Weller, looking fixedly at his son. "'Cos a coachman may do
without suspicion wot other men may not; 'cos a coachman may
be on the very amicablest terms with eighty mile o' females
and yet nobody thinks that he ever means to marry any vun
among 'em. And wot other man can say the same, Sammy?"
"They are not much alike, are they?" said Miss Mayberry. "I think if
Dickens could read my translation he would not in the least recognize
it. The fact is, Mr. Tippengray, I do not believe that your method of
Greek pickling will answer to preserve our fiction for the future. It
may do for histories and scientific work, but when you come to dialect
and vernacular, if you once get it into Greek you can never get it back
again as it used to be."
"That will be a great pity," said Mr. Tippengray, "for fiction makes up
such a large part of our literature. And it does seem that good English
might be properly translated into good Greek."
"Oh, it isn't the translation," said Ida; "that is all easy enough: it's
the resurrection back into the original condition. Look at the prophet
Enoch. He was translated, but if it were possible now to bring him back
again, he would not be the same Enoch, you know."
"One might infer from that simile," said the Greek scholar, smiling,
"that when a bit of English gets into Greek it goes to heaven, and would
better stay there. Perhaps you are right in what you say about fiction.
Anyway it is very pleasant to talk with one who can appreciate this
subject, and reason sensibly about it."
Mr. Tippengray shut up his book and put it back into his pocket, while
his companion tore her translation from her note-book and scattered it
in little bits along the road.
"I would not like it," she said, "if any one but you were to read that
and know I did it."
Mr. Tippengray's eyes and Mr. Tippengray's heart turned towards her.
Those words, "any one but you," touched him deeply. He had a feeling as
if he were being translated into something better than his original
self, and that this young woman was doing it. He wished to express this
in some way, and to say a good many other things which came crowding
upon his mind, but he expressed nothing and said none of these things.
An exclamation from Ida caused him to look in front of him, and there
was the spring wagon with the horses standing still.
Mrs. Cristie turned round and called to them:
"Mr. Beam says that there are some by-roads just ahead of us, and as he
was afraid you might turn into one and get lost, he thought it better to
wait for you."
"Nonsense!" cried Miss Mayberry; "there was no danger that we would turn
into any by-ways. The road is plain enough."
"I'm not so sure of that," said Mr. Tippengray to himself. "I think that
just now I was on the point of turning into a by-way."
The wagon now moved slowly on, and the village cart followed. Mr.
Tippengray would gladly have dropped a good deal behind, but he found
this not practicable, because whenever he made Hammerstein walk
Stolzenfels and Falkenberg also walked. It was plain enough that Lanigan
Beam did not wish any longer to cut himself off from the society of the
lady to whom he had made a proposal of marriage, and whenever he could
find a pretext, which was not difficult for Lanigan, he called back to
her to direct her attention to something, or to ask her opinion about
something. Miss Mayberry did not respond with any readiness, but the
persistence of the young man succeeded in making the conversation a
general one, and the Greek scholar made no attempt to explain to the
nurse-maid that he was in course of translation.
Dinner was very late at the Squirrel Inn that day, and Mrs. Petter gave
her guests a scolding. But this did not in the least disturb the mind of
Mr. Tippengray, who was well used to being scolded for coming late to
his meals. But something else disturbed him, and for nearly an hour
after dinner he wandered about the lawn and around the house. He wanted
very much to see Miss Mayberry again, and to tell her the things he did
not have a chance to tell her on the road, and he also very much wished
to prevent that rascally Lanigan Beam from getting ahead of him, and
continuing his broken-off interview with the lady.
XXV
MR. TIPPENGRAY MOUNTS HIGH
It seemed as if every one must be taking an afternoon nap, for the Greek
scholar had the grounds to himself. When he began to be tired of
walking, he seated himself where he had a good view of the house, and
presently saw Ida Mayberry at her window, with the young Douglas in her
arms. Almost at the same moment he saw Lanigan Beam approaching from the
direction of the barns.
"If he turns his steps towards that window," thought the scholar, "I
shall see to it that I am there before him."
But the young man did not walk towards the front of the house, but went
in the direction of his room, where the ladder stood leaning against the
open window. Mounting this, he disappeared within.
The eyes of Mr. Tippengray flashed, and his face was lighted by a bright
thought. In an instant he was on his feet and running lightly towards
Lanigan's room. Cautiously and silently he approached the ladder;
deftly, and without making the least noise, he moved the upper end of
it from the side of the building, and then, putting it on his shoulder,
gently walked away with it.
