JACK AT THE "CASTLE."
For an answer to this question, the person most interested in it, who
had as yet said least, was shown into the house. Rufe and Wad and Link
and little Chokie came crowding in after him, all eager to hear him talk
of the adventure.
"And, O ma!" cried Link, after Jack had briefly told his story, "he says
he will give us the fawn, and pay me besides, if I will go with him
to-night, and bring back the old mare in the morning."
"I don't know," said the woman, wrapping her red shawl more closely
about her, to conceal from the stranger her untidy attire. "I suppose,
if Mr. Betterson was at home, he would let you take the mare. But you
know, Lincoln,"--turning with a reproachful look to the small boy,--"you
have never been brought up to take money for little services. Such
things are not becoming in a family like ours."
And in the midst of her distress she put on a complacent smirk,
straightened her emaciated form, and sat there, looking like the very
ghost of pride, wrapped in an old red shawl.
"Did you speak of Mr. Betterson?" Jack inquired, interested.
"That is my husband's name."
"Elisha L. Betterson?"
"Certainly. You know my husband? He belongs to the Philadelphia
Bettersons,--a very wealthy and influential family," said the woman with
a simper. "Very wealthy and influential."
"I have heard of your husband," said Jack. "If I am not mistaken, you
are Mrs. Caroline Betterson,--a sister of Vinnie Dalton, sometimes
called Vinnie Presbit."
"You know my sister Lavinia!" exclaimed Mrs. Betterson, surprised, but
not overjoyed. "And you know Mr. Presbit's people?"
"I have never seen them," replied Jack, "but I almost feel as if I had,
I have heard so much about them. I was with Vinnie's foster-brother,
George Greenwood, in New York, last summer, when he was sick, and she
went down to take care of him."
"And I presume," returned Mrs. Betterson, taking another reef in her
shawl, "that you heard her tell a good deal about us; things that would
no doubt tend to prejudice a stranger; though if all the truth was known
she wouldn't feel so hard towards us as I have reason to think she
does."
Jack hastened to say that he had never heard Vinnie speak unkindly of
her sister.
"You are very polite to say so," said Mrs. Betterson, rocking the
cradle, in which the baby had been placed. "But I know just what she
has said. She has told you that after I married Mr. Betterson I felt
above my family; and that when her mother died (she was not _my_ mother,
you know,--we are only half-sisters), I suffered her to be taken and
brought up by the Presbits, when I ought to have taken her and been as a
mother to her,--she was so much younger than I. She is even younger by a
month or two than my oldest son; and we have joked a good deal about his
having an aunt younger than he is."
"Yes," spoke up Rufe, standing in the door; "and I've asked a hundred
times why we don't ever hear from her, or write to her, or have her
visit us. Other folks have their aunts come and see 'em. But all the
answer I could ever get was, 'family reasons, Rufus!'"
"That is it, in a word," said Mrs. Betterson; "family reasons. I never
could explain them; so I have never written to poor, dear
Lavinia--though, Heaven knows, I should be glad enough to see her; and I
hope she has forgiven what seemed my hardness; and--do tell me" (Mrs.
Betterson wiped her eyes) "what sort of a girl is she? how has she come
up?"
"She is one of the kindest-hearted, most unselfish, beautiful girls in
the world!" Jack exclaimed. "I mean, beautiful in her spirit," he added,
blushing at his own enthusiasm.
"The Presbits are rather coarse people to bring up such a girl," said
Mrs. Betterson, with a sigh--of self-reproach, Jack thought.
"But she has a natural refinement which nothing could make her lose," he
replied. "Then, it was a good thing for her to be brought up with George
Greenwood. She owes a great deal to the love of books he inspired in
her. You ought to know your sister, Mrs. Betterson."
The lady gave way to a flood of tears.
"It is too bad! such separations are unnatural. Certainly," she went on,
"I can't be accused of feeling above my family now. Mr. Betterson has
had three legacies left him, two since our marriage; but he has been
exceedingly unfortunate."
"Two such able-bodied boys must be a help and comfort to you," said
Jack.
"Rufus and Wadleigh," said Mrs. Betterson, "are good boys, but they have
been brought up to dreams of wealth, and they have not learned to take
hold of life with rough hands."
Jack suggested that it might have been better for them not to have such
dreams.
"Yes--if our family is to be brought down to the common level. But I
can't forget, I can't wish them ever to forget, that they have Betterson
blood in their veins."
Jack could hardly repress a smile as he glanced from those stout heirs
of the Betterson blood to the evidences of shiftlessness and
wretchedness around them, which two such sturdy lads, with a little
less of the precious article in their veins, might have done something
to remedy.
But his own unlucky adventure absorbed his thoughts, and he was glad
when Link vociferously demanded if he was to go and catch the mare.
