A FIRE IN THE NIGHT
"Aunt Maria, will you let me make some molasses taffy? Monday is
Carrie's birthday and I haven't anything else to send her. She always
gives me something on my birthday. I will be real careful and clean up
everything when I am through."
"Well, I suppose you can try it, though I hate to have you messing
around while I am getting your father's things ready for his trip."
"I won't mess, truly, Aunt Maria," and thankful at receiving even this
grudging permission, she flew out into the tiny kitchen to the pleasant
task of candy-making, reciting, as she rattled among the pots and pans:
"Lars Porsena of Clusium,
By the Nine Gods he swore
That the great house of Tarquin
Should suffer wrong no more.
One cup of molasses, one cup of sugar--that molasses looks awfully
black; I wonder if the taffy will be dark. I like the light-colored
best.
'Hew down the bridge, Sir Consul,
With all the speed ye may;
I, with two more to help me,
Will hold the foe in play.'
A lump of butter and a tablespoon of vinegar. How pretty the stuff looks
boiling up higher and higher every minute. Hm, but it's hot work bending
over this stove.
Four hundred trumpets sounded
A peal of warlike glee,
As that great host, with measured tread,
And spears advanced, and ensigns spread,
Rolled slowly toward the bridge's head,
Where stood the dauntless Three.
My! I would like to have been there and watched them. Isn't Horatius a
splendid name! And Herminius--isn't it grand! But they are like
Dionysius, no one ever uses them nowadays. I believe that candy is
almost done. It is brittle when I put it into water.
Round turned he, as not deigning
Those craven ranks to see;
Naught spake he to Lars Porsena,
To Sextus naught spake he."
She seized the kettle of boiling syrup and lifted it off the stove,
still speaking the impassioned lines of that stirring poem, and
gesticulating wildly, heedless of the utensils in her hands.
"So he spake, and speaking sheathed
The good sword by his side,
And with his harness on his back,
Plunged headlong in the tide."
Bang! went the kettle against a chair-back, and the seething, bubbling
mess of sticky brown syrup poured in a flood over furniture, girl and
floor, and trickled in a rivulet around the brim of her father's hat
carelessly laid on the table while he wrestled with a refractory buckle
on his grip, packed ready for his departure. A gasp of dismay escaped
her lips, and Tabitha stood aghast in the midst of the ruin.
"Tabitha Catt!" exclaimed the aunt, appearing that moment in the
doorway.
"Tabitha Catt!" echoed the father, looking up at the sound of the crash.
"I never saw such carelessness in my life. Look at that hat! My best,
too!"
"You needn't have left it on the table; that's no place for your
wardrobe," burst out the indignant Tabitha, sucking one blistered
finger, and frantically shaking her foot where the hot drops of syrup
had clung and burned.
Her unfortunate words were like oil to a flame.
"I'll have none of your impertinence, young lady," cried the irate
father, seizing her by the shoulder none too gently and giving her a
shake. "You deserve to be trounced."
Tabitha's heart stood still. The day of the licking had come at last! He
looked around for a stick, but the woodbox contained nothing but heavy
billets, and her sentence might have been suspended had his eyes not
rested upon his house slippers still lying in the middle of the floor
where he had thrown them upon discovering that fussy Aunt Maria had
packed them among his belongings for his journey to the east. Grabbing
one of these, he struck the trembling girl half a dozen light blows
across the shoulders, and then dropped it, ashamed of himself and
startled at the frightened, pleading look in the black eyes raised to
his in mute appeal. As the first blow descended, the terror in the thin
face gave way to anger, intense, unreasoning; but she stood like a
statue, silent and dry-eyed, until the slipper fell from her father's
hands and he pushed her from him, saying sternly,
"What have you to say for yourself?"
She wheeled and looked at him with scornful eyes; then without a word of
reply, gathered up both slippers from the floor, walked deliberately to
the stove and threw them into the bed of live coals before either father
or aunt could prevent.
"There, Lynne Maximilian Catt!" she exclaimed in a voice tense with
passion, "you will never use that pair to larrup me with again."
He looked at her in silent amazement, and the rage died in his heart.
She was the image of him. How could he blame her for displaying the
passions that he himself had not learned to control? He turned back to
his satchel on the floor and she, surprised that no further punishment
followed her open rebellion, rushed away to her room, dribbling taffy as
she ran.
