Rutledge

by Miriam Coles Harris

And so, indeed, I found it for a while. I read till I had extracted all the honey from the pile of reviews and magazines before me, and then pushed them away, and leaning against the window, gazed out on the dreary landscape. A sheet of rain and mist hid the lake, the pine grove looked black and sullen, the trees in the park tossed mournfully about their naked branches, as showers of yellow leaves fell in gusts upon the ground; the wind moaned dismally around the house, and dashed the rain, by fits and starts, against the windows with a heavy sound. It was very nice to feel that it could not get in, and that there was stout glass and stone between me and the pitiless autumn storm, and a snug and cosy shelter from its fury. But by and by I grew rather tired of watching the rain and the leaves, and yawning, began to cast about for some more attractive occupation. This I found for a short time in my worsted work, which I disinterred from the depths of my trunk, and applied myself to in great earnest for half an hour. But the motive for exertion was wanting; I could not help thinking wearily, that there was not the least hurry about finishing it, and those roses would blow, on demand, any time during the next six years, with as much advantage as at present.

And so I laid it down and took to the window again, wondering, with a sigh, whether all young ladyhood were like this; and if it were, how it happened that we did not hear of more early deaths—deaths from utter ennui and exhaustion. I had for so long been used to having every half hour in the day filled up with some unavoidable exercise of mind or body, that I felt entirely lost without the routine, and firmly resolved, as soon as I should be settled at my aunt's, to begin a course of study which should fill up all these idle moments, and give some vigor to my faculties. "I should die of this in a month," I thought; and seizing one of the rejected Reviews, the only literature at hand, I resolutely set myself to read the longest, driest paper in it. And really, after the task was accomplished, though I am sorry to say I was not by much the clearer in my views on the particular branch of science of which it treated, still I felt decidedly better satisfied with myself for the effort, and experienced less compunction in taking, after lunch, a short nap.

Kitty had been absent all the morning, having been detailed for some pressing laundry work by the practical Mrs. Roberts, for which I was still owing her a grudge, when, just as I awoke from my nap, she walked in, and accepting the chair I offered her, made me quite a little visit. I exerted myself to appear amiable, and was congratulating myself on the success of my efforts, and on the absence of all disagreeable topics, when, just as she was going, her keen eyes having made the circuit of the room many times, she detected something amiss in the bed, and walking across to the recess where it stood, began to examine the manner in which it was made.

"That Kitty," she said, "was not to be trusted to make even a bed by herself. She was sure I did not lie comfortably."

And stooping down, she began to dissect it. My heart gave a spasmodic thump, and then stood "stock-still for sheer amazement," not to say consternation, when it flashed across me that I had left the guilty miniature between the mattresses, where, in the sleepless nervousness of last night, I had put it, in order to have it as far out of the way as possible. It was the strangest thing that I should never have thought of it since I waked up. "And now," I thought, with a cold chill, "now it is probably under Mrs. Roberts' very nose, and Kitty and I are undone." I hardly breathed as I watched her throwing back blanket and sheet, and making sad havoc among the bolsters and pillows, giving the one a contemptuous shake, and the other an indignant poke; all the while most animatedly anathematizing the the unlucky Kitty. I had already pictured Kitty and myself dragged by the hair of our guilty heads, before Mr. Rutledge, for judgment, and terrified into confession by that awful look of his, when to my unspeakable relief, Mrs. Roberts stopped just short of the mattress, and coming indignantly across the room, rang for Kitty, who promptly answered the bell. She looked somewhat blank to find that the summons was not to dress me, but to stand one of Mrs. Roberts' tirades.

Mrs. Roberts was, I believe, troubled with rheumatism, "the worst kind," and the cold storm and east wind had aggravated these long-tried enemies to an unbearable pitch, and it was well known in the house that there was but one remedy that succeeded in the least in allaying the irritation of her nerves, but one soothing panacea, and that was, a thorough and satisfactory "blow-out" or scolding; the raking fore-and-aft some adversary's craft with the unerring fire of her indignation, the entire annihilation, soul and body, for the time being, of the victim that happened first to cross her path. And tradition pointed to Kitty as the favorite scape-goat on these occasions. She knew her fate, I am certain, from the moment she caught the dull glare of Mrs. Roberts' eye, and doggedly tossing her pretty head to one side, stood ready to confront her.

Did she call that bed made, Mrs. Roberts would like to know? Kitty considered it made—yes.

She did, did she? Then she would please to come across the room and try if she could do it as well the second time.

I made Kitty an agonized gesture, which she promptly understood, but which Mrs. Roberts also caught sight of, and was at her elbow in an instant. It was a pretty severe contest of skill between the veteran rat-catcher and the keen little mouser; Mrs. Roberts knew there was something, and inly vowed to scent it out; Kitty was as determined to elude her vigilance, and as is not unusual, youth and dexterity triumphed. From under the very eyes of Mrs. Roberts, Kitty, under cover of a zealous shake of the mattress, bore off the miniature, and smuggling it in her apron, passed by where I was sitting, and threw it into my lap. I thrust it down to the lowest depths of my pocket, and looked with admiration at Kitty's unshaken composure, as she continued her work under the galling fire of Mrs. Roberts' sarcasms.

The bed at last was made irreproachably; even Mrs. Roberts could find no fault with its unruffled exterior; though to my unpractised eye, it had looked much the same before its revisal. It seemed a long time before the antagonists withdrew, and a longer still before my tranquillity of temper was restored. How I wished the miniature safely back in Kitty's trunk, in the furthest corner of the attic! That came of doing what I was ashamed of! I did not feel as if I could look any one in the face till it was out of my hands. I did not venture to ring for Kitty, for I felt certain Mrs. Roberts stood with the door of her room ajar, ready to pounce upon her if she came in sight again; so I exerted myself to perform the duties of my toilette unaided. They were not arduous, and I was soon dressed, and vainly trying to interest myself in my embroidery till the bell should ring. It was still an open question whether I should go downstairs; I half inclined to playing invalid a little longer, and taking this one more meal in my room. But then the dreary prospect of my solitary dinner, and the long dull twilight, with nothing but my own thoughts for entertainment, and the longer, duller evening, with nothing to amuse but what had failed of that object during the day, weighed down the balance in favor of a change of scene, and I was on my feet in an instant, as my watch pointed to three, and the bell announced dinner, simultaneously. I pushed the worsted into my workbox, and putting the miniature hastily into a drawer, essayed to lock it, but the key was defective, for some cause, and would not turn, and not daring to run the risk of being late, I again put it into my pocket, and hurried down.