Around to the front of the house Mr. Tippengray carried the ladder, and
boldly placed it nearly upright, under Miss Mayberry's window. In
astonishment that young lady looked out, and asked him what in the world
he was doing.
"I want to speak to you," said Mr. Tippengray, "on a subject of great
importance, and I cannot afford to lose this opportunity. May I come
up?"
"Certainly," said Ida.
In a moment the Greek scholar was standing on one of the upper rounds of
the ladder, with his head and shoulders well above the window-sill.
Little Douglas was delighted to see him, and, taking hold of his
outstretched forefinger, gave it a good wag.
"It was a capital notion," said Mr. Tippengray, "for me to take this
ladder. In the first place, it enables me to get up to you, and
secondly, it prevents Lanigan Beam from getting down from his room."
Miss Mayberry laughed, and the baby crowed in sympathy.
"Why shouldn't he get down, Mr. Tippengray?" said she.
"If he did," was the answer, "he would be sure to interfere with me. He
would come here, and I don't want him. I have something to say to you,
Miss Mayberry, and I must be brief in saying it, for bystanders, no
matter who they might be, would prevent my speaking plainly. I have
become convinced, Miss Mayberry, that my life will be imperfect, and
indeed worthless, if I cannot pass it in prosecuting my studies in your
company, and with your assistance. You may think this strong language,
but it is true."
[Illustration: THE PROPOSAL.]
"That would be very pleasant," said the nurse-maid, "but I do not see
how you are going to manage it. My stay here will soon come to an end,
for if Mrs. Cristie does not return to the city in a week or two, I must
leave her. I am a teacher, you know, and before the end of the summer
vacation, I must go and make my arrangements for the next term, and then
you can easily see for yourself that when I am engaged in a school I
cannot do very much studying with you."
"Oh, my dear young lady," cried Mr. Tippengray, "you do not catch my
idea. I am not thinking of schools or positions, and I do not wish you
to think of them. I wish you to know that you have translated me from a
quiet scholar into an ardent lover, and that it would be of no use at
all to try to get me back into my original condition. If I cannot be the
man I want to be, I cannot be the man I was. I ask you for your hands,
your heart, and your intellect. I invite you to join me in pursuing the
higher education until the end of our lives. Take me for your scholar
and be mine. I pray you give me--"
"Upon--my word!" was the ejaculation, loud and distinct, which came up
from the foot of the ladder, and stopped Mr. Tippengray's avowal. Miss
Mayberry instantly thrust her head out of the window, and Mr. Tippengray
looked down. It was Calthea Rose who had spoken, and she stood under the
window in company with Mr. and Mrs. Petter. A short distance away, and
rapidly approaching, were Mrs. Cristie and Walter Lodloe.
"Here is gratitude!" cried Calthea, in stinging tones. "I came all the
way back from Lethbury to see if anything had happened to you and that
horse, and this is what I find. The top of a ladder and a child's nurse!
Such a disgrace never fell on this county."
"Never, indeed," cried Mrs. Petter. "I wouldn't have believed it if
angels had got down on their knees and sworn it to me. Come down from
that ladder, Mr. Tippengray! Come down from it before I make my husband
break it to bits beneath you. Come down, I say!"
"Mr. Tippengray," said Mr. Petter, in solemn voice, "in the name of the
laws of domesticity and the hearthstone, and in the honorable name of
the Squirrel Inn, I command you to come down."
There was but one thing for Mr. Tippengray to do, and that was to come
down, and so down he came.
"Disgraceful!" cried Miss Rose; "you ought to be ashamed to look anybody
in the face."
"Never would I have believed it," exclaimed Mrs. Petter. "Never, never,
if I had not seen it with my own eyes, and in broad daylight too!"
What Mr. Tippengray would have said or done is not known, for at that
instant Ida Mayberry leaned far out of the window and claimed the
attention of the company.
"Look here!" she cried, "we have had enough of this. Mr. Tippengray has
nothing to be ashamed of, and he had a perfect right to climb up this
ladder. I want you all to understand that we are engaged to be married."
This announcement fell like a sudden downpour upon the people beneath
the window, and they stood silenced; but in an instant the Greek scholar
bounded up the ladder, and, seizing Miss Mayberry by the hand, kissed it
rapturously.
