CHAPTER XIX.
AN EXPERIMENT.
Much to her own astonishment, Lucia found herself allowed new liberty.She was permitted to spend the afternoon frequently with Octavia; and onseveral occasions that young lady and Miss Bassett were invited topartake of tea at Oldclough in company with no other guest than FrancisBarold.
"I don't know what it means, and I think it must mean something," saidLucia to Octavia; "but it is very pleasant. I never was allowed to be sointimate with any one before."
"Perhaps," suggested Octavia sagely, "she thinks, that, if you see meoften enough, you will get sick of me, and it will be a lesson to you."
"The more I see of you," answered Lucia with a serious little air, "thefonder I am of you. I understand you better. You are not at all like whatI thought you at first, Octavia."
"But I don't know that there's much to understand in me."
"There is a great deal to understand in you," she replied. "You are apuzzle to me often. You seem so frank, and yet one knows so little aboutyou after all. For instance," Lucia went on, "who would imagine that youare so affectionate?"
"Am I affectionate?" she asked.
"Yes," answered Lucia: "I am sure you are very affectionate. I have foundit out gradually. You would suffer things for any one you loved."
Octavia thought the matter over.
"Yes," she said at length, "I would."
"You are very fond of Miss Bassett," proceeded Lucia, as if arraigningher at the bar of justice. "You are _very_ fond of your father; and I amsure there are other people you are very fond of--_very_ fond of indeed."
Octavia pondered seriously again.
"Yes, there are," she remarked; "but no one would care about them here,and so I'm not going to make a fuss. You don't want to make a fuss overpeople you l-like."
"_You_ don't," said Lucia. "You are like Francis Barold in one way, butyou are altogether different in another. Francis Barold does not wish toshow emotion; and he is so determined to hedge himself around, that onecan't help suspecting that he is always guarding himself against one. Heseems always to be resenting any interference; but you do not appear tocare at all, and so it is not natural that one should suspect you. I didnot suspect you."
"What do you suspect me of now?"
"Of thinking a great deal," answered Lucia affectionately. "And of beingvery clever and very good."
Octavia was silent for a few moments.
"I think," she said after the pause,--"I think you'll find out that it'sa mistake."
"No, I shall not," returned Lucia, quite glowing with enthusiasm. "And Iknow I shall learn a great deal from you."
This was such a startling proposition that Octavia felt decidedlyuncomfortable. She flushed rosy red.
"I'm the one who ought to learn things, I think," she said. "I'm alwaysdoing things that frighten aunt Belinda, and you know how the restregard me."
"Octavia," said Lucia, very naively indeed, "suppose we try to help eachother. If you will tell me when I am wrong, I will try to--to have thecourage to tell you. That will be good practice for me. What I want mostis courage and frankness, and I am sure it will take courage to make upmy mind to tell you of your--of your mistakes."
Octavia regarded her with mingled admiration and respect.
"I think that's a splendid idea," she said.
"Are you sure," faltered Lucia, "are you sure you won't mind thethings I may have to say? Really, they are quite little things inthemselves--hardly worth mentioning"--
"Tell me one of them, right now," said Octavia, point-blank.
"Oh, no!" exclaimed Lucia, starting. "I'd rather not--just now."
"Well," commented Octavia, "that sounds as if they must be prettyunpleasant. Why don't you want to? They will be quite as bad to-morrow.And to refuse to tell me one is a bad beginning. It looks as if you werefrightened; and it isn't good practice for you to be frightened at such alittle thing."
Lucia felt convicted. She made an effort to regain her composure.
"No, it is not," she said. "But that is always the way. I am continuallytelling myself that I _will_ be courageous and candid; and, the firsttime any thing happens, I fail. I _will_ tell you one thing."
She stopped short here, and looked at Octavia guiltily.
"It is something--I think I would do if--if I were in your place," Luciastammered. "A very little thing indeed."
"Well?" remarked Octavia anxiously.
Lucia lost her breath, caught it again, and proceeded cautiously, andwith blushes at her own daring.
"If I were in your place," she said, "I think--that, perhaps--onlyperhaps, you know--I would not wear--my hair--_quite_ so low down--overmy forehead."
Octavia sprang from her seat, and ran to the pier-glass over the mantle.She glanced at the reflection of her own startled, pretty face, andthen, putting her hand up to the soft blonde "bang" which met her brows,turned to Lucia.
"Isn't it becoming?" she asked breathlessly.
"Oh, yes!" Lucia answered. "Very."
Octavia started.
"Then, why wouldn't you wear it?" she cried. "What do you mean?"
Lucia felt her position truly a delicate one. She locked her hands, andbraced herself; but she blushed vividly.
