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[Illustration: SHE SHOOK A WIRE CAGE ENERGETICALLY OVER THE COALS]
Those Dale Girls
BY
Frances Weston Carruth
In the world's broad field of battle,
In the bivouac of Life,
Be not like dumb, driven cattle!
Be a hero in the strife!
--_Longfellow._
Chicago
A. C. McClurg & Co.
1899
Copyright
By A. C. McCLURG & CO.
A. D. 1899
TO EDITH,
MY SISTER AND COMRADE, THE BRAVEST
OF SOLDIER GIRLS
ILLUSTRATIONS
She Shook a Wire Cage Energetically over the Coals Frontispiece
The Girl Sat Down on the Arm of His Chair 48
"May I Have a Guess, Miss Dale?" 114
There Were the Girls in Their Cotton Gowns 188
Julie Was in Bed When Hester Came In That Night 232
The Wedding Breakfast 304
THOSE DALE GIRLS
CHAPTER I
"Julie Dale, you're the laziest thing in creation! Come down from that
window-seat and help."
"Can't, my dear," a gay young voice responded. "I'm as 'comfy as comfy
can be.'"
"Look at her, Peter Snooks," said Hester to a fox-terrier at her side;
"just look at her! She's curled up in a heap, reveling in that
fascinating Kipling, with her mouth all screwed up for this popcorn,
which she thinks we will take in state to her ladyship. But we'll fool
her--eh, Snooks? We'll fool her completely. We'll just sit complacently
on the floor and eat it all up ourselves."
The dog jumped about rapturously. The girl, who was kneeling before an
open fire, shook a wire cage energetically over the coals, and watched
the corn burst into great white flakes.
"It does _smell_ delicious," came in an insinuating tone from the
window-seat across the room.
Hester maintained a lofty silence, and tipping the corn into a bowl,
sprinkled it with salt, adding dabs of butter. She then tossed a piece
to the dog, and began to sample it herself with apparent satisfaction,
for she smacked her lips and said, reflectively, as she put her hands to
her burning cheeks: "I believe it is quite worth ruining my complexion
over."
Suddenly she whisked up bowl and dog, and crossing the room, dropped
both on the seat beside her sister. "There!" she exclaimed, "you knew I
would never eat it alone, even if you are a duffer!"
"'Duffer' is most inelegant" (this from Julie in an assumption of stern
reproach); "I do not see wherever you picked up such a word."
"Read it in a book," quoted Hester, laughing. This was a joke of
longstanding between them--to hold literature responsible for any
suspicious scraps of knowledge. It was a phrase they used also with much
frequency in argument, particularly when the subject was beyond the
range of their experience. "Don't know a thing about it, read it in a
book," one of them would say facetiously, by way of backing up some
remarkable statement, and feel herself at once relieved from personal
responsibility.
"You need not put on such frills," Hester now said to her sister. "You
know you adore slang yourself."
Julie was gazing out of the window. "Look, Hester, quick! There go the
crew! How they are skimming down the river! I'd no idea they trained out
here, had you?"
Both girls watched intently as the narrow shell shot by, the men pulling
the long, steady stroke which was the pride of their university.
"Aren't they splendid?" Hester exclaimed, enthusiastically. "I wish we
knew some of the college men, Julie, don't you?"
"It would be fun. I'd like to see something of college life. Perhaps we
may meet an occasional senior if Miss Ware takes us about any this
winter."
"Do you suppose he'd be nice?" inquired Hester, quizzically. "I don't
think we know much about very young men, do you? All we've known have
been so much older than we are."
Julie puckered up her forehead and gazed after the vanishing crew. She
was trying to classify an unknown species.
"It does seem odd," continued Hester, "_our_ contemplating formal
society, doesn't it? I believe I shall hate it. We have roamed around
with Daddy too much to be quite like pattern society girls."
"I tell you what we'll do, Hester; we'll go out with Miss Ware, meet
loads of people and pick out a nice congenial few whom Dad will like,
too, and just cultivate them informally. You know how Dad dislikes
society in the conventional sense, but he wants us to take our proper
place; and of course we ought to know people, now that we have really
settled down in Radnor to live."
"Heavens! but you're clever, Julie! We might set up a salon; only the
wise, the witty and the beautiful need apply. Which class would we come
under ourselves, do you think? We can begin with Dr. Ware and all the
old dears--only he never seems old a bit--that Dad is always bringing
home to dinner, and add any new dears we meet and think eligible."
Julie laughed. "It sounds like a herd or something." Then, with sudden
gravity, she said: "Hester, dear, I'm anxious about Dad. I can't just
explain it, but somehow he's been different ever since we've been here.
Haven't you noticed how preoccupied he is and tired all the time, so
unlike Dad? The other day I spoke to him about it, and he shook his head
and said I mustn't be so observant, that he happened to have an unusual
stress of business, that was all. But I don't know," she continued,
meditatively; "I can't seem to throw off this queer feeling about him."
Hester regarded her with wide-open eyes. "You frighten me, Julie." Then
leaning toward her sister, she shook her finger admonishingly. "How dare
you go on having worries by yourself and not letting me know a thing
about them?" she said, lightly. "I think it is all your imagination. I
dare say Daddy has heaps of extra things on his hands because of all the
time he spent gadding with us in Europe. Of course, that's it, you
goosey," the idea gaining strength in her mind, "_of course_. You and I
and Peter Snooks must be more amusing, and make him laugh and forget the
'stress of business.' Ugh! what a horrid expression that is! Now I think
of it, he hasn't laughed lately, Julie, has he?" She looked up with an
evident desire to be contradicted.
