Mrs. Carpenter

“ Morrill got up from the bench, and, with his hands in his pockets, turned his back. For a full moment no one spoke or moved.
The two women looked at each other—one of those deep and candid looks that are unusual between women except in moments when unexpected crises tear away their masks. In that moment the reputable and respected wife knew Mrs. Carpenter to be a better woman than herself. And Pippa, seeing the weakness that lay beneath that cool and self-contained exterior, felt a rush of pity that carried away upon its generous flood all thought either of resentment or of blame. ”

“ Pippa shook her head. There was a curious bitterness in her voice as she answered: “No! I am only offering you—myself.” Olaf Nilsson did not understand.
“It is—too much,” he muttered huskily.
“No,” said Mrs. Carpenter quietly, “it is not too much. It is all that I have to give, but that is not—too much. It is quite possible that it is not enough.”
The boy looked as if he could have knelt. His blue eyes were wide and remote with their passion of dreams. ”

“ Carpenter to bring to Paris a deaf and dumb boy for a certain purpose. Deaf and dumb boys are not easily procurable, and ladies, when entrusted with mysterious missions, have an inveterate habit of communicating them to their personal friends. Mrs. Carpenter knew a Mrs. Meves, a music teacher, and hastened to inform her of the strange instructions which she had received from France, and the pair set out to find a child to suit the requirements of Paine. They failed, and Mrs. Meves in her chagrin told her husband of their failure. ”

“ Carpenter, versed in most branches of emotional knowledge, could see that the child—she was a child intrinsically, whether she was nineteen or twenty-seven, married or a school-teacher—had somehow worked herself, whether by progression or retrogression, one could not say at first sight, into a mood of heroics. For a space she was clearly the heroine of her own drama, a fatal rôle for any woman under fifty—or even sixty, in these well-preserved days. ”

“ Carpenter was always beautifully gowned and daintily groomed, but to-day she was in some obscure way more exquisite, in all ways more perfect. Phyllis Grant had never seen any one so charming to look upon. There are few women who do not know on occasion how to present themselves at the greatest advantage; and Pippa Carpenter knew more about it than most women! ”

“ The best thing for us both is to leave her with people who won’t let her get on their nerves as she would on mine.”
Mrs. Carpenter was not subtle, and she hated wasting time, so she opened the subject at once sitting with Patience in the back parlour, her slim silk-stockinged legs crossed easily, one smart foot dangling, her modish head tilted back above the trim cravat of black crêpe and white tulle that her French maid had fabricated for her during the crossing, and a jewelled hand playing with Jane’s long pigtail. ”

“ He seemed about fifteen or sixteen, though some haunted, hunted look about his tense mouth suggested that he might be older, in experience, if not in years.
“Why,” gasped Pippa, “you're hardly more than a child, are you?”
“Eighteen,” said the tramp, in a rather tired voice.
“Do—do you have to do this?” asked Mrs. Carpenter, genuinely aghast.
“Ride the rods? You bet I do! Do you think I'd be doing it for fun?”
The boy did not seem to mean to be impertinent; he was simply quite candid, and very weary.
“When did you get on?” asked Philippa, amazement giving full place to pity. ”

“ And now I come upon a curious problem. I find that two distinct Mrs. Carpenters exist in my mind, and I cannot reconcile them. One was a beautiful romantic creature whom Jane—far away in the Grey House in St. Mary’s Plains—called mother and wrote to once a week and loved with a pure flame of loyalty; the other was Izzy Carpenter, whose loud voice and tall elastic fashionable figure was [Pg 29] so well-known in Paris: Busy Izzy, who was run by Philibert, and a group of young ne’er-do-weels. ”

“ Does God bring the ladies to this place?”
“Ah, surely, Meester Rosythe! The god of beautee, he breengs them to us! And the leetle god with the golden arrow, the rosy cheeks and the leetle dimple—the dimple that we make heem for two hundred dollars a piece—eh, Meester Rosythe? He breengs the ladies to us!”
The critic turned. “Madame Planchet, permit me to introduce Mr. Carpenter. He is a man of wonder, he heals pain, and does it by means of love.” ”

