title: The works of Kathleen Norris.
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As years ago we carried to your knees The tales and treasures of eventful days, Knowing no deed too humble for your praise, Nor any gift too trivial to please, So still we bring, with older smiles and tears, What gifts we may, to claim the old, dear right; Your faith, beyond the silence and the night, Your love still close and watching through the yearso / V \ da y m 6 AUTOGRAPH EDITION LIMITED TO TWO HUNDRED AND SEVENT Y-S EVEN COPIES OF WHICH THIS IS NO . Q~jJa ui/ilk nil . Ma foj , 1 y i THE WORKS OF KATHLEEN NORRIS MOTHER MOTHER CHAPTER I ELL, we couldn’t have much worse weather than this for the last week of school, could we?” Margaret Paget said in discouragement. She stood at one of the school windows, her hands thrust deep in her coat pockets for warmth, her eyes following the whirling course of the storm that howled outside. The day had commenced with snow, but now, at twelve o’clock, the rain was falling in sheets, and the barren schoolhouse yard and the play- shed roof ran muddy streams of water. Margaret had taught in this schoolroom for nearly four years now, ever since her seventeenth birthday, and she knew every feature of the big bare room by heart, and 3 MOTHER 4 every detail of the length of village street that the high, uncurtained windows com¬ manded. She had stood at this window in all weathers: when locust and lilac made even ugly little Weston enchanting, and all the windows were open to floods of sweet spring air; when the dry heat of autumn burned over the world; when the common little houses and barns, and the bare trees, lay dazzling and transfigured under the first snowfall, and the wood crackled in the schoolroom stove; and when, as to-day, mid-winter rains swept drearily past the windows, and the children must have the lights lighted for their writing lesson. She was tired of it all, with an utter and hopeless weariness. Tired of the bells, and the whispering, and the shuffling feet, of the books that smelled of pencil-dust and ink and little dusty fingers; tired of the black¬ boards, cleaned in great irregular scallops by small and zealous arms; of the clear- ticking big clock; of little girls who sulked, MOTHER ii are, twenty-three or four,” Mrs. Porter smiled. “Yes, but he’s not the kind that forgets!” Margaret’s flush was a little resentful. “Oh, of course, you can laugh, Emily. I know that there are plenty of people who don’t mind dragging along day after day, working and eating and sleeping—but I’m not that kind!” she went on moodily. “I used to hope that things would be different; it makes me sick to think how brave I was; but now here’s Ju coming along and Ted growing up, and Bruce’s girl throwing him over—it’s all so unfair ! I look at the Cutter girls, nearly fifty, and running the post- office for thirty years, and Mary Page in the Library, and the Norberrys painting pillows—and I could scream!” “Things will take a turn for the better some day, Margaret,” said the other woman, soothingly; “and as time goes on you’ll find yourself getting more and more pleasure out of your work, as I do. Why, I’ve never 12 MOTHER been so securely happy in my life as I am now. You’ll feel differently some day.” “ Maybe,” Margaret assented unenthusi¬ astically. There was a pause. Perhaps the girl was thinking that to teach school, live in a plain little cottage on the unfash¬ ionable Bridge Road, take two roomers, and cook and sew and plan for Tom and little Emily, as Mrs. Porter did, was not quite an ideal existence. “You’re an angel, anyway, Emily,” said she, affectionately, a little shamefacedly. “Don’t mind my growling. I don’t do it very often. But I look about at other people, and then realize how my mother’s slaved for twenty years and how my father’s been tied down, and I’ve come to the con¬ clusion that while there may have been a time when a woman could keep a house, tend a garden, sew and spin and raise twelve children, things are different now; life is more complicated. You owe your husband something, you owe yourself something. I MOTHER 13 want to get on, to study and travel, to be a companion to my husband. I don't want to be a mere upper servant!" “No, of course not," assented Mrs. Por¬ ter, vaguely, soothingly. “Well, if we are going to stay here, I'll light the stove," Margaret said after a pause. “B-r-r-r! this room gets cold with the windows open! I wonder why Kelly doesn't bring us more wood?" “I guess—I’ll stay!" Mrs. Porter said uncertainly, following her to the big book closet off the schoolroom, where a little gas stove and a small china closet occupied one wide shelf. The water for the tea and bouillon was put over the flame in a tiny enamelled saucepan; they set forth on a fringed napkin crackers and sugar and spoons. At this point a small girl of eleven