We are sitting in a row with ashes on the heads of our cigarettes
mourning, mourning, mourning, because we have had the news that you are
ill. As usual it is up to me to express our feelings, so I have decided
to mail them and the others agree to pay for the ink.
I wish to remark at once that we did not sleep any last night. Jack
told us at dinner, and we spent the evening making a melancholy tour of
places where we had been with you. If you had only been with us! The
roof gardens are particularly desolate without you. The whole of the
city seems to realize it. The watering carts weep from dawn to dark.
All the lamp-posts are wearing black. It is sad at one extreme and
sadder at the other.
You must brace up. If you can’t do that try a belt. Life is too short
to spend in bed. My motto has always been “Spend freely everywhere
else.” At present I recommend anything calculated to mend you. I may in
all modesty mention that just before Christmas I shall be traveling
north and shall then adore to stop and cheer you up a bit if you invite
me. I have made it an invariable rule, however, not to stay over night
anywhere when I am not invited, so I hope you will consider my feelings
and send me an invitation.
My eyes fill as I think what it will be to sit beside you and recall
dear old New York. It will be the next best thing to being run over by
an automobile, won’t it?
Yours, with fondest recollections,
HERBERT KENDRICK MITCHELL.
Aunt Mary laid the letter down.
“Lucinda,” she said in a curiously veiled tone, “give me a
handkerchief—a big one. As big a one as I’ve got.”
Lucinda did as requested.
“Now, go away,” said Aunt Mary.
Lucinda went away. She went straight to Joshua.
“She’s had a letter an’ read it an’ it’s made her cry,” she said.
“That’s better’n if it made her mad,” said Joshua, who was warming his
hands at the stove.
“I ain’t sure that it won’t make her mad later,” said Lucinda. “Say,
but she is a Tartar since she came back. Seems some days’s if I
couldn’t live.”
“You’ll live,” said Joshua, and, as his hands were now well-warmed, he
went out again.
After a while Aunt Mary’s bell jangled violently and Lucinda had to
hurry back.
“Lucinda, did the doctor say anythin’ to you about how long he thought
I might be sick?”
“Yes, he did.”
“What did he say? I want to know jus’ what he said. Speak up!”
“He said he didn’t have no idea how long you’d be sick.”
Aunt Mary threw a look at Lucinda that ought to have annihilated her.
“I want to see Jack,” she said. “Bring my writin’ desk. Right off.
Quick.”
She wrote to Jack, and he came up and spent the next Sunday with her,
cheering her mightily.
“I wish the others could have come, too,” she said once an hour all
through his visit. Mitchell’s letter seemed to have bred a tremendous
longing within her.
“They’ll come later,” said Jack, with hearty good-will. “They all want
to come.”
“I don’t know how we could ever have any fun up here though,” said his
aunt sadly. “My heavens alive, Jack,—but this is an awful place to live
in. And to think that I lived to be seventy before I found it out.”
Jack took her hand and kissed it. He did sympathize, even if he was
only twenty-two and longing unutterably to be somewhere else and
kissing someone else at that very minute.
“Mitchell wrote me a letter,” continued Aunt Mary. “He said he was
comin’. Well, dear me, he can eat mince pie and drive with Joshua when
he goes for the mail, but I don’t know what else I can do with him. Oh,
if I’d only been born in the city!”
Jack kissed her hand again. He didn’t know what to say. Aunt Mary’s lot
seemed to border upon the tragic just then and there.
The next day he returned to town and Lucinda came on duty again. She
soon found that the nephew’s visit had rendered the aunt harder than
ever to get along with.
“I’m goin’ to town jus’’s soon as ever I feel well enough,” she
declared aggressively on more than one occasion. “An’ nex’ time I go
I’m goin’ to stay jus’’s long as ever I’m havin’ a good time. Now,
don’t contradict me, Lucinda, because it’s your place to hold your
tongue. I’m a great believer in your holding your tongue, Lucinda.”
Lucinda, who certainly never felt the slightest inclination toward
contradiction, held her tongue, and the poor, unhappy one twisted about
in bed, and bemoaned the quietude of her environment by the hour at a
time.
“Did you say we had a calf?” she asked suddenly one day. “Well, why
don’t you answer? When I ask a question I expect an answer. Didn’t you
say we had a calf?”
Lucinda nodded.
“Well, I want Joshua to take that calf to the blacksmith and have him
shod behind an’ before right off. To-day—this minute.”
“You want the calf shod!” cried Lucinda, suddenly alarmed by the fear
lest her mistress had gone light-headed.
Aunt Mary glared in a way that showed that she was far from being out
of her usual mind.
“If I said shod, I guess I meant shod,” she said, icily. “I do
sometimes mean what I say. Pretty often—as a usual thing.”
Lucinda stood at the foot of the bed, petrified and paralyzed.
Then the invalid sat up a little and showed some mercy on her servant’s
very evident fright.
“I want the calf shod,” she explained, “so’s Joshua can run up an’ down
the porch with him.”
So far from ameliorating Lucinda’s condition, this explanation rendered
it visibly worse. Aunt Mary contemplated her in silence for a few
seconds, and she suddenly cried out, in a tone that was full of pathos:
“I feel like maybe—maybe—the calf’ll make me think it’s horses’ feet on
the pavement.”
Lucinda rushed from the room.
“She wants the calf shod!” she cried, bursting in upon Joshua, who was
piling wood.
For once in his life Joshua was shaken out of his usual placidity.
“She wants the calf shod!” he repeated blankly.
“Yes.”
“You can’t shoe a calf.”
“But she wants it done.”
Joshua regained his self-control.
“Oh, well,” he said, turning to go on with his work, “the calf’s gone
to the butcher, anyhow. Tell her so.”
Lucinda went back to Aunt Mary.
“The calf’s gone to the butcher,” she yelled.
Aunt Mary frowned heavily.
“Then you go an’ get a lamp and turn it up too high an’ leave it,” she
said,—“the smell’ll make me think of automobiles.”
Lucinda was appalled. As a practical housekeeper she felt that here was
a proposition which she could not face.
“Well, ain’t you goin’?” Aunt Mary asked tartly. “Of course if you
ain’t intendin’ to go I’d be glad to know it; ’n while you’re gone,
Lucinda, I wish you’d get me the handle to the ice-cream freezer an’
lay it where I can see it; it’ll help me believe in the smell.”
Lucinda went away and brought the handle, but she did not light the
lamp. The Fates were good to her, though, for Aunt Mary forgot the lamp
in her disgust over the appearance of the handle.
“Take it away,” she said sharply. “Anybody’d know it wasn’t an
automobile crank. I don’t want to look like a fool! Well, why ain’t you
takin’ it away, Lucinda?”
Lucinda took the crank back to the freezer; but as the days passed on,
the situation grew worse. Aunt Mary slept more and more, and awoke to
an ever-increasing ratio of belligerency.
Before long Lucinda’s third cousin demanded her assistance in “moving,”
and there was nothing for poor Arethusa to do but to take up the
burden, now become a fearfully heavy one.
Aunt Mary was getting to that period in life when the nearer the
relative the greater the dislike, so that when her niece arrived the
welcome which awaited her was even less cordial than ever.
“Did you bring a trunk?” she asked.
“A small one,” replied the visitor.
“That’s something to be grateful for,” said the aunt. “If I’d invited
you to visit me, of course I’d feel differently about things.”
Arethusa accepted this as she accepted all things, unpacked, saw
Lucinda off, assumed charge of the house, and then dragged a rocking
chair to her aunt’s bedside and unfolded her sewing. Ere she had
threaded her needle Aunt Mary was sound asleep, and so her niece sewed
placidly for an hour or more, until, like lightning out of a clear sky:
“Arethusa!”
