CHAPTER XXIX
A BIG NIGHT TO-NIGHT
I carried out the supper to the shelter-house as usual that night, butI might have saved myself the trouble. Mrs. Dicky was sitting on a box,with her hair in puffs and the folding card-table before her, and Mr.Dick was uncorking a bottle of champagne with a nail. There were two orthree queer-smelling cans open on the table.
Mrs. Dick looked at my basket and turned up her nose.
"Put it anywhere, Minnie," she said loftily, "I dare say it doesn'tcontain anything reckless."
"Cold ham and egg salad," I said, setting it down with a slam. "Stewedprunes and boiled rice for dessert. If those cans taste as they smell,you'd better keep the basket to fall back on. Where'd you get THAT?"Mr. Dick looked at me over the bottle and winked. "In the next room,"he said, "iced to the proper temperature, paid for by somebody else, andcoming after a two-weeks' drought! Minnie, there isn't a shadow on myjoy!"
"He'll miss it," I said. But Mr. Dick was pouring out three largetumblersful of the stuff, and he held one out to me.
"Miss it!" he exclaimed. "Hasn't he been out three times to-day, tappinghis little CACHE? And didn't he bring out Moody and the senator and vonInwald this afternoon, and didn't they sit in the next room there fromtwo to four, roaring songs and cracking bottles and jokes."
"Beasts!" Mrs. Dicky said savagely. "Two hours, and we daren't move!"
"Drink, pretty creature!" Mr. Dick said, motioning to my glass. "Don'tbe afraid of it, Minnie; it's food and drink."
"I don't like it," I said, sipping at it. "I'd rather have the springwater."
"You'll have to cultivate a taste for it," he explained. "You'll likethe second half better."
I got it down somehow and started for the door. Mr. Dick came after mewith something that smelled fishy on the end of a fork.
"Better eat something," he suggested. "That was considerable champagne,Minnie."
"Stuff and nonsense," I said. "I was tired and it has rested me. That'sall, Mr. Dick."
"Sure?"
"Certainly," I said with dignity, "I'm really rested, Mr. Dick. Andhappy--I'm very happy, Mr. Dick."
"Perhaps I'd better close the door," he said. "The light may be seen--"
"You needn't close it until I've finished talking," I said. "I've donemy best for you and yours, Mr. Dick. I hope you appreciate it. Nightafter night I've tramped out here through the snow, and lost sleep, andlied myself black in the face--you've no idea how I've had to lie, Mr.Dick."
"Come in and shut the door, Dick," Mrs. Dick called, "I'm freezing."
That made me mad.
"Exactly," I said, glaring at her through the doorway. "Exactly--I canwade through the snow, bringing you meals that you scorn--oh, yes, youscorn them. What did you do to the basket tonight? Look at it, lyingthere, neglected in a corner, with p--perfectly good ham and stewedfruit in it."
All of a sudden I felt terrible about the way they had treated thebasket, and I sat down on the steps and began to cry. I remember that,and Mr. Dick sitting down beside me and putting his arm around me andcalling me "good old Minnie," and for heaven's sake not to cry so loud.But I was past caring. I had a sort of recollection of his getting me tostand up, and our walking through about twenty-one miles of snow to thespring-house. When we got there he stood off in the twilight and lookedat me.
"I'm sorry, Minnie," he said, "I never dreamed it would do that."
"Do what?"
"Nothing. You're sure you won't forget?"
"I never forget," I said. I had got up the steps by this time and wastrying to figure why the spring-house door had two knobs.
I hadn't any idea what he meant.
"Remember," he said, very slowly, "Thoburn is going to have hisparty to-night instead of to-morrow. Tell Pierce that. To-night, notto-morrow." I was pretty well ashamed when I got in the spring-house andsat down in the dark. I kept saying over and over to myself, so I'd notforget, "tonight, not to-morrow," but I couldn't remember WHAT was to beto-night. I was sleepy, too, and my legs were cold and numb. I remembergoing into the pantry for a steamer rug, and sitting down there for aminute, with the rug around my knees before I started to the house. Andthat is all I DO remember.
