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The Only Rose
by
“‘T was owin’ to the weather,” explained Miss Pendexter. “None of us could be so smart as common this year, not even the lazy ones that always get one room done the first o’ March, and brag of it to others’ shame, and then never let on when they do the rest.”
The two women laughed together cheerfully. Mrs. Bickford had put up the wide leaf of her large table between the windows and spread out the flowers. She was sorting them slowly into three heaps.
“Why, I do declare if you haven’t got a rose in bloom yourself!” exclaimed Miss Pendexter abruptly, as if the bud had not been announced weeks before, and its progress regularly commented upon. “Ain’t it a lovely rose? Why, Mis’ Bickford!”
“Yes ‘m, it’s out to-day,” said Mrs. Bickford, with a somewhat plaintive air. “I’m glad you come in so as to see it.”
The bright flower was like a face. Somehow, the beauty and life of it were surprising in the plain room, like a gay little child who might suddenly appear in a doorway. Miss Pendexter forgot herself and her hostess and the tangled mass of garden flowers in looking at the red rose. She even forgot that it was incumbent upon her to carry forward the conversation. Mrs. Bickford was subject to fits of untimely silence which made her friends anxiously sweep the corners of their minds in search of something to say, but any one who looked at her now could easily see that it was not poverty of thought that made her speechless, but an overburdening sense of the inexpressible.
“Goin’ to make up all your flowers into bo’quets? I think the short-stemmed kinds is often pretty in a dish,” suggested Miss Pendexter compassionately.
“I thought I should make them into three bo’quets. I wish there wa’n’t quite so many. Sister Eliza’s very lavish with her flowers; she’s always been a kind sister, too,” said Mrs. Bickford vaguely. She was not apt to speak with so much sentiment, and as her neighbor looked at her narrowly she detected unusual signs of emotion. It suddenly became evident that the three nosegays were connected in her mind with her bereavement of three husbands, and Miss Pendexter’s easily roused curiosity was quieted by the discovery that her friend was bent upon a visit to the burying-ground. It was the time of year when she was pretty sure to spend an afternoon there, and sometimes they had taken the walk in company. Miss Pendexter expected to receive the usual invitation, but there was nothing further said at the moment, and she looked again at the pretty rose.
Mrs. Bickford aimlessly handled the syringas and flowering almond sprays, choosing them out of the fragrant heap only to lay them down again. She glanced out of the window; then gave Miss Pendexter a long expressive look.
“I expect you’re going to carry ’em over to the burying-ground?” inquired the guest, in a sympathetic tone.
“Yes ‘m,” said the hostess, now well started in conversation and in quite her every-day manner. “You see I was goin’ over to my brother’s folks to-morrow in South Fairfield, to pass the day; they said they were goin’ to send over to-morrow to leave a wagon at the blacksmith’s, and they’d hitch that to their best chaise, so I could ride back very comfortable. You know I have to avoid bein’ out in the mornin’ sun?”
Miss Pendexter smiled to herself at this moment; she was obliged to move from her chair at the window, the May sun was so hot on her back, for Mrs. Bickford always kept the curtains rolled high up, out of the way, for fear of fading and dust. The kitchen was a blaze of light. As for the Sunday chaise being sent, it was well known that Mrs. Bickford’s married brothers and sisters comprehended the truth that she was a woman of property, and had neither chick nor child.