Not Quite Eighteen Part 7

False shame and the fear of "people" are powerful influences.

Three days later, Hesse's long, delightful visit ended, and she was speeding home under Uncle's care.

"You must write and invite some of those fine young folk to come up to see you in June," he told her.

"That will be delightful," said Hesse. But when she came to think about it later, she was not so sure about its being delightful.

There is nothing like a long absence from home to open one's eyes to the real aspect of familiar things. The Sparlings-Neck house looked wofully plain and old-fas.h.i.+oned, even to Hesse, when contrasted with the elegance of Madison Avenue; how much more so, she reflected, would it look to the girls!

She thought of Uncle's after-dinner pipe; of the queer little chamber, opening from the dining-room, where he and Aunt chose to sleep; of the green-painted woodwork of the spare bedrooms, and the blue paper-shades, tied up with a cord, which Aunt clung to because they were in fas.h.i.+on when she was a girl; and for a few foolish moments she felt that she would rather not have her friends come at all, than have them come to see all this, and perhaps make fun of it. Only for a few moments; then her more generous nature a.s.serted itself with a bound.

"How mean of me to even think of such a thing!" she told herself, indignantly,--"to feel ashamed to have people know what my own home is like, and Uncle and Aunt, who are so good to me! Hesse Reinike, I should like to hire some one to give you a good whipping! The girls _shall_ come, and I'll make the old house look just as sweet as I can, and they shall like it, and have a beautiful time from the moment they come till they go away, if I can possibly give it to them."

To punish herself for what she considered an unworthy feeling, she resolved not to ask Aunt to let her change the blue paper-shades for white curtains, but to have everything exactly as it usually was. But Aunt had her own ideas and her pride of housekeeping to consider. As the time of the visit drew near, laundering and bleaching seemed to be constantly going on, and Jane, the old housemaid, was kept busy tacking dimity valances and fringed hangings on the substantial four-post bedsteads, and arranging fresh muslin covers over the toilet-tables.

Treasures unknown to Hesse were drawn out of their receptacles,--bits of old embroidery, tamboured tablecloths and "crazy quilts," vases and bow-pots of pretty old china for the bureaus and chimney-pieces. Hesse took a long drive to the woods, and brought back great ma.s.ses of ferns, pink azalea, and wild laurel. All the neighbors' gardens were laid under contribution. When all was in order, with ginger-jars full of cool white daisies and golden b.u.t.tercups standing on the s.h.i.+ning mahogany tables, bunches of blue lupines on the mantel, the looking-gla.s.ses wreathed with traveller's joy, a great bowl full of early roses and quant.i.ties of lilies-of-the-valley, the old house looked cosey enough and smelt sweet enough to satisfy the most fastidious taste.

Hesse drove over with Uncle to the station to meet her guests. They took the big carryall, which, with squeezing, would hold seven; and a wagon followed for the luggage. There were five girls coming; for, besides Pauline and Grace, Hesse had invited Georgie Berrian, Maud Ashurst, and Ella Waring, who were the three special favorites among her New York friends.

The five flocked out of the train, looking so dainty and stylish that they made the old carryall seem shabbier than ever by contrast. Maud Ashurst cast one surprised look at it and at the old white mare,--she had never seen just such a carriage before; but the quality of the equipage was soon forgotten, as Uncle twitched the reins, and they started down the long lane-like road which led to Sparlings-Neck and was Hesse's particular delight.

The station and the dusty railroad were forgotten almost immediately,--lost in the sense of complete country freshness. On either hand rose tangled banks of laurel and barberries, sweet-ferns and budding grapevines, overarched by tall trees, and sending out delicious odors; while mingling with and blending all came, borne on a sh.o.r.eward wind, the strong salt fragrance of the sea.

"What is it? What can it be? I never smelt anything like it!" cried the girls from the city.

"Now, girls," cried Hesse, turning her bright face around from the driver's seat, "this is real, absolute country, you know,--none of the make-believes which you get at Newport or up the Hudson. Everything we have is just as queer and old-fas.h.i.+oned as it can be. You won't be asked to a single party while you are here, and there isn't the ghost of a young man in the neighborhood. Well, yes, there may be a ghost, but there is no young man. You must just make up your minds, all of you, to a dull time, and then you'll find that it's lovely."

"It's sure to be lovely wherever you are, you dear thing!" declared Ella Waring, with a little rapturous squeeze.

I fancy that, just at first, the city girls did think the place very queer. None of them had ever seen just such an old house as the Reinikes' before. The white wainscots with their toothed mouldings matched by the cornices above, the droll little cupboards in the walls, the fire-boards pasted with gay pictures, the queer closets and clothes-presses occurring just where no one would naturally have looked for them, and having, each and all, an odd shut-up odor, as of by-gone days,--all seemed very strange to them. But the flowers and the green elms and Hesse's warm welcome were delightful; so were Aunt's waffles and wonderful tarts, the strawberries smothered in country cream, and the cove oysters and clams which came in, deliciously stewed, for tea; and they soon p.r.o.nounced the visit "a lark," and Sparlings-Neck a paradise.

There were long drives in the woods, picnics in the pine groves, bathing-parties on the beach, morning sittings under the trees with an interesting book; and when a northeaster came, and brought with it what seemed a brief return of winter, there was a crackling fire, a candy-pull, and a charming evening spent in sitting on the floor telling ghost-stories, with the room only lighted by the fitfully blazing wood, and with cold creeps running down their backs! Altogether, the fortnight was a complete success, and every one saw its end with reluctance.

"I wish we were going to stay all summer!" said Georgie Berrian.

"Newport will seem stiff and tiresome after this."

