After Deborah Thayer had shut the door, the young girl sitting beside
it arose. "I didn't know she was in here, or I wouldn't have come
in," she said, nervously.
"That don't make any odds," replied Mrs. Barnard, who was trembling
all over, and had sunk helplessly into a rocking-chair, which she
swayed violently and unconsciously.
Cephas opened the door of the brick oven, and put in a batch of his
pies, and the click of the iron latch made her start as if it were a
pistol-shot.
Charlotte got up and went out of the room with a backward glance and
a slight beckoning motion of her head, and the girl slunk after her
so secretly that it seemed as if she did not see herself. Cephas
looked sharply after them, but said nothing; he was like a
philosopher in such a fury of research and experiment that for the
time he heeded thoroughly nothing else.
The young girl, who was Rose Berry, Charlotte's cousin, followed her
panting up the steep stairs to her chamber. She was a slender little
creature, and was now overwrought with nervous excitement. She fairly
gasped for breath when she sat down in the little wooden chair in
Charlotte's room. Charlotte sat on the bed. The two girls looked at
each other--Rose with a certain wary alarm and questioning in her
eyes, Charlotte with a dignified confidence of misery.
"I didn't sleep here last night," Charlotte said, at length.
"You went over to Aunt Sylvy's, didn't you?" returned Rose, as if
that were all the matter in hand.
Charlotte nodded, then she looked moodily past her cousin's face out
of the window.
"You've heard about it, I suppose?" said Charlotte.
"Something," replied Rose, evasively.
"I don't see how it got out, for my part. I don't believe he told
anybody."
Rose flushed all over her little eager face and her thin neck. She
opened her mouth as if to speak, then shut it with a catch of her
breath.
"I can't imagine how it got out," repeated Charlotte.
Rose looked at Charlotte with a painful effort; she clutched her
hands tightly into fists as she spoke. "I was coming up here 'cross
lots last night, and I heard you out in the road calling Barney," she
said, as if she forced out the words.
"Rose Berry, you didn't tell!"
"I went home and told mother, that's all. I didn't think that it
would do any harm, Charlotte."
"It'll be all over town, that's all. It's bad enough, anyway."
"I don't believe it'll get out; I told mother not to tell."
"Mrs. Thayer knew."
"Maybe Barney told her."
"Rose Berry, you know better. You know Barney wouldn't do such a
thing."
"No; I don't s'pose he would."
"Don't suppose! Don't you know?"
"Yes, of course I do. I know Barney just as well as you do,
Charlotte. Oh, Charlotte, don't feel bad. I wouldn't have told mother
if I'd thought. I didn't mean to do any harm. I was all upset myself
by it. Don't cry, Charlotte."
"I ain't going to cry," said Charlotte, with spirit. "I've stopped
cryin'." She wiped her eyes forcibly with her apron, and gave her
head a proud toss. "I know you didn't mean to do any harm, Rose, and
I suppose it would have got out anyway. 'Most everything does get out
but good deeds."
"I truly didn't mean to do any harm, Charlotte," Rose repeated.
"I know you didn't. We won't say any more about it."
"I was just running over across lots last night," Rose said. "I
supposed you'd be in the front room with Barney, but I thought I'd
see Aunt Sarah. I'd got terrible lonesome; mother had gone to sleep
in her chair, and father had gone to bed. When I got out by the
stone-wall next the wood I heard you; then I ran right back. Don't
you--suppose he'll ever come again, Charlotte?"
"No," said Charlotte.
"Oh, Charlotte!" There was a curious quality in the girl's voice, as
if some great hidden emotion in her heart tried to leap to the
surface and make a sound, although it was totally at variance with
the import of her cry. Charlotte started, without knowing why. It was
as if Rose's words and her tone had different meanings, and
conflicted like the wrong lines with a tune.
"I gave it up last night," said Charlotte. "It's all over. I'm goin'
to pack my wedding things away."
"I don't see what makes you so sure."
"I know him."
"But I don't see what you've done, Charlotte; he didn't quarrel with
you."
"That don't make any odds. He can't get married to me now without he
breaks his will, and he can't. He can't get outside himself enough to
break it. I've studied it all out. It's like ciphering. It's all
over."
"Charlotte."
"What is it?"
"Why--couldn't you go somewhere else to get married? What's the need
of his comin' here, if he's been ordered out, and he's said he
wouldn't?"
"That's just the letter of it," returned Charlotte, scornfully. "Do
you suppose he could cheat himself that way, or I'd have him if he
could? When Barney Thayer went out of this house last night, and said
what he did, he meant that it was all over, that he was never going
to marry me, nor have anything more to do with us, and he's going to
stand by it. I am not finding any fault with him. I've made up my
mind that it's all over, and I'm going to pack away my weddin'
things."
