Aunt Phillis's Cabin/Chapter XXV
Chapter XXV.
The carriage was slowly ascending the road to the old church, a familiar and dear object to each member of the Weston family. A village churchyard fills up so gradually, that one is not startled with a sudden change. Mr. Weston looked from the window at the ivy, and the gothic windows, and the family vault, where many of his name reposed.
The inmates of the carriage had been conversing cheerfully, but as they approached the point where they would see home, each one was occupied with his or her musings. Occasionally, a pleasant word was exchanged, on the appearance of the well-known neighborhood, the balmy air, and the many shades of green that the trees presented; some of them loaded with white and pink blossoms, promising still better things when the season should advance.
Alice leaned from the window, watching for the first glimpse of the well-remembered house. She greeted every tree they passed with a lively look, and smiled gaily as the porter's lodge presented itself. The gates of it flew open as the carriage approached, and Exeter in its beauty met their view. "Oh, uncle," she said, turning from the window, "look! look! Is there any place in the world like this?"
"No, indeed, Alice;" and he took a survey of the home which had been so blessed to him. "How beautiful every thing looks! and how we will enjoy it, after a crowded, noisy hotel. Anna, you are not sorry to see its familiar face again. Ellen, my darling, we have not forgotten you--Exeter is your home, too; you are as welcome as any of us. Why, you look sober; not regretting Washington already?"
"No sir," said Ellen, "I was thinking of other things."
"Well," said Mrs. Weston, "we must look very happy this evening. I wonder, Ellen, Mr. Barbour has not met us."
"I suppose," said Alice, laughing, "he is too much agitated at the thought of meeting Ellen again--he will be over this evening, I dare say."
"I am sorry I can't keep my word with Mr. Barbour," said Ellen, "but I have concluded to marry Abel Johnson, on Arthur's recommendation, and I ought not to give good Mr. Barbour any false expectations."
"You must know, dear uncle," said Alice, "that Ellen and Arthur have been carrying on a postscript correspondence in my letters, and Arthur has turned matchmaker, and has been recommending Abel Johnson to Ellen. They have fallen in love with each other, without having met, and that was the reason Ellen was so hard-hearted last winter."
"Ah! that is the reason. But you must take care of these Yankee husbands, Miss Ellen, if Mr. Kent be a specimen," said Mrs. Weston.
"I am quite sure," said Alice, "Arthur would not have such a friend."
Mr. Weston smiled, and looked out again at home. They were rapidly
approaching the gates, and a crowd of little darkies were holding them open
on each side. "I wish Arthur were here," said he. "How long he has been
away! I associate him with every object about the place."
Alice did not answer; Arthur was in her thoughts. This was his home, every object with which she was surrounded breathed of him. She had thought of it as her home, but she had no right here--she was really only a guest. The thought was new and painful to her. Could the whole of her past existence have been dreamed away?--had she indeed no claim to the place she loved best on earth--was she dependant on the will of others for all the gay and joyous emotions that a few moments before filled her breast? She thought again of Arthur, of his handsome appearance, his good and generous heart, his talents, and his unchanging love to her--of Walter, and of all with which he had had to contend in the springtime of his life. Of his faults, his sin, and his banishment; of his love to her, too, and the delusion under which she had labored, of her returning it. Arthur would, ere long, know it all, and though he might forgive, her proud spirit rebelled at the idea that he would also blame.
She looked at her uncle, whose happy face was fixed on the home of his youth and his old age--a sense of his protecting care and affection came over her. What might the short summer bring? His displeasure, too--then there would be no more for her, but to leave Exeter with all its happiness.
Poor child! for, at nearly nineteen, Alice was only a child. The possibility overpowered her, she leant against her uncle's bosom, and wept suddenly and violently.
"Alice, what is the matter?" said her mother. "Are you ill?"
"What is the matter?" said her uncle, putting his arm around her, and looking alarmed.
"Nothing at all," said Alice, trying to control herself. "I was only thinking of all your goodness to me, and how I love you."
"Is that all," said Mr. Weston, pressing her more closely to his bosom. "Why, the sight of home has turned your little head. Come, dry up your tears, for my old eyes can distinguish the hall door, and the servants about the house collecting to meet us."
"I can see dear Cousin Janet, standing within--how happy she will be," said Mrs. Weston.
"Well," said Ellen, "I hope Abel will make a fuss over me, for nobody else ever has."
