Fashion and Famine Part 55

"There--there. You will never get on alone!" cried the matron, laughing, while she turned a heavy key bright with constant use in its lock, and opened the grated door. "Come, now, I and Georgie will lead the way."

Julia stood in the outer pa.s.sage while the heavy door was secured again, her cheeks all in a glow of joy, her limbs trembling with impatience.

Little George, too, seemed to partake of her eagerness; he ran up and down in the bright atmosphere like a bird revelling in the first gleams of morning. He seized the matron by her dress as she locked the door, and shaking his soft curls gleefully, attempted to draw her away. His sympathy was so graceful and cheering that it made both Julia and the matron smile, and though they mounted the stairs rapidly, he ran up and down a dozen steps while they ascended half the number.

Neither Julia nor her grandmother spoke when they met, but there was joy upon their faces, and the most touching affection in the eyes that constantly turned upon each other.

"And now," said old Mrs. Gray, coming forward with her usual bland kindness, "as neither of you seem to have much to say just now, what if Robert and I come in for a little notice?"

Julia looked up as the kind voice reached her, and there, half hidden by the portly figure of his aunt, she saw Robert Otis looking upon her with the very expression that had haunted her dream that night, in the prison. Their eyes met, the white lids fell over hers as if weighed down by the lashes, through which the l.u.s.trous eyes, kindling beneath, gleamed like diamond flashes. She forgot Mrs. Gray, everything but the glory of her dream, the power of those eloquent eyes.

"And so you will not speak to me--you will not look at me!" said the huckster woman, a little surprised by this reception, but speaking with great cordiality, for she was not one of those very troublesome persons who fancy affronts in everything.

"Not speak to you!" cried the young girl, starting from her pleasant reverie to the scarcely less pleasant reality. "Oh! Mrs. Gray, you knew better!"

"Of course I did," cried the good woman, with a laugh that made her neckerchief tremble, and she shook the little hand that Julia gave with grateful warmth, over and over again. "Come, now, get your bonnet and things."

Julia looked at the matron.

"But I am a prisoner!"

"Nothing of the sort. I've bought you out; given bonds, or something.

Robert can tell you all about it; but the long and short is, you're free as a blackbird. Can go home with me--grandma too, I'm old--I'm getting lonesome--want her to keep house when I'm in market, and you to take care of her."

"But grandfather--where is he? Oh! where is he?"

Mrs. Gray's countenance fell, and she seemed ready to burst into tears.

"Don't ask me; Robert must tell you about that. I did my best; offered to mortgage the whole farm to those crusty old judges, but it was of no use."

"We couldn't leave him here alone!" said Julia, with one of her faint, beautiful smiles.

Robert Otis came forward now.

"It would be useless for either of you to remain here on his account, even if the laws would permit it. You will be allowed to see him quite as frequently if you live with my aunt, and with freedom you may find means of aiding him."

Julia raised her eyes to his face; her glance, instead of embarra.s.sing, seemed to animate the young man.

"It admits of no choice," he added, with a smile. "Your grandfather himself desires that you should accept my aunt's offer, and she--bless her--it would break her heart to be refused."

"Grandfather desires it--Mr. Otis desires it. Shall we not go, grandma?"

"Certainly, child; he wishes it, that is enough; but I shall see him every day, you remember, ma'am. Every day when you come over, I come also. It was a promise!"

"Do exactly as you please--that's my idea of helping folks," answered Mrs. Gray, to whom the latter part of this address had been made. "The kindness that forces people to be happy, according to a rule laid down by the self-conceit of a person who happens to have the means you want, is the worst kind of slavery, because it is a slavery for which you are expected to be very grateful. I have heard brother Jacob say this a hundred times, and so have you, Robert."

"Uncle Jacob never said anything that was not wise and generous in his life!" answered the young man, with kindling eyes.

"If ever an angel lived on earth, he is one!" rejoined Mrs. Gray, looking around upon her audience, as if to impress them fully with this estimate of her brother's character.

A sparkling smile broke over Robert's face.

"Well, aunt, I hope you never fancied the angels dressing exactly after Uncle Jacob's fas.h.i.+on!" he said, casting a look full of comic meaning on the old lady.

"Oh, Robert, you are always laughing at me!" replied the good-humored lady, turning from the young man to her other auditors. "It was always so; the most mischievous little rogue you ever saw. I thought he had grown out of it for a while, but nature is nature the world through."

Robert blushed. His aunt's encomiums did not quite please him, for the character of a mischievous boy was not that which he was desirous of maintaining just then. In the dark eyes turned so earnestly upon his face, he read a depth and earnestness of feeling that made his attempt at cheerfulness seem almost sacrilegious. Julia saw this, and smiled softly. She had not intended to rebuke him by the seriousness of her face, and her look expressed this more eloquently than words could have done.

When the heart is sorrowful, there are times when cheerfulness in those around us has a healthful influence. The joyous laugh, the pleasant word may fall harshly upon a riven heart at first, but imperceptibly they become familiar again, and at length sweep aside the gloom with which the mourner loves to envelope himself. Give the soul plenty of suns.h.i.+ne, and it grows vigorous to withstand the storm. When grief is pampered and cultivated as a duty, it often degenerates into intense selfishness. Sorrow has its vanity as well as joy.

CHAPTER XXVI.

MRS. GRAY AND THE PRISON WOMAN.

Come with thy warm and genial heart-- Bring suns.h.i.+ne to the prison cell; True goodness, without book or chart, Sees the right path, and treads it well.

It was decided that Julia and her grandmother should accompany Mrs. Gray at once to her old homestead on Long Island. They were about to leave the room, when Julia remembered, with a pang, that she must surrender the little boy to his mother again. Her cheek blanched at the thought.

The child had kept by her side since she first entered the room, and now grasped a fold of her dress in his hand almost fiercely. His cheeks were flushed, and his dimpled chin was beginning to quiver, as if he were ready to burst into tears at some wrong premeditated against him.

Tears swelled into Julia's eyes as she bent them upon the child.

"What shall I do? He seems to know that we are about to leave him," she murmured.

"Come with me, I will take you to mamma," said the matron, laying her hand on his head. "There, Georgie, be a little gentleman, dear!"

The tears that had been swelling in the little fellow's bosom broke forth now. He began to sob violently, and shaking off the matron's hand, clung to his new friend.

"Take me up, take me up--I will go too," he sobbed, lifting his little hands and his tearful face to the young girl.

Julia took him in her arms, and putting the curls back from his forehead, pressed a kiss upon it.

"What can I do?" she said, turning her eyes unconsciously upon Robert Otis.

Robert smiled and shook his head; but old Mrs. Gray, whose heart was forever creaming over with the milk of human kindness, came forward at once.

"What can you do? Why, take him along; the homestead is large enough for us all. It will seem like old times to have a little shaver like that running around, now that Robert is away."

"But he has a mother in the prison," said the matron--"a strange, fierce woman, who, somehow or other, has persuaded the authorities to leave him with her for the few days she will be here."

"His mother a prisoner, poor thing. Let me go to her, I dare say she will be glad enough to get a nice home for the boy," answered the good woman, hopefully.

"I'm afraid not," was the matron's reply; "she seems to have a sort of fierce love for the child, and is very jealous that he may become attached to some one beside herself. It was from this feeling she forced him from the poor woman who took him to nurse when only a few weeks old.

He was very fond of her, and always fancies that any new face must be hers. I wonder she submits to his fancy for this young girl!"

"But it's wrong, it's abominable to keep the little fellow here. I'll tell her so, I'll expostulate," persisted Mrs. Gray; "just let me talk with this woman--just let me into her cell, madam."