AAt the end of two weeks, Missy's opinion of the new comers had suffered no change, and her mother's had not improved. Miss Rothermel, after she had seen them drive out one day, took occasion to go to the house and leave Mrs. and Miss Varian's cards, and her own. This visit had been very promptly returned by the two ladies, whom Missy had not been as happy in escaping in her own house, as in theirs. Mrs. Varian also saw them; they were effusive, cordial to suffocation, adroit; they had evidently changed their minds about the war, and meant to know the ground better before they engaged the enemy. She found them clever and amusing; they had traveled a good deal, and seen much of the world. They were also superficially cultivated, and were familiar with some of the outposts of art and literature. They had studied and read just enough to make them glib, and they had tact enough not to go beyond their depth. Many a deep and quietstudent had been abashed before the confident facility of the pretty Flora in the ateliers where she had studied abroad; and at home, it is needless to say she overwhelmed her cotemporaries with her advantages and her successes. What she could not decently relate, herself, of these and of her social triumphs, her mother related for her. The daughter, in return, told of her mother's wonderful abilities and influence; of the Countess This's friendship for her, the Lady That's indebtedness; there was nothing wanting to fill up the picture. They did not spare details; in fact, after awhile, the details became a great bore, though at first they amused everybody, whether everybody believed in them or not. In short, they were not first class artists in puff, only clever amateurs; but in a country where this art is in its infancy, they imposed upon a good many.
At the end of two weeks, Missy's opinion of the new comers had suffered no change, and her mother's had not improved. Miss Rothermel, after she had seen them drive out one day, took occasion to go to the house and leave Mrs. and Miss Varian's cards, and her own. This visit had been very promptly returned by the two ladies, whom Missy had not been as happy in escaping in her own house, as in theirs. Mrs. Varian also saw them; they were effusive, cordial to suffocation, adroit; they had evidently changed their minds about the war, and meant to know the ground better before they engaged the enemy. She found them clever and amusing; they had traveled a good deal, and seen much of the world. They were also superficially cultivated, and were familiar with some of the outposts of art and literature. They had studied and read just enough to make them glib, and they had tact enough not to go beyond their depth. Many a deep and quietstudent had been abashed before the confident facility of the pretty Flora in the ateliers where she had studied abroad; and at home, it is needless to say she overwhelmed her cotemporaries with her advantages and her successes. What she could not decently relate, herself, of these and of her social triumphs, her mother related for her. The daughter, in return, told of her mother's wonderful abilities and influence; of the Countess This's friendship for her, the Lady That's indebtedness; there was nothing wanting to fill up the picture. They did not spare details; in fact, after awhile, the details became a great bore, though at first they amused everybody, whether everybody believed in them or not. In short, they were not first class artists in puff, only clever amateurs; but in a country where this art is in its infancy, they imposed upon a good many.
Missy often had occasion to wonder whether Mr. Andrews was imposed upon or not; he of course might want to marry his cousin, without believing that so many other people had wanted to. But she longed to know whether he saw through their palpable little feminine schemes, whether he knew them for the cheats they were, and was just going into it because he was fascinated with the young woman's pretty looks and sprightly ways, and because the older woman knew how to order him good dinners and keep the children quiet.
For, that he was going into it, she would not permit herself to doubt. He looked rather preoccupied and uncomfortable when she saw him. He had come over one evening alone, to propose some drive or expedition, in which she had promptly refused to take part. Another evening, he had come accompanied by Miss Flora, who had made a jest of her unconventionality, and had been pert and lively to an astonishing degree, but who had wished herself away many times before the call was over, and who had said bitter things to her escort about the stiff household, on her way home. The evenings at the beach gate were at an end; the distance between the two houses had grown into a chasm. The children, ah! that was the hardest part, came less and less frequently, and Jay was as spoiled and changed as Missy, in her greatest despondency, had imagined. Continued petting and present-giving had established a certain tie between him and his cousin, and the sight of Missy always seemed to stir up all the evil in him, or perhaps all the contradictory good. At all events, he was so palpably bad with her, that he gave a text that Mrs. Eustace was not slack in preaching on—to wit, her pernicious influence upon him. Mr. Andrews was a silent man; he did not say amen to any of these comminations, neither did he contradict them.
The chasm between the two houses hourly grew in breadth. Miss Rothermel had never called after the first. All the advances had to be made by the new-comers. Miss Varian had, indeed, been rather troublesome, and had invited the young lady to read to her, and that had been the excuse for several morning visits. But even her persistence was not proof against the coldness of the young lady of the house, and finally she ceased to come at all. The people in the neighborhood had called upon them, and they had been invited to whatever was going on, which, though it was not much, was enough to keep their spirits up. They were quite popular, the mother was called a charming person, thedaughter extremely clever, playing like an artist, painting like a genius, and with such lovely manners, too. Of course, every one said Mr. Andrews would marry her, or break his heart about her. They wondered how Miss Rothermel would take it, and Miss Flora was not slow to express to everybody to whom she had a chance to express it, her regret that Miss Rothermel did not seem to like her, and her innocent wonder what could be the cause.
