THE PROBLEM
The cabin was looking very sweet and fresh after a thorough cleaning
from the willing hands of Susan, who was in a state of bliss because her
beloved mistress was returning. Gwen had found some belated Cherokee
roses and with a few sprays of honeysuckle added had glorified the plain
room.
"You think Miss Lizzie Somerville is el'gant! Well, you jes' oughter see
my missis. She is the mos' el'gantes' lady in the whole er Richmond. I
bet Mis' Carter ain't never in all her life done a han's turn. Gawd
knows what she gonter say 'bout these here young ladies er hern workin'
like they was in service," Susan remarked to the little English Gwen,
who had done many a hand's turn herself and still had an elegance all
her own, so evident that the colored servants recognized her as a "lady
bawn."
"I think it is very wonderful that the Carter girls should be able to
work so well when they have never been brought up to it," said Gwen as
she hung the last freshly laundered sash curtain.
"That's they paw in 'em," declared Susan. "He is the wuckinest gemman I
ever seed. 'Tain't nothin' he won't turn his han' ter. He don't never
set back and holler fer help when he wants the fire fixed er sech like.
No'm, he jes' jumps up an' waits on hisself. Sometimes he used ter git
Mis' Carter kinder put out 'cause he'd even do his own reaching at the
table. Miss Douglas is the spittin' image of him. None of the gals
favors her much 'cep Miss Nan. She looks like her but she ain't so
langrous like when they's work on hand. Miss Helen is the same kind er
spender as her maw. I believe my soul them two would ruther buy than
eat. Cook used ter say that Mis' Carter an' Miss Helen spent like we
done come to the millionennium. Great Gawd! Here they is an' I ain't got
on my clean apron. That's one thing that Mis' Carter'll certainly git
cross over--aprons."
She did not, however. Too pleased to see the faithful Susan, Mrs. Carter
overlooked the doubtful apron.
"What a charming room! Is this where I am to be? And you girls in the
tents beyond? And Bobby--where does Bobby sleep?"
"He is with Lewis Somerville and his friend, Bill Tinsley. I believe he
wrote you about Bill," said Helen, "--the young man who was shipped from
West Point when Lewis was."
"Oh yes, I remember! I am glad to see you have not let yourself run down
like Douglas, my dear. Your hair looks well kept and your complexion is
perfect."
Douglas, much perturbed over her mother's plans, had rushed off to be
alone for a moment to compose herself.
"But, mother, I don't burn like Douglas, and then Douglas' hair is so
lovely it doesn't make any difference what she does to it. Mine must be
well kept to pass muster. I hope you are not going to find it too rough
here for you, mumsy," and Helen put a protecting arm around the little
mother, who was more like a sister, and a younger one at that, than a
mother to these great girls.
"Oh, I think it is delightful for a while. Of course I have been on
shipboard so long that I really am longing for some society. Did you
hear me tell Douglas what my plan is for her and me? I should like to
include you, too, but perhaps it would be best for you to wait a year."
"No, I did not hear; you see the car is such a noisy one that one never
can hear. What is your plan?"
"I want to take Douglas to the White for several weeks preparatory to
her making her debut this winter."
"Debut!" gasped Helen. "White Sulphur!"
"Certainly, why not?"
"But, mother, we haven't money for clothes and things."
"Nonsense! Our credit is perfectly good. I fancy there is not a man in
Richmond who has paid his bills so regularly as Robert Carter, and now
that he is not able to work for a few months I feel sure there is not a
single tradesman with whom we have always dealt who would not be more
than pleased to have us on his books for any amount."
"I wanted to charge a lot of things I thought we needed, but Douglas
just wouldn't have it. She never does realize the importance of clothes.
I don't mean to criticize Douglas, she is wonderful, but she is careless
about clothes."
"Well, I shall put a stop to that, now that I am back with my children.
Your father is so much better I can give my time to other things now.
How exciting it will be to have a daughter in society! I never did want
Douglas to go to college. What made her give it up? She never did say
what her reason was. Letters are very unsatisfactory things when one is
on shipboard."
"It was money, of course," said Helen. "There was no money for
college."
"Oh, to be sure! I forgot that college takes cash. Well, I am heartily
glad she has given it up. I think college girls get too independent. I
am dying to show you my purchases in New York."
"I am dying to see them, too, but, mumsy, I shall have to leave you now
and run and do a million things. We have a great crowd of week-enders
coming up on the late train."
"Can't Susan attend to the things?"
"Oh, Susan does a lot, but I am the chief cook and Douglas is the brains
of the concern and looks after all the money and does the buying. Nan
attends to all the letter writing, and you would be astonished to see
how much she has to do because we have showers of mail about board. Lucy
sees to the setting of the tables, and all of us do everything that
turns up to be done. Even Bobby helps."
