The Debtor Part 47

It followed in Charlotte's reasoning that it must be a man in Banbridge. There had been no talk of their leaving the place. Of course she knew that their stay in one locality was usually short, but here they were now, and it must be a man in Banbridge. She thought of a number of the crudely harmless young men of the village; there were one or two not so crude, but not so harmless, who held her thoughts a little longer, but she decided that she did not want any of them, even if they should want her. Then again the face of Randolph Anderson flashed out before her eyes as it had done before.

Charlotte, with her inborn convictions, laughed at herself, but the face remained.

"There isn't another man in this town to compare with him," she said to herself, "and he is a gentleman, too." Then she fell to remembering every word he had ever said to her, and all the expressions his face had ever taken on with regard to her, and she found that she could recall them all. Then she reflected how he had trusted them, and had never failed to fill their orders, when all the other tradesmen in Banbridge had refused, and that they must be owing him.

"I shouldn't wonder if we were owing him nearly twenty-five dollars,"

Charlotte said to herself, and for the first time a thrill of shame and remorse at the consideration of debt was over her. She had heard his story. "There he had to give up his law practice because he could not make a living, and go into the grocery business, and here we are taking his goods and not paying him," thought she. "It is too bad." A feeling of indignation at herself and her family, and of pity for Anderson came over her. She made up her mind that she would ask her father for money to pay that bill at least. "The butcher can wait, and so can all the others," she thought, "but Mr. Anderson ought to be paid." Besides the pity came a faint realization of the other side of the creditor's point of view. "Mr. Anderson must look down upon us for taking his property and not paying our bills," she thought. She knew that some of the wedding bills had been paid, and that led her to think that her father might have more money than usual, but she overheard some conversation which pa.s.sed between Carroll and his sister on the morning when he gave her the check.

"Now about that?" Anna had asked, evidently referring to some bill.

"I tell you I can't, Anna," Carroll replied. "I used the money as it came on those bills for the wedding. There is very little left." Then he had hurriedly scrawled the check, which she took in spite of her incredulousness of its worth. Therefore Charlotte, when the check had been offered her for a new hat, for Anna had carelessly pa.s.sed it over to her sister-in-law, had eagerly taken it to pay Anderson.

"I paid the grocery bill," Charlotte told her aunt when she returned.

Anna was in her own room, engaged in an unusual task. She was setting things to rights, and hanging her clothes regularly in her closet, and packing her bureau drawers. Charlotte looked at her in astonishment after she had made the statement concerning the grocery bill.

"What are you doing, Anna?" said she.

Anna looked up from a snarl of lace and ribbons and gloves in a bureau drawer. "I am putting things in order," said she.

Then Mrs. Carroll crossed the hall from her opposite room, and entered, trailing a soft, pink, China-silk dressing-gown. She sank into a chair with a swirl of lace ruffles and viewed her sister-in-law with a comical air of childish dismay. "Don't you feel well, Anna, dear?" asked she.

"Yes. Why?" replied Anna Carroll, folding a yard of blue ribbon.

"Nothing, only I have always heard that if a person does something she has never done before, something at variance with her character, it is a very bad sign, and I never knew you to put things in order before, Anna, dear."

"Order is not at variance with my character," said Anna. "It is one of my fundamental principles."

"You never carried it out," said Mrs. Carroll. "You know you never did, Anna. Your bureau drawers have always looked like a sort of chaos of civilization, just like mine. You know you never carried out the principle, Anna, dear."

"A principle ceases to be one when it is carried out," said Anna.

"Then you don't think you are going to die because you are folding that ribbon, honey?"

Anna took up some yellow ribbon. "There is much more need to worry about Charlotte," said she, in the slightly bitter, sarcastic tone which had grown upon her lately.

Mrs. Carroll looked at Charlotte, who had removed her hat and was pinning up her hair at a little gla.s.s in a Florentine frame which hung between the windows. The girl's face, reflected in the gla.s.s, flushed softly, and was seen like a blus.h.i.+ng picture in the fanciful frame, although she did not turn her head, and made no rejoinder to her aunt's remark.

"What has Charlotte been doing?" asked Mrs. Carroll.

"She has been doing the last thing which any Carroll in his or her senses is ever supposed to do," replied Anna, in the same tone, as she folded her yellow ribbon.

"What do you mean, Anna, dear?"

"She has been paying a bill before the credit was exhausted. That is sheer insanity in a Carroll. If there is anything in the old Scotch superst.i.tion, she is fey, if ever anybody was."

"What bill?" asked Mrs. Carroll.

"Mr. Anderson's," replied Charlotte, faintly, still without turning from the gla.s.s which reflected her charming pink face in its gilt, scrolled frame.

"Mr. Anderson's?"

"The grocer's bill," said Charlotte.

"Oh! I did not know what his name was," said Mrs. Carroll.

"He probably is well acquainted with ours, on his books," said Anna.

Mrs. Carroll looked in a puzzled way from her to Charlotte, who had turned with a little air of defiance. "Had he refused to let us have any more groceries?" said she.

"No," said Charlotte.

"I told you he had not," said Anna, shaking out a lace handkerchief, which diffused an odor of violet through the room.

"Then why did you pay him, honey?" asked Mrs. Carroll, wonderingly, of Charlotte.

"I paid him just because he had trusted us," said she, in a voice which rang out clearly with the brave honesty of youth.

Suddenly she looked from her mother to her aunt with accusing eyes.

"I don't believe it is right to go on forever buying things and never paying for them, just because a gentleman is kind enough to let you,"

said she.

"I thought you said it was the grocer, Charlotte, honey," said Mrs.

Carroll, helplessly.

"He is a gentleman, if he is a grocer," said Charlotte, and her cheek blazed.

Anna Carroll looked sharply at her from her drawer, then went on folding the handkerchief.

"He is a lawyer, and as well-educated as papa," Charlotte said, further, in her clear, brave voice, and she returned her aunt's look unflinchingly, although her cheeks continued to blush.

Mrs. Carroll still looked bewildered. "How much did you pay him, Charlotte, dear?" she asked.

"Twenty-five dollars."

"The whole of the check Arthur gave you?"

"Yes, Amy."

"But you might have bought yourself a hat, honey, and you did need one. I can't quite understand why you paid the grocer, when he had not refused to let us have more groceries, and you might have bought a hat."

Anna, packing the drawer, began to laugh, and Charlotte, after frowning a second, laughed also.

"My hat with the roses looks very nice yet, Amy, dear," said she, sweetly and consolingly.

"But it is getting so late for roses," Mrs. Carroll returned.

"The milliner in New York where Ina got her hats has been paid; maybe she will trust Charlotte for a hat. Don't worry, Amy," said Anna, coolly.