"Tut, tut!" said Marion. "I was as bad as yourself, and worse, for I was older. But now, lass, take my advice this time. Speak yon man fair, and let him have it all his own way, and it will come out all right. But, above all, don't keep him waiting."
Mr. Ferrand was in the library, seated in his arm-chair, with his most decided expression of dignity and importance. But it is not easy to look dignified and important on purpose without overdoing the matter, and, consequently, Mr. Ferrand succeeded in being only stiff and pompous. Rhoda instantly compared him in her own mind to a certain small bantam cock formerly belonging to Aunt Hannah.
Mr. Ferrand looked at Rhoda, and Rhoda looked on the floor, vexed at herself for feeling like laughing. She had not felt in the least like laughing under Mrs. Ferrand's gentle and somewhat incoherent reproaches.
"I understand, Rhoda Bowers—I believe that is your name?" said Mr. Ferrand, pausing for an answer.
"Yes, sir," answered Rhoda, meekly, thinking, "The old goose! Just as if he didn't know my name!"
"I understand from Mrs. Ferrand, Rhoda Bowers, that you repent of your conduct on Saturday night and other preceding nights in invading my drawing-room and trespassing upon my daughter's instrument?"
Mr. Ferrand again paused for a reply, and Rhoda said,—
"Yes, sir, I am sorry I should have deceived you and helped Miss Isa to do so. I think it was very wrong, and I beg your pardon."
"Well," said Mr. Ferrand, "I understand also that you are very desirous to remain in my family a short time longer, until you can find another place. Since you see and acknowledge your errors—"
"Excuse me, Mr. Ferrand," said Rhoda, modestly. "It was not that I wished to stay till I can find another place. I can always go back to 'The Home.' But as Mrs. Ferrand was expecting company, and Miss Ferrand is not very well, I thought I might save her trouble by staying till she could find another girl. I have made her so much trouble that I should like to make some amends."
"Well, well, it comes to much the same thing," said Mr. Ferrand. "You are at liberty to remain this week, and then we will see. But one thing I must insist upon—that you shall have no intercourse whatever with Miss Ferrand. If you would give me your word to abandon those pursuits which you must be sensible are altogether unfitted for you, and to be guided by me in your reading, I might perhaps allow you to remain altogether."
"I don't think I can do that, Mr. Ferrand," said Rhoda. "It has always been my greatest desire to get an education, so as to be able to teach, and I do not think I can give it up."
"To teach!" repeated Mr. Ferrand.
"Yes, sir. I am quite sure I could teach if I only had an education. I don't want to boast, but I know I have a talent for both music and mathematics, and I don't think it would be right for me to neglect them altogether, any more than it was right for me to try to cultivate them in wrong ways. It would have been wrong for the man in the parable to use dishonest means to increase his one talent, but that didn't make it right for him to bury it in the ground."
Mr. Ferrand looked surprised, but not offended.
"You really seem to have thought upon the subject," said he. "Sit down. I should like to converse with you farther on this subject."
Never before had Mr. Ferrand asked a servant to sit down in that august apartment, But he was interested, as it were, in spite of himself.
Rhoda took a seat. She was a very pretty and somewhat distinguished-looking girl, and always neat in her dress; and as she sat before him, her face full of animation and thought, Mr. Ferrand was surprised to find himself admiring her and wishing that Isa looked like her.
"You say you think you can teach," he continued. "Why do you think so? You should be able to give a reason for your conviction."
"I think so," answered Rhoda, "because I have always succeeded whenever I have tried."
"Then you have tried?"
"Yes, sir. I have taught two or three of the little ones at 'The Home' to read this last winter. Then there was a little girl in Boonville whom every one thought was not quite like other children—deficient in mind, or peculiar, at any rate. She did not learn to read, and her parents thought she never would, but the poor thing wanted to learn—"
"Excuse me: wished or desired to learn would be the better expression," said Mr. Ferrand. "But go on. I am much interested in everything pertaining to education."
"She wished very much to learn," continued Rhoda, accepting the correction, not without some inward amusement, "and I asked Mrs. Bowers if I might try to teach her. I worked with her nearly three months before she learned a single thing. If she learned to know a word in one place, she did not know it in another; and when she had spelled bat and cat and hat, she had no more idea how to spell rat than if she had never seen a letter. But she would not give up, and I was ashamed to be less persevering than a little child, and at last she seemed to start right off and read without any trouble. It all came to her at once, and after that, I never saw any child improve so fast."
"That is a very interesting case," said Mr. Ferrand. "With your permission, I shall make use of it in my work on education. Have you ever tried to teach anything but reading?"
"Only when I was helping Miss Isa—Miss Ferrand, I mean," said Rhoda, blushing. "I have tried to help her in her music."
Mr. Ferrand's face darkened a little.
"I know it was very wrong," said Rhoda, humbly. "It was deceitful, and deceit can never be right; but Miss Ferrand does work so hard it seemed almost cruel not to help her when she asked me."
"Well, well, I am glad you are sensible of your error. We will talk of this matter again. Meantime, you can go about your duties as usual, for this week, at any rate. I should wish you to take down and dust all the vases and other ornaments in the upper hall. I observed several small cobwebs there yesterday when I had occasion to look behind them."
"Thank you, sir," said Rhoda, both gratified and surprised at the result of the interview.
She longed to intercede for Isa, but something told her that it would not be best. So she made her curtsey and withdrew, resolved to leave not the shadow of a cobweb anywhere within her jurisdiction.
