After A Shadow and Other Stories | Page 6

take so lighthearted
view of the future as I do. He says that the prospect of sitting idle and
being kept by his wife for months to come, is something more wretched
and hopeless than words can describe. I try to raise his spirits by
reminding him of his years of honest hard work for me and the children,
and of the doctor's assurance that his eyes will get the better, in good
time, of their present helpless state. But he still sighs and
murmurs--being one of the most independent and high spirited of
men--about living a burden on his wife. I can only answer, what in my
heart of hearts I feel, that I took him for Better and for Worse; that I
have had many years of the Better, and that, even in our present trouble,
the Worse shows no signs of coming yet!
The bead purse is getting on fast. Red and blue, in a pretty striped
pattern.
21st.--A busy day. We go to Appletreewick to-morrow. Paying bills
and packing up. All poor William's new canvases and painting-things
huddled together into a packing-case. He looked so sad, sitting silent
with his green shade on, while his old familiar working materials were
disappearing around him, as if he and they were never to come together
again, that the tears would start into my eyes, though I am sure I am not
one of the crying sort. Luckily, the green shade kept him from seeing

me: and I took good care, though the effort nearly choked me, that he
should not hear I was crying, at any rate.
The bead purse is done. How are we to get the steel rings and tassels
for it? I am not justified now in spending sixpence unnecessarily, even
for the best of purposes.
22d.-----
23d. _The Farm of Appletreewick._--Too tired, after our move
yesterday, to write a word in my diary about our journey to this
delightful place. But now that we are beginning to get settled, I can
manage to make up for past omissions.
My first occupation on the morning of the move had, oddly enough,
nothing to do with our departure for the farmhouse. The moment
breakfast was over I began the day by making Emily as smart and
nice-looking as I could, to go to the doctor's with the purse. She had her
best silk frock on, showing the mending a little in some places, I am
afraid, and her straw hat trimmed with my bonnet ribbon. Her father's
neck-scarf, turned and joined so that nobody could see it, made a nice
mantilla for her; and away she went to the doctor's, with her little,
determined step, and the purse in her hand (such a pretty hand that it is
hardly to be regretted I had no gloves for her). They were delighted
with the purse--which I ought to mention was finished with some white
beads; we found them in rummaging among our boxes, and they made
beautiful rings and tassels, contrasting charmingly with the blue and
red of the rest of the purse. The doctor and his little girl were, as I have
said, delighted with the present; and they gave Emily, in return, a
workbox for herself, and a box of sugar-plums for her baby sister. The
child came back all flushed with the pleasure of the visit, and quite
helped to keep up her father's spirits with talking to him about it. So
much for the highly interesting history of the bead purse.
Toward the afternoon the light cart from the farmhouse came to fetch
us and our things to Appletreewick. It was quite a warm spring day,
and I had another pang to bear as I saw poor William helped into the
cart, looking so sickly and sad, with his miserable green shade, in the

cheerful sunlight. "God only knows, Leah, how this will succeed with
us," he said, as we started; then sighed, and fell silent again.
Just outside the town the doctor met us. "Good luck go with you!" he
cried, swinging his stick in his usual hasty way; "I shall come and see
you as soon as you are all settled at the farmhouse." "Good-by, sir,"
says Emily, struggling up with all her might among the bundles in the
bottom of the cart; "good-by, and thank you again for the work-box and
the sugar-plums." That was my child all over! she never wants telling.
The doctor kissed his hand, and gave another flourish with his stick. So
we parted.
How I should have enjoyed the drive if William could only have looked,
as I did, at the young firs on the heath bending beneath the steady
breeze; at the shadows flying over the smooth fields; at the high white
clouds moving on and