Elsie's Girlhood Part 26

"No, and she has apparently forgotten him, and bestowed her affections upon another; a widower named Wert. Mr. Was, Aunt Wealthy usually calls him. They both attend our church, and everybody notices how impossible it seems to be for her to keep her eyes off him; and you can never be five minutes in her company without hearing his name.

Didn't she talk of him to-day?"

"Oh, yes, she spoke of Mr. Wert visiting some sick man, to talk and pray with him, and rejoiced that the man did not die till he gave evidence that he was repaired."

"Yes, that sounds like her," laughed Lottie. "She's always getting the wrong word. I told you she never could keep her eyes off Mr. Wert.

Well, the other day--three or four weeks ago--coming from church he was behind her; she kept looking back at him, and presently came b.u.mp up against a post. She made an outcry, of course everybody laughed, and she hurried off with a very red face. That put an idea into my head, and--" Lottie paused, laughing and blushing--

"I'm half ashamed to tell you, but I believe I will--Nettie and I wrote a letter in a sort of manly hand, signed his initials, and put it into an iron pot that she keeps standing near her back door. The letter requested that she would put her answer in the same place, and she did. Oh, it was rich! such a rapture of delight; and such spelling and such grammar as were used to express it! It was such fun that we went on, and there have been half a dozen letters on each side. I daresay she is wondering why the proposal doesn't come. Ah, Elsie, I see you don't approve; you are as grave as a judge."

"I would prefer not to express an opinion; so please don't ask me."

"But you don't think it was quite right, now do you?"

"Since you have asked a direct question, Lottie, dear," Elsie answered, with some hesitation, "I'll own that it does not seem to me quite according to the golden rule."

"No," Lottie said, after a moment's pause, in which she sat with downcast eyes, and cheeks crimsoning with mortification. "I'm ashamed of myself, and I hope I shall never again allow my love of fun to carry me so far from what is true and kind.

"And so Aunt Wealthy took you out shopping, and secured the benefit of your taste and judgment in the choice of her remnants?" she exclaimed, with a sudden change to a lively, mirthful tone.

"How do you know that she bought remnants?" asked Elsie, in surprise.

"Oh, she always does; that's a particular hobby of the dear old body's; two or three times in a season she goes around to all the stores, and buys up the most of their stock; they save the best of them for her, and always know what she's after the moment she shows her pleasant face. She gives them away, generally, to the minister's wife, telling her the largest are to be made into dresses for her little girls; and the poor lady is often in great tribulation, not knowing how to get the dresses out of such small patterns, and afraid to put them to any other use, lest Miss Stanhope should feel hurt or offended. By the way, what do you think of Aunt Wealthy's own dress?"

"That it is very quaint and odd, but suits her as no other would."

"I'm so glad! It's just what we all think, but before you came we were much afraid you would use your influence to induce her to adopt a more fashionable attire."

CHAPTER XIII.

Bear fair presence, though your heart be tainted; Teach sin the carriage of a holy saint.

--SHAKESPEARE'S "COMEDY OF ERRORS."

"It's a very handsome present, child, very; and your old auntie will be reminded of you every time she uses it, or looks at it."

"Both beautiful and useful, like the giver," remarked Lottie.

"It" was a sewing-machine, Elsie's gift to Aunt Wealthy, forwarded from Cincinnati, by Mr. Dinsmore; the handsomest and the best to be found in the city; so Elsie had requested that it should be, and so he had written that it was.

"I am glad you like it, auntie, and you too, Lottie," was all she said in response to their praises, but her eyes sparkled with pleasure at the old lady's evident delight.

"It" had arrived half an hour before, on this the second morning after Mr. Dinsmore's departure, and now stood in front of one of the windows of Aunt Wealthy's bedroom--a delightfully shady, airy apartment on the ground floor, back of the parlor, and with window and door opening out upon a part of the lawn where the trees were thickest and a tiny fountain sent up its showers of spray.

Miss Stanhope stood at a table, cutting out shirts. Lottie was experimenting on the machine with a bit of muslin, and Elsie sat near by with her father's letter in her hand, her soft dark eyes now glancing over it for perhaps the twentieth time, now at the face of one or the other of her companions, as Lottie rattled on in her usual gay, flighty style, and Aunt Wealthy answered her sometimes with a straightforward sentence, and again with one so topsy-turvy that her listeners could not forbear a smile.

"For whom are you making shirts, aunt?" asked Elsie.

"For my boy Harry. He writes that his last set are going wonderfully fast; so I must send up another to make."

"You must let us help you, Lottie and I; we have agreed that it will be good fun for us."

"Thank you, dearie, but I didn't suppose plain sewing was among your accomplishments."

"Mamma says I am quite a good needle-woman," Elsie replied with a smile and a blush, "and if I am not it is no fault of hers. She took great pains to teach me. I cut out a shirt for papa once, and made every st.i.tch of it myself."

"And she can run the machine too," said Lottie, "though her papa won't let her do so for more than half an hour at a time, lest she should hurt herself."

"He's very careful of her, and no wonder," Aunt Wealthy responded, with a loving look at the sweet, fair face. "You may help me a little, now and then, children, when it just suits your humor, but I want you to have all the rides and walks, the reading and recreation of every sort that you can enjoy."

"Here comes Lenwilla Ellawea Schilling," said Lottie, glancing from the window.

"What do you want, w.i.l.l.y?" asked Miss Stanhope, as the child appeared in the doorway with a teacup in her hand.

"Mother wants a little light'ning to raise her bread."

"Yeast? Oh, yes, just go round to Phillis, and she'll give you some."

The door-bell rang.

"It's a gentleman," said the child, "I seen him a-coming in at the gate."

Chloe answered the bell and entered the room the next moment with a letter, which she handed to Miss Stanhope.

The old lady adjusted her spectacles and broke the seal. "Ah, a letter of introduction, and from my old friend and schoolmate Anna Waters; wishes me to treat the young man with all the courtesy and kindness I would show to her own son, for she esteems him most highly, etc., etc.

Aunt Chloe, what have you done with him?"

"Showed him into de parlor, mistis, and leff him a-sittin' dar."

"What's his name, auntie?" asked Lottie, as the old lady refolded the letter and took off her gla.s.ses.

"Bromly Egerton; quite romantic, isn't it? Excuse me for a few minutes, dears; I must go and see what he wants."

Aunt Wealthy found a well-dressed, handsome young man seated on one of her softly-cushioned chairs. He rose and came forward to meet her with courtly ease and grace. "Miss Stanhope, I presume?"

"You are right, Mr. Ledgerfield. Pray be seated, sir."

"Thank you, madam, but let me first help you to a seat. Excuse the correction, but Egerton is my name."

"Ah, yes! For the sake of my friend, Mrs. Waters, I welcome you to Lansdale. Do you expect to make some stay in our town?"

"Well, madam, I hardly had such expectation before arriving here, but I find it so pretty a place that I begin to think I can scarcely do better. My health has been somewhat impaired by very strict and close attention to business; and my physician has ordered entire relaxation for a time, and fresh country air. Can you recommend a boarding-place in town? Some quiet, private hotel where drinking and things of that kind would not be going on. I'm not used to it, and should find it very disgusting."

"I'm glad to hear such sentiments, young man; they do you honor. I daresay Mrs. Sixpence,--no, Mrs. Schilling,--just opposite here, would take you in. She told me some weeks ago that she would be glad to have one or two gentlemen boarders."