PET'S PERIL.
"Who can express the horror of that night,
When darkness lent his robes to monster fear?
And heaven's black mantle, banishing the light,
Made everything in ugly form appear."
Miss Petronilla Lawless having, as Ranty would have expressed it, got
the steam up to a high pressure, thundered over the heath, entered the
forest road, and looked with eyes sparkling with defiance at the dark,
gloomy pine woods on either hand. The bright morning sunshine, falling
in a radiant shower through the waving boughs of the pines, gilded the
crimson glow on her thin cheeks and lips, and brought fiery circlets of
flame through all her short, crisp, jetty curls. Darkly beautiful looked
the little wilful elf, as she slackened her pace through the narrow,
sylvan forest path, as if to give any hidden enemy, if such lurked
there, a full opportunity of making his appearance. None came, however;
and twenty minutes brought her in sight of the gloomy gorge in the cleft
mountain, so appropriately named Dismal Hollow.
Pet slackened the mad pace at which she had started still more, and
loosening her bridle-reins, allowed her sure-footed pony, Starlight, to
choose his own way down the narrow, unsafe bridle-path.
As she approached the house, she ran her eye, with a critical look, over
it, and muttering, "Miss Priscilla's been making improvements," prepared
to alight.
A great change for the better, too, had taken place in the appearance of
Dismal Hollow, since the advent of Miss Priscilla. The great pools of
green slimy water were no longer to be seen before the door; the
receptacles for mud and filth had vanished, as if by magic. A clean, dry
platform spread out where these had once been; the windows were no
longer stuffed full of rags and old hats, but with glass panes, that
fairly glittered with cleanliness; broken fences were put up, outhouses
were repaired, and the whole house had evidently undergone a severe
course of regeneration. Inside, the improvements were still more
remarkable. Every room had undergone a vigorous course of scrubbing,
washing, papering, and plastering, and the doors and windows had been
closed, and hermetically sealed, and no sacrilegious foot was ever
permitted to enter and "muss up," as Miss Priscilla expressed it, those
cherished apartments wherein her soul delighted. The only rooms in the
old house which she permitted to be profaned by use were a couple of
sleeping apartments, a little sitting-room, and the kitchen. The
servants, for so long a time accustomed to do as they liked, and lazy
about as they pleased, were struck with dismay at Miss Priscilla's
appalling vigor and neatness. That worthy lady declared it was not only
a shame, but a sin, to be eaten out of house and home by a parcel of
"shiftless niggers;" and one of her very first acts was to hire half of
them out to any one who would employ them. The remainder were then
informed, in very short terms, that if they did not mind their P's and
Q's, they'd be "sold to Georgy"--a threat sufficient to terrify them
into neatness and order sufficient even to satisfy "Miss 'Silly," as
they called her.
On this particular morning, Miss Priscilla sat up in her sitting-room--a
little, stiff, square, prim, upright and downright sort of an apartment,
with no foolery in the shape of little feminine nicknacks or ornaments
about it, but everything as distressingly clean as it was possible to
be. Miss Priscilla herself, radiant in a scanty, fady calico gown,
reaching to her ankles, a skimpy black silk apron, and a stiff, solemn,
grim-looking mob-cap, was ensconced in a rocking-chair, that kept up an
awful "screechy-scrawchy," as she rocked backward and forward, knitting
away as if her life depended on it. Very hard, and grim, and sour looked
Miss Priscilla, as she sat there with her sharp, cankerous lips so
tightly shut that they reminded one of a vise, and her long, bony nose
running out everlastingly into the thin regions of space.
The sharp clatter of horse's hoofs arrested her attention, and she
turned and looked sharply out of the window. The sour scowl deepened on
her vinegar phiz, as she perceived Pet in the act of alighting.
"That sharp little wiper of a Lawless girl," muttered Miss Priscilla,
"coming here, with a happetite that's hawful to contemplate, when she's
not wanted; turning heverything topsy-turvy, not to speak of that there
pigeon-pie what's for dinner being honly henough for one. Wah! wah!"
And with a look that seemed the very essence of distilled vengeance, and
everything else sour, sharp and cankerous, Miss Priscilla went to the
head of the stairs and called:
"Kupy! Kupy!" (her abbreviation of Cupid), "go and hopen the door for
that Lawless girl, which is come, and bring her pony hinto the barn, and
show her hup 'ere; hand don't mind a-givin' hof her hany hoats. Be quick
there!"