Julie shook her head.
Hester sprang up from her seat, and seizing the dog by the forepaws,
danced him violently about the room. "We need a shaking up, Peter
Snooks, or we'll not be allowed to jingle our bells any longer at the
court of his majesty Dad the Great! Who ever heard of jesters neglecting
their duties! His royal highness must laugh," she said gayly, "or he'll
cry, 'Off with their heads!' like Alice's fierce old queen." She
emphasized this possible calamity by swinging the dog up in the air and
herself executing a daring _pas seul_ before she dropped breathless in a
chair. "I had rather die than be stupid, hadn't you, Julie?" she gasped,
between breaths.
"In that case I think you will be spared to us a while yet," replied her
sister, with quiet humor.
"So glad you think we're a success," Hester said, cheerfully. "Peter
Snooks, do you hear? we're a success--she approves!" The dog lay panting
on the floor, and wagged his tail in understanding of the compliment.
"We'll give a private exhibition to his majesty to-night after dinner.
How he will laugh! We will elaborate this feeble effort and call it 'The
Dance of Joy.' Things are always more interesting with names," she said,
decisively. "Julie, you be showman and introduce us."
Julie took her cue immediately, and rising, bowed low. "Ladies and
gentlemen (that means Dad)--ladies and gentlemen, I shall now have the
honor of presenting to your astonished vision the wonderful and original
'Dance of Joy'--"
The library door opened suddenly, and a middle-aged woman entered and
closed the door after her. She stopped just inside the threshold, and
looking from one to the other with a scared face, stood wringing her
hands helplessly.
"Good gracious! what is the matter, Bridget?" Julie ejaculated. "Tell
us--you look frightened to death."
The woman opened her lips and closed them with a moan. No word escaped
her.
Both girls were beside her in an instant, and Julie gave her a little
shake.
"Is it Daddy? What has happened? Bridget, Bridget, speak!" Her
beseeching young voice cried out with instinctive fear.
"They're bringing him in," Bridget gasped at last. "He took sick in the
office with a stroke. Dr. Ware's with them. He sez you're not to see him
yet. He sez I'm to keep you in here till he comes--the Doctor, I mean."
Her words came in a tumult of confusion.
"Is--he--dead?" Julie asked. "Bridget, tell me the truth."
It seemed to the girls that they lived an eternity in the second before
the woman said: "No, no, he's not dead. Whatever made you say such a
fearful thing?" She buried her face in her apron and wept bitterly.
"He's tired out and sick altogether, the dear man. I've seen it comin'
this long time."
Hester looked at Julie with a sort of awe. The sound of footsteps in the
hall outside penetrated with ominous distinctness into the library.
Julie said tremulously, "Hester, dear, I am going to Dad; they shall not
keep us away."
"No, they shall not. We are not babies; we must go and help."
"That's what I wus after tellin' the Doctor you'd say," Bridget sobbed,
"an' it's not for me to be lavin' you here all alone, an' me all over
the house to onct. But if yez wouldn't go now, darlin's. Just wait till
he's took to his room, an' 'twould be better--indeed, believe your old
Bridget, it would!"
The impetuosity of youth in the shock of joy or sorrow is not to be
checked. The girls went into the hall, to see a stretcher, on which lay
their father, being borne up the stairs, while Dr. Ware and two men, who
proved to be trained nurses, brought up the rear of the little
procession.
"Dr. Ware," whispered the girls, slipping up close to him with blanched
faces, "we know--we must help, too."
He took them each by the hand, as if they were little children, and
turned them back before they could reach their father's side.
"Dear little girls," he said, gently, "you can help your father most by
doing as I ask. It is hard to be shut out, I know, but you can do
nothing now. Later, perhaps, you can do--everything. I will tell you
frankly, he is a very sick man. I have no wish to hide anything from
you, but we shall try and get him better--much. I have two experienced
men, and Bridget here, and when we get him comfortably in bed you may
come in for a moment. He may not regain consciousness for many hours.
Will you trust me and be guided by my better judgment?" looking down at
them earnestly.
"Yes, yes," they both sobbed through the tears, now falling fast; "go to
Dad--don't think of us. We will do everything you say."
"That pleases me--my brave little girls." He went on into Mr. Dale's
chamber.
Left to themselves, they huddled together outside their father's door,
each trying to comfort the other. Peter Snooks, fully conscious that his
young mistresses were in trouble, climbed into Julie's lap and stuck his
wet nose into her hand in true canine sympathy. Though they did not put
it into words, both girls were conscious of a curious sense of
remoteness from their father in being thus kept from him. This
immediate, poignant grief stung them bitterly and prevented for the
moment any thought of what the future might hold.
They never knew how long they had sat there on the stairs when Dr. Ware
opened the bedroom door and beckoned them in. But they carried ever
after a vivid impression of creeping stealthily to their father's bed,
stooping to kiss the dear face, from which there was no answering sign
of recognition, and stealing softly out again. And in Julie's mind there
flashed always an accompanying picture--the remembrance of how, when
they had reached the hall again, Hester had picked up a woe-begone,
shivering little dog, and burying her face in his neck, whispered,
brokenly: "Oh, Peter Snooks, how we were going--to--make--him--laugh!"