It was eleven o'clock in the forenoon, and on the veranda of Mrs.
Hemingway's house three young girls were gathered in
conversation. Below them a garden ran to the water's edge and
gave access to a wooden pier projecting some thirty or forty feet
beyond. Here, in a mimic harbor formed by a sharp turn of the
shore and a line of piles on which the pier was supported, rode
the Hemingway fleet at its moorings: a big half-decked catboat, a
gasoline launch, an Indian canoe and two trim gigs. Here, too,
under the kindly lee of a small boat-house, the Hemingway crew
lay stretched in slumber, his head pillowed on an ancient jib,
and his still-smoking pipe fallen from his unconscious lips. A
Hemingway puppy was stalking some Hemingway tomtits, in the
bland, leisurely, inoffensive manner of one whose intentions were
not serious; and the picture was completed by a Hemingway cat,
with a blue ribbon round its neck, which was purring to itself in
a serenity that a stray page of a Sunday supplement never yet
afforded man.
The wide, shady veranda was articulate of summer and girls and
gaiety, and of all that pleasant, prosperous American homeliness
that we see so much of in life and hear so little about in
fiction. Hammocks, rocking-chairs and rugs were scattered about
in a comfortable, haphazard fashion; a tea-table here was stacked
high with novels and magazines; a card-table there bore a violin,
a couple of tennis racquets, a silver-handled crop and a box of
papa's second-best cigars. (The really-truly best were under the
basketwork sofa.) There was also a sewing-machine, a music-stand,
a couple of dogs asleep on the floor, a family Bible full of pressed
wild flowers, a twenty-two-bore rifle, and the messy remains of a
Latin exercise that the son of the house had recently been engaged
upon before being called away to play Indian.
Dolly Hemingway, a handsome, fair-haired, imperious-looking girl,
was lolling in a hammock, directing the deliberations of Sattie
Felton, aged seventeen, who was sitting on the floor holding a
dog's head in her lap, and of Grace Sinclair, aged twenty, who
was in possession of a stool and a box of chocolate creams. A
very important matter was being discussed, and that was why
everybody was talking at once, and how it came about that a young
man passed unnoticed through the cool darkened rooms of the house
and appeared without warning before the little group--a tall,
bulky young man, with an air of diffidence on his honest,
sunburned face, and a general awkwardness of movement that seemed
to betray a certain doubt as to his welcome. He stammered out
something like "Good morning," and then stood there, hat in hand,
waiting for the massacre to begin.
"Mr. Bassity!" exclaimed Dolly Hemingway, straightening up in the
hammock, and staring at him with cold gray eyes. The bulky young
man halted, tried to find some reassurance in the no less
chilling faces of Sattie Felton and Grace Sinclair, and then
said, "How do you do!" in a voice of extreme dejection.
"It is the custom here," said Dolly in cutting accents, "for a
gentleman, when he calls upon a lady, to announce himself first
at the door--"
"And be told she's out," said Mr. Bassity, timidly defiant.
"Call next day, and out, too! Call next week and still out!"
"When you make a closer study of the social system," began Miss
Hemingway "our social system, which seems in vogue everywhere
except the place you came from--you will discover that such
little subterfuges save painful interviews."
"Oh, now, girls, don't be hard on me," said Mr. Bassity, sitting
down uninvited and speaking with the most disarming contrition.
"We all used to be such good friends once, and now, for the life
of me, I don't know, what's the matter. I valued your friendship
tremendously--valued it more than I can tell, and now I am losing
it without even knowing why. It cuts a fellow; it's humiliating;
it is crool, that's what it is, awful crool, and I'll tell you
the straight-out truth that I've cried over it!"
He looked quite capable of crying over it again, and his honest,
manly face bore mute witness to his words. Though addressing
himself to Miss Hemingway, his eyes were more often fixed on
Grace Sinclair, and it was plain that it was her good opinion he
valued most. But she was as merciless as Dolly, and showed not
the least sign of relenting.
"We have decided that we do not care for the further pleasure
of your acquaintance," said Miss Hemingway. "It's a disagreeable
thing to have to say--but it's the truth! We liked you at first
because there was something breezy and Western about you; then
you got breezier and Westerner til it was more than the traffic
could stand."
