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Title: The Pleasant Street Partnership
A Neighborhood Story
Author: Mary F. Leonard
Illustrator: Frank T. Merrill
Release Date: June 26, 2007 [EBook #21944]
Language: English
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The Pleasant Street Partnership
BOOKS BY MARY F. LEONARD.
* * * * *
=THE SPECTACLE MAN.= A STORY OF THE MISSING
BRIDGE. 266 pages. Cloth. $1.00.
=MR. PAT'S LITTLE GIRL.= A STORY OF THE
ARDEN FORESTERS. 322 pages. Cloth. $1.50.
=THE PLEASANT STREET PARTNERSHIP.= A
NEIGHBORHOOD STORY. 269 pages. Cloth.
[Illustration: A SMALL BOY . . . STOOD SURVEYING THEM WITH GREAT
COMPOSURE]
The
Pleasant Street Partnership
_A Neighborhood Story_
* * * * *
By
Mary F. Leonard
_Illustrated by_
Frank T. Merrill
[Illustration]
W. A. WILDE COMPANY
BOSTON CHICAGO
_Copyright, July, 1903._
BY W. A. WILDE COMPANY.
_All rights reserved._
* * * * *
THE PLEASANT STREET PARTNERSHIP.
=To Charlotte=
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. A WAVE OF IMPROVEMENT 11
II. WHAT SHALL WE CALL IT? 21
III. AN ALIEN 24
IV. MISS WILBUR 35
V. THE SHOP 42
VI. IN THE EYES OF THE NEIGHBORHOOD 50
VII. A SPOOL OF TWIST 60
VIII. A MATTER OF LOYALTY 72
IX. IN THE SHOP 82
X. ALEXINA 90
XI. THE LAST STRAW 98
XII. THE DISCOVERY 107
XIII. AFTERWARD 115
XIV. MRS. MILLARD DEPARTS 121
XV. GIANT DESPAIR 129
XVI. CHARLOTTE 138
XVII. AN EVENING CALL 146
XVIII. THE ADVENTURES OF A BIRTHDAY CAKE 156
XIX. TEA AND TALK 166
XX. MERRY HEARTS 175
XXI. THE RICH MISS CARPENTER 185
XXII. VALENTINES 192
XXIII. NEIGHBORS 203
XXIV. WAYLAND 215
XXV. THE PRICE OF A BOND 222
XXVI. NORAH'S ARK 229
XXVII. AN ANNIVERSARY 236
XXVIII. WHAT IT MEANT 248
XXIX. A LETTER 253
XXX. CHANGES 262
ILLUSTRATIONS.
PAGE
"A small boy . . . stood surveying them with great composure"
_Frontispiece_ 17
"Securely entrenched behind the lace curtain, she levelled her
glass" 61
"She sank into a chair" 109
"James Mandeville's taste was exacting" 194
The
Pleasant Street Partnership
=A Neighborhood Story=
CHAPTER FIRST
A WAVE OF IMPROVEMENT
Pleasant Street was regarded by the Terrace as merely an avenue
of approach to its own exclusive precincts. That Pleasant Street
came to an end at the Terrace seemed to imply that nothing was to
be gained by going farther; and if you desired a quiet, substantial
neighborhood,--none of your showy modern houses on meagre lots, but
spacious dwellings, standing well apart from each other on high
ground,--you found it here.
It could not be denied that the Terrace was rather far down town.
Around it the busy city was closing in, with its blocks of commonplace
houses, its schools and sanitariums, its noisy car lines, until it
seemed but a question of a few years when it would be engulfed in a
wave of mediocrity. Fashion had long ago turned her face in another
direction, and yet in a way the Terrace held its own. It could boast
of some wealth, and more distinguished grandfathers were to be heard
of within its small area than in the length and breadth of Dean
Avenue.
Its residents felt for each other that friendliness born of long
association. Some of the best people of the town had built their homes
here between thirty and forty years ago, and a comparison of
directories would have shown a surprising proportion of the old names
still represented.
Perhaps no one thing contributes more to a sense of dignity than long
residence in one house, and it was natural enough that the Terrace
should shrug its shoulders at the row of toy dwellings that sprang up
almost magically on Pleasant Street. That this thoroughfare, so long
given over to side yards and vacant lots, was showing a disposition to
improve, was a matter of no concern to the Terrace until unexpectedly
its own territory was invaded.
On the northeast corner of the Terrace and Pleasant Street there had
long stood a cottage. In the midst of a large lot, with fine
shade-trees around it and a beautifully kept lawn, it had never seemed
out of place among its more pretentious neighbors; but now upon the
death of its owner the property was divided into three lots and
offered for sale. What this might mean was at first hardly realized,
until one day men were discovered to be at work on the corner, digging
a foundation.
Upon inquiry it developed that a drug store was to be built. The
neighborhood did not like this, but felt on the whole it might have
been worse,--this conclusion, as Wayland Leigh pointed out later on,
being founded on the mistaken hypothesis that all drug stores are
pretty much alike.
It happened that the druggist had for a brother a young and aspiring
architect, who conceived the idea of putting up a building in keeping
with a residence district. The result was a sloping-roofed structure
whose shingled second story projected over the first, which was of
concrete. It might have been a rural station, or post-office, or a
seaside cottage, but a drug store it did not remotely suggest.
The store opened on Pleasant Street; to reach the private entrance you
must go in from the Terrace, where there was a square of lawn and a
maple tree, relic of better days.
The worst of it was its utter incongruousness, the best--so Alexina
Russell said--that it invariably made you smile, and anything in this
weary world that caused a smile was not wholly bad. Miss Sarah Leigh
pretended to admire it, and declared she wanted to meet the architect.
Of all things she liked originality. Mrs. Millard heard her
disdainfully. Any departure from tradition was objectionable in her
eyes, and she was deficient in a sense of humor. Judge Russell
complained that now St. Mark's had taken to high-church customs, and
the Terrace was degenerating, it was time for him to be put away in
Spring Hill Cemetery.
Pretty Madelaine, his granddaughter, looked longingly toward Dean
Avenue, being divided between a desire for its new splendors and a
complacent consciousness that it was something of a distinction in
these days to live in the house where your father was born. Alexina,
her sister, treated this with scorn. She loved the shabby old house
for other reasons.
In spite of the original intentions of the builder, fate decreed that
this much-talked-of place was not to be a drug store after all, and
early in the summer, before it was finished, it was advertised for
rent.
The plastering stage was beginning when the agent in charge one day
appeared conducting a young woman over the premises. If the agent's
manner revealed some slight curiosity concerning her, it was not to be
wondered at, for it was more than probable he had never before seen so
charming a person in the guise of a possible shopkeeper.
Her bearing was dignified and businesslike, and if a smile hovered
about her lips as they explored the odd little house, it did not go
beyond the bounds of a polite interest. At length she seated herself
on an empty nail keg in the shop, and became absorbed in thought. The
agent leaned against the door frame and waited.
"I shall want a few changes made if I lease it," she announced
suddenly, after some minutes of silence.
The agent started as her eyes met his. "Oh, certainly," he replied, as
if ready to agree without hearing what they were. On second thought he
added that the architect was at that moment coming up the street, and
the best plan, perhaps, would be to submit her wishes to him.
To this she graciously assented, and he left her. When he was gone,
the young woman's dignity relaxed. She smiled broadly; she even
laughed. "How ever did it happen!" she exclaimed.
She produced a tape-line and made measurements, then she stood with
the tip of her tongue touching her upper lip. "I do wish Marion could
see it," she said. "She will never believe what a fascinatingly funny
place it is."
She was surveying the neighborhood from the front door when the agent
returned, accompanied by the architect.
She wanted very little, she announced reassuringly; a fireplace in the
shop was the chief thing.
The agent suggested that it would be far more expensive to heat the
room with an open grate than with an anthracite base burner. Whereupon
she explained that an open fire was part of her stock in trade, and it
would be impossible to carry on her line of business without one.
The agent ventured to inquire what her line was, and she answered with
a twinkle in her eye, "Notions."
The architect was doubtful about the fireplace, but not unwilling to
discuss it, and they grew so friendly over the matter that the agent
retired to the door and stared gloomily up the street.
From the fireplace the discussion turned to other things. As a
possible tenant, the young lady consulted the architect about the best
color for the walls, so adroitly insinuating her own ideas as to the
proper stain for the woodwork that they seemed his own.
While they talked, a small boy in a gingham apron, with a sailor hat
on the back of his curly head and a gray flannel donkey under his arm,
wandered in and stood surveying them with great composure.
"Who's going to live here?" he presently asked, his brown eyes upon
the lady.
She met his gaze with a smile that drew him a step nearer, but caused
no break in his seriousness. "I am thinking of it," she said, adding,
with a twinkle of mischief in her eyes, "if they will let me have a
fireplace in this room. Shouldn't you want a fireplace if you were
going to live here?"
He nodded, "'Cause if you didn't, Santa Claus couldn't come."
The lady turned gravely to the architect. "That is a consideration
which had not occurred to me, but it is an important one. I shall not
take it without the fireplace." Her manner said there was no need for
further discussion.
"What is your name?" she asked the small boy.
He shook his head.
"Do you mean you haven't any?"
Another more vigorous shake.
"Perhaps you have forgotten it?"
"No, I haven't."
"Why not tell, then? I am always willing to tell mine."
"What is it?" he inquired with great promptness.
"But I don't think it is fair to ask me when you won't tell yours."
"You said you would."
The lady laughed. "Very well, I am Miss Pennington."
The small boy pondered this for a moment, then announced with much
distinctness, "My name is James Mandeville Norton."
"Well, James, I am glad to meet you. I see you are a fair-minded
person. Do you live in this neighborhood?"
James Mandeville pointed in the direction of the row of toy houses on
Pleasant Street, and said he lived over there.
"Then if they give me a fireplace, you and I will be neighbors."
They were standing in the door, just outside which, on the sidewalk,
was a velocipede. This James Mandeville now mounted with gravity. He
did not express a hope that she might come to live near him, but there
was friendliness in the tone in which he said good-by as he rode
away.
"Good-by Infinitesimal James," replied the lady.
"My name's James Mandeville," he called back.
In the course of a day or two the matter of the fireplace was adjusted
and the lease signed. Norah Pennington was the tenant's name, and her
references all the most timorous landlord could ask.
On the afternoon of the day on which the transaction was closed Miss
Pennington might have been seen walking along the Terrace, gazing
about with interested eyes.
"What dear old houses," she said to herself. "I am sure Marion will
like it here. This might be Doubting Castle, and there is Palace
Beautiful, a little out of repair."
She stood for a moment on the corner in the full blaze of the summer
sun. The happy courage of youth seemed to radiate from her. There was
a vitality, a sparkle in her glance, in the waves of her sunny hair,
in her smile, as with a slight gesture that embraced the Terrace, and
Pleasant Street, too, she said half aloud, "Good-by till September."
CHAPTER SECOND
WHAT SHALL WE CALL IT?
"And now what shall we call it?" Norah asked.
"Call it?" echoed Marion.
They sat on the rocks beside a mountain stream that filled the air
with its delicious murmur.
"Certainly, everything has to have a name. Shall it be _Carpenter and
Pennington, Dry-goods_?"
Marion removed the dark glasses she wore, turning a pair of serious
eyes upon her companion. "How absurd," she said.
"No," insisted Norah, taking the glasses and adjusting them on her own
nose, "not at all. It is businesslike. Can't you see it?--a large
black sign with gilt letters."
"Give me my glasses, and don't be silly. It is not to be a dry-goods'
store in the first place, and above all things let us be original. If
such signs are customary, ours must be different."
"Here speaks wisdom. Here the instinct of the born advertiser betrays
itself. Let us think." Norah buried her face in her hands.
Marion watched her with a half smile, then as an expression of
weariness stole into her face she restored the glasses and sighed, as
with her elbow supported on a ledge of rock she rested her chin in her
palm and looked down on the swift running water. She was extremely
slender, and it was easy to guess she was also tall, and that, seen at
her best, she was a person of grace and elegance rather than beauty.
"I have it," Norah cried presently. "_The Pleasant Street Shop._"
"Or _The Neighborhood Shop_," Marion suggested.
"No, let us have Pleasant Street in it. It seems a good omen that the
street is called Pleasant."
Marion smiled. "Have you told Dr. Baird?" she asked.
"Yes. He said I should be a novelist, and confine my wild-goose
schemes to paper."
"_The Notions of Norah_ would be a taking title," laughed Marion, the
weariness gone from her face.
"But as I told him, 'Deeds, not Dreams,' is my motto, and I'll show
him if it is a wild-goose scheme. I am convinced that deep down in his
heart he was interested; and although he made no promises, I believe
we may count on him."
CHAPTER THIRD
AN ALIEN
With the swiftness of a small tornado, Charlotte descended the long,
straight stairway only to sink in a heap on the broad step at the
bottom. "Oh, dear!" she said, her chin in her hand, "Oh, _dear_!"
A ray of sunlight falling through the side-lights of the door with
their pattern of fleur-de-lis on a crimson ground, cast a rosy stain
on the neutral-tinted carpet and brought to notice a few atoms of dust
on one of the rosewood chairs that stood to attention on either side
of the tall hat-rack. The wall against which they were ranged was done
in varnished paper to represent oak panelling, and on it hung one or
two steel engravings.
"If only something were crooked!" Charlotte sighed.
Now at Aunt Cora's nothing was straight. Etchings and water colors
fought for the honors of the walls, and chased each other up the side
of the stairway. Tables and shelves were crowded with trifles, costly
and otherwise, the chairs were deep and cushiony, except now and then
a gilt toy which was distinctly for show; the divans were smothered
with gay pillows. In contrast this house in Kenton Terrace seemed
unbearably stiff and prim.
Why had not Uncle Landor allowed her to stay with him instead of
sending her so far away? Perhaps, after all, he had not wanted her.
Nobody wanted her--dreadful thought!--unless it were Aunt Cora; and
Charlotte knew in her heart Uncle Landor was wise in deciding she was
not to travel about with Aunt Cora any more.
Since she had been taken away, a child of seven, her memories of this
southern town had grown vague, and it seemed strange to hear Uncle
Landor refer to it as her home. He also said it was the sort of a
background she needed for the next few years, until she should be
ready for college. After that he promised, if she still wished it, she
might come and keep house for him.
But it would be so long. How could she stand it? If only she might
have gone to boarding-school. Why had Aunt Caroline and Aunt Virginia
agreed to her coming? They did not like her. Nothing she did pleased
them. Charlotte looked about for a refuge where she might fling
herself down and cry her heart out. She rose and stole on tiptoe into
the drawing-room.
Here the same absolute order prevailed. She felt sure the carved
chairs and sofas, with their covering of satin brocade, had occupied
these same positions ever since they first appeared on the scene when
Aunt Caroline made her début, more than thirty years ago. Fancy Aunt
Caroline having a party! Aunt Virginia had described it to her, but it
sounded unreal. Thirty years ago was too far in the past. Charlotte's
own mother had been a little girl then.
The buhl cabinet near the window, the inlaid chess table in the corner
beside the white marble mantel, even the folds of the handsome lace
curtains, seemed petrified into their present positions. For thirty
years the mantle mirror had been reflecting the Dresden clock and
candelabra, and the crystal pendants of the chandelier; the face and
figure that confronted Charlotte in the pier glass was, however,
something new and alien.
It was a brown face with blue eyes that danced with mischief or
flashed with anger, or grew soft with entreaty beneath their black
lashes, as occasion might demand. Her hair, too, was brown, and
shadowed her face in a wavy mass held most objectionable by her aunts.
That a girl barely fourteen should have decided views on the subject
of dress, and insist upon wearing what she called a pompadour and
having her belts extremely pointed in front, was surprising to Aunt
Virginia, shocking to Aunt Caroline.
As she stood facing her own image, the sound of sweeping skirts on the
stairway sent her flying behind the half-open door.
"What has become of Charlotte?" she heard Aunt Virginia ask.
"I am sure I don't know," responded Aunt Caroline.
"And what is more, you don't care," added Charlotte, under her breath.
When the door had closed behind them, she ran to the window and
watched as they went down the walk and entered the waiting carriage.
Two very charming ladies, an unprejudiced observer might have
pronounced them. A little precise in their elegance, perhaps, but
pleasant to look upon, especially Aunt Caroline, from head to foot a
shimmer of silver gray. Aunt Caroline was Mrs. Millard, the widow of
an army officer, and Charlotte had expected to like her best; but
after all, Aunt Virginia, who was only Miss Wilbur, had proved the
least objectionable.
She was not so handsome, but seemed kinder; and when she laughed,
Charlotte always felt a little thrill of sympathy. When Aunt Caroline
laughed, it was in a reserved, controlled manner. Charlotte had
arrived at the conclusion that Aunt Virginia stood in awe of her
sister; and this might have been a bond of union if it had been
possible to become really acquainted, but Aunt Virginia held aloof.
It was almost as if she were afraid of Charlotte, too. Still there was
something rather nice about her. Charlotte hardly realized how often
she returned to this opinion.
When they had driven away, she went to the library,--a less formidable
apartment than the drawing-room,--and making herself comfortable in an
arm-chair by the window, began to consider what she should say to
Cousin Francis, for she had decided that pouring out her soul in a
letter would, after all, be more satisfactory than tears.
She looked out across the garden to where, on the other side of
Pleasant Street, stood the little corner shop with its gray-green
shingles, its upper windows all aglow in the afternoon sunshine.
Before it stood a furniture van, and Charlotte idly watched the
unloading.
She had made up her mind that life here was going to be hopelessly
dull. She swung her foot listlessly, and, forgetting her letter,
thought of Aunt Cora's home in a gay little suburb where something was
always going on,--teas, dinners, receptions, where, although in the
background, she had had her share of the excitement.
At the Landors', where she sometimes spent several weeks while Aunt
Cora, worn by her strenuous social life, went down to Atlantic City to
recuperate, it was much quieter. And still she loved to be there. The
elder Mr. Landor was a busy lawyer, his son Francis a literary person,
and they lived in a tall, brown stone house in the old part of
Philadelphia, among any number of others exactly like it. It was a
man's house, overflowing with books and pictures, and yet showing the
lack of a woman's presence. Charlotte was very fond of her guardian
and his son, who petted and made much of her on the occasions of her
visits. She was conscious, however, that Uncle Landor was not quite
satisfied with her. He had a way of looking at her long and steadily
through his glasses, as if he were studying her.
Cousin Frank, perhaps because he had no responsibility in the matter,
treated her as a comrade in a way that was flattering. She was, of
course, an ardent admirer of his stories and verses, and upon one or
two rare occasions had been made blissfully happy by being allowed to
listen to one fresh from the typewriter. But most interesting of all
had been a discovery made on her last visit in the spring. Between the
leaves of a manuscript she had been allowed to read she found some
verses beginning:--
"I love her whether she love me or no,
Just as I love the roses where they blow
In fragrant crimson there beyond the wall."
There was something more about roses being sweet although out of
reach, and teaching a lesson to his heart; but before she had quite
grasped the idea, Francis took the paper away from her with an
exclamation of impatience.
"Why should Francis have minded, unless those verses meant something
personal?" Charlotte wondered. As she thought it over, she recalled
some remarks of Aunt Cora's about a little water-color portrait of a
child in Uncle Landor's study.
"Who is this?" Mrs. Brent asked one day, pausing before it.
"That is old Peter Carpenter's granddaughter May, when she was ten
years old. He had two portraits done of her, and liking the other
better, gave this to me not long before he died."
Aunt Cora said, "Ah!" and studied it with interest. "So this is _the_
Miss Carpenter, is it? I presume Francis has a more recent likeness."
"I do not know that he has. We see very little of May in these days.
She is a great lady." Uncle Landor spoke as one who dismisses a
subject.
Then one rainy afternoon Mrs. Wellington, the Landors' housekeeper,
entertained Charlotte with stories of this same young lady who, it
turned out, lived just across the street in a house distinguished from
the rest of the block by a garden at one side. According to Mrs.
Wellington she was beautiful and rich, and if one more touch were
needed to make her an irreproachable heroine, the long illness from
which she was then beginning to recover supplied it. Watching at the
window, Charlotte had the pleasure of seeing her carried out for a
drive once or twice, but she never had a glimpse of her face.
Putting two and two together, she became quite sure that this Miss
Carpenter was the rose which was out of reach; but though she was on
the point of it several times, she never quite dared to question
Cousin Francis about her.
Charlotte had woven a charming romance with these slender threads,
being at the romantic age when real life is seen beneath the
lime-light of fairyland. Was it any wonder things seemed dull here in
Kenton Terrace?
These entertaining memories being for the time exhausted, her thoughts
turned to the grievance that had sent her downstairs with such
vehemence,--a thrilling, fascinating story taken from her at the most
critically exciting point.
"I cannot allow you to read novels when you are going to school," Aunt
Caroline had said; adding, "and this book is not at all the sort of
thing for a little girl."
At the recollection Charlotte put her hand to her hair. Little girl,
indeed! When people wished to be disagreeable, they reminded you that
you were a little girl.
"I have always read what I pleased," she insisted, relinquishing the
book unwillingly.
"I cannot understand Mrs. Brent's allowing it; but however that may
have been, while you are with us your Aunt Virginia and I will
exercise some supervision over what you read."
Questions about the owner of the novel followed, and here was another
grievance. It had been lent to Charlotte by one of her schoolmates, a
girl with fluffy yellow hair and many rings, whom after a week's
acquaintance,--to use her own phrase,--she simply adored. Her name was
Lucile Lyle--in itself adorable--and the intimacy with her had
resulted in Charlotte becoming Carlotta.
"Lyle?" Aunt Virginia repeated questioningly.
"Don't you remember Maggie McKay, Virginia? This is her daughter," was
Aunt Caroline's reply. To Charlotte she said, "To-morrow I shall give
you this book to return, and while of course I wish you to be polite,
I do not wish you to be intimate with this girl."
"I don't care what she says, I shall read it, and be as intimate as I
please with Lucile," Charlotte told herself; which goes to show that
Mr. Landor was right when he felt she needed different training.
And now having nothing else to do, she wandered to the piano, and
finding an old music book, turned its pages, playing snatches of
"Monastery Bells" and "Listen to the Mocking-bird." She was putting a
good deal of feeling into "I'm a Pilgrim, and I'm a Stranger," when a
sound behind caused her to start.
"You have a pretty touch, my dear," said Aunt Virginia. "We have been
out to Marat's greenhouse, and I have brought you some roses." She
laid them on the piano as she spoke, and slipped away before Charlotte
could make any response.
Was it a peace offering?
CHAPTER FOURTH
MISS WILBUR
Miss Wilbur was perplexed to the point of annoyance, a state of mind
most unusual with her.
She was by nature a serene person, quite content with her easy,
uneventful life. The outside world she faced with a timid reserve
which had not diminished with years and indulgence, finding her life
in her family circle and the round of small cares, her flowers and her
embroidery. She disliked responsibility, and except in what she
considered matters of principle was inclined to distrust her own
judgment. She was full of family loyalty, and had been satisfied to
look on from her place in the background, while her more clever and
ambitious sisters and brothers one by one passed from the home into
the world.
Naturally enough she had not married. She had not cared to, and had
never given any one the opportunity to combat this indifference. Most
people liked her, but she had few intimate friends, having apparently
no desire to be singled out in any way, and yet she was warmly
affectionate. In truth Miss Virginia was an elusive sort of person,
sometimes allowing a glimpse of herself in all her unselfish
sweetness, and then, presto! her reserve had taken alarm, the vision
was gone.
She was conventional, made so by her environment; yet her failings,
many of them, so her sister Caroline declared, were those of an
untrained child. She was careless,--as Charlotte had noticed, she
sometimes forgot the fastenings of her skirt; when she wrote, she
invariably inked her fingers; and she was constantly losing or
breaking her glasses. She treated these matters lightly herself, but
tried to conceal them from her sister.
In their girlhood this sister, a few years older than she, had been
the object of her deepest devotion. Caroline was beautiful and clever,
and to question her opinions never entered Miss Virginia's mind. It
puzzled and hurt her loyal heart that she could not quite get back to
the old attitude when Caroline returned to her home a widow. She
submitted when Caroline assumed command of the household; but after
their father's death relieved her of the position of devoted nurse,
Miss Virginia found life a little empty; and what made it the harder
was that she no longer felt herself altogether in sympathy with her
sister's opinions and methods.
Her aspirations had never gone beyond making home pleasant for
somebody, and now even this was taken from her. The things that most
absorbed Mrs. Millard were of little interest to her; she began to
feel useless and unhappy. She was a failure. Life had somehow slipped
by unawares. She felt old at forty-eight.
Above everything she disliked change, and the sale of the corner lot
and the building of the shop caused her many a pang. In the midst of
all this disquietude Mr. Landor's letter arrived.
"I have most agreeable recollections of your home," he wrote, "and I
realize I am asking a good deal of you, for our little niece is a
somewhat tumultuous person. She has suffered from both over indulgence
and neglect. She needs a different atmosphere, and much in the way of
training that her old guardian cannot give her, so he ventures for
Helen's sake to ask if you will take charge of her daughter for a few
years."
This half sister, twelve years younger than herself, had come and gone
like some happy dream in Miss Virginia's life. She had grown up under
the care of her grandmother, almost a stranger in her father's house,
to which she returned in her gay young girlhood, and for the one time
in her experience Miss Wilbur had been swept into a whirl of gayety as
Helen's chaperon. Her charge had married early, and after a few years
went abroad with her husband and little girl in search of health she
was never to find.
The thought of Helen's child aroused memories both bright and
sorrowful, but at least here was an opportunity to be useful again. It
would be pleasant to have a child in the house, Miss Virginia thought,
studying the photograph of Charlotte at seven, bright-eyed and demure.
The tall, well-grown girl had been a surprise to her aunts. Her
assured manner and pronounced style of dress were not exactly what
one desired in a girl of fourteen. At sight of her Miss Virginia had
been seized with a fit of shyness; in consequence the reins had been
taken by Mrs. Millard, who was not shy and was, besides, a born
manager.
Miss Virginia felt a sympathy for Charlotte, even while disapproving
of her; she felt her sister to be too peremptory. In the matter of the
novel it would have been better to allow Charlotte to finish it, with
the understanding that it was to be the last. What could be more
aggravating than to have to give up a story with only two-thirds of it
read? It was an interesting story, too. Miss Virginia herself sat up
till midnight to finish it. Some time perhaps she would tell Charlotte
the end. Then she reminded herself that this would never do.
It was no use talking to Caroline, and yet Mr. Landor had asked _her_
to take charge of Charlotte, and Caroline had no right to assume
command. Miss Virginia wished they had not agreed to take the child.
She paced back and forth on the front porch one afternoon, thinking of
all this and of the peaceful days of the past, feeling that dulness
was better than problems like these. Across Pleasant Street was the
little shop already showing signs of habitation. As she stood idly
with her hand on the rail, a boy came up the walk and handed her what
at first glance she thought was a note, but it proved on investigation
to be an announcement.
THE PLEASANT STREET SHOP
WILL OPEN
WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER SECOND
Dainty Turnovers Pretty Draperies
Ribbons Bright Chintzes
Baskets
Pottery
Needles and Pins and Other Small Matters
A Specialty.
"How absurd!" thought Miss Virginia. "A shop of this sort in the
Terrace!"
"Have you heard about the new shop, Miss Virginia?" called Alexina
Russell from the gate.
Miss Wilbur held up the card. "I am just reading the announcement. Who
can be starting it? and isn't it too bad?" As she spoke, she descended
the steps and joined the young girl.
"It is the funniest little place I ever saw," answered Alex. "I
suppose it is not nice to have shops springing up in the
neighborhood, but--sometimes I wish I were going to keep a shop."
"My dear! I trust you will never have to do that."
"Haven't you ever felt that you would like to be doing something?--to
be in things--part of the real working world?" Alexina spoke with
fervor.
