CHAPTER III.
ROSE AND ROSEBUD.
Thirty-six hours later the Albany train, running smoothly across thegreen levels beyond the Mill Dam, brought the travellers to Boston.
Katy looked eagerly from the window for her first glimpse of the city ofwhich she had heard so much. "Dear little Boston! How nice it is to seeit again!" she heard a lady behind her say; but why it should be called"little Boston" she could not imagine. Seen from the train, it lookedlarge, imposing, and very picturesque, after flat Burnet with its onebank down to the edge of the lake. She studied the towers, steeples, andred roofs crowding each other up the slopes of the Tri-Mountain, and thebig State House dome crowning all, and made up her mind that she likedthe looks of it better than any other city she had ever seen.
The train slackened its speed, ran for a few moments between rows oftall, shabby brick walls, and with a long, final screech of its whistlecame to halt in the station-house. Every one made a simultaneous rushfor the door; and Katy and Mrs. Ashe, waiting to collect their books andbags, found themselves wedged into their seats and unable to get out. Itwas a confusing moment, and not comfortable; such moments never are.
But the discomfort brightened into a sense of relief as, looking out ofthe window, Katy caught sight of a face exactly opposite, which hadevidently caught sight of her,--a fresh, pretty face, with light, wavinghair, pink cheeks all a-dimple, and eyes which shone with laughter andwelcome. It was Rose herself, not a bit changed during the years sincethey parted. A tall young man stood beside her, who must, of course, beher husband, Deniston Browne.
"There is Rose Red," cried Katy to Mrs. Ashe. "Oh, doesn't she look dearand natural? Do wait and let me introduce you. I want you to know her."
But the train had come in a little behind time, and Mrs. Ashe wasafraid of missing the Hingham boat; so she only took a hasty peepfrom the window at Rose, pronounced her to be charming-looking,kissed Katy hurriedly, reminded her that they must be on the steamerpunctually at twelve o'clock the following Saturday, and was gone,with Amy beside her; so that Katy, following last of all theslow-moving line of passengers, stepped all alone down from theplatform into the arms of Rose Red.
"You darling!" was Rose's first greeting. "I began to think you meantto spend the night in the car, you were so long in getting out. Well,how perfectly lovely this is! Deniston, here is Katy; Katy, this ismy husband."
Rose looked about fifteen as she spoke, and so absurdly young to have a"husband," that Katy could not help laughing as she shook hands with"Deniston;" and his own eyes twinkled with fun and evident recognitionof the same joke. He was a tall young man, with a pleasant, "steady"face, and seemed to be infinitely amused, in a quiet way, witheverything which his wife said and did.
"Let us make haste and get out of this hole," went on Rose. "I canscarcely see for the smoke. Deniston, dear, please find the cab, andhave Katy's luggage put on it. I am wild to get her home, and exhibitbaby before she chews up her new sash or does something else that isdreadful, to spoil her looks. I left her sitting in state, Katy, withall her best clothes on, waiting to be made known to you."
"My large trunk is to go straight to the steamer," explained Katy, asshe gave her checks to Mr. Browne. "I only want the little one taken outto Longwood, please."
"Now, this is cosey," remarked Rose, when they were seated in the cabwith Katy's bag at their feet. "Deniston, my love, I wish you were goingout with us. There's a nice little bench here all ready and vacant,which is just suited to a man of your inches. You won't? Well, come inthe early train, then. Don't forget.--Now, isn't he just as nice as Itold you he was?" she demanded, the moment the cab began to move.
"He looks very nice indeed, as far as I can judge in three minutes anda quarter."
"My dear, it ought not to take anybody of ordinary discernment a minuteand a quarter to perceive that he is simply the dearest fellow that everlived," said Rose. "I discovered it three seconds after I first beheldhim, and was desperately in love with him before he had fairly finishedhis first bow after introduction."
"And was he equally prompt?" asked Katy.
"He says so," replied Rose, with a pretty blush. "But then, you know, hecould hardly say less after such a frank confession on my part. It is nomore than decent of him to make believe, even if it is not true. Now,Katy, look at Boston, and see if you don't _love_ it!"
