The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary Part 18

A door banged below.

"That's Burr!" he exclaimed, remembering suddenly the proximity of their chairs, and making haste to place himself farther away.

Burnett's step was heard on the stair.

"You never said anything to him, did you?" she questioned quickly.

"Certainly not."

The next instant Burnett was in the room, and his sister was in his arms.

(Astonis.h.i.+ng how coolly he accepted the fact, too.)

"Mr. Denham is coming to me with you, Bob," she said when he released her.

"I've persuaded him."

"How did you do it?" she was asked.

"By undertaking to reconcile him with his aunt, dear," she replied, blandly. "It's a contract that we've drawn up between us. You know that I was always rather good in the part of the peacemaker."

As she spoke, her eyes fell warningly on the manifest astonishment of Aunt Mary's nephew.

"You don't know what you're undertaking, Betty," said her brother. "You never had a chance to take Aunt Mary for better, for worse-I have."

"I'm not alarmed," said she, "I'm very courageous. I'm sure I'll succeed."

"Can the mender of ways-other people's ways-come in?" asked a voice at the door.

It was Mitch.e.l.l's voice, and he came in without waiting for an invitation.

"Is it time that I went?" Mrs. Rosscott asked him, anxiously.

"Half an hour yet."

"Oh, I say Jack," cried Burnett, "let's boil some water in the witch-hazel pan, and make a rarebit in the poultice pan, and have some tea here."

"Sure," said Jack, suddenly become his blithe and buoyant self again. "You just take off your hat and look the other way, Mrs. Rosscott, and we'll have you a lunch in a jiffy."

CHAPTER TWELVE - A TRAP FOR AUNT MARY

In Aunt Mary's part of the country the skies had been crying themselves sick for the last six weeks. The cranberry bog was a goner forever, it was feared, and a little house, very handy for sorting berries in, had had its foundations undermined, and disappeared beneath the face of the waters also.

Under such propitious circ.u.mstances, Aunt Mary sat by her own particular window and looked sternly and severely out across the garden and down the road. Lucinda sat by the other window sewing. Lucinda hadn't changed materially, but her general appearance struck her mistress as more irritating than ever. Everything and everybody seemed to have become more and more irritating ever since Jack had been disinherited. Of course, it was right that he should have been disinherited, but Aunt Mary hadn't thought much beforehand as to what would happen afterward, and it was too aggravating to have him turn out so well just when she had lost all patience with him and so cast him off forever, and for him to develop such a beautiful character, all of a sudden too-just as if education and good advice had been his undoing and seclusion and illness were the guardian angels arrived just in time to save him from the evil effects thereof.

It hadn't occurred to Aunt Mary that people keep on living just the same even after they have been cut out of a will. And she never had counted on Jack's taking his bitter medicine in the spirit he was manifesting. She had not calculated any of the possible effects of her hasty action very maturely, but she certainly had not antic.i.p.ated a lamblike submission to even the harshest of her edicts, nor had she expected Jack to be one who would strictly observe the Bible regulations and so return good for evil-in other words, write her now when he had never written her in the bygone years (unless under sharpest financial stress of circ.u.mstances).

Yet such was the case. Jack had become a "ready letter-writer" ever since his removal to the city, whither some kind friends had invited him directly he could leave his sick-room. Aunt Mary did not know who the friends were and had hesitated somewhat as to opening the first letter.

But it had borne no sting-being instead most sweetly pathetic, and since then, others had followed with touching frequency. Their polished periods fell upon the old lady's stony hardness of heart with the persistent frequency of the proverbial drop of water. After the second she had ceased to regard the instructions given Lucinda as to mentioning her nephew's name, and after the third he became again her favorite topic of conversation.

It seemed that the poor boy had had the misfortune to contract measles, and in his weakened state the disease had nearly proved fatal. You can perhaps divine the effect of this statement on the grand-aunt, and the further effect of the words: "But never mind, Aunt Mary," with which he concluded the brief narration.

Aunt Mary had tried to snort and had sniffed instead; she had turned back to the first page, read, "All my head has been shaved, but I don't care about having any more fun, anyhow," and had let the letter fall in her lap. Every time that she had thought since of "our boy," her anger had fallen hotter upon whoever was handiest. Lucinda (who was used to it) lived under a figurative rain of cinders, and thrived salamander-like in their midst; but Arethusa-who had come up for a week-found herself totally unable to stand the endless lava and boiling ashes, and fled back to the bosom of Mr. Arethusa the third morning after her arrival.

"I've got to go, I find," she had yelled the night before her departure.