"For I am not used to being snubbed," she would say. "I don't know why it is, but people generally seem to like me. I suppose it's because I'm good-natured, and don't make any trouble. I know, of course, it's nothing in me different from other people; it's only that I'm happy and all that. But Miss Rothermel seems to hate me, actually. She really is quite rude; and I may say it to you, scarcely lady-like in her treatment of me. Mamma is so incensed about it, and I think it troubles Mr. Andrews, who is so kind, and wants our summer here to be without a cloud. But it isn't worth thinking about. I can't help being happy, and having a beatific time, even if she isn't pleased about it."
Sailing parties, and drives, and whist and sketching parties had all been refused by the severe little lady next door; but at last there came an invitation which she made up her mind to accept. It was to dinner, and Mrs. Varian had said it must be done. She was troubled a little at the attitude in which Missy had placed herself, though she could not help sympathizing with her in her dislike of the two strangers.
"Am I fine enough, mamma?" said Missy, presenting herself before her mother, at seven o'clock, oneevening the latter part of August. She was fine, indeed, in a pale grey dress, with a train that was imposing, and sleeves to the elbow, with beautiful lace, and an open throat with lace, and lovely stockings, and the most bewildering little shoes. She had a string of pearls around her neck, and gloves with no end of buttons, and a great color on her cheeks, and a deal of light in her pale eyes.
"Am I fine enough, mamma?"
"Fine enough, my dear? you are actually pretty; I wish you did not have to go away. I should like to look at you all the evening."
Miss Flora was not able to wear pearls of that magnitude, nor lace of that value; she dressed strikingly, but of necessity, rather cheaply, and her cheap finery galled her, in the presence of such elegance. Missy looked much better than usual; Flora looked much worse, having sailed with Mr. Andrews all the morning, till she had a red tinge on her nose, and a swollen look about her eyelids and lips. The wind had been very strong and the sun very bright, and Miss Flora had forgotten to put on a veil. She had had a very nice sail, but—it was unfortunate that there was to be dinner company that evening. Darkness and cold cream would have put her all right, if she could have taken refuge in them instead of facing all that light and all those people.
The mother also was a little fretted at some of the domestic arrangements. The cook had given warning that morning, and the waitress was doing her worst; the gardener had insulted her point-blank, and the grocer and the butcher hadn't kept their word. Mr. Andrews liked a good dinner and no bother; it was buttoo probable that he wouldn't have the one to-day, and would have the other to-morrow, when the servants came to him with their grievances. When to this was added the inflamed state of Flora's complexion, she felt as if her cup were full, and her eyes were spiteful as they dwelt on Missy, though her smiles were bountiful.
Mr. Andrews was silent, after he had spoken to Missy on her arrival, and they all stood about the room aimlessly, before dinner was ready. If Mrs. Eustace had stood in a nearer relation to him, what a sharp little shot he would have had in his ear for not talking to his guests! He had been talking, quite respectably, for him, to one of the Miss Olors, when Miss Rothermel came in. Since that occurrence he had been silent, and Flora had had to speak to him twice before he could be made even to look at her. This gave a sharp little ring to the young lady's laugh, but he did not remark it, probably.
When dinner was announced, he went straight to Miss Rothermel and offered his arm. But Mrs. Eustace pressed forward and told him he had forgotten, and that he was to take Miss Olor in. She laughed and told Miss Rothermel she hoped she would excuse him; he was the most absent of men.
"Dear Mr. Andrews," she said, "never remembers the claim of young girls; Flora and Lily Olor sat by themselves all last evening while he entertained Mrs. Eve and her sister. Duty is always first."
"Oh, then I am duty?" murmured Missy, drawing back, hardly knowing what she said. Mr. Andrews stood speechless with an awkwardness worthy of ayounger man, waiting to know whom he was to take if he was not to take Miss Rothermel.
"I don't mean, dear Miss Rothermel," she cried, "that it wouldn't be a pleasure to take you. We all know nobody can talk half so well or knows half so much. But Dr. Rogers is to have that pleasure, and Miss Lily falls to Mr. Andrews' share. You know, dear Mr. Andrews, we talked it all over this morning, but you are so forgetful."
Mr. Andrews said to himself, "We didn't do anything of the kind;" but it wasn't exactly the thing to say aloud, and he was obliged to content himself with taking pretty Miss Olor and seeing Miss Rothermel made over to the doctor, who had already diffused an odor of paregoric and rhubarb through the room.
Now the doctor was not a man generally invited out to dinner at Yellowcoats. He was underbred and elderly, and rather stupid. He did not expect to be invited, and nobody could have been more surprised than he to receive this invitation. He was indebted to his middle-agedness for it, and to his stupidity. Mrs. Eustace thought he would be a charming neighbor for Miss Rothermel, and the fact that he was a widower made it a beautiful satire.
The clergyman of the parish took in Mrs. Eustace to dinner; next to him came Missy, and then the doctor. Opposite, were a mamma and a papa of the young people at the other end of the table—a mamma, that is, of one, and a papa of another. At Mr. Andrews' end of the table they were all young and vivacious: two young Olors, two young men from town, and Miss Flora, who was youth itself. They were very vivacious—a thought too much so, for beings who were out ofschool. They laughed and talked about things which seemed to have grown up during their mushroom summer intimacy. Nobody could have seen any thing to laugh at in what they laughed about; their manners put every one else outside. Mr. Andrews seemed to be within the circle; he had heard the jokes so often, he seemed to understand them, and though it was possible that he was bored, he recovered himself sufficiently to be civil. Mrs. Eustace's end of the table was a notable contrast, as it was meant to be. She had been obliged to ask Missy (for whom in fact the dinner was given), but she had planned to make her as uncomfortable as possible.
