The Chronicles of Rhoda Part 13

She went on for quite awhile relating long stories of raps inflicted upon helpless little girls, some of whom had actually been saucy to her, and some of whom had merely played false notes like myself. A much larger girl than I had been rapped that very morning for false notes, and had cried! Afterwards she had played a great deal better.

I listened in growing terror. I wondered if she were trying to frighten me. Then suddenly I glanced up at my great-grandfather's picture.

The parlor walls were hung with the pictures of men who had borne my name. Most of them had preached, but some had fought; and he, my great-grandfather, who looked down over the piano, had preached with a sword in his hand. All the Harcourts had been brave men. They had never been afraid of anything. And on the other side there was granddad Lawrence, whose courage no one could possibly question. He would not have stood this when he was a boy. Just think of Polly!

Something inside of me seemed to awake. I turned and faced her, ogress though she was.

"You'll never rap mine," I said, steadily. "Never! I am bad! I am a Hottentot!"

I made a horrid face at her, such as a Hottentot might be supposed to have.

For the first and only time in the course of our acquaintance she laughed. She laughed as if she would die, while I sat on my sofa pillow and watched her. During the rest of the lesson she was remarkably friendly.

My mother was much pleased with the progress that I made. She often spoke of Madame Tomaso's method, and of how brilliantly her little pupils played. My mother had never heard of raps. All the family were encouraging in their comments, and they, also, set me a s.h.i.+ning example.

My mother rubbed up her musical knowledge, and even my grandmother would steal into the parlor in the early twilight, and play some Old World melody which held within its tune the hurry of dancing feet. All these I was to learn some day, when my fingers had grown as strong as my desire.

I played better and better for the admiring circle, until Madame Tomaso herself would have been astonished if she could have heard me.

"She really does quite well," my father said one night. "It almost sounds like a tune. Is it 'Yankee Doodle,' or 'Old Dog Tray'?"

"Neither!" my mother cried, warmly. "I don't know exactly what it is myself, but it is probably something cla.s.sic. And she is doing it beautifully!"

"It is 'Yankee Doodle,' mother," I said, in a whisper.

She did not hear me. She was looking at the piano with sad eyes.

"They have taken an awful lot out of it," she said. "It was the first thing that we bought after we were married!"

"Was it?" my father inquired, briskly. "I thought we bought the coffee-pot first. Didn't we fry eggs in the coffee-pot?"

My mother gave him a startled glance.

"We did fry eggs in a coffee-pot," she admitted, reluctantly. "At least _you_ fried them. I did not know how."

"Somehow eggs don't taste as good now-a-days as those did," my father said, musingly. "I wonder if it was the coffee-pot."

Grandmother leant over my shoulder, and examined the piano cover.

"What made that, Rhoda?" she demanded, pointing to a broad streak which ran through the plush.

"That is where Madame Tomaso beats time," I answered, meekly.

They looked at one another.

"She is such an excellent teacher," my mother said, apologetically, "that I suppose I ought not to complain. It's very good of her to take so much trouble. Just as soon as they are large enough, she shall teach the twins, too."

"Oh, no, mother!" I cried, quickly.

"Why not, Rhoda?"

I evaded the question.

"Couldn't I teach them, mother?" I asked, anxiously.

They all laughed at me as if I had said something foolish.

It was evident that I should never get rid of Madame Tomaso. She would come year after year, forever and ever, until I and the twins were quite grown up. The twins were little and easily frightened. She would make them cry. I knew that she would. Sometimes, although I was such a big girl, she almost made me cry, when she beat time and shouted, for she was beginning to shout. And that last scene, though I had been victorious, had rankled. I felt that my mother would be highly indignant if I told her, but somehow I could not tell her. There did not seem to be any way out. I looked at the piano cover, and thought and thought.

"Granddad," I inquired next day, "what became of Polly?"

"Oh, Polly left," he answered.

"Right away, granddad?" I demanded, eagerly.

"Just as soon as she could get her trunk packed. Why?"

I rubbed my head against his shoulder without replying.

He did not ask any more questions, but he looked at me, keenly. He slipped his hand under my chin, and forced me to meet his eyes. I could never hide my thoughts from anybody. And granddad was always so horribly sharp! He chuckled a little as he gazed at me. When he went away he made me draw largely on the bank, and he patted me on the head.

"Keep up your courage," he whispered. "You're game!"

Out in the hall I heard him ask my mother a sudden question.

"When does Madame Tomaso come again?" he inquired, suavely.

It was always on Tuesdays that Madame Tomaso came, and it was strange how Tuesdays raced around. That Tuesday, in particular, arrived almost in a moment while I was still thinking. But I had made my preparations.

"You are very careless about the casters, Norah," my mother said at breakfast. "There is actually no pepper on the table."

"But I filled them last night, ma'am!" Norah cried, staring.

It seemed to me that they all turned and looked at me. I slipped from the room in a hurry. Somehow I felt so queer that morning. I kept sighing, and when the door-bell rang I would get quite cold all over. It rang a great many times before Madame Tomaso came, fresh and alert from her walk, with an air of friendliness which was always sure to disappear later. She turned cross very early that day, even before she had taken off her things.

"I have been too lenient with you, little Miss," she told me, in an awful voice. "We will try a new method."

She seated herself by the piano, and folded her arms. I sat perched on my cus.h.i.+on, and stared at her in fascination. Oh, how I wished that I had let the pepper alone! Oh, how I wished that I was good! After all it was so pleasant to be good.

"Play," she said, in a masterful manner. "I will be an audience. I will be a great many mens and womens. We will listen to you."

I played. It was very terrible. Her eyebrows grew together. That was the way she would look when she found me out, only worse, much worse. I played faster. She watched my notes, and sometimes she would moan, feebly, as if something hurt her. I played on faster still, one trembling little hand racing ahead of the other, until musical flesh and blood could stand it no longer. She began to count with a shout.

"One, two, three, four!" she cried, and brought the fan down on the piano cover.

Then she sneezed.

"I knew it," she murmured, grimly, to herself. "I felt it coming on this morning!"

She counted again and sneezed, and I sneezed a little myself in a hurried, guilty way. She looked at me with sudden suspicion. She was sharp, almost as sharp as granddad. In a second she had lifted the piano cover, and found a pile of pepper under that well-worn spot. The things which she said were awful. She said them in three or four languages, and she said them in such a high voice that my mother and grandmother came running in alarm. She pointed at me, with a shaking finger.