VII
Then they went in. They found Cousin Winnie standing by a console in the hall, with a strange look on her face.
“Really!” said she. “This is—Look at this!”
And she held out to them a check for five thousand dollars, drawn by Cousin Ronald to her order.
“Listen!” she said, and began to read:
“My dear Winnie:
“An unexpected stroke of good fortune enables me to tender to you this small token of my profound appreciation of your kindness toward me in a dark hour. I beg that you will honor me by accepting it.
“Furthermore, it occurs to me that this cottage, hallowed as it is to me by its associations, is scarcely suitable in its present condition for a winter residence for ladies accustomed to modern conveniences. I shall endeavor to arrange for the installation of electricity, and I am this afternoon going into the city to consult with an expert upon the advisability of a small furnace.
“I shall be somewhat late in returning. Indeed, my dear Winnie, I should prefer that you read this in my absence, and to consider—”
“That’s all that matters,” said Cousin Winnie, hastily, folding up the letter.
“No! Read the rest!” her child firmly insisted.
“No,” Cousin Winnie asserted. “I—I prefer not.”
“But why?” Lucy began, and then stopped, staring at her mother.
“Mother!” the girl exclaimed.
“Don’t be silly!” said Cousin Winnie, severely.
“Merciful Powers!” Lucy remarked, with a shocking mimicry of Cousin Ronald’s manner. “I fear this is another compromising letter!”
“It is not, at all!” Cousin Winnie declared indignantly. “Nothing could be more honorable and—”
Then suddenly they all began to laugh. Cousin Ronald, coming up the path, heard them. He thought it was an agreeable thing to hear, suggestive of that fine, old-fashioned home life.[Pg 428]
MUNSEY’S
MAGAZINE
AUGUST, 1926
Vol. LXXXVIII NUMBER 3
Miss Cigale
IT SHOULD BE QUITE NATURAL FOR A GRASSHOPPER TO KNOW MORE ABOUT PAWN TICKETS THAN DOES AN ANT
By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding
MRS. RUSSELL sat on the veranda, waiting for her son. A handsome and dignified woman she was, and a very calm one, but her calmness did not suggest patience.
On the contrary, she looked like one of those persons who wait until exactly the right moment, and then proceed to do whatever is exactly the right thing to be done, leaving late or careless persons to their well-deserved fate. Half past six was the dinner hour; at half past six she would go into the dining room, and if her son were not home—
He always was home, though. For twenty-three years he had been trained in punctuality, neatness, and economy, and his mother was satisfied with the result. She turned her eyes toward the west, where the sun was preparing to leave, gathering together his gorgeous, filmy raiment.
She was not looking at, or thinking of, any sunset, however, but looked in that direction because the railway station lay there, and she had heard a train whistle. It was not Geordie’s regular train, but once in awhile he came a little earlier; and, though Mrs. Russell was too reasonable to expect such a thing, she hoped he was coming now.
It was nice to have an extra half hour with her boy; nice to walk about the lawn with him, to talk to him, to listen to him, even just to look at him, as long as he didn’t catch her at it.
No; he wasn’t coming early to-night. The long tree lined street was empty, except for a woman who had just crossed the road. She was an odd figure; even the judicial Mrs. Russell had to smile a little at her frantic progress. A flower crowned hat had slipped far to the back of her head, a gray dust coat, unbuttoned, flew out behind her.
She walked bent by the weight of two heavy bags, pressing forward in haste, as if struggling against a mighty wind. She came nearer, and through the branches of a tree a shaft from the setting sun fell upon her wild fair hair.
“But—goodness gracious!” said Mrs. Russell, half aloud. “But—no! Nonsense! It can’t be!”
For there had been somebody else, with wild fair hair like that, shining not gold, but silver when the sun lay on it; somebody else slight and tall, and always in a desperate hurry. That was years and years ago.
She got up and came to the edge of the veranda, a queer flutter in her heart. Could there be any one else with quite that [Pg 430]air—distinguished, and yet a little ridiculous, and somehow so touching?
“Louie!” she said, incredulously.
Down went the bags on the pavement. The newcomer stood where she was for an instant, then, headlong, rushed through the gate, up the steps, and clasped Mrs. Russell in her arms so violently that the flower crowned hat fell off and rolled down the steps. It lay on the gravel walk like a poor dry little flowerpot.
“Oh, Bella!” she cried. “Oh, Bella! Oh, Bella!”
“There—” said Mrs. Russell. “Sit down, my dear! Try to control yourself!”
As a matter of fact, she was crying herself, in a quiet, dignified sort of way. But, by the time she had gone down the steps and fetched her sister’s lively hat, she had put an end to all such nonsense, and was quite calm again.
“I’m very happy to see you, Louie—” she began, but the other interrupted her.
