Chance of a Lifetime

by Grace Livingston Hill

  “Well, yes, I have faith in—well, in the way you were brought up. And I know you are a sweet, good girl. But you put a good sound apple among a lot of rotten ones and leave it there long enough, and you know what’ll happen.”

  “Well, Grandmother, I’m not going to stay there long enough for that. And anyway, if I see myself getting specked, I’ll send for Keith to come and drag me home. Besides, isn’t God supposed to keep His children?”

  “I’m not so sure He’s going to keep you when you go among the world. You remember what a peck of trouble the Israelites got into when they went down into Egypt, and Lot when he went to live in Sodom.”

  “Mother!” said Mary Washburn. “You ought not to talk that way to the child. She’s almost on the edge of backing out, even now.”

  “Well, perhaps not,” said Grandma, “but I wouldn’t like to see Sherrill spoiled.”

  “Grandmother,” said Sherrill earnestly, “there’s a difference you don’t take into account. I’m not going into Sodom to live, nor because I want to go. If this isn’t an up and down duty, I won’t stir a step! Aren’t we told to be in the world and not of it? Can’t God help me through a place like that? Well, I’m letting Him,” said Sherrill. “Now, Mother, I’ve got these laces all ripped, hadn’t I better wash them before I go? I think there is time.”

  “No, you run along. Harriet likes to do things when she plans. I’ll wash the lace and have it ready for you when you get back. She’ll likely want you to stay to lunch, so don’t worry about anything here. Grandma and I’ll just have that little bit of soup that was left over, and we won’t make a bit of fuss.”

  But Sherrill was back inside of half an hour, two great boxes in her arms and her eyes shining like two stars. Behind her came the beloved friend of the family, her face almost as pleased as Sherrill’s.

  “I couldn’t wait, Mother!” called Sherrill from the walk as she came through the garden. “I want you and Grandmother to see what wonderful things I’ve got!”

  “She’s going to put them on over here and let you see them the first time,” announced the satisfied donor as she entered behind Sherrill, carrying two more boxes.

  “For the land sakes,” exclaimed Grandma, laying her ripping blade carefully away in the drawer and preparing to enjoy the show. “If it takes all those boxes to hold what you’ve bought her, I don’t think there’s much need of our ripping up any more old clothes.”

  “Oh, there isn’t much,” said Harriet Masters. “Remember I haven’t any daughter to spend on, and I just enjoyed picking out pretty things for Sherrill. Mary always said she might be half mine sometimes.”

  “Of course,” said Mary Washburn quickly, remembering Harriet’s little daughter who had lived but three short months, and whose death was followed by the tragic death of the baby’s father. If it gave this dear friend pleasure to take a motherly interest in her child, why, they must not let a false idea of independence spoil that pleasure. She sent Sherrill a warning glance and wreathed her own face in smiles of eagerness. After all, of course any mother wanted to see her dear daughter dressed in beautiful garments, even if she could not afford to buy them for her herself.

  So Sherrill put on the lovely white velvet first, whose frosty sheen and simplicity of cut made Sherrill look like a young seraph, just dropped down from some heavenly sphere.

  It was fashioned cunningly, so plain, so simple, so modest and attractive that a little child might have worn it, yet with a trick of line, and fold and fullness here and there, a sweep of delicate edge, and curve, that gave it a classic look. Silver girdled and silver clasped, it had an air that marked it with distinction, while yet being so severely simple that even to the unsophisticated eyes of Grandma, it did not look or seem out of place, or overdressed for Sherrill.

  “She’ll need a pair of silver shoes of course,” said the family adviser, “but they will go with other evening things, too. Silver stockings and shoes.”

  “I’d like to see her dressed in that going around with other pretty girls,” said Sherrill’s mother wistfully.

  “You wouldn’t like what a good many of the other girls wore,” said her friend. “How the girls of today can go around showing so much of their ugly bones, I can’t understand, and their long, skinny arms. It isn’t legs, it’s arms, and if it isn’t knees, it’s spines. Just somehow to look naked, that’s all they care!”

  Sherrill’s mother looked troubled.