The owner of the name started—but answered immediately:
“Yes, Aunt Mary.”
“When I die I want to be buried from a roof garden! Don’t you forget!
You’d better go an’ write it down. Go now—go this minute!”
Arethusa shook as if with the discharge of a contiguous field battery.
She had not had Lucinda’s gradual breaking-in to her aunt’s new trains
of thought.
“Aunt Mary,” she said feebly at last.
Aunt Mary saw her lips moving; she sat up in bed and her eyes flashed
cinders.
“Well, ain’t you goin’?” she asked wrathfully. “When I say do a thing,
can’t it be done? I declare it’s bad enough to live with a pack of
idiots without havin’ ’em, one an’ all, act as if I was the idiot!”
Arethusa laid aside her work and rose to quit the room. She returned
five minutes later with pen and ink, but Aunt Mary was now off on
another tack.
“I want a bulldog!” she cried imperatively.
“A bulldog!” shrieked her niece, nearly dropping what she held in her
hands. “What do you want a bulldog for?”
“Not a bullfrog!” the old lady corrected; “a bulldog. Oh, I do get so
sick of your stupidity, Arethusa,” she said. “What should I or any one
else want of a bullfrog?”
Arethusa sighed, and the sigh was apparent.
“I’d sigh if I was you,” said her aunt. “I certainly would. If I was
you, Arethusa, I’d certainly feel that I had cause to sigh;” and with
that she sat up and gave her pillow a punch that was full of the direst
sort of suggestion.
Arethusa did not gainsay the truth of the sighing proposition. It was
too apparent.
The next day Aunt Mary slept until noon, and then opened her eyes and
simultaneously declared:
“Next summer I’m goin’ to have an automobile!”
Then she looked about and saw that she had addressed the air, which
made her more mad than ever. She rang her bell violently, and Arethusa
left the lunch table so hastily that she reached the bedroom
half-choked.
“Next summer I’m goin’ to have an automobile,” said the old lady
angrily. “Now, get me some breakfast.”
Her niece went out quickly, and a maid was sent in with tea and toast
and eggs at once. Their effect was to brace the invalid up and make the
lot of those about her yet more wearing.
“I shall run it myself,” she vowed, when Arethusa returned; “an’ I bet
they clear out when they see me comin’.”
It did seem highly probable.
“I don’t know how I can live if I don’t get away from here soon,” she
declared a few minutes later. “You don’t appreciate what life is,
Arethusa. Seems like I’ll go mad with wantin’ to be somewhere else. I
can see Jack gets his disposition straight from me.”
There was a sigh and a pause.
“I shall die,” Aunt Mary then declared with violence, “if I don’t have
a change. Arethusa, you’ve got to write to Jack, and tell him to get me
Granite.”
“Granite!” screamed the niece in surprise.
“Yes, Granite. She was a maid I had in New York. I want her to come
here. She must come. Tell him to offer her anything, and send her
C.O.D. If I can have Granite, maybe I’ll feel some better. You write
Jack.”
“I’ll write to-night,” shrieked Arethusa.
“No, you won’t,” said Aunt Mary; “you’ll get the ink and write right
now. Because I’ve been meeker’n Moses all my life is no reason why I
sh’d be willin’ to be downtrodden clear to the end. Folks around me’d
better begin to look sharp an’ step lively from now on.”
Arethusa went to the desk at once and wrote:
DEAR JACK:
Aunt Mary wants the maid that she had when she was in New York. For
the love of Heaven, if the girl is procurable, do get her. Hire her
if you can and kidnap her if you can’t. Lucinda has played her
usual trick on me and walked off just when she felt like it. I
never saw Aunt Mary in anything like the state of mind that she is,
but I know one thing—if you cannot send the maid, there’ll be an
end of me.
Your loving sister,
ARETHUSA.
Jack was much perturbed upon receipt of this letter. He whistled a
little and frowned a great deal. But at last he decided to be frank and
tell the truth to Mrs. Rosscott. To that end he wrote her a lengthy
note. After two preliminary pages so personal that it would not be
right to print them for public reading, he continued thus:
I’ve had a letter from my sister, who is with Aunt Mary at present. She
says that Aunt Mary is not at all well and declares that she must have
Janice. What under the sun am I to answer? Shall I say that the girl
has gone to France? I’m willing to swear anything rather that put you
to one second’s inconvenience. You know that, don’t you? etc., etc.,
etc. [just here the letter abruptly became personal again].
Jack thought that he knew his fiancée well, but he was totally
unprepared for such an exhibition of sweet ness as was testified to by
the letter which he received in return.
It’s first six pages were even more personal than his own (being more
feminine) and then came this paragraph:
Janice is going to your aunt by to-night’s train. Now, don’t say a
word! It is nothing—nothing—absolutely nothing. Don’t you know that I
am too utterly happy to be able to do anything for anyone that
you—etc., etc., etc.
Jack seized his hat and hurried to where his lady-love was just then
residing. But Janice had gone!
Chapter Twenty-Two
“Granite”
Joshua was despatched to drive through mud and rain to bring Aunt
Mary’s solace from the station.
Aunt Mary had herself propped up in bed to be ready for the return
before Billy’s feet had ceased to cry splash on the road outside of the
gate. Her eagerness tinged her pallor pink. It was as if the prospect
of seeing Janice gave her some of that flood of vitality which always
seems to ebb and flow so richly in the life of a metropolis.
“My gracious heavens, Lucinda” (for Lucinda was back now), she said
joyfully, “to think that I needn’t look at you for a week if I don’t
want to! You haven’t any idea how tired I am of looking at you,
Lucinda. If you looked like anything it would be different. But you
don’t.”
Lucinda rocked placidly; hers was what is called an “even disposition.”
If it hadn’t been, she might have led an entirely different life—in
fact, she would most certainly have lived somewhere else, for she
couldn’t possibly have lived with Aunt Mary.
The hour that ensued after Joshua’s departure was so long that it
resulted in a nap for the invalid, and Lucinda had to wake her by
slamming the closet door when the arrival turned in at the gate.
“Has he got her?” Aunt Mary cried breathlessly. “Has he got someone
with him? Run, Lucinda, an’ bring her in. She needn’t wipe her feet,
tell her; you can brush the hall afterwards. Well, why ain’t you
hurryin’?”
Lucinda was hurrying, her curiosity being as potent as the commands of
her mistress, and five seconds later Janice appeared in the door with
her predecessor just behind her—a striking contrast.
“You dear blessed Granite!” cried the old lady, stretching out her
hands in a sort of ecstasy. “Oh, my! but I’m glad to see you! Come
right straight here. No, shut the door first. Lucinda, you go and do
’most anything. An’ how is the city?”
Janice came to the bedside and dropped on her knees there, taking Aunt
Mary’s withered hand close in both of her own.
“You didn’t shut the door,” the old lady whispered hoarsely. “I wish
you would—an’ bolt it, too. An’ then come straight back to me.”
Janice closed and bolted the door, and returned to the bedside. Aunt
Mary drew her down close to her, and her voice and eyes were hungry,
indeed. For a little she looked eagerly upon what she had so craved to
possess again, and then she suddenly asked:
“Granite, have you got any cigarettes with you?”
The maid started a little.
“Do you smoke now?” she asked, with interest.
“No,” said Aunt Mary sadly, “an’ that’s one more of my awful troubles.
You see I’m jus’ achin’ to smell smoke, an’ Joshua promised his mother
the night before he was twenty-one. You don’t know nothin’ about how
terrible I feel. I’m empty somewhere jus’ all the time. Don’t you
believe’t you could get some cigarettes an’ smoke ’em right close to
me, an’ let me lay here, an’ be so happy while I smell. I’ll have a
good doctor for you, if you’re sick from it.”
The maid reflected; then she nodded.
