The Letter of Credit

Susan Warner (1819-1885), A letter of credit (1881), 1882 edition

Produced by Daniel FROMONT

Note from the transcriber: a very important text for the study of
Susan Warner's "Queechy".

THE LETTER OF CREDIT.

BY THE AUTHOR OF "WILD, WILD WORLD."

I. THE END OF A COIL. 12mo. $1.75.

"Miss Warner has added another pure and beautiful picture to the gallery that has given so much pleasure to such great numbers. All her pictures are bright and warm with the blessedness of true love and true religion. We do not wonder that they receive so wide a welcome, and we wish sincerely that only such stories were ever written."—N. Y. Observer.

II. MY DESIRE. 12mo. $1.75.

"Miss Warner possesses in a remarkable degree the power of vividly describing New England village life, the power of making her village people walk and talk for the benefit of her readers in all the freshness of their clear-cut originality. She has an ample fund of humor, a keen sense of the ridiculous, and a rare faculty of painting homely truths in homely but singularly felicitous phrases."—Philadelphia Times.

III. THE LETTER OF CREDIT. 12mo. $1.75.

IV. PINE NEEDLES. A Tale. 12mo. $1.50.

V. THE OLD HELMET. A Tale. 12mo. $2.25.

VI. MELBOURNE HOUSE. A Tale. 12mo. $2.00.

VII. THE KING'S PEOPLE. 5 vols. $7.00.

VIII. THE SAY AND DO SERIES. 6 vols. $7.50.

IX. A STORY OF SMALL BEGINNINGS. 4 vols. $5.00.

By Miss Anna Warner.

THE BLUE FLAG AND THE CLOTH OF GOLD $1.25

STORIES OF VINEGAR HILL 3 vols. 3.00

ELLEN MONTGOMERY'S BOOKSHELF 5 vols. 5.00

LITTLE JACK'S FOUR LESSONS 2.50

ROBERT CARTER AND BROTHERS,

NEW YORK.

THE

LETTER OF CREDIT.

BY THE AUTHOR OF

"THE WIDE, WIDE WORLD."

…."The bewildering masquerade of life,
Where strangers walk as friends, and friends as strangers."
LONGFELLOW.

NEW YORK: ROBERT CARTER AND BROTHERS,

530 BROADWAY. 1882.

Copyright, 1881,
BY ROBERT CARTER & BROTHERS.

CAMBRIDGE: PRESS OF JOHN WILSON AND SON.

ST. JOHNLAND STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY, SUFFOLK CO., N. Y.

_NOTE.

The following story, like its predecessors, "The End of a Coil," "My Desire," and "Diana," is a record of facts. For the characters and the coloring, of course, I am responsible; but the turns of the story, even in detail, are almost all utterly true.

S. W.

Martlaer's Rock,
Sept. 12, 1881_.

CONTENTS.

CHAP.

I. THE LETTER

II. MOVING

III. JANE STREET

IV. A VISITER

V. PRIVATE TUITION

VI. A LEGACY

VII. MENTAL PHILOSOPHY

VIII. STATEN ISLAND

IX. FORT WASHINGTON

X. L'HOMME PROPOSE

XI. MRS. BUSBY

XII. MRS. BUSBY'S HOUSE

XIII. NOT DRESSED

XIV. IN SECLUSION

XV. MRS. MOWBRAY

XVI. SCHOOL

XVII. BAGS AND BIBLES

XVIII. FLINT AND STEEL

XIX. A NEW DEPARTURE

XX. STOCKINGS

XXI. EDUCATION

XXII. A CHANGE

XXIII. TANFIELD

XXIV. THE PURCELLS

XXV. ROTHA'S REFUGE

XXVI. ROTHA'S WORK

XXVII. INQUIRIES

XXVIII. DISCOVERIES

XXIX. PERPLEXITIES

XXX. DOWN HILL

XXXI. DISCUSSIONS

XXXII. END OF SCHOOL TERM

THE LETTER OF CREDIT.

