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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/37289-8.txt b/37289-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..c80f5cb --- /dev/null +++ b/37289-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6042 @@ +Project Gutenberg's Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs, by Anne Warner + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs + +Author: Anne Warner + +Illustrator: H. M. Brett + +Release Date: September 1, 2011 [EBook #37289] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS *** + + + + +Produced by Beginners Projects, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + + + + + + + SUSAN CLEGG + + AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS + + BY ANNE WARNER + + Author of "The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary," "Sunshine Jane," etc. + + + WITH FRONTISPIECE BY + H. M. BRETT + + BOSTON + LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY + 1916 + + _Copyright, 1916_, + + BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. + + _All rights reserved_ + + Published, May, 1916 + Reprinted, May, 1916 + + + + +[Illustration: "Nothing but the floor stopped me from falling through to +China." FRONTISPIECE. _See Page 144._] + + + +CONTENTS + + + I. SUSAN CLEGG'S COURTING 1 + + II. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CHINESE LADY 32 + + III. SUSAN CLEGG SOLVES THE MYSTERY 58 + + IV. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE OLIVE BRANCH 80 + + V. SUSAN CLEGG'S "IMPROVEMENTS" 104 + + VI. SUSAN CLEGG UPROOTED 129 + + VII. SUSAN CLEGG UNSETTLED 153 + + VIII. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CYCLONE 176 + + IX. SUSAN CLEGG'S PRACTICAL FRIEND 216 + + X. SUSAN CLEGG DEVELOPS IMAGINATION 236 + + XI. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE PLAYWRIGHT 256 + + XII. SUSAN CLEGG'S DISAPPEARANCE 277 + + + + +SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS + + + + +I + +SUSAN CLEGG'S COURTING + + +Mrs. Lathrop sat on her front piazza, and Susan Clegg sat with her. Mrs. +Lathrop was rocking, and Susan was just back from the Sewing Society. +Neither Mrs. Lathrop nor Susan was materially altered since we saw them +last. Time had moved on a bit, but not a great deal, and although both +were older, still they were not much older. + +They were not enough older for Mrs. Lathrop to have had a new rocker, +nor for Susan to have purchased a new bonnet. Susan indeed looked almost +absolutely unaltered. She was a woman of the best wearing quality; she +was hard and firm as ever, and if there were any plating about her, it +was of the quadruple kind and would last. + +If the reader knows Susan Clegg at all, he will surmise that she was +talking. And he will be right. Susan was most emphatically talking. She +had returned from the Sewing Society full to the brim, and Mrs. Lathrop +was already enjoying the overflow. Mrs. Lathrop liked to rock and +listen. She never went to the Sewing Society herself--she never went +anywhere. + +"We was talking about dreams," Susan was saying; "it's a very curious +thing about dreams. Do you know, Mrs. Lathrop," wrinkling her brow and +regarding her friend with that look of friendship which is not blind to +any faults, "do you know, Mrs. Lathrop, they said down there that dreams +always go by contraries. We was discussing it for a long time, and they +ended up by making me believe in it. You see, it all began by my saying +how I dreamed last night that Jathrop was back, and he was a cat and +your cat, too, and he did something he wasn't let to, and you made one +jump at him, and out of the window he went. Now that was a very strange +dream for me to have dreamed, Mrs. Lathrop, and Mrs. Lupey, who's +staying with Mrs. Macy to-day and maybe to-morrow, too, says she's sure +it's a sign. She says if dreams go by contraries, mine ought to be a +sign as Jathrop is coming back, for the contraries is all there: Jathrop +_wasn't_ a cat, and he never done nothing that he shouldn't--nor that he +should, neither--and you never jump--I don't believe you've jumped in +years, have you?" + +"I--" began Mrs. Lathrop reminiscently. + +"Oh, that time don't count," said Susan, "it was just my ball of yarn, +even if it did look like a rat; I meant a jump when you meant it; you +didn't mean that jump. Well, an' to go back to the dream and what was +said about it and to tell you the rest of it, there wasn't any more of +it, but there was plenty more said about it. All of the dream was that +the cat went out of the window, and I woke up, but, oh, my, how we did +talk! Gran'ma Mullins wanted to know in the first place how I knew that +the cat was Jathrop. She was most interested in that, for she says she +often dreams of animals, but it never struck her that they might be any +one she knew. She dreamed she found a daddy-long-legs looking in her +bureau drawer the other night, but she never gave it another thought. +She'll be more careful after this, I guess. Well, then I begun to +consider, and for the life of me I can't think how I knew that that cat +was Jathrop. As I remember it was a very common looking cat, but being +common looking wouldn't mean Jathrop. Jathrop was common looking, but +not a common cat kind of common looking. It was a very strange dream, +Mrs. Lathrop, the more I consider it, the more I can't see what give it +to me. I finished up the doughnuts just before I went to bed, for I was +afraid they'd mold in another day with this damp weather, but it don't +seem as if doughnuts ought to result in cats like Jathrop. If I'd +dreamed of mice, it'd been different, for some of the doughnuts was +gnawed in a way as showed as there'd been mice in the jar. It does beat +all how mice get about. Maybe it was the mice made me think Jathrop was +a cat. But even then I can't see how I did come to dream that dream. +Unless it was a sign. Mrs. Lupey's sure it was a sign. We talked about +signs the whole of the Sewing Society. Dreams and signs. Everybody told +all they knew. Mrs. Macy told about her snow dream. Whenever Mrs. Macy +has her snow dream, somebody dies. She says it's so interesting to look +in a paper the next time she gets hold of one and see who it was. One +time she thought it was Edgar Allen Poe, but when she read it over +twice, she see that it was just that he'd been born. She says her snow +dream's a wonderful sign; it's never failed once. She dreamed it the +night before the earthquake in Italy, and she says to think how many +died of it that time! + +"This started Gran'ma Mullins, and Gran'ma Mullins told about that dream +she had the year before she met her husband. That was an awful dream. I +wonder she met her husband a _tall_ after it. She thought she was alone +in a thick wood, and she saw a man coming, and she was scared to death. +She says she can feel her trembling now. She didn't know what to do, +'cause if she'd hid among the trees he couldn't have seen her, and that +idea scared her as bad as the other. So she just stood and shook and +watched the man coming nearer and nearer. I've heard her tell the story +a hundred times, but my blood always sort o' runs cold to hear it. The +man come nearer and nearer and, my, but she says he _was_ a man! She was +just a young girl, but she was old enough to be afraid, and old enough +not to want to hide from him, neither. She says it was an awful lesson +to her about going in woods alone, because of course you can't never +expect any sympathy if the man does murder you or kiss you--everybody'll +just say, 'Why didn't she hide in the woods?' Well, Gran'ma Mullins +says there she stood, and she can see herself still standing there. She +says she's never been in the woods since just on account of that +dream--and then, too, she's one of those that the mosquitos all get on +in the woods. And then, besides, she doesn't like woods, anyway. And +then, besides, there ain't no thick woods around here. But, anyhow, you +know what happened--just as he got to her she woke up, and I must say of +all the tame stories to have to sit and listen to over and over, that +dream of Gran'ma Mullins is the tamest. I get tired the minute she +begins it, but my dream had started every one to telling signs, and so +of course Gran'ma Mullins had to tell hers along with the rest. + +"When she was done Mrs. Lupey told us about her mother, Mrs. Kitts, and +a curious kind of prophetic dream she used to have and kept right on +having up to the day she died. Mrs. Lupey said she never heard the like +of those dreams of her mother's, and I guess nobody else ever has, +either. No, nor never will. Well, it seems Mrs. Kitts used to dream she +was falling out of bed, and the curious part is that she always _did_ +fall out of bed just as she dreamed it, so it never failed to come true. +She'd dream she hit the floor _bang!_ and the next second she'd hit the +floor _bang!_ Mrs. Lupey said she never saw such a dream for coming +true; if old Mrs. Kitts dreamed she hit her head, she'd hit her head, +and the time she dreamed she sprained her wrist, she sprained her wrist, +and the time she had her stroke, as soon as her mind was got back in +place she told them she'd dreamed she had a stroke in her chair just +before she fell out of her chair with the stroke. Even the minister's +wife didn't have a word to say. + +"Mrs. Lupey said her mother was a most remarkable woman. She's very +sorry now she didn't board that painter for a portrait of her. The +painter was so awful took with old Mrs. Kitts that he was willing to do +her for six weeks and with the frame for two months. But Mrs. Lupey was +afraid to have a painter around. She'd just read a detective story about +a painter that killed the woman he was painting because he didn't want +any one else to paint her. Mrs. Lupey said it was a very Frenchy +story--there was a lot between the lines and on the lines, too--as she +couldn't make out, but it taught her never to have painters around, for +you never could be sure in a house with four other women that he'd kill +the one he was painting. But she's sorry now, for she's older now and +wiser and a match for any painter going, long-haired, short-haired or no +hair at all. But it's too late now, and there's Mrs. Kitts dead +unpainted, and all they've got left is a sweet memory and that cane she +used to hit at 'em with when they weren't spry enough to suit her, and +her hymn-book which she marked up without telling any one and left for a +remembrance. Mrs. Lupey says such markings you never heard of. + +"When Mrs. Lupey was all done, Mrs. Brown took her turn and told us +some very interesting things about Amelia. Seems Amelia is so far +advanced in learning what nobody can understand that she can see quite a +little ways ahead now and tell just what she's going to do. She can't +see for the rest of the family, but she can see for herself. Sometimes +it's just a day ahead, and sometimes it's a long way ahead. The longest +way ahead that she's seen yet is that she can't see herself ever getting +up to breakfast again. Mrs. Brown says of course she respects Amelia's +religious views, but it's trying when Amelia wants to go to church, but +doesn't see herself going, so has to stay at home. She says Amelia just +loves to sew, but she can't see herself sewing any more, so she's given +it all up. She says Amelia's got a superior mind--anybody can tell that +only to see the way she's took to doing her hair--but she says it's a +little hard on young Doctor Brown and her, who haven't got superior +minds, to live with her. Amelia don't want to kill flies any more, for +fear they're going to be her blood relations a million years from now, +and Mrs. Brown says she never was any good once a mouse was caught, but +now she won't even hear to setting a trap; she says all things has equal +rights, and if she feels a spider, some one has got to take it off her +and set it gently outside on the grass. Oh, Mrs. Brown says, Amelia's +very hard to live up to, even with the best will in the world. Mrs.--" + +Here Susan was interrupted by Brunhilde Susan, the minister's youngest +child, who brought the evening milk and the evening paper. + +"There was a letter, so I brought that, too," said Brunhilde Susan. + +"A letter!" said Susan in surprise. + +"It's for Mrs. Lathrop," said Brunhilde Susan. + +"For me!" said Mrs. Lathrop in even greater surprise. + +"Yes'm," said Brunhilde Susan. + +A letter for Mrs. Lathrop was indeed a surprise, as that good lady had +only received two in the last five years. As those had been of the +least interesting variety, she looked upon the present one with but mild +interest. The next minute she gave a scream, for, turning it over as +some people always do turn a letter over before opening it, she read on +the back "Return to Jathrop Lathrop..." and her fingers turning numb +with surprise and her head dizzy for the same reason, she dropped it on +the floor forthwith. + +Brunhilde Susan had turned and gone back down the walk. Miss Clegg, who +had been regarding her friend's slowness to take action with +ill-concealed impatience, now made no attempt at concealing anything, +but leaned over abruptly and picked up the letter. As soon as she looked +at it she came near dropping it, too. "From Jathrop!" she exclaimed, in +a tone appalled. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop!" + +Mrs. Lathrop was quite speechless. Susan held the letter and began to +regard it closely. It was quite a minute before another sound was made, +then suddenly a light burst over the younger woman's face. "It's my +dream. I told you so. It _was_ a sign, just as Mrs. Lupey said. He's +coming back!" + +She looked toward Mrs. Lathrop, but Mrs. Lathrop still sat quite limp +and gasping for breath. + +"Shall I open it and read it to you?" Susan then suggested. + +"Y--y--" began Mrs. Lathrop and could get no further. + +At that Susan promptly opened the letter. It was written on the paper of +a Chicago hotel, and ran thus: + + "_Dear Mother_: + + "Years have passed by, and here I am on my way home again. I've + been to the Klondike and am now rich and on my way home. I hope + that you are well and safe at home. You'll be glad to see me home + again, I know. How is everybody at home? How is Susan Clegg? I + shall get home Saturday morning. + + "Your afft. son, + "J. LATHROP, ESQ." + +That was all and surely it was quite enough. + +"Well, I declare!" Susan Clegg said, staring first at the letter and +then at the mother. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop! Well, I declare. It _was_ a +sign. You and me'll never doubt signs after _this_, I guess." + +Mrs. Lathrop made an effort to rally, but only succeeded in just feebly +shaking her head. + +Susan continued to hold the letter in her hand and contemplate it. +Another slow minute or two passed. + +But at last the wheels of life began to turn again, and that active +mind, which grasped so much so readily, grasped this news, too. Miss +Clegg ceased to view the letter and began to take action regarding it. + +"Did you notice what he says here, Mrs. Lathrop? He says he's rich. I +don't know whether you noticed or not as I read, but he says he's rich. +I wonder how rich he means!" + +Mrs. Lathrop opened and shut her eyes in a futile way that she had, but +continued speechless. + +"Rich," repeated Miss Clegg, "and me dreaming of him last night; that's +very curious, when you come to think of it, 'cause I'm rich, too. And I +was dreaming of him! It doesn't make any difference my thinking he was a +cat; I knew it was Jathrop, even if he was only a cat in a dream. +Strange my dreaming of him that way! I can see him flying out of the +window right now. He was one of those lanky, long cats that eat from +dawn till dark and every time your back's turned and yet keep the +neighbors saying you starve it. And to think it was Jathrop all the +time! Thinking of me right that minute, probably. And he says, 'How's +Susan Clegg?' And he's rich. I _do_ wonder what he'd call rich!" + +Susan paused and looked at her friend, but Mrs. Lathrop remained dumb. + +"The Klondike, that's where he went to, was it? Goodness, I wonder how +he ever got there! Well, I'll never be surprised at nothing after this. +I've had many little surprises in my life, but never nothing to equal +this. Jathrop Lathrop come back rich! Why, the whole town will be at the +station to meet him to-morrow. I wonder if he'll come in the parlor-car! +Think of Jathrop being a cat overnight and coming in a parlor-car next +day! And he says, 'How's Susan Clegg?'" + +The last three words seemed to make quite an impression on Susan, but +Mrs. Lathrop appeared smashed so supremely flat that nothing could make +any further impression on her. She continued dumb, and Susan continued +to hold the letter and comment on it. + +"I wonder what he looks like now. I wonder if he's grown any better +looking! I certainly do wonder if he's got any homelier. And he's rich! +Why, nobody from this town has ever gone away and got rich before, not +that I can remember. I call myself a rich woman, but I ain't rich enough +to dream of writing it in a letter. I certainly should like to know +what Jathrop calls being rich. He couldn't possibly have millions, or it +would have reached here somehow. Maybe he's been digging under another +name! I suppose three or four thousand would seem enough to make him +call himself rich. If he comes home with three or four thousand and +calls that being rich, I shall certainly feel very sorry for you, Mrs. +Lathrop. He'll be very airy over his money, and he'll live on yours. If +you've got to have any one live with you, it's better for them to have +no money a _tall_, because if they've got ever such a little, they +always feel so perky over it. Mrs. Brown says if Amelia didn't have that +six dollars and seventy-five cents a month from her dead mother, she'd +be much easier to live with. Mrs. Brown says whenever Doctor Brown trys +to control Amelia, Amelia hops up and says she'll pay for it with her +own money. Mrs. Brown says to hear Amelia, you'd think she had at least +ten dollars a month of her own. Mrs. Brown's so sad over Amelia. Amelia +sees herself doing such outlandish things some days. Mrs. Brown says +your son's wife is the biggest puzzle a woman ever gets. I guess Mrs. +Brown would have liked young Doctor Brown never to marry." + +Mrs. Lathrop opened her mouth and shut it again. + +"I suppose you're thinking where to put Jathrop when he comes," Susan +said quickly. "I've been thinking of that, too. Where can you put him, +anyway? He never can sleep in that little shed bedroom where he used to +sleep, if he's really rich, and he'll have to have some place to wash +before we can find out." + +Mrs. Lathrop looked distressed. "I--" she began. + +"Oh, that wouldn't do," said Susan, knitting her brows quickly. "Think +of the work of changing all your things. No, I'll tell you what's the +best thing to do; he can sleep over at my house. Father's room was all +cleaned last week, and I'll make up the bed, and Jathrop can sleep there +until we find out how to treat him. Maybe his old shed bedroom will do, +after all, or maybe he's so awfully rich he'll enjoy sleeping in it, +like the president liked to stack hay. Maybe he'll ask nothing better +than to chop wood and take the ashes out of the stove just for a change. +I do wonder how rich he is. If he's rich enough to have a private car, I +expect this town _will_ open its eyes. You'll see a great change in your +position, Mrs. Lathrop, if Jathrop comes in a private car to-morrow +morning. There's something about a private car as makes everybody step +around lively. I don't say that I shan't respect him more myself if he +comes in a private car. But he can sleep one night in father's room, +anyway, although if he calls it being rich to come home with just two or +three thousand, I think he'd better understand it's for just one night +right from the start. I wouldn't want Jathrop to think that I had any +time to waste on him if he calls just two or three thousand being rich. +It'd be no wonder I dreamed he was a cat, if he's got the face to call +that being rich. But that would be just like Jathrop. You know yourself +that if Jathrop could ever do anything to disappoint anybody, he never +let the chance slide. I never had no use for Jathrop Lathrop, as you +know to your cost, Mrs. Lathrop. But, still, if he really is rich, I +haven't got anything against him, and I'll tell you what I'll do right +now: I'll go home and put that room in order and get my supper, and then +after supper I'll just run down to the square and see if anybody else +knows, and then I'll come back and tell you if they do. It's no use your +trying to put things a little in order, because you couldn't straighten +this place up in a month, and, besides, it isn't worth fussing till we +know how rich he is. He may just have writ that in for a joke--to break +it to you gently that he's coming back again to live here. Heaven help +you if that's the case, Mrs. Lathrop, for Jathrop never will. It isn't +in me to deceive so much as a fly on the window, and I never have +deceived you and I never will." + +With which promise Susan took her departure. + +It was all of three hours--quite nine in the evening--when Susan came +back. She found Mrs. Lathrop transferred to her back porch and seemingly +in a somewhat less complete state of total paralysis than when she had +left her. + +Mrs. Lathrop looked up as her friend approached and smiled. + +"Nobody knew," Susan announced as she mounted the steps, "but every one +knows now, for I told them. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you never saw anything +like it. There isn't a person in town as ever expected to see Jathrop +again, and only about three as always thought he'd come back rich. Every +one's going to the station to-morrow morning, even Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Macy +says if it's one of the mornings she can't walk, she'll hire Hiram and +his wheelbarrow just as she does for church those Sundays. Everybody's +so interested. I told them about the private car, and everybody hopes +that he's got one, and that he'll come in it. Mr. Dill says he must be +rich if he's been to the Klondike and come back a _tall_. He says +there's no halfway work about the Klondike. Either you come back a +millionaire or else you eat first your dog and then your boots and +that's the last of you. Gran'ma Mullins says she never heard of eating +boots in the Klondike; she thought you rode on a sled there and that +there weren't any women. She says Hiram's spoken of going there once or +twice, and Lucy thought maybe the coasting would do him good, but +Gran'ma Mullins says not while she's alive, no, sir. Why, it's 'way +across America and up a ways, and so many people want to go up that they +have to sleep three in a berth, and she says will you only think of +Hiram, with the way she's brought him up, three in a berth. If the bed +ain't tucked in with Gran'ma Mullins' own particular kind of tuck, Hiram +kicks at night and don't get any proper nourishment out of his sleep. +No, Gran'ma Mullins says she couldn't think of Hiram in the Klondike +sleeping under a snow-pile and having to hunt up a whale whenever he was +in need of more kerosene oil. And she says what good would millions do +her with the bones of the only baby she ever had feeding whatever kind +of creature they have up there. No, she says, no, and a million times +more, no; she's been reading about it in a New York paper that came +wrapped around her new stove lid, and she knows all there is to know on +that subject now. She says a New York paper is so interesting. She says +the way they print them makes it very entertaining. She was reading +about a sea serpent, and when she turned, she turned wrong, and she read +twelve columns about the suffragettes, looking eagerly to see when the +sea serpent was going on again. She says she give up trying to see why +they print them so or ever trying to finish any one subject at a time; +she just goes regularly through the paper now and lets the subjects +fight it out to suit themselves. She says it makes the last part very +interesting. You read about a baby, and after a while you find out +whether it's the Queen of Spain's or just a race-horse. She says she +supposes next Sunday there'll be a picture of Jathrop in the paper; +maybe there'll be a view of this house with you and me. I think that +that would be very interesting." + +Susan paused to consider the idyllic little picture thus presented to +her mind's eye, and Mrs. Lathrop continued to say nothing. After a while +Susan went on again: + +"I've been thinking a good deal about that letter, Mrs. Lathrop. I don't +know whether you noticed or not, but to my order of thinking it was very +strange his saying, 'How's Susan Clegg?' That's a curious thing for an +unmarried man to ask his mother about an unmarried woman. When you come +to consider how Jathrop was wild to marry me once, it really means a +terrible lot. I was the first woman except you he ever kissed; he wasn't +but a year old, and I was thirteen, but those things make an impression. +I don't mind telling you that I've often thought about Jathrop +nights--and days, too. And lately I've been thinking of him more and +more. And you can see that he's been feeling the same about me, for he's +showed that plain enough by saying in black and white, 'How's Susan +Clegg?' Jathrop is a very silent nature, you can see that from his never +writing even to his own mother in all these years. It means a good deal +when a silent nature opens its mouth all of a sudden and writes, 'How's +Susan Clegg?' And then my dreaming of him was so strange. He had soft +gray fur and big bright yellow eyes, and the way he flew out of the +window! Even in my dream I noticed how nice he jumped. He made a +beautiful cat. And you know I always stood up for him, Mrs. Lathrop, +I always did that. Even when I thought he needed lynching as much +as anybody, I never said so. And now he's come back rich, and he's +coming home to you and me, and he says, 'How's Susan Clegg?' +'How's--Susan--Clegg?'" + +Susan's voice died dreamily away. Mrs. Lathrop said nothing. After a +minute Susan's voice went on again: "It's too bad I haven't time to sort +of freshen up my striped silk. It's got awful creasy laying folded so +long. I'd of put some new braid around the bottom if I'd known, and if +this town wasn't so noticey, I'd put my hair up on rollers to-night. A +little crimp sets my wave off so. But, laws, everybody'd be asking why I +did it, and if Jathrop's got any idea of me in his head, it'll be very +easy to knock it right straight out if this town gets first chance at +him. But I don't intend that this town shall get first chance at him. I +shall be on that platform to-morrow morning, and I'll be the nearest to +that train, and once he gets off that train, I shall bring him right +straight up here to you and me. It's safest, and it's his duty, too. As +soon as you've seen him, I'll take him over to my house to wash. Then +I'll give him his breakfast, and by the time he's done his breakfast, if +he really means anything, I'll know it. If he really means anything, +we'll come over after breakfast, and it'll do your heart good to see +how happy we'll look. He can leave his bag in father's room then, for +we'll have so much to talk over it'll be more convenient to take him +over there. You can see that for yourself, Mrs. Lathrop--you know how +young people like to be alone together when they're engaged, and a woman +of my age don't need no looking after any longer. I'm no Gran'ma Mullins +to be worrying over woods nor yet any Mrs. Lupey as supposes every man +you let into your house may be going to hit you over the head when +you're thinking of something pleasant. + +"No, I ain't afraid of Jathrop Lathrop nor of any other man alive, thank +heaven. _But_, if I find out as he don't mean anything, I shall march +him over to you in sharp order, bag and all. If he don't mean anything, +I'll soon know the reason why, and as soon as I know the reason why, +I'll send Mr. Jathrop Lathrop flying. 'How's Susan Clegg?' indeed! He'll +find it's a very dangerous joke to go joking about me, no matter how +much money he's scraped out of the Klondike. A joke is a thing as I +never stand, Mrs. Lathrop, and if you'd been one as joked, you'd have +found that out to your deep and abiding sorrow long ago. Very few people +have ever tried to have any fun with me, and I've got even with the most +of them, I'm happy to remark. I shall find out yet who sent me that +comic valentine with the man skipping over the edge of the world and me +after him with a net, and when I do find out, I'll get even about that, +too. Me with a net! I'd like to see myself skipping after any man that +was skipping away from me. If he was skipping toward me, I wouldn't +marry him--not 'nless I loved him. I know that. Love is a thing as you +can't raise and lower just as the fancy strikes you. A woman can't love +but once, and I've got a kind of warm bubbling all around my heart as +tells me that I've loved that once and that it was Jathrop. It's very +strange, Mrs. Lathrop, but I've been thinking of Jathrop a great deal +lately. I keep remembering more and more how much I've been thinking +about him. I suppose he was thinking of me, and that's what started me. +'How's Susan Clegg?' I can just seem to hear Jathrop's voice; Jathrop +had a very strange voice. 'How's Susan Clegg?' + +"The mind is a curious thing, when you stop to consider, Mrs. Lathrop. +Mrs. Brown says Amelia says minds can communicate if you know how. Mrs. +Brown says if she calls to Amelia when she's in the hammock and Amelia +don't answer, Amelia always explains afterwards as she was +communicating. + +"It all shows that the mind is a wonderful thing. There was Jathrop and +me communicating regularly, and me so little understanding what it all +meant that I dreamed he was a cat. I can't get over that dream. I wonder +if that meant that he's got whiskers now. If he's got whiskers, and he +loves me, he's got to cut 'em right straight off. You'll have to speak +to him about that as soon as you see him, Mrs. Lathrop, for I won't be +able to, of course. And you can see for yourself that I couldn't have +whiskers around. You can't teach an old dog new tricks, and I've had no +experience with whiskers." + +Mrs. Lathrop promised to remonstrate with Jathrop if he really had +whiskers, and after some further conversation Susan went home and to bed +and slept soundly. In the morning she was up very promptly, and Mrs. +Lathrop saw her off for the station. + +The whole town was at the station. But in front of them all--closest to +the track--stood Susan Clegg. + +It was a breathless moment when Johnny ran out with the flag and the +train stopped. Susan motioned the rest back with dignity and stood her +ground alone. The car door opened, and a stout, homely man, with eyes +set wide apart and a very large mouth, appeared on the platform. He was +well dressed and carried an alligator-skin traveling-bag. + +Everybody gasped. But it was not his appearance nor the alligator-skin +bag that caused them to gasp. It was that Jathrop Lathrop, returning +after his long absence, had brought back a lady with him. + + + + +II + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CHINESE LADY + + +And not merely a lady, but a Chinese lady at that. A particularly +chubby, solemn, Chinese lady, who descended from the train which brought +Jathrop Lathrop back to his native town after making a fortune in the +Klondike, and meekly trotted along in his wake, carrying the large +valise, while Jathrop carried the small one. + +Susan walked off straightway with Jathrop and the Chinese lady, while +the town remained stock and staring behind. The town was frankly "done +did up." That Jathrop might return with a wife had never once entered +the head of any one. Still less had the idea of any one of that +community ever wedding a Chinese been entertained. It was a peculiarly +overwhelming sensation, and one which led Gran'ma Mullins to lean +against Hiram, while Mrs. Macy leaned against the equally firm side-wall +of the station itself. It was several seconds before people came to +their senses enough to go around by the track gate and look to see how +far the bewildering party had got on their way. They were just crossing +the square. + +"Well, if that doesn't beat the Dutch," said Mr. Kimball, and his words +seemed to break the deadlock; everybody scattered forthwith, all talking +at once. + +Meanwhile Jathrop, arriving at his mother's gate, paused and said quite +easily: + +"I'll go in alone, Susan; mother will like the first hour or so quite +alone with me, I know. Won't you take Hop Loo to your house for +breakfast?" + +Susan, who had by no means as yet recovered from the shock of the +Celestial bride, opened and shut her mouth once and her eyes twice, and +yielded. For the nonce she seemed as speechless as Mrs. Lathrop +herself. Jathrop's appealing ease of manner had overawed her all the way +up from the station, and the walk had been accomplished in stately +silence. If the Klondike Prodigal had been surprised over the alteration +in Susan, he had not said so, and now he quietly handed Hop Loo his +alligator-skin traveling-bag (or hers, whichever it was), and passing in +through his mother's gate, shut it forthwith behind him, and went on up +the walk. Susan cast one look, which would have thrown a basilisk into +everlasting darkness, after him; and then, turning, marched back to her +own gate. Hop Loo followed, Susan opened her own gate and passed through +it; Hop Loo passed through after her. Susan went up her walk; Hop kept +close to her heels. Together they mounted the steps and then entered the +house. + +It was all of half an hour before Mrs. Macy, the first completely to +rally from the shock at the station, arrived to call. When she climbed +the steps and rang the bell, Susan came to the door at once. She looked +peculiarly grim and smileless. It was plain to be seen at the present +moment that she was not pleased with the world in general. + +"I thought I'd just come up for a little," began Mrs. Macy, smiling +enough for two all alone by herself. Mrs. Macy always tried to keep up +her own spirits in a laudable attempt, possibly, to heighten those of +others. "I thought maybe you'd be glad to see a face you knew." + +This allusion to the Chinese lady was not intended as unkindly as it +might have been in better society, Mrs. Macy being wholly incapable of +anything so subtle. + +"Sit down," said Susan, briefly, indicating a porch chair. "There's no +use taking you in; she's up-stairs unpacking, and she's already set +about doing his cooking. It's plain to be seen that Jathrop Lathrop +never come all this way from the Klondike to take any chances of being +poisoned by me as soon as he got here. No, sir, Jathrop Lathrop has +learned too many little tricks for that." + +Susan's tone was extremely bitter. She had removed the famous striped +silk and applied her hairbrush to both sides of her head after dipping +it (the hairbrush, not her head) in water. It was easy to be seen that +the vanities of this life had suddenly become offensive in her nostrils. + +"Do you suppose she's really his wife?" asked Mrs. Macy, seating herself +and looking eagerly in her friend's face. + +"Oh, yes, she's his wife," said Susan. + +"Oh, Susan," Mrs. Macy went on, her eyes becoming quite globular under +the severe stress of her curiosity, "do you suppose anybody married 'em, +or did he just buy her for beads?" + +"I don't know," said Susan, rocking severely back and forth, "I don't +know a _tall_. You must ask some one wiser than me what a white man does +about a Chinese when he wants her to cook for him. You ought to have +seen her in my kitchen, Mrs. Macy; she walked straight to my rack of +pans and took down just whatever she fancied. I _never_ saw the beat! +No, nor nobody else. She's learned how to be cool from Jathrop and the +North Pole together, looks to me. I never see such ways as Jathrop has +picked up. He never said a word walking up--nothing but 'Ah' once. I +don't call 'Ah' once much of a conversation for the woman as rocked your +cradle and might have married you, too--if she'd wanted to. For I could +have married Jathrop Lathrop, Mrs. Macy; nobody but me will ever know +what passed between us, but I could have married him. I won't say what +prevented, but I can tell you it wasn't him. And he's lived to regret +it, too. Just like the minister regrets it. When the minister speaks of +the treasure that layeth up in heaven, he doesn't mean no chicken--he +means me." + +Susan paused and shook her head angrily. + +"I don't doubt but what he's sorry," said Mrs. Macy; "maybe he married a +Chinese for fear any other kind would remind him of you." + +Miss Clegg rejected this possible poetic view of Jathrop's action with a +look of great disgust accompanied by another shake of the head. + +"I don't believe it's very often that a man ever marries some other +woman on account of any other woman. That's very pretty in books, but +books ain't life. Life's life, and if Jathrop Lathrop's married that +heathen Chinese, he's got very strange notions of life, and that's all I +can say. Why, if she didn't lug that heavy bag along and walk a little +back, and he never bothered to speak to her. She's very different from +what I'd have been, I can tell you. You can maybe fancy me carrying +Jathrop Lathrop's bag a little behind Jathrop Lathrop! I think I see +myself. 