The Atlantic Monthly, Volume 18, No. 109, November, 1866

Mrs. Johnson also offered to do for me what I forgot to ask of her,—to look in at the post-office and see if there was not a letter there for me from my only sister. Fanny, for once, had sent me none the week before. Mrs. Johnson went to town, and I to school.

I worked and worried through the lessons,—how, I never knew; but I dare say the children were forbearing; children are apt to be when one is not well. I came home and looked at the chicken and rice. But that would not do. They would have made me cry. So I hurried out again, away from them, and away from the meadow, and walked in the woods all that Saturday afternoon, thinking to and fro,—not so violently as in the morning, for I was weaker, but very confusedly and in endless perplexity. How could I stay in Greenville? I should have to be with Jim! But how could I go? What reason had I to give? and what would people think was my reason? But would it not be wrong to stay and see Jim? But it would be wrong to break my engagement to the school committee!

At length again the clock struck five, which was supper-time, and I saw myself no nearer the end of my difficulties; and I had to say once again, "God help me! God have mercy on me!" and so went home.

Mrs. Johnson was awaiting me, with this letter for me in her pocket. It is not in Fanny's handwriting, however, but in that of a friend of ours with whom she was staying, Mrs. Physick, the wife of the most eminent of the younger physicians in Beverly, our native town. I opened it hastily and read:—

"Friday.

"My dear Katie:—

"You must not be uneasy at my writing instead of Fannie, as the Doctor thinks it too great an effort for her. She has had an attack of influenza, not very severe, but you know she is never very strong, and I am afraid she is too much afraid of calling on me for any little thing she wants done. So we think, the Doctor and I, it would do her good to have a little visit from you. She wanted us to wait for the summer vacation, so as not to alarm you; but you know that is three whole weeks off, and nobody knows how much better she may be within that time. The Doctor says, suggest to Katie that the committee might, under the circumstances, agree to her ending the spring term a little earlier than usual, and beginning a little earlier in the fall.

"Yours as ever,"Julia.

"P. S. You must not be anxious about dear Fannie. She has brightened up very much already at the mere thought of seeing you. Her cough is not half so troublesome as it was a week ago, and the Doctor says her very worst symptom is weakness. She says she must write one word herself."

O what a tremulous word!

"Dear Katy:—

"Do come if you can, and don't be anxious. Indeed I am growing stronger every day, and eating so much meat, and drinking so much whiskey. It does me a great deal of good, and would a great deal more if I could only tell how we were ever to [pay for it, I knew she would have said; but Dr. Physick had evidently interposed; for the signature,]

"Your mutinous and obstreperous"Sister Fanny,"

was prefaced with a scratched-out involuntary "℞," and looked like a prescription.

I might be as sad as I would now; and who could wonder? I sat down where I was standing on the door-step, and held the letter helplessly up to Mrs. Johnson. It did seem to me now as if Fate was going to empty its whole quiver of arrows at once upon me, and meant to kill me, body and soul. But I have since thought sometimes, when I have heard people say, Misfortunes never came single, and How mysterious it was! that God only dealt with us, in that respect somewhat as some surgeons think it best to do with wounded men,—perform whatever operations are necessary, immediately after the first injury, so as to make one and the same "shock" take the place of more. In this way of Providence, I am sure I have repeatedly seen accumulated sorrows, which, if distributed through longer intervals, might have darkened a lifetime, lived through, and in a considerable degree recovered from, even in a very few years.

Mrs. Johnson's spectacles, meantime, were with eager curiosity peering over the letter. "Dear heart!" cried she. "Do tell! My! What a providence! There's Sister Nancy Newcome's Elviry jest got home this arternoon from her situation to the South, scairt off with the insurrections as unexpected as anything. She's as smart a teacher as ever was; an' the committee'd ha' gin her the school in a minute, an' thank you, too; but she wuz alwuz a kind o' lookin' up'ards; an' I s'pose she cal'lated it might for'ard her prospects to go down an' show herself among the plantations. There's better opportoonities, they say, sometimes for young ladies to git settled in life down there, owin' to the scurcity on 'em. She'll be glad enough to fill your place, I guess, till somethin' else turns up, for a fortni't or a month, or a term. It'll give her a chance to see her folks, an' fix up her cloes, an' look round her a spell. An' you can step into the cars o' Monday mornin' an' go right off an' close that poor young creator's eyes, an' take your time for 't. Seems as if I hearn tell your ma went off in a kind of a gallopin' decline, didn't she?"