“I’ll write to town,” she cried, in her high, clear tones. “What brand
do you like best?”
“Mitchell’s,” said Aunt Mary. “But you can’t get those because he made
’em himself an’ sealed ’em with a lick. Oh!” she sighed, with the
accent of a starving Sybarite, “I do wish I could see him do it again!
Do you know,” she added suddenly, “he wrote me a letter and he’s goin’
to come here.”
“When?” asked Janice.
“After a while. But you must take off your things. That’s your room in
there,” pointing toward a half-open door at the side. “I wanted you as
close as I could get you. My, but I’ve wanted you! I can’t tell you how
much. But a good deal—a lot—awfully.”
Janice went into the room that was to be hers, and hung up her hat and
cloak.
When she returned Aunt Mary was looking a hundred per cent, improved
already.
“Can you hum ‘Hiawatha’?” she asked immediately. “Granite, I must have
suthin’ to amuse me an’ make me feel good. Can you hum ‘Hiawatha’ an’
can you do that kind of ‘sh—sh—sh—’that everybody does all together at
the end, you know?”
Janice smiled pleasantly, and placing herself in the closest possible
proximity with the ear trumpet, at once rendered the desired _morceau_
in a style which would have done credit to a soloist in a _café
chantant_.
Aunt Mary’s lips wreathed in seraphic bliss.
“My!” she said. “I feel just as if I was back eatin’ crabs’ legs and
tails again. No one’ll ever know how I’ve missed city life this winter
but—well, you saw Lucinda!”
The glance that accompanied the speech was mysterious but significant.
Janice nodded sympathetically.
“I hope you brought a trunk. I ain’t a bit sure when I’ll be able to
let you go,” pursued the old lady. “I don’t believe I can let you go
until I go, too. I’ve most died here alone.”
“I brought a trunk,” Janice cried into the ear trumpet.
“I’m glad,” said Aunt Mary. She paused, and her eyes grew wistful.
“Granite,” she asked, “do you think you could manage to do a skirt
dance on the footboard? I’m ’most wild to see some lace shake.”
Janice looked doubtfully at the footboard. It was wide for a footboard,
but narrow—too narrow—for a skirt dance.
“But I can do one on the floor,” she cried.
Aunt Mary’s features became suffused with heavenly joy.
“Oh, Granite!” she murmured, in accents of greatest anticipation.
The maid stood up, and, going off as far as the limits of the spacious
bedroom would allow, executed a most fetching and dainty _pas seul_ to
a tune of her own humming.
“Give me suthin’ to pound with!” cried her enthusiastic audience. “Oh,
Granite, I ain’t been so happy since I was home! Whatever you want you
can have, only don’t ever leave me alone with Lucinda again.”
Janice was catching her tired breath, but she answered with a smile.
“Can’t you get my Sunday umbrella out of the closet now an’ do a
parasol dance?” the insatiate demanded; “one of those where you shoot
it open an’ shut when people ain’t expectin’.”
The maid went to the closet and brought out the Sunday umbrella; but
its shiny black silk did not appear to inspire any fluffy maneuvres, so
she utilized it in the guise of a broadsword and did something that
savored of the Highlands, and seemed to rebel bitterly at the length of
her skirt. Aunt Mary writhed around in bliss—utter and intense.
“I feel like I was livin’ again,” she said, heaving a great sigh of
content. “I tell you I’ve suffered enough, since I came back, to know
what it is to have some fun again. Now, Granite, I’ll tell you what
we’ll do,” when the girl sat down to rest; “you write for those
cigarettes while I take a little nap and afterwards we’ll get the
Universal Knowledge book and learn how to play poker. You don’t know
how to play poker, do you?”
“A little,” cried the maid.
“Well, I want to learn how,” said the old lady, “an’ we’ll learn
when—when I wake up.”
Janice nodded assent.
“Excuse me shuttin’ my eyes,” said Aunt Mary—and she was asleep in two
minutes.
Chapter Twenty-Three
“Granite”
Continued.
Mary and Arethusa—Aunt Mary’s two nieces—were not uncommonly mercenary;
but about three weeks after the new arrival they became seriously
troubled over the ascendancy that she appeared to be gaining over the
mind of their aunt. Lucinda’s duties had included for many years the
writing of a weekly letter which contained formal advices of the
general state of affairs, and after Janice’s establishment, these
letters became so provocative of gradually increasing alarm that first
Mary, and then Arethusa thought it advisable to make the journey for
the purpose of investigating the affair personally. They found the new
maid apparently devoid of evil intent, but certainly fast becoming
absolutely indispensable to the daily happiness of their influential
relative. Mary feared that a codicil for five thousand dollars would be
the result; but Arethusa felt, with a sinking heart, that there was
another naught going on to the sum, and that, unless the tide turned,
the end might not be even then.
Aunt Mary was so cool that neither niece stayed long, and Lucinda’s
letters had to be looked to for the progress of events. Lucinda’s
letters were frequent and not at all reassuring. After the sisters had
talked them over, they sent them on to Jack.
She [thus Lucinda invariably began] is the same as ever. It’s cross the
heart and bend the knee, an’ then you ain’t down far enough to suit
her. But she’s gettin’ so afraid she’ll go that she’s wax in her hands.
It would scare you. She won’t let her out of her sight a minute. I must
say that whatever she’s giving her, she certainly is earning the money,
for she works her harder every day. The poor thing is hopping about, or
singing, or playing cards, from dawn to dark, and unless it’s a
provision in her will I can’t see what would pay her enough for working
so. Lord knows I considered I earned my wages without skipping around
with my legs crossed like she does, and she has no end of patience too,
even if she won’t ever let her take a walk. She’s getting as pale as
she is herself. Seems like something should be done.
Respectfully,
L. COOKE.
Three days later Lucinda wrote again:
She does seem to be getting worse and worse. She makes her sleep on a
sofa beside her, and she begins to look dreadfully worn out. I do
believe she’ll kill her, before she dies herself. I told her so to-day,
but she only smiled. It’s funny, but I like her even if I am bolted out
all the time. I ain’t jealous, and I’m glad of the rest. I should think
her throat would split with talking so much, but she certainly does
hear her better than anyone else. I think something must be done,
though. She’s getting as crazy as she is herself. They play cards and
call each other “aunty” for two hours at a stretch some days.
Respectfully,
L. COOKE.
At the end of the week Lucinda wrote again:
I think if you don’t come, she will surely die. She is very feeble
herself, but that don’t keep her from wearing her to skin and bone. She
keeps her doing tricks from morning to night. Every minute that she is
awake she keeps her jumping. It’s a mercy she sleeps so much, or she
wouldn’t get any sleep at all. I can’t do nothing, but I can see
something has got to be done. She’s killing her, and she’s getting
where she don’t care for nobody but her, and if she’s to be kept in
trim to keep on amusing her she’ll have to have some rest pretty quick.
Respectfully,
L. COOKE.
If the sisters were perturbed by the general trend of these epistles,
Jack was half wild over the situation. He swore vigorously and he
tramped up and down his room nights until the people underneath put it
in their prayers that his woes might suggest suicide as speedily as
possible. In vain he wrote to Mrs. Rosscott to restore Janice to her
proper place in town; Mrs. Rosscott answered that as long as Aunt Mary
desired Janice at her side, at her side Janice should stay. Jack knew
his lady well enough to know that she would keep her word, and although
he longed to assert his authority he was man enough to feel that he had
better wait now and settle the debt after marriage.
Nevertheless the whole affair was unbearably vexatious and at last he
felt that he could endure it no longer.
“I’m a fool,” he said, in a spirit of annoyance that came so close to
anger that it led to an utter loss of patience. “I’ll take the train
for Aunt Mary’s to-day, and straighten out that mess in short order.”
