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

must be devoted to business for the next two years."

He drew a long breath. "But you don't mean I must break off--everything?" and there was an unsteadiness in his voice.

"Oh, no. Not if you can keep to the old friendliness."

Then Chilian Leverett dropped into his easy-chair and thought. The child had grown very dear to him, she was a gift from her father. A tumultuous, uncomprehended pain wrenched his very soul. To live without her--to miss her everywhere! To have lonely days, longer lonely evenings when the dreariness of winter set in. And yet she had a right to the sweet, rich draught of love. But she did not need it amid all the pleasures of youth. Let her have two or three years, even if it was blissful thoughtlessness. But he must put her on her guard. A young fellow soon changed his mind. The old couplet sang itself in his brain:


"If she be not fair for me,
What care I how fair she be?"


Did he get over his early love and forget? We all say, "But ours was different."

How to find the right moment? Ben did not come over. She was very busy with this friend and that, youth finds so _many_ interests. But one evening, when they were sitting on the porch in the moonlight, the young fellow walked slowly along, glanced at them, halted.

She flew down to the gate.

"Oh, Ben, what has happened?" she cried, the most bewitching anxiety in her face. "Why, you have not been in--for weeks."

"Not quite two weeks." Had it seemed so long to her? To him it had been months.

"Oh, come in. Cousin Chilian will be glad to see you."

The radiant cordiality in her face unnerved him.

"And you?" Yes, he must know.

"Do you have to ask that question?"

The sweet, dangerous eyes said too much, but the smile was that of amusement.

So they walked up the path together. Mr. Leverett greeted him in a friendly manner.

"I thought I ought to come in and say good-bye. I'm going off on some business for father, and may not be back for several weeks."

"That sounds as if you needed an apology for coming at all," she commented with half-resentful gayety.

He flushed and made no immediate reply.

"And we are going to take a journey as well. Up somewhere in Maine. Mr. Giles Leverett insists we shall, for our health, but I think it is our delightful company. He has to go to look after a large estate where some people think of founding a town. Isn't it funny?" and she gave her bewitching laugh that was like the notes of silver bells, soft, yet clear. "They must go off and build up new places. And some people are going West, as if there wasn't room here. Have you noticed that we are overcrowded?"

"Well, sometimes along the docks it looks that way."

"I like a good many people. Often Merrits' is crowded, and it's funny to catch bits of sentences. And at Plummer's as well. Did you ever read right across the paper, one line in each column, and notice the odd and twisted-up sense it made? That's about the way it sounds."

How bright and charming she was! Ben could not keep his eyes from her radiant face. Was she really a coquette, Chilian wondered. Yet she was so simple with it all, so seemingly careless of the effect. That was the danger of it.

He lingered like one entranced. Poor young lad! Chilian began to feel sorry for him.

She walked down to the gate with him, and hoped they would have a nice time when autumn came, if he meant to stay in Salem.

A young man not in love would have called her a bright, merry, chatty girl. He went away with the consciousness that she liked him very much. Chilian asked her if she did.

She glanced up wonderingly.

"Why--he is nice, and being Polly's brother makes it--well, more familiar. Then we can talk about Anthony. I believe he didn't like him much at first, but he does now."

Oh, how could he put her on her guard! She was not dreaming of love. Saltonstall's fancy had died out--no doubt this would, too. Lad's love. Was it worth ruffling up the sunny artlessness? But he would watch the young men closer now that he knew the danger line.

He said simply to himself that he could not give her up to any one else so soon. There would be a long life of joy and satisfaction to her, and he knew she would not grudge him these few years. Then, too, he was quite certain she had not even had an imaginary fancy for these two men--Ben was nothing but a boy.

Anthony Drayton was to join them. Miss Winn was to be Cynthia's companion. Mrs. Stevens had refused to trust her precious self to any wilds, and bear and wolf hunts, though Mr. Giles declared they were not going to take guns along. He was not an enthusiastic hunter. As for Chilian, such sport did not attract him.

The journey was partly by stage, partly on horseback, and one or two days they left the ladies at the tavern where they stopped. Cynthia was charmed and amused at the uncouthness of the people and their dialect in some places, and positive good breeding in others. Anthony unearthed a college chum who was tally man at a sawmill. The new town was really making progress. A small chapel had been started, a schoolhouse built. And twenty years later it was a pretty town; in fifty years an enterprising city.