CHAPTER I.

THE LETTER.

"Mother, I wonder how people do, when they are going to write a book?"

"Do?" repeated her mother.

"Yes. I wonder how they begin."

"I suppose they have something to tell; and then they tell it," said simple Mrs. Carpenter.

"No, no, but I mean a story."

"What story have you got there?"

The mother was shelling peas; the daughter, a girl of twelve years old perhaps, was sitting on the floor at her feet, with an octavo volume in her lap. The floor was clean enough to sit upon; clean enough almost to eat off; it was the floor of the kitchen of a country farmhouse.

"This is the 'Talisman,'" the girl answered her mother's question. "O mother, when I am old enough, I should like to write stories!"

"Why?"

"I should think it would be so nice. Why, mother, one could imagine oneself anything."

"Could you?" said her mother. "I never imagined myself anything but what
I was."

"Ah, but perhaps you and I are different."

Which was undoubtedly the fact, as any stander by might have seen with half an eye. Good types both of them, too. The mother fair, delicate featured, with sweet womanly eyes, must have been exceedingly pretty in her young days; she was pretty now; but the face shewed traces of care and was worn with life-work. While she talked and now and then looked at her daughter, her fingers were untiringly busy with the peas and peas pods and never paused for a minute. The girl on the floor did not look like her mother. She was dark eyed and dark haired; with a dark complexion too, which at present was not fine; and the eyes, large and handsome eyes, revealed a fire and intensity and mobility of nature which was very diverse from the woman's gentle strength. Mrs. Carpenter might be intense too, after her fashion; but it was the fashion of the proverbial still waters that run deep. And I do not mean that there was any shallowness about the girl's nature; though assuredly the placidity would be wanting.

"I wish your father would forbid you to read stories," Mrs. Carpenter went on.

"Why, mother?"

"I don't believe they are good for you."

"But what harm should they do me?"

"Life is not a story. I don't want you to think it is."

"Why shouldn't it be? Perhaps my life will be a story, mother. I think it will," said the girl slowly. "I shouldn't want my life to be always like this."

"Are you not happy?"

"O yes, mother! But then, by and by, I should like to be a princess, or to have adventures, and see things; like the people in stories."

"You will never be a princess, my child. You are a poor farmer's daughter. You had better make up your mind to it, and try to be the best thing you can in the circumstances."

"You mean, do my duty and shell peas?" asked the girl somewhat doubtfully, looking at her mother's fingers and the quick stripped pea pods passing through them. "Is father poor, mother?"

"Yes."

"He has a good farm, he says."

"Yes, but it is encumbered heavily." And Mrs. Carpenter sighed. Rotha had often heard her mother sigh so. It was a breath with a burden.

"I don't know what you mean by 'encumbered.'"

"It is not needful you should know, just yet."

"But I should like to know, mother. Won't you tell me?"

"It is heavily mortgaged. And that you do not understand. Never mind. He has a great deal of money to pay out for it every year the interest on the mortgages and that keeps us poor."

"Why must he pay it?"

"Because the farm is pledged for the debt; and if the interest, this yearly money, were not paid, the farm itself would go."

"Go? How?"

"Be sold. For the money due on it."

There was silence awhile, during which only the pea pods rustled and fell; then the girl asked,

"What should we do then, mother, if the farm was sold?"

"I do not know." The words came faint.

"Does it trouble you, mother?"

"It need not trouble you, Rotha. It cannot happen unless the Lord will; and that is enough. Now you may carry these pea pods out and give them to the pigs."

"Mother," said Rotha as she slowly rose and laid away her book, "all you say makes me wish more than ever that I were a princess, or something."

"You may be something," said Mrs. Carpenter laughing slightly, but with a very sweet merriment. "Now take away this basket."

Rotha stooped for the basket, and then stood still, looking out of the window. Across the intervening piece of kitchen garden, rows of peas and tufts of asparagus greenery, her eye went to the road, where a buggy had just stopped.

