Miss Prudence. Mrs. Nathaniel Conklin
"Well, yes, something like it," he returned in one of Marjorie's contented tones.
"She'll have a good many heart aches before she's through, then," decided
Mrs. West, with some sharpness.
"Probably," said Marjorie's father with the shadow of a smile on his thin lips.
III.
WHAT "DESULTORY" MEANS.
"A rose with all its sweetest leaves yet folded."
"Miss Prudence! O, Miss Prudence!"
It was summer time and Marjorie was almost fourteen years old. Her soul was looking out of troubled eyes to-day. Just now life was all one unanswered question.
"Marjorie! O, Marjorie!" mimicked Miss Prudence.
"I don't know what desultory means," said Marjorie.
"And you don't know where to find a dictionary?"
"Mustn't I ask you questions when I can find the answer myself?" asked
Marjorie, straightforwardly.
"I think it's rather impertinent, don't you?"
"Yes," considered Marjorie, "rather."
Miss Prudence was a fair vision in Marjorie's eyes and Marjorie was a radiant vision in Miss Prudence's eyes. The radiant vision was not clothed in gorgeous apparel; the radiance was in the face and voice and in every motion; the apparel was simply a stiffly starched blue muslin, that had once belonged to Linnet and had been "let down" for Marjorie, and her head was crowned with a broad-brimmed straw hat, around the crown of which was tied a somewhat faded blue ribbon, also a relic of Linnet's summer days; her linen collar was fastened with an old-fashioned pin of her mother's; her boots were new and neatly fitting, her father had made them especially for herself.
Her sense of the fitness of things was sometimes outraged; one of the reasons why she longed to grow up was that she might have things of her own; things bought for her and made for her as they always were for Linnet. But Linnet was pretty and good and was going away to school!
The fair vision was clothed in white, a soft white, that fell in folds and had no kinship with starch. Marjorie had never seen this kind of white dress before; it was a part of Miss Prudence's loveliness. The face was oval and delicate, with little color in the lips and less in the cheeks, smooth black hair was brushed away from the thoughtful forehead and underneath the heavily pencilled black brows large, believing, gray eyes looked unquestioningly out upon the world. Unlike Marjorie, Miss Prudence's questions had been answered. She would have told Marjorie that it was because she had asked her questions of One who knew how to answer. She was swinging in her hammock on the back porch; this back porch looked over towards the sea, a grass plat touched the edge of the porch and then came the garden; it was a kitchen garden, and stretched down to the flat rocks, and beyond the flat rocks were the sand and the sea.
Marjorie had walked two miles and a half this hot afternoon to spend two or three hours with her friend, Miss Prudence. Miss Prudence was boarding at Marjorie's grandfather's; this was the second summer that she had been at this farmhouse by the sea. She was the lady of whom Marjorie had caught a glimpse so long ago in church, and called her Mercy. Throwing aside her hat, Marjorie dropped down on the floor of the porch, so near the gently swaying hammock that she might touch the soft, white drapery, and in a position to watch Miss Prudence's face.
"I don't see the use of learning somethings," Marjorie began; that is, if she could be said to begin anything with Miss Prudence, the beginning of all her questions had been so long ago. So long ago to Marjorie; long ago to Miss Prudence was before Marjorie was born.
There were no books or papers in the hammock. Miss Prudence had settled herself comfortably, so comfortably that she was not conscious of inhabiting her body when Marjorie had unlatched the gate.
"Which one of the things, for instance?"
In the interested voice there was not one trace of the delicious reverie she had been lost in.
"Punctuation," said Marjorie, promptly; "and Mr. Holmes says we must be thorough in it. I can't see the use of anything beside periods, and, of course, a comma once in a while."
A gleam of fun flashed into the gray eyes. Miss Prudence was a born pedagogue.
"I'll show you something I learned when I was a little girl; and, after this, if you don't confess that punctuation has its work in the world, I have nothing more to say about it."
Marjorie had been fanning herself with her broad brim, she let it fall in her eagerness and her eyes were two convincing arguments against the truth of her own theory, for they were two emphasized exclamation points; sometimes when she was very eager she doubled herself up and made an interrogation point of herself.
"Up in my room on the table you will find paper and pencil; please bring them to me."
Marjorie flew away and Miss Prudence gave herself up to her interrupted reverie. To-day was one of Miss Prudence's hard-working days; that is, it was followed by the effect of a hard-working day; the days in which she felt too weak to do anything beside pray she counted the successful days of her life. She said they were the only days in her life in which she accomplished anything.
Marjorie was at home in every part of her grandfather's queer old house; Miss Prudence's room was her especial delight. It was a low-studded chamber, with three windows looking out to the sea, the wide fireplace was open, filled with boughs of fragrant hemlock; the smooth yellow floor with its coolness and sweet cleanliness invited you to enter; there were round braided mats spread before the bureau and rude washstand, and more pretentious ones in size and beauty were laid in front of the red, high-posted bedstead and over the brick hearth. There were, beside, in the apartment, two tables, an easy-chair with arms, its cushions covered with red calico, a camp stool, three rush-bottomed chairs, a Saratoga trunk, intruding itself with ugly modernness, also, hanging upon hooks, several articles of clothing, conspicuously among them a gray flannel bathing suit. The windows were draperied in dotted swiss, fastened back with green cord; her grandmother would never have been guilty of those curtains. Marjorie was sure they had intimate connection with the Saratoga trunk. Sunshine, the salt-breath of the sea and the odor of pine woods as well!
There were rollicking voices outside the window, Marjorie looked out and spied her five little cousins playing in the sand. Three of them held in their hands, half-eaten, the inevitable doughnut; morning, noon, and night those children were to be found with doughnuts in their hands.
She laughed and turned again to the contemplation of the room; on the high mantel was a yellow pitcher, that her grandmother knew was a hundred years old, and in the centre of the mantel were arranged a sugar bowl and a vinegar cruet that Miss Prudence had coaxed away from the old lady; her city friends would rave over them, she said. The old lady had laughed, remarking that "city folks" had ways of their own.
"I've given away a whole set of dishes to folks that come in the yachts," she said. "I should think you would rather have new dishes."
Miss Prudence never dusted her old possessions; she told Marjorie that she had not the heart to disturb the dust of ages.
Marjorie was tempted to linger and linger; in winter this room was closed and seemed always bare and cold when she peeped into it; there was no temptation to stay one moment; and now she had to tear herself away. It must be Miss Prudence's spirit that brooded over it and gave it sweetness and sunshine. This was the way Marjorie put the thought to herself. The child was very poetical when she lived alone with herself. Miss Prudence's wicker work-basket with its dainty lining of rose-tinted silk, its shining scissors and gold thimble, with its spools and sea-green silk needlebook was a whole poem to the child; she thought the possession of one could make any kind of sewing, even darning stockings,