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CHAPTER XII

Not the least difficult part of a clergyman's duty is his round of parochial calls. They must be rightly timed with regard to the domestic arrangements of each family. This he is supposed to know by a sort of intuition. They must not be too infrequent. He must remember the number of the inmates, and be sure to inquire after the new baby. He must stay no longer at Mrs. Wheeler's than he did at Mrs. Brown's. He must swallow, at any physical cost, whatever is set before him in the way of eating or drinking.

Mr. Clifton was fully aware of all these parochial shoals, and, as far as mortal man could do it, steered clear of shipwreck; but "offenses will come," and Dolly was at the wash-tub, up to her elbows in soapsuds, when "the minister" was announced by the breathless Daffy, who was unaware that Monday is generally the day when all clergymen turn their backs upon the study and recruit their exhausted energies by locomotion.

"Why, in the name of common sense, couldn't he have called Saturday?" asked Dolly, hastily, wiping the suds from her parboiled fingers; "then I had on my green silk, and should as lief have seen him as not; but ministers never have any consideration. Daffy – Daffy, here – where's my scalloped petticoat and under-sleeves? I dare say now that the sitting-room center-table is all awry. Daffy, is the Bible on the light stand? and the hymn-book too? Hand me my silk apron trimmed with the pink bows, and get my breast-pin quick, for goodness' sake; men prink forever themselves, but they never can wait a minute for a woman to dress; how do I look, Daffy? I do wish people had sense enough to stay away of a Monday morning. Don't let these calicos lay soaking in the tub, now, till I come back; give 'em a wring and hang 'em out."

"Good morning, Mr. Clifton," said Dolly, dropping a bobbing courtesy; "it is quite a pleasure to see you."

"Thank you, Miss Dolly," replied the minister, with a gravity truly commendable, when the fact is taken into consideration that he had heard every syllable of the foregoing conversation, through the thin partition; "thank you, Miss Dolly."

"Yes, I was just saying to Daffy," resumed Dolly, "how long it was since you called here, and how welcome you were at any time, when you felt inclined to come. I don't think it at all strange that you should prefer calling oftener at Lawyer Briggs's and Squire Beadle's, than at my poor place. I know it is hardly fit to ask a clergyman into."

"Lawyer Briggs and Squire Beadle are my wife's relatives, you know, Miss Dolly."

"Oh, I wasn't complaining, at all," said Dolly; "they are eddicated people, it isn't at all strange; how's your folks?"

"Very well, I thank you; the baby is getting through his teeth bravely."

"I saw Mrs. Clifton go into Mrs. Messenger's the other day," said Dolly. "I see she has her favorites in the parish."

"Mrs. Messenger's little boy was taken in a fit," said Mr. Clifton, "and they sent over in great haste for my wife."

"Ah," said Dolly, "well, I didn't blame her, of course not; I wouldn't have you think so. Mrs. Messenger is considered very genteel here in the village; Mrs. Messenger and I are two very different persons."

"I see you brought me a new parishioner last Sunday," said Mr. Clifton, glad to change the conversation.

"Yes; she is a poor child whom I took out of pity to bring up; her mother is dead, and so I offered her a home."

"That's right," said Mr. Clifton, who had his own views about Dolly's motives. "I hope she will attend the Sabbath-school; Mrs. Clifton, I know, would like her to be in her class."

Dolly's countenance fell. "Well, I don't know about that, though I'm obleeged to Mrs. Clifton. I don't think Rose would be willing to go."

"She might be shy at first," said the minister, "but my wife has quite a gift at drawing out children's hearts. I think little Rose would soon love her."

"I don't think she will be able to go," said Dolly, coldly; "but I'll think of it."

"Do," replied Mr. Clifton, "and perhaps you would allow her sometimes to run over and see the baby and the garden. Children are sociable little creatures, you know. Is she fond of flowers?"

"I guess not," said Dolly. "I am sure I never could see any use in them, except to make artificial ones by, to trim bonnets."

