Evangeline was putting the finishing touches to the supper-table, which was brave with the best Flagg dishes. It was rather a pitiful little bravery, but satisfying to Evangeline. She hurried Miss Theodosia aside and talked very fast.
"I"ve sent Stefana out with Elly Precious. We"re goin" to blind her an"
lead her in an" count one--two--_look_! She"ll see the cake the very quickest thing! She won"t cut off an inch o" the stems, so they"re kind of tall up "n" down, you see. I mean the roses. I"ve put a corset steel o" Mother"s in an" kind of tied "em to it. I hope you don"t see any corset steel."
"No." Miss Theodosia looked not at the centerpiece of roses but at the cake, the tremulous jelly, the platter,--anywhere else. "No, I don"t see any, dear."
"It"s perfectly lovely, isn"t it? Mercy gracious--oh, mercy gracious!
It"ll _dazzle_ Stefana. An" most every speck you did, Miss Theodosia.
Won"t you please stay? Won"t you _please_ to please?"
"No," for the sixth time persisted Miss Theodosia. "I"m going before Stefana gets back. This is a Flagg celebration, dear. Just little Flaggs."
Evangeline drew a long breath. Then little twinkles lighted in her eyes.
"Well," she said, "they"ll be star-spangled Flaggs to-night!"
She followed Miss Theodosia to the door. Even then she could not stop talking. Her excited little voice followed Miss Theodosia home.
"He took us! He"s blue-printing us to see if we wiggled. Elly Precious did--mercy gracious! But maybe one of him, just one, didn"t. He"s goin"
to make reg"lar black an" white pictures of the unwiggled ones. I guess you"ll be surprised when you see us!" She was surprised. John Bradford brought the little blue pictures to her the next day. They bent over them together.
"Oh!" Miss Theodosia uttered softly, for the pictures were instantly tangled in her heartstrings. She could hardly bear the one unwiggled one of Elly Precious. He was draped in tall red roses; they covered his little body and trailed their stems about his outspread legs. He had the effect of peeping at Miss Theodosia through roses. But what she could see of him was Elly Precious--her baby.
"Stefana posed him," the Story Man said, smilingly. "And Evangeline and Carruthers, too. Look at Evangeline."
Across Evangeline trailed the roses. It was a rigid, terribly rigid, Evangeline, but the roses saved her. Some softening grace emanated from them and touched the solemn little face. A little more of Evangeline than of Elly Precious peeped from behind them.
"Carruthers!--et, tu, Carruthers!" murmured Miss Theodosia. For here again was the trail of the roses. Stefana had "posed" them in all the little pictures. The effect of a rose-draped Carruthers was almost startling. He gazed from behind them stolidly, unsmiling and unhappy-souled. Carruthers did not enjoy being taken.
"Now look at Stefana," John Bradford said. This was his special exhibit--exhibit S. He watched Miss Theodosia"s face as she glanced at the little blue print.
No roses trailing there. Just a radiant-faced Stefana gazing at Miss Theodosia. It was the same face that hung on the walls of her memory.
Miss Theodosia had the sense of roses there, out of sight; it was as if Stefana rocked them gently in her lap.
"She wouldn"t wear the flowers herself," the Story Man was saying; "Neither Evangeline nor I could make her. Queer little freak."
"She is wearing them!" smiled Miss Theodosia, "I can see them. It"s only because you are a man that you can"t see,--you and Evangeline! Look at the roses in Stefana"s eyes--in her soul--"
"Oh, you woman! Women are curious things."
"Women are romantic things--oh, you man! Why should you understand us Stefanas with your unsentimental soul-of-a-man? What do you know about our dreams?" She had not meant to say quite that. "Stefana"s dreams,"
she corrected herself. "What do you know about them? And still--"
Miss Theodosia looked up from the radiant little face of Stefana with her dream-roses to the man-face beside her own.
"And still--you sent the roses," she said softly.
CHAPTER VI
A letter came to Miss Theodosia one day. Queer how disturbing a letter could be when for so long peace had enveloped her travel-worn spirit, though it might have been because of the peace that she was disturbed.
Ordinarily a letter from Cornelia Dunlap was the forerunner of interesting events to break the monotony of life. But life was not monotonous now, and it presented interesting events without the intervention--mentally and unkindly Miss Theodosia termed it interference--of Cornelia Dunlap.
