Alison's adventures; or, The Broderick estate; a story for girls

Front matter

I \

■J N v

I '

Chapter I

The afternoon of a day exceptionally sultry, close, and depressing even for August in New York was slowly wearing itself away with only the hope of a possible thunderstorm at nightfall to make it at all endurable.

The old-fashioned, still exclusive neighborhood of Stuyvesant Square showed some animation only in the park itself; the houses bordering it, for the most part genteel in appearance, offering no indications as to whether their owners were in town or country. A few idlers, — nursery-maids with their charges, or mothers or elder sisters of the drudging community with theirs, — glad of the peaceful shade of the park trees, had the square in undisturbed possession. It was four o’clock, as the chime of old St. George’s, breaking the lazy stillness, had just informed the neighborhood, and the occupants of the benches or strollers in the heated walks began to glance apprehensively at the leaden sky.

Not far from the western gate a young girl was seated, as she had been for an hour or more, apparently absorbed in a book open in her hands, yet frequently lifting her eyes from the printed age, gazing dreamily about with an air of preoccupation which gave a new look to her face — a peculiar force scarcely in keeping with her youth, the type which belongs to faces, it would seen},

ALISON’S ADVENTURES.

created for a painter’s model of perfect girlhood, the dawning power of the woman just lighting into new expression eyes, lips, every glance, the whole beautified by the sort of soul-innocence far more captivating when seen in the woman than in the naturally unconscious child. Her costume of blue and white cambric, although well worn and washed, had been evidently fashioned by a skilled modiste , while the plainly trimmed little hat bore the “hall-mark” of some artist’s hand. Whether actually beautiful or not, few persons in their first glance at Alison Fane stopped to enquire.

Something there w 7 as about the fair oval face with its darkly fringed hazel eyes, sensitive nose, well-formed mouth, and resolute, if dimpled, little chin which attracted by force of that indefinable, mystic power which the Italians call simpatica, and we are obliged to define by the too often used term personality. Better still when, at the sight of some merry prank of a little toddler on the grass, the girl’s abstraction vanished, her eyes under their dark fringes lighted, and her composed young lips relaxed into a lovely, dimpling smile; there was a look which made her face irresistible, a mingling of archness and intelligence for which the seriousness of a moment before had not prepared one, and after that there could be no question but that beauty of a really striking and, above all, interesting character the young girl in the well-worn cambric gown certainly possessed.

Her attention from her own thoughts diverted by her neighbor’s little one, she closed her book, and, with a hasty, half-frowning look at the sky, started to leave the square. She had come out for quiet and reflection, but it was evident from her manner, her listless way of walking homeward, that no very satisfactory conclusions had been

ALISON’S AD VENTURES.

reached. But, in point of fact, the position in which Alison Fane found herself admitted of very scant material to build hopefully upon. Three weeks ago her only known relative, an elderly cousin, had died after an illness which very nearly exhausted the slender capital remaining in a New York bank. The income upon which she and Alison had lived comfortably proved to have been an annuity purchased, and spent, by old Mrs. Gildersleeve without a thought of the position in which ignorance of economy alone would place Alison at her death. It was only a year ago the when fatal character of her ailment was made known that the old lady had experienced any qualms of conscience on Alison’s account, but she was too innately selfish to alter in any way her mode of life even by allowing Alison to know and consider with her the probabilities of the future. Well aware that she was dying, and that the young girl who had been so long her cheerful, unselfish companion was being left painfully unequipped for the battle of life, Mrs. Gildersleeve preferred that the reality of her position should come to Alison w 7 ith the shock it had rather than that her own last days be troubled by discussing troublesome matters with anyone. So it had come about that when, in the furnished rooms the two had occupied for three months, Mrs. Gildersleeve breathed her last Alison Fane had discovered that not only was she absolutely without knowledge of anyone to turn to, but almost penniless, the few hundreds remaining on Mrs. Gildersleeve’s bank account being in part devoted to settling up the doctor’s bill, the funeral expenses, etc., after which enough only remained to pay her way for a short time w 7 hile she “looked about.”

