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diff --git a/1716.txt b/1716.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..82da450 --- /dev/null +++ b/1716.txt @@ -0,0 +1,9826 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Copy-Cat and Other Stories, by +Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + +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: The Copy-Cat and Other Stories + +Author: Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + +Release Date: April, 1999 [Etext #1716] +Posting Date: November 20, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COPY-CAT AND OTHER STORIES *** + + + + +Produced by Judy Boss + + + + + +THE COPY-CAT + +AND OTHER STORIES + +By Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + + + +CONTENTS + + THE COPY-CAT + + THE COCK OF THE WALK + + JOHNNY-IN-THE-WOODS + + DANIEL AND LITTLE DAN'L + + BIG SISTER SOLLY + + LITTLE LUCY ROSE + + NOBLESSE + + CORONATION + + THE AMETHYST COMB + + THE UMBRELLA MAN + + THE BALKING OF CHRISTOPHER + + DEAR ANNIE + + + + +THE COPY-CAT + +THAT affair of Jim Simmons's cats never became known. Two little boys +and a little girl can keep a secret--that is, sometimes. The two little +boys had the advantage of the little girl because they could talk over +the affair together, and the little girl, Lily Jennings, had no intimate +girl friend to tempt her to confidence. She had only little Amelia +Wheeler, commonly called by the pupils of Madame's school "The +Copy-Cat." + +Amelia was an odd little girl--that is, everybody called her odd. She +was that rather unusual creature, a child with a definite ideal; and +that ideal was Lily Jennings. However, nobody knew that. If Amelia's +mother, who was a woman of strong character, had suspected, she would +have taken strenuous measures to prevent such a peculiar state of +affairs; the more so because she herself did not in the least approve of +Lily Jennings. Mrs. Diantha Wheeler (Amelia's father had died when she +was a baby) often remarked to her own mother, Mrs. Stark, and to her +mother-in-law, Mrs. Samuel Wheeler, that she did not feel that Mrs. +Jennings was bringing up Lily exactly as she should. "That child thinks +entirely too much of her looks," said Mrs. Diantha. "When she walks past +here she switches those ridiculous frilled frocks of hers as if she were +entering a ballroom, and she tosses her head and looks about to see if +anybody is watching her. If I were to see Amelia doing such things I +should be very firm with her." + +"Lily Jennings is a very pretty child," said Mother-in-law Wheeler, with +an under-meaning, and Mrs. Diantha flushed. Amelia did not in the least +resemble the Wheelers, who were a handsome set. She looked remarkably +like her mother, who was a plain woman, only little Amelia did not have +a square chin. Her chin was pretty and round, with a little dimple in +it. In fact, Amelia's chin was the prettiest feature she had. Her hair +was phenomenally straight. It would not even yield to hot curling-irons, +which her grandmother Wheeler had tried surreptitiously several times +when there was a little girls' party. "I never saw such hair as that +poor child has in all my life," she told the other grandmother, Mrs. +Stark. "Have the Starks always had such very straight hair?" + +Mrs. Stark stiffened her chin. Her own hair was very straight. "I don't +know," said she, "that the Starks have had any straighter hair than +other people. If Amelia does not have anything worse to contend with +than straight hair I rather think she will get along in the world as +well as most people." + +"It's thin, too," said Grandmother Wheeler, with a sigh, "and it hasn't +a mite of color. Oh, well, Amelia is a good child, and beauty isn't +everything." Grandmother Wheeler said that as if beauty were a great +deal, and Grandmother Stark arose and shook out her black silk skirts. +She had money, and loved to dress in rich black silks and laces. + +"It is very little, very little indeed," said she, and she eyed +Grandmother Wheeler's lovely old face, like a wrinkled old rose as to +color, faultless as to feature, and swept about by the loveliest waves +of shining silver hair. + +Then she went out of the room, and Grandmother Wheeler, left alone, +smiled. She knew the worth of beauty for those who possess it and those +who do not. She had never been quite reconciled to her son's marrying +such a plain girl as Diantha Stark, although she had money. She +considered beauty on the whole as a more valuable asset than mere gold. +She regretted always that poor little Amelia, her only grandchild, was +so very plain-looking. She always knew that Amelia was very plain, and +yet sometimes the child puzzled her. She seemed to see reflections +of beauty, if not beauty itself, in the little colorless face, in the +figure, with its too-large joints and utter absence of curves. She +sometimes even wondered privately if some subtle resemblance to the +handsome Wheelers might not be in the child and yet appear. But she was +mistaken. What she saw was pure mimicry of a beautiful ideal. + +Little Amelia tried to stand like Lily Jennings; she tried to walk like +her; she tried to smile like her; she made endeavors, very often +futile, to dress like her. Mrs. Wheeler did not in the least approve +of furbelows for children. Poor little Amelia went clad in severe +simplicity; durable woolen frocks in winter, and washable, unfadable, +and non-soil-showing frocks in summer. She, although her mother had +perhaps more money wherewith to dress her than had any of the other +mothers, was the plainest-clad little girl in school. Amelia, moreover, +never tore a frock, and, as she did not grow rapidly, one lasted several +seasons. Lily Jennings was destructive, although dainty. Her pretty +clothes were renewed every year. Amelia was helpless before that +problem. For a little girl burning with aspirations to be and look like +another little girl who was beautiful and wore beautiful clothes, to be +obliged to set forth for Madame's on a lovely spring morning, when thin +attire was in evidence, dressed in dark-blue-andwhite-checked gingham, +which she had worn for three summers, and with sleeves which, even to +childish eyes, were anachronisms, was a trial. Then to see Lily flutter +in a frock like a perfectly new white flower was torture; not because +of jealousy--Amelia was not jealous; but she so admired the other little +girl, and so loved her, and so wanted to be like her. + +As for Lily, she hardly ever noticed Amelia. She was not aware that +she herself was an object of adoration; for she was a little girl who +searched for admiration in the eyes of little boys rather than little +girls, although very innocently. She always glanced slyly at Johnny +Trumbull when she wore a pretty new frock, to see if he noticed. He +never did, and she was sharp enough to know it. She was also child +enough not to care a bit, but to take a queer pleasure in the sensation +of scorn which she felt in consequence. She would eye Johnny from head +to foot, his boy's clothing somewhat spotted, his bulging pockets, his +always dusty shoes, and when he twisted uneasily, not understanding why, +she had a thrill of purely feminine delight. It was on one such occasion +that she first noticed Amelia Wheeler particularly. + +It was a lovely warm morning in May, and Lily was a darling to +behold--in a big hat with a wreath of blue flowers, her hair tied +with enormous blue silk bows, her short skirts frilled with eyelet +embroidery, her slender silk legs, her little white sandals. Madame's +maid had not yet struck the Japanese gong, and all the pupils were out +on the lawn, Amelia, in her clean, ugly gingham and her serviceable +brown sailor hat, hovering near Lily, as usual, like a common, very +plain butterfly near a particularly resplendent blossom. Lily really +noticed her. She spoke to her confidentially; she recognized her fully +as another of her own sex, and presumably of similar opinions. + +"Ain't boys ugly, anyway?" inquired Lily of Amelia, and a wonderful +change came over Amelia. Her sallow cheeks bloomed; her eyes showed blue +glitters; her little skinny figure became instinct with nervous life. +She smiled charmingly, with such eagerness that it smote with pathos and +bewitched. + +"Oh yes, oh yes," she agreed, in a voice like a quick flute obbligato. +"Boys are ugly." + +"Such clothes!" said Lily. + +"Yes, such clothes!" said Amelia. + +"Always spotted," said Lily. + +"Always covered all over with spots," said Amelia. + +"And their pockets always full of horrid things," said Lily. + +"Yes," said Amelia. + +Amelia glanced openly at Johnny Trumbull; Lily with a sidewise effect. + +Johnny had heard every word. Suddenly he arose to action and knocked +down Lee Westminster, and sat on him. + +"Lemme up!" said Lee. + +Johnny had no quarrel whatever with Lee. He grinned, but he sat still. +Lee, the sat-upon, was a sharp little boy. "Showing off before the +gals!" he said, in a thin whisper. + +"Hush up!" returned Johnny. + +"Will you give me a writing-pad--I lost mine, and mother said I couldn't +have another for a week if I did--if I don't holler?" inquired Lee. + +"Yes. Hush up!" + +Lee lay still, and Johnny continued to sit upon his prostrate form. +Both were out of sight of Madame's windows, behind a clump of the cedars +which graced her lawn. + +"Always fighting," said Lily, with a fine crescendo of scorn. She lifted +her chin high, and also her nose. + +"Always fighting," said Amelia, and also lifted her chin and nose. +Amelia was a born mimic. She actually looked like Lily, and she spoke +like her. + +Then Lily did a wonderful thing. She doubled her soft little arm into an +inviting loop for Amelia's little claw of a hand. + +"Come along, Amelia Wheeler," said she. "We don't want to stay near +horrid, fighting boys. We will go by ourselves." + +And they went. Madame had a headache that morning, and the Japanese +gong did not ring for fifteen minutes longer. During that time Lily and +Amelia sat together on a little rustic bench under a twinkling poplar, +and they talked, and a sort of miniature sun-and-satellite relation was +established between them, although neither was aware of it. Lily, being +on the whole a very normal little girl, and not disposed to even a full +estimate of herself as compared with others of her own sex, did not +dream of Amelia's adoration, and Amelia, being rarely destitute of +self-consciousness, did not understand the whole scope of her own +sentiments. It was quite sufficient that she was seated close to this +wonderful Lily, and agreeing with her to the verge of immolation. + +"Of course," said Lily, "girls are pretty, and boys are just as ugly as +they can be." + +"Oh yes," said Amelia, fervently. + +"But," said Lily, thoughtfully, "it is queer how Johnny Trumbull always +comes out ahead in a fight, and he is not so very large, either." + +"Yes," said Amelia, but she realized a pang of jealousy. "Girls could +fight, I suppose," said she. + +"Oh yes, and get their clothes all torn and messy," said Lily. + +"I shouldn't care," said Amelia. Then she added, with a little toss, "I +almost know I could fight." The thought even floated through her wicked +little mind that fighting might be a method of wearing out obnoxious and +durable clothes. + +"You!" said Lily, and the scorn in her voice wilted Amelia. + +"Maybe I couldn't," said she. + +"Of course you couldn't, and if you could, what a sight you'd be. Of +course it wouldn't hurt your clothes as much as some, because your +mother dresses you in strong things, but you'd be sure to get black and +blue, and what would be the use, anyway? You couldn't be a boy, if you +did fight." + +"No. I know I couldn't." + +"Then what is the use? We are a good deal prettier than boys, and +cleaner, and have nicer manners, and we must be satisfied." + +"You are prettier," said Amelia, with a look of worshipful admiration at +Lily's sweet little face. + +"You are prettier," said Lily. Then she added, equivocally, "Even the +very homeliest girl is prettier than a boy." + +Poor Amelia, it was a good deal for her to be called prettier than a +very dusty boy in a fight. She fairly dimpled with delight, and again +she smiled charmingly. Lily eyed her critically. + +"You aren't so very homely, after all, Amelia," she said. "You needn't +think you are." + +Amelia smiled again. + +"When you look like you do now you are real pretty," said Lily, not +knowing or even suspecting the truth, that she was regarding in the face +of this little ardent soul her own, as in a mirror. + +However, it was after that episode that Amelia Wheeler was called +"Copy-Cat." The two little girls entered Madame's select school arm in +arm, when the musical gong sounded, and behind them came Lee Westminster +and Johnny Trumbull, surreptitiously dusting their garments, and ever +after the fact of Amelia's adoration and imitation of Lily Jennings was +evident to all. Even Madame became aware of it, and held conferences +with two of the under teachers. + +"It is not at all healthy for one child to model herself so entirely +upon the pattern of another," said Miss Parmalee. + +"Most certainly it is not," agreed Miss Acton, the music-teacher. + +"Why, that poor little Amelia Wheeler had the rudiments of a fairly good +contralto. I had begun to wonder if the poor child might not be able at +least to sing a little, and so make up for--other things; and now she +tries to sing high like Lily Jennings, and I simply cannot prevent it. +She has heard Lily play, too, and has lost her own touch, and now it is +neither one thing nor the other." + +"I might speak to her mother," said Madame, thoughtfully. Madame was +American born, but she married a French gentleman, long since deceased, +and his name sounded well on her circulars. She and her two under +teachers were drinking tea in her library. + +Miss Parmalee, who was a true lover of her pupils, gasped at Madame's +proposition. "Whatever you do, please do not tell that poor child's +mother," said she. + +"I do not think it would be quite wise, if I may venture to express an +opinion," said Miss Acton, who was a timid soul, and always inclined to +shy at her own ideas. + +"But why?" asked Madame. + +"Her mother," said Miss Parmalee, "is a quite remarkable woman, with +great strength of character, but she would utterly fail to grasp the +situation." + +"I must confess," said Madame, sipping her tea, "that I fail to +understand it. Why any child not an absolute idiot should so lose her +own identity in another's absolutely bewilders me. I never heard of such +a case." + +Miss Parmalee, who had a sense of humor, laughed a little. "It is +bewildering," she admitted. "And now the other children see how it is, +and call her 'Copy-Cat' to her face, but she does not mind. I doubt if +she understands, and neither does Lily, for that matter. Lily Jennings +is full of mischief, but she moves in straight lines; she is not +conceited or self-conscious, and she really likes Amelia, without +knowing why." + +"I fear Lily will lead Amelia into mischief," said Madame, "and Amelia +has always been such a good child." + +"Lily will never MEAN to lead Amelia into mischief," said loyal Miss +Parmalee. + +"But she will," said Madame. + +"If Lily goes, I cannot answer for Amelia's not following," admitted +Miss Parmalee. + +"I regret it all very much indeed," sighed Madame, "but it does seem to +me still that Amelia's mother--" + +"Amelia's mother would not even believe it, in the first place," said +Miss Parmalee. + +"Well, there is something in that," admitted Madame. "I myself could not +even imagine such a situation. I would not know of it now, if you and +Miss Acton had not told me." + +"There is not the slightest use in telling Amelia not to imitate +Lily, because she does not know that she is imitating her," said Miss +Parmalee. "If she were to be punished for it, she could never comprehend +the reason." + +"That is true," said Miss Acton. "I realize that when the poor child +squeaks instead of singing. All I could think of this morning was a +little mouse caught in a trap which she could not see. She does actually +squeak!--and some of her low notes, although, of course, she is only a +child, and has never attempted much, promised to be very good." + +"She will have to squeak, for all I can see," said Miss Parmalee. "It +looks to me like one of those situations that no human being can change +for better or worse." + +"I suppose you are right," said Madame, "but it is most unfortunate, and +Mrs. Wheeler is such a superior woman, and Amelia is her only child, +and this is such a very subtle and regrettable affair. Well, we have to +leave a great deal to Providence." + +"If," said Miss Parmalee, "she could only get angry when she is called +'Copy-Cat.'" Miss Parmalee laughed, and so did Miss Acton. Then all the +ladies had their cups refilled, and left Providence to look out for poor +little Amelia Wheeler, in her mad pursuit of her ideal in the shape of +another little girl possessed of the exterior graces which she had not. + +Meantime the little "Copy-Cat" had never been so happy. She began to +improve in her looks also. Her grandmother Wheeler noticed it first, and +spoke of it to Grandmother Stark. "That child may not be so plain, +after all," said she. "I looked at her this morning when she started +for school, and I thought for the first time that there was a little +resemblance to the Wheelers." + +Grandmother Stark sniffed, but she looked gratified. "I have been +noticing it for some time," said she, "but as for looking like the +Wheelers, I thought this morning for a minute that I actually saw my +poor dear husband looking at me out of that blessed child's eyes." + +Grandmother Wheeler smiled her little, aggravating, curved, pink smile. + +But even Mrs. Diantha began to notice the change for the better in +Amelia. She, however, attributed it to an increase of appetite and a +system of deep breathing which she had herself taken up and enjoined +Amelia to follow. Amelia was following Lily Jennings instead, but that +her mother did not know. Still, she was gratified to see Amelia's little +sallow cheeks taking on pretty curves and a soft bloom, and she was more +inclined to listen when Grandmother Wheeler ventured to approach the +subject of Amelia's attire. + +"Amelia would not be so bad-looking if she were better dressed, +Diantha," said she. + +Diantha lifted her chin, but she paid heed. "Why, does not Amelia dress +perfectly well, mother?" she inquired. + +"She dresses well enough, but she needs more ribbons and ruffles." + +"I do not approve of so many ribbons and ruffles," said Mrs. Diantha. +"Amelia has perfectly neat, fresh black or brown ribbons for her hair, +and ruffles are not sanitary." + +"Ruffles are pretty," said Grandmother Wheeler, "and blue and pink are +pretty colors. Now, that Jennings girl looks like a little picture." + +But that last speech of Grandmother Wheeler's undid all the previous +good. Mrs. Diantha had an unacknowledged--even to herself--disapproval +of Mrs. Jennings which dated far back in the past, for a reason which +was quite unworthy of her and of her strong mind. When she and Lily's +mother had been girls, she had seen Mrs. Jennings look like a picture, +and had been perfectly well aware that she herself fell far short of +an artist's ideal. Perhaps if Mrs. Stark had believed in ruffles and +ribbons, her daughter might have had a different mind when Grandmother +Wheeler had finished her little speech. + +As it was, Mrs. Diantha surveyed her small, pretty mother-in-law with +dignified serenity, which savored only delicately of a snub. "I do not +myself approve of the way in which Mrs. Jennings dresses her daughter," +said she, "and I do not consider that the child presents to a practical +observer as good an appearance as my Amelia." + +Grandmother Wheeler had a temper. It was a childish temper and soon +over--still, a temper. "Lord," said she, "if you mean to say that +you think your poor little snipe of a daughter, dressed like a little +maid-of-all-work, can compare with that lovely little Lily Jennings, who +is dressed like a doll!--" + +"I do not wish that my daughter should be dressed like a doll," said +Mrs. Diantha, coolly. + +"Well, she certainly isn't," said Grandmother Wheeler. "Nobody would +ever take her for a doll as far as looks or dress are concerned. She may +be GOOD enough. I don't deny that Amelia is a good little girl, but her +looks could be improved on." + +"Looks matter very little," said Mrs. Diantha. + +"They matter very much," said Grandmother Wheeler, pugnaciously, her +blue eyes taking on a peculiar opaque glint, as always when she lost +her temper, "very much indeed. But looks can't be helped. If poor little +Amelia wasn't born with pretty looks, she wasn't. But she wasn't born +with such ugly clothes. She might be better dressed." + +"I dress my daughter as I consider best," said Mrs. Diantha. Then she +left the room. + +Grandmother Wheeler sat for a few minutes, her blue eyes opaque, her +little pink lips a straight line; then suddenly her eyes lit, and she +smiled. "Poor Diantha," said she, "I remember how Henry used to like +Lily Jennings's mother before he married Diantha. Sour grapes hang +high." But Grandmother Wheeler's beautiful old face was quite soft and +gentle. From her heart she pitied the reacher after those high-hanging +sour grapes, for Mrs. Diantha had been very good to her. + +Then Grandmother Wheeler, who had a mild persistency not evident to a +casual observer, began to make plans and lay plots. She was resolved, +Diantha or not, that her granddaughter, her son's child, should have +some fine feathers. The little conference had taken place in her own +room, a large, sunny one, with a little storeroom opening from it. +Presently Grandmother Wheeler rose, entered the storeroom, and began +rummaging in some old trunks. Then followed days of secret work. +Grandmother Wheeler had been noted as a fine needlewoman, and her +hand had not yet lost its cunning. She had one of Amelia's ugly little +ginghams, purloined from a closet, for size, and she worked two or +three dainty wonders. She took Grandmother Stark into her confidence. +Sometimes the two ladies, by reason of their age, found it possible to +combine with good results. + +"Your daughter Diantha is one woman in a thousand," said Grandmother +Wheeler, diplomatically, one day, "but she never did care much for +clothes." + +"Diantha," returned Grandmother Stark, with a suspicious glance, "always +realized that clothes were not the things that mattered." + +"And, of course, she is right," said Grandmother Wheeler, piously. +"Your Diantha is one woman in a thousand. If she cared as much for fine +clothes as some women, I don't know where we should all be. It would +spoil poor little Amelia." + +"Yes, it would," assented Grandmother Stark. "Nothing spoils a little +girl more than always to be thinking about her clothes." + +"Yes, I was looking at Amelia the other day, and thinking how much more +sensible she appeared in her plain gingham than Lily Jennings in all her +ruffles and ribbons. Even if people were all noticing Lily, and praising +her, thinks I to myself, 'How little difference such things really make. +Even if our dear Amelia does stand to one side, and nobody notices her, +what real matter is it?'" Grandmother Wheeler was inwardly chuckling as +she spoke. + +Grandmother Stark was at once alert. "Do you mean to say that Amelia is +really not taken so much notice of because she dresses plainly?" said +she. + +"You don't mean that you don't know it, as observant as you are?" +replied Grandmother Wheeler. + +"Diantha ought not to let it go as far as that," said Grandmother Stark. +Grandmother Wheeler looked at her queerly. "Why do you look at me like +that?" + +"Well, I did something I feared I ought not to have done. And I didn't +know what to do, but your speaking so makes me wonder--" + +"Wonder what?" + +Then Grandmother Wheeler went to her little storeroom and emerged +bearing a box. She displayed the contents--three charming little white +frocks fluffy with lace and embroidery. + +"Did you make them?" + +"Yes, I did. I couldn't help it. I thought if the dear child never wore +them, it would be some comfort to know they were in the house." + +"That one needs a broad blue sash," said Grandmother Stark. + +Grandmother Wheeler laughed. She took her impecuniosity easily. "I had +to use what I had," said she. + +"I will get a blue sash for that one," said Grandmother Stark, "and a +pink sash for that, and a flowered one for that." + +"Of course they will make all the difference," said Grandmother Wheeler. +"Those beautiful sashes will really make the dresses." + +"I will get them," said Grandmother Stark, with decision. "I will go +right down to Mann Brothers' store now and get them." + +"Then I will make the bows, and sew them on," replied Grandmother +Wheeler, happily. + +It thus happened that little Amelia Wheeler was possessed of three +beautiful dresses, although she did not know it. + +For a long time neither of the two conspiring grandmothers dared divulge +the secret. Mrs. Diantha was a very determined woman, and even her own +mother stood somewhat in awe of her. Therefore, little Amelia went to +school during the spring term soberly clad as ever, and even on the +festive last day wore nothing better than a new blue gingham, made +too long, to allow for shrinkage, and new blue hair-ribbons. The two +grandmothers almost wept in secret conclave over the lovely frocks which +were not worn. + +"I respect Diantha," said Grandmother Wheeler. "You know that. She is +one woman in a thousand, but I do hate to have that poor child go to +school to-day with so many to look at her, and she dressed so unlike all +the other little girls." + +"Diantha has got so much sense, it makes her blind and deaf," declared +Grandmother Stark. "I call it a shame, if she is my daughter." + +"Then you don't venture--" + +Grandmother Stark reddened. She did not like to own to awe of her +daughter. "I VENTURE, if that is all," said she, tartly. "You don't +suppose I am afraid of Diantha?--but she would not let Amelia wear one +of the dresses, anyway, and I don't want the child made any unhappier +than she is." + +"Well, I will admit," replied Grandmother Wheeler, "if poor Amelia knew +she had these beautiful dresses and could not wear them she might feel +worse about wearing that homely gingham." + +"Gingham!" fairly snorted Grandmother Stark. "I cannot see why Diantha +thinks so much of gingham. It shrinks, anyway." + +Poor little Amelia did undoubtedly suffer on that last day, when she sat +among the others gaily clad, and looked down at her own common little +skirts. She was very glad, however, that she had not been chosen to do +any of the special things which would have necessitated her appearance +upon the little flower-decorated platform. She did not know of the +conversation between Madame and her two assistants. + +"I would have Amelia recite a little verse or two," said Madame, "but +how can I?" Madame adored dress, and had a lovely new one of sheer +dull-blue stuff, with touches of silver, for the last day. + +"Yes," agreed Miss Parmalee, "that poor child is sensitive, and for her +to stand on the platform in one of those plain ginghams would be too +cruel." + +"Then, too," said Miss Acton, "she would recite her verses exactly like +Lily Jennings. She can make her voice exactly like Lily's now. Then +everybody would laugh, and Amelia would not know why. She would think +they were laughing at her dress, and that would be dreadful." + +If Amelia's mother could have heard that conversation everything would +have been different, although it is puzzling to decide in what way. + +It was the last of the summer vacation in early September, just before +school began, that a climax came to Amelia's idolatry and imitation of +Lily. The Jenningses had not gone away that summer, so the two little +girls had been thrown together a good deal. Mrs. Diantha never went away +during a summer. She considered it her duty to remain at home, and she +was quite pitiless to herself when it came to a matter of duty. + +However, as a result she was quite ill during the last of August and the +first of September. The season had been unusually hot, and Mrs. Diantha +had not spared herself from her duty on account of the heat. She +would have scorned herself if she had done so. But she could not, +strong-minded as she was, avert something like a heat prostration after +a long walk under a burning sun, nor weeks of confinement and idleness +in her room afterward. + +When September came, and a night or two of comparative coolness, she +felt stronger; still she was compelled by most unusual weakness to +refrain from her energetic trot in her duty-path; and then it was that +something happened. + +One afternoon Lily fluttered over to Amelia's, and Amelia, ever on the +watch, spied her. + +"May I go out and see Lily?" she asked Grandmother Stark. + +"Yes, but don't talk under the windows; your mother is asleep." + +Amelia ran out. + +"I declare," said Grandmother Stark to Grandmother Wheeler, "I was half +a mind to tell that child to wait a minute and slip on one of those +pretty dresses. I hate to have her go on the street in that old gingham, +with that Jennings girl dressed up like a wax doll." + +"I know it." + +"And now poor Diantha is so weak--and asleep--it would not have annoyed +her." + +"I know it." + +Grandmother Stark looked at Grandmother Wheeler. Of the two she +possessed a greater share of original sin compared with the size of +her soul. Moreover, she felt herself at liberty to circumvent her +own daughter. Whispering, she unfolded a daring scheme to the other +grandmother, who stared at her aghast a second out of her lovely blue +eyes, then laughed softly. + +"Very well," said she, "if you dare." + +"I rather think I dare!" said Grandmother Stark. "Isn't Diantha Wheeler +my own daughter?" Grandmother Stark had grown much bolder since Mrs. +Diantha had been ill. + +Meantime Lily and Amelia walked down the street until they came to a +certain vacant lot intersected by a foot-path between tall, feathery +grasses and goldenrod and asters and milkweed. They entered the +foot-path, and swarms of little butterflies rose around them, and once +in a while a protesting bumblebee. + +"I am afraid we will be stung by the bees," said Amelia. + +"Bumblebees never sting," said Lily; and Amelia believed her. + +When the foot-path ended, there was the riverbank. The two little girls +sat down under a clump of brook willows and talked, while the river, +full of green and blue and golden lights, slipped past them and never +stopped. + +Then Lily proceeded to unfold a plan, which was not philosophical, +but naughtily ingenious. By this time Lily knew very well that Amelia +admired her, and imitated her as successfully as possible, considering +the drawback of dress and looks. + +When she had finished Amelia was quite pale. "I am afraid, I am afraid, +Lily," said she. + +"What of?" + +"My mother will find out; besides, I am afraid it isn't right." + +"Who ever told you it was wrong?" + +"Nobody ever did," admitted Amelia. + +"Well, then you haven't any reason to think it is," said Lily, +triumphantly. "And how is your mother ever going to find it out?" + +"I don't know." + +"Isn't she ill in her room? And does she ever come to kiss you good +night, the way my mother does, when she is well?" + +"No," admitted Amelia. + +"And neither of your grandmothers?" + +"Grandmother Stark would think it was silly, like mother, and +Grandmother Wheeler can't go up and down stairs very well." + +"I can't see but you are perfectly safe. I am the only one that runs any +risk at all. I run a great deal of risk, but I am willing to take it," +said Lily with a virtuous air. Lily had a small but rather involved +scheme simply for her own ends, which did not seem to call for much +virtue, but rather the contrary. + +Lily had overheard Arnold Carruth and Johnny Trumbull and Lee +Westminster and another boy, Jim Patterson, planning a most delightful +affair, which even in the cases of the boys was fraught with danger, +secrecy, and doubtful rectitude. Not one of the four boys had had a +vacation from the village that summer, and their young minds had become +charged, as it were, with the seeds of revolution and rebellion. Jim +Patterson, the son of the rector, and of them all the most venturesome, +had planned to take--he called it "take"; he meant to pay for it, +anyway, he said, as soon as he could shake enough money out of his +nickel savings-bank--one of his father's Plymouth Rock chickens and have +a chickenroast in the woods back of Dr. Trumbull's. He had planned for +Johnny to take some ears of corn suitable for roasting from his father's +garden; for Lee to take some cookies out of a stone jar in his mother's +pantry; and for Arnold to take some potatoes. Then they four would steal +forth under cover of night, build a camp-fire, roast their spoils, and +feast. + +Lily had resolved to be of the party. She resorted to no open methods; +the stones of the fighting suffragettes were not for her, little +honey-sweet, curled, and ruffled darling; rather the time-worn, if not +time-sanctified, weapons of her sex, little instruments of wiles, and +tiny dodges, and tiny subterfuges, which would serve her best. + +"You know," she said to Amelia, "you don't look like me. Of course you +know that, and that can't be helped; but you do walk like me, and talk +like me, you know that, because they call you 'CopyCat.'" + +"Yes, I know," said poor Amelia. + +"I don't mind if they do call you 'Copy-Cat,'" said Lily, magnanimously. +"I don't mind a bit. But, you see, my mother always comes up-stairs to +kiss me good night after I have gone to bed, and tomorrow night she has +a dinner-party, and she will surely be a little late, and I can't manage +unless you help me. I will get one of my white dresses for you, and all +you have to do is to climb out of your window into that cedar-tree--you +know you can climb down that, because you are so afraid of burglars +climbing up--and you can slip on my dress; you had better throw it out +of the window and not try to climb in it, because my dresses tear awful +easy, and we might get caught that way. Then you just sneak down to our +house, and I shall be outdoors; and when you go up-stairs, if the doors +should be open, and anybody should call, you can answer just like me; +and I have found that light curly wig Aunt Laura wore when she had her +head shaved after she had a fever, and you just put that on and go to +bed, and mother will never know when she kisses you good night. Then +after the roast I will go to your house, and climb up that tree, and +go to bed in your room. And I will have one of your gingham dresses to +wear, and very early in the morning I will get up, and you get up, and +we both of us can get down the back stairs without being seen, and run +home." + +Amelia was almost weeping. It was her worshiped Lily's plan, but she was +horribly scared. "I don't know," she faltered. + +"Don't know! You've got to! You don't love me one single bit or you +wouldn't stop to think about whether you didn't know." It was the +world-old argument which floors love. Amelia succumbed. + +The next evening a frightened little girl clad in one of Lily Jennings's +white embroidered frocks was racing to the Jenningses' house, and +another little girl, not at all frightened, but enjoying the stimulus of +mischief and unwontedness, was racing to the wood behind Dr. Trumbull's +house, and that little girl was clad in one of Amelia Wheeler's +ginghams. But the plan went all awry. + +Lily waited, snuggled up behind an alder-bush, and the boys came, one by +one, and she heard this whispered, although there was no necessity for +whispering, "Jim Patterson, where's that hen?" + +"Couldn't get her. Grabbed her, and all her tail-feathers came out in a +bunch right in my hand, and she squawked so, father heard. He was in his +study writing his sermon, and he came out, and if I hadn't hid behind +the chicken-coop and then run I couldn't have got here. But I can't see +as you've got any corn, Johnny Trumbull." + +"Couldn't. Every single ear was cooked for dinner." + +"I couldn't bring any cookies, either," said Lee Westminster; "there +weren't any cookies in the jar." + +"And I couldn't bring the potatoes, because the outside cellar door was +locked," said Arnold Carruth. "I had to go down the back stairs and out +the south door, and the inside cellar door opens out of our dining-room, +and I daren't go in there." + +"Then we might as well go home," said Johnny Trumbull. "If I had +been you, Jim Patterson, I would have brought that old hen if her +tail-feathers had come out. Seems to me you scare awful easy." + +"Guess if you had heard her squawk!" said Jim, resentfully. "If you want +to try to lick me, come on, Johnny Trumbull. Guess you don't darse call +me scared again." + +Johnny eyed him standing there in the gloom. Jim was not large, but +very wiry, and the ground was not suited for combat. Johnny, although a +victor, would probably go home considerably the worse in appearance; and +he could anticipate the consequences were his father to encounter him. + +"Shucks!" said Johnny Trumbull, of the fine old Trumbull family and +Madame's exclusive school. "Shucks! who wants your old hen? We had +chicken for dinner, anyway." + +"So did we," said Arnold Carruth. + +"We did, and corn," said Lee. + +"We did," said Jim. + +Lily stepped forth from the alder-bush. "If," said she, "I were a +boy, and had started to have a chicken-roast, I would have HAD a +chicken-roast." + +But every boy, even the valiant Johnny Trumbull, was gone in a mad +scutter. This sudden apparition of a girl was too much for their nerves. +They never even knew who the girl was, although little Arnold Carruth +said she had looked to him like "Copy-Cat," but the others scouted the +idea. + +Lily Jennings made the best of her way out of the wood across lots to +the road. She was not in a particularly enviable case. Amelia Wheeler +was presumably in her bed, and she saw nothing for it but to take the +difficult way to Amelia's. + +Lily tore a great rent in the gingham going up the cedar-tree, but that +was nothing to what followed. She entered through Amelia's window, her +prim little room, to find herself confronted by Amelia's mother in a +wrapper, and her two grandmothers. Grandmother Stark had over her arm +a beautiful white embroidered dress. The two old ladies had entered the +room in order to lay the white dress on a chair and take away Amelia's +gingham, and there was no Amelia. Mrs. Diantha had heard the commotion, +and had risen, thrown on her wrapper, and come. Her mother had turned +upon her. + +"It is all your fault, Diantha," she had declared. + +"My fault?" echoed Mrs. Diantha, bewildered. "Where is Amelia?" + +"We don't know," said Grandmother Stark, "but you have probably driven +her away from home by your cruelty." + +"Cruelty?" + +"Yes, cruelty. What right had you to make that poor child look like a +fright, so people laughed at her? We have made her some dresses that +look decent, and had come here to leave them, and to take away those +old gingham things that look as if she lived in the almshouse, and leave +these, so she would either have to wear them or go without, when we +found she had gone." + +It was at that crucial moment that Lily entered by way of the window. + +"Here she is now," shrieked Grandmother Stark. "Amelia, where--" Then +she stopped short. + +Everybody stared at Lily's beautiful face suddenly gone white. For once +Lily was frightened. She lost all self-control. She began to sob. She +could scarcely tell the absurd story for sobs, but she told, every word. + +Then, with a sudden boldness, she too turned on Mrs. Diantha. "They call +poor Amelia 'CopyCat,'" said she, "and I don't believe she would ever +have tried so hard to look like me only my mother dresses me so I look +nice, and you send Amelia to school looking awfully." Then Lily sobbed +again. + +"My Amelia is at your house, as I understand?" said Mrs. Diantha, in an +awful voice. + +"Ye-es, ma-am." + +"Let me go," said Mrs. Diantha, violently, to Grandmother Stark, who +tried to restrain her. Mrs. Diantha dressed herself and marched down the +street, dragging Lily after her. The little girl had to trot to keep up +with the tall woman's strides, and all the way she wept. + +It was to Lily's mother's everlasting discredit, in Mrs. Diantha's +opinion, but to Lily's wonderful relief, that when she heard the story, +standing in the hall in her lovely dinner dress, with the strains of +music floating from the drawing-room, and cigar smoke floating from the +dining-room, she laughed. When Lily said, "And there wasn't even any +chickenroast, mother," she nearly had hysterics. + +"If you think this is a laughing matter, Mrs. Jennings, I do not," said +Mrs. Diantha, and again her dislike and sorrow at the sight of that +sweet, mirthful face was over her. It was a face to be loved, and hers +was not. + +"Why, I went up-stairs and kissed the child good night, and never +suspected," laughed Lily's mother. + +"I got Aunt Laura's curly, light wig for her," explained Lily, and Mrs. +Jennings laughed again. + +It was not long before Amelia, in her gingham, went home, led by her +mother--her mother, who was trembling with weakness now. Mrs. Diantha +did not scold. She did not speak, but Amelia felt with wonder her little +hand held very tenderly by her mother's long fingers. + +When at last she was undressed and in bed, Mrs. Diantha, looking very +pale, kissed her, and so did both grandmothers. + +Amelia, being very young and very tired, went to sleep. She did not know +that that night was to mark a sharp turn in her whole life. Thereafter +she went to school "dressed like the best," and her mother petted her as +nobody had ever known her mother could pet. + +It was not so very long afterward that Amelia, out of her own +improvement in appearance, developed a little stamp of individuality. + +One day Lily wore a white frock with blue ribbons, and Amelia wore one +with coral pink. It was a particular day in school; there was company, +and tea was served. + +"I told you I was going to wear blue ribbons," Lily whispered to Amelia. +Amelia smiled lovingly back at her. + +"Yes, I know, but I thought I would wear pink." + + + + +THE COCK OF THE WALK + +DOWN the road, kicking up the dust until he marched, soldier-wise, in a +cloud of it, that rose and grimed his moist face and added to the heavy, +brown powder upon the wayside weeds and flowers, whistling a queer, +tuneless thing, which yet contained definite sequences--the whistle of +a bird rather than a boy--approached Johnny Trumbull, aged ten, small of +his age, but accounted by his mates mighty. + +Johnny came of the best and oldest family in the village, but it was +in some respects an undesirable family for a boy. In it survived, as +fossils survive in ancient nooks and crannies of the earth, old traits +of race, unchanged by time and environment. Living in a house lighted +by electricity, the mental conception of it was to the Trumbulls as the +conception of candles; with telephones at hand, they unconsciously still +conceived of messages delivered with the old saying, "Ride, ride," +etc., and relays of post-horses. They locked their doors, but still had +latch-strings in mind. Johnny's father was a physician, adopting modern +methods of surgery and prescription, yet his mind harked back to cupping +and calomel, and now and then he swerved aside from his path across the +field of the present into the future and plunged headlong, as if for +fresh air, into the traditional past, and often with brilliant results. + +Johnny's mother was a college graduate. She was the president of the +woman's club. She read papers savoring of such feminine leaps ahead that +they were like gymnastics, but she walked homeward with the gait of her +great-grandmother, and inwardly regarded her husband as her lord and +master. She minced genteelly, lifting her quite fashionable skirts high +above very slender ankles, which were hereditary. Not a woman of her +race had ever gone home on thick ankles, and they had all gone home. +They had all been at home, even if abroad--at home in the truest sense. +At the club, reading her inflammatory paper, Cora Trumbull's real +self remained at home intent upon her mending, her dusting, her house +economics. It was something remarkably like her astral body which +presided at the club. + +As for her unmarried sister Janet, who was older and had graduated from +a young ladies' seminary instead of a college, whose early fancy had +been guided into the lady-like ways of antimacassars and pincushions +and wax flowers under glass shades, she was a straighter proposition. No +astral pretensions had Janet. She stayed, body and soul together, in +the old ways, and did not even project her shadow out of them. There is +seldom room enough for one's shadow in one's earliest way of life, but +there was plenty for Janet's. There had been a Janet unmarried in every +Trumbull family for generations. That in some subtle fashion accounted +for her remaining single. There had also been an unmarried Jonathan +Trumbull, and that accounted for Johnny's old bachelor uncle Jonathan. +Jonathan was a retired clergyman. He had retired before he had preached +long, because of doctrinal doubts, which were hereditary. He had +a little, dark study in Johnny's father's house, which was the old +Trumbull homestead, and he passed much of his time there, debating +within himself that matter of doctrines. + +Presently Johnny, assiduously kicking up dust, met his uncle Jonathan, +who passed without the slightest notice. Johnny did not mind at all. He +was used to it. Presently his own father appeared, driving along in +his buggy the bay mare at a steady jog, with the next professional call +quite clearly upon her equine mind. And Johnny's father did not see him. +Johnny did not mind that, either. He expected nothing different. + +Then Johnny saw his mother approaching. She was coming from the club +meeting. She held up her silk skirts high, as usual, and carried a +nice little parcel of papers tied with ribbon. She also did not notice +Johnny, who, however, out of sweet respect for his mother's nice silk +dress, stopped kicking up dust. Mrs. Trumbull on the village street was +really at home preparing a shortcake for supper. + +Johnny eyed his mother's faded but rather beautiful face under the +rose-trimmed bonnet with admiration and entire absence of resentment. +Then he walked on and kicked up the dust again. He loved to kick up the +dust in summer, the fallen leaves in autumn, and the snow in winter. +Johnny was not a typical Trumbull. None of them had ever cared for +simple amusements like that. Looking back for generations on his +father's and mother's side (both had been Trumbulls, but very distantly +related), none could be discovered who in the least resembled Johnny. No +dim blue eye of retrospection and reflection had Johnny; no tendency to +tall slenderness which would later bow beneath the greater weight of the +soul. Johnny was small, but wiry of build, and looked able to bear any +amount of mental development without a lasting bend of his physical +shoulders. Johnny had, at the early age of ten, whopped nearly every +boy in school, but that was a secret of honor. It was well known in the +school that, once the Trumbulls heard of it, Johnny could never whop +again. "You fellows know," Johnny had declared once, standing over his +prostrate and whimpering foe, "that I don't mind getting whopped at +home, but they might send me away to another school, and then I could +never whop any of you fellows." + +Johnny Trumbull kicking up the dust, himself dust-covered, his shoes, +his little queerly fitting dun suit, his cropped head, all thickly +powdered, loved it. He sniffed in that dust like a grateful incense. He +did not stop dust-kicking when he saw his aunt Janet coming, for, as he +considered, her old black gown was not worth the sacrifice. It was true +that she might see him. She sometimes did, if she were not reading a +book as she walked. It had always been a habit with the Janet Trumbulls +to read improving books when they walked abroad. To-day Johnny saw, with +a quick glance of those sharp, black eyes, so unlike the Trumbulls', +that his aunt Janet was reading. He therefore expected her to pass him +without recognition, and marched on kicking up the dust. But suddenly, +as he grew nearer the spry little figure, he was aware of a pair of gray +eyes, before which waved protectingly a hand clad in a black silk +glove with dangling finger-tips, because it was too long, and it dawned +swiftly upon him that Aunt Janet was trying to shield her face from the +moving column of brown motes. He stopped kicking, but it was too late. +Aunt Janet had him by the collar and was vigorously shaking him with +nervous strength. + +"You are a very naughty little boy," declared Aunt Janet. "You should +know better than to walk along the street raising so much dust. No +well-brought-up child ever does such things. Who are your parents, little +boy?" + +Johnny perceived that Aunt Janet did not recognize him, which was easily +explained. She wore her reading-spectacles and not her far-seeing ones; +besides, her reading spectacles were obscured by dust and her nephew's +face was nearly obliterated. Also as she shook him his face was not much +in evidence. Johnny disliked, naturally, to tell his aunt Janet that her +own sister and brother-in-law were the parents of such a wicked little +boy. He therefore kept quiet and submitted to the shaking, making +himself as limp as a rag. This, however, exasperated Aunt Janet, who +found herself encumbered by a dead weight of a little boy to be shaken, +and suddenly Johnny Trumbull, the fighting champion of the town, the +cock of the walk of the school, found himself being ignominiously +spanked. That was too much. Johnny's fighting blood was up. He lost all +consideration for circumstances, he forgot that Aunt Janet was not a +boy, that she was quite near being an old lady. She had overstepped the +bounds of privilege of age and sex, and an alarming state of equality +ensued. Quickly the tables were turned. The boy became far from limp. He +stiffened, then bounded and rebounded like wire. He butted, he parried, +he observed all his famous tactics of battle, and poor Aunt Janet sat +down in the dust, black dress, bonnet, glasses (but the glasses were +off and lost), little improving book, black silk gloves, and all; and +Johnny, hopeless, awful, irreverent, sat upon his Aunt Janet's plunging +knees, which seemed the most lively part of her. He kept his face +twisted away from her, but it was not from cowardice. Johnny was afraid +lest Aunt Janet should be too much overcome by the discovery of his +identity. He felt that it was his duty to spare her that. So he sat +still, triumphant but inwardly aghast. + +It was fast dawning upon him that his aunt was not a little boy. He was +not afraid of any punishment which might be meted out to him, but he was +simply horrified. He himself had violated all the honorable conditions +of warfare. He felt a little dizzy and ill, and he felt worse when +he ventured a hurried glance at Aunt Janet's face. She was very pale +through the dust, and her eyes were closed. Johnny thought then that he +had killed her. + +He got up--the nervous knees were no longer plunging; then he heard a +voice, a little-girl voice, always shrill, but now high pitched to a +squeak with terror. It was the voice of Lily Jennings. She stood near +and yet aloof, a lovely little flower of a girl, all white-scalloped +frills and ribbons, with a big white-frilled hat shading a pale little +face and covering the top of a head decorated with wonderful yellow +curls. She stood behind a big baby-carriage with a pink-lined muslin +canopy and containing a nest of pink and white, but an empty nest. +Lily's little brother's carriage had a spring broken, and she had been +to borrow her aunt's baby-carriage, so that nurse could wheel little +brother up and down the veranda. Nurse had a headache, and the +maids were busy, and Lily, who was a kind little soul and, moreover, +imaginative, and who liked the idea of pushing an empty baby-carriage, +had volunteered to go for it. All the way she had been dreaming of what +was not in the carriage. She had come directly out of a dream of doll +twins when she chanced upon the tragedy in the road. + +"What have you been doing now, Johnny Trumbull?" said she. She was +tremulous, white with horror, but she stood her ground. It was curious, +but Johnny Trumbull, with all his bravery, was always cowed before Lily. +Once she had turned and stared at him when he had emerged triumphant +but with bleeding nose from a fight; then she had sniffed delicately and +gone her way. It had only taken a second, but in that second the victor +had met moral defeat. + +He looked now at her pale, really scared face, and his own was as pale. +He stood and kicked the dust until the swirling column of it reached his +head. + +"That's right," said Lily; "stand and kick up dust all over me. WHAT +have you been doing?" + +Johnny was trembling so he could hardly stand. He stopped kicking dust. + +"Have you killed your aunt?" demanded Lily. It was monstrous, but she +had a very dramatic imagination, and there was a faint hint of enjoyment +in her tragic voice. + +"Guess she's just choked by dust," volunteered Johnny, hoarsely. He +kicked the dust again. + +"That's right," said Lily. "If she's choked to death by dust, stand +there and choke her some more. You are a murderer, Johnny Trumbull, and +my mamma will never allow me to speak to you again, and Madame will not +allow you to come to school. AND--I see your papa driving up the street, +and there is the chief policeman's buggy just behind." Lily acquiesced +entirely in the extraordinary coincidence of the father and the chief of +police appearing upon the scene. The unlikely seemed to her the likely. +"NOW," said she, cheerfully, "you will be put in state prison and locked +up, and then you will be put to death by a very strong telephone." + +Johnny's father was leaning out of his buggy, looking back at the chief +of police in his, and the mare was jogging very slowly in a perfect reek +of dust. Lily, who was, in spite of her terrific imagination, human and +a girl, rose suddenly to heights of pity and succor. "They shall never +take you, Johnny Trumbull," said she. "I will save you." + +Johnny by this time was utterly forgetful of his high status as champion +(behind her back) of Madame's very select school for select children of +a somewhat select village. He was forgetful of the fact that a champion +never cries. He cried; he blubbered; tears rolled over his dusty cheeks, +making furrows like plowshares of grief. He feared lest he might have +killed his aunt Janet. Women, and not very young women, might presumably +be unable to survive such rough usage as very tough and at the same time +very limber little boys, and he loved his poor aunt Janet. He +grieved because of his aunt, his parents, his uncle, and rather more +particularly because of himself. He was quite sure that the policeman +was coming for him. Logic had no place in his frenzied conclusions. He +did not consider how the tragedy had taken place entirely out of sight +of a house, that Lily Jennings was the only person who had any knowledge +of it. He looked at the masterful, fair-haired little girl like a baby. +"How?" sniffed he. + +For answer, Lily pointed to the empty baby-carriage. "Get right in," she +ordered. + +Even in this dire extremity Johnny hesitated. "Can't." + +"Yes, you can. It is extra large. Aunt Laura's baby was a twin when +he first came; now he's just an ordinary baby, but his carriage is big +enough for two. There's plenty of room. Besides, you're a very small +boy, very small of your age, even if you do knock all the other boys +down and have murdered your aunt. Get in. In a minute they will see +you." + +There was in reality no time to lose. Johnny did get in. In spite of the +provisions for twins, there was none too much room. + +Lily covered him up with the fluffy pink-and-lace things, and scowled. +"You hump up awfully," she muttered. Then she reached beneath him and +snatched out the pillow on which he lay, the baby's little bed. She gave +it a swift toss over the fringe of wayside bushes into a field. "Aunt +Laura's nice embroidered pillow," said she. "Make yourself just as flat +as you can, Johnny Trumbull." + +Johnny obeyed, but he was obliged to double himself up like a +jack-knife. However, there was no sign of him visible when the two +buggies drew up. There stood a pale and frightened little girl, with a +baby-carriage canopied with rose and lace and heaped up with rosy and +lacy coverlets, presumably sheltering a sleeping infant. Lily was a very +keen little girl. She had sense enough not to run. The two men, at the +sight of Aunt Janet prostrate in the road, leaped out of their buggies. +The doctor's horse stood still; the policeman's trotted away, to Lily's +great relief. She could not imagine Johnny's own father haling him away +to state prison and the stern Arm of Justice. She stood the fire of +bewildered questions in the best and safest fashion. She wept bitterly, +and her tears were not assumed. Poor little Lily was all of a sudden +crushed under the weight of facts. There was Aunt Janet, she had no +doubt, killed by her own nephew, and she was hiding the guilty murderer. +She had visions of state prison for herself. She watched fearfully +while the two men bent over the prostrate woman, who very soon began to +sputter and gasp and try to sit up. + +"What