all in your words, miss."

"All right, Poppy, you need not see any meaning in them—all you have to do is to come with me, and look very grave and solemn, and say 'Yes' when I say 'Yes,' and shake your head and look stern when I do. You are older than me, Poppy, and you are coming as a sort of chaperon. Oh dear! Poppy, I wish you would not wear that scarlet wing and those yellow flowers in your hat."

"The cruellest of all the bitings," whispered Poppy under her breath. Aloud she said, in a meek but determined little voice—

"That hat's as it's trimmed, Miss Jasmine, and must remain according, for it can't be denuded in the street."

"All right, Poppy. Your own dear face looks sweet and home-like under it; now let us get into the very first omnibus, and find our way to the city."

When the girls arrived within the sacred precincts of the far-famed Paternoster Row, Jasmine held her breath a little, and stood still while she eagerly considered as to which publishing house she should offer her wares. Finally, she determined that her first pilgrimage should be to the editor of The Downfall, who had not yet returned or even written to her about her "Ode to Adversity."

The office of The Downfall was not in Paternoster Row, but in a very narrow street adjoining, and Jasmine, followed by Poppy, plunged boldly down this narrow alley, and then up, and up, and up, and up the winding stairs to the editor's office at the top of the house.

Jasmine had not been at all agreeably impressed by Mr. Rogers on the occasion of her former visit. Unaccompanied by Poppy, she would scarcely have again ventured to approach him, but Poppy looked quite determined and resolute enough to give her little companion courage, and Jasmine's childish voice was presently heard in the outer office demanding to see the editor.

It so happened that Mr. Rogers was not particularly engaged, for The Downfall was rapidly proving the truth of its title, and was having a very quick descent into an early and untimely grave—consequently its editor had very little to do.

Mr. Rogers consented to see Miss Jasmine Mainwaring and her companion, and accordingly the two girls were ushered into the editorial presence.

Mr. Rogers commenced his interview with Miss Jasmine by apparently forgetting all about her. This had a most disconcerting effect on the young author.

"But surely you must remember that I came to see you nearly three months ago, and brought you a poem called an 'Ode to Adversity,'" pleaded Jasmine—"we had rather a long talk about it; I don't know how you can absolutely forget."

"My dear young lady, so many people call, and leave so many poems, and each poem is so like the last, that really you must pardon me, but my head gets confused."

"Taken with a kind of swimming, sir?" here burst in Poppy. "I suppose it is a sort of Sarah case over again."

The editor stared rather fiercely at this unexpected interruption, deigned no reply whatever to Poppy, and continued his conversation with Jasmine.

"I am sorry that I have forgotten both you and your poem—it is, doubtless, docketed with others to be returned in due course—I am sorry, but of course I could not use it—did you expect me to? Why, the name alone—an 'Ode to Adversity,' was quite sufficient to make me decline it."

"But, but," said Jasmine, coloring crimson and very nearly crying, "I was told by a lady who reads your paper that the name was just what you like. She said that your paper was called by a melancholy name, and of course you wanted melancholy subjects."

The editor smiled in a very bland, though disagreeable manner—"The Downfall," he said; "we chose that title for political reasons." Here he sounded a gong. "Jones," as an attendant came in, "look in pigeon-hole D, and put into an envelope for this young lady some verses entitled an 'Ode to Adversity.' Sorry I can do nothing more for you this morning, Miss Mainwaring. Good morning—good morning."

When the two girls got out on the landing Jasmine thrust her rejected poem into Poppy's hand.

"Put it into your pocket, Poppy," she said, "and don't on any account let me see it—I must try to forget it, or my courage will go. Evidently, Poppy, names go by contraries. I wrote some dismal papers on purpose for The Downfall; I will now offer them to a magazine which has a cheerful title."

"Look there, Miss Jasmine," said Poppy, when they got into the street. "Right there, facing us at the other side, is what I call a pleasant magazine—it has lots of pictures, for see, it's pressed up to the window wide open, and it's called The Joy-bell—I'm a great deal more taken with that sound than with the sound of The Downfall."

"So am I, too," said Jasmine, the April cloud quickly leaving her expressive face—"I'm so glad I have you with me, dear Poppy; I was feeling so low just now that I should never have noticed the office of The Joy-bell—it has a very nice, high-class sound, and I should say was a more attractive magazine than even a shilling one. We'll go there at once, Poppy, and be sure you support me, and say 'Yes' when I look at you; and if I happen to frown in your direction, you'll know that I want you to help me not to accept too low a price. Now come, Poppy; I feel that destiny leads my steps to the office of The Joy-bell."

