Hills of the Shatemuc Part 86

"Yes it would -- it would be better for me. -- I can't hardly be good at all, Governor, except where you are. I get cross now- a-days -- it seems I can't help it -- and I didn't use to do so --"

How gently the hand that was not round her was laid upon her cheek, as if at once forbidding and soothing her sorrow. For it was true, -- Winnie's disease had wrought to make her irritable and fretful, very different from her former self.

And it was true that Winthrop's presence governed it, as no other thing could.

"Would you rather go with me, Winnie?"

"Oh yes, Governor! --oh yes!"

"Then you shall."

He went himself first to make arrangements, which he well knew were very necessary. That one little attic room of his and that closet which was at once Mother Hubbard's cupboard and his clothes press, could never do anything for the comfort of his little sister. He went home and electrified Mrs. Nettley with the intelligence that he must leave her and seek larger quarters, which he knew her house could not give.

"To be sure," said Mrs. Nettley in a brown study, -- "the kitchen's the kitchen, -- and there must be a parlour, -- and George's painting room, -- and the other's my bedroom, -- and George sleeps in that other little back attic. -- Well, Mr.

Landholm, let's think about it. We'll see what _can_ be done. We can't let you go away -- George would rather sleep on the roof."

"He would do what is possible, Mrs. Nettley; and so would I."

It was found to be possible that "the other little back attic"

should be given up. Winthrop never knew how, and was not allowed to know. But it was so given that he could not help taking. It was plain that they would have been worse straitened than in their accommodations, if he had refused their kindness and gone somewhere else.

Mrs. Nettley would gladly have done what she could towards furnis.h.i.+ng the same little back attic for Winnie's use; but on this point Winthrop was firm. He gathered himself the few little plain things the room wanted, from the cheapest sources whence they could be obtained; even that was a serious drain upon his purse. He laid in a further supply of fuel, for Winnie's health, he knew, would not stand the old order of things, -- a fire at meal-times and an old cloak at other times when it was not very cold. Happily it was late in the season and much more fire would not be needed; a small stock of wood he bought, and carried up and bestowed in the closet; he could put his clothes in Winnie's room now and the closet need no longer act as a wardrobe. A few very simple stores to add to Mother Hubbard's shelves, and Winthrop had stretched his limited resources pretty well, and had not much more left than would take him to Wut-a-qut-o, and bring him back again.

"I don't see but I shall have to sell the farm," said Mr.

Landholm on this next visit of his son's.

"Why, sir?"

"To pay off the mortgage -- that mortgage to Mr. Haye."

Winthrop was silent.

"I can't meet the interest on it; --I haven't been able to pay any these five years," said Mr. Landholm with a sigh. "If he don't foreclose, I must. -- I guess I'll take Asahel and go to the West."

"Don't do it hastily, father."

"No," said Mr. Landholm with another sigh; -- "but it'll come to that."

Winthrop had no power to help it. And the money had been borrowed for him and Rufus. Most for Rufus. But it had been for them; and with this added thought of sorrowful care, he reached Mannahatta with his little sister.

It was early of a cold spring day, the ground white with a flurry of snow, the air raw, when he brought Winnie from the steamboat and led her, half frightened, half glad, through the streets to her new home. Winnie's tongue was very still, her eyes very busy. Her brother left the eyes to make their own notes and comments, at least he made none, till they had reached the corner of Little South St. He made none then; the door was opened softly, and he brought her up the stairs and into his room without disturbing or falling in with anybody.

Putting her on a calico-covered settee, Winthrop pulled off his coat and set about making a fire.

Winnie had cried all the day before and as much of the night as her poor eyelids could keep awake; and now in a kind of lull, sat watching him.

"Governor, you'll catch cold --"

"Not if I can make the fire catch," said he quietly.

"But you wanted me to keep on _my_ things."

"Did you want to take them off?"

Winnie sat silent again, shrugging her shoulders to the chill air. But presently the fire caught, and the premonitory snapping and crackling of the kindling wood gave notice of a sudden change of temperature. Winnie's feelings took the cheery influence of the promise and she began to talk in a more hearty strain.

"Is this your room, Winthrop?"

"This is my room, Winnie. Yours is there, next to it."

"Through that door?"

"No -- through the entry; -- that is the door of my storehouse."

Winnie got up to look at it.

"'Tisn't a very large storehouse," was her conclusion.

"And not much in it. But the large storehouses are not far off, Winnie. Shall I leave you here for five minutes, while I go to get something from one of them?"

"Do you mean out of doors? -- from the shops?"

"Yes. Shall I leave you five minutes?"

"O yes!"

He had come before her and was holding both her hands. Before he let them go he stooped down and kissed her.

It was not a very common thing for Winthrop to kiss her; and Winnie sat quieted under the power and the pleasure of it till the five minutes were run out and he had got back again. His going and coming was without seeing any one of the house; a fact owing to Mrs. Nettley's being away to market and Mr.

Inchbald out on another errand.

Winthrop came in with his hands full of brown papers. Winnie watched him silently again while he put his stores in the closet and brought out plates and knives and forks.

"Where do you sleep, Governor?"

"In a pleasanter place than I slept in last night," said her brother.

"Yes, but where? I don't see any bed."

"You don't see it by day. It only shews itself at night."

"But where is it, Governor?"

"You're sitting on it, Winnie."

"This! --"

"What is the matter with it?"

"Why, --" said Winnie, looking dismayfully at the couch with which Winthrop had filled the place of his bed, transferred to her room, -- "it's too narrow!"