CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
ARTISTIC ATTEMPTS
It takes people a long time to learn the difference between talent and
genius, especially ambitious young men and women. Amy was learning this
distinction through much tribulation, for mistaking enthusiasm for
inspiration, she attempted every branch of art with youthful audacity. For a
long time there was a lull in the ‘mud-pie’ business, and she devoted herself
to the finest pen-and-ink drawing, in which she showed such taste and skill
that her graceful handiwork proved both pleasant and profitable. But over-
strained eyes caused pen and ink to be laid aside for a bold attempt at
poker-sketching. While this attack lasted, the family lived in constant fear
of a conflagration, for the odor of burning wood pervaded the house at all
hours, smoke issued from attic and shed with alarming frequency, red-hot
pokers lay about promiscuously, and Hannah never went to bed without a
pail of water and the dinner bell at her door in case of fire. Raphael’s face
was found boldly executed on the underside of the moulding board, and
Bacchus on the head of a beer barrel. A chanting cherub adorned the cover
of the sugar bucket, and attempts to portray Romeo and Juliet supplied
kindling for some time.
From fire to oil was a natural transition for burned fingers, and Amy fell
to painting with undiminished ardor. An artist friend fitted her out with his
castoff palettes, brushes, and colors, and she daubed away, producing
pastoral and marine views such as were never seen on land or sea. Her
monstrosities in the way of cattle would have taken prizes at an agricultural
fair, and the perilous pitching of her vessels would have produced
seasickness in the most nautical observer, if the utter disregard to all known
rules of shipbuilding and rigging had not convulsed him with laughter at the
first glance. Swarthy boys and dark-eyed Madonnas, staring at you from
one corner of the studio, suggested Murillo; oily brown shadows of faces
with a lurid streak in the wrong place, meant Rembrandt; buxom ladies and
dropiscal infants, Rubens; and Turner appeared in tempests of blue thunder,
orange lightning, brown rain, and purple clouds, with a tomato-colored
splash in the middle, which might be the sun or a bouy, a sailor’s shirt or a
king’s robe, as the spectator pleased.
Charcoal portraits came next, and the entire family hung in a row,
looking as wild and crocky as if just evoked from a coalbin. Softened into
crayon sketches, they did better, for the likenesses were good, and Amy’s
hair, Jo’s nose, Meg’s mouth, and Laurie’s eyes were pronounced
‘wonderfully fine’. A return to clay and plaster followed, and ghostly casts
of her acquaintances haunted corners of the house, or tumbled off closet
shelves onto people’s heads. Children were enticed in as models, till their
incoherent accounts of her mysterious doings caused Miss Amy to be
regarded in the light of a young ogress. Her efforts in this line, however,
were brought to an abrupt close by an untoward accident, which quenched
her ardor. Other models failing her for a time, she undertook to cast her own
pretty foot, and the family were one day alarmed by an unearthly bumping
and screaming and running to the rescue, found the young enthusiast
hopping wildly about the shed with her foot held fast in a pan full of plaster,
which had hardened with unexpected rapidity. With much difficulty and
some danger she was dug out, for Jo was so overcome with laughter while
she excavated that her knife went too far, cut the poor foot, and left a lasting
memorial of one artistic attempt, at least.
After this Amy subsided, till a mania for sketching from nature set her to
haunting river, field, and wood, for picturesque studies, and sighing for
ruins to copy. She caught endless colds sitting on damp grass to book ‘a
delicious bit’, composed of a stone, a stump, one mushroom, and a broken
mullein stalk, or ‘a heavenly mass of clouds’, that looked like a choice
display of featherbeds when done. She sacrificed her complexion floating
on the river in the midsummer sun to study light and shade, and got a
wrinkle over her nose trying after ‘points of sight’, or whatever the squint-
and-string performance is called.
If ‘genius is eternal patience’, as Michelangelo affirms, Amy had some
claim to the divine attribute, for she persevered in spite of all obstacles,
failures, and discouragements, firmly believing that in time she should do
something worthy to be called ‘high art’.
She was learning, doing, and enjoying other things, meanwhile, for she
had resolved to be an attractive and accomplished woman, even if she never
became a great artist. Here she succeeded better, for she was one of those
happily created beings who please without effort, make friends everywhere,
and take life so gracefully and easily that less fortunate souls are tempted to
believe that such are born under a lucky star. Everybody liked her, for
among her good gifts was tact. She had an instinctive sense of what was
pleasing and proper, always said the right thing to the right person, did just
what suited the time and place, and was so self-possessed that her sisters
used to say, “If Amy went to court without any rehearsal beforehand, she’d
know exactly what to do.”
