LITMIR.BIZ

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Mary lived years with me, and is the most devoted, faithful creature," said Mrs. Van Arsdel.

      "Never mind – she needs watching. She's getting old now, and don't work as she used to, and if Eva don't look out she won't get half a woman's work out of her – these old servants always take liberties. I shall look into things there. Eva is my girl; I sha'n't let anyone get around her;" and Aunt Maria arose to go forth. But if anybody supposes that two women engaged in a morning talk are going to stop when one of them rises to go, he knows very little of the ways of womankind. When they have risen, drawn up their shawls, and got ready to start, then is the time to call a new subject, and accordingly Aunt Maria, as she was going out the door, turned round and said: "Oh! there now! I almost forgot what I came for: – What are you going to do about the girls' party dresses?"

      "Well, we shall get a dressmaker in the house. If we can get Silkriggs, we shall try her."

      "Now, Nelly, look here, I have found a real treasure – the nicest little dressmaker, just set up, and who works cheap. Maria Meade told me about her. She showed me a suit that she had had made there in imitation of a Paris dress, with ever so much trimming, cross-folds bound on both edges, and twenty or thirty bows, all cut on the bias and bound, and box-plaiting with double quilling on each side all round the bottom, and going up the front – graduated, you know. There was waist, and overskirt, and a little sacque, and, will you believe me, she only asked fifteen dollars for making it all."

      "You don't say so!"

      "It's a fact. Why, it must have been a good week's work to make that dress, even with her sewing machine. Maria told me of her as a great secret, because she really works so well that if folks knew it she would be swamped with work, and then go to raising her price – that's what they all do when they can get a chance – but I've been to her and engaged her for you."

      "I'm sure, Maria, I don't know what we should do if you were not always looking out for us."

      "I don't know – I'm getting to be an old woman," said Aunt Maria. "I'm not what I was. But I consider your family as my appointed field of labor – just as our rector said last Sunday, we must do the duty next us. But tell the girls not to talk about this dressmaker. We shall want all she can do, and make pretty much our own terms with her. It's nice and convenient for Eva that she lives somewhere down in those out-of-the-way regions where she has chosen to set up. Well, good morning;" and Aunt Maria opened the house-door and stood upon the top of the steps, when a second postscript struck her mind.

      "There now!" said she, "I was meaning to tell you that it is getting to be reported everywhere that Alice and Jim Fellows are engaged."

      "Oh, well, of course there's nothing in it," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "I don't think Alice would think of him for a moment. She likes him as a friend, that's all."

      "I don't know, Nelly; you can't be too much on your guard. Alice is a splendid girl, and might have almost anybody. Between you and me – now, Nelly, you must be sure not to mention it – but Mr. Delafield has been very much struck with her."

      "Oh, Maria, how can you? Why, his wife hasn't been dead a year!"

      "Oh, pshaw! these widowers don't always govern their eyes by the almanac," said Aunt Maria, with a laugh. "Of course, John Delafield will marry again. I always knew that; and Alice would be a splendid woman to be at the head of his establishment. At any rate, at the little company the other night at his sister's, Mrs. Singleton's, you know, he was perfectly devoted to her, and I thought Mrs. Singleton seemed to like it."

      "It would certainly be a fine position, if Alice can fancy him," said Mrs. Van Arsdel. "Seems to me he is rather querulous and dyspeptic, isn't he?"

      "Oh; well, yes; his health is delicate; he needs a wife to take care of him."

      "He's so yellow!" ruminated Mrs. Van Arsdel, ingenuously. "I never could bear thin, yellow men."

      "Oh, come, don't you begin, Nelly – it's bad enough to have girls with their fancies. What we ought to look at are the solid excellences. What a pity that the marrying age always comes when girls have the least sense! John Delafield is a solid man, and if he should take a fancy to Alice, it would be a great piece of good luck. Alice ought to be careful, and not have these reports around, about her and Jim Fellows; it just keeps off advantageous offers. I shall talk to Alice the first time I get a chance."

      "Oh, pray don't, Maria – I don't think it would do any good. Alice is very set in her way, and it might put her up to make something of it more than there is."

      "Oh, never fear me," said Aunt Maria, nodding her head; "I understand Alice, and know just what needs to be said. I sha'n't do her any harm, you may be sure," and Aunt Maria, espying her omnibus afar, ran briskly down the steps, thus concluding the conference.

      Now it happened that adjoining the parlor where this conversation had taken place was a little writing-cabinet which Mr. Van Arsdel often used for the purposes of letter-writing. On this morning, when his wife supposed him out as usual at his office, he had retired there to attend to some correspondence. The entrance was concealed by drapery, and so he had been an unintentional and unsuspected but much amused listener to Aunt Maria's adjurations to his wife on his behalf.

      All through his subsequent labors of the pen, he might have been observed to pause from time to time and laugh to himself. The idea of lying as a quiet dead weight on the wheels of the progress of his energetic relation was something vastly pleasing to the dry and secretive turn of his humor – and he rather liked it than otherwise.

      "We shall see whether I am losing my faculties," he said to himself, as he gathered up his letters and departed.

       CHAPTER IV

      EVA HENDERSON TO HARRY'S MOTHER

      My Dear Mother: Harry says I must do all the writing to you and keep you advised of all our affairs, because he is so driven with his editing and proofreading that letter-writing is often the most fatiguing thing he can do. It is like trying to run after one has become quite out of breath.

      The fact is, dear mother, the demands of this New York newspaper life are terribly exhausting. It's a sort of red-hot atmosphere of hurry and competition. Magazines and newspapers jostle each other, and run races, neck and neck, and everybody connected with them is kept up to the very top of his speed, or he is thrown out of the course. You see, Bolton and Harry have between them the oversight of three papers – a monthly magazine for the grown folk, another for the children, and a weekly paper. Of course there are sub-editors, but they have the general responsibility, and so you see they are on the qui vive all the time to keep up; for there are other papers and magazines running against them, and the price of success seems to be eternal vigilance. What is exacted of an editor now-a-days seems to be a sort of general omniscience. He must keep the run of everything, – politics, science, religion, art, agriculture, general literature; the world is alive and moving everywhere, and he must know just what's going on and be able to have an opinion ready made and ready to go to press at any moment. He must tell to a T just what they are doing in Ashantee and Dahomey, and what they don't do and ought to do in New York. He must be wise and instructive about currency and taxes and tariffs, and able to guide Congress; and then he must take care of the Church, – know just what the Old Catholics are up to, the last new kink of the Ritualists, and the right and wrong of all the free fights in the different denominations. It really makes my little head spin just to hear what they are getting up articles about. Bolton and Harry are kept on the chase, looking up men whose specialties lie in these lines to write for them. They have now in tow a Jewish Rabbi, who is going to do something about the Talmud, or Targums, or something of that sort; and a returned missionary from the Gaboon River, who entertained Du Chaillu and can speak authentically about the gorilla; and a lively young doctor who is devoting his life to the study of the brain and nervous system. Then there are all sorts of writing men and women sending pecks and bushels of articles to be printed, and getting furious if they are not printed, though the greater part of them are such hopeless trash that you only need to read four lines to know that they are good for nothing; but they all expect them to be re-mailed with explanations and criticisms, and the ladies sometimes write letters of wrath to Harry that are perfectly fearful.

      Altogether

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