As Miss Priscilla, who looked with contempt upon bells as a useless
superfluity, had a remarkably shrill, ear-splitting voice of her own,
the order to be quick seemed quite unnecessary; for Cupid, clapping his
hand over his bruised and wounded ear-drums, hastened to the door as
rapidly as possible, in order to get rid of the noise. Then Miss
Priscilla walked back to her chair, and deposited her bony form
therein--determining, with a sort of sour grimness, to make the best of
a bad bargain. Not that Miss Priscilla thought anything of the
courtesies of hospitality. She was above such weakness. But Pet Lawless
was the daughter of one of the richest and most influential men in the
State--would be a great heiress and fine lady some day; and Miss
Priscilla, being only flesh and blood, like the rest of us, could not
help feeling a deep veneration for wealth. Personally, she disliked our
mad little whirligig more than anybody else she knew. But money, like
charity, covereth a multitude of sins; and as Miss Pet would inherit
half a million some day, Miss Priscilla Toosypegs, looking into the womb
of futurity, was disposed to forgive her now the awful crime of "mussing
up" her immaculate rooms, in the hope of a substantial return when the
little madcap entered upon her fortune.
Pet, having by this time alighted, ran up the steps, and, with the end
of her riding-whip, knocked so vociferously that she awoke every
slumbering echo in the quiet old house.
Cupid, half-deafened between the piercing voice of Miss Priscilla
within, and the vigorous clamor without, threw open the door; and Pet,
with her riding-habit gathered up in one hand, and flourishing her whip
in the other, stood there, bright, and sparkling, and fresh as a
mountain-daisy before him.
"Well, Cupe how are you these times? Eh? Miss Priscilla at home?"
"Yes, Miss Pet. Miss Silly tole me to tell you you was to walk right
up," said Cupid.
"Very well. Take Starlight, and give him a good rubbing, and then plenty
of oats and water. He's had a hard gallop of it this morning--poor
fellow!" said Pet, as she passed Cupid, and ran up-stairs. "Now to face
the old dragon!" she muttered, as, puckering up her rosy mouth in a
fruitless attempt to whistle, she swaggered into the presence of the
dread spinster, with her usual springing, jaunty air.
"She hates me, and she hates kisses," said Pet, mentally; "so I'll kiss
her, if I die in the attempt! But, ugh! vengeance! verdigris! vitriol,
and vinegar! I'd as lief swallow a dose of sourkrout, and have done with
it. It's going to be awful, I know; but I'll do it!"
"Morning, Miss Pet," said Miss Priscilla, looking grimly up.
"Oh, Miss Priscilla, how do you do! Oh, Miss Priscilla! I'm so glad to
see you again!"
And before Miss Priscilla dreamed of her diabolical intention, the elf
had sprung forward, clutched her by the throat, and clung to her like a
clawfish, while half a dozen short, sharp kisses went off like so many
pop guns on the withered cheek of the luckless old maid.
With no gentle hand, Miss Priscilla caught the monkey by the shoulder,
and hurled her from her with a violence that sent her spinning like a
top across the room.
"It's all very well for people to be glad to see people, which is honly
'uman nature," began Miss Priscilla, in a high, shrill falsetto, while
she adjusted her dislocated mob-cap; "but that hain't no reason why
people must 'ave the clothes tore hoff their back by people, just
because they're glad to see them--which is something I never was used
to, Miss Pet; and though hit may be the fashion hin this 'ere country,
hit's something I don't happrove of hat all, Miss Pet. Now, you'll
hexcuse me for saying I would rather you wouldn't do so no more--which
is disagreeable to the feelings, not to speak of mussing up people's
caps, as is some bother to hiron; though you mayn't think so, Miss Pet."
And having delivered herself of this brilliant and highly-grammatical
oration, and thereby relieved her mind, Miss Priscilla picked up a
stitch in her knitting, which, in the excitement of the moment, she had
dropped.
"Why, Miss Priscilla, I'm sorry; I'm sure I didn't mean to make you
mad," said Pet, in a penitent tone. "But I was so glad to see you, you
know, I couldn't help it. Where's Orlando?"
