t came
up on that never-to-be-forgotten Saturday afternoon. She had waked
that morning with a dull pain in her heart--a dull pain that had grown
keener when she looked from her attic window and saw the sun shining
clear in the sky. Not a cloud sullied the surface of that fair blue
canopy on this day of the faithless Pitt's wedding-journey. A sweet
wind blew the tail feathers of the golden cock on the squire's barn
till he stared the west directly in the eye. What a day to drive to
Portland! She would have worn tan-colored low shoes and brown openwork
stockings (what ugly feet Jennie Perkins had!), a buff challie dress
with little brown autumn leaves on it, a belt and sash of brown
watered ribbon (Jennie had a waist like a flour-barrel!), and a sailor
hat with a bunch of yellow roses on one side--or would two brown
quills, standing up coquettishly, have been more attractive? Then she
would have taken a brown cloth shoulder-cape, trimmed with rows upon
rows of cream-colored lace, and a brown parasol with an acorn of
polished wood on the handle. Oh, what was the use of living when she
could wear none of this bridal apparel, but must put on her old pink
calico and go down to meet Jimmy's brotherly sneers? Was there ever
such a cruelly sunshiny morning? A spot of flickering light danced and
quivered on her blue wallpaper until she could bear it no longer, and
pinned a towel over it. She sat down by the open window and leaned
dejectedly on the sill, the prettiest picture of spiteful, unnecessary
misery that the eye of mortal man ever rested upon, with her bright
hair tumbling over her unbleached nightgown, and her little bare feet
curled about the chair-rounds like those of a disconsolate child.
Nobody could have approved of, or even sympathized with, so trivial a
creature, but plenty of people would have been so sorry for her that
they would have taken sensible, conscientious, unattractive Jennie
Perkins out of Pitt Packard's buggy and substituted the heedless
little Huldah, just for the pleasure of seeing her smile and blush.
There was, however, no guardian imp to look after her ruined fortunes,
and she went downstairs as usual to help about the breakfast,
wondering to herself if there were any tragedies in life too terrible
to be coexistent with three meals a day and the dishes washed after
each one of them.

An infant hope stirred in her heart when she saw a red sparkle here
and there on the sooty bottom of the tea-kettl