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| author | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:34:40 -0700 |
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| committer | Roger Frank <rfrank@pglaf.org> | 2025-10-15 04:34:40 -0700 |
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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/10540-0.txt b/10540-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..0a0d700 --- /dev/null +++ b/10540-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8009 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10540 *** + +MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKENS + +By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. MOTHER CAREY HERSELF + II. THE CHICKENS + III. THE COMMON DENOMINATOR + IV. THE BROKEN CIRCLE + V. HOW ABOUT JULIA? + VI. NANCY'S IDEA + VII. "OLD BEASTS INTO NEW" + VIII. THE KNIGHT OF BEULAH CASTLE + IX. GILBERT'S EMBASSY + X. THE CAREYS' FLITTING + XI. THE SERVICE ON THE THRESHOLD + XII. COUSIN ANN + XIII. THE PINK OF PERFECTION + XIV. WAYS AND MEANS + XV. BELONGING TO BEULAH + XVI. THE POST-BAG + XVII. JACK OF ALL TRADES + XVIII. THE HOUSE OF LORDS + XIX. OLD AND NEW + XX. THE PAINTED CHAMBER + XXI. A FAMILY RHOMBOID + XXII. CRADLE GIFTS + XXIII. NEARING SHINY WALL + XXIV. A LETTER FROM GERMANY + XXV. "FOLLOWING THE GLEAM" + XXVI. A ZOOLOGICAL FATHER + XXVII. THE CAREY HOUSEWARMING + XXVIII. "TIBI SPLENDET FOCUS" + XXIX. "TH' ACTION FINE" + XXX. THE INGLENOOK + XXXI. GROOVES OF CHANGE + XXXII. DOORS OF DARING + XXXIII. MOTHER HAMILTON'S BIRTHDAY. + XXXIV. NANCY COMES OUT + XXXV. THE CRIMSON RAMBLER + + + + + + +I + +MOTHER CAREY HERSELF + + +"By and by there came along a flock of petrels, who are Mother Carey's +own chickens.... They flitted along like a flock of swallows, hopping +and skipping from wave to wave, lifting their little feet behind them so +daintily that Tom fell in love with them at once." + +Nancy stopped reading and laid down the copy of "Water Babies" on the +sitting-room table. "No more just now, Peter-bird," she said; "I hear +mother coming." + +It was a cold, dreary day in late October, with an east wind and a chill +of early winter in the air. The cab stood in front of Captain Carey's +house, with a trunk beside the driver and a general air of expectancy on +the part of neighbors at the opposite windows. + +Mrs. Carey came down the front stairway followed by Gilbert and +Kathleen; Gilbert with his mother's small bag and travelling cloak, +Kathleen with her umbrella; while little Peter flew to the foot of the +stairs with a small box of sandwiches pressed to his bosom. + +Mrs. Carey did not wear her usual look of sweet serenity, but nothing +could wholly mar the gracious dignity of her face and presence. As she +came down the stairs with her quick, firm tread, her flock following +her, she looked the ideal mother. Her fine height, her splendid +carriage, her deep chest, her bright eye and fresh color all bespoke the +happy, contented, active woman, though something in the way of transient +anxiety lurked in the eyes and lips. + +"The carriage is too early," she said; "let us come into the sitting +room for five minutes. I have said my good-byes and kissed you all a +dozen times, but I shall never be done until I am out of your sight." + +"O mother, mother, how can we let you go!" wailed Kathleen. + +"Kitty! how can you!" exclaimed Nancy. "What does it matter about us +when mother has the long journey and father is so ill?" + +"It will not be for very long,--it can't be," said Mrs. Carey wistfully. +"The telegram only said 'symptoms of typhoid'; but these low fevers +sometimes last a good while and are very weakening, so I may not be able +to bring father back for two or three weeks; I ought to be in Fortress +Monroe day after to-morrow; you must take turns in writing to me, +children!" + +"Every single day, mother!" + +"Every single thing that happens." + +"A fat letter every morning," they promised in chorus. + +"If there is any real trouble remember to telegraph your Uncle +Allan--did you write down his address, 11 Broad Street, New York? Don't +bother him about little things, for he is not well, you know." + +Gilbert displayed a note-book filled with memoranda and addresses. + +"And in any small difficulty send for Cousin Ann," Mrs. Carey went on. + +"The mere thought of her coming will make me toe the mark, I can tell +you that!" was Gilbert's rejoinder. + +"Better than any ogre or bug-a-boo, Cousin Ann is, even for Peter!" said +Nancy. + +"And will my Peter-bird be good and make Nancy no trouble?" said his +mother, lifting him to her lap for one last hug. + +"I'll be an angel boy pretty near all the time," he asserted between +mouthfuls of apple, "or most pretty near," he added prudently, as if +unwilling to promise anything superhuman in the way of behavior. As a +matter of fact it required only a tolerable show of virtue for Peter to +win encomiums at any time. He would brush his curly mop of hair away +from his forehead, lift his eyes, part his lips, showing a row of tiny +white teeth; then a dimple would appear in each cheek and a seraphic +expression (wholly at variance with the facts) would overspread the baby +face, whereupon the beholder--Mother Carey, his sisters, the cook or the +chambermaid, everybody indeed but Cousin Ann, who could never be +wheedled--would cry "Angel boy!" and kiss him. He was even kissed now, +though he had done nothing at all but exist and be an enchanting +personage, which is one of the injustices of a world where a large +number of virtuous and well-behaved people go unkissed to their graves! + +"I know Joanna and Ellen will take good care of the housekeeping," +continued Mrs. Carey, "and you will be in school from nine to two, so +that the time won't go heavily. For the rest I make Nancy responsible. +If she is young, you must remember that you are all younger still, and I +trust you to her." + +"The last time you did it, it didn't work very well!" And Gilbert gave +Nancy a sly wink to recall a little matter of family history when there +had been a delinquency on somebody's part. + +Nancy's face crimsoned and her lips parted for a quick retort, and none +too pleasant a one, apparently. + +Her mother intervened quietly. "We'll never speak of 'last times,' +Gilly, or where would any of us be? We'll always think of 'next' times. +I shall trust Nancy next time, and next time and next time, and keep on +trusting till I can trust her forever!" + +Nancy's face lighted up with a passion of love and loyalty. She +responded to the touch of her mother's faith as a harp to the favoring +wind, but she said nothing; she only glowed and breathed hard and put +her trembling hand about her mother's neck and under her chin. + +"Now it's time! One more kiss all around. Remember you are Mother +Carey's own chickens! There may be gales while I am away, but you must +ride over the crests of the billows as merry as so many flying fish! +Good-by! Good-by! Oh, my littlest Peter-bird, how can mother leave you?" + +"I opened the lunch box to see what Ellen gave you, but I only broke off +two teenty, weenty corners of sandwiches and one little new-moon bite +out of a cookie," said Peter, creating a diversion according to +his wont. + +Ellen and Joanna came to the front door and the children flocked down +the frozen pathway to the gate after their mother, getting a touch of +her wherever and whenever they could and jumping up and down between +whiles to keep warm. Gilbert closed the door of the carriage, and it +turned to go down the street. One window was open, and there was a last +glimpse of the beloved face framed in the dark blue velvet bonnet, one +last wave of a hand in a brown muff. + +"Oh! she is so beautiful!" sobbed Kathleen, "her bonnet is just the +color of her eyes; and she was crying!" + +"There never was anybody like mother!" said Nancy, leaning on the gate, +shivering with cold and emotion. "There never was, and there never will +be! We can try and try, Kathleen, and we _must_ try, all of us; but +mother wouldn't have to try; mother must have been partly born so!" + + + +II + +THE CHICKENS + + +It was Captain Carey's favorite Admiral who was responsible for the +phrase by which mother and children had been known for some years. The +Captain (then a Lieutenant) had brought his friend home one Saturday +afternoon a little earlier than had been expected, and they went to find +the family in the garden. + +Laughter and the sound of voices led them to the summer-house, and as +they parted the syringa bushes they looked through them and surprised +the charming group. + + A throng of children like to flowers were sown + About the grass beside, or climbed her knee. + I looked who were that favored company. + +That is the way a poet would have described what the Admiral saw, and if +you want to see anything truly and beautifully you must generally go +to a poet. + +Mrs. Carey held Peter, then a crowing baby, in her lap. Gilbert was +tickling Peter's chin with a buttercup, Nancy was putting a wreath of +leaves on her mother's hair, and Kathleen was swinging from an +apple-tree bough, her yellow curls flying. + +"Might I inquire what you think of that?" asked the father. + +"Well," the Admiral said, "mothers and children make a pretty good +picture at any time, but I should say this one couldn't be 'beat.' Two +for the Navy, eh?" + +"All four for the Navy, perhaps," laughed the young man. "Nancy has +already chosen a Rear-Admiral and Kathleen a Commodore; they are modest +little girls!" + +"They do you credit, Peter!" + +"I hope I've given them something,--I've tried hard enough, but they are +mostly the work of the lady in the chair. Come on and say how d'ye do." + +Before many Saturdays the Admiral's lap had superseded all other places +as a gathering ground for the little Careys, whom he called the +stormy petrels. + +"Mother Carey," he explained to them, came from the Latin _mater cara_, +this being not only his personal conviction, but one that had the +backing of Brewer's "Dictionary of Phrase and Fable." + +"The French call them _Les Oiseaux de Notre Dame_. That means 'The Birds +of our Lady,' Kitty, and they are the sailors' friends. Mother Carey +sends them to warn seafarers of approaching storms and bids them go out +all over the seas to show the good birds the way home. You'll have your +hands full if you're going to be Mother Carey's chickens." + +"I'd love to show good birds the way home!" said Gilbert. + +"Can a naughty bird show a good bird the way home, Addy?" This bland +question came from Nancy, who had a decided talent for sarcasm, +considering her years. (Of course the Admiral might have stopped the +children from calling him Addy, but they seemed to do it because +"Admiral" was difficult, and anyway they loved him so much they simply +had to take some liberties with him. Besides, although he was the +greatest disciplinarian that ever walked a deck, he was so soft and +flexible on land that he was perfectly ridiculous and delightful.) + +The day when the children were christened Mother Carey's chickens was +Nancy's tenth birthday, a time when the family was striving to give her +her proper name, having begun wrong with her at the outset. She was the +first, you see, and the first is something of an event, take it how +you will. + +It is obvious that at the beginning they could not address a tiny thing +on a pillow as Nancy, because she was too young. She was not even +alluded to at that early date as "she," but always as "it," so they +called her "baby" and let it go at that. Then there was a long period +when she was still too young to be called Nancy, and though, so far as +age was concerned, she might properly have held on to her name of baby, +she couldn't with propriety, because there was Gilbert then, and he was +baby. Moreover, she gradually became so indescribably quaint and +bewitching and comical and saucy that every one sought diminutives for +her; nicknames, fond names, little names, and all sorts of words that +tried to describe her charm (and couldn't), so there was Poppet and +Smiles and Minx and Rogue and Midget and Ladybird and finally Nan and +Nannie by degrees, to soberer Nancy. + +"Nancy is ten to-day," mused the Admiral. "Bless my soul, how time +flies! You were a young Ensign, Carey, and I well remember the letter +you wrote me when this little lass came into harbor! Just wait a minute; +I believe the scrap of newspaper verse you enclosed has been in my +wallet ever since. I always liked it." + +"I recall writing to you," said Mr. Carey. "As you had lent me five +hundred dollars to be married on, I thought I ought to keep you posted!" + +"Oh, father! did you have to borrow money?" cried Kathleen. + +"I did, my dear. There's no disgrace in borrowing, if you pay back, and +I did. Your Uncle Allan was starting in business, and I had just put my +little capital in with his when I met your mother. If you had met your +mother wouldn't you have wanted to marry her?" + +"Yes!" cried Nancy eagerly. "Fifty of her!" At which everybody laughed. + +"And what became of the money you put in Uncle Allan's business?" asked +Gilbert with unexpected intelligence. + +There was a moment's embarrassment and an exchange of glances between +mother and father before he replied, "Oh! that's coming back multiplied +six times over, one of these days,--Allan has a very promising project +on hand just now, Admiral." + +"Glad to hear it! A delightful fellow, and straight as a die. I only +wish he could perform once in a while, instead of promising." + +"He will if only he keeps his health, but he's heavily handicapped +there, poor chap. Well, what's the verse?" + +The Admiral put on his glasses, prettily assisted by Kathleen, who was +on his knee and seized the opportunity to give him a French kiss when +the spectacles were safely on the bridge of his nose. Whereupon +he read:-- + + "There came to port last Sunday night + The queerest little craft, + Without an inch of rigging on; + I looked, and looked, and laughed. + + "It seemed so curious that she + Should cross the unknown water, + And moor herself within my room-- + My daughter, O my daughter! + + "Yet, by these presents, witness all, + She's welcome fifty times, + And comes consigned to Hope and Love + And common metre rhymes. + + "She has no manifest but this; + No flag floats o'er the water; + She's rather new for British Lloyd's-- + My daughter, O my daughter! + + "Ring out, wild bells--and tame ones, too; + Ring out the lover's moon, + Ring in the little worsted socks, + Ring in the bib and spoon."[1] + +[Footnote 1: George W. Cable.] + +"Oh, Peter, how pretty!" said Mother Carey all in a glow. "You never +showed it to me!" + +"You were too much occupied with the aforesaid 'queer little craft,' +wasn't she, Nan--I mean Nancy!" and her father pinched her ear and +pulled a curly lock. + +Nancy was a lovely creature to the eye, and she came by her good looks +naturally enough. For three generations her father's family had been +known as the handsome Careys, and when Lieutenant Carey chose Margaret +Gilbert for his wife, he was lucky enough to win the loveliest girl in +her circle. + +Thus it was still the handsome Careys in the time of our story, for all +the children were well-favored and the general public could never decide +whether Nancy or Kathleen was the belle of the family. Kathleen had fair +curls, skin like a rose, and delicate features; not a blemish to mar her +exquisite prettiness! All colors became her; all hats suited her hair. +She was the Carey beauty so long as Nancy remained out of sight, but the +moment that young person appeared Kathleen left something to be desired. +Nancy piqued; Nancy sparkled; Nancy glowed; Nancy occasionally pouted +and not infrequently blazed. Nancy's eyes had to be continually searched +for news, both of herself and of the immediate world about her. If you +did not keep looking at her every "once in so often" you couldn't keep +up with the progress of events; she might flash a dozen telegrams to +somebody, about something, while your head was turned away. Kathleen +could be safely left unwatched for an hour or so without fear of change; +her moods were less variable, her temper evener; her interest in the +passing moment less keen, her absorption in the particular subject less +intense. Walt Whitman might have been thinking of Nancy when he wrote:-- + + There was a child went forth every day + And the first object he looked upon, that object he became, + And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the + day + Or for many years, or stretching cycles of years. + +Kathleen's nature needed to be stirred, Nancy's to be controlled, the +impulse coming from within, the only way that counts in the end, though +the guiding force may be applied from without. + +Nancy was more impulsive than industrious, more generous than wise, more +plucky than prudent; she had none too much perseverance and no +patience at all. + +Gilbert was a fiery youth of twelve, all for adventure. He kindled +quickly, but did not burn long, so deeds of daring would be in his line; +instantaneous ones, quickly settled, leaving the victor with a swelling +chest and a feather in cap; rather an obvious feather suited +Gilbert best. + +Peter? Oh! Peter, aged four, can be dismissed in very few words as a +consummate charmer and heart-breaker. The usual elements that go to the +making of a small boy were all there, but mixed with white magic. It is +painful to think of the dozens of girl babies in long clothes who must +have been feeling premonitory pangs when Peter was four, to think they +couldn't all marry him when they grew up! + + + +III + +THE COMMON DENOMINATOR + + +Three weeks had gone by since Mother Carey's departure for Fortress +Monroe, and the children had mounted from one moral triumph to another. +John Bunyan, looking in at the windows, might have exclaimed:-- + + Who would true valor see + Let him come hither. + +It is easy to go wrong in a wicked world, but there are certain +circumstances under which one is pledged to virtue; when, like a knight +of the olden time, you wear your motto next your heart and fight for +it,--"Death rather than defeat!" "We are able because we think we are +able!" "Follow honor!" and the like. These sentiments look beautifully +as class mottoes on summer graduation programmes, but some of them, +apparently, disappear from circulation before cold weather sets in. + +It is difficult to do right, we repeat, but not when mother is away from +us for the first time since we were born; not when she who is the very +sun of home is shining elsewhere, and we are groping in the dim light +without her, only remembering her last words and our last promises. Not +difficult when we think of the eyes the color of the blue velvet bonnet, +and the tears falling from them. They are hundreds of miles away, but we +see them looking at us a dozen times a day and the last thing at night. + +Not difficult when we think of father; gay, gallant father, desperately +ill and mother nursing him; father, with the kind smile and the jolly +little sparkles of fun in his eyes; father, tall and broad-shouldered, +splendid as the gods, in full uniform; father, so brave that if a naval +battle ever did come his way, he would demolish the foe in an instant; +father, with a warm strong hand clasping ours on high days and holidays, +taking us on great expeditions where we see life at its best and taste +incredible joys. + +The most quarrelsome family, if the house burns down over their heads, +will stop disputing until the emergency is over and they get under a new +roof. Somehow, in times of great trial, calamity, sorrow, the +differences that separate people are forgotten. Isn't it rather like the +process in mathematics where we reduce fractions to a common +denominator? + +It was no time for anything but superior behavior in the Carey +household; that was distinctly felt from kitchen to nursery. Ellen the +cook was tidier, Joanna the second maid more amiable. Nancy, who was +"responsible," rose earlier than the rest and went to bed later, after +locking doors and windows that had been left unlocked since the flood. +"I am responsible," she said three or four times each day, to herself, +and, it is to be feared, to others! Her heavenly patience in dressing +Peter every few hours without comment struck the most callous observer +as admirable. Peter never remembered that he had any clothes on. He +might have been a real stormy petrel, breasting the billows in his +birthday suit and expecting his feathers to be dried when and how the +Lord pleased. He comported himself in the presence of dust, mud, water, +liquid refreshment, and sticky substances, exactly as if clean white +sailor suits grew on every bush and could be renewed at pleasure. + +Even Gilbert was moved to spontaneous admiration and respect at the +sight of Nancy's zeal. "Nobody would know you, Nancy; it is simply +wonderful, and I only wish it could last," he said. Even this style of +encomium was received sweetly, though there had been moments in her +previous history when Nancy would have retorted in a very pointed +manner. When she was "responsible," not even had he gone the length of +calling Nancy an unspeakable pig, would she have said anything. She had +a blissful consciousness that, had she been examined, indications of +angelic wings, and not bristles, would have been discovered under +her blouse. + +Gilbert, by the way, never suspected that the masters in his own school +wondered whether he had experienced religion or was working on some sort +of boyish wager. He took his two weekly reports home cautiously for fear +that they might break on the way, pasted them on large pieces of paper, +and framed them in elaborate red, white, and blue stars united by strips +of gold paper. How Captain and Mrs. Carey laughed and cried over this +characteristic message when it reached them! "Oh! they _are_ darlings," +Mother Carey cried. "Of course they are," the Captain murmured feebly. +"Why shouldn't they be, considering you?" + +"It is really just as easy to do right as wrong, Kathleen," said Nancy +when the girls were going to bed one night. + +"Ye-es!" assented Kathleen with some reservations in her tone, for she +was more judicial and logical than her sister. "But you have to keep +your mind on it so, and never relax a single bit! Then it's lots easier +for a few weeks than it is for long stretches!" + +"That's true," agreed Nancy; "it would be hard to keep it up forever. +And you have to love somebody or something like fury every minute or you +can't do it at all. How do the people manage that can't love like that, +or haven't anybody to love?" + +"I don't know." said Kathleen sleepily. "I'm so worn out with being +good, that every night I just say my prayers and tumble into bed +exhausted. Last night I fell asleep praying, I honestly did!" + +"Tell that to the marines!" remarked Nancy incredulously. + + + +IV + +THE BROKEN CIRCLE + + +The three weeks were running into a month now, and virtue still reigned +in the Carey household. But things were different. Everybody but Peter +saw the difference. Peter dwelt from morn till eve in that Land of Pure +Delight which is ignorance of death. The children no longer bounded to +meet the postman, but waited till Joanna brought in the mail. Steadily, +daily, the letters changed in tone. First they tried to be cheerful; +later on they spoke of trusting that the worst was past; then of hoping +that father was holding his own. "Oh! if he was holding _all_ his own," +sobbed Nancy. "If we were only there with him, helping mother!" + +Ellen said to Joanna one morning in the kitchen: "It's my belief the +Captain's not going to get well, and I'd like to go to Newburyport to +see my cousin and not be in the house when the children's told!" And +Joanna said, "Shame on you not to stand by 'em in their hour of +trouble!" At which Ellen quailed and confessed herself a coward. + +Finally came a day never to be forgotten; a day that swept all the +former days clean out of memory, as a great wave engulfs all the little +ones in its path; a day when, Uncle Allan being too ill to travel, +Cousin Ann, of all people in the universe,--Cousin Ann came to bring the +terrible news that Captain Carey was dead. + +Never think that Cousin Ann did not suffer and sympathize and do her +rocky best to comfort; she did indeed, but she was thankful that her +task was of brief duration. Mrs. Carey knew how it would be, and had +planned all so that she herself could arrive not long after the blow had +fallen. Peter, by his mother's orders (she had thought of everything) +was at a neighbor's house, the centre of all interest, the focus of all +gayety. He was too young to see the tears of his elders with any profit; +baby plants grow best in sunshine. The others were huddled together in a +sad group at the front window, eyes swollen, handkerchiefs rolled into +drenched, pathetic little wads. + +Cousin Ann came in from the dining room with a tumbler and spoon in her +hand. "See here, children!" she said bracingly, "you've been crying for +the last twelve hours without stopping, and I don't blame you a mite. If +I was the crying kind I'd do the same thing. Now do you think you've got +grit enough--all three of you--to bear up for your mother's sake, when +she first comes in? I've mixed you each a good dose of aromatic spirits +of ammonia, and it's splendid for the nerves. Your mother must get a +night's sleep somehow, and when she gets back a little of her strength +you'll be the greatest comfort she has in the world. The way you're +carrying on now you'll be the death of her!" + +It was a good idea, and the dose had courage in it. Gilbert took the +first sip, Kathleen the second, and Nancy the third, and hardly had the +last swallow disappeared down the poor aching throats before a carriage +drove up to the gate. Some one got out and handed out Mrs. Carey whose +step used to be lighter than Nancy's. A strange gentleman, oh! not a +stranger, it was the dear Admiral helping mother up the path. They had +been unconsciously expecting the brown muff and blue velvet bonnet, but +these had vanished, like father, and all the beautiful things of the +past years, and in their place was black raiment that chilled their +hearts. But the black figure had flung back the veil that hid her from +the longing eyes of the children, and when she raised her face it was +full of the old love. She was grief-stricken and she was pale, but she +was mother, and the three young things tore open the door and clasped +her in their arms, sobbing, choking, whispering all sorts of tender +comfort, their childish tears falling like healing dew on her poor +heart. The Admiral soothed and quieted them each in turn, all but Nancy. +Cousin Ann's medicine was of no avail, and strangling with sobs Nancy +fled to the attic until she was strong enough to say "for mother's sake" +without a quiver in her voice. Then she crept down, and as she passed +her mother's room on tiptoe she looked in and saw that the chair by the +window, the chair that had been vacant for a month, was filled, and that +the black-clad figure was what was left to them; a strange, sad, quiet +mother, who had lost part of herself somewhere,--the gay part, the +cheerful part, the part that made her so piquantly and entrancingly +different from other women. Nancy stole in softly and put her young +smooth cheek against her mother's, quietly stroking her hair. "There are +four of us to love you and take care of you," she said. "It isn't quite +so bad as if there was nobody!" + +Mrs. Carey clasped her close. "Oh! my Nancy! my first, my oldest, God +will help me, I know that, but just now I need somebody close and warm +and soft; somebody with arms to hold and breath to speak and lips to +kiss! I ought not to sadden you, nor lean on you, you are too young, +--but I must a little, just at the first. You see, dear, you come next +to father!" + +"Next to father!" Nancy's life was set to a new tune from that moment. +Here was her spur, her creed; the incentive, the inspiration she had +lacked. She did not suddenly grow older than her years, but simply, in +the twinkling of an eye, came to a realization of herself, her +opportunity, her privilege, her duty; the face of life had changed, and +Nancy changed with it. + +"Do you love me next to mother?" the Admiral had asked coaxingly once +when Nancy was eight and on his lap as usual. + +"Oh dear no!" said Nancy thoughtfully, shaking her head. + +"Why, that's rather a blow to me," the Admiral exclaimed, pinching an +ear and pulling a curl. "I flattered myself that when I was on my best +behavior I came next to mother." + +"It's this way, Addy dear," said Nancy, cuddling up to his waistcoat and +giving a sigh of delight that there were so many nice people in the +world. "It's just this way. First there's mother, and then all round +mother there's a wide, wide space; and then father and you come next +the space." + +The Admiral smiled; a grave, lovely smile that often crept into his eyes +when he held Mother Carey's chickens on his knee. He kissed Nancy on the +little white spot behind the ear where the brown hair curled in tiny +rings like grape tendrils, soft as silk and delicate as pencil strokes. +He said nothing, but his boyish dreams were in the kiss, and certain +hopes of manhood that had never been realized. He was thinking that +Margaret Gilbert was a fortunate and happy woman to have become Mother +Carey; such a mother, too, that all about her was a wide, wide space, +and next the space, the rest of the world, nearer or farther according +to their merits. He wondered if motherhood ought not to be like that, +and he thought if it were it would be a great help to God. + + + +V + +HOW ABOUT JULIA? + + +We often speak of a family circle, but there are none too many of them. +Parallel lines never meeting, squares, triangles, oblongs, and +particularly those oblongs pulled askew, known as rhomboids, these and +other geometrical figures abound, but circles are comparatively few. In +a true family circle a father and a mother first clasp each other's +hands, liking well to be thus clasped; then they stretch out a hand on +either side, and these are speedily grasped by children, who hold one +another firmly, and complete the ring. One child is better than nothing, +a great deal better than nothing; it is at least an effort in the right +direction, but the circle that ensues is not, even then, a truly nice +shape. You can stand as handsomely as ever you like, but it simply won't +"come round." The minute that two, three, four, five, join in, the +"roundness" grows, and the merriment too, and the laughter, and the +power to do things. (Responsibility and care also, but what is the use +of discouraging circles when there are not enough of them anyway?) + +The Carey family circle had been round and complete, with love and +harmony between all its component parts. In family rhomboids, for +instance, mother loves the children and father does not, or father does, +but does not love mother, or father and mother love each other and the +children do not get their share; it is impossible to enumerate all the +little geometrical peculiarities which keep a rhomboid from being a +circle, but one person can just "stand out" enough to spoil the shape, +or put hands behind back and refuse to join at all. About the ugliest +thing in the universe is that non-joining habit! You would think that +anybody, however dull, might consider his hands, and guess by the look +of them that they must be made to work, and help, and take hold of +somebody else's hands! Miserable, useless, flabby paws, those of the +non-joiner; that he feeds and dresses himself with, and then hangs to +his selfish sides, or puts behind his beastly back! + +When Captain Carey went on his long journey into the unknown and +uncharted land, the rest of the Careys tried in vain for a few months to +be still a family, and did not succeed at all. They clung as closely to +one another as ever they could, but there was always a gap in the circle +where father had been. Some men, silent, unresponsive, absent-minded and +especially absorbed in business, might drop out and not be missed, but +Captain Carey was full of vitality, warmth, and high spirits. It is +strange so many men think that the possession of a child makes them a +father; it does not; but it is a curious and very general +misapprehension. Captain Carey was a boy with his boys, and a gallant +lover with his girls; to his wife--oh! we will not even touch upon that +ground; she never did, to any one or anything but her own heart! Such an +one could never disappear from memory, such a loss could never be made +wholly good. The only thing to do was to remember father's pride and +justify it, to recall his care for mother and take his place so far as +might be; the only thing for all, as the months went on, was to be what +mother called the three b's,--brave, bright, and busy. + +To be the last was by far the easiest, for the earliest effort at +economy had been the reluctant dismissal of Joanna, the chambermaid. In +old-fashioned novels the devoted servant always insisted on remaining +without wages, but this story concerns itself with life at a later date. +Joanna wept at the thought of leaving, but she never thought of the +romantic and illogical expedient of staying on without compensation. + +Captain Carey's salary had been five thousand dollars, or rather was to +have been, for he had only attained his promotion three months before +his death. There would have been an extra five hundred dollars a year +when he was at sea, and on the strength of this addition to their former +income he intended to increase the amount of his life insurance, but it +had not yet been done when the sudden illness seized him, an illness +that began so gently and innocently and terminated with such sudden and +unexpected fatality. + +The life insurance, such as it was, must be put into the bank for +emergencies. Mrs. Carey realized that that was the only proper thing to +do when there were four children under fifteen to be considered. The +pressing question, however, was how to keep it in the bank, and subsist +on a captain's pension of thirty dollars a month. There was the ten +thousand, hers and the Captain's, in Allan Carey's business, but Allan +was seriously ill with nervous prostration, and no money put into his +business ever had come out, even in a modified form. The Admiral was at +the other end of the world, and even had he been near at hand Mrs. Carey +would never have confided the family difficulties to him. She could +hardly have allowed him even to tide her over her immediate pressing +anxieties, remembering his invalid sister and his many responsibilities. +No, the years until Gilbert was able to help, or Nancy old enough to use +her talents, or the years before the money invested with Allan would +bring dividends, those must be years of self-sacrifice on everybody's +part; and more even than that, they must be fruitful years, in which not +mere saving and economizing, but earning, would be necessary. + +It was only lately that Mrs. Carey had talked over matters with the +three eldest children, but the present house was too expensive to be +longer possible as a home, and the question of moving was a matter of +general concern. Joanna had been, up to the present moment, the only +economy, but alas! Joanna was but a drop in the necessary bucket. + +On a certain morning in March Mrs. Carey sat in her room with a letter +in her lap, the children surrounding her. It was from Mr. Manson, Allan +Carey's younger partner; the sort of letter that dazed her, opening up +as it did so many questions of expediency, duty, and responsibility. The +gist of it was this: that Allan Carey was a broken man in mind and body; +that both for the climate and for treatment he was to be sent to a rest +cure in the Adirondacks; that sometime or other, in Mr. Manson's +opinion, the firm's investments might be profitable if kept long enough, +and there was no difficulty in keeping them, for nobody in the universe +wanted them at the present moment; that Allan's little daughter Julia +had no source of income whatever after her father's monthly bills were +paid, and that her only relative outside of the Careys, a certain Miss +Ann Chadwick, had refused to admit her into her house. "Mr. Carey only +asked Miss Chadwick as a last resort," wrote Mr. Manson, "for his very +soul quailed at the thought of letting you, his brother's widow, suffer +any more by his losses than was necessary, and he studiously refused to +let you know the nature and extent of his need. Miss Chadwick's only +response to his request was, that she believed in every tub standing on +its own bottom, and if he had harbored the same convictions he would not +have been in his present extremity. I am telling you this, my dear Mrs. +Carey," the writer went on, "just to get your advice about the child. I +well know that your income will not support your own children; what +therefore shall we do with Julia? I am a poor young bachelor, with two +sisters to support. I shall find a position, of course, and I shall +never cease nursing Carey's various affairs and projects during the time +of his exile, but I cannot assume an ounce more of financial +responsibility." + +There had been quite a council over the letter, and parts of it had been +read more than once by Mrs. Carey, but the children, though very +sympathetic with Uncle Allan and loud in their exclamations of "Poor +Julia!" had not suggested any remedy for the situation. + +"Well," said Mrs. Carey, folding the letter, "there seems to be but one +thing for us to do." + +"Do you mean that you are going to have Julia come and live with us,--be +one of the family?" exclaimed Gilbert. + +"That is what I want to discuss," she replied. "You three are the family +as well as I.--Come in!" she called, for she heard the swift feet of the +youngest petrel ascending the stairs. "Come in! Where is there a sweeter +Peter, a fleeter Peter, a neater Peter, than ours, I should like to +know, and where a better adviser for the council?" + +"_Neater_, mother! How _can_ you?" inquired Kathleen. + +"I meant neater when he is just washed and dressed," retorted Peter's +mother. "Are you coming to the family council, sweet Pete?" + +Peter climbed on his mother's knee and answered by a vague affirmative +nod, his whole mind being on the extraction of a slippery marble from a +long-necked bottle. + +"Then be quiet, and speak only when we ask your advice," continued Mrs. +Carey. "Unless I were obliged to, children, I should be sorry to go +against all your wishes. I might be willing to bear my share of a +burden, but more is needed than that." + +"I think," said Nancy suddenly, aware now of the trend of her mother's +secret convictions, "I think Julia is a smug, conceited, vain, affected +little pea--" Here she caught her mother's eye and suddenly she heard +inside of her head or heart or conscience a chime of words. "_Next to +father_!" Making a magnificent oratorical leap she finished her sentence +with only a second's break,--"peacock, but if mother thinks Julia is a +duty, a duty she is, and we must brace up and do her. Must we love her, +mother, or can we just be good and polite to her, giving her the breast +and taking the drumstick? _She_ won't ever say, '_Don't let me rob +you_!' like Cousin Ann, when _she_ takes the breast!" + +Kathleen looked distinctly unresigned. She hated drumsticks and all that +they stood for in life. She disliked the wall side of the bed, the +middle seat in the carriage, the heel of the loaf, the underdone +biscuit, the tail part of the fish, the scorched end of the omelet. "It +will make more difference to me than anybody," she said gloomily. + +"Everything makes more difference to you, Kitty," remarked Gilbert. + +"I mean I'm always fourth when the cake plate's passed,--in everything! +Now Julia'll be fourth, and I shall be fifth; it's lucky people can't +tumble off the floor!" + +"Poor abused Kathleen!" cried Gilbert. "Well, mother, you're always +right, but I can't see why you take another one into the family, when +we've been saying for a week there isn't even enough for us five to live +on. It looks mighty queer to put me in the public school and spend the +money you save that way, on Julia!" + +Way down deep in her heart Mother Carey felt a pang. There was a little +seed of hard self-love in Gilbert that she wanted him to dig up from the +soil and get rid of before it sprouted and waxed too strong. + +"Julia is a Carey chicken after all, Gilbert," she said. + +"But she's Uncle Allan's chicken, and I'm Captain Carey's eldest son." + +"That's the very note I should strike if I were you," his mother +responded, "only with a little different accent. What would Captain +Carey's eldest son like to do for his only cousin, a little girl younger +than himself,--a girl who had a very silly, unwise, unhappy mother for +the first five years of her life, and who is now practically fatherless, +for a time at least?" + +Gilbert wriggled as if in great moral discomfort, as indeed he was. +"Well," he said, "I don't want to be selfish, and if the girls say yes, +I'll have to fall in; but it isn't logic, all the same, to ask a sixth +to share what isn't enough for five." + +"I agree with you there, Gilly!" smiled his mother. "The only question +before the council is, does logic belong at the top, in the scale of +reasons why we do certain things? If we ask Julia to come, she will have +to 'fall into line,' as you say, and share the family misfortunes as +best she can." + +"She's a regular shirk, and always was." This from Kathleen. + +"She would never come at all if she guessed her cousins' opinion of her, +that is very certain!" remarked Mrs. Carey pointedly. + +"Now, mother, look me in the eye and speak the whole truth," asked +Nancy. "_Do you like Julia Carey_?" + +Mrs. Carey laughed as she answered, "Frankly then, I do not! But," she +continued, "I do not like several of the remarks that have been made at +this council, yet I manage to bear them." + +"Of course I shan't call Julia smug and conceited to her face," asserted +Nancy encouragingly. "I hope that her bosom friend Gladys Ferguson has +disappeared from view. The last time Julia visited us, Kitty and I got +so tired of Gladys Ferguson's dresses, her French maid, her bedroom +furniture, and her travels abroad, that we wrote her name on a piece of +paper, put it in a box, and buried it in the back yard the minute Julia +left the house. When you write, mother, tell Julia there's a piece of +breast for her, but not a mouthful of my drumstick goes to Gladys +Ferguson." + +"The more the hungrier; better invite Gladys too," suggested Gilbert, +"then we can say like that simple little kid in Wordsworth:-- + + "'Sisters and brother, little maid, + How many may you be?' + 'How many? Seven in all,' she said, + And wondering looked at me!" + +"Then it goes on thus," laughed Nancy:-- + + "'And who are they? I pray you tell.' + She answered, 'Seven are we; + Mother with us makes five, and then + There's Gladys and Julee!'" + +Everybody joined in the laugh then, including Peter, who was especially +uproarious, and who had an idea he had made the joke himself, else why +did they all kiss him? + +"How about Julia? What do you say, Peter?" asked his mother. + +"I want her. She played horse once," said Peter. The opinion that the +earth revolved around his one small person was natural at the age of +four, but the same idea of the universe still existed in Gilbert's mind. +A boy of thirteen ought perhaps to have a clearer idea of the relative +sizes of world and individual; at least that was the conviction in +Mother Carey's mind. + + + +VI + +NANCY'S IDEA + + +Nancy had a great many ideas, first and last. They were generally unique +and interesting at least, though it is to be feared that few of them +were practical. However, it was Nancy's idea to build Peter a playhouse +in the plot of ground at the back of the Charlestown house, and it was +she who was the architect and head carpenter. That plan had brought much +happiness to Peter and much comfort to the family. It was Nancy's idea +that she, Gilbert, and Kathleen should all be so equally polite to +Cousin Ann Chadwick that there should be no favorite to receive an undue +share of invitations to the Chadwick house. Nancy had made two visits in +succession, both offered in the nature of tributes to her charms and +virtues, and she did not wish a third. + +"If you two can't be _more_ attractive, then I'll be _less_, that's +all," was her edict. "'Turn and turn about' has got to be the rule in +this matter. I'm not going to wear the martyr's crown alone; it will +adorn your young brows every now and then or I'll know the reason why!" + +It was Nancy's idea to let Joanna go, and divide her work among the +various members of the family. It was also Nancy's idea that, there +being no strictly masculine bit of martyrdom to give to Gilbert, he +should polish the silver for his share. This was an idea that proved so +unpopular with Gilbert that it was speedily relinquished. Gilbert was +wonderful with tools, so wonderful that Mother Carey feared he would be +a carpenter instead of the commander of a great war ship; but there +seemed to be no odd jobs to offer him. There came a day when even Peter +realized that life was real and life was earnest. When the floor was +strewn with playthings his habit had been to stand amid the wreckage and +smile, whereupon Joanna would fly and restore everything to its +accustomed place. After the passing of Joanna, Mother Carey sat placidly +in her chair in the nursery and Peter stood ankle deep among his +toys, smiling. + +"Now put everything where it belongs, sweet Pete," said mother. + +"You do it," smiled Peter. + +"I am very busy darning your stockings, Peter." + +"I don't like to pick up, Muddy." + +"No, it isn't much fun, but it has to be done." + +Peter went over to the window and gazed at the landscape. "I dess I'll +go play with Ellen," he remarked in honeyed tones. + +"That would be nice, after you clear away your toys and blocks." + +"I dess I'll play with Ellen first," suggested Peter, starting slowly +towards the door. + +"No, we always work first and play afterwards!" said mother, going on +darning. + +Peter felt caught in a net of irresistible and pitiless logic. + +"Come and help me, Muddy?" he coaxed, and as she looked up he suddenly +let fly all his armory of weapons at once,--two dimples, tossing back of +curls, parted lips, tiny white teeth, sweet voice. + +Mother Carey's impulse was to cast herself on the floor and request him +simply to smile on her and she would do his lightest bidding, but +controlling her secret desires she answered: "I would help if you needed +me, but you don't. You're a great big boy now!" + +"I'm not a great big boy!" cried Peter, "I'm only a great big little +boy!" + +"Don't waste time, sweet Pete; go to work!" + +"_I want Joanna_!" roared Peter with the voice of an infant bull. + +"So we all do. It's because she had to go that I'm darning stockings." + +The net tightened round Peter's defenceless body and he hurled himself +against his rocking horse and dragged it brutally to a corner. Having +disposed of most of his strength and temper in this operation, he put +away the rest of his goods and chattels more quietly, but with streaming +eyes and heaving bosom. + +"Splendid!" commented Mother Carey. "Joanna couldn't have done it +better, and it won't be half so much work next time." Peter heard the +words "next time" distinctly, and knew the grim face of Duty at last, +though he was less than five. + +The second and far more tragic time was when he was requested to make +himself ready for luncheon,--Kathleen to stand near and help "a little" +if really necessary. Now Peter _au fond_ was absolutely clean. French +phrases are detestable where there is any English equivalent, but in +this case there is none, so I will explain to the youngest reader--who +may speak only one language--that the base of Peter was always clean. He +received one full bath and several partial ones in every twenty-four +hours, but su-per-im-posed on this base were evidences of his eternal +activities, and indeed of other people's! They were divided into three +classes,--those contracted in the society of Joanna when she took him +out-of-doors: such as sand, water, mud, grass stains, paint, lime, +putty, or varnish; those derived from visits to his sisters at their +occupations: such as ink, paints, lead pencils, paste, glue, and +mucilage; those amassed in his stays with Ellen in the kitchen: sugar, +molasses, spice, pudding sauce, black currants, raisins, dough, berry +stains (assorted, according to season), chocolate, jelly, jam, and +preserves; these deposits were not deep, but were simply dabs on the +facade of Peter, and through them the eyes and soul of him shone, +delicious and radiant. They could be rubbed off with a moist +handkerchief if water were handy, and otherwise if it were not, and the +person who rubbed always wanted for some mysterious reason to kiss him +immediately afterwards, for Peter had the largest kissing acquaintance +in Charlestown. + +When Peter had scrubbed the parts of him that showed most, and had +performed what he considered his whole duty to his hair, he appeared for +the first time at the family table in such a guise that if the children +had not been warned they would have gone into hysterics, but he +gradually grew to be proud of his toilets and careful that they should +not occur too often in the same day, since it appeared to be the family +opinion that he should make them himself. + +There was a tacit feeling, not always expressed, that Nancy, after +mother, held the reins of authority, and also that she was a person of +infinite resource. The Gloom-Dispeller had been her father's name for +her, but he had never thought of her as a Path-Finder, a gallant +adventurer into unknown and untried regions, because there had been +small opportunity to test her courage or her ingenuity. + +Mrs. Carey often found herself leaning on Nancy nowadays; not as a dead +weight, but with just the hint of need, just the suggestion of +confidence, that youth and strength and buoyancy respond to so gladly. +It had been decided that the house should be vacated as soon as a tenant +could be found, but the "what next" had not been settled. Julia had +confirmed Nancy's worst fears by accepting her aunt's offer of a home, +but had requested time to make Gladys Ferguson a short visit at Palm +Beach, all expenses being borne by the Parents of Gladys. This estimable +lady and gentleman had no other names or titles and were never spoken of +as if they had any separate existence. They had lived and loved and +married and accumulated vast wealth, and borne Gladys. After that they +had sunk into the background and Gladys had taken the stage. + +"I'm sure I'm glad she is going to the Fergusons," exclaimed Kathleen. +"One month less of her!" + +"Yes," Nancy replied, "but she'll be much worse, more spoiled, more +vain, more luxurious than before. She'll want a gold chicken breast now. +We've just packed away the finger bowls; but out they'll have to +come again." + +"Let her wash her own finger bowl a few days and she'll clamor for the +simple life," said Kathleen shrewdly. "Oh, what a relief if the +Fergusons would adopt Julia, just to keep Gladys company!" + +"Nobody would ever adopt Julia," returned Nancy. "If she was yours you +couldn't help it; you'd just take her 'to the Lord in prayer,' as the +Sunday-school hymn says, but you'd never go out and adopt her." + +Matters were in this uncertain and unsettled state when Nancy came into +her mother's room one evening when the rest of the house was asleep. + +"I saw your light, so I knew you were reading, Muddy. I've had such a +bright idea I couldn't rest." + +"Muddy" is not an attractive name unless you happen to know its true +derivation and significance. First there was "mother dear," and as +persons under fifteen are always pressed for time and uniformly +breathless, this appellation was shortened to "Motherdy," and Peter +being unable to struggle with that term, had abbreviated it into +"Muddy." "Muddy" in itself is undistinguished and even unpleasant, but +when accompanied by a close strangling hug, pats on the cheek, and +ardent if somewhat sticky kisses, grows by degrees to possess delightful +associations. Mother Carey enjoyed it so much from Peter that she even +permitted it to be taken up by the elder children. + +"You mustn't have ideas after nine P.M., Nancy!" chided her mother. +"Wrap the blue blanket around you and sit down with me near the fire." + +"You're not to say I'm romantic or unpractical," insisted Nancy, leaning +against her mother's knees and looking up into her face,--"indeed, +you're not to say anything of any importance till I'm all finished. I'm +going to tell it in a long story, too, so as to work on your feelings +and make you say yes." + +"Very well, I'm all ears!" + +"Now put on your thinking cap! Do you remember once, years and years +ago, before Peter it was, that father took us on a driving trip through +some dear little villages in Maine?" + +(The Careys never dated their happenings eighteen hundred and anything. +It was always: Just before Peter, Immediately after Peter, or A Long +Time after Peter, which answered all purposes.) + +"I remember." + +"It was one of Gilbert's thirsty days, and we stopped at nearly every +convenient pump to give him drinks of water, and at noon we came to the +loveliest wayside well with a real moss-covered bucket; do you +remember?" + +"I remember." + +"And we all clambered out, and father said it was time for luncheon, and +we unpacked the baskets on the greensward near a beautiful tree, and +father said, 'Don't spread the table too near the house, dears, or +they'll cry when they see our doughnuts!' and Kitty, who had been +running about, came up and cried, 'It's an empty house; come and look!'" + +"I remember." + +"And we all went in the gate and loved every bit of it: the stone steps, +the hollyhocks growing under the windows, the yellow paint and the green +blinds; and father looked in the windows, and the rooms were large and +sunny, and we wanted to drive the horse into the barn and stay +there forever!" + +"I remember." + +"And Gilbert tore his trousers climbing on the gate, and father laid him +upside down on your lap and I ran and got your work-bag and you mended +the seat of his little trousers. And father looked and looked at the +house and said, 'Bless its heart!' and said if he were rich he would buy +the dear thing that afternoon and sleep in it that night; and asked you +if you didn't wish you'd married the other man, and you said there never +was another man, and you asked father if he thought on the whole that he +was the poorest man in the world, and father said no, the very richest, +and he kissed us all round, do you remember?" + +"Do I remember? O Nancy, Nancy! What do you think I am made of that I +could ever forget?" + +"Don't cry, Muddy darling, don't! It was so beautiful, and we have so +many things like that to remember." + +"Yes," said Mrs. Carey, "I know it. Part of my tears are grateful ones +that none of you can ever recall an unloving word between your father +and mother!" + +"The idea," said Nancy suddenly and briefly, "is to go and live in that +darling house!" + +"Nancy! What for?" + +"We've got to leave this place, and where could we live on less than in +that tiny village? It had a beautiful white-painted academy, don't you +remember, so we could go to school there,--Kathleen and I anyway, if +you could get enough money to keep Gilly at Eastover." + +"Of course I've thought of the country, but that far-away spot never +occurred to me. What was its quaint little name,--Mizpah or Shiloh or +Deborah or something like that?" + +"It was Beulah," said Nancy; "and father thought it exactly matched the +place!" + +"We even named the house," recalled Mother Carey with a tearful smile. +"There were vegetables growing behind it, and flowers in front, and your +father suggested Garden Fore-and-Aft and I chose Happy Half-Acre, but +father thought the fields that stretched back of the vegetable garden +might belong to the place, and if so there would be far more than a +half-acre of land." + +"And do you remember father said he wished we could do something to +thank the house for our happy hour, and I thought of the little box of +plants we had bought at a wayside nursery?" + +"Oh! I do indeed! I hadn't thought of it for years! Father and you +planted a tiny crimson rambler at the corner of the piazza at the side." + +"Do you suppose it ever 'rambled,' Muddy? Because it would be ever so +high now, and full of roses in summer." + +"I wonder!" mused Mother Carey. "Oh! it was a sweet, tranquil, restful +place! I wonder how we could find out about it? It seems impossible that +it should not have been rented or sold before this. Let me see, that was +five years ago." + +"There was a nice old gentleman farther down the street, quite in the +village, somebody who had known father when he was a boy." + +"So there was; he had a quaint little law office not much larger than +Peter's playhouse. Perhaps we could find him. He was very, very old. He +may not be alive, and I cannot remember his name." + +"Father called him 'Colonel,' I know that. Oh, how I wish dear Addy was +here to help us!" + +"If he were he would want to help us too much! We must learn to bear our +own burdens. They won't seem so strange and heavy when we are more used +to them. Now go to bed, dear. We'll think of Beulah, you and I; and +perhaps, as we have been all adrift, waiting for a wind to stir our +sails, 'Nancy's idea' will be the thing to start us on our new voyage. +Beulah means land of promise;--that's a good omen!" + +"And father found Beulah; and father found the house, and father blessed +it and loved it and named it; that makes ever so many more good omens, +more than enough to start housekeeping on," Nancy answered, kissing her +mother goodnight. + + + +VII + +"OLD BEASTS INTO NEW" + + +Mother Carey went to sleep that night in greater peace than she had felt +for months. It had seemed to her, all these last sad weeks, as though +she and her brood had been breasting stormy waters with no harbor in +sight. There were friends in plenty here and there, but no kith and kin, +and the problems to be settled were graver and more complex than +ordinary friendship could untangle, vexed as it always was by its own +problems. She had but one keen desire: to go to some quiet place where +temptations for spending money would be as few as possible, and there +live for three or four years, putting her heart and mind and soul on +fitting the children for life. If she could keep strength enough to +guide and guard, train and develop them into happy, useful, agreeable +human beings,--masters of their own powers; wise and discreet enough, +when years of discretion were reached, to choose right paths,--that, she +conceived, was her chief task in life, and no easy one. "Happy I must +contrive that they shall be," she thought, "for unhappiness and +discontent are among the foxes that spoil the vines. Stupid they shall +not be, while I can think of any force to stir their brains; they have +ordinary intelligence, all of them, and they shall learn to use it; dull +and sleepy children I can't abide. Fairly good they will be, if they are +busy and happy, and clever enough to see the folly of being anything +_but_ good! And so, month after month, for many years to come, I must be +helping Nancy and Kathleen to be the right sort of women, and wives, and +mothers, and Gilbert and Peter the proper kind of men, and husbands, and +fathers. Mother Carey's chickens must be able to show the good birds the +way home, as the Admiral said, and I should think they ought to be able +to set a few bad birds on the right track now and then!" + +Well, all this would be a task to frighten and stagger many a person, +but it only kindled Mrs. Carey's love and courage to a white heat. + +Do you remember where Kingsley's redoubtable Tom the Water Baby swims +past Shiny Wall, and reaches at last Peacepool? Peacepool, where the +good whales lie, waiting till Mother Carey shall send for them "to make +them out of old beasts into new"? + +Tom swims up to the nearest whale and asks the way to Mother Carey. + +"There she is in the middle," says the whale, though Tom sees nothing +but a glittering white peak like an iceberg. "That's Mother Carey," +spouts the whale, "as you will find if you get to her. There she sits +making old beasts into new all the year round." + +"How does she do that?" asks Tom. + +"That's her concern, not mine!" the whale remarks discreetly. + +And when Tom came nearer to the white glittering peak it took the form +of something like a lovely woman sitting on a white marble throne. And +from the foot of the throne, you remember, there swam away, out and out +into the sea, millions of new-born creatures of more shapes and colors +than man ever dreamed. And they were Mother Carey's children whom she +makes all day long. + +Tom expected,--I am still telling you what happened to the famous water +baby,--Tom expected (like some grown people who ought to know better) +that he would find Mother Carey snipping, piecing, fitting, stitching, +cobbling, basting, filing, planing, hammering, turning, polishing, +moulding, measuring, chiselling, clipping, and so forth, as men do when +they go to work to make anything. But instead of that she sat quite +still with her chin upon her hand, looking down into the sea with two +great blue eyes as blue as the sea itself. (As blue as our own mother's +blue velvet bonnet, Kitty would have said.) + +Was Beulah the right place, wondered Mrs. Carey as she dropped asleep. +And all night long she heard in dreams the voice of that shining little +river that ran under the bridge near Beulah village; and all night long +she walked in fields of buttercups and daisies, and saw the June breeze +blow the tall grasses. She entered the yellow painted house and put the +children to bed in the different rooms, and the instant she saw them +sleeping there it became home, and her heart put out little roots that +were like tendrils; but they grew so fast that by morning they held the +yellow house fast and refused to let it go. + +She looked from its windows onto the gardens "fore and aft," and they +seemed, like the rest of little Beulah village, full of sweet promise. +In the back were all sorts of good things to eat growing in profusion, +but modestly out of sight; and in front, where passers-by could see +their beauty and sniff their fragrance, old-fashioned posies bloomed and +rioted and tossed gay, perfumed heads in the sunshine. + +She awoke refreshed and strong and brave, not the same woman who took +Nancy's idea to bed with her; for this woman's heart and hope had +somehow flown from the brick house in Charlestown and had built itself a +new nest in Beulah's green trees, the elms and willows that overhung the +shining river. + +An idea of her own ran out and met Nancy's half way. Instead of going +herself to spy out the land of Beulah, why not send Gilbert? It was a +short, inexpensive railway journey, with no change of cars. Gilbert was +nearly fourteen, and thus far seemed to have no notion of life as a +difficult enterprise. No mother who respects her boy, or respects +herself, can ask him flatly, "Do you intend to grow up with the idea of +taking care of me; of having an eye to your sisters; or do you consider +that, since I brought you into the world, I must provide both for myself +and you until you are a man,--or forever and a day after, if you feel +inclined to shirk your part in the affair?" + +Gilbert talked of his college course as confidently as he had before his +father's death. It was Nancy who as the eldest seemed the head of the +family, but Gilbert, only a year or so her junior, ought to grow into +the head, somehow or other. The way to begin would be to give him a few +delightful responsibilities, such as would appeal to his pride and sense +of importance, and gradually to mingle with them certain duties of +headship neither so simple nor so agreeable. Beulah would be a +delightful beginning. Nancy the Pathfinder would have packed a bag and +gone to Beulah on an hour's notice; found the real-estate dealer, in +case there was such a metropolitan article in the village; looked up her +father's old friend the Colonel with the forgotten surname; discovered +the owner of the charming house, rented it, and brought back the key in +triumph! But Nancy was a girl rich in courage and enterprise, while +Gilbert's manliness and leadership and discretion and consideration for +others needed a vigorous, decisive, continued push. + +If Nancy's idea was good, Mother Carey's idea matched it! To see +Gilbert, valise in hand, eight dollars in pocket, leaving Charlestown on +a Friday noon after school, was equal to watching Columbus depart for an +unknown land. Thrilling is the only word that will properly describe it, +and the group that followed his departure from the upper windows used it +freely and generously. He had gone gayly downstairs and Nancy flung +after him a small packet in an envelope, just as he reached the door. + +"There's a photograph of your mother and sisters!" she called. "In case +the owner refuses to rent the house to _you_, just show him the rest of +the family! And don't forget to say that the rent is exorbitant, +whatever it is!" + +They watched him go jauntily down the street, Mother Carey with special +pride in her eyes. He had on his second best suit, and it looked well on +his straight slim figure. He had a gallant air, had Gilbert, and one +could not truly say it was surface gallantry either; it simply did not, +at present, go very deep. "No one could call him anything but a fine +boy," thought the mother, "and surely the outside is a key to what is +within!--His firm chin, his erect head, his bright eye, his quick tread, +his air of alert self-reliance,--surely here is enough, for any mother +to build on!" + + + +VIII + +THE KNIGHT OF BEULAH CASTLE + + +Nancy's flushed face was glued to the window-pane until Gilbert turned +the corner. He looked back, took off his cap, threw a kiss to them, and +was out of sight! + +"Oh! how I wish _I_ could have gone!" cried Nancy. "I hope he won't +forget what he went for! I hope he won't take 'No' for an answer. Oh! +why wasn't I a boy!" + +Mrs. Carey laughed as she turned from the window. + +"It will be a great adventure for the man of the house, Nancy, so never +mind. What would the Pathfinder have done if she had gone, instead of +her brother?" + +"I? Oh! Millions of things!" said Nancy, pacing the sitting-room floor, +her head bent a little, her hands behind her back. "I should be going to +the new railway station in Boston now, and presently I should be at the +little grated window asking for a return ticket to Greentown station. +'Four ten,' the man would say, and I would fling my whole eight dollars +in front of the wicket to show him what manner of person I was. + +"Then I would pick up the naught-from-naught-is-naught, +one-from-ten-is-nine, five-from-eight-is-three,--three dollars and +ninety cents or thereabouts and turn away. + +"'Parlor car seat, Miss?' the young man would say,--a warm, worried +young man in a seersucker coat, and I would answer, 'No thank you; I +always go in the common car to study human nature.' That's what the +Admiral says, but of course the ticket man couldn't know that the +Admiral is an intimate friend of mine, and would think I said it myself. + +"Then I would go down the platform and take the common car for +Greentown. Soon we would be off and I would ask the conductor if +Greentown was the station where one could change and drive to Beulah, +darling little Beulah, shiny-rivered Beulah; not breathing a word about +the yellow house for fear he would jump off the train and rent it first. +Then he would say he never heard of Beulah. I would look pityingly at +him, but make no reply because it would be no use, and anyway I know +Greentown _is_ the changing place, because I've asked three men before; +but Cousin Ann always likes to make conductors acknowledge they don't +know as much as she does. + +"Then I present a few peanuts or peppermints to a small boy, and hold an +infant for a tired mother, because this is what good children do in the +Sunday-school books, but I do not mingle much with the passengers +because my brow is furrowed with thought and I am travelling on +important business." + +You can well imagine that by this time Mother Carey has taken out her +darning, and Kathleen her oversewing, to which she pays little attention +because she so adores Nancy's tales. Peter has sat like a small statue +ever since his quick ear caught the sound of a story. His eyes follow +Nancy as she walks up and down improvising, and the only interruption +she ever receives from her audience is Kathleen's or Mother Carey's +occasional laugh at some especially ridiculous sentence. + +"The hours fly by like minutes," continues Nancy, stopping by the side +window and twirling the curtain tassel absently. "I scan the surrounding +country to see if anything compares with Beulah, and nothing does. No +such river, no such trees, no such well, no such old oaken bucket, and +above all no such Yellow House. All the other houses I see are but as +huts compared with the Yellow House of Beulah. Soon the car door opens; +a brakeman looks in and calls in a rich baritone voice, 'Greentown! +Greentown! Do-not-leave-any-passles in the car!' And if you know +beforehand what he is going to say you can understand him quite nicely, +so I take up my bag and go down the aisle with dignity. 'Step lively, +Miss!' cries the brakeman, but I do not heed him; it is not likely that +a person renting country houses will move save with majesty. Alighting, +I inquire if there is any conveyance for Beulah, and there is, a wagon +and a white horse. I ask the driver boldly to drive me to the Colonel's +office. He does not ask which Colonel, or what Colonel, he simply says, +'Colonel Foster, I s'pose,' and I say, 'Certainly.' We arrive at the +office and when I introduce myself as Captain Carey's daughter I receive +a glad welcome. The Colonel rings a bell and an aged beldame approaches, +making a deep curtsy and offering me a beaker of milk, a crusty loaf, a +few venison pasties, and a cold goose stuffed with humming birds. When I +have reduced these to nothingness I ask if the yellow house on the +outskirts of the village is still vacant, and the Colonel replies that +it is, at which unexpected but hoped-for answer I fall into a deep +swoon. When I awake the aged Colonel is bending over me, his long white +goat's beard tickling my chin." + +(Mother Carey stops her darning now and Kathleen makes no pretence of +sewing; the story is fast approaching its climax,--everybody feels that, +including Peter, who hopes that he will be in it, in some guise or +other, before it ends.) + +"'Art thou married, lady?' the aged one asks courteously, 'and if not, +wilt thou be mine?'" + +"I tremble, because he does not seem to notice that he is eighty or +ninety and I but fifteen, yet I fear if I reject him too scornfully and +speedily the Yellow House will never be mine. 'Grant me a little time in +which to fit myself for this great honor,' I say modestly, and a mighty +good idea, too, that I got out of a book the other day; when suddenly, +as I gaze upward, my suitor's white hair turns to brown, his beard drops +off, his wrinkles disappear, and he stands before me a young Knight, in +full armor. 'Wilt go to the yellow castle with me, sweet lady?' he asks. +'_Wilt I_!' I cry in ecstasy, and we leap on the back of a charger +hitched to the Colonel's horseblock. We dash down the avenue of elms and +maples that line the village street, and we are at our journey's end +before the Knight has had time to explain to me that he was changed into +the guise of an old man by an evil sorcerer some years before, and could +never return to his own person until some one appeared who wished to +live in the yellow house, which is Beulah Castle. + +"We approach the well-known spot and the little picket gate, and the +Knight lifts me from the charger's back. 'Here are house and lands, and +all are yours, sweet lady, if you have a younger brother. There is +treasure hidden in the ground behind the castle, and no one ever finds +such things save younger brothers.' + +"'I have a younger brother,' I cry, '_and his name is Peter_!'" + +At this point in Nancy's chronicle Peter is nearly beside himself with +excitement. He has been sitting on his hassock, his hands outspread upon +his fat knees, his lips parted, his eyes shining. Somewhere, sometime, +in Nancy's stories there is always a Peter. He lives for that moment! + +Nancy, stifling her laughter, goes on rapidly: + +"And so the Knight summons Younger Brother Peter to come, and he flies +in a great air ship from Charlestown to Beulah. And when he arrives the +Knight asks him to dig for the buried treasure." + +(Peter here turns up his sleeves to his dimpled elbows and seizes an +imaginary implement.) + +"Peter goes to the back of the castle, and there is a beautiful garden +filled with corn and beans and peas and lettuce and potatoes and beets +and onions and turnips and carrots and parsnips and tomatoes and +cabbages. He takes his magic spade and it leads him to the cabbages. He +digs and digs, and in a moment the spade strikes metal! + +"'He has found the gold!' cries the Knight, and Peter speedily lifts +from the ground pots and pots of ducats and florins, and gulden and +doubloons." + +(Peter nods his head at the mention of each precious coin and then claps +his hands, and hugs himself with joy, and rocks himself to and fro on +the hassock, in his ecstasy at being the little god in the machine.) + +"Then down the village street there is the sound of hurrying horses' +feet, and in a twinkling a gayly painted chariot comes into view, and in +it are sitting the Queen Mother and the Crown Prince and Princess of the +House of Carey. They alight; Peter meets them at the gate, a pot of gold +in each hand. They enter the castle and put their umbrellas in one +corner of the front hall and their rubbers in the other one, behind the +door. Lady Nancibel trips up the steps after them and, turning, says +graciously to her Knight, 'Would you just as soon marry somebody else? I +am very much attached to my family, and they will need me dreadfully +while they are getting settled.' + +"'I did not recall the fact that I had asked you to be mine,' +courteously answers the youth. + +"'You did,' she responds, very much embarrassed, as she supposed of +course he would remember his offer made when he was an old man with a +goat's beard; 'but gladly will I forget all, if you will relinquish +my hand.' + +"'As you please!' answers the Knight generously. 'I can deny you nothing +when I remember you have brought me back my youth. Prithee, is the other +lady bespoke, she of the golden hair?' + +"'Many have asked, but I have chosen none,' answers the Crown Princess +Kitty modestly, as is her wont. + +"'Then you will do nicely,' says the Knight, 'since all I wish is to be +son-in-law to the Queen Mother!' + +"'Right you are, my hearty!' cries Prince Gilbert de Carey, 'and as we +much do need a hand at the silver-polishing I will gladly give my sister +in marriage!' + +"So they all went into Beulah Castle and locked the door behind them, +and there they lived in great happiness and comfort all the days of +their lives, and there they died when it came their time, and they were +all buried by the shores of the shining river of Beulah!" + +"Oh! it is perfectly splendid!" cried Kathleen. "About the best one you +ever told! But do change the end a bit, Nancy dear! It's dreadful for +him to marry Kitty when he chose Nancibel first. I'd like him awfully, +but I don't want to take him that way!" + +"Well, how would this do?" and Nancy pondered a moment before going on: +"'Right you are, my hearty!' cries Prince Gilbert de Carey, 'and as we +do need a hand at the silver-polishing I will gladly give my sister in +marriage.' + +"'Hold!' cries the Queen Mother. 'All is not as it should be in this +coil! How can you tell,' she says, turning to the knightly stranger, +'that memory will not awake one day, and you recall the adoration you +felt when you first beheld the Lady Nancibel in a deep swoon?' + +"The Young Knight's eyes took on a far-away look and he put his hand to +his forehead. + +"'It comes back to me now!' he sighed. 'I did love the Lady Nancibel +passionately, and I cannot think how it slipped my mind!' + +"'I release you willingly!' exclaimed the Crown Princess Kitty +haughtily, 'for a million suitors await my nod, and thou wert never +really mine!' + +"'But the other lady rejects me also!' responds the luckless youth, the +tears flowing from his eagle eyes onto his crimson mantle. + +"'Wilt delay the nuptials until I am eighteen and the castle is set in +order?' asks the Lady Nancibel relentingly. + +"'Since it must be, I do pledge thee my vow to wait,' says the Knight. +'And I do beg the fair one with the golden locks to consider the claims +of my brother, not my equal perhaps, but still a gallant youth.' + +"'I will enter him on my waiting list as number Three Hundred and +Seventeen,' responds the Crown Princess Kitty, than whom no violet could +be more shy. ''Tis all he can expect and more than I should promise.' + +"So they all lived in the yellow castle in great happiness forever +after, and were buried by the shores of the shining river of +Beulah!--Does that suit you better?" + +"Simply lovely!" cried Kitty, "and the bit about my modesty is too funny +for words!--Oh, if some of it would only happen! But I am afraid Gilbert +will not stir up any fairy stories and set them going." + +"Some of it will happen!" exclaimed Peter. "I shall dig every single day +till I find the gold-pots." + +"You are a pot of gold yourself, filled full and running over!" + +"Now, Nancy, run and write down your fairy tale while you remember it!" +said Mother Carey. + +"It is as good an exercise as any other, and you still tell a story far +better than you write it!" + +Nancy did this sort of improvising every now and then, and had done it +from earliest childhood; and sometimes, of late, Mother Carey looked at +her eldest chicken and wondered if after all she had hatched in her a +bird of brighter plumage or rarer song than the rest, or a young eagle +whose strong wings would bear her to a higher flight! + + + +IX + +GILBERT'S EMBASSY + + +The new station had just been built in Boston, and it seemed a great +enterprise to Gilbert to be threading his way through the enormous +spaces, getting his information by his own wits and not asking questions +like a stupid schoolboy. Like all children of naval officers, the Careys +had travelled ever since their birth; still, this was Gilbert's first +journey alone, and nobody was ever more conscious of the situation, nor +more anxious to carry it off effectively. + +He entered the car, opened his bag, took out his travelling cap and his +copy of "Ben Hur," then threw the bag in a lordly way into the brass +rack above the seat. He opened his book, but immediately became +interested in a young couple just in front of him. They were carefully +dressed, even to details of hats and gloves, and they had an +unmistakable air of wedding journey about them that interested the +curious boy. + +Presently the conductor came in. Pausing in front of the groom he said, +"Tickets, please"; then: "You're on the wrong train!" "Wrong train? Of +course I'm not on the wrong train! You must be mistaken! The ticket +agent told me to take this train." + +"Can't help that, sir, this train don't go to Lawrence." + +"It's very curious. I asked the brakeman, and two porters. Ain't this +the 3.05?" + +"This is the 3.05." + +"Where does it go, then?" + +"Goes to Lowell. Lowell the first stop." + +"But I don't want to go to Lowell!" + +"What's the matter with Lowell? It's a good place all right!" + +"But I have an appointment in Lawrence at four o'clock." + +"I'm dretful sorry, but you'll have to keep it in Lowell, I +guess!--Tickets, please!" this to a pretty girl on the opposite side +from Gilbert, a pink and white, unsophisticated maiden, very much +interested in the woes of the bride and groom and entirely sympathetic +with the groom's helpless wrath. + +"On the wrong train, Miss!" said the conductor. + +"On the wrong train?" She spoke in a tone of anguish, getting up and +catching her valise frantically. "It _can't_ be the wrong train! Isn't +it the White Mountain train?" + +"Yes, Miss, but it don't go to North Conway; it goes to Fabyan's." + +"But my father _put_ me on this train and everybody _said_ it was the +White Mountain train!" + +"So it is, Miss, but if you wanted to stop at North Conway you'd ought +to have taken the 3.55, platform 8." + +"Put me off, then, please, and let me wait for the 3.55." + +"Can't do it, Miss; this is an express train; only stops at Lowell, +where this gentleman is going!" + +(Here the conductor gave a sportive wink at the bridegroom who had an +appointment in Lawrence.) + +The pretty girl burst into a flood of tears and turned her face +despairingly to the window, while the bride talked to the groom +excitedly about what they ought to have done and what they would have +done had she been consulted. + +Gilbert could hardly conceal his enjoyment of the situation, and indeed +everybody within hearing--that is, anybody who chanced to be on the +right train--looked at the bride and groom and the pretty girl, and +tittered audibly. + +"Why don't people make inquiries?" thought Gilbert superciliously. +"Perhaps they have never been anywhere before, but even that's +no excuse." + +He handed his ticket to the conductor with a broad smile, saying in an +undertone, "What kind of passengers are we carrying this afternoon?" + +"The usual kind, I guess!--You're on the wrong train, sonny!" + +Gilbert almost leaped into the air, and committed himself by making a +motion to reach down his valise. + +"I, on the wrong train?" he asked haughtily. "That _can't_ be so; the +ticket agent told me the 3.05 was the only fast train to Greentown!" + +"Mebbe he thought you said Greenville; this train goes to Greenville, if +that'll do you! Folks ain't used to the new station yet, and the ticket +agents are all bran' new too,--guess you got hold of a tenderfoot!" + +"But Greenville will _not_ 'do' for me," exclaimed Gilbert. "I want to +go to _Greentown_." + +"Well, get off at Lowell, the first stop,--you'll know when you come to +it because this gentleman that wanted to go to Lawrence will get off +there, and this young lady that was intendin' to go to North Conway. +There'll be four of you; jest a nice party." + +Gilbert choked with wrath as he saw the mirth of the other passengers. + +"What train shall I be able to take to Greentown," he managed to call +after the conductor. + +"Don't know, sonny! Ask the ticket agent in the Lowell deepot; he's an +old hand and he'll know!" + +Gilbert's pride was terribly wounded, but his spirits rose a little +later when he found that he would only have to wait twenty minutes in +the Lowell station before a slow train for Greentown would pick him up, +and that he should still reach his destination before bedtime, and need +never disclose his stupidity. + +After all, this proved to be his only error, for everything moved +smoothly from that moment, and he was as prudent and successful an +ambassador as Mother Carey could have chosen. He found the Colonel, +whose name was not Foster, by the way, but Wheeler; and the Colonel +would not allow him to go to the Mansion House, Beulah's one small +hotel, but insisted that he should be his guest. That evening he heard +from the Colonel the history of the yellow house, and the next morning +the Colonel drove him to the store of the man who had charge of it +during the owner's absence in Europe, after which Gilbert was conducted +in due form to the premises for a critical examination. + +The Yellow House, as Garden Fore-and-Aft seemed destined to be chiefly +called, was indeed the only house of that color for ten miles square. It +had belonged to the various branches of a certain family of Hamiltons +for fifty years or more, but in course of time, when it fell into the +hands of the Lemuel Hamiltons, it had no sort of relation to their mode +of existence. One summer, a year or two before the Careys had seen it, +the sons and daughters had come on from Boston and begged their father +to let them put it in such order that they could take house parties of +young people there for the week end. Mr. Hamilton indulgently allowed +them a certain amount to be expended as they wished, and with the help +of a local carpenter, they succeeded in doing several things to their +own complete satisfaction, though it could not be said that they added +to the value of the property. The house they regarded merely as a +camping-out place, and after they had painted some bedroom floors, set +up some cots, bought a kitchen stove and some pine tables and chairs, +they regarded that part of the difficulty as solved; expending the rest +of the money in turning the dilapidated barn into a place where they +could hold high revels of various innocent sorts. The two freshman sons, +two boarding-school daughters, and a married sister barely old enough to +chaperon her own baby, brought parties of gay young friends with them +several weeks in succession. These excursions were a great delight to +the villagers, who thus enjoyed all the pleasures and excitements of a +circus with none of its attendant expenses. They were of short duration, +however, for Lemuel Hamilton was appointed consul to a foreign port and +took his wife and daughters with him. The married sister died, and in +course of time one of the sons went to China to learn tea-planting and +the other established himself on a ranch in Texas. Thus the Lemuel +Hamiltons were scattered far and wide, and as the Yellow House in Beulah +had small value as real estate and had never played any part in their +lives, it was almost forgotten as the busy years went by. + +"Mr. Hamilton told me four years ago, when I went up to Boston to meet +him, that if I could get any rent from respectable parties I might let +the house, though he wouldn't lay out a cent on repairs in order to get +a tenant. But, land! there ain't no call for houses in Beulah, nor +hain't been for twenty years," so Bill Harmon, the storekeeper, told +Gilbert. "The house has got a tight roof and good underpinnin', and if +your folks feel like payin' out a little money for paint 'n' paper you +can fix it up neat's a pin. The Hamilton boys jest raised Cain out in the +barn, so 't you can't keep no critters there." + +"We couldn't have a horse or a cow anyway," said Gilbert. + +"Well, it's lucky you can't. I could 'a' rented the house twice over if +there'd been any barn room; but them confounded young scalawags ripped +out the horse and cow stalls, cleared away the pig pen, and laid a floor +they could dance on. The barn chamber 's full o' their stuff, so 't no +hay can go in; altogether there ain't any nameable kind of a fool-trick +them young varmints didn't play on these premises. When a farmer's +lookin' for a home for his family and stock 't ain't no use to show him +a dance hall. The only dancin' a Maine farmer ever does is dancin' round +to git his livin' out o' the earth;--that keeps his feet flyin', +fast enough." + +"Well," said Gilbert, "I think if you can put the rent cheap enough so +that we could make the necessary repairs, I _think_ my mother would +consider it." + +"Would you want it for more 'n this summer?" asked Mr. Harmon. + +"Oh! yes, we want to live here!" + +"_Want to live here_!" exclaimed the astonished Harmon. "Well, it's been +a long time sence we heard anybody say that, eh, Colonel? + +"Well now, sonny" (Gilbert did wish that respect for budding manhood +could be stretched a little further in this locality), "I tell you what, +I ain't goin' to stick no fancy price on these premises--" + +"It wouldn't be any use," said Gilbert boldly. "My father has died +within a year; there are four of us beside my mother, and there's a +cousin, too, who is dependent on us. We have nothing but a small pension +and the interest on five thousand dollars life insurance. Mother says we +must go away from all our friends, live cheaply, and do our own work +until Nancy, Kitty, and I grow old enough to earn something." + +Colonel Wheeler and Mr. Harmon both liked Gilbert Carey at sight, and as +he stood there uttering his boyish confidences with great friendliness +and complete candor, both men would have been glad to meet him halfway. + +"Well, Harmon, it seems to me we shall get some good neighbors if we can +make terms with Mrs. Carey," said the Colonel. "If you'll fix a +reasonable figure I'll undertake to write to Hamilton and interest him +in the affair." + +"All right. Now, Colonel, I'd like to make a proposition right on the +spot, before you, and you can advise sonny, here. You see Lem has got +his taxes to pay,--they're small, of course, but they're an +expense,--and he'd ought to carry a little insurance on his buildings, +tho' he ain't had any up to now. On the other hand, if he can get a +tenant that'll put on a few shingles and clapboards now and then, or a +coat o' paint 'n' a roll o' wall paper, his premises won't go to rack +'n' ruin same's they're in danger o' doin' at the present time. Now, +sonny, would your mother feel like keepin' up things a little mite if we +should say sixty dollars a year rent, payable monthly or quarterly as is +convenient?" + +Gilbert's head swam and his eyes beheld such myriads of stars that he +felt it must be night instead of day. The rent of the Charlestown house +was seven hundred dollars a year, and the last words of his mother had +been to the effect that two hundred was the limit he must offer for the +yellow house, as she did not see clearly at the moment how they could +afford even that sum. + +"What would be your advice, Colonel?" stammered the boy. + +"I think sixty dollars is not exorbitant," the Colonel answered calmly +(he had seen Beulah real estate fall a peg a year for twenty successive +years), "though naturally you cannot pay that sum and make any +extravagant repairs." + +"Then I will take the house," Gilbert remarked largely. "My mother left +the matter of rent to my judgment, and we will pay promptly in advance. +Shall I sign any papers?" + +"Land o' Goshen! the marks your little fist would make on a paper +wouldn't cut much of a figure in a court o' law!" chuckled old Harmon. +"You jest let the Colonel fix up matters with your ma." + +"Can I walk back, Colonel?" asked Gilbert, trying to preserve some +dignity under the storekeeper's attacks. "I'd like to take some +measurements and make some sketches of the rooms for my mother." + +"All right," the Colonel responded. "Your train doesn't go till two +o'clock. I'll give you a bite of lunch and take you to the station." + + +If Mother Carey had watched Gilbert during the next half-hour she would +have been gratified, for every moment of the time he grew more and more +into the likeness of the head of a family. He looked at the cellar, at +the shed, at the closets and cupboards all over the house, and at the +fireplaces. He "paced off" all the rooms and set down their proportions +in his note-book; he even decided as to who should occupy each room, and +for what purposes they should be used, his judgment in every case being +thought ridiculous by the feminine portion of his family when they +looked at his plans. Then he locked the doors carefully with a fine +sense of ownership and strolled away with many a backward look and +thought at the yellow house. + +At the station he sent a telegram to his mother. Nancy had secretly +given him thirty-five cents when he left home. "I am hoarding for the +Admiral's Christmas present," she whispered, "but it's no use, I cannot +endure the suspense about the house a moment longer than is necessary. +Just telegraph us yes or no, and we shall get the news four hours before +your train arrives. One can die several times in four hours, and I'm +going to commit one last extravagance,--at the Admiral's expense!" + +At three o'clock on Saturday afternoon a telegraph boy came through the +gate and rang the front door bell. + +"You go, Kitty, I haven't the courage!" said Nancy, sitting down on the +sofa heavily. A moment later the two girls and Peter (who for once +didn't count) gazed at their mother breathlessly as she opened the +envelope. Her face lighted as she read aloud:-- + + + "_Victory perches on my banners. Have accomplished all I went for_. + GILBERT." + +"Hurrah!" cried both girls. "The yellow house is the House of Carey +forevermore." + +"Will Peter go too?" asked the youngest Carey eagerly, his nose +quivering as it always did in excitement, when it became an animated +question point. + +"I should think he would," exclaimed Kitty, clasping him in her arms. +"What would the yellow house be without Peter?" + +"I wish Gilbert wouldn't talk about _his_ banners," said Nancy +critically, as she looked at the telegram over her mother's shoulder. +"They're not his banners at all, they're ours,--Carey banners; that's +what they are!" + +Mother Carey had wished the same thing, but hoped that Nancy had not +noticed the Gilbertian flaw in the telegram. + + + +X + +THE CAREYS' FLITTING + + +The Charlestown house was now put immediately into the hands of several +agents, for Mrs. Carey's lease had still four years to run and she was +naturally anxious to escape from this financial responsibility as soon +as possible. As a matter of fact only three days elapsed before she +obtained a tenant, and the agent had easily secured an advance of a +hundred dollars a year to the good, as Captain Carey had obtained a very +favorable figure when he took the house. + +It was the beginning of April, and letters from Colonel Wheeler had +already asked instructions about having the vegetable garden ploughed. +It was finally decided that the girls should leave their spring term of +school unfinished, and that the family should move to Beulah during +Gilbert's Easter vacation. + +Mother Carey gave due reflection to the interrupted studies, but +concluded that for two girls like Nancy and Kathleen the making of a new +home would be more instructive and inspiring, and more fruitful in its +results, than weeks of book learning. + +Youth delights in change, in the prospect of new scenes and fresh +adventures, and as it is never troubled by any doubts as to the wisdom +of its plans, the Carey children were full of vigor and energy just now. +Charlestown, the old house, the daily life, all had grown sad and dreary +to them since father had gone. Everything spoke of him. Even mother +longed for something to lift her thought out of the past and give it +wings, so that it might fly into the future and find some hope and +comfort there. There was a continual bustle from morning till night, and +a spirit of merriment that had long been absent. + +The Scotch have a much prettier word than we for all this, and what we +term moving they call "flitting." The word is not only prettier, but in +this instance more appropriate. It was such a buoyant, youthful affair, +this Carey flitting. Light forms darted up and down the stairs and past +the windows, appearing now at the back, now at the front of the house, +with a picture, or a postage stamp, or a dish, or a penwiper, or a +pillow, or a basket, or a spool. The chorus of "Where shall we put this, +Muddy?" "Where will this go?" "May we throw this away?" would have +distracted a less patient parent. When Gilbert returned from school at +four, the air was filled with sounds of hammering and sawing and filing, +screwing and unscrewing, and it was joy unspeakable to be obliged (or at +least almost obliged) to call in clarion tones to one another, across +the din and fanfare, and to compel answers in a high key. Peter took a +constant succession of articles to the shed, where packing was going on, +but his chief treasures were deposited in a basket at the front gate, +with the idea that they would be transported as his personal baggage. +The pile grew and grew: a woolly lamb, two Noah's arks, bottles and +marbles innumerable, a bag of pebbles, a broken steam engine, two china +nest-eggs, an orange, a banana and some walnuts, a fishing line, a +trowel, a ball of string. These give an idea of the quality of Peter's +effects, but not of the quantity. + +Ellen the cook labored loyally, for it was her last week's work with the +family. She would be left behind, like Charlestown and all the old life, +when Mother Carey and the stormy petrels flitted across unknown waters +from one haven to another. Joanna having earlier proved utterly +unromantic in her attitude, Nancy went further with Ellen and gave her +an English novel called, "The Merriweathers," in which an old family +servant had not only followed her employers from castle to hovel, +remaining there without Wages for years, but had insisted on lending all +her savings to the Mistress of the Manor. Ellen the cook had loved "The +Merriweathers," saying it was about the best book that ever she had +read, and Miss Nancy would like to know, always being so interested, +that she (Ellen) had found a place near Joanna in Salem, where she was +offered five dollars a month more than she had received with the Careys. +Nancy congratulated her warmly and then, tearing "The Merriweathers" to +shreds, she put them in the kitchen stove in Ellen's temporary absence. +"If ever I write a book," she ejaculated, as she "stoked" the fire with +Gwendolen and Reginald Merriweather, with the Mistress of the Manor, and +especially with the romantic family servitor, "if ever I write a book," +she repeated, with emphatic gestures, "it won't have any fibs in +it;--and I suppose it will be dull," she reflected, as she remembered +how she had wept when the Merriweathers' Bridget brought her savings of +a hundred pounds to her mistress in a handkerchief. + +During these preparations for the flitting Nancy had a fresh idea every +minute or two, and gained immense prestige in the family. + +Inspired by her eldest daughter Mrs. Carey sold her grand piano, getting +an old-fashioned square one and a hundred and fifty dollars in exchange. +It had been a wedding present from a good old uncle, who, if he had been +still alive, would have been glad to serve his niece now that she was in +difficulties. + +Nancy, her sleeves rolled up, her curly hair flecked with dust and +cobwebs, flew down from the attic into Kathleen's room just after +supper. "I have an idea!" she said in a loud whisper. + +"You mustn't have too many or we shan't take any interest in them," +Kitty answered provokingly. + +"This is for your ears alone, Kitty!" + +"Oh! that's different. Tell me quickly." + +"It's an idea to get rid of the Curse of the House of Carey!" + +"It can't be done, Nancy; you know it can't! Even if you could think out +a way, mother couldn't be made to agree." + +"She must never know. I would not think of mixing up a good lovely woman +like mother in such an affair!" + +This was said so mysteriously that Kathleen almost suspected that +bloodshed was included in Nancy's plan. It must be explained that when +young Ensign Carey and Margaret Gilbert had been married, Cousin Ann +Chadwick had presented them with four tall black and white marble mantel +ornaments shaped like funeral urns; and then, feeling that she had not +yet shown her approval of the match sufficiently, she purchased a large +group of clay statuary entitled You Dirty Boy. + +The Careys had moved often, like all naval families, but even when their +other goods and chattels were stored, Cousin Ann generously managed to +defray the expense of sending on to them the mantel ornaments and the +Dirty Boy. "I know what your home is to you," she used to say to them, +"and how you must miss your ornaments. If I have chanced to give you +things as unwieldy as they are handsome, I ought to see that you have +them around you without trouble or expense, and I will!" + +So for sixteen years, save for a brief respite when the family was in +the Philippines, their existence was blighted by these hated objects. +Once when they had given an especially beautiful party for the Admiral, +Captain Carey had carried the whole lot to the attic, but Cousin Ann +arrived unexpectedly in the middle of the afternoon, and Nancy, with the +aid of Gilbert and Joanna, had brought them down the back way and put +them in the dining room. + +"You've taken the ornaments out of the parlor, I see," Cousin Ann said +at the dinner table. "It's rather nice for a change, and after all, +perhaps you spend as much time in this room as in any, and entertain as +much company here!" + +Cousin Ann always had been, always would be, a frequent visitor, for she +was devoted to the family in her own peculiar way; what therefore could +Nancy be proposing to do with the Carey Curse? + +"Listen, my good girl," Nancy now said to Kathleen, after she had closed +the door. "Thou dost know that the china-packer comes early to-morrow +morn, and that e'en now the barrels and boxes and excelsior are +bestrewing the dining room?" + +"Yes." + +"Then you and I, who have been brought up under the shadow of those +funeral urns, and have seen that tidy mother scrubbing the ears of that +unwilling boy ever since we were born,--you and I, or thou and I, +perhaps I should say, will do a little private packing before the true +packer arriveth." + +"Still do I not see the point, wench!" said the puzzled Kathleen, trying +to model her conversation on Nancy's, though she was never thoroughly +successful. + +"Don't call me 'wench,' because I am the mistress and you my tiring +woman, but when you Watch, and assist me, at the packing, a great light +will break upon you," Nancy answered "In the removal of cherished +articles from Charlestown to Beulah, certain tragedies will occur, +certain accidents will happen, although Cousin Ann knows that the Carey +family is a well regulated one. But if there are accidents, and _there +will be_, my good girl, then the authors of them will be forever unknown +to all but thou and I. Wouldst prefer to pack this midnight or at cock +crow, for packing is our task!" + +"I simply hate cock crow, and you know it," said Kathleen testily. "Why +not now? Ellen and Gilbert are out and mother is rocking Peter +to sleep." + +"Very well; come on; and step softly. It won't take long, because I have +planned all in secret, well and thoroughly. Don't puff and blow like +that! Mother will hear you!" + +"I'm excited," whispered Kathleen as they stole down the back stairs and +went into the parlor for the funeral urns, which they carried silently +to the dining room. These safely deposited, they took You Dirty Boy from +its abominable pedestal of Mexican onyx (also Cousin Ann's gift) and +staggered under its heavy weight, their natural strength being +considerably sapped by suppressed laughter. + +Nancy chose an especially large and stout barrel. They put a little +(very little) excelsior in the bottom, then a pair of dumb-bells, then a +funeral urn, then a little hay, and another funeral urn, crosswise. The +spaces between were carelessly filled in with Indian clubs. On these +they painfully dropped You Dirty Boy, and on top of him the other pair +of funeral urns, more dumbbells, and another Indian club. They had +packed the barrel in the corner where it stood, so they simply laid the +cover on top and threw a piece of sacking carelessly over it. The whole +performance had been punctuated with such hysterical laughter from +Kathleen that she was too weak to be of any real use,--she simply aided +and abetted the chief conspirator. The night was not as other nights. +The girls kept waking up to laugh a little, then they went to sleep, and +waked again, and laughed again, and so on. Nancy composed several +letters to her Cousin Ann dated from Beulah and explaining the sad +accident that had occurred. As she concocted these documents between her +naps she could never remember in her whole life any such night of mirth +and minstrelsy, and not one pang of conscience interfered, to cloud the +present joy nor dim that anticipation which is even greater. + +Nancy was downstairs early next morning and managed to be the one to +greet the china-packers. "We filled one barrel last evening," she +explained to them. "Will you please head that up before you begin work?" +which one of the men obligingly did. + +"We'll mark all this stuff and take it down to the station this +afternoon," said the head packer to Mrs. Carey. + +"Be careful with it, won't you?" she begged. "We are very fond of our +glass and china, our clocks and all our little treasures." + +"You won't have any breakage so long as you deal with James Perkins & +Co.!" said the packer. + +Nancy went back into the room for a moment to speak with the skilful, +virtuous J.P. & Co. "There's no need to use any care with that corner +barrel," she said carelessly. "It has nothing of value in it!" + +James Perkins went home in the middle of the afternoon and left his son +to finish the work, and the son tagged and labelled and painted with all +his might. The Dirty Boy barrel in the corner, being separated from the +others, looked to him especially important, so he gave particular +attention to that; pasted on it one label marked "Fragile," one "This +Side Up," two "Glass with Care," and finding several "Perishables" in +his pocket tied on a few of those, and removed the entire lot of boxes, +crates, and barrels to the freight depot. + +The man who put the articles in the car was much interested in the Dirty +Boy barrel. "You'd ought to have walked to Greentown and carried that +one in your arms," he jeered. "What is the precious thing, anyway?" + +"Don't you mind what it is," responded young Perkins. "Jest you keep +everybody 'n' everything from teching it! Does this lot o' stuff have to +be shifted 'tween here and Greentown?" + +"No; not unless we git kind o' dull and turn it upside down jest for +fun." + +"I guess you're dull consid'able often, by the way things look when you +git through carryin' 'em, on this line," said Perkins, who had no +opinion of the freight department of the A.