But I didn't stay much longer than Father did. I strode into the hall, too, by Aunt Jane. But I didn't leave the house. I came up here to my own room; and ever since I've been writing it all down in my book.
Of course, I don't know now what's going to happen next. But Iwishyou could have seen Aunt Jane's face when Father said I wasn't going to school to-day! I don't believe she's sure yet that she heard aright—though she didn't try to stop me, or even speak when I left and came upstairs. But I just know she's keeping up a powerful thinking.
For that matter, so am I. Whatisgoing to happen next? Have I got to go to school to-morrow? But then, of course, I shan't do that. Besides, I don't believe Father'll ask me to, after what I said about Mother.Hedidn't like that—what those girls said—any better than I did. I'm sure of that. Why, he looked simply furious. But there isn't any other school here that I can be sent to, and—
But what's the use? I might surmise and speculate all day and not come anywhere near the truth. I must await—what the night will bring forth, as they say in really truly novels.
* * * * *
Four days later.
And what did the night bring forth? Yes, what did it bring! Verily it brought forth one thing I thought nothing ever could have brought forth.
It was like this.
That night at the supper-table Aunt Jane cleared her throat in the I-am-determined-I-will-speak kind of a way that she always uses when she speaks to Father. (Aunt. Jane doesn't talk to Father much more than Mother used to.)
"Charles," she began.
Father had an astronomy paper beside his plate, and he was so busy reading he didn't hear, so Aunt Jane had to speak again—a little louder this time.
"Charles, I have something to say to you."
"Eh? What? Oh—er—yes. Well, Jane, what is it?" Father was looking up with his I'll-be-patient-if-it-kills-me air, and with his forefinger down on his paper to keep his place.
As if anybody could talk to a person who's simply tolerating you for a minute like that, with his forefinger holding on to what hewantsto tend to! Why, I actually found myself being sorry for Aunt Jane.
She cleared her throat again.
"It is understood, of course, that Mary is to go to school to-morrow morning, I suppose," she said.
"Why, of course, of course," began Father impatiently, looking down at his paper. "Of course she'll go to—" he stopped suddenly. A complete change came to his face. He grew red, then white. His eyes sort of flashed. "School?" he said then, in a hard, decided voice. "Oh, no; Mary is not going to school to-morrow morning." He looked down to his paper and began to read again. For him the subject was very evidently closed. But for Aunt Jane it wasnotclosed.
"You don't mean, Charles, that she is not to go to school at all, any more," she gasped.
"Exactly." Father read on in his paper without looking up.
"But, Charles, to stop her school like this!"
"Why not? It closes in a week or two, anyway."
Aunt Jane's lips came together hard.
"That's not the question at all," she said, cold like ice. "Charles, I'm amazed at you—yielding to that child's whims like this—that she doesn't want to go to school! It's the principle of the thing that I'm objecting to. Do you realize what it will lead to—what it—"
"Jane!" With a jerk Father sat up straight. "I realize some things that perhaps you do not. But that is neither here nor there. I do not wish Mary to go to school any more this spring. That is all; and I think—it is sufficient."
"Certainly." Aunt Jane's lips came together again grim and hard. "Perhaps you will be good enough to say what sheshalldo with her time."
"Time? Do? Why—er—what she always does; read, sew, study—"
"Study?" Aunt Jane asked the question with a hateful little smile that Father would have been blind not to have understood. And he was equal to it—but I 'most fell over backward when I foundhowequal to it he was.
"Certainly," he says, "study. I—I'll hear her lessons myself—in the library, after I come home in the afternoon. Now let us hear no more about it."
With that he pushed back his plate, stuffed his astronomy paper into his pocket, and left the table, without waiting for dessert. And Aunt Jane and I were left alone.
I didn't say anything. Victors shouldn't boast—and I was a victor, of course, about the school. But when I thought of what Father had said about my reciting my lessons to him every day in the library—I wasn't so sure whether I'd won out or not. Recite lessons to my father? Why, I couldn't even imagine such a thing!
Aunt Jane didn't say anything either. I guess she didn't know what to say. And it was kind of a queer situation, when you came right down to it. Both of us sitting there and knowing I wasn't going back to school any more, and I knowing why, and knowing Aunt Jane didn't know why. (Of course I hadn't told Aunt Jane about Mother and Mrs. Mayhew.) It would be a funny world, wouldn't it, if we all knew what each other was thinking all the time? Why, we'd get so we wouldn't do anythingbutthink—for there wouldn't any of usspeakto each other, I'm afraid, we'd be so angry at what the other was thinking.
Well, Aunt Jane and I didn't speak that night at the supper-table. We finished in stern silence; then Aunt Jane went upstairs to her room and I went up to mine. (You see what a perfectly wildly exciting life Mary is living! And when I think of howfullof good times Mother wanted every minute to be. But that was for Marie, of course.)
The next morning after breakfast Aunt Jane said:
"You will spend your forenoon studying, Mary. See that you learn well your lessons, so as not to annoy your father."
"Yes, Aunt Jane," said Mary, polite and proper, and went upstairs obediently; but even Mary didn't know exactly how to study those lessons.
Carrie had brought me all my books from school. I had asked her to when I knew that I was not going back. There were the lessons that had been assigned for the next day, of course, and I supposed probably Father would want me to study those. But I couldn't imagine Father teachingmeall alone. And how was I ever going to ask him questions, if there were things I didn't understand? Besides, I couldn't imagine myself reciting lessons to Father—Father!
But I needn't have worried. If I could only have known. Little did I think—But, there, this is no way to tell a story. I read in a book, "How to Write a Novel," that you mustn't "anticipate." (Ithought folks always anticipated novels. I do. I thought you wanted them to.)
Well, to go on.
Father got home at four o'clock. I saw him come up the walk, and I waited till I was sure he'd got settled in the library, then I went down.
He wasn't there.
A minute later I saw him crossing the lawn to the observatory. Well, what to do I didn't know. Mary said to go after him; but Marie said nay, nay. And in spite of being Mary just now, I let Marie have her way.
Rush after him and tell him he'd forgotten to hear my lessons?Father? Well, I guess not! Besides, it wasn't my fault.Iwas there all ready. It wasn't my blame that he wasn't there to hear me. But he might remember and come back. Well, if he did,I'dbe there. So I went to one of those bookcases and pulled out a touch-me-not book from behind the glass door. Then I sat down and read till the supper-bell rang.
Father was five minutes late to supper. I don't know whether he looked at me or not. I didn't dare to look at him—until Aunt Jane said, in her chilliest manner:
"I trust your daughter had good lessons, Charles."
Ihadto look at him then. I just couldn't look anywhere else. So I was looking straight at him when he gave that funny little startled glance into my eyes. And into his eyes then there crept the funniest, dearest little understanding twinkle—and I suddenly realized that Father,Father, was laughing with me at a little secret betweenus. But 't was only for a second. The next moment his eyes were very grave and looking at Aunt Jane.
