the long winter was past, and fayre lay basking in the warmth of may. the little river reflected the bright green of its newly clad willows, through which gleams of sunshine, too warm for mortals, rejoiced the minnows darting through the shallows. the air was sweet with blossoms and tender verdure, and the song-birds filled it with rejoicing. it was impossible to be sad on such a day, and wythie, rob, and prue, standing in the doorway of the little grey house, absorbing the beauty through every sense, felt their pulses thrill with young joy in living, like the may's.
the little grey house modestly announced to all the world that its winter, too, was over and gone. newly painted in its own soft grey, the lawn with which its daughters had once vainly struggled, smooth shaven by skilful hands, flowers, once beyond its reach in the strict economy of its finances,[255] now flaming gayly against its low walls, all spoke of the prosperity with which its last son had endowed it.
no great changes had been made in the beloved little home—too well beloved as it was to admit of them—but it had been made beautiful on its own simple lines, and the girls could hardly help feeling it knew and was glad of its physical well-being. and these girls, too, showed the bettering of their lives in many subtle small ways. wythie's fresh prettiness was blooming in the brightness it was intended to wear, rob's variable face was losing its strained look, and prue's beauty was unspoiled by the discontented expression it had too often worn. pretty, fresh white gowns, with their black ribbons fluttered by the may wind, were reminders of a loss which was fast growing to be rather a tender memory than a poignant regret. for sorrow of the higher sort brings with it heights of thought and consolations with which to bear it, but the daily struggle to live, the petty cares and vain effort to make too little suffice, eats out heart and brain, with no uplifting to render it endurable.
from their cradle the grey girls had fought this fight, and won in it nobly, but now that it was over, and an income which to them was abun[256]dant was assured them, they drew a long breath, casting off sordid frets forever, and began to expand as nature had meant them to, into light-hearted young creatures, full of their own may-time.
seeing them happier, and relieved herself of her hard burden, mrs. grey, too, was learning to bear her loss, and give herself up to her hard-earned rest and to her girls' petting, with her anxious mental strain relaxed. it was a day of peace, and, to complete it, "cousin peace" was coming to spend it with them.
for the first time in years the little grey house was awaiting guests. the baldwins, all three, were coming from new york to see the house and its inmates which they had been so fortunate in befriending, and rob burned to make the occasion some approximate expression of her gratitude, and some return for their hospitality to her.
she and oswyth and prue were waiting for battalion b and frances to go to the woods after dogwood with which to turn the little grey house into a bower, and as they waited on the step miss charlotte came.
"come in, dear cousin peace," cried wythie, kissing her lovingly as soon as rob gave her a chance. "mardy is upstairs resting and writing[257] letters. i wonder how long it will take us to get used to the luxury—the unspeakable delight—of seeing mardy rest, and knowing that lydia is in the kitchen doing the work!"
"blackening the stove particularly," added rob. "i find now that, on the whole, i hated most of all to blacken the stove."
"well, i find that what i hated most was what i happened to be doing," remarked prue.
"you're not to think that we are living in idleness, cousin peace," wythie said, as they led the gentle cousin charlotte into the house. "there's only one of lydia, and one person can't do it all, but it is such a relief to have 'help'!"
"there's enough to be done in any house; i understand, lassies," said miss charlotte. "but you were tired lassies, and i am more glad than you know to see your burdens lifted—still more glad for your mother, because i know how happy sylvester would be—is—to see her resting."
"oh, i know that, too, cousin peace!" cried rob. "i know how patergrey felt about 'pretty mary winslow,' as he called her to me, having had a hard life because she married him. i'm beginning almost to be glad—though i miss him most of us all—that he won his fight just as he did; i know he would have chosen it so."
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"and i'm beginning to feel as though he had not gone away at all," said wythie, softly; "as though all this comfort and greater ease were he himself, his love and presence around us, and that in having it we had him. i can't explain, but it is such a comfort!"
"i can understand that, dear wythie," said cousin peace.
"aunt azraella is coming over to luncheon, and to teach lydia her famous short-cake," said rob, after a little pause, as they halted before their mother's door. "she does make wonderful strawberry short-cake, and we are going to stun the baldwins with it. and she's quite a different aunt azraella. she has such a respect for bonds and stocks and coupons, and such little appurtenances, that she regards us through the rose-colored glasses of an invested fifty thousand dollars. she never criticises us—you see we can afford to do what we please—and her respectful manner to me beggars description. oswyth is nowhere now; flighty roberta is her favorite niece, all because of my obstinacy and defiance of her opinion! but i stand for the source of gold, and she regards me no longer as fighting 'bobs,' but as a sort of kimberley."
