Janet found after this experience was over that she had perhaps discounted too quickly the excitement of her position. She had gone too fast, as was the impulse of her nature. Julia Harwood, who had been used to continued “nagging,” which never came to anything, a continual and frivolous demand to which obedience was never exacted, had been taken entirely by surprise by the rapid movements of the little governess. Reason, which had never before been applied to her case, had made a considerable impression upon her; but still more the conviction that Miss Summerhayes would “stand no nonsense,” the wholesome sense of a force which she could not overcome: and between the two the temporary effect produced had been great. And a certain amount of order had followed in the school-room. When the two were alone, Julia replied when she was spoken to, and did more or less what she was told. There was a frame-work created of lessons and rules which helped the hours along, and to which the girl gave a sort of submission. But apart from this, which occupied the mornings of her new existence, poor Janet found herself immersed, submerged, drowned in a sort of tepid bath of Harwoodism which was an experience quite unlooked-for and unthought-of.

Some families, and those perhaps the most amiable in existence, have this tendency so strong that there is no escape from it; they compare everything, judge everything, estimate everything by the rule of their own case—“in our family we do,” or “we don’t do,” so and so, were words continually on Augusta Harwood’s lips. She was a very good, considerate, kind young woman, trying to make everybody comfortable about her, eager to anticipate every want, to see that the stranger was warm enough, cool enough, had just the right amount of sugar in her tea, was not over-tired, did not have damp feet or wear too thin a dress, or get the sun or the firelight in her eyes. Gussy achieved the difficult feat of making a dependent perfectly at her ease, and obliterating almost every trace of that embarrassment which attends the position of a governess. It was not that she fell into one of those sudden enthusiastic friendships which sometimes unites the daughter of the house with the stranger in it, but only that she was constitutionally kind, thoroughly good-hearted and good-natured. It would seem difficult to say any more in her favor than this. And yet, from her gentle, amiable, and good-humored sway there arose one fixed impression: and in her pleasant person there breathed out, embracing all things, one mild, universal atmosphere of the family.

It was as if she knew nothing but Harwoods in the world. Church—even Church!—and State, and laws and governments, and business and books were outside of the oasis in which she dwelt—the universe in general lay beyond, as great London lay beyond the brick walls of the garden in St. John’s Wood. London existed for the advantage of that house, and so did the universe in which London is but a point. But they were outside, and of secondary importance. The Harwoods, their habits, their ways, their ancestors, their relationships, and, above all, their characteristics were within, and everything without took a tinge from this prevailing atmosphere.

It might be some time before the spectators found out what it was. It was like the transparent veil of tarlatan which is sometimes stretched between a drawing-room assembly of spectators and an exhibition of tableaux vivants, to give distance and softness to the mimic scene; it was like the tint sometimes supposed to be becoming to the complexion, which faintly rose-colored glass gives to the air of a boudoir: it was a medium, an atmosphere, all pervading, something from which there was no escape.

Janet had been prepared, as has been seen, for many of the deprivations of a governess, none of which she was called upon to bear. The letters she received from her old friends at Clover, to whom she had narrated her first experiences, were almost enthusiastic in their congratulations.

“You seem to have been fortunate above anything that could be hoped for,” Mrs. Bland wrote. “I never heard of such kind people.”

And so they were, Janet assured herself. Never were people so kind; they cared for her comfort as if she had been a favored visitor; they never allowed her to feel herself de trop. They accepted her into the bosom of the family with the most open as well as the most considerate kindness. Nevertheless, it was not very long before Janet began to feel the creeping in of something not strong enough to be called miasma, a sort of closeness in the air. She felt the heavens contracting round her, and the horizon closing up. These sensations were more or less physically justified by the fact that there is a great deal of vegetation in St. John’s Wood; that the trees grew too close in a hundred gardens, and that though their foliage and greenness were delightful in summer, the fall of the leaf was attended with disagreeables there as in other leafy places; but that was not the heart of the matter.

Janet began to feel herself drawing long breaths of relief when she got outside the garden gate. This was generally in company with Julia, who did not share in the family worship, and whose conversation was very jerky and irregular, leaving the governess free either to lead the dialogue or to refrain from any. And when Janet escaped altogether by herself, as sometimes she did, to go to church, sometimes to the circulating library to get a book, sometimes to the nearest repository of art needlework to match some silk or crewels for Mrs. Harwood, she was still more delighted and relieved.

To escape for an hour from the Harwoods—to become once more conscious of her own individuality, and of the existence of crowds, nay, worlds of people who did not bear that respectable name, became the greatest refreshment to her. She would run out even in the wet if anything was wanted in the most cheerful and, as the family thought, self-denying way.

