The Poor Little Rich Girl Read online

  CHAPTER III

  There was a high wind blowing, and the newly washed garments hanging onthe roofs of nearby buildings were writhing and twisting violently, andtugging at the long swagging clothes-lines. Gwendolyn, watching from theside window of the nursery, pretended that the garments were so manytortured creatures, vainly struggling to be free. And she wished thattwo or three of the whitest and prettiest might loose their hold and goflying away--across the crescent of the Drive and the wide river--toliberty and happiness in the forest beyond.

  Among the flapping lines walked maids--fully a score of them. Some weretaking down wash that was dry and stuffing it into baskets. Others werebusy hanging up limp pieces, first giving them a vigorous shake; thenputting a small portion of each over the line and pinching all securelyinto place with huge wooden pins.

  It seemed cruel.

  Yet the faces of the maids were kind--kinder than the faces of MissRoyle and Jane and Thomas. Behind Gwendolyn the heavy brocade curtainshung touching. She parted them to make sure that she was alone in thenursery. After which she raised the window--just a trifle. The roofsthat were white with laundry were not those directly across from thenursery, but over-looked the next street. Nevertheless, with the windowup, Gwendolyn could hear the crack and snap of the whipping garments,and an indistinct chorus of cheery voices. One maid was singing alilting tune. The rest were chattering back and forth. With all herheart Gwendolyn envied them--envied their freedom, and the fact thatthey were indisputably grown-up. And she decided that, later on, whenshe was as big and strong, she would be a laundry-maid and run about onjust such level roofs, joyously hanging up wash.

  Presently she raised the window a trifle more, so that the lower sillwas above her head. Then, "_Hoo_-hoo-oo-oo!" she piped in her clearvoice.

  A maid heard her, and pointed her out to another. Soon a number werelooking her way. They smiled at her, too, Gwendolyn smiled in return,and nodded. At that, one of a group snatched up a square of white clothand waved it. Instantly Gwendolyn waved back.

  One by one the maids went. Then Gwendolyn suddenly recalled why she waswaiting alone--while Miss Royle and Jane made themselves extra neat intheir respective rooms; why she herself was dressed with such unusualcare--in a pink muslin, white silk stockings, and black patent-leatherpumps, the whole crowned by a pink-satin hair-bow. With the remembrance,the pretend-game was forgotten utterly: The lines of limp, whitecreatures on the roofs flung their tortured shapes about unheeded.

  At bed-time the previous evening Potter had telephoned that Madam wouldpay a morning visit to the nursery. The thought had kept Gwendolyn awakefor a while, smiling into the dark, kissing her own hands for veryhappiness; it had made her heart beat wildly, too. For she reviewed allthe things she intended broaching to her mother--about eating at thegrown-up table, and not having a nurse any more, and going today-school.

  Contrary to a secret plan of action, she slept late. At breakfast,excitement took away her appetite. And throughout the study-hour thatfollowed, her eyes read, and her lips repeated aloud, several pages ofstandard literature for juveniles that her busy brain did notcomprehend. Yet now as she waited behind the rose hangings for thesupreme moment, she felt, strangely enough, no impatience. With three toattend her, privacy was not a common privilege, and, therefore, prized.She fell to inspecting the row of houses across the way--in search forother strange but friendly faces.

  There were exactly twelve houses opposite. The corner one farthest fromthe river she called the gray-haired house. An old lady lived there whoknitted bright worsted; also a fat old gentleman in a gay skull-cap whoshowed much attention to a long-leaved rubber-plant that flourishedbehind the glass of the street door. Gwendolyn leaned out, chin on palm,to canvass the quaintly curtained windows--none of which at the momentframed a venerable head. Next the gray-haired house there had been--upto a recent date--a vacant lot walled off from the sidewalk by a high,broad bill-board. Now a pit yawned where formerly was the vacant space.And instead of the fascinating pictures that decorated the bill-board(one week a baby, rosy, dimpled and laughing; the next some hugelettering elaborately combined with a floral design; the next a mammothbottle, red and beautiful, and flanked by a single gleaming word:"Catsup") there towered--above street and pit, and even above thechimneys of the gray-haired house--the naked girders of a new steelstructure.

  The girders were black, but rusted to a brick-color in patches andstreaks. They were so riveted together that through them could be seensmall, regular spots of light. Later on, as Gwendolyn knew, floors andwindowed walls and a tin top would be fitted to the framework. And whatwas now a skeleton would be another house!