with a brilliant, tawny head, and a wide and tooth¬ less smile, opened the door cautiously, and said, blinking rapidly with excitement— i 4 MOTHER “Mark, Mother theth pleath may thee come in?” This was Rebecca, one of Margaret’s five younger brothers and sisters, and a pupil of the school herself. Margaret smiled at the eager little face. “Hello, darling! Is Mother here? Cer¬ tainly she can! I believe”—she said, turn¬ ing, suddenly radiant, to Mrs. Potter— “I’ll just bet you she’s brought us some lunch!” “Thee brought uth our luncheth—eggth and thpith caketh and everything!” exulted Rebecca, vanishing, and a moment later Mrs. Paget appeared. She was a tall woman, slender but large of build, and showing, under a shabby rain¬ coat and well pinned-up skirt, the gracious generous lines of shoulders and hips, the deep-bosomed erect figure that is rarely seen except in old daguerreotypes, or the ideal of some artist two generations ago. The storm to-day had blown an unusual MOTHER i5 color into her thin cheeks, her bright, deep eyes were like Margaret’s, but the hair that once had shown an equally golden lustre was dull and smooth now, and touched with gray. She came in smiling, and a little breathless. “ Mother, you didn’t come out in all this rain just to bring us our lunches!” Margaret protested, kissing the cold, fresh face. “Well, look at the lunch you silly girls were going to eat!” Mrs. Paget protested in turn, in a voice rich with amusement. “I love to walk in the rain, Mark; I used to love it when I was a girl. Tom and Sister are at our house, Mrs. Porter, playing with Duncan and Baby. I’ll keep them until after school, then I’ll send them over to walk home with you.” “Oh, you are an angel!” said the younger mother, gratefully. And “You are an angel, Mother!” Margaret echoed, as Mrs. Paget opened a shabby suitcase, and took from it a large jar of hot rich soup, a little i6 MOTHER blue bowl of stuffed eggs, half a fragrant whole-wheat loaf in a white napkin, a little glass full of sweet butter, and some of the spice cakes to which Rebecca had already enthusiastically alluded. “There!” said she, pleased with their delight, “now take your time, you’ve got three-quarters of an hour. Julie devilled the eggs, and the sweet-butter man happened to come just as I was starting.” “Delicious! You’ve saved our lives,” Margaret said, busy with cups and spoons. “You’ll stay, Mother?” she broke off sud¬ denly, as Mrs. Paget closed the suitcase. “I can’t, dear! I must go back to the children,” her mother said cheerfully. No coaxing proving of any avail, Margaret went with her to the top of the hall stairs. “What’s my girl worrying about?” Mrs. Paget asked, with a keen glance at Mar¬ garet’s face. “Oh, nothing!” Margaret used both hands to button the top button of her MOTHER 1 7 mother’s coat. “I was hungry and cold, and I didn’t want to walk home in the rain!” she confessed, raising her eyes to the eyes so near her own. “Well, go back to your lunch,” Mrs. Paget urged, after a brief pause, not quite satisfied with the explanation. Margaret kissed her again, watched her descend the stairs, and leaning over the banister called down to her softly: “Don’t worry about me , Mother!” “No—no—no!” her mother called back brightly. Indeed, Margaret reflected, go¬ ing back to the much-cheered Emily, it was not in her nature to worry. No, Mother never worried, or if she did, nobody ever knew it. Care, fatigue, re¬ sponsibility, hard long years of busy days and broken nights had left their mark on her face; the old beauty that had been hers was chiselled to a mere pure outline now; but there was a contagious serenity in Mrs. Paget’s smile, a clear steadiness in her calm i8 MOTHER eyes, and her forehead, beneath an unfash- ionably plain sweep of hair, was untroubled and smooth. The children’s mother was a simple woman; so absorbed in the hourly problems attendant upon the housing and feeding of her husband and family that her own per¬ sonal ambitions, if she had any, were quite lost sight of, and the actual outlines of her character were forgotten by every one, her¬ self included. If her busy day marched successfully to nightfall; if darkness found her husband reading in his big chair, the younger children sprawled safe and asleep in the shabby nursery, the older ones con¬ tented with books or games, the clothes sprinkled, the bread set, the kitchen dark and clean; Mrs. Paget asked no more of life. She would sit, her overflowing work- basket beside her, looking from one absorbed face to another, thinking perhaps of Julie’s new school dress, of Ted’s impending siege with the dentist, or of the old bureau up attic MOTHER 19 that might be mended for Bruce’s room. “Thank God we have all warm beds,” she would say, when they all went upstairs, yawning and chilly. She had married, at twenty, the man she loved, and had found him