“I must let the professional gentleman in first, then find my mother. But if you behave like a little soldier he won’t hurt you very much, not so very much!”
Beatrice felt a little guilty in frightening the unlucky child as she was doing; still she believed that it might result in future relief to the rest of the family, and persisted. Robert had never been placed under a physician’s care before; for the innumerable bumps and bruises he had suffered at the mischance of fate or his own mischief had been cared for by maternal hands alone. Ditto all the childish diseases with which he, in common with the rest of the juvenile world, had been afflicted; and it was, perhaps, one of the reasons for the young Beckwiths’ good health that their mother had been too poor to dose them with drugs, but had relied as far as might be on Doctor Nature instead.
“She must have been terribly frightened this time, to have sent for a physician!” thought Beatrice, as she admitted the gentleman; and it was not until she had questioned Isabelle that she learned how serious the boy’s hurt had at first been supposed.
“He lay unconscious for more than an hour, Bonny; and I never saw Mother so distressed. She thought he had been injured internally, and could not rest until she had somebody examine him. Poor little chap! he’ll be felt of from head to foot now; and I, too, hope it will be a lesson to him. I actually fear he will be killed sometime in some of these ‘accidents.’”
“Not a bit of it! At least I don’t think so now, though Mr. Dolloway did frighten me. But what a pretty little luncheon you have set out! Did you make that batch of biscuits, or Motherkin?”
“I—I myself. And, Bonny, I’m sorry I was so hateful about the housework. Mother has been talking with me and showing me how I can manage. She thinks after I have learned I may be almost as quick as you; and if I plan my work systematically from day to day, that I will be able to get some hours each day for painting or sketching. If I do not have to give up all I dreamed, I shall not mind it so much.”
Bonny threw her arms about her sister’s neck, and gave her a loving kiss. “I think that’s splendid of you, Belle! I have wished I could do both your share and that for which Mr. Brook has offered me payment. But I cannot; and something I read the other night may be a help to all of us. It was about ‘traditions,’ binding ourselves to do just as everybody has settled is the best way for the majority to do. I am not a lucid explainer, but it is like this: I’ve heard you quote dear Miss Joanna for authority in housekeeping matters, country housekeeping; and her servants say she is a ‘model.’ Certainly the great mansion is always spick and span from top to bottom; but that is for her, not for us. There are so many things we can let go, or rather, never undertake, that are wholly unnecessary. The article said that, given a perfect cleanliness, many other ideas about ‘dirt’ were just ‘fussiness.’ In the first place, she who wishes to do something else with her time besides housekeeping should never burden her rooms with knick-knacks. ‘Trash,’ that writer called the lots of things one generally strews about on tables and shelves. Every extra article put into a room means so much extra dusting and cleaning, and so much time to do that in. And a lot more talk like that. It seemed to me, when I had finished reading, that housework might be made ever so much simpler and shorter if one studied how in the same way one studies to learn anything else. For instance, when I began my typewriting it seemed to me that I should never be able to write fast enough to earn my salt; but after a while it came easier, till, for a girl of my age, I really think I do quite well both at that and lecturing! Don’t you?”
“I think you have certainly talked faster than you have eaten; but the notion is a good one. It is ever so much like what Mother told me this morning. Must you go? Won’t you wait to see her first?”
“I ought not. She is closeted with the doctor, and bent upon finding broken bones somewhere about Bob’s anatomy. With that end in view she will be unseeable for some time to come. And look! Roland is chasing that nag, the first time I ever saw her gallop in her life! Poor boy! Give him my kindest regards, accept the same for yourself, and believe me, yours truly, Bon! Really, Belle, I think you’re splendid, and your lunch was fine; and Roland is a pattern,—my mother says so,—and Robert is the dearest, roughest, most exciting little chap in the world. We are a brilliant family! And I have another fine scheme which I will divulge to the assembled multitude this evening. No; it’s not my scheme, either, it’s Mr. Brook’s; so, sure to be right. Good-bye.”
“Farewell! But, say, Bonny!”