Monday, Prissy Purcell aint good to live with."
"When will be a convenient time for me to do my washing?"
"Ha' you things to wash?"
"Yes, I am sorry to say. You will lend me a tub, and a little soap, won't you?"
"I don' know whether I will or not. Suppos'n you've got the tub, do you know how to get your things clean? I don' believe you never done it."
"No, I have never done it. But I can learn."
"I guess it'd be more trouble to learn you, than to do the things. You fetch 'em here, and I'll do 'em my own self."
"But I cannot pay you a cent for it, Mrs. Purcell; not now, at least. You'll have to take it on trust, if you do this for me."
"All right," said Prissy. "You go fetch the things, 'cause I'm bound to have my tubs out o' the way before dinner."
Rotha obeyed, wondering and thankful. The woman was entirely changed towards her; abrupt and unconventional, certainly, in manner and address, but nevertheless shewing real care and kindness; and shewing moreover what a very handsome woman she could be. Her smile was frank and sweet; her face when at rest very striking for its fine contour; and her figure was stately. Moreover, she was an uncommonly good cook; so that the viands, though plain, were made both wholesome and appetizing. In that respect Rotha did not suffer; the exclusive companionship of two such ignorant and unrefined persons was a grievance on the other hand which pressed harder every day.
She kept herself busy. When her dresses were done, she began to spend hours a day out of doors.
The sweet things in the flower borders which were choked and hindered by wild growth and weeds, moved her sympathy; she got a hoe and rake and fork from Mr. Purcell and set about a systematic clearing of the ground. It was a spacious curve from one gate to the other; and all the way went the flower border at one side of the road, and all the way on the other side, except where the house came in. Rotha could do but a little piece a day; but the beauty and pleasantness of that lured her on to spend as much time in the work as she could match with the necessary strength. It was so pretty to see the flowers in good circumstances again! Here a sweet Scotch rose, its graceful growth covered with wild-looking, fair blossoms; here a bed of lily of the valley; close by a carpet of lovely moss pink, which when cleared of encumbering weedy growth that half hid it, fairly greeted Rotha like a smile whenever she went out. And periwinkle also ran in a carpet over the ground, green with purple stars; daffodils were passing away, but pleasant yet to see; and little tufts of polyanthus and here and there a red tulip shewed now in all their delicate beauty, scarcely seen before. Hypericum came out gloriously, when an intrusive and overgrown lilac bush was cut away; and syringa was almost as good as jessamine, Rotha thought; little red poppies began to lift their slender heads, and pansies appeared, and June roses were getting ready to bloom. And as long as Rotha could busy herself in the garden work, she was happy; she forgot all that she had to trouble her; even when Prissy Purcell came out to see and criticise what was going on.
"What are you doin' all that for?" the latter asked one day, after standing some time watching Rotha's work. "Are you thinkin' Mis' Busby'll come by and by?"
"My aunt? No indeed!" said Rotha looking up with a flush. "I have no idea when I shall see my aunt again; and certainly I do not expect to see her here."
"Somebody else, then?"
"Why no! There is nobody to come."
"Didn't you never have a beau?" said Prissy Purcell, stooping down and speaking lower.
"A _what?_" said Rotha turning to her.
"A beau. A young man. Most girls does, when they're as good-lookin' as you be. You know what I mean. Didn't you never keep company with no one?"
"Keep company!" said Rotha, half vexed and half amused. "Mrs. Purcell, I was a little girl only just a few days ago."
"But you're as handsome as a red rose," insisted Mrs. Purcell. "Didn't you never yet see nobody you liked more 'n common?"
Rotha looked at her again, and then went on forking up her ground. "Yes," she said; "but people a great deal older than myself, Mrs. Purcell. Now see how that beautiful stem of white lilies is choked and covered up. A little while longer and we shall have a lovely head of white blossom bells there."
"Older 'n your own self?" repeated Mrs. Purcell softly.