&B. The answer, though not +proper to record in this place, was worthy of Perkins's opponent, who +had a standing grudge against the entire race of expressmen and carters +who brought him boxes and barrels to handle. It always seemed to him +that if they were all out of the country or dead he would have no +work to do. + + + +XI + +THE SERVICE ON THE THRESHOLD + + +From this point on, the flitting went easily and smoothly enough, and +the transportation of the Carey family itself to Greentown, on a mild +budding day in April, was nothing compared to the heavy labor that had +preceded it. All the goods and chattels had been despatched a week +before, so that they would be on the spot well in advance, and the +actual flitting took place on a Friday, so that Gilbert would have every +hour of his vacation to assist in the settling process. He had accepted +an invitation to visit a school friend at Easter, saying to his mother +magisterially: "I didn't suppose you'd want me round the house when you +were getting things to rights; men are always in the way; so I told Fred +Bascom I'd go home with him." + +"Home with Fred! Our only man! Sole prop of the House of Carey!" +exclaimed his mother with consummate tact. "Why, Gilly dear, I shall +want your advice every hour! And who will know about the planting,--for +we are only 'women folks'; and who will do all the hammering and +carpenter work? You are so wonderful with tools that you'll be worth all +the rest of us put together!" + +"Oh, well, if you need me so much as that I'll go along, of course," +said Gilbert, "but Fred said his mother and sisters always did this kind +of thing by themselves." + +"'By themselves,' in Fred's family," remarked Mrs. Carey, "means a +butler, footman, and plenty of money for help of every sort. And though +no wonder you're fond of Fred, who is so jolly and such good company, +you must have noticed how selfish he is!" + +"Now, mother, you've never seen Fred Bascom more than half a dozen +times!" + +"No; and I don't remember at all what I saw in him the last five of +them, for I found out everything needful the first time he came to visit +us!" returned Mrs. Carey quietly. "Still, he's a likable, agreeable +sort of boy." + +"And no doubt he'll succeed in destroying the pig in him before he grows +up," said Nancy, passing through the room. "I thought it gobbled and +snuffled a good deal when we last met!" + +Colonel Wheeler was at Greentown station when the family arrived, and +drove Mrs. Carey and Peter to the Yellow House himself, while the rest +followed in the depot carryall, with a trail of trunks and packages +following on behind in an express wagon. It was a very early season, the +roads were free from mud, the trees were budding, and the young grass +showed green on all the sunny slopes. When the Careys had first seen +their future home they had entered the village from the west, the Yellow +House being the last one on the elm-shaded street, and quite on the +outskirts of Beulah itself. Now they crossed the river below the station +and drove through East Beulah, over a road unknown to any of them but +Gilbert, who was the hero and instructor of the party. Soon the +well-remembered house came into view, and as the two vehicles had kept +one behind the other there was a general cheer. + +It was more beautiful even than they had remembered it; and more +commodious, and more delightfully situated. The barn door was open, +showing crates of furniture, and the piazza was piled high with boxes. + +Bill Harmon stood in the front doorway, smiling. He hoped for trade, and +he was a good sort anyway. + +"I'd about given you up to-night," he called as he came to the gate. +"Your train's half an hour late. I got tired o' waitin', so I made free +to open up some o' your things for you to start housekeepin' with. I +guess there won't be no supper here for you to-night." + +"We've got it with us," said Nancy joyously, making acquaintance in an +instant. + +"You _are_ forehanded, ain't you! That's right!--jump, you little pint +o' cider!" Bill said, holding out his arms to Peter. Peter, carrying +many small things too valuable to trust to others, jumped, as suggested, +and gave his new friend an unexpected shower of bumps from hard +substances concealed about his person. + +"Land o' Goshen, you're _loaded_, hain't you?" he inquired jocosely as +he set Peter down on the ground. + +The dazzling smile with which Peter greeted this supposed tribute +converted Bill Harmon at once into a victim and slave. Little did he +know, as he carelessly stood there at the wagon wheel, that he was +destined to bestow upon that small boy offerings from his stock for +years to come. + +He and Colonel Wheeler were speedily lifting things from the carryall, +while the Careys walked up the pathway together, thrilling with the +excitement of the moment. Nancy breathed hard, flushed, and caught her +mother's hand. + +"O Motherdy!" she said under her breath; "it's all happening just as we +dreamed it, and now that it's really here it's like--it's like--a +dedication,--somehow. Gilbert, don't, dear! Let mother step over the +sill first and call us into the Yellow House! I'll lock the door again +and give the key to her." + +Mother Carey, her heart in her throat, felt anew the solemn nature of +the undertaking. It broke over her in waves, fresher, stronger, now that +the actual moment had arrived, than it ever had done in prospect. She +took the last step upward, and standing in the doorway, trembling, said +softly as she turned the key, "Come home, children! Nancy! Gilbert! +Kathleen! Peter-bird!" They flocked in, all their laughter hushed by the +new tone in her voice. Nancy's and Kitty's arms encircled their mother's +waist. Gilbert with sudden instinct took off his hat, and Peter, looking +at his elder brother wonderingly, did the same. There was a moment of +silence; the kind of golden silence that is full to the brim of thoughts +and prayers and memories and hopes and desires,--so full of all these +and other beautiful, quiet things that it makes speech seem poor and +shabby; then Mother Carey turned, and the Yellow House was blessed. +Colonel Wheeler and Bill Harmon at the gate never even suspected that +there had been a little service on the threshold, when they came up the +pathway to see if there was anything more needed. + +"I set up all the bedsteads and got the mattresses on 'em," said Bill +Harmon, "thinkin' the sandman would come early to-night." + +"I never heard of anything so kind and neighborly!" cried Mrs. Carey +gratefully. "I thought we should have to go somewhere else to sleep. Is +it you who keeps the village store?" + +"That's me!" said Bill. + +"Well, if you'll be good enough to come back once more to-night with a +little of everything, we'll be very much obliged. We have an oil stove, +tea and coffee, tinned meats, bread and fruit; what we need most is +butter, eggs, milk, and flour. Gilbert, open the box of eatables, +please; and, Nancy, unlock the trunk that has the bed linen in it. We +little thought we should find such friends here, did we?" + +"I got your extension table into the dining-room," said Bill, "and tried +my best to find your dishes, but I didn't make out, up to the time you +got here. Mebbe you marked 'em someway so't you know which to unpack +first? I was only findin' things that wan't no present use, as I guess +you'll say when you see 'em on the dining table." + +They all followed him as he threw open the door, Nancy well in the +front, as I fear was generally the case. There, on the centre of the +table stood You Dirty Boy rearing his crested head in triumph, and round +him like the gate posts of a mausoleum stood the four black and white +marble funeral urns. Perfect and entire, without a flaw, they stood +there, confronting Nancy. + +"It is like them to be the first to greet us!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey, +with an attempt at a smile, but there was not a sound from Kathleen or +Nancy. They stood rooted to the floor, gazing at the Curse of the House +of Carey as if their eyes must deceive them. + +"You look as though you didn't expect to see them, girls!" said their +mother, "but when did they ever fail us?--Do you know, I have a courage +at this moment that I never felt before?--Beulah is so far from Buffalo +that Cousin Ann cannot visit us often, and never without warning. I +should not like to offend her or hurt her feelings, but I think we'll +keep You Dirty Boy and the mantel ornaments in the attic for the +present, or the barn chamber. What do you say?" + +Colonel Wheeler and Mr. Harmon had departed, so a shout of agreement +went up from the young Careys. Nancy approached You Dirty Boy with a +bloodthirsty glare in her eye. + +"Come along, you evil, uncanny thing!" she said. "Take hold of his other +end, Gilly, and start for the barn; that's farthest away; but it's no +use; he's just like that bloodstain on Lady Macbeth's hand,--he will not +out! Kathleen, open the linen trunk while we're gone. We can't set the +table till these curses are removed. When you've got the linen out, take +a marble urn in each hand and trail them along to where we are. You can +track us by a line of my tears!" + +They found the stairs to the barn chamber, and lifted You Dirty Boy up +step by step with slow, painful effort. Kathleen ran out and put two +vases on the lowest step and ran back to the house for the other pair. +Gilbert and Nancy stood at the top of the stairs with You Dirty Boy +between them, settling where he could be easiest reached if he had to be +brought down for any occasion,--an unwelcome occasion that was certain +to occur sometime in the coming years. + +Suddenly they heard their names called in a tragic whisper! "_Gilbert! +Nancy! Quick! Cousin Ann's at the front gate_!" + +There was a crash! No human being, however self-contained, could have +withstood the shock of that surprise; coming as it did so swiftly, so +unexpectedly, and with such awful inappropriateness. Gilbert and Nancy +let go of You Dirty Boy simultaneously, and he fell to the floor in two +large fragments, the break occurring so happily that the mother and the +washcloth were on one half, and the boy on the other,--a situation long +desired by the boy, to whom the parting was most welcome! + +"She got off at the wrong station," panted Kathleen at the foot of the +stairs, "and had to be driven five miles, or she would have got here as +she planned, an hour before we did. She's come to help us settle, and +says she was afraid mother would overdo. Did you drop anything? Hurry +down, and I'll leave the vases here, in among the furniture; or shall I +take back two of them to show that they were our first thought?--And oh! +I forgot. She's brought Julia! Two more to feed, and not enough beds!" + +Nancy and Gilbert confronted each other. + +"Hide the body in the corner, Gilly," said Nancy; "and say, Gilly--" + +"Yes, what?" + +"You see he's in two pieces?" + +"Yes." + +"_What do you say to making him four, or more_?" + +"I say you go downstairs ahead of me and into the house, and I follow +you a moment later! Close the barn door carefully behind you!--Am I +understood?" + +"You are, Gilly! understood, and gloried in, and reverenced. My spirit +will be with you when you do it, Gilly dear, though I myself will be +greeting Cousin Ann and Julia!" + + + +XII + +COUSIN ANN + + +Mother Carey, not wishing to make any larger number of persons +uncomfortable than necessary, had asked Julia not to come to them until +after the house in Beulah had been put to rights; but the Fergusons went +abroad rather unexpectedly, and Mr. Ferguson tore Julia from the arms of +Gladys and put her on the train with very little formality. Her meeting +Cousin Ann on the way was merely one of those unpleasant coincidences +with which life is filled, although it is hardly possible, usually, for +two such disagreeable persons to be on the same small spot at the same +precise moment. + +On the third morning after the Careys' arrival, however, matters assumed +a more hopeful attitude, for Cousin Ann became discontented with Beulah. +The weather had turned cold, and the fireplaces, so long unused, were +uniformly smoky. Cousin Ann's stomach, always delicate, turned from +tinned meats, eggs three times a day, and soda biscuits made by Bill +Harmon's wife; likewise did it turn from nuts, apples, oranges, and +bananas, on which the children thrived; so she went to the so-called +hotel for her meals. Her remarks to the landlady after two dinners and +one supper were of a character not to be endured by any outspoken, +free-born New England woman. + +"I keep a hotel, and I'll give you your meals for twenty-five cents +apiece so long as you eat what's set before you and hold your tongue," +was the irate Mrs. Buck's ultimatum. "I'll feed you," she continued +passionately, "because it's my business to put up and take in anything +that's respectable; but I won't take none o' your sass!" + +Well, Cousin Ann's temper was up, too, by this time, and she declined on +her part to take any of the landlady's "sass"; so they parted, rather to +Mrs. Carey's embarrassment, as she did not wish to make enemies at the +outset. That night Cousin Ann, still smarting under the memory of Mrs. +Buck's snapping eyes, high color, and unbridled tongue, complained after +supper that her bedstead rocked whenever she moved, and asked Gilbert if +he could readjust it in some way, so that it should be as stationary as +beds usually are in a normal state. + +He took his tool basket and went upstairs obediently, spending fifteen +or twenty minutes with the much-criticised article of furniture, which +he suspected of rocking merely because it couldn't bear Cousin Ann. This +idea so delighted Nancy that she was obliged to retire from Gilbert's +proximity, lest the family should observe her mirth and Gilbert's and +impute undue importance to it. + +"I've done everything to the bedstead I can think of," Gilbert said, on +coming downstairs. "You can see how it works to-night, Cousin Ann!" + +As a matter of fact it _did_ work, instead of remaining in perfect quiet +as a well-bred bedstead should. When the family was sound asleep at +midnight a loud crash was heard, and Cousin Ann, throwing open the door +of her room, speedily informed everybody in the house that her bed had +come down with her, giving her nerves a shock from which they probably +would never recover. + +"Gilbert is far too young for the responsibilities you put upon him, +Margaret," Cousin Ann exclaimed, drawing her wrapper more closely over +her tall spare figure; "and if he was as old as Methuselah he would +still be careless, for he was born so! All this talk about his being +skilful with tools has only swollen his vanity. A boy of his age should +be able to make a bedstead stay together." + +The whole family, including the crestfallen Gilbert, proposed various +plans of relief, all except Nancy, who did not wish to meet Gilbert's +glance for fear that she should have to suspect him of a new crime. +Having embarked on a career of villainy under her direct instigation, he +might go on of his own accord, indefinitely. She did not believe him +guilty, but she preferred not to look into the matter more closely. + +Mother Carey's eyes searched Gilbert's, but found there no confirmation +of her fears. + +"You needn't look at me like that, mother," said the boy. "I wouldn't be +so mean as to rig up an accident for Cousin Ann, though I'd like her to +have a little one every night, just for the fun of it." + +Cousin Ann refused to let Gilbert try again on the bedstead, and refused +part of Mrs. Carey's bed, preferring to sleep on two hair mattresses +laid on her bedroom floor. "They may not be comfortable," she said +tersely, "but at least they will not endanger my life." + +The next morning's post brought business letters, and Cousin Ann feared +she would have to leave Beulah, although there was work for a fortnight +to come, right there, and Margaret had not strength enough to get +through it alone. + +She thought the chimneys were full of soot, and didn't believe the +kitchen stove would ever draw; she was sure that there were dead toads +and frogs in the well; the house was inconvenient and always would be +till water was brought into the kitchen sink; Julia seemed to have no +leaning towards housework and had an appetite that she could only +describe as a crime, inasmuch as the wherewithal to satisfy it had to be +purchased by others; the climate was damp because of the river, and +there was no proper market within eight miles; Kathleen was too delicate +to live in such a place, and the move from Charlestown was an utter and +absolute and entire mistake from A to Z. + +Then she packed her small trunk and Gilbert ran to the village on glad +and winged feet to get some one to take his depressing relative to the +noon train to Boston. As for Nancy, she stood in front of the parlor +fireplace, and when she heard the hoot of the engine in the distance she +removed the four mortuary vases from the mantelpiece and took them to +the attic, while Gilbert from the upper hall was chanting a favorite +old rhyme:-- + + "She called us names till she was tired, + She called us names till we perspired, + She called us names we never could spell, + She called us names we never may tell. + + "She called us names that made us laugh, + She called us names for a day and a half, + She called us names till her memory failed, + But finally out of our sight she sailed." + +"It must have been written about Cousin Ann in the first place," said +Nancy, joining Kathleen in the kitchen. "Well, she's gone at last! + + "Now every prospect pleases, + And only Julia's vile," + +she paraphrased from the old hymn, into Kathleen's private ear. + +"You oughtn't to say such things, Nancy," rebuked Kathleen. "Mother +wouldn't like it." + +"I know it," confessed Nancy remorsefully. "I have been wicked since the +moment I tried to get rid of You Dirty Boy. I don't know what's the +matter with me. My blood seems to be too red, and it courses wildly +through my veins, as the books say. I am going to turn over a new leaf, +now that Cousin Ann's gone and our only cross is Julia!" + +Oh! but it is rather dreadful to think how one person can spoil the +world! If only you could have seen the Yellow House after Cousin Ann +went! If only you could have heard the hotel landlady exclaim as she +drove past: "Well! Good riddance to bad rubbish!" The weather grew +warmer outside almost at once, and Bill Harmon's son planted the garden. +The fireplaces ceased to smoke and the kitchen stove drew. Colonel +Wheeler suggested a new chain pump instead of the old wooden one, after +which the water took a turn for the better, and before the month was +ended the Yellow House began to look like home, notwithstanding Julia. + +As for Beulah village, after its sleep of months under deep snow-drifts +it had waked into the adorable beauty of an early New England summer. It +had no snow-capped mountains in the distance; no amethyst foothills to +enchain the eye; no wonderful canyons and splendid rocky passes to make +the tourist marvel; no length of yellow sea sands nor plash of ocean +surf; no trade, no amusements, no summer visitors;--it was just a quiet, +little, sunny, verdant, leafy piece of heart's content, that's what +Beulah was, and Julia couldn't spoil it; indeed, the odds were, that it +would sweeten Julia! That was what Mother Carey hoped when her heart had +an hour's leisure to drift beyond Shiny Wall into Peacepool and consider +the needs of her five children. It was generally at twilight, when she +was getting Peter to sleep, that she was busiest making "old beasts +into new." + +"People fancy that I make things, my little dear," says Mother Carey to +Tom the Water Baby, "but I sit here and make them make themselves!" + +There was once a fairy, so the tale goes, who was so clever that she +found out how to make butterflies, and she was so proud that she flew +straight off to Peacepool to boast to Mother Carey of her skill. + +But Mother Carey laughed. + +"Know, silly child," she said, "that any one can make things if he will +take time and trouble enough, but it is not every one who can make +things make themselves." + +"Make things make themselves!" Mother Carey used to think in the +twilight. "I suppose that is what mothers are for!" + +Nancy was making herself busily these days, and the offending Julia was +directly responsible for such self-control and gains in general virtue +as poor impetuous Nancy achieved. Kathleen was growing stronger and +steadier and less self-conscious. Gilbert was doing better at school, +and his letters showed more consideration and thought for the family +than they had done heretofore. Even the Peter-bird was a little sweeter +and more self-helpful just now, thought Mother Carey fondly, as she +rocked him to sleep. He was worn out with following Natty Harmon at the +plough, and succumbed quickly to the music of her good-night song and +the comfort of her sheltering arms. Mother Carey had arms to carry, arms +to enfold, arms to comfort and caress. She also had a fine, handsome, +strong hand admirable for spanking, but she had so many invisible +methods of discipline at her command that she never needed a visible +spanker for Peter. "Spanking is all very well in its poor way," she used +to say, "but a woman who has to fall back on it very often is sadly +lacking in ingenuity." + +As she lifted Peter into his crib Nancy came softly in at the door with +a slip of paper in her hand. + +She drew her mother out to the window over the front door. "Listen," she +said. "Do you hear the frogs?" + +"I've been listening to them for the last half-hour," her mother said. +"Isn't everything sweet to-night, with the soft air and the elms all +feathered out, and the new moon!" + +"Was it ever so green before?" Nancy wondered, leaning over the +window-sill by her mother's side. "Were the trees ever so lace-y? Was +any river ever so clear, or any moon so yellow? I am so sorry for the +city people tonight! Sometimes I think it can't be so beautiful here as +it looks, mother. Sometimes I wonder if part of the beauty isn't inside +of us!" said Nancy. + +"Part of all beauty is in the eyes that look at, it," her mother +answered. + +"And I've been reading Mrs. Harmon's new reference Bible," Nancy +continued, "and here is what it says about Beulah." + +She held the paper to the waning light and read: "_Thou shalt no more be +termed Forsaken, neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate ... +but it shall be called Beulah, for the Lord delighteth in thee_. + +"I think father would be comforted if he could see us all in the Yellow +House at Beulah!" Nancy went on softly as the two leaned out of the +window together. "He was so loving, so careful of us, so afraid that +anything should trouble us, that for months I couldn't think of him, +even in heaven, as anything but worried. But now it seems just as if we +were over the hardest time and could learn to live here in Beulah; and +so he must be comforted if he can see us or think about us at +all;--don't you feel like that, mother?" + +Yes, her mother agreed gently, and her heart was grateful and full of +hope. She had lost the father of her children and the dear companion of +her life, and that loss could never be made good. Still her mind +acknowledged the riches she possessed in her children, so she confessed +herself neither desolate nor forsaken, but something in a humble human +way that the Lord could take delight in. + + + +XIII + +THE PINK OF PERFECTION + + +That was the only trouble with Allan Carey's little daughter Julia, aged +thirteen; she was, and always had been, the pink of perfection. As a +baby she had always been exemplary, eating heartily and sleeping +soundly. When she felt a pin in her flannel petticoat she deemed it +discourteous to cry, because she knew that her nurse had at least tried +to dress her properly. When awake, her mental machinery moved slowly and +without any jerks. As to her moral machinery, the angels must have set +it going at birth and planned it in such a way that it could neither +stop nor go wrong. It was well meant, of course, but probably the angels +who had the matter in charge were new, young, inexperienced angels, with +vague ideas of human nature and inexact knowledge of God's intentions; +because a child that has no capability of doing the wrong thing will +hardly be able to manage a right one; not one of the big sort, anyway. + +At four or five years old Julia was always spoken of as "such a good +little girl." Many a time had Nancy in early youth stamped her foot and +cried: "Don't talk about Julia! I will not hear about Julia!" for she +was always held up as a pattern of excellence. Truth to tell she bored +her own mother terribly; but that is not strange, for by a curious freak +of nature, Mrs. Allan Carey was as flighty and capricious and +irresponsible and gay and naughty as Julia was steady, limited, narrow, +conventional, and dull; but the flighty mother passed out of the Carey +family life, and Julia, from the age of five onward, fell into the +charge of a pious, unimaginative governess, instead of being turned out +to pasture with a lot of frolicsome young human creatures; so at +thirteen she had apparently settled--hard, solid, and firm--into a +mould. She had smooth fair hair, pale blue eyes, thin lips, and a +somewhat too plump shape for her years. She was always tidy and wore her +clothes well, laying enormous stress upon their material and style, this +trait in her character having been added under the fostering influence +of the wealthy and fashionable Gladys Ferguson. At thirteen, when Julia +joined the flock of Carey chickens, she had the air of belonging to +quite another order of beings. They had been through a discipline seldom +suffered by "only children." They had had to divide apples and toys, +take turns at reading books, and learn generally to trot in double +harness. If Nancy had a new dress at Christmas, Kathleen had a new hat +in the spring. Gilbert heard the cry of "Low bridge!" very often after +Kathleen appeared on the scene, and Kathleen's ears, too, grew well +accustomed to the same phrase after Peter was born. + +"Julia never did a naughty thing in her life, nor spoke a wrong word," +said her father once, proudly. + +"Never mind, she's only ten, and there's hope for her yet," Captain +Carey had replied cheerfully; though if he had known her a little later, +in her first Beulah days, he might not have been so sanguine. She seemed +to have no instinct of adapting herself to the family life, standing +just a little aloof and in an attitude of silent criticism. She was a +trig, smug prig, Nancy said, delighting in her accidental muster of +three short, hard, descriptive words. She hadn't a bit of humor, no fun, +no gayety, no generous enthusiasms that carried her too far for safety +or propriety. She brought with her to Beulah sheaves of school +certificates, and when she showed them to Gilbert with their hundred per +cent deportment and ninety-eight and seven-eighths per cent scholarship +every month for years, he went out behind the barn and kicked its +foundations savagely for several minutes. She was a sort of continual +Sunday child, with an air of church and cold dinner and sermon-reading +and hymn-singing and early bed. Nobody could fear, as for some +impulsive, reckless little creature, that she would come to a bad end. +Nancy said no one could imagine her as coming to anything, not even +an end! + +"You never let mother hear you say these things, Nancy," Kathleen +remarked once, "but really and truly it's just as bad to say them at +all, when you know she wouldn't approve." + +"My present object is to be as good as gold in mother's eyes, but there +I stop!" retorted Nancy cheerfully. "Pretty soon I shall get virtuous +enough to go a step further and endeavor to please the angels,--not +Julia's cast-iron angels, but the other angels, who understand and are +patient, because they remember our frames and know that being dust we +are likely to be dusty once in a while. Julia wasn't made of dust. She +was made of--let me see--of skim milk and baked custard (the watery +kind) and rice flour and gelatine, with a very little piece of overripe +banana,--not enough to flavor, just enough to sicken. Stir this up with +weak barley water without putting in a trace of salt, sugar, spice, or +pepper, set it in a cool oven, take it out before it is done, and you +will get Julia." + +Nancy was triumphant over this recipe for making Julias, only regretting +that she could never show it to her mother, who, if critical, was always +most appreciative. She did send it in a letter to the Admiral, off in +China, and he, being "none too good for human nature's daily food," +enjoyed it hugely and never scolded her at all. + +Julia's only conversation at this time was on matters concerning Gladys +Ferguson and the Ferguson family. When you are washing dishes in the +sink of the Yellow House in Beulah it is very irritating to hear of +Gladys Ferguson's mother-of-pearl opera glasses, her French maid, her +breakfast on a tray in bed, her diamond ring, her photograph in the +Sunday "Times," her travels abroad, her proficiency in French +and German. + +"Don't trot Gladys into the kitchen, for goodness' sake, Julia!" +grumbled Nancy on a warm day. "I don't want her diamond ring in my +dishwater. Wait till Sunday, when we go to the hotel for dinner in our +best clothes, if you must talk about her. You don't wipe the tumblers +dry, nor put them in the proper place, when your mind is full +of Gladys!" + +"All right!" said Julia gently. "Only I hope I shall always be able to +wipe dishes and keep my mind on better things at the same time. That's +what Miss Tewksbury told me when she knew I had got to give up my home +luxuries for a long time. 'Don't let poverty drag you down, Julia,' she +said: 'keep your high thoughts and don't let them get soiled with the +grime of daily living.'" + +It is only just to say that Nancy was not absolutely destitute of +self-control and politeness, because at this moment she had a really +vicious desire to wash Julia's supercilious face and neat nose with the +dishcloth, fresh from the frying pan. She knew that she could not grasp +those irritating "high thoughts" and apply the grime of daily living to +them concretely and actually, but Julia's face was within her reach, and +Nancy's fingers tingled with desire. No trace of this savage impulse +appeared in her behavior, however; she rinsed the dishpan, turned it +upside down in the sink, and gave the wiping towels to Julia, asking her +to wring them out in hot water and hang them on the barberry bushes, +according to Mrs. Carey's instructions. + +"It doesn't seem as if I could!" whimpered Julia. "I have always been so +sensitive, and dish towels are so disgusting! They do _smell_, Nancy!" + +"They do," said Nancy sternly, "but they will smell worse if they are +not washed! I give you the dish-wiping and take the washing, just to +save your hands, but you must turn and turn about with Kathleen and me +with some of the ugly, hateful things. If you were company of course we +couldn't let you, but you are a member of the family. Our principal +concern must be to keep mother's 'high thoughts' from grime; ours must +just take their chance!" + +Oh! how Julia disliked Nancy at this epoch in their common history; and +how cordially and vigorously the dislike was returned! Many an unhappy +moment did Mother Carey have over the feud, mostly deep and silent, that +went on between these two; and Gilbert's attitude was not much more +hopeful. He had found a timetable or syllabus for the day's doings, over +Julia's washstand. It had been framed under Miss Tewksbury's guidance, +who knew Julia's unpunctuality and lack of system, and read as +follows:-- + + _Syllabus_ + + Rise at 6.45. + Bathe and dress. + Devotional Exercises 7.15. + Breakfast 7.45. + Household tasks till 9. + Exercise out of doors 9 to 10. + Study 10 to 12. + Preparations for dinner 12 to 1. + Recreation 2 to 4. + Study 4 to 5. + Preparation for supper 5 to 6. + Wholesome reading, walking, or conversation 7 to 8. + Devotional exercises 9. + Bed 9.30. + +There was nothing wrong about this; indeed, it was excellently +conceived; still it appeared to Gilbert as excessively funny, and with +Nancy's help he wrote another syllabus and tacked it over +Julia's bureau. + + _Time Card_ + + On waking I can + Pray for Gilly and Nan; + Eat breakfast at seven. + Or ten or eleven, + Nor think when it's noon + That luncheon's too soon. + From twelve until one + I can munch on a bun. + At one or at two + My dinner'll be due. + At three, say, or four, + I'll eat a bit more. + When the clock's striking five + Some mild exercise, + Very brief, would be wise, + Lest I lack appetite + For my supper at night. + Don't go to bed late, + Eat a light lunch at eight, + Nor forget to say prayers + For my cousins downstairs. + Then with conscience like mine + I'll be sleeping at nine. + +Mrs. Carey had a sense of humor, and when the weeping Julia brought the +two documents to her for consideration she had great difficulty in +adjusting the matter gravely and with due sympathy for her niece. + +"The F-f-f-fergusons never mentioned my appetite," Julia wailed. "They +were always trying to g-g-get me to eat!" + +"Gilbert and Nancy are a little too fond of fun, and a little too prone +to chaffing," said Mrs. Carey. "They forget that you are not used to it, +but I will try to make them more considerate. And don't forget, my dear, +that in a large family like ours we must learn to 'live and let live.'" + + + +XIV + +WAYS AND MEANS + + +It was late June, and Gilbert had returned from school, so the work of +making the Yellow House attractive and convenient was to move forward at +once. Up to now, the unpacking and distribution of the furniture, with +the daily housework and cooking, had been all that Mrs. Carey and the +girls could manage. + +A village Jack-of-all-trades, Mr. Ossian Popham, generally and +familiarly called "Osh" Popham, had been called in to whitewash existing +closets and put hooks in them; also, with Bill Harmon's consent, to make +new ones here and there in handy corners. Dozens of shelves in odd +spaces helped much in the tidy stowing away of household articles, +bed-clothing, and stores. In the midst of this delightful and cheery +setting-to-rights a letter arrived from Cousin Ann. The family was all +sitting together in Mrs. Carey's room, the announced intention being to +hold an important meeting of the Ways and Means Committee, the Careys +being strong on ways and uniformly short on means. + +The arrival of the letters by the hand of Bill Harmon's boy occurred +before the meeting was called to order. + +"May I read Cousin Ann's aloud?" asked Nancy, who had her private +reasons for making the offer. + +"Certainly," said Mrs. Carey unsuspectingly, as she took up the +inevitable stocking. "I almost wish you had all been storks instead of +chickens; then you would always have held up one foot, and perhaps that +stocking, at least, wouldn't have had holes in it!" + +"Poor Muddy! I'm learning to darn," cried Kathleen, kissing her. + + LONGHAMPTON, NEW JERSEY, _June 27th_. + + MY DEAR MARGARET [so Nancy read],--The climate of this seaside + place suits me so badly that I have concluded to spend the rest + of the summer with you, lightening those household tasks which + will fall so heavily on your shoulders. + +[Groans from the whole family greeted this opening passage, and Gilbert +cast himself, face down, on his mother's lounge.] + + It is always foggy here when it does not rain, and the cooking + is very bad. The manager of the hotel is uncivil and the office + clerks very rude, so that Beulah, unfortunate place of residence + as I consider it, will be much preferable. + + I hope you are getting on well with the work on the house, + although I regard your treating it as if it were your own, as + the height of extravagance. You will never get back a penny you + spend on it, and probably when you get it in good order Mr. + Hamilton will come back from Europe and live in it himself, or + take it away from you and sell it to some one else. + + Gilbert will be home by now, but I should not allow him to touch + the woodwork, as he is too careless and unreliable. + +["She'll never forget that the bed came down with her!" exclaimed +Gilbert, his voice muffled by the sofa cushions.] + + Remember me to Julia. I hope she enjoys her food better than + when I was with you. Children must eat if they would grow. + +[Mother Carey pricked up her ears at this point, and Gilbert raised +himself on one elbow, but Nancy went on gravely.] + + Tell Kathleen to keep out of the sun, or wear a hat, as her + complexion is not at all what it used to be. Without color and + with freckles she will be an unusually plain child. + +[Kathleen flushed angrily and laid down her work.] + + Give my love to darling Nancy. What a treasure you have in your + eldest, Margaret! I hope you are properly grateful for her. Such + talent, such beauty, such grace, such discretion-- + +But here the family rose _en masse_ and descended on the reader of the +spurious letter just as she had turned the first page. In the amiable +scuffle that ensued, a blue slip fell from Cousin Ann's envelope and +Gilbert handed it to his mother with the letter. + +Mrs. Carey, wiping the tears of merriment that came to her eyes in spite +of her, so exactly had Nancy caught Cousin Ann's epistolary style, read +the real communication, which ran as follows:-- + + DEAR MARGARET,--I have had you much in mind since I left you, + always with great anxiety lest your strength should fail under + the unexpected strain you put upon it. I had intended to give + each of you a check for thirty-five dollars at Christmas to + spend as you liked, but I must say I have not entire confidence + in your judgment. You will be likelier far to decorate the walls + of the house than to bring water into the kitchen sink. I + therefore enclose you three hundred dollars and beg that you + will have the well piped _at once_, and if there is any way to + carry the water to the bedroom floor, do it, and let me send the + extra amount involved. You will naturally have the well cleaned + out anyway, but I should prefer never to know what you found in + it. My only other large gift to you in the past was one of + ornaments, sent, you remember, at the time of your wedding! + +["We remember!" groaned the children in chorus.] + + I do not regret this, though my view of life, of its sorrows and + perplexities, has changed somewhat, and I am more practical than + I used to be. The general opinion is that in giving for a + present an object of permanent beauty, your friends think of you + whenever they look upon it. + +["That's so!" remarked Gilbert to Nancy.] + + This is true, no doubt, but there are other ways of making + yourself remembered, and I am willing that you should think + kindly of Cousin Ann whenever you use the new pump. + + The second improvement I wish made with the money is the + instalment of a large furnace-like stove in the cellar, which + will send up a little heat, at least, into the hall and lower + rooms in winter. You will probably have to get the owner's + consent, and I should certainly ask for a five years' lease + before expending any considerable amount of money on the + premises. + + If there is any money left, I should suggest new sills to the + back doors and those in the shed. I noticed that the present + ones are very rotten, and I dare say by this time you have + processions of red and black ants coming into your house. It + seemed to me that I never saw so much insect life as in Beulah. + Moths, caterpillars, brown-tails, slugs, spiders, June bugs, + horseflies, and mosquitoes were among the pests I specially + noted. The Mr. Popham who drove me to the station said that + snakes also abounded in the tall grass, but I should not lay any + stress on his remarks, as I never saw such manners in my life in + any Christian civilized community. He asked me my age, and when + I naturally made no reply, he inquired after a few minutes' + silence whether I was unmarried from choice or necessity. When I + refused to carry on any conversation with him he sang jovial + songs so audibly that persons going along the street smiled and + waved their hands to him. I tell you this because you appear to + have false ideas of the people in Beulah, most of whom seemed to + me either eccentric or absolutely insane. + + Hoping that you can endure your life there when the water smells + better and you do not have to carry it from the well, I am + + Yours affectionately, + + ANN CHADWICH. + + +"Children!" said Mrs. Carey, folding the letter and slipping the check +into the envelope for safety, "your Cousin Ann is really a very +good woman." + +"I wish her bed hadn't come down with her," said Gilbert. "We could +never have afforded to get that water into the house, or had the little +furnace, and I suppose, though no one of us ever thought of it, that you +would have had a hard time doing the work in the winter in a cold house, +and it would have been dreadful going to the pump." + +"Dreadful for you too, Gilly," replied Kathleen pointedly. + +"I shall be at school, where I can't help," said Gilbert. + +Mrs. Carey made no remark, as she intended the fact that there was no +money for Gilbert's tuition at Eastover to sink gradually into his mind, +so that he might make the painful discovery himself. His fees had +fortunately been paid in advance up to the end of the summer term, so +the strain on their resources had not been felt up to now. + +Nancy had disappeared from the room and now stood in the doorway. + +"I wish to remark that, having said a good many disagreeable things +about Cousin Ann, and regretting them very much, I have placed the four +black and white marble ornaments on my bedroom mantelpiece, there to be +a perpetual reminder of my sins. You Dirty Boy is in a hundred pieces in +the barn chamber, but if Cousin Ann ever comes to visit us again, I'll +be the one to confess that Gilly and I were the cause of the accident." + +"Now take your pencil, Nancy, and see where we are in point of income, +at the present moment," her mother suggested, with an approving smile. +"Put down the pension of thirty dollars a month." + +"Down.--Three hundred and sixty dollars." + +"Now the hundred dollars over and above the rent of the Charlestown +house." + +"Down; but it lasts only four years." + +"We may all be dead by that time." (This cheerfully from Gilbert.) + +"Then the interest on our insurance money. Four per cent on five +thousand dollars is two hundred; I have multiplied it twenty times." + +"Down.--Two hundred." + +"Of course if anything serious happens, or any great need comes, we have +the five thousand to draw upon," interpolated Gilbert. + +"I will draw upon that to save one of us in illness or to bury one of +us," said Mrs. Carey with determination, "but I will never live out of +it myself, nor permit you to. We are five,--six, while Julia is with +us," she added hastily,--"and six persons will surely have rainy days +coming to them. What if I should die and leave you?" + +"Don't, mother!" they cried in chorus, so passionately that Mrs. Carey +changed the subject quickly. "How much a year does it make, Nancy?" + +"Three hundred and sixty plus one hundred plus two hundred equals six +hundred and sixty," read Nancy. "And I call it a splendid big lump +of money!" + +"Oh, my dear," sighed her mother with a shake of the head, "if you knew +the difficulty your father and I have had to take care of ourselves and +of you on five and six times that sum! We may have been a little +extravagant sometimes following him about,--he was always so anxious to +have us with him,--but that has been our only luxury." + +"We saved enough out of exchanging the grand piano to pay all the +expenses down here, and all our railway fares, and everything so far, in +the way of boards and nails and Osh Popham's labor," recalled Gilbert. + +"Yes, and we are still eating the grand piano at the end of two months, +but it's about gone, isn't it, Muddy?" Nancy asked. + +"About gone, but it has been a great help, and our dear little +old-fashioned square is just as much of a comfort.--Of course there's +the tapestry and the Van Twiller landscape Uncle gave me; they may +yet be sold." + +"Somebody'll buy the tapestry, but the Van Twiller'll go hard," and +Gilbert winked at Nancy. + +"A picture that looks just the same upside down as the right way about +won't find many buyers," was Nancy's idea. + +"Still it is a Van Twiller, and has a certain authentic value for all +time!" + +"The landscapes Van Twiller painted in the dark, or when he had his +blinders on, can't be worth very much," insisted Gilbert. "You remember +the Admiral thought it was partridges nesting in the underbrush at +twilight, and then we found Joanna had cleaned the dining room and hung +the thing upside down. When it was hung the other end up neither father +nor the Admiral could tell what it was; they'd lost the partridges and +couldn't find anything else!" + +"We shall get something for it because it is a Van Twiller," said Mrs. +Carey hopefully; "and the tapestry is lovely.--Now we have been doing +all our own work to save money enough to make the house beautiful; yet, +as Cousin Ann says, it does not belong to us and may be taken away at +any moment after the year is up. We have never even seen our landlord, +though Mr. Harmon has written to him. Are we foolish? What do you +think, Julia?" + + + +XV + +BELONGING TO BEULAH + + +The Person without a Fault had been quietly working at her embroidery, +raising her head now and then to look at some extraordinary Carey, when +he or she made some unusually silly or fantastic remark. + +"I'm not so old as Gilbert and Nancy, and I'm only a niece," she said +modestly, "so I ought not to have an opinion. But I should get a +maid-of-all-work at once, so that we shouldn't all be drudges as we are +now; then I should not spend a single cent on the house, but just live +here in hiding, as it were, till better times come and till we are old +enough to go into society. You could scrimp and save for Nancy's coming +out, and then for Kathleen's. Father would certainly be well long before +then, and Kathleen and I could debut together!" + +"Who wants to 'debut' together or any other way," sniffed Nancy +scornfully. "I'm coming out right here in Beulah; indeed I'm not sure +but I'm out already! Mr. Bill Harmon has asked me to come to the church +sociable and Mr. Popham has invited me to the Red Men's picnic at +Greentown. Beulah's good for something better than a place to hide in! +We'll have to save every penny at first, of course, but in three or four +years Gilly and I ought to be earning something." + +"The trouble is, I _can't_ earn anything in college," objected Gilbert, +"though I'd like to." + +"That will be the only way a college course can come to you now, +Gilbert," his mother said quietly. "You know nothing of the expenses +involved. They would have taxed our resources to the utmost if father +had lived, and we had had our more than five thousand a year! You and I +together must think out your problem this summer." + +Gilbert looked blank and walked to the window with his hands in his +pockets. + +"I should lose all my friends, and it's hard for a fellow to make his +way in the world if he has nothing to recommend him but his graduation +from some God-forsaken little hole like Beulah Academy." + +Nancy looked as if she could scalp her brother when he alluded to her +beloved village in these terms, but her mother's warning look stopped +any comment. + +Julia took up arms for her cousin. "We ought to go without everything +for the sake of sending Gilbert to college," she said. "Gladys Ferguson +doesn't know a single boy who isn't going to Harvard or Yale." + +"If a boy of good family and good breeding cannot make friends by his +own personality and his own qualities of mind and character, I should +think he would better go without them," said Gilbert's mother casually. + +"Don't you believe in a college education, mother?" inquired Gilbert in +an astonished tone. + +"Certainly! Why else should we have made sacrifices to send you? To +begin with, it is much simpler and easier to be educated in college. You +have a thousand helps and encouragements that other fellows have to get +as they may. The paths are all made straight for the students. A stupid +boy, or one with small industry or little originality, must have +_something_ drummed into him in four years, with all the splendid +teaching energy that the colleges employ. It requires a very high grade +of mental and moral power to do without such helps, and it may be that +you are not strong enough to succeed without them;--I do not know your +possibilities yet, Gilbert, and neither do you know them yourself!" + +Gilbert looked rather nonplussed. "Pretty stiff, I call it!" he +grumbled, "to say that if you've got brains enough you can do +without college." + +"It is true, nevertheless. If you have brains enough, and will enough, +and heart enough, you can stay here in Beulah and make the universe +search you out, and drag you into the open, where men have need of you!" +(Mrs. Carey's eyes shone and her cheeks glowed.) "What we all want as a +family is to keep well and strong and good, in body and mind and soul; +to conquer our weaknesses, to train our gifts, to harness our powers to +some wished-for end, and then _pull_, with all our might. Can't my girls +be fine women, fit for New York or Washington, London or Paris, because +their young days were passed in Beulah? Can't my boys be anything that +their brains and courage fit them for, whether they make their own +associations or have them made for them? Father would never have flung +the burden on your shoulders, Gilbert, but he is no longer here. You +can't have the help of Yale or Harvard or Bowdoin to make a man of you, +my son,--you will have to fight your own battles and win your +own spurs." + +"Oh! mother, but you're splendid!" cried Nancy, the quick tears in her +eyes. "Brace up, old Gilly, and show what the Careys can do without +'advantages.' Brace up, Kitty and Julia! We three will make Beulah +Academy ring next year!" + +"And I don't want you to look upon Beulah as a place of hiding while +adversity lasts," said Mother Carey. "We must make it home; as beautiful +and complete as we can afford. One real home always makes others, I am +sure of that! We will ask Mr. Harmon to write Mr. Hamilton and see if he +will promise to leave us undisturbed. We cannot be happy, or prosperous, +or useful, or successful, unless we can contrive to make the Yellow +House a home. The river is our river; the village is our village; the +people are our neighbors; Beulah belongs to us and we belong to Beulah, +don't we, Peter?" + +Mother Carey always turned to Peter with some nonsensical appeal when +her heart was full and her voice a trifle unsteady. You could bury your +head in Peter's little white sailor jacket just under his chin, at which +he would dimple and gurgle and chuckle and wriggle, and when you +withdrew your flushed face and presented it to the public gaze all the +tears would have been wiped off on Peter. + +So on this occasion did Mrs. Carey repeat, as she set Peter down, "Don't +we belong to Beulah, dear?" + +"Yes, we does," he lisped, "and I'm going to work myself, pretty soon +bimebye just after a while, when I'm a little more grown up, and then +I'll buy the Yellow House quick." + +"So you shall, precious!" cried Kathleen. + +"I was measured on Muddy this morning, wasn't I, Muddy, and I was half +way to her belt; and in Charlestown I was only a little farder up than +her knees. All the time I'm growing up she's ungrowing down! She's +smallering and I'm biggering." + +"Are you afraid your mother'll be too small, sweet Pete?" asked Mrs. +Carey. + +"No!" this very stoutly. "Danny Harmon's mother's more'n up to the +mantelpiece and I'd hate to have my mother so far away!" said Peter as +he embraced Mrs. Carey's knees. + +Julia had said little during this long conversation, though her mind was +fairly bristling with objections and negatives and different points of +view, but she was always more or less awed by her Aunt Margaret, and +never dared defy her opinion. She had a real admiration for her aunt's +beauty and dignity and radiant presence, though it is to be feared she +cared less for the qualities of character that made her personality so +luminous with charm for everybody. She saw people look at her, listen to +her, follow her with their eyes, comment on her appearance, her +elegance, and her distinction, and all this impressed her deeply. As to +Cousin Ann's present her most prominent feeling was that it would have +been much better if that lady had followed her original plan of sending +individual thirty-five-dollar checks. In that event she, Julia, was +quite certain that hers never would have gone into a water-pipe or a +door-sill. + +"Oh, Kathleen!" sighed Nancy as the two went into the kitchen together. +"Isn't mother the most interesting 'scolder' you ever listened to? I +love to hear her do it, especially when somebody else is getting it. +When it's I, I grow smaller and smaller, curling myself up like a little +worm. Then when she has finished I squirm to the door and wriggle out. +Other mothers say: 'If you don't, I shall tell your father!' 'Do as I +tell you, and ask no questions.' 'I never heard of such behavior in my +life!' 'Haven't you any sense of propriety?' 'If this happens again I +shall have to do something desperate.' 'Leave the room at once,' and so +on; but mother sets you to thinking." + +"Mother doesn't really scold," Kathleen objected. + +"No, but she shows you how wrong you are, just the same. Did you notice +how Julia _withered_ when mother said we were not to look upon Beulah as +a place of hiding?" + +"She didn't stay withered long," Kathleen remarked. + +"And she said just the right thing to dear old Gilly, for Fred Bascom is +filling his head with foolish notions. He needs father to set +him right." + +"We all need father," sighed Kitty tearfully, "but somehow mother grows +a little more splendid every day. I believe she's trying to fill +father's place and be herself too!" + + + +XVI + +THE POST BAG + + +Letter from Mr. William Harmon, storekeeper at Beulah Corner, to Hon. +Lemuel Hamilton, American Consul at Breslau, Germany. + + Beulah, _June 27th._ + + Dear Lem: The folks up to your house want to lay out money on it + and don't dass for fear you'll turn em out and pocket their + improvements. If you haint got any better use for the propety + I advise you to hold on to this bunch of tennants as they are + O.K. wash goods, all wool, and a yard wide. I woodent like + Mrs. Harmon _to know how I feel about the lady_, who is + hansome as a picture and the children are a first class crop and + no mistake. They will not lay out much at first as they are + short of cash but if ever good luck comes along they will fit + up the house like a pallis and your granchildren will reep the + proffit. I'll look out for your interest and see they don't do + nothing outlandish. They'd have hard work to beat that + fool-job your boys did on the old barn, fixin it up so't + nobody could keep critters in it, so no more from your old + school frend + + BILL HARMON. + + P.S. We've been having a spell of turrible hot wether in Beulah. + How is it with you? I never framed it up jest what kind of a + job an American Counsul's was; but I guess he aint never het + up with overwork! There was a piece in a Portland paper about + a Counsul somewhere being fired because he set in his + shirt-sleeves durin office hours. I says to Col. Wheeler if + Uncle Sam could keep em all in their shirtsleeves, hustlin for + dear life, it wood be all the better for him and us! + + BILL. + +Letter from Miss Nancy Carey to the Hon. Lemuel Hamilton. + + BEULAH, _June 27th_. + + DEAR MR. HAMILTON,--I am Nancy, the oldest of the Carey + children, who live in your house. When father was alive, he + took us on a driving trip, and we stopped and had luncheon + under your big maple and fell in love with your empty house. + Father (he was a Captain in the Navy and there was never + anybody like him in the world!)--Father leaned over the gate + and said if he was only rich he would drive the horse into the + barn and buy the place that very day; and mother said it would + be a beautiful spot to bring up a family. We children had + wriggled under the fence, and were climbing the apple trees by + that time, and we wanted to be brought up there that very + minute. We all of us look back to that day as the happiest one + that we can remember. Mother laughs when I talk of looking + back, because I am not sixteen yet, but I think, although we did + not know it, God knew that father was going to die and we were + going to live in that very spot afterwards. Father asked us + what we could do for the place that had been so hospitable to + us, and I remembered a box of plants in the carryall, that we + had bought at a wayside nursery, for the flower beds in + Charlestown. "Plant something!" I said, and father thought it + was a good idea and took a little crimson rambler rose bush + from the box. Each of us helped make the place for it by taking + a turn with the luncheon knives and spoons; then I planted the + rose and father took off his hat and said, "Three cheers for + the Yellow House!" and mother added, "God bless it, and the + children who come to live in it!"--There is surely something + strange in that, don't you think so? Then when father died + last year we had to find a cheap and quiet place to live, and + I remembered the Yellow House in Beulah and told mother my + idea. She does not say "Bosh!" like some mothers, but if our + ideas sound like anything she tries them; so she sent Gilbert + to see if the house was still vacant, and when we found it + was, we took it. The rent is sixty dollars a year, as I + suppose Bill Harmon told you when he sent you mother's check + for fifteen dollars for the first quarter. We think it is very + reasonable, and do not wonder you don't like to spend anything + on repairs or improvements for us, as you have to pay taxes + and insurance. We hope you will have a good deal over for your + own use out of our rent, as we shouldn't like to feel under + obligation. If we had a million we'd spend it all on the + Yellow House, because we are fond of it in the way you are + fond of a person; it's not only that we want to paint it and + paper it, but we would like to pat it and squeeze it. If you + can't live in it yourself, even in the summer, perhaps you + will be glad to know we love it so much and want to take good + care of it always. What troubles us is the fear that you will + take it away or sell it to somebody before Gilbert and I are + grown up and have earned money enough to buy it. It was Cousin + Ann that put the idea into our heads, but everybody says it is + quite likely and sensible. Cousin Ann has made us a splendid + present of enough money to bring the water from the well into + the kitchen sink and to put a large stove like a furnace into + the cellar. We would cut two registers behind the doors in the + dining-room and sitting-room floors, and two little round + holes in the ceilings to let the heat up into two bedrooms, if + you are willing to let us do it. [Mother says that Cousin Ann + is a good and generous person. It is true, and it makes us + very unhappy that we cannot really love her on account of her + being so fault-finding; but you, being an American Consul and + travelling all over the world, must have seen somebody like + her.] + + Mr. Harmon is writing to you, but I thought he wouldn't know so + much about us as I do. We have father's pension; that is three + hundred and sixty dollars a year; and one hundred dollars a + year from the Charlestown house, but that only lasts for four + years; and two hundred dollars a year from the interest on + father's insurance. That makes six hundred and sixty dollars, + which is a great deal if you haven't been used to three + thousand, but does not seem to be enough for a family of six. + There is the insurance money itself, too, but mother says + nothing but a very dreadful need must make us touch that. You + see there are four of us children, which with mother makes + five, and now there is Julia, which makes six. She is Uncle + Allan's only child. Uncle Allan has nervous prostration and + all of mother's money. We are not poor at all, just now, on + account of having exchanged the grand piano for an + old-fashioned square and eating up the extra money. It is great + fun, and whenever we have anything very good for supper + Kathleen says, "Here goes a piano leg!" and Gilbert says, + "Let's have an octave of white notes for Sunday supper, + mother!" I send you a little photograph of the family taken + together on your side piazza (we call it our piazza, and I hope + you don't mind). I am the tallest girl, with the curly hair. + Julia is sitting down in front, hemming. She said we should + look so idle if somebody didn't do something, but she never + really hems; and Kathleen is leaning over mother's shoulder. + We all wanted to lean over mother's shoulder, but Kitty got + there first. The big boy is Gilbert. He can't go to college + now, as father intended, and he is very sad and depressed; but + mother says he has a splendid chance to show what father's son + can do without any help but his own industry and pluck. Please + look carefully at the lady sitting in the chair, for it is our + mother. It is only a snap shot, but you can see how beautiful + she is. Her hair is very long, and the wave in it is natural. + The little boy is Peter. He is the loveliest and the dearest + of all of us. The second picture is of me tying up the crimson + rambler. I thought you would like to see what a wonderful rose + it is. I was standing in a chair, training the long branches + and tacking them against the house, when a gentleman drove by + with a camera in his wagon. He stopped and took the picture and + sent us one, explaining that every one admired it. I happened + to be wearing my yellow muslin, and I am sending you the one + the gentleman colored, because it is the beautiful crimson of + the rose against the yellow house that makes people admire it + so. If you come to America please don't forget Beulah, because + if you once saw mother you could never bear to disturb her, + seeing how brave she is, living without father. Admiral + Southwick, who is in China, calls us Mother Carey's chickens. + They are stormy petrels, and are supposed to go out over the + seas and show good birds the way home. We haven't done + anything splendid yet, but we mean to when the chance comes. I + haven't told anybody that I am writing this, but I wanted you + to know everything about us, as you are our landlord. We could + be so happy if Cousin Ann wouldn't always say we are spending + money on another person's house and such a silly performance + never came to any good. + + I enclose you a little picture cut from the wall paper we want + to put on the front hall, hoping you will like it. The old + paper is hanging in shreds and some of the plaster is loose, + but Mr. Popham will make it all right. Mother says she feels + as if he had pasted laughter and good nature on all the walls + as he papered them. When you open the front door (and we hope + you will, sometime, and walk right in!) how lovely it will be + to look into yellow hayfields! And isn't the boatful of people + coming to the haymaking, nice, with the bright shirts of the + men and the women's scarlet aprons? Don't you love the white + horse in the haycart, and the jolly party picnicking under the + tree? Mother says just think of buying so much joy and color + for twenty cents a double roll; and we children think we shall + never get tired of sitting on the stairs in cold weather and + making believe it is haying time. Gilbert says we are putting + another grand piano leg on the walls, but we are not, for we are + doing all our own cooking and dishwashing and saving the money + that a cook would cost, to do lovely things for the Yellow + House. Thank you, dearest Mr. Hamilton, for letting us live in + it. We are very proud of the circular steps and very proud of + your being an American consul. + + Yours affectionately, + + NANCY CAREY. + + P.S. It is June, and Beulah is so beautiful you feel like eating + it with sugar and cream! We do hope that you and your children + are living in as sweet a place, so that you will not miss this + one so much. We know you have five, older than we are, but if + there are any the right size for me to send my love to, please + do it. Mother would wish to be remembered to Mrs. Hamilton, + but she will never know I am writing to you. It is my first + business letter. + + N.C. + + + +XVII + +JACK OF ALL TRADES + + +Mr. Ossian (otherwise "Osh") Popham was covering the hall of the Yellow +House with the hayfield paper. Bill Harmon's father had left +considerable stock of one sort and another in the great unfinished attic +over the store, and though much of it was worthless, and all of it was +out of date, it seemed probable that it would eventually be sold to the +Careys, who had the most unlimited ingenuity in making bricks without +straw, when it came to house decoration. They had always moved from post +to pillar and Dan to Beersheba, and had always, inside of a week, had +the prettiest and most delightful habitation in the naval colony where +they found themselves. Beulah itself, as well as all the surrounding +country, had looked upon the golden hayfield paper and scorned it as +ugly and countrified; never suspecting that, in its day, it had been +made in France and cost a dollar and a half a roll. It had been imported +for a governor's house, and only half of it used, so for thirty years +the other half had waited for the Careys. There always are Careys and +their like, and plenty of them, in every generation, so old things, if +they are good, need never be discouraged. + +Mr. Popham never worked at his bricklaying or carpentering or cabinet +making or papering by the hour, but "by the job"; and a kind Providence, +intent on the welfare of the community, must have guided him in this +choice of business methods, for he talked so much more than he worked, +that unless householders were well-to-do, the rights of employer and +employee could never have been adjusted. If they were rich no one of +them would have stopped Ossian's conversation for a second. In the first +place it was even better than his work, which was always good, and in +the second place he would never consent to go to any one, unless he +could talk as much as he liked. The Careys loved him, all but Julia, who +pronounced him "common" and said Miss Tewksbury told her never to listen +to anyone who said "I done it" or "I seen it." To this Nancy replied +(her mother being in the garden, and she herself not yet started on a +line of conduct arranged to please the angels) that Miss Tewksbury and +Julia ought to have a little corner of heaven finished off for +themselves; and Julia made a rude, distinct, hideous "face" at Nancy. I +have always dated the beginning of Julia's final transformation from +this critical moment, when the old Adam in her began to work. It was +good for Nancy too, who would have trodden on Julia so long as she was +an irritating but patient, well-behaved worm; but who would have to use +a little care if the worm showed signs of turning. + +"Your tongue is like a bread knife, Nancy Carey!" Julia exclaimed +passionately, after twisting her nose and mouth into terrifying and +dreadful shapes. "If it wasn't that Miss Tewksbury told me ladies never +were telltales, I could soon make trouble between you and your +blessed mother." + +"No, you couldn't," said Nancy curtly, "for I'd reform sooner than let +you do that!--Perhaps I did say too much, Julia, only I can't bear to +have you make game of Mr. Popham when he's so funny and nice. Think of +his living with nagging Mrs. Popham and his stupid daughter and son in +that tiny house, and being happy as a king." + +"If there wasn't something wrong with him he wouldn't _be_ happy there," +insisted Julia. + +Mr. Popham himself accounted for his contentment without insulting his +intelligence. "The way I look at it," he said, "this world's all the +world we'll git till we git to the next one; an' we might's well smile +on it, 's frown! You git your piece o' life an' you make what you can of +it;--that's the idee! Now the other day I got some nice soft wood that +was prime for whittlin'; jest the right color an' grain an' all, an' I +started in to make a little statue o' the Duke o' Wellington. Well, when +I got to shapin' him out, I found my piece o' wood wouldn't be long +enough to give him his height; so I says, 'Well, I don't care, I'll cut +the Duke right down and make Napoleon Bonaparte.' I'd 'a' been all right +if I'd cal'lated better, but I cut my block off too short, and I +couldn't make Napoleon nohow; so I says, 'Well, Isaac Watts was an awful +short man, so I guess I'll make him!' But this time my wood split right +in two. Some men would 'a' been discouraged, but I wasn't, not a mite; I +jest said, 'I never did fancy Ike Watts, an' there's one thing this +blamed chip _will_ make, an' that's a button for the barn door!'" + +Osh not only whittled and papered and painted, but did anything +whatsoever that needed to be done on the premises. If the pump refused +to draw water, or the sink drain was stopped, or the gutters needed +cleaning, or the grass had to be mowed, he was the man ordained by +Providence and his own versatility to do the work. While he was papering +the front hall the entire Carey family lived on the stairs between +meals, fearful lest they should lose any incident, any anecdote, any +story, any reminiscence that might fall from his lips. Mrs. Carey took +her mending basket and sat in the doorway, within ear shot, while Peter +had all the scraps of paper and a small pasting board on the steps, +where he conducted his private enterprises. + +Osh would cut his length of paper, lay it flat on the board, and apply +the wide brush up and down neatly while he began his story. Sometimes if +the tale were long and interesting the paste would dry, but in that case +he went over the surface again. At the precise moment of hanging, the +flow of his eloquence stopped abruptly and his hearers had to wait until +the piece was finished before they learned what finally became of Lyddy +Brown after she drove her husband ou' doors, or of Bill Harmon's bull +terrier, who set an entire community quarreling among themselves. His +racy accounts of Mrs. Popham's pessimism, which had grown prodigiously +from living in the house with his optimism; his anecdotes of Lallie Joy +Popham, who was given to moods, having inherited portions of her +father's incurable hopefulness, and fragments of her mother's +ineradicable gloom,--these were of a character that made the finishing +of the hall a matter of profound unimportance. + +"I ain't one to hurry," he would say genially; "that's the reason I +won't work by the hour or by the day. We've got one 'hurrier' in the +family, and that's enough for Lallie Joy 'n' me! Mis' Popham does +everything right on the dot, an' Lallie Joy 'n' me git turrible sick o' +seein' that dot, 'n' hevin' our 'tention drawed to it if we _don't_ see +it. Mis' Bill Harmon's another 'hurrier,'--well, you jest ask Bill, +that's all! She an' Mis' Popham hev been at it for fifteen years, but +the village ain't ready to give out the blue ribbon yet. Last week my +wife went over to Harmon's and Mis' Harmon said she was goin' to make +some molasses candy that mornin'. Well, my wife hurried home, put on her +molasses, made her candy, cooled it and worked it, and took some over to +treat Mis' Harmon, who was jest gittin' her kittle out from under +the sink!" + +The Careys laughed heartily at this evidence of Mrs. Popham's celerity, +while Osh, as pleased as possible, gave one dab with his paste brush and +went on:-- + +"Maria's blood was up one while, 'cause Mis' Bill Harmon always +contrives to git her wash out the earliest of a Monday morning. +Yesterday Maria got up 'bout daybreak (I allers tell her if she was real +forehanded she'd eat her breakfast overnight), and by half past five she +hed her clothes in the boiler. Jest as she was lookin' out the kitchen +winder for signs o' Mis' Bill Harmon, she seen her start for her side +door with a big basket. Maria was so mad then that she vowed she +wouldn't be beat, so she dug for the bedroom and slat some clean sheets +and piller cases out of a bureau drawer, run into the yard, and I'm +blamed if she didn't get 'em over the line afore Mis' Harmon found her +clothespins!" + +Good old Osh! He hadn't had such an audience for years, for Beulah knew +all its own stories thoroughly, and although it valued them highly it +did not care to hear them too often; but the Careys were absolutely +fresh material, and such good, appreciative listeners! Mrs. Carey looked +so handsome when she wiped the tears of enjoyment from her eyes that Osh +told Bill Harmon if 't wa'n't agin the law you would want to kiss her +every time she laughed. + +Well, the hall papering was, luckily, to be paid for, not by the hour, +but by an incredibly small price per roll, and everybody was pleased. +Nancy, Kathleen, and Julia sat on the stairs preparing a whiteweed and +buttercup border for the spare bedroom according to a plan of Mother +Carey's. It was an affair of time, as it involved the delicate cutting +out of daisy garlands from a wider bordering filled with flowers of +other colors, and proved a fascinating occupation. + +Gilbert hovered on the outskirts of the hall, doing odd jobs of one sort +and another and learning bits of every trade at which Mr. Popham +was expert. + +"If we hadn't been in such a sweat to git settled," remarked Osh with a +clip of his big shears, "I really'd ought to have plastered this front +entry all over! 'T wa'n't callin' for paper half's loud as 't was for +plaster. Old Parson Bradley hed been a farmer afore he turned minister, +and one Sunday mornin' his parish was thornin' him to pray for rain, so +he says: 'Thou knowest, O Lord! it's manure this land wants, 'n' not +water, but in Thy mercy send rain plenteously upon us.'" + +"Mr. Popham," said Gilbert, who had been patiently awaiting his +opportunity, "the pieces of paper are cut for those narrow places each +side of the front door. Can't I paste those on while you talk to us?" + +"'Course you can, handy as you be with tools! There ain't no trick to +it. Most anybody can be a paperer. As Parson Bradley said when he was +talkin' to a Sunday-school during a presidential campaign: 'One of you +boys perhaps can be a George Washington and another may rise to be a +Thomas Jefferson; any of you, the Lord knows, can be a James K. Polk!'" + +"I don't know much about Polk," said Gilbert. + +"P'raps nobody did very much, but the parson hated him like p'ison. See +here, Peter, I ain't _made_ o' paste! You've used up 'bout a quart +a'ready! What are you doin' out there anyway? I've heerd o' paintin' the +town,--I guess you're paperin' it, ain't you?" + +Peter was too busy and too eager for paste to reply, the facts of the +case being that while Mr. Popham held the family spellbound by his +conversation, he himself was papering the outside of the house with +scraps of assorted paper as high up as his short arms could reach. + +"There's another thing you can do, Gilbert," continued Mr. Popham. "I've +mixed a pail o' that green paint same as your mother wanted, an' I've +brought you a tip-top brush. The settin' room has a good nice floor; +matched boards, no hummocks nor hollers,--all as flat's one of my wife's +pancakes,--an' not a knot hole in it anywheres. You jest put your first +coat on, brushin' lengthways o' the boards, and let it dry good. Don't +let your folks go stepping on it, neither. The minute a floor's painted +women folks are crazy to git int' the room. They want their black +alpacky that's in the closet, an' the lookin' glass that's on the +mantelpiece, or the feather duster that's hangin' on the winder, an' +will you jest pass out the broom that's behind the door? The next +mornin' you'll find lots o' little spots where they've tiptoed in to see +if the paint's dry an' how it's goin' to look. Where I work, they most +allers say it's the cat,--well! that answer may deceive some folks, but +'t wouldn't me.--Don't slop your paint, Gilbert; work quick an' neat an' +even; then paintin' ain't no trick 't all. Any fool, the Lord knows, can +pick up that trade!--Now I guess it's about noon time, an' I'll have to +be diggin' for home. Maria sets down an' looks at the clock from half +past eleven on. She'll git a meal o' cold pork 'n' greens, cold string +beans, gingerbread, 'n' custard pie on t' the table; then she'll stan' +in the front door an' holler: 'Hurry up, Ossian! it's struck twelve more +'n two minutes ago, 'n' everything 's gittin' overdone!'" + +So saying he took off his overalls, seized his hat, and with a parting +salute was off down the road, singing his favorite song. I can give you +the words and the time, but alas! I cannot print Osh Popham's dauntless +spirit and serene content, nor his cheery voice as he travelled with +tolerable swiftness to meet his waiting Maria. + + Here comes a maid-en full of woe. + Hi-dum-di-dum did-dy-i-o! + Here comes a maid-en full of woe. + Hi der-ry O! + Here comes a maid-en full of woe, + As full of woe as she can go! + Hi dum did-dy i + O! Hi der-ry O! + + + +XVIII + +THE HOUSE OF LORDS + + +The Carey children had only found it by accident. All their errands took +them down the main street to the village; to the Popham's cottage at the +foot of a little lane turning towards the river, or on to the +post-office and Bill Harmon's store, or to Colonel Wheeler's house and +then to the railway station. One afternoon Nancy and Kathleen had walked +up the road in search of pastures new, and had spied down in a distant +hollow a gloomy grey house almost surrounded by cedars. A grove of +poplars to the left of it only made the prospect more depressing, and if +it had not been for a great sheet of water near by, floating with cow +lilies and pond lilies, the whole aspect of the place would have been +unspeakably dreary. + +Nancy asked Mr. Popham who lived in the grey house behind the cedars, +and when he told them a certain Mr. Henry Lord, his two children and +housekeeper, they fell into the habit of speaking of the place as the +House of Lords. + +"You won't never see nothin' of 'em," said Mr. Popham. "Henry Lord ain't +never darkened the village for years, I guess, and the young ones ain't +never been to school so far; they have a teacher out from Portland +Tuesdays and Fridays, and the rest o' the week they study up for him. +Henry's 'bout as much of a hermit's if he lived in a hut on a mounting, +an' he's bringing up the children so they'll be jest as odd's he is." + +"Is the mother dead?" Mrs. Carey asked. + +"Yes, dead these four years, an' a good job for her, too. It's an awful +queer world! Not that I could make a better one! I allers say, when +folks grumble, 'Now if you was given the materials, could you turn out a +better world than this is? And when it come to that, what if you hed to +furnish your _own_ materials, same as the Lord did! I guess you'd be put +to it!'--Well, as I say, it's an awful queer world; they clap all the +burglars into jail, and the murderers and the wife-beaters (I've allers +thought a gentle reproof would be enough punishment for a wife-beater, +'cause he probably has a lot o' provocation that nobody knows), and the +firebugs (can't think o' the right name--something like cendenaries), +an' the breakers o' the peace, an' what not; an' yet the law has nothin' +to say to a man like Hen Lord! He's been a college professor, but I went +to school with him, darn his picter, an' I'll call him Hen whenever I +git a chance, though he does declare he's a doctor." + +"Doctor of what?" asked Mrs. Carey. + +"Blamed if I know! I wouldn't trust him to doctor a sick cat." + +"People don't have to be doctors of medicine," interrupted Gilbert. +"Grandfather was Alexander Carey, LL.D.,--Doctor of Laws, that is." + +Mr. Popham laid down his brush. "I swan to man!" he ejaculated. "If you +don't work hard you can't keep up with the times! Doctor of Laws! Well, +all I can say is they _need_ doctorin', an' I'm glad they've got round +to 'em; only Hen Lord ain't the man to do 'em any good." + +"What has he done to make him so unpopular?" queried Mrs. Carey. + +"Done? He ain't done a thing he'd oughter sence he was born. He keeps +the thou shalt not commandments first rate, Hen Lord does! He neglected +his wife and froze her blood and frightened her to death, poor little +shadder! He give up his position and shut the family up in that tomb of +a house so 't he could study his books. My boy knows his boy, an' I tell +you the life he leads them children is enough to make your flesh creep. +When I git roun' to it I cal'late to set the house on fire some night. +Mebbe I'd be lucky enough to ketch Hen too, an' if so, nobody in the +village'd wear mournin'! So fur, I can't get Maria's consent to be a +cendenary. She says she can't spare me long enough to go to jail; she +needs me to work durin' the summer, an' in the winter time she'd hev +nobody to jaw, if I was in the lockup." This information was delivered +in the intervals of covering the guest chamber walls with a delightful +white moire paper which Osh always alluded to as the "white maria," +whether in memory of his wife's Christian name or because his French +accent was not up to the mark, no one could say. + +Mr. Popham exaggerated nothing, but on the contrary left much unsaid in +his narrative of the family at the House of Lords. Henry Lord, with the +degree of Ph.D. to his credit, had been Professor of Zoology at a New +England college, but had resigned his post in order to write a series of +scientific text books. Always irritable, cold, indifferent, he had grown +rapidly more so as years went on. Had his pale, timid wife been a rosy, +plucky tyrant, things might have gone otherwise, but the only memories +the two children possessed were of bitter words and reproaches on their +father's side, and of tears and sad looks on their mother's part. Then +the poor little shadow of a woman dropped wearily into her grave, and a +certain elderly Mrs. Bangs, with grey hair and firm chin, came to keep +house and do the work. + +A lonelier creature than Olive Lord at sixteen could hardly be imagined. +She was a tiny thing for her years, with a little white oval face and +peaked chin, pronounced eyebrows, beautifully arched, and a mass of +tangled, untidy dark hair. Her only interests in life were her younger +brother Cyril, delicate and timid, and in continual terror of his +father,--and a passion for drawing and sketching that was fairly +devouring in its intensity. When she was ten she "drew" the cat and the +dog, the hens and chickens, and colored the sketches with the paints her +mother provided. Whatever appealed to her sense of beauty was +straightway transferred to paper or canvas. Then for the three years +before her mother's death there had been surreptitious lessons from a +Portland teacher, paid for out of Mr. Lord's house allowance; for one of +his chief faults was an incredible parsimony, amounting almost to +miserliness. + +"Something terrible will happen to Olive if she isn't taught to use her +talent," Mrs. Lord pleaded to her husband. "She is wild to know how to +do things. She makes effort after effort, trembling with eagerness, and +when she fails to reproduce what she sees, she works herself into a +frenzy of grief and disappointment." + +"You'd better give her lessons in self-control," Mr. Lord answered. +"They are cheaper than instruction in drawing, and much more practical." + +So Olive lived and struggled and grew; and luckily her talent was such a +passion that no circumstances could crush or extinguish it. She worked, +discovering laws and making rules for herself, since she had no helpers. +When she could not make a rabbit or a bird look "real" on paper, she +searched in her father's books for pictures of its bones. "If I could +only know what it is like _inside_, Cyril," she said, "perhaps its +_outside_ wouldn't look so flat! O! Cyril, there must be some better way +of doing; I just draw the outline of an animal and then I put hairs or +feathers on it. They have no bodies. They couldn't run nor move; they're +just pasteboard." + +"Why don't you do flowers and houses, Olive?" inquired Cyril +solicitously. "And people paint fruit, and dead fish on platters, and +pitchers of lemonade with ice in,--why don't you try things like those?" + +"I suppose they're easier," Olive returned with a sigh, "but who could +bear to do them when there are living, breathing, moving things; things +that puzzle you by looking different every minute? No, I'll keep on +trying, and when you get a little older we'll run away together and live +and learn things by ourselves, in some place where father can never +find us!" + +"He wouldn't search, so don't worry," replied Cyril quietly, and the two +looked at each other and knew that it was so. + +There, in the cedar hollow, then, lived Olive Lord, an angry, resentful, +little creature weighed down by a fierce sense of injury. Her gloomy +young heart was visited by frequent storms and she looked as unlovable +as she was unloved. But Nancy Carey, never shy, and as eager to give +herself as people always are who are born and bred in joy and love, +Nancy hopped out of Mother Carey's warm nest one day, and fixing her +bright eyes and sunny, hopeful glance on the lonely, frowning little +neighbor, stretched out her hand in friendship. Olive's mournful black +eyes met Nancy's sparkling brown ones. Her hand, so marvellously full of +skill, had never held another's, and she was desperately self-conscious; +but magnetism flowed from Nancy as electric currents from a battery. She +drew Olive to her by some unknown force and held her fast, not realizing +at the moment that she was getting as much as she gave. + +The first interview, purely a casual one, took place on the edge of the +lily pond where Olive was sketching frogs, and where Nancy went for +cat-o'-nine-tails. It proved to be a long and intimate talk, and when +Mrs. Carey looked out of her bedroom window just before supper she saw, +at the pasture bars, the two girls with their arms round each other and +their cheeks close together. Nancy's curly chestnut crop shone in the +sun, and Olive's thick black plaits looked blacker by contrast. Suddenly +she flung her arms round Nancy's neck, and with a sob darted under the +bars and across the fields without a backward glance. + +A few moments later Nancy entered her mother's room, her arms filled +with treasures from the woods and fields. "Oh, Motherdy!" she cried, +laying down her flowers and taking off her hat. "I've found such a +friend; a real understanding friend; and it's the girl from the House of +Lords. She's wonderful! More wonderful than anybody we've ever seen +anywhere, and she draws better than the teacher in Charlestown! She's +older than I am, but so tiny and sad and shy that she seems like a +child. Oh, mother, there's always so much spare room in your heart,--for +you took in Julia and yet we never felt the difference,--won't you make +a place for Olive? There never was anybody needed you so much as she +does,--never." + +Have you ever lifted a stone and seen the pale, yellow, stunted shoots +of grass under it? And have you gone next day and next, and watched the +little blades shoot upward, spread themselves with delight, grow green +and wax strong; and finally, warm with the sun, cool with the dew, +vigorous with the flow of sap in their veins, seen them wave their green +tips in the breeze? That was what happened to Olive Lord when she and +Cyril were drawn into a different family circle, and ran in and out of +the Yellow House with the busy, eager group of Mother Carey's chickens. + + + +XIX + +OLD AND NEW + + +The Yellow House had not always belonged to the Hamiltons, but had been +built by a governor of the state when he retired from public office. He +lived only a few years, and it then passed into the hands of Lemuel +Hamilton's grandfather, who had done little or nothing in the way of +remodelling the buildings. + +Governor Weatherby had harbored no extraordinary ambition regarding +architectural excellence, for he was not a rich man; he had simply built +a large, comfortable Colonial house. He desired no gardens, no luxurious +stables, no fountains nor grottoes, no bathroom (for it was only the +year 1810), while the old oaken bucket left nothing to be desired as a +means of dispensing water to the household. He had one weakness, +however, and that was a wish to make the front of the house as +impressive as possible. The window over the front door was as beautiful +a window as any in the county, and the doorway itself was celebrated +throughout the state. It had a wonderful fan light and side lights, +green blind doors outside of the white painted one with its massive +brass knocker, and still more unique and impressive, it had for its +approach, semi-circular stone steps instead of the usual oblong ones. +The large blocks of granite had been cut so that each of the four steps +should be smaller than the one below it; and when, after months of +gossip and suspense, they were finally laid in place, their straight +edges towards the house and their expensive curved sides to the road, a +procession of curious persons in wagons, carryalls, buggies, and gigs +wound their way past the premises. The governor's "circ'lar steps" +brought many pilgrims down the main street of Beulah first and last, and +the original Hamiltons had been very proud of them. Pride (of such +simple things as stone steps) had died out of the Hamilton stock in the +course of years, and the house had been so long vacant that no one but +Lemuel, the Consul, remembered any of its charming features; but Ossian +Popham, when he pried up and straightened the ancient landmarks, had +much to say of the wonderful steps. + +"There's so much goin' on now-a-days," he complained, as he puffed and +pried and strained, and rested in between, "that young ones won't amount +to nothin', fust thing you know. My boy Digby says to me this mornin', +when I asked him if he was goin' to the County Fair 'No, Pop, I ain't +goin',' he says, 'it's the same old fair every year.' Land sakes! when I +was a boy, 'bout once a month, in warm weather, I used to ask father if +I could walk to the other end o' the village and look at the governor's +circ'lar steps; that used to be the liveliest entertainment parents +could think up for their young ones, an' it _was_ a heap livelier than +two sermons of a Sunday, each of 'em an hour and fifteen minutes long." + +Digby, a lad of eighteen and master of only one trade instead of a +dozen, like his father, had been deputed to paper Mother Carey's bedroom +while she moved for a few days into the newly fitted guest room, which +was almost too beautiful to sleep in, with its white satiny walls, its +yellow and green garlands hanging from the ceiling, its yellow floor, +and its old white chamber set repainted by the faithful and +clever Popham. + +The chintz parlor, once Governor Weatherby's study, was finished too, +and the whole family looked in at the doors a dozen times a day with +admiring exclamations. It had six doors, opening into two entries, one +small bedroom, one sitting room, one cellar, and one china closet; a +passion for entrances and exits having been the whim of that generation. +If the truth were known, Nancy had once lighted her candle and slipped +downstairs at midnight to sit on the parlor sofa and feast her eyes on +the room's loveliness. Gilbert had painted the white matting the color +of a ripe cherry. Mrs. Popham had washed and ironed and fluted the old +white ruffled muslin curtains from the Charlestown home, and they +adorned the four windows. It was the north room, on the left as you +entered the house, and would be closed during the cold winter months, so +it was fitted entirely for summer use and comfort. The old-fashioned +square piano looked in its element placed across one corner, with the +four tall silver candlesticks and snuffer tray on the shining mahogany. +All the shabbiest furniture, and the Carey furniture was mostly shabby, +was covered with a cheap, gay chintz, and crimson Jacqueminot roses +clambered all over the wall paper, so that the room was a cool bower +of beauty. + +On the other side of the hall were the double parlors of the governor's +time, made into a great living room. Here was Gilbert's green painted +floor, smooth and glossy, with braided rugs bought from neighbors in +East Beulah; here all the old-fashioned Gilbert furniture that the +Careys had kept during their many wanderings; here all the quaint chairs +that Mr. Bill Harmon could pick up at a small price; here were two noble +fireplaces, one with a crane and iron pot filled with flowers, the other +filled sometimes with sprays of green asparagus and sometimes with +fragrant hemlock boughs. The paper was one in which green rushes and +cat-o'-nine-tails grew on a fawn-colored ground, and anything that the +Careys did not possess for the family sitting room Ossian Popham went +straight home and made in his barn. He could make a barrel-chair or an +hour-glass table, a box lounge and the mattress to put on top of it, or +a low table for games and puzzles, or a window seat. He could polish the +piano and then sit down to it and play "Those Tassels on Her Boots" or +"Marching through Georgia" with great skill. He could paint bunches of +gold grapes and leaves on the old-fashioned high-backed rocker, and, as +soon as it was dry, could sit down in it and entertain the whole family +without charging them a penny. + +The housewarming could not be until the later autumn, Mrs. Carey had +decided, for although most of the living rooms could be finished, Cousin +Ann's expensive improvements were not to be set in motion until Bill +Harmon heard from Mr. Hamilton that his tenants were not to be disturbed +for at least three years. + +The house, which was daily growing into a home, was full of the busy hum +of labor from top to bottom and from morning till night, and there was +hardly a moment when Mother Carey and the girls were not transporting +articles of furniture through the rooms, and up and down the staircases, +to see how they would look somewhere else. This, indeed, had been the +diversion of their simple life for many years, and was just as +delightful, in their opinion, as buying new things. Any Carey, from +mother down to Peter, would spring from his chair at any moment and +assist any other Carey to move a sofa, a bureau, a piano, a kitchen +stove, if necessary, with the view of determining if it would add a new +zest to life in a different position. + +Not a word has been said thus far about the Yellow House barn, the barn +that the "fool Hamilton boys" (according to Bill Harmon's theories) had +converted from a place of practical usefulness and possible gain, into +something that would "make a cat laugh"; but it really needs a chapter +to itself. You remember that Dr. Holmes says of certain majestic and +dignified trees that they ought to have a Christian name, like other +folks? The barn, in the same way, deserves more distinction than a +paragraph, but at this moment it was being used as a storeroom and was +merely awaiting its splendid destiny, quite unconscious of the future. +The Hamilton boys were no doubt as extravagant and thriftless as they +were insane, but the Careys sympathized with their extravagance and +thriftlessness and insanity so heartily, in this particular, that they +could hardly conceal their real feelings from Bill Harmon. Nothing could +so have accorded with their secret desires as the "fool changes" made by +the "crazy Hamilton boys"; light-hearted, irresponsible, and frivolous +changes that could never have been compassed by the Careys' slender +income. They had no money to purchase horse or cow or pig, and no man in +the family to take care of them if purchased; so the removal of stalls +and all the necessary appurtenances for the care of cattle was no source +of grief or loss to them. A good floor had been laid over the old one +and stained to a dark color; the ceiling, with its heavy hand-hewn +beams, was almost as fine as some old oak counterpart in an English +hall. Not a new board met the eye;--old weathered lumber everywhere, +even to the quaint settle-shaped benches that lined the room. There was +a place like an old-fashioned "tie-up" for musicians to play for a +country dance, or for tableaux and charades; in fine, there would be, +with the addition of Carey ideas here and there, provision for frolics +and diversions of any sort. You no sooner opened the door and peeped in, +though few of the Beulah villagers had ever been invited to do so by the +gay young Hamiltons, than your tongue spontaneously exclaimed: "What a +place for good times!" + +"I shall 'come out' here," Nancy announced, as the three girls stood in +the centre of the floor, surrounded by bedsteads, tables, bureaus, and +stoves. "Julia, you can 'debut' where you like, but I shall 'come out' +here next summer!" + +"You'll be only seventeen; you can't come out!" objected Julia +conventionally. + +"Not in a drawing room, perhaps, but perfectly well in a barn. Even you +and Kitty, youthful as you will still be, can attend my coming out +party, in a barn!" + +"It doesn't seem proper to think of giving entertainments when everybody +knows our circumstances,--how poor we are!" Julia said rebukingly. + +"We are talking of next summer, my child! Who can say how rich we shall +be next summer? A party could be given in this barn with mother to play +the piano and Mr. Popham the fiddle. The refreshments would be +incredibly weak lemonade, and I think we might 'solicit' the cake, as +they do for church sociables!" + +Julia's pride was wounded beyond concealment at this humorously intended +suggestion of Nancy's. + +"Of course if Aunt Margaret approves, I have nothing to say," she +remarked, "but I myself would never come to any private party where +refreshments were 'solicited.' The very idea is horrible." + +"I'm 'coming out' in the barn next summer, Muddy!" Nancy called to her +mother, who just then entered the door. "If we are poorer than ever, we +can take up a collection to defray the expenses; Julia and Kitty would +look so attractive going about with tambourines! I want to do what I can +quickly, because I see plainly I shall have to marry young in order to +help the family. The heroine always does that in books; she makes a +worldly marriage with a rich nobleman, in order that her sister Kitty +and her cousin Julia may have a good education." + +"I don't know where you get your ideas, Nancy," said her mother, smiling +at her nonsense. "You certainly never read half a dozen novels in +your life!" + +"No, but Joanna used to read them by the hundred and tell me the +stories; and I've heard father read aloud to you; and the older girls +and the younger teachers used to discuss them at school;--oh! I know a +lot about life,--as it is in books,--and I'm just waiting to see if any +of it really happens!" + +"Digby Popham is the only rich nobleman in sight for you, Nancy!" Kitty +said teasingly. + +"Or freckled Cyril Lord," interpolated Julia. + +"He looks like an unbaked pie!" This from Kitty. + +Nancy flushed. "He's shy and unhappy and pale, and no wonder; but he's +as nice and interesting as he can be." + +"I can't see it," Julia said, "but he never looks at anybody, or talks +to anybody but you, so it's well you like him; though you like all boys, +for that matter!" + +"The boys return the compliment!" asserted Kitty mischievously, "while +poor you and I sit in corners!" + +"Come, come, dears," and Mrs. Carey joined in the conversation as she +picked up a pillow before returning to the house. "It's a little early +for you to be talking about rich noblemen, isn't it?" + +Nancy followed her out of the door, saying as she thoughtfully chewed a +straw, "Muddy, I do believe that when you're getting on to sixteen the +rich nobleman or the fairy prince or the wonderful youngest son does +cross your mind now and then!" + + + +XX + +THE PAINTED CHAMBER + + +Matters were in this state of forwardness when Nancy and Kathleen looked +out of the window one morning and saw Lallie Joy Popham coming down the +street. She "lugged" butter and milk regularly to the Careys (lugging is +her own word for the act), and helped them in many ways, for she was +fairly good at any kind of housework not demanding brains. Nobody could +say why some of Ossian Popham's gifts of mind and conversation had not +descended to his children, but though the son was not really stupid at +practical work, Lallie Joy was in a perpetual state of coma. + +Nancy, as has been intimated before, had a kind of tendency to reform +things that appeared to her lacking in any way, and she had early seized +upon the stolid Lallie Joy as a worthy object. + +"There she comes!" said Nancy. "She carries two quarts of milk in one +hand and two pounds of butter in the other, exactly as if she was +bending under the weight of a load of hay. I'll run down into the +kitchen and capture her for a half hour at five cents. She can peel the +potatoes first, and while they're boiling she can slice apples +for sauce." + +"Have her chop the hash, do!" coaxed Julia for that was her special +work. "The knife is dull beyond words." + +"Why don't you get Mr. Popham to sharpen it? It's a poor workman that +complains of his tools; Columbus discovered America in an open boat," +quoted Nancy, with an irritating air of wisdom. + +"That may be so," Julia retorted, "but Columbus would never have +discovered America with that chopping-knife, I'm sure of that.