“Do not ask me to give you such a promise, Miss Davis.”

“But Hetty, I must, and I do.”

“Then, Miss Davis, I will speak to Mr. Enderby.”

The governess and her two pupils gazed at Hetty in amazement.

“I mean,” Hetty went on, “that I hope he will think drawing a useful study for me.  Will you allow me to speak to him this evening, Miss Davis?”

“Certainly, my dear,” said Miss Davis stiffly.  “There is nothing to hinder you from consulting Mr. Enderby on any subject.  I am sure he will be kind enough to give you his advice.  Only I think I know what it will be beforehand; and I would rather you had shown more confidence in me.”

Hetty could not give her mind to her lessons that day, nor get rid of the feeling that she was in disgrace.  When evening came, the hour when Mr. Enderby was usually to be found in his study, she asked Miss Davis’s permission to go to him, and with her portfolio in her hand presented herself at his door.

“Come in, Hetty,” said Mr. Enderby; “what is this you have got to show me?  Maps, plans, or what?  Why, drawings!”

Hetty’s mouth grew dry, and her heart beat violently.  The tone of his voice betrayed that the master of Wavertree had no more sympathy for art, or anything connected with it, than had Miss Davis.  He was an accurate methodical man with a taste for mathematics, who believed in the power conferred by knowledge on man and woman; but who had little respect for those who concerned themselves with only the beauties and graces of life.  Art was to him a trifle, and devotion to it a folly.  Therefore Hetty with her trembling hopes was not likely to find favour at his hands.

“My child, I am sure they are very pretty; but this sort of thing will not advance you in the world.”

“But, Mr. Enderby,—­I have been thinking—­artists get on as well as governesses.  I do these more easily than I learn my dates.  If I could only learn to be an artist.”

Mr. Enderby put his eye-glass to his eye, and gazed at her a little pityingly, a little severely, with a look that Hetty knew.

“You would like to become an artist?  Well, my girl, I must tell you to put that foolish idea out of your head.  In the first place, you are not to imagine that because you can sketch a flower prettily, you have therefore a genius for painting; and such fancies are only calculated to distract your mind from the real business of your life.  Besides, remember this, I have given, am giving, you a good education as a means of providing for you in life.  Having bestowed one profession upon you already, I am not prepared to enter into the expense and inconvenience of a second.  So run away like a sensible girl and stick to your books.  You had better leave these drawings with me and think no more about them.”

Saying this, Mr. Enderby opened a drawer and locked up Hetty’s designs within it; and, humbled and despairing, Hetty returned to the school-room.