Rose paid no attention to this speech, and when she found that her favorite Sarah was not to accompany her, she almost wept herself into convulsions, declaring that her father, to whom the mother imputed the blame, was cruel and hard-hearted, and that if it was Jenny instead of herself who was sick, she guessed "she'd have forty waiting-maids if she wanted them."
"I should like to know who is to take care of me?" said she. "Jenny isn't going, and grandma would think it an unpardonable extravagance to hire a servant. I will not go, and that ends it! If you want to be rid of me, I can die fast enough here."
Mrs. Lincoln had nothing to say, for she well knew she had trained her daughter to despise every thing pertaining to the old brown house, once her childhood home, and where even now the kind-hearted grandmother was busy in preparing for the reception of the invalid. From morning until night did the little active form of Grandma Howland flit from room to room, washing windows which needed no washing, dusting tables on which no dust was lying, and doing a thousand things which she thought would add to the comfort of Rose. On one room in particular did the good old lady bestow more than usual care. 'Twas the "spare chamber," at whose windows Rose, when a little girl, had stood for hours, watching the thin, blue mist and fleecy clouds, as they floated around the tall green mountains, which at no great distance seemed to tower upward, and upward, until their tops were lost in the sky above. At the foot of the mountain and nearer Glenwood, was a small sheet of water which now in the spring time was plainly discernible from the windows of Rose's chamber, and with careful forethought Mrs. Howland arranged the bed so that the sick girl could look out upon the tiny lake and the mountains beyond. Snowy white, and fragrant with the leaves of rose and geranium which had been pressed within their folds, were the sheets which covered the bed, the last Rose Lincoln would ever rest upon. Soft and downy were the pillows, and the patchwork quilt, Rose's particular aversion, was removed, and its place supplied by one of more modern make.
Once Mrs. Howland thought to shade the windows with the Venetian blinds which hung in the parlor below; but they shut out so much sunlight, and made the room so gloomy, that she carried them back, substituting in their place plain white muslin curtains. The best rocking chair, and the old-fashioned carved mirror, were brought up from the parlor; and then when all was done, Mrs. Howland gave a sigh of satisfaction that it was so well done, and closed the room until Rose should arrive.
CHAPTER XXVIII.
GLENWOOD.
Through the rich crimson curtains which shaded Rose Lincoln's sleeping room, the golden beams of a warm March sun wore stealing, lighting up the thin features of the sick girl with a glow so nearly resembling health, that Jenny, when she came to wish her sister good morning, started with surprise at seeing her look so well.
"Why, Rose, you are better," said she, kissing the fair cheek on which the ray of sunlight was resting.
Rose had just awoke from her deep morning slumber, and now remembering that this was the day appointed for her dreaded journey to Glenwood, she burst into tears, wondering "why they would persist in dragging her from home."
"It's only a pretence to get me away, I know," said she, "and you may as well confess it at once. You are tired of waiting upon me."