Flower of the Dusk | Page 6

into formidable weapons
of offence.
She habitually wore her steel-bowed spectacles half-way down her nose.
They might have fallen off had not a kindly Providence placed a large

wart where it would do the most good. On Sundays, when she put on
shoes, corsets, her best black silk, and her gold-bowed spectacles, she
took great pains to wear them properly. When she reached home,
however, she always took off her fine raiment and laid her spectacles
aside with a great sigh of relief. Miss Mattie's disposition improved
rapidly as soon as the old steel-bowed pair were in their rightful place,
resting safely upon the wart.
[Sidenote: Second-hand Things]
When they sat down to supper, she reverted to the original topic. "As I
was sayin'," she began, "there ain't no sense in the books you and your
pa has always set such store by. Where he ever got 'em, I dunno, but
they was always a comin'. Lots of 'em was well-nigh wore out when he
got 'em, and he wouldn't let me buy nothin' that had been used before,
even if I knew the folks.
"I got a silver coffin plate once at an auction over to the Ridge for
almost nothin' and your pa was as mad as a wet hen. There was a name
on it, but it could have been scraped off, and the rest of it was perfectly
good. When you need a coffin plate you need it awful bad. While your
pa was rampin' around, he said he wouldn't have been surprised to see
me comin' home with a second-hand coffin in the back of the buggy.
Who ever heard of a second-hand coffin? I've always thought his mind
was unsettled by so much readin'.
"I ain't a-sayin' but what some readin' is all right. Some folks has just
moved over to the Ridge and the postmaster's wife was a-showin' me
some papers they get, every week. One is The Metropolitan Weekly,
and the other The Housewife's Companion. I must say, the stories in
those papers is certainly beautiful.
"Once, when they come after their mail, they was as mad as anything
because the papers hadn't come, but the postmaster's wife was readin'
one of the stories and settin' up nights to do it, so she wa'n't to blame
for not lettin' 'em go until she got through with 'em. They slip out of the
covers just as easy, and nobody ever knows the difference.

[Sidenote: The Doctor's Darling]
"She was tellin' me about one of the stories. It's named _Lovely Lulu,
or the Doctor's Darling_. Lovely Lulu is a little orphant who has to do
most of the housework for a family of eight, and the way they abuse
that child is something awful. The young ladies are forever puttin'
ruffled white skirts into her wash, and makin' her darn the lace on their
blue silk mornin' dresses.
"There's a rich doctor that they're all after and one day little Lulu
happens to open the front-door for him, and he gets a good look at her
for the first time. As she goes upstairs, Arthur Montmorency--that's his
name--holds both hands to his heart and says, 'She and she only shall be
my bride.' The conclusion of this highly fascinatin' and absorbin'
romance will be found in the next number of _The Housewife's
Companion_."
"Mother," suggested Roger, "why don't you subscribe for the papers
yourself?"
Miss Mattie dropped her knife and fork and gazed at him in
open-mouthed astonishment. "Roger," she said, kindly, "I declare if
sometimes you don't remind me of my people more'n your pa's. I never
thought of that myself and I dunno how you come to. I'll do it the very
first time I go down to the store. The postmaster's wife can get the
addresses without tearin' off the covers, and after I get 'em read she can
borrow mine, and not be always makin' the people at the Ridge so mad
that she's runnin' the risk of losin' her job. If you ain't the beatenest!"
Basking in the unaccustomed warmth of his mother's approval, Roger
finished his supper in peace. Afterward, while she was clearing up, he
even dared to take up the much-criticised book and lose himself once
more in his father's beloved Emerson.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Childish Memories]

All his childish memories of his father had been blurred into one by the
mists of the intervening years. As though it were yesterday, he could
see the library upstairs, which was still the same, and the grave, silent,
kindly man who sat dreaming over his books. When the child entered,
half afraid because the room was so quiet, the man had risen and caught
him in his arms with such hungry passion that he had almost cried out.