THE SINGING LADY
Maud’s sore throats were one of the greatest trials to her sisters. Not
only were they of frequent occurrence, but they were always regarded
by Grandma in the light of an especial grievance to herself, for which
somebody must be held responsible. If Maud had lived in the present
day, some doctor would probably have decided that her tonsils needed to
be removed, but in 1880 people did not think so much about operations,
and the family physician contented himself with prescribing simple
remedies, and the advice that the child should be kept out of draughts,
and not allowed to get her feet wet. Maud’s prediction on the present
occasion proved only too true. In the middle of the night Daisy was
aroused by a feverish demand from her little sister, for a drink of
water, and by morning Maud could not swallow without considerable
difficulty, and the too familiar white spots had appeared on her
throat. Of course Grandma had to be told, and the consequence was a
severe lecture to the other three, which lasted all through breakfast.
“I might have known what would happen when I let you all go off
yesterday,” grumbled Mrs. Winslow, as she prepared Maud’s gargle in
the nursery after breakfast. “I don’t suppose it ever occurred to one
of you to see that the child did not sit in her warm coat all the
afternoon.”
“Miss Leslie made her take off her coat,” protested Daisy, “and I don’t
really think she got over-heated or anything.”
“Well, she evidently caught cold in some way. At any rate, this has
taught me a lesson. Now remember, Maud, you are to gargle your throat
regularly every two hours, and take one of these powders every hour. If
I hear of your getting out of bed I shall punish you severely.”
“Who is going to stay with Maud this morning, Grandma?” Daisy asked,
following Mrs. Winslow out into the hall. “I suppose one of us will
have to stay home from church.”
Grandma reflected for a moment. She was very particular about
church-going, but under the present circumstances it was evident that
Maud could not be left alone.
“I think you and Daisy had better come to church with me,” she said.
“Maud doesn’t need anything except her gargle and the powders, and
Molly can attend to them.”
So it was settled, much to Molly’s satisfaction, and at half-past ten
Dulcie and Daisy departed for church, with Grandma and Aunt Kate,
and the two younger children were left to themselves. Maud, who was
feverish and rather cross, was inclined to resent this arrangement,
which deprived her of the society of her two older sisters.
“I want Dulcie to stay and tell me stories,” she pleaded. “Nobody can
tell stories but Dulcie.”
“I’ll tell you stories this afternoon,” said Dulcie. “I don’t believe
Grandma will make me go to church twice to-day, on account of your
being sick.”
“But I want stories this morning,” fretted Maud; “I want to hear about
Mamma. Ask Grandma to let you stay at home instead of Molly.”
“It wouldn’t be any use; it would only make her crosser than she is
already. Molly will read to you. There’s a very nice book I got from
the library. It’s called ‘Ministering Children,’ and it’s a regular
Sunday story.”
“I don’t like the way Molly reads,” complained the invalid. “She can’t
pronounce the long words, and she keeps stopping to spell things. I can
read ’most as well as she can myself.”
But whether Maud liked it or not, there was nothing to be done, as they
all knew well. Grandma never changed her mind about things, and when
she had once given an order she expected implicit obedience.
“I’ll do anything you want me to,” said Molly, good-naturedly, as the
retreating footsteps of the church-goers died away in the distance.
“We can’t play lotto, because it’s Sunday, but perhaps it wouldn’t be
wicked to cut out some paper dolls.”
Maud brightened a little at this suggestion, and for the next half-hour
all went well. Then it was time for Maud’s medicine, and she began to
rebel.
“I don’t like those nasty powders, and I’m not going to take any more
till Grandma comes home.”
“Then we shall both get an awful scolding,” said Molly, desperately.
“Grandma knows just how many powders there are, and she’ll count to see
if you’ve taken them all right. Do swallow this one, like a good girl,
and I’ll give you a drink of water to take away the taste.”
Perhaps Maud realized the force of her sister’s argument. At any rate,
she made no further objection to swallowing the medicine, over which
she made a wry face.