It was Saturday, and he arranged to leave by the noon train. He laid in
a heavy supply of bribes for his aged relative and of reading matter
for himself, and went to the station with a heart divided ’twixt many
different emotions. It was an unconscionably long ride, but he did get
there safely about ten o’clock.
It was a pleasant night—not too cold—even suggestive of some lingering
Indian summer intentions on the part of Jack’s namesake. The young man
thought that he would walk out to his childhood’s home, and his
decision was aided by the discovery that there was no other way to get
there.
So he took his suit-case in his hand and set off with a stride that
covered the intervening miles in short order and brought him, almost
before he knew it, to where he could see Lucinda’s light in the
dining-room and her pug-nosed profile outlined upon the drawn shade.
Everyone else was evidently abed, and as he looked, she, too, arose and
took up the lamp. He hurried his steps so that she might let him in
before she went upstairs, but in the same instant the light went out
and with its withdrawal he perceived a little figure sitting alone upon
the doorstep.
His heart gave a tremendous leap—but not with fright—and he made three
rapid steps and spoke a name.
She lifted up her head. Of course it was Janice, and although she had
been weeping, her eyes were as beautiful as ever.
“Oh, Jack!” she exclaimed, and happy the man who hears his name called
in such a tone—even if it be only for once in the whole course of his
existence.
He pitched his suit-case down upon the grass and took the maid in his
arms.
What did anything matter; they both were lonely and both needed
comforting.
He kissed her not once but twenty times,—not twenty times but a
hundred.
“It’s abominable you’re being here,” he said at last.
“I am very, very tired,” she confessed.
“And you’ll go back to the city when I go?” he asked.
“I don’t know,” she said, doubtfully. “I don’t know whether she’ll let
me.”
Jack laughed.
“To-morrow I will beard Aunt Mary in her den,” he declared; “now let’s
go in and—and—”
The hundred and first!
Chapter Twenty-Four
Two Are Company
To the large square room where he had slept (on and off) during a
goodly portion of his boyhood life, Jack went to repose from his
journey, there to meditate the situation which he had come to comfort,
and to try and devise a way to better its existing circumstances.
It was a pleasant room, one window looking down the driveway, and the
other leading forth to a square balcony that topped the little porch of
the side entrance. There were lambrequins of dark blue with fringe that
always caught in the shutters, and a bedroom suite of mahogany that had
come down from the original John Watkins’s aunt, and had been polished
by her descendants so faithfully that its various surfaces shone like
mirrors. Over the bed hung a tent drapery of chintz; over the washstand
hung a crayon done by Arethusa in her infancy—the same representing a
lady engaged in the pleasant and useful occupation of spinning wheat
with a hand composed of five fingers, and no thumb. In the corner stood
a cheval-glass which Jack had seen shrink steadily for years until now
it could no longer reflect his shoulders unless he retired back for
some two yards or more. There was a delectable closet to the room, all
painted white inside, with shelves and cupboards and little bins for
shoes and waste paper and soiled clothes.
Oh! it was really an altogether delightful place in which to abide, and
the pity was that its owner had spent so little time therein of late
years.
To-night—returning to the scene of many childish and boyish
meditations—Jack placed his lamp upon the nightstand at the head of the
bed and sat himself down on a chair near by.
It was late—quite midnight—for he and Aunt Mary’s new maid had talked
long and freely ere they separated at last. From his room he could hear
the little faint sounds below stairs, that told of her final
preparations for Lucinda’s morning eye, and he rested quiet until all
else was quiet and then leaned back upon the chair’s hind legs and,
tipping slowly to and fro in that position, tried to see just what he
had better do the first thing on the following day.
[Illustration: “‘Yesterday I played poker until I didn’t know a blue
chip from a white one.’”]
It was a riddle with a vengeance. It is so easy to say “I’ll cut that
Gordian knot!” and then pack one’s tooth-brush and start off
unknotting, but it is quite another matter when one comes face to face
with the problem and is met by the “buts” of those who have previously
been essaying to disentangle it.
“She won’t let me go,” Mrs. Rosscott had declared, “she won’t consider
it for a minute.”
“But she must,” Jack had declared on his side. “My dearest, you can’t
stay and play maid to Aunt Mary indefinitely, and you know that as well
as I do.”
“Yes, I know that,” the whilom Janice then murmured. “It’s getting to
be an awful question. They want me to come home for Thanksgiving. They
think that I’ve been at the rest-cure long enough.”
Jack had laughed a bit just there, and then he suddenly ceased laughing
and frowned a good deal instead.
“You were crying when I came,” he said. “The truth is you are working
yourself to death and getting completely used up.”
“It is wearing, I must confess,” she answered. “Yesterday I played
poker until I didn’t know a blue chip from a white one, and she won the
whole pot with two little bits of pairs while I was drawing to a king.
I begin to fear that my mind will give way. And yet, I really don’t see
how to stop. She is so sick and tired of life here and she isn’t strong
enough to go to town.”
“I know a very short way to put an end to everything,” said Jack. “I
see two ways in fact,—one is to tell her the truth.”
“Oh, don’t do that,” cried his fiancée affrightedly. “The shock would
kill her outright.”
“The other way,—” said Jack slowly, “would be for me to marry you and
let her think that you are Janice in good earnest.”
“Oh, that wouldn’t do at all,” said the pretty widow. “In the first
place she would go crazy at the idea of her darling nephew’s marrying
her maid,—and in the second place—”
“Well,—in the second place?”
“I wouldn’t marry you,—I said I wouldn’t and I won’t. You’re too
young.”
“But you’ve promised to marry me some day.”
“Yes, I know—but not till—not till—”
“Not till when?”
“I haven’t just decided,” said Mrs. Rosscott, airily. “Not for a good
while, not until you seem to require marrying at my hands.”
“I never shall require marrying at anyone else’s hands,” the lover
vowed, “but if you are so set about it as all that comes to, I shall
not cut up rough for a while. Aunt Mary is the main question just
now—not you.”
“I know,” said his lady in anything but a jealous tone, “and as she is
the question, what are we to do?”
“You will go to bed,” he said, kissing her, “and I will go to think.”
“Can you see any way?” she asked anxiously.
Then he put his hands on either side of her face and turned it up to
his own.
“You plotted once and overthrew my aunt,” he said. “It’s my turn now.”
“Are you going to plot?”
“I’m going to try.”
“I’ll pray for your success,” she whispered.
“Pray for me,” he answered, and shortly after they had achieved the
feat of saying good-night and parting once more, and the result of it
all had been that Jack found himself tipping back and forth on the
small chair, in the big room, at half-past midnight, puzzled,
perturbed, and very much perplexed as to what to do first when the next
morning should have become a settled fact. He was not used to
conspiring, and being only a man, he had not those curious instinctive
gifts of inspiration and luminous conception which fairly radiate
around the brain of clever womankind.
It was some time—a very long time indeed—before any light stole in upon
his Stygian darkness, and then, when the light did come, it came in
skyrocket guise, and had its share of cons attached to its very evident
pros.
“But I don’t care,” he declared viciously, as he rose and began to
undress; “something’s got to be done,—some chances have got to be
taken,—as well that as anything else. Perhaps better—very likely
better.”
Then he laughed over his unconscious imitation of his aunt’s
phraseology, and made short work of finishing his disrobing and getting
to bed.
It was when Lucinda crept forth to begin to unlock the house at 6.30
upon the morning after, that the fact of the nephew’s arrival was first
known to anyone except Janice.
Lucinda saw the coat and hat,—recognized the initial on the
handkerchief in the inside pocket, threw out her arms and gave a faint
squeak in utter bewilderment, and then tore off at once to the barn to
tell Joshua.
She found Joshua milking the cow.
