Part 16

Jonathan was already at the house, impatient to be on his way home, and Serena's bonnet was just being taken down from its nail as Betty came in. It seemed too bad to leave sister Sarah behind, but then she had all the piece-bags for company, as Serena said.

THE TWO FRIENDS.

THE Leicester household had been so long drifting into a staid and ceremonious fashion of life that this visit of Betty's threatened at times to be disturbing. If Aunt Barbara's heart had not been kept young, under all her austere look and manners, Betty might have felt constrained more than once, but there always was an excuse to give Aunt Mary, who sometimes complained of too much chattering on the front door steps, or too much scurrying up and down stairs from Betty's room. It was impossible to count the number of times that important secrets had to be considered in the course of a week, or to understand why there were so many flurries of excitement among the girls of Betty's set, while the general course of events in Tideshead flowed so smoothly. Miss Barbara Leicester was always a frank and outspoken person, and the young people were sure to hear her opinion whenever they asked for it; but she herself seemed to grow younger, in these days, and Betty pleased her immensely one day, when it was mentioned that a certain person who wore caps, and was what Betty called "poky," was about Miss Barbara's age: "Aunt Barbara, you are always the same age as anybody except a baby!"

"I must acknowledge that I feel younger than my grandniece, sometimes," said Aunt Barbara, with a funny little laugh; but Betty was puzzled to know exactly what she meant.

* * * * *

In one corner of the upper story of the large old house there was a delightful little place by one of the dormer-windows. It lighted the crooked stairway which came up to the open garret-floor, and the way to some bedrooms which were finished off in a row. Betty remembered playing with her dolls in this pleasant little corner on rainy days, years before, and revived its old name of the "cubby-house." Her father had kept his guns and a collection of minerals there, in his boyhood. It was over Betty's own room, and noises made there did not affect Aunt Mary's nerves, while it was a great relief from the dignity of the east bedroom, or, still more, the lower rooms of the house, to betake one's self with one's friend to this queer-shaped, brown-raftered little corner of the world. There was a great sea-chest under the eaves, and an astounding fireboard, with a picture of Apollo in his chariot. There was a shelf with some old brown books that everybody had forgotten, an old guitar, and a comfortable wooden rocking-chair, beside Betty's favorite perch in the broad window-seat that looked out into the tops of the trees. Her father's boyish trophies of rose-quartz and beryl crystals and mica were still scattered along on the narrow ledges of the old beams, and hanging to a nail overhead were two dusty bunches of pennyroyal, which had left a mild fragrance behind them as they withered.

Betty had added to this array a toppling light-stand from another part of the garret and a china mug which she kept full of fresh wild flowers. She pinned "London Graphic" pictures here and there, to make a little brightness, and there were some of her favorite artist's (Caldecott's) sketches of country squires and dames, reproduced in faint bright colors, which looked delightfully in keeping with their surroundings. As midsummer came on the cubby-house grew too hot for comfort, but one afternoon, when rain had been falling all the morning to cool the high roof, Mary Beck and Betty sat there together in great comfort and peace. See for yourself Mary in the rocking-chair, and Betty in the window-seat; they were deep in thought of girlish problems, and, as usual, taking nearly opposite sides. They had been discussing their plans for the future. Mary Beck had confessed that she wished to learn to be a splendid singer and sing in a great church or even in public concerts. She knew that she could, if she were only well taught; but there was nobody to give her lessons in Tideshead, and her mother would not hear of her going to Riverport twice a week.

"She says that I can keep up with my singing at home, and she wants me to go into the choir, and I can't bear it. I hate to hear 'we can't afford it,' and I am sure to, if I set my heart on anything. Mother says that it will be time enough to learn to sing when I am through school. Oh, dear me!" and poor Mary looked disappointed and fretful.

A disheartening picture of the present Becky on the concert-stage flashed through Betty's usually hopeful mind. She felt a heartache, as she thought of her friend's unfitness and inevitable disappointment. Becky--plain, ungainly, honest Becky--felt it in her to do great things, yet she hardly knew what great things were. Persons of Betty's age never count upon having years of time in which to make themselves better. Everything must be finally decided by the state of things at the moment. Years of patient study were sure to develop the wonderful gift of Becky's strong, sweet voice.