[259]
"oh, rob!" exclaimed wythie, "don't hunt for motives! it's so much pleasanter to take people at their face value, when it doesn't matter. and aunt azraella is really quite nice now, cousin peace."
she opened her mother's chamber-door as she spoke, and mrs. grey sprang from her big chair to fold in a close embrace her husband's nearest of kin and most of kind.
"try to bear up under the infliction, mardy," said incorrigible rob. "we know you are afflicted when cousin peace comes, but don't let her see it so plainly."
for mrs. grey was radiating the pleasure she felt in the coming of sweet miss charlotte.
"there are the boys and frances coming down the street, saucy robin," said her mother. "take yourselves off, girls, and let me have cousin peace all to myself for a while. wait one moment, charlotte; kiku-san is in that chair—he claims it—but i'll lay him on my bed."
she raised the white cat like a round mat, just as he lay, and miss charlotte seated herself in the vacated rocking-chair where the breeze blew in on her. kiku-san rose from his coiled position, sat up sleepily for a moment on the foot of the bed, then, stretching and yawning, walked over[260] into cousin peace's lap, where he contentedly curled up to continue his nap.
they all laughed. "trust a cat to carry his point!" cried rob. "that chair is kiku's, and kiku will have it, whether cousin peace or a down pillow is in it."
"we're off for dogwood, kiku-san," said prue, laying her cheek on the cat for a farewell. "and we'll bring it home with plenty of bark for bad kittens."
mrs. grey watched the seven young people out of the gate, and her eyes and lips were smiling. miss charlotte said, as if she, too, saw the pretty picture: "they are fine boys, mary, and there are no girls so sweet and pretty as our grey ones. do you ever wonder if a lifelong affection, of a stronger sort, may grow out of this beautiful triple friendship?"
"i suppose it would be impossible not to dream of it, charlotte, but wythie and rob are simple girls, and too unconscious to dream of it themselves," said their mother. "i should be glad if it were to be. yes, i do think of it, and i realize my girls are hovering on the verge of womanhood. they have been too busy, too home-keeping, to cross the line early. sometimes i think basil and bruce, with their half a year ad[261]vance of wythie and rob, are already building a little romance, and i see that basil finds wythie just about perfect in all ways, as bruce evidently considers all other girls mere sawdust beside bright robin, but it all lies folded in the future, and no one can foresee. it would be a lovely little idyl, and i dare to hope for it; almost to feel sure it will come some day."
"i think it will," said miss charlotte, quietly, and the two women smiled at each other, full of loving pride in the girls who were to them both dearest of all girls, prettiest, bravest, sweetest.
it was high noon, and very warm, when the faint sound of distant singing announced to mrs. grey and miss charlotte and to mrs. winslow, who had by that time arrived, that the seven were returning. the singing grew louder, clearer, and at last developed into nothing more classic than the darky song, "won't you come home, bill bailey?" chosen as appropriate, and rendered with immense expression.
almost at once the procession came in sight. prue and bartlemy ahead, prue more than ever beautiful under the great boughs of dogwood, which, like the rest, she bore. oswyth and basil followed, wythie's face looking out flushed and glowing with summer warmth and happiness un[262]der the great white, blotched, so-called blossoms of the shrub. rob and frances divided bruce between them, making an arbor over his head, holding above it, by an effort, their spoils of the glossy green and dazzling white. all seven were singing at the tops of their fresh voices, and even aunt azraella could not resist the charm of this return, but smiled benignantly at them from the window.
"you never saw anyone so changed as mr. flinders," remarked mrs. grey at luncheon, as she busily served her guests to fresh peas. "not only does he carry on the place on halves, instead of two-thirds profit—which is really much fairer—but, now that he has started in well-doing, he is going uphill in virtue, rob says, as if he were on an inverted chute. he is truly grateful to us—to rob especially—for taking polly last winter; he and his wife insist that we saved her life, and i am surprised and delighted with the feeling he shows."
"being disagreeable is like other habits," said miss charlotte. "when people once break off and get over the embarrassment of having their pleasant ways noted, it is quite easy to keep on, even to increase them daily. i believe half the cranky people are so just because they fell into[263] the way of it, and feel awkwardly self-conscious when they behave like other people."
