Mary Cary Part 6

But Miss Katherine is queer, too. If she wasn't, she wouldn't stay at this Orphan Asylum, just to help us children, and doing it as cheerfully as if she were happier here than she would be anywhere else. If her staying isn't queerness, beautiful queerness, what is it?

I don't understand it, and I don't believe I ever will understand how any one who can get ice-cream will take prunes.

But Miss Katherine has got a way of seeing the funny side of things, and sometimes I can't tell whether she minds prunes and pruny things or not.

I'm sure she does, but she says, when you can't change a thing, don't let it change you, and that an inward disposition is hard on other people.

I don't know what that means, but I think it's the same as saying there's no use in always chewing the rag. Martha is right much inclined to be a chewer.

Miss Webb is, too. She is Miss Katherine's best friend, and I just love to hear her talk.

She always comes once a week, often twice, to spend the evening at the Asylum with Miss Katherine, and sometimes when they think I'm asleep, I'm not. I'd be a nuisance if I kept popping up and saying, "I'm not asleep, speak low." So when I can't, really can't, sleep, though I do try, I hear them talking, and the things Miss Webb says are a great relief to my feelings.

She doesn't come to supper, orphan-asylum suppers being refreshments to stay from, not come to, but nearly always they make something on a chafing-dish. Something that's good, painful good.

Miss Webb says Miss Katherine's stomach has some rights, which is true; and when they begin to cook, I just sleep away, breathing regular and easy, so they won't know I am awake, for fear they might think I am not asleep on purpose.

But I have to hold on to the bed and stuff my ears and nose so as not to hear and smell, for I am that hungry I could eat horse if it had Worcesters.h.i.+re sauce on it. And that is what they put in their things, which shows that in eating, even, Miss Katherine preaches sense and practises taste.

Miss Webb just laughs at theories, and brings all sorts of good things with her. She says doctors have wronged more stomachs than they've ever righted by all this dieting business, and, while there's sense in some of it, there's more nonsense; and as for her, she don't believe in it.

I don't know anything about it; but I don't, either.

They always save me some of whatever they make, which I get the next day. But if I could rise out of bed and eat as much as I want out of that chafing-dish, there would be a funeral Miss Bray would like to attend. The corpse would be Mary Cary, died Martha.

There is a screen at the foot of my bed, put there so the light won't bother me and so I won't be seen. And, thinking I am asleep, Miss Katherine and Miss Webb talk on as if I were dead; and it's very interesting the things they talk about.

Of course, Miss Webb came over last night, and, after talking about two hours, she said: "Oh, I forgot to tell you. Lizzie Lane is going to marry Bob Rogers, and right away. I don't suppose you've heard."

"Yes, I have; Lizzie wrote me." And Miss Katherine took the hair-pins out of her hair and let it fall down her back. "What made her change her mind? What is she marrying him for?"

"How do I know?" And Miss Webb tasted the chocolate to see if it was sweet enough.

"How does anybody know what a man is married for? In most cases you can't risk a guess. Lizzie is a woman, therefore 'hath reason or unreason for her act.'"

"How did it happen? What made her change her mind?" and Miss Katherine threw her hair-pins on the bureau and stooped down to get her slippers.

"How does Lizzie explain it?"

"She says she was so sleepy she doesn't remember whether she said yes or no. But Bob remembers, and the wedding is to be week after next. He's courted her three times a year for seven years; but since he's been living North he hasn't even written to her, and she didn't know he was in town until he came up that night to see her.

"He stayed until after one o'clock, and didn't mention marriage. But as he got up to go he told her his house was going to send him on a six months' trip to j.a.pan. If she would marry him and go, say so. If not, say that, too, but for the last time. Lizzie said she'd go."

Miss Katherine fastened her kimono, put her feet up on the chair in front of her, and clasped her hands behind her head.

"I don't wonder at the unhappy marriages," she said. "The queer part is there aren't more of them. Why did Bob wait eight years to talk to Lizzie like this? Why is it a man has so little understanding of a woman?"

"Why? Because he's a Man. The Lord made him, and there must be some reason for him; but even the Lord must sometimes get worn out at his dumbness. However--"

She stopped, for the chocolate was boiling over; then she began to sing:

"Before marriage, men love most.

After marriage, women best.

Marriage many changes makes-- Heart is happy or heart breaks."

And she sang it so many times that I went to sleep and dreamed the dream I love most.

I see hundreds and hundreds of little creatures (they are the Mary part of little children), and they are afraid and s.h.i.+vering and standing about, not knowing where to go or what to do. And then Miss Katherine is in the midst of them, smiling and beckoning, and they follow and follow, and wings come out. Just tiny ones at first, and then larger and larger, and presently they fly all around her, and she points the way, smiling and cheering.

And then they rise higher and higher, and off they go, and she is alone.

Tired out but glad, because she taught them how to use their wings.

VII

"STERILIZED AND FERTILIZED"

This is Sunday, and we have done all the usual Sunday things. There won't be another for seven days. For that we give thanks in our hearts, but not out loud.

This was Presbyterian Sunday. Miss Bray is a Presbyterian.

It is a solemn thing to be a Presbyterian, and easy for the mind, too.

Everything is fixed, and there is no unfixing. You are saved or you are not saved, and you will never know which it is until after you are dead and find out. Miss Bray believes she is saved, and she takes liberties.

She also thinks everything is as G.o.d ordered it, and she believes G.o.d ordered poor Mrs. Craddock to die--that is, took her away. I don't. I think it was that last baby.

She had had twelve, and the thirteenth just wore her out at the thought.

There being n.o.body to do anything for her, she got up and cooked breakfast in her stocking feet when the baby was only a week old, and that night she had the influenza, and the next pneumonia. On the sixth day she was dead, and so was the baby. They forgot to feed it.

I don't believe G.o.d ever took any mothers away intentional. He never would have made them so necessary if He had meant to take them away when they were most needed. When they go I believe He is sorry.

I don't know how to explain it. n.o.body does, though a lot try. But I know He sees it bigger than we do, and maybe He is working at something that isn't finished yet.

Minnie Peters is real sick. Miss Katherine has put her in the hospital-room, and is staying in there with her.

I am all alone by myself to-night. I don't like aloneness at night. It makes you pay too much attention to your feelings, which Miss Katherine says is the cause of more trouble in this world than all other diseases put together.

She says, too, that what we feel about a thing is very often different from the way other people feel about it. And when you don't agree with people, the only thing you can be sure about is that they don't agree with you. I believe that's true. Not being by nature much of an agree-er, and having feelings I hope others don't, I would be a walking argument if Miss Katherine hadn't stopped me and explained some things I didn't realize before.

Last night, being by myself, and not being able to go to sleep, I wrote a piece of poetry.

Miss Katherine says it's hard to forgive people who think they write poetry, so I won't show her this. But it does relieve you to write down a lot of woozy nothing that is somehow like you feel. This is the poem--I mean the verses:

1

Out upon life's ocean vast, With the current drifting fast, I am sailing. Oh, alas, 'Tis a lonely feeling!

2