on earth is the matter, Janet?" inquired Dr. Trumbull, who was +paler than his sister-inlaw. In fact, she was unable to look very pale +on account of dust. + +"Ow!" sputtered Aunt Janet, coughing violently, "get me up out of this +dust, John. Ow!" + +"What was the matter?" + +"Yes, what has happened, madam?" demanded the chief of police, sternly. + +"Nothing," replied Aunt Janet, to Lily's and Johnny's amazement. "What +do you think has happened? I fell down in all this nasty dust. Ow!" + +"What did you eat for luncheon, Janet?" inquired Dr. Trumbull, as he +assisted his sister-inlaw to her feet. + +"What I was a fool to eat," replied Janet Trumbull, promptly. "Cucumber +salad and lemon jelly with whipped cream." + +"Enough to make anybody have indigestion," said Dr. Trumbull. "You have +had one of these attacks before, too, Janet. You remember the time you +ate strawberry shortcake and ice-cream?" + +Janet nodded meekly. Then she coughed again. "Ow, this dust!" gasped +she. "For goodness' sake, John, get me home where I can get some water +and take off these dusty clothes or I shall choke to death." + +"How does your stomach feel?" inquired Dr. Trumbull. + +"Stomach is all right now, but I am just choking to death with the +dust." Janet turned sharply toward the policeman. "You have sense enough +to keep still, I hope," said she. "I don't want the whole town ringing +with my being such an idiot as to eat cucumbers and cream together and +being found this way." Janet looked like an animated creation of dust as +she faced the chief of police. + +"Yes, ma'am," he replied, bowing and scraping one foot and raising more +dust. + +He and Dr. Trumbull assisted Aunt Janet into the buggy, and they drove +off. Then the chief of police discovered that his own horse had gone. +"Did you see which way he went, sis?" he inquired of Lily, and she +pointed down the road, and sobbed as she did so. + +The policeman said something bad under his breath, then advised Lily to +run home to her ma, and started down the road. + +When he was out of sight, Lily drew back the pink-and-white things from +Johnny's face. "Well, you didn't kill her this time," said she. + +"Why do you s'pose she didn't tell all about it?" said Johnny, gaping at +her. + +"How do I know? I suppose she was ashamed to tell how she had been +fighting, maybe." + +"No, that was not why," said Johnny in a deep voice. + +"Why was it, then?" + +"SHE KNEW." + +Johnny began to climb out of the baby-carriage. + +"What will she do next, then?" asked Lily. + +"I don't know," Johnny replied, gloomily. + +He was out of the carriage then, and Lily was readjusting the pillows +and things. "Get that nice embroidered pillow I threw over the bushes," +she ordered, crossly. Johnny obeyed. When she had finished putting the +baby-carriage to rights she turned upon poor little Johnny Trumbull, and +her face wore the expression of a queen of tragedy. "Well," said Lily +Jennings, "I suppose I shall have to marry you when I am grown up, after +all this." + +Johnny gasped. He thought Lily the most beautiful girl he knew, but to +be confronted with murder and marriage within a few minutes was almost +too much. He flushed a burning red. He laughed foolishly. He said +nothing. + +"It will be very hard on me," stated Lily, "to marry a boy who tried to +murder his nice aunt." + +Johnny revived a bit under this feminine disdain. "I didn't try to +murder her," he said in a weak voice. + +"You might have, throwing her down in all that awful dust, a nice, clean +lady. Ladies are not like boys. It might kill them very quickly to be +knocked down on a dusty road." + +"I didn't mean to kill her." + +"You might have." + +"Well, I didn't, and--she--" + +"What?" + +"She spanked me." + +"Pooh! That doesn't amount to anything," sniffed Lily. + +"It does if you are a boy." + +"I don't see why." + +"Well, I can't help it if you don't. It does." + +"Why shouldn't a boy be spanked when he's naughty, just as well as a +girl, I would like to know?" + +"Because he's a boy." + +Lily looked at Johnny Trumbull. The great fact did remain. He had been +spanked, he had thrown his own aunt down in the dust. He had taken +advantage of her little-girl protection, but he was a boy. Lily did not +understand his why at all, but she bowed before it. However, that she +would not admit. She made a rapid change of base. "What," said she, "are +you going to do next?" + +Johnny stared at her. It was a puzzle. + +"If," said Lily, distinctly, "you are afraid to go home, if you think +your aunt will tell, I will let you get into Aunt Laura's baby-carriage +again, and I will wheel you a little way." + +Johnny would have liked at that moment to knock Lily down, as he had his +aunt Janet. Lily looked at him shrewdly. "Oh yes," said she, "you can +knock me down in the dust there if you want to, and spoil my nice clean +dress. You will be a boy, just the same." + +"I will never marry you, anyway," declared Johnny. + +"Aren't you afraid I'll tell on you and get you another spanking if you +don't?" + +"Tell if you want to. I'd enough sight rather be spanked than marry +you." + +A gleam of respect came into the little girl's wisely regarding blue +eyes. She, with the swiftness of her sex, recognized in forlorn little +Johnny the making of a man. "Oh, well," said she, loftily, "I never +was a telltale, and, anyway, we are not grown up, and there will be my +trousseau to get, and a lot of other things to do first. I shall go to +Europe before I am married, too, and I might meet a boy much nicer than +you on the steamer." + +"Meet him if you want to." + +Lily looked at Johnny Trumbull with more than respect--with +admiration--but she kept guard over her little tongue. "Well, you can +leave that for the future," said she with a grown-up air. + +"I ain't going to leave it. It's settled for good and all now," growled +Johnny. + +To his immense surprise, Lily curved her white embroidered sleeve over +her face and began to weep. + +"What's the matter now?" asked Johnny, sulkily, after a minute. + +"I think you are a real horrid boy," sobbed Lily. + +Lily looked like nothing but a very frilly, sweet, white flower. +Johnny could not see her face. There was nothing to be seen except +that delicate fluff of white, supported on dainty white-socked, +white-slippered limbs. + +"Say," said Johnny. + +"You are real cruel, when I--I saved your--li-fe," wailed Lily. + +"Say," said Johnny, "maybe if I don't see any other girl I like better +I will marry you when I am grown up, but I won't if you don't stop that +howling." + +Lily stopped immediately. She peeped at him, a blue peep from under the +flopping, embroidered brim of her hat. "Are you in earnest?" She +smiled faintly. Her blue eyes, wet with tears, were lovely; so was her +hesitating smile. + +"Yes, if you don't act silly," said Johnny. "Now you had better run +home, or your mother will wonder where that baby-carriage is." + +Lily walked away, smiling over her shoulder, the smile of the happily +subjugated. "I won't tell anybody, Johnny," she called back in her +flute-like voice. + +"Don't care if you do," returned Johnny, looking at her with chin in the +air and shoulders square, and Lily wondered at his bravery. + +But Johnny was not so brave and he did care. He knew that his best +course was an immediate return home, but he did not know what he might +have to face. He could not in the least understand why his aunt Janet +had not told at once. He was sure that she knew. Then he thought of a +possible reason for her silence; she might have feared his arrest at the +hands of the chief of police. Johnny quailed. He knew his aunt Janet +to be rather a brave sort of woman. If she had fears, she must have had +reason for them. He might even now be arrested. Suppose Lily did +tell. He had a theory that girls usually told. He began to speculate +concerning the horrors of prison. Of course he would not be executed, +since his aunt was obviously very far from being killed, but he might be +imprisoned for a long term. + +Johnny went home. He did not kick the dust any more. He walked very +steadily and staidly. When he came in sight of the old Colonial mansion, +with its massive veranda pillars, he felt chilly. However, he went on. +He passed around to the south door and entered and smelled shortcake. +It would have smelled delicious had he not had so much on his mind. He +looked through the hall, and had a glimpse of his uncle Jonathan in the +study, writing. At the right of the door was his father's office. The +door of that was open, and Johnny saw his father pouring things from +bottles. He did not look at Johnny. His mother crossed the hall. She +had on a long white apron, which she wore when making her famous cream +shortcakes. She saw Johnny, but merely observed, "Go and wash your face +and hands, Johnny; it is nearly supper-time." + +Johnny went up-stairs. At the upper landing he found his aunt Janet +waiting for him. "Come here," she whispered, and Johnny followed her, +trembling, into her own room. It was a large room, rather crowded with +heavy, old-fashioned furniture. Aunt Janet had freed herself from dust +and was arrayed in a purple silk gown. Her hair was looped loosely on +either side of her long face. She was a handsome woman, after a certain +type. + +"Stand here, Johnny," said she. She had closed the door, and Johnny +was stationed before her. She did not seem in the least injured nor the +worse for her experience. On the contrary, there was a bright-red flush +on her cheeks, and her eyes shone as Johnny had never seen them. She +looked eagerly at Johnny. + +"Why did you do that?" she said, but there was no anger in her voice. + +"I forgot," began Johnny. + +"Forgot what?" Her voice was strained with eagerness. + +"That you were not another boy," said Johnny. + +"Tell me," said Aunt Janet. "No, you need not tell me, because if you +did it might be my duty to inform your parents. I know there is no need +of your telling. You MUST be in the habit of fighting with the other +boys." + +"Except the little ones," admitted Johnny. + +To Johnny's wild astonishment, Aunt Janet seized him by the shoulders +and looked him in the eyes with a look of adoration and immense +approval. "Thank goodness," said she, "at last there is going to be a +fighter in the Trumbull family. Your uncle would never fight, and your +father would not. Your grandfather would. Your uncle and your father are +good men, though; you must try to be like them, Johnny." + +"Yes, ma'am," replied Johnny, bewildered. + +"I think they would be called better men than your grandfather and my +father," said Aunt Janet. + +"Yes, ma'am." + +"I think it is time for you to have your grandfather's watch," said Aunt +Janet. "I think you are man enough to take care of it." Aunt Janet had +all the time been holding a black leather case. Now she opened it, and +Johnny saw the great gold watch which he had seen many times before and +had always understood was to be his some day, when he was a man. "Here," +said Aunt Janet. "Take good care of it. You must try to be as good as +your uncle and father, but you must remember one thing--you will wear a +watch which belonged to a man who never allowed other men to crowd him +out of the way he elected to go." + +"Yes, ma'am," said Johnny. He took the watch. + +"What do you say?" inquired his aunt, sharply. + +"Thank you." + +"That's right. I thought you had forgotten your manners. Your +grandfather never did." + +"I am sorry. Aunt Janet," muttered Johnny, "that I--" + +"You need never say anything about that," his aunt returned, quickly. +"I did not see who you were at first. You are too old to be spanked by a +woman, but you ought to be whipped by a man, and I wish your grandfather +were alive to do it." + +"Yes, ma'am," said Johnny. He looked at her bravely. "He could if he +wanted to," said he. + +Aunt Janet smiled at him proudly. "Of course," said she, "a boy like you +never gets the worst of it fighting with other boys." + +"No, ma'am," said Johnny. + +Aunt Janet smiled again. "Now run and wash your face and hands," said +she; "you must not keep supper waiting. Your mother has a paper to write +for her club, and I have promised to help her." + +"Yes, ma'am," said Johnny. He walked out, carrying the great gold +timepiece, bewildered, embarrassed, modest beneath his honors, but +little cock of the walk, whether he would or no, for reasons entirely +and forever beyond his ken. + + + + +JOHNNY-IN-THE-WOODS + +JOHNNY TRUMBULL, he who had demonstrated his claim to be Cock of the +Walk by a most impious hand-to-hand fight with his own aunt, Miss Janet +Trumbull, in which he had been decisively victorious, and won his spurs, +consisting of his late grandfather's immense, solemnly ticking watch, +was to take a new path of action. Johnny suddenly developed the +prominent Trumbull trait, but in his case it was inverted. Johnny, as +became a boy of his race, took an excursion into the past, but instead +of applying the present to the past, as was the tendency of the other +Trumbulls, he forcibly applied the past to the present. He fairly +plastered the past over the exigencies of his day and generation like a +penetrating poultice of mustard, and the results were peculiar. + +Johnny, being bidden of a rainy day during the midsummer vacation to +remain in the house, to keep quiet, read a book, and be a good boy, +obeyed, but his obedience was of a doubtful measure of wisdom. + +Johnny got a book out of his uncle Jonathan Trumbull's dark little +library while Jonathan was walking sedately to the post-office, holding +his dripping umbrella at a wonderful slant of exactness, without regard +to the wind, thereby getting the soft drive of the rain full in his +face, which became, as it were, bedewed with tears, entirely outside any +cause of his own emotions. + +Johnny probably got the only book of an antiorthodox trend in his +uncle's library. He found tucked away in a snug corner an ancient +collection of Border Ballads, and he read therein of many unmoral +romances and pretty fancies, which, since he was a small boy, held +little meaning for him, or charm, beyond a delight in the swing of the +rhythm, for Johnny had a feeling for music. It was when he read of Robin +Hood, the bold Robin Hood, with his dubious ethics but his certain and +unquenchable interest, that Johnny Trumbull became intent. He had the +volume in his own room, being somewhat doubtful as to whether it might +be of the sort included in the good-boy role. He sat beside a rainwashed +window, which commanded a view of the wide field between the Trumbull +mansion and Jim Simmons's house, and he read about Robin Hood and his +Greenwood adventures, his forcible setting the wrong right; and for the +first time his imagination awoke, and his ambition. Johnny Trumbull, +hitherto hero of nothing except little material fistfights, wished now +to become a hero of true romance. + +In fact, Johnny considered seriously the possibility of reincarnating, +in his own person, Robin Hood. He eyed the wide green field dreamily +through his rain-blurred window. It was a pretty field, waving with +feathery grasses and starred with daisies and buttercups, and it was +very fortunate that it happened to be so wide. Jim Simmons's house was +not a desirable feature of the landscape, and looked much better several +acres away. It was a neglected, squalid structure, and considered a +disgrace to the whole village. Jim was also a disgrace, and an unsolved +problem. He owned that house, and somehow contrived to pay the taxes +thereon. He also lived and throve in bodily health in spite of evil +ways, and his children were many. There seemed no way to dispose finally +of Jim Simmons and his house except by murder and arson, and the village +was a peaceful one, and such measures were entirely too strenuous. + +Presently Johnny, staring dreamily out of his window, saw approaching a +rusty-black umbrella held at precisely the wrong angle in respect of the +storm, but held with the unvarying stiffness with which a soldier might +hold a bayonet, and knew it for his uncle Jonathan's umbrella. Soon he +beheld also his uncle's serious, rain-drenched face and his long ambling +body and legs. Jonathan was coming home from the post-office, whither +he repaired every morning. He never got a letter, never anything except +religious newspapers, but the visit to the post-office was part of his +daily routine. Rain or shine, Jonathan Trumbull went for the morning +mail, and gained thereby a queer negative enjoyment of a perfectly +useless duty performed. Johnny watched his uncle draw near to the house, +and cruelly reflected how unlike Robin Hood he must be. He even +wondered if his uncle could possibly have read Robin Hood and still show +absolutely no result in his own personal appearance. He knew that +he, Johnny, could not walk to the post-office and back, even with the +drawback of a dripping old umbrella instead of a bow and arrow, without +looking a bit like Robin Hood, especially when fresh from reading about +him. + +Then suddenly something distracted his thoughts from Uncle Jonathan. The +long, feathery grass in the field moved with a motion distinct from +that caused by the wind and rain. Johnny saw a tiger-striped back emerge, +covering long leaps of terror. Johnny knew the creature for a cat afraid +of Uncle Jonathan. Then he saw the grass move behind the first leaping, +striped back, and he knew there were more cats afraid of Uncle Jonathan. +There were even motions caused by unseen things, and he reasoned, +"Kittens afraid of Uncle Jonathan." Then Johnny reflected with a great +glow of indignation that the Simmonses kept an outrageous number of +half-starved cats and kittens, besides a quota of children popularly +supposed to be none too well nourished, let alone properly clothed. Then +it was that Johnny Trumbull's active, firm imagination slapped the past +of old romance like a most thorough mustard poultice over the present. +There could be no Lincoln Green, no following of brave outlaws (that +is, in the strictest sense), no bows and arrows, no sojourning under +greenwood trees and the rest, but something he could, and would, do and +be. That rainy day when Johnny Trumbull was a good boy, and stayed in +the house, and read a book, marked an epoch. + +That night when Johnny went into his aunt Janet's room she looked +curiously at his face, which seemed a little strange to her. Johnny, +since he had come into possession of his grandfather's watch, went every +night, on his way to bed, to his aunt's room for the purpose of winding +up that ancient timepiece, Janet having a firm impression that it might +not be done properly unless under her supervision. Johnny stood before +his aunt and wound up the watch with its ponderous key, and she watched +him. + +"What have you been doing all day, John?" said she. + +"Stayed in the house and--read." + +"What did you read, John?" + +"A book." + +"Do you mean to be impertinent, John?" + +"No, ma'am," replied Johnny, and with perfect truth. He had not the +slightest idea of the title of the book. + +"What was the book?" + +"A poetry book." + +"Where did you find it?" + +"In Uncle Jonathan's library." + +"Poetry In Uncle Jonathan's library?" said Janet, in a mystified way. +She had a general impression of Jonathan's library as of century-old +preserves, altogether dried up and quite indistinguishable one from the +other except by labels. Poetry she could not imagine as being there +at all. Finally she thought of the early Victorians, and Spenser and +Chaucer. The library might include them, but she had an idea that +Spenser and Chaucer were not fit reading for a little boy. However, +as she remembered Spenser and Chaucer, she doubted if Johnny could +understand much of them. Probably he had gotten hold of an early +Victorian, and she looked rather contemptuous. + +"I don't think much of a boy like you reading poetry," said Janet. +"Couldn't you find anything else to read?" + +"No, ma'am." That also was truth. Johnny, before exploring his uncle's +theological library, had peered at his father's old medical books +and his mother's bookcases, which contained quite terrifying uniform +editions of standard things written by women. + +"I don't suppose there ARE many books written for boys," said Aunt +Janet, reflectively. + +"No, ma'am," said Johnny. He finished winding the watch, and gave, as +was the custom, the key to Aunt Janet, lest he lose it. + +"I will see if I cannot find some books of travels for you, John," said +Janet. "I think travels would be good reading for a boy. Good night, +John." + +"Good night. Aunt Janet," replied Johnny. His aunt never kissed him good +night, which was one reason why he liked her. + +On his way to bed he had to pass his mother's room, whose door stood +open. She was busy writing at her desk. She glanced at Johnny. + +"Are you going to bed?" said she. + +"Yes, ma'am." + +Johnny entered the room and let his mother kiss his forehead, parting +his curly hair to do so. He loved his mother, but did not care at all to +have her kiss him. He did not object, because he thought she liked to +do it, and she was a woman, and it was a very little thing in which he +could oblige her. + +"Were you a good boy, and did you find a good book to read?" asked she. + +"Yes, ma'am." + +"What was the book?" Cora Trumbull inquired, absently, writing as she +spoke. + +"Poetry." + +Cora laughed. "Poetry is odd for a boy," said she. "You should have +read a book of travels or history. Good night, Johnny." + +"Good night, mother." + +Then Johnny met his father, smelling strongly of medicines, coming up +from his study. But his father did not see him. And Johnny went to bed, +having imbibed from that old tale of Robin Hood more of history and more +knowledge of excursions into realms of old romance than his elders had +ever known during much longer lives than his. + +Johnny confided in nobody at first. His feeling nearly led him astray +in the matter of Lily Jennings; he thought of her, for one sentimental +minute, as Robin Hood's Maid Marion. Then he dismissed the idea +peremptorily. Lily Jennings would simply laugh. He knew her. Moreover, +she was a girl, and not to be trusted. Johnny felt the need of another +boy who would be a kindred spirit; he wished for more than one boy. +He wished for a following of heroic and lawless souls, even as Robin +Hood's. But he could think of nobody, after considerable study, except +one boy, younger than himself. He was a beautiful little boy, whose +mother had never allowed him to have his golden curls cut, although +he had been in trousers for quite a while. However, the trousers were +foolish, being knickerbockers, and accompanied by low socks, which +revealed pretty, dimpled, babyish legs. The boy's name was Arnold +Carruth, and that was against him, as being long, and his mother firm +about allowing no nickname. Nicknames in any case were not allowed in +the very exclusive private school which Johnny attended. + +Arnold Carruth, in spite of his being such a beautiful little boy, +would have had no standing at all in the school as far as popularity was +concerned had it not been for a strain of mischief which triumphed over +curls, socks, and pink cheeks and a much-kissed rosebud of a mouth. +Arnold Carruth, as one of the teachers permitted herself to state when +relaxed in the bosom of her own family, was "as choke-full of mischief +as a pod of peas. And the worst of it all is," quoth the teacher, Miss +Agnes Rector, who was a pretty young girl, with a hidden sympathy for +mischief herself--"the worst of it is, that child looks so like a cherub +on a rosy cloud that even if he should be caught nobody would believe +it. They would be much more likely to accuse poor little Andrew Jackson +Green, because he has a snub nose and is a bit cross-eyed, and I never +knew that poor child to do anything except obey rules and learn his +lessons. He is almost too good. And another worst of it is, nobody +can help loving that little imp of a Carruth boy, mischief and all. I +believe the scamp knows it and takes advantage of it." + +It is quite possible that Arnold Carruth did profit unworthily by his +beauty and engagingness, albeit without calculation. He was so young, +it was monstrous to believe him capable of calculation, of deliberate +trading upon his assets of birth and beauty and fascination. However, +Johnny Trumbull, who was wide awake and a year older, was alive to the +situation. He told Arnold Carruth, and Arnold Carruth only, about Robin +Hood and his great scheme. + +"You can help," said this wise Johnny; "you can be in it, because nobody +thinks you can be in anything, on account of your wearing curls." + +Arnold Carruth flushed and gave an angry tug at one golden curl which +the wind blew over a shoulder. The two boys were in a secluded corner +of Madame's lawn, behind a clump of Japanese cedars, during an +intermission. + +"I can't help it because I wear curls," declared Arnold with angry +shame. + +"Who said you could? No need of getting mad." + +"Mamma and Aunt Flora and grandmamma won't let me have these old curls +cut off," said Arnold. "You needn't think I want to have curls like a +girl, Johnny Trumbull." + +"Who said you did? And I know you don't like to wear those short +stockings, either." + +"Like to!" Arnold gave a spiteful kick, first of one half-bared, dimpled +leg, then of the other. + +"First thing you know I'll steal mamma's or Aunt Flora's stockings and +throw these in the furnace-I will. Do you s'pose a feller wants to wear +these baby things? I guess not. Women are awful queer, Johnny Trumbull. +My mamma and my aunt Flora are awful nice, but they are queer about some +things." + +"Most women are queer," agreed Johnny, "but my aunt Janet isn't as queer +as some. Rather guess if she saw me with curls like a little girl she'd +cut 'em off herself." + +"Wish she was my aunt," said Arnold Carruth with a sigh. "A feller needs +a woman like that till he's grown up. Do you s'pose she'd cut off my +curls if I was to go to your house, Johnny?" + +"I'm afraid she wouldn't think it was right unless your mother said she +might. She has to be real careful about doing right, because my uncle +Jonathan used to preach, you know." + +Arnold Carruth grinned savagely, as if he endured pain. "Well, I s'pose +I'll have to stand the curls and little baby stockings awhile longer," +said he. "What was it you were going to tell me, Johnny?" + +"I am going to tell you because I know you aren't too good, if you do +wear curls and little stockings." + +"No, I ain't too good," declared Arnold Carruth, proudly; "I +ain't--HONEST, Johnny." + +"That's why I'm going to tell you. But if you tell any of the other +boys--or girls--" + +"Tell girls!" sniffed Arnold. + +"If you tell anybody, I'll lick you." + +"Guess I ain't afraid." + +"Guess you'd be afraid to go home after you'd been licked." + +"Guess my mamma would give it to you." + +"Run home and tell mamma you'd been whopped, would you, then?" + +Little Arnold, beautiful baby boy, straightened himself with a quick +remembrance that he was born a man. "You know I wouldn't tell, Johnny +Trumbull." + +"Guess you wouldn't. Well, here it is--" Johnny spoke in emphatic +whispers, Arnold's curly head close to his mouth: "There are a good many +things in this town have got to be set right," said Johnny. + +Little Arnold stared at him. Then fire shone in his lovely blue eyes +under the golden shadow of his curls, a fire which had shone in the +eyes of some ancestors of his, for there was good fighting blood in +the Carruth family, as well as in the Trumbull, although this small +descendant did go about curled and kissed and barelegged. + +"How'll we begin?" said Arnold, in a strenuous whisper. + +"We've got to begin right away with Jim Simmons's cats and kittens." + +"With Jim Simmons's cats and kittens?" repeated Arnold. + +"That was what I said, exactly. We've got to begin right there. It is an +awful little beginning, but I can't think of anything else. If you can, +I'm willing to listen." + +"I guess I can't," admitted Arnold, helplessly. + +"Of course we can't go around taking away money from rich people and +giving it to poor folks. One reason is, most of the poor folks in this +town are lazy, and don't get money because they don't want to work for +it. And when they are not lazy, they drink. If we gave rich people's +money to poor folks like that, we shouldn't do a mite of good. The rich +folks would be poor, and the poor folks wouldn't stay rich; they would +be lazier, and get more drink. I don't see any sense in doing things +like that in this town. There are a few poor folks I have been thinking +we might take some money for and do good, but not many." + +"Who?" inquired Arnold Carruth, in awed tones. + +"Well, there is poor old Mrs. Sam Little. She's awful poor. Folks help +her, I know, but she can't be real pleased being helped. She'd rather +have the money herself. I have been wondering if we couldn't get some of +your father's money away and give it to her, for one." + +"Get away papa's money!" + +"You don't mean to tell me you are as stingy as that, Arnold Carruth?" + +"I guess papa wouldn't like it." + +"Of course he wouldn't. But that is not the point. It is not what your +father would like; it is what that poor old lady would like." + +It was too much for Arnold. He gaped at Johnny. + +"If you are going to be mean and stingy, we may as well stop before we +begin," said Johnny. + +Then Arnold Carruth recovered himself. "Old Mr. Webster Payne is awful +poor," said he. "We might take some of your father's money and give it +to him." + +Johnny snorted, fairly snorted. "If," said he, "you think my father +keeps his money where we can get it, you are mistaken, Arnold Carruth. +My father's money is all in papers that are not worth much now and that +he has to keep in the bank till they are." + +Arnold smiled hopefully. "Guess that's the way my papa keeps HIS money." + +"It's the way most rich people are mean enough to," said Johnny, +severely. "I don't care if it's your father or mine, it's mean. And +that's why we've got to begin with Jim Simmons's cats and kittens." + +"Are you going to give old Mrs. Sam Little cats?" inquired Arnold. + +Johnny sniffed. "Don't be silly," said he. "Though I do think a nice +cat with a few kittens might cheer her up a little, and we could steal +enough milk, by getting up early and tagging after the milkman, to feed +them. But I wasn't thinking of giving her or old Mr. Payne cats and +kittens. I wasn't thinking of folks; I was thinking of all those poor +cats and kittens that Mr. Jim Simmons has and doesn't half feed, and +that have to go hunting around folks' back doors in the rain, when cats +hate water, too, and pick things up that must be bad for their stomachs, +when they ought to have their milk regularly in nice, clean saucers. +No, Arnold Carruth, what we have got to do is to steal Mr. Jim Simmons's +cats and get them in nice homes where they can earn their living +catching mice and be well cared for." + +"Steal cats?" said Arnold. + +"Yes, steal cats, in order to do right," said Johnny Trumbull, and his +expression was heroic, even exalted. + +It was then that a sweet treble, faltering yet exultant, rang in their +ears. + +"If," said the treble voice, "you are going to steal dear little kitty +cats and get nice homes for them, I'm going to help." + +The voice belonged to Lily Jennings, who had stood on the other side of +the Japanese cedars and heard every word. + +Both boys started in righteous wrath, but Arnold Carruth was the angrier +of the two. "Mean little cat yourself, listening," said he. His curls +seemed to rise like a crest of rage. + +Johnny, remembering some things, was not so outspoken. "You hadn't any +right to listen, Lily Jennings," he said, with masculine severity. + +"I didn't start to listen," said Lily. "I was looking for cones on these +trees. Miss Parmalee wanted us to bring some object of nature into the +class, and I wondered whether I could find a queer Japanese cone on one +of these trees, and then I heard you boys talking, and I couldn't help +listening. You spoke very loud, and I couldn't give up looking for that +cone. I couldn't find any, and I heard all about the Simmonses' cats, +and I know lots of other cats that haven't got good homes, and--I am +going to be in it." + +"You AIN'T," declared Arnold Carruth. + +"We can't have girls in it," said Johnny the mindful, more politely. + +"You've got to have me. You had better have me, Johnny Trumbull," she +added with meaning. + +Johnny flinched. It was a species of blackmail, but what could he do? +Suppose Lily told how she had hidden him--him, Johnny Trumbull, the +champion of the school--in that empty baby-carriage! He would have more +to contend against than Arnold Carruth with socks and curls. He did not +think Lily would tell. Somehow Lily, although a little, befrilled girl, +gave an impression of having a knowledge of a square deal almost as much +as a boy would; but what boy could tell with a certainty what such an +uncertain creature as a girl might or might not do? Moreover, Johnny +had a weakness, a hidden, Spartanly hidden, weakness for Lily. He rather +wished to have her act as partner in his great enterprise. He therefore +gruffly assented. + +"All right," he said, "you can be in it. But just you look out. You'll +see what happens if you tell." + +"She can't be in it; she's nothing but a girl," said Arnold Carruth, +fiercely. + +Lily Jennings lifted her chin and surveyed him with queenly scorn. "And +what are you?" said she. "A little boy with curls and baby socks." + +Arnold colored with shame and fury, and subsided. "Mind you don't tell," +he said, taking Johnny's cue. + +"I sha'n't tell," replied Lily, with majesty. "But you'll tell +yourselves if you talk one side of trees without looking on the other." + +There was then only a few moments before Madame's musical Japanese +gong which announced the close of intermission should sound, but three +determined souls in conspiracy can accomplish much in a few moments. The +first move was planned in detail before that gong sounded, and the two +boys raced to the house, and Lily followed, carrying a toadstool, which +she had hurriedly caught up from the lawn for her object of nature to be +taken into class. + +It was a poisonous toadstool, and Lily was quite a heroine in the class. +That fact doubtless gave her a more dauntless air when, after school, +the two boys caught up with her walking gracefully down the road, +flirting her skirts and now and then giving her head a toss, which made +her fluff of hair fly into a golden foam under her daisy-trimmed straw +hat. + +"To-night," Johnny whispered, as he sped past. + +"At half past nine, between your house and the Simmonses'," replied +Lily, without even looking at him. She was a past-mistress of +dissimulation. + +Lily's mother had guests at dinner that night, and the guests remarked +sometimes, within the little girl's hearing, what a darling she was. + +"She never gives me a second's anxiety," Lily's mother whispered to a +lady beside her. "You cannot imagine what a perfectly good, dependable +child she is." + +"Now my Christina is a good child in the grain," said the lady, "but she +is full of mischief. I never can tell what Christina will do next." + +"I can always tell," said Lily's mother, in a voice of maternal triumph. + +"Now only the other night, when I thought Christina was in bed, that +absurd child got up and dressed and ran over to see her aunt Bella. Tom +came home with her, and of course there was nothing very bad about it. +Christina was very bright; she said, 'Mother, you never told me I must +not get up and go to see Aunt Bella,' which was, of course, true. I +could not gainsay that." + +"I cannot," said Lily's mother, "imagine my Lily's doing such a thing." + +If Lily had heard that last speech of her mother's, whom she dearly +loved, she might have wavered. That pathetic trust in herself might have +caused her to justify it. But she had finished her dinner and had been +excused, and was undressing for bed, with the firm determination to rise +betimes and dress and join Johnny Trumbull and Arnold Carruth. Johnny +had the easiest time of them all. He simply had to bid his aunt Janet +good night and have the watch wound, and take a fleeting glimpse of his +mother at her desk and his father in his office, and go whistling to his +room, and sit in the summer darkness and wait until the time came. + +Arnold Carruth had the hardest struggle. His mother had an old school +friend visiting her, and Arnold, very much dressed up, with his curls +falling in a shining fleece upon a real lace collar, had to be shown off +and show off. He had to play one little piece which he had learned upon +the piano. He had to recite a little poem. He had to be asked how old he +was, and if he liked to go to school, and how many teachers he had, and +if he loved them, and if he loved his little mates, and which of them he +loved best; and he had to be asked if he loved his aunt Dorothy, who was +the school friend and not his aunt at all, and would he not like to come +and live with her, because she had not any dear little boy; and he was +obliged to submit to having his curls twisted around feminine fingers, +and to being kissed and hugged, and a whole chapter of ordeals, before +he was finally in bed, with his mother's kiss moist upon his lips, and +free to assert himself. + +That night Arnold Carruth realized himself as having an actual horror of +his helpless state of pampered childhood. The man stirred in the soul of +the boy, and it was a little rebel with sulky pout of lips and frown of +childish brows who stole out of bed, got into some queer clothes, and +crept down the back stairs. He heard his aunt Dorothy, who was not +his aunt, singing an Italian song in the parlor, he heard the clink of +silver and china from the butler's pantry, where the maids were washing +the dinner dishes. He smelt his father's cigar, and he gave a little +leap of joy on the grass of the lawn. At last he was out at night alone, +and--he wore long stockings! That noon he had secreted a pair of his +mother's toward that end. When he came home to luncheon he pulled them +out of the darning-bag, which he had spied through a closet door that +had been left ajar. One of the stockings was green silk, and the other +was black, and both had holes in them, but all that mattered was the +length. Arnold wore also his father's riding-breeches, which came over +his shoes and which were enormously large, and one of his father's silk +shirts. He had resolved to dress consistently for such a great occasion. +His clothes hampered him, but he felt happy as he sped clumsily down the +road. + +However, both Johnny Trumbull and Lily Jennings, who were waiting for +him at the rendezvous, were startled by his appearance. Both began to +run, Johnny pulling Lily after him by the hand, but Arnold's cautious +hallo arrested them. Johnny and Lily returned slowly, peering through +the darkness. + +"It's me," said Arnold, with gay disregard of grammar. + +"You looked," said Lily, "like a real fat old man. What HAVE you got on, +Arnold Carruth?" + +Arnold slouched before his companions, ridiculous but triumphant. He +hitched up a leg of the riding-breeches and displayed a long, green silk +stocking. Both Johnny and Lily doubled up with laughter. + +"What you laughing at?" inquired Arnold, crossly. + +"Oh, nothing at all," said Lily. "Only you do look like a scarecrow +broken loose. Doesn't he, Johnny?" + +"I am going home," stated Arnold with dignity. He turned, but Johnny +caught him in his little iron grip. + +"Oh, shucks, Arnold Carruth!" said he. "Don't be a baby. Come on." And +Arnold Carruth with difficulty came on. + +People in the village, as a rule, retired early. Many lights were out +when the affair began, many went out while it was in progress. All three +of the band steered as clear of lighted houses as possible, and dodged +behind trees and hedges when shadowy figures appeared on the road or +carriage-wheels were heard in the distance. At their special destination +they were sure to be entirely safe. Old Mr. Peter Van Ness always +retired very early. To be sure, he did not go to sleep until late, and +read in bed, but his room was in the rear of the house on the second +floor, and all the windows, besides, were dark. Mr. Peter Van Ness was +a very wealthy elderly gentleman, very benevolent. He had given the +village a beautiful stone church with memorial windows, a soldiers' +monument, a park, and a home for aged couples, called "The Van Ness +Home." Mr. Van Ness lived alone with the exception of a housekeeper and +a number of old, very well-disciplined servants. The servants always +retired early, and Mr. Van Ness required the house to be quiet for his +late reading. He was a very studious old gentleman. + +To the Van Ness house, set back from the street in the midst of a +well-kept lawn, the three repaired, but not as noiselessly as they could +have wished. In fact, a light flared in an up-stairs window, which was +wide open, and one woman's voice was heard in conclave with another. + +"I should think," said the first, "that the lawn was full of cats. Did +you ever hear such a mewing, Jane?" + +That was the housekeeper's voice. The three, each of whom carried a +squirming burlap potato-bag from the Trumbull cellar, stood close to a +clump of stately pines full of windy songs, and trembled. + +"It do sound like cats, ma'am," said another voice, which was Jane's, +the maid, who had brought Mrs. Meeks, the housekeeper, a cup of hot +water and peppermint, because her dinner had disagreed with her. + +"Just listen," said Mrs. Meeks. + +"Yes, ma'am, I should think there was hundreds of cats and little +kittens." + +"I am so afraid Mr. Van Ness will be disturbed." + +"Yes, ma'am." + +"You might go out and look, Jane." + +"Oh, ma'am, they might be burglars!" + +"How can they be burglars when they are cats?" demanded Mrs. Meeks, +testily. + +Arnold Carruth snickered, and Johnny on one side, and Lily on the other, +prodded him with an elbow. They were close under the window. + +"Burglars is up to all sorts of queer tricks, ma'am," said Jane. "They +may mew like cats to tell one another what door to go in." + +"Jane, you talk like an idiot," said Mrs. Meeks. "Burglars talking like +cats! Who ever heard of such a thing? It sounds right under that window. +Open my closet door and get those heavy old shoes and throw them out." + +It was an awful moment. The three dared not move. The cats and kittens +in the bags--not so many, after all--seemed to have turned into +multiplication-tables. They were positively alarming in their +determination to get out, their wrath with one another, and their +vociferous discontent with the whole situation. + +"I can't hold my bag much longer," said poor little Arnold Carruth. + +"Hush up, cry-baby!" whispered Lily, fiercely, in spite of a clawing paw +emerging from her own bag and threatening her bare arm. + +Then came the shoes. One struck Arnold squarely on the shoulder, nearly +knocking him down and making him lose hold of his bag. The other struck +Lily's bag, and conditions became worse; but she held on despite a +scratch. Lily had pluck. + +Then Jane's voice sounded very near, as she leaned out of the window. "I +guess they have went, ma'am," said she. "I seen something run." + +"I can hear them," said Mrs. Meeks, querulously. + +"I seen them run," persisted Jane, who was tired and wished to be gone. + +"Well, close that window, anyway, for I know I hear them, even if they +have gone," said Mrs. Meeks. The three heard with relief the window +slammed down. + +The light flashed out, and simultaneously Lily Jennings and Johnny +Trumbull turned indignantly upon Arnold Carruth. + +"There, you have gone and let all those poor cats go," said Johnny. + +"And spoilt everything," said Lily. + +Arnold rubbed his shoulder. "You would have let go if you had been hit +right on the shoulder by a great shoe," said he, rather loudly. + +"Hush up!" said Lily. "I wouldn't have let my cats go if I had been +killed by a shoe; so there." + +"Serves us right for taking a boy with curls," said Johnny Trumbull. + +But he spoke unadvisedly. Arnold Carruth was no match whatever for +Johnny Trumbull, and had never been allowed the honor of a combat with +him; but surprise takes even a great champion at a disadvantage. Arnold +turned upon Johnny like a flash, out shot a little white fist, up struck +a dimpled leg clad in cloth and leather, and down sat Johnny Trumbull; +and, worse, open flew his bag, and there was a yowling exodus. + +"There go your cats, too, Johnny Trumbull," said Lily, in a perfectly +calm whisper. At that moment both boys, victor and vanquished, felt a +simultaneous throb of masculine wrath at Lily. Who was she to gloat +over the misfortunes of men? But retribution came swiftly to Lily. That +viciously clawing little paw shot out farther, and there was a limit to +Spartanism in a little girl born so far from that heroic land. Lily let +go of her bag and with difficulty stifled a shriek of pain. + +"Whose cats are gone now?" demanded Johnny, rising. + +"Yes, whose cats are gone now?" said Arnold. + +Then Johnny promptly turned upon him and knocked him down and sat on +him. + +Lily looked at them, standing, a stately little figure in the darkness. +"I am going home," said she. "My mother does not allow me to go with +fighting boys." + +Johnny rose, and so did Arnold, whimpering slightly. His shoulder ached +considerably. + +"He knocked me down," said Johnny. + +Even as he whimpered and as he suffered, Arnold felt a thrill of +triumph. "Always knew I could if I had a chance," said he. + +"You couldn't if I had been expecting it," said Johnny. + +"Folks get knocked down when they ain't expecting it most of the time," +declared Arnold, with more philosophy than he realized. + +"I don't think it makes much difference about the knocking down," said +Lily. "All those poor cats and kittens that we were going to give a good +home, where they wouldn't be starved, have got away, and they will run +straight back to Mr. Jim Simmons's." + +"If they haven't any more sense than to run back to a place where they +don't get enough to eat and are kicked about by a lot of children, let +them run," said Johnny. + +"That's so," said Arnold. "I never did see what we were doing such a +thing for, anyway--stealing Mr. Simmons's cats and giving them to Mr. +Van Ness." + +It was the girl alone who stood by her guns of righteousness. "I saw and +I see," she declared, with dangerously loud emphasis. "It was only our +duty to try to rescue poor helpless animals who don't know any better +than to stay where they are badly treated. And Mr. Van Ness has so +much money he doesn't know what to do with it; he would have been real +pleased to give those cats a home and buy milk and liver for them. But +it's all spoiled now. I will never undertake to do good again, with a +lot of boys in the way, as long as I live; so there!" Lily turned about. + +"Going to tell your mother!" said Johnny, with scorn which veiled +anxiety. + +"No, I'm NOT. I don't tell tales." + +Lily marched off, and in her wake went Johnny and Arnold, two poor +little disillusioned would-be knights of old romance in a wretchedly +commonplace future, not far enough from their horizons for any glamour. + +They went home, and of the three Johnny Trumbull was the only one +who was discovered. For him his aunt Janet lay in wait and forced a +confession. She listened grimly, but her eyes twinkled. + +"You have learned to fight, John Trumbull," said she, when he had +finished. "Now the very next thing you have to learn, and make yourself +worthy of your grandfather Trumbull, is not to be a fool." + +"Yes, Aunt Janet," said Johnny. + +The next noon, when he came home from school, old Maria, who had been +with the family ever since he could remember and long before, called him +into the kitchen. There, greedily lapping milk from a saucer, were two +very lean, tall kittens. + +"See those nice little tommy-cats," said Maria, beaming upon Johnny, +whom she loved and whom she sometimes fancied deprived of boyish joys. +"Your aunt Janet sent me over to the Simmonses' for them this morning. +They are overrun with cats--such poor, shiftless folks always be--and +you can have them. We shall have to watch for a little while till they +get wonted, so they won't run home." + +Johnny gazed at the kittens, fast distending with the new milk, and +felt presumably much as dear Robin Hood may have felt after one of his +successful raids in the fair, poetic past. + +"Pretty, ain't they?" said Maria. "They have drank up a whole saucer of +milk. 'Most starved. I s'pose." + +Johnny gathered up the two forlorn kittens and sat down in a kitchen +chair, with one on each shoulder, hard, boyish cheeks pressed against +furry, purring sides, and the little fighting Cock of the Walk felt his +heart glad and tender with the love of the strong for the weak. + + + + +DANIEL AND LITTLE DAN'L + +THE Wise homestead dated back more than a century, yet it had nothing +imposing about it except its site. It was a simple, glaringly white +cottage. There was a center front door with two windows on each side; +there was a low slant of roof, pierced by unpicturesque dormers. On +the left of the house was an ell, which had formerly been used as a +shoemaker's shop, but now served as a kitchen. In the low attic of the +ell was stored the shoemaker's bench, whereon David Wise's grandfather +had sat for nearly eighty years of working days; after him his eldest +son, Daniel's father, had occupied the same hollow seat of patient toil. +Daniel had sat there for twenty-odd years, then had suddenly realized +both the lack of necessity and the lack of customers, since the +great shoe-plant had been built down in the village. Then Daniel had +retired--although he did not use that expression. Daniel said to his +friends and his niece Dora that he had "quit work." But he told himself, +without the least bitterness, that work had quit him. + +After Daniel had retired, his one physiological peculiarity assumed +enormous proportions. It had always been with him, but steady work had +held it, to a great extent, at bay. Daniel was a moral coward before +physical conditions. He was as one who suffers, not so much from agony +of the flesh as from agony of the mind induced thereby. Daniel was a +coward before one of the simplest, most inevitable happenings of earthly +life. He was a coward before summer heat. All winter he dreaded summer. +Summer poisoned the spring for him. Only during the autumn did he +experience anything of peace. Summer was then over, and between him and +another summer stretched the blessed perspective of winter. Then Daniel +Wise drew a long breath and looked about him, and spelled out the beauty +of the earth in his simple primer of understanding. Daniel had in his +garden behind the house a prolific grape-vine. He ate the grapes, full +of the savor of the dead summer, with the gusto of a poet who can at +last enjoy triumph over his enemy. + +Possibly it was the vein of poetry in Daniel which made him a +coward--which made him so vulnerable. During the autumn he reveled in +the tints of the landscape which his sitting-room windows commanded. +There were many maples and oaks. Day by day the roofs of the houses in +the village became more evident, as the maples shed their crimson and +gold and purple rags of summer. The oaks remained, great shaggy masses +of dark gold and burning russet; later they took on soft hues, making +clearer the blue firmament between the boughs. Daniel watched the autumn +trees with pure delight. "He will go to-day," he said of a flaming maple +after a night of frost which had crisped the white arches of the grass +in his dooryard. All day he sat and watched the maple cast its glory, +and did not bother much with his simple meals. The Wise house was +erected on three terraces. Always through the dry summer the grass was +burned to an ugly negation of color. Later, when rain came, the grass +was a brilliant green, patched with rosy sorrel and golden stars of +arnica. Then later still came the diamond brilliance of the frost. So +dry were the terraces in summer-time that no flowers would flourish. +When Daniel's mother had come to the house as a bride she had planted +under a window a blush-rose bush, but always the blush-roses were few +and covered with insects. It was not until the autumn, when it was time +for the flowers to die, that the sorrel blessing of waste lands flushed +rosily and the arnica showed its stars of slender threads of gold, and +there might even be a slight glimpse of purple aster and a dusty spray +or two of goldenrod. Then Daniel did not shrink from the sight of the +terraces. In summer-time the awful negative glare of them under the +afternoon sun maddened him. + +In winter he often visited his brother John in the village. He was very +fond of John, and John's wife, and their only daughter, Dora. When John +died, and later his wife, he would have gone to live with Dora, but +she married. Then her husband also died, and Dora took up dressmaking, +supporting herself and her delicate little girl-baby. Daniel adored this +child. She had been named for him, although her mother had been aghast +before the proposition. "Name a girl Daniel, uncle!" she had cried. + +"She is going to have what I own after I have done with it, anyway," +declared Daniel, gazing with awe and rapture at the tiny flannel bundle +in his niece's arms. "That won't make any difference, but I do wish you +could make up your mind to call her after me, Dora." + +Dora Lee was soft-hearted. She named her girl-baby Daniel, and called +her Danny, which was not, after all, so bad, and her old uncle loved the +child as if she had been his own. Little Daniel--he always called her +Daniel, or, rather, "Dan'l"--was the only reason for his descending into +the village on summer days when the weather was hot. Daniel, when he +visited the village in summer-time, wore always a green leaf inside his +hat and carried an umbrella and a palm-leaf fan. This caused the village +boys to shout, "Hullo, grandma!" after him. Daniel, being a little hard +of hearing, was oblivious, but he would have been in any case. His +whole mind was concentrated in getting along that dusty glare of street, +stopping at the store for a paper bag of candy, and finally ending in +Dora's little dark parlor, holding his beloved namesake on his knee, +watching her blissfully suck a barley stick while he waved his palmleaf +fan. Dora would be fitting gowns in the next room. He would hear the +hum of feminine chatter over strictly feminine topics. He felt very much +aloof, even while holding the little girl on his knee. Daniel had never +married--had never even h ad a sweetheart. The marriageable women he +had seen had not been of the type to attract a dreamer like Daniel Wise. +Many of those women thought him "a little off." + +Dora Lee, his niece, privately wondered if her uncle had his full +allotment of understanding. He seemed much more at home with her little +daughter than with herself, and Dora considered herself a very good +business woman, with possibly an unusual endowment of common sense. She +was such a good business woman that when she died suddenly she left her +child with quite a sum in the bank, besides the house. Daniel did not +hesitate for a moment. He engaged Miss Sarah Dean for a housekeeper, and +took the little girl (hardly more than a baby) to his own home. Dora +had left a will, in which she appointed Daniel guardian in spite of her +doubt concerning his measure of understanding. There was much comment in +the village when Daniel took his little namesake to live in his lonely +house on the terrace. "A man and an old maid to bring up that poor +child!" they said. But Daniel called Dr. Trumbull to his support. "It +is much better for that delicate child to be out of this village, which +drains the south hill," Dr. Trumbull declared. "That child needs pure +air. It is hot enough in summer all around here, and hot enough at +Daniel's, but the air is pure there." + +There was no gossip about Daniel and Miss Sarah Dean. Gossip would have +seemed about as foolish concerning him and a dry blade of field-grass. +Sarah Dean looked like that. She wore rusty black gowns, and her +gray-blond hair was swept curtainwise over her ears on either side +of her very thin, mildly severe wedge of a face. Sarah was a notable +housekeeper and a good cook. She could make an endless variety of cakes +and puddings and pies, and her biscuits were marvels. Daniel had long +catered for himself, and a rasher of bacon, with an egg, suited him much +better for supper than hot biscuits, preserves, and five kinds of cake. +Still, he did not complain, and did not understand that Sarah's fare was +not suitable for the child, until Dr. Trumbull told him so. + +"Don't you let that child live on that kind of food if you want her to +live at all," said Dr. Trumbull. "Lord! what are the women made of, and +the men they feed, for that matter? Why, Daniel, there are many people +in this place, and hard-working people, too, who eat a quantity of food, +yet don't get enough nourishment for a litter of kittens." + +"What shall I do?" asked Daniel in a puzzled way. + +"Do? You can cook a beefsteak yourself, can't you? Sarah Dean would fry +one as hard as soleleather." + +"Yes, I can cook a beefsteak real nice," said Daniel. + +"Do it, then; and cook some chops, too, and plenty of eggs." + +"I don't exactly hanker after quite so much sweet stuff," said Daniel. +"I wonder if Sarah's feelings will be hurt." + +"It is much better for feelings to be hurt than stomachs," declared Dr. +Trumbull, "but Sarah's feelings will not be hurt. I know her. She is +a wiry woman. Give her a knock and she springs back into place. Don't +worry about her, Daniel." + +When Daniel went home that night he carried a juicy steak, and he cooked +it, and he and little Dan'l had a square meal. Sarah refused the steak +with a slight air of hauteur, but she behaved very well. When she +set away her untasted layer-cakes and pies and cookies, she eyed them +somewhat anxiously. Her standard of values seemed toppling before her +mental vision. "They will starve to death if they live on such victuals +as beefsteak, instead of good nourishing hot biscuits and cake," she +thought. After the supper dishes were cleared away she went into the +sitting-room where Daniel Wise sat beside a window, waiting in a sort of +stern patience for a whiff of air. It was a very close evening. The sun +was red in the low west, but a heaving sea of mist was rising over the +lowlands. + +Sarah sat down opposite Daniel. "Close, ain't it?" said she. She began +knitting her lace edging. + +"Pretty close," replied Daniel. He spoke with an effect of forced +politeness. Although he had such a horror of extreme heat, he was always +chary of boldly expressing his mind concerning it, for he had a feeling +that he might be guilty of blasphemy, since he regarded the weather as +being due to an Almighty mandate. Therefore, although he suffered, he +was extremely polite. + +"It is awful up-stairs in little Dan'l's room," said Sarah. "I have got +all the windows open except the one that's right on the bed, and I told +her she needn't keep more than the sheet and one comfortable over her." + +Daniel looked anxious. "Children ain't ever overcome when they are in +bed, in the house, are they?" + +"Land, no! I never heard of such a thing. And, anyway, little Dan'l's so +thin it ain't likely she feels the heat as much as some." + +"I hope she don't." + +Daniel continued to sit hunched up on himself, gazing with a sort of +mournful irritation out of the window upon the landscape over which the +misty shadows vaguely wavered. + +Sarah knitted. She could knit in the dark. After a while she rose and +said she guessed she would go to bed, as to-morrow was her sweeping-day. + +Sarah went, and Daniel sat alone. + +Presently a little pale figure stole to him through the dusk--the child, +in her straight white nightgown, padding softly on tiny naked feet. + +"Is that you, Dan'l?" + +"Yes, Uncle Dan'l." + +"Is it too hot to sleep up in your room?" + +"I didn't feel so very hot, Uncle Dan'l, but skeeters were biting me, +and a great big black thing just flew in my window!" + +"A bat, most likely." + +"A bat!" Little Dan'l shuddered. She began a little stifled wail. "I'm +afeard of bats," she lamented. + +Daniel gathered the tiny creature up. "You can jest set here with Uncle +Dan'l," said he. "It is jest a little cooler here, I guess. Once in a +while there comes a little whiff of wind." + +"Won't any bats come?" + +"Lord, no! Your Uncle Dan'l won't let any bats come within a gun-shot." + +The little creature settled down contentedly in the old man's lap. Her +fair, thin locks fell over his shirt-sleeved arm, her upturned profile +was sweetly pure and clear even in the dusk. She was so delicately small +that he might have been holding a fairy, from the slight roundness of +the childish limbs and figure. Poor little girl!