DIANTHA GROWS UP.
Now that Annabel Sinclair had no immediate use for Persis' services,
Diantha's wardrobe could receive attention. The girl presented herself
at the dressmaker's late one afternoon, her smooth forehead disfigured
by an irritated frown, her mouth resolutely unsmiling. Under one arm
she carried a roll of cheap white lawn. Annabel frequently commented
on the uselessness of buying expensive materials for a girl who grew as
rapidly as Diantha, though the reasonableness of this contention was
slightly discounted by her recognized ability to demonstrate that the
cream of things was invariably her portion, while an all-wise
Providence had obviously designed the skimmed milk for the rest of the
world.
Her eyes upon the girl's averted face, Persis measured off the coarse
stuff, using her arm as a yard-stick. "Hm! Even with skirts as skimpy
as they are now, this won't be enough by a yard and a half. Better
call it two yards. It's high time your skirts were coming down where
they belong. You can't stay a little girl forever."
Some magic had erased the fretful pucker between Diantha's brows. The
grim ungirlish compression of her lips softened into angelic mildness.
As she turned upon Persis, she looked an older sister of the Sistine
cherubs.
"How long--about how long do you think it had better be, Miss Persis?"
"I should say"--Persis looked her over with an impersonal air, lending
weight to the resulting judgment--"I should say about to your
shoe-tops."
Had she guessed the consequences of such an expression of opinion, she
might have modified her verdict or at least held it in reserve. A
tempest swept the room. Persis was seized, whirled this way and then
that, hugged, kissed, forced to join in a delirious two-step. With
scarcely breath to protest, powerless in the grip of the storm she had
herself evoked, she finally came to anchor between the secretary and
the armchair, Diantha still holding her fast.
"Shoe-tops! You _did_ say shoe-tops, didn't you, darling Miss Persis?"
"Yes, I said shoe-tops, and I'm glad I didn't say a train. A real long
dress would have been the death of me, it's more'n likely. For all
you're as tall as Jack's bean-stalk, Diantha Sinclair, you're not grown
up yet."
Persis freed herself, smiling ruefully as she arranged her disordered
hair. The delicious girlishness of the outburst in which she had
involuntarily participated had the effect of challenging her own
obstinate sense of being on the threshold of things, and making her
wonder if perhaps she were not growing old. That the passing shadow on
her face failed to attract Diantha's attention was due less to lack of
insight than to youth's cheerfully selfish absorption in its own
problems. "May I pick out the style from the grown-up part of the
fashion books?" was the girl's breathless question.
"It's got to be simple," Persis warned her sternly. Then softening:
"But good land! Grandmothers nowadays are wearing simple little
girlish things with ribbon bows in the back. Pick out what you want.
Everything in this month's book is just about right for sixteen."
As Diantha gave herself to rapturous study of the fashion-plates,
Persis studied her. "She's in a fair way to make a beauty. Annabel at
her best never held a candle to what this girl is likely to turn out.
Annabel's looks are skin deep. Diantha's have top-roots running to her
brain and her heart, too. Only she ought to be happier. 'Most any
girl face is pretty to look at if it's happy enough, same as 'most any
flower is pretty if it grows in the sun."
A harassing reflection troubled Diantha's bliss. "Miss Persis, I
haven't got a petticoat that comes below my knees."
"I'll make you a petticoat the same length as the dress. That's always
the best way. A skirt that's too long looks as if you wanted to show
the lace, and one's that too short looks as if you were trying to save
on cotton cloth, and I don't know which is worse." To herself Persis
added: "If she went home and asked her mother for a long petticoat, the
fat would all be in the fire."
For a woman at least as conscientious as the average of her sex, Persis
was singularly unmindful of the enormity of encouraging a daughter to
act in defiance of her mother's wishes. Had she been called upon to
defend herself, she might have explained that she had small respect for
the authority of a motherhood which had never progressed beyond the
physical relationship. Annabel, a reluctant mother in the beginning,
had been consistently selfish ever since, and Persis gave scant
recognition to parental rights that were not the out-growth of parental
love. Moreover, the project she had in mind was of too complex
importance for her to allow it to be side-tracked by petty scruples.
"Like enough she'll refuse to pay my bill," thought Persis, with a grim
smile, as she watched Diantha turning the gaily colored plates like a
butterfly fluttering from blossom to blossom. "I guess she won't go as
far as that though, as long as there ain't another dressmaker in
Clematis she'd trust to make her a kimono. If she says anything,
that'll pave the way for me to give her a good plain talking to, and
even if I never get a cent for the dress, I might as well give my
missionary money that way as any other."
The rush of the season--Clematis is sufficiently sophisticated to know
in what months propriety demands overworking one's dressmaker and
milliner--was already over, and the little frock made rapid progress.
