Nine Little Goslings.
by Susan Coolidge.
CURLY LOCKS.
WHEN a little girl is six and a little boy is six, they like pretty much the same things and enjoy pretty much the same games. She wears an ap.r.o.n, and he a jacket and trousers, but they are both equally fond of running races, spinning tops, flying kites, going down hill on sleds, and making a noise in the open air. But when the little girl gets to be eleven or twelve, and to grow thin and long, so that every two months a tuck has to be let down in her frocks, then a great difference becomes visible. The boy goes on racing and whooping and comporting himself generally like a young colt in a pasture; but she turns quiet and shy, cares no longer for rough play or exercise, takes droll little sentimental fancies into her head, and likes best the books which make her cry. Almost all girls have a fit of this kind some time or other in the course of their lives; and it is rather a good thing to have it early, for little folks get over such attacks more easily than big ones.
Perhaps we may live to see the day when wise mammas, going through the list of nursery diseases which their children have had, will wind up triumphantly with, "Mumps, measles, chicken-pox,--and they are all over with "Amy Herbert," "The Heir of Redclyffe," and the notion that they are going to be miserable for the rest of their lives!"
Sometimes this odd change comes after an illness when a little girl feels weak and out of sorts, and does not know exactly what is the matter. This is the way it came to Johnnie Carr, a girl whom some of you who read this are already acquainted with. She had intermittent fever the year after her sisters Katy and Clover came from boarding-school, and was quite ill for several weeks. Everybody in the house was sorry to have Johnnie sick. Katy nursed, petted, and cosseted her in the tenderest way. Clover brought flowers to the bedside and read books aloud, and told Johnnie interesting stories. Elsie cut out paper dolls for her by dozens, painted their cheeks pink and their eyes blue, and made for them beautiful dresses and jackets of every color and fashion.
Papa never came in without some little present or treat in his pocket for Johnnie. So long as she was in bed, and all these nice things were doing for her, Johnnie liked being ill very much, but when she began to sit up and go down to dinner, and the family spoke of her as almost well again, _then_ a time of unhappiness set in. The Johnnie who got out of bed after the fever was not the Johnnie of a month before. There were two inches more of her for one thing, for she had taken the opportunity to grow prodigiously, as sick children often do. Her head ached at times, her back felt weak, and her legs shook when she tried to run about. All sorts of queer and disagreeable feelings attacked her. Her hair had fallen out during the fever so that Papa thought it best to have it shaved close. Katy made a pretty silk-lined cap for her to wear, but the girls at school laughed at the cap, and that troubled Johnnie very much. Then, when the new hair grew, thick and soft as the plumy down on a bird"s wing, a fresh affliction set in, for the hair came out in small round rings all over her head, which made her look like a baby. Elsie called her "Curly," and gradually the others adopted the name, till at last n.o.body used any other except the servants, who still said "Miss Johnnie." It was hard to recognize the old Johnnie, square and st.u.r.dy and full of merry life, in poor, thin, whining Curly, always complaining of something, who lay on the sofa reading story-books, and begging Phil and Dorry to let her alone, not to tease her, and to go off and play by themselves. Her eyes looked twice as big as usual, because her face was so small and pale, and though she was still a pretty child, it was in a different way from the old prettiness. Katy and Clover were very kind and gentle always, but Elsie sometimes lost patience entirely, and the boys openly declared that Curly was a cross-patch, and hadn"t a bit of fun left in her.
One afternoon she was lying on the sofa with the "Wide Wide World" in her hand. Her eyelids were very red from crying over Alice"s death, but she had galloped on, and was now reading the part where Ellen Montgomery goes to live with her rich relatives in Scotland.
"Oh, dear," sighed Johnnie. "How splendid it was for her! Just think, Clover, riding lessons, and a watch, and her uncle takes her to see all sorts of places, and they call her their White Rose! Oh, dear! I wish _we_ had relations in Scotland."
"We haven"t, you know," remarked Clover, threading her needle with a fresh bit of blue worsted.
"I know it. It"s too bad. Nothing ever does happen in this stupid place.
