Sarah Orne Jewett (1849–1909). The Country of the Pointed Firs. 1910.
XXIIThe Queen’s Twin
T
One September day, when I was nearly at the end of my summer at Dunnet Landing, Mrs. Todd came home from a long, solitary stroll in the wild pastures, with an eager look as if she were just starting on a hopeful quest instead of returning. She brought a little basket with blackberries enough for supper, and held it towards me so that I could see that there were also some late and surprising raspberries sprinkled on top, but she made no comment upon her wayfaring. I could tell plainly that she had something very important to say.
“You have n’t brought home a leaf of anything,” I ventured to this practiced herb-gatherer. “You were saying yesterday that the witch hazel might be in bloom.”
“I dare say, dear,” she answered in a lofty manner; “I ain’t goin’ to say it was n’t; I ain’t much concerned either way ’bout the facts o’ witch hazel. Truth is, I ’ve been off visitin’; there ’s an old Indian footpath leadin’ over towards the Back Shore through the great heron swamp that anybody can’t travel over all summer. You have to seize your time some day just now, while the low ground ’s summer-dried as it is to-day, and before the fall rains set in. I never thought of it till I was out o’ sight o’ home, and I says to myself, ‘To-day ’s the day, certain!’ and stepped along smart as I could. Yes, I ’ve been visitin’. I did get into one spot that was wet underfoot before I noticed; you wait till I get me a pair o’ dry woolen stockings, in case of cold, and I ’ll come an’ tell ye.”
Mrs. Todd disappeared. I could see that something had deeply interested her. She might have fallen in with either the sea-serpent or the lost tribes of Israel, such was her air of mystery and satisfaction. She had been away since just before mid-morning, and as I sat waiting by my window I saw the last red glow of autumn sunshine flare along the gray rocks of the shore and leave them cold again, and touch the far sails of some coastwise schooners so that they stood like golden houses on the sea.
I was left to wonder longer than I liked. Mrs. Todd was making an evening fire and putting things in train for supper; presently she returned, still looking warm and cheerful after her long walk.
“There ’s a beautiful view from a hill over where I ’ve been,” he told me; “yes, there ’s a beautiful prospect of land and sea. You would n’t discern the hill from any distance, but ’t is the pretty situation of it that counts. I sat there a long spell, and I did wish for you. No, I did n’t know a word about goin’ when I set out this morning” (as if I had openly reproached her!); “I only felt one o’ them travelin’ fits comin’ on, an’ I ketched up my little basket; I did n’t know but I might turn and come back time for dinner. I thought it wise to set out your luncheon for you in case I did n’t. Hope you had all you wanted; yes, I hope you had enough.”
“Oh, yes, indeed,” said I. My landlady was always peculiarly bountiful in her supplies when she left me to fare for myself, as if she made a sort of peace-offering or affectionate apology.
“You know that hill with the old house right on top, over beyond the heron swamp? You ’ll excuse me for explainin’,” Mr. Todd began, “but you ain’t so apt to strike inland as you be to go right along shore. You know that hill; there ’s a path leadin’ right over to it that you have to look sharp to find nowadays; it belonged to the up-country Indians when they had to make a carry to the landing here to get to the out’ islands. I ’ve heard the old folks say that there used to be a place across a ledge where they ’d worn a deep track with their moccasin feet, but I never could find it. ’T is so overgrown in some places that you keep losin’ the path in the bushes and findin’ it as you can; but it runs pretty straight considerin’ the lay o’ the land, and I keep my eye on the sun and the moss that grows one side o’ the tree trunks. Some brook ’s been choked up and the swamp ’s bigger than it used to be. Yes; I did get in deep enough, one place!”
I showed the solicitude that I felt. Mrs. Todd was no longer young, and in spite of her strong, great frame and spirited behavior, I knew that certain ills were apt to seize upon her, and would end some day by leaving her lame and ailing.
“Don’t you go to worryin’ about me,” she insisted, “settin’ still ’s the only way the Evil One ’ll ever get the upper hand o’ me. Keep me movin’ enough, an’ I ’m twenty year old summer an’ winter both. I don’t know why ’t is, but I ’ve never happened to mention the one I ’ve been to see. I don’t know why I never happened to speak the name of Abby Martin, for I often give her a thought, but ’t is a dreadful out-o’-the-way place where she lives, and I have n’t seen her myself for three or four years. She ’s a real good interesting woman, and we ’re well acquainted; she ’s nigher mother’s age than mine, but she ’s very young feeling. She made me a nice cup o’ tea, and I don’t know but I should have stopped all night if I could have got word to you not to worry.”