“But, my dear, it rains. I couldn’t possibly let you go out in the rain, to take all the stiffening out of your crape, and, perhaps, catch cold, all because I want that book,” Mrs. Harwood would say, divided between her desire for a new novel (which is so doubly acceptable on a wet day) and her concern for Janet.

This was a thing that the gardener could not do, nor even her own maid—could that functionary have been persuaded to wet her feet—for maids and gardeners never know what books you have read, even though they themselves have brought them from the library, and produce the same three volumes again and again, as Mrs. Harwood complained, till you are nearly driven out of your senses.

“If you really think you would like a run,” the old lady added, with a sudden sense of the advantage. “I remember when I was your age I never minded the rain—but it will take all the stiffening out of your crape.”

“She has no crape on that dress,” said Gussy, “which I very much approve of, for what is the good of a thing you have always to be thinking of? We never go in for mourning very much in our family. But, mamma, I do think, what with your books and your crewels, and so forth, you impose very much on Miss Summerhayes.”

“Oh, I like it,” cried Janet, “it gives me the greatest pleasure. I only wish I could run on errands all day long, if I could be of any use—you are all so good to me.”

“That is a grateful little thing, Gussy,” said Mrs. Harwood, as Janet, wrapped in a mackintosh, with her skirts drawn up, and a little felt hat upon her head which could not be spoilt, ran lightly along the glistening path to the garden door.

“Yes,” said Gussy, sedately, “she is a kind little thing: and I am sure she would do anything to please you, mamma. And such a good influence over Ju. Dolff will not believe his eyes when he comes home and sees her actually doing her lessons like any other girl.”

“I hope Miss Summerhayes does not humor her too much,” said Mrs. Harwood, with a sigh.

In the meantime, Janet was running along with the rain in her face, and a sense of freedom which made her heart dance. It was not an attractive day to be out, and the long roads in St. John’s Wood, between the garden walls, with here and there a little oasis formed by a few shops, were not, perhaps, exhilarating to pedestrians generally. On a wet day there was nothing at all to be seen or met with in these roads any more than had they been the suburbs of a country town. On fine days the children and their nurserymaids made a great deal of variety, and the old ladies going out for their airings in their bath chairs. It is not, perhaps, a very gay kind of traffic which is represented by bath chairs and perambulators. But there were the tradesmen, too, and occasional cabs passing to add to the effect. But when it rained everything was desolate. The garden doors were closely shut: the houses invisible behind among the bare branches of the trees from which the last shabby leaves were tumbling like rags among the droppings of the rain. What it is to be twenty, and to have a heart free of care! Janet ran along the glistening pavement with her skirts held up, delighted, glad to be out, though she breathed almost as much rain as air, glad to have escaped from the all-enveloping Harwoods, and to be herself for a moment. She was only going on an errand for her employer, and her return was anxiously looked for, so that she knew that she must not be long: but every moment was good. She carried her umbrella shut; she would not lose the feeling of the soft rain on her forehead. A conviction that this was against all the traditions of the Harwoods made it doubly agreeable. They were all afraid of catching cold and getting wet, but not Janet. She liked it. It meant a mark of freedom and independence. It meant being herself without a thought of Harwoodism, as she had been in the old days.

Janet skipped into the stationer’s shop to which she was bound, and which stood only (alas!) about a quarter-of-a-mile off in one of the oases already described. In St. John’s Wood there are a great many stationers’ shops. They are doubled with a circulating library, usually a branch of the all-pervading Mudie, and they sell all manner of “fancy” articles, cardboarding of every description. There is a great sale for menu cards, for little mounts and frames, for calendars and almanacs, and every sort of little composition of paper, pictures, and mottoes in pretty colors, in such districts. Pencils in boxes and out of them, with little holders, with silver cases, and unadorned for drawing purposes: writing materials in pretty colored covers: little books such as innocent minds love, with texts for every day, or pretty verses, or scraps of genteel philosophy. It would fill all my space if I were to give a catalogue of half the things in these stationers’ shops. In addition to all this and the library, with its rows of novels, a little dilapidated, there was a counter for music in this particular example of the stationers of St. John’s Wood, and another one for newspapers both these things forming a portion of the well-established business carried on by the Misses Mimpriss in Laburnum Place.

