DINNER, AND AFTER IT
Eunice had not fully seen the stranger, and so, when dinner was
announced and Richard led her out, with Andy hovering at her side, she
stood ready to be introduced, with the little speech she had been
rehearsing about "I hope to see you well," etc., trembling on the tip of
her tongue. But her plans were seriously disarranged. Six months before
Richard would have presented her himself, as a matter of course; but he
had learned some things since then, and he tried not to see his mother's
meaning as she glanced from him to Eunice and then to Ethelyn, whose
proud, dignified bearing awed and abashed even her. Eunice, however, had
been made quite too much of to be wholly ignored now, and Mrs. Markham
felt compelled to say, "Ethelyn, this--ah, this is--Eunice--Eunice
Plympton."
That Eunice Plympton was the hired girl Ethelyn did not for a moment
dream; but that she was coarse and vulgar, like the rest of Richard's
family, she at once decided, and if she bowed at all it was not
perceptible to Eunice, who mentally resolved "to go home in the morning
if such a proud minx was to live there."
Mrs. Markham saw the gathering storm, and Richard knew by the drop of
her chin that Ethelyn had not made a good impression. How could she with
that proud cold look, which never for an instant left her face, but
rather deepened in its expression as the dinner proceeded, and one after
the other Mrs. Markham and Eunice left the table in quest of something
that was missing, while Andy himself, being nearest the kitchen, went to
bring a pitcher of hot water for Ethelyn's coffee, lifting the kettle
with the skirt of his coat, and snapping his fingers, which were
slightly burned with the scalding steam. From the position she occupied
at the table Ethelyn saw the whole performance, and had it been in any
other house she would have smiled at Andy's grotesque appearance as he
converted his coat skirts into a holder; but now it only sent a colder
chill to her heart as she reflected that these were Richard's people and
this was Richard's home. Sadly and vividly there arose before her
visions of dear Aunt Barbara's household, where Betty served so quietly
and where, except that they were upon a smaller scale, everything was as
well and properly managed as in Mrs. Dr. Van Buren's family. It was
several hours since she had tasted food, but she could scarcely swallow
a morsel for the terrible homesick feeling swelling in her throat. She
knew the viands before her were as nicely cooked as even Aunt Barbara or
Betty could have cooked them--so much she conceded to Mrs. Markham and
Eunice; but had her life depended upon it she could not have eaten them
and the plate which James had filled so plentifully scarcely diminished
at all. She did pick a little with her fork at the white, tender turkey,
and tried to drink her coffee, but the pain in her head and the pain at
her heart were both too great to allow of her doing more, and Mrs.
Markham and Eunice both felt a growing contempt for a dainty thing who
could not eat the dinner they had been at so much pains to prepare.
Ethelyn knew their opinion of her as well as if it had been expressed in
words; but they were so very far beneath her that whatsoever they might
think was not of the slightest consequence. They were a vulgar, ignorant
set, the whole of them, she mentally decided, as she watched their
manners at table, noticing how James and John poured their coffee into
their saucers, blowing it until it was cool, while Richard, feeling more
freedom now that he was again under his mother's wing, used his knife
altogether, even to eating jelly with it. Ethelyn was disgusted, and
once, as Richard's well-filled knife was moving toward his mouth, she
gently touched his foot with her own; but if he understood her he did
not heed her, and went quietly on with his dinner. Indeed, it might be
truly said of him that "Richard was himself again," for his whole manner
was that of a petted child, which, having returned to the mother who
spoiled it, had cast off the restraint under which for a time it had
been laboring. Richard was hungry, and would have enjoyed his dinner
hugely but for the cold, silent woman beside him, who, he knew, was
watching and criticising all he did; but somehow at home he did not care
so much for her criticisms as when alone with her at fashionable hotels
or with fashionable people. Here he was supreme, and none had ever
disputed his will. Perhaps if Ethelyn had known all that was in his
heart she might have changed her tactics and tried to have been more
conciliatory on that first evening of her arrival at his home. But
Ethelyn did not know--she only felt that she was homesick and
wretched--and pleading a headache, from which she was really suffering,
she asked to go to her room as soon as dinner was over.
