manner.
Now Adele’s father had said only that very morning that Miss Grackle had
plenty of money, so Adele decided that she had just been too ill to
order things.
“I’ll be back in a minute,” the girl said aloud, and away she went,
leaving the wondering Gertrude to care for the invalid.
A woman who often came to the Doring home to help Kate with the cleaning
lived in the house nearest, on the main road, and from her Adele
procured some lamb broth and bread. Miss Grackle, truly faint from
hunger, could not resist the fragrance of the broth which Adele was
heating, and she rather ungraciously permitted Gertrude to prop her up
with the pillows, while Adele brought to her a bowl of the steaming
broth and some fresh bread and butter.
When this was eaten Miss Grackle seemed stronger. She looked at the
girls curiously.
“Young ladies,” she said, “perhaps you do not know it, but you are the
first two human beings who have succeeded in crossing my threshold in
ten years. Now, pray tell me, what did you come for? You must have a
reason.”
“We came to invite you to a surprise birthday-party which we are going
to give for Granny Dorset,” Adele said simply.
The girls, watching the old lady, were surprised to see a twinkle appear
in the gray eyes.
“Well,” she declared, “I had decided to die, but now I do believe that I
will live a while longer; and, thank you kindly, I’ll come to the
party.”
Before they left, Miss Grackle gave the girls some money and asked them
to order some groceries for her at the store.
“And be sure to tell that boy to leave the things just inside the gate
the way he always does.”
The next morning, under the elm-tree, the five other girls listened with
ever-widening eyes, as Adele and Gertrude told of their visit to Miss
Grackle.
“Well, you surely are the two bravest girls I ever met,” Rosamond Wright
declared, and the others fully agreed with her.
“The visit we are going to make this afternoon,” Gertrude replied, “will
be harder still. I almost dread calling on those two old people, who are
so unhappy because they have to live in the poorhouse.”
But a pleasant surprise awaited the girls.
CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE
A VISIT TO THE POORHOUSE
That afternoon Adele and Gertrude drove to the poorhouse, which was two
miles out on the east road. Leaving Firefly hitched at the gate, they
walked up the gravel path, on either side of which was a narrow garden,
bright with autumn flowers. Tall maples stood about on the lawn, and
their leaves were red and yellow. The afternoon sun was warm, and many
old ladies, wrapped in shawls, were seated here and there on rustic
benches.
“Everything seems cheerful,” Adele said. “I wonder where we shall find
Mrs. Quigley.”
They made inquiry of a woman who was coming down the walk.
“I’m Mrs. Quigley!” was the cheerful reply, and the old lady led them to
a bench near by. “I don’t know you, do I?” she asked kindly.
The girls were indeed relieved, for they had both feared that they were
to meet a grief-stricken old lady. They were not old enough to know that
many a bright face hides an aching heart, and the wrinkled face smiling
up at them surely tried to be bright.
When Adele told their errand, Mrs. Quigley exclaimed, “Well, now, won’t
Pa Quigley be pleased! It’s a long time since we were asked to a party.”
Then, turning to Adele, she took her hands and said: “And so you’re
Daniel Doring’s granddaughter. Daniel was mighty good to my man and me,
and he’d be sorry if he knew that we had lost our little home. But
there—” she smiled quickly through her tears. “I tell Pa Quigley, when
he’s wishing we had our little home once more, where we could sit by the
fireplace evenings, like we used to love to do,—I tell him that we must
count our blessin’s. Things might be worse. One of us _might_ be dead,
and then how lonely the other of us would be!”
“That’s true,” Adele said as she arose, and then, stooping, she
impulsively kissed the wrinkled cheeks as she added, “Mrs. Quigley, you
belong to our Sunnyside Club, don’t you?”
“Maybe so,” said the little old lady, rising. “Once I read somewhere,
‘Every cloud has a silver lining; let’s wear our clouds with the linings
on the outside.’ I try to do that. It makes it pleasanter for other
folks, and I don’t know but it’s cheerier even for the person who is
wearing the cloud.”
“I’m going to remember that,” Gertrude said as she pressed the wrinkled
hand which she held. Then Adele exclaimed, “Now, Mrs. Quigley, a week
from Saturday we’ll call for you at two, so you be ready and watching.”
When the girls were driving down the country road, Adele exclaimed
earnestly, “Gertrude, those Quigleys are going to have a home together
if it lies within my power to get it.”
“Isn’t it queer, Adele,” the other remarked reflectively, “how different
people are. There are some women who have everything that money can buy,
and yet they are discontented and fretful. If they could have heard dear
old Mrs. Quigley just now, it might have done them more good than a
whole book full of sermons.”
