Democratic Sentinel, Volume 2, Number 26, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 9 August 1878 — THAT LITTLE PLACE OF BROWN’S. [ARTICLE]

THAT LITTLE PLACE OF BROWN’S.

The place was mine, and we lived as cosily tlu re, my wife and little daughter and I, as birds in a nest, until the Blacks, some old friends of ours from the city, came to live in our neighborhood. We were at supper one night when my wife told me. “ They’re going to take the Frenchroofed house around the comer,” said Sally, “ with the big extension and the conservatory, and as I happened to be walking out jnst as the trucks came down 1 couldn’t help seeing that the parlor furniture is of crimson satin damask and ebony—l think it’s ebony, but I wont be sure,” continued my wife, “ but at any rate it’s inlaid.” “ Well, that's a comfort, anyway,” said I. “If your positive it’s inlaid, Sally, you can perhaps go on with your supper. ” “ Yes,” she said, so preoccupied with her theme that she hadn’t eaten a morsel, “ and there’s the handsomest bedroom set for Jane that I most ever laid my eyes on ; it’s one of these dressing bureaus, Joe, with a magnificent plate glass that reaches down to the floor.” “ That’s good,” said I. “ You can run around tiiere when you have your next gown lifted, and see the hang of It.” “I don’t expect to run around there,” said Sally, crantog her neck up stiffly, turning up the end of her nose, and drawing her lipß down. “Why, what’s the matter?” said I, “Wasn’t Jane friendly? I’ve done many a good turn for Black in my day, and I hope they’re not going to turn the eokl shoulder now—“Oli, she was frienly enough,” said Sally, “ but we can’t expect, Joe, that people living in that kind of style can be on terms of intimacy with people that live as we do. There are certain restrictions in society—” “ Restrictions be hanged 1” said I. “I'm as good a man as Black any day in the week.” “You’re as good as the President, for that matter,” said Sally; “hut it’s all like a pair of scales, Joe; when one goes up another goes jlown, and, from the way things look, it’ll take a pretty heavy weight on the Black side to bring them down to our position.” I must own this kind of logic vexed me a little. T knew pretty well how Black stood commercially, and I told Sally there wasn’t a feather’s weight on h'.s side, so far as the favors of fortune were concerned. “If he has a mind to live above his means,” said I, “he can do it and take the consequences.” “ He has as good a right to live above his means,” said Sally, “as you have to live beneath yours.” This was her Parthian arrow as I went out of. the door, and rankled a little all the way down in the train, the more sharply that I found Black the center of an admiring bevy at the depot, He had quite an imposing make-up and a glib tongue, which he used in inveighing against our system of paving. He complained of the condition of a good many things iu our young township, and seemed to gain popularity with every fault that he found. At last he spied and was exceedingly loud and effusive in his salutation. “ Hallo, Brown 1” he said, shaking my hand again and again, and declaring to the people about him that I was an old friend whom'he was glad to unearth. “ I’ve run you down, you sly fox. That's a very snng little place around the corner, very snug, indeed.” I wouldn’t have believed it possible I could have been such an ass as to feel flattered by this familiarity of Black’s, but I found myself smirking nnd nodding with great complacency. Here were at least half a dozen of the gentrv about me who lived in big houses in my neighborhood, that I had been going up and down to the city with for years, yet scarcely knew tbem well enough for an exchange of civilities, and here was Black already hand and glove with the finest of them. It makes me sick now when I remember that I turned my back on poor old White, and went toadying on with this aristocracy. White lived in even a smaller house than mine, and had hard enough work to pay for that. He had failed iu business some years before, and I don’t know what they would have done without their boy Bob. He was with me in the city, and I knew that a goodly portion of the lad’s earnings were given over to the support of the house. It was rather hard for Bob, but he bore his lot with great resignation. He came over pretty often to have a game of cribbage and talk over business matters with me, and I found him sharp enough at both. Then he had a pleasant way with the women. Our little Rosalie was little more than a child, but Sally used to brighten up when Bob came in, till she got into that kink about the Blacks.