The reverend gentleman was not a conversationalist, the medical one was heavier than lead. The mamma and papa were solid and undertook their dinner materially. Mrs. Eustace made talk diligently. She questioned the clergyman about his Sunday school, the doctor about his patients, she appealed to Miss Rothermel and the mamma opposite about subjects of domestic interest. She treated Missy as the cotemporary of herself and this mamma; she spoke in extenuation of the "young people's" shortcomings at the other end of the table; she begged these two mature ladies not to tell anybody in Yellowcoats what a noisy set they were. Dear Mr. Andrews, she said, enjoyed it so much. It was such a boon to him to have a cheerful home. He was like another man; only that morning he had told her he had not realized what a miserable life he had been leading till they came. And the children, poor neglected darlings, she could not bear to think of what they had had to endure for the past few months.
"I have dismissed their nurse," here she turned to the mamma. "I have found her a most untrusty person. She goes to-morrow. I have been so fortunate in securing a servant I have had at different times for several years. She is a capable, uncompromising creature, and admirable in the government of children. But here I am running on about the children; I beg you will excuse me, I know it isn't table-talk. Dear Miss Rothermel, tell me about your aunt's rheumatism."
The blow about Eliza's going away had been almost too much for Missy's fortitude. Mrs. Eustace looked at her critically, while she waited for the report of Miss Varian's rheumatism.
"I am afraid that isn't table-talk either," she managed to say; but at the moment the darlings in question came into the room, and all eyes were turned to them. Flora opened her arms for Jay to spring into, which he did with considerable roughness. Gabrielle sidled up to Mrs. Eustace, who embraced her with a warmth most beautiful to see, and made a place for her beside her, for dessert was on the table. The children had left off their mourning, and Gabrielle was braw with sashes and trinkets. As soon as Jay caught sight of Missy, he began to fret; not to go to her, but she evidently made him unhappy, and he kept looking at her furtively, and dashing about the glasses and making plunges for things out of his reach, and acting as the worst kind of a story-book boy acts, who is held up as a warning. Flora kept her temper admirably, and bore his kicks and pushes with a beaming sweetness. He also tore her lace, which, though cheap, was her own, and possibly her all.
"He always acts so badly when Miss Rothermel is near," she said, sotto voce, to her neighbors. "I don't know what it is. I suppose sensitively organized children feel the influence of temperament, don't you suppose they do? And really, don't laugh, but that's just the way Miss Rothermel always makesmefeel—restless and fretful, and as if I'd like to break things, and maybe kick somebody."
This made them all laugh, even Mr. Andrews, who turned such an admiring, smiling gaze upon the sunburned Flora, as to fill her with genuine courage.
"Dear Jay," she said, caressing him, "they're laughing at me."
"They ain't," said Jay, loud enough for all the table to hear, "they're laughing at Missy, and you made 'em."
"O, fie," cried Mrs. Eustace, half frightened and half pleased. "Your Flo never did anything so naughty. Little boys sometimes misunderstand."
Missy felt as if she wanted to cry; it was such an enemy's country she was in. She was generally quite ready to defend herself, but this time she had not a word to say; her eyes fell, and her sensitive face showed her pain. Everybody tried not to look at her, but did look at her, of course, and then they tried to talk of other things so diligently as to be apparent. The dinner was wretched after this; a sort of damp crept over every one, even in the youth's department, as Flora called their end of the table. Mr. Andrews never said a word, good or bad, to any one, and that is not a convivial example for a host to set. The dinner had not been a very good one, although pretentious, and Mrs. Eustace had secret stings of apprehension from his silence. She did not know whether it arose from annoyance about the disrespect to Missy, or from disapprobation of the ducks, which were dried up and skinny, and one could fancy had a taste of smoke. The dessert was tame, and the coffee tepid. Contrasted with the perfection of the ménage next door, it was a very shabby dinner, and Mrs. Eustace felt really vicious when she watched Miss Rothermel, scarcely attempting to taste the successive failures set before her. But if the truth were known, it was not contempt for the failures, but real inability to eat. She had been galled and wounded beyond her power to show fight; she only asked to get out of it all, and to be let alone. Even Mrs. Eustace saw she had perhaps gone too far, as she heard the quiver in Missy's voice, when called upon to answer some question at a time that everyone was listening. Mr. Andrews might think she had as much transcended her part in insulting his guest, as she had fallen below it in not preparing him a good dinner; she telegraphed to Flora to discontinue. Flora, in alarm, discontinued, but the ship did not right itself. The mamma and the papa could not recover themselves, the doctors of medicine and theology were helpless in the emergency, the young people were in confusion, Mr. Andrews was struck speechless; it was a total wreck.
The ladies got into the parlor somehow—the gentleman got through their smoking somehow. When they met there afterward, it was to find a very silent party; the young ladies were yawning and declaring themselves worn out with the sailing party of the morning. Missy was sitting in a chair by the window, her face away from the rest of the party. Jay wasstanding in a chair beside her, pulling at the drapery of the window, and talking in a very big-boy tone, but in reality very much comforted by being with her. She had one hand stretched up to take hold of his skirt, for he was rather in danger of tumbling, notwithstanding his grand talk. Missy understood him, and was satisfied of his affection. Mr. Andrews walked straight up to her, not noticing anybody else as he came into the room. She felt herself color fiercely before she turned her face around, for she knew that he was coming.
