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Queechy

<h1> Chapter XIX. </h1> <blockquote> Whilst skies are blue and bright.   Whilst flowers are gay, Whilst eyes that change ere night   Make glad the day; Whilst yet the calm hours creep, Dream thou--and from thy sleep   Then wake to weep. </blockquote> <blockquote> Shelley. </blockquote> The days of summer flew by, for the most part lightly, over the heads of Hugh and Fleda. The farm was little to them but a place of pretty and picturesque doings and the scene of nameless delights by wood and stream, in all which, all that summer, Fleda rejoiced; pulling Hugh along with her even when sometimes he would rather have been poring over his books at home. She laughingly said it was good for him; and one half at least of every fine day their feet were abroad. They knew nothing practically of the dairy but that it was an inexhaustible source of the sweetest milk and butter, and indirectly of the richest custards and syllabubs. The flock of sheep that now and then came in sight running over the hill-side, were to them only an image of pastoral beauty and a soft link with the beauty of the past. The two children took the very cream of country life. The books they had left were read with greater eagerness than ever. When the weather was "too lovely to stay in the house," Shakspeare or Massillon or Sully or the "Curiosities of Literature" or "Corinne" or Milner's Church History, for Fleda's reading was as miscellaneous as ever, was enjoyed under the flutter of leaves and along with the rippling of the mountain spring; whilst King curled himself up on the skirt of his mistress's gown and slept for company; hardly more thoughtless and fearless of harm than his two companions. Now and then Fleda opened her eyes to see that her uncle was moody and not like himself, and that her aunt's gentle face was clouded in consequence; and she could not sometimes help the suspicion that he was not making a farmer of himself; but the next summer wind would blow these thoughts away, or the next look of her flowers would put them out of her head. The whole courtyard in front of the house had been given up to her peculiar use as a flower-garden, and there she and Hugh made themselves very busy. But the summer-time came to an end. It was a November morning, and Fleda had been doing some of the last jobs in her flower-beds. She was coming in with spirits as bright as her cheeks, when her aunt's attitude and look, more than usually spiritless, suddenly checked them. Fleda gave her a hopeful kiss and asked for the explanation. "How bright you look, darling!" said her aunt, stroking her cheek. "Yes, but you don't, aunt Lucy. What has happened?" "Mary and Jane are going away." "Going away!--What for?" "They are tired of the place--don't like it, I suppose." "Very foolish of them! Well, aunt Lucy, what matter? we can get plenty more in their room." "Not from the city--not possible; they would not come at this time of year." "Sure?--Well, then here we can at any rate." "Here! But what sort of persons shall we get here? And your uncle--just think!"-- "O but I think we can manage," said Fleda. "When do Mary and Jane want to go?" "Immediately!--to-morrow--they are not willing to wait till we can get somebody. Think of it!" "Well let them go," said Fleda,--"the sooner the better." "Yes, and I am sure I don't want to keep them; but--" and Mrs. Rossitur wrung her hands--"I haven't money enough to pay them quite,--and they won't go without it." Fleda felt shocked--so much that she could not help looking it. "But can't uncle Rolf give it you?" Mrs. Rossitur shook her head. "I have asked him." "How much is wanting?" "Twenty-five. Think of his not being able to give me that!"--Mrs. Rossitur burst into tears. "Now don't, aunt Lucy!"--said Fleda, guarding well her own composure;--"you know he has had a great deal to spend upon the farm and paying men, and all, and it is no wonder that he should be a little short just now,--now cheer up!--we can get along with this anyhow." "I asked him," said Mrs. Rossitur through her tears, "when he would be able to give it to me; and he told me he didn't know!--" Fleda ventured no reply but some of the tenderest caresses that lips and arms could give; and then sprang away and in three minutes was at her aunt's side again. "Look here, aunt Lucy," said she gently,--"here is twenty dollars, if you can manage the five." "Where did you get this?" Mrs. Rossitur exclaimed. "I got it honestly. It is mine, aunt Lucy," said Fleda smiling. "Uncle Orrin gave me some money just before we came away, to do what I liked with; and I haven't wanted to do anything with it till now." But this seemed to hurt Mrs. Rossitur more than all the rest. Leaning her head forward upon Fleda's breast and clasping her arms about her she cried worse tears than Fleda had seen her shed. If it had not been for the emergency Fleda would have broken down utterly too. "That it should have come to this!