Chapter: XLIV. MY LORD AND LADY.


                           


"Please, Madam Mother, could you lend me my wife for half an hour? The
luggage has come, and I've been making hay of Amy's Paris finery, trying
to find some things I want," said Laurie, coming in the next day to find
Mrs. Laurence sitting in her mother's lap, as if being made "the baby"
again.

"Certainly. Go, dear; I forget that you have any home but this," and
Mrs. March pressed the white hand that wore the wedding-ring, as if
asking pardon for her maternal covetousness.

"I shouldn't have come over if I could have helped it; but I can't get
on without my little woman any more than a--"

"Weathercock can without wind," suggested Jo, as he paused for a simile;
Jo had grown quite her own saucy self again since Teddy came home.

"Exactly; for Amy keeps me pointing due west most of the time, with only
an occasional whiffle round to the south, and I haven't had an easterly
spell since I was married; don't know anything about the north, but am
altogether salubrious and balmy, hey, my lady?"

"Lovely weather so far; I don't know how long it will last, but I'm not
afraid of storms, for I'm learning how to sail my ship. Come home, dear,
and I'll find your bootjack; I suppose that's what you are rummaging
after among my things. Men are _so_ helpless, mother," said Amy, with a
matronly air, which delighted her husband.

"What are you going to do with yourselves after you get settled?" asked
Jo, buttoning Amy's cloak as she used to button her pinafores.

"We have our plans; we don't mean to say much about them yet, because we
are such very new brooms, but we don't intend to be idle. I'm going into
business with a devotion that shall delight grandfather, and prove to
him that I'm not spoilt. I need something of the sort to keep me steady.
I'm tired of dawdling, and mean to work like a man."

"And Amy, what is she going to do?" asked Mrs. March, well pleased at
Laurie's decision, and the energy with which he spoke.

"After doing the civil all round, and airing our best bonnet, we shall
astonish you by the elegant hospitalities of our mansion, the brilliant
society we shall draw about us, and the beneficial influence we shall
exert over the world at large. That's about it, isn't it, Madame
Récamier?" asked Laurie, with a quizzical look at Amy.

"Time will show. Come away, Impertinence, and don't shock my family by
calling me names before their faces," answered Amy, resolving that there
should be a home with a good wife in it before she set up a _salon_ as a
queen of society.

"How happy those children seem together!" observed Mr. March, finding it
difficult to become absorbed in his Aristotle after the young couple had
gone.

"Yes, and I think it will last," added Mrs. March, with the restful
expression of a pilot who has brought a ship safely into port.

"I know it will. Happy Amy!" and Jo sighed, then smiled brightly as
Professor Bhaer opened the gate with an impatient push.

Later in the evening, when his mind had been set at rest about the
bootjack, Laurie said suddenly to his wife, who was flitting about,
arranging her new art treasures,--

"Mrs. Laurence."

"My lord!"

"That man intends to marry our Jo!"

"I hope so; don't you, dear?"

"Well, my love, I consider him a trump, in the fullest sense of that
expressive word, but I do wish he was a little younger and a good deal
richer."

"Now, Laurie, don't be too fastidious and worldly-minded. If they love
one another it doesn't matter a particle how old they are nor how poor.
Women _never_ should marry for money--" Amy caught herself up short as
the words escaped her, and looked at her husband, who replied, with
malicious gravity,--

"Certainly not, though you do hear charming girls say that they intend
to do it sometimes. If my memory serves me, you once thought it your
duty to make a rich match; that accounts, perhaps, for your marrying a
good-for-nothing like me."

"O my dearest boy, don't, don't say that! I forgot you were rich when I
said 'Yes.' I'd have married you if you hadn't a penny, and I sometimes
wish you _were_ poor that I might show how much I love you;" and Amy,
who was very dignified in public and very fond in private, gave
convincing proofs of the truth of her words.

