Ruth Erskine's Son
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Title: Ruth Erskine's Son
Author: Pansy
Illustrator: Louise Clark
Release date: September 21, 2013 [eBook #43785]
Most recently updated: October 23, 2024
Language: English
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK RUTH ERSKINE'S SON ***
[Illustration: "ERSKINE," SHE SAID EAGERLY, "WHAT DO YOU MEAN?"
_Page 91._]
RUTH ERSKINE'S SON
BY
PANSY
AUTHOR OF "RUTH ERSKINE'S CROSSES"; "ESTER RIED'S
NAMESAKE"; "ESTER RIED YET SPEAKING"; "ESTER
RIED"; "DORIS FARRAND'S VOCATION"; "DAVID
RANSOM'S WATCH"; ETC., ETC.
_ILLUSTRATED BY LOUISE CLARK_
[Illustration]
BOSTON
LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.
PANSY
TRADE-MARK
Registered in U. S. Patent Office.
Published, August, 1907.
COPYRIGHT, 1906,
BY LOTHROP, LEE & SHEPARD CO.
_All Rights Reserved._
RUTH ERSKINE'S SON.
Norwood Press
J. S. Cushing Co.--Berwick & Smith Co.
Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I. WHIMS 1
II. "NEVER MIND, MOMMIE" 15
III. MAMIE PARKER 29
IV. WOULD SHE "DO"? 42
V. THE OLD CAT! 55
VI. IDEAL CONDITIONS 69
VII. "MOTHERS ARE QUEER!" 82
VIII. A SPOILED MOTHER 96
IX. SENTIMENT AND SACRIFICE 110
X. "SENTIMENTAL" PEOPLE 124
XI. "PLANS FOR A PURPOSE" 137
XII. ACCIDENT OR DESIGN? 151
XIII. WAS IRENE RIGHT? 164
XIV. THE GENERAL MANAGER 176
XV. LOOKING BACKWARD 189
XVI. FOR MAYBELLE'S SAKE 203
XVII. BUILT ON THE SAND 216
XVIII. JUSTICE OR MERCY? 229
XIX. ALONE 242
XX. THEY HATED MYSTERY 254
XXI. "A STUDY" 268
XXII. A LOYAL HEART 280
XXIII. PUZZLING QUESTIONS 293
XXIV. AN ALLY 306
XXV. A CRISIS 319
XXVI. A STRANGE CHANGE 331
XXVII. A RETROGRADE MOVEMENT 344
XXVIII. "SOMETHING HAD HAPPENED" 358
XXIX. RENUNCIATION 371
XXX. "TWO, AND TWO, AND TWO" 383
ILLUSTRATIONS
"ERSKINE," SHE SAID EAGERLY, "WHAT DO YOU MEAN?" (PAGE 91)
_Frontispiece_
FACING PAGE
"WE WILL GIVE THEM ALL THE SLIP, MY DEAR" 62
"MY MOTHER ISN'T OLD, IRENE" 166
"I AM SORRY THAT I HATED YOU" 354
RUTH ERSKINE'S SON
CHAPTER I
WHIMS
AS a matter of fact the name of this story should be: Ruth Erskine
Burnham's Son. But there are those living who remember Ruth Erskine and
her memorable summer at the New York Chautauqua; and that name is so
entirely associated with those four girls at Chautauqua, and their after
experiences, that it seems natural to speak of her boy, Erskine, as Ruth
Erskine's son; although, of course, he was also Judge Burnham's son.
The day on which she is again introduced to her friends was a dull one
in late autumn; the afterglow of sunset was already fading, and the
shadows were gathering fast. It was the hour that Erskine Burnham liked
best for the piano. He was at that moment softly touching the keys,
bringing forth harmonious sounds with the air of one not even hearing
them.
He was a handsome boy. The promise of his early life,--during which time
the exclamation, "What a beautiful child!" was being continually
heard,--was being fulfilled in his boyhood. Friends of his father were
fond of assuring Ruth that the boy was his father's image; while her
friends were sure that no boy could be more like his mother.
As for Ruth when she saw her son bending over his books, a lock of hair
continually dropping over his left eye and being continually flung back
with a gesture peculiar to Judge Erskine, she would say:--
"He is very much like his grandfather."
As the boy grew older he laughed at all these opinions, and asked his
mother if she did not think it would be difficult for a fellow to have
any individuality who was strikingly like three people who were all, as
nearly as he could make out, strikingly unlike one another.
This remark was one of the memories that came back to her as she looked
out at the swift-falling night, and listened to that musical strain
which was being played over and over and _over_. She seemed to be
watching the people who were hurrying homeward, glancing apprehensively
now and then at the sky; for despite the glow of sunset there were
premonitions of a coming storm, and already a few advance snowflakes
were beginning to fall. But Mrs. Burnham saw neither people nor
snowflakes; or rather she saw them without seeing. Her eyes were
swimming in tears that she did not intend to let have their way. Not as
girl or woman had Ruth Erskine Burnham been given to tears, although
there had been reason enough in her life for them. Since she had not
indulged them then, she did not mean to begin now that she was
middle-aged and her hair was being sprinkled with gray.
She had been going over the story of the years with herself, that
afternoon, which might account in part for the dimmed eyes. It seemed to
her, looking back, that her chief mission in life had been to minister
at dying beds and follow as chief or almost chief mourner in funeral
processions. She had gone away back to the betrothed of her youth, and
added one more heavy sigh to the multitude that stood for a lost
opportunity. How entirely Harold Wayne had been under her influence! how
utterly she had failed him! And she had felt it only when she was
following him to the grave. Then those other graves, her father's and
Judge Burnham's daughters', Seraph and Minta, what strange sad memories
she had connected with both those graves that were not a year apart in
their making. And then their father had been laid beside them and they
two were left alone in the world, she and Erskine.
He was not yet eighteen, but there were times when it seemed to his
mother that he was much older, and that he and she had been alone
together always. All these memories that, because it was an anniversary
of one of her bereavements, had been more vivid with her than usual that
day, trooped again about her as she stood in the waning light,
apparently intent on watching the outside world, in order to escape
being watched by her world, inside.
To people who were acquainted with the girl, Ruth Erskine, it will not
seem strange that a look backward over her checkered life brought sombre
thoughts that were close to tears.
Of the four girls who, years and years before when they were young and
full of courage, went to Chautauqua together and lived their eventful
summer and began their new lives together, hers had had the strangest,
saddest story; it had been marked by experiences so unlike the
commonplace that the world had stopped to look, and express its
astonishment.
The unusual began with her father's strange revelations about that new
mother who yet was not new, but had been her stepmother for years. Was
ever daughter before called upon to receive a new mother in such way as
that? But why go over all that ground again? She too had been followed
to the grave, and no one of all Mrs. Burnham's friends had been more
sincerely missed and mourned. Then there was her sister, Susan Erskine.
Was ever heavier cross or greater blessing thrust into a life than that
girl represented to the girl Ruth Erskine? It had been one of her later
trials to give Susan up to China. She was sorely missed, but it had been
good for Erskine to have such a missionary Auntie as she made. And those
two strange girls Seraphina and Araminta Burnham. Could some writer put
into print the story of those two lives as it interlaced with hers, the
foolish world would call it fiction, and criticise it as unnatural.
Over the early days of her widowhood Ruth Burnham knew better than to
linger. Though so many years had intervened that the little boy he left
had grown to young manhood, she still missed his father so sorely that
she could not trust herself to stay among those few precious months
before he went suddenly from her.
She had been left, without even the warning of an hour, to bring up
their boy alone! It was from this form of her bereavement that she had
shrunken back most fearfully. Judge Burnham, with his life consecrated
to God, had seemed eminently fitted to guide the life of just such a boy
as theirs; but God had planned differently.
And now, what people call the anxious years were gone, and she had kept
her boy.
Yet the tears which she did not mean to shed were, in part, for him. She
knew better than most mothers seem to understand that there were still
"anxious years" to be lived through.
They had lingered over the breakfast table that morning, discussing
certain questions that had been discussed before.
"Mamma," the boy had said as he served her to fruit, "how came you to
have pronounced ideas about all sorts of things? Were you always so?"
His mother laughed genially.
"What a definite question for a lawyer to ask!" for Erskine had already
announced his intention of being a lawyer like his father and
grandfather.
"What 'things' are supposed to be under consideration?"
He echoed her laugh.
"I was thinking aloud then," he said. "It often seems to me as though
you and I knew each other's thoughts. But just now I am thinking of one
of our argumentative subjects. In spite of the horror in which you have
brought me up of those bits of pasteboard called cards, I find that I
cannot feel precisely as you would like to have me, concerning them. I
used to. As a child nobody could be fiercer than I in their
denunciation; but I find that that was merely a reflex influence, and
not judgment. In spite of me nowadays they look meek and harmless; and I
was wondering how you and they came to be in such fierce antagonism. Was
my father of that mind?"
"Am I fierce, Erskine?"
He gave her a half-quizzical, wholly loving smile as he said gayly:--
"That of course is not the word to apply to the most charming of women,
but you know, dearest, that you are very much in earnest about all such
matters. Were you brought up in that way?"
Mrs. Burnham shook her head.
"No, when I was of your age, and younger, we played cards at home; and I
went to card-parties in our set very often. It was your Aunt Flossy who
set a number of us to thinking and studying and praying about such
matters."
Erskine shook his head with pretended gravity.
"I might have known it, mamma. Aunt Flossy isn't like people; in fact
she always seems to me a trifle out of place on earth."
"I thought you were very fond indeed of your Aunt Flossy."
"So I am; and I think I should be very fond of an angel from heaven; but
you see, when a fellow has to live on the earth, it is a trifle more
convenient to be like the other earth worms. All of which was suggested
by the fact that the Mitchells are to give a card-party next week. Very
select, you understand, only the choice few are bidden and I happen to
be one of them."
Then, although his mother shrank from it, feeling that it did harm
rather than good to go again over ground that was familiar to both and
that was so clear to her and did not convince her son, he persisted in
arguing, and in trying to prove that her position was narrow and
untenable in these days. Throughout the interview he had been courteous
and winsome, as he always was with her, and had laughingly complimented
her more than once on her skill in argument; but for all that, she knew
he was entirely unconvinced, and felt that her hold on him was weaker
than when they had gone over the same ground before. The fact was, and
this mother knew it well, that the world and all the allurements for
which that phrase stands was making a hard fight for her handsome son
even so early in life, and there were times when she felt fearful that
in a sense it would win. It was not that she believed he would ever be
sorely tempted by any of the amusements or frivolities of life; he was
strong-principled and strong-willed, and certain, that might be called
main, points had been settled by him once for all. Yet none knew better
than did this woman of long and peculiar experience that it was possible
to maintain a high standing in the world and in the church and yet have
almost as little knowledge of that life hid with Christ in God which was
the Christian's rightful heritage as did the gay world around him. She
craved this separated life for Erskine, yet he was social in his tastes
and fond of being looked upon as a leader, and his mother knew it
already irked him to feel that in certain social functions he must
always be counted out.
"There are so many of them!" he had said to her once, with as much
impatience in his tone as he ever gave to her.
"A fellow could manage to indulge one or two whims, but you know,
dearest, you have at least half a dozen, and to humor them all will make
a rather conspicuous wallflower, I am afraid."
Something very like that he had repeated that morning, and it had
colored his mother's day. She knew that the Mitchells were fond of
Erskine and would make vigorous efforts to secure him for their party.
It was hard, she told herself, that one so fitted to shine in cultured
circles of young people must so often be made to feel embarrassed and
out of place, and she wondered for the dozenth time that season if ways
of thinking about these things had changed, along with other changes.
Was she herself what Erskine, if he had made use of the modern slang,
might call a "back number"? "Still, his father, who had no such
prejudices as mine to deal with, grew very positive in his objection to
cards," she reminded herself, and sighed. If his father had lived, he
would have known just how to manage Erskine; this, at least, she pleased
herself by believing, ignoring the fact that in their son's early
boyhood the father had had many ways of managing, of which she did not
approve. This is a habit which we all have with our beloved dead.
It was the memory of their morning talk that had led Mrs. Burnham to
appeal, that afternoon, to Mr. Conway when he dropped in for a social
chat. Mr. Conway was their new pastor; a brilliant, scholarly man, much
admired by old and young. Erskine in particular had been attracted to
him, and was decidedly of the opinion that in the pulpit he was a great
improvement on Dr. Dennis, even. Of course his mother did not agree with
this verdict, but she was wise enough to remember that the friends of
her girlhood could not be expected to be to her son what they were to
her. Yet Erskine was eminently fair and thoughtful beyond his years for
her. At the very time when he had so heartily indorsed Mr. Conway, he
had made haste to say:--
"Of course, mamma, there is a sense in which no one can ever equal Dr.
Dennis to us, and as for Aunt Marian her loss is irreparable." He held
carefully to the boyish custom of claiming his mother's girl friends as
aunts, and she liked it in him:--
"Nevertheless," he had added firmly, "as a preacher Mr. Conway is far
superior to Dr. Dennis."
Despite his careful courtesy Erskine was at the age when wisdom is at
its height, and opinions as a rule are delivered autocratically without
any softening "I think." His mother, having often to make objections
from principle, had learned the art of being silent when she could, and
she had made no objection in words to his estimate of Mr. Conway. To a
degree she was in sympathy with it. She liked Mr. Conway and was glad
that he was so young that Erskine, being old for his years, could find
him almost companionable, and at the same time could be helped by him.
Because of all these reasons she had been glad that Erskine was in, that
afternoon when Mr. Conway called. He was fond of calling there, and
playfully accused the two of being responsible for many neglected
families in his parish. She had kept herself almost quiet while Erskine
and their guest discussed books and music and men. They had many tastes
in common. Then Erskine had been urged to play, and his selection from
one of the great masters had chanced to be Mr. Conway's special
favorite; and then, Mrs. Erskine having studied how to do it in an
unstudied way, had skilfully turned the conversation into the channel of
her morning talk with Erskine; and before two minutes had passed would
have given much to be able to take back what she had done.
CHAPTER II
"NEVER MIND, MOMMIE"
YET in thinking it over, this course had seemed to Mrs. Burnham
eminently wise. Mr. Conway was quite as much in touch with the
fashionable world as a clergyman could well be; he had been brought up
in its atmosphere and had turned from what were supposed to be very
alluring prospects to live the comparatively straitened life of a
minister of the gospel. His undoubted scholarship commended him
especially to a young fellow like Erskine who came of a scholarly line.
If, without being directly appealed to for advice, the minister could be
drawn into an expression of opinion about these questionable matters, it
would certainly help; and under her skilful management he expressed
himself; but behold, he was on the wrong side! At least he was not on
the side that Ruth Burnham, having been for years accustomed to the
pastorate of Dr. Dennis, had taken it for granted that he would be.
There was, he assured her, something to be said on the other side of
that question. Of course he was opposed to all forms of gambling, but a
social game of cards in the parlor of a friend was innocent amusement
enough--much better than certain others he could name that seemed to
have escaped the ban of the over-cautious. He was really in earnest
about this matter. He considered that there was positive danger in
drawing the lines too taut. He knew a fellow in college who had been
very carefully reared in one of those very narrow homes where a card was
never allowed to penetrate, and where they looked in holy horror upon
the idea of his touching one elsewhere; but he hadn't been in college an
entire year before he spent half his nights at cards! and he went to the
bad as fast as he could. That, the clergyman believed, was what often
happened when young people were held too closely. That was by no means
the only instance which had come under his personal knowledge, and
indeed he believed that, of the two extremes, he feared the narrow the
more. Human nature was such that there was sure to be a rebound from
over-strictness, and the clearer, keener brained the victim was, the
more fear of results. There was much more of the same sort. Poor Ruth,
who had not meant to argue, and who had wished of all things to avoid
anything that would look in the least like a personal matter, tried in
vain to change the subject. Erskine, with an occasional mischievous
glance for her alone, led his pastor on to say much more than he had
probably intended at first. Not that he differed from him in the least;
on the contrary he took the rôle of an eager youth to whom it was a
vital matter to have the "narrowness" of his surroundings immediately
widened.
Mrs. Burnham, disappointed and hurt, became almost entirely silent, and
when she finally walked down the hall with her departing pastor, felt no
wish to consult him about a matter on which she had intended to ask his
advice at the first opportunity. She had a feeling that it made little
difference to her what his advice was on any subject; yet she knew that
that was real narrowness and that she must rise above it. Such was the
condition of things on that evening in late autumn when she stood
looking out of the bay window at the swiftly gathering night and
appeared to be watching the passers-by through a mist of unshed tears,
while Erskine played exquisite strains of harmony. His mother,
listening, or rather letting the music melt unconsciously into her
being, felt peculiarly alone with her responsibilities. Who was she that
she should hope, alone and unaided, to battle successfully with the
temptations of this great wicked world full of yawning pitfalls
especially prepared for the feet of young men? How was she ever to hope
to guide a boy like Erskine successfully through its snares, without
even a pastor to lean upon? What if Erskine should be like that college
boy Mr. Conway had taken such pains to describe graphically and insist
upon going to the bad as soon as he was away from her influence? She
could see that that was just what was being feared for him; it was
probably what Mr. Conway meant.
Wait, must her boy, her one treasure, be away from her influence? Yes,
of course he must; everybody said so. Why, there were people who were
certain that she was ruining her son by keeping so close to him even
now. Not only now, but away back in his young boyhood. She recalled with
a shiver of pain how her husband had once said to her:--
"Have a care, Ruth; you don't want to make a Molly Coddle of the boy,
remember."
Later, she had heard of one of the Mitchells as declaring that "Mrs.
Burnham was making a regular 'Miss Nancy' of that boy of hers, and if
somebody did not take him in hand, he would be ruined."
Then, her intimate friends had been as plain with their cautions as they
dared. Had not Marian Dennis pleaded earnestly for a famous boys' school
fifty miles away? "It would be so good for him, Ruth; he would learn
self-reliance and patience; two lessons that a boy never can learn at
home, when there is but one." And Dr. Dennis had added his word: "As a
rule, my friend, a boy learns manliness by being compelled to be manly
and to depend upon himself."
There was her old friend Eurie, with four rollicking, romping boys of
her own, always looking doubtfully at Ruth's fair-haired, fair-skinned,
rather quiet, always gentlemanly boy.
"Let him come and spend a summer with us, Ruth," she urged, "and row and
swim and hunt and get almost shot and quite drowned a few times; it will
do him good, body and soul. Boys learn manhood by hairbreadth escapes,
you know." She had laughed at Ruth's shudder and had told Marian
privately that "Ruth was simply idiotic over that poor boy."
Only Flossy, their dainty, gentle, still beautiful Flossy, had seemed to
understand. Had she too meant a caution? As she kissed Ruth good-by, the
four girls of Chautauqua memory having spent a never-to-be-forgotten
week together at Ruth Burnham's home, she had said gently:--
"The best place in the world for a boy, dear Ruth, is as close to his
mother as he wants to be, just as long as he plans to be there. I have
studied boys a good deal, and I think I am sure of so much."
Ruth's face had flushed over this murmured word. She had been half vexed
with the others, but it had been given to their little Flossy, as often
before, to give her a new thought. She studied over it; she took it to
heart and let it color all her movements. More and more after that,
although Erskine was still quite young, she kept herself in the
background and pushed him forward. On their little trips to the larger
city and in any of their outings indeed, she compelled herself to sit
quietly in the waiting-room, while Erskine went to buy tickets and check
baggage. It is true that every nerve in her body quivered with
apprehension until he was safely beside her again, yet she held firmly
to her purpose.
Very early in their life alone together she ceased any attempt to drive
the ponies that were Erskine's delight, and sat beside him outwardly
quiet and inwardly quaking until she had learned her lesson--reminding
herself continually that the boy's father had taught him to love and to
manage horses when he was too small to touch his feet to the carriage
floor.
