Rose Clark Part 19

This won't do. What will the doctor say? You must go back to bed, Betty," and Dolly fixed her basilisk eyes on her cowering victim, who nestled more closely to Rose.

"Poor crazed thing," said Mrs. Howe, "she imagines every body is going to hurt her; by and by she will think so of you. She may kill Charley. I ought to send her to the Lunatic Asylum; but she is an old servant who used to live in Mr. Howe's family, and so I keep her, though she is so troublesome. Come, Betty!"

"Maria!" whispered the old lady, hoa.r.s.ely, clutching at Rose's dress--"Maria, tell her _you_ love me, Maria."

"I do--I do!" sobbed Rose, unable to restrain herself, as she threw her arms around her.

"Love that lunatic? What should you love her for, I'd like to know?"

asked the startled Dolly.

"Because she is my grandmother--my own dear grandmother. Oh Aunt Dolly!

hate me, if you will, but love her; she will not live long to trouble any body," and Rose kissed the furrowed temples and stroked back the thin gray locks.

"Well, if I ever!" said Dolly, looking innocent; "I believe the whole world is going mad! Come along, Betty."

"Maria! Maria!" whispered the old lady, again nestling up to Rose.

"There, you see, she is quite out; she fancies you are somebody she has seen before."

"No--she takes me for Maria, my mother," said Rose; "you say that I look like her exactly."

"Come along, Betty!" said the infuriated Mrs. Howe. "Mother and grandmother! you are both as mad as March hares," and seizing "Betty" by the arm, she drew her across the entry into her own den, and turning the key on her, put it in her pocket, and went down into the dining-room.

We have no desire to record her reflections as she sat down to "Moses in the Bulrushes," upon which she had already expended pounds and pounds of German worsted, and who, if ever found by his mother "Miriam," would scarcely have been recognized.

John was in his arm-chair reading the _Daily Bulletin_. He was perfectly aware of the late overthrow of his domestic authority by Dolly; not that it was by any means the first instance of the kind, but the others had been known to no third party. He trusted for the perpetuity of the declaration of domestic independence which he had lately set up, to its being made publicly before the servants. Mistaken man! Dolly's pride lay in a different direction. Well, it was all over now; he only wondered in his cool moments how he had ever been so mad as to attempt to make Rose more comfortable; but let no man ever say what he will or will not do till he has seen a pretty woman in tears.

Still, John had a rod in pickle for Dolly; his publicly-wounded pride must have some satisfaction. He saw by the gleam of her eye, as she sat down to Moses, that she was that morning particularly deficient in his "meekness." It was a good chance. John cleared his throat, preparatory to improving it.

"Oh, I forgot to tell you, Mrs. Howe," said he, laying down his newspaper, as if a sudden thought had struck him, "Finels asked me the other day who Rose was?"

"Finels! Finels!" screamed Mrs. Howe, sticking her needle vigorously into Moses, "how came Finels to see Rose?"

John's eyes gleamed. "When I waited upon him to the door the other day, Rose was just pa.s.sing through the entry, with a pitcher of water."

"Just like her, and I told her expressly to go down the back stairs."

"But the carpenter was fixing the back stairs, that day," said John, "she couldn't pa.s.s, I suppose."

"I don't suppose any such thing," said Mrs. Howe, "she did it on purpose; I know she did. Well, what did Finels say of her?"

"He said she had the loveliest eyes he ever saw, and that her face was without a flaw."

"What o'clock is it?" asked Mrs. Howe, in a husky voice.

"Just one," said John, "Why?"

"What time does the stage go to Exeter?"

"Three, I believe."

"Believe! don't you know?"

"Yes, I know it goes at three."

"Well, go and order it here at our door by that time. Rose shall go back to old Bond this very day; I won't stand it."

"Is the baby well enough?" asked John, not looking for this painful termination to his little bit of connubial fun.

"I don't care whether it is or not; if you don't get that stage, I will."

"I'll get it," said John, "but--"

"There's no but about it, I tell you she shall go, if that child dies on the road; that's all there is to that," and Mrs. Howe went up stairs to inform Rose of her determination.

Rose had just succeeded in lulling the restless baby to sleep upon her bosom. Upon Mrs. Howe's violent bang of the door after entering the room, he uttered a loud, frightened cry.

"Stop that child, will you?" said Mrs. Howe, "I have something to say to you."

The quick blood rushed to Rose's face, as she nestled Charley to her bosom.

"It is now one o'clock," said Mrs. Howe, drawing out her gold watch, with its glittering chain and trinkets; "the stage will be at the door to take you to Exeter, at three o'clock precisely. Do you understand?"

said she, as Rose bent an anxious glance at the sick baby's face.

"I will be ready," said Rose, in a trembling voice.

This mild, acquiescent reply was not what Mrs. Howe desired; she would have preferred something upon which to hinge her pent-up wrath.

"How came that rocking-chair up here, I should like to know?"

"Betty brought it up for old Mrs. Bond."

"Likely story; and Betty told you, I suppose, to parade yourself through the front entry, when Mr. Howe was talking with a gentleman; I know your tricks. I should think you had had enough of _gentlemen_ to last you one while."

"The carpenter was--"

"Don't talk to me about 'carpenters;' where there is a will there is a way; you might have waited for the water."

"It was to mix Charley's medicine," said Rose, with br.i.m.m.i.n.g eyes.

"I dare say--such things don't go down with me; pick up your things quick and get ready."

Rose attempted to lay Charley down on the bed, but he began to cry most piteously.

"There is no need of your stopping for him now; he might as well cry for one thing as another; he is always crying, I am sick to death of hearing him; he is perfectly spoiled."

"He is sick," said Rose, stooping to kiss Charley as if he could be pained by Mrs. Howe's heartlessness.