"Anthony's going to be a first-class fellow. I should like to have such a son. Chilian, you and I should have married and have sons and daughters growing up. But at my time of life I should want them grown up. And smart, as well. I always feel sorry for the fathers of dull lads, when they have plenty of means to educate them. Yes, I should want mine to have a good supply of brains."

Chilian Leverett enjoyed the change very much and the breath of spruce and pine was invigorating. But there was a little nervous feeling about Cynthia. Cousin Giles was somewhat of a lady's man, and he was on the continual lookout that Cynthia should not tire herself unduly, that she be assisted over the rough places, that she should have the best of everything. He was almost jealous at times.

But Cynthia moved about gayly, serenely, full of merry little quips, seizing the small ridiculous events with such a sense of amusement that she inspirited them all. And he could not notice that she paid any more attention to Anthony than either of her seniors. There was such a genuine frankness in all she said and did, a charm of manner that was just herself, and had none of the arts of society, but came from a heart that overflowed with spontaneous warmth, but was not directed to any particular person.

Cousin Giles declared he was sorry to get back to Boston. He could not remember when he had enjoyed such a good time. Then in a business way it had been a success, which added to his satisfaction.

They really had to stay in Boston one night. They would fain have kept Cynthia for a week, but she said she was tired of just changing from one frock to another, and longed for more variety.

"And I'm so glad to get back home again," she cried delightedly. "I've had a splendid time, and I like Anthony ever so much. Cousin Giles was so nice and fatherly. He ought to adopt Anthony and give him his name, and that would always make me think of father. But after all, home is best. Oh, suppose I was a waif, just being handed from one to another!"

She looked frightened with the imaginary lot. She expressed emotions so easily.

"You couldn't have been;" hoarsely.

"Cousin Chilian, if you had not been in the world, or if you hadn't been willing to take me--I don't think father knew much about Cousin Giles--why, I must have gone to strangers."

There were tears in her eyes, and a sweet melancholy in her voice.

She had so much to tell Cousin Eunice that it seemed really as if she had taken the journey with them. She put on Jane's faded gingham sunbonnet and gave her voice a queer nasal twang, and talked as some of the women did up there in the wilderness, who thought a city "must be an awfully crowdy place an' she jes' didn't see how people managed to live in it. An' as fer the sea, give her dry land every time."

Then she talked the French-English patois of the emigrants from Canada, and told of their funny attire, and their log huts, sometimes with only one big room, with a stone chimney in the centre, and sawed logs for seats.

"They did that in Salem nigh on to two hundred years ago," said Cousin Eunice.

"How much people do learn by living," remarked the little girl sagely.

Then the olden round began. Being asked out to tea and inviting in return, sewing bees, quilting parties when some girl was making an outfit. And though the elders shook their heads at such a waste of time, they went out to walk in the afternoon and stopped in the shops that were making a show on Essex Street and Federal Street. There was Miss Rust's pretty millinery parlor--it had a sofa in the front room and a table with an embroidered cover that Cynthia had sent her. They talked of new styles and colors, and were aghast at the thought that royalty sometimes had as many as twenty hats and bonnets. She made pretty old lady caps as well, and she did love to hear the young girls chatter. And Molly Saunders was still baking gingerbread, that had delighted them as school children, and no one made such good spruce and sassafras beer.

One evening at a dance she had a great surprise. Some one said, "Miss Cynthia Leverett, Mr. Marsh."

A rather tall, ruddy, good-looking fellow, with laughing eyes and an unmistakable sailor air, held her dainty hand and studied her face.

"Oh, you don't know me!" in the jolliest of tones. "And I should know you if you had been cast ashore on a rocky island and I were looking at you through a spyglass. You haven't changed in the main, only to grow prettier. You were a poor pale little thing then."

"Oh, I can't think!" She flushed and smiled. Something in the hearty voice won her.

"At Dame Wilby's school. And the bad boy who sat behind you--Tommy Marsh."

"Oh! oh! And that day I sat on the floor!" She laughed gayly. She did not mind it a bit now.

"Wasn't it funny? And the way you just sat still with the school in an uproar. You standing up there and 'sassing' back the old dame! Such a mite of a thing, too. My! but you were a plucky one!" in admiration. "And you never came to school after that. I ought to get down on my knees and beg your pardon for the sly pinches I gave you, and the times I tweaked your curly hair. I've half a mind to do it."

"Oh, no!" and she made a funny gesture of alarm, and