Mr. Ferrand closed the library door, and sat down to meditate upon an idea which had crossed his mind, and which a week ago he would have rejected as utterly wild and impracticable. This young person had certainly a good and clear intellect, however she came by it. She was really talented, and it was evident that she had no common share of perseverance to pursue a course of study at home; yet here was a servant who, with all her work to do and without neglecting the duties of her position, had made very creditable progress in mathematics and music. True, she had been much to blame, but she seemed fully sensible of her error, and we are all human and liable to err, thought Mr. Ferrand, not even excepting himself from this general principle.
Doctor Morton had said very decidedly that Isabella must be taken out of school, and that she ought to have a companion of her own age.
"Get some girl of her own age to stay with her," was his inelegant expression, Mr. Ferrand remembered.
What if he should adopt this young person into his family, procure a suitable governess, and allow the two to study and associate upon equal terms? Rhoda was an orphan—that was one great advantage. She was well-looking and had good taste in dress—that was another. And though, as was to be expected, she used somewhat common and colloquial expressions, she was not vulgar or ungrammatical in her speech, Isabella was fond of her, so was Mrs. Ferrand.
"I will consider upon it, I really will," said Mr. Ferrand to himself. "I cannot but think the plan offers some considerable advantages, But it is not best to act in haste. I will consider upon it."
Two or three days after the conversation in the library there came a ring at the door, and Rhoda opened it, as usual, to be astonished at the apparition of Uncle Jacob Weightman, who looked no less surprised at seeing her.
"Why, Rhoda, is this you?" said he. "What are you doing here?"
"My work," answered Rhoda. "Whom did you wish to see, Mr. Weightman?"
"Oh, that is it?" answered the old man, with a smile of sour satisfaction. "I hope you like your boarding-school."
"Whom did you wish to see?" repeated Rhoda. She was choked with anger, grief, and a spasm of homesickness, but not for the world would she have shed a tear before Uncle Jacob.
"Does Mr. Ferrand live here?"
"Yes. Do you wish to see him?"
"You may tell him I have got some business with him," said Uncle Jacob. "Tell him a gentleman wants to see him on business about his Hobarttown property."
Rhoda knocked at the library door, and said,—
"Mr. Ferrand, here is a person wants to see you on business, if you please."
"Oh, so I am not a gentleman in your eyes, Miss Rhoda? See if I don't pay you for that," muttered the old man as he went forward into the library.
It was not very wise in Rhoda, or perhaps very Christian, but she was only a child, after all, and she certainly had small reason to love Mr. Weightman. She was to have still less before the morning was over.
Mr. Ferrand was polite to everybody for his own sake, and he received Mr. Weightman with his usual courtesy.
After they had finished their business, Mr. Weightman remarked, carelessly,—
"I see you have that girl that my niece took from the asylum."
"Your niece!" said Mr. Ferrand.
"Yes, Mrs. Bowers, of Boonville. She had no children, and adopted this girl from some home or asylum in the city here. It was against my advice, and turned out just as I expected."
"May I ask why your niece did not keep her?" asked Mr. Ferrand. "Please excuse my curiosity. I have a special reason for asking."
"Oh, well, the fact is, I don't want to say anything against the girl, but it did not answer. I don't think such arrangements often do. The girl was sly and idle, and made mischief in the family. I had a sister—she is dead now—but she was infirm in mind, and this girl actually got the poor old woman to make a will leaving her all her property. It was not signed, and of course was worth no more than so much waste paper. She made a deal of trouble for me with poor Hannah, and there were other reasons—in short, they had to get rid of her. But what can you expect? Crab trees will bear crab apples, you know. If people will take children of that kind, they must expect to have the father, and especially the mother, come out in them. You have seen enough of the world to know that, Mr. Ferrand. However, I don't want to injure Rhoda. I am glad to see her working honestly for a living, for there is no knowing what such girls will do."
Mr. Weightman had no particular intention of lying about Rhoda, although he did mean to pay her, as he said, for her disrespect to himself. He had all the time been trying to justify his treatment of Rhoda to himself by making himself believe that Rhoda was all he had represented, and he had to some extent succeeded. Was not Aunt Hannah always making her expensive presents? Had she not made a will at last leaving Rhoda that estate which was his by all right? True, it was not witnessed, or even signed, and he had reason to think that nobody knew of its existence but himself, but that was no thanks to Rhoda. Yes, she was a wicked, designing girl, and it was right to warn people against her.
Rhoda exchanged no words with Uncle Jacob as he went out. She of course knew nothing of what had passed in the library, but the moment she saw Mr. Ferrand, she felt there was a change in his manner toward her. He hardly spoke to her all the rest of the week. When Monday came, he paid her her wages and a month over, made her a present of a good book, handsomely bound, and hoped she would do well. He had reconsidered the matter, and had come to the conclusion that it would not do at all.
CHAPTER XIII.
A NEW FRIEND.
RHODA did not know for a long time how near she had been to the accomplishment of her wishes. She took a tearful leave of Mrs. Ferrand and Isa, and went back to 'The Home' feeling sadly enough.
She was mortified at being dismissed and ashamed at the circumstances which led to the dismissal, and she was broken-hearted at parting with Isa, whom she had learned to love with all the intensity of a school-girl's affection. She had never been much given to striking up those sudden and violent intimacies common among girls, and which are often as short-lived as fervent. She had been a favourite with all the girls at Boonville, but she had been specially intimate with none of them except Alice Brown, who had gone away to the far West a year before. But she loved Isa Ferrand with all her heart, and none the less that she was not insensible to Isa's faults and weaknesses. And now they must part, and would probably never see any more of each other. They might sometimes meet in the street, but there could be no visiting and no correspondence—they could hardly even stop to talk, because Isa would be disobeying her father. It was very, very hard.
Rhoda fell easily enough into her old life at "The Home." Neither Miss Carpenter nor the good managers were disposed to be hard upon her, considering the temptations to which she had been exposed.
