“Maggie has never seen me coming to the front door. My grandfather raises chickens and bees, and I often deliver honey and eggs around at the back door. Perhaps Miss Granger may think it queer if——”
“Of course it isn’t queer!” Charles interrupted with emphasis. “My sister’s best friend has the right to enter the front door of——” He did not complete his sentence, but rose instead, for a stately, rather haughty appearing woman had appeared. The visitor was warmly received.
“Mr. Gale, I am indeed pleased that you have come. Poor little Lenora has not been at all well of late, and that is why I sent for you. She has been at perfect liberty to do as she wished, as you requested, but she contracts frequent colds, and this last one has lingered.”
Miss Granger hesitated, then confessed. “The truth is, your sister does not seem to be real happy here. She is timid and does not care to mingle with her schoolmates.”
Then she added frankly: “I find that, on the whole, the young ladies are rather heartless. They do not make an effort to include in their pleasures one who is naturally reserved and who, in turn, seems to care nothing at all about being included.”
Miss Granger, on entering the room, had bowed somewhat distantly to Jenny Warner, whom she did not recognize, as she had seldom seen her. Charles, noting this, asked: “Miss Granger, are you acquainted with little Miss Warner, whose grandfather is a farmer in this neighborhood?”
The woman, whose manner was rather frigid at all times, lifted her eyebrows ever so slightly as though marveling that a young man whose sister attended her select seminary should be found in the companionship of a hired farmer’s granddaughter.
Their own father, Mr. Gale, might own a farm, but that was very different, as he had countless acres of wheat lands, she understood, and was very rich, while the Warners were merely hired to conduct a small farm belonging to the Poindexter-Jones estate. All this went quickly through the woman’s thoughts and she was astonished to hear the young man saying:
“I have decided, Miss Granger, to remove my sister to the farm home of Miss Warner for the two weeks remaining before I complete my studies at the Berkeley Agricultural College. My sister is very fond of Miss Jenny, and I feel that the companionship she will have in that home will do much to help her recover the strength she will need for the long journey to Dakota.”
Miss Granger prided herself on being able to hide all emotions, and on never expressing surprise, but she could not resist saying:
“I was unaware of this friendship, which is the result, no doubt, of the freedom of action which you wished your sister to have, but if it is a friendship sanctioned by Lenora’s brother, I, of course, can say nothing concerning it.”
Rising, she held out her hand: “I will have Miss Gale’s trunk packed at once, and shall I have it sent to the Poindexter-Jones farm?”
“Yes, if you please, and thank you, Miss Granger, for your many kindnesses to my sister.”
With a cold nod toward the girl and with a formal reply to Charles’ polite speech, she swept from the room. The lad turned with an amused smile toward his companion. In a low voice he said:
“I understand now why Sister never wrote me that I would be sure to love Miss Granger.”
Charles was shocked indeed at the appearance of the sister who was dearer to him than life itself. Pale and so wearily she came into the room leaning on the school nurse. Throwing her arms about her brother’s neck she clung to him. “I’ve been so lonely for mother lately,” she sobbed. “I dream of her often just as though she were alive and well. Then I am so happy, but I waken and realize that mother is never coming back.”
The young man, much moved, pressed his cheek close to the tear-wet one of the girl. “I know, darling, I know.” Then, striving to keep a break out of his voice, he said cheerily: “See who is here, Sister. Someone of whom you have often written me. And she has a wonderful plan to suggest.”
Lenora smiled wanly and held out a frail white hand. “I love Jenny Warner,” she said as though informing her brother of something he already knew. Then she asked, looking from one to the other: “Where am I going? Home to father?”
“Not quite yet, dear girl,” her brother replied. “Jenny’s grandmother has invited you to visit them for two weeks, or rather, until I am through with my studies, then, if you are strong enough, I will take you home to Dad.”
Before Lenora could express her pleasure, the ever watchful nurse stepped forward, saying: “Miss Gale ought not to be kept standing. Miss Granger has ordered the closed carriage and bade me accompany my patient to her destination.”
“That’s fine.” Charles found it hard to keep a note of anxiety out of his voice when Lenora sank into a near chair and began to cough. He followed the nurse from the room when she went to get her wraps. “Please tell me my sister’s condition,” he said in a low, troubled voice. “Her lungs are not affected, are they?”
“No, I am glad to say they are not. The trouble seems to be in her throat.” Then, after a thoughtful moment, the nurse added, glancing about to be sure that no one was near: “I would not wish to be quoted, but I believe Miss Gale’s recovery depends upon her being in an environment which she will enjoy. Here she is very lonely and broods continually for the mother who is gone.”
