spent an exceedingly pleasant hour looking over his valuables and
talking of old times. She purchased the candlesticks, and also the two
pieces of Wedgwood which exactly matched some her grandfather had
brought from England.
"You have shown me all you care to sell?" she asked, rising.
"I believe there is nothing else, madam, except the house. I should like
very much to sell it," was Mr. Clark's reply.
When Zenobia ushered her into the sitting room upstairs some minutes
later, Mrs. Richards was struck with its cosey beauty. Truly, there were
ways of living--pleasant ways--of which she had not dreamed.
Frances was washing the sword fern while she recited her history lesson
to her mother, who was sewing.
"I have come to take you home with me to lunch; I can't do without
you," Mrs. Richards announced.
"Why don't you stay with us--auntie?" Frances spoke the new title
hesitatingly.
"That will be much the better plan, and it will please Jack," added Mrs.
Morrison, cordially, and Mrs. Richards stayed.
The next time she and her nephew were alone together she said to him:
"Jack, there is something I want you to explain to Katherine. I do not
think I could make any difference in my manner of living at my age, even
if I wished to, and I do not; but I am beginning to see that there may
be a charm about--other ways."
"Yes, auntie," as she paused, "the years I have spent knocking about
without any money, having to work hard for Kate and the baby, have been
the happiest and best of my life. There was only one drawback to it
all--" he laid his hand on hers.
She smiled fondly at him. "I want you to say to Katherine that I know I
must seem narrow to her; I realize that she may perhaps fear my
influence upon Frances--" her nephew began a protest, but she silenced
him. "No, let me finish. I have come to see things differently; I want
you to live your own lives in your own way; I want Frances to go on as
she has begun--sweet, generous, unconscious, and I only ask to be near
you."
When Mr. Morrison repeated this to his wife, tears rose to her eyes. "I
haven't been fair to her," she said. "I have been afraid, but I shall
not be any more. I shall love her dearly."
CHAPTER TWENTIETH.
CAROLINE'S STORY.
"Well, I suppose you have heard the news?"
Caroline's pleasant face was more beaming than usual as Emma ushered her
into the room where Mrs. Bond sat with her sewing, the General being
safe in dreamland.
"No, I haven't heard any so far as I remember," was her reply.
Emma gave the visitor a chair, and retreated with her books to a corner
behind her mother, in the hope that she might not be sent away. She knew
something had happened.
"Then you don't know that Mr. Morrison has turned out to be our Mr.
Jack, Miss Frances' nephew?"
"Who is her nephew, did you say?" asked Mrs. Bond, going on with her
work.
"Mr. Morrison, to be sure, the father of little Frances, bless her!"
"He is Mrs. Marvin's nephew?"
"Yes," said Caroline, laughing; "only she isn't Mrs. Marvin at all, but
Mrs. Richards. It is as good as a play."
Mrs. Bond actually dropped her hands in her lap, as she asked, "Do you
mean there isn't any such person as Mrs. Marvin?"
"Of course there is a Mrs. Marvin. She was staying at our house while
Miss Frances was abroad,--she is her cousin,--and the first sewing you
did was for her. I did not think of explaining, so you went on supposing
it was all for Mrs. Marvin. Then when Miss Frances found out that
Frances thought she was Mrs. Marvin, she asked me not to tell you any
different. I couldn't understand why, then."
"Why should she care who I thought she was?" Mrs. Bond asked, taking up
her sewing.
"It is plain enough now. You see, she and Mr. Jack had had a quarrel
years ago, and she had not seen or heard of him since; then one day, you
know, Frances came to our house with Emma, and Mrs. Richards saw her and
knew right away who she was, and was mightily taken with her, but she
didn't want Frances or her mother to know that she was Mr. Morrison's
aunt; don't you see?
"You may say it happened," Caroline continued, "but I say the Lord
brought it about. Why should that child walk into the library and stand
before her great-grandmother's portrait, and Miss Frances come in and
find her there, looking as much like Mr. Jack when he was little as two
peas! Isn't he a splendid man! and just his old self. Why, when he came
out yesterday, he ran upstairs to my room calling out just as he used
to do,--'Where's Caroline?' It made me too happy to sleep."
"Did Mr. Morrison live at your house once?" Emma ventured to ask.