"Oh, dear, Mrs. Vane's rule doesn't work at all," she moaned, nursing
her blistered fingers and smarting foot, heedless of the molasses
trickling down the front of her dress. "I never remember to count ten,
and I suppose if I did get that far, I would let the hateful words fly
after them. It is just like me. That is what comes of being a Catt! If I
only had a different name maybe it would be easier; but with a whole cat
name, how is anyone going to keep from scratching?"
The hot tears came, and for a long time she lay sobbing into the fat
pillow which had seen so many floods of this kind that it had grown very
much accustomed to it.
She heard the door open and shut and her father's footsteps died away in
the distance. He had gone without another word to her; but then this was
nothing unusual. He never said good-by to anyone when he left home--that
is, he had never done so but once. When he had started on his last trip,
he had waved his hand to her, and called, "Good-by, Tabitha. Be a good
girl." She had been startled at the unexpected words, and little thrills
of joy had crept through her heart every time she thought of them. They
were one of the hoarded treasures in her memory book, and she had hoped
he would always remember to wave a farewell when he went away again. Now
she had made him angry. Well, he had made her angry, too. She didn't
intend to spill the candy; he ought to know that; but he had struck her.
She was twelve years old now and this was the first licking. She had
dreaded it all her life; and was just beginning to think she had grown
beyond the age of whippings when the dreadful punishment had befallen
her. No, it didn't hurt much, the blows were not heavy enough for that,
but the ignominy of it!
Why couldn't her father be like Carrie's? When he had waved his hand at
her, she had thought maybe in time he might become like Mr. Carson, and
now he had punished her with the licking that had threatened her ever
since she could remember. She hated him!
"But I was impudent," she told herself as her fierce anger abated
somewhat. "I needn't have said anything about his hat. Maybe then he
wouldn't have struck me at all. Perhaps if I had said I was sorry and
had cleaned up his hat again, he would have waved good-by to me.
Perhaps--_just_ perhaps he might have kissed me as Carrie's father does.
But I suppose it would be too soon to expect kisses."
"Tabitha, have you gone to bed?" It was Aunt Maria's voice nervous and
shaking.
"Not yet. What's the matter?" she asked.
"I thought maybe you would just as soon sleep in Tom's room tonight.
There's a band of gypsies camping a little way up the road, and I don't
like the idea of us two women folks being left alone all night. I tried
to get Max to stay until morning, but he said he couldn't make
connections if he did. I don't suppose there is anything to be afraid
of, but this is our first night without a man in the house, and I am as
nervous as a witch." This was a long speech for Aunt Maria, but she had
a bad attack of the fidgets, and found relief in words.
Tabitha had forgotten that her father's departure would mean she and
Aunt Maria must stay alone on the desert, for Tom had gone away to
college ten days before; and now at her aunt's words she felt a little
tremor of fear pass over her. She had never quite outgrown the feeling
of oppression these black nights on the desert gave her, for the hills
shut out the lights of town, and Carson's house was the only tenanted
one near them. Somewhere she had heard that a man had died in the other
little cottage in their neighborhood which had stood vacant ever since
their arrival at Silver Bow, and it was even hinted that his ghost had
come back to haunt it. True, she had never seen anything to warrant her
believing these stories, but she stood in awful dread of that house
beyond them; so she was only too glad for her aunt's suggestion that she
sleep in Tom's bed.
Trying to put these things out of her mind and to think of more cheerful
subjects, she gathered up her belongings, and crept into the little
box-like room, hardly big enough to turn around in, saying in reassuring
tones to Aunt Maria,
"Of course there is nothing to be afraid of. Those campers aren't
gypsies, but a lot of prospectors, and I think they moved on after they
had cooked supper. At least, I saw them going towards town, horses and
all. I reckon they had to lay in some more supplies and so camped near
the stores to get an early start in the morning."
"Well, I wish there was a man in the house. I never did like to stay
alone at night, and this desert is the blackest place I ever got into. I
don't believe I shall ever get used to it."
"You aren't alone. I'm here, and I'm past twelve. There isn't anything
to hurt us, and we haven't anything that robbers would want if they
should come along. Thieves would know better than to visit a desert
town, Aunt Maria."
