PIPPIN SETS BREAD AND LAYS A PLAN
The Baxters received Pippin with open arms. 'Peared like he had been
away a week, they said, instead of just over night. They certainly had
missed him. No, they hadn't set the dough yet: they were just thinking
of it, but they thought likely--well, hadn't he better have his supper
first? No such great hurry, though of course 'twas _about_ time--
"Gimme five minutes," said Pippin, "and then just watch me!"
In five minutes, washed and brushed, spotless in white cap and apron,
his arms bare to the shoulder, he appeared shouting for his task.
Everything was white in the bakery; shining white of tiles and vessels,
soft white of scoured pine, softer white of snowy flour. The great
caldron stood ready, under the chute that led from the upper floor.
Pippin pressed a knob, and down came the flour, in a steady stream.
Pretty, Pippin thought, to watch it piling up in a soft cone, falling
away in tiny avalanches, piling up again.
Another touch; the stream is checked. Now for the salt and sugar. Now
yeast, milk and water, half and half: more whiteness, brimming in a
white pail. In it goes, with wonderful effects of bubbling and creaming,
while snowy clouds float up and settle on Pippin's brown face and sinewy
arms.
He touches another knob; down comes the iron dasher--this, too, shining
in white enamel--and round and round it goes, tossing, dropping,
gathering, tossing again, steadily, patiently; that is the way they mix
bread at Baxter's bakery.
Pippin watches it, fascinated; he never tires of the wonder of it. But
presently Mrs. Baxter calls. "Supper, Pippin, come now! Buster'll mind
Elbert for you."
Elbert is the dasher, named for the brother baker who persuaded Father
Baxter to give up hand mixing and take to machinery. Pippin gives the
machine a friendly pat. "Good old Elbert!" he says. "Keep it up, old
figger-head! I'll be back, time you're ready to lay off. She's all
right, Buster," as the boy enters, munching his final doughnut. "In
great shape, Elbert is! You want to scrape her down a mite--" give it
twenty masculine names, and a machine must still be feminine--"when she
gets balled up, that's all. She's just as sensible--why, she can all but
talk, this machine can."
"Mourns good and plenty," chuckles Buster, "when she's dry."
"Lots of folks mourn when they're dry! I shall be mournin' myself if I
wait any longer for that cup o' coffee your ma's got for me. So long,
old sport!"
"You said you'd tell me that story about Mike Cooney and the turkey!"
"Sure thing! But I didn't say I'd tell you when your ma was keepin'
supper for me. Quit now!"
Seeing he was so late, Mrs. Baxter thought he might as well set right
down here at the kitchen table; here was his ham and eggs and coffee,
and the pie and doughnuts handy by. She'd been flustrated up all day.
Had Pippin heard that there was thieves about? No, Pippin hadn't; he
wanted to know if there was! Well, 'twas so. Mis' Wilkins had two pies
stole last night right off the butt'ry shelf, and a jug of cider, and
matches all over the floor; and night before that they broke into Al
Tibbetts's store, broke open the till and made away with two dollars and
seventy-five cents. There! She was so nervous she thought she should
fly. Did Pippin think the lock was real safe on the bakery door?
Pippin, after reassuring her on this point, grew thoughtful over his
supper, so thoughtful that he was reproached for not eating a thing. He
roused himself.
"Not eatin'! Just you watch me, Mis' Baxter! Know what ailed the man
that wouldn't eat a supper like this? Well, he was dead, that was what
troubled him!"
The table cleared, Pippin washed his hands and arms at the sink, and
joined Mr. and Mrs. Baxter on the back porch. Soon two pipes were
puffing, and three rocking chairs (Buster had unwillingly gone bedward)
creaked and whined comfortably. It was a soft, dark night, just cool
enough for comfort, Pippin thought, and yet warm enough--well, warm
enough for comfort, too. The back porch looked out on a little gully,
the bed of a stream that flowed through Kingdom to join the river near
at hand. White birches grew on the steep banks--you could see them
glimmering through the dark--and the place was full of fireflies; the
stream murmured drowsily over its pebbles.
"Green grass!" murmured Pippin. "Now wouldn't it give you a pain to
think of leavin' this?"
