“A hurricane!” said Edie. “I thought it was just a big blow. I was in it,” she added modestly. “But then,” she said, looking out at the water thoughtfully, “if that man wasn’t the enemy, he was a burglar.”
“Good heavens!” said the officer again. He turned sharply and reached in his pocket. “Good holy heavens! Why didn’t you say so?” He put a whistle to his mouth and blew it sharply and hard. Whistles began blowing all up and down the shore.
“Where did you say he had gone?” the officer asked.
“I’ll show you,” said Edie.
“At the double, men,” said the officer. “This young lady thinks she’s seen what we’re looking for.”
Edie and Widgy at the double led the soldiers back up the piazza steps to the lawn where they very nearly ran over her family as it came round the corner the opposite way.
“Cripes!” said Theodore, as the Militia swept by. “We needn’t have worried about her. She’s got the whole United States Army looking after her.”
“I’ll be back in a minute,” yelled Edie. “Where have you been?”
She led the soldiers to the edge of the tangled bushes by the stable and showed them the tiny path that led through them. “He went in there. But you better look out. He’s armed, and he might have friends.” She felt she should give them all the advice she could, considering what kind of brains they had, and she hoped fervently that that officer really knew what he was talking about and just had not heard about a war.
To her disgust the soldiers again only stood looking while Theodore and Hubert and Jane stood in a knot on the veranda waiting to see how she was going to manage things.
“That ain’t no place to get caught in,” said one soldier. “Shoot us down like flies.”
“No, it ain’t at that,” said another, feeling his chin.
But the officer blew his whistle again and gave orders.
“Surround this patch of bushes,” he said. “Get going!”
The soldiers trotted off to right and left, and the officer stayed at the entrance to the path. “Sergeant, you go down by the beach and alert that bunch at the other end.”
Edie, while she waited, had a sudden belated thought.
“But what’s he done?” she asked. “You never told me what he’d done. He didn’t take anything from Aunt Louise’s.” You really couldn’t count a pair of Theodore’s old pants.
“Little girl,” said the officer, “go home now and sell your papers. You’ve given us a good lead and we thank you, but it’s dangerous here.” He looked her in the eye. “And take your dog with you. He might get stepped on.”
Edie started walking backwards under his look. She really hated going back to Aunt Louise’s and to her old family who had probably only been down to the village after all. That burglar was hers! At least she ought to be told what he had done. She was worried about it. It was terrible to have to think that she had arranged to have somebody put in jail when he hadn’t done anything but try to take Theodore’s pants, when he wasn’t even the enemy.
“Ted, what did he do? That’s what I want to know. Why don’t you answer? Where have you guys been anyway? I might be dead by this time.”
“Not you,” said Theodore.
“We’ve been under arrest, cock-eye, if you want to know,” said Hubert.
“I might have known you’d do something to get arrested for,” said Edie. “But if you’d be so condescending as to explain the smallest thing—” She pushed past them hurriedly and went up to her room where she slammed the door behind her and flung herself across the bed. If she had had a man caught and jailed, electrocuted for all she knew, she would never get over it for the rest of her life. Those militias were stupid enough to do anything.
It was not long before Jane knocked, and she had to sit up quickly on the edge of the bed to show there was nothing the matter. Theodore and Hubert sat down on the other bed and Jane wandered around. They had come, they said politely, to tell her what had been going on, if she felt in the mood to hear. Edie nodded.
What had happened was that there had been a big hullabaloo over at fat Mrs. Johnson’s next door while they were in the middle of breakfast. She, Edie, must have been dead drunk asleep not to have heard it. And naturally they had gone to see what was up. They had only meant to be gone a minute.
“Cook and Gander too?” asked Edie.
“They’re still there,” said Jane, “under suspicion.”
“And so were we,” said Hubert, “until ten minutes ago. I must say soldiers have awfully little judgment.”
“That’s what I think,” said Edie.
