On winged feet Joyce retraced her steps and entered the diningroom she
had left a few minutes before as eagerly as if it were her own home.
“I’m so glad I could come back right away,” she said. “The men have the
truck all ready and said they would be along in a little while, and oh,
I’m so thankful to you. Now, what can I do first?
“I could see you were a little troubled about that ham, never having
tasted it cooked that way. Is there anything else we could make to help
make up for the chops? Or couldn’t I go somewhere and find the butcher
and ask him to let me have some more for you. I’d pay for them myself,
because I really burned them up you know.”
“Well, you’re a dear child,” said the woman pleasantly. “No, you
can’t find the butcher. He’s taken his wife up in the country for the
afternoon, and he’s cross as two sticks anyway. Besides, I wouldn’t
want him to know I had been so careless, and it’s none of his business
anyway. But I was thinking if there was something else I could make.”
“Well, what have you on hand? Let’s look in the refrigerator,”
suggested the girl.
“Not much. There’s some cold chicken. I was saving it for Jim and he
didn’t come home at noon.”
She hurried to the refrigerator and took out a bowl which Joyce
examined.
“There’s half a breast and a drumstick, and both wings. There’s the
gizzard too. Why don’t we make some chicken salad. Have you any celery?”
“Yes, I bought a stalk the other day. I like the top leaves to flavor
bean soup, but there isn’t much.”
“A little will do. I see you have some tomatoes.”
“Yes, Jim likes them. I say they aren’t very tasty this time of year,
not worth the money, but Jim always asks for them.”
“Well, why don’t we stuff them with chicken salad? That would make a
beautiful salad dish and make the chicken go farther. Didn’t I see
lettuce in the garden? A few leaves will do even if it isn’t very big.
And how about mayonnaise?”
“Why, I make a boiled mayonnaise, but it’s late to get it cool, isn’t
it?”
“Haven’t you any oil? That makes it so much nicer.”
“Yes, Mrs. Parsons brought over a can she had left when they moved away
last week. There’s pretty near a pint in it, just had a few spoonsful
taken out, but I can’t make real mayonnaise. It won’t get stiff for me.
It separates. And it takes so long, doesn’t it?”
“Well, I can. No, it only takes a few minutes. I know a lovely recipe.
Where’s the oil? Get me some salt and pepper and mustard and eggs. I’ll
have it ready in a jiffy while you cut up the celery and chicken. Then
we’ll fix it and put it on the ice all ready.”
The two were soon busily at work, and the mayonnaise whipped itself
into a thick, velvety, yellow mass in no time under Joyce’s skilful
hand. The worried hostess was delighted, and presently a tempting
platter of scarlet tomatoes was set on the ice, filled to overflowing
with the most toothsome chicken salad that ever went to a feast.
“You’re going to have creamed potatoes and new peas out of your own
garden. Isn’t that wonderful? What’s for dessert? Anything I can do
about that?” asked Joyce as she turned away from the refrigerator.
“Why, I’ve ordered ice cream, and I made a cake. That’s all right, I
just looked at it and the icing is hardening nicely. You see I just
got the telegram at three o’clock that they were coming. It went first
to the other Bryants up on the hill and they were away. I ought to
have got it yesterday. I wonder why that ice cream doesn’t come. They
promised to have it here at four. I always order it earlier than I need
it for safety. It’s twenty after four now. I believe I’ll call up to
make sure.”
She went to the phone and in two or three minutes appeared in the
kitchen door where Joyce was just putting on the peas, with her face
the picture of dismay:
“What shall I do? They can’t send it. They say the orders have all gone
out this afternoon, and mine wasn’t among them. There was some mistake.”
“Isn’t there some other place? I’ll run out and get some for you.”
“No,” said Mrs. Bryant in despair, “the other two places don’t have any
fit to eat. I wouldn’t offer it to a cat! I haven’t even a pie on hand.
Isn’t this simply awful!”
The poor woman sat down and dropped her tired face in her hands looking
as if she were going to weep.
“Oh, don’t worry, Mrs. Bryant. There’s always something one can do.
Let me think. Have you any junket tablets?”
“Why, yes,” said the despairing housekeeper, “But what is junket? An
invalid’s food!”
“Wait till you see mine. It’s caramel junket, and we’ll serve it
with whipped cream. You haven’t some preserved cherries or a few
strawberries or something to put on the top of each dish, have you?
It’s the prettiest thing you ever saw. Where is the sugar, quick? We
must hurry. Have you some individual dishes that will be pretty to hold
it?”
Mrs. Bryant produced some long stemmed sherbet glasses and a bottle of
preserved cherries, saying dubiously:
“It’ll never cool. It’s way after four now.” But she watched the deft
fingers as they manipulated the sugar over the flame, until it had
reached the right perfection of caramel color and was stirred fizzing
into the lukewarm milk.
