LITTLE RUTH.
The fine old country house in which the party were stopping was one
of those well-built, substantial affairs seldom found nowadays. One
lofty-pillared porch faced the bay, another the avenue of locust-trees
which led up from the highway. “It is a real, ancestral hall,” Persis
had declared, delightedly, upon first acquaintance with it, and Basil
found it quite up to his idea of what a house should be. Even the
rambling arrangement of rooms seemed quaint and attractive, while
the hostess, with her black silk apron, her jingling key basket, her
lavendered chests, and her herby-smelling store-room, Annis asserted,
was made to match the house.
Mrs. Chamberlaine did, indeed, represent the typical chatelaine of a
by-gone period, and made them all so comfortable in the great roomy
house that they congratulated themselves upon their selection of a
summer stopping-place. Persis, with her housewifely instincts, took
great delight in the big, queer closets, the tower-room, and the
garret. The tower-room was Persis’s discovery, and she was the most
enthusiastic over it. From it one could see the country for miles
around, and on starlight nights could look out from one of its many
windows and see the sparkling heavens as from an observatory. The way
to this place was through a sort of garret, in the dim corners of which
one might detect an old spinning-wheel, a jumble of antiquated hats
and bonnets hanging from the rafters, or perhaps a ponderous cradle in
which many a representative of the family had been rocked.
One corner of the garret, where a semicircular window made it quite
light, was the playroom of Mrs. Chamberlaine’s little grand-daughter,
Ruth Harrison, a grave, old-fashioned child about six years old. Her
grandmother had taken her from her dying mother’s arms when she was a
tiny baby, and she had lived ever since at Bellingly. Left to herself,
with no playmates save a sedate yellow cat and a big old-fashioned doll
by the name of Patience,—a queer, staring creature with regular black
curls,—Ruth had always lived in a world of fancy; her imagination, with
such slight material as a few old fairy-tales had offered, built up a
realm of her own, peopled by beings half angels, half fairies. Among
them was a human companion whom no one ever saw, yet who was an actual
identity to the child. Callie, Ruth believed to be a little girl of her
own age, and together they played strange games in the attic corner.
Since the arrival of all this houseful of strangers Ruth had felt
sorely distressed, for Callie’s room, as she called it, had been given
up to the guests. The child herself slept with her grandmother, and
Callie could not be accommodated there. After long thought Ruth decided
that Callie must have the cradle. She would not mind sleeping in the
playroom, even if it were lonely there at night. Ruth would give up
Patience to Callie. This was a great sacrifice, for ever since she
could remember, Ruth had taken Patience to bed with her, and grandmamma
had not minded, of course, for Patience had been her doll when she was
a little girl. Ruth would say that Patience made her uncomfortable in
this warm weather. This was not quite true, Ruth felt, but she must
make the excuse to Callie, and for her sake, for somehow grandma was
not fond of Callie. So, every night Patience was laid in the big cradle
to be company for the invisible Callie.
Strange to say, all this was confided, not to the gentle little Annis,
nor to the rollicking Persis, but to Lisa. From the first Ruth had
conceived an adoring admiration for the beautiful young lady, whom she
called her fairy princess, and to the eldest Miss Holmes the shy little
child made her first advances, which Lisa, who loved little children,
met half-way. Therefore, not even Mrs. Estabrook, nor Mrs. Brown, could
win from Ruth the secrets which Lisa could, and no matter how the
imperious girl conducted herself toward others, when Ruth appeared all
the sweetness of her nature arose as to her ready arms Ruth ran, while
on Lisa’s face appeared a tenderness which not many ever saw there.
As time went on the members of this house party became on better
terms, and even Mr. Danforth was not excluded entirely from Lisa’s
good graces. Persis admired him exceedingly, and chattered away to him
in the most unconstrained way, while he, in turn, thoroughly liking
his bright little pupil, talked to her of his ambitions, his family
relations, and such like matters, just as he did to Mrs. Estabrook.
He was not a handsome man, but in his clean-shaved face one could
detect strong intelligence, and fearless integrity. There was an
unusual sweetness in the expression of his mouth, yet his chin was
firm and decided. Persis quoted him on every occasion, till Lisa
said, petulantly, “I don’t see how you can make such a fuss over so
commonplace an individual.”
“Commonplace!” objected Persis; “he is not; you don’t know anything
about him. He is very unusual. Just think, he has helped to support his
mother ever since he was fifteen, and has educated himself besides.
That’s why he is down here, so he can make something during the summer.
I shouldn’t wonder if he were a professor like papa, some day. He
writes now for some paper, and he is just as smart as he can be.”
“I never have been impressed by his ability,” remarked Lisa, grandly.