"I never wanted to keep a shop, I am sure," answered Miss Wilbur.
CHAPTER FIFTH
THE SHOP
James Mandeville did not forget the pretty young lady who said she was
coming to be his neighbor if they would give her a fireplace. He had
kept an eye on the shop all summer, and he knew there was a fireplace.
He saw plasterers, carpenters, and painters come and go as he rode
back and forth on his velocipede at a rate of speed altogether out of
proportion to the effort put forth by his plump legs, bare and brown
above his socks. From beneath the brim of his old sailor hat he looked
on with solemn intentness. He was on excellent terms with the workmen,
and often carried home a whole armful of treasures--odd-shaped pieces
of wood, curly shavings, and bits of tile.
At length all was done; the square of lawn on the Terrace side was
sodded, and from the street in front of the shop all the débris was
carried away. Surely, she would come now!
Some rainy days followed, and when the weather permitted James
Mandeville and his velocipede to be abroad again, the place showed
unmistakable signs of occupancy. There were muslin curtains in the
upstairs windows, and, peeping in through the glass door of the shop,
he saw packing-boxes. At another time a woman stood on the curbstone
buying vegetables from a wagon, but she was far removed from the lady
of his dreams. His heart fell.
The door of the shop stood open the next time he passed. James
Mandeville halted, letting one foot slip along the pavement as a
brake. Under his left arm, pressed close to his linen blouse, was a
tin horn. At this moment a lady came to the door and looked out. She
was not the lady of the fireplace,--a glance told him that,--yet she
was quite different from the one who bought vegetables. She was tall
and dark, and wore unbecoming smoked glasses. She took no notice of
him, but turned and went back into the shop. James Mandeville
dismounted and followed.
The packing-cases had been removed, and the sunshine that streamed in
above the sheet tacked across the lower part of the west window
lighted up a scene of cheerful disorder, pervading which was a
pleasant odor of newness. With her back toward him, the lady began to
measure off lengths of some green fabric, standing before a long
table.
He waited, but still she took no notice. Should he go away? He
summoned all his courage and gave voice to the question that was
asking itself in his own mind: "Where is she?"
The lady turned in surprise and looked down upon him. If he could have
expressed his feelings, he would have said she was a haughty person.
But as she looked at him her manner changed, and she smiled as she
asked, "What is it? I don't understand."
James Mandeville struggled to reply, but words were hard to find. As
he stood silent a voice behind him cried, "Why, if it isn't
Infinitesimal James!" and there she was, with her shining hair and
laughing eyes. He laughed, too, for very relief.
"There's a fireplace," he announced, going to meet her. "I saw them
make it."
"So you knew I would come back, didn't you? Yes, it is a very nice
fireplace, and will be all ready for a visit from Santa Claus," she
replied, shaking hands. Then quite unexpectedly she picked him up and
set him on the table among the waves of green stuff. "Now you look
like Triton," she said.
James Mandeville held fast to his horn and eyed his captor doubtfully,
as if he had a mind to escape.
"Do you remember my name? I am Miss Norah, and I want to introduce you
to my partner, who is almost as nice as I am. She is Miss Marion."
The other young lady smiled. "Do you believe in blowing your own horn,
as Miss Norah does?" she asked.
James Mandeville looked at his horn, and then at the speaker; but as
he did not understand, he made no reply.
"She asks foolish questions, doesn't she?" said Miss Norah. "As you
are the first neighbor to call on us, you shall not be required to
answer. You may help me trim the show window, if you like."
James Mandeville wriggled out from among the green waves. "What are
you going to keep in your store?" he asked.
The reply was disappointing. "Why don't you keep candy?" was the next
question.
"Because Miss Marion would give it all away, and we shouldn't be able
to make a living."
"Would you?" he asked, turning to that lady with earnest eyes.
Clearly, she might be worth cultivating.
She laughed and left the room for a moment, returning with something
in her hand wrapped in silver paper. "Do you like chocolate?" she
inquired; adding, "I don't know how it would be if I kept it; but as I
don't keep it, of course I give it away."
This had a puzzling sound. James Mandeville almost forgot to say thank
you. He decided to go, feeling he could better enjoy the chocolate
alone. He edged toward the door.
"Good-by," called Miss Norah. "Come again."
"All right," said James Mandeville, and disappeared from the scene.
After his departure all was quiet in the shop for a time, except for
the occasional sound of Norah's hammer as she worked in the window.
Marion was putting things away in the cases which stood against the
wall. It was she who first spoke.
"I wonder if we shall have any customers?"
"That is reflection upon my skill as a decorator. Do you think the
public can resist the display which is about to dawn upon it on the
morrow?" was Norah's reply.
Marion left her work and sat on the window ledge. Norah wore a blue
dress and a large white apron, and as she stood to drive a tack, the
sunshine sparkled in her hair. She looked the incarnation of cheerful
industry.
"I do not know that I altogether believe in show windows," Marion
said, smiling up at her friend.
"Of course not. It is all of a piece with your haughty reserve. Let me
remind you that after we have made a success and have a name we can
retire into our shell and become the sought rather than the seeker,
but at present it is needful to catch the public eye. You have imbibed
your ideas from the rich Miss Carpenter, but _we_ have our living to
make." She drove her tack with emphasis, then sat down on the floor of
the window. "I am not sure I shall not always like this way best,"
she continued. "Think, if there were no show windows at Christmas!
Marion, think of Christmas!"
"Isn't it a little early? There is a good deal to be done between now
and then." Marion spoke calmly.
Norah tossed a ball of twine at her. "I see it will be by the hardest
work if I get any fun out of life. But to resume my train of thought
which you interrupted--"
"I beg your pardon, you interrupted yourself."
"Did I? Well, to resume, at any rate: my idea is that it will be much
nicer to keep a shop which will attract both great and small, so to
speak. To make a specialty always of nice, simple things."
"Flannelette?" suggested Marion.
"Why not? It is a useful fabric."
"I foresee if we enter into a discussion of this momentous question
your window will not be finished, and I own to some curiosity as to
how you mean to attract the great, for instance."
Marion returned to her baskets, and there was silence again for a
time.
"Your idea of the bookcases was a happy one," she said presently,
standing back to view her work. "These baskets have the air of a
collection of curios behind the glass."
"A charming touch of color against our olive walls. Confess, did you
ever have such a good time in your life?"
"My enthusiasm is sprouting vigorously."
"And the fun is only just beginning. But do come here--quick, Marion!
I want you to see Giant Despair."
A tall, heavily built old man was passing along Pleasant Street, his
brows drawn together in a tremendous frown. He swung a stout
walking-stick in his right hand, as if he would have been pleased to
lay it over somebody's shoulders. At the corner he paused and looked
back at the shop.
"Did you see? He shook his fist!" cried Norah.
"Have we an enemy?" asked Marion.
CHAPTER SIXTH
IN THE EYES OF THE NEIGHBORHOOD
Its isolation in the heart of the city had something to do, no doubt,
with certain village-like customs that prevailed in the Terrace. The
neighbors ran in upon one another with their needlework for a social
afternoon. If Alexina or Madelaine Russell were going to a party,
there was sure to be an audience of two or three waiting to see them
after they were dressed. When the Leigh's cook, Aunt Minty, made
jumbles, a plateful always found its way over the back fence to Miss
Virginia Wilbur; and when the Wilburs had something particularly nice
for dessert, some neighbor had a share of it. Judge Russell and Mr.
Goodman played chess together and talked of old times, and on the
whole friendliness prevailed, with only an occasional neighborly tiff,
when perhaps some one was heard to wish that Caroline Millard would
mind her own business. There were other occasions when Mrs. Millard's
executive ability proved helpful and was warmly appreciated.
The strenuous life had not as yet invaded the Terrace. Mrs. Millard,
to be sure, belonged to the Woman's Club, and presided at various
board meetings, but she was the exception.
The Terrace had its problems. We know Miss Virginia's; but Alexina,
not suspecting it, watching her in church on Sundays, wished she
herself were middle-aged and had all her troublesome questions
answered, for at forty-eight one must have solved life's problems,
Alex thought.
Madelaine only wanted money to gratify her taste for pretty things.
Given plenty of money, and life would be a simple matter. And so it
seemed to Miss Sarah Leigh, always cheery, yet always burdened with
the doubt where next month's bread and butter were to come from, and
with the regret that her nephew, Wayland, must work instead of going
to college.
Old Mr. Goodman had the money, and his great tomb of a house was full
of valuable things, but his problem was hardest of all; for having to
a sad degree lost his faith in men and things, he found no use for it.
Judge Russell sighed for the good old days; but it was a gentle sigh,
and soon forgotten in the companionship of his beloved books.
If from one point of view the neighborhood characteristic was
sociability, its attitude toward the outsider was another matter. A
new resident must undergo a term of probation before being in any
sense accepted. Charlotte Creston, as the Wilburs' niece, was received
and freely discussed. She was only a child, and for that reason
something of a novelty in the Terrace, since the Russells and Wayland
Leigh had grown up.
Toward the shop, which divided with Charlotte the distinction of
latest comer, the feeling was decidedly antagonistic. It was as if
that monster Business had suddenly reached out from his own domain,
blocks away, and laid his hand upon their peaceful territory.
Something like a council of war took place in the Wilburs'
drawing-room several evenings before the opening. Charlotte, supposed
to be studying in the library, became an interested listener, shielded
from view by the half-drawn hangings.
Alexina Russell was the first comer. Charlotte had not yet made up
her mind about Alex, she was so different at different times. She
might have been almost as pretty as Madelaine, if she had fluffed her
hair and dressed a little less plainly. Sometimes she was full of
animation, again, as this evening, she appeared abstracted and silent.
After Miss Sarah Leigh and her aunt arrived there was no more silence;
it had no charms for either of these ladies. Charlotte had at first
felt something like contempt for a person so odd as Miss Sarah, who
wore skirts short enough to display to advantage her serviceable
shoes, and poked her head out when she walked. But if Miss Sarah had
no pretensions to beauty or style, her face was pleasant, her eyes
really fine, and her smile full of kindly humor. Charlotte learned
from Aunt Virginia that Miss Sarah had an unusual number of
distinguished ancestors, which went to show how little appearance can
be relied on in such matters.
Mrs. Leigh suggested a bit of pretty old china of a pattern grown
rare. Her eyes were bright, there was a hint of pink in her cheeks,
and the silvery puffs beneath her lace cap had the exactness born of
long years of training in the way they should go. When she walked, it
was with a lightness wonderful in a woman of seventy-eight.
Before the Leighs were fairly seated one or two others dropped in,
until it seemed quite like a called meeting of the neighborhood. Aunt
Caroline was in the chair which, on this occasion, happened to be
placed where the rosy glow from a shaded lamp fell becomingly on her
soft gray draperies. Aunt Virginia fluttered about, constantly
interrupting conversation with footstools or sofa cushions, or
irrelevant remarks.
"Miss Virginia is always wondering if one more cushion or some other
chair would not make you a little more comfortable," said Alex, as
that lady appeared after her sixth excursion to the hall, this time
with a light shawl for Mrs. Leigh's rheumatic shoulder.
"Do come and sit down, Virginia," laughed Miss Sarah; "you have no
repose of manner."
"It is very fortunate that so many of us happen to be together this
evening," began Mrs. Millard, "for I think we should decide upon our
course in regard to the shop." Her white hand, veiled in a fall of
lace, made a slight motion in the direction of the corner.
"Don't you want some chocolate candy?" asked Miss Virginia, in an
audible aside to Miss Sarah. "Charlotte and I made some this
afternoon."
"When we have decided the fate of the shop," the lady whispered back.
"Seriously," continued Mrs. Millard, turning toward her sister with a
slight frown, "should we not take some action?"
"You are right, Caroline. In my day shops kept to their own
territory," Mrs. Leigh responded. "I remember the colonel used to
say--but there! I promised Sarah I wouldn't tell any stories this
evening. She says I bore people."
"Why, Aunt Sally! you are telling the biggest kind of a one this
minute," cried her niece.
A good-natured warfare waged continually between these two. Mrs.
Leigh, who was in reality the most petted and indulged of old ladies,
pretending to live in constant fear of Miss Sarah.
"But what can we do?" Alexina was heard asking, as the skirmishers
finally retired, Mrs. Leigh having the last word. "We can't exactly
blame these persons, whoever they may be, for coming here. They could
not know we did not want them."
"I saw some one standing in the door of the shop this morning who
_looked_ like a lady," Miss Virginia remarked.
"How do you define a lady, Virginia?" her sister asked with some
severity.
"Why, Caroline, I am not a dictionary; I wish you wouldn't ask me to
define things," replied Miss Virginia, with a little laugh. Then with
the manner of one who regretted this flippancy she added, "I think I
understand the word as you do."
"It seems to me we are too often content with a surface meaning," Mrs.
Millard continued.
"That is true," agreed Alex. "Now, there is no reason in the world why
these shopkeepers may not be ladies."
Mrs. Millard looked at her doubtfully. "Still," she interposed,
"ladies do not as a usual thing keep shops."
"No; they sweep and scrub and cook, and pretend they don't,--that is
the difference," put in Miss Sarah, crossing her knees and bending
forward with the air of one who had found a congenial theme. "I am a
paper-hanger, a painter, and a maid-of-all-work; and this is what it
usually means to be a lady when you are poor."
"Teaching has always seemed to me a most suitable occupation for a
woman," suggested Mrs. Millard.
"The day has passed, Caroline, when just anybody can teach."
"I don't know any girl who had a better education or was more studious
than you, Sarah," spoke up her aunt.
"And when Brother Willie died I didn't know how to write a check or
make the discount on a gas bill."
"I feel as you do, Miss Sarah. It is dreadful to be so ignorant as
women are of the simplest things," exclaimed Alexina.
"Still, I think it is more comfortable not to have to know about them,
don't you?" Miss Virginia asked timidly.
"What are you people talking about?" The question came from the
doorway, where Madelaine stood, a vision of such airiness, daintiness,
and ethereal charm that nothing else seemed worth a thought. Behind
her towered Wayland Leigh.
"May we join the party and help decide the burning question?" he
asked. "Don't get up, Miss Virginia; we'll find chairs."
"I know it is the shop," said Madelaine, floating across the room to
an ottoman beside Mrs. Millard. Madelaine, too, had an instinct for
the effective, and nothing could have made a more charming picture.
"Grandpa and Mr. Goodman were at it a few minutes ago. Mr Goodman
talks about an injunction."
"We began with the shop, but we seem to have switched off on to
education," said Mrs. Leigh. "One never heard such talk when I was
young. Then we had plenty of servants, and there was always some man
to attend to business. After the war I asked our old Malinda one day
how she liked freedom. 'Well, Miss Sally,' she said, 'I likes it, and
I don't like it. I tell you what, Miss Sally, freedom's monstrous
industrious.' That is what I think about these times,--'they's
monstrous industrious.' Goodness, I have gone and told a story!"
"I shall have to take you home before you transgress again," said her
niece, rising.
"Don't go. We haven't decided what we must do," urged Miss Virginia.
"What do you think, Mrs. Millard?" asked Madelaine, with an upward
glance, and flattering emphasis.
Mrs. Millard caressed the hand that lay on her lap as she replied, "My
own feeling is that we should refuse our patronage--not that they are
likely to have anything we'd care to buy--and use our influence
against it."
"Well, I for one shan't make any promises; if I need a spool of thread
and can save a walk, I shall go over there to get it," Miss Sarah
announced positively.
"You might add that your patronage is not likely of itself to save the
shop from bankruptcy," put in her nephew.
Everybody seemed to be going. Charlotte tucked her history under her
arm and ran upstairs. As she went to the window to draw the curtain a
bright light shone from the shop across the street.
"I wonder if you'll be sorry you came here?" said Charlotte to
herself.
CHAPTER SEVENTH
A SPOOL OF TWIST
The shop windows on the opening day proved most alluring to Miss
Virginia. There were two,--one overlooking the square of lawn on the
Terrace, the other, Pleasant Street. Between them, placed across the
corner, was the door.
The Terrace window was full of plants, while on the Pleasant Street
side there was a tempting display of color. Miss Virginia hunted up
her distance glasses, which she seldom used, in order the better to
view it; but she failed to make out anything in particular. Her ardor
might have suggested an archæologist over a cuneiform inscription, as
she tried to decide whether a certain patch of blue and white was a
pillow or a table-cover.
Charlotte openly stopped to view the window on her way home from
school, and Miss Virginia, observing it, privately questioned her.
[Illustration: SECURELY ENTRENCHED BEHIND THE LACE CURTAIN SHE
LEVELLED HER GLASS]
"You ought to go over and look in, Aunt Virginia," she said. "There
are the prettiest baskets you ever saw."
Miss Virginia adored baskets.
"And there is the dearest sofa pillow."
She had decided on a pillow for Caroline's birthday.
"And, Aunt Virginia, there are the cunningest little collars with
cuffs to match," Charlotte continued with mischievous eyes.
Miss Virginia grew impatient. It was out of all reason that such
desirable things should be brought almost to her door and yet be
beyond her reach.
"It wouldn't be giving them much encouragement just to look in the
window," observed Charlotte. "I'll tell you," she cried the next
minute, "opera glasses!"
"My _dear_, look at my neighbors through an opera glass?"
"But they _want_ to be looked at," insisted Charlotte, with
unanswerable logic.
Miss Virginia allowed herself to be persuaded, and, securely
entrenched behind the lace curtain, she levelled her glass. As is ever
the case with one who dallies with temptation, the result was an
increased desire to have that pillow in her hands.
Standing absorbed in contemplation, she suddenly, without intending
it, turned her gaze upon one of the upper windows; and as she did so
the muslin draperies parted and a pair of merry eyes belonging to a
pretty face looked straight into hers.
"I beg your pardon," cried Miss Virginia, dropping her glass and
sinking into a chair, "I shall be ashamed of this to my dying day,"
she groaned, while Charlotte went off into fits of laughter.
It was some time before she could be brought to realize she had not
been seen. "Not that that makes it much better," she added contritely.
"And, Charlotte, don't mention it to your Aunt Caroline. I think my
ideas of propriety are as strict as hers, but I do not succeed so well
in living up to them. I fear I am, as she says, childish."
"I shall not say anything about it, and I am sure I think you are very
nice, Aunt Virginia," answered Charlotte, still laughing.
The suspicion that Charlotte liked her better than she did Caroline
was a secret pleasure to Miss Virginia, and she flushed prettily as
she said, "Thank you, dear; I am far from what I should be."
Charlotte went to take her music lesson; Mrs. Millard was attending a
club meeting; the house was very quiet as Miss Virginia sat down to
her embroidery. While she worked, the face so vividly imprinted on her
memory in that moment's view continued to rise before her. She began
to feel something like sympathy for its owner. She had not supposed it
would be such an attractive shop. What possible harm could there be in
going over just to look? She might even go in and explain to the
proprietor that she had made a mistake in coming into the
neighborhood. It would be a kindness. She could use a spool of
buttonhole twist as an excuse. She really needed it.
Then she saw the foolishness of all this and tried to think of
something else. She worked another scallop, and concluded to go for a
walk.
When she stepped out of the gate, she turned her back upon the shop
and walked in the opposite direction, but a quarter of an hour later
she might have been seen approaching it by way of Pleasant Street.
It was a beautiful October day; there was a suggestion of autumn in
the maples, but the air was soft as spring. As she stood before the
door her heart beat guiltily; her own home across the way wore an
oddly unfamiliar look.
Being a shop one was, of course, expected to open the door and walk
in. Miss Virginia did so, and for a bewildered moment felt she had
made a mistake, for there was nothing in the room she entered that
seemed to bear any relation to a shop.
In the window, where the ferns and palms were, three persons sat, two
young women and a small boy in socks. One of the three rose and came
to meet her. The identity of the face with the one she had seen
through the opera glass so recently, added to her confusion.
"Can I show you something?"
Miss Virginia gazed at the speaker despairingly. "I have forgotten
what I came for," she stammered.
It might have been an everyday occurrence to have customers who had
forgotten what they wanted, for anything the manner of the young woman
showed. She smiled indeed, but sympathetically, saying she often
forgot things herself; and, pushing forward a willow chair, added,
"Won't you sit down and let me show you some of our things?"
Not seeing her way clear to escape, Miss Virginia accepted the chair.
There were other chairs of the same variety, some of them supplied
with cushions; around the olive-tinted walls were low cases which
might hold books or anything; there was a table with a lamp and
magazines upon it, and in the corner fireplace a low fire flickered.
The most businesslike piece of furniture was the long table upon which
the young woman was laying out a bewitching assortment of collars and
cuffs of a daintiness that went to the heart. Miss Virginia forgot her
embarrassment in her pleasure at the array of pretty things.
The small boy crossed the room, and depositing a gray flannel donkey
on the table leaned upon Miss Virginia's chair. He was a pretty child,
and she smiled at him as he lifted his serious brown eyes.
"Jack likes to see what you are doing, but you mustn't sell him by
mistake, Miss Norah," he said.
"Is this your little boy?" she asked.
"No, James Mandeville is a neighbor and very good friend of ours.
Aren't you, Infinitesimal James?"
He nodded emphatically, and continued to look on with interest while
Norah hung soft-tinted fabrics over a convenient rack, and brought out
baskets of all colors and shapes.
It was clearly James Mandeville's fault that Miss Wilbur was unable to
preserve that distant manner which was the only proper attitude toward
this objectionable shop. When he laid his plump hand on hers and
looked up at her in silent good fellowship, she felt a thrill of
pleasure. Could any one refuse a child's offer of friendship? Not Miss
Virginia, certainly. She bent and touched his cheek with her lips.
James Mandeville, moved to further demonstration, brought the donkey
and laid him on her lap.
"Don't show me anything more," she said, patting the donkey.
"Everything is beautiful. I really didn't come expecting to buy, but
I must have one of these collars." She laid a bit of embroidery
against her sleeve and looked down at it thoughtfully.
The sunlight fell slantingly across the room, gleaming in James
Mandeville's short curls and emphasizing all the cosiness and
pleasantness of her surroundings. The spirit of friendliness grew
strong in Miss Virginia. She felt in no haste to leave.
While Norah searched for something in one of the cases, Miss Wilbur
peeped around the chair back at the occupant of the window who was
employing herself with knitting. She was not--so Miss Virginia
thought--as attractive as her associate, although she could not be
called ordinary. Meanwhile James Mandeville investigated her shopping
bag with absorbed interest.
The opening of the shop door interrupted her thoughts, and before she
had time to push aside the draperies which, disposed upon the rack,
intervened between her and the door, she heard a cool, clear voice
announce, "I wish a spool of twist--black if you please."
Miss Virginia gazed wildly toward the door at the other end of the
room, her first impression being that Caroline had come in search of
her. The next moment she realized with surprise and amusement that her
sister had come altogether on her own account and had asked for the
very same thing she herself had thought of purchasing. Miss Virginia
braced herself for the inevitable encounter, and when Miss Norah
returned, thanked her for her kindness in showing so many of her
wares, and selected one from the collars before her. The while she
heard her sister's voice.
"Do you consider this a good locality for a shop?" Mrs. Millard asked.
"It seems to me quite otherwise, and I think it the only proper course
to tell you that the neighborhood strongly objects to such an
intrusion."
Miss Virginia felt her face grow hot.
"Isn't it a little late to tell us this?" The tall young woman who had
put down her knitting to serve the newcomer seemed not a whit abashed
at Mrs. Millard's manner. If anything, she was the more queenly of the
two, and might have been bestowing a favor as she handed back the
change.
Norah's sunny face intervened, "We are very sorry if you don't want
us," she said, "for we shall have to stay for the present. We think we
are quite as nice as a drug store, and perhaps we shall be able to
convince you of it before long."
Could Caroline hold out against such winning address? What she might
have said or done was never known, for James Mandeville, desiring to
see what was going on, and attempting to crawl under the rack with its
burden of fabrics, precipitated it upon himself and was lost in the
ruins, while Miss Virginia was revealed in all her ignominy, with a
flannel donkey in her lap, to the eyes of her relative.
"Virginia! I am astonished!"
Miss Wilbur rose to the occasion. "So am I, Caroline. I, too, came to
get a spool of twist." There is good authority for the assertion that
one may smile and be a villain, but hitherto such depths of perfidy
had been unsuspected in Miss Virginia.
The united efforts of the shopkeepers were required to disentangle
James Mandeville and quiet his cries of alarm. In the struggle Miss
Wilbur's bag suffered a complete upturn, and her small change was
scattered to the four corners of the room.
Mrs. Millard stood apart looking on in disdain at the confusion, when
again the shop door opened, this time to admit Miss Sarah Leigh who
advanced and addressed her, fumbling in her pocket-book meanwhile and
not lifting her eyes. "I want a spool of twist," she said, producing a
sample of blue silk. "Why, Caroline Wilbur!" and she stared in
amazement.
Norah who had set James Mandeville, still weeping, out of harm's way
on the table, met Miss Sarah's bewildered gaze with a frank smile, as
if she appreciated the joke.
"Do you call this a shop?" Miss Sarah demanded; adding, "Well, if
there isn't Virginia! Are Judge Russell and Mr. Goodman hiding
somewhere? Is this a conspiracy?"
"I'll explain later," said Mrs. Millard, with dignity. "Virginia, are
you ready?"
As they crossed Pleasant Street together, Miss Sarah was disposed to
make merry at Mrs. Millard's expense, but that lady's haughtiness was
extreme. There was nothing funny in her actions. She had gone to the
shop with a purpose, thinking it only the part of fairness to tell
them frankly they were not wanted in the neighborhood.
"That is what I thought of doing," said Miss Virginia. But who can
blame her sister for looking incredulous.
"Well, I'm going again," said Miss Sarah, pausing at the gate. "It is
an interesting place."
Miss Virginia agreed with her, and yet she was beginning to feel a
little doubtful about her own behavior this afternoon. She feared she
had not been quite dignified.
"Sarah Leigh was never a person of very strong convictions," her
sister remarked, as they waited at the door.
"Why, I don't know, Caroline,--perhaps they are just different."
"Really, I don't understand you, Virginia," was Mrs. Millard's
response, nor did she manifest any desire for enlightenment.
Miss Virginia felt that her conduct that afternoon was embraced in her
sister's remark, and that it would be quite hopeless to try to
explain.
CHAPTER EIGHTH
A MATTER OF LOYALTY
Mrs. Millard's irritation was not long in bearing fruit. On the hall
table lay a card, and pausing on her way upstairs she examined it
through her jewelled lorgnette. Charlotte, halfway down, leaned over
the rail and watched her, admiring the sweep of her gown, the
perfection of the gloved hand that held the card.
One might object to Aunt Caroline's methods and rebel against her
mandates, and yet not be blind to the exquisite perfection of her
appearance and belongings. Charlotte had privately borrowed one of
Aunt Virginia's skirts, and practised before the cheval glass, but the
flowing lines that so much pleased her she found unattainable.
"Miss Lucile Lyle," Mrs. Millard read aloud.
"It is for me, Aunt Caroline," said Charlotte, from above. "I have
been walking with Miss Alex and missed her."
"Which is rather fortunate than otherwise; for," Mrs. Millard tapped
the card with her glass, "I desire you not to make a friend of this
young lady."
Charlotte sat down on the step. "Does that mean I am to be rude to
her?"
"Certainly not. There are ways of letting people know you do not care
for their society without being rude."
"I don't see how you can do it without being unpleasant," argued
Charlotte; "and I like Lucile."
"That last fact has nothing to do with it. It is important at your age
to form proper friendships. This I do not consider desirable, and I
expect you to be guided by me."
"What am I to do?" Charlotte persisted.
"I see no occasion to do anything."
"She will think it rude if I do not go to see her."
"What she thinks is of little moment. You can say your aunt does not
care to have you make visits while you are occupied with your
studies."
"But she knows I have been to see the Mays."
