THE SUPPER COMPANY
When Sally heard the order for the supper company the next night, she at
once decided that her own simple meal must be quickly eaten, as she must
see something of the fine things at Ingleside.
By standing on the rocks it would be easy to peep through the thin
tangle near the arbor just above her head and close by the wall. It
would not do to take long peeps, but she could take several for a moment
at a time. Yet she must beware: a sudden gust of wind might part the
slight brush, show her bright eyes, then, alas, the pleasure it might
take from her!
Oh, but it was wonders she did with the old brush, the same that the
groom had thrown away at Ingleside! She did not wait until evening to
try it, but during the afternoon, with the bit of looking-glass propped
up before her, she patiently brushed and brushed, until something like a
parting appeared along the middle of her well-shaped head.
At that she took a stout pin, and running it down the uneven seam, made
a beautiful even parting, the thick, ruddy hair standing high on each
side of it.
"My, how pretty that looks!" innocently murmured the child. Then again
she brushed and brushed, until the ripply mass shone like unto burnished
gold. And now, instead of a matted mop, it lay row upon row of soft,
loose, orderly ringlets, so careless yet neat in arrangement that Sally
awoke right there to a knowledge of the extreme beauty of her luxurious
hair.
She gurgled with laughter, saying, in the pretended new voice:
"You will find out considerable about yourself, Maid Sally, what you can
do, and maybe what you can be, if only you follow what I teach. High
time it is you waked up."
Then replied a forlorn young voice:
"Yes, but what good doth it do a poor thing like me to wake up? It is
only to find out how mean and soiled is my dress, how brown are my hands
and feet, and worst of all, that no matter how hard I might long for it,
learning is not for a maid of my quality."
"Prithee, be patient!" cried the new Sally, cheerily. "Thou hast already
made of thyself a more seemly looking maid; still better things may come
ere long."
New words came into Sally's mind as she talked to her other self, and
her language became more proper, sure sign that somewhere within her a
truly fine nature was hidden away.
When she appeared at supper that afternoon, Mistress Cory Ann exclaimed:
"Oh, good Peter! do look at the young one's head, will you? Now have you
been meddling with my comb to-day?" she asked, sharply.
"I found an old brush that I washed and used, Mistress," Sally
answered, "and I think it were time my hair should be made decent."
"Now don't go wasting time trying to get up smart looks," said Mistress
Cory Ann; for, truth to tell, it was sorry she felt to see the great
change and improvement in Sally's appearance. And what was more, she had
noticed that the useful child was growing careful and thoughtful in a
way she did not at all desire she should. Because, if Sally began making
the most of herself, what might it not lead to, pray?
She was through her supper so soon that Mistress Brace again said,
tartly:
"If you take not time to eat your victuals, seeing you are let off after
supper, it is to the table you will stay until the rest of us are
through."
Sally thought to herself, "I will tarry longer at the table to-morrow
night," but now, off she flew, and in a trice was through the hedge, on
the stones, and peeping with great care at a wonderful table, such as
she had never dreamed of in her brightest of fancies.
The long board gleamed with shining, spotless linen. Glass and silver
dishes covered the table. Sprays of green, and bright, choice flowers
lay around, and in between the plates and glasses, with charming color
and taste.
Corniel, in white clothes, with several colored girls about him, who
were to assist in waiting, was flourishing about, placing food at proper
spaces, setting chairs, and giving orders in a pompous way Sally thought
he must enjoy.
Mammy Leezer's cookery was indeed most beautiful to look upon. The
porcupine marmalade, on two separate platters of white china ware edged
with gilt, was a thick jam made from plums or prunes, then turned out
from long oval moulds, and stuck all over with small spikes of cocoanut
meat, standing straight and stiff, looking in very truth like the quills
of the little animal called the porcupine.
The melon puff was a splendid-looking mass, heaped high in a tall glass
dish, and appearing as if made from strained melon pulp, and the whipped
whites of eggs with powdered sugar.
The peach tart was a form of pie with golden-looking sauce peeping up
between crisscross strips of rich puff paste. And pandowdy with sorghum
foam had the look, in a deep glass dish, of being apple sauce and
pie-crust mixed, with a delicious pyramid of golden-colored whipped
sugar standing in a point on the top.
Chicken salad, in other long white and gilt platters, was beautifully
ornamented with white and yellow rings of hard-boiled eggs, having
sprigs of green run through the rings in a way to form fancy garlands
above the crisp whitey-green bordering of lettuce leaves.
"Oh, it is the food of the Fairies! It is the food of the gods!"
Sally whispered in soft delight to herself, not noticing or scarcely
knowing what she was saying. All her soul was steeped in wonder at the
fine, the beautifully fine, things spread before her.
"But they are not for me," she sighed. "Oh, no, never can they be for
me!"
"Why not?" asked the cheery voice that Sally was beginning to listen
for, and to like much to hear.
"I'm so poor," answered Sally, with the usual downward look at frock,
hands, and feet.
"Lift yourself up," said the voice, that seemed ever determined to help
and comfort poor Sally.
"I will try," she replied. Then, in a sparkling, sunshiny way, she said
to herself:
"Oh, you shall be my good Fairy, you new voice! Why not! I will call you
the Fairy whenever you speak."
