A man may hear this shower sing in the wind.
MERRY WIVES OF WINDSOR.
One summer's afternoon, -- this was the first summer of
Winthrop's being in Mannahatta, -- he went to solace himself
with a walk out of town. It was a long and grave and
thoughtful walk; so that Mr. Landholm really had very little
good of the bright summer light upon the grass and trees.
Furthermore, he did not even find it out when this light was
curtained in the west with a thick cloud, which straightway
became gilt and silver-edged in a marvellous and splendid
degree. The cloud of thought was thicker than that, if not
quite so brilliant; and it was not until low growls of thunder
began to salute his ear, that he looked up and found the
silver edge fast mounting to the zenith and the curtain
drawing its folds all around over the clear blue sky. His next
look was earthward, for a shelter; for at the rate that
chariot of the storm was travelling he knew he had not many
minutes to seek one before the storm would be upon him.
Happily a blacksmith's shop, that he would certainly have
passed without seeing it, stood at a little distance; and
Winthrop thankfully made for it. He found it deserted; and
secure of a refuge, took his place at the door to watch the
face of things; for though the edge of the town was near, the
storm was nearer, and it would not do to run for it. The
blackness covered everything now, changing to lurid light in
the storm quarter, and big scattered drops began to come
plashing down. This time Winthrop's mind was so much in the
clouds that he did not know what was going on in the earth;
for while he stood looking and gazing, two ladies almost ran
over him. Winthrop's senses came back to the door of the
blacksmith's shop, and the ladies recovered themselves.
"How do you do, Mr. Landholm," said the one, with a bow.
"O Mr. Winthrop!" cried the other, -- "what shall we do? we
can't get home, and I'm so frightened! --"
Winthrop had not time to open his lips, for either civility or
consolation, when a phaeton, coming at a furious rate,
suddenly pulled up before them, and Mr. Satterthwaite jumped
out of it and joined himself to the group. His business was to
persuade Miss Haye to take the empty place in his carriage and
escape with him to the shelter of her own house or his
father's. Miss Haye however preferred getting wet, and walking
through the mud, and being blinded with the lightning, all of
which alternatives Mr. Satterthwaite presented to her; at
least no other conclusion could be drawn, for she very
steadily and coolly refused to ride home with him.
"Mr. Landholm," said Mr. Satterthwaite in desperation, "don't
you advise Miss Haye to agree to my proposition?"
"I never give advice, sir," said Winthrop, "after I see that
people's minds are made up. Perhaps Miss Cadwallader may be
less stubborn."
Mr. Satterthwaite could do no other than turn to Miss
Cadwallader, who wanted very little urging.
"But Rose!" said her cousin, -- "you're not going to leave me
alone?"
"No, I don't," said Rose. "I'm sure you've got somebody with
you; and he's got an umbrella."
"Don't, Rose!" said Elizabeth, -- "stay and go home with me --
the storm will be over directly."
"It won't -- I can't," said Rose, -- "It won't be over this
hour, and I'm afraid --"
And into Mr. Satterthwaite's phaeton she jumped, and away Mr.
Satterthwaite's phaeton went, with him and her in it.
"You had better step under shelter, Miss Haye," said Winthrop;
"it is beginning to sprinkle pretty fast."
"No," said Elizabeth, "I'll go home -- I don't mind it. I would
rather go right home -- I don't care for the rain."
"But you can't go without the umbrella," said Winthrop, "and
that belongs to me."
"Well, won't you go with me?" said Elizabeth, with a look half
doubtful and half daunted.
"Yes, as soon as it is safe. This is a poor place, but it is
better than nothing. You must come in here and have patience
till then."
He went in and Elizabeth followed him, and she stood there
looking very doubtful and very much annoyed; eyeing the fast
falling drops as if her impatience could dry them up. The
little smithy was black as such a place should be; nothing
looked like a seat but the anvil, and that was hardly safe to
take advantage of.
"I wish there was something here for you to sit down upon,"
said Winthrop peering about, -- "but everything is like
Vulcan's premises. It is a pity I am not Sir Walter Raleigh
for your behoof; for I suppose Sir Walter didn't mind walking
home without his coat, and I do."
"He only threw off his cloak," said Elizabeth.
"I never thought of wearing mine this afternoon," said
Winthrop, "though I brought an umbrella. But see here, Miss
Elizabeth, -- here is a box, one end of which, I think, may be
trusted. Will you sit down?"
Elizabeth took the box, seeming from some cause or other
tongue-tied. She sat looking out through the open door at the
storm in a mixture of feelings, the uppermost of which was
vexation.