--Is +Lallie Joy about our age?" + +"I don't know. She must have been at least forty when she was born, and +that would make her fifty-five now. What _do_ you suppose would wake her +up? If I could only get her to stand straight, or hold her head up, or +let her hair down, or close her mouth! I believe I'll stay in the +kitchen and appeal to her better feelings a little this morning; I can +seed the raisins for the bread pudding." + +Nancy sat in the Shaker rocker by the sink window with the yellow bowl +in her lap. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes were bright, her lips were +red, her hair was goldy-brown, her fingers flew, and a high-necked +gingham apron was as becoming to her as it is to all nice girls. She was +thoroughly awake, was Nancy, and there could not have been a greater +contrast than that between her and the comatose Lallie Joy, who sat on a +wooden chair with her feet on the side rounds. She had taken off her +Turkey red sunbonnet and hung it on the chair-back, where its color +violently assaulted her flaming locks. She sat wrong; she held the +potato pan wrong, and the potatoes and the knife wrong. There seemed to +be no sort of connection between her mind and her body. As she peeled +potatoes and Nancy seeded raisins, the conversation was something +like this. + +"How did you chance to bring the butter to-day instead of to-morrow, +Lallie Joy?" + +"Had to dress me up to go to the store and get a new hat." + +"What colored trimming did you get?" + +"Same as old." + +"Don't they keep anything but magenta?" + +"Yes, blue." + +"Why didn't you try blue for a change?" + +"Dunno; didn't want any change, I guess." + +"Do you like magenta against your hair?" + +"Never thought o' my hair; jest thought o' my hat." + +"Well, you see, Lallie Joy, you can't change your hair, but you needn't +wear magenta hats nor red sunbonnets. Your hair is handsome enough, if +you'd only brush it right." + +"I guess I know all 'bout my hair and how red 't is. The boys ask me if +Pop painted it." + +"Why do you strain it back so tight?" + +"Keep it out o' my eyes." + +"Nonsense; you needn't drag it out by the roots. Why do you tie the +braids with strings?" + +"'Cause they hold, an' I hain't got no ribbons." + +"Why don't you buy some with the money you earn here?" + +"Savin' up for the Fourth." + +"Well, I have yards of old Christmas ribbons that I'll give you if +you'll use them." + +"All right." + +"What do you scrub your face with, that makes those shiny knobs stick +right out on your forehead and cheek bones?" + +"Sink soap." + +"Well, you shouldn't; haven't you any other?" + +"It's upstairs." + +"Aren't your legs in good working order?" + +Uncomprehending silence on Lallie Joy's part and then Nancy returned to +the onslaught. + +"Don't you like to look at pretty things?" + +"Dunno but I do, an' dunno as I do." + +"Don't you love the rooms your father has finished here?" + +"Kind of." + +"Not any more than that?" + +"Pop thinks some of 'em's queer, an' so does Bill Harmon." + +Long silence, Nancy being utterly daunted. + +"How did you come by your name, Lallie Joy?" + +"Lallie's out of a book named Lallie Rook, an' I was born on the Joy +steamboat line going to Boston." + +"Oh, I thought Joy was _Joy_!" + +"Joy Line's the only joy I ever heard of!" + +There is no knowing how long this depressing conversation would have +continued if the two girls had not heard loud calls from Gilbert +upstairs. Lallie Joy evinced no surprise, and went on peeling potatoes; +she might have been a sister of the famous Casabianca, and she certainly +could have been trusted not to flee from any burning deck, whatever the +provocation. + +"Come and see what we've found, Digby and I!" Gilbert cried. "Come, +girls; come, mother! We were stripping off the paper because Mr. Popham +said there'd been so many layers on the walls it would be a good time to +get to the bottom of it and have it all fresh and clean. So just now, as +I was working over the mantel piece and Digby on the long wall, look in +and see what we uncovered!" + +Mrs. Carey had come from the nursery, Kitty and Julia from the garden, +and Osh Popham from the shed, and they all gazed with joy and surprise +at the quaint landscapes that had been painted in water colors before +the day of wall paper had come. + +Mr. Popham quickly took one of his tools and began on another side of +the room. They worked slowly and carefully, and in an hour or two the +pictures stood revealed, a little faded in color but beautifully drawn, +with almost nothing of any moment missing from the scenes. + +"Je-roosh-y! ain't they handsome!" exclaimed Osh, standing in the middle +of the room with the family surrounding him in various attitudes of +ecstasy. "But they're too faded out to leave's they be, ain't they, Mis' +Carey? You'll have to cover 'em up with new paper, won't you, or shall +you let me put a coat of varnish on 'em?" + +Mrs. Carey shuddered internally. "No, Mr. Popham, we mustn't have any +'shine' on the landscapes. Yes, they are dreadfully dim and faded, but I +simply cannot have them covered up!" + +"It would be wicked to hide them!" said Nancy. "Oh, Muddy, _is_ it our +duty to write to Mr. Hamilton and tell him about them? He would +certainly take the house away from us if he could see how beautiful we +have made it, and now here is another lovely thing to tempt him. Could +anybody give up this painted chamber if it belonged to him?" + +"Well, you see," said Mr. Popham assuringly, "if you want to use this +painted chamber much, you've got to live in Beulah; an' Lem Hamilton +ain't goin' to stop consullin' at the age o' fifty, to come here an' +rust out with the rest of us;--no, siree! Nor Mis' Lem Hamilton wouldn't +stop over night in this village if you give her the town drinkin' trough +for a premium!" + +"Is she fashionable?" asked Julia. + +"You bet she is! She's tall an' slim an' so chuck full of airs she'd +blow away if you give her a puff o' the bellers! The only time she come +here she stayed just twenty-four hours, but she nearly died, we was all +so 'vulgar.' She wore a white dress ruffled up to the waist, and a white +Alpine hat, an' she looked exactly like the picture of Pike's Peak in my +stereopticon. Mis' Popham overheard her say Beulah was full o' savages +if not cannibals. 'Well,' I says to Maria, 'no matter where she goes, +nobody'll ever want to eat _her_ alive!'--Look at that meetin' house +over the mantel shelf, an' that grassy Common an' elm trees! 'T wa'n't +no house painter done these walls!" + +"And look at this space between the two front windows," cried Kathleen. +"See the hens and chickens and the Plymouth Rock rooster!" + +"And the white calf lying down under the maple; he's about the prettiest +thing in the room," said Gilbert. + +"We must just let it be and think it out," said Mother Carey. "Don't put +any new paper on, now; there's plenty to do downstairs." + +"I don't know 's I should particularly like to lay abed in this room," +said Osh, his eyes roving about the chamber judicially. "I shouldn't hev +no comfort ondressin' here, nohow; not with this mess o' live stock +lookin' at me every minute, whatever I happened to be takin' off. I +s'pose that rooster'd be right on to his job at sun-up! Well, he +couldn't git ahead of Mis' Popham, that's one thing; so 't I shouldn't +be any worse off 'n I be now! I don't get any too much good sleep as 't +is! Mis' Popham makes me go to bed long afore I'm ready, so 't she can +git the house shut up in good season; then 'bout 's soon's I've settled +down an' bed one short nap she says, 'It's time you was up, Ossian!"' + +"Mother! I have an idea!" cried Nancy suddenly, as Mr. Popham took his +leave and the family went out into the hall. "Do you know who could make +the walls look as they used to? My dear Olive Lord!" + +"She's only sixteen!" objected Mrs. Carey. + +"But she's a natural born genius! You wait and see the things she does!" + +"Perhaps I could take her into town and get some suggestions or some +instruction, with the proper materials," said Mrs. Carey, "and I suppose +she could experiment on some small space behind the door, first?" + +"Nothing that Olive does would ever be put behind anybody's door," Nancy +answered decisively. "I'm not old enough to know anything about +painting, of course (except that good landscapes ought not to be +reversible like our Van Twiller), but there's something about Olive's +pictures that makes you want to touch them and love them!" + +So began the happiest, most wonderful, most fruitful autumn of Olive +Lord's life, when she spent morning after morning in the painted +chamber, refreshing its faded tints. Whoever had done the original work +had done it lovingly and well, and Olive learned many a lesson while she +was following the lines of the quaint houses, like those on old china, +renewing the green of the feathery elms, or retracing and coloring the +curious sampler trees that stood straight and stiff like sentinels in +the corners of the room. + + + +XXI + +A FAMILY RHOMBOID + + +The Honorable Lemuel Hamilton sat in the private office of the American +Consulate in Breslau, Germany, one warm day in July. The post had been +brought in half an hour before, and he had two open letters on the desk +in front of him. It was only ten o'clock of a bright morning, but he +looked tired and worn. He was about fifty, with slightly grey hair and +smoothly shaven face. He must have been merry at one time in his life, +for there were many nice little laughing-wrinkles around his eyes, but +somehow these seemed to have faded out, as if they had not been used for +years, and the corners of his mouth turned down to increase the look of +weariness and discontent. + +A smile had crept over his face at his old friend Bill Harmon's spelling +and penmanship, for a missive of that kind seldom came to the American +Consulate. When the second letter postmarked Beulah first struck his +eye, he could not imagine why he should have another correspondent in +the quaintly named little village. He had read Nancy's letter twice now, +and still he sat smoking and dreaming with an occasional glance at the +girlish handwriting, or a twinkle of the eye at the re-reading of some +particular passage. His own girls were not ready writers, and their +mother generally sent their messages for them. Nancy and Kitty did not +yet write nearly as well as they talked, but they contrived to express +something of their own individuality in their communications, which were +free and fluent, though childlike and crude. + +"What a nice girl this Nancy Carey must be!" thought the American +Consul. "This is such a jolly, confidential, gossipy, winsome little +letter! Her first 'business letter' she calls it! Alas! when she learns +how, a few years later, there will be no charming little confidences; no +details of family income and expenditures; no tell-tale glimpses of +'mother' and 'Julia.' I believe I should know the whole family even +without this photograph!--The lady sitting in the chair, to whom the +photographer's snapshot has not done justice, is worthy of Nancy's +praise,--and Bill Harmon's. What a pretty, piquant, curly head Nancy +has! What a gay, vivacious, alert, spirited expression. The boy is +handsome and gentlemanly, but he'll have to wake up, or Nancy will be +the man of the family. The girl sitting down is less attractive. She's +Uncle Allan's daughter, and" (consulting the letter) "Uncle Allan has +nervous prostration and all of mother's money." Here Mr. Hamilton gave +vent to audible laughter for the third time in a quarter of an hour. +"Nancy doesn't realize with what perfection her somewhat imperfect +English states the case," he thought. "I know Uncle Allan like a book, +from his resemblance to certain other unfortunate gentlemen who have +nervous prostration in combination with other people's money. Let's see! +I know Nancy; friendly little Nancy, about fifteen or sixteen, I should +judge; I know Uncle Allan's 'Julia,' who hems in photographs, but not +otherwise; I know Gilbert, who is depressed at having to make his own +way; the small boy, who 'is the nicest of us all'; Kitty, who beat all +the others in getting to mother's shoulder; and the mother herself, who +is beautiful, and doesn't say 'Bosh' to her children's ideas, and +refuses to touch the insurance money, and wants Gilbert to show what +'father's son' can do without anybody's help, and who revels in the +color and joy of a yellow wall paper at twenty cents a roll! Bless their +simple hearts! They mustn't pay any rent while they are bringing water +into the kitchen and making expensive improvements! And what Hamilton +could be persuaded to live in the yellow house? To think of any one's +wanting to settle down in that little deserted spot, Beulah, where the +only sound that ever strikes one's ear is Osh Popham's laugh or the +tinkle of a cow bell! Oh! if my own girls would write me letters like +this, letting me see how their minds are growing, how they are taking +hold of life, above all what is in their hearts! Well, little Miss Nancy +Carey! honest, outspoken, confidential, clever little Nancy, who calls +me her 'dearest Mr. Hamilton' and thanks me for letting her live in my +yellow house, you shall never be disturbed, and if you and Gilbert ever +earn enough money to buy it, it shall go to you cheap! There's not one +of my brood that would live in it--except Tom, perhaps--for after +spending three hundred dollars, they even got tired of dancing in the +barn on Saturday nights; so if it can fall into the hands of some one +who will bring a blessing on it, good old Granny Hamilton will rest +peacefully in her grave!" + +We have discoursed in another place of family circles, but it cannot be +truthfully said that at any moment the Lemuel Hamiltons had ever assumed +that symmetrical and harmonious shape. Still, during the first eight or +ten years of their married life, when the children were young, they had +at least appeared to the casual eye as, say, a rectangular +parallelogram. A little later the cares and jolts of life wrenched the +right angles a trifle "out of plumb," and a rhomboid was the result. +Mrs. Hamilton had money of her own, but wished Lemuel to amass enough +fame and position to match it. She liked a diplomatic life if her +husband could be an ambassador, but she thought him strangely slow in +achieving this dignity. No pleasure or pride in her husband's ability to +serve his country, even in a modest position, ever crossed her mind. She +had no desire to spend her valuable time in various poky Continental +towns, and she had many excuses for not doing so; the proper education +of her children being the chief among them. Luckily for her, good and +desirable schools were generally at an easy distance from the jewellers' +shops and the dressmakers' and milliners' establishments her soul loved, +so while Mr. Hamilton did his daily task in Antwerp, Mrs. Hamilton +resided mostly in Brussels or Paris; when he was in Zittau, in Saxony, +she was in Dresden. If he were appointed to some business city she +remained with him several months each year, and spent the others in a +more artistic and fashionable locality. The situation was growing +difficult because the children were gradually getting beyond school age, +although there still remained to her the sacred duty of settling them +properly in life. Agnes, her mother's favorite, was still at school, and +was devoted to foreign languages, foreign manners, and foreign modes of +life. Edith had grown restless and developed an uncomfortable fondness +for her native land, so that she spent most of her time with her +mother's relatives in New York, or in visiting school friends here or +there. The boys had gone far away; Jack, the elder, to Texas, where he +had lost what money his father and mother had put into his first +business venture; Thomas, the younger, to China, where he was woefully +lonely, but doing well in business. A really good diplomatic appointment +in a large and important city would have enabled Mr. Hamilton to collect +some of his scattered sons and daughters and provide them with the +background for which his wife had yearned without ceasing (and very +audibly) for years. But Mr. Hamilton did not get the coveted +appointment, and Mrs. Hamilton did not specially care for Mr. Hamilton +when he failed in securing the things she wanted. This was the time when +the laughing-wrinkles began to fade away from Mr. Hamilton's eyes, just +for lack of daily use; and it was then that the corners of his mouth +began to turn down; and his shoulders to stoop, and his eye to grow less +keen and brave, and his step less vigorous. It may be a commonplace +remark, but it is not at these precise moments in life that tired, +depressed men in modest positions are wafted by Uncle Sam to great and +desirable heights; but to Mrs. Hamilton it appeared that her husband was +simply indolent, unambitious, and unlucky; not at all that he needed to +be believed in, or loved, or comforted, or helped, or braced! It might +have startled her, and hurt her wifely pride, if she had seen her lonely +husband drinking in little Nancy Carey's letter as if it were dew to a +thirsty spirit; to see him set the photograph of the Carey group on his +desk and look at it from time to time affectionately, as if he had found +some new friends. It was the contentment, the hope, the unity, the +pluck, the mutual love, the confidence, the ambition, of the group that +touched his imagination and made his heart run out to them. "Airs from +the Eden of youth awoke and stirred in his soul" as he took his pen to +answer Nancy's first business communication. + +Having completed his letter he lighted another cigar, and leaning back +in his revolving chair clasped his hands behind his head and fell into a +reverie. The various diplomatic posts that might be opened to him +crossed his mind in procession. If A or B or C were possible, his wife +would be content, and their combined incomes might be sufficient to +bring the children together, if not quite under one roof, then to points +not so far separated from each other but that a speaking acquaintance +might be developed. Tom was the farthest away, and he was the dearest; +the only Hamilton of the lot; the only one who loved his father. + +Mr. Hamilton leaned forward abstractedly, and fumbling through one +drawer of his desk after another succeeded in bringing out a photograph +of Tom, taken at seventeen or eighteen. Then by a little extra search he +found his wife in her presentation dress at a foreign court. There was +no comfort or companionship in that, it was too furbelowed to be +anybody's wife,--but underneath it in the same frame was one taken just +after their marriage. That was too full of memories to hold much joy, +but it stirred his heart, and made it beat a little; enough at any rate +to show it was not dead. In the letter case in his vest pocket was an +almost forgotten picture of the girls when they were children. This with +the others he stood in a row in front of him, reminding himself that he +did not know the subjects much more intimately than the photographers +who had made their likenesses. He glanced from one family to the other +and back again, several times. The Careys were handsomer, there was no +doubt of that; but there was a deeper difference that eluded him. The +Hamiltons were far more stylishly dressed, but they all looked a little +conscious and a little discontented. That was it; the Careys were +happier! There were six of them, living in the forgotten Hamilton house +in a half-deserted village, on five or six hundred dollars a year, and +doing their own housework, and they were happier than his own brood, +spending forty or fifty times that sum. Well, they were grown up, his +sons and daughters, and the only change in their lives now would come +from wise or unwise marriages. No poverty-stricken sons-in-law would +ever come into the family, with Mrs. Hamilton standing at the bars, he +was sure of that! As for the boys, they might choose their mates in +Texas or China; they might even have chosen them now, for aught he knew, +though Jack was only twenty-six and Tom twenty-two. He must write to +them oftener, all of them, no matter how busy and anxious he might be; +especially to Tom, who was so far away. + +He drew a sheet of paper towards him, and having filled it, another, and +yet another. Having folded and slipped it into an envelope and addressed +it to Thomas Hamilton, Esq., Hong Kong, China, he was about to seal it +when he stopped a moment. "I'll enclose the little Carey girl's letter," +he thought. "Tom's the only one who cares a penny for the old house, and +I've told him I have rented it. He's a generous boy, and he won't grudge +a few dollars lost to a good cause. Besides, these Careys will increase +the value of the property every year they live in it, and without them +the buildings would gradually have fallen into ruins." He added a +postscript to his letter, saying: "I've sent you little Miss Nancy's +letter, the photograph of her tying up the rambler rose, and the family +group; so that you can see exactly what influenced me to write her (and +Bill Harmon) that they should be undisturbed in their tenancy, and that +their repairs and improvements should be taken in lieu of rent." This +done and the letters stamped, he put the photographs of his wife and +children here and there on his desk and left the office. + +Oh! it is quite certain that Mother Carey's own chickens go out over the +seas and show good birds the way home; and it is quite true, as she +said, "One real home always makes another, I am sure of that!" It can +even send a vision of a home across fields and forests and lakes and +oceans from Beulah village to Breslau, Germany, and on to Hong +Kong, China. + + + +XXII + +CRADLE GIFTS + + +Mrs. Henry Lord sent out a good many invitations to the fairies for +Cyril's birthday party, but Mr. Lord was at his critical point in the +first volume of his text book, and forgot that he had a son. Where both +parents are not interested in these little affairs, something is sure to +be forgotten. Cyril's mother was weak and ill at the time, and the +upshot of it was that the anger of The Fairy Who Wasn't Invited was +visited on the baby Cyril in his cradle. In the revengeful spirit of +that fairy who is omitted from these functions, she sent a threat +instead of a blessing, and decreed that Cyril should walk in fear all +the days of his life. Of course, being a fairy, she knew very well that, +if Cyril, or anybody very much interested in Cyril, went to declare that +there was no power whatever behind her curse, she would not be able to +gratify her spite; but she knew also, being a fairy, that if Cyril got +into the habit of believing himself a coward, he would end by being one, +so she stood a good chance of winning, after all. + +Cyril, when he came into the world, had come with only half a welcome. +No mother and father ever met over his cradle and looked at him +together, wondering if it were "well with the child." When he was old +enough to have his red-gold hair curled, and a sash tied around his baby +waist, he was sometimes taken downstairs, but he always fled to his +mother's or his nurse's knee when his father approached. How many times +he and his little sister Olive had hidden under the stairs when father +had called mother down to the study to scold her about the grocer's +bill! And there was a nightmare of a memory concerning a certain +birthday of father's, when mother had determined to be gay. It was just +before supper. Cyril, clad in his first brief trousers, was to knock at +the study door with a little purple nosegay in his hand, to show his +father that the lilac had bloomed. Olive, in crimson cashmere, was to +stand near, and when the door opened, present him with her own picture +of the cat and her new kittens; while mother, looking so pretty, with +her own gift all ready in her hand, was palpitating on the staircase to +see how the plans would work. Nothing could have been worse, however, in +the way of a small domestic tragedy, than the event itself when it +finally came off. + +Cyril knocked. "What do you want?" came from within, in tones that +breathed vexation at being interrupted. + +"Knock again!" whispered Mrs. Lord. "Father doesn't remember that it's +his birthday, and he doesn't know that it's you knocking." + +Cyril knocked again timidly, but at the first sound of his father's +irritable voice as he rose hurriedly from his desk, the boy turned and +fled through the kitchen to the shed. + +Olive held the fort, picture in hand. + +"It's your birthday, father," she said. "There's a cake for supper, and +here's my present." There was no love in the child's voice. Her heart, +filled with passionate sympathy for Cyril, had lost all zest for its +task, and she handed her gift to her father with tightly closed lips and +heaving breast. + +"All right; I'm much obliged, but I wish you would not knock at this +door when I am writing,--I've told you that before. Tell your mother I +can't come to supper to-night, but to send me a tray, please!" + +As he closed the door Olive saw him lay the picture on a table, never +looking at it as he crossed the room to one of the great book-cases that +lined the walls. + +Mrs. Lord had by this time disappeared forlornly from the upper hall. +Olive, aged ten, walked up the stairs in a state of mind ferocious in +its anger. Entering her mother's room she tore the crimson ribbon from +her hair and began to unbutton her dress. "I hate him! I _hate_ him!" +she cried, stamping her foot. "I will never knock at his door again! I'd +like to take Cyril and run away! I'll get the birthday cake and fling it +into the pond; nothing shall stop me!". Then, seeing her mother's white +face, she wailed, as she flung herself on the bed: "Oh, mother, +mother,--why did you ever let him come to live with us? Did we _have_ to +have him for a father? Couldn't you _help_ it, mother?" + +Mrs. Lord grew paler, put her hand to her heart, wavered, caught +herself, wavered again, and fell into the great chair by the window. Her +eyes closed, and Olive, frightened by the apparent effect of her words, +ran down the back stairs and summoned the cook. When she returned, +panting and breathless, her mother was sitting quite quietly by the +window, looking out at the cedars. + +"It was only a sudden pain, dear! I am all well again. Nothing is really +the matter, Bridget. Mr. Lord will not be down to supper; spread a tray +for him, please." + +"I'd like to spread a tray for him at the bottom of the Red Sea; that's +where he belongs!" muttered Bridget, as she descended to the kitchen to +comfort Cyril. + +"Was it my fault, mother?" asked Olive, bending over her anxiously. + +Her mother drew the child's head down and leaned her own against it +feebly. "No, dear," she sighed. "It's nobody's fault, unless it's mine!" + +"Is the pain gone?" + +"Quite gone, dear." + +Nevertheless the pain was to prove the final wrench to a heart that had +been on the verge of breaking for many a year, and it was not long +before Olive and Cyril were motherless. + +Mr. Lord did not have the slightest objection to the growing intimacy +between his children and the new family in the Yellow House, so long as +he was not disturbed by it, and so long as it cost him nothing. They had +strict orders not to play with certain of their village acquaintances, +Mr. Lord believing himself to be an aristocrat; the fact being that he +was almost destitute of human sympathy, and to make a neighbor of him +you would have had to begin with his grandfather and work for three +generations. He had seen Nancy and Gilbert at the gates of his place, +and he had passed Mrs. Carey in one of his infrequent walks to the +post-office. She was not a person to pass without mental comment, and +Mr. Lord instantly felt himself in the presence of an equal, an unusual +fact in his experience; he would not have known a superior if he had met +one ever so often! + +"A very fine, unusual woman," he thought. "She accounts for that +handsome, manly boy. I wish he could knock some spirit into Cyril!" + +The process of "knocking spirit" into a boy would seem to be +inconsistent with educational logic, but by very different methods, +Gilbert had certainly given Cyril a trifling belief in himself, and +Mother Carey was gradually winning him to some sort of self-expression +by the warmth of her frequent welcomes and the delightful faculty she +possessed of making him feel at ease. + +"Come, come!" said the petrels to the molly-mocks in "Water Babies." +"This young gentleman is going to Shiny Wall. He is a plucky one to have +gone so far. Give the little chap a cast over the ice-pack for Mother +Carey's sake." + +Gilbert was delighted, in a new place, to find a boy friend of his own +age, and Cyril's speedy attachment gratified his pride. Gilbert was +doing well these summer months. The unceasing activity, the authority +given him by his mother and sisters, his growing proficiency in all +kinds of skilled labor, as he "puttered" about with Osh Popham or Bill +Harmon in house and barn and garden, all this pleased his enterprising +nature. Only one anxiety troubled his mother; his unresigned and +mutinous attitude about exchanging popular and fashionable Eastover for +Beulah Academy, which seat of learning he regarded with unutterable +scorn. He knew that there was apparently no money to pay Eastover fees, +but he was still child enough to feel that it could be found, somewhere, +if properly searched for. He even considered the education of Captain +Carey's eldest son an emergency vital enough to make it proper to dip +into the precious five thousand dollars which was yielding them a part +of their slender annual income. Once, when Gilbert was a little boy, he +had put his shoulder out of joint, and to save time his mother took him +at once to the doctor's. He was suffering, but still strong enough to +walk. They had to climb a hilly street, the child moaning with pain, his +mother soothing and encouraging him as they went on. Suddenly he +whimpered: "Oh! if this had only happened to Ellen or Joanna or Addy or +Nancy, I could have borne it _so_ much better!" + +There was a good deal of that small boy left in Gilbert still, and he +endured best the economies that fell on the feminine members of the +family. It was the very end of August, and although school opened the +first Monday in September, Mrs. Carey was not certain whether Gilbert +would walk into the old-fashioned, white painted academy with the +despised Beulah "hayseeds," or whether he would make a scene, and +authority would have to be used. + +"I declare, Gilly!" exclaimed Mother Carey one night, after an argument +on the subject; "one would imagine the only course in life open to a boy +was to prepare at Eastover and go to college afterwards! Yet you may +take a list of the most famous men in America, and I dare say you will +find half of them came from schools like Beulah Academy or infinitely +poorer ones. I don't mean the millionaires alone. I mean the merchants +and engineers and surgeons and poets and authors and statesmen. Go ahead +and try to stamp your school in some way, Gilly!--don't sit down feebly +and wait for it to stamp you!" + +This was all very well as an exhibition of spirit on Mother Carey's +part, but it had been a very hard week. Gilbert was sulky; Peter had had +a touch of tonsillitis; Nancy was faltering at the dishwashing and +wishing she were a boy; Julia was a perfect barnacle; Kathleen had an +aching tooth, and there being no dentist in the village, was applying +Popham remedies,--clove-chewing, roasted raisins, and disfiguring bread +poultices; Bill Harmon had received no reply from Mr. Hamilton, and when +Mother Carey went to her room that evening she felt conscious of a +lassitude, and a sense of anxiety, deeper than for months. As Gilbert +went by to his own room, he glanced in at her door, finding it slightly +ajar. She sat before her dressing table, her long hair flowing over her +shoulders, her head bent over her two hands. His father's picture was in +its accustomed place, and he heard her say as she looked at it: "Oh, my +dear, my dear! I am so careworn, so troubled, so discouraged! Gilbert +needs you, and so do I, more than tongue can tell!" The voice was so low +that it was almost a whisper, but it reached Gilbert's ears, and there +was a sob strangled in it that touched his heart. + +The boy tiptoed softly into his room and sat down on his bed in the +moonlight. + +"Dear old Mater!" he thought. "It's no go! I've got to give up Eastover +and college and all and settle down into a country bumpkin! No fellow +could see his mother look like that, and speak like that, and go his own +gait; he's just got to go hers!" + +Meantime Mrs. Carey had put out the lamp and lay quietly thinking. The +last words that floated through her mind as she sank to sleep were those +of a half-forgotten verse, learned, she could not say how many +years before:-- + + You can glad your child or grieve it! + You can trust it or deceive it; + When all's done + Beneath God's sun + You can only love and leave it. + + + +XXIII + +NEARING SHINY WALL + + +Another person presumably on the way to Shiny Wall and Peacepool, but +putting small energy into the journey, was that mass of positively +glaring virtues, Julia Carey. More than one fairy must have been +forgotten when Julia's christening party came off. No heart-to-heart +talk in the twilight had thus far produced any obvious effect. She had +never, even when very young, experienced a desire to sit at the feet of +superior wisdom, always greatly preferring a chair of her own. She +seldom did wrong, in her own opinion, because the moment she entertained +an idea it at once became right, her vanity serving as a pair of +blinders to keep her from seeing the truth. The doctors did not permit +any one to write to poor Allan Carey, so that Julia's heart could not be +softened by continual communication with her invalid father, who, with +Gladys Ferguson, constituted the only tribunal she was willing to +recognize. Her consciousness of superiority to the conditions that +surrounded her, her love of luxury, the silken selfishness with which +she squirmed out of unpleasant duties, these made her an unlikable and +undesirable housemate, and that these faults could exist with what Nancy +called her "everlasting stained-glass attitude" made it difficult for +Mother Carey to maintain a harmonious family circle. It was an outburst +of Nancy's impetuous temper that Mrs. Carey had always secretly dreaded, +but after all it was poor Kathleen who precipitated an unforgettable +scene which left an influence behind it for many months. + +The morning after Mother Carey's interview with Gilbert she looked up as +her door was pushed open, and beheld Julia, white and rigid with temper, +standing on the threshold. + +"What is the matter, child?" exclaimed her aunt, laying down her work in +alarm. + +Close behind Julia came Kathleen, her face swollen with tears, her +expression full of unutterable woe. + +Julia's lips opened almost automatically as she said slowly and with +bitter emphasis, "Aunt Margaret, is it true, as Kathleen says, that my +father has all your money and some of Uncle Peter's?" + +Something snapped in Mother Carey! One glance at Kathleen showed only +too well that she had committed the almost unpardonable sin of telling +Julia what had been carefully and tenderly kept from her. Before she +could answer Kathleen had swept past Julia and flung herself on the +floor near her mother. + +"Oh, mother, I can't say anything that will ever make you understand. +Julia knows, she knows in her heart, what she said that provoked me! She +does nothing but grumble about the work, and how few dresses we have, +and what a drudge she is, and what common neighbors we have, and how +Miss Tewksbury would pity her if she knew all, and how Uncle Allan would +suffer if he could see his daughter living such a life! And this morning +my head ached and my tooth ached and I was cross, and all at once +something leaped out of my mouth!" + +"Tell her what you said," urged Julia inexorably. + +Sobs choked Kathleen's voice. "I said--I said--oh! how can I tell it! I +said, if her father hadn't lost so much of my father's and my mother's +money we shouldn't have been so poor, any of us." + +"Kathleen, how could you!" cried her mother. + +If Julia wished to precipitate a tempest she had succeeded, and her face +showed a certain sedate triumph. + +"Oh! mother! don't give me up; don't give me up!" wailed Kathleen. "It +wasn't me that said it, it was somebody else that I didn't know lived +inside of me. I don't expect you to forgive it or forget it, Julia, but +if you'll only try, just a little bit, I'll show you how sorry I feel. +I'd cut myself and make it bleed, I'd go to prison, if I could get back +to where I was before I said it! Oh! what shall I do, mother, if you +look at me like that again or say 'How could you!'" + +There was no doubting Kathleen's remorse; even Julia saw that. + +"Did she tell the truth, Aunt Margaret?" she repeated. + +"Come here, Julia, and sit by me. It is true that your Uncle Peter and I +have both put money into your father's business, and it is true that he +has not been able to give it back to us, and perhaps may never do so. +There is just enough left to pay your poor father's living expenses, but +we trust his honor; we are as sorry for him as we can be, and we love +him dearly. Kathleen meant nothing but that your father has been +unfortunate and we all have to abide by the consequences; but I am +amazed that my daughter should have so forgotten herself as to speak of +it to you!" (Renewed sobs from the prostrate Kathleen). + +"Especially," said Julia, "when, as Gladys Ferguson says, I haven't +anybody in the world but you, to turn to in my trouble. I am a +fatherless girl" (her voice quivered here), "and I am a guest in +your house." + +Mrs. Carey's blood rose a little as she looked at poor Kitty's shaken +body and streaming eyes, and Julia's unforgiving face. "You are wrong +there, Julia. I fail to see why you should not take your full share of +our misfortunes, and suffer as much as we, from our too small income. It +is not our fault, it is not yours. You are not a privileged guest, you +are one of the family. If you are fatherless just now, my children are +fatherless forever; yet you have not made one single burden lighter by +joining our forces. You have been an outsider, instead of putting +yourself loyally into the breach, and working with us heart to heart. I +welcomed you with open arms and you have made my life harder, much +harder, than it was before your coming. To protect you I have had to +discipline my own children continually, and all the time you were +putting their tempers to quite unnecessary tests! I am not extenuating +Kathleen, but I merely say you have no right to behave as you do. You +are thirteen years old, quite old enough to make up your mind whether +you wish to be loved by anybody or not; at present you are not!" + +Never had the ears of the Paragon heard such disagreeably plain speech. +She was not inclined to tears, but moisture began to appear in her eyes +and she looked as though a shower were imminent. Aunt Margaret was +magnificent in her wrath, and though Julia feared, she admired her. Not +to be loved, if that really were to be her lot, rather terrified Julia. +She secretly envied Nancy's unconscious gift of drawing people to her +instantly; men, women, children,--dogs and horses, for that matter. She +never noticed that Nancy's heart ran out to meet everybody, and that she +was overflowing with vitality and joy and sympathy; on the contrary, she +considered the tribute of affection paid to Nancy as a part of Nancy's +luck. Virtuous, conscientious, intelligent, and well-dressed as she felt +herself to be, she emphatically did not wish to be disliked, and it was +a complete surprise to her that she had not been a successful +Carey chicken. + +"Gladys Ferguson always loved me," she expostulated after a brief +silence, and there was a quiver in her voice. + +"Then either Gladys has a remarkable gift of loving, or else you are a +different Julia in her company," remarked Mother Carey, quietly, raising +Julia's astonishment and perturbation to an immeasurable height. + +"Now, Kathleen," continued Mother Carey, "Mrs. Godfrey has often asked +you to spend a week with Elsie, and you can go to Charlestown on the +afternoon train. Go away from Julia and forget everything but that you +have done wrong and you must find a way to repair it. I hope Julia will +learn while you are away to make it easier for you to be courteous and +amiable. There is a good deal in the Bible, Julia, about the sin of +causing your brother to offend. Between that sin and Kathleen's offence, +there is little, in my mind, to choose!" + +"Yes, there is!" cried Kathleen. "I am much, much worse than Julia. +Father couldn't bear to know that I had hurt Julia's feelings and hurt +yours too. I was false to father, and you, and Uncle Allan, and Julia. +Nothing can be said for me, _nothing_! I am so ashamed of myself that I +shall never get over it in the world. Oh, Julia, could you shake hands +with me, just to show me you know how I despise myself?" + +Julia shook hands considerably less like a slug or a limpet than usual, +and something very queer and unexpected happened when her hand met poor +Kitty's wet, feverish little paw and she heard the quiver in her voice. +She suddenly stooped and kissed her cousin, quite without intention. +Kathleen returned the salute with grateful, pathetic warmth, and then +the two fell on Mother Carey's neck to be kissed and cried over for a +full minute. + +"I'll go to the doctor and have my ugly tooth pulled out," exclaimed +Kathleen, wiping her eyes. "If it hadn't been for that I never could +have been so horrible!" + +"That would be all very well for once," answered her mother with a tired +smile, "but if you pluck out a supposed offending member every time you +do something wrong, I fear you will not have many left when you are an +old lady!" + +"Mother!" said Kathleen, almost under her breath and not daring to look +up, "couldn't I stay at home from Charlestown and show you and Julia, +here, how sorry I am?" + +"Yes, let her, Aunt Margaret, and then I can have a chance to try too," +pleaded Julia. + +Had the heavens fallen? Had the Paragon, the Pink of Propriety and +Perfection, confessed a fault? Had the heart of the smug one, the prig, +melted, and did she feel at last her kinship to the Carey chickens? Had +she suffered a real grievance, the first amongst numberless deeds of +tenderness, and having resented it like an "old beast," forgiven it like +a "new" one? It certainly seemed as if Mother Carey that week were at +her old trade of making things make themselves. Gilbert, Kathleen, and +Julia had all fought their way under the ice-pack and were getting a +glimpse of Shiny Wall. + + + +XXIV + +A LETTER PROM GERMANY + + +Mother Carey walked down the village street one morning late in August, +while Peter, milk pail in hand, was running by her side and making +frequent excursions off the main line of travel. Beulah looked +enchanting after a night of rain, and the fields were greener than they +had been since haying time. Unless Mr. Hamilton were away from his +consular post on a vacation somewhere on the Continent, he should have +received, and answered, Bill Harmon's letter before this, she was +thinking, as she looked at the quiet beauty of the scene that had so +endeared itself to her in a few short months. + +Mrs. Popham had finished her morning's work and was already sitting at +her drawing-in frame in the open doorway, making a very purple rose with +a very scarlet centre. + +"Will you come inside, Mis' Carey?" she asked hospitably, "or do you +want Lallie Joy to set you a chair on the grass, same as you had +last time?" + +"I always prefer the grass, Mrs. Popham," smiled Mrs. Carey. "As it's +the day for the fishman to come I thought we'd like an extra quart of +milk for chowder." + +"I only hope he'll make _out_ to come," was Mrs. Popham's curt response. +"If I set out to _be_ a fishman, I vow I'd _be_ one! Mr. Tubbs stays to +home whenever he's hayin', or his wife's sick, or it's stormy, or the +children want to go to the circus!" + +Mrs. Carey laughed. "That's true; but as your husband reminded me last +week, when Mr. Tubbs disappointed us, his fish is always fresh-caught, +and good." + +"Oh! of course Mr. Popham would speak up for him!" returned his wife. "I +don't see myself as it makes much diff'rence whether his fish is good or +bad, if he stays to home with it! Mebbe I look on the dark side a little +mite; I can't hardly help it, livin' with Mr. Popham, and he +so hopeful." + +"He keeps us all very merry at the Yellow House," Mrs. Carey ventured. + +"Yes, he would," remarked Mrs. Popham drily, "but you don't git it +stiddy; hopefulness at meals, hopefulness evenin's, an' hopefulness +nights!--one everlastin' stiddy stream of hopefulness! He was jest so as +a boy; always lookin' on the bright side whether there was any or not. +His mother 'n' father got turrible sick of it; so much sunshine in the +house made a continual drouth, so old Mis' Popham used to say. For her +part, she said, she liked to think that, once in a while, there was a +cloud that was a first-class cloud; a thick, black cloud, clean through +to the back! She was tired to death lookin' for Ossian's silver linin's! +Lallie Joy's real moody like me; I s'pose it's only natural, livin' with +a father who never sees anything but good, no matter which way he looks. +There's two things I trust I shan't hear any more when I git to +heaven,--that's 'Cheer up Maria!' an' 'It's all for the best!' As for +Mr. Popham, he says any place'll be heaven to him so long as I ain't +there, callin' 'Hurry up Ossian!' so we have it, back an' forth!" + +"It's a wonderful faculty, seeing the good in everything," sighed Mrs. +Carey. + +"Wonderful tiresome," returned Mrs. Popham, "though I will own up it's +Ossian's only fault, and he can't see his own misfortunes any clearer +than he can see those of other folks. His new colt run away with him +last week and stove the mowin' machine all to pieces. 'Never mind, +Maria!' he says, 'it'll make fust-rate gear for a windmill!' He's out in +the barn now, fussin' over it; you can hear him singin'. They was all +here practicin' for the Methodist concert last, night, an' I didn't +sleep a wink, the tunes kep' a-runnin' in my head so! They always git +Ossian to sing 'Fly like a youthful hart or roe, over the hills where +spices grow,' an' I tell him he's too old; youthful harts an' roes don't +fly over the hills wearin' spectacles, I tell him, but he'll go right on +singin' it till they have to carry him up on the platform in a +wheeled chair!" + +"You go to the Congregational church, don't you, Mrs. Popham?" asked +Mrs. Carey. "I've seen Lallie and Digby at Sunday-school." + +"Yes, Mr. Popham is a Methodist and I'm a Congregationalist, but I say +let the children go where they like, so I always take them with me." + +Mrs. Carey was just struggling to conceal her amusement at this +religious flexibility on Mrs. Popham's part, when she espied Nancy +flying down the street, bareheaded, waving a bit of paper in the air. + +"Are you 'most ready to come home, Muddy?" she called, without coming +any nearer. + +"Yes, quite ready, now Lallie has brought the milk. Good morning, Mrs. +Popham; the children want me for some new enterprise." + +"You give yourself most too much to 'em," expostulated Mrs. Popham; "you +don't take no vacations." + +"Ah, well, you see 'myself' is all I have to give them," answered Mrs. +Carey, taking Peter and going to meet Nancy. + +"Mother," said that young person breathlessly, "I must tell you what I +didn't tell at the time, for fear of troubling you. I wrote to Mr. +Hamilton by the same post that Mr. Harmon did. Bill is so busy and such +a poor writer I thought he wouldn't put the matter nicely at all, and I +didn't want you, with all your worries, brought into it, so I wrote to +the Consul myself, and kept a copy to show you exactly what I said. I +have been waiting at the gate for the letters every day for a week, but +this morning Gilbert happened to be there and shouted, 'A letter from +Germany for you, Nancy!' So all of them are wild with curiosity; Olive +and Cyril too, but I wanted you to open and read it first because it may +be full of awful blows." + +Mrs. Carey sat down on the side of a green bank between the Pophams' +corner and the Yellow House and opened the letter,--with some +misgivings, it must be confessed. Nancy sat close beside her and held +one edge of the wide sheets, closely filled. + +"Why, he has written you a volume, Nancy!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey. "It +must be the complete story of his life! How long was yours to him?" "I +don't remember; pretty long; because there seemed to be so much to tell, +to show him how we loved the house, and why we couldn't spend Cousin +Ann's money and move out in a year or two, and a lot about ourselves, to +let him see we were nice and agreeable and respectable." + +"I'm not sure all that was strictly necessary," commented Mrs. Carey +with some trepidation. + +This was Lemuel Hamilton's letter, dated from the office of the American +Consul in Breslau, Germany. + + MY DEAR MISS NANCY,--As your letter to me was a purely + "business" communication I suppose I ought to begin my reply: + "Dear Madam, Your esteemed favor was received on the sixth + inst. and contents noted," but I shall do nothing of the sort. + I think you must have guessed that I have two girls of my own, + for you wrote to me just as if we were sitting together side + by side, like two friends, not a bit as landlord and tenant. + +Mother Carey's eyes twinkled. She well knew Nancy's informal epistolary +style, and her facile, instantaneous friendliness! + + Every word in your letter interested me, pleased me, touched me. + I feel that I know you all, from the dear mother who sits in + the centre-- + +"What does he mean by that?" + +"I sent him a snap shot of the family." + +"_Nancy_! What for?" + +"So that he could see what we were like; so that he'd know we were fit +to be lifelong tenants!" + +Mrs. Carey turned resignedly to the letter again. + + From the dear mother who sits in the centre, to the lovable + little Peter who looks as if he were all that you describe + him! I was about his age when I went to the Yellow House to + spend a few years. Old Granny Hamilton had lived there all her + life, and when my mother, who was a widow, was seized with a + serious illness she took me home with her for a long visit. + She was never well enough to go away, so my early childhood + was passed in Beulah, and I only left the village when I was ten + years old, and an orphan. + +"Oh, dear!" interpolated Nancy. "It seems, lately, as if nobody had both +father and mother!" + + Granny Hamilton died soon after my mother, and I hardly know who + lived in the house for the next thirty years. It was my + brother's property, and a succession of families occupied it + until it fell to me in my turn. I have no happy memories + connected with it, so you can go ahead and make them for + yourselves. My only remembrance is of the west bedroom, where + my mother lived and died. + +"The west bedroom; that isn't the painted one; no, of course it is the +one where I sleep," said Mrs. Carey. "The painted one must always have +been the guest chamber." + + She could only move from bed to chair, and her greatest pleasure + was to sit by the sunset window and look at the daisies and + buttercups waving in that beautiful sloping stretch of field + with the pine woods beyond. After the grass was mown, and that + field was always left till the last for her sake, she used to + sit there and wait for Queen Anne's lace to come up; its tall + stems and delicate white wheels nodding among the grasses. + +"Oh! I do _like_ him!" exclaimed Nancy impetuously. "Can't you _see_ +him, mother? It's so nice of him to remember that they always mowed the +hayfield last for his mother's sake, and so nice of him to think of +Queen Anne's lace all these years!" + + Now as to business, your Cousin Ann is quite right when she + tells you that you ought not to put expensive improvements on + another person's property lest you be disturbed in your + tenancy. That sort of cousin is always right, whatever she + says. Mine was not named Ann; she was Emma, but the principle + is the same. + +"Nancy!" asked Mrs. Carey, looking away from the letter again, "did you +say anything about your Cousin Ann?" + +"Yes, some little thing or other; for it was her money that we couldn't +spend until we knew we could stay in the house. I didn't describe her, +of course, to Mr. Hamilton; I just told him she was very businesslike, +and yes, I remember now, I told him you said she was a very fine person; +that's about all. But you see how clever he is! he just has 'instinks,' +as Mr. Popham says, and you don't have to tell him much about anything." + + If you are intending to bring the water from the well into the + house and put a large stove in the cellar to warm some of the + upper rooms; if you are papering and painting inside, and + keeping the place in good condition, you are preserving my + property and even adding to its value; so under the + circumstances I could not think of accepting any rent in + money. + +"No rent! Not even the sixty dollars!" exclaimed Nancy. + +"Look; that is precisely what he says." + +"There never was such a dear since the world began!" cried Nancy +joyously. "Oh! do read on; there's a lot more, and the last may +contradict the first." + + Shall I tell you what more the Careys may do for me, they who + have done so much already? + +"So much!" quoted Nancy with dramatic emphasis. "Oh, he _is_ a dear!" + + My son Tom, when he went down to Beulah before starting for + China, visited the house and at my request put away my + mother's picture safely. He is a clever boy, and instead of + placing the thing in an attic where it might be injured, he + tucked it away,--where do you think,--in the old brick oven of + the room that is now, I suppose, your dining room. It is a + capital hiding-place, for there had been no fire there for fifty + years, nor ever will be again. I have other portraits of her + with me, on this side of the water. Please remove the one I + speak of from its wrappings and hang it over the mantel shelf + in the west bedroom. + +"My bedroom! I shall love to have it there," said Mother Carey. + + Then, once a year, on my mother's birthday,--it is the fourth of + July and an easy date to remember,--will my little friend Miss + Nancy, or any of the other Careys, if she is absent, pick a + little nosegay of daisies and buttercups (perhaps there will + even be a bit of early Queen Anne's lace) and put it in a vase + under my mother's picture? That shall be the annual rent paid + for the Yellow House to Lemuel Hamilton by the Careys! + +Tears of joy sprang to the eyes of emotional Nancy. She rose to her feet +and paced the greensward excitedly. + +"Oh, mother, I didn't think there could be another such man after +knowing father and the Admiral. Isn't it all as wonderful as a fairy +story?" + +"There's a little more; listen, dear." + + As to the term of your occupancy, the Careys may have the Yellow + House until the day of my death, unless by some extraordinary + chance my son Tom should ever want it as a summer home. + +"Oh, dear! there comes the dreadful 'unless'! 'My son Tom' is our only +enemy, then!" said Nancy darkly. + +"He is in China, at all events," her mother remarked cheerfully. + + Tom is the only one who ever had a bit of sentiment about + Beulah, and he was always unwilling that the old place should + be occupied by strangers. The curious thing about the matter + is that you and yours do not seem to be strangers to me and + mine. Do you know, dear little Miss Nancy, what brought the + tears to my eyes in your letter? The incident of your father's + asking what you could do to thank the Yellow House for the + happy hour it had given you on that summer day long ago, and the + planting of the crimson rambler by the side of the portico. I + have sent your picture tying up the rose,--and it was so + charming I was loath to let it go,--with your letter, and the + snap shot of the family group, all out to my son Tom in China. + He will know then why I have let the house, to whom, and all + the attendant circumstances. Trust him never to disturb you + when he sees how you love the old place. The planting of that + crimson rambler will fix Tom, for he's a romantic boy. + +"The planting of the rose was a heavenly inspiration if it does 'fix +Tom!' We'll call Tom the Chinese Enemy. No, we'll call him the Yellow +Peril," laughed Nancy in triumph. + + I am delighted with the sample of paper you have chosen for the + front hall. + +"I don't see why you didn't go over to Germany yourself, Nancy, and take +a trunk of samples!" cried Mrs. Carey, wiping the tears of merriment +from her eyes. "I can't think what the postage on your letter must have +been." + +"Ten cents," Nancy confessed, "but wasn't it worth it, Muddy?--Come, +read the last few lines, and then we'll run all the way home to tell the +others." + + Send me anything more, at any time, to give me an idea of the + delightful things you are doing. I shall be proud if you honor + me with an occasional letter. Pray give my regards to your + mother, whom I envy, and all the "stormy petrels," whom I envy + too. + + Believe me, dear Miss Nancy, + + Yours sincerely, + + LEMUEL HAMILTON. + + +"I can't remember why I told him about Mother Carey's chickens," said +Nancy reflectively. "It just seemed to come in naturally. The Yellow +Peril must be rather nice, as well as his father, even if he is our +enemy. That was clever of him, putting his grandmother in the brick +oven!" And here Nancy laughed, and laughed again, thinking how her last +remark would sound if overheard by a person unacquainted with the +circumstances. + +"A delightful, warm, kind, friendly letter," said Mother Carey, folding +it with a caressing hand. "I wish your father could have read it." + +"He doesn't say a word about his children," and Nancy took the sheets +and scanned them again. + +"You evidently gave him the history of your whole family, but he +confines himself to his own life." + +"He mentions 'my son Tom' frequently enough, but there's not a word of +Mrs. Hamilton." + +"No, but there's no reason there should be, especially!" + +"If he loved her he couldn't keep her out," said Nancy shrewdly. "She +just isn't in the story at all. Could any of us write a chronicle of any +house we ever lived in, and leave you out?" + +Mrs. Carey took Nancy's outstretched hands and was pulled up from the +greensward. "You have a few 'instinks' yourself, little daughter," she +said with a swift pat on the rosy cheek. "Now, Peter, put your marbles +in the pocket of your blue jeans, and take the milk pail from under the +bushes; we must hurry or there'll be no chowder." + +As they neared Garden Fore-and-Aft the group of children rushed out to +meet them, Kitty in advance. + +"The fish man didn't come," she said, "and it's long past his time, so +there's no hope; but Julia and I have the dinner all planned. There +wasn't enough of it to go round anyway, so we've asked Olive and Cyril +to stay, and we've set the table under the great maple,--do you care?" + +"Not a bit; we'll have a real jollification, because Nancy has some good +news to tell you!" + +"The dinner isn't quite appropriate for a jollification," Kitty observed +anxiously. "Is the news good enough to warrant opening a jar or a can of +anything?" + +"Open all that doth hap to be closed," cried Nancy, embracing Olive +excitedly. "Light the bonfires on the encroaching hills. Set casks +a-tilt, and so forth." + +"It's the German letter!" said Gilbert at a venture. + +"What is the dinner, Kitty?" Mother Carey asked. + +"New potatoes and string beans from the aft garden. Stale bread made +into milk toast to be served as a course. Then, not that it has anything +to do with the case, but just to give a style to the meal, Julia has +made a salad out of the newspaper." + +Nancy created a diversion by swooning on the grass; a feat which had +given her great fame in charades. + +"It was only the memory of Julia's last newspaper salad!" she murmured +when the usual restoratives had been applied. "Prithee, poppet, what +hast dropped into the dish to-day?" + +Julia was laughing too much to be wholly intelligible, but read from a +scrap in her apron pocket: "'Any fruit in season, cold beans or peas, +minced cucumber, English walnuts, a few cubes of cold meat left from +dinner, hard boiled eggs in slices, flecks of ripe tomatoes and radishes +to perfect the color scheme, a dash of onion juice, dash of paprika, +dash of rich cream.' I have left out the okra, the shallot, the +estragon, the tarragon, the endive, the hearts of artichoke, the +Hungarian peppers and the haricot beans because we hadn't any;--do you +think it will make any difference, Aunt Margaret?" + +"It will," said Nancy oracularly, "but all to the good." + +"Rather a dull salad I call it," commented Gilbert. "Lacks the snap of +the last one. No mention of boned sprats, or snails in aspic, calves' +foot jelly, iced humming birds, pickled edelweiss, or any of those +things kept habitually in the cellars of families like ours. No dash of +Jamaica ginger or Pain-killer or sloe gin or sarsaparilla to give it +piquancy. Unless Julia can find a paper that gives more up-to-date +advice to its country subscribers, we'll have to transfer her from the +kitchen department to the woodshed." + +Julia's whole attitude, during this discussion of her recent culinary +experiments, was indicative of the change that was slowly taking place +in her point of view. The Careys had a large sense of humor, from mother +down as far as Peter, who was still in the tadpole stage of it. They +chaffed one another on all occasions, for the most part courteously and +with entire good nature. Leigh Hunt speaks of the anxiety of certain +persons to keep their minds quiet lest any motion be clumsy, and Julia's +concern had been of this variety; but four or five months spent in a +household where mental operations, if not deep, were incredibly quick, +had made her a little more elastic. Mother Carey had always said that if +Julia had any sense of humor she would discover for herself what a +solemn prig she was, and mend her ways, and it seemed as if this might +be true in course of time. + +"What'll we do with all the milk?" now demanded Peter, who had carried +it all the way from the Pophams', and to whom it appeared therefore of +exaggerated importance. + +"Angel boy!" cried Nancy, embracing him. "The only practical member of +the family! What wouldst thou suggest?" + +"Drink it," was the terse reply. + +"And so't shall be, my liege! Fetch the beaker, lackey," identifying +Cyril with a royal gesture. "Also crystal water from the well, which by +the command of our Cousin Ann will speedily flow in a pipe within the +castle walls. There are healths to be drunk this day when we assemble +under the Hamilton maple, and first and most loyally the health of our +American Consul at Breslau, Germany!" + + + +XXV + +"FOLLOWING THE GLEAM" + + +If the summer months had brought many changes to the dwellers in the +Yellow House and the House of Lords, the autumn was responsible for many +more. Cousin Ann's improvements were set in motion and were promised to +be in full force before cold weather set in, and the fall term at Beulah +Academy had opened with six new, unexpected, and interesting students. +Happily for the Careys and happily for Beulah, the old principal, a +faithful but uninspired teacher, had been called to Massachusetts to +fill a higher position; and only a few days before the beginning of the +term, a young college man, Ralph Thurston, fresh from Bowdoin and +needing experience, applied for and received the appointment. The thrill +of rapture that ran like an electric current through the persons of the +feminine students when they beheld Ralph Thurston for the first +time,--dignified, scholarly, unmistakably the gentleman,--beheld him +mount the platform in the assembly room, and knew him for their own, +this can better be imagined than described! He was handsome, he was +young, he had enough hair (which their principals seldom had possessed), +he did not wear spectacles, he had a pleasing voice, and a manner of +speaking that sent tremors of delight up and down a thirteen-year-old +spine. He had a merry wit and a hearty laugh, but one had only to look +at him closely to feel that he had borne burdens and that his +attainments had been bought with a price. He was going to be difficult +to please, and the girls of all ages drew deep breaths of anticipation +and knew that they should study as never before. The vice-principal, a +lady of fine attainments, was temporarily in eclipse, and such an +astounding love for the classics swept through young Beulah that nobody +could understand it. Ralph Thurston taught Latin and Greek himself, but +parents did not at first observe the mysterious connection between cause +and effect. It was all very young and artless and innocent; helpful and +stimulating too, for Thurston was no budding ladies' man, but a +thoroughly good fellow, manly enough to attract the boys and hold +their interest. + +The entrance of the four Careys and two Lords into the list of students +had an inspiring effect upon the whole school. So far as scholarship was +concerned they were often outstripped by their country neighbors, but +the Careys had seen so much of the world that they had a great deal of +general culture, and the academy atmosphere was affected by it. Olive, +Nancy, and Gilbert went into the highest class; Kathleen, Julia, and +Cyril into the one below. + +The intimacy of Nancy and Olive was a romantic and ardent one. Olive had +never had a real companion in her life; Nancy's friends dotted the +universe wherever she had chanced to live. Olive was uncommunicative, +shy, and stiff with all but a chosen few; Nancy was at ease in all +assemblies. It was Nancy's sympathy and enthusiasm and warmth that +attracted Olive Lord, and it was the combination of Olive's genius and +her need of love, that held Nancy. + +Never were two human creatures more unlike in their ways of thought. +Olive had lived in Beulah seven years, and knew scarcely any one because +of her father's eccentricities and his indifference to the world; but +had you immured Nancy in a convent she would have made a large circle of +acquaintances from the window of her cell, before a month passed over +her head. She had an ardent interest in her fellow creatures, and +whenever they strayed from the strict path of rectitude, she was +consumed with a desire to set them straight. If Olive had seen a drunken +man lying in a ditch, she would scarcely have looked at him, much less +inquired his name. Nancy would have sat by until he recovered himself, +if possible, or found somebody to take him to his destination. As for +the delightful opportunity of persuading him of his folly, she would +have jumped at the chance when she was fifteen or sixteen, but as she +grew older she observed a little more reticence in these delicate +matters, at least when she was endeavoring to reform her elders. She had +succeeded in making young Nat Harmon stop cigarette smoking, but he was +privately less convinced of the error of his ways than he was bewitched +by Nancy. She promised readily to wear a blue ribbon and sit on the +platform in the Baptist Chapel at the Annual Meeting of the Junior +Temperance League. On the eve of the affair she even would gladly have +made a speech when the president begged her to do so, but the +horror-stricken Olive succeeded in stopping her, and her mother firmly +stood by Olive. + +"Oh! all right; I don't care a bit about it, Muddy," she answered +nonchalantly. "Only there is something splendid about rising from a band +of blue-ribboned girls and boys and addressing the multitude for a great +cause." "What do you know about this great cause, Nancy dear, at +your age?" + +"Oh, not much! but you don't have to know much if you say it loud and +clear to the back settees. I've watched how it goes! It was thrilling +when we gave 'Esther the Beautiful Queen' in the Town Hall; when we +waved our hands and sang 'Haman! Haman! Long live Haman!' I almost +fainted with joy." + +"It was very good; I liked it too; but perhaps if you 'faint with joy' +whenever your feet touch a platform, it will be more prudent for you to +keep away!" and Mother Carey laughed. + +"Very well, madam, your will is my law! When you see the youth of Beulah +treading the broad road that leadeth to destruction, and looking on the +wine when it is red in the cup, remember that you withheld my hand +and voice!" + +Gilbert and Cyril were much together, particularly after Cyril's +standing had been increased in Beulah by the news that Mr. Thurston +thought him a remarkable mathematician and perhaps the leading student +in his class. Cyril himself, too pale for a country boy of fourteen, +narrow-shouldered, silent, and timid, took this unexpected fame with +absolute terror, but Olive's pride delighted in it and she positively +bloomed, in the knowledge that her brother was appreciated. She herself +secretly thought books were rather a mistake when paints and brushes +were at hand, and it was no wonder that she did not take high rank, +seeing that she painted an hour before school, and all day Saturday, +alternating her work on the guest chamber of the Yellow House with her +portrait of Nancy for Mother Carey's Christmas present. + +Kathleen and Julia had fallen into step and were good companions. +Kathleen had never forgotten her own breach of good manners and family +loyalty; Julia always remembered the passion of remorse that Kathleen +felt, a remorse that had colored her conduct to Julia ever since. Julia +was a good plodder, and Mr. Thurston complimented her on the excellence +of her Latin recitations, when he had his wits about him and could +remember that she existed. He never had any difficulty in remembering +Nancy. She was not, it must be confessed, especially admirable as a +_verbatim et literatim_ "reciter." Sometimes she forgot entirely what +the book had said on a certain topic, but she usually had some original +observation of her own to offer by way of compromise. At first Mr. +Thurston thought that she was trying to conceal her lack of real +knowledge, and dazzle her instructor at the same time, so that he should +never discover her ignorance. Later on he found where her weakness and +her strength lay. She adapted, invented, modified things +naturally,--embroidered all over her task, so to speak, and delivered it +in somewhat different shape from the other girls. (When she was twelve +she pricked her finger in sewing and made a blood-stain on the little +white mull apron that she was making. The stuff was so delicate that she +did not dare to attempt any cleansing process, and she was in a great +hurry too, so she embroidered a green four leaf clover over the +bloodstain, and all the family exclaimed, "How like Nancy!") Grammar +teased Nancy, algebra and geometry routed her, horse, foot, and +dragoons. No room for embroidery there! Languages delighted her, +map-drawing bored her, and composition intoxicated her, although she was +better at improvising than at the real task of setting down her thoughts +in black and white. The class chronicles and prophecies and songs and +poems would flow to her inevitably, but Kathleen would be the one who +would give new grace and charm to them if she were to read them to +an audience. + +How Beulah Academy beamed, and applauded, and wagged its head in pride +on a certain day before Thanksgiving, when there were exercises in the +assembly room. Olive had drawn The Landing of the Pilgrims on the +largest of the blackboards, and Nancy had written a merry little story +that caused great laughter and applause in the youthful audience. +Gilbert had taken part in a debate and covered himself with glory, and +Kathleen closed the impromptu programme by reciting Tennyson's-- + + O young Mariner, + You from the haven + Under the sea-cliff, + You that are watching + The gray Magician + With eyes of wonder,... + follow the Gleam. + + Great the Master, + And sweet the Magic, + When over the valley, + In early summers, + Over the mountain, + On human faces, + And all around me, + Moving to melody + Floated the Gleam. + + O young Mariner, + Down to the haven, + Call your companion, + Launch your vessel + And crowd your canvas, + And, ere it vanishes + Over the margin, + After it, follow it, + Follow the Gleam. + +Kathleen's last year's brown velveteen disclosed bronze slippers and +stockings,--a novelty in Beulah,--her hair fell in such curls as Beulah +had rarely beheld, and her voice was as sweet as a thrush's note; so +perhaps it is not strange that the poem set a kind of fashion at the +academy, and "following the gleam" became a sort of text by which to +study and grow and live. + +Thanksgiving Day approached, and everybody was praying for a flurry of +snow, just enough to give a zest to turkey and cranberry sauce. On the +twentieth it suddenly occurred to Mother Carey that this typical New +England feast day would be just the proper time for the housewarming, so +the Lord children, the Pophams, and the Harmons were all bidden to come +at seven o'clock in the evening. Great preparations ensued. Rows of Jack +o' Lanterns decorated the piazza, and the Careys had fewer pumpkin pies +in November than their neighbors, in consequence of their extravagant +inroads upon the golden treasures of the aft garden. Inside were a few +late asters and branches of evergreen, and the illumination suggested +that somebody had been lending additional lamps and candles for the +occasion. The original equipment of clothes possessed by the Careys on +their arrival in Beulah still held good, and looked well by lamplight, +so that the toilettes were fully worthy of so important a function. + +Olive's picture of Nancy was finished, and she announced the absolute +impossibility of keeping it until Christmas, so it reached the Yellow +House on Thanksgiving morning. When it was unwrapped by Nancy and +displayed for the first time to the family, Mother Carey's lips parted, +her eyes opened in wonder, but no words came for an instant, in the +bewilderment of her mind. Olive had written the title "Young April" +under the picture. Nancy stood on a bit of dandelion-dotted turf, a +budding tree in the background, her arm flung over the neck of a Jersey +calf. The calf had sat for his portrait long before, but Nancy had been +added since May. Olive, by a clever inspiration, had turned Nancy's face +away and painted her with the April breeze blowing her hair across her +cheek. She was not good at painting features, her art was too crude, but +somehow the real thing was there; and the likeness to Nancy, in figure, +pose, and hair, was so unmistakable that her mother caught her breath. +As for the calf, he, at least, was distinctly in Olive's line, and he +was painted with a touch of genius. + +"It is better of the calf than it is of you, Nancy," said Gilbert +critically. + +"Isn't Mr. Bossy lovely?" his sister responded amiably. "Wouldn't he put +any professional beauty out of countenance? I am proud to be painted +beside him! Do you like it, Muddy dear?" + +"Like it?" she exclaimed, "it is wonderful! It must be sent to Boston +for criticism, and we must invent some way of persuading Mr. Lord to +give Olive the best instruction to be had. This picture is even better +than anything she has done in the painted chamber. I shouldn't wonder a +bit, Nancy, if little Beulah were to be very proud of Olive in the +years to come!" + +Nancy was transported at her mother's praise. "I felt it, I knew it! I +always said Olive was a genius," she cried, clapping her hands. "Olive +is 'following the gleam'! Can't you feel the wind blowing my hair and +dress? Don't you see that the calf is chewing his cud and is going to +move in just a minute? Olive's animals are always just going to +move!--Oh, Muddy dear! when you see Olive nowadays, smiling and busy and +happy, aren't you glad you stretched your wings and took her under them +with the rest of us? And don't you think you could make a 'new beast' +out of Mr. Henry Lord, or is he too old a beast even for Mother Carey?" + + + +XXVI + +A ZOOLOGICAL FATHER + + +That was just what Mother Carey was wondering when Nancy spoke, and as +the result of several hours' reflection she went out for a walk just +before dusk and made her way towards The Cedars with a package under +her cloak. + +She followed the long lane that led to the house, and knocked at the +front door rather timidly. In her own good time Mrs. Bangs answered the +knock and admitted Mrs. Carey into the dreariest sitting room she had +ever entered. + +"I am Mrs. Carey from the Hamilton house," she said to Mrs. Bangs. "Will +you ask Mr. Lord if he will see me for a moment?" + +Mrs. Bangs was stupefied at the request, for, in her time, scarcely a +single caller from the village had crossed the threshold, although there +had been occasional visitors from Portland or Boston. + +Mrs. Carey waited a few moments, silently regarding the unequalled +bareness, ugliness, and cheerlessness of the room. "Olive has a sense of +beauty," she thought, "and Olive is sixteen; it is Olive who ought to +make this place different from what it is, and she can, unless her +father is the stumbling-block in the way." + +At this moment the possible stumbling-block, Henry Lord, Ph.D., came in +and greeted her civilly. His manner was never genial, for there was +neither love in his heart nor warm blood in his veins; but he was +courteous, for he was an educated fossil, of good birth and up-bringing. +He had been dissecting specimens in his workroom, and he looked capable +of dismembering Mother Carey; but bless your heart, she had weapons in +her unseen armory that were capable of bringing confusion to his paltry +apparatus!--among others a delicate, slender little sword that pierced +deep on occasion. + +Henry Lord was of medium height; spare, clean-shaven, thin-lipped, with +scanty auburn hair, high forehead, and small keen eyes, especially +adapted to the microscope, though ill fitted to use in friendly +conversation. + +"We are neighbors, Professor Lord, though we have never met," said Mrs. +Carey, rising and giving him her hand. + +"My children know you better than I," he answered, "and I feel it very +kind in you to allow them to call on you so frequently." They had lived +at the Yellow House for four months save at meal times, but as their +father was unaware of the number and extent of their visits Mrs. Carey +thought it useless to speak of them, so she merely said: + +"It is a great pleasure to have them with us. My children have left many +friends behind them in Massachusetts and elsewhere, and might have been +lonely in Beulah; besides, I often think the larger the group (within +certain limits), the better chance children have of learning how +to live." + +"I should certainly not have permitted Olive and Cyril to attend the +local academy but for your family," said Professor Lord. "These country +schools never have any atmosphere of true scholarliness, and the speech +and manners of both teachers and pupils are execrable." + +"I dare say that is often the case. If the academies could furnish such +teachers as existed fifty years ago; and alas! if we parents could +furnish such vigorous, determined, ambitious, self-denying pupils as +used to be sent out from country homes, we should have less to complain +of. Of course we are peculiarly fortunate here in Beulah." + +Mr. Lord looked faintly amused and infinitely superior. "I am afraid, my +dear lady," he remarked, "that you have not had long enough experience +to comprehend the slenderness of Mr. Philpot's mental equipment." + +"Oh, Mr. Philpot resigned nearly three months ago," said Mrs. Carey +easily, giving Henry Lord, Ph.D., her first stab, and a look of +amusement on her own behalf. "Ralph Thurston, the present principal, is +a fine, unusual fellow." + +"Really? The children have never mentioned any change, but I regret to +say I am absent-minded at meals. The death of my wife left many gaps in +the life of the household." + +"So that you have to be mother and father in one!" (Stab two: very +delicately delivered.) + +"I fear I am too much of a student to be called a good family man." + +"So I gathered." (Stab three. She wanted to provoke curiosity.) + +Mr. Lord looked annoyed. He knew his unpopularity, and did not wish any +village gossip to reach the ears of strangers. "You, my dear madam, are +capable of appreciating my devotion to my life work, which the neighbors +naturally wholly misunderstand," he said. + +"I gathered nothing from the neighbors," responded Mrs. Carey, "but a +woman has only to know children well to see at a glance what they need. +You are so absorbed in authorship just now, that naturally it is a +little hard for the young people; but I suppose there are breathing +places, 'between books'?" + +"There are no breathing places between mine; there will be six volumes, +and I am scarcely half through the third, although I have given seven +years to the work. Still, I have an excellent housekeeper who attends to +all our simple needs. My children are not fitted for society." + +"No, not quite." (Stab four). "That is the reason they ought to see a +good deal of it, but they are very fine children and very clever." + +"I am glad you think so, but they certainly write bad English and have +no general knowledge whatsoever." + +"Oh, well, that will come, doubtless, when you have more time with +them." (Stab five.) "I often think such mysterious things as good speech +and culture can never be learned in school. I shouldn't wonder if that +were our department, Dr. Lord!" (Stab six.) "However, you will agree, +modest parent as you are, that your Olive is a genius?" + +"I have never observed it," replied her father. "I cannot, of course, +allow her to practice on any musical instrument, because my studies +demand quiet, but I don't think she cares for music." + +"She draws and paints, however, in the most astonishing way, and she has +a passionate energy, and concentration, and devotion to her work that I +have never seen coupled with anything but an extraordinary talent. She +is destined to go very far, in my opinion." + +"Not too far, I hope," remarked Mr. Lord, with an icy smile. "Olive can +paint on plush and china as much as she likes, but I am not partial to +'careers' for young women." + +"Nor am I; save when the gift is so commanding, so obvious, that it has +to be reckoned with;--but I must not delay my business any longer, nor +keep you from your work. We are having a housewarming this evening at +seven. Olive and Cyril are there now, helping in the preparations, and I +want to know if they may stay to supper, and if you can send for them at +half past nine or ten." + +"Certainly they may stay, though I should think your supper table could +hardly stand the strain." + +"Where there are five already, two more make no difference, save in +better appetite for all," said Mother Carey, smiling and rising. + +"If you will allow me to get my hat and coat I will accompany you to the +main road," said Mr. Lord, going to the front hall, and then opening the +door for Mrs. Carey. "Let me take your parcel, please." + +He did not know in the least why he said it and why he did it. The lady +had interfered with his family affairs to a considerable extent, and had +made several remarks that would have appeared impertinent, had they not +issued from a very winsome, beautiful mouth. Mrs. Ossian Popham or Mrs. +Bill Harmon would have been shown the door for saying less, yet here was +Henry Lord, Ph.D., ambling down the lane by Mother Carey's side, +thinking to himself what a burden she lifted from his shoulders by her +unaccountable interest in his unattractive children. He was also +thinking how "springy" was the lady's step in her short black dress, how +brilliant the chestnut hair looked under the black felt hat, and how +white the skin gleamed above the glossy lynx boa. A kind of mucilaginous +fluid ran in his veins instead of blood, but Henry Lord, Ph.D., had his +assailable side nevertheless, and he felt extraordinarily good natured, +almost as if the third volume were finished, with public and publishers +clamoring for its appearance. + +"I don't know where Olive could have got any such talent as you +describe," he said, as they were walking along the lane. "She had some +lessons long ago, I remember, and her mother used to talk of her amusing +herself with pencil and paint, but I have heard nothing of it +for years." + +"Ask to see her sketches when you are talking with her about her work +some day," suggested Mother Carey. (Stab seven.) "As a matter of fact +she probably gets her talent from you." + +"From me!" Printed letters fail to register the amazement in Professor +Lord's tone. + +"Why not, when you consider her specialty?" + +"_What_ specialty?" + +Really, a slender sword was of no use with this man; a bludgeon was the +only instrument, yet it might wound, and she only wanted to prick. Had +the creature never seen Olive sketching, nor noted her choice +of subjects? + +"She paints animals; paints nothing else, if she can help it; though she +does fairly well with other things. Is it impossible that your study of +zoology--your thought, your absorption for years and years, in the +classification, the structure, the habits of animals--may have been +stamped on your child's mind? She has an ardor equal to your own, only +showing itself in a different manner. You may have passed on, in some +mysterious way, your knowledge to Olive. She may have unconsciously +blended it with some instinct for expression of her own, and it comes +out in pictures. Look at this, Professor Lord. Olive gave it to +me to-day." + +They stood together at the gate leading out into the road, and Mrs. +Carey unwrapped the painting and poised it against the top of the gate. + +Olive's father looked at it for a moment and then said, "I am no judge +of these things, technically or otherwise, but it certainly seems very +creditable work for a girl of Olive's age." + +"Oh, it is surely more than that! My girl Nancy stands there in the +flesh, though her face is hidden. Look at the wind blowing, look at the +delightful, the enchanting calf; above all look at the title! Who in the +world but a little genius could have composed that sketch, breathing +youth in every inch of it,--and called it 'Young April'! Oh! Professor +Lord, I am very bold, because your wife is not living, and it is women +who oftenest see these budding tendencies in children; forgive me, but +do cherish and develop this talent of Olive's." + +The eyes the color of the blue velvet bonnet were turned full upon Henry +Lord, Ph.D. They swam in tears and the color came and went in her cheek; +she was forty, but it was a lovely cheek still. + +"I will think it over," he replied with some embarrassment as he wrapped +the picture again and handed it to her. "Meantime I am certainly very +much obliged to you. You seem to have an uncommon knowledge of young +people. May I ask if you are, or have been, a teacher?" "Oh, no!" Mrs. +Carey remarked with a smile, "I am just a mother,--that's all! +Good night." + + + +XXVII + +THE CAREY HOUSEWARMING + + +The housewarming was at its height, and everybody agreed once in every +ten minutes that it was probably the most beautiful party that had ever +happened in the history of the world. + +Water flowed freely through Cousin Ann's expensive pipes, that had been +buried so deep in their trenches that the winter frosts could not affect +them. Natty Harmon tried the kitchen pump secretly several times during +the evening, for the water had to run up hill all the way from the well +to the kitchen sink, and he believed this to be a continual miracle that +might "give out" at any moment. The stove in the cellar, always alluded +to by Gilbert as the "young furnace," had not yet been used, save by way +of experiment, but it was believed to be a perfect success. To-night +there was no need of extra heat, and there were great ceremonies to be +observed in lighting the fires on the hearthstones. They began with the +one in the family sitting room; Colonel Wheeler, Ralph Thurston, Mr. and +Mrs. Bill Harmon with Natty and Rufus, Mr. and Mrs. Popham with Digby +and Lallie Joy, all standing in admiring groups and thrilling with +delight at the order of events. Mother Carey sat by the fireplace; +little Peter, fairly radiant with excitement, leaning against her knee +and waiting for his own great moment, now close at hand. + +"_When ye come into a house, salute it; and if the house be worthy, let +your peace come upon it_. + +"_To all those who may dwell therein from generation to generation may +it be a house of God, a gate of heaven_. + +"_For every house is builded by some man, but he that built all things +is God, seeing that he giveth to every one of us life and breath and all +good things_." + +Mother Carey spoke these words so simply and naturally, as she looked +towards her neighbors one after another, with her hand resting on +Peter's curly head, that they hardly knew whether to keep quiet or +say Amen. + +"Was that the Bible, Osh?" whispered Bill Harmon. + +"Don't know; 'most everything she says sounds like the Bible or +Shakespeare to me." + +In the hush that followed Mother Carey's salutation Gilbert approached +with a basket over his arm, and quickly and neatly laid a little fire +behind the brass andirons on the hearth. Then Nancy handed Peter a +loosely bound sheaf, saying: "To light this fire I give you a torch. In +it are herbs of the field for health of the body, a fern leaf for grace, +a sprig of elm for peace, one of oak for strength, with evergreen to +show that we live forever in the deeds we have done. To these we have +added rosemary for remembrance and pansies for thoughts." + +Peter crouched on the hearth and lighted the fire in three places, then +handed the torch to Kathleen as he crept again into his mother's lap, +awed into complete silence by the influence of his own mystic rite. +Kathleen waved the torch to and fro as she recited some beautiful lines +written for some such purpose as that which called them +together to-night. + + "Burn, fire, burn! + Flicker, flicker, flame! + Whose hand above this blaze is lifted + Shall be with touch of magic gifted, + To warm the hearts of chilly mortals + Who stand without these open portals. + The touch shall draw them to this fire, + Nigher, nigher, + By desire. + Whoso shall stand on this hearth-stone, + Flame-fanned, + Shall never, never stand alone. + Whose home is dark and drear and old, + Whose hearth is cold, + This is his own. + Flicker, flicker, flicker, flame! + Burn, fire, burn!"