  Directly opposite the nursery, on that part of the side street whichsloped, were ten narrow houses, each four stories high, each withbrown-stone fronts and brown-stone steps, each topped by a large chimneyand a small chimney. In every detail these ten houses were preciselyalike. Jane, for some unaccountable reason, referred to them as privatedwellings. But since the roof of the second brown-stone house was just afoot lower than the roof of the first, the third roof just a foot lowerthan the roof of the second, and so on to the very tenth and last,Gwendolyn called these ten the step-houses.

  The step-houses were seldom interesting. As Gwendolyn's glances travelednow from brown-stone front to brown-stone front, not one presented eventhe relief of a visiting post-man.

  Her progress down the line of step-houses brought her by degrees to thebrick house on the Drive--a large vine-covered house, the wide entranceof which was toward the river. And no sooner had she given it one quickglance than she uttered a little shout of pleased surprise. Thebrick-house people were back!

  All the shades were up. There was smoke rising from one of the four tallchimneys. And even as Gwendolyn gazed, all absorbed interest, the netcurtains at an upper window were suddenly drawn aside and a face lookedout.

  It was a face that Gwendolyn had never seen before in the brick house.But though it was strange, it was entirely friendly. For as Gwendolynsmiled it a greeting, it smiled her a greeting back!

  She was a nurse-maid--so much was evident from the fact that she wore acap. But it was also plain that her duties differed in some way fromJane's. For her cap was different--shaped like a sugar-bowl turnedupside-down; hollow, and white, and marred by no flying strings.

  And she was not a red-haired nurse-maid. Her hair was almost as fair asGwendolyn's own, and it framed her face in a score of saucy wisps andcurls. Her face was pretty--full and rosy, like the face of Gwendolyn'sFrench doll. Also it seemed certain--even at such a distance--that shehad no freckles. Gwendolyn waved both hands at her. She threw a kissback.

  "Oh, thank you!" cried Gwendolyn, out loud. She threw kisses withalternating finger-tips.

  The nurse-maid shook the curtains at her. Then--they fell into place.She was gone.

  Gwendolyn sighed.

  The next moment she heard voices in the direction of the hall--first,Thomas's; next, a woman's--a strange one this. Disappointed, she turnedto face the screening curtains. But she was in no mood to make herselfagreeable to visiting friends of Miss Royle's--and who else could thisbe?

  She decided to remain quietly in seclusion; to emerge for no one excepther mother.

  A door opened. A heavy step advanced, followed by the murmur of trailingskirts upon carpet. Then Thomas spoke--his tone that full and measuredone employed, not to the governess, to Jane, to herself, or to any othercommon mortal, but to Potter, to her father and mother, and to guests."This is Miss Gwendolyn's nursery," he announced.

  Beyond the curtains were persons of importance!

  She shrank against the window, taking care not to stir the brocade.

  "We will wait here,"--the voice was clear, musical.

  "Thank you." Thomas's heavy step retreated. A door closed.

  There was a moment of perfect stillness. Then that musical voice beganagain:

  "Where do you suppose that young one is?"

  A second voice rippled out a low laugh.
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  Gwendolyn laughed too,--silently, her face against the glass. The fatold gentleman in the gray-haired house chanced to be looking in herdirection. He caught the broad smile and joined in.

  "In the school-room likely,"--it was the first speaker, answering herown inquiry--"getting stuffed."

  Stuffed! Gwendolyn could appreciate _that_. She choked back a gigglewith one small hand.

  Someone else thought the declaration amusing, for there was anotherwell-bred ripple; then once more that murmur of trailing skirts, goingtoward the window-seat; going the opposite way also, as if one of thetwo was making a circuit of the room.

  Presently, "Just look at this dressing-table, Louise! Fancy such a pieceof furniture for a _child!_ Ridiculous!"

  Gwendolyn cocked her yellow head to one side--after the manner of hercanary.

  "Bad taste." Louise joined her companion. "_Crystal_, if you please!Must've cost a fabulous sum."

  One or two articles were moved on the dresser. Then, "Poor little girl!"observed the other woman. "Rich, but--"

  Gwendolyn puckered her brows gravely. Was the speaker referring to_her?_ Clasping her hands tight, she leaned forward a little, strainingto catch every syllable. As a rule when gossip or criticism was talkedin her hearing, it was insured against being understood by the use ofstrange terms, spellings, winks, nods, shrugs, or sudden stops at themost important point. But now, with herself hidden, was there not alikelihood of plain speech?

  It came.