"I hope more than one end of this box may be trusted," she
presently roused herself to say. "I have no idea of giving
half trust to anything."
"Yet that is quite as much as it is safe to give to most
things," said Winthrop.
"Is it?"
"I am afraid so."
"I wouldn't give a pin for anything I couldn't trust
entirely," said Elizabeth.
"Which shews what a point of perfection the manufacture of
pins has reached since the days of Anne Boleyn," said
Winthrop.
"Of Anne Boleyn! -- What of them then?"
"Only that a statute was passed in that time, entitled, 'An
act for the true making of pins;' so I suppose they were then
articles of some importance. But the box may be trusted, Miss
Haye, for strength, if not for agreeableness. A quarter of
agreeableness with a remainder of strength, is a fair
proportion, as things go."
"Do you mean to compare life with this dirty box?" said
Elizabeth.
"They say an image should always elevate the subject," said
Winthrop smiling.
"What was the matter with the making of pins," said Elizabeth,
"that an act had to be made about it?"
"Why in those days," said Winthrop, "mechanics and
tradespeople were in the habit occasionally of playing false,
and it was necessary to look after them."
Elizabeth sat silently looking out again, wondering -- what she
had often wondered before -- where ever her companion had got
his cool self-possession; marvelling, with a little impatient
wonder, how it was that he would just as lief talk to her in a
blacksmith's shop in a thunder-storm, as in anybody's drawing-
room with a band playing and fifty people about. She was no
match for him, for she felt a little awkward. She, Miss Haye,
the heiress in her own right, who had lived in good company
ever since she had lived in company at all. Yet there he
stood, more easily, she felt, than she sat. She sat looking
straight out at the rain and thinking of it.
The open doorway and her vision were crossed a moment after by
a figure which put these thoughts out of her head. It was the
figure of a little black girl, going by through the rain, with
an old basket at her back which probably held food or firing
that she had been picking up along the streets of the city.
She wore a wretched old garment which only half covered her,
and that was already half wet; her feet and ancles were naked;
and the rain came down on her thick curly head. No doubt she
was accustomed to it; the road-worn feet must have cared
little for wet or dry, and the round shock of wool perhaps
never had a covering; yet it was bowed to the rain, and the
little blackey went by with lagging step and a sort of slow
crying. It touched Elizabeth with a disagreeable feeling of
pain. The thought had hardly crossed her mind, that she was
sorry for her, when to her great surprise she saw her
companion go to the door and ask the little object of her pity
to come in under the shed. The child stopped her slow step and
her crying and looked up at him.
"Come in here till the rain's over," he repeated.
She gave her head a sort of matter-of-course shake, without
moving a pair of intelligent black eyes which had fixed on his
face.
"Come in," said Winthrop.
The child shook her head again, and said,
"Can't!"
"Why not?" said Winthrop.
"Mustn't!"
"Why mustn't you?"
"'Cause."
"Come in," said Winthrop, -- and to Elizabeth's exceeding
astonishment he laid hold of the little black shoulder and
drew the girl into the shop, -- "it is going to storm hard; --
why mustn't you?"
The little blackey immediately squatted herself down on the
ground against the wall, and looking up at him repeated,
"'Cause."
"It's going to be a bad storm; -- you'll be better under here."
The child's eyes went out of the door for a moment, and then
came back to his face, as if with a sort of fascination.
"How far have you to go?"
"Home."
"How far is that?"
"It's six miles, I guess," said the owner of the eyes.
"That's too far for you to go in the storm. The lightning
might kill you."
"Kill me!"
"Yes. It might."
"I guess I'd be glad if it did," she said, with another glance
at the storm.
"Glad if it did! -- why?"
"'Cause."
"'Cause what?" said Winthrop, entering more into the child's
interests, Elizabeth thought, than he had done into hers.
"'Cause," repeated the blackey. -- "I don't want to get home."
"Who do you live with?"
"I live with my mother, when I'm to home."
"Where do you live when you are not at home?"
"Nowheres."
The gathered storm came down at this point with great fury.
The rain fell, whole water; little streams even made their way
under the walls of the shanty and ran across the floor. The
darkness asked no help from black walls and smoky roof.
"Isn't this better than to be out?" said Winthrop, after his
eyes had been for a moment drawn without by the tremendous
pouring of the rain. But the little black girl looked at it
and said doggedly,
"I don't care."
"Where have you been with that basket?"
