JOHN GILPIN JOINS THE SPORT
Old Michael stood on the wide platform at the top of the slide, his
face aglow with eagerness, and his whole manner altered to boyish
gayety. His great toboggan was perched on the angle of the incline,
like a bird poised for flight, while he was bidding his company to:
"Get on, ladies! Get on and let's be off!"
Behind and around him were the other men employees of Oak Knowe, and
every one of them, except the _chef_, enthusiastic over the coming
sport. But he, unhappy mortal, preferred the warmth of his kitchen
fire to this shivery pastime and had only entered into it to escape
the gibing tongues of the other servants. Yet in point of costume he
could "hold his head up with the best"; and the fact that he could, in
this respect even outshine his comrades was some compensation for his
cold-pinched toes.
The platform was crowded with toboggans and girls; the air rang with
jest and laughter; with girlish squeals of pretended fear; and cries
of: "Don't crowd!" or: "Sit close, sit close!"
"Sit close" they did; the blanketed legs of each tobogganer pressed
forward on either side of the girl in front, and all hands clasping
the small rod that ran along the sides of the toboggan.
The slide had been built wide enough for two of the sleds abreast, and
one side was usually left to the smaller ones of the experienced
girls, who could be trusted to safely manage their own light craft.
To Michael and the matron was always accorded the honor of first slide
on the right while the "best singles" coasted alongside on the left.
That morning, by tacit consent, the new "Dorothy Calvert" was poised
beside the big "Oak Knowe" and the Honorable Gwendolyn Borst-Kennard
was a proud and happy girl, indeed, as she took her place upon it as
guide and protector of ignorant Dorothy.
"She chose me of her own accord! I do believe she begins to really
love me. Oh! it's so nice to be just free and happy with her as the
others are!" thought Gwen, as she took her own place and directed her
mate just how to sit and act. Adding a final:
"Don't you be one bit afraid. I never had an accident sliding and I've
always done it every winter since I can remember. We're off! Bow your
head a little and--keep--your--mouth--shut!"
There wasn't time! Dorothy felt a little quiver run through the thing
on which she sat and a wild rush through icy air! That was all! They
had reached the bottom of the first slide and began to fly upward over
the other before she realized a thing. Gwen hadn't even finished her
directions before they had "arrived!"
The Southerner was too amazed, for a second, to even step off the
toboggan, but Gwendolyn caught her up, gave her a hearty kiss and hug,
and demanded:
"Well! Here we are! How do you like it! We've beat! We've beat!"
Dorothy rubbed her eyes. So they had, for at that instant the big Oak
Knowe fetched up beside them, and its occupants stepped or tumbled
off, throwing up their hands and cheering:
"Three cheers for the Dorothy Calvert! Queen of the Slide for all This
Year!"
And liveliest among the cheerers was the once so dignified young
"Peer," the Honorable Gwen. Dorothy looking into her beaming face and
hearing her happy voice could scarce believe this to be the same girl
she had hitherto known. But she had scant time to think for here they
came, thick and fast, toboggan after toboggan, Seventh Form girls and
Minims, teachers and pupils, the Bishop and the _chef_, maids and
men-servants, the matron and old Michael--all in high spirits, all
apparently talking at once and so many demanding of "Miss Dixie" how
she liked it, that she could answer nobody.
Then the Bishop pushed back her tasseled hood and smiled into her
shining eyes:
"Well little 'Betty the Second,' can you beat that down at old
Baltimore? What do you think now? Isn't it fine--fine? Doesn't it make
you feel you're a bird of the air? Ah! it's grand--grand. Just tell me
you like it and I'll let you go."
"I--Yes--I reckon I do! I hadn't time to think. We hadn't started, and
we were here."
"Up we go. Try her again!" cried one, and the climb back to the top
promptly began, the men carrying the heavier sleds, the girls their
lighter ones, Gwendolyn and Dorothy their own between them. Then the
fun all over again; the jests at awkward starts, the cheers at
skillful ones, the laughter and good will, till all felt the
exhilaration of the moment and every care was forgotten.
Many a slide was taken and now Dorothy could answer when asked did she
like it:
"It's just grand, as the Bishop said. At first I could hardly breathe
and I was dizzy. Now I do as Gwen tells me and I love it! I should
like to stay out here all day!"
