by Kate Chopin
Madame hastened to inform him, deprecatingly:
“Aaron promise’ to sen’ me a load las’ week, monsieur, but his oxen got cripple’ in the cut-off.”
“Never mind, mother,” interrupted Léontine, in French. “You needn’t explain to him; it isn’t necessary.”
The intruder, undismayed at the knowledge that they were “talking about him,” cast a searching eye around, and unceremoniously started out to the buggy, returning with an empty pine box which he had taken from under the seat.
He broke the box on the hearth with his stout boot heel, and in less than five minutes there was a glorious blaze roaring up the cavernous chimney.
“Now that looks more cheerful!” he exclaimed, brushing off his hands. “I’ll bid you good day, mademoiselle; good-by, madame,” interrupting her voluble acknowledgements. “Don’t let mademoiselle chop wood any more. In the first place, she doesn’t know how, and in the second place — she doesn’t know how.”
Then he went brusquely away, entered his buggy, and started the mules at a brisk trot, probably to make up for lost time.
Léontine looked after him in a blaze of indignation.
“Truly a gentleman and a man of noble heart!” madame exclaimed. “Mandy, put the water on for coffee, and also a few sweet potatoes in the ashes.”
If Léontine hoped to have seen the last of this stranger, with his unconventional ways, she was greatly mistaken. Scarcely a day passed that she did not find, on her return from school, evidences of his continued assiduity in her and her mother’s behalf — a basket of fruit, a haunch of venison or a wild turkey hanging out on the meat hook. Some indication of neighborly regard was forever confronting her.
When he called one Sunday afternoon, having obtained her mother’s permission to do so, she was at first the small personification of dignity and reserve. This time he had brought a book with him, and some magazines, and the girl, hungry for such things, must have been of stone not to have melted somewhat under this benign influence.
The subject of wood-chopping seemed by mutual consent to be eliminated from their conversation. Further reference to the theme was moreover entirely unnecessary, since Peter and François, for some mysterious cause, fairly fought with each other over the privilege of chopping wood and rendering themselves generally useful about the place.
“What a noble soul!” madame often exclaimed. “And in my opinion there is none in the parish to compare with him in looks.” Léontine was silent, but it was not the silence of contradiction.
Once she said, with great show of emotion:
“Mother, you must put a stop to Mr. Willet’s constant visits and attentions. Some day he will be bringing a wife home to his plantation. Some one who may look down on us, who will be disagreeable, whom we will dislike. I’m sure we will dislike her. Such men always marry women whom people dislike!”
Madame did not even seem to listen to this harangue. She only ordered Mandy to throw another stick upon the fire.
One afternoon it was raining very hard, and madame was watching through the misty panes for the return of her daughter. It was George Willet’s buggy that stopped at the door, and it was the young planter himself who helped Léontine to alight. They came into the room beaming with some unexpressed secret. To the astonishment of all — none more than Mandy — Mr. Willet walked up to the old lady, threw his arms round her and gave her a hearty kiss.
“It’s all right, mother,” laughed Léontine, and Mr. Willet, gaily echoing her words, cried, “It’s all right, mother!”
When they were married in the spring and moved over to the big plantation, there was but one of Léontine’s possessions that George Willet laid personal claim to. That was the heavy old ax. He bore it away himself in a sort of triumph, proclaiming that as long as he lived it should hold a place of honor in his establishment.
THE IMPOSSIBLE MISS MEADOWS
I
As Miss Meadows was a person of no consequence whatever, Mrs. Hyleigh sent the second best trap over to the railway station for her. The coachman was instructed to bring her trunk or whatever belongings she had, by the same conveyance. Mrs. Hyleigh, a couple of daughters, a son and his college chum were seated on the piazza of their summer home overlooking one of the beautiful Wisconsin lakes.
“One of us ought to have gone over to meet Miss Miller; the bishop won’t like it,” said Evadne who sat in a hammock, munching caramels and reading “The Triumph of Death.”