At first Alison, who, however cold the companionship between her cousin and herself might have been, was

ALISON'S ADVENTURES.

not without a strong sense of natural affection and the value of a protector, felt too stunned or dazed to realize the dreariness of her situation. She did not even give up or change the three rooms they had occupied until her landlady, Mrs. Norton, suggested it. This alone it may have been which roused her to a consideration of what she could, might, or would do. The removal from the parlor to the top floor emphasized her change of fortunes sharply; and the first evening Alison sat alone in the summer twilight upstairs gazing out upon the warm, tired city, the jumble of roofs and irregular buildings among the rather crooked intersection of streets below, she faced the idea, which had by slow degrees been forcing itself as fact upon her mind, that she was very much alone in a great world where she must speedily as possible become a bread-winner.

Perhaps the sense of injustice in having left her so completely ignorant of what such a change would imply helped to make Alison’s grief for her cousin’s loss easier to bear. She had, in deference to the old lady’s wishes, attempted no mourning garments, but had grieved and very truly respected her in her heart. Now, in spite of herself, she could not but see how for years a cold, selfish method had been pursued. In waiting upon, amusing, keeping her old cousin company she had been allowed to waste much precious time, for since she was fourteen her education had been of a very desultory sort, abounding in real study of certain branches which had caught her own fancy, yet wofully lacking in “rudiments.” The only discipline of life had been the lesson of patience her cousin’s whims and oddities taught; of practical knowledge she was almost entirely ignorant, and but for certain traits of character and gifts of mind with which nature

ALISON’S AD VENTURES.

had endowed the girl she would have been pitiably helpless in the great, and to her lonely, world.

But above and beyond all else Alison, as the very poise of her head and carriage of her slender, but firm, young figure showed, was independent by instinct, habit, and inclination. There was an innate bouyancy about her, a sort of calm, self -reassuring faith in things “seen and unseen,” which even Mrs. Gildersleeve’s cold, cut and dried sort of theories failed to impress; and while fully realizing her own deficiencies, still the girl had never yet opened her eyes on a day in which she had allowed herself to say, “I will fail”; and the very fact of repeated disappointments the past week had only made her see more clearly that she must not hope for too much, must not expect just the kind of work she would like, but be ready to take whatever honorable employment was offered her. When it came to summing up her claims as a toiler, she had even laughed at her own lack of what was required in a school-teacher, governess, private secretary, or any such professional capacity. What she knew really well or could do creditably would have no market for her, as she found. In advertising she had been at a loss as to what to demand. She had no experience as a “saleslady”; she could at best be only a very second-rate “assistant” to a dressmaker; she might teach the very “young” if only the “rudiments” were required, for her knowledge of art in foreign countries, her fluent French and German, Seemed to be of small account unaccompanied by experience.

One hope now remained, but that was on so slender a basis that Alison, as she turned her steps homeward, felt it too weak to be classed even among the probabilities, especially as a letter she had written on the strength of it at least two weeks ago remained unanswered.

ALISON'S ADVENTURES.

Among Mrs. Gildersleeve’s papers Alison had found an unfinished letter to a Mrs. Broderick, evidently a friend of long standing, possibly a family connection. The letter spoke of Alison as likely to be soon “alone,” in “need of employment”; it referred to former intimacy, mentioned a town called Exeford, in which was the only inheritance Alison had received from her father — a tiny cottage which rented at forty dollars a year.

Alison had found this letter in an addressed envelope, and had, with a few lines stating her present needs and position, forwarded it to this unknown friend or relative of her late cousin’s. The address was'in care of a law firm, and Alison, hearing nothing, concluded they must be either ignorant of “Mrs. Broderick’s” whereabouts or the lady herself averse to picking up any broken threads, whether sundered by time or death. Still she could not feel altogether hopeless. When things are at their darkest, we look most eagerly for the tiny ray of silver, and youth, after all, is a power in itself. Alison, as she tried to keep in the shade on her homeward walk, persuaded herself to a dozen comforting theories in regard to Mrs. Broderick’s silence. She very probably was not in New York such weather as this, or might be considering what to say, to suggest. Anything was better, thought the young girl as she rang Mrs. Norton’s bell, than complete despondency.

