CHAPTER VIII
Ever since my last birthday there has a great change come over me forI have not kept my diary. Mother took me to one side that morning andsaid it was time for me to act like I was growing up now. She saidmany a girl as big as me could pick a chicken and I couldn't do athing but write a diary; and would even run and stop up my ears everytime Mammy Lou started to wring one's head off. She said all theladies of the neighborhood nearly worried her to death advising her toteach me how to work and saying it was simply ridiculous for a greatbig girl like me to lie flat on her stomach reading a book all day inthe grass. This shows how I am misunderstood by my family, and I toldmother so, but she said for goodness' sake not to get _that_ ideainto my head, for girls that were always complaining about being"misunderstood" were the kind that got divorces from their husbandsafterward. I know this won't be the way with me, though, for I expectto live on good terms with Sir Reginald, always wearing pink satin andspangles even around the castle; and never getting mussy-looking whenI give the children a bath in hopes of retaining his affections, likethey tell you to in ladies' magazines. But I didn't mention SirReginald to mother, or she would have misunderstood me worse thanever.
Goodness! I reckon the neighbors would have a fit if they could see meof a night when I dress up and step out on the porch roof, making likeI'm Juliet in Shakespeare. I wear a lace thing over my head and let apair of Cousin Eunice's last year's bedroom slippers represent Romeowith fur around the top. They are the kind he wore the night they tookme to see him and are all I can find in the house that looks at alllike him. Nobody gets to see me doing this, though, for I lock thedoor. Somehow I think it would be a nicer world if you could alwayslock the door on your advising friends.
Last summer Rufe said I was so clever for my age (_he_ said) that Iought to be in the city (I like this kind of advice) at a good school;so father and mother decided to move to the city and take Mammy Louand spend the winter and all the other winters until I could geteducated and live in a flat. So we went, me writing much sorry poetryabout leaving my old home. The older I get the more I think of poetryand I reckon by the time I'm engaged I'll be crazy about it!
Our leaving was very sad, poor little Lares and Penates crying so hardat the depot where they went to tell Mammy Lou good-by that a drummerwho was traveling with a kind heart gave them a quarter apiece tohush.
I never admired the name of flat from the first and when we started torent one I admired it less than ever. It consists of a very largehouse, divided up, and no place to kill a chicken. There is also noplace to warm your feet, nor to pop corn. In fact, there are moreplaces where you _can't_ do things than where you can. Rufe took us toevery one in town nearly, and mammy paid particular attention to howthe kitchens were fixed and asked what became of the potato peelingswith no pigs to eat them up. Finally, after everything had beenexplained to her, she spoke up in the midst of a lady's flat withtears in her eyes and said:
"Mis' Mary, le's go back to the country whar slop is called _slop_; uphere it's '_gawbage_!'"
Father and mother were both delighted that going back had beenmentioned without either one of _them_ saying it first, for both oftheir feet were sore from looking for flats; and they like to havefallen over each other in agreeing with mammy.
"God never intended for _human beings_ to live in flats," father said,after the elevator had put us down on dry land once more, drawing adeep breath.
"Nor in cities either," Rufe agreed, with a far-away look in his eyes,like he might be thinking of the chestnut hunts and black haws of hisboyhood.
That night they said well, they had found out they couldn't live inthe city, and they weren't going to be separated from me, and I _had_to be educated; so Rufe then told them that a governess was the nextbest thing. This sounded so much like a young girl in a book that atfirst I was delighted. A governess is a very clean person that alwaysexpects you to be the same. Only in books they are usuallydrab-colored young ladies without any nice clothes or parents, but theson of the family falls in love with them, much to their surprise, andthey lose their job. Then the son gets sent away to India with hisregiment, where he hopes he can meet sweet death through a bullethole. This is the way they are in books.
Mine, though, is not anything like that, being very pretty and pink,and with a regular father and mother like other folks have. But thereis a great mystery connected with her. Don't anybody but me know aboutit, and I don't know _all_ about it. From the very first she seemed tohave something on her mind; this is very unusual for a young girl, soI tried to find out what the cause of it was. One day at the dinnertable when she had been here about two weeks father remarked that Iwas learning faster from her than I ever had, and he hoped that shewould stay here with us until I was finished being educated and not bewanting to get married, like most young ladies. Miss Wilburn, insteadof laughing as one would expect, turned red in the face (her firstname is Louise) and said something that sounded like "Oh no!"
