Mrs. Hallam's companion; and The Spring Farm, and other tales

by Mary Jane Holmes

“Meadowbrook, Mass., September—, 18—.

“Miss Keziah Morton:

“Dear Madam,—Mr. Wilmot has told you that there is a good school in Meadowbrook and that he is glad to keep me in his family. He wished me also to thank you for your kindness in furnishing the means for my education, and if I really felt thankful I would do so. But I don’t, and I cannot pretend to be grateful, for I do not think your offer was made in kindness, but because, as you said in your letter, you had no option except to care for me. You said, too, that you did not like deception of any kind, and I think I’d better tell you how I feel about accepting help from you. Since my mother died I have accidentally heard how you treated her and neglected my father because of her, and naturally I am indignant, for a sweeter, lovelier woman than my mother never lived. When she died and left me alone, there was a leaning in my heart towards you and the other aunts, because you were the only relatives I have in the world, and if you had shown the least sympathy for me I could have loved you so much. But in your letter you never said one word of pity or comfort. You offered to educate me, that was all. But I prefer to care for myself, and I can do it, too. I am fourteen, and can earn my own living. I can make dresses, as mother did after father died, or I can do second work until I have enough to pay for my schooling. And I would rather do it than be indebted to any one, and if, when you get this, you think best to change your mind, I shall be glad. But if you do not, I shall try to improve every moment and get a thorough education as soon as possible, and when I can I shall pay you every dollar you expend for me, and you need have no fears that I shall ever disgrace my father’s name, or you either.

“I used to think that I should like to see Morton Park, as it was once my father’s home, but since reading your letter I have no desire to go there and bang doors, and pull the books from the shelves, and sing, whether invited to or not, and shock you with slang. I suppose I do use some,—all the girls do, and example is contagious,—and I am fond of singing, and would like nothing better than to take lessons in vocal and instrumental music, but I am not quite a heathen, and can hardly remember when I did not know the Lord’s Prayer, and Ten Commandments, and Creed. But I have not been confirmed, and do not intend to be until I am a great deal better than I am now, for I believe there is something necessary to confirmation besides mere intellectual knowledge. Father and mother taught me that, and they were true Christians.

“Father used sometimes to tell me of his home and his aunts, who were kind to him, and so, perhaps, you would like to know how peacefully he died, and how handsome he was in his coffin, just as if he were asleep. But mother was lovelier still, with such a sweet smile on her face, and her dear little hands folded upon her bosom. There were needle-pricks and marks of the hard work she had done on her fingers, but I covered them with great bunches of the white pond-lilies she loved so much, and then kissed her good-bye forever, with a feeling that my heart was broken; and, oh, it aches so now when I remember that in all the world there is no one who cares for me, or on whom I have any claim.

“I don’t know why I have written this to you, who, of course, have no interest in it, but guess I did it because I am sure you once loved father a little. I do not expect you to love me, but if I can ever be of any service to you I will, for father’s sake; and something tells me that in the future, I don’t know when or how, I shall bring you some good. Until then adieu.

“Doris Morton.”

I knew this was not the kind of letter which a girl of fourteen should send to a woman of sixty, but I was indignant and hot-headed and young, and felt that in some way I was avenging my mother’s wrongs, and so the letter was sent, unknown to the Wilmots, and I waited anxiously for the result. But there was none, so far as I knew. Aunt Kizzy did not answer it, and in her letter to Mr. Wilmot she made no reference to it. She merely said she was glad I was to live in a clergyman’s family under religious influence, and added that if I had a good voice and he thought it desirable I was to have instruction in both vocal and instrumental music.

It did not occur to me to connect this with anything I had written, but I was very glad, for I was passionately fond of music, as I was of books generally. And so for two years I was a pupil in the High School in Meadowbrook, passing from one grade to another, until at last I was graduated with all the honors which such an institution could give.

During this time not a word had ever been written to me by my aunts. The bills had been regularly paid through Mr. Wilmot, to whom Aunt Kizzy’s letters were addressed, and at the end of every quarter a report of my standing in scholarship and deportment had been forwarded to Kentucky. And that was all I knew of my relatives, who might have been Kamschatkans for anything they were to me.