Frank R. Stockton

“ Haverley wanted a mistress for his house, and felt inclined to marry Miss Cicely Drane, he couldn't make a better choice."
"Choice!" repeated Miss Panney, sarcastically. "He has no choice to make. That is settled, and that is the very reason why people will talk the more and sharper, and nothing you can say, Madam Jane La Fleur, will stop them. Not only does this look like a scheme to marry Mr. Haverley to a girl who can bring him nothing, but to break off a most advantageous match with a lady who, in social position, wealth, and in every way, stands second to no one in this county." ”

“ I simply mean that you should allow him to expose himself to your influences."
"I shall do nothing of the kind!" cried Dora, her face in a flush; "if he wants that sort of exposure, let him come here. I don't know whether I want him to come or not. I am too young to be thinking of marrying anybody, and though I don't want to be disrespectful to you, Miss Panney, I will say that I am getting dreadfully tired of your continual harping about Ralph Haverley, and trying to make me push myself in front of him so that his lordship may look at me. ”

“ As she walked by the side of Dora, with the bottle in one hand and the other holding up her voluminous silk robe, it was well for her peace of mind that no stately coachman sat upon a box and looked at her.
In a corner of the lower floor of the barn they found the calf, lying upon a bed of hay, and covered by a large piece of mosquito netting, which Miriam had fastened above and around him. Dora laughed as she saw this.
"It isn't every calf," she said, "that sleeps so luxuriously." ”

“ At their age they can eat anything."
"How old is Miss Haverley?" asked Dora.
"Miss Haverley!" repeated Miss Panney, "she's nothing but a girl, with her hair down her back and her skirts a foot from the ground. I call her a child."
A shadow came over the soul of Miss Bannister.
Would it be possible, she thought, to maintain, with a girl who did not yet put up her hair or wear long skirts, the intimacy she had hoped to maintain with Mr. Haverley's sister? ”

“ As Miriam went around toward the kitchen, Ralph sprang to the ground, and
Dora approached him. Miss Panney could see her face under the sunbonnet.
It was suffused with the light of a smiling, beaming welcome.
"You did go quickly, didn't you?" she said. "You must be a good driver."
"I didn't want to lose any time," answered Ralph, "and I made Mrs. Browning step along lively. As it was, I was afraid that your brother might arrive before I got back and that I might find you were gone." ”

“ Drane."
"La Fleur," said Miss Panney, "if you leave Dr. Tolbridge, I think it will be a great mistake; and, although I do not want to hurt your feelings, I feel bound to say that it will be almost a crime."
The cook's face assumed an expression of firmness.
"All that may be," she said, "but it makes no difference. If they need me, I shall go to them."
"But cannot somebody else be found to go to them? You are not as necessary there as you are here, nor so highly prized. They let you go of their own accord."
"No one else will go to them for nothing," said La Fleur, "and I shall do that." ”

“ But tell me one thing; do you think that this Haverley-Drane combination is going to deprive me of La Fleur?"
"Upon my word!" cried the old lady, springing to her feet, "never did I see a man so steeped in selfishness. Not a word of sympathy for me! In all this unfortunate affair, you think of nothing but the danger of losing your cook! Well, I am happy to say you are going to lose her. That will be your punishment, and well you deserve it. She will no more think of staying with you, after the Dranes set up housekeeping at Cobhurst, than I would think of coming to cook for you. ”

“ The lady of the house excused herself, and in a few minutes returned, smiling.
"She wished to tell me," said she, "before my visitor left, that the name of the 'sweet' which she gave us at luncheon is la promesse, being merely a promise of what she is going to do, when she gets about her everything she wants."
"Kitty Tolbridge," said Miss Panney, solemnly, "whatever happens, don't mind that woman's oddity. Keep your mind on her cooking, and don't consider anything else. She is an angel, and she belongs to the very smallest class of angels that visit human beings. ”

