Читать книгу The Comings of Cousin Ann - Emma Speed Sampson - Страница 7

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“Here comes Cousin Ann!” It was a wail from the depth of Mildred Bucknor’s heart.

“Surely not!” cried her mother. “There are lots of other places for her to visit before our turn comes again. There’s Uncle Tom’s and Cousin Betty’s and Sister Sue’s, and Big Josh and Little Josh haven’t had her for at least a year. Are you sure, Mildred?”

“It looks like the old rockaway and Uncle Billy’s top hat,” said Mildred. “It is too much to bear just when we are going to have a house party! Mother, please tell her it isn’t convenient this June and have her go on to Big Josh’s.”

“Oh, my dear, you know Father wouldn’t hear of my doing that. Maybe it isn’t she after all. Nan, climb up on the railing and see if that could be Cousin Ann Peyton’s carriage coming along the pike and turning into the avenue.” 21

“Well, all I have to say is if it is her—”

“She,” corrected her mother.

“Her carriage. Wait until I finish my sentence, Mother, before you correct me,” and the girl climbed on the railing of the front porch where the ladies of the Bucknor family were wont to spend the summer mornings. Clinging to one of the great fluted columns she tiptoed, trying to peer through the cloud of limestone dust that enveloped the approaching vehicle.

“It’s her all right and I don’t care what kind of grammar I use to express my disgust,” and Nan jumped from the railing. “I don’t see why—”

“Well, my dear, it can’t be helped. You know how your father feels about his kin. Better run and tell Aunt Em’ly to send Kizzie up to get the guest chamber in order.”

“Oh, Mother, you know it is in order. Nan and I have been busy up there all morning getting it ready for the girls. We’ve even got flowers all fixed and clean bureau scarves and everything,” said Mildred, trying not to weep.

“Yes, and linen sheets. We thought you wouldn’t mind, Mother, because you see Jean Roland is used to such fine doings, and this is her first visit to Kentucky. We know you have only three pairs of linen sheets but this seemed 22 the psychological time to use them. I’ve a great mind to go yank them off the bed.”

“But, Mother,” pleaded Mildred, “couldn’t we put old Cousin Ann Peyton in the little hall room? I can’t see why she always has to have the guest chamber. She’s no better than anybody else.”

“But your father—”

“What difference will it make to Father? He needn’t even know where we put Cousin Ann.”

“What do you think about it, Aunt Em’ly?” Mrs. Bucknor asked the lean old colored woman who appeared in the doorway. “Here comes Miss Ann Peyton, and the young ladies want to put her in the little hall bedroom because they have planned to put their company in the guest chamber?”

“Think! I think I’m a plum fool not ter have wrang the neck er that ol’ dominick rooster yestiddy when he spent the whole day a crowin’ fer comp’ny. I pretty nigh knowed we were in fer some kind er visitation.”

“Maybe he was crowing for our house party,” suggested Nan.

“No, honey, that there rooster don’t never crow for ’vited comp’ny. Now if I had er wrang his neck he’d ’a’ been in the pot, comp’ny or no, an’ it ’ud cure him of any mo’ reckless crowin’.” 23

“But, Aunt Em’ly, what do you think about putting Miss Ann in the hall room?”

“Think! I think she’ll git her back up an’ that ol’ Billy’ll be shootin’ off his mouf, but we-all done entertained Miss Ann an’ ol’ Billy an’ them ca’ige hosses goin’ onter three months already this year an’ it’s high time some er the res’ of the fambly step up. What’s the matter with Marse Big Josh? An’ if he air onable what’s the matter with Marse Lil Josh? Yassum, put her in the hall room an’ ’fo’ Gawd I’ll make that ol’ Billy keep his feet out’n the oven, if not this summer, nex’ winter. He’s the orneris’ nigger fer wantin’ ter sit with his feet in the oven.”

“Then, Mother, may we keep the guest chamber for the girls? Please say yes!” begged Nan. “Aunt Em’ly thinks it is all right and you know you have always been telling us to mind Aunt Em’ly because she has such good judgment.”

