VICTORIA MEETS WITH DIFFICULTIES.
“IT seems to me that you are not as proficient as one would expect. There
are a number of mistakes in this letter. How long have you been using the
typewriter, Victoria?”
“Not very long, Aunt Sophia.”
“But how long?”
“A few—at least, some weeks.”
“Weeks? I supposed that you had owned one for months. In fact, it has
never been explained to me where you got it nor how you happened to get
it. Who bought the typewriter?”
“Er—we did.”
“But which one of you? I am under the impression that it belongs to
Katherine. Am I right? Did she buy it?”
There was no reply. The aunt and niece were in Mrs. Wentworth Ward’s room
this afternoon in June, engaged with the correspondence of the latter. It
was a beautiful day, and Victoria longed to be out of doors. She had
watched Katherine go across the lawn with her music-roll under her arm,
and she knew that she was going to the house on the hill to read music
with Miss Madison. Honor was sitting under the trees with Sophy and
Peter, who was able now to be out of doors, lying stretched out in a
steamer chair. Victoria alone was in the house this golden afternoon;
and, anxious though she was to finish her task and be off,—no doubt for
that very reason,—she had never worked so slowly. Her mistakes were
innumerable, and several times she had been obliged to rewrite a note
because of her aunt’s dissatisfaction with its appearance.
“Which one of you bought the typewriter?” repeated Mrs. Ward.
“Why do you want to know, Aunt Sophia?”
“I have my reasons. Who bought it?”
“Katherine did.”
“Ah, I thought so! I was sure that Honor told me so. And why does not
Katherine use it?”
“She has so much else to do.”
“And yet she seems to have time to go to the Madisons’ almost, if not
quite every day. Katherine is selfish.”
“Oh, Aunt Sophia, I don’t think so!”
“You may not think so, but that does not alter the facts. She is both
selfish and extravagant—two serious faults. It is well for all of you
that she is in a fair way to make a good match, but I am sorry for the
young man.”
“Why, Aunt Sophia, what do you mean?” asked Victoria, gazing at her aunt
in surprise.
“My dear, you must see for yourself what I mean. I shall say no more, but
it is a self-evident fact. I will talk to Honor about it. There is
nothing to be said against his family, and he seems to be a very nice
young man,—good manners, good-looking, and all that, but Katherine is
very young.”
“Young! I should think so,” said Victoria, indignantly. “Katherine hasn’t
an idea of anything of the kind, and I don’t see why it should ever have
occurred to you, Aunt Sophia. Can’t people, men and women, I mean, be
good friends without _that_ being thought of?”
“Very seldom, my dear. But why you should be so disturbed by my remarks I
cannot imagine. Your cheeks are flushed, and your eyes are like saucers.
One would think that I had suggested something quite unusual and very
much to be dreaded, instead of an event which would be most desirable in
every way.”
“I don’t think it would be desirable at all!” exclaimed Victoria. “Excuse
me, Aunt Sophia, for contradicting you, but I can’t help it. It would be
perfectly hateful to have either Honor or Katherine married, and to Mr.
Madison of all people. Oh, it couldn’t possibly be!”
“But why not, Victoria? Why have you such an aversion for Mr. Madison?”
“Oh, because,” said Victoria, breaking down somewhat lamely. “I don’t
want them to marry any one. I wish you hadn’t told me. Not that I think
there is anything in it at all, but—but it just makes me think about it.”
“I most sincerely wish I had not,” rejoined Mrs. Wentworth Ward. “It has
quite prevented your being of any further assistance to me this
afternoon, and we may as well lay aside these other papers. You are
usually so sensible that I supposed you would be so in this case. It is
quite absurd for you to become so excited. There is another question that
I wish to speak about to one of you, but I will wait until I see Honor.
She is the proper one.”
“Won’t I do, Aunt Sophia?”
Victoria was sorry that she had allowed her excitement to run away with
her. If it had been any one but Roger Madison whom her aunt had suggested
as a possible husband for Katherine, she could have borne it better, but
try as she would, and much as she really liked the young man, she could
not overcome the feeling that she had about him in regard to the sale of
the etchings.
That affair had assumed astounding proportions in her mind. From constant
brooding over it without imparting the facts of the case to any one else,
she had greatly exaggerated their importance. It seemed to her out of the
question that Katherine should be allowed to become engaged while in
ignorance of it, and in that event, Honor too should be told, and yet
after her long silence she dreaded speaking of it. She wished that she
could ask the advice of some one else, some older person, but there was
no one. If it were upon any other subject, she would go at once to Miss
Madison, she thought, who was so kind and friendly, but under the
circumstances of course that was out of the question.
