_ CHAPTER XIX. ARCHIE IS IN A BAD HUMOR
"Oh, Archie, I was never more astonished in my life!" exclaimed Mattie, as she tried to adapt her uneven trot to her brother's long swinging footsteps; and then she glanced up in his face to read his mood: but Archie's features were inscrutable and presented an appalling blank. In his mind he was beginning his letter to Grace, and wondering what he should say to her about their new neighbors. "Writing is such a nuisance when one wants to talk to a person," he thought, irritably.
"Oh, Archie, won't you tell me what we are to do?" went on Mattie, excitedly. She would not take Archie's silence as a hint that he wanted to keep his thoughts to himself. "Those poor girls! oh, how nice and pretty they all are, especially the eldest! and is not the youngest--Dulce, I think they called her--the very image of Isabel?"
"Isabel! not a bit. That is so like you, Mattie. You always see likenesses when other people cannot trace the faintest resemblance," for this remark was sure to draw out his opposition. Isabel was a silly flirting little thing in her brother's estimation, and, he thought, could not hold a candle to the youngest Miss Challoner.
"Oh dear! now I have made you cross!" sighed poor Mattie, who especially wanted to keep him in good humor. "And yet every one but you thinks Isabel so pretty. I am sure, from what Grace said in her last letter, that Mr. Ellis Burton means to propose to her."
"And I suppose you will all consider that a catch," sneered Archie. "That is so like a parcel of women, thinking every man who comes to the house and makes a few smooth-tongued speeches--is, in fact, civil--must be after a girl. Of course you have all helped to instill this nonsense into the child's head."
"Dear me, how you talk, Archie!" returned Mattie, feeling herself snubbed as usual. Why, Archie had been quite excited about it only the other day, and had said quite seriously that with seven girls in a family, it would be a great blessing if Isabel could make such a match; for it was very unlikely that Laura and Susie, or even Clara, would do much for themselves in that way, unless they decidedly improved in looks.
"Well, it is nothing to me," he returned in a chilling manner; "we all know our own mind best. If an angular lantern-jawed fellow like Burton, who, by the bye, does not speak the best English, is to Isabel's taste, let her have him by all means: he is well-to-do, and I dare say will keep a carriage for her by and by: that is what you women think a great advantage," finished Archie, who certainly seemed bent on making himself disagreeable.
Mattie heaved another great sigh, but she did not dare to contradict him. Grace would have punished him on the spot by a dose of satire that would have brought him to reason and good nature in a moment; but Mattie ventured only on those laborious sighs which she jerked up from the bottom of her honest little heart.
Archie heard the sigh, and felt ashamed of his bad temper. He did not know himself why he felt so suddenly cross; some secret irritation was at work within him, and he could scarcely refrain from bidding Mattie quite roughly to hold her tongue and not tease him with her chatter. If she expected him in his present state of mind, which was at once contradictory and aggressive, to talk to her about the Challoners, she must just make up her mind to be disappointed, for he could not bring himself to speak of them to her just now: he wanted to hold counsel with his own thoughts and with Grace. He would call at the Friary again and see Mrs. Challoner, and find out more of this strange matter; but as to talking it over with Mattie, he quite shrugged his shoulders as he swung open the green door.
"Are you going in?" faltered Mattie, as she noticed this movement.
"Well, yes; I have letters to write, and it is too hot for a longer walk," he returned, decidedly; and then, as Mattie stood hesitating and wistful in the middle of the road, he strode off, leaving the door to close noisily after him, and not caring to inquire into her further movements, such being the occasional graceless manners of brothers when sisterly friendship is not to their liking.
Mattie felt snubbed; but for the first time in her life, she did not take her snubbing meekly. It was too much to expect of her, who was only a woman and not one of Archie's divinities, that she should follow him into the house and hold her tongue just because he was pleased to refrain from speaking. Water must find its vent; and Mattie's tongue could not be silenced in this way. If Archie would not talk to her, Miss Middleton would: so at once she trotted off for Brooklyn, thereby incurring Archie's wrath if he could only have known her purpose; for gossip was to him as the sin of witchcraft, unless he stooped to it himself, and then it was amiable sociability.
