Leslie and Allison!
Julia Cloud stood gazing out into the west, while the whole sky
lightened and sank away into dusk with a burning ruby on its breast.
The gloom of her spirit glowed into brightness, and joy flooded her
soul.
Leslie and Allison! What round little warm bodies they had, and what
delicate, refined faces! They had not seemed like Ellen's blowsy,
obstreperous youngsters, practical and grasping to the last extreme
after the model of their father. They had starry eyes and hair like
tangled sunbeams. Their laughter rippled like brooks in summer, and
their hands were like bands that bound the heart. Cookies and stories
and long walks and picnics! Those had made up the beautiful days that
they spent with her, roaming the woods and meadows, picking dandelions
and violets, and playing fairy stories. It had been like a brief
return of her old childish days with her boy comrade. She remembered
the heartache and the empty days after they had gone back to their
Western home, and the little printed childish letters that came for a
few months till she was forgotten.
But not really forgotten, after all. For some link of tenderness must
still remain that they should think of her now after all these years
of separation, and want to visit her. They remembered the cookies! She
smiled reminiscently. What a batch of delectable cookies she would
make in the morning! Why, to-morrow would be Wednesday! They would be
here to-morrow night! And there was a great deal to be done!
She turned from the belated sunset unregretting, and hastened to begin
her preparations. There were the two front rooms up-stairs to be
prepared. She would open the windows at once, and let the air sweep
through all night. They had been shut up a long time, for she had
brought the invalid down-stairs to the little sitting-room the last
few months to save steps and be always within hearing. The second
story had been practically unused except when Ellen or the children
were over for a day or two.
She hurried up-stairs, and lit the gas in the two rooms, throwing wide
the windows, hunting out fresh sheets and counterpanes. She could dust
and run the carpet-sweeper over the rooms right away, and have them in
order; and that would save time for to-morrow. Oh, it was good to have
something cheerful to do once more. Just supposing she had yielded--as
once that afternoon she almost had--to Ellen's persistent urgings, and
had gone home with her to-night! Why, the telegram might not have
reached her till after the children had come, and found the house
empty, and gone again!
Julia bustled around happily, putting the rooms into charming order,
hunting up a little picture of the child Samuel kneeling in the
temple, that Allison used to like, going to the bottom of an old hair
trunk for the rag doll she had made for Leslie to cuddle when she
went to sleep at night.
Mrs. Ambrose Perkins across the way looked uneasily out of her bedroom
window at half-past nine, and said to her husband:
"Seems like Julia Cloud is staying up awful late to-night. She's got a
light in both front rooms, too. There can't be company. I s'pose Ellen
and some of her children have stayed down after all. Poor Ellen! She
told me she simply couldn't spare the time away from home any longer,
but Julia was set on staying there. I never thought Julia was selfish;
but I s'pose she doesn't realize how hard it is for Ellen, living that
way between two houses. Julia'll go to live with Ellen now, of course.
It's real good of Herbert Robinson to ask her. Julia ought to
appreciate having relatives like that."
"Relatives nothing!" said Mr. Ambrose, pulling off his coat and
hanging it over a chair. "She'll be a fool if she goes! She's slaved
all her life, and she deserves a little rest now. If she goes out to
Herbert Robinson's, she won't be allowed to call her eyelashes her
own; you mark my words!"
"Well, what else can she do?" said his wife. "She hasn't any husband
or children, and I think she'll be mighty well off to get a good home.
Men are awful hard on each other, Ambrose. I always knew that."
Julia Cloud meanwhile, with a last look at the neat rooms, put out her
lights, and went to bed, but not to sleep. She was so excited that the
darkness seemed luminous about her. She was trying to think how those
two children would look grown up. Allison was nineteen and Leslie
nearly seventeen now. Their mother had been dead five years, and they
had been in boarding-schools. Their guardian was an old gentleman, a
friend of their mother's. That was about all she knew concerning them.
Would they seem like strangers, she wondered, or would there be enough
resemblance to recall the dear girl and boy of the years that were
gone? How she clung to those cookies with hope! There was some
remembrance left, or they would not have put cookies in a telegram.
How impetuous and just like Allison, the boy, that telegram had
sounded!
It was scarcely daylight when Julia Cloud arose and went down to the
kitchen to bake the cookies; and the preparations she made for baking
pies and doughnuts and other toothsome dainties would lead one to
suppose that she was expecting to feed a regiment for a week at
least.
She filled the day with hard work, as she had been wont to do, and
never once thought of gray sunsets or dreary futures. Not even the
thought of her sister Ellen came to trouble her as she put the house
in order, filled her pantry with good things to eat, and set the table
for three with all the best things the house afforded.
