MAIDA SPRINGER.
The succeeding week was a time of depression, waiting, watching, and
general tantalisation for Margaret Naylor and Walter Blount.
Margaret's mother was more cross and more watchful than Argus or
duenna had ever been before. The only consolation--as Joseph, pitying
the lad's despair, found with some remorse that he had let fall--was,
that such preternatural vigilance could not last; or if it did, that
Margaret would be goaded to desperation and rebel.
Interchange of glances even was denied the hapless lovers. Mrs Naylor
intercepted, so to speak, an [oe]illade in its flight across the
breakfast-room on the first morning of the siege, and sternly insisted
that her daughter should change places forthwith to the other side of
the table, and turn her back to the enemy.
To save appearances, while acting jailer on the girl, Mrs Naylor made
a martyr of herself, and moved about under a load of superabundant
clothing--wrapping herself in shawls and wearing a wisp of knitting
upon her head on days when her brother-in-law was wishing himself a
wild Indian, that he might dress in a coat of paint. Mrs Naylor was
"poorly,"--she felt premonitions of ague, a threatening of neuralgia,
and, of course, severe "headache"; at least so the ladies agreed, on
comparing notes, after making tender inquiries--each anxious to make
sure there was nothing infectious, so as to steal away quietly before
the general panic and stampede which would ensue if there were.
"Just a case of general all-overishness, my dears," said Mrs Carraway,
"arising from change to this bracing air, after the sickly heats of
Upper Canada. I had a touch of it myself, on coming first. There is so
much salt and ozone down here."
"I should say it was a case of hypochondria," observed Mrs Chickenpip,
who, being serious and robust in her views, was given to cultivate
truth at the expense of charity. "I am sure we do wrong in encouraging
her to make-believe, by showing so much sympathy. If you had seen, as
I did, the breakfast she made this morning, you would think less of
her ailments."
"That's not always a sign," said Mrs Wilkie. "Look at _me_ now. I eat
hearty. I'm always best at meal-times; but an hour after, I'm just
fairly done, and my heart thumpin' like a smiddie hammer."
"Not at all to be wondered at," Mrs Chickenpip retorted, below her
breath. "If people will over-eat, they must expect to be
uncomfortable,"--a remark which passed unheard.
"How do you feel to-day, Mrs Wilkie?" was more audible. It was Rose
Hillyard who spoke.
"Ah, my dear, it's you? I'm glad to see you. I'm only so-so, between
the heat and the palpitations; but I think the homoeopathy is doing me
good. I think the lady we are speakin' about should try some of it."
"Have you been taking any more powders?" asked Rose, smiling at the
recollection of the cloud of "poother" she had seen issue from the old
lady's mouth.
"Just wan each day. I haven't forgot how kind you were to me the first
day. I have been better ever since."
"You blew that one all away, I think."
"It did me good all the same, my dear; and I won't forget your
kindness givin' it to me. And if ever I can say a good word for you,
I'll do it, ye may rely;" and the old thing actually winked, to Rose's
no small indignation--on which Lettice Deane gave her a pinch in the
arm, and ran away to hide her uproarious laughter.
Mrs Wilkie having dispensed her morsel of patronage, drew herself up
and coughed behind her finger-tips; then, thinking that perhaps she
had shown too marked a preference among candidates, she turned to Mrs
Petty and inquired for Miss Ann, observing that she thought her a nice
girl.
Mrs Naylor led Margaret a life which afforded her ample opportunity to
repent her perverseness, had that been possible. From the time she
left her room in the morning, she kept the girl at her side, to read
to her when she sat, or support her with an arm when she took a walk.
In the evening she kept her still at her elbow; and though she
sometimes allowed her to dance, she had her back again at her side the
moment the dance was ended. The other ladies were charmed and
impressed by these signs of so devoted an attachment between mother
and daughter, and both rose immensely in public esteem, which perhaps
consoled them in their utter boredom with one another. In her heart,
the mother would have liked to whip the intractable girl, while the
girl, in hers, was sorely tempted to run away; but public opinion and
the conventions kept both up to their pretty behaviour--and the
artist's satisfaction in doing a thing really well, and being
applauded for it, was assuredly an alleviation in the long and weary
game of make-believe.
