The Charlestown house was now put immediately into the hands of several agents, for Mrs. Carey's lease had still four years to run and she was naturally anxious to escape from this financial responsibility as soon as possible. As a matter of fact only three days elapsed before she obtained a tenant1, and the agent had easily secured an advance of a hundred dollars a year to the good, as Captain Carey had obtained a very favorable figure when he took the house.
It was the beginning of April, and letters from Colonel Wheeler had already asked instructions about having the vegetable garden ploughed. It was finally decided2 that the girls should leave their spring term of school unfinished, and that the family should move to Beulah during Gilbert's Easter vacation.
Mother Carey gave due reflection to the interrupted studies, but concluded that for two girls like Nancy and Kathleen the making of a new home would be more instructive and inspiring, and more fruitful in its results, than weeks of book learning.
Youth delights in change, in the prospect3 of new scenes and fresh adventures, and as it is never troubled by any doubts as to the wisdom of its plans, the Carey children were full of vigor4 and energy just now. Charlestown, the old house, the daily life, all had grown sad and dreary5 to them since father had gone. Everything spoke6 of him. Even mother longed for something to lift her thought out of the past and give it wings, so that it might fly into the future and find some hope and comfort there. There was a continual bustle7 from morning till night, and a spirit of merriment that had long been absent.
The Scotch8 have a much prettier word than we for all this, and what we term moving they call "flitting." The word is not only prettier, but in this instance more appropriate. It was such a buoyant, youthful affair, this Carey flitting. Light forms darted9 up and down the stairs and past the windows, appearing now at the back, now at the front of the house, with a picture, or a postage stamp, or a dish, or a penwiper, or a pillow, or a basket, or a spool10. The chorus of "Where shall we put this, Muddy?" "Where will this go?" "May we throw this away?" would have distracted a less patient parent. When Gilbert returned from school at four, the air was filled with sounds of hammering and sawing and filing, screwing and unscrewing, and it was joy unspeakable to be obliged (or at least almost obliged) to call in clarion12 tones to one another, across the din13 and fanfare14, and to compel answers in a high key. Peter took a constant succession of articles to the shed, where packing was going on, but his chief treasures were deposited in a basket at the front gate, with the idea that they would be transported as his personal baggage. The pile grew and grew: a woolly lamb, two Noah's arks, bottles and marbles innumerable, a bag of pebbles15, a broken steam engine, two china nest-eggs, an orange, a banana and some walnuts16, a fishing line, a trowel, a ball of string. These give an idea of the quality of Peter's effects, but not of the quantity.
Ellen the cook labored17 loyally, for it was her last week's work with the family. She would be left behind, like Charlestown and all the old life, when Mother Carey and the stormy petrels flitted across unknown waters from one haven18 to another. Joanna having earlier proved utterly19 unromantic in her attitude, Nancy went further with Ellen and gave her an English novel called, "The Merriweathers," in which an old family servant had not only followed her employers from castle to hovel, remaining there without Wages for years, but had insisted on lending all her savings20 to the Mistress of the Manor21. Ellen the cook had loved "The Merriweathers," saying it was about the best book that ever she had read, and Miss Nancy would like to know, always being so interested, that she (Ellen) had found a place near Joanna in Salem, where she was offered five dollars a month more than she had received with the Careys. Nancy congratulated her warmly and then, tearing "The Merriweathers" to shreds22, she put them in the kitchen stove in Ellen's temporary absence. "If ever I write a book," she ejaculated, as she "stoked" the fire with Gwendolen and Reginald Merriweather, with the Mistress of the Manor, and especially with the romantic family servitor, "if ever I write a book," she repeated, with emphatic23 gestures, "it won't have any fibs in it;--and I suppose it will be dull," she reflected, as she remembered how she had wept when the Merriweathers' Bridget brought her savings of a hundred pounds to her mistress in a handkerchief.
During these preparations for the flitting Nancy had a fresh idea every minute or two, and gained immense prestige in the family.
