Just Sixteen.

UNDER A SYRINGA-BUSH

THE old syringa at the foot of the Wade's lawn was rather a tree than a bush. Many years of growth had gone to the thickening of its interlaced boughs, which grew close to the ground, and made an impervious covert, except on the west side, where a hollow recess existed, into which a small person, boy or girl, might squeeze and be quite hidden.

Sundry other small persons with wings and feathers had discovered the advantages of the syringa. All manner of unsuspected housekeepings went on within its fastnesses, from the lark's nest, in a tuft of grass at the foot of the main stem, to the robin's home on the topmost bough. Solicitous little mothers brooded unseen over minute families, while the highly decorative bird papa sat on a neighboring hedge, carrying out his mission, which seemed to be to distract attention from the secreted family by the sweetness of his song and the beauty of his plumage. In the dusk of the evening, soft thrills and twitters sounded from the bush, like whispered conversation; and very entertaining it must have been, no doubt, to any one who understood the language. So, altogether, the old syringa-bush was an interesting little world of itself.

Elly Wade found it so, as she sat in the green hiding-place on the west side, crying as if her heart would break. The syringa recess had been her favorite "secret" ever since she discovered it, nearly two years before. No one else knew about it. There she went when she felt unhappy or was having a mood. Once the boughs had closed in behind her, no one could suspect that she was there, – a fact which gave her infinite pleasure, for she was a child who loved privacies and mysteries.

What are moods? Does any one exactly understand them? Some people attribute them to original sin, others to nerves or indigestion; but I am not sure that either explanation is right. They sweep across the gladness of our lives as clouds across the sun, and seem to take the color out of everything. Grown people learn to conceal, if not to conquer, their moods; but children cannot do this, Elly Wade least of all.

As I said, this was by no means her first visit to the syringa-bush. It has witnessed some stormy moments in her life, when she sat there hot and grieved, and in her heart believing everybody cruel or unjust. Ralph had teased her; or Cora, who was older than she, had put on airs; or little Kitty had been troublesome, or some schoolmate "hateful." She even accused her mother of unkindness at these times, though she loved her dearly all the while.

"She thinks the rest are always right, and I wrong," she would say to herself. "Oh, well! she'll be sorry some day." What was to make Mrs. Wade sorry Elly did not specify; but I think it was to be when she, herself, was found dead, somewhere on the premises, of a broken heart! Elly was very fond of depicting this broken heart and tragical ending, – imaginative children often are. All the same, if she felt ill, or cut her finger, she ran to mamma for help, and was as much frightened as if she had not been thinking these deadly thoughts only a little while before.

To-day Elly had fled to the syringa-bush with no idea of ever coming out again. A great wrong had been done her. Cora was going with a yachting-party, and she was not. Mamma had said she was too young to be trusted, and must wait till she was older and steadier.

"It is cruel!" she said with a fresh burst of sobs, as she recalled the bitter moment when she heard the verdict. "It was just as unkind as could be for her to say that. Cora is only four years the oldest, and I can do lots of things that she can't. She doesn't know a bit about crocheting. She just knits. And she never made sponge-cake, and I have; and when she rows, she pulls the hardest with her left hand, and makes the boat wabble. I've a much better stroke than she has. Papa said so. And I can swim just as well as she can!

"Nobody loves me," was her next reflection, – "nobody at all. They all hate me. I don't suppose anybody would care a bit if I did die."

But this thought was too hard to be borne.

"Yes, they would," she went on. "They'd feel remorse if I died, and they ought to. Then they would recollect all the mean things they've done to me, and they would groan, and say, 'Too late – too late!' like the bad people in story-books."

Comforted by this idea, she resolved on a plan of action.

"I'll just stay here forever, and not come out at all. Of course, I shall starve to death. Then, all summer long they'll be hunting, and wondering and wondering what has become of me; and when the autumn comes, and the leaves fall off, they'll know, and they'll say, 'Poor Elly! how we wish we'd treated her better!'"

She settled herself into a more comfortable position, – it isn't necessary to have cramps, you know, even if you are starving to death, – and went on with her reflections. So still was she that the birds forgot her presence, and continued their twittering gossip and their small domestic arrangements undisturbed. The lark talked to her young ones with no fear of being overheard; the robins flew in and out with worms; the thrush, who occupied what might be called the second story of the syringa, disciplined a refractory fledgling, and papa thrush joined in with a series of musical expostulations. Elly found their affairs so interesting that for a moment she forgot her own, – which was good for her.

A big bumble-bee came sailing through the air like a wind-blown drum, and stopped for a minute to sip at a syringa blossom. Next a soft whir drew Elly's attention, and a shape in green and gold and ruby-red glanced across her vision like a flying jewel. It was a humming-bird, – the first of the season. Elly had never been so near one before, nor had so long a chance to look, and she watched with delight as the pretty creature darted to and fro, dipping its needle-like bill into one flower-cup after another, in search of the honey-drop which each contained. She held her breath, not to startle it; but its fine senses seemed to perceive her presence in some mysterious fashion, and presently it flew away.

