Rebecca Mary

“ Years afterwards Rebecca Mary remembered the dizzy dance of the bottles in the caster—they seemed to join hands and sway and swing about their silver circlet and how Aunt Olivia's buttons marched and countermarched up and down Aunt Olivia's alpaca dress. She did not look above the buttons—she did not dare to. If she was to keep right on being a Plummer, she must not cry. ”

“ And Rebecca Mary confessed that she did, that she cared a lot for him, she had ever since that day at the bank.
"You were always so—so good to me," she murmured as if she just had to have a reason.
"Good to you!" Richard choked as he took her in his arms and kissed her. "Good to you, sweetheart! How could a man be anything but good to you? I want to be good to you all the rest of your life!"
Through the open window they could hear Granny's voice; evidently she was giving a toast for she said—"To all those who keep their hearts young for they shall live forever!" ”

“ For the first time in her life Rebecca Mary knew what it was to be a popular girl. As she had told Granny, since she had been in Waloo she had known no men over eight years of age and while the boys in her third grade were interesting and dear they were young. Here at Riverside, where she was a prisoner, Rebecca Mary found three most attractive men of exactly the right age, Peter Simmons, Wallace Marshall and George Barton, and one very fascinating older man, Frederick Befort, who was a count in his own country, a country which Rebecca Mary scarcely knew by name. ”

“ I'm ready—only I guess you've forgot how long I've had Rebecca Mary. When you've brought a child up—”
“I brought her up myself,” calmly. “I ought to know. She wouldn't have been Rebecca Mary, would she, if I hadn't been right on hand? Who was it taught her to sew patchwork before she was four years old? And make sheets—and beds—and bread? Who was it kept her from being a little tomboy like the minister's girl? Who taught her to walk instead of run, and eat with her fork, and be a lady? Who was it—”
“Oh, you—you!” sighed Aunt Olivia, trembling for her balance. ”

“ Granny became rested, Joan was spoiled, and even Rebecca Mary began to feel the effect of too much attention. There had been a time when Rebecca Mary had thought that it would be perfect bliss to have just one man devoted to her, but now that she had four she found that she never had a minute to herself. Whether she wanted to or not she had to play tennis with Wallie Marshall, walk with George Barton, ride the farmhorses with Peter Simmons, recite French verbs to Frederick Befort or play accompaniments for Major Martingale, who still liked to hear the young people sing the old war songs. ”

“ Granny had been delighted to accept Richard's kind invitation to run away to Waloo. Her faded blue eyes sparkled when Rebecca Mary gave it to her.
"Of course, I'll go," she said at once. "It's too great a strain to be under the same roof with old Peter Simmons. I'm crazy to see him, Rebecca Mary, but I don't dare. Perhaps if I run away again he'll know that I don't want to be teased. I simply can't discuss a golden wedding present now. We've done it too often. But I don't know what I'll do, Rebecca Mary, if he doesn't remember what we planned. ”

“ With her diary in her hand—for Aunt Olivia had remembered her diary—Rebecca Mary went to the window and sat down. She had to hold the cookbook up at a painful angle and peer at it sharply, for the moonlight that filtered into the little room through the vines was dim and soft.
“Aunt Olivia has gone to the city and I haven't,” painfully traced Rebecca Mary. “She wanted the good time all to herself. I shall never forgive Aunt Olivia the Lord have mercy on her.” Then Rebecca Mary went back to bed. She dreamed that the cars ran off the track and they brought Aunt Olivia's pieces home to her. ”

“ I can trust you. It is a great thing, Rebecca Mary, to have a man about whom you can trust." There was something so significant in the way she spoke that Rebecca Mary turned pink until she matched the sweet peas in the center of the table.
She looked so pretty in her self-conscious confusion that Richard had to stop eating omelet and muffins and look at her.
Granny went to telephone to young Mrs. Simmons about the golden wedding, and Joan ran after Pierson to tell her all that they had found at Riverside. Rebecca Mary pushed back her chair and rose, too. ”