"Have you and Jay made friends?" he said, unfortunately.
"I did not know we had quarreled," she returned. She would have resented anything he said, not having forgotten his approving glance at Flora, when she made them all laugh at her.
"I am awfully sorry," began Mr. Andrews, in a low tone, looking at the carpet. But Missy didn't permit him to finish the sentence.
"Oh, Mr. Andrews, that is such an old story. You are always being awfully sorry, but it never prevents things happening. I think the only way is not to give them a chance to happen. I want to go home now, if you will see if my maid is come."
Mr. Andrews went to see if the maid had come. She had, and was having a beautiful time in the kitchen with the servants. What Mr. Andrews was thinking of when he came back into the parlor it was difficult to guess from his face. He might have been angry, he might have been bored, he might have been wounded. He certainly wasn't in a good humor. He merely said to Miss Rothermel that her servant was inthe hall, and then stood aside as she moved away, only bowing as she said good-night, and, with a kiss to Jay, and as few words as possible to the others, passed out of the room.
"The only way is not to give such things a chance to happen," she said to herself, all in a quiver, as she went out into the night, and the door shut behind her. She heard a not very suppressed noise of laughter in the parlor, as she passed the windows going off the piazza. She had crossed that threshold for the last, last time, she said to herself. And this time she kept her resolution.
MRS. HAZARD SMATTER.
TThe two houses were now at open war, at least the female part of them. Jay was forbidden, without any secresy, to go into his neighbor's grounds, Gabrielle was in an ecstasy of gossip all the while, and brought Flora news, true and false, continually. She spied through the hedge, and found the new servants and her high-minded cousins ready to receive a report of all she discovered,i.e., if it were reported in a whisper. Mr. Andrews seemed to have given up all attempts to reconcile the contending parties. He never went to the Varians' now, nor made any effort to exchange neighborly courtesies.
The two houses were now at open war, at least the female part of them. Jay was forbidden, without any secresy, to go into his neighbor's grounds, Gabrielle was in an ecstasy of gossip all the while, and brought Flora news, true and false, continually. She spied through the hedge, and found the new servants and her high-minded cousins ready to receive a report of all she discovered,i.e., if it were reported in a whisper. Mr. Andrews seemed to have given up all attempts to reconcile the contending parties. He never went to the Varians' now, nor made any effort to exchange neighborly courtesies.
Missy was very bitter and unhappy, about these days. She knew what all Yellowcoats was saying about Mr. Andrews and his cousin, for they said that to her openly. And she surmised what they did not say openly to her, to wit: that the cause of her own unhappy looks was her disappointment in the matter. How can one help unhappy looks? One can help unhappy words; one can do all sorts of things that are meant to mean happy acts, but how to keep the cloud off one's face at all hours and moments, is an art yet in the bowels of time. Missy knew she looked unhappy, and she knew she could not dissemble it. She knew, by this time, that she was jealous, and jealous not only in the matter of Jay. She knew that, deride him as she might, the silent widower was an object of interest to her. She did not yet acknowledge to herself that she cared for him, but she did acknowledge that it was important to her that he cared for her, that he gave her a certain sort of admiration. Alas! she felt a doubt now whether he gave her even a small degree of respect. For who can respect a jealous woman? And she had been jealous, even before she saw her rival, or knew more of her than that she might be her rival.
There is nothing kills self-respect like jealousy. Missy hated and despised herself from the moment that she knew she was jealous. She felt herself no longer mistress of her words and actions. Begin the morning with the best resolutions in the world, before noon she would have said or done something that upset them all. She had such evil thoughts of others, such an eating, burning discontent with herself. She remembered her childish days, when her jealousy of herstepfather made her a little fiend. "I was brought up on it, I learned it with my alphabet,—it is not my fault, it is my fate," she said to herself with bitterness.
It was very fortunate perhaps, as she could dissemble so ill, that the two houses saw so little of each other. Flora was not of a jealous nature, and it seemed as if she had very little to be jealous about. She was having it all her own way apparently, and she longed to flaunt her triumphs in her rival's face. That was the one thing that she felt she was not succeeding in. She could not be sure Missy knew it, every time she went out to drive with Mr. Andrews, and that took away half the pleasure. Miss Rothermel kept herself so much out of reach of criticism it was unsatisfactory. Pure speculation grew tiresome. It was the longing of Flora's heart to have another meeting, and to display Mr. Andrews, but Missy baulked her. At church it could have been accomplished, but most unhappily Mr. Andrews wouldn't go to church (at least with them). His amiable and accomplished cousins could make him do a good deal, but they couldn't make him do that. Neither could they make him talk about his neighbors nor laugh at any of their sarcasms.