They were three tired people--Mrs. Baxter had done a big ironing, and
the baker had missed Pippin sorely--and for some time were content to
sit silent, rocking softly, breathing tranquilly, "just letting go," as
Mrs. Baxter put it. But after a half-hour of this pleasant peace,
Pippin sighed, knocked the ashes from his pipe, and sat up straight in
his chair.
"Now, folks," he said, "I've got to talk."
Mrs. Baxter woke out of a comfortable doze; Mr. Baxter straightened
himself and knocked out his own ashes. "That's right!" he said. "We'll
be pleased to hear you, Pippin. I heard you tellin' Buster, and it
sounded real interestin'. Fire away!"
"Well!" said Pippin ruefully. "I'm in hopes you won't be any _too_ well
pleased, Father Baxter. The heft of what I have to say is in four words:
I got to leave!"
The rocking chairs creaked with startled emphasis.
"You ain't, Pippin!"
"You don't mean it, Pippin!"
"You're jokin'! He's jokin', mother, can't you see?"
"I wish't I was!" sighed Pippin. "I tell you, Mr. and Mrs., I don't want
to leave, no way, shape, or manner; but yet I got to. Lemme tell you,
and you'll see for yourselves. First place, I got to tell Mis' Baxter
about before I come here. Yes, Boss, I just plain _got_ to! I meant all
along to tell her before I left, but I've kind of put it off--the
further I get from that feller I used to be, the worse I hate him!
Well!"
Slowly and carefully Pippin rehearsed the familiar story, hiding
nothing, glossing nothing over, giving what glory there was to the Lord
and Elder Hadley. When he finished this part, the baker was holding one
of his hands, his wife the other, both uttering exclamations of pity,
sympathy, encouragement.
_That_ wouldn't make no difference, the good people assured him, not the
least mite. "Why, he told me the very first day, mother! I didn't want
to make you nervous, so I kep' it to myself. It don't cut no ice with
us, Pippin, not a--"
Pippin checked them gently; that was only the first chapter. He went on
to tell of his visit to Cyrus Poor Farm (omitting only the episode of
Flora May), and of his promises to Old Man Blossom and to Jacob Bailey.
"Now you see, you nice folks--you nicest kind of folks--here I be! I
_love_ bakin'--if I was to work within four walls there's nothin' else
I'd choose so soon--but it isn't so intended; I make sure of that. Here
I be, promised to the Old Man to find his little gal if she's to be
found (and that means if she's alive), and promised to Mr. Bailey to get
hold of that boy and give him a boost. You see how 'tis, don't you?
Well, of course! I knew you would! Well, now I was studyin' this out all
the way home, and the Lord took hold and showed me His idea, and I think
'twill work out real good, if we have luck. I say 'we,' because you
folks have got to help."
"For pity's sake, Pippin!"
"Yes, Mis' Baxter, for pity's sake! That's the stuff. And that boy's
sake. Suppose it was Buster! This is a good boy, mind you, only weak.
Suppose it was Buster! Look at here! This is the way I've worked it out.
Mr. Bailey is a dandy man, and Mis' Bailey ekally so woman, but they
made a big mistake. What did that boy need? He needed other boys, and
there wasn't none round, so happened. There was old folks, and blind
folks, and wantin' folks, some good as gold and others--well, the
reverse! He didn't want none of 'em; he wanted a pal! Well! He got one,
and he got a crook. That was his streak of bad luck, see? And he's in it
still. Way I look at it, we got to haul him out, ain't it?"
"I'll do my part, Pippin!" said Mrs. Baxter promptly.
"Count me in!" said the baker. "I don't know what I can do, 'less it's
knead the youngster up in a batch of dough and bake him to keep him out
of mischief, but count me in!"
"Well!" said Pippin. He leaned forward, a hand on the knee of either.
His voice dropped to a whisper. "Now--"
He paused abruptly. Something was moving in the gully beneath them. With
a swift gesture of caution, he stole noiselessly to the railing of the
porch and looked down. All was soft darkness, save where the birches
glimmered dusky white, where the fireflies danced and shone. The stream
droned on; the night clung closer. Look! Was that a blacker shadow
there, just where the old willow overhung the stream? Was it a shadow
that moved, followed by a second stealthy shade? A twig snapped; a
branch rustled. Hark! Was that a whisper, a footstep? The fireflies rose
in a wild whirl, scattered, came together, resumed their rhythmic dance,
filling the little glen with golden sparks. Silence fell like a mantle.