"Well, really, Charlotte, I cannot argue the question further. I
simply expect to be obeyed in the matter." With this final utterance
Mrs. Millard swept past her.
Charlotte had come in from her walk in good spirits. She felt it an
honor to be chosen as a companion by a grown young lady, and Miss Alex
had been very entertaining as they walked about the park under the
beech trees. In these days Charlotte's ideals were in an unstable
state. On the one hand, she admired Lucile, longed to be Carlotta and
the heroine of romantic adventures. On the other, she recognized a
certain distinction in Alexina's severe style, and felt proud of her
notice.
This afternoon Alex's influence had been in the ascendant. She had
shown a flattering interest in all Charlotte told about her life at
Aunt Cora's and the Landors'. She had read some of Cousin Frank's
stories and poems and admired them, making Charlotte proud of being
even distantly related to him.
"It must be splendid to do things," Alex said. "To feel that you have
your own special work to do in the world."
"I should love to write stories or paint pictures," agreed Charlotte.
"Any sort of useful work,--work there was a demand for, and that I
could do better, or at least as well as any one else, would satisfy
me," said Alex.
Alexina had gone on to give Charlotte a great deal of good advice
about making the most of her opportunities. She listened gravely to
the story of the borrowed novel Aunt Caroline had taken away; and
while she acknowledged it was trying, she pointed out that it was a
foolish story, and not worth reading.
When Charlotte went on to describe Lucile, Alex did not seem
impressed, only saying, "I wonder who the Lyles are; I never heard of
them. Of course they may be nice people, but Lucile Lyle is such a
silly name."
"I think it is beautiful," cried Charlotte, wondering what Miss Alex
would think of Carlotta Creston.
"No," the young lady said, as if replying to her thought, "I prefer
plain names. For instance, if you should turn out to be a brilliant
beauty and all that, there is nothing inappropriate in your name,
Charlotte Creston. You can glorify it; but if you are only an ordinary
person, you are made absurd by a name you cannot live up to."
This was a new view to take of it. Charlotte wavered, and really
Lucile's influence was a little on the wane when the encounter with
Aunt Caroline gave it new life. At school next day Charlotte came
again under her spell.
Lucile was undeniably pretty and almost as grown up in appearance as
Miss Alex, though only fifteen. She was intensely romantic, her own
personal experiences at this early age would have supplied several
novels, and her manner toward Charlotte was caressing and flattering.
Charlotte was one of the few who understood her, she said. They were
kindred souls.
Lucile wrote verses which seemed to Charlotte quite as good as Cousin
Frank's, and she could sing any number of love-songs charmingly. The
girls would gather about the piano at recess and beg her to sing. The
favorite was one beginning:--
"Teach, oh, teach me not to love thee!
Turn those beauteous eyes away,"
and Lucile always bent a soulful gaze upon Charlotte when she sang it.
Charlotte wondered if her eyes were beauteous.
"When are you coming to see me Carlotta?" Lucile asked one day.
They were walking home from school, and had paused on the corner where
their ways divided.
"I don't know. They don't like me to go out alone," was the answer,
given with a flushed face.
"But the cars bring you almost to our door. I shall be terribly hurt."
Charlotte looked gloomy. "I can't come if they won't let me. You don't
know. They think I am six years old."
"You don't love me. I see it plainly." With a tragic gesture Lucile
drew a ring from her finger and held it out. "Take it back," she said.
In the first ardor of their friendship they had exchanged rings,
Charlotte feeling a little mortified at the time that Lucile's was so
much handsomer than hers, and she had kept it carefully turned in to
avoid comment. But after all it was not giving up the ring she minded.
Lucile's apparent distress touched her affectionate heart.
"Don't say that!" she entreated, drawing back. "I do love you, and I
will come to see you whether they let me or not." In the glow of her
devotion she felt like a heroine in one of Lucile's favorite tales. It
was a question of loyalty now. She had promised to be friends before
Aunt Caroline issued her commands. So they parted with renewed vows,
and Charlotte's assurance that she would come that very afternoon on
her way from her music lesson, if she could escape unobserved.
Charlotte had very imperfectly learned the lesson of obedience to
higher powers, and it was not difficult to convince herself that she
was justified. It did seem a little underhand, this was all that
troubled her.
Aunt Virginia, who was going down town in the carriage, offered to
take her to her lesson; adding, "You can find your way back, I
suppose."
"I should think so, after so many times," Charlotte answered, feeling
guilty.
Aunt Virginia was particularly agreeable and funny that afternoon.
Charlotte was really becoming very fond of her. She was a merry
companion; she liked foolish things, such as soda-water and candy, and
was even willing to stop and watch a circus parade.
"If it is cool when you leave, be sure to put your jacket on," was her
parting injunction.
"And if it rains, I'll put up my umbrella," Charlotte called after
her, saucily. At the same time she felt ashamed of what she had
planned to do. If it had not been for the memory of Lucile's
reproaches, she would have given it up.
It must have been the thought of Aunt Virginia that kept the call from
being the pleasure she had expected. Lucile was very glad to see her,
and took her over the large, showy house, which seemed exactly suited
to the large blond woman with a complexion of pinkish lavender, whom
she introduced as her mother. Mrs. Lyle wore a costume of black and
white, in broad stripes, and a wonderful, black plumed hat, which
brought to mind Aunt Cora's poster room.
She was most gracious, complimenting Charlotte's eyes, and asking if
she did not find the Terrace dreadfully far down town. She also asked
about the Russells; said Alexina was odd and Madelaine a beauty, and
that it was a great pity the judge had not known how to keep his
money,--all of which seemed strange to Charlotte, when she remembered
Alex's question, "Who are the Lyles?"
Lucile seemed proud of the house and told the cost of a good many
things. She wanted to know why Charlotte's aunts did not sell their
house in the Terrace and build out on the Avenue.
"I don't believe they want to," Charlotte answered; "and I think the
Terrace is very nice," she added, feeling Lucile was rather too
complacent.
"Why, they are beginning to put up stores there!" Lucile exclaimed.
Charlotte had herself freely criticised the Terrace, but this did not
keep her from resenting Lucile's remarks, and she carried away with
her a consciousness of the friction. As she walked home, she felt a
vague dissatisfaction with life in general, and heartily wished she
had not gone. She could not help seeing, just a little, why Aunt
Caroline did not care for the Lyles.
Charlotte had a strong impulse to confess, and say she was sorry for
what she had done; but the right moment did not come. Aunt Caroline
was out that evening and Aunt Virginia in one of her shy, elusive
moods. She got as far as "Aunt Virginia, I want to tell you,--I did
something dreadful to-day--" when a visitor was announced. Her aunt
looked relieved.
"Never mind, my dear; if you are sorry, I have no doubt it will be all
right," she said, rising hastily. "Go to bed early."
How could you tell people things if they did not want to listen? At
any rate she would not go to the Lyles' again, and she gave herself to
her studies with a new earnestness born of repentance.
CHAPTER NINTH
IN THE SHOP
The opposition of the neighborhood resulted in advertising the shop to
some extent. Whoever saw the odd little place was certain to tell some
one else; and this person and that, dropping in out of curiosity to
look, remained to buy, if only a trifle.
The wares were novel and attractive, the prices reasonable, and the
shopkeepers themselves afforded food for speculation. Like their
wares, they were unusual,--considered as shopkeepers, that is. To all
appearances ladies, their manner of speech betrayed they were not
Southern; yet they did not single out the letter _r_ as worthy of
peculiar emphasis,--a thing the Terrace could not tolerate.
To those who often passed the shop, James Mandeville became a familiar
figure; for from the first he elected to bestow upon its proprietors
his unqualified friendship, and a day rarely went by without a visit
from him. He quickly learned to adapt himself to the rule that he must
not finger things, nor interrupt when customers were present. He
usually brought some plaything with him,--most frequently the flannel
donkey,--and amused himself quite happily, with an occasional appeal
to the sympathy of his companions.
His new friends began to look forward each day to his coming and to
the invariable piece of news with which he entered.
"Miss Norah, what do you think?" he exclaimed one morning. "The moon's
awake and it's daytime!" and drawing her to the door he pointed out
the misty phantom in the southwestern sky, with the air of a
discoverer.
On another occasion, "Miss Norah, I can't stay very long to-day,
'cause my geranium is going to bloom."
It developed that James Mandeville's mother was ill in a sanitarium,
his father absorbed in business, and his only guardian an old colored
woman, known as Mammy Belle. Mammy Belle was of the type fast
disappearing. She wore head handkerchiefs of bright colors, and her
purple calicoes were stiff with starch and spotlessly neat. She
possessed the peculiar dignity that accompanied a faithful,
unquestioning acceptance of her station in life.
Mammy had sole charge of the Norton household, and no doubt it was a
relief to her to know that her charge had found so safe an asylum; but
on the occasion of her first visit the shopkeepers felt they were
being weighed in the balance. Her manner was apologetic and reserved,
as she stood, her hands folded on her white apron.
"'Tain't possible to keep dat chile at home," she explained. "Yes'm. I
takes keer of him. Miss Maimie, she's in a hospital, an' dey ain't
nobody to raise James Mandeville but his old mammy."
"I ain't comin', mammy," declared her charge, positively.
"Yes, you is comin', honey; don' you talk to mammy dat way. 'Tisn't
pretty. Looks like it's mighty hard to raise you polite, James
Mandeville."
Norah delighted to talk with her, and gathered from her conversation
that her greatest pleasure, next to a funeral, was to take James
Mandeville to white folks' church on Sunday afternoon, "to see dem
chillen march and sing." To her enthusiasm was due the aspiration of
her charge to be a choir boy, and he was often heard singing lustily
versions of "Onward, Christian Soldiers," and "O Paradise," which were
all his own.
"Dey's ladies, store or no store," Belle was overheard remarking to
Susanna. "I knows quality; you can't fool Belle, no'm."
* * * * *
"I never in my life felt so rich," Marion said, rattling the money
drawer.
It was Saturday evening at the end of their first week. All was in
order in the shop, the long table pushed back, the small one with the
lamp brought forward, the shades drawn, the door barred, and Norah now
rested comfortably in one of the roomy chairs with a gay pillow behind
her head.
"We have done very well, I think," she agreed.
"I perceive this is one subject upon which my enthusiasm is greater
than yours. It must be because you have made money before." Marion
still hung over the money drawer.
"I don't consider that we have made anything yet; but the difference
between us is that I expected all along to do very well, while you
were a doubting Thomas."
"As I always am." With surprising ease for one so tall, Marion slipped
down on the rug at her friend's feet.
Norah caressed the dark head against her knee. "But you are improving,
dearest," she said, "and I'm glad, indeed, if this first week has
encouraged you." She laughed a little as she added, "I believe I am
just a bit more anxious to prove to our friend Miss Carpenter that in
lending us the capital for our venture she has not done a reckless and
unwise thing."
"But, Norah--"
"I know what you are going to say. She is not worrying about the money
and could well afford to take the risk, but with you and me it is a
matter of principle. We must succeed and justify her confidence. So we
won't count our chickens too soon, but lay low, like Brer Rabbit, and
say nothin'."
"At any rate I know what it is to have worked all the week, and to be
tired and glad of Sunday. Norah, it is nonsense expecting people
really to care for Sunday when they don't work."
"I hope you haven't tired yourself too much;" Norah bent forward till
she could see the face on her knee. Her manner was oddly motherly; she
seemed so much the younger and smaller of the two.
"Oh, no; and sometimes I have almost forgotten--"
"Go on forgetting, dear. I know you need not fear, if you will only
think so."
"If I were only sure," Marion sighed. "And sometimes I am," she added.
"At least I am charmed with the neighborhood," Norah went on, "If the
haughty lady across the street continues her opposition, our success
is assured. Her name, I have discovered, is Millard, and that dear
Miss Virginia is her sister, of course; and there is a bright-looking
little girl who goes in and out, and seems to belong to them.
"And I forgot to tell you my adventure this morning. When I got off
the car at Walnut Street, coming home, there was an old gentleman with
some books just behind me. He had an armful, and as he stepped to the
ground they slipped and fell in the dust. He was evidently lame and
stiff with rheumatism, so I picked them up for him. He was a beautiful
old man, with a most courtly manner; and he seemed to think as I had
helped him, I was entitled to know about the books. We walked along
together, and he explained they were some he had found at a
second-hand store. One of them was a first edition of the 'Essays of
Elia' which he thought a tremendous bargain; and it was, I'm sure.
"We fell to discussing books, and he seemed delighted to find I was
not absolutely ignorant and ended by inviting me in to see his
library. He lives in the house that needs paint so badly,--where you
have noticed that beautiful Ginkgo tree."
"Did you accept his invitation?"
"No, I told him I had not time just then. He asked if I lived near;
and, Marion, you should have seen his puzzled look when I said, 'On
the corner of Pleasant Street.' 'You are visiting?--the Wilburs,
perhaps.' he said. 'No,' I answered, 'I am one of the proprietors of
the shop.' He was terribly shocked and disappointed, I could see. I
had really made an impression. He grew a little distant, but was still
charming, thanking me again for my kindness; however, he said no more
about the library."
"It is funny--" began Marion, but she did not finish her sentence, and
they sat in silence for a while. Presently Marion took possession of
the hand that was touching her hair so lightly, and laid her cheek
against it. Not many people, she thought, had such a friend. One who
had been everything in a time of need, who had given her new hope and
courage in an hour of darkness. She felt herself unworthy, because she
did not believe she could ever be such a help to any one.
"Do you remember, when you were a child, Norah, how sometimes when you
had found some delightful game that stirred your imagination, you
would go to sleep at night with the most blissful sense of waking up
to go on with it in the morning? I have had much the same feeling
lately."
"Then I am satisfied about you. 'As little children' is the key to the
best things of life, I firmly believe. Let's read a bit of 'The Golden
Age' before we go to bed," said Norah.
CHAPTER TENTH
ALEXINA
Alexina Russell longed to be of use in the world. It fretted her to
live as they did, pensioners on her grandfather, whose fortune had
sadly dwindled of late years. Her mother's income was barely
sufficient to clothe the three of them, and Alex felt she ought to be
earning her own living. That her grandfather made them more than
welcome, and besides had an old-fashioned horror of a woman going out
into the world as a worker, did not alter her conviction.
She did not feel competent to teach. Delicate as a child, she had gone
to school intermittently, and the best of her somewhat scrappy
education had been gained in her grandfather's library; but she found
it difficult to combat the prejudice of the whole family against any
other method of supporting herself. Alex loved the old house,--the
outside of which time and coal-dust had turned a uniform dingy
gray,--and sometimes wondered how she could ever stand it to live
anywhere else. There is a point where dinginess becomes picturesque;
and the vines, undisturbed by repairs, were doing their best to hide
all deficiencies. The grounds were ample for a city; and the tall
Ginkgo tree which reached out its fern-like branches protectingly
toward the timeworn mansion was only one of many other fine trees and
shrubs. Inside, the lofty rooms and handsome furnishings of many years
ago, some fine old portraits, and many valuable books and prints gave
it a distinction not to be achieved by many modern houses.
Pretty Mrs. Russell, almost as dainty and girlish as her youngest
daughter, shed tears over Alex's oddity; and Alex, who sincerely loved
and admired her mother, felt her burden all the greater because she
was a disappointment. She had submitted for one winter to be taken to
receptions and teas, and to have a dinner given in her honor, in the
newspaper accounts of which the rare old Russell silver figured
effectively, and on the whole she had enjoyed it. But a season of it
was enough; her practical mind rebelled against the expense and
uselessness of such a life. She adopted the plainest style of dress,
declined invitations, and privately studied shorthand.
In the bottom of her heart Madelaine thought it just as well. Plain
things became Alex, and it was nobody's fault but her own if she
preferred the background. And Alex was not in the least jealous of her
sister's popularity. She had something of the responsible feelings of
a father or brother toward her mother and Madelaine.
Alex's refuge was the library and the companionship of her
grandfather, who often told her she took life too seriously.
"You are young yet. Be happy, and things will work out of themselves."
But Alexina did not share his gentle optimism. It seemed to her at
once the charm and weakness of her grandfather's character. She was
impatient; she wanted to know what was the right path for her to take,
not to waste years in finding it.
Mrs. Russell sometimes laughingly declared that Alex's most intimate
friends were Miss Virginia Wilbur and Miss Sarah Leigh, and it was
true she often sought their society. Miss Wilbur had made pets of the
Russell children from their babyhood, and they were both fond of her.
There were times when Alex found her placid absorption in everyday
matters rather soothing, at others Miss Sarah suited her mood better.
Miss Sarah had all manner of troubles and worries, but she did not box
them up and label them "Personal"; instead, she offered them to her
friends dressed up in whimsical fashion for their entertainment, until
it was difficult to consider them seriously. Old Mrs. Leigh was heard
to say she did not know what Sarah would find to laugh about if she
ever became prosperous.
Alexina found shorthand depressing, and after spending an hour or more
over it one afternoon she gave it up in despair and went over to see
Miss Sarah. As she entered the sitting room Mrs. Millard stood talking
to Mrs. Leigh.
"I suppose the next thing we'll be going to the Poor House," the old
lady was remarking cheerfully, for she was not far behind her niece in
the ability to extract pleasure from adversity. "Sarah says the Cement
Company has passed their dividend again. I know that means we don't
get any money."
"Dear me!" exclaimed Mrs. Millard; "why, Sarah, what are you living
on?"
The person addressed looked up from her sewing with a grim smile. "I
don't know--Caroline. We--are just living--_on_."
"I don't see how you can _smile_," said Mrs. Millard, with reproachful
emphasis. She was never guilty of making light of affliction.
"Well, there are funny things about being poor, Caroline; but I
suppose it takes a poor person to appreciate them." Then observing
Alex in the door, Miss Sarah added, "Come in and cheer us up, Alex."
"I am ashamed to say I came to be cheered," Alex said, after Mrs.
Millard had rustled away.
"Well, misery loves company, so just come to the kitchen with me while
I stir up a spice cake for Wayland, and we'll swap woes and have a
good time. I let Anne go to see her sister this afternoon."
When the materials had been collected and Alex assigned her share of
the task, Miss Sarah continued: "I have two things to tell you. First,
I have made up my mind to take boarders. I was trembling in my shoes
all the while Caroline was here, for fear Aunt Sally would tell her.
She will think it a disgrace to the neighborhood; I'll be ranked with
the shop, but I must do something. We can't sell the house, and it
would break Aunt Sally's heart if we could, for it is all she has."
"I don't think it will hurt the neighborhood, and I hope you will
succeed. I'm sure I should love to board with you."
"Would you really, Alex? Doesn't the house strike you as very forlorn?
I'll tell you what I am going to do," and Miss Sarah launched forth
into an account of how she meant to cut the hall carpet in two and
turn it around so the worn part would come under the stairs. "But dear
me!" she interrupted herself to say, "how absurd to bother you with
all this. It is your turn to say something."
"I like to hear it. I am interested, and my worries are the same old
ones. I do want to learn how to do something to support myself, and
stenography is so--abominably dull. I am angry with myself for finding
it so." Alex rested her chin in her hand, and looked at Miss Sarah
disconsolately across the table.
"I do not believe you were meant for that sort of thing," Miss Sarah
said stoutly. "Of course I can't tell you what you _were_ made for;
but I know what I'd like to do, and that is, keep a shop such as the
one on the corner."
"What would Mrs. Millard say to that?" Alex asked, laughing.
"She can't say much since she was caught there herself. You needn't
tell me curiosity had not something to do with it. But I am forgetting
the other thing I had to tell you. I have made trouble in the Wilbur
household."
"What do you mean? How?"
"I was never more provoked with myself. The other day I happened to be
out on Dean Avenue, and whom should I see going into the Lyles' but
Charlotte Creston. You know that big, showy house near the park. What
possessed me to mention it, I don't know, but I did, one evening when
Caroline and Virginia were here. I knew in a minute something was
wrong. I have an idea Charlotte went without permission."
"Who are the Lyles?" asked Alex.
"Mrs. Lyle was at the glove counter at Mason's years ago; she was then
Maggie McKay, and a vain, pretentious thing. She married a plumber
with a romantic name, and her rise has been rapid. Now, if you and I
could only be plumbers!"
"I remember Charlotte mentioned a Lucile Lyle, and seemed rather
fascinated, but I did not think she would be so silly as to go there
against her aunt's wishes. I am afraid she is headstrong."
"She is the sort of a child to be goaded to distraction by Caroline. I
wish I had held my tongue. I can see Virginia is dreadfully upset
about something."
"I think I'll go over and talk to Charlotte," Alex said, as Miss Sarah
shut the oven door on the spice cake. Alexina had had dreams of
influencing Charlotte, and she felt a little annoyed that what she had
said on the subject of this foolish friendship had made such a slight
impression.
"Now don't you go and make matters worse, Alex," cautioned Miss Sarah.
"I have no doubt Caroline has harped on the matter till the child is
desperate. I feel terribly guilty."
"I am disappointed in her, and I mean to tell her so," Alex replied
firmly.
CHAPTER ELEVENTH
THE LAST STRAW
Charlotte was closing the piano after an hour's practice when Alexina
walked in. A week had passed since the discovery of her
disobedience,--a week of increasing unhappiness. The blow had fallen
unexpectedly. One day at dinner she had been conscious of something
amiss. A remark of her own met with no response; Aunt Caroline looked
haughty, Aunt Virginia despondent. Charlotte had not, however, guessed
the cause until she was summoned into the library and the question put
to her by Mrs. Millard, "Did you go to the Lyles' in defiance of my
express wishes, Charlotte?"
"I--"
"Yes or no, if you please."
"Yes," Charlotte answered, "but--"
"I want no explanations. There can be none."
"But, Aunt Caroline, you don't understand--"
"You are the one who seems not to understand," again Mrs. Millard
interrupted. "You have deliberately disobeyed. I see you are not to be
trusted. Hereafter, whenever you go out, you shall be provided with an
attendant. The carriage will take you to and from school, your Aunt
Virginia or I will accompany you to your music lesson when possible;
at other times Martha will go."
"Aunt Caroline, you might let me speak. I tried to tell Aunt
Virginia--I had promised Lucile--I had to go; but I am dreadfully
sorry, and--"
"Charlotte, I will not have any words on the subject. You have
deliberately disobeyed. Nothing you can say alters that." Mrs. Millard
swept from the room, almost running down Miss Virginia, who hovered
about the door.
"She did try to tell, Caroline," Charlotte heard her say.
"Nonsense, what difference can that make?" was the reply.
Not to be allowed one word in self-defence was hard. Charlotte locked
herself in her room and shed bitter tears of anger and mortification.
That she was sorry and had tried to confess seemed to her to be very
much to her credit, and Aunt Caroline was unreasonable as well as
cruel. She refused to go down to supper, saying her head ached; and it
would have been in harmony with her state of mind if she had been
compelled to go without any, but it was sent up to her without
comment.
The worst was to come, however. To a high-spirited girl, used to the
greatest freedom, the constant surveillance was unbearable. She was
not locked up, but in all other respects she felt herself a captive.
She was certain Aunt Virginia was sorry for her,--in an aloof and
timid fashion she showed her friendliness; but Charlotte longed for
some one to whom she could pour out all her unhappiness; and for this
Aunt Virginia allowed her no opportunity.
How long was it to last? Aunt Caroline gave no word. As the days
passed, Charlotte began to wear a sullen, dogged look. The sight of
Alexina brought a thrill of hope. Surely, Miss Alex would listen to
her, and be sorry.
"Charlotte, what is this I hear about you?" Alexina demanded, seating
herself on the piano-stool.
"Oh, Miss Alex, I am so unhappy." Charlotte, who was kneeling to put
away some music in the cabinet, sank in a forlorn little heap at her
feet. "She won't let me go anywhere by myself,--not even to school;
and she wouldn't listen when I said I was sorry." Charlotte's tone was
guarded, but none the less appealing.
But Alex hardened her heart. "I suppose it is because you were
disobedient. I must say I am disappointed in you, for it seems to me
you were deceitful as well as disobedient."
Charlotte sat up. Her last hope of a confidante was gone. "You have no
right to say that. I had to go: I had promised. I was willing to be
punished, but she has no right to treat me like a baby. I wish I had
never come."
"Probably your aunts wish so too," Alex observed coolly. "You are not
reasonable, Charlotte. You have acted like a silly child and made
yourself talked about, and you are just worrying Miss Virginia to
death. But don't look at me in that way. I am sorry for you, and if
you will be patient and accept your punishment, it will come out all
right." Alex laid her hand on Charlotte's shoulder, but the girl
twitched it away. Rising, she stood stony and silent. Alex's
condemnation was the last straw.
As she went drearily up the stairway, Charlotte's thoughts turned with
a great longing to her guardian and the quiet house in Philadelphia.
He did perhaps care a little for her. He had sent her here because he
thought it best, but it had turned out a terrible mistake. She would
write to-night and tell him so. Tell him how impossible it was to
endure it any longer, and implore him to send her to boarding-school.
But would he understand? It was so difficult to write things. If only
she could be with him and Cousin Francis for half an hour and tell
them her story, she was sure she could make them see the matter as she
did. And now a daring thought entered her mind. Why not go to them?
Naturally self-reliant, the thought of the long journey by herself did
not terrify her. In the little silver purse (Aunt Cora's parting
gift) were two gold pieces,--more than enough to buy a ticket to
Philadelphia.
Charlotte's misery grew less at the picture her imagination drew of
her aunts' consternation when her flight should be discovered.
Probably there would be more talk; but little would she care, safe
with Uncle Landor.
Carried away by the excitement of the idea, she found a daily paper
and sat down in the dainty room prepared for her with so much loving
care by Aunt Virginia not three months ago, to study the time-table
and lay her plans.
There was a through train at half-past eight at night which would
exactly suit. She could steal away after supper. It was the evening
for Aunt Caroline's Antiquarian Society, and Aunt Virginia could be
easily eluded.
In stories people who ran away usually left notes. Charlotte
considered this, and decided she would write one to Aunt Virginia. It
took a long while and a great deal of note-paper was wasted before it
was done, and her enthusiasm had cooled a little as she folded it.
She carried a flushed face and an abstracted manner to the supper
table, but her aunts were evidently too much interested in some
matter they were discussing to notice her. If she had been less
absorbed, her curiosity would have been aroused by the guarded manner
in which they talked.
"It is a case where duty seems to call one in opposite directions,"
said Mrs. Millard, studying the handle of her spoon with an air of
profound seriousness that provoked one of those occasionally profane
suggestions from her sister.
"You'll have to toss up a penny," remarked Miss Virginia.
The thought of Aunt Caroline tossing a penny caused Charlotte a
moment's diversion, and a faint smile curled about her lips as Aunt
Virginia promptly took it all back.
"I realize, of course, Caroline, that it is hard to decide; but,
really, I think you can't refuse Georgiana."
"I shall take the matter under careful consideration till to-morrow,"
replied Mrs. Millard.
Before they left the table Miss Sarah Leigh looked in to ask Virginia
about a Mount Mellick stitch. Thus fortune seemed to favor Charlotte's
plans.
"Are you going to study, dear?" Aunt Virginia asked.
Charlotte flushed at the kind tone, "I am going upstairs, Aunt
Virginia," she answered. "I am tired."
If Aunt Virginia's kindness weakened her resolve to run away, an
encounter with Aunt Caroline in the upper hall made it strong again.
While the servants were at supper and Miss Virginia occupied with the
embroidery lesson, and just as Mrs. Millard left the house by the
front door, a slight figure in a long gray coat with a blue veil over
her face slipped down the back stairs, bag in hand, and out of the
side door.
Pleasant Street was full of swaying shadows, for the wind had risen
and the electric light on the corner swung slowly to and fro.
