SOAPSUDS
"Will you think I'm dreadful, Georgiana dear," asked Jeannette, lying
luxuriously back upon her pillow while her cousin sat braiding her own
thick locks by the little bedroom fireplace in which the last remnants
of the fire were smouldering, "if I say I shouldn't have believed I
could possibly have such a good time in such a way? I never did anything
the least bit like it."
"Never coasted?"
"Never."
"Never threw snowballs?"
"Not that I can remember."
"Nor roasted chestnuts?"
"I never tasted one before--except perhaps in the stuffing of a fowl."
"Poor child! But at least you've sat by the fire with other girls and
men and told stories, little Jean?"
The guest considered. "Of course--at house parties. Yet I can't seem to
recall any such scene as the one we just left, down by your fire. I
certainly never sat on the floor with my arm on my father's knee, with
a group of people around, while somebody told stories--sure not such
stories as you told. Oh, you're the cleverest girl I ever knew, to tell
such things in such a way! It was perfectly splendid! How those two men
did enjoy it! I don't know when I've heard men laugh in just that way."
"Just what way? Please tell me how they laughed differently from other
men. To be sure, Jimps just lets go when he's amused and raises the
rafters with his howls of glee; but so do other young men of his age.
And certainly Mr. Jefferson laughed decorously enough."
"Yes, but it was so whole-souled with both of them; and yet there wasn't
a thing in your stories but--oh, I can't tell you just what I mean, if
you don't know. But somehow it all struck me so differently from the way
any girl-and-man evening ever struck me before. There--there seems a
different air to breathe here--if that expresses it--from any I've ever
been in."
The two regarded each other, Jeannette from between half-closed, deeply
fringed eyelids as she lay back upon her pillows, one arm, half veiled
with the finest of linen and lace, outstretched upon the treasured
old-time counterpane, the other beneath her neck; Georgiana sitting up
straight, with two long, dark braids hanging over her shoulders, her
dusky eyes wide open, her cheeks still bright with colour balanced by
the scarlet hue of the loose garment she had put on.
"I've no doubt there is," agreed Georgiana thoughtfully. "Still, though
you live a very different life from any I've ever known, I didn't
suppose your education in the matter of roast chestnuts--and the things
that go with them--had been quite so badly neglected. To think of never
having had them except so disguised by the manipulations of a French
_chef_ that you couldn't recognize them! And to have gone to balls and
horse shows and polo games--and never to have built a snow fort! Dear,
dear, what we have to teach you! Life hasn't been really fair to you,
has it, my dear?"
This was sheer audacity, from a poor girl to a rich one, but it was
charming audacity none the less and by no means wholly ironic. To
Jeannette, studying her cousin with eyes which were envious of the
physical superiority for lack of which no training in the social arts or
mere ability to purchase the aid of dressmaker and milliner could
possibly atone, conscious that Georgiana possessed a mind far keener and
better trained than her own, the question called for a serious answer.
She half sat up and pushed her pillow into a soft mountain behind her as
she spoke:
"No, it hasn't! I thought so before I came here and now I'm sure of it.
I feel a weak and helpless creature beside you--helpless in every way. I
can't do anything you can. If my father should lose his money and I
should be thrown upon my own resources, I shouldn't be able to make so
much as a--snowball for myself!"
Both laughed in spite of Jeannette's earnestness, for the words brought
back vivid memories of the wild sport of the afternoon. Then Georgiana's
ready brain leaped to the inevitable corollary:
"Ah, but there'd be sure to be a man ready to dash into your fort and
make your snowballs for you!"
"I'm not so sure."
"I am."
"Of course the men I know don't seem to mind whether a girl is helpless
or not, if she can look and act the way they want her to. But--I'm
discovering that there are other kinds of men, and somehow I like this
new kind. And I imagine this kind wouldn't care for helpless girls. You
made snowballs for your man to throw, and they were good hard ones, as
my chin can still testify."
"You can learn to make hard snowballs," said Georgiana, smiling.
Jeannette held up one beautifully modelled but undeniably slender arm
and clasped it with her hand. "Soft as----" She paused for a simile.
"Sponge cake," supplied Georgiana, coming over to feel critically of the
extended arm. "It _is_ pretty spongy. It needs exercise with a punchball
or"--she flashed a mischievous glance at the languid form beside
her--"a batch of bread dough."
