OLD STANFIELD HOUSE;

OR,

THE SIN OF COVETOUSNESS.

BY

LUCY ELLEN GUERNSEY

AUTHOR OF

"IRISH AMY," "THE FAIRCHILDS," "RHODA'S EDUCATION," ETC., ETC.

—————————— "Love not the world, neither the things that are in the world." ——————————

PHILADELPHIA:

AMERICAN SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION

NO. 1122 CHESTNUT STREET. —————————— NEW YORK: NO. 8 AND 10 BIBLE HOUSE, ASTOR PLACE. CHICAGO: 73 RANDOLPH ST.

———————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————— Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1880, by the AMERICAN SUNDAY-SCHOOL UNION, In the Office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington. ————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————————

CONTENTS. ——————

CHAP.

I.—THE OLD HOUSE

II.—SCHOOL

III.—AUNT BETSY

IV.—CASSIUS

V.—CALISTA ASKS A QUESTION

VI.—THE SECRET DRAWER

VII.—MISS MEEKS

VIII.—MARY

IX.—THE STORM BREAKS

X.—MISS DRUETT

XI.—THE NEEDLE-CASE

XII.—THE TRUNKS

XIII.—THE OLD MEETING-HOUSE

XIV.—OLD JAEL

XV.—EVIL INFLUENCES

XVI.—THE FAIR

XVII.—MR. FABIAN CALLS AGAIN

XVIII.—MISS PRISCILLA

XIX.—MISS PRISCILLA MAKES CHANGES

XX.—AN EXPLOSION

THE OLD STANFIELD HOUSE. ——————

CHAPTER FIRST.

THE OLD HOUSE.

CALISTA STANFIELD stood at the gate of the old Stanfield place one morning in the latter end of May, looking abroad over the fields. The house stood on a little rise of ground such as in that part of the world is dignified by the name of a hill. The foreground of the picture on which she was looking was not very cheerful in itself, being neither more nor less than an old family burying-ground, very full of gravestones, and with one tall monument towering over all. Now an old graveyard need not be a melancholy sight, provided that the grass be kept green, the stones whole, and the enclosure free from ugly weeds. That on which Calista was looking bore traces of utter neglect. Beyond the graveyard spread fenced fields, some in pasture, others in the carefully-marked squares which showed that they were meant for sweet potatoes, or were tinted with the pale green blades of the springing corn. Low-growing oaks, with here and there a large tree, closed is the prospect.

Calista looked at the melancholy graveyard, and then turned and looked at the house behind her—the old Stanfield place. The one prospect was not more cheering than the other. The mansion had been a fine one, built of small bricks brought from Europe, and with much ornamental woodwork about it. It stood on a high stone basement, and had a flight of solid gray marble steps rising from each side to a wide porch with brick pillars, and quaint carving about the gable; but the woodwork was gray for want of paint, and in some places falling for want of a timely nail; the steps had sunk away, leaving a yawning chasm between themselves and the floor of the porch; most of the shutters—solid wooden shutters such as people affect in that part of the world—were closed, and others hung by only one hinge. There had been a somewhat pretentious garden at one side of the house, with ornamental trellis-work and a summer-house once covered with climbing roses; but the trellis leaned this way and that, the summer-house had partly fallen in, and the beds were overgrown with grass and weeds.

When old General Stanfield was alive, nothing about the place, from the grand house to the smallest chicken-coop, was ever suffered to get out of repair. Then the house was filled with cheerful company from one week's end to another. The second Mrs. Stanfield, like the first, had only one child, a boy, who grew up mostly at home, sometimes under the care of a tutor, sometimes running wild with rod and gun under the charge of a man who had been his father's servant all through the war, and who was still living in a little house which the General had built and given him on the borders of his great estate.

By and by the young Richard went to Princeton, and managed, despite a great deal of idleness and some foolish frolics, to scramble through his college course without disgrace or expulsion, and even with some degree of credit.

"Well, young Stanfield is fairly off our hands," remarked one of the professors to the president on the evening of commencement. "I wonder what he will turn out?"

"There are two things either of which may possibly make a man of him," replied the president. "And they are, to marry a sensible, energetic woman, or to go into the army."

"Well, if marrying will save Stanfield, I am sure I hope he will marry," said the professor; "for, much trouble as he has made me, I am very fond of the boy."

As it happened, young Stanfield did marry and did go into the army, yet neither of them made much of him. He went to the North on a visit, and there married a pretty, poor girl, with no home of her own, and no fortune save the very liberal outfit provided by the distant cousins with whom she lived.

It had never occurred to Richard Stanfield that his father could be seriously angry with him for anything he could do. He had been allowed his own way, and plenty of money to carry out that way, ever since he could remember, and if his father had ever been seriously displeased, a little coaxing penitence from his graceful, handsome son had been all that was needful to reconcile the indulgent father.

If Richard had taken his wife directly home, things might have turned out very differently, for Calista was a sweet, gracious creature, though timid and somewhat reserved.

Richard, however, was well pleased to stay where he was, and he wrote to his father and waited for an answer, amusing himself meanwhile, as he had done all his life, with whatever came to hand.

There was a power near the throne on which Richard had not calculated, and which was in no wise friendly to him. Miss Priscilla Stanfield, the General's daughter by his first wife, had at first been fond of the pretty boy baby, and after his mother died, she had befriended him in her fashion, till he began to interfere with the exercise of her ruling passion. Richard loved to spend money—Miss Priscilla loved to save it; and between the two there was a perpetual contest, sometimes open, sometimes covert, but always more or less active. When Richard was at home, his influence was usually uppermost with the General, who was not very strong-minded at any time; but when Richard was away, his father was wholly in the hands of Priscilla, who had her own ends to serve. Priscilla persuaded her father that Richard had disgraced his family by marrying, clandestinely, an obscure girl without family, education, or money.

The consequence was that the General wrote a very harsh letter to his son, forbidding him to bring home the young woman with whom he had so disgracefully connected himself. If he chose to return without her, he was at liberty to do so. The young woman could remain with her friends, and a suitable allowance should be made her. If Richard chose to comply with these terms, well and, good; if not, Mr. Settson, the old lawyer in Cohansey, was authorized to pay to his order the sum of three hundred dollars a year, which was all that he must expect from his father.

"It is Priscilla's doing!" said Richard to his wife. "I see her hand all through it. My father must be in his dotage. Does he take me for a fool, or a villain?"

"Oh, Richard, we have done very wrong!" said poor Calista. "I never guessed your father could take it in that way. I thought you wrote to him. You said you would."

"Well, I meant to, but the time went on, and on the whole I thought it as well to wait. I am sure I never guessed he would take it in such an absurd way any more than yourself. And three hundred a year! It is just nothing."

"I don't mind that so much," said Calista, to whose New England ideas three hundred dollars seemed a much larger sum than it did to Richard; "but it is so dreadful to think that your father is angry with you. Perhaps if you were to go and see him—"

"I am not sure but it would be a good plan," said Richard, thoughtfully. "If I could see him alone, I dare say I could bring him round; but there is Priscilla."

"Perhaps you might, bring her round too."

"You don't know her, Calista. Priscilla used to be a pretty nice girl when she was young, but she always loved money, and now I think she cares for nothing else. If you had only been rich, she would have thought it was all right."

"Still, if you were to go there," urged Calista. "I would stay here, you know, till you came back; I might even take the school again."

"Take the school indeed! Don't let me hear of such a thing!"

The time came when Calista was only too glad to take the school again.

Richard fully intended to go home, see his father, and "make all right," as he said; that is, get his own way, as he had done twenty times before, by dint of coaxing. But several things happened to prevent him. He had a slight accident while riding, which lamed him for two or three weeks; then Calista was very unwell, and he could not think of leaving her; and then winter set in, and he persuaded himself it would be as well to wait till spring.

Meantime the war of 1812 broke out. The war fever ran very high in that part of the country. Richard fell in with it, as he did with everything that was going. He raised a company by his own exertions, and took command of it. He was soon ordered west, and bade a tender farewell to his wife, whom he commended, in an earnest and dutiful letter, to his father's care and affection. At Calista's earnest request, he also wrote a kind letter to his sister, and enclosed both in one envelope.

Whether these letters reached their destination, Richard never knew. His company was engaged in the disastrous affair of the river Raisin, and not a man escaped the horrible massacre which followed.

His little girl, born three months after her father's death, was motherless as well as fatherless when she was five years old. The old couple who had stood in the place of parents to Calista Folsom were both dead, and her poor child, with no near friends, was left on the hands of distant cousins, who had, or thought they had, enough to do to take care of their own families. What was to be done?

"I am just going to write to her father's family," said Mrs. Tom Folsom, at whose house poor Mrs. Richard Stanfield died. "I would like to keep the child myself, for she is a dear little thing as ever I saw, but I seem to have my hands full already."

"I suppose we might all say that," said Mrs. John Folsom. "But what is our Christianity worth, my dear Sophronia, if it does not lead us to the exercise of practical self-denial?"

"Self-denial—humph!" retorted Mrs. Tom. "Don't talk to me about self-denial, Amanda. The difference in price between your winter set-out and mine would keep the child a year."

Mrs. John kept her temper, at least so far as words were concerned.

"You forget that I had Calista on my hands for two years before she was married," said she.

