Jo's Boys Page 14

  “Yet that is high art, child, and what we need for a time till we are ready for the masters. Cultivate that talent of yours. It is a special gift, this power to bring tears and smiles, and a sweeter task to touch the heart than to freeze the blood or fire the imagination. Tell your uncle he is right, and ask your aunt to try a play for you. I’ll come and see it when you are ready.”

  “Will you? Oh! will you? We are going to have some at Christmas, with a nice part for me. A simple little thing, but I can do it, and should be so proud, so happy to have you there.”

  Josie rose as she spoke, for a glance at the clock showed her that her call was a long one; and hard as it was to end this momentous interview, she felt that she must go. Catching up her hat she went to Miss Cameron, who stood looking at her so keenly that she felt as transparent as a pane of glass, and coloured prettily as she looked up, saying, with a grateful little tremor in her voice:

  “I can never thank you for this hour and all you have told me. I shall do just what you advise, and mamma will be very glad to see me settled at my books again. I can study now with all my heart, because it is to help me on; and I won’t hope too much, but work and wait, and try to please you, as the only way to pay my debt.”

  “That reminds me that I have not paid mine. Little friend, wear this for my sake. It is fit for a mermaid, and will remind you of your first dive. May the next bring up a better jewel, and leave no bitter water on your lips!”

  As she spoke, Miss Cameron took from the lace at her throat a pretty pin of aquamarine, and fastened it like an order on Josie’s proud bosom; then lifting the happy little face, she kissed it very tenderly, and watched it go smiling away with eyes that seemed to see into a future full of the trials and the triumphs which she knew so well.

  Bess expected to see Josie come flying in, all raptures and excitement, or drowned in tears of disappointment, but was surprised at the expression of calm content and resolution which she wore. Pride and satisfaction, and a new feeling of responsibility both sobered and sustained her, and she felt that any amount of dry study and long waiting would be bearable, if in the glorious future she could be an honour to her profession and a comrade to the new friend whom she already adored with girlish ardour.

  She told her little story to a deeply interested audience, and all felt that Miss Cameron’s advice was good. Mrs Amy was relieved at the prospect of delay; for she did not want her niece to be an actress and hoped the fancy would die out.

  Uncle Laurie was full of charming plans and prophecies and wrote one of his most delightful notes to thank their neighbour for her kindness; while Bess, who loved art of all kinds, fully sympathized with her cousin’s ambitious hopes, only wondering why she preferred to act out her visions rather than embody them in marble.

  That first interview was not the last; for Miss Cameron was really interested, and had several memorable conversations with the Laurences, while the girls sat by, drinking in every word with the delight all artists feel in their own beautiful world, and learning to see how sacred good gifts are, how powerful, and how faithfully they should be used for high ends, each in its own place helping to educate, refine, and refresh.

  Josie wrote reams to her mother; and when the visit ended rejoiced her heart by bringing her a somewhat changed little daughter, who fell to work at the once-detested books with a patient energy which surprised and pleased everyone. The right string had been touched, and even French exercises and piano practice became endurable, since accomplishments would be useful by and by; dress, manners, and habits were all interesting now, because “mind and body, heart and soul, must be cultivated”, and while training to become an “intelligent, graceful, healthy girl”, little Josie was unconsciously fitting herself to play her part well on whatever stage the great Manager might prepare for her.

  CHAPTER 9

  THE WORM TURNS

  TWO VERY superior bicycles went twinkling up the road to Plumfield one September afternoon, bearing two brown and dusty riders evidently returning from a successful run, for though their legs might be a trifle weary, their faces beamed as they surveyed the world from their lofty perches with the air of calm content all wheelmen wear after they have learned to ride; before that happy period anguish of mind and body is the chief expression of the manly countenance.

  “Go ahead and report, Tom; I’m due here. See you later,” said Demi, swinging himself down at the door of the Dovecote.

  “Don’t peach, there’s a good fellow. Let me have it out with Mother Bhaer first,” returned Tom, wheeling in at the gate with a heavy sigh.

  Demi laughed, and his comrade went slowly up the avenue, devoutly hoping that the coast was clear; for he was the bearer of tidings which would, he thought, convulse the entire family with astonishment and dismay.

