To both Mistress Mehitable and Barbara the new order of things proved itself, all through that first day, supremely satisfactory; and each vowed most solemnly in her heart that she, at least, would not be the one to blame if it did not last. During the afternoon, when Doctor John and Doctor Jim were drinking a pot of tea with them, and wondering delightedly at the unexpected atmosphere of peace, Barbara asked, suddenly:
"How did you ever manage, Aunt Hitty, to get Doctor John and Doctor Jim off after me so quickly. I thought I hadsucha good start! And howdidyou know which way I was going?"
Both men looked meaningly at Mistress Mehitable, but failed to catch her eye. Doctor Jim began to shake his head violently, but stopped in confusion under Barbara's look of questioning astonishment. But Mistress Mehitable, serenely unconscious, answered at once:
"Old Debby Blue," said she, "with whom you breakfasted, rode over as fast as she could to Doctor Jim with the news. The poor old woman was nearly dead from her exertions, I think you told me, Jim. She has a good heart, and truly loves you, Barbara. I am sorry if I have seemed harsh to her at times."
Barbara's eyes grew wide, her face darkened ominously, and her full, bowed lips drew together to a straight line of scarlet. Doctor John sat up straight, with twinkling eyes, expecting the outbreak of a characteristic Barbara storm, such as he always enjoyed in his big, dry way. But Doctor Jim made haste to interpose.
"You mustn't be too hard on Debby, Barbara, because she told what she had promised not to tell. What elsecouldshe do? You know well enough she couldn't stop you herself, you headstrong baggage. I won't have you unfair to Debby. She loves you, and nearly killed herself to save you!"
Barbara's look of anger changed to a sort of obstinate sullenness for an instant. Then with an effort she forced herself to smile, while tears sprang into her eyes.
"Of course, Debby was right," she acknowledged. "But I wish she'd done it some other way. She shouldn't have let me trust her. Shefooledme when I trusted her. Oh, I'llforgiveher, of course," she continued, bitterly, "but never, never, will Itrusther again!" Then she sprang up impetuously, and ran and flung both arms around Mistress Mehitable. "Of courseI'd forgive her, anyway, because if she hadn't fooled me I might have never found out how lovely you were,—honey!"
Both Doctor John and Doctor Jim were breathless with amazement for a moment. What was this miracle? Whence came this understanding and this sympathy, all in a night? They saw a new glad warmth in Mistress Mehitable's eyes. They exchanged significant glances.
"All I can say, Barbara," growled Doctor Jim, at length, "is that you've been a long while finding out what ought to have been as plain as the nose on your face,—eh, what?"
"For a young lady who was able to discern at first glance the fascinations of Jim Pigeon," chimed in Doctor John, "I think you have been rather undiscriminating, Barbara!"
"She could see two battered old tallow dips, when she couldn't see the moon!" added Doctor Jim, solemnly.
There was always a relish of peril in rallying Barbara, whose audacity in retort was one of the scandals of Second Westings. She flashed her white teeth upon them in a naughty smile, and her eyes danced as she kissed Mistress Mehitable on both cheeks.
"Ofcourse," she cried. "Nobody knows better than you two great big dears what a perfect little fool I've been, not to be in love with Aunt Hitty all this time."
"Barbara!" protested Mistress Mehitable, in a tone of rebuke,—and then again, bethinking herself, "Barbara, child!" in a tone of appeal.
"But now, you can tell a hawk from a handsaw, eh, baggage?" chuckled Doctor John; while Doctor Jim exploded noisily, and then, checking himself, cast upon Mistress Mehitable a glance of apprehension.
But Barbara had heeded neither the rebuke nor the appeal.
"I know, I know," she went on, clapping her hands with delight. "You didn'twantme to find her out,—you didn't want me to know how lovely she is! Conspirators! I won't love you any more, either of you. And I'm going to keep Aunt Hitty all to myself here; and not let you evenseeher; and make you both so jealous you'll wish you had let me run away in the canoe and get drowned in the rapids."
"Barbara, Barbara," murmured Mehitable.
Doctor Jim wagged his great head, and growled inarticulately.
"It's we who are the victims of conspiracy, John," said he. "If Mehitable and Barbara have discovered each other, what becomes of us, I'd like to know! But it sha'n't last. We'll sow seeds of dissension presently,—eh, what?"
"Just let us wait till Bobby Gault comes!" suggested Doctor John, with gentle malice.
Barbara's face grew grave on the instant.
"Of course, Aunt Hitty, they have told you all about Robert," she said, earnestly, "but all they know about his reasons is what he told them himself, you know. And he was determined to shield me, of course. But it wasallmy fault. How could he know how bad and foolish I was? I just mixed him all up; and it makes me ashamed to think how horrid I was; and I will never forgive myself. But you mustn't let them prejudice you against Robert, honey,—but just wait and see what you think of him yourself, won't you, please?"
Mistress Mehitable smiled, and exchanged looks with Doctor John and Doctor Jim.
"Really, dear," said she, "they have not given me any very bad impressions of Robert. I think both Doctor John and Doctor Jim knew where to put the blame. AndIknow, too!"
