Who Are Happiest? and Other Stories Part 10

"She ought to have leather boots, sister," said the old gentleman earnestly. "Stout leather boots. Nothing less can be called a protection for the feet in damp, wintry weather."

"Leather boots!"

Mrs. Walton seemed little less surprised than her daughter had been at the same suggestion.

"It is a damp, cold day," said Uncle Thomas.

"True, but Lizzy was warmly clad. I am very particular on this point, knowing the delicacy of her const.i.tution. She never goes out in winter-time without her furs."

"Furs for the neck and hands, and lasting shoes and thin cotton stockings for the feet!"

"Thick-soled boots," said Mrs. Walton, quickly.

"There are thick-soled boots."

And the old gentleman thrust out both of his feet, well clad in heavy calfskin.

Mrs. Walton could not keep from laughing, as the image of her daughter's feet, thus encased, presented itself to her mind.

"Perhaps," said Uncle Thomas, just a little captiously, "Lizzy has a stronger const.i.tution than I have, and can bear a great deal more. For my part, I would almost as lief take a small dose of poison as go out, on a day like this, with nothing on my feet but thin cotton stockings and lasting shoes."

"Boots," interposed Mrs. Walton.

"I call them boots," said the old gentleman, glancing down again at his stout double-soled calfskins.

But it was of no avail that Uncle Thomas entered his protest against thin shoes, when, in the estimation of city ladies, they were "thick."

And so, in due time, he saw his error and gave up the argument.

When Lizzy came down from her room, her colour was still high--much higher than usual, and her voice, as she spoke, was a very little veiled. But she was in fine spirits, and talked away merrily. Uncle Thomas did not, however, fail to observe that every little while she cleared her throat with a low _h-h-em_; and he knew that this was occasioned by an increased secretion of mucus by the lining membrane of the throat, consequent upon slight inflammation. The cause he attributed to thin shoes and wet feet; and he was not far wrong. The warm boa and m.u.f.f were not sufficient safeguards for the throat when the feet were exposed to cold and wet.

That evening, at tea-time, Mr. Walton observed that Lizzy eat scarcely any thing, and that her face was a little pale. He also noted an expression that indicated either mental or bodily suffering--not severe, but enough to make itself visible.

"Are you not well?" he asked.

"Oh yes, very well," was the quick reply.

"You are fatigued, then?"

"A little."

"Go early to bed. A night's sleep will restore all."

Mr. Walton said this, rather because he hoped than believed that it would be so.

"Oh yes. A night's rest is all I want," replied Lizzy.

But she erred in this.

"Where is Lizzy?" asked Mr. Walton, on meeting his sister-in-law at the breakfast-table on the next morning. The face of the latter wore a sober expression.

"Not very well, I am sorry to say," was the answer.

"What ails her?"

"She has taken a bad cold; I hardly know how--perhaps from getting her feet wet yesterday; and is so hoa.r.s.e this morning that she can scarcely speak above a whisper."

"I feared as much," was the old gentleman's reply. "Have you sent for your doctor?"

"Not yet."

"Then do so immediately. A const.i.tution like her's will not bear the shock of a bad cold, unless it is met instantly by appropriate remedies."

In due time the family physician came. He looked serious when he saw the condition of his patient.

"To what are you indebted for this?" he asked.

"To thin shoes," was the prompt reply of the uncle, who was present.

"I have warned you against this more than once," said the doctor, in a tone of gentle reproof.

"Oh, no; brother is mistaken," spoke up Mrs. Walton. "She wore thick-soled shoes. But the streets, as you know, were very wet yesterday, and it was impossible to keep the feet dry."

"If she had worn good, stout, sensible leather boots, as she ought to have done, the water would never have touched her feet," said Mr.

Walton.

"You had on your gums?" remarked the physician, turning to Lizzy.

"They are so clumsy and unsightly--I never like to wear them," answered the patient, in a husky whisper, and then she coughed hoa.r.s.ely.

The doctor made no reply to this, but looked more serious.

Medicine was prescribed and taken; and, for two weeks, the physician was in daily attendance. The inflammation first attacked Lizzy's throat--descended and lingered along the bronchial tubes, and finally fixed itself upon her lungs. From this dangerous place it was not dislodged, as an acute disease, until certain const.i.tutional predispositions had been aroused into activity. In fact, the latent seeds of that fatal disease, known as consumption, were at this time vivified. Dormant they might have lain for years--perhaps through life--if all exciting causes had been shunned. Alas! the principle of vitality was now awakened.

Slowly, very slowly, did strength return to the body of Miss Walton. Not until the spring opened was she permitted to go forth into the open air.

Then her pale cheek, and slow, feeble steps, showed too plainly the fearful shock her system had received.

A week or two after his remonstrance with his niece about her thin shoes, Mr. Walton returned home. Several letters received by him during the winter advised him of the state of Lizzy's health. In the spring her mother wrote to him--

"Lizzy is much better. The warm weather, I trust, will completely restore her."

But the old gentleman knew better. He had been a deeply interested party in a case like her's before. He _knew_ that summer, with its warm and fragrant airs, would not bring back the bloom to her cheeks. In July came another epistle.

"The hot weather is so debilitating for Lizzy, that I am about taking her to the sea-sh.o.r.e."

Uncle Thomas sighed as he read this, permitted the letter to droop from before his eyes, and sat for some time gazing upon vacancy. Far back his thoughts had wandered, and before the eyes of his mind was the frail, fading form of a beloved sister, who had, years before, left her place and her mission upon the earth, and pa.s.sed up higher.

"The doctor says that I must go South with Lizzy," wrote Mrs. Walton early in December, "and spend the winter. We leave for Charleston next Tuesday, and may pa.s.s over to Havana."