--Dan'l was much too +small and thin. Old man Daniel gazed down at her anxiously. + +"Jest as soon as the nice fall weather comes," said he, "uncle is going +to take you down to the village real often, and you can get acquainted +with some other nice little girls and play with them, and that will do +uncle's little Dan'l good." + +"I saw little Lucy Rose," piped the child, "and she looked at me real +pleasant, and Lily Jennings wore a pretty dress. Would they play with +me, uncle?" + +"Of course they would. You don't feel quite so hot, here, do you?" + +"I wasn't so hot, anyway; I was afeard of bats." + +"There ain't any bats here." + +"And skeeters." + +"Uncle don't believe there's any skeeters, neither." + +"I don't hear any sing," agreed little Dan'l in a weak voice. Very soon +she was fast asleep. The old man sat holding her, and loving her with +a simple crystalline intensity which was fairly heavenly. He himself +almost disregarded the heat, being raised above it by sheer exaltation +of spirit. All the love which had lain latent in his heart leaped +to life before the helplessness of this little child in his arms. He +realized himself as much greater and of more importance upon the face +of the earth than he had ever been before. He became paternity incarnate +and superblessed. It was a long time before he carried the little child +back to her room and laid her, still as inert with sleep as a lily, +upon her bed. He bent over her with a curious waving motion of his old +shoulders as if they bore wings of love and protection; then he crept +back down-stairs. + +On nights like that he did not go to bed. All the bedrooms were under +the slant of the roof and were hot. He preferred to sit until dawn +beside his open window, and doze when he could, and wait with despairing +patience for the infrequent puffs of cool air breathing blessedly of wet +swamp places, which, even when the burning sun arose, would only show +dewy eyes of cool reflection. Daniel Wise, as he sat there through the +sultry night, even prayed for courage, as a devout sentinel might have +prayed at his post. The imagination of the deserter was not in the man. +He never even dreamed of appropriating to his own needs any portion +of his savings, and going for a brief respite to the deep shadows of +mountainous places, or to a cool coast, where the great waves broke in +foam upon the sand, breathing out the mighty saving breath of the sea. +It never occurred to him that he could do anything but remain at his +post and suffer in body and soul and mind, and not complain. + +The next morning was terrible. The summer had been one of unusually +fervid heat, but that one day was its climax. David went panting +up-stairs to his room at dawn. He did not wish Sarah Dean to know that +he had sat up all night. He opened his bed, tidily, as was his wont. +Through living alone he had acquired many of the habits of an orderly +housewife. He went down-stairs, and Sarah was in the kitchen. + +"It is a dreadful hot day," said she as Daniel approached the sink to +wash his face and hands. + +"It does seem a little warm," admitted Daniel, with his studied air of +politeness with respect to the weather as an ordinance of God. + +"Warm!" echoed Sarah Dean. Her thin face blazed a scarlet wedge between +the sleek curtains of her dank hair; perspiration stood on her triangle +of forehead. "It is the hottest day I ever knew!" she said, defiantly, +and there was open rebellion in her tone. + +"It IS sort of warmish, I rather guess," said Daniel. + +After breakfast, old Daniel announced his intention of taking little +Dan'l out for a walk. + +At that Sarah Dean fairly exploded. "Be you gone clean daft, Dan'l?" +said she. "Don't you know that it actually ain't safe to take out such a +delicate little thing as that on such a day?" + +"Dr. Trumbull said to take her outdoors for a walk every day, rain or +shine," returned Daniel, obstinately. + +"But Dr. Trumbull didn't say to take her out if it rained fire and +brimstone, I suppose," said Sarah Dean, viciously. + +Daniel looked at her with mild astonishment. + +"It is as much as that child's life is worth to take her out such a day +as this," declared Sarah, viciously. + +"Dr. Trumbull said to take no account of the weather," said Daniel with +stubborn patience, "and we will walk on the shady side of the road, and +go to Bradley's Brook. It's always a little cool there." + +"If she faints away before you get there, you bring her right home," +said Sarah. She was almost ferocious. "Just because YOU don't feel the +heat, to take out that little pindlin' girl such a day!" she exclaimed. + +"Dr. Trumbull said to," persisted Daniel, although he looked a little +troubled. Sarah Dean did not dream that, for himself, Daniel Wise would +have preferred facing an army with banners to going out under that +terrible fusillade of sun-rays. She did not dream of the actual heroism +which actuated him when he set out with little Dan'l, holding his big +umbrella over her little sunbonneted head and waving in his other hand a +palm-leaf fan. + +Little Dan'l danced with glee as she went out of the yard. The small, +anemic creature did not feel the heat except as a stimulant. Daniel had +to keep charging her to walk slowly. "Don't go so fast, little Dan'l, +or you'll get overhet, and then what will Mis' Dean say?" he continually +repeated. + +Little Dan'l's thin, pretty face peeped up at him from between the sides +of her green sunbonnet. She pointed one dainty finger at a cloud of pale +yellow butterflies in the field beside which they were walking. "Want to +chase flutterbies," she chirped. Little Dan'l had a fascinating way of +misplacing her consonants in long words. + +"No; you'll get overhet. You just walk along slow with Uncle Dan'l, and +pretty soon we'll come to the pretty brook," said Daniel. + +"Where the lagon-dries live?" asked little Dan'l, meaning dragon-flies. + +"Yes," said Daniel. He was conscious, as he spoke, of increasing waves +of thready black floating before his eyes. They had floated since dawn, +but now they were increasing. Some of the time he could hardly see the +narrow sidewalk path between the dusty meadowsweet and hardhack bushes, +since those floating black threads wove together into a veritable veil +before him. At such times he walked unsteadily, and little Dan'l eyed +him curiously. + +"Why don't you walk the way you always do?" she queried. + +"Uncle Dan'l can't see jest straight, somehow," replied the old man; +"guess it's because it's rather warm." + +It was in truth a day of terror because of the heat. It was one of +those days which break records, which live in men's memories as great +catastrophes, which furnish head-lines for newspapers, and are alluded +to with shudders at past sufferings. It was one of those days which seem +to forecast the Dreadful Day of Revelation wherein no shelter may be +found from the judgment of the fiery firmament. On that day men fell in +their tracks and died, or were rushed to hospitals to be succored as by +a miracle. And on that day the poor old man who had all his life feared +and dreaded the heat as the most loathly happening of earth, walked +afield for love of the little child. As Daniel went on the heat seemed +to become palpable--something which could actually be seen. There was +now a thin, gaseous horror over the blazing sky, which did not temper +the heat, but increased it, giving it the added torment of steam. The +clogging moisture seemed to brood over the accursed earth, like some +foul bird with deadly menace in wings and beak. + +Daniel walked more and more unsteadily. Once he might have fallen had +not the child thrown one little arm around a bending knee. "You 'most +tumbled down. Uncle Dan'l," said she. Her little voice had a surprised +and frightened note in it. + +"Don't you be scared," gasped Daniel; "we have got 'most to the brook; +then we'll be all right. Don't you be scared, and--you walk real slow +and not get overhet." + +The brook was near, and it was time. Daniel staggered under the trees +beside which the little stream trickled over its bed of stones. It was +not much of a brook at best, and the drought had caused it to lose +much of its life. However, it was still there, and there were delicious +little hollows of coolness between the stones over which it flowed, and +large trees stood about with their feet rooted in the blessed damp. Then +Daniel sank down. He tried to reach a hand to the water, but could not. +The black veil had woven a compact mass before his eyes. There was a +terrible throbbing in his head, but his arms were numb. + +Little Dan'l stood looking at him, and her lip quivered. With a mighty +effort Daniel cleared away the veil and saw the piteous baby face. +"Take--Uncle Dan'l's hat and--fetch him--some water," he gasped. "Don't +go too--close and--tumble in." + +The child obeyed. Daniel tried to take the dripping hat, but failed. +Little Dan'l was wise enough to pour the water over the old man's head, +but she commenced to weep, the pitiful, despairing wail of a child who +sees failing that upon which she has leaned for support. + +Daniel rallied again. The water on his head gave him momentary relief, +but more than anything else his love for the child nerved him to effort. + +"Listen, little Dan'l," he said, and his voice sounded in his own +ears like a small voice of a soul thousands of miles away. "You take +the--umbrella, and--you take the fan, and you go real slow, so you don't +get overhet, and you tell Mis' Dean, and--" + +Then old Daniel's tremendous nerve, that he had summoned for the sake of +love, failed him, and he sank back. He was quite unconscious--his face, +staring blindly up at the terrible sky between the trees, was to little +Dan'l like the face of a stranger. She gave one cry, more like the +yelp of a trodden animal than a child's voice. Then she took the open +umbrella and sped away. The umbrella bobbed wildly--nothing could be +seen of poor little Dan'l but her small, speeding feet. She wailed +loudly all the way. + +She was half-way home when, plodding along in a cloud of brown dust, a +horse appeared in the road. The horse wore a straw bonnet and advanced +very slowly. He drew a buggy, and in the buggy were Dr. Trumbull and +Johnny, his son. He had called at Daniel's to see the little girl, and, +on being told that they had gone to walk, had said something under his +breath and turned his horse's head down the road. + +"When we meet them, you must get out, Johnny," he said, "and I will take +in that poor old man and that baby. I wish I could put common sense in +every bottle of medicine. A day like this!" + +Dr. Trumbull exclaimed when he saw the great bobbing black umbrella and +heard the wails. The straw-bonneted horse stopped abruptly. Dr. Trumbull +leaned out of the buggy. "Who are you?" he demanded. + +"Uncle Dan'l is gone," shrieked the child. + +"Gone where? What do you mean?" + +"He--tumbled right down, and then he was-somebody else. He ain't there." + +"Where is 'there'? Speak up quick!" + +"The brook--Uncle Dan'l went away at the brook." + +Dr. Trumbull acted swiftly. He gave Johnny a push. "Get out," he said. +"Take that baby into Jim Mann's house there, and tell Mrs. Mann to keep +her in the shade and look out for her, and you tell Jim, if he hasn't +got his horse in his farm-wagon, to look lively and harness her in and +put all the ice they've got in the house in the wagon. Hurry!" + +Johnny was over the wheel before his father had finished speaking, and +Jim Mann just then drew up alongside in his farm-wagon. + +"What's to pay?" he inquired, breathless. He was a thin, sinewy man, +scantily clad in cotton trousers and a shirt wide open at the breast. +Green leaves protruded from under the brim of his tilted straw hat. + +"Old Daniel Wise is overcome by the heat," answered Dr. Trumbull. "Put +all the ice you have in the house in your wagon, and come along. I'll +leave my horse and buggy here. Your horse is faster." + +Presently the farm-wagon clattered down the road, dust-hidden behind a +galloping horse. Mrs. Jim Mann, who was a loving mother of children, +was soothing little Dan'l. Johnny Trumbull watched at the gate. When the +wagon returned he ran out and hung on behind, while the strong, ungainly +farm-horse galloped to the house set high on the sun-baked terraces. + +When old Daniel revived he found himself in the best parlor, with ice +all about him. Thunder was rolling overhead and hail clattered on the +windows. A sudden storm, the heat-breaker, had come up and the dreadful +day was vanquished. Daniel looked up and smiled a vague smile of +astonishment at Dr. Trumbull and Sarah Dean; then his eyes wandered +anxiously about. + +"The child is all right," said Dr. Trumbull; "don't you worry, Daniel. +Mrs. Jim Mann is taking care of her. Don't you try to talk. You didn't +exactly have a sunstroke, but the heat was too much for you." + +But Daniel spoke, in spite of the doctor's mandate. "The heat," said +he, in a curiously clear voice, "ain't never goin' to be too much for me +again." + +"Don't you talk, Daniel," repeated Dr. Trumbull. "You've always been +nervous about the heat. Maybe you won't be again, but keep still. When +I told you to take that child out every day I didn't mean when the world +was like Sodom and Gomorrah. Thank God, it will be cooler now." + +Sarah Dean stood beside the doctor. She looked pale and severe, but +adequate. She did not even state that she had urged old Daniel not to go +out. There was true character in Sarah Dean. + +The weather that summer was an unexpected quantity. Instead of the day +after the storm being cool, it was hot. However, old Daniel, after +his recovery, insisted on going out of doors with little Dan'l after +breakfast. The only concession which he would make to Sarah Dean, who +was fairly frantic with anxiety, was that he would merely go down the +road as far as the big elm-tree, that he would sit down there, and let +the child play about within sight. + +"You'll be brought home agin, sure as preachin'," said Sarah Dean, "and +if you're brought home ag'in, you won't get up ag'in." + +Old Daniel laughed. "Now don't you worry, Sarah," said he. "I'll set +down under that big ellum and keep cool." + +Old Daniel, at Sarah's earnest entreaties, took a palm-leaf fan. But he +did not use it. He sat peacefully under the cool trail of the great elm +all the forenoon, while little Dan'l played with her doll. The child was +rather languid after her shock of the day before, and not disposed to +run about. Also, she had a great sense of responsibility about the old +man. Sarah Dean had privately charged her not to let Uncle Daniel get +"overhet." She continually glanced up at him with loving, anxious, baby +eyes. + +"Be you overhet. Uncle Dan'l?" she would ask. + +"No, little Dan'l, uncle ain't a mite overhet," the old man would assure +her. Now and then little Dan'l left her doll, climbed into the old man's +lap, and waved the palm-leaf fan before his face. + +Old Daniel Wise loved her so that he seemed, to himself, fairly alight +with happiness. He made up his mind that he would find some little girl +in the village to come now and then and play with little Dan'l. In the +cool of that evening he stole out of the back door, covertly, lest +Sarah Dean discover him, and walked slowly to the rector's house in the +village. The rector's wife was sitting on her cool, vine-shaded veranda. +She was alone, and Daniel was glad. He asked her if the little girl +who had come to live with her, Content Adams, could not come the next +afternoon and see little Dan'l. "Little Dan'l had ought to see other +children once in a while, and Sarah Dean makes real nice cookies," he +stated, pleadingly. + +Sally Patterson laughed good-naturedly. "Of course she can, Mr. Wise," +she said. + +The next afternoon Sally herself drove the rector's horse, and brought +Content to pay a call on little Dan'l. Sally and Sarah Dean visited in +the sitting-room, and left the little girls alone in the parlor with +a plate of cookies, to get acquainted. They sat in solemn silence and +stared at each other. Neither spoke. Neither ate a cooky. When Sally +took her leave, she asked little Dan'l if she had had a nice time with +Content, and little Dan'l said, "Yes, ma'am." + +Sarah insisted upon Content's carrying the cookies home in the dish with +a napkin over it. + +"When can I go again to see that other little girl?" asked Content as +she and Sally were jogging home. + +"Oh, almost any time. I will drive you over-because it is rather a +lonesome walk for you. Did you like the little girl? She is younger than +you." + +"Yes'm." + +Also little Dan'l inquired of old Daniel when the other little girl was +coming again, and nodded emphatically when asked if she had had a nice +time. Evidently both had enjoyed, after the inscrutable fashion of +childhood, their silent session with each other. Content came generally +once a week, and old Daniel was invited to take little Dan'l to the +rector's. On that occasion Lucy Rose was present, and Lily Jennings. The +four little girls had tea together at a little table set on the porch, +and only Lily Jennings talked. The rector drove old Daniel and the child +home, and after they had arrived the child's tongue was loosened and she +chattered. She had seen everything there was to be seen at the rector's. +She told of it in her little silver pipe of a voice. She had to be +checked and put to bed, lest she be tired out. + +"I never knew that child could talk so much," Sarah said to Daniel, +after the little girl had gone up-stairs. + +"She talks quite some when she's alone with me." + +"And she seems to see everything." + +"Ain't much that child don't see," said Daniel, proudly. + +The summer continued unusually hot, but Daniel never again succumbed. +When autumn came, for the first time in his old life old Daniel Wise was +sorrowful. He dreaded the effect of the frost and the winter upon his +precious little Dan'l, whom he put before himself as fondly as any +father could have done, and as the season progressed his dread seemed +justified. Poor little Dan'l had cold after cold. Content Adams and Lucy +Rose came to see her. The rector's wife and the doctor's sent dainties. +But the child coughed and pined, and old Daniel began to look forward +to spring and summer--the seasons which had been his bugaboos through +life--as if they were angels. When the February thaw came, he told +little Dan'l, "Jest look at the snow meltin' and the drops hangin' on +the trees; that is a sign of summer." + +Old Daniel watched for the first green light along the fences and the +meadow hollows. When the trees began to cast slightly blurred shadows, +because of budding leaves, and the robins hopped over the terraces, +and now and then the air was cleft with blue wings, he became jubilant. +"Spring is jest about here, and then uncle's little Dan'l will stop +coughin', and run out of doors and pick flowers," he told the child +beside the window. + +Spring came that year with a riotous rush. Blossoms, leaves, birds, +and flowers--all arrived pellmell, fairly smothering the world with +sweetness and music. In May, about the first of the month, there was an +intensely hot day. It was as hot as midsummer. Old Daniel with +little Dan'l went afield. It was, to both, as if they fairly saw the +carnival-arrival of flowers, of green garlands upon treebranches, of +birds and butterflies. "Spring is right here!" said old Daniel. "Summer +is right here! Pick them vilets in that holler, little Dan'l." The +old man sat on a stone in the meadowland, and watched the child in the +blue-gleaming hollow gather up violets in her little hands as if +they were jewels. The sun beat upon his head, the air was heavy with +fragrance, laden with moisture. Old Daniel wiped his forehead. He was +heated, but so happy that he was not aware of it. He saw wonderful new +lights over everything. He had wielded love, the one invincible weapon +of the whole earth, and had conquered his intangible and dreadful enemy. +When, for the sake of that little beloved life, his own life had become +as nothing, old Daniel found himself superior to it. He sat there in the +tumultuous heat of the May day, watching the child picking violets and +gathering strength with every breath of the young air of the year, and +he realized that the fear of his whole life was overcome for ever. +He realized that never again, though they might bring suffering, even +death, would he dread the summers with their torrid winds and their +burning lights, since, through love, he had become under-lord of all the +conditions of his life upon earth. + + + + +BIG SISTER SOLLY + +IT did seem strange that Sally Patterson, who, according to her own +self-estimation, was the least adapted of any woman in the village, +should have been the one chosen by a theoretically selective providence +to deal with a psychological problem. + +It was conceded that little Content Adams was a psychological problem. +She was the orphan child of very distant relatives of the rector. +When her parents died she had been cared for by a widowed aunt on her +mother's side, and this aunt had also borne the reputation of being a +creature apart. When the aunt died, in a small village in the indefinite +"Out West," the presiding clergyman had notified Edward Patterson of +little Content's lonely and helpless estate. The aunt had subsisted +upon an annuity which had died with her. The child had inherited nothing +except personal property. The aunt's house had been bequeathed to the +church over which the clergyman presided, and after her aunt's death he +took her to his own home until she could be sent to her relatives, and +he and his wife were exceedingly punctilious about every jot and tittle +of the aunt's personal belongings. They even purchased two extra trunks +for them, which they charged to the rector. + +Little Content, traveling in the care of a lady who had known her aunt +and happened to be coming East, had six large trunks, besides a hat-box +and two suit-cases and a nailed-up wooden box containing odds and ends. +Content made quite a sensation when she arrived and her baggage was +piled on the station platform. + +Poor Sally Patterson unpacked little Content's trunks. She had sent the +little girl to school within a few days after her arrival. Lily Jennings +and Amelia Wheeler called for her, and aided her down the street between +them, arms interlocked. Content, although Sally had done her best with a +pretty ready-made dress and a new hat, was undeniably a peculiar-looking +child. In the first place, she had an expression so old that it was +fairly uncanny. + +"That child has downward curves beside her mouth already, and lines +between her eyes, and what she will look like a few years hence is +beyond me," Sally told her husband after she had seen the little girl go +out of sight between Lily's curls and ruffles and ribbons and Amelia's +smooth skirts. + +"She doesn't look like a happy child," agreed the rector. "Poor little +thing! Her aunt Eudora must have been a queer woman to train a child." + +"She is certainly trained," said Sally, ruefully; "too much so. Content +acts as if she were afraid to move or speak or even breathe unless +somebody signals permission. I pity her." + +She was in the storeroom, in the midst of Content's baggage. The rector +sat on an old chair, smoking. He had a conviction that it behooved him +as a man to stand by his wife during what might prove an ordeal. He +had known Content's deceased aunt years before. He had also known the +clergyman who had taken charge of her personal property and sent it on +with Content. + +"Be prepared for finding almost anything. Sally," he observed. "Mr. +Zenock Shanksbury, as I remember him, was so conscientious that it +amounted to mania. I am sure he has sent simply unspeakable things +rather than incur the reproach of that conscience of his with regard to +defrauding Content of one jot or tittle of that personal property." + +Sally shook out a long, black silk dress, with jet dangling here and +there. "Now here is this dress," said she. "I suppose I really must keep +this, but when that child is grown up the silk will probably be cracked +and entirely worthless." + +"You had better take the two trunks and pack them with such things, and +take your chances." + +"Oh, I suppose so. I suppose I must take chances with everything except +furs and wools, which will collect moths. Oh, goodness!" Sally held up +an old-fashioned fitch fur tippet. Little vague winged things came from +it like dust. "Moths!" said she, tragically. "Moths now. It is full +of them. Edward, you need not tell me that clergyman's wife was +conscientious. No conscientious woman would have sent an old fur tippet +all eaten with moths into another woman's house. She could not." + +Sally took flying leaps across the storeroom. She flung open the window +and tossed out the mangy tippet. "This is simply awful!" she declared, +as she returned. "Edward, don't you think we are justified in having +Thomas take all these things out in the back yard and making a bonfire +of the whole lot?" + +"No, my dear." + +"But, Edward, nobody can tell what will come next. If Content's aunt had +died of a contagious disease, nothing could induce me to touch another +thing." + +"Well, dear, you know that she died from the shock of a carriage +accident, because she had a weak heart." + +"I know it, and of course there is nothing contagious about that." Sally +took up an ancient bandbox and opened it. She displayed its contents: a +very frivolous bonnet dating back in style a halfcentury, gay with +roses and lace and green strings, and another with a heavy crape veil +dependent. + +"You certainly do not advise me to keep these?" asked Sally, +despondently. + +Edward Patterson looked puzzled. "Use your own judgment," he said, +finally. + +Sally summarily marched across the room and flung the gay bonnet and the +mournful one out of the window. Then she took out a bundle of very old +underwear which had turned a saffron yellow with age. "People are always +coming to me for old linen in case of burns," she said, succinctly. +"After these are washed I can supply an auto da fe." + +Poor Sally worked all that day and several days afterward. The rector +deserted her, and she relied upon her own good sense in the disposition +of little Content's legacy. When all was over she told her husband. + +"Well, Edward," said she, "there is exactly one trunk half full of +things which the child may live to use, but it is highly improbable. We +have had six bonfires, and I have given away three suits of old clothes +to Thomas's father. The clothes were very large." + +"Must have belonged to Eudora's first husband. He was a stout man," said +Edward. + +"And I have given two small suits of men's clothes to the Aid Society +for the next out-West barrel." + +"Eudora's second husband's." + +"And I gave the washerwoman enough old baking-dishes to last her +lifetime, and some cracked dishes. Most of the dishes were broken, but a +few were only cracked; and I have given Silas Thomas's wife ten old wool +dresses and a shawl and three old cloaks. All the other things which did +not go into the bonfires went to the Aid Society. They will go back +out West." Sally laughed, a girlish peal, and her husband joined. But +suddenly her smooth forehead contracted. "Edward," said she. + +"Well, dear?" + +"I am terribly puzzled about one thing." The two were sitting in the +study. Content had gone to bed. Nobody could hear easily, but Sally +Patterson lowered her voice, and her honest, clear blue eyes had a +frightened expression. + +"What is it, dear?" + +"You will think me very silly and cowardly, and I think I have never +been cowardly, but this is really very strange. Come with me. I am such +a goose, I don't dare go alone to that storeroom." + +The rector rose. Sally switched on the lights as they went up-stairs to +the storeroom. + +"Tread very softly," she whispered. "Content is probably asleep." + +The two tiptoed up the stairs and entered the storeroom. Sally +approached one of the two new trunks which had come with Content from +out West. She opened it. She took out a parcel nicely folded in a large +towel. + +"See here, Edward Patterson." + +The rector stared as Sally shook out a dress-a gay, up-to-date dress, a +young girl's dress, a very tall young girl's, for the skirts trailed on +the floor as Sally held it as high as she could. It was made of a fine +white muslin. There was white lace on the bodice, and there were knots +of blue ribbon scattered over the whole, knots of blue ribbon confining +tiny bunches of rosebuds and daisies. These knots of blue ribbon and the +little flowers made it undeniably a young girl's costume. Even in the +days of all ages wearing the costumes of all ages, an older woman +would have been abashed before those exceedingly youthful knots of blue +ribbons and flowers. + +The rector looked approvingly at it. "That is very pretty, it seems to +me," he said. "That must be worth keeping, Sally." + +"Worth keeping! Well, Edward Patterson, just wait. You are a man, and +of course you cannot understand how very strange it is about the dress." +The rector looked inquiringly. + +"I want to know," said Sally, "if Content's aunt Eudora had any young +relative besides Content. I mean had she a grown-up young girl relative +who would wear a dress like this?" + +"I don't know of anybody. There might have been some relative of +Eudora's first husband. No, he was an only child. I don't think it +possible that Eudora had any young girl relative." + +"If she had," said Sally, firmly, "she would have kept this dress. You +are sure there was nobody else living with Content's aunt at the time +she died?" + +"Nobody except the servants, and they were an old man and his wife." + +"Then whose dress was this?" + +"I don't know, Sally." + +"You don't know, and I don't. It is very strange." + +"I suppose," said Edward Patterson, helpless before the feminine +problem, "that--Eudora got it in some way." + +"In some way," repeated Sally. "That is always a man's way out of a +mystery when there is a mystery. There is a mystery. There is a mystery +which worries me. I have not told you all yet, Edward." + +"What more is there, dear?" + +"I--asked Content whose dress this was, and she said--Oh, Edward, I do +so despise mysteries." + +"What did she say, Sally?" + +"She said it was her big sister Solly's dress." + +"Her what?" + +"Her big sister Solly's dress. Edward, has Content ever had a sister? +Has she a sister now?" + +"No, she never had a sister, and she has none now," declared the rector, +emphatically. "I knew all her family. What in the world ails the child?" + +"She said her big sister Solly, Edward, and the very name is so inane. +If she hasn't any big sister Solly, what are we going to do?" + +"Why, the child must simply lie," said the rector. + +"But, Edward, I don't think she knows she lies. You may laugh, but I +think she is quite sure that she has a big sister Solly, and that this +is her dress. I have not told you the whole. After she came home from +school to-day she went up to her room, and she left the door open, and +pretty soon I heard her talking. At first I thought perhaps Lily or +Amelia was up there, although I had not seen either of them come in +with Content. Then after a while, when I had occasion to go up-stairs, +I looked in her room, and she was quite alone, although I had heard her +talking as I went up-stairs. Then I said: 'Content, I thought somebody +was in your room. I heard you talking.' + +"And she said, looking right into my eyes: 'Yes, ma'am, I was talking.' + +"'But there is nobody here,' I said. + +"'Yes, ma'am,' she said. 'There isn't anybody here now, but my big +sister Solly was here, and she is gone. You heard me talking to my big +sister Solly.' I felt faint, Edward, and you know it takes a good deal +to overcome me. I just sat down in Content's wicker rocking-chair. I +looked at her and she looked at me. Her eyes were just as clear and +blue, and her forehead looked like truth itself. She is not exactly a +pretty child, and she has a peculiar appearance, but she does certainly +look truthful and good, and she looked so then. She had tried to fluff +her hair over her forehead a little as I had told her, and not pull it +back so tight, and she wore her new dress, and her face and hands were +as clean, and she stood straight. You know she is a little inclined to +stoop, and I have talked to her about it. She stood straight, and looked +at me with those blue eyes, and I did feel fairly dizzy." + +"What did you say?" + +"Well, after a bit I pulled myself together and I said: 'My dear little +girl, what is this? What do you mean about your big sister Sarah?' +Edward, I could not bring myself to say that idiotic Solly. In fact, I +did think I must be mistaken and had not heard correctly. But Content +just looked at me as if she thought me very stupid. 'Solly,' said she. +'My sister's name is Solly.' + +"'But, my dear,' I said, 'I understand that you had no sister.' + +"'Yes,' said she, 'I have my big sister Solly.' + +"'But where has she been all the time?' said I. + +"Then Content looked at me and smiled, and it was quite a wonderful +smile, Edward. She smiled as if she knew so much more than I could ever +know, and quite pitied me." + +"She did not answer your question?" + +"No, only by that smile which seemed to tell whole volumes about that +awful Solly's whereabouts, only I was too ignorant to read them. + +"'Where is she now, dear?' I said, after a little. + +"'She is gone now,' said Content. + +"'Gone where?' said I. + +"And then the child smiled at me again. Edward, what are we going to do? +Is she untruthful, or has she too much imagination? I have heard of such +a thing as too much imagination, and children telling lies which were +not really lies." + +"So have I," agreed the rector, dryly, "but I never believed in it." The +rector started to leave the room. + +"What are you going to do?" inquired Sally. + +"I am going to endeavor to discriminate between lies and imagination," +replied the rector. + +Sally plucked at his coat-sleeve as they went down-stairs. "My dear," +she whispered, "I think she is asleep." + +"She will have to wake up." + +"But, my dear, she may be nervous. Would it not be better to wait until +to-morrow?" + +"I think not," said Edward Patterson. Usually an easy-going man, when +he was aroused he was determined to extremes. Into Content's room +he marched, Sally following. Neither of them saw their small son +Jim peeking around his door. He had heard--he could not help it--the +conversation earlier in the day between Content and his mother. He had +also heard other things. He now felt entirely justified in listening, +although he had a good code of honor. He considered himself in a way +responsible, knowing what he knew, for the peace of mind of his parents. +Therefore he listened, peeking around the doorway of his dark room. + +The electric light flashed out from Content's room, and the little +interior was revealed. It was charmingly pretty. Sally had done her best +to make this not altogether welcome little stranger's room attractive. +There were garlands of rosebuds swung from the top of the white +satin-papered walls. There were dainty toilet things, a little +dressing-table decked with ivory, a case of books, chairs cushioned with +rosebud chintz, windows curtained with the same. + +In the little white bed, with a rose-sprinkled coverlid over her, lay +Content. She was not asleep. Directly, when the light flashed out, she +looked at the rector and his wife with her clear blue eyes. Her fair +hair, braided neatly and tied with pink ribbons, lay in two tails on +either side of her small, certainly very good face. Her forehead was +beautiful, very white and full, giving her an expression of candor which +was even noble. Content, little lonely girl among strangers in a strange +place, mutely beseeching love and pity, from her whole attitude toward +life and the world, looked up at Edward Patterson and Sally, and the +rector realized that his determination was giving way. He began to +believe in imagination, even to the extent of a sister Solly. He had +never had a daughter, and sometimes the thought of one had made his +heart tender. His voice was very kind when he spoke. + +"Well, little girl," he said, "what is this I hear?" + +Sally stared at her husband and stifled a chuckle. + +As for Content, she looked at the rector and said nothing. It was +obvious that she did not know what he had heard. The rector explained. + +"My dear little girl," he said, "your aunt Sally"--they had agreed upon +the relationship of uncle and aunt to Content--"tells me that you have +been telling her about your--big sister Solly." The rector half gasped +as he said Solly. He seemed to himself to be on the driveling verge of +idiocy before the pronunciation of that absurdly inane name. + +Content's responding voice came from the pink-and-white nest in which she +was snuggled, like the fluting pipe of a canary. + +"Yes, sir," said she. + +"My dear child," said the rector, "you know perfectly well that you have +no big sister--Solly." Every time the rector said Solly he swallowed +hard. + +Content smiled as Sally had described her smiling. She said nothing. +The rector felt reproved and looked down upon from enormous heights of +innocence and childhood and the wisdom thereof. However, he persisted. + +"Content," he said, "what did you mean by telling your aunt Sally what +you did?" + +"I was talking with my big sister Solly," replied Content, with the +calmness of one stating a fundamental truth of nature. + +The rector's face grew stern. "Content," he said, "look at me." + +Content looked. Looking seemed to be the instinctive action which +distinguished her as an individual. + +"Have you a big sister--Solly?" asked the rector. His face was stern, +but his voice faltered. + +"Yes, sir." + +"Then--tell me so." + +"I have a big sister Solly," said Content. Now she spoke rather wearily, +although still sweetly, as if puzzled why she had been disturbed in +sleep to be asked such an obvious question. + +"Where has she been all the time, that we have known nothing about her?" +demanded the rector. + +Content smiled. However, she spoke. "Home," said she. + +"When did she come here?" + +"This morning." + +"Where is she now?" + +Content smiled and was silent. The rector cast a helpless look at his +wife. He now did not care if she did see that he was completely at a +loss. How could a great, robust man and a clergyman be harsh to a tender +little girl child in a pink-andwhite nest of innocent dreams? + +Sally pitied him. She spoke more harshly than her husband. "Content +Adams," said she, "you know perfectly well that you have no big sister +Solly. Now tell me the truth. Tell me you have no big sister Solly." + +"I have a big sister Solly," said Content. + +"Come, Edward," said Sally. "There is no use in staying and talking +to this obstinate little girl any longer." Then she spoke to Content. +"Before you go to sleep," said she, "you must say your prayers, if you +have not already done so." + +"I have said my prayers," replied Content, and her blue eyes were full +of horrified astonishment at the suspicion. + +"Then," said Sally, "you had better say them over and add something. +Pray that you may always tell the truth." + +"Yes, ma'am," said Content, in her little canary pipe. + +The rector and his wife went out. Sally switched off the light with a +snap as she passed. Out in the hall she stopped and held her husband's +arms hard. "Hush!" she whispered. They both listened. They heard this, +in the faintest plaint of a voice: + +"They don't believe you are here, Sister Solly, but I do." + +Sally dashed back into the rosebud room and switched on the light. She +stared around. She opened a closet door. Then she turned off the light +and joined her husband. + +"There was nobody there?" he whispered. + +"Of course not." + +When they were back in the study the rector and his wife looked at each +other. + +"We will do the best we can," said Sally. "Don't worry, Edward, for you +have to write your sermon to-morrow. We will manage some way. I will +admit that I rather wish Content had had some other distant relative +besides you who could have taken charge of her." + +"You poor child!" said the rector. "It is hard on you, Sally, for she is +no kith nor kin of yours." + +"Indeed I don't mind," said Sally Patterson, "if only I can succeed in +bringing her up." + +Meantime Jim Patterson, up-stairs, sitting over his next day's algebra +lesson, was even more perplexed than were his parents in the study. +He paid little attention to his book. "I can manage little Lucy," he +reflected, "but if the others have got hold of it, I don't know." + +Presently he rose and stole very softly through the hall to Content's +door. She was timid, and always left it open so she could see the hall +light until she fell asleep. "Content," whispered Jim. + +There came the faintest "What?" in response. + +"Don't you," said Jim, in a theatrical whisper, "say another word at +school to anybody about your big sister Solly. If you do, I'll whop you, +if you are a girl." + +"Don't care!" was sighed forth from the room. + +"And I'll whop your old big sister Solly, too." + +There was a tiny sob. + +"I will," declared Jim. "Now you mind!" + +The next day Jim cornered little Lucy Rose under a cedar-tree before +school began. He paid no attention to Bubby Harvey and Tom Simmons, +who were openly sniggering at him. Little Lucy gazed up at Jim, and the +blue-green shade of the cedar seemed to bring out only more clearly the +white-rose softness of her dear little face. Jim bent over her. + +"Want you to do something for me," he whispered. + +Little Lucy nodded gravely. + +"If my new cousin Content ever says anything to you again--I heard her +yesterday--about her big sister Solly, don't you ever say a word about +it to anybody else. You will promise me, won't you, little Lucy?" + +A troubled expression came into little Lucy's kind eyes. "But she told +Lily, and Lily told Amelia, and Amelia told her grandmother Wheeler, +and her grandmother Wheeler told Miss Parmalee when she met her on the +street after school, and Miss Parmalee called on my aunt Martha and told +her," said little Lucy. + +"Oh, shucks!" said Jim. + +"And my aunt Martha told my father that she thought perhaps she ought +to ask for her when she called on your mother. She said Arnold Carruth's +aunt Flora was going to call, and his aunt Dorothy. I heard Miss Acton +tell Miss Parmalee that she thought they ought to ask for her when they +called on your mother, too." + +"Little Lucy," he said, and lowered his voice, "you must promise me +never, as long as you live, to tell what I am going to tell you." + +Little Lucy looked frightened. + +"Promise!" insisted Jim. + +"I promise," said little Lucy, in a weak voice. + +"Never, as long as you live, to tell anybody. Promise!" + +"I promise." + +"Now, you know if you break your promise and tell, you will be guilty of +a dreadful lie and be very wicked." + +Little Lucy shivered. "I never will." + +"Well, my new cousin Content Adams--tells lies." + +Little Lucy gasped. + +"Yes, she does. She says she has a big sister Solly, and she hasn't got +any big sister Solly. She never did have, and she never will have. She +makes believe." + +"Makes believe?" said little Lucy, in a hopeful voice. + +"Making believe is just a real mean way of lying. Now I made Content +promise last night never to say one word in school about her big sister +Solly, and I am going to tell you this, so you can tell Lily and the +others and not lie. Of course, I don't want to lie myself, because my +father is rector, and, besides, mother doesn't approve of it; but if +anybody is going to lie, I am the one. Now, you mind, little Lucy. +Content's big sister Solly has gone away, and she is never coming back. +If you tell Lily and the others I said so, I can't see how you will be +lying." + +Little Lucy gazed at the boy. She looked like truth incarnate. "But," +said she, in her adorable stupidity of innocence, "I don't see how she +could go away if she was never here, Jim." + +"Oh, of course she couldn't. But all you have to do is to say that you +heard me say she had gone. Don't you understand?" + +"I don't understand how Content's big sister Solly could possibly go +away if she was never here." + +"Little Lucy, I wouldn't ask you to tell a lie for the world, but if you +were just to say that you heard me say--" + +"I think it would be a lie," said little Lucy, "because how can I help +knowing if she was never here she couldn't--" + +"Oh, well, little Lucy," cried Jim, in despair, still with +tenderness--how could he be anything but tender with little Lucy?--"all +I ask is never to say anything about it." + +"If they ask me?" + +"Anyway, you can hold your tongue. You know it isn't wicked to hold your +tongue." + +Little Lucy absurdly stuck out the pointed tip of her little red tongue. +Then she shook her head slowly. + +"Well," she said, "I will hold my tongue." + +This encounter with innocence and logic had left him worsted. Jim could +see no way out of the fact that his father, the rector, his mother, +the rector's wife, and he, the rector's son, were disgraced by their +relationship to such an unsanctified little soul as this queer Content +Adams. + +And yet he looked at the poor lonely little girl, who was trying very +hard to learn her lessons, who suggested in her very pose and movement +a little, scared rabbit ready to leap the road for some bush of +hiding, and while he was angry with her he pitied her. He had no doubts +concerning Content's keeping her promise. He was quite sure that he +would now say nothing whatever about that big sister Solly to the +others, but he was not prepared for what happened that very afternoon. + +When he went home from school his heart stood still to see Miss Martha +Rose, and Arnold Carruth's aunt Flora, and his aunt who was not his +aunt, Miss Dorothy Vernon, who was visiting her, all walking along in +state with their lace-trimmed parasols, their white gloves, and their +nice card-cases. Jim jumped a fence and raced across lots home, and +gained on them. He burst in on his mother, sitting on the porch, which +was inclosed by wire netting overgrown with a budding vine. It was the +first warm day of the season. + +"Mother," cried Jim Patterson--"mother, they are coming!" + +"Who, for goodness' sake, Jim?" + +"Why, Arnold's aunt Flora and his aunt Dorothy and little Lucy's aunt +Martha. They are coming to call." + +Involuntarily Sally's hand went up to smooth her pretty hair. "Well, +what of it, Jim?" said she. + +"Mother, they will ask for--big sister Solly!" + +Sally Patterson turned pale. "How do you know?" + +"Mother, Content has been talking at school. A lot know. You will see +they will ask for--" + +"Run right in and tell Content to stay in her room," whispered Sally, +hastily, for the callers, their white-kidded hands holding their +card-cases genteelly, were coming up the walk. + +Sally advanced, smiling. She put a brave face on the matter, but she +realized that she, Sally Patterson, who had never been a coward, was +positively afraid before this absurdity. The callers sat with her on the +pleasant porch, with the young vine-shadows making networks over their +best gowns. Tea was served presently by the maid, and, much to Sally's +relief, before the maid appeared came the inquiry. Miss Martha Rose made +it. + +"We would be pleased to see Miss Solly Adams also," said Miss Martha. + +Flora Carruth echoed her. "I was so glad to hear another nice girl had +come to the village," said she with enthusiasm. Miss Dorothy Vernon said +something indefinite to the same effect. + +"I am sorry," replied Sally, with an effort, "but there is no Miss +Solly Adams here now." She spoke the truth as nearly as she could manage +without unraveling the whole ridiculous affair. The callers sighed with +regret, tea was served with little cakes, and they fluttered down the +walk, holding their card-cases, and that ordeal was over. + +But Sally sought the rector in his study, and she was trembling. +"Edward," she cried out, regardless of her husband's sermon, "something +must be done now." + +"Why, what is the matter, Sally?" + +"People are--calling on her." + +"Calling on whom?" + +"Big sister--Solly!" Sally explained. + +"Well, don't worry, dear," said the rector. "Of course we will do +something, but we must think it over. Where is the child now?" + +"She and Jim are out in the garden. I saw them pass the window just +now. Jim is such a dear boy, he tries hard to be nice to her. Edward +Patterson, we ought not to wait." + +"My dear, we must." + +Meantime Jim and Content Adams were out in the garden. Jim had gone to +Content's door and tapped and called out, rather rudely: "Content, +I say, put on your hat and come along out in the garden. I've got +something to tell you." + +"Don't want to," protested Content's little voice, faintly. + +"You come right along." + +And Content came along. She was an obedient child, and she liked Jim, +although she stood much in awe of him. She followed him into the garden +back of the rectory, and they sat down on the bench beneath the weeping +willow. The minute they were seated Jim began to talk. + +"Now," said he, "I want to know." + +Content glanced up at him, then looked down and turned pale. + +"I want to know, honest Injun," said Jim, "what you are telling such +awful whoppers about your old big sister Solly for?" + +Content was silent. This time she did not smile, a tear trickled out of +her right eye and ran over the pale cheek. + +"Because you know," said Jim, observant of the tear, but ruthless, "that +you haven't any big sister Solly, and never did have. You are getting us +all in an awful mess over it, and father is rector here, and mother is +his wife, and I am his son, and you are his niece, and it is downright +mean. Why do you tell such whoppers? Out with it!" + +Content was trembling violently. "I lived with Aunt Eudora," she +whispered. + +"Well, what of that? Other folks have lived with their aunts and not +told whoppers." + +"They haven't lived with Aunt Eudora." + +"You ought to be ashamed of yourself, Content Adams, and you the +rector's niece, talking that way about dead folks." + +"I don't mean to talk about poor Aunt Eudora," fairly sobbed Content. +"Aunt Eudora was a real good aunt, but she was grown up. She was a good +deal more grown up than your mother; she really was, and when I +first went to live with her I was 'most a little baby; I couldn't +speak--plain, and I had to go to bed real early, and slept 'way off from +everybody, and I used to be afraid--all alone, and so--" + +"Well, go on," said Jim, but his voice was softer. It WAS hard lines for +a little kid, especially if she was a girl. + +"And so," went on the little, plaintive voice, "I got to thinking how +nice it would be if I only had a big sister, and I used to cry and say +to myself--I couldn't speak plain, you know, I was so little-'Big sister +would be real solly.' And then first thing I knew--she came." + +"Who came?" + +"Big sister Solly." + +"What rot! She didn't come. Content Adams, you know she didn't come." + +"She must have come," persisted the little girl, in a frightened +whisper. "She must have. Oh, Jim, you don't know. Big sister Solly must +have come, or I would have died like my father and mother." + +Jim's arm, which was near her, twitched convulsively, but he did not put +it around her. + +"She did--co-me," sobbed Content. "Big sister Solly did come." + +"Well, have it so," said Jim, suddenly. "No use going over that any +longer. Have it she came, but she ain't here now, anyway. Content Adams, +you can't look me in the face and tell me that." + +Content looked at Jim, and her little face was almost terrible, so full +of bewilderment and fear it was. "Jim," whispered Content, "I can't +have big sister Solly not be here. I can't send her away. What would she +think?" + +Jim stared. "Think? Why, she isn't alive to think, anyhow!" + +"I can't make her--dead," sobbed Content. "She came when I wanted her, +and now when I don't so much, when I've got Uncle Edward and Aunt Sally +and you, and don't feel so dreadful lonesome, I can't be so bad as to +make her dead." + +Jim whistled. Then his face brightened up. He looked at Content with a +shrewd and cheerful grin. "See here, kid, you say your sister Solly is +big, grown up, don't you?" he inquired. + +Content nodded pitifully. + +"Then why, if she is grown up and pretty, don't she have a beau?" + +Content stopped sobbing and gave him a quick glance. + +"Then--why doesn't she get married, and go out West to live?" + +Jim chuckled. Instead of a sob, a faint echo of his chuckle came from +Content. + +Jim laughed merrily. "I say, Content," he cried, "let's have it she's +married now, and gone?" + +"Well," said Content. + +Jim put his arm around her very nicely and protectingly. "It's all +right, then," said he, "as all right as it can be for a girl. Say, +Content, ain't it a shame you aren't a boy?" + +"I can't help it," said Content, meekly. + +"You see," said Jim, thoughtfully, "I don't, as a rule, care much about +girls, but if you could coast down-hill and skate, and do a few things +like that, you would be almost as good as a boy." + +Content surveyed him, and her pessimistic little face assumed upward +curves. "I will," said she. "I will do anything, Jim. I will fight if +you want me to, just like a boy." + +"I don't believe you could lick any of us fellers unless you get a good +deal harder in the muscles," said Jim, eying her thoughtfully; "but +we'll play ball, and maybe by and by you can begin with Arnold Carruth." + +"Could lick him now," said Content. + +But Jim's face sobered before her readiness. "Oh no, you mustn't go to +fighting right away," said he. "It wouldn't do. You really are a girl, +you know, and father is rector." + +"Then I won't," said Content; "but I COULD knock down that little boy +with curls; I know I could." + +"Well, you needn't. I'll like you just as well. You see, Content"--Jim's +voice faltered, for he was a boy, and on the verge of sentiment before +which he was shamed--"you see, Content, now your big sister Solly is +married and gone out West, why, you can have me for your brother, and of +course a brother is a good deal better than a sister." + +"Yes," said Content, eagerly. + +"I am going," said Jim, "to marry Lucy Rose when I grow up, but I +haven't