"I know that it is uncommon only by hearsay," said Fleda, "I have so many good friends."
He was silent for an instant, possibly thinking there might be a reason for that unknown only to Fleda herself.
"Perhaps one must be in peculiar circumstances to realize it," he said sighing;--"circumstances that leave one of no importance to any one in the world.--But it is a kind lesson I--one learns to depend more on the one friendship that can never disappoint."
Fleda's eyes again gave an answer of sympathy, for she thought from the shade that had come upon his face that these circumstances had probably been known to himself.
"This is rather an amusing scene," he remarked presently in a low tone.
"Very," said Fleda. "I have never seen such a one before."
"Nor I," said he. "It is a pleasant scene too, it is pleasant to see so many evidences of kindness and good feeling on the part of all these people."
"There is all the more shew of it, I suppose, to-day," said Fleda, "because we have a new minister coming;--they want to make a favourable impression."
"Does the old proverb of the 'new broom' hold good here too?" said he, smiling. "What's the name of your new minister?"
"I am not certain," said Fleda,--"there were two talked of--the last I heard was that it was an old Mr. Carey; but from what I hear this morning I suppose it must be the other--a Mr. Ollum, or some such queer name, I believe."
Fleda thought her hearer looked very much amused, and followed his eye into the room, where Mrs. Evelyn was going about in all quarters looking at everything, and finding occasion to enter into conversation with at least a quarter of the people who were present. Whatever she was saying it seemed at that moment to have something to do with them, for sundry eyes turned in their direction; and presently Dr. Quackenboss came up, with even more than common suavity of manner.
"I trust Miss Ringgan will do me the favour of making me acquainted with--a--with our future pastor!" said the doctor, looking however not at all at Miss Ringgan but straight at the pastor in question. "I have great pleasure in giving you the first welcome, sir,--or, I should say, rather the second; since no doubt Miss Ringgan has been in advance of me. It is not un--a--appropriate, sir, for I may say we--a--divide the town between us. You are, I am sure, a worthy representative of Peter and Paul; and I am--a--a pupil of Esculapus, sir! You are the intellectual physician, and I am the external."
"I hope we shall both prove ourselves good workmen, sir," said the young minister, shaking the doctor's hand heartily.
"This is Dr. Quackenboss, Mr. Olmney," said Fleda, making a tremendous effort. But though she could see corresponding indications about her companion's eyes and mouth, she admired the kindness and self-command with which he listened to the doctor's civilities and answered them; expressing his grateful sense of the favours received not only from him but from others.
"O--a little to begin with," said the doctor, looking round upon the room, which would certainly have furnishedthatfor fifty people;--"I hope we ain't done yet by considerable--But here is Miss Ringgan, Mr.--a--Ummin, that has brought you some of the fruits of her own garden, with her own fair hands--a basket of fine strawberries--which I am sure--a--will make you forget everything else!"
Mr. Olmney had the good-breeding not to look at Fleda, as he answered, "I am sure the spirit of kindness was the same in all, Dr. Quackenboss, and I trust not to forget that readily."
Others now came up; and Mr. Olmney was walked off to be "made acquainted" with all or with all the chief of his parishioners then and there assembled. Fleda watched him going about, shaking hands, talking and smiling, in all directions, with about as much freedom of locomotion as a fly in a spider's web; till at Mrs. Evelyn's approach the others fell off a little, and taking him by the arm she rescued him.
"My dear Mr. Olmney!" she whispered, with an intensely amused face,--"I shall have a vision of you every day for a month to come, sitting down to dinner with a rueful face to a whortleberry pie; for there are so many of them your conscience will not let you have anything else cooked--you cannot manage more than one a day."
"Pies!" said the young gentleman, as Mrs. Evelyn left talking to indulge her feelings in ecstatic quiet laughing,--"I have a horror of pies!"
"Yes, yes," said Mrs. Evelyn nodding her head delightedly as she drew him towards the pantry,--"I know!--Come and see what is in store for you. You are to do penance for a month to come with tin pans of blackberry jam fringed with pie-crust--no, they can't be blackberries, they must be raspberries--the blackberries are not ripe yet. And you may sup upon cake and custards--unless you give the custards for the little pig out there--he will want something."
"A pig!--" said Mr. Olmney in a maze; Mrs. Evelyn again giving out in distress. "A pig?" said Mr. Olmney.