"You should not have done it, of course," said Mrs. Mulford. "Deceit is and must be always wrong. But I think Mr. Ferrand made a very unnecessary fuss about the matter. I dare say you would have felt twice as penitent if he had given you permission to practise every day."
"I don't know. I was very sorry as it was," said Rhoda. "But I did feel a great deal more so that day he talked so kindly to me."
"How was that?" asked Mrs. Mulford.
Rhoda repeated the substance of the conversation which had taken place in the library.
"He was just so kind, and even kinder, all that week, till the afternoon Mr. Weightman called, and after that he never spoke to me again till he paid me my wages when I came away. I can't help thinking Mr. Weightman set him against me. He has always been my enemy. I am quite sure that Mr. and Mrs. Bowers would not have sent me away but for him."
"It hardly seems as if any one could be so meanly spiteful as that, and toward a young girl," remarked Mrs. Mulford. "And yet I know narrow-minded, ignorant people will carry enmity to great lengths sometimes."
"I know he does. There was a woman lived next him with whom he had a quarrel. She was an ignorant, hot-tempered woman, and used rather hard language sometimes, but that was the worst of her. Well, he got angry at her for something about a grapevine, and he went to the man whose house she lived in and told him such stories about her that he got her turned out of her house. I don't really think, either, that he means to tell downright lies, but he thinks that any one who opposes him must be everything that is bad."
"He must be a nice person. Well, Rhoda, you did right to come back here, and you are come in very good time too, for several of the old ladies are ailing and need a deal of waiting on. Just take hold and help Mrs. Lambert whenever you see a chance. I suppose you don't give up your idea of getting an education?"
"No, ma'am. I don't think I can give it up so long as there is any 'me,'" said Rhoda, smiling somewhat sadly. "But the time is getting on very fast."
"Yes, and you are getting on too. Well, study as much as you can, my dear; and if you want any help in the way of books, come to me about it. Don't be discouraged. I shall try to find you a place where you can work for your board and go to school, and in the mean time just make yourself useful here. This will always be your home, you know."
Rhoda was very willing to make herself useful. She waited on Granny Parsons, now sick and confined to her room, and did errands for the house, and made caps and aprons for the old ladies, and read aloud to Mrs. Carson, the blind woman, and whenever she had a little time practised scales and exercises diligently on the little old piano, compared to which even the school-room piano at Mr. Ferrand's was a fine instrument.
One day, as she was coming home from executing multifarious commissions, with her hands full of little bundles, she saw Isa crossing the street, and waited for her to come up. Isa was thinner and more languid than ever. She had her arms full of books, and seemed so occupied with her own thoughts that she hardly recognized Rhoda, even when she spoke. Then, with a cry of joy which made two or three people look round, and dropping a shower of books, she threw her arms round her friend's neck and kissed her.
"Oh how glad I am to see you!" she exclaimed. "I have watched and watched for you every day since I began to go to school again, but I never could see you."
"To school!" said Rhoda, picking up Isa's books with some trouble, for her own hands were full. "You don't mean to say you are going to school again, after all the doctor said? I do think your father is crazy."
"I don't know whether 'he' is crazy, but I know who will be," said Isa.
"But when the doctor said so much about it—"
"Oh, pa thinks the doctor was mistaken," said Isa. "He went over and talked to the teachers, and Miss Black—just like her, the cross, meddling old thing!—told him that I was always going into Palmer's and buying ice cream and cake and candy, and that was what made me sick. I have done it sometimes when ma gave me money because I got so faint and hungry. So pa believed it all, of course, and here I am grinding away again. I declare, Rhoda, there isn't a day that I don't wish I was dead."
"Oh, Isa! You shouldn't!"
"I can't help it. I do, and so would you in my place. No, you wouldn't; you would like it, for you are not a dunce and a fool, as I am."
"You are not a dunce, nor a fool either," said Rhoda, warmly. "It doesn't follow that you are a dunce because you can't learn music. A great many people can't. But how do you get on in school? Can you learn your lessons?"
"Yes, some of them. We are reviewing, and the girls help me. But you don't know how my head feels. There is a place up the back of it that feels perfectly numb and dead, and some days the feeling goes down my spine and all over me, and I can't sleep at night. I am just doing lessons, lessons all the time. Oh, if I could only run away or do something!"
The girls had turned into a shady, quiet street by this time, and were walking slowly along together.
"What are you thinking about, Rhoda?" asked Isa, a little impatiently, after a minute's silence. "Why don't you speak?"
"Because I want to say something, and I don't quite know how," answered Rhoda. "I am afraid you will think it odd, coming from me, after all that has happened."
"I shall think it is just right, whatever it is, I know."
"Well, then, Isa dear, you know who it was that said,—
"'Come unto me, all ye that labour and are heavy laden, and I will
give you rest.'
"Why don't you go to him?"
"I don't know; I never thought I could. How?"
"Don't you know the Bible says—
"'...he is able also to save them to the uttermost that come unto God
by him'?
"Nobody loves us as our heavenly Father does and if you ask him, I am sure he will find some way to help you."
"I shouldn't dare, I am so wicked," said Isa. "I suppose that is only meant for very good people."
"No, indeed," answered Rhoda, earnestly. "If it was, I don't know who in all this world would ever dare to come. Why, Isa, don't you read your Bible? Don't you know that Jesus Christ came into the world on purpose to save sinners? Don't you know what he said when the Pharisees found fault with him for eating with them? I thought you read your Bible every night."
"Well, I do, but I am so tired and stupid I can't take any sense of it. But, Rhoda, the Bible says very hard things about liars, and I do tell fibs and cheat in my lessons. I should be in disgrace all the time if Kate Collins and Mary Pomeroy didn't do my sums for me or let me copy theirs."