'How's Susan Clegg?' He'll soon find out how Susan Clegg is. +What do you think, Mrs. Macy, what _do_ you think? When we came to his +mother's gate, he just stopped, said he thought she'd like him alone +best, said to me, 'Give Hop Loo some breakfast, will you?'--and then if +my gentleman didn't walk through the gate and shut it after him! Well, I +_never_ did. There was me and his wife carefully shut out on the other +side of the fence like we was pigs. And then I had to bring her over +here and give her father's room. What would my dead and gone father say +to a Chinese woman having his room, I wonder! Father had very fine +feelings for a man as got about so little, and if he was alive, I don't +believe no Jathrop Lathrop would have gone sending no heathen Chinese +wife to live with _me_. She won't live with me long, I can tell you that +to your face, Mrs. Macy. I took her because I was too dumb did up over +having a gate shut in my face by Jathrop Lathrop to do anything else, +but I ain't intending to have her long. I've always been for shutting +the Chinese out, and I ain't going back on my principles at my time of +life. No, indeed. 'How's Susan Clegg?'" + +Susan paused angrily. Her repetition of the deceptive phrase in +Jathrop's letter seemed to turn her boiling wrath into one of still, +white menace. She sat perfectly still, snapping her eyelids up and down, +and breathing hard. + +"I don't blame you one mite, Susan," said Mrs. Macy warmly; "I wish Mrs. +Lupey was here. She wanted to come, too, but she's got her bag to pack +to go home. She only come for one night, and to-night'll make two, so +she wants to get packed. But she knows all about the Chinese. Her +husband's got a cousin who is a missionary in China, and she could have +felt for you. The cousin's got eleven Chinese servants besides a Bible +class of two as she's training to be missionaries after they're trained. +Mrs. Lupey says she'd have known what to do when that Chinese lady got +off the train this morning. They don't let 'em ride in the same cars in +China." + +Just here Jathrop came out of his mother's front door and walked down +the path. Both ladies were freshly shocked by the sight. At the gate he +turned in the opposite direction. Both ladies stared after him. Soon he +was out of sight. Then they stared at each other. + +"Well, what is he up to now?" Mrs. Macy finally ejaculated. + +"I don't know," said Susan in a tone of complete despair as to ever +again gaining any insight into the motives which moved Jathrop, "I d'n +know, Mrs. Macy. Don't ask me anything about Jathrop Lathrop after he's +gone home to see his mother and has handed me over a Chinese wife to +board. He may be gone up to Mrs. Brown's to run off with Amelia for all +I know. Nothing is ever going to surprise me any more after this day. I +only know one thing, if he does run off with Amelia, that Chinee'll find +herself and his valises dumped off of my premises pretty quick. I never +was one for false feelings, and I should see no call for Christian +charity toward a heathen who comes to me with two black bags on her legs +and a dressing-sack for an overcoat." + +"I wonder if Jathrop likes her wearing such clothes," said Mrs. Macy. +"Everybody is wondering." + +"I don't know," said Miss Clegg, "men are very queer. There's no telling +what they are going to fancy till they get out of the train married to +it. Think of his having the face to write 'How's Susan Clegg?' and him +married to that puzzle-blocks thing all the time. I wonder what his +mother said when he told her!" + +"Let's go over and see Mrs. Lathrop!" suggested Mrs. Macy, "she's over +there alone now." + +This idea immediately found favor with Susan. "But I'll have to go in +and see what _she's_ up to first," she said. "If she's caught a rat and +is making soup in my teapot with it, I shan't feel to enjoy leaving her +alone with my teapot." + +Mrs. Macy could but feel the extreme justice of this view, and Susan, +whose countenance indicated that she was sorely beset by misgivings, +went into the house. + +When she came out, her face wore a relieved expression. + +"She's all safe," she said. "She's asleep on the floor. I must say it's +changed my feelings toward her. It shows she knows her place." + +They walked sedately to Mrs. Lathrop's. They climbed the back steps, and +they knocked. + +Mrs. Lathrop was busy making preparations for dinner. She came to the +door with a promptitude which, in view of her well-known habit of +deliberation, was little short of miraculous. + +"We came to see how you were," said Mrs. Macy. + +"Come in," said Mrs. Lathrop. + +They walked in and seated themselves on two of the wooden-bottomed +kitchen chairs. Mrs. Lathrop went on with her work. She was uncommonly +active, and her face wore a broad, unusual smile. "Jathrop's gone up to +the cemetery," she said. "He's going to have a monument put up to his +father." + +"What do you think of--?" interrupted Susan. + +"Yes, we come to--" began Mrs. Macy. + +"He's going," continued Mrs. Lathrop, taking down a plate and blowing +the thick dust from its surface, "to have an awful handsome monument put +up. Not a animal like you put up to your father, Susan, but a angel +hanging to a pillar with both hands and feeling for a cloud with its +feet. He showed me the picture. And he's going to have the parlor +papered and give the town a watering-trough for horses, with a tin cup +on a chain for people, and he's--" + +"Yes, but--" interrupted Susan. + +"You know, of course--" began Mrs. Macy. + +Mrs. Lathrop swept off the top of the rolling-pin with the stove-brush. +"And he's going to build me on a bedroom right off the hall," she +continued, "and put a furnace under the whole house. And one of those +lamps that haul up and down, and a new set of kitchen things, and he'll +come here every year and see if I want anything else, and if I do, I'm +to have it. I'm to have a pew in church, even if I never do go to +church, and a paper every day, and his baby picture done big, and be +fitted for new glasses." + +"But, Mrs. Lathrop--" Susan interrupted, seeing that Mrs. Lathrop was +surely still in ignorance as to her Mongolian daughter-in-law. + +"Yes, you--" began Mrs. Macy. + +"Liza Em'ly is to do all the sewing I want," went on Mrs. Lathrop, +proceeding with her baking preparations at a great rate, "and Jathrop'll +pay the bill. And any things I want, I'm just to send for, and +Jathrop'll pay the bill; and anything I can think of what I want done, +I'm just to say so, and Jathrop'll pay the bill." + +It seemed as if Susan Clegg would burst at this. It was plain now that +Jathrop really was rich, and here was his mother supposing the rose was +utterly thornless. + +"But did he tell you about his wife?" she broke in desperately. "That's +what I want to know." + +Mrs. Lathrop, who was mixing butter and sugar together in a yellow bowl, +stopped suddenly and stared. + +"His wife!" she said blankly. + +"Yes, his wife," repeated Susan. + +"The wife he brought back with him," explained Mrs. Macy. + +"The wife he--" Mrs. Lathrop pushed the yellow bowl a little back on the +table and rested her hands on the edge. They trembled visibly; "the wife +he--" she repeated. + +"Surely you know that he brought his wife back with him?" said Mrs. +Macy. "Surely he's told you?" + +Mrs. Lathrop--turned her usual dumb self again--looked at Mrs. Macy with +almost unseeing eyes. + +"I--" she ejaculated faintly, "no, he--" + +"Now, you see," exclaimed Susan, half to the friend and half to the +stricken mother, "it don't make any difference what a man turns into +outside, he stays just the same inside. What have I always said to you, +Mrs. Lathrop? You can't make no kind of a purse out of ears like +Jathrop's. Jathrop Lathrop could turn into fifty millionaires, and he'd +still be Jathrop Lathrop. He can hang all the angels he pleases and +water all the horses from here to Meadville, and still he never could be +any other man but just himself. And being himself, he never by no manner +of means could be frank and open. He was always one that held things +back. You thought it was because he didn't have no brains, but you was +his mother and naturally looked on the best side of him. But he never +deceived me, Mrs. Lathrop; I saw through Jathrop right from the start. +There was a foxiness about Jathrop as nobody never fully saw into but +me. That was my reason for never marrying him--one of my many reasons, +for his foxiness hasn't been the only thing about Jathrop that I've seen +through. I never was one to soften the blows to a tempered lamb, so I +will say that so many reasons for not loving a man as I've seen in +Jathrop I never see in any other man yet. But none of my reasons for not +marrying him has ever equalled this new reason as has cropped up now in +his bringing home a wife. When a man comes home with a wife, then you do +see through him for good and all, and when Jathrop come scrambling out +from between those two cars this morning with a heathen Chinee at his +heels--" + +Mrs. Lathrop screamed loudly. "A--" + +"Heathen Chinee," repeated Susan. + +"You know what a Chinee is, don't you?" interposed Mrs. Macy; "they're +from China, you know." + +Mrs. Lathrop retreated to her rocker with a totter. + +"Yes, she's a heathen Chinee," said Susan, with unfailing firmness, "the +kindest heart in the world couldn't mistake her for anything even as +high up as a nigger. Her eyes cross just under her nose, and she's got +her hair wound round her head with a piece of black tape to hold it on. +She wears divided skirts as is most plainly divided, and not a gore has +she got to her name or her figure. She _is_ a Chinese and no mistake, +and you may believe me or not, just as you please, Mrs. Lathrop, but +Jathrop without a so much as by-your-leave dumped her onto me for +breakfast, and she's asleep on father's floor now." + +"On your--" gasped Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, on father's," said Susan, "and now, Mrs. Lathrop, you see what he +is at last. He not only marries a Chinese when if he'd been patient he +might have got a white one, but he brings her home, and don't even tell +you he's brought her home, or even that he's got her, or even that he's +married her, or anything. A man might line my house with furnaces and +have his baby picture done big in every room, and I'd never forgive his +acting in such a way. I never hear the beat. It throws all the other +calamities as ever come upon anybody in this community clean out of the +shade. What will be the use of your having a pew in church; you won't +even be able to face the minister now with your son's marrying one of +them as we have to give our good money to teach to wear clothes. What +good will your having the parlor papered be with everybody ashamed to go +to see a woman who has got a Chinese daughter. To my order of thinking, +you was better off poor. Why, they eat the hen's nests, the Chinese do, +and prefer 'em to the eggs. It's small wonder I dreamed Jathrop was a +cat, with him descending on us like the wrath of heaven married to a +China woman. Jathrop's no fool though, and if you'd seen that humble +heathen going along back of him with his big valise, you'd have to see +as the man as picks out a wife like that never could have been a fool. I +felt for her, I really did, only she was watching me with the wrong eye +all the time, and it made me dizzy to try and look at her kindly. I'll +tell you what, Mrs. Lathrop, when Jathrop comes back, you'll just go for +him and give it to him good. Men must learn as they can't bring their +Chinese wives into this community. There's a principle as we'd ought to +live up to whether we enjoy it or not, and it's all against marrying +Chinese. The Chinese are all right, I hope and trust, but nothing as +feeds itself with a toothpick had ever ought to be held pressed to the +bosom of families like you and me, Mrs. Lathrop. It isn't the way we're +brought up to look at them, and it's a well-known fact as no matter what +the leopard does to the Ethiopian, he sticks to his spot just the same +as before--" + +"But--" broke in Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mrs. Lathrop,--we've been friends +too long for me not to feel kindly to you,--but Mrs. Macy is a witness +to his bringing her, even if I wasn't well known to be one as never +lies. Mrs. Macy is a witness, too, to how he's got her dressed, and a +more burning disgrace than this keeping your chosen wife in loose +overalls and a jacket as any monkey on a hand-organ would weep to see +the fit of, I never see. It may be the custom in the Klondike and may +be convenient for sliding, but this is no sliding community, and, to my +order of thinking, Jathrop would have showed you more affection and us +more respect if he'd bought his wife a bonnet and a shawl before he +brought her here." + +Susan paused for breath. Mrs. Lathrop continued speechless. Mrs. Macy +tried to lighten the atmosphere by remarking, "Lands, she's got a +pigtail, too." + +Susan picked up the cudgels afresh at that. "Wound twice around her +head," she said bitterly; "oh, she _is_ a figure of fun and no mistake. +I d'n know, I'm sure, what Jathrop was ever thinking of the day he +picked her out, but this I do know, and that is, that he'd better pick +her off of me pretty quick. You know, Mrs. Lathrop, as a friend is a +friend and I've always been a good friend to you, but I never was one to +stand any nonsense--not now and not never--and when a man writes, 'I'm +rich' and 'How's Susan Clegg?' he gets me where no Chinese wife ain't +going to please me in a hurry. I'm glad Jathrop is rich, on your +account, Mrs. Lathrop, but his being rich don't alter my views of him a +mite. I look upon him as a gray deceiver, that's what I look upon him +as, and if he's brought a piece of carnelian or anything back to me, you +can tell him to give it to his lawfully wedded wife, for I don't want to +have nothing more to do with him." + +"But, Susan--" broke in poor Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Don't interrupt me, Mrs. Lathrop; I'm in no mood to listen to no +one just now. I ain't mad, but I'm hurt. It's no wonder I dreamed he +was a cat, for of all the sly, back-door things a cat is the +meanest. And there was always something very cat-like about Jathrop +Lathrop--something soft and slow and creepy--nothing bold and +out-spoken. I might have known as even if he did come home rich, he'd +find a way to even it up. And now look how he has evened it up. Think of +your grandchildren; there won't be one of 'em able to ever look anybody +straight in more'n one eye at once. Marrying Chinese is terrible, +anyway--in some States it's forbidden. It's to be hoped Jathrop'll keep +out of those States or he may land in the penitentiary yet." + +Just here the front door slammed, and Jathrop's voice was heard calling, +"Where are you, mother?" + +He didn't wait for an answer, but came straight through the kitchen. +Entering there, what he saw startled him so much that he came to a +sudden halt. + +"We've been telling your--" began Mrs. Macy. + +"--mother about your wife," finished up Susan. + +Jathrop looked at all three in great astonishment. "About my _wife_!" he +repeated. "Did you say 'my wife'?" + +"Yes," said Susan, absolutely undaunted. "I think it would have been +kinder in you to have broke it to her yourself; but anyhow, we've done +it now." + +"Oh, Jathrop, my son, my son!" wailed poor Mrs. Lathrop in +heart-wringing Biblical paraphrase. + +"But I haven't got any wife," said Jathrop. "What under the sun do you +mean?" + +There was a clammy pause; Susan and Mrs. Macy clasped hands. + +"What made you think I had one?" Jathrop asked, quite bewildered. "Who +said I had one?" + +Susan rose with dignity and coughed. Mrs. Macy rose, too, looking at +Susan. Poor Mrs. Lathrop seemed fairly terror-stricken. + +"I think I'll go now," said Susan. "I hope I needn't board her much +longer, that's all. Even if she's only using the floor, it's a floor as +has been sacred to my dead father up to now, and a dead father is not to +be lightly took in vain by a heathen Chinee." + +"But what does it all mean?" asked Jathrop, appearing genuinely +bewildered. "I don't understand. What are you talking about?" + +Susan moved toward the door; Mrs. Macy faltered. "Maybe it was all +right in the Klondike," she began, trying to put a brace under the +situation. + +"Maybe what was all right in the Klondike?" asked Jathrop. + +"To buy her with beads." + +"To buy who with beads? Who's her?" Jathrop's voice was becoming +exasperated. + +"Hop Loo," said Susan, in a tone of piercing scorn, "the Chinese lady as +you brought with you and gave me to board." + +Jathrop looked at them all in amazement. "But Hop Loo's a boy--my boy," +he said. + +"Your boy!" said Susan. + +"Yes, my boy." + +Miss Clegg turned and gave him a long look fraught with disgust, pity, +and hopeless resignation. + +"Jathrop Lathrop," she said, "I _did_ suppose you had some sense even in +the view of all that's dead and gone, but I guess now I'll have to give +up. I did have some respect for you while I thought she was maybe your +wife, but if you've gone so clean crazy that you believe that that is +your boy--well!" + +Susan thereupon sailed out of Mrs. Lathrop's house with Mrs. Macy +wobbling in her wake. + + + + +III + +SUSAN CLEGG SOLVES THE MYSTERY + + +Susan Clegg and Mrs. Macy walked down to Mrs. Lathrop's gate, and out of +her gate and to Miss Clegg's gate; the whole in a silence deadly and +impressive. Mrs. Macy paused there. + +"I don't believe I'll come in," she said doubtfully. + +"I don't blame you," said Susan, "I wouldn't if it was me. Jathrop's +boy, indeed! What kind of a man is it as'll have a Chinese family and go +forcing them onto the true and long-tried friends of his one and only +mother!" + +"I can't see why he didn't leave the boy in the Klondike," said Mrs. +Macy slowly and reflectively. "I thought men always left their Chinese +families just where they found 'em. It's strange Jathrop brought him +home with him." + +"You see now what my dream meant," said Susan darkly, "a cat, indeed. +It's small wonder I knew the cat was Jathrop Lathrop. Of all the mean, +sly, creeping creatures that ever come up against the back of your legs +sudden a cat is the worst. A snake is open and aboveboard beside a cat. +You can see a snake. You don't see 'em often around here, thank heaven." + +"Well, we haven't seen Jathrop often around here for a long time," said +Mrs. Macy, whose mind was as given to easy logical deduction as many of +her mental caliber, "and we do see a lot of cats--you know that, Susan." + +"'How's Susan Clegg?'" quoted Susan in a tone of reflective wrath. "I +don't know whether you know it or not, Mrs. Macy, but Jathrop asked +after me in his letter to his mother, and him with a Chinese wife. +'How's Susan Clegg?' What did he write that for if he was married, I'd +like to know." + +"Maybe he wanted to know how you were," suggested Mrs. Macy. + +The look she received in recognition of this offered explanation led to +her immediately proposing to go on home. "You've got the Chinaman to +look after, anyhow," she added. + +"You'd better come in while I go up and look at him again," said Susan +shortly. "It's a very strange sensation to be alone in your house with +what you fully and freely take to your dead father's bed and board, +supposing it's a wife, and then find out as it's her son instead. Come +on in." + +Mrs. Macy was easily persuaded, and they thereupon went up the walk. "I +guess I'll go see if he's still asleep," Susan said when they reached +the piazza, and Mrs. Macy forthwith sat down to await what might come of +it. + +Susan was absent but a few minutes; she returned with a fresh layer of +disapproval upon her face. + +"Is he still sleeping?" Mrs. Macy asked. + +"Yes, he's still sleeping," Miss Clegg replied, jerking a chair forward +for herself. "You'd know he was Jathrop Lathrop's child just by the way +he sleeps. You remember what a one Jathrop always was for sleeping. I +don't know as I remember Jathrop's ever being awake till he was fairly +grown. Whatever you set him at always just made him more sleepy. You +know yourself, Mrs. Macy, as he wouldn't be no grasshopper with Mrs. +Lathrop for his mother, but a cocoon is a comet beside what Jathrop +Lathrop always was. I don't know whether he's rich or not, but I do know +that heathen Chinee is his son, and I know it just by the way he +sleeps." + +"And so Jathrop's rich," said Mrs. Macy, rocking agreeably to and fro, +and evidently striving toward more pleasant conversation. + +"Yes," said Susan darkly, "rich and with a Chinese wife somewhere. Just +as often as I think of Jathrop Lathrop writing, 'How's Susan Clegg,' +with a Chinese wife I feel more and more tempered, and I can't conceal +my feelings. I never was one to conceal anything; if I had a Chinese +wife the whole world might know it." + +Just here Gran'ma Mullins hove in sight, coming slowly and laboriously +up the street. + +"Why, there's Gran'ma Mullins!" Mrs. Macy exclaimed. "She's surely +coming to see you, too." + +Both ladies remained silent, watching the progress of Gran'ma Mullins. + +Gran'ma Mullins arrived a good deal out of breath. Susan brought a chair +out of the house for her. + +"I come to--tell you," panted the new visitor as soon as she had +attained unto the chair, "that Jathrop's--things is--coming." + +"What things?" asked Susan. + +"They all come on--the ten o'clock--from the junction; Hiram is helping +unload." + +"What's he brought?" Susan asked. + +"Well, he's brought an automobile," said Gran'ma Mullins, "and a lot of +other trunks and boxes." + +"An automobile!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy, "well, he _is_ rich then!" + +"I wouldn't be too sure of that," said Susan, "some very poor folks is +riding that way nowadays." + +"And he brought three trunks and seventeen big wooden boxes," continued +Gran'ma Mullins, "big boxes." + +"Three trunks and sev-en-teen--Three trunks and sev-en--" Susan's voice +faded into nothingness. + +"Goodness knows what's in them," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Hiram was +getting so hot unloading that I wanted him to stop and let me fan him, +but he wouldn't hear to it. Hiram's so brave. If he said he'd unload +something, he'd unload it if he dropped dead under it and was smashed to +nothing." + +There was a pause of unlimited bewilderment while Mrs. Macy and Susan +raised Jathrop upon the pedestal erected by his three trunks, seventeen +boxes and the automobile. + +"And to think of his having a Chinese wife," Susan exclaimed, the keen +edge of sorrow cutting crossways through all her words. + +It was just here that Mrs. Lupey now appeared, approaching at a good +pace. Mrs. Lupey was a large, imposing woman and wore a silk dolman with +fringe. It was immediately necessary for the party to adjourn to the +sitting-room, as the piazza was strictly limited. + +It was Mrs. Lupey who without loss of time did away with the Lathrop +parentage of the young Chinese. + +"Why, he's his servant, of course," she said in a lofty scorn. "I'm +surprised you didn't know that by his age." + +"I did think of his age," Susan said, "but I read once in some paper as +the women in China get married when they're four years old, so you'd +never be able to tell nothing by the age of no one there. Well, well, +and so she isn't his wife, nor yet his son. Well, I'm glad--for Mrs. +Lathrop's sake." + +"But if Jathrop's really got a automobile and seventeen trunks, he +_must_ be awful rich," said Mrs. Macy. "It'll be a great thing for this +town if Jathrop's rich. He'd ought to be very grateful to the place +where his happy childhood memories run around barefoot." + +"Oh, he'll remember," said Gran'ma Mullins, "it's easy to remember when +you've got the money to do it. But I hope to heaven he won't set Hiram +off on that track again. Hiram does so want to go away and make a +fortune; I'm worried for fear he will all the time. And Lucy wants him +to, too. I can't understand a woman as wants a fortune worse than she +wants Hiram. Lucy doesn't seem to want Hiram 'round at all any more. If +he's asleep, she starts right in making the bed the same as if he wasn't +in it, and if she's sewing, he don't dare go within the length of her +thread. + +"Life has come to a pretty pass when a wife'll run a needle into a +husband just for the simple pleasure of feeling him go away when she +sticks him." Gran'ma Mullins sighed. + +"I wonder what they're doing now!" Mrs. Macy said. + +All four turned at this and looked toward the Lathrop house together. It +was quiet as usual. + +"I d'n know as it changes my opinion of Jathrop much, that being his +servant," said Miss Clegg suddenly. "It's kind of different, his handing +his wife or his son over to me; but his heathen Chinee servant! I don't +know as I'm very pleased." + +"Pleased!" said Mrs. Lupey. "Why, in San Francisco they make 'em live +underground like rats." + +"Maybe that was why you dreamed he was a cat, Susan?" suggested Mrs. +Macy, whose brain seemed to grasp at the subject under consideration +with special illumination. + +Susan rose. "I think you'd better go," she said abruptly, "I've got to +get dinner. My mind's in no state to deal with all these sides of +Jathrop and his Chinaman just now." + +What the day brought up the street and in and around Mrs. Lathrop's +house would take too long to catalogue. Suffice it to say that poor Mrs. +Lathrop, who had been for long years the veriest zero in the life of the +community, became suddenly its center and apex. + +When Jathrop went to New York at the end of the week, he left his mother +not only sitting, but rocking in the lap of luxury, with her head +leaning back against more luxury and her feet braced firmly on yet more +luxury. Even her friend over the way was rendered utterly content. + +And the pleasantest part of it all was the way that it affected Susan +Clegg. As Susan sat by Mrs. Lathrop and turned upon her that tender gaze +which one old friend may turn on another old friend when the latter's +son has suddenly bloomed forth golden, her full heart found utterance +thus: + +"Well, Mrs. Lathrop--well, Mrs. Lathrop, I guess no one will ever doubt +anything again. Talk about dreams, _now_! I dreamed Jathrop was a cat, +and the reason was that it's a well-known fact that cats _always_ come +back. Why, Mrs. Macy told me once how she chloroformed a cat, and put it +in a flour sack with a stone, and put the sack in a hogshead of water, +and put the cover on the hogshead, and put a stone--another stone--on +that, and went to church to hear the minister preach on 'Do unto others +as you do unto others,' and when she came back, the cat was asleep on +top of the hogshead, and Mrs. Macy got the worst shock she ever got. So +you can easy see why I dreamed Jathrop was a cat; and he _did_ come +back. + +"I declare that'll always be the pleasantest recollection of my life, +how I met him at the station and how we came chatting up the street +together. How he has improved, Mrs. Lathrop--not but what he was always +handsome! There was always something noble about Jathrop. Gran'ma +Mullins said yesterday as he made her think of a man she saw in a play +once as stood on his crossed legs in front of a fire and smoked. So +careless. + +"And then his bringing Mrs. Macy that polar-bear skin! Mrs. Macy says if +there was one spot in the whole wide world where she never expected to +set foot it was on top of a polar bear, and now she can stand on her +head on one if the fancy takes her. I saw the minister when I was down +in the square to-night, and he told me not to speak of it, but he +thought a service of prayer for any stocks and mines as Jathrop has +would be the only fitting form of gratitude which a reverent and +affectionate congregation might offer to the great and glorious +generosity of him who is going to give us a steeple after all these +years of finishing flat at the top. Mr. Kimball came out to tell me to +ask you if you'd like some one to come regularly for your order, and he +says he'll keep caviare from now on, just on the chance of Jathrop's +being here to eat it; he says why he didn't keep it before was he +thought it was a kind of chamois skin. + +"It's beautiful to see the faces down-town, Mrs. Lathrop; you never saw +nothing like it. Everybody's just so happy. Hiram is grinning from ear +to ear over being took to the Klondike, and everybody is swore to not +let Gran'ma Mullins know he's going. He's going to climb out of the +window at night and get away that way, and Gran'ma Mullins won't mind +what she feels when he really does come back a millionaire, too. She'll +be just like you, Mrs. Lathrop; no one minds anything once it's over. +Little misunderstandings are easy forgot. + +"And to think there's been a blue automobile puffing at these very +kitchen steps! To think you and me was over to Meadville and back +between dinner and supper one day! I guess Mrs. Lupey never got such a +start. She'd been all the morning getting home on the train and was only +just putting her bonnet away in its box when we rolled up. I never +enjoyed nothing like that roll up in all my life! I never see +automobiles from the automobile's side before, but now I can. When a +automobile goes over a duck it makes all the difference in the world +whether it's your automobile or your duck. + +"And then Jathrop's generosity! Not but what he was always generous. +Deacon White says he will say that for Jathrop, he was always generous. +And look what he brought home. Every child in town is just about out of +their senses. Felicia Hemans is crazy about the earrings, and 'Liza +Em'ly won't never take off the bracelet. Mr. Shores can't keep the tears +back when he looks at his watch charm. I think it was so kind of +Jathrop. But Jathrop was always kind; you know yourself that a kinder +creature never lived than Jathrop. I always said that for him. + +"And then his having a new fence built around the cemetery. It was +thoughtful, and Judge Fitch says nobody can't say more. But Judge Fitch +says Jathrop was always thoughtful; he says he's been interested in him +always just for that very reason. Judge Fitch says Jathrop's nature was +always that deep kind that's easy overlooked. He says he'll have to +confess to his shame that some of the time he overlooked him himself. He +says it's very difficult to understand a deep nature, because if a deep +nature don't make money, there's hardly any way of ever knowing that it +really was deep; people just think you're a fool then--like we always +thought Jathrop was. You know, nobody ever thought he ever could amount +to nothing. You know that yourself, Mrs. Lathrop. But making money lets +you see just what a person's got in 'em and see it plain. + +"I'm sure for all I've loved Jathrop as if he was going to be my own, +for years and years and years, still I never credited him with being the +man he is. I supposed he was a tramp somewhere--yes, I really did, Mrs. +Lathrop, you may believe me or not, but that's just what I thought when +I thought anything at all about him--which wasn't often. + +"Everybody in the whole place is busy remembering pleasant things about +him now. The minister's wife remembers his coming to a Christmas tree +once a long time ago when they both was little; she says she hasn't +thought of it in thirty years, but she remembers it as plain as day +now,--he had on a coat and a little tie. + +"And Gran'ma Mullins says she never will forget the day before he was +born, for she went to town and dropped her little bead bag, and you know +how much she thinks of her little bead bag now when the beads is all +worn off, so you can think what store she set by it when the beads were +still on, and so she was all back and forth along the road hunting for +it the whole blessed afternoon, and when she found it and went home, she +_was_ tired, and she slept late next morning because her husband was out +very late the night before, and when he slept late she always slept +late, 'cause she said sleeping late was almost the only treat he ever +give her, and, anyhow, when they did wake up and get up and get out, +there was Jathrop, and she says she shall never forget her joy over +having found the bead bag again. + +"Mrs. Macy says she remembers the day he hid, and you thought he was in +the cistern, and you was kneeling down looking in when he jumped out +from behind the stove and give you such a start you went in head first. + +"I remember that day myself, too--father was insisting he was paralyzed +then, and mother and me wouldn't take his word for it, and we fully +expected he'd race over and help haul you out, but all he said was, +'She'll have to manage the best she can--I'm paralyzed,' and we really +began to believe him from then on. + +"The minister says he shall always remember how well he looked when he +put on long trousers; the minister's preparing a little paper on Jathrop +to read at the Sunday-school annual, and he says he shall begin with the +day he put on long trousers and then mark his rise step by step. The +minister's so pleased over Jathrop's patting Brunhilde Susan on the +head; he says there are pats and pats, but that pat that Jathrop give +Brunhilde Susan was what he calls, in pure and Biblical simplicity, _a_ +pat." + +Susan paused. Mrs. Lathrop just felt her diamond solitaires, glanced at +the new kitchen range, and was silent. + +"And then, Mrs. Lathrop, that dear blessed little Chinese angel--I tell +you I shall never forget that boy. I liked his face when I first laid +eyes on him, and when I thought he was Jathrop's lawful wife, I loved +him as I'd loved even a Chinaman if he was your daughter; but when I saw +him cleaning up my sink, polishing my pans, washing out my cupboards and +all that, just the same as yours, _then_ was when I see that a heathen +Chinee has just the same right to go to heaven that anybody else has, +and from then on I just trusted him completely and let him do every bit +of the work till he left. + +"I see now why everybody's so happy being a missionary if you can just +get away and live with the Chinee. I'd have kept that boy if Jathrop +hadn't wanted him--I'd have been very glad to; and it's awful to think +we're keeping quiet, lovable natures like his from settling here. A girl +might do much worse than marry that Chinese--_very_ much worse. A very +great deal worse. Though I suppose many would hesitate." + +Mrs. Lathrop rose, went to the cupboard, took out a bottle of homemade +gooseberry wine, poured out a little, and took a sip. She did not offer +any to Susan. + +"It'll do you good," said Susan encouragingly. "I don't like the taste +myself, but it'll do you good. Besides, Mrs. Lathrop, you must begin to +get used to it. When you go around with Jathrop in his private car, +you'll have to drink wine, and if I was you, I'd stop tying a stocking +around your neck nights, for you'll have to wear a very different cut of +gowns soon. If Jathrop buys that yacht he's gone to look at, you'll have +to wear a sailor blouse." + +"Oh," said Mrs. Lathrop faintly, "oh, Susan, I--" Miss Clegg put her +hastily back into her chair. + +"Never mind if it does make your head go 'round a little, Mrs. Lathrop; +you must learn how. It may be hard, but it'll make Jathrop happy, and +now he's come back rich, that's what everybody wants to do. + +"Mrs. Brown says next time he comes she's going to make him a jet-black +pound-cake, and Mrs. Allen says she's going to work him a pincushion. +She says it'll be a plain, simple token of affection, but those whom +Fortune smiles on soon learn to know the true worth of a simple gift of +purest love. She says no one has ever known how she loved Jathrop, +'cause she kept it to herself for fear you'd think she was after him for +Polly." + +Mrs. Lathrop rocked dreamily. + +Susan rose to go. + +"Don't--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I must," said Susan. "Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, think of his giving me those +fifty shares of stock just on account of my long-suffering friendship +for you. I declare he's a great character--that's all I can say. + +"I always had a feeling he'd end in some unusual way; when they started +to lynch him, I thought that was the way, but now I see that this was +the way, and I thank heaven that I wasn't right the other time and am +right this time. For human nature is human nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and +people are always kinder to a woman whose son comes home from the +Klondike a millionaire than they are if they had the bother of lynching +him, no matter how much he may have deserved it." + +Mrs. Lathrop continued to finger her solitaire earrings in happy +silence. Miss Clegg, who never exhibited any tenderness toward anything, +went over and arranged the fold-over of her friend's gold-embroidered, +silk-quilted kimono. + +"I'll be glad when your new hair gets here, Mrs. Lathrop," she said +tenderly, "it'll make a different woman of you. It's astonishing what a +little extra hair can do; I always feel that when I put on my wave. + +"You and me will have to be getting used to all kinds of new things now. +And that beautiful dream of mine letting us know he was coming. Mrs. +Brown says Amelia says the Egyptians worshipped cats and used to pickle +them when they died. + +"It's astonishing how, if you know enough, you can see how any dream is +full of meaning. There's Jathrop so fond of pickles, and you and me +worshipping him. And he writing in every letter he has time to get +somebody to write for him, 'How's Susan Clegg?'" + +Mrs. Lathrop lapsed into beatific slumber. Susan Clegg went quietly +home. + + + + +IV + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE OLIVE BRANCH + + +It was not in reason to suppose that the return of Jathrop Lathrop +should continue to occupy wholly the attention of the community. Each +week--even each day--brought its fresh interests. Not the least exciting +of the provocative elements was borne back from the metropolis to which +'Liza Em'ly, that hitherto negatively regarded olive branch of the +ministerial family, had but recently emigrated. 