"Very well, then. You can call me the good Fairy, and Master Lionel can
be your Fairy Prince."
"Oh! Oh! Oh!" gasped Sally. "How dreadful! How ever can I dare!"
She almost tumbled from her perch, so great appeared her presumption in
allowing the thought of coming so near to the Fairy Prince even in
imagination.
But the hopeful voice was talking again:
"Do not put yourself down all the time; there may be no reason why you
should not rise, _if you will!_"
Sally sat down and began thinking in half wonder. "Now what, oh, what,
makes me to have thoughts like that?" she asked, in perplexity. "Are
there very truly two Sallys inside my skin?"
She was too much in earnest to laugh as she went on: "All is, if there
be, we must help each other. Thankful should I be to rise in the world,
and great, great joy would it be if some good Fairy could come and live
with me, helping me to rise. Listen, listen will I for your voice, good
Fairy, and run wherever you send, and do whatever you bid."
Then Sally heard many voices, and the rustle of silken garments, and she
knew that a soft swish of fine muslins and delicately shod feet were
coming over the lawn.
She dared one peep at the gay company. There was Corniel, in all his
glory, viewing the table he had spread so finely, and Sam Spruce, with a
high head and knowing air, directing the waiters by signs and nods. The
company was a mixed show of splendid coats, gowns, and shimmering laces,
but the peep was a short one, and Sally was seated again.
A great chattering, mixed with joyous laughter, floated across the wall,
but a "mocker," the lovely mocking-bird of the South, mingled his notes
with it all, and Sally could hear nothing distinctly in the pleasant
confusion.
Then the charming bird-notes hushed, as some one asked plainly a
question of the Fairy Prince.
"To which university do you go, Master Lionel, to Oxford or to
Cambridge?"
"I hie me to England in the early fall, to be tutored a year for Oxford.
It is to the older university I would go."
"And how old may Oxford be?" asked a young voice.
"It was founded by Alfred the Great, 'way back in the ninth century,
872," came in the firm, assured voice of the Fairy Prince.
"And Cambridge?" asked some one else.
"In 1257," came the quick reply.
"And you go in the _Belle Virgeen_?"
"In the _Belle Virgeen_, most surely."
"What will be the whole course?" was the next question.
"Five years if I finish. Affairs may be such as to prevent my
finishing."
"Oh! Ah! Indeed!" cried a voice of mock surprise. "Five years to fit a
lad, who already hath somewhat in his noddle, to do a man's work?"
"And but twenty-one will I be then," answered the Fairy Prince. "Youth
is the time for study."
"And is so very much learning needed?" asked a womanish voice which yet
was a man's, "for the young gentleman who will have lands and servants
of his own whenever he wants them?"
"No man can properly care for houses, lands, or servants, who hath not a
fair stock of the right kind of learning," said Lionel, stoutly.
"Besides," he added, "they say that there are troublous times ahead in
our fine new country, and one must have a clear understanding of
history, laws, and rules of government in order to act wisely. The
colonists may have to act with great decision before long, and a man
should be equipped 'to follow the right side.'"
"And well prepared you will be, lad, when that time comes!" cried the
hearty voice of Captain Rothwell.
The foppish voice asked again, in tones that all at the table could not
hear, nor could Sally have heard only that the young man was seated
close by the wall:
"And what will comfort the sister and our fair Lady Rosamond, meantime?
Eh? eh? eh? And our fair Lady Rosamond, prithee?"
"There will be homeward trips in the summer," Lionel replied; "no one
will need forget me."
"Well, maids must weep when swains desert," lisped the silly young man,
whom no one answered.
Then the mocker trilled again, the talk became confused, coming in
fragments across the wall. But Sally's eyes were big with a kind of
sorrow, and there had come a fast rising and falling at the bosom of her
faded little gown.
"He is going away!" she sighed. "My Fairy Prince is going away. The fall
will come soon, and away will he go to make the difference between us
greater still. Ah! ah! why did the fine voice arise within me, only to
show the great distance that lieth between the rich and the poor, those
who can learn, and those who know naught?"
"Oh, be quiet, child, and cease repining," cried the good Fairy. "Bestir
yourself! Watch your Fairy Prince while you may, as it comforts you, and
when he goeth forth to study, go you forth also, and seek out ways to
learn yourself. There lieth five years between your age and that of the
Fairy Prince, feel you not within your heart that very much might be
learned in five years if with a strong will you do your best for Maid
Sally?"
"The will is strong enough," whispered Sally, "the will is not wanting,
but the way, dear Fairy, who will show me the way?"
"Watch!" cried the Fairy. "Keep the will, and watch for the way. It will
come! Did not the Fairy Prince himself say so? There is a mind within
you. Stir it up! Jump over hindrances, Sally Dukeen, and find for
yourself a way. It is _there_!"
"I will do my best to obey thee, dear Fairy," said poor little Sally.
But down deep in her "heart-place," a pain was tugging, a new pain she
did not in the least understand.
A foppish voice kept sounding in her ears: "Eh? eh? eh? And our fair
Lady Rosamond, prithee?"