A Red Wallflower

'What is the rent?'

Christopher named the rent. It was less than what they were paying for the house they at present occupied; and Esther at once ordered Christopher to turn about and drive her to the spot.

It was certainly not a fashionable quarter, not even near Broadway or State Street; nevertheless it was respectable, inhabited by decent people. The house itself was a small wooden one. Now it is true that at that day New York was a very different place from what it is at present; and a wooden house, and even a small wooden house, did not mean then what it means now; an abode of Irish washerwomen, or of something still less distinguished. Yet Esther startled a little at the thought of bringing her father and herself to inhabit it. Christopher had the key; and he fastened Buonaparte, and let Esther in, and went all over the house with her. It was in order, truly, as its owner had said; even clean; and nothing was off the hinges or wanting paint or needing plaster. 'Right and tight' it was, and susceptible of being made an abode of comfort; yet it was a very humble dwelling, comparatively, and in an insignificant neighbourhood; and Esther hesitated. Was it pride? she asked herself. Why did she hesitate? Yet she lingered over the place, doubting and questioning and almost deciding it would not do. Then Christopher, I cannot tell whether consciously or otherwise, threw in a makeweight that fell in the scale that was threatening to rise.

'If you please, Miss Esther, would you speak to the master about the blacksmith's bill? I don't hardly never see the colonel, these days.'

Esther faced round upon him. The word 'bill' always came to her now like a sort of stab. She repeated his words. 'The blacksmith's bill?'

'Yes, mum; that is, Creasy, the blacksmith; just on the edge o' the town. It's been runnin' along, 'cause I never could get sight o' the colonel to speak to him about it.'

'Bill for what?'

'Shoes, mum.'

'Shoes?' repeated Esther. 'The blacksmith? What do you mean?'

'Shoes for Buonaparty, mum. He does kick off his shoes as fast as any horse ever I see; and they does wear, mum, on the stones.'

'How much is the bill?'

'Well, mum,' said Christopher uneasily, 'it's been runnin' along – and it's astonishin' how things does mount up. It's quite a good bit, mum; it's nigh on to fifty dollars.'

It took away Esther's breath. She turned away, that Christopher might not see her face, and began to look at the house as if a sudden new light had fallen upon it. Small and mean, and unfit for Colonel Gainsborough and his daughter, – that had been her judgment concerning it five minutes before; but now it suddenly presented itself as a refuge from distress. If they took it, the relief to their finances would be immediate and effectual. There was a little bit of struggle in Esther's mind; to give up their present home for this would involve a loss of all the prettiness in which she had found such refreshment; there would be here no river and no opposite shore, and no pleasant country around with grass and trees and a flower garden. There would be no garden at all, and no view, except of a very humdrum little street, built up and inhabited by mechanics and tradespeople of a humble grade. But then – no debt! And Esther remembered that in her daily prayer for daily bread she had also asked to be enabled to 'owe no man anything.' Was here the answer? And if this were the Lord's way for supplying her necessities, should she refuse to accept it and to be thankful for it?

'It is getting late,' was Esther's conclusion as she turned away. 'We had better get home, Christopher; but I think we will take the house. I must speak to papa; but I think we will take it. You may tell Mrs. Bounder so, with my thanks.'

It cost a little trouble, yet not much, to talk the colonel over. He did not go to see the house, and Esther did not press that he should; he took her report of it, which was an unvarnished one, and submitted himself to what seemed the inevitable. But his daughter knew that her task would have been harder if the colonel's imagination had had the assistance of his eyesight. She was sure that the move must be made, and if it were once effected she was almost sure she could make her father comfortable. To combat his objections beforehand might have been a more difficult matter. Esther found Mrs. Barker's dismay quite enough to deal with. Indeed, the good woman was at first overwhelmed; and sat down, the first time she was taken to the house, in a sort of despair, with a face wan in its anxiety.

'What's the matter, Barker?' Esther said cheerily. 'You and I will soon put this in nice order, with Christopher's help; and then, when we have got it fitted up, we shall be as comfortable as ever; you will see.'

'Oh dear Miss Esther!' the housekeeper ejaculated; 'that ever I should see this day! The like of you and my master!'

'What then?' said Esther, smiling. 'Barker, shall we not take what the

Lord gives us, and be thankful? I am.'