“Well, my jedgment air that Miss Ann oughter been occupewin’ the hall room for some fifty year or mo’, ever sence she an’ that ol’ Billy took ter comin’ so reg’lar,” said Aunt Em’ly. “If I had it ter do over I’d never ’a’ let him git so free with his feet in the oven. The truf er the matter is, Miss Milly, that you an’ Marse Bob Bucknor an’ all yo’ chilluns as well, long 24 with all the res’ of the fambly includin’ of Marse Big Josh an’ Marse Lil Josh, done accepted of Miss Ann Peyton an’ ol’ Billy an’ the ca’ige hosses like they wa’ the will of the Almighty. Well, now le’s see if Miss Ann Peyton can’t accept the hall room like it wa’ the will er the Almighty an’ if ol’ Billy can’t come ter some ’clusion that Gawd air aginst his dryin’ out his ol’ feet in my oven.”

While this discussion was going on, the cloud of limestone dust had disappeared and from it had emerged a quaint old coach, lumbering and shabby, drawn by a pair of sleek sorrel horses, whose teeth would have given evidence of advanced age had a possible purchaser submitted them to the indignity of examining them. Their progress was slow and sedate, although the driver handled the reins as though it were with difficulty that he restrained them from prancing and cavorting as they neared the mansion.

Old Billy’s every line, from his dented top hat to his well-nigh soleless boots, expressed dignity and superiority. He was quite sure that being coachman to Miss Ann Peyton gave him the right to wipe those worn boots on the rest of mankind.

“Look at that ol’ fool nigger!” exclaimed Aunt Em’ly in disgust. “Settin’ up there 25 lookin’ mo’ like a monkey than a man in that long-tail blue coat with brass buttons an’ his ha’r like cotton wool an’ whiskers so long he haster wrop ’em. The onlies wuck that nigger ever does is jes’ growin’ whiskers.”

“Oh, come now, Aunt Em’ly,” remonstrated a young man who stepped from the study window on the porch as the old coach lumbered up the driveway, “Uncle Billy keeps his horses in better condition than any on our farm are kept. Poor old Uncle Billy!”

“Poor old Uncle Billy, indeed!” snapped Mildred. “I reckon, Brother Jeff, you’d say poor old Cousin Ann, too.”

“Of course I would. I can’t think of any person in the world I feel much sorrier for.”

“Well, I can. I feel lots sorrier for Nan and me with our house party on hand and Cousin Ann turning up for the second time since Christmas. It’s all well enough for you and Father to be so high and mighty about honoring the aged, and blood being thicker than water and so on. You don’t have to sleep with Cousin Ann, the way Nan and I do sometimes.”

“We-ell, no!” laughed Jeff.

“Hush, Mildred. Remember how Father feels about the comings of Cousin Ann. You and Nan must be polite.” Mrs. Bucknor sighed, 26 realizing she was demanding of her daughters something that was difficult for her to perform herself. Being polite to Cousin Ann had been the most arduous task imposed upon that wife and mother during twenty-five years of married life.

At the yard gate Uncle Billy drew in his steeds with a great show of their being unwilling to stop. He turned as though to command the footman to alight and open the door of the coach. With feigned astonishment at there being no footman, he climbed down from the box with so much dignity that even Aunt Em’ly was impressed, though unwilling to acknowledge it.

“That ol’ nigger certainly do walk low for anybody who sets so high,” she whispered to Mildred. The bowing of Uncle Billy’s legs in truth took many inches from his height. But the old man, in spite of crooked legs, worn-out boots, shabby livery and battered high hat, carried himself with the air of a prime minister. Miss Ann Peyton was his queen.

There was an expression of infinite pathos on the countenance of the old darkey as he opened the door of the ancient coach. Bowing low, as though to royalty, he said, “Miss Ann, we air done arrive.” 27

Jeff Bucknor took his mother’s arm and gently led her down the walk. Involuntarily she stiffened under his affectionate grasp and held back. It was all very well for the men of the family to take the stand they did concerning Cousin Ann Peyton and her oft-repeated visits. Men had none of the bother of company. Of course she would be courteous to her and always treat her with the consideration due an aged kinswoman, but she could not see the use of pretending she was glad to see her and rushing down the walk to meet her as though she were an honored guest.

“It is hard on Mildred and Nan,” she murmured to her stalwart son, as he escorted her towards the battered coach.

“Yes, Mother, but kin is kin—and the poor old lady hasn’t any real home.”

