The Annotated Little Women Read online

  She stayed till Hannah came to take her home to dinner; but she had no appetite, and could only sit and smile upon every one in a general state of beatitude.

  After that, the little brown hood slipped through the hedge nearly every day, and the great drawing-room was haunted by a tuneful spirit that came and went unseen. She never knew that Mr. Laurence often opened his study door to hear the old-fashioned airs he liked; she never saw Laurie mount guard in the hall, to warn the servants away; she never suspected that the exercise-books and new songs which she found in the rack were put there for her especial benefit; and when he talked to her about music at home, she only thought how kind he was to tell things that helped her so much. So she enjoyed herself heartily, and found, what isn’t always the case, that her granted wish was all she had hoped. Perhaps it was because she was so grateful for this blessing that a greater was given her; at any rate, she deserved both.

  Beth indulges her one passion in this illustration by Jessie Wilcox Smith.

  “Mother, I’m going to work Mr. Laurence a pair of slippers. He is so kind to me I must thank him, and I don’t know any other way. Can I do it?” asked Beth, a few weeks after that eventful call of his.

  “Yes, dear; it will please him very much, and be a nice way of thanking him. The girls will help you about them, and I will pay for the making up,” replied Mrs. March, who took peculiar pleasure in granting Beth’s requests, because she so seldom asked anything for herself.

  After many serious discussions with Meg and Jo, the pattern was chosen, the materials bought, and the slippers begun. A cluster of grave yet cheerful pansies,2 on a deeper purple ground, was pronounced very appropriate and pretty, and Beth worked away early and late, with occasional lifts over hard parts. She was a nimble little needle-woman, and they were finished before any one got tired of them. Then she wrote a very short, simple note, and, with Laurie’s help, got them smuggled on to the study-table one morning before the old gentleman was up.

  When this excitement was over, Beth waited to see what would happen. All that day passed, and a part of the next, before any acknowledgment arrived, and she was beginning to fear she had offended her crotchety friend. On the afternoon of the second day she went out to do an errand, and give poor Joanna, the invalid doll, her daily exercise. As she came up the street on her return she saw three—yes, four heads popping in and out of the parlor windows; and the moment they saw her several hands were waved, and several joyful voices screamed,—

  “Here’s a letter from the old gentleman; come quick, and read it!”

  “Oh, Beth! he’s sent you—” began Amy, gesticulating with unseemly energy; but she got no further, for Jo quenched her by slamming down the window.

  Beth hurried on in a twitter of suspense; at the door her sisters seized and bore her to the parlor in a triumphal procession, all pointing, and all saying at once, “Look there! look there!” Beth did look, and turned pale with delight and surprise; for there stood a little cabinet piano,3 with a letter lying on the glossy lid, directed like a signboard, to “Miss Elizabeth March.”

  “For me?” gasped Beth, holding on to Jo, and feeling as if she should tumble down, it was such an overwhelming thing altogether.

  “Yes; all for you, my precious! Isn’t it splendid of him? Don’t you think he’s the dearest old man in the world? Here’s the key in the letter; we didn’t open it, but we are dying to know what he says,” cried Jo, hugging her sister, and offering the note.

  “You read it; I can’t, I feel so queer. Oh, it is too lovely!” and Beth hid her face in Jo’s apron, quite upset by her present.

  Jo opened the paper, and began to laugh, for the first words she saw were:—

  “MISS MARCH:

  “Dear Madam—”

  “How nice it sounds! I wish some one would write to me so!” said Amy, who thought the old-fashioned address very elegant.

  “ ‘I have had many pairs of slippers in my life, but I never had any that suited me so well as yours,’ ” continued Jo. “ ‘Heart’s-ease is my favorite flower, and these will always remind me of the gentle giver. I like to pay my debts, so I know you will allow “the old gentleman” to send you something which once belonged to the little granddaughter he lost. With hearty thanks, and best wishes, I remain,

  “ ‘Your grateful friend and humble servant,

  “ ‘JAMES LAURENCE.’ ”

  “There, Beth, that’s an honor to be proud of, I’m sure! Laurie told me how fond Mr. Laurence used to be of the child who died, and how he kept all her little things carefully. Just think; he’s given you her piano! That comes of having big blue eyes and loving music,” said Jo, trying to soothe Beth, who trembled, and looked more excited than she had ever been before.