"You don't really think I am such a mercenary creature as I tried to be
once, do you? It would break my heart if you didn't believe that I'd
gladly pull in the same boat with you, even if you had to get your
living by rowing on the lake."

"Am I an idiot and a brute? How could I think so, when you refused a
richer man for me, and won't let me give you half I want to now, when I
have the right? Girls do it every day, poor things, and are taught to
think it is their only salvation; but you had better lessons, and,
though I trembled for you at one time, I was not disappointed, for the
daughter was true to the mother's teaching. I told mamma so yesterday,
and she looked as glad and grateful as if I'd given her a check for a
million, to be spent in charity. You are not listening to my moral
remarks, Mrs. Laurence;" and Laurie paused, for Amy's eyes had an absent
look, though fixed upon his face.

"Yes, I am, and admiring the dimple in your chin at the same time. I
don't wish to make you vain, but I must confess that I'm prouder of my
handsome husband than of all his money. Don't laugh, but your nose is
_such_ a comfort to me;" and Amy softly caressed the well-cut feature
with artistic satisfaction.

Laurie had received many compliments in his life, but never one that
suited him better, as he plainly showed, though he did laugh at his
wife's peculiar taste, while she said slowly,--

"May I ask you a question, dear?"

"Of course you may."

"Shall you care if Jo does marry Mr. Bhaer?"

"Oh, that's the trouble, is it? I thought there was something in the
dimple that didn't suit you. Not being a dog in the manger, but the
happiest fellow alive, I assure you I can dance at Jo's wedding with a
heart as light as my heels. Do you doubt it, my darling?"

Amy looked up at him, and was satisfied; her last little jealous fear
vanished forever, and she thanked him, with a face full of love and
confidence.

"I wish we could do something for that capital old Professor. Couldn't
we invent a rich relation, who shall obligingly die out there in
Germany, and leave him a tidy little fortune?" said Laurie, when they
began to pace up and down the long drawing-room, arm-in-arm, as they
were fond of doing, in memory of the chateau garden.

             [Illustration: They began to pace up and down]

"Jo would find us out, and spoil it all; she is very proud of him, just
as he is, and said yesterday that she thought poverty was a beautiful
thing."

"Bless her dear heart! she won't think so when she has a literary
husband, and a dozen little professors and professorins to support. We
won't interfere now, but watch our chance, and do them a good turn in
spite of themselves. I owe Jo for a part of my education, and she
believes in people's paying their honest debts, so I'll get round her in
that way."

"How delightful it is to be able to help others, isn't it? That was
always one of my dreams, to have the power of giving freely; and, thanks
to you, the dream has come true."

"Ah! we'll do quantities of good, won't we? There's one sort of poverty
that I particularly like to help. Out-and-out beggars get taken care of,
but poor gentlefolks fare badly, because they won't ask, and people
don't dare to offer charity; yet there are a thousand ways of helping
them, if one only knows how to do it so delicately that it does not
offend. I must say, I like to serve a decayed gentleman better than a
blarneying beggar; I suppose it's wrong, but I do, though it is
harder."

"Because it takes a gentleman to do it," added the other member of the
domestic admiration society.

"Thank you, I'm afraid I don't deserve that pretty compliment. But I was
going to say that while I was dawdling about abroad, I saw a good many
talented young fellows making all sorts of sacrifices, and enduring real
hardships, that they might realize their dreams. Splendid fellows, some
of them, working like heroes, poor and friendless, but so full of
courage, patience, and ambition, that I was ashamed of myself, and
longed to give them a right good lift. Those are people whom it's a
satisfaction to help, for if they've got genius, it's an honor to be
allowed to serve them, and not let it be lost or delayed for want of
fuel to keep the pot boiling; if they haven't, it's a pleasure to
comfort the poor souls, and keep them from despair when they find it
out."