"Yes--a pig--a very little one," said Mrs. Evelyn convulsively. "I am sure he is hungry now!--"
They had reached the pantry, and Mr. Olmney's face was all that was wanting to Mrs. Evelyn's delight. How she smothered it, so that it should go no further than to distress his self-command, is a mystery known only to the initiated. Mrs. Douglass was forthwith called into council.
"Mrs. Douglass," said Mr. Olmney, "I feel very much inclined to play the host, and beg my friends to share with me some of these good things they have been so bountifully providing."
"He would enjoy them much more than he would alone, Mrs. Douglass," said Mrs. Evelyn, who still had hold of Mr. Olmney's arm, looking round to the lady with a most benign face.
"I reckon some of 'em would be past enjoying by the time he got to 'em, wouldn't they?" said the lady. "Well, they'll have to take 'em in their fingers, for our crockery ha'n't come yet--I shall have to jog Mr. Flatt's elbow--but hungry folks ain't curious."
"In their fingers, or any way, provided you have only a knife to cut them with," said Mr. Olmney, while Mrs. Evelyn squeezed his arm in secret mischief;--"and pray if we can muster two knives let us cut one of these cheeses, Mrs. Douglass."
And presently Fleda saw pieces of pie walking about in all directions supported by pieces of cheese. And then Mrs. Evelyn and Mr. Olmney came out from the pantry and came towards her, the latter bringing her with his own hands a portion in a tin pan. The two ladies sat down in the window together to eat and be amused.
"My dear Fleda, I hope you are hungry!" said Mrs. Evelyn, biting her pie Fleda could not help thinking with an air of good-humoured condescension.
"I am, ma'am," she said laughing.
"You look just as you used to do," Mrs. Evelyn went on earnestly.
"Do I?" said Fleda, privately thinking that the lady must have good eyes for features of resemblance.
"Except that you have more colour in your cheeks and more sparkles in your eyes. Dear little creature that you were! I want to make you know my children. Do you remember that Mr. and Mrs. Carleton that took such care of you at Montepoole?"
"Certainly I do!--very well."
"We saw them last winter--we were down at their country-place in---- shire. They have a magnificent place there--everything you can think of to make life pleasant. We spent a week with them. My dear Fleda!--I wish I could shew you that place! you never saw anything like it."
Fleda eat her pie.
"We have nothing like it in this country--of course--cannot have. One of those superb English country-seats is beyond even the imagination of an American."
"Nature has been as kind to us, hasn't she?" said Fleda.
"O yes, but such fortunes you know. Mr. Olmney, what do you think of those overgrown fortunes? I was speaking to Miss Ringgan just now of a gentleman who has forty thousand pounds a year income--sterling, sir;--forty thousand pounds a year sterling. Somebody says, you know, that 'he who has more than enough is a thief of the rights of his brother,'--what do you think?"
But Mr. Olmney's attention was at the moment forcibly called off by the "income" of a parishioner.
"I suppose," said Fleda, "his thievish character must depend entirely on the use he makes of what he has."
"I don't know," said Mrs. Evelyn shaking her head,--"I think the possession of great wealth is very hardening."
"To a fine nature?" said Fleda.
Mrs. Evelyn shook her head again, but did not seem to think it worth while to reply; and Fleda was trying the question in her own mind whether wealth or poverty might be the most hardening in its effects; when Mr. Olmney having succeeded in getting free again came and took his station beside them; and they had a particularly pleasant talk, which Fleda who had seen nobody in a great while enjoyed very much. They had several such talks in the course of the day; for though the distractions caused by Mr. Olmney's other friends were many and engrossing, he generally contrived in time to find his way back to their window. Meanwhile Mrs. Evelyn had a great deal to say to Fleda and to hear from her; and left her at last under an engagement to spend the next day at the Pool.
Upon Mr. Olmney's departure with Mrs. Evelyn the attraction which had held the company together was broken, and they scattered fast. Fleda presently finding herself in the minority was glad to set out with Miss Anastasia Finn and her sister Lucy, who would leave her but very little way from her own door. But she had more company than she bargained for. Dr. Quackenboss was pleased to attach himself to their party, though his own shortest road certainly lay in another direction; and Fleda wondered what he had done with his wagon, which beyond a question must have brought the cheese in the morning. She edged herself out of the conversation as much as possible, and hoped it would prove so agreeable that he would not think of attending her home. In vain. When they made a stand at the cross-roads the doctor stood on her side.
"I hope, now you've made a commencement, you will come to see us again, Fleda," said Miss Lucy.