better than her dreams in many ways, and perhaps dis¬ appointing in some few others, but “the best man in the world” for all that. That for more than twenty years he had been sat¬ isfied to stand for nine hours daily behind one dingy desk, and to carry home to her his unopened salary envelope twice a month, she found only admirable. Daddy was “steady,” he was “so gentle with the children,” he was “the easiest man in the world to cook for.” “Bless his heart, no woman ever had less to worry over in her husband!” she would say, looking from her kitchen window to the garden where he trained the pea-vines, with the children’s yellow heads bobbing about him. She never analyzed his character, much less 20 MOTHER criticised him. Good and bad, he was taken for granted; she was much more leni¬ ent to him than to any of the children. She welcomed the fast-coming babies as gifts from God, marvelled over their tiny perfect¬ ness, dreamed over the soft relaxed little forms with a heart almost too full for prayer. She was, in a word, old-fashioned, hope¬ lessly out of the modern current of thoughts and events. She secretly regarded her children as marvellous, even while she laughed down their youthful conceit and punished their naughtiness. Thinking a little of all these things, as a girl with her own wifehood and motherhood all before her does think, Margaret went back to her hot luncheon. One o'clock found her at her desk, refreshed in spirit by her little outburst, and much fortified in body. The room was well aired, and a reinforced fire roared in the little stove. One of the children had brought her a spray MOTHER 21 of pine, and the spicy fragrance of it re¬ minded her that Christmas and the Christ¬ mas vacation were near; her mind was pleas¬ antly busy with anticipation of the play that the Pagets always wrote and performed some time during the holidays, and with the New Year’s costume dance at the Hall, and a dozen lesser festivities. Suddenly, in the midst of a droning spell¬ ing lesson, there was a jarring interruption. From the world outside came a child’s shrill screaming, which was instantly drowned in a chorus of frightened voices, and in the schoolroom below her own Margaret heard a thundering rush of feet, and answering screams. With a suffocating terror at her heart she ran to the window, followed by every child in the room. The rain had stopped now, and the sky showed a pale, cold, yellow light low in the west. At the schoolhouse gate an immense limousine car had come to a stop. The driver, his face alone visible between a great 22 MOTHER leather coat and visored leather cap, was talking unheard above the din. A tall woman, completely enveloped in sealskins, had evidently jumped from the limousine, and now held in her arms what made Mar¬ garet’s heart turn sick and cold, the limp figure of a small girl. About these central figures there surged the terrified crying small children of the just-dismissed primer class, and in the half moment that Margaret watched, Mrs. Por¬ ter, white and shaking, and another teacher, Ethel Elliot, an always excitable girl, who was now sobbing and chattering hysterically, ran out from the school, each followed by her own class of crowding and excited boys and girls. With one horrified exclamation, Mar¬ garet ran downstairs, and out to the gate. Mrs. Porter caught at her arm as she passed her in the path. “Oh, my God, Margaret! It’s poor little Dorothy Scott!” she said. “They’ve killed her. The car went completely over her!” MOTHER 23 “Oh, Margaret, don’t go near, oh, how can you!” screamed Miss Elliot. “Oh, and she’s all they have! Who’ll tell her mother! ” With astonishing ease, for the children gladly recognized authority, Margaret pushed through the group to the motor-car. “Stop screaming—stop that shouting at once—keep still, every one of you!” she said angrily, shaking various shoulders as she went with such good effect that the voice of the woman in sealskins could be heard by the time Margaret reached her. “I don’t think she’s badly hurt!” said this woman, nervously and eagerly. She was evidently badly shaken, and was very white. “Do quiet them, can’t you?” she said, with a sort of apprehensive impatience. “Can’t we take her somewhere, and get a doctor? Can’t we get out of this?” Margaret took the child in her own arms, Little Dorothy roared afresh, but to Mar¬ garet’s unspeakable relief she twisted about and locked her arms tightly about the loved MOTHER 24 teacher’s neck. The other woman watched them anxiously. “That blood on her frock’s just nose¬ bleed,” she said; “but I think the car went over her! I assure you we were running very slowly. How it happened-! But I don’t think she was struck.” “Nosebleed!” Margaret echoed, with a great breath. “No,” she said quietly, over the agitated little head; “I don’t think she’s much hurt. We’ll take her