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“Thanks, I’m going there also. Tom Merryweather has granulated lids, and I promised to touch them up for him. Save a doctor’s fee and be good practice for me. I’m clumsy with my thumbs,” said Tom, bound to be near his idol while he could.
“Hush! Daisy doesn’t like to hear you saw-bones talk of your work. Muffins suit us better” and Ted grinned sweetly, with a view to future favours in the eating line.
“Any news of the Commodore?” asked Tom.
“He is on his way home, and Dan hopes to come soon. I long to see my boys together, and have begged the wanderers to come to Thanksgiving, if not before,” answered Mrs Jo, beaming at the thought.
“They’ll come, every man of them, if they can. Even Jack will risk losing a dollar for the sake of one of our jolly old dinners,” laughed Tom.
“There’s the turkey fattening for the feast. I never chase him now, but feed him well; and he’s ‘swellin wisibly’, bless his drumsticks!” said Ted, pointing out the doomed fowl proudly parading in a neighbouring field.
“If Nat goes the last of the month we shall want a farewell frolic for him. I suppose the dear old Chirper will come home a second Ole Bull,” said Nan to her friend.
A pretty colour came into Daisy’s cheek, and the folds of muslin on her breast rose and fell with a quick breath; but she answered placidly: “Uncle Laurie says he has real talent, and after the training he will get abroad he can command a good living here, though he may never be famous.”
“Young people seldom turn out as one predicts, so it is of little use to expect anything,” said Mrs Meg with a sigh. “If our children are good and useful men and women, we should be satisfied; yet it’s very natural to wish them to be brilliant and successful.”
“They are like my chickens, mighty uncertain. Now, that fine-looking cockerel of mine is the stupidest one of the lot, and the ugly, long-legged chap is the king of the yard, he’s so smart; crows loud enough to wake the Seven Sleepers; but the handsome one croaks, and is no end of a coward. I get snubbed; but you wait till I grow up, and then see” and Ted looked so like his own long-legged pet that everyone laughed at his modest prediction.
“I want to see Dan settled somewhere. ‘A rolling stone gathers no moss’, and at twenty-five he is still roaming about the world without a tie to hold him, except this” and Mrs Meg nodded towards her sister.
“Dan will find his place at last, and experience is his best teacher. He is rough still, but each time he comes home I see a change for the better, and never lose my faith in him. He may never do anything great, or get rich; but if the wild boy makes an honest man, I’m satisfied,” said Mrs Jo, who always defended the black sheep of her flock.
“That’s right, mother, stand by Dan! He’s worth a dozen Jacks and Neds bragging about money and trying to be swells. You see if he doesn’t do something to be proud of and take the wind out of their sails,” added Ted, whose love for his “Danny” was now strengthened by a boy’s admiration for the bold, adventurous man.
“Hope so, I’m sure. He’s just the fellow to do rash things and come to glory—climbing the Matterhorn, taking a ‘header’ into Niagara, or finding a big nugget. That’s his way of sowing wild oats, and perhaps it’s better than ours,” said Tom thoughtfully; for he had gained a good deal of experience in that sort of agriculture since he became a medical student.
“Much better!” said Mrs Jo emphatically. “I’d rather send my boys off to see the world in that way than leave them alone in a city full of temptations, with nothing to do but waste time, money, and health, as so many are left. Dan has to work his way, and that teaches him courage, patience, and self-reliance. I don’t worry about him as much as I do about George and Dolly at college, no more fit than two babies to take care of themselves.”
“How about John? He’s knocking round town as a newspaper man, reporting all sorts of things, from sermons to prize-fights,” asked Tom, who thought that sort of life would be much more to his own taste than medical lectures and hospital wards.
“Demi has three safeguards—good principles, refined tastes, and a wise mother. He won’t come to harm, and these experiences will be useful to him when he begins to write, as I’m sure he will in time,” began Mrs Jo in her prophetic tone; for she was anxious to have some of her geese turn out swans.
