This was why we had never visited Monkshead. We had never seen Uncle William, and we always thought of him as a sort of ogre when we thought of him at all. When we were children, our old nurse, Margaret Hannah, used to frighten us into good behaviour by saying ominously, “If you ‘uns aint good your Uncle William’ll cotch you.”
What he would do to us when he “cotched” us she never specified, probably reasoning that the unknown was always more terrible than the known. My private opinion in those days was that he would boil us in oil and pick our bones.
Uncle Norman and Aunt Jean had been living out west for years. Three months before this Christmas they had come east, bought a house in Monkshead, and settled there. They had been down to see us, and Father and Mother and the boys had been up to see them, but we three girls had not; so we were pleasantly excited at the thought of spending Christmas there.
Christmas morning was fine, white as a pearl and clear as a diamond. We had to go by the seven o’clock train, since there was no other before eleven, and we reached Monkshead at eight-thirty.
When we stepped from the train the stationmaster asked us if we were the three Miss Youngs. Alberta pleaded guilty, and he said, “Well, here’s a letter for you then.”
We took the letter and went into the waiting room with sundry misgivings. What had happened? Were Uncle Norman and Aunt Jean quarantined for scarlet fever, or had burglars raided the pantry and carried off the Christmas supplies? Elizabeth opened and read the letter aloud. It was from Aunt Jean to the following effect:
Dear Girls: I am so sorry to disappoint you, but I cannot help it. Word has come from Streatham that my sister has met with a serious accident and is in a very critical condition. Your uncle and I must go to Streatham immediately and are leaving on the eight o’clock express. I know you have started before this, so there is no use in telegraphing. We want you to go right to the house and make yourself at home. You will find the key under the kitchen doorstep, and the dinner in the pantry all ready to cook. There are two mince pies on the third shelf, and the plum pudding only needs to be warmed up. You will find a little Christmas remembrance for each of you on the dining-room table. I hope you will make as merry as you possibly can and we will have you down again as soon as we come back.
Your hurried and affectionate,
Aunt Jean
We looked at each other somewhat dolefully. But, as Alberta pointed out, we might as well make the best of it, since there was no way of getting home before the five o’clock train. So we trailed out to the stationmaster, and asked him limply if he could direct us to Mr. Norman Young’s house.
He was a rather grumpy individual, very busy with pencil and notebook over some freight; but he favoured us with his attention long enough to point with his pencil and say jerkily, “Young’s? See that red house on the hill? That’s it.”
The red house was about a quarter of a mile from the station, and we saw it plainly. Accordingly, to the red house we betook ourselves. On nearer view it proved to be a trim, handsome place, with nice grounds and very fine old trees.
We found the key under the kitchen doorstep and went in. The fire was black out, and somehow things wore a more cheerless look than I had expected to find. I may as well admit that we marched into the dining room first of all, to find our presents.
There were three parcels, two very small and one pretty big, lying on the table, but when we came to look for names there were none.
“Evidently Aunt Jean, in her hurry and excitement, forgot to label them,” said Elizabeth. “Let us open them. We may be able to guess from the contents which belongs to whom.”
I must say we were surprised when we opened those parcels. “We had known that Aunt Jean’s gifts would be nice, but we had not expected anything like this. There was a magnificent stone marten collar, a dear little gold watch and pearl chatelaine, and a gold chain bracelet set with turquoises.
“The collar must be for you, Elizabeth, because Mary and I have one already, and Aunt Jean knows it,” said Alberta; “the watch must be for you, Mary, because I have one; and by the process of exhaustion the bracelet must be for me. Well, they are all perfectly sweet.”
Elizabeth put on her collar and paraded in front of the sideboard mirror. It was so dusty she had to take her handkerchief and wipe it before she could see herself properly. Everything in the room was equally dusty. As for the lace curtains, they looked as if they hadn’t been washed for years, and one of them had a long ragged hole in it. I couldn’t help feeling secretly surprised, for Aunt Jean had the reputation of being a perfect housekeeper. However, I didn’t say anything, and neither did the other girls. Mother had always impressed upon us that it was the height of bad manners to criticize anything we might not like in a house where we were guests.
