Max Brand

TWO or three days after this—after school hours—Nannie came flying into the schoolroom, where we all were, and announced that some of us had been invited to take tea with the Ervengs that afternoon. While we sat in surprised silence, she went rapidly on to explain: "Such a nice little note to papa, written by Mrs. Erveng: this is one of her 'good days,' and she would like so much to make our acquaintance; would four of us come over and take tea, etc. Hilliard brought the note just now, and papa told him that some of us would be happy to accept." She paused and looked mischievous as a groan broke from us. "I know you are all dying to hear who are to go," she said, "so I'll put you out of your suspense at once; Phil—"

"No, you don't! I haven't any 'bunnit,'" broke in Phil. "You don't catch me going over there again in a hurry, I can tell you."

"But you ought to go, Phil, really you ought," Nannie said. "You and Betty ought to go over and apologise to Mr. and Mrs. Erveng for the way in which you two Goths invaded their house. Fee, papa says you are to go, too," she added to her twin.

"Oh, but this is too bad of the pater!" exclaimed Felix, colouring up; "he knows how I hate to go among strange people. I declare, I won't go!"

"Go tell the governor so—go now, while you're in the humour for it," urged Phil, with suspicious eagerness; "and—um—while you're about it, you know, just mention incidentally that those are my sentiments, too, will you?"

"Nonie, you're to lend grace to the entertainment," went on Nannie, with twinkling eyes.

"Who, me? I?" exclaimed Nora, quickly. "Oh!" Then, recovering herself the next minute, she said coolly, "Well, I'm perfectly willing to go; for that matter" (with that superior air that does so provoke us), "some of us ought to have gone long ago, and called on the Ervengs,—Miss Marston says so, too,—to apologise for and explain the, to say the least very peculiar, conduct of some other members of our family." And here she looked at me,—just as if Phil were not more to blame than I in that horrid affair of the Fetich!

I made a face, and Phil said: "Oh, come, now, Nora, we've heard that before; so do spare us the rest. Who else is to be a victim, Nancy?"

"Betty fills up the sum of the 'some,'" answered Nannie; "papa thinks she certainly ought—"

"I won't go, I won't, I will not," I interrupted. "That boy is too conceited for anything, and I'm not going over there to be criticised,—so now! I don't want any of their old tea, and I'd just like to be ill or to hide away or something, so's not to go."

"Let's you and I run away," suggested Phil, in a stage whisper behind his hand; then, striking an attitude, he extended his long arms: "Come, fair damsel, come, we'll fly to other climes,—the attic or the cellar, anywhere, so it be not to the Ervengs'." He made a sudden snatch at me, but I was prepared,—I know him of old!—and, dodging under his arm, darted round the table and soon put a wide distance between us.

"Then nobody's going," asserted Jack; he sat on the edge of the schoolroom table, grinning and hugging his knees, which were drawn up to his chin.

"Not a one!" "No, sir!" "No, indeed!" answered Phil, Felix, and I, in one breath.

"I do think you are all the rudest, most unmannerly creatures!" exclaimed Nora, indignantly. "These people have been polite enough to invite us to their house, have taken the trouble to prepare for us, when really the attention should have come from us to them, and here you all act as if they had insulted us. Positively, you are a most uncouth set. I am very much pleased with Mrs. Erveng's invitation, and I am going, if no one else does. Rude things!"

She started for the door; but Phil got before her, and salaamed to the floor. "What would we do without you, O most noble and elegant Eleanora!" he cried, as he bobbed up and down; and limping over, Fee stared at her through and under and over his glasses. "Friends," he exclaimed, turning to us and putting on an expression of intense astonishment, "allow me to call your attention to this remarkably healthy variety of a well-known plant, Miss"—with a wave of his hand toward Nora—"Miss Prim Rose."

"You think that's very smart, don't you?" Nora said, getting red, and tossing her head. Jack flew down from the table, and over to Nora's side, calling out, "Now you just stop teasing her, Felix!" and Phil threw an arm round her, and pulled her down on his lap, saying, "Don't ruffle yourself over such trifles, old lady; keep cool!"

I laughed, and Nannie put in quickly, "Nora is quite right: it was our place, as old residents, to call first on the Ervengs,—particularly under the Fetich circumstances; and when they are kind enough to overlook our remissness, and invite us to visit them, we ought at least to appreciate the attention, not rail at it. Anyway, it was papa who decided which of us should go. I would certainly have been included in the number had I not something to do for him this afternoon and evening; I would have liked to go. So do behave yourselves!"

"Nancy Lee on etiquette," said Felix, with a grimace, while Nora struggled away from Phil's encircling arm with a sharp, "Of course I am right!" and stalked out of the room, her nose in the air.