Mammy, who was in the room at the time, spoke up as she usually doesand said well, there must be something wrong with her if she didn'twant to marry, as all right-minded women married once and extra smartones married as often as there was any occasion to! Instead of smilingMiss Wilburn looked more painful than ever; so mammy, who thinksenough of her to _even_ do up her shirtwaists, changed the subject.
That night when I went into the kitchen to talk to mammy during thecooking her mind was still on the subject of Miss Wilburn andmarrying.
"Honey," she said to me, flipping over the cakes with greatconviction, "I've been thinking it over and the long and short of itis that pore child's been _fooled_! I know them _symptoms_! She's beenfooled and she's grievin' over it. Though thar ain't no use for awoman to grieve over nary _one_ man so long's she under forty and gotgood front teeth!"
I said oh, I hoped not. I hated to think about the lover of mygoverness proving false! I told mammy maybe he had just died orsomething else he couldn't help. But she interrupted me.
"Died nothin'! That ain't no excuse, for thar's allus time to marry nomatter what you're fixin' to do. Thar ain't nothin' no excuse for notmarryin' in this world," she kept on, "be it male or female. Youneedn't be settin' thar swingin' your legs and arguin' with _me_ aboutthe holy estate!"
The very first minute I thought there was anything of a loving natureconnected with Miss Wilburn I got out my diary to write it down, asyou see. She had told mother anyhow to let me keep it as it would"stimulate my mental faculties" and they would never be able to make achicken-picking person out of me. I'm going to keep it right here inthe drawer and jot down everything I see, although I am _convinced_that the lover is dead. Julius and Marcella are down here now for thefirst time since they were married. We see them a great deal, for theylove to go walking through the woods with Miss Wilburn and me; but Ican't waste my diary writing about them _now_.
I just happened to think what a pity it was that I didn't try to findout the mystery about Miss Wilburn from Rufe and Cousin Eunice when wewas up there last summer, for they knew her real well before we gother. In fact, for the first few days she and I didn't have anycongenial things to talk about except them and tiny Waterloo.Waterloo's little name by rights is Rufus Clayborne, Junior, and heoccurred at a time when I wasn't keeping my diary; but mygrandchildren would have known about him anyhow, he being their littlefifth cousin. He is very different from Bertha's baby, for he is aboy. I thought when I first saw him that if there was anything sweeterin this world than a girl baby it is a boy one!
Rufe and Cousin Eunice have lately been kinder New Thought persons,which think if you have "poise" enough there can't anything on earthconquer you. Rufe bragged particularly about nothing being able toconquer _him_ or get him in a bad temper, he had so much poise. Butwhen little Rufus was just three nights old and he had walked him theother _two_ and he was still squalling he threw up his job.
"Poise be hanged!" Cousin Eunice told us he said, "I've met _my_Waterloo!" And they've called him that ever since.
>
When we were up there in the summer Waterloo was giving his fatherconsiderable trouble about the editorials. An editorial is a smartremark opposite the society column; and Rufe couldn't think up smartthings while he was squalling.
"Oh, for a desert island!" he said one night when he was awful busyand couldn't get anything done. "Oh, for a mammoth haystack where Imight thrust my head to drown the noise--I've read that Jean JacquesRousseau used to do so! Listen, I've made a rhyme!"
"'Tis not rhymes but dimes we need most just now; so go on with yourwork," Cousin Eunice said, gathering Waterloo together to take himup-stairs.
"Merely removing the location of the noise will lessen it butslightly," Rufe called to her as she got to the door. "Seriously, doyou know of a hayloft in the neighborhood where I might go?"
"You might go next door to the Williams' garage and thrust your headinto their can of gasolene--_that's_ the latter-day equivalent forhay!" Cousin Eunice answered kinder-mad, for _she_ admires Waterloo,no matter how he acts.
So Miss Wilburn and I talked over all we knew about the little fellow;and I thought what a mistake I'd made in not asking Cousin Eunice whatMiss Wilburn's lover's name was and where he is buried and a few otherthings like that. But then I couldn't, because I didn't know thatthere was a lover. Still, Mammy Lou can talk till her hair turnsstraight and she won't get me to believe that he's anything else butdead. Everything seems to point to it, from the fact of her notgetting any letters from young men and looking lonesome at times andnot wearing any diamond engagement ring. I'm sure he gave her one,but maybe his wicked kinfolks made her give it back to them after thefuneral. Or maybe she buried it in his grave. I don't know why MissWilburn never talks about him for one of our neighbors talks all thetime about her husband which was killed in the war. I used to bedelighted to hear her commence telling about him. He was killed at thebattle of Shiloh and was the tallest and handsomest man in the army.She takes a great deal of pleasure in talking about him, and whenthere are summer boarders at her house he grows to be nearly sevenfeet tall and so handsome that it hurts your eyes to look at him. Hersecond husband is stone deaf and can't hear it thunder, which makes itnicer for them, for while it amuses her to talk about her firsthusband's good looks it ain't hurting to the second one's feelings.
