章节正文
development of bough and twig, making poetry against the spiritual
tints of a spring sunset.
"It does look sad," said Peter, "but it is a pretty tree, and it
wasn't its fault."
"There's a heavy dew and it's time we stopped talking nonsense and
went in," decreed Felicity. "If we don't we'll all have a cold,
and then we'll be miserable enough, but it won't be very
exciting."
"All the same, I wish something exciting would happen," finished
the Story Girl, as we walked up through the orchard, peopled with
its nun-like shadows.
"There's a new moon tonight, so may be you'll get your wish," said
Peter. "My Aunt Jane didn't believe there was anything in the
moon business, but you never can tell."
The Story Girl did get her wish. Something happened the very next
day. She joined us in the afternoon with a quite indescribable
expression on her face, compounded of triumph, anticipation, and
regret. Her eyes betrayed that she had been crying, but in them
shone a chastened exultation. Whatever the Story Girl mourned
over it was evident she was not without hope.
"I have some news to tell you," she said importantly. "Can you
guess what it is?"
We couldn't and wouldn't try.
"Tell us right off," implored Felix. "You look as if it was
something tremendous."
"So it is. Listen--Aunt Olivia is going to be married."
We stared in blank amazement. Peg Bowen's hint had faded from our
minds and we had never put much faith in it.
"Aunt Olivia! I don't believe it," cried Felicity flatly. "Who
told you?"
"Aunt Olivia herself. So it is perfectly true. I'm awfully sorry
in one way--but oh, won't it be splendid to have a real wedding in
the family? She's going to have a big wedding--and I am to be
bridesmaid."
"I shouldn't think you were old enough to be a bridesmaid," said
Felicity sharply.
"I'm nearly fifteen. Anyway, Aunt Olivia says I have to be."
"Who's she going to marry?" asked Cecily, gathering herself
together after the shock, and finding that the world was going on
just the same.
"His name is Dr. Seton and he is a Halifax man. She met him when
she was at Uncle Edward's last summer. They've been engaged ever
since. The wedding is to be the third week in June."
"And our school concert comes off the next week," complained
Felicity. "Why do things always come together like that? And what
are you going to do if Aunt Olivia is going away?"
"I'm coming to live at your house," answered the Story Girl rather
timidly. She did not know how Felicity might like that. But
Felicity took it rather well.
"You've been here most of the time anyhow, so it'll just be that
you'll sleep and eat here, too. But what's to become of Uncle
Roger?"
"Aunt Olivia says he'll have to get married, too. But Uncle Roger
says he'd rather hire a housekeeper than marry one, because in the
first case he could turn her off if he didn't like her, but in the
second case he couldn't."
"There'll be a lot of cooking to do for the wedding," reflected
Felicity in a tone of satisfaction.
"I s'pose Aunt Olivia will want some rusks made. I hope she has
plenty of tooth-powder laid in," said Dan.
"It's a pity you don't use some of that tooth-powder you're so
fond of talking about yourself," retorted Felicity. "When anyone
has a mouth the size of yours the teeth show so plain."
"I brush my teeth every Sunday," asseverated Dan.
"Every Sunday! You ought to brush them every DAY."
"Did anyone ever hear such nonsense?" demanded Dan sincerely.
"Well, you know, it really does say so in the Family Guide," said
Cecily quietly.
"Then the Family Guide people must have lots more spare time than
I have," retorted Dan contemptuously.
"Just think, the Story Girl will have her name in the papers if
she's bridesmaid," marvelled Sara Ray.
"In the Halifax papers, too," added Felix, "since Dr. Seton is a
Halifax man. What is his first name?"
"Robert."
"And will we have to call him Uncle Robert?"
"Not until he's married to her. Then we will, of course."
"I hope your Aunt Olivia won't disappear before the ceremony,"
remarked Sara Ray, who was surreptitiously reading "The Vanquished
Bride," by Valeria H. Montague in the Family Guide.
"I hope Dr. Seton won't fail to show up, like your cousin Rachel
Ward's beau," said Peter.