Miss Middleton was listening to her father's reading as usual, but she welcomed Mattie with open arms, literally as well as metaphorically, for she kissed Mattie on either cheek, and then scolded her tenderly for looking so flushed and tired; "for somebody who is always looking after other people, and never has time to spare for herself, is growing quite thin; is she not, father? and we must write to Grace if this goes on," finished Miss Middleton, with one of her kind looks.
All this was cordial to poor Mattie, who, though she was used to snubbing, and took as kindly to it as a spaniel to water, yet felt herself growing rather like a thread-paper and shabby with every-day worries and never an encouraging word to inspirit her.
So she gave Elizabeth a misty little smile,--Mattie's smile was pretty, though her features were ordinary,--and then sat up straight and began to enjoy herself,--that is, to talk,--never noticing that Colonel Middleton looked at his paper in a crestfallen manner, not much liking the interruption and the cessation of his own voice.
"Oh, dear!" began Mattie: she generally prefaced her remarks by an "Oh, dear!" ("That was one of her jerky ways," as Archie said.) "I could not help coming straight to you, for Archie would not talk, and I felt I must tell somebody. Oh, dear, Miss Middleton! What do you think? We have just called at the Friary--and----" but here Colonel Middleton's countenance relaxed, and he dropped his paper.
"Those young ladies, eh? Come, Elizabeth, this is interesting. Well, what sort of place is the Friary, seen from the inside, eh, Miss Drummond?"
"Oh, it is very nice," returned Mattie, enthusiastically. "We were shown into such a pretty room, looking out on the garden. They have so many nice things,--pictures, and old china, and handsomely-bound books, and all arranged so tastefully. And before we went away, the old servant--she seems really quite a superior person--brought in an elegant little tea-tray: the cups and saucers were handsomer even than yours, Miss Middleton,--dark-purple and gold. Just what I admire so----"
"Ah, reduced in circumstances! I told you so, Elizabeth," ejaculated the colonel.
"I never saw Archie enjoy himself so much or seem so thoroughly at home anywhere. Somehow, the girls put us so at our ease. Though they were hanging up curtains when we went in,--and any one else would have been annoyed at our intruding so soon,--actually, before we were in the room a moment, Archie was on the steps, helping the eldest Miss Challoner fasten the hooks."
Miss Middleton exchanged an amused look with her father. Mattie's narrative was decidedly interesting.
"Oh, don't tell him I repeated that, for he is always calling me chatterbox!" implored Mattie, who feared she had been indiscreet, and that the colonel was not to be trusted, which was quite true as far as jokes were concerned. No one understood the art of teasing better than he, and the young vicar had already had a taste of his kindly satire. "Archie only meant to be good-natured and put every one at their ease."
"Quite right. Mr. Drummond is always kind," returned Elizabeth, benignly. She had forgotten Mattie's frequent scoldings, and the poor little thing's tired face, or she would never have hazarded such a compromise with truth. But somehow Elizabeth always forgot people's weaknesses, especially when they were absent. It was so nice and easy to praise people; and if she always believed what she said, that was because her faith was so strong, and charity that is love was her second nature.
"Oh, yes, of course," returned Mattie, innocently. She was far too loyal a little soul to doubt Archie's kindness for a moment. Was he not the pride and ornament of the family,--the domestic pope who issued his bulls without possibility of contradiction? Whatever Archie did must be right. Was not that their domestic creed?--a little slavish, perhaps, but still so exquisitely feminine. Mattie was of opinion that--well, to use a mild term--irritability was a necessary adjunct of manhood. All men were cross sometimes. It behooved their womankind, then, to throw oil on the troubled waters,--to speak peaceably, and to refrain from sour looks, or even the shadow of a frown. Archie was never cross with Grace: therefore it must be she, Mattie, on whom the blame lay; she was such a silly little thing, And so on. There is no need to follow the self-accusation of one of the kindest hearts that ever beat.
"Did not your visit end as pleasantly as it began?" asked Elizabeth, who, though she was over-merciful in her judgments, was not without a good deal of sagacity and shrewdness. Something lay beyond the margin of Mattie's words, she could see that plainly; and then her father was getting impatient.