"Of course he did. When his mother died Miss Frances adopted him. He was
six years old, and it was the same year I went to live with her,--thirty
years this spring. You see, Mr. Jack's father, who was Mrs. Richards'
favorite brother, was thrown from his horse and killed when his little
boy was only three. It was a dreadful blow to the whole family; his wife
did not outlive him long, and his father, Judge Morrison, never
recovered from the shock, for his only other son was an invalid.
"I used to think nobody had as much trouble as Miss Frances. She married
very young and was left a widow before she was twenty-two, and it seemed
as if Mr. Jack was her only comfort, for her father's mind began to
fail, and the old home was so changed she couldn't bear to go there; but
she was wrapped up in the child.
"In those days he wasn't hard to manage, though he had a quick temper;
you couldn't help loving him on account of his sweet ways. He was
devoted to Miss Frances, and gave up to her wonderfully, so I suppose
she got to thinking she would always have things her own way with him,
as she had with every one else.
"There were gay times, I can tell you, when he came home for his
holidays, after he began to go away to school. He might bring home as
many friends as he pleased, and there wasn't anything he couldn't have
for the asking. Yet he wasn't half as spoiled as you'd think.
"The trouble began about the time he left college, but I didn't know
much about it then. Miss Frances had set her heart on his being a
lawyer like his grandfather; but though he studied it to please her, he
did not take any interest in law. Then I think she wanted him to marry a
niece of her husband's who used to be at the house a great deal. That
is-- I don't think she really wanted him to marry at all, but was just
afraid he'd take to some one she did not like. He had always been fond
of Miss Elsie, and it did look contrary in him to turn around and be so
indifferent when he found how his aunt felt.
"Mr. Jack went abroad for a year, and it was soon after he came back
that they had the trouble. I happened to pass the library door one
evening when I heard Miss Frances say, 'If you have no regard for my
wishes perhaps you had better provide for yourself in the future--' and
he answered back as cool as you please, 'Thank you for suggesting it,
Aunt Frances; I have been an idler on your bounty quite too long.' I
never forgot those words. They didn't either of them mean what they
said, but were too proud to take it back. Miss Frances had never denied
him anything, and had more than enough for both, yet it was natural for
her to think he ought to go her way.
"I never knew any more about it, except that Mr. Jack came to my room to
tell me he was going, with a face as white as a sheet. He had some
property of his own, though not much, for his grandfather made way with
almost everything before he died--no one knew how. He had softening of
the brain, brought on by grief.
"The next I knew Mr. Jack sent me a paper with a notice of his marriage.
Mrs. Morrison was the daughter of one of the professors in the college
where he went. But--" Caroline concluded, with a sigh of content, "it is
all right now, and maybe it has all been for the best."
"I suppose they'll be going away soon?" said Mrs. Bond.
"Yes, Mr. Morrison and his wife are going to New York, and Frances is
coming to stay with us."
Emma listened to this story with breathless interest. It seemed to her
quite the most natural and suitable thing that such good fortune should
come to Frances, but it made her feel sorrowful to think she was going
away.
After their visitor had gone Mrs. Bond said, as she folded her work:
"Now, Emma, I do not want you to be foolish. Make up your mind not to
see anything of Frances after this, and you'll not be disappointed."
"Why, mother?"
"Because they are rich and we are poor, and it is not to be expected
that they will care for your society. I never go where I am not wanted,
and I do not choose to have you. Understand, I am not saying anything
against the Morrisons. Frances is a nice child, and her mother is very
pleasant and kind, but you can't change the world; birds of a feather
will flock together."
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIRST.
OVERHEARD BY PETERKIN.
Peterkin was taking a nap in one corner of the big sofa in the hall. It
was a delightful spring afternoon and everybody was out; he knew this,
for he had seen them go. First Miss Moore hurried away with some books
under her arm; next Frances danced downstairs, followed by her father
and mother; a little later Emma and the General started out for a walk;
and last of all came Miss Sherwin, and sat beside him while she put on
her gloves.
She stroked him gently for a minute before she left, and, bending over
him till her face touched his soft fur, said, "Oh, pussy, pussy! so many
things are happening, and it's going to be so lonely. It must be nice to
be a cat."
Peterkin rubbed his head sympathetically against her hand, for her tone
was sad. He had had confidences made to him before and knew how to
receive them. He understood it all as well as if she had spent hours in
the telling, an advantage a cat possesses over a human confidant.
