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GYPSY'S COUSIN JOY
By
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps
New York
Dodd, Mead and Company
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[Illustration]
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Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1866, by
GRAVES & YOUNG,
in the Clerk's Office for the District Court of Massachusetts
Copyright, 1895, by Elizabeth Stuart Phelps Ward.
------------------------------------------------------------------------
PREFACE.
Having been asked to write a preface to the new edition of the Gypsy
books, I am not a little perplexed. I was hardly more than a girl
myself, when I recorded the history of this young person; and I find it
hard, at this distance, to photograph her as she looks, or ought to look
to-day. She does not sit still long enough to be "taken." I see a lively
girl in pretty short dresses and very long stockings,--quite a Tom-boy,
if I remember rightly. She paddles a raft, she climbs a tree, she skates
and tramps and coasts, she is usually very muddy, and a little torn.
There is apt to be a pin in her gathers; but there is sure to be a laugh
in her eyes. Wherever there is mischief, there is Gypsy. Yet, wherever
there is fun, and health, and hope, and happiness,--and I think,
wherever there is truthfulness and generosity,--there is Gypsy, too.
And now, the publishers tell me that Gypsy is thirty years old, and that
girls who were not so much as born when I knew the little lady, are her
readers and her friends to-day.
Thirty years old? Indeed, it is more than that! For is it not thirty
years since the publication of her memoirs? And was she, at that time,
possibly sixteen? Forty-six years? Incredible! How in the world did
Gypsy "grow up?" For that was before toboggans and telephones, before
bicycles and electric cars, before bangs and puffed sleeves, before
girls studied Greek, and golf-capes came in. Did she go to college? For
the Annex, and Smith, and Wellesley were not. Did she have a career? Or
take a husband? Did she edit a Quarterly Review, or sing a baby to
sleep? Did she write poetry, or make pies? Did she practice medicine, or
matrimony? Who knows? Not even the author of her being.
Only one thing I do know: Gypsy never grew up to be "timid," or silly,
or mean, or lazy; but a sensible woman, true and strong; asking little
help of other people, but giving much; an honor to her brave and loving
sex, and a safe comrade to the girls who kept step with her into middle
life; and I trust that I may bespeak from their daughters and their
scholars a kindly welcome to an old story, told again.
Elizabeth Stuart Phelps.
Newton Centre, Mass.,
_April, 1895._
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CONTENTS
CHAPTER I NEWS 7
CHAPTER II SHE SHALL COME? 24
CHAPTER III ONE EVENING 40
CHAPTER IV CHESTNUTS 54
CHAPTER V GYPSY MAKES A DISCOVERY 82
CHAPTER VI WHO PUT IT IN? 99
CHAPTER VII PEACE MAYTHORNE'S ROOM 122
CHAPTER VIII THE STORY OF A NIGHT 148
CHAPTER IX UP RATTLESNAKE 187
CHAPTER X WE ARE LOST 211
CHAPTER XI GRAND TIMES 229
CHAPTER XII A TELEGRAM 243
CHAPTER XIII A SUNDAY NIGHT 263
CHAPTER XIV GOOD BYE 274
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GYPSY'S COUSIN JOY
CHAPTER I
NEWS
The second arithmetic class had just come out to recite, when somebody
knocked at the door. Miss Cardrew sent Delia Guest to open it.
"It's a--ha, ha! letter--he, he! for you," said Delia, coming up to
the desk. Exactly wherein lay the joke, in the fact that Miss Cardrew
should have a letter, nobody but Delia was capable of seeing; but Delia
was given to seeing jokes on all occasions, under all circumstances. Go
wherever you might, from a prayer-meeting to the playground, you were
sure to hear her little giggle.
"A letter for you," repeated Delia Guest. "He, he!"
Miss Cardrew laid down her arithmetic, opened the letter, and read it.
"Gypsy Breynton."
[Illustration]
The arithmetic class stopped whispering, and there was a great lull in
the schoolroom.
"Why I never!" giggled Delia. Gypsy, all in a flutter at having her name
read right out in school, and divided between her horror lest the kitten
she had tied to a spool of thread at recess, had been discovered, and an
awful suspicion that Mr. Jonathan Jones saw her run across his plowed
field after chestnuts, went slowly up to the desk.
"Your mother has sent for you to come directly home," said Miss Cardrew,
in a low tone. Gypsy looked a little frightened.
"Go home! Is anybody sick, Miss Cardrew?"
"She doesn't say--she gives no reasons. You'd better not stop to talk,
Gypsy."
Gypsy went to her desk, and began to gather up her books as fast as she
could.
"I shouldn't wonder a bit if the house'd caught afire," whispered Agnes
Gaylord. "I had an uncle once, and his house caught afire--in the
chimney too, and everybody'd gone to a prayer-meeting; they had now,
true's you live."
"Maybe your father's dead," condoled Sarah Rowe.
"Or Winnie."
"Or Tom."
"Just think of it!"
"What _do_ you s'pose it is?"
"If I were you, I guess I'd be frightened!"
