Family Pride Or Purified by Suffering Part 16

They were not as happy in the new home as she had expected to be, but the fault did not lie with Katy. She performed well her part, and more, taking upon her young shoulders the whole of the burden which her husband should have helped her bear. Housekeeping far more than boarding brings out a husband's nature, for whereas in the latter case one rightfully demands the services for which he pays, in the former he is sometimes expected to do and think, and even wait upon himself. But this was not Wilford's nature. The easy, indolent life he had led so long as a petted son of a partial mother unfitted him for care, and he was as much a boarder in his own home as he had ever been in the hotels in Paris, thoughtlessly requiring of Katy more than he should have required, so that Bell was not far from right when in her journal she described her sister-in-law as "a little servant whose feet were never supposed to be tired, and whose wishes were never consulted." It is true Bell had put it rather strongly, but the spirit of what she said was right, Wilford seldom considering Katy, or allowing her wishes to interfere with his own plans, while accustomed to every possible attention from his mother, he exacted the same from his wife, whose life was not one of unmixed happiness, notwithstanding that every letter home bore a.s.surance to the contrary.

CHAPTER XVIII.

MARIAN HAZELTON.

The last days of June had come, and Wilford was beginning to make arrangements for removing Katy from the city before the warmer weather.

To this he had been urged by Mark Ray's remarking that Katy was not looking as well as when he first saw her, one year ago, "She had grown thin and pale," he said. "Had Wilford remarked it?"

Wilford had not. She complained much of headache; but that was only natural. Still he wrote to the Mountain House that afternoon to secure rooms for himself and wife, and then at an earlier hour than usual went home to tell her of the arrangement. Katy was out shopping, Esther said, and had not yet returned, adding: "There is a note for her upstairs, left by a woman who insisted on seeing the house, until I took her over it, showing her every room."

"A strange woman went over my house in Mrs. Cameron's absence! Who was it?" Wilford asked, hastily, visions of Helen, or possibly Aunt Betsy, rising before his mind.

"She said she was a friend of Mrs. Cameron, and that she knew she would allow the liberty," Esther replied, thus confirming Wilford in his suspicions that some country acquaintance had thrust herself upon them, and hastening up to Katy's room, where the note was lying, he took it up and examined the superscription, examined it closely, holding it up to the light full a minute, and forgetting to open it in his perplexity and the train of thought it awakened.

"They are singularly alike," he said, and still holding the note in his hand he went downstairs to the library, and opening a drawer of his writing desk, which was always kept locked, he took from it a picture and a bit of soiled paper, on which was written: "I am not guilty, Wilford, and G.o.d will never forgive the wrong you have done to me."

There was no name or date, but Wilford needed neither, for he knew well whose hand had penned those lines, and he sat looking at them, comparing them at last with the "Mrs. Wilford Cameron" which the strange woman had written. Then opening the note, he read that, having returned to New York, and wishing employment either as seamstress or dressmaker, Marian Hazelton had ventured to call upon Mrs. Cameron, remembering her promise to give her work if she should desire it. The note concluded by saying:

"I am sure you will pardon me for the liberty I took of going over the house. It was a temptation I could not resist. You have a delightful home. G.o.d grant you may be happy in it. You see I have also made bold to write this in your library, for which I beg pardon,

"Yours truly, MARIAN HAZELTON,

"No. ---- Fourth St., 4th floor, N.Y."

"Who is Marian Hazelton?" Wilford asked himself as he threw down the missive. "Some of Katy's country friends, I dare say. Seems to me I have heard that name. She certainly writes as Genevra did, except that this Hazelton's is more decided and firm. Poor Genevra!"

There was a pallor about Wilford's lips as he said this, and taking up the picture he gazed for a long time upon the handsome, girlish face, whose dark eyes seemed to look reproachfully upon him, just as they must have looked when the words were penned: "G.o.d will never forgive the wrong you have done to me."

"Genevra was mistaken," he said. "At least, if G.o.d has not forgiven, he has prospered me, which amounts to the same thing;" and without a single throb of grat.i.tude to Him who had thus prospered him, Wilford laid Genevra's picture and Genevra's note back with the withered gra.s.s and flowers plucked from Genevra's grave, and then went again upstairs, just as Katy's ring was heard and Katy herself came in.

As thoughts of Genevra always made Wilford kinder toward his wife, so now he kissed her white cheek, noticing that, as Mark had said, it was whiter than last year in June. But mountain air would bring back the roses, he thought, as he handed her the note.

"Oh, yes, from Marian Hazelton," Katy said, glancing first at the name and then hastily reading it through.

"Who is Marian Hazelton? Some intimate friend, I judge, from the liberty she took."