"I may have been a little abrupt," she said, in a low voice, "but I
wasn't going to stand here and let our affair be broken off like that."
At Mr. Tippengray's spontaneous exhibition of tender affection, Mr.
Petter involuntarily and reverently took off his hat, while Mrs. Cristie
and Lodloe clapped their hands. The lover, with radiant face, now
descended the ladder and received congratulations from everybody except
Miss Calthea, who, with her nose pointed about forty-five degrees above
the horizon, walked rapidly to the post where she had tied her horse.
[Illustration: MR. PETTER TAKES OFF HIS HAT.]
Miss Mayberry now appeared, with the baby in her arms, and an expression
of great satisfaction upon her face. Mrs. Cristie relieved her of the
first, but the latter increased as the little company heartily shook
hands with her.
[Illustration: LANIGAN BEAM WANTS HIS LADDER.]
"I had supposed it would be different with you, Mr. Tippengray," said
Mrs. Petter, "but people ought to know their own minds, and I have no
doubt that Calthea would have often made it very hot for you, especially
if you did not turn over an entirely new leaf in regard to coming to
your meals. But there must be no more laddering; whether it is right or
not, it does not look so. When Ida isn't tending to the child, and it's
too wet to be out of doors, you can have the little parlor to
yourselves. I'll have it dusted and aired."
"Excuse me," said Lodloe, coming forward, "but if you have no further
use for that ladder, Mr. Tippengray, I will take it to Lanigan Beam, who
is leaning out of his window, and shouting like mad. I presume he wants
to come down, and as I have locked the door of my room he cannot descend
in that way."
"Poor Lanigan!" ejaculated Mrs. Petter, "he doesn't know what he's
coming down to. But no matter what he undertakes he is always a day
after the fair."
Mr. Petter drew the Greek scholar aside.
"My dear sir," he said expressively, "I have a special reason for
congratulating you on your decision to unite your blood and culture with
those of another. Had you been entrapped by the wiles of our Lethbury
neighbor, a person for whom I have but slight regard, and who is looked
upon with decided disapprobation by those as competent to judge as the
Rockmores of Germantown, I am afraid, my dear sir, I should have been
compelled to sever those pleasant relations which for so many months
have held us together, and which I hope may continue for years."
"My good Petter," said Mr. Tippengray, "I have a pleasant house in town,
which I hope to occupy with my wife this winter, and I should like it
very much if you and Mrs. Petter would make us a visit there, and, if
you wish, I'll have some of the Germantown Rockmores there to meet you."
The landlord of the Squirrel Inn stepped back in amazement.
"Do you mean to say," he exclaimed, "that you know the Rockmores?"
"The way of it is this," replied the Greek scholar; "you see, my mother
was a Purley, and on the maternal side she belonged to the
Kempton-Tucker family, and you know that the head of that family married
for his second wife a Mrs. Callaway, who was own sister to John Brent
Norris, whose daughter married a Rockmore. So you see we are connected."
"And you never told me!" solemnly exclaimed Mr. Petter.
"No," said his companion; "there are pleasures of revelation, which are
enhanced by a delay in realization, and besides I did not wish to place
myself in a position which might, perchance, subordinate some of your
other guests."
"I must admit that I am sorry," said Mr. Petter; "but your action in the
matter proves your blood."
And now, Mrs. Cristie having finished her very earnest conversation with
Ida, the newly betrothed pair walked together towards the bluff from
which there was such a beautiful view of the valley below.
XXVI
ANOTHER SQUIRREL IN THE TAP-ROOM
"If I had known," said Lanigan Beam, as late that night he sat smoking
with Walter Lodloe in the top room of the tower, "that that old rascal
was capable of stealing my ladder in order to make love to my girl, I
should have had a higher respect for him. Well, I'm done for, and now I
shall lose no time in saying good-by to the Squirrel Inn and Lethbury."
"Why so?" asked his companion in surprise. "Was the hope of winning Miss
Mayberry the only thing that kept you here?"
"Oh, no," said Lanigan; "it was the hope that Calthea might get old
Tippengray. You will remember I told you that, but as she cannot now go
off with him, there is nobody for her to go off with, and so I must be
the one to travel."
Lodloe laughed. "Under the circumstances then," he said, "you think you
couldn't stay in this neighborhood?"
