VII
THE FOURTH BEGINS
Amy Redmond looked wistfully from the kitchen window. She leaned on the sill, and gazed farther down the road, in the direction from which came the sound of laughing voices. A moment later a beach wagon rolled past, and she recognized Brenda as one of the merry party.
Amy turned to her work with a sigh. “It seems to me that on holidays I have more to do than on any other day,” she said; “housework is so very, very tiresome.” Nevertheless, in spite of her repining, she did not neglect her work, and she took up the slender steel knife which for a moment she had laid down, and went on peeling potatoes.
“It’s ridiculous,” she murmured, a little impatiently, “for any one to think of eating hot food on a day like this; but I suppose that an invalid has to be humored.”
“Amy, Amy,” called a voice from the garden.
“Yes, ’m,” she answered, briskly, going to the door.
“You need n’t light the stove until eleven. The day is so very hot.”
“Yes, ’m, promptly at eleven,” said Amy, glancing at the clock. It was now only half-past ten, and she saw that she had begun her preparations for dinner a little too early.
Just then an impatient rat-a-tat-tat sounded on her ceiling, as if some one was knocking on the floor above with a stick.
Amy rushed out into the little hall, and up the stairs. In the large, rather pleasant front chamber sat an elderly woman in a steamer-chair, with her eyes shaded by a dark-green shade.
“Where is your mother?” she asked fretfully, as Amy entered the room. Amy hesitated a moment.
“She has gone out to sketch,” she said at length, with a little sigh.
“There it is,” replied the older woman; “always sketching, sketching, as if anything could come from that. Why does n’t she sit down and work at her miniatures. People sometimes make a little money by painting miniatures. But sketches! who ever heard of any one’s selling a sketch from nature in these days.”
“There’s no sense,” said Amy, rather crossly, “in painting miniatures that no one will buy. Mother has several ideal heads that she would sell now, if she could, but nobody wants them. She’s painted me from life, and Fritz from life, and one of the little Murphy children down the road, but they ’re all up there in her room. I can’t see that there has been any great demand for them. She enjoys sketching from nature, and I’m glad that she has gone up in the woods now—the house is very stuffy.”
“Humph!” said the older woman, with a shrug of her shoulders. “What’s good enough for me ought to be good enough for her. I have to stay in the house, even if it is close and hot. I can’t go wandering around in the woods, and I don’t see why any one with a grown daughter should think that she has the right to waste time that way.”
Again Amy gave a sigh. But the sigh was followed by a smile.
“Let me pull down the blinds at this window,” she said pleasantly. “The sun is moving around, and if I open the other window you ’ll have a current of fresh air. That will be a great improvement.”
As she spoke, she stepped forward, and shook up the pillows. “I ’ll run out to the well and get you a glass of water,” she added; “and perhaps you’d like a little luncheon—a biscuit and some apple sauce.”
“You can bring me the biscuit,” said the invalid, “but I don’t care for the apple sauce; it’s made of dried apples. I’d like some fresh fruit. Strawberries are pretty plenty now.”
“There was a man through this back road with some on a cart this morning,” said Amy; “but they were so poor that we thought that you wouldbn’t care for them. Mother thought she might be able to get some better later in the day. But we ’re going to have fresh peas for dinner,” she concluded; “I’m just going to shell them.”
“Very well,” said the complainer, “you need n’t wait here then. I suppose you begrudge the time you spend with me. But it’s no matter; I can sit, and sit, and need n’t expect any one to pay special attention to me.”
“Why, I ’ll come back, cousin Joan, as soon as I can,” said Amy, pleasantly; “and first, I’m going to get the water.”
In a moment Amy had returned, with the glass on a little brass tray, in the centre of which was a small fringed napkin. A plate with two crisp biscuits, and the glass saucer with the despised apple sauce were also on the tray. She knew her cousin Joan well enough to be sure that in the end she would find the sauce an agreeable addition to her luncheon.
“You ’ll call me, won’t you, if you want anything else,” she said, as she left the room. “I ’ll leave the door open.”
“I’m not likely to trouble you,” said cousin Joan. “I hardly ever want anything.”
Amy, in spite of her desire to be respectful, could not help smiling at this remark of the invalid’s, remembering how often, in the course of the day, she was apt to be called to the sick-room.
