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Aikenside

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AIKENSIDE

MARY J. HOLMES



Author of "Maggie Miller," "Dora Drane," "English Orphans," "The
Homestead on the Hillside," "Meadowbrook Farm," "Lena Rivers,"
"Rosamond," "Cousin Maude," "Tempest and Sunshine," "Rector of St.
Marks," "Mildred," "The Leighton Homestead," "Miss McDonald"





CHAPTER I.

THE EXAMINING COMMITTEE.


The good people of Devonshire were rather given to quarreling--
sometimes about the minister's wife, meek, gentle Mrs. Tiverton, whose
manner of housekeeping, and style of dress, did not exactly suit them;
sometimes about the minister himself, good, patient Mr. Tiverton, who
vainly imagined that if he preached three sermons a week, attended the
Wednesday evening prayer-meeting, the Thursday evening sewing society,
officiated at every funeral, visited all the sick, and gave to every
beggar who called at his door, besides superintending the Sunday
school, he was earning his salary of six hundred per year.

Sometimes, and that not rarely, the quarrel crept into the choir, and
then, for one whole Sunday, it was all in vain that Mr. Tiverton read
the psalm and hymn, casting troubled glances toward the vacant seats
of his refractory singers. There was no one to respond, unless it were
good old Mr. Hodges, who pitched so high that few could follow him;
while Mrs. Captain Simpson--whose daughter, the organist, had been
snubbed at the last choir meeting by Mr. Hodges' daughter, the alto
singer--rolled up her eyes at her next neighbor, or fanned herself
furiously in token of her disgust.

Latterly, however, there had come up a new cause of quarrel, before
which every other cause sank into insignificance. Now, though the
village of Devonshire could boast but one public schoolhouse, said
house being divided into two departments, the upper and lower
divisions, there were in the town several district schools; and for
the last few years a committee of three had been annually appointed to
examine and decide upon the merits of the various candidates for
teaching, giving to each, if the decision were favorable, a little
slip of paper certifying their qualifications to teach a common
school. Strange that over such an office so fierce a feud should have
arisen; but when Mr. Tiverton, Squire Lamb and Lawyer Whittemore, in
the full conviction that they were doing right, refused a certificate
of scholarship to Laura Tisdale, niece of Mrs. Judge Tisdale, and
awarded it to one whose earnings in a factory had procured for her a
thorough English education, the villagers, to use a vulgar phrase,
were at once set by the ears, the aristocracy abusing, and the
democracy upholding the dismayed trio, who, as the breeze blew harder,
quietly resigned their office, and Devonshire was without a school
committee.

In this emergency something must be done, and, as the two belligerent
parties could only unite on a stranger, it seemed a matter of special
providence that only two months before, young Dr. Holbrook, a native
of modern Athens, had rented the pleasant little office on the village
common, formerly occupied by old Dr. Carey, now lying in the graveyard
by the side of some whose days he had prolonged, and others whose days
he had surely shortened. Besides being handsome, and skillful, and
quite as familiar with the poor as the rich, the young doctor was
descended from the aristocratic line of Boston Holbrooks, facts which
tended to make him a favorite with both classes; and, greatly to his
surprise, he found himself unanimously elected to the responsible
office of sole Inspector of Common Schools in Devonshire. It was in
vain that he remonstrated, saying he knew nothing whatever of the
qualifications requisite for a teacher; that he could not talk to
girls, young ones especially; that he should make a miserable failure,
and so forth. The people would not listen. Somebody must examine the
teachers and that somebody might as well be Dr. Holbrook as anybody.

"Only be strict with 'em, draw the reins tight, find out to your
satisfaction whether a gal knows her P's and Q's before you give her a
stifficut. We've had enough of your ignoramuses," said Colonel Lewis,
the democratic potentate to whom Dr. Holbrook was expressing his fears
that he should not give satisfaction. Then, as a bright idea suggested
itself to the old gentleman, he added: "I tell you what, just cut one
or two at first; that'll give you a name for being particular, which
is just the thing."

Accordingly, with no definite idea as to what was expected of him,
except that he was to find out "whether a girl knew her P's and Q's,"
and was also to "cut one or two of the first candidates," Dr. Holbrook
accepted the office, and then awaited rather nervously his initiation.
He was not easy in the society of ladies, unless, indeed, the lady
stood in need of his professional services, when he lost sight of
_her_ at once, and thought only of her disease. His patient once
well, however, he became nervously shy and embarrassed, retreating as
soon as possible from her presence to the covert of his friendly
office, where, with his boots upon the table and his head thrown back
in a most comfortable position, he sat one April morning, in happy
oblivion of the bevy of girls who must, of course, ere long-invade his
sanctum.