lon 11 stay here with Rosalie, won’t von, Bob, till we come back?” I said to young White; and as I spoke I felt ™UJ K ,ve » savage pinoh to my arm No sooner were we out the door than she began about poor Bob. “ If you have no regard for your daughters future, and choose to throw her a Pwr miserable beggar like Bob W lute—” began Bally. “ Why, my dear,” I broke in, “ Rosalie s a mere child. Don’t begin to plan about her future, I beg of you. She’s BcjarceJy left off her pinafores, and if ever there was 4 maiden meditation, fancy free, anywhere, it lies in the brown eyes of our Rosalie. ” By this time we bad reached the imposing portal of Black’s house, and were soon ushered into the presence of the n*t,in and damask ebony. Black’s children were none of them grown, but were precocious en ugh to take the lead in conversation; an/1 we sat for a whole mortal hour sod listened to the eldest Sri hammer out os the piano what Mrs. lack called a "reverie.” I was glad ♦ben Black took me into his library, *here ther? good cigars and

some pretty fair wine, and we left the women to themselves. But a goodly quantity of poison was infused into Sally’s system and mine before we left the big, luxurious house, and we went home together as changed as if touched by the wand of an enchanter. “Dear me!” said Sally, “what a little cubby-hole this is! I declare, it’s quite like a baby house.” “ I’dlike tohavealibrary like Black’s,” said I, taking up the refrain. “It’snice to have a room,” I continued, to Bob White, “ where a man can take his friends. It would be far pleasanter, for instance, if you and I could have our game of cribbage without the continual gabble of women in our ears.” “ Oh, I don’t think so,” said Bob —“ I don’t think so at aIL”

The lad looked over at Rosalie and blushed ingenuously. The color deepened in Rosalie’s cheek till it went far ahead of the crimson in Black’s satin damask upholstery, and a shy gleam shot from her brown'eyes that sent a flood of light into my obtuse cranium. I began to think Sally was right. Bob White was all very well in his way, but no sort of a match for my daughter Rosalie. She was my own ewe lamb—the bonniest, best and dearest little girl the sun ever shone upon. And besides all this, there was the secret consciousness that she could, if she wanted to, dress “in silk attire, and siller hae to spare.” 1 hadn’t lived in a plain way all these years for nothing. People about me began to realize that although Brown lived in a small house, he was a man of no inconsiderable means. Blaek had managed to convey this information to them, and I found no fault with this friendliness on his part. Old White never thought of such a thing as taking the seat beside me now on our way down in the train; it was generally filled by more popular parties, and, I began to take quite an interest in the social and political discussion. All this cost me considerable in the way of time and money. My games of cribbage were few and far between, and I put my name to all the subscriptions they chose to get up; but I didn’t mind the money, and I had long since determined that the hss Rosalie saw of young White the better. The color grew ft little less vivid in her rounded cheeks, and the light less mischievous and joyous in her eyes; but Sarah said —I thought this was really a more suitable name for my wife’s years and dignity—that her beauty was growing more and more refined every day. It has lately even attracted the attention of Mr. Percival Gretn, the junior member of Black’s firm, and Green was one of those active business fellows who was sure to make his mark in the world. I told my wife to spare no expense for Rosalie’s advancement and happiness, but was sorry to see a lack of spirit upon her pr<rt, and a quiet denial to partake of these new pleasures ot popularity. One thing was certain—radical measures must be taken to put a gulf between her and Bob White that could not be readily bridged over. The whole White family were as proud as Lucifer, and I knew I should have very little trouble in convincing them that the old intimacy had better be broken off. My new house on the boulevard began to take noble dimensions, and had already cost me a mint of money. Its marble halls were spacious enough to chill me to the bone, and there was quite a melancholy expanse of mud and masonry in its vicinity. It rather surprised me, when I put our snug little place iu the hands of the agent, that my wife was so williug to part with the furniture, too. 1 thought a few of the familiar old time-servers might be used to advantage somewhere in the new house, and I confess to a feeling of keen astonishment when she decided that everything must go. “We don’t want to set up a sec-ond-hand junk shop on the boulevard,” said Sarah; and I was ashamed to foster those old-fashioned sentiments, till oue morning I found Rosalie crying over my old arm-chair in the sitting-room. It was a bungling old trap, covered with a queer pattern of chintz, where the tail of each bird of paradise had gradually faded with many a washing. But the bulgy back seemed to have fitted itself, to my weary spine, and the well-worn* arms of the chair were always cordially held out to me.

