Aunt Lucy

“ Evelyn, I can tell you," Fleda went on gayly.
"Do you know, aunt Lucy, I have made up my mind that my visit to New York was a dream, and the dream is nicely folded away with my silk dresses. Now I must go tell that precious Philetus about the post-office--I am so comforted, aunt Lucy, whenever I see that fellow staggering into the house under a great log of wood! I have not heard anything in a long time so pleasant as the ringing strokes of his axe in the yard. Isn't life made up of little things!" ”

“ Mudge finds it out she will abuse you.”
“I am used to that, Paul,” said Aunt Lucy, with a sorrowful smile. “I have borne it many times, and I can again. But I can't lie quiet and let you go without one word of parting. You are quite determined to go?”
“Quite, Aunt Lucy. I never could stay here. There is no pleasure in the present, and no hope for the future. I want to see something of life,” and Paul's boyish figure dilated with enthusiasm. ”

“ Launce turned redder than ever. “I’m sorry, Aunt Lucy. I heard godfather call you that, and Uncle Will laughed. I thought it was polite.” He hoped she would laugh too, and kiss him in a pleased way, as she did when he remembered to give her her English name of Lucy.
But she still looked at him strangely. “These little flowers are just as sweet,” she said with earnestness: “they are brave and poor, but they content the heart. Oh, yes they content the heart.”
“Not his,” persisted Launce; “he wants roses, Aunt Lucy, red roses with the sun on ’em.” ”

“ Aunt Lucy never saw him again. She insisted upon being brought away immediately to Lime, and shut herself up there. She was very peculiar at this time and for a year afterwards, one of her odd fancies being that her maid Griffiths was always to breakfast and have luncheon with the family and be waited on as a lady. We children all went to the funeral, driving in the family chariot. I had no real affection for Uncle Marcus, but felt unusually solemnised by the tears around me. ”

“ She's always been tender and devoted enough to him. Good heavens, when you think of her beauty and her brilliant ability—what she might not have done if she had been a man.”
“Oh, as a man—yes,” said Aunt Lucy, quite hatefully.
“When you think,” John went on, ignoring the interruption, “of all poor Ray's business failures, and what she has done for him—how to-day they are living on her little capital—I must say it seems to me that every member of his family ought to be abjectly grateful to her.”
“H'm—abject,” observed Aunt Lucy, “a very good word. ”

“ Uncle Julius and Aunt Esther visited Rockend when we were there, and as my aunts when together generally acted as foils to each other, I should have been at liberty to enjoy the really beautiful place—its delightful gardens, storm-beaten rocks, and the tower where Aunt Lucy “made her meditations”—if I had been well enough; but I had generally to spend the greater part of the day lying upon the floor on a hard backboard and in a state of great suffering. ”

“ After lunch, when the twins came into the drawing-room, Lucy drew a footstool near her aunt, and sat down meekly upon it, thinking that the sooner Aunt Anne began to talk the sooner it would be over.
Aunt Anne was feeling almost as much embarrassed by the presence of so many children as they were by that of their aunt, but her sense of duty was strong, and she began to make conversation with the one nearest her—who happened to be Lucy. ”

“ Nearly two months now since both those deaths; surely Lucy's aunt might soon be told now of the engagement. It was after this outing that he began in his letters, and in the few moments he and she were alone, to urge Lucy to tell her aunt. Nobody else need know, he wrote; it could go on being kept secret from the world; but the convenience of her aunt's knowing was so obvious,—think of how she would then keep out of the way, think of how she would leave them to themselves, anyhow indoors, anyhow in the house in Eaton Terrace. ”

“ This from Aunt Lucy. "It's one thing for you to help Mrs. Schuyler out in an emergency, but you're not to get mixed up in a murder trial!"
"An inquest isn't a trial, Auntie," and Win looked like a wise owl, as she aired her new and suddenly acquired knowledge. "Can't I go, Chess?"
"We'll see, Infant. Perhaps, if Mrs. Schuyler needs your services she may want you there with her."
"Oh, in that case—" began Aunt Lucy, but Winnie was off again on one of her enthusiastic descriptions of the grand ways of the Schuyler household, and Aunt Lucy was quite willing to listen. ”

