"I know, dear; but--they don"t always understand." Aunt Hannah sighed in sympathy with the far-away Hugh Calderwell, as she looked down at the bright young face near her.
There was a moment"s silence; then Billy gave a little laugh.
"He _will_ be surprised," she said. "He told me once that Bertram wouldn"t ever care for any girl except to paint. To paint, indeed! As if Bertram didn"t love me--just _me!_--if he never saw another tube of paint!"
"I think he does, my dear."
Again there was silence; then, from Billy"s lips there came softly:
"Just think; we"ve been engaged almost four weeks--and to-morrow it"ll be announced. I"m so glad I didn"t ever announce the other two!"
"The other _two!_" cried Aunt Hannah.
Billy laughed.
"Oh, I forgot. You didn"t know about Cyril."
"Cyril!"
"Oh, there didn"t anybody know it, either not even Cyril himself,"
dimpled Billy, mischievously. "I just engaged myself to him in imagination, you know, to see how I"d like it. I didn"t like it. But it didn"t last, anyhow, very long--just three weeks, I believe. Then I broke it off," she finished, with unsmiling mouth, but dancing eyes.
"Billy!" protested Aunt Hannah, feebly.
"But I _am_ glad only the family knew about my engagement to Uncle William--oh, Aunt Hannah, you don"t know how good it does seem to call him "Uncle" again. It was always slipping out, anyhow, all the time we were engaged; and of course it was awful then."
"That only goes to prove, my dear, how entirely unsuitable it was, from the start."
A bright color flooded Billy"s face.
"I know; but if a girl _will_ think a man is asking for a wife when all he wants is a daughter, and if she blandly says "Yes, thank you, I"ll marry you," I don"t know what you can expect!"
"You can expect just what you got--misery, and almost a tragedy,"
retorted Aunt Hannah, severely.
A tender light came into Billy"s eyes.
"Dear Uncle William! What a jewel he was, all the way through! And he"d have marched straight to the altar, too, with never a flicker of an eyelid, I know--self-sacrificing martyr that he was!"
"Martyr!" bristled Aunt Hannah, with extraordinary violence for her.
"I"m thinking that term belonged somewhere else. A month ago, Billy Neilson, you did not look as if you"d live out half your days. But I suppose _you"d_ have gone to the altar, too, with never a flicker of an eyelid!"
"But I thought I had to," protested Billy. "I couldn"t grieve Uncle William so, after Mrs. Hartwell had said how he--he wanted me."
Aunt Hannah"s lips grew stern at the corners.
"There are times when--when I think it would be wiser if Mrs. Kate Hartwell would attend to her own affairs!" Aunt Hannah"s voice fairly shook with wrath.
"Why-Aunt Hannah!" reproved Billy in mischievous horror. "I"m shocked at you!"
Aunt Hannah flushed miserably.
"There, there, child, forget I said it. I ought not to have said it, of course," she murmured agitatedly.
Billy laughed.
"You should have heard what Uncle William said! But never mind. We all found out the mistake before it was too late, and everything is lovely now, even to Cyril and Marie. Did you ever see anything so beatifically happy as that couple are? Bertram says he hasn"t heard a dirge from Cyril"s rooms for three weeks; and that if anybody else played the kind of music he"s been playing, it would be just common garden ragtime!"
"Music! Oh, my grief and conscience! That makes me think, Billy. If I"m not actually forgetting what I came in here for," cried Aunt Hannah, fumbling in the folds of her dress for the letter that had slipped from her lap. "I"ve had word from a young niece. She"s going to study music in Boston."
"A niece?"
"Well, not really, you know. She calls me "Aunt," just as you and the Henshaw boys do. But I really am related to _her_, for her mother and I are third cousins, while it was my husband who was distantly related to the Henshaw family."
"What"s her name?"
""Mary Jane Arkwright." Where is that letter?"
"Here it is, on the floor," reported Billy. "Were you going to read it to me?" she asked, as she picked it up.
"Yes--if you don"t mind."
"I"d love to hear it."
"Then I"ll read it. It--it rather annoys me in some ways. I thought the whole family understood that I wasn"t living by myself any longer--that I was living with you. I"m sure I thought I wrote them that, long ago.
But this sounds almost as if they didn"t understand it--at least, as if this girl didn"t."
"How old is she?"
"I don"t know; but she must be some old, to be coming here to Boston to study music, alone--singing, I think she said."
"You don"t remember her, then?"
Aunt Hannah frowned and paused, the letter half withdrawn from its envelope.
"No--but that isn"t strange. They live West. I haven"t seen any of them for years. I know there are several children--and I suppose I"ve been told their names. I know there"s a boy--the eldest, I think--who is quite a singer, and there"s a girl who paints, I believe; but I don"t seem to remember a "Mary Jane.""
"Never mind! Suppose we let Mary Jane speak for herself," suggested Billy, dropping her chin into the small pink cup of her hand, and settling herself to listen.
"Very well," sighed Aunt Hannah; and she opened the letter and began to read.
"DEAR AUNT HANNAH:--This is to tell you that I"m coming to Boston to study singing in the school for Grand Opera, and I"m planning to look you up. Do you object? I said to a friend the other day that I"d half a mind to write to Aunt Hannah and beg a home with her; and my friend retorted: "Why don"t you, Mary Jane?" But that, of course, I should not think of doing.
"But I know I shall be lonesome, Aunt Hannah, and I hope you"ll let me see you once in a while, anyway. I plan now to come next week --I"ve already got as far as New York, as you see by the address--and I shall hope to see you soon.
"All the family would send love, I know.
"M. J. ARKWRIGHT."