MRS. DIXON’S INVITATION.
While Connie and Persis waited after service to speak to Mrs. Dixon,
the others walked on.
“Let us stand here in the vestibule,” said Connie, “and then we shall
be sure not to miss her.” And they waited till Mrs. Dixon appeared. She
was surprised and glad to see the girls, but looked a little puzzled
when Persis told where she was stopping. “I wish you could spend part
of your time with me,” she said, looking from one girl to another.
“Oh, I can’t spare her,” said Connie.
Mrs. Dixon smiled, but she looked thoughtful immediately after.
“Couldn’t you both come and spend Saturday and Sunday with me?” she
presently asked. Persis’s look of pleasure gave her answer, but Connie
looked doubtful.
“I am sure your father would not object; and if Mrs. Steuart will
consent, I shall be very glad to have you,” continued Mrs. Dixon.
“If Persis likes, I shall enjoy coming,” said Connie, “and I don’t
think there will be any difficulty about the consent.”
In consequence Persis returned from church with a lighter heart, and
felt that she could eat her Thanksgiving dinner with a real sense of
gratitude since her stay at the Steuarts’ was to be shortened by two
days.
“I will send the carriage for you early on Saturday,” Mrs. Dixon had
said, and Persis counted the hours. There was an honest intention on
the part of the Steuarts to make the girl have a good time, but the
entertainment provided was of such a different character from that to
which Persis was accustomed that she shrank from it. She wondered how
people who pleaded poverty could afford to buy so much confectionery,
and could put such an amount of trimming on their frocks. She had never
been used to dressing conspicuously and sitting at a front window in
order to attract attention, and make remarks on passers by; to laugh
and smirk if a young man chanced to look up; to romp with casual
callers, or to go from shop to shop for the mere purpose of seeing the
crowd and getting into conversation with the clerks. She was so full of
wonder at all this behavior that she made a clean breast of it to Mrs.
Dixon as soon as an opportunity came.
“My dear,” said that lady, “I am so sorry it happened so. I wish your
mother had written to me before you decided to go home with Connie.
The Stewarts are not persons your parents would choose for your
associates. I do not mean that they are bad people. The girls are
simply silly, brainless creatures, who err because they have never been
used to refined influences. Poor little Connie should have better
surroundings. She is the daughter of a dear school-mate of mine who
died when Connie was scarcely more than a baby. Connie’s father married
for his second wife a woman who was not his social equal. She has
been very good to Connie in many ways, and while I regret the child’s
environment, there is nothing much that can be done. I think her school
association will help her, and I hope some day she will be a fine
woman. She has a small fortune left by her mother which will educate
her and give her a little income when she is through school. So she is
not dependent upon her father. Help her all you can, Persis, without
compromising yourself. It is a difficult case and one in which it is
hard to do just right.”
Persis looked immensely relieved. “Oh, Mrs. Dixon,” she said, “you were
so good to invite us here! I should have perished with homesickness if
I had stayed there till Monday; and they really tried to be kind. I
felt so ungrateful, and I didn’t want to hurt their feelings.”
“I know, dear; it was a hard position for you. Now, we must try to do
our best for Constance. I am so glad you find her companionable, and
I hope some day she will prove worthy of the sweet woman who was her
mother. Mere pride of birth is a small matter. No doubt the Stewarts
point to as fine ancestry as you or I, but we cannot help making
social distinctions, and although Mrs. Steuart may be an honest,
well-intentioned woman, she does not rear her daughters as judiciously
as your mother does hers; moreover, you are apt to meet at her house
persons of whom your parents would not approve; so this must be your
last visit there.”
“Oh, Mrs. Dixon, you are such a comfort,” returned Persis. “I am so
glad not to give up Connie, for, I really like her, but I shall never
again, never, insist upon carrying things with such a high hand. I was
so indignant when Lisa suggested that I might make a mistake.”
“‘We are all poor critters,’” laughed Mrs. Dixon. “Where did you leave
Connie?”
“Curled up in the library with a book.”
“Tell her we must get ready for a drive.” And Persis danced out of the
room very happy that all difficult questions were explained.
“What are you reading, Con?” she asked, as she peeped into the quiet
room.
“Oh, such a lovely book!” sighed Connie. “Isn’t it deliciously peaceful
here, Persis? I mean to have just such a home when I grow up. I’m going
to have shelves full of books, and an open fire, and a chair just like
this,—it is a real sleepy hollow; and I’m going to have my bedroom
facing the west, so I can always see the sunset, and all those pretty
silver things Mrs. Dixon has on her dressing-bureau I’m going to have
on mine.”
“What will Mrs. Dixon do?”
“I don’t mean I am going to have hers, goosey,—some just like them.”