About this time, Miss Varian had a friend to stay with her. Mrs. Varian was always rather shy of her sister's friends; they were apt to be unusual people. This one, however, Mrs. Varian remembered in her youth, and had no doubt would be of an unobjectionable kind. Mrs. Hazard Smatter had been an inoffensive New York girl, not considered to carry very heavy guns, but good-looking and good-natured. That was the last Miss Varian knew of her. In the revolution of years she turned up again, now a middle-aged woman, withfeeble gray hair, and misgivings about revealed religion. She had married a Bostonian, and that had been too much for her. She despised her former condition so much as not to desire to allude to it. She was filled with lofty aspirations and cultivated herself. There was nothing that she did not look into, though it was doubtful whether she saw very much when she did look. Having begun rather late, she had to hurry a good deal to know all that was to be known about History, Science, Art, Theology, and Literature; and as these rivers of human thought are continually flowing on, and occasionally altering their channels, it was perhaps excusable that while she kept up, she sometimes lost her breath, and was a little unintelligible. If it had only been one river, but there was such a lot of them, and of course a person of culture can't ignore even a little boiling spring that has just burst out. There's no knowing what it may develop into; one must watch its course, and not let it get ahead of one. Taking notes on the universe is hard work, and Mrs. Hazard Smatter felt that her gray hair was so to be accounted for. It was her one feminine weakness, the one remnant of her pre-cultured state, that led her to call it premature.
What with dress reform, and want of taste, she was not a woman to reproach with personal vanity. She was rather a little person. She had pale blue eyes somewhat prominent; a high forehead, which retreated, and a small chin, which did, too. She attributed these defects to her place of nativity, and drew many inferences about the habits and mental peculiarities of her ancestors, which wouldn't have pleased them if they'd known about it. She had a very candidmind, and of course no family pride, and it was quite surprising to hear her talk on this subject.
Mrs. Varian was quite frightened the first evening. Miss Harriet was delighted. She always had liked the dangerous edge of things, and had felt herself defrauded in being forced to live among such conventional people as her sister's friends. Mrs. Smatter was so unexpectedly changed from the commonplace comrade of her youth, that she could not be thankful enough that she had sent for her. The first evening they only got through Inherited Traits, the History of Modern Thought, the Subjection of Women, and a few other light and airy themes, which were treated, of course, exhaustively. To Miss Varian, it was a foretaste of rich treats in store.
"Mamma," cried Missy, when she was alone with Mrs. Varian, "what kind of creature have we got hold of?"
"I can't classify her," said her mother. "But I am afraid it will be very hard to use hospitality without grudging towards a woman who talks so about her grandfather, and who knows so much more than we do about the sacerdotal systems of the prehistoric races."
"I'd much rather she'd talk of things I don't understand, than of things I do. How long do you suppose she is going to stay?"
"I am afraid Harriet will never be willing to let her go, she seems so charmed with her."
"Don't you think she might be persuaded to take Aunt Harriet home to Boston with her, to live? Fancy, a few minds to tea two or three times a week, and on the alternate nights, lectures, and clubs, and classes.It is just what Aunt Harriet needs, indeed it is. See if you can't lead up to it, mamma."
The next morning, when Missy passed the guest's room, the door of which stood open, she was surprised to see a complete revolution in the furniture. The rugs had all been taken away, the curtains, unhooked and folded up, were lying on a chair, the sofa and two upholstered chairs were rolled away into the adjoining chamber. The bed, pushed out into the room, stood in a most awkward attitude at right angles with nothing. On the pillow was pinned a pocket compass, which indicated due north. Goneril, who was putting the room in order, with set teeth, explained that it was by the lady's orders, who had instructed her that her bed must always stand at exactly that angle, on account of the electric currents.
"I take it," said the woman, "she doesn't like to ride backwards."
The rugs were liable to contain disease germs, as well as the upholstered furniture, and she had intimated that she would like the walls rubbed down with carbolic once or twice a week.
"I told her," snapped Goneril, "that we weren't a hospital, no more were we a hotel."
It was well that the duster was not made of anything sterner than feathers, or the delicate ornaments of the dressing-table would have had a hard time of it, for she brushed with increased vehemence as she got worked up in talking. "She told me she would have preferred straw for her bed, but it was no matter now, as it was all made up. Straw was the only thing for beds, she said, and to be changed once a week. I'm sorry I didn't take her at her word. I know sheenjoys the springs and the new mattress, and if it hadn't been for the trouble, I'd have given her her fill of straw, and lumpy straw at that. I told her I was used to clean and decent Christian folks, who didn't need to have their beds burned once a week, and who didn't carry diseases about with them, and who could get along without carbolic. And as to carrying up water enough to flush a sewer every night and morning, I wouldn't do it for her nor any other woman, clean or dirty. And as to being called up at twelve o'clock at night to look at the thermometer and to close the window an inch and a quarter, and to spread a blanket over her feet to keep the temperature of her body from going a little bit too low—and then being called up at five to look again, and to take the blanket off, and to see that it didn't get a little too high,—it's just a trifle more than I can bear. I hope the new woman will like it, when she comes.I'mgoing next week, Wednesday, and that's the end of it."
"I am ashamed of you, Goneril; you're not going to do anything of the sort. Don't upset Miss Varian by talking so to her. Let her have a little peace, if she likes Mrs. Smatter."