Mr. Clifton smiled, in spite of himself, at this professional view of the subject. "Well, the baby then," he added; "it is just beginning to be interesting. I think she would like the baby."

"She don't seem to have much inclination to go about," answered Dolly, "and it is not best to put her up to it; home is the best place for children."

Ay, home, thought Mr. Clifton, as Rose's sweet sad eyes and pale face passed before him.

"Well, good morning, Miss Dolly; perhaps, after all, you will change your mind about the little girl."

"Good morning, Mr. Clifton," and Dolly bobbed a succession of little courtesys, and avoided answering his last remark. "Good morning, Mr. Clifton; thank you even for a short visit, but I don't complain. It is a poor place, after all, to invite a clergyman into."

"I think I see Rose going to Sabbath-school," said Dolly, as she folded up her finery, put it away, rolled up her sleeves and went back to the wash-tub; "I think I see her going off to Sunday-school and me doing up the work; visiting at the minister's house too; 'baby and flowers,' and all that: she'd be so set up in a fortnight that there would be no getting along with her: all sorts of notions put in her head, instead of thinking herself well off here as she is, with her head under shelter, ten to one she would imagine she was terribly abused. No – Rose don't make any acquaintances if I can help it, and as to Sunday-school, there's the Bible, she might as well study it in one place as another; there's something behind all this; I verily believe that child is going to bewitch folks, just as her mother did before her; the amount of it is, they took a fancy to her, Sunday, in meetin'; Rose is just like her mother exactly; she always looked just so innocent, as if she didn't know that she was – (Dolly couldn't say pretty even to herself, so she added – artful). No, that child shan't go any where, nor see any body, nor do any thing, but work for me;" and Dolly gave the towel she was wringing out, as vigorous a twist as if it had been Rose's neck.

The kind-hearted clergyman and his wife made many after attempts to show Rose some little kindness, but Dolly was always sure to out-general them, and fearing at last that the situation of the child might be made still more irksome by their persistence, they reluctantly confined themselves to sympathetic glances, and nods, when they met her; and this was much to poor Rose, for Dolly's voice grew each day harsher and colder, and Rose's future, hour by hour, looked more dark and rayless.

CHAPTER XIII

And now the minister and his gentle wife had their own sorrow to bear.

The baby was dead.

There are those to whom that phrase conveys but little meaning; there are others whose every heart-string thrills to it. "The baby" may not be pretty to any, save those who gave it being. Its first smile, its first word, its first tottering step, are trifles all to the busy world without; but ah, not in the little home circle: not to him who contending all day long with the jostling world of trade, sickened and disgusted with its trickeries and overreaching, selfishness, and duplicity, weary with the clamorous din of traffic, crosses at length his own peaceful threshhold, and sitting down by that little cradle, bends a brow seamed with care, over the little sleeper, with heaven's own smile upon its lip, heaven's own purity on its baby brow.

Not to her; to whom its faintest smile were reward enough for mortal pangs and throes; its faintest wail of pain loud enough to drown the united call of hunger, thirst, and weariness.

Not to those who, folding it to their united hearts, say —Our baby.

Is their love the less when disease lays its withering finger on the roses of its cheek and lip? Can they spare "the baby" even though other children cluster round the hearth? And when death's shadow falls, can they forget the night-watch nestling of that little velvet cheek? the imploring look of that fading, upturned eye? Can such chords be rudely snapped without a jarring discord? No, let them weep; Jesus wept.

Inexpressibly dreadful is the touch of careless fingers upon the loved dead; the careless robing and unrobing of limbs in life so dearly cherished, so delicately draped.

Inexpressibly beautiful are the services weeping love jealously renders to the departed; bearing on its own shoulders to its last resting-place the coffin and the pall, lowering it carefully, reverently, as if the pulseless heart within would be pained by a stranger touch.

It was Mary Clifton's own fingers which shrouded the baby; it was the father's own hands which placed it in the coffin, it was in their own arms by the light of the quiet stars, it was borne to its garden grave.

