Understood Betsy

by Dorothy Canfield Fisher

  CHAPTER II

  BETSY HOLDS THE REINS

  You can imagine, perhaps, the dreadful terror of Elizabeth Ann as thetrain carried her along toward Vermont and the horrible Putney Farm! Ithad happened so quickly--her satchel packed, the telegram sent, thetrain caught--that she had not had time to get her wits together, assertherself, and say that she would NOT go there! Besides, she had a sinkingnotion that perhaps they wouldn't pay any attention to her if she did.The world had come to an end now that Aunt Frances wasn't there to takecare of her! Even in the most familiar air she could only half breathewithout Aunt Frances! And now she was not even being taken to the PutneyFarm! She was being sent!

  She shrank together in her seat, more and more frightened as the end ofher journey came nearer, and looked out dismally at the winterlandscape, thinking it hideous with its brown bare fields, its brownbare trees, and the quick-running little streams hurrying along, swollenwith the January thaw which had taken all the snow from the hills. Shehad heard her elders say about her so many times that she could notstand the cold, that she shivered at the very thought of cold weather,and certainly nothing could look colder than that bleak country intowhich the train was now slowly making its way.

  The engine puffed and puffed with great laboring breaths that shookElizabeth Ann's diaphragm up and down, but the train moved more and moreslowly. Elizabeth Ann could feel under her feet how the floor of the carwas tipped up as it crept along the steep incline. "Pretty stiff gradehere?" said a passenger to the conductor.

  "You bet!" he assented. "But Hillsboro is the next station and that's atthe top of the hill. We go down after that to Rutland." He turned toElizabeth Ann--"Say, little girl, didn't your uncle say you were to getoff at Hillsboro? You'd better be getting your things together."

  Poor Elizabeth Ann's knees knocked against each other with fear of thestrange faces she was to encounter, and when the conductor came to helpher get off, he had to carry the white, trembling child as well as hersatchel. But there was only one strange face there,--not another soul insight at the little wooden station. A grim-faced old man in a fur capand heavy coat stood by a lumber wagon.

  "This is her, Mr. Putney," said the conductor, touching his cap, andwent back to the train, which went away shrieking for a nearby crossingand setting the echoes ringing from one mountain to another.

  There was Elizabeth Ann alone with her much-feared Great-uncle Henry. Henodded to her, and drew out from the bottom of the wagon a warm, largecape, which he slipped over her shoulders. "The women folks were afraidyou'd git cold drivin'," he explained. He then lifted her high to theseat, tossed her satchel into the wagon, climbed up himself, and cluckedto his horses. Elizabeth Ann had always before thought it an essentialpart of railway journeys to be much kissed at the end and asked a greatmany times how you had "stood the trip."

  She sat very still on the high lumber seat, feeling very forlorn andneglected. Her feet dangled high above the floor of the wagon. She feltherself to be in the most dangerous place she had ever dreamed of in herworst dreams. Oh, why wasn't Aunt Frances there to take care of her! Itwas just like one of her bad dreams--yes, it was horrible! She wouldfall, she would roll under the wheels and be crushed to ... She looked upat Uncle Henry with the wild, strained eyes of nervous terror whichalways brought Aunt Frances to her in a rush to "hear all about it," tosympathize, to reassure.

  Uncle Henry looked down at her soberly, his hard, weather-beaten oldface quite unmoved. "Here, you drive, will you, for a piece?" he saidbriefly, putting the reins into her hands, hooking his spectacles overhis ears, and drawing out a stubby pencil and a bit of paper. "I've gotsome figgering to do. You pull on the left-hand rein to make 'em go tothe left and t'other way for t'other way, though 'tain't likely we'llmeet any teams."

  Elizabeth Ann had been so near one of her wild screams of terror thatnow, in spite of her instant absorbed interest in the reins, she gave aqueer little yelp. She was all ready with the explanation, herconversations with Aunt Frances having made her very fluent inexplanations of her own emotions. She would tell Uncle Henry about howscared she had been, and how she had just been about to scream andcouldn't keep back that one little ... But Uncle Henry seemed not to haveheard her little howl, or, if he had, didn't think it worthconversation, for he ... oh, the horses were CERTAINLY going to one side!She hastily decided which was her right hand (she had never been forcedto know it so quickly before) and pulled furiously on that rein. Thehorses turned their hanging heads a little, and, miraculously, therethey were in the middle of the road again.

