The Wide, Wide World

Ellen explained.

"Well, you have made a figure of yourself! Sit down!" said her aunt shortly, as she thrust a chair down on the hearth before the fire; "I should have thought you'd have wit enough at your age to keep out of the ditch."

"I didn't see any ditch," said Ellen.

"No, I suppose not," said Miss Fortune, who was energetically twitching off Ellen's shoes and stockings with her forefinger and thumb. "I suppose not! you were staring up at the moon or stars, I suppose."

"It all looked green and smooth," said poor Ellen; "one part just like another; and the first thing I knew I was up to my ankles."

"What were you there at all for?" said Miss Fortune, shortly enough.

"I couldn't see where the water came from, and I wanted to find out."

"Well, you've found out enough for one day, I hope. Just look at those stockings! Ha'n't you got never a pair of coloured stockings, that you must go poking into the mud with white ones?"

"No, ma'am."

"Do you mean to say you never wore any but white ones at home?"

"Yes, ma'am; I never had any others."

Miss Fortune's thoughts seemed too much for speech, from the way in which she jumped up and went off without saying anything more. She presently came back with an old pair of grey socks, which she bade Ellen put on as soon as her feet were dry.

"How many of those white stockings have you?" she said.

"Mamma bought me half-a-dozen pair of new ones just before I came away, and I had as many as that of old ones besides."

"Well, now, go up to your trunk and bring'm all down to me – every pair of white stockings you have got. There's a pair of old slippers you can put on till your shoes are dry," she said, flinging them to her; "they aren't much too big for you."

"They're not much too big for the socks, they're a great deal too big for me," thought Ellen; but she said nothing. She gathered all her stockings together and brought them downstairs, as her aunt had bidden her.

"Now you may run out to the barn to Mr. Van Brunt; you'll find him there, and tell him I want him to bring me some white maple bark when he comes home to dinner – white maple bark, do you hear?"

Away went Ellen, but in a few minutes came back. "I can't get in," she said.

"What's the matter?"

"Those great doors are shut, and I can't open them. I knocked, but nobody came."

"Knock at a barn door!" said Miss Fortune. "You must go in at the little cow-house door, at the left, and go round. He's in the lower barn-floor."

The barn stood lower than the level of the chip-yard, from which a little bridge led to the great doorway of the second floor. Passing down the range of outhouses, Ellen came to the little door her aunt had spoken of. "But what in the world should I do if there be cows inside there?" said she to herself. She peeped in; the cow-house was perfectly empty; and cautiously, and with many a fearful glance to the right and left, lest some terrible horned animal should present itself, Ellen made her way across the cow-house, and through the barn-yard, littered thick with straw, wet and dry, to the lower barn-floor. The door of this stood wide open. Ellen looked with wonder and pleasure when she got in. It was an immense room – the sides showed nothing but hay up to the ceiling, except here and there an enormous upright post; the floor was perfectly clean, only a few locks of hay and grains of wheat scattered upon it; and a pleasant sweet smell was there, Ellen could not tell of what. But no Mr. Van Brunt. She looked about for him, she dragged her disagreeable slippers back and forth over the floor in vain.

"Hilloa! what's wanting?" at length cried a rough voice she remembered very well. But where was the speaker? On every side, to every corner, her eyes turned without finding him. She looked up at last. There was the round face of Mr. Van Brunt peering down at her through a large opening or trap-door in the upper floor.

"Well," said he, "have you come out here to help me thrash wheat?"

Ellen told him what she had come for.

"White maple bark; well," said he in his slow way, "I'll bring it. I wonder what's in the wind now."

So Ellen wondered, as she slowly went back to the house; and yet more, when her aunt set her to tacking her stockings together by two and two.

"What are you going to do with them, Aunt Fortune?" she at last ventured to say.

"You'll see when the time comes."

"Mayn't I keep out one pair?" said Ellen, who had a vague notion that by some mysterious means her stockings were to be prevented from ever looking white any more.

"No; just do as I tell you."

