Christmas-time in New York is simply gorgeous, and I loved it. And it
was then that all the intense excitement started and that people began
to understand what had made me nervous; but I must tell what happened
before the holidays came. For a good many things occurred which proved
to be notes in the chord of the big mystery.
Once more my bracelet disappeared and reappeared, as it had before--at
night. And this time the scratching woke me from a sound sleep, and, as
before, I saw a tiny point of light caught in the gold, and in this way
watched it creep about a foot inside of the room by my bed and then
stop. And this time, after it had rested for a moment, it moved again
with a jerk, for about two inches. Then, very quietly, the door at the
head of my bed closed, and I heard the click of the door-knob, after
which the key fell from the lock and clattered loudly on the
floor. . . .
I lay there shaking and gasping, and wishing that even Amy were with me.
But Amy and I were not good friends at that time. . . . Well, that night
I got up, switched on my lights, and picked up the bracelet. I tried to
be a sport, and so I said, “Hello; glad to see you back!” but my voice
wasn’t the sort that should have gone with those words. Then I put the
bracelet up and was just about to turn off the lights when I heard my
door open perhaps an inch and close quickly. And I turned in time to see
a hand reach in to get the flashlight which lay on the table by my bed.
Shakily I said, “_Who is that?_” but no one answered.
And I went to the door and looked out, but no one was in sight. . . .
From down the hall I could hear Uncle Archie snoring, and then Amy
coughed. Nothing was the matter with them. I closed my door and locked
it, although I did not see what good locks would be against a force of
the sort I was meeting. But--it seemed safer.
Every sound from the street rose to bother me and make me think that
there was something outside the door. Every creak in the furniture made
me jump. I sat huddled up in a big chair, warmly wrapped in a blanket,
but shaking as if I had two hundred and nine chills all at once. And
every once in a while I would think I heard a footstep in the hall.
“If this goes on,” I thought, “I do not see how I can _stand_ it.” And
at that time I decided to give up the bracelet and have peace. For
everything looks blacker at night, and in those dark hours it is easy to
give up and let yourself be beaten.
A half an hour after that, perhaps, I heard the beginning of day in the
whir of motors, and nothing ever sounded so good to me. I wanted light,
most terribly.
And as all things that seem as far away as graduation, or your first
low-necked dress, or your first train, it eventually came, and then I
lay down, and slept.
When I got up the next morning Aunt Penelope was nice to me for the
first time since she thought I’d stolen Evelyn’s violets. That is, I
mean she felt like being kind. Before, she had been elaborately polite,
and as just as she could possibly be, but I felt that this was because
she would be uncomfortable if she weren’t, not because her instincts
pointed my way with gentleness. And I was so glad that I had to swallow
a great many times as fast as possible, and couldn’t say good-morning to
Uncle Archie, who got in with his greeting first and “Huh-ed” at me
twice before I could respond.
“My dear child,” said Aunt Penelope, “are you ill?”
I said I was all right, I guessed, but that I hadn’t slept very well.
“Come here,” she said.
I did.
She took my hands in hers and then laid a hand on my cheek. “Hot,” she
said. “Suppose we stay home from school to-day?”
I nodded.
“And do a little petting of ourselves?” she went on.
I said I thought that would be nice.
“Amy will take a note to Miss Gardner,” Aunt Penelope continued, “and
we’ll be cosily fixed at home and have Doctor Vance come in.” And then
she looked at me searchingly, patted my hand and sent me to my place. I
didn’t eat much, I didn’t feel like it and I was too busy thinking, for
I had decided, with daylight, that I would not give up. Uncle Archie got
up, before we had finished, as he always does, and as he went by my
place laid five dollars by it. I did think that was dear of him.
I asked if I might be excused, and followed him to the hall and here I
thanked him. He grunted and looked over my head, and you can imagine my
surprise when he said, “Guess you haven’t been very happy, lately, have
you?”
I replied that I supposed it was my fault if I had not been, and then (I
don’t know what made me, for I had become used to having people think
wrong of me) I added, “_I did not take those violets._”
“Huh----” he grunted.
“I don’t care enough for them,” I went on. “I prefer daisies to orchids,
just as I prefer fishing to _thé dansants_.”
“Fishing,” said Uncle Archie, and he stared down at the surface of the
hall table, which shines highly where it isn’t covered with a lovely
piece of brocade. “I used to fish,” he said, “but my soul--that was a
long time ago!” and he sighed. I got the impression that he had liked it
lots, and I think it seemed to him as if it had happened a long time
past in his life and that he had grown away from it in spirit too, and
somehow couldn’t go back. I felt very sorry for him.
When I went back to the dining-room I found Evelyn just trailing in,
wearing a négligé and looking pretty, but tired. She was fretful about a
frock that had not come when she expected it and sat toying with her
breakfast and complaining about everything. And as always, when she
began this, Amy started to say that _she_ had nothing to wear, and that
her clothes were the worst looking in school and that she was ashamed to
go. And then she began to cry.