"Then I'd be in disgrace," said Rhoda, undauntedly. "Perhaps that would be the best way to make your father understand that you can't learn. Anyhow, Isa, I would pray. I would tell God all about that too, as well as the rest, and ask him to take you out of temptation. He will find some way, I know. He isn't like an earthly friend that can only do very little or perhaps nothing at all."
"But, Rhoda—"
"Well, what?"
"I suppose you must have asked him a great many times to let you get an education?"
"Yes, and I am sure he will, if it is best for me," said Rhoda.
"Yet he let you get found out and sent away from our house."
"Yes, and good reason why—because I had forgotten him, and was trying to help myself in my own way. I was like Jacob in the Bible. God had promised him the birthright, but he wasn't contented to wait. He went to work to get it in underhand ways—by cheating and deceiving his old father, and taking a mean advantage of his brother; and just see how much trouble he made himself. But come now, Isa dear, promise me you will pray."
"Well, I will, Rhoda, I truly will. I am sure I 'labour and am heavy laden' enough, if that is all. I know that it isn't right to cheat, and it makes me ashamed and miserable all the time; but if I don't bring home a good report, pa is so mortified and scolds so and ma is so miserable. But I will try, and you will pray for me, won't you?"
"Indeed I will! Oh, Isa, you don't know how I miss you and want to see you."
"And I am sure I miss you. Have you got a place yet?"
"No. Mrs. Mulford says I am not to be in a hurry about one, because I am really needed at 'The Home,' and she does not think they can spare me just yet."
"What do you do? Tell me."
"Oh, a great many different things," said Rhoda. "I carry up breakfast to Granny Parsons and Mrs. Josleyn when they can't come down; I make and do up caps, and go on errands; and sometimes I keep the books for Miss Carpenter. They are talking about having a school in the house again, when the new wing is done, and perhaps they may let me teach if Miss Wilkins is not able. And I practise an hour every day—sometimes more than that. I have plenty to do and plenty of variety, you see."
"I should like just such a life as that," said Isa. "Well, good-bye, dear; don't forget me."
"There is no danger," said Rhoda. "I haven't so many friends that I can afford to lose any."
"Oh, I forgot to tell you that Aunt Harriet is coming to make us a visit," said Isa, turning back. "I wish you could see her. She is perfectly lovely. I think I should be happy if I could only go to school to Aunt Harriet Hardy."
"She has a school, has she?"
"Yes, a boarding-school in Cohansey—not a large one: she has only about twenty-five girls; and oh, they do have such good times! I was there visiting once with mother, and if I didn't envy those girls! But I mustn't stop another minute, or pa will ask me where I have been. Good-bye."
"You are rather late, Isabella," said her father as she entered. "What detained you?"
"I walked round with one of the girls. Pa, I'll tell you the truth," said Isa, with a spasm of frankness, but trembling as she spoke. "I met Rhoda Bowers and walked part of the way home with her. Now, don't be angry, please don't."
"I am not angry, Isabella, but I am grieved and surprised. Why should you wish to associate with such a girl as that?"
"Why, pa, you said yourself that Rhoda had an uncommonly clear mind."
"She is not deficient in intellect," said Mr. Ferrand—"nay, I will go farther, and say she has an unusually good mind; but she is not trustworthy. She deceived me here, and the person who has called to see me on business two or three times lately tells me that she made great trouble in the family of her adopted parents."
"I don't believe it," said Isa, boldly, "and I wonder, pa, that you should let yourself be influenced by such a common man as that, especially when you said yourself that he tried to take the advantage of you."
"There is something in that view of the case, certainly," said Mr. Ferrand, "and I must say the young person expressed herself very becomingly in regard to her conduct here. But, Isabella, remember that I do not wish you to associate with her. You need not mortify her by refusing to speak when you meet,—we should be courteous to persons in every position in life; but you must not walk in the street, or stop to converse, with her. You had better go and dress for dinner, my daughter. Your aunt Harriet is here."
"Oh, is she? How glad I am! When did she come?"
"By the five o'clock train," said Mr. Ferrand, thinking, with a little something like a pain at his heart, that his daughter had never greeted his coming with any such show of warmth.
But he was altogether too well satisfied with himself—too well balanced, he would have said—to permit himself to be jealous. An affectionate and faithful father should, of course, have the first place in his child's affections. He was affectionate and faithful, therefore it must follow that Isabella loved him better than any one. He did not care very much for demonstrations of feeling, and it would certainly have annoyed him very much if Isabella had rushed into his room, thrown her arms around his neck, and hugged and kissed him as she did her aunt Harriet.
Aunt Harriet, however, did not seem to be in the least disturbed, even though Isa's embrace distressingly crushed her illusion ruffles and tumbled the rich soft black silk which was her favourite wear. She was a delicate little woman, well on in the thirties at the least, yet not old enough to account for the fact that her soft wavy hair was quite gray. She had clear gray eyes,—the colour of a shaded pond,—eyes not at all subdued in their expression by a life of school-teaching, but which could dance with glee or soften with affection or pity, or on occasion flash alarmingly with indignation. She was always elegantly and rather richly dressed, and was, on the whole, one of those persons of whom you naturally say, on seeing them, "Who is that?"
"There! Sit down and let me look at you," said she when Isa's raptures were a little calmed down. "Why, child, how thin you are! And how tired you look! I should not allow you to look like that if you were one of my girls."
"Don't you let your girls look tired, Aunt Harriet?"
"No. When they begin to have that sort of look, I carry them off for a row up the race and a pic-nic, or some such nonsense."
"Then I wish I was one of your girls, for I am tired all the time," said poor Isa. "I am so tired now I should like to go straight to bed."