He had been dozing undisturbed for a long time when he heard the door
open again, and a man's voice he did not recognize say: "How fortunate
that I met you! I seem to have had the wrong number."
It was Miss Sherwin who replied, "I am very much surprised; I did not
know you were in this part of the country."
Then they came and sat on the sofa, and the stranger, who, Peterkin saw,
was a pleasant looking young fellow, said he had been back only a short
time. "I stopped in Maryville a day, and then at home for two more," he
added.
"You have been to Maryville?" Miss Sherwin's voice showed surprise.
Then she began to ask questions about the people there, and to talk of
the delightful weather, in all of which her companion seemed to feel
little interest. Presently there came a silence.
The young man leaned forward, one elbow on his crossed knee that he
might the better look into Miss Sherwin's face, the light in the hall
being a little dim. "Lillian," he began, "in this past year I have had a
good deal of time for thinking, and naturally our--disagreement has been
often in my mind. When I last saw you I thought it was all over forever,
and though I had come to look at it differently in these months--feeling
that perhaps there had been a mistake--still I don't know that I
ever--that is-- I mean the possibility of undoing it never occurred to
me till I was on my way home. I hope you don't mind listening to this;
I'll try to be brief.
"Perhaps you know I got my position in March,--the one I had been hoping
and working for,--and with it the opportunity to come East for a month
or two. I can't say I wanted very much to come. The thought of our old
plans made it rather bitter, but I owed it to the people at home.
"Not to make the story too long, I picked up on the train a magazine
belonging to one of my fellow travellers, and read a little story. It
was called 'The Missing Bridge,' and was a sort of fairy story. It seems
rather absurd, but there was something in it that impressed me
strangely. It was the thought that even when people seem hopelessly
separated from each other, if they are brave enough and true enough to
try, they will find a way across all barriers.
"I may not be making this clear, for you have not read the story; but
you will understand me when I say it made me feel unwilling to have
anything I may have said or done in the past, stand between us now; I
was to blame for much of the quarrel, and I am sorry for it all. I know
how clever you are,--they were all talking about it in Maryville,--and
it may seem only a foolish dream to you now, but I want to tell you--"
he paused with his eyes on the floor, as if afraid to read his answer in
the face beside him.
It was very still in the hall, and, when he looked up after a moment,
Lillian had bowed her head in her hands.
"I don't want to pain you," he began.
"O Aleck!" she cried, putting out one hand, "it was _my_ story!"
At this point Peterkin, seeing matters were likely to be settled
satisfactorily, and feeling no interest in details, dozed off again. The
next thing he knew the gas was lit, and Mr. Morrison was saying, "Why,
how are you, Carter? Delighted to see you. Where did you come from? Let
me present you to Mrs. Morrison," and Miss Sherwin, with a becoming
color in her face, was explaining that Mr. Carter was an old friend, and
they were all talking and laughing at once in the absurd way people have
sometimes, so that it was next to impossible to understand anything.
When Mr. Carter left, after declining the Morrisons' invitation to spend
the evening, Peterkin followed him out on the porch to get a little air.
The Spectacle Man, coming in from a walk, found him sitting there,
looking like some dignified old Quaker in his gray coat and white
necktie.
Mrs. Morrison slipped her hand into Miss Sherwin's as they went
upstairs. "Am I right in what I guess?" she whispered.
"How could you know it?" Lillian asked, with an answering clasp.
"My dear, if you could see your face!--but I felt certain he would
come!"
"O Miss Sherwin!" called Mr. Morrison, who, with Frances, had lingered
at the door, "your acquaintance with Mr. Carter partly explains
something that puzzled me. I was struck with the resemblance between him
and the young farmer in the first illustration in your story. Did he sit
for the portrait?"
"Jack, you must be dreaming!" his wife exclaimed.
"I don't understand at all," Lillian said, in great confusion.
"Could it possibly have been accidental?" A mischievous light shone in
Mr. Morrison's eyes.
His wife shook her head at him, but Frances ran off to find the
magazine. Miss Sherwin recovered herself, and explained with a great
deal of dignity that, if it were so, it was quite accidental. That she
had known Mr. Carter since they were children, and was, of course, very
familiar with his face; then she said good evening, and left them.
"Very well done," Mr. Morrison exclaimed.
