_HOME AGAIN._
WHAT a time I made over that letter, to be sure! I kissed it a dozen
times; and then I was taken with a cold fit of apprehension, and felt
perfectly certain that it announced the death of some member of the
family; and then I perceived that it was sealed with red wax; and
finally I opened it. I rushed through its contents in the greatest
haste, to be sure that it contained no bad news, and then I read it
again more leisurely from end to end, and then I cried a little over
it, and then I read it again.
It was very long. Father and mother wrote that, while they were very
thankful that such kind friends had been raised up to me, and very
grateful to those friends, they could not think of giving away their
daughter to grow up in a foreign land and never see her parents again.
They had sent Mr. Wyndham the money to pay for my homeward passage as
soon as a safe opportunity should be found for me to come to New York,
where my father would meet me.
So I was really going home! I had dreamed about being at home half
the nights that winter, and now the prospect of going seemed a dream.
I shut my eyes and tried to think how all my friends had looked the
last time I saw them, and how it would seem to be living on a farm in
Vermont; and then I remembered, with a pang, that going home involved
parting, probably for ever, with all my dear English friends. And then
I read my letter over again, and was still reading it when Mrs. Austin
opened the door.
"Just as I expected!" said she. "Don't you know that the first
dinner-bell has rung, miss? No, of course you don't know anything, poor
dear! Only that you have a letter from home. Here, take off your slip
and wash your face, and I will get out your dressing things. I hope
your pa and ma are well, miss, and that all the news is good?"
All the time Austin was talking she was getting out my things, brushing
my hair, and helping me to dress. My hair had grown very fast, and I
now wore it in thick curls.
"I must learn to arrange my hair myself," said I, as I looked in the
glass; "I shall not have any one to curl it for me when I go home."
"You are not gone yet, miss," said Austin, shortly, not to say
snappishly. "Maybe there will be two words to that."
These words set me thinking, and I began to wonder whether it were
possible that Mr. Wyndham might keep me, after all; but I rejected
the idea as absurd, and went down to the sitting-room, where, to my
surprise, I found Mr. Wyndham himself. He looked very grave, and even
sad, but he kissed me kindly as usual, and produced from his pocket
a beautiful little "equipage" he had brought me. A lady's "equipage"
contained scissors, tweezers, thimble, tablets, and pencil, and usually
a bottle of some perfume, and was meant to be carried in the pocket.
Pockets were "pockets" in those days. They were made large and deep,
worn in pairs, and tied round the waist with a string.
"Oh, Mr. Wyndham, you are a great deal too good to me," said I,
gratefully.
He kissed me again, but said nothing.
Mrs. Deborah came in pretty soon, and then Mrs. Angelica, the latter in
one of her moods, as I saw at the first glance.
"Well, did you find your company?" asked Mrs. Deborah, smiling.
"Oh yes, madam," I answered; and then I gave Mrs. Deborah a little note
my mother had sent her in the letter.
"Your mother is very obliging, I am sure," said she as she read the
note; "she writes a pretty hand, and expresses herself very kindly
indeed. I shall make a point of answering her note when—when I have a
proper opportunity. Sister Angelica, will you read Mrs. Corbet's note?"
"Really, Sister Deborah, it is very peculiar in you to ask me to read,
when you know I have such a headache that I can hardly see out of my
eyes," answered Mrs. Angelica, the mournful tone I so well knew. "And I
don't know why I should read it, either. Mrs. Corbet is a stranger to
us, and I think it peculiar in her to write at all."
"I suppose Olivia's mother does not regard us as strangers," said Mrs.
Deborah. "She thinks of us as Olivia's friends, and therefore her own."
"And I don't see how she can be Olivia's mother, either," pursued Mrs.
Angelica. "I am sure my brother said Olivia was an orphan—I have his
note now—so how can she have a mother?"
"That was my mistake," said Mr. Wyndham. "I inferred that she was so
from the fact that she was living with her aunt on the same footing as
poor little Miss Vernon."
