thousand dollars. Yes, he _is_ brave. I went to the same school with him
once, and saw him fight a big boy twice his size--such a nasty boy, who
called me 'Fatty,' and made a kissing noise with his lips just to scare
me--and poor little Cyril Winslow got awfully beaten, and when I saw him
on the ground, with his nose bleeding and that big brute pounding him, I
ran to the water-bucket, and poured the whole bucket on that big
bullying boy and stopped the fight, just as the teacher got on the
scene. I cried over little Cyril Winslow. He was crying himself. 'I
ain't crying because he hurt me,' he sobbed; 'I'm crying because I'm so
mad I didn't lick him!' I wonder if he remembers that episode?"
"Perhaps," said Mrs. Ellis.
"Maggie, what makes you think he is falling in love with Sibyl?"
Mrs. Ellis laughed. "I dare say he _isn't_ in love with Sibyl," said
she. "I think the main reason was his always riding by here instead of
taking the shorter road down the other street."
"Does he always ride by here? I hadn't noticed."
"Always!" said Mrs. Ellis. "_I_ had noticed."
"I am sorry for him," said Lorania, musingly. "I think Sibyl is very
much taken with that young Captain Carr at the Arsenal. Young girls
always affect the army. He is a nice fellow, but I don't think he is the
man Winslow is. Now, Maggie, advise me about the suit. I don't want to
look like the escaped fat lady of a museum."
Lorania thought no more of Sibyl's love affairs. If she thought of the
Winslows, it was to wish that Mrs. Winslow would sell or rent her
pasture, which, in addition to her own and Mrs. Ellis' pastures thrown
into one, would make such a delightful bicycle track.
The Winslow house was very different from the two villas that were the
pride of Fairport. A little story and a half cottage peeped out on the
road behind the tall maples that were planted when Winslow was a boy.
But there was a wonderful green velvet lawn, and the tulips and sweet
peas and pansies that blazed softly nearer the house were as beautiful
as those over which Miss Lorania's gardener toiled and worried.
Mrs. Winslow was a little woman who showed the fierce struggle of her
early life only in the deeper lines between her delicate eyebrows and
the expression of melancholy patience in her brown eyes.
She always wore a widow's cap and a black gown. In the mornings she
donned a blue figured apron of stout and serviceable stuff; in the
afternoon, an apron of that sheer white lawn used by bishops and smart
young waitresses. Of an afternoon, in warm weather, she was accustomed
to sit on the eastern piazza, next to the Hopkins place, and rock as she
sewed. She was thus sitting and sewing when she beheld an extraordinary
procession cross the Hopkins lawn. First marched the tall trainer, Shuey
Cardigan, who worked by day in the Lossing furniture factory, and gave
bicycle lessons at the armory evenings. He was clad in a white sweater
and buff leggings, and was wheeling a lady's bicycle. Behind him walked
Miss Hopkins in a gray suit, the skirt of which only came to her
ankles--she, always so dignified in her toilets.
"Land's sakes!" gasped Mrs. Winslow, "if she ain't going to ride a bike!
Well, what next?"
What really happened next was the sneaking (for no other word does
justice to the cautious and circuitous movements of her) of Mrs. Winslow
to the stable, which had one window facing the Hopkins pasture. No cows
were grazing in the pasture. All around the grassy plateau twinkled a
broad brownish-yellow track. At one side of this track a bench had been
placed, and a table, pleasing to the eye, with jugs and glasses. Mrs.
Ellis, in a suit of the same undignified brevity and ease as Miss
Hopkins', sat on the bench supporting her own wheel. Shuey Cardigan was
drawn up to his full six feet of strength, and, one arm in the air, was
explaining the theory of the balance of power. It was an uncanny moment
to Lorania. She eyed the glistening, restless thing that slipped beneath
her hand, and her fingers trembled. If she could have fled in secret she
would. But since flight was not possible, she assumed a firm expression.
