Stepping Heavenward Part 13

OCT. 10.

WE have very sad news from Aunty. She says my Uncle is quite broken down with some obscure disease that has been creeping stealthily along for months. All his physicians agree that he must give up his business and try the effect of a year's rest. Dr. Elliott proposes his going to Europe, which seems to me about as formidable as going to the next world. Aunty makes the best she can of it, but she says the thought of being separated from Uncle a whole year is dreadful I pray for her day and night, that this wild project may be given up.

Why, he would be on the ocean ever so many weeks, exposed to all the discomforts of narrow quarters and poor food, and that just as winter is drawing nigh!

OCT. 12.~Aunty writes that the voyage to Europe has been decided on, and that Dr. Elliott is to accompany Uncle, travel with him, amuse him, and bring him home a well man. I hope Dr. E.'s power to amuse may exist somewhere, but must own it was in a most latent form when I had the pleasure of knowing him. Poor Aunty! How much better it would be for her to go with Uncle! There are the children, to be sure.

Well, I hope Uncle may be the better for this great undertaking, but I don't like the idea of it.

OCT. 15.-Another letter from Aunty, and new plans! The Dr. is to stay at home, Aunty is to go with Uncle, and we-mother and myself-are to take possession of the house and children during their absence! In other words, all this is to be if we say amen. Could anything be more frightful? To refuse would be selfish and cruel. If we consent I thrust myself under Dr. Elliott's very nose.

OCT. 16.-Mother is surprised that I can hesitate one instant. She seems to have forgotten all about Dr. E. She says we can easily find a family to take this house for a year, and that she is delighted to do anything for Aunty that can be done.

Nov. 4.-Here we are, the whole thing settled. Uncle and Aunty started a week ago, and we are monarchs of all we survey, and this is a great deal. I am determined that mother shall not be worn out with these children, although of course I could not them without her advice and help. It is to be hoped they won't all have the measles in a body, or anything of that sort; I am sure it would be annoying to Dr. E. to come here now.

Nov. 25.-Of course the baby must go on teething if only to have the doctor sent for to lance his gums. I told mother I was sure I could not be present when this was being done, so, though she looked surprised, and said people should accustom themselves to such things, she volunteered to hold baby herself.

Nov. 26.-The baby was afraid of mother, not being used to her, so she sent for me. As I entered the room she gave him to me with an apology for doing so, since I shrank from witnessing the operation. What must Dr. E. think I am made of if I can't bear to see a child's gums lanced? However, it is my own fault that he thinks me such a coward, for I made mother think me one. It was very embarra.s.sing to hold baby and have the doctor's face so close to mine. I really wonder mother should not see how awkwardly I am situated here.

Nov. 27.-We have a good many visitors, friends of Uncle and Aunty.

How uninteresting most people are! They all say the same thing, namely, how strange that Aunty had courage to undertake such a voyage, and to leave her children, etc., etc., etc., and what was Dr.

Elliott thinking of to let them go, etc, etc., etc.

Dr. Embury called to-day, with a pretty little fresh creature, his new wife, who hangs on his arm like a work-bag. He is Dr. Elliott's intimate friend, and spoke of him very warmly, and so did his wife, who says she has known him always, as they were born and brought up in the same village. I wonder he did not marry her himself, instead of leaving her for Dr. Embury!

She says he, Dr. Elliott, I mean, was the most devoted son she ever saw, and that he deserves his present success because he has made such sacrifices for his parents. I never met any one whom I liked so well on so short acquaintance-I mean Mrs. Embury, though you might fancy, you poor deluded journal you, that I meant somebody else.

Nov. 30.-I have so much to do that I have little time for writing.

The way the children wear out their shoes and stockings, the speed with which their hair grows, the way they b.u.mp their heads and pinch their fingers, and the insatiable demand for stories, is something next to miraculous. Not a day pa.s.ses that somebody doesn't need something bought; that somebody else doesn't choke itself, and that I don't have to tell stories till I feel my intellect reduced to the size of a pea. If ever I was alive and wide awake, however, it is just now, and in spite of some vague shadows of, I don't know what, I am very happy indeed. So is dear mother. She and the doctor have become bosom friends He keeps her making beef-tea, sc.r.a.ping lint, and boiling calves feet for jelly, till the house smells like an hospital.

