In Wild Rose Time

by Amanda M. Douglas

Then Sandy Fossett came in, and was “introjuced.” He, too, had heard the fame of the ’lickin’ good stews,’ but he was surprised to find such a very little body.

Dil lay on the lounge that night, but did not sleep much, it was all so strange. Any other body would have felt disheartened in the morning, but Patsey was “so good.” He “hustled” the few things out of the little room, asked the woman in the other part about making paste, and ran off for his paper. Dil found a scrubbing-brush, and had the closet partly cleaned when he returned. Mrs. Brian came in and “gave them a hand.” She was a short, stout, cheery body, with just enough Irish to take warmly to Dil.

If the poor child had small aptitude for book-learning, she had the wonderful art of housekeeping at her very finger ends. In a week the boys hardly knew the place. Dil’s little room was really pretty, with its paper of grasses and field flowers on the lightest gray ground. She scalded and scrubbed her cot, and drove out any ghost that might have lingered about; she made a new “bureau” out of grocery boxes, not that she had any clothes at present, but she might have. She was so thankful for a home that work was a pleasure to her, though she did get very, very tired, and a pain would settle in the place where the ribs were broken.

The living room took on a delightful aspect. The chairs were scrubbed and painted, the table was cleaned up and covered with enamelled cloth. And such coffee as Dil made; such stews of meat and potatoes and onions, and a carrot or a bit of parsley; and oh, such soups and chowders! When she made griddlecakes the boys went out and stood on their heads—there was no other way to express their delight. Fin came back in a jiffy, and another lad, named Shorty by his peers. Indeed, there could have been ten if there had been room.

Owen was very much improved. He was shooting up into a tall boy, and had his mother’s black eyes and fresh complexion. When the two boys talked about Bess, Dil could almost imagine her coming back. She sometimes tried to make believe that little Bess had gone to the hospital to get her poor hurted legs mended, and would surely return to them.

There was quite a pretty yard between the two houses. It really belonged to the “front” people. There was a grass-plot and some flowers, and an old honeysuckle climbing the porch. The air was much better than in Barker’s Court, and altogether it was a more humanizing kind of living. And though the people up-stairs ran a sewing-machine in the evening, there were no rows. Mr. Brian did some kind of work on the docks, and went away early, coming back at half-past six or so. He was a nice, steady sort of fellow; and though he had protested vigorously against a “raft of boys” keeping house, after Dil came he was very friendly.

Patsey also “laid out” for Mrs. Quinn. When she came down from the “Island,” she heard that her furniture had been set in the street, and then taken in by some of the neighbors. Dan was in a Home, Owen had not been seen, neither had Dilsey. Then the woman drank again and raged round like a tiger, was arrested, but pleaded so hard, and promised amendment so earnestly, that sentence was suspended.

It was well that Owen and Dilsey kept out of her way, for if she had found either of them she would have wreaked a full measure of vengeance upon them. There had never been a great deal of tenderness in her nature, and her experiences of the last ten years had not only hardened but brutalized her. The habit of steady drinking had blunted her natural feelings more than occasional outbreaks with weeks of soberness. She had no belief in a future state and no regard for it. Still, she had not reached that last stage of demoralization—she was willing to work; and when she had money to spend, Mrs. MacBride made her welcome again.

After Dil had her house a little in order, and had made herself a new gingham gown, she took her way one lovely afternoon over to Madison Square. She had meant to tell Patsey about John Travis, but an inexplicable feeling held her back. How she was coming to reach after higher things, or that they were really higher, she did not understand. Heaven was still a great mystery to her. With the boys Bess was simply dead, gone out of life, and sometime everybody seemed to go out of life. Why they did was the inscrutable mystery?

It was curious, but now she had no desire to finish Christiana, although she devoted some time every day to reading. The old things that had been such a pleasure seemed sacred to Bess, laid away, awaiting a mysterious solution. For she knew John Travis could tell her all about it.