A WALK AND ITS ENDING
It was with great surprise that the dwellers in the houses along the way
saw the contestants in a case of law returning from the trial in the
most harmonious manner.
First came the Montaigne equipage, with Mrs. Montaigne and Helena upon
the back seat, the latter sitting stiffly erect and haughty, the former
chatting most pleasantly with the cripple facing her. Behind the
carriage walked Mrs. Calvert and Mrs. Chester, both in the gayest of
spirits and talking volubly of household matters; as mother Martha
afterward described it:
"Might have been plain Mrs. Bruce, or Jane Jones herself, Mrs. Cecil
might, she was that simple and plain spoke. She's going to have her
currant jell' made right away, even whilst the currants are half green.
Says she's read it was better so, and though she's afraid her old
cook'll 'act up' about it she's bound to try. She said that when a body
gets too old to learn--even about cookin'--it's time to give up living.
Land! She's not one that will give it up till she has to! I never saw
anybody as full of plans as that old lady is. You'd think she was just
starting out in life instead of being so nigh the end of it, and I guess
she thought I was s'prised to hear her tell. Because she caught me
looking at her once, right sharp, and she laughed and said: 'I'm one of
the people who can't settle down, I'm so many years young!' Why, she
might have been Dolly, even, she was so full of fun over the way that
lawsuit ended. I know 'twas that that pleased her so, though she never
mentioned it from the time we left the shop till we got back to Skyrie.
Well, green currants _may_ make the jell' solider, but I shall wait till
just before the Fourth, as I always have, to make mine: and I'm thankful
for the few old currant bushes that still grow along that east wall.
Almost any other kind of shrub'd have died long ago, neglected as things
have been, but you can't kill a currant bush. More'n that, when I get my
jell' done I'm going to send Mrs. Calvert a tumbler and compare notes.
I reckon mine'll come out head, for I never was one to take up with
everything one reads in the papers, nor cook books, either."
Which shows that, despite her previous objections to it, that morning's
excursion to the haunts of justice proved a very enjoyable one to the
rather lonely little woman from the city, who found the enforced quiet
of the country one of her greatest privations.
Following their elders came also Dorothy C. and Herbert, who had slipped
from his saddle to walk beside his new acquaintance, and she was already
chatting with him as if they had always known each other. To both the
world of "outdoors" meant everything. To him because of the gunning,
fishing, riding, and rowing; to her because of its never-ending marvels,
of scenery, of growing things, and of the songs of birds.
"I tell you what--Steady, Bucephalus!" cried Herbert to the restless
animal he led and whose prancing made Dorothy jump aside, now and then,
lest she should be trampled upon. "I tell you what! The very next time I
go out fishing in the _Merry Chanter_, my catboat, I'll coax sister to
go, too, and you must come with us. If she will! But Helena's such a
'fraid-cat and Miss Milliken--she's my sister's governess--is about as
bad. There's some excuse for Helena because she is real delicate. Nerves
or chest or something, I don't know just what nor does anybody else, I
fancy. But the Milliken! Wait till you see her, then talk about nerves.
Say, Miss Dorothy----"
"I'm just plain Dorothy, yet."
"Good enough. I like that. I knew you were the right stuff the minute I
looked at you. I--you're not a goody-good girl nor a 'fraid-cat, now are
you?" demanded Herbert, anxiously.
"No, indeed! I'm not a bit good. I wish I were! And I'm not often afraid
of--_things_. But I am of folks--some folks," she answered with a little
shudder.
"Yes, I know about that. Just like a story out of a book, your being
stolen was. But never mind. That's gone by. Do you like to fish?"
"I never fished," said Dorothy, with some decision.
"You'll learn. The old Hudson's the jolliest going for all sorts of
fish. There's an old fellow at the Landing generally goes out with me
and the rest the boys. He's a champion oarsman, old as he is, and as
for--Say! Ever taste a planked shad?"
"No, never."
"You shall! Old Joe Wampers shall fix us one the first time we go out on
the river. He can cook as well as he can fish, and some of us fellows
had a camp set up on the old Point, last year. I haven't been over there
yet, this summer, but it's all mine anyhow. When it came fall and the
others had to go back to school they--well, they were short on cash and
long on camp, so I bought them out. You like flowers? Ever gather any
water lilies?"
"Like them? I just love them, _love them_! Of course, I never gathered
water lilies, for I've always lived in the city. But I've often--I mean,
sometimes--bought them out of pails, down by Lexington Market. Five or
ten cents a bunch, according to the size. I always tried to save up and
get a big bunch for mother Martha on her birthday. I used to envy the
boys that had them for sale and wish I could go and pick them for
myself. But--but I've seen pictures of them as they really grow,"
concluded Dorothy C., anxious that Herbert should not consider her too
ignorant.