"I'm the one to talk about being upset. It's bad enough to wait on an old vixen like Miss Varian, but when it comes to waiting on all her company, and when her company are fools and idiots, I say it's time to go. I've put up with a good deal in this house. I've come down in the world, but that's no reason I should put up with everything. It's one thing to say you'll be obliging and sleep in a room that's handy, so you could be called if anything extraordinary happened, where the person you're looking after is afflicted ofProvidence. But it's another thing to be broke of your rest two nights running to keep count of the thermometer over a well woman who hasn't sense enough to know when she's hot and when she's cold. It's bad enough to be Help anyhow, but it ain't worth while to be walked over. I can stand folks that's got some sense, even if they've got some temper. But people like this, jumbling up almanacs and doctors' books, and free thinkin' tracts; them I can't stand, and what's more, I won't stand, and there's an end of it."
There wouldn't have been an end of it, though, if Miss Rothermel had not got up and walked away. There is a limit beyond which even American Farmers' Daughters must not be permitted to go, and Goneril had certainly reached that limit, and as she would have talked on for an hour in steadily increasing vehemence, there was nothing but for Missy to go away, with silent disapprobation, and wish the visitor well out of the house. The visitor she found at the breakfast-table, blandly stirring her weak tea, and waiting for her oatmeal to have an additional fifteen minutes on the fire. The cook had been called in and acknowledged that the oatmeal had only had two hours of cooking. Mrs. Smatter had explained, on exact scientific principles, the necessity of boiling oatmeal two hours and thirty-five minutes, and the wheels of breakfast stood still while this was being accomplished. The cook was in a rage, for oatmeal was one of her strong points, and she always boiled it two hours. Miss Varian was growing distrustful of everything. Mrs. Smatter had raised her suspicions about the adulteration of all the food on the table. Even the water, she found, wasn't filtered with the proper filter, and therewas salt enough in the potatoes to destroy the tissues of a whole household. She desired the waitress to have a pitcher of water boiled for her, and then iced; and she would be glad if she would ask the grocer where he got his salt.
By dinner time Miss Varian's usual good appetite was destroyed; she was so engaged in speculating about the assimilation of her food, that she had a bad indigestion. When evening came, she was so fretful she was almost inclined to quarrel with her new-found friend. As they sat around the lamp, Mrs. Smatter became a little restless because the conversation showed a tendency to degenerate into domestic or commonplace channels; she strove to buoy it up with æsthetic, speculative, scientific bladders, as the case might be. Missy pricked one or two of these, by asking some question which wasn't in Mrs. Smatter's catechism; but, nothing daunted, she would inflate another, and go sailing on to the admiration of her hearers.
A letter had come from St. John, in which he gave some hope that he might return in the autumn, though he entered into no explanation of the reason for such a change of plan. Missy was all curiosity, and her mother was all solicitude, but they naturally did not talk much to each other about it, and of course did not wish it alluded to in Mrs. Smatter's presence. Miss Varian, however, asked questions, and brought the subject forward with persistence. It seemed to Miss Rothermel profanation to have her brother's name spoken by this woman. What was her dismay to hear Mrs. Smatter say, settling herself into a speculative attitude:
"I hear, Mrs. Varian, that your son is in one ofthose organizations they call brotherhoods. I should like very much, if you don't mind, if you would tell me something about his youth, and how you brought him up, and what traces you saw of this tendency, and how you account for it."
"I don't understand," faltered Mrs. Varian. "Do you mean—his education—or—or—"
"I mean," said Mrs. Smatter, "was he physically strong, and properly developed, and did you attend to his diet? I should have thought oatmeal and fish and phosphates might have counteracted this tendency; that is, of course, if you could have anticipated it."
"He has always been in very fine health," said the mother.
"Indeed! That seems inexplicable. I have always felt these things could be accounted for, if one were inclined to look into it. Itmustbe the result of something abnormal, you know. If we could look into the matter, I am sure we should find the monastic idea had a physical basis."
"Indeed!" said Miss Varian, tartly. "Well, I shouldn't have thought it had anything of the kind. No more than that the culinary idea had a spiritual basis."
"I have always thought," remarked Mrs. Smatter, ignoring the interruption, "that science would do well to study individual cases of this kind, to ascertain the cause of the mental bias. It would be useful to know the reason of the imperfect development of the brain, for instance, of this young man, who represents a class becoming, I am told, quite numerous. Do you remember, dear Mrs. Varian, any accident in childhood—any fall?"
"I really think you've got beyond your depth," cried Miss Varian, under the spur of indigestion and family feeling. "If I were you I would talk about things I understood a little. St. John Varian isn't down in your books, my dear. You can't take him in any more than you can the planet Jupiter, and you'd better not try."
"Indeed," said Mrs. Smatter, a little uneasy. "Is he so very remarkable an entity?"
"I don't know anything about his entity, but he has a good brain of his own, if you want to know that, and he didn't fall down stairs when he was a child, any more than St. Charles Borromeo, or St. Francis Xavier, or Lacordaire did. But then, perhaps you think they did, if it were only looked into. Fancy what a procession of them, bumping down the stairs of time, or tumbling out of trees of knowledge that they'd been forbidden to climb up."
Missy laughed, a little hysterically, and that irritated Miss Varian, whose indigestion was really very bad, and who was naturally opposed to Missy, and who was ashamed to find herself tackling her guest in this way and upholding the unpardonable step of St. John in the hearing of his mother, who was to blame for it. It was exasperating, and she didn't know whom to hit, or rather, whom not to hit, she was so out of patience with everybody.