  The voice went on: "This is the first time you've met the mother, isn'tit?"

  "I think so,"--indifferently. "Who is she, anyhow?"

  "_No_body."

  Gwendolyn stared.

  "Nobody at all--_absolutely_. You know, they say--" She paused foremphasis.

  Now, Gwendolyn's eyes grew suddenly round; her lips parted in surprise._They_ again!

  "Yes?" encouraged Louise.

  Lower--"They say she was just an ordinary country girl, pretty, andhorribly poor, with a fair education, but no culture to speak of. Shemet him; he had money and fell in love with her; she married him. And,oh, _then!_" She chuckled.

  "Made the money fly?"

  The two were coming to settle themselves in chairs close to the sidewindow.

  "Not exactly. Haven't you heard what's the matter with her?"

  Gwendolyn's face paled a little. There was something the matter with hermother?--her dear, beautiful, young mother! The clasped hands werepressed to her breast.

  "Ambitious?" hazarded Louise, confidently.

  "It's no secret. Everybody's laughing at her,--at the rebuffs she takes;the money she gives to charity (wedges, you understand); the quantitiesof dresses she buys; the way she slaps on the jewels. She's got thesociety bee in her bonnet!"

  Gwendolyn caught her breath. _The society bee in her bonnet?_

  "Ah!" breathed Louise, as if comprehending. Then, "Dear! dear!"

  "She _talks_ nothing else. She _hears_ nothing else. She _sees_ nothingelse."

  "Bad as that?"

  "Goes wherever she can shove in--subscription lectures and musicales,hospital teas, Christmas bazars. And she benches her Poms; has boxes atthe Horse Show and the Opera; gives gold-plate dinners, and Heaven knowswhat!"

  "Ha! ha! _You_ haven't boosted her, dear?"

  "Not a bit of it! Make a point of never being seen _any_where withher."

  "And he?"

  Gwendolyn swallowed. _He_ was her father.

  "Well, it has kept the poor fellow in harness all the time, of course.You should have seen him when he _first_ came to town--straight andboyish, and _very_ handsome. (You know the type.) He's changed! Burnshis candles at both ends."

  "Hm!"

  Gwendolyn blinked with the effort of making mental notes.

  "You haven't heard the latest about him?"

  "Trying to make some Club?"

  Whispering--"On the edge of a _crash_."

  "Who told you?"

  "Oh, a little bird."

  Up came both palms to cover Gwendolyn's mouth. But not to smothermirth. A startled cry had all but escaped her. A little bird! She knewof that bird! He had told things against _her_--true things more oftenthan not--to Jane and Miss Royle. And now here he was chattering abouther father!

  "It's the usual story," commented Louise calmly, "with these _nouveauxriches_."

  "Sh!" A moment of stillness, as if both were listening. Then, "_SprechenSie Deutsch?_"

  "I--er--read it fairly well."

  "_Parlez-vous Francais?_"

  "_Oh, oui! Oui!_"

  "_Allors._" And there followed, in undertones, a short, spiritedconversation in the Gallic.

  Gwendolyn made a silent resolution to devote more time and thought tothe peevish and staccato instruction of Miss Du Bois.

  The two were interrupted by a light, quick step outside. Again the halldoor opened.

  "Oh, you'll pardon my having to desert you, _won't_ you?" It wasGwendolyn's mother. "I didn't intend being so long."

  Gwendolyn half-started forward, then stopped.

  "Why, of course!"--with sounds of rising.

  "_Cer_tainly!"

  "Differences below stairs, I find, require prompt action."

  "I fancy you have oceans of executive ability," declared Louise, warmly."That Orphans' Home affair--I hear you managed it tre_men_dously!"

  "No! No!"

  "Really, my dear,"--it was the other woman--"to be _quite_ frank, wemust confess that we haven't missed you! We've been enjoying our glimpseof the nursery."

  "It's simply _lovely!_" cried Louise.

  "And what a perfectly sweet dressing-table!"

  "Have you seen my little daughter?--Thomas!"

  "Yes, Madam."

  "There's a draught coming from somewhere--"

  "It's the side window, Madam."

  Instinctively Gwendolyn flattened herself against the wood-work at herback.

  Three or four steps brought Thomas across the floor. Then his two bighands appeared high up on the hangings. The next moment, the handsparted, sweeping the curtains with them.

  To escape detection was impossible. A quick thought made Gwendolynraise a face upon which was a forced expression that bore only a faintresemblance to a smile.

  "Boo!" she said, jumping out at him.