Cheap and plain and simple as it was, its effect upon the wearer, even
in its stages of incompleteness, was so striking that Persis sometimes
forgot her official duty in the satisfaction of a long admiring stare.
And probably in her sixteen years of existence, Diantha had never so
nearly approximated all the cardinal virtues as in that idyllic week.
She besieged Persis with offers of assistance, pleading for permission
to pull basting threads or overcast seams. At home she was gentle,
yielding, subdued. Her father, having learned through bitter
experience how open to the attack of a million miseries love makes the
heart, had resolved that fate should not again trick him. He had
steeled himself against the appeal of Diantha's babyhood and had
watched unmoved her precocious development. The mocking politeness
which characterized his manner toward his wife was replaced in the case
of the daughter by a distant formality. Yet now as Diantha went about
the house with dreamy eyes and a half smile on her lips, there were
times when the father looked at her almost wistfully and wondered of
what she were thinking. With all due respect to the human will, we
must acknowledge ourselves creatures of circumstance in no little
degree, when two yards of lawn, retailing at twelve and a half cents,
can prove so potent a factor in character and destiny.
Diantha's mother might have prescribed quinine had she noted anything
unusual in the girl's demeanor. But Annabel had reached a crucial
stage in her flirtation with Thad West. The boy was developing a
gratifying jealousy of the tenor singer in the Unitarian church choir
and must be treated with a nice commingling of indulgence and severity
to prevent his asserting himself in the crude masculine fashion, and
either terminating the intimacy or else permanently getting the upper
hand. Annabel was enjoying the crisis of the game and found it
impossible to spare from her own absorbing interests a thought for such
a minor consideration as Diantha's moods.
Diantha anticipated the time when she was to call for her finished
frock by more than an hour. "I know you're not ready yet," she
apologized, as Persis looked at the clock. "But I thought I'd like to
watch you work, if you don't mind."
"Of course I don't mind, child. Just put those fashion books on the
table and take the easy chair." Persis bent over the finishings of the
little frock with a vague satisfaction in the nearness of the
motionless figure. She was growing fond of Diantha, a not unnatural
result of the adoring attention Diantha had lavished upon her for a
week past. But because Persis was a woman with a living to make, and
Diantha was a girl with a dream to be dreamed, scarcely a word was
spoken till the last stitch was taken.
"There!" Persis removed a basting thread with a jerk, making an
unsuccessful pretense that the finishing of this dress was like the
completion of any other piece of work. "There! It's done at last. I
suppose you'll want to try it on."
"Yes," said Diantha, "I'll try it on." And as the faded blue serge
slipped from her shoulders to be replaced by the white lawn, the
Diantha who had been, took her departure to that remote country from
which the children never come back.
Persis was almost appalled by the result for which she was principally
responsible. The tall Diantha in a dress to her shoe-tops was
disconcertingly unlike the little girl she had known. She looked older
than her years, stately, self-contained and beautiful. It was not till
Persis had fortified herself by the reflection that she might as well
be hung for an old sheep as for a lamb, that she ventured another
revolutionary suggestion.
"Diantha, I s'pose you'll make some change in the way you do your hair?"
"Yes, indeed." Diantha, scrutinizing herself in the mirror, frowned at
the drooping curls with an air of restrained disgust. "This way is
only suitable for children."
Persis' negligent gesture called attention to the open door of the
bedroom. "There's a box of hairpins on the dresser. If you like, you
can fix yourself up and surprise your mother."
Diantha vanished swiftly. She had no illusions regarding the nature of
the coming surprise. Her mother would be very angry, but the sooner
that storm had spent itself, the better. Relentlessly the golden curls
were sacrificed to the impressive coiffure of the woman of fashion.
For a novice Diantha was remarkably deft, her skill suggesting periods
of anticipatory practise with her door locked and no eyes but her own
to admire the effect.
During the progress of this rite, Persis in the adjoining room, looked
at the clock, glanced at the window and then paced the floor, for once
in her well-disciplined life too nervous to utilize the flying moments.
Persis was in the dilemma of a stage manager whose curtain is ready to
go up, and whose _prima donna_ is about to appear, while the audience
has failed to materialize. To such mischances does one subject one's
self in assuming the responsibilities of a deputy-providence.
Then her brow cleared, even while her heart jumped into her throat.
The gate clicked, and a lithe figure swung up the path. Persis took
her time in answering the peremptory knock.
"Good afternoon, Miss Persis. Mother said that you--"
"Walk in, Thad. Yes, I've a little package to send your mother. Sit
down while I look for it."
Would the girl never come! The curtain was rung up, the audience
waiting. But the stage was empty. How long a time in Heaven's name
did Diantha expect to spend in combing her hair. "I should think she
was waiting for it to grow," thought the harassed Persis. Very
deliberately she opened and closed every drawer in the old-fashioned
secretary, though she knew the upper contained only old letters and the
second, garden seeds.
