And meantime what excitement in the little cottage down in Virginia!
Everything was in readiness and everybody was on the tiptoe of
expectation. Everybody meant Mary Duff, (it was she, you know, who had
cared for little Courage through all her babyhood, and who had been sent
down to get everything in order), and besides Mary Duff, Mary Ann the
cook, old Joe and Brevet.
It must be confessed, Brevet had had a little difficulty in winning his
grandmother’s consent to this visit, but he had been able to meet every
objection with such convincing arguments, that he had come off victor in
the encounter.
“You see, Grand_na_na,” he had confidentially explained, with his pretty
little half-southern, half-darkey accent, “I is a perfec’ stranger to
them now I know, but then everything is strange to them down here, so
don’t you s’pose it would be nice for me to be right there waiting at
the gate, where I can call out {039}'How’dy’ just so soon as ever they
come in sight, and so for me not to be a stranger to them more’n the
first minute, and have them find there are folks here who are very glad
to know them right from the start? Besides, the lady--Mary Duff was her
name--told me she just knew those little Bennetts would love to see me,
and that she would surely expect me down to-day for certain.”
And so “Grand_na_na” succumbed, not having the heart to nip such noble
hospitality in the bud, and at two o’clock precisely, the best carriage
wheeled up to the door and Mammy and Brevet were quickly stowed away
within it, to say nothing of a basketful of good things covered with a
huge napkin of fine old damask. But who is Mammy? you ask, and indeed
you should have been told pages ago, for no one for many years had been
half so important as Mammy in the Ellis household. She is an old negro
woman, almost as old as Joe himself, and when on the first of January,
1863, President Lincoln issued the proclamation that made all the slaves
free, she was among the first to turn her back upon the plantation where
she was raised, and make her way to Washington. It was there that Mrs.
Ellis had found her, when in search of a nurse for her two little boys,
and from that day to this she has been the faithful worshipper of the
whole Ellis family. Now in her old age her one and only duty has been to
care for Brevet, a care constantly lessening as that little fellow daily
proves his ability to look out more and more for himself.
Brevet was not to be allowed, however, on the occasion of this first
visit to their new neighbours, to make the trip alone. “Grand_na_na” had
been very firm about that, somewhat to his chagrin, and so, if the truth
be told, Mammy’s presence in the comfortable, old-fashioned carriage was
at first simply tolerated. But that state of affairs did not last long.
Try as he would, Brevet was too happy at heart to cherish any grievance,
imaginary or otherwise, for many minutes together; and soon he and
Mammy were chatting away in the merriest fashion, and the old nurse was
looking forward to the unusual excitement of the day, with quite as
much expectation as her little charge of seven. Had she not devoted the
leisure of two long mornings of preparation to the shelling of almonds
and the stoning of raisins, and then when the day came, with eager
trembling hands, packed all the good things away in the great, roomy
hamper that seemed now to look at her so {041}complacently from the
opposite seat of the phaeton? Yes, indeed, it was every whit as glad a
day for Mammy as Brevet, and she peered out from the carriage just as
anxiously as they drove up to the gate and Mary Duff came out to greet
them. But Mammy had something to say before making any motion to leave
the carriage.
“Are you quite sure, Miss, dat dis yere little pickaninny of ours
ain’t gwine to be in any one’s way or nuffin?” she asked, bowing a
how-do-you-do to Mary, and keeping a restraining hand upon Brevet.
“Oh, perfectly sure.”
“He done told us you wanted him very much,” but in a half-questioning
tone, as though what Brevet “done told them” was sometimes “suspicioned”
of being slightly coloured by what he himself would like to do,
notwithstanding his general high standard of truthfulness.
“Brevet is perfectly right--we do want him very much,” Mary answered,
heartily.
“Even if you have to take his old Mammy ‘long wid him, kase Miss Lindy
wasn’t quite willin to ‘low him ter come by hisself?”
“And we’re very glad to see you, Mammy,” Mary answered cordially, and
so the last of Mammy’s scruples, which were not as real as {042}Mammy
herself tried to think them, were put to rest, and Brevet was permitted
to scramble out of the carriage, while Mary Duff lent a hand to Mammy’s
more difficult alighting.
“Is dere ere a man ‘bout could lift dis yere basket ter de house for
us?” she asked, looking helplessly up to the hamper, “kase Daniel dere
has instructions from de Missus neber to leave de hosses less’n dere
ain’t no way to help it.”
“Well, I guess dere is,” chuckled a familiar voice behind her back, and
Mammy turned to discover Joe close beside her.
“Well, I klar, you heah!” she exclaimed. “Why, it seems like de whole
county turn out to welcome dese yere little Bennetts. Seems, too, like
some of us goin’ to be in de way sure ‘nuff.”
“Howsomever, some on us don’ take up so much room as oders,” grunted
Joe, surmising, and quite correctly, too, that Mammy considered his
presence on the scene something wholly unnecessary and undesirable.
“I’se heah to help wid de trunks, Mammy,” he then added; “what you heah
to help wid?”
Mammy, scorning the insinuation, turned to Mary Duff as they walked up
the path.