Persis was balancing herself on the arm of a big chair. “Did you know
that we are to go to the cricket club this afternoon?”
“No. Are we really?”
“Yes. Mrs. Dixon said we were to join Walter there; and we can play
shuffleboard or roll tenpins or do anything like that if we choose.
Isn’t it fine?”
“I should say so. I have always been wild to go into that club-house
on the cricket grounds, and I never had a chance before this. I have
watched the girls play tennis there and did so wish I belonged to the
club.”
“Well, now’s your chance. Come, get ready.” And the two girls hastened
up-stairs to prepare for the event.
“I wish I had a new coat,” said Persis; “but it was Lisa’s turn this
winter. I don’t generally mind having hand-me-downs, except when I am
away from home, and then I like to be spick and span from head to foot.
Never mind, I have two dollars’ worth of elegance in the shape of a
pair of fine new gloves that grandma gave me just before I came away.
And I have a new hat; the Pigeon had to take mine. I believe, after
all, I am going to be the shortest of the trio, and will have to wear
Mell’s frocks in a year or two. Won’t that be horrid?”
“Who is the Pigeon?” asked Connie, laughing.
“Don’t you know? Mell. We call her that for fun, because she is given
to turning in her toes; and we tell her that sometimes she stands on
the curb as if she had just alighted there, and that she has a way of
looking up and down the street as if she were making up her mind to
which roof she would fly next; so we call her ‘the Pigeon.’ Lisa is
called ‘Lady Dignity,’ or sometimes ‘Dig,’ for short.”
“And what do they call you?”
“Tommy,” replied Persis, laughing. “You can easily guess why. Come, I
hear the carriage. Don’t you like Walter Dixon?”
“I never met him,” confessed Connie. “I have often met Dr. Dixon, and I
like him, he is so jolly.”
“Walter is just like him,” Persis informed her; “so you’ll be sure to
get along well with him.” And the girls started down-stairs to meet
Mrs. Dixon, who was waiting for them in the hall.
They returned from their expedition in high spirits. The girls had
acquitted themselves fairly well at the shuffleboard, which they
thought fine fun, and Walter had shown them over the pretty club-house,
and had kept them laughing all the way home by his flow of nonsense.
“Now, children,” Mrs. Dixon said, when, after a late dinner, all
adjourned to the library, “what do you want to do,—read, play games,
have some music, or what?”
“Let’s get up an impromptu play,” suggested Walter. “I am capable of
taking half a dozen characters at once, and if one of the girls will
help, we can have some fun.”
“I’d much rather be audience,” said Connie; “indeed I should.”
Persis’s eyes sparkled, for there was nothing she enjoyed more than
just such a performance, which would give play to her imagination, and
in which she could exercise her wit, and she nodded a ready assent
when Walter looked at her inquiringly.
“Then Connie and I can keep each other company,” Mrs. Dixon said. “The
doctor is a very uncertain quantity, and we can never depend upon
having his society, although he may be in at any moment. You know,
Walter, that you are welcome to any of the household possessions in
reason, and you always have a pile of properties to draw upon, I know.
He has a way of utilizing the most unusual articles,” she informed the
girls, “so you need not be surprised at anything he may produce.”
Using the library as a stage, the players sent the audience to
the adjoining room, and after many journeys to and from the stage
were taken and sundry thuds were heard, the curtain rose upon the
first scene. This discovered Persis as an old woman at a washtub,
while Walter, as an antiquated specimen of rusticity, carried on
a violent altercation with his partner upon the subject of taking
summer boarders. The rosy Persis was such a very mirthful old woman,
in spite of her queer cap and whitened hair, that the old man with
the sheep-skin “chin-whiskers,” old straw hat, and dejected-looking
appearance generally, was obliged to frown down her merriment
continually, while Mrs. Dixon and Connie laughed till the tears came.
The next scene presented Walter as the boarder, who was also the
villain of the play, and pretended to be scheming to win the affection
of a country maid—represented by Persis—in order to gain possession
of the property belonging to the old people whose daughter Persis
was supposed to be. After a dramatic interview, in which the villain
vowed vengeance upon an unfortunate individual named Willie, who was
the lover of the country maid, Walter in a monologue planned how he
should get rid of the simple-hearted Willie, and decided that he would
shoot him while the two were out hunting together, pretending that it
should be considered an accident. The _dénouement_ came when, after a
startling report, Walter staggered in bearing the form of his victim.
