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Page 13
CHAPTER IV.
"ONE FLEW WEST."
Out in the village of Plainsville, Kansas, the rain was running in
torrents down the gables of the little brown house where the Ware family
lived. It had rained all day, a cold, steady pour, until the world
outside had taken on the appearance of early March, instead of late May.
Holland and Mary and the baby (they called him baby still, although he
was nearly four) were playing menagerie in the corners of the
dining-room. They had a tent made of the clothes-horse and some sheets,
and the growling and roaring that went on inside was something terrific.
It made no difference to the little mother, placidly sewing by the last
rays of daylight at one of the western windows; but the noise grated on
Joyce's mood.
Joyce had finished setting the supper-table, and while she waited for
the potatoes to boil she stood with her face pressed against the kitchen
window, looking gloomily out into the back yard.
It was not a cheerful outlook. Nothing was to be seen but the high board
alley fence with a broken chicken-coop leaning against it, the
weather-beaten old stable, and a scraggy, dripping peach-tree. The yard
was full of puddles, and still the rain splashed on. The sight made
Joyce want to cry.
"If I wasn't at home," she said to herself, "I should think that I am
homesick, for I feel the way I did that day up in Monsieur Gr�ville's
pear-tree in the old French garden. Then I was tired of France and
everything foreign, and would have given all I owned to be back in
America. Now I am here with mother and the children, but still I am as
unhappy and dissatisfied as I was then. I wonder why!"
It had been less than a year since Joyce had had that wonderful winter
in Touraine with her cousin Kate, but it seemed such a long, long time
ago, in looking back upon it. She had settled down into the common
humdrum round of duties so completely that sometimes it seemed to her
that she had never been away at all; that she must have dreamed that
year into her life, or read about it as happening to some other girl.
As she stood with her face pressed against the window-pane, the noise in
the dining-room suddenly ceased, and Mary came into the kitchen,
followed by the rest of the menagerie. "I'm tired of being a lion," she
said, wiping her flushed little face with the sleeve of her apron, and
shaking back her funny little tails of hair tied with red ribbon, that
were always bobbing forward over her shoulders.
"I've roared till my throat is sore, and I'm hungry. Isn't supper most
ready, sister?"
Joyce glanced at the clock. "It'll be ready in ten minutes," she
answered, and returned to her survey of the back yard.
"I wish that we were going to have dumplings for supper to-night," said
Holland, "and turkey and sausages. Don't you, Mary?" He snuffed hungrily
at the saucepan on the stove.
"No," said Mary, pausing thoughtfully, as if considering a weighty
matter. "I'd rather have ice cream and chocolate cake. If I had a witch
with a wand that's what I'd wish for supper to-night. Wouldn't you,
sister?"
Joyce turned away from the window and lifted the lid from the kettle in
which the stew was bubbling. "I don't know," she said, gazing dreamily
into the depths of the savoury stew. "If I had that old witch with a
wand that you are always talking about, I'd not stop simply with
something to eat. I would wish myself back in Tours, with Madame
sweeping down to dinner in her red velvet gown, and the candle-light
shining on the cut glass and silver. I'd wish for dinner to be served
elegantly in courses as Henri did it there every night, and I'd hear old
Monsieur making his little jokes over the walnuts and wine. And
afterward there wouldn't be any dishes for me to wash, as there are
here, and at bedtime Marie would come with my candle and untie my
slippers and brush my hair. Oh, it's so nice to be waited on! You don't
know how I miss it sometimes. It is horrid to be poor."
Mary and Holland listened in flattering silence. They had great respect
for their thirteen-year old sister, who had been across seas and visited
old chateaux where kings and queens once lived. She was the only child
in Plainsville who could boast the distinction of having been abroad,
and there was a glamour about it that enchanted them. They were never
tired of hearing of her adventures.
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