"Something for you, sir. The lady will wait for an answer," said his
"chore boy," passing to his master a little three-cornered note, and
nodding toward the street.

Following the direction indicated, the doctor saw, drawn up near his
door, an old-fashioned one-horse wagon, such as is still occasionally
seen in New England. A square boxed, dark green wagon, drawn by a
sorrel horse, sometimes called by the genuine Yankee "yellow," and
driven by a white-haired man, whose silvery locks, falling around his
wrinkled face, gave to him a pleasing, patriarchal appearance, which
interested the doctor far more than did the flutter of the blue ribbon
beside him, even though the bonnet that ribbon tied shaded the face of
a young girl. The note was from her, and, tearing it open, the doctor
read, in the prettiest of all pretty, girlish handwriting:

"Dr. Holbrook."

Here it was plainly visible that a "D" had been written as if she
would have said "Dear." Then, evidently changing her mind, she had
with her finger blotted out the "D," and made it into an oddly shaped
"S," so that it read simply:

"Dr. Holbrook--Sir: Will you be at leisure to examine me on Monday
afternoon, at three o'clock?

"MADELINE A. CLYDE.

"P. S.--For particular reasons I hope you can attend to me as early as
Monday. M. A. C."

Dr. Holbrook knew very little of girls, but he thought this note, with
its P. S., decidedly girlish. Still he made no comment, either verbal
or mental, so flurried was he with knowing that the evil he so much
dreaded had come upon him at last. Had it been left to his choice, he
would far rather have extracted every one of that maiden's teeth, than
to have set himself up before her like some horrid ogre, asking what
she knew. But the choice was not his, and, turning to the boy, he
said, laconically, "Tell her to come."

Most men would have sought for a glimpse of the face under the bonnet
tied with blue, but Dr. Holbrook did not care a picayune whether it
were ugly or fair, though it did strike him that the voice was
singularly sweet, which, after the boy had delivered his message, said
to the old man, "Now, grandpa, we'll go home. I know you must be
tired."

Slowly Sorrel trotted down the street, the blue ribbons fluttering in
the wind, while one little ungloved hand was seen carefully adjusting
about the old man's shoulders the ancient camlet cloak which had done
duty for many a year, and was needed on this chill April day. The
doctor saw all this, and the impression left upon his mind was, that
Candidate No. 1 was probably a nice-ish kind of a girl, and very good
to her grandfather. But what should he ask her, and how demean himself
toward her? Monday afternoon was frightfully near, he thought, as this
was only Saturday; and then, feeling that he must be ready, he brought
out from the trunk, where, since his arrival in Devonshire, they had
bean quietly lying, books enough to have frightened an older person
than poor little Madeline Clyde, riding slowly home with grandpa, and
wishing so much that she'd had a glimpse of Dr. Holbrook, so as to
know what he was like, and hoping he would give her a chance to repeat
some of the many pages of geography and "Parley's History," which she
knew by heart. How she would have trembled could she have seen the
formidable volumes heaped upon his table and waiting for her. There
were French and Latin grammars, "Hamilton's Metaphysics," "Olmstead's
Philosophy," "Day's Algebra," "Butler's Analogy," and many others,
into which poor Madeline had never so much as looked. Arranging them
in a row, and half wishing himself back again to the days when he had
studied them, the doctor went out to visit his patients, of which
there were so many that Madeline Clyde entirely escaped his mind, nor
did she trouble him again until the dreaded Monday came, and the hands
of his watch pointed to two.

"One hour more," he said to himself, just as the roll of wheels and a
cloud of dust announced the approach of something.

Could it be Sorrel and the square-boxed wagon? Oh, no; far different
from grandfather Clyde's turnout was the stylish carriage and the
spirited bays dashing down the street, the colored driver reining them
suddenly, not before the office door, but just in front of the white
cottage in the same yard, the house where Dr. Holbrook boarded, and
where, if he ever married in Devonshire, he would most likely bring
his wife.

