CALM WEATHER
Gradually the little house at Holly Lodge assumed its usual aspect.
The Colonel and Betty were flooded with offers of hospitality and with
all sorts of services--those kindly acts which in country communities
bridge over catastrophes. Fortescue was gone, having left the second
day after Christmas. On that day he had come over to Holly Lodge to say
good-by and to offer the resources of Rosehill in any emergency. He had
come while Betty was watching Kettle, and although the Colonel urged
that he might call her, Fortescue evaded it, and cut his visit short.
The Colonel asked him if he himself had suffered any evil effects from
the fire. Fortescue replied that his eyes had given him some trouble
from the smoke, and that he would use the rest of his leave in going to
New York to see an oculist. He supposed it was nothing, and that his
eyes would cease to trouble him probably before he got to New York. The
Colonel told this to Betty in good faith, but Betty's interpretation
was that Fortescue needed an excuse to go away as soon as possible, and
gave herself no concern about his eyes. In her heart, however, still
burned a deep resentment, and a longing regret for Fortescue. He was so
brave--he was so much the soldier--and then Betty would check herself
sternly, and try to think of him no more.
As the winter days went by, Kettle grew stronger, and was able to
sit up in a little chair by the kitchen fire. Betty spent many hours
amusing him, his little round, black face delighted with the simple
games she taught him and the stories she told him. His Christmas
presents had been given him, and of them all his new pocket-knife was
his chief delight. He would sit by the hour before the kitchen fire,
whittling industriously, and Aunt Tulip never once complained of the
clutter he made. Betty charmed him by occasionally wearing the great
green and gilt brooch, and the Colonel religiously read through "The
Principles of Hydraulics in Mining." In the evening, before Aunt
Tulip put him to bed, it was Kettle's treat to be helped into the
sitting-room and to listen to Betty playing and singing to her harp, or
the Colonel playing on his violin. The boy's arms had been frightfully
burned, but his hands had escaped. Several times he said to Betty, with
a strange look of distress upon his little black face:
"Miss Betty, I want to arsk you sumpin'. I want you to arsk the doctor
sumpin'."
"What is it, Kettle?" Betty would inquire.
"I tell you pres'ny," Kettle would reply. But the "pres'ny" did not
come for a long time. Then, one day in March, when Kettle was able to
walk about and was almost well, he crept up to Betty in the garden, and
said to her hesitatingly:
"Miss Betty, what I want you to arsk the doctor is, whether I kin ever
play the fiddle agin. I been tryin' to arsk 'im, but somehow I k'yarn'
do it."
"Certainly, I will ask the doctor, Kettle," answered Betty cheerfully,
"and I am sure you will be able to play the fiddle. Yonder is Doctor
Markham's buggy coming down the lane."
Betty met the doctor at the house door. Kettle had slipped away; he
evidently had not the courage to stay. Then Betty put her question.
"Certainly he will be able to play the fiddle," replied Dr. Markham,
smiling over his spectacles. "That little fellow is as hard as nails.
There isn't one child in a hundred who would have survived such
injuries. But he'll be all right."
Betty called Kettle, who reappeared around the corner of the house.
He came slouching up, with a faint shadow of his former grin upon his
face. Something in Betty's eyes told him that there was good news for
him.
"Hello, you young rascal!" cried the doctor jovially. "In another month
or two you will be running around here as mischievous as ever, and you
will be able to fiddle all right when you get stronger. But you are not
to touch the fiddle until I tell you. Do you understand?"
"Yes, sirree," answered Kettle delightedly, his mouth coming wide open.
Then, looking from Betty to the doctor, and back again, and shuffling
his feet awkwardly, he tried to express some of the gratitude that
filled his humble little heart.
"Miss Betty, she treat me white, and so did you, Doc' Markham. I ain'
a-gwine ter furgit it."
Dr. Markham went in the house to see the Colonel, who was ailing, and
who had been ailing a good deal that winter. The doctor's cheery
smile and pleasant words brightened the Colonel up immensely. When Dr.
Markham rose to go, after one of those long and friendly visits of the
country doctor which are so comforting, Betty went out with him. Kettle
was waiting outside in the spring sunshine. In his hand was a small
object, carefully wrapped up in white paper. Kettle shuffled up to the
doctor as he was getting into his buggy, and said to him, with much
stammering and stuttering:
"I--I done heah that folks pays doctors fur comin' to see 'em. I ain'
got no money, but I got a mighty nice knife as Miss Betty gimme last
Chris'mus, and I want you, Doc' Markham, fur to take it. 'Tain't much
fur you, but it's all I got, an' I'se mighty glad to give it to you."
Dr. Markham took the knife, looked at it, and admired it, and put it in
his pocket, and then, taking off his hat, shook Kettle's little black
hand warmly.
"I thank you, Kettle," he said, "from the bottom of my heart. I never
had a fee in my life that meant more than this knife. I shall keep and
use it, and whenever I look at it I shall remember an honest little
boy, who will grow up to be an honest man."
Kettle's face was shining, as the doctor drove off, and which shone
still more when Betty said to him,
"I am glad you gave the doctor your knife, Kettle. You shall have a new
one next Christmas, I promise you."