As gently as possible Edgar broke to his wife the news of the
prospective guest. Julia Pendergast was a good woman. At least she often
said that she was, adding, at the same time, that she never knowingly
refused to do her duty. She said the same thing now to her husband, and
she immediately made some very elaborate and very apparent changes in
her home and in her plans, all with an eye to the expected guest. At
four o'clock Wednesday afternoon Edgar met his sister at the station.
"Well, I don't see as you've changed much," he said kindly.
"Haven't I? Why, seems as if I must look changed a lot," chirruped Jane.
"I'm so rested, and Fred and Sally were so good to me! Why, they tried
not to have me do a thing--and I didn't do much, only a little puttering
around just to help out with the work."
"Hm-m," murmured Edgar. "Well, I'm glad to see you're--rested."
Julia met them in the hall of the beautiful Brookline residence. Lined
up with her were the four younger children, who lived at home. They made
an imposing array, and Jane was visibly affected.
"Oh, it's so good of you--to meet me--like this!" she faltered.
"Why, we wished to, I'm sure," returned Mrs. Pendergast, with a
half-stifled sigh. "I hope I understand my duty to my guest and my
sister-in-law sufficiently to know what is her due. I did not allow
anything--not even my committee meeting to-day--to interfere with this
call for duty at home."
Jane fell back. All the glow fled from her face.
"Oh, then you did stay at home--and for me! I'm so sorry," she
stammered.
But Mrs. Pendergast raised a deprecatory hand.
"Say no more. It was nothing. Now come, let me show you to your room.
I've given you Ella's room, and put Ella in Tom's, and Tom in Bert's,
and moved Bert upstairs to the little room over--"
"Oh, don't!" interrupted Jane, in quick distress. "I don't want to put
people out so! Let me go upstairs." Mrs. Pendergast frowned and sighed.
She had the air of one whose kindest efforts are misunderstood.
"My dear Jane, I am sorry, but I shall have to ask you to be as
satisfied as you can be with the arrangements I am able to make for you.
You see, even though this house is large, I am, in a way, cramped for
room. I always have to keep three guest-rooms ready for immediate
occupancy. I am a member of four clubs and six charitable and religious
organizations, besides the church, and there are always ministers and
delegates whom I feel it my duty to entertain."
"But that is all the more reason why I should go upstairs, and not put
all those children out of their rooms," begged Jane.
Mrs. Pendergast shook her head.
"It does them good," she said decidedly, "to learn to be
self-sacrificing. That is a virtue we all must learn to practice."
Jane flushed again; then she turned abruptly. "Julia, did you want me
to--to come to see you?" she asked.
"Why, certainly; what a question!" returned Mrs. Pendergast, in a
properly shocked tone of voice. "As if I could do otherwise than to want
my husband's sister to come to us."
Jane smiled faintly, but her eyes were troubled.
"Thank you; I'm glad you feel--that way. You see, at Fred's--I wouldn't
have them know it for the world, they were _so_ good to me--but I
thought, lately, that maybe they didn't want--But it wasn't so, of
course. It couldn't have been. I--I ought not even to think it."
"Hm-m; no," returned Mrs. Pendergast, with noncommittal briefness.
Not six weeks later Mary, in her beautiful Commonwealth Avenue home,
received a call from a little, thin-faced woman, who curtsied to the
butler and asked him to please tell her sister that she wished to speak
to her.
Mary looked worried and not over-cordial when she rustled into the room.
"Why, Jane, did you find your way here all alone?" she cried.
"Yes--no--well, I asked a man at the last; but, you know, I've been here
twice before with the others."
"Yes, I know," said Mary.
There was a pause; then Jane cleared her throat timidly.
"Mary, I--I've been thinking. You see, just as soon as I'm strong
enough, I--I'm going to take care of myself, and then I won't be a
burden to--to anybody." Jane was talking very fast now. Her words came
tremulously between short, broken breaths. "But until I get well enough
to earn money, I can't, you see. And I've been thinking;--would you be
willing to take me until--until I can? I'm lots better, already, and
getting stronger every day. It wouldn't be for--long."
"Why, of course, Jane!" Mary spoke cheerfully, and in a tone a little
higher than her ordinary voice. "I should have asked you to come here
before, only I feared you wouldn't be happy here--such a different life
for you, and so much noise and confusion with Belle's wedding coming on,
and all!"
Jane gave her a grateful glance.
"I know, of course,--you'd think that,--and it isn't that I'm finding
fault with Julia and Edgar. I couldn't do that--they're so good to me.
But, you see, I put them out so. Now, there's my room, for one thing. 'T
was Ella's, and Ella has to keep running in for things she's left, and
she says it's the same with the others. You see, I've got Ella's room,
and Ella's got Tom's, and Tom's got Bert's. It's a regular 'house that
Jack built'--and I'm the 'Jack'!"
"I see," laughed Mary constrainedly. "And you want to come here? Well,
you shall. You--you may come a week from Saturday," she added, after a
pause. "I have a reception and a dinner here the first of the week,
and--you'd better stay away until after that."
