Part 29 (1/2)
”Who's going? Who did he ask?” I said, breathless as the child herself.
”You, me, mamma, Josephine, all of us! Be quick.”
”But listen, Essie,” I exclaimed, following her to the hall, as she bounded off up to the nursery. ”Stop a minute. What did he say?--did he say _me?_”
”Yes, yes, he said, 'run up and ask your cousin if she'll take that ride this morning that we talked about at Rutledge, and I'll go into the parlor and ask your mamma and Miss Josephine;' and now let me run for Felicie to get me ready;” and the child was off again, but came back obediently when I called her. I held her tight by the hand, as, with a beating heart, I leaned over the bal.u.s.ters, and heard the merry voices in the hall below. I could not distinguish what Mr. Rutledge said, but I heard Josephine's laughing rejoinder:
”I a.s.sure you, I didn't mean to hint, last night, when I said I longed for a sleigh-ride again; but it was just like you, to remember it. It's a charming day. How we shall enjoy it!”
I led Essie to the stairs, and leaning down, said:
”Go down and tell Mr. Rutledge, that he's very kind, but I beg he will excuse me to-day.”
The child looked bewildered, and exclaimed: ”But, aren't you going?”
”No; go down and say just what I have told you, remember; and then come back, and I'll help you get ready.”
Esther wonderingly obeyed, and slid down the stairs like a spirit. I scorned to listen any longer, though I would have given anything and everything I possessed to have unravelled the tangled maze of voices in the hall, and known how my refusal was received. Pride to the rescue!
however, and I was bending over my German, when my aunt looked in a moment at the door, to inquire if I didn't care to go.
I said, ”No, thank you; I have my translation to finish, and, if you are willing, I will stay at home.”
Just then, Josephine and Grace came up, and Essie burst into the room, exclaiming:
”Mamma, mamma, what shall I wear? What frock had I better put on?”
”Why, you're not going,” cried Josephine, pettishly. ”Surely, mamma, you do not mean to let that child go. There's no room for her if Phil goes, and she'll be whimpering with the cold in ten minutes.”
”Mr. Rutledge only asked her for politeness,” said Grace. ”He never thought of such a snip really going.”
”She'll spoil everything,” said Josephine, decidedly. ”I don't care to go if she does.”
”I think, on the whole, my dear Essie,” said Mrs. Churchill, ”that it is best for you not to go. You must amuse yourself at home, and be a good child; we shall not be gone very long.”
The little girl's lips moved, as if she would speak, but no words came, and, as the others left the room, I looked at her with some anxiety. I never saw a face so changed. The brief radiance that had lighted it had pa.s.sed away, and in its place was a livid look of pa.s.sion that fairly frightened me.
”Why, Essie, child, don't take it so to heart,” I said, soothingly, attempting to touch her cold, clenched hand, but with a fierce gesture she released herself and turned away. I tried to pacify and divert her, but received no word in answer, till, from the window, we saw the party enter the sleigh, and after a moment of adjusting sleigh-robes and furs, the fine horses started spiritedly forward, to the music of their own merry bells; then, with a violent scream, the child threw herself upon the floor, and shook from head to foot with a pa.s.sion that many men and women pa.s.s through life without experiencing. Such tempests cannot fail to blight the souls they sweep over; they bow the cracking forest, and strip it of its leaves; the tender sapling, alone and unprotected in its flexile youth, can hardly escape undesolated. Swayed and whipped about with the fierce blast, all that is tender and delicate about it must be blighted; the stem that should have been fair and straight, must, if it survive the trial, be twisted, and rough, and gnarled; it may strike a deeper root; it will never cast as fine a shade, nor be as fair a tree.
If, unable to sustain the storm, the frail stem snap, and the life-blood ooze away, is it a questionable providence, or an utter mercy?
”Essie, my dear little girl,” I continued, as the child still lay sobbing on the floor, long after the first burst of temper had expended itself, ”Essie, you will surely make yourself sick; you are chilled through already, and the room is getting cold; come upstairs with me.”
But no, the headstrong child would not go upstairs, but would lie there, and only there, and sob, and cry, and refuse all comfort. It was not till the shaking of sleigh-bells at the door announced the return of the party, that my arguments had the least effect.
”Don't let them see you lying there, Esther. Come up, and let me wash the tears off your face and smooth your hair,” I said; and she allowed me to lift her up, and lead her upstairs, before her sisters came in.
Felicie was busy with a skirt of Josephine's, so I shut the nursery door and kept the child with me. But this time there was no soothing her; she was fretful and trying beyond anything I had ever seen; perhaps if I had not been so miserable myself then, I could not have been as patient with her, as I remember I was. I was wretched enough to have lain down and sobbed myself, but the office of comforter is incompatible with that of mourner, and so is an office twice blessed; for tempting as is the luxury of tears, the reward of self-control is always greater and more lasting.
”The dinner-bell will soon ring, Essie, and you will not be ready to come down to dessert; come and let me brush your hair.”
”I don't want to go down; I don't want any dessert,” she whined.