At evening she stood once more beside the front window, looking out
sunsetward. There was nothing gray about either sky or road or
landscape now. There had been brilliant sunshine all day long, and the
sky lay mellow and yellow behind the orchard, with a clear,
transparent greenish-blue above and a hint of rosy light in the long
rays that reached their fingers along the ground between the
apple-trees. In a few minutes the evening train would be in, and there
would be rose in the sunset. She knew the signs, and the sky would be
glorious to-night. They would see it as they came from the train. In
fifteen minutes it would be time for her to put on her hat and go down
to meet them! How her heart throbbed with anticipation!
Forebodings came to shadow her brightness. Suppose they should not
come! Suppose they were delayed, or had changed their minds and should
send another telegram saying so! She drew a deep breath, and tried to
brace herself for the shock of the thought. She looked fearfully down
the road for a possible Johnny Knox speeding along with another
telegram, and was relieved to see only Ambrose Perkins ambling home
for supper followed by his tall, smiling Airedale.
There was a shadow, too, that stood behind her, though she ignored it
utterly; it was the thought of the afterwards, when the two bright
young things had been and gone, and she would have to face the gray in
her life again without the rose. But that would be afterwards, and
this was now! Ten minutes more, and she would go to the station!
At that minute a great blue automobile shot up to the front gate, and
stopped. A big lump flew into Julia Cloud's throat, and her hand went
to her heart. Had it then come, that telegram, saying they had changed
their minds? She stood trembling by the window, unable to move.
But out from the front seat and the back as if ejected from a catapult
shot two figures, and flew together up the front walk, a tall boy and
a little girl, just as the sun dropped low and swung a deep red light
into the sky, flooding the front yard with glory, and staining the
heavens far up into the blue.
They had come! They had come before it was yet train-time!
Julia Cloud got herself to her front door in a tremor of delight, and
instantly four strong young arms encircled her, and nearly smothered
the life out of her.
"O you dear Cloudy Jewel! You look just the same. I knew you would.
Only your hair is white and pretty," Leslie gurgled.
"Sure, she is just the same! What did I tell you?" cried Allison,
lifting them both and carrying them inside.
"Now, who on earth can that be?" said Mrs. Ambrose Perkins, flying to
her parlor window at the first sound of the automobile. "It isn't any
of them folks from the city that were out to the funeral, for there
wasn't a car like that there, I'm certain! I mean to run over and
borrow a spoonful of soda pretty soon, just to find out. It couldn't
be any of Tom's folks from out West, for they couldn't come all that
way in a car. It must be some of her father's relations from over in
Maryland, though I never heard they were that well off. A chauffeur in
livery! The idea of all that style coming to see Julia Cloud!"
"No, we didn't come on the train," explained Leslie eagerly. "We came
in Allison's new car. Mr. Luddington--that's our guardian--was coming
East, and he said we might come with him. We've been dying to come for
ages. And he'd been promising Allison he might get this new car; so we
stopped in the city and bought it, and Allison drove it down. Of
course Mr. Luddington made his man come along. He wouldn't let us come
alone. He's gone up to Boston for three days; and, when he comes back,
he's coming down here to see you."
Leslie was talking as fast as an express train, and Julia Cloud stood
and admired her in wonder.
She was slim and delicately pretty as ever, with the same mop of
goldy-brown curls, done up in a knot now and making her look
quaintly like the little five-year-old on a hot day with her curls
twisted on the top of her head for comfort. She wore a simple little
straight frock of some dark silk stuff, with beaded pockets and
marvellous pleats and belts and straps in unexpected places, such
as one sees in fashion-books, but not on young girls in the town of
Sterling; and her hat was a queer little cap with a knob of bright
beads, wonderfully becoming, but quite different from anything that
Julia Cloud had ever seen before. Her movements were darting and
quick like a humming-bird's; and she wore long soft suède gloves and
tiny high suède boots. The older woman watched her, fascinated.
"And you're sure we're not being an inconvenience, dropping down upon
you in this unexpected way?" asked Allison in a quite grown-up man's
voice, and looking so tall and handsome and responsible that Julia
Cloud wanted to take him in her arms and hug him to make sure he was
the same little boy she used to tuck into bed at night.
"So soon after Grandma's death, too," put in Allison. "We didn't know,
of course, till we got about a mile from Sterling and stopped to ask
the way to the house, and a man told us about the funeral being
Monday. We weren't sure then but it would be an intrusion. You see we
left California about two weeks ago, and none of our mail has reached
us yet; so we hadn't heard. You're sure we won't bother you a bit, you
dear?"
