Betty Leicester's Christmas Part 1

Betty Leicester's Christmas.

by Sarah Orne Jewett.

I

There was once a story-book girl named Betty Leicester, who lived in a small square book bound in scarlet and white. I, who know her better than any one else does, and who know my way about Tideshead, the story-book town, as well as she did, and who have not only made many a visit to her Aunt Barbara and Aunt Mary in their charming old country-house, but have even seen the house in London where she spent the winter: I, who confess to loving Betty a good deal, wish to write a little more about her in this Christmas story. The truth is, that ever since I wrote the first story I have been seeing girls who reminded me of Betty Leicester of Tideshead. Either they were about the same age or the same height, or they skipped gayly by me in a little gown like hers, or I saw a pleased look or a puzzled look in their eyes which seemed to bring Betty, my own story-book girl, right before me.

Now, if anybody has read the book, this preface will be much more interesting than if anybody has not. Yet, if I say to all new acquaintances that Betty was just in the middle of her sixteenth year, and quite in the middle of girlhood; that she hated some things as much as she could, and liked other things with all her heart, and did not feel pleased when older people kept saying _don't!_ perhaps these new acquaintances will take the risk of being friends. Certain things had become easy just as Betty was leaving Tideshead in New England, where she had been spending the summer with her old aunts, so that, having got used to all the Tideshead liberties and restrictions, she thought she was leaving the easiest place in the world; but when she got back to London with her father, somehow or other life was very difficult indeed.

She used to wish for London and for her cronies, the Duncans, when she was first in Tideshead; but when she was in England again she found that, being a little nearer to the awful responsibilities of a grown person, she was not only a new Betty, but London--great, busy, roaring, delightful London--was a new London altogether. To say that she felt lonely, and cried one night because she wished to go back to Tideshead and be a village person again, and was homesick for her four-posted bed with the mandarins parading on the curtains, is only to tell the honest truth.

In Tideshead that summer Betty Leicester learned two things which she could not understand quite well enough to believe at first, but which always seem more and more sensible to one as time goes on. The first is that you must be careful what you wish for, because if you wish hard enough you are pretty sure to get it; and the second is, that no two persons can be placed anywhere where one will not be host and the other guest. One will be in a position to give and to help and to show; the other must be the one who depends and receives.

Now, this subject may not seem any clearer to you at first than it did to Betty; but life suddenly became a great deal more interesting, and she felt herself a great deal more important to the rest of the world when she got a little light from these rules. For everybody knows that two of the hardest things in the world are to know what to do and how to behave; to know what one's own duty is in the world and how to get on with other people. What to be and how to behave--these are the questions that every girl has to face; and if somebody answers, "Be good and be polite," it is such a general kind of answer that one throws it away and feels uncomfortable.

I do not remember that I happened to say anywhere in the story that there was a pretty fas.h.i.+on in Tideshead, as summer went on, of calling our friend "Sister Betty." Whether it came from her lamenting that she had no sister, and being kindly adopted by certain friends, or whether there was something in her friendly, affectionate way of treating people, one cannot tell.

II

Betty Leicester, in a new winter gown which had just been sent home from Liberty's, with all desirable qualities of color, and a fine expanse of smocking at the yoke, and some sprigs of embroidery for ornament in proper places, was yet an unhappy Betty. In spite of being not only fine, but snug and warm as one always feels when cold weather first comes and one gets into a winter dress, everything seemed disappointing.

The weather was s.h.i.+very and dark, the street into which she was looking was narrow and gloomy, and there was a moment when Betty thought wistfully of Tideshead as if there were no December there, and only the high, clear September sky that she had left. Somehow, all out-of-door life appeared to have come to an end, and she felt as if she were shut into a dark and wintry prison. Not long before this she had come from Whitby, the charming red-roofed Yorks.h.i.+re fis.h.i.+ng-town that forever climbs the hill to its gray abbey. There were flocks of young people at Whitby that autumn, and Betty had lived out of doors in pleasant company to her heart's content, and tramped about the moors and along the cliffs with gay parties, and played golf and cricket, and helped to plan some great excitement or lively excursion for almost every day. There is a funny, dancing-step sort of walk, set to the tune of "Humpty-Dumpty,"

which seems to belong with the Whitby walking-sticks which everybody carries; you lock arms in lines across the road, and keep step to the gay chant of the dismal nursery lines, and the faster you go, especially when you are tired, the more it seems to rest you (or that's what some people think) in the long walks home. Whitby was almost as good as Tideshead, to which lovely town Betty now compared every other, even London itself.

Betty and her father had not yet gone to housekeeping by themselves (which made them very happy later on), but they were living in some familiar old Clarges Street lodgings convenient to the Green Park, where Betty could go for a consoling scamper with a new dog called "Toby"

because he looked so exactly like the beloved Toby on the cover of "Punch." Betty had spent a whole morning's work upon a proper belled ruff for Toby, who gravely sat up and wore it as if he were conscious of literary responsibilities.

