A SURPRISE FOR MR. JACK
Life at the Holly farmhouse was not what it had been. The coming of
David had introduced new elements that promised complications. Not
because he was another mouth to feed--Simeon Holly was not worrying
about that part any longer. Crops showed good promise, and all ready in
the bank even now was the necessary money to cover the dreaded note,
due the last of August. The complicating elements in regard to David
were of quite another nature.
To Simeon Holly the boy was a riddle to be sternly solved. To Ellen
Holly he was an everpresent reminder of the little boy of long ago, and
as such was to be loved and trained into a semblance of what that boy
might have become. To Perry Larson, David was the "derndest
checkerboard of sense an' nonsense goin'"--a game over which to chuckle.
At the Holly farmhouse they could not understand a boy who would leave
a supper for a sunset, or who preferred a book to a toy pistol--as
Perry Larson found out was the case on the Fourth of July; who picked
flowers, like a girl, for the table, yet who unhesitatingly struck the
first blow in a fight with six antagonists: who would not go fishing
because the fishes would not like it, nor hunting for any sort of wild
thing that had life; who hung entranced for an hour over the "millions
of lovely striped bugs" in a field of early potatoes, and who promptly
and stubbornly refused to sprinkle those same "lovely bugs" with Paris
green when discovered at his worship. All this was most perplexing, to
say the least.
Yet David worked, and worked well, and in most cases he obeyed orders
willingly. He learned much, too, that was interesting and profitable;
nor was he the only one that made strange discoveries during those July
days. The Hollys themselves learned much. They learned that the rose of
sunset and the gold of sunrise were worth looking at; and that the
massing of the thunderheads in the west meant more than just a shower.
They learned, too, that the green of the hilltop and of the
far-reaching meadow was more than grass, and that the purple haze along
the horizon was more than the mountains that lay between them and the
next State. They were beginning to see the world with David's eyes.
There were, too, the long twilights and evenings when David, on the
wings of his violin, would speed away to his mountain home, leaving
behind him a man and a woman who seemed to themselves to be listening
to the voice of a curly-headed, rosy-cheeked lad who once played at
their knees and nestled in their arms when the day was done. And here,
too, the Hollys were learning; though the thing thus learned was hidden
deep in their hearts.
It was not long after David's first visit that the boy went again to
"The House that Jack Built," as the Gurnseys called their tiny home.
(Though in reality it had been Jack's father who had built the house.
Jack and Jill, however, did not always deal with realities.) It was not
a pleasant afternoon. There was a light mist in the air, and David was
without his violin.
"I came to--to inquire for the cat--Juliette," he began, a little
bashfully. "I thought I'd rather do that than read to-day," he
explained to Jill in the doorway.
"Good! I'm so glad! I hoped you'd come," the little girl welcomed him.
"Come in and--and see Juliette," she added hastily, remembering at the
last moment that her brother had not looked with entire favor on her
avowed admiration for this strange little boy.
Juliette, roused from her nap, was at first inclined to resent her
visitor's presence. In five minutes, however, she was purring in his
lap.
The conquest of the kitten once accomplished, David looked about him a
little restlessly. He began to wonder why he had come. He wished he had
gone to see Joe Glaspell instead. He wished that Jill would not sit and
stare at him like that. He wished that she would say
something--anything. But Jill, apparently struck dumb with
embarrassment, was nervously twisting the corner of her apron into a
little knot. David tried to recollect what he had talked about a few
days before, and he wondered why he had so enjoyed himself then. He
wished that something would happen--anything!--and then from an inner
room came the sound of a violin.
David raised his head.
"It's Jack," stammered the little girl--who also had been wishing
something would happen. "He plays, same as you do, on the violin."
"Does he?" beamed David. "But--" He paused, listening, a quick frown on
his face.
Over and over the violin was playing a single phrase--and the
variations in the phrase showed the indecision of the fingers and of
the mind that controlled them. Again and again with irritating
sameness, yet with a still more irritating difference, came the
succession of notes. And then David sprang to his feet, placing
Juliette somewhat unceremoniously on the floor, much to that petted
young autocrat's disgust.
"Here, where is he? Let me show him," cried the boy, and at the note of
command in his voice, Jill involuntarily rose and opened the door to
Jack's den.
"Oh, please, Mr. Jack," burst out David, hurrying into the room. "Don't
you see? You don't go at that thing right. If you'll just let me show
you a minute, we'll have it fixed in no time!"
The man with the violin stared, and lowered his bow. A slow red came to
his face. The phrase was peculiarly a difficult one, and beyond him, as
he knew; but that did not make the present intrusion into his privacy
any the more welcome.
"Oh, will we, indeed!" he retorted, a little sharply. "Don't trouble
yourself, I beg of you, boy."
"But it isn't a mite of trouble, truly," urged David, with an ardor
that ignored the sarcasm in the other's words. "I WANT to do it."
Despite his annoyance, the man gave a short laugh.
"Well, David, I believe you. And I'll warrant you'd tackle this Brahms
concerto as nonchalantly as you did those six hoodlums with the cat the
other day--and expect to win out, too!"
"But, truly, this is easy, when you know how," laughed the boy. "See!"
