GETTING DOWN TO REALITIES.
“Well, Mother dear, I’m off! Please wish me good luck!”
“I wish you patience and wisdom. These will bring the only sort of
‘luck’ worth having.”
“But I dread it so!”
“Why, Beatrice! Dread beginning your work for Mr. Brook? I thought you
were very happy about it.”
“So I am, in one way. I love him dearly already, I do, indeed.
That is why I shall feel so anxious to please him exactly; and
since I have been with him more I find he is rather--well, sort
of--um-m--particular, you know! And I--I never could do anything alike
twice. I’m excellent for spurts of energy and hap-hazard industry, but
the regular, day-after-day, early-in-the-morning, late-at-night kind is
what will try my soul.”
“And Isabelle is grieving herself half-sick over the ‘drudgery’ of
housework! After all, I wish that our good friend had not been quite
so explicit in his desires; for you don’t object to what tries Belle’s
spirits, and she could do the mechanical part of your labor as well as
you; the typewriting and note-taking, I mean.”
“Well, dear, it can’t be helped. Even you, I fancy, don’t find country
housekeeping quite a picnic. It’s so much easier to run to the corner
bakery for a loaf of bread than to make it one’s self. Oh! your girl
has seen that wrinkly look come on your face, Motherkin, lots of times
during this last week; and-- Dear, are you sorry we came?”
“No,--no, indeed! Not in the least. I am foolishly sorry that I cannot
make everything smooth for you all. It is up-hill work getting into a
settled way of living; but the Beckwiths ‘never say die,’ and a little
more patience is all any of us need, except Roland. He, it seems to me,
is in no want of more. He is an example to me, and a revelation. He,
certainly, has found his right place; and it should be all the reward
any of his womenkind could desire to know that. I never saw a love of
the country and all appertaining to it so marked in anybody. Listen
to him now, whistling away! He has broken his plough; but instead of
losing his temper over it he has gone to work to ‘tinker’ it up the
best he can. And his poor hands, unused to manual labor, are blistered
so that it must give him physical pain every time he touches anything.
Oh, no, I cannot be sorry that we came.”
“Bless the dear old Laureate! I’ll pattern after him if I can. But--it
isn’t all rose-color, is it?”
“Sit down here one moment; you have five to spare. I want to remind
you that though our Mr. Brook is so delightful and seems so young, he
is still an old, old man. Be very gentle with him, even if he should
get impatient and say sharp things to you. I do not know that he will;
I only suggest what is liable to happen. Will you try to put your own
impatience out of the question, dear?”
“I’ll leave it at home with you, Motherkin. I’ll be perfectly angelic,
if I can. And I’m going to say, ‘A dollar a day, six dollars a week!’
to myself, continually. That’s going to be my rock of salvation,
Motherkin! Six dollars a week for a whole year will be over three
hundred dollars toward our home! And we’re all agreed on that. We all
look forward to the day when we can go to Mr. Brook and say, ‘Please,
sir, we’d like to buy The Lindens!’ Oh! I’m not afraid now; and I’m
getting as mercenary as a Jew.”
“H’m-m! No comparisons. And I foresee that the money part will soon be
the last in your mind as connected with your labor. However, time’s up!
Off with you!”
“One moment more, Motherkin. What are you doing with that thing?”
“It is a rude little frame I tacked together to fade some embroidery
silk upon.”
“Fade silk? Why?”
“Because I have none of the right shade for the work I have in hand;
so the sunshine is to help me out. I will wind the threads from these
spools about the frame, then place it in the sunshine--by that south
window, I think--till it pales to the right tint.”
“H’m-m! If I could only run into the art store and buy you the right
sort without all this trouble!”
“I’d rather have this fine light for my task than anything out of the
art store, dearie. And I am so much stronger than when I came, a week
ago.”
“Really stronger, Motherkin darling?”
“Really stronger, sweetheart.”
“That’s glorious! Away goes my silly regret for the things that were!
And that thought will make me able to laugh inside, if I dare not
outside, should my ‘master’ seem stern or hard to please.”
“Don’t go to the opposite extreme. Mr. Brook will never be harsh, or
even ‘stern,’ I fancy, with you. But your ignorance concerning what is
so simple to him may try his patience. That’s all. Now I must go to
Belle. Have you seen Robert lately?”
“Not since breakfast.”
“He is very quiet somewhere.”