  “See the cunning brackets to hold candles, and the nice green silk, puckered up with a gold rose in the middle, and the pretty rack and stool, all complete,” added Meg, opening the instrument, and displaying its beauties.

  “ ‘Your humble servant, James Laurence;’ only think of his writing that to you. I’ll tell the girls; they’ll think it’s killing,” said Amy, much impressed by the note.

  “Try it, honey; let’s hear the sound of the baby pianny,” said Hannah, who always took a share in the family joys and sorrows.

  So Beth tried it, and every one pronounced it the most remarkable piano ever heard. It had evidently been newly tuned, and put in apple-pie order; but, perfect as it was, I think the real charm of it lay in the happiest of all happy faces which leaned over it, as Beth lovingly touched the beautiful black and white keys, and pressed the shiny pedals.

  “You’ll have to go and thank him,” said Jo, by way of a joke; for the idea of the child’s really going, never entered her head.

  “Yes, I mean to; I guess I’ll go now, before I get frightened thinking about it;” and, to the utter amazement of the assembled family, Beth walked deliberately down the garden, through the hedge, and in at the Laurences’ door.

  “Well, I wish I may die, if it ain’t the queerest thing I ever see! The pianny has turned her head; she’d never have gone, in her right mind,” cried Hannah, staring after her, while the girls were rendered quite speechless by the miracle.

  Lizzie Alcott spent countless hours at her melodeon. The instrument pictured occupies an honored place at Orchard House. (Louisa May Alcott Memorial Association; photograph by James E. Coutré)

  They would have been still more amazed, if they had seen what Beth did afterward. If you will believe me, she went and knocked at the study door, before she gave herself time to think; and when a gruff voice called out, “Come in!” she did go in, right up to Mr. Laurence, who looked quite taken aback, and held out her hand, saying, with only a small quaver in her voice, “I came to thank you, sir, for—” but she didn’t finish, for he looked so friendly that she forgot her speech; and, only remembering that he had lost the little girl he loved, she put both arms around his neck, and kissed him.

  If the roof of the house had suddenly flown off, the old gentleman wouldn’t have been more astonished; but he liked it—oh dear, yes! he liked it amazingly; and was so touched and pleased by that confiding little kiss, that all his crustiness vanished; and he just set her on his knee, and laid his wrinkled cheek against her rosy one, feeling as if he had got his own little granddaughter back again.4 Beth ceased to fear him from that moment, and sat there talking to him as cosily as if she had known him all her life; for love casts out fear, and gratitude can conquer pride. When she went home, he walked with her to her own gate, shook hands cordially, and touched his hat as he marched back again, looking very stately and erect, like a handsome, soldierly old gentleman, as he was.

  When the girls saw that performance, Jo began to dance a jig, by way of expressing her satisfaction; Amy nearly fell out of the window in her surprise, and Meg exclaimed, with uplifted hands, “Well, I do believe the world is coming to an end!”

  1. Beth Finds the Palace Beautiful. In each of the four succeeding chapters, one of
the March sisters contends with her signature character flaw: Beth with shyness; Amy with pride; Jo with wrath; and Meg with vanity. The title of each chapter connects the girl’s moral struggle with a trope from The Pilgrim’s Progress.

  2. pansies. Alcott again chooses an apt flower for the occasion. While pansies typically signified loving thoughts in the Victorian era, their association with “shrinking” violets, to which they are related, could also connote shyness—the perfect choice for the reticent Beth.

  3. cabinet piano. A small upright piano. The earliest upright piano was evidently built in Italy in 1739. By the late nineteenth century, the upright piano was “the favorite instrument with the masses . . . in all countries where the piano [was] used” (Spillane, History of the American Pianoforte, p. 32).

  4. feeling as if he had got his own little granddaughter back again. Alcott learned from her experience at Fruitlands to think about family as a concept that transcends blood ties. Frequently in her fiction, feelings of family extend beyond biological barriers.

  CHAPTER VII.