"Down yonder -- where all the folks goes," she said with a
slight motion of her head towards the built-up quarter of the
country.
"Do you bring wood all the way from there on your back?"
"When I get some."
"Aren't you tired?"
The child looked at him steadily, and then in a strange
somewhat softened manner which belied her words, answered,
"No."
"You don't bring that big basket full, do you?"
She kept her bright eyes on him and nodded.
"I should think it would break your back."
"If I don't break my back I get a lickin'."
"Was that what you were crying for as you went by?"
"I wa'n't a cryin'!" said the girl. "Nobody never see me a
cryin' for nothin'!"
"You haven't filled your basket to-day."
She gave an askant look into it, and was silent.
"How came that?"
"'Cause! -- I was tired, and I hadn't had no dinner; and I
don't care! That's why I wished the thunder would kill me. I
can't live without eatin'."
"Have you had nothing since morning?"
"I don't get no mornin' -- I have to get my dinner."
"And you could get none to-day?"
"No. Everything was eat up."
"Everything isn't quite eaten up," said Winthrop, rummaging in
his coat pocket; and he brought forth thence a paper of figs
which he gave the girl. "He isn't so short of means as I
feared, after all," thought Elizabeth, "since he can afford to
carry figs about in his pocket." But she did not know that the
young gentleman had made his own dinner off that paper of
figs; and she could not guess it, ever when from his other
coat pocket he produced some biscuits which were likewise
given to eke out the figs in the little black girl's dinner.
She was presently roused to very great marvelling again by
seeing him apply his foot to another box, one without a clean
side, and roll it over half the length of the shed for the
child to sit upon.
"What do you think of life now, Miss Elizabeth?" he said,
leaving his charge to eat her figs and coming again to the
young lady's side.
"_That_ isn't life," said Elizabeth.
"It seems without the one quarter of agreeableness," he said.
"But it's horrible, Mr. Winthrop! --"
He was silent, and looked at the girl, who sitting on her coal
box was eating figs and biscuits with intense satisfaction.
"She is not a bad-looking child," said Elizabeth.
"She is a very good-looking child," said Winthrop; "at least
her face has a great deal of intelligence; and I think,
something more."
"What more?"
"Feeling, or capacity of feeling."
"I wish you had a seat, Mr. Landholm," said Elizabeth, looking
round.
"Thank you -- I don't wish for one."
"It was very vexatious in Rose to go and leave me!"
"There isn't another box for her if she had stayed," said
Winthrop.
"She would have me go out with her this afternoon to see her
dressmaker, who lives just beyond here a little; and father
had the horses. It was so pleasant an afternoon, I had no
notion of a storm."
"There's a pretty good notion of a storm now," said Winthrop.
So there was, beyond a doubt; the rain was falling in floods,
and the lightning and thunder, though not very near, were very
unceasing. Elizabeth still felt awkward and uneasy, and did
not know what to talk about. She never had talked much to Mr.
Landholm; and his cool matter-of-fact way of answering her
remarks, puzzled or baffled her.
"That child sitting there makes me very uncomfortable," she
said presently.
"Why, Miss Elizabeth?"
Elizabeth hesitated, and then said she did not know.
"You don't like the verification of my setting forth of life,"
he said smiling.
"But _that_ is not life, Mr. Winthrop."
"What is it?"
"It is the experience of one here and there -- not of people in
general."
"What do you take to be the experience of people in general?"
"Not mine, to be sure," said Elizabeth after a little thought,
-- "nor hers."
"Hers is a light shade of what rests upon many."
"Why Mr. Winthrop! do you think so?"
"Look at her," he said in a low voice; -- "she has forgotten
her empty basket in a sweet fig."
"But she must take it up again."
"She won't lessen her burden, but she will her power of
forgetting."
Elizabeth sat still, looking at her vis-à-vis of life, and
feeling very uneasily what she had never felt before. She
began therewith to ponder sundry extraordinary propositions
about the inequalities of social condition and the relative
duties of man to man.
"What right have I," she said suddenly, "to so much more than
she has?"
"Very much the sort of right that I have to be an American,
while somebody else is a Chinese."
"Chance," said Elizabeth.
"No, there is no such thing as chance," he said seriously.
"What then?"
"The fruit of industry, talent, and circumstance."
"Not mine."
"No, but your father's, who gives it to you."
"But why ought I to enjoy more than she does? -- in the
abstract, I mean."
"I don't know," said Winthrop. -- "I guess we had better walk on
now, Miss Elizabeth."
"Walk on! -- it rains too hard."