They were driving along a pleasant street in the village, and Adele soon
drew rein in front of a neat white cottage with green blinds. “There is
Grandfather Dally under the apple-tree,” she remarked as she hitched
Firefly to a post.
“Well! Well!” the old man exclaimed, as he peered over his spectacles at
the two girls. “If it ain’t Tudy and Dellie! ’Taint often I have a call
from two nice little girls, but there, more’n likely you’ve come to call
on my daughter, but she’s out somewheres, a-wheelin’ the baby.”
The girls assured him that they had called on purpose to see him, as
they wished to invite him to a party. The old man was as pleased as a
boy when he heard this. Then he added with a chuckle, “I’ve heerd that
you little girls have turned the cabin out in the meadows into a sort of
a play-house. Ain’t you skeered that the miser’ll come back some time
and ketch you there?”
“Miser!” Adele and Gertrude exclaimed in one breath. “What miser,
Grandpa Dally? We never heard of one!”
“Hum, now, you don’t say! I thought like as not everybody had heerd tell
of him. It was after the sheep-raisin’ business had been given up in
these parts, and there wa’n’t no one a-livin’ in the cabin at that time.
Your grandpa, Della, had locked it up and kept the key. Well, one day a
long, lank man from nobody knew where appeared in these parts, and asked
ole Daniel Doring if he might rent that cabin for a spell. Your grandad
was for givin’ the under fellow a chance, and this stranger said he was
here to recuperate his health or some such, and so he got the key and
was told he could live there as long as he chose and welcome.
“The man stayed pretty close to the cabin, and the folks in town was
puzzled about him, and so one night two of the boys went out there and
they clum up the side of the cabin somehow, and peeked in at that little
high window, and Josh Perkins said afterwards that he almost fell down
agin, when he saw what was a-goin’ on inside of that cabin. There sat
the long, lank man at the table, and in the candlelight he was
a-countin’ out gold pieces. Josh said he had a bag full of them. People
were suspicious, of course, when they heerd that, and the very next day
the sheriff went out to the cabin, and what do you think? The place was
empty. Like as not the miser had heerd the boys prowlin’ about in the
night, and he left for parts unknown and took his gold with him, I
suppose, though nobody knows as to that, for your grandad, Della, locked
the cabin right up then and kept the key.”
Half an hour later the girls were again driving down the road. “What a
strange, uncanny story that was about the miser!” Gertrude said with a
shudder.
“Rosamond has always said that the furniture in the cabin would probably
tell queer stories if it could talk,” Adele remarked. And then she added
suddenly, “Oh, Gertrude! Don’t you wish that we could find that gold,
and then we could take care of the Quigleys!”
Gertrude laughed. “If he was a miser, he certainly took his gold with
him.” Then she asked, “Della, did you ever hear what Miss Grackle’s
great sorrow was, the one that made her turn against every one and live
all alone by herself in that dismal house by the woods?”
“Yes,” Adele replied. “Father was telling mother about it last night. He
said that when he was a boy, Miss Grackle and a younger sister lived in
that big, rambling house on the Dickerson Road, the one that has been
boarded up for so many years. The sister’s name was Miranda, and she was
about ten years younger than Sally, and very pretty, but father said she
was nowhere near as capable. They lived together very happily after
their father died. Sally did all of the housework and waited on Miranda
hand and foot, as the saying goes, and the younger one, who was rather
selfish, accepted it as her due. They owned the house and land together,
but they each had plenty of money besides. Then one day a stranger
appeared in town, and, having heard that the pretty Miranda Grackle had
a fortune in her own right, he began to court her. Miss Sally quickly
saw that he was a mere adventurer, trying to marry some one with money,
and she begged Miranda to give him up, but she wouldn’t, and then one
night they ran away and were secretly married. Miss Sally was
heartbroken. She heard that they had gone to Arizona, where the man had
mines. She followed them there, but never found them. She came back a
broken-hearted woman, boarded up the old homestead where she had been so
happy, and then went to live all alone in that house out by the woods.”
“Poor Miss Grackle!” Gertrude said. “Here we are by the Dickerson Road,
Adele. Would it be much out of our way to drive past the boarded-up
house? I never happened to notice it.”
“No,” Adele replied, as she turned the pony’s head in that direction.
“The house is just beyond that clump of trees.”
When the little grove was passed, the girls gave an exclamation of
surprise. “Why, it isn’t boarded up at all,” Gertrude said. “See, even
the windows are open.”
