GWEN.
Bill Tinsley was as keen on the camp building plan as Lewis Somerville
had said he would be.
"Sleeping on my arms," was his telegram in answer to the letter he got
from Lewis, a letter with R. S. V. P. P. D. Q. plainly marked on the
envelope.
"Good old Bill! I almost knew he would tumble at the chance. All of you
will like Bill, I know."
"What does he mean by sleeping on his arms?" asked Lucy. "I should think
it would make him awfully stiff."
"Oh, that means ready to go at a moment's notice. I bet his kit is
packed now."
Mr. Lane and Dick had worked hard on the plans for the camp and had them
ready when the would-be builder called for them. Then Mr. Lane and Lewis
made a flying trip to Greendale to look into the lay of the land and to
decide on a site for the dining pavilion. It was a spot about one
hundred yards from the log cabin, built by the aforesaid sick
Englishman, that seemed to them to be intended for just their purpose.
It was a hollowed out place in the mountain side, not far from the
summit, and four great pine trees formed an almost perfect rectangle of
forty by twenty-five feet. In the centre stood a noble tulip poplar.
"Pity to sacrifice him," said Bill Tinsley, whom they had picked up at
Charlottesville on their way to Greendale. Bill was a youth of few words
but of frequent mirth expressed in uncontrollable fits of laughter that
nothing could stop, not even being shipped from West Point. It was this
very laugh that had betrayed the hazers. If Bill had only been able to
hold in that guffaw of his they would never have been caught. His laugh
was unmistakable and through it the whole crowd of wrongdoers was
nabbed, poor Lewis along with them although he was innocent.
"No more to blame for laughing than a lightning bug for shining," he
had declared to Lewis; "but I wish I had died before I got you into
this, old fellow."
"Well, it can't be helped, but I bet you will be laughing on the other
side of your face before you know it."
The youths had remained fast friends and now that this chance had come
for them to be of service and to use the surplus energy that was stored
up in their splendidly developed muscles, they were happy at the
prospect of being together again.
Mr. Lane took careful measurements and adapted his plans so as to
utilize the four trees as natural posts and the great tulip poplar as a
support for the roof. Under the pavilion the space was to be made into
kitchen and store room. Some little excavating would be necessary for
this as measurements showed that one edge of the pavilion would rest
almost on the mountain side while the other stood ten feet from the
ground.
"I am trying to spare you fellows all the excavating possible, as that
is the tedious and uninteresting part of building," explained Mr. Lane.
"Oh, we can shovel that little pile of dirt away in no time," declared
Lewis, feeling his muscles twitch with joy at the prospect of removing
mountains. Mr. Lane smiled, knowing full well that it was at least no
mole hill they were to tackle.
Within a week after Mr. and Mrs. Carter had sailed on their
health-seeking voyage, Lewis and his chum were _en route_ for Greendale,
all of the lumber for their undertaking ordered and their tools sent on
ahead by freight. Bill had gone to Richmond, ostensibly to consult a
dentist, but in reality to see the Carter girls, who had aroused in him
a great curiosity.
"They must be some girls," had been his laconic remark.
"So they are, the very best fun you ever saw," Lewis had assured him.
"They took this thing of waking up and finding themselves poor a great
deal better than you and I did waking up and finding ourselves nothing
but civilians when we had expected to be major generals, at least."
The Carter girls had one and all liked Bill, when Lewis took him to call
on them the evening of his arrival in Richmond.
"There is something so frank and open in his countenance," said Helen.
"His mouth!" drawled Nan. "Did you ever see or hear such a laugh?"
"He is a great deal nicer than your old Dr. Wright, who looks as though
it would take an operation on his risibles to get a laugh out of him."
Bill had offered the services of a battered Ford car he had in
Charlottesville as pack mule for the camp and it was joyfully accepted.
He and Lewis stopped in Charlottesville on their way to Greendale and
got the tried old car, making the last leg of their trip in it.
They had decided to sleep in the Englishman's cabin, as the little log
house that went with the property was always called, but Miss Somerville
had made them promise to burn sulphur candles before they went in and
was deeply grieved because her beloved nephew refused to carry with him
a quart bottle of crude carbolic acid that she felt was necessary to
ward off germs.