“Speak of Jenkins, and you’ll hear the rustling of his paper,” cried Tom, as a fresh-faced, brown-eyed young man came up the avenue, waving a newspaper over his head.
“Here’s your Evening Tattler! Latest Edition! Awful murder! Bank clerk absconded! Powder-mill explosion, and great strike of the Latin School boys!” roared Ted, going to meet his cousin with the graceful gait of a young giraffe.
“The Commodore is in, and will cut his cable and run before the wind as soon as he can get off,” called Demi, with “a nice derangement of nautical epitaphs”, as he came up smiling over his good news.
Everyone talked together for a moment, and the paper passed from hand to hand that each eye might rest on the pleasant fact that the Brenda, from Hamburg, was safe in port.
“He’ll come lurching out by tomorrow with his usual collection of marine monsters and lively yarns. I saw him, jolly and tarry and brown as a coffee-berry. Had a good run, and hopes to be second mate, as the other chap is laid up with a broken leg,” added Demi.
“Wish I had the setting of it,” said Nan to herself, with a professional twist of her hand.
“How’s Franz?” asked Mrs Jo.
“He’s going to be married! There’s news for you. The first of the flock, Aunty, so say good-bye to him. Her name is Ludmilla Heldegard Blumenthal; good family, well-off, pretty, and of course an angel. The dear old boy wants Uncle’s consent, and then he will settle down to be a happy and an honest burgher. Long life to him!”
“I’m glad to hear it. I do so like to settle my boys with a good wife and a nice little home. Now, if all is right, I shall feel as if Franz was off my mind,” said Mrs Jo, folding her hands contentedly; for she often felt like a distracted hen with a large brood of mixed chickens and ducks upon her hands.
“So do I,” sighed Tom, with a sly glance at Nan. “That’s what a fellow needs to keep him steady; and it’s the duty of nice girls to marry as soon as possible, isn’t it, Demi?”
“If there are enough nice fellows to go round. The female population exceeds the male, you know, especially in New England; which accounts for the high state of culture we are in, perhaps,” answered John, who was leaning over his mother’s chair, telling his day’s experiences in a whisper.
“It is a merciful provision, my dears; for it takes three or four women to get each man into, through, and out of the world. You are costly creatures, boys; and it is well that mothers, sisters, wives, and daughters love their duty and do it so well, or you would perish off the face of the earth,” said Mrs Jo solemnly, as she took up a basket filled with dilapidated hose; for the good Professor was still hard on his socks, and his sons resembled him in that respect.
“Such being the case, there is plenty for the ‘superfluous women’ to do, in taking care of these helpless men and their families. I see that more clearly every day, and am very glad and grateful that my profession will make me a useful, happy, and independent spinster.”
Nan’s emphasis on the last word caused Tom to groan, and the rest to laugh.
“I take great pride and solid satisfaction in you, Nan, and hope to see you very successful; for we do need just such helpful women in the world. I sometimes feel as if I’d missed my vocation and ought to have remained single; but my duty seemed to point this way, and I don’t regret it,” said Mrs Jo, folding a large and very ragged blue sock to her bosom.
“Neither do I. What should I ever have done without my dearest Mum?” added Ted, with a filial hug which caused both to disappear behind the newspaper in which he had been mercifully absorbed for a few minutes.
“My darling boy, if you would wash your hands semi-occasionally, fond caresses would be l
ess disastrous to my collar. Never mind, my precious touslehead, better grass stains and dirt than no cuddlings at all” and Mrs Jo emerged from that brief eclipse looking much refreshed, though her back hair was caught in Ted’s buttons and her collar under one ear.
Here Josie, who had been studying her part at the other end of the piazza, suddenly burst forth with a smothered shriek, and gave Juliet’s speech in the tomb so effectively that the boys applauded, Daisy shivered, and Nan murmured: “Too much cerebral excitement for one of her age.”