“Then of course he’s in mischief. But he’ll come out all right; he
always does, you know. Good-by.” Off she ran, trilling in her rich
young voice the first bars of “Edinboro Toon;” and Mrs. Beckwith rose
with a smile to seek her other, less light-hearted daughter.
Belle stood over the kitchen sink, her sleeves pushed above elbows far
too white and dainty, as she herself thought, to be plunged in a deep
pan of hot suds, and with a “mop” was trying to wash the morning’s
cups and saucers without touching her hands to the detested water. Her
expression was so lugubrious that, despite a sincere sympathy, the
mother could scarce repress a smile, and the girl faced about just
in time to catch the amused expression and to guess at its cause. A
sudden burst of tears followed, and Mrs. Beckwith was at her daughter’s
side instantly.
“My poor, misguided child! Don’t, I beg of you, allow yourself to weep
over--a pan of soiled dishes!”
“As Bonny would say, I’ll spoil the water! Is that it, Mother?” cried
Belle, beginning to laugh almost hysterically.
“Because it is so unworthy of you, my artist.”
“Artist! This looks like it, doesn’t it?”
“Exactly like it. It is your very finely strung nature which makes
these trivial trials so distasteful to you. It isn’t laziness or
selfishness or vanity; no, I am sure it is not.”
Belle dropped the wooden-handled dish-cloth with a splash, and gazed at
her mother in astonishment. “Why--Mother! Did--you--think it was?”
“No, darling, I did not. Others might think so.”
“Motherkin, I--hate it!”
“You must kill the hatred.”
“I can’t; it’s born in me.”
“Unfortunately, it is the fault of my mistaken training.”
“No, no, no. Please don’t say that. I am ashamed of it, but I can’t
help it.”
“A girl who has the talent, nay, more, the genius, that you have is too
strong a person to say that, mentally too strong.”
“Mother, if I am talented, as you flatter me by saying--”
“I never flatter, dear. Flattery is untruth.”
“Well, if I have talent isn’t it wasted here?”
“I think not. I have never had patience with the theory that geniuses
should be exempt from the general burdens of life. The greater the
intelligence the greater the endurance and courage should be. I don’t
believe the dear Lord ever made a nature lop-sided; though there are so
many lop-sided folks in the world, it sometimes seems so.”
“Tell me what you mean, Mother. I don’t want to be a kill-joy in the
family, but I felt five minutes ago as if I were ready to give up life,
if it were to be all--housework!”
Mrs. Beckwith began unwinding her spools of silk and rewinding them
on her rude frame preparatory to the bleaching process, and Isabelle
watched her curiously.
“I think it is this way. A body has one characteristic more marked
than another; and straightway his or her mistaken friends set about
developing it to the detriment of all the other characteristics, which
being less pronounced are left without training and cultivation till
they really become insignificant. We were in danger of just that for
you, but dish-washing happened in time to prevent. That ‘hated’ task
will make you a symmetrical and noble woman, my Belle, mentally, as you
bid fair to become physically.”
“Mother, you are the dearest, oddest little reasoner in the world!”
“Thank you. But let’s look at this matter practically. Is there not
some way by which you can lessen the distastefulness of your task? Can
you not study nature, landscape ‘effects,’ at the same time, or learn
something of your favorite authors?”
“I see no way. That is why--one why--it is disagreeable. I am here in
the midst of a lovely country, but if I do the housework as it should
be, as Miss Brook assures me it should be, I shall have no time for
anything else.”
“There you go again, twisting your mind out of balance toward the other
side. If I were you, I would certainly combine art with dish-washing
and literature with my other domestic duties. You can, easily.”
“Please tell me,” begged Isabelle, now interested and smiling, and in
this new mood forgetting to take account of her hands otherwise than
that they fulfilled their present task well.
“That window over the sink looks out upon as lovely a bit of country as
God ever made. Now, suppose you take a large sheet of wrapping-paper
and cover the lower sash before which you stand, leaving out the size
of one pane. Then through that loop-hole, as it were, do your studying.
Take the foliage, as it expands. Note the different tones and shades
of green; the forms of the young buds, their manner of growth from
the first appearing to the full perfection. It seems to me that will
give you a knowledge of detail which will help you wonderfully in your
‘technique’ when you come to put your brush to canvas. So with the
cloud and sky tints; they are never-ending in variety. I would keep
a little note-book beside me and jot down the colors your studies
suggest to you; then when you have leisure verify these suggestions
by actual trial. You can vary your outlook continually, and I think
you will become so interested in the experiment that you will acquire
the other knowledge--of how to despatch the dish-washing neatly and
rapidly--without thinking much about it.”
