Chapter XII. "HOME WAS NEVER LIKE THIS"
The roan ponies dashed through the slab settlement, past the blacksmithand wheelwright shop and the ugly red building Tom told Nan was theschool, and reached a large, sprawling, unpainted dwelling on theoutskirts of the village.
There were barns back of the Sherwood house; there was no fence betweenthe yard and the road, the windows of the house stared out upon thepasserby, blindless, and many of them without shades. There was such apainful newness about the building that it seemed to Nan the carpentersmust have just packed their tools and gone, while the painters had notyet arrived.
"Well! Here we are," announced Mr. Henry Sherwood, as Tom held in thestill eager ponies. He stepped out and offered Nan his hand. "Homeagain, little girl. I reckon Kate will be mighty glad to see you, thatshe will."
Nan leaped out and began to stamp her feet on the hard snow, while UncleHenry lifted out the trunk and bags. Just as the ponies sprang awayagain, a door in the ugly house opened and a tall, angular woman lookedforth.
"Bring her in, Hen!" she cried, in a high-pitched voice. "I want to seeher."
Nan went rather timidly up the path. Her aunt was almost as tall as herhusband. She was very bony and was flat-chested and unlovely in everyway. That is, so it seemed, when the homesick girl raised her eyes toAunt Kate's face.
That face was as brown as sole-leather, and the texture of the skinseemed leathery as well. There was a hawklike nose dominating theunfeminine face. The shallows below the cheekbones were deep, asthough she had suffered the loss of her back molars. The eyebrows werestraggly; the eyes themselves of a pale, watery blue; the mouth a thinline when her colorless lips were closed; and her chin was as square anddetermined as Uncle Henry's own.
As Nan approached she saw something else about this unlovely woman. Onher neck was a great, livid scar, of a hand's breadth, and which lookedlike a scald, or burn. No attempt was made to conceal this unsightlyblemish.
Indeed, there was nothing about Aunt Kate Sherwood suggesting asoftening of her hard lines. Her plain, ugly print dress was cut low atthe throat, and had no collar or ruff to hide the scar. Nan's gaze wasfastened on that blemish before she was half way to the door, and shecould see nothing else at first.
The girl fought down a physical shudder when Aunt Kate's clawlike handsseized her by both shoulders, and she stooped to kiss the visitor.
"Welcome, dear Nannie," her sharp voice said, and Nan thought that, withease, one might have heard her in the middle of the village.
But when Aunt Kate's lips touched the girl's forehead they wereWarm, and soft as velvet. Her breath was sweet. There was a wholesomecleanliness about her person that pleased Nan. The ugly dress wasspotless and beautifully laundered. She had a glimpse of the unplasteredkitchen and saw a row of copper pots on the shelf over the dresser thatwere scoured to dazzling brightness. The boards of the floor werewhite as milk. The big, patent range glistened with polish, and itsnickel-work was rubbed till it reflected like a mirror.
"Welcome, my dear!" said Aunt Kate again. "I hope you will be happywhile you stay with us."
Happy! With Momsey and Papa Sherwood on the ocean, and the "littledwelling in amity" closed and deserted? Nan feared she would break downand cry.
Her Aunt Kate left her to herself a minute just then that she mightovercome this weakness. Uncle Henry came up the path with the bags,smiling broadly.
"Well, old woman!" he said heartily.
"Well, old man!" she returned.
And then suddenly, Nan Sherwood had a new vision. She was used toseeing her pretty mother and her handsome father display their mutualaffection; it had not seemed possible that rough, burly Uncle Henry andugly Aunt Kate could feel the same degree of affection for each other.
Uncle Henry dropped the bags. Aunt Kate seemed to be drawn toward himwhen he put out his hands. Nan saw their lips meet, and then the giantgently, almost reverently, kissed the horrid scar on Aunt Kate's neck.
"Here's Nan!" cried the big lumberman jovially. "The pluckiest andsmartest little girl in seven states! Take her in out of the cold, Kate.She's not used to our kind of weather, and I have been watching for thefrost flowers to bloom on her pretty face all the way from the forks."
The woman drew Nan into the warm kitchen. Uncle Henry followed in aminute with the trunk.
"Where'll I put this box, Kate?" he asked. "I reckon you've fixed upsome cozy place for her?"
"The east room, Hen," Aunt Kate replied. "The sun lies in theremornings. I took the new spring rocker out of the parlor, and with thewhite enameled bedstead you bought in Chicago, and the maple bureauwe got of that furniture pedlar, and the best drugget to lay over thecarpet I reckon Nannie has a pretty bedroom."
Meanwhile Nan stared openly around the strange kitchen. The joists andrafters were uncovered by laths or plaster. Muslin, that had once beenwhite, was tacked to the beams overhead for a ceiling. The smoke fromthe cookstove had stained it to a deep brown color above the stove andto a lighter, meerschaum shade in the corners.
The furniture was of the rudest plainest kind much of it evidentlyhome-made. Uncle Henry was not unhandy with tools. She learned, later,that he and the boys had practically built the house by themselves. Theywere finishing it inside, as they had time. In some of the rooms theinside window and door frames were not yet in place.
There was an appetizing smell from the pots upon the stove, and thelong table was set for dinner. They would not let Nan change from hertraveling dress before sitting down to the table. Tom and Rafe came inand all three men washed at the long, wooden sink.
Rafe was of slighter build than his brother, and a year or more younger.He was not so shy as Tom, either; and his eyes sparkled with mischief.Nan found that she could not act "grown up" with her Cousin Rafe.
The principal dish for dinner was venison stew, served with vegetablesand salt-rising bread. There was cake, too, very heavy and indigestible,and speckled with huckleberries that had been dried the fall previous.Aunt Kate was no fancy cook; but appetite is the best sauce, after all,and Nan had her share of that condiment.
During the meal there was not much conversation save about the wonderfulfortune that had fallen to Nan's mother and the voyage she and herhusband were taking to Scotland to secure it. Nan learned, too, thatUncle Henry had telegraphed from Tillbury of Nan's coming to Pine Camp,and consequently Aunt Kate was able to prepare for her.
And that the good woman had done her best to make a nest for her littleniece in the ugly house, Nan was assured. After dinner she insisted uponthe girl's going to the east room to change her dress and lie down. Thecomparison between this great chamber and Nan's pretty room at home wasappalling.
The room had been plastered, but the plaster was of a gray color andunfinished. The woodwork was painted a dusty, brick red with mineralpaint. The odd and ugly pieces of furniture horrified Nan. The druggeton the floor only served to hide a part of the still more atrociouslypatterned carpet. The rocking chair complained if one touched it. Thetop of the huge maple dresser was as bald as one's palm.
Nan sat down on the unopened trunk when her aunt had left her. Shedabbed her eyes with her handkerchief. Home certainly was never likethis! She did not see how she was ever going to be able to stand it.