"I have no cause to complain—of my daughter's lessons to-day," he said very quietly. Then he glanced over at me again. But I had to look awayquick, or I would have laughed right out.
When he got up from the table he said to me: "I shall expect to see you to-morrow in the library at four, Mary."
And Mary answered, "Yes, Father," polite and proper, as she should; but Marie inside was just chuckling with the joke of it all.
The next day I watched again at four for Father to come up the walk; and when he had come in I went down to the library. He was there in his pet seat before the fireplace. (Father always sits before the fireplace, whether there's a fire there or not. And sometimes he lookssofunny sitting there, staring into those gray ashes just as if it was the liveliest kind of a fire he was watching.)
As I said, he was there, but I had to speak twice before he looked up.Then, for a minute, he stared vaguely.
"Eh? Oh! Ah—er—yes, to be sure," he muttered then, "You have come with your books. Yes, I remember."
But there wasn't any twinkle in his eyes, nor the least little bit of an understanding smile; and Iwasdisappointed. Ihadbeen looking for it. I knew then, when I felt so suddenly lost and heart-achey, that I had been expecting and planning all day on that twinkly understanding smile. You know you feel worse when you've just found a father and then lost him!
And I had lost him. I knew it the minute he sighed and frowned and got up from his seat and said, oh, yes, to be sure. He was just Dr. Anderson then—the man who knew all about the stars, and who had been unmarried to Mother, and who called me "Mary" in an of-course-you're-my-daughter tone of voice.
Well, he took my books and heard my lessons, and told me what I was to study next day. He's done that two days now.
Oh, I'm so tired of being Mary! And I've got more than four whole months of it left. I didn't get Mother's letter to-day. Maybe that's why I'm specially lonesome to-night.
* * * * *
July first.
School is done, both the regular school and my school. Not that my school has amounted to much. Really it hasn't. Oh, for three or four days he asked questions quite like just a teacher. Then he got to talking. Sometimes it would be about something in the lessons; sometimes it would be about a star, or the moon. And he'd get so interested that I'd think for a minute that maybe the understanding twinkle would come into his eyes again. But it never did.
Sometimes it wasn't stars and moons, though, that he talked about. It was Boston, and Mother. Yes, he did. He talked a lot about Mother. As I look back at it now, I can see that he did. He asked me all over again what she did, and about the parties and the folks that came to see her. He asked again about Mr. Harlow, and about the concert, and the young man who played the violin, and what was his name, and how old was he, and did I like him. And then, right in the middle of some question, or rather, right in the middle of someanswerI was givinghim, he would suddenly remember he was hearing my lessons, and he would say, "Come, come, Mary, what has this to do with your lessons?"
Just as if I was to blame! (But, then, we women always get the blame, I notice.) And then he'd attend strictly to the books for maybe five whole minutes—before he asked another question about that party, or the violinist.
Naturally the lessons haven't amounted to much, as you can imagine.But the term was nearly finished, anyway; and myrealschool is inBoston, of course.
It's vacation now. I do hopethatwill amount to something!
* * * * *
August first.
It hasn't, so far—I mean vacation. Really, what a world of disappointment this is! How on earth I'm going to stand being Mary for three months more I don't know. But I've got to, I suppose. I've been here May, June, and July; and that leaves August, September, and October yet to come. And when I think of Mother and Boston and Marie, and the darling good times down there where you're reallywanted, I am simply crazy.
If Father wanted me, really wanted me, I wouldn't care a bit. I'd be willing to be Mary six whole months. Yes, I'd begladto. But he doesn't. I'm just here by order of the court. And what can you do when you're nothing but a daughter by order of the court?
Since the lessons have stopped, Father's gone back to his "Good-morning, Mary," and "Good-night," and nothing else, day in and day out. Lately he's got so he hangs around the house an awful lot, too, so I can't even do the things I did the first of the month. I mean that I'd been playing some on the piano, along at the first, after school closed. Aunt Jane was out in the garden a lot, and Father out to the observatory, so I just reveled in piano-playing till I found almost every time I did it that he had come back, and was in the library with the door open. So I don't dare to play now.
And there isn't a blessed thing to do. Oh, I have to sew an hour, and now I have to weed an hour, too; and Aunt Jane tried to have me learn to cook; but Susie (in the kitchen) flatly refused to have me "messing around," so Aunt Jane had to give that up. Susie's the one person Aunt Jane's afraid of, you see. She always threatens to leave if anything goes across her wishes. So Aunt Jane has to be careful. I heard her tell Mrs. Small next door that good hired girls were awfully scarce in Andersonville.
As I said before, if only there was somebody here that wanted me. But there isn't. Of course Father doesn't. That goes without saying. And Aunt Jane doesn't. That goes, too, without saying. Carrie Heywood has gone away for all summer, so I can't have even her; and of course, I wouldn't associate with any of the other girls, even if they would associate with me—which they won't.
That leaves only Mother's letters. They are dear, and I love them. I don't know what I'd do without them. And yet, sometimes I think maybe they're worse than if I didn't have them. They make me so homesick, and I always cry so after I get them. Still, I know I just couldn't live a minute if 'twasn't for Mother's letters.
Besides being so lonesome there's another thing that worries me, too; and that is,this—what I'm writing, I mean. The novel. It's getting awfully stupid. Nothing happens.Nothing!Of course, if 'twas just a story I could make up things—lots of them—exciting, interesting things, like having Mother elope with the violinist, and Father shoot him and fall in love with Mother all over again, or else with somebody else, and shoot that one's lover. Or maybe somebody'd try to shoot Father, and I'd get there just in time to save him. Oh, I'dlovethat!
But this is a real story, so, of course, I can't put in anything only just what happens; andnothing happens.
And that's another thing. About the love story—I'm afraid there isn't going to be one. Anyway, there isn't a bit of a sign of one, yet, unless it's Mother. And of course, I haven't seen her for three months, so I can't say anything about that.
Father hasn't got one. I'm sure of that. He doesn't like ladies. I know he doesn't. He always runs away from them. But they don't run away from him! Listen.
As I said before, quite a lot of them call here to see Aunt Jane, and they come lots of times evenings and late afternoons, and I know now why they do it. They come then because they think Father'll be at home at that time; and they want to see him.
I know it now, but I never thought of it till the other day whenI heard our hired girl, Susie, talking about it with Bridget, theSmalls' hired girl, over the fence when I was weeding the garden oneday. Then I knew. It was like this:
Mrs. Darling had been over the night before as usual, and had stayed an awfully long time talking to Aunt Jane on the front piazza. Father had been there, too, awhile. She stopped him on his way into the house. I was there and I heard her. She said:
"Oh, Mr. Anderson, I'm so glad I saw you! I wanted to ask your advice about selling poor dear Mr. Darling's law library."
And then she went on to tell him how she'd had an offer, but she wasn't sure whether it was a good one or not. And she told him how highly she prized his opinion, and he was a man of such splendid judgment, and she felt so alone now with no strong man's shoulder to lean upon, and she would be so much obliged if he only would tell her whether he considered that offer a good one or not.