The autumn leaves are just lovely now and make you want to write abook, or at least a piece of poetry. It's right hard on you, though,not to have anything to write about but a girl without a beau. It'skinder like eating sweet potatoes without butter. I decided thismorning that I better make the most of what I have got as a subject,so I started to writing one called _The Maiden Widow_. I've heard of abook by that name, but I don't reckon they'll have me arrested forwriting just a short poem by the same name. We have some nature studyevery morning in the woods, which is one of the best things abouthaving a governess. She lets me do just as I like, so I took my tabletand while she was writing some history questions I composed on mypoem. It is very discouraging work, though, to write about widows, forthere's nothing on earth that will rhyme with them. I got one line,"The maiden widow, she wept, she did, oh!" which was sorry enoughsounding, but I didn't know whether or not it was exactly fair to havetwo words rhyming with just one. After a while I thought maybe aregular poet could do a better job by it than even I could, so Idecided to ask Marcella to ask Julius to write me a few lines as acopy to go by, for anybody that can draw such lovely pictures ought tobe able to write poetry.
Marcella came over this afternoon and I took her up-stairs verysecretly to ask her about it. She said why, what on earth made methink that Miss Wilburn was grieving over a dead lover, and I told herthat _everything_ made me think it. After studying about it for alittle while she said well, it might be that I was right, for the girldid seem to have something preying on her mind. But she said suchsubjects were not suitable for children of my age to be writing aboutand that I ought to write about violets and sparrows. I said thenwould she please find out from Julius whether or not there was a rhymefor widow, for I might want to write a poem on them when I got grown,but she said, "Ann, you are incorrigible," which I keep forgetting tolook up in the dictionary, although it looks like I would, for it hasbeen said to me so many times.
A thing happened this morning which made me understand whatShakespeare must have meant when he said "Much Ado About Nothing." Itreminded me of the time Cousin Eunice rushed to the telephone andcalled Rufe up and said, "Oh, dearest, the baby's got a tooth!" Thiswas harmless enough in itself, but it is when things are misunderstoodthat the trouble comes in. Rufe misunderstood and thought she said,"The baby's got the croup," which is very dangerous. So he didn't stopto hear another word, but dropped the telephone and grabbed his hat.It was night, for Rufe's paper is a morning one that works its men atnight, and didn't wait for a car, but jumped into a carriage, whichcosts like smoke. He drove by Doctor Gordon's house and told thedriver to run in and tell Doctor Gordon to come right on and drive tohis house with him, as his baby was very sick, although Doctor Gordonhas an automobile of his own. He and Ann Lisbeth happened to have afew friends in to play cards with them that night, but when she heardthe news about the baby she told the company that Cousin Eunice wasone of the best friends she had in the world and she would have to goon over and see if she could help any. So the card party was broken upand they all drove as hard as they could tear over to Rufe's house,where they found Cousin Eunice tickled to death over the tooth andwashing Waterloo's little mouth out with boric acid water, which isthe proper thing. This is what I call much ado about nothing, and I'msure Shakespeare would if he was living to-day.
What happened this morning was equally as exciting and a long story,so I'm going to stop and sharpen my pencil, for I despise to writeexciting things with a pencil that won't half write.
I reckon some people might lay the blame on me for what happened, butit ain't so at all, if people hadn't just misunderstood me. Anyhow, itmay make me "curb my imagination," as Julius says, for that is whatthey blamed it all on.
When we started out for our nature study this morning father said ifwe could stand the sight of human nature a little would we go downtown right after train time and get the mail? We said yes andMarcella, who was with us, said she would be glad to go in thatdirection, for Julius was there and we could meet him and he wouldwalk home with us. She still likes to see him every few minutes in theday.
There are usually several very handsome drummers and insurance men andthings like that standing around the post-office which have just gotoff of the train at this hour, but this morning there wasn't anybodybut one strange man and he was talking to Julius like he knew him.When we passed by Julius spoke to us and I noticed that the strangeman looked at Miss Wilburn and looked surprised. All in a minute Ithought maybe he was the lover which had just returned from someforeign shore, instead of being dead, and would run up with openhands and say, "Louise," and she would say, "Marmaduke," and all wouldbe well.