“When I grow up, I’m never going to take medicine,” she announced,
decidedly. “I’m not going to do a single thing I don’t want to.”
“Maybe you’ll have to,” said Molly. “Grown-up people can’t always do
just as they like. Papa didn’t want to go to China and leave us all,
but he had to, and Lizzie didn’t want to go away. Listen, the lady next
door is beginning to sing.”
Maud’s face brightened.
“I’m glad,” she said. “She always sings hymns on Sunday. I wonder why
she doesn’t go to church. Maybe she’s sick, too.”
For ten minutes the room was very still, while the two children
listened to the music, which reached them distinctly through the party
wall. Then Maud began to show signs of restlessness again.
“I wish she’d sing ‘Only an Armor-Bearer,’” she complained, fretfully.
“‘Only an Armor-Bearer’ is my favorite hymn; it’s got such a nice,
lively tune. She ’most always sings it on Sunday.”
“Perhaps she will in a little while,” said Molly, and again there was
silence. But, contrary to their expectations, the lady next door did
not sing “Only an Armor-Bearer,” and after a few minutes the music
ceased.
“O dear!” cried Maud, “now she’s stopped, and I did want ‘Only an
Armor-Bearer’ so much. Can’t we ask her to sing some more?”
“Why, Maud, how could we? We don’t know her. Oh, Maud, don’t begin to
cry. You’ll be worse if you do.”
“I am worse now,” declared Maud, seizing eagerly upon this new idea.
“I’m much worse. Maybe I’m going to die and go to heaven, like Mamma.
If I do you’ll be sorry you wouldn’t ask the lady to sing ‘Only an
Armor-Bearer.’”
“But how can I ask her, Maudie? It would be dreadfully rude to call
through the wall, and I don’t believe she’d understand, anyway. If
I went in next door I should have to ring the bell to get back, and
then Mary would see me, and she’d be sure to tell Grandma. Besides, I
wouldn’t know whom to ask for. We don’t even know the lady’s name.”
Maud stopped crying, and raised herself on one elbow.
“If you’ll promise never to tell Grandma,” she said, “I’ll tell you
something. It’s my secret; I’ve had it for ever so many days.”
“A secret! What kind of a secret?” Molly was beginning to be interested.
“It’s a very lovely secret,” said Maud, proudly. “You big ones are
always having secrets, so I got one, too. I won’t tell it, though,
unless you promise not to tell Grandma.”
“Of course I’ll promise. You know I never tell Grandma things, or Aunt
Kate either.”
“I don’t know that we ought to tell Dulcie and Daisy,” said Maud,
doubtfully; “they might think Grandma ought to know. That’s why I
didn’t talk about it. It was so exciting. I peeked in, but I was scared
to go any farther.”
“Peeked in?” repeated Molly; “where did you peek in?”
“Next door. Through the door in the trunk-room, you know.”
“Do you mean the door Grandpa had cut between the houses when Uncle
George lived next door? I thought it was locked up after Uncle George
died, and the boarding-house people came there.”
“It isn’t locked up,” said Maud, triumphantly. “I found out, and that’s
my secret.”
“Maud!” gasped Molly, her eyes round with astonishment. “You mean you
knew such an exciting thing, and never told any one.”
Maud nodded.
“I wanted to have a secret,” she said, “and I was afraid Dulcie or
Daisy would tell Grandma. It was the last time I had a cold, and
Grandma wouldn’t let me go out. I was up here playing all by myself.
I was looking for my littlest china doll. I couldn’t find her, and I
thought perhaps I’d left her in the trunk-room the day we played Libby
Prison in there, so I went to look. I did find her behind one of the
biggest trunks, and then I saw the door. I thought it was locked, of
course, but I shook the handle just for fun, and all of a sudden it
came open, and I looked right in next door.”
“What did you see?” demanded Molly, in a tone of breathless interest.