"Guy Remington, the very chap of all others whom I'd rather see, and,
as I live, there's Agnes, with Jessie. Who knew she was in these
parts?" was the doctor's mental exclamation, as, running his fingers
through his hair and making a feint of pulling up the corners of his
rather limp collar, he hurried out to the carriage, from which a
dashing looking lady of thirty, or thereabouts, was alighting.

"Why, Agnes, I beg your pardon, Mrs. Remington, when did you come?" he
asked, offering his hand to the lady, who, coquettishly shaking back
from her pretty, dollish face a profusion of light brown curls, gave
him the tips of her lavender kids, while she told him she had come to
Aikenside the Saturday before; and hearing, from Guy that the lady
with whom he boarded was an old friend of hers, she had driven over to
call, and brought Jessie with her. "Here, Jessie, speak to the doctor.
He was poor dear papa's friend," and a very proper sigh escaped Agnes
Remington's lips as she pushed a little curly-haired girl toward Dr.
Holbrook.

The lady of the house had spied them by this time, and came running
down the walk to meet her rather distinguished visitor, wondering, it
may be, to what she was indebted for this call from one who, since her
marriage with the supposed wealthy Dr. Remington, had rather cut her
former acquaintances. Agnes was delighted to see her, and, as Guy
declined entering the cottage just then, the two friends disappeared
within the door, while the doctor and Guy repaired to the office, the
latter sitting down in the very chair intended for Madeline Clyde.
This reminded the doctor of his perplexity, and also brought the
comforting thought that Guy, who had never failed him yet, could
surely offer some suggestions. But he would not speak of her just now;
he had other matters to talk about, and so, jamming his penknife into
a pine table covered with similar jams, he said: "Agnes, it seems, has
come to Aikenside, notwithstanding she declared she never would, when
she found that the whole of the Remington property belonged to your
mother, and not your father."

"Oh, yes. She got over her pique as soon as I settled a handsome
little income on Jessie, and, in fact, on her too, until she is
foolish enough to marry again, when it will cease, of course, as I do
not feel it my duty to support any man's wife, unless it be my own, or
my father's," was Guy Remington's reply; whereupon the penknife went
again into the table, and this time with so much force that the point
was broken off; but the doctor did not mind it, and with the jagged
end continued to make jagged marks, while he continued: "She'll hardly
marry again, though she may. She's young--not over twenty-six---

"Twenty-eight, if the family Bible does not lie; but she'd never
forgive me if she knew I told you that. So let it pass that she's
twenty-six. She certainly is not more than three years your senior, a
mere nothing, if you wish to make her Mrs. Holbrook;" and Guy's dark
eyes scanned curiously the doctor's face, as if seeking there for the
secret of his proud young stepmother's anxiety to visit plain Mrs.
Conner that afternoon. But the doctor only laughed merrily at the idea
of his being father to Guy, his college chum and long-tried friend.

Agnes Remington--reclining languidly in Mrs. Conner's easy-chair, and
overwhelming her former friend with descriptions of the gay parties
she had attended in Boston, and the fine sights she saw in Europe,
whither her gray-haired husband had taken her for a wedding tour--
would not have felt particularly flattered, could she have seen that
smile, or heard how easily, from talking of her, Dr. Holbrook turned
to another theme, to Madeline Clyde, expected now almost every moment.
There was a merry laugh on Guy's part, as he listened to the doctor's
story, and, when it was finished, he said: "Why, I see nothing so very
distasteful in examining a pretty girl, and puzzling her, to see her
blush. I half wish I were in your place. I should enjoy the novelty of
the thing." "Oh, take it, then; take my place, Guy," the doctor
exclaimed, eagerly. "She does not know me from Adam. Here are books,
all you will need. You went to a district school once a week when you
were staying in the country. You surely have some idea, while I have
not the slightest. Will you, Guy?" he persisted more earnestly, as he
heard wheels in the street, and was sure old Sorrel had come again.

Guy Remington liked anything savoring of a frolic, but in his mind
there were certain conscientious scruples touching the justice of the
thing, and so at first he demurred; while the doctor still insisted,
until at last he laughingly consented to commence the examination,
provided the doctor would sit by, and occasionally come to his aid.

"You must write the certificate, of course," he said, "testifying that
she is qualified to teach."

"Yes, certainly, Guy, if she is; but maybe she won't be, and my orders
are, to be strict--very strict."

