The Complete Works of L M Montgomery

by L. M. Montgomery

  “I thought you were not coming,” he said. “I expected to meet you here and I was horribly disappointed. I thought the bitterness of that foolish old quarrel must be strong enough to sway you yet.”

  “Didn’t Bella tell you I had a headache?” faltered Beatrice.

  “Bella? Oh, your brother’s wife! I wasn’t talking to her. I’ve been sulking in corners ever since I concluded you were not coming. How beautiful you are, Beatrice! You’ll let an old friend say that much, won’t you?”

  Beatrice laughed softly. She had forgotten for years that she was beautiful, but the sweet old knowledge had come back to her again. She could not help knowing that he spoke the simple truth, but she said mirthfully,

  “You’ve learned to flatter since the old days, haven’t you? Don’t you remember you used to tell me I was too thin to be pretty? But I suppose a bit of blarney is a necessary ingredient in the composition of an M.P.”

  He was still holding her hand. With a glance of dissatisfaction at the open parlour door, he drew her away to the little room at the end of the hall, which Mrs. Cunningham, for reasons known only to herself, called her library.

  “Come in here with me,” he said masterfully. “I want to have a long talk with you before the other people get hold of you.”

  When Beatrice got home from the party ten minutes before her brother and his wife, Margaret was sitting Turk fashion in the big armchair, with her eyes very wide open and owlish.

  “You dear girlie, were you asleep?” asked Aunt Beatrice indulgently.

  Margaret nodded. “Yes, and I’ve let the fire go out. I hope you’re not cold. I must run before Aunt Bella gets here, or she’ll scold. Had a nice time?”

  “Delightful. You were a dear to lend me this dress. It was so funny to see Bella staring at it.”

  When Margaret had put on her hat and jacket she went as far as the street door, and then tiptoed back to the sitting-room. Aunt Beatrice was leaning back in the armchair, with a drooping rose held softly against her lips, gazing dreamily into the dull red embers.

  “Auntie,” said Margaret contritely, “I can’t go home without confessing, although I know it is a heinous offence to interrupt the kind of musing that goes with dying embers and faded roses in the small hours. But it would weigh on my conscience all night if I didn’t. I was asleep, but I wakened up just before you came in and went to the window. I didn’t mean to spy upon anyone — but that street was bright as day! And if you will let an M.P. kiss you on the doorstep in glaring moonlight, you must expect to be seen.”

  “I wouldn’t have cared if there had been a dozen onlookers,” said Aunt Beatrice frankly, “and I don’t believe he would either.”

  Margaret threw up her hands. “Well, my conscience is clear, at least. And remember, Aunt Beatrice, I’m to be bridesmaid — I insist upon that. And, oh, won’t you ask me to visit you when you go down to Ottawa next winter? I’m told it’s such a jolly place when the House is in session. And you’ll need somebody to help you entertain, you know. The wife of a cabinet minister has to do lots of that. But I forgot — he isn’t a cabinet minister yet. But he will be, of course. Promise that you’ll have me, Aunt Beatrice, promise quick. I hear Uncle George and Aunt Bella coming.”

  Aunt Beatrice promised. Margaret flew to the door.

  “You’d better keep that dress,” she called back softly, as she opened it.

  The Running Away of Chester

  Chester did the chores with unusual vim that night. His lips were set and there was an air of resolution as plainly visible on his small, freckled face as if it had been stamped there. Mrs. Elwell saw him flying around, and her grim features took on a still grimmer expression.

  “Ches is mighty lively tonight,” she muttered. “I s’pose he’s in a gog to be off on some foolishness with Henry Wilson. Well, he won’t, and he needn’t think it.”

  Lige Barton, the hired man, also thought this was Chester’s purpose, but he took a more lenient view of it than did Mrs. Elwell.

  “The little chap is going through things with a rush this evening,” he reflected. “Guess he’s laying out for a bit of fun with the Wilson boy.”

  But Chester was not planning anything connected with Henry Wilson, who lived on the other side of the pond and was the only chum he possessed. After the chores were done, he lingered a little while around the barns, getting his courage keyed up to the necessary pitch.

