WHEN Betty had been in Tinsdale about a month it was discovered that she
could play the piano. It happened on a rainy Sunday in Sunday school,
and the regular pianist was late. The superintendent looked about
helplessly and asked if there was anybody present who could play,
although he knew the musical ability of everybody in the village. The
minister's wife had already pleaded a cut finger which was well wrapped
up in a bandage, and he was about to ask some one to start the tune
without the piano when Mrs. Thornton leaned over with a sudden
inspiration to Betty and asked:
"My dear, you couldn't play for us, could you?"
Betty smiled assent, and without any ado went to the instrument, not
realizing until after she had done so that it would have been better
policy for her to have remained as much in the background as possible,
and not to have shown any accomplishments lest people should suspect her
position. However, she was too new at acting a part to always think of
these little things, and she played the hymns so well that they gathered
about her after the hour was over and openly rejoiced that there was
another pianist in town. The leader of Christian Endeavor asked her to
play in their meeting sometimes, and Betty found herself quite popular.
The tallest girl in their class, who had not noticed her before, smiled
at her and patronized her after she came back from playing the first
hymn, and asked her where she learned to play so well.
"Oh, I used to take lessons before my father died," she said, realizing
that she must be careful.
Emily and Bob came home in high feather and told their mother, who had
not been able to get out that morning, and she beamed on Betty with as
warm a smile as if she had been her own daughter:
"Now, ain't that great!" she said, and her voice sounded boyish just
like Jane's. "Why, we'll have to get a pianna. I heard you could get 'em
cheap in the cities sometimes--old-fashioned ones, you know. I heard
they have so many old-fashioned ones that they have to burn 'em to get
rid of 'em, and they even give 'em away sometimes. I wonder, could we
find out and get hold of one?"
"I guess 'twould cost too much to get it here," said Bob practically.
"My! I wisht we had one. Say, Lizzie, 'f we had a pianna would you show
me how to read notes?"
"Of course," said Betty.
"Well, we'll get one somehow! We always do when we need anything
awfully. Look at the bathtub! Good-night! I'm goin' to earn one myself!"
declared Bob.
"Mrs. Crosby's gotta get a new one. P'raps she'll sell us her old one
cheap."
That was the way the music idea started, and nothing else was talked of
at the table for days but how to get a piano. Then one day Emily came
rushing home from school all out of breath, her eyes as bright as stars,
and her cheeks like roses. "Mrs. Barlow came to our school to-day and
talked to the teacher, and I heard her say she was going away for the
winter. She's going to store her goods in the Service Company barn, but
she wants to get somebody to take care of her piano. I stepped right up
and told her my mother was looking for a piano, and we'd be real careful
of it, and she's just delighted; and--it's coming to-morrow morning at
nine o'clock! The man's going to bring it!"
She gasped it out so incoherently that they had to make her tell it over
twice to get any sense out of it; but when Bob finally understood he
caught his little sister in his arms and hugged her with a big smacking
kiss:
"You sure are a little peach, Em'ly!" he shouted. "You're a pippin of
the pippins! I didn't know you had that much nerve, you kid, you! I sure
am proud of you! My! Think of havin' a pianna! Say, Betty, I can play
the base of chopsticks now!"
The next evening when Betty got home from the Hathaways there was the
piano standing in the big space opposite the windows in the dining-room.
Ma had elected to have it there rather than in the front room, because
it might often be too cold in the front room for the children to
practice, and besides it wouldn't be good for the piano. So the piano
became a beloved member of the family, and Betty began to give
instructions in music, wondering at herself that she knew how, for her
own music had been most desultory, and nobody had ever cared whether she
practiced or not. She had been allowed to ramble among the great masters
for the most part unconducted, with the meagerest technique, and her own
interpretation. She could read well and her sense of time and rhythm
were natural, else she would have made worse work of it than she did.
But she forthwith set herself to practicing, realizing that it might yet
stand her in good stead since she had to earn her living.
Little Emily and Bob stood one on either side and watched her as she
played, with wondering admiration, and when Betty went to help their
mother Bob would sit down and try to imitate what she had done. Failing,
he would fall headlong into the inevitable chopsticks, beating it out
with the air of a master.
It was the piano that brought to Betty's realization the first real
meaning of the Sabbath day. Bob came down early and went at the piano as
usual banging out chopsticks, and a one-fingered arrangement of "The
Long, Long Trail," while his mother was getting breakfast. Betty was
making the coffee, proud of the fact that she had learned how. But Bob
had accomplished only a brief hint of his regular program when the music
stopped suddenly and Betty glanced through the kitchen door to see Ma
standing with her hand on her son's shoulder and a look on her face she
had not seen before: It was quite gentle, but it was decided:
"No, Bob! We won't have that kinda music on Sunday," she said. "This is
God's day, an' we'll have all we can rightly do to keep it holy without
luggin' in week-day music to make us forget it. You just get t' work an'
learn 'Safely Through Another Week,' an' if you can't play it right you
get Lizzie to teach you."
Bob pouted:
"There ain't nothin' wrong with chopsticks, Ma. 'Tain't got words to
it."
