Whilst skies are blue and bright.Whilst flowers are gay,Whilst eyes that change ere nightMake glad the day;Whilst yet the calm hours creep,Dream thou--and from thy sleepThen wake to weep.
Whilst skies are blue and bright.Whilst flowers are gay,Whilst eyes that change ere nightMake glad the day;Whilst yet the calm hours creep,Dream thou--and from thy sleepThen wake to weep.
Shelley.
Shelley.
The days of summer flew by, for the most part lightly, over the heads of Hugh and Fleda. The farm was little to them but a place of pretty and picturesque doings and the scene of nameless delights by wood and stream, in all which, all that summer, Fleda rejoiced; pulling Hugh along with her even when sometimes he would rather have been poring over his books at home. She laughingly said it was good for him; and one half at least of every fine day their feet were abroad. They knew nothing practically of the dairy but that it was an inexhaustible source of the sweetest milk and butter, and indirectly of the richest custards and syllabubs. The flock of sheep that now and then came in sight running over the hill-side, were to them only an image of pastoral beauty and a soft link with the beauty of the past. The two children took the very cream of country life. The books they had left were read with greater eagerness than ever. When the weather was "too lovely to stay in the house," Shakspeare or Massillon or Sully or the "Curiosities of Literature" or "Corinne" or Milner's Church History, for Fleda's reading was as miscellaneous as ever, was enjoyed under the flutter of leaves and along with the rippling of the mountain spring; whilst King curled himself up on the skirt of his mistress's gown and slept for company; hardly more thoughtless and fearless of harm than his two companions. Now and then Fleda opened her eyes to see that her uncle was moody and not like himself, and that her aunt's gentle face was clouded in consequence; and she could not sometimes help the suspicion that he was not making a farmer of himself; but the next summer wind would blow these thoughts away, or the next look of her flowers would put them out of her head. The whole courtyard in front of the house had been given up to her peculiar use as a flower-garden, and there she and Hugh made themselves very busy.
But the summer-time came to an end.
It was a November morning, and Fleda had been doing some of the last jobs in her flower-beds. She was coming in with spirits as bright as her cheeks, when her aunt's attitude and look, more than usually spiritless, suddenly checked them. Fleda gave her a hopeful kiss and asked for the explanation.
"How bright you look, darling!" said her aunt, stroking her cheek.
"Yes, but you don't, aunt Lucy. What has happened?"
"Mary and Jane are going away."
"Going away!--What for?"
"They are tired of the place--don't like it, I suppose."
"Very foolish of them! Well, aunt Lucy, what matter? we can get plenty more in their room."
"Not from the city--not possible; they would not come at this time of year."
"Sure?--Well, then here we can at any rate."
"Here! But what sort of persons shall we get here? And your uncle--just think!"--
"O but I think we can manage," said Fleda. "When do Mary and Jane want to go?"
"Immediately!--to-morrow--they are not willing to wait till we can get somebody. Think of it!"
"Well let them go," said Fleda,--"the sooner the better."
"Yes, and I am sure I don't want to keep them; but--" and Mrs. Rossitur wrung her hands--"I haven't money enough to pay them quite,--and they won't go without it."
Fleda felt shocked--so much that she could not help looking it.
"But can't uncle Rolf give it you?"
Mrs. Rossitur shook her head. "I have asked him."
"How much is wanting?"
"Twenty-five. Think of his not being able to give me that!"--Mrs. Rossitur burst into tears.
"Now don't, aunt Lucy!"--said Fleda, guarding well her own composure;--"you know he has had a great deal to spend upon the farm and paying men, and all, and it is no wonder that he should be a little short just now,--now cheer up!--we can get along with this anyhow."
"I asked him," said Mrs. Rossitur through her tears, "when he would be able to give it to me; and he told me he didn't know!--"
Fleda ventured no reply but some of the tenderest caresses that lips and arms could give; and then sprang away and in three minutes was at her aunt's side again.
"Look here, aunt Lucy," said she gently,--"here is twenty dollars, if you can manage the five."
"Where did you get this?" Mrs. Rossitur exclaimed.
"I got it honestly. It is mine, aunt Lucy," said Fleda smiling. "Uncle Orrin gave me some money just before we came away, to do what I liked with; and I haven't wanted to do anything with it till now."
But this seemed to hurt Mrs. Rossitur more than all the rest. Leaning her head forward upon Fleda's breast and clasping her arms about her she cried worse tears than Fleda had seen her shed. If it had not been for the emergency Fleda would have broken down utterly too.
"That it should have come to this!--I can't take it, dear Fleda!"--
"Yes you must, aunt Lucy," said Fleda soothingly. "I couldn't do anything else with it that would give me so much pleasure. I don't want it--it would lie in my drawer till I don't know when. We'll let these people be off as soon as they please. Don't take it so--uncle Rolf will have money again--only just now he is out, I suppose--and we'll get somebody else in the kitchen that will do nicely--you see if we don't."
Mrs. Rossitur's embrace said what words were powerless to say.
"But I don't know how we're to find any one here in the country--I don't know who'll go to look--I am sure your uncle won't want to,--and Hugh wouldn't know--"
"I'll go," said Fleda cheerfully;--"Hugh and I. We can do famously--if you'll trust me. I won't promise to bring home a French cook."
"No indeed--we must take what we can get. But you can get no one to-day, and they will be off by the morning's coach--what shall we do to-morrow,--for dinner? Your uncle--"
"I'll get dinner," said Fleda caressing her;--"I'll take all that on myself. It sha'n't be a bad dinner either. Uncle Rolf will like what I do for him I dare say. Now cheer up, aunt Lucy!--do--that's all I ask of you. Won't you?--for me?"
She longed to speak a word of that quiet hope with which in every trouble she secretly comforted herself--she wanted to whisper the words that were that moment in her own mind, "Truly I know that it shall be well with them that fear God;"--but her natural reserve and timidity kept her lips shut; to her grief.
The women were paid off and dismissed and departed in the next day's coach from Montepoole. Fleda stood at the front door to see them go, with a curious sense that there was an empty house at her back, and indeed upon her back. And in spite of all the cheeriness of her tone to her aunt, she was not without some shadowy feeling that soberer times might be coming upon them.
"What is to be done now?" said Hugh close beside her.
"O we are going to get somebody else," said Fleda.
"Where?"
"I don't know!--You and I are going to find out."
"You and I!--"
"Yes. We are going out after dinner, Hugh dear," said she turning her bright merry face towards him,--"to pick up somebody."
