Chapter V: Calls

The next morning Miss Elinor felt better, and as time passed on and her brother did not again visit his new tenants, she began to feel a little more amiably disposed toward the strangers, and at last decided to call, intending to go next to the brown house in the hollow, where she was a frequent visitor. She accordingly started one afternoon for the white house on the hill, where she was most cordially received. With the ladylike manners of Mrs. Huntington she could find no fault, but she did not like the expression of Adelaide’s eyes, nor the sneering manner in which she spoke of the country and country people; neither did she fail to see the basket which the young lady pushed hastily under the lounge as Aunt Peggy ushered her into the sitting-room. On the table there were scissors, needles and thread, but not a vestige of sewing was visible, though on the carpet were shreds of cloth, and from beneath the lounge peeped something which looked vastly like the wristband of a man’s shirt.

“Pride and poverty! I’ll venture to say they sew for a living,” Miss Elinor thought, and making her call as brief as possible, she arose to go.

It was in vain that Adelaide urged her to stay longer, telling her “it was such a treat to see some one who seemed like their former acquaintances.”

With a toss of her head Miss Elinor declined, saying she was going to visit a poor family in the hollow, a blind man and his daughter, and in adjusting her furs she failed to see how both Adelaide and her mother started at her words. Soon recovering her composure, the former asked, who they were, and if they had always lived in Oakland?

“Their name is Warren,” said Miss Elinor, “and they came, I believe, from some city in western New York, but I know nothing definite concerning them, as they always shrink from speaking of their former condition. Alice, though, is a sweet little creature—so kind to her old father, and so refined, withal.”

Mechanically bidding her visitor good afternoon, Adelaide went to her mother’s side, exclaiming:

“Who thought those Warrens would toss up in Oakland! Of course, when they know that we are here, they’ll tell all about father and everything else. What shall we do?”

“We are not to blame for your father’s misdeeds,” Mrs. Huntington answered; and Adelaide replied:

“I know it, but people think you are a widow with a competence sufficient to support us genteelly—they don’t suspect how late we sit up nights, sewing, to make ends meet. Mercy! I hope the peeking old maid didn’t see that,” she exclaimed, as her own eye fell upon the wristband. Then, after a moment, she continued, “I know what I’ll do. I’ll go to Alice this very night, and tell her how sorry we are for what has happened, and I’ll ask her to say nothing about father’s having cheated them and run away. She’s a pretty good sort of a girl, I guess, if I did once to think her so proud.”

The plan seemed a feasible one, and that evening as Alice Warren sat bending over a vest, which she must finish that night, she was startled by the abrupt entrance of Adelaide Huntington, who, seizing both her hands, said, with well-feigned distress:

“My poor Alice! I never expected to find you thus.”

In his arm-chair Mr. Warren was sleeping, but when the stranger’s shadow fell upon him, he awoke, and stretching out his arms, he said:

“Who is it, Alice?—who stands between me and the fire?”

“It is I,” answered Adelaide, coming to his side, “the daughter of him who ruined you. I have just learned that you were living here in the same village with ourselves, and, at my mother’s request, I have come to tell you how bitterly we have wept over my father’s sin, and to ask you not to hate us for a deed of which we knew nothing until it was all over.”

Then seating herself in a chair she continued to speak hurriedly, telling them some truth and some falsehood—telling them how, for a few months they had lived with a distant relative, a wealthy man, who gave them money now for their support—telling them how her father’s disgrace had affected her mother, and begging of them not to speak of it in Oakland, where it was not known.

“I don’t know why it is,” she said, “but people have the impression that mother is a widow; and though it is wrong to deceive them, I cannot tell them my father ran away to escape a convict’s cell. It would kill my mother outright, and if you will keep silent, we shall be forever grateful.”

There was no reason why Mr. Warren should speak of his former clerk, and he answered Adelaide that neither himself nor Alice had any wish to injure her by talking of the past. Thus relieved of her fears, Adelaide grew very amiable and sympathetic, saying she did not suppose they were so poor, and pitying Alice, who must miss so much her pictures, her flowers, her birds and her music.

“Come up and try my piano. You may practice on it any time,” she said, when at last she arose to go.

“I never played much. I was not fond of it,” was Alice’s answer, while her father rejoined quickly:

“Then you keep a piano. I did not know you had one.”

“Oh, yes, father bought it for me at auction, three years ago, and as he was not owing any one then, our furniture was not disturbed.”

The blind man sighed, while Alice dropped a tear on the vest she was making, as she thought of the difference between herself and Adelaide, who paused as she reached the door, and asked if she knew Mr. Howland.

“I sew for his store,” said Alice, and Adelaide continued:

“Isn’t he a splendid man?”

Alice did not know whether he was splendid or not—she had never observed his looks particularly, she said; but she knew he was very kind, and she liked nothing better than to have him come there evenings, as he often did.