“ Rebecca Mary was suddenly minded that Olivicia was in the dark; must be enlightened before she could smile understandingly.
“Why, you poor dear!—why, you don't know what it is that's coming and that's near to! It's the—city, Olivicia,” enlightened Rebecca Mary, gently, to insure against shock. “Aunt Olivia's going—to—the—city.”
In Rebecca Mary's dreamings it had always been THE city. It did not need local habitation and a name; enough that it had streets upon streets, houses upon houses upon houses, a dazzling swirl of men, women, and little children—noise, glitter, glory. ”

“ I hope Rebecca Mary has forgotten how to frown. But it was a scowl, Stanley, I know it was, which first attracted Richard."
It almost seemed as if Rebecca Mary had forgotten how to do anything but smile, and young Peter had no occasion to shout "Pirate." He was in and out of the house at all hours and so had every opportunity to see what Rebecca Mary was doing. It was not often that she could persuade him to talk to her of his experiences in France.
[Pg 111]
"Of course a man can't get it out of his thoughts," he did say one day, "but it isn't anything he wants to talk about. ”

“ Peter loved to make Rebecca Mary blush and stammer although it was not as easy as it had been. Rebecca Mary was acquiring poise.
Richard's class in motor driving met as he had planned, and his one pupil would never forget the first time that she had her hands on the wheel and felt the pull of the sixty horses harnessed under the hood.
"It makes you feel like a—like a god!" she gasped, not daring to take her eyes from the road.
"It makes you look like a goddess," laughed Richard. "You're going to make a good driver, Miss Wyman. ”

“ Good-bye, Miss Plummer—good-bye, Rebecca Mary. All is, I hope Mis' Avery's boarder'll find her diamond, don't you? But I don't calculate she will. Well, good afternoon. She hadn't ought to have wore the ring, when she knew it was loose in the setting like that. Some folks are just that careless! Well—”
But Rebecca Mary did not hear the rest of the Caller's leave-taking. She had slipped away to Thomas Jefferson out in the sun. ”

“ But if I ever have a second love, I promise it will be you. You're a great DEAL comfortinger than that Tony Trumbull rooster! I could love you this minute if I had never loved Thomas Jefferson. Do you feel like waiting?”
The little, white cat waited. And Aunt Olivia waited. She made tempting dishes for Rebecca Mary's meals, and put a ruffle into her nightgown neck and sleeves—Rebecca Mary had always yearned for ruffles. ”

“ Rebecca Mary hunted bugs and angleworms and arranged them temptingly in rows, but the big, white rooster passed them by with a feeble peck or two. Bits of bread failed to tempt him, or even his favorite cooky crumbs. His eighth appetite departed—his seventh, sixth, fifth, fourth.
“He lost his third one yesterday,” lamented Rebecca Mary, “and today he's lost his second. It's pretty bad when he hasn't only one left, Aunt Olivia.”
“Pretty bad,” nodded Aunt Olivia. She was stirring up a warm mush. When Rebecca Mary had gone upstairs she took it to Thomas Jefferson and commanded him to eat. ”

“ Aunt Olivia got up earlier than usual one day and went about the house for a survey. The valise and the little carpetbag she carried downstairs and out on to the front steps. Her face was whitened as if by a long night's vigil. When she called Rebecca Mary it was with a voice strained hoarse. The beautiful being Olivicia watched her with intent, unwinking gaze. Could it be Olivicia understood?
“Hurry and dress, Rebecca Mary; there's a good deal to do,” Aunt Olivia said at the door. She did not go in. ”

“ Even if she wasn't perfectly contented at Riverside, Rebecca Mary wasn't sure that she wanted to run away again. She had heard that a bird in the hand is worth a lot more than one in the bush. If she ran away with Granny she would leave behind her young Peter and Wallie and George and—and Count Ernach de Befort. ”

“ Rebecca Mary rose obediently and followed Granny and Joan across the hall and into the parlor, which ran the full length of the house and whose many French windows opened on the formal garden and furnished many charming pictures of the river [Pg 143] and the low hills beyond. And the sweet-faced young girl in a gauzy white frock and with a pink rose in her long slender fingers was Richard Cabot's great-grandmother. Rebecca Mary quite forgot that the sweet-faced girl was also Joshua Cabot's great-grandmother as she gazed at her. ”

