Gail

“ Now, Gail, see what Santa Claus has brought you. There's at least one thing, 'cause—"
Cherry clapped her hand over her younger sister's mouth, and began to giggle. So did Gail, when she drew forth from her stocking a bulky potato pig with toothpicks for legs, match-heads for eyes and a dry woodbine tendril for a tail.
"Who in the world made that?" she laughed, tears close to the surface, for she had expected nothing this Christmas day.
"Mr. Strong," gulped Peace, dancing with delight at her sister's evident surprise. "Look at his back! We put a saddle on the old porker. Isn't that cute? ”

“ Gail’s eyelids closed; the long, brown lashes curved down on her cheeks, revealing just a sparkle of brightness, while the mischievous little smile twitched at the corners of her lips.
“If you were an ordinary girl, I would urge you, to-night, to make a selection among the exceptionally excellent matrimonial material of which you have a choice, but, with your extraordinary talents and beauty, my advice is just to the contrary. You should delay until you have had a wider opportunity for judgment. ”

“ You march straight upstairs to bed—and Cherry, too!" Then Gail flew one way and Faith the other, to collect the birds before the buyers had a chance to dish up the delicacy to adored families.
When they had seen the last fowl safely disposed of, and were home once more, Gail said despairingly, "I don't know what in the world to do with that child!"
"She needs a good, sound thrashing," answered Faith sharply. "She gets into more mischief in a day than a monkey would in a month."
"She doesn't mean to," pleaded Gail. "Mother never believed in whipping. ”

“ And she explained, "Well, Gail remembers the speeches and what folks say just to each other. Faith hears only the music. Hope sees the pretty things folks wear. Cherry tells what they had to eat, and Allee fills up the chinks." ”

“ No group of young people could resist such careful work as that, especially when performed by a young woman so adroit and so attractive, and so well gowned; so they lost their awkwardness with her, which removed any sense of discomfort Gail might have felt, which was the aim to be accomplished. In those first few days Gail was the happiest of all creatures, in spite of the fact that the local papers had carried a politer echo of that despicable slave story. ”

“ She gathered Gail into the boneless cradle of her curved arms.
Regina took her sunglasses out of her purse and hid her eyes. "Mind your own damned business," she told Mrs. Baden and me.
"It is our damned business," I whispered to Mrs. Baden, and she held my arm as we followed Regina down the hall.
Mrs. His-tara threaded her way through a cordon of other Hisereans who must have been flown in for the occasion. I couldn't see the children, but I could hear them.
"Him cold!" said Gail. "Him scared!"
"He's scared of you," Regina said. "We're sorry, Gail. Tell him we're sorry. We didn't understand." ”

“ You will whip that child like she deserves, or pay for the damage she has done,—one or the other, and I mean it, too!" Without waiting for her reply, he started down the path again, leaving Gail white-faced and distressed in the kitchen door.
As soon as he was out of sight Peace slid from her perch to the ground below, deserting the corncob doll she had been dressing, and scurried away to the barn loft to face the new and undreamed-of situation. A licking or pay for the damage done! Why had she been so thoughtless and mean? She might have known that Gail would be the one to suffer. ”

“ The drawn curtain flew up with a flirt, a small, tousled head appeared behind the screen, and a childish voice in a loud whisper commanded, "Keep still, you old Towzer! It isn't time to wake Gail yet. We've got to get those flowers and she wouldn't let us if she knew."
A second small face joined the first at the window, followed by still another, all blinking sleepily, but eager with excitement. "Oh, Peace," whispered the oldest of the trio, in an awestruck voice, "isn't it a beau—ti—ful day? ”

“ Reckon all your passengers would have got a good jolt. I stopped so's we could finish dressing. Cherry, where is your other shoe? You have run all the way down the road with only one on. Just look at your stockings!"
"Where's yours? You haven't any stockings at all," retorted the first voice, still sharp with indignation.
"In my pocket. I was afraid Gail would hear as 'fore we got gone. There, Allee, your dress is done. Fasten up your shoes while I put on my stockings. We'll have to hurry like mischief, 'cause I don't think Gail will go back to sleep again." ”