“What do you think!” she panted briefly, with wide-open eyes and
uplifted hands; “Joshua Whittlesey, _what_ do you think?”
“I don’t think nothin’,” said Joshua. “I’m milkin’.”
“What would you say if I told you as _he_ was come.”
“I’d say he was here.”
“Well, he is. He must ’a’ come last night, an’ Lord only knows how he
ever got in, for nothing was left open an’ yet he’s there.”
Joshua made no comment.
“I wonder what he came for?”
Joshua made no comment.
“I wonder how long he’ll stay?”
Still Joshua made no comment.
“Joshua Whittlesey, before you get your breakfast, you’re the meanest
man I ever saw, and I’ll swear to that anywhere.”
“Why don’t you get me my breakfast then?” said Joshua calmly; and the
effect of his speech and his demeanor was to cause Lucinda to turn and
leave him at once—too outraged to address another word to him.
Aunt Mary herself did not awake until ten o’clock. She rang her bell
vigorously then and Janice flew to its answering.
“I dreamed of Jack,” said the old lady, looking up with a smile. “I
dreamed we was each ridin’ on camels in a merry-go-round.”
Janice smiled too, and then set briskly to work to put the room in
order and arrange its occupant for the day.
“Did there come any mail?” Aunt Mary inquired, when her coiffure was
made and her dressing-gown adjusted. “I feel jus’ like I might hear
from Jack. Seems as if I sort of can’t think of anythin’ but him.”
“I’ll go and see,” said Janice pleasantly, and she went to the dining
room where the Reformed Prodigal sat reading the newspaper with his
feet on the table—an action which convinced Lucinda that he had not
reformed so very much after all.
“Suppose you go to her—instead of me,” suggested the maid, pausing
before the reader and usurping all the attention to which the paper
should have laid claim.
“Suppose I do,” said Jack, jumping up, “and suppose you stay away and
let me try what I can accomplish single-handed.”
“Only—” began Janice—and then she stopped and lifted a warning finger.
Jack listened and a stealthy creak betrayed Lucinda’s proximity
somewhere in the vicinity.
It was plain to be seen that there were many issues to be kept in mind,
and the young man grit his teeth because he didn’t dare embrace his
betrothed, and then walked away in the direction of Aunt Mary’s room.
If she was glad to see him! One would have supposed that ten years and
two oceans had elapsed since their last meeting the month before.
She fairly screamed with joy.
“Jack!—You dear, dear, _dear_ boy! Well, if I ever did!—When did you
come?”
He was by the bed hugging her. “And how are they all? How _is_ the
city? Oh, Jack, if I could only go back with you this time!”
“Never mind, Aunt Mary; you’ll be coming soon—in the spring, you know.”
Aunt Mary sank back on the pillows.
“Jack,” she said, “if I have to wait for spring, I shall die. I ain’t
strong enough to be able to bear livin’ in the country much longer.
I’ve pretty much made up my mind to buy a house in town and just keep
this place so’s to have somewhere to put Lucinda.”
“Do you think you’d be happy in town, Aunt Mary?” Jack yelled; “I mean
if you lived there right along?”
“I don’t see how I could be anythin’ else. I don’t see how anyone could
be anythin’ else. I want a nice house with a criss-cross iron gate in
front of it an’ an automobile. An’—I don’t want you to say nothin’
about this to her jus’ yet—but I’m goin’ to keep Granite to look after
everythin’ for me. I don’t ever mean to let Granite go again. Never.
Not for one hour.”
Jack smiled. He felt as if Fate was playing into his hands.
“I want you to live with me,” Aunt Mary continued, “an’ I want the
house big enough so’s Clover an’ Mitchell an’ Burnett can come whenever
they feel like it and stay as long as they like. I don’t want any house
except for us all together. Oh, my! Seems like I can’t hardly wait!”
She leaned back and shut her eyes in a sort of impatient ecstasy of
joys been and to be.
Jack reached forward to get a cigarette from the box on the table at
the bedside.
“Do you smoke now, Aunt Mary?” he inquired, as he took a match.
“No, Granite does.”
“Janice does!” he repeated, quickly knitting his brows.
“Yes, she does it for me—I’m so happy smellin’ the smell. They made her
a little sick at first but she took camphor and now she don’t mind. Not
much—not any.”
Jack arose and walked about the room. The idea of his darling sickening
herself to provide smoke for Aunt Mary braced him afresh to the
conflict.
“What do you do all day?” he asked, presently.
“Well, we do most everythin’. When Lucinda’s out she does Lucinda for
me an’ when Lucinda’s in she does Joshua. It’s about as amusin’ as
anythin’ you ever saw to see her do Lucinda. I never found Lucinda
amusin’, Lord knows, but I like to see Granite do her. An’ we play
cards, an’ she dances, an’—”
“Aunt Mary,” said Jack abruptly, “do you know the people who had Janice
want her back again?”
“I didn’t quite catch that,” said his aunt, “but you needn’t bother to
repeat it because I ain’t never goin’ to let her go. Not never.”
Jack came back and sat down beside the bed, and took her hand.
“Aunt Mary,” he said in a pleading shriek, “don’t you see how pale and
thin she’s getting?”
“No, I don’t,” said his aunt, turning her head away, “an’ it’s no use
tellin’ me such things because it’s about my nap-time and I’ve always
been a great believer in takin’ my nap when it’s my nap-time. As a
general thing.”
Jack sighed and watched her close her eyes and go instantly to sleep.
Janice came in a few minutes later.
“No—no,” she whispered hastily, as he came toward her,—“you mustn’t—you
mustn’t. I don’t believe that she really is asleep and even if she is,
Lucinda is _everywhere_.”
“Where can we go?” Jack asked in despair. “It’s out of all reason to
expect me to behave all the time.”
“We can’t go anywhere,” said Mrs. Rosscott; “we must resign ourselves.
I’ve learned that it’s the only way. Dear me, when I think how long
I’ve been resigned it certainly seems to me that you might do a little
in the same line.”
“Well, but I haven’t learned to resign myself,” said her lover, “and
what is more, I positively decline to learn to resign myself. You
should do the same, too. Where is the sense in humoring her so? I
wouldn’t if I were you.”
Janice lifted up her lovely eyes.
“Oh, yes, you would,” she said simply. “If somebody’s future happiness
depended upon her you would humor her just as much as I do.”
Jack was touched.
“You are an angel of unselfishness,” he exclaimed, warmly, “and I don’t
deserve such devotion.”
“Oh, don’t be too grateful,” she replied, dimpling. “The person to
whose future happiness I referred was myself.”
They both laughed softly at that—softly and mutually.
“Nevertheless,” Jack went on after a minute, “if to all the other
puzzles is to be added the torture of being unable to see you or speak
freely to you, I think the hour for action has arrived.”
“For action!” she cried; “what are you thinking of doing?”
“This,” he said, and straightway took her into his arms and kissed her
as he had kissed her on the night before.
“Oh, if Lucinda has heard or your aunt has seen!” poor Janice cried,
extricating herself and setting her cap to rights with a species of
fluttered haste that led Jack to wonder suddenly why men didn’t fall in
love with maids even oftener than they do. “I do believe that you have
gone and done it this time.”
“Nobody heard and nobody saw,” he assured her, but he didn’t at all
mean what he said, for his prayers were fervent that his kiss had been
public property.
And such was the fact.
Lucinda bounced in on Joshua with a bounce that turned the can of
harness polish upside down, for Joshua was oiling the harnesses.
“He kissed her!” she cried in a state of tremendous excitement.
“Well, she’s his aunt, ain’t she?” Joshua demanded, picking up the can
and privately wishing Lucinda in Halifax.
“I don’t mean her;—I mean Janice.”
“I don’t see anythin’ surprisin’ in that,” said Joshua,—“not if he got
a good chance.”