'There ain't no use for Christopher here, as I see,' Mrs. Barker went on.

'No, and he will not be here. Do you see now how happy it is that he has got a home of his own? – which you were disposed to think so unfortunate.'

'I haven't changed my mind, mum,' said the housekeeper. 'How's your horse goin' to be kep', without Christopher?'

'I am not going to keep the horse. Here I shall not need him.'

'The drives you took was very good for you, mum.'

'I will take walks instead. Don't you be troubled. Dear Barker, do you not think our dear Lord knows what is good for us? and do you not think what He chooses is the best? I do.'

Esther's face was very unshadowed, but the housekeeper's, on the contrary, seemed to darken more and more. She stood in the middle of the floor, in one of the small rooms, and surveyed the prospect, alternately within and without the windows.

'Miss Esther, dear,' she began again, as if irrepressibly, 'you're young, and you don't know how queer the world is. There's many folks that won't believe you are what you be, if they see you are livin' in a place like this.'

Did not Esther know that? and was it not one of the whispers in her mind which she found it hardest to combat? She had begun already to touch the world on that side on which Barker declared it was 'queer.' She went, it is true, hardly at all into society; scarce ever left the narrow track of her school routine; yet even there once or twice a chance encounter had obliged her to recognise the fact that in taking the post of a teacher she had stepped off the level of her former associates. It had hurt her a little and disappointed her. Nobody, indeed, had tried to be patronizing; that was nearly impossible towards anybody whose head was set on her shoulders in the manner of Miss Gainsborough's; but she felt the slighting regard in which low-bred people held her on account of her work and position. And so large a portion of the world is deficient in breeding, that to a young person at least the desire of self-assertion comes as a very natural and tolerably strong temptation. Esther had felt it, and trodden it under foot, and yet Mrs. Barker's words made her wince. How could anybody reasonably suppose that a gentleman would choose such a house and such a street to live in?

'Never mind, Barker,' she said cheerfully, after a pause. 'What we have to do is the right thing; and then let all the rest go.'

'Has the colonel seen it, Miss Esther?'

'No, and I do not mean he shall, till we have got it so nice for him that he will feel comfortable.'

The work of moving and getting settled began without delay. Mrs. Barker spent all the afternoons at the new house; and thither came Esther also every day as soon as school was out at three o'clock. The girl worked very hard in these times; for after her long morning in school she gave the rest of the daylight hours to arranging and establishing furniture, hanging draperies, putting up hooks, and the like; and after that she went home to make her father's tea, and give him as much cheery talk as she could command. In the business of moving, however, she found unexpected assistance.

When Christopher told his wife of the decision about the house, the answering remark, made approvingly, was, 'That's a spunky little girl!'

'What do you mean?' said Christopher, not approving such an irreverent expression.

'She's got stuff in her. I like that sort.'

'But that house ain't really a place for her, you know.'

'That's what I'm lookin' at,' returned Mrs. Bounder, with a broad smile at him. 'She ain't scared by no nonsense from duin' what she's got to du. Don't you be scared neither; houses don't make the folks that live in 'em. But what I'm thinkin' of is, they'll want lots o' help to git along with their movin'. Christopher, do you know there's a big box waggin in the barn?'

'I know it.'

'Wall, that'll carry their things fust-rate, ef you kin tackle up your fine-steppin' French emperor there with our Dolly. Will he draw in double harness?'

'Will he! Well, I'll try to persuade him.'

'An' you needn't to let on anything about it. They ain't obleeged to know where the waggin comes from.'

'You're as clever a woman as any I know!' said Mr. Bounder, with a smile of complacency. 'Sally up there can't beat you; and she's a smart woman, too.'

A few minutes were given to the business of the supper table, and then

Mrs. Bounder asked, —

'What are they goin' to du with the French emperor?'

'Buonaparte?' (Christopher called it 'Buonaparty.') 'Well, they'll have to get rid of him somehow. I suppose that job'll come on me.'

'I was thinkin'. Our Dolly's gittin' old' —

'Buonaparty was old some time ago,' returned Christopher, with a sly twinkle of his eyes as he looked at his wife.

'There's work in him yet, ain't there?'

'Lots!'