"Don't make any diffrence. It b'longs to weekdays an' fun, an' anyhow it
makes you think of other things, an' you can't keep your mind on God.
That's what Sunday was made fer, to kinda tone us up to God, so's we
won't get so far away in the week that we won't be any kind of ready for
heaven some time. An' anyhow, 'tisn't seemly. You better go learn your
Golden Text, Bob. The minister'll be disappointed if you don't have it
fine."
Betty stood by the window thoughtfully looking out. Was that what Sunday
was made for, or was it only a quaint idea of this original woman? She
wished she knew. Perhaps some time she would know the minister's wife
well enough to ask. She would have liked to ask Ma more about it, but
somehow felt shy. But Ma herself was started now, and when she came back
to the kitchen, as if she felt some explanation was due the new inmate
of the family, she said:
"I don't know how you feel about it. I know city folks don't always hold
to the old ways. But it always seemed to me God meant us to stick to
Sunday, and make it diff'rent from other days. I never would let my
children go visitin', nor play ball an' we always tried to have
something good for supper fixed the night before. I heard somebody say a
long time ago that it says somewhere in the Bible that Sunday was meant
to be a sign forever between God and folks. The ones that keeps it are
his'n, an' them as don't aren't. Anyhow, that's the only day we have got
to kinda find out what's wanted of us. You wouldn't mind just playin'
hymns and Sunday things t'day, would you?"
"Oh, no," said Betty, interested. "I like it. It sounds so kind of safe,
and as if God cared. I never thought much about it before. You think God
really thinks about us and knows what we're doing then, don't you?"
"Why, sure, child. I don't just think, I _know_ He does. Hadn't you
never got onto that? Why, you poor little ducky, you! O' course He
does."
"I'd like to feel sure that He was looking out for me," breathed Betty
wistfully.
"Well, you can!" said Ma, hurrying back to see that her bacon didn't
burn. "It's easy as rollin' off a log."
"What would I have to do?"
"Why, just b'lieve."
"Believe?" asked Betty utterly puzzled. "Believe what?"
"Why, believe that He'll do it. He said 'Come unto me, an' I will give
you rest,' an' He said, 'Cast your burden on the Lord,' an' He said
'Castin' all yer care 'pon Him, fer He careth fer you,' an' a whole lot
more such things, an' you just got to take it fer straight, an' act on
it."
"But how could I?" asked Betty.
"Just run right up to your room now, while you're feelin' that way, an'
kneel down by your bed an' tell Him what you just told me," said Mrs.
Carson, stirring the fried potatoes with her knife to keep them from
burning. "It won't take you long, an' I'll tend the coffee. Just you
tell Him you want Him to take care of you, an' you'll believe what I
told you He said. It's all in the Bible, an' you can read it for
yourself, but I wouldn't take the time now. Just run along an' speak it
out with Him, and, then come down to breakfast."
Betty was standing by the kitchen door, her hand on her heart, as if
about to do some great wonderful thing that frightened her:
"But, Mrs. Carson, suppose, maybe, He might not be pleased with me.
Suppose I've done something that He doesn't like, something that makes
Him ashamed of me."
"Oh, why, didn't you know He fixed for all that when He sent His Son to
be the Saviour of the world? We all do wrong things, an' everybody has
sinned. But ef we're rightly sorry, He'll fergive us, and make us His
children."
Betty suddenly sat down in a chair near the door:
"But, Mrs. Carson, I'm not sure I _am_ sorry--at least I know I'm _not_.
I'm afraid I'd do it all over again if I got in the same situation."
Mrs. Carson stood back from the stove and surveyed her thoughtfully a
moment:
"Well, then, like's not it wasn't wrong at all, and if it wasn't He
ain't displeased. You can bank on that. You better go talk it out to
Him. Just get it off your mind. I'll hold up breakfast a minute while
you roll it on Him and depend on it he'll show you in plenty of time for
the next move."
Betty with her cheeks very red and her eyes shining went up to her
little cot, and with locked door knelt and tried to talk to God for the
first time in her life. It seemed queer to her, but when she arose and
hurried back to her duties she had a sense of having a real Friend who
knew all about her and could look after things a great deal better than
she could.
That night she went with Bob and Emily to the young people's meeting and
heard them talk about Christ familiarly as if they knew Him. It was all
strange and new and wonderful to Betty, and she sat listening and
wondering. The old question of whether she was pleasing her earthly
father was merging itself into the desire to please her Heavenly Father.
There were of course many hard and unpleasant things about her new life.
There were so many things to learn, and she was so awkward at work of
all kinds! Her hands seemed so small and inadequate when she tried to
wring clothes or scrub a dirty step. Then, too, her young charge, Elise
Hathaway, was spoiled and hard to please, and she was daily tried by the
necessity of inventing ways of discipline for the poor little neglected
girl which yet would not bring down a protest from her even more
undisciplined mother. If she had been independent she would not have
remained with Mrs. Hathaway, for sometimes the child was unbearable in
her naughty tantrums, and it took all her nerve and strength to control
her. She would come back to the little gray house too weary even to
smile, and the keen eye of Ma would look at her wisely and wonder if
something ought not to be done about it.
