University of Virginia Library

12. CHAPTER XII.
SOCIETY.

IN the course of two weeks all the ton of Olney called
upon Ethelyn, who would gladly have declined
seeing them if she could. But after the morning
when Andy stood outside the door of her room, wringing
his hands in great distress at the tone of Richard's voice,
and after the day Ethelyn stayed in bed with the headache,
and was nursed by Eunice and Melinda, Ethelyn did better,
and was at least polite to those who called. She had said
she would not see them, and Richard had said she should;
and as he usually made people do as he liked, Ethelyn was

forced to submit, but cried herself sick. It was very desolate
and lonely up-stairs that day, for Richard was busy in
town, and the wind swept against the windows with a
mournful, moaning sound, which made Ethelyn think of
Chicopee and the lofty elms through whose branches the
same wind was probably sighing on this autumnal day.

Ethelyn was very wretched, and hailed with delight the
presence of Melinda Jones, who came in the afternoon,
bringing a basket of delicious apples and a lemon tart she
had made herself. Melinda was very sorry for Ethelyn,
and her face said as much as she stood by her side and
laid her hand softly upon the throbbing temples, guessing
just how homesick she was there with Mrs. Markham,
whose ways had never seemed to peculiar, even to her, as
since Ethelyn's arrival. “And still,” she thought, “I do
not see how she can be so very unhappy, in any circumstances,
with a husband like Richard.” But here Melinda made
a mistake; for though Ethelyn had learned to miss her
husband when he was gone, and the day whose close was
not to bring him back would have been very long, she did
not love him as a husband should be loved; and so there
was nothing to fall back upon when other props gave
way.

Wholly unsuspicious, Melinda sat down beside her,
offering to brush her hair; and while she brushed, and
combed, and braided, and admired the glossy brown locks,
she talked on the subject she thought most acceptable to
the young wife's ear,—of Richard, and the great popularity
he had achieved, not only in his own county, but in neighboring
ones, where he stood head and shoulders above his
fellows. There was talk once of making him Governor,
she said, but some thought him too young. Lately, however,

she had heard that the subject was again agitated,
adding that her father and Tim both thought it more than
probable that the next election would take him to the
gubernatorial mansion.

“Tim would work like a hero for Richard,” she said.
“He almost idolizes him, and when he was up for Judge,
Tim's exertions alone procured for him a hundred extra
votes. Tim is a rough, half-savage fellow, but he has the
kindest of hearts, and is very popular with a certain class
of men who could not be reached by one more polished
and cultivated.”

So much Melinda said, by way of excusing Tim; and
then with the utmost tact she led the conversation back to
Richard and the governorship, hinting that Ethelyn could
do much toward securing that office for her husband. A
little attention, which cost nothing, would go a great
ways, she said; and it was sometimes worth one's while to
make an effort, even if they did not feel like it. More
than one rumor had reached Melinda's ear touching the
pride of Dick Markham's wife,—a pride which the Olney
people felt keenly, knowing that they had helped to give
her husband a name; they had made him Judge, and sent
him to Congress, and would like to make him Governor,
knowing well that no office, however high, would change
him from the plain, unpretending man, who, even in the
Senate-chamber, would shake drunken Ike Plympton's
hand, and slap Tim Jones on the back if need be. They
liked their Dick, who had been a boy among them, and
they thought it only fair that his wife should unbend a
little, and not freeze them with her lofty ways.

“She'll kick the whole thing over if she goes on so,”
Tim had said to his father, in Melinda's hearing; and, like

a true friend to Richard, Melinda determined to try and
prevent the proud little feet from doing so much mischief.