“Well then she might—There are plenty of them—very good comfortable ones—”

“You mean homes for old ladies? Oh, Mother, you know Father would never consent to that. Neither would Uncle Tom nor Big Josh. She would hate it and then there’s Uncle Billy and the horses—Cupid and Puck—to say nothing of the chariot.”

Further discussion was impossible. Mother and son reached the yard gate as Uncle Billy 28 opened the coach door and announced the fact that Miss Ann had arrived at her destination. Then began the unpacking of the visitor. It was a roomy carriage, and well that it was so. When Miss Peyton traveled she traveled. Having no home, everything she possessed must be carried with her. Trunks were strapped on the back of the coach and inside with the mistress were boxes and baskets and bundles, suitcases and two of those abominations known as telescopes, from which articles of clothing were bursting forth.

It was plain to see from the untidy packing that Miss Ann and Uncle Billy had left their last abode in a hurry. Even Miss Peyton’s features might have been called untidy, if such a term could be used in connection with a countenance whose every line was aristocratic. As a rule that lady was able so to control her emotions that the uninitiated were ignorant of the fact that she had emotions. She gave one the impression on that morning in June of having packed her emotions hurriedly, as she had her clothes, and they were darting from her flashing eyes as were garments from the telescopes.

Gently, almost as though he were performing a religious rite, Uncle Billy lifted the shabby baggage from the coach. 29

“Let me help you, Uncle Billy. Good morning, Cousin Ann. I am very glad to see you,” said Jeff, although it was impossible to see Cousin Ann until some of the luggage was removed.

“Thank you, cousin.” Miss Ann spoke from the depths of the coach. Her voice trembled a little.

At last, every box, bag and bundle was removed and piled by Uncle Billy upon each side of the yard gate like a triumphal arch through which his beloved mistress might pass.

Old Billy unfolded the steps of the coach. These steps were supposed to drop at the opening of the door but the spring had long ago lost its power and the steps must be lowered by hand.

“Mind whar you tread, Miss Ann,” he whispered. Nobody must hear him suggest that the steps were not safe. Nobody must ever know that he and Miss Ann and the coach and horses were getting old and played out.

Miss Ann had dignity enough to carry off broken steps, shabby baggage, rickety carriage—anything. She emerged from the coach with the air of being visiting royalty conferring a favor on her lowly subjects by stopping with them. Her dignity even overtopped the fact 30 that her auburn wig was on crooked and a long lock of snow-white hair had straggled from its moorings and crept from the confines of the purple quilted-satin poke bonnet. The beauty which had been hers in her youth was still hers although everybody could not see it. Uncle Billy could see it and Jeff Bucknor glimpsed it, as his old cousin stepped from her dingy coach. He had never realized before that Cousin Ann Peyton had lines and proportions that must always be beautiful—a set of the head, a slope of shoulder, a length of limb, a curve of wrist and a turn of ankle. The old purple poke bonnet might have been a diadem, so high did she carry her head; and she floated along in the midst of her voluminous skirts like a belle of the sixties—which she had been and still was in the eyes of her devoted old servant.

Miss Peyton wore hoop skirts. Where she got them was often conjectured. Surely she could not be wearing the same ones she had worn in the sixties and everybody knew that the articles were no longer manufactured. Big Josh had declared on one occasion when some of the relatives had waxed jocose on the subject of Cousin Ann and her style of dress, that she had bought a gross of hoop skirts cheap at the time when they were going out of style and had them 31 stored in his attic—but then everybody knew that Big Josh would say anything that popped into his head and then swear to it and Little Josh would back him up.

“By heck, there’s no room in the attic for trunks,” he had insisted. “Hoop skirts everywhere! Boxes of ’em! Barrels of ’em! Hanging from the rafters like Japanese lanterns! Standing up in the corners like ghosts scaring a fellow to death! I can’t keep servants at all because of Cousin Ann Peyton’s buying that gross of hoop skirts. Little Josh will bear me out in this.”

And Little Josh would, although the truth of the matter was that Cousin Ann had only one hoop skirt, and it was the same she had worn in the sixties. Inch by inch its body had been renewed to reclaim it from the ravages of time until not one iota of the original garment was left. Here a tape and there a wire had been carefully changed, but always the hoop kept its original form. The spirit of the sixties still breathed from it and it enveloped Miss Ann as in olden days.

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