[1] + +[Footnote 1: Florence Converse.] + +Next came Olive's turn to help in the ceremonies. Ralph Thurston had +found a line of Latin for them in his beloved Horace: _Tibi splendet +focus_ (For you the hearth-fire shines). Olive had painted the motto on +a long narrow panel of canvas, and, giving it to Mr. Popham, stood by +the fireside while he deftly fitted it into the place prepared for it. +The family had feared that he would tell a good story when he found +himself the centre of attraction, but he was as dumb as Peter, and for +the same reason. + +"Olive has another lovely gift for the Yellow House," said Mother Carey, +rising, "and to carry out the next part of the programme we shall have +to go in procession upstairs to my bedroom." + +"Guess there wan't many idees to give round to other folks after the +Lord made _her_!" exclaimed Bill Harmon to his wife as they went through +the lighted hall. + +Gilbert, at the head of the procession, held Mother Hamilton's picture, +which had been taken from the old brick oven where "my son Tom" had +hidden it. Mother Carey's bedroom, with its bouquets of field flowers on +the wall paper, was gaily lighted and ready to receive the gift. Nancy +stood on a chair and hung the portrait over the fireplace, saying, "We +place this picture here in memory of Agatha, mother of Lemuel Hamilton, +owner of the Yellow House. Underneath it we lay a posy of pressed +daisies, buttercups, and Queen Anne's lace, the wild flowers she +loved best." + +Now Olive took away a green garland covering the words "_Mater Cara_," +that she had painted in brown letters just over the bricks of the +fireplace. The letters were in old English text, and a riot of +buttercups and grasses twined their way amongst them. + +"_Mater Cara_ stands for 'mother dear,'" said Nancy, "and thus this room +will be full of memories of two dear mothers, an absent and a +present one." + +Then Kathleen and Gilbert and Julia, Mother Carey and Peter bowed their +heads and said in chorus: "_O Thou who dwellest in so many homes, +possess thyself of this. Thou who settest the solitary in families, +bless the life that is sheltered here. Grant that trust and peace and +comfort may abide within, and that love and light and usefulness may go +out from this house forever. Amen_." + +There was a moment's silence and then all the party descended the stairs +to the dining room. + +"Ain't they the greatest?" murmured Lallie Joy, turning to her father, +but he had disappeared from the group. + +The dining room was a blaze of glory, and great merriment ensued as they +took their places at the table. Mother Carey poured coffee, Nancy +chocolate, and the others helped serve the sandwiches and cake, +doughnuts and tarts. + +"Where is Mr. Popham?" asked Nancy at the foot of the table. "We cannot +be happy without Mr. Popham." + +At that moment the gentleman entered, bearing a huge object concealed by +a piece of green felt. Approaching the dining table, he carefully placed +the article in the centre and removed the cloth. + +It was the Dirty Boy, carefully mended! + +The guests naturally had no associations with the Carey Curse, and the +Careys themselves were dumb with amazement and despair. + +"I've seen this thing layin' in the barn chamber in a thousand pieces +all summer!" explained Mr. Popham radiantly. "It wan't none o' my +business if the family throwed it away thinkin' it wan't no more good. +Thinks I to myself, I never seen anything Osh Popham couldn't mend if he +took time enough and glue enough; so I carried this little feller home +in a bushel basket one night last month, an' I've spent eleven evenin's +puttin' him together! I don't claim he's good 's new, 'cause he ain't; +but he's consid'able better'n he was when I found him layin' in the +barn chamber!" + +"Thank you, Mr. Popham!" said Mrs. Carey, her eyes twinkling as she +looked at the laughing children. "It was kind of you to spend so much +time in our behalf." + +"Well, I says to myself there's nothin' too good for 'em, an' when it +comes Thanksgivin' I'll give 'em one thing more to be thankful for!" + +"Quit talkin', Pop, will yer?" whispered Digby, nudging his father. +"You've kep' us from startin' to eat 'bout five minutes a'ready, an' I'm +as holler as a horn!" + +It was as cheery, gay, festive, neighborly, and friendly a supper as +ever took place in the dining room of the Yellow House, although +Governor Weatherby may have had some handsomer banquets in his time. +When it was over all made their way into the rosy, bowery, summer +parlor. Soon another fire sparkled and snapped on the hearth, and there +were songs and poems and choruses and Osh Popham's fiddle, to say +nothing of the supreme event of the evening, his rendition of "Fly like +a youthful hart or roe, over the hills where spices grow," to Mother +Carey's accompaniment. He always slipped up his glasses during this +performance and closed his eyes, but neither grey hairs nor "specs" +could dim the radiant smile that made him seem about fifteen years old +and the junior of both his children. + +Mrs. Harmon thought he sang too much, and told her husband privately +that if he was a canary bird she should want to keep a table cover over +his head most of the time, but he was immensely popular with the rest of +his audience. + +Last of all the entire company gathered round the old-fashioned piano +for a parting hymn. The face of the mahogany shone with delight, and why +not, when it was doing everything (almost everything!) within the scope +of a piano, and yet the family had enjoyed weeks of good nourishing +meals on what had been saved by its exertions. Also, what rational +family could mourn the loss of an irregularly shaped instrument standing +on three legs and played on one corner? The tall silver candle sticks +gleamed in the firelight, the silver dish of polished Baldwins blushed +rosier in the glow. Mother Carey played the dear old common metre tune, +and the voices rang out in Whittier's hymn. The Careys all sang like +thrushes, and even Peter, holding his hymn book upside down, put in +little bird notes, always on the key, whenever he caught a +familiar strain. + + "Once more the liberal year laughs out + O'er richer stores than gems or gold; + Once more, with harvest-song and shout + Is Nature's bloodless triumph told." + + "We shut our eyes, the flowers bloom on; + We murmur, but the corn-ears fill; + We choose the shadow, but the sun + That casts it shines behind us still." + + "O favors every year made new! + O gifts with rain and sunshine sent! + The bounty overruns our due, + The fulness shames our discontent." + + + +XXVIII + +"TIBI SPLENDET FOCUS" + + +There was one watcher of all this, and one listener, outside of the +Yellow House, that none of the party suspected, and that was Henry +Lord, Ph.D. + +When he left Mrs. Carey at the gate at five o'clock, he went back to his +own house and ordered his supper to be brought him on a tray in his +study. He particularly liked this, always, as it freed him from all +responsibility of serving his children, and making an occasional remark; +and as a matter of fact everybody was as pleased as he when he ate +alone, the occasional meals Olive and Cyril had by themselves being the +only ones they ever enjoyed or digested. + +He studied and wrote and consulted heavy tomes, and walked up and down +the room, and pulled out colored plates from portfolios, all with great +satisfaction until he chanced to look at the clock when it struck ten. +He had forgotten to send for the children as he had promised Mother +Carey! He went out into the hall and called Mrs. Bangs in a stentorian +voice. No answer. Irritated, as he always was when crossed in the +slightest degree, he went downstairs and found the kitchen empty. + +"Her cub of a nephew has been staying to supper with her, guzzling and +cramming himself at my expense," he thought, "and now she has walked +home with him! It's perfect nonsense to go after a girl of sixteen and a +boy of thirteen. As if they couldn't walk along a country road at ten +o'clock! Still, it may look odd if some one doesn't go, and I can't lock +the house till they come, anyway." + +He drew on his great coat, put on his cap, and started down the lane in +no good humor. It was a crisp, starlight night and the ground was +freezing fast. He walked along, his hands in his pockets, his head bent. +As he went through the gate to the main road he glanced up. The Yellow +House, a third of a mile distant, was a blaze of light! There must have +been a candle or a lamp in every one of its windows, he thought. The +ground rose a little where the house stood, and although it could not be +seen in summer because of the dense foliage everywhere, the trees were +nearly bare now. + +"My handsome neighbor is extravagant," he said to himself with a grim +smile. "Is the illumination for Thanksgiving, I wonder? Oh, no, I +remember she said the party was in the nature of a housewarming." + +As he went up the pathway he saw that the shades were up and no curtains +drawn anywhere. The Yellow House had no intention of hiding its lights +under bushels that evening, of all others; besides, there were no +neighbors within a long distance. + +Standing on the lowest of the governor's "circ'lar steps" he could see +the corner where the group stood singing, with shining faces:-- + + "Once more the liberal year laughs out + O'er richer stores than gems or gold." + +Mother Carey's fine head rose nobly from her simple black dress, and her +throat was as white as the deep lace collar that was her only ornament. + +Nancy he knew by sight, and Nancy in a crimson dress was singing her +thankful heart out. Who was the dark-haired girl standing by her side, +the two with arms round each other's waists,--his own Olive! He had +always thought her unattractive, but her hair was smoothly braided and +her eyes all aglow. Cyril stood between Gilbert and Mother Carey. Cyril, +he knew, could not carry a tune to save his life, but he seemed to be +opening his lips and uttering words all the same. Where was the timid +eye, the "hangdog look," the shrinking manner, he so disliked in his +son? Great Heavens! the boy laid his hand on Mrs. Carey's shoulder and +beat time there gently with a finger, as if a mother's shoulder could be +used for any nice, necessary sort of purpose. + +If he knocked at the door now, he thought, he should interrupt the +party; which was seemingly at its height. He, Henry Lord, Ph.D., +certainly had no intention of going in to join it, not with Ossian +Popham and Bill Harmon as fellow guests. + +He made his way curiously around the outside of the house, looking in at +all the windows, and by choosing various positions, seeing as much as he +could of the different rooms. Finally he went up on the little back +piazza, attracted by the firelight in the family sitting room. There was +a noble fire, and once, while he was looking, Digby Popham stole quietly +in, braced up the logs with a proprietary air, swept up the hearth, +replaced the brass wire screen, and stole out again as quickly as +possible, so that he might not miss too much of the party. + +"They seem to feel pretty much at home," thought Mr. Lord. + +The fire blazed higher and brighter. It lighted up certain words painted +in dark green and gold on the white panel under the mantelpiece. He +pressed his face quite close to the window, thinking that he must be +mistaken in seeing such unconnected letters as T-i-b-i, but gradually +they looked clearer to him and he read distinctly "Tibi splendet focus." + +"Somebody knows his Horace," thought Henry Lord, Ph.D., as he stumbled +off the piazza. "'For you the hearth-fire glows,' I shan't go in; not +with that crew; let them wait; and if it gets too late, somebody else +will walk home with the children." + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +He picked his way along the side of the house to the front, every window +sending out its candle gleam. + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +From dozens of windows the welcome shone. Its gleams and sparkles +positively pursued him as he turned his face towards the road and his +own dark, cheerless house. Perhaps he had better, on the whole, keep one +lamp burning in the lower part after this, to show that the place was +inhabited? + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +He had "bricked up" the fireplace in his study and put an air-tight +stove in, because it was simply impossible to feed an open fire and +write a book at the same time. He didn't know that you could write twice +as good a book in half the time with an open fire to help you! He didn't +know any single one of the myriad aids that can come to you from such +cheery, unexpected sources of grace and inspiration! + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +Would the words never stop ringing in his ears? Perhaps, after all, it +would look queer to Mrs. Carey (he cared nothing for Popham or Harmon +opinion) if he left the children to get home by themselves. Perhaps-- + +"FOR YOU THE HEARTH-FIRE GLOWS." + +Henry Lord, Ph.D., ascended the steps, and plied the knocker. Digby +Popham came out of the parlor and opened the front door. + +Everybody listened to see who was the late comer at the party. + +"Will you kindly tell Miss Olive and Master Cyril Lord that their father +has called for them?" + +Mr. Lord's cold, severe voice sounded clearly in the parlor, and every +word could be distinctly heard. + +Gilbert and Nancy were standing together, and Gilbert whispered +instantly to his sister: "The old beast has actually called for Olive +and Cyril!" + +"Hush, Gilly! He must be a 'new beast' or he wouldn't have come at all!" +answered Nancy. + + + +XXIX + +"TH' ACTION FINE" + + +December, January, and February passed with a speed that had something +of magic in it. The Careys had known nothing heretofore of the rigors of +a State o' Maine winter, but as yet they counted it all joy. They were +young and hearty and merry, and the air seemed to give them all new +energy. Kathleen's delicate throat gave no trouble for the first time in +years; Nancy's cheeks bloomed more like roses than ever; Gilbert, +growing broader shouldered and deeper chested daily, simply revelled in +skating and coasting; even Julia was forced into an activity wholly +alien to her nature, because it was impossible for her to keep warm +unless she kept busy. + +Mother Carey and Peter used to look from a bedroom window of a clear +cold morning and see the gay little procession start for the academy. +Over the dazzling snow crust Olive and Cyril Lord would be skimming to +meet the Careys, always at the same point at the same hour. There were +rough red coats and capes, red mittens, squirrel caps pulled well down +over curly and smooth heads; glimpses of red woolen stockings; thick +shoes with rubbers over them; great parcels of books in straps. They +looked like a flock of cardinal birds, Mother Carey thought, as the +upturned faces, all aglow with ruddy color, smiled their morning +good-bye. Gilbert had "stoked" the great stove in the cellar full of +hard wood logs before he left, and Mrs. Carey and Peter had a busy +morning before them with the housework. The family had risen at seven. +Julia had swept and dusted; Kathleen had opened the bedroom windows, +made the washstands tidy, filled the water pitchers, and changed the +towels. Gilbert had carried wood and Peter kindlings, for the fires that +had to be laid on the hearths here and there. Mother had cooked the +plain breakfast while Nancy put the dining room in order and set the +table, and at eight o'clock, when they sat down to plates piled high +with slices of brown and white bread, to dishes of eggs or picked-up cod +fish, or beans warmed over in the pot, with baked potatoes sometimes, +and sometimes milk toast, or Nancy's famous corn muffins, no family of +young bears ever displayed such appetites! On Saturday mornings there +were griddle cakes and maple syrup from their own trees; for Osh Popham +had shown them in the spring how to tap their maples, and collect the +great pails of sap to boil down into syrup. Mother Carey and Peter made +the beds after the departure of the others for school, and it was pretty +to see the sturdy Peter-bird, sometimes in his coat and mittens, +standing on the easiest side of the beds and helping his mother to +spread the blankets and comforters smooth. His fat legs carried him up +and downstairs a dozen times on errands, while his sweet piping voice +was lifted in a never ending stream of genial conversation, as he told +his mother what he had just done, what he was doing at the present +moment, how he was doing it, and what he proposed to do in a minute or +two. Then there was a lull from half past ten to half past eleven, +shortened sometimes on baking days, when the Peter-bird had his lessons. +The old-fashioned kitchen was clean and shining by that time. The stove +glistened and the fire snapped and crackled. The sun beamed in at the +sink window, doing all he could for the climate in the few hours he was +permitted to be on duty in a short New England winter day. Peter sat on +a cricket beside his mother's chair and clasped his "Reading without +Tears" earnestly and rigidly, believing it to be the key to the +universe. Oh! what an hour of happiness to Mother Carey when the boy +would lift the very copy of his father's face to her own; when the +well-remembered smile and the dear twinkle of the eyes in Peter's face +would give her heart a stab of pain that was half joy after all, it was +so full to the brim of sweet memories. In that warm still hour, when she +was filling the Peter-bird's mind and soul with heavenly learning, how +much she learned herself! Love poured from her, through voice and lips +and eyes, and in return she drank it in thirstily from the little +creature who sat there at her knee, a twig growing just as her bending +hand inclined it; all the buds of his nature opening out in the +mother-sunshine that surrounded him. Eleven thirty came all too soon. +Then before long the kettle would begin to sing, the potatoes to bubble +in the saucepan, and Mother Carey's spoon to stir the good things that +had long been sizzling quietly in an iron pot. Sometimes it was bits of +beef, sometimes mutton, but the result was mostly a toothsome mixture of +turnips and carrots and onions in a sea of delicious gravy, with +surprises of meat here and there to vary any possible monotony. Once or +twice a week dumplings appeared, giving an air of excitement to the +meal, and there was a delectable "poor man's stew" learned from Mrs. +Popham; the ingredients being strips of parsnip, potatoes cut in +quarters, a slice or two of sweet browned pork for a flavor, and a quart +of rich milk, mixed with the parsnip juices into an appetizing sauce. +The after part of the dinner would be a dish of baked apples with warm +gingerbread, or sometimes a deep apple pandowdy, or the baked Indian +pudding that was a syrupy, fragrant concoction made of corn meal and +butter and molasses baked patiently in the oven for hours. + + +Mother had the dishes to wash after she had tucked the Peter-bird under +the afghan on the sitting room sofa for his daily nap, but there was +never any grumbling in her heart over the weary days and the +unaccustomed tasks; she was too busy "making things make themselves." If +only there were a little more money! That was her chief anxiety; for the +unexpected, the outside sources of income were growing fewer, and in a +year's time the little hoard would be woefully small. Was she doing all +that she could, she wondered, as her steps flew over the Yellow House +from attic to cellar. She could play the piano and sing; she could speak +three languages and read four; she had made her curtsy at two foreign +courts; admiration and love had followed her ever since she could +remember, and here she was, a widow at forty, living in a half-deserted +New England village, making parsnip stews for her children's dinner. +Well, it was a time of preparation, and its rigors and self-denials must +be cheerfully faced. She ought to be thankful that she was able to get +a simple dinner that her children could eat; she ought to be thankful +that her beef and parsnip stews and cracker puddings and corn bread were +being transmuted into blood and brawn and brain-tissue, to help the +world along somewhere a little later! She ought to be grateful that it +was her blessed fortune to be sending four rosy, laughing, vigorous +young people down the snowy street to the white-painted academy; that it +was her good luck to see four heads bending eagerly over their books +around the evening lamp, and have them all turn to her for help and +encouragement in the hard places. Why should she complain, so long as +the stormy petrels were all working and playing in Mother Carey's water +garden where they ought to be; gathering strength to fly over or dive +under the ice-pack and climb Shiny Wall? There is never any gate in the +wall; Tom the Water Baby had found that out for himself; so it is only +the plucky ones who are able to surmount the thousand difficulties they +encounter on their hazardous journey to Peacepool. How else, if they had +not learned themselves, could Mother Carey's chickens go out over the +seas and show good birds the way home? At such moments Mrs. Carey would +look at her image in the glass and say, "No whimpering, madam! You can't +have the joys of motherhood without some of its pangs! Think of your +blessings, and don't be a coward!-- + + "Who sweeps a room as by God's laws + Makes that and th' action fine." + +Then her eyes would turn from blue velvet to blue steel, and strength +would flow into her from some divine, benignant source and transmute her +into father as well as mother! + +Was the hearth fire kindled in the Yellow House sending its glow through +the village as well as warming those who sat beside it? There were +Christmas and New Year's and St. Valentine parties, and by that time +Bill Harmon saw the woodpile in the Carey shed grow beautifully less. He +knew the price per cord,--no man better; but he and Osh Popham winked at +each other one windy February day and delivered three cords for two, +knowing that measurement of wood had not been included in Mother Carey's +education. Natty Harmon and Digby Popham, following examples a million +per cent better than parental lectures, asked one afternoon if they +shouldn't saw and chop some big logs for the fireplaces. + +Mrs. Carey looked at them searchingly, wondering if they could possibly +guess the state of her finances, concluded they couldn't and said +smilingly: "Indeed I will gladly let you saw for an hour or two if +you'll come and sit by the fire on Saturday night, when we are going to +play spelling games and have doughnuts and root beer." + +The Widow Berry, who kept academy boarders, sent in a luscious mince pie +now and then, and Mrs. Popham and Mrs. Harmon brought dried apples or +pumpkins, winter beets and Baldwin apples. It was little enough, they +thought, when the Yellow House, so long vacant, was like a beacon light +to the dull village; sending out its beams on every side. + +"She ain't no kind of a manager, I'm 'fraid!" said Bill Harmon. "I give +her 'bout four quarts and a half of kerosene for a gallon every time she +sends her can to be filled, but bless you, she ain't any the wiser! I +try to give her as good measure in everything as she gives my children, +but you can't keep up with her! She's like the sun, that shines on the +just 'n' on the unjust. Hen Lord's young ones eat their lunch or their +supper there once or twice a week, though the old skinflint's got fifty +thousand dollars in the bank." + +"Never mind, Bill." said Osh Popham; "there's goin' to be an everlastin' +evenupness somewheres! Probably God A'mighty hez his eye on that woman, +and He'll see her through. The young ones are growin' up, and the +teacher at the academy says they beat the devil on book learnin'! The +boy'll make a smart man, pretty soon, and bring good wages home to his +mother. The girls are handsome enough to pick up husbands as soon as +they've fully feathered out, so it won't be long afore they're all on +the up grade. I've set great store by that family from the outset, and +I'm turrible glad they're goin' to fix up the house some more when it +comes spring. I'm willin' to work cheap for such folks as them." + +"You owe 'em somethin' for listenin' to you, Osh! Seems if they moved +here jest in time to hear your stories when you'd 'bout tuckered out the +rest o' the village!" + +"It's a pity you didn't know a few more stories yourself, Bill," +retorted Mr. Popham; "then you'd be asked up oftener to put on the +back-log for 'em, and pop corn and roast apples and pass the evenin'. I +ain't hed sech a gay winter sence I begun settin' up with Maria, twenty +years ago." + +"She's kept you settin' up ever since, Osh!" chuckled Bill Harmon. + +"She has so!" agreed Osh cheerfully, "but you ain't hardly the one to +twit me of it; bein' as how you've never took a long breath yourself +sence you was married! But you don't ketch me complainin'! It's a poor +rule that won't work both ways! Maria hurried me into poppin' the +question, and hurried me into marryin' her, an' she ain't let up on me a +minute sence then; but she'll railroad me into heaven the same way, you +see if she don't. She'll arrive 'head o' time as usual and stan' right +there at the bars till she gits Dig 'n' Lallie Joy 'n' me under cover!" + +"She's a good woman, an' so's my wife," remarked Bill sententiously; +"an' Colonel Wheeler says good women are so rigged inside that they +can't be agreeable all the time. The couple of 'em are workin' their +fingers to the bone for the school teacher to-day; fixin' him up for all +the world as if he was a bride. He's got the women folks o' this village +kind o' mesmerized, Thurston has." + +"He's a first-rate teacher; nobody that ain't hed experience in the +school room is fitted to jedge jest how good a teacher Ralph Thurston +is, but I have, an' I know what I 'm talkin' about." + +"I never heard nothin' about your teachin' school, Osh." + +"There's a good deal about me you never heard; specially about the time +afore I come to Beulah, 'cause you ain't a good hearer, Bill! I taught +the most notorious school in Digby once, and taught it to a finish; I +named my boy Digby after that school! You see my father an' mother was +determined to give me an education, an' I wa'n't intended for it. I was +a great big, strong, clumsy lunkhead, an' the only thing I could do, +even in a one-horse college, was to play base ball, so they kep' me +along jest for that. I never got further than the second class, an' I +wouldn't 'a' got there if the Faculty hadn't 'a' promoted me jest for +the looks o' the thing. Well Prof. Millard was off in the country +lecturin' somewheres near Bangor an' he met a school superintendent who +told him they was awful hard up for a teacher in Digby. He said they'd +hed three in three weeks an' had lost two stoves besides; for the boys +had fired out the teachers and broke up the stoves an' pitched 'em out +the door after 'em. When Prof. Millard heard the story he says, 'I've +got a young man that could teach that school; a feller named Ossian +Popham.' The superintendent hed an interview with me, an' I says: 'I'll +agree to teach out your nine weeks o' school for a hundred dollars, an' +if I leave afore the last day I won't claim a cent!' 'That's the right +sperit,' says the Supe, an' we struck a bargain then an' there. I was +glad it was Saturday, so 't I could start right off while my blood was +up. I got to Digby on Sunday an' found a good boardin' place. The +trustees didn't examine me, an' 't was lucky for me they didn't. The +last three teachers hed been splendid scholars, but that didn't save the +stoves any, so they just looked at my six feet o' height, an' the muscle +in my arms, an' said they'd drop in sometime durin' the month. 'Look in +any time you like after the first day,' I says. 'I shall be turrible +busy the first day!' + +"I went into the school house early Monday mornin' an' built a good fire +in the new stove. When it was safe to leave it I went into the next +house an' watched the scholars arrive. The lady was a widder with one +great unruly boy in the school, an' she was glad to give me a winder to +look out of. It was a turrible cold day, an' when 't was ten minutes to +nine an' the school room was full I walked in as big as Cuffy. There was +five rows of big boys an' girls in the back, all lookin' as if they was +loaded for bear, an' they graded down to little ones down in front, all +of 'em hitchin' to an' fro in their seats an' snickerin'. I give 'em a +surprise to begin with, for I locked the door when I come in, an' put +the key in my pocket, cool as a cucumber. + +"I never said a word, an' they never moved their eyes away from me. I +took off my fur cap, then my mittens, then my overcoat, an' laid 'em in +the chair behind my desk. Then my undercoat come off, then my necktie +an' collar, an' by that time the big girls begun to look nervous; they +'d been used to addressin', but not undressin', in the school room. Then +I wound my galluses round my waist an' tied 'em; then I says, clear an' +loud:' I'm your new teacher! I'm goin' to have a hundred dollars for +teachin' out this school, an' I intend to teach it out an' git my money. +It's five minutes to nine. I give you just that long to tell me what +you're goin' to do about it. Come on now!' I says, 'all o' you big boys, +if you're comin', an' we'll settle this thing here an' now. We can't hev +fights an' lessons mixed up together every day, more 'n 's necessary; +better decide right now who's boss o' this school. The stove's new an' +I'm new, an' we call'ate to stay here till the end o' the term!' + +"Well, sir, not one o' that gang stirred in their seats, an' not one of +'em yipped! I taught school in my shirt sleeves consid'able the first +week, but I never hed to afterwards. I was a little mite weak on +mathematics, an' the older boys an' girls hed to depend on their study +books for their information,--they never got any from me,--but every +scholar in that Digby school got a hundred per cent in deportment the +nine weeks I taught there!" + + + +XXX + +THE INGLENOOK + + +It was a wild Friday night in March, after days of blustering storms and +drifting snow. Beulah was clad in royal ermine; not only clad, indeed, +but nearly buried in it. The timbers of the Yellow House creaked, and +the wreaths of snow blew against the windows and lodged there. King +Frost was abroad, nipping toes and ears, hanging icicles on the eaves of +houses, and decorating the forest trees with glittering pendants. The +wind howled in the sitting room chimney, but in front of the great +back-log the bed of live coals glowed red and the flames danced high, +casting flickering shadows on the children's faces. It is possible to +bring up a family by steam heat, and it is often necessary, but nobody +can claim that it is either so simple or so delightful as by an +open fire! + +The three cats were all nestled cosily in Nancy's lap or snuggled by her +side. Mother Carey had demurred at two, and when Nancy appeared one day +after school with a third, she spoke, with some firmness, of refusing it +a home. "If we must economize on cats," cried Nancy passionately, "don't +let's begin on this one! She doesn't look it, but she is a heroine. When +the Rideout's house burned down, her kittens were in a basket by the +kitchen stove. Three times she ran in through the flames and brought out +a kitten in her mouth. The tip of her tail is gone, and part of an ear, +and she's blind in one eye. Mr. Harmon says she's too homely to live; +now what do you think?" + +"I think nobody pretending to be a mother could turn her back on another +mother like that," said Mrs. Carey promptly. "We'll take a pint more +milk, and I think you children will have to leave something in your +plates now and then, you polish them until it really is indecent." + +To-night an impromptu meeting of the Ways and Means Committee was taking +place by the sitting room fire, perhaps because the family plates had +been polished to a terrifying degree that week. + +"Children," said Mother Carey, "we have been as economical as we knew +how to be; we have worked to the limit of our strength; we have spent +almost nothing on clothing, but the fact remains that we have scarcely +money enough in our reserve fund to last another six months. What +shall we do?" + +Nancy leaped to her feet, scattering cats in every direction. + +"Mother Carey!" she exclaimed remorsefully. "You haven't mentioned money +since New Year's, and I thought we were rubbing along as usual. The +bills are all paid; what's the matter?" + +"That is the matter!" answered Mrs. Carey with the suspicion of a tear +in her laughing voice, "The bills _are_ paid, and there's too little +left! We eat so much, and we burn so much wood, and so many gallons +of oil'" + +"The back of the winter's broken, mother dear!" said Gilbert, as a +terrific blast shook the blinds as a terrier would a rat. "Don't listen +to that wind; it 's only a March bluff! Osh Popham says snow is the poor +man's manure; he says it's going to be an early season and a grand hay +crop. We'll get fifty dollars for our field." + +"That will be in July, and this is March," said his mother. "Still, the +small reversible Van Twiller will carry us through May, with our other +income. But the saving days are over, and the earning days have come, +dears! I am the oldest and the biggest, I must begin." + +"Never!" cried Nancy. "You slave enough for us, as it is, but you shall +never slave for anybody else; shall she, Gilly?" + +"Not if I know it!" answered Gilbert with good ringing emphasis. + +"Another winter I fear we must close the Yellow House and--" + +The rest of Mother Carey's remark was never heard, for at Nancy's given +signal the four younger Careys all swooned on the floor. Nancy had +secretly trained Peter so that he was the best swooner of the family, +and his comical imitation of Nancy was so mirth-compelling that Mother +Carey laughed and declared there was no such thing as talking seriously +to children like hers. + +"But, Muddy dear, you weren't in earnest?" coaxed Nancy, bending her +bright head over her mother's shoulder and cuddling up to her side; +whereupon Gilbert gave his imitation of a jealous puppy; barking, +snarling, and pushing his frowzly pate under his mother's arm to crowd +Nancy from her point of vantage, to which she clung valiantly. Of course +Kitty found a small vacant space on which she could festoon herself, and +Peter promptly climbed on his mother's lap, so that she was covered +with--fairly submerged in--children! A year ago Julia used to creep away +and look at such exhibitions of family affection, with a curling lip, +but to-night, at Mother Carey's outstretched hand and smothered cry of +"Help, Judy!" she felt herself gathered into the heart of the laughing, +boisterous group. That hand, had she but known it, was stretched out to +her because only that day a letter had come, saying that Allan Carey was +much worse and that his mental condition admitted of no cure. He was +bright and hopeful and happy, so said Mr. Manson;--forever sounding the +praises of the labor-saving device in which he had sunk his last +thousands. "We can manufacture it at ten cents and sell it for ten +dollars," he would say, rubbing his hands excitedly. "We can pay fifty +dollars a month office rent and do a business of fifty thousand dollars +a year!" "And I almost believe we could!" added Mr. Manson, "if we had +faith enough and capital enough!" + +"Of course you know, darlings, I would never leave Beulah save for the +coldest months; or only to earn a little money," said Mrs. Carey, +smoothing her dress, flattening her collar, and pinning up the braids +that Nancy's hugs had loosened. + +"I must put my mind on the problem at once," said Nancy, pacing the +floor. "I've been so interested in my Virgil, so wrapped up in my +rhetoric and composition, that I haven't thought of ways and means for a +month, but of course we will never leave the Yellow House, and of course +we must contrive to earn money enough to live in it. We must think about +it every spare minute till vacation comes; then we'll have nearly four +months to amass a fortune big enough to carry us through the next year. +I have an idea for myself already. I was going to wait till my +seventeenth birthday, but that's four months away and it's too long. I'm +old enough to begin any time. I feel old enough to write my +Reminiscences this minute." + +"You might publish your letters to the American Consul in Breslau; +they'd make a book!" teased Gilbert. + +"Very likely I shall, silly Gilly," retorted Nancy, swinging her mane +haughtily. "It isn't every girl who has a monthly letter from an Admiral +in China and a Consul in Germany." + +"You wouldn't catch me answering the Queen of Sheba's letters or the +Empress of India's," exclaimed Gilbert, whose pen was emphatically less +mighty than his sword. "Hullo, you two! what are you whispering about?" +he called to Kathleen and Julia, who were huddled together in a far +corner of the long room, gesticulating eloquently. + +"We've an idea! We've an idea! We've found a way to help!" sang the two +girls, pirouetting back into the circle of firelight. "We won't tell +till it's all started, but it's perfectly splendid, and practical too." + +"And so ladylike!" added Julia triumphantly. + +"How much?" asked Gilbert succinctly. + +The girls whispered a minute or two, and appeared to be multiplying +twenty-five first by fifteen, and then again by twenty. + +"From three dollars and seventy-five cents to four dollars and a half a +week according to circumstances!" answered Kathleen proudly. + +"Will it take both of you?" + +"Yes." + +"All your time?" + +More nods and whispers and calculation. + +"No, indeed; only three hours a day." + +"Any of my time?" + +"Just a little." + +"I thought so!" said Gilbert loftily. "You always want me and my hammer +or my saw; but I'll be busy on my own account; you'll have to paddle +your own canoe!" + +"You'll be paid for what you do for us," said Julia slyly, giving +Kathleen a poke, at which they both fell into laughter only possible to +the very young. + +Then suddenly there came a knock at the front door; a stamping of feet +on the circular steps, and a noise of shaking off snow. + +"Go to the door, Gilbert; who can that be on a night like +this,--although it is only eight o'clock after all! Why, it's Mr. +Thurston!" + +Ralph Thurston came in blushing and smiling, glad to be welcomed, +fearful of intruding, afraid of showing how much he liked to be there. + +"Good-evening, all!" he said. "You see I couldn't wait to thank you, +Mrs. Carey! No storm could keep me away to-night." + +"What has mother been doing, now?" asked Nancy. "Her right hand is +forever busy, and she never tells her left hand a thing, so we children +are always in the dark." + +"It was nothing much," said Mrs. Carey, pushing the young man gently +into the high-backed rocker. "Mrs. Harmon, Mrs. Popham, and I simply +tried to show our gratitude to Mr. Thurston for teaching our troublesome +children." + +"How did you know it was my birthday?" asked Thurston. + +"Didn't you write the date in Lallie Joy's book?" + +"True, I did; and forgot it long ago; but I have never had my birthday +noticed before, and I am twenty-four!" + +"It was high time, then!" said Mother Carey with her bright smile. + +"But what did mother do?" clamored Nancy, Kathleen and Gilbert in +chorus. + +"She took my forlorn, cheerless room and made it into a home for me," +said Thurston. "Perhaps she wanted me to stay in it a little more, and +bother her less! At any rate she has created an almost possible rival to +the Yellow House!" + +Ralph Thurston had a large, rather dreary room over Bill Harmon's store, +and took his meals at the Widow Berry's, near by. He was an orphan and +had no money to spend on luxuries, because all his earnings went to pay +the inevitable debts incurred when a fellow is working his way +through college. + +Mrs. Carey, with the help of the other two women, had seized upon this +stormy Friday, when the teacher always took his luncheon with him to the +academy, to convert Ralph's room into something comfortable and +cheerful. The old, cracked, air-tight stove had been removed, and Bill +Harmon had contributed a second-hand Franklin, left with him for a bad +debt. It was of soapstone and had sliding doors in front, so that the +blaze could be disclosed when life was very dull or discouraging. The +straw matting on the floor had done very well in the autumn, but Mrs. +Carey now covered the centre of the room with a bright red drugget left +from the Charlestown house-furnishings, and hung the two windows with +curtains of printed muslin. Ossian Popham had taken a clotheshorse and +covered it with red felting, so that the screen, so evolved could be +made to hide the bed and washstand. Ralph's small, rickety table had +been changed for a big, roomy one of pine, hidden by the half of an old +crimson piano cloth. When Osh had seen the effect of this he hurried +back to his barn chamber and returned with some book shelves that he had +hastily glued and riveted into shape. These he nailed to the wall and +filled with books that he found in the closet, on the floor, on the foot +of the bed, and standing on the long, old-fashioned mantel shelf. + +"Do you care partic'larly where you set, nights, Ossian?" inquired Mrs. +Popham, who was now in a state of uncontrolled energy bordering on +delirium. "Because your rockin' chair has a Turkey red cushion and it +would look splendid in Mr. Thurston's room. You know you fiddle 'bout +half the time evenin's, and you always go to bed early." + +"Don't mind me!" exclaimed Ossian facetiously, starting immediately for +the required chair and bringing back with it two huge yellow sea shells, +which he deposited on the floor at each end of the hearth rug. + +"How do you like 'em?" he inquired of Mrs. Carey. + +"Not at all," she replied promptly. + +"You don't?" he asked incredulously. "Well, it takes all kinds o' folks +to make a world! I've been keepin' 'em fifteen years, hopin' I'd get +enough more to make a border for our parlor fireplace, and now you don't +take to 'em! Back they go to the barn chamber, Maria; Mis' Carey's +bossin' this job, and she ain't got no taste for sea shells. Would you +like an old student lamp? I found one that I can bronze up in about two +minutes if Mis' Harmon can hook a shade and chimbly out of Bill's stock." + +They all stayed in the room until this last feat was accomplished; +stayed indeed until the fire in the open stove had died down to ruddy +coals. Then they pulled down the shades, lighted the lamp, gave one last +admiring look, and went home. + +It had meant only a few hours' thought and labor, with scarcely a penny +of expense, but you can judge what Ralph Thurston felt when he entered +the door out of the storm outside. To him it looked like a room conjured +up by some magician in a fairy tale. He fell into the rocking-chair and +looked at his own fire; gazed about at the cheerful crimson glow that +radiated from the dazzling drugget, in a state of puzzled ecstasy, till +he caught sight of a card lying near the lamp,--"A birthday present +from three mothers who value your work for their boys and girls." + +He knew Mrs. Carey's handwriting, so he sped to the Yellow House as soon +as his supper was over, and now, in the presence of the whole family, he +felt tongue-tied and wholly unable to express his gratitude. + +It was bed time, and the young people melted away from the fireside. + +"Kiss your mother good-night, sweet Pete," said Nancy, taking the +reluctant cherub by the hand. "'_Hoc opus, hic labor est_,' Mr. +Thurston, to get the Peter-bird upstairs when once he is down. Shake +hands with your future teacher, Peter; no, you mustn't kiss him; little +boys don't kiss great Latin scholars unless they are asked." + +Thurston laughed and lifted the gurgling Peter high in the air. "Good +night, old chap!" he said "Hurry up and come to school!" + +"I'm 'bout ready now!" piped Peter. "I can read +'Up-up-my-boy-day-is-not-the-time-for-sleep-the-dew-will-soon-be-gone' +with the book upside down,--can't I, Muddy?" + +"You can, my son; trot along with sister." + +Thurston opened the door for Nancy, and his eye followed her for a +second as she mounted the stairs. She glowed like a ruby to-night in her +old red cashmere. The sparkle of her eye, the gloss of her hair, the +soft red of her lips, the curve and bend of her graceful young body +struck even her mother anew, though she was used to her daughter's +beauty. "She is growing!" thought Mrs. Carey wistfully. "I see it all at +once, and soon others will be seeing it!" + +Alas! young Ralph Thurston had seen it for weeks past! He was not +perhaps so much in love with Nancy the girl, as he was with Nancy the +potential woman. Some of the glamour that surrounded the mother had +fallen upon the daughter. One felt the influences that had rained upon +Nancy ever since she had come into the world, One could not look at her, +nor talk with her, without feeling that her mother--like a vine in the +blood, as the old proverb says--was breathing, growing, budding, +blossoming in her day by day. + +The young teacher came back to the fireplace, where Mother Carey was +standing in a momentary brown study. + +"I've never had you alone before," he stammered, "and now is my chance +to tell you what you've been to me ever since I came to Beulah." + +"You have helped me in my problems more than I can possibly have aided +you," Mrs. Carey replied quietly. "Gilbert was so rebellious about +country schools, so patronizing, so scornful of their merits, that I +fully expected he would never stay at the academy of his own free will. +You have converted him, and I am very grateful." + +"Meantime I am making a record there," said Ralph, "and I have this +family to thank for it! Your children, with Olive and Cyril Lord, have +set the pace for the school, and the rest are following to the best of +their ability. There is not a shirk nor a dunce in the whole roll of +sixty pupils! Beulah has not been so proud of its academy for thirty +years, and I shall come in for the chief share in the praise. I am +trying to do for Gilbert and Cyril what an elder brother would do, but I +should have been powerless if I had not had this home and this fireside +to inspire me!" + +"_Tibi splendet focus_!" quoted Mrs. Carey, pointing to Olive's +inscription under the mantelpiece. "For you the hearth fire glows!" + +"Have I not felt it from the beginning?" asked Ralph. "I never knew my +mother, Mrs. Carey, and few women have come into my life; I have been +too poor and too busy to cultivate their friendship. Then I came to +Beulah and you drew me into your circle; admitted an unknown, friendless +fellow into your little group! It was beautiful; it was wonderful!" + +"What are mothers for, but to do just that, and more than all, for the +motherless boys?" + +"Well, I may never again have the courage to say it, so just believe me +when I say your influence will be the turning-point in my life. I will +never, so help me God, do anything to make me unworthy to sit in this +fireglow! So long as I have brains and hands to work with, I will keep +striving to create another home like this when my time comes. Any girl +that takes me will get a better husband because of you; any children I +may be blessed with will have a better father because I have known you. +Don't make any mistake, dear Mrs. Carey, your hearth fire glows a long, +long distance!" + +Mother Carey was moved to the very heart. She leaned forward and took +Ralph Thurston's young face, thin with privation and study, in her two +hands. He bent his head instinctively, partly to hide the tears that had +sprung to his eyes, and she kissed his forehead simply and tenderly. He +was at her knees on the hearth rug in an instant; all his boyish +affection laid at her feet; all his youthful chivalry kindled at the +honor of her touch. + +And there are women in the world who do not care about being mothers! + + + +XXXI + +GROOVES OF CHANGE + + +The winter passed. The snow gradually melted in the meadows and the +fields, which first grew brown and then displayed patches of green here +and there where the sun fell strongest. There was deep, sticky mud in +the roads, and the discouraged farmers urged their horses along with the +wheels of their wagons sunk to the hub in ooze. Then there were wet +days, the wind ruffling the leaden surface of the river, the sound of +the rain dripping from the bare tree-boughs, the smell of the wet grass +and the clean, thirsty soil. Milder weather came, then blustery days, +then chill damp ones, but steadily life grew, here, there, everywhere, +and the ever-new miracle of the awakening earth took place once again. +Sap mounted in the trees, blood coursed in the children's veins, mothers +began giving herb tea and sulphur and molasses, young human nature was +restless; the whole creation throbbed and sighed, and was tremulous, and +had growing pains. + +April passed, with all its varying moods of sun and shower, and settled +weather came. + + All the earth was gay. + Land and sea + Gave themselves up to jollity + And with the heart of May + Did every Beast keep holiday. + +The Carey girls had never heard of "the joy of living" as a phrase, but +oh! they knew a deal about it in these first two heavenly springs in +little Beulah village! The sunrise was so wonderful; the trees and grass +so marvellously green; the wild flowers so beautiful! Then the river on +clear days, the glimpse of the sea from Beulah's hill tops, the walks in +the pine woods,--could Paradise show anything to compare? + +And how good the food tasted; and the books they read, how fresh, how +moving, how glorious! Then when the happy day was over, sleep came +without pause or effort the moment the flushed cheek touched the +cool pillow. + +"These," Nancy reflected, quoting from her favorite Wordsworth as she +dressed beside her open window, "These must be + + "The gifts of morn, + Ere life grows noisy and slower-footed thought + Can overtake the rapture of the sense. + +"I was fifteen and a half last spring, and now, though it is only a year +ago, everything is different!" she mused. "When did it get to be +different, I wonder? It never was all at once, so it must have been a +little every day, so little that I hardly noticed it until just now." + +A young girl's heart is ever yearning for and trembling at the future. +In its innocent depths the things that are to be are sometimes rustling +and whispering secrets, and sometimes keeping an exquisite, haunting +silence. In the midst of the mystery the solemn young creature is +sighing to herself, "What am I meant for? Am I everything? Am I nothing? +Must I wait till my future comes to me, or must I seek it?" + +This was all like the sound of a still, small voice in Nancy's mind, but +it meant that she was "growing up," taking hold on life at more points +than before, seeing new visions, dreaming new dreams. Kathleen and Julia +seemed ridiculously young to her. She longed to advise them, but her +sense of humor luckily kept her silent. Gilbert appeared crude, raw; +promising, but undeveloped; she hated to think how much experience he +would have to pass through before he could see existence as it really +was, and as she herself saw it. Olive's older view of things, her sad, +strange outlook upon life, her dislike of anything in the shape of man, +her melancholy aversion to her father, all this fascinated and puzzled +Nancy, whose impetuous nature ran out to every living thing, revelling +in the very act of loving, so long as she did not meet rebuff. + +Cyril perplexed her. Silent, unresponsive, shy, she would sometimes +raise her eyes from her book in school and find him gazing steadily at +her like a timid deer drinking thirstily at a spring. Nancy did not like +Cyril, but she pitied him and was as friendly with him, in her offhand, +boyish fashion, as she was with every one. + +The last days of the academy term were close at hand, and the air was +full of graduation exercises and white muslin and ribbon sashes. June +brought two surprises to the Yellow House. One morning Kathleen burst +into Nancy's room with the news: "Nancy! The Fergusons offer to adopt +Judy, and she doesn't want to go. Think of that! But she's afraid to ask +mother if she can stay. Let's us do it; shall we?" + +"I will; but of course there is not enough money to go around, Kitty, +even if we all succeed in our vacation plans. Julia will never have any +pretty dresses if she stays with us, and she loves pretty dresses. Why +didn't the Fergusons adopt her before mother had made her over?" + +"Yes," chimed in Kathleen. "Then everybody would have been glad, but now +we shall miss her! Think of missing Judy! We would never have +believed it!" + +"It's like seeing how a book turns out, to watch her priggishness and +smuggishness all melting away," Nancy said. "I shouldn't like to see her +slip back into the old Judyisms, and neither would mother. Mother'll +probably keep her, for I know Mr. Manson thinks it's only a matter of a +few months before Uncle Allan dies." + +"And mother wouldn't want a Carey to grow up into an imitation Gladys +Ferguson; but that's what Judy would be, in course of time." + +Julia took Mrs. Ferguson's letter herself to her Aunt Margaret, showing +many signs of perturbation in her usually tranquil face. + +Mrs. Carey read it through carefully. "It is a very kind, generous +offer, Julia. Your father cannot be consulted about it, so you must +decide. You would have every luxury, and your life would be full of +change and pleasure; while with us it must be, in the nature of things, +busy and frugal for a long time to come." + +"But I am one more to feed and clothe, Aunt Margaret, and there is so +little money!" + +"I know, but you are one more to help, after all. The days are soon +coming when Nancy and Gilbert will be out in the world, helping +themselves. You and Kathleen could stay with Peter and me, awaiting your +turn. It doesn't look attractive in comparison with what the Fergusons +offer you!" + +Then the gentle little rivers that had been swelling all the past year +in Julia's heart, rivers of tenderness and gratitude and sympathy, +suddenly overflowed their banks and, running hither and thither, +softened everything with which they came in contact. Rocky places +melted, barren spots waked into life, and under the impulse of a new +mood that she scarcely understood Julia cried, "Oh! dear Aunt Margaret, +keep me, keep me! This is home; I never want to leave it! I want to be +one of Mother Carey's chickens!" + +The child had flung herself into the arms that never failed anybody, and +with tears streaming down her cheeks made her plea. + +"There, there, Judy dear; you are one of us, and we could not let you go +unless you were to gain something by it. If you really want to stay we +shall love you all the better, and you will belong to us more than you +ever did; so dry your eyes, or you will be somebody's duckling instead +of my chicken!" + +The next surprise was a visit from Cousin Ann Chadwick, who drove up to +the door one morning quite unannounced, and asked the driver of the +depot wagon to bring over her two trunks immediately. + +"Two trunks!" groaned Gilbert. "That means the whole season!" + +But it meant nothing of the kind; it meant pretty white dresses for the +three girls, two pairs of stockings and two of gloves for the whole +family, a pattern of black silk for Mrs. Carey, and numberless small +things to which the Carey wardrobe had long been a stranger. + +Having bestowed these offerings rather grimly, as was her wont, and +having received the family's grateful acknowledgments with her usual +lack of grace, she proceeded in the course of a few days to make herself +far more disagreeable than had been the case on any previous visit of +her life. She had never seen such dusty roads as in Beulah; so many +mosquitoes and flies; such tough meat; such a lack of fruit, such +talkative, over-familiar neighbors, such a dull minister, such an +inattentive doctor, such extortionate tradesmen. + +"What shall we do with Cousin Ann!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey to Nancy in +despair. "She makes us these generous presents, yet she cannot possibly +have any affection for us. We accept them without any affection for her, +because we hardly know how to avoid it. The whole situation is +positively degrading! I have borne it for years because she was good to +your father when he was a boy, but now that she has grown so much more +difficult I really think I must talk openly with her." + +"She talked openly enough with me when I confessed that Gilbert and I +had dropped and broken the Dirty Boy!" said Nancy, "and she has been +very cross with me ever since." + +"Cousin Ann," said Mrs. Carey that afternoon on the piazza, "it is very +easy to see that you do not approve of the way we live, or the way we +think about things in general. Feeling as you do, I really wish you +would not spend your money on us, and give us these beautiful and +expensive presents. It puts me under an obligation that chafes me and +makes me unhappy." + +"I don't disapprove of you, particularly," said Miss Chadwick. "Do I act +as if I did?" + +"Your manner seems to suggest it." + +"You can't tell much by manners," replied Cousin Ann. "I think you're +entirely too soft and sentimental, but we all have our faults. I don't +think you have any right to feed the neighbors and burn up fuel and oil +in their behalf when you haven't got enough for your own family. I think +you oughtn't to have had four children, and having had them you needn't +have taken another one in, though she's turned out better than I +expected. But all that is none of my business, I suppose, and, +wrong-headed as you are, I like you better than most folks, which isn't +saying much." + +"But if you don't share my way of thinking, why do you keep fretting +yourself to come and see us? It only annoys you." + +"It annoys me, but I can't help coming, somehow. I guess I hate other +places and other ways worse than I do yours. You don't grudge me bed and +board, I suppose?" + +"How could I grudge you anything when you give us so much,--so much more +than we ought to accept, so much more than we can ever thank you for?" + +"I don't want to be thanked; you know that well enough; but there's so +much demonstration in your family you can't understand anybody's keeping +themselves exclusive. I don't like to fuss over people or have them fuss +over me. Kissing comes as easy to you as eating, but I never could abide +it. A nasty, common habit, I call it! I want to give what I like and +where and when I like, and act as I'm a mind to afterwards. I don't give +because I see things are needed, but because I can't spend my income +unless I do give. If I could have my way I'd buy you a good house in +Buffalo, right side of mine; take your beggarly little income and manage +it for you; build a six-foot barbed wire fence round the lot so 't the +neighbors couldn't get in and eat you out of house and home, and in a +couple of years I could make something out of your family!" + +Mrs. Carey put down her sewing, leaned her head back against the crimson +rambler, and laughed till the welkin rang. + +"I suppose you think I'm crazy?" Cousin Ann remarked after a moment's +pause. + +"I don't know, Cousin Ann," said Mrs. Carey, taking up her work again. +"Whatever it is, you can't help it! If you'll give up trying to +understand my point of view, I won't meddle with yours!" + +"I suppose you won't come to Buffalo?" + +"No indeed, thank you, Cousin Ann!" + +"You'll stay here, in this benighted village, and grow old,--you that +are a handsome woman of forty and might have a millionaire husband to +take care of you?" + +"My husband had money enough to please me, and when I meet him again and +show him the four children, he will be the richest man in Paradise." + +Cousin Ann rose. "I'm going to-morrow, and I shan't be back this year. +I've taken passage on a steamer that's leaving for Liverpool next week!" + +"Going abroad! Alone, Cousin Ann?" + +"No, with a party of Cook's tourists." + +"What a strange idea!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey. + +"I don't see why; 'most everybody's been abroad. I don't expect to like +the way they live over there, but if other folks can stand it, I guess I +can. It'll amuse me for a spell, maybe, and if it don't, I've got money +enough to break away and do as I'm a mind to." + +The last evening was a pleasant, friendly one, every Carey doing his or +her best to avoid risky subjects and to be as agreeable as possible. +Cousin Ann Chadwick left next day, and Mrs. Carey, bidding the strange +creature good-bye, was almost sorry that she had ever had any +arguments with her. + +"It will be so long before I see you again, Cousin Ann, I was on the +point of kissing you,--till I remembered!" she said with a smile as she +stood at the gate. + +"I don't know as I mind, for once," said Miss Chadwick. "If anybody's +got to kiss me I'd rather it would be you than anybody!" + +She drove away, her two empty trunks in the back of the wagon. She +sailed for Liverpool the next week and accompanied her chosen party to +the cathedral towns of England. There, in a quiet corner of York +Minster, as the boy choir was chanting its anthems, her heart, an organ +she had never been conscious of possessing, gave one brief sudden +physical pang and she passed out of what she had called life. Neither +her family affairs nor the names of her relations were known, and the +news of her death did not reach far-away Beulah till more than two +months afterward, and with it came the knowledge that Cousin Ann +Chadwick had left the income of five thousand dollars to each of the +five Carey children, with five thousand to be paid in cash to Mother +Carey on the settlement of the estate. + + + +XXXII + +DOORS OF DARING + + +Little the Careys suspected how their fortunes were mending, during +those last days of June! Had they known, they might almost have been +disappointed, for the spur of need was already pricking them, and their +valiant young spirits longed to be in the thick of the fray. Plans had +been formed for the past week, many of them in secret, and the very next +day after the close of the academy, various business projects would +burst upon a waiting world. One Sunday night Mother Carey had read to +the little group a poem in which there was a verse that struck on their +ears with a fine spirit:-- + + "And all the bars at which we fret, + That seem to prison and control, + Are but the doors of daring set + Ajar before the soul." + +They recited it over and over to themselves afterwards, and two or three +of them wrote it down and pinned it to the wall, or tucked it in the +frame of the looking glass. + + +Olive Lord knocked at her father's study door the morning of the +twenty-first of June. Walking in quietly she said, "Father, yesterday +was my seventeenth birthday. Mother left me a letter to read on that +day, telling me that I should have fifty dollars a month of my own when +I was seventeen, Cyril to have as much when he is the same age." + +"If you had waited courteously and patiently for a few days you would +have heard this from me," her father answered. + +"I couldn't be sure!" Olive replied. "You never did notice a birthday; +why should you begin now?" + +"I have more important matters to take up my mind than the consideration +of trivial dates," her father answered. "You know that very well, and +you know too, that notwithstanding my absorbing labors, I have +endeavored for the last few months to give more of my time to you +and Cyril." + +"I realize that, or I should not speak to you at all," said Olive. "It +is because you have shown a little interest in us lately that I consult +you. I want to go at once to Boston to study painting. I will deny +myself everything else, if necessary, but I will go, and I will study! +It is the only life I care for, the only life I am likely to have, and I +am determined to lead it." + +"You must see that you are too young to start out for yourself anywhere; +it is simply impossible." + +"I shall not be alone. Mrs. Carey will find me a good home in +Charlestown, with friends of hers. You trust her judgment, if no +one else's." + +"If she is charitable enough to conduct your foolish enterprises as well +as those of her own children, I have nothing to say. I have talked with +her frequently, and she knows that as soon as I have finished my last +volume I shall be able to take a more active interest in your affairs +and Cyril's." + +"Then may I go?" + +"When I hear from the person in Charlestown, yes. There is an expedition +starting for South America in a few months and I have been asked to +accompany the party. If you are determined to leave home I shall be free +to accept the invitation. Perhaps Mrs. Carey would allow Cyril to stay +with her during my absence." + +"I dare say, and I advise you to go to South America by all means; you +will be no farther away from your family than you have always been!" +With this parting shot Olive Lord closed the study door behind her. + +"That girl has the most unpleasant disposition, and the sharpest tongue, +I ever met in the course of my life!" said Henry Lord to himself as he +turned to his task. + +Mother Carey's magic was working very slowly in his blood. It had roused +him a little from the bottomless pit of his selfishness, but much +mischief had been done on all sides, and it would be a work of time +before matters could be materially mended. Olive's nature was already +warped and embittered, and it would require a deal of sunshine to make a +plant bloom that had been so dwarfed by neglect and indifference. + +Nancy's door of daring opened into an editorial office. An hour here, an +hour there, when the Yellow House was asleep, had brought about a story +that was on its way to a distant city. It was written, with incredible +care, on one side of the paper only; it enclosed a fully stamped +envelope for a reply or a return of the manuscript, and all day long +Nancy, trembling between hope and despair, went about hugging her first +secret to her heart. + +Gilbert had opened his own particular door, and if it entailed no more +daring than that of Nancy's effort, it required twice the amount of +self-sacrifice. He was to be, from June twenty-seventh till August +twenty-seventh, Bill Harmon's post-office clerk and delivery boy, and +the first that the family would know about it would be his arrival at +the back door, in a linen jacket, with an order-book in his hand. Bravo, +Gilly! One can see your heels disappearing over the top of Shiny Wall! + +The door of daring just ready to be opened by Kathleen and Julia was of +a truly dramatic and unexpected character. + +Printed in plain letters, twenty-five circulars reposed in the folds of +Julia's nightdresses in her lower bureau drawer. The last thing to be +done at night and the first in the morning was the stealthy, whispered +reading of one of these documents, lest even after the hundredth time, +something wrong should suddenly appear to the eye or ear. They were +addressed, they were stamped, and they would be posted to twenty-five +families in the neighborhood on the closing day of the academy. + + + SUMMER VACATION SCHOOL + + The Misses Kathleen and Julia Carey announce the opening of + classes for private instruction on July 1st, from two to four + o'clock daily in the + + Hamilton Barn. + + Faculty. + + Miss Kathleen Carey Reading & Elocution 2 P.M. + Miss Julia Carey Dancing, Embroidery 2-30 P.M. + Mrs. Peter Carey Vocal Music, Part Singing 3 P.M. + Miss Nancy Carey Composition 4 P.M. + Mr. Gilbert Carey Wood carving, Jig Sawing, Manual + Training from 4 to 5 Fridays only. + + Terms cash. 25 cents a week. + + N. B. Children prepared for entrance to the academy at special prices. + + +Meantime the Honorable Lemuel Hamilton had come to America, and was +opening doors of daring at such a rate of speed that he hardly realized +the extent of his own courage and what it involved. He accepted an +official position of considerable honor and distinction in Washington, +rented a house there, and cabled his wife and younger daughter to come +over in September. He wrote his elder daughter that she might go with +some friends to Honolulu if she would return for Christmas. ("It's +eleven years since we had a Christmas tree," he added, "and the first +thing you know we shall have lost the habit!") + +To his son Jack in Texas he expressed himself as so encouraged by the +last business statement, which showed a decided turn for the better, +that he was willing to add a thousand dollars to the capital and +irrigate some more of the unimproved land on the ranch. + +"If Jack has really got hold out there, he can come home every two or +three years," he thought. "Well, perhaps I shall succeed in getting part +of them together, part of the time, if I work hard enough; all but Tom, +whom I care most about! Now that everything is in train I'll take a +little vacation myself, and go down to Beulah to make the acquaintance +of those Careys. If I had ever contemplated returning to America I +suppose I shouldn't have allowed them to settle down in the old house, +still, Eleanor would never have been content to pass her summers there, +so perhaps it is just as well." + +The Peter-bird was too young to greatly dare; still it ought perhaps to +be set down that he sold three dozen marbles and a new kite to Billy +Harmon that summer, and bought his mother a birthday present with the +money. All Peter's "doors of daring" had hitherto opened into places +from which he issued weeping, with sprained ankles, bruised hands, +skinned knees or burned eyelashes. + + + +XXXIII + +MOTHER HAMILTON'S BIRTHDAY + + +It was the Fourth of July; a hot, still day when one could fairly see +the green peas swelling in their pods and the string beans climbing +their poles like acrobats! Young Beulah had rung the church bell at +midnight, cast its torpedoes to earth in the early morning, flung its +fire-crackers under the horses' feet, and felt somewhat relieved of its +superfluous patriotism by breakfast time. Then there was a parade of +Antiques and Horribles, accompanied by the Beulah Band, which, though +not as antique, was fully as horrible as anything in the procession. + +From that time on, the day had been somnolent, enlivened in the Carey +household only by the solemn rite of paying the annual rent of the +Yellow House. The votive nosegay had been carefully made up, and laid +lovingly by Nancy under Mother Hamilton's portrait, in the presence not +only of the entire family, but also of Osh Popham, who had called to +present early radishes and peppergrass. + +"I'd like to go upstairs with you when you get your boquet tied up," he +said, "because it's an awful hot day, an' the queer kind o' things you +do 't this house allers makes my backbone cold! I never suspicioned that +Lena Hamilton hed the same kind o' fantasmic notions that you folks +have, but I guess it's like tenant, like landlord, in this case! Anyhow, +I want to see the rent paid, if you don't mind. I wish't you'd asked +that mean old sculpin of a Hen Lord over; he owns my house an' it might +put a few idees into his head!" + +In the afternoon Nancy took her writing pad and sat on the circular +steps, where it was cool. The five o'clock train from Boston whistled at +the station a mile away as she gathered her white skirts daintily up and +settled herself in the shadiest corner. She was unconscious of the +passing time, and scarcely looked up until the rattling of wheels caught +her ear. It was the station wagon stopping at the Yellow House gate, and +a strange gentleman was alighting. He had an unmistakable air of the +town. His clothes were not as Beulah clothes and his hat was not as +Beulah hats, for it was a fine Panama with a broad sweeping brim. Nancy +rose from the steps, surprise dawning first in her eyes, then wonder, +then suspicion, then conviction; then two dimples appeared in +her cheeks. + +The stranger lifted the foreign-looking hat with a smile and said, "My +little friend and correspondent, Nancy Carey, I think?" + +"My American Consul, I do believe!" cried Nancy joyously, as she ran +down the path with both hands outstretched. "Where did you come from? +Why didn't you tell us beforehand? We never even heard that you were in +this country! Oh! I know why you chose the Fourth of July! It's pay day, +and you thought we shouldn't be ready with the rent; but it's all +attended to, beautifully, this morning!" + +"May I send my bag to the Mansion House and stay a while with you?" +asked Mr. Hamilton. "Are the rest of you at home? How are Gilbert and +Kathleen and Julia and Peter? How, especially, is Mother Carey?" + +"What a memory you have!" exclaimed Nancy. "Take Mr. Hamilton's bag, +please, Mr. Bennett, and tell them at the hotel that he won't be there +until after supper." + +It was a pleasant hour that ensued, for Nancy had broken the ice and +there was plenty of conversation. Then too, the whole house had to be +shown, room by room, even to Cousin Ann's stove in the cellar and the +pump in the kitchen sink. + +"I never saw anything like it!" exclaimed Hamilton. "It is like magic! I +ought to pay you a thousand dollars on the spot! I ought to try and buy +the place of you for five thousand! Why don't you go into the business +of recreating houses and selling them to poor benighted creatures like +me, who never realize their possibilities?" + +"If we show you the painted chamber will you promise not to be too +unhappy?" asked Nancy. "You can't help crying with rage and grief that +it is our painted chamber, not yours; but try to bear up until you get +to the hotel, because mother is so soft-hearted she will be giving it +back to you unless I interfere." + +"You must have spent money lavishly when you restored this room," said +the Consul; "it is a real work of art." + +"Not a penny," said Mrs. Carey. "It is the work of a great friend of +Nancy's, a seventeen-year-old girl, who, we expect, will make Beulah +famous some day. Now will you go into your mother's room and find your +way downstairs by yourself? Julia, will you show Mr. Hamilton the barn a +little later, while Nancy and I get supper? Kitty must go to the +Pophams' for Peter; he is spending the afternoon with them." + +Nancy had enough presence of mind to intercept Kitty and hiss into her +ear: "Borrow a loaf of bread from Mrs. Popham, we are short; and see if +you can find any way to get strawberries from Bill Harmon's; it was to +have been a bread-and-milk supper on the piazza, to-night, and it must +be hurriedly changed into a Consular banquet! _Verb. sap._ Fly!" + +Gilbert turned up a little before six o'clock and was introduced proudly +by his mother as a son who had just "gone into business." + +"I'm Bill Harmon's summer clerk and delivery boy," he explained. "It's +great fun, and I get two dollars and a half a week." + +Nancy and her mother worked like Trojans in the kitchen, for they agreed +it was no time for economy, even if they had less to eat for a week +to come. + +"Mr. Hamilton is just as nice as I guessed he was, when his first letter +came," said Nancy. "I went upstairs to get a card for the supper menu, +and he was standing by your mantelpiece with his head bent over his +arms. He had the little bunch of field flowers in his hand, and I know +he had been smelling them, and looking at his mother's picture, and +remembering things!" + +What a merry supper it was, with a jug of black-eyed Susans in the +centre of the table and a written bill of fare for Mr. Hamilton, +"because he was a Consul," so Nancy said. + +Gilbert sat at the head of the table, and Mr. Hamilton thought he had +never seen anything so beautiful as Mrs. Carey in her lavender challie, +sitting behind the tea cups; unless it was Nancy, flushed like a rose, +changing the plates and waiting on the table between courses. He had +never exerted himself so much at any diplomatic dinner, and he won the +hearts of the entire family before the meal was finished. + +"By the way, I have a letter of introduction to you all, but especially +to Miss Nancy here, and I have never thought to deliver it," he said. +"Who do you think sent it,--all the way from China?" + +"My son Tom!" exclaimed Nancy irrepressibly; "but no, he couldn't, +because he doesn't know us." + +"The Admiral, of course!" cried Gilbert. + +"You are both right," Mr. Hamilton answered, drawing a letter from his +coat pocket. "It is a Round Robin from the Admiral and my son Tom, who +have been making acquaintance in Hong Kong. It is addressed: + + "FROM THE YELLOW PERIL, IN CHINA + + "to + + "THE YELLOW HOUSE, IN BEULAH, + + "_Greeting_!" + +Nancy crimsoned. "Did the Admiral tell your son Tom I called him the +Yellow Peril? It was wicked of him! I did it, you know, because you +wrote me that the only Hamilton who cared anything for the old house, or +would ever want to live in it, was your son Tom. After that I always +called him the Yellow Peril, and I suppose I mentioned it in a letter to +the Admiral." + +"I am convinced that Nancy's mind is always empty at bedtime," said her +mother, "because she tells everything in it to somebody during the day. +I hope age will bring discretion, but I doubt it." + +"My son Tom is coming home!" said his father, with unmistakable delight +in his voice. + +Nancy, who was passing the cake, sat down so heavily in her chair that +everybody laughed. + +"Come, come, Miss Nancy! I can't let you make an ogre of the boy," urged +Mr. Hamilton. "He is a fine fellow, and if he comes down here to look at +the old place you are sure to be good friends." + +"Is he going back to China after his visit?" asked Mrs. Carey, who felt +a fear of the young man something akin to her daughter's. + +"No, I am glad to say. Our family has been too widely separated for the +last ten years. At first it seemed necessary, or at least convenient and +desirable, and I did not think much about it. But lately it has been +continually on my mind that we were leading a cheerless existence, and I +am determined to arrange matters differently." + +Mrs. Carey remembered Ossian Popham's description of Mrs. Lemuel +Hamilton and forebore to ask any questions with regard to her +whereabouts, since her husband did not mention her. + +"You will all be in Washington then," she said, "and your son Tom with +you, of course?" + +"Not quite so near as that," his father replied. "Tom's firm is opening +a Boston office and he will be in charge of that. When do you expect the +Admiral back? Tom talks of their coming together on the Bedouin, if it +can be arranged." + +"We haven't heard lately," said Mrs. Carey; "but he should return within +a month or two, should he not, Nancy? My daughter writes all the letters +for the family, Mr. Hamilton, as you know by this time." + +"I do, to my great delight and satisfaction. Now there is one thing I +have not seen yet, something about which I have a great deal of +sentiment. May I smoke my cigar under the famous crimson rambler?" + +The sun set flaming red, behind the Beulah hills. The frogs sang in the +pond by the House of Lords, and the grasshoppers chirped in the long +grass of Mother Hamilton's favorite hayfield. Then the moon, round and +deep-hued as a great Mandarin orange, came up into the sky from which +the sun had faded, and the little group still sat on the side piazza, +talking. Nothing but their age and size kept the Carey chickens out of +Mr. Hamilton's lap, and Peter finally went to sleep with his head +against the consul's knee. He was a "lappy" man, Nancy said next +morning; and indeed there had been no one like him in the family circle +for many a long month. He was tender, he was gay, he was fatherly, he +was interested in all that concerned them; so no wonder that he heard +all about Gilbert's plans for earning money, and Nancy's accepted story. +No wonder he exclaimed at the check for ten dollars proudly exhibited in +payment, and no wonder he marvelled at the Summer Vacation School in the +barn, where fourteen little scholars were already enrolled under the +tutelage of the Carey Faculty. "I never wanted to go to anything in my +life as much as I want to go to that school!" he asserted. "If I could +write a circular as enticing as that, I should be a rich man. I wish +you'd let me have some new ones printed, girls, and put me down for +three evening lectures; I'd do almost anything to get into that +Faculty." "I wish you'd give the lectures for the benefit of the +Faculty, that would be better still," said Kitty. "Nancy's coming-out +party was to be in the barn this summer; that's one of the things we're +earning money for; or at least we make believe that it is, because it's +so much more fun to work for a party than for coal or flour or meat!" + +A look from Mrs. Carey prevented the children from making any further +allusions to economy, and Gilbert skillfully turned the subject by +giving a dramatic description of the rise and fall of The Dirty Boy, +from its first appearance at his mother's wedding breakfast to its last, +at the house-warming supper. + +After Lemuel Hamilton had gone back to the little country hotel he sat +by the open window for another hour, watching the moonbeams shimmering +on the river and bathing the tip of the white meeting-house steeple in a +flood of light. The air was still and the fireflies were rising above +the thick grass and carrying their fairy lamps into the lower branches +of the feathery elms. "Haying" would begin next morning, and he would be +wakened by the sharpening of scythes and the click of mowing machines. +He would like to work in the Hamilton fields, he thought, knee-deep in +daisies,--fields on whose grass he had not stepped since he was a boy +just big enough to go behind the cart and "rake after." What an +evening it had been! None of them had known it, but as a matter of fact +they had all scaled Shiny Wall and had been sitting with Mother Carey in +Peacepool; that was what had made everything so beautiful! Mr. +Hamilton's last glimpse of the Careys had been the group at the Yellow +House gate. Mrs. Carey, with her brown hair shining in the moonlight +leaned against Gilbert, the girls stood beside her, their arms locked in +hers, while Peter clung sleepily to her hand. + +"I believe they are having hard times!" he thought, "and I can't think +of anything I can safely do to make things easier. Still, one cannot +pity, one can only envy them! That is the sort of mother I would have +made had I been Nature and given a free hand! I would have put a label +on Mrs. Carey, saying: 'This is what I meant a woman to be!'" + + + +XXXIV + +NANCY COMES OUT + + +Nancy's seventeenth birthday was past, and it was on the full of the +August moon that she finally "came out" in the Hamilton barn. It was the +barn's first public appearance too, for the villagers had not been +invited to the private Saturday night dances that took place during the +brief reign of the Hamilton boys and girls. Beulah was more excited +about the barn than it was about Nancy, and she was quite in sympathy +with this view of things, as the entire Carey family, from mother to +Peter, was fairly bewitched with its new toy. Day by day it had grown +more enchanting as fresh ideas occurred to one or another, and +especially to Osh Popham, who lived, breathed, and had his being in the +barn, and who had lavished his ingenuity and skill upon its fittings. +Not a word did he vouchsafe to the general public of the extraordinary +nature of these fittings, nor of the many bewildering features of the +entertainment which was to take place within the almost sacred +precincts. All the Carey festivities had heretofore been in the house +save the one in honor of the hanging of the weather vane, which had been +an out-of-door function, attended by the whole village. Now the +community was all agog to disport itself in pastures new; its curiosity +being further piqued by the reception of written invitations, a +convention not often indulged in by Beulah. + +The eventful day dawned, clear and cool; a day with an air like liquid +amber, that properly belonged to September,--the weather prophet really +shifting it into August from pure kindness, having taken a sticky dogday +out and pitchforked it into the next month. + +The afternoon passed in various stages of plotting, planning, and +palpitation, and every girl in Beulah, of dancing age, was in her +bedroom, trying her hair a new way. The excitement increased a thousand +fold when it was rumored that an Admiral (whatever that might be) had +arrived at the hotel and would appear at the barn in full uniform. After +that, nobody's braids or puffs would go right! + +Nancy never needed to study Paris plates, for her hair dressed itself +after a fashion set by all the Venuses and Cupids and little Loves since +the world began. It curled, whether she would or no, so the only method +was to part the curls and give them a twist into a coil, from which +vagrant spirals fell to the white nape of her neck. Or, if she felt gay +and coquettish as she did tonight, the curls were pinned high to the +crown of her head and the runaways rioted here and there, touching her +cheek, her ear, her neck, never ugly, wherever they ran. + +Nancy had a new yellow organdy made "almost to touch," and a twist of +yellow ribbon in her hair. Kathleen and Julia were in the white dresses +brought them by Cousin Ann, and Mrs. Carey wore her new black silk, made +with a sweeping little train. Her wedding necklace of seed pearls was +around her neck, and a tall comb of tortoise shell and pearls rose from +the low-coiled knot of her shining hair. + +The family "received" in the old carriage house, and when everybody had +assembled, to the number of seventy-five or eighty, the door into the +barn was thrown open majestically by Gilbert, in his character as head +of the house of Carey. Words fail to describe the impression made by the +barn as it was introduced to the company, Nancy's debut sinking into +positive insignificance beside it. + +Dozens of brown japanned candle-lanterns hung from the beamed ceiling, +dispensing little twinkles of light here and there, while larger ones +swung from harness pegs driven into the sides of the walls. The soft +gray-brown of the old weathered lumber everywhere, made a lovely +background for the birch-bark brackets, and the white birch-bark vases +that were filled with early golden-rod, mixed with tall Queen Anne's +lace and golden glow. The quaint settles surrounding the sides of the +room were speedily filled by the admiring guests. Colonel Wheeler's tiny +upright piano graced the platform in the "tie up." Miss Susie Bennett, +the church organist, was to play it, aided now and then by Mrs. Carey or +Julia. Osh Popham was to take turns on the violin with a cousin from +Warren's Mills, who was reported to be the master fiddler of the county. + +When all was ready Mrs. Carey stood between the master fiddler and Susie +Bennett, and there was a sudden hush in the room. "Friends and +neighbors," she said, "we now declare the Hall of Happy Hours open for +the general good of the village. If it had not been for the generosity +of our landlord, Mr. Lemuel Hamilton, we could never have given you this +pleasure, and had not our helpers been so many, we could never have made +the place so beautiful. Before the general dancing begins there will be +a double quadrille of honor, in which all those will take part who have +driven a nail, papered or painted a wall, dug a spadeful of earth, or +done any work in or about the Yellow House." + +"Three cheers for Mrs. Carey!" called Bill Harmon, and everybody +complied lustily. + +"Three cheers for Lemuel Hamilton!" and the rafters of the barn rang +with the response. + +Just then the Admiral changed his position to conceal the moisture that +was beginning to gather in his eyes; and the sight of a personage so +unspeakably magnificent in a naval uniform induced Osh Popham to cry +spontaneously: "Three cheers for the Admiral! I don't know what he ever +done, but he looks as if he could, all right!" at which everybody +cheered and roared, and the Admiral to his great surprise made a speech, +during which the telltale tears appeared so often in his eyes and in his +voice, that Osh Popham concluded privately that if the naval hero ever +did meet an opposing battleship he would be likelier to drown the enemy +than fire into them! + +The double quadrille of honor passed off with much elegance, everybody +not participating in it being green with envy because he was not. Mrs. +Carey and the Admiral were partners; Nancy danced with Mr. Popham, +Kathleen with Digby, Julia with Bill Harmon. The other couples were Mrs. +Popham and Gilbert, Lallie Joy and Cyril Lord, Olive and Nat Harmon, +while Mrs. Bill led out a very shy and uncomfortable gentleman who had +dug the ditches for Cousin Ann's expensive pipes. + +Then the fun and the frolic began in earnest. The girls had been +practising the old-fashioned contra dances all summer, and training the +younger generation in them at the Vacation School. The old folks needed +no rehearsal! If you had waked any of them in the night suddenly they +could have called the changes for Speed the Plough, The Soldier's Joy, +The Maid in the Pump Room, or Hull's Victory. + +Money Musk brought Nancy and Mr. Henry Lord on to the floor as head +couple; a result attained by that young lady by every means, fair or +foul, known to woman; at least a rudimentary, budding woman of seventeen +summers! His coming to the party at all was regarded by Mother Carey, +who had spent the whole force of her being in managing it, as nothing +short of a miracle. He had accepted partly from secret admiration of his +handsome neighbor, partly to show the village that he did not choose +always to be a hermit crab, partly out of curiosity to see the unusual +gathering. Having crawled out of his selfish shell far enough to grace +the occasion, he took another step when Nancy asked him to dance. It was +pretty to see her curtsey when she put the question, pretty to see the +air of triumph with which she led him to the head of the line, and +positively delightful to the onlookers to see Hen Lord doing right and +left, ladies' chain, balance to opposite and cast off, at a girl's beck +and call. He was not a bad dancer, when his sluggish blood once got into +circulation; and he was considerably more limber at the end of Money +Musk, considerably less like a wooden image, than at the beginning +of it. + +In the interval between this astounding exhibition and the Rochester +Schottisch which followed it, Henry Lord went up to Mrs. Carey, who was +sitting in a corner a little apart from her guests for the moment. + +"Shall I go to South America, or shall I not?" he asked her in an +undertone. "Olive seems pleasantly settled, and Cyril tells me you will +consent to take him into your family for six months; still, I would like +a woman's advice." + +Mother Carey neither responded, "I should prefer not to take the +responsibility of advising you," nor "Pray do as you think best"; she +simply said, in a tone she might have used to a fractious boy: + +"I wouldn't go, Mr. Lord! Wait till Olive and Cyril are a little older. +Cyril will grow into my family instead of into his own; Olive will learn +to do without you; worse yet, you will learn to do without your +children. Stay at home and have Olive come back to you and her brother +every week end. South America is a long distance when there are only +three of you!" + +Prof. Lord was not satisfied with Mrs. Carey's tone. It was so maternal +that he expected at any moment she might brush his hair, straighten his +necktie, and beg him not to sit up too late, but his instinct told him +it was the only tone he was ever likely to hear from her, and so he said +reluctantly, "Very well; I confess that I really rely on your judgment, +and I will decline the invitation." + +"I think you are right," Mrs. Carey answered, wondering if the man would +ever see his duty with his own eyes, or whether he had deliberately +blinded himself for life. + + + +XXXV + +THE CRIMSON RAMBLER + + +While Mrs. Carey was talking with Mr. Lord, Nancy skimmed across the +barn floor intent on some suddenly remembered duty, went out into the +garden, and met face to face a strange young man standing by the rose +trellis and looking in at the dance through the open door. + +He had on a conventional black dinner-coat, something never seen in +Beulah, and wore a soft travelling cap. At first Nancy thought he was a +friend of the visiting fiddler, but a closer look at his merry dark eyes +gave her the feeling that she had seen him before, or somebody very like +him. He did not wait for her to speak, but taking off his cap, put out +his hand and said: "By your resemblance to a photograph in my possession +I think you are the girl who planted the crimson rambler." + +"Are you 'my son Tom'?" asked Nancy, open astonishment in her tone. "I +mean my Mr. Hamilton's son Tom?" + +"I am _my_ Mr. Hamilton's son Tom; or shall we say _our_ Mr. Hamilton's? +Do two 'mys' make one 'our'?" + +"Upon my word, wonders will never cease!" exclaimed Nancy. "The Admiral +said you were in Boston, but he never told us you would visit Beulah +so soon!" + +"No, I wanted it to be a secret. I wanted to appear when the ball was at +its height; the ghost of the old regime confronting the new, so +to speak." + +"Beulah will soon be a summer resort; everybody seems to be coming +here." + +"It's partly your fault, isn't it?" + +"Why, pray?" + +"'The Water Babies' is one of my favorite books, and I know all about +Mother Carey's chickens. They go out over the seas and show good birds +the way home." + +"Are _you_ a good bird?" asked Nancy saucily. + +"I'm _home_, at all events!" said Tom with an emphasis that made Nancy +shiver lest the young man had come to Beulah with a view of taking up +his residence in the paternal mansion. + +The two young people sat down on the piazza steps while the music of +The Sultan's Polka floated out of the barn door. Old Mrs. Jenks was +dancing with Peter, her eighty-year-old steps as fleet as his, her white +side-curls bobbing to the tune. Her withered hands clasped his dimpled +ones and the two seemed to be of the same age, for in the atmosphere of +laughter and goodwill there would have been no place for the old in +heart, and certainly Mrs. Jenks was as young as any one at the party. + +"I can't help dreading you, nice and amiable as you look," said Nancy +candidly to Tom Hamilton; "I am so afraid you'll fall in love with the +Yellow House and want it back again. Are you engaged to be married to a +little-footed China doll, or anything like that?" she asked with a +teasing, upward look and a disarming smile that robbed the question of +any rudeness. + +"No, not engaged to anything or anybody, but I've a notion I shall be, +soon, if all goes well! I'm getting along in years now!" + +"I might have known it!" sighed Nancy. "It was a prophetic instinct, my +calling you the Yellow Peril." + +"It isn't a bit nice of you to dislike me before you know me; I didn't +do that way with you!" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Why, in the first letter you ever wrote father you sent your love to +any of his children that should happen to be of the right size. I +chanced to be _just_ the right size, so I accepted it, gratefully; I've +got it here with me to-night; no, I left it in my other coat," he said +merrily, making a fictitious search through his pockets. + +Nancy laughed at his nonsense; she could not help it. + +"Will you promise to get over your foolish and wicked prejudices if I on +my part promise never to take the Yellow House away from you unless you +wish?" continued Tom. + +"Willingly," exclaimed Nancy joyously. "That's the safest promise I +could make, for I would never give up living in it unless I had to. +First it was father's choice, then it was mother's, now all of us seem +to have built ourselves into it, as it were. I am almost afraid to care +so much about anything, and I shall be so relieved if you do not turn +out to be really a Yellow Peril after all!" + +"You are much more of a Yellow Peril yourself!" said Tom, "with that +dress and that ribbon in your hair! Will you dance the next dance with +me, please?" + +"It's The Tempest; do you know it?" + +"No, but I'm not so old but I may learn. I'll form myself on that +wonderful person who makes jokes about the Admiral and plays +the fiddle." + +"That's Ossian Popham, principal prop of the House of Carey!" + +"Lucky dog! Have you got all the props you need?" + +Nancy's hand was not old or strong or experienced enough to keep this +strange young man in order, and just as she was meditating some +blighting retort he went on:-- + +"Who is that altogether adorable, that unspeakably beautiful lady in +black?--the one with the pearl comb that looks like a crown?" + +"That's mother," said Nancy, glowing. + +"I thought so. At least I didn't know any other way to account for her." + +"Why does she have to be accounted for?" asked Nancy, a little +bewildered. + +"For the same reason that you do," said the audacious youth. "You +explain your mother and your mother explains you, a little, at any rate. +Where is the celebrated crimson rambler, please?" + +"You are sitting on it," Nancy answered tranquilly. + +Tom sprang away from the trellis, on which he had been half reclining. +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "Why didn't you tell me? I have a great +affection for that rambler; it was your planting it that first made +me--think favorably of you. Has it any roses on it? I can't see in +this light." + +"It is almost out of bloom; there may be a few at the top somewhere; +I'll look out my window to-morrow morning and see." + +"At about what hour?" + +"How should I know?" laughed Nancy. + +"Oh! you're not to be depended on!" said Tom rebukingly. "Just give me +your hand a moment; step on that lowest rung of the trellis, now one +step higher, please; now stretch up your right hand and pick that little +cluster, do you see it?--That's right; now down, be careful, there you +are, thank you! A rose in the hand is worth two in the morning." + +"Put it in your button hole," said Nancy. "It is the last; I gave your +father one of the first a month ago." + +"I shall put this in my pocket book and send it to my mother in a +letter," Tom replied. ("And tell her it looks just like the girl who +planted it," he thought; "sweet, fragrant, spicy, graceful, vigorous, +full of color.") + +"Now come in and meet mother," said Nancy. "The polka is over, and soon +they will be 'forming on' for The Tempest." + +Tom Hamilton's entrance and introduction proved so interesting that it +delayed the dance for a few moments. Then Osh Popham and the master +fiddler tuned their violins and Mrs. Carey assisted Susie Bennett at the +piano, so that there were four musicians to give fresh stimulus to the +impatient feet. + +Tom Hamilton hardly knew whether he would rather dance with Nancy or +stand at the open door and watch her as he had been doing earlier in the +evening. He could not really see her now, although he was her partner, +his mind was so occupied with the intricate figures, but he could feel +her, in every fibre of his body, the touch of her light hand was so +charged with magnetism. + +Somebody swung the back doors of the barn wide open. The fields, lately +mown, sloped gently up to a fringe of pines darkly green against the +sky. The cool night air stirred the elms, and the brilliant moon +appeared in the very centre of the doorway. The beauty of the whole +scene went to Tom Hamilton's head a little, but he kept his thoughts +steadily on the changes as Osh Popham called them. + +To watch Nancy Carey dance The Tempest was a sight to stir the blood. +The two head couples joined hands and came down the length of the barn +four abreast; back they went in a whirl; then they balanced to the next +couple, then came four hands round and ladies' chain, and presently they +came down again flying, with another four behind them. The first four +were Nancy and Tom, Ralph Thurston and Kathleen, the last two among the +best dancers in Beulah; but while Kitty was slim and straight and +graceful as a young fawn, Nancy swept down the middle of the barn floor +like a flower borne by the breeze. She was Youth, Hope, Joy incarnate! +She had washed the dishes that night, would wash them again in the +morning, but what of that? What mattered it that the years just ahead +(for aught she knew to the contrary) were full of self-denial and +economy? Was she not seventeen? Anything was possible at seventeen! What +if the world was to be a work-a-day world? There was music and laughter +in it as well as work, and there was love in it, too, oceans of love, so +why not trip and be merry and guide one's young partner safely through +the difficult mazes of the dance and bring him out flushed and +triumphant, to receive mother's laughing compliments? + +Everybody was dancing The Tempest in his or her own fashion, thought the +Admiral, looking on. Mrs. Popham was grave, even gloomy from the waist +up, but incredibly lively from the waist down, moving with the precision +of machinery, while her partner, a bricklayer from Beulah Centre, +engaged the attention of the entire company by his wonderful steps. She +was fully up to time too, you may be sure, as her rival, Mrs. Bill +Harmon, was opposite her in the set. Lallie Joy, clad in one of +Kathleen's dresses, her hair dressed by Julia, was a daily attendant at +the Vacation School, but five weeks of steady instruction had not +sufficed to make her sure of ladies' grand chain. Olive moved like a shy +little wild thing, with a bending head and a grace all her own, while +Gilbert had great ease and distinction. + +There was a brief interval for ice cream, accompanied by marble cake, +gold cake, silver cake, election cake, sponge cake, cup cake, citron +cake, and White Mountain cake, and while it was being eaten, Susie +Bennett played The Sliding Waltz, The Maiden's Prayer, and Listen to the +Mocking Bird with variations; variations requiring almost +supernatural celerity. + +"I guess there ain't many that can touch Sutey at the piano!" said Osh +Popham, who sat beside the Admiral. "Have you seen anybody in the cities +that could play any faster'n she can? And Jo you ever ketch her landin' +on a black note when she started for a white one? I guess not!" + +"You are right!" replied the Admiral, "and now there seems to be a +general demand for you. What are they requesting you to do,--fly?" + +"That's it," said Osh. "Mis' Carey, will you play for me? Maria, you can +go into the carriage house if you don't want to be disgraced." + + "Come, my beloved, haste away, + Cut short the hours of thy delay. + Fly like a youthful hart or roe + Over the hills where spices grow." + +At length the strains of the favorite old tune faded on the ears of the +delighted audience. Then they had The Portland Fancy and The Irish +Washerwoman and The College Hornpipe, and at last the clock in the +carriage house struck midnight and the guests departed in groups of twos +and threes and fours, their cheerful voices sounding far down the +village street. + +Osh Popham stayed behind to cover the piano, put out the lanterns, close +the doors and windows, and lock the barn, while Mrs. Carey and the +Admiral strolled slowly along the greensward to the side door of +the house. + +"Good-night," Osh called happily as he passed them a few minutes later. +"I guess Beulah never see a party such as ourn was, this evenin'! I +guess if the truth was known, the State o' Maine never did, neither! +Good-night, all! Mebbe if I hurry along I can ketch up with Maria!" + +His quick steps brushing the grassy pathway could be heard for some +minutes in the clear still air, and presently the sound of his mellow +tenor came floating back:-- + + "Come, my beloved, haste away, + Cut short the hours of thy delay. + Fly like a youthful hart or roe + Over the hills where spices grow." + +Julia had gone upstairs with the sleepy Peter-bird, who had been +enjoying his first experience of late hours on the occasion of Nancy's +coming out; the rest of the young folks were gathered in a group under +the elms, chatting in couples,--Olive and Ralph Thurston, Kathleen and +Cyril Lord, Nancy and Tom Hamilton. Then they parted, Tom Hamilton +strolling to the country hotel with the young school teacher for +companion, while Olive and Cyril walked across the fields to the +House of Lords. + +It was a night in a thousand. The air was warm, clear, and breathlessly +still; so still that not a leaf stirred on the trees. The sky was +cloudless, and the moon, brilliant and luminous, shone as it seldom +shines in a northern clime. The water was low in Beulah's shining river +and it ran almost noiselessly under the bridge. While Kathleen and Julia +were still unbraiding their hair, exclaiming at every twist of the hand +as to the "loveliness" of the party, Nancy had kissed her mother and +crept silently into bed. All night long the strains of The Tempest ran +through her dreams. There was the touch of a strange hand on hers, an +altogether new touch, warm and compelling. There was the gay trooping +down the centre of the barn in fours,--some one by her side who had +never been there before,--and a sensation entirely new and intoxicating, +that whenever she met the glance of her partner's merry dark eyes she +found herself at the bottom of them. + +Was she a child when she heard Osh Popham cry: "Take your partners for +The Tempest!" and was she a woman when he called: "All promenade to +seats!" She hardly knew. Beulah was a dream; the Yellow House was a +dream, the dance was a dream, the partner was a dream. At one moment she +was a child helping her father to plant the crimson rambler, at another +she was a woman pulling a rose from the topmost branch and giving it to +some one who steadied her hand on the trellis; some one who said "Thank +you" and "Good-night" differently from the rest of the world. + +Who was the young stranger? Was he the Knight of Beulah Castle, the +Overlord of the Yellow House, was he the Yellow Peril, was he a good +bird to whom Mother Carey's chicken had shown the way home? Still the +dream went on in bewildering circles, and Nancy kept hearing mysterious +phrases spoken with a new meaning,--"Will you dance with me?" "Doesn't +the House of Carey need another prop?" "Won't you give me a rose?" and +above all: "You sent your love to any one of the Hamilton children who +should be of the right size; I was just the right size, and I took it!" + +"Love couldn't be sent in a letter!" expostulated Nancy in the dream; +and somebody, in the dream, always answered, "Don't be so sure! Very +strange things happen when Mother Carey's messengers go out over the +seas. Don't you remember how they spoke to Tom in 'The Water +Babies'?--Among all the songs that came across the water one was more +sweet and clear than all, for it was the song of a young girl's +voice.... And what was the song that she sung?... Have patience, keep +your eye single and your hands clean, and you will learn some day to +sing it yourself, without needing any man to teach you!" + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 10540 *** diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c9c4377 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #10540 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/10540) diff --git a/old/10540.txt b/old/10540.