“Meadows, not Miller,” corrected Mrs. Hyleigh, “and what the bishop likes or doesn’t like is no concern of yours, my dear, when it comes to the management of my own household.” Mrs. Hyleigh was large and decided. Her hair was white and rolled back in a symmetrical and un-comprising pompadour. Cushions of fat had obliterated all lines of beauty from her face which was red with a suggestion of purple under the skin.
“I don’t see why he chose to saddle her on us,” whimpered Mildred who fumbled with a long gold chain and gazed ill-humoredly across the water. “Goodness knows we do enough church work in town; and the Sheltons coming on Thursday, too. I don’t see what possessed him, or where we’re going to put her. She can’t room with Florence Shelton; that’s a cinch.”
“Mother, I wish you’d make Mildred stop that slang. You don’t realize what it sounds like. If I was running this family— “ and the boy whose name was Max and whose age was nineteen, finished his sentence with a sweeping glance of disapproval which seemed to include the entire household, the lake, the boating, the neighbors and the whole surrounding country. He and his friend had played a little tennis that day, a little golf, had taken the naphta launch around the lake, driven ten miles across country and back, and they were then exchanging remarks upon the monotony of existence at a Wisconsin summer resort.
Mrs. Hyleigh heard little of what went on around her; her mind was always somewhere else, and she now gazed at a nasturtium-bed, planning an alteration in its shape and going through a mental interview with the gardener. It was at the request of the bishop that Mrs. Hyleigh had invited Miss Meadows for a few days’ sojourn at Far Niente. The reverend gentleman had represented the young woman as the daughter of an humble and impoverished English clergyman, whose death had thrown her upon the world and her own resources. A long spell of illness had left the poor creature with shattered nerves which a week or two of wholesome country air would, it was hoped, restore to a healthful condition. The bishop was keenly sensible of Mrs. Hyleigh’s kindness in the matter, and gave her the pleasing assurance that her reward would not be overlooked.
Miss Meadows, even with Max’s assistance, descended awkwardly and timidly from the high trap when William pulled up a short distance from the house. She was tall, thin and stoop-shouldered with a flat chest. She wore a black alpaca skirt and a cheap, ill-fitting shirt waist. A leather belt that encircled her waist, slanted downward at the back, and her skirt band hung a little below it. The young lady’s shoes were shabby, so were her gloves and so also were the sailor hat and bit of black dotted veil that covered the most ordinary and uninteresting features. Her voice alone when she spoke was not commonplace. It was rich and singy with the suggestion of a brogue.
“We are glad to have you come, Miss Meadows,” said Mrs. Hyleigh with her stereotyped amiability; forgetting for the moment that she was not addressing a person of fashion or distinction. She had gone to the edge of the piazza to meet her visitor.
“This is my daughter, Evadne, who will see that the maid shows you to your room. And my older daughter — Mildred, dear?” Mildred arose, mumbled, and fell back into her chair. The boys were duly presented. After the briefest talk concerning the journey from Chicago, Miss Meadows followed Evadne like an embarrassed house-maid seeking an engagement.
“Another Klondike!” groaned Max.
“Hard lines,” responded his friend; and clasping their knees they looked wearily toward the distant tennis court.
Mrs. Hyleigh and her daughter looked at each other.
“Well?” uttered th
e girl in a tone which implied: “I told you so.”
“She’s impossible! utterly impossible!” sighed Mrs. Hyleigh.
II
No one knew precisely what to make of Miss Meadows. She was homely as original sin; not so well dressed as the housemaid; wholly colorless and flat, but always in evidence; Mildred surveyed her with smothered rage, redoubled as the day of the Sheltons’ coming drew near. In a vague unreasoning way she held her creed, indirectly through the bishop, responsible for a long line of discomforts which seemed to culminate in what she called the saddling of Miss Meadows; and she began to think there might be truths worth investigating in Agnosticism. She was a pale, anemic beauty who held her father and mother in condescending tolerance, the college boys in supreme contempt, and everything but the Sheltons in placid indifference.
Evadne, with some compassion and a natural consideration for the looks of things, tried a few improving touches upon Miss Meadows. With the aid of a safety pin, she fastened the girl’s sagging skirt band to the belt of her shirt waist, and suggested an unobtrusive bustle.