Charlotte held to the gate a moment to steady herself; she seemed
swaying, too. Not a single person was to be seen. For the first time
in her life she was alone on the street at night. She told herself
there was nothing to fear, but she looked wistfully at the lighted
windows of the houses along the Terrace, and the cheerful glow that
shone from the little shop across the way; but she did not think of
going back. It was not far to the street-car, which would take her to
the door of the station; after that all would be perfectly simple.
CHAPTER TWELFTH
THE DISCOVERY
It was still early when Miss Sarah rolled up her work, saying her aunt
was not well and must not be left any longer alone.
After she had gone Miss Virginia moved about the drawing-room, pushing
chairs back into their places, changing by a few inches the position
of some ornament, and rearranging the folds of the curtains. Meanwhile
she was thinking that, in part at least, the problem that had been
weighing upon her was about to be solved. She had not felt so cheerful
in weeks.
At last she was to have a chance to redeem herself and silence that
troublesome conscience which continually reminded her she was shirking
her duty. Her relief was not unmixed, for at times she felt convicted
of disloyalty.
Ever since the episode of the spool of twist Caroline had been a
little disagreeable, though in an intangible way that hardly stood
analysis. Where Charlotte was concerned, Miss Virginia considered her
sister's severity extreme, and she had been hurt that her own protest
and plea of extenuating circumstances should have been so scornfully
dismissed. Now if events turned out as they promised, all would be
well again. If only she dared give Charlotte a hint. The child looked
pale and unhappy.
Could there be any harm in saying to her that something was about to
happen which would make everything right? Miss Virginia resolved to do
it. There could be no reasonable doubt as to what Caroline's decision
would be. She ran upstairs light-heartedly.
Charlotte's door was closed, perhaps she was already asleep. Softly
Miss Virginia turned the knob. The room was dark, except for the
outside electric light that threw a vivid shadow of the window-frame
and curtain on the opposite wall. She crossed the room to lower the
blind, and as she did so, discovered the bed was unoccupied.
[Illustration: SHE SANK INTO A CHAIR.]
With nervous haste she searched for the matches. Why did she tremble
so? It seemed an age till she found them. No, Charlotte was not
there; but how absurd to be alarmed, she must be somewhere in the
house. Mechanically Miss Virginia began to fold a ribbon that lay on
the dressing-table. Then her eye fell on a folded paper addressed to
herself. Scarcely able to breathe, she sank into a chair and opened
it. It was written in a large, schoolgirl hand.
"DEAR AUNT VIRGINIA: I am going away to Uncle Landor.
I am sorry to give you so much trouble. I am going to
ask him to send me to boarding school, because I can't
stand it any longer. I know how to go to Philadelphia,
and I have money enough. I did not mean to be
deceitful, but Miss Alex said I was, and that I was
making you miserable, so I think I ought to go.
"Your niece,
"CHARLOTTE CRESTON."
To Philadelphia--that child! Miss Virginia, who never travelled alone,
was overcome with the terror of it. What could she do? Was it too late
to stop her? Oh, for some one to help! She ran out into the hall, but
something checked her first impulse to call the servants. At what
hour did the evening train leave for the north? She hastened
downstairs for the paper.
"It is all my fault! all my fault!" she murmured to herself, as with
trembling hands she searched for the railroad column. It was too late;
the train must have left half an hour ago.
She must consult somebody. Surely, something could be done. Opening
the front door, she looked out into the night. A bright light shone
from the Russells' across the way. Forgetting to close the door behind
her, she hurried over the street and rang the bell.
She told the servant tremblingly that she wished to speak to Miss
Alex, who presently came to her in evident surprise.
"Why, Miss Virginia! Is anything the matter?"
"Oh, Alex, something dreadful has happened!" In her agitation it was
not possible to say more.
"Is any one ill?"
"No, it is Charlotte--she has gone!"
"Gone?" echoed Alex. "But do come in, Miss Virginia."
"I can't; I left the door open. I don't want people to know. Oh, Alex,
what shall I do?"
"I'll go back with you," said Alex. "I don't understand yet what has
happened. Where has Charlotte gone?"
Once inside her own door, Miss Virginia thrust Charlotte's note into
Alexina's hand. "What shall I do?" she cried. "That long journey
alone, and it is all my fault!"
"Don't say that; I am afraid it is partly mine. I was hard on her this
afternoon, but I didn't dream-- There must be some way to stop
her,--by telegraphing ahead, you know. I wonder-- It should be done at
once. The train left half an hour ago, you say?"
Miss Virginia nodded; words were beyond her.
And now into the drawing-room, where they stood in agitated
uncertainty, walked Miss Pennington, the shopkeeper. Her face was
flushed, her hair a little disordered by the wind, but she was
smiling, and somehow her presence seemed at once to relieve the
tension.
"Perhaps you can help me," cried poor Miss Virginia, hardly knowing
what she said.
"I am sure I can," answered the stranger, going to her and taking the
trembling hands in her own firm ones. "Are you worried about
Charlotte? If you are, I have come to tell you she is safe, and is not
going to Philadelphia to-night."
"You are sure? How do you know?" cried Miss Virginia, in bewilderment.
Alex drew near in surprise. She had not at first recognized Miss
Pennington.
"I'll tell you about it as quickly as I can, but you must sit down;"
and Norah drew her to a sofa, where, sitting beside her, she explained
that her friend, Miss Carpenter, had had occasion that night to go to
the station with her maid, whose nephew was to pass through the city
on his way to a western army post. In the waiting-room her attention
had been attracted by the efforts of a man to annoy a little girl.
Finally it became so marked, and the child seemed so alarmed, that
Miss Carpenter interfered, and appealed to a passing official. Then,
surprised that a girl of her appearance should be travelling alone at
night, she questioned her; and thoroughly frightened, Charlotte had
revealed the fact that she was running away.
"Miss Carpenter is a very decided person, and when she understood the
matter, would not let her go, but instead brought her home, where we
talked it over. I hope you won't think me very presuming when I say
that it seemed to us if there were any way of keeping it quiet, it
would be so much better. It was just the momentary rebellion of a
high-spirited girl. I know she is sorry now."
"Caroline need never know a thing about it," exclaimed Miss Virginia,
looking at Alex.
"I am sure that would be best. I'll never speak of it," answered Alex.
"Then I'll bring her over," said Norah, rising. "She is a good deal
excited, so I offered to come over and pave the way."
"You can tell her I will be as good to her--things are going to be
very different." Tears came into Miss Virginia's eyes.
"I am sure you are always good. I haven't the least doubt she was
naughty, but girls are very foolish sometimes." Norah looked at Alex
as if she might be expected to agree to this.
* * * * *
A very pale, subdued Charlotte made her appearance soon after. There
was nobody to receive her but Aunt Virginia, who waited at the door.
Little was said that night. "We'll just pretend it never happened,
dear," Aunt Virginia said tearfully, as she took her into her arms and
kissed her. "You didn't know it, but your Aunt Caroline is going away
for the winter," she added. "It is a secret yet, but she is going very
soon; and I was thinking you and I would have such a good time, and
then--" They both fell to crying over this in a manner to suggest to
one unenlightened that a good time without Aunt Caroline would prove
but a dreary affair.
"I am so sorry, and I am going to be good," Charlotte whispered, when
her aunt came to tuck her in. "And oh, Aunt Virginia, they are lovely!
They were so good." This, of course, referred to the shopkeepers.
"I didn't thank Miss Pennington; I didn't say one word, so far as I
remember," exclaimed Miss Wilbur, "and she was certainly kind. I shall
have to go over and express my appreciation. Judging from her
appearance she is a charming young woman."
CHAPTER THIRTEENTH
AFTERWARD
The newly built fire crackled and blazed merrily, putting to rout what
little daylight sifted through the slats of the window-shutters. How
pleasant to lie there safe and warm! Charlotte hugged her pillow in
thankfulness.
Far from being the heroine she had imagined herself, she realized she
was only a foolish little girl. For once she felt the truth of that
objectionable phrase. The experience of the night before had subdued
her. She went all over it as she lay there, waiting for the rising
bell.
On her way to the station the persistent stare of a man who sat
opposite in the street-car made her uneasy; and when at the station,
after she had bought her ticket, he again appeared and attempted to
talk to her, even following her when she changed her seat, her
uneasiness became alarm.
The dreadful loneliness of that great station, with its hurrying
crowds, she would not soon forget. If it had been day, Charlotte was
sure she would have been braver. In her despair Miss Carpenter came to
her rescue. She recalled vividly how the young lady swept down upon
her tormentor, with blazing eyes, demanding imperiously what he meant
by annoying a little girl; and then Charlotte, clinging to the
friendly hand held out to her, had allowed herself to be led meekly
away. It was all over in a moment, and in a quiet corner out of the
crowd she was replying brokenly to the questions of her rescuer.
Why was it that under the serious gaze of those dark eyes all her
self-confidence and determination had oozed away? Miss Carpenter's
manner was kind, but her decision had been prompt and final. It seemed
to Charlotte no one could have resisted her.
"My child," she said, still holding Charlotte's hand, "you cannot take
such a journey alone. I cannot let you. Come home with me, where we
can talk it over. We'll find some way out of the trouble." And she
added: "You live on the corner of Pleasant Street and the Terrace,
don't you? I think I have seen you there. I am Miss Carpenter of the
shop."
In a sort of bewilderment Charlotte had submitted, and escorted by
Miss Carpenter and the elderly maid she rode back to the Terrace. And
that half-hour in the shop, where they found Miss Pennington
comfortably established by the fire with a book! Charlotte could still
feel the atmosphere of sympathy and reason that enveloped her as she
poured out her story to these strangers with all the pent-up
unhappiness of the past week. How gently they had pointed out that
running away would only add difficulties to the situation.
Her face grew hot now at the thought of how silly she must have seemed
to them. And she wished these young ladies to think well of
her,--which, of course, they never could do.
Aunt Virginia had been good, too. A wave of warm affection surged up
in Charlotte's heart, and with it a determination to be a comfort to
her after this. As she dressed, she wondered if she would ever again
be free from this dreadful feeling of shame. She hated to go down to
breakfast, even though Aunt Caroline did not know.
Later in the day Aunt Virginia called her into her room and closed
the door. There was a pretty flush on her face as she sat erect in an
arm-chair which, like the other furniture in the room, had been her
grandmother's. Beside her on a table was an old Bible with yellow
leaves, and some ancient books of devotion.
"I have been talking to your Aunt Caroline," Miss Wilbur began.
Charlotte started.
"I do not mean about last night. While I feel almost deceitful in
keeping it from her, I have decided to do it. As I told you, your Aunt
Georgiana is out of health and must go to California, and it seems
Caroline's duty to go with her. This will leave you in my charge. You
were really put in my charge at first, but I felt inexperienced and--"
Miss Virginia hesitated, then continued: "What I have been thinking is
this. I should like to try again, starting fresh and forgetting all
that has happened. I think if you would promise always to be frank
with me, and perhaps put up with some things that seem to you foolish
and old-fashioned notions, that we could get along together. I loved
your mother, and I want to love you and have your affection. But if
you cannot be happy, I will write to Mr. Landor and explain--"
"Aunt Virginia, I do love you. I don't want to go away. I am so sorry
about last night!" Charlotte buried her face in her aunt's lap.
"Don't cry, dear. It is all over, then, and we will forget it." Miss
Virginia caressed the brown head.
"But I am so ashamed. It hurts--I can't forget."
"Well, dear, perhaps you had some excuse. Caroline overlooked the fact
that you have lived an unusually independent life, and I think she did
not just understand how you felt about Lucile. I don't mean you were
right to go there, but-- Well, from now on you are my charge, and the
punishment is over. After this we'll try to understand and trust each
other."
"I am going to be good; you'll see," Charlotte whispered, her arms
about her aunt's neck.
She felt impatient to show Aunt Virginia she was really in earnest.
What could she do? As she dressed for the evening an idea occurred to
her. With many a pang she shook out her wavy brown hair and combed it
resolutely back from her face. It had always taken an absurd length of
time to arrange that drooping mass in just the proper manner, but
Lucile had commended her skill. It was much easier to brush it back in
a way to show how prettily it grew about her forehead, but Charlotte
really considered herself a fright as she tied a blue ribbon on her
long braid.
The change gave her rather a chastened look, combined as it was with a
timid self-consciousness when she entered the dining-room. Her aunts
surveyed her with evident astonishment.
"Well, Charlotte," Mrs. Millard remarked, affably, "you are really a
nice-looking little girl when you let yourself alone."
Aunt Virginia patted her hand and said nothing, but Charlotte felt
sure she understood.
CHAPTER FOURTEENTH
MRS. MILLARD DEPARTS
Relieved and thankful though Miss Virginia felt, and confident, too,
that she and Charlotte would now get on very well together, she still
had something on her mind. The feeling that she was concealing
something from her sister weighed upon her, but not so heavily as her
sense of obligation to the shopkeepers. In her agitation she had
hardly thanked Miss Pennington; and the more she considered it, the
more remarkable their kindness and thoughtfulness appeared. Would
Caroline call it officiousness?
Mrs. Millard had gone so far as to acknowledge the shopkeepers
_seemed_ to be persons of refinement, and their effort to make a
living was, of course, creditable; but she feared they did not quite
know their position. Perhaps they were from some small town, where
social distinctions were overlooked.
"Perhaps they are well born, but have lost their money and have to do
something," Miss Virginia suggested, thinking that the manners of the
young women in question were not in the least rustic.
Ignoring this her sister continued: "It is quite evident to my mind
that they are pushing. Why else should they have come into a
neighborhood like this, instead of going where they belong, among
other shops? They evidently hope for some social recognition, and this
is why I lay stress upon not giving them our patronage in any respect.
I see plainly they will leave no stone unturned to ingratiate
themselves."
Did this account for Charlotte's rescue? Miss Virginia shivered at the
thought. It had seemed to her the extreme of neighborly kindness. One
thing was certain,--Miss Carpenter had not invented the occasion. Had
she seized it in the hope of advancing her own interests? Miss
Virginia felt this was silly.
How friendly and helpful Miss Pennington had seemed! Could a
commonplace, pushing young woman have so won Miss Virginia's heart?
She lay awake at night thinking about it, wondering how she could
suitably express her gratitude and at the same time preserve a distant
dignity. In the silence and darkness all sorts of dreadful
possibilities floated through her mind. Perhaps these harmless-looking
young women were adventuresses, come into the neighborhood with some
deep scheme, and the attractive shop as a blind. They might be
burglars. One read of astonishing things done by women in these days.
Miss Virginia felt impatient over this new problem, and her irritation
caused a display of unusual spirit when her sister began to give her
parting instructions.
"You'd better send the drawing-room curtains to Lucinda in January,"
said that lady, thoughtfully, balancing her pencil above the pad on
her knee. "I have made a list--"
"It is quite unnecessary, Caroline," interrupted Miss Virginia; "I
kept house for a good many years without you, and you can't expect to
run things here while you are in California."
"It seems to me, Virginia, you use very unbecoming expressions. I have
no desire to _run things_; I only supposed you would be glad of a few
suggestions."
"I am sure I don't wish to be rude, but I will be frank and tell you,
Caroline, that I mean to do as I please while you are away."
Mrs. Millard gazed at her in surprise. "Why, Virginia, one would
suppose you had been a captive in chains! Very well, I wash my hands
of it all,--only," relapsing into a tone of pathetic reproach, "you do
such singular things at times, you know."
She was manifestly shaken by this declaration of independence, but she
was committed to her older sister. It was too late to change her
plans. She ventured one parting injunction. "Pray, Virginia, do not
patronize the shop. Let me beg of you, if you have any regard for me."
* * * * *
In Mrs. Millard's sudden departure the Terrace naturally felt an
interest.
"So Caroline's going to leave us," Judge Russell remarked at the
breakfast table. "We shall be free to do as we please this winter.
I'll have that poplar set out in February."
"Aren't you ashamed, grandfather!" laughed Madelaine. "As if you had
not strength of mind to do as you like."
The judge smiled as he stirred his coffee. "Caroline is a forceful
woman; and then, too, she is generally right. It may be, as she says,
the tree will not grow, but I want to try it."
"I wonder she is willing to leave Virginia all the responsibility of
Charlotte. She is such a headstrong child, and so northern," said Mrs.
Russell.
"Now, mother," expostulated Alexina, "isn't that dreadfully narrow?"
"What harm is there in liking your own part of the country best?"
asked her sister.
"I did not mean any such thing," cried Alex. "I only insist that no
locality has the monopoly of nice people."
"But some peculiarities are northern and some are southern, and I
don't see that it is narrow to prefer one sort above the other,"
Madelaine persisted. "How can Mrs. Millard make up her mind to leave
the shop?" she continued. "Miss Sarah has gone over to the enemy, and
Alex is going."
"I don't understand about that shop," said her grandfather, not for
the first time, by any means. "I told you about that young lady who
so kindly picked up my books,--a most intelligent person, and as
pretty as--as Madelaine." This with a smile at his youngest
granddaughter.
"Here is another conversion," laughed Madelaine.
"I can't understand about the shop," the judge repeated.
"Why isn't keeping a shop just as respectable as teaching or keeping
boarders?" asked Alex. She had in truth been strongly attracted to
Miss Pennington that evening at Miss Wilbur's, and had a secret desire
to see more of her.
* * * * *
Wayland Leigh brought the news of Mrs. Millard's proposed departure to
his two aunts. He had it from Madelaine Russell.
"I wish you could have such a trip, Sarah," said Mrs. Leigh. "It would
do you a world of good. As Aunt Nancy used to say, you are so thin you
have to stand up twice to cast a shadow."
"Caroline is going from a sense of duty, you may be sure. And what
would my boarders do while I was skylarking in California?" her niece
demanded. This was a mild joke, for the boarders had not as yet
materialized.
"I wish you would give up that idea, Aunt Sarah," growled Wayland.
"You agree with Mrs. Millard, I suppose. She thinks it involves the
whole Terrace in a downward step. But what am I to do? Caroline
assured me she could secure the position of matron at the Children's
Home for me, but what would you and Aunt Sally do then, poor things?"
"Oh, it is easy to laugh--" began Wayland.
"Is it? Then I wish you would favor us sometimes, my dear nephew."
"I was going to say," continued Wayland, with dignity, "that it was
easy to make fun of Mrs. Millard, but she is my idea of an elegant
woman."
"Far be it from me to deny Caroline's elegance. I am often proud to
know her. I believe there could be no emergency great enough to make
her say 'hello!' over the telephone, and I saw her on one occasion put
up her lorgnette when she answered a call."
"Now, Sarah," said Mrs. Leigh, laughing.
The two ladies talked on about neighborhood affairs, but Wayland paid
little heed, being absorbed in his own thoughts. He was in an
impatient and critical mood. What he considered his aunt's oddity
annoyed him. He wished she would dress like other people,--meaning
Mrs. Millard. He was twenty years old, and was working in a bank for
fifty dollars a month, with small chance of promotion. He had wished
to go to college,--not so much, however, as his aunt had wished it for
him,--but now this was overshadowed by the ambition to be rich. And
all for Madelaine. Sometimes he fiercely resolved that he _would_ be
rich; and again he lost heart at the thought that lovely, dainty
Madelaine was certain to find another palace long before his was
built. Her frank worldliness did not weaken his adoration, strange to
say.
CHAPTER FIFTEENTH
GIANT DESPAIR
"Miss Norah, I am afraid Miss Marion is falling back." Susanna stood
in the doorway, a tea towel in one hand, a cup in the other.
Norah, who was putting in order certain shelves before the day's work
began, asked, "Why do you think so, Susanna?"
"Well, Miss Norah, I caught her walking around the house with her eyes
shut, feeling her way like she was trying to get used to it." Susanna
advanced and spoke in a whisper, "And she hasn't had a smile for
anybody this last day or two. Haven't you noticed it?"
"To tell the truth, I have, Susanna; but, after all, it is not
unnatural. The excitement of getting settled and beginning work made
her forget, and now the novelty is wearing off she has, as you say,
slipped back. All this rain and fog is in itself depressing. Don't
worry, Susanna. Hasn't everything I promised you come true up till
now?"
"I suppose so, Miss Norah," was the reluctant answer.
"Then don't worry, and I'll let you keep shop this afternoon."
Where the shop was concerned, Susanna was like a child; and nothing
pleased her more than to be left in charge for an hour or so. Her own
domain, the three bedrooms, dining room, and kitchen, she kept in
spotless order, creating the daintiest repasts as if by magic, and
seeming always to have time to spare.
She went back to her dishes, and Norah worked away with a thoughtful
frown. Presently Marion entered and dropped into a chair with a weary
sigh. "It is a horrid day," she said.
"There is a bit of blue in the west; by afternoon it may be pleasant,"
Norah responded.
When one is immersed in gloom, the sight of determined cheerfulness is
irritating. So Marion found it.
"The air is so heavy one can hardly breathe," she went on. "I believe
I'll let Susanna attend to the plants; I am tired."
"I have time to do it," said Norah, closing the door of the case.
Marion rose impatiently. "You shall not touch them. If Susanna cannot
do them, I will."
"Susanna would cut off her hand if you asked it; but I know she has
more than usual to do this morning, and we agreed the shop was to be
our part. I am not in the least tired. Please, Marion!" Norah stood
between her and the door.
"Very well. I shall attend to it myself," and Marion swept by her.
"O dear!" sighed Norah, "I feel like a tyrant; but she must not give
up."
Marion returned presently and began washing the palms and clipping
away the dead leaves. She worked listlessly, her face wore an
expression of deep melancholy.
A diversion was created by the entrance of James Mandeville. He had
been kept in several days by a cold, and the joy of release radiated
from his small person.
"Mammy says she reckons the sun's going to shine by and by, so she let
me come," he announced.
"Mammy and I are of the same opinion, then," said Norah, helping him
off with his coat. "Can't you think of something to cheer Miss Marion?
She is very tired of this rainy weather."
"I'll sing her a song, that's what I'll do," James Mandeville cried
eagerly. "You wait."
He disappeared into the next room, where presently his voice was heard
uplifted in "Onward, Christian Soldiers," and if the tune was a trifle
uncertain, nothing was lacking in spirit. Through the open door he
marched, holding the morning paper before him, and proceeding the
length of the shop.
"One in hope of _doctor_, one in _cherry tree_,"
he proclaimed lustily.
Even Marion must smile a little at this.
"It is beautiful," said Norah, "though I don't quite understand it. I
seem to feel a sort of connection between the doctor and the cherry
tree, too."
"There's a heap more of verses," James Mandeville assured her. "Do you
feel better?" This to Marion.
Who could resist? She laughed as she drew him to her and kissed him.
"I am cross this morning, and you are a nice boy to sing for me. I
make life very hard for Miss Norah. Suppose you go tell her I am
sorry."
James Mandeville trotted off obediently to find Norah, who had left
the room a moment before. Marion, having finished with the plants, was
absently looking out of the window when the door opened with a jerk
and some one bounced into the shop. Turning with a start, she
recognized the personage Norah called Giant Despair.
"What do you mean?--" he began, then paused and stared about in
bewilderment. "Where am I?" he demanded; and as Marion advanced he
removed his hat, displaying a massive head covered with shaggy gray
hair.
"We call this the Pleasant Street Shop," she answered.
"See here--I thought it was the plumber's. I am getting so blind I
shall soon have to be led around. So you call this a shop? Does it
belong to you? For I can tell you now you have made a mistake in
coming here." His voice was gruff, and as he spoke he peered this way
and that, as if to get some idea of his surroundings.
"If we can't make a success here, we will go elsewhere, but we are
doing very well," Marion said, "The plumber is on the next block."
"I know that now. I am not losing my mind as well as my sight."
Something impelled Marion to say, "I am sorry about your eyes. Can't
something be done?"
"Sorry? How can you be sorry? Nobody knows anything about it who
hasn't tried it."
"I have lived in constant fear of blindness for a year." Marion seldom
spoke of her eyes, but the sight of trouble like her own broke down
her usual reticence.
The old man softened. "You have? A young thing like you?" He peered at
her in his intent way. "I guess you have grit," he said.
"Not much," she answered. "But my eyes are better, they tell me. Time
will show. Can't something be done for yours?"
"Oh, yes, they are going to operate on the right one in the spring,
but it is not likely to do any good; and then I shall have just half
an eye left."
Norah and James Mandeville now entered unobserved.
"I have got to row up that plumber," Giant Despair continued, looking
at his hat. "As I told you, I don't approve of a shop in this
neighborhood, but I don't see anything that looks like one. Good day,"
and with a grim smile he went out more quietly than he had entered.
"Who would ever have expected a visit from Giant Despair?" cried
Norah, "and he seems to have a bit of humor about him, too."
"I am sorry for him. He looks as if he had no one to take care of him,
and he is nearly blind, as you can tell," said Marion.
When Mammy Belle came for her charge at noon, Marion asked her if she
knew anything about old Mr. Goodman.
"Yes'm," answered Belle, "I knows him, Miss Marion," smoothing her
apron.
"Does he live alone in that big house on the Terrace?"
"Yes'm, and he's mighty rich and crusty. He don't waste no pleasant
words, and he don't waste no money. Law, Miss Marion, he's got rusty
dollars layin' up in bank."
"Rusty dollars?" repeated Norah.
"Yes, honey, been layin' thar so long they's rusty. Get up offen the
floor, James Mandeville. You won't have no skin on your knees, fust
you knows."
"Then will I have to be born again to get some?" inquired the small
boy, sitting back on his heels to consider the matter.
"Law, chile, what you talkin' 'bout? You mus' think you's
Nickorydemus! Miss Norah's settin' there laughin' at you. Come 'long
home with mammy."
"Isn't there a delightful variousness about our neighborhood?" said
Norah. "Do you see that sun? Tell me I am not a prophet!"
"You are an angel to put up with me," sighed Marion, but her face was
no longer gloomy.
"I have been constructing a grab-bag, and you shall have the first
grab;" and Norah brought out a bag made of rainbow ribbons. "This is
outwardly symbolic of the cheer within. The principle on which it
works is simple. Whenever I find a consoling sentiment, I write it on
a card and drop it in, then when I am low in my mind, I take one out.
Help yourself."
"What an absurd person you are!" said Marion, obediently putting her
hand in and drawing out a card. She read:--
"Cleave ever to the sunnier side of doubt,
And cling to faith."
Norah looked over her shoulder. "That is good, isn't it?"
Marion caught her hand. "You preacher," she said, adding, "I accept
it, dear, and I'll try." The visit of Giant Despair seemed the
culmination of Marion's depression. It was Saturday afternoon, and
leaving Susanna in charge, they set out on an exploring expedition in
the mood of two light-hearted children.
CHAPTER SIXTEENTH
CHARLOTTE
With the departure of Mrs. Millard a season of repose came to the
Terrace. Charlotte and Miss Virginia actually found life a little tame
after the excitement, for their neighbors were just then absorbed in
their own affairs.
Miss Sarah and her aunt had some new boarders on which to expend time
and thought, and Alexina was living a life of rigid usefulness,
studying shorthand in secret and helping with the house work, for the
Russell mansion was large and servants not numerous. She also made
dainty things for that radiant butterfly Madelaine. Alex was a born
milliner, but she rather despised her gift, even while acknowledging
its usefulness.
The fame of the corner shop was spreading abroad till it was in a fair
way to become fashionable. Charlotte, from her window where she
studied, could see people passing in and out, and not infrequently a
carriage stood before the door. Sometimes she would forget her lesson
in the interest of recalling her evening visit there. How cheery and
cosey it had looked in the lamplight! Should she ever see it again?
Miss Pennington bowed and smiled in a friendly way when they
occasionally met, Miss Carpenter she had not seen again.
It occurred to Charlotte quite suddenly one day that it was something
of a coincidence that there should be a Miss Carpenter across the
street here, and while she was thinking about it she was called down
to see--of all persons!--her guardian. Having business in the South,
Mr. Landor had made it convenient to stop over a day or two.
