It's hardly in a body's pow'r
To keep at times frae being sour.
--BURNS.
Before the sun was up the next morning, Mrs. Van Brunt came into Ellen's
room and aroused her.
"It's a real shame to wake you up," she said, "when you were sleeping so
finely; but 'Brahm wants to be off to his work, and won't stay for
breakfast. Slept sound, did you?"
"Oh yes, indeed; as sound as a top," said Ellen, rubbing her eyes; "I am
hardly awake yet."
"I declare it's too bad," said Mrs. Van Brunt, "but there's no help for
it. You don't feel no headache, do you, nor pain in your bones?"
"No, ma'am, not a bit of it; I feel nicely."
"Ah! well," said Mrs. Van Brunt, "then your tumble into the brook didn't
do you any mischief; I thought it wouldn't. Poor little soul!"
"I am very glad I did fall in," said Ellen, "for if I hadn't I shouldn't
have come here, Mrs. Van Brunt."
The old lady instantly kissed her.
"Oh! mayn't I just take one look at the kitties?" said Ellen, when she
was ready to go.
"Indeed you shall," said Mrs. Van Brunt, "if 'Brahm's hurry was ever so
much; and it ain't besides. Come here, dear."
She took Ellen back to a waste lumber-room, where in a corner, on some
old pieces of carpet, lay pussy and her family. How fondly Ellen's hand
was passed over each little soft back! How hard it was for her to leave
them!
"Wouldn't you like to take one home with you, dear?" said Mrs. Van Brunt
at length.
"Oh! may I?" said Ellen, looking up in delight; "are you in earnest? Oh,
thank you, dear Mrs. Van Brunt! Oh, I shall be so glad!"
"Well, choose one, then, dear; choose the one you like best, and 'Brahm
shall carry it for you."
The choice was made, and Mrs. Van Brunt and Ellen returned to the
kitchen, where Mr. Van Brunt had already been waiting some time. He
shook his head when he saw what was in the basket his mother handed to
him.
"That won't do," said he; "I can't do that, mother. I'll undertake to
see Miss Ellen safe home, but the cat 'ud be more than I could manage. I
think I'd hardly get off with a whole skin 'tween the one and t'other."
"Well, now!" said Mrs. Van Brunt.
Ellen gave a longing look at her black-and-white favourite, which was
uneasily endeavouring to find out the height of the basket, and mewing
at the same time with a most ungratified expression. However, though
sadly disappointed, she submitted with a very good grace to what could
not be helped. First setting down the little cat out of the basket it
seemed to like so ill, and giving it one farewell pat and squeeze, she
turned to the kind old lady who stood watching her, and throwing her
arms around her neck, silently spoke her gratitude in a hearty hug and
kiss.
"Good-bye, ma'am," said she; "I may come and see them some time again,
and see you, mayn't I?"
"Indeed you shall, my darling," said the old woman, "just as often as
you like;--just as often as you can get away. I'll make 'Brahm bring you
home sometimes. 'Brahm, you'll bring her, won't you?"
"There's two words to that bargain, mother, I can tell you; but if I
don't, I'll know the reason on't."
And away they went. Ellen drew two or three sighs at first, but she
could not help brightening up soon. It was early--not sunrise; the cool
freshness of the air was enough to give one new life and spirit; the sky
was fair and bright; and Mr. Van Brunt marched along at a quick pace.
Enlivened by the exercise, Ellen speedily forgot everything
disagreeable; and her little head was filled with pleasant things. She
watched where the silver light in the east foretold the sun's coming.
She watched the silver changed to gold, till a rich yellow tint was
flung over the whole landscape; and then broke the first rays of light
upon the tops of the western hills--the sun was up. It was a new sight
to Ellen.
"How beautiful! Oh, how beautiful!" she exclaimed.
"Yes," said Mr. Van Brunt, in his slow way, "it'll be a fine day for the
field. I guess I'll go with the oxen over to that 'ere big meadow."
"Just look," said Ellen, "how the light comes creeping down the side of
the mountain--now it has got to the wood--Oh, do look at the tops of the
trees! Oh! I wish mamma was here."
Mr. Van Brunt didn't know what to say to this. He rather wished so too
for her sake.
"There," said Ellen, "now the sunshine is on the fence, and the road,
and everything. I wonder what is the reason that the sun shines first
upon the top of the mountain, and then comes so slowly down the side;
why don't it shine on the whole at once?"
Mr. Van Brunt shook his head in ignorance. "He guessed it always did
so," he said.
"Yes," said Ellen, "I suppose it does, but that's the very thing--I want
to know the reason why. And I noticed just now, it shone in my face
before it touched my hands. Isn't it queer?"
"Humph!--there's a great many queer things, if you come to that," said
Mr. Van Brunt philosophically.
But Ellen's head ran on from one thing to another, and her next question
was not so wide of the subject as her companion might have thought.
"Mr. Van Brunt, are there any schools about here?"
"Schools?" said the person addressed. "Yes, there's plenty of schools."