Belle mused for a few moments; her face softening under the conviction
that she would not thus be debarred from all connection with the one
sort of labor she had heretofore loved. Then she asked: “You said
literature, too. How can I read while about the house?”
“This way. Have a wide piece sewn across the bottom of your gingham
aprons, with pockets stitched in it; and in these pockets carry one of
your ‘Handy Volume’ series or one of your art ‘Primers.’ Take out your
book from time to time and memorize anything which pleases you. You can
thus, if you choose, gain more actual understanding of the world’s best
minds during one dinner-getting than during a class-hour at school. I
know; I’ve tried it myself.”
“Oh, Mother! is that the way you came to know so many of the poets by
heart?”
“Yes, dearie, the very way. And the knowledge has been ‘meat and drink’
to me many and many a time. When you were all small, and my darkest
hours were upon me, I had to get right straight out of myself to
enable me just to live. If I had dwelt upon my own hardships, I should
have broken down physically long ago. But I just wouldn’t. I said to
these sweet singers and teachers: ‘You must bear my burdens for me.
God made you stronger than He made me, and I shall utilize you!’ The
beauty of it was that they did support me, and lost no whit of strength
themselves.”
“My set of poets is so nicely bound. They were my prizes at school, you
know. If I had a cheaper edition--”
“Darling, would you rather have a white book or a white soul?”
“Why, Motherkin!”
“Which?” asked Mrs. Beckwith, persistently, gently winding at her bits
of skeins.
“The soul, of course. But--”
“Ah, yes, I thought so. If I had an _edition de luxe_, even, of any
author who had words of cheer for me, I would not hesitate to put it
to the use I have suggested,--not for the twentieth part of a second.
Oh! I could groan sometimes, over the books that are wasted by lying on
library shelves unread, when there are so many hungry minds going unfed
through life.”
Mrs. Beckwith had waxed enthusiastic, as was her wont when books were
her subject; but she had succeeded in banishing the dolorous expression
from her daughter’s face and the forebodings which had troubled her
from her own mind. She rose and fastened her stretcher of silken
thread in the southern window, and then she went out, remarking: “It
is time I looked after Robert. He has been ominously quiet ever since
breakfast-time.”
She sought him in the poultry-house, where, despite his fear of snakes,
he passed much of his time watching the sitting hens with which Miss
Brook had stocked his establishment. He repaired thither each morning
with a firm belief that nature must work a miracle on his behalf, and
that the ordinary three weeks of time required to change eggs into
chickens would be shortened to one, “’cause no little boy ever wanted
chicks so bad.”
“Robert!” called the mother, entering the little house.
There was no reply.
“I wonder, would he disobey me and go fishing or swimming after he had
promised not!”
One of the prospective mother biddies clucked loudly as if to suggest,
“No strangers allowed!” and Mrs. Beckwith retreated.
Just outside the yard she met Mr. Dolloway. “Good-morning, ma’am.
Where’s that boy?”
“I’m looking for him now.”
“H’m-m! I came to tell him he’d probably addled all them eggs a
handling ’em so much, and I’d brought him a few fresh ones. Yesterday
he took a whole nest full and punched a pin-hole in ’em, to see the
chicks inside. He’s--he’s a great one!”
Mr. Dolloway’s tone betokened more amusement than anger, and Mrs.
Beckwith eagerly exclaimed: “I was sure you would like my little son,
after you understood him thoroughly.”
“H’m-m! I defy anybody to do that, ma’am,--understand him, begging your
pardon for my freedom. Ho--hello! What--what-- Look yonder!”
The mother wheeled about anxiously, and followed her neighbor’s gaze
houseward. There on the ridge-pole of the old roof sat the lad they
sought. The house was three stories high in one part, but sloped
downward to within a few feet of the ground on the “Revolutionary”
side, after the fashion of buildings of that period. This long slope
of roof was on the north, and almost directly below the eaves was the
cistern, which for purposes of cleaning and repairing was that morning
uncovered.
“Oh! my boy! if he should slip!”
“As he probably will.”
At that instant Robert stood up to examine the ancient weather-cock
which had attracted him to his perilous perch, and forgetting where he
was began to twist the dingy “chanticleer” upon its rod.
Suddenly there was a rush, a cry--a sudden downward flash of
knickerbockered legs, and “Humpty-Dumpty” had disappeared in the
cistern.