Brenda's Ward Read online

  CHAPTER XI

  MARTINE'S ALTRUISM

  In spite of her love of fun, Martine was considerate enough not to teaseAngelina about her recital. Later, by degrees of her own accord, thelittle Portuguese told the story. After all, there was not much to tell.She had depended on a few posters scattered at random to fill the hall.She had thought that the girls of the Excelsior Club would sell manytickets. But she had fixed the price so high that the girls couldneither afford to buy them, nor succeed in disposing of them to theirfriends.

  Moreover, on the night of the recital, a Grand Army fair was holding anauction to which admission was free, and thither every one with a pennyto spend had rushed, hoping for bargains. Even if Angelina had been awell-known elocutionist, she would have had difficulty in drawing peoplefrom the greater attraction.

  "But I never thought," she said, "that some of the people who regularlybought tickets from me would never pay for them, just because theythought it was too much trouble to go when they found out how far awaythe hall was. My brother John bought and paid for tickets, and so didyou, Miss Martine, and with the tickets I sold I just made out to payMr. Smithkins the ten dollars I'd promised him. But it was veryembarrassing about the hall--and if it hadn't been for your fifteendollars, I don't know what I should have done."

  Martine did not explain her brother's part in the matter.

  "Of course, that Mrs. Stinton could have charged it as well as not. Itwouldn't have been anything to her. They say she owns a whole block ofhouses down by the ferry. But it's my last of the Excelsior Club. Iconsider they went back on me."

  "I hope you have learned a lesson, Angelina. You ought not to havepromised to pay for the hall until you were sure of getting enough moneyout of a recital. You should have waited--"

  "But I couldn't give a recital without a hall, and I should have paid ifI'd sold more tickets."

  "Well, this ought to be the last of your recitals."

  "Didn't I do well?" asked Angelina, anxiously.

  "Oh, that isn't the point."

  Martine did not care at this moment to give her precise opinion ofAngelina's dramatic ability.

  "But you see, this must have cost you a great deal, and you ought tosave your money--everybody ought, and life is more serious--there,Angelina--I'll leave it all to mamma. She'll advise you," concludedMartine, feeling that she was getting into deep water, in advocatingprinciples that she herself had not always been able to live up to.

  The experience of that memorable Saturday, combined with the advicegiven by Mrs. Stratford, so far influenced Angelina that for the timeshe devoted herself exclusively to her household duties, ceased to takeelocution lessons, and began to save money. At first she offered to payMartine a dollar a week, but when the latter learned that Angelina hadother debts, she urged her to consider them first.

  "I can wait," she said, "and when you have finished paying for that pinksatin dress--it would be a good idea for you to make your mother apresent."

  Nora Gostar, who always kept closely in touch with the Rosas at theirhome in Shiloh, had asked Martine to influence Angelina to do more forher family.

  "Ever since the Four Club years ago began to help the Rosas, Angelinahas taken it for granted that the public would look after them. It istrue that on the whole they are now fairly prosperous. With her boardersand her garden Mrs. Rosa makes both ends meet, and John always hassomething to spare for his brothers and sisters. It is only Angelina whoseems ready to escape all responsibility. You will remind her, won'tyou, Martine?"

  "Yes," said Martine, "but some people say I haven't enough sense ofresponsibility myself."

  "My dear, then no one has observed you lately. You certainly have takenhold splendidly of the girls in your painting class. Two or three ofthem, you know, have been called 'hard cases.' No one else ever couldinterest them, and yet they seem perfectly devoted to you."

  "Oh, they are so amusing," said Martine, "that I can't help throwingmyself into the work, and then I find out what they want to do, and letthem do it. It's silly to make people do things they dislike. Ofcourse," she added, with some embarrassment, "I am aware that thiswouldn't be the right principle if I were a real artist, and were tryingto make artists out of them. Some of them can't even draw, but they dotake an interest in color, and so I am always hunting for good picturesin black and white--and their color effects sometimes are quitewonderful."

