Mary. "But the fact is that she exaggerates so constantly that I have
fallen into the habit of only half listening to her. If it had been
Alice, it would have been quite different."
Madge overheard Mamma say this, and she crept away to her own room, and
cried as if her heart would break.
"If Ernie is never found, it will all be my fault," she thought. "Nobody
believes a word that I say. But they would have believed if Alice had
said it, and Mary would have run after that wicked old woman, and got
dear baby away from her. Oh dear, how miserable I am!"
Madge never forgot that long afternoon and that wretched night. Mamma
did not go to bed at all, and none of them slept much. It was not till
ten o'clock the next morning that Papa and Jim came back, bringing--oh,
joy!--little Ernie with them, his pretty hair all tangled and his rosy
cheeks glazed with crying, but otherwise unhurt. He had been found
nearly ten miles away, locked in a miserable cottage by the old woman,
who had taken off his nice clothes and dressed him in a ragged frock.
She had left him there while she went out to beg, or perhaps to make
arrangements for carrying him farther out of reach; but she had given
him some bread and milk for supper and breakfast, and the little fellow
was not much the worse for his adventure; and after a bath and a
re-dressing, and after being nearly kissed to death by the whole family,
he went to sleep in his own crib very comfortably.
"Papa," said Madge that night, "I never mean to exaggerate any more as
long as I live. I mean to say exactly what I think, only not so much, so
that you shall all have confidence in me. And then, next time baby is
stolen, you will all believe what I say."
"I hope there will never be any 'next time,'" observed her mother; "but
I shall have to be glad of what happened this time, if it really cures
you of such a bad habit, my little Madge."
DOLLY'S LESSON.
"What is presence of mind, any way?" demanded little Dolly Ware, as she
sat, surrounded by her family, watching the sunset.
The sunset hour is best of all the twenty-four in Nantucket. At no other
time is the sea so blue and silvery, or the streaks of purple and pale
green which mark the place of the sand-spits and shallows that underlie
the island waters so defined, or of such charming colors. The wind blows
across softly from the south shore, and brings with it scents of heath
and thyme, caught from the high upland moors above the town. The sun
dips down, and sends a flash of glory to the zenith; and small pink
clouds curl up about the rising moon, fondle her, as it were, and seem
to love her. It is a delightful moment, and all Nantucket dwellers learn
to watch for it.
It was the custom of the Ware family, as soon as they had despatched
their supper,--a very hearty supper, suited to young appetites sharpened
by sea air;--of chowder, or hot lobster, or a newly caught blue-fish,
with piles of brown bread and butter, and unlimited milk,--to rush out
_en masse_ to the piazza of their little cottage, and "attend to the
sunset," as though it were a family affair. It was the hour when jokes
were cracked and questions asked, and when Mamma, who was apt to be
pretty busy during the daytime, had leisure to answer them.
Dolly was youngest of the family,--a thin, wiry child, tall for her
years, with a brown bang lying like a thatch over a pair of bright
inquisitive eyes, and a thick pig-tail braided down her back. Phyllis,
the next in age, was short and fat; then came Harry, then Erma, just
sixteen (named after a German great-grandmother), and, last of all,
Jack, tallest and jolliest of the group, who had just "passed his
preliminaries," and would enter college next year. Mrs. Ware might be
excused for the little air of motherly pride with which she gazed at her
five. They were fine children, all of them,--frank, affectionate,
generous, with bright minds and healthy bodies.
"Presence of mind sometimes means absence of body," remarked Jack, in
answer to Dolly's question.
"I was speaking to Mamma," said Dolly, with dignity. "I wasn't asking
you."
"I am aware of the fact, but I overlooked the formality, for once. What
makes you want to know, midget?"
"There was a story in the paper about a girl who hid the kerosene can
when the new cook came, and it said she showed true presence of mind,"
replied Dolly.
"Oh, that was only fun! It didn't mean anything."
"Isn't there any such thing, then?"
"Why, of course there is. Picking up a shell just before it bursts in a
hospital tent, and throwing it out of the door, is presence of mind."
"Yes, and tying a string round the right place on your leg when you've
cut an artery," added Harry, eagerly.
"Swallowing a quart of whiskey when a rattlesnake bites you," suggested
Jack.