Then there was a serious silence before Mrs. Todd spoke again to make a formal announcement.
“She is the Queen’s Twin,” and Mrs. Todd looked steadily to see how I might bear the great surprise.
“The Queen’s Twin?” I repeated.
“Yes, she ’s come to feel a real interest in the Queen, and anybody can see how natural ’t is. They were born the very same day, and you would be astonished to see what a number o’ other things have corresponded. She was speaking o’ some o’ the facts to me to-day, an’ you ’d think she ’d never done nothing but read history. I see how earnest she was about it as I never did before. I ’ve often and often heard her allude to the facts, but now she s’ got to be old and the hurry ’s over with her work, she s’ come to live a good deal in her thoughts, as folks often do, and I tell you ’t is a sight o’ company for her. If you want to hear about Queen Victoria, why Mis’ Abby Martin ’ll tell you everything. And the prospect from that hill I spoke of is as beautiful as anything in this world; ’t is worth while your goin’ over to see her just for that.”
“When can you go again?” I demanded eagerly.
“I should say to-morrow,” answered Mrs. Todd; “yes, I should say to-morrow; but I expect ’t would be better to take one day to rest, in between. I considered that question as I was comin’ home, but I hurried so that there wa’n’t much time to think. It ’s a dreadful long way to go with a horse; you have to go ’most as far as the old Bowden place an’ turn off to the left, a master long, rough road, and then you have to turn right round as soon as you get there if you mean to get home before nine o’clock at night. But to strike across country from here, there ’s plenty o’ time in the shortest day, and you can have a good hour or two’s visit beside; ’t ain’t but a very few miles, and it ’s pretty all the way along. There used to be a few good families over there, but they ’ve died and scattered, so now she ’s far from neighbors. There, she really cried, she was so glad to see anybody comin’. You ’ll be amused to hear her talk about the Queen, but I thought twice or three times as I set there ’t was about all the company she ’d got.”
“Could we go day after to-morrow?” I asked eagerly.
“’T would suit me exactly,” said Mrs. Todd.
One can never be so certain of good New England weather as in the days when a long easterly storm has blown away the warm late-summer mists, and cooled the air so that however bright the sunshine is by day, the nights come nearer and nearer to frostiness. There was a cold freshness in the morning air when Mrs. Todd and I locked the house-door behind us; we took the key of the fields into our own hands that day, and put out across country as one puts out to sea. When we reached the top of the ridge behind the town it seemed as if we had anxiously passed the harbor bar and were comfortably in open sea at last.
“There, now!” proclaimed Mrs. Todd, taking a long breath, “now I do feel safe. It ’s just the weather that ’s liable to bring somebody to spend the day; I ’ve had a feeling of Mis’ Elder Caplin from North Point bein’ close upon me ever since I waked up this mornin’, an’ I did n’t want to be hampered with our present plans. She ’s a great hand to visit; she ’ll be spendin’ the day somewhere from now till Thanksgivin’, but there ’s plenty o’ places at the Landin’ where she goes, an’ if I ain’t there she ’ll just select another. I thought mother might be in, too, ’t is so pleasant; but I run up the road to look off this mornin’ before you was awake, and there was no sign o’ the boat. If they had n’t started by that time they would n’t start, just as the tide is now; besides, I see a lot o’ mackerel-men headin’ Green Island way, and they ’ll detain William. No, we ’re safe now, an’ if mother should be comin’ in to-morrow we ’ll have all this to tell her. She an’ Mis’ Abby Martin ’s very old friends.”
We were walking down the long pasture slopes towards the dark woods and thickets of the low ground. They stretched away northward like an unbroken wilderness; the early mists still dulled much of the color and made the uplands beyond look like a very far-off country.
“It ain’t so far as it looks from here,” said my companion reassuringly, “but we ’ve got no time to spare either,” and she hurried on, leading the way with a fine sort of spirit in her step; and presently we struck into the old Indian footpath, which could be plainly seen across the long-unploughed turf of the pastures, and followed it among the thick, low-growing spruces. There the ground was smooth and brown under foot, and the thin-stemmed trees held a dark and shadowy roof overhead. We walked a long way without speaking; sometimes we had to push aside the branches, and sometimes we walked in a broad aisle where the trees were larger. It was a solitary wood, birdless and beastless; there was not even a rabbit to be seen, or a crow high in air to break the silence.