"How ridiculous! Well, take care of your hands, darling. I hate to see
a girl with roughened hands. There is simply no excuse for it."
Helen was dazed by her mother's attitude.
"She is just presenting a duck-back to trouble," thought the girl,
looking rather ruefully at her shapely hands which were showing the
inevitable signs of work.
She found Douglas sitting in a forlorn heap in their tent. Her
countenance was the picture of woe.
"Helen! Helen! What are we to do?"
"Well, it wouldn't be so bad to take a trip to the White, and you
certainly deserve a change. Poor mumsy, too, is bored to death with such
a long sea trip and she needs some society."
"But, honey, the money!"
"Oh, I don't see that we need worry so about that. Mother says that
there is not a tradesman in Richmond who would not be pleased to have
us on his books for any amount. I, for one, am longing for some new
clothes. I don't mind a bit working and cooking, but I do think I need
some new things--and as for you--why, Douglas, you are a perfect rag
bag."
Douglas looked at her sister in amazement. The lesson, then, was not
learned yet! She had thought that Helen understood about the necessity
of making no bills as the bills were what had helped to reduce their
father to this state of invalidism, but here she was falling into the
mother's way of thinking--willing to plunge into debt to any amount.
"But Dr. Wright----"
"Oh, always Dr. Wright!"
"But, Helen, you know you like Dr. Wright now and you must trust him."
"So I do. I like him better and trust him entirely and he himself told
me at the station that father was getting well fast. He said it would
take a little more time but that he would be perfectly well again--at
least that is what I gathered. I know father would be the last man in
the world to want his girls to go around looking like ash cats and you
know it would make him ill indeed to think that mother wanted to go to
White Sulphur for a while and could not go because of lack of money."
"Of course it would, but surely neither you nor mother would tell him
that she wanted to go if you know there is no money to pay for such a
trip."
"But there is money!" exclaimed Helen with some asperity. "You told me
yourself that the camp was paying well enough for us to begin to have
quite a bank account."
"Yes--but----"
"Well now, if we have some money you must think that I have helped to
earn it!"
"Why, Helen dear, you have done more than any of us. You are so
capable----"
"I don't say I have done more, no one could have worked harder than you
have--in fact, everybody has worked, but if I have done my share of the
work, then I am certainly entitled to my share of the money and I intend
to take my share and send mother to White Sulphur for a change. Of
course you will simply have to go with her as she has set her heart on
it."
"I will not," announced Douglas, her girlish face taking on stern
determination.
A shout from Bobby heralded the arrival of Josephus with the luggage.
The discussion ended for the time being as Douglas and Helen were both
needed to prepare for the inroad of week-enders that were to arrive in a
few minutes. Mr. Carter alighted from the cart, already looking better.
He was most enthusiastic over the camp and all of its arrangements.
"I am going to be your handy man," he said, putting his arm around
Douglas. "Are you well, honey? You look bothered."
"Oh yes, I am as well as can be," said Douglas, trying to smooth her
wrinkled brow. How she did want to talk all the troubles over with her
father, but he of all persons must not be bothered. The old habit of
going to him with every worry was so strong that it was difficult to
keep from doing it now, but she bit her lips and held it in.
"I'll tell Lewis," she thought. "He will at least sympathize."
What was she to do about her mother and Helen? They seemed to have no
more gumption about money than the birds. Even then parcels were being
carried into the cabin from the cart that must have meant much money
spent in New York. Where did mother get it? The rent from the house in
town had been sent to Mrs. Carter for running expenses on shipboard and
hotels at the many places where they had stopped, but that must have
gone for the trip. Could she have charged the purchases in New York?
Poor Douglas! She had felt that the problem of making her sisters see
the necessity of economizing had been a great one, but she realized that
it was nothing to what she must face now. She felt that all her former
arguments had been in vain since Helen was dropping into her mother's
habit of thought and upholding that charming butterfly-like person in
all her schemes of extravagance. Lucy was sure to follow Helen's lead
and begin to demand clothes, treats, trips and what-not. Nan, dear
sensible, unselfish Nan, would be the only one who would sympathize with
her older sister in regard to the necessity of continuing the strict
economy they had practiced since early in May, when Dr. Wright had
declared that the only thing that would save their father's reason was
an immediate change, a long rest and complete cessation of all business
worries.