“It won’t set,” said Mrs. Bryant, “mine never does except in real cold
weather.”
“Oh, yes it will. I put in an extra tablet to hurry it,” said Joyce.
“Now, I want some cream. Can I take it off those two bottles? It looks
rich enough to whip.”
“Yes, it whips I guess,” sighed the woman, “but I never can get time
for such frills. That’s why we’ve decided to sell the cow, it took so
much time to tend to the milk. It’s really sold, but the man isn’t
coming for it till next week.”
Joyce worked breathlessly, one eye on the clock, and all the while her
heart watching for a little house to come riding down the street, yet
the time went by and no house appeared. Could it be that the men had
gone back on their word, or that they had made a mistake and taken it
to the wrong street, or that something had happened to the precious
little structure on the way?
The junket “set” and the cream whipped in spite of the anxiety of
Mrs. Bryant, and at ten minutes to five both were on the ice, and the
cherries were on a plate with a fork near by to place them on their
setting of whipped cream at the proper moment.
“You had better go and get ready yourself now,” said Joyce smiling, as
she lifted the potatoes and poured them through the colander, setting
them to steam dry for a moment before creaming them. “I’ll see to the
peas, and the ham is just perfect. I’ll have it all on the platter
ready to take in and keep it hot. You don’t happen to have a white
apron you could lend me, do you? That is, if you want me to wait on the
table.”
“Oh, will you? I’d be so glad. I’m always nervous with city folks. Yes,
I’ve got an apron. I’ll throw it down the back stairs. And I’ll just
run up and change now, and smooth my hair. It won’t take a minute. They
ought to be here any time now. I’m real relieved. I think things are
going to be all right. If you have time you might cut the cake.”
Joyce, wearied almost to the limit, yet interested in what she was
doing and eager to serve one who had so served her, turned back and put
all the last little touches on the table that she well knew how to put,
smoothed her own pretty hair as well as she could with only the tiny
comb with which her handbag was fitted, washed her face and hands at
the sink, and took off the big gingham apron Mrs. Bryant had loaned,
to replace it with the white one that presently fluttered down the back
stairs. She giggled to herself to think what a change had come over her
life in twenty-four hours. Here she was at almost the same hour getting
supper in another kitchen for an entirely different set of people,
utter strangers. How strange and interesting! How wonderful to have the
opportunity to thus work her way into a bit of land for her house! How
kind of the Heavenly Father to fix it all for her! How good it was that
she could cook, and had the ability to help in this time of need!
But there was no time to meditate. The kitchen clock was striking with
a business-like clang, and the honk of an automobile horn could be
heard coming down the street. Mrs. Bryant rustled down in a gray crêpe
dress and her hair fluffed up becomingly. Her eyes were bright and her
cheeks wore a pretty little touch of nervous color as she looked out
the door.
“I think they are coming!” she said eagerly, and then Joyce glancing
out behind her saw looming clumsily in the distance, blocking up the
street and grown to most enormous proportions, her little vine clad
office riding down behind the bright little car that was speeding
rapidly toward the Bryant gate.
“Oh, Mrs. Bryant!” breathed Joyce in alarm, “My house is coming too,
and you haven’t told me where to put it yet!”
“Your house?” said the preoccupied lady half impatiently, “Oh, yes.
Why, put it anywhere you like for tonight. Just don’t get into the
garden. You won’t have to go out and see to it, will you? Because I
can’t spare you now.”
“Only for a second,” said Joyce happily. “I’ve got to pay the men.”
“Well, wait till the meat is on the table and everything passed. Don’t
forget the coffee. There they are. Now I must go.”
Joyce, starry-eyed, tired to death but smiling, began to take up the
dinner and carry it into the diningroom. She could hear the hum of
voices in greeting, the people going upstairs, the splashing of water
as the guests made rapid toilets, and all the time her senses were
listening for the coming of the truck and trying to time her actions so
that she might go out and tell the men where to put the house, and yet
not interfere with any of her duties as waitress.
She flew out at last while the guests were being seated and told the
chief about where she thought the house should stand.
“I’ve got to go right in,” she said confidingly, “I’m helping Mrs.
Bryant with a dinner. She has company, and they’re going to catch a
train, but you can put it right in there between those two trees,
wherever it is convenient to you. Just so it keeps out of the garden.
I suppose I’ll have to get some one to fix it steady, won’t I? I’ll be
out again in a few minutes if you need me for anything,” and she flew
in again, and straightening her white apron entered the diningroom with
a plate of hot biscuits.