“I didn’t see very much,” confessed Maud, reluctantly. “It was just a
big closet, and there were brooms and dust-pans in it, but it really
was next door. First I was going to tell, but then I was afraid if
Grandma knew she’d have the door locked up right away, and then we
could never go to see the singing lady.”
“I’m sure Grandma would have it locked right up,” said Molly, “and
perhaps the lady who keeps the boarding-house would, too, but it’s
very interesting to know it isn’t locked now. Why, it must have been
unlocked all the time since Uncle George died, and nobody ever found it
out before. I don’t believe the people next door know it any more than
we did.”
“Of course they don’t,” said Maud, “that’s what makes it so
interesting. Now you see you can go to see the singing lady just as
easy as anything, and ask her to sing ‘Only an Armor-Bearer.’”
“Oh, Maud, I couldn’t,” protested Molly; “it would be such a very queer
thing to do. The lady might not like it a bit, and Grandma would make
such a fuss. She never lets us talk to people she doesn’t know.”
“You promised you wouldn’t tell Grandma, and I know the singing lady
wouldn’t be angry. You’ve got to do it, Molly, or else maybe I’ll die
and go to heaven.”
Molly hesitated. It would certainly be a thrilling experience to go
uninvited, and without even ringing the door-bell, into the house next
door, that mysterious boarding-house, upon whose occupants Grandma and
Aunt Kate looked down from their height of social superiority. Molly
loved adventure, and yet--what would Grandma say? Would even Dulcie and
Daisy altogether approve? Maud noticed the hesitation in her sister’s
manner, and was quick to take advantage of it.
“If you won’t go,” she announced, sitting up in bed, “I’ll get right
straight up and go myself.”
Molly rose irresolutely.
“If I go, will you promise faithfully not to get out of bed for a
single minute till I come back?”
Maud nodded emphatically.
“I’ll promise, cross my heart, and that’s the solemnest promise anybody
can make, and if you break it something awful will happen to you. Mary
told me it would. I’ll lie just as still, as still, and when you come
back you can tell me all about the singing lady.”
“And will you gargle and take your powders all day without making any
more fuss?”
“Yes, and I’ll give you my best paper doll, and all her dresses. Don’t
you think I’m kind?”
Molly moved slowly towards the door.
“It seems an awful thing to do,” she said, “but I’ll only stay a
minute, and I can’t let you get out of bed.”
[Illustration: THE DOOR SWUNG OPEN SO QUIETLY AND EASILY THAT SHE
NEARLY FELL OVER BACKWARD.--_Page 63._]
Molly’s heart was beating very fast as she crossed the hall to the dark
room, which Grandma used for storing trunks and boxes. There was no one
to see her, for both the servants were in the kitchen, and she and Maud
had the upper part of the house quite to themselves. The trunk-room was
not locked, and she made her way amid various impediments, to the heavy
door, which she had always known communicated with the adjoining house.
Old Dr. Winslow had had it made in days gone by, when the house next
door had belonged to his only brother, of whom he was very fond. This
brother had died before the children came to New York, and although the
house still belonged to the Winslow family, it had been rented to a
lady, who took boarders, much to the disgust of Grandma and Aunt Kate,
who looked upon a boarding-house as a blot on the neighborhood. Molly
was telling herself that her little sister must have made a mistake. It
did not seem possible that the communicating door could have been left
unfastened all these years, without the fact having been discovered.
With a trembling hand she turned the knob. The door stuck a little, and
she was just about to turn away, convinced that Maud had dreamed the
whole thing, when suddenly the door swung open, so quietly and easily,
that, in her astonishment, she nearly fell over backward.
There, sure enough, was the closet, just as Maud had described it.
Molly fairly gasped, and in that one moment everything else was
forgotten in the excitement of the wonderful discovery she had made.
She did not shrink back, as Maud had done, but pushing her way through
brooms and brushes, and stumbling over various articles on the floor,
reached another door, which she opened, and the next moment she had
stepped out into a hall, which was exactly like the hall of their own
top floor.
