PAYING GUESTS
The first campers were due to arrive the second week in June, but
everything was in complete readiness long before that time. The girls
never wearied of making their tours of inspection to be sure nothing had
been overlooked, and each time it seemed as if they added a few more
finishing touches.
Cousin Roxy declared it was all so inviting that she felt like closing up
the big house and coaxing the Judge to camp out with her.
Instead of grouping the tents together, they had chosen the most
picturesque and sequestered spots to hide them away in. There was one on a
little jutting point of land near the Peckham mill. Here, the river swept
out in a wide U-shaped curve that was crowned with gray rocks and pines.
The music of the falls reached it, and the road was only about quarter of
a mile across the fields to the north, but apparently it was completely
isolated.
"I'd like to put a poet in there," Helen said, "or a musician. Wasn't it
Rubenstein, Kit, who used to take his violin and play the music of the
rain and falling water?"
"Ask me not, child, ask me not," returned Kit, practically. "All I'm
wondering about this minute is how on earth Shad ever expected this fly to
stay put, if a good, old-fashioned Gilead thunder-storm ever hit it."
Helen watched her as she climbed up on a camp stool, with most precarious
footing, and tried to readjust the fly at the back of the tent.
"Don't you have to take them in when it storms or the wind blows, just
like sails?" she asked. "Ingeborg and Astrid told me that. They learned it
from their camp-fire rules. I'm sure you don't leave them stringing out
like that, Kit."
All at once Doris came speeding around the rock path, her eyes wide with
excitement, her whole manner full of mystery.
"There's an automobile just stopped in the road," she exclaimed, "and the
man in it asked me who lived in the tent over here."
"I never supposed any one could see that tent from the road." Kit's tone
held a distinct note of disappointment. "What did he want to sell us,
Dorrie, lightning rods or sewing machines?"
"Oh, Kit, don't," pleaded Doris. "He's really in earnest, and he's coming
over here right now. I told him all about everything, and he thinks he
might want to rent a tent."
Kit's countenance cleared like magic. She forgot the refractory strip of
canvas, and descended immediately from the camp stool.
"Lead me, sister darling, to this first paying guest, who cannot resist
the woodland lure. Helen, don't you dare say anything to spoil the
inviting picture which I shall give him. I don't see what more he could
want." She hesitated a moment, surveying the river, almost directly below
the sloping rock. "Why, he could almost sit up in bed in the morning and
haul in his fish-lines from yon winding stream with a fine catch for
breakfast on it."
"Oh, hurry, Kit, and don't stop to spout," Doris begged. "He is really
awfully nice, and he's in earnest, I know he is."
But Kit went with dignity across the fields to the road where the
automobile stood with its lone occupant. He must have been over forty
years of age, but with his closely curled dark hair and alert smile he
appeared much younger. He wore no hat, and was heavily tanned. It seemed
to Kit at first glance as though she had never seen eyes so full of keen
curiosity and genial friendliness.
"How do you do?" he called as soon as she came within hailing distance.
"Are you the young lady who has the renting of these tents which I see
every once in a while?"
Kit admitted that she was. He nodded his head approvingly and smiled, a
broad pleasant smile which seemed to include the entire landscape.
"I like it here," he announced with emphasis. "It is sequestered and
silent. I have not met a single team or car on the road for miles."
"Oh, that happens often," said Kit, eagerly. "There are days when nobody
passes at all except the mail carrier."
"It suits me," he exclaimed, buoyantly. "I must have quiet and perfect
relaxation. I will rent one of your tents and occupy it at once. I have
been touring this part of the country looking for a spot which appealed to
me."
"We have one on the hill yonder," Kit suggested. He seemed rather
peculiar, and perhaps it would be just as well to sequester him as far off
as possible. "It is right on the edge of the pines, and faces the west.
The sunsets are beautiful from there."
"No, no," he repeated. "I like the sound of the water. I hear falls below
here. I will take that tent I see over there."
So came the first tent dweller to Greenacres. Kit had still been in doubt,
and taking no chances on strangers within the gates, she had guided Mr.
Ormond up to her father to make the closing arrangements on renting the
waterfall tent, as the girls called it, for the entire summer. The most
amazing part was that he left a check that first day for $75.00, full
rental for ten weeks.
"I must not be interrupted or bothered by little things," he told Mr.
Robbins, earnestly. "I must have perfect isolation or I cannot do my
work."