Linking her arm within his she went back to the deserted kitchen premises to see how her promise about taking Mary's place was to be fulfilled.
"Do you know where to look?" said Hugh.
"I've a notion;--but the first thing is dinner, that uncle Rolf mayn't think the world is turning topsy turvy. There is nothing at all here, Hugh!--nothing in the world but bread--it's a blessing there is that. Uncle Rolf will have to be satisfied with a coffee dinner to-day, and I'll make him the most superb omelette--that my skill is equal to! Hugh dear, you shall set the table.--You don't know how?--then you shall make the toast, and I will set it the first thing of all. You perceive it is well to know how to do everything, Mr. Hugh Rossitur."
"Where did you learn to make omelettes?" said Hugh with laughing admiration, as Fleda bared two pretty arms and ran about the very impersonation of good-humoured activity. The table was set; the coffee was making; and she had him established at the fire with two great plates, a pile of slices of bread, and a toasting-iron.
"Where? Oh don't you remember the days of Mrs. Renney? I have seen Emile make them. And by dint of trying to teach Mary this summer I have taught myself. There is no knowing, you see, what a person may come to."
"I wonder what father would say if he knew you had made all the coffee this summer!"
"That is an unnecessary speculation, my dear Hugh, as I have no intention of telling him. But see!--that is the way with speculators! 'While they go on refining'--the toast burns!"
The coffee and the omelette and the toast and Mr. Rossitur's favourite French salad, were served with beautiful accuracy; and he was quite satisfied. But aunt Lucy looked sadly at Fleda's flushed face and saw that her appetite seemed to have gone off in the steam of her preparations. Fleda had a kind of heart-feast however which answered as well.
Hugh harnessed the little wagon, for no one was at hand to do it, and he and Fleda set off as early as possible after dinner. Fleda's thoughts had turned to her old acquaintance Cynthia Gall, who she knew was out of employment and staying at home somewhere near Montepoole. They got the exact direction from aunt Miriam who approved of her plan.
It was a pleasant peaceful drive they had. They never were alone together, they two, but vexations seemed to lose their power or be forgotten; and an atmosphere of quietness gather about them, the natural element of both hearts. It might refuse its presence to one, but the attraction of both together was too strong to be resisted.
Miss Cynthia's present abode was in an out of the way place, and a good distance off; they were some time in reaching it. The barest-looking and dingiest of houses, set plump in a green field, without one softening or home-like touch from any home-feeling within; not a flower, not a shrub, not an out-house, not a tree near. One would have thought it a deserted house, but that a thin wreath of smoke lazily stole up from one of the brown chimneys; and graceful as that was it took nothing from the hard stern barrenness below which told of a worse poverty than that of paint and glazing.
"Can this be the place?" said Hugh.
"It must be. You stay here with the horse, and I'll go in and seek my fortune.--Don't promise much," said Fleda shaking her head.
The house stood back from the road. Fleda picked her way to it along a little footpath which seemed to be the equal property of the geese. Her knock brought an invitation to "come in."
An elderly woman was sitting there whose appearance did not mend the general impression. She had the same dull and unhopeful look that her house had.
"Does Mrs. Gall live here?"
"I do," said this person.
"Is Cynthia at home?"
The woman upon this raised her voice and directed it at an inner door.
"Lucindy!" said she in a diversity of tones,--"Lucindy!--tell Cynthy here's somebody wants to see her."--But no one answered, and throwing the work from her lap the woman muttered she would go and see, and left Fleda with a cold invitation to sit down.
Dismal work! Fleda wished herself out of it. The house did not look poverty-stricken within, but poverty must have struck to the very heart, Fleda thought, where there was no apparent cherishing of anything. There was no absolute distress visible, neither was there a sign of real comfort or of a happy home. She could not fancy it was one.
She waited so long that she was sure Cynthia did not hold herself in readiness to see company. And when the lady at last came in it was with very evident marks of "smarting up" about her.
"Why it's Flidda Ringgan!" said Miss Gall after a dubious look or two at her visitor. "Howdoyou do? I didn't 'spect to seeyou. How much you have growed!"
She looked really pleased and gave Fleda's hand a very strong grasp as she shook it.
"There ain't no fire here to-day," pursued Cynthy, paying her attentions to the fireplace,--"we let it go down on account of our being all busy out at the back of the house. I guess you're cold, ain't you?"
Fleda said no, and remembered that the woman she had first seen was certainly not busy at the back of the house nor anywhere else but in that very room, where she had found her deep in a pile of patchwork.
"I heerd you had come to the old place. Were you glad to be back again?" Cynthy asked with a smile that might be taken to express some doubt upon the subject.
"I was very glad to see it again."
"I hain't seen it in a great while. I've been staying to hum this year or two. I got tired o' going out," Cynthy remarked, with again a smile very peculiar and Fleda thought a little sardonical. She did not know how to answer.
"Well, how do you come along down yonder?" Cynthy went on, making a great fuss with the shovel and tongs to very little purpose. "Ha' you come all the way from Queechy?"
"Yes. I came on purpose to see you, Cynthy."
Without staying to ask what for, Miss Gall now went out to "the back of the house" and came running in again with a live brand pinched in the tongs, and a long tail of smoke running after it. Fleda would have compounded for no fire and no choking. The choking was only useful to give her time to think. She was uncertain how to bring in her errand.
"And how is Mis' Plumfield?" said Cynthy, in an interval of blowing the brand.
"She is quite well; but Cynthy, you need not have taken all that trouble for me. I cannot stay but a few minutes."
"There is wood enough!" Cynthia remarked with one of her grim smiles; an assertion Fleda could not help doubting. Indeed she thought Miss Gall had grown altogether more disagreeable than she used to be in old times. Why, she could not divine, unless the souring effect had gone on with the years.
"And what's become of Earl Douglass and Mis' Douglass? I hain't heerd nothin' of 'em this great while. I always told your grandpa he'd ha' saved himself a great deal o' trouble if he'd ha' let Earl Douglass take hold of things. You ha'n't got Mr. Didenhover into the works again I guess, have you? He was there a good spell after your grandpa died."
"I haven't seen Mrs. Douglass," said Fleda. "But Cynthy, what do you think I have come here for?"
"I don't know," said Cynthy, with another of her peculiar looks directed at the fire. "I s'pose you want someh'n nother of me."
"I have come to see if you wouldn't come and live with my aunt, Mrs. Rossitur. We are left alone and want somebody very much; and I thought I would find you out and see if we couldn't have you, first of all,--before I looked for anybody else."
