The Best of Mary Roberts Rinehart

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  For Mr. Wiggins Tish and I generally send the same things each year--Tish a wreath of autumn foliage and I a sheaf of wheat tied with a lavender ribbon. The program seldom varies. We drive to the cemetery in the afternoon and Aggie places the sheaf and the wreath on Mr. Wiggins's last resting-place, after first removing the lavender ribbon, of which she makes cap bows through the year and an occasional pin-cushion or fancy-work bag; then home to chicken and waffles, which had been Mr. Wiggins's favorite meal. In the evening Charlie Sands generally comes in and we play a rubber or two of bridge.

  On the thirtieth anniversary of Mr. Wiggins's falling off a roof and breaking his neck, Tish was late in arriving, and I found Aggie sitting alone, dressed in black, with a tissue-paper bundle in her lap. I put my sheaf on the table and untied my bonnet-strings.

  "Where's Tish?" I asked.

  "Not here yet."

  Something in Aggie's tone made me look at her. She was eyeing the bundle in her lap.

  "I got a paler shade of ribbon this time," I said, seeing she made no comment on the sheaf. "It's a better color for me if you're going to make my Christmas present out of it this year again. Where's Tish's wreath?"

  "Here." Aggie pointed dispiritedly to the bundle in her lap and went on rocking.

  "That! That's no wreath."

  In reply Aggie lifted the tissue paper and shook out, with hands that trembled with indignation, a lace-and-linen centerpiece. She held it up before me and we eyed each other over it. Both of us understood.

  "Tish is changed, Lizzie," Aggie said hollowly. "Ask her for bread these days and she gives you a Cluny-lace fandangle. On mother's anniversary she sent me a set of doilies; and when Charlie Sands was in the hospital with appendicitis she took him a pair of pillow shams. It's that Syrian!"

  Both of us knew. We had seen Tish's apartment change from a sedate and spinsterly retreat to a riot of lace covers on the mantel, on the backs of chairs, on the stands, on the pillows--everywhere. We had watched her Marseilles bedspreads give way to hem-stitched covers, with bolsters to match. We had seen Tish go through a cold winter clad in a succession of sleazy silk kimonos instead of her flannel dressing-gown; terrible kimonos--green and yellow and red and pink, that looked like fruit salads and were just as heating.

  "It's that dratted Syrian!" cried Aggie--and at that Tish came in. She stood inside the door and eyed us.

  "What about him?" she demanded. "If I choose to take a poor starving Christian youth and assist him by buying from him what I need--what I need!--that's my affair, isn't it? Tufik was starving and I took him in."

  "He took you in, all right!" Aggie sniffed. "A great, mustached, dirty, palavering foreigner, who's probably got a harem at home and no respect for women!"

  Tish glanced at my sheaf and at the centerpiece. She was dressed as she always dressed on Mr. Wiggins's day--in black; but she had a new lace collar with a jabot, and we knew where she had got it. She saw our eyes on it and she had the grace to flush.

  "Once for all," she snapped, "I intend to look after this unfortunate Syrian! If my friends object, I shall be deeply sorry; but, so far as I care, they may object until they are purple in the face and their tongues hang out. I've been sending my money to foreign missions long enough; I'm doing my missionary work at home now."

  "He'll marry you!" This from Aggie.

  Tish ignored her. "His father is an honored citizen of Beirut, of the nobility. The family is impoverished, being Christian, and grossly imposed on by the Turks. Tufik speaks French and English as well as Mohammedan. They offered him a high government position if he would desert the Christian faith; but he refused firmly. He came to this country for religious freedom; at any moment they may come after him and take him back."

  A glint of hope came to me. I made a mental note to write to the mayor, or whatever they call him over there, and tell him where he could locate his wandering boy.

  "He loves the God of America," said Tish.

  "Money!" Aggie jeered.

  "And he is so pathetic, so grateful! I told Hannah at noon to-day--that's what delayed me--to give him his lunch. He was starving; I thought we'd never fill him. And when it was over, he stooped in the sweetest way, while she was gathering up the empty dishes, and kissed her hand. It was touching!"

  "Very!" I said dryly. "What did Hannah do?"

  "She's a fool! She broke a cup on his head."

