Alice’s turn came last.
“It was such a beautiful prescription!” she said. “I went to see Madam Kittredge. Her daughter took me up to her big room furnished with old mahogany heirlooms that made me feel as though I were in New England. And there in an arm-chair sat the most beautiful white-haired woman I ever saw. She is quite imposing and grand, but her smile saves her from being awesome. I loved her at first sight, and was not shy about staying alone with her. You would hardly know she is blind, would you? And she is perfectly delightful. She asked about Mrs. Langdon, and told me some droll 238 stories of her odd ways, even when she was a young girl. She and Mrs. Langdon and another girl were together a great deal when they were young, and now they live within a radius of a hundred miles, but she says they never travel, so it might almost as well be a thousand. One is blind and one is lame and the third is deaf! She laughed about it as though it were not sad at all. The deaf one has been quite ill recently, and Madam Kittredge is making the prettiest present for her. She says Mrs. Langdon writes regular letters to them both, but Madam Kittredge can reply only by dictation, or by sending little gifts, and she takes the greatest pleasure in doing that. She showed me what she was getting ready for ‘Matty,’ as she calls the one who lives in Milwaukee. It seemed so queer to hear her speak of Mrs. Langdon as ‘Sue’! If you should see her once,–” turning to Bert, who sat beside her,–“you would appreciate it. She is almost a fierce-looking old lady, and she says the most startlingly frank things if she chooses. I don’t believe any ordinary person could help being a little afraid of Mrs. Langdon, but Madam Kittredge seems to think her a delicious joke. But I started to tell about the present. You see, this Matty is all alone in the world. She never married and she hasn’t much money, and she just loves pretty things, especially pretty colors. And so Madam Kittredge is sending her a rainbow basket. It 239 ought to have seemed pathetic to see her handling the colored things and hear her telling about the pleasure she was sure her friend would take in them, when she couldn’t see them herself, but somehow it wasn’t. She doesn’t seem to think of herself at all, and so she doesn’t make other people. She said she made excellent use of her sight while she had it, and can picture everything clearly now. The basket itself was beautiful, a big green sweet-grass scrap basket, with a great green bow. And inside were six parcels, each tied with a bow of ribbon, so that all the rainbow shades are there. The friend is to draw one each day for a week. Mrs. Kittredge undid them and let me look. She says she likes the feel of the soft paper and ribbon. First was a little red rose bush in a pot–”
“Is she going to send the thing that way? How can she?”
“I asked, myself, and she smiled and said she allowed herself some extravagances, and one was to carry out her little ideas like that without minding if they did cost rather more doing it her way. She said her friend would enjoy the rose ten times as much coming that way as she would if it were ordered from a Milwaukee florist, so she’s sending it. I like her independent spirit!”
“It might take an independent fortune as well,” remarked Dr. Harlow, “but Madam Kittredge is fortunate enough to have that, or its equivalent, 240 and she uses a good proportion of it in conventional charities, so she is safe from criticism if she chooses to assist the express companies. Perhaps she’s a stockholder in one, for all I know! What did she have for orange, Alice?”
“A box of tangerines, with those tiny, tiny ones like doll oranges; I forget what you call them. They looked so pretty in a nest of green. The yellow parcel was a little sunset picture, only a little colored photograph, she said, but with a charming glow. The basket itself was for the green stripe in the rainbow, and there was a lovely pale blue knitted scarf, which Madam Kittredge made herself. The indigo bothered her, but she sent her daughter searching everywhere till she found a beautiful Persian pattern ribbon with an indigo ground, and she made that up into sachets with violet scent.”
“That finished off two at once,” said Hannah. “If I were Matty, I’d object. I thought you said there were six parcels.”
“One of the sachets was done up with dark blue ribbon and the other with violet. But there was still another parcel, a white one, the prettiest of all, for it held skeins of all the soft shades of embroidery silk you ever saw in a white silk case. I don’t see how any one could help liking to look at them. Madam Kittredge said that what suggested the whole idea to her was Matty’s writing about how she enjoyed having colored silk samples 241 to look at, as she lay in bed. She does embroidery, too, when she is well enough, so she will like the silks to use, by and by.”
“What a charming basket!” Catherine drew a deep breath of pleasure. “I should love to see it.”
“She said she shouldn’t send it for a day or two, so if you go in to-morrow, you can. I’m sure she’d love to have you. She wanted one more thing to make it complete. You see, without intending it, she had put in something for every sense but hearing. There was color and fragrance and touch and taste, and she said she wanted to get some music into it, and she couldn’t think how. Of course her friend is deaf, but that didn’t matter. She said her mind’s ear was as true as ever, and she wanted her to hear something out of that basket. And wasn’t it lovely! I happened to think of something which she said would do exactly!”