"Go to bed, then," said Aunt Harriet. "Lie down here on my bed and sleep till dinner-time."
"I can't," said Isa. "I must dress for dinner, and then look over my Latin. I wish there had never been any ancient Romans, or else that I had been born one."
"Then you might have been obliged to learn Greek, and that would have been worse."
"Pa says I have got to begin Greek next year," said Isa. "Oh dear! If I could only see any end to it, I shouldn't mind so much. But I must go and dress, or I shall not dare to show myself at the dinner-table."
"Oh dear!" she said to herself as she went to her own room. "I do wish pa would go away, and then ma and I could have Aunt Harriet all to ourselves. Pa will be wanting to talk education all the time. I never was so sick of anything. If I ever have any children, they shall never be educated at all."
Miss Hardy was no very great favourite with her brother-in-law; and, as old-fashioned people say, "there was no love lost between them." Miss Hardy was by no means one of those vine-like, submissive women who were Mr. Ferrand's standards of excellence. She had been at the head of an establishment of her own ever since she was three-and-twenty—an establishment in which her will was law. She had had great experience of all sorts of people. She had formed her own opinions and was prepared to defend them, and she did not defer to Mr. Ferrand's superior claims in point of intellect, family, and social position so much as that gentleman thought his wife's sister should have done.
On the other hand, Miss Hardy thought her brother-in-law conceited and disposed to be tyrannical both to his wife and daughter, and perhaps she hardly did justice to his good qualities. However, she was incapable of treating him with disrespect in the presence of her sister, and Mr. Ferrand, on his part, could not be rude to a lady in his own house. Nevertheless, Mrs. Ferrand always felt a secret uneasiness when the two were together, and it was with a feeling of relief that she heard her husband apologize to her sister for the necessity which existed of his leaving town to-morrow to attend to some property he was about to sell at Hobarttown.
"So you mean to sell that mill?" said his wife.
"Yes, I think so. I have a good opportunity, and I prefer to invest the money where it will take care of itself. You had better take the carriage and give your sister a view of the different places in the city. Probably she will like to visit 'The House of Refuge' and 'The School for Truant Children.'"
"I want to see your old ladies' 'Home,'" said Miss Hardy. "They are thinking of getting up a similar institution in Cohansey, and I have heard this one highly spoken of."
"I believe the old people are made very comfortable," said Mrs. Ferrand. "Of course they grumble more or less; but from all I can learn, I think they must be well cared for."
"At the same time, there is a lamentable want of system in the arrangements," remarked Mr. Ferrand. "Their hours are very late, and there seem to be absolutely no rules about exercising and diet. It cannot be proper that any persons should have tea three times a day, and I am credibly informed that several of the old people are allowed to take snuff."
"I suppose they have been used to it all their lives, pa," Isa ventured to say.
"Do you consider that any argument for criminal indulgence, Isabella?" asked her father.
"I shouldn't call it exactly a criminal indulgence to take snuff," answered Isa, emboldened by her aunt's smile. "I shouldn't think it best for a young person to begin, because it is a disagreeable habit; but I should think, when a woman had taken it till she was seventy or eighty years old, she might be allowed to go on for the rest of her life."
"And if a man had gone on stealing till he was eighty, would that be a reason for his keeping on?"
"There is a difference between stealing and taking snuff," answered Isa.
"Decidedly a difference," remarked Miss Hardy. "Did you tell me that there was a department for children and young people attached to the institution?"
"Yes; they have eight little girls, who remain till they are fifteen, unless they are adopted or bound out to suitable places before that time."
"And what becomes of them then?"
"They go out as servants or seamstresses, and Mrs. Mulford tells me they usually do very well. They look upon the institution as a real 'home;' and as long as they behave tolerably well, they are allowed and encouraged to go back there whenever they are out of a place. In that way the managers are able to keep informed of them, and also to maintain a certain control over them."
"A very good plan," said Miss Hardy.
"Yes, I quite approve of that part of the institution," said Mr. Ferrand, "though I fear that hardly enough pains is taken to bring up the children with a proper sense of their position, and of the deference due to their superiors."
"I was not without an object in asking," said Miss Hardy. "I am very much in want of a dining-room girl—one to set and wait on the table and take care of the dishes, which is in itself no small piece of work in a family like ours."
"What has become of that pretty little Margaret you had when I was there?" asked Mrs. Ferrand. "You thought of taking her into school, I remember."
"So I did," answered Miss Hardy. "She did very well for a year and a half, and then she came to an untimely end. You need not look distressed, Lucilla; it was nothing very tragical. The last long vacation she went out to Denver with Mary Nichols—you remember her—partly as companion, partly to take care of the children. That was the last of her. A well-to-do farmer saw her, fell in love with her, and married her. I felt a little uneasy, but Mary writes me she has done very well and is very happy. Since then I have had a succession of incapables, and I want somebody I can keep."
Isa glanced at her mother. Mrs. Ferrand made her a little sign which she well understood as a signal that she was to say nothing.
In compliment to her aunt, and also because the school-room piano had altogether broken down, Isa was allowed to intermit her practising for one evening, but she could not on any account be allowed to sit up a moment later than usual.
But when Miss Hardy went up to bed, Isa peeped out and called her:
"Oh, auntie, please come in. I want to talk to you."
"Get into bed, then, you imprudent child," said Miss Hardy. "Why are you up in this cold room?"
"It is cold," said Isa, shivering—"too cold for you to sit here, I am afraid. But I do want to talk to you about Rhoda. I do want you to take her so much."
"Who is Rhoda?" asked Miss Hardy, wrapping herself in a shawl, for it was one of Mr. Ferrand's maxims that nobody should sleep in a warm room, no matter what the weather might be. "Tell me about her."