got any sister, and I'd like you first rate for one. So I'll be +your big brother instead of your cousin." + +"Big brother Solly?" + +"Say, Content, that is an awful name, but I don't care. You're only +a girl. You can call me anything you want to, but you mustn't call me +Solly when there is anybody within hearing." + +"I won't." + +"Because it wouldn't do," said Jim with weight. + +"I never will, honest," said Content. + +Presently they went into the house. Dr. Trumbull was there; he had +been talking seriously to the rector and his wife. He had come over on +purpose. + +"It is a perfect absurdity," he said, "but I made ten calls this +morning, and everywhere I was asked about that little Adams girl's big +sister--why you keep her hidden. They have a theory that she is either +an idiot or dreadfully disfigured. I had to tell them I know nothing +about it." + +"There isn't any girl," said the rector, wearily. "Sally, do explain." + +Dr. Trumbull listened. "I have known such cases," he said when Sally had +finished. + +"What did you do for them?" Sally asked, anxiously. + +"Nothing. Such cases have to be cured by time. Children get over these +fancies when they grow up." + +"Do you mean to say that we have to put up with big sister Solly until +Content is grown up?" asked Sally, in a desperate tone. And then Jim +came in. Content had run up-stairs. + +"It is all right, mother," said Jim. + +Sally caught him by the shoulders. "Oh, Jim, has she told you?" + +Jim gave briefly, and with many omissions, an account of his +conversation with Content. + +"Did she say anything about that dress, Jim?" asked his mother. + +"She said her aunt had meant it for that out-West rector's daughter Alice +to graduate in, but Content wanted it for her big sister Solly, and told +the rector's wife it was hers. Content says she knows she was a naughty +girl, but after she had said it she was afraid to say it wasn't so. +Mother, I think that poor little thing is scared 'most to death." + +"Nobody is going to hurt her," said Sally. "Goodness! that rector's wife +was so conscientious that she even let that dress go. Well, I can send +it right back, and the girl will have it in time for her graduation, +after all. Jim dear, call the poor child down. Tell her nobody is going +to scold her." Sally's voice was very tender. + +Jim returned with Content. She had on a little ruffled pink gown +which seemed to reflect color on her cheeks. She wore an inscrutable +expression, at once child-like and charming. She looked shy, furtively +amused, yet happy. Sally realized that the pessimistic downward lines +had disappeared, that Content was really a pretty little girl. + +Sally put an arm around the small, pink figure. "So you and Jim have +been talking, dear?" she said. + +"Yes, ma'am," replied little Content. "Jim is my big brother--" She just +caught herself before she said Solly. + +"And your sister Solly is married and living out West?" + +"Yes," said Content, with a long breath. "My sister Solly is married." +Smiles broke all over her little face. She hid it in Sally's skirts, and +a little peal of laughter like a bird-trill came from the soft muslin +folds. + + + + +LITTLE LUCY ROSE + +BACK of the rectory there was a splendid, long hill. The ground receded +until the rectory garden was reached, and the hill was guarded on either +flank by a thick growth of pines and cedars, and, being a part of the +land appertaining to the rectory, was never invaded by the village +children. This was considered very fortunate by Mrs. Patterson, Jim's +mother, and for an odd reason. The rector's wife was very fond of +coasting, as she was of most out-of-door sports, but her dignified +position prevented her from enjoying them to the utmost. In many +localities the clergyman's wife might have played golf and tennis, have +rode and swum and coasted and skated, and nobody thought the worse of +her; but in The Village it was different. + +Sally had therefore rejoiced at the discovery of that splendid, isolated +hill behind the house. It could not have been improved upon for a long, +perfectly glorious coast, winding up on the pool of ice in the garden +and bumping thrillingly between dry vegetables. Mrs. Patterson steered +and Jim made the running pushes, and slid flat on his chest behind his +mother. Jim was very proud of his mother. He often wished that he felt +at liberty to tell of her feats. He had never been told not to tell, but +realized, being rather a sharp boy, that silence was wiser. Jim's mother +confided in him, and he respected her confidence. "Oh, Jim dear," she +would often say, "there is a mothers' meeting this afternoon, and I +would so much rather go coasting with you." Or, "There's a Guild meeting +about a fair, and the ice in the garden is really quite smooth." + +It was perhaps unbecoming a rector's wife, but Jim loved his mother +better because she expressed a preference for the sports he loved, and +considered that no other boy had a mother who was quite equal to his. +Sally Patterson was small and wiry, with a bright face, and very thick, +brown hair, which had a boyish crest over her forehead, and she could +run as fast as Jim. Jim's father was much older than his mother, and +very dignified, although he had a keen sense of humor. He used to laugh +when his wife and son came in after their coasting expeditions. + +"Well, boys," he would say, "had a good time?" + +Jim was perfectly satisfied and convinced that his mother was the very +best and most beautiful person in the village, even in the whole world, +until Mr. Cyril Rose came to fill a vacancy of cashier in the bank, and +his daughter, little Lucy Rose, as a matter of course, came with him. +Little Lucy had no mother. Mr. Cyril's cousin, Martha Rose, kept his +house, and there was a colored maid with a bad temper, who was said, +however, to be invaluable "help." + +Little Lucy attended Madame's school. She came the next Monday after Jim +and his friends had planned to have a chicken roast and failed. After +Jim saw little Lucy he thought no more of the chicken roast. It +seemed to him that he thought no more of anything. He could not by any +possibility have learned his lessons had it not been for the desire +to appear a good scholar before little Lucy. Jim had never been a +self-conscious boy, but that day he was so keenly worried about her +opinion of him that his usual easy swing broke into a strut when he +crossed the room. He need not have been so troubled, because little Lucy +was not looking at him. She was not looking at any boy or girl. She +was only trying to learn her lesson. Little Lucy was that rather rare +creature, a very gentle, obedient child, with a single eye for her duty. +She was so charming that it was sad to think how much her mother had +missed, as far as this world was concerned. + +The minute Madame saw her a singular light came into her eyes--the light +of love of a childless woman for a child. Similar lights were in the +eyes of Miss Parmalee and Miss Acton. They looked at one another with +a sort of sweet confidence when they were drinking tea together after +school in Madame's study. + +"Did you ever see such a darling?" said Madame. Miss Parmalee said she +never had, and Miss Acton echoed her. + +"She is a little angel," said Madame. + +"She worked so hard over her geography lesson," said Miss Parmalee, "and +she got the Amazon River in New England and the Connecticut in South +America, after all; but she was so sweet about it, she made me want to +change the map of the world. Dear little soul, it did seem as if she +ought to have rivers and everything else just where she chose." + +"And she tried so hard to reach an octave, and her little finger is too +short," said Miss Acton; "and she hasn't a bit of an ear for music, but +her little voice is so sweet it does not matter." + +"I have seen prettier children," said Madame, "but never one quite such +a darling." + +Miss Parmalee and Miss Acton agreed with Madame, and so did everybody +else. Lily Jennings's beauty was quite eclipsed by little Lucy, but +Lily did not care; she was herself one of little Lucy's most fervent +admirers. She was really Jim Patterson's most formidable rival in the +school. "You don't care about great, horrid boys, do you, dear?" Lily +said to Lucy, entirely within hearing of Jim and Lee Westminster and +Johnny Trumbull and Arnold Carruth and Bubby Harvey and Frank Ellis, and +a number of others who glowered at her. + +Dear little Lucy hesitated. She did not wish to hurt the feelings of +boys, and the question had been loudly put. Finally she said she didn't +know. Lack of definite knowledge was little Lucy's rock of refuge in +time of need. She would look adorable, and say in her timid little fluty +voice, "I don't--know." The last word came always with a sort of gasp +which was alluring. All the listening boys were convinced that little +Lucy loved them all individually and generally, because of her "I +don't--know." + +Everybody was convinced of little Lucy's affection for everybody, which +was one reason for her charm. She flattered without knowing that she did +so. It was impossible for her to look at any living thing except with +soft eyes of love. It was impossible for her to speak without every tone +conveying the sweetest deference and admiration. The whole atmosphere +of Madame's school changed with the advent of the little girl. Everybody +tried to live up to little Lucy's supposed ideal, but in reality she had +no ideal. Lucy was the simplest of little girls, only intent upon being +good, doing as she was told, and winning her father's approval, also her +cousin Martha's. + +Martha Rose was quite elderly, although still good-looking. She was not +popular, because she was very silent. She dressed becomingly, received +calls and returned them, but hardly spoke a word. People rather dreaded +her coming. Miss Martha Rose would sit composedly in a proffered chair, +her gloved hands crossed over her nice, gold-bound card-case, her chin +tilted at an angle which never varied, her mouth in a set smile which +never wavered, her slender feet in their best shoes toeing out precisely +under the smooth sweep of her gray silk skirt. Miss Martha Rose dressed +always in gray, a fashion which the village people grudgingly admired. +It was undoubtedly becoming and distinguished, but savored ever so +slightly of ostentation, as did her custom of always dressing little +Lucy in blue. There were different shades and fabrics, but blue it +always was. It was the best color for the child, as it revealed the fact +that her big, dark eyes were blue. Shaded as they were by heavy, curly +lashes, they would have been called black or brown, but the blue in +them leaped to vision above the blue of blue frocks. Little Lucy had the +finest, most delicate features, a mist of soft, dark hair, which curled +slightly, as mist curls, over sweet, round temples. She was a small, +daintily clad child, and she spoke and moved daintily and softly; +and when her blue eyes were fixed upon anybody's face, that person +straightway saw love and obedience and trust in them, and love met love +half-way. Even Miss Martha Rose looked another woman when little Lucy's +innocent blue eyes were fixed upon her rather handsome but colorless +face between the folds of her silvery hair; Miss Martha's hair had +turned prematurely gray. Light would come into Martha Rose's face, light +and animation, although she never talked much even to Lucy. She never +talked much to her cousin Cyril, but he was rather glad of it. He had +a keen mind, but it was easily diverted, and he was engrossed in his +business, and concerned lest he be disturbed by such things as feminine +chatter, of which he certainly had none in his own home, if he kept +aloof from Jenny, the colored maid. Hers was the only female voice ever +heard to the point of annoyance in the Rose house. + +It was rather wonderful how a child like little Lucy and Miss Martha +lived with so little conversation. Martha talked no more at home than +abroad; moreover, at home she had not the attitude of waiting for some +one to talk to her, which people outside considered trying. Martha did +not expect her cousin to talk to her. She seldom asked a question. She +almost never volunteered a perfectly useless observation. She made no +remarks upon self-evident topics. If the sun shone, she never mentioned +it. If there was a heavy rain, she never mentioned that. Miss Martha +suited her cousin exactly, and for that reason, aside from the fact that +he had been devoted to little Lucy's mother, it never occurred to him +to marry again. Little Lucy talked no more than Miss Martha, and nobody +dreamed that she sometimes wanted somebody to talk to her. Nobody +dreamed that the dear little girl, studying her lessons, learning +needlework, trying very futilely to play the piano, was lonely; but she +was without knowing it herself. Martha was so kind and so still; and her +father was so kind and so still, engrossed in his papers or books, +often sitting by himself in his own study. Little Lucy in this peace and +stillness was not having her share of childhood. When other little +girls came to play with her. Miss Martha enjoined quiet, and even Lily +Jennings's bird-like chattering became subdued. It was only at school +that Lucy got her chance for the irresponsible delight which was the +simple right of her childhood, and there her zeal for her lessons +prevented. She was happy at school, however, for there she lived in +an atmosphere of demonstrative affection. The teachers were given +to seizing her in fond arms and caressing her, and so were her girl +companions; while the boys, especially Jim Patterson, looked wistfully +on. + +Jim Patterson was in love, a charming little poetical boy-love; but it +was love. Everything which he did in those days was with the thought of +little Lucy for incentive. He stood better in school than he had ever +done before, but it was all for the sake of little Lucy. Jim Patterson +had one talent, rather rudimentary, still a talent. He could play by +ear. His father owned an old violin. He had been inclined to music in +early youth, and Jim got permission to practise on it, and he went by +himself in the hot attic and practised. Jim's mother did not care for +music, and her son's preliminary scraping tortured her. Jim tucked the +old fiddle under one round boy-cheek and played in the hot attic, with +wasps buzzing around him; and he spent his pennies for catgut, and +he learned to mend fiddle-strings; and finally came a proud Wednesday +afternoon when there were visitors in Madame's school, and he stood on +the platform, with Miss Acton playing an accompaniment on the baby grand +piano, and he managed a feeble but true tune on his violin. It was +all for little Lucy, but little Lucy cared no more for music than his +mother; and while Jim was playing she was rehearsing in the depths +of her mind the little poem which later she was to recite; for this +adorable little Lucy was, as a matter of course, to figure in the +entertainment. It therefore happened that she heard not one note of Jim +Patterson's painfully executed piece, for she was saying to herself in +mental singsong a foolish little poem, beginning: + + There was one little flower that bloomed + Beside a cottage door. + +When she went forward, little darling blue-clad figure, there was a +murmur of admiration; and when she made mistakes straight through the +poem, saying, + + There was a little flower that fell + On my aunt Martha's floor, + +for beginning, there was a roar of tender laughter and a clapping of +tender, maternal hands, and everybody wanted to catch hold of little +Lucy and kiss her. It was one of the irresistible charms of this child +that people loved her the more for her mistakes, and she made many, +although she tried so very hard to avoid them. Little Lucy was not in +the least brilliant, but she held love like a precious vase, and it gave +out perfume better than mere knowledge. + +Jim Patterson was so deeply in love with her when he went home that +night that he confessed to his mother. Mrs. Patterson had led up to the +subject by alluding to little Lucy while at the dinner-table. + +"Edward," she said to her husband--both she and the rector had +been present at Madame's school entertainment and the tea-drinking +afterward--"did you ever see in all your life such a darling little girl +as the new cashier's daughter? She quite makes up for Miss Martha, who +sat here one solid hour, holding her card-case, waiting for me to talk +to her. That child is simply delicious, and I was so glad she made +mistakes." + +"Yes, she is a charming child," assented the rector, "despite the fact +that she is not a beauty, hardly even pretty." + +"I know it," said Mrs. Patterson, "but she has the worth of beauty." + +Jim was quite pale while his father and mother were talking. He +swallowed the hot soup so fast that it burnt his tongue. Then he turned +very red, but nobody noticed him. When his mother came up-stairs to kiss +him good night he told her. + +"Mother," said he, "I have something to tell you." + +"All right, Jim," replied Sally Patterson, with her boyish air. + +"It is very important," said Jim. + +Mrs. Patterson did not laugh; she did not even smile. She sat down +beside Jim's bed and looked seriously at his eager, rapt, shamed little +boy-face on the pillow. "Well?" said she, after a minute which seemed +difficult to him. + +Jim coughed. Then he spoke with a blurt. "Mother," said Jim, "by and by, +of course not quite yet, but by and by, will you have any objection to +Miss Lucy Rose as a daughter?" + +Even then Sally Patterson did not laugh or even smile. "Are you thinking +of marrying her, Jim?" asked she, quite as if her son had been a man. + +"Yes, mother," replied Jim. Then he flung up his little arms in pink +pajama sleeves, and Sally Patterson took his face between her two hands +and kissed him warmly. + +"She is a darling, and your choice does you credit, Jim," said she. "Of +course you have said nothing to her yet?" + +"I thought it was rather too soon." + +"I really think you are very wise, Jim," said his mother. "It is too +soon to put such ideas into the poor child's head. She is younger than +you, isn't she, Jim?" + +"She is just six months and three days younger," replied Jim, with +majesty. + +"I thought so. Well, you know, Jim, it would just wear her all out, +as young as that, to be obliged to think about her trousseau and +housekeeping and going to school, too." + +"I know it," said Jim, with a pleased air. "I thought I was right, +mother." + +"Entirely right; and you, too, really ought to finish school, and take +up a profession or a business, before you say anything definite. You +would want a nice home for the dear little thing, you know that, Jim." + +Jim stared at his mother out of his white pillow. "I thought I would +stay with you, and she would stay with her father until we were both +very much older," said he. "She has a nice home now, you know, mother." + +Sally Patterson's mouth twitched a little, but she spoke quite gravely +and reasonably. "Yes, that is very true," said she; "still, I do think +you are wise to wait, Jim." + +When Sally Patterson had left Jim, she looked in on the rector in his +study. "Our son is thinking seriously of marrying, Edward," said she. + +The rector stared at her. She had shut the door, and she laughed. + +"He is very discreet. He has consulted me as to my approval of her as +daughter and announced his intention to wait a little while." + +The rector laughed; then he wrinkled his forehead uneasily. "I don't +like the little chap getting such ideas," said he. + +"Don't worry, Edward; he hasn't got them," said Sally Patterson. + +"I hope not." + +"He has made a very wise choice. She is that perfect darling of a Rose +girl who couldn't speak her piece, and thought we all loved her when we +laughed." + +"Well, don't let him get foolish ideas; that is all, my dear," said the +rector. + +"Don't worry, Edward. I can manage him," said Sally. + +But she was mistaken. The very next day Jim proposed in due form +to little Lucy. He could not help it. It was during the morning +intermission, and he came upon her seated all alone under a hawthorn +hedge, studying her arithmetic anxiously. She was in blue, as usual, and +a very perky blue bow sat on her soft, dark hair, like a bluebird. She +glanced up at Jim from under her long lashes. + +"Do two and seven make eight or ten? If you please, will you tell me?" +said she. + +"Say, Lucy," said Jim, "will you marry me by and by?" + +Lucy stared at him uncomprehendingly. + +"Will you?" + +"Will I what?" + +"Marry me by and by?" + +Lucy took refuge in her little harbor of ignorance. "I don't know," said +she. + +"But you like me, don't you, Lucy?" + +"I don't know." + +"Don't you like me better than you like Johnny Trumbull?" + +"I don't know." + +"You like me better than you like Arnold Carruth, don't you? He has +curls and wears socks." + +"I don't know." + +"When do you think you can be sure?" + +"I don't know." + +Jim stared helplessly at little Lucy. She stared back sweetly. + +"Please tell me whether two and seven make six or eleven, Jim," said +she. + +"They make nine," said Jim. + +"I have been counting my fingers and I got it eleven, but I suppose +I must have counted one finger twice," said little Lucy. She gazed +reflectively at her little baby-hands. A tiny ring with a blue stone +shone on one finger. + +"I will give you a ring, you know," Jim said, coaxingly. + +"I have got a ring my father gave me. Did you say it was ten, please, +Jim?" + +"Nine," gasped Jim. + +"All the way I can remember," said little Lucy, "is for you to pick just +so many leaves off the hedge, and I will tie them in my handkerchief, +and just before I have to say my lesson I will count those leaves." + +Jim obediently picked nine leaves from the hawthorn hedge, and little +Lucy tied them into her handkerchief, and then the Japanese gong sounded +and they went back to school. + +That night after dinner, just before Lucy went to bed, she spoke of her +own accord to her father and Miss Martha, a thing which she seldom did. +"Jim Patterson asked me to marry him when I asked him what seven and two +made in my arithmetic lesson," said she. She looked with the loveliest +round eyes of innocence first at her father, then at Miss Martha. Cyril +Rose gasped and laid down his newspaper. + +"What did you say, little Lucy?" he asked. + +"Jim Patterson asked me to marry him when I asked him to tell me how +much seven and two made in my arithmetic lesson." + +Cyril Rose and his cousin Martha looked at each other. + +"Arnold Carruth asked me, too, when a great big wasp flew on my arm and +frightened me." + +Cyril and Martha continued to look. The little, sweet, uncertain voice +went on. + +"And Johnny Trumbull asked me when I 'most fell down on the sidewalk; +and Lee Westminster asked me when I wasn't doing anything, and so did +Bubby Harvey." + +"What did you tell them?" asked Miss Martha, in a faint voice. + +"I told them I didn't know." + +"You had better have the child go to bed now," said Cyril. "Good night, +little Lucy. Always tell father everything." + +"Yes, father," said little Lucy, and was kissed, and went away with +Martha. + +When Martha returned, her cousin looked at her severely. He was a fair, +gentle-looking man, and severity was impressive when he assumed it. + +"Really, Martha," said he, "don't you think you had better have a little +closer outlook over that baby?" + +"Oh, Cyril, I never dreamed of such a thing," cried Miss Martha. + +"You really must speak to Madame," said Cyril. "I cannot have such +things put into the child's head." + +"Oh, Cyril, how can I?" + +"I think it is your duty." + +"Cyril, could not--you?" + +Cyril grinned. "Do you think," said he, "that I am going to that elegant +widow schoolma'am and say, 'Madame, my young daughter has had four +proposals of marriage in one day, and I must beg you to put a stop to +such proceedings'? No, Martha; it is a woman's place to do such a thing +as that. The whole thing is too absurd, indignant as I am about it. Poor +little soul!" + +So it happened that Miss Martha Rose, the next day being Saturday, +called on Madame, but, not being asked any leading question, found +herself absolutely unable to deliver herself of her errand, and went +away with it unfulfilled. + +"Well, I must say," said Madame to Miss Parmalee, as Miss Martha tripped +wearily down the front walk--"I must say, of all the educated women who +have really been in the world, she is the strangest. You and I have done +nothing but ask inane questions, and she has sat waiting for them, and +chirped back like a canary. I am simply worn out." + +"So am I," sighed Miss Parmalee. + +But neither of them was so worn out as poor Miss Martha, anticipating +her cousin's reproaches. However, her wonted silence and reticence stood +her in good stead, for he merely asked, after little Lucy had gone to +bed: + +"Well, what did Madame say about Lucy's proposals?" + +"She did not say anything," replied Martha. + +"Did she promise it would not occur again?" + +"She did not promise, but I don't think it will." + +The financial page was unusually thrilling that night, and Cyril +Rose, who had come to think rather lightly of the affair, remarked, +absent-mindedly; "Well, I hope it does not occur again. I cannot have +such ridiculous ideas put into the child's head. If it does, we get a +governess for her and take her away from Madame's." Then he resumed his +reading, and Martha, guilty but relieved, went on with her knitting. + +It was late spring then, and little Lucy had attended Madame's school +several months, and her popularity had never waned. A picnic was planned +to Dover's Grove, and the romantic little girls had insisted upon a May +queen, and Lucy was unanimously elected. The pupils of Madame's school +went to the picnic in the manner known as a "strawride." Miss Parmalee +sat with them, her feet uncomfortably tucked under her. She was the +youngest of the teachers, and could not evade the duty. Madame and Miss +Acton headed the procession, sitting comfortably in a victoria driven +by the colored man Sam, who was employed about the school. Dover's Grove +was six miles from the village, and a favorite spot for picnics. The +victoria rolled on ahead; Madame carried a black parasol, for the sun +was on her side and the day very warm. Both ladies wore thin, dark +gowns, and both felt the languor of spring. + +The straw-wagon, laden with children seated upon the golden trusses of +straw, looked like a wagonload of blossoms. Fair and dark heads, rosy +faces looked forth in charming clusters. They sang, they chattered. It +made no difference to them that it was not the season for a straw-ride, +that the trusses were musty. They inhaled the fragrance of blooming +boughs under which they rode, and were quite oblivious to all discomfort +and unpleasantness. Poor Miss Parmalee, with her feet going to sleep, +sneezing from time to time from the odor of the old straw, did not +obtain the full beauty of the spring day. She had protested against the +straw-ride. + +"The children really ought to wait until the season for such things," +she had told Madame, quite boldly; and Madame had replied that she was +well aware of it, but the children wanted something of the sort, and the +hay was not cut, and straw, as it happened, was more easily procured. + +"It may not be so very musty," said Madame; "and you know, my dear, +straw is clean, and I am sorry, but you do seem to be the one to ride +with the children on the straw, because"--Madame dropped her voice--"you +are really younger, you know, than either Miss Acton or I." + +Poor Miss Parmalee could almost have dispensed with her few years +of superior youth to have gotten rid of that straw-ride. She had no +parasol, and the sun beat upon her head, and the noise of the children +got horribly on her nerves. Little Lucy was her one alleviation. Little +Lucy sat in the midst of the boisterous throng, perfectly still, crowned +with her garland of leaves and flowers, her sweet, pale little face +calmly observant. She was the high light of Madame's school, the effect +which made the whole. All the others looked at little Lucy, they talked +to her, they talked at her; but she remained herself unmoved, as a high +light should be. "Dear little soul," Miss Parmalee thought. She also +thought that it was a pity that little Lucy could not have worn a white +frock in her character as Queen of the May, but there she was mistaken. +The blue was of a peculiar shade, of a very soft material, and nothing +could have been prettier. Jim Patterson did not often look away from +little Lucy; neither did Arnold Carruth; neither did Bubby Harvey; +neither did Johnny Trumbull; neither did Lily Jennings; neither did many +others. + +Amelia Wheeler, however, felt a little jealous as she watched Lily. She +thought Lily ought to have been queen; and she, while she did not dream +of competing with incomparable little Lucy, wished Lily would not always +look at Lucy with such worshipful admiration. Amelia was inconsistent. +She knew that she herself could not aspire to being an object of +worship, but the state of being a nonentity for Lily was depressing. +"Wonder if I jumped out of this old wagon and got killed if she would +mind one bit?" she thought, tragically. But Amelia did not jump. She +had tragic impulses, or rather imaginations of tragic impulses, but she +never carried them out. It was left for little Lucy, flower-crowned and +calmly sweet and gentle under honors, to be guilty of a tragedy of which +she never dreamed. For that was the day when little Lucy was lost. + +When the picnic was over, when the children were climbing into the +straw-wagon and Madame and Miss Acton were genteelly disposed in the +victoria, a lamentable cry arose. Sam drew his reins tight and rolled +his inquiring eyes around; Madame and Miss Acton leaned far out on +either side of the victoria. + +"Oh, what is it?" said Madame. "My dear Miss Acton, do pray get out and +see what the trouble is. I begin to feel a little faint." + +In fact, Madame got her cut-glass smelling-bottle out of her bag and +began to sniff vigorously. Sam gazed backward and paid no attention to +her. Madame always felt faint when anything unexpected occurred, and +smelled at the pretty bottle, but she never fainted. + +Miss Acton got out, lifting her nice skirts clear of the dusty wheel, +and she scuttled back to the uproarious straw-wagon, showing her slender +ankles and trimly shod feet. Miss Acton was a very wiry, dainty woman, +full of nervous energy. When she reached the straw-wagon Miss Parmalee +was climbing out, assisted by the driver. Miss Parmalee was very pale +and visibly tremulous. The children were all shrieking in dissonance, +so it was quite impossible to tell what the burden of their tale of woe +was; but obviously something of a tragic nature had happened. + +"What is the matter?" asked Miss Acton, teetering like a humming-bird +with excitement. + +"Little Lucy--" gasped Miss Parmalee. + +"What about her?" + +"She isn't here." + +"Where is she?" + +"We don't know. We just missed her." + +Then the cry of the children for little Lucy Rose, although sadly +wrangled, became intelligible. Madame came, holding up her silk skirt +and sniffing at her smelling-bottle, and everybody asked questions +of everybody else, and nobody knew any satisfactory answers. Johnny +Trumbull was confident that he was the last one to see little Lucy, and +so were Lily Jennings and Amelia Wheeler, and so were Jim Patterson and +Bubby Harvey and Arnold Carruth and Lee Westminster and many others; but +when pinned down to the actual moment everybody disagreed, and only one +thing was certain--little Lucy Rose was missing. + +"What shall I say to her father?" moaned Madame. + +"Of course, we shall find her before we say anything," returned Miss +Parmalee, who was sure to rise to an emergency. Madame sank helpless +before one. "You had better go and sit under that tree (Sam, take a +cushion out of the carriage for Madame) and keep quiet; then Sam must +drive to the village and give the alarm, and the strawwagon had better +go, too; and the rest of us will hunt by threes, three always keeping +together. Remember, children, three of you keep together, and, whatever +you do, be sure and do not separate. We cannot have another lost." + +It seemed very sound advice. Madame, pale and frightened, sat on the +cushion under the tree and sniffed at her smelling-bottle, and the rest +scattered and searched the grove and surrounding underbrush thoroughly. +But it was sunset when the groups returned to Madame under her tree, +and the strawwagon with excited people was back, and the victoria with +Lucy's father and the rector and his wife, and Dr. Trumbull in his +buggy, and other carriages fast arriving. Poor Miss Martha Rose had been +out calling when she heard the news, and she was walking to the scene of +action. The victoria in which her cousin was seated left her in a +cloud of dust. Cyril Rose had not noticed the mincing figure with the +card-case and the parasol. + +The village searched for little Lucy Rose, but it was Jim Patterson who +found her, and in the most unlikely of places. A forlorn pair with a +multiplicity of forlorn children lived in a tumble-down house about half +a mile from the grove. The man's name was Silas Thomas, and his wife's +was Sarah. Poor Sarah had lost a large part of the small wit she had +originally owned several years before, when her youngest daughter, aged +four, died. All the babies that had arrived since had not consoled her +for the death of that little lamb, by name Viola May, nor restored her +full measure of under-wit. Poor Sarah Thomas had spied adorable little +Lucy separated from her mates by chance for a few minutes, picking wild +flowers, and had seized her in forcible but loving arms and carried her +home. Had Lucy not been such a silent, docile child, it could never +have happened; but she was a mere little limp thing in the grasp of the +over-loving, deprived mother who thought she had gotten back her own +beloved Viola May. + +When Jim Patterson, big-eyed and pale, looked in at the Thomas door, +there sat Sarah Thomas, a large, unkempt, wild-visaged, but gentle +creature, holding little Lucy and cuddling her, while Lucy, shrinking +away as far as she was able, kept her big, dark eyes of wonder and +fear upon the woman's face. And all around were clustered the Thomas +children, unkempt as their mother, a gentle but degenerate brood, all +of them believing what their mother said. Viola May had come home again. +Silas Thomas was not there; he was trudging slowly homeward from a job +of wood-cutting. Jim saw only the mother, little Lucy, and that poor +little flock of children gazing in wonder and awe. Jim rushed in and +faced Sarah Thomas. "Give me little Lucy!" said he, as fiercely as any +man. But he reckoned without the unreasoning love of a mother. Sarah +only held little Lucy faster, and the poor little girl rolled appealing +eyes at him over that brawny, grasping arm of affection. + +Jim raced for help, and it was not long before it came. Little Lucy rode +home in the victoria, seated in Sally Patterson's lap. "Mother, you take +her," Jim had pleaded; and Sally, in the face and eyes of Madame, had +gathered the little trembling creature into her arms. In her heart she +had not much of an opinion of any woman who had allowed such a darling +little girl out of her sight for a moment. Madame accepted a seat in +another carriage and rode home, explaining and sniffing and inwardly +resolving never again to have a straw-ride. + +Jim stood on the step of the victoria all the way home. They passed poor +Miss Martha Rose, still faring toward the grove, and nobody noticed her, +for the second time. She did not turn back until the straw-wagon, which +formed the tail of the little procession, reached her. That she halted +with mad waves of her parasol, and, when told that little Lucy was +found, refused a seat on the straw because she did not wish to rumple +her best gown and turned about and fared home again. + +The rectory was reached before Cyril Rose's house, and Cyril yielded +gratefully to Sally Patterson's proposition that she take the little +girl with her, give her dinner, see that she was washed and brushed +and freed from possible contamination from the Thomases, who were not a +cleanly lot, and later brought home in the rector's carriage. However, +little Lucy stayed all night at the rectory. She had a bath; her lovely, +misty hair was brushed; she was fed and petted; and finally Sally +Patterson telephoned for permission to keep her overnight. By that time +poor Martha had reached home and was busily brushing her best dress. + +After dinner, little Lucy, very happy and quite restored, sat in Sally +Patterson's lap on the veranda, while Jim hovered near. His innocent +boy-love made him feel as if he had wings. But his wings only bore him +to failure, before an earlier and mightier force of love than his young +heart could yet compass for even such a darling as little Lucy. He sat +on the veranda step and gazed eagerly and rapturously at little Lucy on +his mother's lap, and the desire to have her away from other loves came +over him. He saw the fireflies dancing in swarms on the lawn, and a +favorite sport of the children of the village occurred to him. + +"Say, little Lucy," said Jim. + +Little Lucy looked up with big, dark eyes under her mist of hair, as she +nestled against Sally Patterson's shoulder. + +"Say, let's chase fireflies, little Lucy." + +"Do you want to chase fireflies with Jim, darling?" asked Sally. + +Little Lucy nestled closer. "I would rather stay with you," said she in +her meek flute of a voice, and she gazed up at Sally with the look which +she might have given the mother she had lost. + +Sally kissed her and laughed. Then she reached down a fond hand and +patted her boy's head. "Never mind, Jim," said Sally. "Mothers have to +come first." + + + + +NOBLESSE + +MARGARET LEE encountered in her late middle age the rather singular +strait of being entirely alone in the world. She was unmarried, and as +far as relatives were concerned, she had none except those connected +with her by ties not of blood, but by marriage. + +Margaret had not married when her flesh had been comparative; later, +when it had become superlative, she had no opportunities to marry. Life +would have been hard enough for Margaret under any circumstances, but it +was especially hard, living, as she did, with her father's stepdaughter +and that daughter's husband. + +Margaret's stepmother had been a child in spite of her two marriages, +and a very silly, although pretty child. The daughter, Camille, was like +her, although not so pretty, and the man whom Camille had married +was what Margaret had been taught to regard as "common." His business +pursuits were irregular and partook of mystery. He always smoked +cigarettes and chewed gum. He wore loud shirts and a diamond scarf-pin +which had upon him the appearance of stolen goods. The gem had belonged +to Margaret's own mother, but when Camille expressed a desire to present +it to Jack Desmond, Margaret had yielded with no outward hesitation, but +afterward she wept miserably over its loss when alone in her room. The +spirit had gone out of Margaret, the little which she had possessed. She +had always been a gentle, sensitive creature, and was almost helpless +before the wishes of others. + +After all, it had been a long time since Margaret had been able to +force the ring even upon her little finger, but she had derived a small +pleasure from the reflection that she owned it in its faded velvet box, +hidden under laces in her top bureau drawer. She did not like to see +it blazing forth from the tie of this very ordinary young man who had +married Camille. Margaret had a gentle, high-bred contempt for Jack +Desmond, but at the same time a vague fear of him. Jack had a measure of +unscrupulous business shrewdness, which spared nothing and nobody, and +that in spite of the fact that he had not succeeded. + +Margaret owned the old Lee place, which had been magnificent, but of +late years the expenditures had been reduced and it had deteriorated. +The conservatories had been closed. There was only one horse in +the stable. Jack had bought him. He was a wornout trotter with legs +carefully bandaged. Jack drove him at reckless speed, not considering +those slender, braceleted legs. Jack had a racing-gig, and when in it, +with striped coat, cap on one side, cigarette in mouth, lines held taut, +skimming along the roads in clouds of dust, he thought himself the man +and true sportsman which he was not. Some of the old Lee silver had paid +for that waning trotter. + +Camille adored Jack, and cared for no associations, no society, for +which he was not suited. Before the trotter was bought she told Margaret +that the kind of dinners which she was able to give in Fairhill were +awfully slow. "If we could afford to have some men out from the city, +some nice fellers that Jack knows, it would be worth while," said she, +"but we have grown so hard up we can't do a thing to make it worth their +while. Those men haven't got any use for a back-number old place like +this. We can't take them round in autos, nor give them a chance at +cards, for Jack couldn't pay if he lost, and Jack is awful honorable. We +can't have the right kind of folks here for any fun. I don't propose +to ask the rector and his wife, and old Mr. Harvey, or people like the +Leaches." + +"The Leaches are a very good old family," said Margaret, feebly. + +"I don't care for good old families when they are so slow," retorted +Camille. "The fellers we could have here, if we were rich enough, come +from fine families, but they are up-to-date. It's no use hanging on to +old silver dishes we never use and that I don't intend to spoil my +hands shining. Poor Jack don't have much fun, anyway. If he wants that +trotter--he says it's going dirt cheap--I think it's mean he can't have +it, instead of your hanging on to a lot of out-of-style old silver; so +there." + +Two generations ago there had been French blood in Camille's family. She +put on her clothes beautifully; she had a dark, rather fine-featured, +alert little face, which gave a wrong impression, for she was +essentially vulgar. Sometimes poor Margaret Lee wished that Camille had +been definitely vicious, if only she might be possessed of more of the +characteristics of breeding. Camille so irritated Margaret in those +somewhat abstruse traits called sensibilities that she felt as if she +were living with a sort of spiritual nutmeg-grater. Seldom did Camille +speak that she did not jar Margaret, although unconsciously. Camille +meant to be kind to the stout woman, whom she pitied as far as she was +capable of pitying without understanding. She realized that it must +be horrible to be no longer young, and so stout that one was fairly +monstrous, but how horrible she could not with her mentality conceive. +Jack also meant to be kind. He was not of the brutal--that is, +intentionally brutal--type, but he had a shrewd eye to the betterment of +himself, and no realization of the torture he inflicted upon those who +opposed that betterment. + +For a long time matters had been worse than usual financially in the Lee +house. The sisters had been left in charge of the sadly dwindled estate, +and had depended upon the judgment, or lack of judgment, of Jack. He +approved of taking your chances and striking for larger income. The few +good old grandfather securities had been sold, and wild ones from the +very jungle of commerce had been substituted. Jack, like most of his +type, while shrewd, was as credulous as a child. He lied himself, and +expected all men to tell him the truth. Camille at his bidding mortgaged +the old place, and Margaret dared not oppose. Taxes were not paid; +interest was not paid; credit was exhausted. Then the house was put up +at public auction, and brought little more than sufficient to pay the +creditors. Jack took the balance and staked it in a few games of chance, +and of course lost. The weary trotter stumbled one day and had to be +shot. Jack became desperate. He frightened Camille. He was suddenly +morose. He bade Camille pack, and Margaret also, and they obeyed. +Camille stowed away her crumpled finery in the bulging old trunks, and +Margaret folded daintily her few remnants of past treasures. She had an +old silk gown or two, which resisted with their rich honesty the inroads +of time, and a few pieces of old lace, which Camille understood no +better than she understood their owner. + +Then Margaret and the Desmonds went to the city and lived in a horrible, +tawdry little flat in a tawdry locality. Jack roared with bitter mirth +when he saw poor Margaret forced to enter her tiny room sidewise; +Camille laughed also, although she chided Jack gently. "Mean of you to +make fun of poor Margaret, Jacky dear," she said. + +For a few weeks Margaret's life in that flat was horrible; then it +became still worse. Margaret nearly filled with her weary, ridiculous +bulk her little room, and she remained there most of the time, although +it was sunny and noisy, its one window giving on a courtyard strung with +clothes-lines and teeming with boisterous life. Camille and Jack +went trolley-riding, and made shift to entertain a little, merry but +questionable people, who gave them passes to vaudeville and entertained +in their turn until the small hours. Unquestionably these people +suggested to Jack Desmond the scheme which spelled tragedy to Margaret. + +She always remembered one little dark man with keen eyes who had seen +her disappearing through her door of a Sunday night when all these gay, +bedraggled birds were at liberty and the fun ran high. "Great Scott!" +the man had said, and Margaret had heard him demand of Jack that she be +recalled. She obeyed, and the man was introduced, also the other members +of the party. Margaret Lee stood in the midst of this throng and heard +their repressed titters of mirth at her appearance. Everybody there was +in good humor with the exception of Jack, who was still nursing his bad +luck, and the little dark man, whom Jack owed. The eyes of Jack and the +little dark man made Margaret cold with a terror of something, she +knew not what. Before that terror the shame and mortification of her +exhibition to that merry company was of no import. + +She stood among them, silent, immense, clad in her dark purple silk gown +spread over a great hoopskirt. A real lace collar lay softly over her +enormous, billowing shoulders; real lace ruffles lay over her great, +shapeless hands. Her face, the delicacy of whose features was veiled +with flesh, flushed and paled. Not even flesh could subdue the sad +brilliancy of her dark-blue eyes, fixed inward upon her own sad state, +unregardful of the company. She made an indefinite murmur of response +to the salutations given her, and then retreated. She heard the roar of +laughter after she had squeezed through the door of her room. Then she +heard eager conversation, of which she did not catch the real import, +but which terrified her with chance expressions. She was quite sure that +she was the subject of that eager discussion. She was quite sure that it +boded her no good. + +In a few days she knew the worst; and the worst was beyond her utmost +imaginings. This was before the days of moving-picture shows; it was +the day of humiliating spectacles of deformities, when inventions +of amusements for the people had not progressed. It was the day of +exhibitions of sad freaks of nature, calculated to provoke tears rather +than laughter in the healthy-minded, and poor Margaret Lee was a chosen +victim. Camille informed her in a few words of her fate. Camille was +sorry for her, although not in the least understanding why she was +sorry. She realized dimly that Margaret would be distressed, but she +was unable from her narrow point of view to comprehend fully the whole +tragedy. + +"Jack has gone broke," stated Camille. "He owes Bill Stark a pile, and +he can't pay a cent of it; and Jack's sense of honor about a poker debt +is about the biggest thing in his character. Jack has got to pay. And +Bill has a little circus, going to travel all summer, and he's offered +big money for you. Jack can pay Bill what he owes him, and we'll have +enough to live on, and have lots of fun going around. You hadn't ought +to make a fuss about it." + +Margaret, pale as death, stared at the girl, pertly slim, and common and +pretty, who stared back laughingly, although still with the glimmer of +uncomprehending pity in her black eyes. + +"What does--he--want--me--for?" gasped Margaret. + +"For a show, because you are so big," replied Camille. "You will make us +all rich, Margaret. Ain't it nice?" + +Then Camille screamed, the shrill raucous scream of the women of her +type, for Margaret had fallen back in a dead faint, her immense bulk +inert in her chair. Jack came running in alarm. Margaret had suddenly +gained value in his shrewd eyes. He was as pale as she. + +Finally Margaret raised her head, opened her miserable eyes, and +regained her consciousness of herself and what lay before her. There was +no course open but submission. She knew that from the first. All three +faced destitution; she was the one financial asset, she and her poor +flesh. She had to face it, and with what dignity she could muster. + +Margaret had great piety. She kept constantly before her mental vision +the fact in which she believed, that the world which she found so hard, +and which put her to unspeakable torture, was not all. + +A week elapsed before the wretched little show of which she was to be a +member went on the road, and night after night she prayed. She besieged +her God for strength. She never prayed for respite. Her realization +of the situation and her lofty resolution prevented that. The awful, +ridiculous combat was before her; there was no evasion; she prayed only +for the strength which leads to victory. + +However, when the time came, it was all worse than she had imagined. How +could a woman gently born and bred conceive of the horrible ignominy +of such a life? She was dragged hither and yon, to this and that little +town. She traveled through sweltering heat on jolting trains; she slept +in tents; she lived--she, Margaret Lee--on terms of equality with the +common and the vulgar. Daily her absurd unwieldiness was exhibited to +crowds screaming with laughter. Even her faith wavered. It seemed to her +that there was nothing for evermore beyond those staring, jeering faces +of silly mirth and delight at sight of her, seated in two chairs, clad +in a pink spangled dress, her vast shoulders bare and sparkling with a +tawdry necklace, her great, bare arms covered with brass bracelets, her +hands incased in short, white kid gloves, over the fingers of which she +wore a number of rings--stage properties. + +Margaret became a horror to herself. At times it seemed to her that she +was in the way of fairly losing her own identity. It mattered little +that Camille and Jack were very kind to her, that they showed her the +nice things which her terrible earnings had enabled them to have. +She sat in her two chairs--the two chairs proved a most successful +advertisement--with her two kid-cushiony hands clenched in her pink +spangled lap, and she suffered agony of soul, which made her inner self +stern and terrible, behind that great pink mask of face. And nobody +realized until one sultry day when the show opened at a village in a +pocket of green hills--indeed, its name was Greenhill--and Sydney Lord +went to see it. + +Margaret, who had schooled herself to look upon her audience as if they +were not, suddenly comprehended among them another soul who understood +her own. She met the eyes of the man, and a wonderful comfort, as of a +cool breeze blowing over the face of clear water, came to her. She knew +that the man understood. She knew that she had his fullest sympathy. She +saw also a comrade in the toils of comic tragedy, for Sydney Lord was in +the same case. He was a mountain of flesh. As a matter of fact, had +he not been known in Greenhill and respected as a man of weight of +character as well as of body, and of an old family, he would have +rivaled Margaret. Beside him sat an elderly woman, sweet-faced, slightly +bent as to her slender shoulders, as if with a chronic attitude of +submission. She was Sydney's widowed sister, Ellen Waters. She lived +with her brother and kept his house, and had no will other than his. + +Sydney Lord and his sister remained when the rest of the audience had +drifted out, after the privileged hand-shakes with the queen of +the show. Every time a coarse, rustic hand reached familiarly after +Margaret's, Sydney shrank. + +He motioned his sister to remain seated when he approached the stage. +Jack Desmond, who had been exploiting Margaret, gazed at him with +admiring curiosity. Sydney waved him away with a commanding gesture. "I +wish to speak to her a moment. Pray leave the tent," he said, and Jack +obeyed. People always obeyed Sydney Lord. + +Sydney stood before Margaret, and he saw the clear crystal, which was +herself, within all the flesh, clad in tawdry raiment, and she knew that +he saw it. + +"Good God!" said Sydney, "you are a lady!" + +He continued to gaze at her, and his eyes, large and brown, became +blurred; at the same time his mouth tightened. + +"How came you to be in such a place as this?" demanded Sydney. He spoke +almost as if he were angry with her. + +Margaret explained briefly. + +"It is an outrage," declared Sydney. He said it, however, rather +absently. He was reflecting. "Where do you live?" he asked. + +"Here." + +"You mean--?" + +"They make up a bed for me here, after the people have gone." + +"And I suppose you had--before this--a comfortable house." + +"The house which my grandfather Lee owned, the old Lee mansion-house, +before we went to the city. It was a very fine old Colonial house," +explained Margaret, in her finely modulated voice. + +"And you had a good room?" + +"The southeast chamber had always been mine. It was very large, and the +furniture was old Spanish mahogany." + +"And now--" said Sydney. + +"Yes," said Margaret. She looked at him, and her serious blue eyes +seemed to see past him. "It will not last," she said. + +"What do you mean?" + +"I try to learn a lesson. I am a child in the school of God. My lesson +is one that always ends in peace." + +"Good God!" said Sydney. + +He motioned to his sister, and Ellen approached in a frightened fashion. +Her brother could do no wrong, but this was the unusual, and alarmed +her. + +"This lady--" began Sydney. + +"Miss Lee," said Margaret. "I was never married. I am Miss Margaret +Lee." + +"This," said Sydney, "is my sister Ellen, Mrs. Waters. Ellen, I wish you +to meet Miss Lee." + +Ellen took into her own Margaret's hand, and said feebly that it was a +beautiful day and she hoped Miss Lee found Greenhill a pleasant place +to--visit. + +Sydney moved slowly out of the tent and found Jack Desmond. He was +standing near with Camille, who looked her best in a pale-blue summer +silk and a black hat trimmed with roses. Jack and Camille never really +knew how the great man had managed, but presently Margaret had gone away +with him and his sister. + +Jack and Camille looked at each other. + +"Oh, Jack, ought you to have let her go?" said Camille. + +"What made you let her go?" asked Jack. + +"I--don't know. I couldn't say anything. That man has a tremendous way +with him. Goodness!" + +"He is all right here in the place, anyhow," said Jack. "They look up to +him. He is a big-bug here. Comes of a family like Margaret's, though he +hasn't got much money. Some chaps were braggin' that they had a bigger +show than her right here, and I found out." + +"Suppose," said Camille, "Margaret does not come back?" + +"He could not keep her without bein' arrested," declared Jack, but he +looked uneasy. He had, however, looked uneasy for some time. The fact +was, Margaret had been very gradually losing weight. Moreover, she was +not well. That very night, after the show was over, Bill Stark, the +little dark man, had a talk with the Desmonds about it. + +"Truth is, before long, if you don't look out, you'll have to pad her," +said Bill; "and giants don't amount to a row of pins after that begins." + +Camille looked worried and sulky. "She ain't very well, anyhow," said +she. "I ain't going to kill Margaret." + +"It's a good thing she's got a chance to have a night's rest in a +house," said Bill Stark. + +"The fat man has asked her to stay with him and his sister while the +show is here," said Jack. + +"The sister invited her," said Camille, with a little stiffness. She was +common, but she had lived with Lees, and her mother had married a Lee. +She knew what was due Margaret, and also due herself. + +"The truth is," said Camille, "this is an awful sort of life for a woman +like Margaret. She and her folks were never used to anything like it." + +"Why didn't you make your beauty husband hustle and take care of her and +you, then?" demanded Bill, who admired Camille, and disliked her because +she had no eyes for him. + +"My husband has been unfortunate. He has done the best he could," +responded Camille. "Come, Jack; no use talking about it any longer. +Guess Margaret will pick up. Come along. I'm tired out." + +That night Margaret Lee slept in a sweet chamber with muslin curtains +at the windows, in a massive old mahogany bed, much like hers which had +been sacrificed at an auction sale. The bed-linen was linen, and smelled +of lavender. Margaret was too happy to sleep. She lay in the cool, +fragrant sheets and was happy, and convinced of the presence of the God +to