  “Perhaps I ought not to make her go,” said she in a worried tone. “I know the dressing of today is not what I approve, and I have reason to suspect that my sister-in-law does not think as I do about these things.”

  The visitor gave her a curious, thoughtful look and wondered if she had any realization just what a far cry it was between the world’s standards and those of the guarded group where

  Sherrill had grown up, but she gave a little, encouraging laugh.

  “Oh well,” she said brightly, “Sherrill has got to learn to hold her own among those who don’t see as she does. Here’s hoping your sister-in-law will strike a happy medium between Rockland and the ultra extremists.”

  “Mother, New York isn’t the only place where they have bare backs. Helen Clancey has one. I saw it at the dressmaker’s when I went with Rose Hawthorn to her fitting.”

  “Well, of course,” said Mrs. Washburn. “Helen has no mother. What could you expect of the niece of Mrs. Rutherford Barnes?”

  “What I am worried about,” said Grandma, “is that Sherrill will get her ideas changed when she gets used to seeing people wear these outlandish things, and doing the things she’s always been taught to feel are wrong.”

  “But dearie,” said Mrs. Masters, “don’t you give Sherrill the credit of having something more than ideas? I think they go deeper than that. Somewhere behind it all, there is a principle, and it’s the principle that Sherrill will be true to, no matter what, or I’m very much mistaken in Sherrill.”

  Sherrill gave her friend a grateful glance and went on admiring the lovely folds of the velvet.

  “It’s wonderful, Harriet,” said Mary Washburn. “We never can thank you enough.”

  “Well, don’t try,” said Harriet Masters shortly. “If Sherrill gets half as much pleasure out of it as I did in buying it for her, I’ll be more than paid. Now Sherrill, get out the other things!”

  “It looks like the heavenly garment of righteousness,” said Grandma wistfully as Sherrill walked across the room, and the graceful folds of the velvet clung about her like a lily sheath.

  But Mary said nothing more as she watched her girl. She was thinking what Sherrill’s father would have said at the sweet vision she made in the lovely frock, wishing he were where she might tell him about it, at least.

  The wrap was a bright little affair of satin and embroidery. Grandma and Mother looked at their girl in the strange, soft garments as if she had suddenly become a tableau. The grand clothes seemed to set her apart in another world from them.

  Then there was a charming turquoise taffeta, full and soft, with little puffed sleeves, a round neck, and a full skirt finished with bound scallops. Bunches of tiny sweetheart roses hung from the belt on slim, gleaming ribbons and nestled at the corsage, and Sherrill looked like a demure doll in it.

  “Oh, you oughtn’t do so much, Harriet,” reproached Mary looking at her child with tender eyes. “But that is lovely. I don’t know which is prettier, the blue or the white.”

  “Both for different occasions. The white for very formal, the blue for cheerful little occasions. But it just suits her type, doesn’t it? And it couldn’t fit better if it had been made to order. Now, don’t scold. There’s just one more, and I had to get it, it was so sweet. It’s just one of those little knitted ensembles. They’re so useful everywhere, and you have to pay so much for them over here, it seemed wicked not to get it when I found just the right thing.”

  Harriet opened another box and brought out a brown knitted dress of heavy silk, with coat to match. The bor
der was of shades of rose and green and gold, and blended beautifully with the woodsy shade of the brown.

  “That,” said Harriet practically, “will do to wear in Rockland just as well as in New York. You can use it almost anywhere and be well dressed. They are very stylish and sensible, I think.”

  Sherrill, bright eyed and pink cheeked, arrayed herself in the knitted ensemble and walked back and forth for their admiration, and wondered in her heart if it was altogether right to be so glad over just clothes.

  Then there were some boxes of exquisite lingerie, and a charming little negligee, all butterflies on a sky-blue ground that fell in lovely folds about her.

  “It’s just like being Cinderella,” said Sherrill, sitting down among her treasures excitedly. “I’m sure I never will be able to eat or sleep again, I’m so unreal.”

  “You precious child,” said Harriet Masters, with a tender, faraway look in her eyes, watching Sherrill folding her pretty things in boxes, and thinking how her little girl would have done the same thing if she had only lived.