“And if there isn’t Miss Grackle herself,” Adele cried, as a tall,
elderly woman appeared in the doorway to shake a dustcloth. She had on a
big apron, with a towel about her head.
Adele drew rein and fairly flew up the walk, Gertrude following her.
“Oh, Miss Grackle!” Adele cried. “I’m so glad to see that you are well
again. And have you really and truly moved over here?”
Somehow Miss Grackle did not seem to be old, like Granny Dorset, and,
for that matter, she was several years the younger.
Upon hearing her name called, the woman turned and welcomed the girls
gladly. “Yes,” she said, and there was almost a quiver in her voice.
“For years it has seemed as though I just couldn’t come back here
without sister Miranda, and when she never even wrote to me, I turned
bitter against everybody, but when you little girls came the other day
and showed me that there was love and kindness in the world, I decided
to live a while longer and see if I couldn’t do a bit of good. I’m going
to try to really live now. I’ve been buried long enough.”
“Oh, Miss Grackle,” Adele cried, “I’m so glad! So glad! And what a nice
place this is! You had beautiful grounds once, didn’t you?”
The lady nodded. “Father was proud of his lawns and gardens,” she said.
“You see that little cottage on the edge of the grove. Father’s gardener
lived there, and his wife helped mother in the kitchen, for there were
three children of us then,—I had a brother who died,—and there was work
enough to do.”
“It’s a pretty little cottage,” Adele said. “Has it been empty all these
years?”
“Yes,” Miss Grackle replied. “I would like to have a couple living in it
now, if the man would attend to my grounds in exchange for the rent.”
With a cry of joy Adele threw her arms about the astonished woman as she
exclaimed, “Would you really, truly, Miss Grackle? Oh, Gertrude,
wouldn’t it be just the nicest place for the Quigleys?”
“Why, what has happened to the Quigleys?” Miss Grackle asked in
surprise. “I thought that they had a small farm of their own. Did they
lose it? You see, I haven’t heard a bit of news in years.”
Then Adele told the whole story, and Miss Grackle indignantly exclaimed:
“That shows the ingratitude of people! There never was a sick child in
the country round but that Mrs. Quigley was there to help the tired
mother care for it, and never a tramp passed her door but that she made
him a cup of tea and gave him a bite to eat, and talked to him all the
time in that bright, cheerful way of hers; and some of them, I know,
took to honest work after that, and they said that it was just because
of her. And the town let the Quigleys go to the poorhouse! Well, they’ll
not stay there! At least they can live in the cottage, and perhaps in
the spring Mr. Quigley could work the garden on shares.” Then she added
simply, “My income is not as large as it was, Adele, and my sister
Miranda may come home at any time and be in need, so I must be saving
for her sake. But there,” she added more brightly, “the Quigleys shall
move into the cottage at once, and a way to provide for them will surely
open up.”
Soon after that two happy girls drove away. “Isn’t it just like magic,
the way things are happening!” Adele exclaimed, and Gertrude agreed. The
girls were to have a strange adventure the next day, as you shall hear.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX
A MYSTERY SOLVED
After school on Friday the Sunny Seven danced over the Buttercup Meadows
on their way to the cabin.
“We ought to call it Golden-rod Meadows now,” Betty Burd declared.
“I love the purple asters tangled in with the gold!” Gertrude Willis
exclaimed. “Dame Nature is a wonderful artist.”
“And the maple wood is so bright and red,” Doris Drexel said. “We might
have Granny Dorset’s party here. Surely, no ball-room could be more
splendid.”
As they were talking they approached the cabin, and Peggy Pierce,
finding the key, opened the door.
“Girls!” Rosamond exclaimed, as she peered in. “I almost wish that
Grandpa Dally had not told us about that miser. It makes me feel
shuddery to think of him. Long and lank, he sat right there at our table
as he counted out his gold pieces by the light of a candle.”
“Well, he isn’t here now,” said practical Bertha, as she entered the
cabin and threw open the window.
“Of course he isn’t,” Adele exclaimed. “There’s no one in our Secret
Sanctum but just ourselves.”
The girls, finding it hard to overcome an uncanny feeling, nevertheless
entered the cabin and began to make definite plans for the party which
they were going to give for Granny Dorset, when suddenly there was a
strange clinking noise in the wall.
Rosamond sprang to her feet, her eyes wide and startled. “What was
that?” she asked. The other girls stood up and listened. They distinctly
heard a scurrying and then another clinking sound.
