CHAPTER X
WHAT DOES IT MATTER?
The days immediately following the receipt of three remarkable lettersby the Blaisdell family were nerve-racking for all concerned. Held byMrs. Jane's insistence that they weren't sure yet that the thing wastrue, the family steadfastly refused to give out any definiteinformation. Even the eager Harriet yielded to Jane on this point,acknowledging that it WOULD be mortifying, of course, if they SHOULDtalk, and nothing came of it.
Their enigmatic answers to questions, and their expressive shrugs andsmiles, however, were almost as exciting as the rumors themselves; andthe Blaisdells became at once a veritable storm center of surmises andgossip--a state of affairs not at all unpleasing to some of them, Mrs.Harriet in particular.
Miss Maggie Duff, however, was not so well pleased. To Mr. Smith, oneday, she freed her mind--and Miss Maggie so seldom freed her mind thatMr. Smith was not a little surprised.
"I wish," she began, "I do wish that if that Chicago lawyer is coming,he'd come, and get done with it! Certainly the present state of affairsis almost unbearable."
"It does make it all the harder for you, to have it drag along likethis, doesn't it?" murmured Mr. Smith uneasily.
"For--ME?"
"That you are not included in the bequest, I mean."
She gave an impatient gesture.
"I didn't mean that. I wasn't thinking of myself. Besides, as I've toldyou before, there is no earthly reason why I should have been included.It's the delay, I mean, for the Blaisdells--for the whole town, forthat matter. This eternal 'Did you know?' and 'They say' is getting onmy nerves!"
"Why, Miss Maggie, I didn't suppose you HAD any nerves," bantered theman.
She threw him an expressive glance.
"Haven't I!" she retorted. Then again she gave the impatient gesture."But even the gossip and the questioning aren't the worst. It's thefamily themselves. Between Hattie's pulling one way and Jane the other,I feel like a bone between two quarrelsome puppies. Hattie is alreadyhouse-hunting, on the sly, and she's bought Bessie an expensive watchand a string of gold beads. Jane, on the other hand, insists that Mr.Fulton will come back and claim the money, so she's running her housenow on the principle that she's LOST a hundred thousand dollars, and somust economize in every possible way. You can imagine it!"
"I don't have to--imagine it," murmured the man.
Miss Maggie laughed.
"I forgot. Of course you don't. You do live there, don't you? But thatisn't all. Flora, poor soul, went into a restaurant the other day andordered roast turkey, and now she's worrying for fear the money won'tcome and justify her extravagance. Mellicent, with implicit faith thatthe hundred thousand is coming wants to wear her best frocks every day.And, as if she were not already quite excited enough, young Pennock hasvery obviously begun to sit up and take notice."
"You don't mean he is trying to come back--so soon!" disbelieved Mr.Smith.
"Well, he's evidently caught the glitter of the gold from afar," smiledMiss Maggie. "At all events, he's taking notice."
"And--Miss Mellicent?" There was a note of anxiety in Mr. Smith's voice.
"Doesn't see him, APPARENTLY. But she comes and tells me his every lastmove (and he's making quite a number of them just now!), so I think shedoes see--a little."
"The young rascal! But she doesn't--care?"
"I think not--really. She's just excited now, as any young girl wouldbe; and I'm afraid she's taking a little wicked pleasure in--not seeinghim."
"Humph! I can imagine it," chuckled Mr. Smith.
"But it's all bad--this delay," chafed Miss Maggie again. "Don't yousee? It's neither one thing nor another. That's why I do wish thatlawyer would come, if he's coming."
"I reckon he'll be here before long," murmured Mr. Smith, with anelaborately casual air. "But--I wish you were coming in on the deal."His kindly eyes were gazing straight into her face now.
She shook her head.
"I'm a Duff, not a Blaisdell--except when they want--" She bit her lip.A confused red suffused her face. "I mean, I'm not a Blaisdell at all,"she finished hastily.
"Humph! That's exactly it!" Mr. Smith was sitting energetically erect."You're not a Blaisdell--except when they want something of you!"
"Oh PLEASE, I didn't mean to say--I DIDN'T say--THAT," cried MissMaggie, in very genuine distress.
"No, I know you didn't, but I did," flared the man. "Miss Maggie, it'sa downright shame--the way they impose on you sometimes."
"Nonsense! I like to have them--I mean, I like to do what I can forthem," she corrected hastily, laughing in spite of herself.
"You like to get all tired out, I suppose."
"I get rested--afterward."
"And it doesn't matter, anyway, of course," he gibed.
"Not a bit," she smiled.
"Yes, I suspected that." Mr. Smith was still sitting erect, stillspeaking with grim terseness. "But let me tell you right here and nowthat I don't approve of that doctrine of yours."
"'Doctrine'?"
"That 'It-doesn't-matter' doctrine of yours. I tell you it's verypernicious--very! I don't approve of it at all."
There was a moment's silence.
