Just Sixteen Part 10

A very uncomfortable gnawing sensation began to make itself evident. It wasn't exactly pain, but Elly felt that it might easily become so. She remembered now that she fled away from the table, leaving her breakfast only half finished, yesterday morning,--was it yesterday, or was it the day before that? It felt like a long while ago.

The sensation increased.

"Dear me!" thought Elly, "the story-books never said that starving to death felt so. I don't like it a bit!"

Bravely she fought against the discomfort, but it gained upon her.

She began to meditate whether her family had perhaps not been sufficiently punished.

"I've been away a whole day," she reflected, "and a whole night, and I guess they've felt badly enough. Very likely they've all sat up waiting for me to come back. They'll be sorry they acted so, and, any way, I'm so dreadfully hungry that I must have something to eat! And I want to see mamma too. Perhaps she'll have repented, and will say, 'Poor Elly!

She _may_ go.'"

In short, Elly was seized with a sudden desire for home, and, always rapid in decision, she lost no time in wriggling herself out of the bush.

"There, it's gone!" chirped the female robin. "I'm glad of it. I hope it will never come back."

Very cautiously Elly crept through the shrubbery on to the lawn. It still seemed dark, but she now perceived that the gloom came from a great thunder-cloud which was gathering overhead. She could not see the sun, and, confused with her long sleep, was not able to make out what part of the day it was; but, somehow, she felt that it was not the early morning as in the bush she had supposed.

Across the lawn she stole, and upon the piazza. No one was visible. The open window showed the dining-table set for something,--was it tea?

Upstairs she crept, and, looking in at the door as she went by, she saw her mother in her room taking off her bonnet.

"My poor child, where did you think we had gone?" she called out. "Papa was kept in town till the second train, and that was late, so we have only just got back. You must be half starved, waiting so long for your dinner. I hope nurse gave you some bread and milk."

"Why,--what day is it?" stammered the amazed Elly.

"Day? Why, Elly, have you been asleep? It's to-day, of course,--Thursday. What did you think it was?"

Elly rubbed her eyes, bewildered. Had the time which seemed to her so long really been so short? Had no one missed her? It was her first lesson in the comparative unimportance of the individual! A sense of her own foolishness seized her. Mamma looked so sweet and kind! Why had she imagined her cruel?

"Did you go to sleep, dear?" repeated Mrs. Wade.

"Yes, mamma," replied Elly, humbly; "I did. But I'm waked up now."

TWO GIRLS--TWO PARTIES.

A great bustle and confusion had reigned the whole week long in the old house at the top of the hilly street, known to the neighborhood as "the Squire's." All the slip-covers had been taken from the furniture in the best parlor. All the company china had been lifted off its top shelf and washed. All the spare lamps had been filled, all the rooms swept and dusted, all the drawers in the bureaus freshly arranged, for--as Milly said to herself--"who knew but some one might take a fancy to peep in?"

Milly Grace, the Squire's daughter, had sat for hours in a cold woodshed tying up wreaths of ground-pine and hemlock with fingers which grew more chilly every hour. These wreaths now ornamented the parlor, festooning curtains, chimney-piece, and door-frames, and making green edges to the family portraits, which were two in number, neither of them by Copley or Stuart, as was plain to the most casual observation.

One of these portraits represented the Squire's father in a short-waisted, square-tailed blue coat, and a canary-colored waistcoat.

His forefinger was inserted in a calf-bound volume of Blackstone, and his eyes were fixed with a fine judicial directness upon the cupola of the court-house seen through a window in the background. The other was his wife, in a sad-colored gown and muslin tucker, with a countenance which suggested nothing except saleratus and the renunciation of all human joys.

The Squire did not care much for this picture. It made him feel badly, he said, just the feeling he used to have when he was a boy and was sent every Sunday by this orthodox parent to study the longer answers of the Shorter Catechism on the third step of the garret-stairs, with orders not to stir from that position till he had them perfectly committed to memory. It was this strict bringing-up, perhaps, which made him so indulgent to Milly,--a great deal too indulgent her step-mother thought.