whom she had prayed. All night Sydney Lord sat down-stairs in his +book-walled sanctum and studied over the situation. It was a crucial +one. The great psychological moment of Sydney Lord's life for +knight-errantry had arrived. He studied the thing from every point of +view. There was no romance about it. These were hard, sordid, tragic, +ludicrous facts with which he had to deal. He knew to a nicety the +agonies which Margaret suffered. He knew, because of his own capacity +for sufferings of like stress. "And she is a woman and a lady," he said, +aloud. + +If Sydney had been rich enough, the matter would have been simple. He +could have paid Jack and Camille enough to quiet them, and Margaret +could have lived with him and his sister and their two old servants. But +he was not rich; he was even poor. The price to be paid for Margaret's +liberty was a bitter one, but it was that or nothing. Sydney faced it. +He looked about the room. To him the walls lined with the dull gleams of +old books were lovely. There was an oil portrait of his mother over +the mantel-shelf. The weather was warm now, and there was no need for a +hearth fire, but how exquisitely home-like and dear that room could +be when the snow drove outside and there was the leap of flame on the +hearth! Sydney was a scholar and a gentleman. He had led a gentle and +sequestered life. Here in his native village there were none to gibe and +sneer. The contrast of the traveling show would be as great for him as +it had been for Margaret, but he was the male of the species, and she +the female. Chivalry, racial, harking back to the beginning of nobility +in the human, to its earliest dawn, fired Sydney. The pale daylight +invaded the study. Sydney, as truly as any knight of old, had girded +himself, and with no hope, no thought of reward, for the battle in the +eternal service of the strong for the weak, which makes the true worth +of the strong. + +There was only one way. Sydney Lord took it. His sister was spared the +knowledge of the truth for a long while. When she knew, she did not +lament; since Sydney had taken the course, it must be right. As for +Margaret, not knowing the truth, she yielded. She was really on the +verge of illness. Her spirit was of too fine a strain to enable her body +to endure long. When she was told that she was to remain with Sydney's +sister while Sydney went away on business, she made no objection. A +wonderful sense of relief, as of wings of healing being spread under her +despair, was upon her. Camille came to bid her good-by. + +"I hope you have a nice visit in this lovely house," said Camille, and +kissed her. Camille was astute, and to be trusted. She did not betray +Sydney's confidence. Sydney used a disguise--a dark wig over his +partially bald head and a little make-up-and he traveled about with the +show and sat on three chairs, and shook hands with the gaping crowd, +and was curiously happy. It was discomfort; it was ignominy; it was +maddening to support by the exhibition of his physical deformity a +perfectly worthless young couple like Jack and Camille Desmond, but it +was all superbly ennobling for the man himself. + +Always as he sat on his three chairs, immense, grotesque--the more +grotesque for his splendid dignity of bearing--there was in his soul +of a gallant gentleman the consciousness of that other, whom he was +shielding from a similar ordeal. Compassion and generosity, so great +that they comprehended love itself and excelled its highest type, +irradiated the whole being of the fat man exposed to the gaze of his +inferiors. Chivalry, which rendered him almost god-like, strengthened +him for his task. Sydney thought always of Margaret as distinct from her +physical self, a sort of crystalline, angelic soul, with no encumbrance +of earth. He achieved a purely spiritual conception of her. And +Margaret, living again her gentle lady life, was likewise ennobled by a +gratitude which transformed her. Always a clear and beautiful soul, she +gave out new lights of character like a jewel in the sun. And she also +thought of Sydney as distinct from his physical self. The consciousness +of the two human beings, one of the other, was a consciousness as of two +wonderful lines of good and beauty, moving for ever parallel, separate, +and inseparable in an eternal harmony of spirit. + + + + +CORONATION + +JIM BENNET had never married. He had passed middle life, and possessed +considerable property. Susan Adkins kept house for him. She was a +widow and a very distant relative. Jim had two nieces, his brother's +daughters. One, Alma Beecher, was married; the other, Amanda, was not. +The nieces had naively grasping views concerning their uncle and his +property. They stated freely that they considered him unable to care for +it; that a guardian should be appointed and the property be theirs at +once. They consulted Lawyer Thomas Hopkinson with regard to it; they +discoursed at length upon what they claimed to be an idiosyncrasy of +Jim's, denoting failing mental powers. + +"He keeps a perfect slew of cats, and has a coal fire for them in the +woodshed all winter," said Amanda. + +"Why in thunder shouldn't he keep a fire in the woodshed if he wants +to?" demanded Hopkinson. "I know of no law against it. And there isn't a +law in the country regulating the number of cats a man can keep." Thomas +Hopkinson, who was an old friend of Jim's, gave his prominent chin an +upward jerk as he sat in his office arm-chair before his clients. + +"There is something besides cats," said Alma + +"What?" + +"He talks to himself." + +"What in creation do you expect the poor man to do? He can't talk to +Susan Adkins about a blessed thing except tidies and pincushions. That +woman hasn't a thought in her mind outside her soul's salvation and +fancy-work. Jim has to talk once in a while to keep himself a man. What +if he does talk to himself? I talk to myself. Next thing you will want +to be appointed guardian over me, Amanda." + +Hopkinson was a bachelor, and Amanda flushed angrily. + +"He wasn't what I call even gentlemanly," she told Alma, when the two +were on their way home. + +"I suppose Tom Hopkinson thought you were setting your cap at him," +retorted Alma. She relished the dignity of her married state, and +enjoyed giving her spinster sister little claws when occasion called. +However, Amanda had a temper of her own, and she could claw back. + +"YOU needn't talk," said she. "You only took Joe Beecher when you had +given up getting anybody better. You wanted Tom Hopkinson yourself. I +haven't forgotten that blue silk dress you got and wore to meeting. You +needn't talk. You know you got that dress just to make Tom look at you, +and he didn't. You needn't talk." + +"I wouldn't have married Tom Hopkinson if he had been the only man on +the face of the earth," declared Alma with dignity; but she colored +hotly. + +Amanda sniffed. "Well, as near as I can find out Uncle Jim can go on +talking to himself and keeping cats, and we can't do anything," said +she. + +When the two women were home, they told Alma's husband, Joe Beecher, +about their lack of success. They were quite heated with their walk and +excitement. "I call it a shame," said Alma. "Anybody knows that poor +Uncle Jim would be better off with a guardian." + +"Of course," said Amanda. "What man that had a grain of horse sense +would do such a crazy thing as to keep a coal fire in a woodshed?" + +"For such a slew of cats, too," said Alma, nodding fiercely. + +Alma's husband, Joe Beecher, spoke timidly and undecidedly in the +defense. "You know," he said, "that Mrs. Adkins wouldn't have those cats +in the house, and cats mostly like to sit round where it's warm." + +His wife regarded him. Her nose wrinkled. "I suppose next thing YOU'LL +be wanting to have a cat round where it's warm, right under my feet, +with all I have to do," said she. Her voice had an actual acidity of +sound. + +Joe gasped. He was a large man with a constant expression of wondering +inquiry. It was the expression of his babyhood; he had never lost it, +and it was an expression which revealed truly the state of his mind. +Always had Joe Beecher wondered, first of all at finding himself in the +world at all, then at the various happenings of existence. He probably +wondered more about the fact of his marriage with Alma Bennet than +anything else, although he never betrayed his wonder. He was always +painfully anxious to please his wife, of whom he stood in awe. Now he +hastened to reply: "Why, no, Alma; of course I won't." + +"Because," said Alma, "I haven't come to my time of life, through all +the trials I've had, to be taking any chances of breaking my bones over +any miserable, furry, four-footed animal that wouldn't catch a mouse if +one run right under her nose." + +"I don't want any cat," repeated Joe, miserably. His fear and awe of the +two women increased. When his sister-in-law turned upon him he fairly +cringed. + +"Cats!" said Amanda. Then she sniffed. The sniff was worse than speech. + +Joe repeated in a mumble that he didn't want any cats, and went out, +closing the door softly after him, as he had been taught. However, he +was entirely sure, in the depths of his subjugated masculine mind, that +his wife and her sister had no legal authority whatever to interfere +with their uncle's right to keep a hundred coal fires in his woodshed, +for a thousand cats. He always had an inner sense of glee when he heard +the two women talk over the matter. Once Amanda had declared that she +did not believe that Tom Hopkinson knew much about law, anyway. + +"He seems to stand pretty high," Joe ventured with the utmost mildness. + +"Yes, he does," admitted Alma, grudgingly. + +"It does not follow he knows law," persisted Amanda, "and it MAY follow +that he likes cats. There was that great Maltese tommy brushing round +all the time we were in his office, but I didn't dare shoo him off for +fear it might be against the law." Amanda laughed, a very disagreeable +little laugh. Joe said nothing, but inwardly he chuckled. It was +the cause of man with man. He realized a great, even affectionate, +understanding of Jim. + +The day after his nieces had visited the lawyer's office, Jim was +preparing to call on his friend Edward Hayward, the minister. Before +leaving he looked carefully after the fire in the woodshed. The +stove was large. Jim piled on the coal, regardless outwardly that the +housekeeper, Susan Adkins, had slammed the kitchen door to indicate her +contempt. Inwardly Jim felt hurt, but he had felt hurt so long from the +same cause that the sensation had become chronic, and was borne with a +gentle patience. Moreover, there was something which troubled him more +and was the reason for his contemplated call on his friend. He evened +the coals on the fire with great care, and replenished from the pail in +the icebox the cats' saucers. There was a circle of clean white saucers +around the stove. Jim owned many cats; counting the kittens, there were +probably over twenty. Mrs. Adkins counted them in the sixties. "Those +sixty-seven cats," she said. + +Jim often gave away cats when he was confident of securing good homes, +but supply exceeded the demand. Now and then tragedies took place +in that woodshed. Susan Adkins came bravely to the front upon these +occasions. Quite convinced was Susan Adkins that she had a good home, +and it behooved her to keep it, and she did not in the least object +to drowning, now and then, a few very young kittens. She did this with +neatness and despatch while Jim walked to the store on an errand and was +supposed to know nothing about it. There was simply not enough room in +his woodshed for the accumulation of cats, although his heart could have +held all. + +That day, as he poured out the milk, cats of all ages and sizes and +colors purred in a softly padding multitude around his feet, and +he regarded them with love. There were tiger cats, Maltese cats, +black-and-white cats, black cats and white cats, tommies and females, +and his heart leaped to meet the pleading mews of all. The saucers were +surrounded. Little pink tongues lapped. "Pretty pussy! pretty pussy!" +cooed Jim, addressing them in general. He put on his overcoat and hat, +which he kept on a peg behind the door. Jim had an arm-chair in the +woodshed. He always sat there when he smoked; Susan Adkins demurred at +his smoking in the house, which she kept so nice, and Jim did not dream +of rebellion. He never questioned the right of a woman to bar tobacco +smoke from a house. Before leaving he refilled some of the saucers. +He was not sure that all of the cats were there; some might be afield, +hunting, and he wished them to find refreshment when they returned. He +stroked the splendid striped back of a great tiger tommy which filled +his armchair. This cat was his special pet. He fastened the outer shed +door with a bit of rope in order that it might not blow entirely open, +and yet allow his feline friends to pass, should they choose. Then he +went out. + +The day was clear, with a sharp breath of frost. The fields gleamed with +frost, offering to the eye a fine shimmer as of diamond-dust under the +brilliant blue sky, overspread in places with a dapple of little white +clouds. + +"White frost and mackerel sky; going to be falling weather," Jim said, +aloud, as he went out of the yard, crunching the crisp grass under heel. + +Susan Adkins at a window saw his lips moving. His talking to himself +made her nervous, although it did not render her distrustful of his +sanity. It was fortunate that Susan had not told Jim that she disliked +his habit. In that case he would have deprived himself of that slight +solace; he would not have dreamed of opposing Susan's wishes. Jim had a +great pity for the nervous whims, as he regarded them, of women--a +pity so intense and tender that it verged on respect and veneration. +He passed his nieces' house on the way to the minister's, and both were +looking out of windows and saw his lips moving. + +"There he goes, talking to himself like a crazy loon," said Amanda. + +Alma nodded. + +Jim went on, blissfully unconscious. He talked in a quiet monotone; only +now and then his voice rose; only now and then there were accompanying +gestures. Jim had a straight mile down the broad village street to walk +before he reached the church and the parsonage beside it. + +Jim and the minister had been friends since boyhood. They were graduates +and classmates of the same college. Jim had had unusual educational +advantages for a man coming from a simple family. The front door of the +parsonage flew open when Jim entered the gate, and the minister stood +there smiling. He was a tall, thin man with a wide mouth, which either +smiled charmingly or was set with severity. He was as brown and dry as a +wayside weed which winter had subdued as to bloom but could not entirely +prostrate with all its icy storms and compelling blasts. Jim, advancing +eagerly toward the warm welcome in the door, was a small man, and bent +at that, but he had a handsome old face, with the rose of youth on the +cheeks and the light of youth in the blue eyes, and the quick changes of +youth, before emotions, about the mouth. + +"Hullo, Jim!" cried Dr. Edward Hayward. Hayward, for a doctor of +divinity, was considered somewhat lacking in dignity at times; still, +he was Dr. Hayward, and the failing was condoned. Moreover, he was +a Hayward, and the Haywards had been, from the memory of the oldest +inhabitant, the great people of the village. Dr. Hayward's house was +presided over by his widowed cousin, a lady of enough dignity to make up +for any lack of it in the minister. There were three servants, besides +the old butler who had been Hayward's attendant when he had been a young +man in college. Village people were proud of their minister, with his +degree and what they considered an imposing household retinue. + +Hayward led, and Jim followed, to the least pretentious room in +the house--not the study proper, which was lofty, book-lined, and +leather-furnished, curtained with broad sweeps of crimson damask, but a +little shabby place back of it, accessible by a narrow door. The little +room was lined with shelves; they held few books, but a collection of +queer and dusty things--strange weapons, minerals, odds and ends--which +the minister loved and with which his lady cousin never interfered. + +"Louisa," Hayward had told his cousin when she entered upon her post, +"do as you like with the whole house, but let my little study alone. +Let it look as if it had been stirred up with a garden-rake--that little +room is my territory, and no disgrace to you, my dear, if the dust rises +in clouds at every step." + +Jim was as fond of the little room as his friend. He entered, and sighed +a great sigh of satisfaction as he sank into the shabby, dusty hollow +of a large chair before the hearth fire. Immediately a black cat leaped +into his lap, gazed at him with greenjewel eyes, worked her paws, +purred, settled into a coil, and slept. Jim lit his pipe and threw the +match blissfully on the floor. Dr. Hayward set an electric coffee-urn at +its work, for the little room was a curious mixture of the comfortable +old and the comfortable modern. + +"Sam shall serve our luncheon in here," he said, with a staid glee. + +Jim nodded happily. + +"Louisa will not mind," said Hayward. "She is precise, but she has +a fine regard for the rights of the individual, which is most +commendable." He seated himself in a companion chair to Jim's, lit +his own pipe, and threw the match on the floor. Occasionally, when the +minister was out, Sam, without orders so to do, cleared the floor of +matches. + +Hayward smoked and regarded his friend, who looked troubled despite his +comfort. "What is it, Jim?" asked the minister at last. + +"I don't know how to do what is right for me to do," replied the little +man, and his face, turned toward his friend, had the puzzled earnestness +of a child. + +Hayward laughed. It was easily seen that his was the keener mind. In +natural endowments there had never been equality, although there was +great similarity of tastes. Jim, despite his education, often lapsed +into the homely vernacular of which he heard so much. An involuntarily +imitative man in externals was Jim, but essentially an original. Jim +proceeded. + +"You know, Edward, I have never been one to complain," he said, with an +almost boyish note of apology. + +"Never complained half enough; that's the trouble," returned the other. + +"Well, I overheard something Mis' Adkins said to Mis' Amos Trimmer the +other afternoon. Mis' Trimmer was calling on Mis' Adkins. I couldn't +help overhearing unless I went outdoors, and it was snowing and I had a +cold. I wasn't listening." + +"Had a right to listen if you wanted to," declared Hayward, irascibly. + +"Well, I couldn't help it unless I went outdoors. Mis' Adkins she was in +the kitchen making lightbread for supper, and Mis' Trimmer had sat right +down there with her. Mis' Adkins's kitchen is as clean as a parlor, +anyway. Mis' Adkins said to Mis' Trimmer, speaking of me--because Mis' +Trimmer had just asked where I was and Mis' Adkins had said I was out in +the woodshed sitting with the cats and smoking--Mis' Adkins said, 'He's +just a doormat, that's what he is.' Then Mis' Trimmer says, 'The way he +lets folks ride over him beats me.' Then Mis' Adkins says again: 'He's +nothing but a door-mat. He lets everybody that wants to just trample +on him and grind their dust into him, and he acts real pleased and +grateful.'" + +Hayward's face flushed. "Did Mrs. Adkins mention that she was one of the +people who used you for a door-mat?" he demanded. + +Jim threw back his head and laughed like a child, with the sweetest +sense of unresentful humor. "Lord bless my soul, Edward," replied Jim, +"I don't believe she ever thought of that." + +"And at that very minute you, with a hard cold, were sitting out in that +draughty shed smoking because she wouldn't allow you to smoke in your +own house!" + +"I don't mind that, Edward," said Jim, and laughed again. + +"Could you see to read your paper out there, with only that little shed +window? And don't you like to read your paper while you smoke?" + +"Oh yes," admitted Jim; "but my! I don't mind little things like that! +Mis' Adkins is only a poor widow woman, and keeping my house nice and +not having it smell of tobacco is all she's got. They can talk about +women's rights--I feel as if they ought to have them fast enough, if +they want them, poor things; a woman has a hard row to hoe, and will +have, if she gets all the rights in creation. But I guess the rights +they'd find it hardest to give up would be the rights to have men look +after them just a little more than they look after other men, just +because they are women. When I think of Annie Berry--the girl I was +going to marry, you know, if she hadn't died--I feel as if I couldn't do +enough for another woman. Lord! I'm glad to sit out in the woodshed and +smoke. Mis' Adkins is pretty good-natured to stand all the cats." + +Then the coffee boiled, and Hayward poured out some for Jim and himself. +He had a little silver service at hand, and willow-ware cups and +saucers. Presently Sam appeared, and Hayward gave orders concerning +luncheon. + +"Tell Miss Louisa we are to have it served here," said he, "and mind, +Sam, the chops are to be thick and cooked the way we like them; and +don't forget the East India chutney, Sam." + +"It does seem rather a pity that you cannot have chutney at home with +your chops, when you are so fond of it," remarked Hayward when Sam had +gone. + +"Mis' Adkins says it will give me liver trouble, and she isn't strong +enough to nurse." + +"So you have to eat her ketchup?" + +"Well, she doesn't put seasoning in it," admitted Jim. "But Mis' Adkins +doesn't like seasoning herself, and I don't mind." + +"And I know the chops are never cut thick, the way we like them." + +"Mis' Adkins likes her meat well done, and she can't get such thick +chops well done. I suppose our chops are rather thin, but I don't mind." + +"Beefsteak and chops, both cut thin, and fried up like sole-leather. +I know!" said Dr. Hayward, and he stamped his foot with unregenerate +force. + +"I don't mind a bit, Edward." + +"You ought to mind, when it is your own house, and you buy the food and +pay your housekeeper. It is an outrage!" + +"I don't mind, really, Edward." + +Dr. Hayward regarded Jim with a curious expression compounded of love, +anger, and contempt. "Any more talk of legal proceedings?" he asked, +brusquely. + +Jim flushed. "Tom ought not to tell of that." + +"Yes, he ought; he ought to tell it all over town. He doesn't, but he +ought. It is an outrage! Here you have been all these years supporting +your nieces, and they are working away like field-mice, burrowing under +your generosity, trying to get a chance to take action and appropriate +your property and have you put under a guardian." + +"I don't mind a bit," said Jim; "but--" + +The other man looked inquiringly at him, and, seeing a pitiful working +of his friend's face, he jumped up and got a little jar from a shelf. +"We will drop the whole thing until we have had our chops and chutney," +said he. "You are right; it is not worth minding. Here is a new brand of +tobacco I want you to try. I don't half like it, myself, but you may." + +Jim, with a pleased smile, reached out for the tobacco, and the two +men smoked until Sam brought the luncheon. It was well cooked and well +served on an antique table. Jim was thoroughly happy. It was not +until the luncheon was over and another pipe smoked that the troubled, +perplexed expression returned to his face. + +"Now," said Hayward, "out with it!" + +"It is only the old affair about Alma and Amanda, but now it has taken +on a sort of new aspect." + +"What do you mean by a new aspect?" + +"It seems," said Jim, slowly, "as if they were making it so I couldn't +do for them." + +Hayward stamped his foot. "That does sound new," he said, dryly. "I +never thought Alma Beecher or Amanda Bennet ever objected to have you do +for them." + +"Well," said Jim, "perhaps they don't now, but they want me to do it +in their own way. They don't want to feel as if I was giving and they +taking; they want it to seem the other way round. You see, if I were to +deed over my property to them, and then they allowance me, they would +feel as if they were doing the giving." + +"Jim, you wouldn't be such a fool as that?" + +"No, I wouldn't," replied Jim, simply. "They wouldn't know how to take +care of it, and Mis' Adkins would be left to shift for herself. Joe +Beecher is real good-hearted, but he always lost every dollar he +touched. No, there wouldn't be any sense in that. I don't mean to give +in, but I do feel pretty well worked up over it." + +"What have they said to you?" + +Jim hesitated. + +"Out with it, now. One thing you may be sure of: nothing that you can +tell me will alter my opinion of your two nieces for the worse. As for +poor Joe Beecher, there is no opinion, one way or the other. What did +they say?" + +Jim regarded his friend with a curiously sweet, far-off expression. +"Edward," he said, "sometimes I believe that the greatest thing a man's +friends can do for him is to drive him into a corner with God; to be so +unjust to him that they make him understand that God is all that mortal +man is meant to have, and that is why he finds out that most people, +especially the ones he does for, don't care for him." + +Hayward looked solemnly and tenderly at the other's almost rapt face. +"You are right, I suppose, old man," said he; "but what did they do?" + +"They called me in there about a week ago and gave me an awful talking +to." + +"About what?" + +Jim looked at his friend with dignity. "They were two women talking, +and they went into little matters not worth repeating," said he. "All +is-they seemed to blame me for everything I had ever done for them, +and for everything I had ever done, anyway. They seemed to blame me for +being born and living, and, most of all, for doing anything for them." + +"It is an outrage!" declared Hayward. "Can't you see it?" + +"I can't seem to see anything plain about it," returned Jim, in a +bewildered way. "I always supposed a man had to do something bad to +be given a talking to; but it isn't so much that, and I don't bear any +malice against them. They are only two women, and they are nervous. +What worries me is, they do need things, and they can't get on and be +comfortable unless I do for them; but if they are going to feel that +way about it, it seems to cut me off from doing, and that does worry me, +Edward." + +The other man stamped. "Jim Bennet," he said, "they have talked, and now +I am going to." + +"You, Edward?" + +"Yes, I am. It is entirely true what those two women, Susan Adkins and +Mrs. Trimmer, said about you. You ARE a door-mat, and you ought to be +ashamed of yourself for it. A man should be a man, and not a door-mat. +It is the worst thing in the world for people to walk over him and +trample him. It does them much more harm than it does him. In the end +the trampler is much worse off than the trampled upon. Jim Bennet, your +being a doormat may cost other people their souls' salvation. You are +selfish in the grain to be a door-mat." + +Jim turned pale. His child-like face looked suddenly old with his mental +effort to grasp the other's meaning. In fact, he was a child--one of +the little ones of the world--although he had lived the span of a man's +life. Now one of the hardest problems of the elders of the world was +presented to him. "You mean--" he said, faintly. + +"I mean, Jim, that for the sake of other people, if not for your own +sake, you ought to stop being a door-mat and be a man in this world of +men." + +"What do you want me to do?" + +"I want you to go straight to those nieces of yours and tell them the +truth. You know what your wrongs are as well as I do. You know what +those two women are as well as I do. They keep the letter of the Ten +Commandments--that is right. They attend my church--that is right. They +scour the outside of the platter until it is bright enough to blind +those people who don't understand them; but inwardly they are petty, +ravening wolves of greed and ingratitude. Go and tell them; they don't +know themselves. Show them what they are. It is your Christian duty." + +"You don't mean for me to stop doing for them?" + +"I certainly do mean just that--for a while, anyway." + +"They can't possibly get along, Edward; they will suffer." + +"They have a little money, haven't they?" + +"Only a little in savings-bank. The interest pays their taxes." + +"And you gave them that?" + +Jim colored. + +"Very well, their taxes are paid for this year; let them use that money. +They will not suffer, except in their feelings, and that is where they +ought to suffer. Man, you would spoil all the work of the Lord by your +selfish tenderness toward sinners!" + +"They aren't sinners." + +"Yes, they are--spiritual sinners, the worst kind in the world. Now--" + +"You don't mean for me to go now?" + +"Yes, I do--now. If you don't go now you never will. Then, afterward, I +want you to go home and sit in your best parlor and smoke, and have all +your cats in there, too." + +Jim gasped. "But, Edward! Mis' Adkins--" + +"I don't care about Mrs. Adkins. She isn't as bad as the rest, but she +needs her little lesson, too." + +"Edward, the way that poor woman works to keep the house nice--and she +don't like the smell of tobacco smoke." + +"Never mind whether she likes it or not. You smoke." + +"And she don't like cats." + +"Never mind. Now you go." + +Jim stood up. There was a curious change in his rosy, child-like face. +There was a species of quickening. He looked at once older and more +alert. His friend's words had charged him as with electricity. When he +went down the street he looked taller. + +Amanda Bennet and Alma Beecher, sitting sewing at their street windows, +made this mistake. + +"That isn't Uncle Jim," said Amanda. "That man is a head taller, but he +looks a little like him." + +"It can't be Uncle Jim," agreed Alma. Then both started. + +"It is Uncle Jim, and he is coming here," said Amanda. + +Jim entered. Nobody except himself, his nieces, and Joe Beecher ever +knew exactly what happened, what was the aspect of the door-mat erected +to human life, of the worm turned to menace. It must have savored of +horror, as do all meek and downtrodden things when they gain, driven to +bay, the strength to do battle. It must have savored of the god-like, +when the man who had borne with patience, dignity, and sorrow for them +the stings of lesser things because they were lesser things, at last +arose and revealed himself superior, with a great height of the spirit, +with the power to crush. + +When Jim stopped talking and went home, two pale, shocked faces of women +gazed after him from the windows. Joe Beecher was sobbing like a child. +Finally his wife turned her frightened face upon him, glad to have still +some one to intimidate. + +"For goodness' sake, Joe Beecher, stop crying like a baby," said she, +but she spoke in a queer whisper, for her lips were stiff. + +Joe stood up and made for the door. + +"Where are you going?" asked his wife. + +"Going to get a job somewhere," replied Joe, and went. Soon the women +saw him driving a neighbor's cart up the street. + +"He's going to cart gravel for John Leach's new sidewalk!" gasped Alma. + +"Why don't you stop him?" cried her sister. "You can't have your husband +driving a tip-cart for John Leach. Stop him, Alma!" + +"I can't stop him," moaned Alma. "I don't feel as if I could stop +anything." + +Her sister gazed at her, and the same expression was on both faces, +making them more than sisters of the flesh. Both saw before them a stern +boundary wall against which they might press in vain for the rest of +their lives, and both saw the same sins of their hearts. + +Meantime Jim Bennet was seated in his best parlor and Susan Adkins was +whispering to Mrs. Trimmer out in the kitchen. + +"I don't know whether he's gone stark, staring mad or not," whispered +Susan, "but he's in the parlor smoking his worst old pipe, and that big +tiger tommy is sitting in his lap, and he's let in all the other cats, +and they're nosing round, and I don't dare drive 'em out. I took up the +broom, then I put it away again. I never knew Mr. Bennet to act so. I +can't think what's got into him." + +"Did he say anything?" + +"No, he didn't say much of anything, but he said it in a way that made +my flesh fairly creep. Says he, 'As long as this is my house and my +furniture and my cats, Mis' Adkins, I think I'll sit down in the parlor, +where I can see to read my paper and smoke at the same time.' Then he +holds the kitchen door open, and he calls, 'Kitty, kitty, kitty!' and +that great tiger tommy comes in with his tail up, rubbing round his +legs, and all the other cats followed after. I shut the door before +these last ones got into the parlor." Susan Adkins regarded malevolently +the three tortoise-shell cats of three generations and various stages +of growth, one Maltese settled in a purring round of comfort with four +kittens, and one perfectly black cat, which sat glaring at her with +beryl-colored eyes. + +"That black cat looks evil," said Mrs. Trimmer. + +"Yes, he does. I don't know why I didn't drown him when he was a +kitten." + +"Why didn't you drown all those Malty kittens?" + +"The old cat hid them away until they were too big. Then he wouldn't let +me. What do you suppose has come to him? Just smell that awful pipe!" + +"Men do take queer streaks every now and then," said Mrs. Trimmer. "My +husband used to, and he was as good as they make 'em, poor man. He would +eat sugar on his beefsteak, for one thing. The first time I saw him do +it I was scared. I thought he was plum crazy, but afterward I found out +it was just because he was a man, and his ma hadn't wanted him to eat +sugar when he was a boy. Mr. Bennet will get over it." + +"He don't act as if he would." + +"Oh yes, he will. Jim Bennet never stuck to anything but being Jim +Bennet for very long in his life, and this ain't being Jim Bennet." + +"He is a very good man," said Susan with a somewhat apologetic tone. + +"He's too good." + +"He's too good to cats." + +"Seems to me he's too good to 'most everybody. Think what he has done +for Amanda and Alma, and how they act!" + +"Yes, they are ungrateful and real mean to him; and I feel sometimes +as if I would like to tell them just what I think of them," said Susan +Adkins. "Poor man, there he is, studying all the time what he can do for +people, and he don't get very much himself." + +Mrs. Trimmer arose to take leave. She had a long, sallow face, capable +of a sarcastic smile. "Then," said she, "if I were you I wouldn't +begrudge him a chair in the parlor and a chance to read and smoke and +hold a pussy-cat." + +"Who said I was begrudging it? I can air out the parlor when he's got +over the notion." + +"Well, he will, so you needn't worry," said Mrs. Trimmer. As she went +down the street she could see Jim's profile beside the parlor window, +and she smiled her sarcastic smile, which was not altogether unpleasant. +"He's stopped smoking, and he ain't reading," she told herself. "It +won't be very long before he's Jim Bennet again." + +But it was longer than she anticipated, for Jim's will was propped by +Edward Hayward's. Edward kept Jim to his standpoint for weeks, until a +few days before Christmas. Then came self-assertion, that self-assertion +of negation which was all that Jim possessed in such a crisis. He called +upon Dr. Hayward; the two were together in the little study for nearly +an hour, and talk ran high, then Jim prevailed. + +"It's no use, Edward," he said; "a man can't be made over when he's cut +and dried in one fashion, the way I am. Maybe I'm doing wrong, but to +me it looks like doing right, and there's something in the Bible about +every man having his own right and wrong. If what you say is true, and +I am hindering the Lord Almighty in His work, then it is for Him to stop +me. He can do it. But meantime I've got to go on doing the way I always +have. Joe has been trying to drive that tip-cart, and the horse ran away +with him twice. Then he let the cart fall on his foot and mash one of +his toes, and he can hardly get round, and Amanda and Alma don't dare +touch that money in the bank for fear of not having enough to pay the +taxes next year in case I don't help them. They only had a little money +on hand when I gave them that talking to, and Christmas is 'most here, +and they haven't got things they really need. Amanda's coat that she +wore to meeting last Sunday didn't look very warm to me, and poor Alma +had her furs chewed up by the Leach dog, and she's going without any. +They need lots of things. And poor Mis' Adkins is 'most sick with +tobacco smoke. I can see it, though she doesn't say anything, and the +nice parlor curtains are full of it, and cat hairs are all over things. +I can't hold out any longer, Edward. Maybe I am a door-mat; and if I am, +and it is wicked, may the Lord forgive me, for I've got to keep right on +being a door-mat." + +Hayward sighed and lighted his pipe. However, he had given up and +connived with Jim. + +On Christmas eve the two men were in hiding behind a clump of cedars +in the front yard of Jim's nieces' house. They watched the expressman +deliver a great load of boxes and packages. Jim drew a breath of joyous +relief. + +"They are taking them in," he whispered--"they are taking them in, +Edward!" + +Hayward looked down at the dim face of the man beside him, and something +akin to fear entered his heart. He saw the face of a lifelong friend, +but he saw something in it which he had never recognized before. He saw +the face of one of the children of heaven, giving only for the sake of +the need of others, and glorifying the gifts with the love and pity of +an angel. + +"I was afraid they wouldn't take them!" whispered Jim, and his watching +face was beautiful, although it was only the face of a little, old man +of a little village, with no great gift of intellect. There was a full +moon riding high; the ground was covered with a glistening snow-level, +over which wavered wonderful shadows, as of wings. One great star +prevailed despite the silver might of the moon. To Hayward Jim's face +seemed to prevail, as that star, among all the faces of humanity. + +Jim crept noiselessly toward a window, Hayward at his heels. The two +could see the lighted interior plainly. + +"See poor Alma trying on her furs," whispered Jim, in a rapture. "See +Amanda with her coat. They have found the money. See Joe heft the +turkey." Suddenly he caught Hayward's arm, and the two crept away. +Out on the road, Jim fairly sobbed with pure delight. "Oh, Edward," +he said, "I am so thankful they took the things! I was so afraid they +wouldn't, and they needed them! Oh, Edward, I am so thankful!" Edward +pressed his friend's arm. + +When they reached Jim's house a great tiger-cat leaped to Jim's shoulder +with the silence and swiftness of a shadow. "He's always watching for +me," said Jim, proudly. "Pussy! Pussy!" The cat began to purr loudly, +and rubbed his splendid head against the man's cheek. + +"I suppose," said Hayward, with something of awe in his tone, "that you +won't smoke in the parlor to-night?" + +"Edward, I really can't. Poor woman, she's got it all aired and +beautifully cleaned, and she's so happy over it. There's a good fire in +the shed, and I will sit there with the pussy-cats until I go to bed. +Oh, Edward, I am so thankful that they took the things!" + +"Good night, Jim." + +"Good night. You don't blame me, Edward?" + +"Who am I to blame you, Jim? Good night." + +Hayward watched the little man pass along the path to the shed door. +Jim's back was slightly bent, but to his friend it seemed bent beneath +a holy burden of love and pity for all humanity, and the inheritance +of the meek seemed to crown that drooping old head. The door-mat, again +spread freely for the trampling feet of all who got comfort thereby, +became a blessed thing. The humble creature, despised and held in +contempt like One greater than he, giving for the sake of the needs of +others, went along the narrow foot-path through the snow. The minister +took off his hat and stood watching until the door was opened and closed +and the little window gleamed with golden light. + + + + +THE AMETHYST COMB + +MISS JANE CAREW was at the railroad station waiting for the New York +train. She was about to visit her friend, Mrs. Viola Longstreet. With +Miss Carew was her maid, Margaret, a middleaged New England woman, +attired in the stiffest and most correct of maid-uniforms. She carried +an old, large sole-leather bag, and also a rather large sole-leather +jewel-case. The jewel-case, carried openly, was rather an unusual +sight at a New England railroad station, but few knew what it was. They +concluded it to be Margaret's special handbag. Margaret was a very tall, +thin woman, unbending as to carriage and expression. The one thing out +of absolute plumb about Margaret was her little black bonnet. That was +askew. Time had bereft the woman of so much hair that she could fasten +no head-gear with security, especially when the wind blew, and that +morning there was a stiff gale. Margaret's bonnet was cocked over one +eye. Miss Carew noticed it. + +"Margaret, your bonnet is crooked," she said. + +Margaret straightened her bonnet, but immediately the bonnet veered +again to the side, weighted by a stiff jet aigrette. Miss Carew observed +the careen of the bonnet, realized that it was inevitable, and did not +mention it again. Inwardly she resolved upon the removal of the jet +aigrette later on. Miss Carew was slightly older than Margaret, and +dressed in a style somewhat beyond her age. Jane Carew had been alert +upon the situation of departing youth. She had eschewed gay colors and +extreme cuts, and had her bonnets made to order, because there were no +longer anything but hats in the millinery shop. The milliner in Wheaton, +where Miss Carew lived, had objected, for Jane Carew inspired reverence. + +"A bonnet is too old for you. Miss Carew," she said. "Women much older +than you wear hats." + +"I trust that I know what is becoming to a woman of my years, thank you. +Miss Waters," Jane had replied, and the milliner had meekly taken her +order. + +After Miss Carew had left, the milliner told her girls that she had +never seen a woman so perfectly crazy to look her age as Miss Carew. +"And she a pretty woman, too," said the milliner; "as straight as an +arrer, and slim, and with all that hair, scarcely turned at all." + +Miss Carew, with all her haste to assume years, remained a pretty +woman, softly slim, with an abundance of dark hair, showing little gray. +Sometimes Jane reflected, uneasily, that it ought at her time of life to +be entirely gray. She hoped nobody would suspect her of dyeing it. She +wore it parted in the middle, folded back smoothly, and braided in +a compact mass on the top of her head. The style of her clothes was +slightly behind the fashion, just enough to suggest conservatism and +age. She carried a little silver-bound bag in one nicely gloved hand; +with the other she held daintily out of the dust of the platform her +dress-skirt. A glimpse of a silk frilled petticoat, of slender feet, and +ankles delicately slim, was visible before the onslaught of the wind. +Jane Carew made no futile effort to keep her skirts down before the +wind-gusts. She was so much of the gentlewoman that she could be gravely +oblivious to the exposure of her ankles. She looked as if she had never +heard of ankles when her black silk skirts lashed about them. She rose +superbly above the situation. For some abstruse reason Margaret's +skirts were not affected by the wind. They might have been weighted with +buckram, although it was no longer in general use. She stood, except for +her veering bonnet, as stiffly immovable as a wooden doll. + +Miss Carew seldom left Wheaton. This visit to New York was an +innovation. Quite a crowd gathered about Jane's sole-leather trunk when +it was dumped on the platform by the local expressman. "Miss Carew is +going to New York," one said to another, with much the same tone as +if he had said, "The great elm on the common is going to move into Dr. +Jones's front yard." + +When the train arrived, Miss Carew, followed by Margaret, stepped +aboard with a majestic disregard of ankles. She sat beside a window, and +Margaret placed the bag on the floor and held the jewel-case in her lap. +The case contained the Carew jewels. They were not especially valuable, +although they were rather numerous. There were cameos in brooches and +heavy gold bracelets; corals which Miss Carew had not worn since her +young girlhood. There were a set of garnets, some badly cut diamonds in +ear-rings and rings, some seed-pearl ornaments, and a really beautiful +set of amethysts. There were a necklace, two brooches--a bar and a +circle--earrings, a ring, and a comb. Each piece was charming, set in +filigree gold with seed-pearls, but perhaps of them all the comb was +the best. It was a very large comb. There was one great amethyst in the +center of the top; on either side was an intricate pattern of plums in +small amethysts, and seed-pearl grapes, with leaves and stems of gold. +Margaret in charge of the jewel-case was imposing. When they arrived in +New York she confronted everybody whom she met with a stony stare, +which was almost accusative and convictive of guilt, in spite of entire +innocence on the part of the person stared at. It was inconceivable that +any mortal would have dared lay violent hands upon that jewel-case +under that stare. It would have seemed to partake of the nature of grand +larceny from Providence. + +When the two reached the up-town residence of Viola Longstreet, Viola +gave a little scream at the sight of the case. + +"My dear Jane Carew, here you are with Margaret carrying that jewel-case +out in plain sight. How dare you do such a thing? I really wonder you +have not been held up a dozen times." + +Miss Carew smiled her gentle but almost stern smile--the Carew smile, +which consisted in a widening and slightly upward curving of tightly +closed lips. + +"I do not think," said she, "that anybody would be apt to interfere with +Margaret." + +Viola Longstreet laughed, the ringing peal of a child, although she was +as old as Miss Carew. "I think you are right, Jane," said she. "I don't +believe a crook in New York would dare face that maid of yours. He +would as soon encounter Plymouth Rock. I am glad you have brought your +delightful old jewels, although you never wear anything except those +lovely old pearl sprays and dull diamonds." + +"Now," stated Jane, with a little toss of pride, "I have Aunt Felicia's +amethysts." + +"Oh, sure enough! I remember you did write me last summer that she had +died and you had the amethysts at last. She must have been very old." + +"Ninety-one." + +"She might have given you the amethysts before. You, of course, will +wear them; and I--am going to borrow the corals!" + +Jane Carew gasped. + +"You do not object, do you, dear? I have a new dinner-gown which clamors +for corals, and my bank-account is strained, and I could buy none equal +to those of yours, anyway." + +"Oh, I do not object," said Jane Carew; still she looked aghast. + +Viola Longstreet shrieked with laughter. "Oh, I know. You think the +corals too young for me. You have not worn them since you left off +dotted muslin. My dear, you insisted upon growing old--I insisted +upon remaining young. I had two new dotted muslins last summer. As for +corals, I would wear them in the face of an opposing army! Do not judge +me by yourself, dear. You laid hold of Age and held him, although +you had your complexion and your shape and hair. As for me, I had my +complexion and kept it. I also had my hair and kept it. My shape has +been a struggle, but it was worth while. I, my dear, have held Youth +so tight that he has almost choked to death, but held him I have. You +cannot deny it. Look at me, Jane Carew, and tell me if, judging by my +looks, you can reasonably state that I have no longer the right to wear +corals." + +Jane Carew looked. She smiled the Carew smile. "You DO look very young, +Viola," said Jane, "but you are not." + +"Jane Carew," said Viola, "I am young. May I wear your corals at my +dinner to-morrow night?" + +"Why, of course, if you think--" + +"If I think them suitable. My dear, if there were on this earth +ornaments more suitable to extreme youth than corals, I would borrow +them if you owned them, but, failing that, the corals will answer. Wait +until you see me in that taupe dinner-gown and the corals!" + +Jane waited. She visited with Viola, whom she loved, although they had +little in common, partly because of leading widely different lives, +partly because of constitutional variations. She was dressed for dinner +fully an hour before it was necessary, and she sat in the library +reading when Viola swept in. + +Viola was really entrancing. It was a pity that Jane Carew had such an +unswerving eye for the essential truth that it could not be appeased by +actual effect. Viola had doubtless, as she had said, struggled to keep +her slim shape, but she had kept it, and, what was more, kept it without +evidence of struggle. If she was in the least hampered by tight lacing +and length of undergarment, she gave no evidence of it as she curled +herself up in a big chair and (Jane wondered how she could bring herself +to do it) crossed her legs, revealing one delicate foot and ankle, +silk-stockinged with taupe, and shod with a coral satin slipper with a +silver heel and a great silver buckle. On Viola's fair round neck the +Carew corals lay bloomingly; her beautiful arms were clasped with them; +a great coral brooch with wonderful carving confined a graceful fold +of the taupe over one hip, a coral comb surmounted the shining waves of +Viola's hair. Viola was an ash-blonde, her complexion was as roses, and +the corals were ideal for her. As Jane regarded her friend's beauty, +however, the fact that Viola was not young, that she was as old as +herself, hid it and overshadowed it. + +"Well, Jane, don't you think I look well in the corals, after all?" +asked Viola, and there was something pitiful in her voice. + +When a man or a woman holds fast to youth, even if successfully, +there is something of the pitiful and the tragic involved. It is the +everlasting struggle of the soul to retain the joy of earth, whose +fleeting distinguishes it from heaven, and whose retention is not +accomplished without an inner knowledge of its futility. + +"I suppose you do, Viola," replied Jane Carew, with the inflexibility +of fate, "but I really think that only very young girls ought to wear +corals." + +Viola laughed, but the laugh had a minor cadence. "But I AM a young +girl, Jane," she said. "I MUST be a young girl. I never had any girlhood +when I should have had. You know that." + +Viola had married, when very young, a man old enough to be her father, +and her wedded life had been a sad affair, to which, however, she seldom +alluded. Viola had much pride with regard to the inevitable past. + +"Yes," agreed Jane. Then she added, feeling that more might be +expected, "Of course I suppose that marrying so very young does make a +difference." + +"Yes," said Viola, "it does. In fact, it makes of one's girlhood an +anti-climax, of which many dispute the wisdom, as you do. But have it I +will. Jane, your amethysts are beautiful." + +Jane regarded the clear purple gleam of a stone on her arm. "Yes," +she agreed, "Aunt Felicia's amethysts have always been considered very +beautiful." + +"And such a full set," said Viola. + +"Yes," said Jane. She colored a little, but Viola did not know why. At +the last moment Jane had decided not to wear the amethyst comb, because +it seemed to her altogether too decorative for a woman of her age, and +she was afraid to mention it to Viola. She was sure that Viola would +laugh at her and insist upon her wearing it. + +"The ear-rings are lovely," said Viola. "My dear, I don't see how you +ever consented to have your ears pierced." + +"I was very young, and my mother wished me to," replied Jane, blushing. + +The door-bell rang. Viola had been covertly listening for it all the +time. Soon a very beautiful young man came with a curious dancing step +into the room. Harold Lind always gave the effect of dancing when he +walked. He always, moreover, gave the effect of extreme youth and of +the utmost joy and mirth in life itself. He regarded everything +and everybody with a smile as of humorous appreciation, and yet the +appreciation was so goodnatured that it offended nobody. + +"Look at me--I am absurd and happy; look at yourself, also absurd +and happy; look at everybody else likewise; look at life--a jest so +delicious that it is quite worth one's while dying to be made acquainted +with it." That is what Harold Lind seemed to say. Viola Longstreet +became even more youthful under his gaze; even Jane Carew regretted that +she had not worn her amethyst comb and began to doubt its unsuitability. +Viola very soon called the young man's attention to Jane's amethysts, +and Jane always wondered why she did not then mention the comb. She +removed a brooch and a bracelet for him to inspect. + +"They are really wonderful," he declared. "I have never seen greater +depth of color in amethysts." + +"Mr. Lind is an authority on jewels," declared Viola. The young man shot +a curious glance at her, which Jane remembered long afterward. It was +one of those glances which are as keystones to situations. + +Harold looked at the purple stones with the expression of a child with +a toy. There was much of the child in the young man's whole appearance, +but of a mischievous and beautiful child, of whom his mother might +observe, with adoration and illconcealed boastfulness, "I can never tell +what that child will do next!" + +Harold returned the bracelet and brooch to Jane, and smiled at her as +if amethysts were a lovely purple joke between her and himself, uniting +them by a peculiar bond of fine understanding. "Exquisite, Miss Carew," +he said. Then he looked at Viola. "Those corals suit you wonderfully, +Mrs. Longstreet," he observed, "but amethysts would also suit you." + +"Not with this gown," replied Viola, rather pitifully. There was +something in the young man's gaze and tone which she did not understand, +but which she vaguely quivered before. + +Harold certainly thought the corals were too young for Viola. Jane +understood, and felt an unworthy triumph. Harold, who was young enough +in actual years to be Viola's son, and was younger still by reason of +his disposition, was amused by the sight of her in corals, although he +did not intend to betray his amusement. He considered Viola in corals +as too rude a jest to share with her. Had poor Viola once grasped Harold +Lind's estimation of her she would have as soon gazed upon herself in +her coffin. Harold's comprehension of the essentials was beyond Jane +Carew's. It was fairly ghastly, partaking of the nature of X-rays, +but it never disturbed Harold Lind. He went along his dance-track +undisturbed, his blue eyes never losing their high lights of glee, his +lips never losing their inscrutable smile at some happy understanding +between life and himself. Harold had fair hair, which was very smooth +and glossy. His skin was like a girl's. He was so beautiful that he +showed cleverness in an affectation of carelessness in dress. He did +not like to wear evening clothes, because they had necessarily to be +immaculate. That evening Jane regarded him with an inward criticism that +he was too handsome for a man. She told Viola so when the dinner was +over and he and the other guests had gone. + +"He is very handsome," she said, "but I never like to see a man quite so +handsome." + +"You will change your mind when you see him in tweeds," returned Viola. +"He loathes evening clothes." + +Jane regarded her anxiously. There was something in Viola's tone which +disturbed and shocked her. It was inconceivable that Viola should be +in love with that youth, and yet--"He looks very young," said Jane in a +prim voice. + +"He IS young," admitted Viola; "still, not quite so young as he looks. +Sometimes I tell him he will look like a boy if he lives to be eighty." + +"Well, he must be very young," persisted Jane. + +"Yes," said Viola, but she did not say how young. Viola herself, now +that the excitement was over, did not look so young as at the beginning +of the evening. She removed the corals, and Jane considered that she +looked much better without them. + +"Thank you for your corals, dear," said Viola. "Where Is Margaret?" + +Margaret answered for herself by a tap on the door. She and Viola's +maid, Louisa, had been sitting on an upper landing, out of sight, +watching the guests down-stairs. Margaret took the corals and placed +them in their nest in the jewel-case, also the amethysts, after +Viola had gone. The jewel-case was a curious old affair with many +compartments. The amethysts required two. The comb was so large that it +had one for itself. That was the reason why Margaret did not discover +that evening that it was gone. Nobody discovered it for three days, when +Viola had a little card-party. There was a whist-table for Jane, who had +never given up the reserved and stately game. There were six tables in +Viola's pretty living-room, with a little conservatory at one end and +a leaping hearth fire at the other. Jane's partner was a stout old +gentleman whose wife was shrieking with merriment at an auction-bridge +table. The other whist-players were a stupid, very small young man who +was aimlessly willing to play anything, and an amiable young woman who +believed in self-denial. Jane played