"If you are going to teach in a public school, the discipline and advantages of the public school education are immeasurably the best. I don"t like boarding schools except for the high up people who care most for accomplishments. And I have been thinking it over, and had a plan to propose to Mrs. Dayton."
"My schooldays seem a great perplexity all around," said Helen with a dubious sort of laugh.
"I do suppose Helen could have worked her way through. I had decided to give her a home, or her other expenses if a pleasant home offered. I would much rather not have her put on the level of a domestic. We may have some very fine theories on this subject, but Helen would have many snubs to endure. And if she resolves to learn what is useful, she will learn it as well there."
"But the experience will be so different. And two years will fit her for just nothing at all. Every year more real education is demanded. I am studying up for a college degree myself."
"Oh, dear!" Helen sighed lugubriously.
"Then, here, I should have had an oversight of your studies, and kept you up to the mark."
"I am resolved I won"t fall below anywhere," she replied resolutely; yet there were tears in her eyes.
"But you don"t know what the standard will be."
"Don"t be discouraging, Mr. Warfield. Helen, go and get your papers,"
interposed Mrs. Dayton.
"Is that old body going to have Helen trained for a lady"s maid?" Mr.
Warfield asked in an imperious manner; his lips touched with a bit of scorn.
"You don"t do her justice. At the end of two years Helen will be free to choose her future course. She will be only sixteen then."
"And spoiled utterly. Full of airs and graces. She is too fine a girl to be made a sort of puppet. There wasn"t a girl in my cla.s.s equal to her, and some had had much better advantages. I should not want her to go on living with the Mulfords."
Helen returned bright and eager, proud of her success as she handed him her examination papers. But Mr. Warfield would not be reconciled to the boarding school plan, and when he saw Mrs. Van Dorn step out of the carriage in her fine attire, he felt that he hated her; that she was an officious old body.
CHAPTER IX
DIFFERENT STANDPOINTS
Helen would have been figuratively torn to pieces if she had spent Sunday at the Center. Uncle Jason"s first resolve was that he would wait until Sunday afternoon before announcing the conspiracy. The more he thought of the plan the greater the benefit to Helen seemed. She _was_ different from the Mulfords, and she had no c.u.mmings blood in her veins.
She had changed these few weeks of her sojourn with Mrs. Dayton. Not that she had grown consequential. Indeed, she had never been more simply sweet than on this afternoon.
She would hate the shop dreadfully. And after all the three dollars a week she would earn the first year, would not more than pay for her board and clothes. Jenny had gone at it with a vim. But she hated books.
The only thing that interested her was arithmetic. Uncle Jason could not put it in words, but he could feel it.
The supper pa.s.sed off without any squabbles. Sam and Jenny walked down to the house, the children were tired and went to bed, and Aunt Jane came out on the porch to take a turn in her rocking chair and fan herself cool. But the wind blew up, and she did not even have to fan.
"Did you ask whether Helen would come home next week? Polly Samson comes two days to make Jen"s wedding gown, and she"ll be married on the sixteenth. We"ve got along wonderfully the last fortnight, and I begin to see my way clear. Dear, how I shall miss Jen, but I"m glad she"ll be so near by. And she bid "em good-by at the shop to-day. Reely"s getting to be quite a help. I don"t know but it _was_ better for her to have Helen away in vacation."
Uncle Jason felt this was the golden opportunity. The lovers would not be home until about ten. It took some courage. He cleared his throat, listened a moment to the crickets, and then plunged into the subject; blurting it all out before Aunt Jane could recover her breath. In fact there was such an awful silence he wondered.
Then the storm descended. He smoked his pipe and listened, though he heard the crickets with one ear, he would have said. And when he did not make an immediate answer, she said angrily:
"You never consented to any such tomfoolery!"
"In the first place," he began slowly, "we couldn"t keep Helen against her will. Her father didn"t make us guardians. At fourteen she can choose. She isn"t bound to us, and we haven"t any real claim on her----"
"Except common grat.i.tude," Aunt Jane flung out.
