The high mantel was piled with books, the gifts of her father, Mr.
Hammerton, and Miss Jewett; on the walls were photographs in oval black-walnut frames of Miss Jewett, sitting at a table with her elbow upon it and one hand resting on a book in her lap, of her father and mother, she sitting and he standing behind her, and one of herself and Dinah, taken when they were fifteen and twenty-one; there were also a large photograph taken from a painting of the Mater Dolorosa, which Mr.
Hammerton had given her on her fourteenth birthday and a chromo of Red Riding Hood that he had given to Dinah upon her fourteenth birthday.
Upon the table at which she was writing, books were piled, and a package of old letters that she had been sorting, and choosing some to burn, among which were two from Felix Harrison. The package contained several from Mr. Hammerton, but his were never worth burning; they were only worth keeping because they were so like himself. Pages of ma.n.u.script were scattered among the books, and a long envelope contained two rejected articles that she had planned to rewrite after a consultation with Mr. Hammerton and to send elsewhere. She had cried over her first rejected article (when she was eighteen), and two years afterward had revised it, changed the t.i.tle, and her father had been proud of it in print.
She was writing and thinking of Sue when a noisy entrance below announced her presence.
"Go right up," said Mrs. Wadsworth"s voice. "Tessa is star-gazing in her room. Don"t stay if you are chilly. Tessa likes to be cold."
Tessa met her at the head of the stairs.
"I"ve come to stay all night. Do you want me?"
"I want you more than I want any one in the world."
"That"s refreshing. I wanted to see you and that"s why I came. Norah Bird said that Dine was to stay all night with her and I knew I should have you all to myself. Dr. Lake brought me. I believe that he wanted me to come. What do you stay up here for? It"s lovely down-stairs with your father and mother; she is sewing and he is reading to her. Put away that great pile of foolscap and talk to me; I"m as full of talk as an egg is full of meat."
"Must I break the sh.e.l.l?"
"Your room always looks pretty and there isn"t much in it, either."
"Of course not, after Old Place."
"Old Place _is_ enchanting!" Sue tossed her gloves and hat to the bed.
"I"ll keep on my sacque; I want to stay up here."
Tessa had reseated herself at the table. Sue dropped down on the carpet at her feet.
"Have they gone?"
"Oh, yes! I stayed to see them off and drove to the depot with them. We called for Nan Gerard. What a flirt that girl is! Any one would think that she had known Mr. Ralph all his life."
Sue leaned backward against Tessa; her face was feverish and excited, her thin cheeks would have looked hollow but for their high color, her eyes as she raised them revealed something new; something new and not altogether pleasant.
Tessa touched her hair and then bent over and kissed her. It was so seldom that Sue was kissed.
"You know that night-" Sue began with an effort, "the night before New Years. Mr. Ralph found me in his den, I was arranging one of his tables, and he said that he wanted to talk to me. And I should think he _did_! I didn"t know that he had so much tongue in his head. His mother calls him Ralph the Silent. Grace Geer calls him Ralph the Wily when n.o.body hears.
He is Ralph the Hateful when he wants to be. How he went on! Fury!
There! I promised him not to talk slang or to use "unlady-like exclamations." I was as high and mighty as he was, but I wanted to cry all the time. He said that I ought to live for something, that I am not a child but a woman. And I promised him that I wouldn"t read novels until he says that I may! He said that I didn"t know what trouble is!
_He_ has had trouble, Grace Geer says. I don"t see how. Some girl I suppose. Perhaps she flirted with him. I hope she did. But I have had trouble. Did _he_ ever wait and wait and wait for a thing till he almost died with waiting, and then find that he didn"t get it and never _could_? Did you ever feel so?"
The appealing eyes were looking into hers; she could not speak instantly.
"I don"t believe that you ever did. You are quiet. You have a nice home and people to love you; your mother and father are so proud of you; your mother is always talking to people about you as if she couldn"t live without you! And you don"t have beaux and such horrid things! I shouldn"t think that you would like Dine to have a lover before you have one."
"Dine?" said Tessa, looking perplexed.
"Why, yes, Mr. Hammerton."
"Oh, I forgot him," replied Tessa, almost laughing.
"I wish that I had _never_ seen Old Place. I never should have thought any thing if it hadn"t been for Grace Geer. Before I went to Old Place I expected to marry Stacey. She put things into my head. She used to call me Mrs. Ralph, and tell me how splendidly I could dress after I was married! And she used to ask me what he said to me and explain that it meant something. I didn"t know that it meant any thing. He was so old and so wise that I thought he could never think of me. Once she went home with me and she told father and Aunt Jane and Dr. Lake that they were going to lose me. He told me himself that night that he was more interested in me than in any body."
"Did he say that?" asked Tessa, startled.
"Yes, he did."
"So am I interested in your life. I want to see what becomes of you."
"Oh, he didn"t mean _that_. He meant in me. But I suppose he didn"t mean any thing, or he wouldn"t have told his mother not to take me to St.
Louis. You think I like him because he"s rich and handsome, but I don"t.
I like him because he was so kind to me; n.o.body was ever so kind to me before; I can love any one who is kind to me. He gave me his photograph a year ago. It"s elegant. I"ll show it to you some time. I know he had six taken, for I saw them and counted them; he didn"t know it, though.
And I heard him tell his mother that he had _five_ taken. I never could find out where that sixth one went to. I know that his mother had one, and Grace Geer, and Miss Sarepta Towne, that"s three! And mine was four, and Philip Towne"s was five. I asked him where the other was."
"What did he say?" asked Tessa, gravely.
"He said nothing. I know that Aunt Jane thinks my not going the queerest thing in nature, and father looked rather nonplussed and asked me what I had been doing. I am as ashamed as I can be."
Tessa arranged her papers thoughtfully; she was pondering Grace Geer"s name for Mr. Towne.
"Perhaps he will change his mind and come home and like me," said Sue, brightening.
"O, Sue, Sue, don"t make a disappointment for yourself! When there are so many good and beautiful things in the world, why do you see only this that is being withheld?"
"Because-" with a drooping head, "I want it so."
"There are good men and good women in the world, Sue; men and women whose word is pure gold."
"Whose, I"d like to know?"
"Miss Jewett"s."
"Oh, of course!"
"And Gus Hammerton"s."
"Oh, he"s as wise and stupid as an owl!"
"Dr. Johnson could think in Latin and I should not wonder if Gus could."
"But he"s awkward and never talks nonsense, and he wears spectacles and has a tiny bald spot on the top of his head, the place where the wool ought to grow! The girls don"t run after him."
"They are not wise enough."
"He"s so old, too."
"He"s younger than Mr. Towne."
"He doesn"t look so. And he"s poor."