LEAVE IT TO DORIS
[Illustration: "I was laughing at you"]
LEAVE IT TO DORIS
BY
ETHEL HUESTON
AUTHOR OF
PRUDENCE OF THE PARSONAGE,
PRUDENCE SAYS SO, ETC.
ILLUSTRATED BY
W. B. KING
[Illustration: Decoration]
NEW YORK
GROSSET & DUNLAP
PUBLISHERS
Made in the United States of America
COPYRIGHT 1919
THE BOBBS-MERRILL COMPANY
_Printed in the United States of America_
_To_
MY BROTHERS AND SISTERS
Who with me learned the secret of riotously
happy living even in parsonage confines
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I THE GENERAL 1
II THE PROBLEM 27
III THE IMP 50
IV THE BLESSING 69
V THE WILL 100
VI THE SERPENT 117
VII DISCIPLINE 133
VIII THE BISHOP 149
IX THE RUNAWAYS 165
X MR. WIZARD 191
XI THE PHILOSOPHER 208
XII FINDING THE PATH 227
XIII ROSALIE'S WAY 245
XIV THE DOCTOR 261
XV RISING TO THE MANSE 274
LEAVE IT TO DORIS
CHAPTER I
THE GENERAL
The Reverend Mr. Artman paced soberly up and down the small living-room
of his manse, as every one called the parsonage. His eyes were clouded.
The lines at the corners of his kindly lips were sternly set. Now and
then he glanced toward the bay-window where Doris sat, untroubled,
serene, her dainty fingers cleverly transforming huge rents in small
garments into triumphs of patchery. The wind, coming softly through the
peach trees outside the windows, loosened tiny tendrils of hair that
curled tenderly about her rosy ears.
Mr. Artman sighed drearily.
Doris, unperturbed, continued her darning, but bright lights were
dancing in her blue eyes.
"Hay, ho," drawled Mr. Artman suggestively.
"Isn't it lovely and cool to-day, father?" queried his daughter sweetly.
Without answering, he walked abruptly to the kitchen door, peering
anxiously into the room beyond, and closed it cautiously. The General
puckered her lips earnestly over a too-small scrap of cloth vainly
coping with a too-large rent. Her father went to the door opening upon
the porch, and closed it also. Then he walked slowly up toward his
daughter, opening his lips as though on the verge of confidence. But he
turned once more, and resumed his restless pacing.
Then Doris dropped the darning into the basket beside her and faced her
father.
"Father," and the voice, though soft, was imperious.
He started guiltily, and flushed.
"Come and sit down," she commanded. "If you do not speak up instantly
and tell me what is on your mind I shall jump up and down and scream.
You make me so nervous when you squirm around that way. What ever in
the world is the matter with you?"
Her father quickly dumped the mending basket and its contents upon
the floor, with masculine and ministerial lack of regard for things
domestic, and appropriated the chair, drawing it close to his
daughter's side.
"Hurry, hurry," came the gentle authoritative voice. "I have oceans to
do. What is it?"
"Well, it is-- Why, nothing special, child, what made you think--"
"You haven't gone and proposed to Miss Carlton, have you?" she gasped.
"No, thank Heaven," came the fervent answer.
"Careful, father. You mean it devoutly, I am sure, but Providence might
mistake it for irreverence. Providence does not know Miss Carlton as we
do, you know. Don't be afraid to tell me then--nothing else could be so
terribly bad."
"Well, dearest, I was just wondering if--don't you think, perhaps--if I
help a lot, and see that the girls do their share--don't you think we
could get along without Miss Carlton this year?"
The General considered, her curly head cocked on one side, her brows
knitted.
"I wanted to take charge right after mother died--but you were not
willing."
"You were too young then, and still in school."
"Aren't you satisfied with Miss Carlton's work?" she asked slyly.
"Her work has nothing to-- Yes, of course I am, dear. And she is a good
woman, very good. And has been a great help to us the last three years,
at a very reasonable salary."
"I have done most of the work myself, but you do not believe it," said
Doris.
"Yes, of course you have, dear. And the Problem is quite old now, and
between the two of you--between the three of us, I mean--"
"You mean, between me," said Doris frankly. "Your intentions are the
best in the world, father darling, but if you ever broke into the
kitchen you would very likely wipe dishes on sermon manuscripts--very
good manuscripts, perhaps, but you can't practise on the dishes the
Endeavor paid forty dollars for. And the Problem! But as you say,
between me, I think perhaps I could get along without Miss Carlton
nicely. She is rather hard to evade, isn't she, dearest?"