It was late in the afternoon as the faithful Ford chugged its way up the
mountain road to the site of the proposed camp. The boys had stopped at
the station at Greendale and taken in all the tools they could stow
away, determined to begin work at excavating the first thing in the
morning.
"Let's lay out the ground this afternoon," proposed Lewis.
"There's nothing to lay out since the four pine trees mark the corners.
I, for one, am going to lay out myself and rest and try to decide which
one of your cousins is the most beautiful."
"Douglas, of course! The others can't hold a candle to her, although
Helen is some looker and Nan has certainly got something about her that
makes a fellow kind of blink. And that Lucy is going to grow up to her
long legs some day and maybe step ahead of all of them."
"Well, I'm mighty glad you thought about giving me this job of working
for such nice gals." These young men always spoke of themselves as being
in the employ of the Carter girls, and all the time they were building
the camp they religiously kept themselves to certain hours as though any
laxity would be cheating their bosses. Besides, the regular habits that
two years at West Point had drilled into them would have been difficult
to break.
"I don't know how to loaf," complained Lewis. "That's the dickens of
it."
"Me, neither!"
"They say the Government makes machines of its men."
"True! I am a perpetual motion machine."
They were busily engaged on their first morning in the mountains, plying
pick and shovel. They bent their brave young shoulders to the task with
evident enjoyment in the work. When they did straighten up to get the
kinks out of their backs, they looked out across a wonderful country
which they fully appreciated as being wonderful, but raving about
landscapes and Nature was not in their line and they would quickly bend
again to the task in a somewhat shamefaced way.
The orchards of Albemarle County in Virginia are noted and the green of
an apple tree in May is something no one need be ashamed to admire
openly, but all these boys would say on the subject was:
"Good apple year, I hope."
"Yep! Albemarle pippins are sho' good eats."
Moving mountains was not quite so easy as they had expected it to be.
They remembered what Mr. Lane had said about excavating when the sun
showed it to be high noon and after five hours' steady work they had
made but little impression on the pile they were to dig away.
"Gee, we make no impression at all!" said Lewis. "I verily believe
little Bobby Carter could have done as much as we have if he had been
turned loose to play mud pies here."
"Well, let's stop and eat. I haven't laughed for an hour," and Bill
gave out one of his guffaws that echoed from peak to peak and started
two rabbits out of the bushes and actually dislodged a great stone that
went rolling down the side of the mountain into an abyss below. At
least, his laugh seemed to be the cause but Bill declared it was
somebody or something, and to be sure a little mountain boy came from
behind a boulder, grinning from ear to ear.
"What be you uns a-doin'?"
"Crocheting a shawl for Aunty," said Lewis solemnly.
"Well, we uns is got a mule an' a scoop that could make a shawl fer
Aunty quicker'n you uns." This brought forth another mighty peal from
Bill and another stone rolled down the mountain side.
"Good for you, son!" exclaimed Lewis. "Suppose you fetch the mule here
this afternoon and we'll have a sewing bee. What do you say, Bill? Do
you believe we would ever in the world get this dirt moved?"
"Doubt it."
"Do you uns want we uns to drive the critter? We uns mostly goes along
'thout no axtra chawge."
"Sure we want you. What do you charge for the mule and driver?"
"Wal, time was when Josephus brought as much as fifty cents a day, but
he ain't to say so spry as onct, an' now we uns will be satisfied to git
thirty cents, with a feedin' of oats."
"Oats! Who has oats? Not I. The only critter we have eats gasoline. I
tell you, son, you feed Josephus yourself and we will feed you and pay
you fifty cents a day for your animal. I don't believe a mule could work
for thirty cents and keep his self-respect."
"Wal, Josephus an' we uns don't want no money what we uns don' arn," and
the little mountain boy flushed a dark red under his sunburned, freckled
face.
He was a very ragged youngster of about twelve. His clothes smacked of
the soil to such an extent that you could never have told what was their
original color. What sleeves there were left in his shirt certainly
must once have been blue, but the body of that garment showed spots of
candy pink calico, the kind you are sure to find on the shelves of any
country store. His trousers, held up by twine, crossed over his wiry
shoulders, were corduroy. They had originally been the color of the
earth and time and weather had but deepened their tone. His eyes shone
out very clear and blue in contrast to the general dinginess of his
attire. His was certainly a very likable face and the young men were
very much attracted to the boy, first because of his ready wit, shown
from his first words, and then because of his quick resentment at the
possibility of any one's giving him or his mule money they had not
earned.