“Yet, after all,” she said, “cousin Joan is not so very sick. It’s only her eyes, and I believe that she does n’t suffer particularly from them. I’m sure she has a very good appetite. If she had n’t, I should have less to do.”
The peas were shelled, the potatoes were in the granite saucepan, and Amy had just lit the wicks in the kerosene stove in the small kitchen, when again she heard her name called.
“Ah! that’s Fritz,” and she opened the door.
“Good enough, Amy,” said the boy; “I was afraid that you might not be home. I wish that you’d come down with me to the shore. I want to celebrate. I ’ve a whole stack of firecrackers; see!” and he held up a pasteboard box so that Amy could see it.
“I have two dollars, too, to spend; but my uncle won’t let me send off a thing near any house. But he said I could go down to the beach—so come, Amy.”
“Oh, I can’t possibly go now, Fritz; you know how much I have to do. There’s dinner to get ready, and—”
“Oh, who wants to eat on the Fourth of July? You could get a bite of something, and then come on with me. Your mother won’t care. She likes you to have as much fun as you can.”
Amy, leaning out of the window, pointed significantly to the window above.
“Oh, I forgot the old lady. But your mother can stay with her.”
“I ’ll tell you what, Fritz,” said Amy, after a moment of reflection. “You stay here to lunch. Of course we can’t have fireworks around this house any more than around yours. But after dinner I can probably go off somewhere with you, when I ’ve washed the dishes.”
“All right,” said Fritz; “I can stay as well as not; and say, don’t you think it would be fun to go over to Marblehead this afternoon? We could go on the electrics, and I have money to pay for quite a little spree.”
“I ’ll see about it. You sit here on the back steps in the shade, until I have the table set. The house seems rather hot.”
But instead of sitting perfectly still, Fritz, boy-like, wandered around the little garden, with his hands in everything.
“Say, Amy,” he called, “these sweet peas need straightening; they are awfully tangled up. I’m going to make some sticks for them to climb on.”
“That’s right,” responded Amy; “go ahead!”
So Fritz, penknife in hand, strolled about, whittling some thin bits of board that he had found into supports for the pea-vines. Or, rather, he connected the little sticks with pieces of twine, thus making a bit of trellis-work for them.
“Is n’t there something more I can do?” he called to Amy. “I want something to keep me busy, so that I won’t be tempted to fire my torpedoes.”
“Oh, dear, you’d better not!” cried Amy.
“Cousin Joan almost had convulsions this morning when she heard the children down the road shouting and amusing themselves.”
“She is a kind of an old tyrant, is n’t she?” said Fritz, sympathetically.
“She’s had a great many trials,” responded Amy; “more, really, than I have had myself. Then her eyes are in a pretty serious condition.”
“If she were deaf, too,” remarked Fritz, “she’d enjoy more, would n’t she?”
"Oh, well, tin horns and torpedoes, and all those things are wearing to one’s nerves, and people here in this neighborhood seemed to get up at about sunrise. Ah! there’s mother,” she exclaimed, as she heard the front door open. “Now we ’ll have dinner.”
It was a plain little room, although tastefully furnished, in which Mrs. Redmond and Fritz and Amy sat down to dinner a half hour later. The walls were kalsomined a greenish gray, and two or three good photographs of foreign scenes hung there, with a fine water-color sketch—evidently a bit of New England landscape—over the mantelpiece. In the centre of the table was a low bowl filled with nasturtiums, and the china and glass, though not expensive, were of good quality.
It took Amy some time to arrange the little tray for the invalid upstairs; and when it was ready, with nothing forgotten,—pepper-pot, salt-cellar, butter-balls, and the many other little things besides the main articles of food,—Fritz hastened forward to offer his services.
“Now you really must let me carry it.”
“What nonsense! it is n’t heavy; besides, cousin Joan does n’t like boys.”
“Then I ’ll take it to the head of the stairs. You can carry it into the room.”
“You might as well let him,” said Mrs. Redmond, with a smile. “I would never discourage a boy from making himself useful in little ways around the house.”
So the two young people, with light hearts and willing hands, carried the tray upstairs. Fritz soon returned.
“I did n’t go in,” he said, with a grimace. “By the tone of the old lady’s voice, I think that Amy will be kept there some time. I heard her say that for some time she had been waiting and waiting for some one to do things for her. She seemed kind of mad.”