Well, when they got there, all the doors at Mrs. Johnson’s had been wide open, so they walked in, and there was nobody there. The hullabaloo had gone off somewhere else. Cook and Gander, once on the scent, had followed it apparently because they were brought back pretty soon with a soldier on each arm. They were shoved in the door, and one of the soldiers had asked Ted if those females belonged to him.
“And he said—” said Jane.
“And I said,” said Theodore, getting up and pacing up and down like Jane.
“He said `God forbid,’ ” said Jane very quickly.
“I also said I would take care of them for a while if he so desired.”
“And then the soldier said he’d take care of them and us too,” said Hubert.
Ted had argued with the soldier. “Quite reasonably for him,” said Jane, and told him just how they got there and why, but it did no good. He had his orders and “in the army, kid,” he said, “you do what you’re told.”
“I bet he hadn’t been told to give Cook a poke with his gun butt,” said Hubert.
“Well, it shut her up.”
But not Gander—you couldn’t shut her up if the sky was coming down. She said: “If you touch me with your filthy weapons, young man, you’ll be the worse for it.”
“So I’m filthy, am I?” said the soldier. “All right, you’re all under arrest.”
“But what for,” said Edie, rocking back and forth. “You never say what for.”
“For fat Mrs. Johnson’s fat jewelry,” said Hubert, lying back on the bed and yawning. “Somebody took it. By the way, did you know we’d had a hurricane?”
They had had to stay there for hours while the soldier leaned against the wall with his hat on the back of his head. He said he was waiting for orders.
“Mrs. Johnson’s house is not as bad as ours,” said Jane.
“Just the same she went to stay at her brother’s, leaving her jewills behind her,” said Hubert.
“Who took them?”
“You’re the only one who knows, sweetheart,” said Theodore. “How about telling us.”
She was? How? When did she ever see anybody taking jewels? Oh my, said Edie’s mind. Of course. It was the Enemy. That man. He probably had them in his pocket right then and he had come into Aunt Louise’s because he knew nobody was there. He had come to change his clothes, get something to eat, and get away. Widgy had foiled him!
She told them about it and they listened respectfully. Even Theodore said: “Ck—ck,” every so often and pounded his fists together. On account of this and their respectfulness, she left out the part about the boys being runts. She was almost sure they would not like it.
“Too bad you couldn’t have shut him in somewhere. That would have showed ’em,” said Ted at the end.
“Well, he was a whole lot bigger than me,” said Edie apologetically.
Finally they had to stop talking—no, not stop, but anyway go downstairs and see about cleaning up the house. Gander had said flatly that she could not do it alone, no, not even after she got out of the hands of “them doughfaces.” It was too much for her entirely, and as they could not go anywhere, it didn’t seem a bad thing to do. Besides, last night the boys had towed back from across the harbor quite a few pieces of Aunt Louise’s furniture, and because it was soaked with salt water, it would have to be drenched down with the hose. A delightfu
l job. Which, of course, was undertaken by the boys simply because it was no use Jane and Edie thinking they could get the hose away from them.
“It’ll never regain its pristine beauty,” said Hubert sadly, when it was set up on the lawn and he and Ted were in their bathing suits hopping around and sprinkling each other, “but we’ll do what we can.”
Jane and Edie reminded them, before they went to get mops and pails, about the gasoline pump and no bath water, but they only answered: “All the better for you, my dears, you won’t have to wash.”
Just the same they worked very hard all the rest of the morning, and themselves sloshed a good deal of water pleasantly through the parlor and wicker chair room, in the end sweeping it out the door and letting the boys run it off the veranda boards. Their knees got sore crawling along and wiping the baseboards, and they said to each other that they bet a lot of the dirt was much older than the hurricane. Edie heard all the news there was to hear. That Mrs. Johnson had come back from her brother’s and they were released and shown the house and what had happened to it, which wasn’t very bad, and the very place where the jewels had been taken from, a real safe in the dining room. “So somebody must have known the combination,” said Jane.
“Who?” said Edie.
“How do I know,” said Jane. “Mrs. Johnson said she kept it in her head, so I don’t suppose anybody could get it out of there without an operation.”