In the b.u.t.tery stood a goodly row of cakes little and big, loaves whose icings shone like snow-crust on a sunny day, little cakes with plums and little cakes without plums; all sorts of cakes. On the swinging shelf of the cellar were moulds of jelly clear and firm. In the woodhouse stood three freezers of ice-cream, "packed" and ready to turn out. Elsewhere were dishes of scalloped oysters ready for the oven, each with its little edging of crimped crackers, platters of chicken-salad, forms of blanc-mange, bowls of yellow custard topped with raspberry-and-egg like sunset-tinted avalanches, all that goes to the delectation of a country party: for a party there was to be, as after this enumeration I need hardly state. It was Milly's party, and all these elaborate preparations were her own work,--the work of a girl of nineteen, with no larger allowance of hands, feet, and spinal-vertebrae than all girls have, and no larger allowance of hours to her day; but with a much greater share of zeal, energy, and what the Squire called "go" than most young women of her age can boast of.

She it was who had pounded away at the tough sacks full of ice and salt till they were ready for the freezers. She it was who had beaten the innumerable eggs for the sponge cakes, pound cakes, fruit cakes, "one, two, three, four," jelly, nut and other cakes, who had swept the rooms, washed the china, rearranged, changed, brightened everything. Like most other families on Croydon Hill, the Graces kept but one "help," a stout woman, who could wash, iron, and scrub with the best, and grapple successfully enough with the simple daily _menu_, but who for finer purposes was as "unhandy" as a gorilla. All the embellishments, all the delicate cookeries, fell to the share of the ladies of the household, which meant Milly as a general thing, and in this case particularly, for the party was hers, and she felt bound to take the burden of it on her own shoulders as far as possible, especially as her step-mother did not quite approve, and considered that the Squire had done a foolish thing in giving consent. "Milly should have her way for once," the Squire had announced.

So Milly had her way, and had borne herself bravely and brightly through the fatigues of preparation. But somehow when things were almost ready, when the table was set, lacking only the last touches, and the fire lighted, a heavy sense of discouragement fell upon her. It was the natural reaction after long overwork, but she was too inexperienced to understand it. She only knew that suddenly the thing she had wished for seemed undesirable and worth nothing, and that she felt perfectly miserable, and "didn't care what became of her." She laid her tired head on the little table by which she was sitting, and, without in the least intending it, began to cry.

Mrs. Grace was lying down, the Squire was out; there was no one to note her distress or sympathize with it excepting Teakettle, the black cat.

He was sorry for Milly after his cat-fas.h.i.+on, rubbed his velvet head against her dress for a little while as if wis.h.i.+ng to console her, but when she took no notice, he walked away and sat down in front of the door, waiting till some one should open it and let him through. Cats soon weary of the role of comforter, and escape to pleasanter things,--suns.h.i.+ne, bird-shadows on the gra.s.s, light-hearted people who will play with them and make no appeal to their sympathies.

Milly's tears did her no good. She was too physically worn out to find relief in them. They only deepened her sense of discouragement. The clock struck six; she roused herself wearily and went upstairs to dress. There were still the lamps to light and last things to do.

"And no one to do them but me," thought poor Milly. "Oh dear, how dreadfully my feet ache! How glad I shall be when they all go away and I can go to bed!"

This was indeed a sad state of mind to be in on the eve of a long-antic.i.p.ated pleasure!

Everything looked bright and orderly and attractive when the guests arrived a little after half-past seven. The fire snapped and the candles shone; a feeling of hospitable warmth was in the air. Milly's arrangements, except so far as they regarded her own well-being, had been judicious and happy. The pretty girls in their short-sleeved blue and crimson merinos, with roses and geranium-leaves in their hair (I need not say that this was at a far-back and old-fas.h.i.+oned date), looked every whit as charming as the girls of to-day in their more elaborate costumes.

Cousin Mary Kendal, who, for all her grown-up sons and daughters liked fun as much as any girl among them, had volunteered to play for the dancing, and the spirit with which she dashed at once into "The Caspian Waltz" and "Corn Rigs are Bonny" was enough to set a church steeple to capering.

