THE CONTRACT'S RECEIVING DAY
"Hello, Sis!" It was Roderick's voice over the telephone. "How are you
feeling this fine, muggy morning?"
"Pretty well, I suppose. How are you, Rod? Where are you telephoning
from?"
"From Burford's shack. We're in a pinch down here, Marian. We need you
to help out. Can't you ask Mr. Gates to hitch up and bring you down to
camp right away? Or if you'll walk down to Gates's Landing I'll send
Mulcahy with the launch, to bring you the rest of the way. And put on
your very best toggery, Sis. War paint and feathers and all that. That
pretty lavender silk rig will do. But don't forget the gimcracks. Put
on all the jewelry you own."
"Why, Roderick Hallowell! What can you mean? Dress up in my best, and
come down to camp at nine in the morning, and on Sunday morning at
that?"
"I mean just what I say." Then Roderick chuckled irresistibly. "Poor
Sis, I don't wonder you're puzzled. But Sunday is the contract's day
at home, and we want you to stand in line and receive; or pour tea,
whichever you prefer to do. Do you see?"
"No, I don't see. All I do see is that you're talking nonsense. And I
don't intend to come down to the camp. It is such a hot, horrid
morning, I don't propose to stir. I want you to come up and spend the
day here instead. Mrs. Gates wants you, too, she says, for dinner and
for supper as well. And yesterday the rural-delivery man brought a
whole armful of new magazines. We'll sit on the porch, and you can
read and I'll write letters, and we'll have a lovely, quiet day
together."
There was a pause. When Roderick spoke again, his voice was rather
quenched.
"Sorry, Sis, but it isn't possible for me to come, even for dinner.
I'll be hard at it here, every minute of the day."
"You mean that you must work on the contract all day Sunday? When you
have worked fourteen hours a day, ever since you came West?" Marian's
voice was very tart. "Can't you stop long enough to go to church with
me, even? There's a beautiful little church four miles away. It's just
a pleasant drive. Surely you can give up two hours of the morning, if
you can spare no more time!"
"It isn't a question of what I'm willing to do. And I am not planning
to work on Sunday. As you know, Sis, we bank our fires Saturday night
and give the laborers a day off. Nearly all the men left for town last
night to stay till Monday. But listen. Burford tells me that, on every
clear Sunday, we can expect a visit from most of the land-owners for
miles around. And not just from the land-owners themselves: their
sisters, and their cousins, and their aunts; and the children, and the
neighbors, and the family cat. They want to see for themselves just
how the work is going on. When you stop to think, it's their own work.
Their money is paying for every shovelful of dirt we move, and every
inch of levee-work. And they're paying every copper of our salaries,
too. They have a right to see how their own investment is being used,
Sis."
"So you have to treat these country people as honored guests! Cart
them up and down the canal, and show them the excavations, and let
them pry into your reports, and ask you silly questions! Of all the
tiresome, preposterous things!"
"That's pretty much what we'll do. But there is nothing preposterous
about it; it's their right. And we fellows want to do the decent
thing. Now, more than ever, we want to do everything properly because
Carlisle is sick and away. Burford says that Carlisle was more
exacting about these visits of inspection than about anything else on
the plant. He said that when a man builds a house to protect his
family he has the right to oversee every inch of the construction, if
he likes. On the same principle, these farmers who are digging canals
and putting up levees to protect their lands should have the right to
watch the work, step by step. Burford says, too, that Carlisle, with
his everlasting patience and courtesy, was steadily winning over the
whole district; even the men who had fought the first assessments
tooth and nail. It is the least we boys can do to keep up the good
feeling that Carlisle has established."
"Well, I think it is all very absurd. Why should I come down to the
work? These people do not even know that I exist. And if you really
need somebody to talk to their wives and be gracious and all that, why
can't Mrs. Burford do it better than I? She is right on the ground,
anyway."
"Yes, she's right on the ground. And so is Thomas Tucker's newest
tooth. The poor little skeezicks howled half the night, Burford says.
He has stopped yelling just now, but he won't let his mother out of
his sight for one minute. Mrs. Burford is pretty much worn to a
frazzle. But I don't want to pester you, Marian." There was a worried
note in Rod's voice now. "I wouldn't have you come for any
consideration, if it were to make you ill or tired. So perhaps we'd
better not think of it."