It was very pleasant up there, for a cheerful wood fire was blazing on
the hearth, and a rocking-chair drawn up before it, with a footstool
which Andy had made and Melinda covered, while the bed in the little
room adjoining looked so fresh, and clean, and inviting, that with a
great sigh of relief, as the door closed between her and the "dreadful
people below," Ethelyn threw herself upon it, and burying her face in
the soft pillows, tried to smother the sobs which, nevertheless, smote
heavily upon Richard's ear when he came in, and drove from him all
thoughts of the little lecture he had been intending to give Ethelyn
touching her deportment toward his folks. It would only be a fair
return, he reflected, for all the Caudles he had listened to so
patiently, and duly strengthened for his task by his mother's remark to
James, accidentally overheard, "Altogether too fine a lady for us. I
wonder what Richard was thinking of," he mounted the stairs resolved at
least to talk with Ethie and ask her to do better.
Richard could be very stern when he tried, and the hazel of his eye was
darker than usual, and the wrinkle between his eyebrows was deeper as he
thus meditated harm against his offending wife. But the sight of the
crushed form lying so helplessly upon the bed and crying in such a
grieved, heart-sick way, drove all thoughts of discipline from his mind.
He could not add one iota to her misery. She might be cold, and proud,
and even rude to his family, as she unquestionably had been, but she was
still Ethie, his young wife, whom he loved so dearly; and bending over
her, he smoothed the silken bands of her beautiful hair and said to her
softly, "What is it, darling? Anything worse than homesickness? Has
anyone injured you?"
No one had injured her. On the contrary, all had met, or tried to meet
her with kindness, which she had thrust back upon them. Ethelyn knew
this as well as anyone, and Mrs. Markham, washing her dishes below
stairs, and occasionally wiping her eyes with the corner of the check
apron as she thought how all her trouble had been thrown away upon a
proud, ungrateful girl, could not think less of Ethie than Ethie thought
of herself, upstairs sobbing among the pillows. The family were ignorant
and ill bred, as she counted ignorance and ill breeding; but they did
mean to be kind to her, and she hated herself for her ingratitude in not
at least seeming pleased with their endeavors to please her. Added to
this was a vague remembrance of a certain look seen in Richard's eye--a
look which made her uneasy as she thought, "What if he should hate
me, too?"
Richard was all Ethelyn had to cling to now. She respected, if she did
not love him, and when she heard his step upon the stairs, her heart,
for an instant, throbbed with dread lest he was coming to chide her as
she deserved. When, then, he bent so kindly over her, and spoke to her
so tenderly, all her better nature went out toward him in a sudden gush
of something akin to love, and lifting her head, she laid it upon his
bosom, and drawing his arm around her neck, held it there with a sense
of protection, while she said: "No one has injured me; but, oh, I am so
homesick, and they are all so different, and my head aches so hard."
He knew she was homesick and it was natural that she should be; and he
knew, too, that, as she said, they were "so different," and though on
this point he could not fully appreciate her feelings he was sorry for
her, and he soothed her aching head, and kissed her forehead, and told
her she was tired; she would feel better by and by, and get accustomed
to their ways, and when, as he said this, he felt the shiver with which
she repelled the assertion, he repressed his inclination to tell her
that she could at least conceal her aversion to whatever was
disagreeable, and kissing her again, bade her lie down and try to sleep,
as that would help her sooner than anything else, unless it were a cup
of sage tea, such as his mother used to make for him when his head was
aching. Should he send Eunice up with a cup?
"No; oh, no," and Ethelyn's voice expressed the disgust she felt for the
young lady with red streamers in her hair, who had stared so at her and
called her husband Richard.
Ethelyn had not yet defined Eunice's position in the family--whether it
was that of cousin, or niece, or companion--and now that Richard had
suggested her, she said to him:
"Who is this Eunice that seems so familiar?"
Richard hesitated a little and then replied:
"She is the girl who works for mother when we need help."
"Not a hired girl--surely not a hired girl!" and Ethelyn opened her
brown eyes wide with surprise and indignation, wondering aloud what Aunt
Sophia or Aunt Barbara would say if they knew she had eaten with and
been introduced to a hired girl.