"Now see here," broke out Mr. Bassity in pleading accents, "have
I ever done anything caddish or ungentlemanly--intentionally, I
mean--anything that could possibly justify my being dropped like
this--that could--"
"Perhaps not intentionally," Interrupted Miss Hemingway, "though
it's no good your coming around here to say you didn't know any
better. You ought to have known better, that's all."
"Known what?" bleated Mr. Bassity. "In Heaven's name, tell me
what?"
"Oh, it isn't one thing--it's a thousand," said Dolly. "It's--it's
--general social ineptitude!"
Mr. Bassity looked more depressed than ever. He didn't know what
the word meant, and it seemed to cover a terrifying accusation.
He was seen silently making a note of it for a future reference
to a dictionary.
"I'm just a rough, uncouth fellow," said he at last. "I know
that well enough without three young ladies' telling me so: An
oil man--a successful oil man--hasn't much chance to cultivate
the social graces. If he can keep on the right side of common
honesty he has done more than most. I guess even our best people
out there would give you a shock--and I don't pretend I even ran
with them!"
"That's the most redeeming thing you've said yet," remarked Grace.
"Oh, they wouldn't have me," remarked Coal Oil Johnny with fatal
truthfulness.
"All you need is toning down," said Miss Hemingway, with a
suspicion of kindness in her voice. "You're too exuberant,
that's all. You're always rushing in where angels fear to tread,
till it has grown on you like a habit. When other people stop
you're just beginning!"
"Couldn't you give me another chance?" he asked, still with his
eyes pathetically on Grace Sinclair's face. "Just one more
chance to try and hit it off better next time? Now, just sit up,
every one of you, and tell me frankly what I've done to offend
you--stamp all over me--bite my head off--and then let's begin
again with a clean slate, and see if I can't buck up"
"I'll leave it to the general vote," said Miss Hemingway. "You
certainly have a very winning nature in some ways--and who
knows?--you might possibly do better after this awful warning.
Only you mustn't come round here next time demanding
explanations. The next time will be positive and final. Yes,"
she went on, "I propose that Mr. Bassity be given a good talking
to, and then have his name put on the probation list."
"Poor Mr. Bassity!" said Sattie Felton. "I second the motion for
reinstating him temporarily!"
Grace Sinclair was not so quick in giving her decision. In her
girlish heart she enjoyed the big man's discomfiture, and was
mischievous enough to prolong his suspense. She knew that to him
her opinion was the most important of all, and this gave her an
added pleasure in withholding her verdict. All three looked at
her as she bent her pretty brown head and seemed to weigh the
question. She was a Southerner, and her French-Spanish blood
betrayed itself in her grace, her slender hands and feet, and the
type of her dark and unusual beauty. She was more a woman than
either Dolly or Sattie, and the fact that Mr. Bassity was
desperately in love with her fanned within her breast a wilful
desire to torment him.
"Let me think!" she said.
"'Pon my soul!--" began that unfortunate young man, boisterously
attempting to sway her judgment.
"Hush!" exclaimed Sattie Felton.
"She's thinking," said Miss Hemingway severely.
Mr. Bassity noisily subsided.
"I don't know whether it's worth while to forgive him," said
Grace at last. "He's so incorrigible--so wild and woolly--that
if you're nice to him he's like one of those dogs that want to
jump all over you!"
"Oh, Miss Sinclair, please, please--!" cried Coal Oil Johnny.
"Well, I won't hang the jury," continued Grace; "only it must be
clearly understood that we have the privilege of making a few
remarks"
Mr. Bassity made a pantomime of baring his breast.
"Strike!" he said.
"You first," said Dolly to Grace.
"Last Tuesday I was playing golf at the links," began that young
lady vindictively. "Mr. Bassity volunteered to call for me at
four and take me home in his French automobile. I knew we were
going too fast and said so twice, but he only answered, 'Oh,
bother!' or something equally polite and gracious. Then as we
raced into Franklin Street we found a rope across it and sixteen
policemen waiting to arrest us! Pleasant, wasn't it?--with a
million people looking on; and my picture next day in the paper.
I was so mortified I could have cried, and I can't think of it
even now without burning all over"
"Perhaps the prisoner might care to offer some explanation?"
suggested Miss Hemingway.
"Well, really, it was most unfortunate," admitted Coal Oil
Johnny. "The fact is, the low gear is chewed up on that car, and
I've always been forced to run it on the intermediate--and the
most you can throttle down the intermediate to is eighteen miles
an hour!"
