"Are you surprised?" Norah asked Joe as they went down in the elevator.
She looked at Joe curiously, for there was a broad grin on Joe's face,
and a grin was not what Norah expected him to wear under the
circumstances. She would have said that a sad and sorry countenance was
more befitting the occasion. But Joe looked anything but sad and sorry.
Indeed, he was so jubilant that Norah borrowed some of his triumphant
satisfaction and smiled, too.
He hesitated. "No," he said slowly, "I'm not surprised, although I don't
know whether you refer to Tessie's engagement to Mr. Bill, or to Mr.
Kingley's successful publicity campaign or to the loss of two of the
Sunshine Islands?"
"I meant Tessie's engagement!" She was surprised that he did not
understand which was the most important of the three events he
mentioned. "I thought you were rather fond of our little queen,
yourself," she said with the frank interest which was Norah Lee. There
was an odd little breathlessness in her voice as she asked the question,
and she watched his face with eager eyes.
Joe laughed carelessly. "Our little queen!" He ironically repeated the
phrase which had been so often on the lips of Mr. Kingley. "Of course
I'm fond of her. She has been like a sister to me. And she used to make
me furious, when she was so unhappy, because she couldn't have
everything that Ethel Kingley had, and yet she never would do anything
to boost herself. She wouldn't do anything but grumble to poor old
Granny. I used to talk to her like a Dutch uncle, and a fat lot of good
it did until this jolt came. Now she has had a chance to see that it
isn't enough to be rich and powerful--to have things. Tessie knows now
that it takes more than power and riches to make a girl happy."
"That's right," agreed Norah quickly, and now she looked as jubilant as
Joe had looked. "A girl does have to have more than things. She has to
have love. I never used to believe that, but I know now it's true. Isn't
it romantic?" she hurried on, as Joe started to ask her how she knew
about love now. "Mr. Bill and the queen who was once a shopgirl! And all
the time she was a shopgirl, Mr. Bill never saw her. Not until she was a
queen!" It almost seemed as if she blamed Mr. Bill for such poor
eyesight in regard to shopgirls.
"More credit to him!" declared Joe warmly. "I've always thought it was
fine in Bill that he never saw the girls who work in the store. If he
had run around after Tessie, I would have known he was a bad egg, but
now-- You see, living at her house as I did, I felt as if she were a
sister. I don't mind telling you that there was a time when I might have
cared for her more than a fellow does care for a sister, but when this
queen business came up I found I didn't. It showed me the girl I really
did care for. Want to hear about her?" He asked in a most friendly
fashion, and with a pleased chuckle which made her look at him quickly.
There was a flush on his face and a light in his eyes she had never seen
there before. They made her almost afraid to hear about this girl Joe
really cared for, but she nodded bravely.
"Of course!" And there was just as much friendliness in her voice as
there had been in Joe's--no more and no less. But the color slipped from
her cheeks and left them rather white, and there was a puzzled
expression in her eyes. "Of course, I've discovered I'm old-fashioned
enough to adore romance."
"This romance isn't finished yet," Joe told her. His voice was not as
confident as it had been. It was just a bit husky and anxious. "The
heroine worked in the Evergreen, too. She was in the advertising
department, and she used to agree with old Kingley that everything was
publicity that came to the store."
"In the advertising department!" interrupted Norah, and all the pretty
color rushed back to her cheeks, and her eyes danced. "Do I know her?"
she demanded. "I used to work in the advertising department of the
Evergreen, too, you know."
"Sure you know her. You see her every day. I used to think my girl was
all for business and getting on, that she considered ambition and
success as the only things that counted. But since I've seen her trying
to help an ignorant little girl, and being kind and sympathetic to an
old woman, why I know she's got a heart so big that it can hold more
than ambition and success. Oh, what's the use of beating about the bush?
You know I mean you! I hope you care for me, but if you don't to-day you
will to-morrow. I'm a persevering cuss, and I usually get what I want."
"And what do you want?" asked Norah, and the corners of her mouth danced
with her eyes. She tried hard to look only politely interested, but she
just succeeded in looking eager to have him put his want in plain words.
"You," he said bluntly, "Tessie's a kid. She'll never grow up. She'll be
some one for Bill to pet and play with all of his life. But I don't want
a plaything. I want a woman for my mate, a woman who will help me do my
share of the world's work and will let me help her do her share. I want
more than a wife. I want a comrade! How about it?" Casual as the words
were, Joe's voice was not casual. It held a deep note which thrilled
Norah through and through and made her put her hand quickly into his.
"That's what counts," she whispered. "Understanding, comradeship. They
mean as much as love, and when you have comradeship and love you are
with the stars. We'll help each other," she promised with sweet
solemnity.