“I don’t believe the Queen ever saw such a lonesome trail as this,” said Mrs. Todd, as if she followed the thoughts that were in my mind. Our visit to Mrs. Abby Martin seemed in some strange way to concern the high affairs of royalty. I had just been thinking of English landscapes, and of the solemn hills of Scotland with their lonely cottages and stone-walled sheepfolds, and the wandering flocks on high cloudy pastures. I had often been struck by the quick interest and familiar allusion to certain members of the royal house which one found in distant neighborhoods of New England; whether some old instincts of personal loyalty have survived all changes of time and national vicissitudes, or whether it is only that the Queen’s own character and disposition have won friends for her so far away, it is impossible to tell. But to hear of a twin sister was the most surprising proof of intimacy of all, and I must confess that there was something remarkably exciting to the imagination in my morning walk. To think of being presented at Court in the usual way was for the moment quite commonplace.
Mrs. Todd was swinging her basket to and fro like a schoolgirl as she walked, and at this moment it slipped from her hand and rolled lightly along the ground as if there were nothing in it. I picked it up and gave it to her, whereupon she lifted the cover and looked in with anxiety.
“’T is only a few little things, but I don’t want to lose ’em,” she explained humbly. “’T was lucky you took the other basket if I was goin’ to roll it round. Mis’ Abby Martin complained o’ lacking some pretty pink silk to finish one o’ her little frames, an’ I thought I ’d carry her some, and I had a bunch o’ gold thread that had been in a box o’ mine this twenty year. I never was one to do much fancy work, but we ’re all liable to be swept away by fashion. And then there ’s a small packet o’ very choice herbs that I gave a good deal of attention to; they ’ll smarten her up and give her the best of appetites, come spring. She was tellin’ me that spring weather is very wiltin’ an’ tryin’ to her, and she was beginnin’ to dread it already. Mother ’s just the same way; if I could prevail on mother to take some o’ these remedies in good season ’t would make a world o’ difference, but she gets all down hill before I have a chance to hear of it, and then William comes in to tell me, sighin’ and bewailin’, how feeble mother is. ‘Why can’t you remember ’bout them good herbs that I never let her be without?’ I say to him—he does provoke me so; and then off he goes, sulky enough, down to his boat. Next thing I know, she comes in to go to meetin’, wantin’ to speak to everybody and feelin’ like a girl. Mis’ Martin’s case is very much the same; but she ’s nobody to watch her. William ’s kind o’ slow-moulded; but there, any William ’s better than none when you get to be Mis’ Martin’s age.”
“Had n’t he any children?” I asked.
“Quite a number,” replied Mrs. Todd grandly, “but some are gone and the rest are married and settled. She never was a great hand to go about visitin’. I don’t know but Mis’ Martin might be called a little peculiar. Even her own folks has to make company of her; she never slips in and lives right along with the rest as if ’t was at home, even in her own children’s houses. I heard one o’ her sons’ wives say once she ’d much rather have the Queen to spend the day if she could choose between the two, but I never thought Abby was so difficult as that. I used to love to have her come; she may have been sort o’ ceremonious, but very pleasant and sprightly if you had sense enough to treat her her own way. I always think she ’d know just how to live with great folks, and feel easier ’long of them an’ their ways. Her son’s wife ’s a great driver with farm-work, boards a great tableful o’ men in hayin’ time, an’ feels right in her element. I don’t say but she ’s a good woman an’ smart, but sort o’ rough. Anybody that ’s gentle-mannered an’ precise like Mis’ Martin would be a sort o’ restraint.
“There ’s all sorts o’ folks in the country, same ’s there is in the city,” concluded Mrs. Todd gravely, and I as gravely agreed. The thick woods were behind us now, and the sun was shining clear overhead, the morning mists were gone, and a faint blue haze softened the distance; as we climbed the hill where we were to see the view, it seemed like a summer day. There was an old house on the height, facing southward,—a mere forsaken shell of an old house, with empty windows that looked like blind eyes. The frost-bitten grass grew close about it like brown fur, and there was a single crooked bough of lilac holding its green leaves close by the door.