"The legal speed being eight, I believe," Icily interjected Miss
Sinclair.
"I don't know what the silly law is," continued Mr. Bassity, "but
the only way to obey it would be to get out and push the car.
Couldn't ask a lady to do that, could I?"
"You could have thrown in your intermediate and then thrown it
out again, and run on momentum," said Miss Sinclair. "That's
automobile A B C!"
"Oh, but my dear girl," protested Coal Oil Johnny, "the clutches
on that car are something fierce, and half the time the
intermediate won't mesh. When you're lucky enough to get it in,
of course you keep it in."
"Yes, and get arrested," said Miss Sinclair, "and give your
passenger some disagreeable notoriety, not to speak of shaking up
her happy home and getting her allowance stopped for a month."
Mr. Bassity looked acutely miserable. To have brought penury to
his lady-love struck him to the heart.
"I'm the most wretched fellow alive," he said. "If ever there
was a child of misfortune, it's me. I can only throw myself on
the mercy of the court and grovel--yes, grovel
--if you'll show me a place to grovel and teach me how!"
"Have you anything else against the prisoner?" Inquired Miss
Hemingway of Grace.
"About sixty-five other complaints," assented that young lady.
"But I'll let it go at this, which was the worst of all"
"Miss Sattie Felton, what have you against the unhappy wretch who
stands trembling at the bar of justice?" asked the self-appointed
president of the court.
"Last Sunday I was at the Country Club with papa," said Miss
Felton. "The prisoner engaged in an altercation with my male
parent on the subject of religion, said parent being a man of
strong views and short temper. Said parent, however, being a man
of the world as well, tried to evade an argument and escape, but
was penned up in a corner for ten purple minutes. Said afterward
that he had never been so affronted in all his life; explodes
even now at the recollection; calls the prisoner a word that
begins with a B, contains a double O and ends with R!"
At this staggering blow poor Coal Oil Johnny covered his face
with his hands and groaned.
"It's all true," he said, "only I was kind of goaded into it. It
began by my saying that if religious people would only be
Christians, too, the world would be a better place to live in!"
"The court is now going to get in its own little knife," said
Miss Hemingway. "The court, in a moment of generous weakness,
verging on imbecility, invited, or, rather, caused to be invited,
the prisoner to dinner. Prisoner, through the absence of one
lady from the party, was placed next to a distinguished young
sociologist. Of course, in his usual headlong and unrestrained
manner, the prisoner had to teach the distinguished young
sociologist a thing or two he didn't know about sociology.
Roared at him! Yes, ladies of the jury, positively roared at
him, and beat on the table, extra, with his fist!"
"But he was such an ass!" said the prisoner.
"No reason at all why you should roar at him," said the court,
"and disturb everybody and make them feel uncomfortable."
"An awful ass!" persisted the prisoner.
"The world is full of them," said the court "If you were to roar
at every one you meet you'd never have time for anything else.
Life would degenerate into one long roar. Everybody knows that
Professor Titcombe is a ninny and an idiot, but the decencies of
intercourse require you to say, 'How nice!' or 'How interesting!'
to his remarks.
"But he had never even been in Colorado," vociferated Coal Oil
Johnny. "It was all lies and hearsay and gas. But I have, and I
know all about it, and if you want proof I have a scar on my head
where a dago shot me at Telluride!"
"Prisoner's motion to show scar overruled," said the court.
"Isn't it about time to let me off?" pleaded Mr. Bassity.
"Surely I've listened like a lamb to everything you've said to
me? I've been slapped on one cheek and then on the other, and if
I haven't always come up smiling it isn't that I haven't tried.
It stings a fellow to hear such things to his face; it hurts a
fellow more than I think you know; for I may not be up to the
general standard of your friends, but I guess my feelings are
just as sensitive, and my regard and respect for all three of you
is not a whit behind theirs. I dare say this has amused you very
much, and I don't grudge for a minute the fun you've had out of
it--but suppose we call it off now and be friends again, and--and
--talk about something else!" He looked earnestly from one to
another.
There was something so naive and affecting in Bassity's plea for
mercy that for a moment his three persecutors looked almost
ashamed of themselves. Grace Sinclair's eyes filled with tears,
and she rose and went over to him and patted his hand.
"Cheer up," she said, smiling. "We've reinstated you now, and
like you better than we ever did before."
