X.
_A TERRIBLE LOSS._
When Miss Ashton dismissed the rest of her little class for the recesswhich they took in the course of the morning, she told Mabel to comewith her; and taking her apart into a room by herself, she talkedgravely but kindly to her.
"Would you like it, my dear?" she said, "if I sent you home with a noteto your mamma, saying I could no longer have you in the school?"
Mabel hesitated a moment, half-inclined to say that it was just whatshe would like; but calling to mind the nice plays she often hadwith her young school-mates, the pretty picture cards she sometimesreceived from Miss Ashton when she had been particularly good orrecited her lessons well, and several other pleasures which schoolafforded, she thought better of it, and said she would not like it atall; adding to herself what she dared not say aloud to Miss Ashton,that she would carry no such note home, but throw it away in the streetif it was given to her.
"And I should be very sorry to do it," said the young lady; "but,Mabel, unless you do better, I cannot have you in my school. Why, mydear, since you have been here there has been more quarrelling anddisturbance than during all the rest of the time I have had the class.This must not go on; for you cannot stay with us if you will behave soas to destroy all our peace and comfort."
Mabel hung her head; but she took the reproof better than she generallyreceived any fault-finding; and after Miss Ashton had talked a littlemore, setting her naughtiness and its sad consequences plainly beforeher, and urging her to be good and amiable for her own sake as well asbecause it was right, she had permission to go, and left her teacher,half-repentant, but still not quite determined to take her advice andwarnings and make up her mind to be a better child.
In this perverse mood, she did not feel like joining the otherchildren, who were playing on the piazza and out in the garden, butwandered back to the school-room by herself. She sat here a momentor two in her own seat, which was next to Belle's, knocking her feetidly against the floor, and wishing for something to amuse herselfwith; but still too proud or too sulky to go and play with the others.But presently she bethought herself once more of the locket, and thetemptation came to her to open Belle's desk and look at it. ThenConscience whispered, "Shame! shame! Belle was so kind to you, andbegged you off when Miss Ashton would have punished you."
The still, small voice made itself heard so plainly that she couldnot refuse to listen at first, but she tried to hush it, and at lastsucceeded.
"I'm not going to do any harm," she said; "only just to look at thelocket, and that can't hurt it. Belle won't know it, and she won't bemad."
She opened Belle's desk and peeped in.
There lay the pretty trifle she coveted in the snug corner where thelittle owner's hands had so carefully placed it. Mabel looked andlooked, and from looking she went to touching it. First with only onefinger, feeling guilty and ashamed all the time; for with all herfaults Mabel was not generally deceitful or meddling. Presently growingbolder, she took it up, shut down the lid of the desk, and sat turningthe locket over and over, wishing that the jeweller were there, so thatshe might show it to him while Belle knew nothing about it.
Suddenly she heard a quick, running step in the hall without; andbefore she had time to open Belle's desk and put the locket in itsplace, Dora Johnson came in. Mabel dropped the locket in her lap, andthrew her pocket-handkerchief over it. Dora saw nothing wrong, onlyMabel sitting there with a very red face, which she supposed to arisefrom shame, as indeed it partly did, though it came from a cause whichDora never suspected.
"It's beginning to rain, and we all have to come in," said Dora; andthe next moment the whole troop of children running in proved the truthof her words. They did not all come into the school-room; but Dora andone or two more were there, so that Mabel did not dare to lift the lidof Belle's desk again and put back the locket.
She was very much frightened, and would have been content, glad indeed,to give up the hope of any locket at all, to have had Belle's safelyback where she had left it. She knew that her school-mates would allcry out shame upon her if they saw that she had meddled with thelocket, and she knew that she deserved this; but she shrank from thelooks and words of scorn and displeasure which she knew would fall uponher when they discovered the treachery she had been guilty of towardsher dear little cousin.
So she felt and thought as she sat there with the locket hidden on herlap, and at last feeling that she must rid herself of it by some means,and fearing that Miss Ashton would return to call them to order beforeshe did so, she rose and wandered out of the room, holding the locketfast within her handkerchief.
Most of the children were in the hall, and she went on into thecloak-room. There was no one there; and as she looked about her,wondering what she should do with the locket, the bell rang to call theclass back to their places.
With no time to think, with no plan in her head, not meaning to keepthe locket from Belle, nor yet seeing her way clearly to the means ofgetting it back, Mabel hastily dropped it in a corner upon the floor,snatched down her own hat and sacque and threw them over it; then ranback to the school-room with beating heart and crimson cheeks. No onenoticed her guilty looks; or, if they did, laid them to the same causethat Dora Johnson had done, and did not speak of them.
The class in reading was now called up; and as Mabel took her standabout the middle of the row, she gave her attention, not to the taskbefore her, but to the locket lying hidden in the cloak-room, and triedto contrive a way out of her difficulty.
Suddenly a thought struck her, and she gave a great sigh of relief.This was the day on which Belle took her music-lesson after school wasdismissed: it might be that she would not discover that the locket hadbeen taken out of her desk till she came to go home; and she, Mabel,would have time to put it back after the other children had left.