Mr. Van Brunt came at dinner-time with the white maple bark. It was thrown forthwith into a brass kettle of water, which Miss Fortune had already hung over the fire. Ellen felt sure this had something to do with her stockings, but she could ask no questions; and as soon as dinner was over she went up to her room. It didn't look pleasant now. The brown wood-work and rough dingy walls had lost their gilding. The sunshine was out of it; and what was more, the sunshine was out of Ellen's heart too. She went to the window and opened it, but there was nothing to keep it open; it slid down again as soon as she let it go. Baffled and sad, she stood leaning her elbows on the window-sill, looking out on the grass-plat that lay before the door, and the little gate that opened on the lake, and the smooth meadow and rich broken country beyond. It was a very fair and pleasant scene in the soft sunlight of the last of October; but the charm of it was gone for Ellen; it was dreary. She looked without caring to look, or knowing what she was looking at; she felt the tears rising to her eyes, and, sick of the window, turned away. Her eye fell on her trunk; her next thought was of her desk inside of it, and suddenly her heart sprang. "I will write to mamma!" No sooner said than done. The trunk was quickly open, and hasty hands pulled out one thing after another till the desk was reached.

"But what shall I do?" thought she; "there isn't a sign of a table. Oh, what a place! I'll shut my trunk and put it on that. But here are all these things to put back first."

They were eagerly stowed away; and then kneeling by the side of the trunk, with loving hands, Ellen opened her desk. A sheet of paper was drawn from her store, and properly placed before her; the pen dipped in the ink, and at first with a hurried, then with a trembling hand she wrote, "My dear Mamma." But Ellen's heart had been swelling and swelling, with every letter of those three words, and scarcely was the last "a" finished, when the pen was dashed down, and flinging away from the desk, she threw herself on the floor in a passion of grief. It seemed as if she had her mother again in her arms, and was clinging with a death-grasp not to be parted from her. And then the feeling that she was parted! As much bitter sorrow as a little heart can know was in poor Ellen's now. In her childish despair she wished she could die, and almost thought she should. After a time, however, though not a short time, she rose from the floor and went to her writing again; her heart a little eased by weeping, yet the tears kept coming all the time, and she could not quite keep her paper from being blotted. The first sheet was spoiled before she was aware; she took another.

"My dearest Mamma, – It makes me so glad and so sorry to write to you, that I don't know what to do. I want to see you so much, mamma, that it seems to me sometimes as if my heart would break. Oh, mamma, if I could just kiss you once more, I would give anything in the whole world. I can't be happy as long as you are away, and I'm afraid I can't be good either; but I will try. Oh, I will try, mamma. I have so much to say to you that I don't know where to begin. I am sure my paper will never hold it all. You will want to know about my journey. The first day was on the steamboat, you know. I should have had a dreadful time that day, mamma, but for something I'll tell you about. I was sitting up on the upper deck, thinking about you, and feeling very badly indeed, when a gentleman came and spoke to me, and asked me what was the matter. Mamma, I can't tell you how kind he was to me. He kept me with him the whole day. He took me all over the boat, and showed me all about a great many things, and he talked to me a great deal. Oh, mamma, how he talked to me. He read in the Bible to me, and explained it, and he tried to make me a Christian. And oh, mamma, when he was talking to me, how I wanted to do as he said, and I resolved I would. I did, mamma, and I've not forgotten it. I will try indeed, but I am afraid it will be very hard without you or him, or anybody else to help me. You couldn't have been kinder yourself, mamma; he kissed me at night when I bid him good-bye, and I was very sorry indeed. I wish I could see him again. Mamma, I will always love that gentleman, if I never see him again in the world. I wish there was somebody here that I could love, but there is not. You will want to know what sort of a person my Aunt Fortune is. I think she is very good-looking, or she would be if her nose was not quite so sharp; but, mamma, I can't tell you what sort of a feeling I have about her; it seems to me as if she was sharp all over. I am sure her eyes are as sharp as two needles. And she don't walk like other people; at least sometimes. She makes queer little jerks and starts and jumps, and flies about like I don't know what. I am afraid it is not right for me to write so about her; but may I not tell you, mamma? There's nobody else for me to talk to. I can't like Aunt Fortune much yet, and I am sure she don't like me; but I will try to make her. I have not forgotten what you said to me about that. Oh, dear mamma, I will try to mind everything you ever said to me in your life. I am afraid you won't like what I have written about Aunt Fortune; but indeed I have done nothing to displease her, and I will try not to. If you were only here, mamma, I should say it was the loveliest place I ever saw in my life. Perhaps, after all, I shall feel better, and be quite happy by-and-by; but oh, mamma, how glad I shall be when I get a letter from you. I shall begin to look for it soon, and I think I shall go out of my wits with joy when it comes. I had the funniest ride down here from Thirlwall that you can think; how do you guess I came? In a cart drawn by oxen. They went so slow we were an age getting here; but I liked it very much. There was a good-natured man driving the oxen, and he was kind to me; but, mamma, what do you think? he eats at the table. I know what you would tell me; you would say I must not mind trifles. Well, I will try not, mamma. Oh, darling mother, I can't think much of anything but you. I think of you the whole time. Who makes tea for you now? Are you better? Are you going to leave New York soon? It seems dreadfully long since I saw you. I am tired, dear mamma, and cold; and it is getting dark. I must stop. I have a good big room to myself; that is a good thing. I should not like to sleep with Aunt Fortune. Good-night, dear mamma. I wish I could sleep with you once more. Oh, when will that be again, mamma? Good-night. Good-night.