  Martine did not explain that not a little of her own pocket money wasspent for pictures suitable to her rather original method of conductingthe class. Photographs and lithographs cost money, and though Amyremonstrated that it was contrary to art to gild the lily, Martinereplied that the end would justify her means.

  Among her six little pupils only one showed marked talent. She was aRussian girl who had been in Boston but a year, and her gift took theform of a genius for making caricatures.

  Her pencil was constantly in her hand, and even with her brush she couldoutline figures and scenes on the margins of her pictures that wouldsend the others into fits of uproarious laughter.

  "Esther, Esther," Martine said one day, "you should never make fun ofolder people. Who is that tall, thin person, with the lorgnette in herhand?"

  "That's teacher," explained one of the others, "the teacher in ourschool. It's her dead image, ain't it?" and the friend to whom sheturned for confirmation, nodded, adding--

  "When she's mad she puts her glasses up just so--and we all feel cheaper'n thirty cents."

  "I hope you don't make fun of me this way, Esther, behind my back."

  "Oh, no'm, you ain't a teacher."

  As Martine was already aware that her girls always spoke of her as "theyoung lady," this doubtful compliment passed without criticism. Neitherin her heart did she think it wise to criticise the little girl'scaricatures.

  She was delighted when Mrs. Redmond, after looking at Esther's drawings,said that the child had real talent. Then without further delay, withoutindeed consulting anyone, Martine engaged an expensive teacher to giveEsther drawing lessons once a week. Mrs. Redmond would have taught hergratuitously, had she not felt that the little girl's peculiar talentwould be best developed by a teacher who made a specialty of figuredrawing.

  Before Mr. Stratford's departure for England Martine had suggested thathe add to the sum he had given her for Yvonne. To the little Acadiennehad gone one third of three hundred dollars. This was a sum that Mr.Stratford had asked his daughter to share with her two friends Amy andPriscilla, and expend on the three young people in whom they had taken aspecial interest during their trip through Acadia.

  It had surprised Martine not a little when her usually generous fatherhad hesitated about granting her little request for Yvonne.

  "Send her ten dollars from your own Christmas money, dear child, andlater I will add to it. Your desire to help her pleases me very much,but just now I would rather not promise a large sum."

  "But I did not mean _very_ large, papa; only enough for Alexander Babetto bring her up here and stay for a few months, until the doctors knowwhat can be done for her eyes. It would make you happier, wouldn't it,papa, to know that she could see perfectly?"

  "Indeed it would, Martine, but just now I would rather postpone anythingof this kind. Besides, even if I were a second Croesus, I should bemore inclined to wait until I could have more thorough knowledge of thecondition of the Babet family."

  "Oh, papa, surely you believe what I have told you--that Yvonne isalmost blind, and that she has the most beautiful voice."

  "Yes, my dear, but I know also that the Acadians are thrifty, and thatthe Babets will spend your gift so carefully, that it will go fartherthan five hundred dollars with most people. Some day we shall do morefor Yvonne, but for the present she must be content with what she has."

  So positively did Mr. Stratford speak, that Martine, too, had to becontent. She managed, however, not only to send the money that Mr.Stratford had suggested, but a box of slightly worn garments that couldbe adapted to the use of the little blind girl
. She remembered Yvonne'slove for pretty things, and what she sent had only enough of the newnessworn off to enable the box to pass the watchful customs officials ofNova Scotia.

  Priscilla did not pretend to be as altruistic as Martine, though bothprofessed to take Amy for their model. Yet letters between Eunice andPriscilla passed back and forth constantly, and after reading themPriscilla was apt to sigh, and fall into a brown study; for Eunice,having for the first time found a confidante of her own age, opened herheart almost too freely, and in emphasizing the disappointments of herdaily life, sometimes threw a cloud over her friend. This is a mistakemade by some young letter-writers. They write intensely of personaldisappointments that soon pass away. Yet the letter that they send seemsto give permanence to their troubles, and if the person to whom theywrite is sensitive, she pictures the absent one as continually unhappy.