conscientiously. She returned trump +leads, and played second hand low, and third high, and it was not until +the third rubber was over that she saw. It had been in full evidence +from the first. Jane would have seen it before the guests arrived, but +Viola had not put it in her hair until the last moment. Viola was wild +with delight, yet shamefaced and a trifle uneasy. In a soft, white gown, +with violets at her waist, she was playing with Harold Lind, and in her +ash-blond hair was Jane Carew's amethyst comb. Jane gasped and paled. +The amiable young woman who was her opponent stared at her. Finally she +spoke in a low voice. + +"Aren't you well. Miss Carew?" she asked. + +The men, in their turn, stared. The stout one rose fussily. "Let me get +a glass of water," he said. The stupid small man stood up and waved his +hands with nervousness. + +"Aren't you well?" asked the amiable young lady again. + +Then Jane Carew recovered her poise. It was seldom that she lost it. +"I am quite well, thank you, Miss Murdock," she replied. "I believe +diamonds are trumps." + +They all settled again to the play, but the young lady and the two +men continued glancing at Miss Carew. She had recovered her dignity of +manner, but not her color. Moreover, she had a bewildered expression. +Resolutely she abstained from glancing again at her amethyst comb +in Viola Longstreet's ash-blond hair, and gradually, by a course of +subconscious reasoning as she carefully played her cards, she arrived +at a conclusion which caused her color to return and the bewildered +expression to disappear. When refreshments were served, the amiable +young lady said, kindly: + +"You look quite yourself, now, dear Miss Carew, but at one time while we +were playing I was really alarmed. You were very pale." + +"I did not feel in the least ill," replied Jane Carew. She smiled her +Carew smile at the young lady. Jane had settled it with herself that +of course Viola had borrowed that amethyst comb, appealing to Margaret. +Viola ought not to have done that; she should have asked her, Miss +Carew; and Jane wondered, because Viola was very well bred; but of +course that was what had happened. Jane had come down before Viola, +leaving Margaret in her room, and Viola had asked her. Jane did not then +remember that Viola had not even been told that there was an amethyst +comb in existence. She remembered when Margaret, whose face was as pale +and bewildered as her own, mentioned it, when she was brushing her hair. + +"I saw it, first thing. Miss Jane," said Margaret. "Louisa and I were +on the landing, and I looked down and saw your amethyst comb in Mrs. +Longstreet's hair." + +"She had asked you for it, because I had gone down-stairs?" asked Jane, +feebly. + +"No, Miss Jane. I had not seen her. I went out right after you did. +Louisa had finished Mrs. Longstreet, and she and I went down to the +mailbox to post a letter, and then we sat on the landing, and--I saw +your comb." + +"Have you," asked Jane, "looked in the jewelcase?" + +"Yes, Miss Jane." + +"And it is not there?" + +"It is not there. Miss Jane." Margaret spoke with a sort of solemn +intoning. She recognized what the situation implied, and she, who +fitted squarely and entirely into her humble state, was aghast before a +hitherto unimagined occurrence. She could not, even with the evidence +of her senses against a lady and her mistress's old friend, believe in +them. Had Jane told her firmly that she had not seen that comb in that +ash-blond hair she might have been hypnotized into agreement. But Jane +simply stared at her, and the Carew dignity was more shaken than she had +ever seen it. + +"Bring the jewel-case here, Margaret," ordered Jane in a gasp. + +Margaret brought the jewel-case, and everything was taken out; all the +compartments were opened, but the amethyst comb was not there. Jane +could not sleep that night. At dawn she herself doubted the evidence of +her senses. The jewel-case was thoroughly overlooked again, and still +Jane was incredulous that she would ever see her comb in Viola's hair +again. But that evening, although there were no guests except Harold +Lind, who dined at the house, Viola appeared in a pink-tinted gown, with +a knot of violets at her waist, and--she wore the amethyst comb. She +said not one word concerning it; nobody did. Harold Lind was in wild +spirits. The conviction grew upon Jane that the irresponsible, beautiful +youth was covertly amusing himself at her, at Viola's, at everybody's +expense. Perhaps he included himself. He talked incessantly, not in +reality brilliantly, but with an effect of sparkling effervescence which +was fairly dazzling. Viola's servants restrained with difficulty their +laughter at his sallies. Viola regarded Harold with ill-concealed +tenderness and admiration. She herself looked even younger than usual, +as if the innate youth in her leaped to meet this charming comrade. + +Jane felt sickened by it all. She could not understand her friend. Not +for one minute did she dream that there could be any serious outcome of +the situation; that Viola, would marry this mad youth, who, she knew, +was making such covert fun at her expense; but she was bewildered and +indignant. She wished that she had not come. That evening when she went +to her room she directed Margaret to pack, as she intended to return +home the next day. Margaret began folding gowns with alacrity. She was +as conservative as her mistress and she severely disapproved of many +things. However, the matter of the amethyst comb was uppermost in her +mind. She was wild with curiosity. She hardly dared inquire, but finally +she did. + +"About the amethyst comb, ma'am?" she said, with a delicate cough. + +"What about it, Margaret?" returned Jane, severely. + +"I thought perhaps Mrs. Longstreet had told you how she happened to have +it." + +Poor Jane Carew had nobody in whom to confide. For once she spoke her +mind to her maid. "She has not said one word. And, oh, Margaret, I don't +know what to think of it." + +Margaret pursed her lips. + +"What do YOU think, Margaret?" + +"I don't know. Miss Jane." + +"I don't." + +"I did not mention it to Louisa," said Margaret. + +"Oh, I hope not!" cried Jane. + +"But she did to me," said Margaret. "She asked had I seen Miss Viola's +new comb, and then she laughed, and I thought from the way she acted +that--" Margaret hesitated. + +"That what?" + +"That she meant Mr. Lind had given Miss Viola the comb." + +Jane started violently. "Absolutely impossible!" she cried. "That, +of course, is nonsense. There must be some explanation. Probably Mrs. +Longstreet will explain before we go." + +Mrs. Longstreet did not explain. She wondered and expostulated when Jane +announced her firm determination to leave, but she seemed utterly at a +loss for the reason. She did not mention the comb. + +When Jane Carew took leave of her old friend she was entirely sure in +her own mind that she would never visit her again--might never even see +her again. + +Jane was unutterably thankful to be back in her own peaceful home, over +which no shadow of absurd mystery brooded; only a calm afternoon light +of life, which disclosed gently but did not conceal or betray. Jane +settled back into her pleasant life, and the days passed, and the weeks, +and the months, and the years. She heard nothing whatever from or about +Viola Longstreet for three years. Then, one day, Margaret returned from +the city, and she had met Viola's old maid Louisa in a department store, +and she had news. Jane wished for strength to refuse to listen, but she +could not muster it. She listened while Margaret brushed her hair. + +"Louisa has not been with Miss Viola for a long time," said Margaret. +"She is living with somebody else. Miss Viola lost her money, and had to +give up her house and her servants, and Louisa said she cried when she +said good-by." + +Jane made an effort. "What became of--" she began. + +Margaret answered the unfinished sentence. She was excited by gossip +as by a stimulant. Her thin cheeks burned, her eyes blazed. "Mr. Lind," +said Margaret, "Louisa told me, had turned out to be real bad. He got +into some money trouble, and then"--Margaret lowered her voice--"he was +arrested for taking a lot of money which didn't belong to him. Louisa +said he had been in some business where he handled a lot of other folks' +money, and he cheated the men who were in the business with him, and +he was tried, and Miss Viola, Louisa thinks, hid away somewhere so they +wouldn't call her to testify, and then he had to go to prison; but--" +Margaret hesitated. + +"What is it?" asked Jane. + +"Louisa thinks he died about a year and a half ago. She heard the lady +where she lives now talking about it. The lady used to know Miss Viola, +and she heard the lady say Mr. Lind had died in prison, that he couldn't +stand the hard life, and that Miss Viola had lost all her money through +him, and then"--Margaret hesitated again, and her mistress prodded +sharply--"Louisa said that she heard the lady say that she had thought +Miss Viola would marry him, but she hadn't, and she had more sense than +she had thought." + +"Mrs. Longstreet would never for one moment have entertained the thought +of marrying Mr. Lind; he was young enough to be her grandson," said +Jane, severely. + +"Yes, ma'am," said Margaret. + +It so happened that Jane went to New York that day week, and at a +jewelry counter in one of the shops she discovered the amethyst comb. +There were on sale a number of bits of antique jewelry, the precious +flotsam and jetsam of old and wealthy families which had drifted, nobody +knew before what currents of adversity, into that harbor of sale for +all the world to see. Jane made no inquiries; the saleswoman volunteered +simply the information that the comb was a real antique, and the stones +were real amethysts and pearls, and the setting was solid gold, and +the price was thirty dollars; and Jane bought it. She carried her old +amethyst comb home, but she did not show it to anybody. She replaced it +in its old compartment in her jewelcase and thought of it with wonder, +with a hint of joy at regaining it, and with much sadness. She was still +fond of Viola Longstreet. Jane did not easily part with her loves. She +did not know where Viola was. Margaret had inquired of Louisa, who did +not know. Poor Viola had probably drifted into some obscure harbor of +life wherein she was hiding until life was over. + +And then Jane met Viola one spring day on Fifth Avenue. + +"It is a very long time since I have seen you," said Jane with a +reproachful accent, but her eyes were tenderly inquiring. + +"Yes," agreed Viola. Then she added, "I have seen nobody. Do you know +what a change has come in my life?" she asked. + +"Yes, dear," replied Jane, gently. "My Margaret met Louisa once and she +told her." + +"Oh yes--Louisa," said Viola. "I had to discharge her. My money is about +gone. I have only just enough to keep the wolf from entering the door +of a hall bedroom in a respectable boarding-house. However, I often +hear him howl, but I do not mind at all. In fact, the howling has become +company for me. I rather like it. It is queer what things one can learn +to like. There are a few left yet, like the awful heat in summer, and +the food, which I do not fancy, but that is simply a matter of time." + +Viola's laugh was like a bird's song--a part of her--and nothing except +death could silence it for long. + +"Then," said Jane, "you stay in New York all summer?" + +Viola laughed again. "My dear," she replied, "of course. It is all very +simple. If I left New York, and paid board anywhere, I would never have +enough money to buy my return fare, and certainly not to keep that wolf +from my hall-bedroom door." + +"Then," said Jane, "you are going home with me." + +"I cannot consent to accept charity, Jane," said Viola. "Don't ask me." + +Then, for the first time in her life, Viola Longstreet saw Jane Carew's +eyes blaze with anger. "You dare to call it charity coming from me to +you?" she said, and Viola gave in. + +When Jane saw the little room where Viola lived, she marveled, with the +exceedingly great marveling of a woman to whom love of a man has never +come, at a woman who could give so much and with no return. + +Little enough to pack had Viola. Jane understood with a shudder of +horror that it was almost destitution, not poverty, to which her old +friend was reduced. + +"You shall have that northeast room which you always liked," she told +Viola when they were on the train. + +"The one with the old-fashioned peacock paper, and the pine-tree growing +close to one window?" said Viola, happily. + +Jane and Viola settled down to life together, and Viola, despite the +tragedy which she had known, realized a peace and happiness beyond her +imagination. In reality, although she still looked so youthful, she was +old enough to enjoy the pleasures of later life. Enjoy them she did to +the utmost. She and Jane made calls together, entertained friends at +small and stately dinners, and gave little teas. They drove about in the +old Carew carriage. Viola had some new clothes. She played very well on +Jane's old piano. She embroidered, she gardened. She lived the sweet, +placid life of an older lady in a little village, and loved it. She +never mentioned Harold Lind. + +Not among the vicious of the earth was poor Harold Lind; rather among +those of such beauty and charm that the earth spoils them, making +them, in their own estimation, free guests at all its tables of bounty. +Moreover, the young man had, deeply rooted in his character, the traits +of a mischievous child, rejoicing in his mischief more from a sense of +humor so keen that it verged on cruelty than from any intention to +harm others. Over that affair of the amethyst comb, for instance, his +irresponsible, selfish, childish soul had fairly reveled in glee. He had +not been fond of Viola, but he liked her fondness for himself. He had +made sport of her, but only for his own entertainment--never for the +entertainment of others. He was a beautiful creature, seeking out paths +of pleasure and folly for himself alone, which ended as do all paths of +earthly pleasure and folly. Harold had admired Viola, but from the same +point of view as Jane Carew's. Viola had, when she looked her youngest +and best, always seemed so old as to be venerable to him. He had at +times compunctions, as if he were making a jest of his grandmother. +Viola never knew the truth about the amethyst comb. He had considered +that one of the best frolics of his life. He had simply purloined it and +presented it to Viola, and merrily left matters to settle themselves. + +Viola and Jane had lived together a month before the comb was mentioned. +Then one day Viola was in Jane's room and the jewel-case was out, and +she began examining its contents. When she found the amethyst comb she +gave a little cry. Jane, who had been seated at her desk and had not +seen what was going on, turned around. + +Viola stood holding the comb, and her cheeks were burning. She fondled +the trinket as if it had been a baby. Jane watched her. She began to +understand the bare facts of the mystery of the disappearance of her +amethyst comb, but the subtlety of it was forever beyond her. Had the +other woman explained what was in her mind, in her heart--how that +reckless young man whom she had loved had given her the treasure because +he had heard her admire Jane's amethysts, and she, all unconscious +of any wrong-doing, had ever regarded it as the one evidence of his +thoughtful tenderness, it being the one gift she had ever received from +him; how she parted with it, as she had parted with her other jewels, +in order to obtain money to purchase comforts for him while he was in +prison--Jane could not have understood. The fact of an older woman being +fond of a young man, almost a boy, was beyond her mental grasp. She had +no imagination with which to comprehend that innocent, pathetic, almost +terrible love of one who has trodden the earth long for one who has just +set dancing feet upon it. It was noble of Jane Carew that, lacking all +such imagination, she acted as she did: that, although she did not, +could not, formulate it to herself, she would no more have deprived the +other woman and the dead man of that one little unscathed bond of tender +goodness than she would have robbed his grave of flowers. + +Viola looked at her. "I cannot tell you all about it; you would laugh at +me," she whispered; "but this was mine once." + +"It is yours now, dear," said Jane. + + + + +THE UMBRELLA MAN + +IT was an insolent day. There are days which, to imaginative minds, at +least, possess strangely human qualities. Their atmospheres predispose +people to crime or virtue, to the calm of good will, to sneaking vice, +or fierce, unprovoked aggression. The day was of the last description. +A beast, or a human being in whose veins coursed undisciplined blood, +might, as involuntarily as the boughs of trees lash before storms, +perform wild and wicked deeds after inhaling that hot air, evil with the +sweat of sinevoked toil, with nitrogen stored from festering sores of +nature and the loathsome emanations of suffering life. + +It had not rained for weeks, but the humidity was great. The clouds of +dust which arose beneath the man's feet had a horrible damp stickiness. +His face and hands were grimy, as were his shoes, his cheap, ready-made +suit, and his straw hat. However, the man felt a pride in his clothes, +for they were at least the garb of freedom. He had come out of prison +the day before, and had scorned the suit proffered him by the officials. +He had given it away, and bought a new one with a goodly part of his +small stock of money. This suit was of a small-checked pattern. Nobody +could tell from it that the wearer had just left jail. He had been there +for several years for one of the minor offenses against the law. His +term would probably have been shorter, but the judge had been careless, +and he had no friends. Stebbins had never been the sort to make many +friends, although he had never cherished animosity toward any human +being. Even some injustice in his sentence had not caused him to feel +any rancor. + +During his stay in the prison he had not been really unhappy. He had +accepted the inevitable-the yoke of the strong for the weak--with a +patience which brought almost a sense of enjoyment. But, now that he +was free, he had suddenly become alert, watchful of chances for his +betterment. From being a mere kenneled creature he had become as a +hound on the scent, the keenest on earth--that of self-interest. He was +changed, while yet living, from a being outside the world to one with +the world before him. He felt young, although he was a middle-aged, +almost elderly man. He had in his pocket only a few dollars. He might +have had more had he not purchased the checked suit and had he not given +much away. There was another man whose term would be up in a week, and +he had a sickly wife and several children. Stebbins, partly from native +kindness and generosity, partly from a sentiment which almost amounted +to superstition, had given him of his slender store. He had been +deprived of his freedom because of money; he said to himself that his +return to it should be heralded by the music of it scattered abroad for +the good of another. + +Now and then as he walked Stebbins removed his new straw hat, wiped his +forehead with a stiff new handkerchief, looked with some concern at the +grime left upon it, then felt anxiously of his short crop of grizzled +hair. He would be glad when it grew only a little, for it was at present +a telltale to observant eyes. Also now and then he took from another +pocket a small mirror which he had just purchased, and scrutinized his +face. Every time he did so he rubbed his cheeks violently, then viewed +with satisfaction the hard glow which replaced the yellow prison pallor. +Every now and then, too, he remembered to throw his shoulders back, hold +his chin high, and swing out his right leg more freely. At such times +he almost swaggered, he became fairly insolent with his new sense of +freedom. He felt himself the equal if not the peer of all creation. +Whenever a carriage or a motor-car passed him on the country road he +assumed, with the skill of an actor, the air of a business man hastening +to an important engagement. However, always his mind was working over a +hard problem. He knew that his store of money was scanty, that it would +not last long even with the strictest economy; he had no friends; a +prison record is sure to leak out when a man seeks a job. He was facing +the problem of bare existence. + +Although the day was so hot, it was late summer; soon would come the +frost and the winter. He wished to live to enjoy his freedom, and all he +had for assets was that freedom; which was paradoxical, for it did not +signify the ability to obtain work, which was the power of life. +Outside the stone wall of the prison he was now inclosed by a subtle, +intangible, yet infinitely more unyielding one--the prejudice of his +kind against the released prisoner. He was to all intents and purposes +a prisoner still, for all his spurts of swagger and the youthful leap +of his pulses, and while he did not admit that to himself, yet always, +since he had the hard sense of the land of his birth--New England--he +pondered that problem of existence. He felt instinctively that it +would be a useless proceeding for him to approach any human being for +employment. He knew that even the freedom, which he realized through all +his senses like an essential perfume, could not yet overpower the reek +of the prison. As he walked through the clogging dust he thought of one +after another whom he had known before he had gone out of the world of +free men and had bent his back under the hand of the law. There were, of +course, people in his little native village, people who had been friends +and neighbors, but there were none who had ever loved him sufficiently +for him to conquer his resolve to never ask aid of them. He had no +relatives except cousins more or less removed, and they would have +nothing to do with him. + +There had been a woman whom he had meant to marry, and he had been sure +that she would marry him; but after he had been a year in prison the +news had come to him in a roundabout fashion that she had married +another suitor. Even had she remained single he could not have +approached her, least of all for aid. Then, too, through all his term +she had made no sign, there had been no letter, no message; and he had +received at first letters and flowers and messages from sentimental +women. There had been nothing from her. He had accepted nothing, with +the curious patience, carrying an odd pleasure with it, which had come +to him when the prison door first closed upon him. He had not forgotten +her, but he had not consciously mourned her. His loss, his ruin, had +been so tremendous that she had been swallowed up in it. When one's +whole system needs to be steeled to trouble and pain, single pricks lose +importance. He thought of her that day without any sense of sadness. +He imagined her in a pretty, well-ordered home with her husband and +children. Perhaps she had grown stout. She had been a slender woman. He +tried idly to imagine how she would look stout, then by the sequence +of self-preservation the imagination of stoutness in another led to the +problem of keeping the covering of flesh and fatness upon his own bones. +The question now was not of the woman; she had passed out of his +life. The question was of the keeping that life itself, the life which +involved everything else, in a hard world, which would remorselessly as +a steel trap grudge him life and snap upon him, now he was become its +prey. + +He walked and walked, and it was high noon, and he was hungry. He had in +his pocket a small loaf of bread and two frankfurters, and he heard the +splashing ripple of a brook. At that juncture the road was bordered +by thick woodland. He followed, pushing his way through the trees and +undergrowth, the sound of the brook, and sat down in a cool, green +solitude with a sigh of relief. He bent over the clear run, made a cup +of his hand, and drank, then he fell to eating. Close beside him grew +some wintergreen, and when he had finished his bread and frankfurters +he began plucking the glossy, aromatic leaves and chewing them +automatically. The savor reached his palate, and his memory awakened +before it as before a pleasant tingling of a spur. As a boy how he +had loved this little green low-growing plant! It had been one of the +luxuries of his youth. Now, as he tasted it, joy and pathos stirred in +his very soul. What a wonder youth had been, what a splendor, what an +immensity to be rejoiced over and regretted! The man lounging beside the +brook, chewing wintergreen leaves, seemed to realize antipodes. He +lived for the moment in the past, and the immutable future, which might +contain the past in the revolution of time. He smiled, and his face fell +into boyish, almost childish, contours. He plucked another glossy leaf +with his hard, veinous old hands. His hands would not change to suit his +mood, but his limbs relaxed like those of a boy. He stared at the brook +gurgling past in brown ripples, shot with dim prismatic lights, showing +here clear green water lines, here inky depths, and he thought of the +possibility of trout. He wished for fishing-tackle. + +Then suddenly out of a mass of green looked two girls, with wide, +startled eyes, and rounded mouths of terror which gave vent to screams. +There was a scuttling, then silence. The man wondered why the girls were +so silly, why they ran. He did not dream of the possibility of their +terror of him. He ate another wintergreen leaf, and thought of the woman +he had expected to marry when he was arrested and imprisoned. She did +not go back to his childish memories. He had met her when first youth +had passed, and yet, somehow, the savor of the wintergreen leaves +brought her face before him. It is strange how the excitement of one +sense will sometimes act as stimulant for the awakening of another. Now +the sense of taste brought into full activity that of sight. He saw the +woman just as she had looked when he had last seen her. She had not +been pretty, but she was exceedingly dainty, and possessed of a certain +elegance of carriage which attracted. He saw quite distinctly her small, +irregular face and the satin-smooth coils of dark hair around her head; +he saw her slender, dusky hands with the well-cared-for nails and the +too prominent veins; he saw the gleam of the diamond which he had given +her. She had sent it to him just after his arrest, and he had returned +it. He wondered idly whether she still owned it and wore it, and what +her husband thought of it. He speculated childishly-somehow imprisonment +had encouraged the return of childish speculations--as to whether the +woman's husband had given her a larger and costlier diamond than his, +and he felt a pang of jealousy. He refused to see another diamond than +his own upon that slender, dark hand. He saw her in a black silk gown +which had been her best. There had been some red about it, and a glitter +of jet. He had thought it a magnificent gown, and the woman in it like +a princess. He could see her leaning back, in her long slim grace, in a +corner of a sofa, and the soft dark folds starry with jet sweeping over +her knees and just allowing a glimpse of one little foot. Her feet had +been charming, very small and highly arched. Then he remembered that +that evening they had been to a concert in the town hall, and that +afterward they had partaken of an oyster stew in a little restaurant. +Then back his mind traveled to the problem of his own existence, his +food and shelter and clothes. He dismissed the woman from his thought. +He was concerned now with the primal conditions of life itself. How was +he to eat when his little stock of money was gone? He sat staring at the +brook; he chewed wintergreen leaves no longer. Instead he drew from +his pocket an old pipe and a paper of tobacco. He filled his pipe with +care--tobacco was precious; then he began to smoke, but his face now +looked old and brooding through the rank blue vapor. Winter was coming, +and he had not a shelter. He had not money enough to keep him long from +starvation. He knew not how to obtain employment. He thought vaguely of +wood-piles, of cutting winter fuel for people. His mind traveled in a +trite strain of reasoning. Somehow wood-piles seemed the only available +tasks for men of his sort. + +Presently he finished his filled pipe, and arose with an air of +decision. He went at a brisk pace out of the wood and was upon the road +again. He progressed like a man with definite business in view until he +reached a house. It was a large white farm-house with many outbuildings. +It looked most promising. He approached the side door, and a dog sprang +from around a corner and barked, but he spoke, and the dog's tail became +eloquent. He was patting the dog, when the door opened and a man stood +looking at him. Immediately the taint of the prison became evident. He +had not cringed before the dog, but he did cringe before the man who +lived in that fine white house, and who had never known what it was to +be deprived of liberty. He hung his head, he mumbled. The house-owner, +who was older than he, was slightly deaf. He looked him over curtly. +The end of it was he was ordered off the premises, and went; but the dog +trailed, wagging at his heels, and had to be roughly called back. The +thought of the dog comforted Stebbins as he went on his way. He had +always liked animals. It was something, now he was past a hand-shake, to +have the friendly wag of a dog's tail. + +The next house was an ornate little cottage with bay-windows, through +which could be seen the flower patterns of lace draperies; the Virginia +creeper which grew over the house walls was turning crimson in places. +Stebbins went around to the back door and knocked, but nobody came. He +waited a long time, for he had spied a great pile of uncut wood. Finally +he slunk around to the front door. As he went he suddenly reflected upon +his state of mind in days gone by; if he could have known that the time +would come when he, Joseph Stebbins, would feel culpable at approaching +any front door! He touched the electric bell and stood close to the +door, so that he might not be discovered from the windows. Presently the +door opened the length of a chain, and a fair girlish head appeared. +She was one of the girls who had been terrified by him in the woods, but +that he did not know. Now again her eyes dilated and her pretty mouth +rounded! She gave a little cry and slammed the door in his face, and he +heard excited voices. Then he saw two pale, pretty faces, the faces of +the two girls who had come upon him in the wood, peering at him around +a corner of the lace in the bay-window, and he understood what it +meant--that he was an object of terror to them. Directly he experienced +such a sense of mortal insult as he had never known, not even when the +law had taken hold of him. He held his head high and went away, his very +soul boiling with a sort of shamed rage. "Those two girls are afraid of +me," he kept saying to himself. His knees shook with the horror of it. +This terror of him seemed the hardest thing to bear in a hard life. +He returned to his green nook beside the brook and sat down again. He +thought for the moment no more of woodpiles, of his life. He thought +about those two young girls who had been afraid of him. He had never +had an impulse to harm any living thing. A curious hatred toward these +living things who had accused him of such an impulse came over him. He +laughed sardonically. He wished that they would again come and peer +at him through the bushes; he would make a threatening motion for the +pleasure of seeing the silly things scuttle away. + +After a while he put it all out of mind, and again returned to his +problem. He lay beside the brook and pondered, and finally fell asleep +in the hot air, which increased in venom, until the rattle of +thunder awoke him. It was very dark--a strange, livid darkness. +"A thunder-storm," he muttered, and then he thought of his new +clothes--what a misfortune it would be to have them soaked. He arose and +pushed through the thicket around him into a cart path, and it was then +that he saw the thing which proved to be the stepping-stone toward his +humble fortunes. It was only a small silk umbrella with a handle tipped +with pearl. He seized upon it with joy, for it meant the salvation of +his precious clothes. He opened it and held it over his head, although +the rain had not yet begun. One rib of the umbrella was broken, but it +was still serviceable. He hastened along the cart path; he did not know +why, only the need for motion, to reach protection from the storm, was +upon him; and yet what protection could be ahead of him in that woodland +path? Afterward he grew to think of it as a blind instinct which led him +on. + +He had not gone far, not more than half a mile, when he saw something +unexpected--a small untenanted house. He gave vent to a little cry of +joy, which had in it something child-like and pathetic, and pushed open +the door and entered. It was nothing but a tiny, unfinished shack, with +one room and a small one opening from it. There was no ceiling; overhead +was the tent-like slant of the roof, but it was tight. The dusty floor +was quite dry. There was one rickety chair. Stebbins, after looking into +the other room to make sure that the place was empty, sat down, and a +wonderful wave of content and self-respect came over him. The poor human +snail had found his shell; he had a habitation, a roof of shelter. The +little dim place immediately assumed an aspect of home. The rain +came down in torrents, the thunder crashed, the place was filled with +blinding blue lights. Stebbins filled his pipe more lavishly this time, +tilted his chair against the wall, smoked, and gazed about him with +pitiful content. It was really so little, but to him it was so much. +He nodded with satisfaction at the discovery of a fireplace and a rusty +cooking-stove. + +He sat and smoked until the storm passed over. The rainfall had been +very heavy, there had been hail, but the poor little house had not +failed of perfect shelter. A fairly cold wind from the northwest blew +through the door. The hail had brought about a change of atmosphere. The +burning heat was gone. The night would be cool, even chilly. + +Stebbins got up and examined the stove and the pipe. They were rusty, +but appeared trustworthy. He went out and presently returned with some +fuel which he had found unwet in a thick growth of wood. He laid a +fire handily and lit it. The little stove burned well, with no smoke. +Stebbins looked at it, and was perfectly happy. He had found other +treasures outside--a small vegetable-garden in which were potatoes and +some corn. A man had squatted in this little shack for years, and had +raised his own garden-truck. He had died only a few weeks ago, and +his furniture had been pre-empted with the exception of the stove, the +chair, a tilting lounge in the small room, and a few old iron pots and +fryingpans. Stebbins gathered corn, dug potatoes, and put them on the +stove to cook, then he hurried out to the village store and bought a few +slices of bacon, half a dozen eggs, a quarter of a pound of cheap tea, +and some salt. When he re-entered the house he looked as he had not for +years. He was beaming. "Come, this is a palace," he said to himself, +and chuckled with pure joy. He had come out of the awful empty spaces of +homeless life into home. He was a man who had naturally strong domestic +instincts. If he had spent the best years of his life in a home instead +of a prison, the finest in him would have been developed. As it was, +this was not even now too late. When he had cooked his bacon and eggs +and brewed his tea, when the vegetables were done and he was seated upon +the rickety chair, with his supper spread before him on an old board +propped on sticks, he was supremely happy. He ate with a relish which +seemed to reach his soul. He was at home, and eating, literally, at his +own board. As he ate he glanced from time to time at the two windows, +with broken panes of glass and curtainless. He was not afraid--that +was nonsense; he had never been a cowardly man, but he felt the need of +curtains or something before his windows to shut out the broad vast face +of nature, or perhaps prying human eyes. Somebody might espy the light +in the house and wonder. He had a candle stuck in an old bottle by +way of illumination. Still, although he would have preferred to have +curtains before those windows full of the blank stare of night, he WAS +supremely happy. + +After he had finished his supper he looked longingly at his pipe. He +hesitated for a second, for he realized the necessity of saving his +precious tobacco; then he became reckless: such enormous good fortune +as a home must mean more to follow; it must be the first of a series of +happy things. He filled his pipe and smoked. Then he went to bed on the +old couch in the other room, and slept like a child until the sun shone +through the trees in flickering lines. Then he rose, went out to the +brook which ran near the house, splashed himself with water, returned +to the house, cooked the remnant of the eggs and bacon, and ate his +breakfast with the same exultant peace with which he had eaten his +supper the night before. Then he sat down in the doorway upon the sunken +sill and fell again to considering his main problem. He did not smoke. +His tobacco was nearly exhausted and he was no longer reckless. His head +was not turned now by the feeling that he was at home. He considered +soberly as to the probable owner of the house and whether he would be +allowed to remain its tenant. Very soon, however, his doubt concerning +that was set at rest. He saw a disturbance of the shadows cast by the +thick boughs over the cart path by a long outreach of darker shadow +which he knew at once for that of a man. He sat upright, and his face +at first assumed a defiant, then a pleading expression, like that of +a child who desires to retain possession of some dear thing. His heart +beat hard as he watched the advance of the shadow. It was slow, as +if cast by an old man. The man was old and very stout, supporting +one lopping side by a stick, who presently followed the herald of his +shadow. He looked like a farmer. Stebbins rose as he approached; the two +men stood staring at each other. + +"Who be you, neighbor?" inquired the newcomer. + +The voice essayed a roughness, but only achieved a tentative +friendliness. Stebbins hesitated for a second; a suspicious look came +into the farmer's misty blue eyes. Then Stebbins, mindful of his prison +record and fiercely covetous of his new home, gave another name. The +name of his maternal grandfather seemed suddenly to loom up in printed +characters before his eyes, and he gave it glibly. "David Anderson," he +said, and he did not realize a lie. Suddenly the name seemed his own. +Surely old David Anderson, who had been a good man, would not grudge the +gift of his unstained name to replace the stained one of his grandson. +"David Anderson," he replied, and looked the other man in the face +unflinchingly. + +"Where do ye hail from?" inquired the farmer; and the new David Anderson +gave unhesitatingly the name of the old David Anderson's birth and life +and death place--that of a little village in New Hampshire. + +"What do you do for your living?" was the next question, and the new +David Anderson had an inspiration. His eyes had lit upon the umbrella +which he had found the night before. + +"Umbrellas," he replied, laconically, and the other man nodded. Men +with sheaves of umbrellas, mended or in need of mending, had always been +familiar features for him. + +Then David assumed the initiative; possessed of an honorable business +as well as home, he grew bold. "Any objection to my staying here?" he +asked. + +The other man eyed him sharply. "Smoke much?" he inquired. + +"Smoke a pipe sometimes." + +"Careful with your matches?" + +David nodded. + +"That's all I think about," said the farmer. "These woods is apt to +catch fire jest when I'm about ready to cut. The man that squatted here +before--he died about a month ago--didn't smoke. He was careful, he +was." + +"I'll be real careful," said David, humbly and anxiously. + +"I dun'no' as I have any objections to your staying, then," said the +farmer. "Somebody has always squat here. A man built this shack about +twenty year ago, and he lived here till he died. Then t'other feller +he came along. Reckon he must have had a little money; didn't work at +nothin'! Raised some garden-truck and kept a few chickens. I took them +home after he died. You can have them now if you want to take care of +them. He rigged up that little chicken-coop back there." + +"I'll take care of them," answered David, fervently. + +"Well, you can come over by and by and get 'em. There's nine hens and a +rooster. They lay pretty well. I ain't no use for 'em. I've got all the +hens of my own I want to bother with." + +"All right," said David. He looked blissful. + +The farmer stared past him into the house. He spied the solitary +umbrella. He grew facetious. "Guess the umbrellas was all mended up +where you come from if you've got down to one," said he. + +David nodded. It was tragically true, that guess. + +"Well, our umbrella got turned last week," said the farmer. "I'll give +you a job to start on. You can stay here as long as you want if you're +careful about your matches." Again he looked into the house. "Guess +some boys have been helpin' themselves to the furniture, most of it," he +observed. "Guess my wife can spare ye another chair, and there's an old +table out in the corn-house better than that one you've rigged up, and I +guess she'll give ye some old bedding so you can be comfortable. + +"Got any money?" + +"A little." + +"I don't want any pay for things, and my wife won't; didn't mean that; +was wonderin' whether ye had anything to buy vittles with." + +"Reckon I can manage till I get some work," replied David, a trifle +stiffly. He was a man who had never lived at another than the state's +expense. + +"Don't want ye to be too short, that's all," said the other, a little +apologetically. + +"I shall be all right. There are corn and potatoes in the garden, +anyway." + +"So there be, and one of them hens had better be eat. She don't lay. +She'll need a good deal of b'ilin'. You can have all the wood you want +to pick up, but I don't want any cut. You mind that or there'll be +trouble." + +"I won't cut a stick." + +"Mind ye don't. Folks call me an easy mark, and I guess myself I am easy +up to a certain point, and cuttin' my wood is one of them points. Roof +didn't leak in that shower last night, did it?" + +"Not a bit." + +"Didn't s'pose it would. The other feller was handy, and he kept +tinkerin' all the time. Well, I'll be goin'; you can stay here and +welcome if you're careful about matches and don't cut my wood. Come over +for them hens any time you want to. I'll let my hired man drive you back +in the wagon." + +"Much obliged," said David, with an inflection that was almost tearful. + +"You're welcome," said the other, and ambled away. + +The new David Anderson, the good old grandfather revived in his +unfortunate, perhaps graceless grandson, reseated himself on the +door-step and watched the bulky, receding figure of his visitor through +a pleasant blur of tears, which made the broad, rounded shoulders +and the halting columns of legs dance. This David Anderson had almost +forgotten that there was unpaid kindness in the whole world, and it +seemed to him as if he had seen angels walking up and down. He sat for a +while doing nothing except realizing happiness of the present and of +the future. He gazed at the green spread of forest boughs, and saw in +pleased anticipation their red and gold tints of autumn; also in pleased +anticipation their snowy and icy mail of winter, and himself, the +unmailed, defenseless human creature, housed and sheltered, sitting +before his own fire. This last happy outlook aroused him. If all this +was to be, he must be up and doing. He got up, entered the house, and +examined the broken umbrella which was his sole stock in trade. David +was a handy man. He at once knew that he was capable of putting it in +perfect repair. Strangely enough, for his sense of right and wrong was +not blunted, he had no compunction whatever in keeping this umbrella, +although he was reasonably certain that it belonged to one of the two +young girls who had been so terrified by him. He had a conviction that +this monstrous terror of theirs, which had hurt him more than many +apparently crueler things, made them quits. + +After he had washed his dishes in the brook, and left them in the sun +to dry, he went to the village store and purchased a few simple things +necessary for umbrella-mending. Both on his way to the store and back he +kept his eyes open. He realized that his capital depended largely upon +chance and good luck. He considered that he had extraordinary good +luck when he returned with three more umbrellas. He had discovered one +propped against the counter of the store, turned inside out. He had +inquired to whom it belonged, and had been answered to anybody who +wanted it. David had seized upon it with secret glee. Then, unheard-of +good fortune, he had found two more umbrellas on his way home; one was +in an ash-can, the other blowing along like a belated bat beside the +trolley track. It began to seem to David as if the earth might be +strewn with abandoned umbrellas. Before he began his work he went to +the farmer's and returned in triumph, driven in the farm-wagon, with +his cackling hens and quite a load of household furniture, besides some +bread and pies. The farmer's wife was one of those who are able to give, +and make receiving greater than giving. She had looked at David, who +was older than she, with the eyes of a mother, and his pride had melted +away, and he had held out his hands for her benefits, like a child who +has no compunctions about receiving gifts because he knows that they are +his right of childhood. + +Henceforth David prospered--in a humble way, it is true, still he +prospered. He journeyed about the country, umbrellas over his shoulder, +little bag of tools in hand, and reaped an income more than sufficient +for his simple wants. His hair had grown, and also his beard. Nobody +suspected his history. He met the young girls whom he had terrified +on the road often, and they did not know him. He did not, during the +winter, travel very far afield. Night always found him at home, warm, +well fed, content, and at peace. Sometimes the old farmer on whose land +he lived dropped in of an evening and they had a game of checkers. The +old man was a checker expert. He played with unusual skill, but David +made for himself a little code of honor. He would never beat the old +man, even if he were able, oftener than once out of three evenings. He +made coffee on these convivial occasions. He made very good coffee, and +they sipped as they moved the men and kings, and the old man chuckled, +and David beamed with peaceful happiness. + +But the next spring, when he began to realize that he had mended for a +while all the umbrellas in the vicinity and that his trade was flagging, +he set his precious little home in order, barricaded door and windows, +and set forth for farther fields. He was lucky, as he had been from the +start. He found plenty of employment, and slept comfortably enough in +barns, and now and then in the open. He had traveled by slow stages for +several weeks before he entered a village whose familiar look gave him +a shock. It was not his native village, but near it. In his younger life +he had often journeyed there. It was a little shopping emporium, almost +a city. He recognized building after building. Now and then he thought +he saw a face which he had once known, and he was thankful that there +was hardly any possibility of any one recognizing him. He had grown +gaunt and thin since those far-off days; he wore a beard, grizzled, as +was his hair. In those days he had not been an umbrella man. Sometimes +the humor of the situation struck him. What would he have said, he the +spruce, plump, head-in-the-air young man, if anybody had told him that +it would come to pass that he would be an umbrella man lurking humbly in +search of a job around the back doors of houses? He would laugh softly +to himself as he trudged along, and the laugh would be without the +slightest bitterness. His lot had been so infinitely worse, and he had +such a happy nature, yielding sweetly to the inevitable, that he saw now +only cause for amusement. + +He had been in that vicinity about three weeks when one day he met the +woman. He knew her at once, although she was greatly changed. She had +grown stout, although, poor soul! it seemed as if there had been no +reason for it. She was not unwieldy, but she was stout, and all the +contours of earlier life had disappeared beneath layers of flesh. Her +hair was not gray, but the bright brown had faded, and she wore it +tightly strained back from her seamed forehead, although it was thin. +One had only to look at her hair to realize that she was a woman who +had given up, who no longer cared. She was humbly clad in a blue-cotton +wrapper, she wore a dingy black hat, and she carried a tin pail half +full of raspberries. When the man and woman met they stopped with a sort +of shock, and each changed face grew like the other in its pallor. She +recognized him and he her, but along with that recognition was awakened +a fierce desire to keep it secret. His prison record loomed up before +the man, the woman's past loomed up before her. She had possibly not +been guilty of much, but her life was nothing to waken pride in her. +She felt shamed before this man whom she had loved, and who felt shamed +before her. However, after a second the silence was broken. The man +recovered his self-possession first. + +He spoke casually. + +"Nice day," said he. + +The woman nodded. + +"Been berrying?" inquired David. The woman nodded again. + +David looked scrutinizingly at her pail. "I saw better berries real +thick a piece back," said he. + +The woman murmured something. In spite of herself, a tear trickled over +her fat, weather-beaten cheek. David saw the tear, and something warm +and glorious like sunlight seemed to waken within him. He felt such +tenderness and pity for this poor feminine thing who had not the +strength to keep the tears back, and was so pitiably shorn of youth and +grace, that he himself expanded. He had heard in the town something of +her history. She had made a dreadful marriage, tragedy and suspicion had +entered her life, and the direst poverty. However, he had not known that +she was in the vicinity. Somebody had told him she was out West. + +"Living here?" he inquired. + +"Working for my board at a house back there," she muttered. She did not +tell him that she had come as a female "hobo" in a freight-car from the +Western town where she had been finally stranded. "Mrs. White sent me +out for berries," she added. "She keeps boarders, and there were no +berries in the market this morning." + +"Come back with me and I will show you where I saw the berries real +thick," said David. + +He turned himself about, and she followed a little behind, the female +failure in the dust cast by the male. Neither spoke until David stopped +and pointed to some bushes where the fruit hung thick on bending, +slender branches. + +"Here," said David. Both fell to work. David picked handfuls of berries +and cast them gaily into the pail. "What is your name?" he asked, in an +undertone. + +"Jane Waters," she replied, readily. Her husband's name had been Waters, +or the man who had called himself her husband, and her own middle name +was Jane. The first was Sara. David remembered at once. "She is taking +her own middle name and the name of the man she married," he thought. +Then he asked, plucking berries, with his eyes averted: + +"Married?" + +"No," said the woman, flushing deeply. + +David's next question betrayed him. "Husband dead?" + +"I haven't any husband," she replied, like the Samaritan woman. + +She had married a man already provided with another wife, although +she had not known it. The man was not dead, but she spoke the entire +miserable truth when she replied as she did. David assumed that he was +dead. He felt a throb of relief, of which he was ashamed, but he +could not down it. He did not know what it was that was so alive and +triumphant within him: love, or pity, or the natural instinct of the +decent male to shelter and protect. Whatever it was, it was dominant. + +"Do you have to work hard?" he asked. + +"Pretty hard, I guess. I expect to." + +"And you don't get any pay?" + +"That's all right; I don't expect to get any," said she, and there was +bitterness in her voice. + +In spite of her stoutness she was not as strong as the man. She was not +at all strong, and, moreover, the constant presence of a sense of injury +at the hands of life filled her very soul with a subtle poison, to her +weakening vitality. She was a child hurt and worried and bewildered, +although she was to the average eye a stout, able-bodied, middle-aged +woman; but David had not the average eye, and he saw her as she really +was, not as she seemed. There had always been about her a little +weakness and dependency which had appealed to him. Now they seemed +fairly to cry out to him like the despairing voices of the children whom +he had never had, and he knew he loved her as he had never loved her +before, with a love which had budded and flowered and fruited and +survived absence and starvation. He spoke abruptly. + +"I've about got my business done in these parts," said he. "I've got +quite a little money, and I've got a little house, not much, but mighty +snug, back where I come from. There's a garden. It's in the woods. Not +much passing nor going on." + +The woman was looking at him with incredulous, pitiful eyes like a +dog's. "I hate much goin' on," she whispered. + +"Suppose," said David, "you take those berries home and pack up your +things. Got much?" + +"All I've got will go in my bag." + +"Well, pack up; tell the madam where you live that you're sorry, but +you're worn out--" + +"God knows I am," cried the woman, with sudden force, "worn out!" + +"Well, you tell her that, and say you've got another chance, and--" + +"What do you mean?" cried the woman, and she hung upon his words like a +drowning thing. + +"Mean? Why, what I mean is this. You pack your bag and come to the +parson's back there, that white house." + +"I know--" + +"In the mean time I'll see about getting a license, and--" + +Suddenly the woman set her pail down and clutched him by both hands. +"Say you are not married," she demanded; "say it, swear it!" + +"Yes, I do swear it," said David. "You are the only woman I ever asked +to marry me. I can support you. We sha'n't be rolling in riches, but we +can be comfortable, and--I rather guess I can make you happy." + +"You didn't say what your name was," said the woman. + +"David Anderson." + +The woman looked at him with a strange expression, the expression of +one who loves and respects, even reveres, the isolation and secrecy +of another soul. She understood, down to the depths of her being she +understood. She had lived a hard life, she had her faults, but she was +fine enough to comprehend and hold sacred another personality. She was +very pale, but she smiled. Then she turned to go. + +"How long will it take you?" asked David. + +"About an hour." + +"All right. I will meet you in front of the parson's house in an hour. +We will go back by train. I have money enough." + +"I'd just as soon walk." The woman spoke with the utmost humility of +love and trust. She had not even asked where the man lived. All her life +she had followed him with her soul, and it would go hard if her poor +feet could not keep pace with her soul. + +"No, it is too far; we will take the train. One goes at half past four." + +At half past four the couple, made man and wife, were on the train +speeding toward the little home in the woods. The woman had frizzled her +thin hair pathetically and ridiculously over her temples; on her left +hand gleamed a white diamond. She had kept it hidden; she had almost +starved rather than part with it. She gazed out of the window at the +flying landscape, and her thin lips were curved in a charming smile. The +man sat beside her, staring straight ahead as if at happy visions. + +They lived together afterward in the little house in the woods, and were +happy with a strange crystallized happiness at which they would have +mocked in their youth, but which they now recognized as the essential of +all happiness upon earth. And always the woman knew what she knew about +her husband, and the man knew about his wife, and each recognized the +other as old lover and sweetheart come together at last, but always +each kept the knowledge from the other with an infinite tenderness +of delicacy which was as a perfumed garment veiling the innermost +sacredness of love. + + + + +THE BALKING OF CHRISTOPHER + +THE spring was early that year. It was only the last of March, but the +trees were filmed with green and paling with promise of bloom; the front +yards were showing new grass pricking through the old. It was high +time to plow the south field and the garden, but Christopher sat in his +rocking-chair beside the kitchen window and gazed out, and did absolutely +nothing about it. + +Myrtle Dodd, Christopher's wife, washed