Nevertheless, the woman's nervous terror found an echo in Tabitha's
heart, and instead of undressing, she exchanged her soiled dress for a
fresh one, removed her shoes, and climbed into bed with her clothes on.
For a long time she lay tossing on the unfamiliar couch, listening to
the night sounds without, and the hideous brays of the wandering burros;
but at last she fell into an uneasy slumber, and dreamed that she had
gone away to boarding school, but instead of having Carrie for a
playmate, her companions were two blazing shoes who kept offering her
molasses taffy out of her father's hat. She awoke with a start,
trembling in every limb, and frightened at her strange surroundings.
Then she remembered how she came to be there, and lay down again on her
pillow; but she could not sleep.
In the distance she heard the sound of a dog's insistent barking, and
was annoyed by the plaintive howls. She stopped her ears but could not
shut out the sound, and in desperation she sat up and looked out of the
window, wishing that morning would dawn.
The night was very dark, but the starlight seemed to break the heavy
blackness that hung like a pall over the landscape. Off toward the
horizon, in the direction of the dog's barking was a faint glimmer of
wavering light, and Tabitha watched it idly for a moment, wondering if
there were campers in that little hollow, too. Then the light grew
brighter and more flickering, the barking more frantic, and Tabitha
started up in terror.
"It's the hermit's house on fire! What can I do? Neither Tom nor Dad is
here to give the alarm, and town is so far away."
She flew out of bed and to the dresser where her father's pistol was
kept, lifted the ugly weapon from its case and mechanically cocked it.
Tom had taught her to use a rifle, but she had never been allowed to
handle a revolver, though she had watched him so often that she was
familiar with its mechanism, and had no thought of fear as she sped
fleetly out of the house, pausing only long enough to slip on her sticky
shoes.
Bang, bang, bang! went the gun in rapid succession; bang, bang, bang!
Six times the report rang sharply through the still night air,--the
signal of fire in this little desert town. Then tossing the empty pistol
aside, she ran down the road as fast as her feet would carry her, all
her terror of the night swept away in the one idea that the townspeople
might be too late to help the old man if he should happen to be in the
burning house. She never stopped to wonder what aid she, a child of
twelve, could render, she never thought of arousing Mr. Carson, but
stumbled breathlessly on in the darkness toward the shack now burning
merrily.
Somewhere behind her she heard a second revolver alarm; then someone
passed her in the road, and a man's voice called, "Go home, Tabitha.
This is no place for you." But still she kept on, having scarcely heard
the words, and hardly aware that other help than her own feeble strength
was at hand.
That was a night she never forgot. In these desert mining towns where
water costs a dollar a barrel and the system of piping it into the
houses is yet in its infancy, fire is not an easy thing to fight, and
many a time the whole camp has been destroyed before the conflagration
could be checked or would burn itself out. The hermit's hut, however,
was so isolated that the town was in no danger, even from the flying
sparks, but there was not a drop of water to throw on the flames, and
the roads were too steep and rough for the volunteer fire department to
drag their chemicals to the rescue.
So the little shack burned to the ground, but Mr. Carson and Tabitha
arrived in time to pull the lone occupant to safety, though it was a
close call for the old miner, for he was almost suffocated with the
smoke and his head and hands were badly burned.
Mr. Carson, too, suffered from his buffeting with the flames, but
Tabitha came out unscathed, and when the men from town arrived, hatless
and anxious, they found the child helping the brave superintendent in
his efforts to revive the unconscious hermit, while the little yellow
cur whined in terror at their feet, and the blaze of the burning house
mounted high in the heavens.
Dr. Vane was among the crowd, and he quietly took charge of the patient,
easing his suffering and binding up his wounds as best he could while
someone went for a rig that the injured man might be carried back to
town more easily.
"Now, put some of that stuff on Mr. Carson's hands," commanded Tabitha,
who had watched the proceedings with interest, holding bandages and
passing ointments under the physician's directions. "His are all
scorched, too."
"How are your own?" someone asked her, noticing how drawn and white her
face was in the lurid glare.
"I did that making candy last evening," she answered, displaying her
blistered fingers, now raw and sore. "I forgot all about them."
Overcome by excitement, weariness and pain, she let the doctor gather
her in his strong arms, and the proud citizens of Silver Bow bore their
little heroine triumphantly home.