"Not very intimate, though I liked her so much, and thought her above her position," Katy replied, repeating all she knew of Marian, and how she chanced to know her at all. "Don't you remember Helen wrote that she fainted at our wedding, and I was so sorry, fearing I might have overworked her."

Wilford did remember something about it, and satisfied that Marian Hazelton had no idea of intruding herself upon them, except as she might ask for work, he dismissed her from his mind and told Katy of his plan for taking her to the Mountain House a few weeks before going to Saratoga.

"Would you not like it?" he asked, as she continued silent, with her eyes fixed upon the window opposite.

"Yes," and Katy drew a long and weary breath. "I shall like any place where there are birds, and rocks, and trees, and real gra.s.s, such as grows of itself in the country; but Wilford," and Katy crept close to him now, "if I might go to Silverton, I should get strong so fast. You don't know how I long to see home once more. I dream about it nights and think about it days, knowing just how pleasant it is there, with the roses in bloom and the meadows so fresh and green. May I go, Wilford?

May I go home to mother?"

Had Katy asked for half his fortune, just as she asked to go home, Wilford would have given it to her, but Silverton had a power to lock all the softer avenues of his heart, and so he answered that the Mountain House was preferable, that the rooms were engaged, and that as he should enjoy it so much better he thought they would make no change.

Katy did not cry, nor utter a word of remonstrance; she was fast learning that quiet submission was better than useless opposition, and so Silverton was again given up. But there was one consolation. Seeing Marian Hazelton would be almost as good as going home, for had she not recently come from that neighborhood, bringing with her the odor from the hills and freshness from the woods. Perhaps, too, she had lately seen Helen or Morris at church, and had heard the music of the organ which Helen played, and the singing of the children just as it sometimes came to Katy in her dreams, making her start in her sleep and murmur s.n.a.t.c.hes of the sacred songs which Dr. Morris taught. Yes, Marian could tell her of all this, and very impatiently Katy waited for the morning when she would drive around to Fourth Street with the piles of sewing she was going to take to Marian.

"Dear Marian, I wonder is she very poor?" Katy thought, as she next day made her preparations for the call, and had Wilford been parsimoniously inclined, he might have winced could he have seen the numerous stores gathered up for Marian and packed away in the carriage with the bundle of cambric and linen and lace, all destined for that fourth-story chamber where Marian Hazelton sat that summer morning, looking drearily out upon the dingy court and contrasting its sickly patch of gra.s.s, embellished with rain water barrels, coal hods and ash pails, with the country she had so lately left, the wooded hills and blooming gardens of Silverton, which had been her home for nearly two years.

It was a fault of Marian's not to remain long contented in any place, and so tiring of the country she had returned to the great city, urged on by a strange desire it may be to see Mrs. Wilford Cameron, to know just how she lived, to judge if she were happy, and perhaps--some time see Wilford Cameron, herself unknown, for not for the world would she have met face to face the man who had so often stood by Genevra Lambert's grave in the churchyard beyond the sea. Thinking she might succeed better alone, she had hired a room far up the narrow stairway of a high, somber-looking building, and then from her old acquaintances, of whom she had several in the city, she had solicited work. More than once she had pa.s.sed the handsome house on Madison Square where Katy lived, walking slowly and gazing with dim eyes which could not weep at Wilford Cameron's luxurious home, and contrasting it with hers, that one room, which yet was not wholly uninviting, for where Marian went there was always an air of humble comfort; and Katy, as she crossed the threshold, uttered an exclamation of delight at the cheerful, airy aspect of the apartment, with its bright ingrain carpet, its simple shades of white, its chintz-covered lounge, its one rocking-chair, its small parlor stove, and its pots of flowers upon the broad window sill.

"Oh, Marian," she exclaimed, tripping across the floor, and impulsively throwing her arms around Miss Hazelton's neck, "I am so glad to meet some one from home. It seems almost like Helen I am kissing," and her lips again met those of Marian Hazelton, who amid her own joy at finding Katy unchanged, wondered what the Camerons would say to see their Mrs.

Wilford kissing a poor seamstress whom they would have spurned.

But Katy did not care for Camerons then, or even think of them, as in her rich basquine and pretty hat, with emeralds and diamonds sparkling on her fingers, she sat down by Marian, whose hands, though delicate and small, showed marks of labor such as Katy had never known.

"You must forgive me for going over your house," Marian said, after they had talked together a moment, and Katy had told how sorry she was to miss the call. "I could not resist the temptation, and it did me so much good, although I must confess to a good cry when I came back and thought of the difference between us."