Father hitched and ahemmed and moved nearer the door all the time she was talking, and he didn't seem to hear her when she pushed a chair toward him and asked him to please sit down and tell her what to do; that she was so alone in the world since poor dear Mr. Darling had gone. (She always calls him poor dear Mr. Darling now, but Susie says she didn't when he was alive; she called him something quite different. I wonder what it was.)
Well, as I said, Father hitched and fidgeted, and said he didn't know, he was sure; that she'd better take wiser counsel than his, and that he was very sorry, but she really must excuse him. And he got through the door while he was talking just as fast as he could himself, so that she couldn't get in a single word to keep him. Then he was gone.
Mrs. Darling stayed on the piazza two whole hours longer, but Father never came out at all again.
It was the next morning that Susie said this over the back-yard fence to Bridget:
"It does beat all how popular this house is with the ladies—after college hours!"
And Bridget chuckled and answered back:
"Sure it is! An' I do be thinkin' the Widder Darlin' is a heap fonder of Miss Jane now than she would have been had poor dear Mr. Darlin' lived!"
And she chuckled again, and so did Susie. And then, all of a sudden, I knew. It was Father all those ladies wanted. It was Father Mrs. Darling wanted. They came here to see him. They wanted to marry him.Theywere the prospective suitors. As if I didn't know what Susie and Bridget meant! I'm no child!
But all this doesn't make Father likethem. I'm not sure but it makes him dislike them. Anyhow, he won't have anything to do with them. He always runs away over to the observatory, or somewhere, and won't see them; and I've heard him say things about them to Aunt Jane, too—words that sound all right, but that don't mean what they say, and everybody knows they don't. So, as I said before, I don't see any chance of Father's having a love story to help out this book—not right away, anyhow.
As formylove story—I don't see any chance of that's beginning, either. Yet, seems as if there ought to be the beginning of it by this time—I'm going on fifteen. Oh, there have beenbeginnings, lots of them—only Aunt Jane wouldn't let them go on and be endings, though I told her good and plain that I thought it perfectly all right; and I reminded her about the brook and river meeting where I stood, and all that.
But I couldn't make her see it at all. She said, "Stuff and nonsense"—and when Aunt Jane saysbothstuff and nonsense I know there's nothingdoing. (Oh, dear, that's slang! Aunt Jane says she does wish I would eliminate the slang from my vocabulary. Well, I wishshe'deliminate some of the long words fromhers. Marie said that—not Mary.)
Well, Aunt Jane said stuff and nonsense, and that I was much too young to run around with silly boys. You see, Charlie Smith had walked home from school with me twice, but I had to stop that. And Fred Small was getting so he was over here a lot. Aunt Jane stoppedhim. Paul Mayhew—yes,Paul Mayhew, Stella's brother!—came home with me, too, and asked me to go with him auto-riding. My, how I did want to go! I wanted the ride, of course, but especially I wanted to go because he was Mrs. Mayhew's son. I just wanted to show Mrs. Mayhew! But Aunt Jane wouldn't let me. That's the time she talked specially about running around with silly boys. But she needn't have. Paul is no silly boy. He's old enough to get a license to drive his own car.
But it wasn't just because he was young that Aunt Jane refused. I found out afterward. It was because he was any kind of a man paying me attention. I found that out through Mr. Claude Livingstone. Mr. Livingstone brings our groceries. He's arealyoung gentleman—tall, black mustache, and lovely dark eyes. He goes to our church, and he asked me to go to the Sunday-School picnic with him. I wassopleased. And I supposed, of course, Aunt Jane would let me go withhim. He'sno silly boy! Besides, I knew him real well, and liked him. I used to talk to him quite a lot when he brought the groceries.
But did Aunt Jane let me go? She did not. Why, she seemed almost more shocked than she had been over Charlie Smith and Fred Small, and the others.
"Mercy, child!" she exclaimed. "Where in the world do you pick up these people?" And she brought out that "these people"sodisagreeably! Why, you'd think Mr. Livingstone was a foreign Japanese, or something.
I told her then quietly, and with dignity, and with no temper (showing), that Mr. Livingstone was not a foreign Japanese, but was a very nice gentleman; and that I had not picked him up. He came to her own door himself, almost every day.
"My own door!" exclaimed Aunt Jane. And she looked absolutely frightened. "You mean to tell me that that creature has been coming here to see you, and I not know it?"
I told her then—again quietly and with dignity, and without temper (showing)—that he had been coming, not to see me, but in the natural pursuance of his profession of delivering groceries. And I said that he was not a creature. On the contrary, he was, I was sure, an estimable young man. He went to her own church and Sunday-School. Besides, I could vouch for him myself, as I knew him well, having seen and talked with him almost every day for a long while, when he came to the house.
But nothing I could say seemed to have the least effect upon her at all, only to make her angrier and angrier, if anything. In factIthink she showed a great deal of temper for a Christian woman about a fellow Christian in her own church.
But she wouldn't let me go to the picnic; and not only that, but I think she changed grocers, for Mr. Livingstone hasn't been here for a long time, and when I asked Susie where he was she looked funny, and said we weren't getting our groceries where Mr. Livingstone worked any longer.
Well, of course, that ended that. And there hasn't been any other since. That's why I saymylove story doesn't seem to be getting along very well. Naturally, when it gets noised around town that your Aunt Jane won't let you go anywhere with a young man, or let a young man come to see you, or even walk home with you after the first time—why, the young men aren't going to do very much toward making your daily life into a love story.
* * * * *
Two weeks later.
A queer thing happened last night. It was like this:
I think I said before what an awfully stupid time Mary is having of it, and how I couldn't play now, or make any noise, 'cause Father has taken to hanging around the house so much. Well, listen what happened.
Yesterday Aunt Jane went to spend the day with her best friend. She said for me not to leave the house, as some member of the family should be there. She told me to sew an hour, weed an hour, dust the house downstairs and upstairs, and read some improving book an hour. The rest of the time I might amuse myself.
Amuse myself! A jolly time I could have all by myself! Even Father wasn't to be home for dinner, so I wouldn't havethatexcitement. He was out of town, and was not to come home till six o'clock.
It was an awfully hot day. The sun just beat down, and there wasn't a breath of air. By noon I was simply crazy with my stuffy, long-sleeved, high-necked blue gingham dress and my great clumpy shoes. It seemed all of a sudden as if I couldn't stand it—not another minute—not a single minute more—to be Mary, I mean. And suddenly I determined that for a while, just a little while, I'd be Marie again. Why couldn't I? There wasn't anybody going to be there but just myself,all day long.
I ran then upstairs to the guest-room closet where Aunt Jane had made me put all my Marie dresses and things when the Mary ones came. Well, I got out the very fluffiest, softest white dress there was there, and the little white slippers and the silk stockings that I loved, and the blue silk sash, and the little gold locket and chain that Mother gave me that Aunt Jane wouldn't let me wear. And I dressed up. My, didn't I dress up? And I justthrewthose old heavy shoes and black cotton stockings into the corner, and the blue gingham dress after them (though Mary went right away and picked the dress up, and hung it in the closet, of course); but I had the fun of throwing it, anyway.
