MARM PARRADAY DOES HER DUTY
It was on the day following the burial of the Narnay baby that the
mystery surrounding Mr. Broxton Day's situation in Mexico was quite
cleared up, and much to his daughter's satisfaction. Quite a packet of
letters arrived for Janice--several delayed epistles, indeed, coming in
a single wrapper.
With them was a letter in the exact script of Juan Dicampa--that
mysterious brigand chief who was Mr. Day's friend--and couched in much
the same flowery phraseology as the former note Janice had received.
It read:
"Señorita:--
"I fain would beg thy pardon--and that most humbly--for my seeming
slight of thy appeal, which reached my headquarters when your humble
servant was busily engaged elsewhere. Thy father, the Senior B. Day,
is safe. He has never for a moment been in danger. The embargo is now
lifted and he may write to thee, sweet señorita, as he may please. The
enemy has been driven from this fair section of my troubled land, and
the smile of peace rests upon us as it rests upon you, dear señorita.
Adios.
"Faithfully thine,
"JUAN DICAMPA."
"Such a strangely boyish letter to come from a bloodthirsty bandit--for
such they say he is. And he is father's friend," sighed Janice,
showing the letter to Nelson Saley. "Oh, dear! I wish daddy would
leave that hateful old mine and come home."
Nevertheless, daddy's return--or his abandonment of the mine--did not
appear imminent. Good news indeed was in Mr. Broxton Day's most recent
letters. The way to the border for ore trains was again open. For six
weeks he had had a large force of peons at work in the mine and a great
amount of ore had been shipped.
There was in the letter a certificate of deposit for several hundred
dollars, and the promise of more in the near future.
"You must be pretty short of feminine furbelows by this time. Be good
to yourself, Janice," wrote Mr. Day.
But his daughter, though possessing her share of feminine vanity in
dress, saw first another use for a part of this unexpected windfall.
She said nothing to a soul but Walky Dexter, however. It was to be a
secret between them.
There was so much going on in Polktown just then that Walky could keep
a secret, as he confessed himself, "without half trying."
"Nelson Haley openin' aour school and takin' up the good work ag'in
where he laid it daown, is suthin' that oughter be noted a-plenty,"
declared Mr. Dexter. "And I will say for 'em, that committee
reinstated him before anybody heard anythin' abeout Jack Besmith havin'
stole the gold coins.
"Sure enough!" went on Walky, "that's another thing that kin honestly
be laid to Lem Parraday's openin' that bar at the Inn. That's where
Jack got the liquor that twisted his brain, that led him astray, that
made him a thief---- Jefers-pelters! sounds jest like 'The Haouse That
Jack Built,' don't it? But poor Jack Besmith has sartainly built him a
purty poor haouse. And there's steel bars at the winders of it--poor
feller!"
However, it was Nelson Haley himself who used the story of Jack Besmith
most tellingly, and for the cause of temperance. As the young fellow
had owned to the crime when taxed with it, and had returned most of the
coins of the collection, he was recommended to the mercy of the court.
But all of Polktown knew of the lad's shame.
Therefore, Nelson Haley felt free to take the incident--and nobody had
been more vitally interested in it than himself--for the text of a
speech that he made in the big tent only a week or so before Town
Meeting Day.
Nelson stood up before the audience and told the story simply--told of
the robbery and of how he had felt when he was accused of it, sketching
his own agony and shame while for weeks and months he had not been
under suspicion. "I did not believe the bad influence of liquor
selling could touch _me_, because I had nothing to do with _it_," he
said. "But I have seen the folly of that opinion."
He pointed out, too, the present remorse and punishment of young Jack
Besmith. Then he told them frankly that the blame for all--for Jack's
misdeed, his own suffering, and the criminal's final situation--lay
upon the consciences of the men who had made liquor selling in Polktown
possible.
It was an arraignment that stung. Those deeply interested in the cause
of prohibition cheered Nelson to the echo. But one man who sat well
back in the audience, his hat pulled over his eyes, and apparently an
uninterested listener, slipped out after Nelson's talk and walked and
fought his conscience the greater part of that night.
Somehow the school teacher's talk--or was it Janice Day's scorn?--had
touched Mr. Cross Moore in a vulnerable part.
Had the Summer visitors to Polktown been voters, there would have been
little doubt of the Town Meeting voting the hamlet "dry." But there
seemed to be a large number of men determined not to have their
liberties, so-called, interfered with.
Lem Parraday's bar had become a noisy place. Some fights had occurred
in the horse sheds, too. And on the nights the railroad construction
gang came over to spend their pay, the village had to have extra police
protection.
Frank Bowman was doing his best with his men; but they were a rough set
and he had hard work to control them. The engineer was a never-failing
help in the temperance meetings, and nobody was more joyful over the
clearing up of Nelson Haley's affairs than he.
"You have done some big things these past few months, Janice Day," he
said with emphasis.
"Nonsense, Frank! No more than other people," she declared.
