A SUDDEN MISFORTUNE.
As the day drew near for the return of her mother and father Hinpoha
went all over the house from garret to cellar seeing that everything was
put to rights. She and the other Winnebagos took a trip into the country
for bittersweet to decorate the fireplace in the library and in her
father's study upstairs. With pardonable pride she arranged a little
exhibition of the Craft work she had done in camp and the sketches she
had made of the lake and hills. On the table in her mother's room she
placed a work basket she had made of reed and lined with silk.
"Gracious sakes, child," said her aunt, from her rocking chair by the
front window of the living-room, "what a fuss you are going to! One
would think it was your Aunt Phoebe who was coming instead of your
mother and father. They'll be just as glad to see you if the house isn't
as neat as a pin from top to bottom." And Aunt Grace resumed her rocking
and her novel, as unconcerned about the imminent return of the travelers
as if it were nothing more than the daily visit of the milkman. Nothing
short of an earthquake would ever shake Aunt Grace out of her settled
complacency.
Hinpoha went happily on, seeing that every tack and screw was in place,
and arranging the books in the cases to correspond to her father's
catalog, for they had become sadly mixed during his absence. She even
took out a volume of his favorite essays and pored over them diligently
so that she might discuss them with him and show that she had used some
of her time to good advantage. She straightened out her bureau drawers
and mended all her clothes and stockings. When everything was in order
she viewed the result with a happy feeling at the pleasure it would give
her mother when she saw it. Hinpoha's most prominent trait in times past
had not been neatness.
Nyoda, who had been called in to make a final inspection before Hinpoha
was satisfied, wondered if all the girls were "seeking beauty" as
earnestly as Hinpoha was. She envied Hinpoha the homecoming of her
mother from the bottom of her heart. This feeling was particularly
strong one afternoon as she sat in the school room after the close of
school, looking over some English papers. It was the anniversary of the
death of her mother and she sat recalling little incidents of her
childhood before this best of chums had been taken away. As she sat
there half dreaming she heard voices in the hall before her door.
"Have you heard the latest?" asked one voice.
"No," said the second voice, "what is it?"
"Why, the _Francona_ has gone down," answered the first voice. "Struck a
mine in the ocean."
At the word "Francona" Nyoda started up. That was the boat Hinpoha's
parents were coming on! She hurried out into the hall after the two
teachers. "What did you say about the _Francona_?" she asked. They
handed her the "extra" they had been reading and she saw with her own
eyes the account of the disaster. The list of "saved" was pitifully
small, and Hinpoha's parents were not among them. Soon she came to the
notation, "Among the lost are Mr. and Mrs. Adam Bradford, prominent
Cleveland lawyer and his wife. Mr. Bradford was the son of the late
Judge Bradford and a well-known man about town." Of what little avail is
"prominence" when calamity stretches out her cruel hands! "Well known"
and obscure gave up their lives together and found a grave side by side.
"You look like a ghost, Miss Kent," said one of the teachers. "Any
friends of yours on board?"
"Dorothy Bradford's mother and father," answered Nyoda, "one of the
pupils here at school."
Leaving her work unfinished, she hastened to Hinpoha's house. The news
had just been learned there. Aunt Grace had fainted and was being
revived with salts. Hinpoha flung herself on Nyoda and clung to her like
a drowning person. Between neighbors and friends coming to sympathize
and reporters from the newspapers seeking interviews the house was a
pandemonium. Nyoda saw that Hinpoha would never quiet down in those
surroundings and took her away to her own apartment. Of all the friends
who offered consolation Nyoda was the one to whom Hinpoha turned for
comfort. Here the brilliant young college woman and the simple girl were
on a level, for they shared a common experience, and each could
comprehend the other's sorrow.
Poor Hinpoha! She had need of all the consolation that Nyoda could give
her in the days that followed. Full of bitterness as her cup was, there
was to be added yet one more drop--the drop that caused it to run over.
Aunt Phoebe came to live with her and be the mistress of the Bradford
house. At some time in the past Judge Bradford and his sister Phoebe had
been named joint guardians of Hinpoha, but the Judge was now dead and
Aunt Phoebe was the sole guardian. Aunt Phoebe was a spinster of the
type usually described in books, tall and spare, with steely blue eyes.