"Bread dough! Would that help it?"
"Rather! So would sweeping, and scrubbing, and moving furniture about.
But you're born to a life of ease, my dear, so those things are out of
the question for you. But fencing lessons would be good for you--and
fashionable, too, which would double their value, of course."
"Georgiana!" Jeannette sat straight up and laid two coaxing arms about
her cousin's firmly moulded neck. "Teach me to make bread, will you,
while I'm here?"
"Oh, good gracious!" Georgiana threw back her head to laugh. "Hear the
child! What good would that do, if you learned? You wouldn't do it when
you went back."
"I would!--Well, of course, I might have difficulty in--but mother wants
me to be strong; she's always fussing about it because I can't endure
the round of society things she says any girl ought to--and enjoy. If
you thought bread-making would really help----"
"It would be a drop in the bucket of exercise you ought to take."
"Nevertheless, I want to learn," persisted Jeannette as Georgiana moved
away, evidently with the intention of leaving her for the night. "I'd
like to feel I knew how. And your bread is the most delicious I ever
tasted. Please!"
"Oh, very well; I'll teach you with pleasure. I shall be setting bread
sponge at six to-morrow morning. Will you be down?" Georgiana's smile
was distinctly wicked.
"Six o'clock!" There was a look of mingled incredulity and horror in the
lovely face on the pillow. "But--does bread--does bread have to be made
so early?"
"Absolutely. After the morning dew is off the grass, bread becomes
heavy."
Jeannette stared into the mocking eyes of her cousin; then she laughed.
"Oh, I see. You're testing me. Well,"--with a stifled sigh--"I'll get up
if you'll call me. I'm afraid I should never wake myself--especially
after all that snowballing----"
"Exactly. And I'll not call you. So lie still in your nest, ladybird,
and don't bother your pretty head about bread sponges. What's the use?
You'll never need to know, and you'll soon forget having had even a
faint desire toward knowledge. Good-night--and sleep sweetly."
"Oh, but wait! I'm really serious. Please call me!"
"Never!"
With one laughing backward look and with a kiss waved toward the slender
figure now sitting up in bed, Georgiana opened the door and fled. That
she did not want to teach her cousin an earthly thing, even if she could
have believed Jeannette serious in her request, was momentarily growing
more evident to her own consciousness. Just why, she might have been
unwilling to explain.
Next morning, however, she found herself destined to carry out the plan
Jeannette had so impulsively proposed. She crept downstairs as quietly
as the creaking boards under the worn stair carpet would permit, and
began her work in a whirl of haste. But she had not more than assembled
her ingredients on the scrupulously scoured top of the old pine table
when she heard the kitchen door softly open. Wheeling, she beheld a
vision which brought a boyish whistle to her lips.
Jeannette, enveloped in a long silken garment evidently thrown on over
her night attire, a little cap of lace and ribbon confining her hair,
the most impractical of slippers on her feet, stood smiling at her
cousin, sleep still clinging to her eyelids.
"I'm down," she announced in triumph.
"So I see. But you're not up," replied Georgiana, regarding the vision
with critical eyes.
Jeannette's gaze left the trim morning garb of the young cook, her
perfectly arranged hair, her whole aspect of efficiency, and dropped to
her own highly inappropriate attire, and she flushed a little. But she
held her ground.
"You didn't call me, and when I woke it was so near six I didn't dare
wait to dress. Can't I learn unless I'm dressed like you?"
"If a French doll had come to life and offered to help me in the kitchen
I couldn't feel more stunned. What will happen to all those floating
ends of lace and ribbon, when they get mixed with flour and yeast? Be
sensible, child, and go back to bed."
"I'll pin everything out of the way, and perhaps you'll lend me an
apron. I really don't want to bother you, Georgiana, but I do want to
learn."
Georgiana relented. "Very well. Come here, and I'll cover you up as best
I can. Or I'll wait while you run up and dress--if you've anything to
put on that's fit for bread-making."
"Nothing much fitter than this, I'm afraid," admitted Jeannette
reluctantly.
"Poor little girl!" Georgiana's momentary irritation was gone, as it
usually was, in no time at all. "Well, here go the frills under a nice
big gingham all-over; and now you look like a combination of Sleeping
Beauty and Mother Bunch! All right; here we go into business. Do you
know how to scald that cupful of milk you see before you?"
