Laura Richards
Hildegarde's Home

CHAPTER XV
AT THE BROWN COTTAGE

Hildegarde's mind was still full of her cousin and his future, as she sat that afternoon in Mrs. Lankton's kitchen, with her sewing-school around her. The brown cottage with the green door had been found the most central and convenient place for the little class, and it was an object of absorbing interest to Mrs. Lankton herself. She hovered about Hildegarde and her scholars, predicting disease and death for one and another, with ghoulish joy.

"Your ma hadn't ought to let you come out to-day, Marthy Skeat. You warn't never rugged from the time you was a baby; teethin' like to have carried you off, and 'tain't too late now. There's wisdom teeth, ye know. Well, it's none o' my business, but I hope your ma's prepared. Good-mornin', Miss Grahame! I'm tellin' Marthy Skeat she ain't very likely to see long skirts, comin' out in this damp air. You're peart, are ye? That's right! Ah! they can look peart as ain't had no troubles yet. I was jist like you oncet, Miss Grahame. I've had a sight o' trouble! no one don't know what I've ben through; don't know nothin' about it. You've fleshed up some since ye came here, ain't ye? Well, they do flesh up that way sometimes, but 'tain't no good sign. There's measles about, too, they say."

"How bright and pretty your plants are, Mrs. Lankton!" said Hilda, trying to make a diversion. "No, Jack! – I mean Jenny! you will have to take that out again. See those long stitches! They look as if they were all running after each other, don't they? Take them out, dear, and make me some nice, neat little stitches, stepping along quietly, as you do when you have on those new shoes you were telling me about. Lizzie, I wonder what turns your thread so dark? See how white my seam is! What do you suppose is the matter with yours?"

Lizzie giggled and hung her head. "Forgot to wash my hands!" she muttered.

"That was a pity!" said Hildegarde. "It spoils the looks of it, you see. I am sure Mrs. Lankton will let you wash your hands in that bright tin basin. Vesta Philbrook, where is your violin?"

"Ma'am?" said Vesta Philbrook, opening her mouth as wide as her eyes.

"Your thimble I mean, of course!" said Hildegarde, blushing violently, and giving herself a mental shake. "Now go to work, like a good girl. Mary, here is the patchwork I promised you, already basted. See, a pink square, a blue square, a white one, and a yellow one. They are all pieces of my dresses, the dresses I wore last summer; and I thought you would like to have them for your quilt."

"Oh, thank you!" cried the child, delighted. "Oh, ain't them pretty?"

"Handsome!" said Mrs. Lankton, peering over the child's shoulder. "Them is handsome. Ah! I pieced a quilt once, with nine hundred and ninety-nine pieces into it. Good goods they was; I had good things then; real handsome calico, just like them. Ah, I didn't know what trouble was when I was your age, children. Wait till you've had lumbago, an' neurology, an' cricks in your necks so's't you can't stand straight, not for weeks together you can't, and your roof leakin', an' dreepin' all over yer bed, an' – "

"Why, Mrs. Lankton!" exclaimed Hildegarde. "Surely the roof is not leaking again, when it was all shingled this summer!"

"Not yet it ain't, dear!" sighed the widow. "But I'm prepared for it, and I don't expect nothin' else, after what I've been through. I was fleshy myself, once, though no one wouldn't think it to look at me."

"I wonder, Mrs. Lankton," began Hildegarde gently.

"You may wonder, dear!" was the reply. "Folks do wonder when they think what I've bean through. Fleshy was no name for it. There! I was fairly corpilent when I was your age."

"Oh!" said Hildegarde, in some confusion. "I meant – I am very thirsty, Mrs. Lankton, and if you could give me a glass of your delicious water – "

"Suttingly!" exclaimed the widow with alacrity. "Suttingly, Miss Grahame! I'll go right out and pump ye some. It is good water," she admitted, with reluctant pride. "I've been expectin' it would dry up, right along, lately!" and she hastened out into the yard.

"Now, children," said Hildegarde hastily, "I will go on with the story I began last time. 'So Robert Bruce was crowned king of Scotland; and no sooner was he king than' – "

By the time Mrs. Lankton returned with the water, every child was listening spellbound to the wonderful tale of Bruce at the ford, and no one had an eye or an ear for the doleful widow, save Hildegarde, whose "Thank you!" and quick glance of gratitude lightened for a moment the gloom of her hostess's countenance.

