Читать книгу Bessie and Her Friends - Mathews Joanna Hooe - Страница 3

Three young ladies sat talking over their work in the pleasant bow-window of Mrs. Stanton's sitting-room, while at a short distance from them two little curly heads bent over the great picture-book which lay upon the table. The eyes in the curly heads were busy with the pictures, the tongues in the curly heads were silent, save when now and then one whispered, "Shall I turn over?" or "Is not that pretty?" but the ears in the curly heads were wide open to all that was passing in the bow-window; while the three young ladies, thinking that the curly heads were heeding nothing but their own affairs, went on chattering as if those attentive ears were miles away.

"Annie," said Miss Carrie Hall, "I am sorry to hear of the severe affliction likely to befall your sister, Mrs. Bradford."

"What is that?" asked Annie Stanton, looking up surprised.

"I heard that Mrs. Lawrence, Mr. Bradford's Aunt Patty, was coming to make her a visit."

"Ah, poor Margaret!" said Annie Stanton, but she laughed as she spoke. "It is indeed a trial, but my sister receives it with becoming submission."

"Why does Mrs. Bradford invite her when she always makes herself so disagreeable?" asked Miss Ellis.

"She comes self-invited," replied Annie. "Margaret did not ask her."

"I should think not, considering the circumstances under which they last parted," said Carrie Hall.

"Oh, Margaret has long since forgotten and forgiven all that," said Annie, "and she and Mr. Bradford have several times endeavored to bring about a reconciliation, inviting Aunt Patty to visit them, or sending kind messages and other tokens of good-will. The old lady, however, was not to be appeased, and for the last three or four years has held no intercourse with my brother's family. Now she suddenly writes, saying she intends to make them a visit."

"I should decline it if I were in the place of Mr. and Mrs. Bradford," said Carrie.

"I fear I should do the same," replied Annie, "but Margaret and Mr. Bradford are more forgiving. I am quite sure though that they look upon this visit as a duty to be endured, not a pleasure to be enjoyed, especially as the children are now older, and she will be the more likely to make trouble with them."

"I suppose they have quite forgotten her," said Carrie.

"Harry and Fred may remember her," answered Annie, "but the others were too young to recollect her at this distance of time. Bessie was a baby, Maggie scarcely three years old."

"Shall you ever forget the day we stopped at your sister's house on our way home from school, and found Mrs. Lawrence and nurse having a battle royal over Maggie?" asked the laughing Carrie.

"No, indeed! Nurse, with Maggie on one arm and Bessie on the other, fairly dancing about the room in her efforts to save the former from Aunt Patty's clutches, both terrified babies screaming at the top of their voices, both old women scolding at the top of theirs; while Fred, the monkey, young as he was, stood by, clapping his hands and setting them at each other as if they had been two cats."

"And your sister," said Carrie, "coming home to be frightened half out of her senses at finding such an uproar in her well-ordered nursery, and poor little Maggie stretching out her arms to her with 'Patty vip me, Patty vip me!'"

"And Margaret quite unable to quell the storm until Brother Henry came in and with a few determined words separated the combatants by sending nurse from the room," continued Annie, with increasing merriment. "Poor mammy! She knew her master's word was not to be disputed, and dared not disobey; but I think she has never quite forgiven him for that, and still looks upon it as hard that when, as she said, she had a chance 'to speak her mind to Mrs. Lawrence,' she was not allowed to do it."

"But what caused the trouble?" asked Laura Ellis.

"Oh, some trifling mischief of Maggie's, for which auntie undertook to punish her severely. Nurse interfered, and where the battle would have stopped, had not Henry and Margaret arrived, it is difficult to tell."

"But surely she did not leave your brother's house in anger for such a little thing as that!" said Laura.