"Hat them there Barrens, which is the desolatest place I hever seen,"
said Miss Priscilla; "hall weeds; and there you'll find him, with
nothing growing but nasty grass, hall halong hof that there hold gipsy
woman and little gal, 'stead hof staying at 'ome, hand 'tending to his
'fairs, as a respectable member hof s'ciety hought for to do; heaving
away his money, with me slavin' hand toilin' from week's hend to week's
hend, smoking hof nasty cigars, as spiles the teeth hand hundermines the
hintellecks; which was something his blessed father (now a hangel hup
there in the graveyard) never did; and shows 'ow youth is a
degeneratin'. Wah! wah!" said Miss Priscilla, concluding with her usual
grimace of sour disgust.
"Just so, Miss Priscilla, I've often had to talk to our Ranty about it,
too," said Pet, gravely; "but these boys are all a nasty set, you know,
and don't mind us girls at all. I've come to stay all day, Miss
Priscilla." And Pet took off her hat and gloves as she spoke. "I thought
you might be lonesome, and knew you'd be glad to have me here; and I
don't really know of any place I like to be so well as I do to be here!"
All the time Pet had been uttering this awful fib, she was taking off
her things, and pitching them about in a way that made Miss Priscilla
gasp with horror. Her hat was thrown into one corner, her gloves into
another, her whip into a third, and her pocket-handkerchief, collar and
brooch anywhere they chose to fall.
"You needn't go putting yourself out about dinner, Miss Priscilla," said
Pet, who well knew the spinster's parsimoniousness in this respect, and
thought she would just give her a hint. "Anything will do for me--a
broiled chicken, with a mince pie and some grapes; or some nice mutton
chops, fried in butter, with a rice-pudding, or a custard--anything, you
know. But don't put yourself out!"
"I don't hintend to," said Miss Priscilla, knitting away, grimly. "I
never do put myself hout for hanybody; wouldn't for the President hof
the United States or the King hof Hingland--no, not hif he was to come
hall the way from Lunnon hon his two blessed bare knees to hask hit hof
me has a favor. Hand hif you'd pick up them there clothes of your'n,
Miss Pet, which his hall pitched habout, hand gives the room a' huntidy
look, and put them hon the table, hand call to Haunt Bob to carry them
hup-stairs, I'd feel heasier hin my mind."
"Oh, let them lay!" said Pet, indifferently. "They're old things; and I
ain't particular about them. I guess the floor won't dirty them much!"
"My floor's clean, Miss Pet, I'd have you for to know, hand wouldn't
dirty hanybody's things!" answered Miss Priscilla, sharply, and with
flashing eyes; "but them there things hof your'n musses hit hup, which
his something I never likes my room to be, being neat myself, a-slavin',
and toilin', and strivin' to keep things to rights from morning till
night, with people a-pitchin' hof things round huntil hit looks like a
'og-stye. Wah! wah!"
And Miss Priscilla got up and picked up all Pet's garments, and carried
them up to her own bedroom, out of the way.
And then Pet, with her diabolical spirit of mischief uppermost, went
flying through the house, opening, shutting, slamming and banging the
doors, in a way that drove the peace-loving spinster to the verge of
madness, and made her sour temper ten degrees sourer, until her very
look would have turned treacle to vinegar. In and out, up and down
stairs, getting astride of the bannisters and sliding down, at the
imminent danger of breaking her neck, ransacking every room, and turning
everything topsy-turvy and upside down, and "mussing things" generally,
until Miss Priscilla Toosypegs "vowed a vow" in her secret heart that
the next time she saw Miss Petronilla Lawless coming, she would lock
every door in the house, and send Cupid out with his "blunderingbuss" to
shoot her, rather than let her ever darken her doors again.
Dinner at length was announced, and Miss Priscilla began to breathe
freely again, in the hope of at least a few moments, respite from her
tormentor. As Pet entered the sitting-room--for Miss Toosypegs dined in
her sitting-room--her thin, dark, bright face all aglow with fun and
frolic; her black eyes dancing and sparkling with insufferable light;
her short, crisp, black curls all tangled and damp over her shoulders
and round, polished, saucy, boyish forehead, she looked the very
embodiment, the very incarnate spirit of mischief and mirth. She looked
like a little grenade, all jets and sparkles--a little barrel of
gunpowder, at any moment ready to explode--a wild, untamed little
animal, very beautiful, but very dangerous.
