Rosanna

“ When you come to my age, you will find sitting down on the slope of a beach a much longer job than you think it now. By the time I was settled, Rosanna had dried her own eyes with a very inferior handkerchief to mine—cheap cambric. She looked very quiet, and very wretched; but she sat down by me like a good girl, when I told her. When you want to comfort a woman by the shortest way, take her on your knee. I thought of this golden rule. But there! Rosanna wasn’t Nancy, and that’s the truth of it! ”

“ Rosanna did not get a chance to say one word to her. She listened while her grandmother called up an intimate friend who lived near by and arranged for her to come in every day to see how Rosanna [Pg 16] was getting on. She called John in and told him just where he could drive the car when Miss Rosanna took her daily ride. "If she wants to take a little girl friend with her, she is to do so, as I want her to have a good time," Mrs. Horton told him. ”

“ Claire brought her a gorgeous embroidered kimono, a good-bye present from Mrs. Maslin. Just the loveliest thing to wear to the dressing-room, thought Rosanna, revelling in its deep color and beautiful handwork. The girls worked swiftly, and before Uncle Bob returned for dinner everything was ready, even to Rosanna's coat and hat and gloves and little change purse. She had put on her plain pongee traveling dress, fine cotton stockings that exactly matched her brown oxfords with their sensible low heels, and looked every inch a well-dressed traveler. ”

“ Maslin had been taken. Rosanna will never to the end of her days be able to look at certain magazines without a shudder. The two girls sat or walked restlessly around the bare waiting-room, turned over the pages of the periodicals on the prim table, or gazed silently out of the window where they could see the usually impassive and unmoved Chang pacing restlessly up and down beside the limousine. ”

“ Charming, by which I mean such interesting, things resident in what I there touch on; with the way they look at each other, Rosanna and Gray, if one is talking about looks. Gray keeps it in comedy, so far as he can—making a tone, a spell, that Rosanna doesn't break into, as she breaks, anything to call really breaks, into nothing as yet: I seem to see the final, from-far-back-prepared moment when she does, for the first and last time, break as of a big and beautiful value. ”

“ How is mother?"
"If you are going to behave yourself now, dear, I will go and see," said Colonel Maslin. He kissed her and hurried off. Claire, feeling strangely weak but so happy, turned to Rosanna.
"She knew us!" she said. "She knew us both, and now, even if she dies, I will always have that to remember."
"She will not die!" Rosanna declared for the hundredth time.
"There are worse cases than your mother's," said the nurse comfortingly. "If she stands the shock, she will be all right, and I am sure she will. Don't you worry or think she is not going to be well. ”

“ Mrs. Horton gave a sigh of relief. “I can’t thank you enough, my dearest girl,” she said. “No one wants to make your life as happy as I do, and if there is anything I can ever do for you, you have only to tell me. Now we must have everything new in the rooms you want, so we will go down and tell Robert and Rosanna. How glad that child will be!”
Rosanna was tired and very nervous, and when Mrs. Horton and Miss Hooker came down with their great plan, Rosanna once more, to her own horror, commenced to cry. ”

“ Horton.
“Nothing at all,” answered Rosanna, “but she is sensible too, because the next time I was there, she asked more about Minnie, and then she said she had decided never to marry. She said she liked to be polite to men and help them pass the time, and to assist them in worthy works, but further than that she despised the whole lot of them, especially blonds.” Rosanna looked up to see what color hair Uncle Robert had, and noticed a very queer look on his face. ”

“ In each corner is a little cottage, right on the wall paper you know, Rosanna, and between just woods that look as though you were seeing them through a mist—sort of delicate and far away. And the rugs are a soft delicate green like the grass in spring. I hope she is lovely enough for all the love Mrs. Hargrave is going to give her."
"Uncle Robert says she is as sweet as she can possibly be," Rosanna assured her. "Well, you are just too good to stay at home with me, Helen. It won't be long before we are both Girl Scouts. And I think you are just as good and sweet as you can be. ”

