A Woman Named Smith

When you were yet an Awful Baby, And bawled o' bed-time, I said "Maybe It is not best to spank or scold her: Suppose a fairy-tale were told her?" And gave you then, to my undoing, The wolf Red Riding-Hood pursuing; Sang Mother Goose her artless rhyming; Showed Jack the Magic Beanstalk climbing; Three Little Pigs were so appealing, You set up sympathetic squealing! Then, Bitsybet, you had your mother-- You bawled until I told another!

The Awful Baby's gone. Here lately You bear your little self sedately. You've shed your rompers; you want dresses Prinked out with frillies; fluff your tresses; Delight your daddy, aunts, and mother; And sisterly set straight your brother. Your bib-and-tucker days abolished, Your manners and your nails are polished. One baby trait remains, thank glory! You're still a glutton for a story. Still, Bitsybet, you beg another: So here's one for you from

YOUR MOTHER.

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

I THE SCARLET WITCH DEPARTS II AND ARIEL MAKES MUSIC III THE DEAR LITTLE GOD! IV THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE V "THY NEIGHBOR AS THYSELF" VI GLAMOURY VII A BRIGHT PARTICULAR STAR VIII PEACOCKS AND IVORY IX THE JUDGMENT OF SPRING X THE FOREST OF ARDEN XI THE JINNEE INTERVENES XII MAN PROPOSES XIII FIRES OF YESTERDAY XIV THE TALISMAN XV THE HEART OF HYNDS HOUSE XVI THE DEVILL HIS RAINBOW XVII ON THE KNEES OF THE GODS XVIII THE GREATEST GIFT XIX DEEP WATERS XX HARBOR

CHARACTERS

SOPHY: A woman named Smith.

ALICIA GAINES: Flower o' the Peach.

NICHOLAS JELNIK: Peacocks and Ivory.

DOCTOR RICHARD GEDDES: Coeur-de-Lion.

THE AUTHOR: Himself.

THE SECRETARY: A Pleasant Person.

MISS EMMELINE PHELPS-PARSONS: of Boston, Massachusetts.

MISS MARTHA HOPKINS: "Clothed in White Samite."

JUDGE GATCHELL: The Law.

SCHMETZ AND RIEDRIECH: Workmen and Visionaries.

THE JINNEE: A Son of the Prophet.

SOPHRONISBA SCARLETT: "The Scarlett Witch."

THE HYNDSES OF HYNDS HOUSE.

PAYING GUESTS.

THE PEOPLE OF HYNDSVILLE, SOUTH CAROLINA.

MARY MAGDALEN; QUEEN-OF-SHEEBA; FERNOLIA: Important Persons.

BORIS: A Russian Wolfhound.

THE BLACK FAMILY: A Witch's Cat's Kittens.

BEAUTIFUL DOG: Last but not Least.

A WOMAN NAMED SMITH

CHAPTER I

THE SCARLETT WITCH DEPARTS

If it had been humanly possible for Great-Aunt Sophronisba Scarlett to lug her place in Hyndsville, South Carolina, along with her into the next world, plump it squarely in the middle of the Elysian Fields, plaster it over with "No Trespassing" signs, and then settle herself down to a blissful eternity of serving writs upon the angels for flying over her fences without permission, and setting the saved by the ears in general, she would have done so and felt that heaven was almost as desirable a place as South Carolina. But as even she couldn't impose her will upon the next world, and there was nobody in this one she hated less than she did me--possibly because she had never laid eyes on me--she willed me Hynds House and what was left of the Hynds fortune; tying this string to her bequest: I must occupy Hynds House within six months, and I couldn't rent it, or attempt to sell it, without forfeiture of the entire estate.

I can fancy the ancient beldam sniggering sardonically the while she figured to herself the chagrined astonishment, the helpless wrath, of her watchfully waiting neighbors, when they should discover that historic Hynds House, dating from the beginning of things Carolinian, had passed into the unpedigreed hands of a woman named Smith. I can fancy her balefully exact perception of the attitude so radically conservative a community must needs assume toward such an intruder as myself, foisted upon it, so to speak, by an enemy who never failed to turn the trick.

Because I'm not a Hynds, at all. Great Aunt Sophronisba was my aunt not by blood but by marriage; she having, when she was no longer what is known as a spring chicken, met my Great-Uncle Johnny Scarlett and scandalized all Hyndsville by marrying him out of hand.

I have heard that she was insanely in love with him, and I believe it; nothing short of an over-mastering passion could have induced one of the haughty Hyndses to marry a person with such family connections as his. For my father, George Smith, was a ruddy English ship-chandler who pitched upon Boston for a home, and lived with his family in the rooms above his shop; and my grandmother Smith dropped her "aitches" with the cheerful ease of one to the manner born, bless her stout old Cockney heart! I can remember her hearing me my spelling-lesson of a night, her spectacles far down on her old button of a nose, her white curls bobbing from under her cap.