"No, she did not!" cried I, springing up with a renewal of energy that must have surprised Mrs. Johnson. "Nothing of the kind! I will take my letter again, if you please. My sister has a cold,—only a cold. But where can I see Miss Newcome?"

"To home; but I declare, you can't feel hardly fit to start off ag'in. Jest you step in an' sup your tea afore it's any colder, I've had mine; an' I'll step right back over there, an' see about it for ye."

Mrs. Johnson, if coarse, was kind; and that time it would be hard to say whether her kindness or her coarseness did me the most good; for the latter roused me, between indignation and horror, to a strong reaction.

Mrs. Johnson, I said to myself, knew no more of the matter than I. Nobody said a word, in the letter, of Fanny's being very ill; and there had been, as I now considered, to the best of my recollection and information, no consumption in our family. My father died when I was five years old, as I had always heard of chronic bronchitis and nervous dyspepsia, or, in other words, of over-work and under-pay. An early marriage to a clergyman, who had no means of support but a salary of five hundred dollars dependent on his own health and the tastes of a parish, early widowhood, two helpless little girls to rear, years of hard work, anxieties, and embarrassments, a typhoid fever, with no physician during the precious first few days, during which, if she had sent for him, Dr. Physick always believed he might have saved her, a sudden sinking and no rallying,—it took all that to kill poor, dear, sweet mamma! She had a magnificent constitution, and bequeathed much of it to me.

Else I do not think I could have borne, and recovered from, those three days even as well as I did. The cars did not run on Sunday. That was so dreadful! But there was no other hindrance in my way. Everybody was very kind. The school committee could not meet in form "on the Sabbath"; but the chairman, who was Miss Elvira Newcome's brother-in-law, "sounded the other members arter meetin', jest as he fell in with 'em, casooally as it were," and ascertained that they would offer no objection to my exchange. He advanced my pay himself, and brought it to me soon after sunrise Monday morning; so that I was more than sufficiently provided with funds for my journey.

Mrs. Johnson forced upon me a suspicious-looking corked bottle of innocent tea,—one of the most sensible travelling companions, as I found before the day was over, that a wayfarer can possibly have,—and a large paper of doughnuts. Feverish as I was, I would right willingly have given her back, not only the doughnuts, but the tea, to bribe her not to persecute me as she did for a message for Jim. But I could leave my thanks for all his kindness, and my regrets—sincere, though repented of—that I could not see him again, before I went, to say good-by; and, already in part effaced by the impression of the last blow that had fallen upon me, that scene in the dreadful meadow seemed months and miles away. The engine shrieked. The cars started. My hopes and spirits rose; and I was glad, because I was going home,—that is, where, when I had a home, it used to be.

CHAPTER III

The rapid motion gratified my restlessness, and, together with the noise, soothed me homœopathically. I slept a great deal. The midsummer day was far shorter than I feared it would be; and I found myself rather refreshed than fatigued when the conductor roused me finally by shouting names more and more familiar, as we stopped at way-stations. I sat upright, and strained my cinderful eyes, long surfeited with undiluted green, for the first far blue and silver glimpses of my precious sea. Then well-known rocks and cedars came hurrying forward, as if to meet me half-way.

As the cars stopped for the last time with me, I caught sight of a horse and chaise approaching at a rapid rate down the main street of the town. The driver sprang out and threw the reins to a boy. He turned his face—a grave face—up, and looked searchingly along the row of car-windows. It was Dr. Physick. I darted out at the nearest door. He saw me, smiled, and was at it in an instant, catching both my hands in his to shake them and help me down by them at the same time.

