The Making of Mary Part 3

"Wha's yon 'at Eesabell's ta'en up wi' the noo?"

"Her name's Mason," said I; "Mary Mason."

"I h'ard yer wife was thinkin' o' keepin' a hoosemaid, but I didna expeck tae see her pap hersel' doon at the table wi' the fem'ly."

"She's not a housemaid. She's just staying with us for a while."

"Ye'd think Eesabell micht hae eneugh adae wi' her ain, 'thoot takin' in ony strangers."

"But Mary is to help with the housework, in return for her board and clothes."

"Let her wear a kep an' ap.r.o.n, then, an' eat wi' Marg'et."

"Margaret might object," and I laughed at the probable dismay of our stalwart, rough-and-ready five-foot-tenner, should this ladyfied blonde permanently invade her domain.

"Hoo lang's she gaun to st'y?"

"That's more than I can tell you."

When Mary had been a week in the house, it became apparent that something must be done with her.

"She's bound she'll not go back to the public school, Dave, and yet she cannot read or write. Do you think we can afford to send her to boarding-school--to a convent, for instance, where she'd be well looked after, and allowances made for her backwardness?"

Belle and I were out driving together. It was the first springlike evening we had had, and I was trying Jim Atwood's new mare on Maple Avenue, which had been newly block-paved. So engrossed was I in watching her paces I did not reply to my wife at once, and she continued:

"You were going to get me a horse and a victoria this spring, but I'm willing to give them up to send Mary to school."

"Please yourself, my dear. You would be the one to use the turnout. I'm content to borrow from my friends. Isn't she a beauty?"

Belle came out of s.p.a.ce to answer me.

"Yes, just now; but she'll not be when she's old. Her features are not good at all; her forehead's too narrow, and her nose too broad. Were it not for her lovely hair and complexion, she'd have nothing to brag about but a pair of very ordinary blue eyes."

"Who? The mare?"

"Don't be stupid, Dave, and do attend to what I am saying. I hardly ever have a chance to speak to you, goodness knows!"

"You get the editorial ear oftener and longer than anybody else."

"Lend it to me now, then. Don't you think a convent would be the best place for Mary?"

"Perhaps--as there are no theosophical educational inst.i.tutions that we know about."

"Mary isn't far enough on for theosophist yet. She'll have to come back many times before she is. The Roman Catholic Church is on her plane this incarnation."

"It does seem to catch the ma.s.ses, that's a fact, whereas your theosophy doesn't appear to be practicable for uneducated people nor for children."

"I don't agree with you there."

"Then why were you so anxious to send Watty to a church school to finish his education, and why are you on the lookout already for a boarding-school for the two girls where they will have the best of Christian influences? What is your object in being so particular that the younger boys are regular in their attendance at our surpliced choir?"

"It gives them a good idea of music--but that is not the point just now.

Can we afford to send Mary Mason to a convent, or can we not?"

"Choose between her and the buggy mare 'suitable for a lady to drive,'"

said I; but in reality it was my mother who settled the question.

When we came home that evening she was sitting by the fireside,

"Nursin' her wrath to keep it warm."

"Ye maun either pit yon hizzy oot the hoose, or I'll hitta gang."

"What's the matter now, mother?"

"I tell't her to brush the boys' bits tae be ready for the schule in the mornin'. They were thrang wi' their lessons an' she wasna daein' a han's turn."

"And what did she say?"

"S'y! I wush ye'd seen the leuk she gi'ed me!"

"The boys can brush their ain bits," said she; "I'm no' their servant."

I laughed.

"It's well seen she hasn't been brought up in Scotland, or she would know it was the bounden duty of the girls in the house to wait on the boys."

"An' a hantle better it is than to see the laddies aye rinnin' efter the la.s.ses, tendin' them han' an' fut as they dae here. When a man comes hame efter his d'y's wark, he should be let sit on his sate, an' hae a'

things dune for him."

"David," said Belle, sinking to a footstool at my feet with a dramatic gesture, "you shall never b.u.t.ton my boots again! But seriously," she continued, as mother withdrew in high dudgeon to her sanctum upstairs, "I don't think Mary should be expected to brush the boys' boots. We didn't engage her as servant, and even if we had, there isn't a hired girl in this part of the country that wouldn't make a fuss if she had to brush the boots of the man of the house, not to mention the boys. We'll have to pack Mary off somewhere, if only to keep the peace."

So Mary was sent to a convent, and at the end of three months came back for her holidays to our summer cottage at Interlaken. Being so near the big lake does not agree with my mother, and she rarely spends more than a week with us there, but during July and August visits my married sister in town. The coast was clear for Belle and me to decide what progress had been made in the making of Mary, and we fancied we discovered a good deal.

"What have they done to you, those nuns, to tone you down so quickly, Mary?" I asked, as she sat beside me, swinging in a low rocker, and looking so pretty that I was quite proud of her as an ornament to our front veranda.

"I dunno," she said, "unless it was the exercise for sitting perfectly still on a row of chairs. A nun goes behind us and drops a big book or something, and any girl that jumps gets a bad mark."

"Capital!" I cried; "no wonder you have learned repose of manner."

Thus encouraged, the girl continued:

"Then we have little parties and receptions, and we have to converse with the nuns and with each other, and anybody that mentions one of the three D's gets a bad mark."

"The three D's?"

"Yes, sir--Dress, Disease, and Domestics."

"Hear this, Belle," I said, laughing, as my wife took the rocking chair on the other side of me; "fancy any collection of women being obliged to steer clear of the three D's!"