 | CHAPTER XIV. Dollars and cents |  |
14. CHAPTER XIV.
Likes both his company and commons;
Displays his talents, sits till ten;
Next day invited, comes again.
Cowper. (Horace.)
WELL might my father say “Good Miss Caffery!”—our
hearts echoed it many times in the course of that
afternoon. The mere sight of her would have soothed
most people; and her white dress, so delicately ruffled,
was enough to unruffle every one else. Her tone of voice
too was so pleasant, so feelingly gentle, that one was
touched as well as interested by what she said. Every
word and look spoke the eminent humanity of her nature,
but said as plainly that it was humanity purified. I never
saw her now without thinking of Mr. Collingwood's words,
“a lovely and well-developed christian character,”—they
helped me to understand what before I had only felt. It
was like being shown the secret spring whence came some
indefinable freshness of the atmosphere.
I do not mean that we were all out of humour on that
eventful day, but there was some embarrassment or anxiety
with each one—now and then with my father a little
moodiness. But Miss Easy seemed to smooth away
everything,—no one could be in such a ray without for the
time at least, assuming its colour.
Miss Avarintha was as usual peculiar: very unwilling
that things should go on quietly, and not having the least
idea how to put her finger in with judgment. Mrs. De
Camp was full of talk; the Captain very bland and benign;
and Mr. Freeman (when he thought my father was thinking
of some one else) very happy and comfortable. He
all disturbance from trifles; but Miss Holbrook herself
was well disposed to give the aforesaid finger a rap
over the knuckles every time she encountered it; and if
she sometimes forbore in deference to Kate's look of reproof,
it was only to utter an energetic aside about “the
Bain of her life.”
In the evening when my father and I were walking
about and joining everybody by turns for the sake of variety,
Mr. Collingwood came in; and like us took a promenade
ticket. Miss Bain had just crossed the room to make an
attack.
“Where do you reside now sir?” she began. “At least
I don't mean now—of course you are at the Moon and
likely there to continue, I suppose, for some time—but
where have you been residing?”
“Really ma'am,” said Mr. Freeman returning from the
antipodes, “I can hardly say,—I did live in New York
until the last six months.”
“And since then?”
“Since then,” he replied, laughing partly at his questioner
and partly at what he was going to say,—“Since then
ma'am, my head has been in the condition of a family in
moving time—the house in one place and the furniture in
another,—of course my existence has been somewhat compounded
and intermediate.”
One summer's day, but Love and Reason,'
Freeman, always brings two evils,—the house wants settling
and the furniture wants mending.”
“I wish no delay about either, sir,” said Mr. Freeman
with great frankness.
“But Mr. Howard,” said Miss Bain insinuatingly, “that
is a lady's province,—you would not expect a gentleman
to undertake it.”
“My expectations are but limited, ma'am, from either
man or woman.”
“What a singular idea!” said Miss Bain.
“You will find it a very plural idea,” said my father.
say, Mr. Rodney?”
“Not quite that, sir.”
“See there now, what it is to want experience!” said
my father, “where's the use of expecting uncertainties?”
“Isn't there an expectation of hope?”
“And a disappointment of hope too, I'm thinking.
You'll come out of that delusion my good sir, unless your
charitable eye-glass gains all the magnifying power that
your mental eye will lose.”
“And what is to hinder?” said Mr. Rodney smiling,—
“why shouldn't it, Mr. Howard? Charity is not so much
needed till delusion fails.”
“I'm sure I can't tell why it shouldn't—I don't know
how it is with you, but there's a considerable degree of
perverseness that will always hinder it in me.”
“Grains of allowance, sir,” said Miss Bain, picking up
an end of the subject.
“And a little soil for them to grow in. I've thrown out
plenty of `grains of allowance' that came to nothing,—so
you see my stock has decreased. I don't mean to expect
anything from anybody in future.”
“Except from that one person in the window?” said Miss
Easy smiling. “Yes sir, you have been looking at her the
whole time to disprove your words, yes.”
“Poh,”—said Mr. Howard, laughing and bringing his
eyes back. “I beg your pardon Miss Easy, but sometimes
one knows what one cannot see. `Love all, trust a
few.'”
“With a little trust to the all, and a very special love to
the few,” said Mr. Rodney smiling. “I will subscribe to
that, Mr. Howard.”
