THE STORY OF WAITSTILL BAXTER
Wiggin, Kate Douglas
The Story of Waitstill Baxter By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN Author of "Rebecca of Sannybrook Fari" (Copyright, 1913, by Kate Dauglas Wiggin) What Has Gone Before WAITSTILL BAXTER and her sister,...
...Waitstill always asks father for me, but I wouldn't take any chances today, and I spoke to him myself...
...I'll turn right round if you'll git in and lemme take you back along a piece, it'll save you a good five minutes," begged Cephas abjectly...
...He makes fun of the yaller color same as you...
...Then as she regarded him more closely, she continued, "Im sorry you're lonesome, Rodman, I'd like to see you look brighter...
...Do you eat meals together over to your house...
...That's a good boy...
...so we should be good friends...
...my forefinger and beckoning to him...
...Patience' chafes under her father's stern rule...
...I always like a walk...
...Bod-man, a young boy, is a member of the Boynton household...
...Perhaps sometime, when my father is away buying goods and we are left alone, you could join us in the woods, and we would have a picnic...
...There isn't a building for half a mile...
...Oh, I couldn't possibly, thank you...
...He caught up with Patty almost in the twinkling of an eye, but she was ready for him...
...the young man called in brusque country fashion as he reined up beside her...
...Deborah, her beloved, her only doll, was tightly clasped in her arms, for Debby, like her parent, had few pleasures and must not he denied so great a one as this...
...I've been over to Limington and am breaking my neck to get home in time myself...
...I wish you could come over and eat with sister and me," said Patty gently...
...says a home's something you want to forget whien you're away from it...
...Debby bore the marks of her adventure longer than her owner, for she had been longer in the fire, but stained and defaced as she was, she was never replaced and remained the only doll of Waitstill's childhood...
...I'd be afraid of this horse and, anyway, I must get out this very minute —yes, I really must...
...I, have never tried yet, but I feel in my bones, somehow, that I could have any boy in Edgewood or RIverboro by just crooking...
...I'm good at marbles and checkers and backgammon and jack straws, though...
...She felt so grown up, so conscious of a new power, as she sat enthroned on the little wagon seat ("Mark Wilson always liked his buggies "courtin' size," so the neighbors said) that she was almost courageous enough to agree to make a royal progress through the village—almost, but not quite...
...I'd like to, but I can't this afternoon, thank you...
...Of her own possible children she never thought...
...At this very moment she lay softly and safely in a bureau drawer ready to be lifted out, some time, Waitstill fancied, and shown tenderly to Patty's children...
...He's a regular skinflint," cried Mark, getting out of the wagon and walking beside her...
...Say, I'll bring something, too— white oak acorns, if you like 'em...
...I couldn't, Uncle Bart, she's got nobody but me...
...There's Phil Perry, but he likes Ellen, and besides, he's too serious for me...
...You don't look it," said Mark admiringly...
...But sometimes in getting her victim into the net the coquette loses her balance and falls in herself...
...There are no parties for me," said Patty plaintively...
...Wonderful houses coul' always be built in the corner of th shop oat of the little odds and end and "nubbins" of white pine, an< Uncle Bart was ever ready to cut...
...I don't want a husband that keeps his mouth wide open whenever I'm talking, no matter whether it's sense or nonsense...
...There was but one man in the world who could ever be the father of them, and she was separated from him by every obstacle that could divide two human beings...
...she sighed, her thoughts running along with her feet...
...Folks that ain't never handled a brush allers think they can mix paint better 'n them that knows their trade...
...You'll tell father how it was, Uncle Bart, won't you...
...I'll give you the reins and let Nero have a flick of the whip...
...Patty never looked up from the road, but walked faster and faster, her heart beating at breakneck speed...
...She was all this at seventeen, and Mark at twenty-four was by no means a match for her in this field of effort yet...
...Mother must have forgiven a good many things when she took father...
...It was a changed world that spun past her...
...satiny rings making them into necklaces, hangini them to their ears and weaving, then into wreaths...
...We're all three at the table, if that means together...
...to Oe continued...
...I don't have many boys to play with, and I never went to a picnic...
...from her own gentle born and gently bred mother and carefully avoiding her respected father's stock, except perhaps to take a dash of his pluck and an ounce of his persistence...
...I'm a good deal tied at home...
...He looks at me all the time in meeting and asked me if I wouldn't take a walk some Sunday afternon...
...There was never any talk between the sisters before going to bed, save on nights when their father was late at the store, usually on Saturdays only, for the good talkers of the village, is well as the gossips and loafers, preferred any other place to swap stories than the bleak atmosphere provided by old Foxy at his place of business...