"How did she look?" Guy asked, and the doctor replied: "Saw nothing
but her bonnet. Came in a queer old go-giggle of a wagon, such as your
country farmers drive. Guess she won't be likely to stir up the bile
of either of us, particularly as I am bullet proof, and you have been
engaged for years. By the way, when do you cross the sea again for the
fair Lucy? Rumor says this summer."

"Rumor is wrong, as usual, then," was Guy's reply, a soft light
stealing into his handsome eyes. Then, after a moment, he added: "Miss
Atherstone's health is far too delicate for her to incur the risks of
a climate like ours. If she were well acclimated, I should be glad,
for it is terribly lonely up at Aikenside."

"And do you really think a wife would make it pleasanter?" Dr Holbrook
asked, the tone of his voice indicating a little doubt as to a man's
being happier for having a helpmate to share his joys and sorrows.

But no such doubts dwelt in the mind of Guy Remington. Eminently
fitted for domestic happiness, he looked forward anxiously to the time
when sweet Lucy Atherstone, the fair English girl to whom he had
become engaged when, four years before, he visited Europe, should be
strong enough to bear transplanting to American soil. Twice since his
engagement he had visited her, finding her always lovely, gentle, and
yielding. Too yielding, it sometimes seemed to him, while occasionally
the thought had flashed upon him that she did not possess a very
remarkable depth of intellect. But he said to himself, he did not
care; he hated strong-minded women, and would far rather his wife
should be a little weak than masculine, like his Aunt Margaret, who
sometimes wore bloomers, and advocated women's rights. Yes, he greatly
preferred Lucy Atherstone, as she was, to a wife like the stately
Margaret, or like Agnes, his pretty stepmother, who only thought how
she could best attract attention; and as it had never occurred to him
that there might be a happy medium, that a woman need not be brainless
to be feminine and gentle, he was satisfied with his choice, as well
he might be, for a fairer, sweeter flower never bloomed than Lucy
Atherstone, his affianced bride. Guy loved to think of Lucy, and as
the doctor's remarks brought her to his mind, he went off into a
reverie concerning her, becoming so lost in thought that until the
doctor's hand was laid upon his shoulder by way of rousing him, he did
not see that what his friend had designated as a go-giggle was
stopping in front of the office, and that from it a young girl was
alighting.

Naturally very polite to females, Guy's first impulse was to go to her
assistance, but she did not need it, as was proven by the light spring
with which she reached the ground. The white-haired man was with her
again, but he evidently did not intend to stop, and a close observer
might have detected a shade of sadness and anxiety upon his face as
Madeline called cheerily out to him: "Good-by, grandpa. Don't fear for
me; I hope you have good luck;" then, as he drove away, she ran a step
after him and said; "Don't look so sorry, for if Mr. Remington won't
let you have the money, there's my pony, Beauty. I am willing to give
him up."

"Never, Maddy. It's all the little fortin' you've got. I'll let the
old place go first;" and, chirruping to Sorrel, the old man drove on,
while Madeline walked, with a beating heart, to the office door,
knocking timidly.

Glancing involuntarily at each other, the young men exchanged meaning
smiles, while the doctor whispered softly: "Verdant--that's sure.
Wonder if she'll knock at a church."

As Guy sat nearest the door, it was he who held it ajar while Madeline
came in, her soft brown eyes glistening with something like a tear,
and her cheeks burning with excitement as she took the chair indicated
by Guy Remington, who unconsciously found himself master of
ceremonies.

Poor little Madeline!




CHAPTER II

MADELINE CLYDE.


Madge her schoolmates called her, because the name suited her, they
said; but Maddy they called her at home, and there was a world of
unutterable tenderness in the voices of the old couple, her
grandparents, when they said that name, while their dim eyes lighted
up with pride and joy when they rested upon the young girl who
answered to the name of Maddy. Their only daughter's only child, she
had lived with them since her mother's death, for her father was a sea
captain, who never returned from his last voyage to China, made two
months before she was born. Very lonely and desolate would the home of
Grandfather Markham have been without the presence of Madeline, but
with her there, the old red farmhouse seemed to the aged couple like a
paradise.