"Ridikilis!" exclaimed Dolly, "as if nobody was good enough to touch that child; minister's folks, too, having sich stuck-up notions; as if the child knew who carried it, as if the sexton didn't understand his business, as if the whole village oughtn't to have seen 'em bury it, if they wanted to. Polly Smith was up in a tree, and saw the whole of it. She said she was determined to. She said they cried like every thing; now that just shows how much they believe what they preach about 'heaven's being the best place;' if that is so, they'd naterally be glad the young one had gone there; pooh, it is all stuff – they don't believe it no more nor I do; any how, I shall make the most of this world, and then, if there's nothing better in t' other, I shall have at least gained something.

"It was perfectly ridikilis, there not being a funeral time; I should have sold yards and yards of black ribbon, for the parish to wear; but minister's folks never think of any body but themselves. I've found that out."

Mary Clifton sits at her nursery-window; the empty cradle is by her side, with its snowy pillow and coverlid, the baby's rattle lies on the mantle, and its little cloak and silken hood hang just in sight within the closet.

That window was her favorite seat; there she used to toss the baby up and down, to catch the woodbine branches that clambered over the open window; they still stirred with life – but oh, where was the little dimpled hand, so late outstretched in glee to reach them?

Just one short week ago that day (before "the baby" was taken sick), oh, how well she remembered it, how bright it looked that morning, with its snowy frock and blue ribbons, she stood just in that spot with it; a pane of glass had lately been broken, and the cement in the new one was yet fresh; the baby pressed its tiny little finger on it, and left its impress. No wonder Mary sits there passing her own finger slowly over the indentation, while the tears chase each other down her face; oh, to how many maternal hearts have such memories been at once a sorrow and a solace?

CHAPTER XIV

"Oh, Aunt Dolly!" said Rose, coming in with her face all a-glow, "will you please tell me is this my mother's thimble? I found it in the drawer, and may I have it?" she asked, pressing it to her lips.

"It don't take me long to answer questions," said Dolly; "it is your mother's, and you may not have it. You had no business to go ferreting round among my things."

"You told me to go to the drawer, and get the thread," answered Rose, "and it lay right there, and I could not help seeing it. Won't you please let me have it? I shall be so happy if you will."

Poor child! This was the worst argument she could have used.

"I will do any thing, Aunt Dolly, if you will," said she, poising the coveted treasure on her tiny finger. "I'll – I'll – "

"Won't you ever say another word to me again about going to school, as long as you live?"

Rose hesitated, and looked at the thimble. "I don't like to promise that, Aunt Dolly."

"Then I don't like to give you the thimble," answered Dolly, snatching it from Rose's finger, and stuffing it into her own pocket. "Now go back to your work, miss."

"I would have given it to her, had I been you," said the good-natured Daffy (adding the only argument which she knew would tell on Dolly); "I really believe the child would do twice the work with that thimble on her finger."

"I didn't think of that," replied Dolly, "perhaps she would – Rose?"

Rose came back with traces of tears upon her face.

"Will you be a very, very good girl, and do every thing I tell you, always?"

Rose could not answer for sobbing.

"Give it to her," whispered the tortured Daffy, "you'll see how it will work."

"Well, there's the thimble," said Dolly, throwing it at her.

"Oh, Aunt Dolly," said Rose, "I thank you. I'll try; indeed I'll try."

"Well, go along, and see that you keep your word. I haven't much faith in it, though."

"I declare," said Dolly, leaning back in her chair, "our Maria was the beater for one thing; every body who ever saw her used to carry on about her just like that child; even the cats and dogs liked a kick from her, better than a petting from any body else, and as to her husband, he thought the model was broke (as that image man said) after his wife was made. I don't suppose fire could burn out the love of that young one for her mother, for all she was so little when Maria died. I am sure I have done my best, but the fact was, Maria had a way with her."

Ah, selfish Dolly! Thy sister had a heart. It shone in her eyes, lingered in her smile, sweetened her voice. Love was the open sesame by which she unlocked all hearts, and without which thy grasping fingers shall try in vain.

"Aunt Dolly," said Rose, returning, "there is a boy in the shop who wants to know if you can make three mourning bonnets right away. Mrs. Sharp died this morning."