Marian shrugged her shoulders. An odd, teasing question stirred in her
mind.
"I rather think I can stand the day if you can. Finnegan and I will be
at the landing in half an hour. I, and my best beads and wampum, and
my new spring hat. There, now!"
Not waiting for Rod's delighted reply, she hurried away to dress. A
whimsical impulse led her to put on her freshest and daintiest gown, a
charming lilac silk, with a wide, tilting picture hat, heaped with
white and purple lilacs. She was standing at the little pier, tugging
at her long gloves, when the duty-launch, with Rod himself at the
wheel, shot round the bend. Rod waved his hand; then, at sight of her
amazing finery, he burst into a whoop of satisfaction.
"Will you look at that! Marian Hallowell, you're the best ever. I
might have known you'd play up. Though I was scared stiff, for fear
you'd think that just every-day clothes would do. My, but you're
stunning! You're looking stronger, too, Sis. You're not nearly so wan
and spooky as you were a week ago."
"I'm feeling better, too." Marian's color rose. Even her sulky humor
must melt under Rod's beaming approval. "Now give me my sailing
orders, Rod. How many callers will we have? What sort of people will
they be? Tart and grim, like Mrs. Chrisenberry, I suppose, or else
kindly and bashful and 'woodsy,' like the Gateses? Will they stop by
on their way home from church, or will they come promptly after dinner
and spend the afternoon?"
Rod laughed. "No telling, Sister. We may have ten callers, we may have
a hundred. You'll find all kinds of people among them; precisely as
you'll find all kinds of people on Mount Vernon Street, Boston,
Massachusetts. There'll be nice, neighborly folks who'll drive up the
canal road in Bond Street motoring clothes and sixty-horse-power cars.
There'll be other nice, neighborly folks who'll ride in through the
woods on their plough horses, wearing slat sunbonnets and hickory
shirts. And they'll be friendly, and critical, and enthusiastic, and
dubersome, all in a heap. You'll need all your social experience, and
all your tact, and all the diplomacy you can muster. See?"
"Yes, I'm beginning to see." Marian's eyes were thoughtful. Then she
sprang up to wave her lilac parasol in greeting to the martin-box and
Sally Lou.
"Isn't this the most mournful luck that ever was!" Sally Lou sat with
Thomas Tucker, a forlorn little figure, planted firmly on her knee.
"To think that my son must spend his first afternoon of the season in
cutting a wicked double tooth! Maybe it'll come through by
dinner-time, though. Then he'll go to sleep, and I can slip over and
help you entertain our people--Why, Marian Hallowell! Oh, what a
lovely, lovely gown! You wise child, how did you know that to wear it
to-day was precisely the wisest thing that you could possibly do!"
"I didn't know that. I just put it on. Partly for fun, and--well,
partly to provoke Rod, I suppose." Marian felt rather foolish. But she
had no time for further confidences.
Up the muddy canal road came a roomy family carriage, drawn by a
superbly matched black team. That carriage was packed solid to the
dashboard. Father, two tall boys, and a rosy little daughter crammed
the front seat; mother, grandmother, and aunty were fitted neatly
into the back; and a fringe of small fry swung from every direction.
"Morning." The father reined in and gave everybody a friendly nod and
smile. "How are you, Mr. Burford? Glad to meet you, Mr. Hallowell. No,
thank you, we're on our way to Sunday-school and church, so we haven't
a minute to stop. But I have been wanting to know how you think
lateral four will work out; the one that turns down past my farm. Will
that sand cut give you much trouble?"
"It will make slower dredging, Mr. Moore. But we'll put it through as
fast as we can."
"Um. I'm in no hurry to see it go through. The high water isn't due
for a month, anyway. Now, I don't know much about sand-cutting. But
I've been told that your worst trouble in a sand streak is with the
slides. After your dredge-dipper has dumped the stuff ashore, it won't
stay put. It keeps tobogganing back into the channel and blocking your
cut. So sometimes you have to hoist it out two or three times over."
"That's exactly the case, Mr. Moore. Usually our levee gangs follow
along and tamp the sand down, or else spread it back from the berm
where it has no chance to slide. But it is getting so near the time
set for the completion of our upper lateral cut that we are obliged to
keep our levee shift at work on the upper laterals and take our
chances on the sand staying where we pile it."