Oh, how good those Marie things did feel to Mary's hot, tired flesh and bones, and how I did dance and sing around the room in those light little slippers! Then Susie rang the dinner-bell and I went down to the dining-room feeling like a really truly young lady, I can tell you.
Susie stared, of course and said, "My, how fine we are to-day!" But I didn't mind Susie.
After dinner I went out into the hall and I sang; I sang all over the house. And I ran upstairs and I ran down; and I jumped all the last three steps, even if it was so warm. Then I went into the parlor and played every lively thing that I could think of on the piano. And I sang there, too—silly little songs that Marie used to sing to Lester. And I tried to think I was really down there to Boston, singing to Lester; and that Mother was right in the next room waiting for me.
Then I stopped and turned around on the piano-stool. And there was the coffin plate, and the wax cross, and the hair wreath; and the room was just as still as death. And I knew I wasn't in Boston. I was there in Andersonville, And there wasn't any Baby Lester there, nor any mother waiting for me in the next room. And all the fluffy white dresses and silk stockings in the world wouldn't make me Marie. I was really just Mary, and I had got to have three whole months more of it.
And then is when I began to cry. And I cried just as hard as I'd been singing a minute before. I was on the floor with my head in my arms on the piano-stool when Father's voice came to me from the doorway.
"Mary, Mary, what in the world does this mean?"
I jumped up and stood "at attention," the way you have to, of course, when fathers speak to you. I couldn't help showing I had been crying—he had seen it. But I tried very hard to stop now. My first thought, after my startled realization that he was there, was to wonder how long he had been there—how much of all that awful singing and banging he had heard.
"Yes, sir." I tried not to have my voice shake as I said it; but I couldn't quite help that.
"What is the meaning of this, Mary? Why are you crying?"
I shook my head. I didn't want to tell him, of course; so I just stammered out something about being sorry I had disturbed him. Then I edged toward the door to show him that if he would step one side I would go away at once and not bother him any longer.
But he didn't step one side. He asked more questions, one right after another.
"Are you sick, Mary?"
I shook my head.
"Did you hurt yourself?"
I shook my head again.
"It isn't—your mother—you haven't had bad news from her?"
And then I blurted it out without thinking—without thinking at all what I was saying: "No, no—but I wish I had, I wish I had; 'cause then I could go to her, and go away from here!" The minute I'd said it Iknewwhat I'd said, and how awful it sounded; and I clapped my fingers to my lips. But 'twas too late. It's always too late, when you've once said it. So I just waited for him to thunder out his anger; for, of course, I thought hewouldthunder in rage and righteous indignation.
But he didn't. Instead, very quietly and gently he said:
"Are you so unhappy, then, Mary—here?"
And I looked at him, and his eyes and his mouth and his whole face weren't angry at all. They were just sorry, actually sorry. And somehow, before I knew it, I was crying again, and Father, with his arm around me—with his arm around me!think of that!—was leading me to the sofa.
And I cried and cried there, with my head on the arm of the sofa, till I'd made a big tear spot on the linen cover; and I wondered if it would dry up before Aunt Jane saw it, or if it would change color or leak through to the red plush underneath, or some other dreadful thing. And then, some way, I found myself telling it all over to Father—about Mary and Marie, I mean, just as if he was Mother, or some one I loved—I mean, some one I loved andwasn't afraid of; for of course I love Father. Of course I do!
Well, I told him everything (when I got started there was no stopping)—all about how hard it was to be Mary, and how to-day I had tried to be Marie for just a little while, to rest me. He interrupted here, and wanted to know if that was why I looked so different to-day—more as I had when I first came; and I said yes, that these were Marie things that Mary couldn't wear. And when he asked, "Why, pray?" in a voice almost cross, I told him, of course, that Aunt Jane wouldn't let me; that Mary had to wear brown serge and calfskin boots that were durable, and that would wear well.
And when I told him how sorry I was about the music and such a noise as I'd been making, he asked ifthatwas Marie's fault, too; and I said yes, of course—that Aunt Jane didn't like to have Mary play at all, except hymns and funeral marches, and Mary didn't know any. And he grunted a queer little grunt, and said, "Well, well, upon my soul, upon my soul!" Then he said, "Go on." And I did go on.
I told him how I was afraid itwasgoing to be just like Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde. (I forgot to say I've read it now. I found it in Father's library.) Of course notjustlike it, only one of me was going to be bad, and one good, I was afraid, if I didn't look out. I told him how Marie always wanted to kick up rugs, and move the chairs out of their sockets in the carpet, and leave books around handy, and such things. And so to-day it seemed as if I'd just got to have a vacation from Mary's hot gingham dresses and clumpy shoes. And I told him how lonesome I was without anybody, notanybody; and I told about Charlie Smith and Paul Mayhew and Mr. Claude Livingstone, and how Aunt Jane wouldn't let me have them, either, even if I was standing where the brook and river meet.
Father gave another funny little grunt here, and got up suddenly and walked over to the window. I thought at first he was angry; but he wasn't. He was even more gentle when he came back and sat down again, and he seemed interested, very much interested in everything I told him. But I stopped just in time from saying again how I wished I could go back to Boston; but I'm not sure but he knew I was going to say it.
But he was very nice and kind and told me not to worry about the music—that he didn't mind it at all. He'd been in several times and heard it. And I thought almost, by the way he spoke, that he'd come in on purpose to hear it; but I guess that was a mistake. He just put it that way so I wouldn't worry over it—about its bothering him, I mean.
He was going to say more, maybe; but I don't know, I had to run. I heard Aunt Jane's voice on the piazza saying good-bye to the lady that had brought her home; so, of course, I had to run and hang Marie in the closet and get out Mary from the corner before she saw me. And I did.
By dinner-time I had on the gingham dress and the hot clumpy shoes again; and I had washed my face in cold water so I had got most of the tear spots off. I didn't want Aunt Jane to see them and ask questions, of course. And I guess she didn't. Anyway, she didn't say anything.
Father didn't say anything either, but he acted queer. Aunt Jane tried to tell him something about the missionary meeting and the heathen, and a great famine that was raging. At first he didn't say anything; then he said, oh, yes, to be sure, how very interesting, and he was glad, very glad. And Aunt Jane was so disgusted, and accused him of being even more absent-minded than usual, which was entirely unnecessary, she said.
But even that didn't move Father a mite. He just said, yes, yes, very likely; and went on scowling to himself and stirring his coffee after he'd drank it all up—I mean, stirring where it had been in the cup.
I didn't know but after supper he'd speak to me and ask me to come to the library. Ihopedhe would. There were lots more things I'd like to have said to him. But he didn't. He never said a word. He just kept scowling, and got up from the table and went off by himself. But he didn't go out to the observatory, as he most generally does. He went into the library and shut the door.
