Opportunities Part 44

"She'll be very good if she does," said Norton. "But I'll tell her you said so. Do you think she would come?"

"I'm certain of it."

CHAPTER XI.

Norton made his way to the brown door of the parsonage, and knocked; but the person that opened it was the minister himself. Norton was a little confused now, remembering what his errand meant there.

"Norton Laval, isn't it?" said Mr. Richmond. "You are very welcome, Norton, at my house. Will you come in?"

"No, sir. If you please----"

"What is it? Something you would rather say to me here?"

"No, sir. I was coming----"

"To see me, I hope?"

"No, sir," said Norton, growing desperate and colouring, which he was very unapt to do. "If you please, Mr. Richmond, I was sent to speak to--I forget what her name is--the woman who lives here."

"Miss Redwood?"

"Yes, sir."

"Who sent you?"

"Matilda Englefield."

"Did she? Pray why did not Matilda come with you?"

"She could not, sir; she was very busy. She asked me to come."

"You can see Miss Redwood," said Mr. Richmond, smiling. "I believe she is always ready to receive visitors; at least I never saw a time when she was not. You have only to walk right in and knock at her door there. When are you coming to see _me_, Norton? You and I ought to be better friends."

"I don't know, sir," said Norton. "I would not intrude."

"Ask your friend Matilda if I do not like such intrusions. I shall have to invite you specially, I see. Well, go in and find Miss Redwood. I will not detain you now."

Norton went in, glad to be released, for he did not exactly want to tell his errand to the minister, knocked at the kitchen door and was bade to enter. It was full, the kitchen was, of the sweet smell of baking bread; and Miss Redwood was busily peering into her stove oven.

"Who's there?" she asked, too much engaged in turning her loaves to give her eyes to anything else, even a visitor. Norton told his name, and waited till the oven doors shut to with a clang; and then Miss Redwood, very pink in the face, rose up to look at him.

"I've seen you before," was her remark.

"Yes. I brought Matilda Englefield here one day," Norton answered.

"H'm. I thought she brought you. What brings you now?"

"Matilda wanted me to come with a message to you."

"Well, you can sit down and tell it, if you're a mind to. Why didn't the child come herself? that's the first idee that comes to me."

"She is busy trying to nurse some sick folks, and they are more than she can manage, and she wants your help. At least, she sent me to ask you if you wouldn't come."

"Who's ill?"

"Some people just come from Switzerland to be my mother's servants."

"Switzerland," repeated Miss Redwood. "I have heard o' Switzerland, more than once in my life. I should like to know whereabouts it is. I never knew any one yet that could tell me."

"Mr. Richmond knows, I suppose," said Norton.

"I suppose he knows Greek," said Miss Redwood, "and ever so many other queer tongues too, I've no doubt; but I should like to see myself askin' him to learn me. No, I mean, as I never knew n.o.body that I'd ask. La! there's folks enough that knows. Only I never had no chances for them things."

"I could shew you where Switzerland is, if you had a map," said Norton.

"I guess I know as much as that myself," said the housekeeper quietly, opening the stove door again for a peep at the oven. "But what does _that_ tell me? I see a little spot o' paper painted green, and a big spot along side of it painted some other colour; and the map is all spots; and somebody tells me that little green spot is Switzerland. And I should like to know, how much wiser am I for that? That's paper and green paint; but what I want to know is, where is the _place_."

"It's hard to tell," said Norton, so much amused that he forgot his commission.

"Well, these folks come from Switzerland, you say. How did they come?"

"They came in a s.h.i.+p--part of the way."

"How fur in a s.h.i.+p?"

"Three thousand miles."

"Three thousand," repeated Miss Red wood. "When you get up there, I don't know what miles mean, no more than if you spoke another language.

I understand a hundred miles. It's nigh that to New York."

"They came that hundred miles, over and above," said Norton.

"Well, how long now, does it take a s.h.i.+p to go that fur? Three thousand miles."

"It depends on how fast the wind blows."

"The wind goes awful fast sometimes," said Miss Redwood. "When it goes at that rate as will carry a chimney off a house, and pick up a tree by the roots as I would a baby under my arm, seems to me a s.h.i.+p would travel at a powerful speed."

"It would certainly, if there was nothing to hinder," said Norton; "but at those times, you see, the wind picks up the water, and sends such huge waves rolling about that it is not very safe to be where they can give you a slap. s.h.i.+ps don't get along best at such times."

"Well, I'm thankful I'm not a sailor," said Miss Redwood. "I'd rather stay home and know less. How many o' these folks o' yourn is ill?"

"All of them, pretty much," said Norton. "Two men and two women."