“ Then came the sewing; and Lucy's heart sank as Cousin Debby opened the work-box.
Strangely enough, however, she did not appear to miss the thimble, although the little satin-lined compartment where it belonged was plainly empty.
"Now let me see how diligent you can be," said she, as she unfolded the little petticoat. "You have done this very neatly, Lucy,—as well as I could have done it myself. Aunt Bernard must have taken great pains with your needlework. There are very few girls of your age who can work so neatly. You see you have at least one thing for which to thank her." ”

“ Lucy said these words with all energy which showed that she was thoroughly in earnest, and which made the gentle little Dulcie look up with surprise and horror.
"Oh, Lady Lucy, you should not feel so! It is not right. If she has treated you ever so bad, you ought to forgive her."
"Aunt Bernard never forgave me or anybody," returned Lucy. "She said once that she never forgave or forgot; and I have heard Margery say that she would never answer her own son's letter, when he wrote begging her pardon for running away to sea." ”

“ How much of care had lighted That lingering, loving kiss, Had you in life but gave it— You never thought of this. No loving hand e'er brightened Her life with tender care, No mother's baby-kisses Were ever hers to share. Only for others caring, The long, long years have fled; Now, only, they say,—the neighbors— "Poor old Aunt Lucy's dead." And they whisper a girl's ambition, A name in the world to make; 'Way back in her vanished youth-time, Gave up for a duty's sake. But whatever had been the story Of love, or grief, or woe, It died with the heart, and no one Will ever care or know. ”

“ But he knows something, and they know too. I think I’ve seen, Aunt Lucy—I’m almost sure I’ve seen. I think he calls things. He wakes and calls. It is like music, but there is no sound. It is like dancing, but he does not move. Only he is awake, somehow, inside the stone. And last night, when the moon came out between the clouds, I saw the rabbits dance on the path, and other things, too—”
“What things?”
“Oh, I don’t know,” said Launce desperately. “I fell asleep on the window-sill. Little queer things out of the larch-plantation, but all alive and dancing.” ”

“ I said glasses with sand inside; that's what Uncle James has got. Runs out every hour. Sits on the table."
"Oh, I know what you mean, auntie! You mean an hour-glass! Grandpa Hale has one and I've seen lots of 'em in France."
Lucy felt humbled. Though pretending to be Bab's aunt, she often found that her little niece knew more than she knew herself!
"Seems queer about Adam and Eve," said she, hastening to change the subject; "who do you s'pose took care of 'em when they were little babies?"
"Why, Auntie Lucy, there wasn't ever any babiness about Adam and Eve! ”

“ Miss Entwhistle wished she had never had a single critical impatient thought of the man this darling little child so deeply loved, and Lucy wished she had never had a single secret from this darling little aunt Everard so blindly didn't love. Dear, dear little Aunt Dot. Lucy's heart was big with gratitude and tenderness and pity,—pity because she herself was so gloriously happy and surrounded by love, and Aunt Dot's life seemed, compared to hers, so empty, so solitary, and going to be like that till the end of her days ”

“ Lucy Rose had a horrible, haunting idea that it was extremely provincial for her aunt always to take the big basket, packed full of country good things, whenever she went to visit Edward and Geraldine. Geraldine was so stylish, and might think it queer; and then Aunt Cyrilla always would carry it on her arm and give cookies and apples and molasses taffy out of it to every child she encountered and, just as often as not, to older folks too. ”

“ As Lucy looked at her aunt, she observed the shifting glance, the crafty smile, the nervous interlacing of the fingers.
“Mean?” she returned innocently. “Why, nothing, Aunt Ellen. We must all work for a living one way or another, I suppose. ”

“ The prosy old omnibus, as it sped on its way to Clapham, was to me as an Elysian chariot. And we had it to ourselves the whole way, but never a word passed between us that might not have been spoken before a committee of dowagers. In fact, we talked chiefly of Miss Brightman. I began it by asking how she was.
"Aunt Lucy is very delicate indeed," replied Annabel. "Papa's death has tried her greatly: and anything that tries her at once affects her chest. ”