"Oh, Charlotte, you take it so calm!"
"What do you want me to do?"
"If it was anybody else, I should think they didn't care."
"Maybe I don't."
"I couldn't bear it so, anyhow! I couldn't!" Rose cried out, with
sudden passion. "I wouldn't bear it. I'd go down on my knees to him
to come back!" Rose flung back her head and looked at Charlotte with
a curious defiance; her face grew suddenly intense, and seemed to
open out into bloom and color like a flower. The pupils of her blue
eyes dilated until they looked black; her thin lips looked full and
red; her cheeks were flaming; her slender chest heaved. "I would,"
said she; "I don't care, I would."
Charlotte looked at her, and a quivering flush like a reflection was
left on her fair, steady face.
"I would," said Rose again.
"It wouldn't do any good."
"It would if he cared anything about you."
"It would if he could give up to the care. Barney Thayer has got a
terrible will that won't always let him do what he wants to himself."
"I don't believe he's enough of a fool to put his own eyes out."
"You don't know him."
"I'd try, anyway."
"It wouldn't do any good."
"I don't believe you care anything about him, Charlotte Barnard!"
Rose cried out. "If you did, you couldn't give him up so easy for
such a silly thing. You sit there just as calm. I don't believe but
what you'll have another fellow on the string in a month. I know one
that's dying to get you."
"Maybe I shall," replied Charlotte.
"Won't you, now?" Rose tried to speak archly, but her eyes were
fiercely eager.
"I can't tell till I get home from the grave," said Charlotte. "You
might wait till I did, Rose." She got up and went to dusting her
bureau and the little gilt-framed mirror behind it. Her lips were
shut tightly, and she never looked at her cousin.
"Now don't get mad, Charlotte," Rose said. "Maybe I ought not to have
spoken so, but it did seem to me you couldn't care as _much_-- It
does seem to me I couldn't settle down and be so calm if I was in
your place, and all ready to be married to anybody. I should want to
do something."
"I should, if there was anything to do," said Charlotte. She stopped
dusting and leaned against the wall, reflecting. "I wish it was a
real mountain to move," said she; "I'd do it."
"I'd go right down in the field where he is ploughing, and I'd make
him say he'd come to see me to-night."
"I called him back last night--you heard me," said Charlotte, with
slow bitterness. Her square delicate chin dipped into the muslin
folds of her neckerchief; she looked steadily at the floor and bent
her brow.
"I'd call him again."
"You would, would you?" cried Charlotte, straightening herself. "You
would stand out in the road and keep on calling a man who wouldn't
even turn his head? You'd keep on calling, and let all the town
hear?"
"Yes, I would. I would! I wouldn't be ashamed of anything if I was
going to marry him. I'd go on my knees before him in the face and
eyes of the whole town."
"Well, I wouldn't," said Charlotte.
"I would, if I was sure he thought as much of me as I did of him."
Charlotte looked at her proudly. "I'm sure enough of that," said she.
Rose winced a little. "Then I wouldn't mind what I did," she
persisted, stubbornly.
"Well, I would," said Charlotte; "but maybe I don't care. Maybe all
this isn't as hard for me as it would be for another girl."
Charlotte's voice broke, but she tossed her head back with a proud
motion; she took up the dusting-cloth and fell to work again.
"Oh, Charlotte!" said Rose; "I didn't mean that. Of course I know you
care. It's awful. It was only because I didn't see how you could seem
so calm; it ain't like me. Of course I know you feel bad enough
underneath. Your wedding-clothes all done and everything. They are
pretty near all done, ain't they, Charlotte?"
"Yes," said Charlotte. "They're--pretty near--done." She tried to
speak steadily, but her voice failed. Suddenly she threw herself on
the bed and hid her face, and her whole body heaved and twisted with
great sobs.
"Oh, poor Charlotte, don't!" Rose cried, wringing her own hands; her
face quivered, but she did not weep.
"Maybe I don't care," sobbed Charlotte; "maybe--I don't care."
"Oh, Charlotte!" Rose looked at Charlotte's piteous girlish shoulders
shaken with sobs, and the fair prostrate girlish head. Charlotte all
drawn up in this little heap upon the bed looked very young and
helpless. All her womanly stateliness, which made her seem so
superior to Rose, had vanished. Rose pulled her chair close to the
bed, sat down, and laid her little thin hand on Charlotte's arm, and
Charlotte directly felt it hot through her sleeve. "Don't,
Charlotte," Rose said; "I'm sorry I spoke so."