“We ’ll just have a good piece of bread-an’-butter now,” said the commander of the expedition, “and then we ’ll hang up the basket on some peg inside the house out o’ the way o’ the sheep, and have a han’some entertainment as we ’re comin’ back. She ’ll be all through her little dinner when we get there, Mis’ Martin will; but she ’ll want to make us some tea, an’ we must have our visit an’ be startin’ back pretty soon after two. I don’t want to cross all that low ground again after it ’s begun to grow chilly. An’ it looks to me as if the clouds might begin to gather late in the afternoon.”
Before us lay a splendid world of sea and shore. The autumn colors already brightened the landscape; and here and there at the edge of a dark tract of pointed firs stood a row of bright swamp-maples like scarlet flowers. The blue sea and the great tide inlets were untroubled by the lightest winds.
“Poor land, this is!” sighed Mrs. Todd as we sat down to rest on the worn doorstep. “I ’ve known three good hard-workin’ families that come here full o’ hope an’ pride and tried to make something o’ this farm, but it beat ’em all. There ’s one small field that ’s excellent for potatoes if you let half of it rest every year; but the land ’s always hungry. Now, you see them little peakéd-topped spruces an’ fir balsams comin’ up over the hill all green an’ hearty; they ’ve got it all their own way! Seems sometimes as if wild Natur’ got jealous over a certain spot, and wanted to do just as she ’d a mind to. You ’ll see here; she ’ll do her own ploughin’ an’ harrowin’ with frost an’ wet, an’ plant just what she wants and wait for her own crops. Man can’t do nothin’ with it, try as he may. I tell you those little trees means business!”
I looked down the slope, and felt as if we ourselves were likely to be surrounded and overcome if we lingered too long. There was a vigor of growth, a persistence and savagery about the sturdy little trees that put weak human nature at complete defiance. One felt a sudden pity for the men and women who had been worsted after a long fight in that lonely place; one felt a sudden fear of the unconquerable, immediate forces of Nature, as in the irresistible moment of a thunderstorm.
“I can recollect the time when folks were shy o’ these woods we just come through,” said Mrs. Todd seriously. “The men-folks themselves never ’d venture into ’em alone; if their cattle got strayed they ’d collect whoever they could get, and start off all together. They said a person was liable to get bewildered in there alone, and in old times folks had been lost. I expect there was considerable fear left over from the old Indian times, and the poor days o’ witchcraft; anyway, I ’ve seen bold men act kind o’ timid. Some women o’ the Asa Bowden family went out one afternoon berryin’ when I was a girl, and got lost and was out all night; they found ’em middle o’ the mornin’ next day, not half a mile from home, scared most to death, an’ sayin’ they ’d heard wolves and other beasts sufficient for a caravan. Poor creatur’s! they ’d strayed at last into a kind of low place amongst some alders, an’ one of ’em was so overset she never got over it, an’ went off in a sort o’ slow decline. ’T was like them victims that drowns in a foot o’ water; but their minds did suffer dreadful. Some folks is born afraid of the woods and all wild places, but I must say they ’ve always been like home to me.”
I glanced at the resolute, confident face of my companion. Life was very strong in her, as if some force of Nature were personified in this simple-hearted woman and gave her cousinship to the ancient deities. She might have walked the primeval field of Sicily; her strong gingham skirts might at that very moment bend the slender stalks of asphodel and be fragrant with trodden thyme, instead of the brown wind-brushed grass of New England and frost-bitten goldenrod. She was a great soul, was Mrs. Todd, and I her humble follower, as we went our way to visit the Queen’s Twin, leaving the bright view of the sea behind us, and descending to a lower country-side through the dry pastures and fields.
The farms all wore a look of gathering age, though the settlement was, after all, so young. The fences were already fragile, and it seemed as if the first impulse of agriculture had soon spent itself without hope of renewal. The better houses were always those that had some hold upon the riches of the sea; a house that could not harbor a fishing-boat in some neighboring inlet was far from being sure of every-day comforts. The land alone was not enough to live upon in that stony region; it belonged by right to the forest, and to the forest it fast returned. From the top of the hill where we had been sitting we had seen prosperity in the dim distance, where the land was good and the sun shone upon fat barns, and where warm-looking houses with three or four chimneys apiece stood high on their solid ridge above the bay.