I was wakened by a terrible hammering in the top of my head. I reachedout for the glass of water that I always put beside my bed at night andI touched a door-knob instead. Then I realized that the knocking wasn'tall in my head. There was a sort of steady movement of feet on the otherside of the door, with people talking and laughing. And above it allrose the steady knock--knock of somebody beating on tin.
"Can't do it." It was the bishop's voice. "I am convinced that nothingbut dynamite will open this tin of lobster."
"Just a moment, Bishop," Mr. Thoburn's voice and the clink of bottles,"I have a can opener somewhere. You'll find the sauce a la Newburg--"
"Here, somebody, a glass, quick! A bottle's broken!"
"Did anybody remember to bring salt and pepper?"
"DEAR Mr. Thoburn!" It sounded like Miss Cobb. "Think of thinking of allthis!"
"The credit is not mine, dear lady," Mr. Thoburn said. "Where the deuceis that corkscrew? No, dear lady, man makes his own destiny, but hisbirth date remains beyond his control."
"Ladies and gentlemen," somebody said, "to Mr. Thoburn's birthday beingbeyond his control!"
There was the clink of glasses, but I had remembered what it had beenthat I was to remember. And now it was too late. I was trapped in thepantry of my spring-house and Mr. Pierce was probably asleep. I clutchedmy aching head and tried to think. I was roused by hearing somebody saythat Miss Jennings had no glass, and by steps nearing the pantry. I hadjust time to slip the bolt.
"Pantry's locked!" said a voice.
"Drat that Minnie!" somebody else said. "The girl's a nuisance."
"Hush!" Miss Summers said. "She's probably in there now--taking downwhat we say and what we eat. Convicting us out of our own mouths."
I held my breath and the knob rattled. Then they found a glass for MissPatty and forgot the pantry.
Under cover of the next burst of noises I tried the pantry window, butit was frozen shut. Nothing but a hammer would have loosened it. I beganto dig at it with a wire hairpin, but I hadn't much hope.
The fun in the spring-house was getting fast and furious. Miss Summerswas leaning against the pantry door and I judged that most of the menin the room were around her, as usual. I put my ear to the panel ofthe door, and I could pretty nearly see what was going on. They weretoasting Mr. Thoburn, and getting hungrier every minute as the supperwas put out on the card-tables.
"To the bottle!" somebody said. "In infancy, the milk bottle; in ourprime, the wine bottle; in our dotage, the pill bottle."
Mr. von Inwald came over and stood beside Miss Summers, and I could hearevery whisper.
"I have good news for you," she said in an undertone.
"Oh! And what?"
"Sh! You may recall," she said, "the series of notes, letters, epistles,with which you have been honoring me lately?"
"How could I forget? They were written in my heart's blood!"
"Indeed!" Her voice lifted its eyebrows, so to speak. "Well, somebodygot in my room last night and stole I dare say a pint of your heart'sblood. They're gone."
He was pretty well upset, as he might be, and she stood by and listenedto the things he said, which, if they were as bad in English as theysounded in German, I wouldn't like to write down.
And when he cooled down and condensed, as you may say, into English,he said Miss Jennings must have seen the letters, for she would hardlyspeak to him. And Miss Summers said she hoped Miss Jennings had--she wastoo nice a girl to treat shamefully.
And after he had left her there alone, I heard a sort of scratchingon the door behind Miss Summers' back, and then something being shovedunder the door. I stooped down and picked it up. It was a key!
I struck a match, and I saw by the tag that it was the one to the olddoctor's rooms. I knew right off what it meant.
Mr. Pierce had gone tobed, or pretended to throw them off the track and Thoburn had locked himin! Thoburn hadn't taken any chances. He knew the influence Mr. Piercehad over them all, and he and his champagne and tin cans had to get intheir work before Mr. Pierce had another chance at them.
