Both children regarded the strange lady with breathless interest
when the lawyer seated her in the room. They silently classed her
among the rich, handsome and powerful people of the earth. She had
what in later years they learned to call refinement, but at that date
they could give it no name except niceness. When Grandma Padgett and
the landlord's wife were summoned to the room, she grew even younger
and more elegant in appearance, though her face was anxious and her
eyes were darkened by crying.
“This is Mrs. Tracy from Baltimore,” said the lawyer. “She was in
Chicago yesterday, and I telegraphed for her a half-hour or so before
the child was taken out of the house. She came as far as
Indianapolis, and found no Pan Handle train, this morning, so she was
obliged to get a carriage and drive over. Mrs. Sebastian, will you be
kind enough to set out something for her to eat as soon as you can?
She has not thought of eating since she started. And Mrs.--what did I
understand your name to be?”
[Illustration: “THIS IS LORD'S DAY,” SAID WILLIAM SEBASTIAN.]
“Padgett,” replied the children's guardian.
“Yes; Mrs. Padgett. Mrs. Padgett, my client is hunting a lost child,
and hearing this little girl was with you some days, she would like
to make some inquiries.”
“But the child's taken clear away!” exclaimed Grandma Padgett.
“If you drove out from Injunop'lis,” said the Quaker's wife, “you
must have met the show-wagon on the 'pike.”
“The show-wagon took to a by-road,” observed the lawyer. “We have
men tracking it now.”
“I knew it wasn't right for them to carry off that child,” said the
Quaker's wife, “and if I'd tended the door they wouldn't carried her
off.”
“It was best not to arouse their suspicions before she could be
identified,” said the lawyer. “It's easy enough to take her when we
know she is the child we want.”
“Maybe so,” said the Quaker's wife.
“Easy enough. The vagabonds can't put themselves beyond arrest
before we can reach them, and on the other hand, they could make a
case against us if we meddle with them unnecessarily. Since Mrs.
Tracy came West a couple of weeks ago, and since she engaged me in
her cause, we have had a dozen wrong parties drawn up for
examination; children of all ages and sizes.”
“Did she,” inquired Mrs. Tracy, bringing her chair close to Grandma
Padgett and resting appealing eyes on the blue glasses, “have hair
that curled? Rather long hair for a child of her years.”
“Yes'm,” replied Grandma Padgett with dignified tenderness. “Long
for a child about five or six, as I took her to be. But she was
babyish for all that.”
“Yes--oh, yes!” said Mrs. Tracy.
“And curly. How long since you lost her?”
The lady from Baltimore sobbed on her handkerchief, but recovered
with a resolute effort, and replied:
“It was nearly three months ago. She was on the street with her
nurse, and was taken away almost miraculously. We could not find a
trace. Her papa is dead, but I have always kept his memory alive to
her. My friends have helped me search, but it has seemed day after
day as if I could not bear the strain any longer.”
Grandma Padgett took off her glasses and polished them.
“I know how you feel,” she observed, glancing at Robert Day and
Corinne. “I had a scare at Richmond, in this State.”
“Are these your children?”
“My youngest and my grandson. It was their notion of running away
with the little girl, and their gettin' lost, that put me to such a
worry:”
Mrs. Tracy extended her hands to Bobaday and aunt Corinne, drawing
one to each side of her, and made the most minute inquiries about
Fairy Carrie. She knew that the child had called herself Rose, and
that she had been in a partially stupified state during her stay with
the little caravan. But when Robert mentioned the dark circles in the
child's face, and her crying behind the tent, the lady turned white
and leaned back, closing her eyes and groping for a small yellow
bottle in her pocket. Having smelled of this, she recovered herself.
But aunt Corinne, in spite of her passionate sympathy, could barely
keep from tittering at the latter action. Though the smelling bottle
was yellow, instead of a dull blue, like the one Ma Padgett kept in
the top bureau drawer at home, aunt Corinne recognized her enemy and
remembered the time she hunted out that treasure and took a long,
strong, tremendous snuff at it, expecting to revel in odors of
delight. Her head tingled again while she thought about it; she felt
a thousand needles running through her nose, and saw herself sitting
on the floor shedding tears. How anybody could sniff at a hartshorn
bottle and find it a consolation or restorative under any
circumstances, she could not understand.
