The Young Step-Mother; Or, A Chronicle of Mistakes. Yonge Charlotte Mary

call the boy to take it,’ said Lucy.

      ‘What, when we are going ourselves?’ said Albinia.

      ‘Oh! but we can’t.’

      ‘Why? Do you think we shall break down under the weight?’

      ‘O no, but people will stare.’

      ‘Why—what should they stare at?’

      ‘It looks so to carry a basket—’

      Albinia burst into one of her merriest peals of laughing.

      ‘Not carry a basket! My dear, I have looked so all the days of my life. Bayford must endure the spectacle, so it may as well begin at once.’

      ‘But, dear mamma—’

      ‘I’m not asking you to carry it. O no, I only hope you don’t think it too ungenteel to walk with me. But the notion of calling a boy away from his work, to carry a couple of dozen asparagus when an able-bodied woman is going that way herself!’

      Albinia was so tickled that she could hardly check herself, even when she saw Lucy looking distressed and hurt, and little laughs would break out every moment as she beheld the young lady keeping aloof, as if ashamed of her company, turning towards the steep church steps, willing at least to hide the dreadful sight from the High Street.

      Just as they had entered the narrow alley, they heard a hasty tread, and almost running over them with his long strides, came Mr. Dusautoy. He brought himself up short, just in time, and exclaimed, ‘I beg your pardon—Mrs. Kendal, I believe. Could you be kind enough to give me a glass of brandy?’

      Albinia gave a great start, as well she might.

      ‘I was going to fetch one,’ quickly proceeded Mr. Dusautoy, ‘but your house is nearer. A poor man—there—just come home—been on the tramp for work—quite exhausted—’ and he pointed to one of the cottages.

      ‘I’ll fetch it at once,’ cried Albinia.

      ‘Thank you,’ he said, as they crossed the street. ‘This poor fellow has had nothing all day, has walked from Hadminster—just got home, sank down quite worn out, and there is nothing in the house but dry bread. His wife wants something nearly as much as he does.’

      In the excitement, Albinia utterly forgot all scruples about ‘Bluebeard’s closet.’ She hurried into the house, and made but one dash, standing before her astonished husband’s dreamy eyes, exclaiming, ‘Pray give me the key of the cellaret; there’s a poor man just come home, fainting with exhaustion, Mr. Dusautoy wants some brandy for him.’

      Like a man but half awake, obeying an apparition, Mr. Kendal put his hand into his pocket and gave her the key. She was instantly opening the cellaret, seeking among the bottles, and asking questions all the time. She proposed taking a jug of the kitchen-tea then in operation, and Mr. Dusautoy caught at the idea, so that poor Lucy beheld the dreadful spectacle of the vicar bearing a can full of steaming tea, and Mrs. Kendal a small cup with the ‘spirituous liquor.’ What was the asparagus to this?

      Albinia told her to go on to Mrs. Meadows’, and that she should soon follow. She intended to have gone the moment that she had carried in the cup, leaving Mr. Dusautoy in the cottage, but the poor trembling frightened wife needed woman’s sympathy and soothing, and she waited to comfort her, and to see the pair more able to enjoy the meeting, in their tidy, but bare and damp-looking cottage. She promised broth for the morrow, and took her leave, the vicar coming away at the same time.

      ‘Thank you,’ he said, warmly, as they came out, and turned to mount the hill together.

      ‘May I go and call on them again?’

      ‘It will be very kind in you. Poor Simkins is a steady, good sort of fellow, but a clumsy workman, down-hearted, and with poor health, and things have been untoward with him.’

      ‘People, who do not prosper in the world are not always the worst,’ said Albinia.

      ‘No, indeed, and these are grateful, warm-hearted people that you will like, if you can get over the poor woman’s lackadaisical manner. But you are used to all that,’ he added, smiling. ‘I see you know what poor folk are made of.’

      ‘I have been living among them nearly all my days,’ said Albinia. ‘I hope you will give me something to do, I should be quite forlorn without it;’ and she looked up to his kind, open face, as much at home with him as if she had known, him for years.

      ‘Fanny—my wife—shall find work for you,’ he said. ‘You must excuse her calling on you, she is never off the sofa, but—’ And what a bright look he gave! as much as to say that his wife on the sofa was better than any one else off. ‘I was hoping to call some of these afternoons,’ he continued, ‘but I have had little time, and Fanny thought your door was besieged enough already.’

      ‘Thank you,’ said Albinia; ‘I own I thought it was your kindness in leaving me a little breathing time. And would Mrs. Dusautoy be able to see me if I were to call?’

      ‘She would be delighted. Suppose you were to come in at once.’

      ‘I wish I could, but I must go on to Mrs. Meadows’. If I were to come to-morrow?’

      ‘Any time—any time,’ he said. ‘She is always at home, and she has been much better since we came here. We were too much in the town at Lauriston.’

      Mr. Dusautoy, having a year ago come out of the diocese where had been Albinia’s home, they had many common friends, and plunged into ‘ecclesiastical intelligence,’ with a mutual understanding of the topics most often under discussion, that made Albinia quite in her element. ‘A great Newfoundland dog of a man in size, and countenance, and kindness,’ thought she. ‘If his wife be worthy of him, I shall reck little of all the rest.’

      Her tread the gayer for this resumption of old habits, she proceeded to Mrs. Meadows’, where the sensation created by her poor little basket justified Lucy’s remonstrance. There were regrets, and assurances that the girl could have come in a moment, and that she need not have troubled herself, and her laughing declarations that it was no trouble were disregarded, except that the old lady said, in gentle excuse to her daughter, that Mrs. Kendal had always lived in the country, where people could do as they pleased.

      ‘I mean to do as I please here,’ said Albinia, laughing; but the speech was received with silent discomfiture that made her heartily regret it. She disdained to explain it away; she was beginning to hold Mrs. and Miss Meadows too cheap to think it worth while.

      ‘Well,’ said Mrs. Meadows, as if yielding up the subject, ‘things may be different from what they were in my time.’

      ‘Oh! mamma—Mrs. Kendal—I am sure—’ Albinia let Maria flounder, but she only found her way out of the speech with ‘Well! and is not it the most extraordinary!—Mr. Dusautoy—so rude—’

      ‘I should not wonder if you found me almost as extraordinary as Mr. Dusautoy,’ said Albinia.

      Why would Miss Meadows always nettle her into saying exactly the wrong thing, so as to alarm and distress the old lady? That want of comprehension of playfulness was a strangely hard trial. She turned to Mrs. Meadows and tried to reassure her by saying, ‘You know I have been always in the clerical line myself, so I naturally take the part of the parson.’

      ‘Yes, my dear,’ said Mrs. Meadows. ‘I dare say Mr. Dusautoy is a very good man, but I wish he would allow his poor delicate wife more butcher’s meat, and I don’t think it looks well to see the vicarage without a man-servant.’

      Albinia finally made her escape, and while wondering whether she should ever visit that house without tingling with irritation with herself and with the inmates, Lucy exclaimed, ‘There, you see I was right. Grandmamma and Aunt Maria were surprised when I told them that you said you were an able-bodied woman.’

      What would not Albinia have given for Winifred to laugh with her? What to do now she did not know, so she thought it best not to hear, and to ask the way to a carpenter’s shop to order some book-shelves.

      She