"That makes me think of another story I read the other day about
Great-uncle Andrew King and Aunt Georgina," laughed the Story
Girl. "It happened eighty years ago. It was a very stormy winter
and the roads were bad. Uncle Andrew lived in Carlisle, and Aunt
Georgina--she was Miss Georgina Matheson then--lived away up west,
so he couldn't get to see her very often. They agreed to be
married that winter, but Georgina couldn't set the day exactly
because her brother, who lived in Ontario, was coming home for a
visit, and she wanted to be married while he was home. So it was
arranged that she was to write Uncle Andrew and tell him what day
to come. She did, and she told him to come on a Tuesday. But her
writing wasn't very good and poor Uncle Andrew thought she wrote
Thursday. So on Thursday he drove all the way to Georgina's home
to be married. It was forty miles and a bitter cold day. But it
wasn't any colder than the reception he got from Georgina. She
was out in the porch, with her head tied up in a towel, picking
geese. She had been all ready Tuesday, and her friends and the
minister were there, and the wedding supper prepared. But there
was no bridegroom and Georgina was furious. Nothing Uncle Andrew
could say would appease her. She wouldn't listen to a word of
explanation, but told him to go, and never show his nose there
again. So poor Uncle Andrew had to go ruefully home, hoping that
she would relent later on, because he was really very much in love
with her."
"And did she?" queried Felicity.
"She did. Thirteen years exactly from that day they were married.
It took her just that long to forgive him."
"It took her just that long to find out she couldn't get anybody
else," said Dan, cynically.
CHAPTER XIV
A PRODIGAL RETURNS
Aunt Olivia and the Story Girl lived in a whirlwind of dressmaking
after that, and enjoyed it hugely. Cecily and Felicity also had
to have new dresses for the great event, and they talked of little
else for a fortnight. Cecily declared that she hated to go to
sleep because she was sure to dream that she was at Aunt Olivia's
wedding in her old faded gingham dress and a ragged apron.
"And no shoes or stockings," she added, "and I can't move, and
everyone walks past and looks at my feet."
"That's only in a dream," mourned Sara Ray, "but I may have to
wear my last summer's white dress to the wedding. It's too short,
but ma says it's plenty good for this summer. I'll be so
mortified if I have to wear it."
"I'd rather not go at all than wear a dress that wasn't nice,"
said Felicity pleasantly.
"I'd go to the wedding if I had to go in my school dress," cried
Sara Ray. "I've never been to anything. I wouldn't miss it for
the world."
"My Aunt Jane always said that if you were neat and tidy it didn't
matter whether you were dressed fine or not," said Peter.
"I'm sick and tired of hearing about your Aunt Jane," said
Felicity crossly.
Peter looked grieved but held his peace. Felicity was very hard
on him that spring, but his loyalty never wavered. Everything she
said or did was right in Peter's eyes.
"It's all very well to be neat and tidy," said Sara Ray, "but I
like a little style too."
"I think you'll find your mother will get you a new dress after
all," comforted Cecily. "Anyway, nobody will notice you because
everyone will be looking at the bride. Aunt Olivia will make a
lovely bride. Just think how sweet she'll look in a white silk
dress and a floating veil."
"She says she is going to have the ceremony performed out here in
the orchard under her own tree," said the Story Girl. "Won't that
be romantic? It almost makes me feel like getting married myself."
"What a way to talk," rebuked Felicity, "and you only fifteen."
"Lots of people have been married at fifteen," laughed the Story
Girl. "Lady Jane Gray was."
"But you are always saying that Valeria H. Montague's stories are
silly and not true to life, so that is no argument," retorted
Felicity, who knew more about cooking than about history, and
evidently imagined that the Lady Jane Gray was one of Valeria's
titled heroines.
The wedding was a perennial source of conversation among us in
those days; but presently its interest palled for a time in the
light of another quite tremendoushappening. One Saturday night
Peter's mother called to take him home with her for Sunday. She
had been working at Mr. James Frewen's, and Mr. Frewen was driving
her home. We had never seen Peter's mother before, and we looked
at her with discreetcuriosity. She was a plump, black-eyed
little woman, neat as a pin, but with a rather tired and care-worn
face that looked as if it should have been rosy and jolly. Life
had been a hard battle for her, and I rather think that her curly-
headed little lad was all that had kept heart and spirit in her.