“What do you think of such goin’s on?”
“I think they’ll lead to goin’s offs.”
“I never would ’a’ believed it,” said Lucinda; “Well, all I can say is
I wish he’d ’a’ tried it on me.”
“You’ll wish a long time,” said Joshua, placidly; and his tone, as
usual, made Lucinda even more angry than his words; so she forthwith
left him and tore back to the house.
Aunt Mary had also had her eyes open, and in this particular case it
was impossible to have one’s eyes open without having one’s eyes
opened. So Aunt Mary had both.
She shut them at once and reflected deeply, and when Janice went out of
the room at last she immediately sat up in bed and addressed her
nephew.
“Jack, what did you kiss her for?”
Jack was fairly wild with joy at the brilliant way in which he had
begun. Mrs. Rosscott had laid one scheme for the overthrow of Aunt Mary
and her plan of attack had been absolutely successful. Now it was his
turn and he, too, was in it to win undying glory or else—well, no
matter. There wouldn’t be any “also ran” in this contest.
“You don’t deny that you kissed her, do you?” said his aunt severely.
“Answer this minute. I’m a great believer in answerin’ when you’re
spoken to.”
“Yes, I kissed her,” he said easily.
[Illustration: “Aunt Mary had also had her eyes open.”]
“Well, what did you do it for?”
“I’m very fond of her;” the words came forth with great apparent
reluctance.
“Fond of her!” said Aunt Mary with great contempt.
Jack lifted his eyes quickly at the tone of her comment.
“_Fond_ of her! Do you think a girl like that is the kind to be fond
of! Why ain’t you in _love_ with her?”
The young man felt his brains suddenly swimming. This surpassed his
maddest hopes.
“Shall I say that I am in love with her?” he cried into the
ear-trumpet.
Aunt Mary raised up in bed,—her eyes sparkling.
“Jack,” she said, almost quivering with excitement, “_are_ you in love
with her?”
“Yes, I am,” he owned, wondering what would come next, but feeling that
the tide was all his way.
Aunt Mary collapsed with a joyful sigh.
“My heavens alive,” she said rapturously, “seems like it’s too good to
be true! Jack,” she continued solemnly, “if you’re in love with her you
shall marry her. If there’s any way to keep a girl like that in the
family I guess I ain’t goin’ to let her slip through my fingers not
while I’ve got a live nephew. You shall marry her an’ I’ll buy you a
house in New York and come an’ live with you.”
Jack sat silent, but smiling.
“Do you think she will want to marry me?” he asked presently.
“You go and bring her to me,” said the old lady vigorously. “I’ll soon
find out. Just tell her I want to speak to her—don’t tell her what
about. That ain’t none of your business an’ I’m a great believer in
people’s not interfering in what’s none of their business. You just get
her and then leave her to me.”
Jack went and found Janice. He was sufficiently mean not to tell her
what had happened, and Janice—being built on a different plan from
Lucinda—had not kept near enough to the keyhole to be posted anyway.
“Mr. Denham says you want me,” she said, coming to the bedside with her
customary pleasant smile.
“I do,” said her mistress. “I want to speak to you on a very serious
subject and I want you to pay a lot of attention. It’s this: I want you
to marry Jack.”
Poor Janice jumped violently,—there was no doubt as to the genuineness
of her surprise.
“Well, don’t you want to?” asked Aunt Mary.
“I don’t believe I do.”
At this it was the old lady’s turn to be astonished.
“Why don’t you?” she said; “my heavens alive, what are you a-expectin’
to marry if you don’t think my nephew’s good enough for you?”
“But I don’t want to marry!” cried poor Janice, in most evident
distress.
Aunt Mary looked at her severely.
“Then what did you kiss him for?” she asked, in the tone in which one
plays the trump ace.
Janice started again.
“Kiss—him—” she faltered.
Aunt Mary regarded her sternly.
“Granite,” she said, “I ain’t a-intendin’ to be unreasonable, but I
must ask you jus’ one simple question. You kissed him, for I saw you;
an’ will you kindly tell me why, in heaven’s name, you ain’t willin’ to
marry any man that you’re willin’ to kiss?”
“There’s such a difference,” wailed the maid.
“I don’t see it,” said her mistress, shaking her head. “I don’t see it
at all. Of course I never for a minute thought of doin’ either myself,
but if I had thought of doin’ either, I’d had sense enough to have seen
that I’d have to make up my mind to do both. I’m a great believer in
never doin’ things by halves. It don’t pay. Never—nohow.”
Janice was biting her lips.
“But I don’t want to marry!” she repeated obstinately.
“Then you shouldn’t have let him kiss you. You’ve got him all started
to lovin’ you and if he’s stopped too quick no one can tell what may
happen. I want him to settle down, but I want him to settle down
because he’s happy an’ not because he’s shattered. He says he’s willin’
to marry you an’ I don’t see any good reason why not.”
Janice’s mouth continued to look rebellious.
“Go and get him,” said Aunt Mary. “I can see that this thing has got to
be settled pleasantly right off, or we shan’t none of us have any
appetite for dinner. You find Jack, or if you can’t find him tell
Lucinda that she’s got to.”
Janice went out and found Jack in the hall.
“Is this a trap?” she asked reproachfully.
Jack laughed.
“No,” he said “it’s a counter-mine.”
“Your aunt wants you at once,” said Janice, putting her hands into her
pockets and looking out of the window.
“I fly to obey,” he said obediently, and went at once to his elderly
relative.
“Jack,” she said, the instant he opened the door, “I’ve had a little
talk with Granite. She don’ want to marry you, but she looks to me like
she really didn’t know her own mind. I’ve said all I can say an’ I’m
too tired holdin’ the ear-trumpet to say any more. I think the best
thing you can do is to take her out for a walk an’ explain things
thoroughly. It’s no good our talkin’ to her together; and, anyway, I’ve
always been a great believer in ‘Two’s company—three’s none.’ That was
really the big reason why I’d never let Lucinda keep a cat. You take
her and go to walk and I guess everything’ll come out all right. It
ought to. My heavens alive!”
Jack took the maid and they went out to walk. When they were beyond
earshot the first thing that they did was to laugh long and loud.
“Of all my many and varied adventures!” cried Mrs. Rosscott, and Jack
took the opportunity to kiss her again—under no protest this time.
“We shall have to be married very soon, now, you know,” he said gayly.
“Aunt Mary won’t be able to wait.”
“Oh, as to that—we’ll see,” said Mrs. Rosscott, and laughed afresh.
“But there is one thing that must be done at once.”
“What’s that?” Jack asked.
“We must tell Aunt Mary who I am.”
“Oh, to be sure,” said the young man.
“I hope she won’t take it in any way but the right way!” the widow said
thoughtfully.
“My dearest, in what other way could she take it? I think she has
proved her opinion of you pretty sincerely.”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Rosscott, with a little smile, “I certainly have cause
to feel that she loves me for myself alone.”
When they returned to the house they went straightway to Aunt Mary’s
room, and the first glance through the old lady’s eye-glasses told her
that her wishes had all been fulfilled. She sat up in bed, took a hand
of each into her own, and surveyed them in an access of such utter joy
as nearly caused all three to weep together.
“Well, I am so glad,” was all she said for the first few seconds, and
nobody doubted her words forever after.
Then Mrs. Rosscott removed her hat and jacket, and when she returned to
the bedside her future aunt made her sit down close to her and hold one
of her hands while Jack held the other.
“I’m so glad you’re to have the runnin’ of Jack,” the old lady declared
sincerely. “All I ask of you is to be patient with him. I always was.
That is, most always.”
“Dear Aunt Mary,” said Mrs. Rosscott, slipping down on her knees beside
the bed, “you are so good to me that you encourage me to tell you my
secret. It isn’t long, and it isn’t bad, but I have a confession to
make.”