"Maybe I don't care," Charlotte sobbed out again. "Maybe I don't."
"Oh, Charlotte, I'm sorry," Rose said, trembling. "I do know you
care; don't you feel so bad because I said that."
Rose tightened her grasp on Charlotte's arm; her voice changed
suddenly. "Look here, Charlotte," said she, "I'll do anything in the
world I can to help you; I promise you that, and I mean it, honest."
Charlotte reached around a hand, and clasped her cousin's.
"I'm sorry I spoke so," Rose said.
"Never mind," Charlotte responded, chokingly. She sobbed a little
longer from pure inertia of grief; then she raised herself, shaking
off Rose's hand. "It's all right," said she; "I needn't have minded;
I know you didn't mean anything. It was just--the last straw,
and--when you said that about my wedding-clothes--"
"Oh, Charlotte, you did speak about them yourself first," Rose said,
deprecatingly.
"I did, so nobody else would," returned Charlotte. She wiped her
eyes, drooping her stained face away from her cousin with a kind of
helpless shame; then she smoothed her hair with the palms of her
hands. "I know you didn't mean any harm, Rose," she added, presently.
"I got my silk dress done last Wednesday; I wanted to tell you."
Charlotte tried to smile at Rose with her poor swollen lips and her
reddened eyes.
"I'm sorry I said anything," Rose repeated; "I ought to have known it
would make you feel bad, Charlotte."
"No, you hadn't. I was terrible silly. Don't you want to see my
dress, Rose?"
"Oh, Charlotte! you don't want to show it to me?"
"Yes, I do. I want you to see it--before I pack it away. It's in the
north chamber."
Rose followed Charlotte out of the room across the passageway to the
north chamber. Charlotte had had one brother, who had died some ten
years before, when he was twenty. The north chamber had been his
room, the bureau drawers were packed with his clothes, and the silk
hat which had been the pride of his early manhood hung on the nail
where he had left it, and also his Sunday coat. His mother would not
have them removed, but kept them there, with frequent brushings, to
guard against dust and moths.
Always when Charlotte entered this small long room, which was full of
wavering lines from its uneven floor and walls and ceiling and the
long arabesques on its old blue-and-white paper, whose green paper
curtains with fringed white dimity ones drooping over them were
always drawn, and in summertime when the windows were open undulated
in the wind, she had the sense of a presence, dim, but as positive as
the visions she had used to have of faces in the wandering design of
the old wall-paper when she had studied it in her childhood. Ever
since her brother's death she had had this sense of his presence in
his room; now she thought no more of it than of any familiar figure.
All the grief at his death had vanished, but she never entered his
old room that the thought of him did not rise up before her and stay
with her while she remained.
Now, when she opened the door, and the opposite green and white
curtains flew out in the draught towards her, they were no more
evident than this presence to which she now gave no thought, and
pushed by her brother's memory without a glance.
Rose followed her to the bed. A white linen sheet was laid over the
chintz counterpane. Charlotte lifted the sheet.
"I took the last stitch on it Wednesday night," she said, in a hushed
voice.
"Didn't he come that night?"
"I finished it before he came."
"Did he see it?"
Charlotte nodded. The two girls stood looking solemnly at the silk
dress.
"You can't see it here; it's too dark," said Charlotte, and she
rolled up a window curtain.
"Yes, I can see better," said Rose, in a whisper. "It's beautiful,
Charlotte."
The dress was spread widely over the bed in crisp folds. It was
purple, plaided vaguely with cloudy lines of white and delicate
rose-color. Over it lay a silvery lustre that was the very light of
the silken fabric.
Rose felt it reverently. "How thick it is!" said she.
"Yes, it's a good piece," Charlotte replied.
"You thought you'd have purple?"
"Yes, he liked it."
"Well, it's pretty, and it's becoming to you."
Charlotte took up the skirt, and slipped it, loud with silken
whispers, over her head. It swept out around her in a great circle;
she looked like a gorgeous inverted bell-flower.
"It's beautiful," Rose said.
Charlotte's face, gazing downward at the silken breadths, had quite
its natural expression. It was as if her mind in spite of herself
would stop at old doors.
"Try on the waist," pleaded Rose.
Charlotte slipped off her calico waist, and thrust her firm white
arms into the flaring silken sleeves of the wedding-gown. Her neck
arose from it with a grand curve. She stood before the glass and
strained the buttons together, frowning importantly.
"It fits you like a glove," Rose murmured, admiringly, smoothing
Charlotte's glossy back.
