best, the finest, the highest, toward all that she herself had reached,
and toward much which she had missed. The quaint, the antiquated, the
absurd, the enchanting things that the little lady taught the little
child, the young maiden! There was nothing so coarse as Shakespeare and
nothing so commonplace as the musical glasses. Shakespeare seemed to
Miss Judy, who knew him only by hearsay, as being a little too decided,
a little too distinctively masculine. It was her theory of manners that
girls should learn only purely feminine things. The musical glasses she
would have deemed rather undesirable as being less modish than the
guitar, and consequently not so well adapted to the high polishing of a
young lady of quality, of such fine breeding as she had determined that
Doris's should be. The guitar which led Miss Judy to this conclusion had
belonged to her mother. Its faded blue ribbon, tied in an old-fashioned
bow, still bore the imprint of her vanished fingers. The ribbon smelt of
dried rose leaves, as the old music-books did too, when Miss Judy got
them out of the cabinet in the darkened parlor, and gave them to Doris,
smiling a little sadly, as she always smiled when thinking of her
mother. Miss Judy preferred Tom Moore's songs, because they were very
sentimental, and also because they were the only ones that she knew. She
had never been able to sing, but she had very high ideals of what she
called "expression," and she could play the guitar after a pretty, airy,
tinkling old fashion. So that Doris, having a low, sweet voice of much
natural music and some real talent for the art, learned easily enough
through even Miss Judy's methods of teaching; and came erelong to sing
of "Those endearing young charms" and "The heart that has truly loved"
in a bewitchingly heart-broken way; while the faded blue ribbon fell
round her lovely young shoulders.
It was really a pity that no one except Miss Sophia saw or heard those
lessons--which must have been so well worth seeing and hearing. Miss
Judy and Doris were both so entirely in earnest in all that they were
doing. Both were so thoroughly convinced that the things being taught
and learned were precisely the things which a young gentlewoman should
know. Yet nobody but poor Miss Sophia, who was asleep most of the time,
ever had so much as a glimpse of all that was constantly going on in
this forming of a young lady of quality. It was another part of Miss
Judy's theory of manners that everything concerning a gentlewoman, young
or old, must be strictly private. When, therefore, it came to such
delicate matters as walking and courtesying--as a young lady of quality
should walk and courtesy--not even Miss Sophia was permitted to be
present. Miss Judy took Doris into the darkened parlor and raised the
shades only a cautious inch or two, so that, while they could see to
move about, no living eye might behold the charming scene which was
taking place. And there in this dim light, the dainty old lady and the
graceful young girl would take delicate steps and make wonderful
courtesies--grave as grave could be--all up and down, and up and down
that sad old room.
Let nobody think, however, that Miss Judy thought only of
accomplishments, while she was thus throwing her whole heart and mind
and soul into the rearing and the training of this child of her spirit.
The substantial branches of education were not neglected. Miss Judy
tried untiringly to help Doris in gaining a store of really useful
knowledge. She did not know so well how to go about this as she did
about the music and the courtesy. She knew little if any more of the
hard prosaic side of the world than Doris herself knew--which was
nothing at all. But she had a few good old books. Her father had been a
true lover of the best in literature, and her mother had been as fond of
sentiment in fiction as in real life. These books, thick, stubby old
volumes bound in leather, gathered by them, were Miss Judy's greatest
pride and delight. She therefore led Doris to them in due time,
impressing her with proper reverence, and thus the girl became in a
measure acquainted with a very few of the few really great in letters,
and learned to know them as they may be known to an old lady and a young
girl who have never had a glimpse of the world.
Miss Judy had but one book which was less than a half century in age.
That one book, however, was very, very new indeed and so remarkable that
Miss Judy held it to be worthy of a place with the old great ones. She
had already read it several times, and yet, strange to say, she had not
given it to Doris to read. Of course she had told her about it as soon
as it came from the thoughtful friend in Virginia who had sent it. But,
for certain reasons which were not quite clear to herself, she was
doubtful about its being the kind of a book best calculated to be really
improving to Doris. She had read it aloud to Miss Sophia (who tried her
best to keep awake), and she was confidently relying upon her judgment,
which she considered so much sounder and more practical than her own, in
making the decision. It was quite a serious matter, and Miss Judy was
still earnestly though silently considering it after breakfast on that
morning in March.