"She is a girl who used to live here—oh, such a good girl! She used to help me about my sums and my music, and all, but pa sent her away because he caught her playing upon the piano, but she is living at 'The Home' now, but she wants a place, and she is so anxious to get an education. She studies at home all the time, every chance she can get. Just think, Aunt Harriet—really studies algebra because she likes it; and she can sing beautifully, and read music, and all. Please ask ma about her. She can tell you the story better than I can. And she knows how to work, and she said herself that she was more help to her than any girl she ever had," said Isa, mixing up her pronouns in a way that would have horrified her father. "And she wants an education more than anything else in the world, and that made pa send her away—at least that wasn't all, for Rhoda herself said she did wrong, but she told pa she was sorry."
"I can't say I get any very lucid ideas from your story, Isa," said Miss Hardy.
"I never can tell anything straight, especially when I am in a hurry," said poor Isa. "But you ask ma. She can tell you all about Rhoda, for she liked her. And I am sure she would suit you, for I love her dearly."
"A very good reason. Well, my love, it is time you were asleep, so we won't talk any more to-night. How you are shivering!"
"I always shiver so when I first go to bed," said Isa, "and then I am so hot you don't know. Marion brings me a hot brick every night, but I can't get warm for all."
"I really think she might answer your purpose very well," said Mrs. Ferrand when Miss Hardy applied to her for information about Rhoda. "She is very neat, and the most trustworthy girl of her age I ever saw. She never disappointed me."
"That is a valuable quality, certainly; but why did she go away? Isa said something about a piano which I did not understand."
Mrs. Ferrand repeated the story, to which her sister listened with great interest.
"Poor child! It was a hard case," said she. "I have known plenty of girls who cheated to get rid of lessons, but I can't say I ever met such an instance as this. And you say she is out of a place? Could I see her, do you think?"
"Oh yes. We shall probably find her at 'The Home;' and if not, I will send for her."
"And won't you give her an education, Aunt Harriet, or let her work for it?" asked Isa, eagerly.
"I will see about that, my child. If she seems likely to suit me, I should prefer to take her as a servant, to begin with, and then I can observe her for myself. I promise you I will do all I can for her."
"All right," said Isa. She had perfect confidence in Aunt Harriet, and not the least doubt of Rhoda's capacity to make her way with "reasonable people," as she expressed it.
Miss Hardy called at "The Home," saw Rhoda, and had a long talk with her.
"You think you would like to come?"
"Oh yes, ma'am."
"It is a long journey," said Miss Hardy, "but a very easy one, and I will send you careful directions. I suppose, if I do not want you till the first of September, you can remain here?"
Rhoda looked at Miss Carpenter.
"Certainly," answered Miss Carpenter. "We shall be very glad to have her. Rhoda makes herself very useful in the family."
"Very well; then we will consider the matter settled," said Miss Hardy—"that is, if I can depend on your not disappointing me and going off to some other place. You look rather indignant, Rhoda, but that is the way I have been served a great many times. I keep a place for a girl and put myself to some inconvenience to keep my engagement to her, but she does not consider herself in the least bound by her promise to me if she fancies she can do better."
"I think you may depend on Rhoda," said Miss Carpenter.
Rhoda was delighted. She liked the change, and she had imbibed from Isa a very high idea of Miss Hardy, which was not lessened by seeing her. Then, best of all, she should be in a school, and it would go hard but she would benefit thereby.
CHAPTER XIV.
MISS DAVIS'S LETTER.
"I SHALL probably want you to come down about the first of September, as our school opens on the thirteenth this year, but I can tell better when I have consulted Mrs. Hallowell, the housekeeper. At all events, I will write and let you know in good time."
These were Miss Hardy's last words on parting with Rhoda. It was now the last of March, and Rhoda settled down for the summer, as she supposed, fulfilling her multifarious duties as assistant sick-nurse, milliner, reader, and factotum in general at the home.
Miss Carpenter remarked one day, with a sigh, that it would be hard to fill Rhoda's place when she was gone.
"I am sure nobody will miss the child more than I shall," said Miss Brown, echoing the sigh. "She is in and out a dozen times a day, and always has something pleasant to say. Only that it is so clearly to her advantage, I should be sorry she was going so far. It don't seem as if I should ever see her again."
But Miss Brown was to go first, and on a longer journey than Rhoda's. She had been ailing for a day or two—not seriously, but so that Mrs. Lambert thought it best she should keep her room, especially as the weather was very trying. Rhoda had arranged her for the night, and left her feeling cheerful and comfortable; but when she went to call her in the morning, her good old friend was sleeping the quiet sleep which knows no waking in this world.
"It is a blessed release to her, I am sure," said Mrs. Lambert, wiping her eyes. "There isn't one in the house that would be more missed, for all she was so quiet, and never made any disturbance. Rhoda's 'most heart-broken, and no wonder. She was like a daughter to the dear old lady."
It was indeed a heavy blow to Rhoda—like losing Aunt Hannah over again.
"She was so good to me. It does seem as though my friends were taken away from me as soon as I learn to love them," she said to Mrs. Worthington.
"You have indeed had a sad experience of the changes of this life for one so young," replied her friend. "You must try to look all the more steadfastly at the things which are not seen, my child. It is the only comfort, and the only way to make affliction work out its good results. Taken in any other way, it only sours and hardens."
Rhoda knew that these words were not mere phrases and matter-of-course consolations, coming as they did from one who had been stricken so sorely, and she tried to take them to heart; but nevertheless she missed her dear old friend every day more and more.
"Well, they've given her a fine funeral," grumbled Granny Parsons, who had crawled down to see the ceremony—"rose-wood coffin with silver handles, and fine cashmere shroud, and all. You won't catch 'em giving me no such coffin as that. Any old pine box will be good enough for me."