Richard did not say, "Aunt Sophia or Aunt Barbara be hanged, or
be--anything," but he thought it, just as he thought Ethelyn's ideas
particular and over-nice. Eunice Plympton was a respectable, trusty
girl, and he believed in doing well for those who did well for him; but
that was no time to argue the point, and so he sat still and listened to
Ethelyn's complaint that Eunice had called him Richard, and would
undoubtedly on the morrow address her as Ethelyn. Richard thought not,
but changed his mind when, fifteen minutes later, he descended to the
kitchen and heard Eunice asking Andy if he did not think "Ethelyn looked
like the Methodist minister's new wife."
This was an offense which even Richard could not suffer to pass
unrebuked, and sending Andy out on some pretext or other, he said that
to Eunice Plympton which made her more careful as to what she called his
wife, but he did it so kindly that she could not be offended with him,
though she was strengthened in her opinion that "Miss Ethelyn was a
stuck-up, an upstart, and a hateful. Supposin' she had been waited on
all her life, and brought up delicately, as Richard said, that was no
reason why she need feel so big, and above speaking to a poor girl when
she was introduced." She guessed that "Eunice Plympton was fully as
respectable and quite as much thought on by the neighbors, if she didn't
wear a frock coat and a man's hat with a green feather stuck in it."
This was the substance of Eunice's soliloquy, as she cleaned the
potatoes for the morrow's breakfast, and laid the kindlings by the
stove, ready for the morning fire. Still Eunice was not a bad-hearted
girl, and when Andy, who heard her mutterings, put in a plea for
Ethelyn, who he said "had never been so far away from home before, and
whose head was aching enough to split," she began to relent, and
proposed, of her own accord, to take up to the great lady a foot-bath
together with hot water for her head.
It was so long since Richard had been at home, and there was so much to
hear of what had happened during his absence that instead of going back
to Ethelyn he yielded to his mother's wish that he should stay with her,
and sitting down in his arm-chair by the blazing fire, he found it so
pleasant to be flattered and caressed and deferred to again, that he was
in some danger of forgetting the young wife who was thus left to the
tender mercies of Andy and Eunice Plympton. Andy had caught eagerly at
Eunice's suggestion of the foot-bath, and offered to carry it up
himself, while Eunice followed with her towels and basin of hot water.
It never occurred to either of them to knock for admittance, and Ethelyn
was obliged to endure their presence, which she did at first with a
shadow on her brow; but when Andy asked so pleadingly that she try the
hot water, and Eunice joined her entreaties with his, Ethelyn consented,
and lay very quiet while Eunice Plympton bathed the aching head and
smoothed the long, bright hair, which both she and Andy admired so much,
for Andy, when he found that Ethelyn declined the foot-bath, concluded
to remain a while, and sitting down before the fire, he scrutinized the
form and features of his new sister, and made remarks upon the luxuriant
tresses which Eunice combed so carefully.
It was something to have the homage of even such subjects as these, and
Ethelyn's heart grew softer as the pain gradually subsided beneath
Eunice's mesmeric touch, so that she answered graciously the questions
propounded by her as to whether that sack, or great-coat, or whatever it
was called, which she wore around her, was the very last style, how much
it took to cut it, and if Miss Markham had the pattern. On being told
that "Miss Markham" had not the pattern, Eunice presumed Melinda Jones
could cut one, and then, while the cooled water was heating on the coals
which Andy raked out upon the hearth, Eunice asked if she might just try
on the "vasquine" and let Miss Markham see how she looked in it.
For a moment Ethelyn hesitated, but Eunice had been so kind, and
proffered her request so timidly, that she could not well refuse, and
gave a faint assent. But she was spared the trial of seeing her basquine
strained over Eunice's buxom figure by the entrance of Richard, who came
to say that Melinda Jones was in the parlor below. In spite of all Tim
had said about madam's airs, and his advice that "Melinda should keep
away," that young lady had ventured upon a call, thinking her intimacy
with the family would excuse any unseemly haste, and thinking, too, it
may be, that possibly Mrs. Richard Markham would be glad to know there
was someone in Olney more like the people to whom she had been
accustomed than Mrs. Markham, senior, and her handmaid, Eunice Plympton.
Melinda's toilet had been made with direct reference to what Mrs.
Ethelyn would think of it, and she was looking very well indeed in her
gray dress and sack, with plain straw hat and green ribbons, which
harmonized well with her high-colored cheeks. But Melinda's pains had
been for naught, just as Richard feared, when she asked if "Mrs.
Markham" was too tired to see her.