As we drew nearer to Mrs. Martin’s it was sad to see what poor bushy fields, what thin and empty dwelling-places had been left by those who had chosen this disappointing part of the northern country for their home. We crossed the last field and came into a narrow rain-washed road, and Mrs. Todd looked eager and expectant and said that we were almost at our journey’s end. “I do hope Mis’ Martin ’ll ask you into her best room where she keeps all the Queen’s pictures. Yes, I think likely she will ask you; but ’t ain’t everybody she deems worthy to visit ’em, I can tell you!” said Mrs. Todd warningly. “She ’s been collectin’ ’em an’ cuttin’ ’em out o’ newspapers an’ magazines time out o’ mind, and if she heard of anybody sailin’ for an English port she ’d contrive to get a little money to ’em and ask to have the last likeness there was. She ’s most covered her best-room wall now; she keeps that room shut up sacred as a meetin’-house! ‘I won’t say but I have my favorites amongst ’em,’ she told me t’ other day, ‘but they ’re all beautiful to me as they can be!’ And she ’s made some kind o’ pretty little frames for ’em all—you know there ’s always a new fashion o’ frames comin’ round; first ’t was shell-work, and then ’t was pine-cones, and bead-work ’s had its day, and now she ’s much concerned with perforated cardboard worked with silk. I tell you that best room ’s a sight to see! But you must n’t look for anything elegant,” continued Mrs. Todd, after a moment’s reflection. “Mis’ Martin’s always been in very poor, strugglin’ circumstances. She had ambition for her children, though they took right after their father an’ had little for themselves; she wa’n’t over an’ above well married, however kind she may see fit to speak. She ’s been patient an’ hard-workin’ all her life, and always high above makin’ mean complaints of other folks. I expect all this business about the Queen has buoyed her over many a shoal place in life. Yes, you might say that Abby ’d been a slave, but there ain’t any slave but has some freedom.”
Presently I saw a low gray house standing on a grassy bank close to the road. The door was at the side, facing us, and a tangle of snowberry bushes and cinnamon roses grew to the level of the window-sills. On the doorstep stood a bent-shouldered, little old woman; there was an air of welcome and of unmistakable dignity about her.
“She sees us coming,” exclaimed Mrs. Todd in an excited whisper. “There, I told her I might be over this way again if the weather held good, and if I came I ’d bring you. She said right off she ’d take great pleasure in havin’ a visit from you; I was surprised, she ’s usually so retirin’.”
Even this reassurance did not quell a faint apprehension on our part; there was something distinctly formal in the occasion, and one felt that consciousness of inadequacy which is never easy for the humblest pride to bear. On the way I had torn my dress in an unexpected encounter with a little thornbush, and I could now imagine how it felt to be going to Court and forgetting one’s feathers or her Court train.
The Queen’s Twin was oblivious of such trifles; she stood waiting with a calm look until we came near enough to take her kind hand. She was a beautiful old woman, with clear eyes and a lovely quietness and genuineness of manner; there was not a trace of anything pretentious about her, or high-flown, as Mrs. Todd would say comprehensively. Beauty in age is rare enough in women who have spent their lives in the hard work of a farmhouse; but autumn-like and withered as this woman may have looked, her features had kept, or rather gained, a great refinement. She led us into her old kitchen and gave us seats, and took one of the little straight-backed chairs herself and sat a short distance away, as if she were giving audience to an ambassador. It seemed as if we should all be standing; you could not help feeling that the habits of her life were more ceremonious, but that for the moment she assumed the simplicities of the occasion.
Mrs. Todd was always Mrs. Todd, too great and self-possessed a soul for any occasion to ruffle. I admired her calmness, and presently the slow current of neighborhood talk carried one easily along; we spoke of the weather and the small adventures of the way, and then, as if I were after all not a stranger, our hostess turned almost affectionately to speak to me.
“The weather will be growing dark in London now. I expect that you ’ve been in London, dear?” she said.
“Oh, yes,” I answered. “Only last year.”
“It is a great many years since I was there, along in the forties,” said Mrs. Martin. “’T was the only voyage I ever made; most of my neighbors have been great travelers. My brother was master of a vessel, and his wife usually sailed with him; but that year she had a young child more frail than the others, and she dreaded the care of it at sea. It happened that my brother got a chance for my husband to go as supercargo, being a good accountant, and came one day to urge him to take it; he was very ill-disposed to the sea, but he had met with losses, and I saw my own opportunity and persuaded them both to let me go too. In those days they did n’t object to a woman’s being aboard to wash and mend, the voyages were sometimes very long. And that was the way I come to see the Queen.”