"Oh! that's very nice. To be sure I can. Go tell him I will begin them this minute. Those hats, Daffy, must not cost less than eight dollars a-piece. It don't do for people in affliction to chaffer about prices and make bargains beforehand, that's one comfort; they must be made of the most expensive English crape, Daffy."

"I thought the Sharps were not very well off," suggested Daffy.

"That's nothing. They ought to pay a proper respect to the dead, if they ain't; beside, they have rich relations. I shall be sure to get it out of some of 'em, never fear. Hand the black crape, Daffy. I wonder what ailed Mrs. Sharp? She was out to meetin' last Sunday. I hope her husband will call to settle the bill. Daffy, don't it make you laugh to see what a fuss widowers make trying to grieve for their wives? It is ridikilis! Mr. Sharp isn't a bad man to look at. How many children has he, Daffy?"

"Ten," said Daffy.

"Couldn't stand it," said Dolly. "Rose is enough of a pill for me. I shall certainly refuse him."

CHAPTER XV

"Good afternoon, Dolly," said one of her neighbors, coming into the back room, and tossing off her shawl, which served the double purpose of cloak and bonnet. "Who is that pretty girl you have there in the shop?"

"Who can she mean?" asked Dolly of Daffy, in affected surprise.

"Why," said Miss Tufts, anticipating Daffy, "that pretty creature with the curly hair and large eyes, who is rolling up your ribbons; she is a real beauty."

"She can't mean Rose?" asked Dolly of Daffy, looking innocent again.

(Simple Daffy, puzzled to know how Dolly wished her to answer, contented herself with a little doubtful shake of the head.)

"Call her pretty?" said Dolly, returning from a tour of observation into the shop, as if she had not the slightest idea who was there; "call Rose pretty. Well, I'm beat now."

"Why – don't you?" asked Miss Tufts. "I don't see how you can help it; her hair curls so beautiful, and she has such a way with her, it took right hold of me; her voice sounds as if a little bird was singing in her mouth."

"Ridikilis!" said Dolly; "how you talk. Has your pa got over his pleurisy? That's right. How do you like this ribbon? It is new style, you see; one side is green, and the other red."

The visitor's eyes being fixed on the ribbon which she had taken to the window to examine, Dolly took the opportunity to whisper to Daffy, "Go tell Rose to go out of the shop into the back part of the house."

"It is a first-rate ribbon," said Miss Tufts, refolding it; "but look, there's Mrs. Clifton going down street. She hasn't held her head up since her baby died. How she does take it to heart, Dolly."

"Yes," said Dolly, snipping off the end of her thread, "that's the way with those people who are always talking about 'another and a better world.' I don't see but they hold on to this one with just as tight a grip as other folks."

"It isn't nature not to feel bad, when a friend dies," remarked Miss Tufts.

"Well, there's no need of making such a blubbering about it," said Dolly. "I didn't, when our Maria died, I restrained my feelings; it is perfectly disgusting."

"Here Daffy," said Dolly, as Miss Tufts tossed her shawl over her head, and bade them good-by, "here's the trimmings Nancy Dawes brought for her bonnet; it is not much matter how you put them on, she has no taste you know; it will be all one to her, if you only tell her it is the fashion; that is the right kind of customer for me, your knowing people are a sight of bother, with their fussing. Daffy, mind you save me enough of Nancy Dawes's ribbon for a bow for my neck, three quarters will make a very decent one, but I had rather have a yard; and Daffy, when Lawyer Grant's wife comes in to ask how much ribbon it will take to trim her bonnet, mind that you tell her a yard extra. She has all her ribbons from the city, and they are just the thing for neck-ribbons. She never will know but it is all put on her bonnet, when the bows are cut up and twisted together; she never asks no questions, there's nothing mean about Lawyer Grant's wife; she don't mind milliners and mantua-makers taking their little perquisites."

"Sometimes I think it isn't right," said Daffy.