The cab had now turned into Boylston Street; and on the right hand laythe Common, green as summer after the autumn rains, with the elm archesleafy still. Long, slant beams of afternoon sun were filtering throughthe boughs and falling across the turf and the paths, where people werewalking and sitting, and children and babies playing together. It was adelightful scene; and Katy received an impression of space and cheer andair and freshness, which ever after was associated with her recollectionof Boston.
Rose was quite satisfied with her raptures as they drove through CharlesStreet, between the Common and the Public Garden, all ablaze with autumnflowers, and down the length of Beacon Street with the blue bay shiningbetween the handsome houses on the water side. Every vestibule andbay-window was gay with potted plants and flower-boxes; and a concourseof happy-looking people, on foot, on horseback, and in carriages, wassurging to and fro like an equal, prosperous tide, while the sunlightglorified all.
"'Boston shows a soft Venetian side,'" quoted Katy, after a while. "Iknow now what Mr. Lowell meant when he wrote that. I don't believe thereis a more beautiful place in the world."
"Why, of course there isn't," retorted Rose, who was a most devotedlittle Bostonian, in spite of the fact that she had lived in Washingtonnearly all her life. "I've not seen much beside, to be sure, but that isno matter; I know it is true. It is the dream of my life to come intothe city to live. I don't care what part I live in,--West End, SouthEnd, North End; it's all one to me, so long as it is Boston!"
"But don't you like Longwood?" asked Katy, looking out admiringly at thepretty places set amid vines and shrubberies, which they were nowpassing. "It looks so very pretty and pleasant."
"Yes, it's well enough for any one who has a taste for naturalbeauties," replied Rose. "I haven't; I never had. There is nothing Ihate so much as Nature! I'm a born cockney. I'd rather live in one roomover Jordan and Marsh's, and see the world wag past, than be the ownerof the most romantic villa that ever was built, I don't care where itmay be situated."
The cab now turned in at a gate and followed a curving drive borderedwith trees to a pretty stone house with a porch embowered with Virginiacreepers, before which it stopped.
"Here we are!" cried Rose, springing out. "Now, Katy, you mustn't eventake time to sit down before I show you the dearest baby that ever wassent to this sinful earth. Here, let me take your bag; come straightupstairs, and I will exhibit her to you."
They ran up accordingly, and Rose took Katy into a large sunny nursery,where, tied with pink ribbon into a little basket-chair and watched overby a pretty young nurse, sat a dear, fat, fair baby, so exactly likeRose in miniature that no one could possibly have mistaken therelationship. The baby began to laugh and coo as soon as it caught sightof its gay little mother, and exhibited just such another dimple ashers, in the middle of a pink cheek. Katy was enchanted.
"Oh, you darling!" she said. "Would she come to me, do you think, Rose?"
"Why, of course she shall," replied Rose, picking up the baby as if shehad been a pillow, and stuffing her into Katy's arms head first. "Now,just look at her, and tell me if ever you saw anything so enchanting inthe whole course of your life before? Isn't she big? Isn't shebeautiful? Isn't she good? Just see her little hands and her hair! Shenever cries except when it is clearly her duty to cry. See her turn herhead to look at me! Oh, you angel!" And seizing the long-suffering baby,she smothered it with kisses. "I never, never, never did see anything sosweet. Smell her, Katy! Doesn't she smell like heaven?"
Little Rose was indeed a delicious baby, all dimples and good-humor andviolet-powder, with a skin as soft as a lily's leaf, and a happycapa
city for allowing herself to be petted and cuddled withoutremonstrance. Katy wanted to hold her all the time; but this Rose wouldby no means permit; in fact, I may as well say at once that the twogirls spent a great part of their time during the visit in fighting forthe possession of the baby, who looked on at the struggle, and smiled onthe victor, whichever it happened to be, with all the philosophiccomposure of Helen of Troy. She was so soft and sunny and equable, thatit was no more trouble to care for and amuse her than if she had been abird or a kitten; and, as Rose remarked, it was "ten times better fun."
"I was never allowed as much doll as I wanted in my infancy," she said."I suppose I tore them to pieces too soon; and they couldn't give me tinones to play with, as they did wash-bowls when I broke the china ones."
"Were you such a very bad child?" asked Katy.