  Elizabeth Ann drew a long breath of relief and pride, and looked toUncle Henry for praise. But he was busily setting down figures as thoughhe were getting his 'rithmetic lesson for the next day and had notnoticed ... Oh, there they were going to the left again! This time, in herflurry, she made a mistake about which hand was which and pulled wildlyon the left line! The horses docilely walked off the road into a shallowditch, the wagon tilted ... help! Why didn't Uncle Henry help! Uncle Henrycontinued intently figuring on the back of his envelope.

  Elizabeth Ann, the perspiration starting out on her forehead, pulled onthe other line. The horses turned back up the little slope, the wheelgrated sickeningly against the wagonbox--she was SURE they would tipover! But there! somehow there they were in the road, safe and sound,with Uncle Henry adding up a column of figures. If he only knew, thoughtthe little girl, if he only KNEW the danger he had been in, and how hehad been saved...! But she must think of some way to remember, for sure,which her right hand was, and avoid that hideous mistake again.

  And then suddenly something inside Elizabeth Ann's head stirred andmoved. It came to her, like a clap, that she needn't know which wasright or left at all. If she just pulled the way she wanted them togo--the horses would never know whether it was the right or the leftrein!

  It is possible that what stirred inside her head at that moment was herbrain, waking up. She was nine years old, and she was in the third Agrade at school, but that was the first time she had ever had a wholethought of her very own. At home, Aunt Frances had always known exactlywhat she was doing, and had helped her over the hard places before sheeven knew they were there; and at school her teachers had been carefullytrained to think faster than the scholars. Somebody had always beenexplaining things to Elizabeth Ann so industriously that she had neverfound out a single thing for herself before. This was a very smalldiscovery, but an original one. Elizabeth Ann was as excited about it asa mother-bird over the first egg that hatches.

  She forgot how afraid she was of Uncle Henry, and poured out to him herdiscovery. "It's not right or left that matters!" she endedtriumphantly; "it's which way you want to go!" Uncle Henry looked at herattentively as she talked, eyeing her sidewise over the top of onespectacle-glass. When she finished--"Well, now, that's so," he admitted,and returned to his arithmetic.

  It was a short remark, shorter than any Elizabeth Ann had ever heardbefore. Aunt Frances and her teachers always explained matters atlength. But it had a weighty, satisfying ring to it. The little girlfelt the importance of having her statement recognized. She turned backto her driving.

  The slow, heavy plow horses had stopped during her talk with UncleHenry. They stood as still now as though their feet had grown to theroad. Elizabeth Ann looked up at the old man for instructions. But hewas deep in his figures. She had been taught never to interrupt people,so she sat still and waited for him to tell her what to do.

  But, although they were driving in the midst of a winter thaw, it was apretty cold day, with an icy wind blowing down the back of her neck. Theearly winter twilight was beginning to fall, and she felt rather empty.She grew very tired of waiting, and remembered how the grocer's boy athome had started his horse. Then, summoning all her courage, with anapprehensive glance at Uncle Henry's arithmetical silence, she slappedthe reins up and down on the horses' backs and made the best imitationshe could of the grocer's boy's cluck. The horses lifted their heads,they leaned forward, they put one foot before th
e other ... they were off!The color rose hot on Elizabeth Ann's happy face. If she had started abig red automobile she would not have been prouder. For it was the firstthing she had ever done all herself ... every bit ... every smitch! She hadthought of it and she had done it. And it had worked!

  Now for what seemed to her a long, long time she drove, drove so hardshe could think of nothing else. She guided the horses around stones,she cheered them through freezing mud-puddles of melted snow, she keptthem in the anxiously exact middle of the road. She was quite astonishedwhen Uncle Henry put his pencil and paper away, took the reins from herhands, and drove into a yard, on one side of which was a little lowwhite house and on the other a big red barn. He did not say a word, butshe guessed that this was Putney Farm.