Cynthy was absolutely silent. She sat before the fire, her feet stretched out towards it as far as they would go and her arms crossed, and not moving her steady gaze at the smoking wood, or the chimney-back, whichever it might be; but there was in the corners of her mouth the threatening of a smile that Fleda did not at all like.
"What do you say to it, Cynthy?"
"I reckon you'd best get somebody else," said Miss Gall with a kind of condescending dryness, and the smile shewing a little more.
"Why?" said Fleda, "I would a great deal rather have an old friend than a stranger."
"Be you the housekeeper?" said Cynthy a little abruptly.
"O I am a little of everything," said Fleda;--"cook and housekeeper and whatever comes first. I want you to come and be housekeeper, Cynthy."
"I reckon Mis' Rossitur don't have much to do with her help, does she?" said Cynthy after a pause, during which the corners of her mouth never changed. The tone of piqued independence let some light into Fleda's mind.
"She is not strong enough to do much herself, and she wants some one that will take all the trouble from her. You'd have the field all to yourself, Cynthy."
"Your aunt sets two tables I calculate, don't she?"
"Yes--my uncle doesn't like to have any but his own family around him."
"I guess I shouldn't suit!" said Miss Gall, after another little pause, and stooping very diligently to pick up some scattered shreds from the floor. But Fleda could see the flushed face and the smile which pride and a touch of spiteful pleasure in the revenge she was taking made particularly hateful. She needed no more convincing that Miss Gall "wouldn't suit;" but she was sorry at the same time for the perverseness that had so needlessly disappointed her; and went rather pensively back again down the little foot-path to the waiting wagon.
"This is hardly the romance of life, dear Hugh," she said as she seated herself.
"Haven't you succeeded?"
Fleda shook her head.
"What's the matter?"
"O--pride,--injured pride of station! The wrong of not coming to our table and putting her knife into our butter."
"And living in such a place!" said Hugh.
"You don't know what a place. They are miserably poor, I am sure; and yet--I suppose that the less people have to be proud of the more they make of what is left. Poor people!--"
"Poor Fleda!" said Hugh looking at her. "What will you do now?"
"O we'll do somehow," said she cheerfully. "Perhaps it is just as well after all, for Cynthy isn't the smartest woman in the world. I remember grandpa used to say he didn't believe she could get a bean into the middle of her bread."
"A bean into the middle of her bread!" said Hugh.
But Fleda's sobriety was quite banished by his mystified look, and her laugh rang along over the fields before she answered him.
That laugh had blown away all the vapours, for the present at least, and they jogged on again very sociably.
"Do you know," said Fleda, after a while of silent enjoyment in the changes of scene and the mild autumn weather,--"I am not sure that it wasn't very well for me that we came away from New York."
"I dare say it was," said Hugh,--"since we came; but what makes you say so?"
"I don't mean that it was for anybody else, but for me. I think I was a little proud of our nice things there."
"You,Fleda!" said Hugh with a look of appreciating affection.
"Yes I was, a little. It didn't make the greatest part of my love for them, I am sure; but I think I had a little, undefined, sort of pleasure in the feeling that they were better and prettier than other people had."
"You are sure you are not proud of your little King Charles now?" said Hugh.
"I don't know but I am," said Fleda laughing. "But how much pleasanter it is here on almost every account. Look at the beautiful sweep of the ground off among those hills--isn't it? What an exquisite horizon line, Hugh!"
"And what a sky over it!"
"Yes--I love these fall skies. Oh I would a great deal rather be here than in any city that ever was built!"
"So would I," said Hugh. "But the thing is--"
Fleda knew quite well what the thing was, and did not answer.
"But my dear Hugh," she said presently,--"I don't remember that sweep of hills when we were coming?"
"You were going the other way," said Hugh.
"Yes but, Hugh,--I am sure we did not pass these grain fields. We must have got into the wrong road."
Hugh drew the reins, and looked, and doubted.
"There is a house yonder," said Fleda,--"we had better drive on and ask."
"There is no house--"
"Yes there is--behind that piece of wood. Look over it--don't you see a light curl of blue smoke against the sky?--We never passed that house and wood, I am certain. We ought to make haste, for the afternoons are short now, and you will please to recollect there is nobody at home to get tea."
"I hope Lucas will get upon one of his everlasting talks with father," said Hugh.
"And that it will hold till we get home," said Fleda. "It will be the happiest use Lucas has made of his tongue in a good while."
Just as they stopped before a substantial-looking farm-house a man came from the other way and stopped there too, with his hand upon the gate.
"How far are we from Queechy, sir?" said Hugh.
"You're not from it at all, sir," said the man politely. "You're in Queechy, sir, at present."
"Is this the right road from Montepoole to Queechy village?"
"It is not, sir. It is a very tortuous direction indeed. Have I not the pleasure of speaking to Mr. Rossitur's young gentleman?"
Mr. Rossitur's young gentleman acknowledged his relationship and begged the favour of being set in the right way home.
"With much pleasure! You have been shewing Miss Rossitur the picturesque country about Montepoole?"
"My cousin and I have been there on business, and lost our way coming back."
"Ah I dare say. Very easy. First time you have been there?"
"Yes sir, and we are in a hurry to get home."
"Well sir,--you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?--comes out just above the lake?"
Hugh did not remember.
"Well--you keep this road straight on,--I'm sorry you are in a hurry,--you keep on till--do you know when you strike Mr. Harris's ground?"
No, Hugh knew nothing about it, nor Fleda.
"Well I'll tell you now how it is," said the stranger, "if you'll permit me. You and your--a--cousin--come in and do us the pleasure of taking some refreshment--I know my sister'll have her table set out by this time--and I'll do myself the honour of introducing you to--a--these strange roads afterwards."
"Thank you, sir, but that trouble is unnecessary--cannot you direct us?"
"No trouble--indeed sir, I assure you, I should esteem it a favour--very highly. I--I am Dr. Quackenboss, sir; you may have heard--"
"Thank you, Dr. Quackenboss, but we have no time this afternoon--we are very anxious to reach home as soon as possible; if you would be be so good as to put us in the way."
'Well, sir, you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?'"Well, sir, you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?"
"I--really sir, I am afraid--to a person ignorant of the various localities--You will lose no time--I will just hitch your horse here, and I'll have mine ready by the time this young lady has rested. Miss--a--won't you join with me? I assure you I will not put you to the expense of a minute--Thank you!--Mr. Harden!--Just clap the saddle on to Lollypop and have him up here in three seconds.--Thank you!--My dear Miss--a--won't you take my arm? I am gratified, I assure you."