So deep were teacher and pupils in Bruce and patchwork that none of them heard the sound of wheels, or the sudden cessation of it outside the door, till Mrs. Lankton exclaimed with tragic unction: "It is Colonel Ferrers! driving hisself, and his hoss all of a sweat. I hope he ain't the bearer of bad news, but I should be prepared, if I was you, Miss Grahame. Poor child! what would you do if your ma was took?" Hildegarde hastened to the door, but was instantly reassured by the old gentleman's cheery smile.

"Why did you move?" he said. "I stopped on purpose to have a look at you, with your flock of doves around you. Hilda and the doves, hey? you remember? 'Marble Faun!' yes, yes! But since you have moved, shall I drive you home, Miss Industry?"

Hildegarde glanced at the clock. "Our time is over," she said to the children. "Yes, Colonel Ferrers, thank you! I should enjoy the drive very much indeed. Can you wait perhaps five minutes?"

The Colonel could and would; and Hildegarde returned to see that all work was neatly folded and put away.

"And, Annie, here is the receipt I promised you. Be sure to mix the meal thoroughly, and have a good hot oven, and you will find them very nice indeed, and your mother will be so pleased at your making them yourself!"

"Vesta, did you try the honey candy?"

"Yes, 'm! 'twas dretful good. My little brother, he like t'ha' died, he eat so much."

"Dear me!" exclaimed Hilda, rather alarmed at this result of her neat little plan of teaching the children something about cookery, without their finding out that they were being taught.

"But you must see to it, Vesta, that he doesn't eat too much. That is one of the things an elder sister is for, you know.

"Now, whose turn is it to sweep up the threads and scraps? Yours, Euleta? Well, see how careful you can be! not a thread must be left on Mrs. Lankton's clean floor, you know."

Soon all was in order, workbags put away, hats and bonnets tied on; and Hildegarde came out with her doves about her, all looking as if they had had a thoroughly good time. With many affectionate farewells to "Teacher," the children scattered in different directions, and Colonel Ferrers chirruped to the brown cob, which trotted briskly away over the smooth road. The Colonel was deeply interested in the sewing-school. Hester Aytoun had had one for the village children, and there had been none from her death until now. He asked many questions, which Hildegarde answered with right good will. They were dear children, she said. She was getting to know them very well, for she tried to see them in their homes once a fortnight, and found they liked to have her come, and looked forward to it. Some of them were very bright; not all, of course, but they all tried, and that was the great thing. Yes, she told them all the stories they wanted, and they wanted a great many.

"Speaking of stories," said the Colonel, "I find I have work laid out for the rest of my life."

"Hugh?" said Hildegarde, smiling.

"Most astonishing child I ever saw in my life!" the Colonel cried. "Most amazing child! to see how he flings himself on books is a wonder. I don't let him keep at 'em long, you understand. A brain like that needs play, sir, play! I've bought him a little foil, and – Harry Monmouth! he gave me a lunge in quart that almost broke my guard, last night. But stories! 'More about kings, please, Sire!' – he's got a notion of calling me Sire – ho! ho! can't get Saul out of his head, d'ye see? I feel like Charlemagne, or Barbarossa, or some of 'em. 'More about kings when they were in battle.' He's learned 'Agincourt' by heart, just from my reading it to him. 'Fair stood the wind for France,' hey? Finest ballad in the English language. Says you read it to him, too. And if I am busy he goes to Elizabeth Beadle and frightens her out of her wits with sentences out of the Lamentations of Jeremiah. Now this boy – mark me, Hildegarde! – will turn out something very uncommon, if he has the right training. That scoundrelly knave, Ephraim Loftus, wanted to make a gentleman of him! Ho! Ephraim doesn't know how a gentleman's shoes look, unless he has been made acquainted with the soles of them. I kicked him myself once, I remember, for beating a horse unmercifully. This boy will be a great scholar, mark my words! And whatever assistance I can give him shall be cheerfully given. Why, the lad has genius! positive genius!"

"Oh!" said Hildegarde, her heart beating fast. "Then you think, Colonel Ferrers, that a – a person should be educated for what seems to be his natural bent. Do you think that?"

"Harry Monmouth! of course I do! Look at me! D'ye think I was fitted for a mercantile life, for example? Never got algebra through my head, and hate figures. The army was what I was born for! Born for it, sir! Shouldered my pap-spoon in the cradle, and presented arms whenever I was taken up. Ho! ho! ho!"

Hildegarde began to tremble, but her courage did not fail. "And – and Jack, dear Colonel Ferrers," she said softly. "He was born for music, was he not?"