  Two women in gingham dresses and white aprons came out of the house. Onewas old and one might be called young, just like Aunt Harriet and AuntFrances. But they looked very different from those aunts. Thedark-haired one was very tall and strong-looking, and the white-hairedone was very rosy and fat. They both looked up at the little, thin,white-faced girl on the high seat, and smiled. "Well, Father, you gother, I see," said the brown-haired one. She stepped up to the wagon andheld up her arms to the child. "Come on, Betsy, and get some supper,"she said, as though Elizabeth Ann had lived there all her life and hadjust driven into town and back.

  And that was the arrival of Elizabeth Ann at Putney Farm.

  The brown-haired one took a long, strong step or two and swung her up onthe porch. "You take her in, Mother," she said. "I'll help Fatherunhitch."

  The fat, rosy, white-haired one took Elizabeth Ann's skinny, cold littlehand in her soft warm fat one, and led her along to the open kitchendoor. "I'm your Aunt Abigail," she said. "Your mother's aunt, you know.And that's your Cousin Ann that lifted you down, and it was your UncleHenry that brought you out from town." She shut the door and went on, "Idon't know if your Aunt Harriet ever happened to tell you about us, andso ..."

  Elizabeth Ann interrupted her hastily, the recollection of all AuntHarriet's remarks vividly before her. "Oh yes, oh yes!" she said. "Shealways talked about you. She talked about you a lot, she ..." The littlegirl stopped short and bit her lip.

  If Aunt Abigail guessed from the expression on Elizabeth Ann's face whatkind of talking Aunt Harriet's had been, she showed it only by adeepening of the wrinkles all around her eyes. She said, gravely: "Well,that's a good thing. You know all about us then." She turned to thestove and took out of the oven a pan of hot baked beans, very brown andcrispy on top (Elizabeth Ann detested beans), and said, over hershoulder, "Take your things off, Betsy, and hang 'em on that lowest hookback of the door. That's YOUR hook."

  The little girl fumbled forlornly with the fastenings of her cape andthe buttons of her coat. At home, Aunt Frances or Grace had always takenoff her wraps and put them away for her. When, very sorry for herself,she turned away from the hook, Aunt Abigail said: "Now you must be cold.Pull a chair right up here by the stove." She was stepping aroundquickly as she put supper on the table. The floor shook under her. Shewas one of the fattest people Elizabeth Ann had ever seen. After livingwith Aunt Frances and Aunt Harriet and Grace the little girl couldscarcely believe her eyes. She stared and stared.

  Aunt Abigail seemed not to notice this. Indeed, she seemed for themoment to have forgotten all about the newcomer. Elizabeth Ann sat onthe wooden chair, her feet hanging (she had been taught that it was notmanners to put her feet on the rungs), looking about her with miserable,homesick eyes. What an ugly, low-ceilinged room, with only a couple ofhorrid kerosene lamps for light; and they didn't keep any girl,evidently; and they were going to eat right in the kitchen like poorpeople; and nobody spoke to her or looked at her or asked her how shehad "stood the trip"; and here she was, millions of miles away from AuntFrances, without anybody to take care of her. She began to feel thetight place in her throat which, by thinking about hard, she couldalways turn into tears, and presently her eyes began to water.

  Aunt Abigail was not looking at her at all, but she now stopped short inone of her rushes to the table, set down the butter-plate she wascarrying, and said "There!" as though she had forgotten something. Shestooped--it was perfectly amazing how spry she was--and pulled out fromunder the stove a half-grown kitten, very sleepy, yawning andstretching, and blinking its eyes. "There, Betsy!" said Aunt Abigail,putting the little yellow and white ball into the child's lap. "There isone of old Whitey's kittens that didn't get given away last summer, andshe pesters the life out of me. I've got so much to do. When I heard youwere coming, I thought maybe you would take care of her for me. If youwant to, enough to bother to feed her and all, you can have her for yourown."

  Elizabeth Ann bent her thin face over the warm, furry, friendly littleanimal. She could not speak. She had always wanted a kitten, but AuntFrances and Aunt Harriet and Grace had always been sure that catsbrought diphtheria and tonsilitis and all sorts of dreadful diseases todelicate little girls. She was afraid to move for fear the little thingwould jump down and run away, but as she bent cautiously toward it thenecktie of her middy blouse fell forward and the kitten in the middle ofa yawn struck swiftly at it with a soft paw. Then, still too sleepy toplay, it turned its head and began to lick Elizabeth Ann's hand with arough little tongue. Perhaps you can imagine how thrilled the littlegirl was at this!

