but nobody came except Josie Grey's brother, to say that her mother was
taken ill suddenly and Josie could not come. I suppose Mr. Holmes
expected her to come and so he has gone to Middlefield, and Morris
thought so, too; and so I am left out in the cold, or rather in by the
fire. Mr. Holmes' chamber is the snuggest room in the house, so full of
books that you can't be lonely in it, and then the fire on the hearth
is company. It began to snow before sun down and now the wind howls and
the snow seems to rush about as if it were in a fury. You ask what I have
read this winter. Books that you will not like: Thomson's 'Seasons,'
Cowper's 'Task,' Pollok's 'Course of Time,' Milton's 'Paradise Regained,'
Strickland's 'Queens of England,' 'Nelson on Infidelity,' 'Lady
Huntington and her Friends,' 'Lady of the Lake,' several of the
'Bridgewater Treatises,' Paley's 'Natural Theology,' 'Trench on
Miracles,' several dozens of the best story books I could find to make
sandwiches with the others, somebody's 'Travels in Iceland,' and
somebody's 'Winter in Russia,' and 'Rasselas,' and 'Boswell's Johnson,'
and I cannot remember others at this moment. Morris says I do not think
anything dry, but go right through everything. Because I have the master
to help me, and I did give 'Paradise Lost' up in despair. Mother says I
shall never make three quilts for you if I read so much, but I do get on
with the patch work and she already has one quilt joined, and Mrs. Rheid
is coming to help her quilt it next week. There is a pile of blocks on
the master's desk now and I intend to sit here in his arm chair and
sew until I am sleepy. I wonder if you will do as much for me when my
Prince comes. Mine is to be as handsome as Hollis, as good as Morris,
as learned as the master, and as devoted as your splendid Will. And if I
cannot find all these in one I will--make patch work for other brides and
live alone with Miss Prudence. And I'll begin now to make the patch work.
Oh, dear, I wish you and Miss Prudence were here. Hark! there's somebody
pounding on the outside kitchen door! Shall I go down or let them pound?
I don't believe it is Robin Hood or any of his merry men, do you? I'll
screw my courage up and go.
"Vol. III. Next Day. I won't keep you in suspense, you dear, sympathetic
Linnet. I went down with some inward quaking but much outward boldness
as the pounding increased, and did not even ask 'Who's there?' before I
opened the door. But I _was_ relieved to find Morris, covered with snow,
looking like a storm king. He said he had heard through Frank Grey that
Josie couldn't come and he would not let me stay alone in a storm. I was
so glad, if I had been you I should have danced around him, but as it was
I and not you I only said how glad I was, and made him a cup of
steaming coffee and gave him a piece of mince pie for being so good.
To-day it snows harder than ever, so that we do not expect father and
mother; and Mr. Holmes has not come out in the storm, because Morris saw
him and told him that he was on the way home. Not a sleigh has passed,
we have not seen a single human being to-day. I could not have got out to
the stable, and I don't know what the cows and hens would have done
without Morris. He has thrown down more hay for the cows, and put corn
where the hens may find it for to-morrow, in case he cannot get out to
them. The storm has not lessened in any degree; I never knew anything
like it, but I am not the 'oldest inhabitant.' Wouldn't I have been
dreary here alone?
"This does seem to be a kind of adventure, but nothing happens. Father is
not strong enough to face any kind of a storm, and I am sure they will
not attempt to start. Morris says we are playing at housekeeping and he
helps me do everything, and when I sit down to sew on your patch work he
reads to me. I let him read this letter to you, forgetting what I had
said about my Prince, but he only laughed and said he was glad that he
was _good_ enough for me, even if he were not handsome enough, or learned
enough, or devoted enough, and said he would become devoted forthwith,
but he could not ever expect to attain to the rest. He teases me and says
that I meant that the others were not good enough. He has had a letter
from Will promising to take him before the mast next voyage and he is
hilarious over it. His mother tries to be satisfied, but she is afraid of
the water. When so many that we know have lost father or brother or
husband on the sea it does seem strange that we can so fearlessly send
another out. Mrs. Rheid told me about a sea captain that she met when she
was on a voyage with Captain Rheid. He had been given up for lost when he
was young and when he came back he found his wife married to another man,
but she gave up the second husband and went back to the first. She was
dead when Mrs. Rheid met him; she said he was a very sad man. His ship
was wrecked on some coast, I've forgotten where, and he was made to work
in a mine until he was rescued. I think I would have remained dead to her
if she had forgotten me like that. But isn't this a long letter? Morris
has made me promise to write regularly to him; I told him he had never
given me a Holland plate two hundred years old, but he says he will go to
Holland and buy me one and that is better.