"It won't make no great difference, I expect, whether we have a rose-wood or pine," remarked Mrs. Josleyn. "So long as we get safe to the other side of Jordan, we may as well go in a pine boat as a rose-wood one. And I'm sure Miss Brown has got nicer white robes by this time than any cashmere, or satin either; for she was a good woman if ever there was one."
"Here's a letter for you, Rhoda, with money in it," said Miss Carpenter, coming into Granny Parsons's room, where Rhoda was sitting with her work, listening to an interminable story of granny's wrongs from her first, second, and third husbands, and wondering in her own mind what anybody should have seen in her to marry. "I expect it is from Miss Hardy. She lives at Cohansey, don't she?"
"Yes, ma'am, but I didn't expect to hear so soon, and it isn't Miss Hardy's writing, either, or at least I think not. I hope nothing has happened," she continued, studying the address with that odd feeling which always prompts one to seek information from the outside rather than the inside of an unexpected letter.
"Well, do open it and see, child. It won't grow any worse or better by keeping."
Rhoda opened and read the letter, and uttered an exclamation of surprise.
"What is it?" asked Miss Carpenter.
"Oh, it is all right. She wants me to come, and has sent the money for my fare, but she writes me to be at Cohansey the first of June instead of the first of September."
"The first of June! Why, that is the day after to-morrow," said Miss Carpenter.
"No, the day after. May has thirty-one days, you know. But the notice is short enough, anyhow. My clothes are all in order, that is one comfort."
"Well, I think you needn't complain," grumbled Granny Parsons, "when she sends you money to go with, and all. Nobody don't send me no money in letters."
"You would hardly want to set off on such a journey as Rhoda's if they did, since you are afraid to ride even on the street cars," remarked Miss Carpenter. "Is the letter from Miss Hardy herself, Rhoda?"
"No, ma'am, from Miss Davis—Anna Davis is the signature. She is one of the teachers, I know. I saw her name in the circular Isa gave me. She says Miss Hardy requests her to write."
"Then it is all correct, of course," said Miss Carpenter. "Well, you must go right to work and get ready, so as not to have too much to do at the last. You had better go and see Mrs. Mulford and Mrs. Worthington."
"And Marion Campbell—I must bid her good-bye; and I dare say Mrs. Ferrand will have something to send her sister," said Rhoda, thinking, it must be confessed, more of the chance of seeing Isa than of obliging her mother. "How strange it will seem starting off on such a long journey!"
"I wish you were not going alone," said Miss Carpenter. "However, I dare say nothing will happen to you."
Rhoda's packing was all done the next day. She had received a good travelling outfit when she left Boonville, and had very little to buy. By Mrs. Mulford's advice, she left her money in the bank, taking only enough with her to pay her expenses back again if necessary.
"And have you all you want? Are you sure?" asked Marion. "A travelling-bag, now?"
"Oh yes," answered Rhoda. "My bag is an old one of mother's. It isn't very smart, but it will do."
"Awed, I thought you might need a new one, and so I bought this," said Marion, producing a very nice morocco satchel. "I'd like you to have everything nice and respectable, as you are going among strangers. But if you don't like it, you can change it at Pritchard's; I bought it on that condition, for I know young lasses have their fancies."
"Indeed, I don't want to change it. I think it is beautiful," said Rhoda, surveying her present. "But what is this in the pocket. Oh what a pretty purse! And money in it, too! Oh, Marion, you shouldn't! I ought not to take it!"
"Aweel, ye can do as you please, but the purse is no my present, it is Mrs. Ferrand's," said Marion. "She bade me give it to you from her and Miss Isa."
"Can't I see them, then?" said Rhoda. "Are they not at home? Oh how sorry I am!"
"No, they're gone away with yon man to some of his nonsense conventions, or such like. It is Isa's vacation, ye ken."
"Of course he couldn't let her have any good of it," said Rhoda. "He would be miserable if he thought the poor child was enjoying herself."
"Na, na, ye should not say that," said Marion. "The man means no harm."
"Perhaps not. Aunt Hannah used to say that more than half the mischief in the world was done by people who meant no harm. Well, good-bye, dear Marion; you won't forget me, will you?"
"What should ail me to forget you, lass?" said Marion, a little gruffly. "There, there! Dinna greet and make me as foolish as yourself. Ye 'll no forget to drop a line and let me know how you have got on."
With all her courage and all her hopes for the future, Rhoda felt rather forlorn as she started on her journey at three in the afternoon. She had taken a sleeping car, by Mrs. Mulford's advice, and was almost alone in it. A part of the road was the same as that she had travelled in coming from Boonville when she supposed herself bound for a boarding-school in the city, and a flood of bitterness rushed over her when she remembered her thoughts and feelings on that occasion. It required something of a crying fit and a good many prayers to quiet her spirits.
But by the time she had reached Caneota, she was sufficiently composed to look eagerly at the crowd around the dépôt to see if she could find any one she knew, for a good many people from Boonville came to Caneota to take the cars. At last her eyes were gladdened by the sight of Jeduthun Cooke's dark face, and she opened the window and called to him.
"Why, Rhoda, is that you?" exclaimed Jeduthun, cordially, shaking hands. "Where you bound?"
"To Philadelphia first, and then from there to Cohansey, where I am going to live for a while."
"Do tell! Going to school?"
"No," answered Rhoda, colouring; "I am going into a school, but it is as a servant, not a scholar. Do you know anything about—"
"About your folks? I heard tell they was going to Hobarttown to live. They ain't any great favourites in Boonville just now, I can tell you. But, Rhoda, you'll have company. Boss and his wife's going down."
"I am so glad!" said Rhoda. "I did dread going alone. Jeduthun, what has become of Aunt Hannah's cow, and the cats, and all?"
