CHAPTER IX

HOME-KEEPING HEARTS

The Wyndhams had been "out of Egypt," as Phyllis called it, a month. Tom painted a highly decorative sign bearing the word "Canaan," in gold letters on a red ground, to be placed over the front door, because the Wyndhams were not only out of Egypt, but entered into the Land of Promise. Although it was not quite possible to hang the inscription in the front hall, Phyllis would not discard it, but placed it between the dining-room windows. The flat was the land of promise to them all, and each realized it in her own way.

Mrs. Wyndham was almost entirely well; her improvement had been rapid from the first, and she was far happier than she had been since the fatal day when Mr. Hurd had come to tell her of her loss, almost a year ago.

Phyllis was completely recovered; she was so happy there was no possibility of being less than well. Her hair was growing out in soft rings of curls, as Ruth had prophesied it would, and she had never been half as pretty in her life as now, with present joy and hope for the future shining in her beautiful eyes. For Phyllis was dreaming and working; when household duties were done she spent certain hours of each day over her desk, and it was hard for her not to share Jessamy and Barbara's sincere conviction that her little stories were one day to see the light.

In the meantime, Phyllis had gravitated naturally into the position of chief cook in the scheme of domestic economy; she loved a kitchen, she took kindly to all that belonged to it, and her delight was to feed those she loved. "Phyllis is a real lady, there's no doubt of that," said Bab. "It is her nature to give bread to her dependents, and the term describes her in its dictionary meaning." With little white Truce on her shoulder, his favorite throne, Phyllis went about her tasks, singing from morning till night, happier than she had ever before been in all her short life.

Jessamy had found her proper place as the beautifier; she set every room in order daily, gave the touch only she could give to the table, planned, and went to market, and was no less happy than Phyllis. Barbara--what was her share? It would be hard to say, but she permeated the little home with her sunny lightheartedness, and never shirked any duty that came her way. "I'm general utility man and clown," she said herself, and, with proper modification of the latter word, perhaps that described her position.

She was growing older, Jessamy thought, watching her; there was a new note of womanliness in her jesting sometimes. But little Barbara was eighteen; her birthday was the first festival celebrated in the new home.

The plan was working triumphantly; the girls were so afraid of the failure prophesied for them that they did not dare spend what they could honestly afford, and the first month's bills were under the estimate; yet they were flourishing, and needed for comfort and health no more than they had.

There were bad days, when everything went cross-ways from the beginning to the end of the day, as there will be in all households, even the best regulated. But when such days came the girls treated them politely, and pretended not to notice that they were crooked, as Phyllis suggested doing, and so they came less often than to people who dwelt on their deficiencies.

Jessamy and Bab were making beds one morning as usual, and Phyllis was out in the kitchen clearing away the breakfast things. Truce was on her shoulder; he was growing fast, but did not seem to think that was any reason why he should alter his custom. He was the most loving of small catkins, with golden eyes, and a preternaturally long, slender tail; he wore a scarlet ribbon to set off his pink-lined ears and pink nose, and the snowy coat his devoted mistress kept spotless by the simple method of sponging with soap and water. Truce never objected to anything Phyllis chose to do to him; indeed, he had "reversed hydrophobia," Bab said, for water had such an irresistible fascination for him that anything containing it was in danger from his meddlesome little white paws, from the biggest water-pitcher to the most dainty vase.

Phyllis was singing, as usual. The two girls in the room near by heard her chanting, to a tune of her own:

"Stay, stay at home, my heart, and rest; Home-keeping hearts are happiest, For those that wander they know not where Are full of trouble and full of care; To stay at home is best."

Then she apparently tired of Longfellow, for there were a few moments of silence and chatter to the kitten alternately. Suddenly she began singing to a swinging, not particularly tuneful tune, like those the little children use for the games they play in the street. This time it was a funny little song of her own:

"Homy and happy, cheery and bright, New tins to left of me, new tins to right, A little white kitten to pet and to cuddle, And purr back my peace when I get in a muddle; A getting-well mother, three girls, and a cat-- My joys are so many they're crowding the flat!

Look out, Truchi-ki; you'll fall!" And Jessamy and Bab heard a saucepan cover drop, and guessed that Phyllis had put up her hand to steady Truce on her shoulder.

"Copyrighted, Phyl?" called Bab; but Phyllis, on her knees looking at her cake in the oven, did not hear her, and Jessamy put her hand over her sister's lips.