"I am glad Hollis wrote such a long letter to his mother if he could not
come home. I wish he would write to her oftener; I do not think she is
quite satisfied to have him write to me instead. I will write to him
to-morrow, but I haven't anything to say, I have told you everything. O,
Linnet, how happy I shall be when your school days are over. Miss
Prudence shall have the next letter; I have something to ask her, as
usual.
"The end of my story in three volumes isn't very startling. But this
snow-storm is. If we hadn't everything under cover we would have to do
without some things.
"Yours,
"MARJORIE"
XIII.
A WEDDING DAY.
"A world-without-end bargain."--_Shakespeare._
A young girl stood in the doorway, shading her eyes with her hand as
she gazed down the dusty road; she was not tall or slight, but a plump,
well-proportioned little creature, with frank, steadfast eyes, a low,
smooth forehead with brown hair rippling away from it, a thoughtful mouth
that matched well with the eyes; an energetic maiden, despite the air of
study that somehow surrounded her; you were sure her voice would be
sweet, and as sure that it would be sprightly, and you were equally sure
that a wealth of strength was hidden behind the sweetness. She was only
eighteen, eighteen to-day, but during the last two years she had rapidly
developed into womanhood. The master told Miss Prudence this morning that
she was trustworthy and guileless, and as sweet and bright as she was
good; still, he believed, as of old, that she did not quite know how to
take her own part; but, as a woman, with a man to fight for her, what
need had she of fighting? He would not have been at all surprised had he
known that she had chosen, that morning, a motto, not only for her new
year, but, as she told Morris, for her lifetime: "The Lord shall fight
for you, and ye shall hold your peace." And he had said: "May I fight for
you, too, Marjorie?" But she had only laughed and answered: "We don't
live in the time of the Crusades."
Although it was Linnet's wedding day Marjorie, the bridesmaid, was
attired in a gingham, a pretty pink and white French gingham; but there
were white roses at her throat and one nestled in her hair. The roses
were the gift of the groomsman, Hollis, and she had fastened them in
under the protest of Morris' eyes. Will and Linnet had both desired
Hollis to "stand up" with Marjorie; the bridesmaid had been very shy
about it, at first; Hollis was almost a stranger, she had seen him but
once since she was fourteen, and their letters were becoming more and
more distant. He was not as shy as Marjorie, but he was not easy and at
home with her, and never once dared to address the maiden who had so
suddenly sprung into a lovely woman with the old names, Mousie, or
Goosie. Indeed, he had nearly forgotten them, he could more readily have
said: "Miss Marjorie."
He had grown very tall; he was the handsomest among the brothers, with an
air of refinement and courtesy that somewhat perplexed them and set him
apart from them. Marjorie still prayed for him every day, that is, for
the Hollis she knew, but this Hollis came to her to-day a stranger; her
school-boy friend was a dream, the friend she had written to so long was
only her ideal, and this tall man, with the golden-red moustache, dark,
soft eyes and deep voice, was a fascinating stranger from the outside
world. She could never write to him again; she would never have the
courage.
And his heart quickened in its beating as he stood beside the white-robed
figure and looked down into the familiar, strange face, and he wondered
how his last letter could have been so jaunty and off-hand. How could he
ever write "Dear Marjorie" again, with this face in his memory? She was
as much a lady as Helen had been, he would be proud to take her among his
friends and say: "This is my old school friend."
But he was busy bringing chairs across the field at this moment and
Marjorie stood alone in the doorway looking down the dusty road. This
doorway was a fitting frame for such a rustic picture as a girl in a
gingham dress, and the small house itself a fitting background.
The house was a story and a half, with a low, projecting roof, a small
entry in the centre, and square, low-studded rooms on both sides, a
kitchen and woodshed stretched out from the back and a small barn stood
in the rear; the house was dazzling in the sun, with its fresh coat of
white paint, and the green blinds gave a cooling effect to the whole;
the door yard was simply a carpet of green with lilac bushes in one
corner and a tall pine standing near the gate; the fence rivalled the
house in its glossy whiteness, and even the barn in the rear had a new
coat of brown to boast of. Every room inside the small house was in
perfect order, every room was furnished with comfort and good taste,
but plainly as it became the house of the captain of the barque _Linnet_
to be. It was all ready for housekeeping, but, instead of taking instant
possession, at the last moment Linnet had decided to go with her husband
to Genoa.
"It is nonsense," Captain Rheid growled, "when the house is all ready."
But Will's mother pleaded for him and gained an ungracious consent.