--I can't take it, dear Fleda!"-- "Yes you must, aunt Lucy," said Fleda soothingly. "I couldn't do anything else with it that would give me so much pleasure. I don't want it--it would lie in my drawer till I don't know when. We'll let these people be off as soon as they please. Don't take it so--uncle Rolf will have money again--only just now he is out, I suppose--and we'll get somebody else in the kitchen that will do nicely--you see if we don't." Mrs. Rossitur's embrace said what words were powerless to say. "But I don't know how we're to find any one here in the country--I don't know who'll go to look--I am sure your uncle won't want to,--and Hugh wouldn't know--" "I'll go," said Fleda cheerfully;--"Hugh and I. We can do famously--if you'll trust me. I won't promise to bring home a French cook." "No indeed--we must take what we can get. But you can get no one to-day, and they will be off by the morning's coach--what shall we do to-morrow,--for dinner? Your uncle--" "I'll get dinner," said Fleda caressing her;--"I'll take all that on myself. It sha'n't be a bad dinner either. Uncle Rolf will like what I do for him I dare say. Now cheer up, aunt Lucy!--do--that's all I ask of you. Won't you?--for me?" She longed to speak a word of that quiet hope with which in every trouble she secretly comforted herself--she wanted to whisper the words that were that moment in her own mind, "Truly I know that it shall be well with them that fear God;"--but her natural reserve and timidity kept her lips shut; to her grief. The women were paid off and dismissed and departed in the next day's coach from Montepoole. Fleda stood at the front door to see them go, with a curious sense that there was an empty house at her back, and indeed upon her back. And in spite of all the cheeriness of her tone to her aunt, she was not without some shadowy feeling that soberer times might be coming upon them. "What is to be done now?" said Hugh close beside her. "O we are going to get somebody else," said Fleda. "Where?" "I don't know!--You and I are going to find out." "You and I!--" "Yes. We are going out after dinner, Hugh dear," said she turning her bright merry face towards him,--"to pick up somebody." Linking her arm within his she went back to the deserted kitchen premises to see how her promise about taking Mary's place was to be fulfilled. "Do you know where to look?" said Hugh. "I've a notion;--but the first thing is dinner, that uncle Rolf mayn't think the world is turning topsy turvy. There is nothing at all here, Hugh!--nothing in the world but bread--it's a blessing there is that. Uncle Rolf will have to be satisfied with a coffee dinner to-day, and I'll make him the most superb omelette--that my skill is equal to! Hugh dear, you shall set the table.--You don't know how?--then you shall make the toast, and I will set it the first thing of all. You perceive it is well to know how to do everything, Mr. Hugh Rossitur." "Where did you learn to make omelettes?" said Hugh with laughing admiration, as Fleda bared two pretty arms and ran about the very impersonation of good-humoured activity. The table was set; the coffee was making; and she had him established at the fire with two great plates, a pile of slices of bread, and a toasting-iron. "Where? Oh don't you remember the days of Mrs. Renney? I have seen Emile make them. And by dint of trying to teach Mary this summer I have taught myself. There is no knowing, you see, what a person may come to." "I wonder what father would say if he knew you had made all the coffee this summer!" "That is an unnecessary speculation, my dear Hugh, as I have no intention of telling him. But see!--that is the way with speculators! 'While they go on refining'--the toast burns!" The coffee and the omelette and the toast and Mr. Rossitur's favourite French salad, were served with beautiful accuracy; and he was quite satisfied. But aunt Lucy looked sadly at Fleda's flushed face and saw that her appetite seemed to have gone off in the steam of her preparations. Fleda had a kind of heart-feast however which answered as well. Hugh harnessed the little wagon, for no one was at hand to do it, and he and Fleda set off as early as possible after dinner. Fleda's thoughts had turned to her old acquaintance Cynthia Gall, who she knew was out of employment and staying at home somewhere near Montepoole. They got the exact direction from aunt Miriam who approved of her plan. It was a pleasant peaceful drive they had. They never were alone together, they two, but vexations seemed to lose their power or be forgotten; and an atmosphere of quietness gather about them, the natural element of both hearts. It might refuse its presence to one, but the attraction