Barbara looked at her doubtfully. Such complete acceptance of her position almost seemed unkind and critical. But her aunt's smile reassured her. This was not criticism, but something as near raillery as Mistress Mehitable would permit herself.
"I believe they have been abusing me behind my back,—and they pretending to love me!" cried Barbara, tossing her head in saucy challenge.
"Never, child; we hug our delusions, Jim Pigeon and I," said Doctor John.
"No, hug me," laughed Barbara, darting around the tea-table and seating herself on his lap.
"You are our worst delusion, baggage!" said Doctor Jim, shaking a large finger at her. "And now I see you're setting out to delude your poor aunt, after making life a burden to her for two years. And poor Bobby Gault,—he'll find you a delusion and a snare!"
"I think you are unkind, even if you are just in fun," protested Barbara, half offended, half amused. But at this moment both men rose to go. Doctor John, as he raised his towering bulk from the chair, lifted Barbara with him as if she had been a baby, held her in his arms for a moment while he peered lovingly and quizzically into her swiftly clearing face, gave her a resounding kiss, and set her on her feet.
"Bless the child!" said Doctor Jim, noticing now for the first time the change in appearance. "What's become of our little Barbara? How she's grown up over night!"
"And how her petticoats have grown down!" added Doctor John, backing off to survey her critically. "Tut, tut, the wanton hussy! How did she dare to kiss me! Goodness gracious! To think I had a young woman like that sitting on my lap!"
"You had better be careful what you say, Doctor John," retorted Barbara, firmly, "or Iwillbe grown up, and never kiss you or let you hold me on your lap any more!"
"I humbly crave your pardon, gracious fair. I am your most devoted, humble servant!" said Doctor John, setting his heels together at a precise right angle, and bowing profoundly over her hand till his brocaded coat-tails stuck out stiffly behind him.
Barbara rather liked this hand-kissing, after Robert's initiation, and took it with composure as her due. Why should she not have her hand kissed, as well as Aunt Hitty? But Doctor Jim made his farewell in different fashion.
"I won't have her grow up this way!" he growled, snatching her up and holding her as if he feared she would be taken away from him. "She's just our little Barby, our little, thorny brier-rose! Eh—what?"
"Ourbarbybrier-rose, you mean!" interjected Doctor John, with a chuckle.
But every one ignored this poor witticism, and Doctor Jim continued, while Barbara softly kicked her toes against his waistcoat. "It would break my heart to have her grown up, and young missish, and prim. What have you done to her, Mehitable?"
Mistress Mehitable gave a clear little ripple of laughter, flute-like and fresh. She was feeling younger and gayer than she had felt for years.
"I have just tried to carry out your own suggestion, Jim!" said she, cheerfully. "I must say, I think it was a very wise suggestion. I have handed Barbara over to her own care, that's all. I am sorry you don't like the results!"
"Don't worry, Doctor Jim!" cried Barbara, purchasing her release by kissing him hard on both cheeks. "Don't worry about me being changed. I wasbornbad, you know. And I'm afraid I'll be just as bad as ever by to-morrow—except to Aunt Hitty! If I'm bad to you any more, dear,"—and she turned impetuously to Mistress Mehitable, "I'll—I'll—" and feeling a sudden imperious threat of tears, she fled away to her own room. It had been a wonderful, wonderful day for her, and she felt that she must have a little cry at once. On her white bed she wept deliciously. Then she thought, and thought, and thought, and made resolves, in sympathetic communion with her pillow.
In the parlour below, Doctor Jim had said, before leaving:
"I think you are going to get a lot of comfort out of her now, Mehitable, eh, what?"
And Doctor John, troubled by a maudlin kind of moisture about his eyes, had said nothing.
And Mistress Mehitable had said, fervently:
"I hope she is going to get a lot of comfort out of me, Jim. I see that I have been greatly in the wrong!"
All the next morning Mistress Mehitable and Barbara were busy overhauling Barbara's frocks. Such as would admit of it were let down some three or four inches. Of the others, two of rich material were laid away in Mistress Mehitable's huge carved oak chest lined with cedar, a repository of varied treasures of the loom. The rest, three in number and plain of weave, were set aside to be given to Mercy Chapman. There was much important planning, much interesting consultation; and in this feminine intimacy they grew ever closer to each other, throwing off the watchful self-consciousness, the sense of admiring and reciprocal discovery, which made them more happy than at ease in each other's company.
Early in the afternoon Barbara decided she would go out to her favourite apple-tree in the back garden and read. She openly took down the second volume of "Clarissa Harlowe,"—having already got through the first volume in surreptitious moments. Mistress Mehitable discreetly, but with difficulty and some soul-questioning, refrained from admonition. Barbara felt in her heart a faint quaver of trepidation, as she thus frankly assumed her independence; but she had the full courage of her convictions, and outwardly she was calm.
"Mr. Richardson does not seem to me a very strong writer," she remarked at the door,—"especially after one has read those wonderful plays of Mr. Shakespeare and Mr. Ben Jonson, as I did at home in Maryland! But every one should know 'Clarissa,' shouldn't they, dear?"
