"Isn"t! Oh, Mother! Oh, Mother, does he feel so badly about Betty?"
"I suppose so!" Mrs. Paget went on with her bread cutting.
"But, Mother, surely he didn"t expect to marry Betty Forsythe?"
"I don"t know why not, Mark. She"s a sweet little thing."
"But, Mother--" Margaret was a little at a loss. "We don"t seem old enough to really be getting married!" she said, a little lamely.
"Brucie came in about half-past five, and said he was going over to Richie"s," Mrs. Paget said, with a sigh.
"In all this rain--that long walk!" Margaret e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, as she filled a long wicker basket with sliced bread.
"I think an evening of work with Richie will do him a world of good,"
said his mother. There was a pause. "There"s Dad. I"ll go in," she said, suddenly ending it, as the front door slammed.
Margaret went in, too, to kiss her father; a tired-looking, gray haired man close to fifty, who had taken her chair by the fire. Mrs.
Paget was anxious to be a.s.sured that his shoulders and shoes were not damp.
"But your hands are icy, Daddy," said she, as she sat down behind a smoking tureen at the head of the table. "Come, have your nice hot soup, dear. Pa.s.s that to Dad, Becky, and light the other gas. What sort of a day?"
"A hard day," said Mr. Paget, heavily. "Here, one of you girls put Baby into his chair. Let go, Bob,--I"m too tired to-night for monkey shines!" He sat down stiffly. "Where"s Bruce? Can"t that boy remember what time we have dinner?"
"Bruce is going to have supper with Richie Williams, Dad," said Mrs.
Paget, serenely. "They"ll get out their blue prints afterwards and have a good evening"s work. Fill the gla.s.ses before you sit down, Ju.
Come, Ted--put that back on the mantel.--Come, Becky! Tell Daddy about what happened to-day, Mark--"
They all drew up their chairs. Robert, recently graduated from a high chair, was propped upon "The Officers of the Civil War," and "The Household Book of Verse." Julie tied on his bib, and kissed the back of his fat little neck, before she slipped into her own seat. The mother sat between Ted and Duncan, for reasons that immediately became obvious. Margaret sat by her father, and attended to his needs, telling him all about the day, and laying her pretty slim hand over his as it rested beside his plate. The chops and cream gravy, as well as a mountain of baked potatoes, and various vegetables, were under discussion, when every one stopped short in surprise at hearing the doorbell ring.
"Who--?" said Margaret, turning puzzled brows to her mother, and "I"m sure I--" her mother answered, shaking her head. Ted was heard to mutter uneasily that, gee, maybe it was old Pembroke, mad because the fellers had soaked his old skate with s...o...b..a.l.l.s; Julie dimpled and said, "Maybe it"s flowers!" Robert shouted, "Bakeryman!" more because he had recently acquired the word than because of any conviction on the subject. In the end Julie went to the door, with the four children in her wake. When she came back, she looked bewildered, and the children a little alarmed.
"It"s--it"s Mrs. Carr-Boldt, Mother," said Julie.
"Well, don"t leave her standing there in the cold, dear!" Mrs. Paget said, rising quickly, to go into the hall. Margaret, her heart thumping with an una.n.a.lyzed premonition of something pleasant, and nervous, too, for the hospitality of the Pagets, followed her. So they were all presently crowded into the hall, Mrs. Paget all hospitality, Margaret full of a fear she would have denied that her mother would not be equal to the occasion, the children curious, Julie a little embarra.s.sed.
The visitor, fur-clad, rain-spattered,--for it was raining again,--and beaming, stretched a hand to Mrs. Paget.
"You"re Mrs. Paget, of course,--this is an awful hour to interrupt you," she said in her big, easy way, "and there"s my Miss Paget,--how do you do? But you see I must get up to town to-night--in this door? I can see perfectly, thank you!--and I did want a little talk with you first. Now, what a shame!"--for the gas, lighted by Theodore at this point, revealed Duncan"s bib, and the napkins some of the others were still carrying. "I"ve interrupted your dinner! Won"t you let me wait here until--"
"Perhaps--if you haven"t had your supper--you will have some with us,"
said Mrs. Paget, a little uncertainly. Margaret inwardly shuddered, but Mrs. Carr-Boldt was gracious.
"Mrs. Paget, that"s charming of you," she said. "But I had tea at Dayton, and mustn"t lose another moment. I shan"t dine until I get home. I"m the busiest woman in the world, you know. Now, it won"t take me two minutes--"
She was seated now, her hands still deep in her m.u.f.f, for the parlor was freezing cold. Mrs. Paget, with a rather bewildered look, sat down, too.
"You can run back to your dinners," said she to the children. "Take them, Julie. Mark, dear, will you help the pudding?" They all filed dutifully out of the room, and Margaret, excited and curious, continued a meal that might have been of sawdust and sand for all she knew. The strain did not last long; in about ten minutes Mrs. Paget looked into the room, with a rather worried expression, and said, a little breathlessly:--
"Daddy, can you come here a moment?--You"re all right, dear," she added, as Mr. Paget indicated with an embarra.s.sed gesture his well worn house-coat. They went out together. The young people sat almost without speaking, listening to the indistinguishable murmur from the adjoining room, and smiling mysteriously at each other. Then Margaret was called, and went as far as the dining-room door, and came back to put her napkin uncertainly down at her place, hesitated, arranged her gown carefully, and finally went out again. They heard her voice with the others in the parlor... questioning... laughing.