"You do? that's a good one, I'd like to see your year's profits on any other system. Why, Mrs. Bond gets all hers and her children's aprons out of the silk, and de-laine, and thibet-cloth that ladies bring her for dresses; it is all right enough. We must take it out some way, when ladies beat us down to the lowest possible price for work; talk to me about its not being right – 'self-preservation is the first law of natur,' as the Bible says."

Daffy did not dispute the questionable authority of the quotation, but rolling the responsibility of the anticipated sin she had assumed, off on Dolly's broad shoulders, proceeded to do her bidding.

CHAPTER XVI

Mrs. Clifton was going down street, as Miss Tufts had said; going to "the baby's" grave, for she could bear the deserted nursery and empty cradle no longer. It was something to be near the little form, though the spirit which shone through the sweet eyes had winged its way to Him who gave it; and so she passes the little wicket-gate, and winds her way among other graves, over which other mothers, like her, have wept. Some of them, carefully kept, others overrun with briars and nettles; seas perhaps, rolling between some babe and her under whose heart it once stirred with embryo life; or, far away, perhaps, the mother too, may be sleeping, waiting, as does her solitary babe, for that day when the dead who are in their graves, shall hear His voice, and come forth!

Mrs. Clifton nears her baby's grave. A little form is bending over it, a slender, delicate child, whose clustering curls, as she stoops, quite hide her sweet face. Somebody else loves "the baby," for the little grave is dotted over with flowers, simple enough, indeed, but love's own offering. The mother draws nearer, smiling through her tears the while – the child looks up; it is Rose.

"Bless you! bless you, my darling," Mrs. Clifton murmurs, and draws her to her bosom.

"Why did you strew flowers on my baby, dear?" asked Mrs. Clifton, wiping her eyes.

"Because I was so sorry for you," said Rose, timidly, "I thought perhaps it would make you happy, when you came here, to see them."

"Did any one ever die whom you loved?" asked Mary.

Rose's lip quivered, the tears gathered slowly in her eyes, and hung trembling on her lashes, as she nodded her little head.

"Who, my darling?" asked Mary, drawing the child nearer to her.

"My mother, my own dear mother!" said the weeping child, drawn to her kind questioner by the mutual sympathy of sorrow.

"Rose – Rose – Rose!" screamed the shrill voice of Dolly from over the wall.

"Oh, I must go! indeed I must; please don't tell, please don't say any thing," and Rose, hastily wiping away her tears, ran breathlessly toward the little wicket-gate.

"Now I'd just like to know, miss, where you have been without leave?" asked Dolly.

"Daffy told me you wanted me to go out of sight till after the company was gone," said Rose, "and I thought I would just step over into the church-yard, and put some daisies on the baby's grave."

"Ridikilis!" exclaimed Dolly; "just as if that baby knew what was top of it; it is perfectly disgusting – you are just like your mother exactly. Now go along into the house."

Rose entered the back parlor and sat down at the little window to her work.

"Rose," said Dolly, about half an hour after, "don't your hair trouble you when you are sewing?"

Rose looked up in astonishment at this demonstration of interest on the part of her tormentor.

"I don't know," she answered; "I never thought any thing about it."

("Now don't go to cutting it," whispered Daffy; "it looks so pretty.")

"I think it is spoiling her eyes," said Dolly; "bring me the scissors, Rose," and Dolly notched her locks in and out, in as jagged a manner as she knew how. As for the offending eyes which Miss Tufts had complimented, they were too useful to be extinguished, and as there was no helping the "bird in her mouth," or the "pretty way she had with her," Dolly resolved to keep Rose out of sight as much as possible, with her sewing in the attic, which she designated as Rose's bed-room; and, in pursuance of this determination, she was ordered up there.

Every body knows what a country attic is, with its hot, sloping, pitch-oozing roof, with its indescribable paraphernalia of dried mullen, elder-blow, thorough-wort, and tansy; with its refuse garden-tools, boxes, baskets, and chests of odds and ends; its spider-webs and its rat-holes.