'Liza Em'ly, it was +whispered one day, had written a book. + +The Sewing Society, at its next meeting, discussed it, as a matter of +course; and Susan Clegg, equally as a matter of course, promptly +reported the proceedings to her friend and neighbor, Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well," she began, sitting down with the heavy thump of one who is +completely and utterly overcome, "I give up. It's beyond me. I was to +the Sewing Society, and it's beyond them all, too. The idea of 'Liza +Em'ly's writing a book! No one can see how she ever come to think as she +could write a book. No one can see where she got any ideas to put in a +book. I don't know what any one thought she _would_ do when she set out +for the city to earn her own living, but there wasn't a soul in town as +expected her to do it, let alone writing a book, too. I can't see +whatever gives any one the idea of earning their living by writing +books. Books always seem so sort of unnecessary to me, anyway--I ain't +read one myself in years. No one in this community ever does read, and +that's what makes everybody so surprised over 'Liza Em'ly, after living +among us so long and so steady, starting up all of a sudden and doing +anything like this. And what makes it all the more surprising is she +never said a word about it either--never wrote home to the family or +told a living soul. And so you can maybe imagine the shock to the +minister when he got word as his own flesh and blood daughter had not +only written a book but got it all printed without consulting him. His +wife says he was completely done up and could hardly speak for quite a +little while, and later when the newspaper clippings begin to come, he +had to go to bed and have a salt-water cloth over his eyes. I tell you, +Mrs. Lathrop, the minister is a very sensitive nature; it's no light +thing to a sensitive nature to get a shock like a daughter's writing a +book." + +"Is--" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, I should say that it was," said Miss Clegg. "I should say that it +was. And not only is it being advertised, but people are buying it just +like mad, the papers say. The minister is still more upset over that; +seems the responsibilities of even being connected with books nowadays +is no light thing. There was that man as was shot for what he wrote in +a book the other day, you know, and the minister's wife says as the +minister is most nervous over what may be in the book; she says he says +very few books as everybody is reading ought to be read, and he knows +what he's talking about, for he's a great reader himself. Why, his wife +says he's got books hid all over the house, and she says--speaking +confidentially--as he says most of 'em he's really very sorry he's +read--after he's finished 'em. She says--he says he'll know no peace +night or day now until he's read 'Liza Em'ly's book. I guess it's no +wonder that he's nervous. 'Liza Em'ly's been a handful for years, and +since she fell in love with Elijah, there's been just no managing her a +_tall_. If Elijah'd loved her, of course it would have been different, +but Elijah wasn't a energetic nature, and 'Liza Em'ly was, and when a +energetic nature loves a man like Elijah, there's just no knowing where +they will end up. I never see why Elijah didn't love 'Liza Em'ly, but +her grandmother's nose has always been against her, and he told me +himself as it was all he could think of when he sat quietly down to +think about her. But all that's neither here nor there, for it's a far +cry from a girl's nose to her brains nowadays, thank heavens, and 'Liza +Em'ly's got something to balance her now. Polly White has sent for one +of the books. She says she'll lend it around, no matter what's in it. +Polly says there's one good thing in getting married, and that is it +makes you a married woman, and being a married woman lets you read all +kinds of books. I guess Polly's been a great reader since she was +married. She's meant to get some good out of that situation, and she's +done it. The deacon isn't so badly off, either. I wouldn't say that he's +glad he's married all the time, but I guess some of the time he don't +mind, and it's about all married people ask if only some of the time +they can feel to not be sorry. A little let-up is a great relief." + +"You--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, I know," said Miss Clegg, "but I pick up a good deal from others, +and there's a feeling as married women have when they talk to a woman as +they suppose can't possibly know anything just 'cause she never got into +any of their troubles, as makes them show forth the truth very plainly. +I won't say as married women strike me more and more as fools, for it +wouldn't be kindly, but I will say as the way they revel in being +married and saying how hard it is, kind of strikes me as amusing. _I_ +wouldn't go into a store and buy a dress and then, when every one knew +as I picked it out myself, keep running around telling how it didn't fit +and was tearing out in all the seams--but that's about what most of this +marriage talk comes to. I do wonder what 'Liza Em'ly has said about +marriage in _Deacon Tooker Talks_. That's a very funny name for a book, +I think myself, but that's what she's named it. And as it seems to be +about most everything, I suppose it must be about marriage, too. Of +course 'Liza Em'ly's so wild to marry Elijah that everybody knows that +that was what took her up to town. She didn't want to earn her living +any more than any girl does. Nobody ever really aches to earn their +living. But some has to, and some wants to be around with men, and there +ain't no better way to be around with men nowadays than to go to work +with 'em. You have 'em all day long then, and pretty soon you have 'em +all the time. 'Liza Em'ly wants to have Elijah all the time." + +"What--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Oh, she says she thinks they're so congenial; she told me herself as +Elijah 'understood.' It seems to be a great thing to understand +nowadays. It's another of those things we used to take for granted but +which is now got new and uncommon and most remarkable. She told me when +she and Elijah watched the sun setting together, they both understood, +and she seemed to feel that that was a safe basis on which to set out +for town and start in to earn her own living. The minister didn't want +her to go. He was very much against it. It cost such a lot, too. The +minister's wife said it would have been ever so much cheaper to fix a +girl to get married. You can get married with six pairs of new +stockings, the minister's wife says, and it takes a whole dozen with the +heels run to earn your living. The minister's wife was very confidential +with me about it all, and 'Liza Em'ly confided considerably in me, too. +They both knew I'd never tell. Every one always confides in me because +they know I never tell. Why, the things folks in this community have +told me! Well!--But I _never_ tell. The real reason I never tell is +because they always tell every one themselves before I can get around, +but then a confiding nature is always telling its affairs, and so you +can't really blame 'em. I never tell my own affairs, because I've +learned as affairs is like love letters, and if they're interesting +enough, it is very risky. But really, Mrs. Lathrop, I must be going now, +and as soon as I get hold of that book, I'll be over with my opinion. +_Deacon Tooker Talks!_ My, but that is a funny name for a book! I can't +see myself what kind of a book it can possibly be with that title--but +anyway, we shall soon know now." + +"Yes, we--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, indeed," said Susan, and the seance broke up for that day. + +It was resumed the day after, and the day after that, but no further +progress having been made in the development of 'Liza Em'ly's affairs, +that interesting topic remained in abeyance until after the next meeting +of the Sewing Society, when the subject was put forward with emphasis. + +"You never hear the beat," said the lady who nearly always went to the +Sewing Society to the lady who hadn't been there for years; "this book +of 'Liza Em'ly's seems to be something just beyond belief. Polly read it +all aloud to us to-day, and I must say it's a _most_ astonishing book. I +will tell you in confidence, Mrs. Lathrop, as I ain't surprised that the +minister hid his copy and that the newspapers is all printing things +about it. Seems it's a man in bed talking to his wife who is asleep +most of the time, only he don't pay the slightest attention to her not +paying the slightest attention. Polly had the name right, it is _Deacon +Tooker Talks_ (which is a _most_ singular name to my order of thinking). +The cover has got a picture of the deacon's head on a pillow talking, +and you can think how the minister would feel over his daughter's book's +cover having a pillow on it! I walked home with Mrs. Fisher, and she +will have it that 'Liza Em'ly's put her father into the book, soul and +body. There's a man called Mr. Lexicon as is a lawyer in the book, and +Mrs. Fisher says it's the minister. I wouldn't swear as it wasn't the +minister myself, but I hate to believe it, for a girl as'll put her +father in a book would be equal to most anything, I should suppose. But +Mrs. Fisher's sure it's the minister; she says she knew him right off by +his ear-muffs. Only 'Liza Em'ly has disguised the ear-muffs by calling +them overshoes. Mr. Lexicon has always got on his overshoes. Mrs. +Fisher waited until we got away from all the rest, and then she showed +me a review from a New York paper that just took my breath away. It says +no such book has appeared before a welcoming public in two hundred and +fifty years, and she's going to write the paper and ask what the book +two hundred and fifty years ago was about. Mrs. Fisher says she's +thinking very seriously of writing a book herself. She says she's always +wanted to write a book, and now she thinks she'll go up to town and see +'Liza Em'ly and ask her about their writing a book together. She says +she'll furnish all the story, and 'Liza Em'ly can write the book. Then +they'll divide the money even. And there'll be money to divide, too, for +'Liza Em'ly's book is surely selling. Mrs. Macy come up after Mrs. +Fisher went home, and she had a piece out of another newspaper that Mrs. +Lupey sent her, saying the book was in its ninth edition already. She +had it with her at the Sewing Society, but she didn't bring it out, out +of consideration for the feelings of the minister's wife. Mrs. Macy +says she thinks she'll write a book, too. She's got the same idea as +Mrs. Fisher about writing it with 'Liza Em'ly, only she says she'll let +'Liza Em'ly use some of her own ideas mixed in with Mrs. Macy's ideas, +and she can have two thirds of the money. She says it can't be hard to +write a book, or 'Liza Em'ly couldn't never have done it, but she says +'Liza Em'ly has got the Fishers in her book, and she's surprised Mrs. +Fisher didn't recognize 'em at the Sewing Society. 'Liza Em'ly calls 'em +the Hunters. Fishers, hunters--you see! An' John Bunyan she calls Martin +Luther, an' in place of being a genius, she covered that all up by +making him a painter. Laws, Mrs. Macy says writing a book's easy. She +says that book of 'Liza Em'ly's is really too flat for words, and what +makes people buy it, she can't see. Well, I shan't buy a copy, I know +_that_. I ain't knowed 'Liza Em'ly all my life to go doing things like +that now." + +With which very common view as to the works produced by our intimate +friends, Miss Clegg rose to take her departure. + +"Did--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, when they next met. + +"No--I asked, but not a soul knew. We haven't got _any_ man in town as +it could _possibly_ be. They was all discussing it, too. Mrs. Macy and +Mrs. Fisher is really going to town to see 'Liza Em'ly and take up their +ideas to talk over. Mrs. Macy is putting her ideas down on a piece of +paper, so as to be sure she has 'em with her. Mrs. Fisher's keeping hers +in her head, for she says if she lost them, anybody might write her +book. They think they'll go Tuesday. I hope they will, 'cause if they +do, they'll come straight from the train and tell me, and then I'll come +straight over and tell you." + +With which amicable arrangement Miss Clegg again took her departure. + +It was quite two weeks before affairs shaped themselves for Mrs. Macy +and Mrs. Fisher to go to the city on their literary errand, but they +managed it at last, and you may be very sure that Mrs. Lathrop peeked +eagerly and earnestly out of her window many times the afternoon after +their journey. They came up to call upon Miss Clegg and narrate their +adventures quite according to their usual friendly ideals, and directly +they took their leave that good lady hied herself rapidly to Mrs. +Lathrop to tell the tale. + +Mrs. Lathrop met her at the door and both sank into chairs immediately. + +"Well, what--" said the older lady then, and her younger friend rejoined +promptly: + +"Perfectly dumfounding; nothing like it was ever knowed before or ever +will be again." + +"Wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"They're both completely paralyzed. Mrs. Fisher can't say a word, and +Mrs. Macy can't keep still." + +"Wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop again. + +Miss Clegg drew a sharp breath. "They went to see 'Liza Em'ly, an' they +saw her. My goodness heavens, I should think they did see her. Mrs. +Macy says if any one ever supposed as the Hanging Gardens of Babylon was +any wonder, they'd ought to go to the city an' see 'Liza Em'ly, and the +Hanging Gardens would keep their mouths shut forever after." + +"Wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop for the third time. + +But Miss Clegg was now quite ready to discharge her full duty. "Seems +'Liza Em'ly's book went into the twentieth edition yesterday," she said, +opening her eyes and mouth with great expressiveness. "They knew that +before they got there, for you can believe Mrs. Macy or not, just as you +please, Mrs. Lathrop, but there were actually signboards saying so stuck +up all along in the fields as the train went by. The train-boy had the +books for sale on the train, too, and kept dropping 'em on top of 'em +all the way, but they didn't mind that, for Mrs. Fisher read her book as +fast as she could until he picked it up again, and she read to good +purpose, for this afternoon she asked for a glass of water, and while I +was out with her in the kitchen getting it, she told me there isn't a +mite of doubt but Mrs. Macy is in the book, and Doctor Carter of +Meadville is in right along with her. Mrs. Fisher says 'Liza Em'ly has +called her Miss Grace and him Doctor Wagner of Lemonadetown, but she +says she knew 'em instantly by the description of how they was in love; +she says you'd recognize how they was in love right off. I must say, +Mrs. Lathrop, as I think 'Liza Em'ly ought to be very careful what she +writes about real people if you can tell 'em as quick as that; but +anyway, they got to town and took a street car, and then, lo and behold, +if their first little surprise wasn't the finding as 'Liza Em'ly has +stopped living where she lives and gone to live in a hotel, so they had +to go to the hotel, too, and when they got there, what do you think?--If +'Liza Em'ly wasn't giving a reception to celebrate the twentieth +edition!" + +"Wh--?" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, indeed," continued Miss Clegg, "certainly--yes, I should say so, +too. If they didn't get a fine shock over 'Liza Em'ly and her hotel and +her reception and the whole thing, Mrs. Macy says she'll never know what +a shock is when she sees it. Seems they was shoved into one end of a +elevator without so much as by your leave and out the other end before +they'd caught their breath, and then they found themselves in a room +with flowers all tied up in banners, and Elijah, with his hair parted in +the middle, passing cups of tea which a lady, with her muff on her head, +was pouring out, while 'Liza Em'ly sat on a table swinging her feet in +shoes she never bought in _this_ town, Mrs. Macy'll take her Bible oath, +and a dress that trained on the floor even from the table." + +"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Oh, that isn't anything," said Susan, "just you wait. Well, and so Mrs. +Macy says you can maybe imagine their feelings when they found their two +perfectly respectable and well brought up selves in the middle of such a +kind of a party! One man and one girl was under the piano playing cat's +cradle, while another man was doing a sum on the wallpaper with a +hatpin. Mrs. Macy says she wouldn't have been surprised at nothing after +that, you'd think, but she says when it comes to 'Liza Em'ly nowadays, +you don't know even what you're thinkin', for you'd suppose 'Liza Em'ly +would at least have looked ashamed of her feet and her train. Instead of +that, she just clapped her hands and said, 'Hello, home-folks,' which +nearly sent Mrs. Fisher over backwards. Elijah saw them then, and _he_ +had the good manners to drop a teacup, but even he didn't look anywhere +near as used up as in Mrs. Macy's opinion a man away from business with +his hair parted in the middle in the middle of the afternoon had ought +to look. He gave them chairs though, and they set down between a young +lady as was smoking a cigarette and another as was very carefully +powdering herself in a little mirror set in her pocketbook. Just then +there was a noise like a awful crash and a hailstorm, and after they'd +both jumped and Mrs. Macy come near dislocating her hip, they see that +a man was beginning on the piano. Well, Mrs. Macy says _such_ +piano-playing her one hope is as she may be going to be spared +hereafter; she says he'd skitter up the piano with both hands, and then +he'd bang his way back to where he belonged, and every time he hit the +very bottom, he'd give his head a flop and jerk down another lot of hair +over his eyes. Mrs. Macy says she never see a man with so much loose +hair where he could manage it, for he kept getting down more and more +till he looked like a cocoanut and nothing else, so help Mrs. Macy, and +then, when he was completely hid, he hit the piano four cracks and +folded his arms and was done." + +"Mercy on--!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I should say so," continued Miss Clegg, "and Mrs. Macy says everybody +clapped like mad, and then 'Liza Em'ly come to earth and went and threw +her arms around his neck, which to Mrs. Macy's order of thinking, didn't +look much like she was going to marry Elijah. And then, before they +could shake hands or say good-by or do a thing, a boy came in with a +lot of telegrams on a tray, and while 'Liza Em'ly was fixing half a +spectacle in one eye to read 'em, a young lady dressed in snakeskins, +and very little else, jumped into the room right over the backs of their +two chairs in a most totally unlooked-for way, and then began to spin +about and wriggle here and there and in and out generally, and Mrs. +Fisher got up and said they really must go, and Elijah showed 'em to the +door with the lady in snakeskins making figure eights around them all +three and 'Liza Em'ly throwing a rose at them and kissing her hand till +somehow they got into the hall. They walked down flights of stairs then +till they thought there never would be a bottom anywhere, and then they +looked at each other, and after a while they got where they could speak, +and then they came home." + +"Well, wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Me, too," said Susan, "I think it's _awful_! And the worst of it is for +her to be the minister's daughter. Think of it! They bought a paper as +had her picture on it and a account of the reception as they'd just been +at. It said Herr Schnitzel Beerstein played, so they know his name now, +and Madame Kalouka S-k-z-o-h danced, so when it comes to her name, they +ain't much better off than they were before. Wherever they looked they +see posters of _Deacon Tooker Talks_, and people in the cars was all +discussing the book. Two ministers is going to take it for a text +to-morrow, and the candy stores has all got little candy boxes like beds +with a chocolate drop for Deacon Tooker and a gum-drop for his wife." + +"Well, wha--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I don't know," said Miss Clegg. "The book's made right out of this +community, and since I've read it myself, I can see who every one is +_except_ Deacon Tooker. I can't see who Deacon Tooker is, for we haven't +got anybody like him. He's talking the whole time; in fact, the book is +all what he says about everything, and all his wife ever does is to wake +up when he shakes her and then go to sleep again. The idea's very +remarkable of a man laying awake chattering to himself all night long, +but I never heard of any such person here. Our only deacon is Deacon +White, and he never talks a _tall_." + +"I wonder if the min--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, I don't believe so," said Miss Clegg. "My goodness, suppose he did +and hit something like they did! No, I hope he won't ever think of it, +and as for 'Liza Em'ly, I hope she'll remember her married father and +mother soon and remember her quiet and loving home, too, before she gets +in the habit of having parties like that very often. My gracious, think +of going to call on a girl as you see christened and having a snake-lady +gartering her way up your leg while you were trying to say good-by and +get away alive. Mrs. Macy says the creature was diving here and +wriggling there and slipping under tables and over chairs in a way as +made your flesh go creeping right after her. Well, it's clear 'Liza +Em'ly's started on a most singular career. Mrs. Macy says first they +give her a sandwich with a bow of ribbon on it, and she swallowed the +ribbon; and then they give her a piece out of a cake that they said had +a lucky quarter in it, and she's almost sure she swallowed the quarter, +so maybe she was prejudiced." + +"Well, I--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"They felt the same way," said Miss Clegg; "they've come home very much +used up. Mrs. Macy says you can talk to her about the days of ancient +Rome and the way folks act underground in Paris, but she says she knows +positively as what she and Mrs. Fisher saw with their own eyes in 'Liza +Em'ly's sitting-room beat all those kind of little circuses hollow. Mrs. +Macy says she's seen enough of what they call high life now to last her +till she dies of shame. She says the only bright spot in the whole thing +is as 'Liza Em'ly's nose isn't anywhere near as prominent as you'd think +any more, and she's got a automobile and is going to Europe when the +book goes into its fiftieth edition." + +"Well--I--" mused Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, and I will, too," said Miss Clegg. "I'll go straight home and do +it. I'm awful tired. And it bothers me more than I like to own not +knowing who Deacon Tooker is. You know my nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and +although I was never one to try to find out things nor to talk about 'em +after I've managed to find 'em out, still I never was one to like not to +know things, and I must say I do want to know who Deacon Tooker is. +Well, they say all things comes to him who waits, so I think I won't +stop here any longer. Good-by, and when I do find out, you can count on +my coming right over to tell you." + +"Goo--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +But Miss Clegg had shut the door after her. + + + + +V + +SUSAN CLEGG'S "IMPROVEMENTS" + + +There was nothing small or mean or economical about Jathrop Lathrop, now +that he had turned out rich. He was the soul of generosity, the epitome +of liberality, the concentrated essence of filial devotion as expressed +in checks and carte-blanche orders directed at his mother. + +One of his earliest kind thoughts was to have Mrs. Lathrop's home +completely modernized, and as Susan Clegg lived next door and was his +mother's best and dearest friend, he decided to build her house over, +too. + +To that end he hunted up the highest-priced architect of whom he could +hear and asked to have designs submitted forthwith. The highest-priced +architect readily undertook the reconstruction of the Lathrop and Clegg +domiciles, but being too occupied to go down into the country and look +over the field personally, he delegated one of his youngest and most +promising assistants to accomplish the task, and the young and promising +assistant forthwith packed his dress-suit case and set off. + +He was an assistant of most extraordinary youth and almost unbelievable +promise, and he saw a chance to plan colleges (endowed by J. Lathrop, +Esq.), palaces (to be built for Lathrop, the millionaire), possibly to +be commissioned with the overseeing of the artistic development of some +new, up-springing city (Lathropville, Alaska, or something of that +sort), if he should only succeed in at once accomplishing a close union +of feeling with the golden offspring of our old friend. His first really +rich client is to a young débutant in bricks just what a well-hung +picture is to the budding artist, or a song before royalty is to a +singer. Such being the well-known facts of life the young and promising +assistant fully intended to do himself proud in the reconstruction of +the two houses consigned by Jathrop's benevolence to his tender mercies. + +The young architect came to town and went to the hotel (at Jathrop's +expense). He spent the next ten days in going twice each day to study +his task, sketch its realities and idealities, and also make the +acquaintance of Mrs. Lathrop and Susan Clegg, for he was a young man of +new and novel ideas, and one of his newest and most novel ideas was to +build a house which would really suit those who were to live in it. He +was so young that he had no conception as to how this was to be done, +nor the faintest inkling as to what a Titanic-crossed-with-Promethean +undertaking it would be to do, if even he did know how; but he felt--and +most truly--that it was a new view of the relation between house and +builder, and he felt proud over having thought it out for himself as +well as for all time to come. Then he had another novel idea--not so +altogether his own, however--which was that a house should "express its +dweller." This latter idea was quite beyond the grasp of his present +audience and just a little beyond his own grasp, too, but he was brave +and conscientious and didn't see it that way at all. + +It has taken some time to lay out all these premises, but if there is +any one with whom one can desire close acquaintance it is surely the man +who comes to build over a comfortable and in-most-ways-satisfactory home +of long years' standing, so I trust that the minutes have not been +altogether wasted. + +Mrs. Lathrop and Miss Clegg received the young man and his mission in +such states of mind as were entirely compatible with their individual +outlook over life. + +"I must say I'm far from altogether liking him," Susan said to her +friend, a very real note of disapproval in her voice, one day toward the +end of the week. Mrs. Lathrop was rocking in her new old-gold-plush +stationary rocker and listened as usual with interest. "He's on the +woodpile now, drawing a three-quarter profile of the woodshed. The way +he perches anywhere and then goes to work and draws anything would +surely make an English snail pull his castle right into his house along +with him, for I've got a feeling as there's nothing about me as he +hasn't got in his book by this time, and there's many things he's drawn +as I never would choose to have the world in general looking over. I'm +sure I don't want no view of my woodshed going down to posterity for one +thing. I've had to have a woodshed, but I've never admired it, and the +way I've nailed anything handy over holes in it is far from my usual way +of mending. You've always mended 'hit or miss,' Mrs. Lathrop, and after +years of such doings as was more worthy a poorhouse than a Christian, +heaven has seen fit to reward your patching with a son fresh from the +Klondike, but I've always darned blue with blue and brown with brown, +and the only spot in my whole life that I haven't carefully and neatly +matched the stripes in is my woodshed, and now to-day when I was +thinking very seriously of using it up for the kitchen-stove next +winter, if there isn't a young man from New York out drawing it in black +and white, and ten to one he'll print it in some unexpected Sunday paper +marked 'Jathrop Lathrop's mother's friend Susan Clegg's woodshed!' +That'll be a pretty kettle of fish, and you needn't tell me that there +won't be somebody to perk up and say, 'No smoke without some fire,' +which will be as good as throwing it in my teeth that I'm one of those +as use a safety pin when a button's off, when it's a thing as I've never +done and never would do even if there is a proverb that a pin's a pin +for all that." + +Susan paused here and looked upon her friend in serious question. Mrs. +Lathrop, however, merely continued to rock pleasantly. A change had come +over the spirit of her rocking since the return of Jathrop. She had +rocked for years with a more or less apologetic air, as if she knew that +there were those who might criticize her action and yet she couldn't +personally feel that she really ought to give it up. But now she rocked +with a wide, free swing as if life was life and if she liked to rock, +she was going to rock, and if there were those who objected, they could +object--she didn't care. There is nothing that so quickly develops an +independent standpoint as the possession of money; there is nothing that +so fully produces a conviction that one is thoroughly justified in doing +just exactly what one pleases; there is nothing that leads to quite the +same lofty indifference as to whether what pleases one pleases or +displeases all the rest of the world. + +We have but to look at Jathrop to see that this is true. Of all the +tame, mild-eyed, listless young individuals, Jathrop was the worst, +falling asleep on an average of three times an afternoon in school, and +never keeping conscious a whole evening. Whether a sudden change in +Jathrop's character was the cause of making him a financial power or +whether his Klondike-acquired bank account was the cause of his +awakening, it still is a fact that now in his quiet way he was a very +live person. + +Jathrop was indifferent to a degree, also, as witness his appearance +with his Chinese boy whom everybody took to be his wife with his great +baggy trousers and pigtail that no respectable boy, Chinese or +otherwise, should wear. Of course, it must be acceded that Jathrop was +indifferent in that case from ignorance. He did not know what the world +was saying. + +Perhaps that accounts for the lofty attitude, one might say lofty +altitude, of so many of our millionaires. They are so far removed from +the world that their ears cannot hear what is being said. People talk in +whispers about the "very rich," which makes it doubly hard for them to +hear, or hearing, to think that it matters very much, else people would +shout. However, when all is said, money does make a difference. + +Mrs. Lathrop had been a silent, sat-upon, unaggressively-rocking person +for years; now Jathrop had come back from the Klondike and altered all +that; it was not that she had turned talkative, it was not that she had +so far altered the very foundations of her being as to presume ever to +try to contradict any other body's opinions, but the return of Jathrop +and the wealth of Jathrop had found expression in his mother through the +one medium of almost all expression with her. Mrs. Lathrop had ceased to +concern herself as to the length or the vigor of her rocking. It was +beautiful to see the energy of independence with which she went back and +forth, bringing her feet down with an audible clap whenever she desired +fresh impetus. + +Susan Clegg did not seem to sympathize. Instead, sitting on her straight +chair opposite, she shook her head severely, further discontent making +itself visible in the manner of her shake. + +But Mrs. Lathrop was proof against all manifestations of disapproval +now. She flew back and forth in the old-gold-plush stationary rocker +like the happy pendulum of some beatific clock. Jathrop was home. +Jathrop was rich. Jathrop would buy her anything she wanted. + +"I d'n know, I'm sure, Mrs. Lathrop," Susan went on, the discontent +ringing somewhat more distinctly in her tone, "as I'm much taken with +this idea of building us over, even if Jathrop does mean it kindly. I +know there's a many as would nigh to go out of their senses at the very +idea of being made over new for nothing, but I was never one to go out +of my senses easy, and that young man on the woodpile doesn't give me +any kind of secure feeling as to what he'll make out of my house. He +looks to me like the kind of young man as will open doors square across +windows where the knob'll smash the glass sure if you're trying to carry +a bureau out at the time of the house-cleaning. The kind of cravats he's +got looks to me like his chimneys would be very likely not to draw, and +their color gives me a feeling that doughnuts in his house will smell in +shut-up closets a week after the frying. You know what shut-up fryings +is like after they've had no fresh air for a week, but I wasn't raised +that way. When I have fish I have fish and done with it, and when I have +onions I have onions, and I ain't very wild over maybe boarding my fish +and my onions in my best bonnet henceforth and forever. + +"Mrs. Brown was telling me yesterday as she heard of some city woman as +had a system of ventilation put into her house, and the rats and mice +used it so freely that you couldn't sleep nights. They nested in it, and +they fought in it, and they died in it, all as happy and gay as you +please, and the family had to have it picked