It was very quiet, and there was no one to be seen. Molly closed the
closet door softly, and stood looking about her. There were four rooms
on the floor, and all the doors were closed. The singing lady’s room
was in the front, she knew, and after one moment’s hesitation, she
stepped boldly forward, and knocked.
“Come in,” called a pleasant voice, and there was a sound as of some
piece of furniture being moved rapidly along the floor. Before Molly
could quite make up her mind to turn the handle, the door was opened
from the inside, and a little lady in a wheel-chair suddenly confronted
her.
She was such a tiny lady that for the first moment Molly thought she
must be a child, but when the pleasant voice spoke again, it sounded
oddly familiar.
“Won’t you come in?” she said, and the face that looked at Molly
from the wheel-chair was so very sweet and winning, that half her
embarrassment melted away at once.
“I hope you’ll excuse me for coming,” she faltered, “but--but, you see,
we live next door, and my little sister is sick. We can hear you sing
through the wall, and we all love it. My sister wants me to ask if you
won’t please sing ‘Only an Armor-Bearer,’ because it’s her favorite
hymn.”
“Come right in,” said the lady, hospitably, “and would you mind closing
the door? The halls are rather chilly.”
Molly complied, and found herself in a room exactly like their own
nursery on the other side of the wall. Indeed, the two houses had been
built at the same time, and were alike in every particular. It was
evidently used as both bed and sitting-room, for a piano stood between
the windows, and by the empty fireplace stood a small mahogany bookcase
well filled with rather shabby-looking books. The room might have been
more tidy, for the bed was still unmade, and on the table was a tray
containing the remains of a breakfast, but the lady herself was as neat
as possible, although her blue wrapper was somewhat faded, and the
slippers on the little feet that hung helplessly over the edge of the
wheel-chair had long ago lost their first freshness.
“You must excuse things being a little upset,” the lady said,
apologetically. “It’s Sunday morning, you know, and the chambermaid has
gone to church. She’s a nice girl, and very kind and obliging, but I
am afraid I give her a good deal of trouble. Take those bedclothes off
that comfortable chair, and sit down. It’s a great pleasure to have a
little girl come to see me. And so your sister likes my singing. I am
very glad. I had no idea any one cared about it.”
“We all like it,” said Molly, who had obeyed her hostess’ instructions,
and seated herself. “You see, our room is just on the other side of the
wall, and we can hear very well indeed. Maud is in bed to-day, with a
sore throat, and she loved the music.”
“Bless her heart!” cried the little lady, fairly beaming with pleasure,
“she shall have all the music I can give her. I love to sing, though I
know I haven’t much of a voice. Would you mind telling me your name?”
“My name is Molly Winslow,” said Molly, “and my sisters’ names are
Dulcie, Daisy and Maud. It’s Maud who is sick. She’s only seven. I’m
nine, and Dulcie and Daisy are eleven and ten. Our mamma is dead, and
our papa has gone to China. We live next door with Grandma Winslow.”
“I know who you are now,” said the lady, smiling; “you are old Dr.
Winslow’s grandchildren. I have always admired your grandfather’s
writing so much. I have read a number of his books, and I was so much
interested when I heard his house was next door.”
“Were you?” said Molly. “I’m glad you like Grandpa’s books. I didn’t
know anybody did. Dulcie began one once, but she said it wasn’t very
interesting. I suppose people ought to like their relations’ books.”
The lady laughed such a merry laugh that Molly found herself laughing,
too, though she did not know why.
“I think Dr. Winslow’s books might seem rather dull to a little girl,”
she said. “Perhaps I might have found them dull myself, if I were
able to get about like other people, but when one has to live in a
wheel-chair one is glad of almost anything to read.”
“Do you always have to stay in the chair?” asked Molly, sympathetically.
“I thought perhaps you had just sprained your ankle or something like
that. Papa sprained his ankle once and he had to keep his foot up for
three whole weeks.”