"Good ones?" said Ellen.
"Well, I don't exactly know about that. There's Captain Conklin's. That
had ought to be a good 'un. He's a regular smart man, they say."
"Whereabouts is that?" said Ellen.
"His school? It's a mile or so the other side of my house."
"And how far is it from your house to Aunt Fortune's?"
"A good deal better than two mile, but we'll be there before long. You
ain't tired, be you?"
"No," said Ellen. But this reminder gave a new turn to her thoughts, and
her spirits were suddenly checked. Her former brisk and springing step
changed to so slow and lagging a one that Mr. Van Brunt more than once
repeated his remark that he saw she was tired.
If it was that, Ellen grew tired very fast. She lagged more and more as
they neared the house, and at last quite fell behind, and allowed Mr.
Van Brunt to go in first.
Miss Fortune was busy about the breakfast, and as Mr. Van Brunt
afterwards described it, "looking as if she could have bitten off a
tenpenny nail," and indeed as if the operation would have been rather
gratifying than otherwise. She gave them no notice at first, bustling to
and fro with great energy, but all of a sudden she brought up directly
in front of Ellen, and said--
"Why didn't you come home last night?"
The words were jerked out rather than spoken.
"I got wet in the brook," said Ellen, "and Mrs. Van Brunt was so kind as
to keep me."
"Which way did you go out of the house yesterday?"
"Through the front door."
"The front door was locked."
"I unlocked it."
"What did you go out that way for?"
"I didn't want to come this way."
"Why not?" Ellen hesitated.
"Why not?" demanded Miss Fortune, still more emphatically than before.
"I didn't want to see you, ma'am," said Ellen, flushing.
"If ever you do so again!" said Miss Fortune in a kind of cold fury.
"I've a great mind to whip you for this, as ever I had to eat."
The flush faded on Ellen's cheek, and a shiver visibly passed over
her--not from fear. She stood with downcast eyes and compressed lips, a
certain instinct of childish dignity warning her to be silent. Mr. Van
Brunt put himself in between.
"Come, come!" said he, "this is getting to be too much of a good thing.
Beat your cream, ma'am, as much as you like, or if you want to try your
hand on something else you'll have to take me first, I promise you."
"Now don't _you_ meddle, Van Brunt," said the lady sharply, "with what
ain't no business o' yourn."
"I don't know about that," said Mr. Van Brunt. "Maybe it is my business;
but meddle or no meddle, Miss Fortune, it is time for me to be in the
field, and if you ha'n't no better breakfast for Miss Ellen and me than
all this here, we'll just go right away hum again; but there's something
in your kettle there that smells uncommonly nice, and I wish you'd just
let us have it and no more words."
No more words did Miss Fortune waste on any one that morning. She went
on with her work and dished up the breakfast in silence, and with a face
that Ellen did not quite understand, only she thought she had never in
her life seen one so disagreeable. The meal was a very solemn and
uncomfortable one. Ellen could scarcely swallow, and her aunt was near
in the same condition. Mr. Van Brunt and the old lady alone despatched
their breakfast as usual, with no other attempts at conversation than
the common mumbling on the part of the latter, which nobody minded, and
one or two strange grunts from the former, the meaning of which, if they
had any, nobody tried to find out.
There was a breach now between Ellen and her aunt that neither could
make any effort to mend. Miss Fortune did not renew the disagreeable
conversation that Mr. Van Brunt had broken off. She left Ellen entirely
to herself, scarcely speaking to her, or seeming to know when she went
out or came in. And this lasted day after day. Wearily they passed.
After one or two, Mr. Van Brunt seemed to stand just where he did before
in Miss Fortune's good graces, but not Ellen. To her, when others were
not by, her face wore constantly something of the same cold, hard,
disagreeable expression it had put on after Mr. Van Brunt's
interference--a look that Ellen came to regard with absolute abhorrence.
She kept away by herself as much as she could; but she did not know what
to do with her time, and for want of something better often spent it in
tears. She went to bed cheerless night after night, and arose spiritless
morning after morning, and this lasted till Mr. Van Brunt more than once
told his mother that "that poor little thing was going wandering about
like a ghost, and growing thinner and paler every day, and he didn't
know what she would come to if she went on so."
Ellen longed now for a letter with unspeakable longing, but none came.
Day after day brought new disappointment, each day more hard to bear. Of
her only friend, Mr. Van Brunt, she saw little. He was much away in the
fields during the fine weather, and when it rained Ellen herself was
prisoner at home, whither he never came but at meal times. The old
grandmother was very much disposed to make much of her; but Ellen
shrank, she hardly knew why, from her fond caresses, and never found
herself alone with her if she could help it, for then she was regularly
called to the old lady's side and obliged to go through a course of
kissing, fondling, and praising she would gladly have escaped. In her
aunt's presence this was seldom attempted, and never permitted to go on.