She gave up early, and with a purpose, the taking Erskine to town with
her for a round of shopping or pleasure-seeking, and learned to say
meekly and in a natural tone of voice:--
"Can you take me to town on Saturday, dear? I have many errands to do,
and I don't like to go alone."
She had lived through all these things, and it was not in any such
directions that either she or her friends had fears any more. Erskine
was self-reliant enough; in fact he was masterful, though so courteous
in his ways that few beside herself suspected it. He had inherited much
from his father. Still, the mother knew that there was a strong sense in
which she dominated his life. That he went to certain places and
refrained from going to certain others simply to please her and not at
all as a matter of principle. She was far from being satisfied with
this, and was always asking herself: "How long will he do this?" and
"Are such concessions worth anything in the way of character?"
She had many questions, this anxious mother of one child; there were
days, and this was one, when they pressed her sorely.
The music flowed on; now soft and tender as a caress, now breaking into
great waves of sound that meant energy, and possibly conflict.
Suddenly it ceased with a great crash of keys, still in harmony, and the
boy wheeled on his stool, looked at his mother, and laughed.
"You woke up the wrong chap that time, didn't you, mother?" he said. "It
was as good as a play to hear him go on and to watch your face. I
haven't enjoyed anything so much in a long time."
He laughed again over the memory. His mother did not join in the laugh;
just then she could not. Those tears that she had managed, not allowing
them to fall, had somehow got into her throat. She felt that she should
choke if she attempted to speak, and she could not summon at the moment
more than the ghost of a smile.
Erskine wheeled back to the piano for a moment, played a few bars of a
popular song with one hand, humming it softly; then, in the midst of a
line, arose and strolled over to the window where his mother stood.
"Never mind, mommie," he said, bending his tall form low enough to kiss
the tip of one ear--a whimsical little caress peculiar to himself. "She
mustn't go and look at the clouds and the storm and the dark as though
there wasn't any sunshine anywhere. I am not intending to go to the dogs
as soon as I go away from home, merely because my mother did her level
best all her life to keep me right side up with care; and in my opinion
it would be a poor sort of chap who would do any such thing. And I don't
feel the need of a social game of cards now and then as a safeguard,
either. I don't feel especially 'taut,' mommie, honestly; and I don't
care a straw for the Mitchells' card party. Did you really think I cared
for it on that account? How absurd! Don't you worry one least little
mite, mamma, there is absolutely nothing to be troubled over except that
you have a pastor who doesn't know enough to talk a little bit on the
side that you want talked, or else keep still. Wasn't it funny?" He
laughed once more, then added, a trifle more gravely:--
"When that man is older, he will understand people better, perhaps.
Don't you hope so? Shall I read to you, mamma, a little while? I have a
delicious book here that I know you will enjoy."
Did he understand, would he ever understand, what a mountain weight he
had suddenly lifted from his mother's heart? What a gracious,
sweet-spirited, self-sacrificing boy he was! Had there ever been one
just like him? She knew he was fond of the Mitchells, and that they were
eager to have him with them in their social life; they had brought as
much pressure as they could, and he had resisted it for his mother's
sake.
It was sweet, but--She could not keep back one little sigh. She was a
devoted mother; but she would, oh, so much rather it had been for
Christ's sake.
There was an unexpected outcome from that interview with Mr. Conway. In
a very short time it became evident that he had lost his hold upon
Erskine. Not that the boy turned against him seriously; but he smiled
over some of his words and purposely misquoted others in a spirit of
mischief. Occasionally there was a curve to the smile that suggested a
sneer; and the strongest feeling he evinced for him might be called
indifference. In his secret heart Erskine knew that he was being
unreasonable, and was really resenting his mother's having been made
uncomfortable; but he could not get away from the feeling that Mr.
Conway, having been weighed in his mother's balance and found wanting,
was not to his mind, however much he himself might differ from her. Of
course all this was mere feeling, not principle.
Nevertheless, the clergyman, who prided himself on his influence with
young men and who puzzled anxiously over Erskine Burnham's changed
attitude which he vaguely felt and could not define, might have been
helped if some one had been frank enough to explain the situation.
Nobody did. The boy scoffed in secret, assuring himself that a minister
who could not be a comfort to a woman and a widow when she tried to lean
on him was a "poor sort of chap." As for the mother, she told herself
that if she had not been weak and foolish in carrying her anxieties to
others, Mr. Conway would not have lost his influence over Erskine; and
the minister remained perplexed and anxious; he was sincerely eager to
be helpful to young men.
Outwardly they all went on as before. The Mitchells and others of their
kind made their card parties and their social dances and their theatre
parties and continued to invite eagerly Mrs. Burnham's handsome young
son, who cheerfully declined all invitations and stayed with his mother.
But he argued no more; in fact he declined to do so, setting the whole
matter gayly aside, with a cheerful--
"Don't let us argue about these things any more, mommie. We shouldn't
agree, and they are not worth disagreeing over. I don't care a copper
for the whole crowd of entertainments that you think of with
interrogation points attached, and I don't care two straws about what
others think of me in connection with them; so let us taboo the whole
subject and enjoy ourselves."
His mother would have liked something very different. She would have
been glad if he had given himself to the study of such matters, and
settled them from principle. She harassed herself by imagining what an
unspeakably happy mother she would be if instead of his gay, kind words
he had said:--
"I have been looking into this matter carefully and I understand why you
take the position that you do. In fact I do not see how a Christian
could do otherwise. I shall take it with you, and you may consider that
the question is settled with me for all time."
However, it is something, indeed it is a great deal, for a lone and
lonely mother to have a boy go her way, and go smilingly, merely to
please her.
CHAPTER III
MAMIE PARKER
ON a bright winter day more than a year after Mr. Conway's deliverance
with regard to cards, Mrs. Burnham's next very distinct milestone was
set up. She was away from the old home and Mr. Conway and all the
associations of her past. She was spending her second winter in a lively
college town, and Erskine was a sophomore.
The lonely mother of one son had been through much anxiety and
perplexity before the plans for this change in their life were fully
formed. Erskine's gay rendering of the situation was that not only did
every adopted aunt and uncle and grandmother that he had in the world
know best how to plan their life for them, but had each a pet college to
ride as a hobby. He gave this as a reason why it was just as well to
break all their hearts at one fell swoop and choose for himself--which
was what in effect he had done; at least he had gone quite contrary to
the urgings of his other friends and had compromised with his mother.
But he had made quite a compromise. His very first choice had been one
of which she entirely disapproved; nor could she be persuaded despite
his arguments to change her point of view. In vain he held her quite
into the night in a close and eager debate, setting forth his important
reasons with skill and eloquence. In vain he assured her that conditions
had very much changed since his father had expressed disapproval of this
particular centre of learning, and as for his grandfather, why there was
nothing left of his times but the name.
His mother urged that her opinion, or her feeling--he might call it
feeling if he chose--was not based on his grandfather's or even entirely
on his father's views, but was the result of her own reading and
inquiry, and was unalterable. If he selected that college, it would be
in direct opposition to her strongly expressed wishes. She had been
tempted to add that if he did so, his money, left in her charge and
subject to her decisions until he was of legal age, would not be
forthcoming. She was mercifully preserved from making this mistake. Had
she said so, he would probably have gone to the college of his choice
even though he had to go penniless. As it was, his eyes flashed a
little. But his mother's voice had trembled as she added those last
words, "And I suppose I need not try to tell you how such a course would
hurt me."
It was that which held the boy. He sprang up suddenly, took two or three
hasty turns up and down the room in a manner so like his father's that
Ruth could hardly bear it, then his face had cleared.
"You shall not be hurt, mommie," he had said in his usual cheery tone.
"You shall never be hurt by me. I want that college more I presume than
I could make you understand, and the more I think about it the more I
feel that I should like to choose it. But I am not a baby who must have
everything he wants; and I do not care enough for anything on earth to
get it at the expense of hurting you. You know that, don't you? I'll
tell you, mother, we will compromise; this is an age of compromise. I
will drop my first choice from this time forth if you will unite
heartily with me on the second one and help me stop this clamor of
tongues."
It had not been by any means her second choice, but she felt that having
been treated so well she must meet him halfway; so the vexed question
was settled.
There had been another anxiety. Marion Dennis had written to her not to
make the mistake of following her boy to college; and Dr. Dennis had
added a few lines to the same effect, saying that in nine cases out of
ten he believed such a course to be a mistake, and even in the tenth,
separation would probably have been better. Moreover, an only son and an
only child needed, as a rule, more than any other to be thrown on his
own resources. All the old arguments over again, and numberless plans
for the disposal of the mother. She was to come to the Dennis home for a
visit of unlimited length; she was to spend the winter with Flossy; she
was to go abroad with Grace and her husband. Eurie, the outspoken,
wrote:--
"Now, Ruth, don't, I beg of you, tie that dear boy to your apron-string.
I am the mother of five, and I know all about how they talk, and how
they feel when they don't talk. Besides, I need you this winter as never
before; let me tell you something." Then had followed revelations
intended to prove that it was Ruth's imperative duty to spend the winter
with her old friend.
Mr. Conway added his courteous hint, and suggested plans. Mrs. Conway
wondered if Mrs. Burnham would not like to join her sister Helen and
their mutual friends, the Hosmers, on an extended Western trip, now that
she was to be alone. The winter was an ideal time for such a tour as
they had planned; and it would be pleasant for Erskine to think of his
mother as travelling with friends instead of being at home alone. Poor
Ruth! her heart turned from them all in almost rebellion. If she must be
separated from Erskine for the first time in his life, couldn't she be
let alone in her own home? To go visiting or sight-seeing without him
she felt would be unbearable. She kept most of these anxieties and
advices to herself, feeling that she must not cloud Erskine's last days
at home with them. Still, she wondered not a little,--and sometimes it
hurt her,--that he had not spoken of her plans at all, but seemed to be
so absorbed in his own as to have forgotten her. At last, when she felt
that some positive decision must be reached, she told him of Mr.
Conway's proposition, and showed him Eurie's letter. He glanced it
through, smiling serenely:--
"Aunt Eurie is cool, as usual," he remarked. "They can all save their
time by planning for somebody else, can't they? Of course I am going to
take you with me, mommie. Do they think I would leave you in this big
house alone, or let you go travelling without me!"
It was all so easy to arrange after that. It sounded so different from
the wording in those letters when Erskine himself replied to them.
"I am very grateful for your thoughtful kindness about my mother, but I
am going to take her with me; I had not a thought of doing otherwise. I
should not be comfortable to have her away from my care in winter, even
though she were with you. I have so long made her first in my thoughts
and look upon her so entirely as my father's precious charge to me, that
no other plan is to be thought of. I shall find pleasant rooms for her,
and I think she will enjoy the change."
Ruth smiled proudly as she made her verbal explanations. "Thank you very
much, but Erskine says I am to go with him; he cannot think of trusting
me to myself; he has taken care of me for a long time, you know." There
was not a thought of sarcasm in this suggestion. She knew that the
assumption of authority sat well on her handsome son who could look down
on her from his splendid height; it seemed quite in keeping with his
appearance and character that he was going to take his mother with him
in order to take care of her.
The scheme had worked well. He "took" his mother and took excellent care
of her, and incidentally she did much, of course, for his comfort, and
they were happy. Early in his college career she had sometimes overheard
explanations like this:--
"No, boys, I can't join you to-night. You see, I have my mother with me
and I feel bound to give her what time I can spare. It will never do to
have her feel lonely and deserted after bringing her away out here among
strangers, on purpose to take care of her."
It was all very pleasant. But she had learned something from those
letters and that volume of advice. She tried steadily not to dominate
her son; indeed, so far as a carefully-watched-over mother could, she
effaced herself, or tried to. Erskine had no thought of such a thing,
and was openly and serenely happy in his mother's society.
"I pity the other fellows," was a phrase often on his lips. "Most of
them live in pokey rooms all by themselves or with only each other; no
woman to speak to but a cross-grained hostess, and nothing homelike
anywhere; while here it is almost as nice as being at home."
And he would glance complacently around the handsomely furnished suite
of rooms that showed everywhere the touch of his mother's hand. But of
course there were evenings that were not spent with his mother. It was
in connection with one of these that she reached that distinct milestone
of which mention has been made. Erskine in explaining about it had shown
an unaccountable embarrassment.
"It is just a kind of spread that one of the boys is getting up in honor
of his sister; she has come to spend the winter with him. It is rather
new business to him and I have promised to help him through, so I must
go early and stay late--not very late, though. Parker's landlady will
look out for that; she is one of the grim and surly kind. I should have
the shivers if I had to get up a spread, with her in charge. Yes, Parker
is the curly-headed one that you don't quite fancy. I don't know why, he
is a good fellow. Haven't I spoken before of his sister? She has been
here for three weeks. Didn't you notice Parker last Wednesday at the
concert? He sat just across from us and had her with him. Yes, she is at
his boarding-house, and the spread is in his room. He has the downstairs
room, mother, in fact it is the back parlor; there is a folding-bed that
does duty as a sort of sideboard during the day. It is very nice,
really. One wouldn't imagine that there was a bed anywhere around.
Parker is one of the fellows who has a good deal of money, I think, but
not the culture that generally goes with such a condition. Sometimes I
fancy that his father must have made his money lately and suddenly; but,
of course, I don't know. Still, everything is very nice and proper about
this spread; of course you know that, or I wouldn't be in it. The
sister? Oh, yes, she is young--younger than Parker. He is older than
most of us, you know. No, there are no women in the house except the
landlady and her sister, a maiden lady. That's a pity; it must be rather
lonely for Ma--for Miss Parker."
The color flamed in his face and he laughed in an embarrassed way and
spoke apologetically:--
"Parker has 'Mamie' so constantly on his tongue that the rest of us are
in danger of forgetting. He is very proud of his sister. Why, no,
mother, of course he could not very well make any other arrangement; why
should he? Of course it is a perfectly proper thing for a young lady to
be in her brother's boarding-house. She isn't obliged to have any more
to do with the other young men than she chooses. Parker wants her to
stay with him all winter. Their father is a mining man, and he and his
wife have gone to the mountains somewhere among the mines to look up
some more of their money, I suppose."
He spoke almost contemptuously; for some reason the evidence of
abundance of money in the Parker family seemed to annoy him. He went on
quickly with his labored explanations:--
"Of course it would be pleasanter for M--for his sister if Parker were
in a house where there are ladies, but he has been there for several
years and has a room that suits him; he doesn't seem to think he can
make a change. Oh, yes, there are to be ladies to-night. Some of the
other boys have sisters, and cousins, or intimate friends; it is a very
informal affair. I fancy that Miss Parker herself is to be hostess. As
for a chaperon, I don't think they have thought of her." He laughed in a
half-embarrassed way as he said that, and added hastily:--
"It is really just a frolic, mother; they are not formal people at all,
under any circumstances, I fancy. Is it possible that that clock is
striking seven! I must be off at once; Parker will think I have
forgotten my promise to see him through from beginning to end."
What had he said to cause his mother to sit, for an hour after his
departure, as still as a stone, her hands clasped over the neglected
book in her lap? What was making that strange stricture around her heart
as though a cold hand had clutched her and was holding on?
He had kissed her good-by with almost more tenderness than usual, if
that were possible. He had called her "mommie," his special pet name for
her, and had inquired solicitously as to whether there was any special
reason for his getting home early. If there was, why of course--or if
for any reason she would rather not be left to-night, he could excuse
himself to Parker,--of course he could. All his friends knew well enough
that his mother came first.
But how relieved and pleased he had looked when she made haste to assure
him that there was not, and that she would be quietly happy with her
book all the evening, and there was no need at all for his hastening
home. And besides--she paused over that connecting phrase and tried to
formulate her fears. How had her son conveyed to her heart the feeling
that the time to which it seemed to her she had always looked
forward--the time when he would look upon some other woman with eyes
that were no longer indifferent, had come?
She could not have put it into words; but though she arose, at last, and
put away her book as something that seemed to have failed her, and sat
down at her desk to spend an hour with Marian Dennis, and abandoned her,
presently, for Flossy Shipley, and gave them both up after the second
page, and selected another book with the firm determination to compel
herself to read it, the simple truth is that she spent the entire
evening, and a large portion of the night as well, with one Mamie
Parker.
CHAPTER IV
WOULD SHE "DO"?
THE next morning Mrs. Burnham came into her pretty parlor, where a
dainty breakfast table was laid for two, prepared to be as wise as a
serpent over the new situation. She was genial, sympathetic, and not too
penetrative in her questions. Erskine had come home late, much later
than he had ever been before; yet apparently his mother had not noticed
it.
She did not even ask at what time he had come. In truth she needed no
information, but how was Erskine to know that?
Did he have a pleasant evening, and was the occasion all that it should
have been? He was not enthusiastic. It was pleasant enough, he said. In
some respects very pleasant; only--well, a few of the boys were noisier
than was agreeable, and two or three of them did not apparently know how
to treat ladies.
"Oh, nothing objectionable, of course," he said quickly, in response to
her startled look.
"They are so used to being alone that they grow loud-voiced and careless
about the small proprieties, or at least courtesies; I fancy some of
their ways must have seemed peculiar to Miss Parker."
"The other girls? Oh, they are used to such things; they were the
sisters and cousins of the boys, and the ways of a lot of fellows
accustomed chiefly to their own society would not seem so strange to
the others; but Miss Parker is--at least I hope, I mean I think
she--" He caught himself and left the sentence unfinished save by a
half-embarrassed laugh, which changed into a slight frown.
While his mother rang her table bell and gave low-voiced directions to
the maid, she pondered. What was it that Erskine hoped? That Miss Parker
was by nature more refined than the other ladies? And was the hope well
founded? She was slightly acquainted with some of the sisters and
cousins who were probably at this gathering. At least she had met them
once or twice and had felt no fear as to their influence over Erskine.
Was this Mamie Parker different? She felt her face flush a little even
over her thoughts. Must she learn to say "Mamie"? One thing was certain:
she must make the acquaintance of the girl at once. She ventured a move.
"Is this Mr. Parker so much your friend, Erskine, that he will expect
your mother to call on his sister, or is that unnecessary?"
Her heart beat in steady thumps while she waited for his answer. If only
he would say in his pleasant, indifferent tone:--
"Oh, it isn't necessary, mother; Parker and I are not especially
intimate, and he has no reason to expect such attentions from you." But
there was no indifference in the quick response.
"Mommie, you know just what, and how, always, don't you? I was wishing
for that very thing and not wanting to trouble you. Parker and I cannot
be said to be inseparable; but he is a good fellow, and I think you
would like him better on closer acquaintance. His sister is very much
alone here; none of those girls who were there last night have homes or
mothers; I mean of course that they are away from home; though I must
admit that some of them acted last night as though they had no mothers
anywhere, worthy of the name. It would mean very much to Miss Parker,
mother, if she could know you; and of course Parker would appreciate it
more than anything else that could be done for her. You don't know how
much the boys admire my mother."
His mother managed to smile cheerfully, and assure him that she would
make the proposed call. When he went away to his recitation he kissed
her fervently and told her she was the dearest mother in the world; and
as she watched him out of sight, she turned from the window and said
with a kind of strange gravity:--
"I think it has come: I must pray for grace to do right."