Nor was she unsuccessful. Ethelyn saw the drift of the
conversation, and though for an instant her cheek crimsoned
with resentment that she should be talked at by
Melinda Jones, she was the better for the talking; and the
Olney people, when next they came in contact with her,
changed their minds with regard to her being so very
proud. She was homesick at first, and that was the cause
of her coldness, they said, excusing her in their kind
hearts, and admiring her as something superior to themselves.
Even Tim Jones got now and then a pleasant
word, for Ethelyn had not forgotten the hundred extra
votes. She would have repelled the insinuation that she
was courting favor, or that hopes of the future governorship
for Richard had anything to do with her changed demeanor.
She despised such things in others; but Ethelyn
was human, and it is just possible that had there been
nothing in expectancy she would not have submitted with
so good a grace to the familiarities with which she so constantly
came in contact. At home she was cold and proud
as ever, for between her mother-in-law and herself there
was no affinity, and they kept as far apart as possible,—
Ethelyn staying mostly in her room, and Mrs. Markham
senior staying in the kitchen, where Eunice Plympton
still remained.

Mrs. Markham had fully expected that Eunice would go
home within a few days after Ethelyn's arrival; but when
the days passed on, and Ethelyn showed no inclination for
a nearer acquaintance with the kitchen, the good woman
began to manifest some anxiety on the subject, and finally
went to Richard to know if “he expected to keep a hired

girl all winter, or was Ethelyn going to do some light
chores.”

Richard really did not know; but after a visit to his
room, where Ethie sat reading in her handsome crimson
wrapper, with the velvet trimmings, he decided that she
could “not do chores,” and Eunice must remain. It was
on this occasion that Washington was broached, Mrs.
Markham repeating what she had heard Ethelyn saying to
Melinda, and asking Richard if he contemplated such a
piece of extravagance as taking his wife to Washington
would be. Richard did not especially mind the expense
she might be to him, and he owned to a weak desire to see
her queen it over all the reigning belles, as he was certain
she would. Unbiassed by his mother, and urged by
Ethelyn, he would probably have yielded in her favor;
but the mother was first in the field, and so she won the
day, and Ethie's disappointment was a settled thing. But
Ethie did not know it, as Richard wisely refrained from
being the first to speak of the matter. That she was
going to Washington Ethelyn had not a doubt, and this
made her intercourse with the Olneyites far more endurable.
Some of them she found pleasant, cultivated people,
—especially Mr. Townsend, the clergyman, who, after the
Sunday on which she appeared at the Village Hall in her
blue silk and elegant basquine, came to see her, and seemed
so much like an old friend when she found that he had
met at Clifton, in New York, some of her acquaintances.
It was easy to be polite to him, and to the people from
Camden, who, hearing much of Judge Markham's pretty
bride, came out to call upon her,—Judge Miller and his
wife, with Marcia Fenton and Miss Ella Backus, both belles
and blondes, and both somebodies, according to Ethelyn's

definition of that word. She liked these people, and
Richard found no trouble in getting her to return their
calls. She would gladly have stayed in Camden altogether,
and once laughingly pointed out to Richard a large vacant
lot adjoining Mr. Fenton's, where she would like to have
her new house built.

There was a decided improvement in Ethelyn; nor did
her old perversity of temper manifest itself very strongly
until one morning, three weeks after her arrival in Olney,
when Richard suggested to her the propriety of his
mother's giving them a party. The people expected it, he
said; they would be disappointed without it, and, indeed,
he felt it was something he owed them for all their kindness
to him. Then Ethelyn rebelled,—stoutly, stubbornly re
belled,—but Richard carried the point, and two days after
the farm-house was in a state of dire confusion, wholly unlike
the quiet which reigned there usually. Melinda Jones
was there all the time, while Mrs. Jones was back and forth,
and a few of the Olney ladies dropped in with suggestions
and offers of assistance. It was to be a grand affair,—so
far, at least, as numbers were concerned,—for everybody
was invited, from Mr. Townsend and the other clergy, down
to Cecy Doane, who did dress-making and tailoring from
house to house. The Markhams were very democratic in
their feelings, and it showed itself in the guests bidden to
the party. They were invited from Camden as well,—Mr.
and Mrs. Miller, with Marcia Fenton and Ella Backus; and
after the two young ladies had come over to ascertain how
large an affair it was to be, so as to know what to wear
Ethelyn began to take some interest in it herself, and to
give the benefit of her own experience in such matters.
But having a party in Mrs. Dr. Van Buren's handsome