"Well, you see, that spoiled everything," returned Mattie, jumbling her narrative in the oddest manner. "Archie was so sorry, and so was I; and he got quite--you know his way when he feels uncomfortable. I thought Miss Challoner was joking at first,--that it was just a bit of make-believe fun,--until I saw how grave Miss Phillis, that is the second one, looked: and then the little one--at least, she is not little, but somehow one fancies she is--seemed as though she were going to cry."
"But what did Miss Challoner say to distress you and Mr. Drummond so?" asked Elizabeth, trying patiently to elicit facts and not vague statements from Mattie.
"Oh, she said--no, please don't think I am exaggerating, for it is all true--that they had lost their money, and were very poor, and, that she and her sisters were dressmakers."
"Dressmakers!" shouted the colonel, and his ruddy face grew almost purple with the shock: his very moustache seemed to bristle. "Dressmakers! my dear Miss Drummond, I don't believe a word of it! Those girls! It is a hoax!--a bit of nonsense from beginning to end!"
"Hush, father! you are putting Mattie out," returned Elizabeth, mildly. It was one of her idiosyncrasies to call people as soon as possible by their Christian names, though no one but her father and brother ever called her Elizabeth. Perhaps her gray hair, and a certain soft dignity that belonged to her, forbade such freedom. "Dear father, we must let Mattie speak." But even Elizabeth let her work lie unheeded in her lap in the engrossing interest of the subject.
"I do not mean they have been dressmakers all this time, but this is their plan for the future. Miss Challoner said they were not clever enough for governesses, and that they did not want to separate. But that is what they mean to do,--to make dresses for people who are not half so good as themselves."
"Preposterous! absurd!" groaned the colonel. "Where is their mother? What can the old lady be thinking about?" Mrs. Challoner was not an old lady by any means; but then the choleric colonel had never seen her, or he would not have applied that term to the aristocratic-looking gentlewoman whom Mattie had admired in Miss Milner's shop.
"I had a good look round the room afterwards," went on Mattie, letting this pass. "They had got a great carved wardrobe,--I thought that funny in a sitting-room; but of course it was for the dresses,"--another groan from the colonel,--"and there was a sewing-machine, and a rosewood davenport for accounts, and a chiffonnier of course for the pieces. Oh, they mean business; and I should not be surprised if they understand their work well," went on Mattie, warming up to her subject and thinking of the breadths of green silk that reposed so snugly between silver paper in her drawers at the vicarage,--the first silk dress she had ever owned, for the Drummond finances did not allow of such luxuries,--the new color, too; such a soft, invisible, shadowy green, like an autumn leaf shrivelled by the sun's richness. "Oh, if they should spoil it!" thought Mattie, with a sigh, as the magnitude of her intended sacrifice weighed heavily upon her mind.
"It is sheer girlish nonsense,--I might say foolery; and the mother must be a perfect idiot!" began the colonel, angrily.
He was an excitable man; and his wrath at the intelligence was really very great. He had taken a fancy to the new-comers, and was prepared to welcome them heartily in his genial way; but now his old-fashioned prejudices were grievously wounded. It was against his nice code of honor that women should do anything out of the usual beaten groove: innovations that would make them conspicuous were heinous sins in his eyes.
"Come, Mattie, you and I will have a chat about this by ourselves," observed Elizabeth, cheerfully, as she noticed her father's vexation. He would soon cool down if left to himself: she knew that well. "Suppose we go down to Miss Milner, and hear what she has to say: you may depend upon it that it was this that made her so reserved with us the other day."
"Oh, do you think so?" exclaimed Mattie; but she was charmed at the idea of fresh gossip. And then they set off together.
Miss Milner seemed a little surprised to see them so soon, for Mattie had already paid her a visit that day; but at Miss Middleton's first words a look of annoyance passed over her good-natured face.
"Dear, dear! to think of that leaking out already," she said, in a vexed voice; "and I have not spoken to a soul, because the young ladies asked me to keep their secret a few days longer. 'You must give us till next Monday,' one of them said this very morning: 'by that time we shall be in order, and then we can set to work.'"
"It was Miss Challoner who told me herself," observed Mattie, in a deprecating manner. "My brother and I called this afternoon: you see, being the clergyman, and such close neighbors, he thought we might be of some use to the poor things."