"Maybe something is going to happen now," she said. "Who is that, mother? There is somebody getting out of a wagon and tying his horse;—now he is coming in. It is 'Siah Barker, mother."

Mrs. Carpenter paused to look out of the window, and then hastily throwing her peas into the pot of boiling water, went herself to the door. A young countryman met her there, with a whip in his hand.

"Mornin', Mis' Carpenter. Kin you help the distressed?"

"What's the matter, 'Siah?"

"Shot if I know; but he's took pretty bad."

"Who, pray?"

"Wall, I skurce can tell that. He's an Englisher—come to our place this mornin' and axed fur a horse and wagon to carry him to Rochester; and he's got so fur,—that's two miles o' the way,—and he can't go no furder, I guess. He's took powerful bad."

"Ill, is he?"

"Says so. And he looks it."

"Cannot go on to Rochester?

"It's fifteen mile, Mis' Carpenter. I wouldn't like to be the man to drive him. He can't go another foot, he says. He was took quite sudden."

"Cannot you turn about and carry him back to Medwayville?"

"Now, Mis' Carpenter, you're a Christian, and a soft-hearted one, we all know. Can't you let him come in and rest a bit? Mebbe you could give him sunthin' that would set him up. You understand doctorin', fust-rate."

Mrs. Carpenter looked grave, considered.

"Is this your idea, or the stranger's, 'Siah?"

"It's his'n, ef it's anybody's in partickler. He told me to set him down some'eres, for he couldn't hold out to go on nohow; and then he seed this house, and he made me stop. He's a sick man, I tell you."

"What's the matter with him?"

"Wall, it's sunthin' in his insides, I guess. He don't say nothin', but he gits as white as a piece o' chalk, and then purple arter it."

Mrs. Carpenter made no more delay, but bade 'Siah fetch the sick man in; and herself hastily threw open the windows of the "spare room" and put sheets on the bed. She had time for all her preparations, for the bringing the stranger to the house was a work of some difficulty, and not accomplished without the help of one of the hired men about the farm. When he came, he was far too ill to give any account of himself; his dress proclaimed him a well-to-do man, and belonging to the better classes; that was all they knew.

As Mrs. Carpenter came out from seeing the stranger put to bed in the spare room, her husband came in from the field. An intellectual looking man, in spite of his farmer's dress, and handsome; but thin, worn, with an undue flush on his cheek, and a cough that sounded hollow. He was very like his little daughter, who instantly laid hold of him.

"Father, father! something has happened. Guess what. There's a sick man stopped here, and he is in the spare room, and we don't know the least bit who he is; only 'Siah Barker said he was English, or an 'Englisher,' he said. We don't know a bit who he is; and his clothes are very nice, like a gentleman, and his valise is a beautiful, handsome leather one."

"You use rather more adjectives than necessary, Rotha."

"But, father, that is something to happen, isn't it?"

"You speak as if you were glad of it."

"I am not glad the man is sick. I am just glad to have something happen.
Things never do happen here."

"I am afraid your mother will hardly feel as much pleased as you do. Is the man very ill, Eunice?"

"I think so. He is too ill to tell how he feels."

"He may be on your hands then for a day or two."

"He may for more than that."

"How can you manage?" said Mr. Carpenter, looking anxiously at the sweet face which already bore such lines of care, and was so work-worn.

"I don't know. I shall find out," Mrs. Carpenter answered as she was dishing the dinner. "The Lord seems to have given me this to do; and he knows. I guess, what he gives me to do, I can do."

"I don't see how you can say that, mother," Rotha put in here.

"What?"

"This man was taken sick on the road, and happened to come in here. How can you say, the Lord gave him to you to take care of?"

"Nothing 'happens,' Rotha. Suppose his sickness had come on a little sooner, or a little later? why was it just here that he found he could go no further?"

"Do you suppose there was any 'why' about it?"

Father and mother both smiled; the father answered.

"Do you suppose I would plough a field, without meaning to get any fruit from it."

"No, father."

"Neither does the Lord, my child."