"Saving the silver, instead of the waste-paper basket, when the house is
on fire," put in Erma.
Dolly looked from one to the other.
"What funny things!" she cried. "I don't believe you know anything about
it. Mamma, tell me what it really means."
"I think," said Mrs. Ware, in those gentle tones to which her children
always listened, "that presence of mind means keeping cool, and having
your wits about you, at critical moments. Our minds--our reasoning
faculties, that is--are apt to be stunned or shocked when we are
suddenly frightened or excited; they leave us, and go away, as it were,
and it is only afterward that we pick ourselves up, and realize what we
ought to have done. To act coolly and sensibly in the face of danger is
a fine thing, and one to be proud of."
"Should you be proud of me if I showed presence of mind?" asked Dolly,
leaning her arms on her mother's lap.
"Very proud," replied Mrs. Ware, smiling as she stroked the brown
head,--"very proud, indeed."
"I mean to do it," said Dolly, in a firm tone.
There was a general laugh.
"How will you go to work?" asked Jack. "Shall I step down to Hussey's,
and get a shell for you to practise on?"
"She'll be setting the house on fire some night, to show what she can
do," added Harry, teasingly.
"I shall do no such thing," protested Dolly, indignantly. "How foolish
you are! You don't understand a bit! I don't want to make things happen;
but, if they do happen, I shall try to keep cool and have my wits about
me, and perhaps I shall."
"It would be lovely to be brave and do heroic things," remarked Phyllis.
"You could at least be brave enough to use your common sense," said her
mother. "Yours is a very good resolution, Dolly dear, and I hope you'll
keep to it."
"I will," said Dolly, and marched undauntedly off to bed. Later, she
found herself repeating, as if it were a lesson to be learned, "Presence
of mind means keeping cool, and having your wits about you;" and she
said it over and over every morning and evening after that, as she
braided her hair. Phyllis overheard, and laughed at her a little; but
Dolly didn't mind being laughed at, and kept on rehearsing her sentence
all the same.
It is not given to all of us to test ourselves, and discover by actual
experiment just how much a mental resolution has done for us. Dolly,
however, was to have the chance. The bathing-beach at Nantucket is a
particularly safe one, and the water through the summer months most warm
and delicious. All the children who lived on the sandy bluff known as
"The Cliff" were in the habit of bathing; and the daily dip taken in
company was the chief event of the day, in their opinion. The little
Wares all swam like ducks; and no one thought of being nervous or
apprehensive if Harry struck out boldly for the jetty, or if Erma and
Phyllis were seen side by side at a point far beyond the depth of either
of them, or little Dolly took a "header" into deep water off an old
boat.
It happened, about two months after the talk on the piazza, that Dolly
was bathing with Kitty Allen, a small neighbor of her own age. Kitty had
just been learning to swim, and was very proud of her new accomplishment;
but she was by no means so sure of herself or so much at home in the
water as Dolly, who had learned three years before, and practised
continually.
The two children had swam out for quite a distance; then, as they turned
to go back, Kitty suddenly realized her distance from the shore, and was
seized with immediate and paralyzing terror.
"Oh, oh!" she gasped. "How far out we are! We shall never get back in
the world! We shall be drowned! Dolly Ware, we shall certainly be
drowned!"
She made a vain clutch at Dolly, and, with a wild scream, went down, and
disappeared.
Dolly dived after her, only to be met by Kitty coming up to the surface
again, and frantically reaching out, as drowning persons do, for
something to hold by. The first thing she touched was Dolly's large
pig-tail, and, grasping that tight, she sank again, dragging Dolly down
with her, backward.
It was really a hazardous moment. Many a good swimmer has lost his life
under similar circumstances. Nothing is more dangerous than to be caught
and held by a person who cannot swim, or who is too much disabled by
fear to use his powers.
And now it was that Dolly's carefully conned lesson about presence of
mind came to her aid. "Keep cool; have your wits about you," rang
through her ears, as, held in Kitty's desperate grasp, she was dragged
down, down into the sea. A clear sense of what she ought to do flashed
across her mind. She must escape from Kitty and hold her up, but not
give Kitty any chance to drag her down again. As they rose, she pulled
her hair away with a sudden motion, and seized Kitty by the collar of
her bathing-dress, behind.