“Very funny!” said Edie. “Do you think they’ll catch that man, Jane?”
“Probably they will,” said Jane, getting up and trying to straighten out. “Come on. That’s good enough. Let’s see if we’re going to get any lunch.”
Gander was just coming in to tell them that they were. “But you’re to go to the lady yonder for your dinners this night,” she added. “Cook’s all asthray,” even though Mrs. Johnson, she told them, had finally convinced the army they were not thieves.
“What about her cook?” asked Jane.
“Sure her help’s all come back to her,” said Gander, “after being scattered like hens from the fright. And the butler himself down on his knees with his coat off scrubbing with the best of them. I never thought I’d see the day.”
“Look what we’ve done,” said Edie. “You might appreciate it.”
“Save us and bless us,” said Gander. “’Tis one miracle after the other and no mistake.”
As for themselves, they stayed dirty the whole day. Such a tremendous cleaning would have to be done for Mrs. Johnson’s dinner that it seemed foolish to do anything beforehand. Even Theodore, who was getting so that he prinked quite a lot, especially for Mrs. Palmer, was “a sight to be’old” as Hood was always saying about the children. They ate standing up, just because it was a waste of time to sit down, and every once in a while they sent a scout into the outside world. When it was Hubert, he said when he came back: “I think the guy got away. All those rookies are back where they were, and just as fresh as ever. Otherwise the dove of peace has descended on the world.”
It seemed too bad to spend the last lovely evening they would have without Mr. Parker or Hood or the children all dressed up at fat Mrs. Johnson’s, but Hubert remarked about six o’clock that he would sell his birthright for a mess of pottage any time, only he hoped it was going to be a good one. Gander very kindly brought out some hot buttered toast and tea about four, but that was worked off in no time hanging the damp rolls of the player piano on the blueberry bushes. Theodore, when he at last had time to think about it, thought they might be saved. Edie had worked desperately.
“You really are a sight, Edith,” said her brother kindly. “You better leave time to hang yourself out somewhere for a while.”
Edie didn’t care what he said at all. She was sure that the player piano was going to be all right again. Quite easily she could let the mice go. There would probably very soon be some more. And anyway, she thought, Ted might have taken his own advice when she saw how he looked to go to Mrs. Johnson’s. There were separate drops of water on every hair at the back of his neck.
Fat Mrs. Johnson was on the harbor-side terrace to greet them because she had been watching the white yacht that had been blown on the rocks in the narrows. It seemed to her strange that no one was doing anything about it. They had to make conversation with her so long that Hubert tightened his belt.
“I just thought I’d give her a hint,” he said later.
She didn’t take it, however. Even after the butler had come out and announced dinner behind their backs, they had to stand there and keep wondering about the white yacht. “Just as if,” said Theodore, “it hadn’t been her who sent for the army and kept us all from doing anything in the first place.” His own boat, he wished them to observe, was still under water.
It was Edie who managed to stop her.
“We’ve got a sloop on our lawn,” she said. “It’s almost in the front door.”
“Imagine!” said Mrs. Johnson. “Don’t let her sloop you, my dear.”
They all said “Ha, ha,” out of positive gratitude, because she turned at last and led the way into the dining room. Once there, they could enjoy themselves, even for a short while without any food, because they could always be sure that her dining table would be quite a wonder, and this time in spite of everything it was the same. How did she do it? All the fruit in the middle was real and so were the nasturtiums in little vases at the four corners. They had been out to look at Aunt Louise’s sweet pea garden, and every blossom had been torn to shreds. It added so much to the questions they wanted to ask that they felt stifled while the maid brought in the soup and Mrs. Johnson told them that the white yacht on the rocks, she thought, belonged to some people called White. “Quite a coincidence, isn’t it?”
“Believe you and me,” said Theodore enthusiastically. “Mrs. Johnson,” he said louder than usual before she could begin again, “how did you manage to save all your stuff? Ours went right across the harbor.”