One of her weaknesses was a desire to move in ‘our best society’,
without being quite sure what the best really was. Money, position,
fashionable accomplishments, and elegant manners were most desirable
things in her eyes, and she liked to associate with those who possessed
them, often mistaking the false for the true, and admiring what was not
admirable. Never forgetting that by birth she was a gentlewoman, she
cultivated her aristocratic tastes and feelings, so that when the opportunity
came she might be ready to take the place from which poverty now
excluded her.
“My lady,” as her friends called her, sincerely desired to be a genuine
lady, and was so at heart, but had yet to learn that money cannot buy
refinement of nature, that rank does not always confer nobility, and that true
breeding makes itself felt in spite of external drawbacks.
“I want to ask a favor of you, Mamma,” Amy said, coming in with an
important air one day.
“Well, little girl, what is it?” replied her mother, in whose eyes the stately
young lady still remained ‘the baby’.
“Our drawing class breaks up next week, and before the girls separate for
the summer, I want to ask them out here for a day. They are wild to see the
river, sketch the broken bridge, and copy some of the things they admire in
my book. They have been very kind to me in many ways, and I am grateful,
for they are all rich and I know I am poor, yet they never made any
difference.”
“Why should they?” and Mrs. March put the question with what the girls
called her ‘Maria Theresa air’.
“You know as well as I that it does make a difference with nearly
everyone, so don’t ruffle up like a dear, motherly hen, when your chickens
get pecked by smarter birds. The ugly duckling turned out a swan, you
know.” and Amy smiled without bitterness, for she possessed a happy
temper and hopeful spirit.
Mrs. March laughed, and smoothed down her maternal pride as she
asked, “Well, my swan, what is your plan?”
“I should like to ask the girls out to lunch next week, to take them for a
drive to the places they want to see, a row on the river, perhaps, and make a
little artistic fete for them.”
“That looks feasible. What do you want for lunch? Cake, sandwiches,
fruit, and coffee will be all that is necessary, I suppose?”
“Oh, dear, no! We must have cold tongue and chicken, French chocolate
and ice cream, besides. The girls are used to such things, and I want my
lunch to be proper and elegant, though I do work for my living.”
“How many young ladies are there?” asked her mother, beginning to look
sober.
“Twelve or fourteen in the class, but I dare say they won’t all come.”
“Bless me, child, you will have to charter an omnibus to carry them
about.”
“Why, Mother, how can you think of such a thing? Not more than six or
eight will probably come, so I shall hire a beach wagon and borrow Mr.
Laurence’s cherry-bounce.” (Hannah’s pronunciation of char-a-banc.)
“All of this will be expensive, Amy.”
“Not very. I’ve calculated the cost, and I’ll pay for it myself.”
“Don’t you think, dear, that as these girls are used to such things, and the
best we can do will be nothing new, that some simpler plan would be
pleasanter to them, as a change if nothing more, and much better for us than
buying or borrowing what we don’t need, and attempting a style not in
keeping with our circumstances?”
“If I can’t have it as I like, I don’t care to have it at all. I know that I can
carry it out perfectly well, if you and the girls will help a little, and I don’t
see why I can’t if I’m willing to pay for it,” said Amy, with the decision
which opposition was apt to change into obstinacy.
Mrs. March knew that experience was an excellent teacher, and when it
was possible she left her children to learn alone the lessons which she
would gladly have made easier, if they had not objected to taking advice as
much as they did salts and senna.
“Very well, Amy, if your heart is set upon it, and you see your way
through without too great an outlay of money, time, and temper, I’ll say no
more. Talk it over with the girls, and whichever way you decide, I’ll do my
best to help you.”
“Thanks, Mother, you are always so kind.” and away went Amy to lay
her plan before her sisters.
Meg agreed at once, and promised her aid, gladly offering anything she
possessed, from her little house itself to her very best saltspoons. But Jo
frowned upon the whole project and would have nothing to do with it at
first.
“Why in the world should you spend your money, worry your family, and
turn the house upside down for a parcel of girls who don’t care a sixpence
for you? I thought you had too much pride and sense to truckle to any
mortal woman just because she wears French boots and rides in a coupe,”
said Jo, who, being called from the tragic climax of her novel, was not in
the best mood for social enterprises.
“I don’t truckle, and I hate being patronized as much as you do!” returned
Amy indignantly, for the two still jangled when such questions arose. “The
girls do care for me, and I for them, and there’s a great deal of kindness and
sense and talent among them, in spite of what you call fashionable
nonsense. You don’t care to make people like you, to go into good society,
and cultivate your manners and tastes. I do, and I mean to make the most of
every chance that comes. You can go through the world with your elbows
out and your nose in the air, and call it independence, if you like. That’s not
my way.”
When Amy had whetted her tongue and freed her mind she usually got
the best of it, for she seldom failed to have common sense on her side,
while Jo carried her love of liberty and hate of conventionalities to such an
unlimited extent that she naturally found herself worsted in an argument.