"Just what I'd supposed. Now, I shall need a lot of that sand, in a
week or so, for some cement work. S'pose I send you a couple of teams
and half a dozen hands to-morrow, to cart off the sand under your
direction. Would that help things along?"
"Help things along? I should say it would!" Rod beamed. "It would be
the most timely help we could ask."
"But won't it put you to a lot of trouble, sir," asked Burford, "to
take the hands off their regular farm-work in that way?"
"W-well, no. Anyway they can haul sand for a day or so without making
much difference. And it will be a heap handier for you boys to have
the stuff carted off as fast as you throw it ashore."
"It surely will. That's the best news we've heard in one while!" The
boys stood smiling at each other, completely radiant. Mr. Moore
nodded and turned his horses.
"Glad if it will be any accommodation. Well, good day to you all. My
good wishes to Mr. Carlisle. Tell him I said he left a couple of
mighty competent substitutes, but that his neighbors will be glad to
see him coming back, just the same."
The big carriage with its gay load rolled away.
"So Moore will send men and teams to help us on that sand cut!"
Burford, fairly chortling with satisfaction, started toward the
martin-box. "If all our land-owners treated us with half the
consideration that he always gives, our work would be a summer's
dream. I'm going up to tell Sally Lou."
He had hardly reached the martin-box before he turned with a shout.
"There come our next visitors, Hallowell. The commodore and Mrs.
McCloskey, in that fat little white launch. See?"
Commodore McCloskey it was, indeed. Finnegan's wild yelp of delighted
greeting would have told as much. Marian promptly joined the hilarious
race to the pier. The commodore, crisp and blinding-white in his
starchy duck, stood at his launch wheel, majestic as if he stood on
the bridge of an ocean liner. But Mrs. McCloskey, a dainty, soft-eyed,
little old lady, with cheeks like Scotch roses, and silky curls white
as dandelion down blowing from under her decorous gray bonnet, won
Marian's heart at the first glance. She was as quaint and gentle and
charming as an old-time miniature.
While the boys took the commodore up and down the laterals that he
might see their progress since his last visit, Mrs. McCloskey trailed
her soft old black silk skirts to the martin-box door and begged for a
glimpse of the baby.
"He's crosser than a prickly little porcupine," protested Sally Lou,
handing him over reluctantly.
"Oh, but he'll come to me just the minute! Won't you, lamb?"
And like a lamb Thomas Tucker forgot his sorrows and snuggled happily
into her tender arms, while his relieved mother bustled about and
helped Marian to make a generous supply of lemonade; for half a dozen
carriage loads of visitors were now coming up the road.
"'Tis amazin'. Where do they all come from?" observed Mrs. McCloskey.
"Yet there's nigh three hundred land-owners in this district. And the
commodore, he passed the word yesterday that there's close on two
hundred thousand acres of land that will be protected by this one
drainage contract. Think of that, Miss Marian. Is it not grand to know
that your brother is giving the power of his hands and his brains to
such a big, helping work as all that?"
"Why, I suppose so." Marian spoke absently.
"And ye will be a help to him, too, I can see that." Mrs. McCloskey
put out a hesitating little hand in a quaint old silken mitt and
patted Marian's fluffy gown. "'Tis not everybody makes as bould as
meself to tell you in so many words of your pretty finery. But sure
'tis everybody that will appreciate it, an' be pleased an' honored
with the compliment of it."
Marian looked utterly puzzled.
"You think that I can be a help to Rod? Why, I don't know the least
thing about his work. I really don't understand----"
"Well, aren't you a magic-maker, Auntie McCloskey!" Sally Lou put
down the lemon-squeezer and stared. "Look at that precious baby! Sound
asleep in your lap! While I haven't been able to pacify him for one
minute, though I walked and sang all night!"
"'Tis the cruel tooth has come through, I'm thinkin'." Mrs. McCloskey
laid the peaceful little porcupine tenderly into his crib. "Now, I'll
stay and watch him while you two go and meet your guests. I'll call
you the minute he chirps."
The two girls hurried to greet their callers, to offer them chairs on
the shady side of the quarter-boat, to serve them with iced tea and
lemonade. Much to Marian's surprise, she found herself chattering away
vigorously and actually enjoying it all. As Rod had said, the slow
stream that came and went all day included all sorts and conditions of
folk. There were the gracious old clergyman and his sweet, motherly
wife, who stopped for a pleasant half-hour, then jogged on across the
country to his "afternoon meeting," twelve miles out in the lowlands.