“I haven’t walked a step for nearly three years,” said the lady,
quietly.
“Can’t you even go up and down stairs?”
The lady shook her head.
“I was carried up here the day I left the hospital,” she said, sadly,
“and I have lived in this room ever since. I shall never walk again,
the doctors tell me. But I manage to get on very well,” she added,
brightening at sight of Molly’s distressed face. “You would really be
surprised to know all the things I can do without getting out of my
chair. Then people are very kind to me. Miss Collins, the lady who
keeps this house, was an old friend of my mother’s, and she often
comes to sit with me in the evening. The chambermaid helps me in many
little ways, and with my books, and my dear piano, I really get on very
comfortably indeed.”
Molly was deeply impressed.
“Could you walk when you were a little girl?” she inquired, anxiously.
A shadow crossed the lady’s sweet face.
“Oh yes, indeed,” she said. “I walked just like any one else till three
years ago, when I met with my accident.”
“What sort of an accident was it?” Molly was so much interested that
she quite forgot that some people might have considered her questions
rather impertinent.
“I was run over, crossing Broadway one very slippery day. The ground
was covered with ice, and I fell in the middle of the street. Before I
could get on my feet again, a horse-car came around the corner, and the
driver could not stop his horses in time. It really wasn’t anybody’s
fault.”
Molly rose. She was beginning to feel embarrassed again. There was
something in the sight of the helpless little figure in the wheel-chair
that made her feel all at once as if she wanted to cry.
“I’m afraid I must go,” she said a trifle unsteadily. “I can’t leave
Maud any longer. I’m awfully glad I know you, and the others will be so
interested when I tell them about you.”
“And I am delighted to know you, too,” her new acquaintance said,
heartily. “I have been more interested in my little neighbors than you
might suppose. You see, I can hear your voices through the wall, just
as you hear my singing, and when one spends a good deal of time alone,
one gets interested in all sorts of little things. I hope you will
come to see me again, and bring all your little sisters.”
“We’d love to come,” declared Molly. “Will you please tell me your name
in case we should want to ask for you at the front door?”
“My name is Oliver, Mary Oliver, but everybody calls me Miss Polly,
and I like it much better. My brother Tom always called me Polly. I am
sorry you must go so soon, for it is a great treat to have a visitor,
but I suppose you mustn’t leave your little sister any longer. I hope
you will find things in better order the next time you come. Maggie is
really very good about keeping the room neat, but Sunday morning----”
And Miss Polly glanced regretfully at the unmade bed and the tray of
breakfast dishes.
“Good-bye,” said Molly, holding out her hand.
Miss Polly shook the little hand--her own hand was not much bigger--and
then she looked at her visitor rather anxiously.
“Aren’t you afraid of taking cold without any wrap?” she questioned.
“To be sure it is only next door.”
“Oh, I don’t have to go out in the street at all,” said Molly,
unthinkingly. “I came through the door in the wall.”
“The door in the wall?” repeated Miss Polly, looking puzzled. “What
door do you mean, dear?”
Molly blushed.
“I didn’t mean to tell,” she said, “because it’s a secret. It’s a door
that was cut between the two houses when Grandpa’s brother lived here.
Everybody thinks it’s locked, but it isn’t. It’s such fun coming that
way--like doing a thing in a book, you know.”
Miss Polly laughed merrily.
“What a delightful way to come,” she said. “I won’t mention your secret
to a soul, and you must often come to see me through the wall.” She
looked so young and pretty, with her face all dancing with merriment,
that Molly felt suddenly as if she were sharing a secret with a little
girl of her own age.
“I’ll tell Dulcie and Daisy as soon as they come home from church,” she
promised, “and I know they’ll want to come and see you right away.” And
then she hurried off.
As she entered the nursery, a few minutes later, the strains of “Only
an Armor-Bearer” could be distinctly heard through the wall, and Miss
Polly’s piano was playing a lively accompaniment to the familiar tune.