Chapter 5
Jo liked to do daring things. When the snowy afternoon came, Jo resolved to try what could be done. She saw Mr. Laurence drive off, and then sallied out to dig her way down to the hedge, where she paused, and took a survey. All quiet; curtains drawn at the lower windows; servants out of sight, and nothing human visible but a curly black head leaning on a thin hand, at the upper window.
Up went a handful of soft snow, and the head turned at once, showing a face which lost its listless look in a minute, as the big eyes brightened and the mouth began to smile. Jo nodded, and laughed, and flourished her broom as she called out, “How do you do? Are you sick?”
Laurie opened the window and croaked out as hoarsely as a raven, “better, thank you. I’ve had a horrid cold, and been shut up for a week.”
“What do you amuse yourself with?”
“Nothing.”
“Isn’t there some nice who’d read and amuse you?”
“Don’t know any.”
“You know me,” began Jo.
“So I do! Will you come, please?” cried Laurie.
“I’m not quiet and nice; but I’ll come, if mother will let me. I’ll go and ask her. Shut the window like a good boy, and wait till I come.”
With that Jo shouldered her broom and marched into the house. Laurie was in a flutter of excitement at the idea of having company, and flew about to get ready, and did honour to the coming guest by brushings his curly pate, putting on a fresh collar, and trying to tidy up the room. Presently there came a loud ring, then a decided voice, asking for “Mr. Laurie,” and a surprised-looking servant came running up to announce a young lady.
“All right, show her up; it’s Miss Jo,” said Laurie, going to the door of his little parlour to meet Jo, who appeared, looking rosy and kind, with a covered dish in one hand and Beth’s three kittens in the other.
“Here I am, bag and baggage,” she said briskly, “Mother sent her love. Meg wanted me to bring some of her blancmange; and Beth thought her cats would be comforting.”
It so happened that Beth’s funny loan was just the thing; for, in laughing over the kits, Laurie forgot his bashfulness, and grew sociable at once.
“Is Beth the rosy one, who stays at home a good deal, and sometimes goes out with a little basket?” asked Laurie with interest.
“Yes, that’s Beth; she’s my girl, and a regular good one she is too.”
“The pretty one is Meg, and the curly-haired one is Amy, I believe?”
“How did you find that out?”
Laurie coloured up, but answered frankly, “Why, you see, I often heat you calling to one another, and when I’m alone up here, I can’t help looking over at your house, you always seem to be having such good times. Sometimes you forget to put down the curtain at the window where the flowers are; and, when the lamps are lighted, it’s like looking at a picture to see fire, and you all round the table with your mother; her face is right opposite, and it looks so sweet behind the flowers, I can’t help watching it. I haven’t got any mother, you know”; and Laurie Poked the fire to hide a little twitching of the lips.
Jo gave Laurie a lively description of the fidgety old lady, the parrot that talked Spanish, and the library where she revelled. Laurie enjoyed that immensely; and when she told about the prim old gentleman who came once to woo Aunt Match, and, in the middle of a fine speech, how poll had tweaked his wig off, the boy lay back and laughed till the tears ran down his cheeks, and a maid popped her head in to see what was the matter.
“Oh! that does me lots of good; tell on, please,” he said taking his face out of the sofa-cushion, red and shining with merriment.
Much elated with her success, Jo did ‘tell on,’ all about their plays and plans, their hopes and fears for father, and the most interesting events of the little would in which the sisters lived. Then they got to talking about books; and to Jo’s delight she found that Laurie loved them as well as she did.
“If you like them so much, come down and see ours Grandpa is out, so you needn’t be afraid,” said Laurie, getting up.
“I’m not afraid of anything,” returned Jo.
“I don’t believe you are!” exclaimed the boy, looking up at her with much admiration. Laurie led the way from room to room, letting Jo stop examine whatever struck her fancy; and so at last they came to the library. It was lined with books, and there were pictures and statues, and distracting little cabinets fill of coins and curiosities, and Sleepy-Hollow chairs, and queer tables and bronzes.
“What richness!” sighed Jo, sinking into the depths of a velvet chair, “Theodore Laurence, you ought to be the happiest boy in the world.”
“A fellow can’t live on books,” said Laurie.
Before he could say any more a bell rang, and Jo flew up, exclaiming with alarm, “Mercy me! It’s your grandpa.”
“Well, what if it is? You are not afraid of anything,” returned the boy, looking wicked.
“The doctor to see you, sir,” and the maid beckoned as she spoke.
“Would you mind if I left you for a minute?” said Laurie.
“Don’t mind me. I’m as happy as a cricket here.” answered Jo.
Laurie went away, and his guest amused herself in her own way. She was standing before a fine portrait of the old gentleman when the door opened again, and, without turning, she said decidedly, “I’m sure now that I shouldn’t be afraid of him, for he’s got kind eyes, though his mouth is grim, and he looks as if he had a will of his own. He isn’t so handsome as my grandfather, but I like him.”
“Thank you, ma’am,” said a gruff voice behind her; and there, to her great dismay, stood old Mr. Laurence.
Poor Jo blushed till she couldn’t blush any redder. For a minute a wild desire to run away possessed her; but that was cowardly; so she resolved to stay, and get out of the scrape as she could. A second look showed her that the living eyes, under the bushy grey eyebrows, were kinder even than the painted ones; and there was a sly twinkle in them. The gruff voice was gruffer than ever, as the old gentleman said abruptly, “So you’re not afraid of me, hey?”