Mrs. Ellis wore a smile of studied and sickly cheerfulness.
"Don't you think it is very _high_?" said Lorania. "I can _never_ get up
on it!"
"It will be by the block at first," said Shuey, in the soothing tones of
a jockey to a nervous horse; "it's easy by the block. And I'll be
steadying it, of course."
"Don't they have any with larger saddles? It is a _very_ small saddle."
"They're all of a size. It wouldn't look sporty larger; it would look
like a special make. Yous wouldn't want a special make."
Lorania thought that she would be thankful for a special make, but she
suppressed the unsportsmanlike thought. "The pedals are very small, too,
Cardigan. Are you _sure_ they can hold me?"
"They could hold two of ye, Miss Hopkins. Now sit aisy and graceful as
ye would on your chair at home, hold the shoulders back, and toe in a
bit on the pedals--ye won't be skinning your ankles so much then--and
hold your foot up ready to get the other pedal. Hold light on the
steering-bar. Push off hard. _Now!_"
"Will you hold me? I'm going--Oh, it's like riding an earthquake!"
Here Shuey made a run, letting the wheel have its own wild way--to teach
the balance. "Keep the front wheel under you!" he cried cheerfully.
"Niver mind _where_ you go. Keep a-pedalling; whatever you do, keep
a-pedalling!"
"But I haven't got but one pedal!" gasped the rider.
"Ye lost it?"
"No; I _never had_ but one! Oh, don't let me fall!"
"Oh, ye lost it in the beginning; now, then, I'll hold it steady, and
you get both feet right. Here we go!"
Swaying frightfully from side to side, and wrenched from capsizing the
wheel by the full exercise of Shuey's great muscles, Miss Hopkins reeled
over the track. At short intervals she lost her pedals, and her feet,
for some strange reason, instead of seeking the lost, simply curled up
as if afraid of being hit. She gripped the steering-handles with an iron
grasp, and her turns were such as an engine makes. Nevertheless Shuey
got her up the track for some hundred feet, and then by a herculean
sweep turned her round and rolled her back to the block. It was at this
painful moment, when her whole being was concentrated on the effort to
keep from toppling against Shuey, and even more to keep from toppling
away from him, that Lorania's strained gaze suddenly fell on the
frightened and sympathetic face of Mrs. Winslow. The good woman saw no
fun in the spectacle, but rather an awful risk to life and limb. Their
eyes met. Not a change passed over Miss Hopkins' features; but she
looked up as soon as she was safe on the ground, and smiled. In a
moment, before Mrs. Winslow could decide whether to run or to stand her
ground, she saw the cyclist approaching--on foot.
"Won't you come in and sit down?" she said, smiling. "We are trying our
new wheels."
And because she did not know how to refuse, Mrs. Winslow suffered
herself to be handed over the fence. She sat on the bench beside Miss
Hopkins in the prim attitude which had pertained to gentility in her
youth, her hands loosely clasping each other, her feet crossed at the
ankles.
"It's an awful sight, ain't it?" she breathed, "those little shiny
things; I don't see how you ever git on them."
"I don't," said Miss Hopkins. "The only way I shall ever learn to start
off is to start without the pedals. Does your son ride, Mrs. Winslow?"
"No, ma'am," said Mrs. Winslow; "but he knows how. When he was a boy
nothing would do but he must have a bicycle, one of those things most as
big as a mill wheel, and if you fell off you broke yourself somewhere,
sure. I always expected he'd be brought home in pieces. So I don't think
he'd have any manner of difficulty. Why, look at your friend; she's most
riding alone!"
"She could always do everything better than I," cried Lorania, with
ungrudging admiration. "See how she jumps off! Now I can't jump off any
more than I can jump on. It seems so ridiculous to be told to press hard
on the pedal on the side where you want to jump, and swing your further
leg over first, and cut a kind of figure eight with your legs, and turn
your wheel the way you don't want to go--all at once. While I'm trying
to think of all those directions I always fall off. I got that wheel
only yesterday, and fell before I even got away from the block. One of
my arms looks like a Persian ribbon."