Yielding to the apparent impossibility of getting anything out of Dr. Quackenboss, except civility, and to the real difficulty of disappointing such very earnest good will, Fleda and Hugh did what older persons would not have done,--alighted and walked up to the house.
"This is quite a fortuitous occurrence," the doctor went on:--"I have often had the pleasure of seeing Mr Rossitur's family in church--in the little church at Queechy Run--and that enabled me to recognise your cousin as soon as I saw him in the wagon. Perhaps Miss--a--you may have possibly heard of my name?--Quackenboss--I don't know that you understood--"
"I have heard it, sir."
"My Irishmen, Miss--a--my Irish labourers, can't get hold of but one end of it; they call me Boss--ha, ha, ha!"
Fleda hoped his patients did not get hold of the other end of it, and trembled, visibly.
"Hard to pull a man's name to pieces before his face,--ha, ha! but I am--a--not one thing myself,--a kind of heterogynous--I am a piece of a physician and a little in the agricultural line also; so it's all fair."
"The Irish treat my name as hardly, Dr. Quackenboss--they call me nothing but Miss Ring-again."
And then Fleda could laugh, and laugh she did, so heartily that the doctor was delighted.
"Ring-again! ha, ha!--Very good!--Well, Miss--a--I shouldn't think that anybody in your service would ever--a--ever let you put your name in practice."
But Fleda's delight at the excessive gallantry and awkwardness of this speech was almost too much; or, as the doctor pleasantly remarked, her nerves were too many for her; and every one of them was dancing by the time they reached the hall-door. The doctor's flourishes lost not a bit of their angularity from his tall ungainly figure and a lantern-jawed face, the lower member of which had now and then a somewhat lateral play when he was speaking, which curiously aided the quaint effect of his words. He ushered his guests into the house, seeming in a flow of self-gratulation.
The supper-table was spread, sure enough, and hovering about it was the doctor's sister; a lady in whom Fleda only saw a Dutch face, with eyes that made no impression, disagreeable fair hair, and a string of gilt beads round her neck. A painted yellow floor under foot, a room that looked excessivelywoodenand smelt of cheese, bare walls and a well-filled table, was all that she took in besides.
"I have the honour of presenting you to my sister," said the doctor with suavity. "Flora, the Irish domestics of this young lady call her name Miss Ring-again--if she will let us know how it ought to be called we shall be happy to be informed."
Dr. Quackenboss was made happy.
"MissRinggan--and this young gentleman is young Mr. Rossitur--the gentleman that has taken Squire Ringgan's old place. We were so fortunate as to have them lose their way this afternoon, coming from the Pool, and they have just stepped in to see if you can't find 'em a mouthful of something they can eat, while Lollypop is a getting ready to see them home."
Poor Miss Flora immediately disappeared into the kitchen, to order a bit of superior cheese and to have some slices of ham put on the gridiron, and then coming back to the common room went rummaging about from cupboard to cupboard, in search of cake and sweetmeats. Fleda protested and begged in vain.
"She was so sorry she hadn't knowed," Miss Flora said,--"she'd ha' had some cakes made that maybe they could have eaten, but the bread was dry; and the cheese wa'n't as good somehow as the last one they cut, maybe Miss Ringgan would prefer a piece of newer-made, if she liked it; and she hadn't had good luck with her preserves last summer--the most of 'em had fomented--she thought it was the damp weather, but there was some stewed pears that maybe she would be so good as to approve--and there was some ham! whatever else it was it was hot!--"
It was impossible, it was impossible, to do dishonour to all this hospitality and kindness and pride that was brought out for them. Early or late, they must eat, in mere gratitude. The difficulty was to avoid eating everything. Hugh and Fleda managed to compound the matter with each other, one taking the cake and pears, and the other the ham and cheese. In the midst of all this over flow of good will Fleda bethought her to ask if Miss Flora knew of any girl or woman that would go out to service. Miss Flora took the matter into grave consideration as soon as her anxiety on the subject of their cups of tea had subsided. She did not commit herself, but thought it possible that one of the Finns might be willing to go out.
"Where do they live?"
"It's--a--not far from Queechy Run," said the doctor, whose now and then hesitation in the midst of his speech was never for want of a thought but simply and merely for the best words to clothe it in.
"Is it in our way to-night?"
He could make it so, the doctor said, with pleasure, for it would give him permission to gallant them a little further.
They had several miles yet to go, and the sun went down as they were passing through Queechy Run. Under that still cool clear autumn sky Fleda would have enjoyed the ride very much, but that her unfulfilled errand was weighing upon her, and she feared her aunt and uncle might want her services before she could be at home. Still, late as it was, she determined to stop for a minute at Mrs. Finn's and go home with a clear conscience. At her door, and not till there, the doctor was prevailed upon to part company, the rest of the way being perfectly plain.
"Not I!--at least I think not. But, Hugh, don't say anything about all this to aunt Lucy. She would be troubled."
Fleda had certainly when she came away no notion of improving her acquaintance with Miss Anastasia; but the supper, and the breakfast and the dinner of the next day, with all the nameless and almost numberless duties of housework that filled up the time between, wrought her to a very strong sense of the necessity of having some kind of "help" soon. Mrs. Rossitur wearied herself excessively with doing very little, and then looked so sad to see Fleda working on, that it was more disheartening and harder to bear than the fatigue. Hugh was a most faithful and invaluable coadjutor, and his lack of strength was like her own made up by energy of will; but neither of them could bear the strain long; and when the final clearing away of the dinner-dishes gave her a breathing-time she resolved to dress herself and put her thimble in her pocket and go over to Miss Finn's quilting. Miss Lucy might not be like Miss Anastasia; and if she were, anything that had hands and feet to move instead of her own would be welcome.
Hugh went with her to the door and was to come for her at sunset.
With superfluity of breedingFirst makes you sick, and then with feeding.
With superfluity of breedingFirst makes you sick, and then with feeding.
Jenyns.
Jenyns.