Thad was fidgeting. "If you can't put your hand on it, Miss Persis,
don't bother to hunt. I'll drop in again in a day or two."
"Just a minute, Thad. It must be right around here. It can't--ah!"
Persis forgot the ending of the unnecessary sentence. For now Thad
West was at liberty to leave whenever he pleased.
A tall slender figure advanced into the room. Diantha's grace had
always made her an anomaly among tall children. Her hair was parted
and drawn back simply, after the fashion doubtless designed by earth's
beauties, since it is the despair of plain women. The yellow curls,
sacrificing their individual distinction, had magnanimously contributed
to the perfection of the exquisite golden coil at the back of her
shapely head. No one would have looked twice at the plain little lawn,
but it proved superior to some more pretentious gowns in that it set
off the charms of the wearer, instead of distracting attention from
them. The unlooked-for apparition brought Thad West to his feet, and
so Youth and Beauty met as if hitherto they had been strangers.
For a long half minute they stood without speaking. "Oh, good
afternoon," Diantha said at last, and veiled her eyes from his
fascinated stare. Formerly she had treated him with the free-and-easy
pertness of a precocious child. Now the exquisite shyness of
maidenhood enveloped her. Instinct drew her back from the man's
inevitable advance. "I didn't know it was so late," she said to
Persis, oblivious to Thad's gasping greeting. "I must hurry."
Thad's sense of confusion was like a physical dizziness. This regal
young beauty was the daughter of the woman whose hand he had held
surreptitiously the previous evening. With an effort he steadied
himself, only to make the discovery that in that hazy moment the world
had undergone a process of readjustment. He knew as well as he was
ever to know it, that Annabel Sinclair belonged to another generation
from his own.
"I suppose you want to take this along." Persis' gesture indicated the
package containing the discarded serge which Diantha would have been
glad to contribute to the wardrobe of the youthful Trotters. But with
all her daring, her courage was hardly equal to such a step. She put
out her hand for the package, but Thad had already pounced upon it.
"I--I'm going your way," he said, a trace of his recent disorder in his
stammering speech. "I'll carry it for you."
Silently Diantha accepted the offer. She kissed Persis good-by in a
fashion which the critical might have pronounced needlessly
provocative, though her dreamy eyes protested that nothing was further
from her maiden thoughts than the presence of Thad West. Persis, who
was intensely alive to every phase of the dramatic situation, had
caught a glimpse of the young fellow's face during the affectionate
leave-taking and was abundantly satisfied.
"Thad's no fool, though he's acted like the twin brother to an idiot.
He can't help seeing that the mother of a grown-up girl like Diantha
hadn't ought to be flirting with a boy like him. If he doesn't see it
now he will before he gets her home, or I miss my guess."
Mr. and Mrs. Stanley Sinclair were seated side by side on their front
porch, presenting an agreeable picture of domesticity. The reason for
Annabel's presence was that the tenor singer of the Unitarian choir was
accustomed to pass the house at that hour. Sinclair stayed on simply
because he suspected that his wife wished him indoors. He read aloud
inane items of village news from the weekly paper, and only the veiled
mockery of his eyes betrayed the fact that he was not the most devoted
and the most complacent of husbands.
As the two young people came into view, Annabel's air of indifferent
listlessness changed to rigid attention. She recognized the gallant
figure of the young man considerably before she knew his graceful
companion. Her husband's eyes were quicker. His paper dropped from
his hand, and his emotions found vent in an explosive and needlessly
profane monosyllable.
The two culprits came up the walk, Thad with a fine color, Diantha
extraordinarily self-possessed. The girl's eyes rested on her mother's
face, then went in swift appeal to her father's. Their consternation
was too obvious to be ignored.
"I wore my new dress home," she remarked casually. Then with sudden
recklessness: "Do you like it?"
"It's--it's absurd," pronounced Annabel almost with a snarl. So a
mother tigress might have corrected her offspring. Never had she
seemed less prepossessing to her youthful adorer than at that moment.
Anger aged her indescribably. The young man looked at her and dropped
his eyes ashamed.
"It's no longer than other girls of sixteen are wearing," said Diantha,
and turned to Thad. "Thank you for carrying my bundle." She took the
package and vanished. Nothing in her outward composure indicated that
her heart was thumping, and girlhood's ready tears burning under her
drooping lids.
Persis' device had been eminently successful, entailing consequences,
indeed, she was far from anticipating. For Stanley Sinclair had waked
to the fact that he was the father of a beautiful girl on the verge of
womanhood, and his sense of parental responsibility, long before
drugged, manacled and locked into a dark cell, had roused at last and
was clamoring to be free from its prison. Annabel, his wife, had
recognized a possible rival in her own household. And lastly, Thad
West was the prey of an uneasy suspicion that perhaps, after all, the
mother of Diantha Sinclair had been making a fool of him.