Mistress Mehitable gasped. She, too, had read those wonderful plays of Mr. Shakespeare and Mr. Ben Jonson. But she was thoroughbred, and gave no sign of her dismay.
"I never liked the lady, myself, dear," she answered, casually. "She always seemed to me rather silly."
This was Barbara's own judgment, and confirmed her new appreciation of her aunt's intelligence. At the same time, this apparently easy acceptance, on Mistress Mehitable's part, of Barbara's emancipation, seemed almost too good to be true. Her heart swelled passionately toward this blue-eyed, calm, patrician little woman, whom she had so long misunderstood. She came back, put a caressing arm around Mistress Mehitable's waist, kissed her fervently, and looked deep into her eyes. Mistress Mehitable actually trembled in the recesses of her soul lest that searching gaze should discover what she had nearly said about young girls and novel-reading! But she kept the blue deeps of her eyes clear and tranquil, and her lips smiled frank response.
"Oh, you are so good and wonderful and wise, honey," Barbara said, at length. "What a foolish, foolish child I've been,—and you, my dear, dear father's sister! Why, just to look at you ought to have brought me to my senses. Somanyways you look like him!"
Then a thing very remarkable indeed took place. Mistress Mehitable's fine poise wavered and vanished. She almost clutched Barbara to her breast, then buried her head on the firm young shoulders and cried a little quite unrestrainedly, feeling a great ache in her heart for her dead brother Winthrop, and a great love in her heart for her dead brother's child. Barbara was surprised, but greatly touched by this outburst. She held her close, and patted her hair, and called her soft names suddenly remembered from the soft-voiced endearments of plantation days; till presently Mistress Mehitable recovered, and laughed gently through her tears.
"Don't think me silly, dear," she pleaded, "but I've just realised for the first time that you have your dear father's wonderful eyes. Your colouring, and your hair, and your mouth, are all very different from his. But your eyes,—they are hisexactly. Such wonderful, deep, clear,trueeyes, Barbara, sometimes sea-gray, sometimes sea-green. Where have my eyes been all this time?"
Barbara sighed happily. "Isn't it lovely we have found each other at last, Aunt Hitty? I don't think it will be so hard now for me to be good!"
Then she picked up "Clarissa" again, and ran gaily out to the garden.
Barbara's apple-tree had three great limbs branching out at about five feet from the ground, forming a most luxurious crotch in which to sit and read. Smaller apple-trees, interspersed with tangled shrubbery and some trellised vines, almost surrounded it, so that on three sides it afforded perfect seclusion. Sweet airs breathed through it, from the neighbouring thyme and mint beds; and sunshine sifted down through its leaves in an intricate and exquisite pattern; and a pair of catbirds, nesting in the shrubs close by, made it their haunt without regard to Barbara's presence. As she looked at this dear nook, with all its memories of intimate hours and dreams, Barbara thought to herself how glad she was that she had not succeeded in running away from Second Westings. She clambered cleverly into the tree, settled herself with a long breath of satisfaction, swung her little scarlet-shod feet idly too and fro, and made a long, absorbing survey of her green realm. Then, locking her ankles lithely as only a slim girl can, she opened her book, and was soon engrossed in the fortunes of Lovelace and Clarissa.
About the time that Barbara was settling herself in the apple-tree, Robert Gault was triumphantly pushing Barbara's canoe to land through the gold-green sedges on the Second Westings shore of the little lake. With pole and paddle he had made the ascent of the stream from Gault House, having been seized that morning with a violent conviction that it was his duty to return the canoe without delay. He had poled through the rapids, and paddled eagerly through the silent solemnities of the woods, too intent upon his purpose to be alive to their mystic influences. The furtive eyes that watched him from pine-tree boll and ironwood bush, from skyey branch or moss-veiled root, touched not his consciousness. To his self-centred mood the peopled stillness was empty as a desert. His eyes, at other times alert and not uninitiated, were turned inward upon his own dreams. He emerged from the great shadows, paddled through the meadowy windings with their iris-beds and lilies, and passed at length old Debby's clamorous dooryard, giving hardly a glance to the green slope with its ducks and fowls, the little red-doored cabin against its trees, or old Debby herself, with the cock-eared yellow pup beside her, sitting on the stoop. He was in a hurry, and had caught glimpses of the open waters of the lake beyond; and he knew from Barbara's description that Mistress Mehitable's landing-place was straight across the lake.
But old Debby, sitting knitting in the sun with the cock-eared yellow pup beside her, saw him, and chuckled at his haste. She had been over to Second Westings the day before, and had got the whole story from Doctor Jim. She had made up her mind to keep well out of the way, till Barbara's indignation should have time to cool; but she was mightily interested in the youth who had been so readily persuaded to the backing of Barbara's mad venture. A moment later she made up her mind that she must have a good look at him, a word with him if possible. She got up and hobbled actively down to the shore; but Robert's haste had carried him already beyond earshot.