She was so glad to see him she came near crying, a most unusual thing
for Charlotte, and her guardian eyed her closely as she drew him into
the library and seated herself on an ottoman beside his chair. Miss
Wilbur was out, and there was nothing to interrupt them.
With her elbow on the arm of his chair, and her chin in her hand as
she looked up at him, Charlotte at first had a dozen questions to ask
concerning Cousin Frank and Mrs. Wellington, and Spruce Street affairs
generally. But after a little, Uncle Landor began to ask the
questions, and then came the confession.
She unfolded the whole story, trying not to spare herself, though
unable to conceal some resentment against Aunt Caroline. Mr. Landor
listened in grave silence, and continued to look at her thoughtfully
after she had finished. Charlotte's eyes fell under his scrutiny, but
she quickly lifted them again.
"Was I deceitful? I did not mean to be."
"What do you think yourself?"
"I--but I tried to tell."
"Things were rather against you, Charlotte. I like to see you loyal.
Do you still think this girl the sort of friend you care to have?"
Charlotte hung her head. "I don't know," she faltered. The truth was,
Lucile's excess of devotion was beginning to grow tiresome. There were
other of her schoolmates who, she could not help seeing, were more
desirable as friends, but they now held aloof. It was hard to
acknowledge that Aunt Caroline had been at least partly right.
Mr. Landor lifted the downcast face, and his gaze was kindly. "I
believe you are learning your lesson, little girl, but it has been a
sharp one. It is always a mistake not to be straightforward. In all
your life I fear you have never truly learned to obey. You are fast
growing up now, and the responsibility will rest more and more upon
yourself. Are you going to listen to the voice that speaks in your
heart, and obey when the conflict comes?" He laid his hand on the
brown head. "In spite of it all, you have improved, Charlotte."
"Do you mean my hair?"
"Have you done anything to your hair? I didn't know; it is very pretty
hair. No, you have grown more gentle and womanly."
"I am happy with Aunt Virginia. She is a dear, and I feel so ashamed
and sorry when I think how she would have felt if I had run away.
Uncle Landor, is it that voice you spoke of--in our hearts--that makes
us feel so dreadfully ashamed sometimes?"
"I suppose we may say it is in this instance. It is the judgment of
the higher self upon the lower self."
Mr. Landor was a reserved and somewhat silent man, and never before
had he talked to Charlotte just as he did this afternoon. Till now
she had been only a child to be petted or reproved. To-day he gently
pointed out her faults, showed her how from now on it rested largely
with herself what she would make of her life; he spoke of the guiding
voice that all may hear who listen and who keep their hearts pure and
loving, and last of all he put into her hand a little pocket
Testament, in which he said he had marked certain things which had
served him as guide-posts on the way, and might help her.
Charlotte was touched and pleased, and took the book with a very
earnest promise to read it and follow its guidance.
After this they went on to talk of other matters. Charlotte pointed
out the shop over the way, and gave an account of the neighborhood
which showed such a keen appreciation of individual foibles, that her
guardian found himself laughing heartily.
"Uncle Landor, I wish you would ask Aunt Virginia to let me go to the
shop," she said. "I liked Miss Carpenter and Miss Pennington so much,
and they were very good to me."
Mr. Landor spent several days in town, and before he left, Miss
Virginia herself asked his opinion as to the proper attitude toward
the shopkeepers.
"They did me a great service, and in the excitement of that evening I
cannot recall thanking Miss Pennington. I went into the shop the day
after Caroline left, meaning to give some expression to my gratitude,
but both the young women were out. I feel uncomfortable about it. I
can't think as Caroline does, that they are trying to force themselves
upon our notice. They really seem to be ladies. What would you
advise?"
A smile illumined Mr. Landor's usually grave countenance at Miss
Wilbur's earnestness.
"It is a thrifty-looking little shop," he said; "Charlotte pointed it
out to me. And I should say, Miss Virginia, that you are perfectly
safe in following your own instincts in the matter. To suppose their
motives in helping Charlotte other than kindly seems to me both
ungracious and absurd. You say they appear to be ladies. They probably
are, but however that may be, you and Charlotte and I owe them our
thanks."
Miss Virginia told Charlotte afterward that she was greatly relieved.
"For Philadelphia people are not likely to go too far in a matter of
this kind. Then, too, Mr. Landor is a man, and able to judge whether
they could possibly be dangerous persons."
Charlotte opened her eyes. "How could they be dangerous?"
"Well, my dear, they might be burglars, come to spy out the
neighborhood, with the shop for a blind."
"Oh, Aunt Virginia!" laughed Charlotte.
"I am sure I have read of such things," the lady insisted stoutly.
Not long after this Charlotte received a letter from Cousin Francis.
"Father tells me you have been having your own troubles, little Char,"
he wrote. "Well, keep up a good heart and work hard. This is what I am
doing just now. Things have not gone my way at all, but in spite of it
I am going to try to do something worth while this winter. I often
wish you were here to be my admiring critic."
A letter came from Mrs. Wellington also, relating chiefly to a package
Aunt Cora had commissioned her to send, but at the end she said:
"Perhaps you will be interested to know the Carpenter house is closed.
Miss May has gone away--not to be home for a year, they say--so if you
were here, you could not watch for her as you used to do."
Was it on account of Miss Carpenter that things were not going Cousin
Frank's way? Charlotte wondered, and began to think once more of the
rose that was out of reach.
CHAPTER SEVENTEENTH
AN EVENING CALL
"Alex, I am glad to see you. I was about to send Martha over for you;
I am alone this evening. How very nice you look!"
It was an understood thing that if Alex had no other engagement, she
was to take supper at the Wilburs' on Fridays. She stood before Miss
Virginia pulling off her long gloves, looking indeed unusually
handsome in a gown of pale gray and a plumy black hat, which she had
made herself with a sort of reluctant pleasure in its becomingness.
"I simply had to go to the Burtons'," she explained. "Madelaine was
receiving, and mother insisted if I never went anywhere, people would
begin to say she pushed me into the background and showed partiality.
There is no arguing with her when she is in that state of mind, so I
went."
"And enjoyed it, I am sure," said Miss Virginia. "I suppose I
should have gone if Caroline had been at home, but to tell the
truth, I forgot it. Charlotte was asked to a party,--one of her
schoolmates,--and I was interested in seeing her dressed. I am
glad the child is to have a little diversion; she has been as good
as gold lately."
"I am certain you will not have any more trouble with her; Charlotte
is a nice child," Alex replied with a half sigh. She felt that
Charlotte had never quite forgiven her for her severity, and that
Madelaine without any effort or care had won the place she had meant
to hold in the little girl's regard.
Madelaine occasionally joined the Friday tea-party; to fascinate was
as natural to her as to breathe, and Charlotte had been quickly won.
"You look sweet with your hair back," Madelaine had said, loosening
the waves about Charlotte's forehead with fairy touches. "It was too
extreme before. We could hardly see your eyes, and they are too pretty
to hide."
Silly flattery, Alex thought, but she knew Charlotte would never
return to the old way.
As she poured the coffee, Miss Virginia told Alex about Mr. Landor's
visit and his decision in regard to the shopkeepers. "I was so
surprised," she concluded, "for Philadelphians are so exclusive, you
know."
"I think he is sensible. I wish one could do the natural, simple thing
always," sighed Alex, "without thinking of dignity or position. It
might be much more entertaining to associate with persons whose social
position was different from one's own."
"Do you think so, Alex? If it were done generally, there would not be
any social positions, would there?" Miss Virginia spoke as one who
faced a deep problem.
"It would be heaven," answered Alex; adding, "suppose we go this
evening."
"Alex! will you go with me? I am so relieved."
Later it appeared that unsuspected difficulties lurked in the
seemingly simple matter of an evening call.
"Shall I take a card?" Miss Virginia paused on the stairway to
inquire. "It is not quite an ordinary call, you know."
"I should take one if I were you; and let me put my name on it," Alex
answered, laughing.
On the porch Miss Wilbur paused again. "Shall we ask them to come to
see us?"
"Need we mention it at all? Let them do as they see fit."
"Of course. You are very sensible, Alex." Miss Virginia sighed.
At the gate there was another delay. "I am afraid your mother will not
like it. I don't want to lead you into mischief, Alex."
"Now, Miss Virginia, I proposed going with you, and I am going whether
you go or not," and Alex linked her arm in her friend's, and drew her
toward the corner.
"I don't know what Caroline _would_ say; but then, she does not know
the circumstances." After this remark, they crossed the street in
silence, broken only by another sigh from Miss Virginia, as Alex
touched the bell.
The maid who admitted them showed some surprise, but ushered them
toward a half-open door at the end of the small hallway, Miss Wilbur's
card in her hand.
"We'll just refer the matter to the _rich_ Miss Carpenter," a
laughing voice was announcing as they entered a room, the first
impression of which was that of a pleasant library, with its shaded
lamps, open fire, and happy mingling of books and work; a second
glance showed it to be simply the shop in evening dress.
The voice belonged to Miss Pennington who now came forward with a
cordial greeting, and presented Alex and Miss Virginia to her friend,
Miss Carpenter. Miss Carpenter's manner was somewhat distant in
contrast, but seen without the disfiguring glasses she usually wore,
Alex found her unexpectedly handsome.
"I have wanted so much to have an opportunity to thank you," Miss
Virginia began, an evident victim to a terrible fit of shyness. "I
came one afternoon, but you were out. You were both so kind to my
niece," she looked at Miss Carpenter.
"I beg you not to think of it again. It was nothing at all. I happened
to be at the station, and seeing how frightened she was, went to her
rescue." Miss Carpenter spoke as one who dismissed a trivial matter.
"We were so interested in her," put in Miss Pennington. "It occurred
to Miss Carpenter that it might be possible to avoid the trying ordeal
of explanations, so she brought her here to talk it over."
"Charlotte is a dear child," said Miss Virginia, "and all the trouble
is over now." Then she added with a sudden accession of
self-possession: "It may seem a small matter to you, Miss Carpenter,
but perhaps you can understand it would have been a most serious and
unhappy thing for me if the child had carried out her plan. I can't be
thankful enough."
"I do see it, and I am very glad that, by a happy accident, I was able
to be of service." Miss Carpenter's manner changed, her tone was soft,
her smile winning. Alex, who was playing the part of spectator,
suddenly warmed to her.
"I met your grandfather several weeks ago, Miss Russell," said Miss
Pennington, turning to her. "He had an armful of books, and seemed to
think I had done him a wonderful favor in picking up two he dropped in
getting out of the car."
"He told me," Alex answered. "He was so pleased that you appreciated
the value of his find."
"And he was so disappointed when he found I kept a shop," laughed
Norah.
Alex smiled and flushed. "Grandfather has old-fashioned ideas about
women supporting themselves, and then, too, the neighborhood was
rather opposed to having a shop built here."
"I know," answered Miss Pennington, "but as it is here we flatter
ourselves nothing could be less objectionable than _our_ shop."
"You are undoubtedly winning us over. It seems to me a delightful
occupation, but I suppose it is not so easy and pleasant as it looks."
"Of course it is work, but we find it pleasant. For several years I
taught, but to keep a store has always been my ambition since I was
three years old, and I at last persuaded my friend to join me in an
experiment."
"You don't make all your lovely baskets, surely?" Alex asked, her eyes
on the strings of raphia and an unfinished basket that lay on the
table.
"Oh, no. It is work Miss Carpenter can do at times,--her eyes allow
very little of any sort,--but most of our stock comes from a Mothers'
Club in a settlement in which we are both interested. I lived there
for a time. You can't think how much it has meant to those women. They
bring their babies with them, and they sing while they work, and the
babies sleep or are entertained by their surroundings. Many of the
patterns are original, and they have developed a wonderful sense for
color and form in some instances."
"How interesting!" exclaimed Alex. "I don't see how you ever happened
to come to a stupid town like this."
"Our pottery has a history, too. It is designed and decorated by two
young women, and it has taken very well wherever it has been
exhibited. But I do not mean to go on talking shop all the evening,"
and Norah paused with a smile.
"I like to hear about it. It has been such a puzzle to me to know what
I could do to support myself. There seemed to be nothing but teaching
or stenography, and I should hate both, I am afraid."
"If possible, do the thing you like to do, is my theory. There are a
good many fields in these days, and still in almost any paper you can
find a young lady who wishes to be a companion and is willing to
travel."
Alex laughed. Miss Virginia was rising, and she reluctantly followed
her example. "May I come again sometime?" she asked.
While Miss Wilbur and Alex were talking over their call, Charlotte
came in in a flutter of gayety, her checks matching her rose-colored
ribbons.
"I wish I could have gone with you," she said when she had heard of
the visit. "Did they say anything about me?"
"You were mentioned," her aunt replied, pinching her cheek; and
adding, "they are certainly very pleasant young women."
"They are charming," said Alex.
"I wonder if this Miss Carpenter could be any relation to the one who
lives across the street from Uncle Landor?" said Charlotte.
"Did you hear what Miss Pennington was saying when we went in, Miss
Virginia?" asked Alex.
"It was something about the rich Miss Carpenter, wasn't it?"
"_My_ Miss Carpenter is rich," said Charlotte, and she related the
romance, almost forgotten of late, which she had built upon Aunt
Cora's remarks about the little portrait and upon Mrs. Wellington's
stories.
"She is the granddaughter of Peter Carpenter," Miss Virginia said. "I
have often heard my father speak of him. They were college mates. He
was very rich and rather peculiar. He had a half-sister much younger
than himself who once visited here on her way South. She and my oldest
sister, Georgiana, were friends and used to correspond, but that was
years and years ago. Mr. Carpenter--for some reason he was always
called Peter--had only one child, a son, who was killed in a railroad
disaster, probably twenty years ago. Your Miss Carpenter, Charlotte,
must be his daughter."
"Carpenter is a common name; there may be a number of rich Miss
Carpenters," said Alex, "but it would be a little odd if they should
turn out to be connected in any way."
"I don't think they cared to talk about themselves," continued Miss
Virginia, referring to the shopkeepers. "I am sure Caroline was wrong
when she called them pushing."
CHAPTER EIGHTEENTH
THE ADVENTURES OF A BIRTHDAY CAKE
In a great, handsome, dreary room sat Giant Despair. The December day
was damp and cheerless, and the coal fire in the ugly old-fashioned
grate beneath the elaborate marble mantel burned in a grudging,
spiritless way. Above the uncurtained windows, with their shutters
thrown wide upon a view of moist, bare garden, the heavy gilt cornices
seemed to frown. Giant Despair was frowning as he searched in a
massive black walnut secretary for a missing paper.
Things had gone wrong to-day. His housekeeper who knew his ways was
absent on her annual vacation, and for the carelessness and stupidity
of the servants he could find no adequate words. In truth he had
exhausted his vocabulary early in the day, and now was reduced to
inarticulate growls.
Against one of the maids in particular his anger burned. He had
mislaid a paper brought to him the evening before by his business
agent; and now that it could not be found, the luckless maid was
accused of making way with it.
She was a Swiss girl with a meek manner and eyes that belied it. Giant
Despair could not see the eyes, and the manner annoyed him.
"If you please,--did you this day order a birthday cake?"
"What? Order what?" cried Giant Despair, turning in great rage to face
the unfortunate maid.
She stood her ground. "A cake,--white, with candles of pink."
"Did I order a pink cake? What do you mean by asking such a question?
You know I didn't." His frown was terrible.
"Candles of pink," corrected the girl, and holding up her hand she
counted, "One, two, three, four, five."
"What is the woman talking about?" demanded Giant Despair.
"De con-fectionaire man bring it. He say it vas for here. He comes not
back."
"Then telephone him to send for it at once. Why do you come bothering
me about it?"
"We know not who sends it."
"Bring the thing here and let me see what you are talking about."
The maid retired, returning presently carrying a small cake covered
with an elaborate white icing, and further decorated, as has been
said, with five pink candles. This she set upon the desk, and, a gleam
of--was it malice or mischief? in her eyes, slipped away.
"Humph!" growled Giant Despair, peering at the strange object, even
resorting to his big magnifying glass that he might see it the better.
An innocent, saucy little cake, it was a wonder it did not shrivel and
disappear amid those strange surroundings, beneath that unfriendly
gaze.
Could this be a joke some one was playing on him? Giant Despair
wondered. But who thought enough about him even for that?
"Take it away," he commanded; but Annie had vanished, and so the cake
had a chance to tell its story.
In this gloomy, tiresome world, somebody was five years old to-day.
Not very much of a story, but somehow it impressed Giant Despair
strangely. He leaned back in his chair, his frown relaxing a trifle.
He did not care for children; they were meddlesome and noisy. He waged
continual warfare against certain naughty boys on Pleasant Street,
who, divining his dislike, resorted to all sorts of teasing tricks.
They carried off his door-mat, unhinged his gate, favored him with
uncomplimentary valentines, and robbed his grape arbor,--each in its
season.
So far as this went, however, he could not be called a favorite with
older persons. In the large drug company where he was still senior
partner he was held responsible for the policy of extorting just as
much work as possible for just as little pay.
Persons of forbidding countenances are fated to be harshly judged; and
the sins of others may have been laid at his door sometimes; but while
his defective sight might be the cause of his frown, it remained that
Giant Despair seldom spoke a kindly word.
The sympathy of that young woman in the shop, into which he stumbled
by mistake, had touched him. She _knew_. It was not pity,--that he
despised,--but a sort of fellowship in misfortune, and he had seized
upon it hungrily, even while he called himself a fool. Perhaps it was
this slight but softening experience which made possible to-day the
faint regret that a little child was to be disappointed about this
cake.
Such feelings could not find a harbor for long in that impatient
breast. Becoming aware of sounds in the hall, Giant Despair strode
across the room and flung open the door, intending to demand the
instant removal of the cake. He was confronted by a small boy in a red
coat and cap who cried excitedly, "Has you got my birfday cake?"
"Hey? So it is yours, is it? And who are you?"
But its owner had caught sight of it through the open door; and
pushing past Giant Despair, he lifted up his voice in a pæan of joy.
"It's here! it's here! it's here!" he cried, standing before the desk
with clasped hands and uplifted eyes, like a worshipper before a
shrine. "Somebody give it to me! It's mine!"
"Where did that child come from?" asked Giant Despair, as he spoke
becoming aware of the presence of some one else in the hall.
"I brought him, Mr. Goodman. It is Miss Carpenter of the shop." Marion
advanced. "It is James Mandeville Norton, a small friend of ours, to
whom we had promised a birthday cake. He was on the watch for it and
was quite sure he saw it carried in here, and to pacify him I ventured
to come and inquire."
If Giant Despair could ever be said to be affable he became so at this
moment, to the evident astonishment of Annie, the maid. She could not
know of the bond of sympathy that existed between this graceful young
lady and her surly master.
"Why, how do you do? Come in;--ridiculous mistake. Glad to find the
owner," he stammered, offering her a chair. "Fearful weather," he
added, poking the fire.
"Very Novemberish," Marion agreed, declining the chair. "We won't
trouble you further," she said.
"Somebody _please_ give me my cake. It's mine; I know it's mine."
James Mandeville's voice betrayed anguish of soul.
"He will let you have it, dear. Mr. Goodman doesn't want it. It was
brought here by mistake," said Marion, reassuringly putting her arm
around the child.
That any one could see such a cake and not want it was naturally
beyond James Mandeville's powers of belief. He stood silent, looking
from Marion to Mr. Goodman.
"Of course you can have it. What do I want with it?" asked the old
man, grimly.
James Mandeville moved forward and slipped his small, soft hand into
Giant Despair's big, hard one. "I'll tell you," he said, "you can come
to the party, and I'll let you have a slice of it; and you can help
blow out the candles."
The little voice was eager, but the confiding touch of the dimpled
hand did most execution.
"We shall be glad to have you, Mr. Goodman," Miss Carpenter said,
laughing. "The party is to be in the shop, and very select for the
reason that our circle of friends is limited."
"There's going to be candy," added James Mandeville.
Giant Despair was embarrassed. "Thank you," he said; "I have not been
to a party for a hundred years, and I am in too bad a humor to-day."
Then it seemed necessary to explain the cause,--the lost lease that
had been burned or thrown in the ash barrel.
Miss Carpenter stood beside a table on which lay several large
volumes; from the leaves of one of them the edge of a folded paper was
visible. "Could this be it?" she asked.
"Pshaw! I put it there myself. Confound my eyes and my memory!" cried
the old man.
* * * * *
Of course Giant Despair had no idea of going to the party, yet,
strange to relate, he went. Miss Sarah Leigh met him striding down the
street with two long, gray flannel ears and a beady eye visible above
a bulging overcoat pocket. She turned to look after him, and was much
amazed to see him disappear presently within the shop.
It was Jack, the flannel donkey, who really won the day. After the
visitors had left, Giant Despair stumbled over him as he lay forgotten
on the floor. The strange object was at first puzzling. He turned and
twisted and felt it, until at length getting the right point of view
he recognized it to be a donkey.
A toy animal was no less out of place in that house than a birthday
cake. He was going out for his daily walk; he would leave it at the
shop door. But once at the door he was lost, for James Mandeville
seized upon him joyfully and would not be denied.
It was Saturday afternoon, and so a half holiday in the shop; and it
seemed to Giant Despair, as he stumbled in looking anything but
festive, yet unable to resist his small captor, that there were a
great many people assembled.
It turned out that the only guest was Charlotte Creston, who had been
the first to discover James Mandeville bewailing the disappearance of
his cake before Mr. Goodman's gate, some hours earlier, and after
trying to console him had taken him back to his friends. This seemed
to entitle her to an invitation, which she delightedly accepted. Mammy
Belle and Susanna were there, also, to look on.
It is certain that never before in his life had Giant Despair
participated in a scene of such childish gayety. He was exceedingly
gruff and awkward, but no amount of gruffness could dismay James
Mandeville.
The sight of Giant Despair seated at the small table, personating the
fifth guest for whom Miss Pennington assured him they had been on the
lookout, and drinking a cup of tea in lieu of the goodies the young
host pressed upon him, was one not soon to be forgotten. After a time
he succumbed to the humor of it, and blew out his candle with the
rest.
James Mandeville did his best to be entertaining. He sang, and recited
Mother Goose, after which he climbed on Giant Despair's knee and asked
for a story.
This was something Giant Despair couldn't do, but he showed the big
seals on his watch chain, and dropped some bright new five-cent pieces
into the chubby hand.
The old man walked home in a somewhat dazed condition. He told himself
roughly that he had turned fool; and yet more than once that evening,
as he sat by his lonely fireside, he felt again the pressure of James
Mandeville's warm little body upon his knee and heard the childish
voice, prompted by Mammy Belle, saying, "Thank you for coming to my
party, Mr. Goodman."
CHAPTER NINETEENTH
TEA AND TALK
"I used to think if ever I kept a shop there would be a bell on the
door to jingle cheerily whenever a customer entered." Norah spoke from
the window where she was occupied in making some changes. Outside the
rain fell steadily, the terrace gardens had a soaked, dismal look, and
the street was almost deserted, except for an occasional wagon.
"If it will add to your happiness, we will have it put in; but I doubt
if you would be able to find one that would ring cheerily,--they
usually jangle."
"I suppose that depends somewhat on the hearer; however, we must
confine ourselves for the present to the strict necessities of life.
Did it ever occur to you, Marion, how the old-fashioned bell is
passing? When I was a child, the milkmen heralded their approach with
bells; and maids would appear with bowls and pitchers and have the
milk measured out to them from large tin cans."
"Your youth must have been in the Dark Ages. I never heard of such a
thing."
"I am often impressed by your ignorance of simple matters. Yesterday,
out in the southwestern part of this very town, where I went to look
for a seamstress, I heard again one of those bells rung lustily, and
there was the tin can, as of old, riding majestically on the front
seat of the wagon; but probably as a concession to modern prejudice
the milkman was supplied with bottles, too. Come and tell me what you
think of my rainy-day window."
Marion crossed the room. "It looks cheerful," she said, "but I hardly
think it will bring us many customers to-day. It is too bad even for
James Mandeville."
Norah had ransacked their stock for the brightest draperies, gayest
baskets, and oddest jars, making of them a sort of barbaric medley not
ungrateful to the eye, which she regarded with satisfaction.
"Well," she said, "if we have no customers, I shall have all the more
time to give to collars. I am sorry I could not find a seamstress. I
did not dream there would be such a demand."
"And there is probably some one who would be glad to do them if we
only knew," said Marion. "Would it be worth while to advertise?"
Not troubled with much custom, the shopkeepers were working and
chatting in the south window that afternoon, when Miss Sarah Leigh put
her head in at the door.
"I hate to come in, I'm so wet," she said; "I'll leave my umbrella
outside."
"You need not mind," said Norah, rising. "As you see, we have a large
rubber mat and an umbrella-stand, and this is the first time we have
needed them."
"Thank you. I had to go to the grocery, and as Aunt Sally was out of
knitting cotton, I dropped in to get some. It is a dreadful day."
Norah pushed a chair to the fire, "Sit down and have a cup of tea.
Miss Carpenter and I are just going to have some."
Miss Sarah accepted the chair. "I have no business to,--I have a
thousand things to do; but this seems a veritable haven of rest."
Susanna now entered, a model of the respectable, elderly maid,
carrying a tray which she placed before Marion.
"Another cup please, Susanna," said Marion; and while she poured the
tea, Norah coaxed the fire into a blaze, remarking that it had fallen
into the way of sympathizing with the weather.
"Are you in the habit of treating your customers in this fashion?"
Miss Sarah asked, accepting the cup and helping herself from the plate
of warm tea-cakes with which Susanna returned.
"This is a reward to rainy-day callers," answered Marion, smiling.
"Well, you are the most astonishing people I ever came in contact
with. I hope you don't mind my saying it," Miss Sarah spoke
confidentially. "I don't mean in respect to tea."
"Not at all," laughed Norah. "We, too, have our impressions of the
neighborhood."
"I shouldn't be surprised if you had." Miss Sarah joined in the laugh.
"Of course it is no secret to you that the neighborhood did not very
much want you, and the way in which you are winning us over is a
miracle. Miss Wilbur, Charlotte, Alex, and now you have captured Mr.
Goodman. Charlotte told me about the party. How do you do it?"
"It has all come about through the merest accident," Marion explained.
"Such accidents don't happen to everybody. I think you practise
witchcraft."
"James Mandeville and the birthday cake captured Giant Despair," said
Norah, the name slipping out before she thought.
"So that is what you call him! Have you named us all? It suits him,
too; but poor man, he has had his troubles, as have some of the rest
of us." Miss Sarah looked meditatively into the fire. "Soon after he
built his house in the Terrace," she continued, "his daughter, an only
child, was burned to death. It was a sad thing,--she was just
eighteen. Then a nephew whom he adopted turned out a scamp, and now he
has lost faith in everything."
While she was speaking the shop door opened to admit Alexina and
Charlotte, rosy and wet from a walk in the rain.
"I want a spool of twist," Charlotte announced merrily.
"Won't a cup of tea do? We are serving that at present," Norah asked.
"How pleasant!" Alex exclaimed as they slipped off their wet
waterproofs. "Are you always cheerful over here?"
Charlotte sought Miss Carpenter's side. "I like tea," she said, the
blue eyes showing, however, a fondness for something more than that
innocent beverage. Just now this young lady had a profound fascination
for her. Miss Alex and Aunt Virginia might prefer Miss Pennington,
Miss Carpenter had her admiration.
"If you need anything more in the way of cheer, I will bring forth the
grab-bag," said Norah, as she handed Alex some tea.
"That sounds interesting; do let us have it," begged Miss Sarah.
"You will be disappointed," Marion put in, mischievously, while Norah
went for the rainbow bag. "You expect amusement and get a sermon. Its
variegated hues give symbolic expression to the truth that 'behind the
clouds the sun is still shining.'"
"You might add that its existence destroys the pleasing idea that we
are always cheerful," Miss Pennington added, holding out the bag to
Alex.