"The more I think of it the surer I feel that the main trouble with
Becky was that she had no proper bringing up, poor thing;" remarked Miss
Judy suddenly and rather absently, as if speaking more to herself than
to her sister.
They sat side by side in their little rocking-chairs as they loved to
sit, and they were busily engaged in sorting garden seeds. That is, Miss
Judy was sorting the seeds while Miss Sophia held the neat little calico
bags which Miss Judy had made in the fall, while Miss Sophia held the
calico. Still, Miss Sophia's cooperation, slight as it seemed, really
required a good deal of effort and very close attention. It was all she
could do to keep the bags on her round little knees; nature, who is
niggardly in many things, having denied the poor lady a lap.
"Who?" asked Miss Sophia, staring, and struggling with the seed-bags.
"_What_ Betty?"
"Why, Becky Sharp, of course," said Miss Judy.
She was much surprised, and a little hurt that Miss Sophia should so
soon have forgotten Becky, when they had talked about her until they had
gone to bed on the night before, to say nothing of many other times. But
she was only a bit hurt, she was never offended by anything that Miss
Sophia did or said, and she went on as if she had not been even
disappointed. "We must make up our minds as to the advisability of
giving Doris the book to read before long. I was just wondering whether
_you_ thought as I think, sister Sophia, that if Becky's mother had
lived she would have been taught better than to do those foolish things,
which were so shockingly misunderstood. I firmly believe that if Becky
had been properly brought up, poor thing, she might have made a good
woman. I have been waiting for a good opportunity to ask _your_ opinion.
What would _we_ have been, without our dear mother?" she urged, as
though pleading with Miss Sophia not to be too hard on Becky. "And she
was always so poor, too. Mercifully _we've_ never had actual poverty to
contend with, as--poor Becky had. Most of the trouble came from
that--Becky herself said it did, you remember, sister Sophia."
"Just so, sister Judy," responded Miss Sophia, warmly, and without a
shade of reserve, although she had but the haziest notion of who Becky
was, or had been, or might be; and speaking with such firm decision that
Miss Judy felt as if the matter were really about decided at last.
V
AN UNCONSCIOUS PHILOSOPHER
There is much more in the way that a thing is said than we are apt to
realize. Miss Sophia always repeated her vague and unvaried formula,
whenever Miss Judy seemed to expect a response, and she always did it
with such an effect of firm conviction as renewed Miss Judy's confidence
in the soundness of her judgment and value of her advice. In this
satisfactory manner the little sisters were again discussing the new
book several weeks later, when the spring was well advanced. They had
thus debated the serious question of Doris's being or not being
permitted to read the new novel, for an hour or more; and they might
have gone on discussing it indefinitely, as they did most things, had
not Sidney Wendall come in quite unexpectedly.
As the Oldfield front doors set open all day, there was not much
ceremony in the announcement of visitors. The caller usually tapped on
the door and entered the house forthwith, going on to seek the family
wherever the members of it were most likely to be found. Sidney now gave
the tap required by politeness, and then, hearing the murmur of voices,
went straight through the passage and into the room in which the sisters
were sitting. They both glanced up with a look of pleased surprise as
Sidney's tall form darkened the doorway. Miss Judy could not rise to
receive Sidney on account of having an apronful of late garden-seeds.
Her sister was holding the calico bags, as usual; and then Miss Sophia's
getting out of a chair and on her feet was always a matter of time and
difficulty. But their faces beamed a warm welcome, and Miss Judy called
Merica away from the ironing-table in the kitchen to fetch the parlor
rocking-chair for Sidney to sit in, which was in itself a distinguished
attention, such as could not but be flattering to any guest. And when
Sidney was seated, Merica was requested to draw a bucket of water fresh
from the well, so that Sidney might have a nice cool drink.