I had no time to wonder how Miss Summers knew I was in the pantry.I tried the window again, but it wouldn't work. Somebody in thespring-house was shouting, "'Hot butter blue beans, please come tosupper!'" and I could hear them crowding around the tables. I workedfrantically with the hairpin, and just then two shadowy figures outsideslipped around the corner of the building. It was Mr. Pierce and DoctorBarnes!
I darted back and put my ear to the door, but they did not come in atonce. Mr. Thoburn made a speech, saying how happy he was that they wereall well and able to go back to civilization again, where the broiledlobster flourished like a green bay tree and the prune and the cabbagewere unknown.
There was loud applause, and then Senator Biggs cleared his throat.
"Ladies and gentlemen, distinguished fellow guests," he began, "Isuggest a toast to the autocrat of Hope Springs. It is the only blot onthe evening, that, owing to the exigencies of the occasion, he can notbe with us. Securely fastened in his room, he is now sleeping the sleepthat follows a stomach attuned to prunes, a mind attuned to rule."
"Eat, drink and be merry!" somebody said, "for to-morrow you diet!"
There was a swish and rustle, as if a woman got up in a hurry.
"Do you mean," said Miss Patty's clear voice, "that you have dared tolock Mr. Pier--Mr. Carter in his room?"
"My dear young lady," several of them began, but she didn't give themtime.
"It is outrageous, infamous!" she stormed. I didn't need to see her toknow how she looked.
"How DARE you! Suppose the building should catch fire!"
"Fire!" somebody said in a bewildered voice. "My dear young lady--"
"Don't 'my dear young lady' me," she said angrily. "Father, Bishop, willyou stand for this? Why, he may jump out the window and hurt himself!Give me the key!"
Miss Julia's fingers were beating a tatoo behind her, as if she wasafraid I might miss it.
"If he jumps out he probably will hurt himself. It is impossible torelease him now, Miss Jennings, but if you insist we can have a mattressplaced under the window."
"Thanks, Thoburn. It won't be necessary." The voice came from the door,and a hush fell on the party. I slipped my bolt and peeped out. Framedin the doorway was Mr. Pierce, with Doctor Barnes looking over hisshoulder.
The people in the spring-house were abject. That's the only word for it.Craven, somebody suggested later, and they were that, too. They smiledsickly grins and tried to be defiant, and most of them tried to put downwhatever they held in their hands and to look innocent. If you ever sawa boy when his school-teacher asks him what he has in his mouth, andmultiply the boy thirty times in number and four times in size, you'llknow how they looked.
Mr. Pierce never smiled. He wouldn't let them speak a word in defenseor explanation. He simply lined them up as he did at gym, and sent them,one by one, to the corner with whatever they had in their hands. Hemade Mr. Jennings give up a bottle of anchovies that he'd stuffed in hispocket, and the bishop had to come over with a cheese.
And when it was all over, he held the door open and they went backto the house. They fairly ducked past him in the doorway, although hehadn't said a dozen words. It was a rout. The backbone of the rebellionwas broken. I knew that never again would the military discipline ofHope Springs be threatened. Thoburn might as well pack and go. It wasMr. Pierce's day.
Mr. von Inwald was almost the last. He stood by, sneering, with an openbottle of olives in his hand, watching the others go out.
Mr. Pierce held the door open and eyed him.
"I'll trouble you to put that bottle with the others, in the corner,"Mr. Pierce said sternly.
They stood glaring at each other angrily.
"And if I refuse?"
"You know the rules here. If you refuse, there is a hotel atFinleyville."
Mr. von Inwald glanced past Mr. Pierce to where Doctor Barnes stoodbehind him, with his cauliflower ear and his pugilist's shoulders. Thenhe looked at the bottle in his hand, and from it to Miss Patty, standinghaughtily by.
"I have borne much for you, Patricia," he said, "but I refuse to bebullied any longer. I shall go to the hotel at Finleyville, and I shalltake the little olives with me." He smiled unpleasantly at Mr. Pierce,whose face did not relax.