  Chester Stephens was an orphan without kith or kin in the world, unless his father’s stepsister, Mrs. Harriet Elwell, could be called so. His parents had died in his babyhood, and Mrs. Elwell had taken him to bring up. She was a harsh woman, with a violent temper, and she had scolded and worried the boy all his short life. Upton people said it was a shame, but nobody felt called upon to interfere. Mrs. Elwell was not a person one would care to make an enemy of.

  She eyed Chester sourly when he went in, expecting some request to be allowed to go with Henry, and prepared to refuse it sharply.

  “Aunt Harriet,” said Chester suddenly, “can I go to school this year? It begins tomorrow.”

  “No,” said Mrs. Elwell, when she had recovered from her surprise at this unexpected question. “You’ve had schoolin’ in plenty — more’n I ever had, and all you’re goin’ to get!”

  “But, Aunt Harriet,” persisted Chester, his face flushed with earnestness, “I’m nearly thirteen, and I can barely read and write a little. The other boys are ever so far ahead of me. I don’t know anything.”

  “You know enough to be disrespectful!” exclaimed Mrs. Elwell. “I suppose you want to go to school to idle away your time, as you do at home — lazy good-for-nothing that you are!” Chester thought of the drudgery that had been his portion all his life. He resented being called lazy when he was willing enough to work, but he made one more appeal.

  “If you’ll let me go to school this year, I’ll work twice as hard out of school to make up for it — indeed, I will. Do let me go, Aunt Harriet. I haven’t been to school a day for over a year.”

  “Let’s hear no more of this nonsense,” said Mrs. Elwell, taking a bottle from the shelf above her with the air of one who closes a discussion. “Here, run down to the Bridge and get me this bottle full of vinegar at Jacob’s store. Be smart, too, d’ye hear! I ain’t going to have you idling around the Bridge neither. If you ain’t back in twenty minutes, it won’t be well for you.”

  Chester did his errand at the Bridge with a heart full of bitter disappointment and anger.

  “I won’t stand it any longer!” he muttered. “I’ll run away — I don’t care where, so long as it’s away from her. I wish I could get out West on the harvest excursions.”

  On his return home, as he crossed the yard in the dusk, he stumbled over a stick of wood and fell. The bottle of vinegar slipped from his hand and was broken on the doorstep. Mrs. Elwell saw the accident from the window. She rushed out and jerked the unlucky lad to his feet.

  “Take that, you sulky little cub!” she exclaimed, cuffing his ears soundly. “I’ll teach you to break and spill things you’re sent for! You did it on purpose. Get off to bed with you this instant.”

  Chester crept off to his garret chamber with a very sullen face. He was too used to being sent to bed without any supper to care much for that, although he was hungry. But his whole being was in a tumult of rebellion over the injustice that was meted out to him.

  “I won’t stand it!” he muttered over and over again. “I’ll run away. I won’t stay here.”

  To talk of running away was one thing. To do it without a cent in your pocket or a place to run to was another. But Chester had a great deal of determination in his make-up when it was fairly roused, and his hard upbringing had made him older and shrewder than his years. He lay awake late that night, thinking out ways and means, but could arrive at no satisfactory conclusion.

  The next day Mrs. Elwell said, “Ches, Abner Stearns wants you to go up there for a fortnight while Tom Bixby is away, and drive the milk wagon of m
ornings and do the chores for Mrs. Stearns. You might as well put in the time ‘fore harvest that way as any other. So hustle off — and mind you behave yourself.”

  Chester heard the news gladly. He had not yet devised any feasible plan for running away, and he always liked to work at the Stearns’ place. To be sure, Mrs. Elwell received all the money he earned, but Mrs. Stearns was kind to him, and though he had to work hard and constantly, he was well fed and well treated by all.

  The following fortnight was a comparatively happy one for the lad. But he did not forget his purpose of shaking the dust of Upton from his feet as soon as possible, and he cudgelled his brains trying to find a way.