"Float, and I'll hold you up," she gasped. "If you try to catch hold of
me again, I'll just swim off, and leave you, and then you _will_ be
drowned, Kitty Allen."
Kitty was too far gone to make any very serious struggle. Then Dolly,
striking out strongly, and pushing Kitty before her, sent one wild cry
for help toward the beach.
The cry was heard. It seemed to Dolly a terribly long time before any
answer came, but it was in reality less than five minutes before a boat
was pushed into the water. Dolly saw it rowing toward her, and held on
bravely. "Be cool; have your wits about you," she said to herself. And
she kept firm grasp of her mind, and would not let the fright, of whose
existence she was conscious, get possession of her.
Oh, how welcome was the dash of the oars close at hand, how gladly she
relinquished Kitty to the strong arms that lifted her into the boat!
But when the men would have helped her in too, she refused.
"No, thank you; I'll swim!" she said. It seemed nothing to get herself
to shore, now that the responsibility of Kitty and Kitty's weight were
taken from her. She swam pluckily along, the boat keeping near, lest her
strength should give out, and reached the beach just as Jack, that
moment aware of the situation, was dashing into the water after her. She
was very pale, but declared herself not tired at all, and she dressed
and marched sturdily up the cliff, refusing all assistance.
There was quite a little stir among the summer colony over the
adventure, and Mrs. Ware had many compliments paid her for her child's
behavior. Mr. Allen came over, and had much to say about the
extraordinary presence of mind which Dolly had shown.
"It was really remarkable," he said. "If she had fought with Kitty, or
if she had tried to swim ashore and had not called for assistance, they
might easily have both been drowned. It is extraordinary that a child of
that age should keep her head, and show such coolness and decision."
"It wasn't remarkable at all," Dolly declared, as soon as he was gone.
"It was just because you said that on the piazza that night."
"Said what?"
"Why, Mamma, surely you haven't forgotten. It was that about presence of
mind, you know. I taught it to myself, and have said it over and over
ever since,--'Keep cool; have your wits about you.' I said it in the
water when Kitty was pulling me under."
"Did you, really?"
"Indeed, I did. And then I seemed to know what to do."
"Well, it was a good lesson," said Mrs. Ware, with glistening eyes. "I
am glad and thankful that you learned it when you did, Dolly."
"Are you proud of me?" demanded Dolly.
"Yes, I am proud of you."
This capped the climax of Dolly's contentment. Mamma was proud of her;
she was quite satisfied.
A BLESSING IN DISGUISE.
It was a dark day for Patty Flint when her father, with that curt
severity of manner which men are apt to assume to mask an inward
awkwardness, announced to her his intention of marrying for the second
time.
"Tell the others after I am gone out," he concluded.
"But, Papa, do explain a little more to me before you go," protested
Patty. "Who is this Miss Maskelyne? What kind of a person is she? Must
we call her mother?"
"Well--we'll leave that to be settled later on. Miss Maskelyne is
a--a--well, a very nice person indeed, Patty. She'll make us all very
comfortable."
"We always have been comfortable, I'm sure," said Patty, in an injured
tone.
Dr. Flint instinctively cast a look around the room. It _was_
comfortable, certainly, so far as neatness and sufficient furniture and
a hot fire in an air-tight stove can make a room comfortable. There was
a distinct lack of anything to complain of, yet something seemed to him
lacking. What was it? His thoughts involuntarily flew to a room which he
had quitted only the day before, no larger, no sunnier, not so well
furnished, and which yet, to his mind, seemed full of a refinement and
homelikeness which he missed in his own, though, man-like, he could have
in no wise explained what went to produce it.
His rather stern face relaxed with a half-smile; his eyes seemed to seek
out a picture far away. But Patty was watching him,--an observant,
decidedly aggrieved Patty, who had done her best for him since her
mother died, and a good best too, her age considered, and who was not
inexcusable in disliking to be supplanted by a stranger. Poor Patty! But
even for Patty's sake it was better so, the father reflected, looking at
the prim, opinionated little figure before him, and noting how all the
childishness and girlishness seemed to have faded out of it during three
years of responsibility. She certainly had managed wonderfully for a
child of fifteen, and his voice was very kind as he said, "Yes, my dear,
so we have. You've been a good girl, Patty, and done your best for us
all; but you're young to have so much care, and when the new mother
comes, she will relieve you of it, and leave you free to occupy and
amuse yourself as other girls of your age do."