Following the path up from the lake-shore, Robert crossed the cow-pasture and climbed the bars back of the barn. Here he was met and challenged by Keep, the mastiff, who, with the discernment of a well-bred dog, appreciated Robert's good clothes, nosed his hand cordially, and let him pass without protest. Keep knew a gentleman at a glance, and was convinced that good manners meant good morals. He had no fear of Robert setting fire to the barn.
Seeking a way to the front of the house, Robert passed through the wicket leading into the back garden. Suddenly, between the tall clumps of hollyhocks, he stopped short, and his heart gave a queer little sliding leap. His breath came quick and light, in a way that greatly perplexed him. What he saw to so disturb him was a pair of little scarlet shoes, two small ankles, and a few inches of slim, shapely silk stockings, lithely intertwined, and vividly in evidence beneath a screen of apple-leaves.
Robert did not need any one to tell him that the rest of the bewildering picture, hidden behind the screen of apple-leaves, was the small, inspiring lady, Mistress Barbara Ladd. He hesitated, and was almost on the point of slipping away,—he knew not why, for the life of him. Then, recovering a part of his composure, he stepped forward in trepidation, hat in hand, forgot the graceful speeches on which he was wont to pride himself, and stammered—"Mistress Barbara!—I beg your pardon!"
The slim ankles unlocked, "Clarissa" fell upon the grass, and lightly as a bird Barbara sprang down from her perch, unconscious, unembarrassed, gracious in her greetings. She smiled him radiant welcome, frankly pleased, and held out her hand to be kissed.
"Why, how did you come?" she cried, gaily, "stealing in this way through the back premises?"
"By water, dear lady," he answered, still stammering. "I brought back the canoe, you know!"
"By my dear river, and through the great, still woods!" she exclaimed, looking him over with clear eyes of approval. "How lovely! I wish I'd been with you!"
"I wish you had!" said Robert, with devout conviction.
"But how tired you must be, all that journey against the current. Really, Robert, it wasverynice of you to come so soon!"
Now Robert was in a sad state of bewilderment, dazzled by eyes and lips and scarlet shoes. And he was further shaken from his customary poise by his perception of Barbara's change in the arrangement of her hair, and by what seemed a sudden increase in her stature through the lengthening of her frocks. Otherwise he would not have been so stupid as to imagine that the promptitude of his coming called for any apology in Barbara's eyes, whatever might be the opinion of Doctor John, or Doctor Jim, or Mistress Mehitable Ladd!
"I thought I ought to come at once, you know," he explained, "to bring back the canoe! Otherwise I should have waited, as I ought, for Mr. Glenowen's coming, and an invitation from him."
"Oh!" said Barbara, her face changing slightly, her voice growing a little cooler. "That was very thoughtful of you. I couldn't sleep for thinking of the canoe!"
Robert looked at her doubtfully, wondering if that were sarcasm in her voice.
"It's a dear canoe. I love it!" said he.
"I wonder you did not want to keep it a little longer, then,—at least, till Uncle Bob could come and send you a proper, formal invitation to bring it back!" said Barbara.
"But I wanted to bring it back now,—I thought it was such a good excuse for coming at once, though I knew Ioughtto have waited for the invitation, of course," persisted Robert, vaguely worried.
"Oh!" exclaimed Barbara, again, allowing herself to be mollified in part, but still feeling a shade of disappointment. She was too inexperienced to appreciate the tribute of Robert's confusion and unexpected awkwardness. She liked him so much better in his grand, elaborate, self-possessed manner, paying stately compliments, making her feel important and grown-up by formal homage. However, he certainly was very nice, and he certainly looked very distinguished; and she realised that, for all his apparent solicitude about returning the canoe, the canoe was not his reason for coming so soon. She would forgive him,—but she would punish him! In fact, she was making progress in the arts of the imperishable feminine.
"Well, we shallallbe glad to see you, Robert," she said. "And now you must go straight to Doctor Jim, who did invite you, as you seem to have forgotten! You go through that white gate, over there, and turn to the left, and then the first turn to the right puts you right on the main street. You're almost at Doctor Jim's then,—any one will point it out to you."
"But,—I didn't come to see Doctor Jim," protested Robert, much taken aback. "I came to bring back the canoe, you know!"
"Of course, I understand!" said Barbara, sweetly. "Tell Doctor Jim and Doctor John that I want them to bring you back here presently, in an hour or two, to present you to Aunt Hitty, and have tea with us!"
"But can't I stay alittlewhilenow,—while no one knows I am here at all?" pleaded Robert.
Ordinarily, this was just what would have seemed reasonable and delightful to Barbara. But just now it pleased her to discipline the boy.
"Decidedlynot, Robert!" said she. "You know how careful you are about etiquette,—so troubled over the idea of coming here at all on the mere invitation of mere me! You shall not talk to me any more till you have been properly presented to Aunt Hitty! Besides, I am just at amostinteresting place in this lovely book,"—and she snatched 'Clarissa' up from the grass, where it had lain forgotten since Robert's appearance,—"and I can't really take my mind off it till I find out what is going to happen. I will see you in the house, with Aunt Hitty, in—let me see—about an hour and a half! Now go right away!"
Robert looked very miserable, but bowed submission, and backed off.
"How will Mistress Ladd receive me?" he asked, doubtfully.