Miss Anastasia was a little surprised and a good deal gratified, Fleda saw, by her coming, and played the hostess with great benignity. The quilting-frame was stretched in an upper room, not in the long kitchen, to Fleda's joy; most of the company were already seated at it, and she had to go through a long string of introductions before she was permitted to take her place. First of all Earl Douglass's wife, who rose up and taking both Fleda's hands squeezed and shook them heartily, giving her with eye and lip a most genial welcome. This lady had every look of being a verycleverwoman; "a manager" she was said to be; and indeed her very nose had a little pinch which prepared one for nothing superfluous about her. Even her dress could not have wanted another breadth from the skirt and had no fulness to spare about the body. Neat as a pin though; and a well-to-do look through it all. Miss Quackenboss Fleda recognised as an old friend, gilt beads and all. Catherine Douglass had grown up to a pretty girl during the five years since Fleda had left Queechy, and gave her a greeting half smiling, half shy. There was a little more affluence about the flow of her drapery, and the pink ribbon round her neck was confined by a little dainty Jew's harp of a brooch; she had her mother's pinch of the nose too. Then there were two other young ladies;--Miss Letitia Ann Thornton, a tall grown girl in pantalettes, evidently a would-be aristocrat from the air of her head and lip, with a well-looking face and looking well knowing of the same, and sporting neat little white cuffs at her wrists, the only one who bore such a distinction. The third of these damsels, Jessie Healy, impressed Fleda with having been brought up upon coarse meat and having grown heavy in consequence; the other two were extremely fair and delicate, both in complexion and feature. Her aunt Syra Fleda recognised without particular pleasure and managed to seat herself at the quilt with the sewing-woman and Miss Hannah between them. Miss Lucy Finn she found seated at her right hand, but after all the civilities she had just gone through Fleda had not courage just then to dash into business with her, and Miss Lucy herself stitched away and was dumb.
So were the rest of the party--rather. The presence of the new-comer seemed to have the effect of a spell. Fleda could not think they had been as silent before her joining them as they were for some time afterwards. The young ladies were absolutely mute, and conversation seemed to flag even among the elder ones; and if Fleda ever raised her eyes from the quilt to look at somebody she was sure to see somebody's eyes looking at her, with a curiosity well enough defined and mixed with a moreor lessamount of benevolence and pleasure. Fleda was growing very industrious and feeling her cheeks grow warm, when the checked stream of conversation began to take revenge by turning its tide upon her.
"Are you glad to be back to Queechy, Fleda?" said Mrs. Douglass from the opposite far end of the quilt.
"Yes ma'am," said Fleda, smiling back her answer,--"on some accounts."
"Ain't she growed like her father, Mis' Douglass?" said the sewing woman. "Do you recollect Walter Ringgan--what a handsome feller he was?"
The two opposite girls immediately found something to say to each other.
"She ain't a bit more like him than she is like her mother," said Mrs. Douglass, biting off the end of her thread energetically. "Amy Ringgan was a sweet good woman as ever was in this town."
Again her daughter's glance and smile went over to the speaker.
"You stay in Queechy and live like Queechy folks do," Mrs. Douglass added, nodding encouragingly, "and you'll beat both on 'em."
But this speech jarred, and Fleda wished it had not been spoken.
"How does your uncle like farming?" said aunt Syra.
A home-thrust, which Fleda parried by saying he had hardly got accustomed to it yet.
"What's been his business? what has he been doing all his life till now?" said the sewing-woman.
Fleda replied that he had had no business; and after the minds of the company had had time to entertain this statement she was startled by Miss Lucy's voice at her elbow.
"It seems kind o' curious, don't it, that a man should live to be forty or fifty years old and not know anything of the earth he gets his bread from?"
"What makes you think he don't?" said Miss Thornton rather tartly.
"She wa'n't speaking o' nobody," said aunt Syra.
"I was--I was speaking ofman--I was speaking abstractly," said Fleda's right hand neighbour.
"What's abstractly?" said Miss Anastasia scornfully.
"Where do you get hold of such hard words, Lucy?" said Mrs. Douglass.
"I don't know, Mis' Douglass;--they come to me;--it's practice, I suppose. I had no intention of being obscure."
"One kind o' word's as easy as another I suppose, when you're used to it, ain't it?" said the sewing-woman.
"What's abstractly?" said the mistress of the house again.
"Look in the dictionary, if you want to know," said her sister.
"I don't want to know--I only want you to tell."
"When do you get time for it, Lucy? ha'n't you nothing else to practise?" pursued Mrs. Douglass.
"Yes, Mis' Douglass; but then there are times for exertion, and other times less disposable; and when I feel thoughtful, or low, I commonly retire to my room and contemplate the stars or write a composition."
The sewing-woman greeted this speech with an unqualified ha! ha! and Fleda involuntarily raised her head to look at the last speaker; but there was nothing to be noticed about her, except that she was in rather nicer order than the rest of the Finn family.
"Did you get home safe last night?" inquired Miss Quackenboss, bending forward over the quilt to look down to Fleda.
Fleda thanked her, and replied that they had been overturned and had several ribs broken.
"And where have you been, Fleda, all this while?" said Mrs. Douglass.
Fleda told, upon which all the quilting-party raised their heads simultaneously to take another review of her.
"Your uncle's wife ain't a Frenchwoman, be she?" asked the sewing-woman.
Fleda said "oh no"--and Miss Quackenboss remarked that "she thought she wa'n't;" whereby Fleda perceived it had been a subject of discussion.
"She lives like one, don't she?" said aunt Syra.
Which imputation Fleda also refuted to the best of her power.
"Well, don't she have dinner in the middle of the afternoon?" pursued aunt Syra.
Fleda was obliged to admit that.
"And she can't eat without she has a fresh piece of roast meat on table every day, can she?"
"It is not always roast," said Fleda, half vexed and half laughing.
"I'd rather have a good dish o' bread and 'lasses than the hull on't;" observed old Mrs. Finn; from the corner where she sat manifestly turning up her nose at the far-off joints on Mrs. Rossitur's dinner-table.
The girls on the other side of the quilt again held counsel together, deep and low.
"Well didn't she pick up all them notions in that place yonder?--where you say she has been?" aunt Syra went on.
"No," said Fleda; "everybody does so in New York."
"I want to know what kind of a place New York is, now," said old Mrs. Finn drawlingly. "I s'pose it's pretty big, ain't it?"
Fleda replied that it was.
"I shouldn't wonder if it was a'most as far as from here to Queechy Run, now, ain't it?"
The distance mentioned being somewhere about one-eighth of New York's longest diameter, Fleda answered that it was quite as far.
"I s'pose there's plenty o' mighty rich folks there, ain't there?"
"Plenty, I believe," said Fleda.
"I should hate to live in it awfully!" was the old woman's conclusion.
"I should admire to travel in many countries," said Miss Lucy, for the first time seeming to intend her words particularly for Fleda's ear. "I think nothing makes people more genteel. I have observed it frequently."
