On the first Sunday after the wedding Pete came up-stairs to tell
his master, William, that Mrs. Stetson wanted to see him in the
drawing-room.
William went down at once.
“Well, Aunt Hannah,” he began, reaching out a cordial hand. “Why, what's
the matter?” he broke off concernedly, as he caught a clearer view of
the little old lady's drawn face and troubled eyes.
“William, it's silly, of course,” cried Aunt Hannah, tremulously, “but
I simply had to go to some one. I--I feel so nervous and unsettled!
Did--did Billy say anything to you--what she was going to do?”
“What she was going to do? About what? What do you mean?”
“About the house--selling it,” faltered Aunt Hannah, sinking wearily
back into her chair.
William frowned thoughtfully.
“Why, no,” he answered. “It was all so hurried at the last, you know.
There was really very little chance to make plans for anything--except
the wedding,” he finished, with a smile.
“Yes, I know,” sighed Aunt Hannah. “Everything was in such confusion!
Still, I didn't know but she might have said something--to you.”
“No, she didn't. But I imagine it won't be hard to guess what she'll do.
When they get back from their trip I fancy she won't lose much time in
having what things she wants brought down here. Then she'll sell the
rest and put the house on the market.”
“Yes, of--of course,” stammered Aunt Hannah, pulling herself hastily to
a more erect position. “That's what I thought, too. Then don't you think
we'd better dismiss Rosa and close the house at once?”
“Why--yes, perhaps so. Why not? Then you'd be all settled here when she
comes home. I'm sure, the sooner you come, the better I'll be pleased,”
he smiled.
Aunt Hannah turned sharply.
“Here!” she ejaculated. “William Henshaw, you didn't suppose I was
coming _here_ to live, did you?”
It was William's turn to look amazed.
“Why, of course you're coming here! Where else should you go, pray?”
“Where I was before--before Billy came--to you,” returned Aunt Hannah a
little tremulously, but with a certain dignity. “I shall take a room in
some quiet boarding-house, of course.”
“Nonsense, Aunt Hannah! As if Billy would listen to that! You came
before; why not come now?”
Aunt Hannah lifted her chin the fraction of an inch.
“You forget. I was needed before. Billy is a married woman now. She
needs no chaperon.”
“Nonsense!” scowled William, again. “Billy will always need you.”
Aunt Hannah shook her head mournfully.
“I like to think--she wants me, William, but I know, in my heart, it
isn't best.”
“Why not?”
There was a moment's pause; then, decisively came the answer.
“Because I think young married folks should not have outsiders in the
home.”
William laughed relievedly.
“Oh, so that's it! Well, Aunt Hannah, you're no outsider. Come, run
right along home and pack your trunk.”
Aunt Hannah was plainly almost crying; but she held her ground.
“William, I can't,” she reiterated.
“But--Billy is such a child, and--”
For once in her circumspect life Aunt Hannah was guilty of an
interruption.
“Pardon me, William, she is not a child. She is a woman now, and she has
a woman's problems to meet.”
“Well, then, why don't you help her meet them?” retorted William, still
with a whimsical smile.
But Aunt Hannah did not smile. For a minute she did not speak; then,
with her eyes studiously averted, she said:
“William, the first four years of my married life were--were spoiled by
an outsider in our home. I don't mean to spoil Billy's.”
William relaxed visibly. The smile fled from his face.
“Why--Aunt--Hannah!” he exclaimed.
The little old lady turned with a weary sigh.
“Yes, I know. You are shocked, of course. I shouldn't have told you.
Still, it is all past long ago, and--I wanted to make you understand
why I can't come. He was my husband's eldest brother--a bachelor. He
was good and kind, and meant well, I suppose; but--he interfered with
everything. I was young, and probably headstrong. At all events, there
was constant friction. He went away once and stayed two whole months. I
shall never forget the utter freedom and happiness of those months for
us, with the whole house to ourselves. No, William, I can't come.” She
rose abruptly and turned toward the door. Her eyes were wistful, and
her face was still drawn with suffering; but her whole frail little self
quivered plainly with high resolve. “John has Peggy outside. I must go.”
“But--but, Aunt Hannah,” began William, helplessly.
She lifted a protesting hand.
“No, don't urge me, please. I can't come here. But--I believe I won't
close the house till Billy gets home, after all,” she declared. The
next moment she was gone, and William, dazedly, from the doorway, was
watching John help her into Billy's automobile, called by Billy and half
her friends, “Peggy,” short for “Pegasus.”
Still dazedly William turned back into the house and dropped himself
into the nearest chair.
What a curious call it had been! Aunt Hannah had not acted like herself
at all. Not once had she said “Oh, my grief and conscience!” while the
things she _had_ said--! Someway, he had never thought of Aunt Hannah as
being young, and a bride. Still, of course she must have been--once. And
the reason she gave for not coming there to live--the pitiful story
of that outsider in her home! But she was no outsider! She was no
interfering brother of Billy's--
William caught his breath suddenly, and held it suspended. Then he gave
a low ejaculation and half sprang from his chair.