“Come here often!” exclaimed Adelaide, her voice indicating the pang with which a feeling of jealousy had been brought to life.

Before Alice could reply there was a footstep outside, and the blind man, whose quick ear caught the sound, said joyfully:

“He’s coming now.”

“I wish I had gone home before,” was the first thought of Adelaide, who did not care to be seen there by Mr. Howland. It might lead to some inquiries which she would rather should not be made. Still, there was now no escape, and trusting much to the promise of the Warrens, she stepped back from the door just as Mr. Howland opened it. He seemed greatly surprised at finding her there, and still more surprised when he learned that they were old acquaintances.

“It is kind in her not to desert them in their poverty,” he thought, and his manner was still more considerate toward Adelaide, who, after standing a few moments, made another attempt to go.

“Wait, Miss Huntington,” said he. “It was both raining and snowing when I came in, and you will need an umbrella.”

This was just what Adelaide wanted, and taking a seat she waited patiently until Mr. Howland signified his readiness to go. Then, bidding Alice good night, she whispered to her softly:

“You never will say a word of father, will you?”

“Certainly not,” was Alice’s reply, and in another moment Adelaide was in the street walking arm in arm with Mr. Howland, who began to speak of the Warrens and their extreme poverty.

“It is evident they have seen better days,” he said, “but they never seem willing to speak of the past. Did he meet with a reverse of fortune?”

For a moment Adelaide was silent, while she revolved the propriety of saying what she finally did say, and which was—

“Ye-es—they met with reverses, but as they are unwilling to talk about it, I, too, had better say nothing of a matter which cannot now be helped.”

“Of course not, if it would be to their detriment,” said Mr. Howland, a painful suspicion entering his mind.

Hitherto he had regarded Mr. Warren as the soul of integrity, but Adelaide’s manner, even more than her words, implied that there was something wrong, and hardly knowing what he said, he continued:

“Was it anything dishonorable?”

“If you please, I would rather say nothing about it,” answered Adelaide. “I don’t wish to do them harm, and I dare say they regret it more than any one else.”

Mentally pronouncing her a very prudent, considerate girl, Mr. Howland walked on in silence, feeling the while that something had been taken from him. He had become greatly interested in the helpless old blind man, and in his writing-desk at home was a receipt in full for the first quarter’s rent, which would become due in a few days. But Mr. Howland was a man of stern integrity, hating anything like fraud and deceit, and if Mr. Warren had been guilty of either, he was not worthy of respect. Alice, too, though she might not have been in fault, did not seem quite the same, and now as he thought of her, there was less of beauty in the deep blue of her eyes and the wavy tresses of her hair.

* * * * *

“Will you go in? It is a long time since you were here,” said Adelaide, when at last they reached her mother’s door.

Her invitation was accepted, and the clock struck nine before Mr. Howland rose to leave. Accompanying him to the door, Adelaide said, jingly:

“I trust you will forget our conversation concerning those Warrens. You know I didn’t really tell you anything.”

Mr. Howland bowed and walked away, wishing in his heart that she had _not_ told him anything, or at least had not created in his mind a suspicion against people he had hitherto liked so much. So absorbed was he in his meditations that he did not at first observe the slender figure which, wrapping its thin shawl close around it, came slowly toward him, but when the girl reached him and the cold wind blew the brown curls over her white face, he knew it was Alice Warren, and his first impulse was to offer her his arm and shield her from the storm. But Adelaide’s dark insinuations were ringing in his ears, and so Alice went on alone, while the rain and the sleet beat upon her head and the cold penetrated through her half worn shoes, chilling her weary feet, and sending a shiver through her frame. But she did not heed it, or even think of the driving storm, so eager was she to be at home, where she could count the contents of the little box and see if with the money received there was not enough to pay the quarter’s rent.

But the blind man, listening to the storm, knew how cold his darling would be, and groping in the darkness, he added fresh fuel to the fire, and then swept up the hearth, placing her chair a little nearer to his own, so that it would seem pleasant to her when she came. Poor, helpless man! He could not see—nay, he had never seen his child, but he could fancy just how bright and beautiful she would look sitting at his side, with the fire he had made shining on her hair, and when at last she came, he clasped her little red hands between his own, rubbing, kissing, and pitying them until he felt that they were warm. Then, seated in his chair, he listened while she counted the silver coin, dropping it piece by piece into his palm and bidding him guess its value by its size. It was all counted at last, and very joyfully Alice said to her father:

“There is enough to pay our rent, and we have been comfortable, too, thanks to Miss Elinor, who has saved us many a shilling by her timely acts of charity.”

Miss Elinor had been to them a ministering angel, and however much she might be disliked at the white house on the hill, she was loved and honored at the brown house in the hollow, and that night when Alice Warren sought her pillow, she breathed a prayer for the kind woman who was to befriend her in more ways than one.