“ Gail answered the imperative knock, and Peace heard him demand wrathfully, "Where is Peace?"
"Somewhere around the place. She was under the maple there at the corner a few moments ago. Is something wrong? Has she been annoying you again?"
"Annoying me? She has daubed letters all over the back of my new barn. I shall have to paint the whole building now, and it isn't very funny business. If I had got hold of her when I first saw her work, I'd have given her a thrashing she wouldn't have forgotten in one while. ”

“ Oh, the paper fell off, and it's shoes—tennis slippers in the winter! Think of it! That is worse than Mrs. Grinnell's hair-ribbon, ain't it?"
"Peace!" cried Gail in shocked tones, entering the kitchen with the rest of the family at her heels. "You should be grateful for the presents people give you and not poke fun at them." ”

“ Hi Allen had shared his home with me when I was an orphan; I would share my home with his little granddaughters, alone in the world and in trouble,—for by this time I had heard about the mortgage and the battle being fought in the little brown house to keep the family together. Mothering this big brood is too great a task for Gail. She needs mothering herself. ”

“ I am grateful, Gail, truly. I ain't poking fun at them, honest, though they are funny presents for this time of the year. I s'pose, maybe, my hair will get long enough for a ribbon sometime, though Mrs. Strong says it is too curly to grow fast. And when summer comes, we can wear these slippers, if they aren't too small. They look awful little already. These are marked for Allee, and here are mine, and those are Cherry's. There aren't any for the rest of you. I s'pose the pie is for you. You're lucky. I would rather have the pie than the shoes. ”

“ And, O Lord, don't blame Gail for getting mad. It's the first time I can remember. She is usu'ly very good. S'posing she was a stepmother, like lame Jennie Munn's, wouldn't we have a time living with her, though? And I am truly sorry about the hens. Hope says we can't get many eggs now, 'cause half of the flock is gone, and if we keep all our customers we will have to do without eggs here at home. I don't mind that at all myself, 'cause I've eaten eggs and eggs till it makes me sick to hunt them now; but what will Faith do for her cakes? ”

“ Helen Davies, and a huge bouquet of American beauties for Gail. The latter young lady was in the music room, engaged with Chopin and a great deal of pensiveness, when the interruption occurred, and not quite understanding the specific division of ceremonies, crossed up into the Louis XIV room, where Nicholas Van Ploon and Miss Van Ploon sat with unusual impressiveness.
“We don’t wish to see any frivolous young people,” said Miss Van Ploon playfully, kissing Gail and pinching her cheek affectionately. ”

“ Now that she has asked some of us older folks for advice, I think we can manage matters beautifully. Gail is just a girl herself, you know. She understands the situation a little better now, but the burden is too heavy for her young shoulders. We must make it lighter, lots lighter. She wants to go to college, and Faith wants music lessons, and Hope ought to study drawing, and what would you like to study?"
"Pigs! I want a pig farm," was the unexpected answer. "Ain't baby pigs the dearest things you ever saw?" ”

“ She is only a girl and it will be years before she's big enough to keep house. So he means to put her in an orphant asylum,—just give her away, Gail, for someone to adopt! Isn't it perfectly heathenish?"
"But maybe she will be better off, dear, than she is now," Gail answered gravely, recalling some of the sad incidents connected with unfortunate Essie's brief history.
"That's what Miss Keith said when I was telling her about it, but it seems dreadful for an own father to give away his only little girl. ”

“ Campbell, who had entered the room so quietly that none of the girls was aware of her presence.
"Well, s'pose you paired us off 'cording to our looks," Peace explained, without waiting for any of the sisters to register objections; "there'd be Hope and Allee together, for they are the lightest; and Gail and Cherry would have a room by themselves, 'cause they aren't either light or dark; and that would leave Faith and me to each other, being the darkest of them all. Now, Faith and me can't get along together two minutes. Ask Gail, ask Hope. ”