"Order!" said Miss Cardrew, in a loud voice.
The girls stopped whispering, and Gypsy, in nowise reassured by their
sympathy, hurried out to put on her things. With her hat thrown on one
side of her head, the strings hanging down into her eyes, her sack
rolled up in a bundle under her arm, and her rubbers in her pocket, she
started for home on the full run. Yorkbury was pretty well used to
Gypsy, but everybody stopped and stared at her that morning; what with
her burning cheeks, and those rubbers sticking out of her pocket, and
the hat-strings flying, and the brambles catching her dress, and the mud
splashing up under her swift feet, it was no wonder.
"Miss Gypsy!" called old Mr. Simms, the clerk, as she flew by the door
of her father's book-store. "Miss Gypsy, my _dear_!"
But on ran Gypsy without so much as giving him a look, across the road
in front of a carriage, around a load of hay, and away like a bird down
the street. Out ran Gypsy's pet aversion, Mrs. Surly, from a shop-door
somewhere--
"Gypsy Breynton, what a sight you be! I believe you've gone clear
crazy--Gypsy!"
"Can't stop!" shouted Gypsy, "it's a fire or something somewhere."
Eight small boys at the word "fire" appeared on the instant from nobody
knew where, and ran after her with hoarse yells of "fire! fire! Where's
the engine? Vi----ir-r-!" By this time, too, three dogs and a
nanny-goat were chasing her; the dogs were barking, and the nanny-goat
was baaing or braying, or whatever it is that nanny-goats do, so she
swept up to the house in a unique, triumphal procession.
Winnie came out to meet her as she came in at the gate panting and
scarlet-faced.
Fifty years instead of five might Winnie have been at that moment, and
all the cares of Church and State on the shoulders of his pinafore, to
judge from the pucker in his chin. There was always a pucker in Winnie's
chin, when he felt--as the boys call it--"big."
"What do s'pose, Gypsy?--don't you wish you knew?"
"What?"
"Oh, no matter. _I_ know."
"Winnie Breynton!"
"Well," said Winnie, with the air of a Grand Mogul feeding a chicken, "I
don't care if I tell you. We've had a temmygral."
"A telegram!"
"I just guess we have; you'd oughter seen the man. He'd lost his nose,
and----"
"A telegram! Is there any bad news? Where did it come from?"
"It came from Bosting," said Winnie, with a superior smile. "I s'posed
you knew _that_! It's sumfin about Aunt Miranda, I shouldn't wonder."
"Aunt Miranda! Is anybody sick? Is anybody dead, or anything?"
"I don't know," said Winnie, cheerfully. "But I guess you wish you'd
seen the envelope. It had the funniest little letters punched through on
top--it did now, really."
Gypsy ran into the house at that, and left Winnie to his meditations.
Her mother called her from over the banisters, and she ran upstairs. A
small trunk stood open by the bed, and the room was filled with the
confusion of packing.
"Your Aunt Miranda is sick," said Mrs. Breynton.
"What are you packing up for? You're not going off!" exclaimed Gypsy,
incapable of taking in a greater calamity than that, and quite
forgetting Aunt Miranda.
"Yes. Your uncle has written for us to come right on. She is very sick,
Gypsy."
"Oh!" said Gypsy, penitently; "dangerous?"
"Yes."
Gypsy looked sober because her mother did, and she thought she ought to.
"Your father and I are going in this noon train," proceeded Mrs.
Breynton, rolling up a pair of slippers, and folding a wrapper away in
the trunk. "I think I am needed. The fever is very severe;
possibly--contagious," said Mrs. Breynton, quietly. Mrs. Breynton made
it a rule to have very few concealments from her children. All family
plans which could be, were openly and frankly discussed. She believed
that it did the children good to feel that they had a share in them;
that it did them good to be trusted. She never kept bad tidings from
them simply because they were bad. The mysteries and prevarications
necessary to keep an unimportant secret, were, she reasoned, worse for
them than a little anxiety. Gypsy must know some time about her aunt's
sickness. She preferred she should hear it from her mother's lips, see
for herself the reasons for this sudden departure and risk, if risk
there were, and be woman enough to understand them.
Gypsy looked sober now in earnest.
"Why, mother! How can you? What if you catch it?"
"There is very little chance of that, one possibility in a hundred,
perhaps. Help me fold up this dress, Gypsy--no, on the bed--so."
"But if you should get sick! I don't see why you need go. She isn't your
own sister anyway, and she never did anything for us, nor cared anything
for us."
"Your uncle wants me, and that is enough. I want to be to her a sister
if I can--poor thing, she has no sister of her own, and no mother,
nobody but the hired nurses with her; and she may die, Gypsy. If I can
be of any help, I am glad to be."