"Of course, you are going to earn it," reassured Lewis. "Now you go home
and get your mule and as soon as we can cook some dinner for ourselves
and satisfy our inner cravings, we will all get to work. You and
Josephus can dig and Bill and I will begin to build."
"Please, sir, wouldn't you uns like Gwen to cook for you uns and wash
the platters an' sich? She is a great han' at fixin's."
"Gwen! Who is Gwen?"
Another stone slipped from behind the boulder from which the boy had
emerged and then a young girl came timidly forth.
"I am Gwen," she said simply.
She was a girl of about fourteen, very slim and straight, with wide grey
eyes that looked very frankly into those of the young men, although you
felt a timidity in spite of her directness. Her scant blue dress was
clean and whole and her brown hair was parted and braided in two long
plaits, showing much care and brushing.
"Oh, how do you do, Miss Gwen? I am Lewis Somerville and this is my
friend and fellow laborer, Mr. William Tinsley."
The girl made a little old-fashioned courtesy with a quaint grace that
charmed the laborers.
"Do you want me to cook and clean for you?"
"Of course we do! What can you cook?"
"I have learned to cook some very good dishes at the Mountain Mission
School. Maybe you would not like them, though."
"Of course we would like them! When can you start?"
"When you wish!"
"Well, I wish now," put in Bill. "I never tasted meaner coffee than you
made last night except what I made myself this morning, and as for your
method of broiling bacon--rotten--rotten!"
The girl followed Lewis to the Englishman's cabin and after being shown
the provisions, she said she thought she could manage to get dinner
without his assistance. He showed her how to light the hard alcohol
stove which was part of their outfit and then gave her carte blanche
with the canned goods and groceries.
Gwen shook her head in disapproval at sight of the pile of dirty dishes
left from breakfast. It would take more than West Point training to make
men wash dishes as soon as a meal is over. Lewis and Bill had a method
of their own and never washed a plate until both sides had been eaten
from, and not then until they were needed immediately. Supper had been
eaten from the top side; breakfast, from the bottom. There were still
some clean plates in the hamper, so why wash those yet?
In an incredibly short time Gwen called the young men to dinner. They
lay stretched at their ease on a grassy slope near the cabin, quite
pleased with themselves and their luck in having found a mule to move
the dirt and a girl to cook their food all in one morning.
"What do you make of her?" asked Lewis. "She doesn't talk or walk like a
mountain girl."
"Mission School!" commented Bill, looking at the slim, erect back of the
girl as she went up the hill to the spring. She had refused their offer
of help and said she wanted to get the water herself.
"I don't believe Mission School would have her walking that way. Don't
you fancy the boy goes to school, too? Look how he slouches."
Just then the boy, whose name was Josh, appeared, leading Josephus.
Surely there never was such a specimen of horse flesh as that mule.
Maud in the comic supplement was beautiful compared to him. His legs had
great lumps on them and he was forced to walk with his feet quite far
apart to keep from interfering. He was sway backed and spavined and
blind in one eye, but there was a kindly expression in his remaining eye
that reassured one. One fore leg was shorter than the other, which gave
him a leaning, tumbling look that seemed to threaten to upset his
equilibrium at every step.
"Well, God bless my soul!" exclaimed Lewis. "Is that Josephus?"
"Yes, sir! He ain't so measly as he looks. He kin do a sight of scrapin'
an' dumpin'," and the boy reached an affectionate arm up around the old
animal's neck. Josephus responded by snorting in his master's ear. "We
uns done brought the implee-ment to make Aunty's shawl," pointing to a
rusty old road shovel that Josephus had hitched to him.
"Good! as soon as Miss Gwen feeds us, we will see what he can do in the
way of fancy work."
Gwen was a born cook and the domestic science that had been so ably
taught in the Mission School had developed her talent wonderfully. She
had turned up two empty boxes and smoothed some wrapping paper over
them. A bunch of mountain laurel glorified an old soup can and made a
beautiful centre piece. The coffee was hot and clear and strong; the
hoecake brown and crisp on the outside and soft and creamy within, just
as a hoecake should be; the bacon vied with the hoecake in crispness,
with no pieces limp and none burned. She had opened a can of baked beans
and another of spaghetti, carefully following the directions on the cans
as how to serve the contents.
