“A babe in the house is a wellspring of pleasure.”
—TUPPER.
SPRING and summer had waxed and waned and the gorgeous October hues were again upon tree and shrub, its soft mellow haze everywhere, on prairie, forest, town, and river.
Annis was not ill-pleased to be sent on an errand that gave her a long walk in the sweet, bracing morning air.
She came hurrying home in almost breathless excitement, rushed upstairs, and in at Mildred’s half-open door.
“O Milly! what do you think? I—”
But Mildred held up a warning finger.
“Excuse me, I forgot,” and Annis’s voice sank to a whisper. “I didn’t wake him though,” she said, stealing on tiptoe to the side of the cradle and bending down over the tiny sleeper. “O Milly, but he is a beauty! even prettier than Zillah’s boy. Don’t you think so?”
“Don’t ask me, and don’t tell Zillah what you think about it,” returned Mildred with a half-amused smile. “But what did you—Ah, I see you have a letter for me,” holding out her hand for it.
“Yes; from Cousin Horace,” Annis answered, putting it into Mildred’s hand; “and see! I have one from Elsie. And, O Milly, they want us to come there to spend the winter, Elsie says. Do you think—”
“Us?”
“Yes; Brother Charlie, you, and me; Fan too, if she will go; but I ’most know she won’t.”
“I doubt if you or I will either; I wouldn’t leave Charlie, he wouldn’t leave his patients, and baby is too young, I fear, for so long a journey.”
Annis’s countenance fell. “O Milly! and I do so want to go! You don’t care much about it, I suppose, because you’ve been there once, but I never have.”
“Well, dear, we’ll discuss the question when your brother comes in,” Mildred said, her eyes upon the open letter in her hand. “Yes, this is from Cousin Horace, and I see contains a very warm invitation from himself, his wife, and Elsie to all four of us—Charlie, my two little sisters, and myself.”
“Well, I’ll go away till Percy wakes,” Annis whispered, with another admiring look at the sleeping babe, and then stole on tiptoe from the room.
She found her mother, Ada, and Fan in the sitting-room, all three busy with the fall sewing for the family.
Her story was told in a breath. “See mother, see! a letter from Elsie,” holding it up, while her face glowed with animation and delight. “And, O Fan, she wants us to go and spend the winter at the Oaks. And Milly had one from Cousin Horace too, and—”
“One what?” interrupted Ada, smiling amusedly into the bright, eager face.
“Letter, to be sure. O mother, do you think we can go?”
“You two, all alone? No, indeed, my child.”
“I’ll not go!” exclaimed Fan with decision, “I wouldn’t leave mother and father and home so long for anything in the world!”
“No, not alone, mother; Brother Charlie and Milly are invited. But I’m not sure, after all, that I do want to go and leave you,” Annis sighed, taking a stool at her mother’s feet and laying her head in her lap.
“And what could mother do without her baby?” Mrs. Keith said, smoothing the bright curls with softly caressing hand. “But we will not try to decide it all in a moment, dear. I doubt if the others go; and if they do not, of course that will settle the question for you.”
“There’s Brother Charlie now!” Annis exclaimed, lifting her head to listen; “yes, I hear his step on the stairs. Milly will show him the letter now, and I hope he’ll say he can go. Mildred says she wouldn’t go without him.”
Mildred looked up with a smile as her husband entered, stepping softly that he might not disturb the slumbers of his little son and heir.
He bent over the cradle for an instant, then drew near and sat down by her side.
“How would you like to go South for the winter?” he asked.
“Accept the invitation to the Oaks, do you mean?”
“I had not heard of it,” he said in some surprise; “but as matters are I think it will be the very thing to do.”
He went on to explain that business of importance called him to the neighborhood of his old home, and was likely to keep him there for several months. “And of course,” he concluded, “I want to take my wife and boy with me. Will you go, love?”
“Must you go? I don’t think I could stand so long a separation,” she said, a slight mist coming over her sight at the very thought; “but isn’t our boy too young for such a journey?”
“No, I think not; he is a strong, healthy little fellow, and the journey, if we start within a week, need not subject him to much exposure or fatigue. Can you get ready in that time? I find it is quite important for me to go.”
“Yes, I can if necessary.”
“This is Wednesday,” he said reflectively; “suppose we consider it settled that we are to start next Tuesday morning.”
“Very well. Fan and Annis are included in the invitation from the Oaks. Are you willing to take charge of them in addition to wife and child?” she asked, with playful look and smile.
“Certainly,” he answered cheerily, “the more the merrier.”
The babe woke, Mildred took him up, presently gave him to his father, and they went down-stairs to let Annis know their decision, and “talk the matter over with mother and the rest.”
As they entered the sitting-room Annis looked up with an eager “O Brother Charlie, will you go?” while Fan dropped her work and holding out her arms for the babe, asked if she might not take it.
“Not just yet, Aunt Fan,” the doctor said, with a good-humored smile, dandling the babe as he spoke, “papa must have him for a little while.”
“Till he begins to fret or cry,” remarked Ada laughingly, “then you’ll be very ready to resign him to the first one who offers to take him.”
“Of course, isn’t that the way fathers always do?” the doctor answered, with imperturbable good nature. “Yes, little sister,” to Annis, “we are going; expect to leave here for the sunny South in the morning stage next Tuesday. Are you going with us?”
“Going where? South, did you say?” asked a merry voice from the open doorway.
All turned toward the speaker; it was Zillah standing there, making a beautiful picture with her babe in her arms; a sweet, fair, chubby little fellow, pink-cheeked, dark-eyed, older by a month or more than Mildred’s boy.
Down went Fan’s work again, and with a bound she was at Zillah’s side, holding out her hands to the child with a “Come to your auntie, sweet, pretty pet!”
Zillah graciously resigned him, and accepting the chair gallantly offered by the doctor, asked again what their talk was about.
“Suppose I read Cousin Horace’s letter aloud,” said Mildred, taking it from her pocket.
“And Elsie’s, too,” said Annis, laying it in her sister’s lap.
Mr. Keith and Rupert coming in at that moment, followed almost immediately by Wallace and Donald, she had the whole family for an audience. Annis silently took possession of her father’s knee, and as Mildred finished, with her arm about his neck whispered in his ear a coaxing entreaty to be allowed to accept Elsie’s invitation.
“Wait a little, pet, till I hear what Brother Charlie has to say. But how are father and mother to do without you for so long a time?” he said, holding her close, with repeated caresses.
“Maybe you’ll enjoy me all the more when I come back,” was the arch rejoinder.
“Ah, child! as if you were not already the very light of our eyes! But there, we must stop talking and hear what the doctor is saying.”
The matter was under discussion for some time. Fan remained steadfast to her resolution to stay at home, Annis urgent to be permitted to go. Before night she had won the consent of both parents, letters of acceptance had been despatched to the Dinsmores, and active preparations for the journey set on foot.
The child’s heart misgave her now and then at thought of the long separation from home, parents, and so many of her dear ones; but the time was so short for all that had to be done to put her wardrobe in such order as mother and sisters deemed desirable, that she was kept in a whirl of excitement that up to the last hour left her little leisure for dwelling upon anything but the business in hand, and the pleasure in store for her at the journey’s end.
The parting was a hard one when it came; she went away drowned in tears and sobbing pitifully, but presently forgot her grief in the interest of new scenes and soothed by the kindly ministrations of her brother and sister.