“ I always think that the glamour of a young marriage ought 97not to be rubbed off by too many practical details.”
Mrs. Vachell used to wonder now and then how it was that Susie constantly took the bread out of Mrs. Carpenter’s mouth without her victim seeming to experience any sense of loss. Mrs. Carpenter did sometimes hesitate as if she thought she had lost something, but Susie seemed so innocent of her theft that it generally passed as an accident. On the whole, Mrs. Carpenter accepted her as an ally.
“How do they like being at Drage?” Mrs. Manley asked. ”

“ Carpenter and Mrs. Vachell,” the maid announced.
146“Ah, this is delightful!” Mrs. Carpenter exclaimed, advancing first and shaking hands with everybody. “You are so wise to go on keeping to one day,” she said to Mrs. Price. “It is almost the only way of seeing one’s friends. I should love it if I had nothing to do, but if I tried to keep an afternoon to myself someone would be sure to call a special meeting somewhere and I should have to go off. And how is your dear girl? (To Susie.) Wrapped up in hubby and the baby, I suppose. I hope he is not getting his teeth too soon ”

“ They could even when necessary carry off affairs disagreeable to themselves with every appearance of special pleasure. When Philibert asked my mother to gather together the clan, all the uncles and aunts and cousins on my mother’s side and my father’s, so that he might present to them his fiancée, my mother apparently felt obliged to meet his wishes, not quite understanding the need for so much fuss, suspecting perhaps the truth that the ceremony was a concession to that tiresome Mrs. Carpenter, yet determining once she had decided to do it, to do it nicely. ”

“ It is a paradox as old as love and life.
“Some day,” he said softly, “I will conquer the world and bring it to you, and lay it at your dear feet—some day!”
“Some day?” echoed the woman, and the twist of her lips was of irony as well as of pain. “Some day I shall be old, Olaf Nilsson!”
He laughed at the thought. There was, indeed, something ageless and immortal about Pippa Carpenter. For fifteen years, time—as women recognize time, the time of fading lips, silvering hair, deepening lines—had stood still for her, dispassionately, not kindly, but like one indifferent to her. ”

“ Carpenter was gone, and then I went over, sir, to see my mother, who does washing in Canterbury Lane, off the Brixton Road. Missis said I might go when Mrs. Carpenter was gone; for I am general servant, and there was not a thing to do, and missis gave cook the latchkey, and I had leave till eleven o'clock; and at eleven to the minute I was back, and cook let me in, and the master and missis were not home until nigh to twelve o'clock, as they had to come from London in a cab. Mrs. ”

“ Izzy sent for Philibert on her return from America. She must have talked to him about Jane. They must have had a curious conversation. I am certain that it was then that they elaborated their plan. The scheme was one of grand proportions. They became partners in a great enterprise. Mrs. Carpenter was to supply her daughter, who had enough money to realize even Philibert’s dreams, and he was to supply the required knowledge, as well as the billet d’entrée into the social arena of Europe. ”

“ The grin faded from the other's face. His brows wrinkled, and he said: “I don't get you, friend. What can a man do?”
“At least he can bow his heart; he can pay his tribute to womanhood.”
“You're too much for me,” responded Rosythe. “The imbeciles choose to go through with it; it's their own choice.”
Said Carpenter: “You have never thought of it as the choice of God?”
“Holy smoke!” exclaimed the critic. “I sure never did!”
At that moment one of the doors was opened. Rosythe turned his eyes. “Ah, Madame Planchet!” he cried. “Come tell us about it!” ”

“ I have put them in an envelope, and sealed it. I may as well burn Miss Carpenter's hair, by the way.
"Though it is only a month since the evening on which I saw the card in the window at Wandsworth, Margaret and I seem to be old friends. After a year Miss Carpenter and I were as far as ever—farther than ever, perhaps—from understanding each other; but with Margaret I need no words to tell me that I am understood. A look, a smile, a movement of the graceful head, is a more eloquent answer than the most elaborate of Miss Carpenter's rhapsodies. ”