Inspired by her eldest24 daughter Mrs. Carey sold her grand piano, getting an old-fashioned square one and a hundred and fifty dollars in exchange. It had been a wedding present from a good old uncle, who, if he had been still alive, would have been glad to serve his niece now that she was in difficulties.
Nancy, her sleeves rolled up, her curly hair flecked with dust and cobwebs, flew down from the attic25 into Kathleen's room just after supper. "I have an idea!" she said in a loud whisper.
"You mustn't have too many or we shan't take any interest in them," Kitty answered provokingly.
"This is for your ears alone, Kitty!"
"Oh! that's different. Tell me quickly."
"It's an idea to get rid of the Curse of the House of Carey!"
"It can't be done, Nancy; you know it can't! Even if you could think out a way, mother couldn't be made to agree."
"She must never know. I would not think of mixing up a good lovely woman like mother in such an affair!"
This was said so mysteriously that Kathleen almost suspected that bloodshed was included in Nancy's plan. It must be explained that when young Ensign Carey and Margaret Gilbert had been married, Cousin Ann Chadwick had presented them with four tall black and white marble mantel ornaments26 shaped like funeral urns27; and then, feeling that she had not yet shown her approval of the match sufficiently28, she purchased a large group of clay statuary entitled You Dirty Boy.
The Careys had moved often, like all naval29 families, but even when their other goods and chattels30 were stored, Cousin Ann generously managed to defray the expense of sending on to them the mantel ornaments and the Dirty Boy. "I know what your home is to you," she used to say to them, "and how you must miss your ornaments. If I have chanced to give you things as unwieldy as they are handsome, I ought to see that you have them around you without trouble or expense, and I will!"
So for sixteen years, save for a brief respite31 when the family was in the Philippines, their existence was blighted32 by these hated objects. Once when they had given an especially beautiful party for the Admiral, Captain Carey had carried the whole lot to the attic, but Cousin Ann arrived unexpectedly in the middle of the afternoon, and Nancy, with the aid of Gilbert and Joanna, had brought them down the back way and put them in the dining room.
"You've taken the ornaments out of the parlor33, I see," Cousin Ann said at the dinner table. "It's rather nice for a change, and after all, perhaps you spend as much time in this room as in any, and entertain as much company here!"
Cousin Ann always had been, always would be, a frequent visitor, for she was devoted34 to the family in her own peculiar35 way; what therefore could Nancy be proposing to do with the Carey Curse?
"Listen, my good girl," Nancy now said to Kathleen, after she had closed the door. "Thou dost know that the china-packer comes early to-morrow morn, and that e'en now the barrels and boxes and excelsior are bestrewing the dining room?"
"Yes."
"Then you and I, who have been brought up under the shadow of those funeral urns, and have seen that tidy mother scrubbing the ears of that unwilling36 boy ever since we were born,--you and I, or thou and I, perhaps I should say, will do a little private packing before the true packer arriveth."
"Still do I not see the point, wench!" said the puzzled Kathleen, trying to model her conversation on Nancy's, though she was never thoroughly37 successful.
"Don't call me 'wench,' because I am the mistress and you my tiring woman, but when you Watch, and assist me, at the packing, a great light will break upon you," Nancy answered "In the removal of cherished articles from Charlestown to Beulah, certain tragedies will occur, certain accidents will happen, although Cousin Ann knows that the Carey family is a well regulated one. But if there are accidents, and _there will be_, my good girl, then the authors of them will be forever unknown to all but thou and I. Wouldst prefer to pack this midnight or at cock crow, for packing is our task!"
"I simply hate cock crow, and you know it," said Kathleen testily38. "Why not now? Ellen and Gilbert are out and mother is rocking Peter to sleep."
"Very well; come on; and step softly. It won't take long, because I have planned all in secret, well and thoroughly. Don't puff39 and blow like that! Mother will hear you!"
"I'm excited," whispered Kathleen as they stole down the back stairs and went into the parlor for the funeral urns, which they carried silently to the dining room. These safely deposited, they took You Dirty Boy from its abominable40 pedestal of Mexican onyx (also Cousin Ann's gift) and staggered under its heavyweight, their natural strength being considerably41 sapped by suppressed laughter.