She was sixty years old, but she might have been a hundred and sixty,
for all the sympathy she had with youth. She had been disappointed in
love when she was twenty and had never thought kindly of any man since.
From her earliest childhood Hinpoha had dreaded the very name of Aunt
Phoebe. When she came to visit a restraint fell over the whole house.
The usual lively chatter at the dinner table was hushed, and Aunt Phoebe
held forth in solemn tones, generally berating some unfortunate person
who nearly always happened to be a good friend of Mrs. Bradford's.
Hinpoha would be called up for a minute examination of her clothes and
manners and would invariably do something which was not right in her
great aunt's eyes.
She had a vivid recollection of going tobogganing down the long front
walk one winter day, her jolly mother on the sled with her, steering it
adroitly around the corner and up the sidewalk for a distance after
leaving the slope. Such fun they were having that they did not look to
see if the road was clear, and went bumping into a female figure that
was coming majestically along the street, knocking her off her feet and
into a snowdrift. It was Aunt Phoebe, coming to make a formal afternoon
call. She sat bolt upright in the snow and adjusted her lorgnette to see
if by any chance her grandniece could be one of those rowdy children.
When she discovered that it was not only Hinpoha, but her mother as
well, frolicking so indecorously, she was speechless. Mrs. Bradford
started to make an abject apology, but the sight of Aunt Phoebe sitting
in the snowdrift with her lorgnette was too much for her and she went
off into a peal of laughter, in which Hinpoha joined gleefully. It was
weeks before Aunt Phoebe could be coaxed to make another visit. And this
was the woman who was coming to take the place of Hinpoha's beloved
mother!
Aunt Grace left the day she came. There was not enough room in one house
for her and Aunt Phoebe. With Aunt Phoebe came "Silky," a wiggling,
snapping Skye terrier. He gave one glance at genial Mr. Bob, who was
rolling on his back before the fireplace, and with a growl fastened his
teeth into his neck. Hinpoha rescued her pet and bore him away to her
room, where she shed tears of despair while he licked her hand
sympathetically. Aunt Phoebe's first act was to put Hinpoha into deep
mourning. Hinpoha objected strenuously, but there was no help, and she
went to school swathed from head to foot in black. Nyoda was wrathful at
the sight, for if there was one point she felt strongly about it was
putting children into mourning. Among the gaily dressed girls Hinpoha
stood out like some dark spirit from the underworld, casting a gloom
wherever she went.
"Where is that beautiful vase I brought your mother from the World's
Fair?" asked Aunt Phoebe one day, suddenly missing it.
"It was accidently broken at our last Camp Fire meeting," answered
Hinpoha, with a tightening around her heart when she thought of that
last happy gathering.
"Camp Fire!" said Aunt Phoebe with a snort. "You don't mean to tell me
that you are mixed up in any such foolishness as that?"
"I certainly am," said Hinpoha energetically, "and it isn't foolishness,
either. I've learned more since I have been a Camp Fire Girl than I did
in all the years before."
"Well, you may consider yourself graduated, then," said Aunt Phoebe,
drily, "for I'll have no such nonsense about me. I can teach you all you
need to know outside of what you learn in school."
"Camp Fire always had mother's fullest approval," said Hinpoha darkly.
"I dare say," returned her aunt. "But I want you to understand once for
all that I won't have any girls holding 'meetings' here, to upset the
house and break valuable ornaments."
"But you don't care if I go to them at other girls' houses, do you?"
asked Hinpoha, the fear gripping her that she was to be denied the
consolation of these weekly gatherings with the Winnebagos.
"I don't want you to have anything to do with that Camp Fire business,"
said Aunt Phoebe in a tone of finality, and Hinpoha left the room, her
heart swelling with bitterness. She was too wise to argue the point with
Aunt Phoebe, and resolved to depend on Nyoda to show her the way. She
dried her tears and went down to the living room and began to play
softly on the piano. It had been her mother's piano, the wedding gift of
her father, and it seemed that her mother's spirit hovered over it. It
was the first time she had touched the keys since that awful Wednesday
when the world had been turned into chaos; she had had no heart to play,
but to-day the sound of the music comforted her and her bitter resentment
against her aunt lost some of its sting. She played on, lost in
memories, when suddenly the sharp voice of her aunt brought her back to
earth. "What does this mean?" cried Aunt Phoebe, "playing on the piano
when your father and mother have just died! I never heard of such a
thing! Come away immediately and don't open that piano again until our
period of mourning is over." She closed the piano and locked it, putting
the key into her bag.