Amy’s definition of Jo’s idea of independence was such a good hit that both
burst out laughing, and the discussion took a more amiable turn. Much
against her will, Jo at length consented to sacrifice a day to Mrs. Grundy,
and help her sister through what she regarded as ‘a nonsensical business’.
The invitations were sent, nearly all accepted, and the following Monday
was set apart for the grand event. Hannah was out of humor because her
week’s work was deranged, and prophesied that “ef the washin’ and ironin’
warn’t done reg’lar, nothin’ would go well anywheres”. This hitch in the
mainspring of the domestic machinery had a bad effect upon the whole
concern, but Amy’s motto was ‘Nil desperandum’, and having made up her
mind what to do, she proceeded to do it in spite of all obstacles. To begin
with, Hannah’s cooking didn’t turn out well. The chicken was tough, the
tongue too salty, and the chocolate wouldn’t froth properly. Then the cake
and ice cost more than Amy expected, so did the wagon, and various other
expenses, which seemed trifling at the outset, counted up rather alarmingly
afterward. Beth got a cold and took to her bed. Meg had an unusual number
of callers to keep her at home, and Jo was in such a divided state of mind
that her breakages, accidents, and mistakes were uncommonly numerous,
serious, and trying.
If it was not fair on Monday, the young ladies were to come on Tuesday,
an arrangement which aggravated Jo and Hannah to the last degree. On
Monday morning the weather was in that undecided state which is more
exasperating than a steady pour. It drizzled a little, shone a little, blew a
little, and didn’t make up its mind till it was too late for anyone else to
make up theirs. Amy was up at dawn, hustling people out of their beds and
through their breakfasts, that the house might be got in order. The parlor
struck her as looking uncommonly shabby, but without stopping to sigh for
what she had not, she skillfully made the best of what she had, arranging
chairs over the worn places in the carpet, covering stains on the walls with
homemade statuary, which gave an artistic air to the room, as did the lovely
vases of flowers Jo scattered about.
The lunch looked charming, and as she surveyed it, she sincerely hoped it
would taste well, and that the borrowed glass, china, and silver would get
safely home again. The carriages were promised, Meg and Mother were all
ready to do the honors, Beth was able to help Hannah behind the scenes, Jo
had engaged to be as lively and amiable as an absent mind, and aching
head, and a very decided disapproval of everybody and everything would
allow, and as she wearily dressed, Amy cheered herself with anticipations of
the happy moment when, lunch safely over, she should drive away with her
friends for an afternoon of artistic delights, for the ‘cherry bounce’ and the
broken bridge were her strong points.
Then came the hours of suspense, during which she vibrated from parlor
to porch, while public opinion varied like the weathercock. A smart shower
at eleven had evidently quenched the enthusiasm of the young ladies who
were to arrive at twelve, for nobody came, and at two the exhausted family
sat down in a blaze of sunshine to consume the perishable portions of the
feast, that nothing might be lost.
“No doubt about the weather today, they will certainly come, so we must
fly round and be ready for them,” said Amy, as the sun woke her next
morning. She spoke briskly, but in her secret soul she wished she had said
nothing about Tuesday, for her interest like her cake was getting a little
stale.
“I can’t get any lobsters, so you will have to do without salad today,” said
Mr. March, coming in half an hour later, with an expression of placid
despair.
“Use the chicken then, the toughness won’t matter in a salad,” advised
his wife.
“Hannah left it on the kitchen table a minute, and the kittens got at it. I’m
very sorry, Amy,” added Beth, who was still a patroness of cats.
“Then I must have a lobster, for tongue alone won’t do,” said Amy
decidedly.
“Shall I rush into town and demand one?” asked Jo, with the
magnanimity of a martyr.
“You’d come bringing it home under your arm without any paper, just to
try me. I’ll go myself,” answered Amy, whose temper was beginning to fail.
Shrouded in a thick veil and armed with a genteel traveling basket, she
departed, feeling that a cool drive would soothe her ruffled spirit and fit her
for the labors of the day. After some delay, the object of her desire was
procured, likewise a bottle of dressing to prevent further loss of time at
home, and off she drove again, well pleased with her own forethought.
As the omnibus contained only one other passenger, a sleepy old lady,
Amy pocketed her veil and beguiled the tedium of the way by trying to find
out where all her money had gone to. So busy was she with her card full of
refractory figures that she did not observe a newcomer, who entered without
stopping the vehicle, till a masculine voice said, “Good morning, Miss
March,” and, looking up, she beheld one of Laurie’s most elegant college
friends. Fervently hoping that he would get out before she did, Amy utterly
ignored the basket at her feet, and congratulating herself that she had on her
new traveling dress, returned the young man’s greeting with her usual
suavity and spirit.
