Part 40 (2/2)

But these storms were rare. Lydia's was a placid life. She was deeply delighted when her cooking was praised, although she pretended to be annoyed by it. She was wearing dresses now that had been hers six years ago; sometimes a blue gingham or a gray madras was worn a whole season by Lydia without one trip to the tub. She carried a red and gray parasol that Cliff Frost had given her ten years ago; her boots were thin, unadorned kid, creased by her narrow foot; they seemed never to wear out.

As the years went by she quoted her mother more and more. The rather silent Mrs. Monroe had evidently left a fund of advice behind her.

Nothing was too trivial to be affected by the memory of Ma's opinion.

”Nice thick cream Williams is giving us,” Lydia might say at the breakfast table. ”Dear Ma used to say that good cream was half the secret of good coffee!” ”I remember Ma used to say that marigolds were rather bold, coa.r.s.e flowers,” she confided to Martie, ”and isn't it true?”

Her appet.i.te for the news of the village was still insatiable; it was rarely uncharitable, but it never ended. Martie came to recognize certain tones in Lydia's voice, when she and Alice Clark or Angela Baxter or young Mrs. King were on the shady side porch. There was the delicately tentative tone in which she trod upon uncertain ground: ”How do you mean she's never been the same since last fall, Lou? I don't remember anything special happening to Minnie Scott last fall.” There was a frankly and flatly amazed tone, in which Lydia might say: ”Well, Clara told me yesterday about Potter Street, and if you'll tell me what POSSESSED that boy, I'll be obliged to you!” And then there was the tone of incredible announcement: ”Alice, I don't know that I should tell this, because I only heard it last night, but I haven't been able to think of one other thing ever since, and I believe I'll tell you; it won't go any further. Mrs. Hughie Wilson came in here last night, and we got to talking about old Mrs. Mulkey's death--”

And so on, for perhaps a full hour. Martie, smiling over her darning, would hear Alice's gratifying, ”Well, for pity!” and ”Did you EVER!” at intervals. Sometimes she herself contributed something, a similar case in New York, perhaps, but the others were not interested. They knew, without ever having expressed it, that there is no intimacy like that of a small village, no novelty or horror that comes so closely home to the people of the Eastern metropolis as did these Monroe events to their own lives.

Martie loved her sister, and they came to understand each other's ways perfectly. Teddy was happy with Aunt Lyd when his mother was at the Library, and Lydia liked her authority over the child and his companions.h.i.+p. There was no peace in the old house, for all her silent meekness, unless Lydia's curious sense of justice was satisfied, and Martie took pains to satisfy it.

One memorable day, just before Christmas, Martie opened a small package, to find John Dryden's book. She was in the Library when Miss f.a.n.n.y came in with the mail, and her hand trembled as she cut the strings. The flimsy tissue paper jacket blew softly over her hand; a dark blue book, slim, dignified: ”Mary Beatrice.”

He had not autographed it, but then John would never think of doing so.

Martie smiled her motherly smile at the memory of his childish dependence upon her suggestions as to the smaller points of living. Her letter of congratulation began to run through her mind as she turned the t.i.tle page.

Suddenly her heart stopped beating. She wet her lips and glanced about.

Miss f.a.n.n.y had gone into the coat-room; n.o.body was near.

Oh, madman, madman! He had dedicated it to her! A detected felony could not have given Martie a more sinking sensation than she experienced at the sight.

Her initials: M. S. B.--she need puzzle only a second over the selection, for her letters to him were always signed, ”Martha Salisbury, Bannister.” And under the initials, this:

Even as to Caesar, Ca.s.sar's toll, To G.o.d what in us is divine; So to your soul above my soul Whatever life finds good in mine. Martie read the four lines as many times, then she lifted the page to her cheek, and held it there, shutting her eyes, and drawing a deep, ecstatic breath.

”Oh, John, JOHN, how wonderful of you!” she whispered, her heart rising on a swift, triumphant flight. Ah, this was something to have brought from the long years; this counted in that inner tribunal of hers.

After awhile she began to turn the pages, wis.h.i.+ng that she were a better judge of all these phrases. The play was short: three brief acts.

”I think it's wonderful!” Martie decided. ”I KNOW it is!”

For the little volume, even at this first quick glimpse, was stamped with something fiery and strange. Martie's eyes drifted here and there; presently fell upon the lines that brought the frightened little Italian princess, fresh from her convent, to the strange coast of England, and to the welcome of the strange King, her prospective husband's brother. The words were simplicity's self, like all inspired words, yet they brought the colour to Martie's face, and a yearning pain to her heart. Youth and love in all their first gold glory were captured here, and something of youth and glory seemed to flood the Library throughout the quiet winter afternoon.

The hours droned on, Martie, moving noiselessly about, and touching the switch that suddenly lighted the dim big room, paused at the window to look down upon Monroe. An early twilight was creeping into the village street, and the drug-store windows glowed with globes of purple and green. The shops were already disguised under bushy evergreens; wreaths of red and green paper made circles of steam against the show windows.

Silva, of the fruit market opposite, was selling a Christmas tree from the score that lay at the curb, to a stout country woman, whose shabby, well-wrapped children watched the transaction breathlessly from a mud-spattered surrey. The Baxter girls went by, Martie saw them turn into the church yard, and disappear into the swinging black doors, ”for a little visit.”

Nothing dramatic or beautiful in the scene: a little Western village street, on the eve of Christmas Eve, but to-night it was lighted for Martie with poetry and romance. The thought of a slim, dark-blue book with its four magic lines thrilled in her heart like a song.

”Christmas day after to-morrow!” she said to f.a.n.n.y, ”don't you love Christmas?”

But she knew that her real Christmas joy had come to-day.

The December kitchen was gas-lighted long before she got there, and Pauline was deep in calm preparation for dinner. Pauline was a Canadian girl, and if her work ever confused or fatigued her, at least she never betrayed the fact. There never were pots and pans awaiting cleaning in Pauline's sink, there never was a teaspoonful of flour spilled upon her biscuit board. Her gingham cuffs were always starched and stiff, her colourless hair smooth. She was a silent, dun-coloured creature, whose most violent expression was an occasional deep, unctuous laugh at Mrs.

Bannister's nonsense.

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