 | CHAPTER V. Dollars and cents |  |
5. CHAPTER V.
He that will have a cake out of the wheat, must needs tarry the grinding.
Shakspeare.
“I DO wish I could do something to-morrow,” said I.
“Do something to-morrow!” said my uncle Ned.
“And what ails to-morrow that it should have something
done on it, of all days in the year?”
“Because papa is going to Kellerton to-day, and Kate and
Stephanie will come home with him to-morrow;—and I do
so want to make a fuss.”
“There will be fuss enough, I'll warrant you,” said my
father. “If you would prepare an anodyne to be administered
as soon as they get here, there'd be some sense in it,
Gracie.”
“There wouldn't be much fun, papa,—and I haven't seen
Kate in so long—and one can't have bonfires by daylight.”
“Why don't you put up a flag?” said my stepmother.
“A flag!—so I might! that would be the very thing.
But then I don't know where to put it—and papa will be
away.”—
“And I will come and do it for you,” said my uncle.
“Will you really? O I should be so very glad. But
where shall we put it? and where can I get a flag?—O I
know!—those red curtains would be splendid!”
“No indeed,” said my uncle,—“I have no notion of hoisting
Captain Kidd's colours at Glen Luna.”
“And besides,” said Mrs. Howard, “the red curtains are
too heavy to fly well, and much too good to be let fly at all.
But there are some white muslin curtains, Grace, that you
may sew together if you like.”
“Well—thank you mamma—only I'm afraid they won't
shew much.”
“Couldn't anything shew better,” said Mr. Ned. “You
sew them up, and we will raise the flag on that high bluff
that looks down the Honiton turnpike,—the white muslin
will make a great appearance against the green woods.”
“And then papa,” I said anxiously, “you will be sure not
to forget to make them look for it?”
“Suppose they are riding backwards?” said my father.
“Now papa!—you know they won't be—you mustn't
let them. I should be so disappointed if they didn't see my
flag after all.”
“That shall not be, dear, if I can help it,” he answered
with a smile,—“if they can't see out of the window I'll put
them on the roof, and if they are asleep I'll wake them up;
—so make your little heart easy.”
The white curtains were upon my mind when I awoke
next morning—indeed I might say that everything else in
my mind was curiously wrapped up in them; so that I could
hardly get at an idea of any sort, except through the medium
of their white folds.
It was the fourth of June,—early summer in reality,
while in effect it was yet spring; for the season had been
very late; but now it was pushing its way with a very lovely
and quiet working. The bright sheen of the late rain was upon
everything; the trees in a perfect hurry to get their leaves
out,—it seemed as if they had grown inches since yesterday,
and our plan could not have had finer weather.
With needle and thread we transformed two curtains into
one big flag, fastened it to the top of a pole, and then Mr.
Ned and I set off for the Brown bluff with an Irish boy for
standard-bearer. There was no regular path—or we missed
it—and many a delusive opening in the woods, many a
promising little hill, lured us on to new disappointments. If
my will had not been stronger than my feet I should hardly
have reached the bluff at all; but once there, the rest was
easy. We chose the most promising tree, and then Andy
squirrelized to the top, and receiving the pole from my uncle
lashed it to the upper branches,—with so many knots and
twistings that the future unfastening thereof seemed problematical.
And away went the white folds of our flag of truce,—
hanging lazily for a moment among the pine boughs, and
possible north wind. If we had foreseen what was before us,
we could have shewn no more appropriate colours on our
first settling at Glen Luna.
We watched the flag for a little, speculating upon the
probable distance to which it could be seen, and then turned
homeward. The moccasin flowers were fully out now, and
in beautiful variety. Some very tall and of the most delicate
pink, while in others the rich depth of colour seemed to
compensate for a lower growth. My hand was never ruthless
in the matter of picking, but I could hardly pass by such
beauties; and with some late anemonies, an early wild lily,
and corydalis flowers, I soon had enough to dress a vase
to put in Kate's room.
How weary I was then!—with having done so much and
with having no more to do. Weary of waiting for the stage-horn
which I thought would never blow; and then fluttered
and excited when I heard the faint sound in the distance, and
stood watching for the first glimpse of the carriage. We
had an April meeting, all round; but the rest of the day was
clear sunshine. I remember that we found the first ripe
strawberry and the first wild violet that afternoon: that we
told everything and showed everything, and yet could not
be satisfied with telling and showing;—that we settled down
into being very quiet and happy, despite bare floors and
confusion. Kate had seen the flag miles away, and had received
all the messages that I sent my absent sister through
its white folds.
“And how do you like the looks of things, Katie?” said
my father next morning at breakfast.
“The place is lovely, papa.”
“And what isn't lovely?”
