Nannie's gone up to Mrs. Kinalden's to get some messages for the letter
to Mr. Bond. What has happened to the old lady? She has grown so very
gracious, and places a chair for Nannie, and offers her a warm doughnut
which she has just fried, and then she sits down with the cat on her
lap, while she talks to the girl about the old gentleman. There's a
good-natured smile upon her face, and somehow Nannie forgets how old and
disagreeable she thought her when she used to come to see the sick man;
and puss feels quite at home on the kind lap that no longer gives her a
spiteful toss upon the hard floor.
There's something come over Mrs. Kinalden, surely! Perhaps the letters
that occasionally reach her from the amiable bachelor have something
contagious in them, and may be they awaken in her mind a faint hope that
the address, "My dear Mrs. Kinalden," may mean a little more than
appears upon the surface. He says "how much he misses the comfort of his
home!" too, and "what delight it will give him to be once more settled
in his quiet room;" and he tells her to "take good care of puss for his
sake;" and isn't that almost equal to a declaration? The old lady often
draws a crumpled paper from her pocket, and carefully adjusting her
spectacles upon her nose, goes over the manuscript with the forefinger
of her right hand, stopping at "For my sake," and pondering the words
very seriously. She doesn't know how it would do to change her situation
at her time of life, although she does not feel a bit older than when
she was married to Mr. Kinalden! She wonders if he, poor dear man! would
rise from his grave if she should ever suffer herself to be called Mrs.
Bond! He used to say that he should not lie peacefully beneath the sod
if she were to drop his name for another. She was always afraid of
"sperits," and if he should appear to her! and she crumples the paper up
again, and thrusts it hastily into its secret receptacle, and chides
herself for forgetting for one moment her buried lord, for the night is
coming on, and she is not particularly courageous in the dreamy hours of
darkness, and she is not sure but Mr. Kinalden's ghost will punish her
for thought as well as deed.
Nannie has gone a long time ago. She only staid a moment to get news for
the letter, and the old lady was quite alone when she suffered herself
to embrace so important a subject as good Mr. Bond. The boarders drop in
one by one and Mrs. Kinalden's thoughts are concentrated in her cups and
saucers, and the hot tea that goes steaming round the table, and the
query whether "Mr. Viets is the gentleman who takes sugar?" and "if it
is Mr. Ballack that doesn't take milk?" and "which of the gentlemen it
is that likes both sugar and milk?" and "which that takes neither?" And
so all her aspirations after the Cuban bachelor are hushed for the
present, amid the sober realities of her responsible station. It is not
very remarkable that she sometimes dreams that it would be very
agreeable to make a different arrangement! To be sure her boarders are
as good as other boarders; but there's this person does not like
beefsteak, and is very fond of mutton chops, and that one can not endure
mutton chops, but delights in beefsteak; and fresh pork is too gross for
such a one's appetite, and veal cutlets are disagreeable to Mr. So and
So. Graham bread is the peculiar diet of one, and another never touches
any thing but dry toast; and some like pastry, and some puddings; and
what with them all and their likes and dislikes, the poor woman is
almost distracted with the worriment and care.
No wonder then that she often sighs to be free from such a bondage! Her
absent lodger never gave her any trouble; she can see it now that he is
away, and she only wishes that his fat merry face would soon show itself
again at her table. It would make her quite contented with her station
at the big waiter.
It is a pity your mind's on that train, Mrs. Kinalden. Mr. Bond's heart
is not made of wax, and is a terribly unimpressible object, so far as
the ladies are concerned. There is only one other heart to whose
pulsations it has ever responded, and that one has ceased to beat. Yours
may throb and throb beneath the waist of your dove-colored merino, but
his will never answer it, be sure of that!