Mrs. Winslow cried out in unfeigned sympathy. She wished Miss Hopkins
would use her linament that she used for Cyril when he was hurt by the
burglars at the bank; he was bruised "terrible."
"That must have been an awful time to you," said Lorania, looking with
more interest than she had ever felt on the meek little woman; and she
noticed the tremble in the decorously clasped hands.
"Yes, ma'am," was all she said.
"I've often looked over at you on the piazza, and thought how cozy you
looked. Mr. Winslow always seems to be home evenings."
"Yes, ma'am. We sit a great deal on the piazza. Cyril's a good boy; he
wa'n't nine when his father died; and he's been like a man helping me.
There never was a boy had such willing little feet. And he'd set right
there on the steps and pat my slipper and say what he'd git me when he
got to earning money; and he's got me every last thing, foolish and all,
that he said. There's that black satin gown, a sin and a shame for a
plain body like me, but he would git it. Cyril's got a beautiful
disposition, too, jest like his pa's, and he's a handy man about the
house, and prompt at his meals. I wonder sometimes if Cyril was to git
married if his wife would mind his running over now and then and setting
with me awhile."
She was speaking more rapidly, and her eyes strayed wistfully over to
the Hopkins piazza, where Sibyl was sitting with the young soldier.
Lorania looked at her pityingly.
"Why, surely," said she.
"Mothers have kinder selfish feelings," said Mrs. Winslow, moistening
her lips and drawing a quick breath, still watching the girl on the
piazza. "It's so sweet and peaceful for them, they forget their sons may
want something more. But it's kinder hard giving all your little
comforts up at once when you've had him right with you so long, and
could cook just what he liked, and go right into his room nights if he
coughed. It's all right, all right, but it's kinder hard. And beautiful
young ladies that have had everything all their lives might--might not
understand that a homespun old mother isn't wanting to force herself on
them at all when they have company, and they have no call to fear it."
There was no doubt, however obscure the words seemed, that Mrs. Winslow
had a clear purpose in her mind, nor that she was tremendously in
earnest. Little blotches of red dabbled her cheeks, her breath came more
quickly, and she swallowed between her words. Lorania could see the
quiver in the muscles of her throat. She clasped her hands tight lest
they should shake. "He is in love with Sibyl," thought Lorania. "The
poor woman!" She felt sorry for her, and she spoke gently and
reassuringly:
"No girl with a good heart can help feeling tenderly toward her
husband's mother."
Mrs. Winslow nodded. "You're real comforting," said she. She was silent
a moment, and then said, in a different tone: "You ain't got a large
enough track. Wouldn't you like to have our pasture too?"
Lorania expressed her gratitude, and invited the Winslows to see the
practice.
"My niece will come out to-morrow," she said, graciously.
"Yes? She is a real fine-appearing young lady," said Mrs. Winslow.
Both the cyclists exulted. Neither of them, however, was prepared to
behold the track made and the fence down the very next morning when they
came out, about ten o'clock, to the west side of Miss Hopkins'
boundaries.
"As sure as you live, Maggie," exclaimed Lorania, eagerly, "he's got it
all done! Now, that is something like a lover. I only hope his heart
won't be bruised as black and blue as I am with the wheel!"
"Shuey says the only harm your falls do you is to take away your
confidence," said Mrs. Ellis.
"He wouldn't say so if he could see my _knees_!" retorted Miss Hopkins.
Mrs. Ellis, it will be observed, sheered away from the love affairs of
Mr. Cyril Winslow. She had not yet made up her mind. And Mrs. Ellis, who
had been married, did not jump at conclusions regarding the heart of man
so readily as her spinster friend. She preferred to talk of the bicycle.