"Oh," replied Barbara, one small brown hand on the apple-tree as she waited for Robert to depart ere she climbed back to her nook, "Aunt Hitty is just perfect. She will be very nice to you, and will quite approve of you, I know. Since everything has turned out for the best, she has already forgiven you for leading her young niece into mischief the way you did!"
Robert stared at her in speechless amazement. But Barbara would not let him ask any more questions. With a mocking little grimace at his confusion, she pointed to the white gate.
"Go away immediately!" she commanded. "And be sure you come back in an hour and a half!"
Robert turned and strode off with an aggrieved air, between the hollyhock rows. When he was half way to the gate, Barbara, who had stood looking after him with a smile on her lips, called imperiously:
"Robert!"
He turned quickly, and snatched off his hat.
"What is it, my lady?"
"You forgot to help me into my tree!" said Barbara.
He was beside her in an instant, his face brightening. He knelt on one knee, and held out his two hands firmly locked, to form a sort of stirrup. Setting one light foot into this support, Barbara sprang up and in a flash was perched gracefully in her niche. It was done with such swiftness that Robert had hardly time to realise her foot had touched him. She laughed down upon him with gay commendation.
"That was very handsomely done, indeed, Robert!" she declared. "Now hurry right away to Doctor Jim, or you'll never manage to get back in one hour and a half!" And she buried her eyes in the first page at which "Clarissa" chanced to open.
Robert hesitated, opened his lips as if to speak, and went without a word. Barbara, watching him from the corner of her eye, was puzzled at the look upon his face, but felt satisfied that it was not displeasure. About half-way up the walk toward the gate, when he believed himself unobserved, Robert gazed curiously at the palms wherein the little foot had rested for that fraction of a heart-beat. Light as was the touch, it had left a subtle tingling behind it. He pressed the place to his lips. This action astonished Barbara, but greatly interested her, and gave her, at the same time, an inexplicable thrill. Her heart understood it, indeed, while it remained an enigma to her brain. And purposeless, profitless, absurd though it seemed to her, that Robert should kiss his own hand, she decided nevertheless that in some way the action had expressed a more fervent homage to her than when the hand that he kissed was hers. She forgot to go on reading the excellent Mr. Richardson's romance.
Mistress Mehitable liked Robert, whose bearing and breeding were in all ways much to her taste. She had seen him when a babe in arms, just before his father and mother had taken him away from Gault House to New York. So gracious was she, that Robert was filled with wonder as he thought of the piteous story which Barbara had told him in the canoe. But this wonder was as nothing, compared to the amazement with which he viewed the warm affection between Barbara and her aunt. What could it all mean? It was plain that they two understood each other, trusted each other, admired each other, loved each other. He had an uneasy feeling that Barbara had made a fool of him. Then, as his dignity was beginning to feel ruffled, and his grave young face to darken, he would remember other details of that eventful afternoon which forbade him to question the girl's sincerity. At this the cloud would lift. There was a mystery behind it all, of course, which he would doubtless, in his determined fashion, succeed in penetrating. Meanwhile, every one seemed extremely happy,—Barbara gaily, whimsically gracious, Mistress Mehitable composedly glad, Doctor Jim as boisterous in his joy as good manners would permit, Doctor John quizzically approving, and filled with mellow mirth. Robert was made to feel himself an honoured guest, for his own sake as well as for the sake of his parents; and in this cordial atmosphere he soon justified all good opinions. Barbara was intensely gratified with him. She audaciously claimed credit for having discovered him, and rescued him from the barbaric wilderness that lay beyond Second Westings. She began to plan expeditions and amusements to make his visit memorable; and when he announced his intention of returning to Gault House on the morrow, there was a unanimous protest. Mistress Mehitable said it was not to be heard of, for one moment. Doctor Jim growled that his hospitality was not to be flouted in any such fashion. Doctor John levelled bushy eyebrows at him, and suggested that no true Gault would run away in the hour of triumph.
"You will do nothing of the kind, Robert," decreed Barbara, with finality. "We want you here. I wonder you are not ashamed, after all the trouble you made for us so lately, when you were old enough and big enough to know better!"
Robert's face flushed with pleasure at all this warmth; and he hugely wanted to stay. But with astonishing discretion he refused to be persuaded. Some intuition taught him the wisdom of timely reserve. Without at all formulating any theory on the subject, which would have been impossible to such inexperience as his, he felt instinctively that at this moment, when she was most gracious to him, a judicious absence would best fix him in Barbara's interest. He said there were matters to be attended to for his grandmother which would not well bear delay. At this unexpected firmness on the part of her cavalier, Barbara was so annoyed that for nearly an hour she seemed to forget his existence; but Robert hid his discomfort under an easy cheerfulness, and no one else seemed to notice the passing shadow. Mistress Mehitable insisted that the guests should stay to sup with her and Barbara; and the boy's coming was made a little festival. Mistress Mehitable was one of those notable housekeepers who seem to accomplish great things with little effort by being craftily forehanded. Before anything was said of supper she had vanished for a few minutes to the kitchen; and in those few minutes she had planned with Abby for a repast worthy the event. The larder of the Ladd homestead was kept victualled beyond peril of any surprise; and Mistress Mehitable, for all her ethereal mould and mien, believed in the efficacy of good eating and good drinking. Well regulated lives, she held, should also be well nourished, and her Puritan conscience was not illiberal in regard to the seemly pleasures of the board.
