When I Am Mary

ANDERSONVILLE.

Well, here I am. I’ve been here two days now, and I guess I’d better write down what’s happened so far, before I forget it.

First, about my leaving Boston. Poor, dear Mother did take on dreadfully, and I thought she just wouldn’t let me go. She went with me to the junction where I had to change, and put me on the parlor car for Andersonville, and asked the conductor to look out for me. (As if I needed that—a young lady like me! I’m fourteen now. I had a birthday last week.)

But I thought at the last that she just wouldn’t let me go, she clung to me so, and begged me to forgive her for all she’d brought upon me; and said it was a cruel, cruel shame, when there were children, and people ought to stop and think and remember, and be willing to stand anything. And then, in the next breath, she’d beg me not to forget her, and not to love Father better than I did her. (As if there was any danger of that!) And to write to her every few minutes.

Then the conductor cried, “All aboard!” and the bell rang, and she had to go and leave me. But the last I saw of her she was waving her handkerchief, and smiling the kind of a smile that’s worse than crying right out loud. Mother’s always like that. No matter how bad she feels, at the last minute she comes up bright and smiling, and just as brave as can be.

I had a wonderful trip to Andersonville. Everybody was very kind to me, and there were lovely things to see out the window. The conductor came in and spoke to me several times—not the way you would look after a child, but the way a gentleman would tend to a lady. I liked him very much.

There was a young gentleman in the seat in front, too, who was very nice. He loaned me a magazine, and bought some candy for me; but I didn’t see much more of him, for the second time the conductor came in he told me he’d found a nice seat back in the car on the shady side. He noticed the sun came in where I sat, he said. (I hadn’t noticed it specially.) But he picked up my bag and magazine—but I guess he forgot the candy-box the nice young gentleman in front had just put on my window-sill, for when I got into my new seat the candy wasn’t anywhere; and of course I didn’t like to go back for it. But the conductor was very nice and kind, and came in twice again to see if I liked my new seat; and of course I said I did. It was very nice and shady, and there was a lady and a baby in the next seat, and I played with the baby quite a lot.

It was heaps of fun to be grown up and traveling alone like that! I sat back in my seat and wondered and wondered what the next six months were going to be like. And I wondered, too, if I’d forgotten how to be “Mary.”

“Dear me! How shall I ever remember not to run and skip and laugh loud or sing, or ask questions, or do anything that Marie wants to do?” I thought to myself.

And I wondered if Aunt Jane would meet me, and what she would be like. She came once when I was a little girl, Mother said; but I didn’t remember her.

Well, at last we got to Andersonville. John was there with the horses, and Aunt Jane, too. Of course I knew she must be Aunt Jane, because she was with John. The conductor was awfully nice and polite, and didn’t leave me till he’d seen me safe in the hands of Aunt Jane and John. Then he went back to his train, and the next minute it had whizzed out of the station, and I was alone with the beginning of my next six months.

The first beginning was a nice smile, and a “Glad to see ye home, Miss,” from John, as he touched his hat, and the next was a “How do you do, Mary?” from Aunt Jane. And I knew right off that first minute that I wasn’t going to like Aunt Jane—just the way she said that “Mary,” and the way she looked me over from head to foot.

Aunt Jane is tall and thin, and wears black—not the pretty, stylish black, but the “I-don’t-care” rusty black—and a stiff white collar. Her eyes are the kind that says, “I’m surprised at you!” all the time, and her mouth is the kind that never shows any teeth when it smiles, and doesn’t smile much, anyway. Her hair is some gray, and doesn’t kink or curl anywhere; and I knew right off the first minute she looked at me that she didn’t like mine, ‘cause it did curl.

I was pretty sure she didn’t like my clothes, either. I’ve since found out she didn’t—but more of that anon. (I just love that word “anon.”) And I just knew she disapproved of my hat. But she didn’t say anything—not in words—and after we’d attended to my trunk, we went along to the carriage and got in.

My stars! I didn’t suppose horses could go so slow. Why, we were ages just going a block. You see I’d forgotten; and without thinking I spoke right out.