He walked jauntily to the door and turned, flourishing the bottle. "Theland of the free and the home of the brave!" he sneered, raising thebottle in the air. Standing jeering in the doorway, he bowed to MissPatty and Mr. Pierce, and put an olive into his mouth.
But instantly he made a terrible face, and clapped a hand just in frontof his left ear. He stood there a moment, his face distorted--then hedarted into the night, and I never saw him again.
"Mumps!" Doctor Barnes ejaculated, and stood staring after him from thesteps.
CHAPTER XXX
LET GOOD DIGESTION
There was no one left but Miss Patty. As she started out past him witha crimson spot in each cheek Mr. Pierce put his hand on her arm. Shehesitated, and he closed the door on Doctor Barnes and put his backagainst it. I had just time to slip back into the pantry and shut myselfin.
For a minute there wasn't a sound. Then--
"I told you I should come," Miss Patty said, in her haughtiest manner."You need not trouble to be disagreeable."
"Disagreeable!" he repeated. "I am abject!"
"I don't understand," she said. "But you needn't explain. It really doesnot matter."
"It matters to me. I had to do this to-night. I promised you I wouldmake good, and if I had let this pass--Don't you see, I couldn't let itgo."
"You can let me go, now."
"Not until I have justified myself to you."
"I am not interested."
I heard him take a step or two toward her.
"I don't quite believe that," he said in a low tone. "You wereinterested in what I said here this afternoon."
"I didn't hear it."
"None of it?"
"Not--not all."
"I spoke, you remember, about your sister, and about Dick--" he paused.I could imagine her staring at him in her wide-eyed way.
"You never mentioned them!" she said scornfully and stopped. He laughed,a low laugh, boyish and full of triumph.
"Ah!" he said. "So you DID hear! I'm going to say it again, anyhow. Ilove you, Patty. I'm--I'm mad for you. I've loved you hopelessly for solong that to-night, when there's a ray of hope, I'm--I'm hardly sane.I--"
"Please!" she said.
"I love you so much that I waken at night just to say your name, overand over, and when dawn comes through the windows--"
"You don't know what you are saying!" she said wildly. "I am--still--"
"I welcome the daylight," he went on, talking very fast, "because itmeans another day when I can see you. If it sounds foolish, it's--it'sreally lots worse than it sounds, Patty."
The door opened just then, and Doctor Barnes' voice spoke from the step.
"I say," he complained, "you needn't--"
"Get out!" Mr. Pierce said angrily, and the door slammed. The second'sinterruption gave him time, I think, to see how far he'd gone, and hisvoice, when he spoke again, was not so hopeful.
"I'm not pleading my cause," he said humbly, "I know I haven't anycause. I have nothing to offer you."
"You said this afternoon," Miss Patty said softly, "that you could offerme the--the kind of love that a woman could be proud of."
She finished off with a sort of gasp, as if she was shocked at herself.I was so excited that my heart beat a tatoo against my ribs, and withoutmy being conscious of it, as you may say, the pantry door opened aboutan inch and I found myself with an eye to the crack.
They were standing facing each other, he all flushed and eager and mydear Miss Patty pale an
d trembly. But she wasn't shy. She was lookingstraight into his eyes and her blessed lips were quivering.
"How can you care?" she asked, when he only stood and looked at her."I've been such a--such a selfish beast!"
"Hush!" He leaned toward her, and I held my breath. "You are everythingthat is best in the world, and I--what can I offer you? I have nothing,not even this sanatorium! No money, no title--"
"Oh, THAT!" she interrupted, and stood waiting. "Well, you--you could atleast offer yourself!"
"Patty!"
She went right over to him and put her hands on his shoulders.
"And if you won't," she said, "I'll offer myself instead!"
His arms went around her like a flash at that, and he kissed her. I'veseen a good many kisses in my day, the spring-house walk being a sortof lover's lane, but they were generally of the quick-get-away variety.This was different. He just gathered her up to him and held her close,and if she was one-tenth as much thrilled as I was in the pantry she'dbe ready to die kissing.
