Faith Gartneys Girlhood | Page 2

checkmated. "I wish I knew what we really could afford! It always seems to be these little things that don't cost much, and that other girls, whose fathers are not nearly so well off, always, have, without thinking anything about it." And she glanced over the table, whereon shone a silver coffee service, and up at the mantel where stood a French clock that had been placed there a month before.
"Pull at the bobbin and the latch will fly up." An unspoken suggestion, of drift akin to this, flitted through the mind of Faith. She wondered if her father knew that this was a Signal Street invitation.
Mr. Gartney was ambitious for his children, and solicitous for their place in society.
But Faith had a touch of high-mindedness about her that made it impossible for her to pull bobbins.
So, when her father presently, with hat and coat on, came into the room again for a moment, before going out for the day, she sat quite silent, with her foot upon the fender, looking into the fire.
Something in her face however, quite unconsciously, bespoke that the world did not lie entirely straight before her, and this catching her father's eye, brought up to him, by an untraceable association, the half-proffered request of his wife.
"So you haven't any shoes, Faithie. Is that it?"
"None nice enough for a party, father."
"And the party is a vital necessity, I suppose. Where is it to be?"
The latch string was put forth, and while Faith still stayed her hand, her mother, absolved from selfish end, was fain to catch it up.
"At the Rushleighs'. The Old Year out and the New Year in."
"Oh, well, we mustn't 'let the colt go bare,'" answered Mr. Gartney, pleasantly, portemonnaie in hand. "But you must make that do." He handed her five dollars. "And take good care of your things when you have got them, for I don't pick up many five dollars nowadays."
And the old look of care crept up, replacing the kindly smile, as he turned and left the room.
"I feel very much as if I had picked my father's pocket," said Faith, holding the bank note, half ashamedly, in her hand.
Henderson Gartney, Esq., was a man of no method in his expenditure. When money chanced to be plenty with him it was very apt to go as might happen--for French clocks, or whatsoever; and then, suddenly, the silver paper fell short elsewhere, and lo! a corner was left uncovered.
The horse and the mare were shod. Great expenses were incurred; money was found, somehow, for grand outlays; but the comfort of buying, with a readiness, the little needed matters of every day--this was foregone. "Not let the colt go bare!" It was precisely the thing he was continually doing.
Mrs. Gartney had long found it to be her only wise way to make her hay while the sun was shining--to buy, when she could buy, what she was sure would be most wanted--and to look forward as far as possible, in her provisions, since her husband scarcely seemed to look forward at all.
So she exemplified, over and over again in her life, the story of Pharaoh and his fat and lean kine.
That night, Faith, her little purchases and arrangements all complete, and flowers and carriage bespoken for the next evening, went to bed to dream such dreams as only come to the sleep of early years.
At the same time, lingering by the fireside below for a half hour's unreserved conversation, Mr. Gartney was telling his wife of another money disappointment.
"Blacklow, at Cross Corners, gives up the lease of the house in the spring. He writes me he is going out to Indiana with his son-in-law. I don't know where I shall find another such tenant--or any at all, for that matter."
CHAPTER II.
SORTES.
"How shall I know if I do choose the right?"
"Since this fortune falls to you, Be content, and seek no new." MERCHANT OF VENICE.
"Now, Mahala Harris," said Faith, as she glanced in at the nursery door, which opened from her room, "don't let Hendie get up a French Revolution here while I'm gone to dinner."
"Land sakes! Miss Faith! I don't know what you mean, nor whether I can help it. I dare say he'd get up a Revolution of '76, over again, if he once set out. He does train like 'lection, fact, sometimes."
"Well, don't let him build barricades with all the chairs, so that I shall have to demolish my way back again. I'm going to lay out my dress for to-night."
And very little dinner could her young appetite manage on this last day of the year. All her vital energy was busy in her anticipative brain, and glancing thence in sparkles from her eyes, and quivering down in swift currents to her restless little feet. It mattered little that there