THE DAMAGE DONE
Jeffry Tucker and his daughter Caroline, otherwise known as Dee, were
surely the most tactful human beings in the world. They could almost
always gain any goal by tact. They set out now to make the grouchy
week-enders dry up and cheer up, and in half an hour after the storm was
over they had attained their object. Page overheard Mr. Tucker pacifying
a very disconsolate maiden lady whose hair had come out of curl and
whose rosy cheeks had run off--not far, however--only to her jaws.
"This is a most outrageous way to treat boarders!" she exclaimed. "The
idea of having no proper shelter for them--charging an enormous price,
too! I certainly intend to leave tomorrow and I will stop some friends
of mine who were planning to come up next week. Isn't it strange how
these places are overrated? Anyhow, I'll not give it a good name but
will get out the first thing in the morning."
"Oh, don't do that," begged the wily Zebedee. "I had planned to get you
to take a walk with me tomorrow evening. The moon will be gorgeous and
there are some wonderful spots around here--romantic spots."
"Well, of course I wouldn't think of going if it clears up."
"It has already cleared up! Just look at the moon! I almost think we
might take a walk now, but it might be very muddy. Let's fox trot
instead."
"'Done, for a ducat!'" laughed Page to herself, as Mr. Tucker and the
much mollified week-ender danced off together. "I am afraid poor Zebedee
will have his whole holiday taken up showing the moon to wet hens."
What Mr. Tucker accomplished with the females, Tillie and Dee did
likewise to the males. Tillie exercised all her fascinations on some
hallroom boys, while Dee went in for some old bachelors who loved their
ease and comfort and did not at all relish the idea of wet sheets on
soggy cots.
"Here is some hot coffee!" she said, with a very winning smile. "Two
lumps, or one?"
"None for me, miss," from a terrible old grouch who had been
particularly loud in his praise of Nature before Nature had shown what
she really could do. "I don't expect to sleep a wink as it is. I am
perfectly sure the beds will be damp."
"But I am sure they will not be. Douglas is seeing about it now and she
says they have plenty of dry bed linen. You had better have some coffee
and I will dance with you until you get sleepy."
"Egad, that would be very pleasant! I am going back to the city tomorrow
and I could sleep on the train, perhaps."
"Oh, please don't go tomorrow. I thought you would be here over Sunday
and we might get up a little crowd and go sit on the rocks and read
aloud or something."
"Well, if it clears I may change my mind."
"It has already cleared! Goody! Goody! Now you will have to stay.
Wouldn't the old-fashioned waltz go well with that record Helen has just
put on? Do you know I adore the old-fashioned waltz?"
As the old-fashioned waltz was the only thing that staid bachelor could
dance, never having been able to master the new dances, this put him in
rare good humor. He swallowed his coffee hastily, pronouncing it
excellent, and in a twinkling he and Dee were dancing the dances of the
early eighties and one more week-ender was saved to the Carters to give
the camp a good name.
After a severe storm sometimes it is more of a wonder what the damage
isn't than what it is. It seems at the time that nothing will ever be
dry and straight again, and then in a very short while the world looks
normal once more.
Camp Carter recuperated in a miraculous manner. Only one tent had been
blown away and those that stood the test of wind had also stood the test
of rain. Some of the blankets were damp but most of them, thanks to
Lewis' foresight, had been protected. The drainage on the side of a
mountain is naturally perfect so there were no disconcerting puddles,
and the rocky paths were hardly muddy, so hard and driving had been the
downpour.
Lewis and Bill Tinsley went with Douglas and Nan to take stock of the
damage and to repair what they could. Their relief was great at the
state of affairs until they entered the cabin. The wind and rain had
gone straight through it. The pretty rag rugs were sopping wet and, as I
have said before, all the dainty finery spread out on the bed, was blown
hither and yon. Douglas looked at the havoc in dismay. Would her mother
want to buy more things to replace these that were ruined? She missed
the pretty hat intended for her own fair head and was in a measure
relieved that she would not have to wear it.
"Let's build a fire immediately," and Nan began to pile up paper and
chips in the open fireplace, the cabin boasting the one chimney in camp
where a fire was possible. "Now this will dry out the room before mother
comes in to go to bed."