Her father flushed boyishly. "I am sure, Doris--"
"Yes, indeed, dear, so am I," she interrupted sweetly. "And I am truly
proud that you have withstood so long. Stronger men than you have
fallen in less persistent sieges. You have done well. But I hope you
will remember that I have been praying right along that you might be
given strength equal to the conquest, so don't take too much credit
yourself."
"Well, I suppose the poor thing really can't help--"
"Oh, no, belovedest, of course she can't help it. Only I haven't
noticed any married women finding you so irresistibly handsome, and
fascinating, and all that, have you? At least, they don't come telling
you about it to your face."
Then at his guilty face she laughed, and snuggled on his knee, kissing
his chin adoringly.
"You are a dear sweet darling love," she said, "and I will do my best
to make you comfortable, and keep the manse on four legs, or four
wheels, or four--what is it a manse runs on, anyhow?"
"Four girls," he said, laughing. "Mine does, anyhow."
"Er, father, when will you break it to Miss Carlton?"
He sighed heavily. "Why, General, I supposed--I thought--maybe it would
be better for you just to tell her you are old enough to take charge
yourself now, and--I think she would take it better from you."
"Oh, father, what a coward you are," she said sadly. "You call me
General, and I know I rule you with a rod of iron, but I haven't much
backbone in my army, I am sure of that. Well, then, I will break it
to Miss Carlton." She looked thoughtfully out at the branches swaying
lazily in the warm wind. "I wonder how the Problem will take it? She is
so likely to object, you know."
He cleared his throat anxiously. "Oh, you can fix it up with her some
way."
"I am to do that, too, am I?" laughed the General. "You'd better look
up that epistle about the armor, father. You need a breastplate, and
a steel helmet, and a sword of faith--and quite a lot of things. Run
along then, dearest, and don't bother me. Miss Carlton will be here in
a few minutes, and I must prepare my campaign."
Mr. Artman reached hastily for his hat. "I--I think I shall go
down-town a while--I need some fresh air-- That mean little headache
again, you know--and I must see Mr. James. Pretty sick man. I may not
be home for dinner to-night. Don't sit up for me--and don't let anybody
else."
"A good thing we have a sick member, isn't it?" she teased. "You aren't
going to get home until the storm is over, are you?" She shook her
curls at him reprovingly. "Such a good, sweet, faithful preacher you
are--and such an awful coward when it comes to us women."
"I tell you, Doris," he said sturdily, "I think it would be easier to
face a den of lions, or a howling mob of I.W.W.'s, or any number of
ordinary sinners, than one Christian woman when she wants--she makes up
her mind--I mean--"
"You mean, when she is getting you ready to propose to her, I suppose.
I do not blame you, father.--Fly, here she comes. Scoot out the back
door, and sneak through the barn. It will be over by morning. Run, you
coward, run," she cried, shooing him gaily out the back door.
Then she went back to the bay-window, and sat down with the mending,
her pretty brows puckered.
"Miss Carlton is wax in my hands," she thought. "But whatever in the
world will Rosalie say? If one only knew what to expect, it would not
be so serious. But nobody ever can predict how our lovely little old
Problem of a Rosalie will take anything."
"Still mending, dear Doris?" came a voice of studied sweetness from the
doorway.
"Yes, still at it. But I did not work all the time. I have been playing
with father. He is such a tease."
Miss Carlton looked around the wide room anxiously, hopefully.
"He is gone now--to see Mr. James, I think--somebody sick, anyhow. I
have been having a serious time with him, Miss Carlton." She dropped
the mending and looked at the older, much older woman, with frank,
straightforward, innocent eyes. "They call me General, but they never
want to do as I say."
"And what is our little General after now?" asked Miss Carlton,
smiling. "Shall I help you get it? I do not think he will refuse it, if
I ask."
"Oh, you will be like every one else; you will say it is not advisable.
But they do not call me General for nothing." Doris straightened her
slender shoulders, and looked very domineering. "I have made up my
mind. I shall have my way."
"Wouldn't your father give in?" Miss Carlton's voice was mildly
surprised. Father Artman withstood Doris very, very seldom indeed.
"Oh, yes, he gave in, of course. That is, he says I shall try it. But I
know he thinks I shall tire of it soon. He does not know me, does he? I
never give up, do I?"
"Not very often, no," admitted Miss Carlton rather grimly.
"Come and sit down, dear, and let me tell you," said Doris eagerly. "I
think it will make you happy too. I am twenty years old, and very, oh,
tremendously mature, don't you think so?"