“Well, let’s see about dinner,” said Alberta, practically, snapping her bracelet on her wrist and admiring the effect.
We went to the kitchen, where Elizabeth proceeded to light the fire, that being one of her specialties, while Alberta and I explored the pantry. We found the dinner supplies laid out as Aunt Jean had explained. There was a nice fat turkey all stuffed, and vegetables galore. The mince pies were in their place, but they were almost the only things about which that could be truthfully said, for the disorder of that pantry was enough to give a tidy person nightmares for a month. “I never in all my life saw—” began Alberta, and then stopped short, evidently remembering Mother’s teaching.
“Where is the plum pudding?” said I, to turn the conversation into safer channels.
It was nowhere to be seen, so we concluded it must be in the cellar. But we found the cellar door padlocked good and fast.
“Never mind,” said Elizabeth. “You know none of us really likes plum pudding. We only eat it because it is the proper traditional dessert. The mince pies will suit us better.”
We hurried the turkey into the oven, and soon everything was going merrily. We had lots of fun getting up that dinner, and we made ourselves perfectly at home, as Aunt Jean had commanded. We kindled a fire in the dining room and dusted everything in sight. We couldn’t find anything remotely resembling a duster, so we used our handkerchiefs. When we got through, the room looked like something, for the furnishings were really very handsome, but our handkerchiefs — well!
Then we set the table with all the nice dishes we could find. There was only one long tablecloth in the sideboard drawer, and there were three holes in it, but we covered them with dishes and put a little potted palm in the middle for a centrepiece. At one o’clock dinner was ready for us and we for it. Very nice that table looked, too, as we sat down to it.
Just as Alberta was about to spear the turkey with a fork and begin carving, that being one of her specialties, the kitchen door opened and somebody walked in. Before we could move, a big, handsome, bewhiskered man in a fur coat appeared in the dining-room doorway.
I wasn’t frightened. He seemed quite respectable, I thought, and I supposed he was some intimate friend of Uncle Norman’s. I rose politely and said, “Good day.”
You never saw such an expression of amazement as was on that poor man’s face. He looked from me to Alberta and from Alberta to Elizabeth and from Elizabeth to me again as if he doubted the evidence of his eyes.
“Mr. and Mrs. Norman Young are not at home,” I explained, pitying him. “They went to Streatham this morning because Mrs. Young’s sister is very ill.”
“What does all this mean?” said the big man gruffly. “This isn’t Norman Young’s house ... it is mine. I’m William Young. Who are you? And what are you doing here?”
I fell back into my chair, speechless. My very first impulse was to put up my hand and cover the gold watch. Alberta had dropped the carving knife and was trying desperately to get the gold bracelet off under the table. In a flash we had realized our mistake and its awfulness. As for me, I felt positively frightened; Margaret Hannah’s warnings of old had left an ineffaceable impression.
Elizabeth rose to
the occasion. Rising to the occasion is another of Elizabeth’s specialties. Besides, she was not hampered by the tingling consciousness that she was wearing a gift that had not been intended for her.
“We have made a mistake, I fear,” she said, with a dignity which I appreciated even in my panic, “and we are very sorry for it. We were invited to spend Christmas with Mr. and Mrs. Norman Young. When we got off the train we were given a letter from them stating that they were summoned away but telling us to go to their house and make ourselves at home. The stationmaster told us that this was the house, so we came here. We have never been in Monkshead, so we did not know the difference. Please pardon us.”
I had got off the watch by this time and laid it on the table, unobserved, as I thought. Alberta, not having the key of the bracelet, had not been able to get it off, and she sat there crimson with shame. As for Uncle William, there was positively a twinkle in his eye. He did not look in the least ogreish.
“Well, it has been quite a fortunate mistake for me,” he said. “I came home expecting to find a cold house and a raw dinner, and I find this instead. I’m very much obliged to you.”