There were the two brisk young plutocrats from the great Kensington
stock farm up-river, who flashed up in a stunning satiny-gray French
car, for a brief exchange of courtesies. There were two of the
district commissioners, quiet, keen-eyed gentlemen. One of these men,
Rod told his sister later, was doing valuable service to the community
by his experiments in improving the yield of corn throughout the
district. The other commissioner was a lawyer of national reputation.
Mrs. Chrisenberry stopped by, too: a brusque little visitor, sitting
very stiff and fine in her cushioned phaeton, her beady eyes darting
questions through her shrewd spectacles. Marian, feeling very real
gratitude, devoted herself to Mrs. Chrisenberry. That lady, however,
hardly spoke till just as she was starting to go. Then she leaned
forward in her carriage. She fixed Marian with a gimlet eye.
"It's agreeable to see that you think we district folks _is_ folks,"
she said, very tartly indeed. "I'd some mistrusted the other day, but
I guess now that you know what's what. Good-afternoon, all."
"Well, Sally Lou! Will you tell me what she meant?"
Sally Lou nodded wisely.
"Your pretty dress, I suspect. Didn't you hear Mrs. McCloskey praise
it, too?"
"Oh!" And now Marian's face was very thoughtful indeed.
Late in the afternoon came the one disagreeable episode of the day.
The drainage district, upon which Roderick and Burford were employed,
had become part of a huge league known as the Central Mississippi
Drainage Association. This league had recently been organized. Its
object was the cutting of protective ditches on a gigantic scale, and
its annual expenditures for this work would run well past the million
mark. Naturally there was strong competition between all the great
engineering firms to win a favorable standing in the eyes of this new
and powerful corporation. The Breckenridge Company, because of its
superior record, was easily in the lead. None the less, as Rod had
remarked a day or so before, it was up to every member of the
Breckenridge Company, from Breck the Great down to the meekest cub
engineer, to keep that lead.
Burford jeered mildly at Rod for taking his own small importance to
the company so seriously.
"Just you wait and see," retorted Roderick.
"Oh, I'll wait, all right," laughed Burford. To-day, however, he was
destined to see; and to see almost too clearly for his own peace of
mind.
A sumptuous limousine car whirled up the muddy road. Its lordly door
swung open; down stepped a large, autocratic gentleman, in raiment of
startling splendor, followed by a quiet, courteous elderly man.
"I am Mr. Ellingworth Locke, of New York. I am the acting president of
the Central Mississippi Drainage Association," announced the
magnificent one. "You gentlemen, I take it, are the--ah--the junior
engineers left in charge by Mr. Carlisle?"
Roderick and Burford admitted their identity.
"This is Mr. Crosby, our consulting engineer. Now that this district
has joined the association, it comes under our direct surveillance.
Mr. Crosby and I desire to go over your laterals and get an idea of
your work thus far."
"We are honored." Burford bowed low and welcomed his guests with
somewhat flamboyant courtesy. He led the way to the duty-launch.
Roderick followed, bringing the cushions and the tarpaulin which the
quick-witted Sally Lou hastily commanded him to carry aboard for the
potentate's comfort.
Of all their guests, that long day, the acting president was the sole
critic. At every rod of the big ditch, at every turn of the laterals,
he found some petty fault. The consulting engineer, Mr. Crosby,
followed him about in embarrassed silence. He was obviously annoyed by
his employer's rudeness. However, for all Mr. Locke's strictures, it
was evident that he could find no serious fault with the work. Yet
both boys were tingling with vexation and chagrin when the regal
limousine rolled away at last.
"What does ail his highness? Did ever you see such a beautiful
grouch?" Rod mopped his forehead and stared belligerently after the
car.
"Nothing ails him but a badly swelled head." Burford's jaw set hard.
"The fact of it is, that the worshipful Mr. Ellingworth Locke hasn't
two pins' worth of practical knowledge of dredging. He is a New York
banker, and he has no understanding of conditions west of the Hudson.
His bank is to make the loans for the association's drainage, and he
has bought a big tract of land in this district. That is why he was
elected acting president. Do you see?"
"Yes, that helps to explain things."