However, it was not the fact that she had never gathered lilies which
had caught his attention; it was that one little sentence: "to save up."
He really could scarcely imagine a state of things in which anybody
would have to "save" the insignificant amount of five or ten cents, in
order to buy a parent a bunch of flowers. Instantly, he was filled with
keen compassion for this down-trodden little maid who was denied the use
of abundant pocket money, and with as great an indignation against the
parents who would so mistreat a child--such a pretty child as Dorothy C.
Of course, it was because the niggardly creatures were only parents by
adoption; and--at that moment there entered the brain of this young
gentleman a scheme by which many matters should be righted. The
suddenness and beauty of the idea almost took his breath away, but he
kept his thought to himself and returned to the practical suggestion of
planked shad.
"Well, sir,--I mean, Dorothy,--a planked shad is about the most
delicious morsel a fellow ever put in his mouth. First, catch your shad.
Old Joe does that in a twinkling. Then while it's still flopping, he
scales and cleans it, splits it open, nails it on a board, seasons it
well with salt and pepper, and stands it up before a rousing fire we've
built on the ground. U'm'm--Yum! In about half or three-quarters of an
hour it's done. Then with the potatoes we've roasted in the ashes and
plenty of bread and butter and a pot of coffee--Well, words fail. You'll
have to taste that feast to know what it means. All the better, too, if
you've been rowing for practice all morning. Old Joe Wampers coaches
college crews even yet, and once he went over with Columbia to Henley.
That's the time he tells about whenever he gets a chance. 'The time of
his life' he calls it, and that's not slang, either. Say. What's to
hinder our doing it right now? This very afternoon--morning, for that
matter, though it's getting rather late to go before lunch, I suppose.
I'll tell you! Just you mention to your folks that you're going on the
river, this afternoon, and I'll coax mother to make Helena and the
Milliken go, too. Then I'll ride right away down to the Landing and get
old Joe warmed up to the subject. He's getting a little stiff in the
joints of his good nature, but a good dose of flattery'll limber him up
considerable. Besides, when he hears it's for that real heroine of a
kidnapping story everybody was talking about, he'll be willing enough.
I'll tell him you never tasted planked shad nor saw one cooked, and
he'll just spread himself. 'Poor as a June shad,' he said yesterday,
when I begged for one, though that's all nonsense. They're good yet.
Will you?"
He paused for breath, his words having fairly tumbled over each other in
their rapidity, and was utterly amazed to hear Dorothy reply:
"No, thank you, I will not. Nothing would tempt me."
"Why, Dorothy Chester! What do you mean?" he asked, incredulous that
anybody, least of all an inexperienced girl, should resist the tempting
prospect that he had spread before her.
"I wouldn't _touch_ to taste one of those horrible 'flopping' fish! I
couldn't. I wouldn't--not for anything. I should feel like a murderer.
So there!"
"Whew! George and the cherry tree! You wouldn't? 'Not for anything?' Not
even for a chance to sail along over a lovely piece of water, dabbling
your hand in it, and pulling out great, sweet-smelling flowers? 'Course,
_you_ needn't see the shad 'flop.' I only said that to show how fresh we
get them. Why, I coaxed even dad over to camp once and I've always
wanted Helena to go. Pshaw! I _am_ disappointed."
"I don't see why nor how you can be much. You didn't know me till an
hour ago--or less, even. And I'm disappointed too. You didn't look like
a boy who would"--Dorothy paused and gave her new acquaintance a
critical glance--"who would _kill_ things!"
"Nor you like a silly, sentimental girl. 'Kill things!' Don't you ever
eat fish? Or beef? or dear little gentle chickens?" demanded this
teasing lad, as he quieted his horse and prepared to mount, though at
the same time managing to keep that animal so directly in Dorothy's path
that she had to stand still for a moment till he should move aside.
She frowned, then laughed, acknowledging:
"Of course I do. I mean I have; but--seems to me now as if I never would
again."
"Well, I'm sorry; and--Good-morning, Miss Chester!"
Away he went, lifting his hat in the direction of the people ahead,
looking an extremely handsome young fellow in his riding clothes, and
sitting the fiery Bucephalus with such ease that lad and steed seemed
but part and parcel of each other. Yet his whole manner was now one of
disapproval, and the acquaintance which had begun so pleasantly seemed
destined to prove quite the contrary.