And there, at the head of the table, the greatest contrast to her dark,
bright, fiery little neighbor that could well be found, sat Miss
Toosypegs, as prim, stiff and upright as if she had swallowed a
ramrod--as sour, sharp and acid as if she had been spoon-fed on verjuice
from infancy upward.
Pet's eyes went dancing over the table to examine the bill of fare. Now,
reader, our Pet was not a gourmand, nor yet an epicure, by any
means--what she got to eat was very little trouble to her, indeed; but
she knew Miss Priscilla was intensely miserly, and, having plenty,
begrudged every mouthful eaten at her board. Therefore, the wicked
little elf determined to give her a slight idea of what she could do in
the eating-line when provoked to it.
But alas! little was there on that table to provoke the appetite. Two
cups of pale, sickly-looking tea, a plate with four small,
dropsical-looking potatoes, a consumptive red-herring, and, by way of
dessert, a pigeon-pie. That was all.
Pet's face fell to a formidable length for an instant; the next, a
bright idea struck her, and she inwardly exclaimed, as she saw Miss
Priscilla's eyes rest lovingly on the pigeon-pie:
"Pet, child, you'll be starved, you know, if you don't look out, before
you get home. It's your duty to show Miss Priscilla what she owes to her
guests; so you walk right into that pigeon-pie, and eat every morsel of
it, though you should burst!"
"Sit down, Miss Pet," said Miss Priscilla, solemnly, pointing to her
chair, and holding her knife and fork threateningly over the
ghostly-looking red-herring, "for what we are about to receive. Which do
you like best, the 'ead or the tail, Miss Pet?--take your choice."
"Thank you, Miss Priscilla; for I don't care for either--I ain't fond of
fish. I guess I'll take this."
And Pet coolly leaned over, took the pie, and commenced vigorously
cutting it up.
"I always make myself at home here, Miss Priscilla," said Pet, speaking
with her mouth full. "I know you ain't fond of dainties; and nobody has
such nice pigeon-pies as you have. You made it on purpose for me--didn't
you? I told you not to put yourself to any trouble on my account; but
you would, you know. It's real nice, Miss Priscilla; and I'd ask you to
have some, only I know you don't care about it."
And all this time Pet had been crunching away, half choking herself in
her haste.
And Miss Priscilla! What pen shall describe her feelings when she saw
that cherished pigeon-pie--the making of which she had been deliberating
about for a week before--that pigeon-pie, which had been uppermost in
her mind all morning, vanishing before her eyes with such frightful
rapidity? The English language is weak, is utterly powerless to describe
how she felt. There she sat, as if turned to stone, her knife and fork
still poised over the herring, speechless with horror and amazement, her
eyes frozen to the face of Pet, while still her cherished pigeon-pie
kept disappearing like mist before the morning sun.
_"Do_ take your dinner, Miss Priscilla. Why, you ain't eating anything,
hardly," said the wicked little wretch, as her fork went up and down
from her plate to her mouth with the nearest approach to perpetual
motion the horrified spinster had ever seen. "Just see how I'm getting
along. This pie is really beautiful, Miss Priscilla. Oh, I love
pigeon-pie; and only I know you'd rather see me eat it, I'd make you
have a piece. There! I've finished!" said Pet, pushing aside the empty
plate, and leaning back in her chair in a state almost "too full for
utterance." "Oh, that pigeon-pie was--was--actually divine! It just was,
Miss Priscilla; and I'd come to see you every day if you'd only make me
one like that."
Without a word, but with a look that might have turned scarlet any face
less hard than that of the wicked little elf, Miss Priscilla began her
dinner. Nothing daunted, Pet sat and talked away unceasingly; but never
a word came from the penknife-lips of Miss Priscilla Toosypegs. Then,
when the slender repast was over, Aunt Bob was called up from the lower
regions to clear away the service; and Pet sat in her chair, feeling it
inconvenient to do anything but talk, just then; and talk she did, with
a right good will, for two mortal hours; and still Miss Priscilla sat
knitting and knitting away, and speaking never a word.
