"Well I did," said Faith smiling,--"I shewed you what I knew; but you shewed me what I had never known before."
"I"m sure you shewed me some things I had never known before," he said laughing a little. "Do you know where we are going now?"--they had left the beaten road, and entered a by-way where only footsteps marked the snow, and no sleigh before their own had broken ground. It seemed to be a sort of coast-way,--leading right off towards the dashing Sound and its low points and inlets. The sh.o.r.e was marked with ice as well as foam; the water looked dark and cold, with the white gulls soaring and dipping, and the white line of Long Island in the distance.
"No, I don"t know. Where are we going? O how beautiful! O how beautiful!" Faith exclaimed. "Hasn"t every time its own pleasure! Where are we going, Endecott?"
"To see one who Dr. Harrison "fancies" may have "something in him."
Whatever made the doctor take such a dislike to Reuben?"
Faith did not answer, and instead looked forward with a sort of contemplative gravity upon her brow. Her cheeks were already so brilliant with riding in the fresh air that a little rise of colour could hardly have been noticed.
"Do you know?"
Faith presently replied that she supposed it was a dislike taken up without any sort of real ground.
"Well to tell you the truth, my little Mignonette," said Mr. Linden, "the doctor"s twenty-five dollars gives me some trouble in that connexion. Reuben will take favours gladly from anybody that likes him, but towards people who do not (they are very few, indeed) he is as proud as if he had the Bank of England at his back. _I_ might send him a dinner every day if I chose; but if Reuben were starving, his conscience would have a struggle with him before he would take bread from Dr. Harrison."
Faith listened very seriously and her conclusion was a very earnest "Oh, I am sorry!--But then," she went on thoughtfully,--"I don"t know that Dr. Harrison _dislikes_ Reuben.--He don"t understand him, how should he?--and I know they have never seemed to get on well together.--"
"I chose to answer for him the other day," said Mr. Linden--"and I shall not let him refuse; but I have questioned whether I would tell him anything about the money till he is ready for the books. Then if he should meet the doctor, and the doctor should ask him!--"
Faith was silent a bit.
"But Reuben will do what you tell him," she said. "And besides, Reuben was doing everything he could for Dr. Harrison the other night--he can"t refuse to let Dr. Harrison do something for him. I don"t think he ought."
"He had no thought of reward. Still, he would not refuse, if he supposed any part of the "doing" was out of care for him,--and you know I cannot tell him that I think it is. But I shall talk to him about it.
Not to-day: I will not run the risk of spoiling his pleasure at the sight of us. There--do you see that little beaver-like hut on the next point?--that is where he lives."
Faith looked at it with curious interest. That little brown spot amidst the waste of snow and waters--that was where the fisherman"s boy lived; and there he was preparing himself for college. And for what beside?
"Will Reuben or his father be hurt at all at anything we have brought them?" she said then.
"No, they will take it all simply for what it is,--a New Year"s gift.
And Reuben would not dream of being hurt by anything we could do,--he is as humble as he is proud. We are like enough to find him alone."
And so they found him. With an absorbed ignoring of sleigh-bells and curiosity--perhaps because the former rarely came for him,--Reuben had sat still at his work until his visiters knocked at the low door. But then he came with a step and face ready to find Mr. Linden--though not Faith; and his first flush of pleasure deepened with surprise and even a little embarra.s.sment as he ushered her in. There was no false pride about it, but "Miss Faith" was looked upon by all the boys as a dainty thing; and Reuben placed a chair for her by the drift-wood fire, with as much feeling of the unfitness of surrounding circ.u.mstances, as if she had been the Queen. Something in the hand that was laid on his shoulder brushed that away; and then Reuben looked and spoke as usual.
Surrounding circ.u.mstances were not so bad, after all. Faith had noticed how carefully and neatly the snow was cleared from the door and down to the water"s edge, and everything within bore the same tokens. The room was very tiny, the floor bare--but very clean; the blazing drift-wood the only adornment. Yet not so: for on an old sea chest which graced one side of the room, lay Reuben"s work which they had interrupted. An open book, with one or two others beside it; and by them all, with mesh and netting-kneedle and twine, lay an old net which Reuben had been repairing. The drift-wood had stone supporters,--the winter wind swept in a sort of grasping way round the little hut; and the dashing of the Sound waters, and the sharp war of the floating ice, broke the stillness. But they were very glad eyes that Reuben lifted to Mr.
Linden"s face and a very glad alacrity brought forward a little box for Faith to rest her feet.
"Don"t you mean to sit down, Mr. Linden?" he said.
"To be sure I do. But I haven"t wished you a happy New Year yet." And the lips that Reuben most reverenced in the world, left their greeting on his forehead. It was well the boy found something to do--with the fire, and Faith"s box, and Mr. Linden"s chair! But then he stood silent and quiet as before.
