The Four Corners. Blanchard Amy Ella

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СКАЧАТЬ coming now," said Nan.

      Mary Lee's footsteps were hastily approaching. She burst into the room with, "Mother, is it true that you are going away?"

      "Yes, dear child."

      "What for? Nan was so mean and wouldn't tell me."

      "I didn't give Nan permission to tell you why I was going."

      "She needn't have been so disagreeable about it though," said Mary Lee. "Why didn't she say that you told her not to tell?"

      "You didn't give me a chance," put in Nan. "You called me a scurvy old pullet before I could explain."

      "What a name, Mary Lee," said Mrs. Corner reprovingly. "Where did you hear it?"

      "Phil says it."

      "Don't say it again. If you lose your temper like that and cannot bridle your tongue, I am afraid your mother will have many sorry moments while she is away trying to regain her health."

      In an instant Mary Lee was on her knees by her mother's side. "Are you ill, mother?" she asked anxiously.

      "Not very, but I may be if I do not have a change of climate, so I am going to take a trip. I have hardly left this place for eight years and more. I shall come back trig as a trivet, Mary Lee, so don't be troubled about me."

      Nan left her mother to explain matters further and sought the twins who were amicably swinging under a big tree. As she unfolded her news to them the point which at first seemed to be most important was the coming of the two boys. Jack objected to their arrival, Jean welcomed it, and straightway they began a discussion in the midst of which Nan left them. Her brain was buzzing with the many thoughts which her interview with her mother suggested. She determined to be zealous in good works, and immediately hunted up Mitty that she might see that all was going well in the kitchen.

      Mitty had not much respect for one younger than herself and paid no attention when Nan entered, but kept on singing in a high shrill key:

      "Whe-e-en Eve eat de apple,

      Whe-e-e-en Eve eat de apple,

      Whe-en Eve eat de apple,

      Lord, what a try-y-in' time."

      "Mitty, have you everything out for supper?" asked Nan with her mother's manner.

      Mitty rolled her eyes in Nan's direction, but vouchsafed no reply, continuing to sing in a little higher key:

      "When she-e gabe de co' to Adam,

      Whe-en she gabe de co' to Adam,

      Whe-e-en she gabe de co' to Adam,

      Lord, what a try-y-yin' time."

      "I want to know," repeated Nan severely, "if you have everything out for supper?"

      "I has what I has," returned Mitty, breaking some splinters of wood across her knee.

      "I wish you'd answer me properly," said Nan, impatiently.

      "Yuh ain' de lady ob de house," returned Mitty, provokingly. "Yuh ain' but jest a little peepin' chick. Yuh ain' even fryin' size yet."

      "I think when mother sends me with a message, it is your place to answer me," said Nan with her head in the air. "I will see if Unc' Landy can get you to tell me what mother wants to know." And she stalked out.

      As Unc' Landy was Mitty's grandfather, and the only being of whom she stood in awe, this had its effect. "I tell yuh, Miss Nan, 'deed an' 'deed I will," cried Mitty, running after her and hastily enumerating the necessary articles to be given out from the pantry. "'Tain' no buttah, 'tain' no sugah, jest a little bit o' co'n meal. Oh, Miss Nan!"

      But Nan had passed beyond hearing and was resolutely turning her steps toward Unc' Landy's quarters, a comfortable brick cabin which stood about fifty yards from the house. The old man was sitting before its door industriously mending a hoe-handle. It was not often that Nan complained of Mitty, for she, too, well knew the effect of such a course. Upon this occasion, however, she felt that her future authority depended upon establishing present relations and that it would never do to let Mitty know she had worsted the eldest daughter of the house. "Unc' Landy, I wish you'd speak to Mitty," said Nan. "She wouldn't tell me what to give out for supper and mother gave me the keys to attend to it for her; she's busy sewing."

      Unc' Landy seized the hoe-handle upon which he was at work, and made an energetic progress toward the kitchen, catching the unlucky Mitty as she was about to flee. Brandishing his hoe-handle, he threateningly cried: "Wha' yo' mannahs? I teach yuh show yo' sassy ways to one of de fambly!"

      Up went Mitty's arm to defend herself from the impending blow while she whimpered forth: "I done say 'tain' no buttah; 'tain' no sugah; the's a little bit o' meal; an' Miss Nan ain' hyah me."

      "Ef I bus' yo' haid open den mebbe she kin hyah yuh nex' time," said Unc' Landy catching the girl's shoulder and beginning to bang her head against the door.

      But here Nan, feeling that Mitty was scared into good behavior interfered. "That will do, Unc' Landy. If she told me, it is all right."

      "She gwine speak loudah an' quickah nex' time," said Unc' Landy, shaking his hoe-handle at Mitty. "Yuh tell Miss Nan what she ast yuh, er I'll fetch Mr. Hoe ober hyah agin an' try both ends, so yuh see which yuh lak bes'." And he went off muttering about "dese yer no 'count young niggahs what so busy tryin' to be sma't dey ain' no time to larn sense."

      The thoroughly humbled Mitty meekly answered all Nan's questions and Nan felt that she was fortified with authority for some time to come.

      Nan was always shocked and repelled by Unc' Landy's methods, and only in extreme cases was she willing to appeal to him. Such appeals, sometimes bringing swifter and more extreme punishment, so affected Nan as to make her avoid Unc' Landy for days. He was always so very tender and courteous to every member of the "fambly" that it seemed almost incredible that he should be so merciless to one of his own flesh and blood, but such was a common attitude of the older negroes toward the younger ones, and his was not an unusual case. When Mrs. Corner was on hand she never permitted the old man to exercise his rights toward Mitty, but once or twice when the girl had overstepped bounds in his presence, he had meted out punishment to her later on, so she feared him while she respected him, praising him lavishly to her boon companions.

      "Gran'daddy got a pow'ful long ahm," she would say, "an' man, I say he swif' an' strong, mos' lak angel Gabr'el wid he swo'd an' trumpet. I mos' as feared o' gran'daddy as I is o' angel Gabr'el. Ef gran'daddy call me an' angel Gabr'el blow he trumpet at de same time I don' know which I bleedged to min'. I specs I run a bilin' to gran'daddy fust."

      Having established her position in the kitchen, Nan returned to her mother. Every moment seemed precious now, and that night after Mary Lee was asleep, Nan crept softly from her bed and laid herself down by her mother whose arms clasped her close, but who did not allow her to remain. "It is not well for you to sleep with me, dear," she said. "It will be better for us both if you go back to your own room." Nan obeyed, but it was an anxious hour that she spent before sleep visited her. The night hours brought her many forebodings, and she felt that her young spirit was stretching beyond the limits of childhood toward that larger and less happy region of womanhood.

      CHAPTER V

      HOUSEWIFELY CARES

      The day for Mrs. Corner's departure came around all too soon. Aunt Sarah was to have arrived the evening before, but up to the last moment she had not come, and Mrs. Corner СКАЧАТЬ