The Colonel turned square round, and gazed at her from under brows that met over his hooked nose. "What then?" he said slowly, after a pause. "If my nephew was born for a fiddler, what then, Miss Hildegarde Grahame? Is it any reason why he should not be trained for something better? I like the boy's playing very well, very well indeed, when he keeps clear of Dutch discords. But you would not compare playing the fiddle with the glorious Art of War, I imagine?"

"Not for an instant!" cried Hildegarde, flushing deeply under the Colonel's half-stern, half-quizzical gaze. "Compare music, lovely music, that cheers and comforts and delights all the world, with fierce, cruel, dreadful war? Look at Jack, with his mind full of beautiful harmonies and – and 'airs from heaven' – they really are! making us laugh or cry, or dance or exult, just by the motion of his hand. Look at him, and then imagine him in a red coat, with a gun in his hand – "

"Red is the British colour," said the Colonel.

"Well, a blue coat, then. What difference does it make? – a gun in his hand, shooting people who never did him any harm, whose faces he had never even seen. Oh, Colonel Ferrers, I would not have believed it of you!"

"And who asked you to believe it of me, pray?" asked the Colonel, as he drove up to the door of Braeside. "To tell the truth, young lady, war is very much more in your line than in my nephew's. Harry Monmouth! Bellona in person, I verily believe. My compliments to your mother, and say I shall call her Madam Althæa in future, for she has brought forth a firebrand."

Instantly Hildegarde's ruffled plumes drooped, smoothed themselves down; instead of the flashing gaze of the eagle, a dove-like look now met the quizzical gaze of the old gentleman. "Dear Colonel Ferrers!" this hypocritical girl murmured, as, standing on the verandah steps, she laid her hand gently on his arm. "Thank you so very much for driving me home. You are always so kind – to me! And – and – I want to ask one question. Can you tell me the first lines of Dryden's 'Song for St. Cecilia's Day'?"

"Of course!" said the simple Colonel.

 
"'From harmony, from heavenly harmony,
This universal frame began.'
 

Why do you – oh! you youthful Circe! you infant Medea, you – " he shook his whip threateningly.

"Good-by, dear Colonel Ferrers!" cried Hildegarde. "I am so glad you remembered the lines. Aren't they beautiful? Good-by!"

CHAPTER XVI
GOOD-BY!

"I have come to say good-by!" cried Jack Ferrers, rushing up the steps, as Hildegarde was sitting on the piazza, with Hugh curled up at her feet. "Uncle Tom will come for me with the wagon. Oh, Hilda, it doesn't seem possible, does it? It is too good to be true! and it is all your doing, every bit. I sha'n't forget it. I say! I wish you were coming too!"

"Oh, no, you don't!" said Hildegarde, speaking lightly, though her cheeks were flushed and her eyes bright with real feeling. "You would send me back by express, labelled 'troublesome baggage.'

"Dear old Jack! You know how glad I am, without my saying it. But, oh! how we shall miss you! Your uncle – "

"Oh! Hugh will take care of Uncle Tom, won't you, Hugh? Hugh suits him down to the ground – I beg pardon, I mean through and through, and they will have fine times together."

"I will try!" said the child. "But we shall be like a pelican in the wilderness, I am afraid."

"You go straight home now?" Hildegarde asked.

"Straight home! five days with Daddy – bless him! and then he goes to New York with me, and sees me off. Oh! see here!" he began fumbling in his pockets. "I have a keepsake for you. I – of course you know I haven't any money, Hilda, or I would have bought you something; but Uncle Tom gave it to me on purpose to give to you; so it's partly from him, too. Here it is! It belonged to our great-grandmother, he says."

Such a lovely ring! A star of yellow diamonds set on a hoop of gold. Hildegarde flushed with delight. "Oh, Jack! how kind of him! how dear of you! Oh! what an exquisite thing! I shall wear it always."

"And – I say! how well it looks on your hand! I never noticed before what pretty hands you have, Hilda. You are the prettiest girl I ever saw, altogether."

"And Rose?" asked Hildegarde, smiling.

Jack blushed furiously. He had fallen deeply in love with Rose's photograph, and had been in the habit of gazing at it for ten or fifteen minutes every day for the past fortnight, ever since it arrived. "That's different!" he said. "She is an angel, if the picture is like her."

"It isn't half lovely enough!" cried loyal Hildegarde. "Not half! You don't see the blue of her eyes, or her complexion, just like 'a warm white rose.' Oh! you would love her, Jack!"

"I – I rather think I do!" Jack confessed. "You might let me have the photograph, Hildegarde."