Elly's mind, no longer diverted, went back to its unhappiness.

"I wonder how long it is since I came here," she thought. "It seems like a great while. I guess it must be as much as three hours. They're all through dinner now, and beginning to wonder where I am. But they won't find me, I can tell them!"

She set her lips firmly, and again shifted her position. At the slight rustle every bird in the bush became silent.

"They needn't," she said to herself. "I wouldn't hurt them. I'm not like Ralph. He's real bad to birds sometimes. Once he took some eggs out of a dear, cunning, little song-sparrow's nest, and blew the yolks. I'd never do such a mean thing as that."

But though she tried to lash herself up to her old sharpness of feeling, the interruption of wrathful thoughts had somewhat soothed her mood. Still, she held firmly to her purpose, while an increasing drowsiness crept over her.

"I shall stay here all night," she thought, "and all to-morrow, and to-morrow night. And then" – a yawn – "pretty soon I shall be dead, I suppose, and they'll be – sorry" – another yawn – "and – "

Elly was asleep.

When she woke, the bright noon sunshine had given place to a dusky light, which made the syringa recess very dark. The robins had discovered her whereabouts, and, hopping nearer and nearer, had perched upon a branch close to her feet, and were talking about her. She was dimly conscious of their voices, but had no idea what they were saying.

"Why did it come here, any way?" asked Mrs. Robin. "A great heavy thing like that in our bush!"

"I don't know, I'm sure," replied Mr. Robin. "It makes a strange noise, but it keeps its eyes shut while it makes it."

"These great creatures are so queer!" pursued Mrs. Robin. "There, – it's beginning to move! I wish it would go away. I don't like its being so near the children. They might see it and be frightened."

The two birds flitted hastily off as Elly stretched herself and rubbed her eyes.

A very uncomfortable gnawing sensation began to make itself evident. It wasn't exactly pain, but Elly felt that it might easily become so. She remembered now that she fled away from the table, leaving her breakfast only half finished, yesterday morning, – was it yesterday, or was it the day before that? It felt like a long while ago.

The sensation increased.

"Dear me!" thought Elly, "the story-books never said that starving to death felt so. I don't like it a bit!"

Bravely she fought against the discomfort, but it gained upon her.

She began to meditate whether her family had perhaps not been sufficiently punished.

"I've been away a whole day," she reflected, "and a whole night, and I guess they've felt badly enough. Very likely they've all sat up waiting for me to come back. They'll be sorry they acted so, and, any way, I'm so dreadfully hungry that I must have something to eat! And I want to see mamma too. Perhaps she'll have repented, and will say, 'Poor Elly! She may go.'"

In short, Elly was seized with a sudden desire for home, and, always rapid in decision, she lost no time in wriggling herself out of the bush.

"There, it's gone!" chirped the female robin. "I'm glad of it. I hope it will never come back."

Very cautiously Elly crept through the shrubbery on to the lawn. It still seemed dark, but she now perceived that the gloom came from a great thunder-cloud which was gathering overhead. She could not see the sun, and, confused with her long sleep, was not able to make out what part of the day it was; but, somehow, she felt that it was not the early morning as in the bush she had supposed.

Across the lawn she stole, and upon the piazza. No one was visible. The open window showed the dining-table set for something, – was it tea? Upstairs she crept, and, looking in at the door as she went by, she saw her mother in her room taking off her bonnet.

"My poor child, where did you think we had gone?" she called out. "Papa was kept in town till the second train, and that was late, so we have only just got back. You must be half starved, waiting so long for your dinner. I hope nurse gave you some bread and milk."

"Why, – what day is it?" stammered the amazed Elly.

"Day? Why, Elly, have you been asleep? It's to-day, of course, – Thursday. What did you think it was?"

Elly rubbed her eyes, bewildered. Had the time which seemed to her so long really been so short? Had no one missed her? It was her first lesson in the comparative unimportance of the individual! A sense of her own foolishness seized her. Mamma looked so sweet and kind! Why had she imagined her cruel?

"Did you go to sleep, dear?" repeated Mrs. Wade.

"Yes, mamma," replied Elly, humbly; "I did. But I'm waked up now."

TWO GIRLS – TWO PARTIES

A GREAT bustle and confusion had reigned the whole week long in the old house at the top of the hilly street, known to the neighborhood as "the Squire's." All the slip-covers had been taken from the furniture in the best parlor. All the company china had been lifted off its top shelf and washed. All the spare lamps had been filled, all the rooms swept and dusted, all the drawers in the bureaus freshly arranged, for – as Milly said to herself – "who knew but some one might take a fancy to peep in?"