“Oh, I say,” cried Jack, “if you put it that way let me do the owning
up!”
“Hush,” said his love authoritatively, “it’s my confession. Leave it to
me.”
“What is it?” said Aunt Mary, looking anxiously from one to the other;
“you haven’t broke your engagement already, I hope.”
“No,” said Mrs. Rosscott, “it’s nothing like that. It’s only rather a
surprise. But it’s a nice surprise,—at least, I hope you’ll think that
it is.”
“Well, hurry and tell me then,” said the old lady. “I’m a great
believer in bein’ told good news as soon as possible. What is it?”
“It’s that I’m not a maid,” said the pretty widow.
“Not—a—” cried Aunt Mary blankly.
“I’m a widow!” said Janice. “I’m Burnett’s sister.”
“Wh—a—at!” cried Aunt Mary. “I didn’t jus’ catch that.”
“You see,” screamed Jack, “she was afraid to have me entertain you in
New York,—afraid you wouldn’t be properly looked after, Aunt Mary, so
she dressed up for your maid and looked after you herself.”
“My heavens alive!”
“Wasn’t she an angel?” he asked.
“But whatever made you take such an interest?” Aunt Mary demanded of
Janice.
Janice rose from her knees and, leaning over the bed, drew the old lady
close in her arms.
“I’ll tell you,” she screamed gently. “I loved Jack, and so I loved his
aunt even before I had ever seen her.”
Aunt Mary’s joy fairly overflowed at that view of things, and, putting
her hands to either side of the lovely face so close to her own, she
kissed it warmly again and again.
“I always knew you were suthin’ out of the ordinary,” she declared
vigorously. “You know I wouldn’t have let him marry you if I hadn’t
been pretty sure as you were different from Lucinda an’ the common
run.”
And then she beamed on them both and Jack beamed on them both and Mrs.
Rosscott kissed each of them and dried her own happy eyes.
“Now I want to know jus’ how an’ where you learned to love him?” the
aunt asked next.
“I loved him almost directly I knew him,” she answered, and at that
Aunt Mary seemed on the point of applauding with the ear-trumpet
against the headboard.
“It was jus’ the same with me,” she said delightedly. “He was only a
baby then, but the first look I took I jus’ had a feelin’—”
“Yes,” said Mrs. Rosscott sympathetically, “so did I.”
They all laughed together.
“An’ now,” said Aunt Mary, laying back and folding her arms upon her
bosom, “an’ now comes the main question,—when do you two want to be
married?”
“Oh!” said the widow starting, “we—I—Jack—”
“Well, go on,” said Aunt Mary. “Say whenever you like. An’ then Jack
can do the same.”
The two young people exchanged glances.
“Speak right up,” said Aunt Mary. “I’m a great believer in not hangin’
back when anythin’ has got to be decided. Jack, what do you think?”
“I want to get married right off,” said Jack decidedly.
“I think he’s too young,” put in Mrs. Rosscott hastily.
“I don’t know,” said Aunt Mary, looking at her nephew reflectively.
“Seems to me he’s big enough, an’ I’m a great believer in never
dilly-dallyin’ over what’s got to be done some time. Why not
Thanksgiving?”
“Thanksgiving!” shrieked Mrs. Rosscott.
“Yes,” said Aunt Mary. “I think it would be a good time, an’ then I can
come and spend Christmas with you in the city.”
“Great idea!” declared her nephew; “me for Thanksgiving.”
“What do you say?” said Aunt Mary to the bride-to-be.
“Oh, I don’t see—” began the latter, wrinkling her pretty forehead in a
prettier perplexity and looking helplessly back and forth between their
double eagerness.
“Well, why not?” said the aunt. “It ain’t as if there was any reason
for waitin’. If there was I’d be the first to be willin’ to do all I
could to be patient, but as it is—even if you an’ Jack ain’t in any
particular hurry, I am, an’ I was brought up to go right to work at
gettin’ what you want as soon as you know what it is.”
“But this is so sudden,” wailed Mrs. Rosscott.
Aunt Mary glanced at her sharply.
“That’s what they all say, a’cordin’ to the papers,” she said calmly,
“an’ it never is counted as anythin’ but a joke.”
“But I’m not joking,” Janice cried.
“Then you jus’ take a little time an’ think it over,” proposed the old
lady,—“I’ll tell you what you can do. You can get me Lucinda because I
want to tell her suthin’ and then you and Jack can sit down together
an’ think it over anywhere an’ anyhow you like.”
“Do you really want Lucinda,” said Janice, rising to her feet, “or is
it something that I can do? You know I’m yours just the same as ever,
Aunt Mary. Next to being good to Jack, I want to always be good to
you.”
Aunt Mary looked up with a light in her eyes that was fine to see.
“Bless you, my child,” she said heartily. “I know that, but I really
want Lucinda, an’ you an’ Jack can take care of yourselves for a while.
Leastways, I hope you can. I guess you can. I presume so, anyway.”
It was late that afternoon that Lucinda, looking as if she had been
accidentally overtaken by a road-roller, joined Joshua in the potato
cellar.
“Well, the sky c’n fall whenever it likes now!” she said, sitting down
on an empty barrel with a resigned sigh.
“That’s a comfort to know,” said Joshua.
“She’s got it all made up for ’em to marry each other.”
“That ain’t no great news to me,” said Joshua.
“Joshua Whittlesey, you make my blood boil. Things is goin’ rackin’ and
ruinin’ at a great pace here an’ you as cold as a cauliflower over it
all.”
Joshua sorted potatoes phlegmatically and said nothing.
“S’posin’ I’d ’a’ wanted to marry him?”
Joshua continued to sort potatoes.
“Or, s’posin’ you wanted to marry her?”
Joshua looked up quickly.
“Which one?” he said.
“Janice!”
“Oh,” he said in a relieved tone.
“Why did you say ‘oh,’—did you think I meant her?”
“I didn’t know who you meant.”
“Why, you wouldn’t think o’ marryin’ her, would you?”
“No,” said Joshua emphatically. “I’d as soon think o’ marryin’ you
yourself.”
Lucinda deliberated for a minute or so as to whether to accept this
insult in silence or not, and finally decided to make just one more
remark.
“I wonder if she’ll send any word to Arethusa ’n’ Mary.”
“They’ll know soon enough,” said Joshua oracularly.
“How’ll they know, I’d like to know?”
“You’ll write ’em.”
Lucinda was dumb. The fact that the letter was already written only
made the serpent-tooth of Joshua’s intimate knowledge cut the deeper.
Chapter Twenty-Five
Grand Finale
She has it all made up for him to marry her, and she is certainly as
happy as she is and he is themselves. She is making plans at a great
rate and she has consented to have her wedding here because she wants
to be there herself. The day is set for Thanksgiving and the Lord be
with us for everything has got to be just so and she is no more good at
helping now that he’s come. They are all going back to New York as soon
as possible after it’s over and I hope to be forgiven for stating
plainly that it will be the happiest day’ of my life.
Respectfully,
L. COOKE.
Upon receipt of this astounding news Arethusa took the train and flew
to the scene where such momentous happenings were piling up on one
another. Her arrival was unexpected and the changes which she found
ensued and ensuing were of a nature bewildering in the extreme. Aunt
Mary had quit her régime of soup and sleep and was not only more
energetically vigorous as to mind than ever, but strengthening daily as
to bodily force. It might have been the excitement, for Burnett was
there, Clover was _en route_, and Mitchell was expected within
twenty-four hours. Other great changes were visible everywhere. A corps
of servants from town had fairly swamped Lucinda and twenty carpenters
were putting up an extra addition to the house in which to give the
wedding room to spread. Nor was this all, for Aunt Mary had turned a
furniture man and an upholsterer loose with no other limit than that
comprised by the two words “_carte blanche_.”
