One can't have everything, so Faith stirred the fire and put a bright spread on the bare table, and another bit of bright colour on the wooden rocking-chair, so that if they had not been forced to live by eating, things would not have been so bad after all. Spring, though, brought troubles; the sun shining squarely upon them through the winter had served to brighten up things and save coal; but now he became an enemy, pouring his fierce rays nearly all the long day into the two windows, old paper shades filled with pin holes the only protection against him. Large companies of flies, too, arrived daily, and evidently came to stay; the butter turned to oil; eatables grew unpalatable; the whole house seemed stuffy and unendurable.
It was one of those warm spring mornings when vital energies flag, that Mr. and Mrs. Vincent toiled up the third flight of stairs; the halls filled with execrable odours of fried ham and cheap coffee; each busy with their own thoughts, possibly of green fields, apple-blossoms, spring violets, tables with damask and silver, cool, inviting rooms, and other equally tantalising suggestions. Faith, at the top, panting and pale as any lily, drew from her husband the exclamation:
"My dear, you cannot endure it any longer; something must be done."
That something seemed all the more imperative, since Daisy was beginning to droop and have feverish days over the advent of each little white tooth. Many perplexed conferences followed.
"You see," said Mr. Vincent, trying to speak cheerfully, "one of us orphans ought to have married some one who had a father and mother, and an old homestead to go to in an emergency like this. As it is, I do not see any other way but for you to take baby and go to my uncle Joshua's for the summer. You will be made welcome, at least, and have good food and good air."
"What if we go to housekeeping in a small way?" Faith suggested.
"It would have to be in a very small way indeed," laughed Frank. "Why, the birds of the air have more to set up housekeeping with than we; they have furnished rooms, rent free. Think of rent, furniture, and all the pots and kettles and pans that housekeeping requires, besides wages to a girl. Never do, wine, my salary wouldn't cover. I have often heard people say it was much cheaper to board than to keep house."
"But we might take a small house in the suburbs and furnish it by degrees, and I could do my own work," persisted Faith.
"My poor little white lily," said Frank, "you know not whereof you speak, Think of a little hot house, you broiling over a cook-stove, and baby crying for your care; besides, my dear, you are not accustomed to work. I shouldn't wonder, now, if I knew just about as, much as you do about cooking. I think I can see you with blistered fingers and aching head, studying cook-books. No, Faith, we shall be obliged to live in two places this summer, I fear. I know it will be lonely for you at uncle Joshua's, but for your own sake and the dear baby's, it must be done. Let us be of good cheer, and perhaps by fall business will revive and my salary be increased, or I can get a better position. Now good-bye, my blossoms, I must be gone," and he sprang away down the stairs hastily, lest Faith should see that his courage was more than half assumed, for the prospect before him was dismal in the extreme.
What Mrs. Vincent did when her husband left her we already know, yet she was not one to sit down in weeping despair before a difficulty until every energy had been put forth to remove it. She sat long and pondered the question; no light came, although she bent her white brows into a deep frown in perplexed thought.