He was there when the telephone message came at eight o'clock. And what do you think? He'dforgottenhe was going to speak before the College Astronomy Club that evening! Forgotten his old stars for once. I don't know why. I did think, for a minute, 'twas 'cause of me—what I'd told him. But I knew, of course, right away that it couldn't be that. He'd never forget his stars forme! Probably he was just reading up about some other stars, or had forgotten how late it was, or something. (Father's always forgetting things.) But, anyway, when Aunt Jane called him he got his hat and hurried off without so much as one word to me, who was standing near, or to Aunt Jane, who was following him all through the hall, and telling him in her most I'm-amazed-at-you voice how shockingly absent-minded he was getting to be.
* * * * *
One week later.
Father's been awfully queer this whole week through. I can't make him out at all. Sometimes I think he's glad I told him all those things in the parlor that day I dressed up in Marie's things, and sometimes I think he's sorry and wished I hadn't.
The very next morning he came down to breakfast with such a funny look on his face. He said good-morning to me three times, and all through breakfast he kept looking over at me with a kind of scowl that was not cross at all—just puzzled.
After breakfast he didn't go out to the observatory, not even into the library. He fidgeted around the dining-room till Aunt Jane went out into the kitchen to give her orders to Susie; then he burst out, all of a sudden:
"Well, Mary, what shall we do to-day?" Just like that he said it, as if we'd been doing things together every day of our lives.
"D-do?" I asked; and I know I showed how surprised I was by the way I stammered and flushed up.
"Certainly, do," he answered, impatient and scowling. "What shall we do?"
"Why, Father, I—I don't know," I stammered again.
"Come, come, of course you know!" he cried. "You know what you want to do, don't you?"
I shook my head. I was so astonished I couldn't even think. And when you can't think you certainly can't talk.
"Nonsense, Mary," scowled Father again. "Of course you know what you want to do! What are you in the habit of doing with your young friends—your Carries and Charlies, and all the rest?"
I guess I just stood and stared and didn't say anything; for after a minute he cried: "Well—well—well? I'm waiting."
"Why, we—we walk—and talk—and play games," I began; but right away he interrupted.
"Good! Very well, then, we'll walk. I'm not Carrie or Charlie, but I believe I can walk and talk—perhaps even play games. Who knows? Come, get your hat."
And I got my hat, and we went.
But what a funny, funny walk that was! He meant to make it a good one; I know he did. And he tried. He tried real hard. But he walked so fast I couldn't half keep up with him; then, when he saw how I was hurrying, he'd slow down, 'way down, and look so worried—till he'd forget and go striding off again, way ahead of me.
We went up on the hill through the Benton woods, and it was perfectly lovely up there. He didn't say much at first. Then, all of a sudden, he began to talk, about anything and everything. And I knew, by the way he did it, that he'd just happened to think he'd got to talk.
And how he talked! He asked me was I warmly clad (and here it is August!), and did I have a good breakfast, and how old was I, and did I enjoy my studies—which shows how little he was really thinking what he was saying. He knows school closed ages ago. Wasn't he teaching me himself the last of it, too? All around us were flowers and birds, and oh, so many, many lovely things. But he never said a word about them. He just talked—because he'd got to talk. I knew it, and it made me laugh inside, though all the while it made me sort of want to cry, too. Funny, wasn't it?
After a time he didn't talk any more, but just walked on and on; and by and by we came home.
Of course, it wasn't awfully jolly—that walk wasn't; and I guess Father didn't think it was either. Anyhow, he hasn't asked me to go again this week, and he looked tired and worried and sort of discouraged when he got back from that one.
But he's asked me to do other things. The next day after the walk he asked me to play to him. Yes, heaskedme to; and he went into the parlor and sat down on one of the chairs and listened while I played three pieces. Of course, I didn't play loud ones, nor very fast ones, and I was so scared I'm afraid I didn't play them very well. But he was very polite and said, "Thank you, Mary," and, "That that was very nice"; then he stood up and said, "Thank you" again and went away into the library, very polite, but stiff, like company.
The next evening he took me out to the observatory to see the stars. That was lovely. Honestly I had a perfectly beautiful time, and I think Father did, too. He wasn't stiff and polite one bit. Oh, I don't mean that he wasimpoliteor rude. It's just that he wasn't stiff as if I was company. And he was so happy with his stars and his telescope, and so glad to show them to me—oh, I had a beautiful time, and I told him so; and he looked real pleased. But Aunt Jane came for me before I'd had half enough, and I had to go to bed.
The next morning I thought he'd be different, somehow, because we'd had such a lovely time together the night before. But he wasn't. He just said, "Good-morning, Mary," and began to read his paper. And he read his paper all through breakfast without saying another word to me. Then he got up and went into the library, and I never saw him again all day except at dinner-time and supper-time, andthenhe didn't talk to me.
But after supper he took me out again to see the stars, and he was just as nice and friendly as could be. Not a bit like a man that's only a father by order of the court. But the next day—!
Well—and that's the way it's been all the week. And that's why I say he's been so queer. One minute he'll be just as nice and folksy as you could ask anybody to be, and the very next he's looking right through you as if he didn't see you at all, and you wonder and wonder what's the matter, and if you've done anything to displease him.
Sometimes he seems almost glad and happy, and then he'll look so sorry and sad!
I just can't understand my father at all.
* * * * *
Another week later.
I'm so excited I don't know what to do. The most wonderful thing has happened. I can't hardly believe it yet myself. Yet it's so. My trunk is all packed, and I'm to go home to-morrow.To-morrow!
This is the way it happened.
Mother wrote Aunt Jane and asked if I might not be allowed to come home for the opening of school in September. She said she understood quite well that she had norightto ask this, and, of course, if they saw fit, they were entirely within their rights to refuse to allow me to go until the allotted time. But that she could not help asking it for my sake, on account of the benefit to be derived from being there at the opening of the school year.
Of course, I didn't know Mother was going to write this. But she knew all about the school here, and how I came out, and everything. I've always told Mother everything that has happened. Oh, of course, I haven't written "every few minutes," as she asked me to. (That was a joke, anyway, of course.) But I have written every few days, and, as I said before, I told her everything.
Well, when the letter came I took it to Aunt Jane myself; and I wascrazyto know what was in it, for I recognized the writing, of course. But Aunt Jane didn't tell me. She opened it, read it, kind of flushed up, and said, "Humph! The idea!" under her breath, and put the letter in her pocket.
Marie wanted to make a scene and insist on knowing what was in her own mother's letter; but Mary contented herself with looking superb and haughty and disdainful, and marching out of the room without giving Aunt Jane the satisfaction of even being asked what was in that letter.
But at the table that noon Aunt Jane read it to Father out loud. So that's how I came to know just what was in it. She started first to hand it over to him to read; but as he put out his hand to take it I guess he saw the handwriting, for he drew back quickly, looking red and queer.
