by Anne Warner
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE - THE PEACE AND QUIET OF THE COUNTRY
Along in the beginning of the fall Aunt Mary began suddenly to grow veryfeeble indeed. After the first week or two it became apparent that shewould have to be quiet and very prudent for some time, and it was whenthis information was imparted to her that the family discovered that shehad been intending to go to New York for the Horse-Show.
"She's awful mad," Lucinda said to Joshua. "The doctor says she'll have tostay in bed."
"She won't stay in bed long," said Joshua.
"The doctor says if she don't stay in bed she'll die," said Lucinda.
"She won't die," said Joshua.
Lucinda looked at Joshua and felt a keen desire to throw her flatiron athim. The world always thinks that the Lucindas have no feelings; the worldnever knows how near the flatirons come to the Joshuas often and often.
Arethusa came for two days and looked the situation well over.
"I think I won't stay," she said to Lucinda, "but you must write me twicea week and I'll write the others."
Then Arethusa departed and Lucinda remained alone to superintend thingsand be superintended by Aunt Mary.
Aunt Mary's superintendence waxed extremely vigorous almost at once. Shehad out her writing desk, and wrote Jack a letter, as a consequence ofwhich everything published in New York was mailed to his aunt as soon asit was off the presses. Lucinda was set reading aloud and, except when themail came, was hardly allowed to halt for food and sleep.
"My heavens above," said the slave to Joshua, "it don't seem like I canlive with her!"
"You'll live with her," said Joshua.
"It's more as flesh and blood can bear."
"Flesh and blood can bear a good deal more'n you think for," said Joshua,and then he delivered up two letters and drove off toward the barn.
"If those are letters," said Aunt Mary from her pillow the instant sheheard the front door close, "I'd like 'em. I'm a great believer in readin'my own mail, an' another time, Lucinda, I'll thank you to bring it as soonas you get it an' not stand out on the porch hollyhockin' with Joshua forhalf an hour while I wait."
Lucinda delivered up the letters without demanding what species ofconversational significance her mistress attached to the phrase,"holly-hocking."
Aunt Mary turned the letters through eagerly.
"My lands alive!" she said suddenly, "if here isn't one from Mitchell,--thedear boy. Well, I never did!--Lucinda, open the blinds to the other window,too--so I--can--see to--" her voice died away,--she was too deep in the letterto recollect what she was saying.
Mitchell wrote:
MY DEAR MISS WATKINS:--
We are sitting in a row with ashes on the heads of our cigarettes mourning, mourning, mourning, because we have had the news that you are ill. As usual it is up to me to express our feelings, so I have decided to mail them and the others agree to pay for the ink.
I wish to remark at once that we did not sleep any last night. Jack told us at dinner, and we spent the evening making a melancholy tour of places where we had been with you. If you had only been with us! The roof gardens are particularly desolate without you. The whole of the city seems to realize it. The watering carts weep from dawn to dark. All the lamp-posts are wearing black. It is sad at one extreme and sadder at the other.
You must brace up. If you can't do that try a belt. Life is too short to spend in bed. My motto has always been "Spend freely everywhere else." At present I recommend anything calculated to mend you. I may in all modesty mention that just before Christmas I shall be traveling north and shall then adore to stop and cheer you up a bit if you invite me. I have made it an invariable rule, however, not to stay over night anywhere when I am not invited, so I hope you will consider my feelings and send me an invitation.
My eyes fill as I think what it will be to sit beside you and recall dear old New York. It will be the next best thing to being run over by an automobile, won't it?
Yours, with fondest recollections,
HERBERT KENDRICK MITCHELL.
Aunt Mary laid the letter down.
"Lucinda," she said in a curiously veiled tone, "give me a handkerchief--abig one. As big a one as I've got."
Lucinda did as requested.
"Now, go away," said Aunt Mary.
Lucinda went away. She went straight to Joshua.
"She's had a letter an' read it an' it's made her cry," she said.
"That's better'n if it made her mad," said Joshua, who was warming hishands at the stove.
"I ain't sure that it won't make her mad later," said Lucinda. "Say, butshe is a Tartar since she came back. Seems some days's if I couldn'tlive."
"You'll live," said Joshua, and, as his hands were now well-warmed, hewent out again.
After a while Aunt Mary's bell jangled violently and Lucinda had to hurryback.
"Lucinda, did the doctor say anythin' to you about how long he thought Imight be sick?"
"Yes, he did."
"What did he say? I want to know jus' what he said. Speak up!"
"He said he didn't have no idea how long you'd be sick."
Aunt Mary threw a look at Lucinda that ought to have annihilated her.
"I want to see Jack," she said. "Bring my writin' desk. Right off. Quick."
She wrote to Jack, and he came up and spent the next Sunday with her,cheering her mightily.
"I wish the others could have come, too," she said once an hour allthrough his visit. Mitchell's letter seemed to have bred a tremendouslonging within her.