The editor of The Joy-bell happened also to be disengaged, and after keeping the young aspirant for literary fame waiting for about a quarter of an hour, consented to see her and her companion.

Jasmine's interview with this editor caused her to come away in very high spirits, for he had not only promised most carefully to consider her poem, "The Flight of the Beautiful," but he had also said he was wanting a serial story to run through the pages of The Joy-bell, and if hers happened to suit him he would be happy to use it. Finally, she went away, leaving both her story and her poems in his hands, and with a large parcel of Joy-bells under her arm.

"I will let you know my decision in a few days," said the editor, with a very suave smile. "Oh, yes, as to terms, we can talk them over when I discover if your story is likely to suit me."

Then Jasmine went away trembling with delight.

"Oh, Poppy!" she said, "how very, very happy I am."

CHAPTER XXXIV. A PLAN.

Mrs. Ellsworthy had by no means forgotten the girls—they had all three taken her fancy, and, as she said to her husband, she could not get them out of her head. Arthur Noel, who was a sort of adopted son of the house, often now brought her information about her favorites, but the good little lady was impatient to see the girls herself, and felt much annoyed at not being able to induce Arthur to give her their address.

"I don't want them to succeed," she said, talking one day to the young man. "I have plenty of money, more than I really know what to do with, and I particularly want to spend some of it on these girls. If they succeed in what they are about they won't want my money, and of course that is the last thing I wish. If I cannot adopt all three, why at least can I not have Jasmine?—Jasmine is my favorite, although I love that little pet Daisy too. Arthur, you may talk to me from morning to night, but you will never persuade me but that Jasmine is the sort of girl who would shine better in prosperity than in adversity."

"You cannot take her from her sisters," said Noel; "I do not believe you would get her to leave them—but if you were to try and were to succeed, you would certainly lower her character, and having done this, you could not say she would be a better girl in prosperity than in adversity."

"You are so particular, Arthur," half grumbled Mrs. Ellsworthy; "you must have forgotten your own very poor days, or you would not speak so warmly for adversity."

"I don't quite forget them," said Arthur, a cloud coming over his face, which was a particularly bright one. "I have a dim memory about them, and a very, very dim memory about a mother and an old nurse, who loved me very much. I can just recall crying night after night for my mother, and being beaten, and silenced, and half starved. Then I suppose I was ill, for I know there is a blank which I never can fill up; but I shall always remember that day when I stood in the snowy street, and cried so bitterly, and tried to ask for pennies, and how my hat blew off, and I ran to catch it, and then—"

"Oh, it was horrible!" said Mrs. Ellsworthy, covering her face with her hands. "I shudder at it even now—the coachman could not keep the horses in, and they went over you, and we thought you were killed. You were lifted into the carriage—such a ragged, thin little figure, with such a lovely face. You came to—you were not so badly hurt—it was nothing short of a miracle, for you ought to have been almost killed. My brother Arthur was with me, and when you opened your eyes you stretched out your arms to him. He just took you to his heart on the spot, and you were his son from that day forward. Well, Arthur, I don't think, prosperity has done you any harm."

"I had no choice," said Noel. "Prosperity came to me as God's gift. It so happens that I am now a rich man and I suppose even rich people can find their mission. The girls at present are poor; our cases are in no way parallel. Oh! how gladly I would help them, but believe me, I would help them to keep their independence."

Mrs. Ellsworthy frowned.

"If you are going to thwart me, Arthur, I am done," she said.

"Can you not help them without adopting them?" asked Arthur.

"Oh! my dear boy, what am I to do? I know lots of influential people, but I can't go to them and say, 'I know three charming girls; they are all as ignorant as possible; they don't know any of our manners and customs; they are not educated up to the required standard; they are fearfully independent. Will you, my dear friend, take the eldest into your family, and give her a governess's salary, although she cannot teach? and will you, my other beloved friend, speak to the editor of the magazine you most admire, and ask him to accept poems which do not scan, and stories which are the feeble productions of an ambitious child? And will you, my last friend, come to the rescue by employing a certain sweet little girl to look after your kittens?' Arthur, how can those girls be independent unless they are taught?"

"Still I believe the girls can be helped; and that it is the right and only thing to do," said Noel. "I propose to talk to Miss Egerton about them. I will ask her to go into figures with me, and to state what sum she thinks ought to be expended on their education. She probably knows something about what talents they have by this time. After she and I have talked our plans over together we will ask you whether you are inclined to