“My! Horses are slow, aren’t they?” I cried. “You see, Grandpa has an auto, and—”

“Mary!”—just like that she interrupted—Aunt Jane did. (Funny how old folks can do what they won’t let you do. Now if I’d interrupted anybody like that!) “You may as well understand at once,” went on Aunt Jane, “that we are not interested in your grandfather’s auto, or his house, or anything that is his.” (I felt as if I was hearing the catechism in church!) “And that the less reference you make to your life in Boston, the better we shall be pleased. As I said before, we are not interested. Besides, while under your father’s roof, it would seem to me very poor taste, indeed, for you to make constant reference to things you may have been doing while not under his roof. The situation is deplorable enough, however you take it, without making it positively unbearable. You will remember, Mary?”

Mary said, “Yes, Aunt Jane,” very polite and proper; but I can tell you that inside of Mary, Marie was just boiling.

Unbearable, indeed!

We didn’t say anything more all the way home. Naturally, I was not going to, after that speech; and Aunt Jane said nothing. So silence reigned supreme.

Then we got home. Things looked quite natural, only there was a new maid in the kitchen, and Nurse Sarah wasn’t there. Father wasn’t there, either. And, just as I suspected, ‘t was a star that was to blame, only this time the star was the moon—an eclipse; and he’d gone somewhere out West so he could see it better.

He isn’t coming back till next week; and when I think how he made me come on the first day, so as to get in the whole six months, when all the time he did not care enough about it to be here himself, I’m just mad—I mean, the righteously indignant kind of mad—for I can’t help thinking how poor Mother would have loved those extra days with her.

Aunt Jane said I was to have my old room, and so, as soon as I got here, I went right up and took off my hat and coat, and pretty quick they brought up my trunk, and I unpacked it; and I didn’t hurry about it either. I wasn’t a bit anxious to get downstairs again to Aunt Jane. Besides, I may as well own up, I was crying—a little. Mother’s room was right across the hall, and it looked so lonesome; and I couldn’t help remembering how different this homecoming was from the one in Boston, six months ago.

Well, at last I had to go down to dinner—I mean supper—and, by the way, I made another break on that. I called it dinner right out loud, and never thought—till I saw Aunt Jane’s face.

“Supper will be ready directly,” she said, with cold and icy emphasis. “And may I ask you to remember, Mary, please, that Andersonville has dinner at noon, not at six o’clock.”

“Yes, Aunt Jane,” said Mary, polite and proper again. (I shan’t say what Marie said inside.)

We didn’t do anything in the evening but read and go to bed at nine o’clock. I wanted to run over to Carrie Heywood’s; but Aunt Jane said no, not till morning. (I wonder why young folks never can do things when they want to do them, but must always wait till morning or night or noon, or some other time!)

In the morning I went up to the schoolhouse. I planned it so as to get there at recess, and I saw all the girls except one that was sick, and one that was away. We had a perfectly lovely time, only everybody was talking at once so that I don’t know now what was said. But they seemed glad to see me. I know that. Maybe I’ll go to school next week. Aunt Jane says she thinks I ought to, when it’s only the first of May. She’s going to speak to Father when he comes next week.

She was going to speak to him about my clothes; then she decided to attend to those herself, and not bother him. As I suspected, she doesn’t like my dresses. I found out this morning for sure. She came into my room and asked to see my things. My! But didn’t I hate to show them to her? Marie said she wouldn’t; but Mary obediently trotted to the closet and brought them out one by one.

Aunt Jane turned them around with the tips of her fingers, all the time sighing and shaking her head. When I’d brought them all out, she shook her head again and said they would not do at all—not in Andersonville; that they were extravagant, and much too elaborate for a young girl; that she would see the dressmaker and arrange that I had some serviceable blue and brown serges at once.

Blue and brown serge, indeed! But, there, what’s the use? I’m Mary now, I keep forgetting that; though I don’t see how I can forget it—with Aunt Jane around.

But, listen. A funny thing happened this morning. Something came up about Boston, and Aunt Jane asked me a question. Then she asked another and another, and she kept me talking till I guess I talked ‘most a whole half-hour about Grandpa Desmond, Aunt Hattie, Mother, and the house, and what we did, and, oh, a whole lot of things. And here, just two days ago, she was telling me that she wasn’t interested in Grandpa Desmond, his home, or his daughter, or anything that was his!

There’s something funny about Aunt Jane.