in. Now, look here, children,” she added loudly to the as¬ sembled pupils of the Weston Grammar School, whom mere curiosity had somewhat quieted, “I want every one of you children to go back to your schoolrooms; do you understand? Dorothy’s had a bad scare, but she’s got no bones broken, and we’re going to have a doctor see that she’s all right. I want you to see how quiet you can be. Mrs. Porter, may my class go into your room a little while?” “Certainly,” said Mrs. Porter, eager to MOTHER 25 cooperate, and much relieved to have her share of the episode take this form. “Form lines, children,” she added calmly. “Ted,” said Margaret to her own small brother, who was one of Mrs. Porter’s pupils, and who had edged closer to her than any boy unprivileged by relationship dared, “will you go down the street, and ask old Doctor Potts to come here? And then go tell Dorothy’s mother that Dorothy has had a little bump, and that Miss Paget says she’s all right, but that she’d like her mother to come for her.” “Sure I will, Mark!” Theodore responded enthusiastically, departing on a run. “Mama!” sobbed the little sufferer at this point, hearing a familiar word. “Yes, darling, you want Mama, don’t you?” Margaret said soothingly, as she started with her burden up the schoolhouse steps. “What were you doing, Dorothy,” she went on pleasantly, “to get under that big car?” 26 MOTHER “I dropped my ball!” wailed the small girl, her tears beginning afresh, “and it rolled and rolled. And I didn’t see the automobile, and I didn't see it! And I fell down and b-b-bumped my nose!” “Well, I should think you did!” Mar¬ garet said, laughing. “Mother won’t know you at all with such a muddy face and such a muddy apron!” Dorothy laughed shakily at this, and several other little girls, passing in orderly file, laughed heartily. Margaret crossed the lines of children to the room where they played and ate their lunches on wet days. She shut herself in with the child and the fur-clad lady. “Now you’re all right!” said Margaret, gayly. And Dorothy was presently com¬ fortable in a big chair, wrapped in a rug from the motor-car, with her face washed, and her head dropped languidly back against her chair, as became an interesting invalid. The Irish janitor was facetious MOTHER 27 as he replenished the fire, and made her laugh again. Margaret gave her a numeri¬ cal chart to play with, and saw with satis¬ faction that the little head was bent inter¬ estedly over it. Quiet fell upon the school; the muffled sound of lessons recited in concert presently reached them. Theodore returned, report¬ ing that the doctor would come as soon as he could and that Dorothy’s mother was away at a card-party, but that Dorothy’s “girl” would come for her as soon as the bread was out of the oven. There was nothing to do but wait. “It seems a miracle,” said the strange lady, in a low tone, when she and Margaret were alone again with the child. “But I don’t believe she was scratched!” “I don’t think so,” Margaret agreed. “Mother says no child who can cry is very badly hurt.” “They made such a horrible noise,” said the other, sighing wearily. She passed a 28 MOTHER white hand, with one or two blazing great stones upon it, across her forehead. Mar¬ garet had leisure now to notice that by all signs this was a very great lady indeed. The quality of her furs, the glimpse of her gown that the loosened coat showed, her rings, and most of all the tones of her voice, the authority of her manner, the well- groomed hair and skin and hands, all marked the thoroughbred. “Do you know that you managed that situation very cleverly just now?” said the lady, with a keen glance that made Margaret color. “One has such a dread of the crowd, just public sentiment, you know. Some officious bystander calls the police, they crowd against your driver, perhaps a brick gets thrown. We had an experience in England once-” She paused, then in¬ terrupted herself. “But I don’t know your name?” she said brightly. Margaret supplied it, was led to talk a little of her own people. MOTHER 29 “Seven of you, eh? Seven’s too many,” said the visitor, with the assurance that Margaret was to learn characterized her. “Eve two myself, two girls,” she went on. “I wanted a boy, but they’re nice girls. And you’ve six brothers and sisters? Are they all as handsome as you and this Teddy of yours? And why do you like teaching?” “Why do I like it?” Margaret said, en¬ joying these confidences and the unusual experience of sitting idle in mid-afternoon. “I don’t, I hate it.” “I see. But then why don’t you come down to New York, and do something else?” the other woman asked. “I’m needed at home, and I don’t know any one there,” Margaret said simply. “I see,” the lady said again thoughtfully. There was a pause. Then the same speaker said reminiscently, “I taught school once for three months when I was a girl, to show