"During which time she did all the sewing and spinning of the family, besides keeping school three terms!" retorted Mrs. Tom. "I don't think you can lay claim to much self-denial on that score."

"Don't let us make the dear child a source of discord and contention," said Miss Malvina Fitch; an elderly lady who lived by herself on a very small income, which she eked out by spinning, braiding hats, and other means. "Let Sophronia write to poor dear Richard's family, as she proposed, and if nothing comes of it, we will see what can be done."

"If nothing comes of it, the child will have to come on the town for support, so far as I see," said Mrs. John, decidedly.

"She won't do that while I have a roof over my head and half a loaf to share with her," said old Miss Malvina, with more warmth than was common with her. "Dear Calista's child shall never be a town charge if I can help it."

"Well, you needn't flare out so!" said Mrs. John. "I only mentioned it."

"Yes, and you ought to blush even to mention such a thing!" said Mrs. Tom. "Poor as I am, with my sick husband and helpless boy, I would work my fingers to the bone before it should happen. Our own relation, and a soldier's child besides, and you sit there in your satin and fine cloth and talk of sending her to the poor-house."

"Oh, very well, manage the matter your own way," said Mrs. John, rising with a lofty air of composure. "I wash my hands of the whole matter; so don't expect anything from me."

"As though any one did expect anything of you," said Mrs. Tom, as she closed the door, not very gently, after her. "Well, then, I'll write to this General Stanfield; though I haven't much hope of anything coming of it; and in the meantime—"

"In the meantime I will keep Calista," said Miss Malvina. "There is no one at my house to be disturbed by her noise, and what is enough for one must stretch for two."

"Oh, I'll help you all I can, and so I am sure will Samuel; and I dare say John too, if he can do it without his wife's knowledge. I shall be very glad if you can have her with you, for it is bad for the child's disposition to be hushed up every minute, and poor Tom can't bear a bit of noise when his bad spells are on."

The letter was written and sent, and it seemed for a time as if nothing was likely to come of it. Calista staid with Miss Malvina all winter, learning to read and sew, and sharing the old lady's simple fare, eked out by contributions from the cousins, and a sly dollar bill now and then from Cousin John. When the child looked back on this winter from her after life, it seemed to her that no fires were ever so bright and warm as Miss Malvina's; no bread so sweet and so thickly buttered; no, cake so delicious as the Sunday's treat of gingerbread, and that Indian loaf (unknown, alas! to this generation) which came hot, red and glutinous from the oven where it had staid simmering ever since the Saturday before. In truth, the seasoning which made all Miss Malvina's plain and economical cooking so grateful—the genuine love and generosity—came to be sadly wanting afterward.

With the spring, however, came a change. A middle-aged gentlewoman appeared one day in the little town, charged with letters and credentials from Miss Priscilla Stanfield, daughter and sole heir of General Stanfield, of Cohansey, and empowered to take possession of the child Calista Stanfield, and carry her home to her aunt. It appeared from the letters brought by Miss Druett that she was the companion and confidential friend of Miss Stanfield.

"Then General Stanfield did not leave his son's wife anything?" said Mrs. Tom.

"Nothing whatever," answered Miss Druett, concisely.

"Nor to the child?"

"I do not know that he was even aware of the child's existence," said Miss Druett.

"Somebody was very much to blame if he was not!" said sharp-spoken Mrs. Tom. "For Calista wrote to him and to Miss Priscilla when the child was born. I know, because I posted the letters myself."

"The mails are somewhat uncertain," said Miss Druett; "but however that may be, the General's whole property was left to his daughter Priscilla. Miss Stanfield wishes it understood that she does not allow the child to have any claim on her. She is willing to take her and give her an education befitting her father's family, but it is entirely an act of charity on her part."

"I would not let the child go if things were different with me," said Miss Malvina to Mrs. Tom when the matter was talked over afterward; "but I know I have not many months to live, and if this Miss Stanfield gives Calista such an education as she promises, the girl can earn her own living."

"And Calista may come into all the property at last; who knows?"

"She most probably will," said Mrs. John, who was assisting at the conference. "But what are you going to do with her mother's things, Malvina? There are all the handsome dresses and other clothes that Father and Mother Folsom bought for her, and the presents her husband made to her afterward. They must be as good as new. What are you going to do with them?"

"That matter is already settled," said Miss Malvina, calmly. "I have turned the trunks which held poor Calista's wardrobe and other property over to Miss Druett for the use of the child. Sophronia and I looked them over, and repacked them with abundance of cedar and black pepper, and locked them up again. Of course they belong to the child; and as Miss Stanfield assumes the care and education of the orphan, she is the fit custodian of all that appertains to her in right of her deceased parent."

And Miss Malvina was a little soothed, in the midst of her grief, by thinking how neatly she had turned her long sentence.

"Oh!" said Mrs. John, significantly, and rising at the same time. "I am sure the child is quite welcome to all that is left of her poor mother's things. At the same time, I must say I think I might have been consulted, if only for form's sake."

"You forget that you said you washed your hands of the whole concern," said Mrs. Tom.

"Oh, very well. I don't grudge you anything you have made of the transaction. Good-morning." And Mrs. John sailed away, resolved to keep a sharp look-out on Mrs. Tom's "go to meeting" clothes, so as to challenge any article of Calista's wardrobe on its first appearance. She was disappointed, however.

Mrs. Tom's temper was sharpened as well as her wits by hard encounters with adverse fortune, but, poor as she was, she would have scorned to enrich herself at the expense of an orphan child. As to Miss Malvina, she was so near heaven already that the richest things on earth and the poorest looked equally small in her eyes.

To the little Calista, the parting with her kind old guardian and the long journey seemed like a dreary dream, from which she woke to find herself an inmate of the old Stanfield house, creeping about by herself, with no mates but the animals in the farmyard, slighted and snubbed by her aunt, treated with a sort of surly kindness by Miss Druett, her aunt's companion and confidante, and sometimes petted and sometimes scolded by the two old servants whom Miss Stanfield still retained.

Sometimes it seemed to her that her present life was a dream, and that she should wake up to find herself in Miss Malvina's little bed-room, under that red-and-white coverlet wrought in gorgeous patterns of long-tailed birds pecking at berries, which she used to follow out with her little fingers. Sometimes the past grew dream-like, and she thought she must always have lived is the old house, saying lessons to Miss Druett and watching the two elderly ladies playing endless games—cribbage one evening, backgammon the next—or slipping out to the kitchen, when, if Chloe were in a good humor, she would contrive some kind of treat for the child, and tell her stories of the past glories of the family, and of her handsome father when he was a boy.

Under such influences Calista had grown up to the age of fifteen. About that time she left off saying her lessons to Miss Druett, and began going to an old-fashioned ladies' school in Cohansey, the chief town in the neighborhood. In pleasant weather she walked; when it was wet or stormy, she rode an elderly white pony named Jeff, or sometimes drove him in a little old chaise which Miss Priscilla had taken on a debt.

Calista believed she owed this change to Miss Druett, and was grateful to that lady accordingly. She liked her school and her lessons, she was friendly with the girls, and she had made one intimate friend in the person of Mary Settson. Then, too, she had now and then an errand to do for her aunt, and she often had a kind word and sometimes a little present from old Mr. Settson, the lawyer, who had had charge of General Stanfield's business, and took an interest in poor Richard's child.

CHAPTER SECOND.

SCHOOL.

CALISTA had not been religiously brought up. True, she attended church once every Sunday with Miss Druett, sitting in the family pew in the old brick church in Cohansey. At home the subject was never even mentioned. Miss Priscilla never went to church, never read the Bible or had family prayers, or asked a blessing at table, or acknowledged God in any of her ways.

Calista had found a ragged old Bible among some waste papers in the garret, and sometimes read it for the stories when she was tired of "Evelina" and the few odd volumes of "Camilla" and "Sir Charles Grandison" of which she had become possessed in the same way. These readings, the Sunday services, the prayers in school, and some faint remembrance of Miss Malvina's teaching, kept the girl from utter heathenism. Of personal religion, of any obligation on her own part to a God or a Saviour, it is hardly an exaggeration to say Calista had no more notion than her old white pony.

She had a kind of attachment to Miss Druett, tempered by a good deal of fear. She had begun by dreading Aunt Priscilla, and ended, I fear, by hating her; but she was not naturally unamiable, and, as Miss McPherson, the schoolmistress, observed, she had the making or marring of a fine woman in her.

"Calista!" called a somewhat harsh yet not altogether unpleasant voice, with then a musical ring in it as of some neglected instrument. Then in a moment—"Calista, do you mean to stand dreaming there all day? It is time you were getting ready for school."

"Yes, Miss Druett," replied Calista, promptly; "I am all ready, and there is plenty of time. Where are you going?" she asked, in surprise, as Miss Druett appeared in the door with her bonnet on.

"I am going to drive into town with you, so don't keep me waiting, child."

Calista skipped lightly up the ruined steps, which looked dangerous for anything heavier than a goat to climb. As she reached the broad flat stone at the top, it tilted a little under her tread.

"Take care!" said Miss Druett.

"That stone will fall with somebody one of these days," said Calista. "Why doesn't Aunt Priscilla have it mended?"

"Little girls shouldn't ask questions," replied Miss Druett.