  Eunice and Balfour Airton were brother and sister living with theirmother in Annapolis. They had been able to make pleasanter than it mighthave been the stay of Mrs. Redmond and the three girls in the old town.

  Eunice and Priscilla had soon become warm friends, and after theircomparatively short acquaintance parted almost in tears. The Airtonswere descended from Tories who had gone to Nova Scotia after theRevolution, and had always been highly respected. Even before the deathof Eunice's father, however, they had lost much of their property, andwere under a heavy strain to make both ends meet. Balfour Airton, whowas a year or two older than Martine, was working his way throughcollege. In his vacations he served as clerk in a grocery shop. Indeed,Martine had made his acquaintance one day when lost in the fog on theNorth Mountain. She had been rescued by Balfour, who fortunately droveup in his grocery cart.

  Balfour proved a most companionable boy, and his energy and industrymade a great impression on Martine, when she contrasted him with theidler college boys whom she knew.

  By a combination of proofs needless to describe here, Martine discoveredthat she and the Airtons were third cousins, since theirgreat-great-grandfather and hers, Thomas Blair, was the Tory exile whohad gone to Nova Scotia after the Revolution. In the same way EdithBlair, Brenda's great friend, was a cousin of Eunice and Balfour, andMartine's first impulse on returning home had been to urge her fatherand Mr. Blair to provide for Balfour, so that he no longer need earn hisway through college.

  Fortunately enough, before she had spoken to her father, she talked thematter over with Mrs. Redmond.

  "My dear Martine, I sincerely hope that you will change your mind aboutthis. Or, if you do not, hope that your father and Mr. Blair will behard-hearted enough to refuse your request."

  "How hard-hearted _you_ are, Mrs. Redmond!"

  "No, indeed, not hard-hearted--only hard-headed."

  "What do you mean?"

  "I am looking strictly to the practical side. In the first place, youwould risk the loss of Balfour's friendship, if you should put him inthe position of a pauper--for this is the light in which he might regardyour interference."

  "Oh, no, not a pauper!"

  "Well, Balfour is very proud--and in the second place, he could notafford to risk his independence, as he must, if he should accept moneyfrom strangers."

  "But they wouldn't be strangers; in the South third cousins are verynear."

  "Well, this isn't the South, and the relationship is on your mother'sside, and Mrs. Blair's. Balfour would probably regard the men asstrangers. Think over what I have said, Martine, and remember Balfour'sdisposition."

  "It is because he is so bright and industrious that I think it a shamethat he should not have as good a chance as Lucian or Robert."

  "Balfour has the best possible chance. In the end his friends will beproud of him, and he will be thankful that no one took away hisindependence."

  Martine was sufficiently impressed by what Mrs. Redmond had said to giveup for the time the plan she had formed of getting help for Balfour.

  When she saw that her father was not quite ready to do what she hadplanned for Yvonne, she was glad that she had not thrown on him theextra burden of considering the case of Balfour. She decided, however,to interest Lucian in Eunice's brother. In spite of Lucian's fondnessfor teasing Martine, he was really devoted to her. He was apt in the endto be influenced by her, although in the beginning often pretending toresist her influence.

  In his Freshman year, Lucian was drifting into the extravagant habits ofan idle group from the preparatory school where he had fitted forHarvard. Fortunately, however, at the critical moment he came under theken of Fritz Tomkins--a Junior. Between the two there then sprang up afriendship rather unusual in its way. For even at Harvard Freshmen andJuniors are seldom intimate. So it happened that when the summer came,instead of going to Europe with two or three of his classmates, Lucianreally preferred a trip with Fritz. The two went to Nova Scotia, and theconstant companionship with the sensible Fritz had given Lucian newviews of life, or not to put it too seriously--of the value of time andmoney. Fritz himself was gay and light-hearted, fond of teasing his oldfriend Amy Redmond, and willing always to have others laugh at him. Butbeneath all his apparent frivolity was a depth of purpose that those whoknew him best fully realized.