"Let her alone, Bab. Listen! She may improvise more," she said. "Now she's beginning to sweep, and that usually inspires her."

Phyllis's broom flew, and Jessamy and Bab waited developments. Evidently Truce had dismounted, and was ready for the frolic sweeping always meant to him, for they heard Phyllis laugh, and cry: "Look out, Truchi-ki! How do you expect me to sweep if you hold my broom? I'll spank you, kitten; you've never had one tiny, least spanking in all your life." Phyllis always talked nonsense to Truce, whose name had developed through an Italian pronunciation of Truce, Truchi, into the Japanese-sounding Truchi-ki, which Phyllis said meant, "Trucie, ki-tten," but which Jessamy more correctly defined as meaning nonsensical affection. Luckily for them, however, all the Wyndhams loved nonsense.

To prove it, Phyllis began to sing once more, a long jumble of nonsense in one rhyme:

"Trouble found me where I sat, But I didn't care for that, Only learned my lesson pat. Then I took a heavy bat, And I hit old Trouble--spat! And I gave him tit for tat. Last, I drowned him in a vat. Now I've learned to make a hat, Wash a dish and sweep a mat, And I think I'm getting fat In this blessed little flat, With my snowy Trucie-cat-- I'm so very, very happy that I don't know where I'm at!"

This was too much for the audience; two peals of laughter rang out from the bedroom, echoed by Mrs. Wyndham from the hall.

"Going crazy, Phyl?" gasped Bab.

"I don't know, I'm sure, and I don't see that it matters," returned Phyllis. "I'm brushing up our own kitchen, and everything I've sung is true; I'd like to know what consequence a little more or less sanity is under these circumstances? Oh, dear peoplekins, do you think we shall ever get used to this niceness? You needn't laugh at my inspirations; they are real hymns of praise, in spirit, even if they sound crazy."

"I am the one to sing hymns of praise, dear little Phyllis," said Mrs. Wyndham, fondly. "No one was ever so blessed with three happy, contented, true-hearted props in misfortune as I have been."

"I'll tell you a secret, mama," said Jessamy, emerging from under Phyllis's desk, where she had been picking up scraps of torn paper. "I suspect it isn't misfortune. I have a deep-seated suspicion that it is just good luck that has come to us, and that if we had stayed rich we should have missed getting into the heart of things and the real fun of living."

"Now be honest, Jessamy," said Bab. "I have entire confidence in Phyllis and myself sincerely enjoying makeshifts, but I have a horrid doubt that you may be making the best of it. Don't you wish you could go about, and have all the pretty things you love, and do no housework, but merely be lovely all day and every day?"

Jessamy paused, her color heightened; she was too honest to answer equivocally. "Sometimes," she said slowly, "I remember that though we are rather simple girls, and like to stay girlish just as long as we can, still we are a little past nineteen, Phyl and I, and Babbie is eighteen, and I'd like to have just a little more girlish fun, because we can't be young long. The pretty things I don't miss much, because I have them, if I may be allowed a bull. So far we have had as nice things to wear as we used to have, because our old stock is not used up. And as to our flat, it is simple, but it has the right look, and beauty is not a matter of cost. I am very happy, and I am truly contented; your 'horrid doubt,' Bab, need not come again. I think this year has done more for us than we know, and I am honestly satisfied. But I do hope that we may be able to help ourselves; if only my illustrating turns out well, I ask nothing more--nothing better of fate."

"Why did you change that _more_ into _better_, Jessamy?" asked Phyllis.

"Oh, because!" said Jessamy, smiling. "I'm not like you and Bab; I can't help looking ahead and wondering."

Barbara looked at her pretty face in Phyllis's glass, and the color mounted to her dark hair. She turned hastily to see if the others were watching her; Jessamy saw, and noted again that Babbie, like the white kitten, was growing up fast.

"Oh!" cried Bab, laughing a little self-consciously. "As to wondering, I wonder, wonder, all the time. It is rather like 'Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,' isn't it? When you're a three-feet snip you wonder what the little star is, and when you're a five-feet snippier you wonder less what is up above the world so high than what is down on your own level, headed toward you. I suppose even the most contented girls have to dream and get restless, don't they, Madrina--don't they, Trucie-pet?"

And she swung Truce to her shoulder, where he kissed her ear as she danced around, singing, "Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star," in waltz time.

Her mother watched her, and sighed. She too saw that Bab was changing, and, mother-like, hated to have her baby less a child.