“It must be a chipmunk or a ground-squirrel,” Adele said, trying to
speak calmly.
“I would think so myself,” Bertha replied, “but for the other noise,—the
clinking. How could a squirrel make that?”
The girls examined the wall, and Gertrude exclaimed, “Why, this seems to
be a boarded-up fireplace.”
“Yes, and here is a loose board,” Bertha said, “so now the mystery will
be explained.”
The bark-covered boards were easily pried away and a stone-lined
fireplace was disclosed. There were wood-ashes on the floor of it, but
no squirrel, and nothing that would clink.
“Look!” Gertrude said. “Here is a hole through which a squirrel might
have gone.”
Adele peered up the blackened chimney. There was a rude stone ledge just
above her head, and suddenly, with a frightened chirr, a chipmunk jumped
from the ledge to the floor and darted into the meadow through the hole
which Gertrude had seen.
The creature’s quick movement had dislodged something on the shelf and
it fell clinking against a stone.
With a cry of amazement Adele stooped and picked up a gold piece.
“Quick, bring a stool, somebody!” she called. “I’ll climb up and see
what is on that ledge.”
[Illustration: “The miser’s gold!”]
“The miser’s gold!” she declared, as she handed Bertha a bag. The
chipmunk, hoping to find nuts, had gnawed a hole in it. The girls
gathered around were scarcely able to believe their eyes. “Here’s a
piece of brown paper,” Adele said, “and there’s writing on it!”
The writing in places was very hard to read, but at last they made it
out, and Adele read aloud:
“To whoever finds this money, I wish to say that it wasn’t come by
honest. It hasn’t brought me any happiness and I don’t want it. I’d give
it back to the folks who own it, if I knew who they was, but I don’t.
I’m going back to the town where I was a boy and I’m going to live
straight.”
“I’m so disappointed,” Adele announced. “I thought of the Quigleys at
once, and how it would help them, but they would not want stolen money.”
“I’ll tell you what,” said Gertrude Willis. “Let’s take it to father
with the note and ask his advice. Perhaps it would help to right the
wrong if the money were used for some good purpose.”
Half an hour later the girls arrived at the neat parsonage. They found
the minister working in his garden, and he listened gravely to the story
of the miser and his bag of gold.
As Gertrude had anticipated, her father said, “Since the money cannot be
returned to its rightful owners, it surely ought to be used in doing
good. If I were you, I would deposit it in the bank and draw upon it as
a need arises.”
Thanking Mr. Willis for his advice, seven happy girls went to the bank
of which Doris Drexel’s father was president.
Luckily Mr. Drexel was still there, and he had the bag emptied and the
money counted. “One thousand dollars,” he reported with a smile, “and I
believe, little lassies, that Mr. Willis has made a wise suggestion.”
When the girls left the place a while later, Bertha carried a little
book which stated that she was the treasurer of the Sunnyside Club,
which had funds to the amount of one thousand dollars in the First
National Bank in the town of Sunnyside.
Next, the seven girls visited Miss Grackle, to tell her the story. “We
wish this money to be used by the Quigleys,” Adele said, “but since we
do not want them to feel that they are receiving charity, we wish that
you, Miss Grackle, would give them a certain amount of it each month for
taking care of your garden and grounds.”
“That will be a splendid plan,” Miss Grackle said brightly. “And now,
before you go, would you girls like to see the cottage in which the
Quigleys are to live? I have aired it out and made it fresh and tidy.”
“We’d love to see it!” Adele exclaimed, and so Miss Grackle led the way
to the little cottage beside the maple grove.
The three rooms were sunny and bright, and the big, old-fashioned stove
in the kitchen had been freshly blackened. The wood-box was filled, for,
as Miss Grackle explained, she wanted it to look home-like as soon as
they saw it. In the living-room there were two easy-chairs with bright
patch-work cushions, and in the bedroom beyond all was spotlessly clean
and inviting.
“I can hardly wait until to-morrow,” Betty Burd exclaimed.
“Nor I,” Gertrude Willis declared. “The party was planned to be a
surprise for Granny Dorset, but think of the joyous surprise which is in
store for those poor Quigleys. They will expect to return to the
poorhouse after the party, and when they find that they are to have a
home, oh, Adele, won’t they be the happiest old people in all the
world!”
“Girls!” Adele cried suddenly. “We did plan on having the party out in
our meadow cabin, but wouldn’t it be much nicer to have it right here?
That is, of course, if you are willing, Miss Grackle.”