“ For several days Cicely and Miriam cut and stitched and fitted and took in and let out, and one morning Miriam came down to breakfast attired in the pink chintz gown, its skirt touching the floor, and with her long brown hair tastefully done up in a knot upon her head.
"What a fine young woman has my little sister grown into!" exclaimed Ralph. "To look at you, Miriam, it seems as if years must have passed since yesterday. That is the pink dress that Dora Bannister wore when she was here, isn't it?" ”

“ When Miriam came back from the kitchen, she found that the doctor had left the house and was going to his buggy at the gate.
"Oh, Ralph!" she exclaimed, "you do not know what a nice woman she is. She is just like an old family nurse." And then she ran out to catch the doctor, and talk to him about Cicely.
"Your sister is a child yet," remarked Mrs. Tolbridge, with a smile.
"Indeed she is," said Ralph; "and she longs for what she never had—old family servants, household ties, and all that sort of thing. And I believe she would prefer a good old Southern mammy to a fine young lover." ”

“ When she had finished this business, Miss Panney stood for a few moments on the broad piazza of the hotel, which was deserted, for almost everybody was on the beach. In spite of her agitation a grim smile came over her face.
"Perhaps that was a little strong," she thought, "but it has gone now. And no matter how he finds things, I can prove to him he is needed. I do not believe he will be too much frightened; men never are, and I will see to it that he has a blessed change in his feelings when he gets here." ”

“ She is shut up in the narrowest place in which a girl can be put, with responsibilities entirely beyond her years, and which help to cramp her mind and her ideas. She should have a total change; she should see how the world, outside of her school and her country home, lives and acts—in fact, she needs exactly what Barport and you and Mrs. Bannister can give her. I do not believe that you can bestow a greater benefit upon a fellow-being than to ask Miriam to pay you a visit while you are at the seaside. Think of this, I beg of you, my dear Dora. ”

“ It might be a long time before people who were jolly good friends came to look upon each other from a marrying point of view. Things ought to be hurried up; that Miss Bannister would be away for two weeks; she, La Fleur, would be here for two weeks. She must try what she could do; the fire must be brightened,—the draught turned on, ashes raked out, kindling-wood thrust in if necessary, to make things hotter. At all events the dinner-bell must ring at the appointed time, in a fortnight, less one day. ”

“ Miss Panney stopped talking, gazed at the dish for a minute, and then helped herself to a goodly portion of its contents.
"Feathers," she said to herself; "no more than froth and feathers to a man who has been working hard half a day, and as to the extravagance of such flimsy victuals—" She could keep quiet no longer, she was obliged to speak out, and she burst into a tirade against people who called themselves pious, and yet, wilfully shutting their eyes, were about to plunge into wicked wastefulness. ”

“ In this world we do want people to do what we think they ought to do."
"Yes," said Ralph, knowingly, "I see. But now, Miss Panney, don't you really think that Boston would have been too rich a place for me? That it would have expected too much of me, and that perhaps it would have done too much for me? Boston is a good enough place, but if you only knew how much lovelier Nantucket is—"
"Stop, stop, boy!" said the old lady. "I am getting so old now, that I am obliged to stop happy people and disappointed people from talking to me. ”

“ I may carry wood for cooks, but I do not eat with them."
"But, Ralph," said Miriam, "you ought to consider the circumstances. She is not a common Irishwoman, or German. She is an American, and has always taken her meals with the family in which she lived. I could not ask her to eat in the kitchen. You know, Mike takes his meals there since Phoebe has gone. Indeed, Ralph, I cannot expect her to do a thing that she has never done in her life, before. Do you really think you would mind it? You work with Mike in the field, and you don't mind that, and this girl is very respectable, I assure you." ”

“ Every preparation and arrangement was made for an early start, and Ralph wandered in and out of the house, impatient as a wild beast to break away and be gone. Cicely, whose soul was full of his sorrow, went out to him on the piazza, where he stood, looking at the late moon rising above the treetops.
"What a different man I should be," he said, "if I could think that
Miriam was standing on the seashore and looking at that moon." ”