Mrs. Martin was looking straight in my eyes to see if I showed any genuine interest in the most interesting person in the world.
“Oh, I am very glad you saw the Queen,” I hastened to say. “Mrs. Todd has told me that you and she were born the very same day.”
“We were indeed, dear!” said Mrs. Martin, and she leaned back comfortably and smiled as she had not smiled before. Mrs. Todd gave a satisfied nod and glance, as if to say that things were going on as well as possible in this anxious moment.
“Yes,” said Mrs. Martin again, drawing her chair a little nearer, “’t was a very remarkable thing; we were born the same day, and at exactly the same hour, after you allowed for all the difference in time. My father figured it out sea-fashion. Her Royal Majesty and I opened our eyes upon this world together; say what you may, ’t is a bond between us.”
Mrs. Todd assented with an air of triumph, and untied her hat-strings and threw them back over her shoulders with a gallant air.
“And I married a man by the name of Albert, just the same as she did, and all by chance, for I did n’t get the news that she had an Albert too till a fortnight afterward; news was slower coming then than it is now. My first baby was a girl, and I called her Victoria after my mate; but the next one was a boy, and my husband wanted the right to name him, and took his own name and his brother Edward’s, and pretty soon I saw in the paper that the little Prince o’ Wales had been christened just the same. After that I made excuse to wait till I knew what she ’d named her children. I did n’t want to break the chain, so I had an Alfred, and my darling Alice that I lost long before she lost hers, and there I stopped. If I ’d only had a dear daughter to stay at home with me, same ’s her youngest one, I should have been so thankful! But if only one of us could have a little Beatrice, I ’m glad ’t was the Queen; we ’ve both seen trouble, but she ’s had the most care.”
I asked Mrs. Martin if she lived alone all the year, and was told that she did except for a visit now and then from one of her grandchildren, “the only one that really likes to come an’ stay quiet ’long o’ grandma. She always says quick as she ’s through her schoolin’ she ’s goin’ to live with me all the time, but she ’s very pretty an’ has taking ways,” said Mrs. Martin, looking both proud and wistful, “so I can tell nothing at all about it! Yes, I ’ve been alone most o’ the time since my Albert was taken away, and that ’s a great many years; he had a long time o’ failing and sickness first.” (Mrs. Todd’s foot gave an impatient scuff on the floor.) “An’ I ’ve always lived right here. I ain’t like the Queen’s Majesty, for this is the only palace I ’ve got,” said the dear old thing, smiling again. “I ’m glad of it too, I don’t like changing about, an’ our stations in life are set very different. I don’t require what the Queen does, but sometimes I ’ve thought ’t was left to me to do the plain things she don’t have time for. I expect she ’s a beautiful housekeeper, nobody could n’t have done better in her high place, and she ’s been as good a mother as she ’s been a queen.”
“I guess she has, Abby,” agreed Mrs. Todd instantly. “How was it you happened to get such a good look at her? I meant to ask you again when I was here t’ other day.”
“Our ship was layin’ in the Thames, right there above Wapping. We was dischargin’ cargo, and under orders to clear as quick as we could for Bordeaux to take on an excellent freight o’ French goods,” explained Mrs. Martin eagerly. “I heard that the Queen was goin’ to a great review of her army, and would drive out o’ her Buckin’ham Palace about ten o’clock in the mornin’, and I run aft to Albert, my husband, and brother Horace where they was standin’ together by the hatchway, and told ’em they must one of ’em take me. They laughed, I was in such a hurry, and said they could n’t go; and I found they meant it and got sort of impatient when I began to talk, and I was ’most broken-hearted; ’t was all the reason I had for makin’ that hard voyage. Albert could n’t help often reproachin’ me, for he did so resent the sea, an’ I ’d known how ’t would be before we sailed; but I ’d minded nothing all the way till then, and I just crep’ back to my cabin an’ begun to cry. They was disappointed about their ship’s cook, an’ I ’d cooked for fo’c’s’le an’ cabin myself all the way over; ’t was dreadful hard work, specially in rough weather; we ’d had head winds an’ a six weeks’ voyage. They ’d acted sort of ashamed o’ me when I pled so to go ashore, an’ that hurt my feelin’s most of all. But Albert come below pretty soon; I ’d never given way so in my life, an’ he begun to act frightened, and treated me gentle just as he did when we was goin’ to be married, an’ when I got over sobbin’ he went on deck and saw Horace an’ talked it over what they could do; they really had their duty to the vessel, and could n’t be spared that day. Horace was real good when he understood everything, and he come an’ told me I ’d more than worked my passage an’ was goin’ to do just as I liked now we was in port. He ’d engaged a cook, too, that was comin’ aboard that mornin’, and he was goin’ to send the ship’s carpenter with me—a nice fellow from up Thomaston way; he ’d gone to put on his ashore clothes as quick ’s he could. So then I got ready, and we started off in the small boat and rowed up river. I was afraid we were too late, but the tide was setting up very strong, and we landed an’ left the boat to a keeper, and I run all the way up those great streets and across a park. ’T was a great day, with sights o’ folks everywhere, but ’t was just as if they was nothin’ but wax images to me. I kep’ askin’ my way an’ runnin’ on, with the carpenter comin’ after as best he could, and just as I worked to the front o’ the crowd by the palace, the gates was flung open and out she came; all prancin’ horses and shinin’ gold, and in a beautiful carriage there she sat; ’t was a moment o’ heaven to me. I saw her plain, and she looked right at me so pleasant and happy, just as if she knew there was somethin’ different between us from other folks.”