One week later.

Father’s come. He came yesterday. But I didn’t know it, and I came running downstairs, ending with a little bounce for the last step. And there, right in front of me in the hall was—Father.

I guess he was as much surprised as I was. Anyhow, he acted so. He just stood stock-still and stared, his face turning all kinds of colors.

“You?” he gasped, just above his breath. Then suddenly he seemed to remember. “Why, yes, yes, to be sure. You are here, aren’t you? How do you do, Mary?”

He came up then and held out his hand, and I thought that was all he was going to do. But after a funny little hesitation he stooped and kissed my forehead. Then he turned and went into the library with very quick steps, and I didn’t see him again till at the supper-table.

At the supper-table he said again, “How do you do, Mary?” Then he seemed to forget all about me. At least he didn’t say anything more to me; but three or four times, when I glanced up, I found him looking at me. But just as soon as I looked back at him he turned his eyes away and cleared his throat, and began to eat or to talk to Aunt Jane.

After dinner—I mean supper—he went out to the observatory, just as he always used to. Aunt Jane said her head ached and she was going to bed. I said I guessed I would step over to Carrie Heywood’s; but Aunt Jane said, certainly not; that I was much too young to be running around nights in the dark. Nights! And it was only seven o’clock, and not dark at all! But of course I couldn’t go.

Aunt Jane went upstairs, and I was left alone. I didn’t feel a bit like reading; besides, there wasn’t a book or a magazine anywhere asking you to read. They just shrieked, “Touch me not!” behind the glass doors in the library. I hate sewing. I mean Marie hates it. Aunt Jane says Mary’s got to learn.

For a time I just walked around the different rooms downstairs, looking at the chairs and tables and rugs all just so, as if they ‘d been measured with a yardstick. Marie jerked up a shade and pushed a chair crooked and kicked a rug up at one corner; but Mary put them all back properly—so there wasn’t any fun in that for long.

After a while I opened the parlor door and peeked in. They used to keep it open when Mother was here; but Aunt Jane doesn’t use it. I knew where the electric push button was, though, and I turned on the light.

It used to be an awful room, and it’s worse now, on account of its shut-up look. Before I got the light on, the chairs and sofas loomed up like ghosts in their linen covers. And when the light did come on, I saw that all the old shiver places were there. Not one was missing. Great-Grandfather Anderson’s coffin plate on black velvet, the wax cross and flowers that had been used at three Anderson funerals, the hair wreath made of all the hair of seventeen dead Andersons and five live ones—no, no, I don’t mean all the hair, but hair from all seventeen and five. Nurse Sarah used to tell me about it.

Well, as I said, all the shiver places were there, and I shivered again as I looked at them; then I crossed over to Mother’s old piano, opened it, and touched the keys. I love to play. There wasn’t any music there, but I don’t need music for lots of my pieces. I know them by heart—only they’re all gay and lively, and twinkly-toe dancy. Marie music. I don’t know a one that would be proper for Mary to play.

But I was just tingling to play something, and I remembered that Father was in the observatory, and Aunt Jane upstairs in the other part of the house where she couldn’t possibly hear. So I began to play. I played the very slowest piece I had, and I played softly at first; but I know I forgot, and I know I hadn’t played two pieces before I was having the best time ever, and making all the noise I wanted to.

Then all of a sudden I had a funny feeling as if somebody somewhere was watching me; but I just couldn’t turn around. I stopped playing, though, at the end of that piece, and then I looked; but there wasn’t anybody in sight. But the wax cross was there, and the coffin plate, and that awful hair wreath; and suddenly I felt as if that room was just full of folks with great staring eyes. I fairly shook with shivers then, but I managed to shut the piano and get over to the door where the light was. Then, a minute later, out in the big silent hall, I crept on tiptoe toward the stairs. I knew then, all of a sudden, why I’d felt somebody was listening. There was. Across the hall in the library in the big chair before the fire sat—Father! And for ‘most a whole half-hour I had been banging away at that piano on marches and dance music! My! But I held my breath and stopped short, I can tell you. But he didn’t move nor turn, and a minute later I was safely by the door and halfway up the stairs.

I stayed in my room the rest of that evening; and for the second time since I’ve been here I cried myself to sleep.