Rotha pondered the subject, and had occasion to ponder it more as the days went on. She found she had some share in the consequences of this "happening"; more dishes to wash, and more sweeping and dusting, and churning, and setting of tables, and cleaning of vegetables; and she quite ceased to be glad that something had come to them out of the common run of affairs. For several days her mother was much engaged in the care of the sick man, and put all she could of the housework upon Rotha's hands; the nursing kept herself very busy. The sickness was at first severe; and then the mending was gradual; so that it was full two weeks before the stranger could leave his room. Mrs. Carpenter had no servant in the house; she did everything for him with her own hands; and with as much care and tenderness and exactness it was done as if the sick man had been a dear friend. By day and by night; nothing failed him; and so, in about two weeks, he was healed and had only his weakness to recover from. Mrs. Carpenter often looked tired and pale during those weeks, but cheerfulness and courage never gave out.

"I have learned something," she said one day at dinner, as the two weeks were ended.

"What is that?" her husband asked.

"The name of our guest."

"Well who is he?"

"He is English; his name is Southwode. He came to America on business two months ago; to New York; then found it was needful for him to see some people in Rochester; and was on his way when he was taken ill at our door."

"That's all?"

"Pretty much all. He is not much of a talker. I never found out so much till to-day."

"It is quite enough. I suppose he will go on to Rochester now?"

"Not for two or three days yet, Liph; he is very weak; but I guess we will have him out to supper with us this evening. You may put a glass of roses on the table, Rotha, and make it look very nice. And set the table in the hall."

Unlike most of its kind, this farmhouse had a wide hall running through the middle of it. Probably it had been built originally for somewhat different occupation. At any rate, the hall served as a great comfort to Mrs. Carpenter in the summer season, enabling her to get out of the hot kitchen, without opening her best room, the "parlour."

It was a pretty enough view that greeted the stranger here, when he was called to supper and crept out of his sick room. Doors stood open at front and rear of the house, letting the breeze play through. It brought the odours of the new hay and the shorn grass, mingled with the breath of roses. Roses were on the table too; a great glass full of them; not skilfully arranged, certainly, but heavy with sweetness and lovely in various hues of red and blush white. A special comfortable chair was placed for him, and a supper served with which an epicure could have found no fault. Mrs. Carpenter's bread was of the lightest and whitest; the butter was as if the cows had been eating roses; the cold ham was cured after an old receipt, and tender and juicy and savoury to suit any fastidious appetite; and there were big golden raspberries, and cream almost as golden. Out of doors, the eye saw green fields, with an elm standing here and there; and on one side, a bit of the kitchen garden. Mr. Southwode was a silent man, at least he was certainly silent here; but he was observant; and his looks went quietly from one thing to another, taking it all in. Perhaps the combination was strange to him and gave him matter for study. There was conversation too, as the meal went on, which occupied his ears, though he could hardly be said to take an active part in it. His host made kind efforts for his entertainment; and Rotha and her father had always something to discuss. Mr. Southwode listened. It was not the sort of talk he expected to hear in a farmhouse. The girl was full of intelligence, the father quite able to meet her, and evidently doing it with delight; the questions they talked about were worthy the trouble; and while on the one hand there was keen inquisitiveness and natural acumen, on the other there was knowledge and the habit of thought and ease of expression. Mr. Southwode listened, and now and then let his eye go over to the fair, placid, matronly face at the head of the table. Mrs. Carpenter did not talk much; yet he saw that she understood. And more; he saw that in both father and mother there was culture and literary taste and literary knowledge. Yet she did her own work, and he came in to-day in his shirt sleeves from the mowing of his own fields. Mr. Southwode drew conclusions, partly false perhaps, but partly true. He thought these people had seen what are called better days; he was sure that they were going through more or less of a struggle now. Moreover, he saw that the farmer was not strong in body or sound in health, and he perceived that the farmer's wife knew it.