Tom--and Nixie, as a matter of course--were due at the apartment that afternoon. The big divan which had been constructed at his suggestion in the boarding days, was promoted to the rank of dining-room couch, and in this honorable position required a new cover. Tom claimed the right, as his part of coöperation, to help in all tasks needing masculine strength of hands; and both for his sake and their own the Wyndhams gladly admitted him to a share in The Experiment, as they called their housekeeping, which they thought of in capitals.

Tom was a little late, but he and Nixie appeared at last. The little dog and Truce were perfectly good friends, though Nixie had the lowest opinion of cats in general, and it is likely Truce held dogs in slight esteem, but his life in an apartment, secluded from the vulgar world, did not expose him to their acquaintance.

The dining-room was a medley of all the contents of the divan, ready emptied for operations, and Tom lost no time in getting to work in the three hours of light remaining.

"Pull the stuff out straight, and let me mark where it is to be cut," said Tom to his three assistants. Mrs. Wyndham sat in the arm-chair to watch the performance and offer advice. The new cover was a beautiful dark red, with the colors of the tapestry paper on the wall suggested and emphasized in the pattern.

"Make a notch here, Bab," ordered Tom, "and cut it off straight across. Then, Jessamy, you and Phyllis can take the piece that comes off and be sewing the pillow-covers, if you like."

"Yes, my lord," said Phyllis, rescuing her cushion full of needles from Truce, who was beside himself with delight at so much going on.

Tom stretched the tapestry over the top of the couch, and held it with a few tacks while he made sure the figure ran straight. Then he sat down on the floor and began tacking the covering on across the front.

"I've something to decide," he said, as well as he could with his mouth full of tacks. "I want advice."

"If we can give it, my dear, you shall have it," said Mrs. Wyndham.

"You know I am to graduate this summer--" Tom began.

"I advise you to do that, if that is what you have to decide," said Bab, saucily.

"Barbara, my dear, pray let Tom speak," said her mother.

"Yes, Miss Impudence, I intend to," said Tom. "But it is the question of the next step I must decide. I think I never told you--please give me the scissors, Jessamy--but I have an uncle, my father's only brother, who had a son my age, and who was left a widower with the boy when we were both about eight years old. My cousin died; it was a dreadful blow to his father, whose whole life was wrapped up in his child. My uncle has a considerable fortune, and he said, when poor Ralph died, I was to be his heir. He has sent me to college, and now he says that if I want to be a specialist, he'll send me to Germany to study in some of those famous schools and under their first-class scientists as long as I please. And I don't know what to tell him."

"Is it a question of being a specialist or a general practitioner?" asked Mrs. Wyndham. "You ought not to consult us; we aren't competent to advise. Besides, isn't it chiefly a matter of vocation?"

"Yes, ma'am, it is a question of taking up general or special practice; and, no, ma'am, it is not a matter of vocation; it is a matter of expediency. I could never be anything but a physician; I never for a moment wanted to do anything but practise medicine, but I don't care which branch of it I practise," said Tom. "Specialists, if they succeed, are likely to make more money."

"But you say you are to inherit your uncle's fortune." "Surely you wouldn't look at your profession merely from the money point of view?" said Jessamy and Barbara, speaking together and with the unworldliness of all good young girls.

"But if you went to Germany you would be gone ever so long," said Phyllis, slowly. "How can you expect us to offer you unselfish advice, when we should miss you so?"

Tom flushed with pleasure. "Then you would miss me?" he said. "That is the point that makes me hesitate; it seems to me I could hardly make the sacrifice."

"I don't think we ought to say one word to keep Tom from the course that is best for him, Phyllis," said Mrs. Wyndham. "You ought to ask some of your medical professors at college, and do what they suggest."

"I think he ought to consider what gives him most opportunity to do good," said Jessamy, "if he is not obliged to depend wholly on his profession for a living."

"And a general practice surely does that," said Barbara.

"Oh, I don't know; a doctor never lacks chances to help suffering in mind and body," said Tom. "It is a hard problem. Do you want this puffed or drawn tight over this edge?"

"The easier way, whichever that may be," said Mrs. Wyndham, smiling. "Either is pretty."

For a while Tom tacked industriously, calling upon the girls occasionally for a stitch taken in strong shoe thread. At last the divan was covered, and the four pairs of young hands packed it again with the numerous bundles and bags of precious remnants taken from it.