"But we are in the shed, while other people are out?"
"No but, -- suppose that by going out I could bring them in?"
"Then I would certainly act as your messenger," he said
smiling. "But you can't reach _all_ the people who are so
careless as to go out without umbrellas."
Elizabeth was betrayed into a laugh --a genuine hearty laugh of
surprise, in which her awkwardness was for a moment forgotten.
"How came you to bring one, such a day?"
"I thought the sun was going to shine."
"But seriously, Mr. Landholm, my question," -- said Elizabeth.
"What was it?"
"How ought I to enjoy so much more than she has?"
"Modestly, I should think."
"What do you mean?"
"If you were to give the half of your fortune to one such, for
instance," he said with a slight smile, "do you fancy you
would have adjusted two scales of the social balance to hang
even?"
"No," said Elizabeth, -- "I suppose not."
"You would have given away what she could not keep; you would
have put out of your power what would not be in hers; and on
the whole, she would be scantly a gainer and the world would
be a loser."
"Yet surely," said Elizabeth, "something is due from my hand
to hers."
Her companion was quite silent, rather oddly, she thought; and
her meditations came back for a moment from social to
individual distinctions and differences. Then, really in a
puzzle as to the former matter, she repeated her question.
"But what can one do to them, then, Mr. Winthrop? -- or what
should be one's aim?"
"Put them in the way of exercising the talent and industry and
circumstance which have done such great things for us."
"So that by the time they have the means they will be ready
for them? -- But dear me! that is a difficult matter!" said
Elizabeth.
Her companion smiled a little.
"But they haven't any talent, Mr. Landholm, -- nor industry nor
circumstance either. To be sure those latter wants might be
made up."
"Most people have talent, of one sort or another," said
Winthrop. "There's a little specimen pretty well stocked."
"Do you think so?"
"Try her."
"I don't know how to try her!" said Elizabeth. "I wish you
would."
"I don't know how, either," said Winthrop. "Circumstances have
been doing it this some time."
"I wish she hadn't come in," said Elizabeth. "She has
unsettled all my ideas."
"They will rest the better for being unsettled."
Elizabeth looked at him, but he did not acknowledge the look.
Presently, whether to try how benevolence worked, or to run
away from her feeling of awkwardness, she got up and moved a
few steps towards the place where the little blackey sat.
"Have you had dinner enough?" she said, standing and looking
down upon her as a very disagreeable social curiosity.
"There aint no more, if I hain't," said the curiosity, with
very dauntless eyes.
"Where do you get your dinner every day?"
"'Long street," said the girl, turning her eyes away from
Elizabeth and looking out into the storm.
"Do you often go without any?"
"When the folks don't give me none."
"Does that happen often?"
"They didn't give me none to-day."
"What do you do then?"
The eyes came back from the door to Elizabeth, and then went
to Winthrop.
"What do you do then?" Elizabeth repeated.
"I gets 'em."
"You didn't get any to-day?" said Winthrop.
She shook her head.
"You mustn't any more."
"Nobody ha'n't no business to let me starve," said the blackey
stoutly.
"No, but I'll tell you where to go the next time you can't get
a dinner, and you shall have it without stealing."
"I ha'n't stole it -- nobody never see me steal -- I only tuk
it," -- said the girl with a little lowering of her voice and
air.
"What's your name?"
"Clam."
"Clam!" said Elizabeth, -- "where did you get such an odd
name?"
"'Long street," said the girl, her black eyes twinkling.
"Where did you get it?" said Winthrop gravely.
"I didn't get it nowheres -- it was guv to me."
"What's your other name?"
"I ha'n't got no more names -- my name's Clam."
"What's your mother's name?"
"She's Sukey Beckinson."
"Is she kind to you?" asked Elizabeth.
"_I_ don' know!"
"Did you have dinner enough?" said Winthrop with a smile.
Clam jumped up, and crossing her hands on her breast dropped a
brisk little courtsey to her benefactor. She made no other
answer, and then sat down again.
"Are you afraid to go home with your empty basket when the
storm's over?" said he kindly.
"No," she said; but it was with a singular expression of cold
and careless necessity.
"The rest of the basketful wouldn't be worth more than that,
would it?" said he giving her a sixpence.
Clam took it and clasped it very tight in her fist, for other
place of security she had none; and looked at him, but made no
more answer than that.
"You won't forget where to come the next time you can't get an
honest dinner," said he. "The corner of Beaver and Little
South Streets. You know where it is? That is where I live. Ask
for Mr. Landholm."