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..ec763bc --- /dev/null +++ b/old/10540.txt @@ -0,0 +1,8438 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, Mother Carey's Chickens, by Kate Douglas +Wiggin + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + + + + +Title: Mother Carey's Chickens + +Author: Kate Douglas Wiggin + +Release Date: December 29, 2003 [eBook #10540] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKENS*** + + +E-text prepared by papeters, Ginny Brewer, and the Project Gutenberg +Online Distributed Proofreading Team + + + +MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKENS + +By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN + + + + + + + +CONTENTS + + I. MOTHER CAREY HERSELF + II. THE CHICKENS + III. THE COMMON DENOMINATOR + IV. THE BROKEN CIRCLE + V. HOW ABOUT JULIA? + VI. NANCY'S IDEA + VII. "OLD BEASTS INTO NEW" + VIII. THE KNIGHT OF BEULAH CASTLE + IX. GILBERT'S EMBASSY + X. THE CAREYS' FLITTING + XI. THE SERVICE ON THE THRESHOLD + XII. COUSIN ANN + XIII. THE PINK OF PERFECTION + XIV. WAYS AND MEANS + XV. BELONGING TO BEULAH + XVI. THE POST-BAG + XVII. JACK OF ALL TRADES + XVIII. THE HOUSE OF LORDS + XIX. OLD AND NEW + XX. THE PAINTED CHAMBER + XXI. A FAMILY RHOMBOID + XXII. CRADLE GIFTS + XXIII. NEARING SHINY WALL + XXIV. A LETTER FROM GERMANY + XXV. "FOLLOWING THE GLEAM" + XXVI. A ZOOLOGICAL FATHER + XXVII. THE CAREY HOUSEWARMING + XXVIII. "TIBI SPLENDET FOCUS" + XXIX. "TH' ACTION FINE" + XXX. THE INGLENOOK + XXXI. GROOVES OF CHANGE + XXXII. DOORS OF DARING + XXXIII. MOTHER HAMILTON'S BIRTHDAY. + XXXIV. NANCY COMES OUT + XXXV. THE CRIMSON RAMBLER + + + + + + +I + +MOTHER CAREY HERSELF + + +"By and by there came along a flock of petrels, who are Mother Carey's +own chickens.... They flitted along like a flock of swallows, hopping +and skipping from wave to wave, lifting their little feet behind them so +daintily that Tom fell in love with them at once." + +Nancy stopped reading and laid down the copy of "Water Babies" on the +sitting-room table. "No more just now, Peter-bird," she said; "I hear +mother coming." + +It was a cold, dreary day in late October, with an east wind and a chill +of early winter in the air. The cab stood in front of Captain Carey's +house, with a trunk beside the driver and a general air of expectancy on +the part of neighbors at the opposite windows. + +Mrs. Carey came down the front stairway followed by Gilbert and +Kathleen; Gilbert with his mother's small bag and travelling cloak, +Kathleen with her umbrella; while little Peter flew to the foot of the +stairs with a small box of sandwiches pressed to his bosom. + +Mrs. Carey did not wear her usual look of sweet serenity, but nothing +could wholly mar the gracious dignity of her face and presence. As she +came down the stairs with her quick, firm tread, her flock following +her, she looked the ideal mother. Her fine height, her splendid +carriage, her deep chest, her bright eye and fresh color all bespoke the +happy, contented, active woman, though something in the way of transient +anxiety lurked in the eyes and lips. + +"The carriage is too early," she said; "let us come into the sitting +room for five minutes. I have said my good-byes and kissed you all a +dozen times, but I shall never be done until I am out of your sight." + +"O mother, mother, how can we let you go!" wailed Kathleen. + +"Kitty! how can you!" exclaimed Nancy. "What does it matter about us +when mother has the long journey and father is so ill?" + +"It will not be for very long,--it can't be," said Mrs. Carey wistfully. +"The telegram only said 'symptoms of typhoid'; but these low fevers +sometimes last a good while and are very weakening, so I may not be able +to bring father back for two or three weeks; I ought to be in Fortress +Monroe day after to-morrow; you must take turns in writing to me, +children!" + +"Every single day, mother!" + +"Every single thing that happens." + +"A fat letter every morning," they promised in chorus. + +"If there is any real trouble remember to telegraph your Uncle +Allan--did you write down his address, 11 Broad Street, New York? Don't +bother him about little things, for he is not well, you know." + +Gilbert displayed a note-book filled with memoranda and addresses. + +"And in any small difficulty send for Cousin Ann," Mrs. Carey went on. + +"The mere thought of her coming will make me toe the mark, I can tell +you that!" was Gilbert's rejoinder. + +"Better than any ogre or bug-a-boo, Cousin Ann is, even for Peter!" said +Nancy. + +"And will my Peter-bird be good and make Nancy no trouble?" said his +mother, lifting him to her lap for one last hug. + +"I'll be an angel boy pretty near all the time," he asserted between +mouthfuls of apple, "or most pretty near," he added prudently, as if +unwilling to promise anything superhuman in the way of behavior. As a +matter of fact it required only a tolerable show of virtue for Peter to +win encomiums at any time. He would brush his curly mop of hair away +from his forehead, lift his eyes, part his lips, showing a row of tiny +white teeth; then a dimple would appear in each cheek and a seraphic +expression (wholly at variance with the facts) would overspread the baby +face, whereupon the beholder--Mother Carey, his sisters, the cook or the +chambermaid, everybody indeed but Cousin Ann, who could never be +wheedled--would cry "Angel boy!" and kiss him. He was even kissed now, +though he had done nothing at all but exist and be an enchanting +personage, which is one of the injustices of a world where a large +number of virtuous and well-behaved people go unkissed to their graves! + +"I know Joanna and Ellen will take good care of the housekeeping," +continued Mrs. Carey, "and you will be in school from nine to two, so +that the time won't go heavily. For the rest I make Nancy responsible. +If she is young, you must remember that you are all younger still, and I +trust you to her." + +"The last time you did it, it didn't work very well!" And Gilbert gave +Nancy a sly wink to recall a little matter of family history when there +had been a delinquency on somebody's part. + +Nancy's face crimsoned and her lips parted for a quick retort, and none +too pleasant a one, apparently. + +Her mother intervened quietly. "We'll never speak of 'last times,' +Gilly, or where would any of us be? We'll always think of 'next' times. +I shall trust Nancy next time, and next time and next time, and keep on +trusting till I can trust her forever!" + +Nancy's face lighted up with a passion of love and loyalty. She +responded to the touch of her mother's faith as a harp to the favoring +wind, but she said nothing; she only glowed and breathed hard and put +her trembling hand about her mother's neck and under her chin. + +"Now it's time! One more kiss all around. Remember you are Mother +Carey's own chickens! There may be gales while I am away, but you must +ride over the crests of the billows as merry as so many flying fish! +Good-by! Good-by! Oh, my littlest Peter-bird, how can mother leave you?" + +"I opened the lunch box to see what Ellen gave you, but I only broke off +two teenty, weenty corners of sandwiches and one little new-moon bite +out of a cookie," said Peter, creating a diversion according to +his wont. + +Ellen and Joanna came to the front door and the children flocked down +the frozen pathway to the gate after their mother, getting a touch of +her wherever and whenever they could and jumping up and down between +whiles to keep warm. Gilbert closed the door of the carriage, and it +turned to go down the street. One window was open, and there was a last +glimpse of the beloved face framed in the dark blue velvet bonnet, one +last wave of a hand in a brown muff. + +"Oh! she is so beautiful!" sobbed Kathleen, "her bonnet is just the +color of her eyes; and she was crying!" + +"There never was anybody like mother!" said Nancy, leaning on the gate, +shivering with cold and emotion. "There never was, and there never will +be! We can try and try, Kathleen, and we _must_ try, all of us; but +mother wouldn't have to try; mother must have been partly born so!" + + + +II + +THE CHICKENS + + +It was Captain Carey's favorite Admiral who was responsible for the +phrase by which mother and children had been known for some years. The +Captain (then a Lieutenant) had brought his friend home one Saturday +afternoon a little earlier than had been expected, and they went to find +the family in the garden. + +Laughter and the sound of voices led them to the summer-house, and as +they parted the syringa bushes they looked through them and surprised +the charming group. + + A throng of children like to flowers were sown + About the grass beside, or climbed her knee. + I looked who were that favored company. + +That is the way a poet would have described what the Admiral saw, and if +you want to see anything truly and beautifully you must generally go +to a poet. + +Mrs. Carey held Peter, then a crowing baby, in her lap. Gilbert was +tickling Peter's chin with a buttercup, Nancy was putting a wreath of +leaves on her mother's hair, and Kathleen was swinging from an +apple-tree bough, her yellow curls flying. + +"Might I inquire what you think of that?" asked the father. + +"Well," the Admiral said, "mothers and children make a pretty good +picture at any time, but I should say this one couldn't be 'beat.' Two +for the Navy, eh?" + +"All four for the Navy, perhaps," laughed the young man. "Nancy has +already chosen a Rear-Admiral and Kathleen a Commodore; they are modest +little girls!" + +"They do you credit, Peter!" + +"I hope I've given them something,--I've tried hard enough, but they are +mostly the work of the lady in the chair. Come on and say how d'ye do." + +Before many Saturdays the Admiral's lap had superseded all other places +as a gathering ground for the little Careys, whom he called the +stormy petrels. + +"Mother Carey," he explained to them, came from the Latin _mater cara_, +this being not only his personal conviction, but one that had the +backing of Brewer's "Dictionary of Phrase and Fable." + +"The French call them _Les Oiseaux de Notre Dame_. That means 'The Birds +of our Lady,' Kitty, and they are the sailors' friends. Mother Carey +sends them to warn seafarers of approaching storms and bids them go out +all over the seas to show the good birds the way home. You'll have your +hands full if you're going to be Mother Carey's chickens." + +"I'd love to show good birds the way home!" said Gilbert. + +"Can a naughty bird show a good bird the way home, Addy?" This bland +question came from Nancy, who had a decided talent for sarcasm, +considering her years. (Of course the Admiral might have stopped the +children from calling him Addy, but they seemed to do it because +"Admiral" was difficult, and anyway they loved him so much they simply +had to take some liberties with him. Besides, although he was the +greatest disciplinarian that ever walked a deck, he was so soft and +flexible on land that he was perfectly ridiculous and delightful.) + +The day when the children were christened Mother Carey's chickens was +Nancy's tenth birthday, a time when the family was striving to give her +her proper name, having begun wrong with her at the outset. She was the +first, you see, and the first is something of an event, take it how +you will. + +It is obvious that at the beginning they could not address a tiny thing +on a pillow as Nancy, because she was too young. She was not even +alluded to at that early date as "she," but always as "it," so they +called her "baby" and let it go at that. Then there was a long period +when she was still too young to be called Nancy, and though, so far as +age was concerned, she might properly have held on to her name of baby, +she couldn't with propriety, because there was Gilbert then, and he was +baby. Moreover, she gradually became so indescribably quaint and +bewitching and comical and saucy that every one sought diminutives for +her; nicknames, fond names, little names, and all sorts of words that +tried to describe her charm (and couldn't), so there was Poppet and +Smiles and Minx and Rogue and Midget and Ladybird and finally Nan and +Nannie by degrees, to soberer Nancy. + +"Nancy is ten to-day," mused the Admiral. "Bless my soul, how time +flies! You were a young Ensign, Carey, and I well remember the letter +you wrote me when this little lass came into harbor! Just wait a minute; +I believe the scrap of newspaper verse you enclosed has been in my +wallet ever since. I always liked it." + +"I recall writing to you," said Mr. Carey. "As you had lent me five +hundred dollars to be married on, I thought I ought to keep you posted!" + +"Oh, father! did you have to borrow money?" cried Kathleen. + +"I did, my dear. There's no disgrace in borrowing, if you pay back, and +I did. Your Uncle Allan was starting in business, and I had just put my +little capital in with his when I met your mother. If you had met your +mother wouldn't you have wanted to marry her?" + +"Yes!" cried Nancy eagerly. "Fifty of her!" At which everybody laughed. + +"And what became of the money you put in Uncle Allan's business?" asked +Gilbert with unexpected intelligence. + +There was a moment's embarrassment and an exchange of glances between +mother and father before he replied, "Oh! that's coming back multiplied +six times over, one of these days,--Allan has a very promising project +on hand just now, Admiral." + +"Glad to hear it! A delightful fellow, and straight as a die. I only +wish he could perform once in a while, instead of promising." + +"He will if only he keeps his health, but he's heavily handicapped +there, poor chap. Well, what's the verse?" + +The Admiral put on his glasses, prettily assisted by Kathleen, who was +on his knee and seized the opportunity to give him a French kiss when +the spectacles were safely on the bridge of his nose. Whereupon +he read:-- + + "There came to port last Sunday night + The queerest little craft, + Without an inch of rigging on; + I looked, and looked, and laughed. + + "It seemed so curious that she + Should cross the unknown water, + And moor herself within my room-- + My daughter, O my daughter! + + "Yet, by these presents, witness all, + She's welcome fifty times, + And comes consigned to Hope and Love + And common metre rhymes. + + "She has no manifest but this; + No flag floats o'er the water; + She's rather new for British Lloyd's-- + My daughter, O my daughter! + + "Ring out, wild bells--and tame ones, too; + Ring out the lover's moon, + Ring in the little worsted socks, + Ring in the bib and spoon."[1] + +[Footnote 1: George W. Cable.] + +"Oh, Peter, how pretty!" said Mother Carey all in a glow. "You never +showed it to me!" + +"You were too much occupied with the aforesaid 'queer little craft,' +wasn't she, Nan--I mean Nancy!" and her father pinched her ear and +pulled a curly lock. + +Nancy was a lovely creature to the eye, and she came by her good looks +naturally enough. For three generations her father's family had been +known as the handsome Careys, and when Lieutenant Carey chose Margaret +Gilbert for his wife, he was lucky enough to win the loveliest girl in +her circle. + +Thus it was still the handsome Careys in the time of our story, for all +the children were well-favored and the general public could never decide +whether Nancy or Kathleen was the belle of the family. Kathleen had fair +curls, skin like a rose, and delicate features; not a blemish to mar her +exquisite prettiness! All colors became her; all hats suited her hair. +She was the Carey beauty so long as Nancy remained out of sight, but the +moment that young person appeared Kathleen left something to be desired. +Nancy piqued; Nancy sparkled; Nancy glowed; Nancy occasionally pouted +and not infrequently blazed. Nancy's eyes had to be continually searched +for news, both of herself and of the immediate world about her. If you +did not keep looking at her every "once in so often" you couldn't keep +up with the progress of events; she might flash a dozen telegrams to +somebody, about something, while your head was turned away. Kathleen +could be safely left unwatched for an hour or so without fear of change; +her moods were less variable, her temper evener; her interest in the +passing moment less keen, her absorption in the particular subject less +intense. Walt Whitman might have been thinking of Nancy when he wrote:-- + + There was a child went forth every day + And the first object he looked upon, that object he became, + And that object became part of him for the day, or a certain part of the + day + Or for many years, or stretching cycles of years. + +Kathleen's nature needed to be stirred, Nancy's to be controlled, the +impulse coming from within, the only way that counts in the end, though +the guiding force may be applied from without. + +Nancy was more impulsive than industrious, more generous than wise, more +plucky than prudent; she had none too much perseverance and no +patience at all. + +Gilbert was a fiery youth of twelve, all for adventure. He kindled +quickly, but did not burn long, so deeds of daring would be in his line; +instantaneous ones, quickly settled, leaving the victor with a swelling +chest and a feather in cap; rather an obvious feather suited +Gilbert best. + +Peter? Oh! Peter, aged four, can be dismissed in very few words as a +consummate charmer and heart-breaker. The usual elements that go to the +making of a small boy were all there, but mixed with white magic. It is +painful to think of the dozens of girl babies in long clothes who must +have been feeling premonitory pangs when Peter was four, to think they +couldn't all marry him when they grew up! + + + +III + +THE COMMON DENOMINATOR + + +Three weeks had gone by since Mother Carey's departure for Fortress +Monroe, and the children had mounted from one moral triumph to another. +John Bunyan, looking in at the windows, might have exclaimed:-- + + Who would true valor see + Let him come hither. + +It is easy to go wrong in a wicked world, but there are certain +circumstances under which one is pledged to virtue; when, like a knight +of the olden time, you wear your motto next your heart and fight for +it,--"Death rather than defeat!" "We are able because we think we are +able!" "Follow honor!" and the like. These sentiments look beautifully +as class mottoes on summer graduation programmes, but some of them, +apparently, disappear from circulation before cold weather sets in. + +It is difficult to do right, we repeat, but not when mother is away from +us for the first time since we were born; not when she who is the very +sun of home is shining elsewhere, and we are groping in the dim light +without her, only remembering her last words and our last promises. Not +difficult when we think of the eyes the color of the blue velvet bonnet, +and the tears falling from them. They are hundreds of miles away, but we +see them looking at us a dozen times a day and the last thing at night. + +Not difficult when we think of father; gay, gallant father, desperately +ill and mother nursing him; father, with the kind smile and the jolly +little sparkles of fun in his eyes; father, tall and broad-shouldered, +splendid as the gods, in full uniform; father, so brave that if a naval +battle ever did come his way, he would demolish the foe in an instant; +father, with a warm strong hand clasping ours on high days and holidays, +taking us on great expeditions where we see life at its best and taste +incredible joys. + +The most quarrelsome family, if the house burns down over their heads, +will stop disputing until the emergency is over and they get under a new +roof. Somehow, in times of great trial, calamity, sorrow, the +differences that separate people are forgotten. Isn't it rather like the +process in mathematics where we reduce fractions to a common +denominator? + +It was no time for anything but superior behavior in the Carey +household; that was distinctly felt from kitchen to nursery. Ellen the +cook was tidier, Joanna the second maid more amiable. Nancy, who was +"responsible," rose earlier than the rest and went to bed later, after +locking doors and windows that had been left unlocked since the flood. +"I am responsible," she said three or four times each day, to herself, +and, it is to be feared, to others! Her heavenly patience in dressing +Peter every few hours without comment struck the most callous observer +as admirable. Peter never remembered that he had any clothes on. He +might have been a real stormy petrel, breasting the billows in his +birthday suit and expecting his feathers to be dried when and how the +Lord pleased. He comported himself in the presence of dust, mud, water, +liquid refreshment, and sticky substances, exactly as if clean white +sailor suits grew on every bush and could be renewed at pleasure. + +Even Gilbert was moved to spontaneous admiration and respect at the +sight of Nancy's zeal. "Nobody would know you, Nancy; it is simply +wonderful, and I only wish it could last," he said. Even this style of +encomium was received sweetly, though there had been moments in her +previous history when Nancy would have retorted in a very pointed +manner. When she was "responsible," not even had he gone the length of +calling Nancy an unspeakable pig, would she have said anything. She had +a blissful consciousness that, had she been examined, indications of +angelic wings, and not bristles, would have been discovered under +her blouse. + +Gilbert, by the way, never suspected that the masters in his own school +wondered whether he had experienced religion or was working on some sort +of boyish wager. He took his two weekly reports home cautiously for fear +that they might break on the way, pasted them on large pieces of paper, +and framed them in elaborate red, white, and blue stars united by strips +of gold paper. How Captain and Mrs. Carey laughed and cried over this +characteristic message when it reached them! "Oh! they _are_ darlings," +Mother Carey cried. "Of course they are," the Captain murmured feebly. +"Why shouldn't they be, considering you?" + +"It is really just as easy to do right as wrong, Kathleen," said Nancy +when the girls were going to bed one night. + +"Ye-es!" assented Kathleen with some reservations in her tone, for she +was more judicial and logical than her sister. "But you have to keep +your mind on it so, and never relax a single bit! Then it's lots easier +for a few weeks than it is for long stretches!" + +"That's true," agreed Nancy; "it would be hard to keep it up forever. +And you have to love somebody or something like fury every minute or you +can't do it at all. How do the people manage that can't love like that, +or haven't anybody to love?" + +"I don't know." said Kathleen sleepily. "I'm so worn out with being +good, that every night I just say my prayers and tumble into bed +exhausted. Last night I fell asleep praying, I honestly did!" + +"Tell that to the marines!" remarked Nancy incredulously. + + + +IV + +THE BROKEN CIRCLE + + +The three weeks were running into a month now, and virtue still reigned +in the Carey household. But things were different. Everybody but Peter +saw the difference. Peter dwelt from morn till eve in that Land of Pure +Delight which is ignorance of death. The children no longer bounded to +meet the postman, but waited till Joanna brought in the mail. Steadily, +daily, the letters changed in tone. First they tried to be cheerful; +later on they spoke of trusting that the worst was past; then of hoping +that father was holding his own. "Oh! if he was holding _all_ his own," +sobbed Nancy. "If we were only there with him, helping mother!" + +Ellen said to Joanna one morning in the kitchen: "It's my belief the +Captain's not going to get well, and I'd like to go to Newburyport to +see my cousin and not be in the house when the children's told!" And +Joanna said, "Shame on you not to stand by 'em in their hour of +trouble!" At which Ellen quailed and confessed herself a coward. + +Finally came a day never to be forgotten; a day that swept all the +former days clean out of memory, as a great wave engulfs all the little +ones in its path; a day when, Uncle Allan being too ill to travel, +Cousin Ann, of all people in the universe,--Cousin Ann came to bring the +terrible news that Captain Carey was dead. + +Never think that Cousin Ann did not suffer and sympathize and do her +rocky best to comfort; she did indeed, but she was thankful that her +task was of brief duration. Mrs. Carey knew how it would be, and had +planned all so that she herself could arrive not long after the blow had +fallen. Peter, by his mother's orders (she had thought of everything) +was at a neighbor's house, the centre of all interest, the focus of all +gayety. He was too young to see the tears of his elders with any profit; +baby plants grow best in sunshine. The others were huddled together in a +sad group at the front window, eyes swollen, handkerchiefs rolled into +drenched, pathetic little wads. + +Cousin Ann came in from the dining room with a tumbler and spoon in her +hand. "See here, children!" she said bracingly, "you've been crying for +the last twelve hours without stopping, and I don't blame you a mite. If +I was the crying kind I'd do the same thing. Now do you think you've got +grit enough--all three of you--to bear up for your mother's sake, when +she first comes in? I've mixed you each a good dose of aromatic spirits +of ammonia, and it's splendid for the nerves. Your mother must get a +night's sleep somehow, and when she gets back a little of her strength +you'll be the greatest comfort she has in the world. The way you're +carrying on now you'll be the death of her!" + +It was a good idea, and the dose had courage in it. Gilbert took the +first sip, Kathleen the second, and Nancy the third, and hardly had the +last swallow disappeared down the poor aching throats before a carriage +drove up to the gate. Some one got out and handed out Mrs. Carey whose +step used to be lighter than Nancy's. A strange gentleman, oh! not a +stranger, it was the dear Admiral helping mother up the path. They had +been unconsciously expecting the brown muff and blue velvet bonnet, but +these had vanished, like father, and all the beautiful things of the +past years, and in their place was black raiment that chilled their +hearts. But the black figure had flung back the veil that hid her from +the longing eyes of the children, and when she raised her face it was +full of the old love. She was grief-stricken and she was pale, but she +was mother, and the three young things tore open the door and clasped +her in their arms, sobbing, choking, whispering all sorts of tender +comfort, their childish tears falling like healing dew on her poor +heart. The Admiral soothed and quieted them each in turn, all but Nancy. +Cousin Ann's medicine was of no avail, and strangling with sobs Nancy +fled to the attic until she was strong enough to say "for mother's sake" +without a quiver in her voice. Then she crept down, and as she passed +her mother's room on tiptoe she looked in and saw that the chair by the +window, the chair that had been vacant for a month, was filled, and that +the black-clad figure was what was left to them; a strange, sad, quiet +mother, who had lost part of herself somewhere,--the gay part, the +cheerful part, the part that made her so piquantly and entrancingly +different from other women. Nancy stole in softly and put her young +smooth cheek against her mother's, quietly stroking her hair. "There are +four of us to love you and take care of you," she said. "It isn't quite +so bad as if there was nobody!" + +Mrs. Carey clasped her close. "Oh! my Nancy! my first, my oldest, God +will help me, I know that, but just now I need somebody close and warm +and soft; somebody with arms to hold and breath to speak and lips to +kiss! I ought not to sadden you, nor lean on you, you are too young, +--but I must a little, just at the first. You see, dear, you come next +to father!" + +"Next to father!" Nancy's life was set to a new tune from that moment. +Here was her spur, her creed; the incentive, the inspiration she had +lacked. She did not suddenly grow older than her years, but simply, in +the twinkling of an eye, came to a realization of herself, her +opportunity, her privilege, her duty; the face of life had changed, and +Nancy changed with it. + +"Do you love me next to mother?" the Admiral had asked coaxingly once +when Nancy was eight and on his lap as usual. + +"Oh dear no!" said Nancy thoughtfully, shaking her head. + +"Why, that's rather a blow to me," the Admiral exclaimed, pinching an +ear and pulling a curl. "I flattered myself that when I was on my best +behavior I came next to mother." + +"It's this way, Addy dear," said Nancy, cuddling up to his waistcoat and +giving a sigh of delight that there were so many nice people in the +world. "It's just this way. First there's mother, and then all round +mother there's a wide, wide space; and then father and you come next +the space." + +The Admiral smiled; a grave, lovely smile that often crept into his eyes +when he held Mother Carey's chickens on his knee. He kissed Nancy on the +little white spot behind the ear where the brown hair curled in tiny +rings like grape tendrils, soft as silk and delicate as pencil strokes. +He said nothing, but his boyish dreams were in the kiss, and certain +hopes of manhood that had never been realized. He was thinking that +Margaret Gilbert was a fortunate and happy woman to have become Mother +Carey; such a mother, too, that all about her was a wide, wide space, +and next the space, the rest of the world, nearer or farther according +to their merits. He wondered if motherhood ought not to be like that, +and he thought if it were it would be a great help to God. + + + +V + +HOW ABOUT JULIA? + + +We often speak of a family circle, but there are none too many of them. +Parallel lines never meeting, squares, triangles, oblongs, and +particularly those oblongs pulled askew, known as rhomboids, these and +other geometrical figures abound, but circles are comparatively few. In +a true family circle a father and a mother first clasp each other's +hands, liking well to be thus clasped; then they stretch out a hand on +either side, and these are speedily grasped by children, who hold one +another firmly, and complete the ring. One child is better than nothing, +a great deal better than nothing; it is at least an effort in the right +direction, but the circle that ensues is not, even then, a truly nice +shape. You can stand as handsomely as ever you like, but it simply won't +"come round." The minute that two, three, four, five, join in, the +"roundness" grows, and the merriment too, and the laughter, and the +power to do things. (Responsibility and care also, but what is the use +of discouraging circles when there are not enough of them anyway?) + +The Carey family circle had been round and complete, with love and +harmony between all its component parts. In family rhomboids, for +instance, mother loves the children and father does not, or father does, +but does not love mother, or father and mother love each other and the +children do not get their share; it is impossible to enumerate all the +little geometrical peculiarities which keep a rhomboid from being a +circle, but one person can just "stand out" enough to spoil the shape, +or put hands behind back and refuse to join at all. About the ugliest +thing in the universe is that non-joining habit! You would think that +anybody, however dull, might consider his hands, and guess by the look +of them that they must be made to work, and help, and take hold of +somebody else's hands! Miserable, useless, flabby paws, those of the +non-joiner; that he feeds and dresses himself with, and then hangs to +his selfish sides, or puts behind his beastly back! + +When Captain Carey went on his long journey into the unknown and +uncharted land, the rest of the Careys tried in vain for a few months to +be still a family, and did not succeed at all. They clung as closely to +one another as ever they could, but there was always a gap in the circle +where father had been. Some men, silent, unresponsive, absent-minded and +especially absorbed in business, might drop out and not be missed, but +Captain Carey was full of vitality, warmth, and high spirits. It is +strange so many men think that the possession of a child makes them a +father; it does not; but it is a curious and very general +misapprehension. Captain Carey was a boy with his boys, and a gallant +lover with his girls; to his wife--oh! we will not even touch upon that +ground; she never did, to any one or anything but her own heart! Such an +one could never disappear from memory, such a loss could never be made +wholly good. The only thing to do was to remember father's pride and +justify it, to recall his care for mother and take his place so far as +might be; the only thing for all, as the months went on, was to be what +mother called the three b's,--brave, bright, and busy. + +To be the last was by far the easiest, for the earliest effort at +economy had been the reluctant dismissal of Joanna, the chambermaid. In +old-fashioned novels the devoted servant always insisted on remaining +without wages, but this story concerns itself with life at a later date. +Joanna wept at the thought of leaving, but she never thought of the +romantic and illogical expedient of staying on without compensation. + +Captain Carey's salary had been five thousand dollars, or rather was to +have been, for he had only attained his promotion three months before +his death. There would have been an extra five hundred dollars a year +when he was at sea, and on the strength of this addition to their former +income he intended to increase the amount of his life insurance, but it +had not yet been done when the sudden illness seized him, an illness +that began so gently and innocently and terminated with such sudden and +unexpected fatality. + +The life insurance, such as it was, must be put into the bank for +emergencies. Mrs. Carey realized that that was the only proper thing to +do when there were four children under fifteen to be considered. The +pressing question, however, was how to keep it in the bank, and subsist +on a captain's pension of thirty dollars a month. There was the ten +thousand, hers and the Captain's, in Allan Carey's business, but Allan +was seriously ill with nervous prostration, and no money put into his +business ever had come out, even in a modified form. The Admiral was at +the other end of the world, and even had he been near at hand Mrs. Carey +would never have confided the family difficulties to him. She could +hardly have allowed him even to tide her over her immediate pressing +anxieties, remembering his invalid sister and his many responsibilities. +No, the years until Gilbert was able to help, or Nancy old enough to use +her talents, or the years before the money invested with Allan would +bring dividends, those must be years of self-sacrifice on everybody's +part; and more even than that, they must be fruitful years, in which not +mere saving and economizing, but earning, would be necessary. + +It was only lately that Mrs. Carey had talked over matters with the +three eldest children, but the present house was too expensive to be +longer possible as a home, and the question of moving was a matter of +general concern. Joanna had been, up to the present moment, the only +economy, but alas! Joanna was but a drop in the necessary bucket. + +On a certain morning in March Mrs. Carey sat in her room with a letter +in her lap, the children surrounding her. It was from Mr. Manson, Allan +Carey's younger partner; the sort of letter that dazed her, opening up +as it did so many questions of expediency, duty, and responsibility. The +gist of it was this: that Allan Carey was a broken man in mind and body; +that both for the climate and for treatment he was to be sent to a rest +cure in the Adirondacks; that sometime or other, in Mr. Manson's +opinion, the firm's investments might be profitable if kept long enough, +and there was no difficulty in keeping them, for nobody in the universe +wanted them at the present moment; that Allan's little daughter Julia +had no source of income whatever after her father's monthly bills were +paid, and that her only relative outside of the Careys, a certain Miss +Ann Chadwick, had refused to admit her into her house. "Mr. Carey only +asked Miss Chadwick as a last resort," wrote Mr. Manson, "for his very +soul quailed at the thought of letting you, his brother's widow, suffer +any more by his losses than was necessary, and he studiously refused to +let you know the nature and extent of his need. Miss Chadwick's only +response to his request was, that she believed in every tub standing on +its own bottom, and if he had harbored the same convictions he would not +have been in his present extremity. I am telling you this, my dear Mrs. +Carey," the writer went on, "just to get your advice about the child. I +well know that your income will not support your own children; what +therefore shall we do with Julia? I am a poor young bachelor, with two +sisters to support. I shall find a position, of course, and I shall +never cease nursing Carey's various affairs and projects during the time +of his exile, but I cannot assume an ounce more of financial +responsibility." + +There had been quite a council over the letter, and parts of it had been +read more than once by Mrs. Carey, but the children, though very +sympathetic with Uncle Allan and loud in their exclamations of "Poor +Julia!" had not suggested any remedy for the situation. + +"Well," said Mrs. Carey, folding the letter, "there seems to be but one +thing for us to do." + +"Do you mean that you are going to have Julia come and live with us,--be +one of the family?" exclaimed Gilbert. + +"That is what I want to discuss," she replied. "You three are the family +as well as I.--Come in!" she called, for she heard the swift feet of the +youngest petrel ascending the stairs. "Come in! Where is there a sweeter +Peter, a fleeter Peter, a neater Peter, than ours, I should like to +know, and where a better adviser for the council?" + +"_Neater_, mother! How _can_ you?" inquired Kathleen. + +"I meant neater when he is just washed and dressed," retorted Peter's +mother. "Are you coming to the family council, sweet Pete?" + +Peter climbed on his mother's knee and answered by a vague affirmative +nod, his whole mind being on the extraction of a slippery marble from a +long-necked bottle. + +"Then be quiet, and speak only when we ask your advice," continued Mrs. +Carey. "Unless I were obliged to, children, I should be sorry to go +against all your wishes. I might be willing to bear my share of a +burden, but more is needed than that." + +"I think," said Nancy suddenly, aware now of the trend of her mother's +secret convictions, "I think Julia is a smug, conceited, vain, affected +little pea--" Here she caught her mother's eye and suddenly she heard +inside of her head or heart or conscience a chime of words. "_Next to +father_!" Making a magnificent oratorical leap she finished her sentence +with only a second's break,--"peacock, but if mother thinks Julia is a +duty, a duty she is, and we must brace up and do her. Must we love her, +mother, or can we just be good and polite to her, giving her the breast +and taking the drumstick? _She_ won't ever say, '_Don't let me rob +you_!' like Cousin Ann, when _she_ takes the breast!" + +Kathleen looked distinctly unresigned. She hated drumsticks and all that +they stood for in life. She disliked the wall side of the bed, the +middle seat in the carriage, the heel of the loaf, the underdone +biscuit, the tail part of the fish, the scorched end of the omelet. "It +will make more difference to me than anybody," she said gloomily. + +"Everything makes more difference to you, Kitty," remarked Gilbert. + +"I mean I'm always fourth when the cake plate's passed,--in everything! +Now Julia'll be fourth, and I shall be fifth; it's lucky people can't +tumble off the floor!" + +"Poor abused Kathleen!" cried Gilbert. "Well, mother, you're always +right, but I can't see why you take another one into the family, when +we've been saying for a week there isn't even enough for us five to live +on. It looks mighty queer to put me in the public school and spend the +money you save that way, on Julia!" + +Way down deep in her heart Mother Carey felt a pang. There was a little +seed of hard self-love in Gilbert that she wanted him to dig up from the +soil and get rid of before it sprouted and waxed too strong. + +"Julia is a Carey chicken after all, Gilbert," she said. + +"But she's Uncle Allan's chicken, and I'm Captain Carey's eldest son." + +"That's the very note I should strike if I were you," his mother +responded, "only with a little different accent. What would Captain +Carey's eldest son like to do for his only cousin, a little girl younger +than himself,--a girl who had a very silly, unwise, unhappy mother for +the first five years of her life, and who is now practically fatherless, +for a time at least?" + +Gilbert wriggled as if in great moral discomfort, as indeed he was. +"Well," he said, "I don't want to be selfish, and if the girls say yes, +I'll have to fall in; but it isn't logic, all the same, to ask a sixth +to share what isn't enough for five." + +"I agree with you there, Gilly!" smiled his mother. "The only question +before the council is, does logic belong at the top, in the scale of +reasons why we do certain things? If we ask Julia to come, she will have +to 'fall into line,' as you say, and share the family misfortunes as +best she can." + +"She's a regular shirk, and always was." This from Kathleen. + +"She would never come at all if she guessed her cousins' opinion of her, +that is very certain!" remarked Mrs. Carey pointedly. + +"Now, mother, look me in the eye and speak the whole truth," asked +Nancy. "_Do you like Julia Carey_?" + +Mrs. Carey laughed as she answered, "Frankly then, I do not! But," she +continued, "I do not like several of the remarks that have been made at +this council, yet I manage to bear them." + +"Of course I shan't call Julia smug and conceited to her face," asserted +Nancy encouragingly. "I hope that her bosom friend Gladys Ferguson has +disappeared from view. The last time Julia visited us, Kitty and I got +so tired of Gladys Ferguson's dresses, her French maid, her bedroom +furniture, and her travels abroad, that we wrote her name on a piece of +paper, put it in a box, and buried it in the back yard the minute Julia +left the house. When you write, mother, tell Julia there's a piece of +breast for her, but not a mouthful of my drumstick goes to Gladys +Ferguson." + +"The more the hungrier; better invite Gladys too," suggested Gilbert, +"then we can say like that simple little kid in Wordsworth:-- + + "'Sisters and brother, little maid, + How many may you be?' + 'How many? Seven in all,' she said, + And wondering looked at me!" + +"Then it goes on thus," laughed Nancy:-- + + "'And who are they? I pray you tell.' + She answered, 'Seven are we; + Mother with us makes five, and then + There's Gladys and Julee!'" + +Everybody joined in the laugh then, including Peter, who was especially +uproarious, and who had an idea he had made the joke himself, else why +did they all kiss him? + +"How about Julia? What do you say, Peter?" asked his mother. + +"I want her. She played horse once," said Peter. The opinion that the +earth revolved around his one small person was natural at the age of +four, but the same idea of the universe still existed in Gilbert's mind. +A boy of thirteen ought perhaps to have a clearer idea of the relative +sizes of world and individual; at least that was the conviction in +Mother Carey's mind. + + + +VI + +NANCY'S IDEA + + +Nancy had a great many ideas, first and last. They were generally unique +and interesting at least, though it is to be feared that few of them +were practical. However, it was Nancy's idea to build Peter a playhouse +in the plot of ground at the back of the Charlestown house, and it was +she who was the architect and head carpenter. That plan had brought much +happiness to Peter and much comfort to the family. It was Nancy's idea +that she, Gilbert, and Kathleen should all be so equally polite to +Cousin Ann Chadwick that there should be no favorite to receive an undue +share of invitations to the Chadwick house. Nancy had made two visits in +succession, both offered in the nature of tributes to her charms and +virtues, and she did not wish a third. + +"If you two can't be _more_ attractive, then I'll be _less_, that's +all," was her edict. "'Turn and turn about' has got to be the rule in +this matter. I'm not going to wear the martyr's crown alone; it will +adorn your young brows every now and then or I'll know the reason why!" + +It was Nancy's idea to let Joanna go, and divide her work among the +various members of the family. It was also Nancy's idea that, there +being no strictly masculine bit of martyrdom to give to Gilbert, he +should polish the silver for his share. This was an idea that proved so +unpopular with Gilbert that it was speedily relinquished. Gilbert was +wonderful with tools, so wonderful that Mother Carey feared he would be +a carpenter instead of the commander of a great war ship; but there +seemed to be no odd jobs to offer him. There came a day when even Peter +realized that life was real and life was earnest. When the floor was +strewn with playthings his habit had been to stand amid the wreckage and +smile, whereupon Joanna would fly and restore everything to its +accustomed place. After the passing of Joanna, Mother Carey sat placidly +in her chair in the nursery and Peter stood ankle deep among his +toys, smiling. + +"Now put everything where it belongs, sweet Pete," said mother. + +"You do it," smiled Peter. + +"I am very busy darning your stockings, Peter." + +"I don't like to pick up, Muddy." + +"No, it isn't much fun, but it has to be done." + +Peter went over to the window and gazed at the landscape. "I dess I'll +go play with Ellen," he remarked in honeyed tones. + +"That would be nice, after you clear away your toys and blocks." + +"I dess I'll play with Ellen first," suggested Peter, starting slowly +towards the door. + +"No, we always work first and play afterwards!" said mother, going on +darning. + +Peter felt caught in a net of irresistible and pitiless logic. + +"Come and help me, Muddy?" he coaxed, and as she looked up he suddenly +let fly all his armory of weapons at once,--two dimples, tossing back of +curls, parted lips, tiny white teeth, sweet voice. + +Mother Carey's impulse was to cast herself on the floor and request him +simply to smile on her and she would do his lightest bidding, but +controlling her secret desires she answered: "I would help if you needed +me, but you don't. You're a great big boy now!" + +"I'm not a great big boy!" cried Peter, "I'm only a great big little +boy!" + +"Don't waste time, sweet Pete; go to work!" + +"_I want Joanna_!" roared Peter with the voice of an infant bull. + +"So we all do. It's because she had to go that I'm darning stockings." + +The net tightened round Peter's defenceless body and he hurled himself +against his rocking horse and dragged it brutally to a corner. Having +disposed of most of his strength and temper in this operation, he put +away the rest of his goods and chattels more quietly, but with streaming +eyes and heaving bosom. + +"Splendid!" commented Mother Carey. "Joanna couldn't have done it +better, and it won't be half so much work next time." Peter heard the +words "next time" distinctly, and knew the grim face of Duty at last, +though he was less than five. + +The second and far more tragic time was when he was requested to make +himself ready for luncheon,--Kathleen to stand near and help "a little" +if really necessary. Now Peter _au fond_ was absolutely clean. French +phrases are detestable where there is any English equivalent, but in +this case there is none, so I will explain to the youngest reader--who +may speak only one language--that the base of Peter was always clean. He +received one full bath and several partial ones in every twenty-four +hours, but su-per-im-posed on this base were evidences of his eternal +activities, and indeed of other people's! They were divided into three +classes,--those contracted in the society of Joanna when she took him +out-of-doors: such as sand, water, mud, grass stains, paint, lime, +putty, or varnish; those derived from visits to his sisters at their +occupations: such as ink, paints, lead pencils, paste, glue, and +mucilage; those amassed in his stays with Ellen in the kitchen: sugar, +molasses, spice, pudding sauce, black currants, raisins, dough, berry +stains (assorted, according to season), chocolate, jelly, jam, and +preserves; these deposits were not deep, but were simply dabs on the +facade of Peter, and through them the eyes and soul of him shone, +delicious and radiant. They could be rubbed off with a moist +handkerchief if water were handy, and otherwise if it were not, and the +person who rubbed always wanted for some mysterious reason to kiss him +immediately afterwards, for Peter had the largest kissing acquaintance +in Charlestown. + +When Peter had scrubbed the parts of him that showed most, and had +performed what he considered his whole duty to his hair, he appeared for +the first time at the family table in such a guise that if the children +had not been warned they would have gone into hysterics, but he +gradually grew to be proud of his toilets and careful that they should +not occur too often in the same day, since it appeared to be the family +opinion that he should make them himself. + +There was a tacit feeling, not always expressed, that Nancy, after +mother, held the reins of authority, and also that she was a person of +infinite resource. The Gloom-Dispeller had been her father's name for +her, but he had never thought of her as a Path-Finder, a gallant +adventurer into unknown and untried regions, because there had been +small opportunity to test her courage or her ingenuity. + +Mrs. Carey often found herself leaning on Nancy nowadays; not as a dead +weight, but with just the hint of need, just the suggestion of +confidence, that youth and strength and buoyancy respond to so gladly. +It had been decided that the house should be vacated as soon as a tenant +could be found, but the "what next" had not been settled. Julia had +confirmed Nancy's worst fears by accepting her aunt's offer of a home, +but had requested time to make Gladys Ferguson a short visit at Palm +Beach, all expenses being borne by the Parents of Gladys. This estimable +lady and gentleman had no other names or titles and were never spoken of +as if they had any separate existence. They had lived and loved and +married and accumulated vast wealth, and borne Gladys. After that they +had sunk into the background and Gladys had taken the stage. + +"I'm sure I'm glad she is going to the Fergusons," exclaimed Kathleen. +"One month less of her!" + +"Yes," Nancy replied, "but she'll be much worse, more spoiled, more +vain, more luxurious than before. She'll want a gold chicken breast now. +We've just packed away the finger bowls; but out they'll have to +come again." + +"Let her wash her own finger bowl a few days and she'll clamor for the +simple life," said Kathleen shrewdly. "Oh, what a relief if the +Fergusons would adopt Julia, just to keep Gladys company!" + +"Nobody would ever adopt Julia," returned Nancy. "If she was yours you +couldn't help it; you'd just take her 'to the Lord in prayer,' as the +Sunday-school hymn says, but you'd never go out and adopt her." + +Matters were in this uncertain and unsettled state when Nancy came into +her mother's room one evening when the rest of the house was asleep. + +"I saw your light, so I knew you were reading, Muddy. I've had such a +bright idea I couldn't rest." + +"Muddy" is not an attractive name unless you happen to know its true +derivation and significance. First there was "mother dear," and as +persons under fifteen are always pressed for time and uniformly +breathless, this appellation was shortened to "Motherdy," and Peter +being unable to struggle with that term, had abbreviated it into +"Muddy." "Muddy" in itself is undistinguished and even unpleasant, but +when accompanied by a close strangling hug, pats on the cheek, and +ardent if somewhat sticky kisses, grows by degrees to possess delightful +associations. Mother Carey enjoyed it so much from Peter that she even +permitted it to be taken up by the elder children. + +"You mustn't have ideas after nine P.M., Nancy!" chided her mother. +"Wrap the blue blanket around you and sit down with me near the fire." + +"You're not to say I'm romantic or unpractical," insisted Nancy, leaning +against her mother's knees and looking up into her face,--"indeed, +you're not to say anything of any importance till I'm all finished. I'm +going to tell it in a long story, too, so as to work on your feelings +and make you say yes." + +"Very well, I'm all ears!" + +"Now put on your thinking cap! Do you remember once, years and years +ago, before Peter it was, that father took us on a driving trip through +some dear little villages in Maine?" + +(The Careys never dated their happenings eighteen hundred and anything. +It was always: Just before Peter, Immediately after Peter, or A Long +Time after Peter, which answered all purposes.) + +"I remember." + +"It was one of Gilbert's thirsty days, and we stopped at nearly every +convenient pump to give him drinks of water, and at noon we came to the +loveliest wayside well with a real moss-covered bucket; do you +remember?" + +"I remember." + +"And we all clambered out, and father said it was time for luncheon, and +we unpacked the baskets on the greensward near a beautiful tree, and +father said, 'Don't spread the table too near the house, dears, or +they'll cry when they see our doughnuts!' and Kitty, who had been +running about, came up and cried, 'It's an empty house; come and look!'" + +"I remember." + +"And we all went in the gate and loved every bit of it: the stone steps, +the hollyhocks growing under the windows, the yellow paint and the green +blinds; and father looked in the windows, and the rooms were large and +sunny, and we wanted to drive the horse into the barn and stay +there forever!" + +"I remember." + +"And Gilbert tore his trousers climbing on the gate, and father laid him +upside down on your lap and I ran and got your work-bag and you mended +the seat of his little trousers. And father looked and looked at the +house and said, 'Bless its heart!' and said if he were rich he would buy +the dear thing that afternoon and sleep in it that night; and asked you +if you didn't wish you'd married the other man, and you said there never +was another man, and you asked father if he thought on the whole that he +was the poorest man in the world, and father said no, the very richest, +and he kissed us all round, do you remember?" + +"Do I remember? O Nancy, Nancy! What do you think I am made of that I +could ever forget?" + +"Don't cry, Muddy darling, don't! It was so beautiful, and we have so +many things like that to remember." + +"Yes," said Mrs. Carey, "I know it. Part of my tears are grateful ones +that none of you can ever recall an unloving word between your father +and mother!" + +"The idea," said Nancy suddenly and briefly, "is to go and live in that +darling house!" + +"Nancy! What for?" + +"We've got to leave this place, and where could we live on less than in +that tiny village? It had a beautiful white-painted academy, don't you +remember, so we could go to school there,--Kathleen and I anyway, if +you could get enough money to keep Gilly at Eastover." + +"Of course I've thought of the country, but that far-away spot never +occurred to me. What was its quaint little name,--Mizpah or Shiloh or +Deborah or something like that?" + +"It was Beulah," said Nancy; "and father thought it exactly matched the +place!" + +"We even named the house," recalled Mother Carey with a tearful smile. +"There were vegetables growing behind it, and flowers in front, and your +father suggested Garden Fore-and-Aft and I chose Happy Half-Acre, but +father thought the fields that stretched back of the vegetable garden +might belong to the place, and if so there would be far more than a +half-acre of land." + +"And do you remember father said he wished we could do something to +thank the house for our happy hour, and I thought of the little box of +plants we had bought at a wayside nursery?" + +"Oh! I do indeed! I hadn't thought of it for years! Father and you +planted a tiny crimson rambler at the corner of the piazza at the side." + +"Do you suppose it ever 'rambled,' Muddy? Because it would be ever so +high now, and full of roses in summer." + +"I wonder!" mused Mother Carey. "Oh! it was a sweet, tranquil, restful +place! I wonder how we could find out about it? It seems impossible that +it should not have been rented or sold before this. Let me see, that was +five years ago." + +"There was a nice old gentleman farther down the street, quite in the +village, somebody who had known father when he was a boy." + +"So there was; he had a quaint little law office not much larger than +Peter's playhouse. Perhaps we could find him. He was very, very old. He +may not be alive, and I cannot remember his name." + +"Father called him 'Colonel,' I know that. Oh, how I wish dear Addy was +here to help us!" + +"If he were he would want to help us too much! We must learn to bear our +own burdens. They won't seem so strange and heavy when we are more used +to them. Now go to bed, dear. We'll think of Beulah, you and I; and +perhaps, as we have been all adrift, waiting for a wind to stir our +sails, 'Nancy's idea' will be the thing to start us on our new voyage. +Beulah means land of promise;--that's a good omen!" + +"And father found Beulah; and father found the house, and father blessed +it and loved it and named it; that makes ever so many more good omens, +more than enough to start housekeeping on," Nancy answered, kissing her +mother goodnight. + + + +VII + +"OLD BEASTS INTO NEW" + + +Mother Carey went to sleep that night in greater peace than she had felt +for months. It had seemed to her, all these last sad weeks, as though +she and her brood had been breasting stormy waters with no harbor in +sight. There were friends in plenty here and there, but no kith and kin, +and the problems to be settled were graver and more complex than +ordinary friendship could untangle, vexed as it always was by its own +problems. She had but one keen desire: to go to some quiet place where +temptations for spending money would be as few as possible, and there +live for three or four years, putting her heart and mind and soul on +fitting the children for life. If she could keep strength enough to +guide and guard, train and develop them into happy, useful, agreeable +human beings,--masters of their own powers; wise and discreet enough, +when years of discretion were reached, to choose right paths,--that, she +conceived, was her chief task in life, and no easy one. "Happy I must +contrive that they shall be," she thought, "for unhappiness and +discontent are among the foxes that spoil the vines. Stupid they shall +not be, while I can think of any force to stir their brains; they have +ordinary intelligence, all of them, and they shall learn to use it; dull +and sleepy children I can't abide. Fairly good they will be, if they are +busy and happy, and clever enough to see the folly of being anything +_but_ good! And so, month after month, for many years to come, I must be +helping Nancy and Kathleen to be the right sort of women, and wives, and +mothers, and Gilbert and Peter the proper kind of men, and husbands, and +fathers. Mother Carey's chickens must be able to show the good birds the +way home, as the Admiral said, and I should think they ought to be able +to set a few bad birds on the right track now and then!" + +Well, all this would be a task to frighten and stagger many a person, +but it only kindled Mrs. Carey's love and courage to a white heat. + +Do you remember where Kingsley's redoubtable Tom the Water Baby swims +past Shiny Wall, and reaches at last Peacepool? Peacepool, where the +good whales lie, waiting till Mother Carey shall send for them "to make +them out of old beasts into new"? + +Tom swims up to the nearest whale and asks the way to Mother Carey. + +"There she is in the middle," says the whale, though Tom sees nothing +but a glittering white peak like an iceberg. "That's Mother Carey," +spouts the whale, "as you will find if you get to her. There she sits +making old beasts into new all the year round." + +"How does she do that?" asks Tom. + +"That's her concern, not mine!" the whale remarks discreetly. + +And when Tom came nearer to the white glittering peak it took the form +of something like a lovely woman sitting on a white marble throne. And +from the foot of the throne, you remember, there swam away, out and out +into the sea, millions of new-born creatures of more shapes and colors +than man ever dreamed. And they were Mother Carey's children whom she +makes all day long. + +Tom expected,--I am still telling you what happened to the famous water +baby,--Tom expected (like some grown people who ought to know better) +that he would find Mother Carey snipping, piecing, fitting, stitching, +cobbling, basting, filing, planing, hammering, turning, polishing, +moulding, measuring, chiselling, clipping, and so forth, as men do when +they go to work to make anything. But instead of that she sat quite +still with her chin upon her hand, looking down into the sea with two +great blue eyes as blue as the sea itself. (As blue as our own mother's +blue velvet bonnet, Kitty would have said.) + +Was Beulah the right place, wondered Mrs. Carey as she dropped asleep. +And all night long she heard in dreams the voice of that shining little +river that ran under the bridge near Beulah village; and all night long +she walked in fields of buttercups and daisies, and saw the June breeze +blow the tall grasses. She entered the yellow painted house and put the +children to bed in the different rooms, and the instant she saw them +sleeping there it became home, and her heart put out little roots that +were like tendrils; but they grew so fast that by morning they held the +yellow house fast and refused to let it go. + +She looked from its windows onto the gardens "fore and aft," and they +seemed, like the rest of little Beulah village, full of sweet promise. +In the back were all sorts of good things to eat growing in profusion, +but modestly out of sight; and in front, where passers-by could see +their beauty and sniff their fragrance, old-fashioned posies bloomed and +rioted and tossed gay, perfumed heads in the sunshine. + +She awoke refreshed and strong and brave, not the same woman who took +Nancy's idea to bed with her; for this woman's heart and hope had +somehow flown from the brick house in Charlestown and had built itself a +new nest in Beulah's green trees, the elms and willows that overhung the +shining river. + +An idea of her own ran out and met Nancy's half way. Instead of going +herself to spy out the land of Beulah, why not send Gilbert? It was a +short, inexpensive railway journey, with no change of cars. Gilbert was +nearly fourteen, and thus far seemed to have no notion of life as a +difficult enterprise. No mother who respects her boy, or respects +herself, can ask him flatly, "Do you intend to grow up with the idea of +taking care of me; of having an eye to your sisters; or do you consider +that, since I brought you into the world, I must provide both for myself +and you until you are a man,--or forever and a day after, if you feel +inclined to shirk your part in the affair?" + +Gilbert talked of his college course as confidently as he had before his +father's death. It was Nancy who as the eldest seemed the head of the +family, but Gilbert, only a year or so her junior, ought to grow into +the head, somehow or other. The way to begin would be to give him a few +delightful responsibilities, such as would appeal to his pride and sense +of importance, and gradually to mingle with them certain duties of +headship neither so simple nor so agreeable. Beulah would be a +delightful beginning. Nancy the Pathfinder would have packed a bag and +gone to Beulah on an hour's notice; found the real-estate dealer, in +case there was such a metropolitan article in the village; looked up her +father's old friend the Colonel with the forgotten surname; discovered +the owner of the charming house, rented it, and brought back the key in +triumph! But Nancy was a girl rich in courage and enterprise, while +Gilbert's manliness and leadership and discretion and consideration for +others needed a vigorous, decisive, continued push. + +If Nancy's idea was good, Mother Carey's idea matched it! To see +Gilbert, valise in hand, eight dollars in pocket, leaving Charlestown on +a Friday noon after school, was equal to watching Columbus depart for an +unknown land. Thrilling is the only word that will properly describe it, +and the group that followed his departure from the upper windows used it +freely and generously. He had gone gayly downstairs and Nancy flung +after him a small packet in an envelope, just as he reached the door. + +"There's a photograph of your mother and sisters!" she called. "In case +the owner refuses to rent the house to _you_, just show him the rest of +the family! And don't forget to say that the rent is exorbitant, +whatever it is!" + +They watched him go jauntily down the street, Mother Carey with special +pride in her eyes. He had on his second best suit, and it looked well on +his straight slim figure. He had a gallant air, had Gilbert, and one +could not truly say it was surface gallantry either; it simply did not, +at present, go very deep. "No one could call him anything but a fine +boy," thought the mother, "and surely the outside is a key to what is +within!--His firm chin, his erect head, his bright eye, his quick tread, +his air of alert self-reliance,--surely here is enough, for any mother +to build on!" + + + +VIII + +THE KNIGHT OF BEULAH CASTLE + + +Nancy's flushed face was glued to the window-pane until Gilbert turned +the corner. He looked back, took off his cap, threw a kiss to them, and +was out of sight! + +"Oh! how I wish _I_ could have gone!" cried Nancy. "I hope he won't +forget what he went for! I hope he won't take 'No' for an answer. Oh! +why wasn't I a boy!" + +Mrs. Carey laughed as she turned from the window. + +"It will be a great adventure for the man of the house, Nancy, so never +mind. What would the Pathfinder have done if she had gone, instead of +her brother?" + +"I? Oh! Millions of things!" said Nancy, pacing the sitting-room floor, +her head bent a little, her hands behind her back. "I should be going to +the new railway station in Boston now, and presently I should be at the +little grated window asking for a return ticket to Greentown station. +'Four ten,' the man would say, and I would fling my whole eight dollars +in front of the wicket to show him what manner of person I was. + +"Then I would pick up the naught-from-naught-is-naught, +one-from-ten-is-nine, five-from-eight-is-three,--three dollars and +ninety cents or thereabouts and turn away. + +"'Parlor car seat, Miss?' the young man would say,--a warm, worried +young man in a seersucker coat, and I would answer, 'No thank you; I +always go in the common car to study human nature.' That's what the +Admiral says, but of course the ticket man couldn't know that the +Admiral is an intimate friend of mine, and would think I said it myself. + +"Then I would go down the platform and take the common car for +Greentown. Soon we would be off and I would ask the conductor if +Greentown was the station where one could change and drive to Beulah, +darling little Beulah, shiny-rivered Beulah; not breathing a word about +the yellow house for fear he would jump off the train and rent it first. +Then he would say he never heard of Beulah. I would look pityingly at +him, but make no reply because it would be no use, and anyway I know +Greentown _is_ the changing place, because I've asked three men before; +but Cousin Ann always likes to make conductors acknowledge they don't +know as much as she does. + +"Then I present a few peanuts or peppermints to a small boy, and hold an +infant for a tired mother, because this is what good children do in the +Sunday-school books, but I do not mingle much with the passengers +because my brow is furrowed with thought and I am travelling on +important business." + +You can well imagine that by this time Mother Carey has taken out her +darning, and Kathleen her oversewing, to which she pays little attention +because she so adores Nancy's tales. Peter has sat like a small statue +ever since his quick ear caught the sound of a story. His eyes follow +Nancy as she walks up and down improvising, and the only interruption +she ever receives from her audience is Kathleen's or Mother Carey's +occasional laugh at some especially ridiculous sentence. + +"The hours fly by like minutes," continues Nancy, stopping by the side +window and twirling the curtain tassel absently. "I scan the surrounding +country to see if anything compares with Beulah, and nothing does. No +such river, no such trees, no such well, no such old oaken bucket, and +above all no such Yellow House. All the other houses I see are but as +huts compared with the Yellow House of Beulah. Soon the car door opens; +a brakeman looks in and calls in a rich baritone voice, 'Greentown! +Greentown! Do-not-leave-any-passles in the car!' And if you know +beforehand what he is going to say you can understand him quite nicely, +so I take up my bag and go down the aisle with dignity. 'Step lively, +Miss!' cries the brakeman, but I do not heed him; it is not likely that +a person renting country houses will move save with majesty. Alighting, +I inquire if there is any conveyance for Beulah, and there is, a wagon +and a white horse. I ask the driver boldly to drive me to the Colonel's +office. He does not ask which Colonel, or what Colonel, he simply says, +'Colonel Foster, I s'pose,' and I say, 'Certainly.' We arrive at the +office and when I introduce myself as Captain Carey's daughter I receive +a glad welcome. The Colonel rings a bell and an aged beldame approaches, +making a deep curtsy and offering me a beaker of milk, a crusty loaf, a +few venison pasties, and a cold goose stuffed with humming birds. When I +have reduced these to nothingness I ask if the yellow house on the +outskirts of the village is still vacant, and the Colonel replies that +it is, at which unexpected but hoped-for answer I fall into a deep +swoon. When I awake the aged Colonel is bending over me, his long white +goat's beard tickling my chin." + +(Mother Carey stops her darning now and Kathleen makes no pretence of +sewing; the story is fast approaching its climax,--everybody feels that, +including Peter, who hopes that he will be in it, in some guise or +other, before it ends.) + +"'Art thou married, lady?' the aged one asks courteously, 'and if not, +wilt thou be mine?'" + +"I tremble, because he does not seem to notice that he is eighty or +ninety and I but fifteen, yet I fear if I reject him too scornfully and +speedily the Yellow House will never be mine. 'Grant me a little time in +which to fit myself for this great honor,' I say modestly, and a mighty +good idea, too, that I got out of a book the other day; when suddenly, +as I gaze upward, my suitor's white hair turns to brown, his beard drops +off, his wrinkles disappear, and he stands before me a young Knight, in +full armor. 'Wilt go to the yellow castle with me, sweet lady?' he asks. +'_Wilt I_!' I cry in ecstasy, and we leap on the back of a charger +hitched to the Colonel's horseblock. We dash down the avenue of elms and +maples that line the village street, and we are at our journey's end +before the Knight has had time to explain to me that he was changed into +the guise of an old man by an evil sorcerer some years before, and could +never return to his own person until some one appeared who wished to +live in the yellow house, which is Beulah Castle. + +"We approach the well-known spot and the little picket gate, and the +Knight lifts me from the charger's back. 'Here are house and lands, and +all are yours, sweet lady, if you have a younger brother. There is +treasure hidden in the ground behind the castle, and no one ever finds +such things save younger brothers.' + +"'I have a younger brother,' I cry, '_and his name is Peter_!'" + +At this point in Nancy's chronicle Peter is nearly beside himself with +excitement. He has been sitting on his hassock, his hands outspread upon +his fat knees, his lips parted, his eyes shining. Somewhere, sometime, +in Nancy's stories there is always a Peter. He lives for that moment! + +Nancy, stifling her laughter, goes on rapidly: + +"And so the Knight summons Younger Brother Peter to come, and he flies +in a great air ship from Charlestown to Beulah. And when he arrives the +Knight asks him to dig for the buried treasure." + +(Peter here turns up his sleeves to his dimpled elbows and seizes an +imaginary implement.) + +"Peter goes to the back of the castle, and there is a beautiful garden +filled with corn and beans and peas and lettuce and potatoes and beets +and onions and turnips and carrots and parsnips and tomatoes and +cabbages. He takes his magic spade and it leads him to the cabbages. He +digs and digs, and in a moment the spade strikes metal! + +"'He has found the gold!' cries the Knight, and Peter speedily lifts +from the ground pots and pots of ducats and florins, and gulden and +doubloons." + +(Peter nods his head at the mention of each precious coin and then claps +his hands, and hugs himself with joy, and rocks himself to and fro on +the hassock, in his ecstasy at being the little god in the machine.) + +"Then down the village street there is the sound of hurrying horses' +feet, and in a twinkling a gayly painted chariot comes into view, and in +it are sitting the Queen Mother and the Crown Prince and Princess of the +House of Carey. They alight; Peter meets them at the gate, a pot of gold +in each hand. They enter the castle and put their umbrellas in one +corner of the front hall and their rubbers in the other one, behind the +door. Lady Nancibel trips up the steps after them and, turning, says +graciously to her Knight, 'Would you just as soon marry somebody else? I +am very much attached to my family, and they will need me dreadfully +while they are getting settled.' + +"'I did not recall the fact that I had asked you to be mine,' +courteously answers the youth. + +"'You did,' she responds, very much embarrassed, as she supposed of +course he would remember his offer made when he was an old man with a +goat's beard; 'but gladly will I forget all, if you will relinquish +my hand.' + +"'As you please!' answers the Knight generously. 'I can deny you nothing +when I remember you have brought me back my youth. Prithee, is the other +lady bespoke, she of the golden hair?' + +"'Many have asked, but I have chosen none,' answers the Crown Princess +Kitty modestly, as is her wont. + +"'Then you will do nicely,' says the Knight, 'since all I wish is to be +son-in-law to the Queen Mother!' + +"'Right you are, my hearty!' cries Prince Gilbert de Carey, 'and as we +much do need a hand at the silver-polishing I will gladly give my sister +in marriage!' + +"So they all went into Beulah Castle and locked the door behind them, +and there they lived in great happiness and comfort all the days of +their lives, and there they died when it came their time, and they were +all buried by the shores of the shining river of Beulah!" + +"Oh! it is perfectly splendid!" cried Kathleen. "About the best one you +ever told! But do change the end a bit, Nancy dear! It's dreadful for +him to marry Kitty when he chose Nancibel first. I'd like him awfully, +but I don't want to take him that way!" + +"Well, how would this do?" and Nancy pondered a moment before going on: +"'Right you are, my hearty!' cries Prince Gilbert de Carey, 'and as we +do need a hand at the silver-polishing I will gladly give my sister in +marriage.' + +"'Hold!' cries the Queen Mother. 'All is not as it should be in this +coil! How can you tell,' she says, turning to the knightly stranger, +'that memory will not awake one day, and you recall the adoration you +felt when you first beheld the Lady Nancibel in a deep swoon?' + +"The Young Knight's eyes took on a far-away look and he put his hand to +his forehead. + +"'It comes back to me now!' he sighed. 'I did love the Lady Nancibel +passionately, and I cannot think how it slipped my mind!' + +"'I release you willingly!' exclaimed the Crown Princess Kitty +haughtily, 'for a million suitors await my nod, and thou wert never +really mine!' + +"'But the other lady rejects me also!' responds the luckless youth, the +tears flowing from his eagle eyes onto his crimson mantle. + +"'Wilt delay the nuptials until I am eighteen and the castle is set in +order?' asks the Lady Nancibel relentingly. + +"'Since it must be, I do pledge thee my vow to wait,' says the Knight. +'And I do beg the fair one with the golden locks to consider the claims +of my brother, not my equal perhaps, but still a gallant youth.' + +"'I will enter him on my waiting list as number Three Hundred and +Seventeen,' responds the Crown Princess Kitty, than whom no violet could +be more shy. ''Tis all he can expect and more than I should promise.' + +"So they all lived in the yellow castle in great happiness forever +after, and were buried by the shores of the shining river of +Beulah!--Does that suit you better?" + +"Simply lovely!" cried Kitty, "and the bit about my modesty is too funny +for words!--Oh, if some of it would only happen! But I am afraid Gilbert +will not stir up any fairy stories and set them going." + +"Some of it will happen!" exclaimed Peter. "I shall dig every single day +till I find the gold-pots." + +"You are a pot of gold yourself, filled full and running over!" + +"Now, Nancy, run and write down your fairy tale while you remember it!" +said Mother Carey. + +"It is as good an exercise as any other, and you still tell a story far +better than you write it!" + +Nancy did this sort of improvising every now and then, and had done it +from earliest childhood; and sometimes, of late, Mother Carey looked at +her eldest chicken and wondered if after all she had hatched in her a +bird of brighter plumage or rarer song than the rest, or a young eagle +whose strong wings would bear her to a higher flight! + + + +IX + +GILBERT'S EMBASSY + + +The new station had just been built in Boston, and it seemed a great +enterprise to Gilbert to be threading his way through the enormous +spaces, getting his information by his own wits and not asking questions +like a stupid schoolboy. Like all children of naval officers, the Careys +had travelled ever since their birth; still, this was Gilbert's first +journey alone, and nobody was ever more conscious of the situation, nor +more anxious to carry it off effectively. + +He entered the car, opened his bag, took out his travelling cap and his +copy of "Ben Hur," then threw the bag in a lordly way into the brass +rack above the seat. He opened his book, but immediately became +interested in a young couple just in front of him. They were carefully +dressed, even to details of hats and gloves, and they had an +unmistakable air of wedding journey about them that interested the +curious boy. + +Presently the conductor came in. Pausing in front of the groom he said, +"Tickets, please"; then: "You're on the wrong train!" "Wrong train? Of +course I'm not on the wrong train! You must be mistaken! The ticket +agent told me to take this train." + +"Can't help that, sir, this train don't go to Lawrence." + +"It's very curious. I asked the brakeman, and two porters. Ain't this +the 3.05?" + +"This is the 3.05." + +"Where does it go, then?" + +"Goes to Lowell. Lowell the first stop." + +"But I don't want to go to Lowell!" + +"What's the matter with Lowell? It's a good place all right!" + +"But I have an appointment in Lawrence at four o'clock." + +"I'm dretful sorry, but you'll have to keep it in Lowell, I +guess!--Tickets, please!" this to a pretty girl on the opposite side +from Gilbert, a pink and white, unsophisticated maiden, very much +interested in the woes of the bride and groom and entirely sympathetic +with the groom's helpless wrath. + +"On the wrong train, Miss!" said the conductor. + +"On the wrong train?" She spoke in a tone of anguish, getting up and +catching her valise frantically. "It _can't_ be the wrong train! Isn't +it the White Mountain train?" + +"Yes, Miss, but it don't go to North Conway; it goes to Fabyan's." + +"But my father _put_ me on this train and everybody _said_ it was the +White Mountain train!" + +"So it is, Miss, but if you wanted to stop at North Conway you'd ought +to have taken the 3.55, platform 8." + +"Put me off, then, please, and let me wait for the 3.55." + +"Can't do it, Miss; this is an express train; only stops at Lowell, +where this gentleman is going!" + +(Here the conductor gave a sportive wink at the bridegroom who had an +appointment in Lawrence.) + +The pretty girl burst into a flood of tears and turned her face +despairingly to the window, while the bride talked to the groom +excitedly about what they ought to have done and what they would have +done had she been consulted. + +Gilbert could hardly conceal his enjoyment of the situation, and indeed +everybody within hearing--that is, anybody who chanced to be on the +right train--looked at the bride and groom and the pretty girl, and +tittered audibly. + +"Why don't people make inquiries?" thought Gilbert superciliously. +"Perhaps they have never been anywhere before, but even that's +no excuse." + +He handed his ticket to the conductor with a broad smile, saying in an +undertone, "What kind of passengers are we carrying this afternoon?" + +"The usual kind, I guess!--You're on the wrong train, sonny!" + +Gilbert almost leaped into the air, and committed himself by making a +motion to reach down his valise. + +"I, on the wrong train?" he asked haughtily. "That _can't_ be so; the +ticket agent told me the 3.05 was the only fast train to Greentown!" + +"Mebbe he thought you said Greenville; this train goes to Greenville, if +that'll do you! Folks ain't used to the new station yet, and the ticket +agents are all bran' new too,--guess you got hold of a tenderfoot!" + +"But Greenville will _not_ 'do' for me," exclaimed Gilbert. "I want to +go to _Greentown_." + +"Well, get off at Lowell, the first stop,--you'll know when you come to +it because this gentleman that wanted to go to Lawrence will get off +there, and this young lady that was intendin' to go to North Conway. +There'll be four of you; jest a nice party." + +Gilbert choked with wrath as he saw the mirth of the other passengers. + +"What train shall I be able to take to Greentown," he managed to call +after the conductor. + +"Don't know, sonny! Ask the ticket agent in the Lowell deepot; he's an +old hand and he'll know!" + +Gilbert's pride was terribly wounded, but his spirits rose a little +later when he found that he would only have to wait twenty minutes in +the Lowell station before a slow train for Greentown would pick him up, +and that he should still reach his destination before bedtime, and need +never disclose his stupidity. + +After all, this proved to be his only error, for everything moved +smoothly from that moment, and he was as prudent and successful an +ambassador as Mother Carey could have chosen. He found the Colonel, +whose name was not Foster, by the way, but Wheeler; and the Colonel +would not allow him to go to the Mansion House, Beulah's one small +hotel, but insisted that he should be his guest. That evening he heard +from the Colonel the history of the yellow house, and the next morning +the Colonel drove him to the store of the man who had charge of it +during the owner's absence in Europe, after which Gilbert was conducted +in due form to the premises for a critical examination. + +The Yellow House, as Garden Fore-and-Aft seemed destined to be chiefly +called, was indeed the only house of that color for ten miles square. It +had belonged to the various branches of a certain family of Hamiltons +for fifty years or more, but in course of time, when it fell into the +hands of the Lemuel Hamiltons, it had no sort of relation to their mode +of existence. One summer, a year or two before the Careys had seen it, +the sons and daughters had come on from Boston and begged their father +to let them put it in such order that they could take house parties of +young people there for the week end. Mr. Hamilton indulgently allowed +them a certain amount to be expended as they wished, and with the help +of a local carpenter, they succeeded in doing several things to their +own complete satisfaction, though it could not be said that they added +to the value of the property. The house they regarded merely as a +camping-out place, and after they had painted some bedroom floors, set +up some cots, bought a kitchen stove and some pine tables and chairs, +they regarded that part of the difficulty as solved; expending the rest +of the money in turning the dilapidated barn into a place where they +could hold high revels of various innocent sorts. The two freshman sons, +two boarding-school daughters, and a married sister barely old enough to +chaperon her own baby, brought parties of gay young friends with them +several weeks in succession. These excursions were a great delight to +the villagers, who thus enjoyed all the pleasures and excitements of a +circus with none of its attendant expenses. They were of short duration, +however, for Lemuel Hamilton was appointed consul to a foreign port and +took his wife and daughters with him. The married sister died, and in +course of time one of the sons went to China to learn tea-planting and +the other established himself on a ranch in Texas. Thus the Lemuel +Hamiltons were scattered far and wide, and as the Yellow House in Beulah +had small value as real estate and had never played any part in their +lives, it was almost forgotten as the busy years went by. + +"Mr. Hamilton told me four years ago, when I went up to Boston to meet +him, that if I could get any rent from respectable parties I might let +the house, though he wouldn't lay out a cent on repairs in order to get +a tenant. But, land! there ain't no call for houses in Beulah, nor +hain't been for twenty years," so Bill Harmon, the storekeeper, told +Gilbert. "The house has got a tight roof and good underpinnin', and if +your folks feel like payin' out a little money for paint 'n' paper you +can fix it up neat's a pin. The Hamilton boys jest raised Cain out in the +barn, so 't you can't keep no critters there." + +"We couldn't have a horse or a cow anyway," said Gilbert. + +"Well, it's lucky you can't. I could 'a' rented the house twice over if +there'd been any barn room; but them confounded young scalawags ripped +out the horse and cow stalls, cleared away the pig pen, and laid a floor +they could dance on. The barn chamber 's full o' their stuff, so 't no +hay can go in; altogether there ain't any nameable kind of a fool-trick +them young varmints didn't play on these premises. When a farmer's +lookin' for a home for his family and stock 't ain't no use to show him +a dance hall. The only dancin' a Maine farmer ever does is dancin' round +to git his livin' out o' the earth;--that keeps his feet flyin', +fast enough." + +"Well," said Gilbert, "I think if you can put the rent cheap enough so +that we could make the necessary repairs, I _think_ my mother would +consider it." + +"Would you want it for more 'n this summer?" asked Mr. Harmon. + +"Oh! yes, we want to live here!" + +"_Want to live here_!" exclaimed the astonished Harmon. "Well, it's been +a long time sence we heard anybody say that, eh, Colonel? + +"Well now, sonny" (Gilbert did wish that respect for budding manhood +could be stretched a little further in this locality), "I tell you what, +I ain't goin' to stick no fancy price on these premises--" + +"It wouldn't be any use," said Gilbert boldly. "My father has died +within a year; there are four of us beside my mother, and there's a +cousin, too, who is dependent on us. We have nothing but a small pension +and the interest on five thousand dollars life insurance. Mother says we +must go away from all our friends, live cheaply, and do our own work +until Nancy, Kitty, and I grow old enough to earn something." + +Colonel Wheeler and Mr. Harmon both liked Gilbert Carey at sight, and as +he stood there uttering his boyish confidences with great friendliness +and complete candor, both men would have been glad to meet him halfway. + +"Well, Harmon, it seems to me we shall get some good neighbors if we can +make terms with Mrs. Carey," said the Colonel. "If you'll fix a +reasonable figure I'll undertake to write to Hamilton and interest him +in the affair." + +"All right. Now, Colonel, I'd like to make a proposition right on the +spot, before you, and you can advise sonny, here. You see Lem has got +his taxes to pay,--they're small, of course, but they're an +expense,--and he'd ought to carry a little insurance on his buildings, +tho' he ain't had any up to now. On the other hand, if he can get a +tenant that'll put on a few shingles and clapboards now and then, or a +coat o' paint 'n' a roll o' wall paper, his premises won't go to rack +'n' ruin same's they're in danger o' doin' at the present time. Now, +sonny, would your mother feel like keepin' up things a little mite if we +should say sixty dollars a year rent, payable monthly or quarterly as is +convenient?" + +Gilbert's head swam and his eyes beheld such myriads of stars that he +felt it must be night instead of day. The rent of the Charlestown house +was seven hundred dollars a year, and the last words of his mother had +been to the effect that two hundred was the limit he must offer for the +yellow house, as she did not see clearly at the moment how they could +afford even that sum. + +"What would be your advice, Colonel?" stammered the boy. + +"I think sixty dollars is not exorbitant," the Colonel answered calmly +(he had seen Beulah real estate fall a peg a year for twenty successive +years), "though naturally you cannot pay that sum and make any +extravagant repairs." + +"Then I will take the house," Gilbert remarked largely. "My mother left +the matter of rent to my judgment, and we will pay promptly in advance. +Shall I sign any papers?" + +"Land o' Goshen! the marks your little fist would make on a paper +wouldn't cut much of a figure in a court o' law!" chuckled old Harmon. +"You jest let the Colonel fix up matters with your ma." + +"Can I walk back, Colonel?" asked Gilbert, trying to preserve some +dignity under the storekeeper's attacks. "I'd like to take some +measurements and make some sketches of the rooms for my mother." + +"All right," the Colonel responded. "Your train doesn't go till two +o'clock. I'll give you a bite of lunch and take you to the station." + + +If Mother Carey had watched Gilbert during the next half-hour she would +have been gratified, for every moment of the time he grew more and more +into the likeness of the head of a family. He looked at the cellar, at +the shed, at the closets and cupboards all over the house, and at the +fireplaces. He "paced off" all the rooms and set down their proportions +in his note-book; he even decided as to who should occupy each room, and +for what purposes they should be used, his judgment in every case being +thought ridiculous by the feminine portion of his family when they +looked at his plans. Then he locked the doors carefully with a fine +sense of ownership and strolled away with many a backward look and +thought at the yellow house. + +At the station he sent a telegram to his mother. Nancy had secretly +given him thirty-five cents when he left home. "I am hoarding for the +Admiral's Christmas present," she whispered, "but it's no use, I cannot +endure the suspense about the house a moment longer than is necessary. +Just telegraph us yes or no, and we shall get the news four hours before +your train arrives. One can die several times in four hours, and I'm +going to commit one last extravagance,--at the Admiral's expense!" + +At three o'clock on Saturday afternoon a telegraph boy came through the +gate and rang the front door bell. + +"You go, Kitty, I haven't the courage!" said Nancy, sitting down on the +sofa heavily. A moment later the two girls and Peter (who for once +didn't count) gazed at their mother breathlessly as she opened the +envelope. Her face lighted as she read aloud:-- + + + "_Victory perches on my banners. Have accomplished all I went for_. + GILBERT." + +"Hurrah!" cried both girls. "The yellow house is the House of Carey +forevermore." + +"Will Peter go too?" asked the youngest Carey eagerly, his nose +quivering as it always did in excitement, when it became an animated +question point. + +"I should think he would," exclaimed Kitty, clasping him in her arms. +"What would the yellow house be without Peter?" + +"I wish Gilbert wouldn't talk about _his_ banners," said Nancy +critically, as she looked at the telegram over her mother's shoulder. +"They're not his banners at all, they're ours,--Carey banners; that's +what they are!" + +Mother Carey had wished the same thing, but hoped that Nancy had not +noticed the Gilbertian flaw in the telegram. + + + +X + +THE CAREYS' FLITTING + + +The Charlestown house was now put immediately into the hands of several +agents, for Mrs. Carey's lease had still four years to run and she was +naturally anxious to escape from this financial responsibility as soon +as possible. As a matter of fact only three days elapsed before she +obtained a tenant, and the agent had easily secured an advance of a +hundred dollars a year to the good, as Captain Carey had obtained a very +favorable figure when he took the house. + +It was the beginning of April, and letters from Colonel Wheeler had +already asked instructions about having the vegetable garden ploughed. +It was finally decided that the girls should leave their spring term of +school unfinished, and that the family should move to Beulah during +Gilbert's Easter vacation. + +Mother Carey gave due reflection to the interrupted studies, but +concluded that for two girls like Nancy and Kathleen the making of a new +home would be more instructive and inspiring, and more fruitful in its +results, than weeks of book learning. + +Youth delights in change, in the prospect of new scenes and fresh +adventures, and as it is never troubled by any doubts as to the wisdom +of its plans, the Carey children were full of vigor and energy just now. +Charlestown, the old house, the daily life, all had grown sad and dreary +to them since father had gone. Everything spoke of him. Even mother +longed for something to lift her thought out of the past and give it +wings, so that it might fly into the future and find some hope and +comfort there. There was a continual bustle from morning till night, and +a spirit of merriment that had long been absent. + +The Scotch have a much prettier word than we for all this, and what we +term moving they call "flitting." The word is not only prettier, but in +this instance more appropriate. It was such a buoyant, youthful affair, +this Carey flitting. Light forms darted up and down the stairs and past +the windows, appearing now at the back, now at the front of the house, +with a picture, or a postage stamp, or a dish, or a penwiper, or a +pillow, or a basket, or a spool. The chorus of "Where shall we put this, +Muddy?" "Where will this go?" "May we throw this away?" would have +distracted a less patient parent. When Gilbert returned from school at +four, the air was filled with sounds of hammering and sawing and filing, +screwing and unscrewing, and it was joy unspeakable to be obliged (or at +least almost obliged) to call in clarion tones to one another, across +the din and fanfare, and to compel answers in a high key. Peter took a +constant succession of articles to the shed, where packing was going on, +but his chief treasures were deposited in a basket at the front gate, +with the idea that they would be transported as his personal baggage. +The pile grew and grew: a woolly lamb, two Noah's arks, bottles and +marbles innumerable, a bag of pebbles, a broken steam engine, two china +nest-eggs, an orange, a banana and some walnuts, a fishing line, a +trowel, a ball of string. These give an idea of the quality of Peter's +effects, but not of the quantity. + +Ellen the cook labored loyally, for it was her last week's work with the +family. She would be left behind, like Charlestown and all the old life, +when Mother Carey and the stormy petrels flitted across unknown waters +from one haven to another. Joanna having earlier proved utterly +unromantic in her attitude, Nancy went further with Ellen and gave her +an English novel called, "The Merriweathers," in which an old family +servant had not only followed her employers from castle to hovel, +remaining there without Wages for years, but had insisted on lending all +her savings to the Mistress of the Manor. Ellen the cook had loved "The +Merriweathers," saying it was about the best book that ever she had +read, and Miss Nancy would like to know, always being so interested, +that she (Ellen) had found a place near Joanna in Salem, where she was +offered five dollars a month more than she had received with the Careys. +Nancy congratulated her warmly and then, tearing "The Merriweathers" to +shreds, she put them in the kitchen stove in Ellen's temporary absence. +"If ever I write a book," she ejaculated, as she "stoked" the fire with +Gwendolen and Reginald Merriweather, with the Mistress of the Manor, and +especially with the romantic family servitor, "if ever I write a book," +she repeated, with emphatic gestures, "it won't have any fibs in +it;--and I suppose it will be dull," she reflected, as she remembered +how she had wept when the Merriweathers' Bridget brought her savings of +a hundred pounds to her mistress in a handkerchief. + +During these preparations for the flitting Nancy had a fresh idea every +minute or two, and gained immense prestige in the family. + +Inspired by her eldest daughter Mrs. Carey sold her grand piano, getting +an old-fashioned square one and a hundred and fifty dollars in exchange. +It had been a wedding present from a good old uncle, who, if he had been +still alive, would have been glad to serve his niece now that she was in +difficulties. + +Nancy, her sleeves rolled up, her curly hair flecked with dust and +cobwebs, flew down from the attic into Kathleen's room just after +supper. "I have an idea!" she said in a loud whisper. + +"You mustn't have too many or we shan't take any interest in them," +Kitty answered provokingly. + +"This is for your ears alone, Kitty!" + +"Oh! that's different. Tell me quickly." + +"It's an idea to get rid of the Curse of the House of Carey!" + +"It can't be done, Nancy; you know it can't! Even if you could think out +a way, mother couldn't be made to agree." + +"She must never know. I would not think of mixing up a good lovely woman +like mother in such an affair!" + +This was said so mysteriously that Kathleen almost suspected that +bloodshed was included in Nancy's plan. It must be explained that when +young Ensign Carey and Margaret Gilbert had been married, Cousin Ann +Chadwick had presented them with four tall black and white marble mantel +ornaments shaped like funeral urns; and then, feeling that she had not +yet shown her approval of the match sufficiently, she purchased a large +group of clay statuary entitled You Dirty Boy. + +The Careys had moved often, like all naval families, but even when their +other goods and chattels were stored, Cousin Ann generously managed to +defray the expense of sending on to them the mantel ornaments and the +Dirty Boy. "I know what your home is to you," she used to say to them, +"and how you must miss your ornaments. If I have chanced to give you +things as unwieldy as they are handsome, I ought to see that you have +them around you without trouble or expense, and I will!" + +So for sixteen years, save for a brief respite when the family was in +the Philippines, their existence was blighted by these hated objects. +Once when they had given an especially beautiful party for the Admiral, +Captain Carey had carried the whole lot to the attic, but Cousin Ann +arrived unexpectedly in the middle of the afternoon, and Nancy, with the +aid of Gilbert and Joanna, had brought them down the back way and put +them in the dining room. + +"You've taken the ornaments out of the parlor, I see," Cousin Ann said +at the dinner table. "It's rather nice for a change, and after all, +perhaps you spend as much time in this room as in any, and entertain as +much company here!" + +Cousin Ann always had been, always would be, a frequent visitor, for she +was devoted to the family in her own peculiar way; what therefore could +Nancy be proposing to do with the Carey Curse? + +"Listen, my good girl," Nancy now said to Kathleen, after she had closed +the door. "Thou dost know that the china-packer comes early to-morrow +morn, and that e'en now the barrels and boxes and excelsior are +bestrewing the dining room?" + +"Yes." + +"Then you and I, who have been brought up under the shadow of those +funeral urns, and have seen that tidy mother scrubbing the ears of that +unwilling boy ever since we were born,--you and I, or thou and I, +perhaps I should say, will do a little private packing before the true +packer arriveth." + +"Still do I not see the point, wench!" said the puzzled Kathleen, trying +to model her conversation on Nancy's, though she was never thoroughly +successful. + +"Don't call me 'wench,' because I am the mistress and you my tiring +woman, but when you Watch, and assist me, at the packing, a great light +will break upon you," Nancy answered "In the removal of cherished +articles from Charlestown to Beulah, certain tragedies will occur, +certain accidents will happen, although Cousin Ann knows that the Carey +family is a well regulated one. But if there are accidents, and _there +will be_, my good girl, then the authors of them will be forever unknown +to all but thou and I. Wouldst prefer to pack this midnight or at cock +crow, for packing is our task!" + +"I simply hate cock crow, and you know it," said Kathleen testily. "Why +not now? Ellen and Gilbert are out and mother is rocking Peter +to sleep." + +"Very well; come on; and step softly. It won't take long, because I have +planned all in secret, well and thoroughly. Don't puff and blow like +that! Mother will hear you!" + +"I'm excited," whispered Kathleen as they stole down the back stairs and +went into the parlor for the funeral urns, which they carried silently +to the dining room. These safely deposited, they took You Dirty Boy from +its abominable pedestal of Mexican onyx (also Cousin Ann's gift) and +staggered under its heavy weight, their natural strength being +considerably sapped by suppressed laughter. + +Nancy chose an especially large and stout barrel. They put a little +(very little) excelsior in the bottom, then a pair of dumb-bells, then a +funeral urn, then a little hay, and another funeral urn, crosswise. The +spaces between were carelessly filled in with Indian clubs. On these +they painfully dropped You Dirty Boy, and on top of him the other pair +of funeral urns, more dumbbells, and another Indian club. They had +packed the barrel in the corner where it stood, so they simply laid the +cover on top and threw a piece of sacking carelessly over it. The whole +performance had been punctuated with such hysterical laughter from +Kathleen that she was too weak to be of any real use,--she simply aided +and abetted the chief conspirator. The night was not as other nights. +The girls kept waking up to laugh a little, then they went to sleep, and +waked again, and laughed again, and so on. Nancy composed several +letters to her Cousin Ann dated from Beulah and explaining the sad +accident that had occurred. As she concocted these documents between her +naps she could never remember in her whole life any such night of mirth +and minstrelsy, and not one pang of conscience interfered, to cloud the +present joy nor dim that anticipation which is even greater. + +Nancy was downstairs early next morning and managed to be the one to +greet the china-packers. "We filled one barrel last evening," she +explained to them. "Will you please head that up before you begin work?" +which one of the men obligingly did. + +"We'll mark all this stuff and take it down to the station this +afternoon," said the head packer to Mrs. Carey. + +"Be careful with it, won't you?" she begged. "We are very fond of our +glass and china, our clocks and all our little treasures." + +"You won't have any breakage so long as you deal with James Perkins & +Co.!" said the packer. + +Nancy went back into the room for a moment to speak with the skilful, +virtuous J.P. & Co. "There's no need to use any care with that corner +barrel," she said carelessly. "It has nothing of value in it!" + +James Perkins went home in the middle of the afternoon and left his son +to finish the work, and the son tagged and labelled and painted with all +his might. The Dirty Boy barrel in the corner, being separated from the +others, looked to him especially important, so he gave particular +attention to that; pasted on it one label marked "Fragile," one "This +Side Up," two "Glass with Care," and finding several "Perishables" in +his pocket tied on a few of those, and removed the entire lot of boxes, +crates, and barrels to the freight depot. + +The man who put the articles in the car was much interested in the Dirty +Boy barrel. "You'd ought to have walked to Greentown and carried that +one in your arms," he jeered. "What is the precious thing, anyway?" + +"Don't you mind what it is," responded young Perkins. "Jest you keep +everybody 'n' everything from teching it! Does this lot o' stuff have to +be shifted 'tween here and Greentown?" + +"No; not unless we git kind o' dull and turn it upside down jest for +fun." + +"I guess you're dull consid'able often, by the way things look when you +git through carryin' 'em, on this line," said Perkins, who had no +opinion of the freight department of the A.