But Persis’s account did make some difference in her manner toward
the young man, and one evening she found herself more than usually
entertained in a long conversation with him.
There was a direct simplicity about Maurice Danforth which Grandma
Estabrook approved highly, but which Lisa declared indicated a man
unaccustomed to conventionalities, a grievous fault in her school-girl
eyes. However, she did concede, after a time, that he was a very
intelligent man, even if he did forget to use his opportunities for
paying compliments, and treated her just as he did every one else; but
the concession brought a sort of defiance with it.
“He’s got to treat me more courteously,” she said to herself. She
caught him looking at her sometimes in what she considered a judicial
way, and she determined to change the look to one of admiration, if
possible.
But a conversation she heard one evening on the porch turned her
impulse in a strangely new direction. Annis, Persis, and the two boys
were frolicking in one corner. Mrs. Estabrook, with Mr. Danforth, sat
somewhat apart from the other three ladies, who were chatting upon
every-day topics. Lisa, with Ruth in her arms, was sitting in a low
rocker listening to the child’s whispered confidences about Callie and
Patience.
“What a sweet, earnest little face Annis Brown has,” Mrs. Estabrook
said; and the answer came,—
“Yes; there is pure goodness there.”
“She is doing Persis a world of good,” returned grandma. “Persis is so
impetuous, and is so ready with her opinions, that I think Annis is a
very helpful influence for her.”
“They are very different-looking girls,” returned Mr. Danforth; “yet
Miss Persis has a fine face. Hers is a strong character.”
“She is not so pretty as her sisters,” Mrs. Estabrook said,
reluctantly; “but,” she added, “I am not sure but that she will be more
beloved.”
“Beauty is not always lovable, nor even admirable,” Mr. Danforth
observed. “The woman whose face indicates self-esteem and selfishness
can never be beautiful.”
“That is a very patriarchal remark for a young man like you to make,”
returned Mrs. Estabrook, smiling.
“I suppose,” the young man replied, “that I am older than men usually
are at my age. I have been my mother’s man ever since my father died,
and perhaps I see the beauty of character earlier than men usually do.
Yet I do like to look at pretty girls.”
“No doubt; that is quite natural. I do myself.”
“But,” returned Mr. Danforth, slowly, “I don’t believe I would ever
fall in love with a beauty, unless the beauty of her spirit were more
evident than that of her features.”
“Take care,” warned his companion. “I am afraid you will never find
your ideal, or else, like too many who talk as you do, you will finally
be captured by an unscrupulous girl who has hoodwinked you by appearing
to have a lofty spirit when she is only catering to your fancy.”
The young man shook his head positively. “I don’t think that possible;
for that very reason I would not flatter a girl. A woman who is to be
won by compliments is not yielding to an affection which can uplift
her, and the man who is willing to win a woman by such means does not
deserve to find in her a noble helpmeet.”
“Poor girls,” returned Mrs. Estabrook, mockingly, “who love to be
flattered and are confronted by a man of theories.”
“Now, Mrs. Estabrook, I hope I don’t impress you as being a man with
a self-righteous soul. You do not know how much I have thought of all
this, and how I have kept a watch over myself lest I should be led away
by a mere exterior charm. I repeat it, a man ought to help a woman up
to the best within her, and how can he do so if he simply adds to her
vanity?” Then he added, reverently, “Don’t you see, Mrs. Estabrook,
that the feeling that a man must be such a help to a woman ought to
make him strive to the uttermost to be a good man. Oh, please don’t
imagine I think we men are saints. That’s just it, we need to have
more moral strength, and the ones who can best help us are the women,
like you and my mother, who do not live for admiration, but for the
happiness of others,—women whose unselfishness and unconsciousness of
having attractions give them a greater charm than all the little airs
and graces in the world. Miss Persis, now, doesn’t begin to know how
attractive a woman she will be.”
“My dear young Daniel come to judgment,” replied Mrs. Estabrook,
ignoring the last part of his speech. “Do you know you are flattering
an old woman? For shame!”
“No, no; that isn’t flattery! You are superior to that sort of thing.
It is simply a young man’s recognition of a good woman’s influence.”
“Thank you,” replied grandma, the mockery gone at the earnest tone.
“Well, my dear boy, I wish you joy in finding the ‘one woman.’”
Lisa in the corner heard every word, and was battling against
indignation and self-reproach. “He scorns me. I suppose it is I against
whom he is casting his arrows of scorn and letting my own grandmother
know it. Oh, I can’t endure him!” And she put down her little companion
so abruptly that the child felt quite aggrieved, for she was in the
midst of a story about Callie and Amber, the yellow cat.