"Oh, utterly depraved, I believe. You wouldn't think so now, would you?I recollect some dreadful occasions at school. Once I had my head pinnedup in my apron because I _would_ make faces at the other scholars, andthey laughed; but I promptly bit a bay-window through the apron, and ranmy tongue out of it till they laughed worse than ever. The teacher usedto send me home with notes fastened to my pinafore with things like thiswritten in them: 'Little Frisk has been more troublesome than usualto-day. She has pinched all the younger children, and bent the bonnetsof all the older ones. We hope to see an amendment soon, or we do notknow what we shall do.'"
"Why did they call you Little Frisk?" inquired Katy, after she hadrecovered from the laugh which Rose's reminiscences called forth.
"It was a term of endearment, I suppose; but somehow my family neverseemed to enjoy it as they ought. I cannot understand," she went onreflectively, "why I had not sense enough to suppress those awfullittle notes. It would have been so easy to lose them on the way home,but somehow it never occurred to me. Little Rose will be wiser thanthat; won't you, my angel? She will tear up the horrid notes--mammywill show her how!"
All the time that Katy was washing her face and brushing the dust of therailway from her dress, Rose sat by with the little Rose in her lap,entertaining her thus. When she was ready, the droll little mamma tuckedher baby under her arm and led the way downstairs to a large squareparlor with a bay-window, through which the westering sun was shining.It was a pretty room, and had a flavor about it "just like Rose," Katydeclared. No one else would have hung the pictures or looped back thecurtains in exactly that way, or have hit upon the happy device offilling the grate with a great bunch of marigolds, pale brown, golden,and orange, to simulate the fire, which would have been quite too warmon so mild an evening. Morris papers and chintzes and "artistic" shadesof color were in their infancy at that date; but Rose's taste was inadvance of her time, and with a foreshadowing of the coming "reaction,"she had chosen a "greenery, yallery" paper for her walls, against whichhung various articles which looked a great deal queerer then than theywould to-day. There was a mandolin, picked up at some Eastern sale, awarming-pan in shining brass from her mother's attic, two old samplersworked in faded silks, and a quantity of gayly tinted Japanese fans andembroideries. She had also begged from an old aunt at Beverly Farms acouple of droll little armchairs in white painted wood, with covers ofantique needle-work. One had "Chit" embroidered on the middle of itscushion; the other, "Chat." These stood suggestively at the corners ofthe hearth.
"Now, Katy," said Rose, seating herself in "Chit," "pull up 'Chat' andlet us begin."
So they did begin, and went on, interrupted only by Baby Rose's coos andsplutters, till the dusk fell, till appetizing smells floated throughfrom the rear of the house, and the click of a latch-key announced Mr.Browne, come home just in time for dinner.
The two days' visit went only too quickly. There is nothing morefascinating to a girl than the menage of a young couple of her own age.It is a sort of playing at real life without the cares and the sense ofresponsibility that real life is sure to bring. Rose was an adventuroushousekeeper. She was still new to the position, she found it veryentertaining, and she delighted in experiments of all sorts. If theyturned out well, it was good fun; if not, that was funnier still! Herhusband, for all his serious manner, had a real boy's love of a lark,and he aided and abetted her in all sorts of whimsical devices. Theyowned a dog who was only less dear than the baby, a cat only less dearthan the dog, a parrot whose education required constant supervision,and a hutch of ring-doves whose melancholy little "whuddering" coos werethe delight of Rose the less. The house seemed astir with young life allover. The only elderly thing in it was the cook, who had the reputationof a dreadful temper; only, unfortunately, Rose made her laugh so muchthat she never found time to be cross.
Katy felt quite an old, experienced person amid all this movement andliveliness and cheer. It seemed to her that nobody in the world couldpossibly be having such a good time as Rose; but Rose did not take thesame view of the situation.
"It's all very well now," she said, "while the warm weather lasts; butin winter Longwood is simply grewsome. The wind never stops blowing daynor night. It howls and it roars and it screams, till I feel as if everynerve in my body were on the point of snapping in two. And the snow,ugh! And the wind, ugh! And burglars! Every night of our lives theycome,--or I think they come,--and I lie awake and hear them sharpeningtheir tools and forcing the locks and murdering the cook and kidnappingBaby, till I long to die, and have done with them forever! Oh, Nature isthe most unpleasant thing!"