A salamander could scarcely have endured Dolly's attic that hot August noon. Rose sat down on the rickety old bed, under the heated eaves, to ply her needle. There was an opening in the roof, but the breeze seemed to blow over it, not into it. Rose made little progress with her sewing, for her temples began to throb painfully, and her fingers almost refused their office. Now she rubs her forehead and eyes, for a mist seems to be gathering over them; now she pulls her needle slowly out again, and now dizziness overpowers her, and she falls forward upon the floor.

"Now just hear that noise," exclaimed Dolly; "hear that young one capering round that attic instead of doing her work. I'll soon settle that: " and taking her little riding-whip from behind the old-fashioned claw-footed clock in the corner, she mounted up stairs into the attic.

Phew! how hot it was – the perspiration started at every step, and this fact did not tend to the diminution of Dolly's rage.

"You needn't play asleep now, because it won't do," said she, laying the whip vigorously round the prostrate child. "I shall whip you till you get up and ask my pardon, d'ye hear?"

There is not much satisfaction in whipping a person who does not appear to feel it, and Dolly turned Rose over to see what was the cause of her obtuseness; the face was so ghastly white that even she was for a moment daunted.

But it is only for a moment. Going to the head of the stairs, she calls, "Daffy?"

"Look here, now," said Dolly, "see what comes of that young one's going into grave-yards, where all those horrid dead people lie moldering; take her up, Daffy, and carry her down into your bed-room; there's a whole day's work lost now for that nonsense; she won't be able to do another stitch to-day."

Days, weeks, and months passed on, no lightening of the heavy load; but now the active spirit which seemed always devising fresh means of torture for the child, was itself prostrated by sickness. A fever had settled upon Dolly's strong frame and iron nerves, and reduced her to almost childish helplessness. Ah – who glides so gently, so tirelessly up stairs and down, bearing burdens under which her feeble frame totters? Who runs to the doctor's, and the apothecary's, who spreads the napkin over the little light-stand, that no rattle of spoons, glasses, and phials, may disturb the chance naps or jar the nerves of the invalid? And who, when she has done her best to please, bears the querulous fretfulness of disease and ill temper, with lamb-like patience?

Who but Rose?

"Why are you crying?" asked Daffy, as Rose stood by the kitchen table upon which she had just set down some glasses. "What is the matter with you?"

"I am so sorry that I can not please Aunt Dolly; she says I have not done a single thing right for her since she was sick; and indeed, Daffy, I have tried very hard," and Rose sobbed again: "I thought perhaps – that – Aunt – Dolly – might love me a little when she got well."

"Never you mind, Rose," said the distressed Daffy, twitching at her thread, "never you mind, she's a – a – there's a six-pence for you Rose."

"No, I thank you," said Rose, returning it, "I don't want money – I want – I want – somebody to love me," said the poor tired child, hiding her face in her apron.

"Never you mind," said Daffy, again, rubbing her sleeve into her own eyes, "you shall – you shall —

"Lor', I don't know what to say to you – Dolly's a – a – well she's sick and childish," said Daffy, ending her sentence in a very different manner from what she had intended.

"Perhaps it is that," said the good little creature, brightening up, "I did not think of that. How cruel it was for me to think her unkind, when she was only sick; I am glad you said that, Daffy," and Rose wiped her eyes and went back into the sick chamber.

"It's awful to hold in when a body's so rampageous mad," said Daffy, jumping up and oversetting her basket of spools, cotton, needles, pins, etc. "I shouldn't wonder if I burst right out some day, to think of that poor, patient little creature being snubbed so, after being on her tired little legs these six weeks, traveling up and down, here and there, and lying on the floor side of Dolly's bed, night after night, and all after the way she has been treated too (for I have eyes if I don't say nothing), and as long as nobody hears me, I'll just out with it; Dolly has no more heart than that pine table," and Daffy gave it a vindictive thump.

"There – now I feel better – I wish I dared tell her so to her face – but it isn't in me; she makes me shrivel all up, when she puts on one of her horrid looks, and I can't be looking out for a new place with this rheumatism fastening on me every time the wind blows; I don't know what is to become of the poor child, bless her sweet face."