my father I could support myself.” “I’vetaught for four years,” Margaret said. MOTHER 30 “ Well, if you ever want to try something else—there are such lots of fascinating things a girl can do now—be sure you come and see me -about it,” the stranger said. “I am Mrs. Carr-Boldt, of New York.” Margaret’s amazed eyes flashed to Mrs. Carr-Boldt’s face; her cheeks crimsoned. “Mrs. Carr-Boldt!” she echoed blankly. “Why not?” smiled the lady, not at all displeased. “Why,” stammered Margaret, laughing and rosy, “why, nothing—only I never dreamed who you were!” she finished, a little confused. And indeed it never afterward seemed to her anything short of a miracle that brought the New York society woman—famed on two continents and from ocean to ocean for her jewels, her entertainments, her gowns, her establishments—into a Weston school¬ room, and into Margaret Paget’s life. “I was on my way to New York now,” said Mrs. Carr-Boldt. MOTHER 3 i “ I don’t see why you should be delayed,” Margaret said, glad to be able to speak normally, with such a fast-beating and pleasantly excited heart. “I’m sure Dor¬ othy’s all right.” “Oh, I’d rather wait. I like my com¬ pany,” said the other. And Margaret decided in that instant that there never was a more deservedly admired and copied and quoted woman. Presently their chat was interrupted by the tramp of the departing school schildren; the other teachers peeped in, were reassured, and went their ways. Then came the doc¬ tor, to pronounce the entirely cheerful Dor¬ othy unhurt, and to bestow upon her some hoarhound drops. Mrs. Carr-Boldt settled at once with the doctor, and when Margaret saw the size of the bill that was pressed into his hand, she realized that she had done her old friend a good turn. “Use it up on your poor people,” said Mrs. Carr-Boldt, to his protestations; and MOTHER 32 when he had gone, and Dorothy’s “girl” ap¬ peared, she tipped that worthy and amazed Teuton, and after promising Dorothy a big doll from a New York shop, sent the child and maid home in the motor-car. “I hope this hasn’t upset your plans,” Margaret said, as they stood waiting in the doorway. It was nearly five o’clock, the school was empty and silent. “No, not exactly. I had hoped to get home for dinner. But I think I’ll get Wool- cock to take me back to Dayton; I’ve some very dear friends there who’ll give me a cup of tea. Then I’ll come back this way and get home, by ten, I should think, for a late supper.” Then, as the limousine appeared, Mrs. Carr-Boldt took both Margaret’s hands in hers, and said, “And now good-bye, my dear girl. I’ve got your address, and I’m go¬ ing to send you something pretty to remem¬ ber me by. You saved me from I don’t know what annoyance and publicity. And don’t forget that when you come to New York MOTHER 33 I’m going to help you meet the people you want to, and give you a start if I can. You’re far too clever and good-look¬ ing to waste your life down here. Good¬ bye!” “Good-bye!” Margaret said, her cheeks brilliant, her head awhirl. She stood unmindful of the chilly evening air, watching the great motor-car wheel and slip into the gloom. The rain was over; a dying wind moaned mysteriously through the dusk. Margaret went slowly upstairs, pinned on her hat, buttoned her long coat snugly about her. She locked the school¬ room door, and, turning the corner, plunged her hands into her pockets, and faced the wind bravely. Deepening darkness and coldness were about her, but she felt sur¬ rounded by the warmth and brightness of her dreams. She saw the brilliant streets of a big city, the carriages and motor-cars coming and going, the idle, lovely women in their sumptuous gowns and hats. These MOTHER 34 things were real, near—almost attainable— to-night. “Mrs. Carr-Boldt!” Margaret said, “the darling! I wonder if I’ll ever see her again! CHAPTER II I IFE in the shabby, commonplace house that sheltered the Paget family sometimes really did seem to pro¬ ceed, as Margaret had suggested, in a long chain of violent shocks, narrow escapes, and closely averted catastrophes. No sooner was Duncan’s rash pronounced not to be scarlet fever than Robert swallowed a penny, or Beck set fire to the dining-room waste¬ basket, or Dad foresaw the immediate failure of the Weston Home Savings Bank, and the inevitable loss of his position there. Sometimes there was a paternal explosion because Bruce liked to murmur vaguely of “dandy chances in Manila,” or because Julie, pretty, excitable, and sixteen, had an occasional dose of stage fever, and would stammer desperately between convulsive 3 6 MOTHER sobs that she wasn’t half as much afraid of “the terrible temptations of the life” as she was afraid of dying a poky old maid in Weston. In short, the home was crowded, the Pagets were poor, and every one of the seven possessed a spirited and distinct en¬ tity. All the mother’s