Part 26 (1/2)

Olivia Marchbanks's face clouded. She had put forward a little p.a.w.n of compliment toward us, as towards a good point, perhaps, for tempting a break in the game. And behold! Rosamond's knight only leaped right over it, facing honestly and alertly both ways.

”Chess would be good for nothing less than once a week,” said Olivia.

”I came to you almost the very first, out of the family,” she added, with a little height in her manner. ”I hope you won't break it up.”

”Break it up! No, indeed! We were all getting just nicely joined together,” replied Rosamond, ladylike with perfect temper. ”I think last winter was so _really good_,” she went on; ”I should be sorry to break up what _that_ did; that is all.”

”I'm willing enough to help in those ways,” said Olivia, condescendingly; ”but I think we might have our _own_ things, too.”

”I don't know, Olivia,” said Rosamond, slowly, ”about these 'own things.' They are just what begin to puzzle me.”

It was the bravest thing our elegant Rosamond had ever done. Olivia Marchbanks was angry. She all but took back her invitation.

”Never mind,” she said, getting up to take leave. ”It must be some time yet; I only mentioned it. Perhaps we had better not try to go beyond ourselves, after all. Such things are sure to be stupid unless everybody is really interested.”

Rosamond stood in the hall-door, as she went down the steps and away.

At the same moment, Barbara, flushed with an evidently hurried walk, came in. ”Why! what makes you so red, Rose?” she said.

”Somebody has been snubbing somebody,” replied Rose, holding her royal color, like her namesake, in the midst of a cool repose. ”And I don't quite know whether it is Olivia Marchbanks or I.”

”A color-question between Rose and Barberry!” said Ruth. ”What have _you_ been doing, Barbie? Why didn't you stay to tea?”

”I? I've been walking, of course.--That boy has got home again,” she added, half aloud, to Rosamond, as they went up stairs.

We knew _very_ well that she must have been queer to Harry again. He would have been certain to walk home with her, if she would have let him. But--”all through the town, and up the hill, in the daylight!

Or--stay to tea with _him_ there, and make him come, in the dark!--And _if_ he imagined that I knew!” We were as sure as if she had said it, that these were the things that were in her mind, and that these were what she had run away from. How she had done it we did not know; we had no doubt it had been something awful.

The next morning n.o.body called. Father came home to dinner and said Mr. Goldthwaite had told him that Harry was under orders,--to the ”Katahdin.”

In the afternoon Barbara went out and nailed up the woodbines. Then she put on her hat, and took a great bundle that had been waiting for a week for somebody to carry, and said she would go round to South Hollow with it, to Mrs. Dockery.

”You will be tired to death. You are tired already, hammering at those vines,” said mother, anxiously. Mothers cannot help daughters much in these buzzes.

”I want the exercise,” said Barbara, turning away her face that was at once red and pale. ”Pounding and stamping are good for me.” Then she came back in a hurry, and kissed mother, and then she went away.

CHAPTER XII.

EMERGENCIES.

Mrs. Hobart has a ”fire-gown.” That is what she calls it; she made it for a fire, or for illness, or any night alarm; she never goes to bed without hanging it over a chair-back, within instant reach. It is of double, bright-figured flannel, with a double cape sewed on; and a flannel belt, also sewed on behind, and furnished, for fastening, with a big, reliable, easy-going b.u.t.ton and b.u.t.ton-hole. Up and down the front--not too near together--are more big, reliable, easy-going b.u.t.tons and b.u.t.ton-holes. A pair of quilted slippers with thick soles belong with this gown, and are laid beside it. Then Mrs. Hobart goes to bed in peace, and sleeps like the virgin who knows there is oil in her vessel.

If Mrs. Roger Marchbanks had known of Mrs. Hobart's fire-gown, and what it had been made and waiting for, unconsciously, all these years, she might not have given those quiet orders to her discreet, well-bred parlor-maid, by which she was never to be ”disengaged” when Mrs.

Hobart called.

Mrs. Hobart has also a gown of very elegant black silk, with deep, rich border-folds of velvet, and a black camel's-hair shawl whose priceless margin comes up to within three inches of the middle; and in these she has turned meekly away from Mrs. Marchbanks's vestibule, leaving her inconsequential card, many wondering times; never doubting, in her simplicity, that Mrs. Marchbanks was really making pies, or doing up pocket-handkerchiefs; only thinking how queer it was it always happened so with her.

In her fire-gown she was destined to go in.

Barbara came home dreadfully tired from her walk to Mrs. Dockery's, and went to bed at eight o'clock. When one of us does that, it always breaks up our evening early. Mother discovered that she was sleepy by nine, and by half past we were all in our beds. So we really had a fair half night of rest before the alarm came.

It was about one in the morning when Barbara woke, as people do who go to bed achingly tired, and sleep hungrily for a few eager hours.