  To his great joy Mrs Jo was discovered alone in a grove of proof-sheets, which she dropped, to greet the returning wanderer cordially. But after the first glance she saw that something was the matter, recent events having made her unusually sharp-eyed and suspicious.

  “What is it now, Tom?” she asked, as he subsided into an easy-chair with a curious expression of mingled fear, shame, amusement, and distress in his brick-red countenance.

  “I’m in an awful scrape, ma’am.”

  “Of course; I’m always prepared for scrapes when you appear. What is it? Run over some old lady who is going to law about it?” asked Mrs Jo cheerfully.

  “Worse than that,” groaned Tom.

  “Not poisoned some trusting soul who asked you to prescribe, I hope?”

  “Worse than that.”

  “You haven’t let Demi catch any horrid thing and left him behind, have you?”

  “Worse even than that.”

  “I give it up. Tell me quick; I hate to wait for bad news.”

  Having got his listener sufficiently excited, Tom launched his thunderbolt in one brief sentence, and fell back to watch the effect.

  “I’m engaged!”

  Mrs Jo’s proof-sheets flew wildly about as she clasped her hands, exclaiming in dismay:

  “If Nan has yielded, I’ll never forgive her!”

  “She hasn’t; it’s another girl.”

  Tom’s face was so funny as he said the words, that it was impossible to help laughing; for he looked both sheepish and pleased, besides very much perplexed and worried.

  “I’m glad, very glad indeed! Don’t care who it is; and I hope you’ll be married soon. Now tell me all about it,” commanded Mrs Jo, so much relieved that she felt ready for anything.

  “What will Nan say?” demanded Tom, rather taken aback at this view of his predicament.

  “She will be rejoiced to get rid of the mosquito who has plagued her so long. Don’t worry about Nan. Who is this ‘other girl’?”

  “Demi hasn’t written about her?”

  “Only something about your upsetting a Miss West down at Quitno; I thought that was scrape enough.”

  “That was only the beginning of a series of scrapes. Just my luck! Of course after sousing the poor girl I had to be attentive to her, hadn’t I? Everyone seemed to think so, and I couldn’t get away, and so I was lost before I knew it. It’s all Demi’s fault, he would stay there and fuss with his old photos, because the views were good and all the girls wanted to be taken. Look at these, will you, ma’am? That’s the way we spent our time when we weren’t playing tennis” and Tom pulled a handful of pictures from his pocket, displaying several in which he was conspicuous, either holding a sun-umbrella over a very pretty young lady on the rocks, reposing at her feet in the grass, or perched on a piazza railing with other couples in seaside costumes and effective attitudes.

  “This is she of course?” asked Mrs Jo, pointing to the much-ruffled damsel with the jaunty hat, coquettish shoes, and racket in her hand.

  “That’s Dora. Isn’t she lovely?” cried Tom, forgetting his tribulations for a moment and speaking with lover-like ardour.

  “Very nice little person to look at. Hope she is
not a Dickens Dora? That curly crop looks like it.”

  “Not a bit; she’s very smart; can keep house, and sew, and do lots of things, I assure you, ma’am. All the girls like her, and she’s sweet-tempered and jolly, and sings like a bird, and dances beautifully, and loves books. Thinks yours are splendid, and made me talk about you no end.”

  “That last sentence is to flatter me and win my help to get you out of the scrape. Tell me first how you got in” and Mrs Jo settled herself to listen with interest, never tired of boys’ affairs.

  Tom gave his head a rousing rub all over to clear his wits, and plunged into his story with a will.

  “Well, we’ve met her before, but I didn’t know she was there. Demi wanted to see a fellow, so we went, and finding it nice and cool rested over Sunday. Found some pleasant people and went out rowing; I had Dora, and came to grief on a confounded rock. She could swim, no harm done, only the scare and the spoilt gown. She took it well, and we got friendly at once—couldn’t help it, scrambling into that beast of a boat while the rest laughed at us. Of course we had to stay another day to see that Dora was all right. Demi wanted to. Alice Heath is down there and two other girls from our college, so we sort of lingered along, and Demi kept taking pictures, and we danced, and got into a tennis tournament; and that was as good exercise as wheeling, we thought. Fact is, tennis is a dangerous game, ma’am. A great deal of courting goes on in those courts, and we fellows find that sort of ‘serving’ mighty agreeable, don’t you know?”

