University of Virginia Library

14. CHAPTER XIV.
MRS. JOHNSON'S LETTER.

The spring had passed away, and the warm June sun
was shining over Spring Bank, whose mistress and servants
were very lonely, for Hugh was absent, and with him
the light of the house had departed. Business of his late
uncle's had taken him to New Orleans, where he might
possibly remain all summer. 'Lina was glad, for since
the fatal dress affair there had been but little harmony
between herself and her brother. The tenderness awakened
by her long illness seemed to have been forgotten,
and Hugh's manner toward her was cold and irritating to
the last degree, so that the young lady rejoiced to be
freed from his presence.

“I do hope he'll stay,” she said one morning, when
speaking of him to her mother. “I think it's a heap nicer
without him, though dull enough at the best. I wish
we could go to some watering place. There's the Tifftons
just returned from New York, and I don't much believe
they can afford it more than we, for I heard their
place was mortgaged to Harney. Oh, bother, to be so
poor,” and the young lady gave a little angry jerk at the
hair she was braiding.

“Whar's ole miss?” asked Claib, who had just returned
from Versailles. “Thar's a letter for her,” and depositing
it upon the bureau, he left the room.

“Whose writing is that?” 'Lina said, catching it up
and examining the postmark. Ho, mother! here's a letter
in a strange hand-writing. Shall I open it?” she
called, and ere her mother could reply, she had broken

the seal, and held in her hand the draft which made her
the heiress of one thousand dollars.

Had the fabled godmother of Cinderilla appeared to
her suddenly, she would scarcely have been more bewildered.

“Mother,” she screamed again, reading aloud the “`Pay
to the order of Adaline Worthington,' etc. What does
it mean, and who could have sent it? Isn't it splendid?
Who is Alice Johnson? Oh, I know, that old friend of
yours, who came to see you once when I was gone.
What does she say? `My dear Eliza, feeling that I have
not long to live —`What — dead? Well, I'm sorry
for that, but, I must say, she did a very sensible thing
sending me a thousand dollars. We'll go somewhere
now, won't we?” and clutching fast the draft, the heartless
girl yielded the letter to her mother, who with
blanched cheek and quivering lip read the last message
of her friend; then burying her face in her hands she
sobbed as the past came back to her, when the Alice
now forever at rest and herself were girls together.

'Lina stood a moment, wishing her mother had not
cried, as it made it very awkward — then, for want of
something better to do took up the letter her mother had
dropped and read it through, commenting as she read.
Wants you to take her daughter Alice. Is the woman crazy.
And her nurse, Densie Densmore. Say, mother, you've
cried enough, let's talk the matter over. Shall you let Alice
come? Ten dollars a week, they'll pay. Five hundred
and twenty dollars a year. Whew! We are rich as
Jews. It won't cost half that sum to keep them. Our
ship is really coming in.”

By this time Mrs. Worthington was able to talk of a
matter which had apparently so delighted 'Lina. Her
first remark, however, was not very pleasing to the young
lady.

“As far as I am concerned I would willingly give Alice

a home, but it's not for me to say. Hugh alone can decide
it. We must write to him.”

“You know he'll refuse,” was 'Lina's angry reply.
“He hates young ladies.” “So if it hangs on his decision,
you may as well save your postage stamp to New Orleans,
and write at once to Miss Johnson that she cannot
come, on account of a boorish clown.”

“'Lina,” feebly interposed Mrs. Worthington, feeling
how inefficient she was to cope with 'Lina's stronger
will. “Lina, we must write to Hugh.”

“Mother, you shall not,” and 'Lina spoke determinedly.
“I'll send an answer to this letter myself, this very day.
I will not suffer the chance to be thrown away. Hugh
may swear a little at first, but he'll get over it.”

“Hugh never swears,” and Mrs. Worthington spoke up
at once.

“He don't, hey? Maybe you've forgotten when he
came home from Frankfort, that time he heard about my
dress. As old Sam says, `I've got a mizzable memory,'
but I have a very distinct recollection that oaths were
thick as hail stones. Didn't his eyes blaze though!”

“I know he swore then; but he never has since, I'm
sure, and I think he is better, gentler, more refined than he
used to be, since — since — Adah came.”

A contemptuous “pshaw!” came from 'Lina's lips, and
then she proceeded to speak of Alice Johnson, asking for
her family. Were they the F. F. V.'s of Boston? and so
forth.

To this Mrs. Worthington gave a decided affiamative;
repeating to her daughter many things which Mrs. Johnson
had herself told Alice in that sad interview when she
lay on her sick bed with Alice sobbing near.