"Why, where is Miss Lillian," asked Frances, coming back; "I want to
show her the picture. It is like Mr. Carter."
"Not now, dear,--another time," said her mother; adding, "You were
aching to tease her, Jack, and I am glad she did not give you an
opportunity."
Mr. Morrison laughed. "I suppose congratulations are next in order. It
is at least a natural inference when you find a young man's image so
deeply graven upon the heart of a young woman that she unconsciously
reproduces it in her drawing."
"I am sure he is to be congratulated," remarked Mrs. Morrison.
"Unless I am very much mistaken, so is she," her husband added.
Frances was listening with wide-open eyes. "Is Miss Sherwin going to be
married to Mr. Carter?"
"I shouldn't be a bit surprised, Wink, if she were," replied her father,
"but you and I are supposed to know nothing about it."
CHAPTER TWENTY-SECOND.
THE LITTLE GIRL IN THE GOLDEN DOORWAY.
It was evident, Mr. Morrison said, that he and his wife could not get
away too soon to please his aunt, and this was true for two reasons.
Mrs. Richards wished her nephew to meet his old friends under her
roof--there would be less talk; and before their return the six months'
lease on the flat would have expired and they would naturally come to
her for a while at least. She also wanted Frances all to herself. The
great house would be another place with the sound of a child's voice to
charm away its loneliness.
She spent much time and thought in plans for her little niece's
entertainment, which were quite unnecessary, for Frances was as happy
as a lark, and found the hours brimful of amusement. To hear Caroline
tell of her father when he was little Jack; to go shopping or driving
with Aunt Frances; to romp with the fox terrier in the garden which the
crocuses and hyacinths were making beautiful; and then, when the day was
almost over, to rest in the depths of some great chair and look up at
the girl in the golden doorway,--this was unalloyed happiness.
One Friday they drove to the house of the Spectacle Man and carried Emma
away to stay till Monday. How she ever came to let her go Mrs. Bond
couldn't understand; she believed she was bewitched. Emma, however, had
a blissful holiday, and before it was over she found courage to ask
Frances a question.
"Do you like me as much as you used to, Frances?" she said.
"What makes you ask such a funny question? Of course I do."
"I thought maybe you wouldn't care so much now."
"Why not?" insisted Frances, greatly puzzled.
Emma thought of quoting her mother's proverb about birds of a feather,
the application of which she did not exactly understand; but she only
said, "Oh, because you are rich, I suppose."
"But I'm not rich,--any richer than I ever was."
"Your aunt is."
"But why should that make me not like you? I don't like you to think
such a thing about me," and Frances looked aggrieved.
"I didn't really think it, only--sometimes it does make a difference,
you know," Emma said.
"Well, it won't to me, for I shall always like you, Emma," was Frances'
reassuring reply, and Emma was satisfied.
Among other pleasant things, Frances and her aunt were arranging a
little surprise for Mr. Morrison's birthday, which was to be celebrated
by a dinner to which a number of cousins and old family friends were
asked.
The travellers, who returned the night before, found a very happy little
girl waiting for them in the carriage at the station.
"I have the loveliest secret, father, but you are not to know it till
your birthday!" She couldn't help telling this much, but all his teasing
could not extract any more; and, as it was not mentioned again, Mr.
Morrison forgot it.
The next evening he dressed early, and went to the library to write a
letter, and when it was finished he fell into a pleasant revery. He
thought of his struggles and disappointments, and of the bright future
that seemed to be opening before him. The little girl smiled down upon
him in the twilight, and he recalled his old dream.
It was surely a most living portrait. This little maiden, painted nearly
seventy years ago, looked as if about to speak. Was she laughing at him
still? would she presently come down? Surely he was dreaming, for there
she stood on the rug beside him! He could see the pattern of the rich
lace that fell from the neck of her quaint brocaded gown.
She came nearer, and he watched her, almost afraid to breathe; it was,
he thought, a most interesting illusion. He put out his hand, expecting
the vision to vanish, when, instead of thin air, his fingers closed upon
a round arm of real flesh and blood, and a laughing voice exclaimed,
"Why, father, I thought you were asleep!"
"Wink! is it really you?" he said, pulling her down on his knee. "I
thought the girl in the golden doorway had come down once more. Where
did you get this dress?"