"I am not a little girl any longer!" said Calista, her color rising a little. "I wish I were, and then my frocks would not all be so outgrown that I am ashamed of them."

Miss Druett deigned no answer to this remark, but Calista was used to having her remarks remain unanswered. She hastened away, and presently returned equipped in her school bonnet of gray batist a good deal the worse for wear, and carrying in one hand her school books and in the other a work-bag—every one carried a work-bag in those days—with the ends of knitting needles sticking out. It would be hard to find a handsomer girl in all Cohansey than Calista Stanfield, but she certainly owed very little to her dress.

"Where is Aunt Priscilla?" asked Calista, as she took her place in the queer shaky little chaise where Miss Druett was already sitting.

"In her room," was the reply. "She is out of sorts this morning, or she would have gone to town herself."

Calista said no more till they were out of sight of the house. Then she began again.

"Miss Druett, I do wish I could have some new frocks this spring. My best frock, that blue bombazette, is ever so much too short, and mended in three or four places. I declare I am ashamed to be seen; there is not a servant girl in Cohansey who goes as shabby as I do."

Miss Druett seemed to be fully occupied in driving a fly off the pony's back, and did not answer a word.

"Then my Sunday bonnet is a perfect fright. It is three years old, and not the least like what any one else wears. And it is just so in everything," continued Calista, with growing heat as she recounted her wrongs. "I can never have a bit of pretty work like the other girls, or have a bit of pocket-money, or any privileges as the rest do. I think it is too bad."

"What do you expect me to do about it?" asked Miss Druett.

"If aunt were as poor as Miss Malvina used to be, and had to work for a living, I would never say a word," continued Calista. "I would work hard, too, and earn my own clothes; but when she is so rich and laying up money all the time, I do think it is a very hard case."

"How do you know your aunt is laying up money all the time?"

"Because it is always coming in and never going out," was the prompt reply. "Don't you think I have eyes and ears, Miss Druett? Don't I know that she gets the rents for her buildings in Philadelphia and Cohansey, and for the farms she lets out, and the butter and hay, and so on? What becomes of all that, if she does not lay it up?"

"You had better ask her," rejoined Miss Druett. "And if you think the servant girls are so much better off than yourself, you had better try living out, and see how you like it."

Calista's eyes flashed. "I declare I will!" said she, with sudden fire and emphasis. "I will go to Mr. Settson this very day and ask him to find me a place where I can work for my board and enough to clothe me. At least I should have enough to eat, and not be taunted and insulted every hour as I am now."

Miss Druett turned her head and looked at Calista, who met the gaze without flinching. She seemed to think matters had gone far enough.

"Come, come, don't let me hear any such nonsense as that!" said she. "If I should tell Priscilla she would turn you out of the house, and never let you into it again."

"Let her!" returned Calista. "I haven't had such very nice times there that I should regret it very much."

"Suppose your aunt had never taken you at all, do you know where you would have been? You would have gone to the poor-house."

"Well, suppose I had, what worse should I have been? I should have had enough to eat and something to wear, and what more do I have now?"

"You have your school for one thing."

"Yes, I know I do, thanks to you. You are good to me—sometimes."

Miss Druett smiled in a curious, sudden fashion, with flash of white teeth and a light in her dark gray eyes under black brows and lashes, which gave quite a new aspect to her face.

"Then if I am good to you—sometimes—have a little patience for the sake of those times," said she. "Don't you think I would do more for you if I could? As for the frocks, I know you need them, and I will see what I can bring to pass; but don't you say a word about them to your aunt. She is in one of her bad moods to-day. Here we are, I declare. Where will you stop?"

"Oh, at the school-house. I suppose I must walk home. I don't mind though; it will be cool and pleasant after five o'clock."

It wanted half an hour of school time, but Calista found Miss McPherson's school-room filled with girls all talking together, as it seemed. As she entered somebody said, laughing,—

"Catch her giving anything. You might as well ask old Miss Stanfield herself."

"Hush," said two or three voices, and Calista felt sure they had been talking of her.

"Here is Calista," said one of the girls. "How early you are! Did you walk?"

"No, I rode in with Miss Druett. What are you all talking about?"

"Oh, about this new plan for furnishing the parsonage house. Haven't you heard?"

"Not a word. How should I?"

"Of course she hasn't," said Belle Adair. "Well, you know Mr. and Mrs. Lee lost all their furniture when the old parsonage was burned."

"Yes, of course. Every one knows that."

"Well, the ladies of the congregation are going to furnish the new parsonage from top to bottom with linen and everything needful, and the young ladies—Miss Jessy McPherson and Miss Alice Settson and that set—are going to hold a fair to buy some of the bed-room furniture."

"A fair!" repeated Calista. "What kind of a fair? I don't know what you mean."

"Why, a kind of sale, like the one Miss Jessy attended in Philadelphia, for the orphans. Don't you remember that she told us about it?"

"Oh, yes! Well, what then?"

"Well, the young ladies are going to have one, and they have asked us school-girls to make things for one of the tables. Miss Jessy is to have it in charge, and two or three of us are to help her. And we are to make all sorts of pretty and useful things for sale, and find the materials ourselves. And I know what I am going to make, but I don't mean to tell anybody—not yet."

All this explanation Belle delivered with great animation and a vast amount of gesticulation, as her fashion was.

"You will have to tell, if we meet together for work," observed one of the girls. "And you know that was what we proposed—to meet with Miss Jessy, Wednesday afternoon of each week."

"To be sure, so we did. I did not think of that, but it don't matter."

"I think the meeting will be half the fun, don't you, Calista?" said little Emma Adair, Belle's cousin.

But Calista was looking for something in her desk, and did not answer.

"I think it is very nice—all of it—only I don't see how I am to do anything, because I have no money," said Theresa Diaments. "Somehow my allowance is always gone before I know it."

"Because you spend it all," returned her cousin, Antoinette, who roomed with her. "You never go out without buying something—pins, or thread, or pencils. You buy ten bunches of hairpins to my one."

"Oh, yes! I dare say," remarked Belle, sarcastically enough. "We all know how economical you are. Perhaps if you bought more pins, poor Tessy would not need to buy so many."

Antoinette colored deeply, and cast anything but an amiable glance at the last speaker.

"What will you do, Calista?" asked Belle.

"How can I tell?" returned Calista. "I don't half understand the matter yet. You are always in such a hurry, Belle. Where is Mary Settson?"

"Here she comes,—

"'Sober, steadfast and demure,'—

"As usual," said Belle. "What are you going to make for the fair, Mary?"

"I haven't said I was going to make anything," replied Mary, looking annoyed, for she was not pleased with Belle's quotation. "Come out a minute, Calista; I want to tell you something. Oh, here comes Miss McPherson to open school! Girls, what are you about? Don't you see?"

All the girls rose—some of them in a little confusion—to greet their schoolmistress. Miss McPherson was a tall Scotch lady, with silvery-white hair put up under a matronly sort of lace cap, bright eyes, and a somewhat commanding presence. She was handsomely dressed, as usual, in her rich black silk and white muslin handkerchief, with a large gold watch in her belt, to which were attached a bunch of seals and a thick gold chain of Indian workmanship. This was her invariable costume, except that in winter she wore a soft gray shawl. She was followed by her niece, Miss Jessy McPherson, a slim lady, not quite so young as she had been, but still pretty and blooming, and dressed with much more regard to the fashion than her aunt. Another teacher entered by the opposite door, and the three took their places on the platform at one end of the room. Miss Jessy read part of a chapter in the New Testament, Miss McPherson made a short prayer, and then the lessons were begun.

Miss McPherson had been educated at one of the best schools in Edinburgh, and finished at a Scotch convent in Paris. She had come to America with her father at the close of the revolution. Captain McPherson sold out his commission in the army and bought land in New Jersey, hoping to make an estate for his daughter; but his farming was not very successful, and he soon died. Miss McPherson, as soon as the first desolation of her loss was over, began to look about her to see what she was to do.

She was not long in deciding. She sold the land which she could not cultivate, bought a house in the growing town of Cohansey, and set up a ladies' school. She taught French and Italian thoroughly—though, it must be owned, with something of a Scotch accent—needle work, plain and ornamental, flower work, feather work, and numberless other works. She also taught the then popular art of reading, writing and spelling the English language correctly by the aid of Mr. Lindley Murray's "Grammar," * and some geography and history by the aid of Mr. Pinnock's "Catechisms." She also taught—and that without extra charge—very excellent manners and sound religion and morality, so that her school might be considered a good one, though metaphysics formed no part of its course, and even such an elementary and old-fashioned book as "Mrs. B.'s Conversations on Chemistry" had never entered its walls.

Miss McPherson prospered, or, as she would have preferred to say, "was prospered," from the first. She was soon enabled to enlarge her house, take a few boarders, and send for her orphan niece, Miss Jessy, who was earning a hard living as a governess in the north of England.

At the time of which I am writing, Miss McPherson had twelve young lady boarders and twenty-five day scholars, and was believed to be a rich woman. She was greatly respected in the community, and was one of the first persons consulted in any charitable or social enterprise. She subscribed liberally to the church, where her young ladies occupied three pews all to themselves. She had been one of the first to propose the building of the new parsonage house, and had given a good sum towards it; and she was indeed a very important person in Cohansey society.

When the lessons were through, she tapped on her desk for attention.