"Little Katy!"—he always would call me so, though, as I sometimes took the liberty to tell him, I was very sure I had long left off being that, even if I was not yet quite the size of some giants I had seen,—"Little Katy! How jolly! 'Fanny?' O, Fanny's pretty comfortable,—looking out for you and putting her head out of the window, I dare say, the minute my back's turned. I look to you now to keep her in order. Baggage? Only bag? Give it to me. Foot,—now hand,—there you are!"

And there I was,—where I was most glad to be once more,—in his gig, and driving, in the cool, moist twilight, down the dear old street, shaded with dear old elms, with the golden and amber sunset still glowing between their dark boughs; where every quiet, snug, old wooden house, with its gables and old-fashioned green or white front-door with a brass or bronze knocker, and almost every shop and sign even, seemed an old friend.

The lingering glow still lay full on the front of our old home, which now had "Philemon Physick, M. D." on the corner. As we stopped before it, I thought I spied a sweet little watching face, for one moment, behind a pane of one of the second-story windows. But if I did, it was gone before I was sure.

"Here she is!" called out the Doctor. "Julia!—Wait a minute, Kate, my dear,—no hurry. Julia!" Up he ran, while "Julia" ran down, said something, in passing, to him on the stairs, kissed me at the foot three times over,—affectionately, but as if to gain time, I thought,—led me into the parlor to take off my bonnet, and told me Fanny was not quite ready to see me just then, but would be, most likely, in two or three minutes. The Doctor had gone up to see about it, and would let me know.

"O, didn't I see her at the window?"

"Yes, dear, you did; and that was just the trouble. She saw you were there; and she was so pleased, it made her a little faint. The Doctor will give her something to take; and as soon as she is a little used to your being here, of course you can be with her all the time."

The Doctor came down, speaking cheerily. "She is all right now. Run up, as fast as you like, and kiss her, Kate, my child; but tell her I forbid your talking till to-morrow. In five minutes, by my watch, I shall call you down to tea; and when you are called, you come. That will give her time to think about it and compose herself. Julia's help shall stay with her in the mean while. Afterwards, you shall share your own old chamber with her. Julia has it, as usual, all ready for you."

Fanny had sunk back on her white pillows, upon the little couch before the window from which she watched for me. How inspired and beautiful she looked!—she who was never thought of as beautiful before,—the very transfigured likeness of herself, as I hope one day to behold her in glory,—and so like our mother, too! She lay still, as she had been ordered, lest she should faint again; but by the cheerful lamp that stood on the stand beside her, I saw her smile as she had never used to smile. The eyes, that I left swollen and downcast, were raised large and bright. But as she slowly opened her arms and clasped me to her, I felt tears on my cheek; and her voice was broken as she said, "Katy, Katy! O, thank God! I was afraid I never should see you again. Now I have everything that I want in the world!"

It was hard to leave her when I was called so soon; but she knew that it was right, and made me go; and when I was allowed to return to her, she lay in obedient but most happy silence for all the rest of the evening, with those new splendid eyes fixed on my face, her dim complexion glowing, and her hands clasping mine. After I had put her to bed, and laid myself down in my own beside her, I felt her reach out of hers and touch me with a little pat two or three times, as a child will a new doll, to make sure that it has not been merely dreaming of it. At first, I asked her if she wanted anything; but she said, "Only to feel that you are really there"; and when, after a very sound and long rest, I awoke, there was her solemn, peaceful gaze still watching me, like that of an unsleeping guardian angel. She had slept too, however, remarkably long and well, whether for joy, as she thought, or from the opium which I had been startled to see given her the night before. She said she had had many scruples about taking it; but the Doctor insisted; and she did not think it her duty on the whole to make him any trouble by opposing his prescriptions, when we owed him so much. Poor Fanny! How hard it was for her to owe any one "anything, but to love one another."

The Doctor's bulletin that morning was, "Remarkably comfortable." But in the forenoon, while Fanny after breakfast took a nap, I snatched an opportunity to cross-question Mrs. Physick, from whom I knew I could sooner or later obtain all she knew,—the sooner it would be, if she had anything good to tell; as, in my inexperience, I was almost sure she must have.

