A Little Girl in Old Salem - Amanda Minnie Douglas (readict books .txt) 📗

She's up in that old garret toiling, and moiling, and packing away enough things to furnish an inn. We shall never want them. And there's your mother's, and some of your grandmother's, blankets."

"The New England thrift is rather too thrifty sometimes," he commented dryly.

Cynthia staid after Mrs. Turner made her adieus. Indeed, as it was nearing supper-time, he walked over for her. She and Betty were in the wide-seated swing and Ben was swinging them so high that Betty, used as she was to it, gave now and then little squeals. Chilian held up his hand and Ben let the "cat die," which meant the swing stopping of itself.

"Oh, Mr. Leverett, can't Cynthy stay to tea? I'll run and ask mother."

"Not to-day. She had better come home now."

"Oh, dear!" cried Bentley disappointedly.

"Yes, I had better go. And I've had such a lovely time. Cousin Chilian, can't I come over again?"

How pretty she looked with her shining eyes, her rosy cheeks, and her entreating lips! What would she coax out of men as she grew older!

"Oh, yes; any time they want you."

"Well, we'd like her every day!" cried Ben eagerly. "And isn't it splendid that she's grown so well and strong, and can run and play, and have good out-of-doors times? Though I used to like it in the winter up in your room, and Mr. Price said he never knew a boy to improve so in Latin."

Bentley made a graceful bow to Mr. Leverett.

"Oh," said Cynthia, skipping along in exuberant joy, "children are nice, aren't they? You can't have much fun alone by yourself, and the days are so long when you go in to Boston."

"I wonder if you would like to try school again?"

"Yes, I think I would;" after a pause. "You see," with a gravity that sat oddly upon her, "I'm not so afraid as I was, and I have more sense. And I know things more evenly than I did. I can write now quite well, and I know most of the tables, though division does bother me. And I can spell all but the very difficult words. I don't think any one would laugh at me now."

"No, they wouldn't," he answered decisively.

"I shouldn't like little boys, but I wouldn't mind them as big as Bentley. And, oh, I wish we had a swing. And they have a real sailors' hammock, such as they have on shipboard. It's delightful under the trees."

"I think we can manage that."

"Well, if your head isn't tousled!" cried Elizabeth. "It looks like a brush heap. Get it fixed, for supper is all ready. Why didn't you stay?" the last ironically.

"Cousin Chilian thought I had better not. They did want me to."

"Are you sure they _wanted_ you to?"

"Why, yes," she answered in ignorance of the sarcasm.

She walked up and down the garden path with Cousin Chilian and asked about the school, was glad when she found Bella and her sister Alice went there. Now and then she gave two or three skips and pulled on the hand she held so tightly. He had never seen her in quite such glee, and how charming she was!

"Chilian, bring that child in out of the dew. Next thing she'll be in for a winter's cold," said the severe voice.

The interview with Madam Torrey was very satisfactory. Chilian asked Miss Winn to go out and buy what was needed and get it made. They went over to Mrs. Turner's one day and took the school in on their way.

"When it rains Silas can take you and come for you. I think the walk will not tire you out."

"Oh, no; I don't get tired out now."

It was Miss Winn's place to look after the child, of course, but Elizabeth felt in some way defrauded. She wished Cynthia had been poor and dependent upon them. Then she would stand a chance to be brought up in a useful manner.

Chilian took her to school the first morning. Miss Winn was to come for her. She had been rather shy at first. But Bella Turner told the girls about her, how she had been born in Salem, and gone to Calcutta when only a few months old, come and gone again in her father's ship, and he was Captain Leverett, and then returned to America. He was to come afterward, but he had died. And Mr. Chilian Leverett, who was something in Harvard College, was her guardian. And she was to have ever so much money when she was a young lady.

Any other child might have been spoiled by the attentions lavished upon her. The girls thought her curly hair so pretty, and her hands were so small, with their dainty, tapering fingers. Then she found one of the girls, Lois Brinsmaid, lived in Central Avenue, so there was no further question of troubling any one. Cousin Chilian had given her a good foundation for study and she was eager for knowledge of all sorts, except that of the needle.

Then autumn began to merge into winter and there were storms and bleak winds, and some days she staid at home. She caught light colds, but Chilian and Miss Winn were very watchful.