Her mother spoke in a quiet, decided tone, with which Gypsy knew there
was no arguing. She helped her fold her dresses and lock her trunk, very
silently, for Gypsy, and then ran away to busy herself with Patty in
getting the travelers' luncheon. When Gypsy felt badly, she always
hunted up something to do; in this she showed the very best of her good
sense. And let me tell you, girls, as a little secret--in the worst
fits of the "blues" you ever have, if you are guilty of having any, do
you go straight into the nursery and build a block house for the baby,
or upstairs and help your mother baste for the machine, or into the
dining-room to help Bridget set the table, or into the corner where some
diminutive brother is crying over his sums which a very few words from
you would straighten, or into the parlor where your father sits shading
his eyes from the lamplight, with no one to read him the paper; and
before you know it, you will be as happy as a queen. You don't believe
it? Try and see.
Gypsy drowned her sorrow at her mother's departure, in broiling her
mutton-chops and cutting her pie, and by the time the coach drove to the
door, and the travelers stood in the entry with bag and baggage, all
ready to start, the smiles had come back to her lips, and the twinkle to
her eyes.
"Good-bye, father! O-oh, mother Breynton, give me another kiss.
There!--one more. Now, if you don't write just as soon as you get
there!"
"Be a good girl, and take nice care of Winnie," called her mother from
the coach-window. And then they were driven rapidly away, and the house
seemed to grow still and dark all at once, and a great many clouds to be
in the warm, autumn sky. The three children stood a moment in the entry
looking forlornly at each other. I beg Tom's pardon--I suppose I should
have said the two children and the "young man." Probably never again in
his life will Tom feel quite as old as he felt in that sixteenth year.
Gypsy was the first to break the dismal silence.
"How horrid it's going to be! You go upstairs and she won't be there,
and there'll be nobody coming home from the store at night, and,
then--you go round, and it's so still, and nobody but me to keep house,
and Patty has just what she likes for breakfast, for all me, and _I_
think Aunt Miranda needn't have gone and been sick, anyway."
"A most sensible and sympathizing niece," observed Tom, in his
patronizing way.
"Well, you see, I suppose I don't care very much about Aunt Miranda,"
said Gypsy, confidentially. "I'm sorry she's sick, but I didn't have a
bit nice time in Boston last vacation, and she scolded me dreadfully
when I blew out the gas. What is it, Patty? Oh, yes--come to dinner,
boys."
"I say," remarked Winnie, at the rather doleful dinner-table, "look
here, Gypsy."
"What?"
[Illustration]
"S'posin' when they'd got Aunt Miranda all nailed into her
coffin--tight in--she should be _un_-deaded, and open her eyes, and
begin--begin to squeal, you know. S'pose they'd let her out?"
Just four days from the morning Mrs. Breynton left, Tom came up from the
office with a very sober face and a letter.
Gypsy ran out to meet him, and put out her hand, in a great hurry to
read it.
"I'll read it to you," said Tom; "it's to me. Come into the parlor."
They went in, and Tom read:
"My Dear Son:
"I write in great haste, just to let you know that your Aunt Miranda
is gone. She died last night at nine o'clock, in great distress. I
was with her at the last. I am glad I came--very; it seems to have
been a comfort to her; she was so lonely and deserted. The funeral
is day after to-morrow, and we shall stay of course. We hope to be
home on Monday. There has been no time yet to make any plans; I
can't tell what the family will do. Poor Joy cannot bear to be left
alone a minute. She follows me round like a frightened child. The
tears come into my eyes every time I look at her, for the thoughts
of three dear, distant faces that might be left just so, but for
God's mercy to them and to me. She is just about Gypsy's age and
height, you know. The disease proved _not_ to be contagious, so you
need feel no anxiety. A kiss to both the children. Your father sends
much love. We shall be glad to get home and see you again.
"Very lovingly,
"Mother."
Inside the note was a slip for Gypsy, with this written on it:
"I must stop to tell you, Gypsy, of a little thing your aunt said
the day before she died. She had been speaking of Joy in her weak,
troubled way--of some points wherein she hoped she would be a
different woman from her mother, and had then lain still a while,
her eyes closed, something--as you used to say when you were a little
girl--very _sorry_ about her mouth, when suddenly she turned and
said, 'I wish I'd made Gypsy's visit here a little pleasanter. Tell
her she must think as well as she can of her auntie, for Joy's sake,
now.'"
Gypsy folded up the paper, and sat silent a moment, thinking her own
thoughts, as Tom saw, and not wishing to be spoken to.
Those of you who have read "Gypsy Breynton" will understand what these
thoughts might be. Those who have not, need only know that Gypsy's aunt
had been rather a gay, careless lady, well dressed and jeweled, and fond
enough of dresses and jewels; and that in a certain visit Gypsy made her
not long ago, she had been far from thoughtful of her country niece's
comfort.
And this was how it had ended. Poor Aunt Miranda!
"Well," said Gypsy, at last, with something dim in her eyes, "I dare say
I was green and awkward, and it was half my fault. I never could
understand how people could just turn round when anybody dies, and say
they were good and perfect, when it wasn't any such a thing, and I can't
say I think she was, for it would be a lie. But I won't say anything
more against her. Poor Joy, poor Joy! Not to have any mother, Tom, just
think! Oh, just _think_!"