"Yes, and we had better put a cot in here for Bobby, now that our tent
is blown off," suggested Lewis.
"But where will you and Bill sleep?" asked Douglas.
"Oh, we can curl up on the floor of the pavilion. Our cots are soaking.
I kept the blankets dry, though."
"But I am so afraid you won't be comfortable."
"Oh, that's all right! Get us in training for the border! Bill and I
have been living so soft I fancy a little roughing it will be good for
us."
Lewis sounded rather bitter and Douglas felt that she would give worlds
if she could tell him that she had decided she did care for him as he
wanted her to. Other girls pretended, why not she? But there was an
uprightness about Douglas Carter that would not let her be a party to
any form of deceit. She was sorry, very sorry, but she could not be
like Tillie Wingo and engage herself to anyone on a moment's notice.
"We are going to miss both of you ever and ever so much. Think what it
would be in a time like this without you to help! I can hardly
contemplate running the camp without you."
"Oh, that will be easy enough! Skeeter and Frank can do what we have
done. You won't miss us at all."
"I didn't mean just the work you do," faltered poor Douglas.
"Oh, well, the rest won't amount to much," declared Lewis, determined to
be difficult.
Bill listened to his chum in amazement. He was in such a seventh heaven
of bliss himself that he could not understand anyone's being anything
but happy. For his part he could not see why Lewis didn't settle matters
with his cousin before going to the border. It never entered his head
that anyone could refuse a Greek god of a fellow like Lewis Somerville.
If a belle like Tillie Wingo could put up with him, why, there was not
a girl living who would not jump at his friend.
Nan sniffed a romance in the air where she had not expected to find it.
She, like all her family, was so accustomed to the friendship between
her elder sister and Lewis that she had not thought of a more serious
relationship being the outcome. Lewis was certainly sounding cold and
formal and Douglas was looking distressed.
"I see how it is," she said to herself; "Lewis has proposed to Douglas
and Douglas has turned him down. He told her he was going to enlist and
proposed all in one breath and poor old Doug couldn't adjust herself
fast enough. She no doubt does love him but doesn't know it. Just wait
until he gets out of sight!"
The week-enders were finally all put to bed in dry sheets and warmed
blankets, after having drunk hot coffee and eaten a rarebit that was so
tender even the grouchiest of the grouchy could not get up indigestion
over it. The leaven of good-humor spread by the Tuckers and Page Allison
had begun to work and all were rising to the occasion and quite proud
of themselves over taking everything so philosophically.
The maiden lady who had threatened to leave on the morning train but had
been persuaded by Zebedee to stay over to take a moonlight walk with him
was now loud in her praise of camp life.
"I say the only way to get along is to take things as they come. I was
just telling Mr. Tucker that one can't expect the comforts of the
Jefferson Hotel up in camp, but then if one wants the comforts of the
Jefferson one had better go there and not come to the country. Now I
would give up any comforts for the beauties of nature!" and so on, and
so on!
Dee danced the old-fashioned waltz until she almost forgot how to do a
single modern step. The grouchy bachelor forgot to worry about the
possibility of damp sheets and babbled along about the dances of the
eighties, and promised to teach his young partner the racket and the
heel and toe polka if any of the records would fit those defunct
dances.
The sprightliness of that particular bachelor was catching, and the two
others, who had begun to inquire about time tables with a view to
beating a hasty retreat to the safety-firstness of the city, found
themselves cheering up, too; and warmed by the good hot coffee, they
began to dance with youthful ardor and actually grumbled when the crowd
broke up for needed repose.
"Aren't the Tuckers splendid?" said Douglas, when she and her sisters
were undressing.
"Indeed they are," agreed Helen, "and I like that little Allison girl a
lot, too. She waltzed in and helped with the eats as though she were one
of us."
"I think Mr. Tucker is kind of gone on her," drawled Nan.
"Nonsense! You are always thinking somebody is gone on somebody,"
laughed Helen.
"Well, somebody always is. He treats her just like he does the twins,
only different."
"How's that, like triplets?"
But Nan had gone to sleep before she could formulate her ideas about how
Mr. Tucker treated Page. She only devoutly hoped he would devise some
method by which he could persuade her mother to give up the idea of
going to White Sulphur and let Douglas alone about making her debut the
following winter.