“ So from time to time Aunt Lucy received, through Ben, letters from Paul, which kept her acquainted with his progress at school. These letters were very precious to the old lady, and she read them over many times. They formed a bright link of interest which bound her to the outside world, and enabled her to bear up with greater cheerfulness against the tyranny of Mrs. Mudge. ”

“ I believed it too, though I dared not dwell on the thought for a moment.
"I know my aunt and Mrs. Alice think so!" she continued. "I should be content, Lucy, only for you. My life has not been long, but I have learned that this world is a sad place for motherless girls."
"You must not talk, my dearest, you will exhaust yourself!" was all I could say.
"It will not hurt her!" said Lady Thornyhaugh, in a whisper from behind the curtain. "Let her say her say and ease her mind."
"I am ready to go!" repeated Amabel. "But, oh, Lucy! I want to see my father and Walter. ”

“ I shall never forget your kindness and charity, as I can never forget your loveliness and truth. My lady of goodness! I believe there is not another such combination of beauty, brains, and sincerity on the face of the earth." "How she swallowed it all!" he added to himself.
She drew out her tiny jewelled watch and glanced at it with a pout. "We must go soon," she murmured, reluctantly. "Aunt Lucy keeps such close count of my every moment, and"—she turned her innocent eyes to his face—"I do so hate deception." ”

“ Jane Denton signified her approval with sparkling eyes, and the other girls followed suit.
"Well, that is settled," said Mrs. Brett. "You may call me Aunt Susy, those of you who like."
Lucy looked at her aunt almost as though she hated her at that moment. Mrs. Brett did not pretend to see the glance.
"Now," she said, "what are you going to do this afternoon? Why should not we all go and have tea down by the river? Why shouldn't we? Your mother wouldn't object, would she?"
"Oh, no; mother never objects to anything," said Lucy, with a little sigh. ”

“ She had watched from an upper window the gathering of the crowd, and now she swooped down upon them.
“Shame o’ yerselbes!” she said. “Come yere bodderin’ the young marse fust minute as eber he get in de house! Whar’s yer manners?”
“Don’t scold them, Aunt Lucy,” pleaded Le. “They came to welcome me home.”
“Dey come to beg, dat’s wot dey come for—to beg. It’s a habit dey gibs deirselves,” said the unrelenting Lucy.
“It is a habit they cannot indulge in more than once in three years, where I am concerned. I do not come home every day.” ”

“ But though we are both here, now, the region is unseemly to both, and neither need remain an hour longer than it is agreeable. Why should you remain out of your sphere, and exposed to every sort of humiliating peril."
"You forget—my aunt."
"Ay, but what security is there that she will not give you another uncle?"
"Oh, fie, Ralph!"
"Ay, she is too feeble of will, too weak, to be independent. She will marry again, Lucy, and is not the woman to choose wisely. Besides, she is not your natural aunt. She is so by marriage only. The tie between you is one which gives her no proper claim upon you." ”

“ It was not quite noon when Cousin Debby and Lucy sat down to dinner.
Lucy had all her life been limited and scrimped as to her food. Aunt Bernard's housekeeping was far from liberal, at the best. True, she had always some sort of meat for dinner; but of this Lucy seldom got more than a very small taste, and right glad was she to be helped to enough of the batter-pudding, or dumpling cooked with the meat, to stay her hunger. Of tart, pudding, or any thing of that sort, she never tasted save by stealth when Margery or Anne would smuggle away a bit for her. ”

“ What do you want to do most?”
“Clare and Lady Desborough are coming back to tea,” suggested Rose, with a laugh. “You are not very hospitable, Pauline. And to-morrow we shall be busy all day. My time will soon be over, won’t it? Do you know, Aunt Lucy has asked Miss Sampson down to Woodcote again to-morrow, Pauline? I wonder if she has found out that she is related to Cousin Lydia’s husband. I don’t see what Aunt Lucy can want her for.”
“Poor relations are a great nuisance,” said Pauline sharply. “It is foolish of your aunt to have anything to do with her. ”