  Mr. Wiggins's anniversary was not a success. Part of this was due to Tish, who talked of Tufik steadily--of his youth; of the wonderful bargains she secured from him; of his belief that this was the land of opportunity--Aggie sniffed; of his familiarity with the Bible and Biblical places; of the search the Turks were making for him. The atmosphere was not cleared by Aggie's taking the Cluny-lace centerpiece to the cemetery and placing it, with my sheaf, on Mr. Wiggins's grave.

  As we got into Tish's machine to go back, Aggie was undeniably peevish. She caught cold, too, and was sneezing--as she always does when she is irritated or excited.

  "Where to?" asked Tish from the driving-seat, looking straight ahead and pulling on her gloves. From where we sat we could still see the dot of white on the grass that was the centerpiece.

  "Back to the house," Aggie snapped, "to have some chicken and waffles and Tufik for dinner!"

  Tish drove home in cold silence. As well as we could tell from her back, she was not so much indignant as she was determined. Thus we do not believe that she willfully drove over every rut and thank-you-ma'am on the road, scattering us generously over the tonneau, and finally, when Aggie, who was the lighter, was tossed against the top and sprained her neck, eliciting a protest from us. She replied in an abstracted tone, which showed where her mind was.

  "It would be rougher on a camel," she said absently. "Tufik was telling me the other day--"

  Aggie had got her head straight by that time and was holding it with both hands to avoid jarring. She looked goaded and desperate; and, as she said afterward, the thing slipped out before she knew she was more than thinking it.

  "Oh, damn Tufik!" she said.

  Fortunately at that moment we blew out a tire and apparently Tish did not hear her. While I was jacking up the car and Tish was getting the key of the toolbox out of her stocking, Aggie sat sullenly in her place and watched us.

  "I suppose," she gibed, "a camel never blows out a tire!"

  "It might," Tish said grimly, "if it heard an oath from the lips of a middle-aged Sunday-school teacher!"

  We ate Mr. Wiggins's anniversary dinner without any great hilarity. Aggie's neck was very stiff and she had turned in the collar of her dress and wrapped flannels wrung out of lamp oil round it. When she wished to address either Tish or myself she held her head rigid and turned her whole body in her chair; and when she felt a sneeze coming on she clutched wildly at her head with both hands as if she expected it to fly off.

  Tufik was not mentioned, though twice Tish got as far as Tu-- and then thought better of it; but her mind was on him and we knew it. She worked the conversation round to Bible history and triumphantly demanded whether we knew that Sodom and Gomorrah are towns to-day, and that a street-car line is contemplated to them from some place or other--it developed later that she meant Tyre and Sidon. Once she suggested that Aggie's sideboard needed new linens, but after a look at Aggie's rigid head she let it go at that.

  No one was sorry when, with dinner almost over, and Aggie lifting her ice-cream spoon straight up in front of her and opening her mouth with a sort of lockjaw movement, the bell rang. We thought it was Charlie Sands. It was not. Aggie faced the doorway and I saw her eyes widen. Tish and I turned.

  A boy stood in the doorway--a shrinking, timid, brown-eyed young Oriental, very dark of skin, very white of teeth, very black of hair--a slim youth of eighteen, possibly twenty, in a shabby blue suit, broken shoes, and a celluloid collar. Twisting between nervous brown fingers, not as clean as they might have been, was a tissue-paper package.

  "My friends!" he said, and smiled.

>   Tish is an extraordinary woman. She did not say a word. She sat still and let the smile get in its work. Its first effect was on Aggie's neck, which she forgot. Tufik's timid eyes rested for a moment on Tish and brightened. Then like a benediction they turned to mine, and came to a stop on Aggie. He took a step farther into the room.

  "My friend's friend are my friend," he said. "America is my friend--this so great God's country!"

  Aggie put down her ice-cream spoon and closed her mouth, which had been open.

  "Come in, Tufik," said Tish; "and I am sure Miss Pilkington would like you to sit down."

  Tufik still stood with his eyes fixed on Aggie, twisting his package.

  "My friend has said," he observed--he was quite calm and divinely trustful--"My friend has said that this is for Miss Pilk a sad day. My friend is my mother; I have but her and God. Unless--but perhaps I have two new friend also--no?"