"Oh, thank you," sighed Jane. "You are so good. I shall tell Julia that
I'm invited here, so she won't think I'm dissatisfied. They're so good
to me--I wouldn't want to hurt their feelings!"
"Of course not," murmured Mary.
* * * * *
The big, fat tire of the touring-car popped like a pistol shot directly
in front of the large white house with the green blinds.
"This is the time we're in luck, Belle," laughed the good-natured young
fellow who had been driving the car. "Do you see that big piazza just
aching for you to come and sit on it?"
"Are we really stalled, Will?" asked the girl.
"Looks like it--for a while. I'll have to telephone Peters to bring
down a tire. Of course, to-day is the day we _didn't_ take it!"
Some minutes later the girl found herself on the cool piazza, in charge
of a wonderfully hospitable old lady, while down the road the
good-looking young fellow was making long strides toward the next house
and a telephone.
"We are staying at the Lindsays', in North Belton," explained the girl,
when he was gone, "and we came out for a little spin before dinner.
Isn't this Belton? I have an aunt who used to live here somewhere--Aunt
Jane Pendergast".
The old lady sat suddenly erect in her chair.
"My dear," she cried, "you don't mean to say that you're Jane
Pendergast's niece! Now, that is queer! Why, this was her very house--we
bought it when the old gentleman died last year. But, come, we'll go
inside. You'll want to see everything, of course!"
It was some time before the young man came back from telephoning, and it
was longer still before Peters came with the new tire, and helped get
the touring-car ready for the road. The girl was very quiet when they
finally left the house, and there was a troubled look deep in her eyes.
"Why, Belle, what's the matter?" asked the young fellow concernedly, as
he slackened speed in the cool twilight of the woods, some minutes
later. "What's troubling you, dear?"
"Will"--the girl's voice shook--"Will, that was Aunt Jane's house. That
old lady--told me."
"Aunt Jane?"
"Yes, yes--the little gray-haired woman that came to live with us two
months ago. You know her."
"Why, y-yes; I think I've--seen her."
The girl winced, as from a blow.
"Will, don't! I can't bear it," she choked. "It only shows how we've
treated her--how little we've made of her, when we ought to have done
everything--everything to make her happy. Instead of that, we were
brutes--all of us!"
"Belle!"--the tone was an indignant protest.
"But we were--listen! She lived in that house all her life till last
year. She never went anywhere or did anything. For twenty years she
lived with an old man who had lost his mind, and she tended him like a
baby--only a baby grows older all the time and more interesting, while
he--oh, Will, it was awful! That old lady--told me."
"By Jove!" exclaimed the young fellow, under his breath.
"And there were other things," hurried on the girl, tremulously. "Some
way, I never thought of Aunt Jane only as old and timid; but she was
young like us, once. She wanted to go away to school--but she couldn't
go; and there was some one who--loved her--once--later, and she sent
him--away. That was after--after grandfather lost his mind. Mother and
Uncle Edgar and Uncle Fred--they all went away and lived their own
lives, but she stayed on. Then last year grandfather died."
The girl paused and moistened her lips. The man did not speak. His eyes
were on the road ahead of the slow-moving car.
"I heard to-day--how--how proud and happy Aunt Jane was that Uncle Fred
had asked her to come and live with him," resumed the girl, after a
minute. "That old lady told me how Aunt Jane talked and talked about it
before she went away, and how she said that all her life she had taken
care of others, and it would be so good to feel that now some one was
going to look out for her, though, of course, she should do everything
she could to help, and she hoped she could still be of some use."
"Well, she has been, hasn't she?"
The girl shook her head.
"That's the worst of it. We haven't made her think she was. She stayed
at Uncle Fred's for a while, and then he sent her to Uncle Edgar's.
Something must have been wrong there, for she asked mother two months
ago if she might come to us."
"Well, I'm sure you've been--good to her."
"But we haven't!" cried the girl. "Mother meant all right, I know, but
she didn't think. And I've been--horrid. Aunt Jane tried to show her
interest in my wedding plans, but I only laughed at her and said she
wouldn't understand. We've pushed her aside, always,--we've never made
her one of us; and--we've always made her feel her dependence."
"But you'll do differently now, dear,--now that you understand."
Again the girl shook her head.
"We can't," she moaned. "It's too late. I had a letter from mother last
night. Aunt Jane's sick--awfully sick. Mother said I might expect to--to
hear of the end any day."
"But there's some time left--a little!"--his voice broke and choked into
silence. Suddenly he made a quick movement, and the car beneath them
leaped forward like a charger that feels the prick of the spur.
The girl gave a frightened cry, then a tremulous little sob of joy. The
man had cried in her ear, in response to her questioning eyes:
"We're--going--to--Aunt Jane!"
And to them both, at the moment, there seemed to be waiting at the end
of the road a little bent old woman, into whose wistful eyes they were
to bring the light of joy and peace.