"From Mrs. Anderson to you?" he asked. And when Aunt Jane nodded her head he sat still farther back in his chair and said, with a little wave of his hand, "I never care to read—other people's letters."
Aunt Jane said, "Stuff and nonsense, Charles, don't be silly!" But she pulled back the letter and read it—after giving a kind of an uneasy glance in my direction.
Father never looked up once while she was reading it. He kept his eyes on his plate and the baked beans he was eating. I watched him. You see, I knew, by Aunt Jane's reading the letter to him, that it was something he had got to decide; and when I found out what it was, of course, I was just crazy. I wanted to go so. So I watched Father's face to see if he was going to let me go. But I couldn't make out. I couldn't make out at all. It changed—oh, yes, it changed a great deal as she read; but I couldn't make out what kind of a change it was at all.
Aunt Jane finished the letter and began to fold it up. I could see she was waiting for Father to speak; but he never said a word. He kept right on—eating beans.
Then Aunt Jane cleared her throat and spoke.
"You will not let her go, of course, Charles; but naturally I had to read the letter to you. I will write to Mrs. Anderson to-night."
Father looked up then.
"Yes," he said quietly; "and you may tell her, please, that Marywillgo."
"Charles!"
Aunt Jane said that. But I—I almost ran around the table and hugged him. (Oh, how I wish he was the kind of a father you could do that to!)
"Charles!" said Aunt Jane again. "Surely you aren't going to give in so tamely as this to that child and her mother!"
"I'm not giving in at all, Jane," said Father, very quietly again. "I am consulting my own wishes in the matter. I prefer to have her go."
I'most cried out then. Some way, ithurtto have him say it like that, right out—that hewantedme to go. You see, I'd begun to think he was getting so he didn't mind so very much having me here. All the last two weeks he'd been different, really different. But more of that anon. I'll go on with what happened at the table. And, as I said, I did feel bad to have him speak like that. And I can remember now just how the lump came right up in my throat.
Then Aunt Jane spoke, stiff and dignified.
"Oh, very well, of course, if you put it that way. I can quite well understand that you would want her to go—foryoursake. But I thought that, under the circumstances, you would manage somehow to put up with the noise and—"
"Jane!" Just like that he interrupted, and he thundered, too, so that Aunt Jane actually jumped. And I guess I did, too. He had sprung to his feet. "Jane, let us close this matter once for all. I am not letting the child go formysake. I am letting her go for her own. So far as I am concerned, if I consulted no one's wishes but my own, I should—keep her here always."
With that he turned and strode from the room, leaving Aunt Jane and me just staring after him.
But only for a minute didIstare. It came to me then what he had said—that he would like to keep me herealways. For I had heard it, even if he had said the last word very low, and in a queer, indistinct voice. I was sure I had heard it, and I suddenly realized what it meant. So I ran after him; and that time, if I had found him, I think Iwouldhave hugged him. But I didn't find him. He must have gone quite away from the house. He wasn't even out to the observatory. I went out to see.
He didn't come in all the afternoon. I watched for that, too. And when he did come—well, I wouldn't have dared to hug him then. He had his very sternest I-am-not-thinking-of-you-at-all air, and he just came in to supper and then went into the library without saying hardly anything. Yet, some way, the look on his face made me cry. I don't know why.
The next day he was more as he has been since we had that talk in the parlor. And hehasbeen different since then, you know. He really has. He has talked quite a lot with me, as I have said, and I think he's been trying, part of the time, to find something I'll be interested in. Honestly, I think he's been trying to make up for Carrie Heywood and Stella Mayhew and Charlie Smith and Mr. Livingstone. I think that's why he took me to walk that day in the woods, and why he took me out to the observatory to see the stars quite a number of times. Twice he's asked me to play to him, and once he asked me if Mary wasn't about ready to dress up in Marie's clothes again. But he was joking then, I knew, for Aunt Jane was right there in the house. Besides, I saw the twinkle in his eyes that I've seen there once or twice before. I just love that twinkle in Father's eyes!
But that hasn't come any since Mother's letter to Aunt Jane arrived. He's been the same in one way, yet different in another. Honestly, if it didn't seem too wildly absurd for anything, I should say he was actually sorry to have me go. But, of course, that isn't possible. Oh, yes, I know he said that day at the dinner-table that he should like to keep me always. But I don't think he really meant it. He hasn't acted a mite like that since, and I guess he said it just to hush up Aunt Jane, and make her stop arguing the matter.
Anyway, I'mgoingto-morrow. And I'm so excited I can hardly breathe.
Well, I came last night. Mother and Grandfather and Aunt Hattie and Baby Lester all met me at the station. And, my! wasn't I glad to see them? Well, I just guess I was!
I was specially glad on account of having such a dreadful time with Father that morning. I mean, I was feeling specially lonesome and homesick, and not-belonging-anywhere like.
You see, it was this way: I'd been sort of hoping, I know, that at the last, when I came to really go, Father would get back the understanding smile and the twinkle, and show that he reallydidcare for me, and was sorry to have me go. But, dear me! Why, he never was so stern and solemn, and you're-my-daughter-only-by-the-order-of-the-court sort of way as he was that morning.
He never even spoke at the breakfast-table. (He wasn't there hardly long enough to speak, anyway, and he never ate a thing, only his coffee—I mean he drank it.) Then he pushed his chair back from the table and stalked out of the room.
He went to the station with me; but he didn't talk there much, only to ask if I was sure I hadn't forgotten anything, and was I warmly clad. Warmly clad, indeed! And there it was still August, and hot as it could be! But that only goes to show how absent-minded he was, and how little he was really thinking ofme!
Well, of course, he got my ticket and checked my trunk, and did all those proper, necessary things; then we sat down to wait for the train. But did he stay with me and talk to me and tell me how glad he had been to have me with him, and how sorry he was to have me go, and all the other nice, polite things 'most everybody thinks they've got to say when a visitor goes away? He did not. He asked me again if I was sure I had not left anything, and was I warmly clad; then he took out his newspaper and began to read. That is, he pretended to read; but I don't believe he read much, for he never turned the sheet once; and twice, when I looked at him, he was looking fixedly at me, as if he was thinking of something. So I guess he was just pretending to read, so he wouldn't have to talk to me.
But he didn't even do that long, for he got up and went over and looked at a map hanging on the wall opposite, and at a big time-table near the other corner. Then he looked at his watch again with a won't-that-train-ever-come? air, and walked back to me and sat down.
And how do you supposeIfelt, to have him act like that before all those people—to show so plainly that he was just longing to have me go? I guess he wasn't any more anxious for that train to come thanIwas. And it did seem as if it never would come, too. And it didn't come for ages. It was ten minutes late.
Oh, I did so hope he wouldn't go down to the junction. It's so hard to be taken care of "because it's my duty, you know"! But he went. I told him he needn't, when he was getting on the train with me. I told him I just knew I could do it beautifully all by myself, almost-a-young lady like me. But he only put his lips together hard, and said, cold, like ice: "Are you then so eager to be rid of me?" Just as ifIwas the one that was eager to get rid of somebody!