Sidney, whom no one ever thought of calling Mrs. Wendall, was a large,
lean, angular woman. She had come in knitting. She always knitted as she
walked, carrying the big ball of yarn under her strong left arm. Her
calico sunbonnet was always worn far back on her head. She took it off
that day as soon as she sat down, and hung it on the knob of the chair.
Then she removed the horn comb from her hair, let it drop, shook it out,
twisted it up again with a swish--into a very tight knot--and thrust the
comb back in place with singular emphasis. Everybody in Oldfield knew
what those gestures meant. Nobody seemed to notice what wonderful hair
she had. It was long, thick, silky, rippling, and of the color of the
richest gold. It was most beautiful hair--rich and dazzling enough to
crown a young queen--and most strangely out of place on Sidney's homely,
middle-aged head; with its plain sallow face, its pale shrewd eyes, its
grotesquely long nose, its expression of whimsical humor, and its wide
jester's mouth.
The Oldfield people were so well used to seeing Sidney take her hair
down, and twist it up again, even in the middle of the big road, that
they had long since ceased to observe the hair itself. It was the
meaning of the gestures that instantly caught and held the eager
interest of the entire community. For, whenever Sidney took off her
bonnet, and let down her hair and shook it vigorously and swished it up
again into a tighter knot, and put the comb back with a certain degree
of emphasis, everybody knew that there was something interesting in the
wind. Poor Miss Sophia, who was not quick to understand many things,
knew what _those_ signs meant, and when she saw them that day she
straightened up suddenly, wide awake, and breathing hard as she always
was when trying her best to keep the track of what was going on, and
forgetting all about the seed-bags, which abruptly slid over the
precipice, wholly unheeded. Even Miss Judy, who so disliked gossip,
could not help feeling somewhat agreeably excited and turning quite
pink, as she remembered that she had never known Sidney's news to do any
harm, to wound any one, to injure any one, or to make mischief of any
description. She had often wondered how Sidney _could_ talk all day
long, day after day, year in and year out, going constantly from house
to house without doing harm sometimes through sheer inadvertence. She
now looked at Sidney in smiling expectancy, turning a rosier pink from
growing anticipation.
The mere fact of an unexpected visit from Sidney was enough to throw any
Oldfield household into a state of delightful excitement. Sidney's
visits were like visits of Royalty; they always had to be arranged for
in advance, and they always had to be paid for afterwards. It was
clearly understood by everybody that Sidney went nowhere without a
formal invitation given some time in advance, and an explicit and
sufficient inducement. Yet there was nothing in this to her discredit;
she was far from being the mere sordid mercenary that Royalty seems now
and then to be. Sidney was an open, upright worker in life's vineyard,
and did nothing discreditable in holding herself worthy of her hire. It
was necessary for her to earn a living for five needy souls; for her
three children, her husband's brother, and herself. There were not many
avenues open to women-workers in any part of the world in the day of
Sidney's direst need. There were fewer where she lived than almost
anywhere else throughout the civilized earth. She did what she might do;
she learned to earn bread for her family by the only honorable means in
her power. She studied to amuse the people of the village who had no
other source of entertainment. She raised her adopted profession until
it became an art. It is probable that she had the comedian's talent to
begin with. She certainly possessed the comic actor's mouth. And then
she doubtless soon learned, as most of us learn sooner or later, that it
is more profitable to make the world laugh than to make it weep. At all
events the part that she played was nearly always a merry one. Only
once, indeed, during the whole of her long professional career, was she
ever known to come close to tragedy; but those who were present at the
time never forgot what she said, how she said it, nor how she looked
while saying it.
It happened one night at old lady Gordon's, over the supper table. The
party had been a gay one, and Sidney had been the life of it, as she
always was of every gathering in Oldfield. She had told her best
stories, she had given out her latest news, she had said many witty and
amusing things, until the whole table was in what the ladies of Oldfield
would have described as a "regular gale." It was not until they were
rising from the supper, still laughing at Sidney's jokes, that she said,
in an off-hand way--as if upon second thought--that she would like to
have some of the dainties, with which the table was laden, to take home
to her children. Before old lady Gordon had time to say, "Certainly,
I'll fix up the basket," as everybody always said whenever Sidney made
that expected remark, Miss Pettus blazed out:--
"How _can_ you!" she cried, turning in her fiery way upon Sidney. "How
can you sit here, eating, laughing, and spinning yarns, when you know
your children are hungry at home--and never think of them till now?" Her
little black eyes were flashing, and she looked Sidney straight in the
face, meaning every word that she said.