    "Your affectionate Ellen."

The letter finished was carefully folded, enclosed, and directed; and then with an odd mixture of pleasure and sadness, Ellen lit one of her little wax matches, as she called them, and sealed it very nicely. She looked at it fondly a minute when all was done, thinking of the dear fingers that would hold and open it; her next movement was to sink her face in her hands, and pray most earnestly for a blessing upon her mother and help for herself – poor Ellen felt she needed it. She was afraid of lingering lest tea should be ready; so, locking up her letter, she went downstairs.

The tea was ready. Miss Fortune and Mr. Van Brunt were at the table, and so was the old lady, whom Ellen had not seen before that day. She quietly drew up her chair to its place.

"Well," said Miss Fortune, "I hope you feel better for your long stay upstairs."

"I do, ma'am," said Ellen; "a great deal better."

"What have you been about?"

"I have been writing, ma'am."

"Writing what?"

"I have been writing to mamma."

Perhaps Miss Fortune heard the trembling of Ellen's voice, or her sharp glance saw the lip quiver and eyelid droop. Something softened her. She spoke in a different tone; asked Ellen if her tea was good; took care she had plenty of the bread and butter, and excellent cheese, which was on the table; and lastly cut her a large piece of the pumpkin pie. Mr. Van Brunt too looked once or twice at Ellen's face as if he thought all was not right there. He was not so sharp as Miss Fortune, but the swollen eyes and tear stains were not quite lost upon him.

After tea, when Mr. Van Brunt was gone, and the tea things cleared away, Ellen had the pleasure of finding out the mystery of the brass kettle and the white maple bark. The kettle now stood in the chimney corner. Miss Fortune, seating herself before it, threw in all Ellen's stockings except one pair, which she flung over to her, saying, "There, I don't care if you keep that one." Then, tucking up her sleeves to the elbows, she fished up pair after pair out of the kettle, and wringing them out hung them on chairs to dry. But, as Ellen had opined, they were no longer white, but of a fine slate colour. She looked on in silence, too much vexed to ask questions.

"Well, how do you like that?" said Miss Fortune at length, when she had got two or three chairs round the fire pretty well hung with a display of slate-coloured cotton legs.

"I don't like it at all," said Ellen.

"Well, I do. How many pair of white stockings would you like to drive into the mud and let me wash out every week?"

"You wash!" said Ellen in surprise; "I didn't think of your doing it."