...It was Cephas Cole driving toward her over the brow of Saco hill...
...If your object was to have everybody see the ell a mile away you've succeeded," said Patty cruelly...
...It won't be a bit of fun without you...
...borrowing qualities: lavishly...
...Is my dress scorched so much I can't wear it...
...the boy asked shyly, wishing to be polite, but conscious that visitors from the village very seldom crossed the threshold...
...Won't you step inside...
...The whole thing was over in the twinkling of an eye, for Uncle Bart was as quick as the child and dragged her out of the imminent danger with no worse harm done than a good scorching...
...I'll skip the candy pull if you say the word...
...She set great store by the old toad, and so did all of us...
...He'll have seen Mark," she thought, "but he can't know I've talked and driven with him...
...I wouldn't want to take him from Waity, though, and then perhaps I couldn't get him anyway...
...Hello, Patty...
...one window and the slanting walls, and Waitstill followed and said good night...
...Day offered to give Mrs...
...He stood in the dooryard blowin' like Bedlam...
...A few minutes later she heard once more the rumble of wheels on the road...
...And Rodman looked so wise and old-fashioned for his years that Patty did not know whether to kiss him or cry over him as she said...
...T won't look so yaller when father lets me paint the house to match, but that won't be till next year...
...Young Mr...
...There was no light in Aunt Abby Cole's kitchen, but a faint glimmer shone through the windows of Uncle Bart's joiner's shop, showing that the old man was either having an hour of peaceful contemplation with no companion but his pipe or that there might be a little group of privileged visitors, headed by Jed Morrill, busily discussing the affairs of the nation...
...You needn't help me...
...There was no formality about the thing...
...Ellen and I made it up expressly for you, thinking your father couldn't object to a candy pull...
...I'll be home in a few minutes," said Patty, "I got delayed and am a little behindhand...
...plenty, indeed, for the stronger sister to cherish, protect and hold precious, as she did with all her mind and soul...
...I'll take today's eggs to father's store on the way and ask him if he minds our having a little walk...
...She still held the doll against her heaving breast, saying, between the sobs: "I couldn t let my Debby burn up...
...He says folks shouldn't use edged tools till they're old enough not to fool with 'em...
...Nobody does but me, but I'm clever at guessing...
...CHAPTER V A Kiss "SHALL we have our walk in the O woods on the Edgewood side of the river, just for a change, Patty...
...I am sure that he is in love with Waitstill...
...There wasn't a bit of harm in Marquis de Lafayette, but he was extremely agile in keeping out of nets...
...Boynton expects her husband to return...
...She opened her window at the back of the house and leaned out...
...The step was an old millstone too worn for active service, and the piles of chips and shavings on each side of it had been there for so many years that sweet Williams, clove pinks and purple phlox were growing in among them in the most irresponsible fashion, while a morning glory vine had crept up and curled around a long handled rake that had been standing against the front of the house since early spring...
...I know he planned Ellen's party hoping I'd be there...
...She doesn't know he has been away for years and years...
...Jed Morrill remarked of Deacon Baxter once "When Old Foxy wants anything he'll wait till hell freezes over afore he'll give up...
...I heard your father blowin' the supper horn jest as I come over the bridge," remarked Cephas, drawing up in the road...
...We never are Ivory goes off early and takes lunch in a pail...
...Ivory's trained me years and years not to tell anything, so I don't...
...Day's chosen territory as there were in that allotted to her, so the river road to Milliken's mills was grudgingly awarded to Aunt Abby by way of compromise, and the ladies started on what was a tour of mercy in those days—the fur: nishing of a subject of discussion for long, quiet evenings...
...Very well," said Patty somewhat apathetically...
...I wish—I wish they were different...
...The dishes washed, the beans put in soak, the hens shut up for the night, the milk strained and carried down cellar...
...Mark alighted notwithstanding her objections, saying gallantly, "I don't miss this pleasure, not by a jugful...
...Any one who believed implicitly in heredity might have been puzzled, perhaps, to account for her...
...If I couldn't, he'd be the only one...
...Neither does it to me," said Patty...
...Good night, Cephas...
...Oh, I say, what's the matter...
...Boyn-ton's and can carry the nosegay there while I come home ahead of you and get supper...
...Mark suggested...
...Waitstill had her father's firm chin, but there the likeness ended...
...Aunt Boynton never sits down to eat...
...Ivory's father abandoned his family to follow Jacob Cochrane, a mystic...
...The fresh breeze lifted the gold thread of her curls and gave her cheeks a brighter color, while her breath came fast through her parted lips and her eyes sparkled at the unexpected, unaccustomed pleasure...