  "Of course we are your friends," said Aggie, feeling for the table-bell with her foot. "We are--aren't we, Lizzie?"

  Tufik turned and looked at me wistfully. It came over me then what an awful thing it must be to be so far from home and knowing nobody, and having to wear trousers and celluloid collars instead of robes and turbans, and eat potatoes and fried things instead of olives and figs and dates, and to be in danger of being taken back and made into a Mohammedan and having to keep a harem.

  "Certainly," I assented. "If you are good we will be your friends."

  He flashed a boyish smile at me.

  "I am good," he said calmly--"as the angels I am good. I have here a letter from a priest. I give it to you. Read!"

  He got a very dirty envelope from his pocket and brought it round the table to me. "See!" he said. "The priest says: 'Of all my children Tufik lies next my heart.'"

  He held the letter out to me; but it looked as if it had been copied from an Egyptian monument and was about as legible as an outbreak of measles.

  "This," he said gently, pointing, "is the priest's blessing. I carry it ever. It brings me friends." He put the paper away and drew a long breath; then surveyed us all with shining eyes. "It has brought me you."

  We were rather overwhelmed. Aggie's maid having responded to the bell, Aggie ordered ice cream for Tufik and a chair drawn to the table; but the chair Tufik refused with a little, smiling bow.

  "It is not right that I sit," he said. "I stand in the presence of my three mothers. But first--I forget--my gift! For the sadness, Miss Pilk!"

  He held out the tissue-paper package and Aggie opened it. Tufik's gift proved to be a small linen doily, with a Cluny-lace border!

  We were gone from that moment--I know it now, looking back. Gone! We were lost the moment Tufik stood in the doorway, smiling and bowing. Tish saw us going; and with the calmness of the lost sat there nibbling cake and watching us through her spectacles--and raised not a hand.

  Aggie looked at the doily and Tufik looked at her.

  "That's--that's really very nice of you," said Aggie. "I thank you."

  Tufik came over and stood beside her.

  "I give with my heart," he said shyly. "I have had nobody--in all so large this country--nobody! And now--I have you!" Aggie saw--but too late. He bent over and touched his lips to her hands. "The Bible says: 'To him that overcometh I will give the morning star!' I have overcometh--ah, so much!--the sea; the cold, wet England; the Ellis Island; the hunger; the aching of one who has no love, no money! And now--I have the morning star!"

  He looked at us all three at once--Charlie Sands said this was impossible, until he met Tufik. Aggie was fairly palpitant and Tish was smug, positively smug. As for me, I roused with a start to find myself sugaring my ice cream.

  Charlie Sands was delayed that night. He came in about nine o'clock and found Tufik telling us about his home and his people and the shepherds on the hills about Damascus and the olive trees in sunlight. We half-expected Tufik to adopt Charlie Sands as a father; but he contented himself with a low Oriental salute, and shortly after he bowed himself away.

  Charlie Sands stood looking after him and smiling to himself. "Pretty smooth boy, that!" he said.

  "Smooth nothing!" Tish snapped, getting the bridge score. "He's a sad-hearted and lonely boy; and we are going to do the kindest thing--we are going to help him to help himself."

  "Oh, he'll help himself all right!" observed Charlie Sands. "But, since his people are Christians, I wish you'd tell me how he knows so much about the inside of a harem!"

  Seeing that comment annoyed us, he ceased, and we fell to our bridge game; but more than once his eye fell on Aggie's doily, and he muttered something about the Assyrian coming down like a wolf on the fold.

  II

  The problem of Tufik's future was a pressing one. Tish called a meeting of the three of us next morning, and we met at her house. We found her reading about Syria in the encyclopædia, while spread round her on chairs and tables were numbers of silk kimonos, rolls of crocheted lace, shirt-waist patterns, and embroidered linens.

  Hannah let us in. She looked surly and had a bandage round her head, a sure sign of trouble--Hannah always referring a pain in her temper to her ear or her head or her teeth. She clutched my arm in the hall and held me back.

  "I'm going to poison him!" she said. "Miss Lizzie, that little snake goes or I go!"

  "I'm ashamed of you, Hannah!" I replied sternly. "If out of the breadth of her charity Miss Tish wishes to assist a fellow man--"

  Hannah reeled back and freed my arm.

