But the little girl still cried, and said, "But I didn't mean to trip
her." Then she shook her head at Bessie Bell and said--because she
just had to say it:
"I beg your pardon!
Grant me grace!
I hope the cat will scratch your face!"
Oh! Sister Mary Felice looked at Sister Theckla, and Sister Theckla
looked at Sister Mary Felice--and they both said: "Where did she learn
that?"
But Bessie Bell knew that the little girl did not mean to throw her
down, so she said, "No, you didn't mean to do it."
She had thought she ought to say that, and she had been getting ready
to say that before the little girl had been made to beg her pardon, and
now that she had gotten ready she said: "No, you didn't mean to do it."
Then the little girl stopped crying, too, and ran and caught Bessie
Bell's hand again and said to her again:
"I beg your pardon!
Grant me grace!
I hope the cat won't scratch your face!"
So they went skipping down the walk together just as they had gone
before. Then Sister Mary Felice and Sister Theckla both said: "Well!
Well!"
* * *
* *
*
One time it came about that Bessie Bell lay a long time in her little
white crib-bed, and she did not know why, and she did not care much
why. She did not get up and play in the sand while Sister Mary Felice
looked one hour at the little girls playing in the sand.
She scarcely wondered why she did not leave the crib-bed to sit on the
long gallery-step in a row with all the other little girls, all with
their feet on the gravel, and all eating the tiny cakes that Sister
Ignatius made, while Sister Angela sat on the bench under the
magnolia-tree and looked at the row of little girls.
If sometimes just at waking from fitful sleep in her crib-bed there
came to her just a thought, or a remembrance, of a great big soft white
cat that reached its paw out and softly touched her cheek, it came to
her only like the touch of fancy in a big soft white dream.
Often Only-Just-Ladies came and talked over her little white crib with
Sister Helen Vincula.
Bessie Bell's little fingers were no longer pink and round now; they
lay just white, so white and small, on the white spread. And Bessie
Bell did not mind how quiet she was told to be, for she was too tired
to want to make any noise at all.
One day it happened that an Only-Just-Lady came and said: "Sister Helen
Vincula, I want to give you a ticket to carry you away to the high
mountain, and I want you to go to stay a month in my house on the
mountain, and I want you to carry this little sick girl with you. And
when you are there, Sister Helen Vincula, my bread-man will bring you
bread, and my milk-man will bring you milk, and my market-man from the
cove will bring you apples and eggs, and all the rest of the good
things that come up the mountain from the warm caves."
"For," the Only-Just-Lady said, "I want this little sick girl to grow
well again, and I want her little arms and legs and fingers to get
round and pink again."
Bessie Bell thought that that was a very pretty tale that the Lady was
telling, but she did not know or understand that that tale was about
her. Then the Only-Just-Lady said, "Sister Helen Vincula, it will do
you good, too, as well as this little girl to stay in the high
mountains."
Not until all of Bessie Bell's little blue checked aprons, and all of
her little blue dresses, and all of her little white petticoats, and
all of her little white night-gowns, and even the tiny old night-gown
with the linen thread name worked on it, had been put with all the rest
of her small belongings into the old trunk with brass tacks in the
leather, the old, old trunk that had belonged to Sister Helen Vincula,
did Bessie Bell know that it was herself, little Bessie Bell, who was
going away Somewhere.
* * *
* *
*
It was a very strange new world to Bessie Bell, that new world up on
the High Mountain.
She did not think the grand views off the edge of the high mountain so
strange. But she loved to look out on those views as she stood by
Sister Helen Vincula on the gray cliff; Sister Helen Vincula holding
her hand very fast while they both looked down into the valleys and
coves. As the shadows of evening crept up to the cliff whereon they
stood, and as those shadows folded round and round the points and
coves, those points and caves lying below and beyond fold over fold,
everything grew purple and violet.
Everything grew so purple, and so violet, and so great, and so wide
that it seemed sometimes to the little girl, standing on the cliff by
Sister Helen Vincula, that she was looking right down into the heart of
a violet as great, as wide--as great, as wide--as the whole world.
But this did not seem so strange to Bessie Bell, for she yet remembered
that window out of which one could see just small, green, moving
things, and of which great grown people had told her, "No, Bessie Bell,
there is no such window in all the world."