My father smiled too, a little—half to himself, as it
were.
“I don't know whether I must put her among the few,”
he said—“I suppose in reality Kate is just like that little
intruder over there. Now Grace thinks all the world of
that cat, and yet would not for all the world trust her near
the open closet.”
“But it's her nature, papa,” I said.
“Precisely, my dear.”
“But it isn't Kate's.”—
“What?” said my father laughing—“to steal into the
pantry? Which one is the cat going to now, Gracie?”
I turned round to watch her progress. She took a good
look at me and then marched off towards the window.
“Does she like Miss Kate better than you?” said Mr.
Collingwood smiling.
“O no, but she wants to get on somebody's lap,—if I
had been sitting still she would have come right to me.
She likes Kate very much though.”
“How perfectly graceful!” said Captain De Camp, waving
his hand as he surveyed the advancing felina; “there cannot
be anything more easy and natural than a cat's motions
—every one of them.” And dovetailing two fingers into
the breast of his closely buttoned coat, he looked on complacently.
Purrer-purrer seated herself in front of Kate, winked
once or twice by way of recognition, turned her head,
winked once at me, and then with a light spring she reached
the desired resting-place.
“My dear Kate!” said Miss Bain in an earnest voice,
and walking towards the scene of action, “how can you
bear that creature!”
“Why I like her very much, ma'am,” said Kate, while
she stroked the pleased little pussy.
Mr. Collingwood and I involuntarily approached the
window.
“But you shouldn't like her—I can't bear to see you
waste your young affections on cats.”
Kate smiled—“I should not give it that name Miss
Avarintha,—mayn't we apply to one sort of charity what
Bunyan says of the other?
The more he cast away, the more he had.'”
“Charity!” said Miss Bain—“you are getting very far
from the cat.”
“And into most classical regions,” said the Captain
laughing—“No wonder the cat don't dare to follow!”
“Well!” said Kate, looking up with a mingling of displeasure
at his and trust in her own position, so bright that
or contemptible sir?”
“Contemptible!” said the Captain,—“I really did not
mean to go quite so far; but you know Bunyan himself
was a very low man.”
“And therefore his work, being what it is, stands all the
higher.”
“But how is it classical, Miss Kate?” said Mr. Collingwood.
“I cannot undertake to prove my assertion as well as
defend it,” she said laughing and colouring,—“I suppose
one of the things Sir Thomas More would have said
`women had better not do,' may be to argue with superior
information. I refer you and Captain De Camp to Macaulay,
Mr. Collingwood, and you can dispute the point with
him at your leisure.”
“Which is one of the things men had better not do,”
said he smiling.
“But just see you all this time petting the cat!” said
Miss Bain,—“wasting your affections, as I say.”
“O,” said Kate, “I don't think one has a measured
amount, which must lose in depth what it gains in
breadth.”
“Nor I.”—
“My dear Mr. Rodney,” said Miss Bain, “what can you
possibly know of the matter? Bless me, I ought to know
a little about cats! my aunt had thirty of them. Now
what do you think of that?”
“I should think she kept no dogs.”
“And I that she had no mice,” said Kate.
“Why Miss Avarintha,” said I, “her house must have
been like the one in the fairy-tale, where the two green-eyed
cats kept watch over the princess.”
“And the eight and twenty relieved guard I suppose,”
said the Captain laughing.
“Bless me!” was all the comment upon this classical
allusion. “But why don't you have prettier pets?—a
canary or chickens? I like to see a lady encompassed by
chickens.”
“Not in the house?” said Kate smiling—“and I have no
time for canaries and like cats better.”
“O so do I, Miss Avarintha! a great deal better!”
“O you of course.—I never saw such girls,—just persuade
one to like a thing and you've persuaded both. You
needn't smile, Mr. Rodney,—it's true.”
“My smile meant no contradiction, ma'am.”
“It's not a good thing, in my judgment,” said the lady
with a new interpretation and answer. “Do tell me now
Kate—Miss Stephanie—I've seen so little of her—is she
always of your mind? or has she tastes of her own?”
“Of her own,” said Kate, trying hard not to smile.
“And have you no tastes of your own, Miss Gracie?”
said Mr. Collingwood smiling quite.
“Indeed she has,” said Kate.