  "My God!" she whispered. "You too!"

  I am very fond of Hannah, who has lived with Tish for many years; but I had small patience with her that morning.

  "I cannot see how it concerns you, anyhow, Hannah," I observed severely.

  Hannah put her apron to her eyes and sniffled into it.

  "Oh, you can't, can't you!" she wailed. "Don't I give him half his meals, with him soft-soapin' Miss Tish till she can't see for suds? Ain't I fallin' over him mornin', noon, and night, and the postman telling all over the block he's my steady company--that snip that's not eighteen yet? And don't I do the washin'? And will you look round the place and count the things I've got to do up every week? And don't he talk to me in that lingo of his, so I don't know whether he's askin' for a cup of coffee or insultin' me?"

  I patted Hannah on the arm. After all, none of the exaltation of a good deed upheld Hannah as it sustained us.

  "We are going to help him help himself, Hannah," I said kindly. "He hasn't found himself. Be gentle with him. Remember he comes from the land of the Bible."

  "Humph!" said Hannah, who reads the newspapers. "So does the plague!"

  The problem we had set ourselves we worked out that morning. As Tish said, the boy ought to have light work, for the Syrians are not a laboring people.

  "Their occupation is--er--mainly pastoral," she said, with the authority of the encyclopædia. "Grazing their herds and gathering figs and olives. If we knew some one who needed a shepherd--"

  Aggie opposed the shepherd idea, however. As she said, and with reason, the climate is too rigorous. "It's all well enough in Syria," she said, "where they have no cold weather; but he'd take his death of pneumonia here."

  We put the shepherd idea reluctantly aside. My own notion of finding a camel for him to look after was negatived by Tish at once, and properly enough I realized.

  "The only camels are in circuses," she said, "and our duty to the boy is moral as well as physical. Circuses are dens of immorality. Of course the Syrians are merchants, and we might get him work in a store. But then again--what chance has he of rising? Once a clerk, always a clerk." She looked round at the chairs and tables, littered with the contents of Tufik's pasteboard suitcase, which lay empty at her feet. "And there is nothing to canvassing from door to door. Look at these exquisite things!--and he cannot sell them. Nobody buys. He says he never gets inside a house door. If you had seen his face when I bought a kimono from him!"

  At eleven o'clock, having found nothing in the "He
lp Wanted" column to fit Tufik's case, Tish called up Charlie Sands and offered Tufik as a reporter, provided he was given no nightwork. But Charlie Sands said it was impossible--that the editors and owners of the paper were always putting on their sons and relatives, and that when there was a vacancy the big advertisers got it. Tish insisted--she suggested that Tufik could run an Arabian column, like the German one, and bring in a lot of new subscribers. But Charlie Sands stood firm.

  At noon Tufik came. We heard a skirmish at the door and Hannah talking between her teeth.

  "She's out," she said.

  "Well, I think she is not out," in Tufik's soft tones.

  "You'll not get in."

  "Ah, but my toes are in. See, my foot wishes to enter!" Then something soft, coaxing, infinitely wistful, in Arabian followed by a slap. The next moment Hannah, in tears, rushed back to the kitchen. There was no sound from the hallway. No smiling Tufik presented himself in the doorway.

  Tish rose in the majesty of wrath. "I could strangle that woman!" she said, and we followed her into the hall.

  Tufik was standing inside the door with his arms folded, staring ahead. He took no notice of us.

  "Tufik!" Aggie cried, running to him. "Did she--did she dare--Tish, look at his cheek!"

  "She is a bad woman!" Tufik said somberly. "I make my little prayer to see Miss Tish, my mother, and she--I kill her!"

  We had a hard time apologizing to him for Hanna. Tish got a basin of cold water so he might bathe his face; and Aggie brought a tablespoonful of blackberry cordial, which is soothing. When the poor boy was calmer we met in Tish's bedroom and Tish was quite firm on one point--Hannah must leave!

  Now, this I must say in my own defense--I was sorry for Tufik; and it is quite true I bought him a suit and winter flannels and a pair of yellow shoes--he asked for yellow. He said he was homesick for a bit of sunshine, and our so somber garb made him heart-sad. But I would never have dismissed a cook like Hannah for him.