Little Women
“You’d have nothing but horses, inkstands, and novels in yours,”
answered Meg petulantly.
“Wouldn’t I though? I’d have a stable full of Arabian steeds, rooms
piled high with books, and I’d write out of a magic inkstand, so that
my works should be as famous as Laurie’s music. I want to do something
splendid before I go into my castle, something heroic or wonderful that
won’t be forgotten after I’m dead. I don’t know what, but I’m on the
watch for it, and mean to astonish you all some day. I think I shall
write books, and get rich and famous, that would suit me, so that is my
favorite dream.”
“Mine is to stay at home safe with Father and Mother, and help take
care of the family,” said Beth contentedly.
“Don’t you wish for anything else?” asked Laurie.
“Since I had my little piano, I am perfectly satisfied. I only wish we
may all keep well and be together, nothing else.”
“I have ever so many wishes, but the pet one is to be an artist, and go
to Rome, and do fine pictures, and be the best artist in the whole
world,” was Amy’s modest desire.
“We’re an ambitious set, aren’t we? Every one of us, but Beth, wants to
be rich and famous, and gorgeous in every respect. I do wonder if any
of us will ever get our wishes,” said Laurie, chewing grass like a
meditative calf.
“I’ve got the key to my castle in the air, but whether I can unlock the
door remains to be seen,” observed Jo mysteriously.
“I’ve got the key to mine, but I’m not allowed to try it. Hang
college!” muttered Laurie with an impatient sigh.
“Here’s mine!” and Amy waved her pencil.
“I haven’t got any,” said Meg forlornly.
“Yes, you have,” said Laurie at once.
“Where?”
“In your face.”
“Nonsense, that’s of no use.”
“Wait and see if it doesn’t bring you something worth having,” replied
the boy, laughing at the thought of a charming little secret which he
fancied he knew.
Meg colored behind the brake, but asked no questions and looked across
the river with the same expectant expression which Mr. Brooke had worn
when he told the story of the knight.
“If we are all alive ten years hence, let’s meet, and see how many of
us have got our wishes, or how much nearer we are then than now,” said
Jo, always ready with a plan.
“Bless me! How old I shall be, twenty-seven!” exclaimed Meg, who felt
grown up already, having just reached seventeen.
“You and I will be twenty-six, Teddy, Beth twenty-four, and Amy
twenty-two. What a venerable party!” said Jo.
“I hope I shall have done something to be proud of by that time, but
I’m such a lazy dog, I’m afraid I shall dawdle, Jo.”
“You need a motive, Mother says, and when you get it, she is sure
you’ll work splendidly.”
“Is she? By Jupiter, I will, if I only get the chance!” cried Laurie,
sitting up with sudden energy. “I ought to be satisfied to please
Grandfather, and I do try, but it’s working against the grain, you see,
and comes hard. He wants me to be an India merchant, as he was, and I’d
rather be shot. I hate tea and silk and spices, and every sort of
rubbish his old ships bring, and I don’t care how soon they go to the
bottom when I own them. Going to college ought to satisfy him, for if I
give him four years he ought to let me off from the business. But he’s
set, and I’ve got to do just as he did, unless I break away and please
myself, as my father did. If there was anyone left to stay with the old
gentleman, I’d do it tomorrow.”
Laurie spoke excitedly, and looked ready to carry his threat into
execution on the slightest provocation, for he was growing up very fast
and, in spite of his indolent ways, had a young man’s hatred of
subjection, a young man’s restless longing to try the world for
himself.
“I advise you to sail away in one of your ships, and never come home
again till you have tried your own way,” said Jo, whose imagination was
fired by the thought of such a daring exploit, and whose sympathy was
excited by what she called ‘Teddy’s Wrongs’.
“That’s not right, Jo. You mustn’t talk in that way, and Laurie mustn’t
take your bad advice. You should do just what your grandfather wishes,
my dear boy,” said Meg in her most maternal tone. “Do your best at
college, and when he sees that you try to please him, I’m sure he won’t
be hard on you or unjust to you. As you say, there is no one else to
stay with and love him, and you’d never forgive yourself if you left
him without his permission. Don’t be dismal or fret, but do your duty
and you’ll get your reward, as good Mr. Brooke has, by being respected
and loved.”
“What do you know about him?” asked Laurie, grateful for the good
advice, but objecting to the lecture, and glad to turn the conversation
from himself after his unusual outbreak.
“Only what your grandpa told us about him, how he took good care of his
own mother till she died, and wouldn’t go abroad as tutor to some nice
person because he wouldn’t leave her. And how he provides now for an
old woman who nursed his mother, and never tells anyone, but is just as
generous and patient and good as he can be.”
“So he is, dear old fellow!” said Laurie heartily, as Meg paused,
looking flushed and earnest with her story. “It’s like Grandpa to find
out all about him without letting him know, and to tell all his
goodness to others, so that they might like him. Brooke couldn’t
understand why your mother was so kind to him, asking him over with me
and treating him in her beautiful friendly way. He thought she was just
perfect, and talked about it for days and days, and went on about you
all in flaming style. If ever I do get my wish, you see what I’ll do
for Brooke.”
“Begin to do something now by not plaguing his life out,” said Meg
sharply.
“How do you know I do, Miss?”