out of the walls in the end +and all new paper put on. That's the kind of ideas young men call modern +improvements, and that young man on the woodpile is about as modern and +improving as they make 'em, I take it. + +"I can't say what it is about that young man that I don't like, but, +being as I'm always frank and open with you, I will remark that so far I +ain't found one thing about him as I _do_ like. He's been down cellar +hammering on the wall wherever the wind blew him to listeth to hammer, +and I had to sit up-stairs and listen without no chance to blow myself. +I caught him down on all fours this morning peeking under my front +porch, and he didn't even have the manners to blush. As to the way he +makes free with the outside of _your_ house, I wouldn't waste breath +with trying to tell you, but my own feeling is that an architect learns +his trade on a tight-rope to judge from that young man's manner, and +from what I've seen while he was swinging by one arm from your premises, +I wouldn't feel safe to take a bath even on top of a chimney, myself." + +Susan rose at this and went to the window and looked out; from her +expression as she turned, it was plain to be seen that the artist was +still at his task. + +"I don't know, Mrs. Lathrop," she said, coming back to her seat, "I d'n +know, I'm sure, as I'm took with this idea a _tall_. I never was one for +favors either given or asked, and although I know this isn't no favor, +but just a evidence of what I've been through with you first and last, +still it's done in spite of me and I've got no feeling that I'm going to +enjoy it. There's something about kindness as is always most trying to +the people who've got no choice but to stand up and be tried. People who +get freely given to is in the habit of getting what they don't want and +can't use, but I ain't. I'm very far from it. There's nothing in me +that's going to be pleased with getting a green hat when I needed a pink +coat--no, sir. + +"And I don't need nothing. Or if I do, I can buy it. I know Jathrop +means it kindly, but Jathrop can't enter into my ways of thinking. +Jathrop is looking into life from the Klondike gold-fields and I'm +looking at it from my back stoop. That young man was out swishing his +pocket handkerchief about and sucking his thumb and holding it up all +yesterday afternoon, and about the time I'd made up my mind to bolt him +out of the kitchen for a lunatic, he come in and told me he really +thought there was wind enough in your back yard and my back yard +together to run a windmill, in which case a water system could be easy +inaugurated. I told him I didn't know you could inaugurate anything but +a president, but he said anything as you hadn't had before and thought +was going to work fine and be a great improvement could be inaugurated. +I told him I supposed I could stand a windmill if you could. + +"What do you think--what _do_ you think, Mrs. Lathrop, if that young man +didn't ask if he might go and look up the parlor fireplace! Well, I told +him he could, and I give him a newspaper to shake his head on after he +was done looking, too. He's been in my garret until I bet he knows every +trunk label by heart, and I must say I feel as if I'd have very little +of my own affairs to tell on Judgment Day if he gets dressed and out of +his grave quicker than I get dressed and out of mine. But that isn't +all, whatever you may think. There's a many other things about him as I +don't like and don't like a _tall_. + +"For one thing, he's got a way of looking around as if it was my house +that was the main thing and I was the last and smallest piece of +cross-paper tied in the kite's tail. To my order of thinking, that's a +far from polite way for a young man as Jathrop's hiring and boarding to +look on a woman whose house he may thank his lucky stars if he may get +the chance to build over. Mrs. Macy says Mrs. Lupey says architects is +all like that, but I'm far from seeing why. I don't consider that young +man superior a _tall_. I consider his brains as very far from being +equal to my own. When he asks me to hold the other end of his tape-line +and does it just as if a pin would do as well, only I was handier at the +moment, I'm very far from feeling flattered. I never saw just such a +young man before, and when I think of being delivered up to him--house +and all--for the summer, I'm also very far from feeling easy. I d'n +know, I'm sure, what will be the end of this, but I do know that it +looks to me like a pretty bad business." + +Susan paused again and looked at her friend, but Mrs. Lathrop just +rocked onward. Life had widened so tremendously for her that she +couldn't possibly be perturbed in any way or by anything. If the roof +fell in, Jathrop would buy her another, and if she were smashed by it, +Jathrop would have her put together again. Why worry? + +The young man remained ten days in all, and when his visit of +investigation was completed, he returned to New York. Jathrop took him +to the Lotus Club to wash and to the Yacht Club to lunch and to +Claremont in the afternoon (in his motor), and they talked it all over. +The young man had his sketches, ideas, ideals, and plans all tied into a +neat patent cover with cost-estimates lightly glued in the back. Jathrop +was deeply interested, and the young man expounded the inmost soul of +all his measurements and proposed altitudes and alterations. The young +man reminded Jathrop of his pertinent hypothesis that a house should +express its owner. Jathrop's own view of "express" was that if you +could pay the bill, it beat freighting all out of sight, but he felt +that perhaps the young man meant something different, so he merely gave +him a cigar. + +The young man took the cigar and proceeded to elucidate his hypothesis +by explaining that, having carefully studied both Mrs. Lathrop and Miss +Clegg, he should suggest that Miss Clegg's house express her by being +severely Doric and that Mrs. Lathrop's should be rambling and Queen Anne +with wide, free floor spaces. He further suggested a hyena-headed +door-knocker for Miss Clegg and an electric button to press, so that the +door opened of itself for Mrs. Lathrop. Also a roofless pergola to +connect the two houses. Jathrop liked all his ideas and sketches very +much, but as he was really good-hearted and had not the least desire to +present green hats to those who wanted pink coats, he had the whole book +sent down to his mother and begged her to carefully inspect it in +company with Susan Clegg. They inspected it. + +"Well," said Susan, "all I can say is I'll have to carry this book home +and sit down and try and make out what he _does_ mean. He's done it very +neat, that I will say, but between crosses and dotted lines and your +house behind mine like two Roman emperors on a cameo pin, I can't make +head or tail of what's going to be done to either of us. I can't even +find my own house in this plan on some pages, and as for this bird-cage +walk that I'm supposed to run back and forth in like a polar bear in a +circus all day long, my own opinion is that if it's got no roof, it's +going to be very hard indeed about the snow in winter, for I'll have to +carry every single solitary shovelful to one end or the other so as to +throw it out of either your kitchen window or mine. That's all the good +that will do us." + +Mrs. Lathrop swung to and fro, totally unconcerned. No sort of +proposition could disconcert her now. If the house when built over +proved a failure, Jathrop would build her another. + +Susan took the prettily-bound portfolio home with her and spent the +evening over it. She studied it profoundly and to some purpose, for the +next morning when she brought it back to Mrs. Lathrop, it held but few +secrets, other than those of a purely technical character, for her. + +"I've been all through it," she said to her friend, "and now I can't +really tell what I think a _tall_. But this I _do_ know, if we ever +really get these houses, I will be running back and forth from dawn to +dark through that wire tunnel in a way as'll make the liveliest polar +bear that ever kept taking a fresh turn look like a petrified tree +beside me. Why, only to keep the conveniences he's got put in scoured +bright would take me all of every morning in my house, to say nothing of +wiping up the floors, for Jathrop isn't intending to buy us no carpets +ever. We're to sit around on cherry when we ain't on Georgia pine, and +he's got every mantelpiece marked with the kind of wood we're to burn in +it, and he's been kind enough to tell us what colored china we're to +use in each bedroom. We're to shoot our clothes into the cellar through +a hole from up-stairs and wash 'em there in those two square boxes as we +couldn't make out. That thing I read 'angle-hook' is a 'inglenook,' and +so far from sitting in it to fish we're to set in it to look at the +fire, if we can get any mahogany to burn in that particular fireplace. + +"Those fans are stairs, we're to go up 'em the way the arrow points, and +heaven knows where or how we're to get down again. What we thought was +beds is closets, and what we thought was closets is beds, and it's +evident with all his hopping and hanging he didn't really charge his +mind with us a _tall_, for he's got a bedroom in your house marked 'Mr. +Lathrop,' when the last bit of real thought would have made him just +_have_ to remember as you're a widow. He's give me a sewing-room when he +must have seen that I always do my mending in the kitchen, and he's give +us each enough places to wash to keep the whole community clean. I must +say he's tried to be fair, for he's give both houses the same number of +rooms and the same names to each room. We've each got a summer kitchen, +but he left the spring and autumn to scratch along anyhow; we've each +got a bathtub, and we've each got a china-closet as well as a pantry, +which shows he had very little observation of the way _you_ keep things +in order." + +Mrs. Lathrop absorbed all this with the happy calm of a contented (and +rocking) sponge. + +"But what takes me is the way he's not only got a finger, but has just +smashed both hands, into every pie on the place," Susan continued. "He's +moved the chicken-house and give us each a horse and give the cow a calf +without even so much as 'by your leave.' I don't know which will be the +most surprised if this plan comes true--me with my horse, or the cow +finding herself with a calf in the fall as well as the spring this year. +Then it beats me where he's going to get all his trees, for both houses +is a blooming bower, and the way tree-toads will sing me to sleep shows +he's had no close friends in the country. Trees brushing your window +mean mosquitos at night and spiders whenever they feel so disposed. And +that ain't all, whatever you may think, for you haven't got a +window-pane over four inches square and, as every window has fifty-six +of them, I see your windows going dirty till out of very shame I get 'em +washed for your funeral. And that ain't all, whatever you may think, +either, for the snow is going to lodge all around all those little +gables and inglenooks he's trimmed your roof with, and you'll leak +before six months goes by, or I'll lose my guess." + +But it was impossible to impress Mrs. Lathrop. If things leaked, Jathrop +would have them mended. She just rocked and rocked. + +"I don't know what to write Jathrop about these plans," Susan Clegg said +slowly. "Of course, I've got to write him something, and I declare I +don't know what to say. He means it kindly, and there's nothing in the +wide world that makes things so hard as when people mean kindly. You can +do all sorts of things when people is enemies, but when any one means +anything kindly, you've got to eat it if it kills you. Mrs. Allen was +telling me the other day that since she's took a vow to do one good +action daily, she's lost most all of her friends. + +"That just shows how people feel about being grabbed by the neck and +held under till you feel you've done enough good to 'em. Jathrop means +this well, but I've got a feeling as we'll go through a great deal of +misery being built over, and I really don't think we'll be so much +better off after we've survived. You'll have to be torn right down, and +the day that that young man was up on my porch post, he said he couldn't +be positive that I'd keep even my north wall. He pounded it all over in +the dining-room until the paper was a sight, and then when he saw how +very far from pleased I was, he tried to get out of it by saying the +wall would have to come down, anyhow. I think he saw toward the last +that he'd gone too far in a many little ways. I didn't like his taking +the hens off their nests to measure how wide the henhouse was. I +consider a hen is one woman when she's seated at work and had ought not +to be called off by any man alive. But, laws, that young man wasn't any +respecter of work or hens or anything else! He called himself an artist, +and since I've been studying these plans, I've begun to think as he was +really telling the truth, for artists is all crazy, and anything crazier +than these plans I never did see. Not content with having us wash in the +sink and the cellar, we're to wash under the front stairs, too, not to +speak of all but swimming up-stairs." + +Mrs. Lathrop just smiled and rocked more. + +"I'm not in favor of it," said Miss Clegg, rising to go. "I don't +believe it'll be any real advantage. We'll be like the Indians that die +as soon as you civilize 'em--that's what we'll be. The windmill will +keep us awake nights, and you don't use any water to speak of, anyhow. +So I don't see why I should be kept awake. As for that laughing tiger +he's give me on my front door, I just won't have it, and that's all +there is about it. A laughing tiger's no kind of a welcome to people you +want, and when people come that I don't want, I don't need no tiger to +let 'em know it. No, I never took to that young man, and I don't take to +his plans. I don't like those four pillars across my front any more than +I do that mouse-hole without a roof that he's give me to go to you in. I +consider it a very poor compliment to you, Mrs. Lathrop, that he's fixed +it so if I once start to go to see you, I've got to keep on, for I can't +possibly get out so to go nowhere else." + +Susan Clegg paused. Mrs. Lathrop rocked. + +"Well?" said Miss Clegg, impatiently. + +But Mrs. Lathrop just rocked. If Susan didn't like it, she needn't like +it. Jathrop would pay the bill. + +Susan Clegg went home, her mind still unconvinced. + + + + +VI + +SUSAN CLEGG UPROOTED + + +Many things against which we protest bitterly at first we eventually +come to accept and possibly even to enjoy. It was that way, to a degree +at least, with the reconstruction of the houses of Susan Clegg and her +friend Mrs. Lathrop, neither lady being particularly charmed with the +idea when it was originally presented, and Miss Clegg being even frankly +displeased with the plans that were sent down for approval. But the +plans were accepted, nevertheless, after some alterations, and by easy +stages Susan Clegg and Mrs. Lathrop arrived at that degree of philosophy +which enabled them to face with commendable composure the fact that they +must vacate their dwellings for an indefinitely extended period. + +It was not that Miss Clegg had ceased to entertain doubts as to the +advisability of "being renovated," nor was it that Mrs. Lathrop looked +forward gladly to a temporary transplanting of herself and her rocker. +But Jathrop's glory as a millionaire was now so strongly to the fore in +their minds that both bowed, more or less resignedly, to his wishes. + +"I must say I d'n know how this thing is going to work out in the end," +Susan observed to Mrs. Lathrop, as the date set for the beginning of the +work drew nearer. "I'm against it myself, but I ain't against Jathrop, +so I'm giving up my views just to see what will happen. My own opinion +is as it's all very well to build over most anything, but if your house +is to be built over, you've got to get out of it, and I must say as I +don't just see as yet when we get out of our houses what we're going to +get into. Jathrop says we can go to the hotel, and that he'll pay the +bill. Well, I must say it's good he'd pay the bill, for I'd never go to +any hotel if somebody else didn't pay the bill--I know that. But even +if I haven't got the bill to pay, I don't feel so raving, raring mad to +go to the hotel. It wouldn't matter to you, Mrs. Lathrop, for nothing +ever does matter to you, and anyway, even if anything had mattered to +you before, you'd not mind it now that Jathrop's come back. But just the +same a hotel does matter to me. They take very little interest in their +housekeeping in hotels, and no matter who's eat off of what, if they can +use it again--and they generally can--they always do. Why, they churn up +the melted odds and ends of ice-cream and serve 'em out as fresh-made +with that cheerful countenance as loveth no giver. And what we'd throw +to the cat they scrape right back into the soup pot, and glad enough to +get it. I don't suppose you'd mind what you ate, nor what kind of a +cloth had dusted your plate, but I was brought up to be clean, and I +don't want to sleep with spiders swinging themselves down to see how I +do it. No, Mrs. Lathrop, I can't consider no hotel, not even in common +affection for Jathrop. I'd go down a well on my hands and knees to dig +coal for him if necessary, or I'd do any other thing as a woman as +respects Jathrop might do if she didn't respect herself more. But live +in a hotel I will not, and you can write and tell him so, for _I_ don't +want to hurt his feelings. But all kindness has its limits, and if I let +a boy architect run through the heart of my house, I consider as I've +done enough to prove my Christian spirit for one year." + +"What--?" ventured Mrs. Lathrop, but Susan Clegg went right on. + +"I don't see where we're ever going to put our things while they haul +our walls down and rock our foundations. That young man says there won't +be a room as won't have to have something done to it, and I don't want +my furniture spoiled, even if I do have to have my house built over +against my will. My furniture is very good furniture, Mrs. Lathrop. It's +been oiled, and rubbed, and polished ever since it was bought, and none +of the chairs has ever had their middles stepped on, and nothing of +mine has got a sunk hole from sitting,--no, sir! My mattresses is all +slept even, from side to side, and there ain't a bottle-mark in the +whole house. It's a sin to take and wreck a happy home like mine. I +shall have untold convenience hereafter, but I shall never take any more +real comfort. That's what I see a-coming. And where under the sun we are +going to put our things the Lord only knows." + +Mrs. Lathrop was one of those who rarely take a question as a personal +matter. She made no suggestion; she just rocked. + +"I can see what I've got to be doing," said Susan, a clearer light +breaking. "I've got to be getting up and seeing where you and me can go, +and where we can put our goods. I don't want to live under the same roof +with you if I can possibly help it. And not to do it's going to be hard, +for knowing we're such friends, folks is going to naturally plan to take +us together. I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mrs. Lathrop, and yet I +can't in Christian courtesy deny that to live with you would drive me +distracted, and so I shan't consider it for a minute. Not for one single +minute. Still, I can't live far from you, for we are old friends, and +the brother that leaveth all else to cleave to his brother wasn't more +close when he done it than I am to you. Besides, if they're building our +houses over, I shall naturally be pretty lively in watching them do it, +and as one of the houses is yours, you'll like to be where I can easy +tell you how it's being done. And so it goes without saying we've got to +be close together. But not too close together." + +All these premises were so undeniably true that the passive Mrs. Lathrop +could not have gainsaid them even had she been so disposed; which she +wasn't. + +Accordingly, upon the very next day, Susan began her search for an +abiding place, and the right abiding place was--as she had +predicted--not to be easily found. + +"There's plenty of places," said Susan, when she returned from her task, +"but they don't any of them suit my views. You're easily suited, Mrs. +Lathrop, but I'm not and never will be. I'm of a nature that never is to +be lightly took in vain, nor yet to be just lightly took either. And no +one isn't going to put me in a room that'll be sunny in July, nor yet in +one that will be shady in September. No room as is pleasant in September +can help being most hot in summer; and although I'm willing to be hot in +my own house, I will not be hot in any place where I pay board. You'll +do very well almost anywhere, Mrs. Lathrop, for Lord knows whatever +other virtues you may have, being particular could never be left at your +door in no orphaned basket. But I'm different. Mrs. Brown would take us +until young Doctor Brown and Amelia gets back, and Mrs. Allen would be +glad of the very dust of our feet; but I couldn't go to either of those +two places. Mrs. Brown would have to have both of us, for there's no one +else to take you, and Mrs. Allen would want to read us her poetry. It's +all right to write if you ain't got brains or time for nothing better, +but I have, and I ain't going to knowingly board myself with no one as +hasn't." + +Mrs. Lathrop made no comment. She merely rocked and waited. + +"As for our things," Susan continued, "I've found where we can put +_them_. It wasn't easy, but I never give up, and Mr. Shores says he's +willing we should have all the back of his upper part. I told him as I +should want to be able to go to 'em any time, and he said far be it from +him to desire to prevent no woman from visiting what was her own. I +could see from his tone as he was thinking of his wife as run off with +his clerk, and it does beat all how you can even make a misery out of a +woman's visiting her furniture if you feel so inclined. So the goods is +off our minds, and now it's just us as has got to be put somewheres till +our own doors is opened to us again. I must say I'd like to know where +we'll end." + +On the very next day the solution was effected. + +"I've got it all fixed," said Susan, returning, dovelike, with the +evening shadows. "Mrs. Macy'll take one of us and Gran'ma Mullins the +other. Gran'ma Mullins says with Hiram gone to the Klondike and Lucy +gone to her father, either you or me can have their room; only for the +love of heaven we mustn't look like Hiram in bed; for her heart is +aching and breaking, and the car-wheels of his train ain't grinding on +any track half as much as they're grinding in her tenderest spot. Now +the question is, Mrs. Lathrop, which'll go which, and it's a thing as I +must consider very carefully, for Lord knows I don't want to be no more +miserable than I've got to be. And it goes without saying I wouldn't +choose to live with Gran'ma Mullins, nor Mrs. Macy, nor nobody else if I +had my choice. I'm too much give to liking to live alone with myself. Of +course, Mrs. Macy is a pleasanter disposition than Gran'ma Mullins, for +she ain't got Hiram to wear my bones into skin over; but I feel as +living with Mrs. Macy all summer will surely lead to her trying to make +it come out even for the rent up to next January, so I would have to +worry over that. Then, too, even if Gran'ma Mullins is wearing, she's +soothing too, and I shall need soothing this summer. I declare, Mrs. +Lathrop, I can't well see how I'm ever going to pack up my things. I +can't see what's to keep 'em from getting scratched and the corners +knocked. How can I fix a toilet set smooth together? A toilet set don't +never fit smooth together; the handles always stick out. And the +frying-pan's got a handle too, and a clothesbar ain't any ways adaptable +to nothing. Chair legs is very bad and table legs is worse, and there's +Mother's wedding-present clock as found its level years ago and ain't +been stirred since. Father give it to her, and it's so heavy I couldn't +stir it if I wanted to, anyhow. But I don't want to stir it. It's my +dead mother's last wish, and as such is sacred. I wasn't to stir Father +nor the clock. It's a French clock, and it's marble. It's a handsome +clock. It was Father's one handsome present to Mother. And now I've got +to put it in storage. And then there's our hens. I don't know but what +it'd be wisest to set right to eating them. I know one thing--I'll never +board chickens. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, this is going to be an awful business! +Think of the carpets! Think of the window shades, and my dead mother's +lamberquins! Think of the things in the garret! And the things in the +cellar! And the things in the closets! I don't know, I'm sure, how we'll +ever get moved." + +As the days went on, the slow trend of life brought the problem still +more pressingly to the front. Susan decided to lodge herself with +Gran'ma Mullins. Gran'ma Mullins, whose heart was still very heavy over +Hiram's escape from the home nest, would have preferred Mrs. Lathrop. +Mrs. Lathrop's capacity for listening would have meant much to Gran'ma +Mullins in these hours of bitter loneliness; but Mrs. Macy wanted Mrs. +Lathrop, and Susan didn't want Mrs. Macy, so the outcome of that +question was a fore-gone conclusion. + +When all was settled, Jathrop dispatched emissaries who, with a deftness +and dexterity possessed only by the hirelings of millionaires, descended +on Mrs. Lathrop, and in the course of a single afternoon transferred +her, her rocker, and the whole contents of her bedroom to Mrs. Macy's. +The emissaries offered to do the same thing for Susan Clegg, but she +rejected their aid. Alone and unassisted Susan wrestled with her +packing, and no one ever knew just how she accomplished it. It took her +several days, and it introduced a new order of things into not only her +life but her speech. Her struggle was valiant, but towards the end she +had to call on Felicia Hemans and Sam Durny for help. When, on Saturday +night, Susan arrived at Gran'ma Mullins's, her first observation was +that when the Lord got through with the creation it was small wonder He +arranged to rest on the seventh day. + +"I d'n know as I shall ever get up again," she said to Gran'ma Mullins, +who was watching her take off her bonnet. "A apron as has been used to +carry things in for six days is bright and starched beside me. Oh, +Gran'ma Mullins, pray on your folded knees as Hiram won't come back rich +and want to build you over! Anything but that." + +"Oh, if he'll only come back, it's all I'll ask!" returned Gran'ma +Mullins sadly. "To think he can't get there for four weeks yet. And +think of Hiram in a boat! Why Hiram can't even see a mirror tipped back +and forth without having to go right where he'll be the only company. +And then to be in a boat! A boat is such a tippy thing. I read about one +man being drowned in one last week. They're hooking for him with +dynamite to see if they can even get a piece of him back for his wife. +His wife isn't much like Lucy, I guess. Oh, Susan, you'll never know +what I've stood from Lucy! Nobody will." + +Miss Clegg shook her head and looked about her quarters with an eye that +was dubious. + +"I've got some eggs for supper," said Gran'ma Mullins, "one for you and +one for me, and one for either of us as can eat two." + +"I can eat two," said Susan, who thought best to declare herself at the +outset. + +"Is your things all out of the house?" Gran'ma Mullins asked, as they +seated themselves at the table. + +"Oh, yes," answered Susan, "everything is out! Towards the last we acted +more like hens being fed than anything else, but we got everything +finished." + +"Did you get the clock out safe?" + +Susan's expression altered suddenly. "The clock! Oh, the clock! What +_do_ you think happened to that clock? And I didn't feel to mind it, +either." + +"Oh, Susan, you didn't break it!" + +"I did. And in sixty thousand flinders. And I'm glad, too. Very glad. +It's a sad thing as how we may be found out, no matter how careful we +sweep up our trackings. And I don't mind telling you as the bitterest +pill in my cup of clearing out has been that very same clock." + +"It was such a handsome clock," said Gran'ma Mullins, opening her +naturally open countenance still wider. "Oh, Susan! What did happen?" + +"You thought it was a handsome clock," said Susan, "and so did I. It was +such a handsome clock that we weren't allowed to pick it up and look at +it. Father screwed it down with big screws, so we couldn't, and he wet +'em so they rusted in. I had a awful time getting those screws out +to-day, I can tell you. You get a very different light on a dead and +gone father when you're trying to get out screws that he wet thirty-five +years ago. Me on a stepladder digging under the claws of a clock for two +mortal hours! And when I got the last one out, I had to climb down and +wake my foot up before I could do the next thing. Then I got a block and +a bed-slat, and I proceeded very carefully to try how heavy that +handsome clock--that handsome marble clock--might be. I put the block +beside it, and I put the bed-slat over the block and under the clock. +Then I climbed my ladder again, and then I bore down on the bed-slat. +Well, Gran'ma Mullins, you can believe me or not, just as you please, +but it's a solemn fact that nothing but the ceiling stopped that clock +from going sky-high. And nothing but the floor stopped me from falling +through to China. I come down to earth with such a bang as brought +Felicia Hemans running. And the stepladder shut up on me with such +another bang as brought Sam Durny." + +"The saints preserve us!" ejaculated Gran'ma Mullins. + +"It wasn't a marble clock a _tall_," confessed Susan. "It was painted +wood. That was why Father screwed it down. Oh, men are such deceivers! +And the best wife in the world can't develop 'em above their natural +natures. I expect it was always a real pleasure to Father to think as +Mother and me didn't know that marble clock was wood. I don't know what +there is about a man as makes his everyday character liking to deceive +and his Sunday sense of righteousness satisfied with just calling it +fooling. Well, he's gone now, and the Bible says 'to him as hath shall +be given,' so I guess he's settling up accounts somewheres. Give me the +other egg!" + +After supper they stepped over to Mrs. Macy's, which was next door, and +the four sat on the piazza in the pleasant spring twilight. Mrs. Macy +was so happy over having Mrs. Lathrop instead of Susan Clegg that she +smiled perpetually. Mrs. Lathrop sat and rocked in her old-gold-plush +rocker. Gran'ma Mullins and Susan Clegg occupied the step at the feet of +the other two. + +"Well, Susan," Mrs. Macy remarked meditatively, "I never looked to see +you leave your house any way except feet first. Well, well, this +certainly is a funny world." + +"Yes," returned Susan, brief for once, "it certainly is." + +"It's a very sad world, I think," contributed Gran'ma Mullins with a +heavy, heavy sigh. "My goodness, to think this time last spring Hiram +was spading up the potato patch! And now where is he?" + +"Nobody knows," answered Susan. "See how many years it was till Jathrop +come back. But I do hope for your sake, Gran'ma Mullins, that when Hiram +does come back he won't take it into his head to buy this house and +build it over for you." + +Gran'ma Mullins looked at Mrs. Macy, and Mrs. Macy looked back at +Gran'ma Mullins, and a message flashed and was answered in the glances. + +"Well, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins with neighborly interest, "you do +see that the house needs fixing up, don't you?" + +Susan was the owner and Mrs. Macy only the tenant, and the implication +was not at all pleasing to her. She turned with the air of the weariest +worm that had ever done so and gave Gran'ma Mullins a look that could +only be translated as an admonition to mind her own business. Whereupon +Gran'ma Mullins promptly subsided, and the subject did not come up +again. + +It was on a Monday--the very next Monday--that the workmen arrived and +set to work to demolish the outer casing of the homes of Susan and Mrs. +Lathrop. Susan went up and stood about for an hour, viewing the way they +did it with great but resigned scorn. She went every day thereafter, and +her heart was rent at the sight of the sacrilege. Then, to add to her +woe, Gran'ma Mullins proved less soothing than had been expected, and +Susan suffered keenly at her hands. + +"Oh, Mrs. Lathrop," she said one morning, when the exigencies of +shopping left the two old friends full freedom of intercourse, "if I'm +going to live in that house for this whole summer, the first thing that +I'll have to do is either to change Gran'ma Mullins or change me! I can +see that. Why, I never heard anything like Gran'ma Mullins' views on +Hiram. You've heard Mrs. Macy, and I've told you what Lucy's told me +whenever I've met her, but I never had no idea it was anything like +what it is. I'm stark, raving crazy hearing about Hiram. Gran'ma Mullins +says no child was ever like Hiram, and I begin to wonder if it ain't so. +No child ever made such an impression on his mother before,--I can take +my Bible oath on that, for she's talking about him from the time I wake +till long after I'm asleep,--and she remembers things in the stillness +of the night and wakes me up to hear 'em for fear she'll forget 'em +before morning. Last night she was up at two to tell me how Hiram used +to shut his eyes before he went to sleep when he was a baby. She said he +had a different way of doing it from any other child that's ever been +born. He picked it all up by himself. She couldn't possibly tell me just +how he did it, but it was most remarkable. He had it in May and well +into June the year he was born, but along in July he began to lose it, +and by October he opened and shut just like other people's babies. +That's what I was woke up to hear, Mrs. Lathrop, and Herod was a sweet +and good-tempered mother of ten compared to me as I listened. And then +at daybreak if she didn't come in again to explain as Hiram was so +different from all other babies that he crept before he walked, and the +first of his trying to walk he climbed up a chair leg." + +"Why, Jathrop--" volunteered Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Of course. They all do. But I must say I don't see how I'm going to +stand it till my house is ready to receive me back with open bosom if +this is the way she's going on straight along. I wouldn't stay with Mrs. +Macy because I was tired of hearing what she said Gran'ma Mullins said +about Hiram, but it never once struck me that if I stayed with Gran'ma +Mullins I'd have it all to hear straight from the fountain mouth. My +lands alive, Mrs. Lathrop, you never hear the beat! Hiram used to +wrinkle up his face when she washed it, and he never wanted to have a +bath. And he used to bring mud turtles into the house; and when she +thinks of that and how now he's off for the Klondike, she says she feels +like going straight after him. She says she could be very useful in the +Klondike. She could polish his pick and his sled-runners, and hang up +his snowy things, and wash out his gold and his clothes. She says she +can't just see how they wash out gold, but she knows how to polish +silver, and she says mother-love like hers can pick up anything. She +goes on and on till I feel like going to the Klondike myself. I'm +getting a great deal of sympathy for Lucy. Lucy always said she could +have been happy with Hiram--maybe--if it hadn't been for his mother. +Lucy's got no kind of tender feeling for Gran'ma Mullins, and I +certainly don't feel to blame her none." + +"Is your--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, striving towards pleasanter paths. + +"Well, it ain't burnt up yet," answered Susan. "I stopped at Mr. Shores' +coming back and took a look at it, and I was far from pleased to find +the door as opens into the next room to the room as my furniture is +locked up in a little open. Goodness knows who'd opened it, but it +looked very much like some one had been trying my door, to me. I asked +Mr. Shores, and I saw at a glance as it was news to him, which shows +just how much interest he's taking in looking out for my things. He said +maybe the cat had pushed it open. The cat! I unlocked my door and went +in. The furniture's all safe enough, but it's enough to put any +housekeeper's heart through the clothes wringer only to see how it's +piled. The beds is smashed flat along the wall, and wherever they could +turn a table or a chair upside down and plant something on the wrong +side of it, they've done it. As for the way the dishes is combined, I +can only say that the Lord fits the back to the burden, so the +wash-bowls is bearing everything. They've put Mother's picture in a +coal-hod for safety, and the coal-hod is sitting on the bookcase. It's a +far from cheering sight, Mrs. Lathrop, but you know I was against being +built over from the start. When I see the walls of my happy home being +smashed flat and then picked over like they was raisins to see what'll +do to use again, and then when I see my furniture put together in a way +as no one living can make head or tail of, and when I see myself woke up +at three in the night to be told that sometimes when Hiram was a baby he +would go to sleep and sometimes he wouldn't, why I feel as if that Roman +as they rolled down hill in a barrel because he wouldn't stay anywhere +else where they put him was sitting smoking cross-legged compared to me. +I d'n know what I'm going to do this summer. It would just drive an +ordinary woman crazy. But I presume I'll survive." + +Mrs. Lathrop looked slightly saddened. "Well, Susan,--" she began to +murmur sympathetically. + +"Oh, it doesn't matter," said Susan. "Of course, if it gets where I +can't stand it, we'll just have to change houses, that's all." + + + + +VII + +SUSAN CLEGG UNSETTLED + + +Life under the roof of Gran'ma Mullins eventually--and eventually was a +matter of days rather than weeks--became unbearable for Susan Clegg. At +least, she so decided, and finding opportunity in the fact that both +Gran'ma Mullins and Mrs. Macy had gone to market, Susan hastened to her +old friend, Mrs. Lathrop, and laid open her fresh burden of woes. + +"I can't stand it, Mrs. Lathrop," she declared with strongest emphasis, +"I can't stand it. No matter what the Bible says, a saint on a gridiron +would smile all over and wriggle for nothing but joy only to think as +where he was and wasn't boarding with Gran'ma Mullins. It's awful. +That's what it is--awful. I never had no idea that nothing could be so +awful. I've got to where I'm thinking very seriously of leaving my +property to Lucy. I'm becoming very sorry for Lucy. Lucy isn't properly +appreciated. Why, Hiram was stung by a bee once,--no ordinary bee, but a +bee a third bigger than the usual bee,--and it swelled up all different +from common, and Gran'ma Mullins thought he was surely going to die +right there before her streaming eyes. But Hiram was so bright he +remembered about putting mud on bee-bites, and he did it. Only there +wasn't no mud, and nobody knew what they could do about it. But Hiram's +mind wasn't like the mind of a ordinary person. Hiram's mind is all +different, and Hiram said, just as quick as scat, to mix water and earth +and make some mud. So they did, and the water and earth, Gran'ma Mullins +says, made the finest mud she ever saw. They covered up Hiram's bee-bite +with it, and it didn't leave so much as a scar. And now there's Hiram in +the Klondike, knowing just what to do when bit by a bee, but without a +notion what to put on if a seal catches him unawares. And all this going +on hour after hour, Mrs. Lathrop, and me sitting there waiting for my +dinner, half mad anyway over the way my dead-and-gone father's home is +being torn limb from limb, and in no mood to listen to anything. Oh, +laws, no! It's no use. I can't stand it, and I won't either." + +Susan paused expressively. + +Mrs. Lathrop gasped. "What will--?" + +"I'm going to find another place to live right away," Susan went on. +"I've too much consideration for you to ask you to go there, Mrs. +Lathrop, and besides, I feel it would be exchanging the fire for the +stew-pan for me to come here. I'm going this town over this very +afternoon, and I think I'll find some place where I can sleep part of +the night, at any rate. I guess I got about three quarters of a hour's +sleep last night. Gran'ma Mullins woke me up weeping on the foot of my +bed before daylight. Just before daylight is her special time for +recollecting how Hiram used to drink milk out of a cup when he was a +baby, and how he used to eat candy if anybody gave him any, and other +remarkable doings that he did. My lands, I wish Job could have met +Gran'ma Mullins! His friends and his boils would have just been pleasant +things to amuse him, then. I'm going first to Mrs. Allen, and then I'm +going to every one. I shan't make no bones about my errand, for +everybody knows Gran'ma Mullins. I'll have the sympathy of the whole +community. I need sympathy, and I feel I can soak up a good lot of it if +I'm let to." + +"How's the--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"They're still pulling 'em down," said Susan gloomily. "It's a awful +sight, and one that doesn't give me more strength for Gran'ma Mullins. I +shall never have another house that will suit me as mine did, Mrs. +Lathrop. I know that Jathrop means it kindly, and I'm far from being one +to hold any gift-horse by the tail, but the truth is the truth, and I +must say nothing teaches you to really prize your cupboards like seeing +men going through 'em with pick-axes. There was many little conveniences +in my house as I never really thought much of until now I see 'em gone +forever. But it's a poor cat that lives on spilt milk, so I'll say no +more of that, but go back and get ready to hunt up a place to live. For +live I must, Mrs. Lathrop, and live I will. And I won't live by eating +and drinking and breathing Hiram Mullins the twenty-four hours round, +neither." + +Miss Clegg's round of visits ended, curiously enough, in her +establishing herself with Lucy Mullins. + +"Which I don't doubt is a very great surprise to you, Mrs. Lathrop," she +confessed to her friend that evening. "But Lucy ran across me in the +street, and when she saw me, those two women who met in the Bible and +knew all each other's business directly was strangers passing on express +trains beside Lucy and me. I took one look at Lucy, and I see she knowed +it all. Judge Fitch is going to be away a lot this month, seeing where +he can hire his witnesses for a big lawsuit, and Lucy says she and me'll +be alone and able to be silent from dawn to dark and on through the +night. She don't want to have to listen to no manner of talk, she says, +and I can have the second floor all alone to myself, for her and her +father sleep in the wings down-stairs." + +"So you--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, I didn't look no more. I was suited, so I didn't see no use in +further fussing. I shall tell Gran'ma Mullins to-night and go there +to-morrow. And I may in confidence remark as no howling oasis in a +desert ever howled for joy the way I'll feel like howling when I get my +trunk on a wheelbarrow again. I've spoke for the wheelbarrow at eight +o'clock to-morrow morning, so I'll be over at Lucy's and settled before +you wake up, Mrs. Lathrop." + +The next day Susan went, and, surprising as it may seem, Gran'ma Mullins +was singularly content over her going. + +"I don't want to make no trouble between friends," said Gran'ma Mullins, +clambering up Mrs. Macy's steps to sit with Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Lathrop. +"But really, Susan is become most changed since her house is begun to be +built over. I wouldn't hardly have known her. I wouldn't say stuck-up +and I wouldn't say airy, but I will say as she's most changed. I +wouldn't say rude, neither, but I didn't consider it exactly friendly to +always either pull her breath in long and loud or else let it out short +and sharp whenever I mentioned Hiram. Hiram is my only legal and natural +child, and with him in the Klondike, and my heart aching and quaking and +breaking for fear the ice'll thaw and let him through into some +unexpected volcano all of a sudden, how can I but mention him? You know +what Hiram is to me, Mrs. Macy. We haven't lived in these two houses for +forty years without your knowing what Hiram is to me. You remember him +as a baby, Mrs. Macy, but you don't, Mrs. Lathrop, so I'll tell you what +Hiram was as a baby. Hiram was a most remarkable--" + +When Mrs. Lathrop saw Susan Clegg again, Miss Clegg was looking far from +happy. + +"Are you--?" enquired Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, I d'n know," came the answer more than a little dubiously. Then: +"Seeing that I am always frank and open with you, Mrs. Lathrop, I may as +well say plainly as I ain't. Very far from it. I never knew when I went +to live with Lucy as Judge Fitch has got a dog as barks. He ain't no +ordinary dog--he's a most uncommon dog. He only barks when it's +moonlight, or when he hears something, and I must say he's got the +sharpest ears I ever see. But it isn't his barking that's so bad, as it +is that whenever he barks, Lucy gets right up to see whether it's Hiram +come back. It seems the reason Lucy took me to board is she hates to go +around the house alone nights with the dog and a candle. That's a pretty +thing for me to never mistrust till I got there with my trunk. I must +say I don't blame Lucy for not liking to go around alone, for the dog +smells your heels all the time, and if he was in the Klondike with Hiram +his nose couldn't be colder. But all the same I think she ought to of +told me. For whatever it may be to others, a cold nose is certainly most +new to my heels. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, we was out hunting with our dog +three times last night, and Lucy says often enough he gets her up nine +and ten times. Lucy's so nervous for fear Hiram'll come back that she +can't possibly sleep if she thinks there's a chance of it. She says if +Hiram's come back, she wants to know it right off. She says that's her +nature. If she's got to have a tooth out, she wants it out at once. She +says she never was one to shrink from nothing. And the dog's prompt, +too. He's quite of the same mind as Lucy. He gives one bark, and then he +don't dilly-dally none. He gets right up, and by the time he's got to +Lucy, Lucy's got up too, and they both come racing up-stairs for me to +join 'em. My door don't lock, so the dog's licking my face before I +know where I am. And then, before I know much more where I am, we're +all three capering down-stairs together again. Then we take the whole +house carefully around and listen at every door and window, with the dog +smelling while we listen. Then, when we know for sure as it ain't Hiram, +the dog scrambles back into his basket, and Lucy tucks him up, and she +and I go back to bed alone and untucked. That's a pretty kettle of fish. +And you can believe me or not, just as you please, Mrs. Lathrop, but I +never had no notion of having my heels smelled by a cold dog's nose +three times, and maybe nine, a night when I went to live at Judge +Fitch's, and if it keeps on, I shall just leave. Lucy's got no lease on +me, and although I'm sorry for her, I ain't anywhere near sorry enough +for her to be woke up to pussy-cornering all over the premises with a +dog the livelong night through. As between having Gran'ma Mullins +sitting on my feet wailing over Hiram, and Lucy's dog smelling of my +heels while we hunt for Hiram, I think I'd rather have Gran'ma Mullins. +I was warm and comfortable and laid out flat at Gran'ma Mullins, but I'm +goodness knows what at Lucy's. And I do hate having my face licked. I +don't like it. I never was used to such things, and I can't begin now." + +"What will--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I shall look up another nice place to live," said Miss Clegg, "and I +shall take a leaf out of the dog's book and be prompt about it, too. +I've spoke for the wheelbarrow to-morrow at ten o'clock, and I shall +move then, whether or no." + +Susan, again on the lookout for a new abiding place, discovered a most +attractive proposition in Mrs. Allen. Mrs. Allen and her husband lived +alone, were neat and well-fed, and kept no dog. + +"I'll never go where there's a dog again, I know that," said Susan. +"Why, Mrs. Lathrop, if I was in a blizzard in Switzerland and fifty of +those little beer-keg dogs they've got there came scurrying up to rescue +me, I wouldn't get up and let 'em have the joy of seeing me obliged. I +won't ever get up for no dog again in my life, I know that. And I know +it for keeps. And there's a bolt on my side of my door at Mrs. Allen's. +I've looked to that, too; and no one is to wake me nights; I've looked +to that. I told Mrs. Allen all the story of what I'd suffered, and she +said she'd see as I had peace in her house. She told me that I'd +suffered because I needed to suffer, but now I was to have peace, and +I'd have it with her. I didn't bother to ask what she meant, for I guess +if she's got any secret thorn, I'll find it out quick enough, anyhow. +And if it's anything that wakes me up nights, my present feeling is as I +won't be well able to bear it. Well, the wheelbarrow is set for ten +o'clock, and so I must go, and when I see you, I'll know what's wrong +with Mrs. Allen, and the Lord help me if it's something as makes me have +to move again. That's all I can say." + +Susan did not visit her old friend directly after her third change of +residence. Two whole days passed by, and Mrs. Lathrop was openly +troubled. + +"Don't you worry," said Gran'ma Mullins soothingly. "There's nothing the +matter with her, because I see her in the square this very morning. But +she looked at me odd and went down a side street. I'm sure I hope +Susan's not losing her mind." + +"Oh, wouldn't that be awful!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy with real sympathy. +"We'd have to appoint a commission to catch her and sit on her, and then +if she was put in the insane asylum, I guess Susan Clegg would be mad." + +"Oh, Susan wouldn't like that a bit," said Gran'ma Mullins meditatively. +"They make little cups and saucers out of beads. I know, because Hiram +had one once. And they read books with the letters all punched out at +you." + +"You're thinking of the Home for the Blind," corrected Mrs. Macy. "I was +there once, too. I don't think Susan would mind going there so much, +because of course she can see, which would give her a great advantage +over the others, and Susan does like to have an advantage over anybody +else. But I don't believe she'd like going to the Insane Asylum much. +The Insane Asylum's so limited. My husband's sister went to the Insane +Asylum once, but it didn't help her none, so she came home. It wouldn't +ever suit Susan." + +"Well, maybe not," said Gran'ma Mullins amicably. "And I don't think she +could go there, anyway, for she isn't crazy, and she's got her own +money. So why should she be a charge on the county?" + +The very next day Susan came wearily in to see her old friend. + +"Well, I d'n know what I've ever done to have this kind of a summer," +she began, seating herself sadly. "Why didn't I stay in my own house and +just simply take you to board while they laid violent hands on your +house? I was against being built over all along, Mrs. Lathrop, you know +that. And now the fox has his cheese and the cow has her corn, just as +the Scripture says, but Susan Clegg's absolutely forced to live with +Mrs. Allen. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, you don't know what living with Mrs. Allen +is, and you can't imagine, either. I never dreamed of such a thing +before I went there. I was a little afraid she'd want to read me her +poetry, but her poetry would have been paradise to what is. Seems as if +Mrs. Allen has got a new kind of religion, and heaven help the present +run of mankind if any more new religions is sprung on us, and heaven +help me if I've got to live long with Mrs. Allen's new one. Mrs. Allen's +new religion is most peculiar. I never see nothing like it. It's +Persian, and it's very singular just to look at. But it's most awful to +live with. Lucy and her dog is simple beside it, and as to Gran'ma +Mullins, she's nothing but a baby dabbing a ball in comparison. +According to Mrs. Allen's new religion, you mustn't find fault with +nothing or nobody--never. Everything's all right, no matter how wrong it +is; and if you lose your purse, you was meant to lose it, so why +complain? You was give your purse for just a little while, and in place +of wildly running here and there trying to find it, you must just thank +heaven for kindly letting you have it so long, and think no more about +it. If you're meant to see any more of that purse, it'll kindly look you +up itself. But it's no manner of use your looking for it, because if +heaven takes back a purse deliberately, never intending to return it, it +never does return it, and that's all there is to be said on the subject. +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you think perhaps you can see what it would be to +live with any one that feels to see life in that way; but you don't +really know what you think a good deal of the time, and never less than +now. Mrs. Allen's things is mostly back in heaven's hands again, and her +biscuits is mostly burnt, and not one bit does she care, seeing as she +don't consider as she has the least thing to do with any of it. She's +happy and singing and forgetting from dawn to dark. She says the day'll +soon be that the whole earth will see the truth and be singing with +her. She says the toiling millions will cease to toil then, and life'll +be all Adams and Eves and no manner of misery. In the meantime, I don't +get nothing to eat, and when I feel to holler down-stairs, she says +dinner was meant to be late that day, or it couldn't possibly have been +late. Not by no manner of means." + +"Well, I--" commented Mrs. Lathrop blankly. + +"Just my way of seeing it," said Susan, "and she aggravates me still +more with pointing her moral, from dawn to dark. She says it's beautiful +to see how beautiful life comes along. You and me needed quiet, and we +got quiet. And now we need our houses built over, and we're getting 'em +built over. I told her I didn't need my house built over a _tall_, and +she said as I just thought so, but that I really did, or it wouldn't be +being done. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, I d'n know, I'm sure, what I will run up +against next. But I don't believe I can stay at Mrs. Allen's. I really +don't. There's one thing--it'll be mighty easy to leave her, for I +shan't have to say nothing. I shall say I was meant to leave and then +and there leave. It's a poor religion as don't fit others as easy as its +own selves; and I ain't washed in the Allens' dirty rain water full of +dead and drowned bugs for two days because I was meant to wash and they +was meant to drown, without learning how to turn even a drowned bug to +my advantage. No, sir, I'm going out this afternoon and see what I can +get, and if I can't do no better, I'll buy a bolt for my door and come +back to Gran'ma Mullins. Gran'ma Mullins has her good points. I always +said that, Mrs. Lathrop, Gran'ma Mullins certainly has her good points. +And I must learn to bear Hiram if I must. There's one thing certain: I +can hear about Hiram in bed, and I don't have to get up and out of bed +to hunt for him. And whatever else Gran'ma Mullins does, she don't burn +her bread and blame it on the Almighty. Mrs. Allen's got the Bible so +pat that you don't need to do nothing, according to her--nothing a +_tall_, but just sit still and let the world turn you around with its +turning. She says Solomon said the little lilies didn't spin, and so why +should she? Well, if we're to quit doing everything that lilies don't +have a hand in, I must say we'll soon be in a pretty state. I never was +one to admire Solomon like some people, and as for David, I think he was +a fool--dancing around the ark like he'd just got it for Christmas!" + +Susan searched long and wearily for a fourth abiding place that +afternoon, but in the end she had to speak for the wheelbarrow for the +next morning and move back to Gran'ma Mullins's. + +And Gran'ma Mullins was very glad to see her back. + +"Your bed's all made up with the same sheets for you, Susan," she said +cordially, "and I ain't even swept so as to spoil the homelike look. +You'll see your own last burnt matches and all, just as you left 'em." + +"I've bought a bolt for my door," said Susan, "and I'll beg to borrow a +screwdriver and something sharp to put it on with." + +"I'll get 'em," agreed Gran'ma Mullins happily, "and I won't wake you no +more nights, Susan. I suppose it's only natural that you, never having +been married, can't possibly know the feelings of a mother. But I meant +it kindly, Susan. When Lucy speaks of Hiram, she means it unkindly. But +when I speak of Hiram, I always mean it kindly." + +"Yes, I know," said Susan, "and if I believed like Mrs. Allen does, I'd +know I was meant to listen and wouldn't mind. But I don't take no stock +in that religion of Mrs. Allen's, and I won't be woke up. And although I +don't want to hurt your feelings, I do want that understood right from +the beginning." + +"I'll remember," said Gran'ma Mullins submissively. "And now I'll fetch +the screwdriver." + +That evening the four friends sat pleasantly once again on Mrs. Macy's +piazza. + +"Mrs. Lathrop had a letter from Jathrop to-day. Did you know that, +Susan?" asked Mrs. Macy. + +"No, I didn't," returned Susan Clegg. "What did he say?" + +"He's going sailing to the West Indies in his new boat," Mrs. Macy +informed her. "He's going for his health, and he's going to take three +other millionaires and their own doctor." + +Susan appeared unimpressed. + +"He sent his mother a book about the place where he's going," said Mrs. +Macy. "Do you want to see it?" She went in and brought it out. + +Susan took the volume and viewed the title with an indifferent eye. + +"_Stark's Guide to the Bahamas_," she read aloud. "What are +they--something to eat?" + +"You're thinking of bananas," suggested Mrs. Macy. "It's islands. It's +where Columbus hit first. Nobody knows just where he hit, but he hit +there; everybody knows that." + +Susan placed the book under her arm. "I'll read it," she said briefly. +"But I must say as to my order of thinking Jathrop's setting off just +now is very much like a hen getting up from her eggs. Here's you and +me--" addressing Mrs. Lathrop directly--"with our houses done away with, +and him as has engineered the wreck skipping away with a parcel of men." + +"He isn't skipping," interposed Mrs. Macy. "He's sailing--sailing in his +own private boat, like the tea-man with the cup." + +"Oh, I don't care what he's doing," said Susan, rising. "I'm about beat +out, and I'm going home and going to bed. Such a week! The Bible says +'Whom the Lord loveth He chaseth,' and heaven knows I've been chased +this week till my legs is about wore off. Such a week! I've had all the +chasing I want for one while. And I never was great on being loved, so +I'm going home and going to bed." + +Whereupon, with the _Guide to the Bahamas_ under her arm and a heavy +fold between her brows, Susan Clegg stalked over to her temporary +domicile. + +"I don't think Susan's very well," said Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Maybe she's worried over Jathrop," suggested Mrs. Macy. + +Mrs. Lathrop said nothing. She just rocked. + + + + +VIII + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CYCLONE + + +"I d'n know, I'm sure, what star this town could ever have been laid out +under," said Susan Clegg, one exceptionally hot night as the four +friends sat out on Mrs. Macy's steps, "but my own opinion is as it must +have been a comet, for we're always skiting along into some sort of hot +water. When it ain't all of us, it's some of us, and when it ain't some +of us, it's one of us, and now the walls of my house is up I'd be +willing to bet a nickel as a calamity'll happen along just because +something's always happening here and my walls is the youngest and +tenderest thing in the community now." + +"Your roof ain't--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Of course not; how could it be, when my walls is only just up? I don't +wish to be casting no stones at him as is the least among us, but I will +say, Mrs. Lathrop, as Jathrop's orders seem to be taking you up under +the loving protection of their wings, while I'm running around like I +was a viper without no warm bosom to hatch me. _Your_ walls have been up +and a-doing for a week, but my walls have been sitting around waiting +until I was nigh to put out. To see your laths going in and your plaster +going on, while I stay lumber and nails, is a lesson in yielding to the +will of heaven as I never calculated on. There's few things more +aggravating than to see some other house speeding along while your own +house sits silently, patiently waiting. Of course I can't say nothing, +as even the boy as carries water knows my house is going to be a present +to me in the end. It's all right, and likely enough the Lord has seen +fit to send this summer to me as a chastisement; but I will say that if +I'd known how this summer was going, the Lord would most certainly have +had to plan some other way to punish me. I don't say as it wasn't +natural that your walls should go up first, Jathrop being your son, and, +now that he's rich, no more to me than a benefactor--" + +"Oh, Susan!" expostulated Mrs. Macy. + +"That's what he is, Mrs. Macy; he's my benefactor, and I can't escape if +I want to. You may tend a man's mother ten years, day and night, house +cleanings and cistern cleanings, moths and the well froze up, and if the +man comes back rich, he's your benefactor." + +"Susan!" cried Mrs. Lathrop, "you--" + +"Don't deny it, Mrs. Lathrop; it's the truth. It's one of those truths +that the wiser they are, the sadder you get. It's one of those truths as +is the whole truth and a little left over; and I'm learning that I'm to +be what's left over, more every day. After a life of being independent +and living on my own money, I'm now going down on my knees learning the +lesson of being humbly grateful for what I don't want. I may sound +bitter, but if I do it isn't surprising, for I feel bitter; and Gran'ma +Mullins knows I'm always frank and open, so she'll excuse my saying that +there's nothing in living with _her_ as tends to calm me much. A woman +as sleeps in a bed as Hiram must have played leap-frog over all his life +from the feel of the springs, and pours out of a pitcher as has got a +chip out of its nose, ain't in no mood to mince nothing. I never was one +to mince, and I never will be--not now and not never. Mincing is for +them as ain't got it in them to speak their minds freely; and my mind is +a thing that's made to be free and not a slave." + +"Well, really, Susan," expostulated Mrs. Macy, "what ever--" + +"Don't interrupt me, Mrs. Macy. I'm full of goodness knows what, but +whatever it is, I'm too full of it for comfort. There's nothing in the +life I'm leading this summer to make me expect comfort, and very little +to make me feel full, but there's things as would make a man dying of +starvation bust if he experienced them. And I'm full of such things. I +never had no idea of being out of my house all summer, and now, when my +walls is up at last, and it looks like maybe I'd get back a home feeling +some day soon, I must up and get quite another kind of feeling--a +feeling that something is going to happen. It's a very strange feeling, +and at first I thought it was just some more of Gran'ma Mullins' +cooking; but it kept getting stronger, and when I was in the square, I +spoke to Mr. Kimball about it; and he says this is cyclone weather, and +maybe a cyclone is going to happen. He says a man was in town yesterday +wanting to insure everybody against fire and cyclones. Most everybody +did it. Mr. Kimball says after the young man got through, you pretty +much had to do it. Them as had policies with the company could get the +word 'cyclone' writ in for a dollar. I guess the young man did a very +good day's work. Mr. Kimball says if it's true as there's any cyclones +coming nosing about here, he wants his dried-apple machine insured +anyhow. It's a fine machine, and every kind of fruit as is left over +each night comes out jam next day, while all the vegetables make +breakfast food. He says it's a wonder." + +"What makes him think we're going to have a cyclone?" inquired Mrs. Macy +anxiously. + +"He says the weather is cyclony. And he says if I feel queer that's a +sign, for I'm a sensitive nature." + +"I never--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, nor me, neither. But Mr. Kimball seemed to feel there wasn't no +doubt. He says I'm just the kind of sensitive nature as could feel a +cyclone. Why, he says cyclones take the roofs off the houses!" + +"Ow!" cried Gran'ma Mullins in surprise. + +"If one's coming, I'm glad to know, for I never see one near to," said +Mrs. Macy pensively. + +"You won't see it a _tall_," said Susan, "for Mr. Kimball says the only +safe place in a cyclone is the cellar; and to pull a kitchen table over +you to keep the house from squashing you flat when it caves in." + +"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"That's what he said. But he says not to worry, for the young man told +him as they're getting so common no one notices them any more. He says +they're always going hop, skip, and jump over Kansas and everywhere, and +no one pays no attention to 'em. He knows all about it. But he wanted it +clear as he was only insuring for _cyclones_; he says his firm wouldn't +have nothing to do with tornadoes. You can get as much on a cyclone as +on a fire, but you can't get a penny on a tornado--" + +"What's the diff--" asked Gran'ma Mullins. + +"That's the trouble; nobody can just tell. A cyclone is wind and +lightning mixed by combustion and drove forward by expulsion, the young +man told Mr. Kimball. He said they'd got cyclones all worked out, and +they can average 'em up same as everything else, but he says a tornado +is something as no man can get hold of, and no man will ever be able to +study. Tornadoes drive nails through fences--" + +"Where do they get the nails?" asked Gran'ma Mullins. + +"I d'n know. Pick 'em out of the fences first, I guess. And they strip +the feathers off chickens and scoop up haystacks and carry them up in +the air for good and all." + +"Oh, my!" cried Mrs. Macy. + +"Mr. Kimball said the young man told him that a tornado dug up a +complete marsh once in Minnesota and spread it out upside down on top of +a wood a little ways off; and when there's a tornado anywhere near, the +sewing-machines all tick like they was telegraphing." + +"No!" cried Mrs. Macy. + +"Yes, the young man said so." + +"But do you believe him?" + +"I don't know why not. I wouldn't believe Mr. Kimball because he's +always fixing up his stories to sound better than they really are, which +makes me have very little faith in him; but Judge Fitch says he'd make +a splendid witness for any one just on that very account. Judge Fitch +says with a little well-advised help Mr. Kimball would carry convictions +to any man,--he don't except none,--but I see no reason why the young +man wasn't telling the truth. Young men do tell the truth sometimes; +most everybody does that. A tornado catches up pigs and carries 'em +miles and pulls up trees by the roots. I don't wonder they won't insure +'em." + +"The pigs?" asked Mrs. Macy. + +"No, the tornadoes." + +"What's the signs of a tornado?" asked Gran'ma Mullins uneasily. + +"Well, the signs is alike for both. The signs is weather like to-day and +a kind of breathlessness like to-night. Mr. Kimball says a funnel-shaped +cloud is a great sign; and when you see it, in three minutes it's on +you, and off goes your roof if it's a cyclone, and off you go yourself +if it's a tornado." + +"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop, clutching the arms of her +old-gold-plush stationary rocker. + +"Do people ever come down again?" Gran'ma Mullins inquired; she was very +pale. + +"Elijah didn't, Mr. Kimball says." + +"Elijah Doxey?" cried Mrs. Macy. "Why, is he off on a cyclone? No one +ever told me." + +"No, Elijah in the Bible, you know. The Elijah as was caught up in a +chariot of fire. Mr. Kimball says there ain't a mite of doubt in his +mind but that it was a tornado. I guess Mr. Kimball told the truth that +time, for it's all in the Bible." + +"That's true," said Gran'ma Mullins. "I remember Elijah myself. He kept +a tame raven, seems to me, or some such thing." + +"Oh, Susan!" Mrs. Lathrop cried out suddenly. "There's a fun--" Her +voice failed her; she raised her hand and pointed. + +Susan turned quickly, and her face became suddenly gray-white. "It can't +be a cy--" she faltered. + +With that all four women jumped different ways at once. + +"Where shall we go?" shrieked Mrs. Macy. "Oh, saints and sinners +preserve us! Oh, Susan, where shall we go?" + +But Susan Clegg stood as if paralyzed, staring straight at the +funnel-shaped cloud. + +Gran'ma Mullins started for her own house; Mrs. Lathrop sprang up and +clasped the piazza post nearest; Mrs. Macy grabbed her skirts up at both +sides and faced the cyclone just as she had once faced the cow. + +The funnel-shaped cloud came sweeping towards them. The town was +between, and a darkness and a mighty roar arose. Buildings seemed +falling; the din was terrible. + +"I knew it," said Susan grimly. "It _is_ a cyclone!" She faced the +worst--standing erect. + +The next instant the storm was on them all. It lifted Mrs. Lathrop's +old-gold-plush stationary rocker and hurled it at that good lady, +smashing her hard against the post. It raised the roof of Mrs. Macy's +house and dropped it like an extinguisher over the fleeing form of +Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Oh, Gran'ma Mullins, it _is_ a cyclone!" Susan shrieked. But Gran'ma +Mullins answered not. + +A second mighty burst of fury blew down two trees, and it blew Susan +herself back against the side wall of the house which shook and swayed +like a bit of cardboard. + +"Oh, yes, it's a cyclone," Susan screamed over and over. "Oh, Mrs. +Lathrop, it's a real cyclone! It isn't a tornado; you can see the +difference now. It's a cyclone; look at the roof; it's a cyclone!" + +Mrs. Lathrop could see nothing. She and the old-gold-plush stationary +rocker were all piled together under the piazza post. + +And now came the third and worst burst of fury. It crashed on the +blacksmith's shop; it carried the sails of the windmill swooping down +the road, and then "without halting, without rest" lifted Mrs. Macy +with her outspread skirts and carried her straight up in the air. "Oh! +Oh!" she shrieked and sailed forth. + +Susan gave a piercing yell. "Oh, Mrs. Macy, it's a tornado, it's a +tornado!" But Mrs. Macy answered not. + +Tipping, swaying, ducking to the right or left, she flew majestically +away over her own roof first and then over that of Gran'ma Mullins' +woodshed. + +"Help! Help!" cried Gran'ma Mullins from under the roof. + +Mrs. Lathrop was oblivious to all, smashed by her own old-gold-plush +stationary rocker. + +Susan Clegg stood as one fascinated, staring after the trail which was +all that was left of Mrs. Macy. + +"It was a tornado!" she said over and over. "Mrs. Macy'll always believe +in the Bible now, I guess. It was a tornado! It _was_ a tornado!" + + * * * * * + +"No, they ain't found her yet," Susan said, coming into the hotel room +where Mrs. Lathrop and Gran'ma Mullins had found a pleasant and +comfortable refuge and were occupied in recuperating together at +Jathrop's expense. Neither lady was seriously injured. Gran'ma Mullins +had been preserved from even a wetting through the neat capping of her +climax by Mrs. Macy's roof; while Mrs. Lathrop's squeeze between the +piazza post and her well beloved old-gold-plush stationary rocker had +not--as Gran'ma Mullins put it--so much as turned a hair of even the +rocker. + +"No one's heard anything from her yet," continued Susan, "but that ain't +so surprising as it would be if anybody had time to want to know. But +nobody's got time for nothing to-day. The town's in a awful taking, and +I d'n know as I ever see a worse situation. You two want to be very +grateful as you're so nicely and neatly laid aside, for what has +descended on the community now is worse'n any cyclone, and if you could +get out and see what the cyclone's done, you'd know what _that_ means." + +"Was you to my house, Susan?" asked Gran'ma Mullins anxiously. + +"I was; but the insurance men was before me, or anyhow, we met there." + +"The insurance men!" + +"That's what I said,--the insurance men. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, we all know +one side of what it is to insure ourselves, but now the Lord in his +infinite wrath has mercifully seen fit to show us the other side. The +Assyrian pouncing down on the wolf in his fold is a young mother +wrapping up her first baby to look out the window compared to those +insurance men. They descended on us bright and shining to-day, and if we +was murderers with our families buried under the kitchen floor, we +couldn't be looked on with more suspicion. I was far from pleased when I +first laid eyes on 'em, for there's a foxiness in any city man as comes +to settle things in the country as is far from being either soothing or +syrupy to him as lives in the country; but you can maybe imagine my +feelings when they very plainly informed me as I couldn't put the roof +back on Mrs. Macy's house till it was settled whether it was a cyclone +or a tornado--" + +"Settled--whether--" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Cyclone or tornado," repeated Susan. "The first thing isn't to get to +rights, but it is to settle whether we've got any rights to get. I never +dreamed what it was to be injured--no, or no one else neither. Seems if +it's a tornado, we don't get a cent of our insurance. And to think it +all depends on Mrs. Macy." + +"On Mrs.--" cried Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Yes, because she's the only one as really knows whether she was carried +off or not. Well, all I can say is, if she don't come back pretty quick, +we're going to have a little John Brown raid right here in town; we--" + +"But what--?" + +"I'm telling you. It'll be the town rising up against the insurance men, +and the insurance men will soon find that when it comes to +dilly-dallying with folks newly cycloned upside down, it's life and +death if you don't deal fair. What with chimneys down and roofs turned +up at the corner like the inquiring angels didn't have time to take the +cover all off but just pried up a little to see what was inside,--I say +with all this and everything wet and Mrs. Macy gone, this community was +in no mood to be sealed up--" + +"Sealed up!" cried Mrs. Lathrop and Gran'ma Mullins together. + +"That's what it is. Sealed up we are, and sealed up we've got to stay +until Mrs. Macy gets back--" + +"But--" cried Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Everybody's just as mad as you are. Charging bulls is setting hens +beside this town to-night. Even Mr. Kimball's mad for once in his life; +he's losing money most awful, for he can't sell so much as a paper of +tacks. They've got both his doors and all his windows sealed, and he's +standing out in front with nothing to do except to keep a sharp eye out +for Mrs. Macy. He says it ain't in reason to expect as she'll fly back, +but she's got to come from somewhere, and he means to prevent her +getting away again on the sly. He says his opinion is as she'd have +stood a better chance before airships was so common. He says ten years +ago folks would have took steps for hooking at her just as quick as they +saw her coming along, but nowadays it'd be a pretty brave man as would +try to stop anything he saw flying overhead. I guess he's about right +there. It's a hard question to know what to do with things that fly, +even if Mrs. Macy hadn't took to it, too. My view is that we advance +faster than we can learn how to manage our new inventions. I d'n know, +I'm sure, though, what Mrs. Macy is going to do about this trip of hers. +She went without even the moment's notice as folks in a hurry always has +had up to now. She's been gone most twenty-four hours. She's skipped +three meals already, not to speak of her night and her nap; and you know +as well as I do how Mrs. Macy was give to her nights and her napping." + +Susan shook her head, and Mrs. Lathrop looked wide-eyed and alarmed. + +"But now--" Gran'ma Mullins asked. + +"I've been all over the place," Susan continued. "I didn't understand +fully what was up when I scurried off to try and get those men to put +the roof back on Mrs. Macy's house, but I know it all now. It's no use +trying to get anybody to do nothing now; the whole town's upside down +and inside out. I never see nothing like it. And the insurance men has +got it laid down flat as nobody can't touch nothing till it's settled +whether it's a cyclone or a tornado. Seems a good many was insured for +cyclones right in with their fires without knowing it; but there ain't a +soul in the place insured against a tornado, because you can't get any +insurance against tornadoes--no one will insure them. The insurance men +say if it's a tornado, we won't have nothing to do except to do the best +we can; but if it's a cyclone, we mus'n't touch anything till they can +get some one to judge what's worth saving and how much it's worth and +deduct that from our insurance. That's how it is." + +"But what has--?" began Gran'ma Mullins. + +"How long--?" demanded Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Nobody knows," said Susan. "The whole town is asking, and nobody knows. +The insurance company won't let anybody go home or get anything unless +they'll sign a paper giving up their insurance and swearing that it was +a tornado. Mr. Dill just had to sign the paper because he was taking a +bath and had nothing except the table cover to wear. He signed the paper +and said he'd swear anything if only for his shoes alone; and it seems +that his house isn't hurt a mite, and he didn't have no insurance +anyhow. A good many is blaming him, but he says he really couldn't think +of anything in the excitement and the table cloth. It's a awful state of +things. The cyclone has tore everything to pieces, and the insurance +men has put their seal on the chips. People is being drove to all +lengths. The minister and his family is camping in the henhouse. Our +walls is fell in so goodness knows what will happen to you and me next, +Mrs. Lathrop. The wires is all down, so we can't hear nothing about the +storm. The rails is all up, so there's no trains. The church is stove +in, so we can't pray. But I must say as to my order of thinking, it +looks as if no one feels like praying. The insurance men is running all +over, like winged ants hatching out, sealing up more doors and more +windows every minute and getting more signatures as it was a tornado +before they'll unstick them. Nothing can't be really settled till Mrs. +Macy comes back. Mrs. Macy is the key to the whole situation." + +"But why--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"The Jilkins is in from Cherry Pond, and all it did there was to rain. +The Sperrits was in, too, and the storm was most singular with them. It +hailed in the sunshine till they see four rainbows--they never see the +beat. Mr. Weskins is advising everybody to go into their houses and make +a test case of it. Judge Fitch is advising everybody not to. It's plain +as he's on the side of the insurance men. He says just as they do, that +we'd better wait till Mrs. Macy comes back and hear her story. He says +in the very nature of things her view'll be a most general one. He says +all there is to know she'll know; she'll know the area affected and be +able to tell whether it was electricity or just wind. Mr. Kimball said +if she went far enough, she'd be a star witness; but no one thinks that +jokes about Mrs. Macy ought to be told now. The situation is too +serious. It may be _very_ serious for Mrs. Macy. If the storm stopped +sudden, it may be very serious indeed for Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Macy isn't as +young as she was, and she hadn't the least idea of leaving town; she +wasn't a bit prepared, that we can all swear to. She was just carried +away by a sudden impulse--as you might say--and the main question is +how far did she get on her impulse, and where is she now? To my order +of thinking, it all depends on how she come down. Cycloning along like +she was, if she come down on a pond or a peak, she'll be far from +finding it funny. I was thinking about her all the way here, and I can't +think of any way as'll be easy for her to come to earth, no matter how +she comes. And if she hits hard, she isn't going to like it. Mrs. Macy +was never one as took a joke pleasant; she never made light of nothing. +She took life very solemn-like--a owl was a laughing hyena compared to +Mrs. Macy. It's too bad she was that way. My own view is as she never +got over not getting married again. Some women don't. She always took it +as a reflection. There's no reflection to not getting married; my +opinion is as there's a deal of things more important and most thing's +more comfortable. If Mrs. Macy was married, she'd be much worse off than +she is right now, for instead of being able to give her whole time and +attention to whatever she's doing and looking over, she'd be wondering +what he was giving his time and attention to doing and prying into. When +a man's out of your sight, you've always got to wonder, and most of the +time that's all in the world you can do about a man. Now Mrs. Macy's +perfectly independent, she can go where she pleases and come down when +she pleases, and she hasn't got to tell what she saw unless she wants +to. Mrs. Brown says she ain't never been nowhere. It's plain to be seen +as Mrs. Brown's envying Mrs. Macy her trip." + +"But why--?" began Gran'ma Mullins with great determination. + +"That's just it," replied Susan promptly. "I declare, I can't but wonder +what'll happen next. I'm in that state that nothing will surprise me. +Everything's so upset and off the track there's no use even trying to +think. My walls is fell into my cistern, and Mrs. Macy's roof is sitting +on the ground beside her house yet. The insurance men has sealed up +Gran'ma Mullins' house, and they wouldn't leave the henhouse open till I +signed a affidavit on behalf of the hens and released 'em from all +claims for feed. Mr. Dill said they tried to seal up his cow. They've +got Mr. Kimball's dried-apple machine tied with a rope. It's awful." + +"But Susan--" interrupted Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Mr. Weskins says the great difficulty is the insurance men say they +don't see how anything is going to be settled or decided until we hear +from Mrs. Macy. The point's right here. If she comes back, it's evidence +as it was a tornado, because if she comes back it proves as she was +carried off, in which case the insurance men won't have to pay nothing +anyhow, and we'll all be unsealed and allowed to go to work putting our +roofs back on our heads and clearing up as fast as we can. But Mr. +Weskins says if Mrs. Macy don't come back, there'll be no way to prove +as she was even carried off by the storm for you, Mrs. Lathrop, had your +back turned; and you, Gran'ma Mullins, was under the roof; and I'm only +one, and it takes two witnesses to prove anything as is contrary to law +and nature." + +"Do they doubt--?" cried Mrs. Lathrop, quite excited--for her. + +"Yes, they do. They doubt everything. Insurance men don't take nothing +for granted. They've decided to just pin their whole case to Mrs. Macy, +and there's Mrs. Macy gone away to, heaven knows where." + +"Well, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins, "we must look on the bright side. +Mrs. Macy'll have something to talk about as'll always interest +everybody if she does come back, and if she don't come back, we'll +always have her to remember." + +"Yes, and if we don't get our houses unstuck pretty soon, we'll remember +her a long while," said Susan darkly. + +Three days passed by and no word was heard from Mrs. Macy. As soon as +the telegraph assumed its usual route, messages were sent all about in +the direction whither she had flown, but not a trace of her was +discovered by any one. The town was very much wrought up, for although +its members were given to having strange experiences, no experience so +strange as this had ever happened there before. The exasperation of +being barred out of house and home until Mrs. Macy should be found, +naturally heightened the interest. Everybody had had just time to add +the magic word "cyclone" to their policies before the cyclone came +"damaging along"--as Susan Clegg expressed it. Susan was much perturbed. + +"Well, Mrs. Lathrop,"--she said on the afternoon of the third day, as +she came into the hotel room where the mother of the millionaire was now +equal to her usual vigorous exercise in her old-gold-plush stationary +rocker. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you may well be grateful as Jathrop has got +money enough for us to be living here, for the living of the community +is getting to be no living a _tall_." + +Gran'ma Mullins, still in bed, turned herself about and manifested a +vivid interest, "Well, Susan," she said, "it's three days now; how long +is this going to keep up?" + +"It can't keep up very much longer, or we'll have a new French +Revolution, that's what we'll have," said Susan. "Why, the community is +getting where it won't stand even being said good morning to pleasantly. +The children is running all over, pulling each other's hair, and Deacon +White says he's going to buy a pistol. Things is come to a pretty pass +when Deacon White wants to buy a pistol, for he's just as afraid of one +end as the other. But it's a straw as shows which way the cyclone blew +his house." + +"But isn't something--?" + +"Something has got to be done. The boys stretched a string across the +door of the insurance men's room this morning, and they fell in a heap +when they started out; and some one as nobody can locate poured a +pitcher of ice water through the ventilator as is over their bed. Seeing +that public feeling is on the rise, they sent right after breakfast for +the appraisers, and they're going to begin appraising and un-sealing +to-morrow morning. They've entirely give up the idea of waiting for +Mrs. Macy. The town just won't stand for any more hanging around waiting +for nothing. I never see us so before. Every one is so upset and divided +in their feelings that some think we'd ought to horsewhip the insurance +men, and some think we'd ought to hold a burial service for Mrs. Macy." + +"I wouldn't see any good in holding a service for Mrs. Macy," said +Gran'ma Mullins. "She wouldn't have been buried here if she was dead; +she was always planning to go to Meadville when she was dead." + +"Yes," said Susan, "I know. Because Mrs. Lupey's got that nice lot with +that nice mausoleum as she bought from the Pennybackers when they got +rich and moved even their great-grandfather to the city." + +"I remember the Pennybackers," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Old man +Pennybacker used to drive a cart for rags. It was a great day for the +Pennybackers when Joe went into the pawnbroker business." + +"Yes," said Susan, "it's wonderful how rich men manage to get on when +they're young. Seems as if there's just no way to crowd a millionaire +out of business or kill him off. I'm always reading what they went +through in the papers, but it never helped none. A millionaire is a +thing as when it's going to be is going to be, and you've just got to +let 'em do it once they get started." + +"It was a nice mausoleum," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Mrs. Macy has told me +about it a hundred times. It's so big, Mrs. Lupey says, she can live up +to her hospitable nature at last, for there's room for all and to spare. +Mrs. Macy was the first person she asked. Mrs. Macy thought that was +very kind of just a cousin. There's only Mrs. Kitts there, now, and Mrs. +Lupey's aunt, Mrs. Cogetts." + +"Mrs. Macy didn't know she had a aunt," said Susan. "Mrs. Cogetts came +way from Jacoma just on account of the mausoleum. That's a long ways to +come just to save paying for a lot where you are, seems to me; but some +natures'll go to any lengths to save money." + +"I wonder where Mrs. Macy is now," said Gran'ma Mullins, with a sigh. + +"Nobody knows. A good many is decided that it's surely a clear case of +Elijah, only nobody pretends to believe in the Bible so much as to think +that she can go up and stay there. Mrs. Macy'd have to come down, and +the higher she went the more heaven help her when she does come down. +Mrs. Macy was very solid, as we all know who've heard her sit down or +seen her get up, and I can't see no happy ending ahead, even though we +all wish her well. The insurance men is very blue over her not coming +back, for they expected to prove a tornado sure; but even insurance men +can't have the whole world run to suit them these days. Anyhow, my view +is as it's no use worrying. Spilt milk's a poor thing to cook with. If +you're in the fire, you ain't in the frying-pan. The real sufferers is +this community, as is all locked out of their houses. The Browns is +living in the cellar to the cowshed, with two lengths of sidewalk laid +over them. Mrs. Brown says she feels like a Pilgrim Father, and she +sees why they got killed off so fast by the Indians,--it was so much +easier to be scalped than to do your hair. Mr. and Mrs. Craig takes +turns at one hammock all night long. Mrs. Craig says they change +regular, for whoever turns over spills out, and the other one is sitting +looking at the moon and waiting all ready to get in." + +"I declare, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins warmly, "I think it's most +shocking. I won't say outrageous, but I will say shocking." + +"But what are you going to do about it?" said Susan. "That's the rub in +this country. There's plenty as is shocking, but here we sit at the +mercy of any cyclone or Congress as comes along. Here we was, peaceful, +happy, and loving, and a cyclone swishes through. Down comes half a +dozen men from the city and seals up everything in town. I tell you you +ought to have heard me when they was sealing up your house and Mrs. +Macy's. I give it to 'em, and I didn't mince matters none. I spoke my +whole mind, and it was a great satisfaction, but they went right on and +sealed up the houses." + +"Oh, Susan," began Mrs. Lathrop, "how are--?" + +"All in ruins," replied Susan promptly. "I don't believe you and me is +ever going to live in happy homes any more. Fate seems dead set against +the idea. And nobody can get ahead of Fate. They may talk all they +please about overcoming, and when I was young I was always charging +along with my horns down and my tail waving same as every other young +thing; but I'm older now, and I see as resignation is the only thing as +really pays in the end. I get as mad as ever, but I stay meek. I wanted +to lam those insurance men with a stick of wood as was lying most handy, +but all I did was to walk home. Mr. Shores says he's just the same way. +We was talking it over this morning. He says when his wife first run off +with his clerk, he was nigh to crazy; he says he thought getting along +without a wife was going to just drive him out of his senses, and he +said her taking the clerk just seemed to add insult to perjury, but he +says now, as he gets older, he finds having no wife a great comfort." + +"I wish Jathrop would--" sighed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, he will, likely enough," said Susan. "Now he's rich, some girl +will snap him up, and he won't find how he's been fooled till three or +four months after the wedding." + +"I suppose Jathrop could marry just any one he pleased now," said +Gran'ma Mullins, sighing in her turn. "Hiram didn't have no choice; +Jathrop'll have a choice." + +"He may be none the better for that," said Susan darkly. "If Jathrop +Lathrop is wise, he'll not go routing wildly around like a president +after a elephant; he'll stick to what's tried and true. But I have my +doubt as to Jathrop's being wise; very few men with money have any +sense." + +"Who do _you_ think--?" began Mrs. Lathrop, looking intently at Susan. + +"I d'n know," said Susan, looking hard at Mrs. Lathrop; "far be it from +me to judge." + +"They do say, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins wisely, "as he'll end up by +marrying you. Everybody says so." + +Susan shook her head hard. "It's not for me to say. Affairs has been +going on and off between Jathrop and me for too many years now for me to +begin to discuss them. What is to be will be, and what isn't to be can't +possibly be brought about." + +Gran'ma Mullins sighed again, and Mrs. Lathrop went on rocking. As she +rocked, she viewed Susan Clegg from time to time in a speculative +manner. It was many, many years since she had suggested to Susan the +idea of marrying Jathrop. + + * * * * * + +It was the next morning that Mrs. Macy re-appeared on the scene. The +insurance men had unsealed all the houses, and the result was her +discovery. + +"Well, you could drown me for a new-born kitten, and I'd never open my +eyes in surprise after _this_," Susan expounded to the friends at the +hotel. "But Mrs. Macy always _was_ peculiar; she was always give to +adventures. To think of her living there as snug as a moth in a rug, +cooking her meals on the little oil-stove--" + +"But where--?" interposed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I'm telling you. She's been sleeping in a good bed, too, and being +perfectly comfortable while we've all been suffering along of waiting +for her to come back." + +"But Susan--" cried Gran'ma Mullins, wide-eyed. + +"I'll tell you where she was; she was in your house--that's where she +was. The cyclone just gave her a lift over your woodshed, and then it +set her down pretty quick. She says she came to earth like a piece of +thistledown on the other side. Her story is as your back door was open, +so she run in, and then it begun to rain, so she saw no reason for going +out again. When it stopped raining, she looked out and seen nobody. That +isn't surprising, for we wasn't there. She thought that it was strange +not seeing any lights, but she started to go home, and she says _what_ +was her feelings when she fell over her own roof in the path. She says +of all the strange sensations a perfectly respectable woman can possibly +ever get to start to go home and fall over her own roof is surely the +most singular. She says she was so sleepy she thought maybe she was +dreaming, and not having any lantern, it was no use trying to +investigate, so she just went back to your house and went to bed in my +bed. She says she dreamed of Hiram's ears all night long. I'd completely +forgot Hiram's ears, which is strange, for they was far and away the +most amusing things in this community. I think that way he could turn +'em about was so entertaining. That way he used to cock 'em at you +always give him the air of paying so much attention. They say he never +cocked 'em at Lucy but once--" + +"Oh, my, that once!" exclaimed Gran'ma Mullins involuntarily. + +"It was a sin and a shame for Lucy to choke Hiram's ears off like she +did," Susan declared warmly. "She just seemed to take all the courage +right out of 'em. Hiram always reminded me of a black-and-tan as long as +he had the free use of his ears, but after Lucy broke their backbone +like she did, he never reminded me of much of nothing." Susan paused to +sigh. Gran'ma Mullins wiped her eyes. + +"You and Hiram give up to Lucy too much," said Susan. "I wish she'd +married me." + +"I wish she had, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins. "I wouldn't wish to seem +unkind to the wife of my born and wedded only son, but I do wish that +she'd married you, and if Hiram could only see Lucy with a mother's +clear blue eye, he'd wish it, too." + +"Where is--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, desiring to recur to the main object +under discussion. + +"Oh, she's gone straight over to Meadville," said Susan. "Oh, my, she +says, but think of her feelings as she sat inside that nice, comfortable +house and realized that she was the only person in town with a roof +over her head! You see, she heard me talking with the insurance men, and +she didn't know why we was to be sealed up, but she got it all straight +as we was going to be turned out of house and home, and she says she +made up her mind as no one should ever know as she was in a house and so +come capering up to put her out. She says she settled down as still as a +mouse, made no smoke, and never lit so much as a candle nights. Mrs. +Macy is surely most foxy!" + +"And she's gone to Meadville?" said Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Yes, she didn't want to pay board here, and her own house hasn't got no +roof, so she's gone to Mrs. Lupey. Old Doctor Carter was over here to +appraise the damage done to folks, and he took her back with him." + +"I wonder if she'll ever--" wondered Gran'ma Mullins. + +"I d'n know. If folks talk about a marriage long enough, it usually ends +up that way. Doctor Carter and Mrs. Macy has been kind of jumping at +each other and then running away for fifteen years or so. They say he'd +like her money, but he hates to be bothered with her." + +"She wouldn't like to be bothered with him, either," said Gran'ma +Mullins. + +"I know," said Susan. "That's what's making so few people like to get +married nowadays. They don't want to be bothered with each other." + +Mrs. Lathrop fixed her little, black, beady eyes hard on Susan. + +Susan stared straight ahead. + + + + +IX + +SUSAN CLEGG'S PRACTICAL FRIEND + + +"Mrs. Sperrit can't stand it no longer, and she's going visiting," +announced Susan Clegg to the three friends who, seated together on Mrs. +Macy's piazza, had been awaiting her return from down-town. Both Mrs. +Macy and Gran'ma Mullins were now back in their own houses after the +temporary absence due to the cyclone, and Mrs. Lathrop and she who might +yet be her daughter-in-law were reëstablished as their paying guests. + +"Why, I never knew that Mr. Sperrit was that kind of a man," said +Gran'ma Mullins, opening her eyes very wide indeed. "I wouldn't say he's +han'some, and I wouldn't say he's entertaining; but I always thought +they got on well together." + +"He isn't that kind of a man a _tall_," rejoined Susan, who had been +holding one hatpin in her mouth while she felt for the other, but now +freed herself of both. "It's just that Mrs. Sperrit's sick of all this +clutter of mending up after the cyclone. She says she's nervous for the +first time in her life and has got to have a change. She says the +carrying off of the barn and its never being heard from any more has got +on her nerves somehow, even if it was only a barn. She says God forgive +her and not to mention it to you, Mrs. Macy, but she wishes every hour +of her life as the cyclone had took you and left their barn, because the +barn had her sewing-machine in it, and she'd as leave be dead as be +without that sewing-machine." + +"Where--?" mildly interpolated Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Mr. Sperrit says wherever she likes. He's been upset by the barn too, +because it had his tool-chest in it, and he's such a handy man with his +tools that he feels for her in a way as not many women get felt for." + +"Where does--?" began Gran'ma Mullins. + +"She didn't know at first, but now she thinks she'll go and stay with +her cousin. She hasn't had much to do with her cousin for years, and she +says she feels as maybe the barn was a judgment. She never got along +well with her cousin. She says her cousin was pretty, with curls, and +she herself was freckled, with straight hair, and so it was only natural +as she always hated her. I don't feel to blame her none, for curls is +very hard on them as is born straight-haired. But there was more reasons +than one for Mrs. Sperrit not to get along with her cousin, and she says +it never was so much the curls as it was her not being practical. Mrs. +Sperrit is practical, and she's always been practical, and her cousin +wasn't. They didn't speak for years and years." + +"Whatever set 'em at it again?" asked Mrs. Macy. + +"Well, Mrs. Sperrit says it come by degrees. She says she first noticed +as her cousin was trying to make up about five years ago, but she +thought she'd best wait and be sure. Mrs. Sperrit's practical; she don't +never look in anywhere until she's leaped around the edge enough to know +what she's doing. She says her cousin named her first boy Gringer, which +is Mrs. Sperrit's family name; but then, it is the cousin's family name, +too, so she didn't pay any attention to that. Then she named her first +girl Eliza, which, as we know, is Mrs. Sperrit's own name, but seeing as +it was the name of the grandmother of both of them, she didn't pay any +attention to _that_, either. Then she named the second boy Sperrit, +which was a little pointed, of course; and Mrs. Sperrit says if her +cousin had been practical, she would certainly have thought that the +Sperrits ought to have given the child something. But she wasn't and +didn't, and they didn't. Then she named the second girl Azile--which is +Eliza spelt backwards--and Mrs. Sperrit says it was the spelling of +Eliza backwards as first showed her how awful friendly her cousin was +trying to get to be. Then, when she named the third boy Jacob, after +Mr. Sperrit, and the fourth boy Bocaj--which is Jacob spelled +backwards--Mrs. Sperrit says that it was no use pretending not to see. +Besides, naming the baby Bocaj just did go to her heart, particularly as +the baby wasn't very strong, anyway. So since then the Sperrits has sent +'em a turkey every Thanksgiving and a quarter apiece to the children +every Christmas." + +"What's she named the other children?" asked Mrs. Macy with real +interest. + +"Why, there ain't no more yet. Bocaj is only six months old." + +"Oh, then they ain't sent no turkey yet!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy. + +"No, not yet, but when they begin, they'll keep it up steady. And now +Mrs. Sperrit says she'll go and visit and see for herself how things +are. She's not very hopeful of enjoying herself, for she says visiting a +person as isn't practical is most difficult. She knows, because when she +taught school, she used to board with a family as was that way. She says +she kept the things she bought then, and she shall take 'em all to her +cousin's. She says when you stay with any one as isn't practical, you +must take your own spirit-lamp, and teapot, and kettle, and tea, and +matches, and a small blanket, and pen and ink, and a box of crackers, +and a sharp knife, and some blank telegrams, and a good deal of +court-plaster, and a teacup, and sugar if you take it, and a ball of +good heavy string, and your own Bible, and a pillow. And never forget to +wear your trunk-key round your neck, even if you only go down-stairs to +look at the clock. She's got all those things left over from her +school-teaching days. She says everything always comes in handy again +some time if you're practical, and she thanks God she's practical." + +"I don't think that I should care to visit that way," said Gran'ma +Mullins thoughtfully. "I wouldn't say I wouldn't, and I wouldn't say I +couldn't, but I don't think--" + +"She's going Tuesday," continued Susan Clegg. "Mr. Sperrit says she can, +and she's going Tuesday. She's written her cousin, and her cousin's +written her. Her cousin says they'll be too glad for words, and for her +to stay till Christmas--or till Thanksgiving, anyway. Mrs. Sperrit says +she won't do that, but she'll stay until the end of next week if she can +stand her cousin's husband. She says she never had any use for her +cousin's husband, because he isn't practical either, and when he was +young, his tie was never on straight. Mrs. Sperrit says a man that wears +his tie crooked when he's young is the kind to keep shy of later. She +says he'll never have a pocket knife and borrow hers, and never have a +pencil and borrow hers. And then, too, she's almost sure as by this time +he's spoilt her cousin's temper; and visiting a cousin whose temper's +spoilt wouldn't be fun, even if she was practical. Which this one +ain't." + +"If her cousin's got a sharp tongue I--" began Gran'ma Mullins in quiet, +sad reminiscence. + +"She was buying some wood alcohol and a cheap spoon at Mr. Kimball's," +Susan went on. "She took me in her buggy and drove me up to look at our +houses, which is trying feebly to climb again to where they was before +the cyclone. But they're a sorry sight. I don't know when we're ever +going to get into them, I'm sure. I only wish Jathrop was to see how +slow those carpenters can be." Then Miss Clegg's countenance assumed a +coy expression, her eyes lowered bashfully, and her fingers nervously +sought to touch between the buttons of her waist some treasured object +hidden within. "I--I had a letter from him to-day." + +And at that all three listeners started in more or less violent +amazement. + +"What!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Nothing that I can tell any one," said Susan serenely. "So it's no use +asking me another word about it." + +Mrs. Sperrit left on Tuesday precisely and practically as she had +planned; but she returned very much sooner than she had expected. + +"And no wonder," declared Susan, just back from the Sewing Society, to +Mrs. Lathrop, who never went. "I should say it was no wonder. Well, Mrs. +Sperrit has had an experience, and I guess no lost barn will ever lead +her into looking up no more cousins after this." + +"She's so worn-looking," said Gran'ma Mullins, who had returned with +Susan. "I wouldn't say white, and I wouldn't say worried, but I call it +peaked." + +"Why, she's been through enough to make a book," said Mrs. Macy, who had +come in with the others, "--a book like _The Jungle_, as makes you right +down sick in spots." + +"Oh, _The Jungle_ isn't so bad," said Susan. "If it was, Roosevelt would +have straightened it out soon enough when he was in it himself. But +what's awful about Mrs. Sperrit is what she has suffered, for that woman +certainly has suffered. She's a lesson once for all as to visiting. No +one as hears her is ever going lightly visiting after this. She lost her +trunk-key as soon as she landed in the house, and she says she was too +took up to miss it for three days, which shows what kind of a time she +had. Why, her cousin went right to bed as soon as she got there, because +she said as she knowed that Mrs. Sperrit was practical and could do +everything better than she could. So that was a nice beginning to begin +with. Well, she says such a house you never see. The chickens come into +the dining-room, and they was raising mud turtles in the bathtub, and +caterpillars in the cake-box. The children was awful right from the +start. She slept in the room with two of them, and they woke her up +mornings playing shave with the ends of her braids. She found out as +they dipped 'em first in the water pitcher and then in the tooth powder +to make it like lather." + +"My heavens alive!" exclaimed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Then Jacob, who's only two and a half, ate mashed potatoes with his +fingers, which is a thing, Mrs. Sperrit says, as must be seen to be +believed, and they all just swum in jam from dawn to dark. She says she +never see such children, anyway. Whenever anybody sat down, they'd play +she was the Alps, and go back and forth over her wherever they could get +a purchase. And she says--would you believe it?