Papa had gone to the British Museum that rainy morning, and was not likely to reappear before the close of day. For a wonder, he was going to dine at home that night. Something very interesting to the scientific world had happened to him during his summer visit to Alaska, and it seemed as if every one of his scientific friends had also made some discovery, or something had happened to each one, which made many talks and dinners and club meetings delightfully important. But most of the London people were in the country; for in England they stay in the hot town until July or August, while all Americans scatter among green fields or seash.o.r.e places; and then spend the gloomy months of the year in their country houses, when we fly back to the shelter and music and pictures and companions.h.i.+p of town life. This all depends upon the meeting of parliament and other great reasons; but even Betty Leicester felt quite left out and lonely in town that dark day. Her best friends, the Duncans, were at their great house in Warwicks.h.i.+re. She was going to stay with them for a month, but not just yet; while her father was soon going to pay a short visit to a very great lady indeed at Danesly Castle, just this side the Border.

This "very great lady indeed" was perfectly charming to our friend; a smile or a bow from her was just then more than anything else to Betty.

We all know how perfectly delightful it is to love some one so much that we keep dreaming of her a little all the time, and what happiness it gives when the least thing one has to do with her is a perfectly golden joy. Betty loved Mrs. Duncan fondly and constantly, and she loved Aunt Barbara with a spark of true enchantment and eager desire to please; but for this new friend, for Lady Mary Danesly (who was Mrs. Duncan's cousin), there was something quite different in her heart. As she stood by the window in Clarges Street she was thinking of this lovely friend, and wis.h.i.+ng for once that she herself was older, so that perhaps she might have been asked to come with papa for a week's visit at Christmas.

But Lady Mary would be busy enough with her great house-party of distinguished people. Once she had been so delightful as to say that Betty must some day come to Danesly with her father, but of course this could not be the time. Miss Day, Betty's old governess, who now lived with her mother in one of the suburbs of London, was always ready to come to spend a week or two if Betty were to be left alone, and it was pleasanter every year to try to make Miss Day have a good time as well as to have one one's self; but, somehow, a feeling of having outgrown Miss Day was hard to bear. They had not much to talk about except the past, and what they used to do; and when friends.h.i.+p comes to this alone, it may be dear, but is never the best sort.

The fog was blowing out of the street, and the window against which Betty leaned was suddenly flecked with raindrops. A telegraph boy came round the corner as if the gust of wind had brought him, and ran toward the steps; presently the maid brought in a telegram to Betty, who hastened to open it, as she was always commissioned to do in her father's absence. To her surprise it was meant for herself. She looked at the envelope to make sure. It was from Lady Mary.

_Can you come to me with your father next week, dear? I wish for you very much._

"There's no answer--at least there's no answer now," said Betty, quite trembling with excitement and pleasure; "I must see papa first, but I can't think that he will say no. He meant to come home for Christmas day with me, and now we can both stay on." She hopped about, dancing and skipping, after the door was shut. What a thing it is to have one's wishes come true before one's eyes! And then she asked to have a hansom cab called and for the company of Pagot, who was her maid now; a very nice woman whom Mrs. Duncan had recommended, in as much as Betty was older and had thoughts of going to housekeeping. Pagot's sister also was engaged as housemaid, and, strange as it may appear, our Tideshead Betty was to become the mistress of a cook and butler. Pagot herself looked sedate and responsible, but she dearly liked a little change and was finding the day dull. So they started off together toward the British Museum in all the rain, with the shutter of the cab put down and the horse trotting along the s.h.i.+ning streets as if he liked it.

III

Mr. Leicester was in the Department of North American Prehistoric Remains, and had a jar of earth before him which he was examining with closest interest. "Here's a bit of charred bone," he was saying eagerly to a wise-looking old gentleman, "and here's a funeral bead--just as I expected. This proves my theory of the sacrificial--Why, Betty, what's the matter?" and he looked startled for a moment. "A telegram?"

"It was so very important, you see, papa," said Betty.

"I thought it was bad news from Tideshead," said Mr. Leicester, looking up at her with a smile after he had read it. "Well, my dear, that's very nice, and very important too," he added, with a fine twinkle in his eyes. "I shall be going out for a bit of luncheon presently, and I'll send the answer with great pleasure."

Betty's cheeks were brighter than ever, as if a rosy cloud of joy were s.h.i.+ning through. "Now that I'm here, I'll look at the arrowheads; mayn't I, papa?" she asked, with great self-possession. "I should like to see if I can find one like mine--I mean my best white one that I found on the river-bank last summer."

Papa nodded, and turned to his jar again. "You may let Pagot go home at one o'clock," he said, "and come back to find me here, and we'll go and have luncheon together. I was thinking of coming home early to get you.

We've a house to look at, and it's dull weather for what I wish to do here at the museum. Clear suns.h.i.+ne is the only possible light for this sort of work," he added, turning to the old gentleman, who nodded; and Betty nodded sagely, and skipped away with Pagot, to search among the arrowheads.