Alberta rose, went to the mantel piece, took the key of the bracelet therefrom, and unlocked it. Then she faced Uncle William. “Mrs. Young told us in her letter that we would find our Christmas gifts on the table, so we took it for granted that these things belonged to us,” she said desperately. “And now, if you will kindly tell us where Mr. Norman Young does live, we won’t intrude on you any longer. Come, girls.”
Elizabeth and I rose with a sigh. There was nothing else to be done, of course, but we were fearfully hungry, and we did not feel enthusiastic over the prospect of going to another empty house and cooking another dinner.
“Wait a bit,” said Uncle William. “I think since you have gone to all the trouble of cooking the dinner it’s only fair you should stay and help to eat it. Accidents seem to be rather fashionable just now. My housekeeper’s son broke his leg down at Weston, and I had to take her there early this morning. Come, introduce yourselves. To whom am I indebted for this pleasant surprise?”
“We are Elizabeth, Alberta, and Mary Young of Green Village,” I said; and then I looked to see the ogre creep out if it were ever going to.
But Uncle William merely looked amazed for the first moment, foolish for the second, and the third he was himself again.
“Robert’s daughters?” he said, as if it were the most natural thing in the world that Robert’s daughters should be there in his house. “So you are my nieces? Well, I’m very glad to make your acquaintance. Sit down and we’ll have dinner as soon as I can get my coat off. I want to see if you are as good cooks as your mother used to be long ago.”
We sat down, and so did Uncle William. Alberta had her chance to show what she could do at carving, for Uncle William said it was something he never did; he kept a housekeeper just for that. At first we felt a bit stiff and awkward; but that soon wore off, for Uncle William was genial, witty, and entertaining. Soon, to our surprise, we found that we were enjoying ourselves. Uncle William seemed to be, too. When we had finished he leaned back and looked at us.
“I suppose you’ve been brought up to abhor me and all my works?” he said abruptly.
“Not by Father and Mother,” I said frankly. “They never said anything against you. Margaret Hannah did, though. She brought us up in the way we should go through fear of you.”
Uncle William laughed.
“Margaret Hannah was a faithful old enemy of mine,” he said. “Well, I acted like a fool — and worse. I’ve been sorry for it ever since. I was in the wrong. I couldn’t have said this to your father, but I don’t mind saying it to you, and you can tell him if you like.”
“He’ll be delighted to hear that you are no longer angry with him,” said Alberta. “He has always longed to be friends with you again, Uncle William. But he thought you were still bitter against him.”
“No — no — nothing but stubborn pride,” said Uncle William. “Now, girls, since you are my guests I must try to give you a good time. We’ll take the double sleigh and have a jolly drive this afternoon. And about those trinkets there — they are yours. I did get them for some young friends of mine here, but I’ll give them something else. I want you to have these. That watch looked very nice on your blouse, Mary, and the bracelet became Alberta’s pretty wrist very well. Come and give your cranky old uncle a hug for them.”
Uncle William got his hugs heartily; then we washed up the dishes and went for our drive. We got back just in time to catch the evening train home. Uncle William saw us off at the station, under promise to come back and stay a week with him when his housekeeper came home.
“One of you will have to come and stay with me altogether, pretty soon,” he said. “Tell your father he must be prepared to hand over one of his girls to me as a token of his forgiveness. I’ll be down to talk it over with him shortly.”
When we got home and told our story, Father said, “Thank God!” very softly. There were tears in his eyes. He did not wait for Uncle William to come down, but went to Monkshead himself the next day.
In the spring Alberta is to go and live with Uncle William. She is making a supply of dusters now. And next Christmas we are going to have a grand family reunion at the old homestead. Mistakes are not always bad.
The Genesis of the Doughnut Club
When John Henry died there seemed to be nothing for me to do but pack up and go back east. I didn’t want to do it, but forty-five years of sojourning in this world have taught me that a body has to do a good many things she doesn’t want to do, and that most of them turn out to be for the best in the long run. But I knew perfectly well that it wasn’t best for me or anybody else that I should go back to live with William and Susanna, and I couldn’t think what Providence was about when things seemed to point that way.
