"Cousin Wealthy," said Hildegarde at breakfast the next morning, "may I tell you what it was that made me so rude as to interrupt you last night?"
"Certainly, my dear," said Miss Wealthy; "you may tell me, and then you may forget the little accident, as I had already done."
"Well," said Hildegarde, "you spoke of the time when Mamma was a 'harum-scarum girl;' and the idea of her ever having been anything of the sort was so utterly amazing that—that was why I cried out. Is it possible that Mammy was not always quiet and blessed and peaceful?"
"Mildred!" exclaimed Miss Wealthy. "Mildred peaceful! My dear Hilda!"
An impressive pause followed, and Hildegarde's eyes began to twinkle. "Tell us!" she murmured, in a tone that would have persuaded an oyster to open his shell. Then she stroked Miss Wealthy's arm gently, and was silent, for she saw that speech was coming in due time.
Miss Wealthy looked at her teacup, and shook her head slowly, smiled, and then sighed. "Mildred!" she said again. "My dear, your mother is now forty years old, and I am seventy. When she came to visit me for the first time, I was forty years old, and she was ten. She had on, when she arrived, a gray stuff frock, trimmed with many rows of narrow green braid, and a little gray straw bonnet, with rows of quilled satin ribbon, green and pink." The girls exchanged glances of horror and amazement at the thought of this headgear, but made no sound. "I shall never forget that bonnet," continued Miss Wealthy, pensively, "nor that dress. In getting out of the carriage her skirt caught on the step, and part of a row of braid was ripped; this made a loop, in which she caught her foot, and tumbled headlong to the ground. I mended it in the evening, after she was in bed, as it was the frock she was to wear every morning. My dears, I mended that frock every day for a month. It is the truth! the braid caught on everything,—on latches, on brambles, on pump-handles, on posts, on chairs. There was always a loop of it hanging, and the child was always putting her foot through it and tumbling down. She never cried, though sometimes, when she fell downstairs, she must have hurt herself. A very brave little girl she was. At last I took all the braid off, and then things went a little better."
Miss Wealthy paused to sip her coffee, and Hildegarde tried not to look as if she begrudged her the sip. "Then," she went on, "Mildred was always running away,—not intentionally, you understand, but just going off and forgetting to come back. Once—dear, dear! it gives me a turn to think of it!—she had been reading 'Neighbor Jackwood,' and was much delighted with the idea of the heroine's hiding in the haystack to escape her cruel pursuers. So she went out to the great haystack in the barnyard, pulled out a quantity of hay, crept into the hole, and found it so comfortable that she fell fast asleep. You may imagine, my dears, what my feelings were when dinner-time came, and Mildred was not to be found. The house was searched from garret to cellar. Martha and I—Martha had just come to me then—went down to the wharf and through the orchard and round by the pasture, calling and calling, till our throats were sore. At last, as no trace of the child could be found, I made up my mind that she must have wandered away into the woods and got lost. It was a terrible thought, my dears! I called Enoch, the man, and bade him saddle the horse and ride round to call out the neighbors, that they might all search together. As he was leading the horse out, he noticed a quantity of hay on the ground, and wondered how it had come there. Coming nearer, he saw the hole in the stack, looked in, and—there was the child, fast asleep!"
"Oh! naughty little mother!" cried Hildegarde. "What did you do to her, Cousin Wealthy?"
"Nothing, my dear," replied the good lady. "I was quite ill for several days from the fright, and that was enough punishment for the poor child. She never meant to be naughty, you know. But my heart was in my mouth all the time. Once, coming home from a walk, I heard a cheery little voice crying, 'Cousin Wealthy! Cousin! see where I am!' I looked up. Hilda, she was sitting on the ridge-pole of the house, waving her bonnet by a loop of the pink quilled ribbon,—it was almost as bad as the green braid about coming off,—and smiling like a cherub. 'I came through the skylight,' she said, 'and the air up here is so fresh and nice! I wish you would come up, Cousin!'
"Another time—oh, that was the worst time of all! I really thought I should die that time." Miss Wealthy paused, and shook her head.