"you ought to know, cousin peace," said rob, suggestively, and, before the laugh with which her hint had been received had died away, she pushed her chair back from the table. "come on, you three big boys and little girls," she cried. "do you realize that it is now half past one, and that the baldwins arrive at four? that isn't long in which to decorate the little grey house, make the toilets of its inmates—kiku-san's ribbon alone needs five minutes to tie—and get a triumphal procession of welcome down to the station to meet them. you can't have another piece of cake, really you cannot have it, bartlemy—unless you put it in your pocket. jump up, all of you!"
rob's younger guests meekly obeyed her, and presently she had them all at work, filling every available vase and jar with water, and bringing them to her—"like isaac's slaves returning from the well," bruce said—in the cool pantry where the girls were arranging the dogwood.
it was not long before the little grey house was massed with the woodland beauty—old fireplaces, narrow mantels, every table and corner, all was full of the starry white, brown-blotched radiance of the dogwood.
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rob fell back to admire, leaning an elbow on wythie and frances's shoulders, and shutting one eye in exaggeration of bartlemy's artistic manner of scrutinizing a sketch. "i think it will do, my brethren and sisters," she said, solemnly.
"o little house that gave me birth,
we've laid the dogwood on thy hearth
because the guests now drawing near
kept you from going to the dogs, my dear—
oh, mercy, i thought that would turn out better. it would, if i had time to develop that noble thought—but you've got to mispronounce hearth or it won't!" cried rob, bringing her disastrous attempt to a hasty conclusion.
"i could do something better than that this minute, but i won't, because you do so hate to be beaten," said basil.
"i never know i am," said rob, and they all shouted, because the statement was quite true.
"poetry reminds me of the story-telling; are you going to keep it up another winter, rob? you must, for you've become an institution of fayre. the children will be heart-broken if you don't," said frances.
"i don't know; i'm not over-scrupulous, but[265] it never seemed right to me for anyone to earn money unless they have to, and now—only think of it—i have enough! i should hate horribly to keep money from a girl having as hard a time as i have had," said rob.
"but there is no one else to do this, and so you don't wrong anyone. it would be a shame to stop, really," protested frances.
"well, we'll see; this is only may, and there's plenty of time to decide—plenty of time for everything in this new, blessed life of ours!" cried rob. "maybe i'll carry it on in kiku-san's name, and send the proceeds to found a rescue league for animals in new york like the one in boston—you'd like that, wouldn't you, my affectionate little white-chrysanthemum-in-japanese?" she added, catching up their pet and swinging him to her shoulder.
"time to dress to go to the station, children!" called mrs. grey from the dining-room.
"come in here and see the little grey house in its parlor," wythie called back. "aunt azraella and cousin peace, too."
they came at once, and stood on the worn door-sill surveying the low-ceiled room, fresh and cool in its green paper, high, white wainscoting, and white paint, its few fine engravings and soft grey[266] prints on the walls, and the starry dogwood lighting it all.
it was really beautiful, and mrs. grey caught her breath, with a sob of gratitude that, in spite of her greater loss, the dear little old homestead was left her.
the girls caught the sound and understood her thought—it was too recent a joy to them all ever to be far beyond the mind of each of them. wythie, rob, and prue ran over to their mardy and twined their arms around her, all three, and hugged her close.
"we have it safe, and we have one another," whispered sweet oswyth.
"it's the loveliest spring of all my life," said prue, solemnly. "and in the winter i didn't dare to think of summer again."
"behold a group of grateful greys," said rob, dashing away a tiny tear from her bright eyes before anyone could suspect it of being there, and laughing blithely. "aren't we perfect geese about our little grey house? we couldn't love it more if it were an old feudal, ancestral castle—though it would be bigger."
"three cheers for the little grey house, and three cheers for the grateful greys!" cried bruce, with an inspiration.
[267]
"for the house where we've had such glorious times, and for the people we love best of all the world," added basil, with a half-glance toward wythie.
"amendment carried!" cried bruce, with an open look at rob.
the open windows bore the cheers out to farmer flinders in the garden, and he stopped work to listen, leaning on his hoe, and smiling to himself with unwonted benignity.
"well, they're havin' happy days in the little grey house at last," he said aloud. "and i declare to mercy, they deserve 'em! there's no doubt they all do deserve 'em."