of both together was too strong to be resisted. Miss Cynthia's present abode was in an out of the way place, and a good distance off; they were some time in reaching it. The barest-looking and dingiest of houses, set plump in a green field, without one softening or home-like touch from any home-feeling within; not a flower, not a shrub, not an out-house, not a tree near. One would have thought it a deserted house, but that a thin wreath of smoke lazily stole up from one of the brown chimneys; and graceful as that was it took nothing from the hard stern barrenness below which told of a worse poverty than that of paint and glazing. "Can this be the place?" said Hugh. "It must be. You stay here with the horse, and I'll go in and seek my fortune.--Don't promise much," said Fleda shaking her head. The house stood back from the road. Fleda picked her way to it along a little footpath which seemed to be the equal property of the geese. Her knock brought an invitation to "come in." An elderly woman was sitting there whose appearance did not mend the general impression. She had the same dull and unhopeful look that her house had. "Does Mrs. Gall live here?" "I do," said this person. "Is Cynthia at home?" The woman upon this raised her voice and directed it at an inner door. "Lucindy!" said she in a diversity of tones,--"Lucindy!--tell Cynthy here's somebody wants to see her."--But no one answered, and throwing the work from her lap the woman muttered she would go and see, and left Fleda with a cold invitation to sit down. Dismal work! Fleda wished herself out of it. The house did not look poverty-stricken within, but poverty must have struck to the very heart, Fleda thought, where there was no apparent cherishing of anything. There was no absolute distress visible, neither was there a sign of real comfort or of a happy home. She could not fancy it was one. She waited so long that she was sure Cynthia did not hold herself in readiness to see company. And when the lady at last came in it was with very evident marks of "smarting up" about her. "Why it's Flidda Ringgan!" said Miss Gall after a dubious look or two at her visitor. "How do you do? I didn't 'spect to see you. How much you have growed!" She looked really pleased and gave Fleda's hand a very strong grasp as she shook it. "There ain't no fire here to-day," pursued Cynthy, paying her attentions to the fireplace,--"we let it go down on account of our being all busy out at the back of the house. I guess you're cold, ain't you?" Fleda said no, and remembered that the woman she had first seen was certainly not busy at the back of the house nor anywhere else but in that very room, where she had found her deep in a pile of patchwork. "I heerd you had come to the old place. Were you glad to be back again?" Cynthy asked with a smile that might be taken to express some doubt upon the subject. "I was very glad to see it again." "I hain't seen it in a great while. I've been staying to hum this year or two. I got tired o' going out," Cynthy remarked, with again a smile very peculiar and Fleda thought a little sardonical. She did not know how to answer. "Well, how do you come along down yonder?" Cynthy went on, making a great fuss with the shovel and tongs to very little purpose. "Ha' you come all the way from Queechy?" "Yes. I came on purpose to see you, Cynthy." Without staying to ask what for, Miss Gall now went out to "the back of the house" and came running in again with a live brand pinched in the tongs, and a long tail of smoke running after it. Fleda would have compounded for no fire and no choking. The choking was only useful to give her time to think. She was uncertain how to bring in her errand. "And how is Mis' Plumfield?" said Cynthy, in an interval of blowing the brand. "She is quite well; but Cynthy, you need not have taken all that trouble for me. I cannot stay but a few minutes." "There is wood enough!" Cynthia remarked with one of her grim smiles; an assertion Fleda could not help doubting. Indeed she thought Miss Gall had grown altogether more disagreeable than she used to be in old times. Why, she could not divine, unless the souring effect had gone on with the years. "And what's become of Earl Douglass and Mis' Douglass? I hain't heerd nothin' of 'em this great while. I always told your grandpa he'd ha' saved himself a great deal o' trouble if he'd ha' let Earl Douglass take hold of things. You ha'n't got Mr. Didenhover into the works again I guess, have you? He was there a good spell after your grandpa died." "I haven't seen Mrs. Douglass," said Fleda. "But Cynthy, what do you think I have come here for?" "I don't know," said Cynthy, with another of her peculiar looks directed at the fire. "I s'pose you want someh'n nother of me." "I have come to see if you wouldn't come and live with my aunt, Mrs. Rossitur. We are left