Chapter II

The Hortons occupied one of the old-fashioned brick houses not far from the square which a few decades ago were fresh from the builder’s hands, and, as Mrs. Norton was fond of saying, designed for the “ real aristocracy” ; but Benton Place to-day knows no patent to nobility, its quiet dwellings aspiring only to be respectable and genteel, as well as “let” to an orderly class of tenants. The Nortons were unusually interested in, and kind to, their young lodger, and she in turn decidedly grateful for their protection, which prevented her feeling wholly cast upon the world. She made not the least secret of her position, even to the exact state of her finances, and the mother and daughters, two cheery, active girls, were as much interested as though old friends in our heroine’s daily efforts, her chances of success, her hopes, her disappointments, even failures.

Now as Nora, the youngest girl, opened the door for their young lodger it was with an air of mystery or suppressed excitement.

“He’s in the parlor,” she whispered eagerly. “Oh, you didn’t know, of course! He said he had written, but his letter must be the one in the stand drawer that came while you were out. He wants to see you at once.”

Alison thanked the girl hurriedly, pausing in the hall just long enough to see that her letter was from the firm in whose care Mrs. Broderick’s correspondence had been addressed. In briefest business fashion it simply stated

ALISON’S ADVENTURES.

that “our clerk, Mr. Powers, will call about 5 p. m. in connection with a letter to our client Mrs. Rachel Broderick,” and was signed “Wilks & Allan.”

Alison glanced hastily in the little hall mirror as she removed her hat and passed her fingers lightly through the soft chestnut hair waving naturally on her brow. Heat had the effect of making her pale, not flushed, and the tone of her eyes under their dark lashes seemed deeper in consequence, the pretty crimson of her lips preventing any thought of over-delicacy in the white of the skin. But what she looked like was the least of Alison’s considerations. Her heart was beating anxiously in nervous, if hopeful, strokes as she turned the handle of the parlor door and went in.

A small, dark-haired, sedate-looking man of fifty rose to receive her greeting with a half-questioning glance at her blue and white attire.

Alison smiled faintly.

“I am Alison Fane,” she said in her soft, girlish accents. “I am not wearing black, because my cousin especially desired I should not.”

“Very sensible, miss,” said Mr. Powers, reseating himself, and holding his straw hat in both hands between his knees, while in a rapid glance at the girlish figure in one corner of the sofa near by he reflected that she was “tip-top,” “quite a little lady,” and then said in an alert, business-like tone : “We forwarded your letter, Miss Fane, to our client, and — h’m — well, she considered it carefully and commissioned me to say she will be glad to see you, but not to expect too much, as she is a — well, in fact, recluse is her own word. She mixes, she says, with too few people to be of any particular service to you.”

Alison listened to the rather halting sentences with

ALISON’S ADVENTURES.

entire attention, but a puzzled expression not lost upon the little man.

“But, Mr. Powers,” she said when he had finished, “if she feels she can be of no service, why should I trouble her with a visit?”

“Oh, don’t misunderstand me, my dear,” exclaimed Mr. Powers anxiously. “She — well — feared you would build too much on mere relationship or connection

“Relationship! connection!” exclaimed Alison, with changing color. “I had not the least idea that such a thing existed!”

It was Mr. Powers’ turn to look surprised, and he did so with the promptest elevation of his brows and pursing up of his lips.

“Can that be possible?” he said, wiping his forehead with his white silk handkerchief, and staring at the young girl before him as if to be sure there was no dissimulation in her apparently frank speech. But an instant’s reflection showed him that she w^ould be the last one anxious to disclaim knowledge of a connection with Mrs. Broderick. “Why, she supposed you knew of it, of course, although, come to think of it, she did say she had requested Mrs. Gildersleeve not to make it known, but we know what that means between two women.” He smiled shrewdly.

