Round Anvil Rock: A Romance

by Nancy Huston Banks

No dread of wintry storms had yet driven away any of the birds that Ruth fed every day on the sill of her chamber window. They were all there as usual—the whole feathered colony—as if they wished to be polite, even though they were not hungry on that sunny morning. The little ones, to be sure, pecked a crumb now and then with a languid indifference. The blue jays—as usual—were brazen in their ingratitude for any dole of commonplace crumbs, while spicy seeds were still strewn by every scented breeze. But shy and bold alike, they all flocked around Ruth's window, and sat on the sill within reach of her hand, and cocked their pretty heads as if it were feast enough only to look at her.

She had already been downstairs to fetch the birds' breakfast, and had gone into the garden where the sweetest and reddest roses of all the year were still blooming. She held a big bunch of them in her hand as she stood at the open window and waved it at David in a morning greeting, when she saw him crossing the yard. She came down the broad stairs as he entered the great room, and she was wearing a fresh white frock and her arms were full of the fragrant red roses.

The rest of the family were already in the room, and the table was laid for breakfast. Ruth greeted each one with a smile, but she did not speak, and began to move quietly about the table, giving those dainty little finishing touches which no true woman ever leaves to a servant. She put some of the roses in a vase, and rearranged this and that, moving lightly and softly about. Her footsteps were as soundless as the fall of tender leaves, and her garments made no more rustle than the unfolding of a flower. She threw one of the red roses at David, and wafted the judge a kiss. Once or twice she turned to speak to William, but forthwith smilingly gave up all thought of it for the time being.

There never was any use in anybody's trying to speak while Miss Penelope was in the height of the excitement of making the morning coffee. An opportunity for a word might possibly occur during the making of the coffee for dinner or supper. Miss Penelope did not consider this function quite so solemn a ceremony at dinner or supper time. Sometimes, at rare intervals, she had been known to allow the coffee for dinner or supper to be made by the cook in the kitchen. But the making of the breakfast coffee was a very different and far more imposing ceremonial. This must always be performed in the presence of the, entire assembled household, by her own hand, on the wide hearth in the great room of Cedar House. To have permitted the cook to make the morning coffee in the kitchen, would have been in Miss Penelope's eyes, to relegate a sacred rite to profane hands in an unconsecrated place. Her own making of the morning coffee had indeed much of the solemnity of a religious ceremony—or would have had, if those who looked on, had been unable to hear, or even slightly dull of hearing. For the sound of Miss Penelope's voice was charming when the listener could not hear what it said. And her dulcet tone always ran through the whole performance like the faint, sweet echo of distant music. But when the listener's ears were keen, and he could hear the things that this kind, caressing voice was saying, the threats that it was uttering!—They were alarming enough to curdle the blood of the little cup-bearers, black, brown, and yellow, who always flew like shuttles back and forth between the big house and the distant kitchen while Miss Penelope was making the breakfast coffee. It required much flying of small dusky legs, to and fro, before the cold water was cold enough, the hot water hot enough, and the fresh egg fresh enough, to satisfy Miss Penelope that the coffee would be all that it should be.

On this particular morning the usual excitement had reached its crisis as Ruth came down the stairs. There was usually a slight lull when the first slender and almost invisible column of steam arose from the long spout of the coffee-pot. That was the most critical moment, and it now being safely past, Miss Penelope hastily sent away all the cup-bearers in a body. But she still hovered anxiously over the pot, gravely considering how many minutes longer it should rest on its trivet over the glowing coals. Hers was a quaint little figure. She wore a queer little black dress, very short and narrow, made after some peculiar fashion of her own, and over it a queerer little cape of the same stuff. Her cap on the other hand was singularly large and white, and the ruffle around her face was very wide and very stiff. The snapping black eyes under the ruffle were never still, and the clawlike little hands were never at rest. David in his idle way used to wonder what she worried about and fidgeted over in her sleep. But it was hard to think of her asleep; it would have been easier to fancy a sleeping weasel. Nevertheless the boy liked Miss Penelope. Ruth and he had learned while they were little children, that there was no unkindness in the snapping of her sharp little black eyes, and that the terrible things she said were as harmless as heat lightning. Even the little cup-bearers, black, brown, and yellow, all knew how kind-hearted she was, and did not mind in the least the most appalling threats uttered by her sweet, soft voice. She always gave them something before she sent them flying back to the cabins. Everybody liked her better than the widow Broadnax who never scolded or meddled and indeed, rarely spoke at all to any one upon any subject. For the household had long since come to understand that this lady, like many another of her kind, was silent mainly because she had nothing to say; and that she never found fault, simply because she did not care. Indifference like hers often passes for amiability; and that sort of motionless silence conceals a vacuum quite as often as it covers a deep. Only one thing ever fully aroused the widow Broadnax; and this was to see her half-sister taking authority in her own brother's house. And indeed, that were enough to rouse the veriest mollusk of a woman. In the case of the widow Broadnax this natural feeling was not at all affected by the fact that she was too indolent to make the exertion to claim and fill her rightful place as mistress of the house. It did not matter in the least that she lay and slept like a sloth while poor little Miss Penelope was up and working like a beaver. No woman's claims ever have anything to do with her deserts; perhaps no man's ever have either; perhaps all who claim most deserve least. At all events, it was perfectly natural that the widow Broadnax should feel as truly and deeply aggrieved at her half-sister's ruling her own brother's house, as if she, herself, had been the most energetic and capable of housekeepers.