Fleda said it was very pleasant; but though encouraged by this opening could not muster enough courage to ask if Miss Lucy had a "notion" to come and prove their gentility. Her next question was startling,--if Fleda had ever studied mathematics?
"No," said Fleda. "Have you?"
"O my, yes! There was a lot of us concluded we would learn it; and we commenced to study it a long time ago. I think it's a most elevating--"
The discussion was suddenly broken off, for the sewing-woman exclaimed, as the other sister came in and took her seat,
"Why Hannah! you ha'n't been makin' bread with that crock on your hands!"
"Well Mis' Barnes!" said the girl,--"I've washed 'em, and I've made bread with 'em, and eventhatdidn't take it off!"
"Do you look at the stars, too, Hannah?" said Mrs. Douglass.
Amidst a small hubbub of laugh and talk which now became general, poor Fleda fell back upon one single thought--one wish; that Hugh would come to fetch her home before tea-time. But it was a vain hope. Hugh was not to be there till sundown, and supper was announced long before that. They all filed down, and Fleda with them, to the great kitchen below stairs; and she found herself placed in the seat of honour indeed, but an honour she would gladly have escaped, at Miss Anastasia's right hand.
A temporary locked-jaw would have been felt a blessing. Fleda dared hardly even look about her; but under the eye of her hostess the instinct of good-breeding was found sufficient to swallow everything; literally and figuratively. There was a good deal to swallow. The usual variety of cakes, sweetmeats, beef, cheese, biscuits, and pies, was set out with some peculiarity of arrangement which Fleda had never seen before, and which left that of Miss Quackenboss elegant by comparison. Down each side of the table ran an advanced guard of little sauces, in Indian file, but in companies of three, the file leader of each being a saucer of custard, its follower a ditto of preserves, and the third keeping a sharp look-out in the shape of pickles; and to Fleda's unspeakable horror she discovered that the guests were expected to help themselves at will from these several stores with their own spoons, transferring what they took either to their own plates or at once to its final destination, which last mode several of the company preferred. The advantage of this plan was the necessary great display of the new silver tea-spoons which Mrs. Douglass slyly hinted to aunt Syra were the moving cause of the tea-party. But aunt Syra swallowed sweetmeats and would not give heed.
There was no relief for poor Fleda. Aunt Syra was her next neighbour, and opposite to her, at Miss Anastasia's left hand, was the disagreeable countenance and peering eyes of the old crone her mother. Fleda kept her own eyes fixed upon her plate and endeavoured to see nothing but that.
"Why here's Fleda ain't eating anything," said Mrs. Douglass. "Won't you have some preserves? take some custard, do!--Anastasy, she ha'n't a spoon--no wonder!"
Fleda had secretly conveyed hers under cover.
"Therewasone," said Miss Anastasia, looking about where one should have been,--"I'll get another as soon as I give Mis' Springer her tea."
"Ha'n't you got enough to go round?" said the old woman plucking at her daughter's sleeve,--"Anastasy!--ha'n't you got enough to go round?"
This speech which was spoken with a most spiteful simplicity Miss Anastasia answered with superb silence, and presently produced spoons enough to satisfy herself and the company. But Fleda! No earthly persuasion could prevail upon her to touch pickles, sweetmeats, or custard, that evening; and even in the bread and cakes she had a vision of hands before her that took away her appetite. She endeavoured to make a shew with hung beef and cups of tea, which indeed was not Pouchong; but her supper came suddenly to an end upon a remark of her hostess, addressed to the whole table, that they needn't be surprised if they found any bite of pudding in the gingerbread, for it was made from the molasses the children left the other day. Who "the children" were Fleda did not know, neither was it material.
It was sundown, but Hugh had not come when they went to the upper rooms again. Two were open now, for they were small and the company promised not to be such. Fathers and brothers and husbands began to come, and loud talking and laughing and joking took place of the quilting chit-chat. Fleda would fain have absorbed herself in the work again, but though the frame still stood there the minds of the company were plainly turned aside from their duty, or perhaps they thought that Miss Anastasia had had admiration enough to dispense with service. Nobody shewed a thimble but one or two old ladies; and as numbers and spirits gathered strength, a kind of romping game was set on foot in which a vast deal of kissing seemed to be the grand wit of the matter. Fleda shrank away out of sight behind the open door of communication between the two rooms, pleading with great truth that she was tired and would like to keep perfectly quiet; and she had soon the satisfaction of being apparently forgotten.
In the other room some of the older people were enjoying themselves more soberly. Fleda's ear was too near the crack of the door not to have the benefit of more of their conversation than she cared for. It soon put quiet of mind out of the question.
"He'll twist himself up pretty short; that's my sense of it; and he won't take long to do it, nother," said Earl Douglass's voice.
Fleda would have known it anywhere from its extreme peculiarity. It never either rose or fell much from a certain pitch; and at that level the words gurgled forth, seemingly from an ever-brimming fountain; he never wanted one; and the stream had neither let nor stay till his modicum of sense had fairly run out. People thought he had not a greater stock of that than some of his neighbours; but he issued an amount of word-currency sufficient for the use of the county.
"He'll run himself agin a post pretty quick," said uncle Joshua in a confirmatory tone of voice.
Fleda had a confused idea that somebody was going to hang himself.
"He ain't a workin' things right," said Douglass,--"he ain't a workin' things right; he's takin' hold o' everything by the tail end. He ain't studied the business; he doesn't know when things is right, and he doesn't know when things is wrong;--and if they're wrong he don't know how to set 'em right. He's got a feller there that ain't no more fit to be there than I am to be Vice President of the United States; and I ain't a going to say what I think Iamfit for, but I ha'n't studied forthatplace and I shouldn't like to stand an examination for't; and a man hadn't ought to be a farmer no more if he ha'n't qualified himself. That's my idee. I like to see a thing done well if it's to be done at all; and there ain't a stitch o' land been laid right on the hull farm, nor a furrow driv' as it had ought to be, since he come on to it; and I say, Squire Springer, a man ain't going to get along in that way, and he hadn't ought to. I work hard myself, and I calculate to work hard; and I make a livin by't; and I'm content to work hard. When I see a man with his hands in his pockets, I think he'll have nothin' else in 'em soon. I don't believe he's done a hand's turn himself on the land the hull season!"
And upon this Mr. Douglass brought up.
"My son Lucas has been workin' with him, off and on, pretty much the hull time since he come; andhesays he ha'n't begun to know how to spell farmer yet."