"Now, young ladies, I want you to listen to me!" said she, in her clear, round tones. "Maria Reese, where are your hands and feet?"

Maria's hands and feet had a way of being in the wrong place, and on this occasion the hands were behind her back, and one foot was twisted round the leg of her chair. Blushing scarlet, she laid her hands in her lap, straightened up her shoulders, and drew in her chin.

"That is much better!" said Miss McPherson. She cast a vigilant eye over the room, and, seeing nothing more to criticise, proceeded with her remarks.

"No doubt you have all been discussing this plan of a fair or sale to help in furnishing the house of our respected minister."

She paused a moment, and Clarissa Whitecar, as the oldest girl, answered for the rest,—

"Yes, ma'am."

"Very well. I cannot say," continued Miss McPherson, "that the scheme is one which I should have proposed myself. I prefer more direct ways of accomplishing good works. However, I am aware that something is to be said on the other side. Such a method as the present promotes sociability, and it also affords an opportunity for those have not much money to bestow, to give their time and their work,—it makes room for self-denial, without which no good work is ever accomplished, and also for the exercise of latent neatness and ingenuity. I have considered the matter, and have also consulted with some of the respected parents and guardians of my pupils," continued Miss McPherson, after another little pause; "and I have come to the conclusion—Charity Latch, are you a lady or a pincushion?"

The young person thus addressed, a tall, overgrown-looking girl, started violently, and hastily removed from her mouth the brass pin with which she was furtively picking her teeth. Charity was one of those people who never see any deficiency in themselves, and therefore never improve.

"I said that I have come to the conclusion to allow the young ladies to devote the hours of afternoon school on Wednesday to working for this object, under certain rules and restrictions, which must be remembered, as I shall allow no departure from them.

"First. Every young lady must provide her own working implements. "Second. Every piece of work must be commenced subject to the approval of myself or Miss Jessy, who will preside in my absence. "Third. Every piece of work once commenced must be perfectly finished before anything else is begun. This rule is invariable. "Fourth. Any young lady must be ready to do her work over again, cheerfully and without complaint, if Miss Jessy or myself thinks it needful. "Fifth. There must be no borrowing from one another without special consent of your teacher for the time being.

"These are all the rules I see fit to make, though I shall not hesitate to add others if I see occasion; but I wish to add a word of advice. Remember that in such a work as this, and done, as this ought to be, for the praise and glory of God, there is no place for anything like emulation or vainglory. Let each do the best she can in whatever she undertakes, and remember that the smallest and cheapest offering given in the right spirit is as acceptable as the most elaborate and costly in the eyes of Him for whom this work is, or should be, done."

Miss McPherson said these words with great earnestness, and smiled as she saw their effect in the suddenly raised eyes and brightened face of a plain and rather poorly-dressed girl who sat near the desk.

"And now the young ladies may take a recess,—" recess she called it, in her Scotch way,—"unless they have any questions to ask."

"If you please, Miss McPherson," said Mary Settson, rising—

"Well, Mary—take time now and consider your words."

"Suppose one of us wishes to make something for the furnishing of the house instead of something for the sale, can we do so?"

"Can she do so?" corrected the schoolmistress. "Let your pronouns agree with their antecedents, my love. Yes, certainly, there can be no objection to that."

"Do you think it would be better to make fancy articles or useful things?" asked another girl.

"I should say a judicious mixture would be best, and in any case it would be well to avoid making your articles too costly. You can settle all these matters in your first meeting, which will take place on Wednesday at the usual time of afternoon school. I must add one thing: If I find these meetings are having an unfavorable effect on your lessons, or tending to produce heart-burning, envy, or unkindness, I shall stop the whole thing at once. You can now take your recess, which will be ten minutes longer than usual."

CHAPTER THIRD.

AUNT BETSY.

THE girls were soon in the spacious play-ground, but to-day neither skipping-rope nor battle-door had attractions for any but the younger children. Every tongue was busy with the new plan, which was talked over in all its bearings. Pincushions and needle work, satin stitch and cross stitch, rug work, cut work, flowers, veils, ruffles, knitting, and netting, all were discussed at once.

"I shall work a piece," said Antoinette, with decision. "I saw a lovely one at my cousin's, in Greenwich—a shepherdess, with her crook, and some sheep and lambs, with their wool all done in French knots with white chenille and gray floss. The shepherdess has on a blue silk gown with real gold spangles. Oh, it is lovely!"

"Yes, and so sweetly natural—a blue silk spangled gown to tend sheep in!" said Belle Adair. "I wonder they did not spangle the sheep too: it would have been about as sensible."

"Just as if that had anything to do with it!" rejoined Antoinette, scornfully. "Any how, I am going to do it—if Miss Jessy will let me, I mean."

"But that will take so long, and be so expensive," remarked Tessy; "and if it should not sell after all, you will lose your labor."

"No, I sha'n't, because I should have the picture anyhow, and as for money, I have all my last quarter's allowance."

"Then you can pay me the three shillings you borrowed of me the last time the peddler was here," said Tessy. "I want some money, and I haven't a bit."

"I haven't any change," returned Antoinette, "and I don't want to break a bill for such a little thing as that."

"You never do have any change, do you, Antoinette?" asked Belle Adair, innocently. Then, as Antoinette did not answer: "If I were you, Tessy, I wouldn't have any change either."

"Well, she does get all my change away," said poor Tessy, half crying, as Antoinette walked away. "She is always saying, 'Oh, Tessy, just lend me a penny,' or 'Just let me have a sixpence, will you?' But if I ask her for anything, she never has it. It is just so with other things. She uses my pins, and needles, and hairpins, so that half the time I don't have any for myself, and then Miss Meeks scolds me, and says, 'Look at Antoinette, she is never unprovided.' Good reason why she isn't."

"You must just learn to say no," said Belle Adair.

"But it seems so mean to refuse such little things."

"It is not so mean to refuse as it is to be sponging for little things," returned Belle, with some justice; "and that is what Antoinette is always doing. The other day, when she began her bead chain, she came to me to know if I had any thread. I told her I had, but did not offer to lend her any. Then she asked me for it straight out, and I told her I wanted my thread myself, and that Miss Jessy had plenty."

"But you gave me a whole nice skein that very day," observed little Emma.

"Yes, because I knew you would pay me, and I did not want you to get into disgrace for forgetting. You are not a sponge, though you are a heedless little puss, and want your ears pinched every day," and Belle suited the action to the word by administering a gentle pinch to the little rosy ear.

"If she would only ask, I wouldn't care so much," said Tessy, "but she just helps herself to anything of mine she wants."

"Well, I know what I would do if I were you," said Emma. "I wouldn't have any money."

"What do you mean, Emma?" asked Tessy.

"Why, Miss McPherson gives you your allowance every month, doesn't she?"

"Yes, of course."

"Well, I would ask her to keep it for me, and just go to her when I wanted any money to use. Then when Antoinette wants to borrow, you can tell her the truth, that you haven't any. Besides, you won't be nearly so apt to spend money if you have to ask Miss McPherson every time; and you know, Tessy, you are rather extravagant," concluded Emma, with a quaint little air of wisdom.

"But perhaps Miss McPherson won't want to be troubled," objected Tessy.

"She won't mind, if you tell her the reason why. Of course you need not mention Antoinette, but you can just say that you know you are apt to throw away your money, and you want to save it for a special purpose."

"What a wise young woman—'a Daniel come to judgment!'" said Belle, who had been reading Shakespeare.

"But really, Tessy, I think this plan an excellent one. Antoinette should not be indulged in such ways, if only for her own sake. If she were poor, it would be different, but I imagine her father is quite as rich as yours."

"Yes, indeed. Well, Emma, I believe I will try this plan of yours. But what shall I do in the mean time? I thought I would knit some curtains, but I haven't even money to buy the cotton."

"You say Antoinette owes you three shillings?"

"She owes me four and sixpence in all."

"Trust to me, Tessy. I'll get it out of her. She is a little too bad."

Meantime Calista and her friend, Mary Settson, were walking up and down under the trees at one side of the play-ground. Calista's black brows were frowning, and she looked vexed and mortified.

"I wish I had never come to school at all," said she, vehemently. "Something is always coming up to make we feel what a miserable, dependent wretch I am."

"Don't use such words, Calista," said Mary.

"They are true words, and why shouldn't I use them?"

"But don't you believe your aunt will let you do anything? I should think she would give you a little money if you ask her in the right time and way."

"Much you know about it. I tell you, Mary, I might just as well expect gold to rain down out of that cloud. The cloud will give me a wetting when I go home, and Aunt Priscilla will give me a scolding, and that is all I shall get from either of them."

"Oh, I forgot," said Mary. "Papa asked Miss Druett to let you stay all night with us, and she said you might. So we will have a good time, and I will teach you to knit the feather stitch that Miss Jessy showed me."

Calista's frown relaxed a little. "Your father is very kind, I am sure; but, Mary, I declare I am ashamed to go."

"Why?"

"My frock is so shabby for one thing, and you and Miss Alice are always so neat."

"Nonsense!"

"And besides, you are always inviting me, and I never can ask you."

"Nonsense!" said Mary again. "Just as if we did not know how things were. I am glad, because I think perhaps papa will contrive some way to help us out of this scrape."