“You know, Honey, de Lord ain’t lef’ no choice ter most on us as ter
what size we’ll be, {043}but pears like you’d better be a fat ole Mammy
like me, than such a ole bag o’ bones as Joe yonder.”
[Illustration: 0067]
But Joe by that time was depositing his basket in the hall-way of the
cottage, and was fortunately quite beyond the fire of this personal
attack. Mary Duff was naturally much amused at the real but harmless
jealousy of these old coloured folk, and realised for perhaps the five
hundredth time what children we all are, be race and nationality what
they may.
Meantime Brevet had taken his position on the top rail of the gate, with
one arm around a slim little cedar that stood guard beside it.
“May I stand right out here, Miss Duff,” he called back to Mary, “so as
to see them a long way off?”
“Bless your heart, yes!” Mary answered, quite certain in her mind that
since Courage herself was a little girl she never had seen such a dear
child. Brevet’s watch was a brief one.
“They are coming! Hear the wheels! They are coming,” he cried
exultingly, with almost the next breath. In just two minutes more they
really _had come_, and Brevet was calling out “How’dy, how’dy, how’dy”
at the top of his strong little lungs, to the wide-eyed {044}amazement
of the Bennetts, who had never heard this Southern abbreviation of the
Northern “How-do-you-do.” Then jumping down from his perch, he ran up to
the carriage, repeating over again his cordial welcoming “How’dy.”
“How’dy, dear little stranger!” replied Courage, waving a greeting to
Mary; “and who are you I would like to know?”
“I’m Howard Stanhope Ellis, but that’s not what you’re to call me, I
have another name. It’s the name they give--” but he did not finish
his sentence, for charming little fellow though he was, he could not be
allowed to monopolise things in this fashion, and Mary gently pushed him
aside to get him out of her way.
“And so here you are at last,” she said joyously; “welcome home, Miss
Courage. How are you, Sylvia?” while she bent down with a cordial kiss
for each friendly little Bennett. Meantime Courage was making friends
with Brevet, and a moment later the children were crowding close about
him.
“My, but I’m glad to see you all,” he exclaimed, with an emphasising
shake of his head, “and I think I know who’s who too. I believe this is
Gertrude,” laying one little brown hand on Gertrude’s sleeve, “and you
are Mary, because Mary’s the oldest, and you {045}Teddy, because Teddy
comes next, and you--you are Allan.” Brevet had learned his lesson from
Mary Duff quite literally by heart, and altogether vanquished by his’
joyous, friendly greeting, the children vied with each other in giving
him the loudest kiss and the very hardest hug, but from that first
moment of meeting it was an accepted fact that Allan held first place.
There was no gainsaying the special joyousness of his “And you--you are
Allan.” The boy play-fellow for whom he had hitherto longed in vain had
come, and to little Brevet it seemed as though the millennium had come
with him.
All this while Joe and Mammy, barely tolerating each other’s presence,
waited respectfully in the background, so that Mary had a chance to
explain who they were, as Courage stood in the path, delightedly looking
up at the dear little house that was to be her home. But Sylvia had
already made their acquaintance. After paying the driver and making sure
that nothing had been left in the carriage, she went straight toward
them. “I thought I should find some of my own people down here in
Virginia,” she said, cordially extending a hand to each as she spoke,
“but I did not expect they would be right on the spot, the very first
moment, to welcome me,” {046}"Miss Duff done tol’ us ‘bout Miss Sylvy
bein’ of de party,” said Joe with great elegance of manner, while Mammy
looked daggers at him, for replying to a remark which she considered
addressed chiefly to herself. It was queer enough, the attitude of these
two oldtime slaves toward each other, and yet to be accounted for, I
think, in their eagerness to be of use to those whom they claimed the
privilege of serving; and each was conscious, by a subtle intuition, of
a determination to outwit the other if possible in this regard--which
was all very well, if they only could have competed in the right sort of
spirit.
But there is no more time in this chapter for Mammy or Joe, nor anything
else for that matter. Indeed, it would take quite a chapter of itself if
I should try to tell you of the unpacking of Grandma Ellis’s basket, and
then of the children’s merry supper; but it seems to me there are more
important things for me to write about, and for you to read about, than
things to eat and of how the children ate them. By nine o’clock quiet
reigned in the little cottage, and “the children were nestled as snug in
their beds” as the little folk in “The Night before Christmas.” Joe and
Mammy and Brevet had long ago gone home, and Courage and Mary Duff were
sitting together in the {047}little living-room, while Sylvia, in the
hall just outside, was busy arranging the books they had brought with
them, on some hanging shelves.
[Illustration: 0073]
“I think this has been the happiest day in all my life,” said Courage.
“I have simply forgotten everything in the pleasure of those children.”
And then, sitting down at the little cottage piano and running her hands
for a few moments over the keys, she sang softly,--
“For all the Saints, who from their labour rest,
Thy name, O Jesus, be forever blest.”
The sweet, familiar hymn brought Sylvia to the door.
“Miss Courage,” she said, standing with her arms folded behind her back,
as she had always a way of standing when deeply interested, “you have
forgotten yourself and your sorrow to-day, but not for one moment have
you really forgotten Miss Julia,” and Courage knew that this was true,
and closed the little piano with tears in her eyes and a wondrous joy
and peace in her heart.
{048}