Richard was glad to see Melinda, and Melinda was glad to see Richard--so
glad that she gave him a hearty kiss, prefacing the act with the remark,
"I can kiss you, now you are a married man."
Richard liked the kiss, and liked Melinda's frank, open manner, which
had in it nothing Van Burenish, as he secretly termed the studied
elegance of Mrs. Richard Markham's style. Melinda was natural, and he
promptly kissed her back, feeling that in doing so he was guilty of
nothing wrong, for he would have done the same had Ethelyn been present.
She had a terrible headache, he said, in answer to Melinda's inquiry,
and perhaps she did not feel able to come down. He would see.
The hot water and Eunice's bathing had done Ethelyn good, and, with the
exception that she was very pale, she looked bright and handsome, as she
lay upon the pillows, with her loose hair forming a dark, glossy frame
about her face.
"You are better, Ethie," Richard said, bending over her, and playfully
lifting her heavy hair. "Eunice has done you good. She's not so bad,
after all."
"Eunice is well enough in her place," was Ethelyn's reply; and then
there was a pause, while Richard wondered how he should introduce
Melinda Jones.
Perhaps it was vain in him, but he really fancied that the name of Jones
was distasteful to Ethelyn, just as the Van Buren name would have been
more distasteful to him than it already was had he known of Frank's love
affair. And to a certain extent he was right. Ethelyn did dislike to
hear of the Joneses, whom she heartily despised, and her brow grew
cloudy at once when Richard said, bunglingly, and as if it were not at
all what he had come up to say: "Oh, don't you remember hearing me speak
of Melinda Jones, whom I hoped you would like? She is very kind to
mother--we all think a great deal of her; and though she knows it is
rather soon to call, she has come in for a few minutes, and would like
to see you. I should be so glad if you would go down, for it will
gratify her, I know, and I really think we owe her something--she has
always been so kind."
But Ethelyn was too tired, and her head ached too hard to see visitors,
she said; and besides that, "Miss Jones ought to have known that it was
not proper to call so soon. None but a very intimate friend could
presume upon such a thing."
"And Melinda is an intimate friend," Richard answered, a little warmly,
as he left his wife, and went back to Melinda with the message, that
"some time she should be happy to make Miss Jones' acquaintance, but
to-night she really must be excused, as she was too tired to come down."
All this time Andy had been standing with his back to the fire, his
coat-skirts taken up in his arms, his light, soft hat on his head, and
his ears taking in all that was transpiring. Andy regarded his stylish
sister-in-law as a very choice gem, which was not to be handled too
roughly, but he was not afraid of her; he was seldom afraid of anybody,
and when Richard was gone, he walked boldly up to Ethelyn and said:
"I don't want to be meddlesome, but 'pears to me if you'd spoke out your
feelings to Dick, you'd said, 'Tell Melinda Jones I don't want to see
her, neither to-night nor any time.' Mebby I'm mistaken, but honest, do
you want to see Melinda?"
There was something so straightforward in his manner that, without being
the least offended, Ethelyn replied:
"No, I do not. I am sure I should not like her if she at all resembles
her brother^ that terrible Timothy."
Andy did not know that there was anything so very terrible about Tim. He
liked him, because he gave him such nice chews of tobacco, and was
always so ready to lend a helping hand in hog-killing time, or when a
horse was sick; neither had he ever heard him called Timothy before, and
the name sounded oddly, but he classed it with the fine ways of his new
sister, who called him Anderson, though he so much wished she wouldn't.
It sounded as if she did not like him; but he said nothing on that
subject now--he merely adhered to the Jones question, and without
defending Tim, replied:
"Gals are never much like their brothers, I reckon. They are softer, and
finer, and neater; leastways our Daisy was as different from us as
different could be, and Melinda is different from Tim. She's been to
Camden high-school, and has got a book that she talks French out of; and
didn't you ever see that piece she wrote about Mr. Baldwin's boy, who
fell from the top of the church when it was building, and was crushed to
death? It was printed, all in rhyme, in the Camden _Sentinel_, and Jim
has a copy of it in his wallet, 'long with a lock of Melinda's hair. I
tell you she's a team."