She found many white quartz arrowpoints and spearheads like her own treasure. Pagot thought them very dull, and was made rather uncomfortable by the Indian medicine-masks and war-bonnets and evil-looking war-clubs, and openly called it a waste of time for any one to have taken trouble to get all that heathen rubbish together. Such savages and their horrid ways were best forgotten by decent folks, if Pagot might be so bold as to say so. But presently it was luncheon time; and the good soul cheerfully departed, while Betty joined her father, and waited for him as still as a mouse for half an hour, while he and the scientific old gentleman reluctantly said their last words and separated. She had listened to a good deal of their talk about altar fires, and the ceremonies that could be certainly traced in a handful of earth from the site of a temple in the mounds of a buried city; but all her thoughts were of Lady Mary and the pleasures of the next week. She looked again at the telegram, which was much nicer than most telegrams.

It was so nice of Lady Mary to have said _dear_ in it--just as if she were talking; people did not often say _dear_ in a message. "Perhaps some of her guests can't come; but then, everybody likes to be asked to Danesly," Betty thought. "And I wonder if I shall dine at table with the guests; I never have. At any rate, I shall see Lady Mary often and be with papa. It is perfectly lovely! I can give her the Indian basket I brought her, now, before the sweet gra.s.s is all dry."

It was a great delight to be asked to the holiday party; many a grown person would be thankful to take Betty's place. For was not Lady Mary a very great lady indeed, and one of the most charming women in England?--a famous hostess and a.s.sembler of really delightful people?

"I am going to Danesly on the seventeenth," said Betty to herself, with satisfaction.

IV

Betty and her father had taken a long journey from London. They had been nearly all day in the train, after a breakfast by candle-light; and it was quite dark, except for the light of the full moon in a misty sky, as they drove up the long avenue at Danesly. Pagot was in great spirits; she was to go everywhere with Betty now, being used to the care of young ladies, and more being expected of this young lady than in the past.

Pagot had been at Danesly before with the Duncans, and had many friends in the household.

Mr. Leicester was walking across the fields by a path he well knew from the little station, with a friend and fellow guest whom they had met at Durham. This path was much shorter than the road, so that papa was sure of reaching the house first; but Betty felt a little lonely, being tired, and shy of meeting a great bright houseful of people quite by herself, in case papa should loiter. But suddenly the carriage stopped, and the footman jumped down and opened the door. "My lady is walking down to meet you, miss," he said; "she's just ahead of us, coming down the avenue." And Betty flew like a pigeon to meet her dear friend. The carriage drove on and left them together under the great trees, walking along together over the beautiful tracery of shadows. Suddenly Lady Mary felt the warmth of Betty's love for her and her speechless happiness as she had not felt it before, and she stopped, looking so tall and charming, and put her two arms round Betty, and hugged her to her heart.

"My dear little girl!" she said for the second time; and then they walked on, and still Betty could not say anything for sheer joy. "Now I'm going to tell you something quite in confidence," said the hostess of the great house, which showed its dim towers and scattered lights beyond the leafless trees. "I had been wis.h.i.+ng to have you come to me, but I should not have thought this the best time for a visit; later on, when the days will be longer, I shall be able to have much more time to myself. But an American friend of mine, Mr. Banfield, who is a friend of your papa's, I believe, wrote to ask if he might bring his young daughter, whom he had taken from school in New York for a holiday. It seemed a difficult problem for the first moment," and Lady Mary gave a funny little laugh. "I did not know quite what to do with her just now, as I should with a grown person. And then I remembered that I might ask you to help me, Betty dear. You know that the Duncans always go for a Christmas visit to their grandmother in Devon."

"I was so glad to come," said Betty warmly; "it was nicer than anything else."

[Ill.u.s.tration: "I WAS SO GLAD TO COME"]

"I am a little afraid of young American girls, you understand," said Lady Mary gayly; and then, taking a solemn tone: "Yes, you needn't laugh, Miss Betty! But you know all about what they like, don't you? and so I am sure we can make a bit of pleasure together, and we'll be fellow hostesses, won't we? We must find some time every day for a little talking over of things quite by ourselves. I've put you next your father's rooms, and to-morrow Miss Banfield will be near by, and you're to dine in my little morning-room to-night. I'm so glad good old Pagot is with you; she knows the house perfectly well. I hope you will soon feel at home. Why, this is almost like having a girl of my very own,"

said Lady Mary wistfully, as they began to go up the great steps and into the hall, where the butler and other splendid personages of the household stood waiting. Lady Mary was a tall, slender figure in black, with a beautiful head; and she carried herself with great spirit and grace. She had wrapped some black lace about her head and shoulders, and held it gathered with one hand at her throat.

"I must fly to the drawing-room now, and then go to dress for dinner; so good-night, darling," said this dear lady, whom Betty had always longed to be nearer to and to know better. "To-morrow you must tell me all about your summer in New England," she said, looking over her shoulder as she went one way and Betty another, with Pagot and a footman who carried the small luggage from the carriage. How good and kind she had been to come to meet a young stranger who might feel lonely, and as if there were no place for her in the great strange house in the first minute of her arrival. And Betty Leicester quite longed to see Miss Banfield and to help her to a thousand pleasures at once for Lady Mary's sake.

V

Somebody has said that there are only a very few kinds of people in the world, but that they are put into all sorts of places and conditions.