"Burglars are not Nature," objected Katy.
"What are they, then? Art? High Art? Well, whatever they are, I do notlike them. Oh, if ever the happy day comes when Deniston consents tomove into town, I never wish to set my eyes on the country again as longas I live, unless--well, yes, I should like to come out just once morein the horse-cars and _kick_ that elm-tree by the fence! The number oftimes that I have lain awake at night listening to its creaking!"
"You might kick it without waiting to have a house in town."
"Oh, I shouldn't dare as long as we are living here! You never know whatNature may do. She has ways of her own of getting even with people,"remarked her friend, solemnly.
No time must be lost in showing Boston to Katy, Rose said. So themorning after her arrival she was taken in bright and early to see thesights. There were not quite so many sights to be seen then as there aretoday. The Art Museum had not got much above its foundations; the newTrinity Church was still in the future; but the big organ and the bronzestatue of Beethoven were in their glory, and every day at high noon asmall straggling audience wandered into Music Hall to hear theinstrument played. To this extempore concert Katy was taken, and toFaneuil Hall and the Athenaeum, to Doll and Richards's, where was anexhibition of pictures, to the Granary Graveyard, and the Old South.Then the girls did a little shopping; and by that time they were quitetired enough to make the idea of luncheon agreeable, so they took thepath across the Common to the Joy Street Mall.
Katy was charmed by all she had seen. The delightful nearness of so manyinteresting things surprised her. She perceived what is one of Boston'schief charms,--that the Common and its surrounding streets make anatural centre and rallying-point for the whole city; as the heart isthe centre of the body and keeps up a quick correspondence and regulatesthe life of all its extremities. The stately old houses on BeaconStreet, with their rounded fronts, deep window-casements, and here andthere a mauve or a lilac pane set in the sashes, took her fancy greatly;and so did the State House, whose situation made it sufficientlyimposing, even before the gilding of the dome.
Up the steep steps of the Joy Street Mall they went, to the house on Mt.Vernon Street which the Reddings had taken on their return fromWashington nearly three years before. Rose had previously shown Katy thesite of the old family house on Summer Street, where she was born, nowgiven over wholly to warehouses and shops. Their present residence wasone of those wide old-fashioned brick houses on the crest of the hill,whose upper windows command the view across to the Boston Highlands; inthe rear was a spacious yard, almost large enough to be called a
garden,walled in with ivies and grapevines, under which were long beds full ofroses and chrysanthemums and marigolds and mignonette.
Rose carried a latch-key in her pocket, which she said had been one ofher wedding-gifts; with this she unlocked the front door and let Katyinto a roomy white-painted hall.
"We will go straight through to the back steps," she said. "Mamma issure to be sitting there; she always sits there till the first frost;she says it makes her think of the country. How different people are! Idon't want to think of the country, but I'm never allowed to forget itfor a moment. Mamma is so fond of those steps and the garden."
There, to be sure, Mrs. Redding was found sitting in a wicker-workchair under the shade of the grapevines, with a big basket of mendingat her side. It looked so homely and country-like to find a personthus occupied in the middle of a busy city, that Katy's heart warmedto her at once.
Mrs. Redding was a fair little woman, scarcely taller than Rose and verymuch like her. She gave Katy a kind welcome.
"You do not seem like a stranger," she said, "Rose has told us so muchabout you and your sister. Sylvia will be very disappointed not to seeyou. She went off to make some visits when we broke up in the country,and is not to be home for three weeks yet."
Katy was disappointed, too, for she had heard a great deal about Sylviaand had wished very much to meet her. She was shown her picture, fromwhich she gathered that she did not look in the least like Rose; forthough equally fair, her fairness was of the tall aquiline type, quitedifferent from Rose's dimpled prettiness. In fact, Rose resembled hermother, and Sylvia her father; they were only alike in littlepeculiarities of voice and manner, of which a portrait did not enableKaty to judge.
The two girls had a cosey little luncheon with Mrs. Redding, after whichRose carried Katy off to see the house and everything in it which was inany way connected with her own personal history,--the room where sheused to sleep, the high-chair in which she sat as a baby and which waspresently to be made over to little Rose, the sofa where Denistonoffered himself, and the exact spot on the carpet on which she had stoodwhile they were being married! Last of all,--
"Now you shall see the best and dearest thing in the whole house,"she said, opening the door of a room in the second story.--"Grandmamma, here is my friend Katy Carr, whom you have so oftenheard me tell about."
It was a large pleasant room, with a little wood-fire blazing in agrate, by which, in an arm-chair full of cushions, with aSolitaire-board on a little table beside her, sat a sweet old lady.This was Rose's father's mother. She was nearly eighty; but she wasbeautiful still, and her manner had a gracious old-fashioned courtesywhich was full of charm. She had been thrown from a carriage the yearbefore, and had never since been able to come downstairs or to minglein the family life.
"They come to me instead," she told Katy. "There is no lack of pleasantcompany," she added; "every one is very good to me. I have a reader fortwo hours a day, and I read to myself a little, and play Patience andSolitaire, and never lack entertainment."
There was something restful in the sight of such a lovely specimen ofold age. Katy realized, as she looked at her, what a loss it had beento her own life that she had never known either of her grandparents.She sat and gazed at old Mrs. Redding with a mixture of regret andfascination. She longed to hold her hand, and kiss her, and play withher beautiful silvery hair, as Rose did. Rose was evidently the oldlady's peculiar darling. They were on the most intimate terms; andRose dimpled and twinkled, and made saucy speeches, and told all herlittle adventures and the baby's achievements, and made jests, andtalked nonsense as freely as to a person of her own age. It was adelightful relation.
"Grandmamma has taken a fancy to you, I can see," she told Katy, as theydrove back to Longwood. "She always wants to know my friends; and shehas her own opinions about them, I can tell you."
"Do you really think she liked me?" said Katy, warmly. "I am so gladif she did, for I _loved_ her. I never saw a really beautiful oldperson before."
"Oh, there's nobody like her," rejoined Rose. "I can't imagine what itwould be not to have her." Her merry little face was quite sad andserious as she spoke. "I wish she were not so old," she added with asigh. "If we could only put her back twenty years! Then, perhaps, shewould live as long as I do."
But, alas! there is no putting back the hands on the dial of time, nomatter how much we may desire it.
The second day of Katy's visit was devoted to the luncheon-party ofwhich Rose had written in her letter, and which was meant to be areunion or "side chapter" of the S.S.U.C. Rose had asked every oldHillsover girl who was within reach. There was Mary Silver, of course,and Esther Dearborn, both of whom lived in Boston; and by good luckAlice Gibbons happened to be making Esther a visit, and Ellen Gray camein from Waltham, where her father had recently been settled over aparish, so that all together they made six of the original nine of thesociety; and Quaker Row itself never heard a merrier confusion oftongues than resounded through Rose's pretty parlor for the first hourafter the arrival of the guests.
There was everybody to ask after, and everything to tell. The girls allseemed wonderfully unchanged to Katy, but they professed to find hervery grown up and dignified.
"I wonder if I am," she said. "Clover never told me so. But perhaps shehas grown dignified too."
"Nonsense!" cried Rose; "Clover could no more be dignified than my babycould. Mary Silver, give me that child this moment! I never saw such agreedy thing as you are; you have kept her to yourself at least aquarter of an hour, and it isn't fair."
"Oh, I beg your pardon," said Mary, laughing and covering her mouth withher hand exactly in her old, shy, half-frightened way.
"We only need Mrs. Nipson to make our little party complete," went onRose, "or dear Miss Jane! What has become of Miss Jane, by the way? Doany of you know?"
"Oh, she is still teaching at Hillsover and waiting for her missionary.He has never come back. Berry Searles says that when he goes out to walkhe always walks away from the United States, for fear of diminishing thedistance between them."
"What a shame!" said Katy, though she could not help laughing. "MissJane was really quite nice,--no, not nice exactly, but she had goodthings about her."
"Had she!" remarked Rose, satirically. "I never observed them. Itrequired eyes like yours, real 'double million magnifying-glasses ofh'extra power,' to find them out. She was all teeth and talons as faras I was concerned; but I think she really did have a softish spot inher old heart for you, Katy, and it's the only good thing I ever knewabout her."