Milly Grace, the Squire's daughter, had sat for hours in a cold woodshed tying up wreaths of ground-pine and hemlock with fingers which grew more chilly every hour. These wreaths now ornamented the parlor, festooning curtains, chimney-piece, and door-frames, and making green edges to the family portraits, which were two in number, neither of them by Copley or Stuart, as was plain to the most casual observation.

One of these portraits represented the Squire's father in a short-waisted, square-tailed blue coat, and a canary-colored waistcoat. His forefinger was inserted in a calf-bound volume of Blackstone, and his eyes were fixed with a fine judicial directness upon the cupola of the court-house seen through a window in the background. The other was his wife, in a sad-colored gown and muslin tucker, with a countenance which suggested nothing except saleratus and the renunciation of all human joys.

The Squire did not care much for this picture. It made him feel badly, he said, just the feeling he used to have when he was a boy and was sent every Sunday by this orthodox parent to study the longer answers of the Shorter Catechism on the third step of the garret-stairs, with orders not to stir from that position till he had them perfectly committed to memory. It was this strict bringing-up, perhaps, which made him so indulgent to Milly, – a great deal too indulgent her step-mother thought.

In the buttery stood a goodly row of cakes little and big, loaves whose icings shone like snow-crust on a sunny day, little cakes with plums and little cakes without plums; all sorts of cakes. On the swinging shelf of the cellar were moulds of jelly clear and firm. In the woodhouse stood three freezers of ice-cream, "packed" and ready to turn out. Elsewhere were dishes of scalloped oysters ready for the oven, each with its little edging of crimped crackers, platters of chicken-salad, forms of blanc-mange, bowls of yellow custard topped with raspberry-and-egg like sunset-tinted avalanches, all that goes to the delectation of a country party: for a party there was to be, as after this enumeration I need hardly state. It was Milly's party, and all these elaborate preparations were her own work, – the work of a girl of nineteen, with no larger allowance of hands, feet, and spinal-vertebræ than all girls have, and no larger allowance of hours to her day; but with a much greater share of zeal, energy, and what the Squire called "go" than most young women of her age can boast of.

She it was who had pounded away at the tough sacks full of ice and salt till they were ready for the freezers. She it was who had beaten the innumerable eggs for the sponge cakes, pound cakes, fruit cakes, "one, two, three, four," jelly, nut and other cakes, who had swept the rooms, washed the china, rearranged, changed, brightened everything. Like most other families on Croydon Hill, the Graces kept but one "help," a stout woman, who could wash, iron, and scrub with the best, and grapple successfully enough with the simple daily menu, but who for finer purposes was as "unhandy" as a gorilla. All the embellishments, all the delicate cookeries, fell to the share of the ladies of the household, which meant Milly as a general thing, and in this case particularly, for the party was hers, and she felt bound to take the burden of it on her own shoulders as far as possible, especially as her step-mother did not quite approve, and considered that the Squire had done a foolish thing in giving consent. "Milly should have her way for once," the Squire had announced.

So Milly had her way, and had borne herself bravely and brightly through the fatigues of preparation. But somehow when things were almost ready, when the table was set, lacking only the last touches, and the fire lighted, a heavy sense of discouragement fell upon her. It was the natural reaction after long overwork, but she was too inexperienced to understand it. She only knew that suddenly the thing she had wished for seemed undesirable and worth nothing, and that she felt perfectly miserable, and "didn't care what became of her." She laid her tired head on the little table by which she was sitting, and, without in the least intending it, began to cry.

Mrs. Grace was lying down, the Squire was out; there was no one to note her distress or sympathize with it excepting Teakettle, the black cat. He was sorry for Milly after his cat-fashion, rubbed his velvet head against her dress for a little while as if wishing to console her, but when she took no notice, he walked away and sat down in front of the door, waiting till some one should open it and let him through. Cats soon weary of the role of comforter, and escape to pleasanter things, – sunshine, bird-shadows on the grass, light-hearted people who will play with them and make no appeal to their sympathies.

Milly's tears did her no good. She was too physically worn out to find relief in them. They only deepened her sense of discouragement. The clock struck six; she roused herself wearily and went upstairs to dress. There were still the lamps to light and last things to do.

"And no one to do them but me," thought poor Milly. "Oh dear, how dreadfully my feet ache! How glad I shall be when they all go away and I can go to bed!"

This was indeed a sad state of mind to be in on the eve of a long-anticipated pleasure!

Everything looked bright and orderly and attractive when the guests arrived a little after half-past seven. The fire snapped and the candles shone; a feeling of hospitable warmth was in the air. Milly's arrangements, except so far as they regarded her own well-being, had been judicious and happy. The pretty girls in their short-sleeved blue and crimson merinos, with roses and geranium-leaves in their hair (I need not say that this was at a far-back and old-fashioned date), looked every whit as charming as the girls of to-day in their more elaborate costumes.