...Patty stretched out her hands to be helped, but Mark forestalled her by putting his arms around her and lifting her down...
...He led the little creature up the hill to explain matters and protect her from a scolding...
...I was the only one that surmised Jed Morrill was going to marry again...
...It's too bad...
...And, now, goodby, I must go this very minute...
...She pulled her sunbonnet over her flaming face, while Mark, with a gay smile of farewell, sprang into the wagon and gave his horse a free rein...
...The evening was mild with a soft wind blowing...
...She had a secret, a dazzling secret, just like Ellen Wilson and some of the other girls who were several years older...
...I wish Mark was a little different...
...Come, do, and make up to me a little for my disappointment...
...One of the villagers declared that Aunt Abby and her neighbor, Mrs...
...Her healthy young body lying not uncomfortably on the bed of corn husks, and the patchwork comforter drawn up under her chin, she could think, but for the first time she could not tell her thoughts to Waitstill...
...What are you doing over here...
...No, Rodman...
...It was an incredibly brief drive at Mark's rate of speed and as exciting and blissful as it was brief and dangerous, Patty thought...
...selecting here and there and modifying, if advisable, a trait of Grandpa or Grandma Fox-well, of Great Uncle or Great Aunt Baxter...
...CHAPTER VI " What Dreams May Come" SUPPER was over and the work done at last...
...I hope I'm not engaged to be married to him, even if he did—" The sentence was too tremendous to be finished even in thought...
...It was, indeed, Mark Wilson, who always drove, according to Aunt Abby Cole, "as if he was goin' for a doctor...
...I ain't no coward, an' I could tackle the deacon tomorrow if so be I had anything to ask him...
...So do I when I go to school...
...It was in the middle of March, but there was no show on the ground and the village boys had built a bon-fire on a plot of land near Uncle Bart's joiner's shop...
...I didn't see him, and the scythe hit him square...
...There were great misty stars in the sky, but no moon...
...thank you for giving me a lift...
...If you hold Nero I can just slip down between the wheels...
...She never flung the poor boy a civil word for fear of getting something warmer than civility in return...
...As for Aunt Abby'S it can only be said that she made all trades her own by sovereign right of investigation, and what she did not know about her neighbor's occupations was unlikely to be discovered on this side of Jordan...
...I don't think I can be...
...cried the boy, gazing after her, wholly entranced with her bright beauty and her kindness...
...Waitstill was restless, too, that night, although she could not have told the reason...
...Patty slept sweetly on the other side of the partition, the contemplation of her two-penny triumphs bringing a smile to her childish lips, but even so a good heart was there (still perhaps in the process of making,) a quick wit, ready sympathy, natural charm...
...Patty had left them at the Boyntons' door with Rodman, who was picking up chips and volunteered to take the nosegay into the house at once...
...asked the boy...
...Her father put out the lights, locked the doors and came up the creaking stairs...
...He is too poor and has his mother to look after...
...A fine Nod-head apple tree shaded the side windows, and underneath it reposed all summer a bright blue sleigh, for Uncle Bart always described himself as being, "plagued for shed room" and kept things as he liked at the shop, having a "p'ison neat" wife who did exactly the opposite at his house...
...Nobody to make a home for that poor lonesome little boy and that poor lonesome big Ivory...
...I've got a big bagful up attic...
...A second of time only was involved, but in that second he held her close and kissed her warm cheek, her cheek that had never felt the touch of any lips but those of Waitstill...
...Ivory is very good to me, and when he's at home I'm never lonesome...
...Waitstill did not lose an instant...
...suggested her sister...
...Uncle Bart's joiner's shop was at the foot of Guide Board hill on the Riverboro side of the bridge, and it was the pleasantest spot in the whole village...
...He doesn't know it...
...Patty could think in the dark...
...She had no idea of bringing a poor, weak, draggled soul to her Makeo- at the last day, saying, "Here is all I have managed to save out of what you gave me...
...I know the deacon, 'n' I ain't huntin' for trouble any more'n you be, though I'd take it quick enough if you jest give me leave...
...You musn't call him names," Pat-ty interposed, with some dignity...
...There was an air of cozy and amiable disorder about the place that would have invited friend-ly confabulation even had not Uncle Bart's white head, honest, ruddy face and smiling welcome coaxed yon in before you were aware...
...Bartholomew Cole's trade was that of a joiner...
...Mother says the two rooms of the ell are big enough for somebody to set up housekeepin' in...
...The excursion took place according to Waitstill's plan, ana at 4 o'clock she sped back to her night work and preparations for supper, leaving Patty with a great bunch of early wild flowers for Ivory's mother...