"Wait till dinner-time! Then you'll be ready enough to go in.
Tobogganing is the hungriest work--or play--there can possibly be!"
said Gwendolyn, pirouetting about on the ice as gracefully as on a
waxed floor, the merriest, happiest girl in all that throng. Not only
Dorothy but many another observed her with surprise. This was a new
Gwen, not the stand-offish sort of creature who had once so haughtily
scorned all their fun. She had always tobogganed, every year that she
had been in that school, but she had never enjoyed it like this; and
again as the Bishop regarded her, he nodded his head in satisfaction
and said to the matron:
"I told you so. I knew it. Do a kindness to somebody and it will
return to yourself in happiness a thousand fold."
"Thanks, dear Bishop! I'll try to remember," merrily answered she;
noticing that Gwendolyn had drawn near enough to hear, and taking this
little preachment to herself to prevent Gwendolyn's doing so. She was
so pleased by sight of the girl's present happiness that she wished
nothing to cloud it, and believing herself discussed would certainly
offend proud, sensitive Gwen.
Almost two hours had passed, and a few were beginning to tire of the
really arduous sport, with its upward climb, so out of proportion to
the swift descent; when suddenly fresh shouts of laughter rang out
from the high platform and those ascending made haste to join the
others at the top.
There stood old John Gilpin and Robin, the latter's young bones now
sound and strong again, and himself much the better for his sojourn at
the cottage with his enforced rest and abundance of good food.
"Well, well! How be ye all? Hearty, you look, and reg'lar circus
pictures in them warm duds! Good day to your Reverence, Bishop, and I
hope I see you in good health. My humble respects, your Reverence, and
I thought as how I'd just step up and ask your Reverence might my lad
here and me have a try on your slide. I thought--why, sir, the talk
on't has spread way into town a'ready, sir, and there'll be more
beggars nor me seekin' use on't, your Reverence--"
The prelate's hearty laughter rang out on the frosty air, a sound
delightful to hear, so full it was of genial humanity, and he grasped
the hand of the old teamster as warmly as he would that of a far
wealthier man.
"Man to man, John, we're all in the same boat to-day. Drop the
formality and welcome to the sport. But what sort of sled is this,
man? Looks rather rough, doesn't it? Sure you could manage it on this
steep incline?"
John bridled and Robin looked disappointed. Expectations of the
toboggan-slide's being made ready had filled his head, and he and the
old man had toiled for hours to make the sled at which the Bishop
looked so doubtfully.
"Well, your Reverence--I mean--you without the Reverence--" here the
Bishop smiled and Robin giggled, thereby causing his host to turn
about with a frown. "You see, sir, Robin's always been hearin' about
your toboggan up here to Oak Knowe and's been just plumb crazy--"
At this point the shy lad pulled John's coat, silently begging him to
leave him out of the talk; but the farmer had been annoyed by Robin's
ill-timed giggle, and testily inquired:
"Well, sir, ain't that so? Didn't you pester the life clean out o' me
till I said I'd try? Hey?"
"Y-yes," meekly assented the boy; then catching a glimpse of Dorothy
and Winifred and their beckoning nods he slipped away to them. To him
Dorothy proudly exhibited her beautiful toboggan, explaining its fine
construction with a glibness that fitted an "old tobogganer" better
than this beginner at the sport. Gwen's face beamed again, listening
to her, as if she felt a more personal pride in the sled than even
Dorothy herself. She even unbent so far from her pride of rank as to
suggest:
"If you'll let me borrow it and he'd like to go, I'll take Robin down
once, to show him how smoothly it runs."
Robin's eyes sparkled. He wasn't shy with girls, but only when he felt
himself made too conspicuous by his host's talk.
"Would you? Could she? May she?" he cried, teetering about on his
ragged shoes in an ecstasy of delight.
Dolly laughed and clapped her hands.
"Verily, she should, would, can, and may! laddie boy. But where's your
jacket? I mean your other one? It's so cold, you'll freeze in that
thin one."