"Scald it?" repeated Jeannette doubtfully--and so the lesson began.
Absolute ignorance on the part of the pupil, assured knowledge on that
of the teacher--the lesson was a very kindergarten in methods. There
were times when Georgiana had much difficulty in restraining her inward
mirth, but she soon saw that this must be done, though Jeannette herself
laughed at her own clumsiness, and evidently was determined to let
nothing escape her.
"Kneading looks so easy when you do it," she lamented; "but I can't seem
to help getting stuck."
"That will come with practice--if you ever try another batch, which I
doubt. And it's the kneading that is so good for your arms."
"Yours are beautiful--and so strong, it must be fun to own them."
"There are times when a bit of muscle is of use in a hustling world,"
admitted her cousin. "There, I think that dough will do very well. Turn
it over and lay it smoothly in the bowl--so. Cover it with its white
blanket--so; and leave it right here, where it will have a good warm
temperature to rise in. Now, run up and snatch another nap; you'll have
plenty of time."
"You're not going back to bed?"
"Rather not!" Georgiana's smile strove to be tolerant. "There are just a
few things to be done about the house, and they are best done before
breakfast. Off with you, lady cousin!"
"Do you always get up so early?" Jeannette persisted.
"I have an extraordinary fondness for early rising," Georgiana
explained. "It's foolish, of course, but it's an old habit. Good-bye, my
dear; my next errand is down cellar," and she vanished from the sight of
her guest, quite unable to keep herself longer in hand before the
amazing point of view of this daughter of luxury.
The "next errand" was the washing of the handful of fine towels with
which the painstaking hostess was keeping the guest-room supplied,
unwilling to furnish the aristocratic young person upstairs with the
coarser articles used by herself and the others. Jeannette, all unaware
that the snowy linen with which her room was kept plentifully supplied
was constantly relaundered in secret by Georgiana's own hands, was as
lavish in her use of it as she was accustomed to be at home, and the
result was a quite unbelievable amount of extra work for her cousin.
Mr. Warne, coming upon his daughter by chance in this very early morning
flurry of laundering, expressed himself upon the subject in the gentle
but positive way which was his.
"Why do it, my dear?" he questioned. "Are the sheets and towels we use
not quite good enough for others?"
"Not half good enough for Lady Jean," responded the laundress, rubbing
energetically away--yet carefully, too, for the old linen was not so
stout as it once had been.
"You are intentionally deceiving her, aren't you, daughter? Why do
that?--since it is not necessary for her comfort."
"But it is. She would shudder at the touch of a cotton sheet. As for a
common huck towel----"
Mr. Warne shook his head. "I can't agree with you. So that the sheets
and towels are spotless--as your sheets and towels are--the mere degree
of fineness is not essential. And if she knew how much labour it costs
you, I am very certain she would infinitely prefer to be less of a
spendthrift in the matter of quantity."
"I've no doubt she would. But I'd rather wash my fingers off than not
give her the fresh towel for her perfect face each time she uses one.
I'd like it myself. I'd like a million towels, all fine as silk. I'd
like----" She stopped abruptly, seeing the look upon her father's face.
"Oh, I'm sorry!" she flashed at him repentantly. "I truly don't mind
being poor in most ways. It's the lack of certain things that go with
nicety of living that grinds me most. I shouldn't mind wearing gingham
outside, if I could have all the fine linen I want underneath.
It's--it's--oh, well, you know! And I'm an idiot to talk about it when
the thing we really need is books--books for your starving mind. If I
could get you all you want of those----" Her voice broke upon the wish,
always strong with her.
"My dear, my mind will never starve while it has the old books to feed
upon. Listen, on what a pertinent thought did I come this morning. I was
delving in good old Thomas Fuller, of those fine seventeenth-century
writers whose works still glow with fire: '_Though my guest was never so
high, yet, by the laws of hospitality, I was above him whilst under my
roof_.'"
The girl laughed, dashing away a hot tear with the back of a soapy hand.
"Trust you to find a classic to turn a tragedy into a comedy," she said.
"Go away now, Father Davy, and I'll soon be through. It's a poor
washerwoman I am to be thinning my suds with brine!"