WHAT ZEBEDEE SAID
We ate dinner very quietly. The twins began to perk up a bit in the
salad course, and by the time we got to Brown Betty and the Roman punch
they were quite themselves, except for a langour that might have come
from overeating as much as from overexertion.
Zebedee avoided the subject of money-making with great tact. He had much
to tell us of Mr. and Mrs. Robert Gordon and their little home in
Norfolk and their happiness and hospitality. Mrs. Gordon was or had been
our beloved Miss Cox, a teacher at Gresham. She had married Mr. Gordon
at Willoughby Beach the summer before while she was chaperoning us, and
all of us felt that we had been instrumental in making the match and
were in a measure responsible for the great happiness of the couple.
The maid had removed all traces of dinner and we were seated snugly
around the drop light on the library table, a table that had been
converted into a dinner table when the Tuckers decided to dine in their
apartment, which boasted no housekeeping arrangements. There was a deep
silence broken only by a smothered yawn from Dee. Running a jitney for
almost eleven hours is some sleep-provoker.
"Well, girls, aren't you going to take your poor old father in out of
the cold?" and Zebedee looked appealingly at his daughters.
"Well, it was this way----" they started in the same breath.
"One at a time, please! Dum, you begin."
"Well, you see I owe seven dollars and twenty-three cents to different
girls at Gresham and I didn't have a red cent and no telling how long
before allowances are due, so I just thought I'd try to earn something.
I found an ad for twenty young women to sell household novelties and so
I applied for the job."
"That was rather ambitious as a starter. Were you going to be all twenty
right from the first?"
"Silly and flippant! I got the job, at least one twentieth of it, and
started out this morning at eight o'clock. I am to get five cents on
every sale. I went up and down Franklin and Grace streets all morning,
going in the front doors, but this afternoon I tried the back doors
because naturally the servants are more interested in these labor-saving
devices than the mistresses; besides, I saw so many people we know when
I went in the front way that I was afraid if they bought from me they
would do it from pity or something, and I wanted to be very businesslike
and create a burning desire for the really excellent articles I am
selling. I didn't want to hold up anyone."
"That's right!" I was trembling for what Zebedee would say about Dum's
meeting all the friends on her canvassing jaunt, but I realized that I
did not really know that gentleman as well as I thought I did. He did
not seem to mind in the least if perhaps everyone in Richmond knew that
one of his girls had been out going from house to house in the most
fashionable residential districts selling batty-cake flappers and
spot-knockers.
"I have made in all on commissions two dollars and ten cents, I think. I
have completely worn out my shoes on the cobblestones in the alleys and
have got a blister on my heel as big as all my commissions put
together."
"Have you collected your money yet?"
"No! I don't get it until the goods are delivered and my customers pay
up."
"How long does your job last?"
"Oh, until the whole town is combed with a fine tooth comb. Our boss
wants every lady in Richmond to have the advantage of these household
novelties." Dum unconsciously took on the tone usual with the
house-to-house canvasser.
Zebedee gave a smile but there was no divining what his real thoughts
were any more than if he had been the Sphynx herself. He looked to me
rather like a man who was seeing a real good show and was deeply
interested but reserving his final opinion of the merits of the actors
and the playwright until the curtain.
"Now, Dee, let's hear from you!"
"Well,--while Dum was looking at the want column, I saw on the front
page that the poor men who run jitneys were in a fair way to be crowded
out of their business by all kinds of ordinances and things that were
likely to be put on them."
"Yes, they won't have long to run without giving bonds, etc."
"I just knew how much you felt for the poor men and approved of their
venture, and so I just decided I'd run a jitney myself for a day or so
and get myself out of debt. I owe five dollars and seventy-three cents
to schoolmates and did not have but thirty-seven cents and a street car
ticket. I wanted to let Dum in on my scheme but she said she would get
out and earn her own money. I did not dream I could make so much, and
indeed I couldn't have, if I had not speeded like fun. The cops knew
Henry in spite of his sign, and I believe they knew me through the dirt
and make-up, and they never once stopped me.
"Of course I had to run in high a lot and it took gas, but I am going to
pay for that out of my earnings. I made four dollars and fifteen cents
this morning and I have not counted yet what I took in this afternoon."
