Read Ebook: Harper's Round Table June 25 1895 by Various

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Ebook has 418 lines and 30936 words, and 9 pages

Edith looked back doubtfully as, having put on her hat, she got into the carriage. What would her basket be like when she next saw it? But it was kind of Cynthia, and how much better Cynthia managed the children than she did. What was the reason? She was thinking it over, when she heard her name called loudly from behind, and, pulling in the horse quickly, she waited, wondering what had happened now.

Cynthia came flying down the avenue. "Edith! Edith! Wait a minute! I forgot to tell you. Don't say anything to papa about Jack's scheme, will you? Let him tell."

"Oh, Cynthia, how you frightened me! I thought something dreadful was the matter."

"But don't, will you, Edith? Promise! You know--well, Edith, Jack can explain it so much better himself."

Cynthia was too kind-hearted to tell Edith that she would spoil it all if she said anything first, but Edith knew that was what she meant. A sharp reply was on her lips, but she controlled herself in time.

"Very well," she said, quietly, "I won't."

And then she drove on, and Cynthia went back to the house satisfied.

Edith had a quick, impatient temper, and it was not an easy matter for her to curb her tongue. Her mother had died five years ago, when she was but eleven years old. Then an aunt had come to live with them, but she had lately married and gone to South America, and now there was no one else, and Edith was considered old enough to keep house and look after the children.

The road wound through the woods, with here and there a view of the river, leading finally into the old New England town and forming its main street.

Tall elm-trees shaded the approach to the village, and fine old houses, with well-kept lawns in front, were to be seen on either side.

The horse that Edith drove was by no means a fine one, and the old buggy was somewhat unsteady and rattled alarmingly. In other words, the Franklins were poor, but they had hosts of friends; and as Edith entered the village she nodded right and left to the various people she met. Every one liked the Franklins, and the family had lived at Oakleigh for generations.

As she reached the station the train came in. A throng of carriages filled the broad space in front, and Edith was obliged to draw up at some little distance from the cars. Presently she saw her father coming towards her, and with him was an odd little figure, the sight of which made Edith's heart sink with apprehension.

"Oh dear! oh dear!" she exclaimed to herself, "if there isn't Aunt Betsey!"

Then she shrank back into the corner of the buggy, and watched the amused glances that were cast upon her relative by all who saw her.

Miss Betsey Trinkett, of Wayborough, was Edith's great-aunt, and constituted one of the largest thorns in her side. She was old, she was odd, she was distinctly conspicuous; and Edith disliked above all things to be conspicuous.

Miss Betsey trotted along the platform by her nephew's side, quite unconscious of the tumult she was raising in the breast of her grandniece. She was dressed in a short, scant velveteen gown that might have belonged to her grandmother, and a large bonnet of the same date, from which hung a figured lace veil. A gay shawl was folded about her slender shoulders, and Mr. Franklin carried her carpet-bag with the silver lock and key.

She waved a welcome to Edith with a mitted hand, and Edith, recovering herself, nodded in response.

"How do you do, Aunt Betsey? What a surprise!"

"Yes, my dear, I like to surprise you now and then. I came up to Boston town on business, and your father insisted upon my coming out to see you all. In fact, I knew he would, so I just popped my best cap and my knitting into my bag, along with some little things for you children, and here I am."

And she stepped nimbly into the buggy, followed by Mr. Franklin.

"We shall be a 'Marblehead couple,'" he said, as he balanced himself on the seat and took the reins.

Edith detested "Marblehead couples," otherwise driving three on a seat, and she hid herself as much as possible in her corner, and hoped that people would not know she was there.

Miss Betsey chatted away with her nephew, and in time the three miles were covered, and they turned into the Oakleigh drive. Edith had recovered somewhat by this time, having been engaged in scolding herself all the way from the village for her uncordial feelings.

The others welcomed Aunt Betsey most cordially. Her carpet-bag always contained some rare treat for the little ones; and, besides, they were a hospitable family.

"But come with me, girls," said Miss Betsey, mysteriously, when she had bestowed her gifts. "There is something I want to consult you about."

She trotted up the long flight of stairs to her accustomed room with the springiness of a young girl, Edith and Cynthia following her. She closed the door behind them, and seating herself in the rocking-chair, looked at them solemnly.

"Do you remark anything different about my appearance?"