  “Not much tennis in my day, but I understand perfectly,” said Mrs Jo, enjoying it all as much as Tom did.

  “Upon my word, I hadn’t the least idea of being serious,” he continued slowly, as if this part of his tale was hard to tell; “but everyone else spooned, so I did. Dora seemed to like it and expect it, and of course I was glad to be agreeable. She thought I amounted to something, though Nan does not, and it was pleasant to be appreciated after years of snubbing. Yes, it was right down jolly to have a sweet girl smile at you all day, and blush prettily when you said a neat thing to her, and look glad when you came, sorry when you left, and admire all you did, and make you feel like a man and act your best. That’s the sort of treatment a fellow enjoys and ought to get if he behaves himself; not frowns and cold shoulders year in and year out, and made to look like a fool when he means well, and is faithful, and has loved a girl ever since he was a boy. No, by Jove, it’s not fair, and I won’t stand it!”

  Tom waxed warm and eloquent as he thought over his wrongs, and bounced up to march about the room, wagging his head and trying to feel aggrieved as usual, but surprised to find that his heart did not ache a bit.

  “I wouldn’t. Drop the old fancy, for it was nothing more—and take up the new one, if it is genuine. But how came you to propose, Tom, as you must have done to be engaged?” asked Mrs Jo, impatient for the crisis of the tale.

  “Oh, that was an accident. I didn’t mean it at all; the donkey did it, and I couldn’t get out of the scrape without hurting Dora’s feelings, you see,” began Tom, seeing that the fatal moment had come.

  “So there were two donkeys in it, were there?” said Mrs Jo, foreseeing fun of some sort.

  “Don’t laugh! It sounds funny, I know; but it might have been awful,” answered Tom darkly, though a twinkle of the eye showed that his love trials did not quite blind him to the comic side of the adventure.

  “The girls admired our new wheels, and of course we liked to show off. Took ’em to ride, and had larks generally. Well, one day, Dora was on behind, and we were going nicely along a good bit of road, when a ridiculous old donkey got right across the way. I thought he’d move, but he didn’t, so I gave him a kick; he kicked back, and over we went in a heap, donkey and all. Such a mess! I thought only of Dora, and she had hysterics; at least, she laughed till she cried, and that beast brayed, and I lost my head. Any fellow would, with a poor girl gasping in the road, and he wiping her tears and begging pardon, not knowing whether her bones were broken or not. I called her my darling, and went on like a fool in my flurry, till she grew calmer, and said, with such a look: ‘I forgive you, Tom. Pick me up, and let us go on again.’

  “Wasn’t that sweet now, after I’d upset her for the second time? It touched me to the heart; and I said I’d like to go on for ever with such an angel to steer for, and—well, I don’t know what I did say; but you might have knocked me down with a feather when she put her arm round my neck and whispered: ‘Tom, dear, with you I’m not afraid of any lions in the path.’ She might have said donkeys; but she was in earnest, and she spared my feelings. Very nice of the dear girl; but there I am with two sweethearts on my hands, and in a deuce of a scrape.”

  Finding it impossible to contain herself another moment, Mrs Jo laughed till the tears ran down her cheeks at this characteristic episode; and after one reproachful look, which only added to her merriment, Tom burst into a jolly roar that made the room ring.

  “Tommy Bangs! Tommy Bangs! who but you could ever get into such a catastrophe?” said Mrs Jo, when she recovered her breath.

  “Isn’t it a muddle all round, and won’t everyone chaff me to death about it? I shall have to quit old Plum for a while,” answered Tom, as he mopped his face, trying to realize the full danger of his position.

  “No, indeed; I’ll stand by you, for I think it the best joke of the season. But tell me how things ended. Is it really serious, or only a summer flirtation? I don’t approve of them, but boys and girls will play with edged tools and cut their fingers.”