house, where the servants were so well trained, and everything
necessary was so easy of access, or even having a
party at Aunt Barbara's, was a very different thing from
having one here under the supervision of Mrs. Markham,
whose ideas were so many years back, and who objected to
nearly everything which Ethelyn suggested. But by dint
of perseverance on Melinda's part, her scruples were finally
overcome; so that when the night of the party arrived the
house presented a very respectable appearance, with its
lamps of kerosene, and the sperm candles flaming on the
mantels in the parlor, and the tallow candles smoking in the
kitchen.

Mrs. Markham's bed had been removed from the sitting-room,
and the carpet taken from the floor, for they were
going to dance; and Eunice's mother had been working
hard all day to keep her liege lord away from the Cross
Roads tavern, so that he might be presentable at night, and
capable of performing his part, together with his eldest son,
who played the flute. She was out in the kitchen now,
very large and important with the office of head waiter,
her hoops in everybody's way, and her face radiant with
satisfaction as she talked to Mrs. Markham about what we
better do. The table was laid in the kitchen and loaded
with all the substantials, beside many delicacies which Melinda
and Ethelyn had concocted; for the latter had put
her hands to the work, and manufactured two large dishes
of charlotte-russe, with pretty moulds of blanc-mange, which
Eunice persisted in calling “corn-starch pudding.” There
were trifles, and tarts, and jellies, and sweetmeats, with
raised biscuits by the hundred, and loaves on loaves of
frosted cake; while out in the wood-shed, wedged in a tub
of ice, was a huge tin pail, over which James, and John,

and Andy, and even Richard had sat, by turns, stirring the
freezing mass. Mrs. Jones' little colored boy, who knew
how to wait on company, came over in his clean jacket, and
out on the doorstep was eating chestnuts and whistling
Dixie, as he looked down the road to see if anybody was
coming. Melinda Jones had gone home to dress, feeling
more like going to bed than making merry at a party, as she
looped up her black braids of hair, and donned her white
muslin dress with the scarlet ribbons. Melinda was very
tired, for a good share of the work had fallen upon her,—
or rather she had assumed it,—and her cheeks and hands
were redder than usual when about seven o'clock Tim
drove her over to Mrs. Markham's, and then went on to the
village after the dozen or more of girls whom he had promised
“to see to the doin's.”

But Melinda looked very pretty,—at least James Markham
thought so,—when she stood up on tiptoe to tie
his cravat in a better-looking bow than he had done.
Since the night when Richard first told her of Ethelyn,
it had more than once occurred to Melinda that possibly
she might yet bear the name of Markham, for her woman-nature
was quick to see that James, at least, paid
her the homage which Richard had withheld. But
Melinda's mind was not yet made up, and as she was
too honest to encourage hopes which might never be
fulfilled, she would not even look up into the handsome
eyes resting so admiringly upon her as she tied
the bow of the cravat and felt James' breath upon her
burning cheeks. She did, however, promise to dance
the first set with him, and then she ran up-stairs to
see if Ethelyn needed her. But Eunice had been before
her, and Ethelyn's toilet was made.