The supper ended, a new scene opened for his consideration. With quick and skilful hands the mother and daughter cleared the table, carrying the things into the kitchen. Rotha brought a Bible and laid it before her father; and mother and daughter resumed their seats. Mr. Carpenter read a chapter, like a man who both knew and loved it; and then, a book being given to the stranger, the other three set up a hymn. There was neither formality nor difficulty; as the one had read, so they all sang, as if they loved it. The voices were not remarkable; what was remarkable, to the guest, was the sweet intonations and the peculiar appropriation with which the song was sung. It was a very common hymn,

"Jesus, I love thy charming name,
'Tis music to my ear;"—

And Mr. Southwode noticed a thing which greatly stirred his curiosity. As the singing went on, the lines of those careworn faces relaxed; Mrs. Carpenter's brow lost its shadow, her husband's face wore an incipient smile; it was quite plain that both of them had laid down for the moment the burden which it was also quite plain they carried at other times. What had become of it? and what power had unloosed them from it? Not the abstract love of music, certainly; though the melody which they sang was sweet, and the notes floated out upon the evening air with a kind of grave joy. So as the summer breeze was wafted in. There was a harmony, somehow, between the outer world and this little inner world, for the time, which moved Mr. Southwode strangely, though he could not at all understand it. He made no remark when the service was over, either upon that or upon any other subject. Of course the service ended with a prayer. Not a long one; and as it was in the reading and singing, so in this; every word was simply said and meant. So evidently, that the stranger was singularly impressed with the reality of the whole thing, as contradistinguished from all formal or merely duty work, and as being a matter of enjoyment to those engaged in it.

He had several occasions for renewing his observations; for Mr. Southwode's condition of weakness detained him yet several days at the farm-house. He established for himself during this interval the character he had gained of a silent man; however, one afternoon he broke through his habit and spoke. It was the day before he intended to continue his journey. Rotha had gone to the field with her father, to have some fun in the hay; Mr. Southwode and Mrs. Carpenter sat together in the wide farmhouse hall. The day being very warm, they had come to the coolest place they could find. Mrs. Carpenter was busy with mending clothes; her guest for some time sat idly watching her; admiring, as he had done often already, the calm, sweet strength of this woman's face. What a beauty she must have been once, he thought; all the lines were finely drawn and delicate; and the soul that looked forth of them was refined by nature and purified by patience. Mr. Southwode had something to say to her this afternoon, and did not know how to begin.

"Your husband seems to have a fine farm here," he remarked.

"It is, I believe," Mrs. Carpenter answered, without lifting her eyes from her darning.

"He took me over some of his ground this morning. He knows what to do with it, too. It is in good order."

"It would be in good order, if my husband had his full strength."

"Yes. I am sorry to see he has not."

"Did he say anything to you about it?" the wife enquired presently, with a smothered apprehensiveness which touched her companion. He answered however indifferently in the negative.

"I don't like his cough, though," he went on after a little interval.
"Have you had advice for him?"

There was a startled look of pain in the eyes which again met him, and the lips closed upon one another a little more firmly. They always had a firm though soft set, and the corners of the mouth told of long and patient endurance. Now the face told of another stab of pain, met and borne.

"He would not call in anybody," she said faintly.

That was not what Mr. Southwode had meant to talk about, though closely connected with the subject of his thoughts. He would try again.

"I owe you a great debt of gratitude, Mrs. Carpenter," he said after a long enough pause had ensued, and beginning on another side. "I presume you have saved my life."

"I am very glad we have been able to do anything," she said quietly.
"There is no need of thanks."

"But I must speak them, or I should not deserve to live. It astonishes me, how you should be so kind to an entire stranger."

"That's why you needed it," she said with a pleasant smile.

"Yes, yes, my need is one thing; that was plain enough; but if everybody took care of other people's needs—Why, you have done everything for me, night and day, Mrs. Carpenter. You have not spared yourself in the least; and I have given a deal of trouble."

"I did not think it trouble," she said in the same way. "There is no need to say anything about it."

"Excuse me; I must say something, or earn my own contempt. But what made you do all that for a person who was nothing to you? I do not understand that sort of thing, in such a degree."