Nancy chose an especially large and stout42 barrel. They put a little (very little) excelsior in the bottom, then a pair of dumb-bells, then a funeral urn11, then a little hay, and another funeral urn, crosswise. The spaces between were carelessly filled in with Indian clubs. On these they painfully dropped You Dirty Boy, and on top of him the other pair of funeral urns, more dumbbells, and another Indian club. They had packed the barrel in the corner where it stood, so they simply laid the cover on top and threw a piece of sacking carelessly over it. The whole performance had been punctuated43 with such hysterical44 laughter from Kathleen that she was too weak to be of any real use,--she simply aided and abetted45 the chief conspirator46. The night was not as other nights. The girls kept waking up to laugh a little, then they went to sleep, and waked again, and laughed again, and so on. Nancy composed several letters to her Cousin Ann dated from Beulah and explaining the sad accident that had occurred. As she concocted47 these documents between her naps she could never remember in her whole life any such night of mirth and minstrelsy, and not one pang48 of conscience interfered49, to cloud the present joy nor dim that anticipation50 which is even greater.
Nancy was downstairs early next morning and managed to be the one to greet the china-packers. "We filled one barrel last evening," she explained to them. "Will you please head that up before you begin work?" which one of the men obligingly did.
"We'll mark all this stuff and take it down to the station this afternoon," said the head packer to Mrs. Carey.
"Be careful with it, won't you?" she begged. "We are very fond of our glass and china, our clocks and all our little treasures."
"You won't have any breakage so long as you deal with James Perkins & Co.!" said the packer.
Nancy went back into the room for a moment to speak with the skilful51, virtuous52 J.P. & Co. "There's no need to use any care with that corner barrel," she said carelessly. "It has nothing of value in it!"
James Perkins went home in the middle of the afternoon and left his son to finish the work, and the son tagged and labelled and painted with all his might. The Dirty Boy barrel in the corner, being separated from the others, looked to him especially important, so he gave particular attention to that; pasted on it one label marked "Fragile," one "This Side Up," two "Glass with Care," and finding several "Perishables53" in his pocket tied on a few of those, and removed the entire lot of boxes, crates54, and barrels to the freight depot55.
The man who put the articles in the car was much interested in the Dirty Boy barrel. "You'd ought to have walked to Greentown and carried that one in your arms," he jeered56. "What is the precious thing, anyway?"
"Don't you mind what it is," responded young Perkins. "Jest you keep everybody 'n' everything from teching it! Does this lot o' stuff have to be shifted 'tween here and Greentown?"
"No; not unless we git kind o' dull and turn it upside down jest for fun."
"I guess you're dull consid'able often, by the way things look when you git through carryin' 'em, on this line," said Perkins, who had no opinion of the freight department of the A.&B. The answer, though not proper to record in this place, was worthy57 of Perkins's opponent, who had a standing58 grudge59 against the entire race of expressmen and carters who brought him boxes and barrels to handle. It always seemed to him that if they were all out of the country or dead he would have no work to do.