"The cross, cantankerous, sharp-nosed old thing!" muttered Pet, at last,
getting tired of this unprofitable occupation. "The stingy old miser!
to sit there sulking because I ate the only thing fit to eat on the
table. I declare! if I haven't a good mind to come every day and do the
same, just for her ugliness! Oh, yaw-w-w! how sleepy I am! I guess I've
done all the mischief I can do, just now, so I'll go to sleep. I'd go
home, only I said I wouldn't go till dark, and I won't, either! So, now,
Pet, child, you drop into the 'arms of Murphy,' as Ranty says, as fast
as you like."
And curling herself up in her chair, with her head pillowed on her arm,
Pet, in five minutes, was sound asleep.
* * * * *
From her slumbers she was awoke by a vigorous shake, given by no gentle
hand. Pet started up, rubbed her eyes, and beheld Miss Priscilla, by the
light of a lamp she carried, bending over her.
"I'm a-going to bed, Miss Lawless," said Miss Priscilla, grimly; "hand
hunless you intends staying all night--which I shouldn't be hany
surprised at hif you was--hit's time you was a-going 'ome."
"Why, how late is it?" exclaimed Pet, jumping to her feet.
"Height o'clock, hand as dark as a wolf's mouth, hat that."
"My stars! And isn't tea ready yet, Miss Priscilla?"
"I've 'ad my tea a' hour ago," said Miss Priscilla, with a grim sort of
smile. "You was so sound hasleep I didn't care about wakening hof you,
not to speak hof aveing heat so much for your dinner, I didn't think
you'd care for hany tea. 'Ere's your things, Miss Pet, and your 'oss is
at the door; but you can stay hall night, hif you like."
"I won't stay all night! I'll never come here again--yes I will too!
I'll come every single day--see if I don't," exclaimed Pet, bouncing
across the room, and giving her hat a slap on her head. "I know you
don't want me, and I'll just come! If you was to our house, do you think
I'd pack you off without any tea? No, I wouldn't if I had to boil the
tea-leaves we used the last time for it! It just shows the sort of folks
Englishers are, and I wish there wasn't one in the world--I just do;
and I don't care who hears me saying it. I'm a-going, Miss Priscilla,
and I vow to Sam! I'll be back to-morrow, and the next day, and the
next--see if I don't!"
And while scolding furiously, and flinging things about in a manner
perfectly awful to so neat a housekeeper as the ancient spinster, Miss
Petronilla had managed to dress herself and descend the stairs, while
Miss Priscilla, grim as a cast-iron statue, stood at the head, holding
the light. Pet flounced out of the hall, giving the door a terrific bang
behind her, and stepped out into the night.
By the light that streamed from the glass top of the door, Pet saw Cupid
holding her pony. Springing lightly on his back, she gathered up the
reins, and paused a moment before starting to look around.
The night was pitch dark, still, and sultry. Not a breath of air moved,
not a leaf rustled; but from the inky pall of deepest gloom overhead,
short, fitful flashes of lightning at intervals blazed. A storm was at
hand, and would soon burst.
"For de Lor's sake! hurry, Miss Petronilla," said Cupid, in a frightened
whisper. "Dar's de awfulest storm a-comin' to-night you ever see'd. Miss
'Silly oughtn't 'lowed you to go froo de woods to-night."
"Miss 'Silly, indeed! I guess she hopes I may only get my neck broke
before I get home," said Pet, shortly, as she turned her pony's head in
the direction of the bridle-path leading through the gorge.
The sure-footed steed, left to himself, securely trod the narrow path,
and entered, at last, upon the forest road. Having nothing else to do,
Pet began ruminating.
"If that ain't what I call mean!" she indignantly muttered; "sending me
off like an Arab, without anything to eat. The hateful, stingy old
thing! I like that soft, green, good-natured Orlando, but I can't bear
her. 'Sh-h-h! softly, Starlight, my boy! there's niggers in these woods,
you know, who wouldn't mind chawing you and me right up."
Even while she spoke, a hand grasped her bridle-rein, and a deep, stern
voice cried:
"Stop!"
At the same moment there came a vivid flash of lightning, and Pet
beheld, for a second, the face of a negro black as a demon. The next
instant all was deepest darkness again.