"Perhaps you do not put it the right way," she returned. "Anybody who is in trouble is something to me."

"What, pray?" said he quickly.

"My neighbour,"—she said with that slight, pleasant smile again. "Don't you know the gospel rule is, to do to others what you would wish them to do to you?"

"I never saw anybody before who observed that rule."

"Didn't you? I am sorry for that. It is a pleasant rule to follow."

"Pleasant!" her guest echoed. "Excuse me; you cannot mean that?"

"I mean it, yes, certainly. And there is another thing, Mr. Southwode; I like to do whatever my Master gives me to do; and he gave you to me to take care of."

"Did he?"

"I think so."

"You did it," said the stranger slowly. "Mrs. Carpenter, I am under very great obligations to you."

"You are very welcome," she said simply.

"You have done more for me than you know. I never saw what religion can be—what religion is—until I saw it in your house."

She was silent now, and he was silent also, for some minutes; not knowing exactly how to go on. He felt instinctively that he must not offer money here. The people were poor unquestionably; at the same time they did not belong to the class that can take that sort of pay for service. He never thought of offering it. They were quite his equals.

"Mr. Carpenter was so good as to tell me something of his affairs as we walked this morning," he began again. "I am sorry to hear that his land is heavily encumbered."

"Yes!" Mrs. Carpenter said with a sigh, and a shadow crossing her face.

"That sort of thing cannot be helped sometimes, but it is a bother, and it leads to more bother. Well! I should like to be looked upon as a friend, by you and your husband; but I shall be a friend a good way off. Mrs. Carpenter, do not be offended at my plain speaking;—I would say, that if ever you find yourself in difficulties and need a friend's help, I would like you to remember me, and deliver that letter according to the address."

He handed her as he spoke a letter, sealed, and addressed to "Messrs. Bell & Buckingham, 46 Barclay St., New York." Mrs. Carpenter turned the letter over, in silent surprise; looked at the great red seal and read the direction.

"Keep it safe," Mr. Southwode went on, "and use it if ever you have' occasion. Do not open it; for I shall not be at the place where it is to be delivered, and an open letter would not carry the same credit. With the letter, if ever you have occasion to make use of it, enclose a card with your address; that my agent may know where to find you."

"You are very kind!" Mrs. Carpenter said in a little bewilderment; "but nothing of this kind is necessary."

"I hope it may not be needed; however, I shall feel better, if you will promise me to do as I have said, if ever you do need it."

Mrs. Carpenter gave the promise, and looked at the letter curiously as she put it away. Would the time ever come when she would be driven to use it? Such a time could not come, unless after the wreck of her home and her life happiness; never could come while her husband lived. If it came, what would matter then? But there was the letter; almost something uncanny; it looked like a messenger out of the unknown future.

CHAPTER II.

MOVING.

Mr. Southwode went away, his letter was locked up in a drawer, and both were soon forgotten. The little family he left had enough else to think of.

As the warm weather turned to cold, it became more and more evident that the head of the family was not to be with it long. Mr. Carpenter was ill. Nevertheless, with failing strength, he continued to carry the burden that had been too much for him when well. He would not spare himself. The work must be done, he said, or the interest on the mortgages could not be paid. He wrought early and late, and saw to it that his hired people did their part; he wore himself out the quicker; but the interest on the mortgages was not paid, even so. Mrs. Carpenter saw just how things were going, saw it step by step, and was powerless to hinder.

"They will foreclose!" Mr. Carpenter said with a half groan. It was late in the winter; towards spring; his health had failed rapidly of late; and it was no secret either to him or his wile that his weeks were numbered. They were sitting together one evening before the fire; he in his easy chair, and she beside him; but not holding each other's hands, not touching, nor looking at one another. Their blood was of a genuine New England course; and people of that kind, though they would die for one another, rarely exchange kisses. And besides, there are times when caresses cannot be borne; they mean too much. Perhaps this was such a time. Mrs. Carpenter sat staring into the fire, her brow drawn into fine wrinkles, which was with her a sign of uncommon perturbation. It was after a time of silence that her husband came out with that word about foreclosing.