Spunkie, disturbed from her doze by the fire, uttered a purring
“me-o-ow,” and looked up inquiringly.
For a long minute William gazed dumbly into the cat's yellow, sleepily
contented eyes; then he said with tragic distinctness:
“Spunkie, it's true: Aunt Hannah isn't Billy's husband's brother, but--I
am! Do you hear? I _am!_”
“Pur-r-me-ow!” commented Spunkie; and curled herself for another nap.
There was no peace for William after that. In vain he told himself that
he was no “interfering” brother, and that this was his home and had been
all his life; in vain did he declare emphatically that he could not go,
he would not go; that Billy would not wish him to go: always before his
eyes was the vision of that little bride of years long gone; always in
his ears was the echo of Aunt Hannah's “I shall never forget the utter
freedom and happiness of those months for us, with the whole house to
ourselves.” Nor, turn which way he would, could he find anything to
comfort him. Simply because he was so fearfully looking for it, he found
it--the thing that had for its theme the wretchedness that might be
expected from the presence of a third person in the new home.
Poor William! Everywhere he met it--the hint, the word, the story, the
song, even; and always it added its mite to the woeful whole. Even the
hoariest of mother-in-law jokes had its sting for him; and, to make his
cup quite full, he chanced to remember one day what Marie had said when
he had suggested that she and Cyril come to the Strata to live: “No; I
think young folks should begin by themselves.”
Unhappy, indeed, were these days for William. Like a lost spirit he
wandered from room to room, touching this, fingering that. For long
minutes he would stand before some picture, or some treasured bit of old
mahogany, as if to stamp indelibly upon his mind a thing that was soon
to be no more. At other times, like a man without a home, he would
go out into the Common or the Public Garden and sit for hours on some
bench--thinking.
All this could have but one ending, of course. Before the middle of
August William summoned Pete to his rooms.
“Oh, Pete, I'm going to move next week,” he began nonchalantly. His
voice sounded as if moving were a pleasurable circumstance that occurred
in his life regularly once a month. “I'd like you to begin to pack up
these things, please, to-morrow.”
The old servant's mouth fell open.
“You're goin' to--to what, sir?” he stammered.
“Move--_move_, I said.” William spoke with unusual harshness.
Pete wet his lips.
“You mean you've sold the old place, sir?--that we--we ain't goin' to
live here no longer?”
“Sold? Of course not! _I'm_ going to move away; not you.”
If Pete could have known what caused the sharpness in his master's
voice, he would not have been so grieved--or, rather, he would have
been grieved for a different reason. As it was he could only falter
miserably:
“_You_ are goin' to move away from here!”
“Yes, yes, man! Why, Pete, what ails you? One would think a body never
moved before.”
“They didn't--not you, sir.”
William turned abruptly, so that his face could not be seen. With stern
deliberation he picked up an elaborately decorated teapot; but the
valuable bit of Lowestoft shook so in his hand that he set it down at
once. It clicked sharply against its neighbor, betraying his nervous
hand.
Pete stirred.
“But, Mr. William,” he stammered thickly; “how are you--what'll you do
without--There doesn't nobody but me know so well about your tea, and
the two lumps in your coffee; and there's your flannels that you never
put on till I get 'em out, and the woolen socks that you'd wear all
summer if I didn't hide 'em. And--and who's goin' to take care of
these?” he finished, with a glance that encompassed the overflowing
cabinets and shelves of curios all about him.
His master smiled sadly. An affection that had its inception in his
boyhood days shone in his eyes. The hand in which the Lowestoft had
shaken rested now heavily on an old man's bent shoulder--a shoulder that
straightened itself in unconscious loyalty under the touch.
“Pete, you have spoiled me, and no mistake. I don't expect to find
another like you. But maybe if I wear the woolen socks too late you'll
come and hunt up the others for me. Eh?” And, with a smile that was
meant to be quizzical, William turned and began to shift the teapots
about again.
“But, Mr. William, why--that is, what will Mr. Bertram and Miss Billy
do--without you?” ventured the old man.
There was a sudden tinkling crash. On the floor lay the fragments of a
silver-luster teapot.
The servant exclaimed aloud in dismay, but his master did not even
glance toward his once treasured possession on the floor.
“Nonsense, Pete!” he was saying in a particularly cheery voice. “Have
you lived all these years and not found out that newly-married folks
don't _need_ any one else around? Come, do you suppose we could begin
to pack these teapots to-night?” he added, a little feverishly. “Aren't
there some boxes down cellar?”
“I'll see, sir,” said Pete, respectfully; but the expression on his face
as he turned away showed that he was not thinking of teapots--nor of
boxes in which to pack them.