"Much the same," said Mrs. Sharpe, with brevity; "wants to starve herself to death, crying in spells, and making a time. Let me help you."
This to Sally, who was scrambling to get half a dozen things at once on the table. Mrs. Sharpe came to the rescue with a practiced hand, and upon the entrance of old Peter, who had been out chaining up the dogs, the quartet immediately sat down to breakfast.
After breakfast, the new nurse again made herself generally useful in the kitchen, helped Sally, who was inclined to give out at the knees, to "red up," washed dishes and swept the floor with a brisk celerity worthy of all praise.
And then, it being wash-day, she whipped up her sleeves, displaying two l.u.s.ty, round arms, and fell to with a will among the soiled linens and steaming soap-suds.
"I may as well do something," she said, brusquely, in answer to Mrs.
Oleander"s very faint objections; "there"s nothing to do upstairs, and she doesn"t want me. She only calls me names."
So Mrs. Susan Sharpe rubbed, and wrung, and soaped, and pounded, and boiled, and blued for three mortal hours, and then there was a huge basket of clothes all ready to go on the line.
"Now, ma"am," said this priceless treasure, "if you"ll just show me the clothes-line, I"ll hang these here out."
Mrs. Oleander pointed to two long ropes strung at the lower end of the back yard, and Susan Sharpe, hoisting the basket, set off at once to hang them to dry.
The two old women watched her from the window with admiring eyes.
"She"s a n.o.ble worker!" at last said old Sally. "She "minds me of the time when I was a young girl myself. Dearie me! It went to my heart to see her rubbing them sheets and things as if they were nothing."
"And I think she"s to be trusted, too," said Mrs. Oleander. "She talks as sharp to that girl as you or I, Sally. I shouldn"t mind if we had her here for good."
Meantime, the object of all this commendation had marched across the yard, and proceeded scientifically to hang the garments on the line. But all the while the keen eyes inside the green spectacles went roving about, and alighted presently on something that rewarded her for her hard day"s work.
It was a man emerging from the pine woods, and crossing the waste strip of marshland that extended to the farm.
A high board fence separated the back yard from this waste land, and but few ever came that way.
The man wore the dress and had the pack of a peddler, and a quant.i.ty of tow hair escaped from under a broad-brimmed hat. The brown face was half hidden in an enormous growth of light whiskers.
"Can it be?" thought Susan, with a throbbing heart. "I darsn"t speak, for them two old witches are watching from the window."
Here the peddler espied her, and trolled out, in a rich, manly voice:
"My father he has locked the door, My mother keeps the key: But neither bolts nor bars shall part My own true love and me."
"It is him!" gasped Mrs. Susan Sharpe. "Oh, good gracious!"
"Good-day to you, my strapping, la.s.s. How do you find yourself this blessed morning?"
Susan Sharpe knew there were listening ears and looking eyes in the kitchen, and for their benefit she retorted:
"It"s no business of yours how I am! Be off with you! We don"t allow no vagrants here!"
"But I ain"t a vagrant, my duck o" diamonds. I"m a respectable Yankee peddler, trying to turn an honest penny by selling knickknacks to the fair sect. Do let me in, there"s a pretty dear! You hain"t no idee of the lovely things I"ve got in my pack--all dirt cheap, too!"
"I don"t want nothing," said Mrs. Susan Sharpe.
"But your ma does, my love, or your elder sister, which I see "em at the winder this minute. Now do go, there"s a lamb, and ask your ma if I mayn"t come in."
Mrs. Sharpe dropped her basket in a pet and stalked back to the house.
"It"s a peddler-man," she said, crossly, "a-wanting to come in. I told him he couldn"t, and it"s of no use; and the best thing you can do is to set the dogs on him."
"No, no!" cried Mrs. Oleander, shrilly. "Let him come in. I like peddlers. Go with her, Sally, and tell the man to come round to the garden gate."
"I"ll tell him," said Susan Sharpe, stalking out again. "Let Sally go and open the gate."
She marched across the yard and addressed the "perambulating merchant."
"You"re to go round to the front gate. This way. I"ve a note for you in my thimble. I"ll drop the thimble in your box."
The first half of Mrs. Sharpe"s speech was given for the benefit of Mrs.
Oleander"s greedy ears--the latter half, hurriedly and in a low voice, for his own.
The sagacious peddler nodded, struck up a second stave of his ditty, and trudged round to the front gate.
Mrs. Sharpe finished hanging out the clothes before she re-entered the kitchen. When she did, there sat the peddler displaying his wares, and expatiating volubly on their transcendent merits. And there stood Sally and Mrs. Oleander, devouring the contents of the box with greedy eyes.
It is not in the heart of women--country women, particularly--to resist the fascinations of the peddler"s pack.
Mrs. Oleander and her old servant were rather of the strong-minded order; but their eyes glistened avariciously, for all that, at the display of combs, and brushes, and handkerchiefs, and ribbons, and gaudy prints, and stockings, and cotton cloth, and all the innumerables that peddlers do delight in.
"This red-and-black silk handkerchief, ma"am," the peddler was crying, holding up a gay square of silk tartan, "is one fifty, and dirt cheap at that. Seein" it"s you, ma"am, however, I"ll take a dollar for it. Wuth two--it is, by ginger! Sold three dozens on "em down the village, and got two dollars apiece for "em, every one."
"I"ll take it at a dollar," said Mrs. Oleander. "Sally, that piece of brown merino would just suit you."
"Makes up lovely, ma"am," said the peddler, turning to Sally; "only four dollars for the hull piece. Jest feel of it--soft as a baby"s skin.
Halloo! miss, what can I do for you?"
This last to Susan Sharpe, who had set down her basket, and was looking on.
"Nothing," replied Susan, with asperity.
"Oh, now, don"t you say that!" exclaimed this persuasive man; "you do want suthin"--lots o" things--I kin see it in them air sparklin" eyes o"
your"n. What makes you wear green gla.s.ses. See here, I"ve blue, and white, and fancy colors, with silver straddles for the nose. Do look at "em--there"s a love!"
Mrs. Oleander laughed, and Mrs. Sharpe so far unbent her austerity as to kneel down and begin rummaging the miscellaneous articles.
The peddler"s quick eye never left her hands; and when he heard the tiny click of something falling, an intelligent flash shot from him to the obnoxious green gla.s.ses.
"I want a thimble," said Mrs. Sharpe, with phlegm. "I"ve lost mine. How much do you ask for these here, mister?"
"Three cents apiece."
Susan paid down the three cents, pocketed the bra.s.s thimble, and slowly rose.
"No more to sell to-day," said the peddler, bundling up with celerity.
"So you won"t take the brown, ma"am? Sorry we can"t make a trade; but I"ll run up again to-morrow with a new lot, and I"ve no doubt we can strike a bargain. Good-morning, ladies."