"Here, what do you mean by holding up the traffic?" exclaimed Mr. Bill,
who had remained behind with Tessie for a short consultation with Mr.
Marvin, and who found them lingering flushed and important in the
corridor. "Come on and help us tell Granny that her queen has
abdicated."
"And Johnny, the Boy Scout," added Joe. "Johnny will take the news hard.
He had great ideas about changing the cannibals into Scouts. He confided
to me that just because there never had been a Scoutmaster as young as
he is was no reason why there never would be one. It will take some tact
to break the news to Johnny."
It took no tact at all to break it to Granny. She took off her glasses
and looked at Tessie.
"My soul and body!" she murmured. "And you had to marry a man like
Ka-kee-ta? I'm glad you said you wouldn't! And just imagine living where
you could be drowned any minute! You did exactly right, Tessie! You'll
be much safer and happier right here in Waloo, where we know what to
expect." She was silent for a moment and then she added slowly, "the
good Lord never forgets the Gilfoolys!"
"Oh come, Granny," objected Joe. "Don't tell me you think the Lord
destroyed two perfectly good islands, and nobody knows how many people,
to keep Tessie Gilfooly from making a fool of herself!"
"They were savages, Joe," corrected Granny. "Poor, ignorant savages, not
much more than animals, to look at Ka-kee-ta and hear him talk. I'm
sorry for him, but I can't help feeling more comfortable about Tessie.
And, when you think of all the troubles those poor natives might have
had--famine and smallpox and revolution--I guess a tidal wave was easy
for them. I haven't liked much I heard about that kingdom of yours after
I got over being proud to think you were a queen, Tessie, and if you had
to marry a tattooed black man to keep it, I think you did exactly right
to give it back. I expect we'll be a lot happier without any thrones in
the family. There won't be any more kidnaping, and I shan't have to stay
dressed up all the time. We can take it easy again, thank the good Lord!
And you're going to marry Mr. Bill, Tessie? Can you believe it? You're a
good lad, aren't you, Mr. Bill?" She looked questioningly into Mr.
Bill's radiant face.
He stammered something, and Granny nodded her head.
"Well, well," she said. "To think of little Tessie Gilfooly marrying the
big Evergreen! That means more to me than to hear you were queen of a
lot of cannibals, away off in the Pacific Ocean. We've seen the
Evergreen and know what it is! But Ka-kee-ta and his ax weren't a good
advertisement for the islands. Well, well, I wonder what Mrs. Scanlon'll
say now! She's been snooping around all morning, wanting to know if we
were back for good and saying she was glad her Lil was satisfied to be a
good stenographer and didn't aim to be what she couldn't be. I wonder
what she'll say when she hears you're going to marry the Evergreen!
Well, well! I guess we'd all better have a cup of coffee and steady our
nerves after what we been through. And, Tessie, you'd better change your
dress. I like you to look like a queen so long's you got the clothes.
This has been good for Tessie," she confided to the others as Tessie
tore her hand from Mr. Bill, and obediently ran up the narrow stairs.
"It's good for any girl to think she is a queen for a while. And she
don't have to be told she's queen of any cannibal islands, either. It's
enough for a girl to know she's queen of a good man's heart."
"You are!" Granny caught Norah in a warm embrace. Granny did not seem at
all surprised to hear what Norah was, but she did seem pleased.
"You see, the Lord has been good to the Carys as well as to the
Gilfoolys," grinned Joe, and he put his arm around the two women.
"Well, well!" Granny put Norah away so that she could look into her
shining face. "All I can say is you're a lucky girl. Joe Cary's been a
good friend, and he'll make a good husband. I know!" And she looked at
Norah and then at Joe, as if indeed she did know.
"Not as good as Mr. Bill!" declared Tessie from the doorway. She was
breathless with the haste she had made, but she looked more familiar to
them now in her crepe frock than she had in the shabby black sateen.
"Mr. Bill is going to make the best husband in the world!" she told
Granny confidently, as she slipped her fingers into Mr. Bill's waiting
hand.
"You darling!" exclaimed Mr. Bill chokingly, and he put out his arm and
drew her closer. "You darling Tessie Gilfooly!" And he kissed her warm
red lips.
Granny smiled at them and at Joe and Norah. "What a grand thing that
would be," she said slowly, "if all the men would try to be the best
husbands in the world, and all the girls would try to be the best wives
in the world. I guess then we wouldn't have no divorces. H--sh! Is that
Johnny in the pantry?" Her keen ears had caught the rattle of crockery.
"Who's going to tell him that some of the Sunshine Islands have been
washed away by a tidal wave? Who's going to tell him that Tessie's given
back her kingdom and now the islands'll never have Boy Scouts?"
* * * * *
_Novels for Cheerful Entertainment_
* * * * *