“Thank you for having told me.” Charles was indeed grateful to the nurse, whose name he did not know. “I shall see that such an environment is found for my dear sister if it exists anywhere. Our mother has been dead for several years, but, as time goes on, we miss her more and more.”
“I understand,” the nurse said as though she, too, had had a similar loss, then she glided quietly away.
On returning to the reception room, Jenny suggested that she would better go at once to the farmhouse that she might be there to welcome Lenora and the nurse. Charles agreed that the plan was a good one, and so, tenderly kissing her friend, Jenny went out; the young man opening the door for her.
When she had driven away, Charles returned to his sister, who smiled up at him faintly as she said: “Wasn’t I right, Charles? Isn’t Jenny the sweetest, dearest girl you ever saw?”
But her brother shook his head. “No, indeed,” he said, emphatically, taking one of the listless hands from the arm of the chair. “The sweetest, dearest girl in this world to me is your very own self, and, although I am quite willing to like any girl whom you may select as a best friend, you will never get me to acknowledge that she is sweeter than my very own sister. However, I will agree that I am pleased with Miss Jenny Warner to the extent of being willing, even glad, to have you in the same house with her until you are strong enough to travel to our home with me. I’ll wire Dad tonight. I have purposely kept your illness from him. It would be unwise for him to come here at this time of the year. We cannot both be away from the farm at seeding time.”
The nurse reappeared, saying the coach was waiting. The young giant of a lad lifted his sister and carried her out of the seminary which she was indeed glad to leave.
Jenny and her grandmother were on the side porch of the picturesque adobe farmhouse when Charles Gale on horseback rode up, immediately followed by the closed carriage. Susan Warner with tender pity in her face and voice, welcomed the pale girl, who was lifted out of the conveyance by the strong arms of her brother. Lenora’s sweet gray eyes were brimmed with tears and her lips trembled when she tried to thank the old woman for her great kindness. “There, there, dearie. Don’t try to be sayin’ anything now. You’re all petered out with the ride.” Then cheerily: “Jenny’ll show you where to fetch little Lenora, Mister—” she hesitated and the girl at her side hastened to say: “Grandma Sue, this is Charles Gale, Lenora’s brother. Miss Granger had sent for him.”
The pleasant-faced young man bowed as he apologized for his inability to remove his hat. His sister having recovered from her first desire to cry, smilingly did it for him. “Haven’t I a giant for a brother?” she asked; then holding out a frail hand to the nurse, who had descended from the carriage carrying the wraps and a satchel. Lenora said: “Mrs. Warner, this is Miss Adelaide Wells, who has been very kind to me.” Then, as memory of the place she had left surged over her, the tears again came: “Oh, brother,” she half sobbed, clinging to him, “promise me I’ll never, never have to be sent to a seminary again.”
“Why, of course not,” he assured her. “When I have finished my schooling you and I will go back to our farm home and stay there forever and forever. If you need any further instruction, I can help you, so put that fear quite out of your thought.”
The girl smiled, but seemed too weak to make a reply. Charles followed Jenny through the kitchen and the cheerful living room into the bedroom which had been decked in so festive a fashion only that morning. After the nurse had put Lenora to bed, she returned to the seminary. The weary girl rested for a while with her eyes closed, then she opened them and looked about her.
She found Jenny sitting quietly by her bedside just waiting. Lenora smiled without speaking and seemed to be listening to the rush of the waves on the rocks, then she said: “That is the lullabye I once said I would like to hear in the night. It’s like magic, having it all come to pass.”
She smiled around at the flowers. “How sweet they are! I know that each one tells me some message of the thoughtfulness and love of my friend.” Holding out a frail hand, Lenora continued: “Jenny Warner, if I live, I am going to do something to make you glad that you have been so kind to me.”
A pang, like a pain, shot through the listener’s heart. “If I live.” She had not for one moment thought that her dear, dear friend might die. She was relieved to hear the other girl add in a brighter manner, as though she felt stronger after her brief rest: “I believe now that I shall live, but truly, Jenny, I didn’t care much when I lay all day up there in that cold, dreary seminary with no one near to mind whether I stayed or went. But now that I am here with you in this lovely, cheerful room, somehow I feel sure that I shall live.” Before her companion could reply, she asked: “Where is brother Charles?”
Jenny glanced out of the window. “Oh, there he is, standing on that high rock on the point, the one that canopies over our seat, you know, where we sat the last time you were at the farm. Shall I call him, dear?”
Lenora nodded and so Jenny, bareheaded, ran out toward the point of rocks. Charles, turning, saw her and went to meet her. “Has my sister rested?” he asked. Jenny said that she had, then anxiously she inquired: “Mr. Gale, what does the nurse think? Lenora is not seriously ill, is she?”