By the color which came to the lad's cheek Dolly realized that she had
asked a "leading question," but Robin's dismay lasted only an instant;
then he laughed merrily at the "good joke," and answered:
"Well, you see, Miss Dorothy, my 'other one' is at some tailor's shop
in town. I haven't had a chance yet to choose one, let alone pay for
it! But what matter? 'Tisn't winter all the year and who wears
top-coats in summer? Did she really mean it?"
Gwendolyn proved that she "really meant it" by pushing the "Dorothy
Calvert" into position and nodding to him that she was ready.
"All right! Let her go!" he responded to her silent invitation and
away they went, as ill-matched a pair as might have been found. But he
had a boy's fearlessness and love of adventure; and even on that
swift descent his gay whistling floated back to those above.
Meanwhile, John Gilpin was explaining with considerable pride,
yet thankful that the Bishop was out of hearing on his own
downward-speeding toboggan:
"You see, lassie, how't Robin was dead set to come. Said he knew so
good a man as his Reverence wouldn't say 'No' to us, and just kept
teasin' at me till we stepped-an'-fetched a lot of staves come off a
hogshead. So I fastened 'em together on the insides--See? And we've
shaved an' shaved, an' glass-scraped 'em on t'other till they'll never
hurt no slide 't ever was iced. The Bishop seemed terr'ble afraid I'd
rough up his track with it, but it's a poor track that water won't
freeze smooth again; so if we do happen to scratch it a mite, I'll
step-an'-fetch a few buckets o' water and fix it up again. And say,
girlie, where's that Jack, boot-boy? And Baal? I ain't seen hide nor
hair of ary one this long spell, an' I allow I kind of sorter miss
'em. He used to give the dame the fidgets with his yarns of what
he's goin to be an' do, time comes, but me an' him got on fairly
well--fairly. As for that goat, he was the amusingest little creatur'
't ever jumped a fence, even if we did fight most of the time. Hah,
hum! I've noticed more'n once that the folks or things you quarrel
with are the ones you miss most, once they're gone."
"We haven't seen Jack since that time he locked me in the drying-room.
He ran away, I reckon, and took Baal with him. And it's just like
you say: nobody liked him much, and he was always in disgrace with
somebody, but I heard the Lady Principal say, only yesterday, that
she actually believed she missed that worthless boot-boy more than
any other servant who might have left."
"Well, now, Dorothy, don't that beat all? That book-l'arned lady just
agreein' with me! I often tell Dame 't I know more'n she thinks I do,
but all she'll answer to that is: 'John, that'll do.' A rare silent
woman is my Dame but a powerful thinker. Hello! Here they come back
again. Robin! Robin! Look-a-here! You didn't bamboozle me into makin'
our sled and climbin' this height just to leave me go for a passel o'
silly girls! No, siree! You come and slide with me right to once. I
set out to go a-tobogganin' an' I'm goin'. So none of your backslidin'
now!"
"All right, Mr. Gilpin, here am I! And I do hope it won't be any true
_back_ sliding we shall do on this thing. You'd ought to have put a
little handrail on the sides like I told you there always was; but--"
"But that'll do, Robin. In my young days knee-high boys didn't know
more'n their elders. That'll do!"
The old farmer's imitation of his wife's manner seemed very funny to
all the young folks, but his anxiety was evident, as he glanced from
his own hand-made "toboggan" to the professional ones of the others.
Upon his was not even the slight rod to hold on by and the least jar
might send him off upon the ice. Peering down, it seemed to him that
glazed descent was a straight road to a pit of perdition and his old
heart sank within him.
But--He had set out to go tobogganing and go he would, if he perished
doing it. Dame had besought him with real tears not to risk his old
bones in such a foolhardy sport, and he had loftily assured her that
"what his Reverence can do I can do. Me and him was born in the same
year, I've heard my mother tell, and it's a pity if I can't ekal him!"
Moreover, there were all these youngsters makin' eyes at him, plumb
ready to laugh, and thinkin' he'd back out. Back out? He? John Gilpin?
Never!
"Come on, Robin! Let's start!"
Gwendolyn and Dorothy were also ready to "start" upon what they
intended should be their last descent of that morning. Alas! it proved
to be! Five seconds later such a scream of terror rent the air that
the hearts of all who heard it chilled in horror.