"You never run around after me so," he said.
"Go to sea to-day and see what I will do," she answered, and he kissed
her for the first time in so many years that she blushed like a girl and
hurried away to see if the tea-kettle were boiling.
Linnet's mother was disappointed, for she wanted to see Linnet begin her
pretty housekeeping; but Marjorie declared that it was as it should be
and quite according to the Old Testament law of the husband cheering up
his wife.
But Marjorie did not stay very long to make a picture of herself, she ran
back to see if Morris had counted right in setting the plates on the long
dining table that was covered with a heavy cloth of grandma's own making.
There was a silk quilt of grandma's making on the bed in the "spare
room" beside. As soon as the ceremony was performed she had run away with
"the boys" to prepare the surprise for Linnet, a lunch in her own
house. The turkeys and tongue and ham had been cooked at Mrs. Rheid's,
and Linnet had seen only the cake and biscuits prepared at home, the
fruit had come with Hollis from New York at Miss Prudence's order, and
the flowers had arrived this morning by train from Portland. Cake and
sandwiches, lemonade and coffee, would do very well, Linnet said, who had
no thought of feasting, and the dining room at home was the only
banqueting hall she had permitted herself to dream of.
Marjorie counted the chairs as Hollis brought them across the field from
home, and then her eyes filled as he drew from his pocket, to show her,
the deed of the house and ten acres of land, the wedding present from his
father to the bride.
"Oh, he's too good," she cried. "Linnet will break down, I know she
will."
"I asked him if he would be as good to my wife," answered Hollis, "and he
said he would, if I would please him as well as Will had done."
"There's only one Linnet," said Marjorie.
"But bride's have sisters," said Morris. "Marjorie, where shall I put all
this jelly? And I haven't missed one plate with a bouquet, have I? Now
count everybody up again and see if we are all right."
"Marjorie and I," began Hollis, audaciously, pushing a chair into its
place.
"Two," counted Morris, but his blue eyes flashed and his lip trembled.
"And Will and Linnet, four," began Marjorie, in needless haste, and
father and mother, six, and Will's father and mother, eight, and the
minister and his wife, ten, and Herbert and his wife, twelve, and Mr.
Holmes and Miss Prudence, fourteen, and Sam and Harold, sixteen, and
Morris, seventeen. That is all. Oh, and grandfather and grandmother,
nineteen."
"Seventeen plates! You and I are to be waiters, Marjorie," said Morris.
"I'll be a waiter, too," said Hollis. "That will be best fun of all. I'm
glad you didn't hire anybody, Marjorie."
"I wouldn't; I wanted to be primitive and do it all ourselves; I knew
Morris would be grand help, but I was not so sure of you."
"Are you sure of me, now?" he laughed, like the old Hollis who used to go
to school.
After that Marjorie would not have been surprised if he had called her
"Mousie."
"Morris, what do you want to be a sailor for?" inquired Hollis, arranging
the white rose in his button-hole anew.
"To sail," answered Morris seriously. "What do you want to be a salesman
for?"
"To sell," said Hollis, as seriously, "Marjorie, what do you want to be
yourself for?"
"To help you to be yourself," she answered promptly, and flew to the
front door where there was a sound of shouting and laughter. They were
all there, every one of the little home-made company; and the waiters
ushered them into the kitchen, where the feast was spread, with great
ceremony.
If Linnet had not been somebody's wife she would have danced around and
clapped her hands with delight; as it was she nearly forgot her dignity,
and exclaimed with surprise and pleasure sufficient to satisfy those who
were in the secret of the feast.
Linnet was in her gray travelling suit, but the dash of crimson this time
was in both cheeks; there was a haziness in her eyes that subdued the
brightness of her face and touched them all. The bridegroom was handsome
and proud, his own merry self, not a trifle abashed before them all on
his wedding day, everything that he said seemed to be thought worth
laughing at, and there was not a shadow on any face, except the flitting
of a shadow ever and anon across Morris Kemlo's blue eyes.
The feast was ended, prayer offered by the pastor and the new home
dedicated to him who is the Father in every home where his children
dwell, and then kisses and congratulations and thanks mingled with the
tears that the mothers must need shed out of their joy and natural
regret. The mothers were both exultantly proud and sure that _her_ child
would not be the one to make the other unhappy. The carriages rolled
away, Will and Linnet to take the train to Portland, for if the wind
were fair the _Linnet_ would sail the next day for New York and thence to
Genoa. Linnet had promised to bring Marjorie some of the plastering of
the chamber in which Christopher Columbus was born, and if they went down
to Naples she would surely climb Mt. Vesuvius and bring her a branch of
mulberry.