Everybody seemed in a fair way to have a delightful evening except one person. That one was poor Milly, usually the merriest in every party, but now dull, spiritless, and inert. She did not even look pretty! Color and sparkle, the chief elements of beauty in her face, were, for the moment, completely quenched. She was wan and jaded, there were dark rings under her eyes, and an utter absence of spring to her movements, usually so quick and buoyant. She sat down whenever she had the chance, she was silent unless she must speak; half-unconsciously she kept a watch of the clock and was saying to herself, "Only two hours more and I can go to bed." Her fatigued looks and lack of pleasure were a constant damper to the animation of the rest. Every one noticed, and wondered what could be the matter; but only Janet Norcross dared to ask.

"Have you got a headache?" she whispered; but the "No" which she received by way of answer sounded so cross that she did not venture on further inquiries.

"Why won't you dance with me?" urged Will Benham; "you said you would when we were talking about the party after the Lecture--don't you remember?"

"I'd rather the others had the chance--it's my party, you know," replied Milly.

"But they _are_ having a chance. Everybody is dancing but you. Come, Milly."

"Oh, Will, don't tease," cried Milly irritably. "I never saw such an evening. Do please to leave me alone and go and ask some of the others."

Weariness sharpened her voice. Till the words were out of her lips she had no idea that she was going to speak so petulantly to Will. It sounded dreadfully even to herself.

"Oh, certainly," said Will with freezing dignity. He crossed the room, and presently Milly saw him take Helen Jones out to the set of Lancers just forming. He did not look at Milly again, or come near her, and the sense of his displeasure was just the one drop too much. Milly felt herself choke, a hot rush of tears blinded her eyes, she turned, and being fortunately near the door, got out of it and upstairs without suffering her face to be seen.

Janet found her half an hour later lying p.r.o.ne across the bed, and sobbing as if her heart would break.

"What _is_ the matter?" she cried in alarm. "Are you ill, dear Milly?

has anything dreadful happened? I came up to look for you. Will Benham got worried because you were away so long, and came to me to ask what had become of you. I told him I guessed you were taking out the ice-creams, but Katy said you hadn't been in the kitchen at all, so I came up here. What is the matter--do tell me?"

"Oh, nothing is the matter at all, except that I am a perfect idiot, and so tired that I wish I were dead," said Milly. "It was awfully good of Will to care, for I spoke so crossly to him. You can't think. It was horrid of me, but somehow I felt so dreadfully tired that the words seemed to jump out of my mouth against my will. Dear Janet--and I was cross to you, too," added Milly penitently. "Everything has gone wrong with me to-night. Oh, and there is that horrible ice-cream! I must go and get it out of the freezers. But my back aches so, Janet, and the soles of my feet burn like fire."

"You poor thing, you are just tired out," said her friend. "No wonder.

You must have worked like a horse to make everything so nice and pretty as it is. Don't worry about the ice-cream. Just tell me what dishes to put it in, and I'll see to it. It won't take five minutes. But do rouse yourself now, and keep up a little while longer. The others will wonder so if you don't go down. You _must_ go down, you know. Here is a wet towel for your eyes, and I'll smooth your hair."

Even so small a lift as having the ice-cream taken out for her was a relief, and Janet's kindness, and the sense that Will was not hopelessly alienated by her misconduct, helped Milly to recover her equilibrium.

Soothed and comforted she went downstairs, and got through the rest of the evening tolerably well.

But when the last good-night had been said, and the last sleigh-bell had jingled away from the door, she found herself too tired to rest. All night long she tossed restlessly on her hot pillows, while visions of pounding ice and stirring cake, of Will's anger, and Janet's surprise when she found her in tears, whirled through her thoughts. When morning came she was so "poorly" that the doctor was sent for.

"Too much party, no doubt," was his inward commentary when he received the summons; and his first words to Milly were, "Well, Missy, so you are down with fruit cake and mottoes, are you?"