"I've got a spencer-cape to wear over my neck to meeting," Charlotte
said, and she opened the upper-most drawer in the chest and took out
a worked muslin cape, and adjusted it carefully over her shoulders,
pinning it across her bosom with a little brooch of her brother's
hair in a rim of gold.
"It's elegant," said Rose.
"I'll show you my bonnet," said Charlotte. She went into a closet and
emerged with a great green bandbox.
Rose bent over, watching her breathlessly as she opened it. "Oh!" she
cried. "Oh, Charlotte!"
Charlotte held up the bonnet of fine Dunstable straw, flaring in
front, and trimmed under the brim with a delicate lace ruche and a
wreath of feathery white flowers. Bows of white gauze ribbon stood up
from it stiffly. Long ribbon strings floated back over her arm as she
held it up.
"Try it on," said Rose.
Charlotte stepped before the glass and adjusted the bonnet to her
head. She tied the strings carefully under her chin in a great square
bow; then she turned towards Rose. The fine white wreath under the
brim encircled her face like a nimbus; she looked as she might have
done sitting a bride in the meeting-house.
"It's beautiful," Rose said, smiling, with grave eyes. "You look real
handsome in it, Charlotte." Charlotte stood motionless a moment, with
Rose surveying her.
"Oh, Charlotte," Rose cried out, suddenly, "I don't believe but what
you'll have him, after all!" Rose's eyes were sharp upon Charlotte's
face. It was as if the bridal robes, which were so evident, became
suddenly proofs of something tangible and real, like a garment left
by a ghost. Rose felt a sudden conviction that the quarrel was but a
temporary thing; that Charlotte would marry Barney, and that she knew
it.
A change came over Charlotte's face. She began untying the bonnet
strings.
"Sha'n't you?" repeated Rose, breathlessly.
"No, I sha'n't."
Charlotte took the bonnet off and smoothed the creases carefully out
of the strings.
"If I were you," Rose cried out, "I'd feel like tearing that bonnet
to pieces!"
Charlotte replaced it in the bandbox, and began unfastening her
dress.
"I don't see how you can bear the sight of them. I don't believe I
could bear them in the house!" Rose cried out again. "I would put
that dress in the rag-bag if it was mine!" Her cheeks burned and her
eyes were quite fierce upon the dress as Charlotte slipped it off and
it fell to the floor in a rustling heap around her.
"I don't see any sense in losing everything you have ever had because
you haven't got anything now," Charlotte returned, in a stern voice.
She laid the shining silk gown carefully on the bed, and put on her
cotton one again. Her face was quite steady.
Rose watched her with the same sharp question in her eyes. "You know
you and Barney will make it up," she said, at length.
"No, I don't," returned Charlotte. "Suppose we go down-stairs now.
I've got some work I ought to do."
Charlotte pulled down the green paper shades of the windows, and went
out of the room. Rose followed. Charlotte turned to go down-stairs,
but Rose caught her arm.
"Wait a minute," said she. "Look here, Charlotte."
"What is it?"
"Charlotte," said Rose again; then she stopped.
Charlotte turned and looked at her. Rose's eyes met hers, and her
face had a noble expression.
"You write a note to him, and I'll carry it," said Rose. "I'll go
down in the field where he is, on my way home."
Tears sprang into Charlotte's eyes. "You're real good, Rose," she
said; "but I can't."
"Hadn't you better?"
"No; I can't. Don't let's talk any more about it."
Charlotte pushed past Rose's detaining hand, and the girls went
down-stairs. Mrs. Barnard looked around dejectedly at them as they
entered the kitchen. Her eyes were red, and her mouth drooping; she
was clearing the débris of the pies from the table; there was a smell
of baking, but Cephas had gone out. She tried to smile at Rose. "Are
you goin' now?" said she.
"Yes; I've got to. I've got to sew on my muslin dress. When are you
coming over, Aunt Sarah? You haven't been over to our house for an
age."
"I don't care if I never go anywhere!" cried Sarah Barnard, with
sudden desperation. "I'm discouraged." She sank in a chair, and flung
her apron over her face.
"Don't, mother," said Charlotte.
"I can't help it," sobbed her mother. "You're young and you've got
more strength to bear it, but mine's all gone. I feel worse about you
than if it was myself, an' there's so much to put up with besides. I
don't feel as if I could put up with things much longer, nohow."
"Uncle Cephas ought to be ashamed of himself!" Rose cried out.
Sarah stood up. "Well, I don't s'pose I have so much to put up with
as some folks," she said, catching her breath as if it were her
dignity. "Your Uncle Cephas means well. It did seem as if them sorrel
pies were the last straw, but I hadn't ought to have minded it."
"You haven't got to eat sorrel pies, have you?" Rose asked, in a
bewildered way.