Peter went home with her and returned Sunday evening. We were in
the orchard sitting around the Pulpit Stone, where we had,
according to the custom of the households of King, been learning
our golden texts and memory verses for the next Sunday School
lesson. Paddy, grown sleek and handsome again, was sitting on the
stone itself, washing his jowls.
Peter joined us with a very queer expression on his face. He
seemed bursting with some news which he wanted to tell and yet
hardly liked to.
"Why are you looking so mysterious, Peter?" demanded the Story Girl.
"What do you think has happened?" asked Peter solemnly.
"What has?"
"My father has come home," answered Peter.
The announcement produced all the sensation he could have wished.
We crowded around him in excitement.
"Peter! When did he come back?"
"Saturday night. He was there when ma and I got home. It give
her an awful turn. I didn't know him at first, of course."
"Peter Craig, I believe you are glad your father has come back,"
cried the Story Girl.
"'Course I'm glad," retorted Peter.
"And after you saying you didn't want ever to see him again," said
Felicity.
"You just wait. You haven't heard my story yet. I wouldn't have
been glad to see father if he'd come back the same as he went
away. But he is a changed man. He happened to go into a revival
meeting one night this spring and he got converted. And he's come
home to stay, and he says he's never going to drink another drop,
but he's going to look after his family. Ma isn't to do any more
washing for nobody but him and me, and I'm not to be a hired boy
any longer. He says I can stay with your Uncle Roger till the
fall 'cause I promised I would, but after that I'm to stay home
and go to school right along and learn to be whatever I'd like to
be. I tell you it made me feel queer. Everything seemed to be
upset. But he gave ma forty dollars--every cent he had--so I
tints of a spring sunset.
"It does look sad," said Peter, "but it is a pretty tree, and it
wasn't its fault."
"There's a heavy dew and it's time we stopped talking nonsense and
went in," decreed Felicity. "If we don't we'll all have a cold,
and then we'll be miserable enough, but it won't be very
exciting."
"All the same, I wish something exciting would happen," finished
the Story Girl, as we walked up through the orchard, peopled with
its nun-like shadows.
"There's a new moon tonight, so may be you'll get your wish," said
Peter. "My Aunt Jane didn't believe there was anything in the
moon business, but you never can tell."
The Story Girl did get her wish. Something happened the very next
day. She joined us in the afternoon with a quite indescribable
expression on her face, compounded of triumph, anticipation, and
regret. Her eyes betrayed that she had been crying, but in them
shone a chastened exultation. Whatever the Story Girl mourned
over it was evident she was not without hope.
"I have some news to tell you," she said importantly. "Can you
guess what it is?"
We couldn't and wouldn't try.
"Tell us right off," implored Felix. "You look as if it was
something tremendous."
"So it is. Listen--Aunt Olivia is going to be married."
We stared in blank amazement. Peg Bowen's hint had faded from our
minds and we had never put much faith in it.
"Aunt Olivia! I don't believe it," cried Felicity flatly. "Who
told you?"
"Aunt Olivia herself. So it is perfectly true. I'm awfully sorry
in one way--but oh, won't it be splendid to have a real wedding in
the family? She's going to have a big wedding--and I am to be
bridesmaid."
"I shouldn't think you were old enough to be a bridesmaid," said
Felicity sharply.
"I'm nearly fifteen. Anyway, Aunt Olivia says I have to be."
"Who's she going to marry?" asked Cecily, gathering herself
together after the shock, and finding that the world was going on
just the same.
"His name is Dr. Seton and he is a Halifax man. She met him when
she was at Uncle Edward's last summer. They've been engaged ever
since. The wedding is to be the third week in June."
"And our school concert comes off the next week," complained
Felicity. "Why do things always come together like that? And what
are you going to do if Aunt Olivia is going away?"