"And oo'll be mamma's little darling and will never be naughty
again?" added Miss Hemingway.
"Poor old Johnny!" said Miss Felton sympathetically; "that's the
trouble about being a rough diamond and being polished while you
wait--makes you sorry you ever came, doesn't it?"
"Now you can smoke a cigar, Mr. Bassity," said Dolly, "and
improve your mind listening to us talk!"
"So long as I'm not the subject of it," observed Coal Oil Johnny
ruefully.
"Oh, we can't bother about you for always," said Miss Hemingway.
"You've had your little turn and must now give way to something
mere important!"
"Delighted!" said Mr. Bassity.
"And don't look as though your own cigars were better than
papa's," added Dolly.
"But they are," he retorted.
"Will nothing ever prevent your speaking the truth?" cried Miss
Sinclair. "There ought to be tracts about the young man who
always spoke the truth--and his awful end!"
"Do you want me to listen intelligently or unintelligently?" Mr.
Bassity asked Dolly.
"Oh, any old way," she said. "We don't mind particularly which."
"But you might tell me what the next topic's about," he said. "It
might improve my mind more, you know, to have some glimmering of
what's going on. Possibly--I say it with all diffidence--possibly I
might be able to contribute some valuable suggestions."
At this there arose such a chorus of incredulity that even the
dogs jumped up and barked.
"It'll be a long time before you'll ever pay your social way,"
said Miss Hemingway cruelly. "In the meanwhile you're a social
pauper, living on crusts, and the most becoming thing you can do
is to sit very silent and grateful and self-effacing."
"Yep," said Coal Oil Johnny, pretending to gulp down a manly
emotion. "Yep, kind lady, and God bless your purty face, and if
a lifetime of humble devotion and--"
"We all three have to do something for the St. John's Home for
Incurable Children," Interrupted Dolly, "and the question is,
what?"
"Simplest thing out," said Mr. Bassity, feeling for his
pocketbook.
"That's just what we're not going to do," continued Dolly. "It's
horrid to go around dunning people for subscriptions, and being
ten dollars nice to them for three dollars and fifty cents cash.
We're all pledged to earn some money--really, truly earn it--and
every one of us is going to get out and hustle, and, of course,
we want to arrange it so that none of us three will overlap. My
own idea is dog-thinning!"
"Dog-what?" ejaculated Coal Oil Johnny.
"Most people's dogs are too fat," explained Miss Hemingway. "Most
owners are so slack and good-natured that, though they know they
are their own dogs' worst enemies, they weakly go on pampering
them in spite of their better judgment. I am going to reduce
dogs for ten dollars a dog--not brutally, like a vet, who kicks
them into a cellar and leaves them there--but giving up my whole
time to it for a month. Plain living, lots of exercise,
sympathy, tact, and all the comforts of home! I've already got
the promise of four, and there's a Russian Poodle, besides, and a
dachshund, who are trying to make up their minds."
"I wish I could have thought of anything so original," cried
Sattie Felton mournfully. "It seems so commonplace just to work
in papa's office for two weeks, doesn't it?"
"'Specially the way you'll work!" exclaimed Grace Sinclair.
"I am going to help Miss Drayton in the filing department," said
Sattie. "Put a letter from an F man into an F drawer, and from a
G man into a G drawer, and from an H man into an H drawer, and
from an I man into an I drawer--"
"Oh, stop!" cried Dolly Hemingway, warningly.
"And from a J man into a J drawer," continued Sattie drearily,
"and from a K man into--"
The hurried passing of the chocolate creams in her direction
brought about a welcome silence.
"What's your plan, Miss Sinclair?" Inquired Mr. Bassity.
"Oh, Grace has a snap," said Sattie in thick, chocolate-cream
accents.
"My Despardoux car!" exclaimed Grace. "It holds five, you know,
and I'm going every day to the I.B.&Q. depot and take passengers.
Hang out a little card: Beautiful Stackport, Two Hours' Ride for
One Dollar; Children Half-Price!"
"No chauffeur?" asked Coal Oil Johnny.
"Of course not. In that case it would be the money he earned
--not mine!"
"I don't think I'd do that," said Coal Oil Johnny.
"It matters so little what you think!" said Grace.
"But all alone?" objected Bassity.
"I told you it holds five," said Miss Sinclair.
"I shall make it a point to go every trip," said Coal Oil Johnny.