“After all these years!” she cried, with a sob. “It doesn’t seem possible, does it, Bella? We were young then, Bella. Oh, think of that! Young, Bella—”
“I shan’t think of any such thing,” said Mrs. Russell, tartly. “Do stop crying, Louie, please, and tell me something about yourself.”
“It isn’t me yet, Bella; not the poor, silly forty-five-year-old me. It’s the other Louie, with her hair down her back, sitting here with the old Bella in that plaid dress. Do you remember that plaid gingham, Bella, that mother made for you? With the bias—”
“No!” Mrs. Russell replied. “I do not. I don’t want to, either. What I want to hear is something about yourself, Louie—something sensible and intelligible.”
“I remember you, Bella, so well—sitting at the piano, with a great black braid over your shoulder, playing that ‘Marche Aux Flambeaux,’ and poor father keeping time with his pipe. And that duet, Bella! You and I—the Grande Fantasia for Les Huguenots—” She giggled through her tears, and that giggle was more than Mrs. Russell could bear. It made the plaid dress and the duet and a hundred heartbreaking, dusty, forgotten things rise up before her.
“Louie!” she said. “I’m ashamed of you! When two sisters haven’t met for—”
“For two lifetimes!” said the incorrigible Louie. “I don’t care, Bella! The old things are the best.”
“What,” interrupted Mrs. Russell, sternly, “have you been doing all these years, Louie? Why didn’t you ever write to me?”
“I never had time, Bella. I’ve been too busy, failing. I’ve failed at everything, Bella, everything! I gave my recital—and you must have read how quickly and thoroughly I failed there. Then I tried giving music lessons, but I was always late, or I forgot to come at all, or I’d feel not in the mood for teaching. Then I studied filing and indexing, and oh, Bella, you should have seen the awful things I did! You know I never was exactly methodical! Then I learned typing. I was a little frightened then, Bella. I really tried, at that. But, you see, I wasn’t young any more then, and not good at the work. That failed, too. Then I tried to peddle things—scented soap, from door to door.”
“Louie! I—I’m very sorry, my dear!”
“Well, you needn’t be!” said her sister, drying her eyes. “It’s been very wonderful—sometimes, Bella. I’ve been happy most of the time—because, you see, I never minded failing.”
“Are you—” Mrs. Russell began, with no little embarrassment. “Are you—in difficulties now, Louie?”
“I haven’t a penny in the world, Bella. You remember that fable of La Fontaine’s we used to recite in school? ‘La Cigale et La Fourmis’? (The Grasshopper and the Ant.) I’m Miss Cigale, Bella, and you’re Mrs. Fourmis. I’m the poor, silly grasshopper who danced the summer away—and here I am, Bella. It’s winter—for me—and I want to rest, here with you, until the summer comes back.”
“Oh, don’t be so—‘highfalutin’’!” cried Mrs. Russell, stung by emotion into using a long-forgotten word. “Try to talk sensibly, Louie.”
This was all so typical of her sister; all her memories of Louisa were made up of these queer little storms, these showers of tears, these rainbow smiles.
“Always so upsetting!” she thought, half angry. Yet there never had been any one dear to her in the way Louisa was.
“Come upstairs,” she said, firmly, “and get ready for dinner, and then—Oh! There’s Geordie!”
“Oh, Bella! Your son!”
“Louie, listen to me! You must not be—silly about Geordie. He won’t understand it, and he won’t like it. Do, for goodness’ sake, pull yourself together![Pg 431]”
But Louie couldn’t. She tried; she sat up very straight in her chair, and smiled, but Mrs. Russell was not satisfied. She wished that she had had time to put Louie in order before the boy saw her. He was so fastidious; what would he think of this unexpected aunt, with her wild, fair hair, her blue eyes swimming in tears, her trembling smile?
“She looks worn,” thought Mrs. Russell, “but not—well, somehow, not grown up!”
Geordie had come up the steps now; a good-looking young fellow, and somehow touching, with his sulky mouth and his sulky blue eyes.
“Louisa!” said Mrs. Russell, in a threatening voice. “This is my son, George. Geordie, your Aunt Louisa!”
Poor Louisa said nothing at all, for fear of bursting into tears, but Geordie could be trusted to behave with decorum. He said something about this being an unexpected pleasure; said it punctiliously. But Mrs. Russell knew at once, by the tone of his voice, that he didn’t like this aunt. She saw him cast a quick glance at her lamentable untidiness.
“Are those your bags, out in the street?” he inquired. “Shan’t I get them?”
“Oh, no!” cried Louie. “Please don’t bother! I’ll get them!” And she made a sort of rush forward, which Mrs. Russell checked.
“Louie!” she said, sternly, and after Geordie had gone down the steps: “Louie! You must have more dignity!”