For several days thereafter the hours that Mrs. Burnham spent alone were
unusually thoughtful and prayerful. The feeling grew upon her that her
son had reached a critical point in his life. It is true he was very
young, not yet twenty; but none knew better than she that boys of twenty
sometimes glorify and sometimes mar all their future by reason of their
interest in one young woman. Also, she knew that a single false step on
her part, just now, might spoil all her future with her son and hasten a
condition of things that she longed to postpone for him. But she could
not plan her way, could not indeed see a single step before her until
that first one was taken: she must make that call on Mamie Parker. While
she allowed one triviality after another to delay her, the conviction
grew upon her that the step was important. Erskine's interest was keen;
despite the sympathy there had always been between them he had never
before shown such a lively desire to hear about each moment of his
mother's time while they were separated. That he chose not to ask in so
many words whether or not she had yet made that call but emphasized the
situation. When, before, had he hesitated to urge what he desired?
Moreover, he was often absent-minded and constrained; seeming to be
almost embarrassed over his own thoughts. He could not mention the
girl's name without a heightened color, yet he evidently planned ways of
introducing it that would sound accidental.
All things considered, Mrs. Burnham, as she dressed carefully for
calling, gravely admitted to herself that she was evidently about to
meet one who, for good or ill, had taken a strong hold upon her son's
life.
As she waited in the large ugly parlor, where the wall-paper was gaudily
angry over the colors in the carpet, and where every article of
furniture or ornament--of which last there were many--seemed ready to
fight with every other one, she wondered what Erskine the fastidious
thought of this room. It seemed almost profane to think of meeting one's
ideal in such a room. Yet she must be reasonable; of course the girl was
not to blame for the taste, or want of taste, displayed in her brother's
boarding-house.
She had to wait an unreasonable length of time, and despite her furs she
felt the chill of the half-warmed room. There were a few books on the
table, but she tried in vain to find one that would hold her thoughts.
Perhaps no book could have been expected to do that under the
circumstances.
Presently she became aware that some one else had entered an adjoining
room where there had been brisk moving about ever since her arrival.
With the coming of another, a sharp little voice could be distinctly
heard:--
"Oh, say, Lucile, do come here and fasten this waist; I'm scared to
pieces and my fingers all feel like thumbs. Don't you think 'Ma' has
come to look me over and see if I will do! Oh dear! can't you hook it?
It's awful tight, but I've got to be squeezed into it somehow; I'm
keeping her waiting an awful while. I had on that fright of a wrapper
when she came, and my hair in crimps. I didn't get up to breakfast this
morning; we were so horrid late last night, I couldn't."
"'Ma' who?" said another voice. "Not Erskine Burnham's mother? You don't
say so! My land! I should think you would be scared. They say she's
awful particular who she calls on. You must mind your p's and q's,
Mamie, or you'll never see that handsome boy of hers again. They say she
keeps him right under her thumb all the time."
Mamie's response was in too low a tone to penetrate into the next room,
but it was followed by explosive giggles from both talkers. Meanwhile,
the caller's face was glowing, not only with shame for them, but with
indignation. What might _not_ those coarse girls--she was sure they were
both coarse--be saying about her son!
The door opened at last and a mass of fluffy hair entered; behind which
peeped a pert little face with pink cheeks and bright, keen eyes.
The girl was dressed in the extreme of the prevailing style,--quite too
much dressed for morning, though the material of which her garments were
made was flimsy and cheap-looking. Plainly if she had money she had not
learned how to spend it to advantage. Still the clothes were worn with
an air that hinted at her ability to learn how to play the fine lady if
she were given the opportunity.
Her manner to her caller suggested a curious mixture of timidity and
bravado. She chattered incessantly and showered slang words and phrases
about her freely; yet all the while kept up a nervous little undertone
of movement and manner that showed she was not at ease.
"Oh, indeed, she was having an awfully good time. Brother Jim was doing
the best he could to give her a lark. She had never been much away from
home and they lived in a stupid little village where there was nothing
going on. Oh, Jim was an elegant brother; he wanted her to stay all
winter and look after his buttons and things."
"I expect you have heard a good deal about Jim, haven't you, from your
son? Only he calls him 'Parker' instead of Jim; the boys all do that,
you know. It's 'Parker,' and 'Burnham,' and all the rest of them. Ain't
it funny, instead of using their first names? I s'pose that's the
college of it; but your son has such a pretty name it seems a pity not
to use it. Don't you think Erskine is an awful pretty name? I do. It has
such an aristocratic sound. Ma says I ought to have been born with a
silver spoon in my mouth, I like aristocratic things so well. Not but
what we've got money enough;"--this with an airy toss of the frizzed
head. Then, in a confidential tone: "But I may as well own to you that
it didn't pan out until a little while ago."
Mrs. Burnham, as she took her thoughtful way home, too much exhausted
with this effort to think of making another call, studied in vain the
problem of her son's enthralment.
The girl was pretty, certainly, with a kind of garish, unfinished
beauty, not unlike that of a pert doll; and her chatter, if one could
divest one's self of all thought of interest in the chatterer save in
the way of a moment's diversion, was rather entertaining than otherwise,
when it was not too much mixed with slang; but what Erskine, her
cultivated and always fastidious son, could find in the empty little
brain to attract him was beyond the mother's comprehension. But he must
have been pronounced in his attentions. Had she not been reported as
having called to see if the girl would "do"? Ruth's sensitive face
flushed over the memory. Should she tell that to Erskine? What should
she tell to Erskine? How should the place and the interview and her
impressions of the entire scene be described? It required serious
thought. The more the mother considered it, the more sure she felt that
much of Erskine's future might turn on the way in which she, his mother,
conducted herself just now. She puzzled long and reached no clearer
conclusion than that until she saw her way clearer she would take no
steps at all, and would be entirely noncommittal in her statements. This
she found hard; Erskine was curious, more curious than she had ever
before known him to be. He cross-questioned her closely as to her call,
and was openly regretful, almost annoyed, at her having so little to
tell. In the course of the next few days the watching mother, who yet
did not wish to appear to watch, knew of at least two social functions
that included her son and Miss Parker. One was a sleigh-ride which fell
on the evening of the mid-week prayer-meeting in the church they were
attending. Erskine had been scrupulous in his attendance on this
meeting, declining for it social and business engagements alike,
sometimes to his own inconvenience.
"There was no use in compromising about these matters," he said. "Busy
people can find something important to detain them every week of their
lives if they once admit an exception. The only way is to set one's face
like a flint and march ahead."
But he came to her with profuse apologies for this exception; Parker had
planned, without knowing anything about the prayer-meeting; he had not
been brought up to think of such things, and it was going to embarrass
him very much if he declined. He wouldn't have had it happen in this way
for a great deal, and he should take care to let Parker know in the
future that Thursday evening belonged to his mother and to no one else.
He himself arranged for her to have agreeable company to and from the
church, and she had grace to be sweet and cheerfully acquiescent in all
his plans. Nevertheless she owned, quite to herself, that she felt in a
strange, new sense alone. She was more straitened in her praying that
evening than she had been for months, almost for years. There was a
miserable undertone question hovering about each petition: Could it be
possible that she must teach herself to pray for Mamie Parker, not as a
passing acquaintance but as one of her very own? and could she learn
such a lesson? She had by no means settled it that such a catastrophe
must come upon them, but she could not keep down her forebodings.
It was two days afterwards that Mrs. Burnham, having at last reached a
decision, made another very careful move. It was discussed over the
cosey breakfast which she and Erskine took together in her parlor.
"Would he like to have her ask Mr. Parker and his sister in to dinner on
some evening soon? or would that indicate a greater degree of intimacy
with the young man than he cared to live up to?"
There was a sudden stricture at her heart over the flash of pleasure on
her son's face.
"Mommie, you are a jewel!" this was his first outburst. "Parker would be
everlastingly obliged to you for such an attention. You see he knows
very few people here of the sort that he would care to have his sister
visit. Most of his friends are just college boys away from home, and
Parker has ideas about his sister's associates. He is a real good
fellow, Mommie; if he had had one-third of my opportunities, he would
have made more of them, I believe, than I have."
His mother did not choose to argue that question. She felt a wicked
temptation to say that she would be glad if she need never hear his name
again; but she restrained herself and asked another question.
CHAPTER V
THE OLD CAT!
"WOULD he like to have one or two young people asked to meet them? Alice
Warder, for instance, and her cousin. How would they do?" Did his face
cloud a little?
"I don't know," he said slowly, and his voice suggested a cloud, or at
least a diminution of his pleasure.
"Is that necessary, do you think, mother? It is not as though we were at
home, of course. Several guests at one time would hardly be expected at
a boarding-house."
His mother reminded him of their hostess's cordial offer of a separate
table for themselves and three or four guests whenever they cared to
give her a half-day's notice; and added that Alice was so used to being
called upon to help entertain their guests, that to count her out would
seem almost strange to her. Besides, wouldn't this be a convenient time
to show her cousin some attention? He was not to be with her long.
Apparently Erskine had no more arguments to offer.
"Oh, very well," he said. Those were matters for her to settle, and it
must all be just as she thought, of course. Then he kissed her,
lavishly, and went away; but she felt that she had destroyed much of his
pleasure in the proposed visit. And he used to be so fond of Alice!
During the next two days she spent much time and thought over her little
boarding-house dinner-party. She had adhered to her resolve to include
Alice and her cousin among the guests, although she had given herself
time to look steadily in the face the reason why she was so insistent
about this when Erskine evidently desired it otherwise.
Alice Warder was Flossy Shipley's dear friend, and being introduced by
her to the Burnhams was at once established on the footing of an old
friend. It had taken but a very short time to learn to love her for
herself. Even the careful mother of one son of marriageable age would
have found it hard to find flaws in Alice Warder. She was beautiful to
look upon, with regular, well-modelled features and a complexion that
was faultless. Perhaps her great brown eyes were what a stranger noticed
first; they were certainly very expressive. But she was much more than
beautiful. There was about her a charm of manner and movement that are
difficult to define and impossible to describe, but that made their
invariable impression even on those who met her casually. Ruth Burnham,
who in her womanhood was, as she had been in her girlhood, fastidious to
a fault with regard to young women, had yielded to the subtle charm of
this one at their very first meeting; and as the intimacy between them
deepened into friendship she had found graces of heart and mind that
fully harmonized with the lovely exterior.
The Warders bought a home very near to the Burnham place, and so far as
social life was concerned the two families speedily became as one.
Mrs. Burnham, singularly enough, as she reflected afterward, had not
once, during the early days of their friendship, coupled the names of
Alice and Erskine in her thoughts, congenial as they were. Although they
were almost to a day of the same age, Alice, who had been for several
years the nominal head of her father's house, appeared much the older,
and more like a mature young woman than a girl still in the charge of a
governess. It might have been this apparent disparity in their ages that
helped Mrs. Burnham to take the girl to her heart and think of her as
the daughter she had often wished for; not by any means as Erskine's
wife, but as his sister.
Erskine had been from the first of their acquaintance drawn to the young
woman in the frank and brotherly way that his mother desired. When the
plans for college were matured, one of the loudly spoken regrets on the
part of both mother and son was that they must be separated from the
Warders.
It came to pass, however, in the course of their second year of absence
that Mr. Warder had occasion to make the college town his headquarters
for several months; so Alice and her former governess were installed in
one of the hotels for the winter, that her father might have as much of
her company as possible; and the Burnhams rejoiced greatly thereat.
Yet here was Erskine, barely six weeks afterwards, considering it not
necessary to invite Alice to dinner! The poor mother sighed over the
perversity and the blindness of young manhood, and knew for the first
time that if Erskine had developed the peculiar interest which Miss
Parker seemed to have awakened, for Alice Warder, instead, she could
have rejoiced with her whole heart.
They came to dinner, Alice and her Boston cousin, a Harvard student of
marked ability, and Miss Parker and her brother. And Alice was fully as
marked a contrast to the other young woman as Ruth had believed that she
would be. First, in the matter of dress. Alice Warder was an artist in
dress. She wore at this quiet little dinner party a cloth gown of
olive-green, so severely plain in its make-up that its richness of
texture and faultless workmanship were apparent. And Miss Parker
appeared in an elbow-sleeved white dress badly laundered and profusely
trimmed with a quantity of lace that was startling rather than fine.
Moreover, she was adorned with a mass of hothouse blooms to which she
referred so significantly that the little company were at once made
aware that Erskine was the giver.
But the dress was perfection compared with the poor girl's manner. She
gayly and unblushingly appropriated Erskine to herself and rallied her
brother on the situation.
"Poor Jim! you haven't any girl at all, have you? Since Miss
Warder--must I call you 'Miss Warder'? it sounds ever so much more
friendly and cosey to say 'Alice.' You must look after your cousin, I
suppose. Are you sure he is your cousin? You know that is a dodge girls
have when--Oh, well, never mind; I won't bother you. This is good for
Jim; he always has half a dozen strings to his bow and can never decide
which one of them he wants the most; so this will be excellent
discipline for him, leaving him out in the cold. Dear me! What am I
talking about? Here is Mrs. Burnham looking young enough this minute to
be one of us."
All this, while they were making their way through the boarding-house
halls and large dining-room to a cosey little alcove, where a table had
been set for the Burnhams and their guests. Erskine's face had flushed
deeply during the outburst, and he had darted an annoyed look at his
mother to see if she was hearing it. He led the way across the
dining-room much to the irrepressible Mamie's disappointment, though she
chose to seem to ridicule it.
"Dear me!" she said in a stage whisper to Alice, "do look at that
ridiculous boy walking off alone. Where I come from, the fellows take
the girls out to supper. Can't I borrow your cousin for this evening,
and get even with him?"
Mrs. Burnham felt the color rising in her face, but Alice was gracious
and lovely. She laughed pleasantly as though used to such jokes, linked
her arm in the girl's, and said merrily:--
"We will give them all the slip, my dear, and go in together."
[Illustration: "WE WILL GIVE THEM ALL THE SLIP, MY DEAR."--_Page 61._]
Throughout that embarrassing and long-drawn-out dinner Alice was a help
and comfort at least to her hostess, and did steadily and patiently what
she could to cover the blunders of the girl beside her. Utterly
unaccustomed to even the formalities of a fashionable boarding-house
table, Mamie made constant blunders with forks and spoons and other
instruments of torture for the uninitiated; but these were trifles
compared with the blunders of her tongue. She made evident attempts to
cover her ignorance with regard to table formalities by much gay talk.
She laughed incessantly, and told many jokes at her brother's expense.
She said: "him and me," and "her and I," and "you folks," and a dozen
other provincialisms. When they returned to Mrs. Burnham's parlor, it
was almost worse--for then Mamie sang; and it was hard for her hostess
to determine of which she was most ashamed, the bad taste of the girl's
selections or the less than mediocre execution.
Still, the music was by no means the worst feature of that memorable
hour. Mamie's next startling venture was a pretence of being offended by
what she called Erskine's desertion of her at dinner-time.
"Oh, you needn't come around," she said rudely, as he rose to arrange
her music. "I can fix things myself, thank you, and Mr. Colchester will
turn the music for me, I know; won't you, Mr. Colchester?" with a jaunty
little smile for the stately Boston cousin. "You can't make up for
rudeness to me, sir, as easy as you think. I make fellows who want my
company mind their p's and q's, don't I, Jim?"
The stalwart brother thus appealed to replied only by a slight
embarrassed laugh, and the hostess had time out of her own embarrassment
to bestow a swift glance of pity upon him. He had already seen enough of
another sort of world to realize that his pretty, pert little sister,
the idol of his country home, was not making as good an impression on
these new friends of his as he wished she were. If the ladies had but
known it, the poor young fellow was at that moment saying to himself:--
"Why can't Mamie act more like that Miss Warder, I wonder? There's an
awful difference between them, and she doesn't catch on, somehow."
Throughout the interminable evening, Alice Warder proved not only the
excellent foil that Mrs. Burnham had foreseen, but a faithful and
efficient coadjutor. Not a lift of her eyebrows or a stray glance of any
kind betrayed a second's surprise at the character of the guests invited
to meet her dignified cousin and herself. She was gracious and friendly
to such an extent that before the evening was over, Mamie, who was
frankness itself, said admiringly:--
"How long you going to stay in this place? Dear me! I wish you was going
to be here all winter; I can see that you and me would be real cronies."
In the privacy of Mrs. Burnham's bedroom, whither Alice was taken to put
on her wraps, the girl bestowed her closing touch of sweetness and balm
upon her hostess.
"I had quite a little visit with Mr. Parker while you were entertaining
the others with those pictures; I was much interested in him; he is a
young man of good principle, isn't he? One on whom education will tell.
It is lovely in you and Erskine to open your home to him in this way; it
will be sure to mean much to him; and it ought to help the little
sister, too. It is pleasant to see how fond he is of her."
"You helped," said Mrs. Burnham, significantly. "I am more grateful for
your help to-night than the mere words will express."
She kissed her as she spoke, and felt in her heart that she was willing
that Erskine should marry this girl to-morrow, if he would.
"I was glad of the opportunity," the girl said simply. "And so, I am
sure, was Ranford. He is very much interested in young men of this
type."
For a full half hour after "Jim" had carried off his pouting
sister,--whose parting shot had been that she considered it "awfully
pokey" for a girl to go home from a dinner-party with "nothing but her
brother"--spoken in a pretended confidence to him, but loud enough for
all to hear,--silence reigned in the Burnham parlor.
Erskine had a desk in one of its corners, where he kept certain of his
books, and studied, whenever he chose to remain with his mother. He
flung himself down before it the moment the door closed after their
guests, as though work pressed hard.
His mother took a book and sat silent and apparently absorbed, although
as a matter of fact, instead of reading, she was studying the
half-averted face that was drawn in almost stern lines, and the eyes
that stared at the open page as though they did not see its words. She
did not believe that Erskine was studying Latin.
What had this terrible evening done for him, and for her? Had that
pretty-faced, ill-dressed, ill-bred girl secured in some unaccountable
way a permanent hold on her son's heart? Might it not be possible that
in giving him this awful view of her in sharp contrast with Alice Warder
she had but alienated him from herself? Perhaps she had blundered, and
perhaps the consequences of her blunder would be fatal to them both. Why
had she done it? Why had she not waited, and watched, and understood
better before she attempted anything? What should she do now? How was
she to bear this silence? And yet, what might not Erskine say when at
last he broke it?
A half-hour passed and neither mother nor son had turned a page.
Suddenly he wheeled his chair around so that she could get a full view
of his face, and smiled a half-sad, half-whimsical smile, and spoke his
word:--
"I don't believe we can do it, Mommie. It was good in you to try, and
you did it royally, as you do things, but--she can't be assimilated. She
doesn't belong. We shall have to wait until she goes home before we can
do much for Parker. All the same, mother, you understand that I thank
you for the effort. Alice was superb to-night, wasn't she?"
Then Ruth Burnham understood that it was her business to understand that
her son's interest lay solely in the young man Parker, and that in the
desire to help the brother the sister must be thought of as simply
tolerated. Already Erskine had put away his first illusion so utterly
that he did not propose to own it to himself, much less to his mother.
Poor Mamie Parker spent her fruitless winter in the college town, and
tried by many innocent and a few questionable ways to win back to
interest and special attention her brother's handsome friend, whose
sudden defection she could not understand. She tortured herself in a
vain effort to discover what could have happened on that evening which
she had expected to be memorable to her for other reasons than now
appeared. Why had it so utterly changed the attitude toward her of the
young man who, she had confidently assured Jim, was "caught, all right,"
she "knew the signs"?
By degrees, without any clearly defined reason for doing so, she came to
associate the defection with the young man's mother, and called her
"that old cat!" with a bitterness that had more than mere anger behind
it; there was a lump in her throat and a curious stricture about the
little organ that she called her heart, which was new to the frivolous
girl.
Jim's handsome college friend had afforded his sister Mamie a glimpse
into a new, strange world, one that she felt she could have loved, and
in which she believed that she could have shone; and in some way, she
did not understand how, his mother had closed the door.
"The old cat!" she said. "I should like to get even with her!" And then
she cried.