"Ay, ay! My wife--she's a little harder on folks than I be--I think it ain't worth while to say nothin' of a man without I can say some good of him--that's my idee--and it don't do no harm, nother,--but my wife, she says he's got to let down his notions a peg or two afore they'll hitch just in the right place; and I won't say but what I think she ain't maybe fur from right. If a man's above his business he stands a pretty fair chance to be below it some day. I won't say myself, for I haven't any acquaintance with him, and a man oughtn't to speak but of what he is knowing to,--but I have heerd say, that he wa'n't as conversationable as it would ha' been handsome in him to be, all things considerin'. There seems to be a good many things said of him, somehow, and I always think men don't talk of a man if he don't give 'em occasion; but anyhow I've been past the farm pretty often myself this summer, workin' with Seth Plumfield; and I've took notice of things myself; and I know he's been makin' beds o' sparrowgrass when he had ought to ha' been makin' fences, and he's been helpin' that little girl o' his'n set her flowers, when he would ha' been better sot to work lookin' after his Irishman; but I don't know as it made much matter nother, for if he went wrong Mr. Rossitur wouldn't know how to set him right, and if he was a going right Mr. Rossitur would ha' been just as likely to ha' set him wrong. Well I'm sorry for him!"
"Mr. Rossitur is a most gentlemanlike man," said the voice of Dr. Quackenboss.
"Ay,--I dare say he is," Earl responded in precisely the same tone. "I was down to his house one day last summer to see him.--He wa'n't to hum, though."
"It would be strange if harm come to a man with such a guardian angel in the house as that man has in his'n," said Dr. Quackenboss.
"Well she's a pretty creetur'!" said Douglass, looking up with some animation. "I wouldn't blame any man that sot a good deal by her. I will say I think she's as handsome as my own darter; and a man can't go no furder than that I suppose."
"She won't help his farming much, I guess," said uncle Joshua,--"nor his wife, nother."
Fleda heard Dr. Quackenboss coming through the doorway and started from her corner for fear he might find her out there and know what she had heard.
He very soon found her out in the new place she had chosen and came up to pay his compliments. Fleda was in a mood for anything but laughing, yet the mixture of the ludicrous which the doctor administered set her nerves a twitching. Bringing his chair down sideways at one angle and his person at another, so as to meet at the moment of the chair's touching the floor, and with a look and smile slanting to match, the doctor said,
"Well, Miss Ringgan, has--a--Mrs. Rossitur,--does she feel herself reconciled yet?"
"Reconciled, sir?" said Fleda.
"Yes--a--to Queechy?"
"She never quarrelled with it, sir," said Fleda, quite unable to keep from laughing.
"Yes,--I mean--a--she feels that she can sustain her spirits in different situations?"
"She is very well, sir, thank you."
"It must have been a great change to her--and to you all--coming to this place."
"Yes, sir; the country is very different from the city."
"In what part of New York was Mr. Rossitur's former residence?"
"In State street, sir."
"State street,--that is somewhere in the direction of the Park?"
"No, sir, not exactly."
"Was Mrs. Rossitur a native of the city?"
"Not of New York. O Hugh, my dear Hugh," exclaimed Fleda in another tone,--"what have you been thinking of?"
"Father wanted me," said Hugh. "I could not help it, Fleda."
"You are not going to have the cruelty to take your--a--cousin away, Mr. Rossitur?" said the doctor.
But Fleda was for once happy to be cruel; she would hear no remonstrances. Though her desire for Miss Lucy's "help" had considerably lessened she thought she could not in politeness avoid speaking on the subject, after being invited there on purpose. But Miss Lucy said she "calculated to stay at home this winter," unless she went to live with somebody at Kenton for the purpose of attending a course of philosophy lectures that she heard were to be given there. So that matter was settled; and clasping Hugh's arm Fleda turned away from the house with a step and heart both lightened by the joy of being out of it.
"I couldn't come sooner, Fleda," said Hugh.
"No matter--O I'm so glad to be away! Walk a little faster, dear Hugh.--Have you missed me at home?"
"Do you want me to say no or yes?" said Hugh smiling. "We did very well--mother and I--and I have left everything ready to have tea the minute you get home. What sort of a time have you had?"
In answer to which Fleda gave him a long history; and then they walked on awhile in silence. The evening was still and would have been dark but for the extreme brilliancy of the stars through the keen clear atmosphere. Fleda looked up at them and drew large draughts of bodily and mental refreshment with the bracing air.
"Do you know to-morrow will be Thanksgiving day?"
"Ye--what made you think of it?"
"They were talking about it--they make a great fuss here Thanksgiving day."
"I don't think we shall make much of a fuss," said Hugh.
"I don't think we shall. I wonder what I shall do--I am afraid uncle Rolf will get tired of coffee and omelettes in the course of time; and my list of receipts is very limited."
"It is a pity you didn't beg one of Mrs. Renney's books," said Hugh laughing. "If you had only known--"
"'Tisn't too late!" said Fleda quickly,--"I'll send to New York for one. I will! I'll ask uncle Orrin to get it for me. That's the best thought!--"
"But, Fleda! you're not going to turn cook in that fashion?"
"It would be no harm to have the book," said Fleda. "I can tell you we mustn't expect to get anybody here that can make an omelette, or even coffee, that uncle Rolf will drink. Oh Hugh!--"
"What?"
"I don't know where we are going to get anybody!--But don't say anything to aunt Lucy about it."
"Well, we can keep Thanksgiving day, Fleda, without a dinner," said Hugh cheerfully.
"Yes indeed; I am sure I can--after being among these people to-night. How much I have that they want! Look at the Great Bear over there!--isn't that better than New York?"
"The Great Bear hangs over New York too," Hugh said with a smile.
"Ah but it isn't the same thing. Heaven hasn't the same eyes for the city and the country."
As Hugh and Fleda went quick up to the kitchen door they overtook a dark figure, at whom looking narrowly as she passed, Fleda recognised Seth Plumfield. He was joyfully let into the kitchen, and there proved to be the bearer of a huge dish carefully covered with a napkin.
"Mother guessed you hadn't any Thanksgiving ready," he said,--"and she wanted to send this down to you; so I thought I would come and fetch it myself."
"O thank her! and thank you, cousin Seth;--how good you are?"
"Mother ha'n't lost her old trick at 'em," said he, "so I hopethat'sgood."
"O I know it is," said Fleda. "I remember aunt Miriam's Thanksgiving chicken-pies. Now, cousin Seth, you must come in and see aunt Lucy."