"I don't know anything about her aunt or little Miss Vernon; I only
know that you said yourself, Brother Augustus, that Olivia was an
orphan. And I don't see what right these people have to take her away,
and I must say I think Olivia is very ungrateful to want to go back to
that dreadful country."
The bringing in of the dinner diverted Mrs. Angelica, to my great
relief. Fortunately, the cook had made a different kind of soup from
that which had been ordered, and there was no shrimp sauce to the fish,
so the poor lady had a new grievance, which took her attention off
from me. After dinner she went to sleep in her chair, and Mr. Wyndham
carried Mrs. Deborah and myself off to the library for a conversation
on my prospects.
"So you know by this time that we are to lose you, my little Olivia,"
said he, kindly. "Your father and mother think they cannot give away a
daughter, though they have two others and poor I have none. Ah, well! I
cannot blame them."
"No, indeed; it is only natural," said Mrs. Deborah. "I am sure,
Augustus, our own honoured father and mother would never have given
away poor dear Charlotte even to the duke himself. I think Olivia is
like Charlotte as she was when a child; don't you think so?"
"I thought so the first moment I ever saw her," said Mr. Wyndham; and
then there was a little pause.
"Well, my dear, your father has written me a very fine, manly letter,"
said Mr. Wyndham, presently. "He need not have sent money for your
passage home; that was very unnecessary, and not quite reasonable,
seeing that I was the means of your coming. You know, Olivia, how very
glad we should be to keep you—" Mr. Wyndham cleared his throat, and
getting out his snuff-box, offered it to his sister and look a great
pinch himself—"but your parents' will must of course be obeyed."
"Of course," added Mrs. Deborah. "We shall miss Olivia very much—very
much; she has been a very good girl ever since she came, and was the
greatest possible comfort to me while I was lame. I hardly knew what I
should have done without her."
It gave me a painful pleasure to hear Mrs. Deborah speak in this way,
and I could hardly keep back the tears, which I knew she disliked, as I
answered,—
"Dear Mrs. Deborah, I am so glad I could be any comfort to you. You
have all been so good to me."
"Nonsense, child! It was only natural to be kind to a good little girl
who was shipwrecked on a strange shore."
"It would not be natural to everybody," said I, remembering Miss
Nicholas. "I have been so happy here, and learned so much! I am sure I
shall never forget it."
Mrs. Deborah put her hand on my head and smoothed down my hair, and I
got hold of her other hand and kissed it.
"Well, well!" said Mr. Wyndham, after another little pause. "Of course
Olivia must go, as I said. An American gentleman whom I have known for
some years in London sails for New York about the end of April, and his
wife has kindly consented to take charge of Olivia. She is an estimable
lady, and I presume will take excellent care of her. I shall write to
Mr. Corbet by the first mail, so that he can provide for meeting his
daughter in New York; and meantime, as it is desirable that she should
have a suitable outfit, and as also I want to enjoy as much of her
society as possible, I propose that you all return with me to London."
I was delighted with the prospect of seeing London, and I don't think
Mrs. Deborah was averse to it. Mrs. Angelica made many objections, of
which one was that we were sure to be robbed on the road. But when Mrs.
Deborah said, "Very well; then we will give it up," she changed her
tone and thought it very hard that Deborah should want to deprive her
of the pleasure of seeing London once more.
The next day we all went to church together.
Of the three large pews which I mentioned in my description of the
church, only ours was usually occupied, but to-day the one opposite was
filled, and Mrs. Angelica was no sooner in church than she whispered to
her sister that Sir John Denham and his family were come down, which,
indeed, she could have seen for herself.
Lady Denham and the Misses Denham were very fine ladies indeed, and
dressed in the extreme of the fashion; and a very short and scanty and
low-necked extreme it was. I do not by any means admire the dress of
the present day, but I can tell the people who rail at it, and who talk
about the simplicity of their grandmothers, that that simplicity was
rather too much like that of Eve in the garden. If any young lady were
to appear now in such a dress as perfectly modest women of fashion wore
during the French Revolution, she would be in danger of being openly
rebuked.