CHAPTER VI
IDEAL CONDITIONS
ERSKINE BURNHAM'S lesson was short, but sharp, and he seemed to have
learned it thoroughly. He gave himself more persistently to study than
before, and was even more devoted to his mother than ever, if that were
possible. He let the visiting sisters of freshmen and sophomores
dignifiedly alone, and resisted without a sigh numerous attempts to draw
him into local society circles.
"Haven't time for society just now," was his invariable excuse. "Nor
inclination," he would add privately for his mother's benefit.
Occasionally the mother urged the acceptance of an invitation and begged
him not to make a recluse of himself for her sake; but he met her
suggestions with his whimsical smile and the gay retort that a society
composed of two entirely congenial people met all his present
requirements. She was not insistent. Why should she be, when Erskine was
undeniably happy in the life he had planned?
Certainly it was an ideal life for the fond mother; for both of them,
perhaps. It had been unique from the first of Erskine's college course.
They had been settled but a few weeks in their new home when Mrs.
Burnham, finding much time at her disposal, proposed to Erskine that she
take up some of her long-ago-dropped studies and let him introduce her
to modern college ways. The young man laughed as he gave her an admiring
glance and assured her that she knew more than other women, already.
Nevertheless it pleased him to go into careful detail about his work,
and on the following day it surprised as well as pleased him to find
that his mother was quite as well prepared with some of his studies as
he was himself. From that evening a new order of things was established;
Mrs. Burnham, without matriculating as a college student, and without
letting it be known, save to the choice few who were their very intimate
friends, became nevertheless a student. How much of Erskine Burnham's
acknowledged success in college was due to the fact that his mother
studied with him throughout the entire course is something that will
never be known; but her son gave her full credit for the help that she
was to him. From the first he recognized her as a stimulant; he
discovered that he must have his points very fully in his grasp in order
to explain them satisfactorily to his pupil. She always insisted on
being his pupil and kept carefully the subordinate place, although her
keen questionings more than once led him to change his view of a subject
under discussion.
Altogether, it was a life replete with satisfaction to both mother and
son. Not that they shut themselves away from society. Such of his
friends as Erskine thought his mother would enjoy or could help he
brought freely to their rooms, and between several of the students and
herself there was built up by degrees that kind of friendship which one
occasionally sees between self-respecting young men and certain
middle-aged women. It was a very pleasant experience, and it made Ruth
feel, as she expressed it to Erskine, that she had several sons always
ready to serve her.
Neither did they wholly neglect the outside world. Both mother and son
held carefully to their resolve not to let college or any other
functions interfere with their Sunday and mid-week engagements in the
church of their choice, and through this channel they made certain
acquaintances that ripened into friendship. But there came a time in the
mother's life when she wished, not that she had enjoyed her studies with
Erskine less, but that both of them had given more time and thought and
enjoyment to distinctively religious themes and duties.
Meantime their friendship for Alice Warder ripened and deepened,
although there had been an interim during which its very life had seemed
to be threatened. Following that painful episode with Mamie Parker,
Erskine had seemed to shun even Alice Warder. He had not from the first
been entirely sure that he cared to see much of her Boston cousin, and
presently made him an excuse for seeing little of Alice, for the cousin
seemed to be staying indefinitely. This state of things lasted until the
college year closed and they went home, and became again next-door
neighbors to the Warders. At first, it seemed to Mrs. Burnham that the
old friendship was lost. Something very vague and intangible, but
distinctly felt, seemed to have come between them. Then, suddenly,
whatever it was, it passed. On a certain evening that stood out plainly
afterward in the mother's memory Alice had appeared at her window with
an air of decision, and a question.
"Has Erskine come in yet, Mrs. Burnham? When he comes, will you ask him
if he can give me an uninterrupted half-hour this evening for something
special?"
Later, the mother wondered, and often wondered what that something
special was, but she had not been told. It was something that made a
marked difference in Erskine's manner. From apparently avoiding Alice
Warder's society as much as possible, he frankly sought it; proposing
her as a third on occasions when his mother would have hesitated, and in
every possible way proclaiming that the old cordial relations were
reestablished. From that time on, the young woman next door became so
entirely identified with the daily life of the Burnhams that the
intimate friends of the family said "Alice and Erskine," quite as a
matter of course.
In the fall they went back to college, mother and son. At least that was
Erskine's way of putting it.
"Why not?" he said, laughing at his mother's protest. "You are as much
in college as I am. They ought to give you a diploma. I believe I'll
divide mine; have the sheepskin cut exactly in two, and your name
inserted. Half of my honors belong to you, anyhow."
During his senior year Erskine and Alice Warder were more inseparable
than ever. Mr. Warder went abroad on an extended business trip, which
was so entirely business that he would have little or no time for Alice,
and she chose to be left behind. But her friend who had lived with her
as a companion, since she had ceased to be a governess, wanted the
winter for her personal friends, so it was decided that Alice should
secure rooms at the same house where the Burnhams boarded and be
chaperoned by Mrs. Burnham. This made them practically one family,
though each adhered to his own programme. Alice gave much time to
correspondence, and interested herself at once in special church work;
while Mrs. Burnham continued to study with her son. But in all social
functions, and indeed, in all their leisure time, they were together
quite as a family.
It was during this winter that Mrs. Burnham took up a study quite by
herself and made diligent effort in it. This was the study of adjusting
herself to new relations. She was getting acquainted with and growing
used to her daughter, she told herself hopefully; for by this time she
had fully decided that Alice Warder was the one who was to share through
all their future Erskine's love and care. She grew more than reconciled;
she told herself that she was perfectly happy in Erskine's choice; that
of course she wanted him to marry, she had always wanted it; and where
in all the earth could he have found a more lovely character or a more
entirely acceptable person in every way than Alice Warder? It really
seemed as though a special Providence had planned and created them each
for the other.
As the intimacy deepened, so that the three seemed to think in unison,
the mother told herself cheerfully that it was almost as though the two
were married already; there would be no strange chasm to bridge over
when that time came; nor would they have to readjust themselves in any
way. Alice had not known a mother's love and care since childhood, and
she turned as naturally to Mrs. Burnham for mothering as though they
were really mother and daughter. It was all ideal.
There were times, of course, when Mrs. Burnham could not help sitting in
secret judgment on certain ways and words of this daughter of hers. She
would allow herself to wish that this or that had been different, and
then would bring herself to order with severity, assuring herself that
she had no right to expect perfection, and where, on this earth, could
there be found another girl so near it as Alice?
Over one phase of the girl's life this mother in all sincerity rejoiced.
Alice was unquestionably and deeply religious. Her Christian life was
deep-rooted and pervasive, and the perfume of its flowering filled her
days. To come in contact with her for even a short interview was to
discover that religion with her was not merely a duty, but a joy.
"Alice is very unusual in this respect," Ruth said to Erskine. "It isn't
simply that she is regular and methodical in her Christianity as in
everything else. I have seen girls before who went to prayer-meeting,
for instance, regularly, from a sense of duty; but with Alice it is
this, and something more. She looks forward to it as a pleasure; and she
comes from it uplifted and advanced in her Christian experience."
Erskine was hearty in his response.
"Yes, Alice takes hold of life generally with a kind of joyful
enthusiasm that is delicious. And there is contagion in it; I enjoy the
mid-week meetings better myself, since I have learned to plan for them
as she does."
Everything considered, that last year of college life passed all too
quickly, at least for Mrs. Burnham. There were times when she realized
that the peculiarly close relations which she and her son had sustained
for four beautiful winters could not, in reason, continue, and she
shrank from any change. Yet for the most part she was strong in her
gratitude that her son's college life had been what it had been, and
that the most censorious could not discover any evil results from this
long, close fellowship with his mother. There were still years of study
for him. It had been decided that he would study law in the city where
his father had practised it, and live at the old homestead, making daily
trips to and from the larger city. In due course of time, therefore,
they were once more settled at home for an indefinite period. Alice
Warder had gone to the coast of Maine for a long-promised visit among
her mother's relatives, but on her return, the Warders were again to
become next-door neighbors.
Already in her letters to Mrs. Burnham, which were quite as frequent as
those to Erskine, Alice Warder was planning certain functions in which
"You and father, and Erskine and I" were in evidence.
There was one feature of the situation that troubled the mother. As the
days passed the question which it involved grew more and more insistent.
Why did not Erskine, at least, confide in her? Had he not from his very
babyhood been in the habit of bringing to her not only every joy and
sorrow, but every passing emotion or fancy, however trivial, until she
had believed them as nearly one as it was possible for two people to
become? Why then, in this supreme decision of his life, had she in a
sense been counted out? No hint as to his new hopes and plans had been
put into words for her; she had simply been left like the rest of the
world to take things for granted.
There were times when this question probed her keenly. She struggled to
discover whether she had been in fault. Despite her earnest efforts to
hold herself well in check and give no sign of certain emotions which
every true mother must feel at such an hour, had she failed? Had she
appeared cold, or indifferent, or, worse than either, jealous? Despite
her careful cross-examination of herself she could not lay her finger
upon any word or act that she could make different; and she was obliged
to content herself with redoubling her efforts to show her entire
acceptance of Alice as one of them; but so far as any special
confidences were concerned she did it in vain. Both Erskine and Alice
were entirely frank in their manifest interest in each other, acting at
all times as though they had nothing to conceal. They had even reached
the stage when they claimed each other's time and attention as a matter
of course, and so expressed themselves.
Erskine, for instance, would glance at a note that had been laid on his
desk a short time before, and explain to his mother:--
"I shall have to defer my call on Dr. West, mother, until some other
evening. Alice has to meet her committee at the hall, and wants me to
take her over."
Could anything, argued the mother, indicate more surely that they two
had already passed the early stages of sentiment, and begun to realize
that they belonged to each other for convenience as well as for love?
Then why did they not confide in his mother, _their_ mother?
No comparatively small matter had ever troubled Ruth Burnham more than
did this one. There were times when she felt almost indignant, and was
on the verge of saying to them both that she did not think she deserved
such careless treatment at their hands. Why, her very intimate friends
were almost asking when the wedding was to be! There were other times
when she told herself that she would not be the first to speak, even
though they kept silence until the wedding day was come.
Matters were in this state when she reached another distinct milestone
in the singularly marked journey of her life.
CHAPTER VII
"MOTHERS ARE QUEER!"
IT was but the week before Alice's expected return, and Mrs. Burnham was
out paying afternoon visits. She had confessed to Erskine that she
wanted to get them off of her mind before Alice came, and be able to
give undivided attention to her for a while.
"I don't suppose you can imagine how I have missed her," she added in a
voice that she intended to express archness, but which was almost
wistful. He felt the wistfulness and mistook its cause, and said
tenderly:--
"Poor little mother! you need a daughter, don't you?"
She had turned from him abruptly to hide the glimmer of tears; and she
had told herself almost angrily afterward that it was time she had
learned self-control.
At the home of one of her friends she met a Mrs. Carson, with whom she
had also a calling acquaintance. Mrs. Carson had been spending some
weeks in Boston, and had no sooner exchanged greetings with Mrs. Burnham
than she brought out with eager hand from her news budget a choice
morsel.
"And what do you both think I heard just before I left the city? At
first I could scarcely believe my ears; in fact, I did not credit the
news at all; I said it could not be so; I am sure, dear Mrs. Burnham,
you will understand why. But afterward it was so signally confirmed that
I was obliged to accept it."
"Dear me!" said the hostess, "this is quite exciting. Do enlighten us,
Mrs. Carson. We have been so humdrum here this fall that news is thrice
welcome."
"You would never guess my news, I am sure, that is, you would not, Mrs.
Webster; but there sits our dear Mrs. Burnham, looking as calm and
unconcerned as usual, though I presume she has known all about it this
long time."
"Now you arouse my curiosity, certainly," that lady said with a quiet
smile. "I don't recall any special news from Boston, of late."
"Oh, well, I don't suppose it is late news to you, but it certainly was
to me. Why, Mrs. Webster, I have it on excellent authority that our
friend Alice Warder is engaged to her cousin, Ranford Colchester, and
the marriage is to take place very soon. Now do you wonder that I was
simply amazed over such an announcement?"
Mrs. Burnham took her startled nerves into instant and stern check, and
was entirely silent while Mrs. Webster exclaimed and expostulated.
"I told you you wouldn't be able to believe it," said the gratified
news-dealer. "Such a surprise to us all! and yet you see this naughty
woman doesn't express any, and hasn't a word to say for herself! Dear
Mrs. Burnham, it isn't necessary I suppose for us to confess that we
have been waiting these many weeks for the formal announcement of her
engagement to an entirely different person? Her cousin, indeed! why I
thought they were the same as brother and sister. I was never more
surprised in my life. At first I simply disputed it and assured my
friends that Alice Warder was as good as married, already. But it came
to me too straight to be disputed. It's this way. My aunt has a young
niece living with her this year who is a very intimate friend of Miriam
Stevens, and she, you know, is Mr. Colchester's stepdaughter; and she
told her all about it. It seems, although they have been engaged for a
very long time, years and years, Miriam said, the engagement has just
been announced. Mr. Colchester, the father, of course, has opposed the
match, because it interfered with some of his pet plans. There was an
old love story connected with it, don't you know, and a good deal of
sentiment and obstinacy on the part of the old gentleman, who has always
thought that the world was made for his convenience. But he found that
his son could be obstinate too; he was willing to marry Alice Warder,
and he would never, no never, marry anybody else. Then Alice decided
that she would show a little spirit, and she refused to come into the
family so long as there was a breath of opposition. Nobody knows just
what has happened, at least Miriam doesn't; but she says that her
stepfather has not only withdrawn his opposition, but seems quite as
eager as his son to have the marriage take place. Miriam did not think
that the day had been fixed yet, but she felt sure it would be not later
than Christmas. Now, isn't that a romantic story, and a startling one?
Just think how that girl has stolen a march on us when we thought we
understood all about her future, and were breathlessly awaiting our
invitations to the wedding! And here sits our dear Mrs. Burnham, looking
as unconcerned as possible; though all this while she has been helping
deceive us into the belief that Alice Warder was almost her daughter!"
How Ruth Burnham got away from their volubility and their playful
accusations and their congratulations she was never afterward able to
clearly explain, even to herself. She knew that her brain felt on fire,
and every nerve in her body seemed to be quivering, but she also knew
that she had one supreme determination, not by word or glance to betray
consternation or surprise or indeed feeling of any sort. Since these
women believed that she had deceived them, let them by all means
continue to do so, at least until she could determine what she thought,
or what she was to say.
She knew that she preserved her outward calm, and made some commonplace
reply to the eager questioning exclamations showered upon her. She
remembered murmuring something about young people's secrets being sacred
to themselves, and then she got herself away and walked the seven
squares between her and her home, and wished that there were more of
them, that she might have time to steady herself and plan what step to
take next. How, for instance, was she to break this terrible piece of
news to Erskine?
To her astonishment she found that she was giving full credit to the
story. Although the details had been too minute and the source of
information too terribly reliable to admit of reasonable doubt, yet her
reason told her that she ought to be able to turn in contempt from such
a story. How was it possible for Alice Warder to be guilty of such
long-drawn-out unpardonable hypocrisy as this? Alice Warder of all women
in the world! How had it been possible for her to deceive Erskine in
this way? Why had she done it? What could have been her motive? Had she
simply and deliberately flirted with him, to show that insufferable old
man that there were others besides his son who wanted her? Poor Erskine!
poor trusting, deceived heart! What could his mother do or say to soften
such a revelation as this! Finally she walked quite past her own door,
adding several more blocks to the already long distance, before she had
herself under sufficient control to meet her son. For the first time in
her life she was glad that he was not in when she reached home; and glad
again that when he came a friend was with him, who remained to dinner.
This enabled her to watch Erskine closely, without his observing it, and
to determine whether he might have heard from some other source the
strange news.
She decided that he had not; he was even more full of good cheer than
usual, and referred several times to Alice, as his guest was also her
friend.
Mrs. Burnham's unusual quiet finally called forth solicitous inquiries
from her son. Had she overwearied herself that afternoon? Had there been
any accident or detention that had worn upon her? She made haste to
reassure him, and struggled to appear at ease; while all the time her
mind was busy with the problem of how to break her news to Erskine. The
more she thought about it, the more strangely improbable it seemed.
Alice Warder engaged to be married to any one but Erskine! As for the
cruel wickedness of the girl whom she had loved and trusted as a
daughter, the woman who felt herself betrayed could not trust her
thoughts just yet in that direction. She must give all there was of her
to Erskine.
When their visitor had gone, Erskine gave himself in earnest to anxiety
about his mother.
"I cannot remember ever to have seen you look so wan and worn. Is it
simply the making calls that has exhausted you? I remember I used to
notice that that was an exhausting function for you. I wouldn't do it
any more, Mommie; let people come to you. Where did you go? and what was
said to tire you so? or was it what they didn't say? I have noticed that
ladies when making calls never seem to really say anything. They talk a
good deal, but then!--"
If he only knew what they had said that day! How should she tell him?
They went to the library; Erskine bemoaning the fact that he had some
work which must be done, and could not read to her. But he would
establish her among the cushions where she could rest, and he could look
at her occasionally. So she lay there, outwardly quiet, looking steadily
at him as though she must see his very soul, and going on with her
problem. Was she being cruel, too, lying quietly there concealing a
weapon with which she was presently to stab him? If she could only
decide upon the least terrible way of telling him what she had heard!
She planned and discarded a dozen forms of speech, and finally plunged
headlong into the baldest and most commonplace of them.
Erskine had risen to close a door, and then had come to adjust her
cushions and ask if she were comfortable. And then--should she like him
by and by, when he had run over two or three more pages, to read to her?
There was a magazine article he had been saving up to enjoy with her. Or
was she too tired to-night for reading?
And she had caught his hand and held it in a nervous grip while she
exploded her news.
"I heard something very strange this afternoon, Erskine; something that
I do not in the least understand. I don't know how to credit it, yet it
came to me very straight. Mrs. Carson has just returned from Boston, and
has it, she says, from one of the family that Alice Warder is soon to be
married to her cousin."
She felt breathless. She did not know whether to look at her victim or
to look mercifully away from him. He was leaning forward in the act of
tucking a refractory cushion into place, and he persisted in conquering
the cushion before he spoke. Then he said cheerfully:
"That is out at last, is it? Alice must feel relieved."
His mother pushed all the cushions recklessly and sat upright.
"Erskine," she said eagerly, "what do you mean? You don't mean, you
_can't_ mean that you knew it all the while!"
"Why not, mother? have known it for months, might say years. It had to
be a profound secret, though, on account of old Mr. Colchester's state
of mind; he had other plans, you see, and at first he utterly refused to
side with the young people; then Alice refused to enter the family so
long as there was any objection to her, and also refused to have her
engagement made public; it has been a long, wearisome time; I am glad
for both of them that the struggle is over. I have served them to the
best of my abilities, but I can see that the new order of things will be
a comfort to both; to all three of us indeed."
He laughed a little over that last admission, but his mother had not yet
recovered from her first amazement.
"Erskine, why didn't you tell me?"
He laughed again and bent over to kiss her.
"Mommie, you speak as though at the least I had committed forgery. How
could I tell you, dearest? It was another's secret. Alice was absurdly
sensitive, it is true, but of course I had to respect her wishes. She is
not accustomed to being objected to, you know. There was a sense in
which I came upon their secret at first, by accident, which served to
make me doubly careful; I did not feel that I could speak of it even to
you; though I will own that I thought it extremely foolish in Alice not
to do so.
"Do you feel like being read to, mamma, or would you rather be entirely
quiet to-night? Do you feel a little bit rested?"
"Yes, indeed," she told him eagerly. She was very much rested; in fact
she did not feel tired at all; she would like exceedingly to be read to;
or she was ready to do anything that he wished.