“That is really a first-rate idea!” Miss Grackle declared. “And then,
instead of having a cold chicken supper, we can have a warm one.”
Adele’s mother, when she heard of the change, agreed that it was a
splendid plan. Kate offered to cook the chickens and things in her own
kitchen, and then, at the last moment, they were to be taken to the
cottage and kept warm until served.
When Saturday morning dawned, Adele, at an early hour, drove over to the
orphanage and readily obtained permission for Eva and Amanda to spend
the day with her. On their way back they gathered armfuls of bright red
leaves from the sumac bushes, and graceful stalks of golden-rod and
purple aster. These they took to the cottage where the Quigleys were to
live, and Adele filled bowls and pitchers and set them about everywhere.
Soon thereafter the other six girls arrived, and then what a hustling
and bustling there was! The living-room table was covered with a
snowy-white cloth, and on it was laid Miss Grackle’s choice
old-fashioned blue-and-white china and the newly polished silver, and in
the very center was a blue bowl of golden-glow.
“Now,” Adele said as she stood back and surveyed the scene, “everything
is ready for the surprise-party and we may rest a while from our labors.
At two o’clock Bob Angel and Gertrude Willis are to go to the poorhouse
to get the Quigleys, and at two-thirty Brother Jack and Eva may go after
Granny Dorset. I think it would be nice to have all of the guests here
before she arrives.”
“Here comes an automobile up the drive now!” Betty Burd exclaimed. “Who
do you suppose is in it?”
“Oh, it’s brother Bob in our car,” Bertha declared.
The girls skipped out to the driveway, and Bob, leaping to the ground,
made a deep bow as he said, “Ladies, this is a free bus which will
gladly convey you to your several homes, if you care to entrust your
lives to my keeping.”
“Oh, good enough!” Peggy Pierce exclaimed. “I was just wishing that I
was home to help mother get the dinner, and now I will be there in a
twinkling.”
“We have our fiery steed,” Adele said, “so Eva and Amanda and I will
travel in my little red cart, but thank you, just the same.”
Then, waving good-bye to smiling Miss Grackle, the girls and Bob started
down the Dickerson Road on their homeward way.
Meanwhile, in the poorhouse, Mrs. Quigley was hunting in her shabby
hair-trunk for a bit of old-time finery. Little, indeed, did she dream
of the great joy which was so soon to be hers.
CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN
A REALLY, TRULY HOME
Promptly at two o’clock Bob Angel and Gertrude Willis arrived at the
poorhouse, and on a bench near the gate sat the old couple. How their
faces shone when they saw the automobile which was to bear them to the
party!
The old lady in bonnet and shawl, and the old man in a well-brushed,
though threadbare, coat, and hat, frayed at the edges, arose as Gertrude
went forward to greet them. She said afterwards that it was hard for her
to keep from throwing her arms about the dear old lady and telling her
then and there of the great happiness that was in store for them, but,
instead, she kissed the bright, wrinkled face and shook hands with Mr.
Quigley, whom she had never met before. Bob had leaped to the ground,
and after Gertrude had introduced him to their guests, he carefully
helped the old lady to the comfortable back seat and the old man to the
front.
Mr. Quigley’s eyes were shining like a boy’s as Bob drove rather slowly
down the country road. “Land sakes alive, ma!” he called. “Ain’t this
great! Make her go faster, boy. We ain’t a mite afeared.” So Bob put on
a bit more speed, and soon they reached the Grackle homestead.
“Well, I swan!” the old man cried when he shook hands with Miss Grackle.
“Wonders never will cease, I reckon. If here ain’t Sally Grackle
herself, lookin’ younger’n she did when I saw her last.”
Miss Grackle beamed happily as she greeted the Quigleys and led them
into the cottage. A moment later Grandpa Dally, as he insisted that
every one should call him, arrived in a long-tailed coat which he had
first worn at his wedding many years before.
“Well, Della!” he exclaimed when that maiden met him at the door. “So
the party day arrived all right. Bless me, but you do look cozy in here!
Howdy, Dan Quigley! Mighty glad to see you lookin’ so pert! Hum, ha!” he
added, with twinkling eyes, as the two old ladies appeared from the
bedroom. “And if these girls aren’t Sally Grackle and Betsy Quigley. You
don’t look a minute older’n you did in them days when we used to have
parties pretty frequent.”
Suddenly Adele darted into the living-room from the kitchen. “Everybody
hide!” she whispered. “Here comes Granny Dorset, and when she gets well
settled I will say ‘Ahem,’ and then you are all to spring out and call
‘Happy Birthday!’”