Miss Fortune was sure to pull Ellen away and bid her mother "stop that
palavering," avowing that "it made her sick." Ellen had one faint hope
that her aunt would think of sending her to school, as she employed her
in nothing at home, and certainly took small delight in her company; but
no hint of the kind dropped from Miss Fortune's lips, and Ellen's
longing look for this as well as for a word from her mother was daily
doomed to be ungratified and to grow more keen by delay.
One pleasure only remained to Ellen in the course of the day, and that
one she enjoyed with the carefulness of a miser. It was seeing the cows
milked, morning and evening. For this she got up very early, and watched
till the men came for the pails; and then away she bounded out of the
house and to the barn-yard. There were the milky mothers, five in
number, standing about, each in her own corner of the yard or
cow-house, waiting to be relieved of their burden of milk. They were
fine gentle animals, in excellent condition, and looking every way happy
and comfortable; nothing living under Mr. Van Brunt's care was ever
suffered to look otherwise. He was always in the barn or barn-yard at
milking time, and under his protection Ellen felt safe and looked on at
her ease. It was a very pretty scene--at least she thought so. The
gentle cows standing quietly to be milked as if they enjoyed it, and
munching the cud; and the white stream of milk foaming into the pails;
then there was the interest of seeing whether Sam or Johnny would get
through first; and how near Jane or Dolly would come to rivalling
Streaky's fine pailful; and at last Ellen allowed Mr. Van Brunt to teach
herself how to milk. She began with trembling, but learnt fast enough;
and more than one pailful of milk that Miss Fortune strained had been,
unknown to her, drawn by Ellen's fingers. These minutes in the farm-yard
were the pleasantest in Ellen's day. While they lasted every care was
forgotten, and her little face was as bright as the morning; but the
milking was quickly over, and the cloud gathered on Ellen's brow almost
as soon as the shadow of the house fell upon it.
"Where is the post-office, Mr. Van Brunt?" she asked one morning, as she
stood watching the sharpening of an axe upon the grindstone. The axe was
in that gentleman's hand, and its edge carefully laid to the whirling
stone, which one of the farm boys was turning.
"Where is the post-office? Why, over to Thirlwall, to be sure," replied
Mr. Van Brunt, glancing up at her from his work. "Faster, Johnny."
"And how often do letters come here?" said Ellen.
"Take care, Johnny!--some more water--mind your business, will
you!--Just as often as I go to fetch 'em, Miss Ellen, and no oftener."
"And how often do you go, Mr. Van Brunt?"
"Only when I've some other errand, Miss Ellen; my grain would never be
in the barn if I was running to post-office every other thing, and for
what ain't there too. I don't get a letter but two or three times a
year, I s'pose, though I call, I guess, half-a-dozen times."
"Ah, but there's one there now, or soon will be, I know, for me," said
Ellen. "When do you think you'll go again, Mr. Van Brunt?"
"Now if I'd ha' knowed that I'd ha' gone to Thirlwall yesterday--I was
within a mile of it. I don't see as I can go this week anyhow in the
world; but I'll make some errand there the first day I can, Miss Ellen,
that you may depend on. You shan't wait for your letter a bit longer
than I can help."
"Oh, thank you, Mr. Van Brunt, you are very kind. Then the letters never
come except when you go after them?"
"No--yes, they do come once in a while by old Mr. Swaim, but he ha'n't
been here this great while."
"And who's he?" said Ellen.
"Oh, he's a queer old chip that goes round the country on all sorts of
errands; he comes along once in a while. That'll do, Johnny. I believe
this here tool is as sharp as I have any occasion for."
"What's the use of pouring water upon the grindstone?" said Ellen; "why
wouldn't it do as well dry?"
"I can't tell, I am sure," replied Mr. Van Brunt, who was slowly drawing
his thumb over the edge of the axe; "your questions are a good deal too
sharp for me, Miss Ellen; I only know it would spoil the axe, or the
grindstone, or both most likely."
"It's very odd," said Ellen thoughtfully; "I wish I knew everything.
But, oh dear! I am not likely to know anything," said she, her
countenance suddenly changing from its pleased inquisitive look to a
cloud of disappointment and sorrow. Mr. Van Brunt noticed the change.
"Ain't your aunt going to send you to school, then?" said he.
"I don't know," said Ellen, sighing; "she never speaks about it, nor
about anything else. But I declare I'll make her!" she exclaimed,
changing again. "I'll go right in and ask her, and then she'll have to
tell me. I will! I am tired of living so. I'll know what she means to
do, and then I can tell you what _I_ must do."
Mr. Van Brunt, seemingly dubious about the success of this line of
conduct, stroked his chin and his axe alternately two or three times in
silence, and finally walked off. Ellen, without waiting for her courage
to cool, went directly into the house.
Miss Fortune, however, was not in the kitchen; to follow her into her
secret haunts, the dairy, cellar, or lower kitchen, was not to be
thought of. Ellen waited awhile, but her aunt did not come, and the
excitement of the moment cooled down. She was not quite so ready to
enter upon the business as she had felt at first; she had even some
qualms about it.
"But I'll do it," said Ellen to herself; "it will be hard, but I'll do
it!"