A DEFECT IN THE TITLE
In spite of their having made such an early start in talking about
gardens the members of the United Service Club did not weary of the idea
or cease to plan for what they were going to do. The only drawback that
they found in gardening as a Club activity was that the gardens were for
themselves and their families and they did not see exactly how there was
any "service" in them.
"I'll trust you youngsters to do some good work for somebody in
connection with them," asserted Grandfather Emerson one day when Roger
had been talking over with him his pet plan for remodelling the old
Emerson farmhouse into a place suitable for the summer shelter of poor
women and children from the city who needed country air and relief from
hunger and anxiety.
"We aren't rushing anything now," Roger had explained, "because we boys
are all going to graduate this June and we have our examinations to
think about. They must come first with us. But later on we'll be ready
for work of some sort and we haven't anything on the carpet except our
gardens."
"There are many good works to be done with the help of a garden,"
replied Mr. Emerson. "Ask your grandmother to tell you how she has sent
flowers into New York for the poor for many, many summers. There are
people right here in Rosemont who haven't enough ground to raise any
vegetables and they are glad to have fresh corn and Brussels sprouts
sent to them. If you really do undertake this farmhouse scheme there'll
have to be a large vegetable garden planted near the house to supply it,
and you can add a few flower beds. The old place will look better
flower-dressed than empty, and perhaps some of the women and children
will like to work in the garden."
Roger went home comforted, for he was very loyal to the Club and its
work and he did not want to become so involved with other matters that
he could not give himself to the purpose for which the Club was
organized--helping others.
As he passed the Miss Clarks he stopped to give their furnace its
nightly shaking, for he was the accredited furnace man for them and his
Aunt Louise as well as for his mother. He added the money that he earned
to the treasury of the Club so that there might always be enough there
to do a kind act whenever there should be a chance.
As he labored with the shaker and the noise of his struggles was sent
upward through the registers a voice called to him down the cellar
stairs.
"Ro-ger; Roger!"
"Yes, ma'am," replied Roger, wishing the old ladies would let him alone
until he had finished his work.
"Come up here, please, when you've done."
"Very well," he agreed, and went on with his racket.
When he went upstairs he found that the cause of his summons was the
arrival of a young man who was apparently about the age of Edward
Watkins, the doctor brother of Tom and Della.
"My nephew is a law student," said Miss Clark as she introduced the two
young people, "and I want him to know all of our neighbors."
"My name is Stanley Clark," said the newcomer, shaking hands cordially.
"I'm going to be here for a long time so I hope I'll see you often."
Roger liked him at once and thought his manner particularly pleasant in
view of the fact that he was several years older. Roger was so
accustomed to the companionship of Edward Watkins, who frequently joined
the Club in their festivities and who often came to Rosemont to call on
Miss Merriam, that the difference did not seem to him a cause of
embarrassment. He was unusually easy for a boy of his age because he had
always been accustomed to take his sailor father's place at home in the
entertainment of his mother's guests.
Young Clark, on his side, found his new acquaintance a boy worth talking
to, and they got on well. He was studying at a law school in the city,
it seemed, and commuted every day.
"It's a long ride," he agreed when Roger suggested it, "but when I get
home I have the good country air to breathe and I'd rather have that
than town amusements just now when I'm working hard."
Roger spoke of Edward Watkins and Stanley was interested in the
possibility of meeting him. Evidently his aunts had told him all about
the Belgian baby and Miss Merriam, for he said Elisabeth would be the
nearest approach to a soldier from a Belgian battlefield that he had
seen.
Roger left with the feeling that his new acquaintance would be a
desirable addition to the neighborhood group and he was so pleased that
he stopped in at his Aunt Louise's not only to shake the furnace but to
tell her about Stanley Clark.
[Illustration: The Hot Bed]
During the next month they all came to know him well and they liked his
cheerfulness and his interest in what they were doing and planning. On
Saturdays he helped Roger build a hot bed in the sunniest spot against
the side of the kitchen ell. They found that the frost had not stiffened
the ground after they managed to dig down a foot, so that the excavation
was not as hard as they had expected. They dug a hole the size of two
window sashes and four feet deep, lining the sides with some old bricks
that they found in the cellar. At first they filled the entire bed with
fresh stable manure and straw. After it had stayed under the glass two
days it was quite hot and they beat it down a foot and put on six inches
of soil made one-half of compost and one-half of leaf mould that they
found in a sheltered corner of the West Woods.
"Grandfather didn't believe we could manage to get good soil at this
season even if we did succeed in digging the hole, but when I make up my
mind to do a thing I like to succeed," said Roger triumphantly when they
had fitted the sashes on to planks that sloped at the sides so that rain
would run off the glass, and called the girls out to admire their
result.
"What are we going to put in here first?" asked Ethel Brown, who liked
to get at the practical side of matters at once.
"I'd like to have some violets," said Ethel Blue. "Could I have a corner
for them? I've had some plants promised me from the Glen Point
greenhouse man. Margaret is going to bring them over as soon as I'm
ready for them."
"I want to see if I can beat Dicky with early vegetables," declared
Roger. "I'm going to start early parsley and cabbage and lettuce,
cauliflower and egg plants, radishes and peas and corn in shallow
boxes--flats Grandfather says they're called--in my room and the kitchen
where it's warm and sunny, and when they've sprouted three leaves I'll
set them out here and plant some more in the flats."
"Won't transplanting them twice set them back?"
"If you take up enough earth around them they ought not to know that
they've taken a journey."
"I've done a lot of transplanting of wild plants from the woods," said
Stanley, "and I found that if I was careful to do that they didn't even
wilt."
"Why can't we start some of the flower seeds here and have early
blossoms?"