Even though Victoria and Roger Madison had met that afternoon in Peter’s
room, she had tried since to avoid him. This was not easy, for he came to
the house very frequently, ostensibly to see Peter. Was it really to see
Katherine? She wondered what other alarming news her Aunt Sophia might
have to disclose. Something disagreeable, she had no doubt, and she would
try to save Honor from hearing it.
“I hope you will tell me,” she said, as she watched her aunt fold up the
unanswered letters, replace them in their envelopes, and lay them away in
the proper pigeon-hole in her desk. “I will try not to be so excited over
this, but the other was such a surprise.”
“I have no doubt this will be also,” said Mrs. Wentworth Ward, “and
probably you will take up the cudgels in defence of the young man just as
violently as you have scouted the idea of Katherine’s plans.”
“Her plans? And what young man? Are you again speaking of Mr. Madison?”
“Not by any means. I am speaking of the young man who attends to so much
of your gardening, and who, as far as I can make out, has more confidence
reposed in him, than any one else who comes to Glen Arden. I mean David.”
“David? Dave Carney? Why, Aunt Sophia, what is the trouble about him? We
have always found him so satisfactory.”
“Exactly so, and therefore you have never taken the trouble to find out
anything else about him. Where did you get him in the first place?”
“Peter met him in Fordham, and brought him home.”
“And do you mean to tell me that is all you know about him? Did you look
up his references?”
“No-o, I don’t think so—at least, I’m not sure. Honor attends to all such
things. But why, Aunt Sophia? What makes you ask?”
“I have reason to suspect him,” said Mrs. Wentworth Ward. “When I was in
Boston yesterday I saw him, or some one who closely resembled him, going
into a pawnbroker’s shop, and since then I have questioned Ellen
Higgins.”
Ellen Higgins was Mrs. Ward’s maid whom she had brought with her to Glen
Arden.
“And what does she say?” asked Victoria. She did not fancy Ellen herself,
and since her advent there had been endless trouble in the kitchen.
“She does not like him, and she thinks you trust him entirely too much.”
Victoria felt like replying, “I wish Ellen Higgins would mind her own
business,” but she restrained herself. Instead she remarked:
“We all like Dave Carney, and we have found him very satisfactory, but I
think, after all, that Honor is the one for you to speak to about him.
And now if you will excuse me, I will go—that is, if you have quite
finished with the work.”
“I have finished because you were doing it so badly,” said her aunt. “I
am ashamed to send such miserable typewriting as you did this afternoon.”
“Why not let me write the letters over with a pen, Aunt Sophia? I write a
very clear hand, you know.”
“I prefer the typewriter for many reasons, and as you own one, you should
be able to make use of it, even if Katherine was the one to buy it. I am
astonished at you all. You are very headstrong. Now you may go.”
And Victoria quickly took her departure.
[Picture: “She found her eldest sister sitting on a rustic bench under
the trees, with her work in her hands”]
Her mind was filled with the new ideas presented to her, but she found
time to wonder why her aunt was not willing to have her notes and various
documents written in a good clear hand with a pen, instead of insisting
upon having them typewritten. But such a question was of minor
importance, she thought, as she ran downstairs and across the lawn. Even
if she could not tell Honor what was troubling her about Katherine, it
would be a comfort to be near her.
She had two secrets now to keep from her sisters, and strangely enough,
they were both connected with Roger Madison. Victoria felt that life had
become very complicated within the last few months.
She found her eldest sister sitting on a rustic bench under the trees,
with her work in her hands. She was making a dress for Sophy, who was
playing with her doll, but who was so deeply interested in Peter’s
occupation that the doll was frequently neglected.
Peter was lying back in his chair while he held an opera-glass to his
eyes and gazed up into the branches of the tree above him. No one had
spoken for some time, and when Victoria drew near, her brother held up
his hand with a gesture of warning.
“Hush!” he whispered.
Victoria sank quietly upon the grass and waited. It gave her time to
think over her aunt’s disturbing speeches, and for this she was not
sorry.
The silence lasted for some minutes, and then Peter put down his glass.
“It’s a robin’s nest,” said he. “I thought it was, from the shape. I bet
if we could see into it, we’d find it was lined with mud. Robins’ nests
always are. The young ones are getting quite big, and one is terribly
greedy when the old ones come. I daresay it is a cowbird.”
“But you said they were robins, Peter,” said Sophy.
“I know I did, but that doesn’t prevent a cowbird being there too, does
it? That is just what those hateful cowbirds do. They are too lazy to
build nests of their own, but they go and lay their eggs in other birds’
nests whenever they get a chance, and never go near them again. Then the
cowbird’s egg gets hatched with the robin’s or the catbird’s eggs, or
whatever nest it happens to have been laid in, and the little cowbird is
awfully greedy and snatches all the food, and grows up to be just like
its parents. Oh, they are hateful birds! I was reading about them to-day
in a book Mr. Madison lent me on birds. It said there that no
self-respecting American bird will have anything to do with cowbirds.