There was a sudden shadowing of the eyes that looked down at her. “I don’t know, Miss Jenny. I sincerely hope not. At my request Miss Wells will send me a daily report of my sister’s condition. The nurse takes a walk every afternoon, and, if your grandmother is willing, she will stop here until our little Lenora is much better.”
“I think that a splendid plan. It will be better than having a doctor call every day.” Then brightening: “Oh, Mr. Gale, I am sure Lenora will get well. She is better, come and see for yourself.” And so together they went indoors.
“What do you suppose is the matter with Gwyn? Ever since Jenny Warner delivered a note from her mother Saturday afternoon, she has been as glum as a—well, what is glum, anyway?” Patricia looked up from the book she was studying to make this comment.
Beulah mumbled some reply which was unintelligible, nor did she cease trying to solve the problem she was intent upon. Pat continued: “I have it figured out that Gwyn’s mother wrote something which greatly upset our never-too-amiable friend. She kept shut in her room yesterday, tight as a clam in its shell. I rapped several times and asked if she had a headache and if she wished me to bring tea or anything, but she did not reply.”
“Take it from me, Pat, you waste your good Samaritan impulses on a person like Gwyn. She is simply superlatively selfish.”
Pat leaped up and put a hand over her friend’s mouth. “I heard the knob turn. I think we are about to be honored with a visit. Don’t be sarcastic, Beulah. Maybe Gwyn has a real trouble.”
This whispered remark had just been concluded when there came an imperative rapping on the inner door. Pat skipped to open it. Gwynette, dressed for the street, entered. “What’s the grand idea of locking the door between our rooms?” she inquired.
“Didn’t know it was locked,” Pat replied honestly. Beulah was again solving the intricate problem, or attempting to, and acted as though she had not heard.
Patricia, always the more tender-hearted, offered their visitor a chair. Then solicitously: “What is the matter, Gwyn. You look as though you had cried for hours. Bad news in the note Jenny Warner brought you?”
There was a hard expression in the brown eyes that were turned coldly toward the sympathetic inquirer. Slowly she said, “I sometimes think that I hate my mother and that she hates me.”
There was a quick protest from Pat. “Don’t say that, Gwyn, just because you are angry! You have told me, yourself, that your mother has granted your every wish until recently.”
Gwynette shrugged her proudly-held shoulders. “Even so! Why am I now treated like a child and told what I must do, or be punished?” Noting a surprised expression in Patricia’s pleasant face, Gwyn repeated with emphasis: “Just exactly that! If I do not take the tests, or if I fail in them when they are taken, I cannot have my coming-out party next year, but must remain in this or some other school until I obtain a diploma as a graduate with honors. So Ma Mere informed me in the note brought by that despicable Jenny Warner.”
Beulah could not help hearing and she looked up, her eyes flashing. “Gwynette, if you wish to slander a friend of Pat’s and mine, you will have to choose another audience.”
The eyebrows of the visitor were lifted. “Indeed? Since when have you become the champion of the granddaughter of my mother’s servants?”
Beulah’s answer was defiant. “Pat and I both consider Jenny Warner one of the most beautiful and lovable girls we have ever met. We went for a ride with her on Saturday, and this afternoon, if we aren’t too exhausted after the tests, we are going to walk down to her farm home and call on her and upon little Lenora Gale, who has been moved there from the infirmary.”
Gwynette rose, flinging over her shoulder contemptuously, “Well, I see that you have made your choice of friends. Of course you cannot expect to associate with me, if you are hobnobbing at the same time with our servants. What is more, that Lenora Gale’s father is a wheat rancher in Dakota. I, at least, shall select my friends from exclusive families. I will bid you good-bye. From now on our intimacy is at end.” The door closed behind Gwyn with an emphatic bang. Beulah leaped up and danced a jig. Pat caught her and pushed her back into her chair. “Don’t. She’ll hear and her feelings will be hurt.”
“Well, she’s none too tender with other people’s feelings,” Beulah retorted.
A carriage bearing the Poindexter-Jones coat-of-arms and drawn by two white horses was waiting under the wide portico in front of the seminary when Gwynette emerged. The liveried footman was standing near the open door to assist her within, then he took his place by the coachman and the angry girl was driven from the Granger Place grounds.
She did not notice the golden glory of the day; she did not glance out as she was driven down the beautiful Live Oak Canyon road, nor did she observe when the wife of the lodgekeeper opened the wide iron gates and curtsied to her. She was staring straight ahead with hard, unseeing eyes.