"If I had been stronger," he went on, "I could have taken in that twenty acre lot and planted it with wheat; and that would have made some difference. Now I am behindhand—and I could not help it—and they will foreclose."

"They cannot do it till next fall," said Mrs. Carpenter; and her secret thought was, By that time, nothing will matter!

"No," said her husband,—"not until fall. But then they will. Eunice, what will you do?"

"I will find something to do."

"What? Tell me now, while I can counsel you."

"I don't know anything I could do, but take in sewing." She spoke calmly, all the while a tear started which she did not suffer to be seen.

"Sewing?" said Mr. Carpenter. "There are too many in the village already that do sewing—more than can live by it."

"If I cannot here," his wife said after a pause, overcoming herself,—"I might go to New York. Serena would help me to get some work."

"Would she?" asked her husband.

"I think she would."

"Your charity always goes ahead of mine, Eunice."

"You think she would not?"

"I wouldn't like to have you dependent on her.—This is what you get for marrying a poor man, Eunice!"

He smiled and stretched out his hand to take the hand of his wife.

"Hush!" she said. "I married a richer man than she did. And I have wanted for nothing. We have not been poor."

"No," he said. "Except in this world's goods—which are unimportant.
Until one is leaving one's wife and child alone!"

I suppose she could not speak, for she answered nothing. The fingers clasped fingers fast and hard; wrung them a little. Yet both faces were steady. Mrs. Carpenter's eyes looked somewhat rigidly into the fire, and her husband's brow wore a shadow.

"I wish your father had left you at least the old place at Tanfield. It would have been no more than justice. Serena might have had all the rest, but that would have given you and Rotha a home."

"Never mind," said Mrs. Carpenter gently. "I am content with my share."

"Meaning me!" And he sighed.

"The best share of this world's goods any woman could have, Liph."

"We have been happy," he said, "in spite of all. We have had happy years; happier I could not wish for, but for this money trouble. And we shall have happy years again, Eunice; where the time is not counted by years, but flows on forever, and people are not poor, nor anxious, nor disappointed."

She struggled with tears again, and then answered, "I have not been disappointed. And you have no need to be anxious."

"No, I know," he said. "But at times it is hard for faith to get above sense. And I am not anxious; only I would like to know how you are going to do."

There was a silence then of some length.

"Things are pretty unequal in this world," Mr. Carpenter began again. "Look at Serena and you. One sister with more than she can use; the other talking of sewing for a livelihood! And all because you would marry a poor man. A poor reason!"

"Liph, I had my choice," his wife said, with a shadow of a smile. "She is the one to be pitied."

"Well, I think so," he said. "For if her heart were as roomy as her purse, she would have shewn it before now. My dear, do not expect anything from Serena. Till next fall you will have the shelter of this house; and that will give you time to look about you."

"Liph, you must not talk so!" his wife cried; and her voice broke. She threw herself upon her husband's breast, and they held each other in a very long, still, close embrace.

Mr. Carpenter was quite right in some at least of his expectations. His own life was not prolonged to the summer. In one of the last days of a rough spring, the time came he had spoken of, when his wife and child were left alone.

She had till fall to look about her. But perhaps, in the bitterness of her loneliness, she had not heart to push her search after work with sufficient energy. Yet Mrs. Carpenter never lacked energy, and indulged herself selfishly no more in grief than she did in joy. More likely it is that in the simple region of country she inhabited there was not call enough for the work she could do. Work did not come, at any rate. The only real opening for her to earn her livelihood, was in the shape of a housekeeper's situation with an old bachelor farmer, who was well off and had nobody to take care of him. In her destitution, I do not know but Mrs. Carpenter might have put up with even this plan; but what was she to do with Rotha? So by degrees the thought forced itself upon her that she must take up her old notion and go to the great city, where there were always people enough to want everything. How to get there, and what to do on first arriving there, remained questions. Both were answered.