  She held her hand perfectly still until the kitten stopped and begansuddenly washing its own face, and then she put her hands under it andvery awkwardly lifted it up, burying her face in the soft fur. Thekitten yawned again, and from the pink-lined mouth came a fresh, milkybreath. "Oh!" said Elizabeth Ann under her breath. "Oh, you DARLING!"The kitten looked at her with bored, speculative eyes.

  Elizabeth Ann looked up now at Aunt Abigail and said, "What is its name,please?" But the old woman was busy turning over a griddle full ofpancakes and did not hear. On the train Elizabeth Ann had resolved notto call these hateful relatives by the same name she had for dear AuntFrances, but she now forgot that resolution and said, again, "Oh, AuntAbigail, what is its name?"

  Aunt Abigail faced her blankly. "Name?" she asked. "Whose ... oh, thekitten's? Goodness, child, I stopped racking my brain for kitten namessixty years ago. Name it yourself. It's yours."

  Elizabeth Ann had already named it in her own mind, the name she hadalways thought she WOULD call a kitten by, if she ever had one. It wasEleanor, the prettiest name she knew.

  Aunt Abigail pushed a pitcher toward her. "There's the cat's saucerunder the sink. Don't you want to give it some milk?"

  Elizabeth Ann got down from her chair, poured some milk into the saucer,and called: "Here, Eleanor! Here, Eleanor!"

  Aunt Abigail looked at her sharply out of the corner of her eye and herlips twitched, but a moment later her face was immovably grave as shecarried the last plate of pancakes to the table.

  Elizabeth Ann sat on her heels for a long time, watching the kitten lapthe milk, and she was surprised, when she stood up, to see that CousinAnn and Uncle Henry had come in, very red-cheeked from the cold air.

  "Well, folks," said Aunt Abigail, "don't you think we've done somelively stepping around, Betsy and I, to get supper all on the table foryou?"

  Elizabeth Ann stared. What did Aunt Abigail mean? She hadn't done athing about getting supper! But nobody made any comment, and they alltook their seats and began to eat. Elizabeth Ann was astonishinglyhungry, and she thought she could never get enough of the creamedpotatoes, cold ham, hot cocoa, and pancakes. She was very much relievedthat her refusal of beans caused no comment. Aunt Frances had alwaystried very hard to make her eat beans because they have so much proteinin them, and growing children need protein. Elizabeth Ann had heard thissaid so many times she could have repeated it backward, but it had nevermade her hate beans any the less. However, nobody here seemed to knowthis, and Elizabeth Ann kept her knowledge to herself. They had alsoevidently never heard how delicate her digestion was, for she never sawanything like the number of pancakes they let her eat. ALL SHE WANTED!She
had never heard of such a thing!

  They still did not ask her how she had "stood the trip." They did notindeed ask her much of anything or pay very much attention to her beyondfilling her plate as fast as she emptied it. In the middle of the mealEleanor came, jumped into her lap, and curled down, purring. After thisElizabeth Ann kept one hand on the little soft ball, handling her forkwith the other.

  After supper--well, Elizabeth Ann never knew what did happen aftersupper until she felt somebody lifting her and carrying her upstairs. Itwas Cousin Ann, who carried her as lightly as though she were a baby,and who said, as she sat down on the floor in a slant-ceilinged bedroom,"You went right to sleep with your head on the table. I guess you'repretty tired."

  Aunt Abigail was sitting on the edge of a great wide bed with fourposts, and a curtain around the top. She was partly undressed, and wasundoing her hair and brushing it out. It was very curly and all fluffedout in a shining white fuzz around her fat, pink face, full of softwrinkles; but in a moment she was braiding it up again and putting on atight white nightcap, which she tied under her chin.

  "We got the word about your coming so late," said Cousin Ann, "that wedidn't have time to fix you up a bedroom that can be warmed. So you'regoing to sleep in here for a while. The bed's big enough for two, Iguess, even if they are as big as you and Mother."

  Elizabeth Ann stared again. What queer things they said here. She wasn'tNEARLY as big as Aunt Abigail!