They got on excellently, for Amy’s chief care was soon set at rest by
learning that the gentleman would leave first, and she was chatting away in
a peculiarly lofty strain, when the old lady got out. In stumbling to the door,
she upset the basket, and—oh horror!—the lobster, in all its vulgar size and
brilliancy, was revealed to the highborn eyes of a Tudor!
“By Jove, she’s forgotten her dinner!” cried the unconscious youth,
poking the scarlet monster into its place with his cane, and preparing to
hand out the basket after the old lady.
“Please don’t—it’s—it’s mine,” murmured Amy, with a face nearly as red
as her fish.
“Oh, really, I beg pardon. It’s an uncommonly fine one, isn’t it?” said
Tudor, with great presence of mind, and an air of sober interest that did
credit to his breeding.
Amy recovered herself in a breath, set her basket boldly on the seat, and
said, laughing, “Don’t you wish you were to have some of the salad he’s
going to make, and to see the charming young ladies who are to eat it?”
Now that was tact, for two of the ruling foibles of the masculine mind
were touched. The lobster was instantly surrounded by a halo of pleasing
reminiscences, and curiosity about ‘the charming young ladies’ diverted his
mind from the comical mishap.
“I suppose he’ll laugh and joke over it with Laurie, but I shan’t see them,
that’s a comfort,” thought Amy, as Tudor bowed and departed.
She did not mention this meeting at home (though she discovered that,
thanks to the upset, her new dress was much damaged by the rivulets of
dressing that meandered down the skirt), but went through with the
preparations which now seemed more irksome than before, and at twelve
o’clock all was ready again. Feeling that the neighbors were interested in
her movements, she wished to efface the memory of yesterday’s failure by a
grand success today, so she ordered the ‘cherry bounce’, and drove away in
state to meet and escort her guests to the banquet.
“There’s the rumble, they’re coming! I’ll go onto the porch and meet
them. It looks hospitable, and I want the poor child to have a good time
after all her trouble,” said Mrs. March, suiting the action to the word. But
after one glance, she retired, with an indescribable expression, for looking
quite lost in the big carriage, sat Amy and one young lady.
“Run, Beth, and help Hannah clear half the things off the table. It will be
too absurd to put a luncheon for twelve before a single girl,” cried Jo,
hurrying away to the lower regions, too excited to stop even for a laugh.
In came Amy, quite calm and delightfully cordial to the one guest who
had kept her promise. The rest of the family, being of a dramatic turn,
played their parts equally well, and Miss Eliott found them a most hilarious
set, for it was impossible to control entirely the merriment which possessed
them. The remodeled lunch being gaily partaken of, the studio and garden
visited, and art discussed with enthusiasm, Amy ordered a buggy (alas for
the elegant cherry-bounce), and drove her friend quietly about the
neighborhood till sunset, when ‘the party went out’.
As she came walking in, looking very tired but as composed as ever, she
observed that every vestige of the unfortunate fete had disappeared, except
a suspicious pucker about the corners of Jo’s mouth.
“You’ve had a loverly afternoon for your drive, dear,” said her mother, as
respectfully as if the whole twelve had come.
“Miss Eliott is a very sweet girl, and seemed to enjoy herself, I thought,”
observed Beth, with unusual warmth.
“Could you spare me some of your cake? I really need some, I have so
much company, and I can’t make such delicious stuff as yours,” asked Meg
soberly.
“Take it all. I’m the only one here who likes sweet things, and it will
mold before I can dispose of it,” answered Amy, thinking with a sigh of the
generous store she had laid in for such an end as this.
“It’s a pity Laurie isn’t here to help us,” began Jo, as they sat down to ice
cream and salad for the second time in two days.
A warning look from her mother checked any further remarks, and the
whole family ate in heroic silence, till Mr. March mildly observed, “salad
was one of the favorite dishes of the ancients, and Evelyn…” Here a general
explosion of laughter cut short the ‘history of salads’, to the great surprise
of the learned gentleman.
“Bundle everything into a basket and send it to the Hummels. Germans
like messes. I’m sick of the sight of this, and there’s no reason you should
all die of a surfeit because I’ve been a fool,” cried Amy, wiping her eyes.
“I thought I should have died when I saw you two girls rattling about in
the what-you-call-it, like two little kernels in a very big nutshell, and
Mother waiting in state to receive the throng,” sighed Jo, quite spent with
laughter.
“I’m very sorry you were disappointed, dear, but we all did our best to
satisfy you,” said Mrs. March, in a tone full of motherly regret.
“I am satisfied. I’ve done what I undertook, and it’s not my fault that it
failed. I comfort myself with that,” said Amy with a little quiver in her
voice. “I thank you all very much for helping me, and I’ll thank you still
more if you won’t allude to it for a month, at least.”
No one did for several months, but the word ‘fete’ always produced a
general smile, and Laurie’s birthday gift to Amy was a tiny coral lobster in
the shape of a charm for her watch guard.
