"Well, old Molly-grubs, I've got to leave you here," said Bobby Hargrew,
pinching the arm of Jess. "You're certainly down in the mouth to-night.
I never saw you so before. I'd like to know what the matter is with
you," complained Bobby, and ran off in the rain.
Jess was heartily glad to get rid of her; and it was seldom that she
ever felt that way about Bobby. Bobby was the double distilled essence
of cheerfulness.
But Jess felt as though nothing could cheer her to-night but the finding
of a big, fat pocket-book on the street--one that "didn't belong to
nobody!" There wasn't such an object in sight, however, along the
glistening walk--the walk that glistened in the lamplight from Mr.
Vandergriff's store.
She positively _had_ to try her luck at the butter and egg shop. The man
could do no more than refuse her, that was sure.
But when Jess had lowered her umbrella and backed into the shop, she
found several customers waiting at the counter. Mr. Vandergriff and his
son, whom the boys called "Griff" and who played fullback on the Central
High football team, were waiting upon these customers. Soon Griff was
through with the man he was waiting on and came to Jess.
"What's yours to-night, Miss Morse?" he asked, and was so cheerful about
it that the girl's heart rose. They didn't owe Mr. Vandergriff such a
large bill, anyway. The proprietor was waiting upon the lady who stood
beside Jess as she gave her order to Griff. The lady was a very dressy
person and she laid her silver-mesh purse on the counter between herself
and Jess. The latter saw the glint of gold coins between the meshes of
the purse and her heart throbbed. She moved quietly away from the lady.
Wasn't it wicked--seemingly--that one should have so much money, while
another needed the very necessities of life?
"Thank you, Griff," Jess heard herself saying to the younger
Vandergriff, as he packed her modest order in the basket. "I shall have
to ask you to charge that."
"All right, Miss Morse. Nothing more to-night?"
"No," said Jess, and went back and unhooked her umbrella from the edge
of the counter where she had hung it, and started for the door. A
bright-eyed man in a long blue raincoat who had been waited upon by
Griff already was just then going out, and he held open the door for
her. As she stepped out the girl saw that the rain was no longer
falling--merely a mist clung about the street lamps. She did not raise
her umbrella, but hurried toward home.
There was enough in her basket for breakfast, at least. She would wait
until to-morrow--which was Saturday--before she went to the butcher's.
Perhaps something would happen. Perhaps in the morning mail there would
be a check for her mother instead of a returned manuscript.
And all the time, while her feet flew homeward, she thought of the prize
of two hundred dollars that Mrs. Mabel Kerrick was to offer for the
girls of Central High to work for. What was the task? Could it be
something that _she_ excelled in?
Jess was almost tempted to wait up until the reception was over and then
run to the Belding house and see her chum before Laura went to bed.
Laura might know all about it.
_Two hundred dollars!_
Jess saw the words before her in dancing, rain-drop letters. They seemed
to beckon her on, and in a few minutes she was at the cottage, just at
the "elbow" of Whiffle Street, and came breathlessly into the kitchen.
The room was empty, and the fire in the stove was but a spark. Jess
tiptoed to the sitting-room door and peered in. Her mother, wearing an
ink-stained jacket, was busy at her desk, the pen scratching on the big
sheets of pad paper. The typewriter was open, too, and the girl could
see that the title and opening paragraphs of a new story had already
been written on the machine.
"Genius burns again!" sighed Jess, and went back to remove her damp hat
and jacket, and replenish the fire. Mother would want some tea by and
by, if she worked late into the evening, and Jess drew the kettle
forward.
She stood her umbrella behind the entry door, and removed her overshoes
and put them under the range to dry. She had scarcely done so when a
stumbling foot sounded on the porch. She opened the door before the
visitor could knock, so that Mrs. Morse would not be disturbed.
"Why, Mr. Chumley!" she exclaimed, recognizing the withered little man
who stood there.
"Oh! you're home, are ye?" squeaked the landlord. "I was here a little
while ago and nobody answered my knock, though I could hear that
typewriter going _rat, tat, tat_ all the time."
"I'm sorry, Mr. Chumley," said Jess, hastily. "But you know how mother
is when she's busy. She hears nothing."
"Humph!"
"Won't you come in?" hesitated Jess, still holding the door. The rent
was not due for a day or two, and he usually gave them a few days' grace
if they did not happen to have it right in the nick of time.
"I guess I will," squeaked the landlord.
He was a little whiffet of a man--"looked like a figure on a New Year's
cake," Bobby Hargrew said. His mouth was a mere slit in his gray,
wrinkled face, and his eyes were so close together that the sharp bridge
of his nose scarcely parted them.
