CHAPTER I. A NEW HOME

“BUT YOU WILL HAVE TO take sides,” declared Jaqueline Mason, “and it would be ungrateful if you did not take our side. You are going to live here; you really belong to us, you know. Your mother was own cousin to our dear mother, and Patty was named after her–-“

“I don’t see why I should be called Patty when you’ve given up Jack and make such a fuss!” interrupted a slim, unformed girl, who was nearly as tall as the first speaker.

“Well, Miss Patty, I am sixteen and in long gowns; and next winter I expect to go to balls and parties, and be presented at the White House. Oh, I wish it was a court!”

A young fellow, astride the low window seat, laughed with a teasing, bantering sound in his voice, and his deep eyes were alight with mirth.

“You think you are a great patriot, Jacky, but you hanker after the fleshpots of Egypt and royalty, when we have fought for our freedom and gained our independence and set a noble example to the downtrodden nations of Europe. Sighing for a king and a court!”

“I’m not sighing. One can think of a thing without wishing it–-“

“And he called you Jacky!” cried Patty, with a certain triumph ringing in her tone.

“Father said you were not to.” Jaqueline Mason raised her head with dignity. “I used to think it rather funny when I was romping round, and it teased Aunt Catharine; but I hate it now, and I’ve given up romping. There is a great difference.”

“And Cousin Annis is eager to hear about her side. You hardly know which side you are on yourself.”

She gave him a withering look, and turned to the little girl who stood in a shrinking attitude, and whose eyes had a certain lustrousness, as if tears were in their limpid depths.

“I wish you wouldn’t interrupt, Louis Mason! I am trying to explain. Grandfather Floyd isn’t our very own grandfather—he married grandmother—and he believes we shouldn’t really have separated from England, or at least we should have modeled our government upon hers and had a king. He thought Washington ought to have stood up for some grandeur and state, and he is afraid now we shall all go to ruin. He never did like President Jefferson. But you are too little to understand politics, Annis, and I was going to explain—father and Aunt Catharine are own brother and sister; then there are five Floyd children, uncle and aunt’s too. You really are not related to them. You are on our mother’s side.”

“Jaqueline, you will be qualified to write the genealogy of Virginia,” and Louis laughed mockingly.

The girl colored with vexation. “Well, everybody is married to almost everybody else; and now your mother has married our father, and that in a way makes us sisters.”

The little girl standing by the window, where the sunshine sifted flecks of gold through the green clustering vines, looked up wistfully. She had wished out in Kentucky that she had a sister, and now that three had welcomed her and taken possession of her, she was not sure that she wanted sisters. She had slept with Varina, who was about her own age, but who had not taken to her very cordially. There was a still younger child, a boy, curled upon the next window ledge, poring over an old copy of Froissart, dog-eared and well worn. Varina was petting two doves, who arched their necks and strutted about.

“Yes, people get queerly married, up or down or crosswise. I mean to marry someone quite new and strange. But we were glad that father chose a cousin of our own dear mother’s, and I am sure we shall all like her. What do you suppose they are about! Why don’t they come to breakfast?”

This was the great dining room. Four windows faced the east, two the south, shaded by the wide porch roof and the vines. There was a massive sideboard and a china closet with glass doors, wherein were many family heirlooms. The antlers and head of a great buck were suspended over the mantel, which was graced by a pair of silver candlesticks with several branches and a snuffers and tray. There was a large, roomy sofa and some high-backed chairs, quite stiff enough for the dames of early eighteen hundred. The floor was bare, but laid with various-colored woods. It had a hospitable air, altogether, in spite of its massive furnishing. The table was set for breakfast, and a tall silver coffee urn graced one end of it.

There was a stir in the hall, and the sound of servants’ voices mingling with a mellow masculine greeting. The little girl made a rush for her own dear mother, and ran into Chloe, but her new father rescued her from harm, since the woman was carrying a dish of savory fried fish, followed by other servants with numerous viands.

He lifted her in his arms and kissed her, and her mother bent over to give her another caress. Then he stood her down, and she almost buried her face in her mother’s gown and impeded her progress.

“Well, chicken,” and the round, cheery voice sounded as if a laugh was at the back of it, ready for the slightest provocation, “how does it seem with all these brothers and sisters? For that’s what you are to be. Children, here is your new mother, by daylight. Take a good look at her and love her, though she will be more like a big sister than a mother. I could have been her father. For when I first saw her she was no older than you, Patty.”

The children thronged about her. Second marriages were quite common occurrences, and the children of those days were expected to accept and make the best of them. Miss Catharine Mason had taken excellent care of her brother’s household, and now gone to Williamsburg to take charge of the Rev. William Conway’s rectory and be a mother to the three children. There had been a governess, a certain Miss Betts, from farther North, who somehow could not easily adapt herself to Southern ways, and a rather turbulent household. There had been numerous complaints, and at the summer vacation she had resigned. Miss Jaqueline had in a measure taken the head of the house, with Maum Chloe and Mammy Phil, who had brought up the younger part of the flock and comforted the elders in times of difficulty and trouble.

The new mother held out her arms. Jaqueline and Patty gave her a warm embrace. Louis shook hands with the grace of a gentleman, and smiled out of fine soft-brown eyes. A very good-looking young fellow of eighteen, home from his first college year.

“Oh, children, I hope you will all love me, for I have had a sad, lonely time for the last five years. It seems so good to get to a real home, and have a corner in your father’s big heart. And we will all try to make each other happy.”

She was rather tall and slim, this new Mrs. Mason, with light-brown hair and blue eyes, and a sweet, wistful smile. Nine years before this, she and her husband and baby had gone out to Kentucky with a colony, and though the valley was extraordinarily beautiful and fertile they had known many hardships and more than one Indian skirmish. Still, they were young and happy and prospering when death came to Philip François Bouvier, and for five years she had been full of perplexity and sorrow, when the coming of her dead cousin’s husband had brought a glimpse of rest and the proffer of a haven of delight.

“And this little one.” She reached out her hand to Varina. “You and Annis cannot be far apart in age, and will be excellent friends, I trust. Was there not–-“ glancing around.

“Charles, put up your book and come and speak to your new mother. And then to breakfast. I shouldn’t blame Chloe if she put us on short commons this morning, we are shamefully late. Your mother and I had several points to discuss. We will do better to-morrow, Chloe. I hope you have not allowed these marauders to tear down the house nor tear up the garden. Ah, good-morning, Homer.”

Homer was the tall, stately major-domo. The Indian blood in his veins showed in his erect stature, his straight nose, and his hair, which, though quite frosty and curly, was not kinky. And Homer felt as proud of his blood as any of the Rolfe descendants.

They were all settled about the table presently—a household to be proud of. Mrs. Mason took her place at the urn; Annis had a seat beside her. Varina was on one side of her father, Charles on the other. A fine-appearing flock, truly; Jaqueline and Patricia giving promise of much beauty. Louis was tall and manly, though one could see he had been bitten with the follies of early youth by a certain aspect of finery that young men affected.

The meal was long and entertaining to the partakers. There was so much to tell. Many things had happened in the six weeks’ absence of the head of the house, and everybody running wild. True, the overseer was a man of judgment and foresight, and of wide experience, and the estate had not suffered. Chloe had managed to keep what she called the “whip hand” of the house servants. It was the children who had suffered most. Indeed, if Aunt Catharine could have looked upon them now she would have thought them demoralized beyond redemption.

But Squire Mason was an easy-going man, and had a feeling that most things come out right if you give them a chance. Prosperity is apt to make one buoyant and cheerful. And...