"No," said he quietly,--"I've got my farm-boots on--I guess I won't see anybody but you."
But Fleda would not suffer that, and finding she could not move him she brought her aunt out into the kitchen. Mrs. Rossitur's manner of speaking and thanking him quite charmed Seth, and he went away with a kindly feeling towards those gentle bright eyes which he never forgot.
"Now we've something for to-morrow, Hugh!" said Fleda;--"and such a chicken-pie I can tell you asyounever saw. Hugh, isn't it odd how different a thing is in different circumstances? You don't know how glad I was when I put my hands upon that warm pie-dish and knew what it was; and when did I ever care in New York about Emile's doings?"
"Except the almond gauffres," said Hugh smiling.
"I never thought to be so glad of a chicken-pie," said Fleda, shaking her head.
Aunt Miriam's dish bore out Fleda's praise, in the opinion of all that tasted it; for such fowls, such butter, and such cream, as went to its composition could hardly be known but in an unsophisticated state of society. But one pie could not last for ever; and as soon as the signs of dinner were got rid of, Thanksgiving day though it was, poor Fleda was fain to go up the hill to consult aunt Miriam about the possibility of getting "help."
"I don't know, dear Fleda," said she;--"if you cannot get Lucy Finn--I don't know who else there is you can get. Mrs. Toles wants both her daughters at home I know this winter, because she is sick; and Marietta Winchel is working at aunt Syra's;--I don't know--Do you remember Barby Elster, that used to live with me?"
"O yes!"
"Shemightgo--she has been staying at home these two years, to take care of her old mother, that's the reason she left me; but she has another sister come home now,--Hetty, that married and went to Montepoole,--she's lost her husband and come home to live; so perhaps Barby would go out again. But I don't know,--how do you think your aunt Lucy would get along with her?"
"Dear aunt Miriam! you know we must do as we can. Wemusthave somebody."
"Barby is a little quick," said Mrs. Plumfield, "but I think she is good-hearted, and she is thorough, and faithful as the day is long. If your aunt and uncle can put up with her ways."
"I am sure we can, aunt Miriam. Aunt Lucy's the easiest person in the world to please, and I'll try and keep her away from uncle Rolf. I think we can get along. I know Barby used to like me."
"But then Barby knows nothing about French cooking, my child; she can do nothing but the common country things. What will your uncle and aunt say to that?"
"I don't know," said Fleda, "but anything is better than nothing. I must try and do what she can't do. I'll come up and get you to teach me, aunt Miriam."
Aunt Miriam hugged and kissed her before speaking.
"I'll teach you what I know, my darling;--and now we'll go right off and see Barby--we shall catch her just in a good time."
It was a poor little unpainted house, standing back from the road, and with a double row of boards laid down to serve as a path to it. But this board-walk was scrubbed perfectly clean. They went in without knocking. There was nobody there but an old woman seated before the fire shaking all over with the St. Vitus's Dance. She gave them no salutation, calling instead on "Barby!"--who presently made her appearance from the inner door.
"Barby!--who's this?"
"That's Mis' Plumfield, mother," said the daughter, speaking loud as to a deaf person.
The old lady immediately got up and dropped a very quick and what was meant to be a very respect-shewing curtsey, saying at the same time with much deference and with one of her involuntary twitches,--"I ''maun' to know!"--The sense of the ludicrous and the feeling of pity together were painfully oppressive. Fleda turned away to the daughter who came forward and shook hands with a frank look of pleasure at the sight of her elder visitor.
"Barby," said Mrs. Plumfield, "this is little Fleda Ringgan--do you remember her?"
"I 'mind to know!" said Barby, transferring her hand to Fleda's and giving it a good squeeze.--"She's growed a fine gal, Mis' Plumfield. You ha'n't lost none of your good looks--ha' you kept all your old goodness along with 'em?"
Fleda laughed at this abrupt question, and said she didn't know.
"If you ha'n't, I wouldn't give much for your eyes," said Barby letting go her hand.
Mrs. Plumfield laughed too at Barby's equivocal mode of complimenting.
"Who's that young gal, Barby?" inquired Mrs. Elster.
"That's Mis' Plumfield's niece, mother!"
"She's a handsome little creetur, ain't she?"
They all laughed at that, and Fleda's cheeks growing crimson, Mrs. Plumfield stepped forward to ask after the old lady's health; and while she talked and listened Fleda's eyes noted the spotless condition of the room--the white table, the nice rag-carpet, the bright many-coloured patch-work counterpane on the bed, the brilliant cleanliness of the floor where the small carpet left the boards bare, the tidy look of the two women; and she made up her mind thatshecould get along with Miss Barbara very well. Barby was rather tall, and in face decidedly a fine-looking woman, though her figure had the usual scantling proportions which nature or fashion assigns to the hard-working dwellers in the country. A handsome quick grey eye and the mouth were sufficiently expressive of character, and perhaps of temper, but there were no lines of anything sinister or surly; you could imagine a flash, but not a cloud.
"Barby, you are not tied at home any longer, are you?" said Mrs. Plumfield, coming back from the old lady and speaking rather low;--"now that Hetty is here, can't your mother spare you?"
"Well I reckon she could, Mis' Plumfield,--if I could work it so that she'd be more comfortable by my being away."
"Then you'd have no objection to go out again?"
"Where to?"
"Fleda's uncle, you know, has taken my brother's old place, and they have no help. They want somebody to take the whole management--just you, Barby. Mrs. Rossitur isn't strong."
"Nor don't want to be, does she? I've heerd tell of her. Mis' Plumfield, I should despise to have as many legs and arms as other folks and not be able to help myself!"
"But you wouldn't despise to help other folks, I hope," said Mrs. Plumfield smiling.
"People that want you very much too," said Fleda; for she quite longed to have that strong hand and healthy eye to rely upon at home. Barby looked at her with a relaxed face, and after a little consideration said "she guessed she'd try."
"Mis' Plumfield," cried the old lady as they were moving,--"Mis' Plumfield, you said you'd send me a piece of pork."
"I haven't forgotten it, Mrs. Elster--you shall have it."
"Well you get it out for me yourself," said the old woman speaking very energetically,--"don't you send no one else to the barrel for't; because I know you'll give me the biggest piece."
Mrs. Plumfield laughed and promised.
"I'll come up and work it out some odd day," said the daughter nodding intelligently as she followed them to the door.
"We'll talk about that," said Mrs. Plumfield.