Then, without releasing her, he raised his head, with such a look ofvictory in his face that I still see it sometimes in my sleep, and hiseye caught mine through the crack.
But if I'd looked to see him drop her I was mistaken. He drew her up andkissed her again, but this time on the forehead. And when he'd let hergo and she had dropped into a chair and hid her shining face against theback, as if she was ashamed, which she might well be, he stood laughingover her bent head at me.
"Come out, Minnie!" he called. "Come out and hear the good news!"
"Hear!" I said, "I've seen all the news I want."
"Gracious!" Miss Patty said, and buried her head again. But he hadreached the shameless stage; a man who is really in love always seems toget to that point sooner or later. He stooped and kissed the back of herneck, and if his hand shook when he pushed in one of her shell hairpinsit was excitement and not fright.
"I hardly realize it, Minnie," he said. "I don't deserve her for aminute."
"Certainly not," I said.
"He does." Miss Patty's voice smothered. Then she got up and came overto me.
"There is going to be an awful fuss, Minnie," she said. "Think of AuntHonoria--and Oskar!"
"Let them fuss!" I said grandly. "If the worst comes, you can spend yourhoneymoon in the shelter-house. I'm so used to carrying meals there nowthat it's second nature."
And at that they both made for me, and as Mr. Pierce kissed me DoctorBarnes opened the door. He stood for a moment, looking queer and wild,and then he slammed the door and we heard him stamping down the steps.
Mr. Pierce had to bring him back.
Well, that's all there is to it. The place filled up and stayed filled,but not under Mr. Pierce. Mr. Jennings said ability of his kind waswasted there, once the place was running, and set him to building arailroad somewhere or other, with him and Miss Patty living in a privatecar, and he carrying a portable telephone with him so he can talk to herevery hour or so. Mr. Dick and his wife are running the sanatorium, orthink they are. Doctor Barnes is the whole place, really. Mr. Jenningswas so glad to have Miss Patty give up the prince and send him backhome, after he'd been a week in the hotel at Finleyville looking as ifhis face would collapse if you stuck a pin in it--Mr. Jennings was sohappy, not to mention having worked off his gout at the wood-pile, thathe forgave the Dickys without any trouble, and even went out and had ameal with them in the shelter-house before they moved in, with Mr. Dickmaking the coffee.
I miss the spring, as I said at the beginning. It is hard to teach anold dog new tricks, but with Miss Patty happy, and with Doctor Barnesaround--
Thoburn came out the afternoon before he left, just after the rest hour,and showed me how much too loose his waistcoat had become.
"I've lost, Minnie," he confessed. "Lost fifteen pounds and the dream ofmy life. But I've found something, too."
"What?"
"My waist line!" he said, and threw his chest out.
"You look fifteen years younger," I said, and at that he came over to meand took my hand.
"Minnie," he said, "maybe you and I haven't always agreed, but I'vealways liked you, Minnie--always."
"Thanks," I said, taking my hand away.
"You've got all kinds of spirit," he said. "You've saved the place, allright. And if you--if you tire of this, and want another home, I've gotone, twelve rooms, center hall, tiled baths, cabinet mantels--I'd begood to you, Minnie. The right woman could do anything with me."
When I grasped what he meant, I was staggered.
"I'm sorry," I explained, as gently as I could. "I'm--I'm going to marryDoctor Barnes one of these days."
He stared at me. Then he laughed a little and went toward the door.
"Barnes!" he said, turning. "Another redhead, by gad! Well, I'll tellyou this, young woman, you're red, but he's redder. Your days forrunning things to suit yourself are over."
"I'm glad of it," I retorted. "I want to be managed myself for a change.Somebody," I said, "who won't be always thinking how he feels, unlessit's how he feels toward me."
"Bah! He'll bully you."
"'It's human nature to like to be bullied,'" I quoted. "And I guess I'mnot afraid. He's healthy and a healthy man's never a crank."
"A case of yours for health, eh?" he said, and held out his hand.
THE END
Where There's a Will Page 29