  “I shall be completely spoiled!” declared Sherrill. “I can feel my head is turned already”—and she twisted her curly brown mop toward her mother.

  “There are some things that don’t spoil,” said the guest. “I think you are one of them.”

  “Harriet! You will spoil her!” said the mother with a loving, anxious glance toward her child.

  “Well, if she’s got to go,” said Grandma, “I’m glad she’s going right! I couldn’t stand it to see that Eloise turn up her nose at Sherrill’s outfit.”

  “Mother! I never suspected you of being worldly.” Mary laughed, hurrying away to get some lunch on the table and insisting that the guest should stay.

  Keith came home unexpectedly for lunch and had to see the new clothes and admire everything, and join in the thanks.

  “Now, I’ll only have to get a coat,” chanted Sherrill happily. “I can make all the rest of my outfits, I’m sure. Aunt Harry has shown me her things, and there are the duckiest little dresses. So easy to copy. I’m positive I can do it. Isn’t she a dear? She’s letting me copy every pretty thing she’s got.”

  “A coat,” said Keith thoughtfully. “What kind of a coat?”

  “Oh, just a coat,” said Sherrill contentedly. “I can perfectly get it and all the little things I need out of that wonderful check you gave me.”

  “Mmmm!” said Keith. “Well, don’t get it right away. I may have an idea!”

  “Now, Keith!” said Sherrill in instant alarm. “You’re not to do another thing for me. If you do, I’ll go and spend this whole check on a new suit and an overcoat for you! So there!”

  It was a happy lunchtime, and the guest enjoyed it as much as anyone, entering into the plans for Sherrill’s journey as if she were her own mother. They ate excellent fried potatoes and cold ham and apple sauce and raised biscuits with a relish, and talked so long that Keith suddenly looked at his watch and found he was going to be late at the office.

  Then Sherrill gathered pins and newspapers and her pet scissors and prepared to go back with Harriet Masters and take off patterns from the imported frocks, with which to glorify her old clothes.

  Chapter 10

  The days went by swiftly.

  Willa Barrington took the position in the bank that Sherrill had given up, and Sherrill had her time free to get ready.

  Every morning she spent sewing, and part of the afternoons when she was not helping her mother in the house. Little by little the charming wardrobe grew, hanging under chintz covers in the closet of the guest room: the green satin, made over after a Paquin model, with touches of old lace treated in coffee, and laboriously “picked out” by Grandma’s frail fingers; the brown satin became a brown cape, with Belgian embroidery on the sleeves and a quaint buckle that had come from Cairo, and had an accompanying necklace of antique filigree set with strange old stones of many colors. Aunt Harriet’s trunks were a never-ending source of treasures to “finish off” whatever Sherrill was trying to make.

  The handsome old brocade worked into a wonderful blouse and skirt, with a vest of rare old lace to set off its quaintness. An old thread lace shawl of Grandma’s supplied the black lace dress that Harriet Masters said was indispensable. Sherrill bought black velvet and copied a dress from Paris that looked very smart indeed when it was done. And as she hung them away, one by one, proudly, her heart ached with every new accomplishment. If only she might stay at home and wear those pretty clothes among her friends, whom she loved!

  Yet, of course, with it all there was an elation at the thought of going away and seeing things. Going away and doing things! Seeing the world, living a storybook existence for a little while in a grand mansion, and not having to lift a finger for herself. Certainly that would be fun for a while. If only she could take all her friends with her!

  Almost every evening she saw Alan MacFarland for a few minutes at least. But Alan was hard at work, and there was little time for games of tennis, which had made the summer so happy. Alan was working day and night, trying to pull his father’s business back into shape. With Judge Whiteley’s assistance, things were bidding fair to be on a more prosperous basis than ever before, but Alan was pale and thin, and wore his lips in a determined line that made him seem suddenly older. Sometimes Sherrill felt just a little hurt that he had to stay away so much, couldn’t even go down to the Flats with her as he used to do to call on some of their protégés in the early evening. She had to get Keith to take her once or twice.