Well, as I said, he went. But he wasn't much better on the train than he had been in the station. He was as nervous and fidgety as a witch, and he acted as if he did so wish it would be over and over quick. But at the junction—at the junction a funny thing happened. He put me on the train, just as Mother had done, and spoke to the conductor. (How I hated to have him do that! Why, I'm six whole months older, 'most, than I was when I went up there!) And then when he'd put me in my seat (Father, I mean; not the conductor), all of a sudden he leaned over and kissed me;kissed me—Father! Then, before I could speak, or even look at him, he was gone; and I didn't see him again, though it must have been five whole minutes before that train went.
I had a nice trip down to Boston, though nothing much happened. This conductor was not near so nice and polite as the one I had coming up; and there wasn't any lady with a baby to play with, nor any nice young gentleman to loan me magazines or buy candy for me. But it wasn't a very long ride from the junction to Boston, anyway. So I didn't mind. Besides, I knew I had Mother waiting for me.
And wasn't I glad to get there? Well, I just guess I was! Andtheyacted as if they were glad to see me—Mother, Grandfather, Aunt Hattie, and even Baby Lester. He knew me, and remembered me. He'd grown a lot, too. And they said I had, and that I looked very nice. (I forgot to say that, of course, I had put on the Marie clothes to come home in—though I honestly think Aunt Jane wanted to send me home in Mary's blue gingham and calfskin shoes. As if I'd have appeared in Boston inthatrig!)
My, but it was good to get into an automobile again and justgo! And it was so good to have folks around you dressed in something besides don't-care black alpaca and stiff collars. And I said so. And Mother seemed so pleased.
"You did want to come back to me, darling, didn't you?" she cried, giving me a little hug. And she looked so happy when I told her all over again how good it seemed to be Marie again, and have her and Boston, and automobiles, and pretty dresses and folks and noise again.
She didn't say anything about Father then; but later, when we were up in my pretty room alone, and I was taking off my things, she made me tell her that Fatherhadn'twon my love away from her, and that Ididn'tlove him better than I did her; and that Iwouldn'trather stay with him than with her.
Then she asked me a lot of questions about what I did there, and Aunt Jane, and how she looked, and Father, and was he as fond of stars as ever (though she must have known 'most everything, 'cause I'd already written it, but she asked me just the same). And she seemed real interested in everything I told her.
And she asked was he lonesome; and I told her no, I didn't think so; and that, anyway, he could have all the ladies' company he wanted by just being around when they called. And when she asked what I meant, I told her about Mrs. Darling, and the rest, and how they came evenings and Sundays, and how Father didn't like them, but would flee to the observatory. And she laughed and looked funny, for a minute. But right away she changed and looked very sober, with the kind of expression she has when she stands up in church and says the Apostles' Creed on Sunday; only this time she said she was very sorry, she was sure; that she hoped my father would find some estimable woman who would make a good home for him.
Then the dinner-gong sounded, and she didn't say any more.
There was company that evening. The violinist. He brought his violin, and he and Mother played a whole hour together. He's awfully handsome. I think he's lovely. Oh, I do so hope he'stheone! Anyhow, I hope there'ssomeone. I don't want this novel to all fizzle out without there beinganyone to make it a love story! Besides, as I said before, I'm particularly anxious that Mother shall find somebody to marry her, so she'll stop being divorced, anyway.
* * * * *
A month later.
Yes, I know it's beenagessince I've written here in this book; but there just hasn't been a minute's time.
First, of course, school began, and I had to attend to that. And, of course, I had to tell the girls all about Andersonville—except the parts I didn't want to tell, about Stella Mayhew, and my coming out of school. I didn't tellthat. And right here let me say how glad I was to get back to this school—a real school—so different from that one up in Andersonville! For that matter,everything'sdifferent here from what it is in Andersonville. I'd so much rather be Marie than Mary. I know I won't ever be Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde here. I'll be the good one all the time.
It's funny how much easier it is to be good in silk stockings and a fluffy white dress than it is in blue gingham and calfskin. Oh, I'll own up that Marie forgets sometimes and says things Mary used to say; like calling Olga a hired girl instead of a maid, as Aunt Hattie wants, and saying dinner instead of luncheon at noon, and some other things.
I heard Aunt Hattie tell Mother one day that it was going to take about the whole six months to break Mary Marie of those outlandish country ways of hers. (So, you see, it isn't all honey and pie even for Marie. This trying to be Mary and Marie, even six months apart, isn't the easiest thing ever was!) I don't think Mother liked it very well—what Aunt Hattie said about my outlandish ways. I didn't hear all Mother said, but I knew by the way she looked and acted, and the little I did hear, that she didn't care for that word "outlandish" applied to her little girl—not at all.
Mother's a dear. And she's so happy! And, by the way, I think itisthe violinist. He's here a lot, and she's out with him to concerts and plays, and riding in his automobile. And she always puts on her prettiest dresses, and she's very particular about her shoes, and her hats, that they're becoming, and all that. Oh, I'm so excited! And I'm having such a good time watching them! Oh, I don't mean watching them in a disagreeable way, so that theyseeit; and, of course, I don't listen—not the sneak kind of listening. But, of course, I have to get all I can—for the book, you know; and, of course, if I just happen to be in the window-seat corner in the library and hear things accidentally, why, that's all right.
And I have heard things.
He says her eyes are lovely. He likes her best in blue. He's very lonely, and he never found a woman before who really understood him. He thinks her soul and his are tuned to the same string. (Oh, dear! That sounds funny and horrid, and not at all the way it did whenhesaid it. It was beautiful then. But—well, that is what it meant, anyway.)
She told him she was lonely, too, and that she was very glad to have him for a friend; and he said he prized her friendship above everything else in the world. And he looks at her, and follows her around the room with his eyes; and she blushes up real pink and pretty lots of times when he comes into the room.
Now, if that isn't making love to each other, I don't know whatis.I'm sure he's going to propose. Oh, I'm so excited!
Oh, yes, I know if he does propose and she says yes, he'll be my new father. I understand that. And, of course, I can't help wondering how I'll like it. Sometimes I think I won't like it at all. Sometimes I almost catch myself wishing that I didn't have to have any new father or mother. I'dneverneed a new mother, anyway, and I wouldn't need a new father if my father-by-order-of-the-court would be as nice as he was there two or three times in the observatory.
But, there! After all, I must remember that I'm not the one that's doing the choosing. It's Mother. And if she wants the violinist I mustn't have anything to say. Besides, I really like him very much, anyway. He's the best of the lot. I'm sure of that. And that's something. And then, of course, I'm glad to have something to make this a love story, and best of all I would be glad to have Mother stop being divorced, anyway.
Mr. Harlow doesn't come here any more, I guess. Anyway, I haven't seen him here once since I came back; and I haven't heard anybody mention his name.