Some landlords hire agents to attend to their property and to the
collection of rents. Not so Mr. Chumley. He did not mind the trouble of
collecting, and he could fight off repairs longer than any landlord in
town. And the one-half of one per cent. collection fee was an item.
"Think I've come ahead of time, eh?" he cackled, rubbing his blue
hands--as blue as a turkey's foot, Jess thought--over the renewed fire.
"It ain't many days before rent's due again. If ye have it handy ye can
pay me now, Miss Josephine."
"It isn't handy, Mr. Chumley. We are shorter than usual just now," said
Jess, hating the phrase that comes so often to the lips of poverty.
"Well! well! Can't expect money before it's due, I s'pose," said the old
man, licking his thin lips. "And I'm afraid ye find it pretty hard to
meet your bills at 'tis?" he added, his head on one side like a gray old
stork.
Jess flushed and then paled. What had _he_ heard? Had that Mrs. Brown,
in the grocer's shop, told him already that Mr. Closewick had refused to
let her increase the bill? The girl looked at him without speaking,
schooling her features to betray nothing of the fear that gripped her
heart.
"Hey?" squeaked Mr. Chumley. "Don't ye hear well?"
"I hear you, sir," said Jess, glancing quickly to make sure that she had
closed the door tightly between the kitchen and the room in which her
mother was at work.
"Well, I'm willin' to help folks out--always," said Mr. Chumley, his
withered cheek flushing. "If you're finding the rent of this house too
much fer ye, why, there's cheaper tenements in town. I own some of 'em
myself. Taxes is increased this year and I gotter go up on all
rentals----"
"But, Mr. Chumley! we've lived in this cottage of yours ever since I can
remember. We've paid you a lot of rent. You surely are not going to
increase it now?"
"I am, after December, Miss Josephine," declared Mr. Chumley. "I gotter
do it. Beginnin' with January first your mother will have to pay three
dollars more each month. You kin tell her that. I'm giving you a month's
warning."
"Oh, Mr. Chumley! Surely you won't put us out----"
"I ain't sayin' nothing about putting you out, though your mother ain't
as sure pay as some others. She's slow. And she's a woman alone. Hard to
git your money out of a widder woman. No. She can stay if she pays the
three dollars increase. Otherwise, I got the cottage as good as rented
right now to another party."
He moved toward the door, without lifting his eyes again to Jess's face.
"You'll tell her that," he said. "I'd like to do business with her
instead of with a half-grown gal. Don't suppose you _could_ let me have
the next month's rent to-night, eh?"
"It isn't due yet, Mr. Chumley," Jess said, undecided whether to "get
mad" or to cry!
"Well----Hello! who's these?"
There was another clatter of footsteps upon the porch as old Mr. Chumley
opened the outer door. Jess looked past him and saw a female and a male
figure crowding into the entry. For a moment she recognized neither.
"That's the girl!" exclaimed the woman, and her voice was sharp and
excited.
"Hello!" muttered Mr. Chumley, and stood aside. "Here's young
Vandergriff."
Jess looked on, speechless with amazement. She now recognized Griff, and
the woman with him was the fashionably attired lady who had stood beside
Jess at the counter in the butter and egg store.
"Miss Jess! Miss Jess!" exclaimed Griff, quickly. "Did you open your
umbrella on the way home?"
"I--I----"
"Stupid!" exclaimed the woman.
"Why, Griff, I didn't open it."
"And you haven't opened it yet?"
"Why--no," admitted the puzzled Jess.
"Where is it?" cried the young man. "Now, you wait, Mrs. Prentice. I
know it will be all right."
"That's all very fine, young man. But it isn't your purse that is lost,"
exclaimed the woman, tartly.
At last Jess understood. She started forward and her face flamed.
"Oh!" she cried. "Did you lose that silver mesh purse?"
"You see! She remembers it well enough," said the woman.
"I could scarcely forget it. You laid it on the counter between us. And
it was heavy with money," said Jess.
"Now, wait!" cried Griff, interposing, while old Chumley listened
eagerly, his little eyes snapping. "Did you set your umbrella aside
without opening it, Miss Morse?"
"Yes, I did," repeated Jess.
"And you had it hanging by the hooked handle on the edge of the counter
right beside this lady, didn't you?"
"Yes, I did."
"I saw it. It's just like a story book!" laughed Griff. "Get the
umbrella, Miss Morse. I knew it would be all right----"
"I am not convinced that it is 'all right,' as you say, young man,"
spoke Mrs. Prentice, eyeing Jess's flushed face, suspiciously.
"Get it from behind the door there, Griff," said the girl, hurriedly.
She, too, had heard of such an incident as this. Perhaps the purse had
been knocked from the counter into her open umbrella. But suppose it was
_not_ there?