"Well, perhaps," was the doubtful admission.
"Yes, of course. And you know how hard up we preachers always are, and
we have to economize just fearfully, especially now the Problem is a
junior in college--and somehow it takes lots more clothes for her in
college than it ever did for me. And you have been so wonderful to us
all these three years, and such a help--but now I feel that I am old
enough--and that it is my duty and my priceless opportunity to take
charge of the family, and then you can go home again and be free to
live your own life, and though you have never complained I know how
happy it will make you."
"No, indeed," came the quick protest. "I like it here. The salary is
nothing extra, but you have done quite a lot of the work, you know. Oh,
no indeed, little girl, you must not think of it. Why, it is just time
for you to have your play days now your school is over, and we older
ones can bear the burdens of life. You must not think of it."
"But I have thought of it," said Doris sweetly. "And father promised I
should try. And I am the General."
"You have been planning all these years to go to Chicago and study, and
become a missionary. You can not give up your life ambitions now."
"I have changed them," said Doris. "Father wants me, and that is
enough."
"He won't let you change them for him."
"Father is the most unselfish thing in the world, I know," smiled
Doris. "But father has forgotten that I ever even thought of such a
thing--and since he wants me here, it is settled. I shall never think
of it again."
"You won't be happy--"
"Oh, Miss Carlton," said Doris, standing up suddenly, tall and
straight. "You think I won't be happy staying where father wants me,
and filling father's need?"
"But it would be wicked to deny the call to service as--"
"I wanted to be a missionary because it appealed to me. But I hear no
call but father's voice. If a message came from Heaven, the way would
be changed for me. Right now, the path of service goes right smack into
the manse, and I do not see it going out on the other side." Doris
smiled winsomely.
"Wait till I talk things over with your father--he will see how absurd
it is."
"He promised. Father may have his faults, though I do not know what
they are, but he always keeps a promise."
"He should not have promised until he discussed things with me."
"But, Miss Carlton, _we_ are his family, you know. And I am the oldest
daughter, and very grown up. You see how it is, don't you? Of course, I
do not wish to hurry you off, but I know how anxious you must be to get
home, and you need not feel you have to linger on my account. I haven't
planned anything to do to-morrow, and can help you with your packing
the whole day long."
"I can do my own packing, thank you. And I shall do it immediately.
Your father really consented to this arrangement, did he?"
"Oh, certainly he did. He sees himself that it is the proper thing to
do, and will save quite a little money, and goodness knows we need
it. And then the responsibility will develop my character, or--or
something."
Miss Carlton flounced out of the room and up the stairs. Doris listened
intently at the door.
"She is not exactly happy about it, but I am. And father is. If I only
knew what the Problem would think of it. I wish Miss Carlton would go
right straight away--she is angry enough to do it. Then I could tackle
the Problem alone, and it would be too late to undo."
She shut her eyes very tightly and murmured softly, unintelligibly
beneath her breath. "Now to make doubly sure, I shall go and
concentrate. Every one says you get things if you concentrate hard
enough."
She listened once more at the door that led into the hall. Miss Carlton
was undoubtedly throwing her possessions violently and untenderly into
her bags and trunk.
"Concentration won't hurt, for when she remembers how handsome father
is she may change her mind," said the General soberly.
So she slipped back to the bay-window, and bent all her energies, and
all the force of her strong young will to the task of concentration.
A little later she heard Miss Carlton at the up-stairs branch of the
telephone, and though she would not dream of listening to a telephonic
conversation, she did saunter carelessly to the hall door and so
overheard Miss Carlton giving a hurried order for an expressman.
"Providence and concentration together are really irresistible," she
smiled to herself. "I suppose, after all, I could have gotten along
without the concentration, but in a crisis like this I thought it would
not hurt to try everything."
She went demurely back to her mending, and after a while the expressman
came and took away the trunk and bags, and finally Miss Carlton came to
her.
"I am going home right now, Doris," she said, "but I do not regard this
as final. We shall say I am going for a visit. And when you want me to
come back, just telephone. After all, I think it is a good move. Your
father will soon find out what a difference I made in the home. He will
be the first to want me back." She smiled without resentment. "So I
quite agree with you, little General. This just suits my purpose, and I
shall stay at home until--some one comes after me."
"I know we are going to miss you," cried Doris sincerely. "You have
always been kind to us, and we have never been able to pay you half
what you deserved. And if we find we can't get along, and you are
willing, we shall have you back in a hurry. But I am going to try, and
I never yield until I have to."