Quite a lot of the others are here, and there are some new ones. But the violinist is here most, and Mother seems to go out with him most to places. That's why I say I think it's the violinist.
I haven't heard from Father.
Now just my writing that down that way shows that Iexpectedto hear from him, though I don't really see why I should, either. Of course, he neverhaswritten to me; and, of course, I understand that I'm nothing but his daughter by order of the court. But, some way, I did think maybe he'd write me just a little bit of a note in answer to mine—my bread-and-butter letter, I mean; for of course, Mother had me write that to him as soon as I got here.
But he hasn't.
I wonder how he's getting along, and if he misses me any. But of course, he doesn't dothat. If I was a star, now—!
* * * * *
Two days after Thanksgiving.
The violinist has got a rival. I'm sure he has. It's Mr. Easterbrook. He's old—much as forty—and bald-headed and fat, and has got lots of money. And he's a very estimable man. (I heard Aunt Hattie say that.) He's awfully jolly, and I like him. He brings me the loveliest boxes of candy, and calls me Puss. (I don't likethat, particularly. I'd prefer him to call me Miss Anderson.) He's not nearly so good-looking as the violinist. The violinist is lots more thrilling, but I shouldn't wonder if Mr. Easterbrook was more comfortable to live with.
The violinist is the kind of a man that makes you want to sit up and take notice, and have your hair and finger nails and shoes just right; but with Mr. Easterbrook you wouldn't mind a bit sitting in a big chair before the fire with a pair of old slippers on, if your feet were tired.
Mr. Easterbrook doesn't care for music. He's a broker. He looks awfully bored when the violinist is playing, and he fidgets with his watch-chain, and clears his throat very loudly just before he speaks every time. His automobile is bigger and handsomer than the violinist's. (Aunt Hattie says the violinist's automobile is a hired one.) And Mr. Easterbrook's flowers that he sends to Mother are handsomer, too, and lots more of them, than the violinist's. Aunt Hattie has noticed that, too. In fact, I guess there isn't anything about Mr. Easterbrook that she doesn't notice.
Aunt Hattie likes Mr. Easterbrook lots better than she does the violinist. I heard her talking to Mother one day. She said that any one that would look twice at a lazy, shiftless fiddler with probably not a dollar laid by for a rainy day, when all the while there was just waiting to be picked an estimable gentleman of independent fortune and stable position like Mr. Easterbrook—well, she had her opinion of her; that's all. She meant Mother, of course.Iknew that. I'm no child.
Mother knew it, too; and she didn't like it. She flushed up and bit her lip, and answered back, cold, like ice.
"I understand, of course, what you mean, Hattie; but even if I acknowledged that this very estimable, unimpeachable gentleman was waiting to be picked (which I do not), I should have to remind you that I've already had one experience with an estimable, unimpeachable gentleman of independent fortune and stable position, and I do not care for another."
"But, my dear Madge," began Aunt Hattie again, "to marry a man withoutanymoney—"
"I haven't married him yet," cut in Mother, cold again, like ice. "But let me tell you this, Hattie. I'd rather live on bread and water in a log cabin with the man I loved than in a palace with an estimable, unimpeachable gentleman who gave me the shivers every time he came into the room."
And it was just after she said this that I interrupted. I was right in plain, sight in the window-seat reading; but I guess they'd forgotten I was there, for they both jumped a lot when I spoke. And yet I'll leave it to you if what I said wasn't perfectly natural.
"Of course, you would, Mother!" I cried. "And, anyhow, if you did marry the violinist, and you found out afterward you didn't like him, that wouldn't matter a mite, for you could _un_marry him at any time, just as you did Father, and—"
But they wouldn't let me finish. They wouldn't let me say anything more. Mother cried, "Marie!" in her most I'm-shocked-at-you voice; and Aunt Hattie cried, "Child—child!" And she seemed shocked, too. And both of them threw up their hands and looked at each other in the did-you-ever-hear-such-a-dreadful-thing? way that old folks do when young folks have displeased them. And them they both went right out of the room, talking about the unfortunate effect on a child's mind, and perverted morals, and Mother reproaching Aunt Hattie for talking about those things before that child (meaning me, of course). Then they got too far down the hall for me to hear any more. But I don't see why they needed to have made such a fuss. It wasn't any secret that Mother got a divorce; and if she got one once, of course she could again. (That's what I'm going to do when I'm married, if I grow tired of him—my husband, I mean.) Oh, yes, I know Mrs. Mayhew and her crowd don't seem to think divorces are very nice; but there needn't anybody try to make me think that anything my mother does isn't perfectly nice and all right. Andshegot a divorce. So, there!
* * * * *
One week later.
There hasn't much happened—only one or two things. But maybe I'd better tell them before I forget it, especially as they have a good deal to do with the love part of the story. And I'm always so glad to get anything of that kind. I've been so afraid this wouldn't be much of a love story, after all. But I guess it will be, all right. Anyhow, IknowMother's part will be, for it's getting more and more exciting—about Mr. Easterbrook and the violinist, I mean.
They both want Mother. Anybody can see that now, and, of course,Mother sees it. But which she'll take I don't know. Nobody knows. It'sperfectly plain to be seen, though, which one Grandfather and AuntHattie want her to take! It's Mr. Easterbrook.
And he is awfully nice. He brought me a perfectly beautiful bracelet the other day—but Mother wouldn't let me keep it. So he had to take it back. I don't think he liked it very well, and I didn't like it, either. Iwantedthat bracelet. But Mother says I'm much too young to wear much jewelry. Oh, will the time ever come when I'll be old enough to take my proper place in the world? Sometimes it seems as if it never would!
Well, as I said, it's plain to be seen who it is that Grandfather and Aunt Hattie favor; but I'm not so sure about Mother. Mother acts funny. Sometimes she won't go with either of them anywhere; then she seems to want to go all the time. And she acts as if she didn't care which she went with, so long as she was just going—somewhere. I think, though, she really likes the violinist the best; and I guess Grandfather and Aunt Hattie think so, too.
Something happened last night. Grandfather began to talk at the dinner-table. He'd heard something he didn't like about the violinist, I guess, and he started in to tell Mother. But they stopped him. Mother and Aunt Hattie looked at him and then at me, and then back to him, in their most see-who's-here!—you-mustn't-talk-before-her way. So he shrugged his shoulders and stopped.
But I guess he told them in the library afterwards, for I heard them all talking very excitedly, and some loud; and I guess Mother didn't like what they said, and got quite angry, for I heard her say, when she came out through the door, that she didn't believe a word of it, and she thought it was a wicked, cruel shame to tell stories like that just because they didn't like a man.
This morning she broke an engagement with Mr. Easterbrook to go auto-riding and went with the violinist to a morning musicale instead; and after she'd gone Aunt Hattie sighed and looked at Grandfather and shrugged her shoulders, and said she was afraid they'd driven her straight into the arms of the one they wanted to avoid, and that Madge alwayswouldtake the part of the under dog.