"What's the use of asking?" said her sister abruptly. "If she has a mind to she will, and if she ha'n't I am sure we don't want her."
They turned off.
"Those are excellent people," said the doctor when they were beyond hearing;--"really respectable!"
"Are they?" said Fleda.
"But your goodness does not look, I am sure, to find--a--Parisian graces in so remote a circle?"
"Certainly not!" said Fleda.
"We have had a genial day!" said the doctor, quitting the Finns.
"I don't know," said Fleda, permitting a little of her inward merriment to work off,--"I think it has been rather too hot."
"Yes," said the doctor, "the sun has been ardent; but I referred rather to the--a--to the warming of affections, and the pleasant exchange of intercourse on all sides which has taken place. How do you like our--a--the stranger?"
"Who, sir?"
"The new-comer,--this young Mr. Ummin?"
Fleda answered, but she hardly knew what, for she was musing whether the doctor would go away or come in. They reached the door, and Fleda invited him, with terrible effort after her voice; the doctor having just blandly offered an opinion upon the decided polish of Mr. Olmney's manners!
Labour is light, where lore (quoth I) doth pay;(Saith he) light burthens heavy, if far borne.
Labour is light, where lore (quoth I) doth pay;(Saith he) light burthens heavy, if far borne.
Drayton.
Drayton.
Fleda pushed open the parlour door and preceded her convoy, in a kind of tip-toe state of spirits. The first thing that met her eyes was her aunt in one of the few handsome silks which were almost her sole relic of past wardrobe prosperity, and with a face uncommonly happy and pretty; and the next instant she saw the explanation of this appearance in her cousin Charlton, a little palish, but looking better than she had ever seen him, and another gentleman of whom her eye took in only the general outlines of fashion and comfortable circumstances; now too strange to it to go unnoted. In Fleda's usual mood her next movement would have been made with a demureness that would have looked like bashfulness. But the amusement and pleasure of the day just passed had for the moment set her spirits free from the burden that generally bound them down; and they were as elastic as her step as she came forward and presented to her aunt "Dr. Quackenboss,--and then turned to shake her cousin's hand."
"Charlton!--Where did you come from? We didn't expect you so soon."
"You are not sorry to see me, I hope?"
"Not at all--very glad;"--and then as her eye glanced towards the other new-comer Charlton presented to her "Mr. Thorn;" and Fleda's fancy made a sudden quick leap on the instant to the old hall at Montepoole and the shot dog. And then Dr. Quackenboss was presented, an introduction which Capt. Rossitur received coldly, and Mr. Thorn with something more than frigidity.
The doctor's elasticity however defied depression, especially in the presence of a silk dress and a military coat. Fleda presently saw that he was agonizing her uncle. Mrs. Rossitur had drawn close to her son. Fleda was left to take care of the other visitor. The young men had both seemed more struck at the vision presented to them than she had been on her part. She thought neither of them was very ready to speak to her.
"I did not know," said Mr. Thorn softly, "what reason I had to thank Rossitur for bringing me home with him to-night--he promised me a supper and a welcome,--but I find he did not tell me the half of my entertainment."
"That was wise in him," said Fleda;--"the half that is not expected is always worth a great deal more than the other."
"In this case, most assuredly," said Thorn bowing, and Fleda was sure not knowing what to make of her.
"Have you been in Mexico too, Mr. Thorn?"
"Not I!--that's an entertainment I beg to decline. I never felt inclined to barter an arm for a shoulder-knot, or to abridge my usual means of locomotion for the privilege of riding on parade--or selling oneself for a name--Peter Schlemil's selling his shadow I can understand; but this is really lessening oneself that one's shadow may grow the larger."
"But you were in the army?" said Fleda.
"Yes--It wasn't my doing. There is a time, you know, when one must please the old folks--I grew old enough and wise enough to cut loose from the army before I had gained or lost much by it."
He did not understand the displeased gravity of Fleda's face, and went on insinuatingly;--
"Unless I have lost what Charlton has gained--something I did not know hung upon the decision--Perhaps you think a man is taller for having iron heels to his boots?"
"I do not measure a man by his inches," said Fleda.
"Then you have no particular predilection for shooting men?"
"I have no predilection for shooting anything, sir."
"Then I am safe!" said he, with an arrogant little air of satisfaction. "I was born under an indolent star, but I confess to you, privately, of the two I would rather gather my harvests with the sickle than the sword. How does your uncle find it?"
