University of Virginia Library

6. CHAPTER VI.
RAISING THE WIND.

“Where are you going now?” asked Mrs. Carter of
her daughter, as she saw her preparing to go out one
afternoon, a few weeks after the engagement.

“Going to raise the wind,” was the answer.

“Going to what?” exclaimed Mrs. Carter.

“To raise the wind! Are you deaf?” yelled Lenora.

“Raise the wind!” repeated Mrs. Carter; “what do
you mean?”

“Mean what I say,” said Lenora; and closing the door
after her she left her mother to wonder “what fresh mischief
the little torment was at.”

But she was only going to make a friendly call on
Margaret and Carrie, the latter of whom she had heard
was sick.

“Is Miss Hamilton at home?” asked she of the servant
girl, who answered her ring, and whom she had
never seen before.

Yes, ma'am; walk in the parlor. What name shall I
give her if you please?”

“Miss Carter,—Lenora Carter;” and the servant girl
departed, repeating to herself all the way up the stairs,
“Miss Carther,—Lenora Carther!”

“Lenora Carter want to see me!” exclaimed Mag,
who, together with Kate Kirby, was in her sister's room.

“Yes, ma'am; an' sure 'twas Miss Hampleton she was
wishin' to see,” said the Irish girl.

“Well, I shall not go down,” answered Mag. “Tell
her, Rachel, that I am otherwise engaged.”

“Oh, Maggie,” said Carrie, “why not see her? I
would if I were you.”

“Rachel can ask her up here if you wish it,” answered
Mag, “but I shall leave the room.”

“Faith, an' what shall I do?” asked Rachel, who was
fresh from “swate Ireland” and felt puzzled to know why
a “silk frock and smart bonnet” should not always be
welcome.

“Ask her up,” answered Kate. “I've never seen her
nearer than across the church and have some curiosity —”

A moment after Rachel thrust her head in at the parlor
door, saying, “If you please, ma'am, Miss Marget is
engaged, and does not want to see you, but Miss Carrie
says you may come up there.”

“Very well,” said Lenora; and tripping after the servant
girl, she was soon in Carrie's room.

After retailing nearly all the gossip of which she was
mistress, she suddenly turned to Carrie, and said, “Did
you know that your father was going to be married?”

“My father going to be married!” said Carrie, opening
her blue eyes in astonishment. “My father going to
be married! To whom, pray?”

“To a lady from the east,—one whom he used to know

and flirt with when he was in college!” was Lenora's
grave reply.

“What is her name?” asked Kate.

“Her name? Let me see,— Miss — Blackwell,— Blackmer,—
Blackheart. It sounds the most like Blackheart.”

“What a queer name,” said Kate, “but tell us what
opportunity has Mr. Hamilton had of renewing his early
acquaintance with the lady.”

“Don't you know he's been east this winter?” asked
Lenora.

“Yes, as far as Albany,” answered Carrie.

“Well,” continued Lenora, “'t was during his eastern
trip that the matter was settled; but pray don't repeat
it from me, except it be to Maggie, who, I dare say, will
feel glad to be relieved of her heavy responsibilities;—but
as I live, Carrie, you are crying! What is the matter?”

But Carrie made no answer, and for a time wept on in
silence. She could not endure the thought that another
would so soon take the place of her lost mother in the
household and in the affections of her father. There was,
besides, something exceedingly annoying in the manner
of her who communicated the intelligence, and secretly
Carrie felt glad that the dreaded, “Miss Blackheart” had,
of course, no Lenora to bring with her!

“Do you know all this to be true?” asked Kate.

“Perfectly true,” said Lenora. “We have friends living
in the vicinity of the lady, and there can be no mistake,
except indeed in the name, which I am not sure is
right!”

Then hastily kissing Carrie, the little hussy went away,
very well satisfied with her afternoon's call. As soon as
she was out of hearing Margaret entered her sister's room,
and on noticing Carrie's flushed cheek and red eyes, inquired

the cause. Immediately Kate told her what Lenora
had said, but instead of weeping as Carrie had done,
she betrayed no emotion whatever.

“Why, Maggie, ain't you sorry?” asked Carrie.

“No, I am glad,” returned Mag. “I've seen all along
that sooner or later father would make himself ridiculous,
and I'd rather he'd marry forty women from the east,
than one woman not far from here whom I know.”

All that afternoon Mag tripped with unwonted gayety
about the house. A weight was lifted from her heart,
for in her estimation, any one whom her father would
marry was preferable to Mrs. Carter.

Oh, how the widow scolded the daughter, and how the
daughter laughed at the widow, when she related the particulars
of her call.

“Lenora, what could have possessed you to tell such a
lie?” said Mrs. Carter.

“Not so fast, mother mine,” answered Lenora.
“'Twasn't a lie. Mr. Hamilton is engaged to a lady
from the east. He did flirt with her in his younger days;
and, pray, didn't he have to come east when he called to
inquire after his beloved classmates, and ended by getting
checkmated! Besides I think you ought to thank me
for turning the channel of gossip in another direction,
for now you will be saved from all impertinent questions
and remarks.”

This mode of reasoning failed to convince the widow,
who felt quite willing that people should know of her
flattering prospects; and when, a few days after, Mrs.
Dr. Otis told her that Mrs. Kimball said that Polly Larkins
said, that her hired girl told her, that Mrs. Kirby's

hired girl told her, that she overheard Miss Kate telling
her mother, that Lenora Carter said that Mr. Hamilton
was going to be married to her mother's intimate friend,
Mrs. Carter would have denied the whole, and probably
divulged her own secret, had not Lenora, who chanced
to be present, declared, with the coolest effrontery, that
'twas all true—that her mother had promised to stand up
with them; and so folks would find it to be if they did
not die of curiosity before autumn!

Lenora, child, how can you talk so?” asked the distressed
lady, as the door closed upon her visitor.

Lenora went off into fits of explosive laughter, bounding
up and down like an India rubber ball, and at last
condescended to say, “I know what I'm about. Do you
want Mag Hamilton breaking up the match, as she surely
would do, between this and autumn, if she knew it?”

“And what can she do?” asked Mrs. Carter.

“Why, returned Lenora, “can't she write to the place
you came from, if, indeed, such a spot can be found, for
I believe you sometimes book yourself from one town
and sometimes from another? But depend upon it, you
had better take my advice and keep still, and in the denouément
which follows, I alone shall be blamed for a
slight stretch of truth which you can easily excuse, as
“one of dear Lenora's silly, childish freaks!”

Upon second thoughts Mrs. Carter concluded to follow
her daughter's advice, and the next time Mr. Hamilton
called, she laughingly told the story which Lenora
had set afloat, saying, by way of excuse, that the dear
girl did not like to hear her mother joked on the subject
of matrimony, and had turned the attention of people
another way.

Mr. Hamilton hardly relished this, and half wished,
mayhap, as, indeed, gentlemen generally do in similar circumstances,

that the little “objection” in the shape of
Lenora, had never had existence, or at least had never
called the widow mother!