Nor did Miss Hopkins refuse the subject. To her at this moment the most
important object on the globe was the shining machine which she would
allow no hand but hers to oil and dust. Both Mrs. Ellis and she were
simply prostrated (as to their mental powers) by this new sport. They
could not think nor talk nor read of anything but _the wheel_.
Between their accidents, they obtained glimpses of an exquisite
exhilaration. And there was also to be counted the approval of their
consciences, for they felt that no Turkish bath could wring out moisture
from their systems like half an hour's pumping at the bicycle treadles.
Lorania during the month had ridden through one bottle of liniment and
two of witch hazel, and by the end of the second bottle could ride a
short distance alone. But Lorania could not yet dismount unassisted, and
several times she had felled poor Winslow to the earth when he rashly
adventured to stop her. Captain Carr had a peculiar, graceful fling of
the arm, catching the saddle bar with one hand while he steadied the
handles with the other. He did not hesitate in the least to grab
Lorania's belt if necessary. But poor modest Winslow, who fell upon the
wheel and dared not touch the hem of a lady's bicycle skirt, was as one
in the path of a cyclone, and appeared daily in a fresh pair of white
trousers.
"Yous have now," Shuey remarked impressively, one day--"yous have now
arrived at the most difficult and dangerous period in learning the
wheel. It's similar to a baby when it's first learned to walk but ain't
yet got sense in walking. When it was little it would stay put wherever
ye put it, and it didn't know enough to go by itself, which is similar
to you. When I was holding ye you couldn't fall, but now you're off
alone depindent on yourself, object-struck by every tree, taking most
of the pasture to turn in, and not able to git off save by falling--"
"Oh, couldn't you go with her somehow?" exclaimed Mrs. Winslow, appalled
at the picture. "Wouldn't a rope round her be some help? I used to put
it round Cyril when he was learning to walk."
"Well, no, ma'am," said Shuey, patiently. "Don't you be scared; the
riding will come; she's getting on grandly. And ye should see Mr.
Winslow. 'Tis a pleasure to teach him. He rode in one lesson. I ain't
learning him nothing but tricks now."
"But, Mr. Winslow, why don't you ride here--with us?" said Sibyl, with
her coquettish and flattering smile. "We're always hearing of your
beautiful riding. Are we never to see it?"
"I think Mr. Winslow is waiting for that swell English cycle suit that I
hear about," said the captain, grinning; and Winslow grew red to his
eyelids.
Lorania gave an indignant side glance at Sibyl. Why need the girl make
game of an honest man who loved her? Sibyl was biting her lips and
darting side glances at the captain. She called the pasture practice
slow, but she seemed, nevertheless, to enjoy herself sitting on the
bench, the captain on one side and Winslow on the other, rattling off
her girlish jokes, while her aunt and Mrs. Ellis, with the anxious, set
faces of the beginner, were pedalling frantically after Cardigan.
Lorania began to pity Winslow, for it was growing plain to her that
Sibyl and the captain understood each other. She thought that even if
Sibyl did care for the soldier, she need not be so careless of Winslow's
feelings. She talked with the cashier herself, trying to make amends for
Sibyl's absorption in the other man, and she admired the fortitude that
concealed the pain that he must feel. It became quite the expected thing
for the Winslows to be present at the practice; but Winslow had not yet
appeared on his wheel. He used to bring a box of candy with him, or
rather three boxes--one for each lady, he said--and a box of peppermints
for his mother. He was always very attentive to his mother.
"And fancy, Aunt Margaret," laughed Sibyl, "he has asked both auntie and
me to the theater. He is not going to compromise himself by singling one
of us out. He's a careful soul. By the way, Aunt Margaret, Mrs. Winslow
was telling me yesterday that I am the image of auntie at my age. Am I?
Do I look like her? Was she as slender as I?"
"Almost," said Mrs. Ellis, who was not so inflexibly truthful as her
friend.