effort could not keep them always contented. Growing ambi¬ tions made the Weston horizon seem nar¬ row and mean, and the young eyes that could not see beyond to-morrow were often wet with rebellious tears. Through it all they loved each other; sometimes whole weeks went by in utter harmony; the children contented over “Parches” on the hearthrug in the winter evenings, Julie singing in the morning sun¬ light, as she filled the vases from the shabby marguerite bushes on the lawn. But there were other times when to the dreamy studious Margaret the home circle seemed all discord, all ugly dinginess and thread¬ bareness; the struggle for ease and beauty MOTHER 37 and refinement seemed hopeless and over¬ whelming. In these times she would find herself staring thoughtfully at her mother’s face, bent over the mending basket, or her eyes would leave the chessboard that held her father’s attention so closely, and move from his bald spot, with its encircling crown of fluffy gray, to his rosy face, with its kind, intent blue eyes and the little lines about his mouth that his moustache didn’t hide—with a half-formed question in her heart. What hadn’t they done, these dear¬ est people, to be always struggling, always tired, always “behind the game?” Why should they be eternally harassed by plum¬ ber’s bills, and dentists’ bills, and shoes that would wear out, and school-books that must be bought ? Why weren’t they hold¬ ing their place in Weston society, the place to which they were entitled by right of the Quincy grandfather, and the uncles who were judges? . And in answer Margaret came despond- MOTHER 38 ently to the decision, “If you have children, you never have anything else! ” How could Mother keep up with her friends, when for some fifteen years she had been far too busy to put on a dainty gown in the afternoon, and serve a hospitable cup of tea on the east porch? Mother was buttering bread for supper, then; opening little beds and laying out little nightgowns, starting Ted off for the milk, washing small hands and faces, soothing bumps and binding cuts, admonish¬ ing, praising, directing. Mother was only too glad to sink wearily into her rocker after dinner, and, after a few spirited visits to the rampant nursery upstairs, express the hope that nobody would come in to-night. Grad¬ ually the friends dropped away, and the social life of Weston flowed smoothly on without the Pagets. But when Margaret began to grow up, she grasped the situation with all the keen¬ ness of a restless and ambitious nature. Weston, detested Weston, it must appar- MOTHER 39 ently be. Very well, she would make the best of Weston. Margaret called on her mother’s old friends; she was tireless in charming little attentions. Her own first dances had not been successful; she and Bruce were not good dancers, Margaret had not been satisfied with her gowns, they both felt out of place. When Julie’s dancing days came along, Margaret saw to it that everything was made much easier. She planned social evenings at home, and ex¬ hausted herself preparing for them, that Julie might know the “right people.” To her mother all people were alike, if they were kind and not vulgar; Margaret felt very differently. It was a matter ot the greatest satisfaction to her when Julie blos¬ somed into a fluffy-haired butterfly, tre¬ mendously in demand, in spite of much- cleaned slippers and often-pressed frocks. Margaret arranged Christmas theatricals, May picnics, Fourth of July gatherings. She never failed Bruce when this dearest MOTHER 40 brother wanted her company; she was, as Mrs. Paget told her over and over, “the sweetest daughter any woman ever had.” But deep in her heart she knew moods of bitter distaste and restlessness. The strug¬ gle did not seem worth the making; the odds against her seemed too great. Still dreaming in the winter dark, she went through the home gate, and up the porch steps of a roomy, cheap house that had been built in the era of scalloped and pointed shingles, of colored glass embellish¬ ments around the window-panes, of perfo¬ rated scroll work and wooden railings in Grecian designs. A mass of wet over¬ shoes lay on the porch, and two or three of the weather-stained porch rockers swayed under the weight of spread wet raincoats. Two opened umbrellas wheeled in the cur¬ rent of air that came around the house; the porch ran water. While Margaret was adding her own rainy-day equipment to the MOTHER 4i others, a golden-brown setter, one ecstatic wriggle from nose to tail, flashed into view, and came fawning to her feet. “Hello, Bran!” Margaret said, propping herself against the house with one hand, while she pulled at a tight overshoe. “ Hello, old fellow! Well, did they lock him out ? ” She let herself and a freezing gust of air into the dark hall, groping to the hat-rack for matches. While she was lighting the gas, a very pretty