“ Won’t that be splendid?”
“Think of it!” said Rosanna. “Won’t the girls be wild when they hear about it? Oh, dear, I wish I was eighteen so I could be a lieutenant!”
“I don’t wish you were eighteen,” said Miss Hooker. “I like you just as you are.”
“Oh, Miss Hooker, you are so sweet!” said Rosanna.
Miss Hooker dimpled. “One thing we had better settle right now,” she said. “What are you going to call me?”
Rosanna looked blank. “I hadn’t thought about that at all. Of course I can’t go on calling you Miss Hooker, and then Mrs. Horton. And you are too little and too young to be anybody’s aunt.” ”

“ When Rosanna goes over to her Father it befals before she has had more than twenty words with him that one of the Nurses who is most sympathetic to her appears in the long window that opens from the house on to the verandah, and it is thus at once disclosed that he has come. Rosanna has taken for granted from the quiet air of the place that this event hasn't yet occurred; but Gray has in fact arrived with the early morning, has come on the boat from New York, the night one, and is there above with, or ready to be with, the dying man. ”

“ There is nothing to be gained in this life by remaining narrow. We must know life and our fellowmen in order to be able to choose wisely and well. How can we tell the worthy from the unworthy unless we have known enough of people to be able to recognize both the good and bad? Oh, Virginia! I feel that Rosanna will come back to you, to us, and we must remember that we are old women, and she is a child, and like calls to like. We must remember that God expects us to love and guide her but she must have friends and outside interests."
"Oh, if she only, only comes back!" cried Mrs. Horton. ”

“ His shoulders shook with sobs.
Rosanna looked up with a smile as Claire entered, but Claire did not return it. She closed the door carefully, almost as though she thought it might break, then leaning against it, stood looking into space.
"What did he say?" asked Rosanna.
"Nothing; that is, I didn't speak to him," said Claire. Then with a rush, "Rosanna, I can't invite you to the seashore after all. I shall not go. I shall stay with dad. He is down there with mother's picture in his hand, crying. I never saw him cry, Rosanna. It's awful! He is always so brave. I never saw him cry. ”

“ Horton, Rosanna's grandmother, did not think that chauffeurs' families were ever the sort who ought to look down into the garden where Rosanna played and where she herself sat in state and had tea served of an afternoon.
At one side of the garden where the roses were wildest and the flowers grew thickest was a little cottage, built to fit Rosanna. Grown people had to stoop to get in and their heads almost scraped the ceilings. The furniture all fitted Rosanna too, even to the tiny piano. This was Rosanna's playhouse. ”

“ In a week afterwards, Rosanna Spearman entered this establishment as our second housemaid.
Not a soul was told the girl’s story, excepting Miss Rachel and me. My lady, doing me the honour to consult me about most things, consulted me about Rosanna. Having fallen a good deal latterly into the late Sir John’s way of always agreeing with my lady, I agreed with her heartily about Rosanna Spearman.
A fairer chance no girl could have had than was given to this poor girl of ours. None of the servants could cast her past life in her teeth, for none of the servants knew what it had been. ”

“ Poor little Rosanna! To the little girl behind it, a six-foot brick wall looks as high as the sky. And the garden, as I have told you before, was a very, very big garden indeed. Plenty large enough to be very lonesome in.
One morning Mrs. Horton was not ready to drive [Pg 6] at the appointed time. Rosanna was ready, however, and was dancing around on the front porch when the automobile rolled up. She ran toward it but drew back at the sight of a strange chauffeur. ”

“ Her grandmother had certainly not named any little girl, but Rosanna knew that she did not mean or intend that Rosanna should entertain the little girl who lived over the garage. Her grandmother thought every one was all right if they belonged to an old family. The first thing she ever asked Rosanna about any little girl was "What is her family?" or "Who are her people?"
Rosanna, whose conscience was troubling her in a queer way, determined to ask Helen about her family, although it seemed that was one of the things that were not very nice to do. But perhaps Helen had a family. ”