the breakfast dishes, and later +kneaded the bread, all the time glancing furtively at her husband. She +had a most old-fashioned deference with regard to Christopher. She was +always a little afraid of him. Sometimes Christopher's mother, Mrs. +Cyrus Dodd, and his sister Abby, who had never married, reproached her +for this attitude of mind. "You are entirely too much cowed down by +Christopher," Mrs. Dodd said. + +"I would never be under the thumb of any man," Abby said. + +"Have you ever seen Christopher in one of his spells?" Myrtle would ask. + +Then Mrs. Cyrus Dodd and Abby would look at each other. "It is all your +fault, mother," Abby would say. "You really ought not to have allowed +your son to have his own head so much." + +"You know perfectly well, Abby, what I had to contend against," replied +Mrs. Dodd, and Abby became speechless. Cyrus Dodd, now deceased some +twenty years, had never during his whole life yielded to anything but +birth and death. Before those two primary facts even his terrible will +was powerless. He had come into the world without his consent being +obtained; he had passed in like manner from it. But during his life +he had ruled, a petty monarch, but a most thorough one. He had spoiled +Christopher, and his wife, although a woman of high spirit, knew of no +appealing. + +"I could never go against your father, you know that," said Mrs. Dodd, +following up her advantage. + +"Then," said Abby, "you ought to have warned poor Myrtle. It was a shame +to let her marry a man as spoiled as Christopher." + +"I would have married him, anyway," declared Myrtle with sudden +defiance; and her mother-inlaw regarded her approvingly. + +"There are worse men than Christopher, and Myrtle knows it," said she. + +"Yes, I do, mother," agreed Myrtle. "Christopher hasn't one bad habit." + +"I don't know what you call a bad habit," retorted Abby. "I call having +your own way in spite of the world, the flesh, and the devil rather a +bad habit. Christopher tramples on everything in his path, and he always +has. He tramples on poor Myrtle." + +At that Myrtle laughed. "I don't think I look trampled on," said she; +and she certainly did not. Pink and white and plump was Myrtle, although +she had, to a discerning eye, an expression which denoted extreme +nervousness. + +This morning of spring, when her husband sat doing nothing, she wore +this nervous expression. Her blue eyes looked dark and keen; her +forehead was wrinkled; her rosy mouth was set. Myrtle and Christopher +were not young people; they were a little past middle age, still far +from old in look or ability. + +Myrtle had kneaded the bread to rise for the last time before it was put +into the oven, and had put on the meat to boil for dinner, before she +dared address that silent figure which had about it something tragic. +Then she spoke in a small voice. "Christopher," said she. + +Christopher made no reply. + +"It is a good morning to plow, ain't it?" said Myrtle. + +Christopher was silent. + +"Jim Mason got over real early; I suppose he thought you'd want to get +at the south field. He's been sitting there at the barn door for 'most +two hours." + +Then Christopher rose. Myrtle's anxious face lightened. But to her +wonder her husband went into the front entry and got his best hat. "He +ain't going to wear his best hat to plow," thought Myrtle. For an awful +moment it occurred to her that something had suddenly gone wrong with +her husband's mind. Christopher brushed the hat carefully, adjusted it +at the little looking-glass in the kitchen, and went out. + +"Be you going to plow the south field?" Myrtle said, faintly. + +"No, I ain't." + +"Will you be back to dinner?" + +"I don't know--you needn't worry if I'm not." Suddenly Christopher did +an unusual thing for him. He and Myrtle had lived together for years, +and outward manifestations of affection were rare between them. He put +his arm around her and kissed her. + +After he had gone, Myrtle watched him out of sight down the road; then +she sat down and wept. Jim Mason came slouching around from his station +at the barn door. He surveyed Myrtle uneasily. + +"Mr. Dodd sick?" said he at length. + +"Not that I know of," said Myrtle, in a weak quaver. She rose and, +keeping her tear-stained face aloof, lifted the lid off the kettle on +the stove. + +"D'ye know am he going to plow to-day?" + +"He said he wasn't." + +Jim grunted, shifted his quid, and slouched out of the yard. + +Meantime Christopher Dodd went straight down the road to the minister's, +the Rev. Stephen Wheaton. When he came to the south field, which he was +neglecting, he glanced at it turning emerald upon the gentle slopes. He +set his face harder. Christopher Dodd's face was in any case hard-set. +Now it was tragic, to be pitied, but warily, lest it turn fiercely upon +the one who pitied. Christopher was a handsome man, and his face had an +almost classic turn of feature. His forehead was noble; his eyes full of +keen light. He was only a farmer, but in spite of his rude clothing he +had the face of a man who followed one of the professions. He was in +sore trouble of spirit, and he was going to consult the minister and ask +him for advice. Christopher had never done this before. He had a sort +of incredulity now that he was about to do it. He had always associated +that sort of thing with womankind, and not with men like himself. +And, moreover, Stephen Wheaton was a younger man than himself. He was +unmarried, and had only been settled in the village for about a year. +"He can't think I'm coming to set my cap at him, anyway," Christopher +reflected, with a sort of grim humor, as he drew near the parsonage. The +minister was haunted by marriageable ladies of the village. + +"Guess you are glad to see a man coming, instead of a woman who has +doubts about some doctrine," was the first thing Christopher said to the +minister when he had been admitted to his study. The study was a small +room, lined with books, and only one picture hung over the fireplace, +the portrait of the minister's mother--Stephen was so like her that a +question concerning it was futile. + +Stephen colored a little angrily at Christopher's remark--he was a +hot-tempered man, although a clergyman; then he asked him to be seated. + +Christopher sat down opposite the minister. "I oughtn't to have spoken +so," he apologized, "but what I am doing ain't like me." + +"That's all right," said Stephen. He was a short, athletic man, with an +extraordinary width of shoulders and a strong-featured and ugly face, +still indicative of goodness and a strange power of sympathy. Three +little mongrel dogs were sprawled about the study. One, small and alert, +came and rested his head on Christopher's knee. Animals all liked him. +Christopher mechanically patted him. Patting an appealing animal was as +unconscious with the man as drawing his breath. But he did not even look +at the little dog while he stroked it after the fashion which pleased it +best. He kept his large, keen, melancholy eyes fixed upon the minister; +at length he spoke. He did not speak with as much eagerness as he did +with force, bringing the whole power of his soul into his words, which +were the words of a man in rebellion against the greatest odds on earth +and in all creation--the odds of fate itself. + +"I have come to say a good deal, Mr. Wheaton," he began. + +"Then say it, Mr. Dodd," replied Stephen, without a smile. + +Christopher spoke. "I am going back to the very beginning of things," +said he, "and maybe you will think it blasphemy, but I don't mean it for +that. I mean it for the truth, and the truth which is too much for my +comprehension." + +"I have heard men swear when it did not seem blasphemy to me," said +Stephen. + +"Thank the Lord, you ain't so deep in your rut you can't see the stars!" +said Christopher. "But I guess you see them in a pretty black sky +sometimes. In the beginning, why did I have to come into the world +without any choice?" + +"You must not ask a question of me which can only be answered by the +Lord," said Stephen. + +"I am asking the Lord," said Christopher, with his sad, forceful voice. +"I am asking the Lord, and I ask why?" + +"You have no right to expect your question to be answered in your time," +said Stephen. + +"But here am I," said Christopher, "and I was a question to the Lord +from the first, and fifty years and more I have been on the earth." + +"Fifty years and more are nothing for the answer to such a question," +said Stephen. + +Christopher looked at him with mournful dissent; there was no anger +about him. "There was time before time," said he, "before the fifty +years and more began. I don't mean to blaspheme, Mr. Wheaton, but it is +the truth. I came into the world whether I would or not; I was forced, +and then I was told I was a free agent. I am no free agent. For fifty +years and more I have thought about it, and I have found out that, at +least. I am a slave--a slave of life." + +"For that matter," said Stephen, looking curiously at him, "so am I. So +are we all." + +"That makes it worse," agreed Christopher--"a whole world of slaves. I +know I ain't talking in exactly what you might call an orthodox strain. +I have got to a point when it seems to me I shall go mad if I don't talk +to somebody. I know there is that awful why, and you can't answer it; +and no man living can. I'm willing to admit that sometime, in another +world, that why will get an answer, but meantime it's an awful thing to +live in this world without it if a man has had the kind of life I have. +My life has been harder for me than a harder life might be for another +man who was different. That much I know. There is one thing I've got +to be thankful for. I haven't been the means of sending any more slaves +into this world. I am glad my wife and I haven't any children to ask +'why?' + +"Now, I've begun at the beginning; I'm going on. I have never had +what men call luck. My folks were poor; father and mother were good, +hardworking people, but they had nothing but trouble, sickness, and +death, and losses by fire and flood. We lived near the river, and one +spring our house went, and every stick we owned, and much as ever we +all got out alive. Then lightning struck father's new house, and the +insurance company had failed, and we never got a dollar of insurance. +Then my oldest brother died, just when he was getting started in +business, and his widow and two little children came on father to +support. Then father got rheumatism, and was all twisted, and wasn't +good for much afterward; and my sister Sarah, who had been expecting to +get married, had to give it up and take in sewing and stay at home and +take care of the rest. There was father and George's widow--she was +never good for much at work--and mother and Abby. She was my youngest +sister. As for me, I had a liking for books and wanted to get an +education; might just as well have wanted to get a seat on a throne. I +went to work in the grist-mill of the place where we used to live when I +was only a boy. Then, before I was twenty, I saw that Sarah wasn't going +to hold out. She had grieved a good deal, poor thing, and worked too +hard, so we sold out and came here and bought my farm, with the mortgage +hitching it, and I went to work for dear life. Then Sarah died, and then +father. Along about then there was a girl I wanted to marry, but, Lord, +how could I even ask her? My farm started in as a failure, and it has +kept it up ever since. When there wasn't a drought there was so much +rain everything mildewed; there was a hail-storm that cut everything to +pieces, and there was the caterpillar year. I just managed to pay the +interest on the mortgage; as for paying the principal, I might as well +have tried to pay the national debt. + +"Well, to go back to that girl. She is married and don't live here, and +you ain't like ever to see her, but she was a beauty and something more. +I don't suppose she ever looked twice at me, but losing what you've +never had sometimes is worse than losing everything you've got. When she +got married I guess I knew a little about what the martyrs went through. + +"Just after that George's widow got married again and went away to +live. It took a burden off the rest of us, but I had got attached to the +children. The little girl, Ellen, seemed 'most like my own. Then poor +Myrtle came here to live. She did dressmaking and boarded with our +folks, and I begun to see that she was one of the nervous sort of women +who are pretty bad off alone in the world, and I told her about the +other girl, and she said she didn't mind, and we got married. By that +time mother's brother John--he had never got married-died and left her +a little money, so she and my sister Abby could screw along. They bought +the little house they live in and left the farm, for Abby was always +hard to get along with, though she is a good woman. Mother, though +she is a smart woman, is one of the sort who don't feel called upon to +interfere much with men-folks. I guess she didn't interfere any too +much for my good, or father's, either. Father was a set man. I guess if +mother had been a little harsh with me I might not have asked that awful +'why?' I guess I might have taken my bitter pills and held my tongue, +but I won't blame myself on poor mother. + +"Myrtle and I get on well enough. She seems contented--she has never +said a word to make me think she wasn't. She isn't one of the kind of +women who want much besides decent treatment and a home. Myrtle is +a good woman. I am sorry for her that she got married to me, for she +deserved somebody who could make her a better husband. All the time, +every waking minute, I've been growing more and more rebellious. + +"You see, Mr. Wheaton, never in this world have I had what I wanted, +and more than wanted-needed, and needed far more than happiness. I have +never been able to think of work as anything but a way to get money, +and it wasn't right, not for a man like me, with the feelings I was born +with. And everything has gone wrong even about the work for the money. +I have been hampered and hindered, I don't know whether by Providence +or the Evil One. I have saved just six hundred and forty dollars, and +I have only paid the interest on the mortgage. I knew I ought to have a +little ahead in case Myrtle or I got sick, so I haven't tried to pay +the mortgage, but put a few dollars at a time in the savings-bank, which +will come in handy now." + +The minister regarded him uneasily. "What," he asked, "do you mean to +do?" + +"I mean," replied Christopher, "to stop trying to do what I am hindered +in doing, and do just once in my life what I want to do. Myrtle asked +me this morning if I wasn't going to plow the south field. Well, I ain't +going to plow the south field. I ain't going to make a garden. I ain't +going to try for hay in the ten-acre lot. I have stopped. I have worked +for nothing except just enough to keep soul and body together. I have +had bad luck. But that isn't the real reason why I have stopped. Look +at here, Mr. Wheaton, spring is coming. I have never in my life had a +chance at the spring nor the summer. This year I'm going to have the +spring and the summer, and the fall, too, if I want it. My apples may +fall and rot if they want to. I am going to get as much good of the +season as they do." + +"What are you going to do?" asked Stephen. + +"Well, I will tell you. I ain't a man to make mystery if I am doing +right, and I think I am. You know, I've got a little shack up on Silver +Mountain in the little sugar-orchard I own there; never got enough sugar +to say so, but I put up the shack one year when I was fool enough to +think I might get something. Well, I'm going up there, and I'm going +to live there awhile, and I'm going to sense the things I have had to +hustle by for the sake of a few dollars and cents." + +"But what will your wife do?" + +"She can have the money I've saved, all except enough to buy me a few +provisions. I sha'n't need much. I want a little corn meal, and I will +have a few chickens, and there is a barrel of winter apples left over +that she can't use, and a few potatoes. There is a spring right near the +shack, and there are trout-pools, and by and by there will be berries, +and there's plenty of fire-wood, and there's an old bed and a stove and +a few things in the shack. Now, I'm going to the store and buy what +I want, and I'm going to fix it so Myrtle can draw the money when she +wants it, and then I am going to the shack, and"--Christopher's voice +took on a solemn tone--"I will tell you in just a few words the gist of +what I am going for. I have never in my life had enough of the bread +of life to keep my soul nourished. I have tried to do my duties, but I +believe sometimes duties act on the soul like weeds on a flower. They +crowd it out. I am going up on Silver Mountain to get once, on this +earth, my fill of the bread of life." + +Stephen Wheaton gasped. "But your wife, she will be alone, she will +worry." + +"I want you to go and tell her," said Christopher, "and I've got my +bank-book here; I'm going to write some checks that she can get cashed +when she needs money. I want you to tell her. Myrtle won't make a fuss. +She ain't the kind. Maybe she will be a little lonely, but if she is, +she can go and visit somewhere." Christopher rose. "Can you let me have +a pen and ink?" said he, "and I will write those checks. You can tell +Myrtle how to use them. She won't know how." + +Stephen Wheaton, an hour later, sat in his study, the checks in his +hand, striving to rally his courage. Christopher had gone; he had seen +him from his window, laden with parcels, starting upon the ascent of +Silver Mountain. Christopher had made out many checks for small amounts, +and Stephen held the sheaf in his hand, and gradually his courage to +arise and go and tell Christopher's wife gained strength. At last he +went. + +Myrtle was looking out of the window, and she came quickly to the door. +She looked at him, her round, pretty face gone pale, her plump hands +twitching at her apron. + +"What is it?" said she. + +"Nothing to be alarmed about," replied Stephen. + +Then the two entered the house. Stephen found his task unexpectedly +easy. Myrtle Dodd was an unusual woman in a usual place. + +"It is all right for my husband to do as he pleases," she said with an +odd dignity, as if she were defending him. + +"Mr. Dodd is a strange man. He ought to have been educated and led a +different life," Stephen said, lamely, for he reflected that the words +might be hard for the woman to hear, since she seemed obviously quite +fitted to her life, and her life to her. + +But Myrtle did not take it hardly, seemingly rather with pride. "Yes," +said she, "Christopher ought to have gone to college. He had the head +for it. Instead of that he has just stayed round here and dogged round +the farm, and everything has gone wrong lately. He hasn't had any luck +even with that." Then poor Myrtle Dodd said an unexpectedly wise thing. +"But maybe," said Myrtle, "his bad luck may turn out the best thing for +him in the end." + +Stephen was silent. Then he began explaining about the checks. + +"I sha'n't use any more of his savings than I can help," said Myrtle, +and for the first time her voice quavered. "He must have some clothes +up there," said she. "There ain't bed-coverings, and it is cold nights, +late as it is in the spring. I wonder how I can get the bedclothes and +other things to him. I can't drive, myself, and I don't like to hire +anybody; aside from its being an expense, it would make talk. Mother +Dodd and Abby won't make talk outside the family, but I suppose it will +have to be known." + +"Mr. Dodd didn't want any mystery made over it," Stephen Wheaton said. + +"There ain't going to be any mystery. Christopher has got a right to +live awhile on Silver Mountain if he wants to," returned Myrtle with her +odd, defiant air. + +"But I will take the things up there to him, if you will let me have a +horse and wagon," said Stephen. + +"I will, and be glad. When will you go?" + +"To-morrow." + +"I'll have them ready," said Myrtle. + +After the minister had gone she went into her own bedroom and cried a +little and made the moan of a loving woman sadly bewildered by the ways +of man, but loyal as a soldier. Then she dried her tears and began to +pack a load for the wagon. + +The next morning early, before the dew was off the young grass, Stephen +Wheaton started with the wagon-load, driving the great gray farm-horse +up the side of Silver Mountain. The road was fairly good, making many +winds in order to avoid steep ascents, and Stephen drove slowly. The +gray farmhorse was sagacious. He knew that an unaccustomed hand held +the lines; he knew that of a right he should be treading the plowshares +instead of climbing a mountain on a beautiful spring morning. + +But as for the man driving, his face was radiant, his eyes of young +manhood lit with the light of the morning. He had not owned it, but he +himself had sometimes chafed under the dull necessity of his life, but +here was excitement, here was exhilaration. He drew the sweet air into +his lungs, and the deeper meaning of the spring morning into his soul. +Christopher Dodd interested him to the point of enthusiasm. Not even the +uneasy consideration of the lonely, mystified woman in Dodd's deserted +home could deprive him of admiration for the man's flight into the +spiritual open. He felt that these rights of the man were of the +highest, and that other rights, even human and pitiful ones, should give +them the right of way. + +It was not a long drive. When he reached the shack--merely a one-roomed +hut, with a stovepipe chimney, two windows, and a door--Christopher +stood at the entrance and seemed to illuminate it. Stephen for a minute +doubted his identity. Christopher had lost middle age in a day's time. +He had the look of a triumphant youth. Blue smoke was curling from the +chimney. Stephen smelled bacon frying, and coffee. + +Christopher greeted him with the joyousness of a child. "Lord!" said +he, "did Myrtle send you up with all those things? Well, she is a good +woman. Guess I would have been cold last night if I hadn't been so +happy. How is Myrtle?" + +"She seemed to take it very sensibly when I told her." + +Christopher nodded happily and lovingly. "She would. She can understand +not understanding, and that is more than most women can. It was mighty +good of you to bring the things. You are in time for breakfast. Lord! +Mr. Wheaton, smell the trees, and there are blooms hidden somewhere that +smell sweet. Think of having the common food of man sweetened this way! +First time I fully sensed I was something more than just a man. Lord, I +am paid already. It won't be so very long before I get my fill, at this +rate, and then I can go back. To think I needn't plow to-day! To think +all I have to do is to have the spring! See the light under those +trees!" + +Christopher spoke like a man in ecstasy. He tied the gray horse to a +tree and brought a pail of water for him from the spring near by. + +Then he said to Stephen: "Come right in. The bacon's done, and the +coffee and the corn-cake and the eggs won't take a minute." + +The two men entered the shack. There was nothing there except the little +cooking-stove, a few kitchen utensils hung on pegs on the walls, an old +table with a few dishes, two chairs, and a lounge over which was spread +an ancient buffalo-skin. + +Stephen sat down, and Christopher fried the eggs. Then he bade the +minister draw up, and the two men breakfasted. + +"Ain't it great, Mr. Wheaton?" said Christopher. + +"You are a famous cook, Mr. Dodd," laughed Stephen. He was thoroughly +enjoying himself, and the breakfast was excellent. + +"It ain't that," declared Christopher in his exalted voice. "It ain't +that, young man. It's because the food is blessed." + +Stephen stayed all day on Silver Mountain. He and Christopher went +fishing, and had fried trout for dinner. He took some of the trout home +to Myrtle. + +Myrtle received them with a sort of state which defied the imputation of +sadness. "Did he seem comfortable?" she asked. + +"Comfortable, Mrs. Dodd? I believe it will mean a new lease of life to +your husband. He is an uncommon man." + +"Yes, Christopher is uncommon; he always was," assented Myrtle. + +"You have everything you want? You were not timid last night alone?" +asked the minister. + +"Yes, I was timid. I heard queer noises," said Myrtle, "but I sha'n't +be alone any more. Christopher's niece wrote me she was coming to make +a visit. She has been teaching school, and she lost her school. I rather +guess Ellen is as uncommon for a girl as Christopher is for a man. +Anyway, she's lost her school, and her brother's married, and she don't +want to go there. Besides, they live in Boston, and Ellen, she says +she can't bear the city in spring and summer. She wrote she'd saved a +little, and she'd pay her board, but I sha'n't touch a dollar of her +little savings, and neither would Christopher want me to. He's always +thought a sight of Ellen, though he's never seen much of her. As for me, +I was so glad when her letter came I didn't know what to do. Christopher +will be glad. I suppose you'll be going up there to see him off and on." +Myrtle spoke a bit wistfully, and Stephen did not tell her he had been +urged to come often. + +"Yes, off and on," he replied. + +"If you will just let me know when you are going, I will see that you +have something to take to him--some bread and pies." + +"He has some chickens there," said Stephen. + +"Has he got a coop for them?" + +"Yes, he had one rigged up. He will have plenty of eggs, and he carried +up bacon and corn meal and tea and coffee." + +"I am glad of that," said Myrtle. She spoke with a quiet dignity, but +her face never lost its expression of bewilderment and resignation. + +The next week Stephen Wheaton carried Myrtle's bread and pies to +Christopher on his mountainside. He drove Christopher's gray horse +harnessed in his old buggy, and realized that he himself was getting +much pleasure out of the other man's idiosyncrasy. The morning was +beautiful, and Stephen carried in his mind a peculiar new beauty, +besides. Ellen, Christopher's niece, had arrived the night before, and, +early as it was, she had been astir when he reached the Dodd house. She +had opened the door for him, and she was a goodly sight: a tall girl, +shaped like a boy, with a fearless face of great beauty crowned with +compact gold braids and lit by unswerving blue eyes. Ellen had a square, +determined chin and a brow of high resolve. + +"Good morning," said she, and as she spoke she evidently rated Stephen +and approved, for she smiled genially. "I am Mr. Dodd's niece," said +she. "You are the minister?" + +"Yes." + +"And you have come for the things aunt is to send him?" + +"Yes." + +"Aunt said you were to drive uncle's horse and take the buggy," said +Ellen. "It is very kind of you. While you are harnessing, aunt and I +will pack the basket." + +Stephen, harnessing the gray horse, had a sense of shock; whether +pleasant or otherwise, he could not determine. He had never seen a girl +in the least like Ellen. Girls had never impressed him. She did. + +When he drove around to the kitchen door she and Myrtle were both there, +and he drank a cup of coffee before starting, and Myrtle introduced him. +"Only think, Mr. Wheaton," said she, "Ellen says she knows a great deal +about farming, and we are going to hire Jim Mason and go right ahead." +Myrtle looked adoringly at Ellen. + +Stephen spoke eagerly. "Don't hire anybody," he said. "I used to work on +a farm to pay my way through college. I need the exercise. Let me help." + +"You may do that," said Ellen, "on shares. Neither aunt nor I can think +of letting you work without any recompense." + +"Well, we will settle that," Stephen replied. When he drove away, his +usually calm mind was in a tumult. + +"Your niece has come," he told Christopher, when the two men were +breakfasting together on Silver Mountain. + +"I am glad of that," said Christopher. "All that troubled me about being +here was that Myrtle might wake up in the night and hear noises." + +Christopher had grown even more radiant. He was effulgent with pure +happiness. + +"You aren't going to tap your sugar-maples?" said Stephen, looking up +at the great symmetrical efflorescence of rose and green which towered +about them. + +Christopher laughed. "No, bless 'em," said he, "the trees shall keep +their sugar this season. This week is the first time I've had a chance +to get acquainted with them and sort of enter into their feelings. Good +Lord! I've seen how I can love those trees, Mr. Wheaton! See the pink on +their young leaves! They know more than you and I. They know how to grow +young every spring." + +Stephen did not tell Christopher how Ellen and Myrtle were to work the +farm with his aid. The two women had bade him not. Christopher seemed to +have no care whatever about it. He was simply happy. When Stephen left, +he looked at him and said, with the smile of a child, "Do you think I am +crazy?" + +"Crazy? No," replied Stephen. + +"Well, I ain't. I'm just getting fed. I was starving to death. Glad +you don't think I'm crazy, because I couldn't help matters by saying I +wasn't. Myrtle don't think I am, I know. As for Ellen, I haven't seen +her since she was a little girl. I don't believe she can be much like +Myrtle; but I guess if she is what she promised to turn out she wouldn't +think anybody ought to go just her way to have it the right way." + +"I rather think she is like that, although I saw her for the first time +this morning," said Stephen. + +"I begin to feel that I may not need to stay here much longer," +Christopher called after him. "I begin to feel that I am getting what I +came for so fast that I can go back pretty soon." + +But it was the last day of July before he came. He chose the cool of +the evening after a burning day, and descended the mountain in the full +light of the moon. He had gone up the mountain like an old man; he came +down like a young one. + +When he came at last in sight of his own home, he paused and stared. +Across the grass-land a heavily laden wagon was moving toward his barn. +Upon this wagon heaped with hay, full of silver lights from the moon, +sat a tall figure all in white, which seemed to shine above all things. +Christopher did not see the man on the other side of the wagon leading +the horses; he saw only this wonderful white figure. He hurried forward +and Myrtle came down the road to meet him. She had been watching for +him, as she had watched every night. + +"Who is it on the load of hay?" asked Christopher. + +"Ellen," replied Myrtle. + +"Oh!" said Christopher. "She looked like an angel of the Lord, come to +take up the burden I had dropped while I went to learn of Him." + +"Be you feeling pretty well, Christopher?" asked Myrtle. She thought +that what her husband had said was odd, but he looked well, and he might +have said it simply because he was a man. + +Christopher put his arm around Myrtle. "I am better than I ever was in +my whole life, Myrtle, and I've got more courage to work now than I had +when I was young. I had to go away and get rested, but I've got rested +for all my life. We shall get along all right as long as we live." + +"Ellen and the minister are going to get married come Christmas," said +Myrtle. + +"She is lucky. He is a man that can see with the eyes of other people," +said Christopher. + +It was after the hay had been unloaded and Christopher had been shown +the garden full of lusty vegetables, and told of the great crop with no +drawback, that he and the minister had a few minutes alone together at +the gate. + +"I want to tell you, Mr. Wheaton, that I am settled in my mind now. I +shall never complain again, no matter what happens. I have found that +all the good things and all the bad things that come to a man who tries +to do right are just to prove to him that he is on the right path. They +are just the flowers and sunbeams, and the rocks and snakes, too, that +mark the way. And--I have found out more than that. I have found out the +answer to my 'why?'" + +"What is it?" asked Stephen, gazing at him curiously from the +wonder-height of his own special happiness. + +"I have found out that the only way to heaven for the children of men is +through the earth," said Christopher. + + + + +DEAR ANNIE + +ANNIE HEMPSTEAD lived on a large family canvas, being the eldest of six +children. There was only one boy. The mother was long since dead. If +one can imagine the Hempstead family, the head of which was the Reverend +Silas, pastor of the Orthodox Church in Lynn Corners, as being the +subject of a mild study in village history, the high light would +probably fall upon Imogen, the youngest daughter. As for Annie, she +would apparently supply only a part of the background. + +This afternoon in late July, Annie was out in the front yard of the +parsonage, assisting her brother Benny to rake hay. Benny had not cut +it. Annie had hired a man, although the Hempsteads could not afford to +hire a man, but she had said to Benny, "Benny, you can rake the hay and +get it into the barn if Jim Mullins cuts it, can't you?" And Benny had +smiled and nodded acquiescence. Benny Hempstead always smiled and nodded +acquiescence, but there was in him the strange persistency of a willow +bough, the persistency of pliability, which is the most unconquerable +of all. Benny swayed gracefully in response to all the wishes of others, +but always he remained in his own inadequate attitude toward life. + +Now he was raking to as little purpose as he could and rake at all. The +clover-tops, the timothy grass, and the buttercups moved before his rake +in a faint foam of gold and green and rose, but his sister Annie raised +whirlwinds with hers. The Hempstead yard was large and deep, and had two +great squares given over to wild growths on either side of the gravel +walk, which was bordered with shrubs, flowering in their turn, like a +class of children at school saying their lessons. The spring shrubs had +all spelled out their floral recitations, of course, but great clumps +of peonies were spreading wide skirts of gigantic bloom, like dancers +courtesying low on the stage of summer, and shafts of green-white Yucca +lilies and Japan lilies and clove-pinks still remained in their school +of bloom. + +Benny often stood still, wiped his forehead, leaned on his rake, and +inhaled the bouquet of sweet scents, but Annie raked with never-ceasing +energy. Annie was small and slender and wiry, and moved with angular +grace, her thin, peaked elbows showing beneath the sleeves of her pink +gingham dress, her thin knees outlining beneath the scanty folds of the +skirt. Her neck was long, her shoulder-blades troubled the back of +her blouse at every movement. She was a creature full of ostentatious +joints, but the joints were delicate and rhythmical and charming. Annie +had a charming face, too. It was thin and sunburnt, but still charming, +with a sweet, eager, intent-to-please outlook upon life. This last was +the real attitude of Annie's mind; it was, in fact, Annie. She was +intent to please from her toes to the crown of her brown head. She +radiated good will and loving-kindness as fervently as a lily in the +border radiated perfume. + +It was very warm, and the northwest sky had a threatening mountain +of clouds. Occasionally Annie glanced at it and raked the faster, and +thought complacently of the water-proof covers in the little barn. This +hay was valuable for the Reverend Silas's horse. + +Two of the front windows of the house were filled with girls' heads, and +the regular swaying movement of white-clad arms sewing. The girls sat in +the house because it was so sunny on the piazza in the afternoon. There +were four girls in the sittingroom, all making finery for themselves. +On the other side of the front door one of the two windows was blank; in +the other was visible a nodding gray head, that of Annie's father taking +his afternoon nap. + +Everything was still except the girls' tongues, an occasional burst of +laughter, and the crackling shrill of locusts. Nothing had passed on the +dusty road since Benny and Annie had begun their work. Lynn Corners was +nothing more than a hamlet. It was even seldom that an automobile got +astray there, being diverted from the little city of Anderson, six miles +away, by turning to the left instead of the right. + +Benny stopped again and wiped his forehead, all pink and beaded with +sweat. He was a pretty young man--as pretty as a girl, although large. +He glanced furtively at Annie, then he went with a soft, padding glide, +like a big cat, to the piazza and settled down. He leaned his head +against a post, closed his eyes, and inhaled the sweetness of flowers +alive and dying, of new-mown hay. Annie glanced at him and an angelic +look came over her face. At that moment the sweetness of her nature +seemed actually visible. + +"He is tired, poor boy!" she thought. She also thought that probably +Benny felt the heat more because he was stout. Then she raked faster +and faster. She fairly flew over the yard, raking the severed grass +and flowers into heaps. The air grew more sultry. The sun was not yet +clouded, but the northwest was darker and rumbled ominously. + +The girls in the sitting-room continued to chatter and sew. One of them +might have come out to help this little sister toiling alone, but Annie +did not think of that. She raked with the uncomplaining sweetness of an +angel until the storm burst. The rain came down in solid drops, and the +sky was a sheet of clamoring flame. Annie made one motion toward the +barn, but there was no use. The hay was not half cocked. There was no +sense in running for covers. Benny was up and lumbering into the house, +and her sisters were shutting windows and crying out to her. Annie +deserted her post and fled before the wind, her pink skirts lashing her +heels, her hair dripping. + +When she entered the sitting-room her sisters, Imogen, Eliza, Jane, and +Susan, were all there; also her father, Silas, tall and gaunt and gray. +To the Hempsteads a thunder-storm partook of the nature of a religious +ceremony. The family gathered together, and it was understood that they +were all offering prayer and recognizing God as present on the wings of +the tempest. In reality they were all very nervous in thunder-storms, +with the exception of Annie. She always sent up a little silent petition +that her sisters and brother and father, and the horse and dog and cat, +might escape danger, although she had never been quite sure that she was +not wicked in including the dog and cat. She was surer about the horse +because he was the means by which her father made pastoral calls upon +his distant sheep. Then afterward she just sat with the others and +waited until the storm was over and it was time to open windows and see +if the roof had leaked. Today, however, she was intent upon the hay. In +a lull of the tempest she spoke. + +"It is a pity," she said, "that I was not able to get the hay cocked and +the covers on." + +Then Imogen turned large, sarcastic blue eyes upon her. Imogen was +considered a beauty, pink and white, golden-haired, and dimpled, with +a curious calculating hardness of character and a sharp tongue, so at +variance with her appearance that people doubted the evidence of their +senses. + +"If," said Imogen, "you had only made Benny work instead of encouraging +him to dawdle and finally to stop altogether, and if you had gone +out directly after dinner, the hay would have been all raked up and +covered." + +Nothing could have exceeded the calm and instructive superiority of +Imogen's tone. A mass of soft white fabric lay upon her lap, although +she had removed scissors and needle and thimble to a safe distance. She +tilted her chin with a royal air. When the storm lulled she had stopped +praying. + +Imogen's sisters echoed her and joined in the attack upon Annie. + +"Yes," said Jane, "if you had only started earlier, Annie. I told Eliza +when you went out in the yard that it looked like a shower." + +Eliza nodded energetically. + +"It was foolish to start so late," said Susan, with a calm air of wisdom +only a shade less exasperating than Imogen's. + +"And you always encourage Benny so in being lazy," said Eliza. + +Then the Reverend Silas joined in. "You should have more sense of +responsibility toward your brother, your only brother, Annie," he said, +in his deep pulpit voice. + +"It was after two o'clock when you went out," said Imogen. + +"And all you had to do was the dinner-dishes, and there were very few +to-day," said Jane. + +Then Annie turned with a quick, cat-like motion. Her eyes blazed under +her brown toss of hair. She gesticulated with her little, nervous hands. +Her voice was as sweet and intense as a reed, and withal piercing with +anger. + +"It was not half past one when I went out," said she, "and there was a +whole sinkful of dishes." + +"It was after two. I looked at the clock," said Imogen. + +"It was not." + +"And there were very few dishes," said Jane. + +"A whole sinkful," said Annie, tense with wrath. + +"You always are rather late about starting," said Susan. + +"I am not! I was not! I washed the dishes, and swept the kitchen, and +blacked the stove, and cleaned the silver." + +"I swept the kitchen," said Imogen, severely. "Annie, I am surprised at +you." + +"And you know I cleaned the silver yesterday," said Jane. + +Annie gave a gasp and looked from one to the other. + +"You know you did not sweep the kitchen," said Imogen. + +Annie's father gazed at her severely. "My dear," he said, "how long must +I try to correct you of this habit of making false statements?" + +"Dear Annie does not realize that they are false statements, father," +said Jane. Jane was not pretty, but she gave the effect of a long, +sweet stanza of some fine poetess. She was very tall and slender and +large-eyed, and wore always a serious smile. She was attired in a purple +muslin gown, cut V-shaped at the throat, and, as always, a black velvet +ribbon with a little gold locket attached. The locket contained a coil +of hair. Jane had been engaged to a young minister, now dead three +years, and he had given her the locket. + +Jane no doubt had mourned for her lover, but she had a covert pleasure +in the romance of her situation. She was a year younger than Annie, and +she had loved and lost, and so had achieved a sentimental distinction. +Imogen always had admirers. Eliza had been courted at intervals +half-heartedly by a widower, and Susan had had a few fleeting chances. +But Jane was the only one who had been really definite in her heart +affairs. As for Annie, nobody ever thought of her in such a connection. +It was supposed that Annie had no thought of marriage, that she was +foreordained to remain unwed and keep house for her father and Benny. + +When Jane said that dear Annie did not realize that she made false +statements, she voiced an opinion of the family before which Annie was +always absolutely helpless. Defense meant counter-accusation. Annie +could not accuse her family. She glanced from one to the other. In her +blue eyes were still sparks of wrath, but she said nothing. She felt, as +always, speechless, when affairs reached such a juncture. She began, +in spite of her good sense, to feel guiltily responsible for +everything--for the spoiling of the hay, even for the thunder-storm. +What was more, she even wished to feel guiltily responsible. Anything +was better than to be sure her sisters were not speaking the truth, that +her father was blaming her unjustly. + +Benny, who sat hunched upon himself with the effect of one set of bones +and muscles leaning upon others for support, was the only one who spoke +for her, and even he spoke to little purpose. + +"One of you other girls," said he, in a thick, sweet voice, "might have +come out and helped Annie; then she could have got the hay in." + +They all turned on him. + +"It is all very well for you to talk," said Imogen. "I saw you myself +quit raking hay and sit down on the piazza." + +"Yes," assented Jane, nodding violently, "I saw you, too." + +"You have no sense of your responsibility, Benjamin, and your sister +Annie abets you in evading it," said Silas Hempstead with dignity. + +"Benny feels the heat," said Annie. + +"Father is entirely right," said Eliza. "Benjamin has no sense of +responsibility, and it is mainly owing to Annie." + +"But dear Annie does not realize it," said Jane. + +Benny got up lumberingly and left the room. He loved his sister Annie, +but he hated the mild simmer of feminine rancor to which even his +father's presence failed to add a masculine flavor. Benny was always +leaving the room and allowing his sisters "to fight it out." + +Just after he left there was a tremendous peal of thunder and a blue +flash, and they all prayed again, except Annie; who was occupied with +her own perplexities of life, and not at all afraid. She wondered, as +she had wondered many times before, if she could possibly be in the +wrong, if she were spoiling Benny, if she said and did things without +knowing that she did so, or the contrary. Then suddenly she tightened +her mouth. She knew. This sweet-tempered, anxious-to-please Annie was +entirely sane, she had unusual self-poise. She KNEW that she knew +what she did and said, and what she did not do or say, and a strange +comprehension of her family overwhelmed her. Her sisters were truthful; +she would not admit anything else, even to herself; but they confused +desires and impulses with accomplishment. They had done so all their +lives, some of them from intense egotism, some possibly from slight +twists in their mental organisms. As for her father, he had simply +rather a weak character, and was swayed by the majority. Annie, as she +sat there among the praying group, made the same excuse for her sisters +that they made for her. "They don't realize it," she said to herself. + +When the storm finally ceased she hurried upstairs and opened the +windows, letting in the rain-fresh air. Then she got supper, while her +sisters resumed their needlework. A curious conviction seized her, as +she was hurrying about the kitchen, that in all probability some, if +not all, of her sisters considered that they were getting the supper. +Possibly Jane had reflected that she ought to get supper, then she +had taken another stitch in her work and had not known fairly that her +impulse of duty had not been carried out. Imogen, presumably, was sewing +with the serene consciousness that, since she was herself, it followed +as a matter of course that she was performing all the tasks of the +house. + +While Annie was making an omelet Benny came out into the kitchen and +stood regarding her, hands in pockets, making, as usual, one set of +muscles rest upon another. His face was full of the utmost good nature, +but it also convicted him of too much sloth to obey its commands. + +"Say, Annie, what on earth makes them all pick on you so?" he observed. + +"Hush, Benny! They don't mean to. They don't know it." + +"But say, Annie, you must know that they tell whoppers. You DID sweep +the kitchen." + +"Hush, Benny! Imogen really thinks she swept it." + +"Imogen always thinks she has done everything she ought to do, whether +she has done it or not," said Benny, with unusual astuteness. "Why don't +you up and tell her she lies, Annie?" + +"She doesn't really lie," said Annie. + +"She does lie, even if she doesn't know it," said Benny; "and what is +more, she ought to be made to know it. Say, Annie, it strikes me that +you are doing the same by the girls that they accuse you of doing by me. +Aren't you encouraging them in evil ways?" + +Annie started, and turned and stared at him. + +Benny nodded. "I can't see any difference," he said. "There isn't a day +but one of the girls thinks she has done something you have done, or +hasn't done something you ought to have done, and they blame you all the +time, when you don't deserve it, and you let them, and they don't know +it, and I don't think myself that they know they tell whoppers; but they +ought to know. Strikes me you are just spoiling the whole lot, father +thrown in, Annie. You are a dear, just as they say, but you are too much +of a dear to be good for them." + +Annie stared. + +"You are letting that omelet burn," said Benny. "Say, Annie, I will go +out and turn that hay in the morning. I know I don't amount to much, but +I ain't a girl, anyhow, and I haven't got a cross-eyed soul. That's +what ails a lot of girls. They mean all right, but their souls have been +cross-eyed ever since they came into the world, and it's just such +girls as you who ought to get them straightened out. You know what has +happened to-day. Well, here's what happened yesterday. I don't tell +tales, but you ought to know this, for I believe Tom Reed has his eye +on you, in spite of Imogen's being such a beauty, and Susan's having +manners like silk, and Eliza's giving everybody the impression that she +is too good for this earth, and Jane's trying to make everybody think +she is a sweet martyr, without a thought for mortal man, when that is +only her way of trying to catch one. You know Tom Reed was here last +evening?" + +Annie nodded. Her face turned scarlet, then pathetically pale. She bent +over her omelet, carefully lifting it around the edges. + +"Well," Benny went on, "I know he came to see you, and Imogen went to +the door and ushered him into the parlor, and I was out on the piazza, +and she didn't know it, but I heard her tell him that she thought you +had gone out. She hinted, too, that George Wells had taken you to the +concert in the town hall. He did ask you, didn't he?" + +"Yes." + +"Well, Imogen spoke in this way." Benny lowered his voice and imitated +Imogen to the life. "'Yes, we are all well, thank you. Father is busy, +of course; Jane has run over to Mrs. Jacobs's for a pattern; Eliza is +writing letters; and Susan is somewhere about the house. Annie--well, +Annie-George Wells asked her to go to the concert--I rather--' Then," +said Benny, in his natural voice, "Imogen stopped, and she could say +truthfully that she didn't lie, but anybody would have thought from what +she said that you had gone to the concert with George Wells." + +"Did Tom inquire for me?" asked Annie, in a low voice. + +"Didn't have a chance. Imogen got ahead of him." + +"Oh, well, then it doesn't matter. I dare say he did come to see +Imogen." + +"He didn't," said Benny, stoutly. "And that isn't all. Say, Annie--" + +"What?" + +"Are you going to marry George Wells? It is none of my business, but are +you?" + +Annie laughed a little, although her face was still pale. She had folded +the omelet and was carefully watching it. + +"You need not worry about that, Benny dear," she said. + +"Then what right have the girls to tell so many people the nice things +they hear you say about him?" + +Annie removed the omelet skilfully from the pan to a hot plate, which +she set on the range shelf, and turned to her brother. + +"What nice things do they hear me say?" + +"That he is so handsome; that he has such a good position; that he is +the very best young man in the place; that you should think every girl +would be head over heels in love with him; that every word he speaks is +so bright and clever." + +Annie looked at her brother. + +"I don't believe you ever said one of those things," remarked Benny. + +Annie continued to look at him. + +"Did you?" + +"Benny dear, I am not going to tell you." + +"You won't say you never did, because that would be putting your sisters +in the wrong and admitting that they tell lies. Annie, you are a dear, +but I do think you are doing wrong and spoiling them as much as they say +you are spoiling me." + +"Perhaps I am," said Annie. There was a strange, tragic expression +on her keen, pretty little face. She looked as if her mind was +contemplating strenuous action which was changing her very features. She +had covered the finished omelet and was now cooking another. + +"I wish you would see if everybody is in the house and ready, Benny," +said she. "When this omelet is done they must come right away, or +nothing will be fit to eat. And, Benny dear, if you don't mind, please +get the butter and the cream-pitcher out of the ice-chest. I have +everything else on the table." + +"There is another thing," said Benny. "I don't go about telling tales, +but I do think it is time you knew. The girls tell everybody that you +like to do the housework so much that they don't dare interfere. And +it isn't so. They may have taught themselves to think it is so, but it +isn't. You would like a little time for fancy-work and reading as well +as they do." + +"Please get the cream and butter, and see if they are all in the house," +said Annie. She spoke as usual, but the strange expression remained in +her face. It was still there when the family were all gathered at the +table and she was serving the puffy omelet. Jane noticed it first. + +"What makes you look so odd, Annie?" said she. + +"I don't know how I look odd," replied Annie. + +They all gazed at her then, her father with some anxiety. "You don't +look yourself," he said. "You are feeling well, aren't you, Annie?" + +"Quite well, thank you, father." + +But after the omelet was served and the tea poured Annie rose. + +"Where are you going, Annie?" asked Imogen, in her sarcastic voice. + +"To my room, or perhaps out in the orchard." + +"It will be sopping wet out there after the shower," said Eliza. "Are +you crazy, Annie?" + +"I have on my black skirt, and I will wear rubbers," said Annie, +quietly. "I want some fresh air." + +"I should think you had enough fresh air. You were outdoors all the +afternoon, while we were cooped up in the house," said Jane. + +"Don't you feel well, Annie?" her father asked again, a golden bit of +omelet poised on his fork, as she was leaving the room. + +"Quite well, father dear." + +"But you are eating no supper." + +"I have always heard that people who cook don't need so much to eat," +said Imogen. "They say the essence of the food soaks in through the +pores." + +"I am quite well," Annie repeated, and the door closed behind her. + +"Dear Annie! She is always doing odd things like this," remarked Jane. + +"Yes, she is, things that one cannot account for, but Annie is a dear," +said Susan. + +"I hope she is well," said Annie's father. + +"Oh, she is well enough. Don't worry, father," said Imogen. "Dear Annie +is always doing the unexpected. She looks very well." + +"Yes, dear Annie is quite stout, for her," said Jane. + +"I think she is thinner than I have ever seen her, and the rest of you +look like stuffed geese," said Benny, rudely. + +Imogen turned upon him in dignified wrath. "Benny, you insult your +sisters," said she. "Father, you should really tell Benny that he should +bridle his tongue a little." + +"You ought to bridle yours, every one of you," retorted Benny. "You +girls nag poor Annie every single minute. You let her do all the work, +then you pick at her for it." + +There was a chorus of treble voices. "We nag dear Annie! We pick at dear +Annie! We make her do everything! Father, you should remonstrate with +Benjamin. You know how we all love dear Annie!" + +"Benjamin," began Silas Hempstead, but Benny, with a smothered +exclamation, was up and out of the room. + +Benny quite frankly disliked his sisters, with the exception of Annie. +For his father he had a sort of respectful tolerance. He could not see +why he should have anything else. His father had never done anything +for him except to admonish him. His scanty revenue for his support and +college expenses came from his maternal grandmother, who had been a +woman of parts and who had openly scorned her son-in-law. + +Grandmother Loomis had left a will which occasioned much comment. By its +terms she had provided sparsely but adequately for Benjamin's education +and living until he should graduate; and her house, with all her +personal property, and the bulk of the sum from which she had derived +her own income, fell to her granddaughter Annie. Annie had always +been her grandmother's favorite. There had been covert dismay when the +contents of the will were made known, then one and all had congratulated +the beneficiary, and said abroad that they were glad dear Annie was so +well provided for. It was intimated by Imogen and Eliza that probably +dear Annie would not marry, and in that case Grandmother Loomis's +bequest was so fortunate. She had probably taken that into +consideration. Grandmother Loomis had now been dead four years, and her +deserted home had been for rent, furnished, but it had remained vacant. + +Annie soon came back from the orchard, and after she had cleared +away the supper-table and washed the dishes she went up to her room, +carefully rearranged her hair, and changed her dress. Then she sat down +beside a window and waited and watched, her pointed chin in a cup of one +little thin hand, her soft muslin skirts circling around her, and +the scent of queer old sachet emanating from a flowered ribbon of her +grandmother's which she had tied around her waist. The ancient scent +always clung to the ribbon, suggesting faintly as a dream the musk and +roses and violets of some old summer-time. + +Annie sat there and gazed out on the front yard, which was silvered over +with moonlight. Annie's four sisters all sat out there. They had spread +a rug over the damp grass and brought out chairs. There were five +chairs, although there were only four girls. Annie gazed over the yard +and down the street. She heard the chatter of the girls, which was +inconsequent and absent, as if their minds were on other things than +their conversation. Then suddenly she saw a small red gleam far down the +street, evidently that of a cigar, and also a dark, moving figure. Then +there ensued a subdued wrangle in the yard. Imogen insisted that her +sisters should go into the house. They all resisted, Eliza the most +vehemently. Imogen was arrogant and compelling. Finally she drove them +all into the house except Eliza, who wavered upon the threshold of +yielding. Imogen was obliged to speak very softly lest the approaching +man hear, but Annie, in the window above her, heard every word. + +"You know he is coming to see me," said Imogen, passionately. "You +know--you know, Eliza, and yet every single time he comes, here are you +girls, spying and listening." + +"He comes to see Annie, I believe," said Eliza, in her stubborn voice, +which yet had indecision in it. + +"He never asks for her." + +"He never has a chance. We all tell him, the minute he comes in, that +she is out. But now I am going to stay, anyway." + +"Stay if you want to. You are all a jealous lot. If you girls can't have +a beau yourselves, you begrudge one to me. I never saw such a house as +this for a man to come courting in." + +"I will stay," said Eliza, and this time her voice was wholly firm. +"There is no use in my going, anyway, for the others are coming back." + +It was true. Back flitted Jane and Susan, and by that time Tom Reed had +reached the gate, and his cigar was going out in a shower of sparks on +the gravel walk, and all four sisters were greeting him and urging upon +his acceptance the fifth chair. Annie, watching, saw that the young man +seemed to hesitate. Then her heart leaped and she heard him speak +quite plainly, with a note of defiance and irritation, albeit with +embarrassment. + +"Is Miss Annie in?" asked Tom Reed. + +Imogen answered first, and her harsh voice was honey-sweet. + +"I fear dear Annie is out," she said. "She will be so sorry to miss +you." + +Annie, at her window, made a sudden passionate motion, then she sat +still and listened. She argued fiercely that she was right in so doing. +She felt that the time had come when she must know, for the sake of her +own individuality, just what she had to deal with in the natures of her +own kith and kin. Dear Annie had turned in her groove of sweetness and +gentle yielding, as all must turn who have any strength of character +underneath the sweetness and gentleness. Therefore Annie, at her window +above, listened. + +At first she heard little that bore upon herself, for the conversation +was desultory, about the weather and general village topics. Then Annie +heard her own name. She was "dear Annie," as usual. She listened, fairly +faint with amazement. What she heard from that quartette of treble +voices down there in the moonlight seemed almost like a fairy-tale. +The sisters did not violently incriminate her. They were too astute for +that. They told half-truths. They told truths which were as shadows of +the real facts, and yet not to be contradicted. They built up between +them a story marvelously consistent, unless prearranged, and that Annie +did not think possible. George Wells figured in the tale, and there were +various hints and pauses concerning herself and her own character in +daily life, and not one item could be flatly denied, even if the girl +could have gone down there and, standing in the midst of that moonlit +group, given her sisters the lie. + +Everything which they told, the whole structure of falsehood, had beams +and rafters of truth. Annie felt helpless before it all. To her fancy, +her sisters and Tom Reed seemed actually sitting in a fairy building +whose substance was utter falsehood, and yet which could not be utterly +denied. An awful sense of isolation possessed her. So these were her +own sisters, the sisters whom she had loved as a matter of the simplest +nature, whom she had admired, whom she had served. + +She made no allowance, since she herself was perfectly normal, for the +motive which underlay it all. She could not comprehend the strife of the +women over the one man. Tom Reed was in reality the one desirable match +in the village. Annie knew, or thought she knew, that Tom Reed had it +in mind to love her, and she innocently had it in mind to love him. She +thought of a home of her own and his with delight. She thought of it as +she thought of the roses coming into bloom in June, and she thought of +it as she thought of the every-day happenings of life--cooking, setting +rooms in order, washing dishes. However, there was something else +to reckon with, and that Annie instinctively knew. She had been +long-suffering, and her long-suffering was now regarded as endless. She +had cast her pearls, and they had been trampled. She had turned her +other cheek, and it had been promptly slapped. It was entirely true +that Annie's sisters were not quite worthy of her, that they had taken +advantage of her kindness and gentleness, and had mistaken them for +weakness, to be despised. She did not understand them, nor they her. +They were, on the whole, better than she thought, but with her there was +a stern limit of endurance. Something whiter and hotter than mere wrath +was in the girl's soul as she sat there and listened to the building of +that structure of essential falsehood about herself. + +She waited until Tom Reed had gone. He did not stay long. Then she went +down-stairs with flying feet, and stood among them in the moonlight. Her +father had come out of the study, and Benny had just been entering the +gate as Tom Reed left. Then dear Annie spoke. She really spoke for the +first time in her life, and there was something dreadful about it all. +A sweet nature is always rather dreadful when it turns and strikes, +and Annie struck with the whole force of a nature with a foundation of +steel. She left nothing unsaid. She defended herself and she accused her +sisters as if before a judge. Then came her ultimatum. + +"To-morrow morning I am going over to Grandmother Loomis's house, and +I am going to live there a whole year," she declared, in a slow, steady +voice. "As you know, I have enough to live on, and--in order that no +word of mine can be garbled and twisted as it has been to-night, I speak +not at all. Everything which I have to communicate shall be written in +black and white, and signed with my own name, and black and white cannot +lie." + +It was Jane who spoke first. "What will people say?" she whimpered, +feebly. + +"From what I have heard you all say to-night, whatever you make them," +retorted Annie--the Annie who had turned. + +Jane gasped. Silas Hempstead stood staring, quite dumb before the +sudden problem. Imogen alone seemed to have any command whatever of the +situation. + +"May I inquire what the butcher and grocer are going to think, no +matter what your own sisters think and say, when you give your orders +in writing?" she inquired, achieving a jolt from tragedy to the +commonplace. + +"That is my concern," replied Annie, yet she recognized the difficulty +of that phase of the situation. It is just such trifling matters which +detract from the dignity of extreme attitudes toward existence. Annie +had taken an extreme attitude, yet here were the butcher and the grocer +to reckon with. How could she communicate with them in writing without +appearing absurd to the verge of insanity? Yet even that difficulty had +a solution. + +Annie thought it out after she had gone to bed that night. She had been +imperturbable with her sisters, who had finally come in a body to +make entreaties, although not apologies or retractions. There was +a stiff-necked strain in the Hempstead family, and apologies and +retractions were bitterer cuds for them to chew than for most. She had +been imperturbable with her father, who had quoted Scripture and prayed +at her during family worship. She had been imperturbable even with +Benny, who had whispered to her: "Say, Annie, I don't blame you, but it +will be a hell of a time without you. Can't you stick it out?" + +But she had had a struggle before her own vision of the butcher and the +grocer, and their amazement when she ceased to speak to them. Then she +settled that with a sudden leap of inspiration. It sounded too apropos +to be life, but there was a little deaf-anddumb girl, a far-away +relative of the Hempsteads, who lived with her aunt Felicia in +Anderson. She was a great trial to her aunt Felicia, who was a widow +and well-to-do, and liked the elegancies and normalities of life. This +unfortunate little Effie Hempstead could not be placed in a charitable +institution on account of the name she bore. Aunt Felicia considered it +her worldly duty to care for her, but it was a trial. + +Annie would take Effie off Aunt Felicia's hands, and no comment would +be excited by a deaf-anddumb girl carrying written messages to the +tradesmen, since she obviously could not give them orally. The only +comment would be on Annie's conduct in holding herself aloof from her +family and the village people generally. + +The next morning, when Annie went away, there was an excited conclave +among the sisters. + +"She means to do it," said Susan, and she wept. + +Imogen's handsome face looked hard and set. "Let her, if she wants to," +said she. + +"Only think what people will say!" wailed Jane. + +Imogen tossed her head. "I shall have something to say myself," she +returned. "I shall say how much we all regret that dear Annie has such +a difficult disposition that she felt she could not live with her own +family and must be alone." + +"But," said Jane, blunt in her distress, "will they believe it?" + +"Why will they not believe it, pray?" + +"Why, I am afraid people have the impression that dear Annie has--" Jane +hesitated. + +"What?" asked Imogen, coldly. She looked very handsome that morning. Not +a waved golden hair was out of place on her carefully brushed head. She +wore the neatest of blue linen skirts and blouses, with a linen collar +and white tie. There was something hard but compelling about her blond +beauty. + +"I am afraid," said Jane, "that people have a sort of general impression +that dear Annie has perhaps as sweet a disposition as any of us, perhaps +sweeter." + +"Nobody says that dear Annie has not a sweet disposition," said Imogen, +taking a careful stitch in her embroidery. "But a sweet disposition is +very often extremely difficult for other people. It constantly puts them +in the wrong. I am well aware of the fact that dear Annie does a great +deal for all of us, but it is sometimes irritating. Of course it is +quite certain that she must have a feeling of superiority because of it, +and she should not have it." + +Sometimes Eliza made illuminating speeches. "I suppose it follows, +then," said she, with slight irony, "that only an angel can have a very +sweet disposition without offending others." + +But Imogen was not in the least nonplussed. She finished her line of +thought. "And with all her sweet disposition," said she, "nobody can +deny that dear Annie is peculiar, and peculiarity always makes people +difficult for other people. Of course it is horribly peculiar what she +is proposing to do now. That in itself will be enough to convince people +that dear Annie must be difficult. Only a difficult person could do such +a strange thing." + +"Who is going to get up and get breakfast in the morning, and wash the +dishes?" inquired Jane, irrelevantly. + +"All I ever want for breakfast is a bit of fruit, a roll, and an egg, +besides my coffee," said Imogen, with her imperious air. + +"Somebody has to prepare it." + +"That is a mere nothing," said Imogen, and she took another stitch. + +After a little, Jane and Eliza went by themselves and discussed the +problem. + +"It is quite evident that Imogen means to do nothing," said Jane. + +"And also that she will justify herself by the theory that there is +nothing to be done," said Eliza. + +"Oh, well," said Jane, "I will get up and get breakfast, of course. I +once contemplated the prospect of doing it the rest of my life." + +Eliza assented. "I can understand that it will not be so hard for you," +she said, "and although I myself always aspired to higher things than +preparing breakfasts, still, you did not, and it is true that you would +probably have had it to do if poor Henry had lived, for he was not one +to ever have a very large salary." + +"There are better things than large salaries," said Jane, and her face +looked sadly reminiscent. After all, the distinction of being the only +one who had been on the brink of preparing matrimonial breakfasts was +much. She felt that it would make early rising and early work endurable +to her, although she was not an active young woman. + +"I will get a dish-mop and wash the dishes," said Eliza. "I can manage +to have an instructive book propped open on the kitchen table, and keep +my mind upon higher things as I do such menial tasks." + +Then Susan stood in the doorway, a tall figure gracefully swaying +sidewise, long-throated and prominent-eyed. She was the least +attractive-looking of any of the sisters, but her manners were so +charming, and she was so perfectly the lady, that it made up for any +lack of beauty. + +"I will dust," said Susan, in a lovely voice, and as she spoke she +involuntarily bent and swirled her limp muslins in such a way that she +fairly suggested a moral duster. There was the making of an actress in +Susan. Nobody had ever been able to decide what her true individual self +was. Quite unconsciously, like a chameleon, she took upon herself the +characteristics of even inanimate things. Just now she was a duster, and +a wonderfully creditable duster. + +"Who," said Jane, "is going to sweep? Dear Annie has always done that." + +"I am not strong enough to sweep. I am very sorry," said Susan, who +remained a duster, and did not become a broom. + +"If we have system," said Eliza, vaguely, "the work ought not to be so +very hard." + +"Of course not," said Imogen. She had come in and seated herself. Her +three sisters eyed her, but she embroidered imperturbably. The same +thought was in the minds of all. Obviously Imogen was the very one to +take the task of sweeping upon herself. That hard, compact, young body +of hers suggested strenuous household work. Embroidery did not seem to +be her role at all. + +But Imogen had no intention of sweeping. Indeed, the very imagining of +such tasks in connection with herself was beyond her. She did not even +dream that her sisters expected it of her. + +"I suppose," said Jane, "that we might be able to engage Mrs. Moss to +come in once a week and do the sweeping." + +"It would cost considerable," said Susan. + +"But it has to be done." + +"I should think it might be managed, with system, if you did not hire +anybody," said Imogen, calmly. + +"You talk of system as if it were a suction cleaner," said Eliza, with +a dash of asperity. Sometimes she reflected how she would have hated +Imogen had she not been her sister. + +"System is invaluable," said Imogen. She looked away from her embroidery +to the white stretch of country road, arched over with elms, and +her beautiful eyes had an expression as if they sighted system, the +justified settler of all problems. + +Meantime, Annie Hempstead was traveling to Anderson in the jolting +trolley-car, and trying to settle her emotions and her outlook upon +life, which jolted worse than the car upon a strange new track. She +had not the slightest intention of giving up her plan, but she realized +within herself the sensations of a revolutionist. Who in her family, +for generations and generations, had ever taken the course which she was +taking? She was not exactly frightened--Annie had splendid courage when +once her blood was up--but she was conscious of a tumult and grind of +adjustment to a new level which made her nervous. + +She reached the end of the car line, then walked about half a mile to +her Aunt Felicia Hempstead's house. It was a handsome house, after the +standard of nearly half a century ago. It had an opulent air, with +its swelling breasts of bay windows, through which showed fine lace +curtains; its dormer-windows, each with its carefully draped curtains; +its black-walnut front door, whose side-lights were screened with +medallioned lace. The house sat high on three terraces of velvet-like +grass, and was surmounted by stone steps in three instalments, each of +which was flanked by stone lions. + +Annie mounted the three tiers of steps between the stone lions and rang +the front-door bell, which was polished so brightly that it winked +at her like a brazen eye. Almost directly the door was opened by an +immaculate, white-capped and white-aproned maid, and Annie was ushered +into the parlor. When Annie had been a little thing she had been +enamoured of and impressed by the splendor of this parlor. Now she had +doubts of it, in spite of the long, magnificent sweep of lace curtains, +the sheen of carefully kept upholstery, the gleam of alabaster +statuettes, and the even piles of gilt-edged books upon the polished +tables. + +Soon Mrs. Felicia Hempstead entered, a tall, well-set-up woman, with +a handsome face and keen eyes. She wore her usual morning costume--a +breakfast sacque of black silk profusely trimmed with lace, and a black +silk skirt. She kissed Annie, with a slight peck of closely set lips, +for she liked her. Then she sat down opposite her and regarded her with +as much of a smile as her sternly set mouth could manage, and inquired +politely regarding her health and that of the family. When Annie +broached the subject of her call, the set calm of her face relaxed, and +she nodded. + +"I know what your sisters are. You need not explain to me," she said. + +"But," returned Annie, "I do not think they realize. It is only because +I--" + +"Of course," said Felicia Hempstead. "It is because they need a dose +of bitter medicine, and you hope they will be the better for it. I +understand you, my dear. You have spirit enough, but you don't get it +up often. That is where they make their mistake. Often the meek are meek +from choice, and they are the ones to beware of. I don't blame you for +trying it. And you can have Effie and welcome. I warn you that she is a +little wearing. Of course she can't help her affliction, poor child, but +it is dreadful. I have had her taught. She can read and write very +well now, poor child, and she is not lacking, and I have kept her well +dressed. I take her out to drive with me every day, and am not ashamed +to have her seen with me. If she had all her faculties she would not be +a bad-looking little girl. Now, of course, she has something of a vacant +expression. That comes, I suppose, from her not being able to hear. She +has learned to speak a few words, but I don't encourage her doing that +before people. It is too evident that there is something wrong. She +never gets off one tone. But I will let her speak to you. She will be +glad to go with you. She likes you, and I dare say you can put up with +her. A woman when she is alone will make a companion of a brazen image. +You can manage all right for everything except her clothes and lessons. +I will pay for them." + +"Can't I give her lessons?" + +"Well, you can try, but I am afraid you will need to have Mr. Freer come +over once a week. It seems to me to be quite a knack to teach the deaf +and dumb. You can see. I will have Effie come in and tell her about +the plan. I wanted to go to Europe this summer, and did not know how to +manage about Effie. It will be a godsend to me, this arrangement, and of +course after the year is up she can come back." + +With that Felicia touched a bell, the maid appeared with automatic +readiness, and presently a tall little girl entered. She was very well +dressed. Her linen frock was hand-embroidered, and her shoes were ultra. +Her pretty shock of fair hair was tied with French ribbon in a fetching +bow, and she made a courtesy which would have befitted a little +princess. Poor Effie's courtesy was the one feature in which Felicia +Hempstead took pride. After making it the child always glanced at her +for approval, and her face lighted up with pleasure at the faint smile +which her little performance evoked. Effie would have been a pretty +little girl had it not been for that vacant, bewildered expression of +which Felicia had spoken. It was the expression of one shut up with +the darkest silence of life, that of her own self, and beauty was +incompatible with it. + +Felicia placed her stiff forefinger upon her own lips and nodded, and +the child's face became transfigured. She spoke in a level, awful voice, +utterly devoid of inflection, and full of fright. Her voice was as the +first attempt of a skater upon ice. However, it was intelligible. + +"Good morning," said she. "I hope you are well." Then she courtesied +again. That little speech and one other, "Thank you, I am very well," +were all she had mastered. Effie's instruction had begun rather late, +and her teacher was not remarkably skilful. + +When Annie's lips moved in response, Effie's face fairly glowed with +delight and affection. The little girl loved Annie. Then her questioning +eyes sought Felicia, who beckoned, and drew from the pocket of her +rustling silk skirt a tiny pad and pencil. Effie crossed the room and +stood at attention while Felicia wrote. When she had read the words on +the pad she gave one look at Annie, then another at Felicia, who nodded. + +Effie courtesied before Annie like a fairy dancer. "Good morning. I hope +you are well," she said. Then she courtesied again and said, "Thank you, +I am very well." Her pretty little face was quite eager with love and +pleasure, and yet there was an effect as of a veil before the happy +emotion in it. The contrast between the awful, level voice and the grace +of motion and evident delight at once shocked and compelled pity. Annie +put her arms around Effie and kissed her. + +"You dear little thing," she said, quite forgetting that Effie could not +hear. + +Felicia Hempstead got speedily to work, and soon Effie's effects were +packed and ready for transportation upon the first express to Lynn +Corners, and Annie and the little girl had boarded the trolley thither. + +Annie Hempstead had the sensation of one who takes a cold plunge--half +pain and fright, half exhilaration and triumph--when she had fairly +taken possession of her grandmother's house. There was genuine girlish +pleasure in looking over the stock of old china and linen and ancient +mahoganies, in starting a fire in the kitchen stove, and preparing a +meal, the written order for which Effie had taken to the grocer and +butcher. There was genuine delight in sitting down with Effie at her +very own table, spread with her grandmother's old damask and pretty +dishes, and eating, without hearing a word of unfavorable comment upon +the cookery. But there was a certain pain and terror in trampling upon +that which it was difficult to define, either her conscience or sense of +the divine right of the conventional. + +But that night after Effie had gone to bed, and the house was set to +rights, and she in her cool muslin was sitting on the front-door step, +under the hooded trellis covered with wistaria, she was conscious of +entire emancipation. She fairly gloated over her new estate. + +"To-night one of the others will really have to get the supper, and wash +the dishes, and not be able to say she did it and I didn't, when I +did," Annie thought with unholy joy. She knew perfectly well that her +viewpoint was not sanctified, but she felt that she must allow her +soul to have its little witch-caper or she could not answer for the +consequences. There might result spiritual atrophy, which would be much +more disastrous than sin and repentance. It was either the continuance +of her old life in her father's house, which was the ignominious and +harmful one of the scapegoat, or this. She at last reveled in this. Here +she was mistress. Here what she did, she did, and what she did not do +remained undone. Here her silence was her invincible weapon. Here she +was free. + +The soft summer night enveloped her. The air was sweet with flowers +and the grass which lay still unraked in her father's yard. A momentary +feeling of impatience seized her; then she dismissed it, and peace came. +What had she to do with that hay? Her father would be obliged to buy hay +if it were not raked over and dried, but what of that? She had nothing +to do with it. + +She heard voices and soft laughter. A dark shadow passed along the +street. Her heart quickened its beat. The shadow turned in at her +father's gate. There was a babel of welcoming voices, of which Annie +could not distinguish one articulate word. She sat leaning forward, her +eyes intent upon the road. Then she heard the click of her father's gate +and the dark, shadowy figure reappeared in the road. Annie knew who it +was; she knew that Tom Reed was coming to see her. For a second, rapture +seized her, then dismay. How well she knew her sisters-how very well! +Not one of them would have given him the slightest inkling of the true +situation. They would have told him, by the sweetest of insinuations, +rather than by straight statements, that she had left her father's roof +and come over here, but not one word would have been told him concerning +her vow of silence. They would leave that for him to discover, to his +amazement and anger. + +Annie rose and fled. She closed the door, turned the key softly, and ran +up-stairs in the dark. Kneeling before a window on the farther side from +her old home, she watched with eager eyes the young man open the gate +and come up the path between the old-fashioned shrubs. The clove-like +fragrance of the pinks in the border came in her face. Annie watched +Tom Reed disappear beneath the trellised hood of the door; then the bell +tinkled through the house. It seemed to Annie that she heard it as she +had never heard anything before. Every nerve in her body seemed urging +her to rise and go down-stairs and admit this young man whom she loved. +But her will, turned upon itself, kept her back. She could not rise +and go down; something stronger than her own wish restrained her. She +suffered horribly, but she remained. The bell tinkled again. There was a +pause, then it sounded for the third time. + +Annie leaned against the window, faint and trembling. It was rather +horrible to continue such a fight between will and inclination, but she +held out. She would not have been herself had she not done so. Then she +saw Tom Reed's figure emerge from under the shadow of the door, pass +down the path between the sweet-flowering shrubs, seeming to stir up +the odor of the pinks as he did so. He started to go down the road; +then Annie heard a loud, silvery call, with a harsh inflection, from her +father's house. "Imogen is calling him back," she thought. + +Annie was out of the room, and, slipping softly down-stairs and out into +the yard, crouched close to the fence overgrown with sweetbrier, its +foundation hidden in the mallow, and there she listened. She wanted to +know what Imogen and her other sisters were about to say to Tom Reed, +and she meant to know. She heard every word. The distance was not great, +and her sisters' voices carried far, in spite of their honeyed tones +and efforts toward secrecy. By the time Tom had reached the gate of +the parsonage they had all crowded down there, a fluttering assembly in +their snowy summer muslins, like white doves. Annie heard Imogen first. +Imogen was always the ringleader. + +"Couldn't you find her?" asked Imogen. + +"No. Rang three times," replied Tom. He had a boyish voice, and his +chagrin showed plainly in it. Annie knew just how he looked, how dear +and big and foolish, with his handsome, bewildered face, blurting out to +her sisters his disappointment, with innocent faith in their sympathy. + +Then Annie heard Eliza speak in a small, sweet voice, which yet, to one +who understood her, carried in it a sting of malice. "How very strange!" +said Eliza. + +Jane spoke next. She echoed Eliza, but her voice was more emphatic and +seemed multiple, as echoes do. "Yes, very strange indeed," said Jane. + +"Dear Annie is really very singular lately. It has distressed us all, +especially father," said Susan, but deprecatingly. + +Then Imogen spoke, and to the point. "Annie must be in that house," said +she. "She went in there, and she could not have gone out without our +seeing her." + +Annie could fairly see the toss of Imogen's head as she spoke. + +"What in thunder do you all mean?" asked Tom Reed, and there was a +bluntness, almost a brutality, in his voice which was refreshing. + +"I do not think such forcible language is becoming, especially at the +parsonage," said Jane. + +Annie distinctly heard Tom Reed snort. "Hang it if I care whether it is +becoming or not," said he. + +"You seem to forget that you are addressing ladies, sir," said Jane. + +"Don't forget it for a blessed minute," returned Tom Reed. "Wish I +could. You make it too evident that you are--ladies, with every word you +speak, and all your beating about the bush. A man would blurt it out, +and then I would know where I am at. Hang it if I know now. You all say +that your sister is singular and that she distresses your father, and +you"--addressing Imogen--"say that she must be in that house. You are +the only one who does make a dab at speaking out; I will say that much +for you. Now, if she is in that house, what in thunder is the matter?" + +"I really cannot stay here and listen to such profane language," said +Jane, and she flitted up the path to the house like an enraged white +moth. She had a fleecy white shawl over her head, and her pale outline +was triangular. + +"If she calls that profane, I pity her," said Tom Reed. He had known the +girls since they were children, and had never liked Jane. He continued, +still addressing Imogen. "For Heaven's sake, if she is in that house, +what is the matter?" said he. "Doesn't the bell ring? Yes, it does ring, +though it is as cracked as the devil. I heard it. Has Annie gone deaf? +Is she sick? Is she asleep? It is only eight o'clock. I don't believe +she is asleep. Doesn't she want to see me? Is that the trouble? What +have I done? Is she angry with me?" + +Eliza spoke, smoothly and sweetly. "Dear Annie is singular," said she. + +"What the dickens do you mean by singular? I have known Annie ever since +she was that high. It never struck me that she was any more singular +than other girls, except she stood an awful lot of nagging without +making a kick. Here you all say she is singular, as if you meant she +was"--Tom hesitated a second--"crazy," said he. "Now, I know that Annie +is saner than any girl around here, and that simply does not go down. +What do you all mean by singular?" + +"Dear Annie may not be singular, but her actions are sometimes +singular," said Susan. "We all feel badly about this." + +"You mean her going over to her grandmother's house to live? I don't +know whether I think that is anything but horse-sense. I have eyes in my +head, and I have used them. Annie has worked like a dog here; I suppose +she needed a rest." + +"We all do our share of the work," said Eliza, calmly, "but we do it in +a different way from dear Annie. She makes very hard work of work. +She has not as much system as we could wish. She tires herself +unnecessarily." + +"Yes, that is quite true," assented Imogen. "Dear Annie gets very tired +over the slightest tasks, whereas if she went a little more slowly +and used more system the work would be accomplished well and with no +fatigue. There are five of us to do the work here, and the house is very +convenient." + +There was a silence. Tom Reed was bewildered. "But--doesn't she want to +see me?" he asked, finally. + +"Dear Annie takes very singular notions sometimes," said Eliza, softly. + +"If she took a notion not to go to the door when she heard the bell +ring, she simply wouldn't," said Imogen, whose bluntness of speech was, +after all, a relief. + +"Then you mean that you think she took a notion not to go to the door?" +asked Tom, in a desperate tone. + +"Dear Annie is very singular," said Eliza, with such softness and +deliberation that it was like a minor chord of music. + +"Do you know of anything she has against me?" asked Tom of Imogen; but +Eliza answered for her. + +"Dear Annie is not in the habit of making confidantes of her sisters," +said she, "but we do know that she sometimes takes unwarranted +dislikes." + +"Which time generally cures," said Susan. + +"Oh yes," assented Eliza, "which time generally cures. She can have no +reason whatever for avoiding you. You have always treated her well." + +"I have always meant to," said Tom, so miserably and helplessly that +Annie, listening, felt her heart go out to this young man, badgered by +females, and she formed a sudden resolution. + +"You have not seen very much of her, anyway," said Imogen. + +"I have always asked for her, but I understood she was busy," said Tom, +"and that was the reason why I saw her so seldom." + +"Oh," said Eliza, "busy!" She said it with an indescribable tone. + +"If," supplemented Imogen, "there was system, there would be no need of +any one of us being too busy to see our friends." + +"Then she has not been busy? She has not wanted to see me?" said Tom. "I +think I understand at last. I have been a fool not to before. You girls +have broken it to me as well as you could. Much obliged, I am sure. Good +night." + +"Won't you come in?" asked Imogen. + +"We might have some music," said Eliza. + +"And there is an orange cake, and I will make coffee," said Susan. + +Annie reflected rapidly how she herself had made that orange cake, and +what queer coffee Susan would be apt to concoct. + +"No, thank you," said Tom Reed, briskly. "I will drop in another +evening. Think I must go home now. I have some important letters. Good +night, all." + +Annie made a soft rush to the gate, crouching low that her sisters might +not see her. They flocked into the house with irascible murmurings, like +scolding birds, while Annie stole across the grass, which had begun to +glisten with silver wheels of dew. She held her skirts closely wrapped +around her, and stepped through a gap in the shrubs beside the walk, +then sped swiftly to the gate. She reached it just as Tom Reed was +passing with a quick stride. + +"Tom," said Annie, and the young man stopped short. + +He looked in her direction, but she stood close to a great +snowball-bush, and her dress was green muslin, and he did not see her. +Thinking that he had been mistaken, he started on, when she called +again, and this time she stepped apart from the bush and her voice +sounded clear as a flute. + +"Tom," she said. "Stop a minute, please." + +Tom stopped and came close to her. In the dim light she could see that +his face was all aglow, like a child's, with delight and surprise. + +"Is that you, Annie?" he said. + +"Yes. I want to speak to you, please." + +"I have been here before, and I rang the bell three times. Then you were +out, although your sisters thought not." + +"No, I was in the house." + +"You did not hear the bell?" + +"Yes, I heard it every time." + +"Then why--?" + +"Come into the house with me and I will tell you; at least I will tell +you all I can." + +Annie led the way and the young man followed. He stood in the dark entry +while Annie lit the parlor lamp. The room was on the farther side of the +house from the parsonage. + +"Come in and sit down," said Annie. Then the young man stepped into +a room which was pretty in spite of itself. There was an old Brussels +carpet with an enormous rose pattern. The haircloth furniture gave out +gleams like black diamonds under the light of the lamp. In a corner +stood a what-not piled with branches of white coral and shells. Annie's +grandfather had been a sea-captain, and many of his spoils were in the +house. Possibly Annie's own occupation of it was due to an adventurous +strain inherited from him. Perhaps the same impulse which led him to +voyage to foreign shores had led her to voyage across a green yard to +the next house. + +Tom Reed sat down on the sofa. Annie sat in a rocking-chair near by. At +her side was a Chinese teapoy, a nest of lacquer tables, and on it stood +a small, squat idol. Annie's grandmother had been taken to task by her +son-in-law, the Reverend Silas, for harboring a heathen idol, but she +had only laughed, + +"Guess as long as I don't keep heathen to bow down before him, he can't +do much harm," she had said. + +Now the grotesque face of the thing seemed to stare at the two +Occidental lovers with the strange, calm sarcasm of the Orient, but they +had no eyes or thought for it. + +"Why didn't you come to the door if you heard the bell ring?" asked Tom +Reed, gazing at Annie, slender as a blade of grass in her clinging green +gown. + +"Because I was not able to break my will then. I had to break it to go +out in the yard and ask you to come in, but when the bell rang I hadn't +got to the point where I could break it." + +"What on earth do you mean, Annie?" + +Annie laughed. "I don't wonder you ask," she said, "and the worst of +it is I can't half answer you. I wonder how much, or rather how little +explanation will content you?" + +Tom Reed gazed at her with the eyes of a man who might love a woman and +have infinite patience with her, relegating his lack of understanding of +her woman's nature to the background, as a thing of no consequence. + +"Mighty little will do for me," he said, "mighty little, Annie dear, if +you will only tell a fellow you love him." + +Annie looked at him, and her thin, sweet face seemed to have a luminous +quality, like a crescent moon. Her look was enough. + +"Then you do?" said Tom Reed. + +"You have never needed to ask," said Annie. "You knew." + +"I haven't been so sure as you think," said Tom. "Suppose you come over +here and sit beside me. You look miles away." + +Annie laughed and blushed, but she obeyed. She sat beside Tom and +let him put his arm around her. She sat up straight, by force of her +instinctive maidenliness, but she kissed him back when he kissed her. + +"I haven't been so sure," repeated Tom. "Annie darling, why have I been +unable to see more of you? I have fairly haunted your house, and seen +the whole lot of your sisters, especially Imogen, but somehow or other +you have been as slippery as an eel. I have always asked for you, but +you were always out or busy." + +"I have been very busy," said Annie, evasively. She loved this young man +with all her heart, but she had an enduring loyalty to her own flesh and +blood. + +Tom was very literal. "Say, Annie," he blurted out, "I begin to think +you have had to do most of the work over there. Now, haven't you? Own +up." + +Annie laughed sweetly. She was so happy that no sense of injury could +possibly rankle within her. "Oh, well," she said, lightly. "Perhaps. I +don't know. I guess housekeeping comes rather easier to me than to the +others. I like it, you know, and work is always easier when one likes +it. The other girls don't take to it so naturally, and they get very +tired, and it has seemed often that I was the one who could hurry the +work through and not mind." + +"I wonder if you will stick up for me the way you do for your sisters +when you are my wife?" said Tom, with a burst of love and admiration. +Then he added: "Of course you are going to be my wife, Annie? You know +what this means?" + +"If you think I will make you as good a wife as you can find," said +Annie. + +"As good a wife! Annie, do you really know what you are?" + +"Just an ordinary girl, with no special talent for anything." + +"You are the most wonderful girl that ever walked the earth," exclaimed +Tom. "And as for talent, you have the best talent in the whole world; +you can love people who are not worthy to tie your shoestrings, and +think you are looking up when in reality you are looking down. That is +what I call the best talent in the whole world for a woman." Tom Reed +was becoming almost subtle. + +Annie only laughed happily again. "Well, you will have to wait and find +out," said she. + +"I suppose," said Tom, "that you came over here because you were tired +out, this hot weather. I think you were sensible, but I don't think you +ought to be here alone." + +"I am not alone," replied Annie. "I have poor little Effie Hempstead +with me." + +"That deaf-and-dumb child? I should think this heathen god would be +about as much company." + +"Why, Tom, she is human, if she is deaf and dumb." + +Tom eyed her shrewdly. "What did you mean when you said you had broken +your will?" he inquired. + +"My will not to speak for a while," said Annie, faintly. + +"Not to speak--to any one?" + +Annie nodded. + +"Then you have broken your resolution by speaking to me?" + +Annie nodded again. + +"But why shouldn't you speak? I don't understand." + +"I wondered how little I could say, and have you satisfied," Annie +replied, sadly. + +Tom tightened his arm around her. "You precious little soul," he said. +"I am satisfied. I know you have some good reason for not wanting to +speak, but I am plaguey glad you spoke to me, for I should have been +pretty well cast down if you hadn't, and to-morrow I have to go away." + +Annie leaned toward him. "Go away!" + +"Yes; I have to go to California about that confounded Ames will case. +And I don't know exactly where, on the Pacific coast, the parties I have +to interview may be, and I may have to be away weeks, possibly months. +Annie darling, it did seem to me a cruel state of things to have to go +so far, and leave you here, living in such a queer fashion, and not +know how you felt. Lord! but I'm glad you had sense enough to call me, +Annie." + +"I couldn't let you go by, when it came to it, and Tom--" + +"What, dear?" + +"I did an awful mean thing: something I never was guilty of before. +I--listened." + +"Well, I don't see what harm it did. You didn't hear much to your or +your sisters' disadvantage, that I can remember. They kept calling you +'dear.'" + +"Yes," said Annie, quickly. Again, such was her love and thankfulness +that a great wave of love and forgiveness for her sisters swept over +her. Annie had a nature compounded of depths of sweetness; nobody +could be mistaken with regard to that. What they did mistake was the +possibility of even sweetness being at bay at times, and remaining +there. + +"You don't mean to speak to anybody else?" asked Tom. + +"Not for a year, if I can avoid it without making comment which might +hurt father." + +"Why, dear?" + +"That is what I cannot tell you," replied Annie, looking into his face +with a troubled smile. + +Tom looked at her in a puzzled way, then he kissed her. + +"Oh, well, dear," he said, "it is all right. I know perfectly well you +would do nothing in which you were not justified, and you have spoken to +me, anyway, and that is the main thing. I think if I had been obliged +to start to-morrow without a word from you I shouldn't have cared a hang +whether I ever came back or not. You are the only soul to hold me here; +you know that, darling." + +"Yes," replied Annie. + +"You are the only one," repeated Tom, "but it seems to me this minute as +if you were a whole host, you dear little soul. But I don't quite like +to leave you here living alone, except for Effie." + +"Oh, I am within a stone's-throw of father's," said Annie, lightly. + +"I admit that. Still, you are alone. Annie, when are you going to marry +me?" + +Annie regarded him with a clear, innocent look. She had lived such a +busy life that her mind was unfilmed by dreams. "Whenever you like, +after you come home," said she. + +"It can't be too soon for me. I want my wife and I want my home. What +will you do while I am gone, dear?" + +Annie laughed. "Oh, I shall do what I have seen other girls do--get +ready to be married." + +"That means sewing, lots of hemming and tucking and stitching, doesn't +it?" + +"Of course." + +"Girls are so funny," said Tom. "Now imagine a man sitting right down +and sewing like mad on his collars and neckties and shirts the minute a +girl said she'd marry him!" + +"Girls like it." + +"Well, I suppose they do," said Tom, and he looked down at Annie from +a tender height of masculinity, and at the same time seemed to look up +from the valley of one who cannot understand the subtle and poetical +details in a woman's soul. + +He did not stay long after that, for it was late. As he passed through +the gate, after a tender farewell, Annie watched him with shining eyes. +She was now to be all alone, but two things she had, her freedom and her +love, and they would suffice. + +The next morning Silas Hempstead, urged by his daughters, walked +solemnly over to the next house, but he derived little satisfaction. +Annie did not absolutely refuse to speak. She had begun to realize that +carrying out her resolution to the extreme letter was impossible. But +she said as little as she could. + +"I have come over here to live for the present. I am of age, and have a +right to consult my own wishes. My decision is unalterable." Having said +this much, Annie closed her mouth and said no more. Silas argued and +pleaded. Annie sat placidly sewing beside one front window of the sunny +sittingroom. Effie, with a bit of fancy-work, sat at another. Finally +Silas went home defeated, with a last word, half condemnatory, half +placative. Silas was not the sort to stand firm against such feminine +strength as his daughter Annie's. However, he secretly held her dearer +than all his other children. + +After her father had gone, Annie sat taking even stitch after even +stitch, but a few tears ran over her cheeks and fell upon the soft mass +of muslin. Effie watched with shrewd, speculative silence, like a pet +cat. Then suddenly she rose and went close to Annie, with her little +arms around her neck, and the poor dumb mouth repeating her little +speeches: "Thank you, I am very well, thank you, I am very well," over +and over. + +Annie kissed her fondly, and was aware of a sense of comfort and of love +for this poor little Effie. Still, after being nearly two months with +the child, she was relieved when Felicia Hempstead came, the first of +September, and wished to take Effie home with her. She had not gone to +Europe, after all, but to the mountains, and upon her return had missed +the little girl. + +Effie went willingly enough, but Annie discovered that she too missed +her. Now loneliness had her fairly in its grip. She had a telephone +installed, and gave her orders over that. Sometimes the sound of a +human voice made her emotional to tears. Besides the voices over the +telephone, Annie had nobody, for Benny returned to college soon after +Effie left. Benny had been in the habit of coming in to see Annie, and +she had not had the heart to check him. She talked to him very little, +and knew that he was no telltale as far as she was concerned, although +he waxed most communicative with regard to the others. A few days before +he left he came over and begged her to return. + +"I know the girls have nagged you till you are fairly worn out," he +said. "I know they don't tell things straight, but I don't believe they +know it, and I don't see why you can't come home, and insist upon your +rights, and not work so hard." + +"If I come home now it will be as it was before," said Annie. + +"Can't you stand up for yourself and not have it the same?" + +Annie shook her head. + +"Seems as if you could," said Benny. "I always thought a girl knew how +to manage other girls. It is rather awful the way things go now over +there. Father must be uncomfortable enough trying to eat the stuff they +set before him and living in such a dirty house." + +Annie winced. "Is it so very dirty?" + +Benny whistled. + +"Is the food so bad?" + +Benny whistled again. + +"You advised me--or it amounted to the same thing--to take this stand," +said Annie. + +"I know I did, but I didn't know how bad it would be. Guess I didn't +half appreciate you myself, Annie. Well, you must do as you think best, +but if you could look in over there your heart would ache." + +"My heart aches as it is," said Annie, sadly. + +Benny put an arm around her. "Poor girl!" he said. "It is a shame, but +you are going to marry Tom. You ought not to have the heartache." + +"Marriage isn't everything," said Annie, "and my heart does ache, but--I +can't go back there, unless--I can't make it clear to you, Benny, but +it seems to me as if I couldn't go back there until the year is up, or +I shouldn't be myself, and it seems, too, as if I should not be doing +right by the girls. There are things more important even than doing +work for others. I have got it through my head that I can be dreadfully +selfish being unselfish." + +"Well, I suppose you are right," admitted Benny with a sigh. + +Then he kissed Annie and went away, and the blackness of loneliness +settled down upon her. She had wondered at first that none of the +village people came to see her, although she did not wish to talk to +them; then she no longer wondered. She heard, without hearing, just what +her sisters had said about her. + +That was a long winter for Annie Hempstead. Letters did not come very +regularly from Tom Reed, for it was a season of heavy snowfalls and the +mails were often delayed. The letters were all that she had for comfort +and company. She had bought a canary-bird, adopted a stray kitten, and +filled her sunny windows with plants. She sat beside them and sewed, and +tried to be happy and content, but all the time there was a frightful +uncertainty deep down within her heart as to whether or not she was +doing right. She knew that her sisters were unworthy, and yet her love +and longing for them waxed greater and greater. As for her father, she +loved him as she had never loved him before. The struggle grew terrible. +Many a time she dressed herself in outdoor array and started to go +home, but something always held her back. It was a strange conflict +that endured through the winter months, the conflict of a loving, +self-effacing heart with its own instincts. + +Toward the last of February her father came over at dusk. Annie ran to +the door, and he entered. He looked unkempt and dejected. He did not +say much, but sat down and looked about him with a half-angry, +half-discouraged air. Annie went out into the kitchen and broiled some +beefsteak, and creamed some potatoes, and made tea and toast. Then she +called him into the sitting-room, and he ate like one famished. + +"Your sister Susan does the best she can," he said, when he had +finished, "and lately Jane has been trying, but they don't seem to have +the knack. I don't want to urge you, Annie, but--" + +"You know when I am married you will have to get on without me," Annie +said, in a low voice. + +"Yes, but in the mean time you might, if you were home, show Susan and +Jane." + +"Father," said Annie, "you know if I came home now it would be just +the same as it was before. You know if I give in and break my word with +myself to stay away a year what they will think and do." + +"I suppose they might take advantage," admitted Silas, heavily. "I fear +you have always given in to them too much for their own good." + +"Then I shall not give in now," said Annie, and she shut her mouth +tightly. + +There came a peal of the cracked door-bell, and Silas started with a +curious, guilty look. Annie regarded him sharply. "Who is it, father?" + +"Well, I heard Imogen say to Eliza that she thought it was very foolish +for them all to stay over there and have the extra care and expense, +when you were here." + +"You mean that the girls--?" + +"I think they did have a little idea that they might come here and make +you a little visit--" + +Annie was at the front door with a bound. The key turned in the lock and +a bolt shot into place. Then she returned to her father, and her face +was very white. + +"You did not lock your door against your own sisters?" he gasped. + +"God forgive me, I did." + +The bell pealed again. Annie stood still, her mouth quivering in a +strange, rigid fashion. The curtains in the dining-room windows were +not drawn. Suddenly one window showed full of her sisters' faces. It was +Susan who spoke. + +"Annie, you can't mean to lock us out?" Susan's face looked strange and +wild, peering in out of the dark. Imogen's handsome face towered over +her shoulder. + +"We think it advisable to close our house and make you a visit," she +said, quite distinctly through the glass. + +Then Jane said, with an inaudible sob, "Dear Annie, you can't mean to +keep us out!" + +Annie looked at them and said not a word. Their half-commanding, +half-imploring voices continued a while. Then the faces disappeared. + +Annie turned to her father. "God knows if I have done right," she said, +"but I am doing what you have taken me to account for not doing." + +"Yes, I know," said Silas. He sat for a while silent. Then he rose, +kissed Annie--something he had seldom done--and went home. After he had +gone Annie sat down and cried. She did not go to bed that night. The cat +jumped up in her lap, and she was glad of that soft, purring comfort. It +seemed to her as if she had committed a great crime, and as if she +had suffered martyrdom. She loved her father and her sisters with such +intensity that her heart groaned with the weight of pure love. For the +time it seemed to her that she loved them more than the man whom she was +to marry. She sat there and held herself, as with chains of agony, from +rushing out into the night, home to them all, and breaking her vow. + +It was never quite so bad after that night, for Annie compromised. She +baked bread and cake and pies, and carried them over after nightfall +and left them at her father's door. She even, later on, made a pot of +coffee, and hurried over with it in the dawn-light, always watching +behind a corner of a curtain until she saw an arm reached out for it. +All this comforted Annie, and, moreover, the time was drawing near when +she could go home. + +Tom Reed had been delayed much longer than he expected. He would not be +home before early fall. They would not be married until November, and +she would have several months at home first. + +At last the day came. Out in Silas Hempstead's front yard the grass +waved tall, dotted with disks of clover. Benny was home, and he had been +over to see Annie every day since his return. That morning when Annie +looked out of her window the first thing she saw was Benny waving a +scythe in awkward sweep among the grass and clover. An immense pity +seized her at the sight. She realized that he was doing this for her, +conquering his indolence. She almost sobbed. + +"Dear, dear boy, he will cut himself," she thought. Then she conquered +her own love and pity, even as her brother was conquering his sloth. She +understood clearly that it was better for Benny to go on with his task +even if he did cut himself. + +The grass was laid low when she went home, and Benny stood, a conqueror +in a battle-field of summer, leaning on his scythe. + +"Only look, Annie," he cried out, like a child. "I have cut all the +grass." + +Annie wanted to hug him. Instead she laughed. "It was time to cut it," +she said. Her tone was cool, but her eyes were adoring. + +Benny laid down his scythe, took her by the arm, and led her into the +house. Silas and his other daughters were in the sitting-room, and the +room was so orderly it was painful. The ornaments on the mantel-shelf +stood as regularly as soldiers on parade, and it was the same with the +chairs. Even the cushions on the sofa were arranged with one corner +overlapping another. The curtains were drawn at exactly the same height +from the sill. The carpet looked as if swept threadbare. + +Annie's first feeling was of worried astonishment; then her eye caught +a glimpse of Susan's kitchen apron tucked under a sofa pillow, and of +layers of dust on the table, and she felt relieved. After all, what she +had done had not completely changed the sisters, whom she loved, faults +and all. Annie realized how horrible it would have been to find her +loved ones completely changed, even for the better. They would have +seemed like strange, aloof angels to her. + +They all welcomed her with a slight stiffness, yet with cordiality. Then +Silas made a little speech. + +"Your father and your sisters are glad to welcome you home, dear Annie," +he said, "and your sisters wish me to say for them that they realize +that possibly they may have underestimated your tasks and overestimated +their own. In short, they may not have been--" + +Silas hesitated, and Benny finished. "What the girls want you to know, +Annie, is that they have found out they have been a parcel of pigs." + +"We fear we have been selfish without realizing it," said Jane, and she +kissed Annie, as did Susan and Eliza. Imogen, looking very handsome +in her blue linen, with her embroidery in her hands, did not kiss her +sister. She was not given to demonstrations, but she smiled complacently +at her. + +"We are all very glad to have dear Annie back, I am sure," said she, +"and now that it is all over, we all feel that it has been for the best, +although it has seemed very singular, and made, I fear, considerable +talk. But, of course, when one person in a family insists upon taking +everything upon herself, it must result in making the others selfish." + +Annie did not hear one word that Imogen said. She was crying on Susan's +shoulder. + +"Oh, I am so glad to be home," she sobbed. + +And they all stood gathered about her, rejoicing and fond of her, but +she was the one lover among them all who had been capable of hurting +them and hurting herself for love's sake. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Copy-Cat and Other Stories, by +Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE COPY-CAT AND OTHER STORIES *** + +***** This file should be named 1716.txt or 1716.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/7/1/1716/ + +Produced by Judy Boss + +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. 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