Under Aunt Phoebe's management the house soon lost its look of inviting
friendliness. The blinds were always kept drawn, so that even on the
brightest days the rooms had a gloomy appearance. No more cheerful wood
fires crackled and glowed in the grate. They made ashes on the rugs and
were extravagant, as the house was heated by steam. The bookcases were
locked and Hinpoha was forbidden to read fiction, as this was not proper
when one was in mourning. "You will become acquainted with much pleasant
literature reading to me while I crochet," she said when Hinpoha rose in
revolt at this edict. The "pleasant literature" which Aunt Phoebe was
just then perusing was a History of the Presbyterian Church in eleven
volumes, which bored Hinpoha so it nearly gagged her.
Besides, Aunt Phoebe constantly found fault with Hinpoha's manner of
reading. It was either too loud or not loud enough; either too fast or
too slow, but it was never right. That reading aloud was the last straw
to Hinpoha. After sitting still a whole afternoon getting her school
lessons, she longed to move about after supper, but then Aunt Phoebe
expected her to sit still the entire evening and entertain her with the
activities of the Early Presbytery. After nearly a week of this deadly
dullness Hinpoha was ready to fly. And yet Aunt Phoebe was not conscious
that there was anything wrong in the way she was treating Hinpoha. She
cared for her in her frozen way. She was merely trying to bring her up
in the way she herself had been brought up by a maiden aunt, not taking
into account that this was another day and age. In her time it was
considered the proper thing to shut down on all lightheartedness after a
death in the family, and she was adhering steadfastly to the old
principles. She was yet to learn that she could not force obsolete
customs upon a girl who had lived for sixteen years in the sunlight of
modern ideas.
All Hinpoha's troubles were confided to Nyoda, who sympathized with her
entirely, but bade her be of good cheer and hope for the time when Aunt
Phoebe would see for herself that the new way was best; and above all to
win the respect and liking of her aunt the first thing, as more could be
accomplished in this way than by being antagonistic. "I don't suppose
you could go for a long walk with me Sunday afternoon?" said Nyoda.
Hinpoha shook her head sadly. "We don't do anything like that on
Sunday," she answered, with resentment flaming in her eye. "We go to
church morning and evening and in the afternoon I am supposed to read
the Bible or a book by a man named Thomas à Kempis." Nyoda turned her
eyes inward with such a comical expression that Hinpoha forgot her
troubles for a moment and laughed.
"The Bible and Thomas à Kempis," said Nyoda musingly; "where did I hear
those two mentioned before? Oh, I have it! Did you ever read this
anywhere, 'Commit to memory one hundred verses of the Bible or an equal
amount of sacred literature, such as Thomas à Kempis'?"
Hinpoha hung her head, still smiling. "Why, Nyoda," she said, "there's a
chance to earn an honor bead that I probably wouldn't have thought of
otherwise!"
"Right-o," said Nyoda. "'It's an ill wind,' you know. And while you are
doing so much Bible reading you will undoubtedly come across something
about 'in the wilderness a cedar,' and will learn that most waste places
can be turned into blooming gardens if we only know how."
"Thank you," said Hinpoha, "I always feel less forlorn after a talk with
you." Her face brightened, but immediately fell again. "But what good
will it do me to work for honors?" she said sadly. "Aunt Phoebe won't
let me come to the meetings."
"Won't she really?" asked Nyoda in surprise. Hinpoha nodded, near to
tears. "I must see about that," said Nyoda resolutely. "I think if I
explain the mission and activities of Camp Fire she will not object to
your belonging. She probably has a wrong idea of what it means."
Accordingly Nyoda came a-calling on Aunt Phoebe that very night. In
addition to being very pretty Nyoda had a great deal of dignity, and
when she put on her formal manner she looked very impressive indeed. She
did not act as if she had come to see Hinpoha at all, but asked for
"Miss Bradford," and said she had come to pay her respects to her new
neighbor. She listened politely to Aunt Phoebe's account of her last
siege of rheumatism, admired her crochet work, and hoped she liked this
street as well as her former neighborhood. She said she had often seen
Miss Bradford's name in the papers in connection with various charitable
organizations and was very glad to have the honor of meeting the sister
of the prominent Judge. Aunt Phoebe was pleased and flattered at the
deference paid her. But when Nyoda announced herself as the leader of
the club to which Hinpoha belonged and asked permission for her to
attend the meetings, she refused. She was perfectly polite about it, and
did not mention her antipathy to Camp Fire, and taking refuge behind her
favorite excuse, that of being in mourning, stated that she did not wish
Hinpoha to go out in society.