English sparrows are the only birds that will go with them. I thought
that was pretty good, for every one knows that an English sparrow hasn’t
much self-respect. I’m sure that is a cowbird up there, poking its head
so far out and snatching, every time the old robins come with the worms.”
“Oh, Peter, I wish you would let me look!” said Sophy, in pleading tones.
Peter hesitated. He was very much interested in the proceedings in the
tree; the opera-glass was adjusted to exactly the right point for his
eyes, and in all probability Sophy would move it—she always did. Then,
again, Sophy would never be able to locate the nest, and much valuable
time would be wasted for nothing.
He was about to refuse her request when a new idea occurred to him. After
all, it was not much to do for Sophy, who had been so devoted to him ever
since his accident. She had run up and down stairs for him forty times a
day. In fact, she had gone to the house a short time ago when he had
expressed a wish for the opera-glass, and had brought it to him, and
again for a book on birds. She never refused to do what he asked; on the
contrary, she was eager to please him.
Peter handed her the glass.
“Look right up the trunk of the tree, Soph,” he said kindly, “till you
get to the second branch from the top to the right, and a little way
along that, leaning up against a small branch that isn’t much more than a
twig, is the robin’s nest. Do you see? With all those heads sticking out.
They’re getting hungry, I guess, for the old birds haven’t been back for
ten minutes at least. They hear us talking, I suppose, and are afraid to
come. Keep very quiet, now, if you’ve found the nest, and watch.”
Sophy, greatly pleased, peered up into the tree and waited. She had
scarcely dared hope that Peter would allow her to look, and her heart was
filled with an overpowering love for the brother who was so good to her.
It was a little thing for him to do, perhaps, but Peter felt happier than
if he had declined to point out the nest to Sophy, and even though it did
take her a long time to find it, and though she turned the screw to and
fro in her efforts to see better, and retained possession of the glass
for at least ten minutes, he was glad on the whole that he had lent it to
her.
Victoria sat upon the grass, absent-mindedly poking a hole in the ground
with a bit of stick that she had found, and thinking about the very
disturbing topic that had been suggested to her by her aunt. She did not
pay much attention to the remarks about Dave Carney, for she considered
her aunt a very prejudiced person who had objected to the boy’s presence
at Glen Arden from the first.
The news about Katherine was far more alarming, and while she thought
about it the sound of voices was heard in the distance, and the very
persons of whom she was thinking were seen coming down the avenue towards
the group under the trees.
“Dear me,” exclaimed Peter, impatiently, “here they all come! Now I shall
have no chance at the birds at all. Mr. Madison is an awfully good
fellow, but I wish he had stayed away this afternoon.”
Victoria’s glance chanced to rest upon Honor at this moment, and she was
surprised to see a peculiar expression cross her face and the color
deepen in her cheeks. She wondered if Aunt Sophia’s absurd ideas about
Katherine and Roger Madison could possibly have occurred to her as well.
In that case, perhaps they were not so absurd. She really thought she
must talk to Honor about it that very night. There could be no harm in
doing so, and she felt that she was incapable of bearing the burden of
two secrets.
In the meantime there was no necessity for staying where she was if Roger
Madison were coming, so Victoria rose at their approach, and waving her
hand to them walked back to the house.
“Why does your sister, Victoria, always run away from us?” said Miss
Madison, as she seated herself beside Honor. “I like her so much, and I
wish I could see more of her.”
“She doesn’t run away from _you_,” said Sophy before Honor could reply.
Miss Madison as well as her brother was a great favorite with the child,
and she would have liked to gaze for hours at the beautiful face had her
sisters not admonished her so frequently for staring.
“It’s your brother,” she added.
“But why my brother?” said Miss Madison in surprise.
“I don’t know,” said the truthful Sophy, “but ever since you came I’ve
noticed that Vic ran away from your brother, and the other day when she
was in Peter’s room and didn’t know he was coming and I brought him in,
Vic said: ‘Don’t tell any one. I’ve tried not to meet you. Nobody knows
it.’ I asked her afterwards what she meant, and she wouldn’t tell me.”
“Why, Sophy, what are you talking about?” asked Honor.
“Mr. Madison knows, don’t you?” said the child, turning to him. “Will you
tell me what Vic meant?”
“Certainly not, if Miss Victoria won’t tell you herself,” said he; “I
think you must ask her. Did you see the bird’s nest?”
“Yes, I did,” said Sophy, nodding her head wisely, “but you are only
trying to get out of telling me by changing the subject. We weren’t
talking about birds.”