"Now, what on earth do you suppose he meant by that?" Kit asked, after the
underslung gray roadster had passed out of sight. "My goodness, girls, he
may be a counterfeiter. You can bet a cookie Gilead would look upon him as
a suspicious character when he could pay seventy-five dollars right down
all at once."
"I rather liked his face," Mrs. Robbins remarked, "and he gave your father
excellent business references. I think you're very fortunate that he
happened to travel this way."
He arrived promptly the following day and arranged with Shad to put up the
automobile in the barn.
"Well, I've lugged down all his belongings to the tent," Shad said, rather
hopelessly, that night, "and I can't find out for the life of me what kind
of business he's in. He had a lot of heavy bundles, and I asked him a few
questions about them, but he didn't seem to take kindly to it, so I let
him alone. There's one thing though he's got, and that's a big photograph
in a silver frame of an all-fired handsome woman he says is his wife.
She's dressed just like a queen, crown and all."
Helen's eyes were bright with interest, as she listened, but Kit's
straight, dark brows were drawn together in a frown of perplexity.
"I suppose we'll just have to wait until we find out," she said, "but
we'll hope for the best. Piney says he's made arrangements to buy eggs and
chickens from them, so I see where our paying guests are going to scatter
prosperity around the neighborhood."
Ralph MacRae and Honey arrived the seventeenth of June and took the Turtle
Cove tent. The girls did not see very much of them until after Jean came
up from the city, but then Ralph became what Doris called "the unexpected
guest," dropping in at any time. Helen was the one who suspected a budding
romance, but she contented herself with watching Jean meditatively, and
investing her with the glamour of all her favorite heroines.
The first fruits of Jean's efforts to colonize the tents came with a
letter from Bab Crane.
"You're going to have four of the girls from school through July anyway,
and August if they like it. I've told them the scenery is perfectly
gorgeous and they can pitch their easels anywhere they like, so be sure
and give them the tents with the best outlook. I think it probable that
you may catch Miss Emery, too, if Frances writes back approvingly. She's
awfully odd, and lives all alone in a beautiful old mansion down on
Washington Square, but her pictures are splendid, and she's a member of
the N.A.D."
The next surprise was a letter from Billie. He could not reach home before
the middle of July, as he was going on another trip with Stanley, but
there were five of the boys from his class who wanted to come up and camp.
"I've told them the fishing is great around there, and they're going to
make the trip from here in Jeff Saunders' car. Jeff's from Georgia, and
most of the fellows have never been north. We're going to join them later
on, so if you've got a bunch of tents together, you better save us three.
"Now, Kit, listen here, when I struck Delphi, and landed with all that
crowd of girls unexpectedly, you know how well I behaved, just for your
sake. Don't you get superior and toploftical with the boys when they come,
because every last one of them is the right sort, and they're expecting to
find Gilead folks waiting for them with open arms from what I've told
them."
"Well, upon my word, I like that," exclaimed Kit, as she threw the letter
down on the table. "Any one would think that I didn't know how to treat
people. Just the same, we'll put them all over in the glen, where they can
do just as they please, and not interfere with high art or our mysterious
stranger."
Sally opened her "General Emporium" the first of June. It stood exactly at
the crossroads, beside Greenacre Hall. There was the waterfall, and the
old bridge leading to the Scotland road. With Shad to superintend the
work, the Peckham boys had erected a little slab shack, and Sally had
planted wild cucumber and morning-glory vines thickly about the outside,
the last week in April, so that by June they had clambered half-way up.
There were rustic window boxes of birch, filled with nasturtiums and
Wandering Jew.
Inside the store there were two counters, one on either side as you
entered, and these had been Mr. Peckham's contribution to the good cause.
Several old hickory armchairs from Cousin Roxy's helped to give the
interior an inviting appearance, and Sally put up little, thin scrim
curtains at the windows.
At first the stocking up of the store had been somewhat of a problem, but
Cousin Roxy helped out with the business plan, and by this time nearly
every one in Gilead was taking a keen, personal interest in the girls'
venture.
It was Ma Parmalee who first suggested Sally selling on the commission
plan.
"I've got thirty-five jars of the best kind of preserves and canned goods
in Gilead, though I say it as shouldn't," she announced, one day, when she
had stopped on her way by the crossroads to look over the new
establishment. "Most of them are pints, and besides I've got--land, I
don't know how many glasses of jell. I'd be willing to give you a right
good share of whatever you could make on 'em, if you could sell 'em off
for me down here."