"I'm coming to live at your house," answered the Story Girl rather
timidly. She did not know how Felicity might like that. But
Felicity took it rather well.
"You've been here most of the time anyhow, so it'll just be that
you'll sleep and eat here, too. But what's to become of Uncle
Roger?"
"Aunt Olivia says he'll have to get married, too. But Uncle Roger
says he'd rather hire a housekeeper than marry one, because in the
first case he could turn her off if he didn't like her, but in the
second case he couldn't."
"There'll be a lot of cooking to do for the wedding," reflected
Felicity in a tone of satisfaction.
"I s'pose Aunt Olivia will want some rusks made. I hope she has
plenty of tooth-powder laid in," said Dan.
"It's a pity you don't use some of that tooth-powder you're so
fond of talking about yourself," retorted Felicity. "When anyone
has a mouth the size of yours the teeth show so plain."
"I brush my teeth every Sunday," asseverated Dan.
"Every Sunday! You ought to brush them every DAY."
"Did anyone ever hear such nonsense?" demanded Dan sincerely.
"Well, you know, it really does say so in the Family Guide," said
Cecily quietly.
"Then the Family Guide people must have lots more spare time than
I have," retorted Dan contemptuously.
"Just think, the Story Girl will have her name in the papers if
she's bridesmaid," marvelled Sara Ray.
"In the Halifax papers, too," added Felix, "since Dr. Seton is a
Halifax man. What is his first name?"
"Robert."
"And will we have to call him Uncle Robert?"
"Not until he's married to her. Then we will, of course."
"I hope your Aunt Olivia won't disappear before the ceremony,"
remarked Sara Ray, who was surreptitiously reading "The Vanquished
Bride," by Valeria H. Montague in the Family Guide.
"I hope Dr. Seton won't fail to show up, like your cousin Rachel
Ward's beau," said Peter.
"That makes me think of another story I read the other day about
Great-uncle Andrew King and Aunt Georgina," laughed the Story
Girl. "It happened eighty years ago. It was a very stormy winter
and the roads were bad. Uncle Andrew lived in Carlisle, and Aunt
Georgina--she was Miss Georgina Matheson then--lived away up west,
so he couldn't get to see her very often. They agreed to be
married that winter, but Georgina couldn't set the day exactly
because her brother, who lived in Ontario, was coming home for a
visit, and she wanted to be married while he was home. So it was
arranged that she was to write Uncle Andrew and tell him what day
to come. She did, and she told him to come on a Tuesday. But her
writing wasn't very good and poor Uncle Andrew thought she wrote
Thursday. So on Thursday he drove all the way to Georgina's home
to be married. It was forty miles and a bitter cold day. But it
wasn't any colder than the reception he got from Georgina. She
was out in the porch, with her head tied up in a towel, picking
geese. She had been all ready Tuesday, and her friends and the
minister were there, and the wedding supper prepared. But there
was no bridegroom and Georgina was furious. Nothing Uncle Andrew
could say would appease her. She wouldn't listen to a word of
explanation, but told him to go, and never show his nose there
again. So poor Uncle Andrew had to go ruefully home, hoping that
she would relent later on, because he was really very much in love
with her."
"And did she?" queried Felicity.
"She did. Thirteen years exactly from that day they were married.
It took her just that long to forgive him."
"It took her just that long to find out she couldn't get anybody
else," said Dan, cynically.
CHAPTER XIV
A PRODIGAL RETURNS
Aunt Olivia and the Story Girl lived in a whirlwind of dressmaking
after that, and enjoyed it hugely. Cecily and Felicity also had
to have new dresses for the great event, and they talked of little
else for a fortnight. Cecily declared that she hated to go to
sleep because she was sure to dream that she was at Aunt Olivia's
wedding in her old faded gingham dress and a ragged apron.
"And no shoes or stockings," she added, "and I can't move, and
everyone walks past and looks at my feet."
"That's only in a dream," mourned Sara Ray, "but I may have to
wear my last summer's white dress to the wedding. It's too short,
but ma says it's plenty good for this summer. I'll be so
mortified if I have to wear it."
