CHAPTER XIX.
LIFE AT THE COTTAGE.
It was arranged that Flora should, for the present at least, remain at the cottage, and Maddy accepted the kindness gratefully. She had become so much accustomed to being cared for by Guy that she almost looked upon it as a matter of course, and did not think what others might possibly say, but when, in as delicate a manner as possible, Guy suggested furnishing the cottage in better style, even proposing to modernize it entirely in the spring, Maddy objected at once. They were already indebted to him for more than they could ever pay, she said, and she would not suffer it. So Guy submitted, though it grated upon his sense of the beautiful and refined terribly, to see Maddy amid so humble surroundings. Twice a week, and sometimes oftener, he rode down to Honedale, and Maddy felt that without these visits life would hardly have been endurable.
During the vacation Jessie spent a part of the time with her, but Agnes resolutely resisted all Guy’s entreaties that she should at least call on Maddy, who had expressed a wish to see her, and who, on account of her grandfather’s health, and the childishness with which Uncle Joseph clung to her, could not well go up to Aikenside. Agnes would not go to Honedale neither would she give other reasons for the obstinacy than the apparently foolish one that she did not wish to see a crazy man, as such things made her nervous. Still, she did not object to Jessie’s going as often as she liked, and she sent by her many little delicacies from Aikenside, some for grandpa, but most for Uncle Joseph, who prized highly everything coming from “the Madam,” and sent back to her more than one strangely-worded message, which made the proud woman’s eyes overflow when sure that no one could see her.
But this kind of intercourse came to an end at last. The vacation was over, Jessie had gone back to school, and Maddy began in sober earnest the new life before her. Flora, it is true, relieved her of all household drudgery, but no one could share the burden of care and anxiety pressing so heavily upon her; anxiety for her grandfather, whose health seemed failing so fast, and who always looked so disturbed if a shadow were resting on her bright face, or her voice was less cheerful in its tone; and care for the imbecile Joseph, who clung to her as a child clings to its mother, refusing to be cared for by any one else, and often requiring of her more than her strength could endure for a great length of time. She gave him his breakfast in the morning, amused him through the day, and then after he was in bed at night often sat by his side till a late hour, singing to him old songs, or telling Bible stories until he fell asleep. Then if he woke, as he frequently did, there was a cry for Maddy, and the soothing process had to be repeated, until the tired, pale watcher ceased to wonder that her grandmother had died so suddenly, wondering rather that she had lived so long and borne so much.
Those were dark, wearisome hours to Maddy, and when the long, cold winter was gone from the New England hills, and the early buds of spring were coming up by the cottage door, the neighbors began to talk of the change which had come over the young girl, once so full of life and health, but now so languid and pale. Still, Maddy was not unhappy, nor was the discipline too severe, for by it she learned at last the great object of life; learned to take her troubles and cares to one who helped her bear them so cheerfully, that those who pitied her most never dreamed how heavy was her burden, so patiently and sweetly she bore it. Occasionally there came to her letters from the doctor, but latterly they gave her less pleasure than pain, for as often as she read one of his kind, friendly messages of sympathy and remembrance, the tempter whispered to her that though she did not love him as she ought to love her husband, a life with him would be far preferable to the life she was living, and a receipt of his letters always gave her a pang which lasted until Guy came down to see her, when it usually disappeared. Agnes was now at Aikenside, and thus Maddy frequently had Jessie at the cottage, but Agnes never came, and Maddy little guessed how often the proud woman cried herself to sleep after listening to Jessie’s recital of all Maddy had to do for the crazy man, and how patiently she did it. He had taken a fancy that Maddy must tell him stories of Sarah, describing her as she was now, and not as she used to be when he knew her. “What is she now? How does she look? What does she wear? Tell me, tell me!” he would plead, until Maddy, forced to tell him something, and having distinctly in her mind but one fashionable woman such as she fancied Sarah might be, told him of Agnes Remington, describing her as she was in her mature beauty, with her heavy flowing curls, her brilliant color, her flashing diamonds and costly laces, and Uncle Joseph, listening to her with parted lips and hushed breath, would whisper softly, “Yes, that’s Sarah, beautiful Sarah; but tell me—does she ever think of me, or of that time in the orchard when I wove the apple blossoms in her hair, where the diamonds are now? She loved me then; she told me so. Does she know how sick, and sorry, and foolish I am?—how the aching in my poor simple brain is all for her, and how you, poor Maddy, are doing for me what it should have been her place to do? Had I a voice,” and the crazy man would grow excited, as, raising himself in bed, he gesticulated wildly, “had I a voice to reach her, I’d cry shame on her, to let you do her work, let you wear your young life and fresh, bright beauty all away for me, whom she ruined.”
The voice he craved, or the echo of it, did reach her, for Jessie had been present when the fancy first seized him to hear of Sarah, and in the shadowy twilight she told her mother all, dwelling most upon the touching sadness of his face when he said, “Does she know how sick and sorry I am?”
The pillow which Agnes pressed that night was wet with tears, while in her heart was planted a germ of gratitude and respect for the young girl doing her work for her. All that she could do for Maddy without going directly to her, she did, devising many articles of comfort, sending her fruit and flowers, the last new book, or whatever else she thought might please her, and always finding a willing messenger in Guy. He was miserable, and managed when at home to make others so around him. The sight of Maddy bearing her burden so uncomplainingly almost maddened him. Had she fretted or complained he could have borne it better, he said, but he did not see the necessity for her to lose all her spirit or interest in everything and everybody. Once when he hinted as much to Maddy, he had been awed into silence by the subdued expression of her face as she told him in part what it was which helped her to bear, and made the rough places so smooth. He had seen something like this in Lucy, when paroxysms of pain were racking her delicate frame, but he could not understand it; he only knew it was something he could not touch—something against which his arguments beat helplessly; and so with an added respect for Maddy Clyde he smothered his impatience, and determining to help her all he could, rode down to Honedale every day, instead of twice a week, as he had done before.
Attentions so marked could not fail to be commented upon; and while poor, unsuspecting Maddy was deriving so much comfort from his daily visits, deeming that day very long which did not bring him to her, the Honedale gossips, of which there were many, were busy with her affairs, talking them over at their numerous tea-drinkings, discussing them in the streets, and finally at a quilting, where they met in solemn conclave, deciding that “for a girl like Maddy Clyde it did not look well to have so much to do with young Remington, who, everybody knew, was engaged to somebody in England.”
“Yes, and would have been married long ago, if it wasn’t for this foolin’ with Maddy,” chimed in Mrs. Joel Spike, throwing the chalk across the quilt to her sister, Tripheny Marvel, who wondered if Maddy thought he’d ever have her.