The very breath was taken out of the company. The ladies were stricken
speechless with amazement and dismay. Even old lady Gordon had not a
thing ready to say. Sidney, too, stood still and silent for a moment,
resting her hand on the back of her chair. She turned white, standing
very erect, looking taller than ever, and very calm--a figure of great
dignity.
"I think of my children first, last, and all the time," she said quietly
and slowly after an instant's strained silence. Her cool, pale eyes met
Miss Pettus's hot black eyes steadily.
"But I don't think it best to talk about them too much;" she went on
calmly. "Do any of you ladies think my children would get their supper
any sooner if I came here whining about how hungry they were? Would you
ever invite me to come again if I did that--even once? Would you, Mrs.
Gordon? Would you invite me to _your_ parties, Miss Pettus? Wouldn't
you, and you, and all of you"--turning from one to another--"begin right
away to regard me as a tiresome beggar and my children as paupers? I am
afraid you would. It would only be human nature. I'm not blaming
anybody. But--I don't intend to risk it. I think things are better as
they stand now. I amuse you and you help me. I give you what you like in
exchange for what my children need. It's a fair trade; you're all bound
by it to regard me and my children with respect."
Miss Pettus was crying as if her heart would break long before Sidney
was done speaking. She fairly flew at her and, throwing her arms around
Sidney's neck, begged her forgiveness with a humility such as no one
ever knew that hasty, hot-tempered, well-meaning little woman to show
over any other of her many mistakes. Never afterward would she allow
Sidney to be criticised in her presence. She quarrelled fiercely with
the doctor's wife for saying that she really could not see how Sidney
got her news, and for quoting the doctor's opinion that it must come
over the grapevine telegraph. Miss Pettus would have had her brother
send Sidney's children a portion of everything that his store contained.
But Sidney would not accept from any one a pennyworth more than she
earned. If Miss Pettus wished to send the Wendall family a pound of
candles after Sidney had supped with her, spicing the meal with news and
anecdote, all very well and good. Or if, after Sidney's making a special
effort to enliven one of Miss Pettus's dinner parties in the middle of
the day, that lady suggested giving Uncle Watty a pair of her brother's
trousers, Sidney was glad and even thankful. To get her brother-in-law's
clothes was, indeed, the hardest problem she had to solve. And then,
when Uncle Watty had done with the trousers, they could be cut down for
her son, Billy. Under such proper circumstances, Sidney accepted all
sorts of things from everybody--anything, indeed, that she chanced to
want--with as complete independence and as entire freedom from any
feeling of obligation, as any artist accepts his fee for entertaining
the public.
The obligation commonly imposed by hospitality had consequently no
weight whatever with Sidney, and in this, also, she was not unlike some
other celebrities. She did not hesitate to express her opinion of old
lady Gordon, whose supper she had eaten on the previous evening, when
Miss Judy, knowing about it and wishing to start the conversational ball
rolling, now asked how things passed off. Sidney had swapped her
spiciest stories for old lady Gordon's richest food. Old lady Gordon was
perfectly free to think and to say what she pleased about those stories
(provided she never mentioned them before Miss Judy); and Sidney, on her
side, held herself equally free to think and to say what she thought of
her hostess and of the supper too, had that been open to
criticism--which old lady Gordon's suppers never were.
"That old woman is a regular _Hessian_," was Sidney's reply to Miss
Judy's innocent inquiry.
"Dear me!" exclaimed Miss Judy, quite startled and rather shocked.
"Really, Sidney, I don't think you should call anybody such a name as
that."
"Well, I'd like to know what else a body is to call an old woman who
hasn't got a mite of natural feeling."
"But we have no right to say that either of anybody. We can't tell,"
pleaded gentle Miss Judy.
