Miss Lulu Bett | Page 5

a bit hopelessly, somehow foiled in her dignity. She brushed at her skirt, the veins of her long, wrinkled hands catching an intenser blue from the dark cloth. She put her hair behind her ears.
"We put a potato in the oven for you," said Ina. She had never learned quite how to treat these periodic refusals of her mother to eat, but she never had ceased to resent them.
"No, thank you," said Mrs. Bett. Evidently she rather enjoyed the situation, creating for herself a spot-light much in the manner of Monona.
"Mother," said Lulu, "let me make you some toast and tea."
Mrs. Bett turned her gentle, bloodless face toward her daughter, and her eyes warmed.
"After a little, maybe," she said. "I think I'll run over to see Grandma Gates now," she added, and went toward the door.
"Tell her," cried Dwight, "tell her she's my best girl."
Grandma Gates was a rheumatic cripple who lived next door, and whenever the Deacons or Mrs. Bett were angry or hurt or wished to escape the house for some reason, they stalked over to Grandma Gates--in lieu of, say, slamming a door. These visits radiated an almost daily friendliness which lifted and tempered the old invalid's lot and life.
Di flashed out at the door again, on some trivial permission.
"A good many of mamma's stitches in that dress to keep clean," Ina called after.
"Early, darling, early!" her father reminded her. A faint regurgitation of his was somehow invested with the paternal.
"What's this?" cried Dwight Herbert Deacon abruptly.
On the clock shelf lay a letter.
"Oh, Dwight!" Ina was all compunction. "It came this morning. I forgot."
"I forgot it too! And I laid it up there." Lulu was eager for her share of the blame.
"Isn't it understood that my mail can't wait like this?"
Dwight's sense of importance was now being fed in gulps.
"I know. I'm awfully sorry," Lulu said, "but you hardly ever get a letter----"
This might have made things worse, but it provided Dwight with a greater importance.
"Of course, pressing matter goes to my office," he admitted it. "Still, my mail should have more careful----"
He read, frowning. He replaced the letter, and they hung upon his motions as he tapped the envelope and regarded them.
"Now!" said he. "What do you think I have to tell you?"
"Something nice," Ina was sure.
"Something surprising," Dwight said portentously.
"But, Dwight--is it _nice?_" from his Ina.
"That depends. I like it. So'll Lulu." He leered at her. "It's company."
"Oh, Dwight," said Ina. "Who?"
"From Oregon," he said, toying with his suspense.
"Your brother!" cried Ina. "Is he coming?"
"Yes. Ninian's coming, so he says."
"Ninian!" cried Ina again. She was excited, round-eyed, her moist lips parted. Dwight's brother Ninian. How long was it? Nineteen years. South America, Central America, Mexico, Panama "and all." When was he coming and what was he coming for?
"To see me," said Dwight. "To meet you. Some day next week. He don't know what a charmer Lulu is, or he'd come quicker."
Lulu flushed terribly. Not from the implication. But from the knowledge that she was not a charmer.
The clock struck. The child Monona uttered a cutting shriek. Herbert's eyes flew not only to the child but to his wife. What was this, was their progeny hurt?
"Bedtime," his wife elucidated, and added: "Lulu, will you take her to bed? I'm pretty tired."
Lulu rose and took Monona by the hand, the child hanging back and shaking her straight hair in an unconvincing negative.
As they crossed the room, Dwight Herbert Deacon, strolling about and snapping his fingers, halted and cried out sharply:
"Lulu. One moment!"
He approached her. A finger was extended, his lips were parted, on his forehead was a frown.
"You picked the flower on the plant?" he asked incredulously.
Lulu made no reply. But the child Monona felt herself lifted and borne to the stairway and the door was shut with violence. On the dark stairway Lulu's arms closed about her in an embrace which left her breathless and squeaking. And yet Lulu was not really fond of the child Monona, either. This was a discharge of emotion akin, say, to slamming the door.

II
MAY
Lulu was dusting the parlour. The parlour was rarely used, but every morning it was dusted. By Lulu.
She dusted the black walnut centre table which was of Ina's choosing, and looked like Ina, shining, complacent, abundantly curved. The leather rocker, too, looked like Ina, brown, plumply upholstered, tipping back a bit. Really, the davenport looked like Ina, for its chintz pattern seemed to bear a design of lifted eyebrows and arch, reproachful eyes.
Lulu dusted the upright piano, and that was like Dwight--in a perpetual attitude of rearing back, with paws out, playful, but capable, too, of roaring a ready bass.
And the black fireplace--there was Mrs. Bett to the life. Colourless, fireless, and with a dust of ashes.
In the midst of all was Lulu herself reflected in the