  On the evening when he left the Stearns’ homestead, Mr. Stearns paid him for his fortnight’s work, much to the boy’s surprise, for Mrs. Elwell had always insisted that all such money should be paid directly to her. Chester found himself the possessor of four dollars — an amount of riches that almost took away his breath. He had never in his whole life owned more than ten cents at a time. As he tramped along the road home, he kept his hand in his pocket, holding fast to the money, as if he feared it would otherwise dissolve into thin air.

  His mind was firmly made up. He would run away once and for all. This money was rightly his; he had earned every cent of it. It would surely last him until he found employment elsewhere. At any rate, he would go; and even if he starved, he would never come back to Aunt Harriet’s!

  When he reached home, he found Mrs. Elwell in an unusual state of worry. Lige had given warning — and this on the verge of harvest!

  “Did Stearns say anything about coming down tomorrow to pay me for your work?” she asked.

  “No, ma’am. He didn’t say a word about it,” said Chester boldly.

  “Well, I hope he will. Take yourself off to bed, Ches. I’m sick of seeing you standing there, on one foot or t’other, like a gander.”

  Chester had been shifting about uneasily. He realized that, if his project did not miscarry, he would not see his aunt again, and his heart softened to her. Harsh as she was, she was the only protector he had ever known, and the boy had a vague wish to carry away with him some kindly word or look from her. Such, however, was not forthcoming, and Chester obeyed her command and took himself off to the garret. Here he sat down and reflected on his plans.

  He must go that very night. When Mr. Stearns failed to appear on the morrow, Mrs. Elwell was quite likely to march up and demand the amount of Chester’s wages. It would all come out then, and he would lose his money — besides, no doubt, getting severely punished into the bargain.

  His preparations did not take long. He had nothing to carry with him. The only decent suit of clothes he possessed was his well-worn Sunday one. This he put on, carefully stowing away in his pocket the precious four dollars.

  He had to wait until he thought his aunt was asleep, and it was about eleven when he crept downstairs, his heart quaking within him, and got out by the porch window. When he found himself alone in the clear moonlight of the August night, a sense of elation filled his cramped little heart. He was free, and he would never come back here — never!

  “Wisht I could have seen Henry to say good-by to him, though,” he muttered with a wistful glance at the big house across the pond where the unconscious Henry was sleeping soundly with never a thought of moonlight flittings for anyone in his curly head.

  Chester meant to walk to Roxbury Station ten miles away. Nobody knew him there, and he could catch the morning train. Late as it was, he kept to fields and wood-roads lest he might be seen and recognized. It was three o’clock when he reached Roxbury, and he knew the train did not pass through until six. With the serenity of a philosopher who is starting out to win his way in the world and means to make the best of things, Chester curled himself up in the hollow space of a big lumber pile behind the station, and so tired was he that he fell soundly asleep in a few minutes.

  Chester was awakened by the shriek of the express at the last crossing before the station. In a panic of haste he scrambled out of his lumber and dashed into the station house, where a sleepy, ill-natured agent stood behind the ticket window. He looked sharply enough at the freckled, square-jawed boy who asked for a second-class ticket to Belltown. Chester’s heart quaked within him at the momentary thought that the ticket agent recognized him. He had an agonized vision of being collared without ceremony and haled straightway back to Aunt Harriet. When the ticket and his change were pushed out to him, he snatched them and fairly ran.

  “Bolted as if the police were after him,” reflected the agent, who did not sell many tickets and so had time to take a personal interest in the purchasers thereof. “I’ve seen that youngster before, though I can’t recollect where. He’s got a most fearful determined look.”

  Chester drew an audible sigh of relief when the train left the station. He was fairly off now and felt that he could defy even curious railway officials.

  It was not his first train ride, for Mrs. Elwell had once taken him to Belltown to get an aching tooth extracted, but it was certainly his first under such exhilarating circumstances, and he meant to enjoy it. To be sure, he was very hungry, but that, he reflected, was only what he would probably be many times before he made his fortune, and it was just as well to get used to it. Meanwhile, it behooved him to keep his eyes open. On the road from Roxbury to Belltown there was not much to be seen that morning that Chester did not see.