"Poor things indeed!" ejaculated Miss Milner. "I cannot tell you how bad I felt," she went on, her little gray curls bobbing over her high cheek-bones with every word, "when that dear young lady put down her head there"--pointing to a spot about as big as a half-crown on the wooden counter--"and cried like a baby. 'Oh, how silly I am!' she said, sobbing-like; 'and what would my sisters say to me? But you are so kind, Miss Milner; and it does seem all so strange and horrid.' I made up my mind, then and there," finished the good woman, solemnly, "that I would help them to the best of my powers. I have got their bits of advertisements to put about the shop; and there's my new black silk dress, that has laid by since Christmas, because I knew Miss Slasher would spoil it; not but what they may ruin it finely for me; but I mean to shut my eyes and take the risk," with a little smile of satisfaction over her own magnanimity.
Elizabeth stretched out her hand across the counter.
"Miss Milner, you are a good creature," she said, softly. "I honor you for this. If people always helped each other and thought so little of a sacrifice, the world would be a happier place." And then, without waiting for a reply from the gratified shopwoman, she went out of the library with a thoughtful brow.
"Miss Milner has read me a lesson," she said, by and by, when Mattie had marvelled at her silence a little. "Conventionality makes cowards of the best of us. I am not particularly worldly-minded," she went on, with a faint smile, "but all the same I must plead guilty to feeling a little shocked myself at your news; but when I have thought a little more about it, I dare say I shall see things by a truer light, and be as ready to admire these girls as I am now to wonder at them." And after this she bade Mattie a kindly good-bye.
Meanwhile, Phillis was bracing herself to undergo another ordeal. Mr. Drummond and his sister had only just left the cottage when a footman from the White House brought a note for her. It was from Mrs. Cheyne, and was worded in a most friendly manner.
She thanked the sisters gracefully for their timely help on the previous evening, and, though making light of her accident, owned that it would keep her a prisoner to her sofa for a few days; and then she begged them to waive ceremony and come to her for an hour or two that evening.
"I will not ask you to dinner, because that will perhaps inconvenience you, as you must be tired or busy," she wrote; "but if one or both of you would just put on your hats and walk up in the cool of the evening to keep Miss Mewlstone and myself company, it would be a real boon to us both." And then she signed herself "Magdalene Cheyne."
Phillis wore a perplexed look on her face as she took the note to Nan, who was still in the linen-closet.
"Very kind; very friendly," commented Nan, when she had finished reading it; "but I could not possibly go, Phil. As soon as I have done this I have promised to sit with mother. She has been alone all day. You could easily send an excuse, for Mrs. Cheyne must know we are busy."
"I don't feel as though an excuse will help us here," returned Phillis, slowly. "When an unpleasant thing has to be done, it is as well to get it over: thinking about it only hinders one's sleep."
"But you will surely not go alone!" demanded Nan, in astonishment. "You are so tired, Phil: you have been working hard all day. Give it up, dear, and sit and rest in the garden a little."
"Oh, no," returned Phillis, disconsolately. "I value my night's rest too much to imperil it so lightly: besides, I owe it to myself for a penance for being such a coward this afternoon." And then, without waiting for any further dissuasion, she carried off the letter and wrote a very civil but vague reply, promising to walk up in the evening and inquire after the invalid; and then she dismissed the messenger, and went up to her room with a heavy heart.
Dulce came to help her, like a dutiful sister, and chattered on without intermission.
"I suppose you will put on your best dress?" she asked, as she dived down into the recesses of a big box.
Phillis, who was sitting wearily on the edge of her bed, roused up at this:
"My best blue silk and cashmere, that we wore last at Fitzroy Lodge? Dulce, how can you be so absurd! Anything will do,--the gray stuff, or the old foulard. No, stop; I forgot: the gray dress is better made and newer in cut. We must think of that. Oh, what a worry it is going out when one is tired to death!" she continued, with unusual irritation.
Dulce respected her sister's mood, and held her peace, though she knew the gray dress was the least becoming to Phillis, who was pale, and wanted a little color to give her brightness.
"There, now, you look quite nice," she said, in a patronizing voice, as Phillis put on her hat and took her gloves. Phillis nodded her thanks rather sadly, and then bethought herself and came back and kissed her.
"Thank you, dear Dulce; I am not nearly so tired now; but it is getting late, and I must run off." And so she did until she had turned the corner, and then, in spite of herself, her steps became slower and more lagging. _