The appearance of the figure, far from causing tears from the audience,
caused them to laugh uncontrolledly, for the cumbersome and unwieldy
lay-figure which Walter had constructed out of brooms and pillows,
dressed in a suit of old clothes, and surmounted with a false-face and
a wig of astrachan cloth, was such a ludicrous object that Persis, as
the broken-hearted maid, shook with laughter as she buried her face in
her hands. She recovered, however, and her simulated agony over such
a ridiculous-looking creature nearly upset even Walter’s gravity. So
when the scene concluded with Persis propping up the luckless Willie
and announcing in ecstatic tones that he still lived, while she gazed
tenderly at the simpering false-face, such laughter ensued that the
play was pronounced ended.
“My goodness! we’ve taken up nearly the whole evening,” exclaimed
Persis. “I’m all tired out with my agonizing. Did I do well, Mrs.
Dixon?”
“Remarkably so, considering the object of your devotion,” laughed Mrs.
Dixon. “You are ready for some hot chocolate I hope. We’ll have it
with some cake in the library. Where is Walter?”
“He has gone to remove his villany,” said Persis, laughing. “Did you
ever see such an evil-looking wretch as he made of himself with that
fierce black moustache?”
“Where did he get it?” asked Connie.
“It’s a piece of monkey fur,” replied Persis. “I think Walter is very
ingenious. I do wish you lived nearer us, Mrs. Dixon, we could all
have such good times together; just like one family, for Walter, being
Basil’s cousin, would make him one of us.”
“I sometimes wish so, too,” returned Mrs. Dixon, “although we have
many ties here, and Walter has some pleasant friends among his
college-mates. I should be glad, however, if he had a sister. I think
it would be better for him to be thrown more with nice girls, for,
close friends as we two are, the society of young people is good for
him, and I often think how pleasant it would have been for him if his
little sister had lived, and they could have had the same circle of
friends.”
“And we three Holmes girls have no brother,” said Persis. “Oh, yes;
we count Basil and Porter as brothers now, so the family isn’t so
one-sided as it used to be. I like Basil better than Porter, but they
are both nice boys, and we all have lively times at home, I can tell
you.”
Monday morning came all too soon, notwithstanding Persis’s homesick
attack of Thanksgiving-day. “I have had such a good time,” she told
Mrs. Dixon as she took her leave.
And yet she went back home in quite a subdued frame of mind.
“I am wild to hear what sort of a time you had,” said Lisa, on their
way home from school, for an early train had given Connie and Persis
barely time to reach school by nine o’clock.
“Oh, I had a nice time,” said Persis, rather vaguely.
Lisa looked at her. “You aren’t a bit enthusiastic.”
“I was so glad to see Mrs. Dixon,” returned Persis, with an increase of
animation. “We had a lovely time at her house.”
“Mrs. Dixon? Oh, yes; of course, we all love to be with her. Did you go
to her house?”
“I spent Saturday and Sunday there; so did Connie.”
“You did?” And Lisa looked curiously at her sister. “Perse, you’re
hedging. Tell me straight out about the Steuarts.”
And Persis, too frank to conceal anything, told all.
“Then I was right,” declared Lisa, triumphantly. “You’ll believe me
next time. I ought to know better, being older than you.”
“Well, I don’t care; Connie is a nice girl, and I am going to stand by
her.”
“Of course,” rejoined Lisa, with her chin in the air.
Persis lost no time in relating her experiences to her mother, who
listened thoughtfully. “Dear child,” she said. “I am so glad you had
the penetration to see just what was wrong, and to shrink from joining
in the actions you felt were not right. We withdraw ourselves from
certain acquaintances because they are underbred, not because they are
poor.”
“Annis Brown is poor.”
“Exactly, but she has a refined gentlewoman for a mother, who is,
moreover, a Christian in every sense of the word. Even though she
might occupy the most humble position in the world, Mrs. Brown would
always be a lady, and her character would always distinguish her as
one of God’s chosen ones, while poor Connie’s step-mother cannot have
refined instincts, and must either be a weak woman or one lacking in
delicate perception; otherwise she would not permit her daughters to
make themselves conspicuous by their questionable behavior. Innocent
amusement is one thing and a bold seeking for notice is another. I am
rather glad, after all, Persis, that you have had your lesson while you
are so young.”
“Oh, dear, mamsey, it is so good to get back,” said Persis, fondling
her mother’s hand. “I forgot to take my soap, and that dreadful
strong-scented stuff the Stewart girls used nearly made me ill.”
Mrs. Holmes laughed. “I am very glad you are so pleased to get back to
your soap.”
Persis laughed too. “Oh, mamsey, that was a most random sort of
a remark. I wish there was some sign we could use when we mean
parentheses,—so, for example,” and she described two curves with her
hand. “It is you I am glad to see, soap or no soap.”
“That’s gross flattery,” responded Mrs. Holmes. And Persis answered the
charge with a frantic kiss.
[Illustration: Decoration]