  Startled, he fell back. "Why, Miss Gwendolyn!"

  "Gwendolyn?" repeated her mother, surprised. "Why, what were you doingthere, darling?"

  "_Gwendolyn!_"--this in a faint gasp from both visitors.

  Gwendolyn came slowly forward. She did not raise her eyes; onlycurtsied.

  "So _this_ is your little daughter!" A gloved hand was reached out, andGwendolyn was drawn forward. "How _cunning!_"

  Gwendolyn recognized the voice of Louise. Now, she looked up. And saw apleasant face, young, but not so pretty as her mother's. She shookhands bashfully. Then shook again with an older woman, whose plaincountenance was dimly familiar. After which, giving a sudden littlebound, and putting up eager arms, she was caught to her mother.

  "My baby!"

  "_Moth-er!_"

  Cheek caressed cheek.

  "She's six, isn't she, my dear?" asked the plain, elderly one.

  "Oh, she's seven." A soft hand stroked the yellow hair.

  "As much as that? Really?"

  The inference was not lost upon Gwendolyn. She tightened her embrace.And turning her head on her mother's breast, looked frank resentment.

  The visitors were not watching her. They were exchanging glances--andsmiles, faint and uneasy. Slowly now they began to move toward the halldoor, which stood open. Beside it, waiting with an impressive air, wasMiss Royle.

  "I think we must go, Louise."

  "Oh, we must,"--quickly. "Dear me! I'd almost forgot! We've promised tolunch with one or two people down-town."

  "I wish you were lunching here," said Gwendolyn's mother. She freedherself gently from the clinging arms and followed the two. "Miss Royle,will you take Gwendolyn?"

  As the governess
promptly advanced, with a half-bow, and a set smilethat was like a grimace, Gwendolyn raised a face tense with earnestness.Until half an hour before, her whole concern had been for herself. Butnow! To fail to grow up, to have her long-cherished hopes come short offulfillment--that was _one_ thing. To know that her mother and fatherhad real and serious troubles of their own, that was another!

  "Oh, moth-er! Don't _you_ go!"

  "Mother must tell the ladies good-by."

  "What touching affection!" It was the elder of the visiting pair.

  Miss Royle assented with a simper.

  "Will you come back?" urged Gwendolyn, dropping her voice. "Oh, I wantto see you"--darting a look sidewise--"all by myself."

  There was a wheel and a flutter at the door--another silent exchange ofcomment, question and exclamation, all mingled eloquently. Then Louiseswept back.

  "What a bright child!" she enthused. "Does she speak French?"

  "She is acquiring two tongues at present," answered Gwendolyn's motherproudly, "--French and German."

  "_Splendid!_" It was the elder woman. "I think every little girl shouldhave those. And later on, I suppose, Greek and Latin?"

  "I've thought of Spanish and Italian."

  "_Eventually_," informed Miss Royle, with a conscious, sinuous shiftfrom foot to foot, "Gwendolyn will have _seven_ tongues at her command."

  "How _chic!_" Once more the gloved hand was extended--to pat thepink-satin hair-bow.

  Gwendolyn accepted the pat stolidly. Her eyes were fixed on her mother'sface.

  Now, the elder of the strangers drew closer. "I wonder," she began,addressing her hostess with almost a coy air, "if we could induce _you_to take lunch with us down-town. Wouldn't that be jolly,Louise?"--turning.

  "_Awfully_ jolly!"

  "_Do_ come!"

  "Oh, _do_!"

  "Moth-er!"

  Gwendolyn's mother looked down. A sudden color was mounting to hercheeks. Her eyes shone.

  "We-e-ell," she said, with rising inflection.

  It was acceptance.

  Gwendolyn stepped back the pink muslin in a nervous grasp at eitherside. "Oh, _won't_ you stay?" she half-whispered.

  "Mother'll see you at dinnertime, darling. Tell Jane, Miss Royle."

  A bow.

  Louise led the way quickly, followed by the elderly lady. Gwendolyn'smother came last. A bronze gate slid between the three and Gwendolyn,watching them go. The cage lowered noiselessly, with a last glimpse ofupturned faces and waving hands.

  Gwendolyn, lips pouting, crossed toward the school-room door. The doorwas slightly ajar. She gave it a smart pull.

  A kneeling figure rose from behind it. It was Jane, who greeted her witha nervous, and somewhat apprehensive grin.

  "I was waitin' to jump out at Miss Royle and give her a scare when she'dcome through," she explained.

  Gwendolyn said nothing.