"Not with Calthea unattached," replied Lanigan. "Oh, no! Quite
impossible."
When Miss Rose had been convinced that all her plans had come to naught,
earnestly and with much severity and singleness of purpose she
considered the situation. It did not take her long to arrive at the
conclusion that the proper thing for her to do was to marry Lanigan
Beam, and to do it without loss of time. Having come to this decision,
she immediately began to make arrangements to carry it into effect.
It was utterly vain and useless for Lanigan to attempt to get away from
her. She came upon him with a sweet assurance which he supposed had
vanished with her earlier years; she led him with ribbons which he
thought had faded and fallen into shreds long, long ago; she clapped
over his head a bag which he supposed had been worn out on old
Tippengray; and she secured him with fetters which he imagined had long
since been dropped, forgotten, and crumbled into dust. He did not go
away, and it was not long before it was generally understood in the
neighborhood that, at last, he and Calthea Rose were to be married.
Shortly after this fact had been made public, Lanigan and Walter Lodloe,
who had not seen each other for some days, were walking together on the
Lethbury road.
"Yes," said the former, "it is a little odd, but then odd things are all
the time happening. I don't know whether Calthea has taken me in by
virtue of my first engagement to her, or on some of the others. Or it
may be that it is merely a repeal of our last breaking off. Anyway, I
found she had never dreamed of anything but marrying me, and though I
thought I had a loose foot, I found I hadn't, and there's an end of it.
Besides, I will say for Calthea that her feelings are different from
what I supposed they were. She has mellowed up a good deal in the last
year or two, and I shall try to make things as easy for her as I can.
"But one thing is certain; I shall stick to my resolution not to tell
her that I have made money, and have reformed my old, loose ways of
living and doing business. All that I am going to keep as a sort of
saving fund that I can draw on when I feel like it, and let it alone
when I don't feel like it. We are going to travel,--she is wild on that
point,--and she expects to pay the piper. She can't do it, but I shall
let her think she's doing it. She takes me for a rattling scapegrace,
and I needn't put on the sober and respectable unless I choose to; and
when I do choose it will be a big card in my hand. By George! sir, I
know Calthea so well that I can twist her around my finger, and I am not
sure, if I had got the other one, that I could have done that. It's much
more likely that I should have been the twisted one."
"What is Miss Rose going to do about her business?" asked Lodloe.
"Oh, that's to be wound up with a jerk," answered his companion. "I've
settled all that. She wanted to hire somebody to take charge of the
store while we're gone, and to sell out the things on her old plan; but
that's all tomfoolery. I have engaged a shopkeeper at Romney to come out
and buy the whole stock at retail price, and I gave him the money to do
it with. That's good business, you know, because it's the same as money
coming back to me, and as for the old oddments, and remnants, and
endments of faded braids and rotten calicoes, it's a clear profit to be
rid of them. If the Romney man sends them to be ground up at the
paper-mill, he may pay himself for the cartage and his time. So the shop
will be shut day after to-morrow, and you can see for yourself that my
style of business is going to be of the stern, practical sort; and,
after all, I don't see any better outlook for a fellow than to live a
married life in which very little is expected of him, while he knows
that he has on tap a good bank-account and a first-class moral
character."
The autumn was a very pleasant one, and as there was no reason for doing
anything else, the guests at the Squirrel Inn remained until late in the
season. Therefore it was that Miss Calthea was enabled to marry and
start off on her wedding tour before the engaged couples at the inn had
returned to the city, or had even fixed the dates for their weddings.
Calthea was not a woman who would allow herself to be left behind in
matters of this nature. From her general loftiness and serenity of
manner, and the perfect ease and satisfaction with which she talked of
her plans and prospects with her friends and acquaintances, no one could
have imagined that she had ever departed from her original intention of
becoming Mrs. Lanigan Beam.
In the midst of her happiness she could not help feeling a little sorry
for Ida Mayberry, and this she did not hesitate to say to some persons
with whom she was intimate, including Mrs. Petter. To be sure, she had
been informed as to the year of Mr. Tippengray's birth, which, if
correct, would make him forty-six; but it was her private opinion that
sixty would be a good deal nearer the mark. However, if the young
child's nurse should become an early widow, and be thrown upon her own
resources, she, for one, would not withhold a helping hand. But she
earnestly insisted that not a word she said on this subject should ever
be breathed into another ear.
When Ida Mayberry heard what Calthea had said about her and Mr.