Both Doctor John and Doctor Jim, as befitted their stature, were valiant trenchermen; and Robert was a boy; and the lavish delicacies of Abby's serving met with that reception which was the best tribute to their worth. Gaiety made herself handmaid to appetite; and the ale was nutty-mellow from last October; and Mistress Mehitable's old Madeira wine, of which herself partook but sparingly, was fiery-pungent on the tongue. As she toasted him, and her blue eyes sparkled upon him over the glass, Robert wondered anew how Barbara could have wanted to run away from so admirable an aunt. As for Barbara, reduced for a little to silence by supreme content, she sipped at her Angelica cordial, surveyed Mistress Mehitable with grateful ardour, and took it all as largess to herself.
At last, with a happy sigh, she cried, "Oh, if only Uncle Bob could have come in time for this!" And so electric with sympathy was the air that on the word every eye turned and glanced at the door, as if expecting that a wish so well-timed might bring fruition on the instant. There was silence for some seconds.
Then Mistress Mehitable said, "He will be here in a very few days, dear! And then you, Robert, must come to us again without delay. I agree with Barbara that nothing I can think of except Mr. Glenowen's presence could add to our happiness to-night!"
After supper there was music in the candle-lit drawing-room, Mistress Mehitable having a rare gift for the harpsichord, and Doctor Jim a nice art in the rendering of certain old English ballads of the robuster sort. Where they might have seemed to the ladies' ears a trifle more robust than nice, Doctor Jim had fined them down to a fitting delicacy. But they suited his rolling bass, and he loved them because, being Cavalier-born, they appealed to his king-loving sympathies. Doctor Jim was an exemplary Congregationalist, but solely by force of environment, Congregationalism being the creed of all the gentry of that region. Episcopalianism he looked upon with a distrust mingled with affection; but in all other respects he was a king's man, through and through, an aristocrat, and a good-natured scorner of the masses. It was a stupendous triumph for accident and atmosphere to have succeeded in fitting Doctor Jim to his inherited environment of Second Westings. His Congregationalism was a thing that might conceivably be changed to meet changed conditions; while his Toryism was bred in the bone. With Mistress Mehitable, on the other hand, her Congregationalism was deep-rooted, a matter of conscience. It was by conscience, too, no less than by blood, that she was an aristocrat. She was a royalist, a Tory, no less unquestioning than Doctor Jim, but this by a chance election of that strenuous conscience which, by a different chance twist, would have made her an equally sincere Whig.
When Doctor Jim had sung till Doctor John told him he was getting hoarse and spoiling his voice, Barbara, in a burst of daring, started up a wild plantation song, patting her accompaniment. To Mistress Mehitable, as to Robert, this was an undreamed novelty, and their eyes opened wide in wonder. At first they thought it barbarous, but in a few minutes the piquing rhythms and irresponsible cadences caught them, and they listened in rapture. Barbara's store of these songs was a rich one, and she had perfected the rendering in many a secret performance to the audience of Doctor John and Doctor Jim. When she was quite sure of the effect she was producing, she sprang to her feet, flung her hair loose by a quick movement of both hands, and began to dance as she sang. And now, to the ever-growing amazement of Mistress Mehitable, Doctor Jim took up the patting, while Doctor John, seating himself at the harpsichord, began a strange staccato picking of the keys. Then Barbara stopped singing, and gave herself up wholly to the dance. She danced with arms and hands and head and feet, and every slender curve of her young body. She moved like flames. Her eyes and lips and teeth were a radiance through the live, streaming darknesses of her hair. Light, swift, unerring, ecstatic, it was like the most impassioned of bird-songs translated into terms of pure motion. Doctor John played faster and faster his wild, monotonous melody. Doctor Jim patted harder and harder. Barbara's dance grew madder and stranger, till at last, with a little breathless cry that was half a sob, she stopped, darted across the room, flung herself down, and buried her dishevelled head in Mistress Mehitable's lap.
On ordinary occasions Mistress Mehitable would have felt inclined to hold that anything so extraordinary, so utterly outside the range of all conceptions, and at the same time so very beautiful, must be wrong. Now, however, she was under the spell of Barbara and under the spell of the whole situation. "I cannot see any possible harm in it!" she said to herself. And to Barbara she said, tenderly and deftly arranging the disordered locks:
"Most beautiful, and most singular, dear. I suppose that is yourdanceof 'Maryland Memories,' is it not? It seems to me not only amazingly beautiful, but as if it might be the most wholesome and desirable of exercises."
Barbara gurgled a gasping laugh from the depths of Mistress Mehitable's taffeta. It had never occurred to her that these mad negro dances, in which she found expression for so much in herself which she did not understand, could be regarded in the light of exercise. But she was glad indeed if they could be so regarded by Aunt Hitty.