Fanny's "influenza," I now discovered, dated back to May. She kept her room a few days, did not seem so ill as many fellow-patients who were now quite well again, and soon resumed her usual habits, but was never quite rid of her cough. Two or three weeks after, there was a Sunday-school festival in the parish to which we belonged. She was called upon to sing and assist in various ways, over-tasked her strength, was caught in a shower, looked very sick, and being, on the strength of Mrs. Physick's representations, formally escorted into the office, was found to have a quick pulse and sharp pain in one side. This led to a careful examination of the chest, and the discovery not only of "acute pleurisy," but of "some mischief probably of longer standing in the lungs," yet "no more," the Doctor said, "than many people carried about with them all their lives without knowing it, nor than others, if circumstances brought it to light, recovered from by means of good care and good spirits, and lived to a good old age."

"How long ago was that?"

"The pleurisy? About the beginning of June. The Doctor said last week he 'could scarcely discover a vestige of it.' And now, Katy," continued kind, cheery Mrs. Physick, "you see, your coming back has put her in the best of spirits; and you and the Doctor and I are all going to take the best of care of her; and so we may all hope the best."

"The best of care"? Ah, there was little doubt of that! But even "good spirits"! who could hope to see Fanny enjoying them for any length of time, till she had done with time? Good, uncomplaining, patient, I had always seen her,—happy, how seldom!—when, indeed, till now? There was not enough of earth about her for her to thrive and bloom.

My mother, I believe, used to attribute in part to Fanny's early training her early joylessness. In her early days,—so at least I have understood,—it was thought right even by some good people of our "persuasion," to lose no opportunity of treating the little natural waywardnesses of children with a severity which would now be called ferocity. Mamma could never have practised this herself; but perhaps she suffered it to be practised to a greater extent than she would have consented to endure, had she foreseen the consequences. My poor father must have been inexperienced, too; and I suppose his nerves, between sickness and poverty, might at times be in such a state that he scarcely knew what he did.

I was four years younger than Fanny, and know nothing about it, except a very little at second-hand. But at any rate I have often heard my mother say, with a glance at her, and a gravity as if some sad association enforced the lesson on her mind, that it was one of the first duties of those who undertook the charge of children to watch over their cheerfulness, and a most important rule, never, if it was possible to put it off, so much as to reprimand them when one's own balance was at all disturbed. This was a rule that she never to my knowledge broke; though she was naturally rather a high-strung person, as I think the pleasantest and most generous people one meets with generally are.

From whatever cause or causes,—to return to Fanny,—she grew up, not fierce, sullen, nor yet hypocritical, but timid and distrustful, miserably sensitive and anxious, and morbidly conscientious.

There was another pleasure in store for her, however; for, the afternoon following that of my return, Mrs. Julia, looking out as usual for her husband,—with messages from four different alarmingly or alarmed sick persons, requesting him to proceed without delay in four different directions,—saw him at length driving down the road with such unprofessional slowness that she feared some accident to himself or his harness. When he came before the door, the cause appeared. It was a handsome Bath chair, with a basket of strawberries on the floor and a large nosegay on the seat, fastened to the back of his gig, and safely towed by it.

"What is that for?" cried I from Fanny's window.

"Fanny's coach," said he, looking up. "Miss Dudley has sent it to be taken care of for her. She does not want it herself for the present; and you can draw your dolly out in it every fine day."

"O," cried Fanny, sitting upright on the couch by the window,—where she spent the greater part of the day,—to see for herself, with the tears in her eyes. "O, how lovely! That is the very kindest thing she has done yet;—and you don't know how she keeps sending me everything, Katy!"

"Miss Dudley? Who is she?"

"O, don't you know? The great naturalist's sister. He lives in that beautiful place, on the shore, in the large stone cottage. The ground was broken for it before you went to Greenville. She is very sick, I am afraid,—very kind, I am sure. I never saw her. She has heard about me. I am afraid the Doctor told her. I hope she does not think I meant he should."

"Of course, dear, she does not."

"Do you really think so?"

"Certainly."

"Why?"

"Why,—I know I should not like being begged of in that underhand way myself; and if I did not like it, I might send something once, but after that I should never keep on sending."