"No, Sibyl," said Lorania, with a deep, deep sigh, "I was always plump;
I was a chubby _child_! And oh, what do you think I heard in the crowd
at Manly's once? One woman said to another, 'Miss Hopkins has got a
wheel.' 'Miss Sibyl?' said the other. 'No; the stout Miss Hopkins,' said
the first creature; and the second--" Lorania groaned.
"What _did_ she say to make you feel that way?"
"She said--she said, 'Oh, my!'" answered Lorania, with a dying look.
"Well, she was horrid," said Mrs. Ellis; "but you know you have grown
thin. Come on; let's ride!"
"I _never_ shall be able to ride," said Lorania, gloomily. "I can get
on, but I can't get off. And they've taken off the brake, so I can't
stop. And I'm object-struck by everything I look at. Some day I shall
look down hill. Well, my will's in the lower drawer of the mahogany
desk."
Perhaps Lorania had an occult inkling of the future. For this is what
happened: That evening Winslow rode on to the track in his new English
bicycle suit, which had just come. He hoped that he didn't look like a
fool in those queer clothes. But the instant he entered the pasture he
saw something that drove everything else out of his head, and made him
bend over the steering-bar and race madly across the green; Miss
Hopkins' bicycle was running away down hill! Cardigan, on foot, was
pelting obliquely, in the hopeless thought to intercept her, while Mrs.
Ellis, who was reeling over the ground with her own bicycle, wheeled as
rapidly as she could to the brow of the hill, where she tumbled off,
and, abandoning the wheel, rushed on foot to her friend's rescue.
She was only in time to see a flash of silver and ebony and a streak of
brown dart before her vision and swim down the hill like a bird. Lorania
was still in the saddle, pedalling from sheer force of habit, and
clinging to the handle-bars. Below the hill was a stone wall, and
farther was the creek. There was a narrow opening in the wall where the
cattle went down to drink; if she could steer through that she would
have nothing worse than soft water and mud; but there was not one
chance in a thousand that she could pass that narrow space. Mrs.
Winslow, horror-stricken, watched the rescuer, who evidently was cutting
across to catch the bicycle.
"He's riding out of sight!" thought Shuey, in the rear. He himself did
not slacken his speed, although he could not be in time for the
catastrophe. Suddenly he stiffened; Winslow was close to the runaway
wheel.
"Grab her!" yelled Shuey. "Grab her by the belt! _Oh, Lord!_"
The exclamation exploded like the groan of a shell. For while Winslow's
bicycling was all that could be wished, and he flung himself in the path
of the on-coming wheel with marvelous celerity and precision, he had not
the power to withstand the never yet revealed number of pounds carried
by Miss Lorania, impelled by the rapid descent and gathering momentum at
every whirl. They met; he caught her; but instantly he was rolling down
the steep incline and she was doubled up on the grass. He crashed
sickeningly against the stone wall; she lay stunned and still on the
sod; and their friends, with beating hearts, slid down to them. Mrs.
Winslow was on the brow of the hill. She blesses Shuey to this day for
the shout he sent up, "Nobody killed, and I guess no bones broken."
* * * * *
When Margaret went home that evening, having seen her friend safely in
bed, not much the worse for her fall, she was told that Cardigan wished
to see her. Shuey produced something from his pocket, saying: "I picked
this up on the hill, ma'am, after the accident. It maybe belongs to him,
or it maybe belongs to her; I'm thinking the safest way is to just give
it to you." He handed Mrs. Ellis a tiny gold-framed miniature of Lorania
in a red leather case.
* * * * *
The morning was a sparkling June morning, dewy and fragrant, and the
sunlight burnished the handles and pedals of the friends' bicycles
standing on the piazza unheeded. It was the hour for morning practice,
but Miss Hopkins slept in her chamber, and Mrs. Ellis sat in the little
parlor adjoining, and thought.
