“Not unless I should happen to marry a rich man. Poor girls like me have sometimes done that, haven’t they?” was Maddy’s demure reply.
Grandpa Markham shook his head.
“They have, but it’s mostly their ruination; so don’t build castles in the air about this Guy Remington.”
“Me! oh, grandpa, I never dreamed of Mr. Guy!” and Madeline blushed half indignantly. “He’s too rich, too aristocratic, though Sarah said he didn’t act one bit proud, and is so pleasant that the servants all worship him, and Mrs. Noah thinks him good enough for the Queen of England. I shall think so, too, if he lets you have the money. How I wish it was Monday night, so we could know for sure!”
“Perhaps we both shall be terribly disappointed,” suggested grandpa, but Maddy was more hopeful.
She, at least, should not fail; while what she had heard of Guy Remington, the master of Aikenside, made her believe that he would accede at once to her grandfather’s request.
All that night in her dreams she was working to pay the debt, giving the money herself into the hands of Guy Remington, whom she had never seen, but who came up before her the tall, handsome-looking man she had so often heard described by Sarah Jones after her return from Aikenside, where she had once done some plain sewing for the housekeeper. Even the next day, when, by her grandparent’s side, Maddy knelt reverently in the small church at Honedale, her thoughts were more intent upon the to-morrow and Aikenside than the sacred words her lips were uttering. She knew it was wrong, and with a nervous start tried to bring her mind back from decimal fractions to what the minister was saying; but Maddy was mortal, and right in the midst of the Collect, Aikenside and its owner would rise before her, together with the wonder how she and her grandfather would feel one week from that day. Would the desired certificate be hers? or would she be disgraced forever and ever by a rejection? Would the mortgage be paid and her grandfather at ease, or would his heart be breaking with the knowing he must leave what had been his home for so many years?
But no such thoughts troubled the aged disciple beside her—the good old man, whose white locks swept the large-lettered book over which his wrinkled face was bent, as he joined in the responses, or said the prayers whose words had so soothing an influence upon him, carrying his thoughts upward to the house not made with hands, which he felt assured would one day be his. Once or twice, it is true, the possibility of losing the dear old red cottage flitted across his mind with a keen, sudden pang, but he put it quickly aside, remembering at the same instant how the Father he loved doeth all things well to such as are his children. Grandpa Markham was old in the Christian course, while Maddy could hardly be said to have commenced it as yet, and so to her that April Sunday was long and wearisome. How she did wish she might just look over the geography, by way of refreshing her memory, and see exactly how the rule for extracting the cubic root did read, but Maddy forbore, and read only the Pilgrim’s Progress, the Bible, and the book brought from the Sunday-school, vainly imagining that by so doing she was earning the good she so much desired.
With the earliest dawn of day she was up, and her grandmother heard her repeating to herself much of what she fancied Dr. Holbrook might question her upon. Even when bending over the wash-tub, for there were no servants at the red cottage, a book was arranged before her so that she could study with her eyes, while her fat hands and dimpled arms were busy in the suds. Before ten o’clock everything was done, the clothes, white as snow-drops in the garden beds, were swinging upon the line, the kitchen floor was scrubbed, the windows washed, the best room swept, the vegetables cleaned for dinner, and then Maddy’s work was finished. Grandma could do all the rest, and Madeline was free to pore over her books until called to dinner; she could not eat so great was her excitement.
Swiftly the hours flew until it was time to be getting ready, when again the short hair was deplored, as before her looking-glass Madeline brushed and arranged her shining, beautiful locks. Would Dr. Holbrook think of her age? Suppose he should ask it. But no, he wouldn’t. Only census-takers did that. If Mr. Green thought her old enough, surely it was not a matter with which the doctor need trouble himself; and, somewhat at ease on that point, Madeline donned her longest frock, and, standing on a chair, tried to discover how much of her pantalet was visible.