"Am I to take something?" Alex asked; and putting her hand in, she
drew out a card. "'If we live truly, we shall see truly,'" she read.
"But it seems to me it ought to be the other way. If we could see
truly, we could live truly. It is such a puzzle. Do you think this is
true? And what does it mean to live truly?"
"You are an animated problem, Alex," Miss Sarah remarked.
"It is a little like something Uncle Landor said to me, that if we try
to do right and keep our hearts pure, we will hear a voice telling us
which way to go." Charlotte spoke shyly.
Marion took her hand in a soft clasp, and Norah gave her a friendly
smile. "Yes," she said, "that is it. I will tell you what it means to
me. It means that if I go straight on, doing each day the thing that
comes to me, not allowing myself to become entangled in fears for
to-morrow, that little by little the path will be made plain to me."
"I am afraid I want to _know_ where I am going. It might be such a
waste of time," said Alex.
"Its very simplicity makes it hard, but I believe it is the best way,"
Norah answered.
"Are we allowed to have only one helpful sentiment at a time?" asked
Miss Sarah.
"Certainly; one is as much as anybody can live up to at a time."
"It is not for lack of moral sentiments, however," Marion added. "The
supply is constantly renewed. They naturally gravitate to Norah."
"I wish," remarked Norah, "that a seamstress capable of making stocks
and collars would gravitate to me."
"Here is one at your side." Miss Sarah leaned over to examine her
work. "I think I could do it."
"She can do anything," said Alex, waking up from a brown study. "But
how would you find time, Miss Sarah?"
"If you could do only a few, it would be a help," the shopkeepers
cried in the same breath, and Norah began at once to explain what was
wanted, and unfold patterns.
Susanna carried away the tea things, and Alex joined Charlotte and
Marion, who were talking about James Mandeville and Mr. Goodman.
"He has won the old man's heart," Marion was saying. "They have been
walking together several times, and James Mandeville always returns
with a bag of what he calls _finger ladies_."
Miss Sarah's voice interrupted presently. "I don't know when I have
spent such an eventful hour. I must take my knitting cotton and go. I
know now where to come when I have the blues."
"It is worth while to give Miss Sarah a little pleasure," Alex said as
the door closed behind her. "She is the bravest, brightest person, and
her life is anything but easy." Then she returned to the consideration
of the card she had drawn. "I am dreadfully puzzled over what I ought
to do. I want to make my own living, and yet it is hard to go against
the wishes of everybody at home. Do you really think if I just go on
doing what comes to me that the way will open? It sounds lazy."
"No, it sounds serene. If I were you, I'd try it," said Norah.
CHAPTER TWENTIETH
MERRY HEARTS
Many things combined in the Terrace to proclaim the season of the
year. Great was the seeding of raisins, shelling of nuts, and slicing
of citron for fruit-cake and puddings,--matters these housekeepers
were wont to attend to themselves. Neighborly consultations were held
also, and the relative merits of last year's cakes discussed.
"I really have no business making fruit-cake this season," Miss Sarah
Leigh remarked over her grocery bill. "Everything is so expensive."
"Why, Sarah Leigh, who ever heard of Christmas without fruit-cake!"
her aunt exclaimed.
"But you don't eat it, Aunt Sally."
"I shall this year."
Wayland ate it, if his aunt did not. He would be disappointed if she
did not have one as usual; perhaps she could save in some other way,
Miss Sarah thought. "After all, my saving will be a good deal like
Mrs. Green's keeping Lent," she told Miss Virginia. "She never, under
any circumstances, went anywhere, and she didn't have dessert except
on Sunday, and then she seldom ate it on account of her rheumatism, so
there really seemed to be no way to deny herself any further."
Nevertheless, Miss Sarah ordered the raisins and other good things,
and at night she sat up making collars and belts for the shop.
At the shop James Mandeville lay on the floor, poring over a profusely
illustrated copy of "'Twas the Night before Christmas," bursting forth
tunefully, now and then, with "_Susanna_ in the highest."
There was no manner of use in correcting him, he preferred his own
versions, and stuck to them.
The window of the shop presented an ever changing variety of wares,
from posters and colored photographs to baskets, bags, and pottery,
all unique in their way. Besides the other things, Norah had done a
motto in black and red letters, "A merry heart doeth good like a
medicine," and hung it in the midst.
The popularity of the place increased. Susanna was often called in to
help, and one day a society reporter, out for news, and directed there
by Madelaine Russell, dropped in and interviewed them.
An elaborate description, with mention of the charming and intelligent
young women who had it in charge, appeared next day in one of the
papers. Miss Sarah immediately sent a marked copy to Mrs. Millard.
"We are becoming famous," laughed Norah, as she read it to Marion.
"I wish it did not have to be," said Marion, discontentedly.
"Ungrateful person that you are!" cried Norah.
The newspaper article brought Mrs. Leigh to the shop. Heretofore her
opposition had been consistently maintained; but now, early one
morning, she walked in, a picture of an old lady, with a close-fitting
bonnet over her silvery puffs, a black silk circular lined with gray
squirrel, and an old-fashioned reticule on her arm.
"I have just come to look around," she told Norah. "I have heard so
much of this shop, and it is not in the least like anything I ever saw
before,--and neither are you, for that matter."
Then, as Norah laughed, she added, "I mean you are entirely too pretty
for a shopkeeper. I'd like to know what you are doing it for, but of
course you won't tell me."
"Oh, yes, I will. I am doing it for a living."
"Well, in my day a pretty girl like you wouldn't have had a chance to
make her own living for long, but it is different now. I don't know
whose fault it is."
All the while she was walking about, seeing everything, admiring or
finding fault with equal frankness. Norah, who was delighted with her
visitor, urged her to sit down and rest a few moments.
"Thank you, I believe I will. I am on my way out to my niece's to show
her how to make a plum-pudding." She laughed a little, reminiscently,
and Norah looked interested.
"It makes me think of the time my husband was invited to dine at Dr.
Gray's to meet a distinguished clergyman who had arrived
unexpectedly. It was on Saturday, and when Mr. Leigh came home that
evening he couldn't say enough about Mrs. Gray's plum-pudding. It was
the best he ever ate, and I must get the receipt. I didn't say
anything until next day. Mr. Leigh was mighty fond of dessert; and
when he found there wasn't any for Sunday dinner, he looked terribly
disappointed, and wanted to know why. 'The reason is, Mr. Leigh,' I
said, 'because you ate it yesterday. I intended to have plum-pudding
to-day, but as Mrs. Gray had unexpected company, I sent it over to
her; and my own opinion is, it is more than you deserved to have had a
taste of it.'
"Maybe you think he wasn't teased. He didn't hear the last of that
very soon. Yes, indeed, it was all true. Mrs. Gray and I were good
friends and often helped each other out in an emergency. Well, you
will think me a most unprofitable customer; here I have talked a blue
streak, as Sarah says, and haven't bought a thing."
"Nevertheless, I hope you will come again soon, and I wish success to
the pudding," Norah said, following her visitor to the door.
Being off the beaten track of trade, the rush at the shop was over
before Christmas Eve, and Marion and Norah, leaving Susanna in charge,
went down town on a lark, as Norah said, and came home loaded with
holly and mistletoe.
It was after their late dinner and Norah was putting up the last bit
of holly, when Mammy Belle came in. "Miss Norah, honey, kin you trim a
Chris'mus tree?" she asked.
"Why, yes, I have trimmed many a one."
"I done promise James Mandeville he should have one, for him an' his
papa in the mawnin',--Marse Tom's comin' home; but look like I ain't
got good sense, and I seed Miss Maimie do it las' year." Mammy Belle's
tone was despairing.
"Never mind, we'll do it for you. I might have thought of it, only I
have been so busy," said Norah. "Don't you want to go, Marion?"
Marion was more than ready for anything so in keeping with the night,
and gathering up some unused holly and a box of ornaments for the
tree, they accompanied Mammy Belie to the small house, half a block
distant on Pleasant Street.
It was a tiny place, quite simply and tastefully furnished, but
betraying in many trifling ways the absence of the mistress. James
Mandeville was fast asleep in his crib upstairs, where Mammy Belle
conducted them to peep at him.
"I hope Miss Maimie won't mind our doing this," Norah whispered, as
they went down again.
"I don't believe she will," Marion answered, moving about the tiny
parlor, changing the position of a table here, a chair there, till the
whole room had taken on a new look. The tree in the corner by the
window bore melancholy witness to Mammy Belle's lack of ability in
that line, but under Norah's fingers it began at once to revive.
They were in the midst of the dressing, Mammy Belle looking on in
delight, when there was a ring at the door, and of all persons, who
should it be but Mr. Goodman with a large package under his arm!
"It is a horse for that little rascal," he explained, puffing and
embarrassed.
"Come in and see our tree, Mr. Goodman," called Norah.
The old man stood in the doorway. "I have been stumbling round trying
to find this place for half an hour," he growled. "I took this thing
to the shop, but you weren't there, and that Susan woman tried to
direct me where to go."
"Ought you to go about by yourself at night?" Marion asked. "Won't you
come in and wait for us? We are nearly through."
"And do look at this beautiful horse!" cried Norah, unwrapping a
stately animal with flowing mane and tail. "Won't James Mandeville
rejoice? Jack will be nowhere."
"I suppose boys like horses," said the old man, accepting the chair
Mammy Belle brought forward, and evidently not indifferent to the
admiration his gift excited.
The tree trimming went on, and presently returning to his usual
attitude of mind, Mr. Goodman remarked that there was a sinful waste
of money at this time of year.
"That is true," said Norah, pausing to study the effect of a paper
angel in tinsel, "but also there is the money that _might_ be spent to
make people happy, and isn't."
"Come, Norah, really, we must not stay any longer. You have done quite
enough," Marion was saying, partly in the wish to cut off a possible
argument, when the front door opened with a startling suddenness, and
a young man with a bag in his hand stepped into the hall and faced the
scene in the parlor,--the gay Christmas tree, the holly; Norah
standing on a chair, with her laughing face over her shoulder; Marion,
tall and stately, by the fireplace; and grim-looking Giant Despair in
the chair of state.
"Why, Marse Tom," gasped Mammy Belle, "I done spect you in de
mawnin'."
It was Marion who made the explanations,--their friendship for James
Mandeville and Mammy Belle's difficulty with the tree, and she did it
with a gracious charm of manner that was irresistible.
Mr. Norton's boyish yet careworn face flushed. "You are very kind to
my little boy," he said. "I wish his mother were here to thank you."
"Why, Norton, is that you?" exclaimed Giant Despair, waking up. "Do
you mean to tell me that James Mandeville is your boy? Upon my word!"
"It is fortunate you know Mr. Norton, for now you can testify to our
good intentions in invading his house, Mr. Goodman," said Norah,
laughing.
Mr. Norton was embarrassed. "I travel for Mr. Goodman's drug house,"
he said. Clearly he was not in the habit of meeting his employer
socially.
* * * * *
"And you say they keep a shop, mammy?" This was after the guests had
departed, and Belle had done her best to explain.
"Dey is ladies, anyhow," she insisted stoutly.
"That is very evident," said Mr. Norton.
"Jus' you ax James Mandeville in the mawnin'," added Mammy Belle. "He
'lows dat Miss Marion and Miss Norah done put the moon up, shore."
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIRST
THE RICH MISS CARPENTER
Miss Virginia was writing to her sister. She had a great deal that was
pleasant to relate, and her pen moved on smoothly. There was
Charlotte's Christmas party which, with the assistance of Alex and
Madelaine, had gone off successfully.
Lucile Lyle had been one of the guests, for as a classmate of
Charlotte's it seemed necessary to ask her; but this Miss Virginia did
not mention. She did say, however, that Charlotte's interest in Lucile
seemed to have abated. This was quite true; indeed, there was a
growing coolness between the once devoted friends.
The cause of this was a little girl, a year younger than Charlotte,
who with her father and mother had recently come to board at the
Leighs'. The Reeds were strangers in the city, and Miss Sarah had
asked Charlotte to do what she could to make Helen feel at home.
They had taken a fancy to each other, and Charlotte enjoyed playing
chaperon to Helen when she was entered at Miss Barrows's school. Helen
was a bright girl with sweet, gentle manners, inclined to look up to
Charlotte as older and more experienced than herself; and in their
daily walks back and forth the friendship grew. Lucile chose to be
jealous, and something very like what in schoolgirl language is called
a fuss, followed. They no longer wore each other's rings, and Lucile
sang no more of beauteous eyes.
Miss Virginia knew all about it, and took pleasure in mentioning to
her sister that Charlotte's good sense had come to the rescue, and an
intimacy was no longer to be feared. That Mrs. Millard had small
confidence in her powers of discipline, Miss Virginia was well aware;
but Charlotte's excellent school reports spoke for themselves.
After giving various items of neighborhood interest, she paused;
glancing up, her eye fell on the shop across the way, and immediately
a sensation of uneasiness took possession of her. With an elbow on her
desk she continued to gaze out of the window, thoughtfully tapping
her cheek with her penholder. She had warned her sister that she meant
to do as she pleased; at the same time, she had not intended to buy
most of her Christmas gifts at the shop, and more than this, to remain
to chat on several occasions. And yesterday Charlotte had come in with
the announcement that Miss Carpenter was willing to show Helen and her
how to make baskets if they would come over some evening. They were
very eager to go. Could she refuse? The question interrupted her flow
of thought; she put aside the letter to be finished some other time,
and went in to see the Leighs.
She found Alexina in the sitting room with Miss Sarah and her aunt.
Old Mrs. Leigh had the quilt she was making spread out on the couch
for admiration and suggestions. Miss Virginia, after paying tribute to
its beauties, mentioned the basket making, and asked for advice.
"Caroline insisted that they would push themselves into notice, and
while I cannot see that they are pushing, they are certainly--"
"Getting there," suggested Miss Sarah. "Do you know, Mr. Goodman has
been in several times after the shop closed at five o'clock, to have
Miss Norah read to him? Now, is that anything but pure kindness? I
suppose Caroline would say they were after his money."
"I had not thought of his caring to be read to as he has John; but he
told grandfather he got tired of John's reading, and there were some
political articles in the _Nineteenth Century_ Miss Pennington offered
to read to him," said Alexina, who had made up her mind definitely
that she wanted these shopkeepers for friends.
"I think that Miss Norah carries a cunning bag, as Malinda used to
say," remarked Mrs. Leigh.
"They have not returned our call, Miss Virginia," said Alex.
"No, and if I could do just as I pleased, I'd like to know them
better. I'd ask them to tea." Miss Wilbur spoke as one considering
some daring departure from the path of propriety.
Miss Sarah laughed. "I wish you would," she said.
When Friday night came, Miss Virginia did not see her way clear to
oppose the basket lessons, and in consequence found herself one of a
merry party in the shop. Alex had come over with them, and presently
Miss Sarah ran in.
Alex was in one of her bright moods, and Miss Sarah kept them laughing
over her first experiences in paying her taxes. Miss Carpenter, as she
separated long strands of raphia and initiated her pupils into the art
of twisting and stitching, was almost as merry as Miss Pennington,
whose infectious laugh, as she related James Mandeville's latest
speeches, kept them all in a gale.
Once in the course of the evening, Norah said, in reference to a
remark of somebody's, "That reminds me of our friend the rich Miss
Carpenter." And when the lesson was over, and Miss Virginia, beginning
to murmur something about its being late, Charlotte suddenly
announced, "I know a Miss Carpenter in Philadelphia."
There was an odd silence for a moment until she added: "At least, I
don't exactly know her, but I have heard a great deal about her. She
lives across the street from my uncle, and last spring when I was
there I used to see them take her out to drive. She had been ill, and
I never really saw her. _She_ is rich, and I wondered if she could be
the Miss Carpenter you spoke of, Miss Norah."
It was Marion who answered the question. "She is the very one. Norah
thinks a great deal of her, in fact,--is a little absurd about her."
"Why shouldn't I be? Hasn't she done everything for us?" cried Norah,
stoutly.
"Then you have seen her," said Charlotte, delightedly. "Is she
beautiful and--everything--as Mrs. Wellington said?" she looked at
Marion.
"Ask Miss Pennington."
"I consider her handsome and charming, but Marion is a connection and
ought to be able to tell you more than I."
"I am glad you know her, for I am very much interested in her because
of a special reason."
"Charlotte, my dear," Miss Virginia spoke warningly, "it is really
time we were going."
* * * * *
The discovery that Miss Carpenter of the shop was a relative of the
Philadelphia Carpenters relieved Miss Virginia beyond measure. She
sat down at once to finish her letter and convey the news to her
sister. She was vindicated; once more her conscience was easy.
The Terrace in general received the news with approval. That the
shopkeepers were not exactly ordinary persons had been felt all along.
Everybody had heard of Peter Carpenter. Possibly the shop was simply
another manifestation of family eccentricities on the part of this
cousin. It was easily settled that Miss Marion was a cousin,--probably
a second or third cousin; for Miss Virginia knew about the family, and
Peter Carpenter had had but one son.
Mrs. Russell, who went to the shop with Alex one day, was greatly
impressed with Marion's bearing. "Any one can see she is not an
ordinary person," she said.
"That must be because you know she is well-connected, mother," Alex
replied. "Mrs. Millard could not see it."
"I trust I am not quite so prejudiced," Mrs. Russell said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SECOND
VALENTINES
"Undoubtedly our connection with the rich Miss Carpenter has affected
our social position. The air is full of affability. Before we know it,
we shall be in society." Norah looked up from her account-book to make
this remark.
"As it is all your doing, I trust you are pleased," returned Marion.
"That pretty fraud, Madelaine Russell, asked me yesterday if she might
not come with Alexina to the basket making next Friday," continued
Norah. "Of course I had to say 'yes.' Now I think I'll ask that little
type-writer girl I met at the mission. She is really a neighbor, for
she boards in that tall, dreary house on the corner of Walnut and
Pleasant streets."
"Why not ask her to dinner? I should really enjoy some company."
"A good idea, Marion. She looks hungry,--I don't mean for dinner, but
for something besides work. She is from the country. What have you in
that bag, Infinitesimal James?--some more 'finger ladies'?"
James Mandeville, who had at that moment entered, nodded his head,
speech being for obvious reasons out of the question.
"Eating in the shop is against the rule, except at afternoon tea,"
said Marion. "You must go outside, or join Susanna in the kitchen."
"Did you happen to meet Mr. Goodman this morning?" asked Norah.
"Yes, he buyed the finger ladies," answered James Mandeville, helping
himself again from the bag, and then passing it around. "I am going to
buy him a valentine," he added.
"To be sure, he deserves one. We'll go down town this very afternoon
and select it."
"Goody!" said James Mandeville, and in great spirits he carried his
cakes out of doors, and was presently busily engaged in playing
conductor on the doorstep, calling out in stentorian tones at
intervals, "All on a board!"
Norah found the business of selecting valentines in company with a
small boy, a lengthy one. James Mandeville's taste was exacting. At
first the comic ones caught his eye, and he was with difficulty
induced to consider more worthy specimens of art; then he bestowed his
favor upon an elaborate white satin heart, a combination sachet and
valentine, and again had to be diverted. At length his selection was
made,--a gilt and lace affair with a border of roses and the touching
motto, "To my own true love."
On their way home they stopped in a large jewelry store where Norah
had left her watch to be repaired, and while she waited she saw
Wayland Leigh bending in an absorbed manner over a collection of
fans,--delicate mother-of-pearl and lace trifles, as frail as they
were pretty. What business had he with such expensive things? she
wondered. It was quickly forgotten, however, in the difficulties
involved in making headway past the show windows, James Mandeville
wishing to exhaust the beauties of each one before moving on.
[Illustration: JAMES MANDEVILLE'S TASTE WAS EXACTING.]
The afternoon was nearly over when, after leaving her companion at his
home, she entered the shop, where Marion was busy folding and putting
away. Norah stood before the table, pulling off her gloves.
Suddenly she stooped and picked up an envelope from the floor. "Did
you get a letter from Dr. Baird?" she asked, as she read the address.
Marion's face flushed oddly. "No," she said, "it was just an
enclosure."
"A valentine?" cried Norah; but Marion went on with her folding, and
did not reply.
Norah walked to the window and looked out through the screen of plants
at the Terrace and the faint rosy glow that lingered in the southwest.
She guessed what it was her friend had received, and for a moment she
was not quite happy. Then she asked herself inwardly, but sternly,
"Are you a selfish beast, Norah Pennington?"
Presently Marlon came behind her and put an arm around her. "You don't
mind my not showing it to you, Norah. It was only a--"
Norah turned, and with a sudden motion stopped the word on her lips.
"Child, what is friendship worth if one minds things--like that? I
invited Miss Martin," she added.
Louise Martin was a fair, fresh-looking girl, who had come from a
country town several years before, and after a course in a business
college had found a position as stenographer in a real estate office.
Her gentle, refined manners had attracted Norah, who, persisting in
the effort to make friends with her, had at length broken through the
distant reserve with which she met all advances. The girl hesitated
over the invitation, saying she did not often go anywhere; but Norah's
friendly manner won the day, and promptly at half past six on Friday
evening Susanna ushered her into the shop.
Norah met her and presented her to Marion. "And now you are to come
upstairs to take off your things, for that always seems the sociable
way to begin," she said.
Miss Martin looked about her in surprise. "When you said you kept a
shop, I did not dream it was like this."
"We pride ourselves on not keeping an ordinary shop, but a most
unpretentious one, as you see."
"And this is where you live?" Miss Martin exclaimed with a sigh of
admiration, as she followed her guide into a very simple bedroom.
"We live all over the house. This is my room, however."
"It is the most beautiful place I ever saw," the girl said.
Remembering the dingy boarding-house, Norah understood. "It is all
simple and inexpensive," she said. "Miss Carpenter and I pride
ourselves on the large amount of comfort we have achieved for a small
amount of money. You see we have matting on the floor, with a few
rugs; as our landlord would not do anything to the walls, we had a
frieze made of this big-flowered paper which cost next to nothing, and
relieves the whiteness; the white iron beds and the dressing-tables
were not expensive, nor the draperies, which are in our line, you
know." While she talked Norah opened the door into the next room.
"This is Miss Carpenter's," she said. "We are just alike, except that
she is rose colored and I am blue."
There were some things Norah had not mentioned,--toilet articles such
as Miss Martin had never seen outside of a show-case, and a silk
dressing-gown of great daintiness that lay across a chair in Miss
Carpenter's room.
"I was surprised when you said you kept a store,--you did not look
like it; but if this is the way you live--" Miss Martin did not
finish her sentence as she allowed Norah to take her hat.
That everything about the small domain impressed her, it was easy to
see. The simple dinner served so deftly by Susanna, the appointments
of the table, and by no means least, her two hostesses.
Before eight o'clock the basket makers arrived, with them Madelaine,
who made a pretty pretence of being deeply grateful to Miss Pennington
for allowing her to come. Miss Martin watched her with serious
admiration in her eyes. Here was a girl little younger than herself,
whose whole business in life was to be beautiful and engaging.
"I have brought my prettiest valentine to show you," Madelaine said.
"Isn't it a dear?" and taking from its box a gauzy fan, she held it
out for inspection.
Norah, who was nearest, took it. "It is certainly pretty if not
durable," she remarked.
"I hate durable things," said its owner, with a shrug of her dainty
shoulders. "I know it cost a great deal, for I priced one like it."
"Madelaine!" expostulated her sister.
"Goosie, I don't mean since this came."
"And you don't know who sent it?" asked Charlotte.
"Think of sending a gift like this and not getting the credit for it,"
said Miss Sarah, viewing it from a practical standpoint.
"If I knew who sent it, mamma wouldn't let me keep it,--at least Alex
wouldn't,--so of course I do not know."
It was impossible not to smile at her.
"You are a fraud, Madelaine," Miss Sarah said. "I wish I had the money
some people spend on valentines."
"James Mandeville has a more practical mind than Miss Russell's
unknown admirer; he delivered his valentines in person and demanded
full credit," Marion observed.
Norah whispered to Alex, "Please be nice to my little girl," so Alex
took a seat beside Miss Martin and showed her how to begin a basket.
"Miss Pennington says you are a stenographer. I am trying to learn,
but I am hopelessly stupid. Do you think one can learn by one's self?"
"I learned at the Business College," answered Miss Martin; and
looking Alex up and down she added, "but you do not have to do it, do
you? I am glad I can support myself, but there are other ways,--like
this,--only I never dreamed of it before. In a business office
generally you are just part of a machine." Discovering that Miss
Wilbur, too, was listening, she came to an embarrassed pause.
"What would you do if you were to become suddenly rich, Miss Sarah?"
Madelaine asked, and everybody stopped to listen.
"Lose my mind, probably," was the answer.
"Riches make people so dreadfully commonplace," said Norah.
"What can be more commonplace than poverty?" Alex demanded.
"Well, I suppose both extremes are bad. It is, after all, the people
who have neither poverty nor riches who have ideas and make something
out of life."
"I could get heaps out of life if I were rich," Madelaine said.
"I still insist that rich people are to a considerable extent
unoriginal and stupid. They associate with persons exactly like
themselves, do the same things, say the same things, eat the same
things--"
"This is Miss Pennington's hobby," Marion remarked, smiling.
"What would you do if you were to become rich?" Miss Virginia asked
her.
"I believe I should go on with the shop for the present," was the
reply.
"I think I should start a Settlement like the one you have told me
about," Alex said, turning to Norah. "But then," she added, "I should
have to learn a great deal first. You can't do anything that amounts
to anything without learning how."
Miss Sarah had been meditating, now she spoke, "I think I'd try to
give a good time to some persons who never have any fun, to whom life
is only a grind."
"There are so many of them," added Miss Martin, timidly.
"I am afraid I have always been dreadfully selfish," sighed Miss
Virginia.
"Oh, no, Virginia, you aren't that," said Miss Sarah. "Like some of
the rest of us, you may have lived in a small circle, but within its
bounds no one could accuse you of selfishness. Let's all promise to
remember each other when we come into our fortunes," she added.
After they had gone,--Miss Martin lingering to say with shy
earnestness, "I have had _such_ a good time," and receiving in return
a cordial invitation to consider herself a member of the basket
society,--Norah joined Marion before the fire.
"Do you know, Wayland Leigh gave that fan to Madelaine," she said.
"Are you sure? It must have cost twenty-five or thirty dollars."
"I saw him looking at them the other day. I rather suspect his aunts
have spoiled him."
CHAPTER TWENTY-THIRD
NEIGHBORS
Late in February, after some weeks of unusually cold weather, an
epidemic of grip developed. In the Terrace there were several victims,
among the first the Leighs' cook; and when it came to filling her
place, it was discovered that she was by no means the only member of
that useful profession laid low. It was quite impossible to find a
substitute. Miss Sarah was obliged to do her own cooking, with the
assistance of a not very intelligent housemaid.
There were ten in her family now, and it was no light task; but she
might have proved equal to it if she had not been overworking all
winter. Her spare moments had been given to sewing and embroidering
for the shop, she had indulged and petted her aunt and Wayland just as
usual, besides attending to her housekeeping in the most painstaking
fashion; and all the while like an ominous cloud hovering over her was
the doubt whether she would be able to make the two ends meet.
Perhaps she was extravagant with the table, but during her brother's
lifetime they had lived in an easy, lavish way, and she knew no other.
It hurt Miss Sarah,--foolishly, but naturally,--that her nephew should
have to pay board out of his small salary; and when one week he
omitted to hand her the usual five dollars, she could not bear to ask
him for it, although the lack of it put her to some inconvenience.
To Wayland things seemed moving on easily enough at home. He had
become almost reconciled to the boarders, who made possible the more
elaborate table; and it seemed to him quite impossible that so small a
sum could make any great difference. He meant to pay it in time, but
just now he was hard up. He had made the mistake of trying to be a
society man, to compete with those whose incomes were many times as
large as his own. In his heart he knew the purchase of that fan for
Madelaine was a piece of inexcusable extravagance, but he had been too
weak to resist.
