Ethelyn's Mistake

by Mary Jane Holmes

"Was Barbara crazy, that she thought of going to New York in this hot weather, when the smallpox, and the dysentery, and the plague, and mercy knew what was there? Besides that, how did Barbara intend to manage? What was she going to do?"

Barbara hardly knew herself how she should manage, or what she should do. "Providence would direct," she said, though to be sure she had an idea. Ethie had written that she had found employment, and what was more probable than to suppose that the employment was giving music lessons, for which she was well qualified, or teaching in some gentleman's family. Taking this as her basis, Aunt Barbara intended to inquire for every governess and teacher in the city, besides watching every house where such an appendage would be likely to be found. Still her great hope was in the street and the Park. She should surely meet Ethie there some day--at least she would try the effect of her plan; and she went quietly on with her preparations, while Mrs. Van Buren tried to dissuade her from a scheme which seemed so foolish and utterly impracticable.

"Suppose Ethie was a governess, the family most likely would be out of town at that season; and what good would it do for Aunt Barbara to risk her life and health in the crowded city?"

This view of the matter was rather dampening to Aunt Barbara's zeal; but trusting that Providence would interfere in her behalf, she still insisted that she should go, and again expressed a wish that Sophia would go with her. "It would not be so lonesome, and would look better, too," she said, "while you know more of city ways than I do, and would not get imposed upon."

Mrs. Van Buren could go far beyond her sister in abusing Richard, but when it came to a sacrifice of her own comfort and pleasure, she held back. Nothing could induce her to go to New York. She preferred the cool seaside, where she was to join a party of Boston élite. Her dresses were made, her room engaged, and she must go, she said, urging that Nettie's health required the change--Nettie, who had given to her husband a sickly, puny child, which lived just long enough to warrant a grand funeral, and then was laid to rest under the shadow of the Van Buren monument, out in pleasant Mount Auburn.

So Mrs. Van Buren went back to Boston, while Aunt Barbara gave all needful directions to Betty with regard to the management of the house, and the garden, and plants, and cellar door, which must be shut nights, and the spot on the roof which sometimes leaked when it rained, and the burdocks and dandelions which must be dug up, and the grass which Uncle Billy Thompson must cut once in two weeks, and the old cat, Tabby, and the young cat, Jim, who had come to the door in a storm, and was now the pet of the house, and the canary bird, and the yeast, and look in the vinegar barrel to see that all was right, and be sure and scald the milk-pans, and turn them up in the sun for an hour, and keep the doors locked, and the silver up in the scuttle-hole; and if she heard the rat which baffled and tormented them so long, get some poison and kill it, but not on any account let it get in the cistern; and keep the door-steps clean, and the stoop, and once in a while sweep the low roof at the back of the house, and not sit up late nights, or sleep very long in the morning; and inasmuch as there would be so little to do, she might as well finish up all her new sewing, and make the pile of sheets and pillow-cases which had been cut out since March. These were Aunt Barbara's directions, which Betty, nothing appalled, promised to heed, telling her mistress not to worry an atom, as things should be attended to, even better than if she were at home to see to them herself.

Aunt Barbara knew she could trust old Betty, and so, after getting herself vaccinated in both arms, as a precaution against the smallpox, and procuring various disinfecting agents, and having underpockets put in all her dresses, by way of eluding pickpockets, the good woman started one hot July morning on her mission in search of Ethie. But, alas, finding Ethie, or anyone, in New York, was like "hunting for a needle in a hay mow," as Aunt Barbara began to think after she had been for four weeks or more an inmate of an uptown boarding house, recommended as first-class, but terrible to Aunt Barbara, from the contrast it presented to her own clean, roomy home beneath the maple trees, which came up to her so vividly, with all its delicious coolness and fragrance, and blossoming shrubs, and newly cut grass, with the dew sparkling like diamonds upon it.

Aunt Barbara was terribly homesick from the first, but she would not give up; so day after day she traversed one street after another, looking wistfully in every face she met for the one she sought, questioning children playing in the parks and squares as to whether they knew any teacher by the name of Markham or Grant, ringing the door-bells of every pretentious-looking house and putting the same question to the servants, until the bombazine dress and black Stella shawl, and brown Neapolitan hat, and old-fashioned lace veil, and large sun umbrella became pretty well known in various parts of New York, while the owner thereof grew to be a suspicious character, whom servants watched from the basement and ladies from the parlor windows, and children shunned on the sidewalk, while even the police were cautioned with regard to the strange woman who went up and down day after day, sometimes in stages, sometimes in cars, but oftener on foot, staring at everyone she met, especially if they chanced to be young or pretty, and had any children near them. Once down near Washington Square, as she was hurrying toward a group of children, in the center of which stood a figure much like Ethie's, a tall man in the blue uniform accosted her, inquiring into her reasons for wandering about so constantly.

Aunt Barbara's honest face, which she turned full toward the officer, was a sufficient voucher for her with the simple, straightforward explanation which she made to the effect that her niece had left home some time ago--run away, in fact--and she was hunting for her here in New York, where her letter was dated. "But it's wearisome work for an old woman like me, walking all over New York, as I have," Aunt Barbara said, and her lip began to quiver as she sat down upon one of the seats in the square, and looked helplessly up at the policeman. She was not afraid of him, nor of the five others of the craft who knew her by sight, and stopped to hear what she had to say. She never dreamed that they could suspect her of wrong, and they did not when they heard her story, and saw the truthful, motherly face. Perhaps they could help her, they said, and they asked the name of the runaway.

At first Aunt Barbara refused to give it, wishing to spare Ethie this notoriety; but she finally yielded so far as to say, "She might call herself either Markham or Grant," and that was all they could get from her; but after that day the bombazine dress, and black Stella shawl, and large sun umbrella were safe from the surveillance of the police, save as each had a kindly care for the owner, and an interest in the object of her search.