"Indeed you shan't," protested Grace. "The basis of the whole idea
is that no friends are allowed. It's to be genuine money-making
without favoritism or the personal element, and I think it's
splendidly original and American."
Coal Oil Johnny looked at her and slowly shook his head.
"Don't do it," he said seriously. "Please don't do it."
"But I please will, thank you," she returned; "and I'm going to
make more money out of it than anybody."
"What does your father say?" he asked,
"Offered me a hundred dollars not to!"
"Then I suppose it wouldn't be any good offering two hundred."
"Not in the least--nor two thousand!"
Coal Oil Johnny sighed, and puffed away at his cigar.
"See here," he said at last, "why wouldn't it be a bright idea to
give me lessons--at so much a lesson--on how to behave, and that
kind of thing!"
Sattie Felton clapped her hands together excitedly.
"I take him, I take him!" she cried. "I spoke first, girls, and
it beats filing all hollow." In her eagerness she jumped up and
ran to Coal Oil Johnny, as though to hold him tight and prevent
his being snatched away from her by the others. Poor Bassity had
hoped to fall into other hands, and his face showed his
disappointment.
"I hoped--" he stammered. "I thought perhaps--"
"No, Sattie spoke first," said Miss Hemingway, detecting
incipient rebellion, "and, anyway, she deserves to have you, for
her plan wasn't any good and was hardly better than getting a
present of the money from her father!"
"What can I charge him?" exclaimed Sattie. "What are lessons
worth, Dolly--good long ones?"
"Five dollars each, or fifty for a course of twelve," replied that
reliable authority. "Diploma, elegantly tinted for framing, one
dollar!"
"It isn't too much, is it?" asked Sattie anxiously of Mr.
Bassity. "I don't want to rob you, you know, and even half would
be more than I could get by filing."
"Oh, it's cheap," said Coal Oil Johnny, attempting to seem
cheerful. "I never expected to become a social favorite for
anything under a hundred. Only I wish you wouldn't try your
way," he added aside to Miss Sinclair. "I mean it in all
earnestness. If I had a sister--"
"You'd keep her in a red morocco case, and only show her in peeps
to people of guaranteed respectability," said Grace, continuing
his sentence for him. "That's always the way with imaginary
sisters. But the real ones like to jump in and help the old
world along!"
"Oh, but do take a chauffeur," he pleaded.
Miss Sinclair gave him a mocking smile.
"Would you mind my running my own little show in my own little
way?" she observed sweetly.
He blew out a large smoke-ring and did not reply. His honest,
sunburned face assumed a far-away expression. Coal Oil Johnny
was thinking!
In the line of cabs and omnibuses that stood outside the I.B.&Q.
depot was a Despardoux car, dazzling the eye with brass, and
reflecting the passing throng in the deep, ruby,
red of its highly polished surface. Its only occupant was Miss
Grace Sinclair, suffocating in a leather coat, and with her shy,
pretty face well concealed behind an automobile mask. At the
side of the car, neatly pinned to one of the long rawhide
baskets, was the following invitation to the public:
BEAUTIFUL STACKPORT
TWO HOURS' RIDE FOR $1
CHILDREN 1/2 PRICE
But the public who had possibly already seen beautiful Stackport
for themselves, or who, maybe, were withheld by the lack of the
necessary dollar--the public, jostling past in an intermittent
stream, and coy as always in the investment of its cash,
disregarded the allurements of the Despardoux, and scarcely
deigned even to look its way. A few of its members, however, of
a chatty and mechanical turn, were willing to volunteer a vast
deal of random conversation with less than no encouragement; but
the man with the dollar, the man who desired to see beautiful
Stackport, the man who thirsted for a two hours' ride--children
half-price--was yet to come.
Grace Sinclair had waited an hour. Her first eager expectancy
had given way to a heartbreaking consciousness of failure. She
felt herself humiliated, less for herself than for her
Despardoux. She had thrown down her pearls, and the swine (true
to tradition) were treating them in the time-honored manner. At
last, when hope was nearly dead within her breast, it was
suddenly revived by the appearance of a rustic gentleman, who,
stopping as though he had received a galvanic shock, opened his
mouth as he slowly spelled out the notice on the basket. It was
plain he was from the country, for his reddish whiskers were
untrimmed, his hair long and straggling, his clothes of an
extraordinary and antique design; and, moreover, under his arm he
carried a coal-oil box, slatted across the front, which contained
a live rooster. It was a pity that so sturdy a representative of
the agricultural classes should have worn spectacles, and blue
ones at that,
and he had a troubled, peering, blind look that caused Grace a
momentary pang. But he seemed a jolly, hearty fellow in spite of
his infirmity, and coming up to her he gave her a broad and
confidential smile.
