Ethelyn's Mistake. Mary Jane Holmes
Richard's chamber was a little room where Mrs. Markham's flour and meal and corn were kept, but which, with a little fitting up, would answer nicely for a bedroom, and after an amount of engineering, which would have done credit to the general of an army, Melinda succeeded in coaxing Mrs. Markham to move her barrels and bags, and give up the room for Ethelyn's bed, which looked very nice and inviting, notwithstanding that the pillows were small, and the bedstead a high poster, which had been in use for twenty years. Mrs. Markham knew all about the boxes, as she called them. There was one in Mrs. Jones' front chamber, but she had never bought one, for what then would she do with her old ones--"with them laced cords," so greatly preferable to the hard slats, which nearly broke her back the night she slept on some at a friend's house in Olney.
Richard was fond of books, and had collected from time to time a well-selected library, which was the only ornament in his room when Melinda first took it in hand; but when she had finished her work--when the carpet was down, and the neat, white shades were up at the windows; when the books which used to be on the floor and table, and chairs, and mantel, and window sills, and anywhere, were neatly arranged in the very respectable shelves which Andy made and James had painted; when the little sewing chair designed for Ethelyn was put before one window, and Richard's arm-chair before the other, and the drab lounge was drawn a little into the room, and the bureau stood corner-ways, with a bottle of cologne upon it, which John had bought, and a pot of pomade Andy had made, and two little pink and white mats Melinda had crocheted, the room was very presentable. Great, womanish Andy was sure Ethelyn would be pleased, and rubbed his hands jubilantly over the result of his labors, while Melinda was certainly pardonable for feeling that in return for what she had done for Richard's wife she might venture to suggest that the huge box, marked piano, which for ten days had been standing on the front piazza, be opened and the piano set up, so that she could try its tone. This box had cost Andy a world of trouble, keeping him awake nights, and taking him from his bed more than once, as he fancied he heard a mysterious sound, and feared someone might be stealing the ponderous thing, which it took four men to lift. With the utmost alacrity he helped in the unpacking, nearly bursting a blood-vessel as he tugged at the heaviest end, and then running to the village with all his speed, to borrow Mrs. Crandall's piano key, which, fortunately, fitted Ethelyn's, so that Melinda Jones was soon seated in state, and running her fingers over the superb five-hundred dollar instrument, Ethelyn's gift from Aunt Barbara on her nineteenth birthday.
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