Betty felt that she must keep this place, of course, because it was
necessary for her to be able to pay some board. She could not be
beholden to the Carsons. And they had been so kind, and were teaching
her so many things, that it seemed the best and safest place she could
be in. So the days settled down into weeks, and a pleasant life grew up
about her, so different from the old one that more and more the
hallucination was with her that she had become another creature, and the
old life had gone out forever.
Of course as striking-looking a girl as Betty could not enter into the
life of a little town even as humbly as through the Carson home, without
causing some comment and speculation. People began to notice her. The
church ladies looked after her and remarked on her hair, her complexion,
and her graceful carriage, and some shook their heads and said they
should think Mrs. Hathaway would want to know a little more about her
before she put her only child in her entire charge; and they told weird
stories about girls they had known or heard of.
Down at the fire-house, which was the real clearing-house of Tinsdale
for all the gossip that came along and went the rounds, they took up the
matter in full session several evenings in succession. Some of the
younger members made crude remarks about Betty's looks, and some of the
older ones allowed that she was entirely too pretty to be without a
history. They took great liberties with their surmises. The only two,
the youngest of them all, who might have defended her, had been
unconsciously snubbed by her when they tried to be what Bobbie called
"fresh" with her, and so she was at their mercy. But if she had known it
she probably would have been little disturbed. They seemed so far
removed from her two worlds, so utterly apart from herself. It would not
have occurred to her that they could do her any harm.
One night the fire-house gang had all assembled save one, a little
shrimp of a good-for-nothing, nearly hairless, toothless, cunning-eyed,
and given to drink when he could lay lips on any. He had a wide loose
mouth with a tendency to droop crookedly, and his hands were always
clammy and limp. He ordinarily sat tilted back against the wall to the
right of the engine, sucking an old clay pipe. He had a way of often
turning the conversation to imply some deep mystery known only to
himself behind the life of almost any one discussed. He often added
choice embellishments to whatever tale went forth as authentic to go the
rounds of the village, and he acted the part of a collector of themes
and details for the evening conversations.
His name was Abijah Gage.
"Bi not come yet?" asked the fire chief settling a straw comfortably
between his teeth and looking around on the group. "Must be somepin'
doin'. Don't know when Bi's been away."
"He went up to town this mornin' early," volunteered Dunc Withers.
"Reckon he was thirsty. Guess he'll be back on the evenin' train. That's
her comin' in now."
"Bars all closed in the city," chuckled the chief. "Won't get much
comfort there."
"You bet Bi knows some place to get it. He won't come home thirsty,
that's sure."
"I donno, they say the lid's down pretty tight."
"Aw, shucks!" sneered Dunc. "Bet I could get all I wanted."
Just then the door opened and Abijah Gage walked in, with a toothless
grin all around.
"Hello, Bi, get tanked up, did yeh?" greeted the chief.
"Well, naow, an' ef I did, what's that to you?" responded Bi, slapping
the chief's broad shoulder with a folded newspaper he carried. "You
don't 'spose I'm goin' to tell, an' get my frien's in trouble?"
"Le's see yer paper, Bi," said Dunc, snatching at it as Bi passed to his
regular seat.
Bi surrendered his paper with the air of one granting a high favor and
sank to his chair and his pipe.
"How's crops in the city?" asked Hank Fielder, and Bi's tale was set
a-going. Bi could talk; that was one thing that always made him welcome.
Dunc was deep in the paper. Presently he turned it over:
"Whew!" he said speculatively. "If that don't look like that little
lollypop over to Carson's I'll eat my hat! What's her name?"
They all drew around the paper and leaned over Dunc's shoulder squinting
at the picture, all but Bi, who was lighting his pipe:
"They're as like as two peas!" said one.
"It sure must be her sister!" declared another.
"Don't see no resemblance 'tall," declared the chief, flinging back to
his comfortable chair. "She's got short hair, an she's only a kid. This
one's growed up!"
"She might a cut her hair," suggested one.
Bi pricked up his ears, narrowed his cunning eyes, and slouched over to
the paper, looking at the picture keenly:
"Read it out, Dunc!" he commanded.
"Five thousand dollars reward for information concerning Elizabeth
Stanhope!"
There followed a description in detail of her size, height, coloring,
etc.
An inscrutable look overspread Bi's face and hid the cunning in his
eyes. He slouched to his seat during the reading and tilted back
comfortably smoking, but he narrowed his eyes to a slit and spoke little
during the remainder of the evening. They discussed the picture and the
possibility of the girl in the paper being a relative of the girl at
Carson's, but as Bi did not come forward with information the subject
languished. Some one said he had heard the Carson kid call her Lizzie,
he thought, but he wasn't sure. Ordinarily Bi would have known the full
name, but Bi seemed to be dozing, and so the matter was finally dropped.
But the hounds were out and on the scent, and it was well for Betty
sleeping quietly in her little cot beneath the roof of the humble Carson
home, that she had committed her all to her heavenly Father before she
slept.