"If you'd give up the phosphates," she said, "and inquire into the way he was brought up, you might get more satisfaction. How he was drilled and drilled and made to read saints' lives, and told legends of the martyrs when he was going to bed, and made to believe that all that was nice and jolly in life was tobe given up almost before you got it, and that all the sins in the decalogue were to be confessed, almost before you'd committed them; if you'd look intothis, you might get a little light upon your subject."
"Ah!" said Mrs. Smatter, interested, "perhaps that might account—"
"Aunt Harriet," cried Missy, getting up, and letting her work fall on the floor—spools, thimble and scissors dispersing themselves in corners—"Aunt Harriet, there is a limit—"
"A limit to what? Superstition and priest-craft—maudlin sentiment and enervating influence—"
"Mamma, won't you go up stairs with me?" cried Missy, and there was no time given Mrs. Smatter for further speculation, or Miss Varian for further aggression. After the door closed behind them, Miss Varian's wrath rose against her inquisitive friend, and family feeling carried the day.
"You'd better drop the subject of St. John, permanently," she said with decision.
And Mrs. Smatter accommodatingly offered to read her a treatise on the Artistic Dualism of the Renaissance, with which the evening closed.
A GARDEN PARTY.
TThe summer had come to its end, to its very last day. Mrs. Hazard Smatter still lingered at Yellowcoats, notwithstanding the defective sanitary arrangements and the absence of stimulating mental contact. Miss Varian had felt considerable mortification that her friend should know she lived in such an atmosphere, and was always speaking of it apologetically and as temporarily stagnant. She had however given Mrs. Varian no rest till she had consented to see that it was her duty to provide some social entertainment for Mrs. Smatter, something, of course, inadequate to the mental needs of that lady, but something that would show her that she was still in the midst of civilized life. A lady who used familiarly the names that Mrs. Smatter did, could not of course be dazzled by the doctor or the rector. But she could be made to see that they had a good many young women who dressed well and several men who were good style. And there were two painters, and a stray architect or so, and a composer, staying in the place. These were not much, to make a show against the minds to which Mrs. Smatter was accustomed, but they were better than nothing. Therefore, Mrs. Varian must have at least two headaches, and Missy at least three days' work writing her invitations and getting up her garden party.
The summer had come to its end, to its very last day. Mrs. Hazard Smatter still lingered at Yellowcoats, notwithstanding the defective sanitary arrangements and the absence of stimulating mental contact. Miss Varian had felt considerable mortification that her friend should know she lived in such an atmosphere, and was always speaking of it apologetically and as temporarily stagnant. She had however given Mrs. Varian no rest till she had consented to see that it was her duty to provide some social entertainment for Mrs. Smatter, something, of course, inadequate to the mental needs of that lady, but something that would show her that she was still in the midst of civilized life. A lady who used familiarly the names that Mrs. Smatter did, could not of course be dazzled by the doctor or the rector. But she could be made to see that they had a good many young women who dressed well and several men who were good style. And there were two painters, and a stray architect or so, and a composer, staying in the place. These were not much, to make a show against the minds to which Mrs. Smatter was accustomed, but they were better than nothing. Therefore, Mrs. Varian must have at least two headaches, and Missy at least three days' work writing her invitations and getting up her garden party.
Now, a garden party is a charming thing, wheneverything is favorable. All the neighborhood was delighted at the prospect, for invitations to garden parties were not rife in Yellowcoats, and the Varians' place was unusually nice for such a thing.
The weather had been close and warm for several days, and the deep shade of the trees upon the lawn and the cooling ripple of the water beyond had entered into the picture everyone had drawn of the projected garden party. But on the morning of that day, a cold east wind set in, and dashes of rain fell about noon—then the sky grew leaden from having been gusty and mottled, and though no more rain fell, the wind was as raw as November, and the chill was something that ate to one's very marrow. A garden party! the very idea became grotesque. A warming-pan party, a chimney-corner party, a range, a furnace-party, would all have been more to the purpose.
But people came, and shivered and looked blue. They huddled together in the house, where fires were lighted, and gazed out of windows at the cold water and the dreary lawn. A few daring spirits braved the blast, and went out to play lawn-tennis and a little feeble archery. But their courage did not keep them long at it in gauze de Chambery and India mull. One by one they dropped away and came shaking back into the house.
Mrs. Smatter was quite above being affected by the weather. She expected to hold high carnival with the painters and the architect, who were of course presented to her at once. The composer, a grim, dark man, looking like a Mexican cut-throat, held off. He preferred young women, and did not care to talk about Wagner out of office hours. The architect was a mildyoung person, not at all used to society, and he very soon broke down. Mrs. Smatter was a little agitated by this, and did not discriminate between her painters; she talked about the surface muscles to the landscape man, and about cloud effects to the figure painter. This confused everybody, and they severally bowed themselves away as soon as they could, and Mrs. Smatter ever after spoke with great contempt of the culture of Yellowcoats. She was obliged to content herself with the doctor and the rector, who did not dare to go away while she was asking them questions and giving them information, which she never ceased doing till the entertainment ended.
As to Missy, the whole thing was such a vexation and disappointment she scarcely knew how to bear it. The bright fires and the flowers, and the well-ordered entertainment redeemed it somewhat, but it remained a burlesque upon a garden party, and would never be what it was meant to be. The people from next door had come—Miss Flora in a new gown, and the mother all beaming in a bonnet crowned with buttercups; Mr. Andrews very silent and a trifle awkward. There were too many people to make it necessary to say many words to them when they came in, and they were presently scattered among the crowd.