“Not much, sir.”
“And you don’t think me so handsome as your grandfather?”
“Not quite, sir.”
“But you like me in spite of if?”
“Yes, I do, sir.”
That answer pleased the old gentleman; he gave short laugh, shook hands with her, and turned up her face, examined it gravely, and let it go saying, with a nod, “You’ve got your grandfather’s spirit, if you haven’t his face.”
“Thank you, sir.”
Laurie came running downstairs, and brought up with a start of surprise at the astonishing sight of Jo arm-in-arm with the redoubtable grandfather.
“I didn’t know you’d come, sir,” he began, as Jo gave him a triumphant little glance.
“That’s evident by the way you racket downstairs. Come to your tea, sir and behave like a gentleman”; and having pulled the boy’s hair by way of a caress, Mr. Laurence walked on, while Laurie went through a series of comic evolutions behind their backs, which nearly produced an explosion of laughter from Jo.
When they rose, she proposed to go, but Laurie said he had something more to show her, and took her away to the conservatory; It seemed quite fairy-like to Jo, as she went up and down the walks, while her new friend cut the finest flowers till his hands were full; then he tied them up, saying, “Please give these to your mother, and tell her I like the medicine she sent me very much.”
They found Mr. Laurence standing before the fire in the great drawing-room, but Jo’s attention was absorbed by a grand piano, which stood open.
“Do you play?” she asked, turning to Laurie.
“Sometimes,” he answered modestly.
“Please do now; I want to hear it, so I can tell Beth.”
So Laurie played, and Jo listened, with her nose luxuriously buried in heliotrope and tea roses. Her respect and regard for the ‘Laurence boy’ increased. For he played remarkably well, and didn’t put on any airs. She wished Beth could hear him but she did not say so; only praised him till he was quite abashed.
Now Jo got ready to leave.
“Good night, Laurie!”
“Good night, Jo; good night!”
When all the afternoon’s adventures had been told, the family felt inclined to go visiting in a body, for each found something very attractive in the big house on the other side of the hedge. Mrs. March wanted to talk of her father with the old man who had not forgotten him; Meg longed to walk in the conservatory; Beth sighed for the grand piano; and Amy was eager to see the fine pictures and statues.
“Mother, why didn’t Mr. Laurence like to have Laurie play?” asked Jo.
“I think it was because his son, Laurie’s father, married an Italian lady, a musician, which displeased the old man. The lady was good and lovely, but he did not like her, and never saw his son after he had married. They both died when Laurie was a little child, and then his grandfather took him home. I fancy the boy, who was born in Italy, is not very strong, and the old man is afraid of losing him. Laurie comes naturally by his love of music, for he is like his mother, and I dare say his grandfather fears that he may want to be a musician; at any rate, his skill reminds him of the woman he did not like.”
“How silly!” said Jo, “let him be a musician if he wants to, and not plague his life out sending him to college, when he hates to go.”
All sorts of pleasant things happened about that time. Everybody liked Laurie, and he informed his tutor that. The Marches were reguarly splendid girls. They took the solitary boy into their midst, and he found something very charming in the innocent companionship of these simple-hearted girls. Never having known mother or sisters, he was quick to feel the influences they brought about him; and their busy, lively ways made him ashamed of the indolent life he led. He was tired of books, and found people so interesting now that Mr. Brooke was obliged to make very unsatisfactory reports; for Laurie was always playing truant, and running over to the Marches.
“Never mind, let him take a holiday, and make it up afterwards,” said the old gentleman. “The good lady next door says he is studying too hard, and needs young society. I suspect she is right.”
What good times they had! Such plays and tableaux; such sleigh-rides and skating frolics; such pleasant evenings in the old parlour, and now and then such gay little parties at the great house.
One morning, Beth’s sisters seized her and bore her to the parlour in a triumphal procession, all pointing, and all saying at once, “Look there! Look there!” Beth did look, and turned pale with delight and surprise; for there stood a little cabinet piano, with a letter lying on the glossy lid, directed, like a signboard, to “Miss Elizabeth March.”
“For me?” gasped Beth, holding on to Jo.
“Yes; all for you, my precious! Isn’t it splendid of him? Here’s the key in the letter; we didn’t open it, but we are dying to know what he says,” cried Jo, offering the note.
“You read it; I can’t I feel so queer. Oh, it is too lovely!” and Beth hid her face in Jo’s apron.
Jo opened the paper, and began to laugh, for the first words she saw were—
Miss March
I have had many pairs of slippers in my life but I never had any that suited me so well as yours. I like to pay my debts, so I know you will allow ‘the old gentleman’ to send you something which once belonged to the little grand-daughter he lost. With hearty thanks and best wishes I remain.
Your grateful friend and humble servant.
James Laurence
“Yes, I mean to; I guess I’ll go now, before I get frightend thinking about it”’ and, to the utter amazement of the assembled family, Beth walked down the garden, through the hedge, and in at the Laurence’s door.
Beth put both arms round Mr. Larence neck and kissed him.
The old gentleman was so touched and pleased by that confiding little kiss that all his crustiness vanished; and he just set her on his knee, and laid his wrinkled cheek against her rosy one, feeling as if he had got his own little grand-daughter back again.