  But one day in the third week of November, Alan came early in the evening and brought a little box with him, and when he gave it to Sherrill, he sat and watched her open it, like a child with a new doll.

  Sherrill was astonished. Alan had never given her presents, except now and then a book at Christmas, or a box of candy for her birthday, and this was neither. She opened the box and lifted out a necklace of pearl beads, holding them up with delight.

  “Oh, Alan,” she said, “how lovely! How wonderful for you to give them to me. But you shouldn’t have spent so much money on me—”

  “Now don’t begin that, Sherry!” protested the boy. “I’ve had the time of my life earning the money for those. I wanted you to have something to take with you to remind you of me. I only wish they were real pearls. Someday maybe I can buy pearls. But these are good imitations. Your Mrs. Masters picked them out for me in the city. She said they were what everybody was wearing and were good enough to go with your Paris dresses.”

  “Oh, Alan, they are lovely,” said Sherrill ecstatically. “I wouldn’t want real pearls. I’d be afraid they would be stolen. And these are beautiful! They look real to me. Why, Alan, Alan!” And her voice drew her near to tears. “I’ll have to give you a kiss for those!”

  Then right before her grandmother, who was sitting in her rocker, darning some old lace for Sherrill’s dress; and before her mother, who was setting the table for breakfast; and before Keith, who had looked up from reading the evening paper, she rushed over and dropped a tiny little kiss on the very top of Alan’s handsome brown head. Then she slipped back to her chair and began to put the beads around her neck.

  Alan’s face turned purple, but his eyes took on a happy light, and Grandma had a satisfied look around her lips.

  “Now you know why I couldn’t come over and help you with the place cards for the Thanksgiving dinner,” said the boy to cover his embarrassment. “Mrs. Masters was going in town the next day to get the necklace and I had to see her about it.”

  “Oh, Alan! And I scolded you for not coming to help,” said Sherrill penitently.

  “Oh, that’s all right!” said the boy. “Does one good to be scolded. I’m glad you like it, if it is only beads. Just put it on when your aunt brings around that other guy she expects you to land, and perhaps you won’t forget old friends entirely.”

  He finished with a laugh, but there was a huskiness in his voice, and Sherrill’s eyes were misty with feeling as she gave him a l
ook that comforted him.

  After they had gone into the parlor to try over some of the songs that were to be sung at the Thanksgiving dinner, and Keith had gone out to see a man on business, Grandma looked up with a gleam in her old eye.

  “That was a nice pretty thing for that boy to do,” she said, with a keen look at her daughter.

  “Yes, wasn’t it,” said Mary quickly. “He’s a dear boy.”

  “In my day we wouldn’t have thought we could accept anything valuable like that, unless we were engaged.”

  “Nonsense, Mother! They’re only beads,” said Mary Washburn sharply. “And he’s only a boy. Don’t, for pity’s sake, put anything like that into Sherrill’s head.”

  “Well, I’m not quite a fool, Mary, though you seem to think I am sometimes,” replied the old lady smartly. “But I don’t see that that’s any worse than talking about Sherrill’s going to New York to make a clever marriage.”

  “Oh, Mother,” said Mary, and her voice had a note of anguish in it, “that wasn’t serious. We were only joking about what Eloise had said. Sherrill doesn’t take anything but fun out of that.”

  “ Well, I can tell you who did,” said Grandma wisely, nodding toward the parlor door. “That boy in there did!”

  “Oh, Mother, no he didn’t,” said Mary. “He knew we were just joking.”

  “He’s a nice boy, Mary, and Sherrill oughtn’t to hurt him.”

  “Mother, please don’t talk that way. Sherrill isn’t going to hurt anybody. They will hear you. I wouldn’t have any notions put in their heads just now for anything. They are just children, I tell you.”

  “Well, Mary, I can tell you one thing,” said her mother after a pause, “they won’t be children when Sherrill gets back. They’ll have grown up! If you want to keep Sherrill a child a little longer, you’d better keep her at home.”

  “I wish I could,” said Mary fervently, with a sudden pang that her child was to go away, “but I guess it’s right that she should go.”