girl of sixteen, with crim¬ son cheeks and tumbled soft dark hair, came to the dining-room door. This was her sister Julie, Margaret’s roommate and warmest admirer, and for the last year or two her inseparable companion. Julie had her finger in a book, but now she closed it, and said affectionately between her yawns: “Come in here, darling! You must be dead.” “Don’t let Bran in,” cried some one from upstairs. “He is in, Mother!” Margaret called MOTHER 42 back, and Rebecca and the three small boys—Theodore, the four-year-old baby, Robert, and Duncan, a grave little lad of seven—all rushed out of the dining-room together, shouting, as they fell on the de¬ lighted dog: “Aw, leave him in! Aw, leave the poor little feller in! Come on, Bran, come on, old feller! Leave him in, Mark, can’t we?” Kissing and hugging the dog, and stum¬ bling over each other and over him, they went back to the dining-room, which was warm and stuffy. A coal fire was burning low in the grate, the window-panes were beaded, and the little boys had marked their initials in the steam. They had also pushed the fringed table-cover almost off, and scat¬ tered the contents of a box of “Lotto” over the scarred walnut top. The room was shabby, ugly, comfortable. Julie and Mar¬ garet had established a tea-table in the bay window, had embroidered a cover for the wide couch, had burned the big wooden MOTHER 43 bowl that was supposedly always full of nuts or grapes or red apples. But these touches were lost in the mass of less pleasing detail. The “body Brussels” carpet was worn, the wall paper depressing, the wood¬ work was painted dark brown, with an imitation burl smeared in by the painter’s thumb. The chairs were of several differ¬ ent woods and patterns, the old black wal¬ nut sideboard clumsy and battered. About the fire stood some comfortable worn chairs. Margaret dropped wearily into one of these* and the dark-eyed Julie hung over her with little affectionate attentions. The children returned to their game. “Well, what a time you had with little Dolly Scott!” said Julie, sympathetically. “Ted’s been getting it all mixed up! Tell us about it. Poor old Mark, you’re all in, aren’t you? Mark, would you like a cup of tea?” “Love it!” Margaret said, a little sur¬ prised, for this luxury was not common. MOTHER 44 “And toast—we’ll toast it!” said Theo¬ dore, enthusiastically. “No, no—no tea!” said Mrs. Paget, coming in at this point with some sewing in her hands. “ Don’t spoil your dinner, now, Mark dear; tea doesn’t do you any good. And I think Blanche is saving the cream for an apple tapioca. Theodore, Mother wants you to go right downstairs for some coal, dear. And, Julie, you’d better start your table; it’s close to six. Put up the game, Rebecca!” There was general protest. Duncan, it seemed, needed only “two more” to win. Little Robert, who was benevolently al¬ lowed by the other children to play the game exactly as he pleased, screamed de¬ lightedly that he needed only one more, and showed a card upon which even the blank spaces were lavishly covered with glass. He was generously conceded the victory, and kissed by Rebecca and Julie as he made his way to his mother’s lap. MOTHER 45 “Why, this can’t be Robert Paget!” said Mrs. Paget, putting aside her sewing to gather him in her arms. “Not this great, big boy!” “Yes, I am!” the little fellow asserted joyously, dodging her kisses. “Good to get home!” Margaret said luxu¬ riously. “You must sleep late in the morning,” her mother commanded affectionately. “Yes, because you have to be fresh for the party Monday!” exulted Julie. She had flung a white cloth over the long table, and was putting the ringed napkins down with rapid bangs. “And New Year’s Eve’s the dance!” she went on buoyantly. “I just love Christmas, anyway!” “Rebecca, ask Blanche if she needs me,” that was Mother. “You’d go perfectly crazy about her, Ju, she’s the most fascinating, and the most unaffected woman!” Margaret was full of the day’s real event. MOTHER 46 “And Mother theth that Ted and Dune and I can have our friendth in on the day after Chrithmath to thee the Chrithmath tree!” That was Rebecca, who added, “Blanche theth no, Mother, unleth you want to make thorn cream gravy for the chopth!” “And, Mark, Eleanor asked if Bruce and you and I weren’t going as Pierrot and Pierettes; she’s simply crazy to find out!” This was Julie again; and then Margaret, coaxingly, “Do make cream gravy for Bruce, Mother. Give Baby to me!” and little Robert’s elated “I know three things Becky’s going to get for Christmas, Mark!” “Well, I think I will, there’s milk,” Mrs. Paget conceded, rising. “Put Bran out, Teddy; or put him in the laundry if you want to, while we have dinner.” Mar¬ garet presently followed her mother into the kitchen, stopping in a crowded pas¬ sageway to tie an apron over her school gown. MOTHER 47 “Bruce come