“So I thought.”
“Take care,” said Miss Bain, “this is a dangerous atmosphere,—a
person cannot remain in it long and be dissimilar.”
“I'm sure that is a blessing to society,” said the Captain
bowing. “But Miss Howard, speaking of tastes—is it
permitted to ask what one renders this ice-cream so very
delicious?”
“I believe,—nothing very uncommon is it?”
“Uncommon on our side of the lake. Henderson and I
were trying to pronounce upon the flavour of Mrs. Shelton's,
and we decided that it `wath pomatum' Miss Kate,”
said the Captain laughing.
“Pomatum!” exclaimed Miss Bain,—“what a dreadful
idea! You don't really mean Captain De Camp that Mrs.
Shelton flavours ice-cream with pomatum?”
“Not at all, ma'am,—I only mean that this was as near
as we could come to it.”
“I should think it would have affected you most unpleasantly!”
The Captain's present affection was quite ecstatic.
“O that was only because gentlemen don't know things
by their right names,” said Kate.
“Pretty sweeping charge that, against `superior information'!”
said Mr. Rodney.
“I assure you Miss Kate you would have thought I knew
the name of one thing, if you had tasted that ice,” said the
Captain.
“I heard of a gentleman once,” said Kate, “who asked
a lady if her blancmange was flavoured with eye-water.”
“That is a good idea!” said the Captain,—“I will inquire
about the pomatum.”
But Kate disapproved that with a very decided little
shake of her head.
“Why not, Miss Kate?” said Mr. Collingwood smiling,
—“how are men to learn if they may not ask questions?”
“They may—if they will only ask in the right way,—
and when they really need information,” she said with a
look that half applied her words. “But the gentleman I
referred to transgressed the first rule,—he should have inquired
simply what the flavour was. I hold that it isn't
right to suggest disagreeable ideas to people.”
“But,” said Captain De Camp, “what are `disagreeable
ideas'?—for instance,” he added laughing, “is pomatum
reprehensible?”
“Very decidedly, if applied to ice-cream that I am eating;—if
it is only indefinite ice that I never saw, it does
not so much matter.”
“But don't you think Katie—” said I—
“What?”
“Yes let's have your opinion on the pomatum question,
Miss Grace,” said the Captain.
“Not much of an opinion sir, but I was thinking it
wouldn't be pleasant to have disagreeable things said even
about other ice-cream, for one might get such an association
with it in general. I shouldn't want to think of pomatum
every time I eat ice.”
“Nor I, I'm sure!” said the Captain laughing. “Your
remark is quite just, Miss Grace, and proves what your
sister said that you do not always think alike.”
“I only said it did not matter so much,” said Kate.
“But we do always think alike!” I said,—“only our
tastes are a little different sometimes.”
“You are drawing very nice distinctions, Miss Gracie,”
said Mr. Collingwood while the Captain laughed.
“Distinctions about what?” said Stephanie, coming towards
us.
“We were talking of things agreeable and things disagreeable,”
said Kate.
“Dividing them off? In which class do you put this
interminable noise of katydids? I maintain that nobody
can like it, and Miss Easy maintains that she does.”
“Ah?” said the Captain.
“But where have you put Mr. Freeman?” said Miss
Bain. “Where is he?”
“I'm sure I don't know, ma'am,” said Stephanie,—“Mr.
Freeman is not under my thumb to put anywhere. If he
were, he would find himself among things disagreeable.”
“Why my dear Miss Holbrook!” said Miss Avarintha,
while Stephanie enforced her words by a slight pinch on the
back of Kate's neck.
“He is talking to my mother,” said Captain De Camp,
“but I suppose there is such a class as things agreeabler,
Miss Kate? Freeman! face about, will you!
“Now,” continued the Captain, “I am going to try how
much he knows about names.”
“Come up and be questioned Mr. Freeman,” said Mr.
Collingwood as he smilingly made room for him in the
circle.
“Whether I will or no?”
“Whether you will or no—and by a gentleman whose
knowledge of the subject dates back some fifteen minutes.”
“But take some cake first (by your leave, Miss Howard,)”
said the Captain handing him the basket. “Now
what is it flavoured with?”
“This ring?” said Mr. Freeman, as after taking a small
bite he collared a digit with the remainder.
