"One out of suits with fortune."
"O Celia!" called Miss Betty Bishop, from her front door, "come in a
minute. I had a tea party last night, and I want to send your mother some
of Sophy's marshmallow cake. I am so glad you happened by," she added, as
Celia came up the walk, "I was wondering how I should get it to her."
"It is very kind of you, Miss Betty," said Celia, following her into the
dining room.
"There is no kindness about it," asserted Miss Betty, opening the cake
box. "I am just proud of Sophy's good things and like to make other people
envy me."
"That is not hard," Celia answered, thinking that life seemed easy and
pleasant in this snug little house. Miss Betty had had her hard times, she
knew, but the troubles of others are apt to seem easier to bear than
one's own, just as in bad weather the best walking is always on the other
side of the street.
Celia was warm and tired, and the dim, cool room was grateful to her as
she sat resting in silence while Miss Betty fluttered back and forth.
"Perhaps you'll think I'd better mind my own business," she said,
returning after a moment's absence, "but here is something I saw in the
_Gazette_. It might be worth trying."
Celia knew by heart the advertisement held out to her. "Work at home.
Fifteen dollars a week made with ease, etc." She accepted it meekly,
however, not wishing to hurt her friend's feelings.
"Talking about minding your own business," continued Miss Betty, "in my
experience it does not pay. I once saw Cousin Anne Gilpin looking at
taffeta at Moseley's, and I knew as well as I knew my name that the piece
she selected wouldn't wear. At first I thought I'd tell her; then I
decided it was none of my business,--Cousin Anne was old enough to know
about the quality of silk. And what do you think? She sent me a waist
pattern off it for a Christmas gift!"
Celia laughed as she rose to go. "Thank you for the cake, even if it isn't
a kindness. Mother will enjoy it," she said.
"You haven't noticed my hall paper," Miss Betty remarked, escorting her
visitor to the door. "I don't expect you to say it is pretty, for it
isn't. I have to confess wall paper is too much for me. This entry is so
small I could not put anything big and bright on it, so I thought I was
getting the very thing when I selected this,--and what does it look like?
Nothing in the world but a clean calico dress. Now it is done I see it
would have been better with plain paper."
"It is clean and unobtrusive," Celia agreed, smiling. Her smiles were a
little forced this morning, it was easy to see; and Miss Betty, laying a
kind hand on her arm, said, "Don't worry too much, Celia. I know something
about hard times, and you will work through after a while."
Celia felt the tears rising, and she left Miss Betty with an abruptness
that made her ashamed of herself as she recalled it. After the exertion
of climbing the hill she stopped to rest on the rustic seat just inside
her own gate. "I wonder," she asked herself, "if there is anything much
harder to bear than seeing a house you love going to ruin and not to be
able to save it."
A branch of the honeysuckle that twined about the gate-post touched her
shoulder, as if to remind her there was still some sweetness in life after
all; but she did not heed it, nor the rose vines and clematis which made
the old gray house beautiful in spite of needed repairs. Celia saw only
rotting woodwork and sagging steps. She thought how the flower garden had
been her father's pride, and how in his spare moments, few as they were,
he was sure to be found digging and trimming and training, with the
happiness of the born gardener. Ah, those days! She remembered the
half-incredulous wonder with which she had been used to hear people speak
of the certainty of trouble. She had felt so certain that joy overbalanced
sorrow, that smiles were more frequent than tears. Now she understood,
since she had tried to hide her own grief under a smiling face.
From her babyhood she had been her father's companion and confidante,
driving about the country with him, interested in all that concerned his
large practice. A warm-hearted, impulsive man, open handed to the point of
extravagance, Dr. Fair had had few enemies and many friends; and loving
his work, life had been full of joy to him. In contrast with those happy
years the bitterness of his last days seemed doubly cruel to Celia.
Whenever she was tired and discouraged, the memory of that dark time rose
before her.
She had been only a child when Patterson Whittredge left home, but she
could remember how warmly her father had taken his side, and how this had
caused the first coolness between him and his boyhood friend, Judge
Whittredge. The judge was influenced by his wife, and between the stubborn
doctor and imperious Mrs. Whittredge there had been no love lost.
The storm had passed after a while, and when the judge's health began to
fail Dr. Fair had been called in. But Mrs. Whittredge had not forgotten,
and the doctor's position was not an easy one. Only his devotion to his
old friend had kept him from giving up the case at the beginning. The
Gilpin will and her father's testimony to the old man's sanity had added
to the trouble, and upon this had come the accusation which, whispered
about, had broken the doctor's heart. Harassed by the hard times and the
failure of investments, denied a place at the bedside of his friend, he
had fallen an easy victim to pneumonia, outliving Judge Whittredge only a
few days. The memory of it lay like lead upon Celia's heart.
"I have left you nothing but a heritage of misfortune, Celia," had been
his last words to her.
"Don't think of that, father; I'll manage," she answered; and she had
tried, but the solving of the problem was costing her the bloom of her
youth. There were the two brothers to be educated, and a delicate, almost
invalid mother to be cared for, and an income that would little more than
pay the taxes on their home. To sell or rent it was not at present
practicable, and she could not take boarders, for no one boarded in
Friendship. Neither could she leave to try her fortune in the city, so she
had been doing whatever her hand found to do. Sewing, embroidering, a
little teaching, and, in season, pickling and preserving. Friends had been
kind, but Celia was proud and determined to fight her own battle, and
sometimes, as this morning, kindness made her burden seem harder to bear.
The worst of it was the root of bitterness in her heart. She could never
forgive Mrs. Whittredge. Few guessed the intensity hidden beneath Celia's
gentle manner. Only now and then a spark from her dark blue eyes revealed
it. The general construction put upon her proud reserve was that she was
unsociable.
There is no loneliness like that of the unforgiving heart. Celia had never
felt it so strongly as after her meeting with Rosalind Whittredge in the
cemetery. There had been something in the soft gaze of the gray eyes that
she could not forget. It had made her take up the rose again after she
flung it away and carry it home with her.
But she must not linger here any longer. There was an order from the
Exchange in the city which should be promptly filled if she hoped for
others. As she rose she confronted Morgan entering the gate.
"Good morning," he said, and there was an odd sort of embarrassment in his
manner as he added, "Some of your window frames need fixing, Miss Celia."