"What?--O yes!" said Rotha laughing; "a great deal older than myself. Not what you are thinking about. I have been a school girl till I came here, Mrs. Purcell."
"Then Mis' Busby didn't send you here to keep you away from no one?"
Again Rotha looked in the woman's face, a half startled look this time. "No one, that I know," she answered. But a strange, doubtful feeling therewith came over her, and for a moment she stood still, with her eye going off to the gate and the road, musing. If it were so!--and a terrible impatience swelled in her breast. Ay, if it _were_ so, there was no help for her. She could not get away, and nobody could come to her, because nobody knew and nobody would know where she was. Even supposing that so unimportant a person as poor little Rotha Carpenter were not already and utterly forgotten. That was most probable, and anything different was not to be assumed. Continued care for her would have forwarded some testimonials of its existence, in letters or messages. Who should say that it had not? was the next instant thought. They would have come to her aunt, and her aunt would never have delivered them.
This sort of speculation, natural enough, is besides very exasperating. It broke up Rotha's peace for that day and took all the pleasure out of her garden work. She went on pulling up weeds and forking up the soil, but she did the one with a will and the other with a vengeance; staid out longer than usual, and came in tired.
"Joe," said Mrs. Purcell meanwhile in the solitude of her kitchen, "I'll bet you a cookie, Mis' Busby's up to some tricks!"
CHAPTER XXVII.
INQUIRIES.
The weeks went on now without any change but the changes of the season. Rotha's flower borders bloomed up into beauty; somewhat old-fashioned beauty, but none the worse for that. Hypericum and moss pink faded away; the roses blossomed and fell; sweet English columbines lifted their sonsy heads, pale blue and pale rose, and dark purple; poppies sprang up, as often in the gravel road as in the beds; lilies came and went; the laburnum shook out its clusters of gold; old honeysuckles freshened out and filled all the air with the fragrance of their very sweet flowers. Rotha's tulip tree came into blossom, and was a beautiful object from her high window which looked right into the heart of it. Rotha grew very fond of that tulip tree. There were fruits too. The door in the fence, which she had noticed on her first expedition to the barnyard, was found to be the entrance to a large kitchen garden. Truly, Joe Purcell cultivated few vegetables; cabbages however were in number and variety, also potatoes, and that resource of the poor, onions.
The fruits were little cared for; still, there were numbers of purple raspberry bushes trained along the fence, which yielded a good supply of berries; there were strawberry beds, grown up with weeds, where good picking was to found if any one wanted to take the trouble. Gooseberries were in great profusion, and currants in multitude. Old cherry trees, which shaded parts of the garden disadvantageously for the under growth, yielded a magnificent harvest of Maydukes, white hearts and ox hearts; and pear trees and mulberry trees were not wanting, promising later crops. Mr. and Mrs. Purcell had paid little attention to these treasures; Joe hadn't time, he said; and Prissy wouldn't be bothered with gathering berries after all the rest she had to do. Rotha made it her own particular task to supply the little family with fruit; and it was one of the pieces of work she most enjoyed. Very early, most often, while the sun's rays yet came well aslant, she set off for the old garden with her basket on her arm; and brought in such loads of nature's riches that Joe and his wife declared they had never lived so in their lives. It was lonely but sweet work to Rotha to gather the fruit. The early summer mornings are some of the most wonderful times of the year, for the glory and fulness and freshness of natu
re; the spirit of life and energy abroad is catching; and sometimes Rotha's heart sang with the birds. For she had a happy faculty of living in the present moment, and throwing herself wholly into the work she might be about, forgetting care and trouble for the time. Other mornings and evenings, she would almost forget the present in thoughts that roamed the past and the future. Pushing her hand among the dewy tufts of strawberry plants to seek the red fruit which had grown large under the shadow of them, her mind would go wandering and searching among old experiences to find out the hidden motives and reasons which had been at work, or the hidden issues