"Well, I guess you have," he proclaimed, with twinkling eyes, "Just
think! You've brought out the truth about that lost coin collection;
you've saved Hopewell Drugg from becoming a regular reprobate--at
least, so says his mother-in-law; you've converted Walky Dexter from
his habit of taking a 'snifter'----"
"Oh, no!" laughed Janice. "Josephus converted Walky."
Save at times when he had to deliver freight or express to the hotel,
the village expressman had very little business to take him near Lem
Parraday's bar nowadays. However, because of that secret between
Janice and himself, Walky approached the Inn one evening with the
avowed purpose of speaking to Joe Bodley.
Marm Parraday had returned home that very day--and she had returned a
different woman from what she was when she went away. The Inn was
already being conducted on a Winter basis, for most of the Summer
boarders had flitted. There were few patrons now save those who hung
around the bar.
Walky, entering by the front door instead of the side entrance, came
upon Lem and his wife standing in the hall. Marm Parraday still had
her bonnet on. She was grimly in earnest as she talked to Lem--so much
in earnest, indeed, that she never noticed the expressman's greeting.
"That's what I've come home for, Lem Parraday--and ye might's well know
it. I'm a-goin' ter do my duty--what I knowed I should have done in
the fust place. You an' me have worked hard here, I reckon. But you
ain't worked a mite harder nor me; and you ain't made the Inn what it
is no more than I have."
"Not so much, Marm--not so much," admitted her husband evidently
anxious to placate her, for Marm Parraday was her old forceful self
again.
"I'd never oughter let rum sellin' be begun here; an' now I'm a-goin'
ter end it!"
"My mercy, Marm! 'Cordin' ter the way folks talk, it's goin' to be
ended, anyway, when they vote on Town Meeting Day," said Lem,
nervously. "I ain't dared renew my stock for fear the 'drys' might git
it----"
"Lem Parraday--ye poor, miser'ble worm!" exclaimed his wife. "Be you
goin' ter wait till yer neighbors put ye out of a bad business, an'
then try ter take credit ter yerself that ye gin it up? Wal, _I_
ain't!" cried the wife, with energy.
"We're goin' aout o' business right now! I ain't in no prayin' mood
terday--though I thank the good Lord he's shown me my duty an' has give
me stren'th ter do it!"
On the wall, in a "fire protection" frame, was coiled a length of hose,
with a red painted pail and an axe. Marm turned to this and snatched
down the axe from its hooks.
"Why, Marm!" exploded Lem, trying to get in front of her.
"Stand out o' my way, Lem Parraday!" She commanded, with firm voice and
unfaltering mien.
"Yeou air crazy!" shrieked the tavern keeper, dancing between her and
the barroom door.
"Not as crazy as I was," she returned grimly.
She thrust him aside as though he were a child and strode into the
barroom. Her appearance offered quite as much excitement to the
loafers on this occasion as it had the day of the tempest. Only they
shrank from her with good reason now, as she flourished the axe.
"Git aout of here, the hull on ye!" ordered the stern woman. "Ye have
had the last drink in this place as long as Lem Parraday and me keeps
it. Git aout!"
She started around behind the bar. Joe Bodley, smiling cheerfully,
advanced to meet her.
"Now, Marm! You know this ain't no way to act," he said soothingly.
"This ain't no place for ladies, anyway. Women's place is in the home.
This here----"
"Scat! ye little rat!" snapped Marm, and made a swing at him--or so he
thought--that made Joe dance back in sudden fright.
"Hey! take her off, Lem Parraday! _The woman's mad!_"
"You bet I'm mad!" rejoined Marm Parraday, grimly, and _smash!_ the axe
went among the bottles on the shelf behind the bar. Every bottle
containing anything to drink was a target for the swinging axe. Joe
jumped the bar, yelling wildly. He was the first out of the barroom,
but most of the customers were close at his heels.
"Marm! Yeou air ruinin' of us!" yelled Lem.
"I'm a-savin' of us from the wrath to come!" returned the woman,
sternly, and swung her axe again.
The spigot flew from the whiskey barrel in the corner and the next blow
of the axe knocked in the head of the barrel. The acrid smell of
liquor filled the place.
Not a bottle of liquor was left. The barroom of the Lake View Inn
promised to be the driest place in town.
Up went the axe again. Lem yelled loud enough to be heard a block:
"Not that barrel, Marm! For the good Land o' Goshen! don't bust in
_that_ barrel."
"Why not?" demanded his breathless wife, the axe poised for the stroke.
"Cause it's merlasses! If ye bust thet in, ye will hev a mess here,
an' no mistake."
"Jefers-pelters!" chuckled Walky Dexter, telling of it afterward, "I
come away then an' left 'em erlone. But you kin take it from me--Marm
Parraday is quite in her us'al form. Doc. Poole's a wonderful
doctor--ain't he?
"But," pursued Walky, "I had a notion that old fiddle of Hopewell's
would be safer outside than it was in Marm Parraday's way, an' I tuk it
down 'fore I fled the scene of de-vas-ta-tion! Haw! haw! haw!