“My new James,” said Mrs. Johnson. “That’s my butler, my dear. My wonderful new James. He stayed right here and hung onto the door.”
“Your water couldn’t have been as high as ours,” said Edie, putting down her soup spoon. “Ours smashed the door.”
“He says it was very high,” said Mrs. Johnson, “and you’re sitting on the furniture this minute. I don’t think you were here to see what he did,” she added severely, stretching her stoutness, “so perhaps you’ll believe your elders.”
Theodore nudged Edie and Hubert kicked her under the table to make her shut up and not argue with a hostess, but she did not like it, so she looked down hard at her place while the wonderful new James changed the plates.
“Would you tell us about your jewels, Mrs. Johnson,” said Jane politely, trying to break the uncomfortable silence.
“Hush, my dear,” said Mrs. Johnson, “do hush.” She put her finger to her lips. “Everyone’s so sensitive, you know. James,” she said, as the butler came into the room again, “show these young people how you held the door.”
“Certainly, Madam,” said James as he put the chicken on a side table. “It was like this, Madam, with the waves beating on the outside.” He went to the glass door, bolted it, and stood with his knee and foot pressed hard against it. They all watched his back and saw the muscles standing out under his butler’s coat. They had to believe he had done it all right. Edie watched particularly, thinking he must be a marvelous kind of man. Why hadn’t Theodore and Hubert thought of that? She sat with her head down in to her shoulders with admiration.
“That’s how it was, Madam,” said James, turning to face them.
Edie spent one more second with her head in her shoulders. Then she sat up, but something told her to do it slowly. This man was the Enemy! She knew it as plain as day. Mrs. Johnson’s wonderful new James was the Enemy. Was she going crazy? Maybe he had a twin brother or something. When he passed her the chicken, she dropped the serving spoon and it went clattering to the floor. As he picked it up, the long dark ha
ir that she had seen fell over his forehead and he had to put it back with two fingers. She had seen him do that too. It was the same man all right and his gun would be in his pocket. She was going to have to be awfully, awfully careful.
Edie’s being so careful completely took away her power of eating, and as fat Mrs. Johnson liked everybody to eat including herself, she began to fuss.
“The child’s stomach must be out of order,” she said. “Can’t you eat all that good food, my dear?”
Edie took some of everything and tried putting it in in little bits, but with the Enemy stirring round the dining room her throat would not swallow. What was she going to do? Should she yell? Mrs. Johnson wouldn’t believe her and the Enemy would have time to shoot them all as dead as doornails.
“I feel sick to my stomach,” she said, raising her eyes to Mrs. Johnson’s.
“Go outside, my dear. Outside quickly. Don’t be sick in here. There’s been enough for one day.”
“Do you want me to come?” asked Jane.
“No, nobody come,” said Edie, getting up slowly and walking out. James was passing the vegetable and looked at her. She tried by stiffening all over to control her blood so that she wouldn’t get red.
“Miss Edith has a stomach-ache,” said Mrs. Johnson. “Go right ahead, James. The excitement has upset her.”
“Edie never gets upset like that,” said Jane. “I hope she hasn’t got appendicitis.”
“Don’t invite trouble, child,” said Mrs. Johnson.
They all watched Edie as she sat down on the terrace steps waiting, apparently, to be sick.
“She might go a little farther away,” said Mrs. Johnson. “James, tell Miss Edith to move out of sight.”
“She might need help, Madam,” said James, watching Edie over his shoulder, and kept on passing.
Edie looked out to sea and wondered if she were sure, absolutely sure. She had only seen him in glimpses. But, as she thought, she became surer, because she understood what he must have done. Gone into those bushes and then turned out of them behind the stable, gone past the bridge after the sentry had run over when the lieutenant whistled, and then calmly walked back to Mrs. Johnson’s along the shell road like any ordinary person when everybody was looking for him in the other direction. That settled it. Still, it didn’t settle what to do. Where were those old militias anyway? If she made a dash for the beach, would they still be there and what would James do to her family in the meantime?
Terrible, Horrible Edie Page 14