"Yes! yes! do anything but kill me with that dreadful voice!" replied
the mother, waving him off with her trembling hand. "Don't infer from
what I have said," she resumed, gathering herself up again with feeble
pride, "that we are poor. Mr. Betterson will come into a large fortune
when an uncle of his dies; and he gets help from him occasionally now.
Not enough, however, to enable him to carry on a farm; and it requires
capital, you are aware, to make agriculture a respectable profession."
Jack could not forbear another hit at the big boys.
"It requires land," he said; "and that you have. It also requires bone
and muscle; and I see some here."
"True," simpered Mrs. Betterson. "But their father hasn't encouraged
them very much in doing the needful labors of the farm."
"He hasn't set us the example," broke in Rufe, piqued by Jack's remark.
"If he had taken hold of work, I suppose we should. But while he sits
down and waits for something or somebody to come along and help him,
what can you expect of us?"
"Our Betterson blood shows itself in more ways than one!" said Wad with
a grin, illustrating his remark by lazily seating himself once more on
the doorstep.
Evidently the boys were sick of hearing their mother boast of the
aristocratic family connection. She made haste to change the subject.
"Sickness has been our great scourge. The climate has never agreed with
either me or my husband. Then our poor Cecilia met with an accident a
year ago, which injured her so that she has scarcely taken a step
since."
"An accident done a-purpose!" spoke up Rufe, angrily. "Zeph Peakslow
threw her out of a swing,--the meanest trick! They're the meanest family
in the world, and there's a war between us. I'm only waiting my chance
to pay off that Zeph."
"Rufus!" pleaded the little invalid from the lounge, "you know he could
never have meant to hurt me so much. Don't talk of paying him off,
Rufus!"
"Cecie is so patient under it all!" said Mrs. Betterson. "She never
utters a word of complaint. Yet she doesn't have the care she ought to
have. With my sick baby, and my own aches and pains, what can I do?
There are no decent house-servants to be had, for love or money. O, what
wouldn't I give for a good, neat, intelligent, sympathizing girl! Our
little Lilian, here,--poor child!--is all the help I have."
At that moment the bright little dish-washer, having put away the
supper things, and gone to the spring for water, came lugging in a small
but brimming pail.
"It is too bad!" replied Jack. "You should have help about the hard
work," with another meaning glance at the boys.
"Yes," said Rufe, "we ought to; and we did have Sal Wiggett a little
while this summer. But she had never seen the inside of a decent house
before. About all she was good for was to split wood and milk the cow."
"O, how good this is!" said the invalid, drinking. "I was so thirsty!
Bless you, dear Lill! What should we do without you?"
Jack rose to his feet, hardly repressing his indignation.
"Would you like a drink, sir?" said Lill, taking a fresh cupful from her
pail, and looking up at him with a bright smile.
"Thank you, I should very much! But I can't bear the thought of your
lugging water from the spring for me."
"Why, Lilie!" said Cecie, softly, "you should have offered it to him
first."
"I thought I did right to offer it to my sick sister first," replied
Lill, with a tender glance at the lounge.
"You did right, my good little girl!" exclaimed Jack, giving back the
cup. He looked from one to the other of the big boys, and wondered how
they could witness this scene and not be touched by it. But he only
said, "Have these young men too much Betterson blood in them to dress
the fawn, if I leave it with you?"
"We'll fall back on our Dalton blood long enough for that," said Wad,
taking the sarcasm in good part.
"A little young venison will do Cecie so much good!" said Mrs.
Betterson. "You are very kind. But don't infer that we consider the
Dalton blood inferior. I was pleased with what you said of Lavinia's
native refinement. I feel as if, after all, she was a sister to be proud
of."
At this last display of pitiful vanity Jack turned away.
"The idea of such a woman concluding that she may be proud of a sister
like Vinnie!" thought he.
But he spoke only to say good by; for just then Link came riding the
mare to the door.
She was quickly harnessed to the buggy, while Link, at his mother's
entreaty, put on a coat, and made himself look as decent as possible.
Then Jack drove away, promising that Link, who accompanied him, should
bring the mare back in the morning.
"Mother," said the thoughtful Lill, "we ought to have got him some
supper."
"I thought of it," said the sick woman, "but you know we have nothing
fit to set before him."
"He won't famish," said Rufe, "with the large supply of sauce which he
keeps on hand! Mother, I wish you wouldn't ever speak of our Betterson
blood again; it only makes us ridiculous."
Thereupon Mrs. Betterson burst into tears, complaining that her own
children turned against her.
"O, bah!" exclaimed Rufe, with disgust, stalking out of the room,
banging a milk-pail, and waking the baby. "Be sharpening the knives,
Wad, while I milk; then we'll dress that fawn in a hurry. Wish the
fellow had left us the doe instead."