"Don"t _you_ mean to sit down, Reuben?" said Faith.
Reuben smiled,--not as if he cared about a seat; but he brought forward another little box, not even the first cousin of Faith"s, and sat down as she desired.
"Didn"t you find it very cold, Miss Faith?" he said, as if he could not get used to seeing her there. "Are you getting warm now?"
Faith said she hadn"t been cold; and would fast enough have entered into conversation with Reuben, but she thought he would rather hear words from other lips, and was sure that other lips could give them better.
"And have you got quite well, ma"m?" said Reuben.
"Don"t I look well?" she said smiling at him. "What are you doing over there, Reuben?--making a net?"
"O I was mending it, Miss Faith."
"I can"t afford to have you at that work just now," said Mr.
Linden,--"you know we begin school again to-morrow. You must tell your father from me, Reuben, that he must please to use his new one for the present, and let you mend up that at your leisure. Will you?"
Reuben flushed--looking up and then down as he said, "Yes, sir,"--and then very softly, "O Mr. Linden, you needn"t have done that!"
"Of course I need not--people never need please themselves, I suppose.
But you know, Reuben, there is a great deal of Santa Glaus work going on at this time of year, and Miss Faith and I have had some of it put in our hands. I won"t answer for what she"ll do with you!--but you must try and bear it manfully."
Reuben laughed a little--half in sympathy with the bright words and smile, half as if the spirit of the time had laid hold of him.
"You know, Mr. Linden," said Faith laughing, but appealingly too,--"that Reuben will get worse handling from you than he will from me!--so let him have the worst first."
"I"ll bring in your basket," was all he said,--and the basket came in accordingly; Reuben feeling too bewildered to even offer his services.
Faith found herself in a corner. She jumped up and placed herself in front of the basket so as to hide it. "Wait!"--she said. "Reuben, how much of a housekeeper are you?"
"I don"t know, Miss Faith,--I don"t believe I ever was tried."
"Do you know how to make mince pies, for instance?"
But Reuben shook his head, with a low-spoken, "No, Miss Faith,"--a little as if she were somehow transparent, and he was viewing the basket behind her.
"Never mind my questions," said Faith, "but tell me. Could you stuff a turkey, do you think, if you tried?"
"I suppose I could--somehow," Reuben said, colouring and laughing. "I never tried, Miss Faith."
"Then you couldn"t!" said Faith, her laugh rolling round the little room, as softly as the curls of smoke went up the chimney. "You needn"t think you could! But Reuben, since you can"t, don"t you think you would let me do it once for you?"
Reuben"s words were not ready in answer. But a bashful look at Faith"s face--and her hands,--one that reminded her of the clam-roasting,--was followed by a grateful, low-spoken--"I don"t think you ought to do anything for _me_, Miss Faith."
"I have had so much pleasure in it, Reuben, you"ll have to forgive me;"--Faith answered, withdrawing from the basket.
"You must look into that at your leisure, Reuben," Mr. Linden said, as he watched the play of feeling in the boy"s face. "Miss Faith is in no hurry for her basket."
Reuben heard him silently, and as silently lifted the basket from where it stood and set it carefully on the table. But then he came close up to Faith and stood by her side. "You are _very_ good, Miss Faith!" he said. "I don"t know how to thank you."
"Reuben!" said Faith colouring--"you mustn"t thank me at all. I"ve just had the pleasure of doing--but it is Mr. Linden that has brought the basket here, and me too."
"And he must take you away," Mr. Linden said. "Reuben, you may thank Miss Faith just as much as you please. If I had nothing else to do, I should invite my self here to dinner, but as it is I must be off. Are you ready?" he said to Faith, while in silence Reuben knelt down to put on again the moccasins which she had thrown off, and then she followed Mr. Linden. Reuben followed too,--partly to help their arrangements, partly at Mr. Linden"s bidding to bring back the net. But when there was added thereto a little package which could only mean books, Reuben"s cup of gravity, at least, was full; and _words_ of good-bye he had none.
And for a few minutes after they drove away Faith too was silent with great pleasure. She hardly knew, though she felt, how bright the sun was on the snow, and how genial his midday winter beams; and with how crisp a gleam the light broke on ice points and crests of foam and glanced from the snow-banks. The riches of many days seemed crowded into the few hours of that morning. Were they not on a "shining"
expedition! Had they not been leaving sunbeams of gladness in house after house, that would shine on, n.o.body knew how long! Faith was too glad for a little while not to feel very sober; those sunbeams came from so high a source, and were wrought in with others that so wrapped her own life about. So she looked at Jerry"s ears and said nothing.