  “Well, Dora considers herself engaged, and wrote to her people at once. I couldn’t say a word when she took it all in solemn earnest and seemed so happy. She’s only seventeen, never liked anyone before, and is sure all will be all right; as her father knows mine, and we are both well off. I was so staggered that I said: ‘Why, you can’t love me really when we know so little of one another.’ But she answered right out of her tender little heart: ‘Yes, I do, dearly, Tom; you are so gay and kind and honest, I couldn’t help it.’ Now, after that what could I do but go ahead and make her happy while I stayed, and trust to luck to straighten the snarl out afterwards?”

  “A truly Tomian way of taking things easy. I hope you told your father at once.”

  “Oh yes, I wrote off and broke it to him in three lines. I said: ‘Dear Father, I’m engaged to Dora West, and I hope she will suit the family. She suits me tiptop. Yours ever, Tom.’ He was all right, never liked Nan, you know; but Dora will suit him down to the ground.” And Tom looked entirely satisfied with his own tact and taste.

  “What did Demi say to this rapid and funny lovemaking? Wasn’t he scandalized?” asked Mrs Jo, trying not to laugh again as she thought of the unromantic spectacle of donkey, bicycle, boy, and girl all in the dust together.

  “Not a bit. He was immensely interested and very kind; talked to me like a father; said it was a good thing to steady a fellow, only I must be honest with her and myself and not trifle a moment. Demi is a regular Solomon, especially when he is in the same boat,” answered Tom, looking wise.

  “You don’t mean—?” gasped Mrs Jo, in sudden alarm at the bare idea of more love-affairs just yet.

  “Yes, I do, please, ma’am; it’s a regular sell all the way through, and I owe Demi one for taking me into temptation blindfold. He said he went to Quitno to see Fred Wallace, but he never saw the fellow. How could he, when Wallace was off in his yacht all the time we were there? Alice was the real attraction, and I was left to my fate, while they were maundering round with that old camera. There were three donkeys in this affair, and I’m not the worst one, though I shall have to bear the laugh. Demi will look innocent and sober, and no one will say a word to him.”

  “The midsummer madness has broken out, and no one knows who will be stricken next. Well, leave Demi to his mother, and let us see what you are going to do, Tom.”

  “I don’t know exactly; it’s awkward to be in love with two girls at once. What do you advise?”

  �
��A common-sense view of the case, by all means. Dora loves you and thinks you love her. Nan does not care for you, and you only care for her as a friend, though you have tried to do more. It is my opinion, Tom, that you love Dora, or are on the way to it; for in all these years I’ve never seen you look or speak about Nan as you do about Dora. Opposition has made you obstinately cling to her till accident has shown you a more attractive girl. Now, I think you had better take the old love for a friend, the new one for a sweetheart, and in due time, if the sentiment is genuine, marry her.”

  If Mrs Jo had any doubts about the matter, Tom’s face would have proved the truth of her opinion; for his eyes shone, his lips smiled, and in spite of dust and sunburn a new expression of happiness quite glorified him as he stood silent for a moment, trying to understand the beautiful miracle which real love works when it comes to a young man’s heart.

  “The fact is I meant to make Nan jealous, for she knows Dora, and I was sure would hear of our doings. I was tired of being walked on, and I thought I’d try to break away and not be a bore and a laughing-stock any more,” he said slowly, as if it relieved him to pour out his doubts and woes and hopes and joys to his old friend. “I was regularly astonished to find it so easy and so pleasant. I didn’t mean to do any harm, but drifted along beautifully, and told Demi to mention things in his letters to Daisy, so Nan might know. Then I forgot Nan altogether, and saw, heard, felt, cared for no one but Dora, till the donkey—bless his old heart!—pitched her into my arms and I found she loved me. Upon my soul, I don’t see why she should! I’m not half good enough.”

  “Every honest man feels that when an innocent girl puts her hand in his. Make yourself worthy of her, for she isn’t an angel, but a woman with faults of her own for you to bear, and forgive, and you must help one another,” said Mrs Jo, trying to realize that this sober youth was her scapegrace Tommy.