alone and want somebody very much; and I thought I would find you out and see if we couldn't have you, first of all,--before I looked for anybody else." Cynthy was absolutely silent. She sat before the fire, her feet stretched out towards it as far as they would go and her arms crossed, and not moving her steady gaze at the smoking wood, or the chimney-back, whichever it might be; but there was in the corners of her mouth the threatening of a smile that Fleda did not at all like. "What do you say to it, Cynthy?" "I reckon you'd best get somebody else," said Miss Gall with a kind of condescending dryness, and the smile shewing a little more. "Why?" said Fleda, "I would a great deal rather have an old friend than a stranger." "Be you the housekeeper?" said Cynthy a little abruptly. "O I am a little of everything," said Fleda;--"cook and housekeeper and whatever comes first. I want you to come and be housekeeper, Cynthy." "I reckon Mis' Rossitur don't have much to do with her help, does she?" said Cynthy after a pause, during which the corners of her mouth never changed. The tone of piqued independence let some light into Fleda's mind. "She is not strong enough to do much herself, and she wants some one that will take all the trouble from her. You'd have the field all to yourself, Cynthy." "Your aunt sets two tables I calculate, don't she?" "Yes--my uncle doesn't like to have any but his own family around him." "I guess I shouldn't suit!" said Miss Gall, after another little pause, and stooping very diligently to pick up some scattered shreds from the floor. But Fleda could see the flushed face and the smile which pride and a touch of spiteful pleasure in the revenge she was taking made particularly hateful. She needed no more convincing that Miss Gall "wouldn't suit;" but she was sorry at the same time for the perverseness that had so needlessly disappointed her; and went rather pensively back again down the little foot-path to the waiting wagon. "This is hardly the romance of life, dear Hugh," she said as she seated herself. "Haven't you succeeded?" Fleda shook her head. "What's the matter?" "O--pride,--injured pride of station! The wrong of not coming to our table and putting her knife into our butter." "And living in such a place!" said Hugh. "You don't know what a place. They are miserably poor, I am sure; and yet--I suppose that the less people have to be proud of the more they make of what is left. Poor people!--" "Poor Fleda!" said Hugh looking at her. "What will you do now?" "O we'll do somehow," said she cheerfully. "Perhaps it is just as well after all, for Cynthy isn't the smartest woman in the world. I remember grandpa used to say he didn't believe she could get a bean into the middle of her bread." "A bean into the middle of her bread!" said Hugh. But Fleda's sobriety was quite banished by his mystified look, and her laugh rang along over the fields before she answered him. That laugh had blown away all the vapours, for the present at least, and they jogged on again very sociably. "Do you know," said Fleda, after a while of silent enjoyment in the changes of scene and the mild autumn weather,--"I am not sure that it wasn't very well for me that we came away from New York." "I dare say it was," said Hugh,--"since we came; but what makes you say so?" "I don't mean that it was for anybody else, but for me. I think I was a little proud of our nice things there." "You, Fleda!" said Hugh with a look of appreciating affection. "Yes I was, a little. It didn't make the greatest part of my love for them, I am sure; but I think I had a little, undefined, sort of pleasure in the feeling that they were better and prettier than other people had." "You are sure you are not proud of your little King Charles now?" said Hugh. "I don't know but I am," said Fleda laughing. "But how much pleasanter it is here on almost every account. Look at the beautiful sweep of the ground off among those hills--isn't it? What an exquisite horizon line, Hugh!" "And what a sky over it!" "Yes--I love these fall skies. Oh I would a great deal rather be here than in any city that ever was built!" "So would I," said Hugh. "But the thing is--" Fleda knew quite well what the thing was, and did not answer. "But my dear Hugh," she said presently,--"I don't remember that sweep of hills when we were coming?" "You were going the other way," said Hugh. "Yes but, Hugh,--I am sure we did not pass these grain fields. We must have got into the wrong road." Hugh drew the reins, and looked, and doubted. "There is a house yonder," said Fleda,--"we had better drive on and ask." "There is no house--" "Yes there is--behind that piece of wood. Look over it--don't you see a light curl of blue smoke against the sky?