“You see, a person of your build — well — it’s too bad about your hair, isn’t it— “
“Yes,” replied Miss Meadows looking in the glass and passing a nerveless hand over her thin short blond hair. “It comes of the typhoid — but it seems to be coming out no thicker for that,” with a profound sigh. There was all the beauty of vigorous youth and health in the face that glanced into the mirror over Miss Meadows’ shoulder.
“Never mind,” exclaimed the girl cheerfully, endeavouring to straighten back Miss Meadows’ shoulders. “Brace up and look pleasant. You must get some color into your cheeks before you go back to town. I’m going to take you driving and sailing and teach you tennis, if you don’t know it. Your folks won’t recognize you, the time I get through with you.”
Miss Meadows smiled in a way that lighted her whole face showing a row of fine teeth and a sudden light in her eyes. But in a second the light and the smile faded and she looked as dull and commonplace as ever.
She began at the very start to carry a piece of embroidery about with her and was forever losing her thimble or her scissors.
“Have you any relations in this country?” asked Mrs. Hyleigh the morning following the girl’s arrival at Far Niente. They were alone together on the piazza. She laid down her embroidery and shook her head lugubriously, beginning to sway in the rocking chair, with a forward bob of the head.
“Father died eight months ago, the Friday past,” clutching at the coarse handkerchief which lay in her lap. “He was all I had, save for an uncle in the north. There was very little, ma’m, indeed very little left when he was gone; and what with paying the pitiful debts, nothing left except from the furniture. Barely enough to bring me to New York. Me uncle thought there’d be more chance on this side, and Dr. Whitemar gave me a letter to the bishop in Chicago. But when I got there the typhoid took me before I ever so much as set me eye on his Grace.” Here she passed a hand over her thin light hair and pressed the handkerchief to her lips.
It was indeed too bad. Mrs. Hyleigh felt uncomfortably moved; but really wished she might have helped the girl in some more agreeable way to herself, than entertaining her in the height of the season at Far Niente.
“There, there, my dear; we’ll see what can be done. What does the bishop propose?”
“A nursery governess is about all I’m equal to, ma’m,” going back to her work with a resigned air. “His Grace thinks he can place me with a family on the North Side when I get back. Indeed me pride’s all gone. For it isn’t me ancestor who fought for Charles II that can help me now!”
Mrs. Hyleigh, too, heaved a deep sigh. She couldn’t have told if it was over the ragged condition of her nasturtium-bed or the utter impossibility of counting upon Charles II or his followers to alleviate the present distress of Miss Meadows. She dimly felt it incumbent upon her to return the young person to the bishop in a better condition than she had received her.
“Well,” she said rising, “you must get about. Don’t mope over that fancy work. The boys’ll see that you have a good time and Evadne’ll look after you.”
“The boys,” engaged in a game of “go bang” just within the hall way, and overhearing all, fell in a heap against each other and uttered a simultaneous groan. A moment later they were leaving the house swiftly and noiselessly by a rear exit.
POLLY
Polly particularly disliked to have her mail addressed to the real estate office in which she was employed as assistant bookkeeper. She pushed aside the businesslike letter which confronted her one morning when she had mounted the high stool before her desk.
What Polly did like was to find letters awaiting her at her boarding-house in the evening, when she might, in the privacy of her room, enjoy reading the news from home or from friends scattered over the western hemisphere.
There was one weekly letter to which Polly especially looked forward. She always read it slowly, as she would have eaten ice-cream, making the delight of it last as long as possible. There was in every one of those letters a cheerful reference to something which was going to happen “when Ferguson opens up in St. Jo”; something that made Polly look as bright as a sparrow on a maple branch.
What was not going to happen when Ferguson opened up in St. Jo? Polly was going to get a better position; or rather, some one else, named George, was going to get a better position, and incidentally through George Polly was going to get a position which every well-meaning girl, at some time of her life, looks forward to as the beginning of better things.