"Find what, sir?"
"The worship of Ceres?--I remember he used to be devoted to Apollo and the Muses."
"Are they rival deities?"
"Why--I have been rather of the opinion that they were too many for one house to hold," said Thorn glancing at Mr. Rossitur. "But perhays the Graces manage to reconcile them!"
"Did you ever hear of the Graces getting supper?" said Fleda. "Because Ceres sometimes sets them at that work. Uncle Rolf," she added as she passed him,--"Mr. Thorn is inquiring after Apollo--will you set him right, while I do the same for the tablecloth?"
Her uncle looked from her sparkling eyes to the rather puzzled expression of his guest's face.
"I was only asking your lovely niece," said Mr. Thorn coming down from his stilts,--"how you liked this country life?"
Dr. Quackenboss bowed, probably in approbation of the epithet.
"Well sir--what information did she give you on the subject?"
"Left me in the dark, sir, with a vague hope that you would enlighten me."
"I trust Mr. Rossitur can give a favourable report?" said the doctor benignly.
But Mr. Rossitur's frowning brow looked very little like it.
"What do you say to our country life, sir?"
"It's a confounded life, sir," said Mr. Rossitur, taking a pamphlet from the table to fold and twist as he spoke,--"it is a confounded life; for the head and the hands must either live separate, or the head must do no other work but wait upon the hands. It is an alternative of loss and waste, sir."
"The alternative seems to be of--a--limited application," said the doctor, as Fleda, having found that Hugh and Barby had been beforehand with her, now came back to the company. "I am sure this lady would not give such a testimony."
"About what?" said Fleda, colouring under the fire of so many eyes.
"The blighting influence of Ceres' sceptre," said Mr. Thorn.
"This country life," said her uncle;--"do you like it, Fleda?"
"You know, uncle," said she cheerfully, "I was always of the old Douglasses' mind--I like better to hear the lark sing than the mouse squeak."
"Is that one of Earl Douglass's sayings?" said the doctor.
"Yes sir," said Fleda with quivering lips,--"but not the one you know--an older man."
"Ah!" said the doctor intelligently. "Mr. Rossitur,--speaking of hands,--I have employed the Irish very much of late years--they are as good as one can have, if you do not want a head."
"That is to say,--if you have a head," said Thorn.
"Exactly" said the doctor, all abroad,--"and when there are not too many of them together. I had enough of that, sir, some years ago when a multitude of them were employed on the public works. The Irish were in a state of mutilation, sir, all through the country."
"Ah!" said Thorn,--"had the military been at work upon them?"
"No sir, but I wish they had, I am sure; it would have been for the peace of the town. There were hundreds of them. We were in want of an army."
"Of surgeons,--I should think," said Thorn.
Fleda saw the doctor's dubious air and her uncle's compressed lips; and commanding herself, with even a look of something like displeasure she quitted her seat by Mr. Thorn and called the doctor to the window to look at a cluster of rose acacias just then in their glory. He admired, and she expatiated, till she hoped everybody but herself had forgotten what they had been talking about. But they had no sooner returned to their seats than Thorn began again.
"The Irish in your town are not in the same mutilated state now, I suppose, sir?"
"No sir, no," said the doctor;--"there are much fewer of them to break each other's bones. It was all among themselves, sir."
"The country is full of foreigners," said Mr. Rossitur with praiseworthy gravity.
"Yes sir," said Dr. Quackenboss thoughtfully;--"we shall have none of our ancestors left in a short time, if they go on as they are doing."
Fleda was beaten from the field, and rushing into the breakfast-room astonished Hugh by seizing hold of him and indulging in a most prolonged and unbounded laugh. She did not shew herself again till the company came in to supper; but then she was found as grave as Minerva. She devoted herself particularly to the care and entertainment of Dr. Quackenboss till he took leave; nor could Thorn get another chance to talk to her through all the evening.
When he and Rossitur were at last in their rooms Fleda told her story.
"You don't know how pleasant it was, aunt Lucy--how much I enjoyed it--seeing and talking to somebody again. Mrs. Evelyn was so very kind."
"I am very glad, my darling," said Mrs. Rossitur, stroking away the hair from the forehead that was bent down towards her;--"I am glad you had it to-day and I am glad you will have it again to-morrow."
"You will have it too, aunt Lucy. Mrs. Evelyn will be here in the morning--she said so."
"I shall not see her."
"Why? Now aunt Lucy!--you will."
"I have nothing in the world to see her in--I cannot."