  The train reached Belltown about noon. He did not mean to stop long there — it was too near Upton. From the conductor on the train, he found that a boat left Belltown for Montrose at two in the afternoon. Montrose was a hundred miles from Upton, and Chester thought he would be safe there. To Montrose, accordingly, he decided to go, but the first thing was to get some dinner. He went into a grocery store and bought some crackers and a bit of cheese. He had somewhere picked up the idea that crackers and cheese were about as economical food as you could find for adventurous youths starting out on small capital.

  He found his way to the only public square Belltown boasted, and munched his food hungrily on a bench under the trees. He would go to Montrose and there find something to do. Later on he would gradually work his way out West, where there was more room for an ambitious small boy to expand and grow. Chester dreamed some dazzling dreams as he sat there on the bench under the Belltown chestnuts. Passers-by, if they noticed him at all, saw merely a rather small, poorly clad boy, with a great many freckles, a square jaw and shrewd, level-gazing grey eyes. But this same lad was mapping out a very brilliant future for himself as people passed him heedlessly by. He would get out West, somehow or other, some time or other, and make a fortune. Then, perhaps, he would go back to Upton for a visit and shine in his splendour before all his old neighbours. It all seemed very easy and alluring, sitting there in the quiet little Belltown square. Chester, you see, possessed imagination. That, together with the crackers and cheese, so cheered him up that he felt ready for anything. He was aroused from a dream of passing Aunt Harriet by in lofty scorn and a glittering carriage, by the shrill whistle of the boat. Chester pocketed his remaining crackers and cheese and his visions also, and was once more his alert, wide-awake self. He had inquired the way to the wharf from the grocer, so he found no difficulty in reaching it. When the boat steamed down the muddy little river, Chester was on board of her.

  He was glad to be out of Belltown, for he was anything but sure that he would not encounter some Upton people as long as he was in it. They often went to Belltown on business, but never to Montrose.

  There were not many passengers on the boat, and Chester scrutinized them all so sharply in turn that he could have sworn to each and every one of them for years afterwards had it been necessary. The one he liked best was a middle-aged lady who sat just before him on the opposite side of the deck She was plump and motherly looking, with a fresh, rosy face and beaming blue eyes.

  “If I was looking for anyone to adopt me I’d pick her,” said Chester to himself. The more he lo
oked at her, the better he liked her. He labelled her in his mind as “the nice, rosy lady.”

  The nice, rosy lady noticed Chester staring at her after awhile. She smiled promptly at him — a smile that seemed fairly to irradiate her round face — and then began fumbling in an old-fashioned reticule she carried, and from which she presently extracted a chubby little paper bag.

  “If you like candy, little boy,” she said to Chester, “here is some of my sugar taffy for you.”

  Chester did not exactly like being called a little boy. But her voice and smile were irresistible and won his heart straightway. He took the candy with a shy, “Thank you, ma’am,” and sat holding it in his hand.

  “Eat it,” commanded the rosy lady authoritatively. “That is what taffy is for, you know.”

  So Chester ate it. It was the most delicious thing he had ever tasted in his life, and filled a void which even the crackers and cheese had left vacant. The rosy lady watched every mouthful he ate as if she enjoyed it more than he did. When he had finished the taffy she smiled one of her sociable smiles again and said, “Well, what do you think of it?”

  “It’s the nicest taffy I ever ate,” answered Chester enthusiastically, as if he were a connoisseur in all kinds of taffies. The rosy lady nodded, well pleased.

  “That is just what everyone says about my sugar taffy. Nobody up our way can match it, though goodness knows they try hard enough. My great-grandmother invented the recipe herself, and it has been in our family ever since. I’m real glad you liked it.”

  She smiled at him again, as if his appreciation of her taffy was a bond of good fellowship between them. She did not know it but, nevertheless, she was filling the heart of a desperate small boy, who had run away from home, with hope and encouragement and self-reliance. If there were such kind folks as this in the world, why, he would get along all right. The rosy lady’s smiles and taffy — the smiles much more than the taffy — went far to thaw out of him a certain hardness and resentfulness against people in general that Aunt Harriet’s harsh treatment had instilled into him. Chester instantly made a resolve that when he grew stout and rosy and prosperous he would dispense smiles and taffy and good cheer generally to all forlorn small boys on boats and trains.