Calista shook her head. "You don't know Aunt Priscilla as I do. Why, Mary, grandfather's monument is actually falling down for want of a little money laid out in repairs. I haven't much reason to be obliged to General Stanfield," continued Calista, rather as if thinking aloud, "but I believe the very first thing I do when I have the place will be to put that graveyard in order."

Mary looked annoyed in her turn.

"I would not think so much about that if I were you, Calista," said she. "You are not sure that the place will ever be yours. Miss Priscilla can leave it to whom she pleases, you know."

"What would you think about it if you were in my place?" demanded Calista, rather fiercely. "Come, Mary, tell me something agreeable in my affairs to think about."

"Well, here is the school and Miss McPherson."

"Miss McPherson is just as good and kind as she can be," admitted Calista, "and the school is pleasant, and I like my lessons; but even here Aunt Priscilla annoys me all the time. Something is forever coming up to remind me how dependent and helpless I am. Aunt Priscilla won't let me have a bit of fancy work, or take music lessons, or have a penny to spend on any of the girls' little frolics."

"Was that the reason you did not go to the gipsy party?"

"Of course it was. I had nothing to carry."

"But, Calista, you know—"

"Oh, yes, I know. Miss Alice would have made something for me, but I wouldn't have that. I may be a pauper, but I won't be a beggar and a sponge like—some folks," casting a glance, as she spoke, at Antoinette, who was passing.

"Well, any how, Calista, you can make the most of what lessons you have, and when you are a little older you can find a place as teacher somewhere and support yourself. And, besides," said Mary, lowering her voice a little, "you might have something else if you would. You might be looking forward to an inheritance that would never fade nor disappoint you."

Calista made an impatient movement.

"So you say, and I believe you really think so, but all that is nothing to me. It has no reality in it to my mind. Aunt Priscilla does not believe in any such thing. She believes in the French philosophers, and Voltaire and Rousseau are about the only authors she reads."

"And you have a great respect for Miss Priscilla's opinion, of course," returned Mary, with a little touch of sarcasm. "It is quite natural you should be governed by it."

Calista laughed. "It would be a reason for thinking the other way if I wanted one, which I don't. But somehow religion has no reality for me. I wouldn't have Miss McPherson hear me say so, but it is no more real to me than the Greek mythology in Magnall's questions."

"I suppose that is the way with a good many people, if they had the honesty to own it," remarked Mary, thoughtfully; "at least to judge by their actions. But now tell me, Calista, are not all your best friends Christians? I have often heard you speak of Miss Malvina; was not she a Christian?"

"Yes, indeed she was, dear old soul!"

"And is not Miss McPherson one, and Miss Jessy, and my father, and Alice?"

"Very true, my dear, not to mention yourself. As to Miss Druett, if any one can tell what she is, they must be wiser than I am."

"Miss Druett is good to you, isn't she?"

"Yes, in a kind of way. She is so sharp and sarcastic that she puts me in a rage ten times a week; but everything good that I get comes through her."

"Well, wouldn't she do something for you in this matter?"

"Very likely she would if she could, but she can't. I told her this morning that I wanted some new frocks, and she said she would get me some if possible, but that I must not speak to Aunt Priscilla about it. I tell you, Mary, you have no idea what she is in one of her bad moods. It is like living with a wild animal or an evil spirit."

"The more reason why you should qualify yourself to earn your own living as soon as possible. But there is the bell. By the way, will you go to Aunt Hannah's with me after school? I have to carry her a message about the towels she is weaving for Alice."

Aunt Hannah Parvin and her sister, Aunt Betsy, lived in a curious old wooden house on the outskirts of the town.

"Come in, come in," said Aunt Betsy. "I suppose, Mary, thee has come about the yarn; and who is this with thee? I ought to know her, but I can't call her by name."

"Surely it is Richard Stanfield's daughter," said Aunt Hannah, appearing at the door. "I never saw a greater likeness between a father and child. Come in, children. I have been expecting thee, Mary."

Aunt Hannah, though the younger of the two old ladies, was much the most staid and precise in her appearance. Her plain gray gown, made in the simplest fashion, was without a wrinkle; her muslin handkerchief and close cap white as snow. She was very pretty with the exquisite delicacy of complexion which "Friends" are so apt to possess and preserve—thanks to their shady, sensible headgear. Her hair, with still a golden shine in it here and there, lay in satin-like bands over her serene forehead, and her large gray eyes looked like the very abode of peace.

Aunt Betsy's hair, on the contrary, would wave, and crinkle, and break away into rebellious little curls round her face and under her cap; her dress, though spotlessly clean, was worn with quite a different air from her sister's, and her complexion showed traces of free exposure to the sun.

"Sister Betsy, how thee is burned with the sun!" said Aunt Hannah, in a tone of mild reproof. "Why won't thee keep thy sunbonnet on?"

"Because I can't see as well with it, Sister Hannah, and, besides, I like to feel the sun. What does it matter for an old woman like me?"

Aunt Hannah sighed gently. "Well, Betsy, thee will always be thyself to the end."

"Would thee want me to be any one else, Hannah?"

Aunt Hannah smiled, and turned to the girls.

"I suppose, Mary, thee has come about the towels. Has Alice decided upon the pattern?"

"No, Aunt Hannah; she told me to say she would leave it to you, and then she should be sure to like it."

"Very well. I will bring down all my patterns for you both to look at, and meantime my sister will find you some refreshments."

"To be sure," said the elder lady. "I had a notion thee would come to-day, Mary, and so I baked a sweet-potato pie and some gingerbread. Just sit down and take your bonnets off. Oh, yes, of course you will stay to tea. Alice won't mind, Mary. She knows I always keep thee to tea."

The girls suffered themselves to be persuaded, and laying aside their bonnets, they sat down by the open window, while Aunt Betsy set her table and brought out her beautiful old china—a set of thin "blue and white," which would set any modern "Ceramical Club" into a fever of rapture.

"What pretty china!" said Calista, admiring the egg-shell cups and the sugar-basin with its gilt pineapples.

"Why, thy folks have some just like it, or ought to have," said Aunt Betsy. "I remember thy mother—I mean thy grandmother—bought a set in Philadelphia the very day I bought this. Dear, dear! What a pretty creature she was, and how the old General doted on her and her curly-headed boy! Poor Richard!"

"You knew my father then," said Calista, much interested.

"Oh, yes. I knew all thy family. Thy grandma used often to come and see me and bring thy father, when he was a little boy. She had him in very good order too, but after she was gone, thy grandfather never controlled him. Hannah often used to tell the old gentleman he was wrong to indulge the child so. I well remember the very last time the General was here. He had stopped one day some weeks before and spoken about Richard, how he had disappointed him; and says Hannah—thee sees she is never afraid to say what she thinks right—says she,—

"'Richard Stanfield, is thee going to cast off thy son because he is what thy indulgence has made him? Where is the justice of that?'

"'There is something in what you say, Hannah,' said he. 'I'll just think it over.'

"Some three or four weeks after, he was just coming home from a journey, and he stopped again, and says he,—

"'Well, Hannah, I have done justice to poor Dick, I think. I have altered my will, and left the old place to him, and to his children if he has any.'"

"Then grandfather did leave the place to my father after all!" said Calista, her eyes flashing and her color changing, as it was apt to do under any excitement.

"He certainly said so—I am quite sure of that," said Aunt Betsy. "I suppose he must have altered his will again, or Miss Priscilla would not have come into everything. Sometimes I have thought maybe she only has the care of the place till thee comes of age. Thee never heard thy father say anything about it I suppose, Mary?"

"No," replied Mary. "Only he said once, he hoped Calista would make the most of her schooling, so as to be independent by and by."

"Yes, but that might have meant that he wished her to be able to look after her own property," argued Aunt Betsy. "I suppose Priscilla never tells thee anything about it, Calista."

"Not she!" answered Calista. "She never speaks to me at all if she can help it."

"Priscilla is peculiar—she always was; but no doubt she means to do right, though she always did sit too close to the world," observed Aunt Hannah, who had come down just in time to hear the end of the conversation; "she was very closely and strictly kept by her mother, and I suppose she thinks it is the best way."

"I was telling Calista about what her grandfather said the last time he was here," observed Aunt Betsy, as she set a jug of rich cream on the table.

"I wouldn't think too much about it, Calista," said Aunt Hannah, looking a little annoyed.

"But grandfather did say that—I mean, that he had given the old place to my father and his children?" asked Calista.

"Oh, yes, there is no doubt of that; but I suspect he altered matters afterwards."

"He hadn't much time to alter them, for he died in a few days," said Aunt Betsy. "I remember it well. I went out that very afternoon wetting down some linen I had bleaching on the grass, when I saw Cassius, your grandfather's servant, riding by as hard as he could go on the old gray.

"'Anything the matter, Cassius?' says I.

"'Yes,' says he, 'the old gentleman's taken very bad. I believe myself he's dead!' says he, and the tears rolled down his black face, for he was very fond of his master; 'but, anyhow, I'm going for the doctor.'

"Presently I saw old Doctor Elsmore riding by, and the next thing I heard the old gentleman was dead, sure enough. Don't thee remember, Hannah? Thee said,—

"'Well, I am glad I freed my mind to him, anyhow.'"

"I remember," said Hannah.

"Was that before I was born?" asked Calista.

"Oh, no. Thee must have been—let's see. How old is thee now?"