"You have this?"
"For the morning? A rich French silk?--It would be absurd. No, no,--it would be better to wear my old merino than that."
"But you will have to dress in the morning for Mr. Thorn?--he will be here to breakfast."
"I shall not come down to breakfast.--Don't look so, love!--I can't help it."
"Why was that calico got for me and not for you?" said Fleda, bitterly.
"A sixpenny calico," said Mrs. Rossitur smiling,--"it would be hard if you could not have so much as that, love."
"And you will not see Mrs. Evelyn and her daughters at all!--and I was thinking that it would do you so much good!--"
Mrs. Rossitur drew her face a little nearer and kissed it, over and over.
"It will do you good, my darling--that is what I care for much more."
"It will not do me half as much," said Fleda sighing.
Her spirits were in their old place again; no more a tip-toe to-night. The short light of pleasure was overcast. She went to bed feeling very quiet indeed; and received Mrs. Evelyn and excused her aunt the next day, almost wishing the lady had not been as good as her word. But though in the same mood she set off with her to drive to Montepoole, it could not stand the bright influences with which she found herself surrounded. She came home again at night with dancing spirits.
It was some days before Capt. Rossitur began at all to comprehend the change which had come upon his family. One morning Fleda and Hugh having finished their morning's work were in the breakfast-room waiting for the rest of the family, when Charlton made his appearance, with the cloud on his brow which had been lately gathering.
"Where is the paper?" said he. "I haven't seen a paper since I have been here."
"You mustn't expect to find Mexican luxuries in Queechy, Capt. Rossitur," said Fleda pleasantly.--"Look at these roses, and don't ask me for papers!"
He did look a minute at the dish of flowers she was arranging for the breakfast table, and at the rival freshness and sweetness of the face that hung over them.
"You don't mean to say you live without a paper?"
'Look at these roses, and don't ask me for papers!'"Look at these roses, and don't ask me for papers!"
"Well, it's astonishing how many things people can live without," said Fleda rather dreamily, intent upon settling an uneasy rose that would topple over.
"I wish you'd answer me really," said Charlton. "Don't you take a paper here?"
"We would take one thankfully if it would be so good as to come; but seriously, Charlton, we haven't any," she said changing her tone.
"And have you done without one all through the war?"
"No--we used to borrow one from a kind neighbour once in a while, to make sure, as Mr. Thorn says, that you had not bartered an arm for a shoulder-knot."
"You never looked to see whether I was killed in the meanwhile, I suppose?"
"No--never," said Fleda gravely, as she took her place on a low seat in the corner,--"I always knew you were safe before I touched the paper."
"What do you mean?"
"I am not an enemy, Charlton," said Fleda laughing. "I mean that I used to make aunt Miriam look over the accounts before I did."
Charlton walked up and down the room for a little while in sullen silence; and then brought up before Fleda.
"What are you doing?"
Fleda looked up,--a glance that as sweetly and brightly as possible half asked half bade him be silent and ask no questions.
"Whatareyou doing?" he repeated.
"I am putting a patch on my shoe."
His look expressed more indignation than anything else.
"What do you mean?"
"Just what I say," said Fleda, going on with her work.
"What in the name of all the cobblers in the land do you do it for?"
"Because I prefer it to having a hole in my shoe; which would give me the additional trouble of mending my stockings."
Charlton muttered an impatient sentence, of which Fleda only understood that "the devil" was in it, and then desired to know if whole shoes would not answer the purpose as well as either holes or patches?
"Quite--if I had them," said Fleda, giving him another glance which, with all its gravity and sweetness, carried also a little gentle reproach.
"But do you know," said he after standing still a minute looking at her, "that any cobbler in the country would do what you are doing much better for sixpence?"
"I am quite aware of that," said Fleda, stitching away.
"Your hands are not strong enough for that work!"
Fleda again smiled at him, in the very dint of giving a hard push to her needle; a smile that would have witched him into good humour if he had not been determinately in a cloud and proof against everything. It only admonished him that he could not safely remain in the region of sunbeams; and he walked up and down the room furiously again. The sudden ceasing of his footsteps presently made her look up.
"What have you got there?--Oh, Charlton, don't!--please put that down!--I didn't know I had left them there.--They were a little wet and I laid them on the chair to dry."
"What do you call this?" said he, not minding her request.
"They are only my gardening gloves--I thought I had put them away."
"Gloves!" said he, pulling at them disdainfully,--"why here are two--one within the other--what's that for?"