He looked at her curiously, and a trifle anxiously. There was something
about his mother this evening that he did not understand. A few minutes
ago she had looked pale and worn to a degree that was unusual; now her
cheeks were flushed and her eyes were very bright. Could she be
feverish? he wondered. And he mentally vowed vengeance on all formal
calls.
It was nearly a week afterward that Erskine and Alice, walking home
together from some society function, lapsed into confidential talk.
"How did you find my mother?" Erskine asked. "Was she able to be as glad
over it all as you could wish?"
"She was lovely," said Alice, enthusiastically. "An own mother could not
have shown more tenderness and lovingness. I have missed my mother all
my life, Erskine, but I shall miss her less, even during this time when
a girl needs her mother most, because you are so kind in lending me
yours."
"And yet, do you know, I think she has lately suffered a shock and a
disappointment? I am nearly certain that she had cherished hopes which
included us both. I did not realize until very lately indeed that she
too was being deceived; else I must have insisted on her being taken
into confidence."
Alice's merry laugh astonished and almost vexed him, her first words
were more surprising still.
"So you thought she was disappointed? What bats men are, to be sure!"
"What do you mean? Do you not know that to my mother you are the one
young woman?"
"Oh, indeed I do, and rejoice in it. But I know also, my dear simpleton,
that she is almost deliriously happy at this moment over her late
discovery. I know she loves me almost as she could a daughter, and I
also know that she loves me more, oh, far more, because her son Erskine
is a brother to me instead of--something else."
His puzzled look made her laugh again.
But after that he studied his mother from a new standpoint. Certainly
she was very fond of Alice and was about to lose her; yet certainly she
was happy--happier than he had ever known her to be.
"Mothers are queer!" was his grave conclusion.
CHAPTER VIII
A SPOILED MOTHER
IT had been an ideal October day: one of those ravishing days that come
sometimes in late autumn when, though the air is crisp with the hint of
a coming winter, it is at the same time balmy with the memory of the
departed summer. The hills in the near distance had put on their
glorified autumn dress, and the flowers in the gardens were all of the
gorgeous or deep-toned colorings that tell of summer suns and autumn
crispness. It was, in short, one of those days when it is, or should be,
a delight simply to live.
The Burnham place had never looked more lovely than it did that
afternoon, bathed in the soft glory of an unusually brilliant
sun-setting. It was customary to speak of this as the old Burnham place;
yet nothing in Ruth Erskine Burnham's changeful life showed more
markedly the effect of change than did this.
The long, low, rambling, old-fashioned house, much in need of paint,
that Ruth had come to as a bride, was there still, but so altered that
even she had all but forgotten the original. The house and the grounds
had been, like many other things and persons, transformed. No spot
anywhere, for miles around, was such a source of pride and pleasure to
the old friends of that region as the Burnham place. There were those
still living who could tell in minutest detail the story of its
transformation, when the Judge's new wife came out there to live, and
astonished the country by her doings. Some of them had been more than
half afraid of Ruth in those early days; they all believed in her now.
She had come out to the upper porch for a moment, not so much to get a
view of the wonderful sunset as to get her breath. The house was full of
flowers, and they had seemed to stifle her.
A handsome woman still was Mrs. Burnham. Stately was one of the words
that people had been wont to use in describing her; she was stately yet,
though her son Erskine would soon celebrate his thirtieth birthday.
These later years had touched her lightly. They had been spent, for the
most part, in the cheerful quiet of their old home, which, although the
city had grown out to it, had yet not absorbed it, but allowed its
favored residents to have much of the pleasures of country life, with a
rapid transit into the heart of the great city as often as life of that
kind was desired.
Erskine had for several years been admitted to the bar, and the old firm
name that had meant so much in legal circles had once more the strong
name of Burnham associated with it. That her son was a legal success was
not a surprise to his mother. With such antecedents as his how could it
have been otherwise? She had not kept up with his legal studies as she
had almost done through his college course, but she had kept in touch
with them, and could copy his notes for him, giving him just the points
he needed--better, he told her, than he could do it himself.
"We will take you into the firm if you say so, dearest," he said gayly
one evening, after a spirited argument between them with regard to a
point of law in which Mrs. Burnham had vindicated her side by an appeal
to an undoubted authority. "I told Judge Hallowell, yesterday, that it
was easier to consult you than to look up a point, and did just as well.
He would agree to the partnership, mother, without hesitation; he
considers you a wonderful woman."
At which the happy mother laughed, and told him he was a wonderful
flatterer; and then--Did he want her to look up the evidence in that
Brainard case for him? She could do it as well as not. She had been
reading up about it that morning.
An ideal life they had lived together all these years, this mother and
son. More than once in the years gone by Mrs. Burnham had overheard some
such remark as: "It will be hard on that mother when Erskine marries,
will it not?" It used to annoy her a little. She was conscious of a
feeling very like resentment that people should consider it necessary to
discuss their affairs at all; especially to intimate that there would
ever be anything "hard" between them.
There had been other talk, too, that she had resented. It had been
noticed that Judge Hallowell, Judge Burnham's lifelong friend, came
often to the old Burnham place, and somebody got up a very sentimental
reason for his never having married; and somebody else objected that
Mrs. Burnham did not believe in second marriages; she had been heard to
go so far as to say she thought they were actually wrong. Then somebody
else looked wise and smiled, and said she had heard of people, before
this, who changed their opinions about such things, on occasion. And--
How would such a masterful young man as Erskine get on with a
stepfather? This bit of gossip had floated about the Burnhams for a year
or more, while Erskine was studying law, without their having been the
wiser for it. The day for the wedding had almost been set, still without
reference to them, when Judge Hallowell, sixty years old though he was,
suddenly brought home a wife; and that, without an hour's break in the
friendship between himself and the Burnhams.
By degrees, the form of the question which the talkers asked each other
slightly changed, and they said they were afraid it would be hard on
Mrs. Burnham if Erskine should ever marry, and they added that it wasn't
probable that he ever would. They even ventured, one or two of the more
intimate, or the more rude, to express some such thought to the mother
herself. When they did, she laughed lightly and bade them not be sure of
anything. Her son might astonish them all, yet. She was sure she hoped
so. She was sincere in this. As each year passed she told herself more
and more firmly that of course she wanted him to marry. Why shouldn't
she want him to find that lovely being who must have been foreordained
for him? She was sure now, after all her long years of experience with
him, that she should know the very first moment when he discovered her.
Of course she had not been through the years since Alice Warder was
married without more than once imagining that she had been discovered.
They had numbered some very lovely young women among their friends.
There had been a certain Miriam whom she had admired and liked and
almost loved, and had meant to love in earnest if Erskine really wished
it. And she had gone about the finding out very cautiously. Didn't he
think Miriam was pretty?
"Very pretty indeed," he had answered promptly.
And she was so sweet and winsome, so thoughtful of her elders, so
gracious to everybody; quite unlike many others in that respect.
He was quick to agree with this, also.
Didn't he think her delightful in conversation? She seemed able to
converse sensibly on any subject that was under discussion, as well as
to talk the most delicious nonsense, on occasion.
"Well," he said cheerfully. In that respect he must differ from her. He
could not say he thought the young woman especially gifted in
conversation; it seemed to him to be her weak point. If she could talk
as well as her grandmother, she would be charming.
Mrs. Burnham had argued loyally for her favorite; had assured her son
that Miriam was a charming talker when she chose, and that it was
ridiculous to think of comparing her with her grandmother! But she had
laughed light-heartedly at his folly, and had confessed to her secret
self that she was glad he liked the grandmother better.
There were several other temporary interests, and then the mother
settled down to restfulness. Erskine was a boy no longer, but a
full-grown man, doing a man's work in the world; she could trust him. He
had always confided in her and of course he would not fail to do so when
this supreme hour of his life came to him. She still wanted him to
marry; she believed that he would, some day. She promised herself that
she would be, when the time came, a perfect mother. She would love the
chosen one with all her heart; she should be second only to Erskine
himself. And she would give herself to helping them both to be so happy,
anticipating their wishes and aiding and abetting all their plans, that
they would be glad to have her with them always. And always she closed
these hours of planning with a long-drawn sigh of satisfaction that they
were all in the dim future.
Erskine Burnham had passed his thirtieth birthday before he had been
separated from his mother for more than a few days at a time. It was
early in the May following the thirtieth anniversary when the break
came. He went abroad then, on legal business of importance.
"Shall you take your mother over with you?" Judge Hallowell had asked,
but a short time before he started; and he had answered quickly: "Oh,
yes, indeed; I couldn't think of leaving mother alone, with the ocean
between us; she is too much accustomed to my daily care for that.
Moreover, I think a sea voyage will be good for her."
But his mother met him at the door, that afternoon, open letter in hand,
and the grave announcement that she had bad news for him.
"What is it, dearest?" he had asked composedly, as he bent to kiss her.
It occurred to him then there could be no very bad news for either of
them so long as they stood there together, safe and well.
"It is Alice; she is ill, very ill they are afraid, and her husband
writes that she wants me immediately. They think, Erskine, that there
will have to be an operation, and she feels that she cannot go through
it without me. I fill the place of mother to her, you know, dear."
Erskine did not take his disappointment easily. He was used to having
his own way, and he had planned a delightful outing for his mother. He
argued the question strenuously, and was loath to admit that his
mother's duty lay elsewhere, and that he must go abroad without her.
"It is hard on my mother," he said discontentedly to Judge Hallowell.
But he admitted to himself that it was quite as hard for him; he hated
travelling alone.
For Mrs. Burnham the summer had dragged. For thirty years she had lived
for her son. Why should life without him be called living? It was harder
for her because her sacrifice proved to be unnecessary. The surgical
operation was, after all, postponed; there was some hope that it would
not have to be at all; and Alice herself had gone abroad with her
husband: not by Erskine's route, but on a sailing vessel, making the
ocean trip as long as possible.
Mrs. Burnham had stayed to do the thousand and one little things for the
invalid that a mother would naturally do, and to see her fairly started
on her journey, and then had come back to her lonely home: what
might-have-been crowding itself discontentedly among her thoughts. She
had lost her summer with Erskine for nothing, she told herself. Still,
the summer was going; it would not be long now.
Erskine had written to her daily, mailing his letters as opportunity
offered. At first the letters were long, very long and full; it was
almost like seeing the old world with him. Then, as business matters
pressed him, and social functions growing out of business relations
consumed more and more of his time, they shortened, often to a few
hurried lines.
Sometimes there was only the date at a late hour, and "Good night,
mother dear. This has been my 'busy day.' Interesting things have
happened. Heaps to tell you when I get home, which I hope now will be
soon. Perhaps in my very next I can set the date."
She had lived on his letters, watching for each as eagerly as a maiden
might watch for word from her lover. Was he not her lover? All she had
in all the world, she told herself proudly, and was satisfied, and
smiled over that word, "Dearest," that fell as naturally from his pen as
from his lips.
That next letter in which perhaps he would set the date of his return
was waited for in almost feverish impatience. There was so much she
wanted to do just before he came. She had planned to set the house and
grounds in festive array as for the coming of a conqueror. Actually his
first home-coming of any note in which she was there to greet him!
Always before they had come together.
The watched-for letter was delayed. There occurred a longer interval by
several days than there had been before, between letters. Mrs. Burnham
allowed herself to grow almost nervous over this, and watched the
newspapers hourly, glancing over foreign items in feverish haste. She
talked about the strangeness of this delay with her friends, until the
most sympathetic among them laughed a little and told each other that
that spoiled mother was really absurd! And at last it came.
She remembered--she will always remember that October evening when, the
shades being drawn close and a brisk fire burning in the grate, she had
seated herself near it in a luxurious reading chair and, merely for
company, had pushed Erskine's favorite easy-chair just opposite and
laughed a little at her folly, and tried to assure herself that young
Ben had returned long ago with the evening mail, which had to be sent
for, if one could not wait until morning. And then--Ben's step had
crunched on the gravel outside, and she had held her breath to listen,
and--in another minute it lay in her lap! A thick letter, when she had
expected only a few hurried lines. It was almost like the steamer letter
that he had written her on going out. It couldn't be a steamer letter!
not yet! She seized it eagerly and studied the postmark. Could he be
coming so soon that this was really her last letter?
How silly she was! her hand trembled so that the thin foreign paper
rattled in her grasp. There were many sheets written fine and full.
But it was not a steamer letter; he was still in Paris.
She made herself wait until she gave careful attention to Ellen, who
appeared just then, answering all her questions, directing her in minute
detail as to a piece of next morning's work, having her add another
block to the fire and rearrange the windows before she finally dismissed
her.
At last she was fairly into her letter. She read rapidly at first,
devouring the pages with her eyes. Then, more slowly, stopping over one
page, re-reading it, a third, a fourth time; staring at it, with a
strange look in her eyes. Suddenly she dropped them, all the thin
rustling sheets, and covered her face with both hands.
It seemed to her afterward that she spent a lifetime shut up with that
foreign letter.
CHAPTER IX
SENTIMENT AND SACRIFICE
THE woman on the upper porch who had come out to get her breath had in a
short time passed through so many phases of feeling as to be hardly able
to recognize herself. She had lived ten days since that bulky foreign
letter had seemed to change the current of her life and set it
flowing--when indeed it flowed again--in another channel.
In truth, Ruth Erskine Burnham, as she stood there ostensibly watching
the sunset, was reviewing the days in a half-frightened, half-shamefaced
way. She had always, even in young girlhood, been self-controlled. Why
could she not hold herself in better check even though her world had
suddenly turned to--stop! she would not say it! What had happened to
her, after all, but that which fell to the lot of mothers? It was not as
though some terrible calamity had overtaken her, and yet--could she have
done differently if it had been? She went back in thought to that
evening ten days away and looked at herself as though she were another
person looking on. She even smiled faintly at the absurdity of that
foolish woman's first action, before she had finished reading the
letter. She had risen suddenly and turned off the light, and pushed up
every window to its highest, and rolled back the curtains and let in a
whirl of wind that had made the foreign sheets fly about as though they
were things of life. Then, aided only by the firelight, she had stooped
and clutched after them and held them for a second to her breast and
then, suddenly, had thrown them from her with a low cry of pain. The
woman on the upper porch looking at the sunset smiled at that
half-insane woman of ten days ago and wondered that she could have so
far forgotten herself. Why should there have been any such outburst as
that, when Erskine was well and--and happy. She shivered a little even
now over the word, and drew her wrap closer and told herself that as
soon as the sun disappeared the chill came. Then she went back to her
review and reminded herself firmly that there had been no calamity to
any one; there was nothing but joy. Erskine was not only well and happy,
but he was coming home. He was coming to-night! No, she must not say
"he" any more; _they_ were coming. Forever and ever after this it must
be "they": her son and daughter. That to which she had looked forward
for so many years with varying emotions had come upon her. Erskine was a
married man; and to-night he was bringing home his bride. She had said
over the words aloud, that day, when she was quite alone, trying to make
herself feel that she was speaking of her son. It was all so sudden, so
utterly different from any imaginings of hers, and she thought that she
had gone over in her imaginings the whole wide range of possibilities.
That long letter over which she had spent a strange night, believed that
it was giving her the minutest particulars of this strange thing.
Erskine had met the woman who was now his wife on his first evening in
Paris, and from the very first had been attracted to her by his sympathy
with her unprotected condition. Her only friend and companion in a
strange land was a maiden aunt who was an invalid. Indeed it was for her
sake that they were lingering in France, because she was not able to
travel; she had been made worse by the ocean voyage, instead of better
as had been hoped. Irene had been very closely confined with her for
many weeks, and welcomed a face and voice from home as only those can
understand who have themselves been cast adrift among foreigners. He had
been able to do a few little things for the comfort of the invalid, and
the gratitude of both ladies was almost embarrassing. They were staying
at the same hotel, and as they chanced at that time to be almost the
only Americans, at least the only ones belonging to their world, they
naturally saw much of each other. As the aunt grew more and more feeble
and Irene became entirely dependent on him not only for what little rest
and recreation she got, but for all those offices which members of the
same family can do for each other in a time of illness, their friendship
made rapid strides. Then, when her aunt was suddenly taken alarmingly
ill, and after a few days of really terrible suffering died, leaving
Irene alone in a strange land, her situation was pitiable. He would have
to confess that he did not know just what she would have done, had he
not been there to care for her.
"Of course, mother, you do not need to have me tell you that long before
this I knew that I had met the one woman in all the world who could ever
become my wife. The reason that I had not mentioned her in any of my
letters was that I could not, even on paper, speak of her casually, as
of any ordinary acquaintance, and I had no right to speak in any other
way. Then, when I had the right to tell you everything, it was so near
my home-coming that I determined to leave it until you and I were face
to face, and I could answer all your questions and look into your dear
eyes and receive from you the sympathy that has never failed me and I
know never will. Nothing was farther from our thoughts at that time than
immediate marriage. Indeed it would have seemed preposterous to me, as
it would have been under any other circumstances, to be married without
your knowledge and presence. But when this unexpected blow came, I
realized the almost impossibility of any other course, although, even
then, I had the greatest difficulty in persuading Irene to take such a
step. She had to be convinced through some annoying experiences of the
folly of her hesitation. I do not know that even you, with your long
experience, realize the difference between this country and ours in
matters of etiquette. Things which at home would be done as a
matter-of-course are so unusual here as to be almost, if not quite,
questionable; and the number of purely business details that loomed up
to be managed by that lonely homesick girl simply appalled her. She sank
under them, physically, and I plainly saw that she simply must have my
help and care day and night. Why, even the nurse who had attended her
aunt, deserted us! that is, she was summoned away by telegraph. In
short, mamma, there was literally no other course for us than the one we
took; although it had to be taken at the sacrifice of a good deal of
sentiment on the part of both. It is a continual relief to me to
remember that I am writing to a sane and reasonable woman, who is in the
habit of weighing questions carefully, and who, when she decides that a
thing is right, does it without regard to sentiment or adverse opinion.
But oh, mommie, it was hard not to have you with us."
There was more in the letter, much more. Erskine had exhausted language
and repeated himself again and again in his effort to make everything
very clear and convincing.
He had been skilful also in his attempt to make his mother see the woman
of his choice with his eyes.
"She will appeal to your sympathies, mamma," he had written. "Although
she is so young, barely twenty-six, she has been through much trouble
and sorrow. She is an orphan, and has been for four years a widow. I
need hardly add that her short married life was unhappy and so sad that
she can scarcely speak of that year even to me. Of course it is an
experience that I shall do my utmost to make her forget; and I need not
speak of it again. I wanted you to know, dear mother, that you and I
have much to make up to her. She was made fatherless and motherless in a
single day, when she was a child of sixteen. I like to think of what you
will be to her, dearest mother; a revelation, I am sure, of mother-love;
for besides being so young when she lost hers, there are mothers, and
_mothers_, you know, and I am sure Irene does not understand it very
well; Do you know, she is half afraid of you? She has read a few of your
letters, and has caught an idea of what we are to each other, and talks
mournfully about coming between us! as though any one ever could! I have
assured her that I am simply bringing to you the daughter for whom your
heart has always longed."
It was at that point that Ruth Burnham had flung the sheets away from
her and buried her face in her hands.
But ten days had passed since then, and she had long known, by heart,
all that that letter could tell her.
And now, in less than another hour, they would be at home! her son and
daughter!
She had not gone to New York to meet the incoming steamer, as had been
arranged, or rather, as it had once arranged itself, quite as a matter
of course.
"Think how delightful it will be, when you stand on the dock watching
the incoming steamer, and straining your eyes to discover which
frantically waved handkerchief is mine!"
This was what Erskine had said as he gave her one of her good-by kisses.
She had replied that she would recognize his handkerchief among a
thousand.