Now perhaps you think because we said all this that we didn't go to the Ervengs'; well, we did, the whole four of us, and that very afternoon. Though we fret and fume over things beforehand, we generally end by doing just as papa says about them. One reason for this is that, when it comes to the point, none of us are willing to tell him that we won't obey. Papa's very gentle, but he expects us to do as he says, and dear mamma always made us mind; so, as I said, it generally ends by our following orders. Still, sometimes it is a great satisfaction to "spunk up" beforehand, as Phil calls it, and just speak out our minds in the bosom of our family. And after that,—it's the funniest thing! but do you know, we'll almost always turn right round and do just what we said we wouldn't do, as meek as lambs. I don't know if all large families are like this, but it's our way.

Well, to go back to the tea. Nora was very glum on the way over,—she usually is when she's on her high horse,—but the boys seemed to be in great spirits, for they just giggled to the Ervengs' very door, and barely had a straight face when Buttons appeared. I fancied that he looked curiously at me, and I wondered uncomfortably if he knew that Phil and I were the two fat old black-robed ladies he had admitted the other day.

Mr. Erveng was out, for which Phil and I weren't sorry; but Hilliard met us in the hall and took us upstairs to his mother's sitting-room, where she was lying in an invalid's chair with a white shawl round her shoulders. She's very pretty,—Hilliard isn't a bit like her,—but she looks very delicate and fragile; why, her hands are like mites, and she's very, very gentle, and speaks in a low voice. She welcomed us very cordially, and said she thought it was so kind of us to come,—here I thought of our remarks at home, and didn't dare look at Phil and Fee,—and she and Nora seemed to get on nicely.

Very soon Hilliard carried the boys off to show them his microscope and his "specimens," and what he called his home-gymnasium. I should have loved dearly to go, too, but nobody asked me; so there I had to sit primly on a chair and listen while Mrs. Erveng and Nora talked of books and pictures and music and all sorts of things. And while they talked I looked around the room; Nora said afterward that I stared at everything, until she was ashamed,—but what else was there for me to do? And it was such a pretty room! furnished in light blue, with touches of yellow here and there; some lovely pictures hung on the walls, a graceful bronze Mercury stood on a pedestal between the curtains of one of the windows, growing plants were scattered about, and everywhere were books and flowers. It was all very sweet and lovely: it matched well with Mrs. Erveng, who looked daintiness itself lying back on her silken cushions, and I ought to have enjoyed it; but in some way or other it made me feel uncomfortably big and clumsy and overgrown, and I couldn't get over the feeling. Nora, however, didn't seem to be troubled in this way; I couldn't but notice how pretty she looked, and how well she talked.

You mustn't think that Mrs. Erveng slighted me, for she didn't,—she was very polite; but I had a feeling all the time that she just looked upon me as a great rough tomboy,—thinking of that horrid Fetich affair! for she certainly didn't treat me as she did Nora, and there are only fourteen months between us, if Nora is so tall, and acts so grown up. At home we make great fun of Nora's airs and graces, and even that night Phil nudged me, when no one was looking, and whispered, "Do see the frills Nonie's putting on!" but all the same I think both Felix and he were very glad that she could carry off things so well.

We had tea in the cosiest little room on the same floor, and we couldn't but notice how Hilliard waited on his mother,—just like a girl would have done; indeed, he was very much more gentle and helpful than I could have been, I am afraid,—though Fee used to be like that with mamma. After tea Nora played; I was asked, too, but I could no more have got through a piece without breaking down than I could have flown. She didn't feel so, though, and did splendidly; she is really a fine pianist, Miss Marston says. After that we sang college songs, and about nine o'clock, or a little after, we four went home.

"Unfortunately, I am not able to return any visits," Mrs. Erveng said, when we were leaving, "but if you or your sisters will take pity on my loneliness, and come over to see me whenever you can spare an afternoon or evening, I shall consider it very friendly, and I shall be very glad to see you."

She looked at Nora, and Nora answered very sweetly, "Thank you for our pleasant evening, Mrs. Erveng; we shall be glad to come again." Now I never would have thought of saying that! Then we all bade good-night and went home.

Hilliard walked to our door with us, and as he shook hands for good-night he said to me, "I'm very glad you came over; mother and I enjoyed it. I hope you'll come again; you see we get very quiet sometimes, just she and father and I."

I was surprised that he didn't say this to Nora, for he had talked almost entirely to her,—very little to me during the evening; but I suppose he did it so I shouldn't feel slighted,—as if I cared!

Phil admits that he likes Hilliard better than he did, and Felix, who had a long talk with him, says "he's bright, and 'way up in the classics." Well, he may be all that, but all the same I think he's a poke. I don't like him very much. I have a feeling that he went home and told his mother what I said about making faces and sliding down banisters, and that—with the Fetich affair—she thinks I'm a great rough girl. I don't really care, you know, for I have other friends who like me and think I am nice,—Murray and Hope Unsworth and Helen Vassah are always glad to have my company,—but still it isn't comfortable, now that I'm growing older, to be treated as if I were a child.