"I'd rather not go at all than wear a dress that wasn't nice,"
said Felicity pleasantly.
"I'd go to the wedding if I had to go in my school dress," cried
Sara Ray. "I've never been to anything. I wouldn't miss it for
the world."
"My Aunt Jane always said that if you were neat and tidy it didn't
matter whether you were dressed fine or not," said Peter.
"I'm sick and tired of hearing about your Aunt Jane," said
Felicity crossly.
Peter looked grieved but held his peace. Felicity was very hard
on him that spring, but his loyalty never wavered. Everything she
said or did was right in Peter's eyes.
"It's all very well to be neat and tidy," said Sara Ray, "but I
like a little style too."
"I think you'll find your mother will get you a new dress after
all," comforted Cecily. "Anyway, nobody will notice you because
everyone will be looking at the bride. Aunt Olivia will make a
lovely bride. Just think how sweet she'll look in a white silk
dress and a floating veil."
"She says she is going to have the ceremony performed out here in
the orchard under her own tree," said the Story Girl. "Won't that
be romantic? It almost makes me feel like getting married myself."
"What a way to talk," rebuked Felicity, "and you only fifteen."
"Lots of people have been married at fifteen," laughed the Story
Girl. "Lady Jane Gray was."
"But you are always saying that Valeria H. Montague's stories are
silly and not true to life, so that is no argument," retorted
Felicity, who knew more about cooking than about history, and
evidently imagined that the Lady Jane Gray was one of Valeria's
titled heroines.
The wedding was a perennial source of conversation among us in
those days; but presently its interest palled for a time in the
light of another quite tremendoushappening. One Saturday night
Peter's mother called to take him home with her for Sunday. She
had been working at Mr. James Frewen's, and Mr. Frewen was driving
her home. We had never seen Peter's mother before, and we looked
at her with discreetcuriosity. She was a plump, black-eyed
little woman, neat as a pin, but with a rather tired and care-worn
face that looked as if it should have been rosy and jolly. Life
had been a hard battle for her, and I rather think that her curly-
headed little lad was all that had kept heart and spirit in her.
Peter went home with her and returned Sunday evening. We were in
the orchard sitting around the Pulpit Stone, where we had,
according to the custom of the households of King, been learning
our golden texts and memory verses for the next Sunday School
lesson. Paddy, grown sleek and handsome again, was sitting on the
stone itself, washing his jowls.
Peter joined us with a very queer expression on his face. He
seemed bursting with some news which he wanted to tell and yet
hardly liked to.
"Why are you looking so mysterious, Peter?" demanded the Story Girl.
"What do you think has happened?" asked Peter solemnly.
"What has?"
"My father has come home," answered Peter.
The announcement produced all the sensation he could have wished.
We crowded around him in excitement.
"Peter! When did he come back?"
"Saturday night. He was there when ma and I got home. It give
her an awful turn. I didn't know him at first, of course."
"Peter Craig, I believe you are glad your father has come back,"
cried the Story Girl.
"'Course I'm glad," retorted Peter.
"And after you saying you didn't want ever to see him again," said
Felicity.