&B. The answer, though not +proper to record in this place, was worthy of Perkins's opponent, who +had a standing grudge against the entire race of expressmen and carters +who brought him boxes and barrels to handle. It always seemed to him +that if they were all out of the country or dead he would have no +work to do. + + + +XI + +THE SERVICE ON THE THRESHOLD + + +From this point on, the flitting went easily and smoothly enough, and +the transportation of the Carey family itself to Greentown, on a mild +budding day in April, was nothing compared to the heavy labor that had +preceded it. All the goods and chattels had been despatched a week +before, so that they would be on the spot well in advance, and the +actual flitting took place on a Friday, so that Gilbert would have every +hour of his vacation to assist in the settling process. He had accepted +an invitation to visit a school friend at Easter, saying to his mother +magisterially: "I didn't suppose you'd want me round the house when you +were getting things to rights; men are always in the way; so I told Fred +Bascom I'd go home with him." + +"Home with Fred! Our only man! Sole prop of the House of Carey!" +exclaimed his mother with consummate tact. "Why, Gilly dear, I shall +want your advice every hour! And who will know about the planting,--for +we are only 'women folks'; and who will do all the hammering and +carpenter work? You are so wonderful with tools that you'll be worth all +the rest of us put together!" + +"Oh, well, if you need me so much as that I'll go along, of course," +said Gilbert, "but Fred said his mother and sisters always did this kind +of thing by themselves." + +"'By themselves,' in Fred's family," remarked Mrs. Carey, "means a +butler, footman, and plenty of money for help of every sort. And though +no wonder you're fond of Fred, who is so jolly and such good company, +you must have noticed how selfish he is!" + +"Now, mother, you've never seen Fred Bascom more than half a dozen +times!" + +"No; and I don't remember at all what I saw in him the last five of +them, for I found out everything needful the first time he came to visit +us!" returned Mrs. Carey quietly. "Still, he's a likable, agreeable +sort of boy." + +"And no doubt he'll succeed in destroying the pig in him before he grows +up," said Nancy, passing through the room. "I thought it gobbled and +snuffled a good deal when we last met!" + +Colonel Wheeler was at Greentown station when the family arrived, and +drove Mrs. Carey and Peter to the Yellow House himself, while the rest +followed in the depot carryall, with a trail of trunks and packages +following on behind in an express wagon. It was a very early season, the +roads were free from mud, the trees were budding, and the young grass +showed green on all the sunny slopes. When the Careys had first seen +their future home they had entered the village from the west, the Yellow +House being the last one on the elm-shaded street, and quite on the +outskirts of Beulah itself. Now they crossed the river below the station +and drove through East Beulah, over a road unknown to any of them but +Gilbert, who was the hero and instructor of the party. Soon the +well-remembered house came into view, and as the two vehicles had kept +one behind the other there was a general cheer. + +It was more beautiful even than they had remembered it; and more +commodious, and more delightfully situated. The barn door was open, +showing crates of furniture, and the piazza was piled high with boxes. + +Bill Harmon stood in the front doorway, smiling. He hoped for trade, and +he was a good sort anyway. + +"I'd about given you up to-night," he called as he came to the gate. +"Your train's half an hour late. I got tired o' waitin', so I made free +to open up some o' your things for you to start housekeepin' with. I +guess there won't be no supper here for you to-night." + +"We've got it with us," said Nancy joyously, making acquaintance in an +instant. + +"You _are_ forehanded, ain't you! That's right!--jump, you little pint +o' cider!" Bill said, holding out his arms to Peter. Peter, carrying +many small things too valuable to trust to others, jumped, as suggested, +and gave his new friend an unexpected shower of bumps from hard +substances concealed about his person. + +"Land o' Goshen, you're _loaded_, hain't you?" he inquired jocosely as +he set Peter down on the ground. + +The dazzling smile with which Peter greeted this supposed tribute +converted Bill Harmon at once into a victim and slave. Little did he +know, as he carelessly stood there at the wagon wheel, that he was +destined to bestow upon that small boy offerings from his stock for +years to come. + +He and Colonel Wheeler were speedily lifting things from the carryall, +while the Careys walked up the pathway together, thrilling with the +excitement of the moment. Nancy breathed hard, flushed, and caught her +mother's hand. + +"O Motherdy!" she said under her breath; "it's all happening just as we +dreamed it, and now that it's really here it's like--it's like--a +dedication,--somehow. Gilbert, don't, dear! Let mother step over the +sill first and call us into the Yellow House! I'll lock the door again +and give the key to her." + +Mother Carey, her heart in her throat, felt anew the solemn nature of +the undertaking. It broke over her in waves, fresher, stronger, now that +the actual moment had arrived, than it ever had done in prospect. She +took the last step upward, and standing in the doorway, trembling, said +softly as she turned the key, "Come home, children! Nancy! Gilbert! +Kathleen! Peter-bird!" They flocked in, all their laughter hushed by the +new tone in her voice. Nancy's and Kitty's arms encircled their mother's +waist. Gilbert with sudden instinct took off his hat, and Peter, looking +at his elder brother wonderingly, did the same. There was a moment of +silence; the kind of golden silence that is full to the brim of thoughts +and prayers and memories and hopes and desires,--so full of all these +and other beautiful, quiet things that it makes speech seem poor and +shabby; then Mother Carey turned, and the Yellow House was blessed. +Colonel Wheeler and Bill Harmon at the gate never even suspected that +there had been a little service on the threshold, when they came up the +pathway to see if there was anything more needed. + +"I set up all the bedsteads and got the mattresses on 'em," said Bill +Harmon, "thinkin' the sandman would come early to-night." + +"I never heard of anything so kind and neighborly!" cried Mrs. Carey +gratefully. "I thought we should have to go somewhere else to sleep. Is +it you who keeps the village store?" + +"That's me!" said Bill. + +"Well, if you'll be good enough to come back once more to-night with a +little of everything, we'll be very much obliged. We have an oil stove, +tea and coffee, tinned meats, bread and fruit; what we need most is +butter, eggs, milk, and flour. Gilbert, open the box of eatables, +please; and, Nancy, unlock the trunk that has the bed linen in it. We +little thought we should find such friends here, did we?" + +"I got your extension table into the dining-room," said Bill, "and tried +my best to find your dishes, but I didn't make out, up to the time you +got here. Mebbe you marked 'em someway so't you know which to unpack +first? I was only findin' things that wan't no present use, as I guess +you'll say when you see 'em on the dining table." + +They all followed him as he threw open the door, Nancy well in the +front, as I fear was generally the case. There, on the centre of the +table stood You Dirty Boy rearing his crested head in triumph, and round +him like the gate posts of a mausoleum stood the four black and white +marble funeral urns. Perfect and entire, without a flaw, they stood +there, confronting Nancy. + +"It is like them to be the first to greet us!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey, +with an attempt at a smile, but there was not a sound from Kathleen or +Nancy. They stood rooted to the floor, gazing at the Curse of the House +of Carey as if their eyes must deceive them. + +"You look as though you didn't expect to see them, girls!" said their +mother, "but when did they ever fail us?--Do you know, I have a courage +at this moment that I never felt before?--Beulah is so far from Buffalo +that Cousin Ann cannot visit us often, and never without warning. I +should not like to offend her or hurt her feelings, but I think we'll +keep You Dirty Boy and the mantel ornaments in the attic for the +present, or the barn chamber. What do you say?" + +Colonel Wheeler and Mr. Harmon had departed, so a shout of agreement +went up from the young Careys. Nancy approached You Dirty Boy with a +bloodthirsty glare in her eye. + +"Come along, you evil, uncanny thing!" she said. "Take hold of his other +end, Gilly, and start for the barn; that's farthest away; but it's no +use; he's just like that bloodstain on Lady Macbeth's hand,--he will not +out! Kathleen, open the linen trunk while we're gone. We can't set the +table till these curses are removed. When you've got the linen out, take +a marble urn in each hand and trail them along to where we are. You can +track us by a line of my tears!" + +They found the stairs to the barn chamber, and lifted You Dirty Boy up +step by step with slow, painful effort. Kathleen ran out and put two +vases on the lowest step and ran back to the house for the other pair. +Gilbert and Nancy stood at the top of the stairs with You Dirty Boy +between them, settling where he could be easiest reached if he had to be +brought down for any occasion,--an unwelcome occasion that was certain +to occur sometime in the coming years. + +Suddenly they heard their names called in a tragic whisper! "_Gilbert! +Nancy! Quick! Cousin Ann's at the front gate_!" + +There was a crash! No human being, however self-contained, could have +withstood the shock of that surprise; coming as it did so swiftly, so +unexpectedly, and with such awful inappropriateness. Gilbert and Nancy +let go of You Dirty Boy simultaneously, and he fell to the floor in two +large fragments, the break occurring so happily that the mother and the +washcloth were on one half, and the boy on the other,--a situation long +desired by the boy, to whom the parting was most welcome! + +"She got off at the wrong station," panted Kathleen at the foot of the +stairs, "and had to be driven five miles, or she would have got here as +she planned, an hour before we did. She's come to help us settle, and +says she was afraid mother would overdo. Did you drop anything? Hurry +down, and I'll leave the vases here, in among the furniture; or shall I +take back two of them to show that they were our first thought?--And oh! +I forgot. She's brought Julia! Two more to feed, and not enough beds!" + +Nancy and Gilbert confronted each other. + +"Hide the body in the corner, Gilly," said Nancy; "and say, Gilly--" + +"Yes, what?" + +"You see he's in two pieces?" + +"Yes." + +"_What do you say to making him four, or more_?" + +"I say you go downstairs ahead of me and into the house, and I follow +you a moment later! Close the barn door carefully behind you!--Am I +understood?" + +"You are, Gilly! understood, and gloried in, and reverenced. My spirit +will be with you when you do it, Gilly dear, though I myself will be +greeting Cousin Ann and Julia!" + + + +XII + +COUSIN ANN + + +Mother Carey, not wishing to make any larger number of persons +uncomfortable than necessary, had asked Julia not to come to them until +after the house in Beulah had been put to rights; but the Fergusons went +abroad rather unexpectedly, and Mr. Ferguson tore Julia from the arms of +Gladys and put her on the train with very little formality. Her meeting +Cousin Ann on the way was merely one of those unpleasant coincidences +with which life is filled, although it is hardly possible, usually, for +two such disagreeable persons to be on the same small spot at the same +precise moment. + +On the third morning after the Careys' arrival, however, matters assumed +a more hopeful attitude, for Cousin Ann became discontented with Beulah. +The weather had turned cold, and the fireplaces, so long unused, were +uniformly smoky. Cousin Ann's stomach, always delicate, turned from +tinned meats, eggs three times a day, and soda biscuits made by Bill +Harmon's wife; likewise did it turn from nuts, apples, oranges, and +bananas, on which the children thrived; so she went to the so-called +hotel for her meals. Her remarks to the landlady after two dinners and +one supper were of a character not to be endured by any outspoken, +free-born New England woman. + +"I keep a hotel, and I'll give you your meals for twenty-five cents +apiece so long as you eat what's set before you and hold your tongue," +was the irate Mrs. Buck's ultimatum. "I'll feed you," she continued +passionately, "because it's my business to put up and take in anything +that's respectable; but I won't take none o' your sass!" + +Well, Cousin Ann's temper was up, too, by this time, and she declined on +her part to take any of the landlady's "sass"; so they parted, rather to +Mrs. Carey's embarrassment, as she did not wish to make enemies at the +outset. That night Cousin Ann, still smarting under the memory of Mrs. +Buck's snapping eyes, high color, and unbridled tongue, complained after +supper that her bedstead rocked whenever she moved, and asked Gilbert if +he could readjust it in some way, so that it should be as stationary as +beds usually are in a normal state. + +He took his tool basket and went upstairs obediently, spending fifteen +or twenty minutes with the much-criticised article of furniture, which +he suspected of rocking merely because it couldn't bear Cousin Ann. This +idea so delighted Nancy that she was obliged to retire from Gilbert's +proximity, lest the family should observe her mirth and Gilbert's and +impute undue importance to it. + +"I've done everything to the bedstead I can think of," Gilbert said, on +coming downstairs. "You can see how it works to-night, Cousin Ann!" + +As a matter of fact it _did_ work, instead of remaining in perfect quiet +as a well-bred bedstead should. When the family was sound asleep at +midnight a loud crash was heard, and Cousin Ann, throwing open the door +of her room, speedily informed everybody in the house that her bed had +come down with her, giving her nerves a shock from which they probably +would never recover. + +"Gilbert is far too young for the responsibilities you put upon him, +Margaret," Cousin Ann exclaimed, drawing her wrapper more closely over +her tall spare figure; "and if he was as old as Methuselah he would +still be careless, for he was born so! All this talk about his being +skilful with tools has only swollen his vanity. A boy of his age should +be able to make a bedstead stay together." + +The whole family, including the crestfallen Gilbert, proposed various +plans of relief, all except Nancy, who did not wish to meet Gilbert's +glance for fear that she should have to suspect him of a new crime. +Having embarked on a career of villainy under her direct instigation, he +might go on of his own accord, indefinitely. She did not believe him +guilty, but she preferred not to look into the matter more closely. + +Mother Carey's eyes searched Gilbert's, but found there no confirmation +of her fears. + +"You needn't look at me like that, mother," said the boy. "I wouldn't be +so mean as to rig up an accident for Cousin Ann, though I'd like her to +have a little one every night, just for the fun of it." + +Cousin Ann refused to let Gilbert try again on the bedstead, and refused +part of Mrs. Carey's bed, preferring to sleep on two hair mattresses +laid on her bedroom floor. "They may not be comfortable," she said +tersely, "but at least they will not endanger my life." + +The next morning's post brought business letters, and Cousin Ann feared +she would have to leave Beulah, although there was work for a fortnight +to come, right there, and Margaret had not strength enough to get +through it alone. + +She thought the chimneys were full of soot, and didn't believe the +kitchen stove would ever draw; she was sure that there were dead toads +and frogs in the well; the house was inconvenient and always would be +till water was brought into the kitchen sink; Julia seemed to have no +leaning towards housework and had an appetite that she could only +describe as a crime, inasmuch as the wherewithal to satisfy it had to be +purchased by others; the climate was damp because of the river, and +there was no proper market within eight miles; Kathleen was too delicate +to live in such a place, and the move from Charlestown was an utter and +absolute and entire mistake from A to Z. + +Then she packed her small trunk and Gilbert ran to the village on glad +and winged feet to get some one to take his depressing relative to the +noon train to Boston. As for Nancy, she stood in front of the parlor +fireplace, and when she heard the hoot of the engine in the distance she +removed the four mortuary vases from the mantelpiece and took them to +the attic, while Gilbert from the upper hall was chanting a favorite +old rhyme:-- + + "She called us names till she was tired, + She called us names till we perspired, + She called us names we never could spell, + She called us names we never may tell. + + "She called us names that made us laugh, + She called us names for a day and a half, + She called us names till her memory failed, + But finally out of our sight she sailed." + +"It must have been written about Cousin Ann in the first place," said +Nancy, joining Kathleen in the kitchen. "Well, she's gone at last! + + "Now every prospect pleases, + And only Julia's vile," + +she paraphrased from the old hymn, into Kathleen's private ear. + +"You oughtn't to say such things, Nancy," rebuked Kathleen. "Mother +wouldn't like it." + +"I know it," confessed Nancy remorsefully. "I have been wicked since the +moment I tried to get rid of You Dirty Boy. I don't know what's the +matter with me. My blood seems to be too red, and it courses wildly +through my veins, as the books say. I am going to turn over a new leaf, +now that Cousin Ann's gone and our only cross is Julia!" + +Oh! but it is rather dreadful to think how one person can spoil the +world! If only you could have seen the Yellow House after Cousin Ann +went! If only you could have heard the hotel landlady exclaim as she +drove past: "Well! Good riddance to bad rubbish!" The weather grew +warmer outside almost at once, and Bill Harmon's son planted the garden. +The fireplaces ceased to smoke and the kitchen stove drew. Colonel +Wheeler suggested a new chain pump instead of the old wooden one, after +which the water took a turn for the better, and before the month was +ended the Yellow House began to look like home, notwithstanding Julia. + +As for Beulah village, after its sleep of months under deep snow-drifts +it had waked into the adorable beauty of an early New England summer. It +had no snow-capped mountains in the distance; no amethyst foothills to +enchain the eye; no wonderful canyons and splendid rocky passes to make +the tourist marvel; no length of yellow sea sands nor plash of ocean +surf; no trade, no amusements, no summer visitors;--it was just a quiet, +little, sunny, verdant, leafy piece of heart's content, that's what +Beulah was, and Julia couldn't spoil it; indeed, the odds were, that it +would sweeten Julia! That was what Mother Carey hoped when her heart had +an hour's leisure to drift beyond Shiny Wall into Peacepool and consider +the needs of her five children. It was generally at twilight, when she +was getting Peter to sleep, that she was busiest making "old beasts +into new." + +"People fancy that I make things, my little dear," says Mother Carey to +Tom the Water Baby, "but I sit here and make them make themselves!" + +There was once a fairy, so the tale goes, who was so clever that she +found out how to make butterflies, and she was so proud that she flew +straight off to Peacepool to boast to Mother Carey of her skill. + +But Mother Carey laughed. + +"Know, silly child," she said, "that any one can make things if he will +take time and trouble enough, but it is not every one who can make +things make themselves." + +"Make things make themselves!" Mother Carey used to think in the +twilight. "I suppose that is what mothers are for!" + +Nancy was making herself busily these days, and the offending Julia was +directly responsible for such self-control and gains in general virtue +as poor impetuous Nancy achieved. Kathleen was growing stronger and +steadier and less self-conscious. Gilbert was doing better at school, +and his letters showed more consideration and thought for the family +than they had done heretofore. Even the Peter-bird was a little sweeter +and more self-helpful just now, thought Mother Carey fondly, as she +rocked him to sleep. He was worn out with following Natty Harmon at the +plough, and succumbed quickly to the music of her good-night song and +the comfort of her sheltering arms. Mother Carey had arms to carry, arms +to enfold, arms to comfort and caress. She also had a fine, handsome, +strong hand admirable for spanking, but she had so many invisible +methods of discipline at her command that she never needed a visible +spanker for Peter. "Spanking is all very well in its poor way," she used +to say, "but a woman who has to fall back on it very often is sadly +lacking in ingenuity." + +As she lifted Peter into his crib Nancy came softly in at the door with +a slip of paper in her hand. + +She drew her mother out to the window over the front door. "Listen," she +said. "Do you hear the frogs?" + +"I've been listening to them for the last half-hour," her mother said. +"Isn't everything sweet to-night, with the soft air and the elms all +feathered out, and the new moon!" + +"Was it ever so green before?" Nancy wondered, leaning over the +window-sill by her mother's side. "Were the trees ever so lace-y? Was +any river ever so clear, or any moon so yellow? I am so sorry for the +city people tonight! Sometimes I think it can't be so beautiful here as +it looks, mother. Sometimes I wonder if part of the beauty isn't inside +of us!" said Nancy. + +"Part of all beauty is in the eyes that look at, it," her mother +answered. + +"And I've been reading Mrs. Harmon's new reference Bible," Nancy +continued, "and here is what it says about Beulah." + +She held the paper to the waning light and read: "_Thou shalt no more be +termed Forsaken, neither shall thy land any more be termed Desolate ... +but it shall be called Beulah, for the Lord delighteth in thee_. + +"I think father would be comforted if he could see us all in the Yellow +House at Beulah!" Nancy went on softly as the two leaned out of the +window together. "He was so loving, so careful of us, so afraid that +anything should trouble us, that for months I couldn't think of him, +even in heaven, as anything but worried. But now it seems just as if we +were over the hardest time and could learn to live here in Beulah; and +so he must be comforted if he can see us or think about us at +all;--don't you feel like that, mother?" + +Yes, her mother agreed gently, and her heart was grateful and full of +hope. She had lost the father of her children and the dear companion of +her life, and that loss could never be made good. Still her mind +acknowledged the riches she possessed in her children, so she confessed +herself neither desolate nor forsaken, but something in a humble human +way that the Lord could take delight in. + + + +XIII + +THE PINK OF PERFECTION + + +That was the only trouble with Allan Carey's little daughter Julia, aged +thirteen; she was, and always had been, the pink of perfection. As a +baby she had always been exemplary, eating heartily and sleeping +soundly. When she felt a pin in her flannel petticoat she deemed it +discourteous to cry, because she knew that her nurse had at least tried +to dress her properly. When awake, her mental machinery moved slowly and +without any jerks. As to her moral machinery, the angels must have set +it going at birth and planned it in such a way that it could neither +stop nor go wrong. It was well meant, of course, but probably the angels +who had the matter in charge were new, young, inexperienced angels, with +vague ideas of human nature and inexact knowledge of God's intentions; +because a child that has no capability of doing the wrong thing will +hardly be able to manage a right one; not one of the big sort, anyway. + +At four or five years old Julia was always spoken of as "such a good +little girl." Many a time had Nancy in early youth stamped her foot and +cried: "Don't talk about Julia! I will not hear about Julia!" for she +was always held up as a pattern of excellence. Truth to tell she bored +her own mother terribly; but that is not strange, for by a curious freak +of nature, Mrs. Allan Carey was as flighty and capricious and +irresponsible and gay and naughty as Julia was steady, limited, narrow, +conventional, and dull; but the flighty mother passed out of the Carey +family life, and Julia, from the age of five onward, fell into the +charge of a pious, unimaginative governess, instead of being turned out +to pasture with a lot of frolicsome young human creatures; so at +thirteen she had apparently settled--hard, solid, and firm--into a +mould. She had smooth fair hair, pale blue eyes, thin lips, and a +somewhat too plump shape for her years. She was always tidy and wore her +clothes well, laying enormous stress upon their material and style, this +trait in her character having been added under the fostering influence +of the wealthy and fashionable Gladys Ferguson. At thirteen, when Julia +joined the flock of Carey chickens, she had the air of belonging to +quite another order of beings. They had been through a discipline seldom +suffered by "only children." They had had to divide apples and toys, +take turns at reading books, and learn generally to trot in double +harness. If Nancy had a new dress at Christmas, Kathleen had a new hat +in the spring. Gilbert heard the cry of "Low bridge!" very often after +Kathleen appeared on the scene, and Kathleen's ears, too, grew well +accustomed to the same phrase after Peter was born. + +"Julia never did a naughty thing in her life, nor spoke a wrong word," +said her father once, proudly. + +"Never mind, she's only ten, and there's hope for her yet," Captain +Carey had replied cheerfully; though if he had known her a little later, +in her first Beulah days, he might not have been so sanguine. She seemed +to have no instinct of adapting herself to the family life, standing +just a little aloof and in an attitude of silent criticism. She was a +trig, smug prig, Nancy said, delighting in her accidental muster of +three short, hard, descriptive words. She hadn't a bit of humor, no fun, +no gayety, no generous enthusiasms that carried her too far for safety +or propriety. She brought with her to Beulah sheaves of school +certificates, and when she showed them to Gilbert with their hundred per +cent deportment and ninety-eight and seven-eighths per cent scholarship +every month for years, he went out behind the barn and kicked its +foundations savagely for several minutes. She was a sort of continual +Sunday child, with an air of church and cold dinner and sermon-reading +and hymn-singing and early bed. Nobody could fear, as for some +impulsive, reckless little creature, that she would come to a bad end. +Nancy said no one could imagine her as coming to anything, not even +an end! + +"You never let mother hear you say these things, Nancy," Kathleen +remarked once, "but really and truly it's just as bad to say them at +all, when you know she wouldn't approve." + +"My present object is to be as good as gold in mother's eyes, but there +I stop!" retorted Nancy cheerfully. "Pretty soon I shall get virtuous +enough to go a step further and endeavor to please the angels,--not +Julia's cast-iron angels, but the other angels, who understand and are +patient, because they remember our frames and know that being dust we +are likely to be dusty once in a while. Julia wasn't made of dust. She +was made of--let me see--of skim milk and baked custard (the watery +kind) and rice flour and gelatine, with a very little piece of overripe +banana,--not enough to flavor, just enough to sicken. Stir this up with +weak barley water without putting in a trace of salt, sugar, spice, or +pepper, set it in a cool oven, take it out before it is done, and you +will get Julia." + +Nancy was triumphant over this recipe for making Julias, only regretting +that she could never show it to her mother, who, if critical, was always +most appreciative. She did send it in a letter to the Admiral, off in +China, and he, being "none too good for human nature's daily food," +enjoyed it hugely and never scolded her at all. + +Julia's only conversation at this time was on matters concerning Gladys +Ferguson and the Ferguson family. When you are washing dishes in the +sink of the Yellow House in Beulah it is very irritating to hear of +Gladys Ferguson's mother-of-pearl opera glasses, her French maid, her +breakfast on a tray in bed, her diamond ring, her photograph in the +Sunday "Times," her travels abroad, her proficiency in French +and German. + +"Don't trot Gladys into the kitchen, for goodness' sake, Julia!" +grumbled Nancy on a warm day. "I don't want her diamond ring in my +dishwater. Wait till Sunday, when we go to the hotel for dinner in our +best clothes, if you must talk about her. You don't wipe the tumblers +dry, nor put them in the proper place, when your mind is full +of Gladys!" + +"All right!" said Julia gently. "Only I hope I shall always be able to +wipe dishes and keep my mind on better things at the same time. That's +what Miss Tewksbury told me when she knew I had got to give up my home +luxuries for a long time. 'Don't let poverty drag you down, Julia,' she +said: 'keep your high thoughts and don't let them get soiled with the +grime of daily living.'" + +It is only just to say that Nancy was not absolutely destitute of +self-control and politeness, because at this moment she had a really +vicious desire to wash Julia's supercilious face and neat nose with the +dishcloth, fresh from the frying pan. She knew that she could not grasp +those irritating "high thoughts" and apply the grime of daily living to +them concretely and actually, but Julia's face was within her reach, and +Nancy's fingers tingled with desire. No trace of this savage impulse +appeared in her behavior, however; she rinsed the dishpan, turned it +upside down in the sink, and gave the wiping towels to Julia, asking her +to wring them out in hot water and hang them on the barberry bushes, +according to Mrs. Carey's instructions. + +"It doesn't seem as if I could!" whimpered Julia. "I have always been so +sensitive, and dish towels are so disgusting! They do _smell_, Nancy!" + +"They do," said Nancy sternly, "but they will smell worse if they are +not washed! I give you the dish-wiping and take the washing, just to +save your hands, but you must turn and turn about with Kathleen and me +with some of the ugly, hateful things. If you were company of course we +couldn't let you, but you are a member of the family. Our principal +concern must be to keep mother's 'high thoughts' from grime; ours must +just take their chance!" + +Oh! how Julia disliked Nancy at this epoch in their common history; and +how cordially and vigorously the dislike was returned! Many an unhappy +moment did Mother Carey have over the feud, mostly deep and silent, that +went on between these two; and Gilbert's attitude was not much more +hopeful. He had found a timetable or syllabus for the day's doings, over +Julia's washstand. It had been framed under Miss Tewksbury's guidance, +who knew Julia's unpunctuality and lack of system, and read as +follows:-- + + _Syllabus_ + + Rise at 6.45. + Bathe and dress. + Devotional Exercises 7.15. + Breakfast 7.45. + Household tasks till 9. + Exercise out of doors 9 to 10. + Study 10 to 12. + Preparations for dinner 12 to 1. + Recreation 2 to 4. + Study 4 to 5. + Preparation for supper 5 to 6. + Wholesome reading, walking, or conversation 7 to 8. + Devotional exercises 9. + Bed 9.30. + +There was nothing wrong about this; indeed, it was excellently +conceived; still it appeared to Gilbert as excessively funny, and with +Nancy's help he wrote another syllabus and tacked it over +Julia's bureau. + + _Time Card_ + + On waking I can + Pray for Gilly and Nan; + Eat breakfast at seven. + Or ten or eleven, + Nor think when it's noon + That luncheon's too soon. + From twelve until one + I can munch on a bun. + At one or at two + My dinner'll be due. + At three, say, or four, + I'll eat a bit more. + When the clock's striking five + Some mild exercise, + Very brief, would be wise, + Lest I lack appetite + For my supper at night. + Don't go to bed late, + Eat a light lunch at eight, + Nor forget to say prayers + For my cousins downstairs. + Then with conscience like mine + I'll be sleeping at nine. + +Mrs. Carey had a sense of humor, and when the weeping Julia brought the +two documents to her for consideration she had great difficulty in +adjusting the matter gravely and with due sympathy for her niece. + +"The F-f-f-fergusons never mentioned my appetite," Julia wailed. "They +were always trying to g-g-get me to eat!" + +"Gilbert and Nancy are a little too fond of fun, and a little too prone +to chaffing," said Mrs. Carey. "They forget that you are not used to it, +but I will try to make them more considerate. And don't forget, my dear, +that in a large family like ours we must learn to 'live and let live.'" + + + +XIV + +WAYS AND MEANS + + +It was late June, and Gilbert had returned from school, so the work of +making the Yellow House attractive and convenient was to move forward at +once. Up to now, the unpacking and distribution of the furniture, with +the daily housework and cooking, had been all that Mrs. Carey and the +girls could manage. + +A village Jack-of-all-trades, Mr. Ossian Popham, generally and +familiarly called "Osh" Popham, had been called in to whitewash existing +closets and put hooks in them; also, with Bill Harmon's consent, to make +new ones here and there in handy corners. Dozens of shelves in odd +spaces helped much in the tidy stowing away of household articles, +bed-clothing, and stores. In the midst of this delightful and cheery +setting-to-rights a letter arrived from Cousin Ann. The family was all +sitting together in Mrs. Carey's room, the announced intention being to +hold an important meeting of the Ways and Means Committee, the Careys +being strong on ways and uniformly short on means. + +The arrival of the letters by the hand of Bill Harmon's boy occurred +before the meeting was called to order. + +"May I read Cousin Ann's aloud?" asked Nancy, who had her private +reasons for making the offer. + +"Certainly," said Mrs. Carey unsuspectingly, as she took up the +inevitable stocking. "I almost wish you had all been storks instead of +chickens; then you would always have held up one foot, and perhaps that +stocking, at least, wouldn't have had holes in it!" + +"Poor Muddy! I'm learning to darn," cried Kathleen, kissing her. + + LONGHAMPTON, NEW JERSEY, _June 27th_. + + MY DEAR MARGARET [so Nancy read],--The climate of this seaside + place suits me so badly that I have concluded to spend the rest + of the summer with you, lightening those household tasks which + will fall so heavily on your shoulders. + +[Groans from the whole family greeted this opening passage, and Gilbert +cast himself, face down, on his mother's lounge.] + + It is always foggy here when it does not rain, and the cooking + is very bad. The manager of the hotel is uncivil and the office + clerks very rude, so that Beulah, unfortunate place of residence + as I consider it, will be much preferable. + + I hope you are getting on well with the work on the house, + although I regard your treating it as if it were your own, as + the height of extravagance. You will never get back a penny you + spend on it, and probably when you get it in good order Mr. + Hamilton will come back from Europe and live in it himself, or + take it away from you and sell it to some one else. + + Gilbert will be home by now, but I should not allow him to touch + the woodwork, as he is too careless and unreliable. + +["She'll never forget that the bed came down with her!" exclaimed +Gilbert, his voice muffled by the sofa cushions.] + + Remember me to Julia. I hope she enjoys her food better than + when I was with you. Children must eat if they would grow. + +[Mother Carey pricked up her ears at this point, and Gilbert raised +himself on one elbow, but Nancy went on gravely.] + + Tell Kathleen to keep out of the sun, or wear a hat, as her + complexion is not at all what it used to be. Without color and + with freckles she will be an unusually plain child. + +[Kathleen flushed angrily and laid down her work.] + + Give my love to darling Nancy. What a treasure you have in your + eldest, Margaret! I hope you are properly grateful for her. Such + talent, such beauty, such grace, such discretion-- + +But here the family rose _en masse_ and descended on the reader of the +spurious letter just as she had turned the first page. In the amiable +scuffle that ensued, a blue slip fell from Cousin Ann's envelope and +Gilbert handed it to his mother with the letter. + +Mrs. Carey, wiping the tears of merriment that came to her eyes in spite +of her, so exactly had Nancy caught Cousin Ann's epistolary style, read +the real communication, which ran as follows:-- + + DEAR MARGARET,--I have had you much in mind since I left you, + always with great anxiety lest your strength should fail under + the unexpected strain you put upon it. I had intended to give + each of you a check for thirty-five dollars at Christmas to + spend as you liked, but I must say I have not entire confidence + in your judgment. You will be likelier far to decorate the walls + of the house than to bring water into the kitchen sink. I + therefore enclose you three hundred dollars and beg that you + will have the well piped _at once_, and if there is any way to + carry the water to the bedroom floor, do it, and let me send the + extra amount involved. You will naturally have the well cleaned + out anyway, but I should prefer never to know what you found in + it. My only other large gift to you in the past was one of + ornaments, sent, you remember, at the time of your wedding! + +["We remember!" groaned the children in chorus.] + + I do not regret this, though my view of life, of its sorrows and + perplexities, has changed somewhat, and I am more practical than + I used to be. The general opinion is that in giving for a + present an object of permanent beauty, your friends think of you + whenever they look upon it. + +["That's so!" remarked Gilbert to Nancy.] + + This is true, no doubt, but there are other ways of making + yourself remembered, and I am willing that you should think + kindly of Cousin Ann whenever you use the new pump. + + The second improvement I wish made with the money is the + instalment of a large furnace-like stove in the cellar, which + will send up a little heat, at least, into the hall and lower + rooms in winter. You will probably have to get the owner's + consent, and I should certainly ask for a five years' lease + before expending any considerable amount of money on the + premises. + + If there is any money left, I should suggest new sills to the + back doors and those in the shed. I noticed that the present + ones are very rotten, and I dare say by this time you have + processions of red and black ants coming into your house. It + seemed to me that I never saw so much insect life as in Beulah. + Moths, caterpillars, brown-tails, slugs, spiders, June bugs, + horseflies, and mosquitoes were among the pests I specially + noted. The Mr. Popham who drove me to the station said that + snakes also abounded in the tall grass, but I should not lay any + stress on his remarks, as I never saw such manners in my life in + any Christian civilized community. He asked me my age, and when + I naturally made no reply, he inquired after a few minutes' + silence whether I was unmarried from choice or necessity. When I + refused to carry on any conversation with him he sang jovial + songs so audibly that persons going along the street smiled and + waved their hands to him. I tell you this because you appear to + have false ideas of the people in Beulah, most of whom seemed to + me either eccentric or absolutely insane. + + Hoping that you can endure your life there when the water smells + better and you do not have to carry it from the well, I am + + Yours affectionately, + + ANN CHADWICH. + + +"Children!" said Mrs. Carey, folding the letter and slipping the check +into the envelope for safety, "your Cousin Ann is really a very +good woman." + +"I wish her bed hadn't come down with her," said Gilbert. "We could +never have afforded to get that water into the house, or had the little +furnace, and I suppose, though no one of us ever thought of it, that you +would have had a hard time doing the work in the winter in a cold house, +and it would have been dreadful going to the pump." + +"Dreadful for you too, Gilly," replied Kathleen pointedly. + +"I shall be at school, where I can't help," said Gilbert. + +Mrs. Carey made no remark, as she intended the fact that there was no +money for Gilbert's tuition at Eastover to sink gradually into his mind, +so that he might make the painful discovery himself. His fees had +fortunately been paid in advance up to the end of the summer term, so +the strain on their resources had not been felt up to now. + +Nancy had disappeared from the room and now stood in the doorway. + +"I wish to remark that, having said a good many disagreeable things +about Cousin Ann, and regretting them very much, I have placed the four +black and white marble ornaments on my bedroom mantelpiece, there to be +a perpetual reminder of my sins. You Dirty Boy is in a hundred pieces in +the barn chamber, but if Cousin Ann ever comes to visit us again, I'll +be the one to confess that Gilly and I were the cause of the accident." + +"Now take your pencil, Nancy, and see where we are in point of income, +at the present moment," her mother suggested, with an approving smile. +"Put down the pension of thirty dollars a month." + +"Down.--Three hundred and sixty dollars." + +"Now the hundred dollars over and above the rent of the Charlestown +house." + +"Down; but it lasts only four years." + +"We may all be dead by that time." (This cheerfully from Gilbert.) + +"Then the interest on our insurance money. Four per cent on five +thousand dollars is two hundred; I have multiplied it twenty times." + +"Down.--Two hundred." + +"Of course if anything serious happens, or any great need comes, we have +the five thousand to draw upon," interpolated Gilbert. + +"I will draw upon that to save one of us in illness or to bury one of +us," said Mrs. Carey with determination, "but I will never live out of +it myself, nor permit you to. We are five,--six, while Julia is with +us," she added hastily,--"and six persons will surely have rainy days +coming to them. What if I should die and leave you?" + +"Don't, mother!" they cried in chorus, so passionately that Mrs. Carey +changed the subject quickly. "How much a year does it make, Nancy?" + +"Three hundred and sixty plus one hundred plus two hundred equals six +hundred and sixty," read Nancy. "And I call it a splendid big lump +of money!" + +"Oh, my dear," sighed her mother with a shake of the head, "if you knew +the difficulty your father and I have had to take care of ourselves and +of you on five and six times that sum! We may have been a little +extravagant sometimes following him about,--he was always so anxious to +have us with him,--but that has been our only luxury." + +"We saved enough out of exchanging the grand piano to pay all the +expenses down here, and all our railway fares, and everything so far, in +the way of boards and nails and Osh Popham's labor," recalled Gilbert. + +"Yes, and we are still eating the grand piano at the end of two months, +but it's about gone, isn't it, Muddy?" Nancy asked. + +"About gone, but it has been a great help, and our dear little +old-fashioned square is just as much of a comfort.--Of course there's +the tapestry and the Van Twiller landscape Uncle gave me; they may +yet be sold." + +"Somebody'll buy the tapestry, but the Van Twiller'll go hard," and +Gilbert winked at Nancy. + +"A picture that looks just the same upside down as the right way about +won't find many buyers," was Nancy's idea. + +"Still it is a Van Twiller, and has a certain authentic value for all +time!" + +"The landscapes Van Twiller painted in the dark, or when he had his +blinders on, can't be worth very much," insisted Gilbert. "You remember +the Admiral thought it was partridges nesting in the underbrush at +twilight, and then we found Joanna had cleaned the dining room and hung +the thing upside down. When it was hung the other end up neither father +nor the Admiral could tell what it was; they'd lost the partridges and +couldn't find anything else!" + +"We shall get something for it because it is a Van Twiller," said Mrs. +Carey hopefully; "and the tapestry is lovely.--Now we have been doing +all our own work to save money enough to make the house beautiful; yet, +as Cousin Ann says, it does not belong to us and may be taken away at +any moment after the year is up. We have never even seen our landlord, +though Mr. Harmon has written to him. Are we foolish? What do you +think, Julia?" + + + +XV + +BELONGING TO BEULAH + + +The Person without a Fault had been quietly working at her embroidery, +raising her head now and then to look at some extraordinary Carey, when +he or she made some unusually silly or fantastic remark. + +"I'm not so old as Gilbert and Nancy, and I'm only a niece," she said +modestly, "so I ought not to have an opinion. But I should get a +maid-of-all-work at once, so that we shouldn't all be drudges as we are +now; then I should not spend a single cent on the house, but just live +here in hiding, as it were, till better times come and till we are old +enough to go into society. You could scrimp and save for Nancy's coming +out, and then for Kathleen's. Father would certainly be well long before +then, and Kathleen and I could debut together!" + +"Who wants to 'debut' together or any other way," sniffed Nancy +scornfully. "I'm coming out right here in Beulah; indeed I'm not sure +but I'm out already! Mr. Bill Harmon has asked me to come to the church +sociable and Mr. Popham has invited me to the Red Men's picnic at +Greentown. Beulah's good for something better than a place to hide in! +We'll have to save every penny at first, of course, but in three or four +years Gilly and I ought to be earning something." + +"The trouble is, I _can't_ earn anything in college," objected Gilbert, +"though I'd like to." + +"That will be the only way a college course can come to you now, +Gilbert," his mother said quietly. "You know nothing of the expenses +involved. They would have taxed our resources to the utmost if father +had lived, and we had had our more than five thousand a year! You and I +together must think out your problem this summer." + +Gilbert looked blank and walked to the window with his hands in his +pockets. + +"I should lose all my friends, and it's hard for a fellow to make his +way in the world if he has nothing to recommend him but his graduation +from some God-forsaken little hole like Beulah Academy." + +Nancy looked as if she could scalp her brother when he alluded to her +beloved village in these terms, but her mother's warning look stopped +any comment. + +Julia took up arms for her cousin. "We ought to go without everything +for the sake of sending Gilbert to college," she said. "Gladys Ferguson +doesn't know a single boy who isn't going to Harvard or Yale." + +"If a boy of good family and good breeding cannot make friends by his +own personality and his own qualities of mind and character, I should +think he would better go without them," said Gilbert's mother casually. + +"Don't you believe in a college education, mother?" inquired Gilbert in +an astonished tone. + +"Certainly! Why else should we have made sacrifices to send you? To +begin with, it is much simpler and easier to be educated in college. You +have a thousand helps and encouragements that other fellows have to get +as they may. The paths are all made straight for the students. A stupid +boy, or one with small industry or little originality, must have +_something_ drummed into him in four years, with all the splendid +teaching energy that the colleges employ. It requires a very high grade +of mental and moral power to do without such helps, and it may be that +you are not strong enough to succeed without them;--I do not know your +possibilities yet, Gilbert, and neither do you know them yourself!" + +Gilbert looked rather nonplussed. "Pretty stiff, I call it!" he +grumbled, "to say that if you've got brains enough you can do +without college." + +"It is true, nevertheless. If you have brains enough, and will enough, +and heart enough, you can stay here in Beulah and make the universe +search you out, and drag you into the open, where men have need of you!" +(Mrs. Carey's eyes shone and her cheeks glowed.) "What we all want as a +family is to keep well and strong and good, in body and mind and soul; +to conquer our weaknesses, to train our gifts, to harness our powers to +some wished-for end, and then _pull_, with all our might. Can't my girls +be fine women, fit for New York or Washington, London or Paris, because +their young days were passed in Beulah? Can't my boys be anything that +their brains and courage fit them for, whether they make their own +associations or have them made for them? Father would never have flung +the burden on your shoulders, Gilbert, but he is no longer here. You +can't have the help of Yale or Harvard or Bowdoin to make a man of you, +my son,--you will have to fight your own battles and win your +own spurs." + +"Oh! mother, but you're splendid!" cried Nancy, the quick tears in her +eyes. "Brace up, old Gilly, and show what the Careys can do without +'advantages.' Brace up, Kitty and Julia! We three will make Beulah +Academy ring next year!" + +"And I don't want you to look upon Beulah as a place of hiding while +adversity lasts," said Mother Carey. "We must make it home; as beautiful +and complete as we can afford. One real home always makes others, I am +sure of that! We will ask Mr. Harmon to write Mr. Hamilton and see if he +will promise to leave us undisturbed. We cannot be happy, or prosperous, +or useful, or successful, unless we can contrive to make the Yellow +House a home. The river is our river; the village is our village; the +people are our neighbors; Beulah belongs to us and we belong to Beulah, +don't we, Peter?" + +Mother Carey always turned to Peter with some nonsensical appeal when +her heart was full and her voice a trifle unsteady. You could bury your +head in Peter's little white sailor jacket just under his chin, at which +he would dimple and gurgle and chuckle and wriggle, and when you +withdrew your flushed face and presented it to the public gaze all the +tears would have been wiped off on Peter. + +So on this occasion did Mrs. Carey repeat, as she set Peter down, "Don't +we belong to Beulah, dear?" + +"Yes, we does," he lisped, "and I'm going to work myself, pretty soon +bimebye just after a while, when I'm a little more grown up, and then +I'll buy the Yellow House quick." + +"So you shall, precious!" cried Kathleen. + +"I was measured on Muddy this morning, wasn't I, Muddy, and I was half +way to her belt; and in Charlestown I was only a little farder up than +her knees. All the time I'm growing up she's ungrowing down! She's +smallering and I'm biggering." + +"Are you afraid your mother'll be too small, sweet Pete?" asked Mrs. +Carey. + +"No!" this very stoutly. "Danny Harmon's mother's more'n up to the +mantelpiece and I'd hate to have my mother so far away!" said Peter as +he embraced Mrs. Carey's knees. + +Julia had said little during this long conversation, though her mind was +fairly bristling with objections and negatives and different points of +view, but she was always more or less awed by her Aunt Margaret, and +never dared defy her opinion. She had a real admiration for her aunt's +beauty and dignity and radiant presence, though it is to be feared she +cared less for the qualities of character that made her personality so +luminous with charm for everybody. She saw people look at her, listen to +her, follow her with their eyes, comment on her appearance, her +elegance, and her distinction, and all this impressed her deeply. As to +Cousin Ann's present her most prominent feeling was that it would have +been much better if that lady had followed her original plan of sending +individual thirty-five-dollar checks. In that event she, Julia, was +quite certain that hers never would have gone into a water-pipe or a +door-sill. + +"Oh, Kathleen!" sighed Nancy as the two went into the kitchen together. +"Isn't mother the most interesting 'scolder' you ever listened to? I +love to hear her do it, especially when somebody else is getting it. +When it's I, I grow smaller and smaller, curling myself up like a little +worm. Then when she has finished I squirm to the door and wriggle out. +Other mothers say: 'If you don't, I shall tell your father!' 'Do as I +tell you, and ask no questions.' 'I never heard of such behavior in my +life!' 'Haven't you any sense of propriety?' 'If this happens again I +shall have to do something desperate.' 'Leave the room at once,' and so +on; but mother sets you to thinking." + +"Mother doesn't really scold," Kathleen objected. + +"No, but she shows you how wrong you are, just the same. Did you notice +how Julia _withered_ when mother said we were not to look upon Beulah as +a place of hiding?" + +"She didn't stay withered long," Kathleen remarked. + +"And she said just the right thing to dear old Gilly, for Fred Bascom is +filling his head with foolish notions. He needs father to set +him right." + +"We all need father," sighed Kitty tearfully, "but somehow mother grows +a little more splendid every day. I believe she's trying to fill +father's place and be herself too!" + + + +XVI + +THE POST BAG + + +Letter from Mr. William Harmon, storekeeper at Beulah Corner, to Hon. +Lemuel Hamilton, American Consul at Breslau, Germany. + + Beulah, _June 27th._ + + Dear Lem: The folks up to your house want to lay out money on it + and don't dass for fear you'll turn em out and pocket their + improvements. If you haint got any better use for the propety + I advise you to hold on to this bunch of tennants as they are + O.K. wash goods, all wool, and a yard wide. I woodent like + Mrs. Harmon _to know how I feel about the lady_, who is + hansome as a picture and the children are a first class crop and + no mistake. They will not lay out much at first as they are + short of cash but if ever good luck comes along they will fit + up the house like a pallis and your granchildren will reep the + proffit. I'll look out for your interest and see they don't do + nothing outlandish. They'd have hard work to beat that + fool-job your boys did on the old barn, fixin it up so't + nobody could keep critters in it, so no more from your old + school frend + + BILL HARMON. + + P.S. We've been having a spell of turrible hot wether in Beulah. + How is it with you? I never framed it up jest what kind of a + job an American Counsul's was; but I guess he aint never het + up with overwork! There was a piece in a Portland paper about + a Counsul somewhere being fired because he set in his + shirt-sleeves durin office hours. I says to Col. Wheeler if + Uncle Sam could keep em all in their shirtsleeves, hustlin for + dear life, it wood be all the better for him and us! + + BILL. + +Letter from Miss Nancy Carey to the Hon. Lemuel Hamilton. + + BEULAH, _June 27th_. + + DEAR MR. HAMILTON,--I am Nancy, the oldest of the Carey + children, who live in your house. When father was alive, he + took us on a driving trip, and we stopped and had luncheon + under your big maple and fell in love with your empty house. + Father (he was a Captain in the Navy and there was never + anybody like him in the world!)--Father leaned over the gate + and said if he was only rich he would drive the horse into the + barn and buy the place that very day; and mother said it would + be a beautiful spot to bring up a family. We children had + wriggled under the fence, and were climbing the apple trees by + that time, and we wanted to be brought up there that very + minute. We all of us look back to that day as the happiest one + that we can remember. Mother laughs when I talk of looking + back, because I am not sixteen yet, but I think, although we did + not know it, God knew that father was going to die and we were + going to live in that very spot afterwards. Father asked us + what we could do for the place that had been so hospitable to + us, and I remembered a box of plants in the carryall, that we + had bought at a wayside nursery, for the flower beds in + Charlestown. "Plant something!" I said, and father thought it + was a good idea and took a little crimson rambler rose bush + from the box. Each of us helped make the place for it by taking + a turn with the luncheon knives and spoons; then I planted the + rose and father took off his hat and said, "Three cheers for + the Yellow House!" and mother added, "God bless it, and the + children who come to live in it!"--There is surely something + strange in that, don't you think so? Then when father died + last year we had to find a cheap and quiet place to live, and + I remembered the Yellow House in Beulah and told mother my + idea. She does not say "Bosh!" like some mothers, but if our + ideas sound like anything she tries them; so she sent Gilbert + to see if the house was still vacant, and when we found it + was, we took it. The rent is sixty dollars a year, as I + suppose Bill Harmon told you when he sent you mother's check + for fifteen dollars for the first quarter. We think it is very + reasonable, and do not wonder you don't like to spend anything + on repairs or improvements for us, as you have to pay taxes + and insurance. We hope you will have a good deal over for your + own use out of our rent, as we shouldn't like to feel under + obligation. If we had a million we'd spend it all on the + Yellow House, because we are fond of it in the way you are + fond of a person; it's not only that we want to paint it and + paper it, but we would like to pat it and squeeze it. If you + can't live in it yourself, even in the summer, perhaps you + will be glad to know we love it so much and want to take good + care of it always. What troubles us is the fear that you will + take it away or sell it to somebody before Gilbert and I are + grown up and have earned money enough to buy it. It was Cousin + Ann that put the idea into our heads, but everybody says it is + quite likely and sensible. Cousin Ann has made us a splendid + present of enough money to bring the water from the well into + the kitchen sink and to put a large stove like a furnace into + the cellar. We would cut two registers behind the doors in the + dining-room and sitting-room floors, and two little round + holes in the ceilings to let the heat up into two bedrooms, if + you are willing to let us do it. [Mother says that Cousin Ann + is a good and generous person. It is true, and it makes us + very unhappy that we cannot really love her on account of her + being so fault-finding; but you, being an American Consul and + travelling all over the world, must have seen somebody like + her.] + + Mr. Harmon is writing to you, but I thought he wouldn't know so + much about us as I do. We have father's pension; that is three + hundred and sixty dollars a year; and one hundred dollars a + year from the Charlestown house, but that only lasts for four + years; and two hundred dollars a year from the interest on + father's insurance. That makes six hundred and sixty dollars, + which is a great deal if you haven't been used to three + thousand, but does not seem to be enough for a family of six. + There is the insurance money itself, too, but mother says + nothing but a very dreadful need must make us touch that. You + see there are four of us children, which with mother makes + five, and now there is Julia, which makes six. She is Uncle + Allan's only child. Uncle Allan has nervous prostration and + all of mother's money. We are not poor at all, just now, on + account of having exchanged the grand piano for an + old-fashioned square and eating up the extra money. It is great + fun, and whenever we have anything very good for supper + Kathleen says, "Here goes a piano leg!" and Gilbert says, + "Let's have an octave of white notes for Sunday supper, + mother!" I send you a little photograph of the family taken + together on your side piazza (we call it our piazza, and I hope + you don't mind). I am the tallest girl, with the curly hair. + Julia is sitting down in front, hemming. She said we should + look so idle if somebody didn't do something, but she never + really hems; and Kathleen is leaning over mother's shoulder. + We all wanted to lean over mother's shoulder, but Kitty got + there first. The big boy is Gilbert. He can't go to college + now, as father intended, and he is very sad and depressed; but + mother says he has a splendid chance to show what father's son + can do without any help but his own industry and pluck. Please + look carefully at the lady sitting in the chair, for it is our + mother. It is only a snap shot, but you can see how beautiful + she is. Her hair is very long, and the wave in it is natural. + The little boy is Peter. He is the loveliest and the dearest + of all of us. The second picture is of me tying up the crimson + rambler. I thought you would like to see what a wonderful rose + it is. I was standing in a chair, training the long branches + and tacking them against the house, when a gentleman drove by + with a camera in his wagon. He stopped and took the picture and + sent us one, explaining that every one admired it. I happened + to be wearing my yellow muslin, and I am sending you the one + the gentleman colored, because it is the beautiful crimson of + the rose against the yellow house that makes people admire it + so. If you come to America please don't forget Beulah, because + if you once saw mother you could never bear to disturb her, + seeing how brave she is, living without father. Admiral + Southwick, who is in China, calls us Mother Carey's chickens. + They are stormy petrels, and are supposed to go out over the + seas and show good birds the way home. We haven't done + anything splendid yet, but we mean to when the chance comes. I + haven't told anybody that I am writing this, but I wanted you + to know everything about us, as you are our landlord. We could + be so happy if Cousin Ann wouldn't always say we are spending + money on another person's house and such a silly performance + never came to any good. + + I enclose you a little picture cut from the wall paper we want + to put on the front hall, hoping you will like it. The old + paper is hanging in shreds and some of the plaster is loose, + but Mr. Popham will make it all right. Mother says she feels + as if he had pasted laughter and good nature on all the walls + as he papered them. When you open the front door (and we hope + you will, sometime, and walk right in!) how lovely it will be + to look into yellow hayfields! And isn't the boatful of people + coming to the haymaking, nice, with the bright shirts of the + men and the women's scarlet aprons? Don't you love the white + horse in the haycart, and the jolly party picnicking under the + tree? Mother says just think of buying so much joy and color + for twenty cents a double roll; and we children think we shall + never get tired of sitting on the stairs in cold weather and + making believe it is haying time. Gilbert says we are putting + another grand piano leg on the walls, but we are not, for we are + doing all our own cooking and dishwashing and saving the money + that a cook would cost, to do lovely things for the Yellow + House. Thank you, dearest Mr. Hamilton, for letting us live in + it. We are very proud of the circular steps and very proud of + your being an American consul. + + Yours affectionately, + + NANCY CAREY. + + P.S. It is June, and Beulah is so beautiful you feel like eating + it with sugar and cream! We do hope that you and your children + are living in as sweet a place, so that you will not miss this + one so much. We know you have five, older than we are, but if + there are any the right size for me to send my love to, please + do it. Mother would wish to be remembered to Mrs. Hamilton, + but she will never know I am writing to you. It is my first + business letter. + + N.C. + + + +XVII + +JACK OF ALL TRADES + + +Mr. Ossian (otherwise "Osh") Popham was covering the hall of the Yellow +House with the hayfield paper. Bill Harmon's father had left +considerable stock of one sort and another in the great unfinished attic +over the store, and though much of it was worthless, and all of it was +out of date, it seemed probable that it would eventually be sold to the +Careys, who had the most unlimited ingenuity in making bricks without +straw, when it came to house decoration. They had always moved from post +to pillar and Dan to Beersheba, and had always, inside of a week, had +the prettiest and most delightful habitation in the naval colony where +they found themselves. Beulah itself, as well as all the surrounding +country, had looked upon the golden hayfield paper and scorned it as +ugly and countrified; never suspecting that, in its day, it had been +made in France and cost a dollar and a half a roll. It had been imported +for a governor's house, and only half of it used, so for thirty years +the other half had waited for the Careys. There always are Careys and +their like, and plenty of them, in every generation, so old things, if +they are good, need never be discouraged. + +Mr. Popham never worked at his bricklaying or carpentering or cabinet +making or papering by the hour, but "by the job"; and a kind Providence, +intent on the welfare of the community, must have guided him in this +choice of business methods, for he talked so much more than he worked, +that unless householders were well-to-do, the rights of employer and +employee could never have been adjusted. If they were rich no one of +them would have stopped Ossian's conversation for a second. In the first +place it was even better than his work, which was always good, and in +the second place he would never consent to go to any one, unless he +could talk as much as he liked. The Careys loved him, all but Julia, who +pronounced him "common" and said Miss Tewksbury told her never to listen +to anyone who said "I done it" or "I seen it." To this Nancy replied +(her mother being in the garden, and she herself not yet started on a +line of conduct arranged to please the angels) that Miss Tewksbury and +Julia ought to have a little corner of heaven finished off for +themselves; and Julia made a rude, distinct, hideous "face" at Nancy. I +have always dated the beginning of Julia's final transformation from +this critical moment, when the old Adam in her began to work. It was +good for Nancy too, who would have trodden on Julia so long as she was +an irritating but patient, well-behaved worm; but who would have to use +a little care if the worm showed signs of turning. + +"Your tongue is like a bread knife, Nancy Carey!" Julia exclaimed +passionately, after twisting her nose and mouth into terrifying and +dreadful shapes. "If it wasn't that Miss Tewksbury told me ladies never +were telltales, I could soon make trouble between you and your +blessed mother." + +"No, you couldn't," said Nancy curtly, "for I'd reform sooner than let +you do that!--Perhaps I did say too much, Julia, only I can't bear to +have you make game of Mr. Popham when he's so funny and nice. Think of +his living with nagging Mrs. Popham and his stupid daughter and son in +that tiny house, and being happy as a king." + +"If there wasn't something wrong with him he wouldn't _be_ happy there," +insisted Julia. + +Mr. Popham himself accounted for his contentment without insulting his +intelligence. "The way I look at it," he said, "this world's all the +world we'll git till we git to the next one; an' we might's well smile +on it, 's frown! You git your piece o' life an' you make what you can of +it;--that's the idee! Now the other day I got some nice soft wood that +was prime for whittlin'; jest the right color an' grain an' all, an' I +started in to make a little statue o' the Duke o' Wellington. Well, when +I got to shapin' him out, I found my piece o' wood wouldn't be long +enough to give him his height; so I says, 'Well, I don't care, I'll cut +the Duke right down and make Napoleon Bonaparte.' I'd 'a' been all right +if I'd cal'lated better, but I cut my block off too short, and I +couldn't make Napoleon nohow; so I says, 'Well, Isaac Watts was an awful +short man, so I guess I'll make him!' But this time my wood split right +in two. Some men would 'a' been discouraged, but I wasn't, not a mite; I +jest said, 'I never did fancy Ike Watts, an' there's one thing this +blamed chip _will_ make, an' that's a button for the barn door!'" + +Osh not only whittled and papered and painted, but did anything +whatsoever that needed to be done on the premises. If the pump refused +to draw water, or the sink drain was stopped, or the gutters needed +cleaning, or the grass had to be mowed, he was the man ordained by +Providence and his own versatility to do the work. While he was papering +the front hall the entire Carey family lived on the stairs between +meals, fearful lest they should lose any incident, any anecdote, any +story, any reminiscence that might fall from his lips. Mrs. Carey took +her mending basket and sat in the doorway, within ear shot, while Peter +had all the scraps of paper and a small pasting board on the steps, +where he conducted his private enterprises. + +Osh would cut his length of paper, lay it flat on the board, and apply +the wide brush up and down neatly while he began his story. Sometimes if +the tale were long and interesting the paste would dry, but in that case +he went over the surface again. At the precise moment of hanging, the +flow of his eloquence stopped abruptly and his hearers had to wait until +the piece was finished before they learned what finally became of Lyddy +Brown after she drove her husband ou' doors, or of Bill Harmon's bull +terrier, who set an entire community quarreling among themselves. His +racy accounts of Mrs. Popham's pessimism, which had grown prodigiously +from living in the house with his optimism; his anecdotes of Lallie Joy +Popham, who was given to moods, having inherited portions of her +father's incurable hopefulness, and fragments of her mother's +ineradicable gloom,--these were of a character that made the finishing +of the hall a matter of profound unimportance. + +"I ain't one to hurry," he would say genially; "that's the reason I +won't work by the hour or by the day. We've got one 'hurrier' in the +family, and that's enough for Lallie Joy 'n' me! Mis' Popham does +everything right on the dot, an' Lallie Joy 'n' me git turrible sick o' +seein' that dot, 'n' hevin' our 'tention drawed to it if we _don't_ see +it. Mis' Bill Harmon's another 'hurrier,'--well, you jest ask Bill, +that's all! She an' Mis' Popham hev been at it for fifteen years, but +the village ain't ready to give out the blue ribbon yet. Last week my +wife went over to Harmon's and Mis' Harmon said she was goin' to make +some molasses candy that mornin'. Well, my wife hurried home, put on her +molasses, made her candy, cooled it and worked it, and took some over to +treat Mis' Harmon, who was jest gittin' her kittle out from under +the sink!" + +The Careys laughed heartily at this evidence of Mrs. Popham's celerity, +while Osh, as pleased as possible, gave one dab with his paste brush and +went on:-- + +"Maria's blood was up one while, 'cause Mis' Bill Harmon always +contrives to git her wash out the earliest of a Monday morning. +Yesterday Maria got up 'bout daybreak (I allers tell her if she was real +forehanded she'd eat her breakfast overnight), and by half past five she +hed her clothes in the boiler. Jest as she was lookin' out the kitchen +winder for signs o' Mis' Bill Harmon, she seen her start for her side +door with a big basket. Maria was so mad then that she vowed she +wouldn't be beat, so she dug for the bedroom and slat some clean sheets +and piller cases out of a bureau drawer, run into the yard, and I'm +blamed if she didn't get 'em over the line afore Mis' Harmon found her +clothespins!" + +Good old Osh! He hadn't had such an audience for years, for Beulah knew +all its own stories thoroughly, and although it valued them highly it +did not care to hear them too often; but the Careys were absolutely +fresh material, and such good, appreciative listeners! Mrs. Carey looked +so handsome when she wiped the tears of enjoyment from her eyes that Osh +told Bill Harmon if 't wa'n't agin the law you would want to kiss her +every time she laughed. + +Well, the hall papering was, luckily, to be paid for, not by the hour, +but by an incredibly small price per roll, and everybody was pleased. +Nancy, Kathleen, and Julia sat on the stairs preparing a whiteweed and +buttercup border for the spare bedroom according to a plan of Mother +Carey's. It was an affair of time, as it involved the delicate cutting +out of daisy garlands from a wider bordering filled with flowers of +other colors, and proved a fascinating occupation. + +Gilbert hovered on the outskirts of the hall, doing odd jobs of one sort +and another and learning bits of every trade at which Mr. Popham +was expert. + +"If we hadn't been in such a sweat to git settled," remarked Osh with a +clip of his big shears, "I really'd ought to have plastered this front +entry all over! 'T wa'n't callin' for paper half's loud as 't was for +plaster. Old Parson Bradley hed been a farmer afore he turned minister, +and one Sunday mornin' his parish was thornin' him to pray for rain, so +he says: 'Thou knowest, O Lord! it's manure this land wants, 'n' not +water, but in Thy mercy send rain plenteously upon us.'" + +"Mr. Popham," said Gilbert, who had been patiently awaiting his +opportunity, "the pieces of paper are cut for those narrow places each +side of the front door. Can't I paste those on while you talk to us?" + +"'Course you can, handy as you be with tools! There ain't no trick to +it. Most anybody can be a paperer. As Parson Bradley said when he was +talkin' to a Sunday-school during a presidential campaign: 'One of you +boys perhaps can be a George Washington and another may rise to be a +Thomas Jefferson; any of you, the Lord knows, can be a James K. Polk!'" + +"I don't know much about Polk," said Gilbert. + +"P'raps nobody did very much, but the parson hated him like p'ison. See +here, Peter, I ain't _made_ o' paste! You've used up 'bout a quart +a'ready! What are you doin' out there anyway? I've heerd o' paintin' the +town,--I guess you're paperin' it, ain't you?" + +Peter was too busy and too eager for paste to reply, the facts of the +case being that while Mr. Popham held the family spellbound by his +conversation, he himself was papering the outside of the house with +scraps of assorted paper as high up as his short arms could reach. + +"There's another thing you can do, Gilbert," continued Mr. Popham. "I've +mixed a pail o' that green paint same as your mother wanted, an' I've +brought you a tip-top brush. The settin' room has a good nice floor; +matched boards, no hummocks nor hollers,--all as flat's one of my wife's +pancakes,--an' not a knot hole in it anywheres. You jest put your first +coat on, brushin' lengthways o' the boards, and let it dry good. Don't +let your folks go stepping on it, neither. The minute a floor's painted +women folks are crazy to git int' the room. They want their black +alpacky that's in the closet, an' the lookin' glass that's on the +mantelpiece, or the feather duster that's hangin' on the winder, an' +will you jest pass out the broom that's behind the door? The next +mornin' you'll find lots o' little spots where they've tiptoed in to see +if the paint's dry an' how it's goin' to look. Where I work, they most +allers say it's the cat,--well! that answer may deceive some folks, but +'t wouldn't me.--Don't slop your paint, Gilbert; work quick an' neat an' +even; then paintin' ain't no trick 't all. Any fool, the Lord knows, can +pick up that trade!--Now I guess it's about noon time, an' I'll have to +be diggin' for home. Maria sets down an' looks at the clock from half +past eleven on. She'll git a meal o' cold pork 'n' greens, cold string +beans, gingerbread, 'n' custard pie on t' the table; then she'll stan' +in the front door an' holler: 'Hurry up, Ossian! it's struck twelve more +'n two minutes ago, 'n' everything 's gittin' overdone!'" + +So saying he took off his overalls, seized his hat, and with a parting +salute was off down the road, singing his favorite song. I can give you +the words and the time, but alas! I cannot print Osh Popham's dauntless +spirit and serene content, nor his cheery voice as he travelled with +tolerable swiftness to meet his waiting Maria. + + Here comes a maid-en full of woe. + Hi-dum-di-dum did-dy-i-o! + Here comes a maid-en full of woe. + Hi der-ry O! + Here comes a maid-en full of woe, + As full of woe as she can go! + Hi dum did-dy i + O! Hi der-ry O! + + + +XVIII + +THE HOUSE OF LORDS + + +The Carey children had only found it by accident. All their errands took +them down the main street to the village; to the Popham's cottage at the +foot of a little lane turning towards the river, or on to the +post-office and Bill Harmon's store, or to Colonel Wheeler's house and +then to the railway station. One afternoon Nancy and Kathleen had walked +up the road in search of pastures new, and had spied down in a distant +hollow a gloomy grey house almost surrounded by cedars. A grove of +poplars to the left of it only made the prospect more depressing, and if +it had not been for a great sheet of water near by, floating with cow +lilies and pond lilies, the whole aspect of the place would have been +unspeakably dreary. + +Nancy asked Mr. Popham who lived in the grey house behind the cedars, +and when he told them a certain Mr. Henry Lord, his two children and +housekeeper, they fell into the habit of speaking of the place as the +House of Lords. + +"You won't never see nothin' of 'em," said Mr. Popham. "Henry Lord ain't +never darkened the village for years, I guess, and the young ones ain't +never been to school so far; they have a teacher out from Portland +Tuesdays and Fridays, and the rest o' the week they study up for him. +Henry's 'bout as much of a hermit's if he lived in a hut on a mounting, +an' he's bringing up the children so they'll be jest as odd's he is." + +"Is the mother dead?" Mrs. Carey asked. + +"Yes, dead these four years, an' a good job for her, too. It's an awful +queer world! Not that I could make a better one! I allers say, when +folks grumble, 'Now if you was given the materials, could you turn out a +better world than this is? And when it come to that, what if you hed to +furnish your _own_ materials, same as the Lord did! I guess you'd be put +to it!'--Well, as I say, it's an awful queer world; they clap all the +burglars into jail, and the murderers and the wife-beaters (I've allers +thought a gentle reproof would be enough punishment for a wife-beater, +'cause he probably has a lot o' provocation that nobody knows), and the +firebugs (can't think o' the right name--something like cendenaries), +an' the breakers o' the peace, an' what not; an' yet the law has nothin' +to say to a man like Hen Lord! He's been a college professor, but I went +to school with him, darn his picter, an' I'll call him Hen whenever I +git a chance, though he does declare he's a doctor." + +"Doctor of what?" asked Mrs. Carey. + +"Blamed if I know! I wouldn't trust him to doctor a sick cat." + +"People don't have to be doctors of medicine," interrupted Gilbert. +"Grandfather was Alexander Carey, LL.D.,--Doctor of Laws, that is." + +Mr. Popham laid down his brush. "I swan to man!" he ejaculated. "If you +don't work hard you can't keep up with the times! Doctor of Laws! Well, +all I can say is they _need_ doctorin', an' I'm glad they've got round +to 'em; only Hen Lord ain't the man to do 'em any good." + +"What has he done to make him so unpopular?" queried Mrs. Carey. + +"Done? He ain't done a thing he'd oughter sence he was born. He keeps +the thou shalt not commandments first rate, Hen Lord does! He neglected +his wife and froze her blood and frightened her to death, poor little +shadder! He give up his position and shut the family up in that tomb of +a house so 't he could study his books. My boy knows his boy, an' I tell +you the life he leads them children is enough to make your flesh creep. +When I git roun' to it I cal'late to set the house on fire some night. +Mebbe I'd be lucky enough to ketch Hen too, an' if so, nobody in the +village'd wear mournin'! So fur, I can't get Maria's consent to be a +cendenary. She says she can't spare me long enough to go to jail; she +needs me to work durin' the summer, an' in the winter time she'd hev +nobody to jaw, if I was in the lockup." This information was delivered +in the intervals of covering the guest chamber walls with a delightful +white moire paper which Osh always alluded to as the "white maria," +whether in memory of his wife's Christian name or because his French +accent was not up to the mark, no one could say. + +Mr. Popham exaggerated nothing, but on the contrary left much unsaid in +his narrative of the family at the House of Lords. Henry Lord, with the +degree of Ph.D. to his credit, had been Professor of Zoology at a New +England college, but had resigned his post in order to write a series of +scientific text books. Always irritable, cold, indifferent, he had grown +rapidly more so as years went on. Had his pale, timid wife been a rosy, +plucky tyrant, things might have gone otherwise, but the only memories +the two children possessed were of bitter words and reproaches on their +father's side, and of tears and sad looks on their mother's part. Then +the poor little shadow of a woman dropped wearily into her grave, and a +certain elderly Mrs. Bangs, with grey hair and firm chin, came to keep +house and do the work. + +A lonelier creature than Olive Lord at sixteen could hardly be imagined. +She was a tiny thing for her years, with a little white oval face and +peaked chin, pronounced eyebrows, beautifully arched, and a mass of +tangled, untidy dark hair. Her only interests in life were her younger +brother Cyril, delicate and timid, and in continual terror of his +father,--and a passion for drawing and sketching that was fairly +devouring in its intensity. When she was ten she "drew" the cat and the +dog, the hens and chickens, and colored the sketches with the paints her +mother provided. Whatever appealed to her sense of beauty was +straightway transferred to paper or canvas. Then for the three years +before her mother's death there had been surreptitious lessons from a +Portland teacher, paid for out of Mr. Lord's house allowance; for one of +his chief faults was an incredible parsimony, amounting almost to +miserliness. + +"Something terrible will happen to Olive if she isn't taught to use her +talent," Mrs. Lord pleaded to her husband. "She is wild to know how to +do things. She makes effort after effort, trembling with eagerness, and +when she fails to reproduce what she sees, she works herself into a +frenzy of grief and disappointment." + +"You'd better give her lessons in self-control," Mr. Lord answered. +"They are cheaper than instruction in drawing, and much more practical." + +So Olive lived and struggled and grew; and luckily her talent was such a +passion that no circumstances could crush or extinguish it. She worked, +discovering laws and making rules for herself, since she had no helpers. +When she could not make a rabbit or a bird look "real" on paper, she +searched in her father's books for pictures of its bones. "If I could +only know what it is like _inside_, Cyril," she said, "perhaps its +_outside_ wouldn't look so flat! O! Cyril, there must be some better way +of doing; I just draw the outline of an animal and then I put hairs or +feathers on it. They have no bodies. They couldn't run nor move; they're +just pasteboard." + +"Why don't you do flowers and houses, Olive?" inquired Cyril +solicitously. "And people paint fruit, and dead fish on platters, and +pitchers of lemonade with ice in,--why don't you try things like those?" + +"I suppose they're easier," Olive returned with a sigh, "but who could +bear to do them when there are living, breathing, moving things; things +that puzzle you by looking different every minute? No, I'll keep on +trying, and when you get a little older we'll run away together and live +and learn things by ourselves, in some place where father can never +find us!" + +"He wouldn't search, so don't worry," replied Cyril quietly, and the two +looked at each other and knew that it was so. + +There, in the cedar hollow, then, lived Olive Lord, an angry, resentful, +little creature weighed down by a fierce sense of injury. Her gloomy +young heart was visited by frequent storms and she looked as unlovable +as she was unloved. But Nancy Carey, never shy, and as eager to give +herself as people always are who are born and bred in joy and love, +Nancy hopped out of Mother Carey's warm nest one day, and fixing her +bright eyes and sunny, hopeful glance on the lonely, frowning little +neighbor, stretched out her hand in friendship. Olive's mournful black +eyes met Nancy's sparkling brown ones. Her hand, so marvellously full of +skill, had never held another's, and she was desperately self-conscious; +but magnetism flowed from Nancy as electric currents from a battery. She +drew Olive to her by some unknown force and held her fast, not realizing +at the moment that she was getting as much as she gave. + +The first interview, purely a casual one, took place on the edge of the +lily pond where Olive was sketching frogs, and where Nancy went for +cat-o'-nine-tails. It proved to be a long and intimate talk, and when +Mrs. Carey looked out of her bedroom window just before supper she saw, +at the pasture bars, the two girls with their arms round each other and +their cheeks close together. Nancy's curly chestnut crop shone in the +sun, and Olive's thick black plaits looked blacker by contrast. Suddenly +she flung her arms round Nancy's neck, and with a sob darted under the +bars and across the fields without a backward glance. + +A few moments later Nancy entered her mother's room, her arms filled +with treasures from the woods and fields. "Oh, Motherdy!" she cried, +laying down her flowers and taking off her hat. "I've found such a +friend; a real understanding friend; and it's the girl from the House of +Lords. She's wonderful! More wonderful than anybody we've ever seen +anywhere, and she draws better than the teacher in Charlestown! She's +older than I am, but so tiny and sad and shy that she seems like a +child. Oh, mother, there's always so much spare room in your heart,--for +you took in Julia and yet we never felt the difference,--won't you make +a place for Olive? There never was anybody needed you so much as she +does,--never." + +Have you ever lifted a stone and seen the pale, yellow, stunted shoots +of grass under it? And have you gone next day and next, and watched the +little blades shoot upward, spread themselves with delight, grow green +and wax strong; and finally, warm with the sun, cool with the dew, +vigorous with the flow of sap in their veins, seen them wave their green +tips in the breeze? That was what happened to Olive Lord when she and +Cyril were drawn into a different family circle, and ran in and out of +the Yellow House with the busy, eager group of Mother Carey's chickens. + + + +XIX + +OLD AND NEW + + +The Yellow House had not always belonged to the Hamiltons, but had been +built by a governor of the state when he retired from public office. He +lived only a few years, and it then passed into the hands of Lemuel +Hamilton's grandfather, who had done little or nothing in the way of +remodelling the buildings. + +Governor Weatherby had harbored no extraordinary ambition regarding +architectural excellence, for he was not a rich man; he had simply built +a large, comfortable Colonial house. He desired no gardens, no luxurious +stables, no fountains nor grottoes, no bathroom (for it was only the +year 1810), while the old oaken bucket left nothing to be desired as a +means of dispensing water to the household. He had one weakness, +however, and that was a wish to make the front of the house as +impressive as possible. The window over the front door was as beautiful +a window as any in the county, and the doorway itself was celebrated +throughout the state. It had a wonderful fan light and side lights, +green blind doors outside of the white painted one with its massive +brass knocker, and still more unique and impressive, it had for its +approach, semi-circular stone steps instead of the usual oblong ones. +The large blocks of granite had been cut so that each of the four steps +should be smaller than the one below it; and when, after months of +gossip and suspense, they were finally laid in place, their straight +edges towards the house and their expensive curved sides to the road, a +procession of curious persons in wagons, carryalls, buggies, and gigs +wound their way past the premises. The governor's "circ'lar steps" +brought many pilgrims down the main street of Beulah first and last, and +the original Hamiltons had been very proud of them. Pride (of such +simple things as stone steps) had died out of the Hamilton stock in the +course of years, and the house had been so long vacant that no one but +Lemuel, the Consul, remembered any of its charming features; but Ossian +Popham, when he pried up and straightened the ancient landmarks, had +much to say of the wonderful steps. + +"There's so much goin' on now-a-days," he complained, as he puffed and +pried and strained, and rested in between, "that young ones won't amount +to nothin', fust thing you know. My boy Digby says to me this mornin', +when I asked him if he was goin' to the County Fair 'No, Pop, I ain't +goin',' he says, 'it's the same old fair every year.' Land sakes! when I +was a boy, 'bout once a month, in warm weather, I used to ask father if +I could walk to the other end o' the village and look at the governor's +circ'lar steps; that used to be the liveliest entertainment parents +could think up for their young ones, an' it _was_ a heap livelier than +two sermons of a Sunday, each of 'em an hour and fifteen minutes long." + +Digby, a lad of eighteen and master of only one trade instead of a +dozen, like his father, had been deputed to paper Mother Carey's bedroom +while she moved for a few days into the newly fitted guest room, which +was almost too beautiful to sleep in, with its white satiny walls, its +yellow and green garlands hanging from the ceiling, its yellow floor, +and its old white chamber set repainted by the faithful and +clever Popham. + +The chintz parlor, once Governor Weatherby's study, was finished too, +and the whole family looked in at the doors a dozen times a day with +admiring exclamations. It had six doors, opening into two entries, one +small bedroom, one sitting room, one cellar, and one china closet; a +passion for entrances and exits having been the whim of that generation. +If the truth were known, Nancy had once lighted her candle and slipped +downstairs at midnight to sit on the parlor sofa and feast her eyes on +the room's loveliness. Gilbert had painted the white matting the color +of a ripe cherry. Mrs. Popham had washed and ironed and fluted the old +white ruffled muslin curtains from the Charlestown home, and they +adorned the four windows. It was the north room, on the left as you +entered the house, and would be closed during the cold winter months, so +it was fitted entirely for summer use and comfort. The old-fashioned +square piano looked in its element placed across one corner, with the +four tall silver candlesticks and snuffer tray on the shining mahogany. +All the shabbiest furniture, and the Carey furniture was mostly shabby, +was covered with a cheap, gay chintz, and crimson Jacqueminot roses +clambered all over the wall paper, so that the room was a cool bower +of beauty. + +On the other side of the hall were the double parlors of the governor's +time, made into a great living room. Here was Gilbert's green painted +floor, smooth and glossy, with braided rugs bought from neighbors in +East Beulah; here all the old-fashioned Gilbert furniture that the +Careys had kept during their many wanderings; here all the quaint chairs +that Mr. Bill Harmon could pick up at a small price; here were two noble +fireplaces, one with a crane and iron pot filled with flowers, the other +filled sometimes with sprays of green asparagus and sometimes with +fragrant hemlock boughs. The paper was one in which green rushes and +cat-o'-nine-tails grew on a fawn-colored ground, and anything that the +Careys did not possess for the family sitting room Ossian Popham went +straight home and made in his barn. He could make a barrel-chair or an +hour-glass table, a box lounge and the mattress to put on top of it, or +a low table for games and puzzles, or a window seat. He could polish the +piano and then sit down to it and play "Those Tassels on Her Boots" or +"Marching through Georgia" with great skill. He could paint bunches of +gold grapes and leaves on the old-fashioned high-backed rocker, and, as +soon as it was dry, could sit down in it and entertain the whole family +without charging them a penny. + +The housewarming could not be until the later autumn, Mrs. Carey had +decided, for although most of the living rooms could be finished, Cousin +Ann's expensive improvements were not to be set in motion until Bill +Harmon heard from Mr. Hamilton that his tenants were not to be disturbed +for at least three years. + +The house, which was daily growing into a home, was full of the busy hum +of labor from top to bottom and from morning till night, and there was +hardly a moment when Mother Carey and the girls were not transporting +articles of furniture through the rooms, and up and down the staircases, +to see how they would look somewhere else. This, indeed, had been the +diversion of their simple life for many years, and was just as +delightful, in their opinion, as buying new things. Any Carey, from +mother down to Peter, would spring from his chair at any moment and +assist any other Carey to move a sofa, a bureau, a piano, a kitchen +stove, if necessary, with the view of determining if it would add a new +zest to life in a different position. + +Not a word has been said thus far about the Yellow House barn, the barn +that the "fool Hamilton boys" (according to Bill Harmon's theories) had +converted from a place of practical usefulness and possible gain, into +something that would "make a cat laugh"; but it really needs a chapter +to itself. You remember that Dr. Holmes says of certain majestic and +dignified trees that they ought to have a Christian name, like other +folks? The barn, in the same way, deserves more distinction than a +paragraph, but at this moment it was being used as a storeroom and was +merely awaiting its splendid destiny, quite unconscious of the future. +The Hamilton boys were no doubt as extravagant and thriftless as they +were insane, but the Careys sympathized with their extravagance and +thriftlessness and insanity so heartily, in this particular, that they +could hardly conceal their real feelings from Bill Harmon. Nothing could +so have accorded with their secret desires as the "fool changes" made by +the "crazy Hamilton boys"; light-hearted, irresponsible, and frivolous +changes that could never have been compassed by the Careys' slender +income. They had no money to purchase horse or cow or pig, and no man in +the family to take care of them if purchased; so the removal of stalls +and all the necessary appurtenances for the care of cattle was no source +of grief or loss to them. A good floor had been laid over the old one +and stained to a dark color; the ceiling, with its heavy hand-hewn +beams, was almost as fine as some old oak counterpart in an English +hall. Not a new board met the eye;--old weathered lumber everywhere, +even to the quaint settle-shaped benches that lined the room. There was +a place like an old-fashioned "tie-up" for musicians to play for a +country dance, or for tableaux and charades; in fine, there would be, +with the addition of Carey ideas here and there, provision for frolics +and diversions of any sort. You no sooner opened the door and peeped in, +though few of the Beulah villagers had ever been invited to do so by the +gay young Hamiltons, than your tongue spontaneously exclaimed: "What a +place for good times!" + +"I shall 'come out' here," Nancy announced, as the three girls stood in +the centre of the floor, surrounded by bedsteads, tables, bureaus, and +stoves. "Julia, you can 'debut' where you like, but I shall 'come out' +here next summer!" + +"You'll be only seventeen; you can't come out!" objected Julia +conventionally. + +"Not in a drawing room, perhaps, but perfectly well in a barn. Even you +and Kitty, youthful as you will still be, can attend my coming out +party, in a barn!" + +"It doesn't seem proper to think of giving entertainments when everybody +knows our circumstances,--how poor we are!" Julia said rebukingly. + +"We are talking of next summer, my child! Who can say how rich we shall +be next summer? A party could be given in this barn with mother to play +the piano and Mr. Popham the fiddle. The refreshments would be +incredibly weak lemonade, and I think we might 'solicit' the cake, as +they do for church sociables!" + +Julia's pride was wounded beyond concealment at this humorously intended +suggestion of Nancy's. + +"Of course if Aunt Margaret approves, I have nothing to say," she +remarked, "but I myself would never come to any private party where +refreshments were 'solicited.' The very idea is horrible." + +"I'm 'coming out' in the barn next summer, Muddy!" Nancy called to her +mother, who just then entered the door. "If we are poorer than ever, we +can take up a collection to defray the expenses; Julia and Kitty would +look so attractive going about with tambourines! I want to do what I can +quickly, because I see plainly I shall have to marry young in order to +help the family. The heroine always does that in books; she makes a +worldly marriage with a rich nobleman, in order that her sister Kitty +and her cousin Julia may have a good education." + +"I don't know where you get your ideas, Nancy," said her mother, smiling +at her nonsense. "You certainly never read half a dozen novels in +your life!" + +"No, but Joanna used to read them by the hundred and tell me the +stories; and I've heard father read aloud to you; and the older girls +and the younger teachers used to discuss them at school;--oh! I know a +lot about life,--as it is in books,--and I'm just waiting to see if any +of it really happens!" + +"Digby Popham is the only rich nobleman in sight for you, Nancy!" Kitty +said teasingly. + +"Or freckled Cyril Lord," interpolated Julia. + +"He looks like an unbaked pie!" This from Kitty. + +Nancy flushed. "He's shy and unhappy and pale, and no wonder; but he's +as nice and interesting as he can be." + +"I can't see it," Julia said, "but he never looks at anybody, or talks +to anybody but you, so it's well you like him; though you like all boys, +for that matter!" + +"The boys return the compliment!" asserted Kitty mischievously, "while +poor you and I sit in corners!" + +"Come, come, dears," and Mrs. Carey joined in the conversation as she +picked up a pillow before returning to the house. "It's a little early +for you to be talking about rich noblemen, isn't it?" + +Nancy followed her out of the door, saying as she thoughtfully chewed a +straw, "Muddy, I do believe that when you're getting on to sixteen the +rich nobleman or the fairy prince or the wonderful youngest son does +cross your mind now and then!" + + + +XX + +THE PAINTED CHAMBER + + +Matters were in this state of forwardness when Nancy and Kathleen looked +out of the window one morning and saw Lallie Joy Popham coming down the +street. She "lugged" butter and milk regularly to the Careys (lugging is +her own word for the act), and helped them in many ways, for she was +fairly good at any kind of housework not demanding brains. Nobody could +say why some of Ossian Popham's gifts of mind and conversation had not +descended to his children, but though the son was not really stupid at +practical work, Lallie Joy was in a perpetual state of coma. + +Nancy, as has been intimated before, had a kind of tendency to reform +things that appeared to her lacking in any way, and she had early seized +upon the stolid Lallie Joy as a worthy object. + +"There she comes!" said Nancy. "She carries two quarts of milk in one +hand and two pounds of butter in the other, exactly as if she was +bending under the weight of a load of hay. I'll run down into the +kitchen and capture her for a half hour at five cents. She can peel the +potatoes first, and while they're boiling she can slice apples +for sauce." + +"Have her chop the hash, do!" coaxed Julia for that was her special +work. "The knife is dull beyond words." + +"Why don't you get Mr. Popham to sharpen it? It's a poor workman that +complains of his tools; Columbus discovered America in an open boat," +quoted Nancy, with an irritating air of wisdom. + +"That may be so," Julia retorted, "but Columbus would never have +discovered America with that chopping-knife, I'm sure of that.