"Well, General Dent, he bought old Snowball of Mr. Weightman. The old man was just a-going to sell her to a drover, when the general came riding up, and kind of rescued her. Oh, she's well off, the old cow is. And Kissy, she's got Molly and Fuzzyball."
"Dear old Molly! Jeduthun, if Molly has any more kittens, and you are going to town some time, will you take one to Miss Carpenter at 'The Home'? She is so fond of cats."
"Of course I will. Then they was good to you there?"
"Yes, indeed; nobody could be better. And, Jeduthun, please persuade the Boonville folks to send them a nice box this fall. What has become of Aunt Hannah's house?"
"Oh, it's all torn down, and Mr. Weightman is building a mill on the place—means to run us all out, I suppose. Here comes boss, just at the last minute as usual. I never did see such a man. Well, good-bye, and good luck to you."
Under her altered circumstances, Rhoda rather shrank from meeting Mr. and Mrs. Antis. She had imbibed a strong dread of "putting herself forward," which, like a great deal of seeming humility, was nothing but "pride turned inside out." But she could not perceive that they made the least difference in their manner to her, even after they heard that she was going to live out as a servant.
"It is an abominable shame," declared Mrs. Antis, warmly. "Not but that it is creditable in you to do anything you can, Rhoda, and I am sure you will turn out all right; but I wish you had come to me instead of going away so far. Why won't you come now? You would just be one of the family, you know."
"You are very kind, Mrs. Antis," said Rhoda, "but there are several things in the way. One is that I have promised Miss Hardy to stay a year with her, and the other—Well, Mrs. Antis, the truth is—I suppose it is foolish pride, but the truth is, I would rather live out anywhere else than in Boonville."
"I understand," said Mrs. Antis. "But, Rhoda, I shouldn't wish nor expect you to be a servant; I should want you to come as a daughter or younger sister, and just be one of ourselves. I always did like you, ever since you came to Boonville; and if it hadn't been for the sickness and death of Mr. Antis's sister, which cramped us for means at that time, we should have sent for you at once. Of course I should expect you to help me with the work, as Mary used to, but that would be all."
Rhoda sat still, utterly overcome by this unexpected proposition.
"You mustn't think this is any sudden notion of Cassy's," said Mr. Antis, misinterpreting Rhoda's silence. "We have often talked it over since we knew your circumstances, and I don't see why we shouldn't suit each other very well."
"I am sure you are very kind—more than kind," said Rhoda, after a little longer silence. "I don't know how to thank you, but I am afraid it won't do. I must keep my promise to Miss Hardy, because she depends upon me, and it would be a great inconvenience to her; and then I do think I ought to earn my own living. But you don't know how much good you have done me by just speaking of such a thing. I don't think the world will ever look so dark to me again. And if I may come and stay with you sometimes—"
"Of course you may," said Mrs. Antis, a little disappointed, but at once understanding and sympathizing with Rhoda. "We shall be glad to have you any time."
"And I think all the more of you for wishing to keep your engagement," said Mr. Antis. "I wish every one was as careful. I begin to think sometimes that there is no such thing as faithfulness left in the world. I have had half a dozen boys since Eben Fairchild left me, and not one that I could leave to measure a bushel of corn and be sure it would be done."
"Good old Eben! How is he getting on now?"
"Just the same steady way. He is going to Philadelphia to attend lectures next winter."
And then ensued a flood of news and neighbourhood gossip about Boonville people.
"Have you ever heard anything about Aunt Annie—I mean Mr. and Mrs. Evans?" asked Rhoda, at length.
"Oh yes. They are in Scotland, so Mr. Evans's brother told me, and little Harry is so much better for the change that they mean to stay two or three years. Haven't you ever written to them?"
"No," answered Rhoda; "I knew how Aunt Annie would feel, and I didn't want to make trouble in the family, as Mr. Weightman says I did between him and Aunt Hannah."
"Did he say so? Well, he is a nice person!"
The party arrived in Philadelphia without accident. And finding that Rhoda had a few hours to spare, Mr. Antis took a carriage and showed his wife and Rhoda part of the city. Rhoda saw the Mint, the stores in Chestnut street, and the American Sunday-school Union, * and other places that she had heard of. They had lunch at the Continental.
* 1122 Chestnut street, Philadelphia, and which all of our readers are
cordially invited to visit.—[EDITOR.
And when the time came, Mr. Antis went down and saw her across the river and into the Cohansey train.
"Now, remember, Rhoda, you have always got a home," said he as he shook hands with her.
"Mr. Antis, you don't know how I thank you," said Rhoda, earnestly. "I couldn't say half what I wanted to Mrs. Antis, but it seems as if you had made everything easy to me. I hope Mrs. Antis won't think I don't value her kindness?"
"No, no! Don't you worry yourself. Mrs. Antis understands, and so do I, and we shall think all the more of you. But I want you to tell me one thing, while I think of it. Did you ever know whether your aunt Hannah made a will?"
"I know she did," said Rhoda. "She told me a year ago that she had, and that her affairs were all settled."
"You don't know who the witnesses were?"
"No, I never heard."
"It is very odd. Mr. Weightman declares there was no will."
"Perhaps Aunt Hannah had burned it up, or something," said Rhoda.
"Or possibly Mr. Weightman has done the same. I don't think he is any too good. A man can't be honest and be so fond of money as he is. Well, good-bye once more."
Arrived at Cohansey, Rhoda easily found her way by the omnibus to Miss Hardy's school. It was a handsome, old-fashioned house, standing well up from the street, and covered to the chimney-top with luxuriant English ivy, which lives through the winter in that climate. A wing of much later date extended to one side, and evidently contained the school-rooms.