An hour later, Missy, with her cheeks flushed from the talking and the warm rooms, went out of the summer parlor and across the lawn to a pair of young people who had been silly enough to stay there till there was danger of their being made ill by the cold. She had promised an anxious mamma by the fire to see that her daughter had a shawl or came in, and had just delivered the message and the shawl and turnedaway from the obdurate little idiot, who would not give up her flirtation even to escape pneumonia, when she saw that Mr. Andrews had followed her.
"It is a very unlucky day for my garden party," she said, as he joined her. "The sky and the water like ink, and a wind that actually howls."
"I wanted to speak to you a moment," he said, as if he had not noticed what she was saying. "Will you take cold here for a moment?"
"No," she answered, feeling her cheeks burn.
"This has been an unlucky summer in some ways, Miss Rothermel, but now it's over; and before we part, I want to say a few words to you."
"Certainly," said Missy, distantly. "I hope you're not going away soon?"
"I've taken passage for the 6th, that is a week from to-day, and I don't know when we shall return—very possibly not for several years."
There was a pause, while Missy got her voice steady and staggered up from under the blow.
"I've been unlucky this summer, as I said, and seem to have managed to give you offense by everything I did."
Now, no woman likes to be told she's not sweet-tempered, even if she knows she is a spitfire, and this nettled Missy sharply, and steadied her voice considerably.
"I am sorry," she said, "that you think me so unamiable, but I don't exactly know why you should think it well to tell me of it."
"I haven't told you that you were unamiable; I have told you that I hadn't been able to do thething that pleased you, though Heaven knows I've tried hard enough."
"It's a pity that I'm such a dragon. Poor little Jay, even, is afraid of me by this time, isn't he?"
"I don't know about Jay. I'm rather stupid about things, I'm afraid. Women perplex me very much."
Missy drew the scarf that she had picked up in the hall as she came out, about her shoulders, and beat her foot upon the gravel as if she were cold and a trifle tired of Mr. Andrews' sources of perplexity.
"What I wanted to say," he went on, "is, that I thank you always for what you've been to the children."
"Ah, please," she cried, with a gesture of impatience.
"And that I shall always regret the misstep that I took in bringing my cousins here. I did it in the hope that it would make it possible for you to come familiarly to my house and remove all the annoyances from which you had suffered. I made a mistake, it has all gone wrong. As I said before, I don't understand your sex, and it is best, I suppose, that I should give up trying to. Only there are some things that I should think you might express to a woman as you would to a man. I desire to say I am sorry to have given pain and annoyance to you all the time, as I and mine seem to have been the means of doing. I have great cause to feel grateful to you, and nothing can ever change the high esteem in which I hold you."
"Thank you very much," said Missy; "not even the opinion of the ladies of your household?"
Mr. Andrews turned his head away, with a stolid look towards the lead-colored bay.
"I don't suppose anything will be gained by discussing them," he said.
"No, Mr. Andrews, for I don't like them, and you know when women don't like each other they are apt to be unreasonable."
Mr. Andrews was silent, and his silence roused a fire of jealousy in his companion's mind. Why did he not say to her that he despised them, that he saw through them, that he did not think her prejudice against them in the least unreasonable?
"We shall get cold if we stay here any longer I'm afraid," she said, moving slowly forward up the path.
Mr. Andrews walked beside her for a moment without speaking, then he said very deliberately:
"You have given me much pain, at various times, Miss Rothermel, and a heavy disappointment, but nothing can ever alter my regard for you. A man, I suppose, has no right to blame a woman for disliking him; he can only blame her for misleading him—"
The path from the beach-gate to the house was too short—too short, ah, by how much! they were already at the steps. Missy glanced up and saw more than one eager and curious pair of eyes gazing down upon the tête-à-tête. It was over, it was ended, and Missy, as in a dream, walked up the steps and into the chattering groups that stood about the summer parlor. She knew all now—what she had thrown away, what her folly of jealousy had cost her. The mists of suspicion and passion rolled away, and she saw all. Many a woman, younger and older, has seen the same, the miserable, inevitable sight—jealousy dead, and hope along with it.
The cold wind had not taken the flush out of hercheeks; she walked about the parlors and talked to the guests, and, to her own surprise, knew their names and what they said to her. Since she had gone out upon the lawn to take the shawl to the foolish virgin there, the world had undergone a revolution that made her stagger. Such a strong tide had borne her chance of happiness away from her, already almost out of sight, she wondered that she could stand firm and watch it go. What a babble of voices! How wiry and shrill and imbecile the clanging of tongues! It was all like a dream. The woman whom she had dreaded, unmasked and harmless walked before her, a trifler among triflers, a poor rival indeed. The man whom she had lost stood there silent in a group of flippant talkers, more worthy and more manly now that he was beyond her reach. What was the use of regretting? No use. What was the use of anything? No use.
Miss Rothermel looked uncommonly well, they said to each other driving home, almost pretty, really, and so young. What could that tête-à-tête have signified between her and Mr. Andrews? He was evidently out of spirits. What an odd thing it would be after all if he had really liked her. There was something queer about it all. Going abroad with his cousins, however, didn't much look like it. It was a puzzle, and they gave it up.
P. P. C.