"It's an old-fashioned way of mending matters,--two friends covering each other's deficiencies. The inner pair are too thin alone, and the outer ones have holes that are past cobbling."
"Are we going to have any breakfast to-day?" said he flinging the gloves down. "You are very late!"
"No," said Fleda quietly,--"it is not time for aunt Lucy to be down yet."
"Don't you have breakfast before nine o'clock?"
"Yes--by half-past eight generally."
"Strange way of getting along on a farm!--Well I can't wait--I promised Thorn I would meet him this morning--Barby!--I wish you would bring me my boots!--"
Fleda made two springs,--one to touch Charlton's mouth, the other to close the door of communication with the kitchen.
"Well!--what is the matter?--can't I have them?"
"Yes, yes, but ask me for what you want. You mustn't call upon Barby in that fashion."
"Why not? is she too good to be spoken to? What is she in the kitchen for?"
"She wouldn't be in the kitchen long if we were to speak to her in that way," said Fleda. "I suppose she would as soon put your boots on for you as fetch and carry them. I'll see about it."
"It seems to me Fleda rules the house," remarked Capt. Rossitur when she had left the room.
"Well who should rule it?" said Hugh.
"Not she!"
"I don't think she does," said Hugh; "but if she did, I am sure it could not be in better hands."
"It shouldn't be in her hands at all. But I have noticed since I have been here that she takes the arrangement of almost everything. My mother seems to have nothing to do in her own family."
"I wonder what the family or anybody in it would do without Fleda!" said Hugh, his gentle eyes quite firing with indignation. "You had better know more before you speak, Charlton."
"What is there for me to know?"
"Fleda does everything."
"So I say; and that is what I don't like."
"How little you know what you are talking about!" said Hugh. "I can tell you she is the life of the house, almost literally; we should have had little enough to live upon this summer if it had not been for her."
"What do you mean?"--impatiently enough.
"Fleda--if it had not been for her gardening and management. She has taken care of the garden these two years and sold I can't tell you how much from it. Mr. Sweet, the hotel-man at the Pool, takes all we can give him."
"How much does her 'taking care of the garden' amount to?"
"It amounts to all the planting and nearly all the other work, after the first digging,--by far the greater part of it."
Charlton walked up and down a few turns in most unsatisfied silence.
"How does she get the things to Montepoole?"
"I take them."
"You!--When?"
"I ride with them there before breakfast. Fleda is up very early to gather them."
"You have not been there this morning?"
"Yes."
"With what?"
"Peas and strawberries."
"And Fleda picked them?"
"Yes--with some help from Barby and me."
"That glove of hers was wringing wet."
"Yes, with the pea-vines, and strawberries too; you know they get so loaded with dew. O Fleda gets more than her gloves wet. But she does not mind anything she does for father and mother."
"Humph!--And does she get enough when all is done to pay for the trouble?"
"I don't know," said Hugh rather sadly. "Shethinks so. It is no trifle."
"Which?--the pay or the trouble?"
"Both. But I meant the pay. Why she made ten dollars last year from the asparagus beds alone, and I don't know how much more this year."
"Ten dollars!--The devil!"
"Why?"
"Have you come to counting your dollars by the tens?"
"We have counted our sixpences so a good while," said Hugh quietly.
Charlton strode about the room again in much perturbation. Then came in Fleda, looking as bright as if dollars had been counted by the thousand, and bearing his boots.
"What on earth did you do that for?" said he angrily. "I could have gone for them myself."
"No harm done," said Fleda lightly,--"only I have got something else instead of the thanks I expected."
"I can't conceive," said he, sitting down and sulkily drawing on his foot-gear, "why this piece of punctiliousness should have made any more difficulty about bringing me my boots than about blacking them."
A sly glance of intelligence, which Charlton was quick enough to detect, passed between Fleda and Hugh. His eye carried its question from one to the other. Fleda's gravity gave way.
"Don't look at me so, Charlton," said she laughing;--"I can't help it, you are so excessively comical!--I recommend that you go out upon the grass-plat before the door and turn round two or three times."
"Will you have the goodness to explain yourself? Whodidblack these boots?"
"Never pry into the secrets of families," said Fleda. "Hugh and I have a couple of convenient little fairies in our service that do thingsunknownst."
"I blacked them, Charlton," said Hugh.
Capt. Rossitur gave his slippers a fling that carried them clean into the corner of the room.