I wanted to stay in Carleton. I loved the big, straggling, bustling little town that always reminded me of a lanky, overgrown schoolboy, all arms and legs, but full to the brim with enthusiasm and splendid ideas. I knew Carleton was bound to grow into a magnificent city, and I wanted to be there and see it grow and watch it develop; and I loved the whole big, breezy golden west, with the rush and tingle of its young life. And, more than all, I loved my boys, and what I was going to do without them or they without me was more than I knew, though I tried to think Providence might know.
But there was no place in Carleton for me; the only thing to do was to go back east, and I knew that all the time, even when I was desperately praying that I might find a way to remain. There’s not much comfort, or help either, praying one way and believing another.
I’d lived down east in Northfield all my life — until five years ago — lived with my brother William and his wife. Northfield was a little pinched-up village where everybody knew more about you than you did about yourself, and you couldn’t turn around without being commented upon. William and Susanna were kind to me, but I was just the old maid sister, of no importance to anybody, and I never felt as if I were really living. I was simply vegetating on, and wouldn’t be missed by a single soul if I died. It is a horrible feeling, but I didn’t expect it would ever be any different, and I had made up my mind that when I died I would have the word “Wasted” carved on my tombstone. It wouldn’t be conventional at all, but I’d been conventional all my life, and I was determined I’d have something done out of the common even if I had to wait until I was dead to have it.
Then all at once the letter came from John Henry, my brother out west. He wrote that his wife had died and he wanted me to go out and keep house for him. I sat right down and wrote him I’d go and in a week’s time I started.
It made quite a commotion; I had that much satisfaction out of it to begin with. Susanna wasn’t any too well pleased. I was only the old maid sister, but I was a good cook, and help was scarce in Northfield. All the neighbours shook their heads, and warned me I wouldn’t like it. I was too old to change my ways, and
I’d be dreadfully homesick, and I’d find the west too rough and boisterous. I just smiled and said nothing.
Well, I came out here to Carleton, and from the time I got here I was perfectly happy. John Henry had a little rented house, and he was as poor as a church mouse, being the ne’er-do-well of our family, and the best loved, as ne’er-do-wells are so apt to be. He’d nearly died of lonesomeness since his wife’s death, and he was so glad to see me. That was delightful in itself, and I was just in my element getting that little house fixed up cosy and homelike, and cooking the most elegant meals. There wasn’t much work to do, just for me and him, and I got a squaw in to wash and scrub. I never thought about Northfield except to thank goodness I’d escaped from it, and John Henry and I were as happy as a king and queen.
Then after awhile my activities began to sprout and branch out, and the direction they took was boys. Carleton was full of boys, like all the western towns, overflowing with them as you might say, young fellows just let loose from home and mother, some of them dying of homesickness and some of them beginning to run wild and get into risky ways, some of them smart and some of them lazy, some ugly and some handsome; but all of them boys, lovable, rollicking boys, with the makings of good men in them if there was anybody to take hold of them and cut the pattern right, but liable to be spoiled just because there wasn’t anybody.
Well, I did what I could. It began with John Henry bringing home some of them that worked in his office to spend the evening now and again, and they told other fellows and asked leave to bring them in too. And before long it got to be that there never was an evening there wasn’t some of them there, “Aunt-Pattying” me. I told them from the start I would not be called Miss. When a woman has been Miss for forty-five years she gets tired of it.
So Aunt Patty it was, and Aunt Patty it remained, and I loved all those dear boys as if they’d been my own. They told me all their troubles, and I mothered them and cheered them up and scolded them, and finally topped off with a jolly good supper; for, talk as you like, you can’t preach much good into a boy if he’s got an aching void in his stomach. Fill that up with tasty victuals, and then you can do something with his spiritual nature. If a boy is well stuffed with good things and then won’t listen to advice, you might as well stop wasting your breath on him, because there is something radically wrong with him. Probably his grandfather had dyspepsia. And a dyspeptic ancestor is worse for a boy than predestination, in my opinion.
The Complete Works of L M Montgomery Page 702