OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBORS
By Belle K. Maniates
AMARILLY OF CLOTHES-LINE ALLEY
MILDEW MANCE
OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBORS
[Illustration: "What's your rush?" I asked, when I had overtaken him.
FRONTISPIECE. _See page 114._]
OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBORS
By
Belle Kanaris Maniates
With illustrations by
Tony Sarg
Boston
Little, Brown, and Company
1917
Copyright, 1917,
By Little, Brown, and Company.
All rights reserved
Published February, 1917
Norwood Press
Set up and electrotyped by J. S. Cushing Co., Norwood, Mass., U.S.A.
Presswork by The Colonial Press, Boston, Mass., U.S.A.
CONTENTS
I ABOUT SILVIA AND MYSELF 1
II INTRODUCING OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBORS 9
III IN WHICH WE ARE PESTERED BY POLYDORES 28
IV IN WHICH WE TAKE BOARDERS 45
V IN WHICH WE TAKE A VACATION 61
VI A FLIRT AND A WOMAN-HATER 77
VII IN WHICH NOTHING MUCH HAPPENS 90
VIII PTOLEMY DISAPPEARS AND I VISIT A HAUNTED HOUSE 99
IX IN WHICH WE SEE GHOSTS 123
X IN WHICH WE MAKE SOME DISCOVERIES 138
XI A BAD MEANS TO A GOOD END 152
XII "TOO MUCH POLYDORES" 164
XIII ROB'S FRIEND THE REPORTER 173
XIV A MIDNIGHT EXCURSION 195
XV WHAT MISS FRAYNE FOUND OUT 203
XVI PTOLEMY'S TALE 213
XVII ALL ABOUT UNCLE ISSACHAR'S VISIT 229
XVIII IN WHICH I DECIDE ON EXTREME MEASURES 254
XIX WHICH HAS TO DO WITH SOME LETTERS 267
XX "THE MONEY WE EARNT FOR YOU" 276
ILLUSTRATIONS
"What's your rush?" I asked, when I had overtaken
him. _Frontispiece_
Uncle Issachar 10
Dr. Felix Polydore 23
"Lucien Wade!" she gasped. "Here are our letters to
Beth and Rob." 80
He pleaded eloquently to be taken with us. 102
I babbled aimlessly to myself and then managed to
pull together and beat it to the lake 126
The landlady intears waylaid me 132
I had to carry Diogenes most of the way 168
Now and then above his howls, I heard Silvia's
plaintive protests outside the door 192
I held out my hand, which he shook solemnly, but
with an injured air 224
"He went to the front window and dropped a young
kitten down on the old gent's head." 242
"We heard a suppressed sneeze, and Rob pulled
Emerald from underneath." 256
OUR NEXT-DOOR NEIGHBOURS
CHAPTER I
_About Silvia and Myself_
Some people have children born unto them, some acquire children and
others have children thrust upon them. Silvia and I are of the last
named class. We have no offspring of our own, but yesterday, today,
and forever we have those of our neighbor.
We were born and bred in the same little home-grown city and as a
small boy, even, I was Silvia's worshiper, but perforce a worshiper
from afar.
Her upcoming had been supervised by a grimalkin governess who drew
around the form of her young charge the awful circle of exclusiveness,
intercourse with child-kind being strictly prohibited.
Children are naturally gregarious little creatures, however, and
Silvia on rare occasions managed to break parole and make adroit
escape from surveillance. Then she would speed to the top of the
boundary wall that separated the stable precincts from an alluring
alley which was the playground of the plebeian progeny of the humble
born.
To the circle of dirty but fascinating ragamuffins she became an
interested tangent, a silent observer. Here I had my first meeting
with her. I was not of her class, neither was I to the alley born, but
sailed in the sane mid-channel that ameliorates the distinction
between high and low life.
On this eventful day I was taking a short cut on my way to school. One
of the group of alleyites, with the inherent friendliness of the
unchartered but big-hearted members of the silt of the stream of
humans, had proffered to little Silvia a chip on which was a patch of
mud designed to become a fruitcake stuffed with pebbles in lieu of
raisins and frosted with moistened ashes. Before the enticing pastime
of transformation was begun, however, Silvia was swiftly snatched from
the contaminating midst and borne away over the ramparts.
Thereafter I haunted the alley, hoping for another glimpse of the
little picture girl on the wall. At last I attained my desire. One
Saturday afternoon I saw her coming, alone, down a long rosebush
bordered path. A thrill ran through me. Our eyes met. Yet all I found
to say was: "C'mon over."
She responded to this invitation and I helped her over the wall. She
looked longingly at the Irish playing in the mud, but a clean sandpile
in my own backyard not far away seemed to me a more fitting
environment for one so daintily clad.
We played undisturbed for a never-to-be-forgotten half hour and then
they found her out. Reprimanding voices jangled and the whole world
was out of tune.
Thereafter a strict watch was kept on little Silvia's movements and I
saw her only at rare intervals, when she was going into church or as
she rode past our house. She always remembered me and on such
meetings a faint, reminiscent smile lighted the somber little face and
her eyes met mine as if in a mysterious promise.
She grew up an outlawed, isolated child deprived of her birthright,
but in spite of the handicaps of so barren a childhood, she achieved
young womanhood unspoiled and in possession of her early democratic
tendencies.
When I was making a modest start in a legal way, her parents died and
left her with that most unprofitable of legacies, an encumbered
estate. Then I dared to renew our acquaintance begun on the sandpile.
She went to live with a poor but practical relation and was initiated
into the science of stretching an inadequate income to meet everyday
needs. In time I wooed and won her.
We set up housekeeping in a small, thriving mid-Western city where I
secured a partnership in a legal firm. Silvia had all the requisites
of mind and manner and Domestic Science necessary to a "hearth-and
home-" maker.
We lived in a house which was one of many made to the same measure
with the inevitable street porch, big window, trimmed lawn in front
and garden in the rear. We had attained the standard of prosperity
maintained in our home town by keeping "hired help" and installing a
telephone, so our social status was fixed.
There was but one adjunct missing to our little Arcadia. While at a
word or look children flocked to me like friendly puppies in response
to a call, to Silvia they were still an unknown quantity.
I had hoped that her understanding and love for children might be
developed in the usual and natural way, but we had now been married
ten years and this hope had not been realized.
She had tried most assiduously to cultivate an acquaintance with
members of child-world, but into that kingdom there is no open sesame.
The sure keen intuition of a child recognizes on sight a kindred
spirit and Silvia's forced advances met with but indifferent response.
She wistfully proposed to me one day that we adopt a child. My doubts
as to the advisability of such a course were confirmed by Huldah, our
strong staff in household help. In our section of the country servants
were generally quite conversant with the intimate and personal affairs
of the home.
"Don't you never do it, Mr. Wade," she counseled. "Ready-mades ain't
for the likes of her."
When, in acting on this advice, I vetoed Silvia's lukewarm
proposition, I was convinced of Huldah's wisdom by seeing the look of
relief that flashed into my wife's troubled countenance, and I knew
that her suggestion had been but a perfunctory prompting of duty.
Time alone could overcome the effects of her early environment!