“ Mrs. Carpenter had ventured timidly. How humble and self-effacing she had grown by [Pg 54] that time, poor thing. “Not at all,” replied Philibert. “There will be no women and not more than six guns.” And he added then with a sublime simplicity unequalled, I believe, by any monarch or any court jester in history, “When royalty comes to Ste. Clothilde for the shooting, there is another place laid at table, that is all.”
Poor Izzy, she was completely at a loss. No longer could she attempt to follow him. It was Jane who understood. ”

“ These facts were reported faithfully to Philibert of course, also the incidents of the morning, when Jane got up with a bound and placed herself abruptly before her mother’s long mirror and cried with the accent of despair—“Am I always to be so ugly?”
But I imagine Mrs. Carpenter in telling Philibert did not finish the story. She had said to Jane—“No, my child, you can be considered a beauty if you want to. With that body your face doesn’t matter. Men will admire you, never fear ”

“ Of course there'll be a supper or something of that kind for them over there."
"Oh, my dear, if he once gets off with that set you won't see him until morning," said Mrs. Roberts as one who knew. "But isn't it exactly like men? You depend on them, and they'll throw you over for even a business engagement every time. No woman would do that."
"Yes, she would," said Audrey hotly.
"I really ought to have stayed with my husband this evening," murmured Mrs. Carpenter bitterly, as the Misses Rickland entered the room, all pearl and feathers and laciness, with the prettiest of dancing slippers. ”

“ A woman [Pg 64] came by wheeling a cart full of flowers. She filled her arms and arrived at her mother’s doorway breathless with pleasure. Mrs. Carpenter had the sense not to scold her, but she was obliged during the days that followed to engage a special duenna who could walk far enough and fast enough to keep up with her daughter. It appeared that Jane had read a good deal of French history. She visited churches, monuments and museums and made excursions to Versailles, la Malmaison, Fontainebleau. ”

“ I was telling you how it looks to me when I know how Evangeline loves all sunny and kind things.”
“I hear you are going to be married and give up all your work,” said Mrs. Carpenter. “I must congratulate you and I hope you will be very happy. Aldwych is a lovely place and David Varens is quite delightful I think. You find you can’t keep on with your poor people, don’t you? With so many new interests, I daresay it is not easy for young people to think of others.”
“Yes,” said Teresa, her cheeks glowing. “But you know you will never make anything different out of Mrs. ”

“ His hands were tied in the same manner, and round his neck was an iron collar, with a chain about six feet in length which was secured at the end to another band around the waist of one of the "braves."
As the prisoner stood erect, Carpenter saw that he was a man of herculean proportions and over six feet three or four inches in height. His arms and naked chest were cut, bleeding and bruised, and a bamboo gag was in his mouth; but what at once attracted the captain's attention and sympathy was the man's face. ”

“ Pippa Carpenter, with her instant instinct to shield love and lovers, shrank toward the wall and averted her eyes. But even in that moment, the door from the music room opened once more, less gently, and the big frame of Jack Rivers loomed there.
The broad bar of light streamed sharply on to the two figures on the bench. The clean-cut features of young Ralph Morrill flashed into view; the woman, with a smothered cry, hid her face against his shoulder. There was nothing to be seen of her but a wave of silver-gray chiffon. ”

“ It was her hour for getting together the data that she would hand on later in the day to Philibert.
Jane would say—“Our little Marquis was riding this morning. He joined me. His eyes looked puffy. They had funny little pouches under them.” And Mrs. Carpenter, who, with a languid finger turning the page of a letter, had pricked up her ears, would sigh inwardly and say aloud—
“The poor man must be tired. He has so many demands [Pg 68] on him.” ”

“ Furtive, sly, darting, rolling hither and thither, never still, comprehensive, all-seeing, malicious and deadly shrewd. These were the eyes of Jud Carpenter, and they told it all. To this, add again that they looked in contrary directions.
As a man's eye, so is the tenor of his life.
Yet in them, now and then, the twinkle of humor shone. He had a conciliatory way with those beneath him, and he considered all the mill hands in that class. ”