E. Delafield - The Collected Works of E. M. Delafield (Illustrated Edition)

"But I think it's time I had her with me again, poor little thing! or she will feel I'm shirking my responsibilities," he ended with a rather melancholy smile.

"No one could possibly think that, Louis, if you leave her here, where she will always have a home and a mother's care—unless, indeed, you think she ought to be at school?"

"Certainly not. There has never been any question of her going to school. But, my dear Marianne, Villetswood is Zella's natural home, even though circumstances have altered."

"They have indeed," said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans agitatedly; "and you surely cannot intend, Louis, to keep her alone in that great house, with no one but the servants. For although a father may be very devoted, a girl must have a mother, at Zella's age, or some good woman to take a mother's place."

"I do not think anyone can do that," said Louis gravely; " but Zella shall not lack care."

"Governesses are sometimes very artful, Louis, and you might find many unforeseen difficulties with them."

"No doubt," replied Louis dryly, rather inclined to laugh at the delicately veiled insinuation. "But for the moment I had not thought of getting a governess for Zella. It will be education enough, for the present, if I take her abroad with me."

All Mrs. Lloyd-Evans's most cherished prejudices settled round the fatal word "abroad," and she was silent from sincere dismay.

"I want a companion, and it will do Zella good," said Louis serenely. "Besides, it is time we went to visit my mother."

"Paris ?" almost groaned his sister-in-law.

"No. She is in Rome for the winter, and is very anxious that Zella and I should join her there for a couple of months."

Rome, to Mrs. Lloyd-Evans's thinking, was merely one degree worse than Paris, in harbouring the Pope and a society mainly composed of intriguing and loose-living Cardinals. Nor did she belong to the class that is accustomed to travelling as a matter of course, and, as she afterwards said to Henry, it seemed to her nothing less than scandalous that an old woman of seventy, like the Baronne de Kervoyou, should be rushing all over the globe at her time of life.

Louis, who with his wife was accustomed to spending a week in Paris or a fortnight in Italy whenever the fancy seized them, only partially understood her dismay.

"We shall be back by the middle of February, I expect," he said kindly, "and Zella will enjoy seeing Italy."

"Christmas in Rome!"

He misunderstood her. "The New Year is more of a festival there, I fancy."

"No wonder, in a country without any religion but Romanism!"

"Oh," said Louis rather humorously, "if that is what you are thinking of, there is an English church all right, and Zella can attend it; though I admit I much prefer the Catholic ones myself. But my mother, as a matter of fact, will be exceedingly particular about all that."

"Louis," said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans warmly, "you have a perfect right to do as you please with your own child."

Few words could have conveyed her unalterable disapproval more effectively.

But Mrs. Lloyd-Evans gave no sign of disapproving her brother-in-law's decision before his child, to Zella's intense relief. A shade of added gravity in Aunt Marianne's manner might merely be attributed to the responsibility, which she took upon herself as a matter of course, of superintending Zella's packing and purchasing one or two additions to her mourning.

"You see, dear," she gravely told her niece, "you will hardly be able to get anything very suitable out there. I know what foreign shops are."

"We shall be two nights in Paris," said Zella.

"A little girl cannot shop in a town like Paris," Mrs. Lloyd-Evans told her, thereby infuriating Zella, who since her father's arrival had ceased to regard herself as a little girl.

The term, so obnoxious to fourteen, was now felt by Zella to be only appropriate to Muriel. For the past two months, Zella felt that she had been regarded by all her surroundings as Muriel's inferior in education, sense, and virtue; and, though Muriel herself was utterly unconscious on the subject, Zella had resented the knowledge passionately, and took full advantage of her present triumphant emancipation, suddenly magnificently self-confident again.

Muriel was frankly envious of a cousin whose father could suddenly arrive, as Uncle Louis had done, and take his daughter away from Miss Vincent and the routine of lessons and walks, to spend the winter abroad.

Miss Vincent said rather coldly:

"This will be an opportunity, Zella, for you to learn Italian. I hope you will make the most of it."

"When shall you start ?" Muriel asked wistfully.

"We are going to London on Monday, and to Paris next day; but I dare say we shall stay there a day or two," said Zella in the most matter-of-fact tone at her command. "Of course, I know Paris quite well already."

"You are lucky," said Muriel enviously.

"I am rather fond of travelling!" observed Zella casually.

Even the submissive Muriel was moved at this to say rather defiantly:

"Of course, I shall go abroad myself when I'm seventeen, to finish my education. I expect I shall go to Germany, so as to work at my violin-playing."

This reference to an accomplishment which she did not herself possess did not please Zella, and she replied that perhaps by that time, Muriel would have given up the fiddle. Muriel was offended, and the two cousins might have parted with some coldness but for the chastening influence of the Last Evening.

It was a modified edition of that Last Evening consecrated to James's departure, and the weight of it oppressed Zella strangely. She had not been happy at Boscombe, and had been glad to know she was leaving; yet she found herself gazing regretfully round the drawing-room, grown so familiar in the last two months, and at her silent relatives, of whom only her father was talking cheerfully and unconstrainedly.

She despised Muriel, and found her irritating and uncongenial; but she now sat and held Muriel's hand, and promised to write her long letters from Rome.

She even said, " Oh, I do wish you were coming, too! I shall miss you so," and felt that Muriel was her first cousin, exactly of her own age, and that they had been, and would always continue to be, sisters to one another.

And Muriel waxed disconsolate and affectionate, and gave Zella a small flat bottle of very strong scent "for the train."

Aunt Marianne also gave her a present.

She came to Zella's room after her niece was in bed, and said very kindly:

"Here is a little keepsake, darling, and I want you to make Aunt Marianne a promise."

The little keepsake was a copy of the "Imitation," bound in soft green morocco, with a green satin ribbon marker, and the smallest print Zella had ever seen. The promise was that she should read a chapter of it every night before going to bed.

She made the promise willingly, feeling intensely grateful for the gift, as a token that Aunt Marianne had, after all, found something about her niece that was lovable, although Zella knew herself to be a liar and deceitful and ungrateful.

"Aunt Marianne has marked one or two passages," Mrs. Lloyd-Evans told her gently. "But of course you can find others for yourself that will have a special meaning for you as you grow older. I always think that a book means so much more to one when one has marked all the little bits that come home to one most."

Zella, more than most children, had been brought up to consider scribbling on the pages of a book little short of criminal; but grave and considered underlinings and annotations in a book of devotion were a different matter. She rather looked forward to discovering in the " Imitation," which she had never read, passages peculiarly suited to the especial needs of her soul.

"I have put in a little pressed fern leaf from the garden, dear, to remind you of your home at Boscombe," said Mrs. Lloyd-Evans; "and I thought one day you would like to add another for yourself, from your dear, dear mother's resting-place near the little church at Villetswood."