She went to the Turners one afternoon and staid to tea, and the big boys hovered about her like bees. She was not forward or aggressive, but there was a sort of charming sweetness about her. When she raised her lovely eyes they seemed to appeal to every heart, though they never went very far with Cousin Elizabeth.

One day she came home and found the house in a great state of excitement. Elizabeth had started to go down into the cellar with both hands full. She had been a little dizzy for several days, and meant to take a dose of herb tea, boneset being her great stand-by, when she could find time. Whether it was the vertigo, or she slipped, she lay there unconscious, and they sent for Doctor Prescott.

Silas and the doctor carried her upstairs, and the latter brought her out of the faint. But when she started to stand up, she toppled over and fainted again.

"There's something quite serious. Let us carry her up to her room, and you women undress her. Her legs are sound, so the trouble is higher up."

Then he found her hip was broken, a bad thing at any time of life, but at her age doubly so. And he sent for Doctor Lapham to help him set it. It was very bad. They were still there when Chilian came home.

"I'm afraid she's laid up for a year or so;" and the doctor shook his head ominously.

"Do your very best for her," besought Chilian.

He said to Eunice, "Now you must have some one. You can't carry on the house alone."

"If it is the same to you, Chilian, I'd rather have a nurse. There's Mother Taft, who is good and strong, and used to nursing. She's willing to help about a little, too."

"Just as you think best. I want every care taken of her."

For a month it was a very serious matter. They thought the spine was somewhat injured as well. And Elizabeth knew they could never get on without her.

"I expect I shall find the house in such a state when I do get about, it will take me all summer to right it. You never were as thorough as I could wish, Eunice."

Miss Winn begged that she might be of service. She had so little to do, or to think about, that time hung heavy on her hands, now that Cynthia was in school. For then school hours were from nine to five. And the child was getting so handy caring for herself. She curled her hair and put on her clothes, brought her shoes down every evening for Silas to black, and sometimes wiped the tea dishes while Miss Winn washed them. Somehow there didn't seem so much work to do. Eunice didn't always have two kinds of cake for supper, nor a great shelf full of pies for Silas to take home. There was plenty of everything and no one complained.

They found Mother Taft invaluable. She was about the average height, and had long arms, and strength according. Then she had a most excellent way with her. When Elizabeth groaned that they never could get on without her, and she must be up and about before everything went to "wrack and ruin," Mother Taft said:

"The kitchen looks like a new pin. There's no signs of ruin that I can see. Meals are good, cake fine, house clean. When you get downstairs you'll think you haven't been out of the harness more'n a week."

"A likely story," Elizabeth moaned.

Cynthia went through March very successfully, but with the first warm spell in April she caught a cold and coughed, and Chilian was almost wild about her, his nerves having been worn somewhat by Elizabeth's mishap. But after ten days or so she came around all right and was eager for school again.

She was sitting in her old place by the window late one afternoon and he had been reading some poems to her--a volume lately come from England.

"Cousin Chilian," she said, "will you tell me what true relation we are?"

"Why, what has put that in your head?"

"I want to know." She said it persuasively.

"Well, it isn't very near after all. My father and yours were cousins. My father was the son of the oldest brother, your father the son of the youngest, that stretched them quite far apart. When I wasn't much more than a baby Anthony came to live with us, and was like an elder brother to me. Father was very fond of him. But he would go to sea and he made a fine sailor and captain. Then he was married from here, and you were born here."

"The girls sometimes say, 'your uncle.' I wonder if you would like to have me call you uncle?"

Something in him protested. He could not tell what it was, unless an odd feeling that it made him seem older. He wished he were ten years younger, and he could give no reason for that either.

"I think I like the 'cousin' best;" after some deliberation.

"And it is so lovely to be dear to some one, very dear. I like Rachel, she's been almost a mother to me, and I like Cousin Eunice for her sweet ways. But I've no one of my very own, and so--I'm very glad to be dear to you. It is like a ship being anchored to something safe and strong."

She came and put her arms about his neck and kissed him. He drew her down on his knee. She was her mother's child, and her mother had been dear to him, his first love, his only love so far.

Oh, how would the garden get made and the house cleaned, the blankets and the winter clothing aired and put away, those in use washed? Eunice and Miss Winn went up in the garret one day and swept and dusted, not giving a whole week to it.

"Now," said Mother Taft, "I'm going to take a holiday off. I'm tired of puttering round in the sick room, and she's so much better now that she doesn't keep one on the jump. And I'm going to wash them