So Doris paid Miss Carlton the modest sum due her and the two parted
with cordiality, Miss Carlton leaving friendly messages for the other
members of the household.
As soon as she was quite out of sight, Doris flew to the kitchen.
"Even the Problem is amenable to a good meal," she said. "She shall
have delicious cream gravy--the little glutton--and pear preserves, and
apple dumplings."
So eagerly and so passionately did she devote her energies to the task
that she did not hear the door open behind her, and never knew her
sister was at her elbow until a soft ripply voice said suddenly:
"Well, Mr. General, is mess nearly ready for us?"
"Oh, Rosalie," cried Doris, flinging floury arms about the girl at her
side. "Oh, you dear little darling, I am so glad you came."
"Why so mushy?" demanded Rosalie in a voice so soft and gurgling
and throaty it made one think of tinkling waterfalls, and silver
moonshine, and irresistible dimples. "Don't I _always_ come? Why all
the exclamations at me?"
"Because I love you, and because I am happy, and because--you scoot to
the phone, will you, and call up Mr. James' residence and tell father
I want him to come home to dinner to-night without fail, for very extra
special reasons--apple dumplings, but you needn't tell him over the
phone--and hurry, dear, before he leaves there."
The General looked soberly after her sister as she danced lightly
out of the kitchen. Rosalie was quite too terribly lovely for
anything--that was really what made her such a Problem. And her eyes
were full of dazzling witching lights, and dangerous dark shadows, her
lips were rosy, pouty, tempting lips, her skin was a pearly pink and
white, and her voice melting melody.
"She is Problem enough now--what will she be a little later on?"
thought the General anxiously as she took a loving look at her
dumplings.
"Where is Miss Carlton?" asked Rosalie, returning promptly. "Father
says he will come immediately. Aren't the girls home yet? I suppose I
must set the table then. I think you should speak to them, Doris--they
are never here when you want them. Where is Miss Carlton? Won't she be
here for dinner?"
"No, not--"
"Goody!--Doris, do you think she--has her eye on father?"
"Why, Rosalie, whatever put such a notion as that into your head?"
Doris was all wide-eyed astonishment.
"Well, perhaps it is not nice of me to mention it, but she is always
tagging him about, and telling him how clever he is, and she is always
saying how much we need a mother-- Oh, she's all right, of course--not
my type at all, but--I am glad she won't be home for dinner. Doris,
will you ask father if we may go to the Country Club da--party next
week? They may dance, but we won't have to. I could do it though as
easy as not. This is the first time they have asked us to a strictly
town affair, and we just have to go. This is the way they dance that
new step the girls are raving about. See? Three steps this way, one,
two, three; one, two, three; hippity hip--"
"Rosalie!" gasped Doris. "Wherever did you learn that?"
"Amy taught me. She takes regular dancing lessons from a man, a dollar
a lesson, and then she teaches me. It is just like gym, you know, only
at a dance there are men. Miss Graham says I am very graceful, and
with my slender ankles and high insteps I would look lovely in dancing
slippers. Now, Doris, don't be horrified, I am not going to dance. But
you tell father we are invited, and-- You sit out the dances, you know,
if you are a preacher and can't dance--and you get behind a big fern,
and the men tell you how lovely you are, and how much nicer it is to
sit out with _you_ than to go stumbling around over other girls' toes,
getting their collars all sweated out, and how sweet and cool you look,
and--"
"Rosalie!"
"They do not mean it, Doris, they just talk that way. And I know they
do not mean it, so it does me no harm. And it is lots of fun. They all
do it."
"They do not talk that way to me," said Doris virtuously.
"No, you do not give them a chance. If a man says you have beautiful
blue eyes, you look him straight in the face and say, 'Yes, thank
goodness, I need something to make up for my pug nose.' That is no way
to talk to a man. You ought to drop your lashes like this, and then
look up suddenly, and away again quickly, and laugh a little and say,
'Oh, you talk that way to every one--you do not mean it,' and then they
say you are the only girl in the world--"
"Rosalie Artman, I think you are perfectly terrible. Where in the world
do you learn all that silly stuff?"
"I do not learn it," laughed Rosalie. "I do not have to. It was born in
me. I sort of breathe it. Tra, la, la, lalala. I can do a toe dance,
Doris. I will teach you. Does father go to the Sessions to-night? Then
we will have a lesson while he is gone. Oh, there come--"
"Rosalie, I want to ask you-- Don't you think we ought to get along
without Miss Carlton now? She is so sort of prim, and bossy--and
it costs eighteen dollars a month--and if we do you can have nicer
clothes, you know."