"No?" Miss Maggie said then, demurely. "Oh, well--it doesn't matter--ifyou don't."
He caught the twinkle in her eyes and threw up his hands despairingly.
"You are incorrigible!"
With a sudden businesslike air of determination Miss Maggie faced him.
"Just what is the matter with that doctrine, please, and what do youmean?" she smiled.
"I mean that things DO matter, and that we merely shut our eyes to thereal facts in the case when we say that they don't. War, death, sin,evil--the world is full of them, and they do matter."
"They do matter, indeed." Miss Maggie was speaking very gravely now."They matter--woefully. I never say 'It doesn't matter' to war, ordeath, or sin, or evil. But there are other things--"
"But the other things matter, too," interrupted the man irritably."Right here and now it matters that you don't share in the money; itmatters that you slave half your time for a father who doesn't anywherenear appreciate you; it matters that you slave the rest of the time forevery Tom and Dick and Harry and Jane and Mehitable in Hillerton thathas run a sliver under a thumb, either literally or metaphorically. Itmatters that--"
But Miss Maggie was laughing merrily. "Oh, Mr. Smith, Mr. Smith, youdon't know what you are saying!"
"I do, too. It's YOU who don't know what you are saying!"
"But, pray, what would you have me say?" she smiled.
"I'd have you say it DOES matter, and I'd have you insist on havingyour rights, every time."
"And what if I had?" she retaliated sharply. "My rights, indeed!"
The man fell back, so sudden and so astounding was the change that hadcome to the woman opposite him. She was leaning forward in her chair,her lips trembling, her eyes a smouldering flame.
"What if I had insisted on my rights, all the way up?" she quivered."Would I have come home that first time from college? Would I havestepped into Mother Blaisdell's shoes and kept the house? Would I haveswept and baked and washed and ironed, day in and day out, to make ahome for father and for Jim and Frank and Flora? Would I have come backagain and again, when my beloved books were calling, calling, alwayscalling? Would I have seen other girls love and marry and go to homesof their own, while I--Oh, what am I saying, what am I saying?" shechoked, covering her eyes with the back of her hand, and turning herface away. "Please, if you can, forget what I said. Indeed, INEVER--broke out like that--before. I am so--ashamed!"
"Ashamed! Well, you needn't be." Mr. Smith, on his feet, was trying towork off his agitation by tramping up and down the small room.
"But I am ashamed," moaned Miss Maggie, her face still averted. "And Ican't think why I should have been so--so wild. It was just somethingthat you said--about my rights, I think. You see--all my life I've justHAD to learn to say 'It doesn't matter,' when there were so many thingsI w
anted to do, and couldn't. And--don't you see?--I found out, after awhile, that it didn't really matter, half so much--college and my ownlittle wants and wishes as that I should do--what I had to do,willingly and pleasantly at home."
"But, good Heavens, how could you keep from tearing 'round and throwingthings?"
"I couldn't--all the time. I--I smashed a bowl once, and two cups." Shelaughed shamefacedly, and met his eyes now. "But I soon found--that itdidn't make me or anybody else--any happier, and that it didn't helpthings at all. So I tried--to do the other way. And now, please, PLEASEsay you'll forget all this--what I've been saying. Indeed, Mr. Smith Iam very much ashamed."
"Forget it!" Mr. Smith turned on his heel and marched up and down theroom again. "Confound that man!"
"What man?"
"Mr. Stanley G. Fulton, if you must know, for not giving you any ofthat money."
"Money, money, money!" Miss Maggie threw out both her hands with agesture of repulsion. "If I've heard that word once, I've heard it ahundred times in the last week. Sometimes I wish I might never hear itagain."
"You don't want to be deaf, do you? Well, you'd have to be, to escapehearing that word."
"I suppose so. But--" again she threw out her hands.
"You don't mean--" Mr. Smith was regarding her with curious interest."Don't you WANT--money, really?"
She hesitated; then she sighed.
"Oh, yes, of course. We all want money. We have to have money, too; butI don't think it's--everything in the world, by any means."
"You don't think it brings happiness, then?"
"Sometimes. Sometimes not."
"Most of--er--us would be willing to take the risk."
"Most of us would."
"Now, in the case of the Blaisdells here--don't you think this money isgoing to bring happiness to them?"
There was no answer. Miss Maggie seemed to be thinking.
"Miss Maggie," exclaimed Mr. Smith, with a concern all out ofproportion to his supposed interest in the matter, "you don't mean tosay you DON'T think this money is going to bring them happiness!"
Miss Maggie laughed a little.
"Oh, no! This money'll bring them happiness all right, ofcourse,--particularly to some of them. But I was just wondering; if youdon't know how to spend five dollars so as to get the most out of it,how will you spend five hundred, or five hundred thousand--and get themost out of that?"
"What do you mean?"
But Miss Maggie shook her head.
"Nothing. I was just thinking," she said.