"Indeed, she did; at least, she insisted that Maggie should be punished and nurse dismissed. Dear old mammy, who nursed every one of us, from Ruthven down to myself, and whom mother gave to Margaret as a treasure past all price when Harry was born, – poor mammy, who considers herself quite as much one of the family as any Stanton, Duncan, or Bradford among us all, – to talk of dismissing her! But nothing less would satisfy Aunt Patty; and Margaret gently claiming the right to correct her own children and govern her own household as she saw fit, and Henry firmly upholding his wife, Aunt Patty departed that very afternoon in a tremendous passion, and has never entered the house since."

"Greatly to your sister's relief, I should think," said Laura. "Why, what a very disagreeable inmate she must be, Annie! I am sure I pity Mrs. Bradford and all her family, if they are to undergo another visit from her now."

"Yes," said Annie. "Some sudden freak has taken her, and she has written to say that she will be here next month. You may well pity them. Such another exacting, meddling, ill-tempered old woman it would be difficult to find. She has long since quarrelled with all her relations; indeed, it was quite wonderful to every one how Margaret and her husband bore with her as long as they did. I do not know how the poor children will get on with her. She and Fred will clash before she has been in the house a day, while the little ones will be frightened out of their senses by one look of those cold, stern eyes. Do you remember, Carrie, how, during that last unfortunate visit, Maggie used to run and hide her head in her mother's dress the moment she heard Aunt Patty's step?"

"Yes, indeed," said Carrie. "I suppose she will be here at Christmas time too. Poor little things! She will destroy half their pleasure."

All this and much more to the same purpose fell upon those attentive ears, filling the hearts of the little listeners with astonishment and dismay. It was long since Maggie's hand had turned a leaf of the scrap-book, long since she or Bessie had given a look or thought to the pictures. There they both sat, motionless, gazing at one another, and drinking in all the foolish talk of those thoughtless young ladies.

They meant no harm, these gay girls. Not one of them but would have been shocked at the thought that she was poisoning the minds of the dear little children whom they all loved towards the aged relative whom they were bound to reverence and respect. They had not imagined that Maggie and Bessie were attending to their conversation, and they were only amusing themselves; it was but idle talk. Ah, idle talk, idle words, of which each one of us must give account at the last great day!

So they sat and chatted away, not thinking of the mischief they might be doing, until, at a question from Miss Carrie, Annie Stanton dropped her voice as she answered. Still now and then a few words would reach the little ones. "Shocking temper" – "Poor Margaret so uncomfortable" – "Mr Bradford very much displeased" – "patience quite worn out" until Bessie said, —

"Aunt Annie, if you don't mean us to know what you say, we do hear a little."

Aunt Annie started and colored, then said, hastily "Oh, I had almost forgotten you were there. Would you not like to go down-stairs, pets, and ask old Dinah to bake a little cake for each of you? Run then, and if you heard what we were saying, do not think of it. It is nothing for you to trouble your small heads about. I am afraid we have been rather imprudent," she continued uneasily when her little nieces had left the room. "Margaret is so particular that her children shall hear nothing like gossip or evil speaking, and I think we have been indulging in both. If Maggie and Bessie have been listening to what we were saying, they will not have a very pleasant impression of Mrs. Lawrence. Well, there is no use in fretting about it now. What is said cannot be unsaid; and they will soon find out for themselves what the old lady is."

Yes, what is said cannot be unsaid. Each little word, as it is spoken, goes forth on its errand of good or evil, and can never be recalled.

Perhaps Aunt Annie would have regretted her thoughtlessness still more if she had seen and heard the little girls as they stood together in the hall. They had no thought of old Dinah and the cakes with this important matter to talk over. Not think of what they heard, indeed! That was a curious thing for Aunt Annie to say. She had been right in believing that Maggie must have forgotten Mrs. Lawrence. Maggie had done so, but now this conversation had brought the whole scene of the quarrel with nurse to her mind. It all came back to her; but in recollection it appeared far worse than the reality. Aunt Patty's loud, angry voice seemed sounding in her ears, uttering the most violent threats, and she thought of the old lady herself almost as if she had been some terrible monster, ready to tear in pieces her own poor frightened little self, clinging about nurse's neck.

