MISS JACOBSEN’S CHANCE.

South Canterbury Times, Issue 6750, 3 February 1892, Page 4

MISS JACOBSEN’S CHANCE.

LITERATURE

| CONTINUED. ‘He’s a doctor —Dr Lionel Fraill. Don’t you like the name of Lionel ? I think it’s lovely. He came out on board one of the emigrant ships/ said Lai Strover.

*ls that all ?’ said Sara, with a shrug of her shoulders.

* Oh, but he has all sorts of testimonials. He is extraordinary clever. He has been in I don’t know how many wars. He fought in America, and was taken prisoner He can mesm rize people, and tell characters. Isn’t it romantic ? And he squashed a mutiny or something on board the ship. The country has to do something for him in consequence, and he is asked to dine at Government House.’ • Oh ! so are we/ said Sara, with a little flash of triumph pulling out the card, which lay under a heap of bice on the table.

‘ I thought I saw the orderly riding down the Point!’ exclaimed Lally. ‘ When is it for P Let me see. Then I bet you anything it is to meet Dr Fraill. I must run home and find out out if we are asked too.’

Miss Strover gathered up her parcels, and seized her umbrella. The rovers lived in a large house with ext-naive grounds on the same side as Janion’s Avenue, but higher up in the bend of the river. Just as Lally was going out of the door, Sara asked hesi tatingly : ‘ Have you ever been at a grand dinner-party, Lai ?’ * N— o/ replied Lally doubtfully. ‘ They don’t ask girls, as a rule, when there are mothers. Perhaps this one wi'l be different.’ ‘ You don't know, Lai/ continued Sara, ‘ whether a dress—like this—would be the right thing P’ Oh, mamma always wears a low dress when she goes to dine at Gov-k eminent House, il that’s what you want to know/ said Lally. ‘ And gloves P’ pursued Sara— ‘ all dinner time ?’ Miss S'rover reflected for a moment. ‘ I suppose you’d take them off when you were eating, for they might get dirty, don’t you sea ? But I can ask mamma, and Jet you know. Goodbye. Will you come ' over to the Gardens to-morrow, and hear the band play P’ ‘lcan’t/ said Sara ; * I must work at my dress. I’ve got all the ribbon to ruche in the machine ; and oh, Lai, if you are going to the North Side tomorrow, bring me a sixpenny Japanese fan that I can trim with black lace. The Princess wore a fan of magnificent black ostrich feathers with jewelled sticks/ added Sara, with a deep sigh. But Miss Lally had already sprung down the veranda steps, and was out of hearing. Sara took up the fashion-book, and studied it for a minute or two with puckered brows. Then she leaned back in her chair, and devoted a few more minutes to idle meditation. She wished that she bad been born a great lady in England, to whom all the details of civilized life would, she supposed, come as easily as eating end drinking. She had a contempt for all that was colonial, though she knew nothing better, and indeed only the worst side of colonial society. She was as thoroughly discontented with her own lot as any fairly healthyminded girl can be. She had been educated at a cheap school from which she had come home hardly a year before. She had found herself clevereh than her school-fellows; clever enougr to know that her mistress taught her flashily and superficially ; taught her scarcely anything that was worth the learning. Most of her knowledge, such as it been derived from novels; and what irritated her about novels was that they did not go deep enough, and never told her just the things she wanted to know. She despised her surroundings. She bad hardly known ber mother, and her feelings towards her father were not an illustration 0/ filial devotion. She had very few girl, companions. Even the best of them, Lally Strover, grated upon her sometimes ; and she did not care for the second-rate bank clerks and Civil servants with whim that young lady surrounded herself, and of whom she non complained. There was no reason why bank clerks, even it their incomes only ranged from £l5O to £3OO a year, should not be well bred and agreeable ; and, indeed, their manners bore favourable comparison with those of certain higher officials with whom sbe bad been brought into contact.

But nevertheless Sara looked down upon the bank clerks, and declined to collect from them any eiemen'a ot drama wherewith to flavour her somewhat colourless life. Perhaps she resented the fact that not one of them had shown any disposition to make love to her. She seemed to repel rather than to attract that order of young naan. Sara had never had a lover in her * life. No one bad ever asked her Kr marry him; and that yvas so extraordinary a fact in relation to an Australian girl of seventeen tha* it gave her food for reflection. Australian girls usually ' begin having offers oi some kind when they reach sixteen or sixteen and a half. Sara laid the blame on her father’s peculiarities and her lack of opportunity. She hid a craving for the dramatic. She had a thirst for experience. If experience of a kind xvorth having did not come to her during the next six months she must look upon herself as a total failure. She bad an inward conviction that it was only opportunity and a litt’e training, and perhaps some aid in the matter of dress, that she needed. She was almost certain she was pretty and elegant and interesting. If she

had only been born a princess, or had married and become a princess—— But in that case she would not need to be exercising her mind, or worrying over the dress which must be got ready for the dinner-party. Sara was of too practical a turn of mind to waste many vain regrets over the unattainable, She set to work again, and ran up width after width with the speed ot b steam-engine, her slim form swaying with the motion of the treadle. She worked on steadily till the housemaid brought in the cloth, and spread her somewhat frugal lunch of cold mutton, bread and butter, and bananas. The eventful evening had come. Sara’s dress was finished. Though not quite on a par with the celebrated costume of the ‘ Princess * in ‘ The Queen/ Sara felt satisfied,as she twisted and tnrned herself before the glass, that the general effect was all that she could desire. She had worked very closely to get it done. One might have finoied that she had gained a little willowy bend from stooping over the machine ; and 8 * her face was perhaps slightly paler and more trans-parent-looking. Still she liked herself very much. She liked her long black gloves, which she bad ascertained from “ The Queen ” to be the correct accompaniments to her black dress; she liked her fan, for which she had also a model in The Queen ” —it was a Japanese screen that she had covered and frilled with lace, and on which she bad pinned a big bunch of stephanotis. In default of the ‘ magnificent aigrette of diamonds,’ she had looped her dress with stephanotis. and had put some clusters m the lace at her neck. She stood in an attitude which she had been studying for some minutes, with her fan raised touching her chin, and her arm curved, showing off the fit of her gloves. She gazed at herself with delight, and practised several other bewitching tricks. Presently a strident sounded along the veranda. Toe house was all on the ground floor, and Sara’s room was next the dining-room, and looked out on the garden. ‘ Sara ! Come—’harry up !’