He kissed Patty as he finished speaking. Kisses were not such every-day
matters in the Flint family as to be unimportant, and Patty, with all
her vexation, could not but be gratified. Then he hurried away, and,
after watching till his gig turned the corner, she went slowly upstairs
to the room where the children were learning their Sunday-school
lessons.
There were three besides herself,--Susy and Agnes, aged respectively
twelve and ten; and Hal, the only boy, who was not quite seven. This
hour of study in the middle of Saturday morning was deeply resented by
them all; but Patty's rules were like the laws of the Medes and
Persians, which alter not, and they dared not resist. They had solaced
the tedium of the occasion by a contraband game of checkers during her
absence, but had pushed the board under the flounce of the sofa when
they heard her steps, and flown back to their tasks. Over-discipline
often leads to little shuffles and deceptions like this, and Patty, who
loved authority for authority's sake, was not always wise in enforcing
it.
"When you have got through with your lessons, I have something to tell
you," was her beginning.
It was an indiscreet one; for of course the children at once protested
that they were through! How could they be expected to interest
themselves in the "whole duty of man," with a secret obviously in the
air.
"Very well, then," said Patty, indulgently,--for she was dying to tell
her news,--"Papa has just asked me to say to you that he is--is--going
to be married to a lady in New Bedford."
"Married!" cried Agnes, with wide-open eyes. "How funny! I thought only
people who are young got married. Can we go to the wedding, do you
suppose, Patty?"
"Oh, perhaps we shall be bridesmaids! I'd like that," added Susy.
"And have black cake in little white boxes, just as many as we want.
Goody!" put in Hal.
"Oh, children, how can you talk so?" cried Patty, all her half-formed
resolutions of keeping silence and not letting the others know how she
felt about it flying to the winds. "Do you really want a stepmother to
come in and scold and interfere and spoil all our comfort? Do you want
some one else to tell you what to do, and make you mind, instead of me?
You're too little to know about such things, but I know what stepmothers
are. I read about them in a book once, and they're dreadful creatures,
and always hate the children, and try to make their Papas hate them too.
It will be awful to have one, I think."
Patty was absolutely crying as she finished this outburst; and, emotion
being contagious, the little ones began to cry also.
"Why does Papa want to marry her, if she's so horrid?" sobbed Agnes.
"I'll never love her!" declared Susy.
"And I'll set my wooden dog on her!" added Hal.
"Oh, Hal," protested Patty, alarmed at the effect of her own injudicious
explosion, "don't talk like that! We mustn't be rude to her. Papa
wouldn't like it. Of course, we needn't love her, or tell her things, or
call her 'mother,' but we _must_ be polite to her."
"I don't know what you mean exactly, but I'm not going to be it,
anyway," said Agnes.
And, indeed, Patty's notion of a politeness which was to include neither
liking nor confidence nor respect _was_ rather a difficult one to
comprehend.
None of the children went to the wedding, which was a very quiet one.
Patty declared that she was glad; but in her heart I think she regretted
the loss of the excitement, and the opportunity for criticism. A big
loaf of thickly frosted sponge cake arrived for the children, with some
bon-bons, and a kind little note from the bride; and these offerings
might easily have placated the younger ones, had not Patty diligently
fanned the embers of discontent and kept them from dying out.
And all the time she had no idea that she was doing wrong. She felt
ill-treated and injured, and her imagination played all sorts of
unhappy tricks. She made pictures of the future, in which she saw
herself neglected and unloved, her little sisters and brother
ill-treated, her father estranged, and the household under the rule of
an enemy, unscrupulous, selfish, and cruel. Over these purely imaginary
pictures she shed many needless tears.
"But there's one thing," she told herself,--"it can't last always. When
girls are eighteen, they come of age, and can go away if they like; and
I _shall_ go away! And I shall take the children with me. Papa won't
care for any of us by that time; so he will not object."
So with this league, offensive and defensive, formed against her, the
new Mrs. Flint came home. Mary the cook and Ann the housemaid joined in
it to a degree.