And was it possible that this dreadful old woman was really coming again to their house to make a visit? How could papa and mamma think it best to allow it?

Such mischief had already been done by idle talk!

"Maggie," said Bessie, "do you remember about that Patty woman?"

"Yes," answered Maggie, "I did not remember about her till Aunt Annie and Miss Carrie said that, but I do now; and oh, Bessie, she's awful! I wish, I wish mamma would not let her come. She's the shockingest person you ever saw."

"Aunt Annie said mamma did not want her herself; but she let her come because she thought it was right," said Bessie.

"I wonder why mamma thinks it is right when she is so cross and tempered," said Maggie, with a long sigh. "Why, she used to scold even papa and mamma! Oh, I remember her so well now. I wish I didn't; I don't like to think about it;" and Maggie looked very much distressed.

Bessie was almost as much troubled, but she put her arm about her sister and said, "Never matter, dear Maggie, papa and mamma won't let her do anything to us."

"But suppose papa and mamma both had to go out and leave us, as they did that day she behaved so," said Maggie. "Nursey has so many to take care of now, and maybe she'd meddle again, – Aunt Annie said she was very meddling too, – and try to punish me when I did not do any blame."

"Jane would help nurse pertect us," said Bessie, "and if she couldn't, we'd yun away and hide till papa and mamma came."

"She shouldn't do anything to you, Bessie. I wouldn't let her do that, anyhow," said Maggie, shaking her head, and looking very determined.

"How could you help it if she wanted to, Maggie?"

"I'd say, 'Beware, woman!'" said Maggie, drawing her eyebrows into a frown, and extending her hand with the forefinger raised in a threatening manner.

"Oh!" said Bessie, "what does that mean?"

"I don't quite know," said Maggie, slowly, "but it frightens people very much."

"It don't frighten me a bit when you say it."

"'Cause you don't have a guilty conscience; but if you had, you'd be, oh, so afraid!"

"How do you know I would?"

"I'll tell you," said Maggie. "Uncle John had a picture paper the other day, and in it was a picture of a woman coming in at the door, and she had her hands up so, and she looked as frightened, as frightened, and a man was standing behind the curtain doing so, and under the picture was 'Beware, woman!' I asked Uncle John what it meant, and he said that was a wicked woman who was going to steal some papers so she could get some money, and when she came in, she heard somebody say, 'Beware, woman,' and she was so frightened she ran away and was never seen again. I asked him to tell me more about it, but he said, 'No, it was a foolish story, not fit for little people.' Then I asked him if foolish stories were only fit for big people, but he just laughed and pinched my cheek. But I coaxed him to tell me why the woman was so frightened when the man did nothing but say those two words, and he said it was because she had a guilty conscience, for wicked people feared what good and innocent people did not mind at all. So if that old Mrs. Patty – I sha'n't call her aunt – don't behave herself to you, Bessie, I'll just try it."

"Do you think she has a guilty conscience, Maggie?"

"Course she has; how could she help it?"

"And will she yun away and never be seen again?"

"I guess so," said Maggie; "anyhow, I hope she will."

"I wonder why mamma did not tell us she was coming," said Bessie.

"We'll ask her to-morrow. We can't do it to-night because it will be so late before she comes home from Riverside and we'll be asleep, but we'll do it in the morning. And now, don't let's think about that shocking person any more. We'll go and ask Dinah about the cakes."

But although they resolved to try to forget Aunt Patty for the present, they could not help thinking of her a good deal and talking of her also, for their young hearts had been filled with dread of the old lady and her intended visit.

The reason that Mr. and Mrs. Bradford had not spoken to their children of Mrs. Lawrence's coming was that it was not yet a settled thing; and as there was not much that was pleasant to tell, they did not think it best to speak of her unless it was necessary. It was long since her name had been mentioned in the family, so long that, as Mrs. Bradford had hoped and supposed, all recollection of her had passed from Maggie's mind, until the conversation she had just heard had brought it back.