“ Don't you know that youth should enjoy things for old age [Pg 13] to remember? And take it from me, Rebecca Mary, that the old find their greatest pleasure in recalling their youth. Will you have cream or lemon in your tea? Lemon always seems more like a party to me."
Rebecca Mary took the lemon while a puzzled frown appeared between her two eyebrows. "It isn't that I don't like my work, Cousin Susan," she said slowly, "for I do. I love children, and I love to teach. If I had a million I should want to teach somewhere, in a settlement or a mission, you know. ”

“ I think it's very hard sometimes for every one, for even an old lady, to know what is best to do. But if you were in a book, Rebecca [Pg 274] Mary, it would be easy. All you would have to do would be to wait for your knight of the four-leaf clover," she laughed.
"Oh, that!" Rebecca Mary had lost all pleasure in her mysterious talisman; it had brought her all at once such a huge amount of bad luck. "But how am I going to find him?" she asked impatiently. "It's weeks since that day at the Waloo, and I don't know any more than I did then."
"Don't you?" Granny raised quizzical eyebrows. ”

“ Even when Rebecca Mary had explained what question it was which had made Granny abandon her comfortable home in Waloo at midnight Peter didn't seem to understand, and he said so.
"That's because you're a man!" Rebecca Mary was very scornful of a man's power of comprehension. "I understand perfectly, and I don't blame Granny a bit. It must be perfectly maddening to have your husband ask you whether you want light meat or dark every time a chicken comes to the table or what you want for a birthday or a Christmas present. ”

“ The potato masher hit her nose and she frowned again.
Joan leaned against her with a tired sigh. "It's—it's very hard when no one wants you," she hiccoughed.
Rebecca Mary knew just how hard it was, but she didn't say so. Her back was toward the street so that she did not see a limousine coming toward them. It stopped in front of the cottage, and if it hadn't been for the four-leaf clover in her pocket Rebecca Mary would have been very much surprised to hear Mrs. Peter Simmons' voice.
"Does Mr. Frederick Befort live here? Upon my word!" as Rebecca Mary jumped up and faced her. ”

“ The letters Rebecca Mary wrote were formally correct and brief. There was no homesickness in them. It was pleasant at the school, that book about bones was going to be very interesting. Aunt Olivia was not to worry about the rubbers, and Rebecca Mary would never forget to air her clothes when they came from the wash. Yes, she had aired the nightgown that Aunt Olivia ironed the last thing. No, she hadn't needed any liniment yet, but she wouldn't get any in her eyes. ”

“ If she had not been Rebecca Mary, she would have danced about the room.
“Oh, I'm so relieved, Olivicia!” she laughed, softly. “If they're not up here, THEY'RE DOWN THERE. They've got to be somewhere. They're in that valise—valise—vali-i-ise!”
Rebecca Mary had never been to a city, and within her remembrance Aunt Olivia had never been. Curiosity was not a Plummer trait, hence Rebecca Mary had never asked many questions about the remote period before her own advent into Aunt Olivia's life. The same Plummer restraint kept her now from asking questions. ”

“ Granny admitted when she heard how repentant Rebecca Mary was. "I do wish I were home, Rebecca Mary. It was so silly to run away as we did. I might have known something would happen. I'd give anything if we could be back in Waloo before old Peter Simmons. I shan't mind his teasing so much at home. I shan't feel quite so foolish there. A woman can't stand up to her husband as well as she should if [Pg 270] she feels foolish. ”

“ He'll want us to stay at home until he can go with us, and he can never go. He's always too busy."
Rebecca Mary's eyes opened wider. She didn't understand why Granny should want to leave for Seven Pines in almost the middle of the night if old Peter Simmons was coming home. Rebecca Mary did not know old Peter Simmons, she did not know very much about him except that he was the head of a big manufacturing plant and that he was to have a golden wedding on the twenty-second of July. Granny had always spoken as if she adored her husband. ”

“ Old Peter Simmons looked at her from under the grizzled eyebrows which he drew together in a frown so deep that Rebecca Mary almost thought he was going to dash up the stairs and make Granny open the door.
"H-m," he said slowly, "I hope she is asleep. She [Pg 232] has had a hard time the last few years; all women have. I'm glad she had sense enough to come here away from people and things and get a little rest. We must humor her." He looked at wide-eyed Rebecca Mary for a second and then turned to young Peter. "If your grandmother has gone to bed we might as well get to work at once. ”