Chapter XIV

Miss Nancy's Nerves

The Gateses were our distant relatives. Not nearer than fourth cousins-in-law, I fancy, but we counted them among our "kinfolks" in Virginia, calling Mrs. Gates "Cousin Nancy," and Captain Gates, "Cousin 'Ratio." His proper name was Horatio, of course, and he belonged to the family that gave the Revolutionary hero, Horatio Gates, to his country.

I was slowly getting over the whooping-cough, having taken it, as I took most "catching" things that fell in my way,--with all my might. I began to whoop the last of April, and kept it up all summer, when every other child on the plantation was entirely well.

Captain Gates drove over to our house by the time the breakfast-table was cleared one sultry August day, bringing in his roomy double buggy a basket of Georgia peaches--brunettes with crimson cheeks--and the biggest watermelon I had ever seen, as a neighborly gift to my mother.

"Miss Nancy gave me no peace of my life till I got off with them," he said in his loud, breezy tones. "There's none of her kin she sets more store by than by Cousin Ma'y Anna Burwell. And she's as proud as a peacock of our fruit. I tell her a judgment will come upon her for it. As I take it, Old Marster sends the rain upon the unjust as well as upon the just, and if it's our turn this year, somebody else's turn will come next year, and yet we'll be as good Christians then as we are now. It's one of His ways that's past finding out. Howdy'e, little lady!" putting out a brawny hand to pull me between his knees.

I was standing a yard or so away, but right in front of him, my hands behind me, my eyes and ears, and, I'm afraid, my mouth, open to his hearty talk. I had never heard God called "Old Marster" before, and if I had not been taught that children ought not to criticise what grown people say and do, I should have been quite sure that it was wrong. I did not want to think any harm of Cousin 'Ratio, and determined that I would not, when he drew a great finger gently over my thin cheek, and looked down at me with kindly, pitying eyes.

"Tut! tut! tut! this is too bad! too bad! We must fill up this gulley somehow, Cousin Ma'y Anna. Other folks' victuals are the best physic I know for that sort of work. Miss Nancy would cry her eyes out if I was to go home with the story that little Molly Burwell had coughed her bones pretty near as bare as barrel-staves, and I didn't try to cover them up again. A week in my peach-orchard and watermelon-patch, with quarts of cream and Miss Nancy's breakfasts, dinners, and suppers--is what she wants. Get her bonnet, and stick a tooth-brush and a pocket-handkerchief into a bandbox, Chloe, for I'm going to take her home with me, right straight off."

My mother shook her head smilingly at the thought of the week's visit.

"The child coughs so badly at night that I don't like to have her away from me, Cousin 'Ratio. But change of air, even for a day, would do her good. Her father and I will come for her about sundown."

Thus it happened, that, decked in a clean pink calico frock and white muslin apron, I was hoisted to my perch in the high gig beside Cousin 'Ratio, and set off to spend a whole day at Cold Comfort.

The name was so out of keeping with Cousin 'Ratio's kind, red face and funny ways, and the warm, sweet-smelling day, that I couldn't help asking him on the way "why he called his house such a _shivery_ name?"

The gig swayed and creaked under his laugh.

"That was just the reason my grandmother gave for naming it. You see, the house stands on the top of a hill, and all the winds from three counties get at it in winter. The house my grandfather put up was of wood, and none too tight in the joints, and the poor old lady, his wife--my step-grandmother she was--had rheumatism, and suffered a heap all the year 'round. So, nothing would do but it must be 'Cold Comfort,' and Cold Comfort it has been ever since. We Gateses have a way of giving in to our wives in 'most everything. Everything that's reasonable, I mean. And we don't pick out unreasonable girls for wives."

The fat, sleek horse was taking his own lazy pace in a mile of shady road, cut through the heart of a pine forest. The ground was brown and soft with pine needles, and the high gig swung and creaked a sort of drowsy tune. Cousin 'Ratio tapped the wheel nearest him with his whip, and fell into talk with himself, rather than with the child under his elbow.

"Now, there's Miss Nancy! There's been a heap of fun poked at me, first and last, for building my house in the shape I did. Though, for the life of me, I can't see why I should be obleeged to live in a four-square box because every other man-Jack in Pow'tan County builds his in that way. Miss Nancy was always mighty nervous from the time she was a child; I knew it when I married her. Fact is, she says to me: 'Cap'n Gates, I'm as nervous as a witch, and I'm afraid you'll get out of patience with me sometimes, and I wouldn't blame you if you did.' And, says I,--my hand right on my heart,--'Miss Nancy Miller! if you'll take _me_ as I am, I'll be proud and happy to take _you_ as you are, nerves and all!' says I. 'The proudest man in the State of Virginia,' says I. 'Call it a bargain.'

"And she did--bless her soul! It was the best bargain that ever I made, or ever expect to make, too. Some men marry Temper, and some Extravagant Notions, and some Vanity, and some Jealous, Suspicious Dispositions, and some, again, Stinginess--Good gracious! there's no end to the disagreeable things men _do_ marry! I married _Nerves!_ and with them, the best and sweetest and, to my way of thinking, the prettiest woman in the County and State, and the Universe, and I've been thankful for it every day and every hour since--God bless her!"

I waited for him to say something more until I began to wonder, then to get impatient, that he let the horse jog along, the soft creak of the gig keeping time with the leisurely motions of the pampered beast, the master's eyes fixed upon the wheel he was tapping with his whip, as if he had forgotten me entirely.

I made a bold effort to reopen the conversation.

"I suppose Cousin Nancy asked you to build your house round, instead of square?"

I had heard so many different stories about the odd structure which was one of the county curiosities that I was anxious to get at the truth.