“Oh, well, Amy will find out what the trouble is; she can smooth out cousin Joan’s wrinkles better than I can.”
Amy soon came back to the dining-room, and her face had a deeper flush than that which had been caused by her cooking operations on the little stove, and it was a different color from that which a hot day produces. Her mother saw that she had had some little encounter with cousin Joan, but wisely she refrained from questioning her about it.
Fritz, who now sat at Mrs. Redmond’s table, was much stronger looking than the boy whom Brenda had met on the rocks a week or ten days before. He no longer had his eye bandaged, and his cheek was not so pale. He was a mischievous, merry-looking boy, a little younger, apparently, than Amy, yet bright and quick enough to be a congenial companion for the thoughtful girl.
“I tell you what!” he exclaimed; “this is a heap better than sitting down with my uncle in that old dreary dining-room, or ten to one I should be sitting there alone, for you know he never comes to the table unless he happens to feel exactly in the humor. Why, you know that I get more than half my meals alone!”
“Poor boy!” said Mrs. Redmond, sympathetically. “Do you eat more or less than you ought, then?”
“Well, that depends. If it’s anything I particularly like, I eat more, and if I don’t like it, I eat less. But then I’m on pretty good terms with the cook, and, generally, she takes care to have the things that I like. I’m afraid, though, that I should have fared badly to-day, because I sent off a firecracker, almost under the nose of her pet cat,—my! you should have seen him jump,—and I’m of the opinion that I should have had little or nothing to eat to-day had I stayed at home. My! but everything here does taste good.”
“Yes, Amy is growing to be a pretty fair cook. She roasted this lamb yesterday so that we might have it cold to-day; and she cooked the vegetables to-day; and this sponge cake is some of her work; and—”
“There, mother, Fritz would have enjoyed his dinner better if he had thought that you were the artist who had prepared it all.”
Fritz was placed in an embarrassing position. He did not know exactly what to say, nor how to decide between his two friends. For to say that he preferred things as they were, might seem to make him, in some way, imply that Mrs. Redmond might have done better; or to say that he was perfectly satisfied with things as they were, might sound as if he doubted Mrs. Redmond’s power to do better. Very wisely, therefore, he said nothing,—nothing further, at least, on the subject of the dinner.
For so young a girl, however, Amy had a rather unusual knowledge of cooking and housekeeping matters. Ten years earlier her father had been a rising young lawyer in a neighboring town. Before he had accumulated much money, he had died rather suddenly. The income which he left his wife and daughter was hardly enough to pay house-rent, even in a quiet street of this town. But among his possessions was a little house on the back road. Mrs. Redmond decided that the very best thing that she could do was to occupy this house. In no other way could she live so cheaply; and although the neighborhood was certainly not a desirable one, she intended to have her little girl so closely in her own care that neither of them would be disagreeably affected by their surroundings.
Until the coming of Fritz into the neighborhood, Amy had had a rather lonely time. I do not mean that she repined, or perhaps realized just how lonely she was. With her books and the society of her mother, she was very well satisfied. Her hands were seldom idle, and her mind was always busy. But her mother knew that it would be better for Amy to have more companionship of her own age, and she regretted that she could not give her daughter this companionship. Now the father of Fritz was an explorer,—an explorer who sometimes was away from home for two or three years at a time. In his absence he left his young son in the care of his own elder brother,—a serious man, fond of study, who had little idea of the proper way of bringing up boys. In other words, he was so afraid that some disaster would befall Fritz in his father’s absence, that he was inclined to coddle him. In the winter, when they were in the city, Fritz went regularly to school; but he was not allowed to play foot-ball or base-ball or to skate, or to do any of the other delightful things which count for more with boys—or at least with some boys—than many of their more serious occupations. Fritz, indeed, often looked longingly at his friends, when he saw them starting off, after school, in pairs or in groups, bound, evidently, for the ball field. He did not like to be considered a milk-sop, and he knew that other boys were apt to express themselves pretty strongly about one who did not share their sports. He did not like to complain in letters to his father, because in every way his uncle was so kind to him. Yet he did think that some of the rules made for him,—that he should be in the house always before dark, and that he should avoid the sports that I have named,—he did think that these rules were rather hard for a boy of sixteen to obey. It was not strange, perhaps, since he had had so little to do with boys of his own age that when he came to know Amy he found her so very companionable. Their acquaintance had begun one morning on the beach, and as his uncle, Mr. Tomkins, came early each season to his summer cottage, in the three years of their acquaintance Amy and Fritz had spent much time together. As they were so near the same age, although Amy had read much more than Fritz, they were very congenial. Fritz, indeed, regarded with much admiration the tall girl who in many ways seemed older than he. Her ideas on all subjects were so much more decided, and she was so fearless in expressing herself.