In the earlier letters much had been said about that home-coming, and
elaborate plans had been made as to what they would do together in New
York. But in that last long letter, on the margin of the last page, as
though it had been an afterthought, were these words:--
"On the whole, mother, we believe that it would be better for you not to
try to meet us in New York. Irene has no love for that city; it was the
scene of some of her sorrows. She wants to stop there only long enough
to call upon her cousins; and we are both in such frantic haste to be at
home that we shall make the delay as short as possible; so we think it
would be less fatiguing to you to avoid that trip and be at home to
welcome us."
Ruth Burnham said over that sentence as she stood on that upper veranda,
waiting to welcome them. She had said it a hundred times before. What
was there about it that jarred? She could not have told, in words; yet
the jar was there.
Could it be that continually recurring "we"? Was she going to be a
jealous woman, with all the rest? So meanly jealous as that? "God
forbid!" she said the words aloud, and solemnly.
She knew that she needed the help of God in this crisis of her life;
since the news of it came to her she had spent hours on her knees
seeking his strength. She wanted Erskine to say "we" and think "we" and
to be supremely happy,--not only in his married life, but to have that
life all that it could be to two souls. And yet--Would it have been
wrong for him, in that first letter, to have remembered that she had
been used all his life to being the "we" of his thoughts, and to have
said simply "I" once or twice? Of course she could never any more be
"dearest"--his special name for her; but--was he never again for a
little while to be just himself, to her? And must she learn to think
"they" and never "him"?
Oh, she didn't mean any of this, she told herself nervously, and she
must get her thoughts away at once. Of course she would say "Erskine and
Irene" now, always, and forever. Or should she put it, "Irene and
Erskine"? Could she? Perhaps that would help. Did other mothers, waiting
for the home-coming of their married sons, have such strange thoughts as
haunted her?
There was Mrs. Adams, for instance, whose three sons had all been
married within a few years. And Mrs. Adams had not seemed to care. Well,
as to that, neither would she seem to; and she drew herself up
instinctively. But Mrs. Adams had four boys; five, indeed; the youngest
of them was almost as tall as his mother, while she--"The only son of
his mother, and she was a widow." The words seemed to repeat themselves
in her brain like a dull undertone refrain.
Other words that had nothing whatever to do with the situation, but that
had been familiar to her girlhood, came back and stupidly repeated
themselves:--
"Dead! One of them shot by the sea in the east." But that was wildness,
and utter folly! Erskine would be ashamed of her and with reason, could
he know--which he never should--that such fancies had been tolerated for
a moment.
Outwardly Mrs. Burnham was irreproachable. So was her home. In the ten
days following that letter she had given time and thought to its
adorning. She was a model housekeeper, and to have Erskine's rooms
always in spotless order had been one of her pleasures. But they had
been very thoroughly gone over, and whereever it was possible to add a
touch of beauty, it had been done.
Already she had drawn the shades and lighted up brilliantly, for at this
season the twilights were very brief. She had paused, on her way to the
veranda, to take a final critical survey, and had told herself that she
did not know how to make an added touch. And then she went swiftly to
her own room and brought therefrom a vase of roses and set them on the
dressing-table of the bride. The vase was a costly trifle that Erskine
had brought her just before he went abroad, and the roses were his
special favorites. She had kept that vase filled with them on her table
ever since she reached home.
For herself, she was dressed in white: Erskine's favorite home dress for
her, summer and winter. Indeed he was almost absurd about it, never
quite liking to see her in any other attire. "I suppose you will want me
to dress in white when I am eighty!" she had said to him once,
laughingly. His reply had been quick. "Of course I shall. What could be
more appropriate for a beautiful old lady? You will be beautiful,
dearest, but I cannot think that you will ever be old."
So, on this evening, although she had taken down a black silk and looked
at it wistfully, she had resolutely hung it away again, and brought out
a white cashmere richly trimmed with white silk. This was a festive
evening and she must honor it with one of her prettiest dresses.
All at once as she stood there, waiting, her heart seemed for a moment
to stop its beating. She clutched at the railing to prevent her falling,
and made a stern and effectual protest. "This is ridiculous! I will not
faint, and I shall do nothing to mar his home-coming, or to give him
occasion to be ashamed of me."
But she stood still, although the carriage that had gone to the station
to meet the bridal party was whirling around the corner, was turning in
at the carriage drive, was stopping before the door. They were getting
out. They were on the porch, they were in the hall; she could hear her
son's voice:--
"Where is my mother?"
And she was not there as she had meant to be to welcome them! she was
still on the upper veranda, steadying herself by the railing and feeling
it impossible to take a single step.
CHAPTER X
"SENTIMENTAL" PEOPLE
ERSKINE came up the stairs in quick leaps. "Mother!" he was calling.
"Mother! Where are you? Why, mommie!" and he had her in his arms.
"I thought I should be sure to see you the moment the carriage turned
the corner! Are you ill, mother? What is the matter?"
Was there reproach in his voice? There was something that gave back his
mother's self-command.
"It is tardiness," she said lightly. "The carriage came sooner than I
had thought it possible. O Erskine, it is good to hear your voice
again."
He kept his arms about her and was half smothering her in kisses while
he talked. Yet his tones had that note in them which held her in check.
"Irene will think this a strange welcome home, I am afraid; I had to
leave her in the hall with the maids while I came in search of you."
"We will go down at once," said his mother; and she withdrew herself
from his arms and led the way.
"She is very pretty." This was Mrs. Burnham's mental tribute to her new
daughter, as they stood together on the side porch after breakfast. It
was the morning after the arrival of the bride and groom. They had been
drawn thither by Erskine, who had walked back and forth with an arm
about each, bewailing the fact that he could not spare even one day for
his wife in her new home, but must get at once to business. In the midst
of his regretful sentence his car was heard at the crossing above, and
he had hurried away, calling back to them to take care of themselves,
and get well acquainted while he was gone.
The two ladies had each returned a gay answer, and then had watched
their opportunity to glance furtively at each other, uncertain how to
begin the formidable task set them.
Ruth Burnham had it in her heart to be almost sorry for the younger
woman, left thus without Erskine to lean upon, her only companion in
this new, strange home, a woman to whom the place had been home for a
generation. Did this give her a special advantage? Ought she to do
something to make the other woman feel at home? What should it be? What
ideas had they in common? There was Erskine, of course. It was not hard
for the mother to understand why this woman had been attracted to him.
How indeed could she help it? But what was it in her that had won him?
"She is certainly very pretty," she said again, as she studied the
shapely figure leaning meditatively against one of the porch pillars;
she was looking down into the garden gay with autumn blooms.
She was rather above medium height, with a fair skin and a wealth of
golden brown hair and eyes that were very blue. Ruth did not like her
eyes. That is, she would not have liked them if they had not belonged to
her daughter-in-law. In the solitude of her strangely solitary room, the
night before, she had fought out again one of her battles, and had
resolved anew that there should be nothing about this new daughter that
she would not like.
Certainly she was pretty; so was her dress. She was all in white; not a
touch of color anywhere. Was that her taste, or Erskine's fancy? Could
his mother make it a stepping-stone to conversation?
"You dressed for Erskine, this morning, I fancy," she said with a
winsome smile. "I presume you have already discovered how fond he is of
white?"
"Oh, yes, he has held forth to me on that subject. Some of his ideas are
absurd, but they serve me very well just now. All white answers as a
substitute for mourning, under the circumstances. I hate black, and I am
glad that Erskine did not want me to wear it."
This was the first reference that had been made to her bereavement. Mrs.
Burnham had not known how to touch it. Neither had her daughter's words
suggested what should be said. She murmured some commonplace about the
peculiar hardness of the situation.
"Yes, indeed," said the younger woman. "It was simply dreadful! Aunt
Mary had been an invalid always,--ever since I knew her, at least,--but
nobody supposed that she would ever die. She was one of the nervous
kind, you know, full of aches and pains; a fresh list each morning, and
a detailed description of each. I did get so tired of it! If it hadn't
been for Erskine, I don't know what I should have done. Poor auntie was
very fond of him, and no wonder. He bore with all her stories and her
whims like a hero. I used to tell him that he had not lived with his
mother all his life, for nothing."
"Her sudden death must have been a great shock to you."
The new mother made a distinct effort to keep her voice from sounding
cold. Something in the words or the tones of the younger woman had
jarred.
"Oh yes," she said, and sighed. "You cannot imagine what a perfectly
dreadful time it was! You know when people are always ill and always
fussing, you get used to it, and expect them to go on forever. If I had
had the least idea that she was going to die, I should have planned
differently, of course. What I should have done without Erskine, as
things turned out, it makes me shudder to think. What a queer old place
this is, isn't it? Erskine tells me that he has always lived here and
that the garden looks much as it did when he was a child. Is that so? It
seems so strange to me! I have moved about so much that I cannot imagine
how it would be to live always, anywhere. I don't believe I should like
it. The everlasting sameness, you know, would be such a bore. Don't you
find it so?"
Ruth tried to smile. "I am very much attached to the place. I came to
it, as you have, a bride; and now I am afraid I should have difficulty
in making any other place seem like home."
"Yes, that is because you are old. Poor auntie was forever sighing for
home. Nothing in all France or Italy was at all to be compared to the
delights of her room at home with four south windows and long curtains
that she had hemstitched herself."
She laughed lightly and flitted away from the subject.
"Is that an oak tree over there by the south gateway? Don't you think
oaks are ugly? They haven't the least bit of grace. I like elm trees
better than any other; every movement of their limbs is graceful. There
isn't one about the place, is there?"
"Oh, yes, indeed, the other entrance from the east is lined with them
the entire length of the carriage drive. Was your aunt compelled to
remain abroad on account of the climate? It seems sad to think that she
had to be away from her home when she missed it and mourned for it."
Ruth could not keep her thoughts from reverting to the aunt who had been
so large a part of the younger woman's life for many years and had been
so recently removed from it.
"Oh, I suppose she could have lived at home. In fact she was worse after
leaving it, or thought she was; I didn't see any great difference. It
was a lonesome, poky old house where she lived. Older than this, and
awfully dreary in winter. I couldn't have stayed there a winter, after I
once got away, to have saved her life. It was back in the country, you
know, two miles from town; think of it! I hate the country. Little
cities like this one are bad enough, but the country! Deliver me from
ever having to live in it again. I thought I should die when I was there
as a girl.
"Is Erskine very much attached to this place, do you suppose, or has he
stayed here just for your sake? I should think it would be much better
for him to live where his business is. Think how much of his time is
consumed in going back and forth! and then, too, it is so disagreeable
for him to never be within call when one wants him."
"As to the length of time it takes to go back and forth, that is no more
than is taken by those who live in the best residence portions of the
large city; we have rapid transit, and all the business men who can
afford to do so, keep their homes out here. Erskine has never known any
other home than this, and it would be strange indeed if he were not
attached to it. Of course it is associated with his father as no other
place can ever be."
This time it was not possible for the elder lady to keep her voice from
sounding cold and constrained. The thought of Erskine in any other home
than this one that had been improved from time to time and made
beautiful, always with his interests in view, had not so much as
occurred to her. She recoiled from the mere suggestion, and also from
the easy and careless manner in which it was made.
The young woman's manner was still careless.
"Oh, of course; but young people do not feel such attachments much; it
isn't natural. We talk a great deal about sentimental youth, but I think
it is the old who are sentimental, don't you? Auntie was an illustration
of that. She had the greatest quantity of old duds that she carried
about with her wherever she went, just because they were keepsakes,
souvenirs, and all that sort of thing. They were of no real value, you
know, the most of them, and some were mere rubbish. I had the greatest
time when we were packing to go abroad; she wanted to lug ever so much
of that stuff with her! I just had to set my foot down that it couldn't
be done; and it was fortunate that I did, as things turned out. We had a
horrid time getting packed; if Erskine had had all that rubbish to see
to with the rest, I don't know what would have become of him. I don't
believe he has sentimental notions; he is too sensible. He ought to be
in the city; that is the place for a man to rise; and you want him to
rise, don't you? Aren't you ambitious for him? I am. I want him to stand
at the very head of his profession. I tell him that if he doesn't, it
will not be for lack of brains, but on account of a morbid conscience.
Don't you think he is inclined to be over-conscientious, sometimes? What
an odd, old-fashioned plant that is beyond the rose arbor; it looks like
a weed."
She had a curious fashion of mixing the important and the trivial in a
single sentence. The mother, whose nerves quivered with her desire to
answer that remark about over-conscientiousness, restrained herself and
explained the plant that looked like a weed.
"It is a very choice variety of begonia and has a lovely blossom in its
season. It is the first thing that Erskine planted quite by himself. He
was a tiny boy then, with yellow curls."
The mother's voice trembled. A vision of her boy in his childish beauty,
in the long-ago days when he was all her own, came back to her, bringing
with it a strange new pang.
The wife laughed carelessly.
"And you have kept it all these years, ugly as it is, on that account? I
told you it was old people who were sentimental."
Mrs. Burnham turned abruptly away, murmuring something about household
duties. She went to the kitchen and gave the cook some directions that
she did not need; then went swiftly to her room and closed and locked
her door. Then she passed through to her sitting room, the door of which
was opposite her son's, and stood always open, inviting his entrance,
and closed and locked it. She had a feeling that she must be alone. More
alone than closed and locked doors would make her. She must shut out
something that had come in unawares and taken hold of her life. But
could she shut it out, or get away from it?
"I must pray," she said aloud, clasping both hands over her throbbing
forehead. "I must pray a great deal. I am not alone; God is with me; and
nothing dreadful has happened, or is about to happen. There is nothing
and there must be nothing but peace and joy in our home. I must be quiet
and sensible and not sentimental. Oh, I must not be sentimental at all!"
She laughed a little over that word--the kind of laugh that does not
help one; but it was followed immediately by tears, and they relieved a
little of the strain.
Then she went to her knees; and when she arose, was quiet and ready for
life. The thought came to her that it was well that she was acquainted
with God and did not have to seek him at this time as one unknown. He
had kept his everlasting arms underneath her through trying years,
certainly she could trust him now.
She went out at once in search of her daughter, intending to propose a
drive; but Ellen met her in the hall with a message.
"I was to tell you, ma'am, that young Mrs. Burnham has gone to lie down
and doesn't want to be disturbed. She doesn't want to be awakened even
for luncheon; she says she has been on a steady strain for weeks, and
has a lot of sleeping to make up; she shouldn't wonder if she slept all
day."
"Very well, Ellen, we will keep the house quiet and let her rest as long
as she will."
The mother's voice was quietness itself, yet, despite that phrase "young
Mrs. Burnham," which, some way, jarred, her heart was filled with
compunction. Had the poor young wife, a stranger in a strange home, shut
herself up to sleep, or to cry? She had been through nerve-straining
experiences so recently; death and marriage coming into one short week;
and now, a new home, and Erskine away for the day, and no one within
sight or sound whom she had ever seen before. Would it be any wonder if
the tears wanted to come? Could not her new mother have helped her
through this first strange day? Why had she not put tender arms about
her and kissed her, and called her "daughter," and said how glad she was
to have a daughter? That was what she had meant to do. This morning when
she came from her night vigil, she had almost the words on her lips that
she meant to say as soon as they two were alone. She had meant the words
in their fulness; so at least she believed. They had come to her in
answer to her cry for help. What had kept her from saying them?
Even while she asked herself the question, a faint weary smile hovered
about her lips.
Had she done so, would she have been thought "sentimental?"
CHAPTER XI
"PLANS FOR A PURPOSE"
THE Burnhams were still seated at their dinner table, although Mrs.
Erskine Burnham had just remarked that the evening was too lovely to
spend in eating.
"Let us take a walk on the porch in the moonlight the minute we are
through dinner," she said to her husband. Apparently she paid no heed to
the slight dry cough which came so frequently from Erskine that his
mother's face took on a shade of anxiety. Erskine's coughs had been his
mother's chief anxiety concerning him through the years; he had never
been able to tamper with them; but his wife laughed at her fears and
frankly told her that Erskine was too old now to be coddled.
To all outward appearances the Burnham dining room was exhibiting a
perfect home scene. The day had been balmy, with a hint of summer in the
air, and although the evening was cool enough for a bright fire in the
grate, the mantle above it had been banked with violets, whose sweet
spring breath pervaded the air.
To Erskine Burnham who had been all day in the rush and roar of the
great city, the lovely room with its flower-laden air, and its daintily
appointed dinner table with the two ladies seated thereat in careful
toilets, formed a picture of complete and restful home life. He glanced
from wife to mother with eyes of approval and spoke joyously.
"I don't suppose you two can fully appreciate what it is to me to get
home to you after a stuffy, snarly day in town. I sit in the car
sometimes with closed eyes after a day of turmoil, to picture how it
will all look. But the reality always exceeds my imagination."
His wife laughed gayly.
"That is because you come home hungry," she said. "You want your dinner
and you like the odor of it and make believe that it is sentiment and
violets. In reality it is roast beef and jelly that charm you."
He echoed her laugh. He thought her gay spirits were charming. "The
roast beef helps, undoubtedly," he said. "Though it was violets I
noticed first, to-night. Aren't they lovely? Did you arrange them,
Irene? Hasn't it been a perfect day? Too pleasant for staying in doors
patiently. I hope you have both been out a great deal? Oh, it is Friday,
isn't it? Then you have, mamma, of course. What have you been about,
Irene?"
"I went to the lake this morning with the Bensons; and we spent an hour
or more with the Langhams; they are here for a month. It is lovely out
there, Erskine, and there are some charming cottages for rent. Two
simply ideal ones, either of which would suit us. Darling little
bird's-nests of cottages, not a great staring room in one of them. I
wish we could go there for the summer."
Erskine laughed indulgently, but at the same time shook his head.
"Too far away, dear. I couldn't get out there at night until seven, or
later. Besides, you wouldn't find it so pleasant as you fancy. Life in
one of those bird's-nest cottages is ideal only on paper. Nothing could
be pleasanter, I am sure, than our own home; and it is a delightful
drive to the lake whenever we want to go there. So the Langhams are
down."
"Oh, yes, and came to lunch with me. You should see Harry! he has shaved
his mustache, and it changes his face so that I hardly knew him."
"Oh, Harry is here, is he? His face could bear changing. What did you
think of him, mamma? He is the young man of whom I wrote you, who went
over on the same steamer that I did, last spring."
Before Mrs. Burnham could reply, his wife's voice chimed in. "She didn't
meet him. I went off with a rush, this morning. I heard through the mail
that the Langhams were down, and I was in such a hurry to see Nettie
that I thought of nothing else. I ran away, don't you think! Never said
where I was going, or anything; and then came back to luncheon so late
that I supposed of course mother had lunched long before, and was lying
down, so I wouldn't have her disturbed. And don't you think she had
waited, and so lost her luncheon altogether."
Erskine laughed genially and waited to hear his mother say that of
course that was of no consequence; but she did not speak. The cheerful
voice of his wife went on:--
"Nettie Langham has the sweetest little home, Erskine. If you could see
it, you would never say again that cottages were only nice on paper. I'm
sure I long to prove to you how perfectly charming one could be. And we
have such a host of pretty things that would fit into it. Will Langham
says he saves ten minutes night and morning by being at that end of the
town instead of this."
Erskine chose to ignore the cottage.
"You had an afternoon of calls, had you not? I met the Emersons and the
Stuarts down town and both spoke of having been here."
"Oh, yes, they were here, with the Needham girls; and Mrs. Easton and
her daughter Faye were here. We met them in New York, you know. And oh,
don't you think, Mrs. Janeway's niece that we used to hear so much about
called this afternoon with a letter of introduction from Mrs. Janeway.
She is lovely, Erskine. I was prepared to dislike her because we heard
such perfection of her; but really she is charming. And she is going to
be at one of the lake cottages for several weeks; that is another reason
for our being out there, you see."