I was disgusted, and I thought Evelyn ought to be ashamed to start it,
for bad temper is just as catching as measles or mumps, and anyone who
gives it to the public should be punished in some way.
Aunt looked tried.
“What _is_ the matter with you?” she asked. “I never sit down that you
and Amy don’t ask for something, and I’m sure I don’t see where you got
that habit----”
(I almost smiled at that.) Then she looked at a little tiny
diamond-trimmed wrist-watch she wears, spoke sharply to Amy of the time,
added a word about her own engagements, and both she and Amy left.
Evelyn and I, who had not finished eating, were alone.
And I did an awful thing, but it was a satisfaction. I told Evelyn just
what I thought of her. She started it.
“What is the matter with _people_?” she said. “Sometimes they’re simply
on edge. . . . Here I come in, make a calm statement about needing
frocks, and Amy begins to cry. . . . Anyone can see that I need more
than a child of her age does. . . .”
“People are all pigs,” I said, “and want more than they have and more
and more and more, and that is the reason you’re so unhappy. You started
the bad temper,” I continued (it really was interesting, for she had let
her mouth open in astonishment, and astonishment evidently relaxed the
spring, for it stayed so), “and then--you wonder what made it. Any girl
like Amy looks up to an older sister, and when the older sister
complains the entire time, why--she does too! And that’s the reason,” I
stated with entire frankness, “that you’re going to miss happiness. You
think frocks and having things makes it--well, things and frocks don’t.
Responsibility and love and giving make a return, and they only. . . .
Look here,” I paused for a moment, and then went on, “Amy adores you,
she patterns herself over you; therefore she is beginning to be cross to
aunt and never to say a decent thing at home and to complain _all the
time_. That’s what she sees in _you_----”
Evelyn stood up.
“And,” I hurried on before she could break in, “she will miss real love,
as you will, because real love hasn’t enough money for motors and frocks
and all she wants. And I think real love is lucky, for all he would get
would be a request for more money, complaints and no consideration. Look
at Uncle Archie,” I added, and I went on at length about his caring for
fishing and never doing it and how he never sat down to a meal without a
request of some sort, from one of them, for money.
“That whole business has soured this family,” I said, “and I am glad you
are not going to let it sour another--since money is evidently most
important to you.”
Then I left. Evelyn had plenty of time to speak, but she didn’t; and
what is more she didn’t speak about it later, or tell Aunt Penelope of
what I had done. I know it was frightful of me, but, as I said, it was a
satisfaction, for I had come in the library one afternoon hunting a book
and found Evelyn and Mr. Apthorpe sitting there before a fire. The heavy
rugs muffled my footsteps and before I could speak and let them know I
was there, I heard, “Four thousand--oh, Herbert, I don’t see how _we_
could. I love you, but how _could_ we manage on that!” And he hadn’t
come to call since, so I knew how it ended.
That was what made me so mad--to see her throw away that chance (for it
was a big one if she did care) because of greed.
Several weeks went by after that and everyone but Evelyn was nicer to
me. She wasn’t unpleasant, but she didn’t notice me. The Doctor said I
was a little nervously upset, and that commanded Amy’s respect and made
the girls in school splendid to me. Hardly a day went by that I didn’t
get gum-drops or a French pastry or have someone offer to let me wear
their violets for a half-hour. I liked that. And more for the spirit
than for the benefits which I received from it.
Mr. Kempwood was splendid to me all that time and took me for lots of
nice drives and to the theatre several times. We became better and
better friends, and he began to seem less old and more “S. K.,” a chum.
One night he sent a new servant up to ask if I cared to go walking with
him before dinner. I was in the dining-room helping Ito serve aunt’s
friends who had been playing auction and were ready to be tea-ed up.
When I hunted the man to give him my answer I couldn’t find him, until,
looking down the long hall which leads toward the sleeping-rooms, I saw
him step from my room.
“I beg pardon,” he said, as he reached me, “but I heard a window go up
in that room, and then a heavy tool drop. It sounded like a sneak thief
and I went to see. . . . The window was open, miss, and there is a bit
of wood broken from the sill. I beg pardon if I did wrong, but there
seemed to be no one about but the party of ladies and I thought
immediate action necessary.”
I said it was all right and thanked him. And I found something he had
not seen--and that was that the lock of the window was broken.
Someone had been there, and with intent fixed that window so it could be
opened. It was the one which led out on the little iron grilled balcony.
That was the night I set the trap. If I recall correctly, it was the
night before Thanksgiving. But that doesn’t matter. What does matter was
that five people wore bandages on their right hands the next
day--so--how could I tell who had found the trap?
Nothing seemed to work out as I hoped it would, everything only made
more confusion; and I felt--Madam Jumel smile!