But if there was no outer change in Thirza, there was an inner change going on, which became at length a feverish restlessness, which disturbed her night and day. She found herself continually taking down from her shelves certain fascinating books, treating of foreign scenes and people; reading and re-reading them, and laying them aside with strange reluctance. Then she fell into a habit of taking her little bank-book, and figuring assiduously upon the covers. Three thousand dollars! Enough, she bitterly reflected, to keep her from the almshouse when her hands became too feeble to tend the loom, but a paltry sum, after all! Many persons, even in Millburn, spent far more than that yearly.
All at once a thought flashed upon her, a thought which took away her breath and set her brain to whirling. And yet it was not an absolutely new thought. It had haunted her under various disguises from the moment when Jane Withers, by a few words, had transmuted the barren pastures and piney woods of her farm into actual dollars; and now, after hovering about all this time, it had found a moment,—when some fascinating book had thrown her off her guard,—to spring upon and overpower her. For a moment she was stunned and overwhelmed—then she calmly closed the little bank-book, and said: "I will do it!"
In one week the whole town knew that Thirza Bradford was going to travel, and all former discussions of her affairs sank into nothing in comparison with the importance they now assumed. Among her immediate acquaintances there was considerable excitement, and their opinions were freely, if not elegantly, expressed. The men, almost without exception, pronounced her "a fool," as did the elder women, whose illusions, if they had ever entertained any, had long since been dispelled. But among the younger women there was a more or less repressed feeling of sympathy, amounting to envy. Poor girls! they, too, no doubt, indulged in secret longings which their prosaic work-a-day world failed to satisfy; and doubtless those who had themselves "aunt Abigails," or any other "expectations" of a like nature, were led into wild and wicked speculations upon the tenure of human life, for which, it is to be hoped, Thirza will not be held accountable.
It is the fashion of the day to ascribe our more objectionable peculiarities and predilections to "hereditary taint," and there is something so comforting and satisfactory in this theory, that it has attracted many adherents not otherwise of a scientific turn of mind. Millburn was not scientific; but even Millburn fell into the same way of theorizing.
"Bill Bradford," said public opinion, "was an oneasy sort of a chap,—a half crazy, extravagant critter,—and Thirzy is a chip o' the old block."
When the news reached Jones' Hill,—which it shortly did by the never-failing means of Jane Withers, who was accommodatingly helping Orthaniel's mother through a course of "soap-bilin',"—the comments were severe. Orthaniel received the tidings as he was about starting for the cow-yard, with a milk-pail in each hand. He listened, with fallen jaw, unto the bitter end. Then, giving his blue overalls an expressive hitch, he remarked ungallantly:
"That gal hain't got no more sense 'n a yaller dog!"—and he, at least, may be pardoned for so thinking.
As for Thirza, her decision once made, she troubled herself little about the "speech of people." From the moment when she had closed her little bank-book with the words "I will do it," she became, not another woman, but her real self. She went serenely about her simple preparations for her departure in a state of quiet exultation which lent a new charm to her dark face and a new grace to her step.
Squire Brooks arranged her money affairs for her,—not without remonstrance, however. It seemed to the close-fisted, elderly man a wild and wanton thing to do; but there was something in the half-repressed enthusiasm of the girl which caused the wise, prudential words to die upon his lips. When she left his office, on the evening before her departure, he watched the light-stepping figure out of sight, and then walked up to the dingy office mirror and surveyed his wrinkled visage on all sides. Carefully brushing up the sparse gray locks which had been ordered to the front, as it were, to fill the gaps created by Time's onslaughts, he shook his head deprecatingly, and with a sigh walked away from the glass, humming softly "Mary of Argyle."
As Thirza, absorbed in thought, turned into the long, shaded street which led down to her boarding-house, she was startled out of her reverie by the sound of her own name, pronounced in a friendly tone. Looking up, she saw a gentleman approaching. Her heart gave a quick leap as she recognized Warren Madison, son of the richest manufacturer of Millburn. He was no recent acquaintance. In her school days, when social distinctions weighed but little, there had been a childish intimacy and fondness between them. Time and separation, and the wide difference in their position,—which she, at least, felt most keenly,—had estranged them. Since the young man's return, after years of study and travel, to become his father's partner, she had met him very often, both in the mill and outside of it, and he had constantly shown a disposition to renew their former friendship. But poor, proud Thirza had rejected all his advances. Even now, although her cheeks tingled and her hands trembled nervously, she would have passed him with a simple nod; but somehow, before she realized it, young Madison had secured her hand and a smile, too; and, to her surprise, she found herself walking by his side, talking with something of the familiarity of the old school days.