"You can. I don't see why we can't keep it going all the time and have a
constant supply of flowers and vegetables earlier than we should if we
trusted to Mother Nature to do the work unaided."
"Then in the autumn we can stow away here some of the plants we want to
save, geraniums and begonias, and plants that are pretty indoors, and
take them into the house when the indoor ones become shabby."
"Evidently right in the heart of summer is the only time this article
won't be in use," decided Stanley, laughing at their eagerness. "Have
you got anything to cover it with when the spring sunshine grows too
hot?"
"There is an old hemp rug and some straw matting in the attic--won't
they do?"
"Perfectly. Lay them over the glass so that the delicate little plants
won't get burned. You can raise the sashes, too."
"If we don't forget to close them before the sun sets and the night
chill comes on, I suppose," smiled Ethel Blue. "Mr. Emerson says that
seeds under glass do better if they're covered with newspaper until they
start."
It was about the middle of March when Mrs. Smith went in to call on her
neighbors, the Miss Clarks, one evening. They were at home and after a
talk on the ever-absorbing theme of the war Mrs. Smith said,
"I really came in here on business. I hope you've decided to sell me the
meadow lot next to my knoll. If you've made up your minds hadn't I
better tell my lawyer to make out the papers at once?"
"Sister and I made up our minds some time ago, dear Mrs. Smith, and we
wrote to Brother William about it before he came to stay with us, and he
was willing, and Stanley, here, who is the only other heir of the estate
that we know about, has no objection."
"That gives me the greatest pleasure. I'll tell my lawyer, then, to have
the title looked up right away and make out the deed--though I feel as
if I should apologize for looking up the title of land that has been in
your family as long as Mr. Emerson's has been in his."
"You needn't feel at all apologetic," broke in Stanley. "It's never safe
to buy property without having a clear title, and we aren't sure that we
are in a position to give you a clear title."
"That's why we haven't spoken to you about it before," said the elder
Miss Clark; "we were waiting to try to make it all straight before we
said anything about it one way or the other."
"Not give me a clear title!" cried Mrs. Smith. "Do you mean that I won't
be able to buy it? Why, I don't know what Dorothy will do if we can't
get that bit with the brook; she has set her heart on it."
"We want you to have it not only for Dorothy's sake but for our own. It
isn't a good building lot--it's too damp--and we're lucky to have an
offer for it."
"Can you tell me just what the trouble is? It seems as if it ought to be
straight since all of you heirs agree to the sale."
"The difficulty is," said Stanley, "that we aren't sure that we are all
the heirs. We thought we were, but Uncle William made some inquiries on
his way here, and he learned enough to disquiet him."
"Our father, John Clark, had a sister Judith," explained the younger
Miss Clark. "They lived here on the Clark estate which had belonged to
the family for many generations. Then Judith married a man named
Leonard--Peter Leonard--and went to Nebraska at a time when Nebraska was
harder to reach than California is now. That was long before the Civil
War and during those frontier days Aunt Judith and Uncle Peter evidently
were tossed about to the limit of their endurance. Her letters came less
and less often and they always told of some new grief--the death of a
child or the loss of some piece of property. Finally the letters ceased
altogether. I don't understand why her family didn't hold her more
closely, but they lost sight of her entirely."
"Probably it was more her fault than theirs," replied Mrs. Smith softly,
recalling that there had been a time when her own pride had forbade her
letting her people know that she was in dire distress.
"It doesn't make much difference to-day whose fault it was," declared
Stanley Clark cheerfully; "the part of the story that interests us is
that the family thought that all Great-aunt Judith's children were
dead. Here is where Uncle William got his surprise. When he was coming
on from Arkansas he stopped over for a day at the town where Aunt Judith
had posted her last letter to Grandfather, about sixty years ago. There
he learned from the records that she was dead and all her children were
dead--_except one_."
"Except one!" repeated Mrs. Smith. "Born after she ceased writing home?"
"Exactly. Now this daughter--Emily was her name--left the town after her
parents died and there is no way of finding out where she went. One or
two of the old people remember that the Leonard girl left, but nothing
more."
"She may be living now."
"Certainly she may; and she may have married and had a dozen children.
You see, until we can find out something about this Emily we can't give
a clear title to the land."
Mrs. Smith nodded her understanding.
"It's lucky we've never been willing to sell any of the old estate,"
said Mr. William Clark, who had entered and been listening to the story.
"If we had we should, quite ignorantly, have given a defective title."
"Isn't it possible, after making as long and thorough a search as you
can, to take the case into court and have the judge declare the title
you give to be valid, under the circumstances?"
"That is done; but you can see that such a decision would be granted
only after long research on our part. It would delay your purchase
considerably."
"However, it seems to me the thing to do," decided Mrs. Smith, and she
and Stanley at once entered upon a discussion of the ways and means by
which the hunt for Emily Leonard and her heirs was to be accomplished.
It included the employment of detectives for the spring months, and
then, if they had not met with success, a journey by Stanley during the
weeks of his summer vacation.
Dorothy and Ethel were bitterly disappointed at the result of Mrs.
Smith's attempt to purchase the coveted bit of land.
"I suppose it wouldn't have any value for any one else on earth," cried
Dorothy, "but I want it."
"I don't think I ever saw a spot that suited me so well for a summer
play place," agreed Ethel Blue, and Helen and Roger and all the rest of
the Club members were of the same opinion.
"The Clarks will be putting the price up if they should find out that we
wanted it so much," warned Roger.
"I don't believe they would," smiled Mrs. Smith. "They said they thought
themselves lucky to have a customer for it, because it isn't good for
building ground."
"We'll hope that Stanley will unearth the history of his great-aunt,"
said Roger seriously.
"And find that she died a spinster," smiled his Aunt Louise. "The fewer
heirs there are to deal the simpler it will be."