She did not look surprised at the maid's announcement that Mrs. Winslow
begged to see her for a few moments. Mrs. Winslow was pale. She was a
good sketch of discomfort on the very edge of her chair, clad in the
black silk which she wore Sundays, her head crowned with her bonnet of
state, and her hands stiff in a pair of new gloves.
"I hope you'll excuse me not sending up a card," she began. "Cyril got
me some going on a year ago, and I _thought_ I could lay my hand right
on 'em, but I'm so nervous this morning I hunted all over, and they
wasn't anywhere. I won't keep you. I jest wanted to ask if you picked up
anything--a little red Russia-leather case--"
"Was it a miniature--a miniature of my friend Miss Hopkins?"
"I thought it all over, and I came to explain. You no doubt think it
strange; and I can assure you that my son never let any human being look
at that picture. I never knew about it myself till it was lost and he
got up out of his bed--he ain't hardly able to walk--and staggered over
here to look for it, and I followed him; and so he _had_ to tell me. He
had it painted from a picture that came out in the papers. He felt it
was an awful liberty. But--you don't know how my boy feels, Mrs. Ellis;
he has worshipped that woman for years. He ain't never had a thought of
anybody but her since they was children in school; and yet's he's been
so modest and so shy of pushing himself forward that he didn't do a
thing until I put him on to help you with this bicycle."
Margaret Ellis did not know what to say. She thought of the marquis; and
Mrs. Winslow poured out her story: "He ain't never said a word to me
till this morning. But don't I _know_? Don't I know who looked out so
careful for her investments? Don't I know who was always looking out for
her interest--silent, and always keeping himself in the background? Why,
she couldn't even buy a cow that he wa'n't looking round to see that she
got a good one! 'Twas him saw the gardener, and kept him from buying
that cow with tuberculosis, 'cause he knew about the herd. He knew by
finding out. He worshipped the very cows she owned, you may say, and
I've seen him patting and feeding up her dogs; it's to our house that
big mastiff always goes every night. Mrs. Ellis, it ain't often that a
woman gits love such as my son is offering, only he da'sn't offer it,
and it ain't often a woman is loved by such a good man as my son. He
ain't got any bad habits; he'll die before he wrongs anybody; and he
has got the sweetest temper you ever see; and he's the tidiest man about
a house you could ask, and the promptest about meals."
Mrs. Ellis looked at her flushed face, and sent another flood of color
into it, for she said, "Mrs. Winslow, I don't know how much good I may
be able to do, but I am on your side."
Her eyes followed the little black figure when it crossed the lawn. She
wondered whether her advice was good, for she had counseled that Winslow
come over in the evening.
"Maggie," said a voice. Lorania was in the doorway. "Maggie," she said,
"I ought to tell you that I heard every word."
"Then _I_ can tell _you_," cried Mrs. Ellis, "that he is fifty times
more of a man than the marquis, and loves you fifty thousand times
better!"
Lorania made no answer, not even by a look. What she felt Mrs. Ellis
could not guess. Nor was she any wiser when Winslow appeared at her
gate, just as the sun was setting.
"I didn't think I would better intrude on Miss Hopkins," said he, "but
perhaps you could tell me how she is this evening. My mother told me
how kind you were, and perhaps you--you would advise me if I might
venture to send Miss Hopkins some flowers."
Out of the kindness of her heart Mrs. Ellis averted her eyes from his
face; thus she was able to perceive Lorania saunter out of the Hopkins
gate. So changed was she by the bicycle practice that, wrapped in her
niece's shawl, she made Margaret think of the girl. An inspiration
flashed to her; she knew the cashier's dependence on his eye-glasses,
and he was not wearing them.
"If you want to know how Miss Hopkins is, why not speak to her niece
now?" she said.
He started. He saw Miss Sibyl, as he supposed, and he went swiftly down
the street. "Miss Sibyl," he began, "may I ask how is your aunt?"--and
then she turned.