"I run inter Joe Bodley on the outside. 'Joe,' says I, 'I reskered
part of your belongin's. It looks ter me as though yeou'll hev time
an' to spare to take this fiddle to the city an' raffle it off. But
'fore ye do that, what'll ye take for the fiddle--lowest cash price?'
"'Jest what it cost me, Walky,' says Joe. 'One hundred dollars.'
"'No, Joe; it didn't cost ye that,' says I. 'I mean what _yeou_ put
into it yerself. That other feller that backed out'n his bargain put
in some. How much?'
"Wal," pursued the expressman, "he hummed and hawed, but fin'ly he
admitted that he was out only fifty dollars. 'Here's yer fifty, Joe,'
says I. 'Hopewell wants his fiddle back.'
"I reckon Joe needed the money to git him out o' taown. He can take a
hint as quick as the next feller--when a ton of coal falls on him!
Haw! haw! haw! He seen his usefulness in Polktown was kind o' passed.
So he took the fifty, an' here's the vi'lin, Janice Day. I reckon ye
paid abeout forty-seven-fifty too much for it; but ye told me ter git
it at _any_ price."
To Hopewell and 'Rill, Janice, when she presented the storekeeper with
his precious fiddle, revealed a secret that she had _not_ entrusted to
Walky Dexter. By throwing the strong ray of an electric torch into the
slot of the instrument she revealed to their wondering eyes a peculiar
mark stamped in the wood of the back of it.
"That, Mr. Drugg," the girl told him, quietly, "is a mark to be found
only in violins manufactured by the Amati family. The date of the
manufacture of this instrument I do not know; but it is a genuine
Cremona, I believe. At least, I would not sell it again, if I were
you, without having it appraised first by an expert."
"Oh, my dear girl!" cried 'Rill, with streaming eyes, "Hopewell won't
ever sell it again. I won't let him. And we've got the joyfulest
news, Janice! You have doubled our joy to-day. But already we have
had a letter from Boston which says that our little Lottie is in better
health than ever and that the peril of blindness is quite dissipated.
She is coming home to us again in a short time."
"Joyful things," as Janice said, were happening in quick rotation
nowadays. With the permanent closing of the Lake View Inn bar, several
of the habitués of the barroom began to straighten up. Jim Narnay had
really been fighting his besetting sin since the baby's death. He had
found work in town and was taking his wages home to his wife.
Trimmins was working steadily for Elder Concannon. And being so far
away from any place where liquor was dispensed, he was doing very well.
Really, with the abrupt closing of the bar, the cause of the "wets" in
Polktown rather broke down. They had no rallying point, and, as Walky
said, "munitions of war was mighty scurce."
"A feller can't re'lly have the heart ter _vote_ for whiskey 'nless
ther's whiskey in him," said Walky, at the close of the voting on Town
Meeting Day. "How about that, Cross Moore? We dry fellers have walked
over ye in great shape--ain't that so?"
"I admit you have carried' the day, Walky," said the selectman, grimly.
"He! he! I sh'd say we had! Purty near two ter one. Wal! I thought
ye said once that no man in Polktown could best ye--if ye put yer mind
to it?"
Cross Moore chewed his straw reflectively. "I don't consider I have
been beaten by a man," he said.
"No? Jefers-pelters! what d'ye call it?" blustered Walky.
"I reckon I've been beaten by a girl--and an idea," said Mr. Cross
Moore.
"Wal," sighed Aunt 'Mira, comfortably, rocking creakingly on the front
porch of the old Day house in the glow of sunset, "Polktown does seem
rejoovenated, jest like Mr. Middler preached last Sunday, since rum
sellin' has gone out. And it was a sight for sore eyes ter see Marm
Parraday come ter church ag'in--an' that poor, miser'ble Lem taggin'
after her."
Janice laughed, happily. "I know that there can be nobody in town as
glad that the vote went 'no license' as the Parradays."
"Ya-as," agreed Aunt 'Mira, rather absently. "Did ye notice Marm's new
bonnet? It looked right smart to me. I'm a-goin' ter have Miz Lynch
make me one like it."
"Say, Janice! want anything down town?" asked Marty coming out of the
house and starting through the yard.
"It doesn't seem to me as though I really wanted but one thing in all
this big, beautiful world!" said his cousin, with longing in her voice.
"What's that, child?" asked her aunt.
"I want daddy to come home."
Marty went off whistling. Aunt 'Mira rocked a while, "Ya-as," she
finally said, "if Broxton Day would only let them Mexicaners alone an'
come up here to Polktown----"
Janice suddenly started from her chair; her cheeks flushed and her eyes
sparkled. "Oh! here he is!" she murmured.
"Here _who_ is? Who d'ye mean, Janice Day? _Not yer father?_" gasped
Aunt 'Mira, staring with near-sighted eyes down the shadowy path.
Janice smiled. "It's Nelson," she said softly, her gaze upon the manly
figure mounting the hill.