The mothers remained to wash the dishes and pack things away, to lock up
the house, and brush the last flake of dust from any of Linnet's new
possessions; Captain Rheid called to Hollis and asked him to walk over
the farm with him and see where everything was planted. Hollis was to
remain over night, but Morris was to take a late train to join the
_Linnet's_ crew, it being his first voyage as second mate.
The mothers took off their kitchen aprons, washed their hands at Linnet's
new sink, and gave Morris the key of the front door to hang up in an
out-of-the-way corner of the wood shed.
"It may better be here," said Mrs. Rheid, "and then any of us can get in
at any time to see how things are without troubling anybody to find the
key. The captain will see that every door and window is safe and as we
have the silver I don't believe anybody will think of troubling the
house."
"Oh, dear no," replied Mrs. West. "I always leave my clothes out on the
line and we never think of locking a door at night."
"Our kitchen windows look over this way and I shall always be looking
over. Now come home with me and see that quilt I haven't got finished
yet for them. I told your husband to come to our house for you, for you
would surely be there. I suppose Marjorie and Morris will walk back; we
wouldn't have minded it, either, on our eighteenth birthday."
"Come, Marjorie, come see where I hang the key," said Morris.
Marjorie followed him down the kitchen steps, across the shed to a corner
at the farther end; he found a nail and slipped it on and then asked her
to reach it.
Even standing on tip toe her upstretched hand could not touch it.
"See how I put the key of my heart out of your reach," he said,
seriously.
"And see how I stretch after it," she returned, demurely.
"I will come with you and reach it for you."
"How can you when you are demolishing plaster in Christopher Columbus'
house or falling into the crater of Mt. Vesuvius? I may want to come
here that very day."
"True; I will put it lower for you. Shall I put it under this stone so
that you will have to stoop for it?"
"Mrs. Rheid said hang it over the window, that has been its place for
generations. They lived here when they were first married, before they
built their own house; the house doesn't look like it, does it? It is all
made over new. I am glad he gave it to Will."
"He can build a house for Hollis," said he, watching her as he spoke.
"Let me see you put the key there," she returned, unconcernedly.
He hung the key on the nail over the small window and inquired if it were
done to her satisfaction.
"Yes," she said. "I wonder how Linnet feels about going away from us all
so far."
"She is with her husband," answered Morris. "Aren't you woman enough to
understand that?"
"Possibly I am as much of a woman as you are."
"You are years ahead of me; a girl at eighteen is a woman; but a boy at
eighteen is a boy. Will you tell me something out here among the wood?
This wood pile that the old captain sawed and split ten years ago shall
be our witness. Why do you suppose he gets up in winter before daylight
and splits wood--when he has a pile that was piled up twenty years ago?"
"That is a question worthy the time and place and the wood pile shall be
our witness."
"Oh, that isn't the question," he returned with some embarrassment,
stooping to pick up a chip and toss it from him as he lifted himself.
"Marjorie, _do_ you like Hollis better than you like me?"
"You are only a boy, you know," she answered, roguishly.
"I know it; but do you like me better than Hollis?"
His eyes were on the chips at his feet, Marjorie's serious eyes were upon
him.
"It doesn't matter; suppose I don't know; as the question never occurred
to me before I shall have to consider."
"Marjorie, you are cruel," he exclaimed raising his eyes with a flash in
them; he was "only a boy" but his lips were as white as a man's would
have been.
"I am sorry; I didn't know you were in such earnest," she said,
penitently. "I like Hollis, of course, I cannot remember when I did not
like him, but I am not acquainted with him."
"Are you acquainted with me?" he asked in a tone that held a shade of
relief.
"Oh, you!" she laughed lightly, "I know what you think before you can
speak your thought."
"Then you know what I am thinking now."
"Not all of it," she returned, but she colored, notwithstanding, and
stepped backward toward the kitchen.
"Marjorie," he caught her hand and held it, "I am going away and I want
to tell you something. I am going far away this time, and I must tell
you. Do you remember the day I came? You were such a little thing, you
stood at the kitchen sink washing dishes, with your sleeves rolled back
and a big apron up to your neck, and you stopped in your work and looked
at me and your eyes were so soft and sorry. And I have loved you better
than anybody every day since. Every day I have thought: 'I will study
like Marjorie. I will be good like Marjorie. I will help everybody like
Marjorie.'"
She looked up into his eyes, her own filled with tears.
"I am so glad I have helped you so."
"And will you help me further by saying that you like me better than
Hollis."