Forty years they had lived there, tilling the rather barren soil of
the rocky homestead, and, saving the sad night when they heard that
Richard Clyde was lost at sea, and the far sadder morning when their
daughter died, bitter sorrow had not come to them; and, truly thankful
for the blessings so long vouchsafed them, they had retired each night
in peace with God and man, and risen each morning to pray. But a
change was coming over them. In an evil hour Grandpa Markham had
signed a note for a neighbor and friend, who failed to pay, and so it
all fell on Mr. Markham, who, to meet the demand, mortgaged his
homestead; the recreant neighbor still insisting that long before the
mortgage should be due, he certainly would be able himself to meet it.
This, however, he had not done, and, after twice begging off a
foreclosure, poor old Grandfather Markham found himself at the mercy
of a grasping, remorseless man, into whose hands the mortgage had
passed. It was vain to hope that Silas Slocum would wait. The money
must either be forthcoming, or the red farmhouse be sold, with its few
acres of land. Among his neighbors there was not one who had the money
to spare, even if they had been willing to do so. And so he must look
among strangers.

"If I could only help," Madeline had said one evening when they sat
talking over their troubles; "but there's nothing I can do, unless I
apply for our school this summer. Mr. Green is committeeman; he likes
us, and I don't believe but what he'll let me have it. I mean to go
and see;" and, ere the old people had recovered from their
astonishment, Madeline had caught her bonnet and shawl, and was flying
down the road.

Madeline was a favorite with all, especially with Mr. Green, and as
the school would be small that summer, the plan struck him favorably.
Her age, however, was an objection, and he must take time to see what
others thought of a child like her becoming a schoolmistress. Others
thought well of it, and so before the close of the next day it was
generally known through Honedale, as the southern part of Devonshire
was called, that pretty little Madge Clyde had been engaged as
teacher, she receiving three dollars a week, with the understanding
that she must board herself. It did not take Madeline long to
calculate that twelve times three were thirty-six, more than a tenth
of what her grandfather must borrow. It seemed like a little fortune,
and blithe as a singing bird she flitted about the house, now stopping
a moment to fondle her pet kitten, while she whispered the good news
in its very appreciative ear, and then stroking her grandfather's
silvery hair, as she said:

"You can tell them that you are sure of paying thirty-six dollars in
the fall, and if I do well, maybe they'll hire me longer. I mean to
try my very best. I wonder if ever anybody before me taught a school
when they were only fourteen and a half. Do I look as young as that?"
and for an instant the bright; childish face scanned itself eagerly in
the old-fashioned mirror, with the figure of an eagle on the top.

She did look very young, and yet there was something womanly, too, in
the expression of the face, something which said that life's realities
were already beginning to be understood by her.

"If my hair were not short I should do better. What a pity I cut it
the last time; it would have been so long and splendid now," she
continued, giving a kind of contemptuous pull at the thick, beautiful
brown hair on whose glossy surface there was in certain lights a
reddish tinge, which added to its beauty.

"Never mind the hair, Maddy," the old man said, gazing fondly at her
with a half sigh as he remembered another brown head, pillowed now
beneath the graveyard turf. "Maybe you won't pass muster, and then the
hair will make no difference. There's a new committee-man, that Dr.
Holbrook, from Boston, and new ones are apt to be mighty strict."

Instantly Maddy's face flushed all over with nervous dread, as she
thought: "What if I should fail?" fancying that to do so would be an
eternal disgrace. But she should not. She was called by everybody the
very best scholar in school, the one whom the teachers always put
forward when desirous of showing off, the one whom Mr. Tiverton, and
Squire Lamb, and Lawyer Whittemore always noticed so much. Of course
she should not fail, though she did dread Dr. Holbrook, wondering much
what he would ask her first, and hoping it would be something in
arithmetic, provided he did not stumble upon decimals, where she was
apt to get bewildered. She had no fears of grammar. She could pick out
the most obscure sentence and dissect a double relative with perfect
ease; then, as to geography, she could repeat whole pages of that,
while in the spelling-book, the foundation of a thorough education, as
she had been taught, she had no superiors, and but a very few equals.
Still she would be very glad when it was over, and she appointed
Monday, both because it was close at hand, and because that was the
day her grandfather had set in which to ride to Aikenside, in an
adjoining town, and ask its young master for the loan of three hundred
dollars.

He could hardly tell why he had thought of applying to Guy Remington
for help, unless it were that he once had saved the life of Guy's
father, who, as long as he lived, had evinced a great regard for his
benefactor, frequently asserting that he meant to do something for
him. But the something was never done, the father was dead, and in his
strait the old man turned to the son, whom he knew to be very rich,
and who he had been told was exceedingly generous.

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