She seemed bent on holding his attention, but Erskine turned to his
mother with a question.
"Mamma, don't you think Mrs. Stuart is looking ill? I was shocked at the
change in her. Isn't it marked, or is it because I haven't seen her
lately?"
"I did not see her to-day, my son. I did not even know she had been
here."
Mrs. Erskine Burnham pretended to frown at her husband.
"What a stupid boy you can be when you choose!" she said. "How many
times must I tell you that I thought mother was resting, this afternoon,
and did not disturb her with callers? I'm sure the Stuarts are not such
infrequent guests that one must make a special effort to meet them. I'll
tell you some other people who were here. The Hemingways, don't you
think! The last time we saw them was just as we were leaving Paris. They
came back only last month, and Mrs. Hemingway says she is already
homesick for Paris. That is the worst of living abroad for a time; one
is never afterward quite satisfied with this country."
"Mamma," said Erskine. "Do I understand that you have not been out,
to-day, Friday, though it is? Aren't you feeling well?"
There was tender solicitude in his tones, but his mother's voice was
cold.
"Quite well, Erskine. May I give you some coffee?" This he declined, and
almost immediately his wife made a movement to leave the table. She
linked her arm at once in her husband's and drew him toward the door.
"Come out on the porch, Erskine, do; this room is stuffy to-night. One
can't breathe in a house with a fire, on such charming days as these.
Why, of course, it's prudent. The air is as mild as it is in midsummer.
Don't go to housing yourself up because you have a tiny little cold; it
is the best way in the world to make it cling. Dear me! don't I know all
about that? Poor auntie was forever hunting about for draughts, and
closing doors and windows and putting shawls on herself and everybody
else. If I had to stay in the house with another invalid of that kind, I
should die."
They were on the porch by this time; she had overcome Erskine's
half-reluctance and had closed the door behind them. But the window was
open and the mother could distinctly hear the slight dry cough, more
frequent now that they were in the open air. She stood irresolute for a
moment, then turned and went swiftly up to her own rooms and closed and
locked her door. Then she went hurriedly to the front windows and drew
the curtains close; she had a feeling that she must shut out the outside
world very carefully. But she had no tears to shed; on the contrary her
eyes were very dry and bright and seemed almost to burn in their
sockets, and two red spots glowed on her cheeks.
It was a little more than six months since that October evening when
Erskine Burnham had brought home his bride, and they had been months of
revelation to his mother.
During that time she had tried--did any woman ever try harder?--to be,
in the true sense of the word, a mother to her daughter-in-law. Her
son's appeal during their first moments of privacy had touched her
deeply. He had ignored any necessity for a further explanation of his
sudden marriage, accepting it as a matter of course that his mother
would fully appreciate the simple statement that, however hard it was
for all three, it seemed to be the only right solution of their
difficulties; and went straight to his point.
"I want you to be a revelation to Irene, mommie. She knows very little
about mother-love, having had chiefly to imagine it, with, I fancy,
rather poor models on which to build her imaginings. She is singularly
alone in the world, and she doesn't make close friends easily. It is a
joy to me to think how a part of her nature that has heretofore been
starved and dwarfed will blossom out under your love and care."
Then his mother had kissed him, a long, clinging, self-surrendering
kiss, while she vowed to her secret soul never to disappoint his hopes.
What had she not done and left undone and endured during those six
months in order to try to keep that vow! What an impossible vow it was!
How utterly Erskine had misunderstood his wife in supposing that she
wanted to be loved by his mother! that she wanted anything whatever of
his mother except to efface her.
By slow degrees Mrs. Burnham was reaching the conclusion that such was
the policy of her daughter-in-law. It had come to her as a surprise.
Whatever else in her checkered life Ruth Erskine Burnham had been called
upon to bear, she had been accustomed to being recognized always as an
important force. Mrs. Erskine Burnham had not planned in that way. She
did not argue, she never openly combated any thing; she simply carried
out her own intentions without the slightest regard to the plans or the
convenience of others; or at least of one other.
From the first of her coming into this hitherto ideal home she had
assumed that her mother-in-law was a feeble old woman on whom the claims
of society were irksome, and the ordering of her home and servants a
bore. At first, Ruth, with her utterly different experience from which
to judge, did not understand the situation. When her new daughter
assured her that it was too windy or too damp or too chilly or too warm
for her to expose herself, she laughed amusedly and explained that she
was in excellent health and was accustomed to going out in all weather.
When callers came and went without her being notified, she attributed it
at first to forgetfulness, on the part of a bride, or to her ignorance
of the customs of the neighborhood; then to her over-solicitude for an
older woman's comfort, then to carelessness, pure and simple, and
finally, by closely contested steps, to the conviction that it was a
deeply laid, steadily carried-out plan, for a purpose. This day, at the
close of which she had locked herself into her room and vainly tried to
shut out the sounds of laughter on the porch below, had given her
abundant proof of the truth of this conviction.
It was Friday, the day which, ever since Erskine was graduated and they
were permanently settled in their home, she had devoted to making a
round of calls upon people who had been long ill, or who for any special
reason needed special thought. She took one or another of them for a
drive, she did errands for certain others, she carried flowers and fruit
and reading matter to such as could enjoy them; in short she gave
herself and her carriage and horses in any way that could best meet the
interests of those set apart. So much a feature of their life had this
morning programme become that Erskine was in the habit of referring to
it much as he did to Sunday.
"We must not plan for guests at luncheon on Fridays, Irene; mamma is
much too tired for social functions after her strenuous mornings."
"We could not have the carriage for that day, dear; it is Friday, you
remember."
Numberless times since the advent of the new member of the family, had
such reference to the special custom been made; the mother's eyes being
now opened, she recalled instance after instance in which there had been
in progress some pet scheme for Friday, that would interfere with her
disposal of it. More than once she had tried to enter a protest; had
urged that she could wait until another day, or she could order a
carriage from the livery for that time; but Erskine's negative had been
prompt and emphatic.
"No, indeed, mamma; we don't want you to do anything of the kind. We are
interested in the Friday programme, too, remember. I consider it almost
in the light of a trust. Why, the very horses would be hurt, Irene, if
they were not allowed to go their Friday rounds, carrying roses, and
jellies, and balm. Nothing not absolutely necessary, mommie, must be
permitted to interfere with that."
Yet, on that Friday morning when Mrs. Burnham, having studied the
barometer and the sky, had sent word to an especially delicate invalid
that she believed she could safely take a drive, and had come down at
the appointed hour dressed for driving, with a couch pillow in hand and
an extra wrap over her arm, Ellen had met her at the foot of the stairs
with a flushed face and eyes that had dropped their glance to the floor
for very shame, as she said: "The carriage has gone, ma'am; I was coming
to ask you if I should 'phone for another, right away."
"Gone!" echoed her mistress, standing still on the third step, and
staring at the girl. "What do you mean, Ellen? Gone where?"
"To the station, ma'am. Jonas said Mrs. Erskine had ordered him to take
her there to meet a friend."
"Oh," said Mrs. Burnham, reaching for her watch. "Some guest just heard
from who must be met, I presume. Then they will be back very soon, of
course."
Again the maid's indignant eyes drooped as though unwilling to see her
mistress's discomfiture as she hurried her story.
"I guess not, ma'am. She ordered luncheon to be late; not earlier than
two or half past, and said there would be company; two anyway, perhaps
more. Will I 'phone for a carriage, ma'am?"
CHAPTER XII
ACCIDENT OR DESIGN?
MRS. BURNHAM had stood for a full minute irresolute; then she had spoken
in her usual tone, explaining to Ellen that the friend she had intended
to take out would not be able to go in a livery carriage. She would
herself make plain to her why the drive must be deferred until another
time. The mistake had occurred by her neglecting to explain to her
daughter the morning's plans. Then she had turned and slowly retraced
her steps. She had seen and been humiliated by the flush on Ellen's face
and the flash in her eyes. It was humiliating to think that her maid was
indignant over the way she was being treated by her daughter. It is
probably well that she did not hear the maid's exclamation:--
"The horrid cat! If I only dared tell Mr. Erskine all about it!"
Ruth Burnham had gone downstairs again after a time. She had changed her
street dress first, and made a careful at-home toilet. She had given
certain additional directions to the cook, with a view to doing honor to
their unexpected guests. She had made a special effort to have Ellen
understand that all was quite as it should be, and had sternly assured
herself that such was the case. If she could not sympathize with the
sudden movements of young people on hearing of the coming of friends,
she deserved to be set aside as too old to be endurable. It was absurd
in her to be so wedded to an old custom! just as though any other day in
the week would not do as well as Friday. Then she had gone to the living
room which was Erskine's favorite of the entire house.
"It is such a home-y room, mamma," he used to say, away back in his
early boyhood. When it had been refurnished, or at least renewed, with a
view to Erskine's home-coming, his mother had taken pains to preserve
the sense of homeiness, and had seen to it that his pet luxuries, sofa
pillows, were in lavish evidence.
It was a charming room. Very long and many windowed, with wide, low
window-seats, and tempting cosy-corners, piled high with cushions so
carefully chosen, as to size and harmony of color, that they were in
themselves studies in art. There was a smaller room opening from this
and nearer the front entrance, which was used as a reception room, and
was furnished more after the fashion of the conventional parlor; but
guests who, as Erskine phrased it, really "belonged," were always
entertained in the living room.
In the doorway of this room the mistress of the house had stopped short
and looked about her in astonishment. It wore an unfamiliar air. The
easy-chairs, each one of which she had made a study, until it seemed to
have been created for the particular niche in which it was placed, had
every one changed places and to the eyes of the mistress of the house
looked awkward and uncomfortable. But that was foolish, she assured
herself quickly. Chairs, of course, belonged wherever their friends
chose to place them. There were other changes. The window-seats had been
shorn of some of their largest and prettiest cushions, and a little onyx
table that had occupied a quiet corner was gone. It had held a choice
picture of Erskine's father, set in a dainty frame, and near it had
stood a tiny vase which was daily filled with fresh blossoms. Picture
and vase and flowers had disappeared.
"Ellen," Mrs. Burnham had said, catching sight of the girl in the next
room, "what has happened here? Has there been an accident?"
"No, m'm," said Ellen, appearing in the opposite doorway, duster in
hand.
"It wasn't any accident, ma'am, it was orders. She didn't want such a
lot of pillows here, she said. It looked for all the world like a show
room, or as if it had been got ready for a church fair. Those was her
very words."
"Never mind the pillows, Ellen." Mrs. Burnham had spoken hastily, and
was regretting that she had spoken at all. "It is the table, and
especially the picture about which I am inquiring. I hope the picture is
safe? It is the best one we have."
"It's all safe, ma'am; I looked out for that; but that was orders, too.
She said the room was too full, and looked cluttery; and she said that
only country folks kept family pictures in their parlors. And she had me
take the table and the picture and the vase up into the back attic. She
said the vase was a nuisance; it was always tipping over and she didn't
want it around in the way. Of course I had to take them; you told me to
obey orders."
Ellen's indignation was getting the better of her usual discreetness. It
was her tone and manner that recalled the elder woman to her senses. She
spoke with decision and dignity.
"Certainly, Ellen. Why should there be occasion for mentioning that? Of
course Mrs. Erskine Burnham's orders are to be obeyed equally with my
own; or, if they conflict at any time with my own, give hers the
preference. Especially should the parlors and sitting rooms be arranged
just as she wishes. Young people care more about such little matters
than we older ones do."
She knew that her voice had been steady, and she took care to make her
movements quiet and her manner natural and at ease. Not for the world
would she have had Ellen know of the turmoil going on inside. It was the
picture that hurt her; or rather that emphasized the hurt. Erskine's
favorite picture of his father; the one that as a child he had daily
kissed good morning; the one that now after all these years he always
stood beside in silence for a moment, after greeting her. And she could
not recall that he had ever forgotten to select from the flowers he
brought home, an offering for the tiny vase.
How was it possible for his wife to have spent six months in his home
without noting all this? And noting it, how could she possibly have
interfered with that cherished corner?
The morning had been a distinct advance on former experiences. The new
daughter had evidently misunderstood the spirit in which small
interferences and small slights had heretofore been accepted, and
determined on aggressive effort. Long before this, and as often as she
chose, she had made what changes pleased her in the more pretentious
parlor, and Mrs. Burnham had openly approved some of them and been
pleasantly silent over others. She had also given explicit directions to
the would-be rebel, Ellen, that the "new lady's" slightest hint was to
be obeyed.
There had been no pettiness in her thoughts about the changes. She was
earnestly anxious to have her son's wife feel so entirely at home that
she would not need to hesitate about carrying out her own tastes. But
was it not to be supposed that a wife would consult her husband's tastes
as well as her own? And his father's picture that he had cherished ever
since he was a child! She had herself told Irene one morning, standing
before that very picture, how Erskine had singled it out from all the
others and said decidedly: "That one is papa." And his wife could banish
it to the attic!
Ruth Erskine Burnham was used to mental struggles. There had been times
in her life when her strong-willed feelings had got the upper hand and
swayed her for days together; but it is doubtful if a more violent storm
of feeling had ever swept about her than surged that morning. For a
while the pent-up emotions of many weeks were allowed their way. But
only for a little while. The Christian of many years' experience had
herself too well in training for long submission to the enemy's control.
By the time that delayed luncheon hour drew near she believed that she
was her quiet self again; ready to receive and assist in entertaining
her daughter's guests whoever they might be. As was her habit when under
the power of strong feeling that must be held in check she took refuge
with her absent friends, and wrote a long letter to Marian Dennis,
ignoring the immediate present utterly and revelling in certain happy
experiences of their past. When her unusually lengthy epistle was
finished, she was startled at the lateness of the hour, and began to
wonder how certain details of the dinner could be managed if luncheon
were much longer delayed. Just then Ellen knocked at her door.
"They are 'most through luncheon, ma'am," was her message. "I heard you
moving around and I thought I'd venture to tell you."
"Why, Ellen, how is this? I did not hear any call to luncheon."
"You wasn't called, ma'am. She said you was likely asleep, and she
wouldn't let me come up and see. She thinks you don't do anything but
sleep when you are upstairs!"
This last was muttered, and not supposed to be heard by her mistress.
Ellen had evidently reached the limit of her endurance. Since the
mistress said not a word, she ventured a further statement. "There's
four of them, ma'am, besides Mrs. Burnham; and it's long after three,
and they're on the last course. I thought you would be wanting something
to eat by this time."
Outwardly, Ruth was herself again.
"Thank you, Ellen," she said. "Since I am so late, I think I will not go
down until the guests have left the dining room. I am not in the least
hungry; I think on the whole I should prefer to wait until dinner is
served."
Her tone was gentleness itself; but there was in it that quality which
made Ellen understand that she was dismissed.
Then Mrs. Burnham went back to her room and sat down near the open
window. The sweet spring air came to her, laden with the breath of the
flowers she loved, but their odor almost sickened her. She had thought
that her battle was fought and victory declared, and behold it was only
a lull! What was she to do? What ought she to do? Should she go down to
the guests, apologize for tardiness, and act as though nothing had
occurred to disturb her? That, of course, would be the sensible way;
but,--could she do it well, with the closely observing and indignant
Ellen to confront? It scarcely seemed possible; and she blushed for
shame over the thought that she was afraid to meet the anxious eyes of
her maid.
Even while she waited and considered, a carriage swung around the corner
and stopped before her door. Three ladies alighted, evidently with the
intent of paying an afternoon visit. Among them was Mrs. Stuart, her
most intimate acquaintance. Now indeed she would have to go down; but
she would wait for a summons, that would make it appear more natural. So
she waited; but no summons came. The ladies, all of them her friends,
made their call and departed. And others came--a constant succession of
callers; the new spring day had tempted everybody out. Most of the
people Mrs. Burnham knew by sight; some of them were comparative
strangers, paying their first calls. What was being given as the reason
why she was not there to meet them? The words of Ellen recurred to her,
words that she had considered it wisdom not to seem to hear:--
"She thinks you don't do anything but sleep when you are upstairs." The
matron's lip curled a little. She was not given to sleeping by daylight;
a fifteen minutes' nap after luncheon was always sufficient, and even
that was frequently omitted.
It was a strange afternoon, the strangest that she had ever passed. She
kept her seat at the window, almost within view, if the guests had
raised their eyes, and saw friends who rarely got out to make calls, and
whom she had always made special efforts to entertain. What must they
think of her, at home, and well, and not there to meet them? And why was
she not there? What strange freak or whim was this? Could her
daughter-in-law hope to make a prisoner of her in her own house? Why did
she sit there in that inane way as though she were in very deed a
prisoner? Why not go down, as a matter of course, and take her proper
place as usual? But the longer she delayed and watched those groups of
callers come and go, the more impossible it seemed to do this. With each
fresh arrival she felt sure that she would be summoned, and waited
nervously for Ellen's knock. But no Ellen came.
The day waned and the hour for Erskine and dinner drew near; and still
Mrs. Burnham sat like one dazed at that open window. An entire afternoon
lost. When, before, had she spent a day in such fashion?
She leaned forward, presently, and watched Erskine's car stop at the
corner, and watched his springing step as he came with glad haste to his
home, and received his bow and smile as he looked up at her window. Now
indeed she must go down; and go before he could come in search of her,
and question her with keen gaze and searching words. Her eyes told no
tales, they were dry, and there were bright spots glowing on her cheeks.
She had not known what she should say, just how she should manage his
solicitous inquiries. She would make no plans, she told herself; things
must just take their course. Matters had so shaped themselves that any
planning of hers was useless.
Then she had gone down to that cheerful dining room, and listened to the
chatter of her daughter-in-law, and replied to her son as best she
could. Now she was back in her room, and Erskine and his wife were out
on the porch in the moonlight, and that slight, frequent cough was
coming up to her. Presently he would come, and she dreaded it. For
almost the first time in her life she dreaded to meet her son. He would
be insistent, and she was not good at dissembling. And yet, he must not
know, he must never know how she had been treated that day. If only he
would stay away and give her a chance to think, to pray, to grow calm.
Should she lock her door?
Lock out her son? She could not do that! but she could not talk with him
to-night; she would turn off her light and ask him not to light up again
and not to stay, because she was tired. That at least would be true: she
was tired. For the first time in her life she was tired of life! She
must get into a different spirit from this. After Erskine had kissed her
good-night she would have it out with her heart, or her will.
Hark! he was coming! they were coming upstairs together, and Irene was
chattering. Out went the lights in the mother's room. She heard the wife
pass on to her own room, she heard her son, stepping lightly, stopping a
moment before her door, then he too passed on, to his own room, and
closed his door.
CHAPTER XIII
WAS IRENE RIGHT?
IF she could have heard some of the talk that had taken place on the
porch in the moonlight, Mrs. Burnham would have better understood her
son's consideration. They had taken but very few turns on the porch when
Erskine said:--
"Mamma has gone upstairs. I think I must run up and see her a few
minutes, Irene. She does not seem to feel quite well to-night; although
in some respects I think I never saw her looking better; her eyes were
very bright, did you notice? Perhaps she is feverish. Did she speak of
having cold?"
"Not at all; I have no idea that she doesn't feel quite well."
"There was something peculiar about her. Didn't she really go out at all
to-day? That is certainly unusual; you have seen how particular she is
to keep her Friday programme. Irene, I am really afraid that she is
ill."
"She isn't ill at all, you fussy boy; I think you are absurd about your
mother. You fuss over her as though she were a spoiled child. That is
just the word for it."
"Very well," he said good-humouredly. "I must go and 'fuss over' her,
enough to know why she overturned her usual programme," and he moved
toward the door.
His wife held to his arm and tried to arrest his steps.