On that morning her dull eyes kept an unwavering, unwinking watch over the coffee making; as they always did over every encroachment upon her rights. Her heavy eyelids were only partially lifted, yet not a movement of Miss Penelope's restless little body, not a gesture of her nervous little hands was allowed to escape. Now that the coffee was nearly ready, Miss Penelope had become rather more composed. She still stood guard over the coffee-pot; she never left it till she carried it to the table with her own hands, but she was lapsing into a sort of spent silence. She merely sighed at intervals with the contented weariness that comes from a sense of duty well done. But her half-sister still eyed her as a fat, motionless spider eyes a buzzing little fly which is ceasing to flutter. Miss Penelope had not observed a large pewter cup resting on the floor near the widow Broadnax's chair. It had been left there by a careless servant, who had used a portion of the mixture of red paint and sour buttermilk with which it was filled, to give the wide hearth its fine daily gloss. Miss Penelope had not observed it because she was always oblivious to everything else while hanging over the coffee-pot. The widow Broadnax had seen the cup at once because it was slightly in the way of her foot; and she was quick enough to notice the least discomfort. But she had not immediately perceived the longed-for opportunity which it gave her. That came like an inspiration a few moments later, when Miss Penelope was off guard for an instant. Her back was turned only long enough for her to go to the table and see if the tray was ready for the coffee-pot, but the widow Broadnax found this plenty of time. With a quickness truly surprising in one of her habitual slowness, she swooped down and seized the cup of buttermilk and paint. In a flash she lifted the lid of the coffee-pot, poured the contents of the cup in the coffee, set the empty cup down in its place, and was back again, resting among the cushions as if she had never stirred, when poor little Miss Penelope, all unsuspecting, returned to her post.

"You really must get up, Sister Molly," that lady said resolutely, renewing an altercation. "I hid the pantry keys under your chair cushions at supper, last night. That's always the safest place. But I forgot to take them out before you sat down. And you must get up—there isn't enough sugar for the coffee."

"Let me," said Ruth, coming forward with a smile, in her pretty, coaxing way.

When the antagonism between the sisters broke into open hostility, it was nearly always she who managed to soothe them and restore a temporary semblance of peace—for beyond that no mortal power could go. She now prevailed upon the widow Broadnax to rise with her assistance, thus securing the keys, and when that lady was once on her feet she was easier to move, so that Ruth now led her to her place at the breakfast table without further trouble. There was, however, always more or less trouble about the place itself. It was but woman nature to feel it to be very hard for a whole sister to sit at the side of the table while a half sister sat at its head. The judge always did what he could to spare her feelings, and Miss Penelope's at the same time. He was a bachelor, and held women in the half-gallant, half-humorous regard which sets the bachelor apart from the married man, and places him at a disadvantage which he is commonly unaware of. The judge thought he understood the distinctively feminine weaknesses particularly well, and that he made uncommonly large allowance for them, as the bachelor always thinks and never does. And then when the quarrel reached a crisis, and he was entirely at the end of his resources for keeping the peace, he could always threaten to take to the woods, and that usually brought a short truce.

"Ruth, my dear, what's all this about some stranger's bringing you home last night?" he inquired, taking his seat at the foot of the table. "Where were you, William? and what were you doing? You shouldn't have taken Ruth to such a place, or anywhere, if you couldn't take care of her," with unusual severity.