ACCIDENT OR DESIGN?
Mrs. Burnham had stood for a full minute irresolute; then she had spoken in her usual tone, explaining to Ellen that the friend she had intended to take out would not be able to go in a livery carriage. She would herself make plain to her why the drive must be deferred until another time. The mistake had occurred by her neglecting to explain to her daughter the morning's plans. Then she had turned and slowly retraced her steps. She had seen and been humiliated by the flush on Ellen's face and the flash in her eyes. It was humiliating to think that her maid was indignant over the way she was being treated by her daughter. It is probably well that she did not hear the maid's exclamation:—
"The horrid cat! If I only dared tell Mr. Erskine all about it!"
Ruth Burnham had gone downstairs again after a time. She had changed her street dress first, and made a careful at-home toilet. She had given certain additional directions to the cook, with a view to doing honor to their unexpected guests. She had made a special effort to have Ellen understand that all was quite as it should be, and had sternly assured herself that such was the case. If she could not sympathize with the sudden movements of young people on hearing of the coming of friends, she deserved to be set aside as too old to be endurable. It was absurd in her to be so wedded to an old custom! just as though any other day in the week would not do as well as Friday. Then she had gone to the living room which was Erskine's favorite of the entire house.
"It is such a home-y room, mamma," he used to say, away back in his early boyhood. When it had been refurnished, or at least renewed, with a view to Erskine's home-coming, his mother had taken pains to preserve the sense of homeiness, and had seen to it that his pet luxuries, sofa pillows, were in lavish evidence.
It was a charming room. Very long and many windowed, with wide, low window-seats, and tempting cosy-corners, piled high with cushions so carefully chosen, as to size and harmony of color, that they were in themselves studies in art. There was a smaller room opening from this and nearer the front entrance, which was used as a reception room, and was furnished more after the fashion of the conventional parlor; but guests who, as Erskine phrased it, really "belonged," were always entertained in the living room.
In the doorway of this room the mistress of the house had stopped short and looked about her in astonishment. It wore an unfamiliar air. The easy-chairs, each one of which she had made a study, until it seemed to have been created for the particular niche in which it was placed, had every one changed places and to the eyes of the mistress of the house looked awkward and uncomfortable. But that was foolish, she assured herself quickly. Chairs, of course, belonged wherever their friends chose to place them. There were other changes. The window-seats had been shorn of some of their largest and prettiest cushions, and a little onyx table that had occupied a quiet corner was gone. It had held a choice picture of Erskine's father, set in a dainty frame, and near it had stood a tiny vase which was daily filled with fresh blossoms. Picture and vase and flowers had disappeared.
"Ellen," Mrs. Burnham had said, catching sight of the girl in the next room, "what has happened here? Has there been an accident?"
"No, m'm," said Ellen, appearing in the opposite doorway, duster in hand.
"It wasn't any accident, ma'am, it was orders. She didn't want such a lot of pillows here, she said. It looked for all the world like a show room, or as if it had been got ready for a church fair. Those was her very words."