Mrs. Rosscott still continued to wait upon Aunt Mary, but another maid
had arrived to await upon Mrs. Rosscott. The latter had shed her black
uniform and bloomed forth in rose-hued robes. Mr. Stebbins was kept on
tap from dawn to dark and the checks flowed like water. Emissaries had
been despatched to New York to buy the young couple a suitable house
and furnish that also from top to bottom.
“Well, Arethusa,” the aunt said to the niece when they met the morning
after her arrival, “I’m feelin’ better ’n I was last time you were
here.”
“I’m so glad,” yelled Arethusa.
“They’ll live in New York and I’ll live with them. As far as I’ve seen
there ain’t no other place on earth to live. I’m goin’ to get me a coat
lined with black-spotted white cat’s fur and have my glasses put on a
parasol handle, and I’m going to have the collars and sleeves left out
of most of my dresses an’ look like other people. I’m a great believer
in doin’ as others do, an’ Jack won’t ever have no cause to complain
that I didn’t take easy to city life.”
Arethusa felt herself dumb before these revelations.
Later she was conducted to see the wedding presents, which were
gorgeous. Among them was the biggest and brightest of crimson
automobiles; and Mitchell, who had presented it, had christened it
beforehand “The Midnight Sun.” Aunt Mary’s gift was the New York house
and money enough for them to live on the income.
“I know you’re able to look out for yourself,” she told the bride, “but
I don’t want Jack to have to worry over things at all, and, although I
know it’s a good habit, still I shouldn’t like to have him ever work so
hard that he wouldn’t feel like goin’ around with us nights. Not ever.
Not even sometimes.”
Mitchell was overjoyed at the way things had turned out.
“My dear Miss Watkins,” he screamed, when he was ushered into Aunt
Mary’s presence, “who could have guessed in the hour of that sad
parting in New York that such a glad future was held in store for us
all!”
“I didn’t quite catch that,” Aunt Mary exclaimed, rapturously, “but it
doesn’t matter—as long as you got here safe at last.”
“Safe!” exclaimed the young man; “it would have been the very
refinement of cruelty if my train had smashed me on this journey.”
Burnett was equally happy.
“I suppose it will be up to me to give you away,” he said to his
sister; “before all these people, too. What a mean trick!”
Jack had thought that he would like to have Tweedwell marry him, as
that young man had put in the summer vacation getting ordained.
Tweedwell accepted—although he had just taken charge of a living in
Seattle and came through on a flyer which arrived two hours before
_the_ hour. Some fifty or sixty of the guests came in on the same
train, and Burnett and Clover met them all at the cars and made the
majority comfortable in the different hotels and honored the minority
with Aunt Mary’s hospitality.
The day was gorgeous. The addition to the house was done and lined with
white and decorated in gold. An orchestra was ensconced behind palms
just as orchestras always covet to be and a magnificent breakfast had
been sent up from the city in its own car with its own service and
attendants to serve it.
There was only one hitch in the entire programme. That was that when
they got to the church Tweedwell did not show up. Jack was distressed
even though Mrs. Rosscott laughed. Mitchell wanted to read the
ceremony, but Aunt Mary was afraid it wouldn’t be legal, and Mr.
Stebbins agreed with her. In the end the regular clergyman married
them; and just as they were all filing out they met Tweedwell and
Lucinda tearing along, he in his surplice and she in the black silk
dress which Aunt Mary had given her in celebration of the occasion.
They were both too exhausted to be able to explain for several minutes;
but it finally came out (of Lucinda) that Burnett, whose place it was
to have overseen officiating Tweedwell, had forgotten all about him,
and the poor fellow, exhausted by his long journey, had never awakened
until Lucinda, going in to clear up his room, had let forth a piercing
howl of surprise.
So far from dampening anyone’s spirits this little _contretemps_ only
seemed to set things off at a livelier pace. They had a brisk ride
home, and the wedding feast and the wedding cake were all that could be
desired. What went with it was the finest that any of the guests ever
tasted before or since, and the champagne was all but served in beer
steins.
When it came to the healths they drank to Aunt Mary along with the
bride and groom, and Mitchell made a speech, invoking Heaven’s
blessings on the triple compact and covering himself with glory.
“Here’s to Aunt Mary and her bride and her groom,” he cried, when they
told him to rise and proclaim. “Here’s to Aunt Mary and her bride and
groom, and here’s to their health and their wealth and their happiness.
Here’s to their brilliant past, their roseate present and their
gorgeous future. And here’s to hoping that Fate, who is ready and
willing to deal any man a bride, may some time see fit to deal some one
of us another such as Jack’s Aunt Mary. So I propose her health before
all else. Aunt Mary, long may she wave!”
Aunt Mary looked as if words and actions were poor things in which to
attempt to express her feelings, but no one who glanced at her could be
in two minds as to her state of approval as to everything that was
going on.
The bridal pair drove away somewhere after five o’clock, and about
seven the main body of the guests returned to the city.
Mrs. Rosscott’s mother and Mitchell and Burnett remained a day or two
to keep Aunt Mary from feeling blue, but Aunt Mary was not at all
inclined that way.
“If those two young people are lookin’ forward to anythin’ like as much
fun as I am,” she said over and over again, “well, all is they’re
lookin’ forward to a good deal.”
“Won’t we whoop her up next summer!” said Burnett; “well, I don’t
know!”
“My dear Robert,” said his mother gently.
“Don’t stop him,” said Aunt Mary. “He knows just how I feel an’ I know
jus’ how he feels. It isn’t wrong, Mrs. Burnett, it’s natural. We were
born to be happy, only sometimes we don’t know just how to set about
it.”
“Miss Watkins has hit the nail on the head,” said Mitchell, rolling a
cigarette. “She has not only hit the nail on its own head, but she has
succeeded in driving its point well into all our heads. She taught us
many things during her short visit. I, for one, am her debtor forever.
Me for joy, from now on!”
Aunt Mary smiled. “My heavens!” she murmured; “to think how nice it all
come out, and how really put out I was when Jack first began, too.”
Burnett put his hand in his pocket and pulled out some gum.
“Robert!” cried his mother, “you don’t chew gum, do you?”
“Of course he doesn’t,” said his friend quickly; “that’s why he had it
in his pocket.”
Aunt Mary looked thoughtfully at him.
“Give me a little,” she said, “maybe it’s suthin’ I’ve been missin’.”
Mrs. Burnett left the next day, and Mitchell went the day after.
The carpenters took down the addition, and the wedding presents were
shipped to town.
“She says she’ll be goin’ soon,” said Lucinda to Joshua.
“Then she’ll be goin’ soon,” said Joshua.
“I’m sure I’ll be glad,” said Lucinda; “such hifalutin sky-larkin’!”
Joshua said nothing. Mr. Stebbins had apprised him of Aunt Mary’s
arrangements in his behalf and he felt no inclination to criticize any
of her doings and sayings.
Toward the end of the next week this telegram was received.
Dear Aunt Mary: We’re home and ready when you are. Telegraph what
train.
J. and J.
The telegram was handed to Aunt Mary at ten in the morning. Her fingers
trembled as she opened it.
“My heavens alive, Lucinda,” she cried, the next minute, “I do believe,
if you’ll be quick, that I can make the twelve-twenty! Run! Tell Joshua
to get my trunk down and harness Billy as quick as he can. He can
telegraph that I’m comin’ after I’m gone.”
Lucinda flew Joshua-wards.
“She wants to make the twelve-twenty train!” she cried. Joshua looked
up.
“Then she’ll make it,” he said.
She made it!
_Anne Warner’s “Susan Clegg” Books_