Just at this moment there came a sudden rushing sound up from
the water. The sky, which had been overclouded, showed a strange
funnel-shaped cloud moving rapidly along. In an incredibly short space
of time the gale was upon them. Every one rushed into the house to
lower windows and to fasten the blinds, which were flapping in the
fierce wind. For a few moments it seemed as if the spirits of chaos
were abroad; the mighty roar of the wind surging along, rising to a
terrific shriek as it passed over the land; the snapping of trees whose
branches were hurled violently against the house; the dash of the salt
spray flung with fury upon the windows looking toward the bay front;
the threatening flashes of lightning; the sullen roll of thunder which,
as the storm came nearer, increased to an incessant crashing, all made
a season of terror to every one.
Persis sought her grandmother’s side; Annis cowered near her mother;
Basil tried to quiet his mother’s fears; Porter, boy like, darted from
window to window, peering out into the darkness, which seemed filled
with the writhing, swaying forms of storm-tossed trees. Lisa stood with
her hands clasped, never saying a word, but gazing into the outer
world with an expression of wonder.
“It is a terrible gale,” said Mr. Danforth at her side.
“It is wonderful, mysterious,” rejoined Lisa. “I feel as if I were
seeing ‘Dante’s Inferno.’”
Presently Grandma Estabrook’s voice rose solemnly in the words of
Cowper’s old hymn,—
“God moves in a mysterious way
His wonders to perform;
He plants his footsteps in the sea,
And rides upon the storm.”
She repeated it to the end, while the rest listened silently.
Suddenly Mrs. Chamberlaine appeared from the kitchen, where she had
been to quiet the terror of the servants. “Is Ruth with you?” she
asked, anxiously.
“She was with me just before we came in-doors,” Lisa informed her,
feeling conscience-stricken at not keeping the child with her. “What
was it she was saying? Oh——!”
She was interrupted by a sudden crash, sounding near at hand, and the
jar given to the house showed that one of the large locust-trees must
have succumbed to the gale and have fallen against the building.
Mr. Danforth ran to the door to see if he could ascertain what had
taken place. As he was crossing the hall Lisa’s white figure passed
him, and he saw her disappear up the stairway.
“Don’t go up, Miss Holmes,” he cried. “The tree may have broken
through the roof, and you do not know what injury you may be courting.”
But Lisa, unheeding, fled on, and Mr. Danforth turned to follow.
Up the first flight, on to the second she went, and then she came to
the garret. A confused sound filled her ears as she opened the door.
“Ruth! Ruth!” she called. A faint sobbing reached her from the corner
where the little girl kept her toys. It was pitch dark, except for
the sudden flashes of lightning, and in one of these Lisa, anxiously
looking before her, saw, sitting beyond a heap of _débris_, Ruth’s
little figure.
“Ruth! Ruth! Are you safe?” she called, eagerly, as she tried to pick
her way across the floor.
“Yes, Princess,” Ruth’s plaintive little voice answered, “I’m safe;
but Patience is killed and Callie is dreadfully hurt, and I don’t know
where Amber is.”
Groping her way along, Lisa at last reached the child. There was a
great gap in the roof overhead, and the place was strewed with bits
of plaster and brick. The tree had indeed fallen against one of the
chimneys, which had toppled in upon the roof.
“Oh, my dear, my little dear!” said Lisa, catching the child in her
arms. “You might have been killed. Let me take you and Patience
down-stairs.” And Lisa began to make her way in a roundabout fashion
back to the stairway.
At the top step she encountered Mr. Danforth with a light. “Miss
Holmes,” he exclaimed, “what are you doing up here? I could not find
you before, there are so many passages in this rambling old house.”
“I came for Ruth,” replied Lisa. “I thought she might be up here.”
“You might both have been killed.” And as he gave utterance to the
words another crash brought down more bricks and mortar.
“I couldn’t leave Patience and Callie,” explained Ruth. “And poor
Patience is dead. A brick fell right on her head.”
“Maybe she can be cured,” Lisa tried to comfort her by saying, as she
put her cheek against the child’s soft hair. “Never mind, dear; you are
sure you are not hurt? And Callie,—perhaps Callie had not gone to bed
yet,” she whispered. “Maybe we shall find her in her own room where
Persis and I sleep. Let us go and see.—Please tell Mrs. Chamberlaine
that Ruth is safe,” was the only remark she vouchsafed Mr. Danforth,
as, with Ruth’s arms clasping her neck and with the battered doll held
closely, she passed into her room, leaving Mr. Danforth looking after
her.
[Illustration: “Please tell Mrs. Chamberlaine that Ruth is safe.”]
[Illustration: Decoration]