I learned afterward, though, that his name is Mr. White and he livesin the city and has come down here on business and knew Julius. Afterwe had passed he remarked that he was surprised to see Miss Wilburndown here as he didn't know she was away from home. Julius asked himif he knew Miss Wilburn and he said no, but he knew Paul Creighton,the fellow she was going to marry, mighty well. Julius, instead of notsaying anything as a person ought, spoke up and said why he understoodthat Miss Wilburn's sweetheart was dead. The strange man said why hewas utterly shocked for he had seen Creighton on the streets only afew days before, but he _had_ looked kinder pale and worried then. Hesaid it made him feel weak in the knees to hear such a thing, andJulius commenced saying something about it must be a mistake then, butMr. White said no, he guessed it was so, for Mr. Creighton had lookedawful pale and thin, like he might be going into consumption. Juliussaid well he was certain his wife had told him something about MissWilburn having a dead lover, but he hadn't paid much attention to whatshe was saying, like most married men; but it surely couldn't be so.By that time Mr. White
was moving down the street to where we were andwas asking Julius to introduce him to Miss Wilburn, so he could findout the particulars about poor old Creighton. I _will_ give Juliuscredit for trying to stop him, but he is one of the kind of personsthat never knows when to say a thing and when not to, Mr. White, Imean. And before Julius could get him side-tracked they had caught upwith us and there wasn't anything else to do but introduce him. MissWilburn smiled very joyfully when she heard his name, and in a minutehe had got her off to one side and I heard him saying something abouthow horrified he was to hear the news about poor Creighton. In justan instant Miss Wilburn was the one that looked horrified and said why_what_? This seemed to bring Mr. White to his right mind a little andinstead of going ahead and telling it he turned around to Julius andsaid:
"Why our friend, Young, here, was telling me that----"
"I _told_ you that it must be a mistake," Julius spoke up, lookingawfully uncomfortable, "but I remember my wife saying that--oh, say,Marcella, explain--will you?"
"Why, Julius Young," Marcella commenced in a married-lady tone, "youpromised me that you wouldn't say a word about it; anyway we onlysuspected----"
"Will _nobody_ tell me what has happened to Paul?" Miss Wilburn saidin a low, strangled voice, like she couldn't get her breath good.
"Ain't anything happened to him that _we_ know of," I told her, forJulius and the rest of them looked like they were speechless. "Wethought _you_ knew it!"
"Knew _what_? Oh, for the love of Heaven, tell me!" she said, poorthing! And I felt awful sorry for us all, but for Miss Wilburn and mein particular.
I just couldn't tell her we thought he was _plumb_ dead, so I told herwe thought he must be very sick or something.
"He may be," she answered, not looking any happier. "I haven't heardfrom him since I've been here! Oh, it serves me right for acting suchan idiot as to run off down here and forbid his writing to me! He maybe desperately ill! How did you hear it?"
"Ain't anybody heard it _yet_!" I told her, feeling so angry atMarcella and Julius and Mr. White for telling such a thing and soashamed of myself for making it up that I couldn't think very well. Ikept wishing in my mind that it was the first day of April so I couldsay "April Fool," or an earthquake would happen or _anything_ else topass it off; but didn't anything happen, so I had to stand there withall of them looking at me and tell Miss Wilburn how Mammy Lou said_she_ believed she had been fooled because she looked so sad at themention of marrying, but _I_ believed the gentleman was dead.
Well, it took every one of us every step of the way home to explain itto her and to each other, each one of us talking as hard as we could;and Julius remarked what he'd do the next time he heard any such"sewing-society tales" under his breath.
Just as we got in sight of the house poor Miss Wilburn was so worn outwith grief and anxiety that she sat down on the big stump and laughedand cried as hard as she could. Mother saw her from the window and sheand mammy ran down to where we were to see what it was all about. Shepatted Miss Wilburn on the back and on the head and said, "poor dear,"while mammy said she would run right back to the house and brew hersome strong tea, which was splendid when a body was distressed about aman.
"There, dear, talk to us about him," mother said, after the wholestory was told, "tell us about him, for talking will do you good.You've been unnaturally quiet about him since you've been here!"
"I was trying to find out whether or not I really loved him," MissWilburn said, after Julius and Marcella had left us and we were goingon up the walk. "It was silly of me, for all the time I've been solonesome for him that I felt as if I should scream if anybodysuggested men or marrying to me!"
"Yes, you pore lamb," mammy said, walking on fast to make the tea,"you loves him, you shore do. I knows them symptoms!"
The Annals of Ann Page 8