  Amy’s Valley of Humiliation.1

  “THAT boy is a perfect Cyclops,2 isn’t he?” said Amy, one day, as Laurie clattered by on horseback, with a flourish of his whip as he passed.

  “How dare you say so, when he’s got both his eyes? and very handsome ones they are, too;” cried Jo, who resented any slighting remarks about her friend.

  “I didn’t say anything about his eyes, and I don’t see why you need fire up when I admire his riding.”

  “Oh, my goodness! that little goose means a centaur, and she called him a Cyclops,” exclaimed Jo, with a burst of laughter.

  “You needn’t be so rude, it’s only a ‘lapse of lingy,’3 as Mr. Davis says,” retorted Amy, finishing Jo with her Latin. “I just wish I had a little of the money Laurie spends on that horse,” she added, as if to herself, yet hoping her sisters would hear.

  “Why?” asked Meg, kindly, for Jo had gone off in another laugh at Amy’s second blunder.

  “I need it so much; I’m dreadfully in debt, and it won’t be my turn to have the rag-money4 for a month.”

  “In debt, Amy; what do you mean?” and Meg looked sober.

  “Why, I owe at least a dozen pickled limes,5 and I can’t pay them, you know, till I have money, for Marmee forbid my having anything charged at the shop.”

  “Tell me all about it. Are limes the fashion now? It used to be pricking bits of rubber to make balls;” and Meg tried to keep her countenance, Amy looked so grave and important.

  “Why, you see, the girls are always buying them, and unless you want to be thought mean, you must do it, too. It’s nothing but limes now, for every one is sucking them in their desks in school-time, and trading them off for pencils, bead-rings, paper dolls, or something else, at recess. If one girl likes another, she gives her a lime; if she’s mad with her, she eats one before her face, and don’t offer even a suck. They treat by turns; and I’ve had ever so many, but haven’t returned them, and I ought, for they are debts of honor, you know.”

  “How much will pay them off, and restore your credit?” asked Meg, taking out her purse.

  “A quarter would more than do it, and leave a few cents over for a treat for you. Don’t you like limes?”

  “Not much; you may have my share. Here’s the money,—make it last as long as you can, for it isn’t very plenty, you know.”

  “Oh, thank you! it must be so nice to have pocket-money. I’ll have a grand feast, for I haven’t tasted a lime this week. I felt delicate about taking any, as I couldn’t return them, and I’m actually suffering for one.”

  Next day Amy was rather late at school; but could not resist the temptation of displaying, with pardonable pride, a moist brown paper parcel, before she consigned it to the inmost recesses of her desk. During the next few minutes the rumor that Amy March had got twenty-four delicious limes (she ate one on the way), and was going to treat, circulated through her “set,” and the attentions of her friends became quite overwhelming. Katy Brown invited her to her next party on the spot; Mary Kingsley insisted on lending her her watch till recess, and Jenny Snow, a satirical young lady who had basely twitted Amy upon her limeless state, promptly buried the hatchet, and offered to furnish answers to certain appalling sums. But Amy had not forgotten Miss Snow’s cutting remarks about “some persons whose noses were not too flat to smell other people’s limes, and stuck-up people, who were not too proud to ask for them;” and she instantly crushed “that Snow girl’s” hopes by the withering telegram, “You needn’t be so polite all of a sudden, for you won’t get any.”

  A distinguished personage happened to visit the school that morning, and Amy’s beautifully drawn maps received praise, which honor to her foe rankled in the soul of Miss Snow, and caused Miss March to assume the airs of a studious young peacock. But, alas, alas! pride goes before a fall, and the revengeful Snow turned the tables with disastrous success. No sooner had the guest paid the usual stale compliments, and bowed himself out, than Jenny, under pretence of asking an important question, informed Mr. Davis, the teacher, that Amy March had pickled limes in her desk.