When the coach stopped and the footman had opened the door, the girl mounted the many marble steps leading to the pillared front porch. Instantly, and before she could ring, a white-caped maid admitted her. It was one who had been with them for years in their palatial San Francisco home, as had, also, the other servants. “Where is my mother, Cecile?” the girl inquired with no word of greeting, though she had not seen the trim French maid for many months. The maid’s eyes narrowed and her glance was not friendly. She liked to be treated, at least, as though she were human. She volunteered a bit of advice: “Madame is veer tired, Mees Gwyn. What you call, not yet strong. Doctor, he say, speak quiet where Madame is.”
Gwyn glared at the servant who dared to advise her. “Kindly tell me where my mother is at this moment. Since she sent the carriage for me, it is quite evident that she wishes to see me.”
“Madame is in lily-pond garden. I tell her Mees Gwyn has come.” But the girl, brushing past the maid, walked down the long, wide hall which extended from the front to the double back door and opened out on a most beautiful garden, where, on the blue mirror of an artificial pond many fragrant white lilies floated. There, sheltered from the sea breeze by tall, flowering bushes, Mrs. Poindexter-Jones reclined on a softly cushioned chair. Near her was a nurse in blue and white uniform who had evidently been reading aloud.
When Gwynette approached, the older woman said in a low voice: “Miss Dane, I prefer to be alone when I receive my daughter.”
The nurse slipped away through the shrubbery and Mrs. Poindexter-Jones turned again toward the girl whose rapid step and carriage plainly told her belligerence of spirit. The pale face of the patrician woman would have touched almost any heart, but Gwyn’s wrath had been accumulating since her conversation with Beulah and Pat. She considered herself the most abused person in existence.
“Ma Mere,” the girl began at once, “I don’t see why you didn’t let me come to you in France. If you aren’t any stronger than you seem to be, I should have thought you would have remained where you were and sent for Harold and me to join you there.”
“Sit down, Gwyn, if you do not care to kiss me.” There was a note of sorrow in the weary voice that did not escape the attention of the selfish girl. Stooping, she kissed her mother on the pale forehead. Then she took the seat vacated by the nurse. “Of course I am sorry you have been sick, Ma Mere,” she said in a tone which implied that decency demanded that much of her. “But it seems to me it would have been much better for you to have remained where you were. I was simply wild to have you send for me while you were at that adorable resort in France. I can’t see why you wanted to returnhere.” The last word was spoken with an emphasis of depreciation.
Mrs. Poindexter-Jones leaned her head back wearily on the cool pillow as she said, more to herself than to her listener, “I just wanted to come home. I wanted to see the trees my husband and I planted when we were first married. I felt that I would be nearer him someway, and I wanted to see my boy. Harold wished me to come home. He preferred to spend the summer here and I was glad.”
The pity, which for a moment had flickered in the girl’s heart when she saw how very weak her mother really was, did not last long enough to warm into a flame. “Ma Mere,” she said petulantly, “I cannot understand why you never speak of your husband as my father.” There was no response, only a tightening of the woman’s lips as though she were making an effort to not tell the truth.
“Moreover,” Gwyn went on, not noticing the change in her mother’s manner, “why should Harold’s wishes be put above mine? Perhaps you do not realize that he has become interested, to what degree I do not know, but nevertheless really interested, in the granddaughter of your servants on the farm.”
Mrs. Poindexter-Jones turned toward the girl. There was not in her eyes the flash of indignation which Gwynette had expected, only surprise and perhaps inquiry. “Is that true?” Then, after a meditative moment the woman concluded, “Fate does strange things. What was it they called her?”
Gwyn held herself proudly erect. At least she had been sure that her mother would have sided with her in denouncing Harold’s plan to become a farmer under the direction of Silas Warner. She hurried on to impart the information without telling the name of the girl whom she so disliked, although without reason.
“I recall now,” was the woman’s remark. “Jenny Warner. Jeanette was her name and yours was Gwynette.”
Angrily her companion put in, “Ma Mere, did you hear me say that Harold has decided to become a farmer, a mere laborer, when you had planned that he should become a diplomat or something like that?”
“Yes, I heard.” The woman leaned back wearily. “My boy wrote me that was why he wanted to stay here, although he would give up his own wishes if they did not accord with mine.” Then she added, with an almost pensive smile on her thin lips, “He is more dutiful than my daughter is, one might think.”
Gwynette flung herself about in the chair impatiently. “Harold knows you will do everything to please him and nothing to please me.”
The woman’s eyes narrowed as she looked at the hard, selfish face which nevertheless was beautiful in a cold way.
The woman seemed to be making an effort to speak calmly. “Gwynette,” she said at last, “we will call this unpleasant interview at an end. The fault probably is mine. Without doubt I do favor Harold. He is very like his father, and I seem to feel that Harold cares more for me than you do.” She put up a protesting hand. “Don’t answer me, please. I am very tired. You may go now.”