She turned the pockets of her father's greatcoat inside out into my lap
and the bills and coin made such a showing that I thought it no wonder
she had announced she was rolling in wealth. I counted six dollars and
thirty-five cents. That made ten dollars and fifty cents for the day's
work.
"I think being a jitneur is mighty hard work. There is a nerve-racking
something about it that sho' does you up. In the first place there are
always some idiots on board, the kind that rock the boat, and they will
sit on the doors and are liable at any time to go spinning into the
street. Then there are some old ladies who always drop their nickels and
then you stand chugging away, scared to death for fear Henry will give
up the ghost, and that means getting out to crank up when you have got
on skirts and don't want to flaunt them."
"I have been wondering what you did about your skirts."
"Did nothing! Just ignored them! I didn't have to crank up but once this
morning, and that was when I hit a hole out on Robinson Street and Henry
blinked out; but I had just got rid of my last fare and no one saw my
disgrace. This afternoon I had awful bad luck. There were three funerals
and every single one of them crossed my route and I had to wait for them
to pass. You know how Henry gets mad and stops playing when he has to
stand still too long--well, every one of those funerals got me in bad.
One of them I was glad to see, as I was having an awful time. A girl
dressed up to beat the band had got on the front seat with me and she
was lollapalusing all over me, and I had no room to drive. She would
talk to me, although I never encouraged her with anything sweeter than a
grunt. I had made an awful mash and was up against it. She got me so
hacked I let a fare get away from me,--man just got out and walked off
without paying. I felt like Rosalind must have felt when Phebe pursued
her or like Viola when Olivia got soft, but this girl was more of the
Phebe type. I was afraid she was going to spend the afternoon with Henry
and me. She had just intimated that she would go on downtown with us
again and make a round trip when we struck the funeral. Henry chugged
away and then stopped off short. I dropped the plaid shawl I had my
skirts wrapped up in and climbed over the foolish virgin, and I tell you
I blessed the day I was born a girl then. I wish you could have seen the
minx. I cranked up and climbed back, and there was no more lollapalusing
from her. She scrouged herself over into her own corner and laughed a
scornful laugh. The people on the back seat had been amused by her
goings-on before, but when they found out I was a girl, they roared with
laughter and my mash got out on the next corner. She gave me a dime and
told me I could keep the change, so I did not lose anything after all
from the man who sneaked off."
"You didn't really keep it?" exclaimed Dum.
"Keep it! O course I did! It would have been very melodramatic to hurl
it after her. I was not driving a jitney for my health. I was out for
money--rocks--spondulix--tin--the coin--and that idiot's dime was just
as good as any man's. Besides, she had taken up more than her share of
room and owed me something for letting the sneak get off.
"That dollar bill! I bet you can't guess who paid me that,--Mrs. Barton
Alston. She got in and handed me the dollar and said: 'Here, boy! Just
ride me until that is used up!' It was ten round trips so she was with
me a good part of the afternoon. She said she never did get out in
automobiles much these days, that her friends sometimes come and drive
her out to the cemetery, but she is tired of graveyards and wants to
cheer up some. She told me all this when we were having a little spin
alone, but I heard her telling some of the fares the same thing. She was
real nice and jolly and took people on her lap and did the honors of the
jitneys with as much graciousness as she used to entertain before they
lost their money. I was sorry she was so broad-beamed, as it was
difficult to get three on the seat while she stayed with me, and of
course when you are running a jitney every inch counts. When her ten
round trips were up, I hated to tell her and took her another for luck.
Some day let's go get her, Zebedee, and take her out to the Country Club
or something and give her a good time. She is mighty tired of being
supposed to be in retirement, mourning for Mr. Alston. She never did
recognize me, although I talked to her quite freely. She called me 'Boy'
all the time. Gee whilikins, but she can talk!"
"There are others!" put in Dum. "Do you know you have not stopped once
for half-an-hour?"
"Well, I'm not out of gas yet."
"No, I reckon not! You are some self-starter, too. Nobody has to get out
and crank you up and persuade you to get going. Funerals don't stop you.
You go in high all the time, go so fast a traffic cop can't see your
number."
"Well, I'm afraid I have monopolized the conversation some but it has
been a very exciting day. I'm going to divide up with you, Dum. I
believe between us we can get all of those debts paid."
"Oh, Dee, that would be too good of you!"
"Nonsense! You worked just as hard as I did. I believe in an equal
distribution of wealth. Count up, Page, and see where we stand."