I suppose he thinks me a poor, selfish, frivolous girl, whom nothing would tempt to raise a finger for his invalids. But, of course, I do not care what he thinks.

Dec. 4.-Dr. Elliott came this morning to ask mother to go with him to see a child who had met with a horrible accident. She turned pale, and pressed her lips together, but went at once to get ready. Then my long-suppressed wrath burst out.

"How can you ask poor mother to go and see such sights?" I cried.

"You must think her nothing but a stone, if you suppose that after the way in which my father died-"

"It was indeed most thoughtless in me," he interrupted; "but your mother is such a rare woman, so decided and self-controlled, yet so gentle, so full of tender sympathy, that I hardly know where to look for just the help I need to-day. If you could see this poor child, even you would justify me."

"Even you!" you monster of selfishness, heart of stone, floating bubble, "even you would justify it!"

How cruel, how unjust, how unforgiving he is!

I rushed out of the room, and cried until I was tired.

DEC. 6.-Mother says she feels really grateful to Dr. E. for taking her to see that child, and to help soothe and comfort it while he went through with a severe, painful operation which she would not describe, because she fancied I looked pale. I said I should think the child's mother the most proper person to soothe it on such an occasion.

"The poor thing has no mother," she said, reproachfully. "What has got into you, Kate? You do not seem at all like yourself."

"I should think you had enough to do with this great house to keep in order, so many mouths to fill, and so many servants to oversee, without wearing yourself out with nursing all Dr. Elliott's poor folks," I said, gloomily.

"The more I have to do the happier I am," she replied. "Dear Katy, the old wound isn't healed yet, and I like to be with those who have wounds and bruises of their own. And Dr. Elliott seems to have divined this by instinct."

I ran and kissed her dear, pale face, which grows more beautiful every day. No wonder she misses father so! He loved and honored her beyond description, and never forgot one of those little courtesies which must have a great deal to do with a wife's happiness. People said of him that he was a gentleman of the old school, and that race is dying out.

I feel a good deal out of sorts myself. Oh, I do so wish to get above myself and all my childish, petty ways, and to live in a region where there is no temptation and no sin!

DEC. 22.-I have been to see Mrs. Embury to-day. She did not receive me as cordially as usual, and I very soon resolved to come away. She detained me, however.

"Would you mind my speaking to you on a certain subject?" she asked, with some embarra.s.sment.

I felt myself flush up.

"I do not want to meddle with affairs that don't concern me," she went on, "but Dr. Elliott and I have been intimate friends all our lives. And his disappointment has really distressed me."

One of my moods came on, and I couldn't speak a word.

"You are not at all the sort of a girl I supposed he would fancy,"

she continued. "He always has said he was waiting to find some one just like his mother, and she is one of the gentlest, meekest, sweetest, and fairest among women."

"You ought to rejoice then that he has escaped the snare," I said, in a husky voice, "and is free to marry his ideal, when he finds her."

"But that is just what troubles me. He is not free. He does not attach himself readily, and I am afraid that it will be a long, long time before he gets over this unlucky pa.s.sion for you."

"Pa.s.sion!" I cried, contemptuously.

She looked at me with some surprise, and then went on.

"Most girls would jump at the chance of getting such a husband."

"I don't know that I particularly care to be cla.s.sed with 'most girls,'" I replied, loftily.

"But if you only knew him as well as I do. He is so n.o.ble, so disinterested, and is so beloved by his patients. I could tell you scores of anecdotes about him that would show just what he is."

"Thank you," I said, "I think we have discussed Dr. Elliott quite enough already. I cannot say that he has elevated himself in my opinion by making you take up the cudgels in his defence."

"You do him injustice, when you say that," she cried. "His sister, the only person to whom he confided the state of things, begged me to find out, if I could, whether you had any other attachment, and if her brother's case was quite hopeless. But I am sorry I undertook the task as it has annoyed you so much."

I came away a good deal ruffled. When I got home mother said she was glad I had been out at last for a little recreation, and that she wished I did not confine myself so to the children. I said that I did not confine myself more than Aunty did.

"But that is different," mother objected. "She is their own mother, and love helps her to bear her burden."

"So it does me," I returned. "I love the children exactly as if they were my own."

That," she said, "is impossible."

"I certainly do," I persisted.

Mother would not dispute with me, though I wished she would.