The girl rose, somewhat ashamed of herself. Petulantly, she said, “But Ma Mere, must I take the horrid old test? I will fail miserably and be disgraced. I supposed I was to make my debut next winter and I did not consider a diploma necessary to an eligible marriage.”
The woman had been watching the girl, critically, but not unkindly. Her reply was in a softer voice. “No, Gwyn, you need not take the tests. Somehow I have failed to bring you up well.” Then to the listener’s amazement, the invalid added: “Tell the coachman, when he returns from the seminary, to stop at the farm and bring Jenny Warner over to see me. I would like to know how Susan Warner succeeded in bringing up her girl.”
Gwynette was again angry. “You are a strange mother to wish to compare your own daughter with the granddaughter of one of your servants.”
With that she walked away, and, with a sorrowful expression the woman watched her going. How she wished the girl would relent, turn back and fling herself down by the side of the only mother she had ever known, and beg to be forgiven and loved, but nothing was farther from Gwynette’s thought.
Glad as she was to be freed from taking the tests, she was more than ever angry because she would have to remain at the seminary until the close of the term, which was another week. Why would not her mother permit her to visit some friend in San Francisco? Then came the sickening realization that she no longer had an intimate friend. Patricia and Beulah had both gone over to the enemy. Why did she hate Jenny Warner, she wondered as she was being driven back to the school. Probably because Beulah had once said they looked alike with one difference, that the farmer’s granddaughter was much the more beautiful. And then Harold actually preferred the companionship of that ignorant peddler of eggs and honey to his own sister. Purposely she neglected to mention to the coachman that he was to call at the farm and take Jenny Warner back with him. But Fate was even then planning to carry out Mrs. Poindexter-Jones’s wishes in quite another way.
“Lenora, dearie, can you spare Jenny a spell! I want her to tote a basket of fresh eggs over to Poindexter Arms, and a few jars o’ honey. Like as not the poor sick missus will be glad of somethin’ different and tasty. Don’t let her pay for ’em, Jenny-gal. Tell her they’re a welcome-home present from all of us. Tell her how we’re hopin’ the sea air’ll bring back her strength soon, and that ol’ Susan Warner will pay her respects as soon as she’s wanted. Jenny, dearie, can you recollect all that?”
The girl, who had been seated on the top step of the seaward veranda shelling peas and reading to her best friend, had leaped up when her dear old grandmother had appeared. Laughingly she slipped an arm about her, when she finished speaking, and kissed both of her cheeks. Then she peered into the faded blue eyes that were smiling at her so fondly as she entreated, “Granny Sue, wouldn’t it do as well if I left the basket at the kitchen door and asked a maid to give the message?”
The old woman looked inquiringly into the flower-like face so close to her own. “Would you mind seein’ the missus, if you was let to? I’d powerful well like to hear the straight of how she is, and when she’d like to have me pay my respects. You aren’t skeered of her, are you, dearie?”
“Of course not, Granny Sue. Although I must confess I was terribly scared of her when I was little. I thought she was an ogress. I do believe I will put in some of our field poppies to golden up the basket. Would she like that, Granny, do you think? I gathered ever so many this morning.”
“I reckon she’d be pleased, an’ if I was you. I’d put on that fresh yellow muslin. You look right smart in it.”
Lenora was an interested listener. She had heard all about the proud, haughty woman who was owner of the farm, and mother of the disagreeable Gwynette and of the nice Harold. She knewhemust be nice by the way all three of the Warners spoke of him.
She now put in: “O, Jenny, do wear that adorable droopy hat with the buttercup wreath. You look like a nymph of sunshine when you’re all in yellow.”
“Very well, I will! I live but to please.” This was said gaily. “Be prepared now for a transformation scene: from an aproned sheller of peas to a nymph of sunshine.”
In fewer minutes than seemed possible, Jenny again appeared, and spreading her fresh yellow muslin skirt, she made a minuet curtsy. Then she asked merrily, “Mistress Lenora, pray tell how a nymph of sunshine should walk and what she should say when she calls upon the most Olympian person she knows. Sort of a Juno.”
“Just act natural, dearie,” the proud grandmother had appeared with the basket of eggs, poppies and honey in time to reply to this query, “and no nymphs, whatever they be, could be sweeter or more pleasin’.” Then she added, “Your grandpa’s got Dobbin all hitched an’ waitin’ for you. Good-bye, dearie! Harold’ll be glad to have you kind to his ma. He sets a store by her.”