"Why don't you sing in the choir, Becky?" asked Betty suddenly. "It would make the singing so much better. I should love to do it, if I could, and it would help to make Sunday so pleasant for everybody, to hear you sing. Poor Miss Fedge's voice sounds funny, doesn't it? Sing me something now, Becky dear; sing 'Bonny Doon'!"

But Becky took no notice of the request. "What do you mean to be, yourself?" she asked her companion, with great interest.

"You know that I can't sing or paint or do any of those things," answered Betty humbly. "I used to wish that I could write books when I grew up, or at any rate help papa to write his. I am almost discouraged, though papa says I must keep on trying to do the things I really wish to do." And a bright flush covered Betty's eager face.

"Oh, Becky dear!" she said suddenly. "You have something that I envy you more than even your singing: just living at home in one place and having your mother and the boys. I am always wishing and wishing, and telling myself stories about living somewhere in the same house all the time, with papa, and having a real home and taking care of him. You don't know how good it would feel! Papa says the best we can do now is to make a home wherever we are, for ourselves and others--but I think it is pretty hard, sometimes."

"Well, I think the nicest thing would be to see the world, as you do," insisted Mary Beck. "I just hate dusting and keeping things to rights, and I never shall learn to cook! I like to do fancy work pretty well. You would think Tideshead was perfectly awful, in winter!"

"Why should it be?" asked Betty innocently. "Winter is house-time. I save things to do in winter, and"--

"Oh, you are so preachy, you are so good-natured, you believe all the prim things that grown people say!" exclaimed Becky. "What would you say if you never went to Boston but once, and then had the toothache all the time? You have been everywhere, and you think it's great fun to stay a little while in poky old Tideshead, this one summer!"

"Why, it is because I have seen so many other places that I know just how pleasant Tideshead is."

"Well, I want to see other places, too," maintained the dissatisfied Becky.

"Papa says that we ourselves are the places we live in," said Betty, as if it took a great deal of courage to tell Mary Beck so unwelcome a truth. "I like to remember just what he says, for sometimes, when I haven't understood at first, something will happen, may be a year after, to make it flash right into my mind. Once I heard a girl say London was stupid; just think! London!"

Mary Beck was rocking steadily, but Betty sat still, with her feet on the window-seat and her hands clasped about her knees. She could look down into the green yard below, and watch some birds that were fluttering near by in the wet trees. The wind blew in very soft and sweet after the rain.

"I used to think, when I was a little bit of a girl, that I would be a missionary, but I should perfectly hate it now!" said Mary, with great vehemence. "I just hate to go to Sunday-school and be asked the questions; it makes me prickle all over. I always feel sorry when I wake up and find it is Sunday morning. I suppose you think that's heathen and horrid."

"I always have my Sunday lessons with papa; he reads to me, and gives me something to learn by heart,--a hymn or some lovely verses of poetry. I suppose that his telling me what things in the Bible really mean keeps me from being 'prickly' when other people talk about it. What made you wish to be a missionary?" Betty inquired, with interest.

"Oh, there used to be some who came here and talked in the vestry Sunday evenings about riding on donkeys and camels. Sometimes they would dress up in Syrian costumes, and I used to look grandpa's 'Missionary Herald' all through, to find their names afterward. It was so nice to hear about their travels and the natives; but that was a long while ago," and Becky rocked angrily, so that the boards creaked underneath.

"Last summer I used to go to such a dear old church, in the Isle of Wight," said Betty. "You could look out of the open door by our pew and see the old churchyard, and look away over the green downs and the blue sea. You could see the red poppies in the fields, and hear the larks, too."

"What kind of a church was it?" asked Mary, with suspicion. "Episcopal?"

"Yes," answered Betty. "Church of England, people say there."

"I heard somebody say once that your father was very lax in religious matters," said Becky seriously.

"I'd rather be very lax and love my Sundays," said Betty severely. "I don't think it makes any difference, really, about what one does in church. I want to be good, and it helps me to be in church and think and hear about it. Oh, dear! my foot's getting asleep," said Betty, beginning to pound it up and down. The two girls did not like to look at each other; they were considering questions that were very hard to talk about.