So in her own way she thought that maybe after awhile that the big, big
violet might drift away, away, and great grown people might say, "No,
Bessie Bell, there never was a violet in all the world like that."
It was the people--and all the people--of that new world that seemed so
strange to Bessie Bell.
There were children, and children in all the summer cabins on that high
mountain.
And those children did not walk in rows.
And those children did not do things by one hours.
And those children did not wash their hands in little white basins
sitting in rows on long back gallery benches.
It was strange to Bessie Bell that those children did not sit in rows
to eat tiny cakes with caraway seeds in them while Sister Angela sat on
the bench under the great magnolia-tree and looked at the row of little
girls.
It was so very strange to Bessie Bell that these children wore all
sorts of clothes--all sorts! Not just blue dresses, and blue checked
aprons.
And Bessie Bell knew, too, that those little girls in all sorts of
clothes could not float away into that strange country of No-where and
Never-was, where, too, the things that she remembered seemed to drift
away--and to so nearly get lost, living only in dimming memory.
These little girls in all sorts of clothes were real, and sure-enough,
and nobody could ever say of them, "There are no such little girls in
the world," because sometimes when Bessie Bell would get to thinking,
and thinking about the strangeness of them, she would almost wonder if
she did not just remember them. When she would give one just a little
pinch to see if that one was a real sure-enough little girl, why that
little girl would say, "Don't." She would say "Don't!" just the same as
a little girl in the row of little girls all with blue checked aprons
would say "Don't," if you pinched one of them ever so little.
There were no Sisters on that high mountain. Sister Helen Vincula was
the only Sister there. That seemed very strange to Bessie Bell.
One day the strangest thing of all so far happened.
One little girl called another little girl with whom she was playing,
"Sister."
Bessie Bell laughed at that.
"Oh, she is not a Sister!" said Bessie Bell.
"Yes, she is; she is my sister!" said the little girl.
"No," said Bessie Bell, just as great grown people said to her when she
remembered strange things, "No, there never was in the world a Sister
like that!"
Then the smaller of the little girls who were playing together ran to
the larger one, and caught hold of her hand, and they stood together in
front of Bessie Bell--they both had long black curls, but Bessie Bell
had short golden curls--and the smaller girl said: "Yes, she is my
sister!"
And the larger girl said: "Yes, she is, too. She is
my-own-dear-sister!"
The smaller little girl shook her black curls and said: "She is my
own-dear-owny-downy-dear-sister!"
In all of her life Bessie Bell had never heard anything like that.
And all the other little girls who were playing joined in and said:
"Bessie Bell doesn't know what she is talking about. Of course you are
sisters. Everybody knows you are sisters!"
Bessie Bell was distressed to be told that she did not know what she
was talking about--and she knew so much about Sisters.
So she began to cry, very softly.
Then she stopped crying long enough to say: "But I never saw Sisters
like that before!"
Then she took up her crying again right where she left off.
Then a little boy--but he seemed a very large boy to Bessie Bell with
his long-striped-stocking-legs--said to Bessie Bell: "No, Bessie Bell,
they are not Sisters like Sister Helen Vincula and the Sisters that you
know, but they are just what they say they are--just own dear sisters."
Then came to Bessie Bell that knowledge that we are often times slow in
getting: she knew all of a sudden--that she did not know everything.
She did not know all, even about Sisters.
Because, in all that she knew or remembered or wondered about, there
was nothing at all about that strange thing that all the little
children, but herself, knew so well about--"Own-dear-sisters."
Another strange thing came into her mind, brought into her mind partly
by her ears, but mostly by her eyes: There were not in this new world
on the high mountain--perhaps there were not after all so many anywhere
as she had thought--there were not so many Sisters like Sister Helen
Vincula (for was not Sister Helen Vincula the only Sister she had seen
on the mountain?). There were not after all so many Sisters like
Sister Angela; and Sister Mary Felice, who watched the little
blue-checked-apron girls playing in the sand; and Sister Ignatius, who
cooked the cakes with the caraway seeds in them; and Sister Theckla,
who taught the little girls to Count and to Sing.