I didn't say much while Nora and the boys were giving Nannie an account of our evening,—they had enjoyed it; but later, when we were alone up in our room, it all came out. She said: "What's wrong, Miss Elizabeth?"—that's one of her pet names for me. "You look as sober as a judge; didn't you enjoy yourself this evening?" And then I told her all about it, though really there wasn't much to tell when we came to it, for Mrs. Erveng had been very polite and nice, and the boy had treated me politely, too. I was afraid Nannie would think I was making a mountain out of a molehill, as nurse says. But that's one of the lovely things about Nannie,—she understands just how things are, and so quickly.

She came over and sat on the edge of the bed, and taking one of my hands in hers, kept smoothing it while she talked. "It means this, dear," she said, "that you are getting to be quite grown up, and that the time has come for you to put away rough, hoidenish ways, and to begin to be gentle and dignified, like the true lady that we all know you are at heart. You see we are accustomed to your ways, and while we may tease and scold one another here at home, we also make allowances for the different ones as an outsider would never do, because we love one another—see? Mrs. Erveng and Hilliard simply know you as a tall girl who looks quite a young lady, and naturally they are surprised when you act like a tomboy. You know, Betty, you are nearly as tall as Nora; now just imagine her sliding down the banisters, wrestling with the boys, climbing the fence in the yard, hanging to the tops of the doors, and making the horrible faces that you do!"

But my imagination couldn't picture such an impossibility as Nora and I acting alike. "I couldn't—I couldn't be like Nora," I declared, sitting up in bed. "I know she's got nice manners and all that,"—I had never really thought so till that evening,—"but, oh! I couldn't be as prim and—and—proper as she is—" Here my voice began to shake, and I got so sorry for myself that the tears came.

Then Nannie put her arms round me, and gave me a hug. "You needn't be like anybody but yourself," she said,—"the nicest, gentlest, and best part of yourself. Give up one hoidenish way at a time; that will be easier than trying to do all at once, you know. Suppose you begin by walking down the stairs to-morrow morning to breakfast, instead of sliding down on the banisters, as you usually do."

"Oh, but you don't know how awfully hard that'll be to do," I said tearfully; "our banisters are so broad and smooth, and one goes so swiftly down them,—almost like flying—"

"I don't suppose it will be easy to give up the habit," broke in Nannie, wiping my eyes with her handkerchief; "but all the same, Miss Elizabeth, I am confident that if you really make up your mind to stop sliding, you'll do it. You can't keep up such a tomboyish trick all your life, and now is a good time to begin, I think. Dear mamma used to say that everybody had to have some responsibility or other; why not begin to take up yours now? Helen Vassah is only about six months older than you are, and here she has the responsibility of being little Paul's godmother. And there's Hope Unsworth a little younger than you; you know how she helps her grandmother in her charitable work. They are certainly not 'prim or proper;' they are full of fun, yet they wouldn't either of them ever think of doing the rough things that you do,—now would they?"

I had to admit that I knew they wouldn't.

"Then," said Nannie, "don't you do them either. Take yourself as your responsibility, and show us what you can accomplish in that line. Will you, dearie?" She snuggled her head close up to mine on the pillow as she said this.

"Oh, dear!" I sighed, "I do wish Jack had been I, and I'd been Jack!"

"Even then you would have had to stop such childish tricks some time or other before you grew up. With all his larks, Phil doesn't do them; and think of papa's coming down to breakfast on the banisters!" Nannie and I had to laugh at the very thought.

"Well," I said presently, "perhaps I'll try; but that conceited boy'll think he's made me do it."

"Oh, no, he won't!" Nannie said, in a tone of conviction that was very comforting. "If he does think now that you're inclined to be a hoiden, why, he'll soon change his mind, when he finds what a nice, sweet little lady you are from day to day. Don't look so dismal, Miss Elizabeth; there's lots of fun left for you!"

"I'll try; but I know I'll forget, time and again," I said, sighing heavily.

"I don't think there'll be so very many slips," Nannie answered cheerfully; "but if there should be, we'll just do as Rip Van Winkle did,—'we won't count' them."

"And will you promise not to tell anybody that I'm trying—not a single creature—not even Felix or Jack?" I asked anxiously.

"I will promise not to tell anybody—not a single creature—not even Felix or Jack," Nannie replied, laughing. "Does that satisfy you? Now," she added, "I'm going to say my prayers here beside you, and I'm going to ask our Lord to help you keep your word; you'll ask, too, won't you?"

I nodded, and as she knelt down slipped my hand into hers; a few minutes after I was asleep.

IX.