“ You can’t see to think through them the way they are,” and as Helen looked on, expecting to see Rosanna snapped in two any second, she held out her hand for the glasses, shaking out a clean pocket handkerchief as she did so. No one was more surprised than Mr. Harriman himself when he took off the smeary spectacles and handed them to Rosanna, who silently polished them and handed them back. They were better; Mr. Harriman acknowledged it with a grunt.
“Girls are real handy,” said Rosanna with her sweet smile. ”

“ That night he came up to show Rosanna how to put her puppy to bed for the night, and when the little fellow at last snuggled down in his basket, and went to sleep, Uncle Robert settled down in his favorite chair and lighted a cigarette and wanted to hear all the news.
“What shall I start with?” asked Rosanna, listening to the soft breathing of the little collie.
“Oh, it doesn’t matter,” said Uncle Robert. “Begin with Miss—er Gwenny.”
“Why, you needn’t call her Miss,” said Rosanna. “You never used to! I thought first you were going to say begin with Miss Hooker.” ”

“ And she is Cita. She is dear. That is what it means."
"I know," said Claire. "She is a dear, I can agree with you there. I like her as well as I ever like anyone."
"Don't you love your friends?" asked Rosanna wistfully. This strange green-eyed girl, so cold and so reserved, made her feel sad.
"I have no friends," replied Claire indifferently.
"Well, you will make a lot of friends here in Louisville," Rosanna assured her, smiling.
"No," said Claire. The car stopped before Rosanna's house.
"Oh, yes!" insisted Rosanna as she stood at the curb. "You see you will want friends when you grow up. ”

“ Rosanna, driven by a real loneliness to confide in someone, spent much time with Miss Hooker and while Rosanna honestly thought she was attending strictly to Scout business, the conversation was sure to slip around to Uncle Robert. Miss Hooker never appeared to join Rosanna in her talk, but it was surprising what a good listener she proved to be. The only time she said anything was when Rosanna would enlarge on the way Uncle Robert felt about girls. Then Miss Hooker would always assert that she thought he was perfectly right, because she herself thought very little of men. ”

“ She laughed and nodded as she left the girls and hurried on to the Times-Leader office.
"She means it; she actually means it!" said Rosanna in a hushed voice.
"Of course she means it!" laughed Claire. "Isn't she funny? I never saw a girl so conceited in my life. And really she isn't bright at all. She is just an ordinary girl with ordinary gifts. I think she is usually quite stupid when she talks, but perhaps that is because she is so awfully conceited that it bores you." ”

“ Rosanna whispered finally.
"There is no hope," said Claire. "She seems to get worse all the time. She scarcely knows daddy now, and doesn't seem to care whether he comes to see her or not. For a long time she wanted to see him."
"Did she know what the matter was?" asked Rosanna.
"No, not that we know, only she is so sad, when she is herself, that daddy thinks she knows."
"Oh, I do feel sure that she will get well!" said Rosanna.
Claire sadly shook her head.
"There is no hope," she repeated. "We have had doctor after doctor, all the big specialists, and they can't do a thing. ”

“ I will help you all I can, Rosanna, and I feel very sure, Helen, that your savings or the fairy godmother will take you to college with Rosanna. Two little girls as nice and sweet and well-bred as you ought to be friends all your lives. ”

“ "About the years that are gone, Mr. Betteredge," says Rosanna quietly. "My past life still comes back to me sometimes."
"Come, come, my girl," I said, "your past life is all sponged out. Why can't you forget it?"
She took me by one of the lappets of my coat. I am a slovenly old man, and a good deal of my meat and drink gets splashed about on my clothes. Sometimes one of the women, and sometimes another, cleans me of my grease. The day before, Rosanna had taken out a spot for me on the lappet of my coat, with a new composition, warranted to remove any thing. ”

“ Horton continued.
"Yes," replied Culver.
"Any children?"
"One little girl," said Culver, glancing at Rosanna with a smile.
Mrs. Horton saw the look. She said nothing, but when Rosanna sat before her at the great round table, eating her luncheon, Mrs. Horton remarked, "Of course, Rosanna, you will make no effort whatever to meet the child living over the garage. Unless you make the opportunity, she will never see you, thanks to the arrangement of the windows. She is a child that it would be impossible for you to know." ”