--her cousin is got to be +so calm that it drives you out of your senses only to see the way she +takes things. Mrs. Sperrit says all she can say is as when a woman as +isn't practical does go to bed, she's resigned to that degree that you +wish you could blow her up with dynamite if only to see her move quick +just once." + +"Why didn't she come home?" asked Mrs. Macy. "My view would be as I'd +come home. I said so to her to-day." + +"She did come home, didn't she?" said Miss Clegg. "You heard her, and +you know she's home. It's Mrs. Lathrop as all this is new to, isn't it? +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, it would go to your heart to hear what happened to +all those little conveniences as she took. There wasn't no sharp knife +in the house but hers, so she never see hers after she unpacked it. +There wasn't no string or court-plaster either, so they disappeared +too. Then they run out of tea the minute they see she brought some, and +not being practical, her cousin's teapot naturally didn't have no nose, +so she lost her teapot, too. The whole family took her hairbrush and +used it for a clothes brush, and she thinks for a shoe brush when she +was down-town. Her cousin wore her stockings and her collars, and her +cousin's husband slept on the pillow with the blanket folded around him. +Not being practical, he liked his feet free." + +"Well, I nev--!" ejaculated Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Mrs. Sperrit said by the third day she had to begin to do something, so +she asked if she could clean her own room, and her cousin said she was +going to let her make herself happy in her own way and just to go ahead +and clean the whole house if she liked. So she went to work and cleaned +the whole house, and she says such a house she never dreamed could +exist. She found families of mice, and families of swallows, and +families of moths. She found things as had been lost for years, and +they was wild with delight to see 'em again. She found things as, she +says, she wouldn't like to say she found, because when all's said and +done a cousin is still a cousin, but she says--Good lands, what she +found! Well, she says when she got the house cleaned, her cousin was +still in bed, so she took heart of grace and asked if she might teach +the children to mind. Her cousin said she didn't care, so Mrs. Sperrit +went to work on those six children. Well, she says that was a job, and +it was that as led to her coming away like she did. She says the +children was the very worst children anybody ever saw. She says she +taught school, and she thought she knew children, but anything like +those children nobody--even those as is chock full of things not fit to +eat--could ever by any possibility of dreamed of. Why, she says they was +used to heating the poker and jabbing one another with it when mad; and +while you was leaning down to tie your shoe, they'd snatch your chair +away from behind you, and such games. But Mrs. Sperrit is practical, +and she believes in her Bible, and she thought as how the Lord had +delivered them into her hands and set to work. She said she begun by +washing them all--for they was always slippery from jam. And then she +cut their nails very short and started in. Well, she says it was some +work, for they was so funny she could hardly keep from laughing. She +says they're mighty bright children--she must say that for 'em, although +it don't soften her feelings a mite towards 'em. Well, she says you +couldn't do nothing a _tall_ with 'em. But she didn't lose courage. When +she talked serious, they took it as a great joke, and she had to stop +for meals so often that it used her all up; for she says such steady +eating she never see. She says the meals was most terrible, too, as they +always had herring, and of course the bones made so much picking that +the children kept telling her she ate with her fingers, herself. She +says that was the most awful part, the way they talked back. But she +didn't despair. She kept washing them out of the jam and taking a fresh +cut at their nails, until finally come the last hour of wrath. And then, +she says, they did make her mad--good and mad." + +"But what did--?" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, seems the worst child was 'Zile. Of course, Mrs. Sperrit, having +taught school, thought they'd pronounce it like Azalea, and make a real +pretty name out of Eliza spelt backwards, but seems they dropped the A +and just called her 'Zile to rhyme with file; and Mrs. Sperrit says she +rhymed with file all right." + +"Go on, Susan," urged Mrs. Macy. + +"Well, the cousin and the husband was invited to go on a all-day +excursion, so the cousin got up and dressed and went. She said she might +as well, seeing as Mrs. Sperrit was there with the children. When they +was gone, Mrs. Sperrit made up her mind as now was her chance to bring +those children to time, once and for all. So she rolled up her sleeves +and give 'em all a good bath--for she says the way they'd get freshly +jammed was most astonishing--and then she went up-stairs to get her +scissors to cut their nails. She was opening her trunk to get out the +scissors when she heard a click. Well, when she run to the door, what do +you suppose? She found they'd locked her in. + +"Well, maybe you can imagine her feelings! She says she was never so mad +in all her life. She called through the door, but not a sound. There was +a crack big enough to put your hand through under the door, and she +tried to look through it, but it wasn't high enough to put your eye to. +Then she heard a shout and run to the window. There they all was, out on +the grass in front,--all but Bocaj, who was asleep in his cradle +down-stairs. Well, such doings! She says 'Zile, who was always full of +ideas, was just outstripping herself in ideas this time. They had a old +pair of scissors, and first they went to work for half an hour cutting +each other's hair. She says you can maybe think of her feelings in the +upper window, left in charge of 'em, with full permission to whip 'em +if necessary, and having to sit and watch 'em trim each other anyway +the notion hit 'em. She says tying a man to a tree while cannibals eat +up his family is the only thing as would express it a _tall_. After they +got done cutting hair, they went in and got a pot of jam and brought it +out and sat down in full sight and eat jam with their fingers till there +was no more jam. She says she'd stopped calling things to 'em by that +time and was just sitting quietly in the window, thanking God for every +minute as they stayed where she could see what they was doing. But when +they had finished the jam, they went in the house and was so deathly +quiet she was scared to fits. She thought maybe they was setting fire to +something. But after a while they begun to bang on the piano, and when +she was half crazy over the noise, she looked towards the door, and +there was the key poked under. She made a jump for the key, and it was +jerked back by a piece of string. And her own string at that. Then she +was called to the window by Gringer yelling, and while she was trying +to hear what he had to say--the piano jangling worse than ever--they +opened the door suddenly and bundled Bocaj into the room and then locked +the door again. + +"The baby was just woke up and hungry, and it was a pretty kettle of +fish. She says she made up her mind then and there to quit that house +and adopt Bocaj. She says she saw as there was no use trying to reform +the rest; but Bocaj was so little and helpless, and nothing in her heart +made her feel as he couldn't be raised to be practical. She went to work +and fed him crackers soaked in boiling water while she packed her trunk. +And when her cousin came home, she was sitting with her bonnet on ready +to go. Her cousin just naturally felt awful. She wanted to call it a +joke; but Mrs. Sperrit is a woman whose feelings isn't lightly took in +vain. She left, and she took Bocaj with her. She telegraphed Mr. +Sperrit, and he met her at the train. He was some disappointed because +he'd forgotten about the baby's name and thought from reading it in the +telegraph that she was bringing back a monkey. Seems Mr. Sperrit has +always wanted a monkey, and she wouldn't have one. But now she says he +can have a monkey or anything else, if he'll only stay practical. She +says she doesn't believe she could ever live with any one as wasn't +practical, after this experience." + +Susan paused, Mrs. Macy and Gran'ma Mullins rose to go to their kitchens +and get suppers for their guests. When they had gone, Susan, having Mrs. +Lathrop alone, eased a troubled conscience. + +"Oh, Mrs. Lathrop," she confided, "do you remember me saying the other +evening I'd had a letter from Jathrop?" + +Mrs. Lathrop suddenly stopped rocking. "Yes--yes, Susan," she answered +eagerly. "I--" + +"Well, I didn't have one. It was just as everybody in this community has +got their minds fixed on Jathrop's being wild about me, so I felt to +mention a letter, and I shall go on mentioning getting a letter from +him whenever the spirit moves me." + +"Why, Susan--!" exclaimed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"It doesn't hurt him a _tall_," said Susan Clegg with calm decision, +"and it saves me from being asked questions. And you know as well as I +do, Mrs. Lathrop, that I can have him if I want him." + +Mrs. Lathrop sat open-mouthed, dumb. + +"If I don't have him, it'll be because I don't want him," added Miss +Clegg with dignity. "So it's no use your saying one other word, Mrs. +Lathrop." + +And Mrs. Lathrop, thus adjured, refrained from further speech. + + + + +X + +SUSAN CLEGG DEVELOPS IMAGINATION + + +"Far be it from me, Mrs. Lathrop," said Susan Clegg, returning from an +early errand down-town and dropping in at Mrs. Macy's to find her friend +still in her own room and rocking in her old-gold stationary rocker. It +was now autumn, and to take the chill off the room an oil burner was +brightly ablaze. "Far be it from me to say anything disrespectful of +such a good Samaritan as your son Jathrop, but as we have it in the +scriptures, he certainly does move in a mysterious way his neighbors to +inform. It's mighty good of him to go to all the expense of building +over my house in a way I'd never in this wide world have had it if I +could 'a' understood those plans of that boy architect, and it may +be--providing we escape earthquake, fire, blood, and famine--that I'll +get into it once more before next summer, notwithstanding it's all of +two months behind yours, you being his mother, Mrs. Lathrop, and me only +your friend. But a early frost is sure to crack the plaster, and, seeing +as the glass blowers has gone on a strike, there's no telling when +they'll blow the panes for the windows. Just the same, kind and good as +Jathrop is, he might have had more consideration for me as would this +day have been his wife, if I'd felt to answer him with a three-letter +word instead of a two, than to put me on the pillar of scorn before a +community as has known me always as a scrupulous lover of the voracious +truth." + +"You don't--" began Mrs. Lathrop, in mild astonishment. + +"Yes, I do," continued Susan, with growing indignation. "Jathrop has +done his best to make me out a liar, and I don't know as I'll ever be +able to hold my head up again. He's struck me in the tenderest spot he +could strike me in, and not boldly neither, but in a skulking, +underhand way that makes it all the bitterer pill to swallow." + +"I can't see--" objected Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, nor me neither. But he did, and in no time everybody'll know it +from Johnny, at the station, to Mrs. Lupey in Meadville, not forgettin' +the poor demented over to the insane asylum. And it all comes of those +letters I have been getting from Jathrop during the summer." + +"But--" + +"Yes, I know and you know there was no letters a _tall_. But everybody +else, except you and me and the postmaster, believed I had a letter +regular every week. Whenever I run short of subjects at the Sewing +Society, I just fell back on my last letter from Jathrop and told them +all about what he was doing in those islands. I'd read the book he sent, +and I'd read it to good profit. There was some things as I didn't quite +understand, of course, but on them I just put my own interpretations, +and knowing Jathrop as I did, it was easy enough for me to figure out +how he'd be most likely to act in a strange, barbaric land. The book +didn't have a word to say about the costumes of the native tribes, but +I'm not so ignorant as not to know how those South Sea Islanders never +wear nothing more hamperin' than sea-shell earrings and necklaces of +sharks' teeth; and I'd read, too, that foreign visitors, on account of +the unbearable heat, was in the habit of adoptin' the native fashions in +dress. When you get started makin' things up, there's no knowing just +where you're likely as to end. It's so easy to go straight ahead and say +just whatever you please that seems in any way interesting. And so, when +Mrs. Fisher asked me one day whether I supposed there was any cannibals +there, I said there was one cannibal tribe that was most ferocious and +had appetites that there was no such thing as quenchin'. I said that in +Jathrop's last letter he had written me about how this tribe had +captured the cook off the yacht and that when they finally found his +captors and defeated them in a desperate battle lasting three days, all +that was found of the cook was two chicken croquettes." + +"For gra--!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"That's what Mrs. Fisher said. Of course, with the cook eat up--all but +what was in the two croquettes, that is,--Jathrop and his millionaire +friends was a good deal put about. There wasn't a one of 'em as knew the +first thing about cooking, and after the exercise of the three days' +battle they was most awful hungry. And then, I says, quoting from the +letter from Jathrop which never came, they had a piece of real luck, +just as millionaires is always having. They had taken one prisoner, and +by means of signs, not knowin' a word of the cannibal language, they +discovered that the prisoner was the cook of the tribe. He pointed to +the croquettes as a example of his handiwork, and Jathrop said that he +never saw anything in the cookin' line that looked more toothsome than +they did. So, of course they engaged the cannibal cook on the spot and +carried him back to the yacht with 'em. Everything went well for a few +days, but on a day when they had invited the chief of a friendly tribe +to dinner, there was something as aroused their suspicions. The +principal dish for the feast was, so far as they could make out from the +cook's sign-language, a savory rabbit stew. Now as they had never seen +or heard tell of a rabbit in the Bahamas, they was naturally curious to +learn where the cook had managed to dig it up. He either couldn't or +wouldn't tell. I says that Jathrop says you might 'a' thought that the +cook was a thirty-second degree mason and that the origin of the rabbit +was a thirty-second degree masonic secret. The millionaires gathered in +council and discussed the question, pro and con, from every obtainable +or imaginable angle. Then, just as they were about to adjourn without +having reached any conclusion whatever, they rang for the cabin boy to +fetch some liquid refreshment. But there wasn't no answer. And they +might 'a' been ringing yet as to any good it would do. They never did +see that cabin boy, and the only one to eat the savory rabbit stew was +the visiting chief." + +"I don't--" observed Mrs. Lathrop, rocking faster. + +"Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you're right about that," Susan confirmed, +loosening her shawl, for the oil-stove was rapidly lifting the room's +temperature. "I don't see, myself, why anybody should ever have known +any better, and nobody would have, if it hadn't been as Jathrop took it +into his head to talk to a newspaper man at Atlantic City on about the +same day as I had him missing the cabin boy and refusing a helping to +the rabbit stew. Mr. Kimball showed me the paper as came from New York +wrapped around a new ledger he just received by express. The reporter +had written two columns and over about the 'Klondike Bonanza King,' and +if Jathrop had set his mind to makin' me out a Ananias and a Saphira +boiled into one, he couldn't have succeeded better. He hasn't been in +the Bahamas a _tall_. The yacht started for there, but it went to Cuba +instead, and he and his friends only stayed in Cuba a week. From there +they went down to Panama and looked over the canal as far as it's gone. +They spent the summer sailin' from one summer resort to another, and I +must say I should think there was better ways of passin' the time than +that. When it comes to eatin', I'd about as leave eat the dishes of a +cannibal cook as eat things made of the salt water that people go +bathin' in, and that's what they do at Atlantic City. The minister +showed me some candy 'Liza Em'ly sent him from Atlantic City in July, +and I know what I'm talkin' about, for it was printed on the paper +around each piece. 'Salt-water Taffy.' Think of that! It's plain to be +seen that they ain't got any fresh water there, or they wouldn't use +salt. Jathrop and the other millionaires, I suppose, drink nothin' but +wine, but the poor folks must drink salt water or go thirsty. I suppose +it saves salt in seasonin', but I'd rather have my vituals unseasoned +than have 'em salted with water that folks has swum in. They certainly +ain't got no enterprise, that's sure. If they had they'd pipe +water--fresh water--from somewheres. And if there's no place near enough +to pipe it from, they'd build cisterns. But water's not the only thing +as shows their shiftlessness. Our town isn't exactly a metropolis, but +we got a few cement sidewalks. Atlantic City ain't got a one. I heard +about that long ago. And in these days of progress, too! Nothing but a +board walk on its principal street--nothing a _tall_." + +"What did--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"He said a good deal more'n his prayers, I can tell you that. He said +his object in going to the Bahamas, to which he never went, after all, +was to look into the possibility of securin' a large tract of land there +for the cultivation and growth of sisal. Now what under the sun would +you suppose sisal was? I saw in the book that sisal was being grown in +increasing quantities in the islands, and I just naturally supposed it +was some sort of animal. It might of been buffalo, or it might of been +guinea pigs, but when I spoke at the Sewing Society of how Jathrop had +mentioned the great number of sisal, and Mrs. Allen says: 'What is +sisal?' I just right then and there on the spur of the minute says: +'Why, don't you know? Sisal is a sort of small oxen striped like a zebra +and spotted like a leopard.' And would you believe it, Mrs. Lathrop, +when Mr. Kimball asked me that same question to-day, I said the very +same thing--small oxen striped like a zebra and spotted like a leopard. +'That's what Mrs. Allen told me you said, Miss Clegg,' says he, 'but +accordin' to the paper, Jathrop Lathrop don't quite agree with you.' I +don't know, Mrs. Lathrop, I d'n know, I'm sure, why Jathrop should take +pleasure in making me appear like a ignoramus, but there ain't no +question about it that that's what he did when he gave that interview to +that there reporter. 'What kind of animal is a sisal, then, Mr. +Kimball?' I asked, and you can believe me my blood was boilin' in my +veins. 'It ain't no animal a _tall_,' he says. 'It's hemp what they +make ropes out of to hang murderers with. And the seeds they feed +canaries on.' 'Well,' I says, 'that may be the reporter's sisal, but it +ain't mine, and it ain't Jathrop's. The newspapers never get nothin' +right nohow, but when it comes to reducin' cattle into rope and +birdseed, they are certainly goin' one better on the Chicago pork +packers.' In all my life I have never been a respecter of the untruth, +but I know enough on the subject to tell a good lie when necessity calls +upon me and to stick to it as long as it has an eyelid to hang by. But I +will say this for your son Jathrop, Mrs. Lathrop, and that is that +before he got done with that reporter, he didn't leave so much as a +eyelash, let alone a lid. It wasn't only that he'd never been to those +islands a _tall_, and I'd been tellin' everybody in town as how I'd had +a letter from him there every week the whole summer through, but he must +air his acquaintance with things on the islands just as if he'd been +born and raised there. And it seems there ain't no natives within miles +of the Bahamas, and hasn't been since Columbus and his people was there, +goin' on fifteen hundred years ago. Columbus told 'em that he'd take 'em +to the land where all their dead relatives and friends had gone to, a +land flowin' with milk and honey, and he kept his word. Seems he shipped +every last mother's son and daughter of 'em back to Spain with him, and +left the islands bare for the next comers. It may have appeared a rather +roundabout way for the native Bahamians to reach heaven and their +departed folks, seeing as it led through hard work in the Spanish mines, +but there ain't no question whatever that they every one got there in +the end." + +"You mean--" suggested Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I mean that unless Lathrop or the reporter made it up, or the pair of +'em together, that nobody lives there now except whites and blacks, and +there's not enough whites to make a nice shepherd's plaid out of the +combination. But savagery, except for pirates, has never had any place +there, and cannibalism is absolutely unknown. It's all very +humiliating, and it'd 'a' been much better to let people ask me and +never said nothing back a _tall_. When people is in the dark, they've +got to imagine for themselves, and as long as they don't tell what they +imagine to others, no piece in a newspaper can never make 'em blush. I +can tell you it's learnt me a lesson as I won't soon forget. I'll never +get over the way Mr. Kimball looked at me when he said as how sisal was +hemp; and me thinking all the time it was a animal when it was a herb. +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, it's a ill wind that don't chill the shorn lamb. I'm +that chilled that I feel I never shall talk again. I'll never say black +is black or white is white until I've looked at the color twice with my +glasses on. Accuracy is the best policy, I says, from this day +henceforth." + +"You might--" began Mrs. Lathrop sympathetically. + +"That's true, too. I might have known that it didn't sound true to be +getting letters every week from a man who went away to the Klondike and +never sent his mother so much as a picture postal card in all the years +he was there. But then, too, you've got to consider the kind of folks as +you're telling things to, and with all due respect to the ladies of the +Sewing Society, from Mrs. Allen to Gran'ma Mullins, they're not +over-burdened with the kind of intellect as can add two and two and get +the same answer twice in succession. There wasn't a one of 'em as +thought of that, or they'd 'a' said it straight out, without once +considering my feelings. And I'll say this much for you, Mrs. Lathrop: +you're not the best housekeeper I ever see, and you're about a match for +Mrs. Sperrit's cousin when it comes to being practical, but you have got +some brains, and I'd no more think of trying to deceive you than I'd +think of trying to deceive Judge Fitch when he'd got a big retainer to +get the truth out of me." + +Mrs. Lathrop leaned down and turned out the oil burner. + +"Was that--?" + +"No, it wasn't all. There was something else that has set me all of a +flutter. If it wasn't as you never can tell whether a newspaper is +voracious or just bearing false witness, I'd certainly feel as if +Jathrop was playing fast and loose with my affections. I can remember, +and you can remember, too, when the freedom of the press didn't mean +freedom to make a Pike's Peak out of a ant hill. But in these days +there's no telling whether, when we read of a poor soul being attacked +by a wild beast, it's a jungle tiger or just a pet yellow kitten. Folks +would rather read about the tiger than the kitten, and so the papers +give 'em what they want without any regard for the real facts a _tall_. +Elijah Doxey, who's a real editor if there ever was one, and knows all +about the paper business, says that the newspaper, like everything else, +has to keep abreast of the times or go to the wall, and that since +people in these days 'ld rather read fiction than history, it stands to +reason a paper can't stand in its own light by sticking always to cold +commonplace facts." + +"Did the--?" Mrs. Lathrop attempted mildly to question. + +"I don't know, I d'n know, I'm sure, Mrs. Lathrop. But the interview +with Jathrop wasn't all interview, by no means. It said a lot about his +party, and it mentioned each of the millionaires as was in it. Seems the +interview was given on one of those Atlantic City board walks, and it +was given--from what on earth do you think, Mrs. Lathrop? From a wheel +chair. Jathrop in a wheel chair! Think of that! And not alone, either. +'Beside him,' wrote the interviewer, 'was the beautiful, dark-eyed Cuban +señora who, rumor says, is soon to become his bride.' My lands! If it +hadn't been for Mr. Kimball's apple barrel, I certainly would have +dropped. It would 'a' been bad enough if they was both strong and well, +but to think of Jathrop being too weak to walk and going to marry a +foreigner no more robust than himself. You can't imagine the shock it +give me. For a minute I was clean speechless, and I'd 'a' been dumb yet, +I do believe, if it wasn't as I begun to figure things out in my head +and got sight of a ray of hope. Just as like as not, I says, Jathrop was +suffering from the sudden change of climate,--from the Klondike to Cuba +seems to me a pretty rigorous switch for any constitution,--and the +Cuban woman was more'n likely his trained nurse fetched from the island. +Either that or the woman was just recovering from a illness, and Jathrop +got in to ride with her out of pure kindness of heart. Then, too, I +remembered that: 'rumor says,' and cheered right up. Rumor never told +the truth yet, as far as I know, and it's not in reason to believe the +shameless thing is going to reform in these degenerate days. Jathrop may +be going to marry the señora, I don't say he isn't, and I don't say he +is. But before I believe it, I've got to have some better authority than +what rumor says. He's steered clear of wives in the Klondike, and he's +steered clear of 'em in other places, and I don't see as there's any +reason to think his steering apparatus come to grief while he was in +Cuba. 'How's Susan Clegg?' That was what he wrote in the first letter +you'd had from him in a dog's age, Mrs. Lathrop, and it showed pretty +clear to me who he was thinking of while engaged in the steering +operation." + +"You don't think--" Mrs. Lathrop began distressfully. + +"No man as was seriously sick, Mrs. Lathrop, ever talked two whole long +newspaper columns to a reporter. You can bank on that. He was well +enough to make me out the king of prevaricators, and it took some +strength and a good deal of attention to small details to do it, and as +the Cuban señora never said one word in all that time, I can't think as +she is cutting any figure eights in his affairs. Consequently, I don't +believe it'll pay either of us to do any great lot of worrying." + +"If--" Mrs. Lathrop attempted once more to interpolate. + +"That's just what I told Mr. Kimball. 'If Mrs. Lathrop could only see +this paper,' I says, 'I know she'd be delighted.' It stands to reason +as a mother must be proud of a son who, after having no more sense than +to take a kicking cow for a bad debt, goes to the Klondike and comes +back a millionaire; but it stands to reason, too, that she'd be more +proud of him to get two columns of free advertising in a New York paper +that can sell its columns to the department stores for real money. Well, +I asked him for the paper just to show you, and though he didn't feel to +part with it, just the same he did in the end, and I carried it away in +triumph." + +"You've brought--" + +"No, I haven't. I'm sorry to disappoint you, Mrs. Lathrop, more sorry +than I am to disappoint Mr. Kimball in not being able to return it, but +the truth is I lost it on the way home." + +"Lost--" + +"Every last scrap of it. And I can't say as it was altogether accidental +either. As Shakespeare says: 'Self-protection is the best part of +valor.' If that paper was ever to get before the Sewing Society, my +character would be stripped off me to the last rag. Mr. Kimball can say +what was in it, but without the paper itself, he'll have a hard time +proving anything, and my word when it comes to a dispute is as good as +his and a thousand times better." + +Mrs. Lathrop leaned forward and for a moment stopped rocking. + +"You--" she said quietly but tensely. + +"Tore it into small bits," returned Susan, rising, "and scattered them +to the winds of heaven. There's a paper trail all the way from the +square to Mrs. Macy's gate." + +Mrs. Lathrop resumed her rocking and relapsed into silence. + +Susan Clegg, laying her finger to her lips as a parting warning, went +quietly out. + + + + +XI + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE PLAYWRIGHT + + +"Well," said Miss Clegg to her dear friend in the early fall of that +same year, while they still waited under alien roofs the completion of +their own made-over houses, "the men who write the Sunday papers and say +that when you look at the world with a impartial eye in this century you +can't but have hopes of women some day developing into something, surely +would know they spoke the truth if they could see Elijah Doxey now." + +"But Eli--" expostulated Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, of course not. But 'Liza Em'ly is, and it's her I'm talking about. +She was up to see me this afternoon, and she says she'll spare no money +nowhere. The trained nurse is to stay with him right along forever if +he likes, and the two can have her automobile and ride or walk or do +anything, without thinking once what it costs. There was a doctor up +from the city again yesterday, and that makes four visits at a hundred a +visit. But 'Liza Em'ly says even if Elijah hadn't anything of his own, +she'd pay all the bills sooner'n think anything that could be done was +being left out. It's a pretty sad case, Mrs. Lathrop, and this last +doctor says he never see a sadder. He said nothing more could be done +right now, for there really is nothing in this community to remind +Elijah that he ever wrote a play, if they only could get those clippings +from the newspapers away from him. But that's just what they can't do. +He keeps looking them over, and then such a look of agony comes into his +eyes,--and Elijah was never one to bear pain as you must know, +remembering him with the colic,--and he clasps his hands and shakes his +head, and--well, Mrs. Lathrop, Elijah just wasn't strong enough to write +a play, and some one as was stronger ought to of restrained him right +in the first of it." + +"He--" said Mrs. Lathrop pityingly. + +"Yes, that's it," confirmed Susan, "and oh, it's awful to take a bright +young promising life like his and wreck it completely like that! To see +Elijah walking about with a trained nurse and those clippings at his age +is surely one of the most touching sights as this town'll ever see. +'Liza Em'ly says she offered a thousand dollars to any newspaper as +would print one good notice, 'cause the doctors say just one good notice +might turn the whole tide of his brain. But the newspapers say if they +printed one good notice of such a play, the Pure Food Commission would +have 'em up for libel within a week, and they just don't dare risk it. +This last doctor says he can't blame Elijah for going mad, 'cause he +knows a little about the stage through being in love with a actress +once, and he says he wasn't treated fair. He says play-writing is not +like any other kind of writing, and Elijah wasn't prepared for the +great difference. Seems all words on the stage mean something they don't +mean in the dictionary, and that makes it very hard for a mere ordinary +person to know what they're saying if they say anything a _tall_. And +then, too, Elijah never grasped that the main thing is to keep the +gallery laughing, even if the two-dollar people have tears running down +their cheeks. And you can't write for the stage nowadays without you +keep folks laughing the whole time. Elijah never thought about the +laughing, because his play was a tragedy like _Hamlet_, only with Hamlet +left out. For the lady is dead in the play, and her ghost is all that's +left of her. But 'Liza Em'ly told me to-day as his trouble came right in +the start, for the people who look plays over no sooner looked Elijah's +over before they took hold of it and fixed it. And they kept on fixing +it till it was _Hamlet_ with nobody but Hamlet left in. And then, so as +to manage the laughs, they dressed everybody like chickens if they +turned back-to. So that while the audience was weeping, if any one on +the stage turned 'round, they went off into shrieks of laughter. 'Liza +Em'ly says they never told Elijah about the chicken feathers, and the +opening night was the first he knew about that little game, for he was +laid up for ever so long before then. He got all used up in the first +part of the rehearsals; for it seems you can only have a theater to +rehearse in at times when even the people who sweep it don't feel to be +sweeping. And so they always rehearse from one to six in the morning. +And Elijah naturally wasn't used to that. But they'd had trouble even +before then; for right from the start there was a pretty how-d'ye-do +over the plot. Seems Elijah wanted his own plot and his own people in +his own play, and they had a awful time getting it through his head as +it's honor enough to have your own play, and it's only unreasonable to +stick out for your own plot and your own people too. 'Liza Em'ly says +they had a awful time with him over it all, and there was a time when he +felt so bad over giving up his plot and his people that any one ought +to have seen right there as he'd never be strong enough to stand all the +rest of what was surely coming. 