There was a moment when the Queen’s Twin could not go on and neither of her listeners could ask a question.
“Prince Albert was sitting right beside her in the carriage,” she continued. “Oh, he was a beautiful man! Yes, dear, I saw ’em both together just as I see you now, and then she was gone out o’ sight in another minute, and the common crowd was all spread over the place pushin’ an’ cheerin’. ’T was some kind o’ holiday, an’ the carpenter and I got separated, an’ then I found him again after I did n’t think I should, an’ he was all for makin’ a day of it, and goin’ to show me all the sights; he ’d been in London before, but I did n’t want nothin’ else, an’ we went back through the streets down to the waterside an’ took the boat. I remember I mended an old coat o’ my Albert’s as good as I could, sittin’ on the quarter-deck in the sun all that afternoon, and ’t was all as if I was livin’ in a lovely dream. I don’t know how to explain it, but there has n’t been no friend I ’ve felt so near to me ever since.”
One could not say much—only listen. Mrs. Todd put in a discerning question now and then, and Mrs. Martin’s eyes shone brighter and brighter as she talked. What a lovely gift of imagination and true affection was in this fond old heart! I looked about the plain New England kitchen, with its wood-smoked walls and homely braided rugs on the worn floor, and all its simple furnishings. The loud-ticking clock seemed to encourage us to speak; at the other side of the room was an early newspaper portrait of Her Majesty the Queen of Great Britain and Ireland. On a shelf below were some flowers in a little glass dish, as if they were put before a shrine.
“If I could have had more to read, I should have known ’most everything about her,” said Mrs. Martin wistfully. “I ’ve made the most of what I did have, and thought it over and over till it came clear. I sometimes seem to have her all my own, as if we ’d lived right together. I ’ve often walked out into the woods alone and told her what my troubles was, and it always seemed as if she told me ’t was all right, an’ we must have patience. I ’ve got her beautiful book about the Highlands; ’t was dear Mis’ Todd here that found out about her printing it and got a copy for me, and it ’s been a treasure to my heart, just as if ’t was written right to me. I always read it Sundays now, for my Sunday treat. Before that I used to have to imagine a good deal, but when I come to read her book, I knew what I expected was all true. We do think alike about so many things,” said the Queen’s Twin with affectionate certainty. “You see, there is something between us, being born just at the same time; ’t is what they call a birthright. She ’s had great tasks put upon her, being the Queen, an’ mine has been the humble lot; but she ’s done the best she could, nobody can say to the contrary, and there ’s something between us; she ’s been the great lesson I ’ve had to live by. She ’s been everything to me. An’ when she had her Jubilee, oh, how my heart was with her!”
“There, ’t would n’t play the part in her life it has in mine,” said Mrs. Martin generously, in answer to something one of her listeners had said. “Sometimes I think, now she ’s older, she might like to know about us. When I think how few old friends anybody has left at our age, I suppose it may be just the same with her as it is with me; perhaps she would like to know how we came into life together. But I ’ve had a great advantage in seeing her, an’ I can always fancy her goin’ on, while she don’t know nothin’ yet about me, except she may feel my love stayin’ her heart sometimes an’ not know just where it comes from. An’ I dream about our being together out in some pretty fields, young as ever we was, and holdin’ hands as we walk along. I ’d like to know if she ever has that dream too. I used to have days when I made believe he did know, an’ was comin’ to see me,” confessed the speaker shyly, with a little flush on her cheeks; “and I ’d plan what I could have nice for supper, and I was n’t goin’ to let anybody know she was here havin’ a good rest, except I ’d wish you, Almira Todd, or dear Mis’ Blackett would happen in, for you ’d know just how to talk with her. You see, she likes to be up in Scotland, right out in the wild country, better than she does anywhere else.”