Lady Denham was a good-natured-looking woman, in spite of her finery,
and spoke kindly to me when I was presented to her after church. She
asked Mr. Wyndham and his sisters to dine with them next day, excusing
the shortness of the notice by the fact that they were so soon to
return to town.
Mrs. Angelica was delighted, and said, as we were walking home, how
charming it was to have some society once more, and how very affable
Lady Denham was, and how very elegant were the young ladies. She had
the conversation mostly to herself, only Mr. Wyndham said he supposed
there was no getting out of it, and Mrs. Deborah said it was only for
once. However, they all went, and I was left at home with Mrs. Austin,
for I was not to go to school any more. I ate my roasted chicken
and apricot tart in solitary state, Mrs. Austin standing behind my
chair and carving for me with as much ceremony as if I were a whole
dinner-party. After dinner I begged her to bring her knitting and sit
with me, and she consented. Indeed, she often did so with her "ladies,"
as she called them.
"How came Mrs. Angelica to be so different from Mrs. Deborah?" I
ventured to ask, after she had entertained me with various bits of
family history and tradition.
"Well, my dear, I hardly know," answered Mrs. Austin. "She was always
rather delicate, for one thing, and both my mistresses—her own mother
and Mr. Augustus's mother—petted her and let her have her own way.
Mrs. Deborah was always active, and liked to work and wait on people,
but Mrs. Angelica was excused and indulged till she came to think that
everything must give way to her. 'Poor Angelica' she was always called
in the family."
"I think it is 'Poor Deborah' sometimes," said I. "I can't help feeling
provoked at the way Mrs. Deborah gives way and puts herself and her own
pleasure aside for her."
"Well, I won't deny but I have felt the same way, Miss Olivia, scores
of times," said Mrs. Austin, "specially when they were younger and
going into company. It was always 'Poor Angelica' who must have the new
gown, if there was but one, and the new riding-habit and the seat in
the carriage, and so on, and Mrs. Deborah must give way. 'Deborah won't
care,' everybody said, because she was always so sweet about it. I
don't want to judge my betters, but I do think it would have been wiser
in my mistresses to make Mrs. Angelica know what 'giving up' meant; and
there's one thing you may learn, my dear, from her example, and that is
not to let yourself get in the habit of having set ways, so as to think
you must have one particular chair and place, and so on. You can see
how much trouble it makes."
"Please, Mrs. Austin, who was Charlotte?" I ventured to ask, presently.
"Mrs. Deborah said I was like Charlotte."
"And so you are, my dear. Charlotte was Mr. Augustus's own sister,
and a very pretty young lady she was, and good too. She married an
officer and went away to India, and died there. Her father and mother
were opposed to the marriage. Captain Ingraham—that was her husband's
name—had been very attentive to Mrs. Deborah, and every one thought
it would be a match, but presently Charlotte came home—she had been
away in London at a finishing-school—and it was not long before the
captain took to her and left her sister. I don't know that she was to
blame—perhaps she wasn't, either. It hung on a long time, and one while
he was forbidden the house, but Mrs. Deborah begged for her sister that
he might be allowed to come again. I think that made my master and
mistress believe that Mrs. Deborah had never cared for him. Such bats
as some people are!" said Mrs. Austin, indignantly—"Not that I mean
any disrespect to my master and mistress. But however one may wish to
'order one's self lowly and reverently to one's betters,' one can't
help having eyes in one's head, and I do say master and mistress were
blind as owls in that matter."
"Well, and so Mrs. Deborah—" said I, very much interested.
"Well, and so Mrs. Deborah brought it about, and got her sister
married, and was as gay as a lark at the wedding and till Mrs. Ingraham
went away. But then she had a long low fever, and we all thought she
would die. But she got well, and since then she has just lived for
other people—for her sister and brother and the poor and afflicted.