"Don't go in, Erskine; it is stuffy inside, and I haven't seen you since
morning. As for that programme which worries you so much, if you were
not dreadfully stupid to-night you would understand that it is I who
overturned it. I ran away with the carriage, I told you--almost as soon
as you went yourself. I was so charmed with the idea of seeing the
Langhams again that I forgot everything else."
Her husband turned then to look at her, his face expressing surprise.
"Did you take our carriage, dear? I supposed you ordered one from the
livery."
His wife pretended to pout.
"You are cross to-night, Erskine. I don't see why I should. I thought
'Our' meant mine as much as hers. Why shouldn't she order one if she
wanted it?"
He laughed, as though he was expected to understand that she was talking
nonsense, but he spoke with an undertone of decision.
"Oh if it comes to that, the carriage as well as the horses are
undoubtedly my mother's, but she and I have never drawn any hard and
fast lines about 'mine' and 'thine'; I have always found her too willing
to give up her convenience for mine. For that reason, perhaps, I have
been careful to plan systematically for her, and to anticipate and
overrule her personal sacrifices as much as possible, and I know that
you will delight to join me in it. I am afraid that she was much
inconvenienced to-day; still, that cannot be why she did not see any of
her friends. What reason did she give, dear, for not coming down?"
Irene pouted in earnest this time.
"Really, Erskine, you are strangely obtuse! I have explained at least
three times that mother spent the afternoon in her room, and that I gave
orders that she should not be disturbed. I thought I should be commended
for it instead of blamed."
"I haven't had a thought of blaming you, Irene, but I am a trifle
anxious about my mother, and what you say only increases the anxiety.
She has never been given to sleeping much in the daytime."
"Oh what nonsense! as though you knew what she did all day, while you
are in town! Of course she sleeps; old people always do."
"My mother isn't old, Irene."
[Illustration: "MY MOTHER ISN'T OLD, IRENE."--_Page 167._]
"Why not, I wonder? you ridiculous boy! When should people begin to be
called old, pray, if not at fifty? And she is more than that. She is
within a few years of Auntie's age, and you thought she was an old
woman, and were always preaching to me about how patient I must be with
her on that account."
Her husband gave her a troubled, half-startled look. His mother nearly
as old as the invalid aunt who had seemed to him old enough to be his
grandmother!
"Are you sure?" he asked helplessly.
His wife laughed satirically.
"Sure of what, my beloved dunce? That your mother is fifty-three? Of
course I am. It was only a few days ago that she showed me her
gold-lined silver cup, that has the imprint of her first teeth and is
dated for her first birthday."
Then her face sobered.
"And I'll tell you another way in which I know it, Erskine. She is
growing nervous and over-sensitive, as old people always do. I can see a
great difference in her, even in the short time that I have been here.
It is nothing to worry about, of course; simply something to be expected
as among the infirmities of age. You ought to have married me six or
eight years before you did; it would have been easier for her. She
simply cannot get used to your having a wife. 'My son' has 'lived and
breathed and had his being' so many years for her sake alone, that to
share him with another is a bitter experience. She doesn't love me one
bit, Erskine, and it is not my fault. If I were an angel from heaven, it
wouldn't make any difference, provided I had presumed to marry you. It
makes it hard for both of us; and for that very reason it would be much
better if you and I were in a little house of our own. She would get
used to it much easier if she did not have me continually before her
eyes."
If she could have seen distinctly the look of pain on her husband's
face, as she got off these sentences with composed voice, it might have
moved her to pity for him. When he spoke, his voice was almost sharp. "I
am sure you are mistaken, Irene; utterly mistaken. My mother wanted me
to marry; she has wanted it for years; at times she was actually
troubled because I did not, and spoke of it very seriously."
Irene laughed lightly as she gave his arm some half-reproving,
half-caressing pats.
"Blind as a bat, you are!" she said. "Despite all your supposed wisdom.
On general principles your mother wanted you to marry, of course,
because that is the proper thing for a man to do. But marriage in the
abstract and marriage in the concrete are two very different matters.
There! haven't I put that well? Those are lawyers' terms, aren't they?
They sound learned, anyway."
He smiled in an absent-minded way at her folly. His thoughts were
elsewhere. Something in the turn of her sentence had carried him
suddenly back to a moon-lighted evening in which he had walked and
talked with Alice Warder, and he could seem to hear her voice again as
she said:--
"I know your mother loves me, Erskine, almost as she would a daughter;
and I also know that she loves me a great deal better because her son is
like a brother to me instead of being--something else." He remembered
how he had puzzled over it all, and studied his mother's face, and half
decided that Alice was right. Was Irene right, also? Was his mother
grieved that he had married at all? Was it possible that she could have
stooped to so small a feeling as jealousy!
His wife laid her head caressingly against his arm and said softly:--
"Don't worry about it, Erskine. We can't either of us help it now; and
we must just make the best of it and do as well as we can."
For the first time in his life, as those low tremulously spoken words
sounded in his ears, a feeling very like resentment toward his mother
swelled in Erskine Burnham's heart, and a torrent of tenderness rushed
over him toward the wife who had no one in all the world but himself.
This was what she had often told him.
All things considered it is perhaps not strange that he did not visit
his mother's room that evening.
It is true that when they went upstairs he paused before her door and
listened, and told himself that she was asleep and he would not disturb
her. But there had been nights before, many of them, in which he had
waited at her door and listened, and murmured: "Mommie," and received a
prompt invitation to enter. On this evening, though the hour was not
late, he was not insistent. He made no attempt to knock or to speak. It
was his concession to that new thought about her being an old woman. Or
was it a slight concession, unawares, to that new feeling of resentment?
His mother, knowing nothing of what had been talked over in the
moonlight, held her breath and waited. Of course Erskine would come to
say good night. She forgot that she had wished he would not come! When
his footsteps moved toward his own room, she waited a minute, then
stepped into the hall.
"Erskine!" she said; but she said it very softly and he did not hear
her. She could hear his voice. He was talking with his wife. The mother
slipped softly back to her own room and locked her door. It was not
late, and she and her son were only across a hall from each other; yet,
for the first time in her life under like conditions, if she slept at
all it must be without his good-night kiss. There is no true mother but
will appreciate the situation. There are, it is true, mothers who are
not accustomed to good-night kisses from their grown sons, and so would
not miss them, but they are accustomed to a certain atmosphere, and they
can understand what it would be like to be suddenly removed from it.
Mrs. Burnham went to her bed as usual, after a while, like the sensible
woman that she was. That she did not go to sleep was not her fault, for
she made earnest effort to do so. She told herself repeatedly and with a
calmness which was itself unnatural, that nothing terrible had happened,
and that she was above making herself miserable over trifles. Was her
daughter-in-law's indifference to her only a trifle? She made a distinct
pause over that word "indifference" and selected it with care; of course
it was nothing more; and--yes, it was a trifle. How could one who knew
her so little and had so little in common with her life be expected to
be other than indifferent? Erskine had expected more, very much more,
but Erskine was--was different from other people.
Then, suddenly, all her heart went out in a great swell of tenderness
for Erskine. She did not stop to reason about it, she did not wait to
ask herself why Erskine, who had everything, should be the subject of
her shielding care; she simply took him metaphorically once more into
her mother-arms and vowed to shield him from even a hint of solicitude
on her account. She would rise above it all; she would treat Irene
exactly as though she were at all times the loving and considerate
daughter that Erskine believed she was; she would let him be blind to
her faults, she would even help him to increased blindness. That was her
work for him now; she would accept it and be diligent in it. The thought
helped to quiet her, but it did not bring her sleep. She was broad
staring awake. She told herself that sleep seemed an impossibility; she
wondered curiously how she had ever slept.
A low murmur of talk came to her from the room across the hall. They
were not sleeping, either. Could she have heard some of the talk in that
room across the hall it would have made things plainer to her than they
were.
"There is one thing, dear," Erskine Burnham was saying to his wife,
"which we must look upon as settled. We can have no home apart from my
mother's. You can plan for summer cottages if you will, and where you
will, for a stay of a few weeks, but the real home must always be here.
I have taken care of my mother, practically all my life; and now if she
is, as you say, growing old, it is not the time to make any change."
"Not even though the change would be a benefit to her?" His wife
intended her words to represent a playful sarcasm, but Erskine's face
had clouded and he had answered quickly:
"No; not even under such an extraordinary supposition as that. Young as
I was when my father died, he said that to me about my mother which has
always made her seem to me as a trust; and I must be true to my trust in
any case."
After a moment's constrained silence between them his face had cleared
and he had laughed cheerfully.
"But we need not be so solemn over it, Irene. I know my mother, and I
have no fears as to her wishes. Nothing that anybody could say would
make me believe that she could be happier away from me than with me. I
would almost not believe it if she said so herself. Quite, indeed. I
should feel that she had over-persuaded herself in some spirit of
sacrifice. There is material in my mother for martyrdom, Irene. It shall
be your and my study to prevent her from indulging in it."
His wife made no attempt to reply. She was in some respects a wise woman
and she understood that there was a time when silence was golden. When
she spoke again, it was to ask if he did not think curtains lined with
rose color would be an improvement on those now separating their
dressing room from the main apartment.
CHAPTER XIV
THE GENERAL MANAGER
"MOTHER, don't you think that you are being rather hard on Irene to
undertake to hold her to restrictions to which she has never been
accustomed, and which to her seem narrow and unreasonable?"
Erskine Burnham had followed his mother to her room evidently with a
view to speaking to her alone, his wife having gone on into her own room
and closed the door. Even though she had not felt it in the tone of his
voice, Mrs. Burnham would have known by her son's opening word that he
was annoyed.
He rarely used the word "mother" when addressing her directly. As a rule
the habits of his childhood prevailed, and "mamma" was the name in
frequent use; or, oftener still perhaps, when they were quite alone, his
special pet name for her, "mommie," came naturally to his lips. But of
late she had heard, oftener than ever before, what was to him a colder
term "Mother," and had learned to know what it meant.
She hesitated a moment before replying, and her hesitation seemed to
irritate her son. He spoke quickly, with a note in his voice which she
had never found in it before.
"I must confess, mother, that I am surprised and not a little
disappointed at the course you are taking. When I brought Irene here, it
was not only in the hope but the assured belief that I was bringing her
to what she had never really had before--a mother,--and that you would
become to her in time, what you have always been to me. I never for a
moment dreamed of your standing coldly at one side, not only indifferent
to her innocent devices for pleasure, but actually blocking her way! If
I could have imagined such a condition of things, I would have better
understood her feeling from the very first that we ought to go into a
house of our own, where she would not feel herself an interloper."
Mrs. Burnham was ready then with her reply.
"Erskine, I do not think Irene could have understood me. I made no
attempt to hold her to any restrictions. She asked a direct question
about my own views, which, of course, I answered. But I ought not to
have to explain to my son that I do not try to force my opinions upon
any one."
He made a movement of impatience.
"That kind of thing is not necessary, mother, between us; but you know
very well that there are ways of expressing one's opinions that
effectually trammel others of the same household.
"The simple truth is that Irene has played cards, for amusement, in her
own and her friends' parlors, ever since she was old enough to play
games of any kind; and to her, our ideas concerning cards seem as absurd
as though applied to tennis or golf. Personally, I see no reason why she
should not continue to amuse herself in her own way. It is true I do not
play cards; but she knows, what both you and I understand perfectly,
that this is a concession on my part to the extreme views of my mother,
who could hardly expect my wife to have exactly the same spirit. I have
told Irene that out of deference to your feelings, I do not want her to
entertain her friends with cards, in the parlors, but she certainly
ought to be left free to do in her own rooms what she pleases."
At almost any other period in Mrs. Burnham's life, a formal and
elaborate expression of her son's views upon any subject, given in a
haughty and almost dictatorial tone, such as he was using, would have
filled his mother with astonishment and pain. She was almost curiously
interested in herself on discovering that she had passed that stage, and
was occupying her mind for the moment with quite a different matter.
Why had Irene chosen just this line of attack? What did she hope to
accomplish by such a singularly distorted representation of their talk
together? It must have been sadly distorted to have moved Erskine to an
exhibition of annoyance such as he had never before shown to her. Yet
had he been present at the interview, his mother felt confident that it
would not have disturbed him.
She went swiftly over the talk, in memory, while Erskine waited, and
fingered the books and magazines on her table with the air of a nervous
man who wanted to appear at ease. It had been a brief conversation, not
significant at least to an observer, in any way. Irene had been looking
over the mail, and had exclaimed at an invitation.
"The Wheelers are giving another card party; what indefatigable
entertainers they are! it isn't a month since their last one. This time
it is a very select few, in Mrs. Harry Wheeler's rooms. That is what
Erskine and I must do, since you won't allow cards in the parlors. Have
you really such queer notions, mother, as Erskine pretends?"
Mrs. Burnham remembered just how carefully she had watched her words, in
reply.
"I don't play cards, Irene, if that is what you mean."
"Oh, I mean a great deal more than that. Erskine says you won't allow
such wicked things in your part of the house. Is that so?"
"We have never had them in the house since Judge Burnham changed his
views with regard to them."
"Oh, did he change? how curious, for a lawyer, too! I don't believe
Erskine will get notional as he grows older. He isn't one of that kind."
Whereupon the older woman had turned resolutely away, resolved to speak
no more words on the subject unless they were spoken in Erskine's
presence. It was this conversation, reported, that had brought her son
to her in his new and lofty mood of guardian of his wife's liberties!
Just as he tossed down the magazine with which he had been playing, with
the air of one who meant to wait no longer, his mother spoke with gentle
dignity.
"Erskine, of course your rooms are your own, to do with as you will. I
made no restrictions and hinted at none. On my desk under the
paper-weight is the quotation you wished looked up, and also the
statistics about which you asked." Then she turned and passed out, to
the hall.
All this was on a midsummer morning nearly three months removed from
that moonlighted evening on which this mother had renewed her solemn
pledge to be to her son and her son's wife all that they would let her
be. In the face of steady resistance she had been fairly true to the
pledge. It had now become quite plain to her that it was not chance, nor
mere heedlessness, that was working against her, but that Mrs. Erskine
Burnham meant to resist her, meant to look upon her as a force in her
way, to be got rid of if possible; if not by persuading her son to leave
her, then, perhaps by making her so uncomfortable that she would leave
him. The plan was not succeeding. Ruth Erskine Burnham had lived through
too many trying experiences before this time to be easily routed. She
was in the home to which her husband had brought her as a bride, and she
meant that nothing but a stern sense of duty should ever separate her
from it.
Yet Mrs. Erskine Burnham, if she had but known it, had accomplished
much. The mother no longer turned with a sickening pain from the thought
of Erskine having other home than hers. There were times when she could
almost have joined his wife in pleading for that "cunning little
cottage." There were days wherein she told herself breathlessly and very
secretly, that for Erskine to come home to her for a single half-hour,
_alone_, would compensate for days of absence.
But if she had changed her point of view, so had Irene. His wife talked
to him no more of a home by themselves. She was growing fond of the
many-roomed, rambling old house whose utter abandonment to luxurious
comfort was the talk and the pride of the neighborhood; and was the
result of years of careful study on the part of a cultured woman
accustomed to luxuries.
The new Mrs. Burnham developed an interest in the carefully-trained
servants who had been a part of the establishment for so many years that
they said "our" and "ours" in speaking of its belongings. She came to
realize, at least in a measure, that servants like these were hard to
secure, and harder to keep. She began also to like the comfort of
proprietorship, without the accompanying sense of responsibility. The
machinery of this house could move on steadily without break or jar, and
without an hour of care or thought bestowed by her; yet her slightest
order was obeyed promptly and skilfully.
Her orders were growing more and more frequent, and it was becoming
increasingly apparent to those who had eyes to see that "young Mrs.
Burnham," as some of them called her, was assuming the reins and being
recognized as the head of the house.
Ellen, the maid who had been with Mrs. Burnham since Erskine's boyhood,
and who was a rebel against other authority than hers, had openly
rebelled, one day, and with blazing eyes that yet softened when the
tears came, assured Ruth that she could not have two mistresses,
especially when the one who wasn't mistress at all took pains to
contradict the orders of the other; and if she had got to be ordered
about all the time by Mrs. Erskine, the sooner she went, the better.
"Very well, Ellen," Mrs. Burnham had said, holding her tones to cold
dignity. "I shall be sorry to part with you, but it is quite certain
that so long as you remain in the house you must obey Mrs. Erskine
Burnham's slightest wish. If you cannot do this, of course we must
separate."
So Ellen went. In a perfect storm of tears and sobs and regrets, it is
true; but she went. This arrangement pleased just one person. Erskine
openly complained that her successor was not and never would be a
circumstance to Ellen, and made his mother confess that she missed Ellen
sorely, and asked her why, after being faithfully served for twenty
years, she could not have borne with a few peculiarities. His mother was
thankful that he did not insist upon knowing just what form her
peculiarities took, and his wife's eyes sparkled. She had recognized
Ellen from the first as an enemy, and had meant to be rid of her.
In short, Mrs. Erskine Burnham had settled down. She told her special
friends with a cheerful sigh that she had sacrificed herself to her
husband's mother, who was growing old and ought not to be burdened with
the care of a house. So, much as they would have enjoyed a home to
themselves, they had determined to stay where they were.
So steady and skilful were this General's movements toward supremacy
that Ruth herself scarcely realized the fact that when she gave an order
in these days, she did it hesitatingly, often adding as an
afterthought:--
"Let that be the arrangement, unless Mrs. Erskine Burnham has other
plans; if she has, remember, I am not at all particular." And she was
never surprised any more by the discovery that there was a totally
different arrangement. It was therefore in exceeding bad taste for
Erskine Burnham to present himself to his mother in lofty mood and
threaten her with a separate home for himself and wife. One of his
mother's chief concerns at this time was to shield him from the
knowledge that she sometimes prayed for solitude as the safest way out
of the thickening clouds. That he did not realize any of this can only
be attributed to the condition of which his wife often accused him;
namely, that he was "as blind as a bat."
The proposed card-party at the Wheelers' came off in due time, both
Irene and Erskine being among the guests. Within the month, Irene gave
what the next morning's social column called "an exclusive and charming
affair" of the same kind in her own rooms. It is true that she had
schemed for a different result from this. She had meant to give a card
party on a larger scale. Her careful rendering to her husband of the
talk about restrictions had been intended to call from him the
declaration that the parlors were as much theirs as his mother's, and
that if she chose to play cards in them, no one should disturb her. She
miscalculated. Instead of this, his deliverance was more emphatic than
ever before.
"Remember, Irene, that my mother's sense of the fitness of things must
never be infringed upon in any way that can disturb her. Our rooms are
our castle and we will do with them as we choose; but no cards
downstairs, remember, or anything else that will disturb her--"
"Prejudices!" his wife had interrupted in a manner that she had intended
should be playful; but he had spoken quickly and with dignity.
"Very well, prejudices if you will. I was going to say traditions; but
if you prefer the other word, it doesn't matter. Whatever they are, they
are to be respected."
So Irene, having learned some time before this that such deliverances on
the part of her husband were to be respected, took care to keep within
the limits of their own rooms. But she took a little private revenge
upon her mother-in-law, given in that especially trying would-be playful
tone of hers.
"I am sorry that your prejudices--oh, no, pardon me, I mean your
traditions--will not allow you to meet our guests this evening; but I
suppose that would be wicked, too? Pray how is your absence to be
accounted for? Must I trump up an attack of mumps, or dumps, or what?"
As for Erskine, he remained happily unconscious of all these small
stings. He was much engrossed in business cares, and left home early and
returned late, so that in reality he knew little of what took place
during his absence. That all was not quite as he had hoped between his
wife and his mother he could not help seeing, but he told himself that
he must not be unreasonable; that two people as differen
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