So far as she was concerned, Alice Johnson was welcome
to Spring Bank; but justice demanded that Hugh should
be consulted ere an answer were returned. 'Lina, however,
overruled her arguments as she always did, and with

a sigh she yielded the point, hoping there would be some
way by which Hugh might be appeased.

“Now let us talk a little about the thousand dollars,”
'Lina said, for already the money was beginning to burn
in her hands.

“I'm going to Saratoga, and you are going, too. We'll
have heaps of dresses. We'll take Lu, for a waiting
maid. That will be sure to make a sensation at the
North. `Mrs. Worthington, daughter, and colored servant,
Spring Bank, Kentucky.' I can almost see that on the
clerk's books. Then I can manage to let it be known that
I'm an heiress, as I am. We needn't tell that it's only a
thousand dollars, most of which I have on my back, and
maybe I'll come home Adaline somebody else. There are
always splendid matches at Saratoga. We'll go north the
middle of July, just three weeks from now.”

'Lina had talked so fast that Mrs. Worthington had
been unable to put in a word; but it did not matter.
'Lina was invulnerable to all she could say. She'd go to
town that very day and make her purchases. Miss Allis,
of course, must be consulted for some of her dresses, while
Adah could make the rest. With regard to Miss Alice,
they would write to her at once, telling her she was welcome
to Spring Bank, and also informing her of their intentions
to come north immediately. She could join
them at Saratoga, or, if she preferred, could remain at
Snowdon until they returned home in the autumn.

'Lina's decision with regard to their future movements
had been made so rapidly and so determinedly, that Mrs.
Worthington had scarcely ventured to expostulate, and
the few remonstrances she did advance produced no impression.
'Lina wrote to Alice Johnson that morning,
went to Frankfort that afternoon, to Versailles and Lexington
the next day, and on the morning of the third, after
the receipt of Mrs. Johnson's letter, Spring Bank presented
the appearance of one vast show-room, so full of

silks, and muslins, and tissues, and flowers, and ribbons,
and laces, while amidst it all, in a maze of perplexity as
to what was required of her, or where first to commence,
sat Adah, who had come at 'Lina's bidding.

Womanlike, the sight of 'Lina's dresses awoke in
Adah a thrill of delight, and she entered heartily into the
matter without a single feeling of envy.

“I's goin', too. Did you know that?” Lulu said to
her, as she sat bending over a cloud of lace and soft blue
silk.

“You? For what?” and Adah lifted her brown eyes
inquiringly.

“Oh, goin' to wait on 'em. It's grand to have a nigger,
and Miss 'Lina keeps trainin me how to act and
what to say. I ain't to tell how mean Spring Bank is
furnished, nor how poor master Hugh is. Nothin' of
the kind. We're to be fust cut. Oh, so nice, Miss 'Lina
an, Airey, and when we get home, if I does well, I'm to
hev that gownd, all mud, what Miss 'Lina wared to the
Tiffton party, whew!” and in the mischievous glance of
Lulu's saucy eyes, Adah read that the quick-witted negro
was not in the least deceived with regard to the “Airey,”
as she called Miss 'Lina.

Half amused at Lulu's remarks and half sorry that she
had listened to them, Adah resumed her work, just as
'Lina appeared, saying to her, “Here is Miss Tiffton's
square-necked bertha. She's just got home from New
York, and says they are all the fashion. You are to cut
me a pattern. There's a paper, the Louisville Journal, I
guess, but nobody reads it, now Hugh is gone,” and with
a few more general directions, Lina hurried away, having
first tossed into Adah's lap the paper containing Anna
Richards' advertisement.

In spite of the doctor's predictions and consignment of
that girl to Georgia, or some warmer place, it had reached
her at last. The compositor had wondered at its wording,

a few casual readers had wondered at it, too — a western
editor, laughing jocosely at its “married or unfortunate
woman with a child a few months old,” had copied it into
his columns, thus attracting the attention of his more
south-western neighbor, who had thought it too good to
lose, and so given it to his readers with sundry remarks
of his own. But through all its many changes, Adah's
God had watched it, and brought it around to her. She
did not see it at first, but just as her scissors were raised
to cut the pattern, her eyes fell on the spot headed, “A
curious advertisement,” and suspending her operations
for a moment, she read it through, a feeling rising in her
heart that it was surely an answer to her own advertisement
sent forth months ago, with tearful prayers that it might
be successful. She did not know that “A. E. R.” meant it
for her, and no one else. She only felt that at Terrace
Hall there was a place for her, a home where she would
no longer be dependent on Hugh, whose straits she understood
perfectly well, knowing why Rocket was sold, and
how it hurt his master to sell him. Oh, if she only could
redeem him, no toil, no weariness would be too great; but
she never could, even if “A. E. R.” should take her —
the pay would be so small that Rocket would be old and
worthless ere she could earn five hundred dollars; but she
could do something toward it, and her heart grew light and
happy as she thought how surprised Hugh would be to
receive a letter containing money earned by the feeble
Adah, to whom he had been so kind.