"I shall be sixteen in July."

"Then thee must have been about four years old when thy grandfather died."

"We won't talk about it any more," said Aunt Hannah, interposing with a glance of gentle authority at her sister. "Doubtless it was all ordered for the best."

"I just want to ask one question," said Calista. "What became of Cassius? Is he dead?"

"Oh no. I saw him last week. He was a careful fellow, and had saved money, and after his master's death, he bought quite a piece of new land on the river road, near the house thy grandfather gave him. Thee must have seen the place—a low, broad house, with a very large thorny acacia growing over it."

"I have never been over that road," said Calista.

"No! Well, I wonder at that! It is a very little longer than this, but much pleasanter, especially in summer, though it is rather lonely."

"So that is the reason aunt told me not to go by the river road," thought Calista. "I declare I will the very next time I drive home."

Aunt Hannah again interposed with her bundle of patterns, and the subject was dropped.

But, as they were returning home, Calista adverted to it again.

"Do you suppose, Mary, that the place really was left to me, and that Aunt Priscilla is keeping me out of it?"

"No," answered Nary; "I am quite sure I have heard my father say that nobody knew Mr. Stanfield had a child, till Miss Druett brought you home. But if you want to know about the matter, you had better ask father himself. Only, Calista, if I were you, I would try not to think so much about money. If you are not careful, you will come to be as fond of it as poor Miss Priscilla herself."

"I don't think I am fond of money," said Calista, looking a little offended.

"But you do think about it a great deal, Calista; you cannot deny that."

"And wouldn't you if you were in my place?"

"I should be tempted to, no doubt," said Mary, honestly; "but I should try not to give way to it, because I should not feel it right."

"Why not?"

"Because covetousness is sin," returned Mary. "The Bible says covetousness is idolatry (Col. 3:5); and speaks of 'the covetous, whom God abhorreth' (Ps. 10:3); and our Lord himself bids us 'take heed, and beware of covetousness: for a man's life consisteth not in the abundance of the things which he possesseth' (Luke 12:15). Moreover, we are told not to love the world, neither the things which are in the world, because if any man love the world, the love of the Father is not in him (1 John 2:15)."

"If you were in my place, you couldn't help thinking about it," persisted Calista, "any more than you could help thinking about food if you didn't have enough to eat."

"I suppose Miss Priscilla thinks she can't help it either."

"I am much obliged to you, Mary, for comparing me to Miss Priscilla!" said Calista, with offended stiffness. "I didn't know, before, what a good opinion you had of me."

"Now you are unreasonable, Calista, and I sha'n't answer you."

"But about this matter of grandfather's will: do you think it is unreasonable in me to want to know the truth about it?"

"No, I don't, especially after what you have heard, and if I were you, I would ask papa; only, Calista, don't build upon it."

But Calista could not help building upon it. She had no opportunity of asking Judge Settson about the matter, for company came in to spend the evening, and the next day he was called away out of town. But Calista held firmly to her purpose.

CHAPTER FOURTH.

CASSIUS.

THE school was closed rather earlier than usual next day, and Calista walked home. She hesitated for a moment when she came to the place where the two roads divided, and then took the lower road, which ran near the bank of the river, and a good deal of the way through oak-scrub and deserted clearings. Calista had been used to walking to and from the village alone for half a dozen years, but it cannot be denied that she felt a little nervous as she went on for one stretch of the road after another, meeting nobody and seeing no human habitation. What if she should meet with wild hogs or cattle? Or, worse still, with some of the more than half-wild "pine rats," who were to be found here and there in the wilderness which thus stretched a great part of the way from Cohansey River to the Atlantic Ocean.

"Pshaw, what a goose I am!" she said to herself impatiently, as she found herself starting at a sudden rustle in the bushes. "I haven't anything worth stealing, and I don't believe any one would want to hurt me."

Nevertheless she felt a thrill of uncomfortable fear as a man pushed his way through the bushes, carrying a gun and followed by a large dog, and she was not a little relieved when the new-comer proved to be a negro, who touched his hat civilly as he said good-afternoon.

"This is the road to the Mills, is it not?" asked Calista, returning the old man's greeting.

"Yes, Miss, this is one road." Then, as he walked along by her side, he said, with a little hesitation, "Beg pardon, Missy, but isn't this the old General Stanfield's grandchild?"

"Yes; I am General Stanfield's grandchild, the daughter of Mr. Richard Stanfield. Did you know my father?"

"Reckon I did," said the man, taking off his hat and bowing again. "Many's the time I've rode your pa on my back, and took him out fishing on the creek. I was with your grandpa through great part of the old war, and all the time afterward till he died. He was a fine old gentleman, and I wouldn't never have left him, but I couldn't run with Miss Priscy after he was gone; so I bought a piece of land and set up farming for myself."

"And how do you get on?" asked Calista, much interested.

"Oh, first-rate," answered Cassius, cheerfully. "We's had our ups and downs, of course. I've been laid up with the rheumatiz some, and the old woman has her poor spells, but we rub on. I sell a good deal of truck in the village; and we keep lots of chickens, and ducks, and geese. Then I fish and shoot some in the season—I've got a real nice boat—and altogether we make out to lay up a little against the hour of need. For the rest, why we has food and raiment, and we's learned to be therewith content, as the good Book says."

"Have you any children?" asked Calista.

"Only two boys, Missy. They's both doing well; one's living out in Princeton, and one in Philadelphia; both in nice gentlemen's families. We had two nice girls, but the Lord took them both. His will be done." And the old man lifted his hat again.

"That was hard on you," said Calista.

"Yes, it did seem hard, Missy; but He knew best. I tell my old woman they's just as much ours as ever they was, only the Lord's keeping them for us. Won't you stop in a minute and see Sally? She'll be dreadful glad to see you."

"I am afraid I ought not to stop to-night, Cassius," replied Calista, looking, with rather longing eyes, at the neat little house, where stood Sally in the cleanest of turban handkerchiefs and aprons, curtseying, and showing her white teeth in a smile of welcome. "But I mean to come and see you some time. I should like to hear about my father."

Sally was not to be cheated, however. She came down to the gate to speak to Calista; gave her a handful of lilies-of-the-valley, from her neat flower garden, and insisted on filling her basket with delicate, fresh-baked ginger-nuts, which Calista would have refused.

"Please do take 'em, Missy," said Sally. "I know young ladies is fond of ginger-nuts, and it ain't every one that can make 'em like me, though I say it that shouldn't."

She emptied her plate into Calista's basket, and then said something in an undertone to her husband, of which Calista only caught the words "Old Zeke."

"I'm a-going," said Cassius.

"Well, Missy, I won't urge you to stay, as it's growing late; and young ladies of good family shouldn't ought to be out in lonesome places after sundown. I've got to go your way a piece, so I'll just see you past the woods."

"What did Sally say?" asked Calista, as they walked on together.

"Oh, she was speaking about an old fellow that hangs about here sometimes; they call him Old Zeke. I don't really suppose he'd do you any harm; but he's a rough customer, and might scare you. And if you'll excuse the freedom, Missy, I wouldn't come this way unless you are driving. It's rather too lonesome a road for a young lady; and some of these pine rats is apt to be hanging round, fishing or something. There's Zeke now. Don't be scared, Missy, he won't hurt you."

Calista looked up, and as she confronted the old man, she was glad she had not encountered him alone.

He was a very tall and powerful man, a good deal bent, with a shock of grizzled hair that fell on his shoulders, and shaggy brows, under which looked out a pair of fierce light-blue eyes. He was dressed in an indescribable mass of rags and tatters; but over his shoulder he carried a good, serviceable looking gun.

"Evening, Zeke," said Cassius, good-naturedly.

The old man returned a surly sort of nod, and honored Calista with a fixed stare, which lasted till a turn of the road hid him from sight.

"That's a queer old fellow," said Calista. "I am glad I did not meet him alone."

"Well, I don't reckon he would have hurt you—indeed, I can't say as he ever hurt any one; but he is a queer body, as you say, Missy, and his wife is queerer still, if all tales are true. The folks round here do say that they know more than they've got any business to."

"More about what?" asked Calista.

"Oh, they say the old folks are in league with spirits and that they know how to find treasures, and lost money, and so on."

"I should not think they could have found much, to judge from his appearance," said Calista.

Cassius laughed. "Well, you can't always tell from the outside who has money and who hasn't, but I believe it is true that they do spend a good deal of time seeking for the money that folks say the pirates buried along the creek here in the time of the old French war. Old Mrs. Tyerson began talking to me about it one day, but says I,—

"'You go along with your pirates and their money. Suppose'n you did find it, 'twould be bloody gold, and never bring you nothing but ill luck,' says I. 'Don't covet an evil covetousness to your house, Sister Tyerson,' says I. 'Let Old Zeke and his spells alone. I don't want his money. I've got enough to eat and drink and wear, and something to give to my Master besides, and when you've got that, it ain't money, nor the want of money, that makes folks well off or bad off,' says I."

"But money is a good thing," said Calista, struck with the old man's remarks.

"It is a good thing when it comes with the blessing of God, and in the right way, Missy," said Cassius, solemnly. "So is everything else. But when it comes any other way, it is nothing but a curse and a judgment. Well, here we are within sight of the house, so I'll bid you good-night."

"Good-night, and thank you, Cassius. I shall come and see you again some time when I have the horse."