But this Hildegarde wholly refused to do. "I have something much more useful for you!" she said; and, running into the house, she brought out a handkerchief-case of linen, daintily embroidered, containing a dozen fine hemstitched handkerchiefs. "I hemstitched them myself," she said; "the peacock still spreads its tail, you observe. And – see! on one side of the case are forget-me-nots – that is my flower, you know; and on the other are roses. I take credit for putting the roses on top."

"Dear Hilda!" cried her cousin, giving her hand a hearty shake. "What a good fel – what a jolly girl you are! You ought," he added shyly, "to marry the best man in the world, and I hope you will."

"I mean to," said Hildegarde, laughing, with a happy light in her eyes.

Hildegarde had never seen her "fairy prince, with joyful eyes, and lighter-footed than the fox"; but she knew he would come in good time. She knew, too, very much what he was like, – a combination of Amyas Leigh, Sir Richard Grenville, Dundee, and Montrose, with a dash of the Cid, and a strong flavour of Bayard, the constancy of William the Silent, the kindness of Scott, and the eyes of Edwin Booth. Some day he would come, and find his maiden waiting for him. Meantime, it was so very delightful to have Jack fall in love with Rose. If – she thought, and on that "if" rose many a Spanish castle, fair and lofty, with glittering pinnacle and turret. But she had not the heart to tell Jack of the joyful news she had just received, dared not tell him of the letter in her pocket which said that this dearest Rose was coming soon, perhaps this very week, to make her a long, long visit. If she could only have come earlier!

But now Jack was taking his violin out of his box. "Where is your mother?" he said. "This is my own, this present for you both. It is 'Farewell to Braeside!'"

Hildegarde flew to call her mother, and met her just coming downstairs. "Jack has composed a farewell for us," she cried. "All for us, mamma! Come!"

Farewell! the words seemed to breathe through the lovely melody, as the lad played softly, sweetly, a touch of sadness underlying the whole. "Farewell! farewell! parting is pain, is pain, but Love heals the wound with a touch. Love flies over land and sea, bringing peace, peace, and good tidings and joy." Then the theme changed, and a strain of triumph, of exultation, made the air thrill with happiness, with proud delight. The girl and her mother exchanged glances. "This is his work, his life!" said their eyes. And the song soared high and higher, till one fine, exquisite note melted like a skylark into the blue; then sinking gently, gently, it flowed again into the notes of the farewell, —

"Parting is pain, is pain, but Love is immortal."

Both women were in tears when the song died away, and Jack's own eyes were suspiciously bright.

"My dear boy," said Mrs. Grahame, wiping her eyes, "I do believe you are going to a life of joy and of well-earned triumph. I do heartily believe it."

"It is all Hilda's doings," said Jack, "and yours. All Hilda's and yours, Aunt Mildred. I shall not forget."

Here Hugh, who had been listening spellbound, asked suddenly, "What was the name of the boat which the gentleman who begins with O made to go swiftly over the sea when he played with his hand?"

"The Argo, dear," said Hildegarde.

"It is that boat he should go in," nodding to Jack. "It would leap like an unicorn, wouldn't it, if he played those beautiful things which he just played?"

And now Colonel Ferrers drove up to the door, with the brown cob and the yellow wagon. The last words were said; the precious violin was carefully stowed under the seat. Jack kissed Mrs. Grahame warmly, and exchanged with Hildegarde a long, silent pressure of the hand, in which there was a whole world of kindness and affection and comradeship. Boys and girls can be such good friends, if they only know how!

"Boot and saddle!" cried the Colonel.

"Good-by!" cried the lad, springing into the wagon. "Good-by! Don't forget the ostrich gentleman!"

"Good-by, dear Jack!"

"God bless you, my dear lad! Good-by!" and the wheels went crashing over the gravel.

At the end of the driveway the Colonel checked his horse for a moment before turning into the main road. "Look back, boy," he said.

Jack looked, and saw Hildegarde and her mother standing on the verandah with arms entwined, gazing after them with loving looks. The girl's white-clad figure and shining locks were set in a frame of hanging vines and creepers; her face was bright with love and cheer. The slender mother, in her black dress, seemed to droop and lean towards her; on the other side the child clasped her hand with fervent love and devotion.

"My boy," said Colonel Ferrers, "take that picture with you wherever you go. You will see many places and many people, good and bad, comely and ill-favoured; but you will see no sight so good as that of a young woman, lovely and beloved, shining in the doorway of the home she makes bright."