"Oh, I do, you know I do," she cried, impulsively. "I am not acquainted
with him, and I know every thought you think."
"Now I am satisfied," he cried, exultantly, taking both her hands in his
and kissing her lips. "I am not afraid to go away now."
"Marjorie,"--the kitchen door was opened suddenly,--"I'm going to take
your mother home with me. Is the key in the right place."
"Everything is all right, Mrs. Rheid," replied Morris. "You bolt that
door and we will go out this way."
The door was closed as suddenly and the boy and girl stood silent,
looking at each other.
"Your Morris Kemlo is a fine young man," observed Mrs. Rheid as she
pushed the bolt into its place.
"He is a heartease to his mother," replied Mrs. West, who was sometimes
poetical.
"Does Marjorie like him pretty well?"
"Why, yes, we all do. He is like our own flesh and blood. But why did you
ask?"
"Oh, nothing. I just thought of it."
"I thought you meant something, but you couldn't when you know how Hollis
has been writing to her these four years."
"Oh!" ejaculated Hollis' mother.
She did not make plans for her children as the other mother did.
The two old ladies crossed the field toward the substantial white
farmhouse that overlooked the little cottage, and the children, whose
birthday it was, walked hand in hand through the yard to the footpath
along the road.
"Must you keep on writing to Hollis?" he asked.
"I suppose so. Why not? It is my turn to write now."
"That's all nonsense."
"What is? Writing in one's turn?"
"I don't see why you need write at all."
"Don't you remember I promised before you came?"
"But I've come now," he replied in a tone intended to be very convincing.
"His mother would miss it, if I didn't write; she thinks she can't write
letters. And I like his letters," she added frankly.
"I suppose you do. I suppose you like them better than mine," with an
assertion hardly a question in his voice.
"They are so different. His life is so different from yours. But he is
shy, as shy as a girl, and does not tell me all the things you do. Your
letters are more interesting, but _he_ is more interesting--as a study.
You are a lesson that I have learned, but I have scarcely begun to learn
him."
"That is very cold blooded when you are talking about human beings."
"My brain was talking then."
"Suppose you let your heart speak."
"My heart hasn't anything to say; it is not developed yet."
"I don't believe it," he answered angrily.
"Then you must find it out for yourself. Morris, I don't want to be _in
love_ with anybody, if that's what you mean. I love you dearly, but I am
not in love with you or with anybody."
"You don't know the difference," he said quickly.
"How do you know the difference? Did you learn it before I was born?"
"I love my mother, but I am in love with you; that's the difference."
"Then I don't know the difference--and I do. I love my dear father and
Mr. Holmes and you,--not all alike, but I need you all at different
times--"
"And Hollis," he persisted.
"I do not know him," she insisted. "I have nothing to say about that.
Morris, I want to go with Miss Prudence and study; I don't want to be
a housekeeper and have a husband, like Linnet! I have so much to learn; I
am eager for everything. You see you _are_ older than I am."
"Yes," he said, disappointedly, "you are only a little girl yet. Or you
are growing up to be a Woman's Rights Woman, and to think a 'career' is
better than a home and a man who is no better than other men to love you
and protect you and provide for you."
"You know that is not true," she answered quietly; "but I have been
looking forward so long to going to school."
"And living with Miss Prudence and becoming like her!"
"Don't you want me to be like her?"
"No," he burst out. "I want you to be like Linnet, and to think that
little house and house-keeping, and a good husband, good enough for you.
What is the good of studying if it doesn't make you more a perfect woman?
What is the good of anything a girl does if it doesn't help her to be a
woman?"
"Miss Prudence is a perfect woman."
Marjorie's tone was quiet and reasonable, but there was a fire in her
eyes that shone only when she was angry.
"She would be more perfect if she stayed at home in Maple Street and made
a home for somebody than she is now, going hither and thither finding
people to be kind to and to help. She is too restless and she is not
satisfied. Look at Linnet; she is happier to-day with her husband that
reads only the newspapers, the nautical books, and his Bible, than Miss
Prudence with all her lectures and concerts and buying books and knowing
literary people! She couldn't make a Miss Prudence out of Linnet, but she
will make a Miss Prudence twice over out of you."
"Linnet is happy because she loves Will, and she doesn't care for books
and people, as we do; but we haven't any Will, poor Miss Prudence and
poor Marjorie, we have to substitute people and books."
"You might have, both of you!" he went on, excitedly; "but you want
something better, both of you,--_higher_, I suppose you think! There's
Mr. Holmes eating his heart out with being only a friend to Miss
Prudence, and you want me to go poking along and spoiling my life as he
does, because you like books and study better!"