"Oh, yes, honey," she agreed, in haste. "I'msureit's wholesome; and Iknowit'sdesirable,—isn't it?"
This appeal was to every one, but it was Robert, at last awaking from his rapture and finding breath, who answered:
"There was never anything else so wonderful in all the world," he said, solemnly.
Doctor John and Doctor Jim, with one impulse, jumped up, each seized one of Barbara's hands, and plucked her to her feet. They then stood hand in hand in a row before Mistress Mehitable and Robert, bowing their thanks for such appreciation of their poor efforts to please.
"We are going to London to perform before the king!" declared Doctor Jim.
Mistress Mehitable gravely took a shilling from her purse, and bestowed it upon Doctor John because he was the tallest. He pretended to spit on it, for luck, but kissed it instead, and slipped it into the bosom of his ruffled shirt. When the approving laughter had subsided, Mistress Mehitable said, musingly:
"I see now how you have been teaching Barbara her Latin. It was that peculiar dialect of Latin that prevails in Maryland!"
After this a sack posset was mixed by Mistress Mehitable, with the eager assistance of every one but Robert, who was still too much possessed by Barbara's dancing to do more than stand about and get in the way, and smile a gravely fatuous smile whenever spoken to.
When the posset began to go around, calling forth encomiums at every sip, Doctor Jim demanded the cards. There was silence. To Robert, just from the Tory circles of New York, it seemed the most natural thing in the world. To Barbara it seemed natural, but foreign to Mistress Mehitable and Second Westings. To Doctor John it seemed right and desirable, but he chuckled and said nothing, being aware of Mistress Mehitable's views. And this time Mistress Mehitable was firm.
"No, Jim," said she, "we won't play. I know good people do play,—people who know just as well as I do what is right and what is wrong. But for some reason card-playing does not seem right to me. You know Doctor Sawyer would strongly disapprove!"
"Officially, that's all, dear lady!" corrected Doctor John.
"But you have them in the house,—yonder in that very drawer, most gracious mistress!" persisted Doctor Jim.
"My dear father used them," confessed Mistress Mehitable. "Therefore I would not for a moment think of refusing to have them in my house. But I think it is better not to play, Jim."
And though Mistress Mehitable spoke with appeal and apology rather than with decision, the matter was plainly settled. There was nothing to do but tell riddles and drink up the rest of the posset. The pervading satisfaction was in no way checked by Doctor Jim's failure, for all agreed that cards were stupid anyway. Barbara, in spite of her excitement, and to her intense self-disgust, began to grow sleepy. She was horribly afraid she might show it, which, for one but forty-eight hours grown-up, would have been humiliating beyond words. She felt herself divided between a fear lest so perfect an evening should end too soon, and an equally harassing fear lest it should end not soon enough. At length the keen and loving eyes of Doctor John discerned her trouble; and at the dissolute hour of half-past ten he broke up the party. Adieux were made with a warmth, an abandon of homage held in fetters of elaborate courtliness, which might have seemed excessive at a less propitious conjunction of time and sentiment. At last the three, Doctor John, Doctor Jim, and Robert, found themselves arm-in-arm on the street, and all talking at once, overbrimming with happiness and reciprocal congratulations, as they took their discreet way homeward.
Barbara and Mistress Mehitable, left alone, silently put out the lights. Then, each lighting her candle, they paused at the head of the stairs to say good night. Each set down her candle on the little mahogany table under the clock, and looked into the other's eyes. Barbara was first to break the sweet but too searching scrutiny. She flung both arms around Mistress Mehitable's neck, and kissed her with a tremulous fervour that told much. Mistress Mehitable, whose eyes were brighter than Barbara had ever guessed that they could be, pressed her in a close embrace which concealed much, even from Mistress Mehitable herself. Then Barbara, after whispering something to the kittens, went straight to bed, and straight to sleep. But Mistress Mehitable sat looking out of her window.
It had been arranged that Robert should borrow a horse from Doctor John's stables, ride it over to Gault House, and keep it there till his return to Second Westings. But as he was strolling down the village street before breakfast, he saw, in a paddock beside an unpretentious cottage, a splendid Narragansett pacer, a dark sorrel, one of the handsomest of the breed that he had ever seen. He had long coveted one of these horses, famous in all the thirteen colonies for their easy gait, speed over rough country, and unparalleled endurance. With characteristic promptness in getting to his point, he went in, interviewed the owner, tried the horse, loved it, and asked the price. The owner was not anxious to sell; but when he found out who the would-be purchaser was, and the liberal price he was ready to pay, the prospect of an immediate draft on the bank at Hartford proved irresistible, and Robert rode off with his prize. He knew horse-flesh, and did not grudge the price; and both Doctor John and Doctor Jim, who knew this sorrel pacer well, were constrained to commend the purchase, though to them it seemed that so weighty an action demanded, if but for form's sake, the tribute of delay and pondering.
"Buy a horse like that, Robert, in three shakes of a ram's tail? It's undignified!" roared Doctor Jim, eyeing the beast with unmixed approbation. "It's an insult to the horse. And it's a slight upon the value of our assistance, you cock-sure young rascal. But it's just the mulish way your father would have gone and done it, so I suppose we must forgive you."
