Chapter LVII

“Doctor?” said Mrs. Hall, “put down that book, will you? I want to talk to you a bit; there you’ve sat these three hours, without stirring, except to brush the flies off your nose, and my tongue actually aches keeping still.”

“Sh-sh-sh,” said the doctor, running his forefinger along to guide his purblind eyes safely to the end of the paragraph. “Sh-sh. ‘It—is es-ti-ma-ted by Captain Smith—that—there—are—up’ards—of—ten—hundred—human—critters—in—the—Nor-West—sett-le-ment.’ Well—Mis. Hall—well—” said the doctor, laying a faded ribbon mark between the leaves of the book, and pushing his spectacles back on his forehead, “what’s to pay now? what do you want of me?”

“I’ve a great mind as ever I had to eat,” said the old lady, pettishly, “to knit twice round the heel of this stocking, before I answer you; what do you think I care about Captain Smith? Travelers always lie; it is a part of their trade, and if they don’t it’s neither here nor there to me. I wish that book was in the Red Sea.”

“I thought you didn’t want it read,” retorted the irritating old doctor.

“Now I suppose you call that funny,” said the old lady. “I call it simply ridiculous for a man of your years to play on words in such a frivolous manner. What I was going to say was this, i. e. if I can get a chance to say it, if you have given up all idea of getting Harry’s children, I haven’t, and now is the time to apply for Katy again; for, according to all accounts, Ruth is getting along poorly enough.”

“How did you hear?” asked the doctor.

“Why, my milliner, Miss Tiffkins, has a nephew who tends in a little grocery-shop near where Ruth boards, and he says that she buys a smaller loaf every time she comes to the store, and that the milkman told him that she only took a pint of milk a day of him now; then Katy has not been well, and what she did for doctors and medicines is best known to herself; she’s so independent that she never would complain if she had to eat paving stones. The best way to get the child will be to ask her here on a visit, and say we want to cure her up a little with country air. You understand? that will throw dust in Ruth’s eyes, and then we will take our own time about letting her go back you know. Miss Tiffkins says her nephew says that people who come into the grocery-shop are very curious to know who Ruth is; and old Mr. Flake, who keeps it, says that it wouldn’t hurt her any, if she is a lady, to stop and talk a little, like the rest of his customers; he says, too, that her children are as close-mouthed as their mother, for when he just asked Katy what business her father used to do, and what supported them now he was dead, and if they lived all the time on bread and milk, and a few such little questions, Katy answered, ‘Mamma does not allow me to talk to strangers,’ and went out of the shop, with her loaf of bread, as dignified as a little duchess.”

“Like mother, like child,” said the doctor; “proud and poor, proud and poor; that tells the whole story. Well, shall I write to Ruth, Mis. Hall, about Katy?”

“No,” said the old lady, “let me manage that; you will upset the whole business if you do. I’ve a plan in my head, and to-morrow, after breakfast, I’ll take the old chaise, and go in after Katy.”

In pursuance of this plan, the old lady, on the following day, climbed up into an old-fashioned chaise, and turned the steady old horse’s nose in the direction of the city; jerking at the reins, and clucking and gee-ing him up, after the usual awkward fashion of sexegenarian female drivers. Using Miss Tiffkin’s land-mark, the little black grocery-shop, for a guide-board, she soon discovered Ruth’s abode; and so well did she play her part in commiserating Ruth’s misfortunes, and Katy’s sickly appearance, that the widow’s kind heart was immediately tortured with the most unnecessary self-reproaches, which prepared the way for an acceptance of her invitation for Katy “for a week or two;” great promises, meanwhile, being held out to the child of “a little pony to ride,” and various other tempting lures of the same kind. Still little Katy hesitated, clinging tightly to her mother’s dress, and looking, with her clear, searching eyes, into her grandmother’s face, in a way that would have embarrassed a less artful manœuverer. The old lady understood the glance, and put it on file, to be attended to at her leisure; it being no part of her present errand to play the unamiable. Little Katy, finally won over, consented to make the visit, and the old chaise was again set in motion for home.