Their aunt assured them rapturously that their coming was the most
blessed thing that could have been just at this time.
"Oh! then I'm relieved," said Leslie, throwing off her hat and
dropping into the nearest chair. "Allison, tell that man to put the
car somewhere in a garage and get back to the city. They said there
was a train back about this time. The man who directed us told us so.
No, dear, he doesn't need any dinner. He's not used to it till seven,
and he'll be in the city by that time. He's in a hurry to get back.
Cookies? Well, yes, you might give him a cooky or two if you're sure
there'll be enough left for us. I've just dreamed of those cookies all
these years. I'm so anxious to see if they'll taste as they did when I
was a child. May I come with you and see if I remember where the
cooky-jar is? Oh, joy, Allison! Just look! A whole crock and a platter
full! Isn't this peachy? Allison, do hustle up and get that man off so
we can begin our visit!"
It was like having a couple of dolls suddenly come alive and begin to
talk.
They talked so fast and they took everything so delightfully for
granted that Julia Cloud was in a tremble of joy. It seemed the most
beautiful thing in the world that these two strong, handsome, vivid
young things should have dropped into her life and taken her into
their hearts in this way as if she really belonged, as if they loved
her! She was too excited to talk. She hardly knew what to do first.
But they did not wait for her initiative. Allison was off with his car
and his man, munching cookies as he went, and promising to return in
fifteen minutes hungry as a bear.
"Now let's go up-stairs, you dear Cloudy Jewel, and I'll smooth my
hair for dinner. I'm crazy to see if I remember things. There was a
little red chair that I used to sit in----"
"It's here, in your room, dear, and the old rag doll, Betsey; do you
remember her?"
"Well, I should say I did! Is Betsey alive yet? Dear old Betsey! How
ducky of you to have kept her for me all these years! Oh, isn't it
perfectly peachy that we could come? That we're really here at last,
and you want us? You do, don't you, Cloudy, dear? You're sure you do?"
Lesley's tone was anxious, and her bright brown eyes studied the older
woman's face eagerly; but what she saw there was fully satisfactory,
for she smiled, and rattled joyfully on in the old babbling-brook
voice that reminded one so of years ago.
"I'm not to tell you what we've really come for till Allison comes,
because I've promised; and anyway he's the man, and he wants to tell
you himself; but it's the dandiest reason, perfectly peachy! It's
really a plan. And say, Cloudy, dear, won't you promise me right here
and now that you will say 'Yes' to what he asks you if you possibly,
_possibly_ can?"
Julia Cloud promised in a maze of delight.
She stood in hovering wonder, and watched the mass of curls come down
and go up again with the swift manipulation of the slim white fingers,
remembering how she used to comb those tangled curls with the plump
little body leaning sturdily against her knee. It seemed to be the
first time since she was a child that youth and beauty had come to
linger before her. All her experience had been of sickness and
suffering and death, not life and happiness.
There was stewed chicken and little biscuits with gravy for supper. It
was a dish the children used to love. It was all dished up and
everything ready when Allison came back. He reported that the car was
housed but a block away, and the man had gone to his train, tickled to
death with his cookies. Allison was so glad to be back that he had to
take his aunt in his arms again and give her a regular bear-hug till
she pleaded for mercy, but there was a happy light in her eyes and a
bright color in her cheeks when he released her that made her a very
good-looking aunt indeed to sit down at the table with two such
handsome children.
Just at that moment Ellen Robinson in her own home was pouring her
husband's second cup of coffee.
"Don't you think I'd better take the car and run down for Julia
before dark?" she said. "I think she'll be about ready to come back
with me by this time, and I need her early in the morning if I'm going
to begin cleaning house."
"Better wait one more night," said Herbert stolidly. "Let her get her
fill of staying alone nights. It'll do her good. We don't want her to
be high and mighty when she gets here. I'm boss here, and she's got to
understand that. She's so mighty independent, you know, it's important
she should find that out right at the start. I'm not going to have her
get bossy with these children, either. They aren't her children."
Four pairs of keen little Robinson eyes took in this saying with quick
intelligence, and four stolid sets of shoulders straightened up
importantly with four uplifted saucy chins. They would store these
remarks away for future reference when the aunt in question arrived on
the scene. They would come in well, they knew, for they had had
experience with her in times past.
"Aunt Jule ain't goin' to boss me," swaggered the youngest.
"Ner me, neither!"
"Ner me!"
"I guess she wouldn't _dast_ try it on _me_!" boasted the eldest.