Mrs. Sebastian, in her First Day clothes, and unwilling to lose a
word of what was going on in the sitting-room, had left the early
dinner to her assistant. But she brought in a cup of strong tea, and
some cream toast, begging the bereaved mother to stay her stomach
with that until the meal's victuals was ready. Mrs. Tracy appeared to
have forgotten that her stomach needed staying, but she thanked the
landlady and drank the tea as if thirsty, between her further
inquiries about the child.
“Are you not sure,” she asked the lawyer, “that we are on the right
track this time?”
He said he was not sure, but indications were better than they had
been before.
“I don't wish to reproach you,” said Mrs. Tracy, “but it is a
fearful thought to me, that they may be poisoning my child with
opiates again and injuring her perhaps for life. You might have
detained her.”
“That's what I've said right along,” exclaimed Mrs. Sebastian.
“But there was that woman who pretended to be her rightful mother,”
observed Grandma Padget, who, though not obliged to set up any
defence, wanted the case seen in all its bearings. “There _she_
set, easy and deliberate, telling _her_ story, how the little
thing's father died comin' over the water, and how hard, it was for
her to do the right thing by the child. She maintained she only dosed
the child to keep her from sufferin'. I didn't believe her, but we
had nothing to set up against her.”
Mrs. Tracy became as erect and fierce in aspect as such a delicate
creature could become. The long veil of crape which hung from her
bonnet and swept the floor, emphasizing the blackness of all her
other garments, trembled as she rose.
“Why am I sitting here and waiting for anything, when that woman is
claiming my child for her own? The idea of anybody's daring to own my
child! It is more cruel than abuse. I never thought of their being
able to teach her to forget me--that they could confuse her mamma
with another person in her mind!”
“You're tired out,” said the lawyer, “and matters are moving just as
rapidly as if you were chasing over all the roads in Hancock County.
You must quiet yourself, ma'am, or you'll break down.”
Mrs. Tracy made apparent effort to quiet herself. She took hold of
Grandma Padgett's arm when they were called out to dinner. Robert
walked on the other side of her, having her hand on his shoulder and
aunt Corinne went behind, carrying the end of the crape veil as if
Fairy Carrie's real mother could thus receive support and consolation
through the back of the head.
Nobody was more concerned about her trouble than William Sebastian.
And he remembered more tempting pickles and jellies than had ever
been on the table before at once. Yet the dinner was soon over.
Grandma Padgett said she had intended to go a piece on the road that
afternoon anyhow, but she could not feel easy in her mind to go very
far until the child was found. Virginia folks and Marylanders were
the same as neighbors. If Mrs. Tracy would take a seat in the
carriage, they would make it their business to dally along the road
and meet the word the men out searching were to bring in. Mrs. Tracy
clung to Grandma Padgett's arm as if she knew what a stay the Ohio
neighbors had always found this vigorous old lady. The conveyance
which brought her from Indianapolis had been sent back. She was glad
to be with, the Padgetts. No railroad trains would pass through until
next day. William Sebastian helped her up the carriage steps, and
aunt Corinne set down reverently on the back seat beside her. Zene
was already rumbling ahead with the wagon. Mrs. Sebastian came down
the steps of log and put a hearty lunch in. It was particularly for
the child they hoped to find.
[Illustration: MRS. TRACY MAKES INQUIRIES.]
“Make her eat something,” she counselled the mother. “She hardly
tasted a bite of supper last night, and according to all accounts,
she ain't in hands that understands feedin' children now.”
“The Lord prosper all thy undertakings,” said William Sebastian,
“and don't thee forget to let us know what hour we may begin to
rejoice with thee.”
The lawyer touched his hat as Hickory and Henry stepped away on the
plank 'pike. He remained in Greenfield, and was to ride after them if
any news came in about Fairy Carrie.