Calista hastened homeward, and entering at the back door, ran up stairs to her room without meeting any one. She hid away her basket of ginger-nuts in a safe place, brushed her hair, and went down stairs.

"Now for it!" said she as she put her hand on the lock of the parlor door. "I wonder what kind of mood she is in?"

Miss Priscilla and Miss Druett had apparently just taken their seats at the tea-table.

Miss Priscilla was a small, delicate woman, with a trim, upright figure, reddish-brown hair, hardly touched with gray, and greenish hazel eyes. She was dressed neatly, though with the utmost plainness, and would have been pretty but for her eager, suspicious expression, and the nervous restlessness of her eyes, which seemed not to be still for a moment. As Aunt Chloe said, Priscilla looked as if she saw ghosts, or was afraid she should see them. Her greeting to Calista was characteristic.

"Well, what has brought you home now? I didn't expect to see you till after supper. You would have had plenty of time to walk home afterwards."

"She is late enough as it is," observed Miss Druett, not unkindly. "Get yourself a plate, Calista; Chloe has not provided one for you."

Calista did not answer either observation. She brought herself a plate and knife, accepted the cup of tea Miss Druett handed her, and helped herself to a slice of bread and some butter. A small dish of fried fish stood at Miss Priscilla's plate, and there was nothing else on the table.

"Oh, don't be bashful!" said Miss Priscilla, in a bitterly sarcastic tone. "Take all the butter on the plate, do. Perhaps you would like some of my fish?"

A spark of fun gleamed in Calista's eyes.

"Thank you, aunt; since you are so kind, I won't hurt your feelings by refusing. My walk has given me an appetite." And she coolly helped herself to the smallest of the fish.

Miss Priscilla looked helplessly irritated at seeing herself taken at her word, and regaining possession of the dish, she hastily set it on the other side of her plate.

Miss Druett suppressed a smile, and shook her head at Calista.

"Well, and what is going on in town?" asked Miss Druett, presently. "Haven't you any news to tell us?"

"There is a good deal going on in one way," said Calista. "The ladies are all very busy about this fair for furnishing the new parsonage house."

"Rubbish!" said Miss Priscilla.

"The girls are all going to work for it," continued Calista. "Miss McPherson gives them Wednesday afternoon, and they are each to make something for the sale."

"Oh," said Miss Priscilla, with an unusually polite display of interest, "that seems a very nice plan of Miss McPherson's. I suppose she furnishes the materials?"

"Of course she furnishes the materials for most of the girls' work. She buys all their silks and crewels, and so on, in Philadelphia."

"And makes a good profit on them, no doubt. Trust a Scotch woman for that."

"I don't know how that is," replied Calista. "She wanted Mr. Clapp to keep fine working materials, but he said the profit was not worth the risk and trouble. He does keep netting, thread, and silk, and a few other things."

"Oh," said Miss Priscilla, again; "and what part do you intend to take in this notable display of industry and charity?"

Calista made no answer, but passed her cup for some more tea.

"One cup of tea is enough for a girl like you," said Miss Priscilla. "Do you hear me, Druey? I say one cup is enough."

"Nonsense!" was the reply. "Let the child have her tea. I am sure it is not strong enough to hurt her."

And she coolly filled the cup and returned it to Calista.

"Oh, very well; of course it is for you to say. Perhaps, Miss Calista Stanfield, you will condescend to answer my question. What part are you intending to take in this matter?"

"That is for you to say, Aunt Priscilla," replied Calista, in unruffled good humor. "You know very well that I have nothing of my own. I thought if I had some fine knitting cotton, I might knit a bureau cover, or something of that sort."

"Oh! And how much might this same fine knitting cotton cost?"

"About a quarter of a dollar, I suppose; perhaps thirty or forty cents."

"Oh, indeed! Then I can tell you, Miss Calista Stanfield, you will have no twenty-five or thirty cents to spend on any such purpose. Twenty-five or thirty cents, indeed! Why not ask at once for twenty-five or thirty dollars?"

"I might about as well, I suppose," said Calista. "I should not have mentioned the matter at all if you had not asked me."

"Don't be pert, miss. I suppose you want to show off your charity at my expense; but you must make up mind to be mortified for once."

"For once!" thought Calista. But she said, cheerfully: "Oh, it won't mortify me at all, Aunt Priscilla. All the girls will know that it is your doing and not mine, and so will every one else."

"You might let the child have a little money for once," said Miss Druett.

"Money indeed! You talk as if I were made of money!" said Miss Priscilla. "Money to furnish the parsonage! Let Mr. Lee furnish his own parsonage. Money indeed! Money!"

The party relapsed into silence, which was maintained till Chloe came to take the tea-things.

Miss Priscilla, with her own hands, carefully removed some infinitesimal particles of butter from the plates and replaced them on the dish.

"There is enough for your supper and David's," said she, anxiously. "You won't need to use any more."

Chloe sniffed the air contemptuously, but made no reply.

"What made you so late coming home?" asked Miss Druett.

"I came by the river road," replied Calista.

"Why did you do that? It is longer and very lonely."

"Yes, I know, and I don't think I shall try it again; at least on foot."

"Did you see anybody?"

"Yes, I saw old Cassius and his wife, and had quite a talk with him."

"Cassius—what about Cassius?" asked Miss Priscilla.

"Nothing, aunt, only I was saying I saw him and had a little talk with him."

"I won't have you talking with every one you meet," said Miss Priscilla, sharply; "you are just such another as your father—hail fellow, well met, with half the vagabonds in the country."

"I should not call Cassius a vagabond," said Calista, too much accustomed to Miss Priscilla's remarks about her father to mind them as another girl would. "He has a nice little farm, with everything comfortable about him, and seems as contented as the day is long. But I did meet a vagabond, Miss Druett," said Calista; "the queerest-looking old fellow I ever saw. Cassius calls him Old Zeke. He says the old man and his wife are treasure-seekers, and know more than they ought to. Do you know anything about him, Miss Druett?" she asked, seeing, or fancying, that Miss Druett looked uneasy.

"A little," replied Miss Druett. "He used to hang about here, years ago. He and his wife are miserable cheats and impostors. I hope poor Cassius is not taken in by him."

"I should say there was no danger," said Calista. "Cassius says that, even if they did find the pirate's money, it would be bloody gold and would bring ill luck; and besides, he has enough without it."

"Has he? He must be rich, then!"

"I don't think it always takes riches to make people contented," observed Calista; "just see Miss Hannah and Miss Betsy, how happy they are!"

"So they ought to be—such prices as they ask for their weaving and spinning," said Miss Priscilla. "What do you know about them, pray?"

"I went with Mary to see them about some towels they are weaving for Miss Alice, and they asked us to stay to tea."

"Oh, Miss Alice is too fine a lady to do her own spinning, I suppose!"

"Not at all, aunt. Miss Alice spins beautifully fine thread, but she sends it to Miss Hannah to be woven. She is having a set of towels made of her own spinning for the new parsonage."

"Oh, she is! And you tell of it, thinking I will be moved to do the like."

"Not at all, aunt. I never thought of such a thing."

Miss Priscy muttered something about sly minxes, as she sank back in her chair for the nap she always took between her early tea and her game of cribbage or backgammon.

Calista waited till her eyes were closed, and then addressed herself in a low tone to Miss Druett.

"Do you know anything about these people—Zeke and his wife?"

"Why should you think I know anything about them?" said Miss Druett, answering, as she often did, one question by another.

"I thought you looked so."

"You are a sharp observer. Yes, I have known something about them."

"Do they really set up for supernatural knowledge, and all that sort of thing?"

"They really do, and perhaps believe a little in their own devices, though I hold them to be miserable swindlers and cheats. They have done mischief enough in these parts before now. I am very sorry to hear that they have appeared again. Their father was in the same way, and it was said that he did really discover a sum of money. It was quite true that he went to Philadelphia, and was seen there dressed like a gentleman and spending a great deal. But his prosperity did not last long. He spent all he had, and the next any one knew, he was back again living in his hole on the river bank. Zeke and his wife Jael were acquainted with your aunt at one time, and had anything but a good influence upon her. I should be sorry to have her fall in with them again."

Miss Druett said these words in a low whisper.

"You don't mean to say that she engaged with them in any treasure-seeking!"

Miss Druett nodded.

"How perfectly absurd! Especially for one who does not pretend to believe in anything."

"There is nothing strange in that. A great many people believe in witchcraft who don't believe in the Bible. You can see how very unlucky it would be for her to fall in with them again."

"Yes, indeed. I am sorry I mentioned seeing the old man. He is a horrid-looking object. I should not like to meet him alone."

"You must never run the risk," said Miss Druett. "I am very glad old Cassius was with you."

"Have you done anything about my frocks?" asked Calista, after a little silence.

"Not yet, but I hope to."

"I need some books," said Calista. "Miss McPherson says I must have a dictionary and grammar, and a book to write exercises in."

"Then you may tell Miss McPherson that you won't have anything of the sort!" said Miss Priscilla, rousing herself and speaking with a sharpness and suddenness which made Calista start. "You have had books enough already. Always something to extort money. I won't let you go to school another day. You shall stay at home and work for a living, and save me the expense of a servant, instead of going to school all day and then coming home and sitting for an hour with your hands before you doing nothing. I say you shall not go to school another day."