It was the last remark that gave Jenny courage to ask if she might see Mrs. Poindexter-Jones, twenty minutes later, when she had driven around to the side door of the mansion-like stone house. Cecile looked doubtful. “Ef eets to give the basket, the keetchen’s the place for that.”
Jenny smiled on Cecile, and the maid found herself staring in puzzled amazement. Who was this girl who looked like that other one who had just left; looked like her and yet didn’t, for she was far prettier and with such a kindly light in her smiling brown eyes. “Please tell Mrs. Poindexter-Jones that Susan Warner, on the farm, sent me over and would like me to deliver a message myself if she wishes to see me.”
There was nothing for Cecile to do but carry the message, and, to her amazement, Mrs. Poindexter-Jones looked pleased and requested that the maid show the girl at once to the pond-lily garden.
Almost shyly Jenny Warner went down the box-edged path. The elderly lady, not vain and proud as she had been in her younger days, lying back on soft silken pillows, watched her coming.
How pretty the girl looked in her simple yellow muslin frock, with her wide drooping hat, buttercup wreathed, and on her arm a basket, golden with field poppies.
As she neared, Mrs. Poindexter-Jones felt a mist in her eyes, for this girl looked very like the other only there was such a sweet, loving expression in the responsive face, while Gwynette’s habitual outlook on life had made her proud, critical and cold. The woman impulsively held out a hand. “Jenny Warner,” she said as she lifted the mist-filled eyes, “won’t you kiss me, dear?”
Instinctively Jenny knew that this invalid mother of Harold was in real need of tenderness and love. Unhesitatingly she kissed her, then took the seat toward which Mrs. Poindexter-Jones motioned. The basket she placed on the table. “Grandmother wished me to bring you some of our strained honey and fresh eggs and to ask you when you would like her to come and pay her respects.”
The woman smiled faintly. She seemed very very tired. Thoughtfully she replied, “Tomorrow, at about this hour, if the day is as pleasant as this. I will again be in the garden here. Tell Susan Warner I very much want to see her. I want to ask her a question.” Then she closed her eyes and seemed to be resting. Jenny wondered if she ought to go, but at her first rustle the eyes were opened and the woman smiled at the girl. “Jenny,” she said, somewhat wistfully, “I want to ask your grandmotherhowshe brought you up.”
The girl was puzzled. Why should Mrs. Poindexter-Jones care about the simple home life of a family in her employ.
But, before she had time to wonder long, the invalid was changing the subject. “Jenny, do you like to read aloud?” she asked.
There was sincere enthusiasm in the reply. “Oh, Mrs. Poindexter-Jones, I love to! I read aloud every day to my dear friend Lenora Gale, who is visiting me. We are reading poetry just now, but I care a great deal for prose also. Books and nature are the two things for which I care most.”
As she spoke Jenny glanced at the book lying on the small table where she had placed her basket. Almost shyly she asked. “Were you reading this book before I came?”
“My nurse, Miss Dane, was reading it to me. She is a very kind, good woman, but her voice is rasping, and it is hard for me to listen. My nerves are still far from normal and I was wishing that I had some young girl to read to me.” Jenny at once thought of Gwynette. Surely she would be glad to read to her mother while she was ill. As though she had heard the thought, the woman answered it, and her tone was sad. “My daughter, unfortunately, does not like to read aloud. She does not care for books—nor for nature—nor for——” the woman hesitated. She did not want to criticize Gwynette before another, and so she turned and looked with almost wistful inquiry at the girl. “Jenny Warner, may I engage your services to read to me one or two hours a day if your grandmother can spare you that long?”
Jenny’s liquid brown eyes were aglow with pleasure. This was Harold’s mother for whom she could do a real service. “Oh, may I read to you, Mrs. Poindexter-Jones? I would be so glad to do something—” she hesitated and a deeper rose color stole into her cheeks. She could not say for “Harold’s mother.” Mrs. Poindexter-Jones would not understand the depth of the girl’s gratitude toward the boy who was making it possible for her dear old grandparents to remain on the farm. And the woman, gazing at her, found that just then she could not mention remuneration.
“Suppose you come to me day after tomorrow at ten.” Miss Dane had appeared to say that it was time for the invalid to go into the house.
“Is it noon so soon?” the woman inquired, then turning back toward the girl who had risen, she added: “Seeing you has done me much good. Good-bye. Tell Susan Warner I want to see her tomorrow.”
Jenny returned home, her heart singing. She was to have an opportunity to thank Harold, and she was glad.
When Jenny reached the farmhouse she found her family in the kitchen, and by the way they all stopped talking when she entered, she was sure that something had happened during her absence which they had been discussing, nor was she wrong.
She looked from one interested face to another, then exclaimed: “You’re keeping a secret from me. What is it, please tell!”