Adah was a famous castle-builder, and she went on
rearing castle after castle, until Lina came back again and
taking a seat beside her, began to talk so familiarly and
pleasantly that Adah felt emboldened to tell her of the
advertisement and her intention to answer it. Averse
as Lina had at first been to Adah's remaining at
Spring Bank, she now saw a channel through which she
could be made very useful, and would far rather that she

should remain. So she opposed the plan, urging so many
arguments against it that Adah began to think the idea a
foolish one, and with a sigh dismissed it from her mind
until another time, when she might give it more consideration.

That afternoon Ellen Tiffton rode over to see 'Lina,
who told her of Alice Johnson, whom they were expecting.

“Alice Johnson,” Ellen repeated; “why, that's the
girl father says so much about. Fortieth or fiftieth cousin.
He was at their house in Boston a few years ago, and
when he came home he annoyed me terribly by quoting
Alice continually, and comparing me with her. Of course
I fell in the scale, for there was nothing like Alice, Alice
— so beautiful, so refined, so sweet, so amiable, so religious.”

“Religious!” and 'Lina laughed scornfully. Adah pretends
to be religious, too, and so does Sam, while Alice
will make three. Pleasant prospects ahead. I wonder
if she's the blue kind — thinks dancing wicked, and all
that.”

Ellen could not tell. She only knew what her father
said; but she did not fancy Miss Alice to be more morose
or gloomy — at all events she would gladly have her for
a companion, and she thought it queer that Mrs. Johnson
should send her to a stranger, as it were, when they
would have been so glad to receive her. “Pa won't like it
a bit, I know, and I quite envy you,” she said, as she took
her leave, her remarks raising Alice largely in 'Lina's
estimation, and making her not a little proud that Spring
Bank had been selected as Miss Johnson's home.

One week later, and there came a letter from Alice herself,
saying that at present she was stopping in Boston
with her guardian, Mr. Liston, who had rented the cottage
in Snowdon, but that she would meet Mrs. Worthington
and daughter at Saratoga. Of course she did not now

feel like mingling in gay society, and should consequently
go to the Columbian, where she could be comparatively
quiet; but this need not interfere with their arrangements,
as they could see each other often.

The same day also brought a letter from Hugh, making
many kind inquiries after them all, saying his business was
turning out better than he expected, and enclosing forty
dollars, fifteen of which, he said, was for Adah, and the
rest for Ad, as a peace offering for the harsh things he had
said to her. Hugh's conscience when away was always
troubling him with regard to 'Lina, and knowing that
money with her would atone for a score of sins, he had
felt so happy in sending it, giving her the most because he
had sinned against her the most. Once the thought suggested
itself that possibly she might keep the whole, but
he repudiated it at once as a base slander upon 'Lina.

Alas, he little suspected the treachery of which she was
capable. As a taste of blood makes wild beasts thirst for
more, so Mrs. Johnson's legacy had made 'Lina greedy for
gold, and the sight of the smooth paper bills sent to her
by Hugh, awoke her avaricious passions. Forty dollars
was just the price of a superb pearl bracelet in Lexington,
and if Hugh had only sent it all to her instead of a
part to Adah! What did Adah want of money, any way,
living there in the cornfield, and seeing nobody? Besides
that, hadn't she just paid her three dollars, and a muslin
dress, and was that not enough for a girl in her circumstances?
Nobody would be the wiser if she kept the whole,
for her mother was not present when Claib brought the
letter. She'd never know they'd heard from Hugh; and
on the whole she believed she'd keep it, and so she went
to Lexington next day in quest of the bracelet, which
was pronounced beautiful by the unsuspecting Adah, who
never dreamed that her money had helped to pay for it.
Truly 'Lina was heaping up against herself a dark catalogue
of sin to be avenged some day, but the time was
not yet.

Thus far every thing went swimmingly. The dresses fitted
admirably, and nothing could exceed the care with which
they had been packed. Her mother no longer annoyed her
about Hugh. Lulu was quite well posted with regard to
her duty. Ellen Tiffton had lent her quizzing-glass and
several ornaments, while Irving Stanley, grand-nephew,
like Hugh, to Uncle John, was to be at Saratoga, so 'Lina
incidentally heard, and as there was a kind of relationship
between them, he would of course notice her more or
less, and from all accounts, to be noticed by him was a
thing to be desired.

Thus it was in the best of humors that 'Lina tripped
from Spring Bank door one pleasant July morning, and
was driven with her mother and Lulu to Lexington,
where they intended taking the evening train for Cincinnati.