Mr. Tomkins and Mrs. Redmond were both gratified when they observed the intimacy that had grown up between the two young people. Mr. Tomkins felt that there was less danger of broken limbs for Fritz if he spent the most of his spare time with a girl; and Mrs. Redmond, even though she might have preferred for Amy the companionship of some pleasant girl, still knew that a refined boy like Fritz was sure to have good influence over her. His influence in many ways was even better than Mrs. Redmond imagined. For Fritz was fun-loving where Amy was serious, and it was a great advantage for her to have a friend who could make her laugh—sometimes in spite of herself.
Mr. Tomkins, with his sense of responsibility for his nephew, had Fritz study regularly, even on hot summer days. “A boy who is going to College has no time to waste. There’s no danger that you will pass your examinations too well.” So from the time he left school in May for their summer home, until the late autumn, when they went back to the city, Fritz read his Latin and Greek with his uncle, and waded through pages of ancient history. Mr. Tomkins was not fond of mathematics, and he was too conscientious to undertake to teach a subject which was distasteful to him. Consequently it was only in winter that Fritz turned to his algebra and geometry. And then he had to devote himself to these subjects with all his might and main, for not even the warmest friend of Fritz could very truthfully say that the bright boy was destined to be a mathematician.
Amy, on the other hand, had not had just the same school advantages that Fritz had had. Her mother had been her chief teacher, and had made her lessons at home very interesting. Twice a week in winter she went to the city for French and music,—an extravagance, some people who knew Mrs. Redmond’s circumstances might have said. But her mother thought that to give Amy this opportunity was really a duty, and she felt that she was justified in letting her have these lessons, by the fact that she herself gave her her other instruction. Had they lived in the city, she would have sent Amy to the grammar school; but to have her go to school, as things were, would have meant leaving her alone so many hours every day, that neither mother nor daughter could make up their minds to this separation. Yet Mrs. Redmond was a busy woman, giving all the time that she could to her art, and although she directed her daughter’s studies very carefully, little more than an hour was spent in recitations, and Amy had much time every day for reading. Books completely filled the shelves around three sides of their sitting-room, and they represented the best in English literature. In the evenings mother and daughter read together; and when Amy could choose the author, it was apt to be a poet,—Tennyson, Longfellow, Spenser. If any one had asked Amy to say which of these great men she preferred, she would have found it hard to answer. She was fond of them all, and she had begun to make Fritz feel a part of her enthusiasm. When Amy was enthusiastic on any subject, she could quickly bring others to her point of view; and it was no wonder, then, that Fritz, too, had begun to follow her in her admiration for the great poets.
But Amy and Fritz were both fond of fun, and as they sat this day at Mrs. Redmond’s little dining-table, they showed that their spirits were running high.
“Now, Mrs. Redmond, if you say that we cannot go over to Marblehead, I shall consider you the hardest-hearted parent that ever was,—I really shall.”
“Ah, Fritz,” replied Mrs. Redmond, with a smile, “I have n’t a word to say about your going to Marblehead. You know what your uncle would approve, and really I can’t see much harm in your going. But it’s so different for a girl.”
“Why, Mrs. Redmond, have n’t I heard you say that you believed that a girl ought to be as brave and fearless as a boy? and Amy is always preaching courage to me. Now I’m sure that if there are any dangers to be overcome in Marblehead, Amy ought to have a shy at them, as well as I.”
There was a gleam of mischief in the boy’s eye, and Mrs. Redmond understood that his speech was not intended to be disrespectful.