  "Mother, did you put Shep out?" asked Cousin Ann; and when Aunt Abigailsaid, "No! There! I forgot to!" Cousin Ann went away; and that was thelast of HER. They certainly believed in being saving of their words atPutney Farm.

  Elizabeth Ann began to undress. She was only half-awake; and that madeher feel only about half her age, which wasn't very great, the whole ofit, and she felt like just crooking her arm over her eyes and giving up!She was too forlorn! She had never slept with anybody before, and shehad heard ever so many times how bad it was for children to sleep withgrown-ups. An icy wind rattled the windows and puffed in around theloose old casings. On the window-sill lay a little wreath of snow.Elizabeth Ann shivered and shook on her thin legs, undressed in a hurry,and slipped into her night-dress. She felt just as cold inside as out,and never was more utterly miserable than in that strange, ugly littleroom, with that strange, queer, fat old woman. She was even toomiserable to cry, and that is saying a great deal for Elizabeth Ann!

  She got into bed first, because Aunt Abigail said she was going to keepthe candle lighted for a while and read. "And anyhow," she said, "I'dbetter sleep on the outside to keep you from rolling out."

  Elizabeth Ann and Aunt Abigail lay very still for a long time, AuntAbigail reading out of a small, worn old book. Elizabeth Ann could seeits title, "Essays of Emerson." A book with, that name had always laidon the center table in Aunt Harriet's house, but that copy was all newand shiny, and Elizabeth Ann had never seen anybody look inside it. Itwas a very dull-looking book, with no pictures and no conversation. Thelittle girl lay on her back, looking up at the cracks in the plasterceiling and watching the shadows sway and dance as the candle flickeredin the gusts of cold air. She herself began to feel a soft, pervasivewarmth. Aunt Abigail's great body was like a stove.

  It was very, very quiet, quieter than any place Elizabeth Ann had everknown, except church, because a trolley-line ran past Aunt Harriet'shouse and even at night there were always more or less hangings andrattlings. Here there was not a single sound except the soft, whisperynoise when Aunt Abigail turned over a page as she read steadily andsilently forward in her book. Elizabeth Ann turned her head so that shecould see the round, rosy old face, full of soft wrinkles, and the calm,steady old eyes which were fixed on the page. And as she lay there inthe warm bed, watching that quiet face, something very queer began tohappen to Elizabeth Ann. She felt as though a tight knot inside her wereslowly being untied. She felt--what was it she felt? There are no wordsfor it. From deep within her something rose up softly ... she drew one ortwo long, half-sobbing breaths....

  "Do you know," said Aunt Abigail, "I think it's going tobe real nice, having a little girl in the house again."]

  Aunt Abigail laid down her book and looked over at the child. "Do youknow," she said, in a conversational tone, "do you know, I think it'sgoing to be real nice, having a little girl in the house again."

  Oh, then the tight knot in the little unwanted girl's heart was loosenedindeed! It all gave way at once, and Elizabeth Ann burst suddenly intohot tears--yes, I know I said I would not tell you any more about hercrying; but these tears were very different from any she had ever shedbefore. And they were the last, too, for a long, long time.

  Aunt Abigail said, "Well, well!" and moving over in bed took the littleweeping girl into her arms. She did not say another word then, but sheput her soft, withered old cheek close against Elizabeth Ann's, till thesobs began to grow less, and then she said: "I hear your kitty cryingoutside the door. Shall I let her in? I expect she'd like to sleep withyou. I guess there's room for three of us."

  She got out of bed as she spoke and walked across the room to the door.The floor shook under her great bulk, and the peak of her nightcap madea long, grotesque shadow. But as she came back with the kitten in herarms Elizabeth Ann saw nothing funny in her looks. She gave Eleanor tothe little girl and got into bed again. "There, now, I guess we're readyfor the night," she said. "You put the kitty on the other side of you soshe won't fall out of bed."

  She blew the light out and moved over a little closer to Elizabeth. Ann,who immediately was enveloped in that delicious warmth. The kittencurled up under the little girl's chin. Between her and the terrors ofthe dark room loomed the rampart of Aunt Abigail's great body.

  Elizabeth Ann drew a long, long breath ... and when she opened her eyesthe sun was shining in at the window.