There was a quiver of her lip and a tone in her voice which touched Katy's heart, and she tried to comfort her, forgetting entirely whether what she said was proper or not, and impetuously letting out that even in houses like hers there was trouble. Not that she was unhappy in the least, for she was not; but, oh! the fuss it was to be fashionable and keep from doing anything to shock his folks, who were so particular about every little thing, even to the way she tied her bonnet and sat in a chair.

This was what Katy said, and Marian, looking straight into Katy's face, felt that she would not exchange places with the young girl-wife whom so many envied.

"Tell me of Silverton," was Katy's next remark. "You don't know how I want to go there; but Wilford does not think it best--that is, at present. Next fall I am surely going. I picture to myself just how it will look; Morris' garden, full of the autumnal flowers--the ripe peaches in our orchard, the grapes ripening on the wall, and the long shadows on the gra.s.s, just as I used to watch them, wondering what made them move so fast, and where they could be going. Will it be unchanged, Marian? Do places seem the same when once we have left them?" and Katy's eager eyes looked wistfully at Marian, who replied: "Not always--not often, in fact; but in your case they may. You have not been long away."

"Only a year," Katy said. "I was as long as that in Canandaigua; but this past year is different. I have seen so much, and lived so much, that I feel ten years older than I did last spring, when you and Helen made my wedding dress. Darling Helen! When did you see her last?"

"I was there five weeks ago," Marian replied. "I saw them all, and told them I was coming to New York."

"Do they miss me any? Do they talk of me? Do they wish me back again?"

Katy asked, and Marian replied: "They talked of little else--that is, your own family. Dr. Morris, I think, did not mention your name. He has grown very silent and reserved," and Marian's eyes were fixed inquiringly upon Katy, as if to ascertain how much she knew of the cause for Morris' reserve.

But Katy had no suspicion, and only replied: "Perhaps he is vexed that I do not write to him oftener, but I can't. I think of him a great deal, and sometimes have so wished I could sit in his public library, and forget that there are such things as dinner parties, where you are in constant terror lest you should do something wrong--evening parties, where your dress and style are criticised--receptions or calls, and all the things which make me so confused. Morris could always quiet me. It rested me just to hear him talk, and I respect him more than any living man, except, of course, Wilford; but when I try to write, something comes in between me and what I wish to say, for I want to convince him that I am not as frivolous as I fear he thinks I am. I have not forgotten the Sunday school, nor the church service, which I so loved to hear, especially when Morris read it, as he did in Mr. Browning's absence; but in the city it is so hard to be good, particularly when one is not, you know--that is, good like you and Helen and Morris--and the service and music seem all for show, and I feel so hateful when I see Juno and Wilford's mother making believe, and putting their heads down on velvet cushions, knowing as I do that they both are thinking either of their own bonnets or those just in front."

"Are you not a little uncharitable?" Marian asked, laughing in spite of herself at the picture Katy drew of fashion trying to imitate religion in its humility.

"Perhaps so," Katy answered. "I grow bad from looking behind the scenes, and the worst is that I do not care. But tell me, do you think Morris likes me less than formerly?"

Marian did not, and a.s.sured on that point, Katy went back to the farmhouse, asking numberless questions about its inmates, and at last coming to the business which had brought her to Marian's room.

There were perceptible spots on Marian's neck, and her lips were very white, while her hands grasped the bundles tossed into her lap--the yards and yards of lace and embroidery, linen, and cambric, which she was expected to make for the wife of Wilford Cameron; and her voice was husky as she asked directions or made suggestions of her own.

"It's because she has no such joy in expectation. I should feel so, too, if I were thirty and unmarried," Katy thought, as she noticed Marian's agitation, and tried to divert her mind by telling her as delicately as possible that she had brought with her sundry stores of which she had such an abundance.

"I knew you were not an object of charity," she said, as she saw the flush on Marian's brow, "but when I have so much I like to share it with others, and you seem like our folks."

"Did Wilf--did Mr. Cameron know?" Marian asked, and Katy answered "No; but it does not matter. He lets me do as I like in these matters, and the greatest pleasure I have is giving. You are not offended?" she continued, as she saw a tear drop from Marian's eyelids.

"No--oh, no," and Marian quietly laid aside the packages which would find their way to many an humble garret or cellar, where biting poverty had its abode.

It would choke her to eat whatever came from Wilford Cameron, but she could not tell Katy so, though she did say: "I will keep these because you brought them, but do not do so again. There are many far more needy.

I saved something in Silverton. I shall not suffer so long as my health is spared."

Then after a few more inquiries concerning the work, about which she could now talk calmly, she asked where Katy went when she was abroad, her blue eyes growing almost black as Katy talked of Rome, of Venice, of Paris, and then of Alnwick, where they had stopped so long.