  Now Mr. Davis had declared limes a contraband article, and solemnly vowed to publicly ferule6 the first person who was found breaking the law. This much-enduring man had succeeded in banishing gum after a long and stormy war, had made a bonfire of the confiscated novels and newspapers, had suppressed a private post-office, had forbidden distortions of the face, nicknames, and caricatures, and done all that one man could do to keep half a hundred rebellious girls in order. Boys are trying enough to human patience, goodness knows! but girls are infinitely more so, especially to nervous gentlemen with tyrannical tempers, and no more talent for teaching than “Dr. Blimber.”7 Mr. Davis knew any quantity of Greek, Latin, Algebra, and ologies of all sorts, so he was called a fine teacher; and manners, morals, feelings, and examples were not considered of any particular importance. It was a most unfortunate moment for denouncing Amy, and Jenny knew it. Mr. Davis had evidently taken his coffee too strong that morning; there was an east wind, which always affected his neuralgia, and his pupils had not done him the credit which he felt he deserved; therefore, to use the expressive, if not elegant, language of a schoolgirl, “he was as nervous as a witch and as cross as a bear.” The word “limes” was like fire to powder; his yellow face flushed, and he rapped on his desk with an energy which made Jenny skip to her seat with unusual rapidity.

  “Young ladies, attention, if you please!”

  At the stern order the buzz ceased, and fifty pairs of blue, black, gray, and brown eyes were obediently fixed upon his awful countenance.

  “Miss March, come to the desk.”

  Amy rose to comply, with outward composure, but a secret fear oppressed her, for the limes weighed upon her conscience.

  “Bring with you the limes you have in your desk,” was the unexpected command which arrested her before she got out of her seat.

  “Don’t take all,” whispered her neighbor, a young lady of great presence of mind.

  Amy hastily shook out half a dozen, and laid the rest down before Mr. Davis, feeling that any man possessing a human heart would relent when that delicious perfume met his nose. Unfortunately, Mr. Davis particularly detested the odor of the fashionable pickle, and disgust added to his wrath.

  “Is that all?”

  “Not quite,” stammered Amy.

  “Bring the rest, immediately.”

  With a despairing glance at her set she obeyed.

  “You are sure there are no more?”

  “I never lie, sir.”

  “So I see. Now take these disgusting things, two by two, and throw them out of the window.”

  There was a simultaneous sigh, which created quite a little gust as the last hope fled, and the treat was ravished from their longing lips. Scarlet with shame and anger, Amy went to and fro twelve mortal times; and as each doomed couple, looking, oh, so plump and juicy! fell from her reluctant hands, a
shout from the street completed the anguish of the girls, for it told them that their feast was being exulted over by the little Irish children, who were their sworn foes.8 This—this was too much; all flashed indignant or appealing glances at the inexorable Davis, and one passionate lime-lover burst into tears.

  As Amy returned from her last trip, Mr. Davis gave a portentous “hem,” and said, in his most impressive manner,—

  “Young ladies, you remember what I said to you a week ago. I am sorry this has happened; but I never allow my rules to be infringed, and I never break my word. Miss March, hold out your hand.”

  Amy started, and put both hands behind her, turning on him an imploring look, which pleaded for her better than the words she could not utter. She was rather a favorite with “old Davis,” as, of course, he was called, and it’s my private belief that he would have broken his word if the indignation of one irrepressible young lady had not found vent in a hiss. That hiss, faint as it was, irritated the irascible gentleman, and sealed the culprit’s fate.

  “Your hand, Miss March!” was the only answer her mute appeal received; and, too proud to cry or beseech, Amy set her teeth, threw back her head defiantly, and bore without flinching several tingling blows on her little palm. They were neither many nor heavy, but that made no difference to her. For the first time in her life she had been struck; and the disgrace,9 in her eyes, was as deep as if he had knocked her down.

  “You will now stand on the platform till recess,” said Mr. Davis, resolved to do the thing thoroughly, since he had begun.

  That was dreadful; it would have been bad enough to go to her seat and see the pitying faces of her friends, or the satisfied ones of her few enemies; but to face the whole school, with that shame fresh upon her, seemed impossible, and for a second she felt as if she could only drop down where she stood, and break her heart with crying. A bitter sense of wrong, and the thought of Jenny Snow, helped her to bear it; and, taking the ignominious place, she fixed her eyes on the stove-funnel above what now seemed a sea of faces, and stood there so motionless and white, that the girls found it very hard to study, with that pathetic little figure before them.