"You just wait. You haven't heard my story yet. I wouldn't have
been glad to see father if he'd come back the same as he went
away. But he is a changed man. He happened to go into a revival
meeting one night this spring and he got converted. And he's come
home to stay, and he says he's never going to drink another drop,
but he's going to look after his family. Ma isn't to do any more
washing for nobody but him and me, and I'm not to be a hired boy
any longer. He says I can stay with your Uncle Roger till the
fall 'cause I promised I would, but after that I'm to stay home
and go to school right along and learn to be whatever I'd like to
be. I tell you it made me feel queer. Everything seemed to be
upset. But he gave ma forty dollars--every cent he had--so I
- poetry [´pəuitri]
n.诗；诗意 (初中英语单词) - miserable [´mizərəbəl] a.悲惨的；可怜的 (初中英语单词)
- orchard [´ɔ:tʃəd] n.果园 (初中英语单词)
- triumph [´traiəmf] n.胜利 vi.得胜，战胜 (初中英语单词)
- whatever [wɔt´evə] pron.&a.无论什么 (初中英语单词)
- evident [´evidənt] a.明显的，明白的 (初中英语单词)
- amazement [ə´meizmənt] n.惊愕；惊奇 (初中英语单词)
- wedding [´wediŋ] n.婚礼，结婚 (初中英语单词)
- reading [´ri:diŋ] n.(阅)读；朗读；读物 (初中英语单词)
- furious [´fjuəriəs] a.狂怒的；猛烈的 (初中英语单词)
- forgive [fə´giv] vt.原谅，谅解，宽恕 (初中英语单词)
- ceremony [´seriməni] n.典礼；礼仪；客气 (初中英语单词)
- romantic [rəu´mæntik] a.传奇(式)的；浪漫的 (初中英语单词)
- presently [´prezəntli] ad.不久；目前 (初中英语单词)
- tremendous [tri´mendəs] a.可怕的；巨大的 (初中英语单词)
- working [´wə:kiŋ] a.工人的；劳动的 (初中英语单词)
- curiosity [,kjuəri´ɔsiti] n.好奇；奇事；珍品 (初中英语单词)
- mysterious [mi´stiəriəs] a.神秘的；难以理解的 (初中英语单词)
- sensation [sen´seiʃən] n.感觉；轰动；轰动一时 (初中英语单词)
- nonsense [´nɔnsəns] n.胡说 int.胡说!废话 (高中英语单词)
- perfectly [´pə:fiktli] ad.理想地；完美地 (高中英语单词)
- awfully [´ɔ:fuli] ad.令人畏惧地 (高中英语单词)
- finding [´faindiŋ] n.发现物；判断；结果 (高中英语单词)
- housekeeper [´haus,ki:pə] n.主妇，女管家 (高中英语单词)
- reception [ri´sepʃən] n.接待；欢迎；招待会 (高中英语单词)
- fortnight [´fɔ:tnait] n.两星期 (高中英语单词)
- ragged [´rægid] a.衣服破烂的 (高中英语单词)
- hearing [´hiəriŋ] n.听力；听证会；审讯 (高中英语单词)
- loyalty [´lɔiəlti] n.忠诚；忠心；忠实 (高中英语单词)
- saying [´seiŋ, ´sei-iŋ] n.言语；言论；格言 (高中英语单词)
- announcement [ə´naunsmənt] n.通告；宣布；言谈 (高中英语单词)
- crowded [´kraudid] a.充(拥)满了的 (高中英语单词)
- anticipation [æn,tisi´peiʃən] n.预期；预料；期望 (英语四级单词)
- gathering [´gæðəriŋ] n.集会，聚集 (英语四级单词)
- bridegroom [´braidgru:m] n.新郎 (英语四级单词)
- appease [ə´pi:z] vt.平息；使满足 (英语四级单词)
- whirlwind [´wə:l,wind] n.旋风；猛烈的势力 (英语四级单词)
- happening [´hæpəniŋ] n.事件，偶然发生的事 (英语四级单词)
- pulpit [´pulpit] n.讲坛 (英语四级单词)
- felicity [fi´lisiti] n.幸福；(措词)适当 (英语六级单词)
- exultation [egzʌl´teiʃən] n.欢腾，狂欢 (英语六级单词)
- flatly [´flætli] ad.平淡地；断然地 (英语六级单词)
- ontario [ɔn´tɛəriəu] n.安大略湖 (英语六级单词)
- relent [ri´lent] vi.发慈悲心；怜悯 (英语六级单词)
- prodigal [´prɔdigəl] a.浪费的 n.挥霍者 (英语六级单词)
- gingham [´giŋəm] n.方格花布，条格平布 (英语六级单词)
- perennial [pə´reniəl] a.长期的 n.多年生植物 (英语六级单词)
- discreet [di´skri:t] a.谨慎的，考虑周到的 (英语六级单词)
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章节正文
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