--We never passed that house and wood, I am certain. We ought to make haste, for the afternoons are short now, and you will please to recollect there is nobody at home to get tea." "I hope Lucas will get upon one of his everlasting talks with father," said Hugh. "And that it will hold till we get home," said Fleda. "It will be the happiest use Lucas has made of his tongue in a good while." Just as they stopped before a substantial-looking farm-house a man came from the other way and stopped there too, with his hand upon the gate. "How far are we from Queechy, sir?" said Hugh. "You're not from it at all, sir," said the man politely. "You're in Queechy, sir, at present." "Is this the right road from Montepoole to Queechy village?" "It is not, sir. It is a very tortuous direction indeed. Have I not the pleasure of speaking to Mr. Rossitur's young gentleman?" Mr. Rossitur's young gentleman acknowledged his relationship and begged the favour of being set in the right way home. "With much pleasure! You have been shewing Miss Rossitur the picturesque country about Montepoole?" "My cousin and I have been there on business, and lost our way coming back." "Ah I dare say. Very easy. First time you have been there?" "Yes sir, and we are in a hurry to get home." "Well sir,--you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?--comes out just above the lake?" Hugh did not remember. "Well--you keep this road straight on,--I'm sorry you are in a hurry,--you keep on till--do you know when you strike Mr. Harris's ground?" No, Hugh knew nothing about it, nor Fleda. "Well I'll tell you now how it is," said the stranger, "if you'll permit me. You and your--a--cousin--come in and do us the pleasure of taking some refreshment--I know my sister'll have her table set out by this time--and I'll do myself the honour of introducing you to--a--these strange roads afterwards." "Thank you, sir, but that trouble is unnecessary--cannot you direct us?" "No trouble--indeed sir, I assure you, I should esteem it a favour--very highly. I--I am Dr. Quackenboss, sir; you may have heard--" "Thank you, Dr. Quackenboss, but we have no time this afternoon--we are very anxious to reach home as soon as possible; if you would be be so good as to put us in the way." <ANTIMG src="images/illus12.jpg" height-obs="250" alt="'Well, sir, you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?'" title="'Well, sir, you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?'" /> "Well, sir, you know the road by Deacon Patterson's?" "I--really sir, I am afraid--to a person ignorant of the various localities--You will lose no time--I will just hitch your horse here, and I'll have mine ready by the time this young lady has rested. Miss--a--won't you join with me? I assure you I will not put you to the expense of a minute--Thank you!--Mr. Harden!--Just clap the saddle on to Lollypop and have him up here in three seconds.--Thank you!--My dear Miss--a--won't you take my arm? I am gratified, I assure you." Yielding to the apparent impossibility of getting anything out of Dr. Quackenboss, except civility, and to the real difficulty of disappointing such very earnest good will, Fleda and Hugh did what older persons would not have done,--alighted and walked up to the house. "This is quite a fortuitous occurrence," the doctor went on:--"I have often had the pleasure of seeing Mr Rossitur's family in church--in the little church at Queechy Run--and that enabled me to recognise your cousin as soon as I saw him in the wagon. Perhaps Miss--a--you may have possibly heard of my name?--Quackenboss--I don't know that you understood--" "I have heard it, sir." "My Irishmen, Miss--a--my Irish labourers, can't get hold of but one end of it; they call me Boss--ha, ha, ha!" Fleda hoped his patients did not get hold of the other end of it, and trembled, visibly. "Hard to pull a man's name to pieces before his face,--ha, ha! but I am--a--not one thing myself,--a kind of heterogynous--I am a piece of a physician and a little in the agricultural line also; so it's all fair." "The Irish treat my name as hardly, Dr. Quackenboss--they call me nothing but Miss Ring-again." And then Fleda could laugh, and laugh she did, so heartily that the doctor was delighted. "Ring-again! ha, ha!--Very good!