--Is +Lallie Joy about our age?" + +"I don't know. She must have been at least forty when she was born, and +that would make her fifty-five now. What _do_ you suppose would wake her +up? If I could only get her to stand straight, or hold her head up, or +let her hair down, or close her mouth! I believe I'll stay in the +kitchen and appeal to her better feelings a little this morning; I can +seed the raisins for the bread pudding." + +Nancy sat in the Shaker rocker by the sink window with the yellow bowl +in her lap. Her cheeks were pink, her eyes were bright, her lips were +red, her hair was goldy-brown, her fingers flew, and a high-necked +gingham apron was as becoming to her as it is to all nice girls. She was +thoroughly awake, was Nancy, and there could not have been a greater +contrast than that between her and the comatose Lallie Joy, who sat on a +wooden chair with her feet on the side rounds. She had taken off her +Turkey red sunbonnet and hung it on the chair-back, where its color +violently assaulted her flaming locks. She sat wrong; she held the +potato pan wrong, and the potatoes and the knife wrong. There seemed to +be no sort of connection between her mind and her body. As she peeled +potatoes and Nancy seeded raisins, the conversation was something +like this. + +"How did you chance to bring the butter to-day instead of to-morrow, +Lallie Joy?" + +"Had to dress me up to go to the store and get a new hat." + +"What colored trimming did you get?" + +"Same as old." + +"Don't they keep anything but magenta?" + +"Yes, blue." + +"Why didn't you try blue for a change?" + +"Dunno; didn't want any change, I guess." + +"Do you like magenta against your hair?" + +"Never thought o' my hair; jest thought o' my hat." + +"Well, you see, Lallie Joy, you can't change your hair, but you needn't +wear magenta hats nor red sunbonnets. Your hair is handsome enough, if +you'd only brush it right." + +"I guess I know all 'bout my hair and how red 't is. The boys ask me if +Pop painted it." + +"Why do you strain it back so tight?" + +"Keep it out o' my eyes." + +"Nonsense; you needn't drag it out by the roots. Why do you tie the +braids with strings?" + +"'Cause they hold, an' I hain't got no ribbons." + +"Why don't you buy some with the money you earn here?" + +"Savin' up for the Fourth." + +"Well, I have yards of old Christmas ribbons that I'll give you if +you'll use them." + +"All right." + +"What do you scrub your face with, that makes those shiny knobs stick +right out on your forehead and cheek bones?" + +"Sink soap." + +"Well, you shouldn't; haven't you any other?" + +"It's upstairs." + +"Aren't your legs in good working order?" + +Uncomprehending silence on Lallie Joy's part and then Nancy returned to +the onslaught. + +"Don't you like to look at pretty things?" + +"Dunno but I do, an' dunno as I do." + +"Don't you love the rooms your father has finished here?" + +"Kind of." + +"Not any more than that?" + +"Pop thinks some of 'em's queer, an' so does Bill Harmon." + +Long silence, Nancy being utterly daunted. + +"How did you come by your name, Lallie Joy?" + +"Lallie's out of a book named Lallie Rook, an' I was born on the Joy +steamboat line going to Boston." + +"Oh, I thought Joy was _Joy_!" + +"Joy Line's the only joy I ever heard of!" + +There is no knowing how long this depressing conversation would have +continued if the two girls had not heard loud calls from Gilbert +upstairs. Lallie Joy evinced no surprise, and went on peeling potatoes; +she might have been a sister of the famous Casabianca, and she certainly +could have been trusted not to flee from any burning deck, whatever the +provocation. + +"Come and see what we've found, Digby and I!" Gilbert cried. "Come, +girls; come, mother! We were stripping off the paper because Mr. Popham +said there'd been so many layers on the walls it would be a good time to +get to the bottom of it and have it all fresh and clean. So just now, as +I was working over the mantel piece and Digby on the long wall, look in +and see what we uncovered!" + +Mrs. Carey had come from the nursery, Kitty and Julia from the garden, +and Osh Popham from the shed, and they all gazed with joy and surprise +at the quaint landscapes that had been painted in water colors before +the day of wall paper had come. + +Mr. Popham quickly took one of his tools and began on another side of +the room. They worked slowly and carefully, and in an hour or two the +pictures stood revealed, a little faded in color but beautifully drawn, +with almost nothing of any moment missing from the scenes. + +"Je-roosh-y! ain't they handsome!" exclaimed Osh, standing in the middle +of the room with the family surrounding him in various attitudes of +ecstasy. "But they're too faded out to leave's they be, ain't they, Mis' +Carey? You'll have to cover 'em up with new paper, won't you, or shall +you let me put a coat of varnish on 'em?" + +Mrs. Carey shuddered internally. "No, Mr. Popham, we mustn't have any +'shine' on the landscapes. Yes, they are dreadfully dim and faded, but I +simply cannot have them covered up!" + +"It would be wicked to hide them!" said Nancy. "Oh, Muddy, _is_ it our +duty to write to Mr. Hamilton and tell him about them? He would +certainly take the house away from us if he could see how beautiful we +have made it, and now here is another lovely thing to tempt him. Could +anybody give up this painted chamber if it belonged to him?" + +"Well, you see," said Mr. Popham assuringly, "if you want to use this +painted chamber much, you've got to live in Beulah; an' Lem Hamilton +ain't goin' to stop consullin' at the age o' fifty, to come here an' +rust out with the rest of us;--no, siree! Nor Mis' Lem Hamilton wouldn't +stop over night in this village if you give her the town drinkin' trough +for a premium!" + +"Is she fashionable?" asked Julia. + +"You bet she is! She's tall an' slim an' so chuck full of airs she'd +blow away if you give her a puff o' the bellers! The only time she come +here she stayed just twenty-four hours, but she nearly died, we was all +so 'vulgar.' She wore a white dress ruffled up to the waist, and a white +Alpine hat, an' she looked exactly like the picture of Pike's Peak in my +stereopticon. Mis' Popham overheard her say Beulah was full o' savages +if not cannibals. 'Well,' I says to Maria, 'no matter where she goes, +nobody'll ever want to eat _her_ alive!'--Look at that meetin' house +over the mantel shelf, an' that grassy Common an' elm trees! 'T wa'n't +no house painter done these walls!" + +"And look at this space between the two front windows," cried Kathleen. +"See the hens and chickens and the Plymouth Rock rooster!" + +"And the white calf lying down under the maple; he's about the prettiest +thing in the room," said Gilbert. + +"We must just let it be and think it out," said Mother Carey. "Don't put +any new paper on, now; there's plenty to do downstairs." + +"I don't know 's I should particularly like to lay abed in this room," +said Osh, his eyes roving about the chamber judicially. "I shouldn't hev +no comfort ondressin' here, nohow; not with this mess o' live stock +lookin' at me every minute, whatever I happened to be takin' off. I +s'pose that rooster'd be right on to his job at sun-up! Well, he +couldn't git ahead of Mis' Popham, that's one thing; so 't I shouldn't +be any worse off 'n I be now! I don't get any too much good sleep as 't +is! Mis' Popham makes me go to bed long afore I'm ready, so 't she can +git the house shut up in good season; then 'bout 's soon's I've settled +down an' bed one short nap she says, 'It's time you was up, Ossian!"' + +"Mother! I have an idea!" cried Nancy suddenly, as Mr. Popham took his +leave and the family went out into the hall. "Do you know who could make +the walls look as they used to? My dear Olive Lord!" + +"She's only sixteen!" objected Mrs. Carey. + +"But she's a natural born genius! You wait and see the things she does!" + +"Perhaps I could take her into town and get some suggestions or some +instruction, with the proper materials," said Mrs. Carey, "and I suppose +she could experiment on some small space behind the door, first?" + +"Nothing that Olive does would ever be put behind anybody's door," Nancy +answered decisively. "I'm not old enough to know anything about +painting, of course (except that good landscapes ought not to be +reversible like our Van Twiller), but there's something about Olive's +pictures that makes you want to touch them and love them!" + +So began the happiest, most wonderful, most fruitful autumn of Olive +Lord's life, when she spent morning after morning in the painted +chamber, refreshing its faded tints. Whoever had done the original work +had done it lovingly and well, and Olive learned many a lesson while she +was following the lines of the quaint houses, like those on old china, +renewing the green of the feathery elms, or retracing and coloring the +curious sampler trees that stood straight and stiff like sentinels in +the corners of the room. + + + +XXI + +A FAMILY RHOMBOID + + +The Honorable Lemuel Hamilton sat in the private office of the American +Consulate in Breslau, Germany, one warm day in July. The post had been +brought in half an hour before, and he had two open letters on the desk +in front of him. It was only ten o'clock of a bright morning, but he +looked tired and worn. He was about fifty, with slightly grey hair and +smoothly shaven face. He must have been merry at one time in his life, +for there were many nice little laughing-wrinkles around his eyes, but +somehow these seemed to have faded out, as if they had not been used for +years, and the corners of his mouth turned down to increase the look of +weariness and discontent. + +A smile had crept over his face at his old friend Bill Harmon's spelling +and penmanship, for a missive of that kind seldom came to the American +Consulate. When the second letter postmarked Beulah first struck his +eye, he could not imagine why he should have another correspondent in +the quaintly named little village. He had read Nancy's letter twice now, +and still he sat smoking and dreaming with an occasional glance at the +girlish handwriting, or a twinkle of the eye at the re-reading of some +particular passage. His own girls were not ready writers, and their +mother generally sent their messages for them. Nancy and Kitty did not +yet write nearly as well as they talked, but they contrived to express +something of their own individuality in their communications, which were +free and fluent, though childlike and crude. + +"What a nice girl this Nancy Carey must be!" thought the American +Consul. "This is such a jolly, confidential, gossipy, winsome little +letter! Her first 'business letter' she calls it! Alas! when she learns +how, a few years later, there will be no charming little confidences; no +details of family income and expenditures; no tell-tale glimpses of +'mother' and 'Julia.' I believe I should know the whole family even +without this photograph!--The lady sitting in the chair, to whom the +photographer's snapshot has not done justice, is worthy of Nancy's +praise,--and Bill Harmon's. What a pretty, piquant, curly head Nancy +has! What a gay, vivacious, alert, spirited expression. The boy is +handsome and gentlemanly, but he'll have to wake up, or Nancy will be +the man of the family. The girl sitting down is less attractive. She's +Uncle Allan's daughter, and" (consulting the letter) "Uncle Allan has +nervous prostration and all of mother's money." Here Mr. Hamilton gave +vent to audible laughter for the third time in a quarter of an hour. +"Nancy doesn't realize with what perfection her somewhat imperfect +English states the case," he thought. "I know Uncle Allan like a book, +from his resemblance to certain other unfortunate gentlemen who have +nervous prostration in combination with other people's money. Let's see! +I know Nancy; friendly little Nancy, about fifteen or sixteen, I should +judge; I know Uncle Allan's 'Julia,' who hems in photographs, but not +otherwise; I know Gilbert, who is depressed at having to make his own +way; the small boy, who 'is the nicest of us all'; Kitty, who beat all +the others in getting to mother's shoulder; and the mother herself, who +is beautiful, and doesn't say 'Bosh' to her children's ideas, and +refuses to touch the insurance money, and wants Gilbert to show what +'father's son' can do without anybody's help, and who revels in the +color and joy of a yellow wall paper at twenty cents a roll! Bless their +simple hearts! They mustn't pay any rent while they are bringing water +into the kitchen and making expensive improvements! And what Hamilton +could be persuaded to live in the yellow house? To think of any one's +wanting to settle down in that little deserted spot, Beulah, where the +only sound that ever strikes one's ear is Osh Popham's laugh or the +tinkle of a cow bell! Oh! if my own girls would write me letters like +this, letting me see how their minds are growing, how they are taking +hold of life, above all what is in their hearts! Well, little Miss Nancy +Carey! honest, outspoken, confidential, clever little Nancy, who calls +me her 'dearest Mr. Hamilton' and thanks me for letting her live in my +yellow house, you shall never be disturbed, and if you and Gilbert ever +earn enough money to buy it, it shall go to you cheap! There's not one +of my brood that would live in it--except Tom, perhaps--for after +spending three hundred dollars, they even got tired of dancing in the +barn on Saturday nights; so if it can fall into the hands of some one +who will bring a blessing on it, good old Granny Hamilton will rest +peacefully in her grave!" + +We have discoursed in another place of family circles, but it cannot be +truthfully said that at any moment the Lemuel Hamiltons had ever assumed +that symmetrical and harmonious shape. Still, during the first eight or +ten years of their married life, when the children were young, they had +at least appeared to the casual eye as, say, a rectangular +parallelogram. A little later the cares and jolts of life wrenched the +right angles a trifle "out of plumb," and a rhomboid was the result. +Mrs. Hamilton had money of her own, but wished Lemuel to amass enough +fame and position to match it. She liked a diplomatic life if her +husband could be an ambassador, but she thought him strangely slow in +achieving this dignity. No pleasure or pride in her husband's ability to +serve his country, even in a modest position, ever crossed her mind. She +had no desire to spend her valuable time in various poky Continental +towns, and she had many excuses for not doing so; the proper education +of her children being the chief among them. Luckily for her, good and +desirable schools were generally at an easy distance from the jewellers' +shops and the dressmakers' and milliners' establishments her soul loved, +so while Mr. Hamilton did his daily task in Antwerp, Mrs. Hamilton +resided mostly in Brussels or Paris; when he was in Zittau, in Saxony, +she was in Dresden. If he were appointed to some business city she +remained with him several months each year, and spent the others in a +more artistic and fashionable locality. The situation was growing +difficult because the children were gradually getting beyond school age, +although there still remained to her the sacred duty of settling them +properly in life. Agnes, her mother's favorite, was still at school, and +was devoted to foreign languages, foreign manners, and foreign modes of +life. Edith had grown restless and developed an uncomfortable fondness +for her native land, so that she spent most of her time with her +mother's relatives in New York, or in visiting school friends here or +there. The boys had gone far away; Jack, the elder, to Texas, where he +had lost what money his father and mother had put into his first +business venture; Thomas, the younger, to China, where he was woefully +lonely, but doing well in business. A really good diplomatic appointment +in a large and important city would have enabled Mr. Hamilton to collect +some of his scattered sons and daughters and provide them with the +background for which his wife had yearned without ceasing (and very +audibly) for years. But Mr. Hamilton did not get the coveted +appointment, and Mrs. Hamilton did not specially care for Mr. Hamilton +when he failed in securing the things she wanted. This was the time when +the laughing-wrinkles began to fade away from Mr. Hamilton's eyes, just +for lack of daily use; and it was then that the corners of his mouth +began to turn down; and his shoulders to stoop, and his eye to grow less +keen and brave, and his step less vigorous. It may be a commonplace +remark, but it is not at these precise moments in life that tired, +depressed men in modest positions are wafted by Uncle Sam to great and +desirable heights; but to Mrs. Hamilton it appeared that her husband was +simply indolent, unambitious, and unlucky; not at all that he needed to +be believed in, or loved, or comforted, or helped, or braced! It might +have startled her, and hurt her wifely pride, if she had seen her lonely +husband drinking in little Nancy Carey's letter as if it were dew to a +thirsty spirit; to see him set the photograph of the Carey group on his +desk and look at it from time to time affectionately, as if he had found +some new friends. It was the contentment, the hope, the unity, the +pluck, the mutual love, the confidence, the ambition, of the group that +touched his imagination and made his heart run out to them. "Airs from +the Eden of youth awoke and stirred in his soul" as he took his pen to +answer Nancy's first business communication. + +Having completed his letter he lighted another cigar, and leaning back +in his revolving chair clasped his hands behind his head and fell into a +reverie. The various diplomatic posts that might be opened to him +crossed his mind in procession. If A or B or C were possible, his wife +would be content, and their combined incomes might be sufficient to +bring the children together, if not quite under one roof, then to points +not so far separated from each other but that a speaking acquaintance +might be developed. Tom was the farthest away, and he was the dearest; +the only Hamilton of the lot; the only one who loved his father. + +Mr. Hamilton leaned forward abstractedly, and fumbling through one +drawer of his desk after another succeeded in bringing out a photograph +of Tom, taken at seventeen or eighteen. Then by a little extra search he +found his wife in her presentation dress at a foreign court. There was +no comfort or companionship in that, it was too furbelowed to be +anybody's wife,--but underneath it in the same frame was one taken just +after their marriage. That was too full of memories to hold much joy, +but it stirred his heart, and made it beat a little; enough at any rate +to show it was not dead. In the letter case in his vest pocket was an +almost forgotten picture of the girls when they were children. This with +the others he stood in a row in front of him, reminding himself that he +did not know the subjects much more intimately than the photographers +who had made their likenesses. He glanced from one family to the other +and back again, several times. The Careys were handsomer, there was no +doubt of that; but there was a deeper difference that eluded him. The +Hamiltons were far more stylishly dressed, but they all looked a little +conscious and a little discontented. That was it; the Careys were +happier! There were six of them, living in the forgotten Hamilton house +in a half-deserted village, on five or six hundred dollars a year, and +doing their own housework, and they were happier than his own brood, +spending forty or fifty times that sum. Well, they were grown up, his +sons and daughters, and the only change in their lives now would come +from wise or unwise marriages. No poverty-stricken sons-in-law would +ever come into the family, with Mrs. Hamilton standing at the bars, he +was sure of that! As for the boys, they might choose their mates in +Texas or China; they might even have chosen them now, for aught he knew, +though Jack was only twenty-six and Tom twenty-two. He must write to +them oftener, all of them, no matter how busy and anxious he might be; +especially to Tom, who was so far away. + +He drew a sheet of paper towards him, and having filled it, another, and +yet another. Having folded and slipped it into an envelope and addressed +it to Thomas Hamilton, Esq., Hong Kong, China, he was about to seal it +when he stopped a moment. "I'll enclose the little Carey girl's letter," +he thought. "Tom's the only one who cares a penny for the old house, and +I've told him I have rented it. He's a generous boy, and he won't grudge +a few dollars lost to a good cause. Besides, these Careys will increase +the value of the property every year they live in it, and without them +the buildings would gradually have fallen into ruins." He added a +postscript to his letter, saying: "I've sent you little Miss Nancy's +letter, the photograph of her tying up the rambler rose, and the family +group; so that you can see exactly what influenced me to write her (and +Bill Harmon) that they should be undisturbed in their tenancy, and that +their repairs and improvements should be taken in lieu of rent." This +done and the letters stamped, he put the photographs of his wife and +children here and there on his desk and left the office. + +Oh! it is quite certain that Mother Carey's own chickens go out over the +seas and show good birds the way home; and it is quite true, as she +said, "One real home always makes another, I am sure of that!" It can +even send a vision of a home across fields and forests and lakes and +oceans from Beulah village to Breslau, Germany, and on to Hong +Kong, China. + + + +XXII + +CRADLE GIFTS + + +Mrs. Henry Lord sent out a good many invitations to the fairies for +Cyril's birthday party, but Mr. Lord was at his critical point in the +first volume of his text book, and forgot that he had a son. Where both +parents are not interested in these little affairs, something is sure to +be forgotten. Cyril's mother was weak and ill at the time, and the +upshot of it was that the anger of The Fairy Who Wasn't Invited was +visited on the baby Cyril in his cradle. In the revengeful spirit of +that fairy who is omitted from these functions, she sent a threat +instead of a blessing, and decreed that Cyril should walk in fear all +the days of his life. Of course, being a fairy, she knew very well that, +if Cyril, or anybody very much interested in Cyril, went to declare that +there was no power whatever behind her curse, she would not be able to +gratify her spite; but she knew also, being a fairy, that if Cyril got +into the habit of believing himself a coward, he would end by being one, +so she stood a good chance of winning, after all. + +Cyril, when he came into the world, had come with only half a welcome. +No mother and father ever met over his cradle and looked at him +together, wondering if it were "well with the child." When he was old +enough to have his red-gold hair curled, and a sash tied around his baby +waist, he was sometimes taken downstairs, but he always fled to his +mother's or his nurse's knee when his father approached. How many times +he and his little sister Olive had hidden under the stairs when father +had called mother down to the study to scold her about the grocer's +bill! And there was a nightmare of a memory concerning a certain +birthday of father's, when mother had determined to be gay. It was just +before supper. Cyril, clad in his first brief trousers, was to knock at +the study door with a little purple nosegay in his hand, to show his +father that the lilac had bloomed. Olive, in crimson cashmere, was to +stand near, and when the door opened, present him with her own picture +of the cat and her new kittens; while mother, looking so pretty, with +her own gift all ready in her hand, was palpitating on the staircase to +see how the plans would work. Nothing could have been worse, however, in +the way of a small domestic tragedy, than the event itself when it +finally came off. + +Cyril knocked. "What do you want?" came from within, in tones that +breathed vexation at being interrupted. + +"Knock again!" whispered Mrs. Lord. "Father doesn't remember that it's +his birthday, and he doesn't know that it's you knocking." + +Cyril knocked again timidly, but at the first sound of his father's +irritable voice as he rose hurriedly from his desk, the boy turned and +fled through the kitchen to the shed. + +Olive held the fort, picture in hand. + +"It's your birthday, father," she said. "There's a cake for supper, and +here's my present." There was no love in the child's voice. Her heart, +filled with passionate sympathy for Cyril, had lost all zest for its +task, and she handed her gift to her father with tightly closed lips and +heaving breast. + +"All right; I'm much obliged, but I wish you would not knock at this +door when I am writing,--I've told you that before. Tell your mother I +can't come to supper to-night, but to send me a tray, please!" + +As he closed the door Olive saw him lay the picture on a table, never +looking at it as he crossed the room to one of the great book-cases that +lined the walls. + +Mrs. Lord had by this time disappeared forlornly from the upper hall. +Olive, aged ten, walked up the stairs in a state of mind ferocious in +its anger. Entering her mother's room she tore the crimson ribbon from +her hair and began to unbutton her dress. "I hate him! I _hate_ him!" +she cried, stamping her foot. "I will never knock at his door again! I'd +like to take Cyril and run away! I'll get the birthday cake and fling it +into the pond; nothing shall stop me!". Then, seeing her mother's white +face, she wailed, as she flung herself on the bed: "Oh, mother, +mother,--why did you ever let him come to live with us? Did we _have_ to +have him for a father? Couldn't you _help_ it, mother?" + +Mrs. Lord grew paler, put her hand to her heart, wavered, caught +herself, wavered again, and fell into the great chair by the window. Her +eyes closed, and Olive, frightened by the apparent effect of her words, +ran down the back stairs and summoned the cook. When she returned, +panting and breathless, her mother was sitting quite quietly by the +window, looking out at the cedars. + +"It was only a sudden pain, dear! I am all well again. Nothing is really +the matter, Bridget. Mr. Lord will not be down to supper; spread a tray +for him, please." + +"I'd like to spread a tray for him at the bottom of the Red Sea; that's +where he belongs!" muttered Bridget, as she descended to the kitchen to +comfort Cyril. + +"Was it my fault, mother?" asked Olive, bending over her anxiously. + +Her mother drew the child's head down and leaned her own against it +feebly. "No, dear," she sighed. "It's nobody's fault, unless it's mine!" + +"Is the pain gone?" + +"Quite gone, dear." + +Nevertheless the pain was to prove the final wrench to a heart that had +been on the verge of breaking for many a year, and it was not long +before Olive and Cyril were motherless. + +Mr. Lord did not have the slightest objection to the growing intimacy +between his children and the new family in the Yellow House, so long as +he was not disturbed by it, and so long as it cost him nothing. They had +strict orders not to play with certain of their village acquaintances, +Mr. Lord believing himself to be an aristocrat; the fact being that he +was almost destitute of human sympathy, and to make a neighbor of him +you would have had to begin with his grandfather and work for three +generations. He had seen Nancy and Gilbert at the gates of his place, +and he had passed Mrs. Carey in one of his infrequent walks to the +post-office. She was not a person to pass without mental comment, and +Mr. Lord instantly felt himself in the presence of an equal, an unusual +fact in his experience; he would not have known a superior if he had met +one ever so often! + +"A very fine, unusual woman," he thought. "She accounts for that +handsome, manly boy. I wish he could knock some spirit into Cyril!" + +The process of "knocking spirit" into a boy would seem to be +inconsistent with educational logic, but by very different methods, +Gilbert had certainly given Cyril a trifling belief in himself, and +Mother Carey was gradually winning him to some sort of self-expression +by the warmth of her frequent welcomes and the delightful faculty she +possessed of making him feel at ease. + +"Come, come!" said the petrels to the molly-mocks in "Water Babies." +"This young gentleman is going to Shiny Wall. He is a plucky one to have +gone so far. Give the little chap a cast over the ice-pack for Mother +Carey's sake." + +Gilbert was delighted, in a new place, to find a boy friend of his own +age, and Cyril's speedy attachment gratified his pride. Gilbert was +doing well these summer months. The unceasing activity, the authority +given him by his mother and sisters, his growing proficiency in all +kinds of skilled labor, as he "puttered" about with Osh Popham or Bill +Harmon in house and barn and garden, all this pleased his enterprising +nature. Only one anxiety troubled his mother; his unresigned and +mutinous attitude about exchanging popular and fashionable Eastover for +Beulah Academy, which seat of learning he regarded with unutterable +scorn. He knew that there was apparently no money to pay Eastover fees, +but he was still child enough to feel that it could be found, somewhere, +if properly searched for. He even considered the education of Captain +Carey's eldest son an emergency vital enough to make it proper to dip +into the precious five thousand dollars which was yielding them a part +of their slender annual income. Once, when Gilbert was a little boy, he +had put his shoulder out of joint, and to save time his mother took him +at once to the doctor's. He was suffering, but still strong enough to +walk. They had to climb a hilly street, the child moaning with pain, his +mother soothing and encouraging him as they went on. Suddenly he +whimpered: "Oh! if this had only happened to Ellen or Joanna or Addy or +Nancy, I could have borne it _so_ much better!" + +There was a good deal of that small boy left in Gilbert still, and he +endured best the economies that fell on the feminine members of the +family. It was the very end of August, and although school opened the +first Monday in September, Mrs. Carey was not certain whether Gilbert +would walk into the old-fashioned, white painted academy with the +despised Beulah "hayseeds," or whether he would make a scene, and +authority would have to be used. + +"I declare, Gilly!" exclaimed Mother Carey one night, after an argument +on the subject; "one would imagine the only course in life open to a boy +was to prepare at Eastover and go to college afterwards! Yet you may +take a list of the most famous men in America, and I dare say you will +find half of them came from schools like Beulah Academy or infinitely +poorer ones. I don't mean the millionaires alone. I mean the merchants +and engineers and surgeons and poets and authors and statesmen. Go ahead +and try to stamp your school in some way, Gilly!--don't sit down feebly +and wait for it to stamp you!" + +This was all very well as an exhibition of spirit on Mother Carey's +part, but it had been a very hard week. Gilbert was sulky; Peter had had +a touch of tonsillitis; Nancy was faltering at the dishwashing and +wishing she were a boy; Julia was a perfect barnacle; Kathleen had an +aching tooth, and there being no dentist in the village, was applying +Popham remedies,--clove-chewing, roasted raisins, and disfiguring bread +poultices; Bill Harmon had received no reply from Mr. Hamilton, and when +Mother Carey went to her room that evening she felt conscious of a +lassitude, and a sense of anxiety, deeper than for months. As Gilbert +went by to his own room, he glanced in at her door, finding it slightly +ajar. She sat before her dressing table, her long hair flowing over her +shoulders, her head bent over her two hands. His father's picture was in +its accustomed place, and he heard her say as she looked at it: "Oh, my +dear, my dear! I am so careworn, so troubled, so discouraged! Gilbert +needs you, and so do I, more than tongue can tell!" The voice was so low +that it was almost a whisper, but it reached Gilbert's ears, and there +was a sob strangled in it that touched his heart. + +The boy tiptoed softly into his room and sat down on his bed in the +moonlight. + +"Dear old Mater!" he thought. "It's no go! I've got to give up Eastover +and college and all and settle down into a country bumpkin! No fellow +could see his mother look like that, and speak like that, and go his own +gait; he's just got to go hers!" + +Meantime Mrs. Carey had put out the lamp and lay quietly thinking. The +last words that floated through her mind as she sank to sleep were those +of a half-forgotten verse, learned, she could not say how many +years before:-- + + You can glad your child or grieve it! + You can trust it or deceive it; + When all's done + Beneath God's sun + You can only love and leave it. + + + +XXIII + +NEARING SHINY WALL + + +Another person presumably on the way to Shiny Wall and Peacepool, but +putting small energy into the journey, was that mass of positively +glaring virtues, Julia Carey. More than one fairy must have been +forgotten when Julia's christening party came off. No heart-to-heart +talk in the twilight had thus far produced any obvious effect. She had +never, even when very young, experienced a desire to sit at the feet of +superior wisdom, always greatly preferring a chair of her own. She +seldom did wrong, in her own opinion, because the moment she entertained +an idea it at once became right, her vanity serving as a pair of +blinders to keep her from seeing the truth. The doctors did not permit +any one to write to poor Allan Carey, so that Julia's heart could not be +softened by continual communication with her invalid father, who, with +Gladys Ferguson, constituted the only tribunal she was willing to +recognize. Her consciousness of superiority to the conditions that +surrounded her, her love of luxury, the silken selfishness with which +she squirmed out of unpleasant duties, these made her an unlikable and +undesirable housemate, and that these faults could exist with what Nancy +called her "everlasting stained-glass attitude" made it difficult for +Mother Carey to maintain a harmonious family circle. It was an outburst +of Nancy's impetuous temper that Mrs. Carey had always secretly dreaded, +but after all it was poor Kathleen who precipitated an unforgettable +scene which left an influence behind it for many months. + +The morning after Mother Carey's interview with Gilbert she looked up as +her door was pushed open, and beheld Julia, white and rigid with temper, +standing on the threshold. + +"What is the matter, child?" exclaimed her aunt, laying down her work in +alarm. + +Close behind Julia came Kathleen, her face swollen with tears, her +expression full of unutterable woe. + +Julia's lips opened almost automatically as she said slowly and with +bitter emphasis, "Aunt Margaret, is it true, as Kathleen says, that my +father has all your money and some of Uncle Peter's?" + +Something snapped in Mother Carey! One glance at Kathleen showed only +too well that she had committed the almost unpardonable sin of telling +Julia what had been carefully and tenderly kept from her. Before she +could answer Kathleen had swept past Julia and flung herself on the +floor near her mother. + +"Oh, mother, I can't say anything that will ever make you understand. +Julia knows, she knows in her heart, what she said that provoked me! She +does nothing but grumble about the work, and how few dresses we have, +and what a drudge she is, and what common neighbors we have, and how +Miss Tewksbury would pity her if she knew all, and how Uncle Allan would +suffer if he could see his daughter living such a life! And this morning +my head ached and my tooth ached and I was cross, and all at once +something leaped out of my mouth!" + +"Tell her what you said," urged Julia inexorably. + +Sobs choked Kathleen's voice. "I said--I said--oh! how can I tell it! I +said, if her father hadn't lost so much of my father's and my mother's +money we shouldn't have been so poor, any of us." + +"Kathleen, how could you!" cried her mother. + +If Julia wished to precipitate a tempest she had succeeded, and her face +showed a certain sedate triumph. + +"Oh! mother! don't give me up; don't give me up!" wailed Kathleen. "It +wasn't me that said it, it was somebody else that I didn't know lived +inside of me. I don't expect you to forgive it or forget it, Julia, but +if you'll only try, just a little bit, I'll show you how sorry I feel. +I'd cut myself and make it bleed, I'd go to prison, if I could get back +to where I was before I said it! Oh! what shall I do, mother, if you +look at me like that again or say 'How could you!'" + +There was no doubting Kathleen's remorse; even Julia saw that. + +"Did she tell the truth, Aunt Margaret?" she repeated. + +"Come here, Julia, and sit by me. It is true that your Uncle Peter and I +have both put money into your father's business, and it is true that he +has not been able to give it back to us, and perhaps may never do so. +There is just enough left to pay your poor father's living expenses, but +we trust his honor; we are as sorry for him as we can be, and we love +him dearly. Kathleen meant nothing but that your father has been +unfortunate and we all have to abide by the consequences; but I am +amazed that my daughter should have so forgotten herself as to speak of +it to you!" (Renewed sobs from the prostrate Kathleen). + +"Especially," said Julia, "when, as Gladys Ferguson says, I haven't +anybody in the world but you, to turn to in my trouble. I am a +fatherless girl" (her voice quivered here), "and I am a guest in +your house." + +Mrs. Carey's blood rose a little as she looked at poor Kitty's shaken +body and streaming eyes, and Julia's unforgiving face. "You are wrong +there, Julia. I fail to see why you should not take your full share of +our misfortunes, and suffer as much as we, from our too small income. It +is not our fault, it is not yours. You are not a privileged guest, you +are one of the family. If you are fatherless just now, my children are +fatherless forever; yet you have not made one single burden lighter by +joining our forces. You have been an outsider, instead of putting +yourself loyally into the breach, and working with us heart to heart. I +welcomed you with open arms and you have made my life harder, much +harder, than it was before your coming. To protect you I have had to +discipline my own children continually, and all the time you were +putting their tempers to quite unnecessary tests! I am not extenuating +Kathleen, but I merely say you have no right to behave as you do. You +are thirteen years old, quite old enough to make up your mind whether +you wish to be loved by anybody or not; at present you are not!" + +Never had the ears of the Paragon heard such disagreeably plain speech. +She was not inclined to tears, but moisture began to appear in her eyes +and she looked as though a shower were imminent. Aunt Margaret was +magnificent in her wrath, and though Julia feared, she admired her. Not +to be loved, if that really were to be her lot, rather terrified Julia. +She secretly envied Nancy's unconscious gift of drawing people to her +instantly; men, women, children,--dogs and horses, for that matter. She +never noticed that Nancy's heart ran out to meet everybody, and that she +was overflowing with vitality and joy and sympathy; on the contrary, she +considered the tribute of affection paid to Nancy as a part of Nancy's +luck. Virtuous, conscientious, intelligent, and well-dressed as she felt +herself to be, she emphatically did not wish to be disliked, and it was +a complete surprise to her that she had not been a successful +Carey chicken. + +"Gladys Ferguson always loved me," she expostulated after a brief +silence, and there was a quiver in her voice. + +"Then either Gladys has a remarkable gift of loving, or else you are a +different Julia in her company," remarked Mother Carey, quietly, raising +Julia's astonishment and perturbation to an immeasurable height. + +"Now, Kathleen," continued Mother Carey, "Mrs. Godfrey has often asked +you to spend a week with Elsie, and you can go to Charlestown on the +afternoon train. Go away from Julia and forget everything but that you +have done wrong and you must find a way to repair it. I hope Julia will +learn while you are away to make it easier for you to be courteous and +amiable. There is a good deal in the Bible, Julia, about the sin of +causing your brother to offend. Between that sin and Kathleen's offence, +there is little, in my mind, to choose!" + +"Yes, there is!" cried Kathleen. "I am much, much worse than Julia. +Father couldn't bear to know that I had hurt Julia's feelings and hurt +yours too. I was false to father, and you, and Uncle Allan, and Julia. +Nothing can be said for me, _nothing_! I am so ashamed of myself that I +shall never get over it in the world. Oh, Julia, could you shake hands +with me, just to show me you know how I despise myself?" + +Julia shook hands considerably less like a slug or a limpet than usual, +and something very queer and unexpected happened when her hand met poor +Kitty's wet, feverish little paw and she heard the quiver in her voice. +She suddenly stooped and kissed her cousin, quite without intention. +Kathleen returned the salute with grateful, pathetic warmth, and then +the two fell on Mother Carey's neck to be kissed and cried over for a +full minute. + +"I'll go to the doctor and have my ugly tooth pulled out," exclaimed +Kathleen, wiping her eyes. "If it hadn't been for that I never could +have been so horrible!" + +"That would be all very well for once," answered her mother with a tired +smile, "but if you pluck out a supposed offending member every time you +do something wrong, I fear you will not have many left when you are an +old lady!" + +"Mother!" said Kathleen, almost under her breath and not daring to look +up, "couldn't I stay at home from Charlestown and show you and Julia, +here, how sorry I am?" + +"Yes, let her, Aunt Margaret, and then I can have a chance to try too," +pleaded Julia. + +Had the heavens fallen? Had the Paragon, the Pink of Propriety and +Perfection, confessed a fault? Had the heart of the smug one, the prig, +melted, and did she feel at last her kinship to the Carey chickens? Had +she suffered a real grievance, the first amongst numberless deeds of +tenderness, and having resented it like an "old beast," forgiven it like +a "new" one? It certainly seemed as if Mother Carey that week were at +her old trade of making things make themselves. Gilbert, Kathleen, and +Julia had all fought their way under the ice-pack and were getting a +glimpse of Shiny Wall. + + + +XXIV + +A LETTER PROM GERMANY + + +Mother Carey walked down the village street one morning late in August, +while Peter, milk pail in hand, was running by her side and making +frequent excursions off the main line of travel. Beulah looked +enchanting after a night of rain, and the fields were greener than they +had been since haying time. Unless Mr. Hamilton were away from his +consular post on a vacation somewhere on the Continent, he should have +received, and answered, Bill Harmon's letter before this, she was +thinking, as she looked at the quiet beauty of the scene that had so +endeared itself to her in a few short months. + +Mrs. Popham had finished her morning's work and was already sitting at +her drawing-in frame in the open doorway, making a very purple rose with +a very scarlet centre. + +"Will you come inside, Mis' Carey?" she asked hospitably, "or do you +want Lallie Joy to set you a chair on the grass, same as you had +last time?" + +"I always prefer the grass, Mrs. Popham," smiled Mrs. Carey. "As it's +the day for the fishman to come I thought we'd like an extra quart of +milk for chowder." + +"I only hope he'll make _out_ to come," was Mrs. Popham's curt response. +"If I set out to _be_ a fishman, I vow I'd _be_ one! Mr. Tubbs stays to +home whenever he's hayin', or his wife's sick, or it's stormy, or the +children want to go to the circus!" + +Mrs. Carey laughed. "That's true; but as your husband reminded me last +week, when Mr. Tubbs disappointed us, his fish is always fresh-caught, +and good." + +"Oh! of course Mr. Popham would speak up for him!" returned his wife. "I +don't see myself as it makes much diff'rence whether his fish is good or +bad, if he stays to home with it! Mebbe I look on the dark side a little +mite; I can't hardly help it, livin' with Mr. Popham, and he +so hopeful." + +"He keeps us all very merry at the Yellow House," Mrs. Carey ventured. + +"Yes, he would," remarked Mrs. Popham drily, "but you don't git it +stiddy; hopefulness at meals, hopefulness evenin's, an' hopefulness +nights!--one everlastin' stiddy stream of hopefulness! He was jest so as +a boy; always lookin' on the bright side whether there was any or not. +His mother 'n' father got turrible sick of it; so much sunshine in the +house made a continual drouth, so old Mis' Popham used to say. For her +part, she said, she liked to think that, once in a while, there was a +cloud that was a first-class cloud; a thick, black cloud, clean through +to the back! She was tired to death lookin' for Ossian's silver linin's! +Lallie Joy's real moody like me; I s'pose it's only natural, livin' with +a father who never sees anything but good, no matter which way he looks. +There's two things I trust I shan't hear any more when I git to +heaven,--that's 'Cheer up Maria!' an' 'It's all for the best!' As for +Mr. Popham, he says any place'll be heaven to him so long as I ain't +there, callin' 'Hurry up Ossian!' so we have it, back an' forth!" + +"It's a wonderful faculty, seeing the good in everything," sighed Mrs. +Carey. + +"Wonderful tiresome," returned Mrs. Popham, "though I will own up it's +Ossian's only fault, and he can't see his own misfortunes any clearer +than he can see those of other folks. His new colt run away with him +last week and stove the mowin' machine all to pieces. 'Never mind, +Maria!' he says, 'it'll make fust-rate gear for a windmill!' He's out in +the barn now, fussin' over it; you can hear him singin'. They was all +here practicin' for the Methodist concert last, night, an' I didn't +sleep a wink, the tunes kep' a-runnin' in my head so! They always git +Ossian to sing 'Fly like a youthful hart or roe, over the hills where +spices grow,' an' I tell him he's too old; youthful harts an' roes don't +fly over the hills wearin' spectacles, I tell him, but he'll go right on +singin' it till they have to carry him up on the platform in a +wheeled chair!" + +"You go to the Congregational church, don't you, Mrs. Popham?" asked +Mrs. Carey. "I've seen Lallie and Digby at Sunday-school." + +"Yes, Mr. Popham is a Methodist and I'm a Congregationalist, but I say +let the children go where they like, so I always take them with me." + +Mrs. Carey was just struggling to conceal her amusement at this +religious flexibility on Mrs. Popham's part, when she espied Nancy +flying down the street, bareheaded, waving a bit of paper in the air. + +"Are you 'most ready to come home, Muddy?" she called, without coming +any nearer. + +"Yes, quite ready, now Lallie has brought the milk. Good morning, Mrs. +Popham; the children want me for some new enterprise." + +"You give yourself most too much to 'em," expostulated Mrs. Popham; "you +don't take no vacations." + +"Ah, well, you see 'myself' is all I have to give them," answered Mrs. +Carey, taking Peter and going to meet Nancy. + +"Mother," said that young person breathlessly, "I must tell you what I +didn't tell at the time, for fear of troubling you. I wrote to Mr. +Hamilton by the same post that Mr. Harmon did. Bill is so busy and such +a poor writer I thought he wouldn't put the matter nicely at all, and I +didn't want you, with all your worries, brought into it, so I wrote to +the Consul myself, and kept a copy to show you exactly what I said. I +have been waiting at the gate for the letters every day for a week, but +this morning Gilbert happened to be there and shouted, 'A letter from +Germany for you, Nancy!' So all of them are wild with curiosity; Olive +and Cyril too, but I wanted you to open and read it first because it may +be full of awful blows." + +Mrs. Carey sat down on the side of a green bank between the Pophams' +corner and the Yellow House and opened the letter,--with some +misgivings, it must be confessed. Nancy sat close beside her and held +one edge of the wide sheets, closely filled. + +"Why, he has written you a volume, Nancy!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey. "It +must be the complete story of his life! How long was yours to him?" "I +don't remember; pretty long; because there seemed to be so much to tell, +to show him how we loved the house, and why we couldn't spend Cousin +Ann's money and move out in a year or two, and a lot about ourselves, to +let him see we were nice and agreeable and respectable." + +"I'm not sure all that was strictly necessary," commented Mrs. Carey +with some trepidation. + +This was Lemuel Hamilton's letter, dated from the office of the American +Consul in Breslau, Germany. + + MY DEAR MISS NANCY,--As your letter to me was a purely + "business" communication I suppose I ought to begin my reply: + "Dear Madam, Your esteemed favor was received on the sixth + inst. and contents noted," but I shall do nothing of the sort. + I think you must have guessed that I have two girls of my own, + for you wrote to me just as if we were sitting together side + by side, like two friends, not a bit as landlord and tenant. + +Mother Carey's eyes twinkled. She well knew Nancy's informal epistolary +style, and her facile, instantaneous friendliness! + + Every word in your letter interested me, pleased me, touched me. + I feel that I know you all, from the dear mother who sits in + the centre-- + +"What does he mean by that?" + +"I sent him a snap shot of the family." + +"_Nancy_! What for?" + +"So that he could see what we were like; so that he'd know we were fit +to be lifelong tenants!" + +Mrs. Carey turned resignedly to the letter again. + + From the dear mother who sits in the centre, to the lovable + little Peter who looks as if he were all that you describe + him! I was about his age when I went to the Yellow House to + spend a few years. Old Granny Hamilton had lived there all her + life, and when my mother, who was a widow, was seized with a + serious illness she took me home with her for a long visit. + She was never well enough to go away, so my early childhood + was passed in Beulah, and I only left the village when I was ten + years old, and an orphan. + +"Oh, dear!" interpolated Nancy. "It seems, lately, as if nobody had both +father and mother!" + + Granny Hamilton died soon after my mother, and I hardly know who + lived in the house for the next thirty years. It was my + brother's property, and a succession of families occupied it + until it fell to me in my turn. I have no happy memories + connected with it, so you can go ahead and make them for + yourselves. My only remembrance is of the west bedroom, where + my mother lived and died. + +"The west bedroom; that isn't the painted one; no, of course it is the +one where I sleep," said Mrs. Carey. "The painted one must always have +been the guest chamber." + + She could only move from bed to chair, and her greatest pleasure + was to sit by the sunset window and look at the daisies and + buttercups waving in that beautiful sloping stretch of field + with the pine woods beyond. After the grass was mown, and that + field was always left till the last for her sake, she used to + sit there and wait for Queen Anne's lace to come up; its tall + stems and delicate white wheels nodding among the grasses. + +"Oh! I do _like_ him!" exclaimed Nancy impetuously. "Can't you _see_ +him, mother? It's so nice of him to remember that they always mowed the +hayfield last for his mother's sake, and so nice of him to think of +Queen Anne's lace all these years!" + + Now as to business, your Cousin Ann is quite right when she + tells you that you ought not to put expensive improvements on + another person's property lest you be disturbed in your + tenancy. That sort of cousin is always right, whatever she + says. Mine was not named Ann; she was Emma, but the principle + is the same. + +"Nancy!" asked Mrs. Carey, looking away from the letter again, "did you +say anything about your Cousin Ann?" + +"Yes, some little thing or other; for it was her money that we couldn't +spend until we knew we could stay in the house. I didn't describe her, +of course, to Mr. Hamilton; I just told him she was very businesslike, +and yes, I remember now, I told him you said she was a very fine person; +that's about all. But you see how clever he is! he just has 'instinks,' +as Mr. Popham says, and you don't have to tell him much about anything." + + If you are intending to bring the water from the well into the + house and put a large stove in the cellar to warm some of the + upper rooms; if you are papering and painting inside, and + keeping the place in good condition, you are preserving my + property and even adding to its value; so under the + circumstances I could not think of accepting any rent in + money. + +"No rent! Not even the sixty dollars!" exclaimed Nancy. + +"Look; that is precisely what he says." + +"There never was such a dear since the world began!" cried Nancy +joyously. "Oh! do read on; there's a lot more, and the last may +contradict the first." + + Shall I tell you what more the Careys may do for me, they who + have done so much already? + +"So much!" quoted Nancy with dramatic emphasis. "Oh, he _is_ a dear!" + + My son Tom, when he went down to Beulah before starting for + China, visited the house and at my request put away my + mother's picture safely. He is a clever boy, and instead of + placing the thing in an attic where it might be injured, he + tucked it away,--where do you think,--in the old brick oven of + the room that is now, I suppose, your dining room. It is a + capital hiding-place, for there had been no fire there for fifty + years, nor ever will be again. I have other portraits of her + with me, on this side of the water. Please remove the one I + speak of from its wrappings and hang it over the mantel shelf + in the west bedroom. + +"My bedroom! I shall love to have it there," said Mother Carey. + + Then, once a year, on my mother's birthday,--it is the fourth of + July and an easy date to remember,--will my little friend Miss + Nancy, or any of the other Careys, if she is absent, pick a + little nosegay of daisies and buttercups (perhaps there will + even be a bit of early Queen Anne's lace) and put it in a vase + under my mother's picture? That shall be the annual rent paid + for the Yellow House to Lemuel Hamilton by the Careys! + +Tears of joy sprang to the eyes of emotional Nancy. She rose to her feet +and paced the greensward excitedly. + +"Oh, mother, I didn't think there could be another such man after +knowing father and the Admiral. Isn't it all as wonderful as a fairy +story?" + +"There's a little more; listen, dear." + + As to the term of your occupancy, the Careys may have the Yellow + House until the day of my death, unless by some extraordinary + chance my son Tom should ever want it as a summer home. + +"Oh, dear! there comes the dreadful 'unless'! 'My son Tom' is our only +enemy, then!" said Nancy darkly. + +"He is in China, at all events," her mother remarked cheerfully. + + Tom is the only one who ever had a bit of sentiment about + Beulah, and he was always unwilling that the old place should + be occupied by strangers. The curious thing about the matter + is that you and yours do not seem to be strangers to me and + mine. Do you know, dear little Miss Nancy, what brought the + tears to my eyes in your letter? The incident of your father's + asking what you could do to thank the Yellow House for the + happy hour it had given you on that summer day long ago, and the + planting of the crimson rambler by the side of the portico. I + have sent your picture tying up the rose,--and it was so + charming I was loath to let it go,--with your letter, and the + snap shot of the family group, all out to my son Tom in China. + He will know then why I have let the house, to whom, and all + the attendant circumstances. Trust him never to disturb you + when he sees how you love the old place. The planting of that + crimson rambler will fix Tom, for he's a romantic boy. + +"The planting of the rose was a heavenly inspiration if it does 'fix +Tom!' We'll call Tom the Chinese Enemy. No, we'll call him the Yellow +Peril," laughed Nancy in triumph. + + I am delighted with the sample of paper you have chosen for the + front hall. + +"I don't see why you didn't go over to Germany yourself, Nancy, and take +a trunk of samples!" cried Mrs. Carey, wiping the tears of merriment +from her eyes. "I can't think what the postage on your letter must have +been." + +"Ten cents," Nancy confessed, "but wasn't it worth it, Muddy?--Come, +read the last few lines, and then we'll run all the way home to tell the +others." + + Send me anything more, at any time, to give me an idea of the + delightful things you are doing. I shall be proud if you honor + me with an occasional letter. Pray give my regards to your + mother, whom I envy, and all the "stormy petrels," whom I envy + too. + + Believe me, dear Miss Nancy, + + Yours sincerely, + + LEMUEL HAMILTON. + + +"I can't remember why I told him about Mother Carey's chickens," said +Nancy reflectively. "It just seemed to come in naturally. The Yellow +Peril must be rather nice, as well as his father, even if he is our +enemy. That was clever of him, putting his grandmother in the brick +oven!" And here Nancy laughed, and laughed again, thinking how her last +remark would sound if overheard by a person unacquainted with the +circumstances. + +"A delightful, warm, kind, friendly letter," said Mother Carey, folding +it with a caressing hand. "I wish your father could have read it." + +"He doesn't say a word about his children," and Nancy took the sheets +and scanned them again. + +"You evidently gave him the history of your whole family, but he +confines himself to his own life." + +"He mentions 'my son Tom' frequently enough, but there's not a word of +Mrs. Hamilton." + +"No, but there's no reason there should be, especially!" + +"If he loved her he couldn't keep her out," said Nancy shrewdly. "She +just isn't in the story at all. Could any of us write a chronicle of any +house we ever lived in, and leave you out?" + +Mrs. Carey took Nancy's outstretched hands and was pulled up from the +greensward. "You have a few 'instinks' yourself, little daughter," she +said with a swift pat on the rosy cheek. "Now, Peter, put your marbles +in the pocket of your blue jeans, and take the milk pail from under the +bushes; we must hurry or there'll be no chowder." + +As they neared Garden Fore-and-Aft the group of children rushed out to +meet them, Kitty in advance. + +"The fish man didn't come," she said, "and it's long past his time, so +there's no hope; but Julia and I have the dinner all planned. There +wasn't enough of it to go round anyway, so we've asked Olive and Cyril +to stay, and we've set the table under the great maple,--do you care?" + +"Not a bit; we'll have a real jollification, because Nancy has some good +news to tell you!" + +"The dinner isn't quite appropriate for a jollification," Kitty observed +anxiously. "Is the news good enough to warrant opening a jar or a can of +anything?" + +"Open all that doth hap to be closed," cried Nancy, embracing Olive +excitedly. "Light the bonfires on the encroaching hills. Set casks +a-tilt, and so forth." + +"It's the German letter!" said Gilbert at a venture. + +"What is the dinner, Kitty?" Mother Carey asked. + +"New potatoes and string beans from the aft garden. Stale bread made +into milk toast to be served as a course. Then, not that it has anything +to do with the case, but just to give a style to the meal, Julia has +made a salad out of the newspaper." + +Nancy created a diversion by swooning on the grass; a feat which had +given her great fame in charades. + +"It was only the memory of Julia's last newspaper salad!" she murmured +when the usual restoratives had been applied. "Prithee, poppet, what +hast dropped into the dish to-day?" + +Julia was laughing too much to be wholly intelligible, but read from a +scrap in her apron pocket: "'Any fruit in season, cold beans or peas, +minced cucumber, English walnuts, a few cubes of cold meat left from +dinner, hard boiled eggs in slices, flecks of ripe tomatoes and radishes +to perfect the color scheme, a dash of onion juice, dash of paprika, +dash of rich cream.' I have left out the okra, the shallot, the +estragon, the tarragon, the endive, the hearts of artichoke, the +Hungarian peppers and the haricot beans because we hadn't any;--do you +think it will make any difference, Aunt Margaret?" + +"It will," said Nancy oracularly, "but all to the good." + +"Rather a dull salad I call it," commented Gilbert. "Lacks the snap of +the last one. No mention of boned sprats, or snails in aspic, calves' +foot jelly, iced humming birds, pickled edelweiss, or any of those +things kept habitually in the cellars of families like ours. No dash of +Jamaica ginger or Pain-killer or sloe gin or sarsaparilla to give it +piquancy. Unless Julia can find a paper that gives more up-to-date +advice to its country subscribers, we'll have to transfer her from the +kitchen department to the woodshed." + +Julia's whole attitude, during this discussion of her recent culinary +experiments, was indicative of the change that was slowly taking place +in her point of view. The Careys had a large sense of humor, from mother +down as far as Peter, who was still in the tadpole stage of it. They +chaffed one another on all occasions, for the most part courteously and +with entire good nature. Leigh Hunt speaks of the anxiety of certain +persons to keep their minds quiet lest any motion be clumsy, and Julia's +concern had been of this variety; but four or five months spent in a +household where mental operations, if not deep, were incredibly quick, +had made her a little more elastic. Mother Carey had always said that if +Julia had any sense of humor she would discover for herself what a +solemn prig she was, and mend her ways, and it seemed as if this might +be true in course of time. + +"What'll we do with all the milk?" now demanded Peter, who had carried +it all the way from the Pophams', and to whom it appeared therefore of +exaggerated importance. + +"Angel boy!" cried Nancy, embracing him. "The only practical member of +the family! What wouldst thou suggest?" + +"Drink it," was the terse reply. + +"And so't shall be, my liege! Fetch the beaker, lackey," identifying +Cyril with a royal gesture. "Also crystal water from the well, which by +the command of our Cousin Ann will speedily flow in a pipe within the +castle walls. There are healths to be drunk this day when we assemble +under the Hamilton maple, and first and most loyally the health of our +American Consul at Breslau, Germany!" + + + +XXV + +"FOLLOWING THE GLEAM" + + +If the summer months had brought many changes to the dwellers in the +Yellow House and the House of Lords, the autumn was responsible for many +more. Cousin Ann's improvements were set in motion and were promised to +be in full force before cold weather set in, and the fall term at Beulah +Academy had opened with six new, unexpected, and interesting students. +Happily for the Careys and happily for Beulah, the old principal, a +faithful but uninspired teacher, had been called to Massachusetts to +fill a higher position; and only a few days before the beginning of the +term, a young college man, Ralph Thurston, fresh from Bowdoin and +needing experience, applied for and received the appointment. The thrill +of rapture that ran like an electric current through the persons of the +feminine students when they beheld Ralph Thurston for the first +time,--dignified, scholarly, unmistakably the gentleman,--beheld him +mount the platform in the assembly room, and knew him for their own, +this can better be imagined than described! He was handsome, he was +young, he had enough hair (which their principals seldom had possessed), +he did not wear spectacles, he had a pleasing voice, and a manner of +speaking that sent tremors of delight up and down a thirteen-year-old +spine. He had a merry wit and a hearty laugh, but one had only to look +at him closely to feel that he had borne burdens and that his +attainments had been bought with a price. He was going to be difficult +to please, and the girls of all ages drew deep breaths of anticipation +and knew that they should study as never before. The vice-principal, a +lady of fine attainments, was temporarily in eclipse, and such an +astounding love for the classics swept through young Beulah that nobody +could understand it. Ralph Thurston taught Latin and Greek himself, but +parents did not at first observe the mysterious connection between cause +and effect. It was all very young and artless and innocent; helpful and +stimulating too, for Thurston was no budding ladies' man, but a +thoroughly good fellow, manly enough to attract the boys and hold +their interest. + +The entrance of the four Careys and two Lords into the list of students +had an inspiring effect upon the whole school. So far as scholarship was +concerned they were often outstripped by their country neighbors, but +the Careys had seen so much of the world that they had a great deal of +general culture, and the academy atmosphere was affected by it. Olive, +Nancy, and Gilbert went into the highest class; Kathleen, Julia, and +Cyril into the one below. + +The intimacy of Nancy and Olive was a romantic and ardent one. Olive had +never had a real companion in her life; Nancy's friends dotted the +universe wherever she had chanced to live. Olive was uncommunicative, +shy, and stiff with all but a chosen few; Nancy was at ease in all +assemblies. It was Nancy's sympathy and enthusiasm and warmth that +attracted Olive Lord, and it was the combination of Olive's genius and +her need of love, that held Nancy. + +Never were two human creatures more unlike in their ways of thought. +Olive had lived in Beulah seven years, and knew scarcely any one because +of her father's eccentricities and his indifference to the world; but +had you immured Nancy in a convent she would have made a large circle of +acquaintances from the window of her cell, before a month passed over +her head. She had an ardent interest in her fellow creatures, and +whenever they strayed from the strict path of rectitude, she was +consumed with a desire to set them straight. If Olive had seen a drunken +man lying in a ditch, she would scarcely have looked at him, much less +inquired his name. Nancy would have sat by until he recovered himself, +if possible, or found somebody to take him to his destination. As for +the delightful opportunity of persuading him of his folly, she would +have jumped at the chance when she was fifteen or sixteen, but as she +grew older she observed a little more reticence in these delicate +matters, at least when she was endeavoring to reform her elders. She had +succeeded in making young Nat Harmon stop cigarette smoking, but he was +privately less convinced of the error of his ways than he was bewitched +by Nancy. She promised readily to wear a blue ribbon and sit on the +platform in the Baptist Chapel at the Annual Meeting of the Junior +Temperance League. On the eve of the affair she even would gladly have +made a speech when the president begged her to do so, but the +horror-stricken Olive succeeded in stopping her, and her mother firmly +stood by Olive. + +"Oh! all right; I don't care a bit about it, Muddy," she answered +nonchalantly. "Only there is something splendid about rising from a band +of blue-ribboned girls and boys and addressing the multitude for a great +cause." "What do you know about this great cause, Nancy dear, at +your age?" + +"Oh, not much! but you don't have to know much if you say it loud and +clear to the back settees. I've watched how it goes! It was thrilling +when we gave 'Esther the Beautiful Queen' in the Town Hall; when we +waved our hands and sang 'Haman! Haman! Long live Haman!' I almost +fainted with joy." + +"It was very good; I liked it too; but perhaps if you 'faint with joy' +whenever your feet touch a platform, it will be more prudent for you to +keep away!" and Mother Carey laughed. + +"Very well, madam, your will is my law! When you see the youth of Beulah +treading the broad road that leadeth to destruction, and looking on the +wine when it is red in the cup, remember that you withheld my hand +and voice!" + +Gilbert and Cyril were much together, particularly after Cyril's +standing had been increased in Beulah by the news that Mr. Thurston +thought him a remarkable mathematician and perhaps the leading student +in his class. Cyril himself, too pale for a country boy of fourteen, +narrow-shouldered, silent, and timid, took this unexpected fame with +absolute terror, but Olive's pride delighted in it and she positively +bloomed, in the knowledge that her brother was appreciated. She herself +secretly thought books were rather a mistake when paints and brushes +were at hand, and it was no wonder that she did not take high rank, +seeing that she painted an hour before school, and all day Saturday, +alternating her work on the guest chamber of the Yellow House with her +portrait of Nancy for Mother Carey's Christmas present. + +Kathleen and Julia had fallen into step and were good companions. +Kathleen had never forgotten her own breach of good manners and family +loyalty; Julia always remembered the passion of remorse that Kathleen +felt, a remorse that had colored her conduct to Julia ever since. Julia +was a good plodder, and Mr. Thurston complimented her on the excellence +of her Latin recitations, when he had his wits about him and could +remember that she existed. He never had any difficulty in remembering +Nancy. She was not, it must be confessed, especially admirable as a +_verbatim et literatim_ "reciter." Sometimes she forgot entirely what +the book had said on a certain topic, but she usually had some original +observation of her own to offer by way of compromise. At first Mr. +Thurston thought that she was trying to conceal her lack of real +knowledge, and dazzle her instructor at the same time, so that he should +never discover her ignorance. Later on he found where her weakness and +her strength lay. She adapted, invented, modified things +naturally,--embroidered all over her task, so to speak, and delivered it +in somewhat different shape from the other girls. (When she was twelve +she pricked her finger in sewing and made a blood-stain on the little +white mull apron that she was making. The stuff was so delicate that she +did not dare to attempt any cleansing process, and she was in a great +hurry too, so she embroidered a green four leaf clover over the +bloodstain, and all the family exclaimed, "How like Nancy!") Grammar +teased Nancy, algebra and geometry routed her, horse, foot, and +dragoons. No room for embroidery there! Languages delighted her, +map-drawing bored her, and composition intoxicated her, although she was +better at improvising than at the real task of setting down her thoughts +in black and white. The class chronicles and prophecies and songs and +poems would flow to her inevitably, but Kathleen would be the one who +would give new grace and charm to them if she were to read them to +an audience. + +How Beulah Academy beamed, and applauded, and wagged its head in pride +on a certain day before Thanksgiving, when there were exercises in the +assembly room. Olive had drawn The Landing of the Pilgrims on the +largest of the blackboards, and Nancy had written a merry little story +that caused great laughter and applause in the youthful audience. +Gilbert had taken part in a debate and covered himself with glory, and +Kathleen closed the impromptu programme by reciting Tennyson's-- + + O young Mariner, + You from the haven + Under the sea-cliff, + You that are watching + The gray Magician + With eyes of wonder,... + follow the Gleam. + + Great the Master, + And sweet the Magic, + When over the valley, + In early summers, + Over the mountain, + On human faces, + And all around me, + Moving to melody + Floated the Gleam. + + O young Mariner, + Down to the haven, + Call your companion, + Launch your vessel + And crowd your canvas, + And, ere it vanishes + Over the margin, + After it, follow it, + Follow the Gleam. + +Kathleen's last year's brown velveteen disclosed bronze slippers and +stockings,--a novelty in Beulah,--her hair fell in such curls as Beulah +had rarely beheld, and her voice was as sweet as a thrush's note; so +perhaps it is not strange that the poem set a kind of fashion at the +academy, and "following the gleam" became a sort of text by which to +study and grow and live. + +Thanksgiving Day approached, and everybody was praying for a flurry of +snow, just enough to give a zest to turkey and cranberry sauce. On the +twentieth it suddenly occurred to Mother Carey that this typical New +England feast day would be just the proper time for the housewarming, so +the Lord children, the Pophams, and the Harmons were all bidden to come +at seven o'clock in the evening. Great preparations ensued. Rows of Jack +o' Lanterns decorated the piazza, and the Careys had fewer pumpkin pies +in November than their neighbors, in consequence of their extravagant +inroads upon the golden treasures of the aft garden. Inside were a few +late asters and branches of evergreen, and the illumination suggested +that somebody had been lending additional lamps and candles for the +occasion. The original equipment of clothes possessed by the Careys on +their arrival in Beulah still held good, and looked well by lamplight, +so that the toilettes were fully worthy of so important a function. + +Olive's picture of Nancy was finished, and she announced the absolute +impossibility of keeping it until Christmas, so it reached the Yellow +House on Thanksgiving morning. When it was unwrapped by Nancy and +displayed for the first time to the family, Mother Carey's lips parted, +her eyes opened in wonder, but no words came for an instant, in the +bewilderment of her mind. Olive had written the title "Young April" +under the picture. Nancy stood on a bit of dandelion-dotted turf, a +budding tree in the background, her arm flung over the neck of a Jersey +calf. The calf had sat for his portrait long before, but Nancy had been +added since May. Olive, by a clever inspiration, had turned Nancy's face +away and painted her with the April breeze blowing her hair across her +cheek. She was not good at painting features, her art was too crude, but +somehow the real thing was there; and the likeness to Nancy, in figure, +pose, and hair, was so unmistakable that her mother caught her breath. +As for the calf, he, at least, was distinctly in Olive's line, and he +was painted with a touch of genius. + +"It is better of the calf than it is of you, Nancy," said Gilbert +critically. + +"Isn't Mr. Bossy lovely?" his sister responded amiably. "Wouldn't he put +any professional beauty out of countenance? I am proud to be painted +beside him! Do you like it, Muddy dear?" + +"Like it?" she exclaimed, "it is wonderful! It must be sent to Boston +for criticism, and we must invent some way of persuading Mr. Lord to +give Olive the best instruction to be had. This picture is even better +than anything she has done in the painted chamber. I shouldn't wonder a +bit, Nancy, if little Beulah were to be very proud of Olive in the +years to come!" + +Nancy was transported at her mother's praise. "I felt it, I knew it! I +always said Olive was a genius," she cried, clapping her hands. "Olive +is 'following the gleam'! Can't you feel the wind blowing my hair and +dress? Don't you see that the calf is chewing his cud and is going to +move in just a minute? Olive's animals are always just going to +move!--Oh, Muddy dear! when you see Olive nowadays, smiling and busy and +happy, aren't you glad you stretched your wings and took her under them +with the rest of us? And don't you think you could make a 'new beast' +out of Mr. Henry Lord, or is he too old a beast even for Mother Carey?" + + + +XXVI + +A ZOOLOGICAL FATHER + + +That was just what Mother Carey was wondering when Nancy spoke, and as +the result of several hours' reflection she went out for a walk just +before dusk and made her way towards The Cedars with a package under +her cloak. + +She followed the long lane that led to the house, and knocked at the +front door rather timidly. In her own good time Mrs. Bangs answered the +knock and admitted Mrs. Carey into the dreariest sitting room she had +ever entered. + +"I am Mrs. Carey from the Hamilton house," she said to Mrs. Bangs. "Will +you ask Mr. Lord if he will see me for a moment?" + +Mrs. Bangs was stupefied at the request, for, in her time, scarcely a +single caller from the village had crossed the threshold, although there +had been occasional visitors from Portland or Boston. + +Mrs. Carey waited a few moments, silently regarding the unequalled +bareness, ugliness, and cheerlessness of the room. "Olive has a sense of +beauty," she thought, "and Olive is sixteen; it is Olive who ought to +make this place different from what it is, and she can, unless her +father is the stumbling-block in the way." + +At this moment the possible stumbling-block, Henry Lord, Ph.D., came in +and greeted her civilly. His manner was never genial, for there was +neither love in his heart nor warm blood in his veins; but he was +courteous, for he was an educated fossil, of good birth and up-bringing. +He had been dissecting specimens in his workroom, and he looked capable +of dismembering Mother Carey; but bless your heart, she had weapons in +her unseen armory that were capable of bringing confusion to his paltry +apparatus!--among others a delicate, slender little sword that pierced +deep on occasion. + +Henry Lord was of medium height; spare, clean-shaven, thin-lipped, with +scanty auburn hair, high forehead, and small keen eyes, especially +adapted to the microscope, though ill fitted to use in friendly +conversation. + +"We are neighbors, Professor Lord, though we have never met," said Mrs. +Carey, rising and giving him her hand. + +"My children know you better than I," he answered, "and I feel it very +kind in you to allow them to call on you so frequently." They had lived +at the Yellow House for four months save at meal times, but as their +father was unaware of the number and extent of their visits Mrs. Carey +thought it useless to speak of them, so she merely said: + +"It is a great pleasure to have them with us. My children have left many +friends behind them in Massachusetts and elsewhere, and might have been +lonely in Beulah; besides, I often think the larger the group (within +certain limits), the better chance children have of learning how +to live." + +"I should certainly not have permitted Olive and Cyril to attend the +local academy but for your family," said Professor Lord. "These country +schools never have any atmosphere of true scholarliness, and the speech +and manners of both teachers and pupils are execrable." + +"I dare say that is often the case. If the academies could furnish such +teachers as existed fifty years ago; and alas! if we parents could +furnish such vigorous, determined, ambitious, self-denying pupils as +used to be sent out from country homes, we should have less to complain +of. Of course we are peculiarly fortunate here in Beulah." + +Mr. Lord looked faintly amused and infinitely superior. "I am afraid, my +dear lady," he remarked, "that you have not had long enough experience +to comprehend the slenderness of Mr. Philpot's mental equipment." + +"Oh, Mr. Philpot resigned nearly three months ago," said Mrs. Carey +easily, giving Henry Lord, Ph.D., her first stab, and a look of +amusement on her own behalf. "Ralph Thurston, the present principal, is +a fine, unusual fellow." + +"Really? The children have never mentioned any change, but I regret to +say I am absent-minded at meals. The death of my wife left many gaps in +the life of the household." + +"So that you have to be mother and father in one!" (Stab two: very +delicately delivered.) + +"I fear I am too much of a student to be called a good family man." + +"So I gathered." (Stab three. She wanted to provoke curiosity.) + +Mr. Lord looked annoyed. He knew his unpopularity, and did not wish any +village gossip to reach the ears of strangers. "You, my dear madam, are +capable of appreciating my devotion to my life work, which the neighbors +naturally wholly misunderstand," he said. + +"I gathered nothing from the neighbors," responded Mrs. Carey, "but a +woman has only to know children well to see at a glance what they need. +You are so absorbed in authorship just now, that naturally it is a +little hard for the young people; but I suppose there are breathing +places, 'between books'?" + +"There are no breathing places between mine; there will be six volumes, +and I am scarcely half through the third, although I have given seven +years to the work. Still, I have an excellent housekeeper who attends to +all our simple needs. My children are not fitted for society." + +"No, not quite." (Stab four). "That is the reason they ought to see a +good deal of it, but they are very fine children and very clever." + +"I am glad you think so, but they certainly write bad English and have +no general knowledge whatsoever." + +"Oh, well, that will come, doubtless, when you have more time with +them." (Stab five.) "I often think such mysterious things as good speech +and culture can never be learned in school. I shouldn't wonder if that +were our department, Dr. Lord!" (Stab six.) "However, you will agree, +modest parent as you are, that your Olive is a genius?" + +"I have never observed it," replied her father. "I cannot, of course, +allow her to practice on any musical instrument, because my studies +demand quiet, but I don't think she cares for music." + +"She draws and paints, however, in the most astonishing way, and she has +a passionate energy, and concentration, and devotion to her work that I +have never seen coupled with anything but an extraordinary talent. She +is destined to go very far, in my opinion." + +"Not too far, I hope," remarked Mr. Lord, with an icy smile. "Olive can +paint on plush and china as much as she likes, but I am not partial to +'careers' for young women." + +"Nor am I; save when the gift is so commanding, so obvious, that it has +to be reckoned with;--but I must not delay my business any longer, nor +keep you from your work. We are having a housewarming this evening at +seven. Olive and Cyril are there now, helping in the preparations, and I +want to know if they may stay to supper, and if you can send for them at +half past nine or ten." + +"Certainly they may stay, though I should think your supper table could +hardly stand the strain." + +"Where there are five already, two more make no difference, save in +better appetite for all," said Mother Carey, smiling and rising. + +"If you will allow me to get my hat and coat I will accompany you to the +main road," said Mr. Lord, going to the front hall, and then opening the +door for Mrs. Carey. "Let me take your parcel, please." + +He did not know in the least why he said it and why he did it. The lady +had interfered with his family affairs to a considerable extent, and had +made several remarks that would have appeared impertinent, had they not +issued from a very winsome, beautiful mouth. Mrs. Ossian Popham or Mrs. +Bill Harmon would have been shown the door for saying less, yet here was +Henry Lord, Ph.D., ambling down the lane by Mother Carey's side, +thinking to himself what a burden she lifted from his shoulders by her +unaccountable interest in his unattractive children. He was also +thinking how "springy" was the lady's step in her short black dress, how +brilliant the chestnut hair looked under the black felt hat, and how +white the skin gleamed above the glossy lynx boa. A kind of mucilaginous +fluid ran in his veins instead of blood, but Henry Lord, Ph.D., had his +assailable side nevertheless, and he felt extraordinarily good natured, +almost as if the third volume were finished, with public and publishers +clamoring for its appearance. + +"I don't know where Olive could have got any such talent as you +describe," he said, as they were walking along the lane. "She had some +lessons long ago, I remember, and her mother used to talk of her amusing +herself with pencil and paint, but I have heard nothing of it +for years." + +"Ask to see her sketches when you are talking with her about her work +some day," suggested Mother Carey. (Stab seven.) "As a matter of fact +she probably gets her talent from you." + +"From me!" Printed letters fail to register the amazement in Professor +Lord's tone. + +"Why not, when you consider her specialty?" + +"_What_ specialty?" + +Really, a slender sword was of no use with this man; a bludgeon was the +only instrument, yet it might wound, and she only wanted to prick. Had +the creature never seen Olive sketching, nor noted her choice +of subjects? + +"She paints animals; paints nothing else, if she can help it; though she +does fairly well with other things. Is it impossible that your study of +zoology--your thought, your absorption for years and years, in the +classification, the structure, the habits of animals--may have been +stamped on your child's mind? She has an ardor equal to your own, only +showing itself in a different manner. You may have passed on, in some +mysterious way, your knowledge to Olive. She may have unconsciously +blended it with some instinct for expression of her own, and it comes +out in pictures. Look at this, Professor Lord. Olive gave it to +me to-day." + +They stood together at the gate leading out into the road, and Mrs. +Carey unwrapped the painting and poised it against the top of the gate. + +Olive's father looked at it for a moment and then said, "I am no judge +of these things, technically or otherwise, but it certainly seems very +creditable work for a girl of Olive's age." + +"Oh, it is surely more than that! My girl Nancy stands there in the +flesh, though her face is hidden. Look at the wind blowing, look at the +delightful, the enchanting calf; above all look at the title! Who in the +world but a little genius could have composed that sketch, breathing +youth in every inch of it,--and called it 'Young April'! Oh! Professor +Lord, I am very bold, because your wife is not living, and it is women +who oftenest see these budding tendencies in children; forgive me, but +do cherish and develop this talent of Olive's." + +The eyes the color of the blue velvet bonnet were turned full upon Henry +Lord, Ph.D. They swam in tears and the color came and went in her cheek; +she was forty, but it was a lovely cheek still. + +"I will think it over," he replied with some embarrassment as he wrapped +the picture again and handed it to her. "Meantime I am certainly very +much obliged to you. You seem to have an uncommon knowledge of young +people. May I ask if you are, or have been, a teacher?" "Oh, no!" Mrs. +Carey remarked with a smile, "I am just a mother,--that's all! +Good night." + + + +XXVII + +THE CAREY HOUSEWARMING + + +The housewarming was at its height, and everybody agreed once in every +ten minutes that it was probably the most beautiful party that had ever +happened in the history of the world. + +Water flowed freely through Cousin Ann's expensive pipes, that had been +buried so deep in their trenches that the winter frosts could not affect +them. Natty Harmon tried the kitchen pump secretly several times during +the evening, for the water had to run up hill all the way from the well +to the kitchen sink, and he believed this to be a continual miracle that +might "give out" at any moment. The stove in the cellar, always alluded +to by Gilbert as the "young furnace," had not yet been used, save by way +of experiment, but it was believed to be a perfect success. To-night +there was no need of extra heat, and there were great ceremonies to be +observed in lighting the fires on the hearthstones. They began with the +one in the family sitting room; Colonel Wheeler, Ralph Thurston, Mr. and +Mrs. Bill Harmon with Natty and Rufus, Mr. and Mrs. Popham with Digby +and Lallie Joy, all standing in admiring groups and thrilling with +delight at the order of events. Mother Carey sat by the fireplace; +little Peter, fairly radiant with excitement, leaning against her knee +and waiting for his own great moment, now close at hand. + +"_When ye come into a house, salute it; and if the house be worthy, let +your peace come upon it_. + +"_To all those who may dwell therein from generation to generation may +it be a house of God, a gate of heaven_. + +"_For every house is builded by some man, but he that built all things +is God, seeing that he giveth to every one of us life and breath and all +good things_." + +Mother Carey spoke these words so simply and naturally, as she looked +towards her neighbors one after another, with her hand resting on +Peter's curly head, that they hardly knew whether to keep quiet or +say Amen. + +"Was that the Bible, Osh?" whispered Bill Harmon. + +"Don't know; 'most everything she says sounds like the Bible or +Shakespeare to me." + +In the hush that followed Mother Carey's salutation Gilbert approached +with a basket over his arm, and quickly and neatly laid a little fire +behind the brass andirons on the hearth. Then Nancy handed Peter a +loosely bound sheaf, saying: "To light this fire I give you a torch. In +it are herbs of the field for health of the body, a fern leaf for grace, +a sprig of elm for peace, one of oak for strength, with evergreen to +show that we live forever in the deeds we have done. To these we have +added rosemary for remembrance and pansies for thoughts." + +Peter crouched on the hearth and lighted the fire in three places, then +handed the torch to Kathleen as he crept again into his mother's lap, +awed into complete silence by the influence of his own mystic rite. +Kathleen waved the torch to and fro as she recited some beautiful lines +written for some such purpose as that which called them +together to-night. + + "Burn, fire, burn! + Flicker, flicker, flame! + Whose hand above this blaze is lifted + Shall be with touch of magic gifted, + To warm the hearts of chilly mortals + Who stand without these open portals. + The touch shall draw them to this fire, + Nigher, nigher, + By desire. + Whoso shall stand on this hearth-stone, + Flame-fanned, + Shall never, never stand alone. + Whose home is dark and drear and old, + Whose hearth is cold, + This is his own. + Flicker, flicker, flicker, flame! + Burn, fire, burn!"