"Well, don't this beat all?" said Bill as he sank down by the improvised
table.
"But you must come and eat with us, you and Josh," insisted Lewis.
"Oh, no, the table isn't big enough, and, besides, I must go on baking
hoecakes."
"Well, Josh, you come, anyhow."
"No, sir, thanky! We uns will wait for Gwen. We uns ain't fitten to sit
down with the likes of you uns, all dirty with we uns' meat a-stickin'
through the rags."
"Nonsense!" exclaimed Lewis, "if you are fit to sit with Miss Gwen, you
are fit to sit with us. We don't mind your meat sticking through, and as
for being dirty--why don't you wash?"
Gwen gave a laugh of delight. "There now, Josh, what do I tell you all
the time? Rags don't make a bit of difference if you are just clean."
"Wal, we uns'll eat with Josephus if we uns has to wash. This ain't no
time of the week for washin'." But while the young men were enjoying the
very appetizing food, Josh did sneak off to the stream and came back
with his face and hands several shades fairer.
That afternoon was a busy one for all on that mountain side. Gwen gave
the cabin a thorough cleaning, washed all the dishes and put papers on
the shelves that were already in the cabin, unpacked the provisions and
placed them with the dishes neatly on the shelves and in the old
cupboard that still stood in the corner, left there by the Englishman.
She went back to her home for yeast and made up a sponge, planning to
have hot rolls for breakfast.
Josephus showed the mettle of his pasture by scraping and dumping about
three times as much dirt in an hour as the two West Pointers had been
able to move in a whole morning's work. Josh did very spirited driving,
pretending all the time that his steed had to be handled very carefully
or he would run away, road-shovel and all.
"How did your mule happen to have one leg shorter than the other?"
teased Lewis.
"Wal, that's a mounting leg. He got that walkin' round the mounting. All
critters in the mountings is built that a way. Ain't you an' Mr. Bill
there a-planning that there buildin' after we unses' mule, with short
legs up the hill an' long legs down?"
Bill almost fell out of the poplar tree where he had climbed to saw off
limbs for twenty feet or more. He laughed so loud and long at the way
Josh had gotten ahead of his friend in repartee that Gwen came out of
the cabin to see what was the matter. Bill's laugh was a very
disconcerting thing until you got used to him.
That first day showed much accomplished. The excavating was half done;
the post holes were dug and logs cut and trimmed and planted ready for
the beams. A load of lumber arrived before sundown and that meant no
delay in the to-morrow's work.
Six o'clock found them very tired and hungry but Gwen had supper all
ready for them, a great dish of scrambled eggs and flannel cakes. She
had brought from home a pitcher of milk that stayed delightfully cool in
the mountain spring.
"There'll be buttermilk to-morrow," she said, blushing with pleasure at
the praise the young men bestowed on her culinary efforts.
"Splendid and more splendid!" exclaimed Lewis. "And will you and your
brother just come every day and take care of us?"
"You mean Josh? He is not my brother."
"Oh, cousin, then?"
"No, he is no relation to me. I live with his mother, though, Aunt
Mandy. I have lived with her for five years. I am very fond of Josh, but
if he were my brother, I'd simply make him take baths."
"Can't you anyhow as it is?"
"No," sadly. "He thinks it is foolishness. Teacher has told him time and
time again and even sent him home, five miles across the mountains, but
he won't wash for her or for me. Aunt Mandy thinks it is foolishness,
too, but she makes him bathe oftener than he used to in summer."
"Boys will be boys and it is hard to make them anything else. I remember
the time well when bathing was something that I thought grown-ups
wished on me just for spite, and now a cold shower every morning is as
necessary to my happiness as dirt used to be when I was a kid. Bill and
I are going to pipe from the spring up there and concoct a shower
somehow under the pavilion."
"That will be glorious. Father always meant to use that spring and get a
shower at the cabin."
"Your father!"
"Yes, my father was the man who built the Englishman's cabin. He died
five years ago."
"Gee whilikins! Now I understand!"