in yet?” she said in a low voice. Her mother flashed her a sympathetic look. “I don’t believe he’s coming, Mark.” “Isn’t! Oh, Mother! Oh, Mother, docs he feel so badly about Betty?” “I suppose so!” Mrs. Paget went on with her bread cutting. “But, Mother, surely he didn’t expect to marry Betty Forsythe?” “I don’t know why not, Mark. She’s a sweet little thing.” “But, Mother-” Margaret was a little at a loss. “We don’t seem old enough to really be getting married!” she said, a little lamely. “Brucie came in about half-past five, and said he was going over to Richie’s,” Mrs. Paget said, with a sigh. “In all this rain—that long walk!” Mar¬ garet ejaculated, as she filled a long wicker basket with sliced bread. “I think an evening of work with Richie 48 MOTHER will do him a world of good,” said his mother. There was a pause. “There's Dad. I’ll go in,” she said, suddenly ending it, as the front door slammed. Margaret went in, too, to kiss her father, a tired-looking, gray-haired man close to fifty, who had taken her chair by the fire. Mrs. Paget was anxious to be assured that his shoulders and shoes were not damp. “But your hands are icy, Daddy,” said she, as she sat down behind a smoking tureen at the head of the table. “Come, have your nice hot soup, dear. Pass that to Dad, Becky, and light the other gas. What sort of a day?” “A hard day,” said Mr. Paget, heavily. “Here, one of you girls put Baby into his chair. Let go, Bob—I’m too tired to-night for monkey-shines!” He sat down stiffly. “Where’s Bruce? Can’t that boy remem¬ ber what time we have dinner?” “Bruce is going to have supper with Richie Williams, Dad,” said Mrs. Paget, MOTHER 49 serenely. “They’ll get out their blue prints afterward and have a good evening’s work. Fill the glasses before you sit down, Ju. Come, Ted—put that back on the mantel. Come, Becky! Tell Daddy about what happened to-day, Mark—— ” They all drew up their chairs. Robert, recently graduated from a high chair, was propped upon “The Officers of the Civil War” and “The Household Book of Verse.” Julie tied on his bib, and kissed the back of his fat little neck before she slipped into her own seat. The mother sat between Ted and Duncan, for reasons that immediately became obvious. Margaret sat by her father, and attended to his needs, telling him all about the day, and laying her pretty slim hand over his as it rested beside his plate. The chops and cream gravy, as well as a mountain of baked potatoes, and various vegetables, were under discussion, when every one stopped short in surprise at hearing the doorbell ring. MOTHER So “Who-?” said Margaret, turning puz¬ zled brows to her mother, and “I’m sure I-” her mother answered, shaking her head. Ted was heard to mutter uneasily that, gee, maybe it was old Pembroke, mad because the fellers had soaked his old -skate with snowballs; Julie dimpled and said, “ Maybe it’s flowers!” Robert shouted “ Bakeryman!” more because he had re¬ cently acquired the word than because of any conviction on the subject. In the end Julie went to the door, with the four chil¬ dren in her wake. When she came back, she looked bewildered, and the children a little alarmed. “It’s—it’s Mrs. Carr-Boldt, Mother,” said Julie. “Well, don’t leave her standing there in the cold, dear!” Mrs. Paget said, rising quickly, to go into the hall. Margaret, her heart thumping with an unanalyzed prem¬ onition of something pleasant, and ner¬ vous, too, for the hospitality of the Pagets, MOTHER 5i followed her. So they were all presently crowded into the hall, Mrs. Paget all hos¬ pitality, Margaret full of a fear she would have denied that her mother would not be equal to the occasion, the children curious, Julie a little embarrassed. The visitor, fur-clad, rain-spattered—for it was raining again—and beaming, stretched a hand to Mrs. Paget. “You’re Mrs. Paget, of course—this is an awful hour to interrupt you/’ she said in her big, easy way, “and there’s my Miss Paget—how do you do? But you see I • must get up to town to-night—in this door ? I can see perfectly, thank you—and I did want a little talk with you first. Now, what a shame!”—for the gas, lighted by Theodore at this point, revealed Duncan’s bib, and the napkins some of the others were still carrying. “I’ve interrupted your dinner! Won’t you let me wait here un¬ til-” “Perhaps—if you haven’t had your sup- 52 MOTHER per—you will have some with us,” said Mrs. Paget, a little uncertainly. Margaret in¬ wardly shuddered, but Mrs. Carr-Boldt was gracious. “Mrs. Paget, that’s charming of you,” she said. “But I had tea at Dayton, and mustn’t lose another moment. I shan’t dine until I get home. I’m the busiest woman in the world, you know. Now, it won’t take me two minutes-” She was seated now, her hands still deep in her muff, for the parlor was freezing cold. Mrs. Paget, with a rather bewildered look, sat down, too. 