“But we will talk about them now, Sophy,” said Honor, quietly, while she
wondered what the child could mean. “We have been studying birds all the
afternoon, Mr. Madison, and there are several questions that I know Peter
wants to ask you.”
But Honor determined to speak to Victoria that very night, for she too
had noticed her peculiar conduct, so unlike Vic’s usual open and cordial
manner. There must be some reason for it, and Honor would have questioned
her about it before this had there not been so many other things to
occupy their minds.
It was a beautiful evening, and after supper the family sat on the piazza
while the twilight deepened after the long June day, and in time the
light of the moon made itself felt, and shone down upon the lawn where
the trees cast such strange shadows.
Peter lay in the hammock until his bedtime, and after he and Sophy had
gone upstairs and Mrs. Ward into the house to establish herself with her
book by the parlor lamp, with the remark that she had no time to waste in
moon gazing, the three sisters were left alone.
Victoria, who was anxious to speak with Honor, wished that there was
something which would take Katherine into the house or elsewhere, that
she might have the desired opportunity, for her words were meant for
Honor’s ears alone.
Honor, while equally desirous of speaking to Victoria, was perfectly
willing to do so in Katherine’s presence. The three had always been in
the habit of talking freely together, and so Honor opened the subject at
once.
“Why do you always try to avoid the Madisons, Vic?” said she, suddenly.
Victoria started guiltily. How strange, she thought, that Honor should
have pounced upon the very topic that was occupying her mind.
“Do I?” said she. It was a difficult matter for Victoria to attempt
evasion.
“Yes. You know you do. There must be some reason for it. We have all
noticed it, and Miss Madison spoke of it this afternoon.”
“I don’t try to avoid _her_,” said Victoria.
“No, we know that,” said Katherine, “but you do avoid Roger, and it is
very strange.”
“Roger! Do you call him Roger?” asked Victoria, somewhat icily.
“Oh, no, of course not to his face,” rejoined Katherine, impatiently,
“but I hear his sister speak of him so often that I did it then without
thinking.”
“I don’t think you ought to,” said Honor. “You might do it without
thinking before him.”
“You must think I am very stupid,” laughed Katherine, “and I am not quite
so ignorant of the ways of the world as all that! Honor, you are too
funny about Roger Mad—I mean, Mr. Madison, begging all your pardons! He
is so nice and jolly, and sings so well, but you never will go there
much, and Vic is still queerer. Come now, Vicky, and tell us why you run
away from him.”
“I can’t tell you anything,” replied Victoria, in a somewhat stifled
voice. “I wish you wouldn’t ask me such unnecessary questions.”
“They are not unnecessary, dear,” said Honor, gently. “If you have any
reason for doing it, you really ought to tell us. When it reaches such a
pass that even little Sophy speaks of it, and repeated before us all this
afternoon what you said to Mr. Madison the day you met him in Peter’s
room, I really think you ought to explain.”
“Did Sophy do that?” exclaimed Victoria. “What did she say?”
“That you begged Mr. Madison not to tell any one, and that you had tried
not to meet him, and that no one knew it. It is certainly very
mysterious, Vic, and I think you ought to tell us.”
Victoria, sitting on the steps with her white dress gleaming in the
moonlight, was silent. She would like to tell them the whole story.
Should she do so? But then, if Katherine—she stopped short, even in her
thoughts. She wished that her Aunt Sophia had never presented so
disagreeable an idea to her imagination.
Should she tell them, or should she not? It would be a distinct relief to
talk it over with them, and to feel free at last from the burden of a
secret. She was about to speak when Katherine motioned to her to be
silent.
“Wait a minute,” Katherine said in a whisper. She had been watching
intently the clump of trees and shrubbery, near the side of the house,
which separated them from the flower garden. “I’m sure I heard something
or somebody moving, and I thought I saw the shadow of a man. Who can it
be?”
“Let’s go find out,” said Victoria, promptly, glad to have the matter
decided for her and the subject changed. “It was probably a night-hawk or
an owl. It couldn’t be a man, Katherine!”
The three went around the corner of the house and walked about among the
shrubbery. No thought of fear entered their minds.
“It is nothing, after all,” said Katherine at last. “I must have been
mistaken, but it was exactly like the shadow of a man.”
“Well, I am going to bed as long as your shadow isn’t going to
materialize,” said Victoria; “so good night, girls!” And abruptly leaving
them, she went into the house.
“It is funny about Vic, isn’t it, Honor?” said Katherine. “I mean that
she won’t explain why she doesn’t like Mr. Madison.”
“Very, and I am going to speak to her again about it. Perhaps she would
tell me more if we were alone.”
“You mean without me? Why, I should like to know? However, if you do find
out, you mustn’t fail to tell me, for I really am most curious about it.”