--Well, Miss--a--I shouldn't think that anybody in your service would ever--a--ever let you put your name in practice." But Fleda's delight at the excessive gallantry and awkwardness of this speech was almost too much; or, as the doctor pleasantly remarked, her nerves were too many for her; and every one of them was dancing by the time they reached the hall-door. The doctor's flourishes lost not a bit of their angularity from his tall ungainly figure and a lantern-jawed face, the lower member of which had now and then a somewhat lateral play when he was speaking, which curiously aided the quaint effect of his words. He ushered his guests into the house, seeming in a flow of self-gratulation. The supper-table was spread, sure enough, and hovering about it was the doctor's sister; a lady in whom Fleda only saw a Dutch face, with eyes that made no impression, disagreeable fair hair, and a string of gilt beads round her neck. A painted yellow floor under foot, a room that looked excessively wooden and smelt of cheese, bare walls and a well-filled table, was all that she took in besides. "I have the honour of presenting you to my sister," said the doctor with suavity. "Flora, the Irish domestics of this young lady call her name Miss Ring-again--if she will let us know how it ought to be called we shall be happy to be informed." Dr. Quackenboss was made happy. "Miss Ringgan--and this young gentleman is young Mr. Rossitur--the gentleman that has taken Squire Ringgan's old place. We were so fortunate as to have them lose their way this afternoon, coming from the Pool, and they have just stepped in to see if you can't find 'em a mouthful of something they can eat, while Lollypop is a getting ready to see them home." Poor Miss Flora immediately disappeared into the kitchen, to order a bit of superior cheese and to have some slices of ham put on the gridiron, and then coming back to the common room went rummaging about from cupboard to cupboard, in search of cake and sweetmeats. Fleda protested and begged in vain. "She was so sorry she hadn't knowed," Miss Flora said,--"she'd ha' had some cakes made that maybe they could have eaten, but the bread was dry; and the cheese wa'n't as good somehow as the last one they cut, maybe Miss Ringgan would prefer a piece of newer-made, if she liked it; and she hadn't had good luck with her preserves last summer--the most of 'em had fomented--she thought it was the damp weather, but there was some stewed pears that maybe she would be so good as to approve--and there was some ham! whatever else it was it was hot!--" It was impossible, it was impossible, to do dishonour to all this hospitality and kindness and pride that was brought out for them. Early or late, they must eat, in mere gratitude. The difficulty was to avoid eating everything. Hugh and Fleda managed to compound the matter with each other, one taking the cake and pears, and the other the ham and cheese. In the midst of all this over flow of good will Fleda bethought her to ask if Miss Flora knew of any girl or woman that would go out to service. Miss Flora took the matter into grave consideration as soon as her anxiety on the subject of their cups of tea had subsided. She did not commit herself, but thought it possible that one of the Finns might be willing to go out. "Where do they live?" "It's--a--not far from Queechy Run," said the doctor, whose now and then hesitation in the midst of his speech was never for want of a thought but simply and merely for the best words to clothe it in. "Is it in our way to-night?" He could make it so, the doctor said, with pleasure, for it would give him permission to gallant them a little further. They had several miles yet to go, and the sun went down as they were passing through Queechy Run. Under that still cool clear autumn sky Fleda would have enjoyed the ride very much, but that her unfulfilled errand was weighing upon her, and she feared her aunt and uncle might want her services before she could be at home. Still, late as it was, she determined to stop for a minute at Mrs. Finn's and go home with a clear conscience. At her door, and not till there, the doctor was prevailed upon to part company, the rest of the way being perfectly plain. "Not I!--at least I think not. But, Hugh, don't say anything about all this to aunt Lucy. She would be troubled." Fleda had certainly when she came away no notion of improving her acquaintance with Miss Anastasia; but the supper, and the breakfast and the dinner of the next day, with all the nameless and almost numberless duties of housework that filled up the time between, wrought her to a very strong sense of the necessity of having some kind of "help" soon. Mrs. Rossitur wearied herself excessively with doing very little, and then looked so sad to see Fleda working on, that it was more disheartening and harder to bear than the fatigue. Hugh was a most faithful and invaluable coadjutor, and his lack of strength was like her own made up by energy of will; but neither of them could bear the strain long; and when the final clearing away of the dinner-dishes gave her a breathing-time she resolved to dress herself and put her thimble in her pocket and go over to Miss Finn's quilting. Miss Lucy might not be like Miss Anastasia; and if she were, anything that had hands and feet to move instead of her own would be welcome. Hugh went with her to the door and was to come for her at sunset. <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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