She was wondering, nevertheless, as she spoke, what could have occurred
at old lady Gordon's on the night before. It was plain that the news
which Sidney was holding back for an effective bringing forth must have
had something to do with the visit. However, it was always useless to
try to make Sidney tell what she had to tell, until she was quite ready.
Even Miss Sophia was well aware of this peculiarity of Sidney's, and,
breathing harder than ever in the intensity of her curiosity and
suspense, she leaned forward, doing her utmost to understand what was
being said in leading up to the news. Miss Judy, of course, understood
Sidney's methods perfectly, through long and intimate acquaintance with
them; and then, aside from the fact that Sidney could not be hurried,
Miss Judy always tried anyway to turn the talk away from unpleasant
themes.
"Did you remember to ask Mrs. Gordon about Mr. Beauchamp?" Miss Judy now
inquired, adroitly bending Sidney's thoughts toward a delightful subject
in which they were both deeply interested. "Did she know whether he used
to be a dancing-master in his own country, as we have understood? I do
hope you haven't changed your mind," she added earnestly. "It is really
most important for Doris to learn to dance."
"No, I haven't changed it a bit. I've got the same Hard-shell, Whiskey
Baptist mind that I've had for the last forty years. But it isn't as _I_
think about dancing, or anything else that Doris is concerned in. It's
as you think--"
"No--no, you mustn't say that," protested Miss Judy.
"I do say it, I mean it, and I intend to abide by it," declared Sidney,
laying her knitting on her lap and loosing rings of yarn from her big
ball and holding them out at arm's length. "You've always known better
what was good for Doris than I ever have. When it comes to a difference
of opinion I'm bound to give up."
Miss Judy blushed and looked distressed. "It is really such an important
matter," she urged timidly. "A young lady cannot possibly learn how to
walk and how to carry herself with real grace, without being taught
dancing. If I only had some one to play the tune, I might teach Doris
the rudiments myself; or sister Sophia might, if she hadn't that
shortness of breath, and if I could play any instrumental piece on the
guitar except the Spanish fandango. That tune, however, is not very well
suited to the minuet, which is the only dance that we ever learned.
Mother taught us the minuet, because she thought it necessary for all
well brought up girls to learn it just for deportment, though she knew
we should probably never have an opportunity to dance it in society."
Thus reminded of the many things that they had missed, Miss Judy turned
and smiled a little sadly at Miss Sophia, as though it were the sweetest
and most natural thing in the world to speak of Miss Sophia's dancing
the minuet,--poor, little, round, slow Miss Sophia! And Miss Sophia also
thought it sweet and natural, her dull gaze meeting her sister's bright
one with confiding love as she murmured the usual vague assent.
"And did you think to ask Mrs. Gordon whether Mr. Beauchamp--" Miss Judy
hesitated at the Frenchman's name, which she pronounced as the English
pronounce it, and delicately touched her forehead.
"She said he was perfectly sane except upon that one subject, and the
kindest, honestest soul alive," said Sidney, whisking the ball from
under her arm and reeling off more yarn.
Miss Judy's sweet old face and soft blue eyes wore the dreamy look which
always came over them when her imagination was stirred. "How romantic it
is and how touching, that he should have believed, through all these
years of hard work and a menial life, that he is Napoleon's son, the
real King of Rome."
"Well, it don't do any harm," Sidney, the practical, said. "He don't
dance with his head. It seems to me, too, I've heard that lots of crazy
folks were great dancers. Anyway, you may tell him, as soon as you like,
that I'll knit his summer socks to pay him for showing Doris how to
dance, and you may say that I'll throw in the cotton to boot. I always
like to pay the full price for whatever I get. If he still thinks that
isn't enough, you might tell him I'm willing to knit his winter ones
too, but he's got to furnish the yarn--there's reason in all things."
"You are sure that Mr. Beauchamp used to be a dancing-master?" asked
Miss Judy.
"Old lady Gordon told me she had heard something of the kind, but she
said she had never paid any attention. She never does pay any attention
to anything unless she means to eat it," Sidney said.
"Poor old lady Gordon," sighed Miss Judy. "She hasn't much except her
meals _to_ attend to or think about. She must be very, very lonely, all
alone in the world."