Mrs Wilkie praised Margaret as a good biddable girl, and confided to
every one who cared to listen, "that she would be quite pleased if
Peter would take a fancy to her; though, to be sure, there was that
Miss Hillyard, a most superior person,--and it was doubtful to which
he would incline." Mrs Petty thought her the sweetest-tempered heiress
she had ever seen, wished she could secure her for her boy Walter, and
became the inseparable companion of mother and daughter.
By the third day of Mrs Naylor's sickness, she found herself the
recipient of so much attention, that she became quite reconciled to
her _rôle_--liked it almost--and might, I suppose, be taken as of that
curious class of people of whom it is recorded in newspapers that they
"enjoy poor health." Mrs Petty fairly laid siege to the regard of
mother and daughter, and old Mrs Wilkie sought the society of the two
mothers, who paid her unlimited attention in return, each protesting
to the other that it was quite a lark to quiz the simple soul, while
both were devoutly hoping that she would accept their blandishments in
good faith, and influence her son accordingly. Soon other ladies
joined the coterie--Mrs Deane with Lettice and Rose, and others; and
then bachelors began to hover on the confines of the circle--till the
sick lady's chair became a centre for whatever was going on.
Walter Blount growled at being of those outside, and was very
down-hearted, though he struggled his best. He cultivated his favoured
rival Walter Petty, waylaid Lucy, who was not under surveillance,
several times a-day, and intrusted her with messages to her sister.
There was Joseph, too, from whom he could extract sympathy at least;
and then there was the sight of his charmer's back hair, always in
view at the dinner-table, reminding him how near she was, "if still so
far"--which was something, but not enough; and after a week, he
removed his base of operations to Lippenstock, a few miles along the
coast, where, being out of sight, he could mitigate the severity of
Margaret's durance, though still within touch of whatever went on at
Clam Beach.
He might have had others, who would have been happy to distract his
thoughts, but he could think only of the one, and was indifferent to
other society; whence it arose that he spent a good deal of his time
alone, and interested many a tender heart in his behalf.
"Who can he be?" Fanny Payson asked Lettice Deane. "And what is the
matter with him? Did you ever see so young a fellow, so handsome and
so down in the mouth, at a watering-place before? _I_ never did. He
should turn hermit, or join the Shakers. They live quite near. He is
no sort of use here, and quite out of place. He minds nobody, and I am
sure I have given him every chance."
"He is not altogether a stranger. He has friends here. He knows the
Naylors. I see him sometimes with Lucy, and he is often with the
uncle, whom Rose Hillyard has chosen to inthral. I suspect he is only
a retiring young man, and painfully shy. What would you say to our
taking him in hand, and teaching him how nice he might become? He is a
fine manly-looking fellow, and our hands are not very full just now.
It would make us feel 'kind o' useful in our generation,' as my uncle
Zebedee says, to draw him out. Suppose you and I form ourselves into a
Geneva Red Cross Branch Society, to cure his bashfulness, and teach
him how to flirt."
"It can't be done, Lettice. I have tried, and I guess you'll allow I'm
a qualified practitioner. The trouble I've taken! And all for nothing.
I should feel downright mean about it, if I wasn't sure the man's a
loon."
"What brings him to Clam Beach, I wonder?"
"That I can't imagine. But he's of no account here. He evidently
believes his eyes were only given him to see with; as for _looking_,
he has no more notion of it than a stone wall. I have given him the
very nicest and most varied opportunities--you know he sits opposite
me at table. I have tried every variety of assault, from pensive up to
arch, and he seems absolutely impervious. I doubt even if he could
distinguish me from the chair I sit on, and yet I have gone so far as
actually to ask him to pass the butter. He just looks steadily past
me, as if his attention was fixed on what went on at the table
behind."
Maida Springer likewise observed the young misanthrope, felt
interested in him, and discussed him with Mrs Denwiddie. "He has a
history, that young man," she would say; and she would sigh as she
said it, as if to imply that there were others who had histories as
well. "It's a heart history too, and not a happy one; and he has just
come here, I do believe, to try if he can't learn to bear it. He is
seeking to drown memory with sounds of mirth and fashionable
dissipation; but he finds it a hollow mockery, just as others have
done, and he wanders down upon the wave-beat shore, and listens to the
ever-sounding sea, and it kind o' calms him, and he comes back feelin'
better--just like the rest. Ah yes!--as I have done myself."