"If you are to be married," said Alice, smiling through her tears, "you must have his name changed, or always call him Mr. Johnson."
"Never," said Ellen. "I have a perfect passion for the name of Abel. There was a picture in my room of Abel lying down, and Cain standing, holding the club over him. Whenever I got into a passion when I was a child, mammy used to take me to the picture and say, 'Look there, honey, if you don't learn how to get the better of your temper, one of these days you will get in a passion like Cain and kill somebody. Just look at him, how ugly he is--because he's in such a rage.' But I always looked at Abel, who was so much prettier. I have no doubt Abel Johnson looks just as he does in the picture."
They were about to pass through the gates leading to the grounds; some of the servants approached the carriage, and respectfully bowing, said, 'Welcome home, master,' but passed on without waiting to have the salutation returned. Mrs. Weston guessed the cause of there not being a general outbreak on the occasion of their return. Miss Janet had spoken to a number of the servants, telling them how unable Mr. Weston was to bear any excitement, and that he would take the earliest opportunity of seeing them all at their cabins. As he was much attached to them and might feel a good deal at the meeting after so long a separation, it would be better not to give him a noisy welcome.
She had, however, excepted the children in this prohibition, for Miss Janet had one excellent principle in the management of children, she never forbade them doing what she knew they could not help doing. Thus, as the carriage passed the lodge, a noisy group of small-sized darkies were making a public demonstration. "Massa's come home," says one. "I sees Miss Alice," says another. "I sees Miss Anna, too," said a third, though, as yet, not a face was visible to one of them. They put their heads out of the carriage, notwithstanding, to speak to them, and Alice emptied a good-sized basket of sugar-plums, which she had bought for the purpose, over their heads.
"Take care, Mark," said Mr. Weston, "don't cut about with that whip, while all these children are so near."
"If I didn't, sir," said Mark, "some of 'em would a been scrunched under the carriage wheels 'fore now. These little niggers," he muttered between his teeth, "they're always in the way. I wish some of 'em would get run over." Mark's wife was not a very amiable character, and she had never had any children.
"Hurrah! daddy, is that you?" said an unmistakeable voice proceeding from the lungs of Bacchus the younger. "I been dansin juba dis hole blessed day--I so glad you come. Ask mammy if I aint?"
"How is your mother, Bacchus?" said Mr. Weston, looking out the window.
"Mammy, she's well," said the young gentleman; "how's you, master?"
"Very well, I thank you, sir," said Mr. Weston. "Go down there and help pick up the sugar-plums."
Bacchus the elder, now slid down from the seat by Mark, and took a short cut over to his cabin.
"Poor Aunt Phillis!" said Mrs. Weston, looking after him, "I hope she will get well."
"Ah!" said Mr. Weston, "I had forgotten Phillis on this happy day. There is
something, you see, Anna, to make us sigh, even in our happiest moments.
"But you shall not sigh, dearest uncle," said Alice, kissing his hand, "for Aunt Phillis will get well now that we are all back. Oh, there is Cousin Janet, and little Lydia--I wish the carriage would stop."
"You are the most perfect child I ever saw, Alice," said Mrs. Weston. "I think you are out of your senses at the idea of getting home."
The carriage wheeled round, and William let down the steps, with a face bright as a sunflower. Miss Janet stood at the top of the portico steps, in her dove-colored gown, and her three-cornered handkerchief, with open arms. Alice bounded like a deer, and was clasped within them. Then Mrs. Weston, then Ellen; and afterwards, the aged relatives warmly embraced each other. Little Lydia was not forgotten, they all shook hands with her, but Alice, who stooped to kiss her smooth, black cheek. William was then regularly shaken hands with, and the family entered the large, airy hall, and were indeed at home.
Here were collected all the servants employed about the house, each in a Sunday dress, each greeted with a kind word. Alice shook hands with them two or three times over, then pointing to the family pictures, which were arranged along the hall, "Look at them, uncle," said she; "did you ever see them so smiling before?"
They went to the drawing-room, all but Alice, who flew off in another direction.
"She is gone to see Phillis," said Mr. Weston, gazing after her. "Well, I will rest a few moments, and then go too."