Andy was warming up with his subject, and finding Ethelyn a good
listener, he continued:
"I want you to like her, and I b'lieve you orter, for if it hadn't been
for her this room wouldn't of been fixed up as 'tis. Melinda coaxed
mother to buy the carpet, and the curtings, and to put your bed in
there. Why, that was the meal room, where you be, and we used to keep
beans there, too; but Melinda stuck to it till mother moved the chest
and the bags, and then we got some paint, and me and the boys and
Melinda painted, and worked, hopin' all the time that you'd be pleased,
as I guess you be. We wanted to have you like us."
And simple-hearted Andy drew near to Ethelyn, who was softened more by
what he said than she could have been by her husband's most urgent
appeal. The thought of the people to whom she had been so cold, and even
rude, working and planning for her comfort, touched a very tender chord,
and had Richard then proffered his request for her to go down, it is
very possible she might have done so; but it was too late now, and after
Andy left her she lay pondering what he had said and listening to the
sound of voices which came up to her from the parlor directly beneath
her room where James, and John, and Andy, and the mother, with Melinda,
and Eunice, were talking to Richard, who was conscious of a greater
feeling of content, sitting there in their midst again, than he had
known in many a day. Melinda had been more than disappointed at Mrs.
Richard's non-appearance, for aside from a curiosity to see the great
lady, there was a desire to be able to report that she seen her to other
females equally curious, whom she would next day meet at church. It
would have added somewhat to her self-complacency as well as importance
in their eyes, could she have quoted Mrs. Richard's sayings, and,
described Mrs. Richard's dress, the very first day after her arrival. It
would look as if the intimacy, which many predicted would end with Mrs.
Ethelyn's coming, was only cemented the stronger; but no such honor was
in store for her. Ethelyn declined coming down, and with a good-humored
smile Melinda said she was quite excusable; and then, untying her
bonnet, she laid it aside, just as she did the indescribable air of
stiffness she had worn while expecting Mrs. Richard.
How merrily they all laughed and chatted together! and how handsome
James' eyes grew as they rested admiringly upon the sprightly girl, who
perfectly conscious of his gaze, never looked at him, but confined her
attention wholly to Richard, until Andy asked "if they could not have a
bit of a tune."
Then, for the first time, Richard discovered that Ethelyn's piano had
been unpacked, and was now standing between the south windows, directly
under Daisy's picture. It was open, too, and the sheet of music upon the
rack told that it had been used. Richard did not care for himself, but
he was afraid of what Ethelyn might say, and wondered greatly why she
had not spoken of the liberty they had taken.
Ethelyn had not observed the piano; or if she did she had paid no
attention to it. Accustomed as she had always been to seeing one in the
room, she would have missed its absence more than she noticed its
presence. But when, as she lay half dozing and thinking of Aunt Barbara,
the old familiar air of "Money-musk," played with a most energetic hand,
came to her ear, she started, for she knew the tone of her own
instrument--knew, too, that Melinda Jones' hands were sweeping the
keys--and all that Melinda Jones had done for her comfort was forgotten
in the deep resentment which heated her blood and flushed her cheek as
she listened to "Old Zip Coon," which followed "Money-musk," a shuffling
sound of feet telling that somebody's boots were keeping time after a
very unorthodox fashion. Next came a song--"Old Folks at Home"--and in
spite of her resentment Ethelyn found herself listening intently as
James' rich, deep bass, and John's clear tenor, and Andy's alto joined
in the chorus with Melinda's full soprano. The Markham boys were noted
for their fine voices; and even Richard had once assisted at a public
concert; but to-night he did not sing--his thoughts were too intent upon
the wife upstairs and what she might be thinking of the performance, and
he was glad when the piano was closed and Melinda Jones had gone.
It was later than he supposed, and the clock pointed to almost eleven
when he at last said good-night to his mother and went, with a
half-guilty feeling, to his room. But there were no chidings in store
for him; for, wearied with her journey and soothed by the music, Ethelyn
had forgotten all her cares and lay quietly sleeping, with one hand
beneath her cheek and the other resting outside the white counterpane.
Ethie was very pretty in her sleep, and the proud, restless look about
her mouth was gone, leaving an expression more like a child's than like
a girl of twenty. And Richard, looking at her, felt supremely happy that
she was his, forgetting all of the past which had been unpleasant, and
thinking only that he was blessed above his fellow mortals that he could
call the beautiful girl before him his Ethelyn--his wife.