"Why need Cornelia write me now, or if she does write, why can"t she talk about mushrooms?" which were Cornelia"s most recent palliative to her self-imposed and brief sojourns in her little home town. It had been cats when she and Miss Theodosia returned from Spain, Belgian hares after their long stay in Egypt. Miss Theodosia herself had never tried mushrooms nor Belgian hares. She had borne her short homecomings unpalliated, and had flitted again relievedly. Usually she and Cornelia Dunlap had flitted together. They had formed the flitting habit when family bereavements had left them both lonely women.
"Why must she write about j.a.pan?" sighed Miss Theodosia now, over the disturbing letter. "What do I care about j.a.pan?" Yet she always had cared about j.a.pan. Cornelia Dunlap and she had left that delectable country of cherry blossoms and quaint, kimona-ed women for their old age, they said, to help them bear it. But Cornelia had forgotten that.
"Let"s go to j.a.pan," she wrote. "I can pack in twenty-four hours; how long will it take you? We"ll stay there till cherry blossom time.
Frankly, Theodosia Baxter, I am bored, and you needn"t tell me that you aren"t--frankly--too. You haven"t even mushrooms (they didn"t earn their own living, my dear. I don"t know what the trouble was). "My native country, thee,"--I love it. I tell you I do! You know yourself that I never stay overnight in a place without unfurling my country"s flag.
Remember in sunny Italy?--the little brown bambino that cheered my colors? But I love my country best--in j.a.pan! Come, dear, pack--pack! If I can leave my mushrooms, I guess you can leave your lonesome, big house in Nowhere."
Miss Theodosia dreamed a little over her letter, of the little island of romance and flowers and fans. They did not need to wait; they could go again when they were old.
She told John Bradford at their next meeting of the lure of j.a.pan, though in her heart she was not lured. She was not "bored"; it was not a big, lonesome house in Nowhere! She would tell Cornelia Dunlap so. She would tell her that Flaggs were better than mushrooms--they earned their own living! Cornelia could run away alone to j.a.pan to her cherry blossoms.
But John Bradford had his scare, and through him Evangeline hers. Gloom settled on Evangeline. If her beloved lady was going away--the bitter, bitter taste of life without the beloved lady! But the inspiration that flashed into Evangeline"s nimble mind temporarily comforted her. She set about its carrying-out. Inspirations were sweet morsels under Evangeline"s tongue.
To Miss Theodosia on her porch, telling Cornelia Dunlap that j.a.pan had no lure, came a solemn procession across the gra.s.s. Evangeline led, with the effect of walking backward--though she walked straight ahead--and waving a baton. Stefana had Elly Precious, and Carrathers tramped soberly behind, in time to that imaginary wand. Miss Theodosia"s fascinated gaze was riveted to the procession"s arms. The wonder grew with nearness. Every individual parader in the procession wore a somber black arm-band. Elly Precious held his small member straight out from his side as if a little afraid of it.
"Evangeline!" uttered Miss Theodosia. It did not occur to her to address any one but Evangeline. Instinctively she recognized that the procession was Evangeline.
"Halt!" with an imaginary flourish. "Right about your faces!" Then Evangeline turned to Miss Theodosia and offered her sad little explanation.
"We"re in mournin"," she said. "All of us are--on our sleeves. Elly Precious"s doesn"t stay on very well."
"Evangeline!" again cried Miss Theodosia, this time in a startled voice.
Fears beset her. Was it the mother, or had poor Aunt Sarah raveled out?
How could it have happened so suddenly--a bolt out of the clear little Flagg skies?
"It"s you," Evangeline said. Miss Theodosia settled a little in her chair and waited. In time--Evangeline"s time--she would know. Elly Precious held out his rigid little mourning arm and softly whimpered.
"Give him to me, Stefana; he wants to come to me," Miss Theodosia said, extending welcoming hands. Very gently she relieved the tension of the small arm.
"We"re in mournin" for you," Evangeline explained sadly. "_He_ said we might as well make up our minds, I tied a stockin" round his arm, but he took it off again because he said he didn"t wear his stockin"s--no, I guess it wasn"t his stockin"s; it was his heart--on his sleeves. But he said he was in mournin", too."
Miss Theodosia gave it up. She appealed to Stefana in gentle despair.
"You tell me, dear. What does she mean?"
"We"re so sorry you are going to j.a.pan, and Evangeline said we ought to go into mourning, so we went," explained the quiet Stefana.
"She cried; you know you did, Stefana Flagg! I would"ve, only I was gettin" the mournin" ready. I"m _goin_" to."
"Don"t cry!" Miss Theodosia said, though she was doing it herself. The pulling of her heartstrings! "Don"t cry, Evangeline dear. I wish we could take back Stefana"s tears."
"You mean--you ain"t goin"?"