"I will see," he said rising, "whether some other service cannot be had more satisfactory than that of fairies!"
"Now Charlton," said Fleda with a sudden change of manner, coming to him and laying her hand most gently on his arm,--"please don't speak about these things before uncle Rolf or your mother--Please do not!--Charlton!--It would only do a great deal of harm and do no good."
She looked up in his face, but he would not meet her pleading eye, and shook off her hand.
"I don't need to be instructed how to speak to my father and mother; and I am not one of the household that has submitted itself to your direction."
Fleda sat down on her bench and was quiet, but with a lip that trembled a little and eyes that let fall one or two witnesses against him. Charlton did not see them, and he knew better than to meet Hugh's look of reproach. But for all that there was a certain consciousness that hung about the neck of his purpose and kept it down in spite of him; and it was not till breakfast was half over that his ill-humour could make head against this gentle thwarting and cast it off. For so long the meal was excessively dull. Hugh and Fleda had their own thoughts; Charlton was biting his resolution into every slice of bread and butter that occupied him; and Mr. Rossitur's face looked like anything but encouraging an inquiry into his affairs. Since his son's arrival he had been most uncommonly gloomy; and Mrs. Rossitur's face was never in sunshine when his was in shade.
"You'll have a warm day of it at the mill, Hugh," said Fleda, by way of saying something to break the dismal monotony of knives and forks.
"Does that mill make much?" suddenly inquired Charlton.
"It has made a new bridge to the brook, literally," said Fleda gayly; "for it has sawn out the boards; and you know you mustn't speak evil of what carries you over the water."
"Does that mill pay for the working?" said Charlton, turning with the dryest disregard from her interference and addressing himself determinately to his father.
"What do you mean? It does not work gratuitously," answered Mr. Rossitur, with at least equal dryness.
"But, I mean, are the profits of it enough to pay for the loss of Hugh's time?"
"If Hugh judges they are not, he is at liberty to let it alone."
"My time is not lost," said Hugh; "I don't know what I should do with it."
"I don't know what we should do without the mill," said Mrs. Rossitur.
That gave Charlton an unlucky opening.
"Has the prospect of farming disappointed you, father?"
"What is the prospect of your company?" said Mr. Rossitur, swallowing half an egg before he replied.
"A very limited prospect!" said Charlton,--"if you mean the one that went with me. Not a fifth part of them left."
"What have you done with them?"
"Shewed them where the balls were flying, sir, and did my best to shew them the thickest of it."
"Is it necessary to shew it to us too?" said Fleda.
"I believe there are not twenty living that followed me into Mexico," he went on, as if he had not heard her.
"Was all that havoc made in one engagement?" said Mrs. Rossitur, whose cheek had turned pale.
"Yes, mother--in the course of a few minutes."
"I wonder what would pay forthatloss!" said Fleda indignantly.
"Why, the point was gained! and it did not signify what the cost was so we did that. My poor boys were a small part of it."
"What point do you mean?"
"I mean the point we had in view, which was taking the place."
"And what was the advantage of gaining the place."
"Pshaw!--The advantage of doing one's duty."
"But what made it duty?" said Hugh.
"Orders."
"I grant you," said Fleda,--"I understand that--but bear with me, Charlton,--what was the advantage to the army or the country?"
"The advantage of great honour if we succeeded, and avoiding the shame of failure."
"Is that all?" said Hugh.
"All!" said Charlton.
"Glory must be a precious thing when other men's lives are so cheap to buy it," said Fleda.
"We did not risk theirs without our own," said Charlton colouring.
"No,--but still theirs were risked for you."
"Not at all;--why this is absurd! you are saying that the whole war was for nothing."
"What better than nothing was the end of it? We paid Mexico for the territory she yielded to us, didn't we, uncle Rolf?"
"Yes."
"How much?"
"Twenty millions, I believe."
"And what do you suppose the war has cost?"
"Hum--I don't know,--a hundred."
"A hundred million! besides--how much besides!--And don't you suppose, uncle Rolf, that for half of that sum Mexico would have sold us peaceably what she did in the end?"
"It is possible--I think it is very likely."
"What was the fruit of the war, Capt. Rossitur?"
"Why, a great deal of honour to the army and the nation at large."
"Honour again! But granting that the army gained it, which they certainly did, for one I do not feel very proud of the nation's share."
"Why they are one" said Charlton impatiently.
"In an unjust war"
"It wasnotan unjust war!"