...It is what they say when they ask that I should like, much better than being married, when I'm only just past seventeen...
...All right, much obliged, but it's against the rules and you must drop me at the foot of our hill and let me walk up...
...Ivory Boynton, whose father disappeared, is interested in Waitstill...
...When she doesn't watch she prays...
...He was a likable, light weight young chap, as indolent and pleasure loving as the strict customs of the community would permit, and a kiss, in his mind, most certainly never would lead to the altar, else lie had already been many times a bridegroom...
...He admires me, I can tell that by the way he looks, but he admires himself just as much and expects me to do the same...
...The reason my eyes are so swollen up is because I killed our old toad by mistake this morning...
...No, I'd rather not drive," she said...
...You haven't got any mother, have you...
...Fright, triumph, shame, delight, gratified vanity swam over her in turn...
...Not going...
...he inquired as they passed his father's house...
...Cole the privilege of Saco hill and Aunt Betty Jack's, she herself to take Guide Board and Town House hills...
...And there's Mark Wilson, he's the best dressed and the only one that's been to college...
...She stood on the outskirts of the crowd, a silent, absorbed little figure clad in a shabby woolen coat, with a blue knit hood framing her rosy face...
...So I have, but not because I've been punished...
...I'm sorry...
...If father was only like any one else things might be so different...
...This seemed to Patty a line of conversation distinctly to be discouraged under all the circumstances, and she tried to keep Cephas on the subject of his daily tasks and his mother's rheumatism until she could escape from his overappreciative society...
...He takes ca,re of his daft mother...
...Jump...
...But, after all, you couldn't help it...
...Neither have I, nor any father, nor any relations but Aunt Boynton and Ivory...
...The proud curve of her nostrils, the clear, well opened eye with its deep fringe of lashes, the earnest mouth, all these came from the mother who was little more than a dim memory...
...Why aren't you on your way to the party...
...Perry, for instance...
...Such a couple were Cephas Cole's father and mother, Aunt Abby and Uncle Bart...
...She gave a scream of anguish and without giving any warning of her intentions, probably without realizing them herself, she dashed through the little crowd into the bonfire and snatched her cherished offspring from the burning pile...
...with you, but I don't care what becomes of me this afternoon if I can't go to Ellen's party...
...There's Cephas Cole, but he's as stupid as an owl...
...Maine had just separated amicably from her mother, Massa chusetts, and become an independent state...
...I should almost like Ivory for myself, he is so tall and handsome, but of course he can never marry anybody...
...I am not going...
...Certainly...
...Here sleep descended upon the slightly puzzled, but on the whole delightfully complacent little creature bringing her most alluring and untrustworthy dreams...
...I'll try to get a chance to see you soon again, but perhaps I can't...
...She could hear the full brook dashing through the edge of the wood lot and even the "kerchug" of an occasoinal bullfrog...
...Come on, let's shake the old tabbies up and start 'em talking, shall we...
...o saw a special piece needed for som'< great purpose...
...We would bring enough for you—all sorts of good things—hard boiled eggs, doughnuts, apple turnovers and bread spread with jelly," "I'd like it fine...
...Your father doesn't like you to go anywheres, I guess," interposed Rodman...
...Her afternoon's experience loomed as large in her innocent mind as if it had been an elopement...
...There was a large gathering in celebration of the historic event and Waitstill crept down the hill with her home-made rag doll in her arms...
...Don't forget the picnic...
...Patty went up to her little room with the...
...She just stands at the window and takes a bite of something now and then...
...What do you think...
...Aunt Boynton watches for uncle 'most all the time...
...Some think I've got the ell a little dite too yaller...
...I don't like his careless ways...
...The dear innocent had indeed no need of haste...
...Suddenly one of the thoughtless young scamps in the group, wishing to create a new sensation and add to the general excitement, caught the doll from the child's arms and running forward with a wild warwhoop, flung it into the flames...
...My forefinger just stays straight and doesn't feel like crooking...
...They don't make me want to beckon to them...
...Just jump in and have a spin till we come to the first house...
...Come and have a little ride, won't you...
...It'll tone down," Cephas responded, rather crestfallen, "I wanted a good, bright, lastin' shade...
...She cries enough now without my telling her there's been a death in the family...
...Village "aunts" and "uncles" were elected to that relationship by the common consent of the community, their fitness being established by great age, by decided individuality or eccentricity of character, by uncommon lovableness or by the possession of an abundant wit and humor...
...Did she imagine it or did Mack help her into the wagon differently from—old Dr...
...I guess you're late to supper...
...How do you like my last job...
...You think I've been crying," the boy said shrewdly...
...I've only 'raked after,' and I want to begin on mowing soon's I can...