"What has become of Lilly Page?" asked Ellen.
"She's in Europe with her mother. I dare say you'll meet, Katy, and whata pleasure that will be! And have you heard about Bella? she's teachingschool in the Indian Territory. Just fancy that scrap teaching school!"
"Isn't it dangerous?" asked Mary Silver.
"Dangerous? How? To her scholars, do you mean? Oh, the Indians! Well,her scalp will be easy to identify if she has adhered to her favoritepomatum; that's one comfort," put in naughty Rose.
It was a merry luncheon indeed, as little Rose seemed to think, for shelaughed and cooed incessantly. The girls were enchanted with her, andvoted her by acclamation an honorary member of the S.S.U.C. Her healthwas drunk in Apollinaris water with all the honors, and Rose returnedthanks in a droll speech. The friends told each other their historiesfor the past three years; but it was curious how little, on the whole,most of them had to tell. Though, perhaps, that was because they did nottell all; for Alice Gibbons confided to Katy in a whisper that shestrongly suspected Esther of being engaged, and at the same moment EllenGray was convulsing Rose by the intelligence that a theological studentfrom Andover was "very attentive" to Mary Silver.
"My dear, I don't believe it," Rose said, "not even a theologicalstudent would dare! and if he did, I am quite sure Mary would considerit most improper. You must be mistaken, Ellen."
"No, I'm not mistaken; for the theological student is my second cousin,and his sister told
me all about it. They are not engaged exactly, butshe hasn't said no; so he hopes she will say yes."
"Oh, she'll never say no; but then she will never say yes, either. Hewould better take silence as consent! Well, I never did think I shouldlive to see Silvery Mary married. I should as soon have expected to findthe Thirty-nine Articles engaged in a flirtation. She's a dear oldthing, though, and as good as gold; and I shall consider your secondcousin a lucky man if he persuades her."
"I wonder where we shall all be when you come back, Katy," said EstherDearborn as they parted at the gate. "A year is a long time; all sortsof things may happen in a year."
These words rang in Katy's ears as she fell asleep that night. "Allsorts of things may happen in a year," she thought, "and they may not beall happy things, either." Almost she wished that the journey to Europehad never been thought of!
But when she waked the next morning to the brightest of October sunsshining out of a clear blue sky, her misgivings fled. There could nothave been a more beautiful day for their start.
She and Rose went early into town, for old Mrs. Bedding had made Katypromise to come for a few minutes to say good-by. They found her sittingby the fire as usual, though her windows were open to admit thesun-warmed air. A little basket of grapes stood on the table beside her,with a nosegay of tea-roses on top. These were from Rose's mother, forKaty to take on board the steamer; and there was something else, a smallparcel twisted up in thin white paper.
"It is my good-by gift," said the dear old lady. "Don't open it now.Keep it till you are well out at sea, and get some little thing with itas a keepsake from me."
Grateful and wondering, Katy put the little parcel in her pocket. Withkisses and good wishes she parted from these new made friends, and sheand Rose drove to the steamer, stopping for Mr. Browne by the way. Theywere a little late, so there was not much time for farewells after theyarrived; but Rose snatched a moment for a private interview with thestewardess, unnoticed by Katy, who was busy with Mrs. Ashe and Amy.
The bell rang, and the great steam-vessel slowly backed into the stream.Then her head was turned to sea, and down the bay she went, leaving Roseand her husband still waving their handkerchiefs on the pier. Katywatched them to the last, and when she could no longer distinguish them,felt that her final link with home was broken.
It was not till she had settled her things in the little cabin whichwas to be her home for the next ten days, had put her bonnet and dressfor safe keeping in the upper berth, nailed up her red and yellow bag,and donned the woollen gown, ulster, and soft felt hat which were to doservice during the voyage, that she found time to examine themysterious parcel.
Behold, it was a large, beautiful gold-piece, twenty dollars!
"What a darling old lady!" said Katy; and she gave the gold-piece akiss. "How did she come to think of such a thing? I wonder if there isanything in Europe good enough to buy with it?"
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