"About this burd," he began, in a rich, friendly drawl, indicating
the rooster. "Be there any trouble about the burd coming, too?"
"Not a particle," said Miss Sinclair.
"Hey?" said the stranger. "Hey?"
"Glad to have it," said Miss Sinclair, trying to suit her English
to the intelligence of the plain people.
"But no monkey business?" said the gentleman from the country.
"No half-price rung on me later? No extry for live stock?"
"One dollar, and no charge for rooster," said Grace in her most
matter-of-fact tones.
From a capacious and inner pocket the stranger produced a
venerable wallet, and from the venerable wallet a dollar bill.
"A lot of money for just whizzing through the air," he remarked
genially, handing it to her. "I could fall off my barn for
nothing, and as like as not be less hurt than when you've got
through with me!"
"I'll get you back all right," said Miss Sinclair.
The stranger showed symptoms of wanting to climb into the tonneau
by way of the mud-guard; and his enthusiasm was unbounded when he
was directed to the door.
"Gosh!" he exclaimed, seating himself luxuriously on the
cushions. "Gosh! but they've got these things down fine! I
never read the Poultry Gazette of a Saturday night without saying
to myself, what next? Every day some new way of being killed, or
some old way improved! My! but this is the dandiest of all!"
"There isn't the least danger if people are careful," said Grace,
gazing out of the corner of her eye at three very loud and
offensively jocular young men, their straw hats tilted at the
back of their heads, who had also been arrested by the notice on
the basket. They were flashily dressed, with race-tout written
all over them, and their keen, impudent, tallowy faces filled her
with sudden misgiving.
"Let's try the old hell-wagon," said one.
"If people are only careful," repeated Grace forlornly.
"I dug four automobeelists out of a ditch once," observed the
rural gentleman. "One had his leg broke, and the others were
scratched something awful--but perhaps they weren't careful!"
"Say, we want to see beautiful Stackport," said one of the touts,
clambering into the front seat beside Grace.
"Get out of that and give your place to a handsomer man," cried
another, trying to pull him out by the legs.
The scuffle ended in the triumph of number one, who turned to
Grace and addressed her in a hoarse, ironical voice.
"Never you mind them," he said. "They're only a pair of cheap
skates who've won out a little on the track, and are blowing it
in."
"Cock-a-doodle-doo!" exclaimed another, poking his fingers
through the bars at the rooster.
"Wind her up, young chafer!" exclaimed the third.
"The fare is one dollar in advance," said Grace Sinclair, whose
heart was sinking within her.
Then there ensued a humorous altercation in which they tried to
beat her down to seventy-five cents. But Grace, remaining firm,
finally received her three dollars, though they made it a point
of honor to pay her in the smallest change they could muster.
One fun-maker turned in three post-cards and a two-cent stamp;
while another convulsed the company on the curb, now five deep
and swelling rapidly, by volunteering to give his necktie in lieu
of a quarter. It was no small relief to Grace when at last they
rode out of the depot amid the cheers of the multitude, and took
their swift way down Fairfield Avenue. But the three young
rowdies, far from subsiding, egged one another on to fresh
enormities. They would whoop at every passing automobile, shout
audible remarks about the personal appearance of its occupants,
tell an old gentleman, cautiously picking his way across the
street, to skin out or they'd take his leg off! It was a wild
and mortifying progress, and as the streets gradually gave way to
country roads, and Grace anticipated that the worst was over, the
three young men discovered a new means of making themselves
objectionable. They insisted on stopping at every roadhouse,
tooting loudly for the bartender to come out and serve them, and
tossing off, in the course of a dozen miles, an uncountable
number of glasses of beer.
Had it not been for the presence of the farmer, seated placidly
in the tonneau of the car with the rooster on his lap, Grace
would have been terrified at her predicament. But his large,
friendly bulk, his heavy shoulders, his big hands and honest face
were immensely comforting to her. He resisted all the
importunities of the others to drink with them, refusing with the
greatest good-nature, and maintaining throughout a certain
aloofness and detachment. They called him Judge Hayseed, and
guyed him mercilessly; but his deep, hearty laugh never showed
the least sign of resentment, even when imaginary misadventures,
of the blow-out-the-gas order, were fathered on him.