"I never had so good a time,--never!" declared Ella. "And, Hesse, I do think your aunt and uncle are the dearest old people I ever saw!" That pleased Hesse most of all. But what pleased her still more was when, after the guests were gone, and the house restored to its old order, and the regular home life begun again, Uncle put his arm around her, and gave her a kiss,--not a bedtime kiss, or one called for by any special occasion, but an extra kiss, all of his own accord.

"A dear child," he said; "not a bit ashamed of the old folks, was she?

I liked that, Hesse."

"Ashamed of you and Aunt? I should think not!" answered Hesse, with a flush.

Uncle gave a dry little chuckle.

"Well, well," he said, "some girls would have been; you weren't,--that's all the difference. You're a good child, Hesse."

THE CORN-BALL MONEY, AND WHAT BECAME OF IT.

Dotty and Dimple were two little sisters, who looked so much alike that most people took them for twins. They both had round faces, blue eyes, straight brown hair, cut short in the neck, and cheeks as firm and pink as fall apples; and, though Dotty was eleven months the oldest, Dimple was the taller by half an inch, so that altogether it was very confusing.

I don't believe any twins could love each other better than did these little girls. n.o.body ever heard them utter a quarrelsome word from the time they waked in the morning, and began to chatter and giggle in bed like two little squirrels, to the moment when they fell asleep at night, with arms tight clasped round each other's necks. They liked the same things, did the same things, and played together all day long without being tired. Their father's farm was two miles from the nearest neighbor, and three from the schoolhouse; so they didn't go to school, and no little boys and girls ever came to see them.

Should you think it would be lonely to live so? Dotty and Dimple didn't.

They had each other for playmates, and all outdoors to play in, and that was enough.

The farm was a wild, beautiful spot. A river ran round two sides of it; and quite near the house it "met with an accident," as Dotty said; that is, it tumbled over some high rocks in a waterfall, and then, picking itself up, took another jump, and landed, all white and foaming, in a deep wooded glen.

The water where it fell was dazzling with rainbows, like soap-bubbles; and the pool at the bottom had the color of a green emerald, only that all over the top little flakes of sparkling spray swam and glittered in the sun. Altogether it was a wonderful place, and the children were never tired of watching the cascade or hearing the rush and roar of its leap.

All summer long city people, boarding in the village, six miles off, would drive over to see the fall. This was very interesting, indeed!

Carryalls and big wagons would stop at the gate, and ladies get out, with pretty round hats and parasols; and gentlemen, carrying canes; and dear little children, in flounced and braided frocks. And they would all come trooping up close by the house, on their way to see the view.

Sometimes, but not often, one would stop to get a drink of water or ask the way. Dotty and Dimple liked very much to have them come. They would hide, and peep out at the strangers, and make up all kinds of stories about them; but they were too shy to come forward or let themselves be seen. So the people from the city never guessed what bright eyes were looking at them from behind the door or on the other side of the bushes.

But all the same, it was great fun for the children to have them come, and they were always pleased when wheels were heard and wagons drove up to the gate.

It was early last summer that a droll idea popped into Dotty's head. It all came from a man who, walking past, and stopping to see the fall, sat down a while to rest, and said to the farmer:--

"I should think you'd charge people something for looking at that ere place, stranger."

"No," replied Dotty's father. "I don't calculate on asking folks nothing for the use of their eyes."

"Well," said the man, getting up to go, "you might as well. It's what folks is doing all over the country. If 't was mine, I'd fix up a lunch or something, and fetch 'em that way."

But the farmer only laughed. That night, when Dotty and Dimple were in bed, they began to whisper to each other about the man.

"Wasn't it funny," giggled Dimple, "his telling Pa to fix a lunch?"

"Yes," said Dotty. "But I'll tell you what, Dimple! when he said that, I had such a nice plan come into my head. You know you and me can make real nice corn-b.a.l.l.s."

"'Course we can."

"Well, let's get Pa, or else Zach, to make us a little table,--out of boards, you know; and let's put it on the bank, close to the place where folks go to see the fall; and every day let's pop a lot of corn, and make some b.a.l.l.s, and set them on the table for the folks to eat. Don't you think that would be nice?"

"I'm afraid Mother wouldn't let us have so much mola.s.ses," said the practical Dimple.

"Oh, but don't you see I mean to have the folks _pay_ for 'em! We'll put a paper on the table, with 'two cents apiece,' or something like that, on it. And then they'll put the money on the table, and when they're gone away we'll go and fetch it. Won't that be fun? Perhaps there'd be a great, great deal,--most as much as a dollar!"

"Oh, no," cried Dimple, "not so much as _that_! But we might get a greenback. How much is a greenback, Dot?"

"Oh, I don't know," replied Dotty. "A good deal, I know, but I guess it isn't so much as a dollar."

The little sisters could hardly sleep that night, they were so excited over their plan. Next morning they were up with the birds; and before breakfast Mother, Father, and Zach, the hired man, had heard all about the wonderful scheme.

Mother said she didn't mind letting them try; and Zach, who was very fond of the children, promised to make the table the very first thing after the big field was ploughed. And so he did; and a very nice table it was, with four legs and a good stout top. Dotty and Dimple laughed with pleasure when they saw it.

Zach set it on the bank just at the place where the people stood to look at the view; and he drove a stake at each corner; and found some old sheeting, and made a sort of tent over the table, so that the sun should not s.h.i.+ne under and melt the corn-b.a.l.l.s. When it was all arranged, and the table set out, with the corn-b.a.l.l.s on one plate and maple-sugar cakes on another, it looked very tempting, and the children were extremely proud of it. Dotty cut a sheet of paper, and printed upon it the following notice: