CHAPTER II.

A FORTUNATE THING.

MR. WEST and his daughter were at breakfast. At least they were sitting before a small square table that held part of a loaf of baker's bread, and a saucer in which floated a sickly yellowish mass named butter, for which only the flies seemed to have a relish; and they, poor creatures, paid for their appetites by their lives. Dilly was constantly engaged in fishing out victim after victim who seemed determined to sacrifice himself in the oily flood.

The little room in which the table was set, had but one window, and that an eastern, and the morning sun had a fierce spite against it, apparently, for he flashed in, even at this comparatively early hour, red and angry, revealing dust and cobwebs, and the bodies of dead moths, and bugs, of every shape and size. The floor was bare and soiled; the three chairs were sadly worn; the low mantel was decorated as the mantels of such rooms are wont to be, with scraps of paper, little bundles of left-over things for which there was no place, a bunch of dried wild flowers, which Dilly had saved because they were once so pretty, and because she hardly ever had any flowers, and could not bear to throw them away; besides which, there were a fork, a spoon, and a soiled cup, left over from yesterday's effort at cooking; and around this spoon, and fork, and cup, the flies had gathered in such masses that they were simply black humps rising out of the surrounding dust.

Yet this was not the home of a drunkard; Mr. West wail a sober, hard-working man, who wasted no money on himself, save that which went for his daily smoke; and he labored under the usual wild delusions, first, that tobacco was necessary to sustain his failing strength, secondly, that it cost a very trifle, not worthy to be counted among the family economies. It was simply a home where hard grinding poverty, occasioned by fire, and flood, and other misfortunes, had brought in its train sickness and death, and left these two to struggle on as best they could. Their "best" was very feeble this morning. Mr. West sturdily ate at his stale and indeed almost moldy bit of bread, grimly dipping it in the oil occasionally, to make it slip down more easily, and stealthily watched Dilly as she turned her piece over on her plate with a knife, looked doubtfully at the under side, turned it back again, and finally took a very little nibble from its outer edge, and sat back discouraged.

"You can't eat a mite this morning, can you, my girl? And it's another scorching day—worse than yesterday, I'm afraid; I don't know what we are going to do." And he heaved such a weary sigh that Dilly, who was almost too sorry for herself to endure it, became so sorry for him that despite her efforts at self-control, the tears seemed rushing into her throat to choke her.

"Don't bother about me, father," she said at last, when she could get her voice. "I ain't a mite hungry, so of course I don't need to eat; and it'll be cooler sometime; then I'll feel better."

"I don't know when," said the father gloomily, referring to the weather. "It ain't August yet, and everybody says that will be a scorcher, this year; and folks who go on day after day without being a mite hungry, don't get strength any too fast. You ought to have something nourishing, but where you are going to get it beats me."

"Of course it does, father. Never mind, I don't want anything; it seems to me I couldn't eat, this morning, not if there was toast, and egg, and milk, and everything."

But this made the father sigh again, and made Dilly so sorry she had spoken that the tears rushed back, and this time a few of them had their way, and rolled down her cheek. Toast and egg were dainties that her mother used to make for her when she was sick; no longer ago than last spring when eggs were scarcest, and had not been seen in the West family for weeks and weeks, she remembered. And the father remembered it too, how Dilly was sick for several days, not dangerously, but a little "down," the mother said, and needed petting; and how one morning there was a covered dish at her place, which, being uncovered with care, disclosed a lovely fresh egg lying on a slice of the daintiest bit of toast, of just such a delicate brown as only a mother could make. How was it possible to keep back tears as she thought of these things?

The father did not wonder at the tears, but drooped his head lower, and at last, when he thought Dilly too much occupied to notice, put up the back of his hard hand and brushed away one or two of his own.

It was well for them both that something happened, just then, to change the current of their thoughts. Dilly saw it first, and exclaimed: "Father, there is Mrs. Hammond's phaeton at the door again. I do hope she has not changed her mind about the work; because I thought—" And there Dilly stopped.

"What did you think, my girl?" the father said, rising hastily, and looking about for his old straw hat.

"It's no matter, father," and a faint flush stole into the sallow face. "I thought maybe she would let you pick a flower or two, when you were there at work; I would so like a sweet-smelling flower. She had one in the carriage yesterday, but I don't suppose she gives away her flowers."

Mr. West went out without saying a word.

Dilly, when she was five or six years old, frolicked about, all the summer day, in a great garden full of old-fashioned flowers, and picked as many as she would. I don't suppose she had an idea how it made her father's heart ache to think that now she longed in vain for one little sweet-smelling blossom. Children know very little about father's hearts.

But what Mrs. Hammond wanted nearly took the breath away from the astonished father. Dilly watched them curiously while they talked, rather while Mrs. Hammond talked, and her father, after a first startled exclamation, listened, whether in pleasure, as well as in intense surprise, Dilly could not be certain.

"She's coming in!" Dilly exclaimed at last, leaving the window suddenly, and giving the little table an excited push to get it further into the background, dusting a chair with her apron, hanging a towel, which was thrown across the back of another chair, in a corner, as much out of sight as possible, and by these preparations so exhausting her strength, or rather her weakness, that she sat flushed and panting when at last Mrs. Hammond finally appeared at the door.

"Good-morning," she said pleasantly. "She looks a little better this morning, I think, or, is it the heat which has flushed her face?"

The room was insufferably warm. Though there was no fire in the shabby little cook stove, and had not been that day, it was warmer than any room in Mrs. Hammond's house ever became.

Mr. West brought forward the dusted chair for the lady, and she dropped gracefully into it, trailing her delicate white robes and rich embroidery on the bare, and not clean, floor, in a way which made Dilly shiver. Then he said with a troubled look at the girl, "I don't see no great change for the better, ma'am; she ain't eat a mite this morning, and folks can't get strong without eating, I s'pose. Though how folks are going to eat, when—" And there the poor father stopped.

Mrs. Hammond finished the sentence: "When the weather is so oppressive. That is true; this heat takes away the appetites of even well persons."

Mrs. Hammond had no experience with poverty, save that which was given by an occasional glance of her eyes around the homes of the poor; and though she thought she understood all about it, I cannot describe to you how shocked she would have been, had she known that a dry and nearly moldy piece of bread was the only temptation to eat which had been before Dilly that morning.

However, she did appreciate the heat, and made haste to get herself out of it. "You live in such a very close part of the town, Mr. West, I do not see how she is ever to gain strength here; there is no chance for a circulation of air."

Which is a fortunate thing for you, dear Mrs. Hammond, if you did but know it; for the air which would circulate through here if it had a chance, would come direct from the stables and out-houses clustered thick on the East side, or from the over-crowded tenement houses on the North. But the lady knew nothing of all this.

She turned to the girl and spoke rapidly: "I have been talking with your father about you. What is your name?"

"Fidelia, ma'am, but they all call me Dilly."

"Well, Fidelia, I have been asking your father to let you go with me to the mountains; I am going to-morrow. I fancy that after a few days of mountain air you would grow strong enough to look after my little Ethel while she is out of doors, and keep her out of harm's way. What do you say, would you like to try it? It is not far from home, you know; only on Monteagle—a few hours' ride."

But father and visitor had both over-estimated poor Dilly's strength, or else did not understand the strength of her longing for a breath of cool air. The very word "mountains," coupled with the bare possibility of her seeing them, made her feel sick and faint. The room began to whirl about in the most unaccountable manner; Mrs. Hammond faded into the merest gray speck, but rose up without sound and floated to her side, and reached out a white hand which sparkled with rings, and then—Dilly knew no more.

Where she went to, or how long she stayed, she did not know, but when she opened her eyes again, she was spread out on all three of the chairs, and her father was putting little dabbles of warm water over her face with what poor Dilly knew was the cup-cloth! And Mrs. Hammond with an air of the greatest concern stood helplessly looking on, and shuddering a little as the muddy-looking drops from the cloth gathered in a dark puddle on the dark floor.

"Are you better, my girl?" Mr. West asked, his voice as gentle and as full of anxiety as it could have been if the cloth with which he mopped her face had been of the softest linen.

Dilly gasped, and struggled, and pushed away the cloth with her hand, making a great effort to sit up.

"What's the matter?" she asked, "I ain't sick."

"Lie still, my girl, don't try to sit up yet; you fainted dead away while the lady was talking to you. It's the heat, I s'pose. You see, ma'am," turning to Mrs. Hammond, and shaking his head with a troubled air, "she hasn't got any strength to build on; I'm afraid she wouldn't be able to do a thing—she's all tuckered out."

There was the deepest anxiety in his voice. It was clear that the thought of the mountain air had touched the only ray of hope for his girl which this father's heart had left, yet he must be honest, and own that he did not believe she could be of use.

"She would try her level best, ma'am; and before she was sick she was as handy a little woman as could be found; and she is fond of little folks, and as good as gold to them; but the fever has burnt all the life out of her—you see how it is."

"Yes," said Mrs. Hammond, with sudden energy, "I see how it is; and I see she will get no strength so long as she stays here. I think you would do well, Mr. West, to get her ready to go with me to-morrow morning; I am going to take the early train, to avoid as much of the heat as possible. I think the mountain air will help her—in fact, I am almost sure of it. Wouldn't you like to try it, my poor girl?"

"Oh!" said Dilly, drawing a long tremulous sigh, and turning a pair of great earnest eyes which were now dim with a film of tears, full on the lady's face. "I can't think it is possible that I could go; it would be almost like going to heaven."

"You 'shall' go, poor child," Mrs. Hammond said, and she felt the tears starting in her own eyes. "Mr. West, I feel sure it is the thing to do; your daughter will die, I am afraid, if she has not a change."

She was moving toward the door as she spoke, for Dilly had now quite recovered, and had struggled to a seat on one chair.

Mr. West followed the lady, with a strange light in his eyes, and yet with a look of intense perplexity on his face. "I'm sure," he said, "that it would be a wonderful chance for her; but I don't know, ma'am, after all, as I can do it—her clothes, you see—I don't know much about such things; only I know she has got along with almost nothing ever since the sickness and the hard times; and she has been sick now for six weeks or more, and I couldn't get no washing done hardly, and, you see how it is—the poor child's mother is gone." For this last sentence, he sunk his voice almost to a whisper.

Mrs. Hammond who was by this time on the steps, turned and looked thoughtfully again at Dilly.

"How old is she?"

"Going on thirteen; she was twelve early in the spring."

"About the age of Mrs. Chestney's Claire," Mrs. Hammond said, not to the father, but as if speaking aloud to herself. Then she stood lost in thought while Mr. West continued:

"And another thing, ma'am, I understand your kind meaning, but I'm afraid it will be good while before she could do a thing to pay you for it all. She is weaker this morning than ever, and it wouldn't be right, maybe, for you to go to the expense—"

Mrs. Hammond interrupted him. She had not heard a word he said:

"I think I can manage it, Mr. West. I will send a woman to wash and iron Dilly's things to-day, and get them ready. If she has nothing suitable for travelling, I think my friend Mrs. Chestney who has a daughter a little older than she, can help us out. I will manage it in some way. The train leaves the station at six-fifteen; I will send the carriage around for Dilly at a quarter of six. It will be easier for her to get ready before this excessive heat comes on. It will be all right, Mr. West; I will bring her back to you with some color in her cheeks, I believe. Dear! Dear! How intensely hot the sun is! I wish we were at Monteagle this minute. Good-morning."

She was in her carriage already, and the sleek little pony was obeying her word of command.

The father looked after her in a half-dazed way, shading his eyes with his hand, until the fat pony turned the corner.

"Well, I never!" he said at last, and went back to Dilly.