When Janet skipped in, her face fresh from the rain and cold air, her eyes dancing with freedom and satisfaction, she almost ran against a gentleman who was standing inside turning over the music, and who turned round quickly with a mixture of surprise and curiosity. He was a young man and rather handsome, Janet thought; not very tall but strong and well built, with dark hair and a fine complexion, a little like, perhaps, the male beauties in the hairdressers’ shops. She was so much taken by surprise to find a man in that feminine place that she was, perhaps, a little severe in her hasty judgment. He interfered with her satisfaction somehow, though he was perfectly well-bred, and after the one glance of surprised attention—which was quite justifiable surely when a girl came like a bombshell into a little shop, where no such projectile could have been expected on a wet day—returned to his music and took no further notice. The momentary shock, however, made Janet’s fresh countenance blaze with its surprise and unexpectedness. She went back into the further part of the shop to look over the novels and choose one which Mrs. Harwood would like, which was no easy task. She had to ask for the help of the disengaged sister, who presided over that shrine of fiction, and had a long consultation with her to see which books Mrs. Harwood had already read. Finally, she chose one with much internal doubt, intensified, she could scarcely tell how, by the presence of the man who stood with his back to her, certainly not interfering in any way with that simple operation. And it happened to make matters worse that the sister whom Janet was consulting was not the sister whose business it was to enter the books. Accordingly, when Janet’s Miss Mimpriss said to the other Miss Mimpriss “391,-121 for Mrs. Harwood,” the gentleman who was buying music turned half round again, exactly as if he had said, “Oh!” and gave Janet a look, not like the former look, which was merely conventional, but one which was personal to herself, and meant several things. It was a glance full of understanding, as if he knew all about her, and of criticism, and amusement. His eyebrows went up a little, and he seemed to say, “Oh! so that is who you are? It is you, is it?” which made Janet very angry, though for the life of her she could not have told why. She took her three battered volumes in her hands and left the shop, feeling her little expedition to be quite spoiled. She had meant to make an investigation herself among the music and to look over the “fancy” articles. She was only after all a country young lady; and she believed that among the many pretty things which the Miss Mimprisses sold at a cost of from one to two shillings, she could have found something which Mrs. Bland would have set upon the drawing-room mantelpiece in the vicarage, bidding her visitors look what a pretty thing Janet had sent her from London, and was it not kind of the child?

Janet could not linger, however, to make any such purchase under that man’s eye. She would not have liked to do it before anybody, and had, indeed, jibed at the fancy articles when she had entered the shop with Miss Harwood; but she felt much aggrieved to be so balked.

“Very like a barber’s block,” she said to herself; the sort of man whom you might expect to see in that respectable part of St. John’s Wood, buying music, which perhaps he was going to take with him to some tea-party, to sing to the ladies.

When she had exhaled her annoyance in this angry criticism, Janet recovered some portion of her pleasure, and walked home, but much more slowly, in order that she might have the enjoyment of every moment of her freedom, and not go in too soon. We are all much displeased when maids and page-boys, and other light-hearted but slow-footed messengers, do this, and keep our letters or our novels from us, forgetting that these functionaries too might, like Janet, have need to feel themselves now and then, and be able to think, as they walk along Acacia Road, that they are John or Mary, and not mere officials executing our will.

That night began just as other evenings had begun after dinner. The family group was very comfortable, warm and safe from all contention of the elements which had settled into a downpour outside, from all inharmonious noises or interruptions within. Mrs. Harwood and Gussy at opposite sides of the fire, Miss Summerhayes seated at a little distance with the book upon the table, the very book which she had got from the library, and which she had volunteered to read aloud while the others worked. Very comfortable, but rather dull, but for the book, which was something, and lent an interest to the monotonous night.

When lo! all at once, in the midst of this monotony and unbroken calm, the stillness was suddenly broken by the tingle of the house bell. Somebody at the door! Late in the evening, nearly nine, an hour at which no stranger step or sound ever disturbed the house. Janet stopped reading involuntarily, and grew pale in her surprise, looking round upon her companions with a sort of appeal.

“Bless us,” cried Mrs. Harwood, “who can this be so late at night?”

“It is, perhaps, a telegram,” said Gussy. And then she glanced at the clock, and added, “It is not so very late. We have had people come later than this.”

Gussy had a little light, not usually there, kindled in her eyes. She let her work drop upon her knees and listened. The sound of the unwilling parlor-maid sallying out in the wet to unlock the door, the sound of a voice and another step, even of a dripping umbrella placed in a stand, and an overcoat being taken off, were listened to by the ladies with much unanimity of interest. Even Janet was glad that something was coming to break the calm routine. When this last stage of suspense was reached, Gussy said,

“It will be Charley Meredith and his songs,” and laughed a little, as it were, under her breath.

And then the door opened, and there walked in, with the assured step of one who knew himself welcome, the man of the music and the stationer’s shop, the man who had looked round upon Janet as she got her novel, saying, “Oh!” with his eyes.