He laughed low and pleasantly:--

"Ask me! Not she, bless your soul! She would never have thought of such a thing. 'Twas me that studied it out, lying awake on windy nights because I knew she couldn't sleep for the roaring and whistling around the corners of the old house, and the wind humming in the chimneys and between the window-sashes like a bumblebee as big as a whale. It made her feel so lonesome and blue that many's the time I've heard her crying to herself when she thought I was sound asleep. We were going to pull down the old house, anyhow. It was a rickety concern, and inconvenient as could be. So I got Miss Nancy to tell me how many rooms and closets and all that she'd like to have in a house that was to be built on purpose for her, and for nobody else, and I made a plan of it all on paper, and then I sent her up to stay with her mother in Buckingham County for six months, going up to see her myself every Saturday to spend Sunday--like a nigger going to his 'wife-house,'"--here he stopped to laugh again--"until the last window-shutter was hung, and all the furniture put back and in order--Je_rew_salem! how I _did_ work! Then I brought her home. I wish you could have seen her face when we came in sight of the solid brick house--round as a cheese box--and I told her I had it built in that shape, so's she should never be made sorrowful, nor kept awake again by the wind a-cutting up shines around sharp corners, so long as we both should live--Amen!"

He jerked a blazing red bandanna handkerchief out of his pocket, turning his face clear away from me to do it, and blew his nose until the woods rang as with the echoes of a foxhunter's horn, then rolled the handkerchief into a ball and polished his face with it in the oddest possible fashion.

Most of the tales current about the round brick house had something to do with Cousin Nancy's whims, especially with her dislike to hearing the wind blow around the corners. Young as I was, I felt, after hearing Cousin 'Ratio's story, that he had done a beautiful thing in planning the ingenious surprise for his delicate wife. It crossed my mind, too, that she might have thought the house as ridiculous as other people did, yet pretended to like it sooner than hurt his feelings. She must be a good and devoted wife. Furthermore, I got into my foolish head the notion that it was nice and interesting to have Nerves. I resolved to get a set of my own at an early opportunity and to work them well. To this end, I would watch Cousin Nancy's ways and copy them as closely as a little girl could copy the behavior of a grown-up heroine.

She met us in the porch of the house, crying out with pleasure at sight of me.

"That's a little lady, not to be afraid to come all by herself to see two quiet old folks!" she said as she kissed me. "I ought to have had a dozen girls and boys for you to play with by this time--but I haven't a single one."

She laughed in saying it, yet with such sincere regret of face and accent that I answered, without taking time to think:--

"I'm mighty sorry you haven't!" Catching myself up, I blundered on: "Not that you and Cousin 'Ratio are not company enough for me. But it seems a pity that, in this pretty place, with so many peaches and watermelons and flowers--and pigeons--and chickens--and all that--there are not any children to eat, and to play with them--and keep you company. I've heard mother say, 'Home wouldn't be Home without the babies.'"

"Your mother is right, child! Your mother is right!"

The words seemed to stick in her throat, and to scrape it as she got them out. Then, to my horror, she sank into a rocking-chair, and, throwing her hands over her face, began to cry, with queer little squeals between the sobs that shook her all over.

[Illustration: A TEA-PARTY IN THE SUMMER-HOUSE.

"Dovey appeared with a large saucer of peaches and cream."]

Malviny, her mulatto maid, ran to her with a bottle of hartshorn, and Cousin 'Ratio knelt upon the floor by her and put his arm about her, and fanned her with a turkey-tail fan, and another colored woman rushed off to the kitchen, and was back in a jiffy with a bunch of feathers all on fire, and making a dreadful smell, and stuck them under her mistress's nose. I backed to the door with a wild notion of getting out of the way, and running back home, yet could not tear myself away from the unusual scene.

As soon as Cousin Nancy could speak, she laughed at sight of my face,--the tears still dripping all the way to her chin,--and held out her arms:--

"Poor little lammie! did I frighten the life out of her? You mustn't mind my nervous turns, dear. They don't mean anything."

"I was afraid I had said something I oughtn't to," I faltered, on the verge of tears. "I'm sorry if I did!"

Whereupon I was drawn close to her, and kissed three times to assure me that I was the "best little girl in the world, and that she wouldn't give way again."

"But, you see, I had got so nervous because you were gone so long, and you drove that skittish colt, and I was sure something had happened," she explained to her husband, who still stood by her, stroking the back of her hand, in awkward fondness. He stooped to lay his bearded face against hers.

"That's like you! Always thinking of other people, and never of yourself!" he said admiringly.

She thought a great deal of me for the rest of my visit, ordering Malviny to cut out and make a doll's pelisse for me of a lovely piece of red silk, saying that she would have done it herself if sewing did not make her so nervous.

"I haven't darned a sock or hemmed a pocket-handkerchief for Cap'n Gates in ten years. If he were not the best man on earth, he would have sent me packing long ago."

She despatched another servant to the garret for some toys her sister's children had left with her last year, and gave me permission to pull all the flowers I wanted in the garden. I carried three maimed dolls, a headless horse, a three-legged cat, and a Britannia tea-set to a summer-house at the end of a long walk, and made believe that I was Titania, the Queen of the Fairies, of whom I had read in a tattered copy of Shakespeare I found in a lumber closet. By and by, Malviny brought out to me a pretty china plate with four sugar cakes, shaped like ivy leaves, and a glass of very sweet lemonade. Awhile later, Dovey, a half-grown girl, appeared with a large saucer of peaches and cream, plentifully sugared.

"Mistis says you must eat 'em all, for she knows you mus' be mighty thirsty, and peaches is coolin' for little ladies whar's been sick."

There were still some cake crumbs and a spoonful of peaches left when I saw Cousin Nancy herself come sailing down the walk.

[Illustration]