"We"ve taken care of her a few years. I dare say there"d be people in North Hope who would take a smart girl like Helen and pay her three dollars a week. Mrs. Dayton thought she might stay there and go to the High School before that other offer come along. And Warfield thinks it would be dreadful not to give her a chance at school when she could earn it for herself. She doesn"t want to go in the shop----"
"As if a girl of fourteen knew what she wanted!"
"Jenny did, and you agreed with her. I was awfully took by surprise when old lady Van Dorn first snapped this onto me, but Helen and Mrs. Dayton were so much in earnest, and then drivin" home I kept thinking it over.
If someone offered to take Sam and teach him store business, and he had his heart set upon going, and it was a good chance, I don"t believe it would be right to oppose him. It"s just the same with Helen."
"And have her stick up above us and despise us! She"s had pride enough, and I"ve tried to break her of it. I just wish I hadn"t let her go at all. She"ll be unthankful and full of conceit, and she never _shall_ go with my consent."
Uncle Jason kept silence, which was very irritating. Aunt Jane went over the ground again, growing more dogmatic at every step. Then the young people returned.
"Goodness sakes, mother, what are you scolding about?" cried Jenny.
"They can hear you half a mile away."
Then the story had to be gone over again.
"Well, I declare! I don"t see that it"s anything to get mad about," said Jenny sensibly. "Why, it"s--it"s just splendid! Pop, don"t you think she ought to go? And if she likes teaching better than anything else, for goodness sake, let her teach! I"d rather go out washing. And a girl who don"t like it in the shop won"t get along. Helen hasn"t quite the right way with her. She"s on the Grant side of the fence. My! The idea! That old lady must have taken a smashin" fancy to her. And she has sights of money, folks say. Maybe she"ll leave her something in the end, and she"s quite old."
"I"m fairly stumped!" declared Sam. "Mother, what"s the reason you don"t want her to go?"
"Mother"s afraid she"ll put on airs, and crow over us. Goodness! Let her, if she wants to. I"m going to have a good home, and a good husband," squeezing Joe"s hand, "and she may crow over me as much as she likes. It won"t hurt me a bit. And if you undertake to keep her home she"ll be cranky, and you"ll wish you hadn"t."
They were all on Helen"s side. Mrs. Mulford could not make any headway and went off to bed in high dudgeon. All day Sunday she carried about an injured look, and said she had reached the time of life when her opinions were of no account, after all she had done, and where would anyone have been without her thrift and judgment?
On Monday Jenny helped wash and iron, and sang about the house. She told her mother the matter wasn"t worth minding. Tuesday, Polly Samson came with three new patterns of wedding gowns, and fairly alive with the wonderful news that a rich old woman boarding at Mrs. Dayton"s was going to adopt Helen, and send her away to school.
The next afternoon the carriage came over with Mrs. Van Dorn, Mrs.
Dayton, and Helen, and the agreement. Certainly Mrs. Van Dorn"s part sounded very generous. For the next two years she would provide wholly for Helen, and keep her at school, but she would be free in the summer vacation. After that Helen must decide her course. Mr. Castles, the lawyer, vouched for Mrs. Van Dorn. The Mulfords were to visit her whenever they chose.
"I don"t agree to any of this," said Mrs. Mulford, in her most severe tone. "I don"t believe in girls being brought up above their station.
We"re just plain farmer people, and Helen"s our kin, though if she was on the c.u.mmings" side, I"d have some voice in the matter. Mr. Mulford"s willing, and if it turns out bad, and she grows up proud and lazy, and ashamed of honest labor, "taint my fault. I wash my hands of it all,"
and she fairly wrung them out.
Helen"s face was scarlet.
Mrs. Van Dorn said in a very dignified manner, "Will you sign this, Mr.
Mulford? You will see the money is in Mr. Castles" hands, and must be used for that alone. You can compel me to keep my word," smiling.
"I don"t doubt you at all," said Mr. Mulford. "I"d trust you without the scratch of a pen."
"But that wouldn"t be business."
Jenny brought in some cake, and some very nice root beer. If the ladies chose they could have a cup of tea.