"But this isn't 'society'," broke in Hinpoha desperately.
"A meeting of a club partakes of a social nature," returned her aunt,
"and is not to be thought of." And there the matter rested.
So Nyoda had to depart without accomplishing her mission. Hinpoha,
utterly crushed, followed her to the door, and Nyoda gave her hand a
reassuring squeeze. "Don't despair, dear," she whispered hopefully; "she
will come around to it eventually, but it will take time. Be patient.
And in the meantime read this," and she slipped into her hand a tiny
copy of "The Desert of Waiting." "Just be true to the Law, and see if
you cannot find the roses among the thorns and from them distil the
precious ointment that will open the door of the City of Your Desire
later on."
Hinpoha thrust the little book into her blouse, and when she was safe in
her own room read it from cover to cover. When she finished there was a
song in her heart again and a light in her eyes. Resolutely she turned
her face to the East and began her long sojourn in the Desert of
Waiting.
Nyoda pondered the problem for a long while that night, and the next day
she went to call on Gladys's mother. Mrs. Evans had taken a great liking
to the popular young teacher of whom Gladys was so fond, and cordially
invited her to spend as much time as she could at the house with the
family. It was to her, then, that Nyoda appealed for advice in regard to
Hinpoha. Mrs. Evans made a slight grimace when the facts were laid
before her.
"If that isn't just like Phoebe Bradford," she exclaimed indignantly.
"Trying to shut up that poor girl like a nun to conform to some
moth-eaten ideas of hers! If the Judge were alive that house wouldn't
look as if there was a perpetual funeral going on! I certainly will call
and see if I can do anything to change her mind, although I doubt very
much if that could be accomplished by human means."
The next day Aunt Phoebe was agreeably surprised to receive a call from
Mrs. Evans, "All the best people in the neighborhood are making haste to
call on the sister of Judge Bradford," she reflected complacently. Mrs.
Evans made herself very agreeable, speaking of many friends they had in
common, and finally led the conversation around to Hinpoha.
"The child looks very pale," she said. "I presume the death of her
parents was a terrible shock to her?"
Aunt Phoebe dabbed her eyes with her black-bordered handkerchief. "The
hand of misfortune has fallen heavily upon this house," she said
mournfully.
"It has indeed!" thought Mrs. Evans. Aloud she said, "You must not let
the girl grieve herself sick. Cheerful company is what she needs at this
time. Make her go out with the Camp Fire Girls as much as possible."
Aunt Phoebe drew herself up rather stiffly. "I do not approve of the
Camp Fire Girls," she said.
"Not approve of the Camp Fire Girls!" echoed Mrs. Evans in well-feigned
astonishment; "why, what's wrong with them?"
Just what the great objection was Aunt Phoebe was not prepared to say,
but she remarked that such nonsense had never been thought of in her
day. "And, of course," she added, hiding behind her usual argument,
"while we are in mourning my grandniece will not go out to any
gatherings."
"Why, I wouldn't think of keeping Gladys home for that reason," said
Mrs. Evans, seeing the subterfuge. "She went to a Camp Fire meeting the
day after her grandfather's funeral. It's not like going to a social
function, you know."
Aunt Phoebe shook her head, but her policy of seclusion for Hinpoha was
getting shaky. Mrs. Homer Evans was a power in the community, and what
she did set the fashion in a good many directions. Aunt Phoebe was very
anxious to keep her as a permanent acquaintance, and if Mrs. Evans gave
her sanction to this Camp Fire business, she wondered if she had not
better swallow her prejudice--outwardly at least, for she declared
inwardly that she had never heard of such foolishness in all her born
days. When Mrs. Evans went home Aunt Phoebe had actually promised that
after three months Hinpoha might attend the meetings as before. Those
three months of mourning, however, were sacred to her, and on no account
would she have consented to allow a single ray of cheer to enter the
house during that period.