Mr. Bryant was a meek, apologetic little man with a retreating chin
and kind eyes. He half arose when he saw Joyce as if he thought this
was another guest that had somehow got misplaced, but Mrs. Bryant
incorporated her at once into the picture with a glance that placed
her as a server, and Mr. Bryant slid back into his chair, his mouth
the shape of an inaudible O, and addressed himself to this new and
mysterious kind of ham that looked like roast veal and cut like chicken.
The guests exclaimed with delight over their food. They said they had
lived in hotels all winter and it was just wonderful to get back to
home cooking again, and what wonderful ham! Was it really ham, just
HAM? And how did she do it? Could she give them the recipe? And then
Joyce as she came and went with relays of hot biscuits and peas and
potatoes heard Mrs. Bryant tell carefully how she rubbed the mustard
into the meat, etc., through all the performance just as she had done
it, and finish up:
“Yes, we think it is the best way in the world to cook ham,” just as if
she had been doing it that way all her life. She smiled to herself over
the salad as she arranged the ice cold tomatoes on the crisp lettuce
leaves. Well, it was a pretty dinner and she was proud to think she had
helped make it so. The poor burnt chops were utterly forgotten now,
lying in the grass at the kitchen door, and sometime within the next
few hours she would get a chance to sit down, perhaps to lie down,
somewhere, on the grass if nowhere else, and rest. Oh, that would be
wonderful!
She took the plates out and brought in the salad, adding some crackers
she had found in the pantry, and then slipped out to see what the men
were doing.
“What a very superior waitress you seem to have, Aunt Mattie,”
remarked a niece, eyeing the door through which Joyce had passed, “You
don’t want to let me steal her and take her up to New York do you? I’d
certainly give a good deal to get one that looked like that. She seems
a real lady.”
“She is,” said Mrs. Bryant shortly, “She’s not a waitress at all. She’s
just a neighbor who came in to help me so that I could have all my time
with you instead of running out to the kitchen all the time.”
There was something innately, grimly honest about Mattie Bryant. She
might claim the credit of a well-cooked ham, but she would never let
a young girl who had been kind to her be treated like a servant.
It wasn’t in her. She would have liked to have posed as having
well-trained servants, but she couldn’t.
“A-a neighbor, did you say, mother?” asked Mr. Bryant, “Why, I don’t
seem to remember her. Where does she live?”
“No, I guess you don’t, father, she’s mostly been here when you were
away. She lives on this street. Cornelia, won’t you have another cup of
coffee?”
And then there came a shuddering, sliding sound, and a dull,
reverberating thud, that vibrated along the floor, and seemed to make
the dinner table shiver a tiny bit and everybody looked up and said,
“Why, what is that? An earthquake?” and only Mrs. Bryant kept her cool
indifference, and went on pouring coffee. But outside the little vine
covered house had slid into place between the two maples, and settled
to rest exactly where it had been aimed by the three men who had put it
there, and Joyce was out in the sunset fluttering three five dollar
bills from her precious hoard and smiling her wistful, wild rose smile:
“I wish I could give you ten times as much,” she said, “If I only had
it! You’ve been so kind.”
The old chief stood a minute and watched her as she went in, looked
at the bill, half folded it to put in his pocket, thought better
of it and stepped inside the building. He glanced about, fumbled
a pin from the lapel of his old coat and pinned it up on the wall
opposite the door. Tom watched him from a distance, squinting his eyes
thoughtfully, busied himself with his dinnerpail and pickaxe till the
chief was around the corner, when he slipped into the cottage, took a
look around, stood thoughtful a minute and deliberately took out his
own five dollar bill and pinned it beside the other. Then he went out
quickly and followed his chief down the street.
Over in the kitchen Joyce, too weary to eat much supper had taken a
bite and gone at the dishes pell mell. She was a swift worker and
used to turning things off rapidly, but the last two days had been
more strenuous than any in her short life, and now that the immediate
excitement of the dinner and the house were over, she was beginning to
feel that she had reached her limit.
Mrs. Bryant slipped away from her guests long enough to smile upon
her, and tell her to eat a good supper, that everything was wonderful,
and she couldn’t thank her enough; then went back to the parlor where
the chatter of relatives long separated with many years to check up
in a short time made a din almost amounting to a church social. There
was the uncle who had certain jokes that he had to tell over, and the
cousin who boasted, and the cousin who wanted to recount all the
past, and the aunt who wanted to forget the past and dilate on her
house in New York, and her place in Maine, and her winter in Florida
and the trip she was going to take abroad this summer, and with it
all the poor, eager little Bryants hardly got in a word. The strange
young woman in the kitchen might naturally be forgotten under such
circumstances, especially as they were planning to take all their
guests into the city in time for the late train.
So Joyce washed out the dish towels and slipped out the back door with
only the moon to light her to her little new house.