“ Mamma knows how to fix them up in Sara's and Marion's clothes. We must have them. Mr. Strong will give us a good recommend, I know."
Gail laughed. "There is no need of that at all. I am willing that they should go, only you can hardly blame me for hesitating a little, as this will be the first time either one has been away from home over night; and besides, Peace is such a blunderbus, I rather dread to let her go anywhere for fear she will get into trouble."
"Now you oughtn't to feel that way at all," cried Frances gaily. ”

“ Race himself entered the corridor and beckoned to Miss Gerald. So the quartette dispersed to take up other duties.
Peace, her desire for letter writing forgotten, wandered forlornly away to her room to await Gail's return, mentally chiding herself that she had allowed the big sister to go motoring without her. "I could have gone as well as not; but they prob'ly wouldn't have driven very far if I had; while as 'tis, they'll likely stay till dark." ”

“ She paused for breath, and the amused, amazed preacher found opportunity to murmur, politely, "But I am sure you all have good names—"
"Oh, yes, they are good enough! The trouble is, they don't fit, except Hope's. She is our sunbeam, always doing and saying something pretty, and meaning it, too. Now, Gail isn't a gale at all, but just the bestest kind of a sister; while Faith is usu'lly cross as two sticks unless things go just as she wants them; and Cherry doesn't stand around on corners d'livering tracks and worn-out clo's to the needy poor, like Charity always does in the pictures. ”

“ Jenny, Lilly, Carry, Hetty, Fanny, and the rest of you, dearly beloved and longed for,—Mary, my queen my singing-bird, a royal captive, but she shall come to her crown one day,—my two Ellens, graceful and brilliant, and you, my sweet-mouthed, soft-eyed islander, with your life deep and boundless like the sea that lulled you to baby-slumbers,—knowing you, shall I talk of regard? Knowing you, and from you, all, do I not know what girls can be? Sometimes it seems as if no one knows girls EXCEPT me. ”

“ With all his power depending solely upon himself, with love and life awaiting only his worthiness, with a devotion that knows no measure standing ready and eager to bless him, all the dew of youth, all the faith of innocence, all the boundless trust of tenderness, all the grace and charm and resource of an infinitely daring and enduring affection,—he turns away from it all and claims the coarseness of a promise! ”

“ Kind Nature takes her poor warped little ones, and with gentle, imperceptible hand touches them to a grace and softness which we have no right to expect, but to never that divine grace, that ineffable sweetness, of which the human soul is capable, and to which in its highest moods it ever yearns. O, if this one truth could be imprinted upon this age,—the one truth that the regeneration of the world is to come through love,—what hope could one not see for the future! ”

“ Just as the young girl leaves her tender home, and goes fearless to her future,—to the future which brings sadness for her smiling, and patience for her hope, and pain for her bloom, and the cold requital of kindness, or the unrequital of coldness for her warmth of love, so goes the moon, unconscious and serene, to meet her fate. ”

“ Better that woman should take her place alone, moved by an ineffable disdain, than that she should remain forever in her low estate. Better still that man and woman should go together, he bringing his sturdy strength to shorten, she lending her manifold grace to lighten, the path that leads up thither; and both, following the still, small voice of love, shall find no roughness, shall feel no grief, shall fear no evil, but shall walk softly till the end come, and shall rest in the peace of the beloved. ”

“ If they did but know how delightful, how noble and ennobling, how gracious and consoling and helpful, they might be, how wearied eyes might love to rest upon them, how sore hearts might be healed, and weak hearts strengthened, by the fragrance of their unfolding youth! There is not one girl in a thousand, North or South, who might not be lovely and beloved. ”

“ We stopped at Fontdale a-cousining. I have a veil, a beautiful—HAVE, did I say? Alas! Troy WAS. But I must not anticipate—a beautiful veil of brown tissue, none of your woolleny, gruff fabrics, fit only for penance, but a silken, gossamery cloud, soft as a baby's cheek. Yet everybody fleers at it. Everybody has a joke about it. Everybody looks at it, and holds it out at arms' length, and shakes it, and makes great eyes at it, and says, "What in the world—" and ends with a huge, bouncing laugh. Why? One is ashamed of human nature at being forced to confess. ”