And she will have her crown in heaven, miss, you may be sure. Neither
Captain nor Mrs. Ingraham lived long. They died of the fever they have
over there before they had been in India a year. Oh, it's a sad story."
"I think Mrs. Deborah is just like an angel," said I. "I never saw any
one so good, only my own mother."
"Ah, well! It's only natural, as Mrs. Deborah says, that you should
like your own mother best. But I wish you could stay, Miss Olivia. I
never took to any young lady as I have to you—not since my mistress
was young; and I'll tell you what, my dear: you shall copy out my own
private recipe-book for your use when you go to house-keeping; and
that's what I wouldn't do for the duke's house-keeper herself, I do
assure you. 'No, Mrs. Smith, ma'am,' says I; 'anything in reason, such
as my almond biscuits or peppermint cordial, you are welcome to, but my
lemon curds and rose cakes are my own, and I wouldn't impart them to
Queen Charlotte herself;' says I."
I appreciated highly this token of Austin's regard, and really spent,
the next day in copying out the recipes, which was no easy task,
considering Austin's cramped hand-writing and her very peculiar views
as to spelling. I have the manuscript somewhere now.
I spent a few days in Plymouth, finishing a piece of needle-work I
had begun with Miss Nicholas, and, to my great delight and that of my
school-mates, Mrs. Deborah provided the materials for a farewell party,
at which I presided, and which was quite a grand entertainment. The
girls overwhelmed me with housewives and cushions and other keepsakes.
Even Miss Nicholas gave me an elegant thread-case when I took leave of
her, and we parted the best of friends.
The next week we all went up to town, and were established in
commodious and handsome lodgings in what was then the fashionable part
of London. Mrs. Austin mourned over the bread and the dirt and the
blue milk and thin cream, but I thought everything charming. We had
a handsome carriage and servants at our command, for Mr. Wyndham was
both rich and liberal, and we went to see all the sights—the Tower,
and Hampton Court, and the exhibitions of all sorts, and Raneleigh,
then a fashionable resort, and the parks, and many other fine things.
We also went to Windsor, and there I saw King George III., whom I had
grown-up to think a kind of monster, and found, to my surprise, to be
a kindly-looking, white-headed old man, whom I instantly compared to
old Deacon Bradley in Lee. Also I saw Queen Charlotte, who curtseyed
politely in answer to the low reverences of our ladies, and the little
princess Amelia, and, what I believe I valued more than all, I had a
good look at Miss Burney, the author of "Evelina," who was then in
attendance on the queen. And I saw other authors and lords and ladies,
who looked very much like other people when all was done. And I had
more new clothes made than I thought I should ever wear out in the
world, and gloves and fans, and pretty things in plenty. And I bought
presents for everybody in the family, mostly of books, only I purchased
a fine large pair of ear-rings for Rose, who had a negro's fondness for
gay finery.
The last day came. It was a heart-breaking day. I did not know how much
I loved my friends till I came to leave them. Mrs. Deborah kissed me
and held me in her arms and called me her "darling child," and Mrs.
Angelica mourned alternately over my ingratitude in going and her
brother's unkindness in letting me go, and gave me a bottle of her
beloved camphor julep: "In case you should have a headache when you get
to that dreadful America, my dear." Oh, it was a sad time.
Mr. and Mrs. Chapin, with whom I travelled, were very kind and
attentive, and we had a short and pleasant voyage. I reached New York
without a single misadventure or a day's sickness, and found my father
waiting for me.
There was nothing to detain us in New York after father had wondered
over the amount of my baggage and got it safely passed through the
custom-house. We went up the Hudson to Albany in a sloop in four days,
which was considered a very short passage, and travelled the rest of
the way in our own wagon, which father had brought down and left with a
friend in Albany. And so it came to pass that at the end of a week we
reached Castle Hill, and I found myself once more in my mother's arms,
after an absence of nearly three years.