"Why, of course, Aunt Betsey!" exclaimed Cynthia; "your hair!"

"Well, I want to know! Cynthy, you are very smart. You get it from your great-grandmother Trinkett, for whom you were named. Well, what do you think of it?"

Edith had hastened to the closet, and was opening drawers and removing garments from the hooks in apparently a sudden desire for neatness. In reality she was convulsed with laughter.

Cynthia controlled herself, and replied, with gravity, "Did it grow there?"

Miss Betsey rocked with satisfaction, her hands folded in her velveteen lap.

"I knew it was a success. No one would ever know it, would they? My dears, I bought it to-day in Boston town. The woman told me it looked real natural. I don't know as I like the idea exactly of wearing other people's hair, but one has to keep up with the times, and mine was getting very scant. Silas said to me the other night, said he, 'Betsey, strikes me your hair isn't as thick as it used to be.' That set me thinking, and I remember I'd heard tell of these frontispieces, and I then and there made up some business I'd have to come to Boston town about, and here I am. I bought two while I was about it. The woman said it was a good plan, in case one got lost or rumpled, and here it is in this box. Just lay it away carefully for me, Cynthy, my dear."

The old lady's thin and grayish locks had been replaced by a false front of smooth brown, with puffs at the side, and a nice white part of most unnatural straightness down the middle.

"You see, I like to please Silas," she continued. "I'll tell you again, as I've told you before, girls, Silas Green and I we've been keeping steady company now these forty years. But I can't give up the view from my sitting-room windows to go and live at his house on the other hill, and he can't give up the view from his best-room windows to come and live at my house. We've tried and tried, and we can't either of us give up. And so he just comes every Sunday night to see me, as he's done these forty years, and I guess it'll go on a while longer."

They were interrupted by the sound of the tea bell.

Miss Betsey hastily settled her cap over the new front, and they all went down stairs, Cynthia pinching Edith to express her feelings, and longing to tell Jack about Aunt Betsey's latest.

But they found Jack having an animated discussion with his father, his thoughts on business plans intent.

Cynthia anxiously surveyed the two, and she feared from appearances that Mr. Franklin did not intend to yield.

LIFE IN A LIGHT-HOUSE.

BY A. J. ENSIGN.

A cold biting west wind was blowing. The sea close under the beach was smooth and steel blue, and the breakers reared their white crests slowly, falling in dull booms of muttered thunder. Beyond the rollers a wide expanse of ice-hard gray water swept away to the iron line of the horizon, where strange shapes of writhing billows tossed against the glow of the rising moon. Half a dozen stars of the first magnitude swam in moisture in the zenith, and far away in the west a smudge of black cloud, touched on its lower edge with blood red, kept the record of the swift winter sunset.

"It will blow from the south'ard and east'ard afore mornin', an' it'll snow," said the light-house keeper, as he peered out into the growing gloom, pierced as it was by the rays of the lamp which he had set burning half an hour before.

"Ay," said his assistant, "an' we'll have fog, too, I'm thinkin'."

"Well, get steam up for the siren, an' stan' by fur trouble afore dawn."

The predictions of both men came true. Before two o'clock in the morning the wind had shifted to the southeast, and was blowing a gale. Great tangled masses of brown cloud were flying across the sky at terrific speed, and in and out of the rifts shot the red moon flaming like a comet. The breakers no longer reared and fell slowly, but hurled themselves in shrieking masses of foam upon the stricken beach. A yelling as of ten thousand evil spirits surrounded the caged lantern; but the great yellow light blazed out its warning upon the black waters. But not for long; for out of the southeast swept the impenetrable gray fog that no light could pierce. Then the hoarse moaning blast of the steam-siren sent its cry of warning out over the raging waters. At four o'clock the gale was terrific, and ever and anon the shriek of a steam-whistle told that some vessel was groping her way toward the entrance to the harbor. Suddenly the whistle burst into a series of rapid screams.

"Wake up, Tom!" shouted the assistant keeper, who was on watch. "There's a tug out yonder that's parted the hawser of her tow."

The keeper sprang to his feet and listened to the despairing screams of the whistle out in the fog.

"You're right!" he exclaimed. "And whatever's gone adrift'll be ashore in less than an hour. They'll never hear those whistles at the station with the wind in this quarter."

He jumped to the telephone and called up the life-saving station a mile above.

"There's a tug off here," he said, "and she's lost her tow."

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