"It may sound rather silly when I tell you why, Octavia," she said; "butI really do think it is a sort of reason. You know, in those absurdpictures of actresses, bangs always seem to be the principal feature. Isaw some in the shop-windows when I went to Harriford with grandmamma.And they were such dreadful women,--some of them,--and had so very fewclothes on, that I can't help thinking I shouldn't like to look likethem, and"--
"Does it make me look like them?"
"Oh, very little!" answered Lucia; "very little indeed, of course; but"--
"But it's the same thing after all," put in Octavia. "That's what youmean."
"It is so very little," faltered Lucia, "that--that perhaps it isn'ta reason."
Octavia looked at herself in the glass again.
"It isn't a very good reason," she remarked, "but I suppose it will do."
She paused, and looked Lucia in the face.
"I don't think that's a little thing," she said. "To be told you looklike an _opera bouffe_ actress."
"I did not mean to say so," cried Lucia, filled with the most poignantdistress. "I beg your pardon, indeed--I--oh, dear! I was afraid youwouldn't like it. I felt that it was taking a great liberty."
"I don't like it," answered Octavia; "but that can't be helped. I didn'texactly suppose I should. But I wasn't going to say any thing about_your_ hair when _I_ began," glancing at poor Lucia's coiffure, "though Isuppose I might."
"You might say a thousand things about it!" cried Lucia piteously. "Iknow that mine is not only in bad taste, but it is ugly and unbecoming.""Yes," said Octavia cruelly, "it is."
"And yours is neither the one nor the other," protested Lucia. "You knowI told you it was pretty, Octavia."
Octavia walked over to the table, upon which stood Miss Belinda'swork-basket, and took therefrom a small and gleaming pair of scissors,returning to the mantle-glass with them.
"How short shall I cut it?" she demanded.
"Oh!" exclaimed Lucia, "don't, don't!"
For answer, Octavia raised the scissors, and gave a snip. It was a savagesnip, and half the length and width of her love-locks fell on the mantle;then she gave another snip, and the other half fell.
Lucia scarcely dared to breathe.
For a moment Octavia stood gazing at herself, with pale face and dilatedeyes. Then suddenly the folly of the deed she had done seemed to revealitself to her.
"Oh!" she cried out. "Oh, how diabolical it looks!"
She turned upon Lucia.
"Why did you make me do it?" she exclaimed. "It's all your fault--everybit of it;" and, flinging the scissors to the other end of the room, shethrew herself into a chair, and burst into tears.
Lucia's anguish of mind was almost more than she could bear. For at leastthree min
utes she felt herself a criminal of the deepest dye; after thethree minutes had elapsed, however, she began to reason, and called tomind the fact that she was failing as usual under her crisis.
"This is being a coward again," she said to herself. "It is worse than tohave said nothing. It is true that she will look more refined, now onecan see a little of her forehead; and it is cowardly to be afraid tostand firm when I really think so. I--yes, I will say something to her."
"Octavia," she began aloud, "I am sure you are making a mistake again."This as decidedly as possible, which was not very decidedly. "You--youlook very much--nicer."
"I look _ghastly_!" said Octavia, who began to feel rather absurd.
"You do not. Your forehead--you have the prettiest forehead I ever saw,Octavia," said Lucia eagerly; "and your eyebrows are perfect. I--wish youwould look at yourself again."
Rather to her surprise, Octavia began to laugh under cover of herhandkerchief: reaction had set in, and, though the laugh was a triflehysterical, it was still a laugh. Next she gave her eyes a final littledab, and rose to go to the glass again. She looked at herself, touched upthe short, waving fringe left on her forehead, and turned to Lucia, witha resigned expression.
"Do you think that any one who was used to seeing it the other waywould--would think I looked horrid?" she inquired anxiously.
"They would think you prettier,--a great deal," Lucia answered earnestly."Don't you know, Octavia, that nothing could be really unbecoming to you?You have that kind of face."
For a few seconds Octavia seemed to lose herself in thought of aspeculative nature.
"Jack always said so," she remarked at length.
"Jack!" repeated Lucia timidly.
Octavia roused herself, and smiled with candid sweetness.
"He is some one I knew in Nevada," she explained. "He worked in father'smine once."
"You must have known him very well," suggested Lucia, somewhat awed.
"I did," she replied calmly. "Very well."
She tucked away her pocket-handkerchief in the jaunty pocket at the backof her basque, and returned to her chair. Then she turned again to Lucia.
"Well," she said, "I think you have found out that you _were_ mistaken,haven't you, dear? Suppose you tell me of something else."
Lucia colored.
"No," she answered: "that is enough for to-day."