"I am very glad you think so; for I like her kindness, though I scarcely like to have her show it in this way, because I am afraid I can never do anything for her. But I hope she does like to send; for Dr. Physick says she always asks after me, almost before he can after her, and looks very much pleased if she hears that I have been so. I suppose the Doctor will think it is too late to take me down to-night. Katy, don't you want to go and see the wagon, and tell me about it, and pour the strawberries into a great dish on the tea-table, and all of you have some, and bring up the flowers when you come back after tea?"

When I came back with the flowers, Fanny smiled rather pensively, and did not ask me about the chair.

"Fanny," said I, "the Doctor says you may go out to-morrow forenoon, and stay as long as you like, if it is fair; and the sun is going down as red as a Baldwin apple. The chair is contrived so, with springs and the cushions, that you can lie down in it, as flat as you do on your sofa, when you are tired of sitting up."

"O Katy," cried she, with a little quiver in her voice, for she was too weak to bear anything, "I have been seeing how inconsiderate I was! To think of letting you exert and strain yourself in that way!"

In came the Doctor, looking saucy. "Fanny won't go, I suppose? I thought so. I said so to De Quincey [his horse], as I drove him down the street at a creep, sawing his mouth to keep him from running away, till he foamed at it epileptically, while all the sick people were sending north, south, east, and west after all the other doctors. I hope you won't mention it, said I to the horse; but Fanny is always getting up some kind of a row. But there is Katy now,—Katy is a meek person, and always does as she is bid. She has been cooped up too much, and bleached her own roses with teaching the Greenville misses to sickly o'er with the pale cast of thought. Katy needs gentle exercise. So does Deacon Lardner." Deacon Lardner was the fat inhabitant of the town, and ill of the dropsy. "I will send Katy out a-walking, with Deacon Lardner in Miss Dudley's chair."

I laughed. Fanny smiled. The Doctor saw his advantage, and followed it up. "Julia, my dear, get my apothecary's scales out of the office. Put an ounce weight into one, and Fanny into the other. Then put the ounce weight into the chair. If Katy can draw that, she can draw Fanny."

This time, it was poor Fanny who had the laugh to herself.

The next day, the Doctor carried her down stairs, as soon as she could bear it after her breakfast, and left her on a sofa, in the little parlor, to rest. About ten o'clock, he came back from his early rounds. I was dressed and waiting for him, with Fanny's bonnet and shawl ready. I put them on her, while he drew out the chair from its safe stable in the hall. Once again he took her up; and thus by easy stages we got her into "her coach." I pulled, and he pushed it, "to give me a start." How easy and light and strong it was! How delighted were both she and I!

Fanny was too easily alarmed to enjoy driving much, even when she was well; and she had not walked out for weeks. During that time, the slow, late spring had turned into midsummer; and the mere change from a sick-room to the fresh, outer world is always so very great! For me, it was the first going abroad since my return to Beverly. We went in the sun till my charge's little snowdrop hands were warm, and then drew up under the shade of an elm, on a little airy knoll that commanded a distant view of the sea, and was fanned by a soft air, which helped poor Fanny's breathing. She now insisted on my resting myself; and I turned the springs back and arranged the cushions so that she could lie down, took a new handkerchief of my guardian's from my pocket, and hemmed it, as I sat at her side on a stone, while she mused and dozed. When she awoke, I gave her her luncheon from a convenient little box in the chair, and drew her home by dinner-time.

In this way we spent much of the month of July—shall I say it?—agreeably. Nobody will believe it, who has not felt or seen the marvellous relief afforded by an entire change of scene and occupation to a person tried as I had been. If I had but "one idea," that idea was now Fanny. Instinctively in part, and partly of set purpose, I postponed to her every other consideration and thought. It was delightful to me to be able, in my turn, to take her to one after another of the dear old haunts, in wood or on beach, where she had often led me, when a child, to play. I always did love to have something to take care of; and the care of Fanny wore upon me little. She was the most considerate of invalids.

Besides, she was better, or at any rate I thought so, after she began to go out in Miss Dudley's chair. Her appetite improved; her nerves grew more firm; and her cough was sometimes so quiet at night that her laudanum would stand on her little table in the morning, just as it was dropped for her the evening before.