Alison leaned her head on her hand, deep in thought, too much surprised to speak for a moment, since she realized how much might lie back of this revelation. Mrs. Gildersleeve’s cautious manner in regard to any family matter, her apparent loneliness, lack of all ties of kinship, the fact that while abroad she had encouraged Alison in going among her friends, even allowing her some “society,” while at home in their own country no nun could have led a more secluded life — all these hitherto

ALISON’S ADVENTURES.

meaningless ideas or “caprices” of her late cousin seemed now to take on a curious importance. Bright, alert, spirited as she was by nature, Alison was singularly devoid of curiosity, and it had prevented any but the most casual enquiries into the cause for any dictum her cousin and guardian had uttered. But this news of actual relationship with a person hitherto no more than a name to her made the young girl see that both of the past and future there would be much to learn.

“She never spoke of Mrs. Broderick to me,” Alison said at last, lifting her young eyes with a gravely anxious look in them to Mr. Powers’ face. “It was by the merest chance I sent that unfinished letter, and only because” — her cheek colored — “I had tried so many ways to get employment, and every day made it only more important.”

“Mrs. Gildersleeve’s income,, then, died with her?” Mr. Powers said, really interested now in this lonely, but independent, young creature who looked at once ill fit to cope with the rougher side of bread-winning, yet fully equal to a spirited contest with any fate.

“Yes; when all was settled, there was barely anything left, and work of some kind, you see, was necessary.”

“Yes; but it is strange she made no provision for you. She must have known ”

Alison interrupted him.

“It is useless to discuss it, sir. My cousin’s health for a long time made even talking on business a dangerous excitement, but I fully believe she intended to make matters clear to me from little things she said, only at the last her death was terribly sudden.”

“Ah, yes — um, yes,” assented the legal gentleman, nodding his head sagely. “Put it off and put it off, the way

ALISON'S ADVENTURES.

I’ve seen many a one do. Well, my dear young lady,” he added in a brisker tone, “all that’s neither here nor there. This isn’t business — at least the business in hand. Mrs. Broderick desired me to say that she will be pleased to see you to-morrow morning about ten o’clock, when she will discuss matters with you. Do you know your way about? She lives in rather an out of the way place, though even in my boyhood the neighborhood was considered a most genteel one. Anyway, it’s her oldest home, I believe, and the old lady clings to it. If anyone could persuade her to move, it might add ten years to her life, but so far no one has.”

He was writing an address on the back of his own card as he spoke, and handed it to the still thoughtful, puzzled Alison. The street was quite unknown to her, but she could easily find it, or Molly Norton would go with her.

“Thank you,” the young girl said quietly, and as Mr. Power’s rose to depart, she added with a quick smile and blush : “Oh, one thing more, if you please. You spoke of my relationship to Mrs. Broderick. Can you tell me, sir, if you please, what it is?”

Mr. Powers, hat in hand, stared again, and then laughed good-humoredly.

“Well, upon my word, my dear child,” he said indulgently, “it’s about time you hunted up your family tree! Mrs. Broderick! Why, she’s your grandmother /”

Chapter III

Alison remained standing for five minutes just where Mr. Powers left her, too completely overcome by the surprising revelation in his last words to either move or speak. The transition from a state in which one has fancied one’s self almost without kith or kin to that in which so definite a lineal relation is discovered would overwhelm the staidest among us, and Alison was young enough to have it come upon her with a force in which all feelings but absolute wonder and surprise were forgotten; since, as she presently found herself thinking, one’s cousins may exist anywhere unknown to us upon the earth’s surface, but a being so closely allied as a parent’s own mother to have been all one’s life an unknown quantity, so to speak, seemed almost too strange to be true. Yet the pleasant, elderly gentleman who had, after sending his bombshell, just departed could not have been mistaken. How surprised he had seemed that she was unaware of such a connection ! How actually incredulous he had looked ! But his surprise or bewilderment was as nothing to her own. Alison presently moved away in a mechanical fashion with some dim idea of reaching her own room to “ think it all out,’' for the family supper, which by arrangement she shared, would not take place until nearly seven, and it was as yet not six o’clock.