“ Haverley, and her dear mother is living with her, and when Miss Miriam has gone to finish her education at whatever seminary is decided on. Then this house will seem like my true home, and begging your pardon, madam, you cannot imagine how happy I am going to be."
"You!" exclaimed Miss Panney. "What earthly difference does it make to anybody whether you are happy or not?"
The jelly seemed to grow softer and more transparent.
"I am only a cook," said La Fleur, "but I can be as happy as persons of the highest quality, and I understand their natures very well, having lived with them. ”

“ Now I don't believe there is anything serious the matter with you today."
"There is always something serious the matter with a person of my age," said Miss Panney, "and as for Dr. Tolbridge's visits to me doing him any harm, it is all stuff and nonsense. They do him good; they rest him; they brighten him up. He's never livelier than when he is with me. He doesn't have to hang over me all the night, giving me this and that, to keep the breath in my body, when he ought to be taking the rest that he needs more than any of us."
Mrs. Tolbridge laughed. ”

“ When Ralph heard this, he was very angry, and wanted to go and talk to the woman.
"Don't you do anything of the kind," said Miriam. "It is not your business to talk to cooks. I do that. And I want to go to-morrow to Thorbury and get some one to come to us by the day until the new cook arrives. If I can get her, I am going to engage Seraphina, Mike's sister."
Ralph looked at her and laughed.
"Well, well, Miss Teaberry," he said, "you are getting on bravely. Putting up your hair and letting down your skirts has done wonders. You are the true lady of the house now." ”

“ Let the good woman go down and see Molly Tooney, and if she can give her some points about cooking, I am sure we shall all be delighted."
"Oh, she would not do that," said Mrs. Drane. "She is a very considerate person; but I suppose, in any house, her instincts would naturally draw her toward the cook."
When Ralph turned to La Fleur, and assured her that his sister would be glad to have her visit the kitchen, the old woman, who had not taken her eyes from him for an instant, thanked him with great unction, again bowed, courtesied, smiled, and, being shown the way to the kitchen, descended. ”

“ And if there is any one who does not think so—"
"Stop!" exclaimed Miss Panney; "your face is getting red. Never jump over a wall when there is a bottomless ditch on the other side. You might miss the ditch, but it is not likely. You are in love, and when people are that way, the straight back of a saw is parallel to every line of its teeth. Don't quarrel, and I will go on with my congratulations."
"Very queer ones they are so far, I am sure," replied Ralph, his face still flushed a little. ”

“ Miriam is a most lovely girl, but her character has not hardened itself into what it is going to be, and association with a thoroughbred girl, such as Dora Bannister, admirably educated, who has seen something of the world, with an intelligence and wit such as I have never known in any one of her age, and more than all with a soul as beautiful as her face, cannot fail to be an inestimable benefit to your sister. ”

“ Miss Panney was glad to find Miriam alone on the front piazza, training some over-luxuriant vines upon the pillars; and the moment her eyes fell upon the girl, she saw that she was dressed as a woman, and not in the youthful costume in which she had last seen her. This strengthened the old lady's previous impression that Ralph's sister was rapidly becoming the real head of this house, and that it would be necessary to be very careful in her conduct toward her. It might be difficult, even impossible, to carry out her match-making plans if Miriam should rise up in opposition to them. ”

“ Whether or not Dora would have enjoyed all this as much had she been alone is a point not necessary to settle, but she was a true country girl, and had loved chickens, barns, and hay from her babyhood up. She stepped quickly to the open door, and she and Ralph leaned upon the bar and looked out upon the beautiful scene.
"How charming it will be," she said, "for your sister to come here and sit with her reading or sewing. She can look out and see you, almost wherever you happen to be on your farm."
"I don't believe Miriam will be content to sit still and watch anybody," replied Ralph. ”