Had this party been at Mrs. Dr. Van Buren's, in
Boston, Ethelyn would have worn her beautiful white
satin with the fleecy lace; but here it would be out
of place, she thought, and so she left it pinned up in
towels at the bottom of her trunk, and chose a delicate
lavender, trimmed with white applique. Lavender was
not the most becoming color Ethelyn could wear, but
she looked very handsome in it, with the soft pearls
upon her neck and arms. Richard thought her dress
too low, while modest Andy averted his eyes, lest he
should do wrong in looking upon the beautiful round
neck and shoulders which so greatly shocked his mother.
“It was ridiculous and disgraceful for respectable wimmen
folks to dress like that,” she said to Melinda Jones,
who spoke up for Ethelyn, saying the dress was like
that of all fashionable ladies, and in fact was not as
low as Mrs. Judge Miller wore to a reception when
Melinda was at school in Camden.

Mrs. Markham “did not care for Miss Miller, nor forty
more like her. Ethelyn looked ridickelous, showing her
shoulderblades, with that sharp p'int running down her
back, and her skirts moppin' the floor for half a yard
behind.”

Any superfluity of length in Ethelyn's skirts was more
than counterbalanced by Mrs. Markham, who this night
wore the heavy black silk which her sister-in-law had
matched in Boston ten years before. Of course it was
too narrow, and too short, and too flat in front, Andy
said, admiring Ethelyn far more than he did his mother,
even though the latter wore the coiffeur which Aunt
Barbara had sent her, and a big collar made from the
thread lace which Mrs. Captain Markham, of Chicopee,

had also matched in Boston. Ethelyn was perfect, Andy
thought, and he hovered constantly near her, noticing how
she carried her hands, and her handkerchief, and her fan,
and thinking Richard must be perfectly happy in the possession
of such a gem.

But Richard was not happy,—at least not that night,—
for, with Mrs. Miller, and Marcia Fenton, and Ella Backus
before her mind, Ethelyn had lectured him again on etiquette,
and Richard did not bear lecturing here as well
as at Saratoga. There it was comparatively easy to make
him believe he did not know anything which he ought
to know; but at home, where the old meed of praise
and deference was awarded to him, where his word was
law and gospel, and he was Judge Markham, the potentate
of the town, Ethelyn's criticisms were not palatable,
and he hinted that he was old enough to take care of
himself without quite so much dictation. Then, when he
saw a tear on Ethelyn's eyelashes, he would have put his
arm around her and kissed it away if she had not kept
him back, telling him he would muss her dress. Still he
was not insensible to her pretty looks, and felt very proud
of her, as she stood at his side and shook the hands of
the arriving guests.

By eight o'clock the Olneyites had assembled in full
force; but it was not until the train came in and brought
the élite from Camden that the party fairly commenced.
There was a hush when the three ladies with veils on their
heads went up the stairs, and a greater bush when they
came down again,—Mrs. Judge Miller, splendid in green
moire-antique, with diamonds in her ears, while Marcia Fenton
and Ella Backus figured in white tarleton, one with
trimmings of blue, the other with trimmings of pink, and

both with waists so much lower than Ethelyn's that Mrs.
Markham thought the latter very decent by comparison.

It took the ladies a few minutes to inspect the cut of
Mrs. Miller's dress, and the style of hair worn by Marcia
and Ella, whose heads had been under a hair-dresser's
hands, and were curiosities to some of the Olneyites. But
all stiffness vanished with the sound of Jerry Plympton's
fiddle, and the girls on the west side of the room began to
look at the boys on the opposite side, who were straightening
their collars and glancing at their “pumps.”

Ethelyn did not intend to dance, but when Judge Miller
politely offered to lead her to the floor, saying, as he guessed
her thoughts, “Remember the old adage, `among the Romans,
and so forth,”' she involuntarily assented, and found
herself leading the first cotillon to the sound of Jerry Plympton's
fiddle. Mrs. Miller was dancing too, as were both
Marcia and Ella, and that in a measure reconciled her to
what she was doing. They knew something of the Lancers
there on the prairie, and terrible Tim Jones offered to call
off “if Miss Markham would dance with him and keep him
goin' straight.”