Madelaine was most gracious in these days to Winston Graham, a
pampered youth whom Wayland had despised from his babyhood, and had
tyrannized over at school. Now the tables were turned. Years had
improved Winston, and any lack of brilliancy was more than atoned for
by an ample fortune, in the management of which he was showing
unexpected shrewdness.
For the moment that foolish fan had brought him a little pleasure.
There could be no doubt Madelaine guessed the sender. Somebody was
absurd, she said; if she were certain who sent it, she would return
it,--and then she smiled bewitchingly over the gauzy trifle that had
cost more than half a month's salary.
Miss Sarah was in some measure to blame. She should have taken her
nephew into her confidence. Such things as taxes and unexpected
plumber's bills did not present themselves to his mind, and when he
presently found himself in debt, he went so far as to wonder if she
might not be able to help him out,--temporarily, of course.
It was not till matters had grown desperate that he decided to do
this. Wayland was not in the habit of getting into debt, and an
insistent tailor and florist made his life miserable. With masculine
obtuseness he chose the most unpropitious moment. Miss Sarah, after a
hard day, had dropped into an easy-chair for a little rest after
dinner. Wayland had forgotten the absence of the cook, and in the
lamplight his aunt looked placid and comfortable.
"Aunt Sarah," he began, "I am rather hard up just now--"
"Never mind, dear, I can get along, I think. You can pay me back
sometime when it is convenient."
"Yes, I mean to,--but I have been a fool. I--I am going to turn over a
new leaf,--not go out any more, and save up," Wayland stammered.
Usually to a remark of this kind his aunt would respond with consoling
assurance that he was young and must have a little pleasure; but
to-night she only said with a sigh it would perhaps be better; that
when one was poor the only peaceful thing was to accept it.
"Then I suppose you couldn't lend me a little?" he faltered.
"Lend?" Miss Sarah sat up very straight. "Oh, Wayland, are you in
debt?"
"Oh, well, if you can't it is all right; but you needn't jump all over
a fellow."
"I do not understand what you mean by 'jumping all over you.' I
certainly don't feel like such gymnastics. But I want you to tell me
honestly the state of affairs."
The truth was hard to extract. Wayland was sullen, apologetic, and
contrite by turns. At last it came out. He owed one hundred and fifty
dollars.
"I am sorry." Miss Sarah sank back in her chair. "I fear you have been
very foolish. To go in debt seems to me not quite honest. But I am
glad you told me. I'll try to help you; and you'll promise, won't you,
not to do this again?"
Somehow his aunt's low, controlled tone exasperated Wayland far more
than if she had shown anger. "I guess if you knew what other fellows
spend, you wouldn't think I was so awful. Of course I am sorry, and of
course I don't mean to do it again," and he flung out of the room.
Two days later Miss Sarah alarmed the household at the breakfast table
by fainting, something she had never been known to do before. Simple
restoratives proved of no avail, and Wayland rushed off to the nearest
telephone to call a physician, almost running over Miss Pennington,
who was starting for a morning walk.
"Could I be of any help?" she asked as he hurriedly explained.
"If you would," Wayland cried gratefully.
Norah entered upon a scene of confusion. Old Mrs. Leigh was frightened
out of her senses, and no one seemed able to think what to do. Knowing
something of illness and possessing a cool head and steady hand, Norah
took command; and when the doctor arrived, Miss Sarah was beginning to
recover consciousness.
She was ordered to bed at once; and when she ventured to expostulate
feebly, Norah said: "Now, Miss Sarah, we can manage things for to-day.
For once trust to your friends and don't worry. You will get well just
so much sooner."
Miss Sarah looked up in to the bright face that bent over her. "You
are very good. Perhaps I will,--just for to-day."
"She is threatened with pneumonia; she must have a nurse," the doctor
said, outside her door.
It was the beginning for Miss Sarah of a serious illness which in one
way and another involved a number of her neighbors. Owing to the
prevailing epidemic, it was at first impossible to get a satisfactory
nurse, and Norah and Miss Virginia Wilbur offered their services. Miss
Wilbur also lent her cook until Anne should be able to return, saying
she and Charlotte could do very well with Martha.
In the shop Alex took Norah's place. Norah herself suggested it with
some hesitation, thinking Mrs. Russell might object; but this lady,
like many others, had somewhat modified her opinion of the shop. "You
know," she explained on more than one occasion, "those young women are
most interesting. Miss Carpenter, indeed, has a great deal of
elegance. Alex, with her eccentric ideas, is delighted with them, and
was so anxious to go I could not refuse."
Without the shop these would have been lonely days for Charlotte, with
Aunt Virginia absent so much of the time, and her friend Helen one of
the grip victims. Miss Carpenter had exerted a peculiar fascination
over Charlotte since the evening when she had come to her rescue.
Others might prefer Miss Pennington; Charlotte never wavered in her
admiration for the more quiet member of the firm. On her way to school
each morning she invariably crossed the street that she might pass the
shop, and perhaps receive a smile from Marion.
This new enthusiasm overshadowed all former ones, and Miss Carpenter
seemed by no means indifferent to the little girl's adoration, making
her welcome to run in and out at all times. After hours, or when
business was dull, Charlotte would often talk to her about the
Landors, and their Philadelphia home, and Miss Carpenter seemed quite
ready to listen; but Charlotte's curiosity about her cousin who lived
across the street, was never satisfied.
Miss Sarah, to whom indirectly this cementing of the ties between the
shop and its neighbors was due, called Norah to her bedside on the
first day of her illness, and confided to her a certain railroad bond.
"I am afraid it will be some time before I am able to attend to this
myself," she said, "so I am going to ask you to see if you can sell
it for me. I went yesterday to see about it, but they told me to hold
on to it for a while, if possible, and I thought I could perhaps wait;
but now I want the money. It will have to go at whatever price it will
bring. It is too bad to ask you,--you are so good."
Norah assured her she would not mind in the least, and leaving the
patient in Miss Virginia's hands she walked thoughtfully toward home.
She happened to know that there was considerable interest felt at
present in the fluctuation of these bonds, for she sometimes read the
market news to Mr. Goodman, and he had a few days before spoken of
buying some. Was there any possible way by which she could sell Miss
Sarah's bond without sacrificing it?
At the corner she met Mr. Goodman, and at sight of him a sudden idea
took possession of her.
"Mr. Goodman, can you tell me how G. W. & S. bonds are selling
to-day?" she asked.
"Seventy-two they are asking to-day. A good thing if you want to buy.
They are bound to go up," was the old gentleman's reply.
"Could you come in and let me ask you a few questions?" said Norah.
Mr. Goodman never objected to talking stocks and bonds, and therefore
assented affably.
To the very evident amusement of Alex and Marion, Norah conducted her
companion through the shop into the next room, flashing a mischievous
glance over her shoulder as she pushed the door to. Giving the old man
a chair, she seated herself opposite him; and leaning forward with her
folded arms on the table, she told him of Miss Sarah's illness and her
need of money. "Now," she concluded, "she has one of those bonds, and
I want to sell it for a thousand dollars."
"My dear young lady, you can't do the impossible. Keep it six months
and it may be at par."
"But she can't wait. She must have the money,--at least she thinks so;
and she is too ill to be argued with. I want to make her mind easy.
Why couldn't--somebody--give a thousand dollars for it?" Norah's heart
beat quickly at her own daring. "What would be lost?"
"Why doesn't somebody give her three hundred dollars, you mean?"
"No, that is not at all what I mean," urged Norah. "I think you said
you were buying to sell? Now, if that bond is worth a thousand dollars
six months from now, what would--anybody lose who gave that for it
now? Only the interest on not quite three hundred dollars. That is, of
course, taking for granted he expected to sell."
"Upon my word!" exclaimed Mr. Goodman. "What is she talking about? I
didn't say they would be at par in six months."
"Well, say a year, then. If you'll buy the bond, I'll pay the
interest. I'll give you my note," Norah said, laughing.
"It is the most astonishing proposition I ever heard," growled the old
man.
"It is to help a neighbor out, and that is the best thing in life,
particularly any one so brave and bright as Miss Sarah. She would
never let us do it if she guessed, but I can tell her they are going
up steadily. I think I can manage it." Norah beamed across the table.
Whether she had won or not was difficult to tell, for Mr. Goodman rose
suddenly, buttoned up his coat, and saying he would see her the next
day, strode off without so much as good evening.
"Norah, what made you do it?" Marion exclaimed when she heard the
story. "Surely, it could have been arranged."
"I don't know. It popped into my head when I saw him. It won't do any
harm to get some of his rusty dollars into circulation. I almost
believe he will do it."
And she was right. Mr. Goodman gave her a check for a thousand
dollars, and, moreover, suggested that if Miss Sarah did not need the
whole amount at present, he could invest several hundred of it
advantageously. And this was the kindest thing Giant Despair had done
for many a year. As for Norah's scheme for paying him interest, he
only laughed at that.
Poor Miss Sarah was too ill to understand more than that the bond was
sold. She was feverishly anxious till she could put the money for his
debts into Wayland's hands. After this she grew rapidly worse, and the
outcome began to seem doubtful.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FOURTH
WAYLAND
Wayland blamed himself bitterly. He could not forget the touch of
those burning fingers pressing the money into his hand. He tried to
refuse it, but his aunt whispered: "Take it, dear. It is all right. I
shall not be happy till you do." After this he had been sent from the
room and not allowed to see her again.
Old Mrs. Leigh, bemoaning Sarah's hard lot and accusing herself of
selfishness, unconsciously enlightened him as to the true state of
affairs. Wayland sincerely loved his aunt,--the only mother he had
ever known,--and he realized with shame how unworthy had been his
attitude toward her of late. While she had been struggling to make a
home for him and her old aunt, thinking and spending for him till
there was nothing left for herself, he, absorbed in his own affairs,
had been disdainful and critical, fretted by her habit of laughing at
things, annoyed by her style of dress.
And this money. He guessed where it came from. She must have sold a
bond left to her by a friend some years ago, which she called her
rainy-day legacy. He fiercely promised himself he would pay it back.
But in the terrible fear that she would not recover, this thought
ceased to console him. What if he should never have the opportunity to
tell her how sorry he was, how ashamed? The doctor looked very grave,
the nurse and Miss Virginia shook their heads and said, "No better."
Norah was the only one who gave him any encouragement. She bade him
not give up yet, and devised errands to distract him from his misery,
and make him feel that he was of some use. He hung upon her words with
such an appealing face her heart was touched, for she guessed that
remorse mingled with his sorrow.
There came a dreadful day when even she had no hopeful word to say;
when, hurrying home at the earliest moment, he found the house hushed
in a terrible suspense.
Miss Virginia sat with Mrs. Leigh, and they talked of Miss Sarah, and
wiped the tears from their eyes as if she were already dead. Wayland
could not endure it.
In his longing for comfort he thought of Madelaine. Surely, she would
be kind to him now. She was tender-hearted and sympathetic; just the
touch of her pretty hand would help him. He had not seen her for more
than a week.
Miss Madelaine was dressing to go out, but would see him for a moment
if he cared to wait, the servant said; and presently as he strode back
and forth, too restless to sit down, she floated in, lovely and
gracious as ever.
"I am going to dinner at the Mays'. I am sorry I can't see you for
more than a minute. How is Miss Sarah to-night?"
"No better--worse," Wayland answered brokenly, holding fast the hand
she offered him. Gently Madelaine drew it away, and began to put on
her glove.
"I am _so_ sorry," she said, "but you mustn't despair. I am sure she
is going to get well."
Upon Wayland's sensitive ear the words fell with a hollowness almost
unbearable. "She does not care at all," he told himself.
This was perhaps a little unjust to Madelaine. She was very full at
that moment of the joy of living; she knew nothing by experience, of
illness and death. She was sorry for Wayland, but the thought of the
evening's pleasure was not for an instant dimmed by it.
Wayland went blindly home again, conscious of nothing but the pain in
his heart. At the door Norah met him with a note which she asked him
to take to Miss Carpenter. "The doctor thinks there will be no change
for some hours," she told him.
He sat staring into the fire in the same blind way when Marion entered
the room.
"There is no haste about the answer. Won't you stay with me for a
while?" she said. "I am alone, and I know you must be feeling the
strain of suspense."
Norah's note had said: "Do keep the poor boy and comfort him if you
can. He does nothing but wander in and out."
"Thank you, I think I must go back," he answered, lingering aimlessly
however.
Marion brought him a cup of after-dinner coffee, and he submitted and
drank it, although he felt it must choke him; and when he had
swallowed it, he was the better for it.
Marion did not make the mistake of trying to cheer him in the face of
this terrible anxiety, but in every possible way she showed her
sympathy. She spoke of his aunt, of her brightness and kindness, of
her evident attachment for him; and poor Wayland, longing to pour out
his unhappiness to some one, forgot she was almost a stranger and came
out with his confession. His foolishness and extravagance, his
carelessness of his aunt's comfort. It was very boyish and perfectly
sincere. Madelaine was not mentioned by name, but the wound showed
plainly, and Marion guessed what he did not tell.
"And now I shall never have a chance to show her how sorry I am," he
groaned, hiding his face.
"Don't say that. There is still some room for hope that you may have
another opportunity; and even if you do not, you can yet make of
yourself what she would wish," Marion said; adding, "If you will let
me speak to you as if you were my younger brother, I should say that
all the trouble has come from a natural but selfish determination to
have what, after all, was not meant for you. I think I understand;
and although you may not believe me, I am sure it could never have
made you happy if you had been able to obtain it."
"If you mean Madelaine," Wayland said, lifting his head, "that is all
over."
Afterward he could look back on that evening and feel that out of his
grief he had won a friend who might never have been his under other
circumstances. At the moment he was conscious only of the new courage
and determination that inspired him, when after the long talk he said
good night.
With the morning new hope came. There was a chance for recovery; and
this grew, until at length Miss Sarah began slowly to climb the hill
toward health again.
It was some time before Wayland could pour out to her his repentance,
and then his aunt would not let him say half he wanted to say.
"Why, child," she exclaimed, patting the head bowed on the arm of her
chair, "you have done nothing to call forth all this. You have been
thoughtless, as most young persons are; but I suspect it is my fault.
I spoiled you. I did so want you to have what you wanted, always. I
suppose it is foolish, but it is the way we feel about the children we
bring up."
"You shall have that bond back, or one just as good, Aunt Sarah," he
assured her; and there was something in his face which showed he meant
it.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIFTH
THE PRICE OF A BOND
"Mr. Goodman, I want to understand about that bond Miss Pennington
sold for me. I have been reading the papers, and I don't see how it
could have brought a thousand dollars when they are only quoted at
eighty-something." Miss Sarah was still white and weak, but she spoke
with a touch of her old energy.
Ever since she had been able to think connectedly, the matter had
puzzled her. Norah, when appealed to, was innocence itself.
"I am sure he did not lose anything, Miss Sarah," she said. "I offered
it to him because I happened to know he had already bought some."
So now she had summoned Giant Despair himself, happening to see from
her window his clumsy figure coming up the street.
"I am glad to see you better, Miss Sarah," he said, appearing rather
ill at ease as he seated himself ponderously in a wicker chair.
"Goodness! I hope it won't give way with him," thought Miss Sarah;
then aloud she repeated her question, adding, "I have no confidence
whatever in Miss Pennington."
Giant Despair squinted at her with his best eye, as if to see just
what she meant.
"My own opinion," Miss Sarah continued, "has always been that she is a
witch; but even then I don't understand it."
Mr. Goodman smiled grimly and slapped his gloves across his knee.
"Probably you don't know much about the ways of witches," he remarked.
"I ought to know something. I can't imagine what I should have done
without Norah. Everybody was kind,--more than kind,--but she knew how
to take hold and manage things. I--" she hesitated a moment before she
added, "and we didn't want them in the neighborhood!"
"I guess you are right about the witch business," agreed the old man.
"But the bond," urged Miss Sarah.
"Well, there is nothing to be said about the bond, so far as I know.
As a general thing women don't know much about business, but Miss
Norah has taught me a thing or two. I haven't lost anything on your
bond, Miss Sarah, and I expect to make before I get through."
"And you are sure that she--"
"She didn't lose anything, either,--if that is what you mean. That
bond was worth to me what I paid for it, and that is all I can say on
the subject, unless--" Giant Despair hesitated. "Years ago your
brother saved me a good deal of money at one time and another. He was
a good man. I have sometimes wished I had taken his advice. If you
aren't satisfied, just remember that."
There had been a time when Miss Sarah's brother, Wayland's father, had
managed Mr. Goodman's law business; but the relations had come to a
sudden end. The only explanation Mr. Leigh had ever made to his sister
was that he did not care for certain of the drug company's methods.
"Then all I can do is to thank you most warmly," she said as he rose.
"If I have helped you, Miss Sarah, I am glad. As I say, I have not
lost anything, and I am a useless old codger, anyhow."
Miss Sarah wiped some tears away; she was far from strong yet. "I
think it was a conspiracy between you and Miss Pennington, but I'll
have to let it go."
"I am in good company, at any rate," said Giant Despair.
James Mandeville waited for Mr. Goodman at the gate, and the two
walked away together, hand in hand, the little boy taking great pains
to point out all obstacles in the path, chattering ceaselessly, his
radiant face lifted constantly to the rugged one so far above him.
Miss Sarah watched them and smiled.
As for Mr. Goodman, he felt a strange sense of exhilaration,--so much
so, that when they met an organ-grinder and a monkey (spring being now
at hand) he contributed a dime instead of the usual five-cent piece.
A week later he went to a hospital to have his eye operated on, and
during the weeks of helplessness that followed he was the recipient of
an amount of attention that greatly surprised him.
The hospital was only a few blocks away from the Terrace, and hardly a
day passed without a visit from some of his neighbors. Marion, Norah,
and Alexina took turns in reading to him; and James Mandeville came
whenever he could induce any one to bring him.
In the same corridor was a man recovering from a stroke of paralysis,
who, rolling himself back and forth in his chair, occasionally
encountered Mr. Goodman and exchanged a few words.
"I notice you have a great many friends," the stranger remarked one
day.
"I?" exclaimed Giant Despair, who looked fiercer than ever with one
eye bandaged. "Well, I suppose I have," he admitted, and became lost
in thought. Eight months ago probably not a soul would have done more
than leave a card, unless it had been a member of the firm. How had it
come about? Undoubtedly the shopkeepers had something to do with it.
They had showed themselves friendly. Then he thought of that bond.
Suppose he had refused Norah? Ah, he had told Miss Sarah the strict
truth when he said he had not lost anything in that transaction. He
really felt the impulse to do another kindness to somebody, but not
being in practice, nothing suggested itself.
An opportunity came, however. One Sunday afternoon James Mandeville
brought his father with him to see Mr. Goodman. The child's joyous air
of proprietorship was pretty to see.
"Here's my father," he announced. "Isn't you glad he's come home?"
Then, as the two men shook hands, he asked, leaning confidingly
against his old friend, "Does your eye hurt, still yet?"
The conversation turned naturally to business, and after a time Mr.
Goodman suddenly said, "Norton, it has just occurred to me-- We are
making some changes this spring, and we need an experienced man to
look after the city trade. How would you like the place?"
Mr. Norton's careworn, boyish face flushed and brightened. "It would
mean a great deal to me now, Mr. Goodman. My wife will be at home
soon; I was dreading the thought of having to leave. Thank you very
much."
"You needn't thank me. I am considering my own interest," the old man
replied, with an affability that astounded himself.
"I rather think Jenks is expecting the place, but he isn't married;
he can wait," he added.
* * * * *
"Miss Norah, does you reckon old Marse Goodman's gittin' religion?"
asked Mammy Belle one day. "Looks like he's mighty soft-hearted."
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIXTH
NORAH'S ARK
Alexina said the shop, like a little leaven, was leavening the whole
neighborhood, and truly it seemed so. To her those two weeks of
association with Marion had been a joy. In the congenial surroundings
of the shop she found it easy to live in to-day, leaving the future to
unfold as it would. Her shorthand book lay unopened; she began to feel
the truth of Marion's assurance, "Your forte is dainty, feminine
things, Alex, in spite of your disdain for them."
In their leisure moments they had built many castles concerned with
the future of the shop, one of these being a millinery department of
which Alex was to have charge.
Indeed, the two weeks of Miss Sarah's illness saw the beginning of
many things. Between Miss Virginia and Norah Pennington a strong
friendship grew up.
"Miss Virginia is such a dear!" Norah said. "I adore her stilted
little expressions, such as 'busy with my needle or pen,' instead of
sewing or writing, and with it all she is at heart a child."
"That is the point of contact between you," Marion answered, smiling.
Miss Virginia was like one who had thrown off a yoke, yet she hardly
understood her own light-heartedness. It was quite true that she had
never outgrown her girlhood. It was only overlaid by grown-up manners,
and unconsciously she was beginning to let the burden of convention
slip from her shoulders and to enjoy herself as her nature prompted.
Charlotte was an hourly pleasure. Miss Virginia enjoyed looking after
her wardrobe as in the past she had enjoyed dressing her dolls. She
listened to the schoolgirl experiences poured into her ear, with
genuine interest. They were like two children together; but Miss
Virginia's sweetness and sincerity, her delicate refinement, could not
but have their influence on her impetuous little niece.
One broadening influence came from those Friday evenings in the shop,
with their basket making and pleasant talk. Miss Virginia had been
accustomed to accept things as they were. When in her very infrequent
visits to business offices she had encountered young women acting as
bookkeepers and stenographers, she had looked upon them as a class
apart. Not that she felt consciously superior, or anything but kindly,
but simply that her life and theirs did not touch. She was actually
surprised to find Norah's friend Louise Martin so much like other
girls, and when Norah described the hall bedroom in the gloomy
boarding-house, which was her only home, Miss Virginia began to wish
and then to wonder if she could not do something to brighten a life
that seemed so dreary.
Another addition to the Friday gatherings was a Miss Jackson, a
fellow-boarder of Miss Martin's, a public school teacher and an
ambitious, high-spirited girl.
Toward these two Miss Virginia began to show a timid friendliness so
plainly sincere it was irresistible. She found them much more
interesting than many of the people who belonged to her own sphere,
and whom she was accustomed to call friends. The end of it was, she
asked them to tea with Alex and the shopkeepers,--a tremendous
departure, a step taken with fear and trembling. But when it was over,
she found herself looking back on it as one of the happiest occasions
of her life.
And now the Friday evenings at the shop began to be enlarged in their
scope. It came about quite naturally. Norah, the sunny-hearted, could
not breathe without attracting friends; and while the basket making
still went on, and Miss Sarah and Miss Virginia brought their
embroidery, others dropped in for the pleasant talk.
Alex induced her grandfather to go with her on one occasion, and the
judge was clearly both bewildered and charmed. He renewed his
acquaintance with Norah, of whom he had not ceased to speak in
admiration, and was greatly impressed by Marion's graceful bearing.
Madelaine, who enjoyed doing unexpected things, appeared upon the
scene this same night with Winston Graham in tow. This gentleman's
astonishment was only exceeded by his willingness to follow Madelaine
anywhere. He professed some interest in baskets, whereupon Marion gave
him a seat beside Miss Martin.
"'The rich and the poor meet together, the Lord is the maker of them
all,'" Miss Sarah quoted to Miss Virginia.
"What do you call this place, Miss Pennington? It isn't really a
shop--you don't sell things?" asked Mr. Graham, when, a little later,
Norah came to the rescue.
"Why, of course we do. How else could we make a living? And it has
several names," she replied. "Has Alex told you the latest," turning
to Judge Russell. "She saw Mammy Belle on the corner one morning,
gazing over here with all her eyes. 'It shorely do look like a
_Norah's Ark_, Miss Alex,' she said. And really there is no doubt
about its resembling an ark although we had none of us thought of it;
and while I can't claim exclusive proprietorship, I accept the honor
of having it named for me. What do you think of it?"
The old gentleman glanced about him. "It is not nearly poetic enough,
my dear," he said.
Norah laughed at this gallant speech. "You see," she went on, "we are
simply reviving a cosey old custom of living over the shop, which
should interest you as a lover of old things."
"And also of young things--if you will pardon the expression," said
the judge, smiling.
"Why, grandfather," cried Alex, "I shall be afraid to bring you
again."
"I expect to wake some morning and find the shop has disappeared,
leaving no trace of itself," Miss Sarah remarked.
"I trust not," exclaimed Norah. "Where would we be?"
"An enchanted prince would have carried you off," laughed Charlotte.
"Two princes," suggested Miss Virginia.
A sudden gravity fell on Norah, so noticeable that Miss Sarah said, as
she turned away, "She seems not to like the idea of the prince."
* * * * *
The days grew long, the air soft and warm; the Terrace gardens bloomed
again and the rich foliage of summer succeeded the delicate lace-work
of spring. The Russell house was again a Palace Beautiful in its
mantle of vines, and the judge sat on the rustic bench beneath the
Ginkgo tree, his hands on his stick and a faraway look in his eyes.
Every moment that could be spared from the shop found Marion and
Norah off to the country, to return laden with fragrant trophies. The
delicate look had gone from Marion's face, and the disfiguring glasses
were rarely seen.
One evening in May an unexpected visitor appeared in the shop. A tall,
wiry man, past middle age, with a keen, kindly face.
"Why, Dr. Baird!" cried Norah, "I was just wishing for you."
"You were?" he said, shaking hands. "Anything wrong with my patient?"
"Here she is, to speak for herself," said Marion, entering from the
next room.
The physician looked at her long and intently. "I give up," he said at
length. "It has worked. You are all right, and"--turning to Norah--"I
suppose you think you are very clever, miss. Your wild-goose scheme
has been a success."
"You shall not call it names, for it has been the happiest winter of
my life," said Marion.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVENTH
AN ANNIVERSARY
"Miss Marion, are you here? I am so glad to see you! I have something
to show you. Where is Miss Norah?" Charlotte punctuated her breathless
remarks with an ardent embrace.
"Why, Charlotte, how rosy you look, and I believe you have grown two
inches!" Miss Carpenter had risen to meet her, and now took the brown
face in both her hands and smiled into the blue eyes. "It is good to
see you again. When did you get home?"
"Early this morning; and now Aunt Virginia has everything out of our
trunks--you would think there had been ten instead of two--and she and
Martha are putting away, so I ran," Charlotte answered gayly.
It was September again. The shop, which had been closed for a month
while its proprietors took a holiday, had reopened, but the days were
still warm, and little was doing. This afternoon, with its shaded
windows and its autumn decorations of goldenrod and asters, it looked
cool and inviting.
Marion, who had been reading when Charlotte entered, laid her book on
the table and motioned to a place beside her in the window-seat. "What
have you to show me?" she asked.
"You'll never guess, so I shall have to tell you. And, oh, Miss
Marion, I want to ask you something, but I'm afraid."
"Am I so very formidable? I can't imagine what it can be. I'll promise
not to answer if I do not like the question."
"It isn't that," cried Charlotte. "It is nothing I want you to tell
me, it is something I want you to do."
"Then I am more puzzled than ever. Do let me see what you have. Is it
a book?"
For answer Charlotte slipped the outer cover from a small green and
gold volume and put it into Marion's hand, drawing near and leaning
against her shoulder as she did so. "It is Cousin Frank's book," she
said. "It came while he was with us at Rocky Point. He gave me the
very first. Isn't it a dear?"
Marion turned the leaves in silence. "Love's Reason, and Other Poems,"
the title-page said. She turned another leaf, "To One Far Away," was
the dedication. She paused here for a moment, then went on turning the
pages.
"It is a very pretty little book," she said, in a tone that seemed to
Charlotte less interested than the occasion called for.
"I thought you'd like it, because I have talked to you so much about
Cousin Frank. And, oh, Miss Marion, it is about Miss Carpenter I want
to ask you." Charlotte's head was against Marion's arm, and she did
not lift her eyes.