To his surprise, the man found himself relinquishing the violin and bow
into the slim, eager hands that reached for them. The next moment he
fell back in amazement. Clear, distinct, yet connected like a string of
rounded pearls fell the troublesome notes from David's bow. "You see,"
smiled the boy again, and played the phrase a second time, more slowly,
and with deliberate emphasis at the difficult part. Then, as if in
answer to some irresistible summons within him, he dashed into the next
phrase and, with marvelous technique, played quite through the rippling
cadenza that completed the movement.
"Well, by George!" breathed the man dazedly, as he took the offered
violin. The next moment he had demanded vehemently: "For Heaven's sake,
who ARE you, boy?"
David's face wrinkled in grieved surprise.
"Why, I'm David. Don't you remember? I was here just the other day!"
"Yes, yes; but who taught you to play like that?"
"Father."
"'Father'!" The man echoed the word with a gesture of comic despair.
"First Latin, then jiujitsu, and now the violin! Boy, who was your
father?"
David lifted his head and frowned a little. He had been questioned so
often, and so unsympathetically, about his father that he was beginning
to resent it.
"He was daddy--just daddy; and I loved him dearly."
"But what was his name?"
"I don't know. We didn't seem to have a name like--like yours down
here. Anyway, if we did, I didn't know what it was."
"But, David,"--the man was speaking very gently now. He had motioned
the boy to a low seat by his side. The little girl was standing near,
her eyes alight with wondering interest. "He must have had a name, you
know, just the same. Didn't you ever hear any one call him anything?
Think, now."
"No." David said the single word, and turned his eyes away. It had
occurred to him, since he had come to live in the valley, that perhaps
his father did not want to have his name known. He remembered that once
the milk-and-eggs boy had asked what to call him; and his father had
laughed and answered: "I don't see but you'll have to call me 'The Old
Man of the Mountain,' as they do down in the village." That was the
only time David could recollect hearing his father say anything about
his name. At the time David had not thought much about it. But since
then, down here where they appeared to think a name was so important,
he had wondered if possibly his father had not preferred to keep his to
himself. If such were the case, he was glad now that he did not know
this name, so that he might not have to tell all these inquisitive
people who asked so many questions about it. He was glad, too, that
those men had not been able to read his father's name at the end of his
other note that first morning--if his father really did not wish his
name to be known.
"But, David, think. Where you lived, wasn't there ever anybody who
called him by name?"
David shook his head.
"I told you. We were all alone, father and I, in the little house far
up on the mountain."
"And--your mother?" Again David shook his head.
"She is an angel-mother, and angel-mothers don't live in houses, you
know."
There was a moment's pause; then gently the man asked:--
"And you always lived there?"
"Six years, father said."
"And before that?"
"I don't remember." There was a touch of injured reserve in the boy's
voice which the man was quick to perceive. He took the hint at once.
"He must have been a wonderful man--your father!" he exclaimed.
The boy turned, his eyes luminous with feeling.
"He was--he was perfect! But they--down here--don't seem to know--or
care," he choked.
"Oh, but that's because they don't understand," soothed the man. "Now,
tell me--you must have practiced a lot to play like that."
"I did--but I liked it."
"And what else did you do? and how did you happen to come--down here?"
Once again David told his story, more fully, perhaps, this time than
ever before, because of the sympathetic ears that were listening.
"But now" he finished wistfully, "it's all, so different, and I'm down
here alone. Daddy went, you know, to the far country; and he can't come
back from there."
"Who told you--that?"
"Daddy himself. He wrote it to me."
"Wrote it to you!" cried the man, sitting suddenly erect.
"Yes. It was in his pocket, you see. They--found it." David's voice was
very low, and not quite steady.
"David, may I see--that letter?"
The boy hesitated; then slowly he drew it from his pocket.
"Yes, Mr. Jack. I'll let YOU see it."
Reverently, tenderly, but very eagerly the man took the note and read
it through, hoping somewhere to find a name that would help solve the
mystery. With a sigh he handed it back. His eyes were wet.
"Thank you, David. That is a beautiful letter," he said softly. "And I
believe you'll do it some day, too. You'll go to him with your violin
at your chin and the bow drawn across the strings to tell him of the
beautiful world you have found."
"Yes, sir," said David simply. Then, with a suddenly radiant smile:
"And NOW I can't help finding it a beautiful world, you know, 'cause I
don't count the hours I don't like."
"You don't what?--oh, I remember," returned Mr. Jack, a quick change
coming to his face.
"Yes, the sundial, you know, where my Lady of the Roses lives."
"Jack, what is a sundial?" broke in Jill eagerly.
Jack turned, as if in relief.
"Hullo, girlie, you there?--and so still all this time? Ask David.
He'll tell you what a sundial is. Suppose, anyhow, that you two go out
on the piazza now. I've got--er-some work to do. And the sun itself is
out; see?--through the trees there. It came out just to say
'good-night,' I'm sure. Run along, quick!" And he playfully drove them
from the room.
Alone, he turned and sat down at his desk. His work was before him, but
he did not do it. His eyes were out of the window on the golden tops of
the towers of Sunnycrest. Motionless, he watched them until they turned
gray-white in the twilight. Then he picked up his pencil and began to
write feverishly. He went to the window, however, as David stepped off
the veranda, and called merrily:--
"Remember, boy, that when there's another note that baffles me, I'm
going to send for you."
"He's coming anyhow. I asked him," announced Jill.
And David laughed back a happy "Of course I am!"