"So he struts around and tries to pick flaws with the most trifling
points of our construction, to keep us from guessing how little he
really knows about the big underlying principles. Gentle innocent, he
tries to think he's an expert!" Burford waved a disrespectful muddy
paw after the flying car. "All that an acting president is good for,
anyway, is to wear white spats and to put on side."
"Well, that engineer knows his job."
"Crosby? Yes, he's an engineer all right. And a gentleman, too. Just
the same, I'm glad we kowtowed to Mr. Locke. His opinion is so
influential that his approval may mean a tremendous advantage to the
Breckenridge Company some day."
"I'm hoping that Breckenridge himself will come before long and give
us a looking over."
"I'm hoping for that myself. Half an hour of Breck will swing
everything into shape. You want to know Breckenridge if ever you get
the chance, Hallowell. He's the grandest ever. Just to watch him tramp
up and down a ditch, great big silent figure that he is, and hear him
fire off those cool, close-mouthed questions of his at you, brings you
bristling up like a fighting-cock. He's a regular inspiration, I call
him."
"I'm banking on the chance that I shall know him some day." Rod's eyes
lighted. He remembered the words of his old professor, "To work under
Breckenridge is not only an advantage to any engineer. It is an
education in itself."
It was nearly six o'clock when their last callers arrived. They were
not an interesting carriage load: a gaunt, silent, middle-aged man; a
sallow-cheeked young woman, in cheap, showy clothes, her rough hands
glittering with gaudy rings; and a six-year-old girl--a pitiful little
ghost of a girl--who looked like a frail little shadow against Sally
Lou's lusty, rosy two-year-old son. Her warped, tiny body in its
forlorn lace-trimmed pink silk dress was braced in pillows in her
mother's arms. Her dim black eyes stared listlessly with the
indifference of long suffering.
Marian was always shaken and repelled by the sight of pain. But by
this time Thomas Tucker was awake and loudly demanding his mother; so
Marian must do her shrinking best, to make the new-comers feel
themselves welcomed.
"No, Mamie she don't drink lemonade. No, she don't want no milk,
neither. We'll just set here in the cool and rest a while till pappy
gets through lookin' around." The young, tired mother sat down on the
little pier. She settled the wan little creature carefully into her
arms again. "No, there's nothing you can get for her; nothing at all."
"Doesn't she like to look at pictures? I have some new magazines,"
ventured Marian.
"She does like pictures once in a while. Want to see what the lady's
got for you, Mamie?"
Mamie roused herself and looked silently at the books that Marian
piled before her. Bent on pleasing the little wraith, Marian cut out
several lovely ladies, and on a sudden inspiration added rosy cheeks
from Rod's tray of colored pencils.
Those red and blue and purple pencils caught Mamie's listless eye. She
even bestirred herself to try and draw a portrait or so with her own
shaky little fingers.
"Beats all," sighed her mother. A little pleased color rose in her
cheeks. "I haven't seen her take such an interest for months. Not even
in her dollies. We buy her all the playthings we can think of. Her
pappy, he don't ever go to town without he up and brings her a whole
grist of candy and toys and clutter. But we never once thought of the
pencils for her. Nor of paper dolls, either. My, I'm glad we stopped
by. And her pappy, he'll be more pleased than words can tell. He's
always so heart-set for Mamie to have a little fun."
"She must take these pencils home with her. Rod has a whole boxful."
Marian tied up not only the pencils, but a generous roll of Rod's
heavy drawing-paper, expressly adapted to making paper dolls that
would stand alone. The child clutched the bundle in her little lean
hands without a word of thanks. But her white little face was
eloquent. So was her father's face when he came to carry her away, and
heard her mother's story of the new pleasure.
"Well, this day has meant hard work all right, even though it was a
day of rest from my regular work," said Roderick. He was swinging the
launch up the canal to the Gates's Landing. "It's a queer way to spend
Sunday, isn't it, Sis? But it seems to be the only way for me just at
present. And you can be sure that we're obliged to you, old lady, for
the way that you've held up your end."
"I didn't mind the day, nor did I mind meeting all those people nearly
as much as I'd imagined that I would," pondered Marian. "Especially
the McCloskeys, the dear things! And that poor little crippled child,
too. I wish I could do something more for her. Y-yes, as you say, it
was pretty hard work. I'm rather tired to-night. But the day was well
worth while."
But just how worth while that day had been, neither Rod nor Marian
could know.