In the midst of an unceasing and vociferous hilarity, as they
were bowling along at twelve miles an hour, which Grace would
have made twenty if the engine hadn't worked so queerly, she felt
the sharp dig of a finger against her back, and one of the young
men cried out: "Say, young chafer, you've plunked a tire!"
She stopped the car and got out, and there, sure enough, one of
the rear tires presented itself to her view in a state of
melancholy collapse. It had picked up a horseshoe together with
the three jagged nails adhering to it, and was patently,
hopelessly, irretrievably punctured. Grace had seen a hundred
repairs made on the road, but up to now she had never put her
hands to the task herself. She brimmed over with the most
correct theory, but had invariably relegated the practice to a
skilful young man. As she dejectedly scanned the faces of her
passengers, and met nothing in return but blank and dispirited
stares, she manfully got out her little jack and started in on
her own account. But she had hardly raised the wheel free from
the ground, and was in the act of unscrewing the valve, when the
wrench was suddenly taken out of her hand by Judge Hayseed, who
asked in a very businesslike manner if there was an inner tube in
the kit.
"I took notice of a feller doing this on my farm once," he
drawled, "and it's kind of stuck in my head ever since." It had
certainly stuck remarkably well, for the farmer attacked the shoe
with the precision of a veteran. Loosening the lugs, and using
the two strippers against each other with adroitness and
strength, he quickly reached the point where he could easily draw
out the inner tube.
When the tire was pumped up, and Grace was again about to take
her place at the steering-wheel, the farmer sprang a fresh
surprise.
"Hold on a minute," he said. "What's been making you miss so
horribly on the off cylinder?"
"Oh, the whole engine has been acting like the dickens," she
returned distressfully. "It hasn't been developing half its
power. It's in one of its mean humors to-day, and behaving like
a pig."
"Couldn't you take off that front thing and let's see what's the
trouble?" said the countryman, jumping back into his drawl.
And then, wrench in hand, he made a prolonged examination of the
machinery. Then he turned over the engine and listened; then he
turned over the engine again and listened some more. Then he
crawled in under the wagon, reappearing with a lick of grease
over one eye.
"It gets me," he said. "I ran a little oil out of the crank-case
on general principles, and chased up the magnets--but
everything's tip-top as far as I can see!"
"Suppose you crank up and let's try again," said the girl.
But the car went worse than ever. Instead of missing
occasionally the engine began to run now in gasps. Just when
Grace waited for it to die altogether it would give another cough
and take another spurt ahead, progressing the car in a series of
agonizing little rushes, every one promising to be the last. To
add to Grace's discomfiture there was a fairly steep hill looming
in front of them, and she foresaw their being stalled at the
bottom. They made another stop. A pair of new spark-plugs was
put in, but, instead of improving, the gasping got gaspier than
ever. Still another stop, to replace the high tension wires.
But no improvement was effected. A weird, whizzling sound added
itself to the other noises. Every gasp brought them nearer the
hill, where, at the foot, the engine gave one awful hiccough and
died dead.
"We might manage to crawl home the way we came," said Grace, at
her wits' end.
"No, there's only one thing to do," said the farmer decisively,
"and that's to start all over again and ferret out the trouble."
He got out again. So did Grace. So did the three touts. So did
the rooster. It was a depressing moment.
Grace took off her long coat, laid it on one side of the road,
and deposited her cap, mask and gauntlets. It would take time to
put the car to rights, and she didn't wish to be hampered. Her
dark, glowing, girlish face came as a revelation to the three
sports. She had been hidden behind so much glass and leather
that the transformation was startling. The horsy gentlemen
uttered murmurs of surprise and gratification. One of them
sidled up to her with a leer.
"We've had a bum ride in your bum wagon," he said, "and now you've
stuck us down here nine miles from the nearest beer! You've a
lot to answer for, you have."
"I shall certainly return your money," returned Grace coldly. "I
can't do more than that, can I?"
"Oh, yes, you can, you wicked little chafer," he said, giving a
wink over his shoulder to his companions. "What's the matter
with a kiss?" And with that he passed his arm around her waist.
What happened next happened quicker than it takes to write it.