"Wouldn't be proper," said Rosalie lightly. "Beautiful girls must be
properly guarded. And besides, I would have to do more work, and I
don't like to work."
"Father is proper enough for anybody," said Doris with spirit. "And I
do all of the work anyhow."
"Could I have a regular evening dress, V in the back and no sleeves?"
demanded Rosalie with glittering eyes. "Isn't it funny, the less there
is to a dress, the more there is to the cost? All the girls have
evening dresses, and I have the nicest shoulders in the whole gym. But
Miss Carlton would never go. You couldn't fire her off."
"Who is the General?" demanded Doris loftily. "If I say go, she goes in
a hurry."
Rosalie looked up quickly.
"You bad General, she is gone already, isn't she?"
"Yes; do you mind?"
"Are you sure father won't go trotting after her, and marry her on the
sly?"
Doris lifted horrified eyes skyward.
"Well, I am sure I do not care. I think I am rather glad. Whenever
I got my dates mixed, and had two or three callers at once, she was
always shocked. She said the boys didn't act that way when she was a
girl. I rather suppose they didn't. But what Miss Carlton was and what
I am are two remotely different things. Why, you would hardly believe
we are both feminine, would you?"
"No," said Doris honestly. "One can't think of any two things more
different. You are such a--such--"
"Problem," laughed Rosalie. "Don't I know it? Well, you can not solve
me, Doris, so don't try. But I am just like those horrible trigonometry
nightmares--you can't figure them out to save your life, but they are
quite perfectly all right in spite of you."
Doris turned to give her sister a warm adoring look. "I know that,"
she said happily. "Only, however in the world you manage to say such
wonderful things with your eyes, Rosalie--I've tried and tried--alone,
of course," she added hastily. "I wouldn't before people for anything.
But I can't take people's breath away as you do."
Rosalie's voice rippled into mellow laughter. "You will learn. No,
you never will, Doris. You will fall in love, and marry a perfectly
adorable man, and have perfectly wonderful babies, and be as happy as
the day is long. And I will fritter along and sparkle along, and have
a hundred beaus, and Miss Carlton and I will finish up together. There
come those bad girls. Now you just scold them, General. Don't you stand
for this nonsense any more. Why, I have had to set the table every
night for a week."
The younger sisters came into the room together, as they went
everywhere together. They were very nearly of the same height, though
one was two years older.
"Are you tired, Treasure?" asked Doris quickly.
"I haven't done anything but laugh all afternoon," came the answer.
"Why should I be tired?"
Doris looked tenderly from the face of one little sister to the other.
Treasure's eyes were clear, serene and limpid. Her delicately tinted
olive face was fine and spiritual. And right by her side stood Zee, the
baby of the manse, thirteen years old, dark curls a-tangle, dark eyes
a-sparkle, red cheeks aglow.
"Oh, you little Imp!" cried Rosalie. "You look just awful."
"I do not think so," said Treasure quickly. "She looks lovely all blown
about like that."
Zee laughed at them both with charming unconcern. "Do I have to brush
myself down before dinner?" she demanded, edging toward her corner of
the table.
"Indeed you do; wash down, and brush down, and rub down, and do it
quickly, for here comes father."
Zee obediently skipped up the stairs, and Rosalie ran to the hall to
greet her father.
"And how is the Blessing of the Manse?" he asked, crossing the
room, with Rosalie still clinging to his arm, to look tenderly into
Treasure's soft fine face.
"Perfectly all right," came the even answer.
"But not very healthy," put in Zee slyly, coming back in haste. "Didn't
I do a quick job, General? Treasure is all right, but not very healthy.
That is why she is a blessing. Haven't you noticed, Rosalie, that
blessings are very, very frail? Maybe if I looked sickish you would
call me a blessing, too?"
"Is she gone, General?" came the anxious whisper as the father drew
near his oldest daughter. "And how did the Problem take it?"
"Gone, father, and the Problem is glad of it--we might have known she
would be whatever we did not expect. Now I am the General in very
truth, and supper is ready--Zee, don't rush. Just a minute, dear, the
pear preserves won't evaporate. You mustn't hurry father into the
blessing."
When the blessing had been asked on their food the father looked about
the little round table, and his face was richly satisfied.
"This is something like," he said, smiling into the faces of his four
girls.
"Yes, it is now," said Rosalie. "But you just wait till the General
gets started. She will never let us slide along and be comfortable as
Miss Carlton did. Wait till she has time to think up orders!"