What Answer?. Anna E. Dickinson
but I've seen all along that they looked at me with no friendly eyes, and for the last day or two I've heard a word here and there which makes me think there's trouble brewing—bad enough, I'm afraid; maybe to the losing of my place, though Mr. Surrey has said nothing about it to me."
Just here the little green door opened, and the foreman whom we have before seen—James Given as the register had him entered, Jim Given as every one knew him—came in; no longer with grimy face and flannel sleeves, but brave in all his Sunday finery, and as handsome a b'hoy, they said, at his engine-house, as any that ran with the machine; having on his arm a young lady whom he apostrophized as Sallie, as handsome and brave as he.
"Evening,"—a nod of the head accompanying. "Miss Howard's traps done?"
"I wish you wouldn't say 'traps,' Jim," corrected Sallie, sotto voce: "it's not proper. It's for a collar and pair of cuffs, Mrs. Franklin," she added aloud, putting down a little check.
"Not proper! goodness gracious me! there spoke Snipe! Come, Sallie, you've pranced round with that stuck-up jackanapes till you're getting spoiled entirely, so you are, and I scarcely know you. Not proper—O my!"
"Spoiled, am I? Thank you, sir, for the compliment! And you don't know me at all—don't you? Very well, then I'll say good night, and leave; for it wouldn't be proper to take a young lady you don't know to the theatre—now, would it? Good by!"—making for the door.
"Now don't, Sallie, please."
"Don't what?"
"Don't talk that way."
"Don't yourself, more like. You're just as cross as cross can be, and disagreeable, and hateful—all because I happen to know there's some other man in the world besides yourself, and smile at him now and then. 'Don't,' indeed!"
"Come, Sallie, you're too hard on a fellow. It's your own fault, you know well enough, if you will be so handsome. Now, if you were an ugly old girl, or I was certain of you, I shouldn't feel so bad, nor act so neither. But when there's a lot of hungry chaps round, all gaping to gobble you up, and even poor little Snipes trying to peck and bite at you, and you won't say 'yes' nor 'no' to me, how do you expect a man to keep cool? Can't do it, nohow, and you needn't ask it. Human nature's human nature, I suppose, and mine ain't a quiet nor a patient one, not by no manner of means. Come, Sallie, own up; you wouldn't like me so well as I hope you do if it was—now, would you?"
Mrs. Franklin smiled, though she had heard not a word of the lovers' quarrel, as she put a pin in the back of the ruffled collar which Sallie had come to reclaim. A quarrel it had evidently been, and as evidently the lady was mollified, for she said, "Don't be absurd, Jim!" and Jim laughed and responded, "All right, Sallie, you're an angel! But come, we must hurry, or the curtain'll be up,"—and away went the dashing and handsome couple.
Abram, shutting in the shutters, and fastening the door, sat down to a quiet evening's reading, while his mother knitted and sewed—an evening the likeness of a thousand others of which they never tired; for this mother and son, to whom fate had dealt so hard a measure, upon whom the world had so persistently frowned, were more to each other than most mothers and sons whose lines had fallen in pleasanter places—compensation, as Mr. Emerson says, being the law of existence the world over.
CHAPTER III
"Every one has his day, from which he dates." OLD PROVERB
You see, Surrey, the school is something extra, and the performances, and it will please Clara no end; so I thought I'd run over, and inveigled you into going along for fear it should be stupid, and I would need some recreation."
"Which I am to afford?"
"Verily."
"As clown or grindstone?—to make laugh, or sharpen your wits upon?"
"Far be it from me to dictate. Whichever suits our character best. On the whole, I think the last would be the most appropriate; the first I can swear wouldn't!"
"Pourquoi?"
"O, a woman's reason—because!"
"Because why? Am I cross?"
"Not exactly."
"Rough?"
"As usual—like a May breeze."
"Cynical?"
"As Epicurus."
"Irritable?"
"'A countenance [and manner] more in sorrow than in anger.' Something's wrong with you; who is she?"
"She!"
"Ay—she. That was a wise Eastern king who put at the bottom of every trouble and mischief a woman."
"Fine estimate."
"Correct one. Evidently he had studied the genus thoroughly, and had a poor opinion of it."
"No wonder."
"Amazing! you say 'no wonder'! Astounding words! speak them again."
"No wonder—seeing that he had a mother, and that she had such a son. He must needs have been a bad fellow or a fool to have originated so base a philosophy, and how then could he respect the source of such a stream as himself?"
"Sir Launcelot—squire of dames!"
"Not Sir Launcelot, but squire of dames, I hope."
"There you go again! Now I shall query once more, who is she?"
"No woman."
"No?"
"No, though by your smiling you would seem to say so!"
"Nay, I believe you, and am vastly relieved in the believing. Take advice from ten years of superior age, and fifty of experience, and have naught to do with them. Dost hear?"
"I do."
"And will heed?"
"Which?—the words or the acts of my counsellor? who, of a surety, preaches wisely and does foolishly, or who does wisely and preaches foolishly; for preaching and practice do not agree."
"Nay, man, thou art unreasonable; to perform either well is beyond the capacity of most humans, and I desire not to be blessed above my betters. Then let my rash deeds and my prudent words both be teachers unto thee. But if it be true that no woman is responsible for your grave countenance this morning, then am I wasting words, and will return to our muttons. What ails you?"
"I am belligerent."
"I see—that means quarrelsome."
"And hopeless."
"Bad—very! belligerent and hopeless! When you go into a fight always expect to win; the thought is half the victory."
"Suppose you are an atom against the universe?" "Don't fight, succumb. There's a proverb—a wise one—Napoleon's, 'God is on the side of the strongest battalions.'"
"A lie—exploded at Waterloo. There's another proverb, 'One on the side of God is a majority.' How about that?"
"Transcendental humbug."
"A truth demonstrated at Wittenberg."
"Are you aching for the martyr's palm?"
"I am afraid not. On the whole, I think I'd rather enjoy life than quarrel with it. But"—with a sudden blaze—"I feel to-day like fighting the world."
"Hey, presto! what now, young'un?"
"I don't wonder you stare"—a little laugh. "I'm talking like a fool, and, for aught I know, feeling like one, aching to fight, and knowing that I might as well quarrel with the winds, or stab that water as it flows by."
"As