"This is the secret, father. Aunt Frances found it among my
great-grandmother's things. It was made for the picture, and was copied
from another portrait that the little girl's father liked. It almost
fitted me. Do you really think I look like her?"
"Indeed you do, Wink; it is wonderful."
Frances leaned her head on his shoulder, and looked up at her
great-grandmother in great content.
"Do you know, Wink," said her father, presently, "I believe my old dream
has come true, and at last I have caught the girl in the golden
doorway."
"How nice!" cried Frances, "for that puts me into the story. You will
have to write a sequel to it, father. Jack never guessed the girl would
turn out to be his own daughter, did he?"
"He certainly did not," answered Mr. Morrison, laughing.
They were pleasing themselves with these fancies when lights and Mrs.
Morrison, in her pretty evening gown, appearing together, put an end to
them. Some minutes later Mrs. Richards walked in upon a charming family
group. Life was becoming very full and sweet to her, and she looked very
handsome and happy. She felt proud of her children, most of all of that
graceful little person in the old brocade who ran to meet her.
"Auntie, what do you think? We have found the sequel to 'The Girl in the
Golden Doorway.' The dream has come true: Jack has caught her, and she
turns out to be me." Frances made a courtesy, laughing merrily.
"There is some more to it," she added. "Father, can't you tell it?"
"Tell it yourself, Wink," was the smiling reply, and three pairs of
eyes watched her fondly as she stood, a finger on her lips, an intent
expression on her face.
"Oh, yes! I remember. And together they are going to explore the House
of the Golden Doorway, and find out all its secrets."
Mrs. Richards took the rosy face between her hands. "You have opened the
golden door to me, too, my darling," she said.
CHAPTER TWENTY-THIRD.
"THE DUCKS AND THE GEESE THEY ALL SWIM OVER."
"Out of a song the story grew,
Just how it happened nobody knew,
But, song and story, it all came true.
"Out of sight till time of need
The story lay hid like a little seed;
And then it grew that all might read--
"Might read and learn--however gray
The clouds may hang, or how dark the day,
That love and courage can find the way."
No one suspected the Spectacle Man of poetical aspirations until Miss
Moore one day picked up these verses from the hall floor. "Dear me, what
are we all coming to!" she exclaimed. "Here is Lillian the strong-minded
going to be married, the Morrisons have found a fairy godmother, and
now Mr. Clark has taken to verse! If I were not so commonplace I'd
expect something to happen to me."
Things were happening; there was no doubt about that.
Soon after her nephew's return, Mrs. Richards made Mr. Clark an offer
for his house which he thought it wise to accept, and by the time summer
was fairly begun it was rapidly disappearing in a cloud of dust and
mortar to make room for a five-story office building.
Frances could not be reconciled to this, nor was she the only one who
felt sad at sight of yawning vacancy where the dignified old mansion had
stood. The feelings of the optician were mixed; he was fond of the
place, but its sale solved some of the difficulties that had weighed
upon him, and when Mrs. Bond took a small house farther out, where there
were trees and a garden for the General to play in, he furnished two
rooms for himself, and, after the first wrench of leaving, he and
Peterkin found it very comfortable. His show-cases and other fixtures
were moved to a shop not far from the old one.
Before this, however, something even more interesting had occurred.
As Mr. Carter had only six weeks' leave, he and Lillian decided to have
a quiet wedding the last of April, making a short visit at his home on
their way West.
"I am very much alone in the world, and there are no people I care more
to have at my wedding than you and Mary," Lillian said to Mrs. Morrison;
"and it is easier and simpler to have it here."
Miss Moore professed to be highly indignant at the whole affair. "Here I
have been upholding her in her independence, taking her side, and she in
the basest manner deserts and goes over to the enemy," she exclaimed.
Lillian laughed shamelessly. "Never mind, dear, when you have finished
your course you are coming out to me, and we'll start the most ideal of
kindergartens in our wild Western town."
She went about her preparations with a light heart, growing prettier and
brighter each day. As for Mr. Carter, he won golden opinions from
everybody, even from the critical Wilson, who was one day moved to
confide that he and Zenobia were contemplating the same step.
No one showed a more genuine interest in the wedding preparations than
Mrs. Richards. She had taken a fancy to Lillian, and declared that her
love affair was delightfully interesting and novel for these unromantic
times. She lent her carriage to facilitate the shopping, and the evening
before the wedding day entertained the bride and groom elect.