“I’m glad you’ve got a toar or two to spare, Rosy,” I said, “at parting with old friends. 11l never get another so lenient with my rickety bones.” “ I’ll never part with it, father,” said Rosalie; and I didn’t care to tell her of her mother’s decree. In the meantime, however, I had broken the intelligence to poor Rob, as kindly as I could, that it would be better to cease his visits to the house. I think, as well as I remember, that I did put the blame upon my wife. I was glad to Bee that he took my communication in a manly, practical way, and bore up under it wonderfully. It troubled me that Rosalie seemed to take the matter so much to heart. Young Green’s turnout was seen quite frequently at our door that winter, and I was tired of my wife’s apologies about the house and its appurtenances. Every day that drew me nearer to the draughty chaos on the boulevard lent a warmer charm to the snug title home I was leaving, and I was not alone in my appreciation. No sooner had it became known that my tittle place was in the market than offers began to pour in from different quarters. All these offers were referred to the Egent, who told me one morning as he was passing that the house had been rented and the furniture sold some time since to a young married couple. “ Here’s another pair in search of a nuptial nest,” I said, as I propped up an ingenioiously-carved bit of a cigar box on the maple tree beneath my window. I felt a tittle blue as I went in to mv breakfast, and had scarcely broken my egg when the'door-bell rang, and I found Black at the door. His face was ashy pale, and his hard trembled upon his gold-headed cane. “No more bad news,” I stammered out, for some speculations of ours had turned out very disastrously of late. “ I’m a ruined man,” said Black, sinking into a chair by the parlor door. Big beads of terror started to my own forehead. “Green has disappeared, the scoundrel,” said Black, “and of course I shall be accused of complicity with the defaulter.”

"Naturally,” I said, dryly, for I was too wretched myself to have any sympathy to spare. " This is a confidential visit, Brown ” continued Black. "I shall have to fall back upon wliat little money remains to my wife, and I’ve come around here at her suggestion to hire this little place of yours for the coming year.” “My good gracious!” said a voice behind ns; and there stood Sally, as red as the feathers in the duster she held in her hand. "Yes, Mrs. Brown,” said Black, “ we’ve always been fond of this little place, and I ready believe we will be as happy here in our adversity as you will in your fine new house.” " Perdition seize my fine new house and every one that has led me into this muddle!” I cried, beside myself with fright and vexation. ‘ ‘ You know well that I shan’t have the money now to go on with it. It will be all I can do to keep fiom bankruptcy myself.” ‘ ‘ God forbid that I should refuse to aid my husband in this extremity,” said Bally, with great nobility of accent and manner. " We’ll make the sacrifice ourselves, Joe; we’ll keep our own little place; we’ll go on in the old way, dear. We’il stay here onrselves, Joe.” "I’m obliged to you for your consideration, madam,” I replied; “ but when the horse is gone, it’s too late to shut

the stable door. The house is let and the furniture is sold.” “ My furniture sold 1” shrieked Sally. “Oh 1 oh ! oh! my furniture, my furniture, my dear old furniture taken from me! Why, they can’t do it! They shan’t. It’s mine. It ain’t yours. They can’t take my things for your debts.” “ Just wait,” said I, “ will you, till you’re called upon to pay my debts. You gave orders for the furniture to be sold and the house to be rented yourself. The agent had told me this morning that a young married couple had taken them. We’ll have to go to town and take a furnished flat.” “A furnished flat,” echoed my wife, sinking into a chair and covering her face with her apron—“a furnished flat!” And, although I can safely swear she had time and again held this way of living to be a domestic felicity, there was an unspeakable misery in her view of it now. “I wish I was dead,” she said. “ I’d rather go to my grave than to a furnished flat—just in the lovely springtime, when the Brahmas are be.ginnicg to set, and the strawberry bed is one mass of bloom. Oh, my poor child !” she cried, to Rosalie, who had run in and thrown herself at her mother’s knee, “your Mr. Green has turned out to be a nasty defaulter. A young married couple have robbed us of house and home, and your father has the cruelty to talk to me of a furnished flat.” “He isn’t my Mr. Green,” Rosalie broke in, “nor ever was, and the married couple won’t rob vou of anything but—but a—a bad, undiutiful daughter. You shall stay here, mother dear, and—and Bo—Bob and I will go to the city and take the furnished flat. ” “Am I to understand,” said I, advancing to this dear, blushing, weeping child, and feeling a singular warmth and cheer creep about my fainting heart—“am I to believe that you and Bob are the married couple in question ?” Rosalie hung her sweet head, and my wife cried out to me, with the coolest assurance, that she told me how it would be all along, and that all further opposition on my part would be useless. “ You’d better go to the train, Joe,” she said; “poor old Black has been gone this ten minutes. And bring home some garden seeds’with you, and bring Bob to supper. We’ll all live here together. And, please God, my darling,” she said, fliDging her arms about our little daughter, “ we’ll all be happy yet 1”