Tippengray's age, she was very angry, and declared she would not go to
the old thing's wedding, which was to take place the next day in the
Lethbury church. But, after thinking over the matter, she changed her
mind, and concluded that at times like this we should all be pleasant
and good-natured towards one another; so she sat down and wrote a letter
to Miss Calthea, which she sent to the expectant bride that very
afternoon. The missive ran thus:
MY DEAR MISS ROSE:
I have seen so little of Mr. Beam in the last few days that
I have had no opportunity to express to him some thanks
which are due him from Mr. Tippengray and myself. I am
therefore obliged to ask you, my dear Miss Rose, to give to
him a message from me, which, as it is one of gratitude, you
will be pleased to deliver.
Not long ago, when Mr. Beam took occasion to tell me that he
loved me and asked me to marry him,--I remember now that it
was on the very day that Mr. Petter's horse behaved so badly
and, unfortunately for you, tipped you out of the tail end
of the little cart, and made it necessary for you to give up
both it and Mr. Tippengray to me,--he (Mr. Beam) was so good
as to say that if I would agree to be his wife and still
wished the instructive companionship of Mr. Tippengray, he
would take that gentleman into his family as a tutor. Now
this, as you will readily acknowledge, my dear Miss Rose,
was very good in Mr. Beam, and in return I wish you to say
to him, both from Mr. Tippengray and from me, that if there
should ever be any position in our gift which he is capable
of filling, all he has to do is to ask for it.
Most sincerely yours,
Ida Mayberry.
And the next day in church no face expressed a more delighted interest
in the nuptial ceremonies than that of the pretty Miss Mayberry.
* * * * *
It was late in November, and the weather was getting decidedly cool.
There was a fire in the tap-room of the Squirrel Inn, and also one in
the little parlor, and by this, after supper, sat Mr. and Mrs. Petter.
The guests were all gone; Mr. and Mrs. Tippengray, who had had a quiet
wedding in New York, were on their way to Cambridge, England, where the
bride would spend a portion of the honeymoon in the higher studies there
open to women, while Mrs. Cristie and Mr. Lodloe were passing happy days
in the metropolis preparing for their marriage early in the new year.
The Beams were in Florida, where, so Lanigan wrote, they had an idea of
buying an orange grove, and where, so Calthea wrote, she would not live
if they gave her a whole county.
The familiar faces all being absent, and very few people dropping in
from Lethbury or the surrounding neighborhood, the Squirrel Inn was
lonely, and the hostess thereof did not hesitate to say so. As for the
host, he had his books, his plans, and his hopes. He also had his
regrets, which were useful in helping him to pass his time.
"What in the world," asked Mrs. Petter, regarding an object in her
husband's hands, "made you take down that miserable, dilapidated little
squirrel from the sign-post? You might as well have let him stay there
all winter, and put up a new one in the spring."
"This has been a most memorable year," replied her husband, "and I wish
to place this squirrel in his proper position on the calendar shelf of
the tap-room before the storms and winds of winter have blown the fur
from his body and every hair from his upturned tail. I have killed and
prepared a fresh squirrel, and I will place him on the sign-post in a
few days."
"If you would let that one stay until he was a skin skeleton, he would
have given people a better idea of the way this year has turned out than
he does now," said Mrs. Petter.
"How so?" he asked, looking at her in surprise.
"Don't we sit here stripped of every friendly voice?" she said. "Of
course, it's always more lonesome in the winter, but it's never been so
bad as this, for we haven't even Calthea to fall back on. Things didn't
turn out as I expected them to, and I suppose they never will, but it
always was my opinion, and is yet, that nothing can go straight in such
a crooked house. This very afternoon, as I was coming from the
poultry-yard, and saw Lanigan's ladder still standing up against the
window of his room, I couldn't help thinking that if a burglar got into
that room, he might suppose he was in the house; but he'd soon find
himself greatly mistaken, and even if he went over the roof to Mr.
Lodloe's room, all he could do would be to come down the tower stairs,
and then he would find himself outside, just where he started from."
"That would suit me very well," remarked Mr. Petter.
"If this house had been built in a plain, straightforward way," his wife
continued, "with a hall through the middle of it, and the rooms alike on
both sides, then things might have happened in a straightforward way,
and not all mixed up, as they were here this summer. Nobody could tell
who was going to marry who, and why they should do it, if they ever
did."