Tim had laid a wager with a companion as rough as himself
that he would dance with the proud beauty, and this was
the way he took to win his bet. The ruse succeeded, too,
Richard's eyes and low-toned “Ethelyn!” availing more
than aught else to drive Ethelyn to the floor with the
dreadful Tim, who interlarded his directions with little
asides of his own, such as “Go it, Jim,” “Cut her down
there, Tom,” and so forth.

Ethelyn could have screamed out with disgust, and the
moment the set was over, she said to Richard, “I shall not
dance again to-night.”

And she kept her word, until toward the close of the
party, when poor Andy, who had been so unfortunate as to
find everybody engaged or too tired, came up to her as
she sat playing an accompaniment to Jerry's “Monymusk,”
and with a most doleful expression said to her
timidly—

“Please, sister Ethie, dance just once with me; none of
the girls wants to, and I hain't been in a figger to-night.”

Ethelyn could not resist Andy, whose face was perfectly
radiant as he led her to the floor, and bumped his head
against hers in bowing to her. Eunice was in the same
set,—her partner the terrible Tim,—who cracked his jokes
and threw his feet about in the most astounding fashion.
And Ethelyn bore it all, feeling that by being there with
such people she had fallen from the pedestal on which
Ethelyn Grant once stood. Her lavender dress was stepped
upon, and her point applique caught and torn by the big
pin Andy had upon his coat-cuff. Taken as a whole, that
party was the most dreadful of anything Ethelyn had endured,
and she could have cried for joy when the last guest
had said good-night, and she was at liberty to lay her aching
head upon her pillow.

Four days after there was a large and fashionable party
at Mrs. Judge Miller's, in Camden, and Ethelyn went over
in the cars, taking Eunice with her as dressing-maid, and
stopping at the Stafford House. That night she wore her
bridal robes, and received so much attention that her head
was nearly turned with flattery. She could dance with
the young men of Camden, and flirt with them too,—especially
with Harry Clifford, who, she found, had been in
college with Frank Van Buren. Harry Clifford was a fast
young man, but pleasant to talk with for a while, and Ethelyn

found him very agreeable, saving that his mention of Frank
made her heart throb unpleasantly; for she fancied he
might know something of that page in her past life which
she had concealed from Richard. Nor were her fears without
foundation, for once, when they were standing together
near her husband, Harry said—

“It seems so strange that you are the Ethie about whom
Frank used to talk so much, and a lock of whose hair he
kept so sacred. I remember I tried to buy a part of it
from him, but could not succeed until once, when his funds
from home failed to come, and he was hard up, as we used
to say, he actually sold, or rather pawned half of the shining
tress for the sum of five dollars. As the pawn was
never redeemed, I have the hair now, but never expected to
meet with its owner, who needs not to be told that the tress
is ten-fold more valuable since I have met her, and know
her to be the wife of our esteemed Member,” and young
Clifford bowed toward Richard, whose face wore a perplexed,
dissatisfied expression.

He did not fancy Harry Clifford, and he certainly did
not care to hear that he had in his possession a lock of
Ethelyn's hair, while the allusions to Frank Van Buren
were anything but agreeable to him. Neither did he like
Ethelyn's painful blushes, and her evident desire for Harry
to stop. It looked as if the hair business meant more than
he would like to believe. Naturally bright and quick,
young Clifford began at once to wonder if there had not
been something more serious between Frank Van Buren
and Ethelyn than he had at first supposed.

“I mean to find out,” he thought; and watching an
opportunity, when Ethelyn was comparatively alone, he
crossed to her side and said, in a low tone, “Excuse me,

Mrs. Markham. If, in my allusions to Frank Van Buren, I
touched a subject not altogether agreeable to you, I meant
no harm, I assure you.”

Instead of rebuking the impertinent young man, Ethelyn
turned very red and stammered out something about its
being of no consequence; and so Harry Clifford held the
secret which she had kept so carefully from Richard; and
that party in Camden was the stepping-stone to much of
the wretchedness that afterward came to our heroine.