Lenora, who had been made comfortable with pillows in grandfather’s easy chair, drawn close to the stove, merrily replied: “The secret is in plain sight. You must hunt, though, and find it.”
Jenny whirled to look at the table, already set with the supper things, but nothing unusual was there; then her glance traveled to the old mahogany cupboard, where, behind glass doors, in tidy rows, the best china stood. There, leaning against a tumbler, was an envelope bearing a foreign stamp.
With a cry of joy Jenny leaped forward. Instinctively she seemed to know that it was the long watched-for letter from Etta Heldt, nor was she wrong.
With eager fingers the envelope was opened. A draft fluttered to the floor. Jenny picked it up, then, after a glance at it, turned a glowing face toward the others.
“I knew it!” she cried joyfully. “I knew Etta Heldt was honest! This is every penny that she owes us.”
The handwriting was difficult to read and for a silent moment Jenny studied it, then brightly she exclaimed: “Oh, such wonderful news!” Then she read:
“Dear Friend:“I would have written long ago, but my grandpa took sick and was like to die when I got here, and my grandma and I had to set up nights, turn about, and days I was so tired and busy. I didn’t forget though. Poor grandpa died after a month, but I’m glad I got here first. He was more willing to go, being as I’d be here with grandma.“Now I guess you’re wondering where I got the money I’m sending you. I got it from Hans Heldt. He’s sort of relation of mine, though not close, and he wanted me to marry him and I said no, not till I paid the money I owed. He said he’d give it to me and then we’d make it up working grandpa’s farm together. So we got married and here’s the money, and my grandma wishes to tell your grandma how thankful she is to her and you for sending me home to her. I guess that’s all. Good-bye.Your grateful friend,Etta Heldt.”
“Dear Friend:
“I would have written long ago, but my grandpa took sick and was like to die when I got here, and my grandma and I had to set up nights, turn about, and days I was so tired and busy. I didn’t forget though. Poor grandpa died after a month, but I’m glad I got here first. He was more willing to go, being as I’d be here with grandma.
“Now I guess you’re wondering where I got the money I’m sending you. I got it from Hans Heldt. He’s sort of relation of mine, though not close, and he wanted me to marry him and I said no, not till I paid the money I owed. He said he’d give it to me and then we’d make it up working grandpa’s farm together. So we got married and here’s the money, and my grandma wishes to tell your grandma how thankful she is to her and you for sending me home to her. I guess that’s all. Good-bye.
Your grateful friend,
Etta Heldt.”
There were tears in Jenny’s eyes as she looked up. “Oh, Grandma Sue,” she ran across the room and clung to the dear old woman, “aren’t you glad, glad, glad we brought so much happiness into three lives?” Later, when they were at supper, Jenny told about her visit to Poindexter Arms.
There was a sad foreboding in the hearts of the old couple that evening. Although they said little, each was wondering what the outcome of their “gal’s” daily readings would be. “Whatever ’tis, ’twill like to be for the best, I reckon,” was Susan Warner’s philosophic conclusion, and the old man’s customary reply, “I cal’late yer right, Ma! Yo’ be mos’ allays.”
Susan Warner reached Poindexter Arms at the hour appointed and found her employer in the lily-pond garden. The old woman curtsied. Her heart was filled with pity. How changed was her formerly haughty mistress. There were more lines in the pale, patrician face than there were in the ruddy countenance of the humbler woman who was years the older. Hesitatingly she spoke: “I reckon you’ve been mighty sick, Mis’ Poindexter-Jones. It’s a pity, too, you havin’ so much to make life free of care an’ happy.” But the sad expression in the tired eyes, that were watching her so kindly, seemed to belie the words of the old woman who had been nurse for Baby Harold and housekeeper at Poindexter Arms for many years.
“Be seated, Susan. Miss Dane, my nurse, has gone to town to make a few purchases for me. Some of them books—” the invalid paused and turned questioningly toward the older woman. “Did your Jenny tell you that I wish to engage her services for an hour or two each morning—reading to me?”
Susan Warner nodded, saying brightly, “She was that pleased, Jenny was! She didn’t tell me just what she was meaning, but she said, happy-like, ‘It will give me a chance to pay a debt.’”
“A debt.” The invalid was perplexed. “Why, Jenny Warner is in no way indebted to me.” Then a cold, almost hard expression crept into her eyes, as she added, “If Gwynette had said that, I might have understood. But she never does. She takes all that I give her, and is rebellious because it is not more.” She had been thinking aloud. Before her amazed listener uttered a comment, if, indeed, she would have done so, which is doubtful, the younger woman said bitterly: “Susan Warner, I have failed, failed miserably as a mother. You have succeeded. That is why I especially wished to talk with you this morning. I want your advice.” Then Mrs. Poindexter-Jones did a very unusual thing for her. She acknowledged her disappointment in her adopted daughter to someone apart from herself.