"They'll come later," said Jack, with hearty good-will. "They all want tocome."
"I don't know how we could ever have any fun up here though," said hisaunt sadly. "My heavens alive, Jack,--but this is an awful place to livein. And to think that I lived to be seventy before I found it out."
Jack took her hand and kissed it. He did sympathize, even if he was onlytwenty-two and longing unutterably to be somewhere else and kissingsomeone else at that very minute.
"Mitchell wrote me a letter," continued Aunt Mary. "He said he was comin'.Well, dear me, he can eat mince pie and drive with Joshua when he goes forthe mail, but I don't know what else I can do with him. Oh, if I'd onlybeen born in the city!"
Jack kissed her hand again. He didn't know what to say. Aunt Mary's lotseemed to border upon the tragic just then and there.
The next day he returned to town and Lucinda came on duty again. She soonfound that the nephew's visit had rendered the aunt harder than ever toget along with.
"I'm goin' to town jus''s soon as ever I feel well enough," she declaredaggressively on more than one occasion. "An' nex' time I go I'm goin' tostay jus''s long as ever I'm havin' a good time. Now, don't contradict me,Lucinda, because it's your place to hold your tongue. I'm a great believerin your holding your tongue, Lucinda."
Lucinda, who certainly never felt the slightest inclination towardcontradiction, held her tongue, and the poor, unhappy one twisted about inbed, and bemoaned the quietude of her environment by the hour at a time.
"Did you say we had a calf?" she asked suddenly one day. "Well, why don'tyou answer? When I ask a question I expect an answer. Didn't you say wehad a calf?"
Lucinda nodded.
"Well, I want Joshua to take that calf to the blacksmith and have him shodbehind an' before right off. To-day--this minute."
"You want the calf shod!" cried Lucinda, suddenly alarmed by the fear lesther mistress had gone light-headed.
Aunt Mary glared in a way that showed that she was far from being out ofher usual mind.
"If I said shod, I guess I meant shod," she said, icily. "I do sometimesmean what I say. Pretty often--as a usual thing."
Lucinda stood at the foot of the bed, petrified and paralyzed.
Then the invalid sat up a little and showed some mercy on her servant'svery evident fright.
&
nbsp; "I want the calf shod," she explained, "so's Joshua can run up an' downthe porch with him."
So far from ameliorating Lucinda's condition, this explanation rendered itvisibly worse. Aunt Mary contemplated her in silence for a few seconds,and she suddenly cried out, in a tone that was full of pathos:
"I feel like maybe--maybe--the calf'll make me think it's horses' feet onthe pavement."
Lucinda rushed from the room.
"She wants the calf shod!" she cried, bursting in upon Joshua, who waspiling wood.
For once in his life Joshua was shaken out of his usual placidity.
"She wants the calf shod!" he repeated blankly.
"Yes."
"You can't shoe a calf."
"But she wants it done."
Joshua regained his self-control.
"Oh, well," he said, turning to go on with his work, "the calf's gone tothe butcher, anyhow. Tell her so."
Lucinda went back to Aunt Mary.
"The calf's gone to the butcher," she yelled.
Aunt Mary frowned heavily.
"Then you go an' get a lamp and turn it up too high an' leave it," shesaid,--"the smell'll make me think of automobiles."
Lucinda was appalled. As a practical housekeeper she felt that here was aproposition which she could not face.
"Well, ain't you goin'?" Aunt Mary asked tartly. "Of course if you ain'tintendin' to go I'd be glad to know it; 'n while you're gone, Lucinda, Iwish you'd get me the handle to the ice-cream freezer an' lay it where Ican see it; it'll help me believe in the smell."
Lucinda went away and brought the handle, but she did not light the lamp.The Fates were good to her, though, for Aunt Mary forgot the lamp in herdisgust over the appearance of the handle.
"Take it away," she said sharply. "Anybody'd know it wasn't an automobilecrank. I don't want to look like a fool! Well, why ain't you takin' itaway, Lucinda?"
Lucinda took the crank back to the freezer; but as the days passed on, thesituation grew worse. Aunt Mary slept more and more, and awoke to anever-increasing ratio of belligerency.
Before long Lucinda's third cousin demanded her assistance in "moving,"and there was nothing for poor Arethusa to do but to take up the burden,now become a fearfully heavy one.
Aunt Mary was getting to that period in life when the nearer the relativethe greater the dislike, so that when her niece arrived the welcome whichawaited her was even less cordial than ever.
"Did you bring a trunk?" she asked.
"A small one," replied the visitor.
"That's something to be grateful for," said the aunt. "If I'd invited youto visit me, of course I'd feel differently about things."
Arethusa accepted this as she accepted all things, unpacked, saw Lucindaoff, assumed charge of the house, and then dragged a rocking chair to heraunt's bedside and unfolded her sewing. Ere she had threaded her needleAunt Mary was sound asleep, and so her niece sewed placidly for an hour ormore, until, like lightning out of a clear sky:
"Arethusa!"