Sally agreed gladly, and the fruit made a splendid showing along the upper
shelves behind the counters. Not only that, but it began to sell at once.
Mr. Ormond bought up all of the quince jelly after sampling one glass, and
Ralph acknowledged that he and Honey were perfectly willing to become
responsible for the strawberry preserves and spiced pears. By the time
Frances Cunningham and the other girls from the Academy had arrived,
Sally was already looking around for more supplies.
Then Cynthy Allen had come over with Cousin Roxy one day. Ever since her
home had burned the year before she had been under the friendly roof up at
Elmhurst, helping out according to her strength, and never fully realizing
how the shelter of the old house kept her from the poor-farm down on the
Plains. She came into the store with an old black lace veil fluttering as
usual from her hat, and a brown bombazine dress that dated from the
eighties.
"Well, you've got the place fixed up real sightly," she said. "I wonder--I
don't suppose you'd have any sale for braided rag rugs, would you? I've
got some awful pretty ones packed away in my chest, brand new, too. I've
been sewing and winding all winter for Roxana, too, but I guess she plans
to use them for carpets."
Sally accepted the suggestion instantly, and down came half a dozen oval
rugs, braided in Cynthy's best style, that were snapped up at once by the
tent dwellers. Frances bought three to put around in the tent which she
had reserved for Miss Emery.
"Haven't you got some of that painted tinware, too, Sally?" she asked. "I
don't know just what you call it, but I mean the black candlesticks and
little trays with trailing vines on them. I'd like to put some of those
around."
The very next day Helen started off with Piney on the trail of old
candlesticks. They stopped at nearly every house they came to, and
returned with a perfect treasure trove of old relics.
"Why, we found candlesticks stuck out in wood-sheds and corn-cribs, rusty
as could be, but the real thing in colonial art, and mother," Helen added,
almost lowering her voice with a touch of awe, "what on earth do you think
Mrs. Parmalee had on her hen-house door? This!"
She held up an ancient brass knocker, a smiling faun's head encircled in
wreathing vines.
"That doesn't look as if it ever belonged on a Puritan's front door," said
Mrs. Robbins, laughingly. "I rather think it must have come from Merry
Mount, where they held the first Maypole dance and shocked good Cotton
Mather. I think I'll have to buy that from Sally myself."
There were several old lacquered trays and a couple of old gray stone
dasher churns.
"We'll take those and fill them with yellow daisies," Piney said,
admiringly, "and I'll bet a cookie they'll sell the first day to some of
the artist crowd. I found them in the Bennetts' smoke-house covered with
the dust of ages."
It was little things like these that made Sally's shop unusual and
inviting, but Piney started a new venture herself accidentally. She and
Sally had always been chums, and now she spent most of her time helping
her. It became the order of the day for them to have a cup of tea about
four o'clock. Piney would take a candle-stand by the west window and make
it look so inviting with a little strip of homespun linen and a spray of
flowering almond that no one could resist tea from the old blue ware which
Mrs. Peckham had donated.
They were just having tea one afternoon when Miss Emery came in with the
girls from the Academy in New York. There was Frances, and the two Farley
sisters, Gwen and Elise. The other girl was Cecil Fanshawe. Kit had a way
of summing up family history with a few brief, terse remarks, and she had
all four indexed and filed, so to speak.
"Cecil's from Fanshawe Grange, somewhere in Middlesex, England. Father's a
Major in France, mother's dead, got two aunts in New York. Gwen and Elise
come from Ohio, got French blood from colonial days. Frances is old
Knickerbocker stock, born on Washington Square, warranted sterling. I like
Cecil best."
When they discovered the tea-table that afternoon, Miss Emery insisted
that she would not leave until she had partaken also from the willow
pattern cups, and Sally, all blushes and smiles, prepared her first guest
tea.
After they had gone she looked at the seventy-five cents in her hand, as
though it had fallen from the sky, but Piney took the cue from Fate.
"We will serve afternoon tea here from now on," she said, "and it's going
to be twenty cents instead of fifteen. I know what we'll call this place,
Sally. There are willow trees all around here, and along the river. This
is the 'Sign of the Willow Tree.' We'll make it a stopping-off place for
all good pilgrims."