Why, the whole world, surely the up-on-the mountain-world, seemed full
of Only-Just-Ladies.
Not just a Lady here and there, coming to visit with hats on, to talk a
little to the Sisters, to look at the little girls with blue checked
aprons on. But here they were coming and going all the time, moving
about, and living in the cabins, walking everywhere with or without
hats on, standing on the gray cliffs, and looking down--maybe into the
heart of a worldwide violet there, off the edge of the cliff, such as
Bessie Bell saw or fancied she saw.
So many Ladies.
Bessie Bell leaned against the little fluted post of the gallery to the
cabin that she and Sister Helen Vincula lived in, and decided to
herself that, strange as it was, yet was it true that the whole world
was full of--Ladies.
There were yet stranger things for Bessie Bell to learn.
She had not for long played with those many little girls in all sorts
of clothes, and with larger girls, and with boys,--some with
short-striped-stocking-legs and some with
long-striped-stocking-legs,--before she heard one child say: "Mama says
she will take me to Sweet Fern Cave to-morrow."
Or perhaps it was another child who said: "Mama won't let me wade in
the branch."
Or another child said: "Mama says I can have a party for all the little
girls and boys on the mountain next Friday!"
Then another little child said: "My Mama has made me a beautiful pink
dress, and I will wear that to your party."
Mama? My Mama?
Bessie Bell leaned against the little fluted post of the gallery to the
cabin where she and Sister Helen Vincula lived, and thought a great
deal about that.
And Bessie Bell wondered a great deal what that could mean: Mama? My
Mama?
There were strange new things in this world.
Bessie Bell almost forgot to remember now, because every day was so
full of such strange new things to know.
Mama? My Mama?
Bessie Bell did a great deal of thinking about that.
One day the little children were playing at building rock chimneys.
There was not much sand there for little children to play in, so that
the children often built rock chimneys, and rock tables, and rock
fences.
As they were playing one little girl suddenly left the playground and
ran, calling: "Mama! Mama! Come here; come this way, and see the
chimney we have built!"
Bessie Bell turned quickly from play and looked after the little girl
who was running across the playground to where three ladies were
standing.
The little girl caught the dress of one of the ladies, and came pulling
at her dress and bringing her across the ground to see the stone
chimney, and the little girl kept saying:
"Look, Mama! See, Mama! Isn't it a grand chimney? Won't it 'most hold
smoke?"
Bessie Bell stood still with her little hands--they were beginning to
be round pink little hands again, now--clasped in front of her and
wondered.
"See, Mama! Look, Mama!" cried the little girl.
"Why does she say: Mama?" asked Bessie Bell, because she just wondered,
and wondered--and she did not know.
"Because it is her Mama," said a child who had just brought two more
rocks to put on the chimney.
"Oh," said Bessie Bell.
That lady who was the little girl's Mama looked much as all the ladies
looked.
"Are all Ladies Mamas?" asked Bessie Bell.
She hoped the child who had brought the two rocks would not laugh, for
Bessie Bell knew she would cry if she did.
The little girl did not laugh at all. She was trying so carefully to
put the last rock on top of the stone chimney, she said: "No, Bessie
Bell: some are Mamas, and some are only just Ladies."
There. There it was again: Only-Just-Ladies.
Bessie Bell wondered how to tell which were Mamas, and which were
Ladies--just Ladies.
Very often after that day she watched those who passed the cabin where
she and Sister Helen Vincula lived, and wondered which were Mamas--
And which were Ladies.
There was no rule of old or young by which Bessie Bell could tell.
Nor was it as one could tell Sisters from Just-Ladies by a way of
dress. For Sisters, like Sister Helen Vincula, wore a soft white
around the face, and soft long black veils, and a small cross on the
breast of the dress: so that even had any not known the difference one
could easily have guessed.
But for Ladies and Mamas there were none of these differences.
But Bessie Bell looked and looked and wondered, but her eyes brought to
her no way of knowing.
Bessie Bell could at length think of only one way to find out the
difference, and that was to ask--to let her ears help her eyes to bring
to her some way of knowing.
One day, a dear old lady with white curls all around under her bonnet
stopped near the playground and called Bessie Bell to her and gave her
some chocolate candy, every piece of candy folded up in its own white
paper.