Aunt Jane's Nieces
Moreover, all the servants sang Beth's praises, from Misery and Phibbs
down to Oscar and Susan. Of course James the gardener favored no one,
as the numerous strangers at Elmhurst kept him in a constant state of
irritation, and his malady seemed even worse than usual. He avoided
everyone but his mistress, and although his work was now often
neglected Miss Merrick made no complaint. James' peculiarities were
well understood and aroused nothing but sympathy.
Louise, however, had played her cards so well that all Beth's friends
were powerless to eject the elder girl from Aunt Jane's esteem. Louise
had not only returned the check to her aunt, but she came often to sit
beside her and cheer her with a budget of new social gossip, and no
one could arrange the pillows so comfortably or stroke the tired head
so gently as Louise. And then, she was observing, and called Aunt
Jane's attention to several ways of curtailing the household
expenditures, which the woman's illness had forced her to neglect.
So Miss Merrick asked Louise to look over the weekly accounts, and in
this way came to depend upon her almost as much as she did upon Lawyer
Watson.
As for Patsy, she made no attempt whatever to conciliate her aunt, who
seldom mentioned her name to the others but always brightened visibly
when the girl came into her presence with her cheery speeches and
merry laughter. She never stayed long, but came and went, like a
streak of sunshine, whenever the fancy seized her; and Silas Watson,
shrewdly looking on, saw a new light in Jane's eyes as she looked
after her wayward, irresponsible niece, and wondered if the bargain
between them, regarding the money, would really hold good.
It was all an incomprehensible problem, this matter of the
inheritance, and although the lawyer expected daily to be asked to
draw up Jane Merrick's will, and had, indeed, prepared several forms,
to be used in case of emergency, no word had yet passed her lips
regarding her intentions.
Kenneth's life, during this period, was one of genuine misery.
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There was once a king who was very powerful. He had great influence over the wild beasts and animals. Now the tortoise was looked upon as the wisest of all beasts and men. This king had a son named Ekpenyon, to whom he gave fifty young girls as wives, but the prince did not like any of them. The king was very angry at this, and made a law that if any man had a daughter who was finer than the prince's wives, and who found favour in his son's eyes, the girl herself and her father and mother should be killed.
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