“The girl’s selfishness is phenomenal,” she continued, not without bitterness. “She is jealous of the least favor I show my own boy and wishes all of our plans to be made with her pleasure as our only consideration.”
The old woman shook her head sympathetically. “Tut! tut! Mis’ Poindexter-Jones, that’s most unfeelin’ of her. Most!” She had been about to say that it was hard to believe that the two girls were really sisters, but, fearing that the comparison might hurt the other woman’s feelings, she said no more.
The invalid, an unusual color burning in her cheeks, sighed deeply. “Susan Warner,” she said, and there was almost a break in her voice, “don’t blame the girl too much. I try not to. If you had brought her up, and I had had Jenny, it might have been different. They——”
But Susan Warner could not wait, as was her wont for a superior to finish a sentence. She hurriedly interrupted with “Our Jenny wouldn’t have been different from what she is—no matter how she was fetched up. I reckon she justcouldn’tbe. She’d have been so grateful to you for havin’ given her a chance—she’d have been sweeter’n ever. Jenny would.”
The older woman was not entirely convinced. “I taught Gwynette to be proud,” she said reminiscently. “I wanted her to select her friends from only the best families. I was foolishly proud myself, and now I am being punished for it.”
Susan Warner said timidly, “Maybe she’ll change yet. Maybe ’tisn’t too late.”
“I fear it is far too late.” The invalid again dropped wearily back among her silken pillows. She closed her eyes, but opened them almost at once to turn a keenly inquiring glance at her visitor. “Susan Warner, I wanted to ask you this question: Do you think it might break down Gwynette’s selfish, haughty pride if she were to be told that she is your Jenny’s sister and my adopted daughter?”
The older woman looked startled. “Oh, I reckon I wouldn’t be hasty about tellin’ that, Mis’ Poindexter-Jones. I reckon I wouldn’t!” Then she faced the matter squarely. Perhaps the panic in her heart had been caused by selfish reasons. If the two girls were told that they were sisters, then Jenny would have to know that she was not the real granddaughter of the Warners. Would she, could she love them as dearly after that? The old woman rose, saying quaveringly, “Please, may I talk it over with Silas first. He’s clear thinkin’, Silas is, an’ he’ll see the straight of it.” And to this Mrs. Poindexter-Jones agreed.
On the day following, at the appointed hour, Jenny Warner, again wearing her pale yellow dress, appeared in the garden by the lily pond, and was welcomed by the invalid with a smile that brightened her weary face.
There were half a dozen new books on the small table, and Mrs. Poindexter-Jones, without preface, said: “Choose which one you would like to read, Jeanette.”
She glanced quickly at the girl, rebuking herself for having used the name of long ago, but it evidently had been unnoticed. The truth was that Miss Dearborn, her beloved teacher, had often used that longer name.
“They all look interesting. O, here is one, ‘The Morning Star.’ I do believe that is poetry in prose. How I wish Lenora might hear it also.”
“Lenora?” the woman spoke inquiringly; then “O, I recall now. You did say that you have a visitor who is ill. Is she strong enough to accompany you to my garden for our readings?”
“She would be, I think. The doctor said that by tomorrow I might take her for a drive. I could bring her chair and her cushions.” But the older woman interrupted. “No need to do that Jeanette. I have many pillows and several reclining chairs.” Then she suggested: “Suppose we leave the book until your friend is with us. There is a collection of short stories that will do for today.”
Jenny Warner read well. Miss Dearborn had seen to that, as she considered reading aloud an accomplishment to be cultivated.
The invalid was charmed. The girl’s voice was musical, soft yet clear, and most soothing to the harassed nerves of the woman, broken by the endless round of society’s demands.
When the one story was finished, the woman said: “Close the book, please, Jeanette. I would rather talk. I want to hear all about yourself, what you do, who are your friends, and what are your plans for the future.”
Jenny Warner told first of all about Miss Dearborn. That story was very enlightening to the listener. She had felt that some influence, other than that of the Warners, must have helped in the moulding of the girl who sat before her. “I would like to meet Miss Dearborn,” was her only comment.
Then Jenny told about Lenora Gale and the brother, Charles, who was coming to take her back to Dakota.
“But Lenora will not be strong enough to travel, perhaps not for a month, the doctor thinks. I do not know what her brother will do, but Lenora will remain with me.” Such a glad light was shining in the liquid brown eyes that the older woman was moved to say, “It makes you very happy to have a girl companion.”