Never did mother hold to her heart a child dearer to her, than Phillis, when she pressed Alice to her bosom. Alice had almost lived with her, when she, and Walter, and Arthur were children. Mrs. Weston knew that she could not be in better hands than under the care of so faithful and respectable a servant. Phillis had a large, old clothes' basket, where she kept the toys, all the little plates and cups with which they played dinner-party, the dolls without noses, and the trumpets that would not blow. Her children were not allowed to touch them when the owners were not there, but they took a conspicuous part in the play, being the waiters and ladies' maids and coach-drivers of the little gentlemen and Alice. After Walter and Arthur went away, Alice was still a great deal with Phillis, and she, regarding her as Arthur's future wife, loved her for him as well as for herself. Alice loved Phillis, too, and all her children, and they considered her as a little above mortality. Bacchus used to insist, when she was a child, that she never would live, she was too good. When, during her severe illness, Phillis would go to her cabin to look around, Bacchus would greet her with a very long face, and say, "I told you so. I know'd Miss Alice would be took from us all." Since her recovery, he had stopped prophesying about her.
"Aunt Phillis," said Alice, "you don't look very sick. I reckon you will work when you ought not. Now I intend to watch you, and make you mind, so that you will soon be well."
"I am a great deal better than I was, Miss Alice, but there's no knowing; howsomever, I thank the Lord that he has spared me to see you once more. I want to give Master time to talk to Miss Janet a little while, then I am going in to see him and Miss Anna."
"Oh! come now," said Alice, "or he will be over here."
Phillis got up, and walked slowly to the house, Alice at her side, and Bacchus stumping after her. As they went in, Alice tripped on first, and opened the drawing-room door, making way for Phillis, who looked with a happy expression of face towards her master.
"Is this you, Phillis?" said Mr. Weston, coming forward, and taking her hand most kindly. Mrs. Weston and Ellen got up to shake hands with her, too. "I am very glad to find you so much better than I expected," continued Mr. Weston; "you are thin, but your countenance is good. I hope you will get perfectly well, now that we are going to have summer weather."
"Thank you, sir," said Phillis. "I am a great deal better. Thank God, you all look so well, Miss Anna and all. Miss Janet began to be mighty lonesome. I've been a great trouble to her."
"No, you have not," said Miss Janet; "you never were a trouble to any one."
"Master," said Bacchus, "I think the old ooman looks right well. She aint nigh so bad as we all thought. I reckon she couldn't stand my bein away so long; she hadn't nobody to trouble her."
"You will never give her any more trouble," said Alice. "Aunt Phillis, you don't know how steady Uncle Bacchus has been; he is getting quite a temperance man."
"Old Nick got the better of me twice, though," said Bacchus. "I did think, master, of tryin to make Phillis b'lieve I hadn't drank nothin dis winter; but she'd sure to find me out. There's somefin in her goes agin a lie."
"But that was doing very well," said Alice; "don't you think so, Aunt Phillis? Only twice all through the winter."
"Its an improvement, honey," said Phillis; "but what's the use of getting drunk at all? When we are thirsty water is better than any thing else; and when we aint thirsty, what's the use of drinking?"
Phillis had been sitting in an arm-chair, that Mrs. Weston had placed for her. When she first came in, her face was a little flushed from pleasure, and the glow might have been mistaken as an indication of health. The emotion passed, Mrs. Weston perceived there was a great change in her. She was excessively emaciated; her cheek-bones prominent, her eyes large and bright. The whiteness of her teeth struck them all. These symptoms, and the difficulty with which she breathed, were tokens of her disease. She became much fatigued and Miss Janet advised her to go home and lie down. "They shan't tell you of their grand doings to-night, Phillis," she said; "for you have been excited, and must keep quiet. In the morning you will be able to listen to them. Don't tell any long stories, Bacchus," she continued. "Dr. Lawton wants her to keep from any excitement at night, for fear she should not sleep well after it. All you travelers had better go to bed early, and wake up bright in the morning."
Alice went home with Phillis, and came back to welcome Mr. Barbour, who had just arrived. The happy evening glided away; home was delightful to the returned family.
Bacchus gave glowing descriptions of scenes, in which he figured largely, to the servants; and Bacchus the younger devoutly believed there had not been so distinguished a visitor to the metropolis that winter, as his respected father.
Dr. Lawton came regularly to see Phillis, who frequently rallied. Her cheerfulness made her appear stronger than she was; but when Alice would tell her how well she looked, and that the sight of Arthur would complete her recovery, she invariably answered, "I want to see him mightily, child; but about my gettin well, there's no telling. God only knows."