PIE AND POETRY
Laura's sleeves were rolled up to her plump elbows and she had an
enveloping apron on that covered her dress from neck to toe. There was
flour on her arms, on one cheek, and even on the tip of her nose.
Out-of-doors old Boreas, Jess said, held sway. Shutters flapped, the
branches of the hard maple creaked against the clapboarded ell of the
house, and there was an occasional throaty rattle in the chimney that made
one think that the Spirit of the Wind was dying there.
"You certainly are poetic," drawled Bobby, who had come into the Beldings'
big kitchen, too, and was comfortably seated on the end of the table at
which Laura had been rolling out piecrust.
"Now, if that crust is only crisp!" murmured Mother Wit.
"If it isn't," chuckled Chet, stamping the snow off his shoes, "we'll make
you eat it all."
"I'm willing to take the contract of eating it, sight unseen, if Laura made
the pie," interjected Lance Darby, opening the door suddenly.
"Come in! Come in!" cried Jess. "Want to freeze us all?"
"You would better not be so reckless, Lance," Laura said, smiling. "These
are mock cherry pies; and I never do know whether I get sugar enough in
them until they are done. Some cranberries are sourer than others, you
know."
"M-m! Ah!" sighed Chet ecstatically. "If there is one thing I like----"
Lance began to sing-song:
"'There was a young woman named Hooker,
Who wasn't so much of a looker;
But she could build a pie
That would knock out your eye!
So along came a fellow and took 'er!'"
"Oh! Oh! We're all running to poetry," groaned Chet. "This will never do."
"'Poetry,' indeed!" scoffed Jess Morse. "I want to know how Lance dares
trespass upon Bobby's domain of limericks?"
"And I wish to know," Laura added haughtily, "how he dares intimate that I
am not 'a good looker'?"
"'_Peccavi!_"' groaned Lance. "I have sinned! But, anyway, Bobby is off the
limerick business. Aren't you, Bobby?"
"She hasn't sprung a good one for an age," declared Chet.
"A shortage," sighed Laura.
"Gee Gee says the lowest form of wit is the pun, and the most execrable
form of rhyme is the limerick," declared Jess soberly.
"Just for that," snapped Bobby, "I'll give you a bunch of them. Only these
must be written down to be appreciated."
She produced a long slip of paper from her pocket, uncrumpled it, and began
to read:
"'There was a fine lady named Cholmondely,
In person and manner so colmondely
That the people in town
From noble to clown
Did nothing but gaze at her, dolmondely.'
Now, isn't that refined and beautiful?"
"It is--not!" said Chet. "That is only a play upon pronunciation."
"Carping critics!" exclaimed Lance. "Go ahead, Bobby. Let's hear the
others."
As Bobby had been saving them up for just such an opportunity as this, she
proceeded to read:
"'There lived in the City of Worcester
A lively political borcester,
Who would sit on his gate
When his own candidate
Was passing, and crow like a rorcester!"
"Help! Help!" moaned Chet, falling into the cook's rocking chair and making
it creak tremendously.
"Don't break up the furniture," his sister advised him, as she took a peep
at the pies in the oven.
"'Pies and poetry'!" exclaimed Jess. "Go ahead, Bobby. Relieve your
constitution of those sad, sad doggerels."
Nothing loath, the younger girl, and with twinkling eyes, sing-songed the
following:
"'There was a young sailor of Gloucester,
Who had a sweetheart, but he loucest'er.
She bade him good-day,
So some people say,
Because he too frequently boucest'er.'
Take notice all you 'bossy' youths."
"Isn't English the funny language?" demanded Chet, sitting up again. "And
spelling! My! Do you wonder foreigners find English so difficult? Here's
one that I found in an almanac at the drug store," and he fished out a
clipping and read it to them:
"'A lady once purchased some myrrh
Of a druggist who said unto hyrrh:
"For a dose, my dear Miss,
Put a few drops of this
In a glass with some water, and styrrh."'"
"Do, do stop!" begged Laura.
"I promise not to offend again," said Lance. "Besides, I hope to taste some
of the pie, and a pie-taster should not be a poetaster."
"Oh! Oh! Awful!" Jess cried.
"I've run out of limericks myself," confessed Chet.
"But one more!" Bobby hastened to say. Then dramatically she mouthed, with
her black eyes fastened on Chet:
"'Said Chetwood to young Short and Long,
"Just list to my warning in song:
If you know of the crime,
For both reason and rhyme
Betray it--and so ring the gong!"'"
The other girls burst out laughing at the expression on the boys' faces.
Chet and Lance looked much disturbed, and Chet finally scowled upon the
teasing Bobby and shook his head.
"What do you know about that?" whispered Lance to his chum.
"You are altogether too smart, Bobby," declared Chet. "What do you mean?"
"We know you and Short and Long are trying to hide something from us," said
Jess quickly.
"You might as well tell us all about it," Laura put in quietly. "What has
Billy really got against Purt Sweet?"
"I don't admit he has anything against Purt," said Chet quickly.
"Nothing but suspicion," muttered Lance, likewise shaking his head.
"Then there is something in it?" Laura said quickly. "Can it be possible
that Purt Sweet would do such an awful thing and not really betray himself
before this?"
"There you've said it, Laura!" cried Lance. "That is what I tell both Chet
and Billy. If Pretty was guilty, he would be scared so that he would never
dare go out again in his car."
"Oh! Oh!" cried Bobby with dancing eyes. "Then my rhyme is a true bill?"
"Aw, Lance would have to give it away!" growled Chet.
"Boys are as clannish as they can be!" said Jess severely. "We are just as
much interested as you are, Chet. What made Billy believe Pretty Sweet ran
the man down?"
"Oh, well," sighed Chet, "we might as well give in to you girls, I
suppose."
"Besides," laughed his sister, "the pies are almost done, and both you and
Lance will want to sample them."
"Go on. Tell 'em, Chet," said Lance.
"Why, Billy had been riding that day in the Sweets' car. You know Purt is
too lazy to breathe sometimes, and he wouldn't get out his chains and put
'em on. Billy knew that the chains were not on at dinner time that evening,
for he passed the Sweet place and saw the car standing outside the garage
with the radiator blanketed.
"Well, the only thing we were sure of about the car that ran that man
down--the Alaskan miner, you know--was that the rear wheels had no chains
on them, and that it was a Perriton car like Purt's."
"Yes, it was a Perriton," said his sister.
"So we fellows hiked up there to Sweets'. Purt was out with the car. He
came home in about an hour, and he was still skidding over the ice. We
tried to get out of him where he had been, but he wouldn't tell. We had to
almost muzzle Billy, or he would have accused him right there and then. And
Billy has been savage over it ever since."
"Really then," said Laura, "there is nothing sure about it."
"Well, it is sure the car was a Perriton. And since then we have found out
that Purt's is the only Perriton in town that isn't out of commission for
the winter. You can talk as you please about it: If the police only knew
what we know, sure thing Purt would be neck-deep in trouble right now!"