Miss Ashton's voice roused her, calling back her thoughts to her lessonand reminding her that it was her turn to read; but she did not knowwhere the place was, and when it was pointed out to her by Belle, shestumbled and blundered over words that she knew quite well, and readmost disgracefully, finishing her performance with a new burst ofcrying.
Miss Ashton did not find fault with her, believing perhaps thatshe really could not help it, but passed on to the next. Would shehave taken it so quietly if she had known the true cause of Mabel'sexcitement? The child could not help asking herself this question, orwondering what punishment she would be called on to bear if her teacherknew all. Not for twenty lockets such as Belle's would she have bornethe miserable feelings from which she was suffering now.
So the time dragged on, heavily, heavily, till it was the hour fordismissal; and the little ones prepared to go home.
Mabel watched Belle's every motion, scarcely daring to hope thatshe would not discover her loss before she went downstairs to hermusic-lesson; but Belle, never dreaming but that her treasure laysafely hidden in the far corner where she had left it, put books andslate back into her desk in haste, and at last followed Miss Ashtonfrom the room.
Then Mabel hurried into the cloak-room, a new fear taking hold of her,as fears without number or reason ever will of the guilty. Supposeany of the other children had lifted her sacque and found the locketbeneath it! No: it lay upon the floor still,--not just as she had leftit, it seemed to her fearful, suspicious eyes. But no one turned uponher with accusing words or looks; and she believed herself safe, if shecould but manage to be the last child to go.
Nanette, her nurse, who was waiting for her, was too well used to herfreaks to be much surprised when she declared she was not going homejust yet; and stood by, with what patience she might, to await thepleasure of her hard young task-mistress, who plumped herself down onthe floor upon her sacque with a look of dogged determination, whichNanette knew well would change to one of furious passion if she werecrossed.
As Lily Norris left the room, she could not refrain from a parting shotat Mabel.
"Mabel," she said, "in the 'Nonsense Book' there is a picture of asul
ky girl sitting on a carpet, and the reading about her begins,
'There was a young lady of Turkey, Whose temper was exceedingly murky;'
and I just b'lieve the man what took her portrait, and made the poetryabout her, meant you;" with which, mindful of the fact that Mabel'shand was swift and heavy when she was provoked, she flew from the room,chuckling over her own joke, and joined in her laughter by those whofollowed her, Lily being considered a great wit.
So had Mabel set all her young school-mates against her that therewas scarcely one who did not enjoy a laugh at her expense. But justnow Mabel was too much troubled about another matter to vex herselfconcerning Lily's tantalizing words; and she was only too thankful tosee all the children leave the cloak-room one after another.
The moment the last one had disappeared, she ordered her nurse to goout and stand in the entry; sprang to her feet and snatched up thesacque, intending to run with the locket and pop it into Belle's deskwithout loss of time.
But--there was no locket there!
She shook out her sacque and turned it over and over, looked in herhat, searched all about the corner, and then threw her eyes hastilyaround the room; all in vain. The locket was certainly gone; and thenext moment a cry, half of rage, half of alarm and despair, broughtNanette back to the room.
"What is it?" she asked, seeing by the child's face that it was noordinary fit of temper that ailed Mabel.
"It's gone! Oh, it's gone!" sobbed Mabel, wringing her hands andlooking the very picture of distress.
"But what is gone? What have you lost?" asked the maid.
Then Mabel recollected herself, and cried less loudly: she would nothave even Nanette know how naughty she had been, how meanly she hadacted towards the dear little cousin who had been so kind to her; for,mingled with her own fears for herself, there was a feeling of deepremorse for the trouble she had brought upon Belle.
What would the latter say when she should discover her loss?
And, oh dear! oh dear! what was she to do herself?
Even her own indulgent and all-excusing mother could hardly overlooksuch a thing as this.
She ceased her loud cries and tried to choke back the sobs, but in vaindid she wipe her eyes again and again: the tears gathered and rolleddown her cheeks as fast as she dried them away; and presently MissAshton, who had heard her cries, came running upstairs, followed byBelle, to see what was the matter.
But the moment she saw them, Mabel turned sullen, pouted out her lips,and would not speak; nor could Nanette give any explanation of thecause of the commotion she had made. And Miss Ashton, much displeasedat this new disturbance, bade the nurse put on Mabel's things and takeher home at once.
Mabel was glad enough to obey, and she suffered Nanette to lead herhome as quietly as a lamb, though she could not help a tear and a sighnow and then; and Nanette wondered much what secret trouble should havebrought about this distress.
Nor was Mabel's mamma more successful in discovering the cause, whenshe noticed the traces of tears and observed the child's evidentunhappiness. Mabel would not speak, or confess what she had done; andshe shrank from her mother's caresses and coaxings, and hung around insullen, miserable silence, waiting till Belle should come home grievedto the heart, as she knew she would be, by the loss of her much-prizedlocket.