"I don't s'pose they'll be any worse than some other things we eat,"
Sarah answered, scraping the pie-board again.
"I don't see how you can."
"I guess they won't hurt us any," Sarah said, shortly, and Rose
looked abashed.
"Well, I must be going," said she.
As she went out, she looked hesitatingly at Charlotte. "Hadn't you
better?" she whispered. Charlotte shook her head, and Rose went out
into the spring sunlight. She bent her head as she went down the road
before the sweet gusts of south wind; the white apple-trees seemed to
sing, for she could not see the birds in them.
Rose's face between the green sides of her bonnet had in it all the
quickened bloom of youth in spring; her eyes had all the blue
surprise of violets; she panted softly between red swelling lips as
she walked; pulses beat in her crimson cheeks. Her slender figure
yielded to the wind as to a lover. She passed Barney Thayer's new
house; then she came opposite the field where he was at work
ploughing, driving a white horse, stooping to his work in his blue
frock.
Rose stood still and looked at him; then she walked on a little way;
then she paused again. Barney never looked around at her. There was
the width of a field between them.
Finally Rose went through the open bars into the first field. She
crossed it slowly, holding up her skirts where there was a wet gleam
through darker grass, and getting a little nosegay of violets with a
busy air, as if that were what she had come for. She passed through
the other bars into the second field, and Barney was only a little
way from her. He did not glance at her then. He was ploughing with
the look that Cadmus might have worn preparing the ground for the
dragon's teeth.
Rose held up her skirts, and went along the furrows behind him.
"Hullo, Barney," she said, in a trembling voice.
"Hullo," he returned, without looking around, and he kept on, with
Rose following.
"Barney," said she, timidly.
"Well?" said Barney, half turning, with a slight show of courtesy.
"Do you know if Rebecca is at home?"
"I don't know whether she is or not."
Barney held stubbornly to his rocking plough, and Rose followed.
"Barney," said she, again.
"Well?"
"Stop a minute, and look round here."
"I can't stop to talk."
"Yes, you can; just a minute. Look round here."
Barney stopped, and turned a stern, miserable face over his shoulder.
"I've been up to Charlotte's," Rose said.
"I don't know what that is to me."
"Barney Thayer, ain't you ashamed of yourself?"
"I can't stop to talk."
"Yes, you can. Look here. Charlotte feels awfully."
Barney stood with his back to Rose; his very shoulders had a dogged
look.
"Barney, why don't you make up with her?"
Barney stood still.
"Barney, she feels awfully because you didn't come back when she
called you last night."
Barney made no reply. He and the white horse stood like statues.
"Barney, why don't you make up with her? I wish you would." Rose's
voice was full of tender inflections; it might have been that of an
angel peace-making.
Barney turned around between the handles of the plough, and looked at
her steadily. "You don't know anything about it, Rose," he said.
Rose looked up in his face, and her own was full of fine pleading.
"Oh, Barney," she said, "poor Charlotte does feel so bad! I know that
anyhow."
"You don't know how I am situated. I can't--"
"Do go and see her, Barney."
"Do you think I'm going into Cephas Barnard's house after he's
ordered me out?"
"Go up the road a little way, and she'll come and meet you. I'll run
ahead and tell her."
Barney shook his head. "I can't; you don't know anything about it,
Rose." He looked into Rose's eyes. "You're real good, Rose," he said,
as if with a sudden recognition of her presence.
Rose blushed softly, a new look came into her eyes, she smiled up at
him, and her face was all pink and sweet and fully set towards him,
like a rose for which he was a sun.
"No, I ain't good," she whispered.
"Yes, you are; but I can't. You don't know anything about it." He
swung about and grasped his plough-handles again.
"Barney, do stop a minute," Rose pleaded.
"I can't stop any longer; there's no use talking," Barney said; and
he went on remorselessly through the opening furrow. Just before he
turned the corner Rose made a little run forward and caught his arm.
"You don't think I've done anything out of the way speaking to you
about it, do you, Barney?" she said, and she was half crying.
"I don't know why I should think you had; I suppose you meant all
right," Barney said. He pulled his arm away softly, and jerked the
right rein to turn the horse. "G'lang!" he cried out, and strode
forward with a conclusive air.
Rose stood looking after him a minute; then she struck off across the
field. Her knees trembled as she stepped over the soft plough-ridges.
When she was out on the road again she went along quickly until she
came to the Thayer house. She was going past that when she heard some
one calling her name, and turned to see who it was.
Rebecca Thayer came hurrying out of the yard with a basket on her
arm. "Wait a minute," she called, "and I'll go along with you."