Mrs. Wyndham went to her room, and Phyllis stood absent-mindedly gazing down on their neighbors' back yards, while Truce, from her shoulder, watched a cat on the fence with mild curiosity. Jessamy and Barbara put the pillows in place, and gave the last touches to their loops and ruffles.

Tom walked over to Phyllis, and stood beside her. "What do you say about me going to Germany, Phyllis? I would rather have your opinion than any one's, and you have not spoken." His tone was lower than usual, but rather as if the subject were serious than to exclude the other two.

Phyllis looked up at him, frankly smiling. "Mine?" she said. "Why, Tom, if I thought you would heed it I wouldn't dare give it, for I don't know anything about what is best, as you know quite well."

"But on general principles?" insisted Tom.

"On general principles, and if you really don't care which you do, then I think 'home-keeping hearts are happiest.' That little song has been haunting me all day," said Phyllis. "I hate to think of you so far away, alone, and for so long."

"You would rather I did not go? You would rather have me here, in New York, and near you?" asked Tom, eagerly.

Phyllis laughed, and pushed her hair, getting to an inconvenient length, back from her eyes to see him better. "Why, Tom!" she said. "What a foolish question! Don't you know I would? Aren't you one of ourselves, and shouldn't we all be crippled if you left us? Unless it is much better for you, I should feel dreadfully to think of losing you for three or four years."

"Then I stay," said Tom, decidedly. "For general practice I can get all the training I need in our own hospitals, and I shall stay. You've settled it, Phyllis."

Tom repaired to the bath-room to get the black from the curled hair, tacks, and hammer off his hands, and the girls went out to get dinner.

Phyllis sang her own little rhyme of the morning as she peeled potatoes and dipped the cutlets in eggs and crumbs, but Jessamy was thoughtful, and, unlike herself, did queer things setting the table. Bab was silent; her cheeks were red, and her manner jerky. Once she ordered Nixie out from under her feet sharply, and then sat down on the floor to hug him and beg the pardon he lavishly accorded.

At dinner Bab and Tom nearly fell out over nothing more likely than a difference of opinion as to a political candidate, though it turned out in the end that the man Bab denounced so fiercely was not the one of whom she thought she was speaking.

Tom went home early, and Mrs. Wyndham asked Phyllis to read to her and let the other two girls attend to the dishes. Every one seemed a trifle disturbed in mind except Phyllis, who was as happy and calm as--Phyllis Wyndham, and that means a very clear and peaceful calmness.

Barbara washed the dishes and Jessamy wiped them in silence, each busy with her own thoughts. At last, when Barbara was putting the butter in the lower part of the refrigerator, and Jessamy was hanging her wet dish-towels on the line to dry, Jessamy said: "Bab, do tell me; did it occur to you this afternoon that Tom cared more for Phyllis's wishes in the matter of his going to Germany than for ours?"

"Yes," said Barbara, shortly.

"Have you thought he was beginning to like--care for Phyllis; I mean differently from the way he likes us--the old brotherly way?" said Jessamy.

"Yes," said Barbara again, her head still in the refrigerator.

"Lately? When did you begin to think so?" insisted Jessamy.

"Yes, lately; the last three or four times, perhaps," said Bab, not very lucidly.

"Phyl doesn't notice it, if it is so," remarked Jessamy, thoughtfully. "She is as unconscious as the new moon."

There was no remark from Bab in reply to this, but the cover of the earthen jar she was putting away was set in place with rather unnecessary violence.

"Well," said Jessamy, turning from the last refractory towel, into which she had forced a pin with difficulty, because she had not wrung the water out thoroughly, "well, maybe it is not so at all; we mustn't get sentimental, contrary to our habit, and imagine things; but I really couldn't help thinking Tom was beginning to care for Phyllis. He's a dear boy, just as splendid and true as he can be; and if it were so, and she grew to care about him, it would be lovely, wouldn't it?" Bab withdrew from the refrigerator and stood up. Her cheeks were very red, but that might have been from long stooping.

"Lovely!" she said. "I don't see anything lovely about it! I think it is all horrid, horrid--likings, and changes, and growing up, and everything! For goodness sake, why can't we stay children forever?"

She spoke with such violence and excitement in her voice that Jessamy stared in amazement as she dashed through the dining-room to her own little room.

"Poor Babbie! I didn't know she cared," thought Jessamy, turning down the gas and setting the milk-bottles on the dumb-waiter. "She does love to be a little girl; and how nice it would be if we all could be little girls for years and years!"