“I can always tell by his face when he goes away. If you have been
good, he looks satisfied and walks briskly. If you have plagued him,
he’s sober and walks slowly, as if he wanted to go back and do his work
better.”
“Well, I like that? So you keep an account of my good and bad marks in
Brooke’s face, do you? I see him bow and smile as he passes your
window, but I didn’t know you’d got up a telegraph.”
“We haven’t. Don’t be angry, and oh, don’t tell him I said anything! It
was only to show that I cared how you get on, and what is said here is
said in confidence, you know,” cried Meg, much alarmed at the thought
of what might follow from her careless speech.
“I don’t tell tales,” replied Laurie, with his ‘high and mighty’ air,
as Jo called a certain expression which he occasionally wore. “Only if
Brooke is going to be a thermometer, I must mind and have fair weather
for him to report.”
“Please don’t be offended. I didn’t mean to preach or tell tales or be
silly. I only thought Jo was encouraging you in a feeling which you’d
be sorry for by-and-by. You are so kind to us, we feel as if you were
our brother and say just what we think. Forgive me, I meant it kindly.”
And Meg offered her hand with a gesture both affectionate and timid.
Ashamed of his momentary pique, Laurie squeezed the kind little hand,
and said frankly, “I’m the one to be forgiven. I’m cross and have been
out of sorts all day. I like to have you tell me my faults and be
sisterly, so don’t mind if I am grumpy sometimes. I thank you all the
same.”
Bent on showing that he was not offended, he made himself as agreeable
as possible, wound cotton for Meg, recited poetry to please Jo, shook
down cones for Beth, and helped Amy with her ferns, proving himself a
fit person to belong to the ‘Busy Bee Society’. In the midst of an
animated discussion on the domestic habits of turtles (one of those
amiable creatures having strolled up from the river), the faint sound
of a bell warned them that Hannah had put the tea ‘to draw’, and they
would just have time to get home to supper.
“May I come again?” asked Laurie.
“Yes, if you are good, and love your book, as the boys in the primer
are told to do,” said Meg, smiling.
“I’ll try.”
“Then you may come, and I’ll teach you to knit as the Scotchmen do.
There’s a demand for socks just now,” added Jo, waving hers like a big
blue worsted banner as they parted at the gate.
That night, when Beth played to Mr. Laurence in the twilight, Laurie,
standing in the shadow of the curtain, listened to the little David,
whose simple music always quieted his moody spirit, and watched the old
man, who sat with his gray head on his hand, thinking tender thoughts
of the dead child he had loved so much. Remembering the conversation of
the afternoon, the boy said to himself, with the resolve to make the
sacrifice cheerfully, “I’ll let my castle go, and stay with the dear
old gentleman while he needs me, for I am all he has.”
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
SECRETS
Jo was very busy in the garret, for the October days began to grow
chilly, and the afternoons were short. For two or three hours the sun
lay warmly in the high window, showing Jo seated on the old sofa,
writing busily, with her papers spread out upon a trunk before her,
while Scrabble, the pet rat, promenaded the beams overhead, accompanied
by his oldest son, a fine young fellow, who was evidently very proud of
his whiskers. Quite absorbed in her work, Jo scribbled away till the
last page was filled, when she signed her name with a flourish and
threw down her pen, exclaiming...
“There, I’ve done my best! If this won’t suit I shall have to wait till
I can do better.”
Lying back on the sofa, she read the manuscript carefully through,
making dashes here and there, and putting in many exclamation points,
which looked like little balloons. Then she tied it up with a smart red
ribbon, and sat a minute looking at it with a sober, wistful
expression, which plainly showed how earnest her work had been. Jo’s
desk up here was an old tin kitchen which hung against the wall. In it
she kept her papers, and a few books, safely shut away from Scrabble,
who, being likewise of a literary turn, was fond of making a
circulating library of such books as were left in his way by eating the
leaves. From this tin receptacle Jo produced another manuscript, and
putting both in her pocket, crept quietly downstairs, leaving her
friends to nibble on her pens and taste her ink.
She put on her hat and jacket as noiselessly as possible, and going to
the back entry window, got out upon the roof of a low porch, swung
herself down to the grassy bank, and took a roundabout way to the road.
Once there, she composed herself, hailed a passing omnibus, and rolled
away to town, looking very merry and mysterious.
If anyone had been watching her, he would have thought her movements
decidedly peculiar, for on alighting, she went off at a great pace till
she reached a certain number in a certain busy street. Having found the
place with some difficulty, she went into the doorway, looked up the
dirty stairs, and after standing stock still a minute, suddenly dived
into the street and walked away as rapidly as she came. This maneuver
she repeated several times, to the great amusement of a black-eyed
young gentleman lounging in the window of a building opposite. On
returning for the third time, Jo gave herself a shake, pulled her hat
over her eyes, and walked up the stairs, looking as if she were going
to have all her teeth out.
There was a dentist’s sign, among others, which adorned the entrance,
and after staring a moment at the pair of artificial jaws which slowly
opened and shut to draw attention to a fine set of teeth, the young
gentleman put on his coat, took his hat, and went down to post himself
in the opposite doorway, saying with a smile and a shiver, “It’s like
her to come alone, but if she has a bad time she’ll need someone to
help her home.”
In ten minutes Jo came running downstairs with a very red face and the