"He's a horrid, cruel boy! Kills birds and things just for fun! He isn't
half as nice as Jim Barlow, for all he's so much better looking and
richer. Poor Jim! He felt so ashamed to have made everybody so much
trouble. I wish--I wish he'd come with us instead of that Herbert:"
thought the little maid so unceremoniously deserted by her new friend.
"She's just a plain, silly, 'fraid-cat of a girl, after all!" were the
reflections of the young horseman, as he galloped away, and with these
he dismissed her from his mind.
Now it happened that Mrs. Calvert liked young folks much better than she
did old ones, and the conversation which she had rendered so delightful
to Mrs. Chester, during that homeward walk, was far less interesting to
herself than the fragments of talk which reached her from the girl and
boy behind her. So when the hoofs of Bucephalus clattered away in an
opposite direction, she turned to Dorothy and mischievously inquired:
"What's the matter, little girl? Isn't he the sort of boy you like? You
don't look pleased."
Dorothy's frown vanished as she ran forward to take the hand held toward
her and she answered readily enough, as she put herself "in step" with
her elders:
"I would like him--lots, if he didn't--if he wasn't such a _killer_. I
like his knowing so much about birds and animals--he says he can whistle
a squirrel out of a tree, any time, and that's more than even Jim can
do. At least I never heard him say he could. And Jim Barlow will not
kill anything. He simply will not. Even old Mrs. Stott had to kill her
own poultry for the market though she'd strap him well for refusing. All
the reason he'd tell her was that he could not make anything live, so he
didn't think he'd any right to make it die. Mrs. Calvert, have--have you
forgiven poor Jim for letting the dogs get away? and me too? Because I
know he feels terrible. I do, and it makes me sort of ashamed to have
you so kind to me when it was part my carelessness----"
"There, there, child! Have done with that affair. It was more amusing
than annoying, for a time, and after I found my Danes were safe; but I
hate old stories repeated, and that story is finished--for the present.
There'll be more to come, naturally. One can't make a single new
acquaintance without many unexpected things following. For instance:
John Chester riding so familiarly in Archibald Montaigne's carriage and
talking--Well, talking almost as his little daughter has been doing with
her new friend. I overheard Mrs. Montaigne mention something about
having once been a patient at a hospital in our city and that was the
'open sesame' to 'Johnnie's' confidence. Oh! it's a dear old world,
isn't it? Where enemies can change into friends, all in one morning: and
where people whom we didn't know at breakfast time have become our
intimates by the dinner hour. This is a glorious day! See. We are almost
at the turn of the road that leads to Skyrie. Slowly as we have come it
hasn't taken us long. I'm glad I walked. It has done me good and--given
my neighbors yonder a chance to know one another."
"I'm glad, too. I haven't enjoyed myself so much since we moved here,
only, of course, when Dolly got home," responded Mrs. Chester. "Yet what
an angry, disgusted woman I was when I went over this road before,
lawsuit-wards, so to speak."
They were almost at the corner when Dorothy cast a last glance backward
and exclaimed:
"I don't see Jim anywhere. Why do you suppose he didn't come? Where do
you suppose he is?"
"Well, little girl, my supposing is that he felt himself not one with
any of our party. 'Neither hay nor grass' he would likely express it.
That's for his not coming. As for where he is now I suppose, to a degree
that is certainty, that he is--doing his duty! From my brief
acquaintance with the lad I judge that to be his principal idea. His
duty, this morning, would have been the transplanting of the celery
seedlings, which yesterday's events delayed. If we could look through
the trees between us and my vegetable garden I believe we should see him
bending over the rows of little green plants, oblivious to all that's
going on around him, so intent is he on making up for lost time and not
cheating his employer by wasting it. Jim Barlow is all right. I was
angry enough with him yesterday, for a while, but I can do him justice,
to-day."
Her guess at his whereabouts was correct. The lad had hurried away from
Seth Winters's office and was already well along with his work while
they were thus discussing him. But both his new mistress and Dorothy
promptly forgot him when they came to that turn of the road they had
been approaching and the view beyond lay open to them.
For an instant everybody stopped, even the coachman checked his horses
in amazement, though he as swiftly resumed his ordinary impassive
expression and drove forward again at the risk of disaster.
"What in the world! It looks like a--a funeral! Or the county fair!
Whatever does that mean?" cried Mrs. Cecil, who was the first to voice
her astonishment. Yet she wondered if she heard aright when, clasping
her hands in dismay, Mrs. Chester almost shouted to her husband in
front--riding backwards and thus unable to see at what they all so
earnestly gazed:
"John, John! That dreadful advertisement!"