"Let's see! You made ten dollars and fifty cents; Dum made two dollars
and ten cents--that makes twelve dollars and sixty cents. You owe five
dollars and seventy-three cents--Dum owes seven dollars and twenty-three
cents. That makes twelve dollars and ninety-six cents. You are
thirty-six cents short."
"Oh, but I've got thirty-seven cents and a street car ticket. That
leaves a penny over, to say nothing of the ticket. Hurrah! Hurrah!" and
those irresponsible Tuckers, all three of them, got up and danced the
lobster quadrille with me in the middle. When they stopped, completely
out of breath, Dee exclaimed:
"Oh, Zebedee! I am awfully sorry, but I am afraid you will have to pay
for the gas after all. I charged it."
And all Zebedee said was: "I'll be----" and just as Dee said would be
the case, what he said does not bear repetition and certainly is not to
be printed.
Mrs. Barton Alston had many a treat from the Tuckers. Dum did not
collect her two dollars and ten cents until she had made many trips to
the boss. He tried to persuade her to accept a steady job with him as an
agent for household novelties, and while she naturally could not do it,
she declared it gave her a very comfortable feeling that if she should
have to earn her living there was at least one avenue open to her.
The day after Dee's success as a jitneur the paper came out with
headlines that the jitneys were no longer within the law. Bonds must be
furnished, licenses must be paid, etc. Dee had been not a day too soon
in her venture.
Zebedee never said one word of reproach to Tweedles. When he gave voice
to the unprintable remark above he was through.
"I know I ought to do something about it," he moaned to me several days
after when he caught me alone. "It was a very risky thing for both of my
girls--they might have got in no end of scrapes--but what am I to do? If
I row with them and get Mr. Tuckerish even you get out with me, and
somehow I feel as long as the girls tell me everything, that they can't
get into very serious mischief. I know I have not done my part by them.
If I had been the right kind of unselfish father I would have married
long ago when they were tiny little tots and have had some good,
sensible woman bring them up."
"They don't look at it that way."
"Well, you could hardly expect them to 'kiss the rod'."
I laughed aloud at that.
"What's the matter?"
"I am wondering what the 'good, sensible woman' would think at being
called a rod. I wonder if there is any woman good enough to undertake
the job of rod."
"Perhaps not," he said ruefully. "You see when my little Virginia died,
all my friends and hers got busy and found a roomful of worthy ladies
that they considered the proper persons to marry me and bring up the
twins, but all of them were rather rod-like in a way, and somehow I
never could make up my mind to kiss 'em either. The trouble about me is
I can't grow up, and anyone whom my friends consider a suitable age for
me now, I look upon as a kind of mother to me."
"I think Tweedles are getting on pretty well without a stepmother," I
managed to say. I felt about as bad as the twins themselves would have
at the thought of Zebedee's marrying again. "They never do anything too
bad to tell you, but they do lots of things I fancy they would not tell
a stepmother."
"Well, little friend, if you think that, I reckon I'll worry along 'in
single blessedness' for a while yet."
The Tucker Twins had been living in dread of a stepmother ever since
they had been conscious of living at all. It was a theme with all of
their relations and friends and one that was aired on every occasion.
"Jeffry Tucker should marry again!" was the cry and sometimes the battle
cry of every chaperone in Richmond. As Mr. Tucker said, it was always
some good, settled lady who needed a home and was willing to put up with
the twins who was selected as his mate.
"I don't want to run an old ladies' home. If I ever marry I shall do it
for some reason besides furnishing a stepmother to my family and giving
a haven of refuge to some deserving lady."
"I don't want to seem disloyal to Dum and Dee, but I think it might be
rather salutary if you talk to them just as you have to me, I mean about
stepmothers and things. It might make them a little more circumspect."
"All right, I'll try; but I am afraid I have cried 'Wolf!' too often and
they would just laugh at me."
Tweedles did listen to him quite seriously when he broached the subject
of his duty to marry again and give them the proper chaperonage.
"Oh, Zebedee, please don't talk about such terrible things. We'll be
good and learn how to sew," wailed Dum. "I'm going to make some shirts
the very first thing."
"Oh please, please spare me! I couldn't bear for you to get so good that
I'd have to wear home-made shirts!" And so the threat of a stepmother
was withdrawn for the time being.