“It isn't a ring, Mr. Freeman,” I said.
“What is it then?”
“It's a jumble, sir.”
“Well that is certainly making a jumble of plain English!
I advise you to remodel your cook-book, Miss
Grace.”
The “cook-book” was lost upon the gentlemen, but Kate
and Stephanie were fain to pat the cat.
“But what does it taste of?” said the Captain.
“Sugar—” said Mr. Freeman, as if he felt upon sure
ground.
“Bless my spurs!” said the Captain,—“but what else?”
“I'm sure I don't know—the thing I like best about it, is
I have tasted before too;—it is isinglass!” said Mr. Freeman
decidedly.
There was no standing this,—the Captain led off and we
all had to follow. Even Mr. Howard and the astonished
mover of our mirth joined in, they knew not why.
“Captain De Camp has been testing Miss Howard's
opinion that men don't know everything,” said Mr. Rodney.
“Is that all you're laughing at!” said my father,—“bless
me, I am told that every day of my life.”
“O papa!” said Kate.
“I didn't say by whom, Katie,—maybe it's myself.”
“But I don't understand,” said Miss Easy's soft voice.
“Yes sir, who is it that does not know everything?”
“It's an abstract proposition proved upon me, I believe
ma'am,” said Mr. Freeman.
“Your lesson is but a quarter of an hour behind ours,”
said Mr. Rodney.
“Mr. Freeman,” said Kate getting up and opening a
cabinet, “did you ever see these shells?—papa would tell
you that they are worth the trouble.”
“And will you tell me the same thing, Miss Kate?” said
the Captain.
“No sir,” she answered with light gravity, “I know too
little of them and of you,—your taste may not lie that way.”
The taste of several persons seemed to lie that way just
then, and we had full occupation as show-women. Kate
laughingly set out a cold collation of “olives” and “pigs,”
“poached eggs” and “thorny woodcocks,” which Captain
De Camp immediately declared he should choose,—“he
went in for utility.”
“What do you say to a `weaver's shuttle' then?” said
Stephanie,—“don't you call that useful?”
“Not to my taste, Miss Holbrook.”
“Well here is the ear of King Midas,—and more useful
still”—
But Kate took the shell out of her hand with a glance
which Stephanie did not see fit to disregard.
“What is that, Miss Kate?”
“This one?” said she taking up another. “It is Venus's
comb,—don't you wish to inspect such an antique?”
“By no means!” he said with a gesture of refusal—
“everything shows best in its proper place.”
The shell was immediately restored to the cabinet, and
Kate bestowed her attention upon Mr. Freeman.
“Here is a perspective shell for you, Mr. Rodney,” I
said,—“and this Argonaut—isn't it beautiful?”
“I wonder where all the shells get their names!” said
Captain De Camp,—“such as this for instance.”—
“Why this must have been called after the Argonauts”
—I said,—“because it is such a good sailor.”
“The Argonauts!” said Captain De Camp. “And pray
who were they, Miss Grace?”
“Why you know, sir,” said I, as if he wanted to find out
the depth of my knowledge—“they were the men that
rowed the Argo—the ship in which Jason went after the
Golden Fleece.”
“I don't know anything about it,”—said the Captain
frankly,—“I am ashamed to say, Miss Grace, that I have
never read those old stories.”
“Papa told me,”—I said.
“But what is this shell?” said he helping himself. “Miss
Holbrook this is the one you were going to show me.”
“That's the most useful shell in the case,” remarked Mr.
Freeman.
“Well it's one of the prettiest. I don't care much for
quirlicues.”
“You don't like that”—said Mr. Freeman,—“you
wouldn't have one in your room for a dollar.”
“I tell you I like it particularly,” said the Captain with
an approving and contemplative twirl of his moustaches.
“If ever I buy any shells I shall begin with this one.”
“I wonder who knows the names of things now!” said
Mr. Freeman with an air of injured innocence. “Why
man that is a razor shell!”
The Captain certainly looked posed for a minute, but
then he laughed as if he had received an extraordinary compliment.
As for Mr. Freeman,—this turn, together with
his previous good-nature, so won upon my father that at
parting he gave him a most cordial invitation to come as
often as he could. Which invitation the gentleman certainly
complied with.
| CHAPTER XIV. Dollars and cents | |