“I ’d really love to take her out to see mother at Green Island,” said Mrs. Todd with a sudden impulse.
“Oh, yes! I should love to have you,” exclaimed Mrs. Martin, and then she began to speak in a lower tone. “One day I got thinkin’ so about my dear Queen,” she said, “an’ livin’ so in my thoughts, that I went to work an’ got all ready for her, just as if she was really comin’. I never told this to a livin’ soul before, but I feel you ’ll understand. I put my best fine sheets and blankets I spun an’ wove myself on the bed, and I picked some pretty flowers and put ’em all round the house, an’ I worked as hard an’ happy as I could all day, and had as nice a supper ready as I could get, sort of telling myself a story all the time. She was comin’ an’ I was goin’ to see her again, an’ I kep’ it up until nightfall; an’ when I see the dark an’ it come to me I was all alone, the dream left me, an’ I sat down on the doorstep an’ felt all foolish an’ tired. An’, if you ’ll believe it, I heard steps comin’, an’ an old cousin o’ mine come wanderin’ along, one I was apt to be shy of. She was n’t all there, as folks used to say, but harmless enough and a kind of poor old talking body. And I went right to meet her when I first heard her call, ’stead o’ hidin’ as I sometimes did, an’ she come in dreadful willin’, an’ we sat down to supper together; ’t was a supper I should have had no heart to eat alone.”
“I don’t believe she ever had such a splendid time in her life as she did then. I heard her tell all about it afterwards,” exclaimed Mrs. Todd compassionately. “There, now I hear all this it seems just as if the Queen might have known and could n’t come herself, so she sent that poor old creatur’ that was always in need!”
Mrs. Martin looked timidly at Mrs. Todd and then at me. “’T was childish o’ me to go an’ get supper,” she confessed.
“I guess you wa’n’t the first one to do that,” said Mrs. Todd. “No, I guess you wa’n’t the first one who ’s got supper that way, Abby,” and then for a moment she could say no more.
Mrs. Todd and Mrs. Martin had moved their chair a little so that they faced each other, and I, at one side, could see them both.
“No, you never told me o’ that before, Abby,” said Mrs. Todd gently. “Don’t it show that for folks that have any fancy in ’em, such beautiful dreams is the real part o’ life? But to most folks the common things that happens outside ’em is all in all.”
Mrs. Martin did not appear to understand at first, strange to say, when the secret of her heart was put into words; then a glow of pleasure and comprehension shone upon her face. “Why, I believe you ’re right, Almira!” she said, and turned to me.
“Would n’t you like to look at my pictures of the Queen?” she asked, and we rose and went into the best room.
The mid-day visit seemed very short. September hours are brief to match the shortening days. The great subject was dismissed for a while after our visit to the Queen’s pictures, and my companions spoke much of lesser persons until we drank the cup of tea which Mrs. Todd had foreseen. I happily remembered that the Queen herself is said to like a proper cup of tea, and this at once seemed to make her Majesty kindly join so remote and reverent a company. Mrs. Martin’s thin cheeks took on a pretty color like a girl’s. “Somehow I always have thought of her when I made it extra good,” she said. “I ’ve got a real china cup that belonged to my grandmother, and I believe I shall call it hers now.”
“Why don’t you?” responded Mrs. Todd warmly, with a delightful smile.
Later they spoke of a promised visit which was to be made in the Indian summer to the Landing and Green Island, but I observed that Mrs. Todd presented the little parcel of dried herbs, with full directions, for a cure-all in the spring, as if there were no real chance of their meeting again first. As we looked back from the turn of the road the Queen’s Twin was still standing on the doorstep watching us away, and Mrs. Todd stopped, and stood still for a moment before she waved her hand again.
“There ’s one thing certain, dear,” she said to me with great discernment; “it ain’t as if we left her all alone!”
Then we set out upon our long way home over the hill, where we lingered in the afternoon sunshine, and through the dark woods across the heron-swamp.