Doctor John, meanwhile, had been handling the beast critically, and looking at its teeth.
"Worth all you gave for him, Bobby; and not a day over five years old!" was the verdict. "I see you're old enough to go about alone. Don't you mind what Jim Pigeon says. He'd have had you run to him and ask if you might have a horse of your own, and then get him and me to go down and look at the beast, and come back here and talk it all over in council, and then go back and bully Enoch Barnes some more about the price, and then all three of us ride the beast up to Mistress Mehitable's, to ask the opinion of her and Barbara on the subject, and then—"
But Robert interrupted at this point in the tirade.
"Thatwouldhave been a good idea," he asserted, regretfully. "I wish I had thought to consult the ladies. But, you know, Iknewthat horse was just the one I'd so long been wanting the moment I set eyes on him. So I didn't dare wait, lest some one else should come along and snap him up. Of course you both know a thousand times more about horses than I do,—but I knew enough to know I wanted this one!"
"Yougenerallyseem to know what you want, Master Gault!" said Doctor Jim. "And you seem like to get it, generally, if I don't mistake the cut of you,—eh, what?"
"Tut, tut," said Doctor John, scowling upon him quizzically. "That's all very well as far as horses are concerned, and men! But wait till it comes to women, Robert. You've a lot to learn, my son. If I'm not much mistaken, you'll be taught a lot, and not spared in the teaching!"
"I'm always anxious to learn," answered Robert, modestly.
"You will! You will!" said Doctor John.
Breakfast was a substantial meal of boiled "Yokeag" with molasses, and broiled salmon, and venison cutlets, and fried ham, and rich guava jelly from the West Indies. Robert was surprised to see each of his friends preface the repast with a quart mug of the hardest and headiest old cider, he himself being accustomed to a small cup of light ale merely, or a sip of claret, at this hour. Both Doctor John and Doctor Jim assured him that there was nothing like sound cider to tone up the stomach for its day's adventures; and on their advice he tried it, though sparingly, and therefore with no tragic results.
After breakfast, he was so obviously restless that the big-hearted brothers made no effort to detain him. With heavy hands upon his shoulders, they told him to make the least possible delay in his return, and to bear in mind how warm the welcome ever awaiting him at Second Westings.
"How like to Richard in the saddle!" exclaimed Doctor John, when Robert had mounted the sorrel pacer.
"And that's a compliment not many a lad of your age could win, my son!" said Doctor John.
Robert's dark face flushed with pleasure.
"I try hard to be as like my father as possible," said he. "Don't you think I might properly ride around and pay my respects to the ladies before I leave?"
"Unquestionably you might! 'Pon my word a capital idea!" laughed Doctor Jim, with huge derision.
"Unquestionably, my boy, you would find yourself in hot water if you didn't!" said Doctor John.
So Robert, without more ado, turned the head of his Narragansett pacer toward Westings House, whose wide white gables were partly visible through the trees.
A very erect, graceful, and masterful young figure he made, as he reined in his tall sorrel before Mistress Mehitable's porch. Mistress Mehitable from her window above had seen him coming, and was on the steps to greet him. He flung himself from the saddle, kissed her hand deferentially, thanked her with fervour for her delightful hospitality,—and at the same time cast a solicitous eye about the walks and windows, wondering where Barbara could be. Mistress Mehitable had an amused smile, but would not help him. She said polite things, and assured him of the pleasure with which she would look forward to his next visit,—and even added that he had better not postpone that next visit beyond five or six days, or a week at most, as Mr. Glenowen was expected at once, and might not be able to stay long at Second Westings. But of Barbara she said not a word. Robert showed her, with pride, his sorrel pacer, related with an abstracted air the circumstances of its purchase, and enlarged upon the special merits of the breed, while Mistress Mehitable patted the silky white nose, and murmured boundless admiration. But still no sign, no word, of Barbara.
At last Robert could contain himself no longer.
"I ought to be on the road," he stammered, "but I should be sorry to leave without making my adieux to Mistress Barbara. Is she within?"
"She went out about half an hour ago!" said Mistress Mehitable, "and did not say where she was going!"
Robert's face fell so pathetically that Mistress Mehitable felt a little flush of resentment against Barbara for her cruelty.
"She left kindest messages for you," she continued, hastily. "She told me to say how sorry she was not to see you this morning, and that she would never forgive you if you did not come again to Second Westings very soon. And I was to say good-bye to you for her!"
"I thank you," said Robert, heavily. "Pray you give her my devotions, and tell her how grieved I am to be denied the privilege of paying them in person. I kiss your hand again, dear Mistress Ladd!" And with that he rode off musingly, through a morning whose sunlight had on the sudden lost its sparkle, whose spicy airs had all at once lost their zest. His pride in the new pacer, which he had hoped to show off to Barbara, was all fallen flat. He forced the restive beast to walk soberly for some moments. Then a swift heat of anger, a sense of undeserved injury, went over him. He swore he would come no more to Second Westings all that summer; and setting spurs to the willing sorrel, he tore away down the road at a pounding gallop.