...Miss Patience Baxter's maiden meditations and uncertainties and perplexities, therefore, were decidedly premature...
...I was trying to see if I could swing the scythe so's to help Ivory in haying time...
...She doesn't know it...
...How the children „love:< to play with the white...
...Ivory's always right...
...Anyway, Mark is going away for a month on business, so I shan't have to make up my mind just yet...
...Still, I suppose none of them are perfect, and girls have to forgive lots of little things when they are engaged...
...The shop itself had a cheery look, with its weather stained shingles, its small square windows and its hospitable door, half as big as the front side of the building...
...Goodness gracious, I do believe that is his horse coming behind me...
...Come along...
...No, but we should always look round everywheres when we're cutting —that's what Ivory says...
...I won't...
...Abel Day, had argued for an hour before they could make a bargain about the method of disseminating a certain important piece of news, theirs by exclusive right of discovery and prior possession...
...exclaimed Rodman, his big dark eyes sparkling with anticipation...
...Men must surely say something and not take it for granted you are in love with them and want to marry them...
...So am I," said Patty, laughing...
...There's no other in the village that goes at such a gait...
...Aunt Abby quickly proved the injustice of this decision, saying that there were twice as many families living in Mrs...
...We can gather our flowers in the hill pasture, and then you'll be quite near Mrs...
...The water is so high this year that the river will be splendid...
...Patty sped down the long lane, crept under the bars and flew like a lapwing over the highroad...
...She had taken off her sunbonnet just to twirl it by the string, she was so warm with walking, and in a jiffy she had lifted the clustering curls from her ears, tucked them back with a single expert movement and disclosed two coral pendants just the color of her ear tips and her glowing cheeks...
...I cried for an hour, that's what I did, and I don't care who knows it, except I wouldn't like the boys at school to hector me^ I've buried the toad out behind the barn and I hope Ivory'll let me keep the news from Aunt Boynton...
...Uncle Bart delighted in telling an instance of it that occurred when she was a child of five...
...The seat of the sleigh was all white now with scattered fruit blossoms, and one of Waitstill's earliest remembrances was of going downhill with Patty toddling at her side, of Uncle Bart's lifting them into the sleigh and permitting them to sit there and eat the ripe red apples that had fallen from the tree...
...Certain women were always called "Aunt Sukie," or "Aunt Hitty," or what not, while certain men were distinguished as "Uncle Rish," or "Uncle Pel," without previous arrangement or the consent of the high contracting parties...
...He might fantastically picture her as making herself out of her ancestors, using a free hand, picking and choosing what she liked best, with due care for the effect of combinations...
...I call him a good many myself, but I'm his daughter...
...I did the best I could...
...I never think," returned Patty, with a tantalizing laugh...
...I've heard Ivory tell Aunt Boynton things, but I wouldn't repeat them...
...Indeed, I almost coaxed him...
...She had joined the church at fifteen, more or less because other girls did and the parson had persuaded her, but out of her hard life she had somehow framed a courageous philosophy that kept her erect and uncrushed, no matter how great her difficulties...
...The Story of Waitstill Baxter By KATE DOUGLAS WIGGIN Author of "Rebecca of Sannybrook Fari" (Copyright, 1913, by Kate Dauglas Wiggin) What Has Gone Before WAITSTILL BAXTER and her sister, Patience (Patty), keep house for their " widowed, mean father...
...Some one would be sure to see us, and father's so strict...
...approved Patty...
...then I'll let you out, and you can walk the rest of the way home...
...how stupid and common he looks...
...Waitstill felt troubled and anxious tonight, bruised by the little daily tor-ments that lessened her courage but never wholly destroyed it...
...I've an errand at Aunt Abby's that would take me down to the bridge anyway...
...Marquis de Lafayette Wilson—Mark : for short-was not in the least a gay deceiver or ruthless breaker of hearts, and so far as known no scalps of village beauties were hung to his belt...
...I must run all the way down the hill now or I shan't be in time to supper...
...Then, somehow or other, the old toad came out from under the steps...
...I can't help it...
...Uncle Bart's son, Cephas (Patty's secret adorer), was a painter by trade and kept his pots and cans and brushes in a little outhouse at the back, while Uncle Bart himself stood every day behind his long joiner's bench almost knee dee] in shavings...
...Waitstill disdained any vague, dreary, colorless theory of life and its meaning...
...There had always been a passionate loyalty in Waitstill's affection, wherever it had been bestowed...
...She was a natural born, unconsciously artistic, highly expert and finished coquette...
...Sometimes she wants me to pray with her, but praying don't come easy to me...
Vol. 6 • June 1914 • No. 23