The farmer's right hand descended on the young man's collar, and
his left executed a succession of slaps on the young man's
countenance, which, for vigor and swiftness, could not have been
done better by machinery. Then he trailed him to one side of the
road, still shaking him in an iron grasp, and kicked him into the
ditch.
"Help!" roared the young man repeatedly in the course of these
proceedings. "Help!"
This brought to the rescue his two friends, who, for the last
instant, had been too spellbound to move. The farmer squared his
fists and received the newcomers on his knuckles. He was a clean
hitter, and from the way he pirouetted and skipped you would have
said he could dance, too. The three young sports, considerably
the worse for wear, fled pell-mell for the barbed-wire fence that
bordered the road, and went over it in the twinkling of an eye.
Only a few bits of what they would probably have called "nobby
pants," speckled here and there on the barbs, betrayed to later
wayfarers this new instance of man's inhumanity to man.
"Do you know, we have never looked at the contact-box," said the
farmer, returning to the car quite calmly to take up the
interrupted thread of his conversation.
The tears were streaming down Grace's face, and her voice was
scarcely controllable.
"It's a b-brush s-s-system," she said, "and it has always worked
b-b-beautifully, and I never could have f-f-forgiven myself if
they had h-h-hurt you!"
The farmer did not hear more than half the sentence. He was on
his knees peering down into the works. Suddenly he raised his
head with an expression of triumph.
Bing! A stone struck one of the kerosene lamps with a vicious
crash.
Bing! Another just missed the countryman's rumpled hair.
Bing! A mud-guard shook with a loud and tinny reverberation.
The enemy, lined up in the neighboring field, and yelling
shrilly, were opening up a rear-guard action with artillery.
"The contact-box is upside down," cried the farmer. "I can't see
how it ever worked at all. Yank me out a screw-driver quick!"
The contact-box was on the exposed side. The farmer tried to
hunch himself into the least compass possible, but his broad back
and powerful frame interfered with his efforts to make a human
hedgehog of himself. He was hit twice, once by a grazing shot
that brought out blood on his cheek, the other a stinger on the
hand.
"Scratch up a few rocks," he called to Grace, doggedly continuing
his work, and keeping a careful eye on the screws he was taking
out.
She got a dozen or so, and passed them over to him in a piece of
chamois leather taken from the tool kit. He caught it up and ran
for the fence, the enemy retiring precipitately out of range.
But if he made no bull's-eyes he had a pleasant sense, for a
moment or two, of dominating the situation. Then he returned
hurriedly to the car.
"I wonder if you and I couldn't push her around," he said to
Grace. "They'll be back again in a minute, and then it will be
altogether too sunny on this side." The pair of them laid on to
the spokes of the driving-wheels, and with a yeo-heave-yeo
managed to head the Despardoux in the direction of its native
Stackport. Then the farmer settled to work again, Grace scurried
about searching for ammunition, and the three young touts rained
shower on shower of stones. If ever delicate adjustments were
made under difficulties, it was on that Despardoux on that
fateful occasion. The only alleviation of an otherwise
intolerable situation was the magnificent behavior of the
contact-box, which now, right side up and readjusted, showed
every symptom of meaning to do its duty.
It was anxiously put to the test, and, on the engine being
started, the farmer and Grace were rewarded by the chippetty,
chippetty, chippetty, chippetty of perfect sparking and
combustion.
The farmer rolled back the enemy, recovered Grace's coat and his
own rooster, seated himself at the wheel, gave the girl a hand
in, threw in his clutches and speeded up.
"Slow down!" cried Grace. "Slow down, please. I want to leave
their horrid money on the road."
"Not on your life," said the farmer. "That three dollars belongs
to the St. John's Home for Incurable Children!"
"You oughtn't to know anything about the St. John's Home," said
Grace.
"Oh, I forgot--I don't," he retorted brazenly. "Only that three
dollars is going to stay on board this car. If anybody ever
earned three dollars by the sweat of their brow I guess it was
you and me!"
Grace put her hands up to his head and deliberately drew off his
hat, drew off his red wig, drew off his red whiskers, and tossed
them all back into the tonneau.
"Are you sorry I came?" said Coal Oil Johnny.
"There are some emotions that can not be put into words," she
answered. "I won't try to say anything. I can't. But if I
should ever seem unkind, or distant, or forgetful, or anything
but the joy of your whole future existence--just you say
contact-box, and I'll melt!"