"Yes, indeed; and there's another class who can't ask, and who suffer in
silence. I know something of it, for I belonged to it before you made a
princess of me, as the king does the beggar-maid in the old story.
Ambitious girls have a hard time, Laurie, and often have to see youth,
health, and precious opportunities go by, just for want of a little help
at the right minute. People have been very kind to me; and whenever I
see girls struggling along, as we used to do, I want to put out my hand
and help them, as I was helped."

"And so you shall, like an angel as you are!" cried Laurie, resolving,
with a glow of philanthropic zeal, to found and endow an institution for
the express benefit of young women with artistic tendencies. "Rich
people have no right to sit down and enjoy themselves, or let their
money accumulate for others to waste. It's not half so sensible to leave
legacies when one dies as it is to use the money wisely while alive, and
enjoy making one's fellow-creatures happy with it. We'll have a good
time ourselves, and add an extra relish to our own pleasure by giving
other people a generous taste. Will you be a little Dorcas, going about
emptying a big basket of comforts, and filling it up with good deeds?"

"With all my heart, if you will be a brave St. Martin, stopping, as you
ride gallantly through the world, to share your cloak with the beggar."

"It's a bargain, and we shall get the best of it!"

So the young pair shook hands upon it, and then paced happily on again,
feeling that their pleasant home was more home-like because they hoped
to brighten other homes, believing that their own feet would walk more
uprightly along the flowery path before them, if they smoothed rough
ways for other feet, and feeling that their hearts were more closely
knit together by a love which could tenderly remember those less blest
than they.

                       [Illustration: Tail-piece]

 Laurie comes over to the March household and asks Marmee if he can borrow Amy to help him find something in their luggage. Laurie, Jo, and Marmee talk about the way that Amy keeps Laurie on the straight and narrow. As Jo helps Amy put her coat on, she asks what the newly-married Laurences are going to do with themselves. Neither of them needs to work, since Laurie is rich, but they do have plans. Laurie says that he's going to go into business, if only to give him something to do and to keep him from getting into trouble. Amy, as his wife, is going to entertain all the most important people in society at their mansion. Amy and Laurie go off together. Mr. and Mrs. March comment on how happy they seem and what a good couple they make. Jo sighs, but then smiles as Mr. Bhaer comes in! Later that evening, Amy and Laurie talk about the family and their plans. Laurie says to Amy that Mr. Bhaer seems interested in marrying Jo. Amy says that she hopes he will. Laurie wishes Mr. Bhaer was younger and richer. Amy scolds Laurie and starts talking about how women shouldn't marry for money, which makes them both laugh, since she used to claim she would do exactly that. In fact, Amy has married a rich man - but not for his money! She's comforted by his aristocratic appearance, too; he has the nose that she's always wanted. Amy asks Laurie if he will mind if Jo marries Mr. Bhaer. She seems a little bit worried that Laurie might still have romantic feelings for Jo. Laurie assures her that all his romance is directed at her, not at Jo. Amy's last bit of jealousy vanishes forever. Amy and Laurie speculate on how to use their fortune. They wish they could give money to Jo and Mr. Bhaer, but they know their help wouldn't be accepted. Laurie suggests that he and Amy focus on using their fortune to help "poor gentle folks" instead of "out and out beggars." This is a common nineteenth-century idea - that there are "deserving" and "undeserving" poor people. We're not sure we agree, but Amy and Laurie might have something when they say that some kinds of poverty are more invisible to society. They want to help people who aren't necessarily asking for help, but still need it. Laurie describes the talented young men that he has met abroad who were trying to make their way in the world and needed just a little help. Amy describes girls like herself, who have respectable backgrounds but no money, and miss opportunities. Laurie and Amy agree that they will use their money to help people who are working hard and need just a little assistance to get ahead in the world. They're the nineteenth-century novel equivalent of something like small business loans from the government or scholarships - they're going to give small amounts of money here and there, in subtle ways, to fund projects that wouldn't happen otherwise, and help people succeed. Laurie and Amy's resolution to use their money well draws them closer together in their marriage.