Nan's tastes were simple, but she had a passion for color and beautiful
textiles and sometimes indulged that taste in adorning her dainty little
person. As a rule, however, she was quite satisfied to behold the color
in a Persian rug or the wings of a butterfly. Beauty was to the girl
the most important thing in life whether it was of line, color, sound
or idea. She was perfectly happy with a good book and a comfortable
place in which to curl up. Her fault was laziness, a certain physical
inertia which her indulgent mother always attributed to her delicate
constitution; but the summer in the mountains with the enforced activity
had proven that the delicate constitution was due to the inertia and not
the inertia to the delicate constitution. Up to that time in her life
there had been no especial reason for exerting herself, but Nan was very
unselfish and when she realized that her sisters were one and all
busying themselves, she threw off her lazy habits as she would an ugly
robe, and many tasks at Week-End Camp fell to her share.
Douglas, in this trouble that had arisen, felt that she could go to
Nan for comfort and advice. Nan's mind was as normally active as her
graceful little body was inactive and she had a faculty of seeing her
way through difficulties that the conscientious but more slowly thinking
Douglas much envied her.
"Nan, it's fifteen minutes before train time when the week-enders will
come piling in--I'm dying to have a talk with you."
"Well, don't die--just talk," drawled Nan, looking up from her book but
never stopping turning the crank of the mayonnaise mixer. This was a job
Nan loved, making mayonnaise. She had gotten it down to a fine art since
she could mix and read at the same time. She declared it was a plain
waste of time to use your hands without using your head and since
turning a mayonnaise mixer crank required no intelligence beyond that of
seeing that the funnel was filled with olive oil, she was able to
indulge in her passion for poetry while she was making the quarts of
mayonnaise that the young housekeepers dealt out so generously to their
week-enders.
"Listen to this!" and Nan turned the crank slowly while she read:
"'Alas for all high hopes and all desires!
Like leaves in yellow autumn-time they fall--
Alas for prayers and psalms and love's pure fires--
One silence and one darkness ends them all!'"
The crank stopped and all of the oil flowed through the funnel while Nan
softly turned the leaves of Marston's "Last Harvest."
"Yes, honey, it is beautiful, but you had better read a livelier form of
verse or your salad dressing will go back on you."
"Heavens, you are right! I've got 'Barrack Room Ballads' here ready in
case I get to dawdling," laughed Nan.
"I want to talk about something very important, Nan. Can you turn your
crank and listen?"
"Yes, indeed, but you'll have to talk fast or else I'll get to poking
again. You see, I have to keep time."
So Douglas rapidly repeated the conversations she had had with her
mother and later with Helen.
"What are we to do? Must I tell Dr. Wright? I am afraid to get them
started for fear father will be mixed up in it. He must not know mother
wants to go to White Sulphur--he would be sure to say let her go and
then he would try to work again before he is fit for it, and he would
certainly get back into the same state he was in last spring."
"Poor little mumsy! I was sure she would not understand," and once more
the mixer played a sad measure.
"I was afraid she wouldn't," sighed Douglas, "but I did think Helen had
been taught a lesson and realized the importance of our keeping within
our earnings and saving something, too, for winter."
"Helen--why, she is too young for the lesson she learned to stick. She
is nothing but a child."
"Is that so, grandmother?" laughed Douglas, amused in spite of her
trouble at Nan's ancient wisdom (Nan being some two years younger than
Helen).
"Why, Douglas, Helen has just been play-acting at being poor. She has no
idea of its being a permanency," and Nan filled the funnel again with
oil and began to turn her crank with vigor.
"But what are we to do? I am not going to White Sulphur and I am not
going to make my debut--that's sure. I have never disobeyed mother that
I can remember, but this time I shall have to. I don't know what I am to
say about the trip to the White. Helen is saying she has helped to earn
the money and she means to spend her share giving poor mumsy a little
fun after her tiresome long journey on the water. I wish we had never
told her we were able to put something in the bank last month. It was
precious little and Helen's share would not keep them at White Sulphur
more than two or three days. Helen thinks I am stingy and mother thinks
I am stubborn and ugly and sunburned--and there's the train with all the
week-enders----" and poor Douglas gave a little sob.
"And I have turned my wheel until this old mayonnaise is done--just look
how beautiful it is! And you, poor old Doug, must just leave it to me,
and I'll think up something to keep them here if I have to break out
with smallpox and get them quarantined on the mountain."
"Oh, Nan! Is there some way out of it without letting father know that
mother wants something and cannot have it for lack of money?"
"Sure there is! You go powder your nose and put on a blue linen blouse
and give a few licks to your pretty hair while I hand over the
mayonnaise to Gwen and see that Lucy has counted noses for the supper
tables. I've almost got a good reason already for mumsy's staying here
aside from the lack of tin, but I must get it off to her with great
finesse."
"I knew you would help!" and Douglas gave her little sister and the
mayonnaise bowl an impartial hug, and then hastened to make herself more
presentable, hoping to find favor in the eyes of her fastidious mother.