Mrs. Ashe was afraid of missing the Hingham boat; so she only took a hasty peep from the window at Rose, pronounced her to be charming-looking, kissed Katy hurriedly, reminded her that they must be on the steamer punctually at twelve o’clock the following Saturday, and was gone, with Amy beside her; so that Katy, following last of all the slow-moving line of passengers, stepped all alone down from the platform into the arms of Rose Red.
“You darling!” was Rose’s first greeting. “I began to think you meant to spend the night in the car, you were so long in getting out. Well, how perfectly lovely this is! Deniston, here is Katy; Katy, this is my husband.”
Rose looked about fifteen as she spoke, and so absurdly young to have a “husband,” that Katy could not help laughing as she shook hands with “Deniston;” and his own eyes twinkled with fun and evident recognition of the same joke. He was a tall young man, with a pleasant, “steady” face, and seemed to be infinitely amused, in a quiet way, with everything which his wife said and did.
“Let us make haste and get out of this hole,” went on Rose. “I can scarcely see for the smoke. Deniston, dear, please find the cab, and have Katy’s luggage put on it. I am wild to get her home, and exhibit baby before she chews up her new sash or does something else that is dreadful, to spoil her looks. I left her sitting in state, Katy, with all her best clothes on, waiting to be made known to you.”
“My large trunk is to go straight to the steamer,” explained Katy, as she gave her checks to Mr. Browne. “I only want the little one taken out to Longwood, please.”
“Now, this is cosey,” remarked Rose, when they were seated in the cab with Katy’s bag at their feet. “Deniston, my love, I wish you were going out with us. There’s a nice little bench here all ready and vacant, which is just suited to a man of your inches. You won’t? Well, come in the early train, then. Don’t forget.—Now, isn’t he just as nice as I told you he was?” she demanded, the moment the cab began to move.
“He looks very nice indeed, as far as I can judge in three minutes and a quarter.”
“My dear, it ought not to take anybody of ordinary discernment a minute and a quarter to perceive that he is simply the dearest fellow that ever lived,” said Rose. “I discovered it three seconds after I first beheld him, and was desperately in love with him before he had fairly finished his first bow after introduction.”
“And was he equally prompt?” asked Katy.
“He says so,” replied Rose, with a pretty blush. “But then, you know, he could hardly say less after such a frank confession on my part. It is no more than decent of him to make believe, even if it is not true. Now, Katy, look at Boston, and see if you don’t love it!”
The cab had now turned into Boylston Street; and on the right hand lay the Common, green as summer after the autumn rains, with the elm arches leafy still. Long, slant beams of afternoon sun were filtering through the boughs and falling across the turf and the paths, where people were walking and sitting, and children and babies playing together. It was a delightful scene; and Katy received an impression of space and cheer and air and freshness, which ever after was associated with her recollection of Boston.
Rose was quite satisfied with her raptures as they drove through Charles Street, between the Common and the Public Garden, all ablaze with autumn flowers, and down the length of Beacon Street with the blue bay shining between the handsome houses on the water side. Every vestibule and bay-window was gay with potted plants and flower-boxes; and a concourse of happy-looking people, on foot, on horseback, and in carriages, was surging to and fro like an equal, prosperous tide, while the sunlight glorified all.
“‘Boston shows a soft Venetian side,’” quoted Katy, after a while. “I know now what Mr. Lowell meant when he wrote that. I don’t believe there is a more beautiful place in the world.”
“Why, of course there isn’t,” retorted Rose, who was a most devoted little Bostonian, in spite of the fact that she had lived in Washington nearly all her life. “I’ve not seen much beside, to be sure, but that is no matter; I know it is true. It is the dream of my life to come into the city to live. I don’t care what part I live in,—West End, South End, North End; it’s all one to me, so long as it is Boston!”
“But don’t you like Longwood?” asked Katy, looking out admiringly at the pretty places set amid vines and shrubberies, which they were now passing. “It looks so very pretty and pleasant.”
“Yes, it’s well enough for any one who has a taste for natural beauties,” replied Rose. “I haven’t; I never had. There is nothing I hate so much as Nature! I’m a born cockney. I’d rather live in one room over Jordan and Marsh’s, and see the world wag past, than be the owner of the most romantic villa that ever was built, I don’t care where it may be situated.”
The cab now turned in at a gate and followed a curving drive bordered with trees to a pretty stone house with a porch embowered with Virginia creepers, before which it stopped.
“Here we are!” cried Rose, springing out. “Now, Katy, you mustn’t even take time to sit down before I show you the dearest baby that ever was sent to this sinful earth. Here, let me take your bag; come straight upstairs, and I will exhibit her to you.”
They ran up accordingly, and Rose took Katy into a large sunny nursery, where, tied with pink ribbon into a little basket-chair and watched over by a pretty young nurse, sat a dear, fat, fair baby, so exactly like Rose in miniature that no one could possibly have mistaken the relationship. The baby began to laugh and coo as soon as it caught sight of its gay little mother, and exhibited just such another dimple as hers, in the middle of a pink cheek. Katy was enchanted.
“Oh, you darling!” she said. “Would she come to me, do you think, Rose?”
“Why, of course she shall,” replied Rose, picking up the baby as if she had been a pillow, and stuffing her into Katy’s arms head first. “Now, just look at her, and tell me if ever you saw anything so enchanting in the whole course of your life before? Isn’t she big? Isn’t she beautiful? Isn’t she good? Just see her little hands and her hair! She never cries except when it is clearly her duty to cry. See her turn her head to look at me! Oh, you angel!” And seizing the long-suffering baby, she smothered it with kisses. “I never, never, never did see anything so sweet. Smell her, Katy! Doesn’t she smell like heaven?”
Little Rose was indeed a delicious baby, all dimples and good-humor and violet-powder, with a skin as soft as a lily’s leaf, and a happy capacity for allowing herself to be petted and cuddled without remonstrance. Katy wanted to hold her all the time; but this Rose would by no means permit; in fact, I may as well say at once that the two girls spent a great part of their time during the visit in fighting for the possession of the baby, who looked on at the struggle, and smiled on the victor, whichever it happened to be, with all the philosophic composure of Helen of Troy. She was so soft and sunny and equable, that it was no more trouble to care for and amuse her than if she had been a bird or a kitten; and, as Rose remarked, it was “ten times better fun.”
“I was never allowed as much doll as I wanted in my infancy,” she said. “I suppose I tore them to pieces too soon; and they couldn’t give me tin ones to play with, as they did wash-bowls when I broke the china ones.”
“Were you such a very bad child?” asked Katy.
“Oh, utterly depraved, I believe. You wouldn’t think so now, would you? I recollect some dreadful occasions at school. Once I had my head pinned up in my apron because I would make faces at the other scholars, and they laughed; but I promptly bit