The girls in books always do have such nice times. Ellen could leap, and she spoke French _beau_tifully. She learned at that place, you know, the place where the Humphreys lived."
"Litchfield Co., Connecticut," said Clover mischievously. "Katy was there last summer, you recollect. I guess they don"t _all_ speak such good French. Katy didn"t notice it."
"Ellen did," persisted Johnnie. "Her uncle and all those people were so surprised when they heard her. Wouldn"t it be grand to be an adopted child, Clover?"
"To be adopted by people who gave you your bath like a baby when you were thirteen years old, and tapped your lips when they didn"t want you to speak, and stole your Pilgrim"s Progresses? No, thank you. I would much rather stay as I am."
"I wouldn"t," replied Johnnie pensively. "I don"t like this place very much. I should love to be rich and to travel in Europe."
At this moment Papa and Katy came in together. Katy was laughing, and Papa looked as if he had just bitten a smile off short. In his hand was a letter.
"Oh, Clovy," began Katy, but Papa interposed with "Katy, hold your tongue;" and though he looked quizzical as he said it, Katy saw that he was half in earnest, and stopped at once.
"We"re about to have a visitor," he went on, picking Johnnie up and settling her in his lap,--"a distinguished visitor. Curly, you must put on your best manners, for she comes especially to see you."
"A visitor! How nice! Who is it?" cried Clover and Johnnie with one voice. Visitors were rare in Burnet, and the children regarded them always as a treat.
"Her name is Miss Inches,--Marion Joanna Inches," replied Dr. Carr, glancing at the letter. "She"s a sort of G.o.dmother of yours, Curly; you"ve got half her name."
"Was I really named after her?"
"Yes. She and Mamma were school-friends, and though they never met after leaving school, Mamma was fond of her, and when little No. 4 came, she decided to call her after her old intimate. That silver mug of yours was a present from her."
"Was it? Where does she live?"
"At a place called Inches Mills, in Ma.s.sachusetts. She"s the rich lady of the village, and has a beautiful house and grounds, where she lives all alone by herself. Her letter is written at Niagara. She is going to the Mammoth Cave, and writes to ask if it will be convenient for us to have her stop for a few days on the way. She wants to see her old friend"s children, she says, and especially her namesake."
"Oh, dear!" sighed Johnnie, ruffling her short hairs with her fingers.
"I wish my curls were longer. What _will_ she think when she sees me?"
"She"ll think
"There is a little girl, and she has a little curl Right in the middle of her forehead; When she is good she is very, very good, And when she is bad she is horrid--"
said Dr. Carr, laughing. But Johnnie didn"t laugh back. Her lip trembled, and she said,--
"I"m not horrid _really_, am I?"
"Not a bit," replied her father; "you"re only a little goose now and then, and I"m such an old gander that I don"t mind that a bit."
Johnnie smiled and was comforted. Her thoughts turned to the coming visitor.
"Perhaps she"ll be like the rich ladies in story-books," she said to herself.
Next day Miss Inches came. Katy was an experienced housekeeper now, and did not worry over coming guests as once she did. The house was always in pleasant, home-like order; and though Debby and Alexander had fulfilled Aunt Izzie"s prediction by marrying one another, both stayed on at Dr. Carr"s and were as good and faithful as ever, so Katy had no anxieties as to the dinners and breakfasts. It was late in the afternoon when the visitor arrived. Fresh flowers filled the vases, for it was early June, and the garden-beds were sweet with roses and lilies of the valley. The older girls wore new summer muslins, and Johnnie in white, her short curls tied back with a blue ribbon, looked unusually pretty and delicate.
Miss Inches, a wide-awake, handsome woman, seemed much pleased to see them all.
"So this is my name-child," she said, putting her arm about Johnnie.
"This is my little Joanna? You"re the only child I have any share in, Joanna; I hope we shall love each other very deeply."
Miss Inches" hand was large and white, with beautiful rings on the fingers. Johnnie was flattered at being patted by such a hand, and cuddled affectionately to the side of her name-mamma.