No one met her on the way upstairs, and even in those first half-dazed moments Alison decided that, at all events until after her interview with Mrs. Broderick next day,

1 2

ALISON'S AD VENTURES.

she would say nothing of the most important piece of news Mr. Powers had brought her. A queer dread lest the meeting prove in some way unsatisfactory governed even her pleasure in finding herself less wholly friendless than she had supposed, but she was glad of the relief which even knowing of and expecting to see so near a relative had already given her. It was something, it was much , to the poor child, the desolate young orphan, to feel herself possessed of one really human tie.

“And yet,” thought Alison as she entered her own room, and, taking off her hat, flung herself into a deep chair by the window, “only last night I was wondering if I could really believe lie cares for the widowed and the orphaned ! Oh ! God send it may mean at least work of some honest sort to me !”

Alison leaned back, her eyes fixed on the roofs and treetops, the lurid sky seen from her window, while thoughts of the farthest past rose in her remembrance — pictures suddenly forming themselves, the very elements of which she had been scarcely conscious before of remembering. But now all took on a distinct importance. Those questions of parentage, those far-away memories of her childhood which she had never discussed with anyone, were of supreme value, since on the morrow she was to stand face to face with her mother’s parent — she knew it must be on her mother’s side, since her father’s parents were long since dead.

Of her baby days Alison remembered only that they were spent in the country somewhere; then had come a journey at sea, during which she recalled the terror of a storm, and her sense of security when her father held her closely in his strong arms ; later scenes Were in a French seaport town, where her mother died, where she had

ALISON’S ADVENTURES.

some happy days in her father’s company, — she recalled perfectly his studio, the people who visited them, who petted, indulged, caressed her, — and although she knew her parents must have been very poor, she remembered no actual privation. Then came the dreariest time of all, when she was perhaps twelve years of age : they had been back once to America and returned to Dieuville — her father’s long illness, death, and the arrival of Mrs. Gildersleeve, with whom when “all was over” she had gone away. Strange enough it now seemed to the girl that in all these recollections none supplied the least hint of family history, ties, or connection, except that slender one with Mrs. Gildersleeve, and Alison regretted now keenly both her own lack of curiosity and her old cousin’s persistent reticence. Strange indeed did it seem to be about to meet so near a relative as her grandmother in total ingorance of all concerning her own mother and father’s past! How would it impress Mrs. Broderick? Might it not even imply that somewhere hung a cloud which darkened the histories of those so dear to her? But however that might be, thought Alison, to believe her father guilty of anything disgraceful was impossible. No. Unfortunate he might have been, probably was, but guilty or disgraced — never. Her memories were too clear to admit of doubt on this score at least; and there rose before her mental vision a picture of the fine, open, kindly face of her father, Donald Fane — the clear, speaking eyes, the noble brow, the well-formed nose and finely curved lips, all candor, honesty, nobility’s very self; and Alison, without in the least knowing why, instinctively arrayed herself against this newly discovered kinswoman, believing, since she had never sought her, Fane’s only child, she must have undervalued him.

ALISON'S AD VENTURES.

But, in spite of this defensive armor against any discoveries on the morrow, Alison went down at seven o’clock to the family living- and dining-room, the front basement, with a very cheerful manner and expression. Hope had been thoroughly aroused. She was young, naturally light-hearted, and ready to take as bright a view of life as the fates would permit.

Mrs. Norton, a stout, good-humored woman of fortyfive, was just placing the last dish on the supper-table, and looked up to say : “Too hot this weather for cooked food, aint it, my dear?” a stereotyped remark since the heated term had set in, and Alison said the usual “Oh, yes, of course,” as she took her place, with the widow and her daughters and a tall, reserved-looking young man, the only son and hope of the family, assembled to do justice to bread and butter, cold ham, and a fresh-looking salad, with tea, which Alison drank always from thirst or courtesy alone.