When the noon hour came Polly laid aside her brown paper cuffs, put on her jacket, stabbed a hat-pin through her cloth hat, and thrusting the businesslike letter into her hand-bag, went out to luncheon.
It was not until Polly was entirely through with her frugal repast that she opened the businesslike letter to see what it was all about. She first saw that it enclosed a check for one hundred dollars, payable to the order of Polly McQuade. Then she saw that it was a letter from her Uncle Ben.
It is to be regretted that Uncle Ben’s letter cannot be omitted here, so lacking was it in elegance or refinement of expression. It was from Fort Worth, and it read:
“Dear Little Polly. Your Uncle Ben has struck it rich in a small way, and the first treat he gives himself is to send you the enclosed — with conditions. You are to spend every red cent of it. No rainy-day fund will be tolerated by your Uncle B. Just you go to the stores and blow it all in — just take a fling with it. I want to give you the opportunity to feel what it’s like to spend money for once in your life. Let me know when Ferguson opens up in St. Jo, and this little transaction will be duplicated. How are you getting on? Love to your mother and the girls. Affectionately, your Uncle Ben.”
“Uncle Ben! Dear, dear Uncle Ben!” exclaimed Polly, with subdued emotion. This was an event in her life, and she met it with prompt decision. She had no intention of disregarding her Uncle Ben’s conditions. She at once gave the waiter ten cents, which left a balance in her favor of ninety-nine dollars and ninety cents.
She went straight back to the office and asked the junior partner for an afternoon off. It was the first favor she had asked, and while the junior partner realized the indelicacy of refusing it, he was appalled.
“A whole afternoon! And so near the end of the month!”
“Yes, please.” A most unfeminine Polly thus to keep her own counsel bottled and bubbling up inside her. Most girls would have — but never mind the other girls; this is about Polly.
It did not take her the whole afternoon to spend that hundred dollars. Uncle Ben would have been rather startled at her promptness in following his wishes. She had often lingered before the shop windows, and in imagination had sometimes spent as much as this and even more. It was as easy as if she had had a list written out beforehand.
A complete dinner-set of dainty but bygone pattern, $15, reduced from $25.
Sitting-room rug, $20.
Books, $21.50.
Table-cloth and napkins, $5.
Sitting-room curtains, $6 (great bargain).
Order on a Filmore coal dealer for one hundred bushels of coal to be delivered to Mrs. Louise McQuade, $12.
Order on a Filmore grocer for supplies amounting to $10, to be delivered to Mrs. Louise McQuade.
A telegram to Filmore, 25 cents.
“Will be home Saturday evening to visit over Sunday. Polly.”
A gorgeous cravat for Uncle Ben, a box of candy for the girls, a dozen linen handkerchiefs for mother, express charges, and a fifty-mile round-trip ticket to Filmore more than cleared up Polly’s obligations to Uncle Ben.
Polly lay feverishly awake that night picturing the wonder of the family when this hundred dollars’ worth of solid comfort began to descend upon them. The next day she sent a second telegram:
“Don’t get excited. It’s only me. Will explain Saturday. Polly.”
Polly, in the bosom of her family on Saturday evening, could only laugh and laugh. She did not at once take off her wraps, but sat on the sofa beside her mother, doubling up with mirth. Her sister Phoebe, still a schoolgirl, was trying to tell her all about it.
“The whole town turned out, Polly, after the station-master had circulated the news that Mrs. McQuade had bought out St. Louis. When the things began to arrive, Mr. Fulton had to come over to keep order and hold back the crowd. In the midst up drives Smith: ‘And where do you want the groceries put, Mrs. McQuade?’ Groceries! And mum on the eve of nervous prostration! And there was Murphy at the back with two wagons shoveling coal into the shed till the planks gave way, and old Hiram so excited he couldn’t find the hatchet and nails. Mr. Fulton’s dog had three fits, and old Peter Neely’s rheumatism left him in the effort he made to hobble down here, and it’s never come back!”
Polly was hugging her mother, who was small, like herself, with gray hair. She looked like Polly with the light of youth grown dim within her.