[1] + +[Footnote 1: Florence Converse.] + +Next came Olive's turn to help in the ceremonies. Ralph Thurston had +found a line of Latin for them in his beloved Horace: _Tibi splendet +focus_ (For you the hearth-fire shines). Olive had painted the motto on +a long narrow panel of canvas, and, giving it to Mr. Popham, stood by +the fireside while he deftly fitted it into the place prepared for it. +The family had feared that he would tell a good story when he found +himself the centre of attraction, but he was as dumb as Peter, and for +the same reason. + +"Olive has another lovely gift for the Yellow House," said Mother Carey, +rising, "and to carry out the next part of the programme we shall have +to go in procession upstairs to my bedroom." + +"Guess there wan't many idees to give round to other folks after the +Lord made _her_!" exclaimed Bill Harmon to his wife as they went through +the lighted hall. + +Gilbert, at the head of the procession, held Mother Hamilton's picture, +which had been taken from the old brick oven where "my son Tom" had +hidden it. Mother Carey's bedroom, with its bouquets of field flowers on +the wall paper, was gaily lighted and ready to receive the gift. Nancy +stood on a chair and hung the portrait over the fireplace, saying, "We +place this picture here in memory of Agatha, mother of Lemuel Hamilton, +owner of the Yellow House. Underneath it we lay a posy of pressed +daisies, buttercups, and Queen Anne's lace, the wild flowers she +loved best." + +Now Olive took away a green garland covering the words "_Mater Cara_," +that she had painted in brown letters just over the bricks of the +fireplace. The letters were in old English text, and a riot of +buttercups and grasses twined their way amongst them. + +"_Mater Cara_ stands for 'mother dear,'" said Nancy, "and thus this room +will be full of memories of two dear mothers, an absent and a +present one." + +Then Kathleen and Gilbert and Julia, Mother Carey and Peter bowed their +heads and said in chorus: "_O Thou who dwellest in so many homes, +possess thyself of this. Thou who settest the solitary in families, +bless the life that is sheltered here. Grant that trust and peace and +comfort may abide within, and that love and light and usefulness may go +out from this house forever. Amen_." + +There was a moment's silence and then all the party descended the stairs +to the dining room. + +"Ain't they the greatest?" murmured Lallie Joy, turning to her father, +but he had disappeared from the group. + +The dining room was a blaze of glory, and great merriment ensued as they +took their places at the table. Mother Carey poured coffee, Nancy +chocolate, and the others helped serve the sandwiches and cake, +doughnuts and tarts. + +"Where is Mr. Popham?" asked Nancy at the foot of the table. "We cannot +be happy without Mr. Popham." + +At that moment the gentleman entered, bearing a huge object concealed by +a piece of green felt. Approaching the dining table, he carefully placed +the article in the centre and removed the cloth. + +It was the Dirty Boy, carefully mended! + +The guests naturally had no associations with the Carey Curse, and the +Careys themselves were dumb with amazement and despair. + +"I've seen this thing layin' in the barn chamber in a thousand pieces +all summer!" explained Mr. Popham radiantly. "It wan't none o' my +business if the family throwed it away thinkin' it wan't no more good. +Thinks I to myself, I never seen anything Osh Popham couldn't mend if he +took time enough and glue enough; so I carried this little feller home +in a bushel basket one night last month, an' I've spent eleven evenin's +puttin' him together! I don't claim he's good 's new, 'cause he ain't; +but he's consid'able better'n he was when I found him layin' in the +barn chamber!" + +"Thank you, Mr. Popham!" said Mrs. Carey, her eyes twinkling as she +looked at the laughing children. "It was kind of you to spend so much +time in our behalf." + +"Well, I says to myself there's nothin' too good for 'em, an' when it +comes Thanksgivin' I'll give 'em one thing more to be thankful for!" + +"Quit talkin', Pop, will yer?" whispered Digby, nudging his father. +"You've kep' us from startin' to eat 'bout five minutes a'ready, an' I'm +as holler as a horn!" + +It was as cheery, gay, festive, neighborly, and friendly a supper as +ever took place in the dining room of the Yellow House, although +Governor Weatherby may have had some handsomer banquets in his time. +When it was over all made their way into the rosy, bowery, summer +parlor. Soon another fire sparkled and snapped on the hearth, and there +were songs and poems and choruses and Osh Popham's fiddle, to say +nothing of the supreme event of the evening, his rendition of "Fly like +a youthful hart or roe, over the hills where spices grow," to Mother +Carey's accompaniment. He always slipped up his glasses during this +performance and closed his eyes, but neither grey hairs nor "specs" +could dim the radiant smile that made him seem about fifteen years old +and the junior of both his children. + +Mrs. Harmon thought he sang too much, and told her husband privately +that if he was a canary bird she should want to keep a table cover over +his head most of the time, but he was immensely popular with the rest of +his audience. + +Last of all the entire company gathered round the old-fashioned piano +for a parting hymn. The face of the mahogany shone with delight, and why +not, when it was doing everything (almost everything!) within the scope +of a piano, and yet the family had enjoyed weeks of good nourishing +meals on what had been saved by its exertions. Also, what rational +family could mourn the loss of an irregularly shaped instrument standing +on three legs and played on one corner? The tall silver candle sticks +gleamed in the firelight, the silver dish of polished Baldwins blushed +rosier in the glow. Mother Carey played the dear old common metre tune, +and the voices rang out in Whittier's hymn. The Careys all sang like +thrushes, and even Peter, holding his hymn book upside down, put in +little bird notes, always on the key, whenever he caught a +familiar strain. + + "Once more the liberal year laughs out + O'er richer stores than gems or gold; + Once more, with harvest-song and shout + Is Nature's bloodless triumph told." + + "We shut our eyes, the flowers bloom on; + We murmur, but the corn-ears fill; + We choose the shadow, but the sun + That casts it shines behind us still." + + "O favors every year made new! + O gifts with rain and sunshine sent! + The bounty overruns our due, + The fulness shames our discontent." + + + +XXVIII + +"TIBI SPLENDET FOCUS" + + +There was one watcher of all this, and one listener, outside of the +Yellow House, that none of the party suspected, and that was Henry +Lord, Ph.D. + +When he left Mrs. Carey at the gate at five o'clock, he went back to his +own house and ordered his supper to be brought him on a tray in his +study. He particularly liked this, always, as it freed him from all +responsibility of serving his children, and making an occasional remark; +and as a matter of fact everybody was as pleased as he when he ate +alone, the occasional meals Olive and Cyril had by themselves being the +only ones they ever enjoyed or digested. + +He studied and wrote and consulted heavy tomes, and walked up and down +the room, and pulled out colored plates from portfolios, all with great +satisfaction until he chanced to look at the clock when it struck ten. +He had forgotten to send for the children as he had promised Mother +Carey! He went out into the hall and called Mrs. Bangs in a stentorian +voice. No answer. Irritated, as he always was when crossed in the +slightest degree, he went downstairs and found the kitchen empty. + +"Her cub of a nephew has been staying to supper with her, guzzling and +cramming himself at my expense," he thought, "and now she has walked +home with him! It's perfect nonsense to go after a girl of sixteen and a +boy of thirteen. As if they couldn't walk along a country road at ten +o'clock! Still, it may look odd if some one doesn't go, and I can't lock +the house till they come, anyway." + +He drew on his great coat, put on his cap, and started down the lane in +no good humor. It was a crisp, starlight night and the ground was +freezing fast. He walked along, his hands in his pockets, his head bent. +As he went through the gate to the main road he glanced up. The Yellow +House, a third of a mile distant, was a blaze of light! There must have +been a candle or a lamp in every one of its windows, he thought. The +ground rose a little where the house stood, and although it could not be +seen in summer because of the dense foliage everywhere, the trees were +nearly bare now. + +"My handsome neighbor is extravagant," he said to himself with a grim +smile. "Is the illumination for Thanksgiving, I wonder? Oh, no, I +remember she said the party was in the nature of a housewarming." + +As he went up the pathway he saw that the shades were up and no curtains +drawn anywhere. The Yellow House had no intention of hiding its lights +under bushels that evening, of all others; besides, there were no +neighbors within a long distance. + +Standing on the lowest of the governor's "circ'lar steps" he could see +the corner where the group stood singing, with shining faces:-- + + "Once more the liberal year laughs out + O'er richer stores than gems or gold." + +Mother Carey's fine head rose nobly from her simple black dress, and her +throat was as white as the deep lace collar that was her only ornament. + +Nancy he knew by sight, and Nancy in a crimson dress was singing her +thankful heart out. Who was the dark-haired girl standing by her side, +the two with arms round each other's waists,--his own Olive! He had +always thought her unattractive, but her hair was smoothly braided and +her eyes all aglow. Cyril stood between Gilbert and Mother Carey. Cyril, +he knew, could not carry a tune to save his life, but he seemed to be +opening his lips and uttering words all the same. Where was the timid +eye, the "hangdog look," the shrinking manner, he so disliked in his +son? Great Heavens! the boy laid his hand on Mrs. Carey's shoulder and +beat time there gently with a finger, as if a mother's shoulder could be +used for any nice, necessary sort of purpose. + +If he knocked at the door now, he thought, he should interrupt the +party; which was seemingly at its height. He, Henry Lord, Ph.D., +certainly had no intention of going in to join it, not with Ossian +Popham and Bill Harmon as fellow guests. + +He made his way curiously around the outside of the house, looking in at +all the windows, and by choosing various positions, seeing as much as he +could of the different rooms. Finally he went up on the little back +piazza, attracted by the firelight in the family sitting room. There was +a noble fire, and once, while he was looking, Digby Popham stole quietly +in, braced up the logs with a proprietary air, swept up the hearth, +replaced the brass wire screen, and stole out again as quickly as +possible, so that he might not miss too much of the party. + +"They seem to feel pretty much at home," thought Mr. Lord. + +The fire blazed higher and brighter. It lighted up certain words painted +in dark green and gold on the white panel under the mantelpiece. He +pressed his face quite close to the window, thinking that he must be +mistaken in seeing such unconnected letters as T-i-b-i, but gradually +they looked clearer to him and he read distinctly "Tibi splendet focus." + +"Somebody knows his Horace," thought Henry Lord, Ph.D., as he stumbled +off the piazza. "'For you the hearth-fire glows,' I shan't go in; not +with that crew; let them wait; and if it gets too late, somebody else +will walk home with the children." + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +He picked his way along the side of the house to the front, every window +sending out its candle gleam. + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +From dozens of windows the welcome shone. Its gleams and sparkles +positively pursued him as he turned his face towards the road and his +own dark, cheerless house. Perhaps he had better, on the whole, keep one +lamp burning in the lower part after this, to show that the place was +inhabited? + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +He had "bricked up" the fireplace in his study and put an air-tight +stove in, because it was simply impossible to feed an open fire and +write a book at the same time. He didn't know that you could write twice +as good a book in half the time with an open fire to help you! He didn't +know any single one of the myriad aids that can come to you from such +cheery, unexpected sources of grace and inspiration! + +"For you the hearth-fire glows." + +Would the words never stop ringing in his ears? Perhaps, after all, it +would look queer to Mrs. Carey (he cared nothing for Popham or Harmon +opinion) if he left the children to get home by themselves. Perhaps-- + +"FOR YOU THE HEARTH-FIRE GLOWS." + +Henry Lord, Ph.D., ascended the steps, and plied the knocker. Digby +Popham came out of the parlor and opened the front door. + +Everybody listened to see who was the late comer at the party. + +"Will you kindly tell Miss Olive and Master Cyril Lord that their father +has called for them?" + +Mr. Lord's cold, severe voice sounded clearly in the parlor, and every +word could be distinctly heard. + +Gilbert and Nancy were standing together, and Gilbert whispered +instantly to his sister: "The old beast has actually called for Olive +and Cyril!" + +"Hush, Gilly! He must be a 'new beast' or he wouldn't have come at all!" +answered Nancy. + + + +XXIX + +"TH' ACTION FINE" + + +December, January, and February passed with a speed that had something +of magic in it. The Careys had known nothing heretofore of the rigors of +a State o' Maine winter, but as yet they counted it all joy. They were +young and hearty and merry, and the air seemed to give them all new +energy. Kathleen's delicate throat gave no trouble for the first time in +years; Nancy's cheeks bloomed more like roses than ever; Gilbert, +growing broader shouldered and deeper chested daily, simply revelled in +skating and coasting; even Julia was forced into an activity wholly +alien to her nature, because it was impossible for her to keep warm +unless she kept busy. + +Mother Carey and Peter used to look from a bedroom window of a clear +cold morning and see the gay little procession start for the academy. +Over the dazzling snow crust Olive and Cyril Lord would be skimming to +meet the Careys, always at the same point at the same hour. There were +rough red coats and capes, red mittens, squirrel caps pulled well down +over curly and smooth heads; glimpses of red woolen stockings; thick +shoes with rubbers over them; great parcels of books in straps. They +looked like a flock of cardinal birds, Mother Carey thought, as the +upturned faces, all aglow with ruddy color, smiled their morning +good-bye. Gilbert had "stoked" the great stove in the cellar full of +hard wood logs before he left, and Mrs. Carey and Peter had a busy +morning before them with the housework. The family had risen at seven. +Julia had swept and dusted; Kathleen had opened the bedroom windows, +made the washstands tidy, filled the water pitchers, and changed the +towels. Gilbert had carried wood and Peter kindlings, for the fires that +had to be laid on the hearths here and there. Mother had cooked the +plain breakfast while Nancy put the dining room in order and set the +table, and at eight o'clock, when they sat down to plates piled high +with slices of brown and white bread, to dishes of eggs or picked-up cod +fish, or beans warmed over in the pot, with baked potatoes sometimes, +and sometimes milk toast, or Nancy's famous corn muffins, no family of +young bears ever displayed such appetites! On Saturday mornings there +were griddle cakes and maple syrup from their own trees; for Osh Popham +had shown them in the spring how to tap their maples, and collect the +great pails of sap to boil down into syrup. Mother Carey and Peter made +the beds after the departure of the others for school, and it was pretty +to see the sturdy Peter-bird, sometimes in his coat and mittens, +standing on the easiest side of the beds and helping his mother to +spread the blankets and comforters smooth. His fat legs carried him up +and downstairs a dozen times on errands, while his sweet piping voice +was lifted in a never ending stream of genial conversation, as he told +his mother what he had just done, what he was doing at the present +moment, how he was doing it, and what he proposed to do in a minute or +two. Then there was a lull from half past ten to half past eleven, +shortened sometimes on baking days, when the Peter-bird had his lessons. +The old-fashioned kitchen was clean and shining by that time. The stove +glistened and the fire snapped and crackled. The sun beamed in at the +sink window, doing all he could for the climate in the few hours he was +permitted to be on duty in a short New England winter day. Peter sat on +a cricket beside his mother's chair and clasped his "Reading without +Tears" earnestly and rigidly, believing it to be the key to the +universe. Oh! what an hour of happiness to Mother Carey when the boy +would lift the very copy of his father's face to her own; when the +well-remembered smile and the dear twinkle of the eyes in Peter's face +would give her heart a stab of pain that was half joy after all, it was +so full to the brim of sweet memories. In that warm still hour, when she +was filling the Peter-bird's mind and soul with heavenly learning, how +much she learned herself! Love poured from her, through voice and lips +and eyes, and in return she drank it in thirstily from the little +creature who sat there at her knee, a twig growing just as her bending +hand inclined it; all the buds of his nature opening out in the +mother-sunshine that surrounded him. Eleven thirty came all too soon. +Then before long the kettle would begin to sing, the potatoes to bubble +in the saucepan, and Mother Carey's spoon to stir the good things that +had long been sizzling quietly in an iron pot. Sometimes it was bits of +beef, sometimes mutton, but the result was mostly a toothsome mixture of +turnips and carrots and onions in a sea of delicious gravy, with +surprises of meat here and there to vary any possible monotony. Once or +twice a week dumplings appeared, giving an air of excitement to the +meal, and there was a delectable "poor man's stew" learned from Mrs. +Popham; the ingredients being strips of parsnip, potatoes cut in +quarters, a slice or two of sweet browned pork for a flavor, and a quart +of rich milk, mixed with the parsnip juices into an appetizing sauce. +The after part of the dinner would be a dish of baked apples with warm +gingerbread, or sometimes a deep apple pandowdy, or the baked Indian +pudding that was a syrupy, fragrant concoction made of corn meal and +butter and molasses baked patiently in the oven for hours. + + +Mother had the dishes to wash after she had tucked the Peter-bird under +the afghan on the sitting room sofa for his daily nap, but there was +never any grumbling in her heart over the weary days and the +unaccustomed tasks; she was too busy "making things make themselves." If +only there were a little more money! That was her chief anxiety; for the +unexpected, the outside sources of income were growing fewer, and in a +year's time the little hoard would be woefully small. Was she doing all +that she could, she wondered, as her steps flew over the Yellow House +from attic to cellar. She could play the piano and sing; she could speak +three languages and read four; she had made her curtsy at two foreign +courts; admiration and love had followed her ever since she could +remember, and here she was, a widow at forty, living in a half-deserted +New England village, making parsnip stews for her children's dinner. +Well, it was a time of preparation, and its rigors and self-denials must +be cheerfully faced. She ought to be thankful that she was able to get +a simple dinner that her children could eat; she ought to be thankful +that her beef and parsnip stews and cracker puddings and corn bread were +being transmuted into blood and brawn and brain-tissue, to help the +world along somewhere a little later! She ought to be grateful that it +was her blessed fortune to be sending four rosy, laughing, vigorous +young people down the snowy street to the white-painted academy; that it +was her good luck to see four heads bending eagerly over their books +around the evening lamp, and have them all turn to her for help and +encouragement in the hard places. Why should she complain, so long as +the stormy petrels were all working and playing in Mother Carey's water +garden where they ought to be; gathering strength to fly over or dive +under the ice-pack and climb Shiny Wall? There is never any gate in the +wall; Tom the Water Baby had found that out for himself; so it is only +the plucky ones who are able to surmount the thousand difficulties they +encounter on their hazardous journey to Peacepool. How else, if they had +not learned themselves, could Mother Carey's chickens go out over the +seas and show good birds the way home? At such moments Mrs. Carey would +look at her image in the glass and say, "No whimpering, madam! You can't +have the joys of motherhood without some of its pangs! Think of your +blessings, and don't be a coward!-- + + "Who sweeps a room as by God's laws + Makes that and th' action fine." + +Then her eyes would turn from blue velvet to blue steel, and strength +would flow into her from some divine, benignant source and transmute her +into father as well as mother! + +Was the hearth fire kindled in the Yellow House sending its glow through +the village as well as warming those who sat beside it? There were +Christmas and New Year's and St. Valentine parties, and by that time +Bill Harmon saw the woodpile in the Carey shed grow beautifully less. He +knew the price per cord,--no man better; but he and Osh Popham winked at +each other one windy February day and delivered three cords for two, +knowing that measurement of wood had not been included in Mother Carey's +education. Natty Harmon and Digby Popham, following examples a million +per cent better than parental lectures, asked one afternoon if they +shouldn't saw and chop some big logs for the fireplaces. + +Mrs. Carey looked at them searchingly, wondering if they could possibly +guess the state of her finances, concluded they couldn't and said +smilingly: "Indeed I will gladly let you saw for an hour or two if +you'll come and sit by the fire on Saturday night, when we are going to +play spelling games and have doughnuts and root beer." + +The Widow Berry, who kept academy boarders, sent in a luscious mince pie +now and then, and Mrs. Popham and Mrs. Harmon brought dried apples or +pumpkins, winter beets and Baldwin apples. It was little enough, they +thought, when the Yellow House, so long vacant, was like a beacon light +to the dull village; sending out its beams on every side. + +"She ain't no kind of a manager, I'm 'fraid!" said Bill Harmon. "I give +her 'bout four quarts and a half of kerosene for a gallon every time she +sends her can to be filled, but bless you, she ain't any the wiser! I +try to give her as good measure in everything as she gives my children, +but you can't keep up with her! She's like the sun, that shines on the +just 'n' on the unjust. Hen Lord's young ones eat their lunch or their +supper there once or twice a week, though the old skinflint's got fifty +thousand dollars in the bank." + +"Never mind, Bill." said Osh Popham; "there's goin' to be an everlastin' +evenupness somewheres! Probably God A'mighty hez his eye on that woman, +and He'll see her through. The young ones are growin' up, and the +teacher at the academy says they beat the devil on book learnin'! The +boy'll make a smart man, pretty soon, and bring good wages home to his +mother. The girls are handsome enough to pick up husbands as soon as +they've fully feathered out, so it won't be long afore they're all on +the up grade. I've set great store by that family from the outset, and +I'm turrible glad they're goin' to fix up the house some more when it +comes spring. I'm willin' to work cheap for such folks as them." + +"You owe 'em somethin' for listenin' to you, Osh! Seems if they moved +here jest in time to hear your stories when you'd 'bout tuckered out the +rest o' the village!" + +"It's a pity you didn't know a few more stories yourself, Bill," +retorted Mr. Popham; "then you'd be asked up oftener to put on the +back-log for 'em, and pop corn and roast apples and pass the evenin'. I +ain't hed sech a gay winter sence I begun settin' up with Maria, twenty +years ago." + +"She's kept you settin' up ever since, Osh!" chuckled Bill Harmon. + +"She has so!" agreed Osh cheerfully, "but you ain't hardly the one to +twit me of it; bein' as how you've never took a long breath yourself +sence you was married! But you don't ketch me complainin'! It's a poor +rule that won't work both ways! Maria hurried me into poppin' the +question, and hurried me into marryin' her, an' she ain't let up on me a +minute sence then; but she'll railroad me into heaven the same way, you +see if she don't. She'll arrive 'head o' time as usual and stan' right +there at the bars till she gits Dig 'n' Lallie Joy 'n' me under cover!" + +"She's a good woman, an' so's my wife," remarked Bill sententiously; +"an' Colonel Wheeler says good women are so rigged inside that they +can't be agreeable all the time. The couple of 'em are workin' their +fingers to the bone for the school teacher to-day; fixin' him up for all +the world as if he was a bride. He's got the women folks o' this village +kind o' mesmerized, Thurston has." + +"He's a first-rate teacher; nobody that ain't hed experience in the +school room is fitted to jedge jest how good a teacher Ralph Thurston +is, but I have, an' I know what I 'm talkin' about." + +"I never heard nothin' about your teachin' school, Osh." + +"There's a good deal about me you never heard; specially about the time +afore I come to Beulah, 'cause you ain't a good hearer, Bill! I taught +the most notorious school in Digby once, and taught it to a finish; I +named my boy Digby after that school! You see my father an' mother was +determined to give me an education, an' I wa'n't intended for it. I was +a great big, strong, clumsy lunkhead, an' the only thing I could do, +even in a one-horse college, was to play base ball, so they kep' me +along jest for that. I never got further than the second class, an' I +wouldn't 'a' got there if the Faculty hadn't 'a' promoted me jest for +the looks o' the thing. Well Prof. Millard was off in the country +lecturin' somewheres near Bangor an' he met a school superintendent who +told him they was awful hard up for a teacher in Digby. He said they'd +hed three in three weeks an' had lost two stoves besides; for the boys +had fired out the teachers and broke up the stoves an' pitched 'em out +the door after 'em. When Prof. Millard heard the story he says, 'I've +got a young man that could teach that school; a feller named Ossian +Popham.' The superintendent hed an interview with me, an' I says: 'I'll +agree to teach out your nine weeks o' school for a hundred dollars, an' +if I leave afore the last day I won't claim a cent!' 'That's the right +sperit,' says the Supe, an' we struck a bargain then an' there. I was +glad it was Saturday, so 't I could start right off while my blood was +up. I got to Digby on Sunday an' found a good boardin' place. The +trustees didn't examine me, an' 't was lucky for me they didn't. The +last three teachers hed been splendid scholars, but that didn't save the +stoves any, so they just looked at my six feet o' height, an' the muscle +in my arms, an' said they'd drop in sometime durin' the month. 'Look in +any time you like after the first day,' I says. 'I shall be turrible +busy the first day!' + +"I went into the school house early Monday mornin' an' built a good fire +in the new stove. When it was safe to leave it I went into the next +house an' watched the scholars arrive. The lady was a widder with one +great unruly boy in the school, an' she was glad to give me a winder to +look out of. It was a turrible cold day, an' when 't was ten minutes to +nine an' the school room was full I walked in as big as Cuffy. There was +five rows of big boys an' girls in the back, all lookin' as if they was +loaded for bear, an' they graded down to little ones down in front, all +of 'em hitchin' to an' fro in their seats an' snickerin'. I give 'em a +surprise to begin with, for I locked the door when I come in, an' put +the key in my pocket, cool as a cucumber. + +"I never said a word, an' they never moved their eyes away from me. I +took off my fur cap, then my mittens, then my overcoat, an' laid 'em in +the chair behind my desk. Then my undercoat come off, then my necktie +an' collar, an' by that time the big girls begun to look nervous; they +'d been used to addressin', but not undressin', in the school room. Then +I wound my galluses round my waist an' tied 'em; then I says, clear an' +loud:' I'm your new teacher! I'm goin' to have a hundred dollars for +teachin' out this school, an' I intend to teach it out an' git my money. +It's five minutes to nine. I give you just that long to tell me what +you're goin' to do about it. Come on now!' I says, 'all o' you big boys, +if you're comin', an' we'll settle this thing here an' now. We can't hev +fights an' lessons mixed up together every day, more 'n 's necessary; +better decide right now who's boss o' this school. The stove's new an' +I'm new, an' we call'ate to stay here till the end o' the term!' + +"Well, sir, not one o' that gang stirred in their seats, an' not one of +'em yipped! I taught school in my shirt sleeves consid'able the first +week, but I never hed to afterwards. I was a little mite weak on +mathematics, an' the older boys an' girls hed to depend on their study +books for their information,--they never got any from me,--but every +scholar in that Digby school got a hundred per cent in deportment the +nine weeks I taught there!" + + + +XXX + +THE INGLENOOK + + +It was a wild Friday night in March, after days of blustering storms and +drifting snow. Beulah was clad in royal ermine; not only clad, indeed, +but nearly buried in it. The timbers of the Yellow House creaked, and +the wreaths of snow blew against the windows and lodged there. King +Frost was abroad, nipping toes and ears, hanging icicles on the eaves of +houses, and decorating the forest trees with glittering pendants. The +wind howled in the sitting room chimney, but in front of the great +back-log the bed of live coals glowed red and the flames danced high, +casting flickering shadows on the children's faces. It is possible to +bring up a family by steam heat, and it is often necessary, but nobody +can claim that it is either so simple or so delightful as by an +open fire! + +The three cats were all nestled cosily in Nancy's lap or snuggled by her +side. Mother Carey had demurred at two, and when Nancy appeared one day +after school with a third, she spoke, with some firmness, of refusing it +a home. "If we must economize on cats," cried Nancy passionately, "don't +let's begin on this one! She doesn't look it, but she is a heroine. When +the Rideout's house burned down, her kittens were in a basket by the +kitchen stove. Three times she ran in through the flames and brought out +a kitten in her mouth. The tip of her tail is gone, and part of an ear, +and she's blind in one eye. Mr. Harmon says she's too homely to live; +now what do you think?" + +"I think nobody pretending to be a mother could turn her back on another +mother like that," said Mrs. Carey promptly. "We'll take a pint more +milk, and I think you children will have to leave something in your +plates now and then, you polish them until it really is indecent." + +To-night an impromptu meeting of the Ways and Means Committee was taking +place by the sitting room fire, perhaps because the family plates had +been polished to a terrifying degree that week. + +"Children," said Mother Carey, "we have been as economical as we knew +how to be; we have worked to the limit of our strength; we have spent +almost nothing on clothing, but the fact remains that we have scarcely +money enough in our reserve fund to last another six months. What +shall we do?" + +Nancy leaped to her feet, scattering cats in every direction. + +"Mother Carey!" she exclaimed remorsefully. "You haven't mentioned money +since New Year's, and I thought we were rubbing along as usual. The +bills are all paid; what's the matter?" + +"That is the matter!" answered Mrs. Carey with the suspicion of a tear +in her laughing voice, "The bills _are_ paid, and there's too little +left! We eat so much, and we burn so much wood, and so many gallons +of oil'" + +"The back of the winter's broken, mother dear!" said Gilbert, as a +terrific blast shook the blinds as a terrier would a rat. "Don't listen +to that wind; it 's only a March bluff! Osh Popham says snow is the poor +man's manure; he says it's going to be an early season and a grand hay +crop. We'll get fifty dollars for our field." + +"That will be in July, and this is March," said his mother. "Still, the +small reversible Van Twiller will carry us through May, with our other +income. But the saving days are over, and the earning days have come, +dears! I am the oldest and the biggest, I must begin." + +"Never!" cried Nancy. "You slave enough for us, as it is, but you shall +never slave for anybody else; shall she, Gilly?" + +"Not if I know it!" answered Gilbert with good ringing emphasis. + +"Another winter I fear we must close the Yellow House and--" + +The rest of Mother Carey's remark was never heard, for at Nancy's given +signal the four younger Careys all swooned on the floor. Nancy had +secretly trained Peter so that he was the best swooner of the family, +and his comical imitation of Nancy was so mirth-compelling that Mother +Carey laughed and declared there was no such thing as talking seriously +to children like hers. + +"But, Muddy dear, you weren't in earnest?" coaxed Nancy, bending her +bright head over her mother's shoulder and cuddling up to her side; +whereupon Gilbert gave his imitation of a jealous puppy; barking, +snarling, and pushing his frowzly pate under his mother's arm to crowd +Nancy from her point of vantage, to which she clung valiantly. Of course +Kitty found a small vacant space on which she could festoon herself, and +Peter promptly climbed on his mother's lap, so that she was covered +with--fairly submerged in--children! A year ago Julia used to creep away +and look at such exhibitions of family affection, with a curling lip, +but to-night, at Mother Carey's outstretched hand and smothered cry of +"Help, Judy!" she felt herself gathered into the heart of the laughing, +boisterous group. That hand, had she but known it, was stretched out to +her because only that day a letter had come, saying that Allan Carey was +much worse and that his mental condition admitted of no cure. He was +bright and hopeful and happy, so said Mr. Manson;--forever sounding the +praises of the labor-saving device in which he had sunk his last +thousands. "We can manufacture it at ten cents and sell it for ten +dollars," he would say, rubbing his hands excitedly. "We can pay fifty +dollars a month office rent and do a business of fifty thousand dollars +a year!" "And I almost believe we could!" added Mr. Manson, "if we had +faith enough and capital enough!" + +"Of course you know, darlings, I would never leave Beulah save for the +coldest months; or only to earn a little money," said Mrs. Carey, +smoothing her dress, flattening her collar, and pinning up the braids +that Nancy's hugs had loosened. + +"I must put my mind on the problem at once," said Nancy, pacing the +floor. "I've been so interested in my Virgil, so wrapped up in my +rhetoric and composition, that I haven't thought of ways and means for a +month, but of course we will never leave the Yellow House, and of course +we must contrive to earn money enough to live in it. We must think about +it every spare minute till vacation comes; then we'll have nearly four +months to amass a fortune big enough to carry us through the next year. +I have an idea for myself already. I was going to wait till my +seventeenth birthday, but that's four months away and it's too long. I'm +old enough to begin any time. I feel old enough to write my +Reminiscences this minute." + +"You might publish your letters to the American Consul in Breslau; +they'd make a book!" teased Gilbert. + +"Very likely I shall, silly Gilly," retorted Nancy, swinging her mane +haughtily. "It isn't every girl who has a monthly letter from an Admiral +in China and a Consul in Germany." + +"You wouldn't catch me answering the Queen of Sheba's letters or the +Empress of India's," exclaimed Gilbert, whose pen was emphatically less +mighty than his sword. "Hullo, you two! what are you whispering about?" +he called to Kathleen and Julia, who were huddled together in a far +corner of the long room, gesticulating eloquently. + +"We've an idea! We've an idea! We've found a way to help!" sang the two +girls, pirouetting back into the circle of firelight. "We won't tell +till it's all started, but it's perfectly splendid, and practical too." + +"And so ladylike!" added Julia triumphantly. + +"How much?" asked Gilbert succinctly. + +The girls whispered a minute or two, and appeared to be multiplying +twenty-five first by fifteen, and then again by twenty. + +"From three dollars and seventy-five cents to four dollars and a half a +week according to circumstances!" answered Kathleen proudly. + +"Will it take both of you?" + +"Yes." + +"All your time?" + +More nods and whispers and calculation. + +"No, indeed; only three hours a day." + +"Any of my time?" + +"Just a little." + +"I thought so!" said Gilbert loftily. "You always want me and my hammer +or my saw; but I'll be busy on my own account; you'll have to paddle +your own canoe!" + +"You'll be paid for what you do for us," said Julia slyly, giving +Kathleen a poke, at which they both fell into laughter only possible to +the very young. + +Then suddenly there came a knock at the front door; a stamping of feet +on the circular steps, and a noise of shaking off snow. + +"Go to the door, Gilbert; who can that be on a night like +this,--although it is only eight o'clock after all! Why, it's Mr. +Thurston!" + +Ralph Thurston came in blushing and smiling, glad to be welcomed, +fearful of intruding, afraid of showing how much he liked to be there. + +"Good-evening, all!" he said. "You see I couldn't wait to thank you, +Mrs. Carey! No storm could keep me away to-night." + +"What has mother been doing, now?" asked Nancy. "Her right hand is +forever busy, and she never tells her left hand a thing, so we children +are always in the dark." + +"It was nothing much," said Mrs. Carey, pushing the young man gently +into the high-backed rocker. "Mrs. Harmon, Mrs. Popham, and I simply +tried to show our gratitude to Mr. Thurston for teaching our troublesome +children." + +"How did you know it was my birthday?" asked Thurston. + +"Didn't you write the date in Lallie Joy's book?" + +"True, I did; and forgot it long ago; but I have never had my birthday +noticed before, and I am twenty-four!" + +"It was high time, then!" said Mother Carey with her bright smile. + +"But what did mother do?" clamored Nancy, Kathleen and Gilbert in +chorus. + +"She took my forlorn, cheerless room and made it into a home for me," +said Thurston. "Perhaps she wanted me to stay in it a little more, and +bother her less! At any rate she has created an almost possible rival to +the Yellow House!" + +Ralph Thurston had a large, rather dreary room over Bill Harmon's store, +and took his meals at the Widow Berry's, near by. He was an orphan and +had no money to spend on luxuries, because all his earnings went to pay +the inevitable debts incurred when a fellow is working his way +through college. + +Mrs. Carey, with the help of the other two women, had seized upon this +stormy Friday, when the teacher always took his luncheon with him to the +academy, to convert Ralph's room into something comfortable and +cheerful. The old, cracked, air-tight stove had been removed, and Bill +Harmon had contributed a second-hand Franklin, left with him for a bad +debt. It was of soapstone and had sliding doors in front, so that the +blaze could be disclosed when life was very dull or discouraging. The +straw matting on the floor had done very well in the autumn, but Mrs. +Carey now covered the centre of the room with a bright red drugget left +from the Charlestown house-furnishings, and hung the two windows with +curtains of printed muslin. Ossian Popham had taken a clotheshorse and +covered it with red felting, so that the screen, so evolved could be +made to hide the bed and washstand. Ralph's small, rickety table had +been changed for a big, roomy one of pine, hidden by the half of an old +crimson piano cloth. When Osh had seen the effect of this he hurried +back to his barn chamber and returned with some book shelves that he had +hastily glued and riveted into shape. These he nailed to the wall and +filled with books that he found in the closet, on the floor, on the foot +of the bed, and standing on the long, old-fashioned mantel shelf. + +"Do you care partic'larly where you set, nights, Ossian?" inquired Mrs. +Popham, who was now in a state of uncontrolled energy bordering on +delirium. "Because your rockin' chair has a Turkey red cushion and it +would look splendid in Mr. Thurston's room. You know you fiddle 'bout +half the time evenin's, and you always go to bed early." + +"Don't mind me!" exclaimed Ossian facetiously, starting immediately for +the required chair and bringing back with it two huge yellow sea shells, +which he deposited on the floor at each end of the hearth rug. + +"How do you like 'em?" he inquired of Mrs. Carey. + +"Not at all," she replied promptly. + +"You don't?" he asked incredulously. "Well, it takes all kinds o' folks +to make a world! I've been keepin' 'em fifteen years, hopin' I'd get +enough more to make a border for our parlor fireplace, and now you don't +take to 'em! Back they go to the barn chamber, Maria; Mis' Carey's +bossin' this job, and she ain't got no taste for sea shells. Would you +like an old student lamp? I found one that I can bronze up in about two +minutes if Mis' Harmon can hook a shade and chimbly out of Bill's stock." + +They all stayed in the room until this last feat was accomplished; +stayed indeed until the fire in the open stove had died down to ruddy +coals. Then they pulled down the shades, lighted the lamp, gave one last +admiring look, and went home. + +It had meant only a few hours' thought and labor, with scarcely a penny +of expense, but you can judge what Ralph Thurston felt when he entered +the door out of the storm outside. To him it looked like a room conjured +up by some magician in a fairy tale. He fell into the rocking-chair and +looked at his own fire; gazed about at the cheerful crimson glow that +radiated from the dazzling drugget, in a state of puzzled ecstasy, till +he caught sight of a card lying near the lamp,--"A birthday present +from three mothers who value your work for their boys and girls." + +He knew Mrs. Carey's handwriting, so he sped to the Yellow House as soon +as his supper was over, and now, in the presence of the whole family, he +felt tongue-tied and wholly unable to express his gratitude. + +It was bed time, and the young people melted away from the fireside. + +"Kiss your mother good-night, sweet Pete," said Nancy, taking the +reluctant cherub by the hand. "'_Hoc opus, hic labor est_,' Mr. +Thurston, to get the Peter-bird upstairs when once he is down. Shake +hands with your future teacher, Peter; no, you mustn't kiss him; little +boys don't kiss great Latin scholars unless they are asked." + +Thurston laughed and lifted the gurgling Peter high in the air. "Good +night, old chap!" he said "Hurry up and come to school!" + +"I'm 'bout ready now!" piped Peter. "I can read +'Up-up-my-boy-day-is-not-the-time-for-sleep-the-dew-will-soon-be-gone' +with the book upside down,--can't I, Muddy?" + +"You can, my son; trot along with sister." + +Thurston opened the door for Nancy, and his eye followed her for a +second as she mounted the stairs. She glowed like a ruby to-night in her +old red cashmere. The sparkle of her eye, the gloss of her hair, the +soft red of her lips, the curve and bend of her graceful young body +struck even her mother anew, though she was used to her daughter's +beauty. "She is growing!" thought Mrs. Carey wistfully. "I see it all at +once, and soon others will be seeing it!" + +Alas! young Ralph Thurston had seen it for weeks past! He was not +perhaps so much in love with Nancy the girl, as he was with Nancy the +potential woman. Some of the glamour that surrounded the mother had +fallen upon the daughter. One felt the influences that had rained upon +Nancy ever since she had come into the world, One could not look at her, +nor talk with her, without feeling that her mother--like a vine in the +blood, as the old proverb says--was breathing, growing, budding, +blossoming in her day by day. + +The young teacher came back to the fireplace, where Mother Carey was +standing in a momentary brown study. + +"I've never had you alone before," he stammered, "and now is my chance +to tell you what you've been to me ever since I came to Beulah." + +"You have helped me in my problems more than I can possibly have aided +you," Mrs. Carey replied quietly. "Gilbert was so rebellious about +country schools, so patronizing, so scornful of their merits, that I +fully expected he would never stay at the academy of his own free will. +You have converted him, and I am very grateful." + +"Meantime I am making a record there," said Ralph, "and I have this +family to thank for it! Your children, with Olive and Cyril Lord, have +set the pace for the school, and the rest are following to the best of +their ability. There is not a shirk nor a dunce in the whole roll of +sixty pupils! Beulah has not been so proud of its academy for thirty +years, and I shall come in for the chief share in the praise. I am +trying to do for Gilbert and Cyril what an elder brother would do, but I +should have been powerless if I had not had this home and this fireside +to inspire me!" + +"_Tibi splendet focus_!" quoted Mrs. Carey, pointing to Olive's +inscription under the mantelpiece. "For you the hearth fire glows!" + +"Have I not felt it from the beginning?" asked Ralph. "I never knew my +mother, Mrs. Carey, and few women have come into my life; I have been +too poor and too busy to cultivate their friendship. Then I came to +Beulah and you drew me into your circle; admitted an unknown, friendless +fellow into your little group! It was beautiful; it was wonderful!" + +"What are mothers for, but to do just that, and more than all, for the +motherless boys?" + +"Well, I may never again have the courage to say it, so just believe me +when I say your influence will be the turning-point in my life. I will +never, so help me God, do anything to make me unworthy to sit in this +fireglow! So long as I have brains and hands to work with, I will keep +striving to create another home like this when my time comes. Any girl +that takes me will get a better husband because of you; any children I +may be blessed with will have a better father because I have known you. +Don't make any mistake, dear Mrs. Carey, your hearth fire glows a long, +long distance!" + +Mother Carey was moved to the very heart. She leaned forward and took +Ralph Thurston's young face, thin with privation and study, in her two +hands. He bent his head instinctively, partly to hide the tears that had +sprung to his eyes, and she kissed his forehead simply and tenderly. He +was at her knees on the hearth rug in an instant; all his boyish +affection laid at her feet; all his youthful chivalry kindled at the +honor of her touch. + +And there are women in the world who do not care about being mothers! + + + +XXXI + +GROOVES OF CHANGE + + +The winter passed. The snow gradually melted in the meadows and the +fields, which first grew brown and then displayed patches of green here +and there where the sun fell strongest. There was deep, sticky mud in +the roads, and the discouraged farmers urged their horses along with the +wheels of their wagons sunk to the hub in ooze. Then there were wet +days, the wind ruffling the leaden surface of the river, the sound of +the rain dripping from the bare tree-boughs, the smell of the wet grass +and the clean, thirsty soil. Milder weather came, then blustery days, +then chill damp ones, but steadily life grew, here, there, everywhere, +and the ever-new miracle of the awakening earth took place once again. +Sap mounted in the trees, blood coursed in the children's veins, mothers +began giving herb tea and sulphur and molasses, young human nature was +restless; the whole creation throbbed and sighed, and was tremulous, and +had growing pains. + +April passed, with all its varying moods of sun and shower, and settled +weather came. + + All the earth was gay. + Land and sea + Gave themselves up to jollity + And with the heart of May + Did every Beast keep holiday. + +The Carey girls had never heard of "the joy of living" as a phrase, but +oh! they knew a deal about it in these first two heavenly springs in +little Beulah village! The sunrise was so wonderful; the trees and grass +so marvellously green; the wild flowers so beautiful! Then the river on +clear days, the glimpse of the sea from Beulah's hill tops, the walks in +the pine woods,--could Paradise show anything to compare? + +And how good the food tasted; and the books they read, how fresh, how +moving, how glorious! Then when the happy day was over, sleep came +without pause or effort the moment the flushed cheek touched the +cool pillow. + +"These," Nancy reflected, quoting from her favorite Wordsworth as she +dressed beside her open window, "These must be + + "The gifts of morn, + Ere life grows noisy and slower-footed thought + Can overtake the rapture of the sense. + +"I was fifteen and a half last spring, and now, though it is only a year +ago, everything is different!" she mused. "When did it get to be +different, I wonder? It never was all at once, so it must have been a +little every day, so little that I hardly noticed it until just now." + +A young girl's heart is ever yearning for and trembling at the future. +In its innocent depths the things that are to be are sometimes rustling +and whispering secrets, and sometimes keeping an exquisite, haunting +silence. In the midst of the mystery the solemn young creature is +sighing to herself, "What am I meant for? Am I everything? Am I nothing? +Must I wait till my future comes to me, or must I seek it?" + +This was all like the sound of a still, small voice in Nancy's mind, but +it meant that she was "growing up," taking hold on life at more points +than before, seeing new visions, dreaming new dreams. Kathleen and Julia +seemed ridiculously young to her. She longed to advise them, but her +sense of humor luckily kept her silent. Gilbert appeared crude, raw; +promising, but undeveloped; she hated to think how much experience he +would have to pass through before he could see existence as it really +was, and as she herself saw it. Olive's older view of things, her sad, +strange outlook upon life, her dislike of anything in the shape of man, +her melancholy aversion to her father, all this fascinated and puzzled +Nancy, whose impetuous nature ran out to every living thing, revelling +in the very act of loving, so long as she did not meet rebuff. + +Cyril perplexed her. Silent, unresponsive, shy, she would sometimes +raise her eyes from her book in school and find him gazing steadily at +her like a timid deer drinking thirstily at a spring. Nancy did not like +Cyril, but she pitied him and was as friendly with him, in her offhand, +boyish fashion, as she was with every one. + +The last days of the academy term were close at hand, and the air was +full of graduation exercises and white muslin and ribbon sashes. June +brought two surprises to the Yellow House. One morning Kathleen burst +into Nancy's room with the news: "Nancy! The Fergusons offer to adopt +Judy, and she doesn't want to go. Think of that! But she's afraid to ask +mother if she can stay. Let's us do it; shall we?" + +"I will; but of course there is not enough money to go around, Kitty, +even if we all succeed in our vacation plans. Julia will never have any +pretty dresses if she stays with us, and she loves pretty dresses. Why +didn't the Fergusons adopt her before mother had made her over?" + +"Yes," chimed in Kathleen. "Then everybody would have been glad, but now +we shall miss her! Think of missing Judy! We would never have +believed it!" + +"It's like seeing how a book turns out, to watch her priggishness and +smuggishness all melting away," Nancy said. "I shouldn't like to see her +slip back into the old Judyisms, and neither would mother. Mother'll +probably keep her, for I know Mr. Manson thinks it's only a matter of a +few months before Uncle Allan dies." + +"And mother wouldn't want a Carey to grow up into an imitation Gladys +Ferguson; but that's what Judy would be, in course of time." + +Julia took Mrs. Ferguson's letter herself to her Aunt Margaret, showing +many signs of perturbation in her usually tranquil face. + +Mrs. Carey read it through carefully. "It is a very kind, generous +offer, Julia. Your father cannot be consulted about it, so you must +decide. You would have every luxury, and your life would be full of +change and pleasure; while with us it must be, in the nature of things, +busy and frugal for a long time to come." + +"But I am one more to feed and clothe, Aunt Margaret, and there is so +little money!" + +"I know, but you are one more to help, after all. The days are soon +coming when Nancy and Gilbert will be out in the world, helping +themselves. You and Kathleen could stay with Peter and me, awaiting your +turn. It doesn't look attractive in comparison with what the Fergusons +offer you!" + +Then the gentle little rivers that had been swelling all the past year +in Julia's heart, rivers of tenderness and gratitude and sympathy, +suddenly overflowed their banks and, running hither and thither, +softened everything with which they came in contact. Rocky places +melted, barren spots waked into life, and under the impulse of a new +mood that she scarcely understood Julia cried, "Oh! dear Aunt Margaret, +keep me, keep me! This is home; I never want to leave it! I want to be +one of Mother Carey's chickens!" + +The child had flung herself into the arms that never failed anybody, and +with tears streaming down her cheeks made her plea. + +"There, there, Judy dear; you are one of us, and we could not let you go +unless you were to gain something by it. If you really want to stay we +shall love you all the better, and you will belong to us more than you +ever did; so dry your eyes, or you will be somebody's duckling instead +of my chicken!" + +The next surprise was a visit from Cousin Ann Chadwick, who drove up to +the door one morning quite unannounced, and asked the driver of the +depot wagon to bring over her two trunks immediately. + +"Two trunks!" groaned Gilbert. "That means the whole season!" + +But it meant nothing of the kind; it meant pretty white dresses for the +three girls, two pairs of stockings and two of gloves for the whole +family, a pattern of black silk for Mrs. Carey, and numberless small +things to which the Carey wardrobe had long been a stranger. + +Having bestowed these offerings rather grimly, as was her wont, and +having received the family's grateful acknowledgments with her usual +lack of grace, she proceeded in the course of a few days to make herself +far more disagreeable than had been the case on any previous visit of +her life. She had never seen such dusty roads as in Beulah; so many +mosquitoes and flies; such tough meat; such a lack of fruit, such +talkative, over-familiar neighbors, such a dull minister, such an +inattentive doctor, such extortionate tradesmen. + +"What shall we do with Cousin Ann!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey to Nancy in +despair. "She makes us these generous presents, yet she cannot possibly +have any affection for us. We accept them without any affection for her, +because we hardly know how to avoid it. The whole situation is +positively degrading! I have borne it for years because she was good to +your father when he was a boy, but now that she has grown so much more +difficult I really think I must talk openly with her." + +"She talked openly enough with me when I confessed that Gilbert and I +had dropped and broken the Dirty Boy!" said Nancy, "and she has been +very cross with me ever since." + +"Cousin Ann," said Mrs. Carey that afternoon on the piazza, "it is very +easy to see that you do not approve of the way we live, or the way we +think about things in general. Feeling as you do, I really wish you +would not spend your money on us, and give us these beautiful and +expensive presents. It puts me under an obligation that chafes me and +makes me unhappy." + +"I don't disapprove of you, particularly," said Miss Chadwick. "Do I act +as if I did?" + +"Your manner seems to suggest it." + +"You can't tell much by manners," replied Cousin Ann. "I think you're +entirely too soft and sentimental, but we all have our faults. I don't +think you have any right to feed the neighbors and burn up fuel and oil +in their behalf when you haven't got enough for your own family. I think +you oughtn't to have had four children, and having had them you needn't +have taken another one in, though she's turned out better than I +expected. But all that is none of my business, I suppose, and, +wrong-headed as you are, I like you better than most folks, which isn't +saying much." + +"But if you don't share my way of thinking, why do you keep fretting +yourself to come and see us? It only annoys you." + +"It annoys me, but I can't help coming, somehow. I guess I hate other +places and other ways worse than I do yours. You don't grudge me bed and +board, I suppose?" + +"How could I grudge you anything when you give us so much,--so much more +than we ought to accept, so much more than we can ever thank you for?" + +"I don't want to be thanked; you know that well enough; but there's so +much demonstration in your family you can't understand anybody's keeping +themselves exclusive. I don't like to fuss over people or have them fuss +over me. Kissing comes as easy to you as eating, but I never could abide +it. A nasty, common habit, I call it! I want to give what I like and +where and when I like, and act as I'm a mind to afterwards. I don't give +because I see things are needed, but because I can't spend my income +unless I do give. If I could have my way I'd buy you a good house in +Buffalo, right side of mine; take your beggarly little income and manage +it for you; build a six-foot barbed wire fence round the lot so 't the +neighbors couldn't get in and eat you out of house and home, and in a +couple of years I could make something out of your family!" + +Mrs. Carey put down her sewing, leaned her head back against the crimson +rambler, and laughed till the welkin rang. + +"I suppose you think I'm crazy?" Cousin Ann remarked after a moment's +pause. + +"I don't know, Cousin Ann," said Mrs. Carey, taking up her work again. +"Whatever it is, you can't help it! If you'll give up trying to +understand my point of view, I won't meddle with yours!" + +"I suppose you won't come to Buffalo?" + +"No indeed, thank you, Cousin Ann!" + +"You'll stay here, in this benighted village, and grow old,--you that +are a handsome woman of forty and might have a millionaire husband to +take care of you?" + +"My husband had money enough to please me, and when I meet him again and +show him the four children, he will be the richest man in Paradise." + +Cousin Ann rose. "I'm going to-morrow, and I shan't be back this year. +I've taken passage on a steamer that's leaving for Liverpool next week!" + +"Going abroad! Alone, Cousin Ann?" + +"No, with a party of Cook's tourists." + +"What a strange idea!" exclaimed Mrs. Carey. + +"I don't see why; 'most everybody's been abroad. I don't expect to like +the way they live over there, but if other folks can stand it, I guess I +can. It'll amuse me for a spell, maybe, and if it don't, I've got money +enough to break away and do as I'm a mind to." + +The last evening was a pleasant, friendly one, every Carey doing his or +her best to avoid risky subjects and to be as agreeable as possible. +Cousin Ann Chadwick left next day, and Mrs. Carey, bidding the strange +creature good-bye, was almost sorry that she had ever had any +arguments with her. + +"It will be so long before I see you again, Cousin Ann, I was on the +point of kissing you,--till I remembered!" she said with a smile as she +stood at the gate. + +"I don't know as I mind, for once," said Miss Chadwick. "If anybody's +got to kiss me I'd rather it would be you than anybody!" + +She drove away, her two empty trunks in the back of the wagon. She +sailed for Liverpool the next week and accompanied her chosen party to +the cathedral towns of England. There, in a quiet corner of York +Minster, as the boy choir was chanting its anthems, her heart, an organ +she had never been conscious of possessing, gave one brief sudden +physical pang and she passed out of what she had called life. Neither +her family affairs nor the names of her relations were known, and the +news of her death did not reach far-away Beulah till more than two +months afterward, and with it came the knowledge that Cousin Ann +Chadwick had left the income of five thousand dollars to each of the +five Carey children, with five thousand to be paid in cash to Mother +Carey on the settlement of the estate. + + + +XXXII + +DOORS OF DARING + + +Little the Careys suspected how their fortunes were mending, during +those last days of June! Had they known, they might almost have been +disappointed, for the spur of need was already pricking them, and their +valiant young spirits longed to be in the thick of the fray. Plans had +been formed for the past week, many of them in secret, and the very next +day after the close of the academy, various business projects would +burst upon a waiting world. One Sunday night Mother Carey had read to +the little group a poem in which there was a verse that struck on their +ears with a fine spirit:-- + + "And all the bars at which we fret, + That seem to prison and control, + Are but the doors of daring set + Ajar before the soul." + +They recited it over and over to themselves afterwards, and two or three +of them wrote it down and pinned it to the wall, or tucked it in the +frame of the looking glass. + + +Olive Lord knocked at her father's study door the morning of the +twenty-first of June. Walking in quietly she said, "Father, yesterday +was my seventeenth birthday. Mother left me a letter to read on that +day, telling me that I should have fifty dollars a month of my own when +I was seventeen, Cyril to have as much when he is the same age." + +"If you had waited courteously and patiently for a few days you would +have heard this from me," her father answered. + +"I couldn't be sure!" Olive replied. "You never did notice a birthday; +why should you begin now?" + +"I have more important matters to take up my mind than the consideration +of trivial dates," her father answered. "You know that very well, and +you know too, that notwithstanding my absorbing labors, I have +endeavored for the last few months to give more of my time to you +and Cyril." + +"I realize that, or I should not speak to you at all," said Olive. "It +is because you have shown a little interest in us lately that I consult +you. I want to go at once to Boston to study painting. I will deny +myself everything else, if necessary, but I will go, and I will study! +It is the only life I care for, the only life I am likely to have, and I +am determined to lead it." + +"You must see that you are too young to start out for yourself anywhere; +it is simply impossible." + +"I shall not be alone. Mrs. Carey will find me a good home in +Charlestown, with friends of hers. You trust her judgment, if no +one else's." + +"If she is charitable enough to conduct your foolish enterprises as well +as those of her own children, I have nothing to say. I have talked with +her frequently, and she knows that as soon as I have finished my last +volume I shall be able to take a more active interest in your affairs +and Cyril's." + +"Then may I go?" + +"When I hear from the person in Charlestown, yes. There is an expedition +starting for South America in a few months and I have been asked to +accompany the party. If you are determined to leave home I shall be free +to accept the invitation. Perhaps Mrs. Carey would allow Cyril to stay +with her during my absence." + +"I dare say, and I advise you to go to South America by all means; you +will be no farther away from your family than you have always been!" +With this parting shot Olive Lord closed the study door behind her. + +"That girl has the most unpleasant disposition, and the sharpest tongue, +I ever met in the course of my life!" said Henry Lord to himself as he +turned to his task. + +Mother Carey's magic was working very slowly in his blood. It had roused +him a little from the bottomless pit of his selfishness, but much +mischief had been done on all sides, and it would be a work of time +before matters could be materially mended. Olive's nature was already +warped and embittered, and it would require a deal of sunshine to make a +plant bloom that had been so dwarfed by neglect and indifference. + +Nancy's door of daring opened into an editorial office. An hour here, an +hour there, when the Yellow House was asleep, had brought about a story +that was on its way to a distant city. It was written, with incredible +care, on one side of the paper only; it enclosed a fully stamped +envelope for a reply or a return of the manuscript, and all day long +Nancy, trembling between hope and despair, went about hugging her first +secret to her heart. + +Gilbert had opened his own particular door, and if it entailed no more +daring than that of Nancy's effort, it required twice the amount of +self-sacrifice. He was to be, from June twenty-seventh till August +twenty-seventh, Bill Harmon's post-office clerk and delivery boy, and +the first that the family would know about it would be his arrival at +the back door, in a linen jacket, with an order-book in his hand. Bravo, +Gilly! One can see your heels disappearing over the top of Shiny Wall! + +The door of daring just ready to be opened by Kathleen and Julia was of +a truly dramatic and unexpected character. + +Printed in plain letters, twenty-five circulars reposed in the folds of +Julia's nightdresses in her lower bureau drawer. The last thing to be +done at night and the first in the morning was the stealthy, whispered +reading of one of these documents, lest even after the hundredth time, +something wrong should suddenly appear to the eye or ear. They were +addressed, they were stamped, and they would be posted to twenty-five +families in the neighborhood on the closing day of the academy. + + + SUMMER VACATION SCHOOL + + The Misses Kathleen and Julia Carey announce the opening of + classes for private instruction on July 1st, from two to four + o'clock daily in the + + Hamilton Barn. + + Faculty. + + Miss Kathleen Carey Reading & Elocution 2 P.M. + Miss Julia Carey Dancing, Embroidery 2-30 P.M. + Mrs. Peter Carey Vocal Music, Part Singing 3 P.M. + Miss Nancy Carey Composition 4 P.M. + Mr. Gilbert Carey Wood carving, Jig Sawing, Manual + Training from 4 to 5 Fridays only. + + Terms cash. 25 cents a week. + + N. B. Children prepared for entrance to the academy at special prices. + + +Meantime the Honorable Lemuel Hamilton had come to America, and was +opening doors of daring at such a rate of speed that he hardly realized +the extent of his own courage and what it involved. He accepted an +official position of considerable honor and distinction in Washington, +rented a house there, and cabled his wife and younger daughter to come +over in September. He wrote his elder daughter that she might go with +some friends to Honolulu if she would return for Christmas. ("It's +eleven years since we had a Christmas tree," he added, "and the first +thing you know we shall have lost the habit!") + +To his son Jack in Texas he expressed himself as so encouraged by the +last business statement, which showed a decided turn for the better, +that he was willing to add a thousand dollars to the capital and +irrigate some more of the unimproved land on the ranch. + +"If Jack has really got hold out there, he can come home every two or +three years," he thought. "Well, perhaps I shall succeed in getting part +of them together, part of the time, if I work hard enough; all but Tom, +whom I care most about! Now that everything is in train I'll take a +little vacation myself, and go down to Beulah to make the acquaintance +of those Careys. If I had ever contemplated returning to America I +suppose I shouldn't have allowed them to settle down in the old house, +still, Eleanor would never have been content to pass her summers there, +so perhaps it is just as well." + +The Peter-bird was too young to greatly dare; still it ought perhaps to +be set down that he sold three dozen marbles and a new kite to Billy +Harmon that summer, and bought his mother a birthday present with the +money. All Peter's "doors of daring" had hitherto opened into places +from which he issued weeping, with sprained ankles, bruised hands, +skinned knees or burned eyelashes. + + + +XXXIII + +MOTHER HAMILTON'S BIRTHDAY + + +It was the Fourth of July; a hot, still day when one could fairly see +the green peas swelling in their pods and the string beans climbing +their poles like acrobats! Young Beulah had rung the church bell at +midnight, cast its torpedoes to earth in the early morning, flung its +fire-crackers under the horses' feet, and felt somewhat relieved of its +superfluous patriotism by breakfast time. Then there was a parade of +Antiques and Horribles, accompanied by the Beulah Band, which, though +not as antique, was fully as horrible as anything in the procession. + +From that time on, the day had been somnolent, enlivened in the Carey +household only by the solemn rite of paying the annual rent of the +Yellow House. The votive nosegay had been carefully made up, and laid +lovingly by Nancy under Mother Hamilton's portrait, in the presence not +only of the entire family, but also of Osh Popham, who had called to +present early radishes and peppergrass. + +"I'd like to go upstairs with you when you get your boquet tied up," he +said, "because it's an awful hot day, an' the queer kind o' things you +do 't this house allers makes my backbone cold! I never suspicioned that +Lena Hamilton hed the same kind o' fantasmic notions that you folks +have, but I guess it's like tenant, like landlord, in this case! Anyhow, +I want to see the rent paid, if you don't mind. I wish't you'd asked +that mean old sculpin of a Hen Lord over; he owns my house an' it might +put a few idees into his head!" + +In the afternoon Nancy took her writing pad and sat on the circular +steps, where it was cool. The five o'clock train from Boston whistled at +the station a mile away as she gathered her white skirts daintily up and +settled herself in the shadiest corner. She was unconscious of the +passing time, and scarcely looked up until the rattling of wheels caught +her ear. It was the station wagon stopping at the Yellow House gate, and +a strange gentleman was alighting. He had an unmistakable air of the +town. His clothes were not as Beulah clothes and his hat was not as +Beulah hats, for it was a fine Panama with a broad sweeping brim. Nancy +rose from the steps, surprise dawning first in her eyes, then wonder, +then suspicion, then conviction; then two dimples appeared in +her cheeks. + +The stranger lifted the foreign-looking hat with a smile and said, "My +little friend and correspondent, Nancy Carey, I think?" + +"My American Consul, I do believe!" cried Nancy joyously, as she ran +down the path with both hands outstretched. "Where did you come from? +Why didn't you tell us beforehand? We never even heard that you were in +this country! Oh! I know why you chose the Fourth of July! It's pay day, +and you thought we shouldn't be ready with the rent; but it's all +attended to, beautifully, this morning!" + +"May I send my bag to the Mansion House and stay a while with you?" +asked Mr. Hamilton. "Are the rest of you at home? How are Gilbert and +Kathleen and Julia and Peter? How, especially, is Mother Carey?" + +"What a memory you have!" exclaimed Nancy. "Take Mr. Hamilton's bag, +please, Mr. Bennett, and tell them at the hotel that he won't be there +until after supper." + +It was a pleasant hour that ensued, for Nancy had broken the ice and +there was plenty of conversation. Then too, the whole house had to be +shown, room by room, even to Cousin Ann's stove in the cellar and the +pump in the kitchen sink. + +"I never saw anything like it!" exclaimed Hamilton. "It is like magic! I +ought to pay you a thousand dollars on the spot! I ought to try and buy +the place of you for five thousand! Why don't you go into the business +of recreating houses and selling them to poor benighted creatures like +me, who never realize their possibilities?" + +"If we show you the painted chamber will you promise not to be too +unhappy?" asked Nancy. "You can't help crying with rage and grief that +it is our painted chamber, not yours; but try to bear up until you get +to the hotel, because mother is so soft-hearted she will be giving it +back to you unless I interfere." + +"You must have spent money lavishly when you restored this room," said +the Consul; "it is a real work of art." + +"Not a penny," said Mrs. Carey. "It is the work of a great friend of +Nancy's, a seventeen-year-old girl, who, we expect, will make Beulah +famous some day. Now will you go into your mother's room and find your +way downstairs by yourself? Julia, will you show Mr. Hamilton the barn a +little later, while Nancy and I get supper? Kitty must go to the +Pophams' for Peter; he is spending the afternoon with them." + +Nancy had enough presence of mind to intercept Kitty and hiss into her +ear: "Borrow a loaf of bread from Mrs. Popham, we are short; and see if +you can find any way to get strawberries from Bill Harmon's; it was to +have been a bread-and-milk supper on the piazza, to-night, and it must +be hurriedly changed into a Consular banquet! _Verb. sap._ Fly!" + +Gilbert turned up a little before six o'clock and was introduced proudly +by his mother as a son who had just "gone into business." + +"I'm Bill Harmon's summer clerk and delivery boy," he explained. "It's +great fun, and I get two dollars and a half a week." + +Nancy and her mother worked like Trojans in the kitchen, for they agreed +it was no time for economy, even if they had less to eat for a week +to come. + +"Mr. Hamilton is just as nice as I guessed he was, when his first letter +came," said Nancy. "I went upstairs to get a card for the supper menu, +and he was standing by your mantelpiece with his head bent over his +arms. He had the little bunch of field flowers in his hand, and I know +he had been smelling them, and looking at his mother's picture, and +remembering things!" + +What a merry supper it was, with a jug of black-eyed Susans in the +centre of the table and a written bill of fare for Mr. Hamilton, +"because he was a Consul," so Nancy said. + +Gilbert sat at the head of the table, and Mr. Hamilton thought he had +never seen anything so beautiful as Mrs. Carey in her lavender challie, +sitting behind the tea cups; unless it was Nancy, flushed like a rose, +changing the plates and waiting on the table between courses. He had +never exerted himself so much at any diplomatic dinner, and he won the +hearts of the entire family before the meal was finished. + +"By the way, I have a letter of introduction to you all, but especially +to Miss Nancy here, and I have never thought to deliver it," he said. +"Who do you think sent it,--all the way from China?" + +"My son Tom!" exclaimed Nancy irrepressibly; "but no, he couldn't, +because he doesn't know us." + +"The Admiral, of course!" cried Gilbert. + +"You are both right," Mr. Hamilton answered, drawing a letter from his +coat pocket. "It is a Round Robin from the Admiral and my son Tom, who +have been making acquaintance in Hong Kong. It is addressed: + + "FROM THE YELLOW PERIL, IN CHINA + + "to + + "THE YELLOW HOUSE, IN BEULAH, + + "_Greeting_!" + +Nancy crimsoned. "Did the Admiral tell your son Tom I called him the +Yellow Peril? It was wicked of him! I did it, you know, because you +wrote me that the only Hamilton who cared anything for the old house, or +would ever want to live in it, was your son Tom. After that I always +called him the Yellow Peril, and I suppose I mentioned it in a letter to +the Admiral." + +"I am convinced that Nancy's mind is always empty at bedtime," said her +mother, "because she tells everything in it to somebody during the day. +I hope age will bring discretion, but I doubt it." + +"My son Tom is coming home!" said his father, with unmistakable delight +in his voice. + +Nancy, who was passing the cake, sat down so heavily in her chair that +everybody laughed. + +"Come, come, Miss Nancy! I can't let you make an ogre of the boy," urged +Mr. Hamilton. "He is a fine fellow, and if he comes down here to look at +the old place you are sure to be good friends." + +"Is he going back to China after his visit?" asked Mrs. Carey, who felt +a fear of the young man something akin to her daughter's. + +"No, I am glad to say. Our family has been too widely separated for the +last ten years. At first it seemed necessary, or at least convenient and +desirable, and I did not think much about it. But lately it has been +continually on my mind that we were leading a cheerless existence, and I +am determined to arrange matters differently." + +Mrs. Carey remembered Ossian Popham's description of Mrs. Lemuel +Hamilton and forebore to ask any questions with regard to her +whereabouts, since her husband did not mention her. + +"You will all be in Washington then," she said, "and your son Tom with +you, of course?" + +"Not quite so near as that," his father replied. "Tom's firm is opening +a Boston office and he will be in charge of that. When do you expect the +Admiral back? Tom talks of their coming together on the Bedouin, if it +can be arranged." + +"We haven't heard lately," said Mrs. Carey; "but he should return within +a month or two, should he not, Nancy? My daughter writes all the letters +for the family, Mr. Hamilton, as you know by this time." + +"I do, to my great delight and satisfaction. Now there is one thing I +have not seen yet, something about which I have a great deal of +sentiment. May I smoke my cigar under the famous crimson rambler?" + +The sun set flaming red, behind the Beulah hills. The frogs sang in the +pond by the House of Lords, and the grasshoppers chirped in the long +grass of Mother Hamilton's favorite hayfield. Then the moon, round and +deep-hued as a great Mandarin orange, came up into the sky from which +the sun had faded, and the little group still sat on the side piazza, +talking. Nothing but their age and size kept the Carey chickens out of +Mr. Hamilton's lap, and Peter finally went to sleep with his head +against the consul's knee. He was a "lappy" man, Nancy said next +morning; and indeed there had been no one like him in the family circle +for many a long month. He was tender, he was gay, he was fatherly, he +was interested in all that concerned them; so no wonder that he heard +all about Gilbert's plans for earning money, and Nancy's accepted story. +No wonder he exclaimed at the check for ten dollars proudly exhibited in +payment, and no wonder he marvelled at the Summer Vacation School in the +barn, where fourteen little scholars were already enrolled under the +tutelage of the Carey Faculty. "I never wanted to go to anything in my +life as much as I want to go to that school!" he asserted. "If I could +write a circular as enticing as that, I should be a rich man. I wish +you'd let me have some new ones printed, girls, and put me down for +three evening lectures; I'd do almost anything to get into that +Faculty." "I wish you'd give the lectures for the benefit of the +Faculty, that would be better still," said Kitty. "Nancy's coming-out +party was to be in the barn this summer; that's one of the things we're +earning money for; or at least we make believe that it is, because it's +so much more fun to work for a party than for coal or flour or meat!" + +A look from Mrs. Carey prevented the children from making any further +allusions to economy, and Gilbert skillfully turned the subject by +giving a dramatic description of the rise and fall of The Dirty Boy, +from its first appearance at his mother's wedding breakfast to its last, +at the house-warming supper. + +After Lemuel Hamilton had gone back to the little country hotel he sat +by the open window for another hour, watching the moonbeams shimmering +on the river and bathing the tip of the white meeting-house steeple in a +flood of light. The air was still and the fireflies were rising above +the thick grass and carrying their fairy lamps into the lower branches +of the feathery elms. "Haying" would begin next morning, and he would be +wakened by the sharpening of scythes and the click of mowing machines. +He would like to work in the Hamilton fields, he thought, knee-deep in +daisies,--fields on whose grass he had not stepped since he was a boy +just big enough to go behind the cart and "rake after." What an +evening it had been! None of them had known it, but as a matter of fact +they had all scaled Shiny Wall and had been sitting with Mother Carey in +Peacepool; that was what had made everything so beautiful! Mr. +Hamilton's last glimpse of the Careys had been the group at the Yellow +House gate. Mrs. Carey, with her brown hair shining in the moonlight +leaned against Gilbert, the girls stood beside her, their arms locked in +hers, while Peter clung sleepily to her hand. + +"I believe they are having hard times!" he thought, "and I can't think +of anything I can safely do to make things easier. Still, one cannot +pity, one can only envy them! That is the sort of mother I would have +made had I been Nature and given a free hand! I would have put a label +on Mrs. Carey, saying: 'This is what I meant a woman to be!'" + + + +XXXIV + +NANCY COMES OUT + + +Nancy's seventeenth birthday was past, and it was on the full of the +August moon that she finally "came out" in the Hamilton barn. It was the +barn's first public appearance too, for the villagers had not been +invited to the private Saturday night dances that took place during the +brief reign of the Hamilton boys and girls. Beulah was more excited +about the barn than it was about Nancy, and she was quite in sympathy +with this view of things, as the entire Carey family, from mother to +Peter, was fairly bewitched with its new toy. Day by day it had grown +more enchanting as fresh ideas occurred to one or another, and +especially to Osh Popham, who lived, breathed, and had his being in the +barn, and who had lavished his ingenuity and skill upon its fittings. +Not a word did he vouchsafe to the general public of the extraordinary +nature of these fittings, nor of the many bewildering features of the +entertainment which was to take place within the almost sacred +precincts. All the Carey festivities had heretofore been in the house +save the one in honor of the hanging of the weather vane, which had been +an out-of-door function, attended by the whole village. Now the +community was all agog to disport itself in pastures new; its curiosity +being further piqued by the reception of written invitations, a +convention not often indulged in by Beulah. + +The eventful day dawned, clear and cool; a day with an air like liquid +amber, that properly belonged to September,--the weather prophet really +shifting it into August from pure kindness, having taken a sticky dogday +out and pitchforked it into the next month. + +The afternoon passed in various stages of plotting, planning, and +palpitation, and every girl in Beulah, of dancing age, was in her +bedroom, trying her hair a new way. The excitement increased a thousand +fold when it was rumored that an Admiral (whatever that might be) had +arrived at the hotel and would appear at the barn in full uniform. After +that, nobody's braids or puffs would go right! + +Nancy never needed to study Paris plates, for her hair dressed itself +after a fashion set by all the Venuses and Cupids and little Loves since +the world began. It curled, whether she would or no, so the only method +was to part the curls and give them a twist into a coil, from which +vagrant spirals fell to the white nape of her neck. Or, if she felt gay +and coquettish as she did tonight, the curls were pinned high to the +crown of her head and the runaways rioted here and there, touching her +cheek, her ear, her neck, never ugly, wherever they ran. + +Nancy had a new yellow organdy made "almost to touch," and a twist of +yellow ribbon in her hair. Kathleen and Julia were in the white dresses +brought them by Cousin Ann, and Mrs. Carey wore her new black silk, made +with a sweeping little train. Her wedding necklace of seed pearls was +around her neck, and a tall comb of tortoise shell and pearls rose from +the low-coiled knot of her shining hair. + +The family "received" in the old carriage house, and when everybody had +assembled, to the number of seventy-five or eighty, the door into the +barn was thrown open majestically by Gilbert, in his character as head +of the house of Carey. Words fail to describe the impression made by the +barn as it was introduced to the company, Nancy's debut sinking into +positive insignificance beside it. + +Dozens of brown japanned candle-lanterns hung from the beamed ceiling, +dispensing little twinkles of light here and there, while larger ones +swung from harness pegs driven into the sides of the walls. The soft +gray-brown of the old weathered lumber everywhere, made a lovely +background for the birch-bark brackets, and the white birch-bark vases +that were filled with early golden-rod, mixed with tall Queen Anne's +lace and golden glow. The quaint settles surrounding the sides of the +room were speedily filled by the admiring guests. Colonel Wheeler's tiny +upright piano graced the platform in the "tie up." Miss Susie Bennett, +the church organist, was to play it, aided now and then by Mrs. Carey or +Julia. Osh Popham was to take turns on the violin with a cousin from +Warren's Mills, who was reported to be the master fiddler of the county. + +When all was ready Mrs. Carey stood between the master fiddler and Susie +Bennett, and there was a sudden hush in the room. "Friends and +neighbors," she said, "we now declare the Hall of Happy Hours open for +the general good of the village. If it had not been for the generosity +of our landlord, Mr. Lemuel Hamilton, we could never have given you this +pleasure, and had not our helpers been so many, we could never have made +the place so beautiful. Before the general dancing begins there will be +a double quadrille of honor, in which all those will take part who have +driven a nail, papered or painted a wall, dug a spadeful of earth, or +done any work in or about the Yellow House." + +"Three cheers for Mrs. Carey!" called Bill Harmon, and everybody +complied lustily. + +"Three cheers for Lemuel Hamilton!" and the rafters of the barn rang +with the response. + +Just then the Admiral changed his position to conceal the moisture that +was beginning to gather in his eyes; and the sight of a personage so +unspeakably magnificent in a naval uniform induced Osh Popham to cry +spontaneously: "Three cheers for the Admiral! I don't know what he ever +done, but he looks as if he could, all right!" at which everybody +cheered and roared, and the Admiral to his great surprise made a speech, +during which the telltale tears appeared so often in his eyes and in his +voice, that Osh Popham concluded privately that if the naval hero ever +did meet an opposing battleship he would be likelier to drown the enemy +than fire into them! + +The double quadrille of honor passed off with much elegance, everybody +not participating in it being green with envy because he was not. Mrs. +Carey and the Admiral were partners; Nancy danced with Mr. Popham, +Kathleen with Digby, Julia with Bill Harmon. The other couples were Mrs. +Popham and Gilbert, Lallie Joy and Cyril Lord, Olive and Nat Harmon, +while Mrs. Bill led out a very shy and uncomfortable gentleman who had +dug the ditches for Cousin Ann's expensive pipes. + +Then the fun and the frolic began in earnest. The girls had been +practising the old-fashioned contra dances all summer, and training the +younger generation in them at the Vacation School. The old folks needed +no rehearsal! If you had waked any of them in the night suddenly they +could have called the changes for Speed the Plough, The Soldier's Joy, +The Maid in the Pump Room, or Hull's Victory. + +Money Musk brought Nancy and Mr. Henry Lord on to the floor as head +couple; a result attained by that young lady by every means, fair or +foul, known to woman; at least a rudimentary, budding woman of seventeen +summers! His coming to the party at all was regarded by Mother Carey, +who had spent the whole force of her being in managing it, as nothing +short of a miracle. He had accepted partly from secret admiration of his +handsome neighbor, partly to show the village that he did not choose +always to be a hermit crab, partly out of curiosity to see the unusual +gathering. Having crawled out of his selfish shell far enough to grace +the occasion, he took another step when Nancy asked him to dance. It was +pretty to see her curtsey when she put the question, pretty to see the +air of triumph with which she led him to the head of the line, and +positively delightful to the onlookers to see Hen Lord doing right and +left, ladies' chain, balance to opposite and cast off, at a girl's beck +and call. He was not a bad dancer, when his sluggish blood once got into +circulation; and he was considerably more limber at the end of Money +Musk, considerably less like a wooden image, than at the beginning +of it. + +In the interval between this astounding exhibition and the Rochester +Schottisch which followed it, Henry Lord went up to Mrs. Carey, who was +sitting in a corner a little apart from her guests for the moment. + +"Shall I go to South America, or shall I not?" he asked her in an +undertone. "Olive seems pleasantly settled, and Cyril tells me you will +consent to take him into your family for six months; still, I would like +a woman's advice." + +Mother Carey neither responded, "I should prefer not to take the +responsibility of advising you," nor "Pray do as you think best"; she +simply said, in a tone she might have used to a fractious boy: + +"I wouldn't go, Mr. Lord! Wait till Olive and Cyril are a little older. +Cyril will grow into my family instead of into his own; Olive will learn +to do without you; worse yet, you will learn to do without your +children. Stay at home and have Olive come back to you and her brother +every week end. South America is a long distance when there are only +three of you!" + +Prof. Lord was not satisfied with Mrs. Carey's tone. It was so maternal +that he expected at any moment she might brush his hair, straighten his +necktie, and beg him not to sit up too late, but his instinct told him +it was the only tone he was ever likely to hear from her, and so he said +reluctantly, "Very well; I confess that I really rely on your judgment, +and I will decline the invitation." + +"I think you are right," Mrs. Carey answered, wondering if the man would +ever see his duty with his own eyes, or whether he had deliberately +blinded himself for life. + + + +XXXV + +THE CRIMSON RAMBLER + + +While Mrs. Carey was talking with Mr. Lord, Nancy skimmed across the +barn floor intent on some suddenly remembered duty, went out into the +garden, and met face to face a strange young man standing by the rose +trellis and looking in at the dance through the open door. + +He had on a conventional black dinner-coat, something never seen in +Beulah, and wore a soft travelling cap. At first Nancy thought he was a +friend of the visiting fiddler, but a closer look at his merry dark eyes +gave her the feeling that she had seen him before, or somebody very like +him. He did not wait for her to speak, but taking off his cap, put out +his hand and said: "By your resemblance to a photograph in my possession +I think you are the girl who planted the crimson rambler." + +"Are you 'my son Tom'?" asked Nancy, open astonishment in her tone. "I +mean my Mr. Hamilton's son Tom?" + +"I am _my_ Mr. Hamilton's son Tom; or shall we say _our_ Mr. Hamilton's? +Do two 'mys' make one 'our'?" + +"Upon my word, wonders will never cease!" exclaimed Nancy. "The Admiral +said you were in Boston, but he never told us you would visit Beulah +so soon!" + +"No, I wanted it to be a secret. I wanted to appear when the ball was at +its height; the ghost of the old regime confronting the new, so +to speak." + +"Beulah will soon be a summer resort; everybody seems to be coming +here." + +"It's partly your fault, isn't it?" + +"Why, pray?" + +"'The Water Babies' is one of my favorite books, and I know all about +Mother Carey's chickens. They go out over the seas and show good birds +the way home." + +"Are _you_ a good bird?" asked Nancy saucily. + +"I'm _home_, at all events!" said Tom with an emphasis that made Nancy +shiver lest the young man had come to Beulah with a view of taking up +his residence in the paternal mansion. + +The two young people sat down on the piazza steps while the music of +The Sultan's Polka floated out of the barn door. Old Mrs. Jenks was +dancing with Peter, her eighty-year-old steps as fleet as his, her white +side-curls bobbing to the tune. Her withered hands clasped his dimpled +ones and the two seemed to be of the same age, for in the atmosphere of +laughter and goodwill there would have been no place for the old in +heart, and certainly Mrs. Jenks was as young as any one at the party. + +"I can't help dreading you, nice and amiable as you look," said Nancy +candidly to Tom Hamilton; "I am so afraid you'll fall in love with the +Yellow House and want it back again. Are you engaged to be married to a +little-footed China doll, or anything like that?" she asked with a +teasing, upward look and a disarming smile that robbed the question of +any rudeness. + +"No, not engaged to anything or anybody, but I've a notion I shall be, +soon, if all goes well! I'm getting along in years now!" + +"I might have known it!" sighed Nancy. "It was a prophetic instinct, my +calling you the Yellow Peril." + +"It isn't a bit nice of you to dislike me before you know me; I didn't +do that way with you!" + +"What do you mean?" + +"Why, in the first letter you ever wrote father you sent your love to +any of his children that should happen to be of the right size. I +chanced to be _just_ the right size, so I accepted it, gratefully; I've +got it here with me to-night; no, I left it in my other coat," he said +merrily, making a fictitious search through his pockets. + +Nancy laughed at his nonsense; she could not help it. + +"Will you promise to get over your foolish and wicked prejudices if I on +my part promise never to take the Yellow House away from you unless you +wish?" continued Tom. + +"Willingly," exclaimed Nancy joyously. "That's the safest promise I +could make, for I would never give up living in it unless I had to. +First it was father's choice, then it was mother's, now all of us seem +to have built ourselves into it, as it were. I am almost afraid to care +so much about anything, and I shall be so relieved if you do not turn +out to be really a Yellow Peril after all!" + +"You are much more of a Yellow Peril yourself!" said Tom, "with that +dress and that ribbon in your hair! Will you dance the next dance with +me, please?" + +"It's The Tempest; do you know it?" + +"No, but I'm not so old but I may learn. I'll form myself on that +wonderful person who makes jokes about the Admiral and plays +the fiddle." + +"That's Ossian Popham, principal prop of the House of Carey!" + +"Lucky dog! Have you got all the props you need?" + +Nancy's hand was not old or strong or experienced enough to keep this +strange young man in order, and just as she was meditating some +blighting retort he went on:-- + +"Who is that altogether adorable, that unspeakably beautiful lady in +black?--the one with the pearl comb that looks like a crown?" + +"That's mother," said Nancy, glowing. + +"I thought so. At least I didn't know any other way to account for her." + +"Why does she have to be accounted for?" asked Nancy, a little +bewildered. + +"For the same reason that you do," said the audacious youth. "You +explain your mother and your mother explains you, a little, at any rate. +Where is the celebrated crimson rambler, please?" + +"You are sitting on it," Nancy answered tranquilly. + +Tom sprang away from the trellis, on which he had been half reclining. +"Bless my soul!" he exclaimed. "Why didn't you tell me? I have a great +affection for that rambler; it was your planting it that first made +me--think favorably of you. Has it any roses on it? I can't see in +this light." + +"It is almost out of bloom; there may be a few at the top somewhere; +I'll look out my window to-morrow morning and see." + +"At about what hour?" + +"How should I know?" laughed Nancy. + +"Oh! you're not to be depended on!" said Tom rebukingly. "Just give me +your hand a moment; step on that lowest rung of the trellis, now one +step higher, please; now stretch up your right hand and pick that little +cluster, do you see it?--That's right; now down, be careful, there you +are, thank you! A rose in the hand is worth two in the morning." + +"Put it in your button hole," said Nancy. "It is the last; I gave your +father one of the first a month ago." + +"I shall put this in my pocket book and send it to my mother in a +letter," Tom replied. ("And tell her it looks just like the girl who +planted it," he thought; "sweet, fragrant, spicy, graceful, vigorous, +full of color.") + +"Now come in and meet mother," said Nancy. "The polka is over, and soon +they will be 'forming on' for The Tempest." + +Tom Hamilton's entrance and introduction proved so interesting that it +delayed the dance for a few moments. Then Osh Popham and the master +fiddler tuned their violins and Mrs. Carey assisted Susie Bennett at the +piano, so that there were four musicians to give fresh stimulus to the +impatient feet. + +Tom Hamilton hardly knew whether he would rather dance with Nancy or +stand at the open door and watch her as he had been doing earlier in the +evening. He could not really see her now, although he was her partner, +his mind was so occupied with the intricate figures, but he could feel +her, in every fibre of his body, the touch of her light hand was so +charged with magnetism. + +Somebody swung the back doors of the barn wide open. The fields, lately +mown, sloped gently up to a fringe of pines darkly green against the +sky. The cool night air stirred the elms, and the brilliant moon +appeared in the very centre of the doorway. The beauty of the whole +scene went to Tom Hamilton's head a little, but he kept his thoughts +steadily on the changes as Osh Popham called them. + +To watch Nancy Carey dance The Tempest was a sight to stir the blood. +The two head couples joined hands and came down the length of the barn +four abreast; back they went in a whirl; then they balanced to the next +couple, then came four hands round and ladies' chain, and presently they +came down again flying, with another four behind them. The first four +were Nancy and Tom, Ralph Thurston and Kathleen, the last two among the +best dancers in Beulah; but while Kitty was slim and straight and +graceful as a young fawn, Nancy swept down the middle of the barn floor +like a flower borne by the breeze. She was Youth, Hope, Joy incarnate! +She had washed the dishes that night, would wash them again in the +morning, but what of that? What mattered it that the years just ahead +(for aught she knew to the contrary) were full of self-denial and +economy? Was she not seventeen? Anything was possible at seventeen! What +if the world was to be a work-a-day world? There was music and laughter +in it as well as work, and there was love in it, too, oceans of love, so +why not trip and be merry and guide one's young partner safely through +the difficult mazes of the dance and bring him out flushed and +triumphant, to receive mother's laughing compliments? + +Everybody was dancing The Tempest in his or her own fashion, thought the +Admiral, looking on. Mrs. Popham was grave, even gloomy from the waist +up, but incredibly lively from the waist down, moving with the precision +of machinery, while her partner, a bricklayer from Beulah Centre, +engaged the attention of the entire company by his wonderful steps. She +was fully up to time too, you may be sure, as her rival, Mrs. Bill +Harmon, was opposite her in the set. Lallie Joy, clad in one of +Kathleen's dresses, her hair dressed by Julia, was a daily attendant at +the Vacation School, but five weeks of steady instruction had not +sufficed to make her sure of ladies' grand chain. Olive moved like a shy +little wild thing, with a bending head and a grace all her own, while +Gilbert had great ease and distinction. + +There was a brief interval for ice cream, accompanied by marble cake, +gold cake, silver cake, election cake, sponge cake, cup cake, citron +cake, and White Mountain cake, and while it was being eaten, Susie +Bennett played The Sliding Waltz, The Maiden's Prayer, and Listen to the +Mocking Bird with variations; variations requiring almost +supernatural celerity. + +"I guess there ain't many that can touch Sutey at the piano!" said Osh +Popham, who sat beside the Admiral. "Have you seen anybody in the cities +that could play any faster'n she can? And Jo you ever ketch her landin' +on a black note when she started for a white one? I guess not!" + +"You are right!" replied the Admiral, "and now there seems to be a +general demand for you. What are they requesting you to do,--fly?" + +"That's it," said Osh. "Mis' Carey, will you play for me? Maria, you can +go into the carriage house if you don't want to be disgraced." + + "Come, my beloved, haste away, + Cut short the hours of thy delay. + Fly like a youthful hart or roe + Over the hills where spices grow." + +At length the strains of the favorite old tune faded on the ears of the +delighted audience. Then they had The Portland Fancy and The Irish +Washerwoman and The College Hornpipe, and at last the clock in the +carriage house struck midnight and the guests departed in groups of twos +and threes and fours, their cheerful voices sounding far down the +village street. + +Osh Popham stayed behind to cover the piano, put out the lanterns, close +the doors and windows, and lock the barn, while Mrs. Carey and the +Admiral strolled slowly along the greensward to the side door of +the house. + +"Good-night," Osh called happily as he passed them a few minutes later. +"I guess Beulah never see a party such as ourn was, this evenin'! I +guess if the truth was known, the State o' Maine never did, neither! +Good-night, all! Mebbe if I hurry along I can ketch up with Maria!" + +His quick steps brushing the grassy pathway could be heard for some +minutes in the clear still air, and presently the sound of his mellow +tenor came floating back:-- + + "Come, my beloved, haste away, + Cut short the hours of thy delay. + Fly like a youthful hart or roe + Over the hills where spices grow." + +Julia had gone upstairs with the sleepy Peter-bird, who had been +enjoying his first experience of late hours on the occasion of Nancy's +coming out; the rest of the young folks were gathered in a group under +the elms, chatting in couples,--Olive and Ralph Thurston, Kathleen and +Cyril Lord, Nancy and Tom Hamilton. Then they parted, Tom Hamilton +strolling to the country hotel with the young school teacher for +companion, while Olive and Cyril walked across the fields to the +House of Lords. + +It was a night in a thousand. The air was warm, clear, and breathlessly +still; so still that not a leaf stirred on the trees. The sky was +cloudless, and the moon, brilliant and luminous, shone as it seldom +shines in a northern clime. The water was low in Beulah's shining river +and it ran almost noiselessly under the bridge. While Kathleen and Julia +were still unbraiding their hair, exclaiming at every twist of the hand +as to the "loveliness" of the party, Nancy had kissed her mother and +crept silently into bed. All night long the strains of The Tempest ran +through her dreams. There was the touch of a strange hand on hers, an +altogether new touch, warm and compelling. There was the gay trooping +down the centre of the barn in fours,--some one by her side who had +never been there before,--and a sensation entirely new and intoxicating, +that whenever she met the glance of her partner's merry dark eyes she +found herself at the bottom of them. + +Was she a child when she heard Osh Popham cry: "Take your partners for +The Tempest!" and was she a woman when he called: "All promenade to +seats!" She hardly knew. Beulah was a dream; the Yellow House was a +dream, the dance was a dream, the partner was a dream. At one moment she +was a child helping her father to plant the crimson rambler, at another +she was a woman pulling a rose from the topmost branch and giving it to +some one who steadied her hand on the trellis; some one who said "Thank +you" and "Good-night" differently from the rest of the world. + +Who was the young stranger? Was he the Knight of Beulah Castle, the +Overlord of the Yellow House, was he the Yellow Peril, was he a good +bird to whom Mother Carey's chicken had shown the way home? Still the +dream went on in bewildering circles, and Nancy kept hearing mysterious +phrases spoken with a new meaning,--"Will you dance with me?" "Doesn't +the House of Carey need another prop?" "Won't you give me a rose?" and +above all: "You sent your love to any one of the Hamilton children who +should be of the right size; I was just the right size, and I took it!" + +"Love couldn't be sent in a letter!" expostulated Nancy in the dream; +and somebody, in the dream, always answered, "Don't be so sure! Very +strange things happen when Mother Carey's messengers go out over the +seas. Don't you remember how they spoke to Tom in 'The Water +Babies'?--Among all the songs that came across the water one was more +sweet and clear than all, for it was the song of a young girl's +voice.... And what was the song that she sung?... Have patience, keep +your eye single and your hands clean, and you will learn some day to +sing it yourself, without needing any man to teach you!" + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MOTHER CAREY'S CHICKENS*** + + +******* This file should be named 10540.txt or 10540.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/0/5/4/10540 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. 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