“Well, Miss Fane, I hope your friend brought good new T s,” Mrs. Norton said in her cheery voice, glancing at Alison’s brightening young face. “You look smarter.”

“He desired me to call on Mrs. Broderick to-morrow,” Alison answered, smiling. “I don’t know what to expect, but she would hardly have sent for me, I think, unless it was to my advantage.”

“No, indeed,” Mrs. Norton and Molly had just said together when Connor, the grave young man, enquired:

“Broderick, did you say the name was?” and on Alison’s nodding in assent he continued : “We’ve done some work for a Mrs. Broderick in our office” — a real estate agent’s. “I wonder if it is the same.”

“I don’t know, of course,” said Alison, and, eager to hear something of her unknown kinswoman from an impartial

ALISON’S ADVENTURES.

stranger, she added: “This lady is very old, I fancy. She lives in an out of the way place — 18 Mordick Street.”

Connor Norton’s shrewd, quiet eyes gleamed.

“The very same,” he exclaimed. “Well, Miss Fane, if you make anything out of her , you’ll be smarter than most of us.”

He turned again to his supper, but Alison w’as too anxious for further particulars to let the subject rest there.

“Why, do tell me, Mr. Norton; 1 am — she is a perfect stranger to me! Can’t you give me some hints or points that may help me? Ho, please.”

“Why, yes, Connor,” said his mother, regarding her son with complacency and pride. “I’m sure, Miss Fane, if anyone could put you up to a point or two, it would be Connor, for, quiet as he is, he takes it all in.”

“Oh, bother!” laughed the object of these remarks, looking, nevertheless, fully aware of his own importance. “I guess, mother, Miss Fane’s smart enough to see it for herself. I only meant,” he added, turning with a judicial air to Alison, who sat on his right hand, “that the old lady has the name of being a dreadful screw. But there’s money enough there ! Why, the last piece of property she bought from us we offered her an advance of twenty per cent, on a month later! We’d never have sold it at the figure we did if the boss had been home. He was mad, I can tell you, when he came back. But the old girl wouldn’t give it up, and it’s doubled in value since.”

“But is she — miserly?” Alison asked, with a contraction of the heart again.

“I guess so,” young Norton answered slowly. “At least the only time I was in the house on Mordick Street 1 thought she looked to live like it. She seems pretty well alone in the world.”

ALISON'S ADVENTURES.

“Yes,” said Alison in a low tone, “we are related, this gentleman told me, yet, as I never heard of her before, I can scarcely believe it until I see her.”

“Related!” exclaimed Nora eagerly. “Why, Miss Fane, perhaps you’ll turn out to be her heiress! Like someone in a book or a play !”

Alison laughed and shook her head.

“No such destiny, my dear,” she answered. “Mrs. Broderick, 1 think, would have hardly ignored my existence all these years if she intended anything so fine at this late date. No, indeed. If she will only put me in the way of a good means of earning my living, I’ll be more than thankful.”

“And very sensible you are, my dear,” declared Mrs. Norton. “Dead men’s shoes wear out in waiting for them. I’d rather stand and work in my own any day. Don’t you fret, Miss Alison! You won’t need to be idle long. Why, perhaps Molly’s boss will send for you yet. Especially as you looked so nice jn that new mantle. You’re just the one for a figure in a shop like Been & Harrison’s.”

Alison’s smile and sigh together were expressive. It was difficult to say why, but she shrank from work such as good-hearted Molly Norton was trying to obtain for her in the large establishment where she worked herself; still, as she knew, she could not “pick and choose.” If the interview with her grandmother came to nothing, then she would beg Molly to redouble her efforts, and go with her the very next day to interview the dreaded Mr. Been himself. Something within her, however, made Alison feel sure she could cope with a field in which her brains would be better utilized than in the mere standing as a lay figure upon which mantles and wraps and coats could be draped 2

ALISON'S ADVENTURES.