“I don’t anticipate any great disturbance in Marblehead to-day, and I daresay that toward evening the harbor will look very pretty. Undoubtedly, there will be illuminations on some of the yachts, and—”
“But, mother, dear, it won’t do us any good, even if there are illuminations. Fritz always has to come back early, and you would n’t let me stay until dark.”
For a moment Mrs. Redmond seemed to be thinking deeply. At last she said, with a smile,—
“I will tell you what I will do. You may go to Marblehead this afternoon, and about six o’clock I will meet you. But first, Fritz, I wish that you would get your uncle’s permission to stay out for the evening.”
Fritz’s face clouded over.
“It won’t be very easy to get it.”
“I will give you a note to take to him immediately after dinner. It will explain what we intend to do. I will tell him that I will hold myself responsible for your safe return—provided that you and Amy will promise to keep out of mischief this afternoon.”
“Oh, mother, as if we ever get into mischief! ”
“How about that base-ball that landed so unceremoniously over Fritz’s eye?”
“But that was an accident.”
“Well, there are one or two other things that I might mention,—only I’d rather not spoil your holiday. But to-day I want you to have just as good a time as you can. The wind has changed since the early morning, and we are not likely to find it so very hot this afternoon.”
While Amy was clearing the table, Mrs. Redmond wrote the note, and Fritz ran off with it toward his home. The two houses were not very far apart, although Mr. Tomkins’ house was much more pleasantly situated on high land, with trees about it, and a grove that quite hid the back road from sight. When Fritz returned, it was easy to see that he had secured his uncle’s approval of Mrs. Redmond’s plan,—
“Only he says that he hopes we won’t be set on fire, or anything of that kind,” cried Fritz, with rather an amused expression; “as if we were babies!”
“Remember that eye of yours,” and Mrs. Redmond shook her head significantly.
“Yes, ’m, yes, ’m,” rejoined Fritz. “Oh, Amy, uncle gave me another dollar!” he almost shouted, as Amy appeared, looking very happy in her dark serge skirt and light-blue shirt waist. Fritz was still in knickerbockers, to his own great annoyance, as he had really passed the age when boys are supposed to wear those picturesque garments. His uncle had promised to let him give them up in the autumn; and in the mean time he really looked like most of the other lads of his age who spent half the summer on wheels. Fritz, himself, however, had to take what comfort he could out of the clothes, for a bicycle was one of the things that he was not permitted to have—on account of its danger.
“When you and I have bicycles, what fun we ’ll have spinning over the country,” he said to Amy, as they walked the half mile which they had to traverse before they could reach the electric car.
“When I have a bicycle!” exclaimed Amy, a little bitterly; “you will probably be in Europe or Hindostan—or somewhere with your father.”
“Well, I ’ve written him about letting me have a wheel, and I’m perfectly sure that he will. I should n’t be a bit surprised if I should have a letter any day.”
“That will be fine,” said Amy; but her tone was not particularly cheerful.
“Oh, come now, don’t feel glum; you can’t tell what may happen. I should n’t be at all surprised if you should have one too.”
“Well, I should be surprised. You know it’s rather funny, I have a bicycle pump. My music teacher spent a week with us in the spring, and she left it behind her. It’s a foot-pump, and rather clumsy to carry to town, so she insisted on letting it stay at our house until the autumn. She expects to come again.”
“Oh, yes; that was the pump that you lent to that girl who wanted your mother to take in washing. That was a joke!” and Fritz laughed as he recalled the description that Amy had given of the incident.
“There, there, Fritz, I’m sure that Miss Barlow has made up for that since. She was really rather kind to us the other day. You know that you thought so then.”
“Oh, yes, you were rather funny yourself that day,—rather dignified and stiff; the way you can be when you are not particularly pleased about things. I fancy that you were thinking about the laundress business too.”
Amy did not deny this accusation. She knew very well that she had let Brenda’s remark rankle longer than she should have; for, in spite of her politeness to Brenda at the time of their first meeting, and her acceptance of the apology, she had not felt pleased at being taken for a laundress’ daughter.
“The fact is, Amy,” continued Fritz, “you are kind of down on the summer people. But I don’t think that you ought to be so—so—”
“Prejudiced,” prompted Amy.
“Well, yes,—prejudiced. I really think that you are not quite as manly sometimes as you are at others.”
“Manly” was a term Fritz applied to Amy when he wished to praise her.