"I certainly wish you would," replied her aunt. "I'm a great believer in married women paying attention at home before they begin to pry into their neighbors' affairs. It's a good idea. Most generally-most always."

This was bitterly unkind, since Arethusa was in the habit of taking the long journey purely out of a sense of duty and to keep Lucinda up to the mark; but grateful appreciation is rarely ever a salient point in the character of an autocrat.

"I'm glad she's gone," Aunt Mary told Lucinda, when they were left together once more. "She puts me beyond all patience. She chatters gibberish that I can't make out a word of for an hour at a time, and then, all of a sudden, she screams, 'Dinner's ready,' or something equally silly, in a voice like a carvin' knife. It's enough to drive a sane person stark, raving mad. It is."

Lucinda acquiesced with a nod. Lucinda herself was glad that Arethusa had gone. She resented the manner in which the latter always looked over the preserve closet and counted the silver. Nothing was ever missing, because Lucinda was as honest as a day twenty-five hours long, but the more honest those of Lucinda's caliber are, the more mad they get if they feel that they are being watched. So Lucinda acquiesced with a nod.

The mistress and maid were sitting alone together, with the June rain falling without, and it was that pleasantly exciting hour which comes only in the country and is known as "about mail-time."

"There's Joshua now," Aunt Mary exclaimed, presently, "I see him turnin'

in the gate. He'll be at the door before you get there, Lucinda,-he will.

There, he's twistin' his wheel off. He's tryin' to hold Billy an' hold the letters an' whistle, all at once. Why don't you go to him, Lucinda? Can't you hear a whistle that I can see? Or, if you can't hear the whistle, can't you hear me? Do you think whoever wrote those letters would be much pleased if they could see you so slow about gettin' them? Do-"

Just here the old lady, turning toward Lucinda, perceived that she had been gone-Heaven knew how long. She felt decidedly vexed at finding herself to be in the wrong, rubbed her nose impatiently, and waited in a temper to match the rubbing.

"My Lord! how slow she is!" she thought. "Well, if I don't die of old age first, I presume I'll get my letters some time. Maybe."

As a matter of fact, the door had blown shut behind Lucinda, and the latter personage was making her way, with well-hoisted skirts, around the house to the back door. She didn't pa.s.s the window where the Argus-eyed was looking forth; because that lady had strong opinions of those who let doors bang behind them without their own volition.

Five minutes later the maid did finally appear with one letter.

"I thought you was waitin' to bring to-morrow's mail at the same time,"

said Aunt Mary, icily.

Then she found that the letter was from Jack, and Lucinda was completely forgotten in the pleasure of opening and reading it.

DEAR AUNT MARY:

It seems so strange how I'm just learning the pleasure of writing letters. I enjoy it more every day. When I see a pen I can hardly keep from feeling that I ought to write you directly. I think of you, then, because I'm thinking of you most always. It seems as if I never appreciated you before, Aunt Mary.

I want to tell you something that I know will make you happy. I've never made you very happy Aunt Mary, but I'm going to begin now.

I've got a place where I can earn my own living, and I'm going to work just as soon as I am strong enough. I'm as tickled as a baby over it. I'll lay you any odds I get to be a richer man than the other John Watkins. I reckon money was bad for me, Aunt Mary, and I can see that you've done just the right thing to make a man of me. That isn't surprising, because you always did do just the right thing, Aunt Mary; it was I that always did just the wrong thing, but I'm straightened out now and this time it's forever-you just wait and see.

There's one thing bothers me some, and that is I don't get strong very fast. They want me to take a tonic, but I don't think a tonic would help me much. I feel so sort of blue and depressed, and perhaps that's natural, for Bob's away most of the time and I'm here all alone. It's a big house and sort of lonely and sometimes I find myself imagining how it would seem to have someone from home in it with me, and I find myself almost crying-I do, for a fact, Aunt Mary.

Next week, Bob is going to be away more than usual, and I'm dreading it awfully; but never mind, Aunt Mary, I don't want to make you blue, because honestly I don't think I'm going into a decline, even if the doctor does. And, after all, if I did sort of dwindle away it wouldn't matter much, for I'm not worth anything, and no one knows that as well as myself-except you, Aunt Mary. I must stop because it's nine o'clock and time I was in bed. I've got some socks to wash out first, too; you see, I'm learning how to economize just as fast as I can. It's only two miles to my work, and I'm going to walk back and forth always-that'll be between fifty cents and a dollar saved each week. I'm figuring on how to live on my salary and never have a debt, and you'll be proud of me yet, Aunt Mary-if I don't die first.

Think of me all alone here next week. If I wasn't steadfast as a rock I believe I'd do something foolish just to get out of myself.