Clam nodded and said, "I know!"
"I hope you'll get some supper to-night," said he.
"I will!" said Clam determinately.
"How will you?" said Elizabeth.
"I'll make mammy give me some," said the girl flourishing her
clasped fist.
"Wouldn't you like to leave picking things out of the street,
and go to live with somebody who would take care of you and
teach you to be a good girl?" said Elizabeth.
Clam tossed her sixpence up and down in her hand, and finally
brought her eyes to bear upon Elizabeth and said,
"I don't want nobody to take care of me."
"If she could be taught, and would, I'd take care of her
afterwards," said Elizabeth to Winthrop.
"If _he'd_ say so, I would," said Clam.
"Look here," said Winthrop. "Would you like to come into some
kind house -- if I can find you one -- and learn to do clean
work?"
"It don't make no odds," said Clam looking at her basket.
"What do you say?"
"I guess no one don't want me."
"Perhaps not; but if somebody would have you, would you be a
good girl?"
"I s'pose I'd get dinner reglar," said the little black girl,
still fingering the edge of her basket.
"Certainly! --and something better than figs."
"Be them figs?" said Clam, suddenly looking up at him.
"Yes -- the sweet ones."
"Goody! -- I didn't know that before."
"Well -- you haven't answered me yet."
"I don't care much," -- said Clam. "Is it your house?"
"Maybe."
"I'll come!" said she clapping her hands. "I'll clear out, and
mother won't never give it to me no more. -- Nor nobody else
sha'n't?" said she looking up at Winthrop.
"If you behave yourself."
"I'll go now right off!" said Clam, jumping up in great
spirits. Then with a changing and doubtful tone she added,
looking to Winthrop, "Will you take me?"
"Yes," he said smiling, "but not this evening. You must go
home now, when the storm is over, for to-night; and I'll come
and see your mother about it."
"What for?" was the very earnest and prompt answer.
"If you agree to come, I must get her to bind you out."
"I aint goin' to be bound," said Clam shaking her head; -- "if
you bind me, I'll run."
"Run as fast as you please," said Winthrop; -- "run whenever
you want to; -- but I can't take you unless you be bound, for I
won't have your mother coming after you."
"Can't she do nothin' to me if I'm bound?" said Clam.
"Nothing at all, till you grow up to be a woman; and then you
can take care of yourself."
"I'll take care of myself all along," said Clam. "Nobody else
aint a goin' to."
"But somebody must give you clothes to wear, and a bed to
sleep in, and your dinner, you know; and you must do work for
somebody, to pay for it."
"To pay for my dinner?"
"Yes."
"Very good!" said Clam. "I guess I'll stand it. Will it be
for you?"
"No, I think not."
"Won't you?" said Clam wishingly. "I'll do work for you."
"Thank you. Maybe you shall."
"I'm goin' home now," said Clam, getting up and shouldering
her basket.
"The storm's too bad yet," said Winthrop.
"Crackey! what do you think I care for that! The rain won't
wet _me_ much."
"Come to my house to-morrow, if you want to see me again,"
said Winthrop, -- "about dinner-time."
Clam nodded, and fixing her bright eyes very intently first on
one and then on the other of the friends she was leaving, she
ended with a long parting look at Winthrop which lasted till
she had passed from sight out of the door of the shed.
The violence of the storm was gone over; but though the
thunder sounded now in the distance and the lightning played
fainter, the rain fell yet all around them, in a gentle and
very full shower.
"Do you suppose she has six miles to go?" said Elizabeth.
"No."
"I thought you answered as if you believed her when she said
so."
"It isn't best to tell all one's thoughts," said Winthrop
smiling.
Elizabeth went back to her box seat.
"I wish the rain would let us go home too," she said.
"Your wishes are so accustomed to smooth travelling, they
don't know what to make of a hindrance," said her companion.
Elizabeth knew it was true, and it vexed her. It seemed to
imply that she had not been tried by life, and that nobody
knew what she would be till she was tried. That was a very
disagreeable thought. There again he had the advantage of her.
Nothing is reliable that is not tried. "And yet," she said to
herself, "I _am_ reliable. I know I am."
"What can anybody's wish make of a hindrance?" was her reply.
"Graff it in well, and anybody can make a pretty large thorn
of it."
"Why Mr. Winthrop! -- but I mean, in the way of dealing with it
pleasantly?"
"Pleasantly? -- I don't know," said he; "unless they could get
my mother's recipe."
"What does _her_ wish do with a hindrance?"