The owner of the name started--but answered immediately:
"Yes, Aunt Mary."
"When I die I want to be buried from a roof garden! Don't you forget!You'd better go an' write it down. Go now--go this minute!"
Arethusa shook as if with the discharge of a contiguous field battery. Shehad not had Lucinda's gradual breaking-in to her aunt's new trains ofthought.
"Aunt Mary," she said feebly at last.
Aunt Mary saw her lips moving; she sat up in bed and her eyes flashedcinders.
"Well, ain't you goin'?" she asked wrathfully. "When I say do a thing,can't it be done? I declare it's bad enough to live with a pack of idiotswithout havin' 'em, one an' all, act as if I was the idiot!"
Arethusa laid aside her work and rose to quit the room. She returned fiveminutes later with pen and ink, but Aunt Mary was now off on another tack.
"I want a bulldog!" she cried imperatively.
"A bulldog!" shrieked her niece, nearly dropping what she held in herhands. "What do you want a bulldog for?"
"Not a bullfrog!" the old lady corrected; "a bulldog. Oh, I do get so sickof your stupidity, Arethusa," she said. "What should I or any one elsewant of a bullfrog?"
Arethusa sighed, and the sigh was apparent.
"I'd sigh if I was you," said her aunt. "I certainly would. If I was you,Arethusa, I'd certainly feel that I had cause to sigh;" and with that shesat up and gave her pillow a punch that was full of the direst sort ofsuggestion.
Arethusa did not gainsay the truth of the sighing proposition. It was tooapparent.
The next day Aunt Mary slept until noon, and then opened her eyes andsimultaneously declared:
"Next summer I'm goin' to have an automobile!"
Then she looked about and saw that she had addressed the air, which madeher more mad than ever. She rang her bell violently, and Arethusa left thelunch table so hastily that she reached the bedroom half-choked.
"Next summer I'm goin' to have an automobile," said the old lady angrily."Now, get me some breakfast."
Her niece went out quickly, and a maid was sent in with tea and toast andeggs at once. Their effect was to brace the invalid up and make the lot ofthose about her yet more wearing.
"I shall run it myself," she vowed, when Arethusa returned; "an' I betthey clear out when they see me comin'."
It did seem highly probable.
"I don't know how I can live if I don't get away from here soon," shedeclared a few minutes later. "You don't appreciate what life is,Arethusa. Seems like I'll go mad with wantin' to be somewhere else. I cansee Jack gets his disposition straight from me."
There was a sigh and a pause.
"I shall die," Aunt Mary then declared with violence, "if I don't have achange. Arethusa, you've got to write to Jack, and tell him to get meGranite."
"Granite!" screamed the niece in surprise.
"Yes, Granite. She was a maid I had in New York. I want her to come here.She must come. Tell him to offer her anything, and send her C.O.D. If Ican have Granite, maybe I'll feel some better. You write Jack."
"I'll write to-night," shrieked Arethusa.
"No, you won't," said Aunt Mary; "you'll get the ink and write right now.Because I've been meeker'n Moses all my life is no reason why I sh'd bewillin' to be downtrodden clear to the end. Folks around me'd better beginto look sharp an' step lively from now on."
Arethusa went to the desk at once and wrote:
DEAR JACK:
Aunt Mary wants the maid that she had when she was in New York. For the love of Heaven, if the girl is procurable, do get her. Hire her if you can and kidnap her if you can't. Lucinda has played her usual trick on me and walked off just when she felt like it. I never saw Aunt Mary in anything like the state of mind that she is, but I know one thing--if you cannot send the maid, there'll be an end of me.
Your loving sister,
ARETHUSA.
Jack was much perturbed upon receipt of this letter. He whistled a littleand frowned a great deal. But at last he decided to be frank and tell thetruth to Mrs. Rosscott. To that end he wrote her a lengthy note. After twopreliminary pages so personal that it would not be right to print them forpublic reading, he continued thus:
I've had a letter from my sister, who is with Aunt Mary at present. She says that Aunt Mary is not at all well and declares that she must have Janice. What under the sun am I to answer? Shall I say that the girl has gone to France? I'm willing to swear anything rather that put you to one second's inconvenience. You know that, don't you? etc., etc., etc. [just here the letter abruptly became personal again].
Jack thought that he knew his fiancee well, but he was totally unpreparedfor such an exhibition of sweet ness as was testified to by the letterwhich he received in return.
It's first six pages were even more personal than his own (being morefeminine) a
nd then came this paragraph:
Janice is going to your aunt by to-night's train. Now, don't say a word! It is nothing--nothing--absolutely nothing. Don't you know that I am too utterly happy to be able to do anything for anyone that you--etc., etc., etc.
Jack seized his hat and hurried to where his lady-love was just thenresiding. But Janice had gone!