As Mr. Carpenter had foreseen, the mortgages came in the fall to foreclosure. The sale of the land, however, what he had not foreseen, brought in a trifle more than the mortgage amount. To this little sum the sale of household goods and furniture and stock, added another somewhat larger; so that altogether a few hundreds stood at Mrs. Carpenter's disposal. This precisely made her undertaking possible. It was a very doubtful undertaking; but what alternative was there? One relation she would find, at the least; and another Mrs. Carpenter had not in the wide world. She made her preparations very quietly, as she did everything; her own child never knew how much heart-break was in them.

"Shall we go first to aunt Serena's, mother?" Rotha asked one day.

"No."

The "no" was short and dry. Rotha's instinct told her she must not ask why, but she was disappointed. From a word now and then she had got the impression that this relation of theirs was a very rich woman and lived accordingly; and fancy had been busy with possibilities.

"Where then, mother?"

"Mr. Forbes," he was the storekeeper at the village, "has told me of the boarding house he goes to when he goes to New York. We can put up there for a night or two, and look out a quiet lodging."

"What is New York like, mother?"

"I have never been there, Rotha, and do not know. O it is a city, my child; of course; it is not like anything here."

"How different?"

"In every possible way."

"Every way, mother? Aren't the houses like?"

"Not at all. And the houses there stand close together."

"There must be room to get about, I suppose?"

"Those are the streets."

"No green grass, or trees?"

"Little patches of grass in the yards."

"No trees?"

"No. In some of the fine streets I believe there are shade trees."

"No gardens, mother?"

"No."

"But what do people do for vegetables and things?"

"They are brought out of the country, and sold in the markets. Don't you know Mr. Jones sends his potatoes and his fruit to the city?"

"Then if you want a potato, you must go to the market and buy it?"

"Yes."

"Or an apple, mother?"

"Yes, or anything."

"Well I suppose that will do," said Rotha slowly, "if you have money enough. I shouldn't think it was pleasant. Do the houses stand close together?"

"So close, that you cannot lay a pin between them."

"I should want to have very good neighbours, then."

Rotha was innocently touching point after point of doubt and dread in her mother's mind. Presently she touched another.

"I don't think it sounds pleasant, mother. Suppose we should not like it after we get there?"

Mrs. Carpenter did not answer.

"What then, mother? Would you come back again, if we did not like it there?"

"There would be no place to come to, here, any more, my child. I hope we shall find it comfortable where we are going."

"Then you don't know?" said Rotha. "And perhaps we shall not! But, mother, that would be dreadful, if we did not like it!"

"I hope you would help me to bear it."

"I!" said Rotha. "You don't want help to bear anything; do you, mother?"

An involuntary gush of tears came at this appeal; they were not suffered to overflow.

"I should not be able to bear much without help, Rotha. Want help? yes, I want it—and I have it. God sends nothing to his children but he sends help too; else," said Mrs. Carpenter, brushing her hand across her eyes, "they would not last long! But, Rotha, lie means that we should help each other too."

"I help you?"

"Yes, certainly. You can, a great deal."

"That seems very funny. Mother, what is wrong about aunt Serena?" said
Rotha, following a very direct chain of ideas.

"I hope nothing is wrong about her."

And Mrs. Carpenter, in her gentle, unselfish charity, meant it honestly; her little daughter was less gentle and perhaps more logical.

"Why, mother, does she ever do anything to help you?"

"Her life is quite separate from mine," Mrs. Carpenter replied evasively.

"Well, it would be right in her to help you. And when people are not right, they are wrong."

"Let us take care of our own right and wrong, Rotha. We shall have enough to do with that."

"But, mother, what is the matter with aunt Serena? Why doesn't she help you? She can."

"Our lives went different ways, a long time ago, my child. We have never been near each other since."

"But now you are going to be where she is, mother?"

"Rotha, did you rip up your brown merino?"

"Not yet."

"Then go and do it now. I want it to make over for you."