Miss Billie's Decision [61]
haven't seen them for four or five years. They used to live in our town. The mother was a little sweet- faced woman with young eyes and prematurely white hair.''
``That describes my Mrs. Greggory exactly,'' cried Billy's eager voice. ``And the daughter?''
``Alice? Why--as I said, it's been four years since I've seen her.'' A touch of constraint had come into Arkwright's voice which Billy's keen ear was quick to detect. ``She was nineteen then and very pretty.''
``About my height, and with light-brown hair and big blue-gray eyes that look steely cold when she's angry?'' questioned Billy.
``I reckon that's about it,'' acknowledged the man, with a faint smile.
``Then they _are_ the ones,'' declared the girl, plainly excited. ``Isn't that splendid? Now we can know them, and perhaps do something for them. I love that dear little mother already, and I think I should the daughter--if she didn't put out so many prickers that I couldn't get near her! But tell us about them. How did they come here? Why didn't you know they were here?''
``Are you good at answering a dozen questions at once?'' asked Aunt Hannah, turning smiling eyes from Billy to the man at her side.
``Well, I can try,'' he offered. ``To begin with, they are Judge Greggory's widow and daughter. They belong to fine families on both sides, and they used to be well off--really wealthy, for a small town. But the judge was better at money-making than he was at money-keeping, and when he came to die his income stopped, of course, and his estate was found to be in bad shape through reckless loans and worthless investments. That was eight years ago. Things went from bad to worse then, until there was almost nothing left.''
``I knew there was some such story as that back of them,'' declared Billy. ``But how do you suppose they came here?''
``To get away from--everybody, I suspect,'' replied Arkwright. ``That would be like them. They were very proud; and it isn't easy, you know, to be nobody where you've been somebody. It doesn't hurt quite so hard--to be nobody where you've never been anything but nobody.''
``I suppose so,'' sighed Billy. ``Still--they must have had friends.''
``They did, of course; but when the love of one's friends becomes _too_ highly seasoned with pity, it doesn't make a pleasant morsel to swallow, specially if you don't like the taste of the pity-- and there are people who don't, you know. The Greggorys were that kind. They were morbidly so. From their cheap little cottage, where they did their own work, they stepped out in their shabby garments and old-fashioned hats with heads even more proudly erect than in the old days when their home and their gowns and their doings were the admiration and envy of the town. You see, they didn't want--that pity.''
``I _do_ see,'' cried Billy, her face aglow with sudden understanding; ``and I don't believe pity would be--nice!'' Her own chin was held high as she spoke.
``It must have been hard, indeed,'' murmured Aunt Hannah with a sigh, as she set down her teacup.
``It was,'' nodded Arkwright. ``Of course Mrs. Greggory, with her crippled foot, could do nothing to bring in any money except to sew a little. It all depended on Alice; and when matters got to their worst she began to teach. She was fond of music, and could play the piano well; and of course she had had the best instruction she could get from city teachers only twenty miles away from our home town. Young as she was-- about seventeen when she began to teach, I think --she got a few beginners right away, and in two years she had worked up quite a class, meanwhile keeping on with her own studies, herself.
``They might have carried the thing through, maybe,'' continued Arkwright, ``and never _apparently_ known that the `pity' existed, if it hadn't been for some ugly rumors that suddenly arose attacking the Judge's honesty in an old matter that somebody raked up. That was too much. Under this last straw their courage broke utterly. Alice dismissed every pupil, sold almost all their
``That describes my Mrs. Greggory exactly,'' cried Billy's eager voice. ``And the daughter?''
``Alice? Why--as I said, it's been four years since I've seen her.'' A touch of constraint had come into Arkwright's voice which Billy's keen ear was quick to detect. ``She was nineteen then and very pretty.''
``About my height, and with light-brown hair and big blue-gray eyes that look steely cold when she's angry?'' questioned Billy.
``I reckon that's about it,'' acknowledged the man, with a faint smile.
``Then they _are_ the ones,'' declared the girl, plainly excited. ``Isn't that splendid? Now we can know them, and perhaps do something for them. I love that dear little mother already, and I think I should the daughter--if she didn't put out so many prickers that I couldn't get near her! But tell us about them. How did they come here? Why didn't you know they were here?''
``Are you good at answering a dozen questions at once?'' asked Aunt Hannah, turning smiling eyes from Billy to the man at her side.
``Well, I can try,'' he offered. ``To begin with, they are Judge Greggory's widow and daughter. They belong to fine families on both sides, and they used to be well off--really wealthy, for a small town. But the judge was better at money-making than he was at money-keeping, and when he came to die his income stopped, of course, and his estate was found to be in bad shape through reckless loans and worthless investments. That was eight years ago. Things went from bad to worse then, until there was almost nothing left.''
``I knew there was some such story as that back of them,'' declared Billy. ``But how do you suppose they came here?''
``To get away from--everybody, I suspect,'' replied Arkwright. ``That would be like them. They were very proud; and it isn't easy, you know, to be nobody where you've been somebody. It doesn't hurt quite so hard--to be nobody where you've never been anything but nobody.''
``I suppose so,'' sighed Billy. ``Still--they must have had friends.''
``They did, of course; but when the love of one's friends becomes _too_ highly seasoned with pity, it doesn't make a pleasant morsel to swallow, specially if you don't like the taste of the pity-- and there are people who don't, you know. The Greggorys were that kind. They were morbidly so. From their cheap little cottage, where they did their own work, they stepped out in their shabby garments and old-fashioned hats with heads even more proudly erect than in the old days when their home and their gowns and their doings were the admiration and envy of the town. You see, they didn't want--that pity.''
``I _do_ see,'' cried Billy, her face aglow with sudden understanding; ``and I don't believe pity would be--nice!'' Her own chin was held high as she spoke.
``It must have been hard, indeed,'' murmured Aunt Hannah with a sigh, as she set down her teacup.
``It was,'' nodded Arkwright. ``Of course Mrs. Greggory, with her crippled foot, could do nothing to bring in any money except to sew a little. It all depended on Alice; and when matters got to their worst she began to teach. She was fond of music, and could play the piano well; and of course she had had the best instruction she could get from city teachers only twenty miles away from our home town. Young as she was-- about seventeen when she began to teach, I think --she got a few beginners right away, and in two years she had worked up quite a class, meanwhile keeping on with her own studies, herself.
``They might have carried the thing through, maybe,'' continued Arkwright, ``and never _apparently_ known that the `pity' existed, if it hadn't been for some ugly rumors that suddenly arose attacking the Judge's honesty in an old matter that somebody raked up. That was too much. Under this last straw their courage broke utterly. Alice dismissed every pupil, sold almost all their