"It lies down and dies," he said, with a change of tone which
shewed whither his thoughts had gone.
"I think I never wish mine to do that," said Elizabeth.
"What then? Remember you are speaking of hindrances absolute --
that cannot be removed."
"But Mr. Winthrop, do you think it is possible for one's wish
to lie down and die so?"
"If I had not seen it, I might say that it was not."
"I don't understand it --I don't know what to make of it," said
Elizabeth. "I don't think it is possible for mine."
Winthrop's thoughts went back a moment to the sweet calm brow,
the rested face, that told of its truth and possibility in one
instance.. He too did not understand it, but he guessed where
the secret might lie.
"It must be a very happy faculty," said Elizabeth; -- "but it
seems to me -- of course it is not so in that instance, -- but
in the abstract, it seems to me rather tame; -- I don't like
it. I have no idea of giving up!"
"There is no need of your giving up, in this case," said
Winthrop. "Do you see that sunshine?"
"And the rainbow!" said Elizabeth.
She sprang to the door; and they both stood looking, while the
parting gifts of the clouds were gently reaching the ground,
and the sun taking a cleared place in the western heaven,
painted over against them, broad and bright, the promissory
token that the earth should be overwhelmed with the waters no
more. The rain-drops glittered as they fell; the grass looked
up in refreshed green where the sun touched it; the clouds
were driving over from the west, leaving broken fragments
behind them upon the blue; and the bright and sweet colours of
the rainbow swept their circle in the east and almost finished
it in the grass at the door of the blacksmith's shop. It was a
lovely show of beauty that is as fresh the hundredth time as
the first. But though Elizabeth looked at it and admired it,
she was thinking of something else.
"You have no overshoes," said Winthrop, when they had set out
on their way; -- "I am afraid you are not countrywoman enough
to bear this."
"O yes I am," said Elizabeth, -- "I don't mind it -- I don't
care for it. But Mr. Winthrop --"
"What were you going to say?" he asked, when he had waited
half a minute to find out.
"You understood that I did not mean to speak of your mother,
when I said that, about thinking it seemed tame to let one's
wishes die out? -- I excepted her entirely in my thought -- I
was speaking quite in the abstract."
"I know that, Miss Elizabeth."
She was quite satisfied with the smile with which he said it.
"How much better that odd little black child liked you than
she did me," she went on with a change of subject and tone
together.
"You were a little further off," said Winthrop.
"Further off?" said Elizabeth.
"I suppose she thought so."
"Then one must come near people in order to do them good?"
"One mustn't be _too_ far off," said Winthrop, "to have one's
words reach them."
"But I didn't mean to be far off," said Elizabeth.
"I didn't mean to be near."
Elizabeth looked at him, but he was grave; and then she
smiled, and then laughed.
"You've hit it!" she exclaimed. "I shall remember that."
"Take care, Miss Elizabeth," said Winthrop, as her foot
slipped in the muddy way, -- "or you will have more to remember
than would be convenient. You had better take my arm."
So she did; musing a little curiously at herself and that arm,
which she had seen in a shirt-sleeve, carrying a pickaxe on
shoulder; and making up her mind in spite of it all that she
didn't care! So the walk home was not otherwise than
comfortable. Indeed the beauty of it was more than once
remarked on by both parties.
"Well!" said Rose, when at last Elizabeth came into the room
where she was sitting, -- "have you got home?"
"Yes."
"What have you been doing all this while?"
"Getting very angry at you in the first place; and then
cooling down as usual into the reflection that it was not
worth while."
"Well, I hope Winthrop made good use of his opportunity?"
"Yes, he did," said Elizabeth coolly, taking off her things.
"And you have engaged him at last as your admirer?"
"Not at all; -- I have only engaged a little black girl to be
my servant."
"A servant! What?"
"What do you mean by 'what'?" said Elizabeth contemptuously.
"I mean, what sort of a servant?"
"I am sure I don't know -- a black servant."
"But what for?"
"To do my bidding."
"But what is she? and where did you pick her up?"
"She is an odd little fish called Clam; and I didn't pick her
up at all; -- Mr. Landholm did that."
"O ho!" said Rose, -- "it's a joint concern! -- that's it. But I
think you are beginning to make up your household very early."
Elizabeth flung down her shoe and lifted her head, and Miss
Cadwallader shrunk; even before her companion said with
imperious emphasis, "Rose, how dare you! --"
Rose did not dare, against the flushed face and eye of fire
which confronted her. She fell back into her chair and her
book and was dumb.