"It was one evening when Cousin Frank and I were sitting on the sand
in the moonlight. Some man--I forget his name, but at any rate he is a
great critic--stopped us as we were leaving the hotel, to say
something very nice about the poems; and I asked Cousin Frank if he
were not pleased. He said he was glad, of course, to have it liked,
and he valued this man's judgment; but that after all it was for the
opinion of just one person he cared the most. I was certain it must be
Miss Carpenter, because of the dedication,--that couldn't mean any one
else; so I said I knew she must like it. He looked at me in such a
funny way and asked what I meant. So I told him what I had guessed,
and he did not seem to mind.
"I asked if he had sent her a book, but he said he did not know where
she was, and the only person who did know was away, too. Then for a
long time he did not say anything; but after a while I slipped my hand
in his, and told him I knew she must care,--she couldn't help
it,--although I hadn't any idea why she had gone away without letting
him know where she was.
"He said if he were sure she did not care at all, he would give it up,
for that would be the only manly thing; but until he was sure, he must
hope. It was then I began to wonder if you knew where she was, Miss
Marion. If you do, couldn't you tell her how much he cares? I don't
see why she went away; but Cousin Frank said she had a reason,
although he didn't think it was a good one. Could you tell her, Miss
Marion?"
"Did you ever say anything to Mr. Landor about the shop or--" Marion
left the question unfinished.
"Yes, that very evening I told him I was certain my Miss Carpenter was
lovelier than his." Charlotte squeezed the hand she held. "He smiled,
and asked a great many questions. But could you tell her?" Charlotte
was nothing if not persistent.
This Miss Carpenter, of whom she had grown so fond, was a quiet
person, not given to demonstration of any sort, but Charlotte suddenly
felt herself drawn into a close embrace, while a very gentle voice
said in her ear: "Charlotte, you may tell him I _know_ she cares. I
think she was right to go away--she had a reason, but--"
"What is going on here?" broke in Norah's gay tones. "Why, Charlotte,
how are you? You two look as if you had been in mischief."
A moment later who should walk in but Mrs. Leigh, looking like an old
ivory portrait, her apple-blossom face framed in silver puffs and
white frills. "Are you at home, and ready to show your pretty things?
Upon my word, I am glad to see the shop open again. We have missed
you."
"Thank you, dear Mrs. Leigh; we are glad to be back again," said
Norah, greeting her cordially, while Marion pushed forward a chair
and Charlotte brought a cushion.
Mrs. Leigh adored to be waited upon; she beamed graciously on the
three. "Thank you, my dears. This is a charming place, and I must say
I didn't expect to see you here again."
"Why not? We had no idea of not coming back," Marion said.
"Oh, I have never believed it would last," Mrs. Leigh's bright eyes
twinkled. "You are too--well, there is a mystery about you, you know."
"I didn't know. How interesting!" exclaimed Norah, laughing.
"Well, I suppose there is no use in talking about it. You won't tell
me. Charlotte, when is your Aunt Caroline expected?"
"They were looking for her in a day or two," Charlotte replied,
putting on her hat as she spoke. She did not care to stay and listen
to Mrs. Leigh just now.
Marion caught her hand. "May I have the little book for a while?" she
whispered.
"I have a piece of news for you," announced the old lady, as Charlotte
disappeared.
"Madelaine Russell is engaged to Winston Graham. It is to be announced
this week. It will be a relief to her mother to have her well married,
and I expect she is getting what she wants."
"I think it is an excellent match," remarked Norah. "Winston is not a
bad fellow, and Madelaine couldn't be happy without money. Why, if
there isn't Mammy Belle!" she added, looking up.
In the doorway stood that dusky personage, arrayed not in her usual
starched calico and white apron, but in her Sunday dress of black,
with floating crêpe veil.
"Howdy, Miss Norah; howdy, Miss Marion. I des come to see how you all
was gettin' on. I'se tolable, thank you, ma'am. Yes'm, James
Mandeville's gone wid his mamma to see his grandpaw, and Marse Tom's
the onliest one lef'."
"Sit down and rest," said Marion. "Mrs. Leigh, you know Aunt Belle,
don't you?"
"Is that Belle Campbell? Of course I do. I remember you, Belle, when
you lived at the Graingers'."
"Yes'm, Miss Sally, I 'members you. Looks like you's mighty peart
yit." Mammy Belle smoothed the front of her skirt and then folded her
black gloved hands in her lap.
"Oh, I'm not good for much any more," answered Mrs. Leigh. "But tell
me, Belle, what made you leave the Graingers? I thought you were a
fixture there."
"Yes'm, I reckon I'd be living there yit, if 'twarn't fur ole Marse
Andrew. He done sassed me too much, Miss Sally. Aunt Judy she say,
'Better stay whar de pot biles hardes', Belle,' but I couldn't stan'
ole Marse Andrew."
"I had forgotten about Aunt Judy. Is she still living?" asked Mrs.
Leigh.
"Yes, ma'am, she's livin', but she is mighty porely."
"Isn't she very old?"
"Yes'm, Miss Sally, Aunt Judy's tolable ole. Look like she don' know
fur shore how ole she is. You knows Marse Andrew, Miss Sally? Well,
Aunt Judy say she war a little gal runnin' round when Marse Andrew was
bawn, an' dey tuk her into de house dat day to wait on ole Miss, Marse
Andrew's grandmaw, and it was corn-shuckin' time; so if you knows how
ole Marse Andrew is, you knows how ole Aunt Judy is."
These interesting reminiscences were interrupted by Alex and her
grandfather, who stopped at the door to welcome their neighbors back,
as the judge explained, his fine old face beaming with friendliness.
"What do you think Caroline is going to say when she finds us all
friends of the shop, Judge?" asked plain-spoken Mrs. Leigh.
"I am of the opinion that even Mrs. Millard will be unable to hold out
against it very long. You know she hasn't had our opportunities," was
the reply. "I have some new books to show you,--or some old ones,
rather,--Miss Norah," the judge added.
* * * * *
Norah had been sitting alone in the south window for some time when
Marion joined her.
"Where have you been? and what is that small green book you are
carrying about?" Norah asked.
Marion put it into her hand; as she did so, a paper fluttered out and
fell to the floor. Stooping for it, Norah's quick eyes read
involuntarily,
"I love her whether she love me or no,"
and something told her it was the valentine of last winter.
Marion's fingers closed over it. "Charlotte brought me the book," she
explained; "but don't try to read by this light."
"I shall not read much; I want to see what it is."
There was silence for some minutes; then Norah put an arm around her
friend. "Marion, I have been thinking I'd ask Alex to be my partner
when you go." Try as she would, there was a little break on that last
word.
"Why, Norah!"
"No, let me finish. You know a shop is not the station to which you
are called, dear. I see clearly that the fairy prince is coming, and
there is no reason why he should not." Norah pressed her cheek against
Marion's. "Do you realize this is the anniversary of our coming here?"
"It seems to me you are very ready to give me up," said Marion.
"Oh, Marion!"
"Forgive me, dear, I know you aren't. That was not fair. But I don't
know--I can't talk about it now. I feel drawn two ways, and I am
jealous of Alex when I think of her in my place."
"I don't want you to be altogether glad, but I am proud of what the
shop has done for you. And of course I have known all along it could
not last. We have had a good time, haven't we?"
"And it is not over yet," Marion said, pressing the hand she held.
"There is one thing that perplexes me. The time has come for
explanations, I suppose, and the situation seems a little melodramatic
and silly."
"Don't think about it, then. It will work out of itself. Does it not
seem strange when you look back to that evening when we first thought
of the shop, that it has really been tried and proved a success?"
"Indeed, it does. How miserable I was, and determined not to go
abroad, as Dr. Baird wished, but to stay there at home. Then you
declined to stay with me, Norah; and when I was in despair you
proposed the wild scheme of keeping a shop. I was interested at first,
but you don't know how often I would have given up if it had not been
for the fear of losing you. And now, Norah, I wouldn't give a hundred
thousand dollars for the experience."
"That is a good deal of money. I ought to be very triumphant that my
plan worked so well." Norah's tone was sad, however.
After the lamps were lighted Marion became absorbed in the little
book, bending over it with a pretty glow in her face. From the other
side of the table Norah watched her. After a while she rose and took
down the rainbow bag and drew out a card.
"If I make dark my countenance,
I shut my life to happier chance."
She pondered it. "That is true," she told herself, "and there is no
end to the beautiful things that may happen if only one is ready for
them."
CHAPTER TWENTY-EIGHTH
WHAT IT MEANT
Charlotte walked slowly home. She wondered what Miss Marion meant.
"Tell him I know she cares." Charlotte had often noticed that Miss
Carpenter seemed not to be deeply interested in her Philadelphia
cousin, and now suddenly she turned around and was apparently
intimately acquainted with her feelings. It was a puzzle.
She sat down in one of the porch chairs to think it over, making a
pleasant picture in her white dress, with the feathery clematis for a
background, her blue eyes serious and thoughtful, as she rocked softly
back and forth. The old self-assertion which a year ago had shown
itself in attitude and speech had become softened now until it was no
more than a gentle independence.
She had toned down, Cousin Francis told her, with evident approval. In
spite of its tempestuous beginning, the year in the Terrace had in
great measure resulted as her guardian hoped it would.
Aunt Virginia's sweet refinement, Alexina's earnestness, Madelaine's
grace,--all these had had their influence; but most potent had been
her admiration--almost adoration--for Miss Carpenter. Charlotte had
made pleasant friends in school, but after all her happiest hours had
been spent in the Terrace, where a year ago life had promised to be so
dull.
Aunt Virginia joined her presently, dropping into a chair with a sigh
of satisfaction. "It is good to be at home again, and Martha and I
have everything put away," she said. "Where have you been?"
"Over to see Miss Marion, but Mrs. Leigh came in and I didn't care to
stay."
Miss Virginia rocked briskly for some minutes, then she remarked,
"There was something in your Aunt Caroline's last letter I did not
understand." Taking it from the envelope she unfolded it and glanced
down the page. "Here it is. 'I infer from certain hints you have
dropped at different times that you have not taken my advice in regard
to the shop--' I didn't hint, I only said--" Miss Virginia hesitated.
She did not recall just what she had said, but she knew she had by no
means revealed the true extent of her intimacy with the shopkeepers.
She went on with the letter. "'I have lately received some first-hand
information concerning these young women, who seem to have fulfilled
my prophecy that they would lose no opportunity to ingratiate
themselves. I fear you have been too credulous, my dear Virginia, but
I will not enter into the matter further till I see you.'
"I wonder what she means by 'first-hand information'?" said Miss
Virginia. "I know Caroline will never feel as the rest of us do, but
she can't know anything against them."
"No, indeed," Charlotte cried. "There isn't anything about Miss
Marion, or Miss Norah either, that is not lovely."
The thought of Marion's caress returned, and with it the question
whether she should tell Cousin Frank or not; for it occurred to her he
might think her officious to have spoken of the matter to a stranger.
If-- Charlotte became lost in thought again.
A good many miles to the northward two gentlemen were dining together
at the very hour when Miss Virginia and Charlotte sat on the porch and
watched the sunset without thinking of it.
"You have great reason to be pleased with the reviews of your book,
Frank," the elder man remarked, gratified affection in the grave smile
with which his gaze rested on his son.
"Yes, for the most part the critics are kind," Francis Landor replied,
drawing hieroglyphics in an absent manner on the cloth with the handle
of his spoon.
"But one thing is lacking," thought the father, his glance still
resting on the bent head. "The boy must come to something with such a
head," he had often said in his childhood; and now the belief was
likely to be justified. The face before him was showing the strong,
serious lines of maturity, yet he almost regretted the lost boyishness
as he noted them.
Suddenly Frank looked up. "I am thinking of going away for a week or
so," he announced.
A smile hovered about his father's lips. "May I ask in what
direction?--To see Charlotte?"
Their eyes met. "Yes, to see Charlotte," Francis answered.
"When do you go?"
"Sometime to-morrow."
"I wish you good luck, my son."
"So he, too, has guessed," thought Frank.
When he was alone, he took out a letter which bore evidence of more
than one reading. Its date showed it to be a year old.
"I am going away," the letter said, "to be gone a long
time,--at least a year. By then my fate ought to be
decided. I am trying to hope, as Dr. Baird assures me
I may, trying to live entirely in the present. It is
not easy, but how can I make any plans for the future
when a possible life of helplessness lies before me?
You are generous, and I know you will forgive if this
causes you pain. Forget--everything but that I am
always your friend,
"MARION CARPENTER.
"I have told no one where I am going, as it seems best to make as
complete a break as possible with my life here. Dr. Baird, of course,
knows."
CHAPTER TWENTY-NINTH
A LETTER
"Really, Mrs. Millard, you have treated us very shabbily. It is nearly
a year since you left us."
"Ten months, Judge Russell. You are very kind to say you have missed
me. I had no thought of staying so long when I left, and I am
delighted to be at home again." Mrs. Millard stood in the
drawing-room, as composed and elegant as if she had not arrived from a
three days' railway journey only a few hours before.
It was a summer-like evening, doors and windows were open, and one
after another of the neighbors had dropped in, until Charlotte was
reminded of the evening a year ago when the shop was under discussion.
She felt a little shy in Aunt Caroline's presence, although that lady
was graciousness itself; and Wayland Leigh, who came in with his aunt,
joined her in the corner by the library door and wanted to know what
made her so quiet.
"Quite a party, isn't it?" he said; adding, "but where are Miss Marion
and Miss Norah?" Like Charlotte, Wayland always put Marion first.
"I don't believe Aunt Caroline would want them," she replied, smiling.
"To be sure, when she went away we didn't know them."
That others were also thinking of the shop was evident, for Miss Sarah
was now heard remarking, "You left us defenceless, Caroline, and we
surrendered soon after your departure."
"Yes, the shop has become a neighborhood institution," Judge Russell
added.
"I am more than surprised to hear _you_ say so, Judge Russell."
"But Mr. Goodman is the most remarkable convert, Mrs. Millard," said
Alex. "Just ask him his opinion of the shop."
"I do not wish to criticise, this first evening at home," Mrs. Millard
began graciously; "but as I have been telling Virginia, I cannot
understand the fascination these persons seem to have exercised over
you."
"But you know they are really charming young women," ventured Mrs.
Russell. "I objected to the shop as decidedly as any one until I found
out about them. Their popularity is not confined to this neighborhood,
and of course you know they are well connected."
"It is about that I wish to speak," interposed Mrs. Millard. "As you
may have heard, Miss Unadilla Carpenter, the half-sister of Peter
Carpenter, is a friend of my oldest sister. For years they have
corresponded; so when I heard from Virginia that these people claimed
to be related to the Philadelphia Carpenters, I took it upon myself to
write a letter of inquiry to Miss Unadilla. She was ill at the time
and some months passed before she replied. A few weeks ago I received
a letter, in a part of which you may be interested."
Mrs. Millard was evidently prepared for the occasion, for she at once
produced the paper in question.
"I shall be glad to hear it, but it can't alter my opinion of our
friends across the street," Miss Sarah said stoutly, at which remark
Miss Virginia visibly brightened.
Mrs. Millard paid no heed, but began to read. "'Of the Miss Carpenter
of whom you write I know nothing. She is not related to us. My niece,
May Carpenter, is my only connection of the name, as I am hers. Of my
niece I know little at present. Two years ago she had a long illness
which came near being fatal, since then I believe she has been abroad.
As to the young woman in question, I repeat we have no cousins.'" Mrs.
Millard looked around the circle in triumph.
"Of course," said Miss Sarah, "there are some things difficult to
explain; but the most difficult of all would be, how two young women
could come into a neighborhood and make it better and happier for
their presence, could nurse some of us when we were ill, and show
themselves in a thousand ways helpful and kindly and companionable,
and all with the utmost simplicity,--to explain how they could do all
this and yet be impostors, would be harder still. The good Book says,
'By their fruits ye shall know them,' and that is how we know the
shopkeepers."
Wayland clapped noiselessly. "Good for auntie!" he whispered to
Charlotte.
"I really don't remember Marion's saying she was a cousin of Miss
Carpenter," said Alex. "Perhaps we jumped to the conclusion."
Mrs. Millard's lips were parted to reply when an exclamation from Miss
Virginia caused all eyes to turn toward the door. From the awed
silence it might have been a ghost, instead of Norah Pennington in a
white dress, who stood there.
She could not but be conscious of the excitement her appearance
aroused. Her color deepened as for a second she felt herself the
object of the silent gaze of this roomful of people. She did not lose
her self-possession, however, and in another moment Charlotte was at
her side, and Miss Virginia had recovered her power of speech.
"I really came in search of Alex," Norah explained, a most engaging
impostor surely, as she smiled upon the assembly.
"Do you know my sister, Miss Pennington?" Miss Virginia's
embarrassment was painfully evident.
"I believe I once met Mrs. Millard in the shop." There was a twinkle
of mischief in Norah's demureness.
Mrs. Millard bowed distantly.
"I am going to settle this here and now," Miss Sarah whispered to Mrs.
Russell as Norah crossed the room to the sofa where Alex sat. Leaning
forward she said in a tone quite audible to everybody, "Norah, excuse
me for asking a personal question, but did you say Miss
Carpenter--Marion--was related to the Philadelphia Carpenters?"
Norah was quick-witted. So this was what they had been talking about!
A glance at Mrs. Millard's haughty shoulders explained. "I think I did
say so," she replied frankly.
"But Miss Unadilla says she can't be," observed Wayland in an
undertone from behind her.
Norah made her decision promptly. "Miss Unadilla would not have said
so if she had understood. I am going to take the liberty of explaining
what has perhaps puzzled some of you. It was I who in the beginning
caused the mistake, and I think now the time has come to set it
right." In the faces of her friends she saw nothing but confidence.
"Some of you have perhaps already guessed that there is just one Miss
Carpenter. Marion is Miss Unadilla's niece."
"I knew it! I knew it!" Charlotte whispered in an ecstasy.
Norah continued: "We had no idea of making a mystery of it; that
simply happened. Marion was recovering from a long illness, which left
her with a nervous affection of the eyes, so serious she felt she
would lose her sight. She and I were school friends, and when she was
taken ill she sent for me, and I was with her through it all. When she
grew stronger, her physician felt she must have some radical
change--something which would take her thoughts from herself, but
nothing seemed the right thing. Then I thought of putting into
execution an old plan of mine to open a shop. I coaxed her into it,
and we set out to seek our fortune, just as if the rich Miss Carpenter
did not exist,--or, at least, was merely our patron. We came here
partly because the climate was mild, and also because I had been here
before and knew about the place; and it was far enough from Miss
Carpenter's home to make it unlikely she would be recognized. We took
no one into our confidence except Dr. Baird, and it was generally
understood that we were travelling somewhere for Marion's health. The
fiction about the rich Miss Carpenter has annoyed Marion all along;
but as it came about, I didn't see how to avoid it. It really seemed
better that it should not be known." Norah looked at Alex, as if
seeking her opinion.
"Of course, I understand," said Alex; "go on."
"There isn't anything more, except that at the outset we were
discovered by Mr. Landor, Charlotte's guardian, and an old friend of
Marion's. He promised to keep our secret, and also to speak a good
word for us to Miss Virginia."
"My dear, he did; and at the time I was a little surprised, but--"
Miss Virginia hesitated.
Norah interrupted her. "You have all been so good to us. If Marion
were here, she would join me in saying it. The best part of our
venture--and it has been a success in other ways--is the friends we
have made."
"You showed yourselves friendly and won us in spite of ourselves,"
said Miss Sarah.
"I always said there was a mystery," old Mrs. Leigh remarked. "And are
you, too, a millionnairess, Miss Norah?"
Norah spread out her hands in an odd little gesture: "I am sorry, but
I am just a plain poor person."
"Is this the end of the shop?" some one asked.
"I trust not. I have no idea of giving up, unless you drive me away,"
Norah answered.
Perhaps the only person present who was greatly surprised was Mrs.
Millard. She had planned her little scene with some care, anticipating
just such a gathering in honor of her return. To have the title
rôle--as it were--snatched from her in the moment of triumph was
annoying. But whatever her faults, Mrs. Millard was a lady, and as
such she accepted the situation. She said little, but what she said
was graceful and to the point. The eccentricity of the whole thing
was, it seemed to her, sufficient excuse for her attitude, which, now
she understood, she regretted.
"Did you want anything in particular of me, Norah?" Alex asked as they
were leaving.
"Yes," was the answer. "I want you to be my partner."
"Norah!" Alex cried. "You know I'll be glad, glad to be; but, oh, I am
sorry for you, if you must lose Marion."
CHAPTER THIRTIETH
CHANGES
"Was I not right to come? You said a year, and that is over."
"I did not expect you so soon." Marion smiled over the great bunch of
wild sunflowers she held. Coming in a few minutes earlier she had
found Francis Landor pacing impatiently back and forth. Something,
perhaps it was the unexpectedness of it, made her a trifle stately.
It seemed to Francis that those flaunting yellow flowers made a
barrier between them. "It was only by chance I found you. Charlotte
gave me a hint. How long did you intend to leave me in uncertainty?
Was it quite fair?"
"I have been in uncertainty myself; happily my fears have not been
realized. I did what seemed best at the time, and please remember the
year is only just over." Marion looked at him gravely from behind her
flowery screen.
"I did not mean to begin by reproaching you," he said, drawing
nearer. "But you cannot realize what it has meant to be left in
complete ignorance. Even now I don't understand why you are here." He
glanced about the room.
"Norah Pennington and I are living here, earning our daily
bread--really doing it,"--she laughed a little; "and, as you see, it
has made me over. It was Norah's plan, and you can see how we were
obliged to keep it to ourselves, if it was to be carried out. I had to
cut loose from everything,--the suspense about my eyes was killing me.
Of course, looking back, it seems needless; but one cannot argue with
nerves."
She paused a moment, then continued: "There is one thing I want to
explain at the beginning. This winter's experience has made a
different person of me. I can never go back to the old life of a
society woman, with perhaps a little charitable work thrown in. I want
to come in touch with people--all sorts of people. I want to try
experiments. I think I must have inherited some of my grandfather's
business instincts. I haven't made any very definite plans, but I
should like to start other shops such as this, where women who have
some ability and the gift for making useful and beautiful things can
find their opportunity. I shall make mistakes, and lose money perhaps,
but I want to experiment. I want you to understand how I feel,
before--before--" Marion's eyes shone, a lovely flush was on her face
as she hesitated.
Francis Landor took sudden possession of the yellow flowers, tossing
them with scant courtesy on the table, and leaning forward he grasped
her hands. "May, what has this to do with it? Does it crowd me out of
your life? Since you were a little girl, since the days when we played
together, you have been my help and inspiration. Do you mean this has
come between us, or do you still care?"
Tears shone in Marion's eyes; she bent her head till it touched his
shoulder. "Francis, I do care--I have always cared; I told Charlotte
to tell you."
"You will forgive me if I am only half glad to see you, Mr. Landor,"
was Norah's greeting a little later. "Susanna, now, is wholly
delighted. She sees the end of what has been to her a long exile, but
I must needs go in search of another partner."
"Why not take me in as a third, Miss Norah? I believe I should like
it."
"I shouldn't," she replied, laughing. "It would end in my playing
third fiddle, and you must know this place is _Norah's_ Ark; I am
chief manager." She went off gayly, pausing at the door to ask, "You
do not mind my speaking to Alex to-night, Marion?"
What happened in the course of her search for Alex, we have already
seen.
The two in the shop were left undisturbed. It must have been nearly
ten o'clock, which was considered late in the Terrace, when a voice
was heard insisting, "I must see Miss Marion, Susanna, just for a
minute. Is she here?" and Charlotte burst into the room.
"Oh, Miss Marion, I had half guessed,--I was not quite sure. Oh, I am
so glad!" Oblivious to the presence of any one else she threw her arms
about Miss Carpenter, who had risen hastily as she entered.
"What are you talking about, dearie?" she asked, returning the embrace
of the excited girl.
"Where is that message you were told to deliver to me, Charlotte?" Mr.
Landor demanded.
"Cousin Frank!" she cried, releasing Marion, "where did you come
from?" Then glancing from one to the other, she added, "But you didn't
wait for it. Oh, I am so glad!"
"You are a tremendous goose, Charlotte," said Marion, but she laughed.
In fact they all three laughed a great deal in the course of the next
few minutes.
"I have never exactly understood how you came to be so wise on this
subject, Charlotte," Mr. Landor said, making her sit beside him.
"You know you never could keep anything to yourself, Francis," Miss
Carpenter remarked reproachfully.
Charlotte looked mischievous. "The beginning of it was when I found
those verses about the rose that was out of reach, and you were so
provoked I thought they must mean something. Then Aunt Cora said--"
"Never mind Aunt Cora," Francis said, laughing; "this will do."
"I agree with you," remarked Marion.
"Charlotte, Miss Virginia is standing at the door. I know she is
distracted over your absence," said Norah, entering.
"She knows I am here, but I mustn't stay," she rose regretfully.
Francis accompanied her. "And so you think your Miss Carpenter is
lovelier than mine?" he remarked, as they crossed the street.
"Well, at least she is just as lovely," Charlotte answered blithely.
* * * * *
The news spread quickly. The Terrace was stirred to its depths. Life
within its quiet borders was becoming exciting. The announcement of
Madelaine's engagement with all the splendors in prospect would have
sufficed for one season, but even this was eclipsed by the romance of
the shop,--so named by Mrs. Leigh.
"Look like I already knowed Miss Marion was a rich lady," Aunt Belle
was heard to declare. "Yes'm, she done carry her haid so proud-like."
In the shop many a serious conference was held by Marion, Norah, and
Alexina, and at length Miss Sarah was called in. As a result, another
surprise was sprung upon the Terrace. The corner shop was to be given
up--Norah could not live there alone--and a new one opened in the
spacious drawing-rooms of the Leigh house. Here there would be room
to expand, Norah would have a home, and Miss Sarah would be freed from
the necessity of boarders. There were those who held moreover that by
this arrangement the enterprise acquired a new dignity. The idea
originated with Mrs. Millard, who, while she did not give the shop her
full approval, from henceforth withdrew all opposition.
Old Mrs. Leigh was heard to remark that she had in her life done many
things she had not expected to do, but living over a shop was about
the last.
"I suppose you'll agree it is better than the poorhouse, or even
boarders," said her niece.
"Better? I am as proud of it as I can be," the old lady replied, and
proud of it she seemed.
Norah called her their advertising agent. Her acquaintance was
extensive, and at church or on the street, wherever she happened to
be, she waylaid her friends and gave them a cordial invitation to
visit _our_ shop. On more than one occasion she constituted herself
hostess. Recognizing from her window a familiar carriage, she would
descend, dainty and bright-eyed, to enjoy a social chat, which would
sometimes result in her holding a reception, for everybody enjoyed
her merry talk, and she was quickly made the centre of an interested
group.
Miss Sarah was inclined to interfere, but Norah and Alex protested.
They liked to have her. She was an added attraction. But all this was
afterward.
It was on the last evening, as they walked arm in arm around the
dismantled shop, that Marion said: "I am selfish about it, but I could
not have endured to go away and have you go on without me in this dear
little place where we have been so happy. How wonderfully everything
has worked out! and it was all your doing."
"I don't know; I think we owe a great deal to our friend the rich Miss
Carpenter." There was a mist in Norah's eyes, but she smiled.
* * * * *
Transcriber's Notes:
Obvious punctuation errors repaired.
Italic text is surround by _tags_ and bold is denoted by =tags=.
Page 9 and Illustration, "intrenched" changed to "entrenched" to
conform to text. (Securely entrenched behind)
Page 216, "who one" changed to "one who" (the only one who gave)
One instance each of type-writer and typewriter were retained.
End of Project Gutenberg's The Pleasant Street Partnership, by Mary F. Leonard
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