Presently the low murmur broke into audible farewells; chairs were pushed back, feet sc.r.a.ped in the hall.
"Good-night, then!" said Mrs. Carr-Boldt"s clear tones, "and so sorry to have--Good-night, Mr. Paget!--Oh, thank you--but I"m well wrapped.
Thank you! Good-night, dear! I"ll see you again soon--I"ll write."
And then came the honking of the motor-car, and a great swish where it grazed a wet bush near the house. Somebody lowered the gas in the hall, and Mrs. Paget"s voice said regretfully, "I wish we had had a fire in the parlor--just one of the times!--but there"s no help for it." They all came in, Margaret flushed, starry-eyed; her father and mother a little serious. The three blinked at the brighter light, and fell upon the cooling chops as if eating were the important business of the moment.
"We waited the pudding," said Julie. "What is it?"
"Why--" Mrs. Paget began, hesitatingly. Mr. Paget briskly took the matter out of her hands.
"This lady," he said, with an air of making any further talk unnecessary, "needs a secretary, and she has offered your sister Margaret the position. That"s the whole affair in a nutsh.e.l.l. I"m not at all sure that your mother and I think it a wise offer for Margaret to accept, and I want to say here and now that I don"t want any child of mine to speak of this matter, or make it a matter of general gossip in the neighborhood. Mother, I"d like very much to have Blanche make me a fresh cup of tea."
"Wants Margaret!" gasped Julie, unaffected--so astonishing was the news--by her father"s unusual sternness. "Oh, Mother! Oh, Mark! Oh, you lucky thing! When is she coming down here?"
"She isn"t coming down here--she wants Mark to go to her--that"s it,"
said her mother.
"Mark--in New York!" shrilled Theodore. Julie got up to rush around the table and kiss her sister; the younger children laughed and shouted.
"There is no occasion for all this," said Mr. Paget, but mildly, for the fresh tea had arrived. "Just quiet them down, will you, Mother? I see nothing very extraordinary in the matter. This Mrs.--Mrs. Carr Boldt--is it?--needs a secretary and companion; and she offers the position to Mark."
"But--but she never even saw Mark until to-day!" marvelled Julie.
"I hardly see how that affects it, my dear!" her father observed unenthusiastically.
"Why, I think it makes it simply extraordinary!" exulted the generous little sister. "Oh, Mark, isn"t this just the sort of thing you would have wished to happen! Secretary work,--just what you love to do! And you, with your beautiful handwriting, you"ll just be invaluable to her! And your German--and I"ll bet you"ll just have them all adoring you--!"
"Oh, Ju, if I only can do it!" burst from Margaret, with a little childish gasp. She was sitting back from the table, twisted about so that she sat sideways, her hands clasped about the top bar of her chair-back. Her tawny soft hair was loosened about her face, her dark eyes aflame. "Lenox, she said," Margaret went on dazedly; "and Europe, and travelling everywhere! And a hundred dollars a month, and nothing to spend it on, so I can still help out here! Why, it--I can"t believe it!"--she looked from one smiling, interested face to another, and suddenly her radiance underwent a quick eclipse. Her lip trembled, and she tried to laugh as she pushed her chair back, and ran to the arms her mother opened. "Oh, Mother!" sobbed Margaret, clinging there, "do you want me to go--shall I go? I"ve always been so happy here, and I feel so ashamed of being discontented,--and I don"t deserve a thing like this to happen to me!"
"Why, G.o.d bless her heart!" said Mrs. Paget, tenderly, "of course you"ll go!"
"Oh, you silly! I"ll never speak to you again if you don"t!" laughed Julie, through sympathetic tears.
Theodore and Duncan immediately burst into a radiant reminiscence of their one brief visit to New York; Rebecca was heard to murmur that she would "vithet Mark thome day"; and the baby, tugging at his mother"s elbow, asked sympathetically if Mark was naughty, and was caught between his sister"s and his mother"s arms and kissed by them both. Mr. Paget, picking his paper from the floor beside his chair, took an arm-chair by the fire, stirred the coals noisily, and while cleaning his gla.s.ses, observed rather huskily that the little girl always knew, she could come back again if anything went wrong.
"But suppose I don"t suit?" suggested Margaret, sitting back on her heels, refreshed by tears, and with her arms laid across her mother"s lap.
"Oh, you"ll suit," said Julie, confidently; and Mrs. Paget smoothed the girl"s hair back and said affectionately, "I don"t think she"ll find many girls like you for the asking, Mark!"
"Reading English with the two little girls," said Margaret, dreamily, "and answering notes and invitations. And keeping books--"
"You can do that anyway," said her father, over his paper.
"And dinner lists, you know, Mother--doesn"t it sound like an English story!" Margaret stopped in the middle of an ecstatic wriggle.
"Mother, will you pray I succeed?" she said solemnly.
"Just be your own dear simple self, Mark," her mother advised.
"January!" she added, with a great sigh. "It"s the first break, isn"t it, Dad? Think of trying to get along without our Mark!"