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tenant
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| n.承租人；房客；佃户；v.租借，租用 | |
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decided
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| adj.决定了的，坚决的；明显的，明确的 | |
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prospect
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| n.前景，前途；景色，视野 | |
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vigor
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| n.活力，精力，元气 | |
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dreary
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| adj.令人沮丧的，沉闷的，单调乏味的 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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bustle
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| v.喧扰地忙乱，匆忙，奔忙；n.忙碌；喧闹 | |
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scotch
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| n.伤口，刻痕；苏格兰威士忌酒；v.粉碎，消灭，阻止；adj.苏格兰(人)的 | |
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darted
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| v.投掷，投射( dart的过去式和过去分词 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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spool
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| n.（缠录音带等的）卷盘（轴）；v.把…绕在卷轴上 | |
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urn
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| n.（有座脚的）瓮；坟墓；骨灰瓮 | |
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clarion
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| n.尖音小号声；尖音小号 | |
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din
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| n.喧闹声，嘈杂声 | |
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fanfare
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| n.喇叭；号角之声；v.热闹地宣布 | |
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pebbles
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| [复数]鹅卵石； 沙砾； 卵石，小圆石( pebble的名词复数 ) | |
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walnuts
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| 胡桃（树）( walnut的名词复数 )； 胡桃木 | |
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labored
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| adj.吃力的，谨慎的v.努力争取(for)( labor的过去式和过去分词 )；苦干；详细分析；（指引擎）缓慢而困难地运转 | |
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haven
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| n.安全的地方，避难所，庇护所 | |
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utterly
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| adv.完全地，绝对地 | |
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savings
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| n.存款，储蓄 | |
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manor
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| n.庄园，领地 | |
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shreds
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| v.撕碎，切碎( shred的第三人称单数 )；用撕毁机撕毁（文件） | |
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emphatic
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| adj.强调的，着重的；无可置疑的，明显的 | |
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eldest
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| adj.最年长的，最年老的 | |
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attic
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| n.顶楼，屋顶室 | |
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ornaments
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| n.装饰( ornament的名词复数 )；点缀；装饰品；首饰v.装饰，点缀，美化( ornament的第三人称单数 ) | |
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27
urns
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| n.壶( urn的名词复数 )；瓮；缸；骨灰瓮 | |
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sufficiently
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| adv.足够地，充分地 | |
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naval
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| adj.海军的，军舰的，船的 | |
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chattels
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| n.动产，奴隶( chattel的名词复数 ) | |
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respite
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| n.休息，中止，暂缓 | |
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blighted
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| adj.枯萎的，摧毁的 | |
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parlor
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| n.店铺，营业室；会客室，客厅 | |
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devoted
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| adj.忠诚的，忠实的，热心的，献身于...的 | |
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peculiar
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| adj.古怪的，异常的；特殊的，特有的 | |
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unwilling
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| adj.不情愿的 | |
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thoroughly
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| adv.完全地，彻底地，十足地 | |
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testily
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| adv. 易怒地, 暴躁地 | |
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39
puff
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| n.一口(气)；一阵(风)；v.喷气，喘气 | |
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40
abominable
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| adj.可厌的，令人憎恶的 | |
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41
considerably
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| adv.极大地；相当大地；在很大程度上 | |
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43
punctuated
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| v.（在文字中）加标点符号，加标点( punctuate的过去式和过去分词 )；不时打断某事物 | |
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44
hysterical
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| adj.情绪异常激动的，歇斯底里般的 | |
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45
abetted
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| v.教唆（犯罪）( abet的过去式和过去分词 )；煽动；怂恿；支持 | |
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conspirator
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| n.阴谋者，谋叛者 | |
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47
concocted
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| v.将（尤指通常不相配合的）成分混合成某物( concoct的过去式和过去分词 )；调制；编造；捏造 | |
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pang
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| n.剧痛，悲痛，苦闷 | |
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49
interfered
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| v.干预( interfere的过去式和过去分词 )；调停；妨碍；干涉 | |
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50
anticipation
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| n.预期，预料，期望 | |
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51
skilful
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| (=skillful)adj.灵巧的，熟练的 | |
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52
virtuous
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| adj.有品德的，善良的，贞洁的，有效力的 | |
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53
perishables
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| n.容易腐坏的东西（尤指食品）( perishable的名词复数 ) | |
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54
crates
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| n. 板条箱, 篓子, 旧汽车 vt. 装进纸条箱 | |
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depot
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| n.仓库，储藏处；公共汽车站；火车站 | |
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56
jeered
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| v.嘲笑( jeer的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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57
worthy
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| adj.(of)值得的，配得上的；有价值的 | |
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58
standing
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| n.持续，地位；adj.永久的，不动的，直立的，不流动的 | |
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59
grudge
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| n.不满，怨恨，妒嫉；vt.勉强给，不情愿做 | |
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