The Old Homestead Part 44

"To live with somebody, ma'am, I--I thought at first it was here!"

"Where did you come from?"

Mary blushed. Poor child! She had a vague idea that there was something to be ashamed of in coming from the Alms House. As she hesitated the woman repeated her question, but more briefly, only saying:

"Where?"

"From the Alms House!"

Aunt Hannah's eyes fell. A faint color crept through the wrinkles on her forehead, and for a few moments she ceased to interrogate the child. But she spoke at length in the same impa.s.sive voice as before:

"Have you a father?"

"No, ma'am."

"A mother?"

"She is dead."

"Who is Isabel?"

"A little girl that was with me in"--she was about to say in the Alms House; but more sensitive regarding Isabel than herself, she changed the term and said, "that was with me in the carriage."

"The carriage," repeated aunt Hannah, moving toward a window and lifting the paper blind, "did it take four horses to drag you and another little girl over the mountains?"

"Oh! no, ma'am, there was a lady."

"A lady! Who?"

"A lady who lives down the river in a great square house, with a sort of short steeple on the roof."

"What, Mrs. Farnham?" said the woman, dropping the blind as if it had been a roll of fire, while her face turned white to the lips, and a glow came into her eyes that made Mary's heart beat quick, for there was something startling in it, as the woman stood searching her face for the answer.

"Yes, that is the name, ma'am."

Aunt Hannah's lips grew colder and whiter, while the glow concentrated in her eyes like a ray of fire.

"Is she coming here to live?" broke in low, stern tones from those cold lips.

"Yes, I heard her say that she was," replied the little girl, gently, warmed by a touch of sympathy; for even this stern betrayal of feeling was less repulsive than the chill apathy of her previous manner.

"And this Isabel. Is the girl hers?"

"No, not hers, she is like me--no, not like me--only in having no father and mother--for Isabel is--oh, how beautiful."

"And what is she doing here?" questioned the woman, still in her stern, low tones.

"Mrs. Farnham has adopted her," answered the child, "and no wonder; anybody would like to have Isabel for a child."

"Why?"

"Because she is lovely."

"Why didn't she adopt you?" said the woman, without a change in her voice.

"Me, ma'am! Oh, how could she?"

The child, as she spoke, spread her little hands abroad, and looked downward as was her touching habit, when her person was brought in question.

The woman stood in the centre of the room, pale, and still gazing upon that singular little face, with a degree of intensity of which its former coldness seemed incapable. At last she strode up to the window, and putting her hand on Mary's forehead, bent back her head, while she perused her face.

"And who will adopt you?" she said, at length, as if communing with herself.

"I don't know," said the child, sadly. "When I came here I thought perhaps this house was the one that Mr. Sharp expected me to live in."

The woman continued her gaze during some seconds, then her hand dropped away from the throbbing little forehead, and she returned to her seat.

That moment the door opened, and Enoch Sharp looked through, with a smile that penetrated into the room like a sunbeam.

"Come, aunt Hannah," he said, "we can do nothing without you."

CHAPTER XXIX.

AUNT HANNAH AND UNCLE NATHAN.

The apple trees were all growing old, And old was the house that sheltered him; But that brave, warm heart, was a heart of gold!

Though his head was grey, and his eyes were dim.

Aunt Hannah arose, and walked with a precise and firm step from the room. Enoch Sharp led the way into a low back porch that overlooked that portion of the garden devoted to vegetables. In one end of this porch stood a huge cheese-press; and on the dresser opposite, a wooden churn was turned bottom up, with the dasher leaning against it.

Several milking-pails of wood, scoured to a spotless whiteness, were ranged on each side, while nicely kept strainers hung over them. There was a faint, pure smell of the dairy near, as if the porch opened to a b.u.t.ter and cheese-room; but the exquisite cleanliness of everything around made this rather agreeable than otherwise.

The princ.i.p.al object in the porch, however, was an old man seated in a huge armed-chair of unpainted oak, with a splint bottom worn smooth by constant use. The chair stood near the back entrance, and the old man seemed quite too large and unwieldy for any attempt at exercise; but his broad, rosy face was turned toward the door, as he heard Enoch Sharp and his sister coming through the kitchen; and one of the frankest smiles you ever beheld, beamed from his soft brown eyes over the benevolent expanse of his face.

"Well, Nathan, what do you want of me?" inquired the austere lady in her usual cold tones.

The good man seemed taken aback by this short address. He looked at the Judge as if for help, saying,

"Hasn't he told you, Hannah?"

"Yes, he wants us to keep this little thing in yonder, and let others pay us for it. I don't sell kindness--do you, Nathan?"

"No, no, certainly not; but then, Hannah, you must reflect; the Judge's own house is not exactly suited for a person like this little girl; and if we don't take her who will?"

The woman stood musing, her cold face unchanged, her eyes cast thoughtfully downward.