"What eyes she has!" murmured Miss Inches to Dr. Carr. She lowered her voice, but Johnnie caught every word. "Such a lambent blue, and so full of soul. She is quite different from the rest of your daughters, Dr.
Carr; don"t you think so?"
"She has been ill recently, and is looking thin," replied the prosaic Papa.
"Oh, it isn"t _that_! There is something else,--hard to put into words, but I feel it! You don"t see it? Well, that only confirms a theory of mine, that people are often blind to the qualities of their nearest relations. We cannot get our own families into proper perspective. It isn"t possible."
These fine words were lost on Johnnie, but she understood that she was p.r.o.nounced nicer than the rest of the family. This pleased her: she began to think that she should like Miss Inches very much indeed.
Dr. Carr was not so much pleased. The note from Miss Inches, over which he and Katy had laughed, but which was not shown to the rest, had prepared him for a visitor of rather high-flown ideas, but he did not like having Johnnie singled out as the subject of this kind of praise.
However, he said to himself, "It doesn"t matter. She means well, and jolly little Johnnie won"t be harmed by a few days of it."
Jolly little Johnnie would not have been harmed, but the pale, sentimental Johnnie left behind by the recently departed intermittent fever, decidedly _was_. Before Miss Inches had been four days in Burnet, Johnnie adored her and followed her about like a shadow. Never had anybody loved her as Miss Inches did, she thought, or discovered such fine things in her character. Ten long years and a half had she lived with Papa and the children, and not one of them had found out that her eyes were full of soul, and an expression "of mingled mirth and melancholy unusual in a childish face, and more like that of _Goethe"s Mignon_ than any thing else in the world of fiction!" Johnnie had never heard of "_Mignon_," but it was delightful to be told that she resembled her, and she made Miss Inches a present of the whole of her foolish little heart on the spot.
"Oh, if Papa would but give you to me!" exclaimed Miss Inches one day.
"If only I could have you for my own, what a delight it would be! My whole theory of training is so different,--you should never waste your energies in house-work, my darling, (Johnnie had been dusting the parlor); it is sheer waste, with an intelligence like yours lying fallow and only waiting for the master"s hand. Would you come, Johnnie, if Papa consented? Inches Mills is a quiet place, but lovely. There are a few bright minds in the neighborhood; we are near Boston, and not too far from Concord. Such a pretty room as you should have, darling, fitted up in blue and rose-buds, or--no, Morris green and Pompeian-red would be prettier, perhaps. What a joy it would be to choose pictures for it,--pictures, every one of which should be an impulse in the best Art direction! And how you would revel in the garden, and in the fruit! My strawberries are the finest I ever saw; I have two Alderney cows and quant.i.ties of cream. Don"t you think you could be happy to come and be my own little Curly, if Papa would consent?"
"Yes, yes," said Johnnie eagerly. "And I could come home sometimes, couldn"t I?"
"Every year," replied Miss Inches. "We"ll take such lovely journeys together, Johnnie, and see all sorts of interesting places. Would you like best to go to California or to Switzerland next summer? I think, on the whole, Switzerland would be best. I want you to form a good French accent at once, but, above all, to study German, the language of _thought_. Then there is music. We might spend the winter at _Stuttgard_--"
Decidedly Miss Inches was counting on her chicken before hatching it, for Dr. Carr had yet to be consulted, and he was not a parent who enjoyed interference with his nest or nestlings. When Miss Inches attacked him on the subject, his first impulse was to whistle with amazement. Next he laughed, and then he became almost angry. Miss Inches talked very fast, describing the fine things she would do with Johnnie, and for her; and Dr. Carr, having no chance to put in a word, listened patiently, and watched his little girl, who was clinging to her new friend and looking very eager and anxious. He saw that her heart was set on being "adopted," and, wise man that he was, it occurred to him that it might be well to grant her wish in part, and let her find out by experiment what was really the best and happiest thing. So he did not say "No" decidedly, as he at first meant, but took Johnnie on his knee, and asked,--
"Well, Curly, so you want to leave Papa and Katy and Clover, and go away to be Miss Inches" little girl, do you?"