"To be sure, it's provoking enough that Miss Patty can be when she's a
mind," observed Mary; "a-laying down the law, and ordering me about,
when she knows no more than the babe unborn how things should be done!
Still, I'd rather keep on wid her than be thrying my hand at a stranger.
This'll prove a hard missis, mark my word for it, Ann! See how the
children is set against her from the first! That's a sign."
Everything was neat and in order on the afternoon when Dr. and Mrs.
Flint were expected. Patty had worked hard to produce this result. "She
shall see that I know how to keep house," she said to herself. All the
rooms had received thorough sweeping, all the rugs had been beaten and
the curtains shaken out, the chairs had their backs exactly to the wall,
and every book on the centre table lay precisely at right angles with a
second book underneath it. Patty's ideas of decoration had not got
beyond a stiff neatness. She had yet to learn how charming an easy
disorder can be made.
The children, in immaculate white aprons, waited with her in the parlor.
They did not run out into the hall when the carriage stopped. The
malcontent Ann opened the door in silence.
"Where are the children?" were the first words that Patty heard her
stepmother say.
The voice was sweet and bright, with a sort of assured tone in it, as of
one used always to a welcome. She did not wait for the Doctor, but
walked into the room by herself, a tall, slender, graceful woman, with a
face full of brilliant meanings, of tenderness, sense, and fun. One look
out of her brown eyes did much toward the undoing of Patty's work of
prejudice with the little ones.
"Patty, dear child, where are you?" she said. And she kissed her warmly,
not seeming to notice the averted eyes and the unresponding lips. Then
she turned to the little ones, and somehow, by what magic they could not
tell, in a very few minutes they had forgotten to be afraid of her,
forgotten that she was a stranger and a stepmother, and had begun to
talk to her freely and at their ease. Dr. Flint's face brightened as he
saw the group.
"Getting acquainted with the new mamma?" he said. "That's right."
But this was a mistake. It reminded the children that she was new, and
they drew back again into shyness. His wife gave him a rapid, humorous
look of warning.
"It always takes a little while for people to get acquainted," she said;
"but these 'people' and I do not mean to wait long."
She smiled as she spoke, and the children felt the fascination of her
manner; only Patty held aloof.
The next few weeks went unhappily enough with her. She had to see her
adherents desert her, one by one; to know that Mary and Ann chanted the
praises of the new housekeeper to all their friends; to watch the little
girls' growing fondness for the stranger; to notice that little Hal
petted and fondled her as he had never done his rather rigorous elder
sister; and that her father looked younger and brighter and more content
than she had ever seen him look before. She had also to witness the
gradual demolishment of the stiff household arrangements which she had
inherited traditionally from her mother, and sedulously observed and
kept up.
The new Mrs. Flint was a born homemaker. The little instinctive touches
which she administered here and there presently changed the whole aspect
of things. The chairs walked away from the walls; the sofa was wheeled
into the best position for the light; plants, which Patty had eschewed
as making trouble and "slop," blossomed everywhere. Books were
"strewed," as Patty in her secret thought expressed it, in all
directions; fresh flowers filled the vases; the blinds were thrown back
for the sunshine to stream in. The climax seemed to come when Mrs. Flint
turned out the air-tight stove, opened the disused fireplace, routed a
pair of andirons from the attic, and set up a wood fire.
"It will snap all over the room. The ashes will dirty everything. The
children will set fire to their aprons, and burn up!" objected Patty.
"There's a big wire fireguard coming to make the children safe," replied
her stepmother, easily. "As for the snapping and the dirt, that's all
fancy, Patty. I've lived with a wood fire all my life, and it's no
trouble at all, if properly managed. I'm sure you'll like it, dear, when
you are used to it."
And the worst was that Patty _did_ like it. It was so with many of the
new arrangements. She opposed them violently at first in her heart, not
saying much,--for Mrs. Flint, with all her brightness and affectionate
sweetness, had an air of experience and authority about her which it was
not easy to dispute,--and later ended by confessing to herself that they
were improvements. A gradual thaw was taking place in her frozen little
nature. She fought against it; but as well might a winter-sealed pond
resist the sweet influences of spring.