"That's what you call a knock-downer," said Fleda laughing. "But I confess myself so simple as to have agreed with Seth Plumfield, when I heard him and Lucas disputing about it last winter, that it was a shame to a great and strong nation like ours to display its might in crushing a weak one."
"But they drew it upon themselves.Theybegan hostilities."
"There is a diversity of opinion about that."
"Not in heads that have two grains of information."
"I beg your pardon. Mrs. Evelyn and Judge Sensible were talking over that very question the other day at Montepoole; and he made it quite clear to my mind that we were the aggressors." "Judge Sensible is a fool!" said Mr. Rossitur.
"Very well!" said Fleda laughing;--"but as I do not wish to be comprehended in the same class, will you shew me how he was wrong, uncle?"
This drew on a discussion of some length, to which Fleda listened with profound attention, long after her aunt had ceased to listen at all, and Hugh was thoughtful, and Charlton disgusted. At the end of it Mr. Rossitur left the table and the room, and Fleda subsiding turned to her cold coffee-cup.
"I didn't know you ever cared anything about politics before," said Hugh.
"Didn't you?" said Fleda smiling, "You do me injustice."
Their eyes met for a second, with a most appreciating smile on his part; and then he too went off to his work. There was a few minutes' silent pause after that.
"Mother," said Charlton looking up and bursting forth, "what is all this about the mill and the farm?--Is not the farm doing well?"
"I am afraid not very well," said Mrs. Rossitur, gently.
"What is the difficulty?"
"Why, your father has let it to a man by the name of Didenhover, and I am afraid he is not faithful; it does not seem to bring us in what it ought."
"What did he do that for?"
"He was wearied with the annoyances he had to endure before, and thought it would be better and more profitable to have somebody else take the whole charge and management. He did not know Didenhover's character at the time."
"Engaged him without knowing him!"
Fleda was the only third party present, and Charlton unwittingly allowing himself to meet her eye received a look of keen displeasure that he was not prepared for.
"That is not like him," he said in a much moderated tone. "But you must be changed too, mother, or you would not endure such anomalous service in your kitchen."
"There are a great many changes, dear Charlton," said his mother, looking at him with such a face of sorrowful sweetness and patience that his mouth was stopped. Fleda left the room.
"And have you really nothing to depend upon but that child's strawberries and Hugh's wood-saw?" he said in the tone he ought to have used from the beginning.
"Little else."
Charlton stifled two or three sentences that rose to his lips, and began to walk up and down the room again. His mother sat musing by the tea-board still, softly clinking her spoon against the edge of her tea-cup.
"She has grown up very pretty," he remarked after a pause.
"Pretty!" said Mrs. Rossitur.
"Why?"
"No one that has seen much of Fleda would ever describe her by that name."
Charlton had the candour to think he had seen something of her that morning.
"Poor child!" said Mrs. Rossitur sadly,--"I can't bear to think of her spending her life as she is doing--wearing herself out, I know, sometimes--and buried alive."
"Buried!" said Charlton in his turn.
"Yes--without any of the advantages and opportunities she ought to have. I can't bear to think of it. And yet how should I ever live without her!"--said Mrs. Rossitur, leaning her face upon her hands. "And if she were known she would not be mine long. But it grieves me to have her go without her music that she is so fond of, and the books she wants--she and Hugh have gone from end to end of every volume there is in the house, I believe, in every language, except Greek."
"Well, she looks pretty happy and contented, mother."
"I don't know!" said Mrs. Rossitur shaking her head.
"Isn't she happy?"
"I don't know," said Mrs. Rossitur again;--"she has a spirit that is happy in doing her duty, or anything for those she loves; but I see her sometimes wearing a look that pains me exceedingly. I am afraid the way she lives and the changes in our affairs have worn upon her more than we know of--she feels doubly everything that touches me, or Hugh, or your father. She is a gentle spirit!--"
"She seems to me not to want character," said Charlton.
"Character! I don't know who has so much. She has at least fifty times as much character as I have. And energy. She is admirable at managing people--she knows how to influence them somehow so that everybody does what she wants."
"And who influences her?" said Charlton.
"Who influences her? Everybody that she loves. Who has the most influence over her, do you mean?--I am sure I don't know--Hugh, if anybody,--butsheis rather the moving spirit of the household."
Capt. Rossitur resolved that he would be an exception to her rule.
He forgot, however, for some reason or other, to sound his father any more on the subject of mismanagement. His thoughts indeed were more pleasantly taken up.