Chapter XIV: News From America

AS Maimie went away, I had a conviction in my mind that her absence would not be only for one week. And my conviction proved true. The week grew into four weeks, before Aunt Briscoe would part with her.

It was strange how we all missed the girl. Jack was utterly miserable, and Robert seemed quite at a loss without her pretty caresses, and Cherry evidently found it not easy to be so cheerful as usual.

The month was one of trouble and anxiety to us, which made the matter wow. Bills had come in, which we could not tell how to meet, and worries and fears pressed heavily.

Then we heard of an opening for Cress in a mercantile house, and Cress fought against the notion, in a way that distressed us all much. I longed for Maimie to help us in persuading him. He was angry and excited. He said he had always hoped to go to college, somehow. Robert patiently explained to him the impossibility of any such thing. Cress argued and protested, and gave way to temper, and seemed thoroughly out of sorts. He had to go to bed at last for a whole day, to be nursed and comforted. But Robert would have no further putting off of the decision. He said it was an opening too good to be refused, and Cress must make up his mind to what was a necessity. Cress had to yield, but the boy looked wretched, and for days he spoke hardly a pleasant word to anybody.

So the month of Maimie’s absence was altogether a trying time to us.

Jack went once to see her, and found her very bright, only longing to come back to us. Aunt Briscoe seemed “awfully” fond of her, Jack said, and he thought Maimie liked Aunt Briscoe better than at first, only “not like mother.” And Aunt Briscoe had declared her intention of keeping Maimie exactly one month, which she did to the very day.

She brought Maimie back herself, at the month’s end, remaining again to tea with us. I never can forget how Maimie rushed into my arms, whispering. “O Aunt Marion, I thought I should never get home again!” Her sweet face was glowing with happiness, and the old look of health had fully come back. So I was very grateful to Aunt Briscoe.

While we were having our tea together, the postman came. Nobody seemed to notice the rap particularly, we were talking so much: but presently Ted ran out, and brought back a letter addressed to Maimie.

She sprang up with a little cry, as he dropped it on the table, and a glow flushed her cheeks.

“It’s from father!” she exclaimed. “Aunt Marion! A letter from father at last!”

There seemed no chance at first of the letter being read. Almost before I had gathered the sense of the words, Maimie was clinging to me, clasping the envelope, and sobbing violently. I had never quite known till that moment how the poor child had suffered under her stepfather’s long silence. Aunt Briscoe sat looking at her with an odd mystified expression.

“Don’t cry, Maimie,” I whispered. “You are not sorry, are you?”

She lifted her face, streaming with tears still, yet quivering with happiness.

“O no, no, no! sorry! no! He hasn’t forgotten me, you see. But oh, Aunt Marion—if he wants me—”

“Maimie, you shan’t go,” cried Jack hoarsely. “Nobody has a right to you now, except us?”

“Suppose Maimie sees what he says, before we go into that question,” I suggested.

“What does he say, Maimie?” cried two or three impatient voices.

“I don’t know. Only I am glad he has written.”

Poor Jack looked most gloomy. He evidently thought the loss of Maimie was becoming certain.

“Perhaps Uncle Churton is coming home,” said Cherry. “Do see, Maimie.”

Maimie heaved a sigh, stood up, and with trembling hands tore open the envelope. Something dropped out, and she stooped for it.

“A bank-note,” she said slowly, putting it into my hands. “That is for you and Uncle Robert.”

“Read the letter first, Maimie,” I said.

Maimie obeyed, not once only. A look of perplexity came over her face, and the bright look faded.

“The bank-note is for you, of course, Aunt Marion,” she said soberly. “He says it is a present towards expenses.”

“How much is it for?” asked Aunt Briscoe. Maimie glanced at it, and murmured something about “dollars.”

“We are not in America,” said Aunt Briscoe drily.

“O no,” and Maimie gave another look. “It is—twenty-five pounds.”

I could not but feel a throb of relief and gratitude. At that moment we were so needing help. I saw an echo of my own sensations in Robert’s face.

“Is your stepfather coming home?” asked Aunt Briscoe.

“He—doesn’t say,” faltered Maimie. “He only says he writes just to send a little present. He is going away somewhere else—I mean he was when he wrote,—so he couldn’t give his address.”

“Humph!” Aunt Briscoe said expressively. “Where is he now, child?”

“He doesn’t say.”

“No address on the sheet?”

“No,” Maimie said very low, and she gave the letter first to me, then to Robert.

“Well, my dear,” he said cheerfully, handing it back; “it is very evident that Churton means you to belong to us for the present.”

“It isn’t right,” she whispered.

“Bosh!” cried Jack, who had grown radiant. “As if we could ever bear to part with you!”

She really did smile then, and it was not a sad smile.

“But he might have told me a little more of his plans,” she said.

“You need never trouble yourself with thinking what a man ‘might have’ done,” said Aunt Briscoe. “It’s sheer waste of time. They just care to please themselves, and that’s all.”

Maimie glanced at my husband, and shook her head.

“Maimie, you are happy here. You don’t really want to go to America?” Jack said wistfully.

“No,” she answered. “I am as happy as can be, and I don’t want to go. Only it is hard that I should be a burden on you.”

“If Mary Browne is a burden on anybody, she may come and live at The Gables,” said Aunt Briscoe.

Maimie looked from her to me silently.

“But she is not a burden,” I said. “She is our help and comfort. We really haven’t known how to get along without her this month.”

“Just as you please,” Aunt Briscoe said shortly. “I never press my favours on anybody. Only when you are tired of Mary Browne, you may send her to me.”

Then Aunt Briscoe rose to go away; and Maimie presently gave her a loving kiss, whispering gratitude, I suppose, for I heard the old lady answer, “There’s nothing to make a fuss about.” And when she was gone, Maimie came to my side, and sat down on a low stool, and laid her head on my knee, with a sigh of content.

“Aunt Briscoe is very very kind,” she murmured. “And I should like to hear more about father. But this is home, and no other place can ever be home to me, like it.”

Jack’s face beamed all over, and Cherry smiled, while I said, “We are all glad that you feel it so, Mamie.”