"You, my dear, with a history? Ah yes! to be sure. You mentioned it
one day. Your friend went away without proposin', I think you said?
It may have been mean of him--I can't say; or it may have been a
mistake of your own. Girls are so ready to fool themselves that way.
It don't folly that the man was in fault. If a man only passes them
the apple-sarse with a smile, there are women who will call it a
particular attention."
"I didn't mention anything of the kind," the other answered tartly,
turning to go away; but no one of her friends whom she could join was
in sight, so she changed her intention, and proceeded to bestow on her
cross-grained companion "a bit of her mind."
"You appear to think it a grand thing to have been able to get
yourself married, Mrs Denwiddie, and you seem disposed to look down on
every young woman who is still single; but you don't tell what _kind_
of man you got, and you forget that if everybody was willing to take
what offered, there would be no single folks left. We may have been
too particular, we single women, but the married ones have no call to
despise us for that."
"No offence, my dear," said Mrs Denwiddie, who really could not afford
to quarrel with her chief intimate. "I was just speaking in the
gineral."
"And so was I, ma'am; and don't you forget it. I'm going home on
Friday, and as there's few you are likely to pick up with much when
I'm gone, except the single ladies, I would strongly recommend you to
respect their feelin's, and not brag too much about havin' been
married. They could have been married too, if they'd have took what
offered--like some others."
"Hoity-toity, my dear! I said 'no offence.' But you're all that
tetchy, you old--hm--but never mind. I'm sorry you're going. I for one
will miss you. I did not think the schools at Montpelier took up so
soon. I expected that you and me would have been leaving at the same
time, in about three weeks."
"I have arrangements to make at our ladies' college. They are adding a
class of Metaphysics and Political Economy, and Miss Rolph, our
principal, says I would get it if I wasn't so young."
"And well you would teach economy too, my dear, to judge by the neat
way your gloves and slippers is mended. And it's a thing girls have
much need to learn, if only there was some one who knew it; but the
mothers of town-bred girls are ez extravagant mostly ez themselves.
But how old must a woman be before she is qualified to teach economy?
Strikes me, if they don't know it when they're young, they'll never
know it."
"This is metaphysics and political economy. That means running the
State, not household management. Miss Rolph's establishment is devoted
to the higher culture. We leave the affairs of common life to
elementary schools. Miss Rolph says a woman should be forty and a
formed character before she ventures to instil these grand subjects
into the American woman of the future. I won't be thirty till my next
birthday."
"You don't mean that, my dear? You'll be a married woman, I hope,
before you're old enough to go lecterin' about physic, on them terms.
And I don't hold with women-doctors, let me tell you. They hain't got
strength in their arms to pull out a good-sized tooth; and as for
intelleck, I can't abide a woman of intelleck. But you're different,
my dear, and you're young yet--in a way; and you do yourself
injestice, let me tell you. What makes you dress so severe? A veil
would save your eyes as good as them blue glasses you wear out of
doors, and be a sight more becomin'. You can't expect to fetch a young
man with a look that comes filterin' to him through coloured glass.
And I'd put on more style, if I was as young as you, my dear, and buy
me a new _jupong_ out of Bosting. There's nothing like stylish
clothes, my dear, when you're young; and you'll never be younger."
Maida felt positively grateful and soothed at the old woman's prattle.
It takes so very small a crumb of personal interest to cheer and warm
the hearts of lonely ones. The schoolma'am was by herself in the
world, earning her own living, and battling her solitary way in life.
Those among whom she lived employed her at what she could do, paid
her, and that was the end of it. They had their own concerns and
interests. When Maida's work was done, they let her go her way,--a
drop in the river, a unit in the crowd, into whose life they were not
called on to intrude, and who would have shrunk from pushing herself
into theirs. She could have kissed Mrs Denwiddie, had the situation
been more favourable; as it was, she drew closer to her in their walk
upon the sands, rubbing against her dumbly, as the animals do when
they find a friend, and felt warmed in doing it.
Mrs Denwiddie understood, and a motherly instinct awoke within her,
which was new and pleasant--a fresh interest in the monotony of a life
in which the bells for meals had been the only landmark.