“Why nothing, I suppose,” said Kate rather dubiously—
“only I was thinking of what Mrs. Osborne said, `that nobody
lived here.'”
“Mrs. Osborne said that, did she? Well, if I am as wise
for a man as she is for a woman, I make no doubt we shall
get through the world comfortably.”
“But seriously Mr. Howard,” said Stephanie, “are we to
have anything in the way of neighbours?”
“There'll be plenty of them in our way, I'm afraid,” said
Moon.”
“Uncle Ned does not think very much of his neighbours,”
said Kate, “and who are ours, papa? what do you mean by
`plenty'?”
“Plenty, my dear, is defined by Johnson to be `such a
quantity as is more than enough'.”
“But what do you call enough neighbours?” said Stephanie.
“Depends entirely on the kind”—replied Mr. Howard.
“If the kind were Mrs. Osborne I should call herself
`plenty'.”
“Ah papa! you are too bad. Who is there here that we
shall be apt to see?”
“Why there's your old friend Mrs. De Camp, and our
new friend Miss Caffery, and there is Mr. Collingwood's
family.”
“Mr. Collingwood is only a farmer,” said Kate.
“And if he were a fair type of the class, it would be well
if all the world were `only farmers'. I am thankful Osbornes
don't grow in the country!—Then my dear when I
get my stone cottages built, you know we can sell them to
whom we please; and for the present we are at least in a
wholesome atmosphere.”
“Stone cottages!” cried Mrs. Howard.
“Why yes,” said my father.—“Ned thinks and so do I
that there is more land here than I want myself; and I talk
of putting up a few cottages to sell or let.”
“And how much would it cost?”
“O I don't know exactly—not much,—there's abundance
of fine stone on the spot,—they would pay for themselves in
no time.”
“I don't believe it,” said Mrs. Howard,—“you'll just lay
the foundations with dollars and there it will end—unless
you are ruined by the means.”
“Poh!—I tell you they couldn't help paying for themselves,
and I shall set men to getting out stone at once.
Ruined, indeed! And by the way I mean to take some
specimens of the stone over to—what's the name of the
place?—where they are to build this college—Ethan,—I
don't doubt the trustees will buy of me, for I never saw
For a little while after his departure my stepmother sat
eyeing her coffee cup with a somewhat sad expression of
face; but then rousing herself she remarked that whatever
else was done we might as well get in order. And for
many days that was the word. Busily we all worked at
jobs too nice and delicate for hired hands,—books could be
dusted and arranged by none but our own; and if Mr.
Howard's head had not been full of granite and cottages, he
would hardly have trusted even us to unpack his precious
shells and minerals. But for the time the new hobby supplanted
the old. What he was about we could not always
tell,—there was great talk of mills and mill-dams, roads and
plantations; and Mr. Ned Howard and my father would
come bustling in, and desire a dusted table in all haste,—to
be as quickly covered with maps and plans. New ones,
just finished apparently,—coloured and uncoloured, lithograph,
pen and ink, and pencil. Here a road going smoothly
through impassable places,—and there an imposing row of
stone cottages about which a fine young forest had suddenly
sprung up—but that might have been the lithographer's
fancy. Then the scene changed to wheels and timbers and
foaming torrents,—a half-finished mill-dam, with a cart and
horse comfortably carrying out gravel;—and at the bottom
a long string of units and tens and hieroglyphics—“wheels
—say so much,” and “mill-stones—say so much.”
“If you were anybody else I should laugh at you,” said
Mrs. Howard one day when she had been listening and
looking on. “As it is it comes too near home, and is too
serious work.”
“A great deal too serious!” said my uncle looking up
with a very excited face. “The thing to laugh at will be
the profits.”
“When I see them.”—
“I don't believe you would look at them if they were
here,” said my father, whose hobby did not like a check.
“And if I am to laugh at the profits,” said my stepmother
gently, and laying her hand on his shoulder, “what shall I
do when I see the loss?”
“Laugh at that too”—said Mr. Howard, but with a change
he added looking up at the eyes that were brighter than he
liked to see them, and with no touch of impatience now in
voice or manner,—“you don't know anything about the
matter—won't that content you?”
“It would if I could think so.”
“Well think so,” he said smiling and taking her hand,—
“have you so little trust in my sense as to suppose that I
shall take a flying leap off a precipice?”
“But I did hear of a man once,” said my stepmother with
an answering smile, “who being upon a wild horse could
not dismount, and had to go whither the horse carried him.”
A momentary expression of doubt which I had once or
twice seen before, crossed my father's face:—then shaking
it off he said laughingly,
“Never fear—I will make sure that the horse is a tame
one.”—
And seeing that more words would be useless, my stepmother
as usual spoke them not.
| CHAPTER V. Dollars and cents | |