"Very well, aunt," replied Calista, coolly. She had heard the threat too often to be alarmed at it.

"Nonsense!" said Miss Druett, in her trenchant way.

"Get the backgammon board, Calista, and tell Chloe to bring candles."

Calista did so, and then betook herself to her own room. It was anything but a sumptuous apartment. There had once been a handsome paper on the walls, but it was stained with damp and hanging loose in some places. The pieces of carpet by the bedside and before the glass were trodden into shreds despite Calista's mending, and the bed covering was old and faded. Forlorn as the room was, it was Calista's only place of refuge, and she had done her best to make it look pleasant. The floor was clean and the old furniture well dusted. Calista's few books were neatly disposed on the mantlepiece. The window, which looked to the east, was open, and a full flood of yellow moonlight poured in at it. A mocking-bird was singing in the pine trees which bordered one side of the old graveyard, and frogs and beetles piped a not unmelodious chorus. Calista drew a chair into the deep window recess and sat down, leaning her arm on the sill.

"How lovely it all is!" said she to herself. "If Judge Settson or even Aunt Hannah had this place, what a paradise they would make of it! As for Aunt Priscilla, she might as well be in the poor-house as here for all the comfort she takes or lets any one else take. I wonder if it really is religion that makes the difference. To be sure there is Antoinette Diaments—she pretends to be a Christian, and she is as mean as Aunt Priscilla in a different way. But, then, she is only one.

"I verily believe it is as Mary says, that it is not money that spoils people, but the love of it. If I thought it would make me like Aunt Priscilla, I am sure I would never think of being rich again. Oh dear, how hungry I am!"

And then Calista bethought herself of Sally's basket of ginger-nuts, and, taking them from their concealment, she made a hearty supper. The spicy gingerbread made her thirsty, and taking her cracked jug she went down to the well for some water. As she was drinking from the bucket, she saw that her handkerchief had fallen from the window. As she went to pick it up, she heard Miss Druett say inside,—

"You might let her have some new frocks and a little money for this work nonsense. I tell you, Priscilla, you are making yourself the town talk, and if you push the child to the wall, she will rebel."

"I can't," said Miss Priscilla. "I shall die in the poor-house."

"You might let her have her mother's things, at least. She has a right to them, and she is quite old enough—"

Calista heard no more, for a movement within awoke to the fact that it would not be well for her to be caught listening, and she hastened back to her room. She had heard enough to give her food for reflection and wonder.

Her mother's things! What did Miss Druett mean? She went back to her childish days when she lived with Miss Malvina, and tried to recall everything that the old lady had said to her. There was a vision floating before her of some boxes carefully put away, and of Miss Malvina showing her several things, and especially a beautiful book, and saying something about her dear mother. But think as she could, the vision would not assume any distinctness.

"Oh dear, if I could only remember!" said she at last. "If I could only remember my mother! But I can't. All I can think of is a pale lady lying on a sofa, or something, and dressing a doll for me, and then holding me on her lap and teaching me to say, 'Now I lay me down to sleep.' Oh, if she had only lived, wouldn't I have worked my fingers off for her! I do think it was very hard I could not have a father and mother like other people. Mary would say I had a Father in heaven, but that does not seem the same at all."

Then came one of those vivid flashes of memory which do come unbidden, though they will seldom obey the will. She saw herself seated upon Miss Malvina's lap by the side of the great open fireplace filled with generous logs, before which stood a row of roasting apples. She could see the very smoothing-irons on the mantlepiece, the stand with the great Bible in the corner, the patchwork cushioned chairs, and Miss Malvina's chintz short-gown and quilted petticoat, and heard the old lady's tremulous voice as she said, "That was your dear mother's favorite hymn, Calista, my love. Never forget it; never forget that your dear mother was a true Christian, if a Christian ever lived. The Lord was her shepherd, and he will be yours too, and lead you home to himself and to her if you will only give your heart to him."

"Then my mother is in heaven now!" said Calista to herself, with a feeling of awe. She sat a few minutes longer, and then lighting her very small end of candle, she got out her old ragged Bible and opened it at random.

"'Come unto me, all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you, and learn of me; for I am meek and lowly in heart: and ye shall find rest unto your souls.'" (Matt. 11: 28, 29).

Calista sighed. She knew that she was not meek or lowly. She tried again, and opened to the third of Colossians, where she read,—

"'Set your affection on things above, not on things on the earth.'"

There was not much comfort in that either, but she read the chapter to the end, and then knelt down and repeated the Lord's Prayer and "Now I lay me down to sleep."

She could not have told exactly what she expected to gain by the action. It was simply an act of obedience. God had told people to pray, and she would pray. But by so doing, she had made a great step. She had recognized and confessed a conscious relationship of some kind between herself and her Creator. Hereafter, the world would never be quite the same to her.

CHAPTER FIFTH.

CALISTA ASKS A QUESTION.

CALISTA was up and dressed early as usual. She had heard the threat of taking her out of school too often to be much impressed by it, and she went down to her breakfast with Miss Druett cheerfully enough. Miss Priscilla usually breakfasted in bed, and as Calista passed the door of her room she heard her scolding Chloe for putting so much butter on the toast.

"There she goes," thought Calista; "I do wonder why Chloe stays here, when she might go away if she pleased."

Breakfast was the only comfortable part of her home life to Calista. Miss Druett gave her a fair share of the food, such as it was, and often shared her own cup of coffee or chocolate with her, and she could eat without feeling that every mouthful was watched. She dispatched her basin of bread and milk with an appetite. Miss Druett was not unkind, and gave her a liberal supply of coffee, but she did not seem inclined to talk, and Calista fancied that her face wore an unusual shade of care.

"Am I to go to school, Miss Druett?" asked Calista, when she had finished her breakfast.

"To school!" said Miss Druett, starting. "Yes, of course; why not?"

"You know what aunt said last night; and, really, there is not much use in my going unless I can have books. I need a dictionary and a Bible to use in school."

"A Bible!" said Miss Druett, in a tone of as much surprise as if Calista had said she needed an Arabic lexicon. "What do you want of a Bible?"

"To read in. We read round every morning now. Besides, we are to have a Bible-class three times a week, and Miss McPherson wishes all the girls to join it."

"Oh! Well, I will see what can be done; but I don't know. I can't promise anything."

"Aunt Priscilla grows harder every day, I think," observed Calista.

"That is to be expected. Calista!" said Miss Druett, with sudden animation. "Whatever you do, never, never set your heart upon money—upon being rich. It is a love that once hatched in the heart is like the cow-bird in the robin's nest: it turns everything else out that it may devour all for itself. I love you, child—you may not believe it, but I do—and I would rather see you in your coffin than see you setting your heart on being rich."

Calista was standing by Miss Druett, and as the lady finished speaking, she did what she had hardly ever done before: she stooped down and kissed Miss Druett.

"I do believe you love me, Miss Druett, and I love you. I wish I could love Aunt Priscilla, but she won't let me."

Miss Druett returned the kiss, and her eyes were suspiciously bright as she said,—

"Pity her then, child; you can do that. Now get ready for school, and go into Priscilla's room before you set out. She has a message to send to Mr. Settson. Don't say anything to her about your books. Ask Miss McPherson to provide for you what is absolutely needful, and if Priscilla won't pay the bill, I will contrive to do it myself."

Calista went away and got ready for school as she was bidden, and then opened the door of her aunt's room. Miss Priscilla, with a shawl round her shoulders, was sitting up in bed examining an account-book, and looked up impatiently as Calista entered.

"What do you want here?" was her polite salutation.

"Miss Druett said you wanted to send some message by me," returned Calista, with equal conciseness.

"Oh! Well, you may go and see Mr. Settson and tell him I think he must foreclose that mortgage of Simpson's. He will never pay in the world."

"His wife is sick so much," said Calista, she hardly knew why.

"What is that to you, miss? Are you going to set up to direct my business affairs? Take the message as I tell you."

"Very well," answered Calista, dryly; "anything else?"

"Anything else! No, nothing else. I suppose you would like to have me give you a commission to buy yourself a silk dress and an India shawl, wouldn't you?"

"An India shawl would hardly be suitable for me, but I should like the dress very much," said Calista, with the mischievousness which no amount of snubbing had ever subdued. "Shall I get black or colored, aunt? Clapp has a lovely dark blue, which would be just the thing for me. Shall I bring you a sample?"

Miss Priscilla seized the book which lay before her in a way which made Calista dodge, as if she expected to have her ears boxed with it—a thing which had happened before—but Miss Priscilla, if such were her design, relinquished it and contented herself with a threatening shake of her head.

Calista went away laughing; but her laugh was suddenly checked.

"I ought not to enrage her so," she said to herself. "There is no telling what she might do. But the temptation is so strong to take her at her word. I wonder what she would say if I did. Anyway, I shall have a chance to see Mr. Settson."

Calista walked to school—not by the river road, however—and arrived just in time to save a "tardy" mark.

At recess the girls were of course engaged in discussing the question of the sale.

"What are you going to make, Calista?" asked Antoinette Diaments of Calista, as the latter stood near Miss McPherson, in the school-house porch. She had purposely chosen her time with the amiable intention of mortifying Calista before her schoolmistress; but her scheme failed; and, moreover, involved herself in unexpected trouble.