'Liza Em'ly didn't tell me the whole of +the rest what come, but Mr. Kimball told me that what was one great +strain on Elijah, right through to the hour he begun to scream, was that +the leading lady fell in love with him and used to have him up at all +hours to fix up her part, and then kiss him. And Elijah didn't want to +fix up her part, and he hated to be kissed. But they told him the part +must be fixed up to suit her, and that the kisses didn't matter, because +they was only little things after all. + +"He was wading along through the mire as best he could, when all of a +sudden it come out as she had one husband as she'd completely overlooked +and never divorced. He turned up most unexpectedly and come at Elijah +about the kisses. Then they told Elijah he couldn't do a better thing by +his play than to let the man shoot him two or three times in places as +would let him be carried pale and white to a box for the opening night; +and then, between the last two acts, marry the lady and let it be in all +the morning papers. You can maybe think, Mrs. Lathrop, how such a idea +would come to the man as is to be shot. But, oh, my, they didn't make +nothing of Elijah's feelings in the matter. Nothing a _tall_. They just +set right to work and called a meeting of the play manager and the stage +manager and the leading lady's manager and Elijah's manager, and the man +who really does the managing. They all got together, and they drew up a +diagram as to where Elijah was to be hit, and a contract for him and the +leading lady to sign as they wouldn't marry anybody else in the +meantime. And if it hadn't been for 'Liza Em'ly, the deal, as they +called it, would have gone straight through. For Elijah was so dead beat +by this time that about all he was fit for was to sit on a electric +battery with a ice bag on his head, and look up words in a stage +dictionary and then cross 'em out of his play." + +"Oh, I--" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"That's just what 'Liza Em'ly said she said," rejoined Susan Clegg. "I +tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, 'Liza Em'ly is no fool since her book's gone +into the thirty-seventh edition, and that's a fact. She told me to-day +as when she realized the man she loved--for 'Liza Em'ly really loves +Elijah; any one can see that just by looking at the trained nurse she's +got him--was being murdered alive, she went straight up and took a hand +in the matter herself. I guess she had a pretty hard time, for the +leading lady wouldn't hear to changing any of what they call the +routing, and said if Elijah wasn't shot and married according to the +signed agreement, she wouldn't play. And when a leading lady won't play, +then is when you find out what Shakespeare really did write for, +according to 'Liza Em'ly. For a little they was all running this way and +that way, just beside themselves, with the leading lady in the +Adirondacks and two detectives watching her husband. And the man as was +painting the scenery took a overdose of chloral and went off with all +his ideas in his head, and that unexpected trouble brought 'em all +together again. The husband came down off his high horse and said he'd +take five per cent, of the net--Don't ask me what that means, for Mr. +Dill don't know either--and the littlest chorus girl and go to Europe. +And he said, too, as he'd sign a paper first releasing Elijah from all +claim on account of his wife. So they all signed, and he sailed. He was +clear out to sea before they discovered as he had another wife as he'd +never divorced, so the leading lady could of married Elijah, after all. +Well, that was a pretty mess, with a husband as had no claim on nobody +gone off to Europe with five percent of the net. The stage manager and +Elijah's manager took the _Mauretania_ and started right after him, for +when it comes to five per cent. on any kind of stage thing, Mr. Kimball +says, any monkeying counts up so quick that even hiring a yacht is +nothing if you want to catch that five per cent. in time. So they was +off, one in the captain's room and the other in the bridal suite, while +'Liza Em'ly was down in Savannah getting local color to patch up the +scenery, leaving Elijah totally unprotected on his battery with his +ideas. + +"But Elijah wasn't to be left in peace even now. Seems they was having a +investigation into the poor quality of the electricity in the city, and +a newspaper opened a referendum and made 'em double the power. The +company was so mad, they didn't give no warning to a soul, but just slid +up the needle from 100 to 200 right then and there; and one of the +results was they blew Elijah nearly through the ceiling. Nothing in the +world but the ice bag saved him from having his skull caved in, and the +specialist thinks he's got a concussion in his sinus right now. Poor +Elijah!" + +"But--?" Mrs. Lathrop queried. + +"They took him to the hospital, and from then on to the opening night +he had nothing to do with his own play. The leading lady married the +stage manager till she got the stage to suit her, and then she married +the man who really does the managing until she got everything else to +suit her. Next, without letting any of the others know, she married +Elijah's manager secretly, so that when poor Elijah in the hospital +thought he was looking at his manager, he was really nursing a viper in +his bosom. When 'Liza Em'ly came back with her local color, they told +her they didn't want it because they was going to have the camping-out +scene in the parlor, and play the people all liked a joke. When she went +to a lawyer to protest, the lawyer looked through all Elijah's contracts +and said Elijah had never stipulated as the camping-out scene should be +in the woods. So 'Liza Em'ly paid him fifty dollars and come away a good +deal wiser than she went. + +"Then come the opening night, and Mr. Kimball says he shall never forget +that opening night as long as he lives. You know he bought himself one +of those hats as when you sit on 'em just gets a better shape, and then +he went up to see his own nephew's own play. Seems he sat on his hat in +Elijah's own box, but he says Elijah was looking very bad even before +the curtain went up. Seems Elijah didn't expect much, but he did have +just a little hope that here and there in spots he'd see some of his own +play. But the hope was very faint. After the curtain went up, it kept +getting fainter. Of course Elijah meant it for a tragedy and called it +_Millicent_; and seeing the title changed to _Milly Tilly_ was a hard +blow to him right in the beginning. Seems the woman poisoned herself +because she was unhappy, and after she's dead, she remembers there was +some poison left in the bottle, and so she wants to warn the family. It +was a very nice plot, Polly White thinks, and Elijah was wild over it +'cause there's never been a plot used like it. But of course his idea +was as it should be took seriously. Do you wonder then, Mrs. Lathrop, +that the first time in the play when one of the play actors turned +round he nearly died? Mr. Kimball says he nearly died himself. He says +he never saw anything so funny as those chicken backs in all his life. +He says people was just laying any way and every way in their seats, +wailing to stop, so they could stop too. He says he was laughing fit to +kill himself when all of a sudden he looked up to see Elijah, and he +says nothing ever give him such a chill as Elijah's then-and-there +expression. Seems Elijah was just staring at the leading lady as was +flapping her wings and playing crow, while the gallery was pounding and +yelling like mad. And then Elijah suddenly shot out of the box and round +behind the scenes and vanished completely." + +Mrs. Lathrop gasped and lifted her hands, but no word issued from +between her lips. + +"Well, of course we know now what happened, but nobody did then. Nobody +was expecting him on the stage, before the scenes or behind 'em, and Mr. +Kimball didn't know where he was gone. So it was the end of the piece +before he was really missed. Then they begun to hunt, and no Elijah high +or low nowhere. You know how the papers was full of it, and there would +have been more about it, only Mr. Kimball and 'Liza Em'ly supposed it +was just advertising. Even 'Liza Em'ly thought it was the wrong kind of +advertising and that the leading lady had seen Elijah's face and thought +it was better to kidnap him until the play got settled down her way. +Seems if you can keep a play going any kind of a way for a little while, +you can't never change it afterwards, no matter what you've put in it. +It's all most remarkable business, a play is. But anyway, wherever he +was, they all moved on to the next town anyhow. 'Liza Em'ly and Mr. +Kimball went right with them to protect Elijah's interest, as it was +plain to be seen from where Elijah's manager was sleeping, where his +interest was now. And as soon as they begun to unload the scenery, the +afternoon of that day, whatever do you suppose? There was Elijah, just +where he'd fell when he tripped over the first scene. They'd carted him +off in the triangle that unfolds into a grand piano, right along to the +baggage-car, where they'd piled the whole of his play on top of him, +ending up even with the chicken feathers." + +"Great heav--!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"So he said," interrupted Miss Clegg. "But there was no help for it. +Seems while you're playing Act III. of a play, Act II. is getting packed +up, and Act I. is already in the train. So Elijah was all packed and +pretty flat before they even missed him, and most crazy before he was +found. Well, and so to try and soothe him they took him to the theater +that night again, and the leading lady, when she looked at him and saw +how awful weak he looked, sent him in a new idea she'd got, which was to +let her have a poster done of him packed up in the scenery. Then every +night he could sit in a box and at a certain sign give a yell and shoot +out. Then she'd make a speech about his having been in the scenery car +all the night before, and being naturally kind of excited. She said it +would make the play draw like mad. Well, Elijah wouldn't consent to that +a _tall_. And then again they worked with him and talked to him and +called him a fool till he really begun to get awfully scared. They had +in all the managers together, and they wouldn't let him consult any one. +Seems they just all sat looking at his forehead just over his nose where +you hypnotize people, and he kept getting more and more scared. Seems he +told his nurse, during what they call a lucid interval, that you can +talk all you please about will power--and it may be true of people in +general--but no rule ever made on earth can possibly apply to any one +who has just written a play. There's something about writing a play as +takes all the marrow out of your bones and the blood out of your body. +And he says he wasn't no more responsible when he signed that contract +to go mad in a box every evening and at least one matinée every week +than a grasshopper. He says his one and only thought by that time was +to get away from 'em and make a break to where he'd never hear about his +play again. But after he'd signed, they never let him out of sight. They +locked him up in a dressing-room with the leading lady's pet mouse until +after the performance, and then they took him and introduced him to two +very big managers as was engaged to do nothing except manage him nights +in the box. + +"Well, you know the rest, Mrs. Lathrop. He really did go mad, then, and +we've got him here now helpless, getting rich almost as fast as 'Liza +Em'ly, and crazy as a loon. I declare, it's one of the saddest cases I +ever see. I don't know whatever can be done. They say as fast as he gets +sane, the play'll surely drive him crazy again, so I don't see what +'Liza Em'ly will do. She set with me the whole afternoon and talked very +nicely about it all. To see her here, you'd never think she could act +the way Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Fisher tell about. I can see she's got a +little airy, and she says she misses her maid and her secretary more +than she ever tells the minister's family; but on the whole I like her +very much, and her devotion to Elijah is most beautiful. She says he's +the one love of her life, and she shall marry him if ever he gets sense +enough to know what he's doing. If he doesn't, she says she shall take a +yacht and sail with him and write books until he dies. She says they can +land once in a while to get their provisions and their royalties. But +she says the only possible salvation for Elijah, as things are now, will +be to stay where he never sees a car to remind him of scenery, or a +house to remind him of a stage, for years and years to come. I asked her +what she _really_ thought of his play, and she said she thought the +leading lady was just right and very clever, only Elijah was too +sensitive a nature to understand little artistic touches like the +chicken feathers. She says folks are too tired nowadays to be bothered +to laugh. They want to be made to laugh without even thinking. She says +Elijah is a earnest nature as likes to work his laughs out very +carefully and conscientious; but the leading lady understands getting +the same effect, only a million times quicker, with chicken feathers and +divorces. 'Liza Em'ly says the leading lady is very fair according to +her own idea of fairness. She didn't have no money to put in the play, +so she agreed to put in four divorces and one scandal as her part of the +stock. Now the play's only been on a month, and she's paid up everything +except one divorce and the scandal; and she's done so well they're +trying to work up some scheme to let her pay both those off at the same +time. The play is going fine. They print columns about Elijah and his +madness, and the whole company is learning to crow together at the end +of the second act. Every night they take out a little of what Elijah +wrote, and the main manager says that there'll soon be nothing of Elijah +left in except the ghost, and the ghost of the bottle, and the agreement +to pay Elijah his royalties. And according to the main manager's views, +that's being pretty fair and square with Elijah." + +"Do you--?" queried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, I don't know," answered Miss Clegg, "I really d'n know what to +say. I'm kind of dumb did over both 'Liza Em'ly and Elijah, for you know +as well as I do, Mrs. Lathrop, that nobody ever looked for those kind of +things from them." + +"Shall--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, if it ever comes where I can," responded Miss Clegg, "I shall like +to see it very much." + +"Did--?" pressed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Oh, yes, I asked her," Susan admitted, "I asked her fair and square. I +says: ''Liza Em'ly, there's no use denying as you've used real people in +this community in your book, and now I want to know who is Deacon +Tooker?' She said Deacon Tooker was just the book itself. She seemed +more amused than there was any particular sense in; but I thought if +anything could give her a good laugh, it wasn't me would begrudge her. +There's this to be said for our young folks when they do get rich, Mrs. +Lathrop, and that is that they're nice about it, and it makes every one +feel kindly towards 'em. Every one feels kindly towards Jathrop, and +every one feels kindly towards 'Liza Em'ly, and as for poor, dear +Elijah--Well!" + +The tone was expressive enough. Mrs. Lathrop shook her head sadly. Then +both were silent. + + + + +XII + +SUSAN CLEGG'S DISAPPEARANCE + + +The "building-over" of Susan Clegg and her friend, Mrs. Lathrop, was +completed during the second week in December, and in less than +twenty-four hours they were once more established in their own +dwellings, surrounded by their own goods and chattels. For only the +briefest space, however, did Miss Clegg remain where she was put. Then +she hurried through the passageway afforded by the connecting pergola +and burst excitedly into her neighbor's brand new kitchen in the very +center of which sat Mrs. Lathrop in her old-gold-plush stationary +rocker, calmly surveying her domiciliary spick-and-spanness. On her lap +lay a just-opened letter; but for once the scrupulously observing Miss +Clegg failed to observe. She was too full of fresh trials. + +"I d'n know whatever sins I committed in this world, Mrs. Lathrop," she +began, dropping into the nearest chair and facing her friend in an +upright, a little bent forward attitude that was clearly pugnacious, +"that I should have these things visited upon me. The Lord knows, just +the same as you do, as I've always been a good and pure woman, loving my +neighbors like myself and doing all my Christian duties as I was give to +see 'em. When I was tore up from my home by the roots and cast wilted +and faded upon Gran'ma Mullins, where the infant memories of Hiram +certainly wasn't calculated to do no reviving, I made the best of it. I +made the best of Lucy and a dog with a cold nose, too; and I bore up +with courage and no complaint under Mrs. Allen and her Persian religion. +And I did it all to please you, Mrs. Lathrop, and your fool of a son, +Jathrop, whose money, it's my opinion, has acted on him in a most +injurious way. He never had much sense, as you yourself know, but now he +ain't got no sense a _tall_." + +"I don't--" Mrs. Lathrop started gently to protest. + +"Well, I do," rejoined Susan Clegg spiritedly; "and if you don't, you +ought to. Anyhow, I mean to tell you, if it's the last act of my life. +Anybody as has any sense a _tall_ must have seen that building over was +just a mite removed from building new; and what's new never did go with +what's old, and it never will. If we was to be built over, we ought to +have been all built over or let alone. Jathrop's built the houses over, +but he ain't built over the furnishings, and the built-over houses and +the not-built-over furniture and carpets and window shades and pots and +kettles and pans and china and linen and everything else don't agree and +just naturally can't and never can. They're fighting now like sixty, and +they'll go on fighting the longer they're kept together. My house was +restful and peaceful before, but now it's like a circus with all the +wild animals let loose. And I can tell you this, Mrs. Lathrop; my things +is getting the worst of it. Why, before they went to storage at Mr. +Shores', they was in the best repair you ever see, and now it would make +your heart ache to look at 'em. They've aged a century at least during +the summer. They're wrinkled and halt and lame and blind, and the new +paper on the walls and the new polish on the floors and the new paint on +the woodwork is making 'em look sicker and sicker every minute. If +there's a society for the prevention of cruelty to furniture and other +household goods, it ought to put Jathrop Lathrop in prison. I feel so +sorry for those poor tables and chairs and bedsteads and all the rest of +'em as I could cry my eyes out this very minute. There's one walnut, +haircloth sofa as Father laid on before he was took to his bed as is +pitiful to behold. It looks sicker than Father did even in his last +hours, and I wouldn't be surprised any minute to see it just turn over +all of itself and give up the ghost. And everything has on such a +reproachful look it's more than human nature can bear to face it. If I'd +ever thought as being built over would of come to this, I'd of gone on +my knees and worked 'em to the bare bones before I'd of put up with it." + +Mrs. Lathrop continued to rock in silence. + +"Still, there's no cloud, however black, as hasn't got some silk in its +lining, and the silk in this is the clock as Father gave Mother, which +was supposed to be marble and wasn't. Much as I hated that clock, I +couldn't have borne to see its agonies when set on by the new fireplace +below, and the pink and gold wall paper behind, and the roses and cupids +in the cornish above. It must just of shriveled in shame instead of +going out in glorious flight, as it did when I set it flying at the end +of the bed-slat. Lord knows, though, Mrs. Lathrop, that's a small thing +to be thankful for; and it's the only thing. I haven't begun yet to tell +you all. And I don't intend to. There's a limit to my temper, and if I +once got started, there's no saying where I'd end. But there's one thing +more as I can't hold in, and it's the thing as was marked on the plans: +'But. Pan.' I never did understand why I should be give a separate room +to keep butter pans in, seeing as I ain't got no cow, let alone no +dairy. And even if I had, why I should keep my butter pans or my milk +pans either in a little alley-way between the kitchen and the +dining-room, just where the heat and smells could get at 'em from one +side and the flies from both, not to mention the added footsteps put on +me journeying from the stove to the dinner table. You can see for +yourself, Mrs. Lathrop, there's no sense in it, whatever. But I'd never +say a word about it, if that was all. But it ain't all. It's the +littlest part. For Jathrop's cruelty hasn't stopped with torturing the +furniture. It's clear he couldn't be satisfied till he fixed up a trap +as sooner or later would hit me square in the face and break my nose. At +both ends of his 'But. Pan.' he's had hung doors as swing, and springs +on 'em to make 'em swing hard and deadly. What either one of those +swinging doors might do to my features, let alone to the pudding or stew +I might be carrying, it isn't in mortal tongue to express. If I could +find one thing as was right in the whole house, I'd be fair and square +enough to overlook the others; but there ain't to my mind a single +solitary betterment. There's glass knobs on all the doors as will show +every finger mark, and will keep me busy wiping from dawn to dark. The +old brown knobs never showed nothing and didn't never have to be thought +of, let alone polished. It's always been my idea as a cupboard was a +place to shut things up in out of sight, and here if he hasn't gone and +put glass doors on the one in the corner of the dining room, so as every +one can see just what's meant to be hid. It's clear to be seen he's +crazy on the subject of glass, which I ain't and never have been. And I +don't like the way he's stinted things as is necessary and put all the +money in things as had better been left out. Necessities before +everything is my motto. What use, I'd like to know, is that cupid and +rose cornish? But he puts that there just to catch dust and leaves out +the whole of one parlor wall. If you'll believe me, Mrs. Lathrop, +there's not a hair or hide of a wall between my entry hall and my +parlor. Nothing but a pair of white posts as most people use on their +piazzas. How I'm ever going to keep that parlor dark I don't see; for +he's got glass over the front door and on both sides of it, and no +shutters to keep the sun out. He's built in both the kitchen stove and +the ice box, and for the life of me, I can't find no reasonable way of +taking the ashes out of the one or the water out of the other. The +builder says the ashes dump into a place in the cellar and the water +from the ice drains down a pipe underneath the house. But I don't like +neither plan. The drip from a ice box is a very cheering sound, I think, +and with hot ashes going down cellar where you can't see 'em, I'll be in +deadly fear of the house going up in smoke while I'm dreaming in my bed. +The long and the short of it is, Mrs. Lathrop, I feel as I have been +assaulted and robbed. Jathrop's took away my home and left me a house as +isn't a home to me and never can be. And as far as I can see, he's done +the same to you, which is ten thousand times worse, you being his +mother." + +"I--" began Mrs. Lathrop, taking up the letter from her lap so that at +last it was forced upon Susan's observance. + +"From him, I suppose," Miss Clegg instantly concluded, reaching for it. +"If he's got anything to say in his defence, I'm sure I'd delight to +read it. But no matter what he says, he can't undo to me what he's done +to me. I'll never feel the same towards Jathrop, your son or not your +son, Mrs. Lathrop, as long as I live." + +Mrs. Lathrop passed the letter to Miss Clegg. Like all of Jathrop's +letters, it was brief and to the point. He announced that he would spend +Christmas with his mother in her rebuilt home and would bring with him a +friend as his guest. Susan read it over twice, turning the page each +time, evidently in hope of finding an enlightening postscript. + +"Well, of all things!" she exclaimed, as she passed the letter back to +her friend. "Coming to see his work of destruction and going to bring +_her_ with him!" + +"He don't--" Mrs. Lathrop endeavored to explain. + +"He don't, because he don't dare; but there's no question what he means. +He's bringing the señora. And he wouldn't bring her if it wasn't that +he's going to marry her. Even you must see that. And if there was ever a +insult multiplied by perjury, Jathrop's done it in that action. It's a +good thing he didn't ask: 'How's Susan Clegg?' this time, as he did the +time he was coming back from the Klondike. For I don't believe I could +ever have stood that. All I can say, Mrs. Lathrop, is as I'm sorry for +you from the soles of my feet up. You'll never in the world be able to +get up a Christmas dinner as will please any señora, you can take my +word on that. And not to please her will be a bad beginning with a +señora as is to be your future daughter-in-law. Señoras don't care +shucks for turkey and mince pie. They're not used to 'em and likely to +get indigestion from 'em, and think what it would mean to Jathrop, let +alone to her, if she should be carried off by a acute attack right here +in your new, built-over house, at the dinner table. He'd blame it on +you, and like as not she'd haunt you the rest of your living days. No, +sir. You've got to give her Spanish omelets with lots of red peppers in +'em, and everything else Creole style, which means all he't up with +tabasco sauce fit to burn out your insides. It's eating like that as +makes those Spaniards and Cubans so dark colored you can't tell 'em from +mulattoes. The peppers and the tabasco sauce bakes 'em brown on the +outside, after leaving 'em all scorched and parched within." + +For once, however, Susan Clegg was wrong in her deduction. Jathrop +arrived in a red automobile on the day before Christmas, with a +chauffeur in bear-skins driving, and a guest in sealskin beside him. But +the guest was not the señora. It was one of Jathrop's millionaire +friends who, Jathrop said, could buy and sell him twenty times over. He +was a small man with a bald head and a red beard and old enough to be +Jathrop's father. + +Miss Clegg viewed the arrival from her bedroom window and was so glad it +wasn't the señora that she at once set about baking extra doughnuts and +mince pie to contribute to the festivities of the morrow. This occupied +her until supper time. Then she made a hurried meal, washed her one +plate and cup and saucer, and loaded down with her thank offering, +flitted through the pergola and in at Mrs. Lathrop's kitchen door. The +kitchen was empty, but voices penetrating from the dining room told her +that her friend and her visitors were still at table. Being a trifle +nervous and unable to sit quietly, she began at once to put the +disordered kitchen into some degree of order, purely for the sake of +occupation. + +She had just finished washing and scouring the pots and pans and was +flushing the waste-pipe of Mrs. Lathrop's new porcelain sink with +lye-water so strong that her eyes ran tears from the fumes, when the +voices growing more and more audible told her that Jathrop was leading +his mother and his guest toward the kitchen. She just had time hurriedly +to dry her hands on the roller towel when they appeared. + +"Well, well," exclaimed Jathrop, in apparent surprise, "if here ain't +our old friend, Susan Clegg!" + +There is no question that Miss Clegg was slightly flustered at thus +being taken unawares, but she recovered herself promptly, and shook +hands cordially with Jathrop and not less cordially with the little +millionaire, whom he introduced as Mr. Kettlewell. And Mr. Kettlewell +was cordiality itself. Everybody sat down, right there in the kitchen +and talked for a full hour, and in the course of the talk, Jathrop told +Susan that he had arranged with a department store in New York to let +her have whatever she needed for her built-over house and charge the +same to his account. She could select the things from the firm's +catalogue, or go to the city at his expense and pick out the actual +articles. It was his Christmas present to his mother's and his own +oldest friend. In conclusion, Jathrop joined with his mother in an +invitation to Susan to take Christmas dinner with them; and Mr. +Kettlewell smilingly begged her, for his sake, not to refuse. Altogether +Susan had the pleasantest evening she had experienced in years, and the +next morning, while Jathrop and Mr. Kettlewell were off in the car after +evergreens with which to decorate the two houses, she ran over with the +express purpose of telling Mrs. Lathrop so. + +"Jathrop mayn't have much judgment when it comes to selecting +architects," she began, "nor again when it comes to selecting servants, +as was proved by his bringing that Hop Loo all the way from the +Klondike. Nor again, neither, when it comes to wives, if it's a real +fact that he's going to marry a brown-baked señora; but there's no +getting away from the fact that he's a king in choosing his men friends. +I've seen men in my life of all sorts and descriptions, from the +minister to the blacksmith, but I ain't never see before such a +handsome, high-minded, superior gentleman as Jathrop's friend, Mr. +Kettlewell. I never thought much of bald-headed men before, but his head +is so white and shiny, it's a pleasure to look at it. And I always just +hated a red beard; but Mr. Kettlewell's beard is of a different red. +It's a nice, warm, comforting red as makes you feel as cosy as the glow +of a red-hot stove when the thermometer's down around zero. I can't say +either, Mrs. Lathrop, as I wasn't more or less prejudiced against men as +never rightly grew up, but stopped in the women's sizes. But there's a +something about Mr. Kettlewell's proportions as gives you the idea he's +really taller than he seems. And there's only one thing to compare his +voice to. It's milk and honey. My lands, what a sweet, clear-rolling, +liquid voice that Mr. Kettlewell has!" + +"Ja--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, I heard him. But I don't put that against Mr. Kettlewell, not a +_tall_. I'm sure he made every penny of it honestly, and if he's retired +from business now, it don't mean he's quit work. It's no easy job +cutting coupons off all the bonds he must have, and collecting rents is +a occupation I don't envy nobody. It's the penalty that rich men have to +pay for their success. They work hard to get the principal, and then +they're made to work twice as hard to get the interest. There's no such +thing as rest for the rich any more'n there is for the poor. I used to +think before Father died as I'd like to roll in wealth, but it ain't no +easy rolling, I can tell you that, Mrs. Lathrop, especially when you've +got a tenant like Mrs. Macy, who won't buy so much as a gas-tip or do so +much as drive a nail without charging it up to the owner." + +Miss Clegg's participation in the Christmas dinner at her neighbors' was +twofold. She took part in its preparation as well as in its discussion. +It was her soup which began it, it was her "stuffing" which added zest +to the roast turkey, it was her cranberry sauce which sweetened +contrastingly the high seasoning, and it was her mince pie which brought +the repast to a fitting and enjoyable close. Seated opposite to Mr. +Kettlewell, where she could revel in a full view of his shining pate and +his warmly comforting whiskers, her enjoyment was ocular as well as +gustatory; and under the caressing sweetness of his voice it was +likewise auricular. For the occasion Jathrop had provided a fine vintage +champagne, and though Miss Clegg, whose total-abstinence principles +forbade her to even taste, refrained from so much as touching her lips +to the edge of her glass, she unquestionably warmed in the stimulating +atmosphere of the sparkling, bubbling, golden juice of the grape. To her +it was indeed the red-letter Christmas of her life, and every incident, +of the dinner especially, was a matter for reflection and rumination in +the succeeding hours. + +In this vale of tears, however, there is apparently no great joy without +its compensating sorrow; and in Susan Clegg's case the one followed +swiftly on the heels of the other. In the pale gray of the dawn of the +following day, Susan Clegg dashed wildly out of her kitchen door and +flitted with lifted skirts across the brief intervening space that led +to Mrs. Lathrop's back door. As pallid as the morning itself, her scant +hair streaming, her eyes wide with mixed terror and indignation, she +burst into her neighbor's kitchen, where to her great relief she found +her old friend already up and occupied. + +One glimpse of Susan was enough for Mrs. Lathrop. Up went her hands and +down went she on to the nearest chair with an inarticulate gasp of +horrified yet questioning astonishment, while Miss Clegg flopped limply +into another at the end of the kitchen table. + +There she must have sat for a full minute before she could get breath to +utter a word, which, being contrary to all her habits, was in itself +terrifying to her friend. Eventually, however, she forced herself to +assume an upright position and simultaneously attained a somewhat +feeble attempt at speech. + +"Well, of all things in this world to happen to me!" Then she paused for +a fresh breath, which being utterly without precedent, added mightily to +Mrs. Lathrop's alarm. "And even now at this minute I don't really know +whether I'm more dead than alive, or more alive than dead." + +Mrs. Lathrop, believing that the situation being extraordinary, some +extraordinary effort on her part was demanded, stirred herself to a +prolonged speech. + +"Don't tell me I'm looking--" + +"No, I'm not a ghost, if that's what you mean. You are looking at Susan +Clegg in the flesh--all the flesh that ain't been scared clean off her. +But it's the greatest miracle as ever happened in this community that +it's my body and not my spirit as is here to tell the tale. My house was +broken into by a burglar, Mrs. Lathrop, and I was tied up and gagged in +one of my own chairs." + +Mrs. Lathrop just gasped. Susan drew herself up a little straighter, +gaining courage from the sound of her own voice, and striking something +like her old oral gait. + +"I was gagged for five hours, Mrs. Lathrop, and knowing me as you do for +all these years and years, maybe you can feel what being gagged for five +hours and not able to say even 'boo' meant to a active person like me. +Every one of those hours was like a eternity in a Spanish inferno of +torture. And everything I possess in this world, from my bonnet and +striped silk dress to Father's deeds at the mercy of that gagger. And +all I've got to say is this: If I hadn't of been built over, it never in +the wide creation would have happened. And if your son Jathrop thinks he +can ever make up to me for being gagged by inviting me to a Christmas +dinner, most of which I cooked with my own hands, and offering to give +me strange pieces of furniture to take the place of pieces as is old +friends and dearer than the apples of my two eyes, he'd better do some +more thinking. There never was nothing about the house I was born in and +my mother and father died in to make a burglar look at it twice. No +burglar as had any respect for himself or his calling, Mrs. Lathrop, +would have looked at it once or knowed as it was there. But built over +it's as different as diamon's is from pebbles. It looks money from the +tips of its lightning rods to its cellar windows and is as inviting to +robbers as if it had a sign on the gatepost, reading: 'Walk in!' So, +however you look at it, there's nobody responsible for my gagging and +for whatever is missing but one man, and that man is Jathrop Lathrop. +It's easy to be seen as he's no more fit to have money than a crow as +steals gold trinkets that cost fortunes and goes and hides 'em in hollow +trees. He was born poor, and the Lord meant him to stay poor, no matter +what Mrs. Allen and her Persian religion has to say about things as +happens being meant to happen. The Lord hadn't nothing to do with +Jathrop going to the Klondike and getting rich, you can be certain +about that. If he hadn't been fool enough to take a kicking cow for a +perfectly good debt and then let it loose to ride over a peaceful and +long-suffering community, he'd 'a' lived and died a pauper in this here +very town. So's far as I can see it was the devil and not the Lord as +guided Jathrop from the first, and everything as has happened since +shows the devil is still guiding him. Everything he turns his mind to +goes by contraries. I'm not saying anything against the goodness of +Jathrop's intentions, mind you, Mrs. Lathrop, but no matter how good +they are, evil and misery certainly seems sure to follow." + +The tirade stirred Mrs. Lathrop to her feet, but she was not resentful. +She knew that Susan Clegg's bitterness was confined to her tongue, and +that even with that she could salve as well as sting. + +"Can't I--?" she suggested. + +"Indeed you can," answered Miss Clegg. "I never felt as I needed a cup +of tea more, and if the doughnuts I brought you ain't all eat up, I'd +relish four or five of 'em right now." + +"You haven't--" began Mrs. Lathrop, taking down the teapot. + +"No; but I'm coming to it. I begun with the cause, and the effect'll +come trailing after like the tails of Mary's little lambs. Only the +tails in this case was bigger than the sheep. It may have been hearing +the noise Jathrop makes when he eats, or it may have been your turkey +gravy or your biscuits, Mrs. Lathrop, or all of 'em put together. Not +knowing which, I'm not foolish enough to blame one more'n the other. But +it's a fact as is undeniable that I never slept poorer than last night. +I was in bed by nine, but I never closed my eyes till eleven, and I +certainly heard the clock strike midnight. I counted goats jumping over +a stile, and I counted 'em backward as well as forward, but I heard one +struck, and I heard two. And then I heard something as set my hair up on +end and the gooseflesh sprouting all over me. It sounded like footsteps +in the 'But. Pan.,' and they was too heavy for the cat's, I could tell +that at once, though at two in the morning it's surprising how loud a +cat's footsteps can sound, especially when it's reached the pouncing +stage, and the rat ain't got no hole to run to. I'd forgot to put the +turkey leg in the ice-box as I'd carried home with me, and all I could +think of was that if it was the cat, there'd be nothing left on that +bone by morning, unless I stopped things right then and immediately. +You'd never believe how cold a house can be at two o'clock in the +morning of the day after Christmas unless you'd got up in it as I did; +and now to look back at it, I see how lucky it was as it was as cold as +it was, for if it hadn't of been, I'd a gone down just as I was, and I +was in no trim to meet a man burglar, I can tell you _that_. So I just +slipped into this flannel wrapper and a old pair of slippers, which I've +got on now under these arctics, and I picked up the candle as I'd lit, +and down-stairs I went. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, I hope you may never in your +born days in this world or the other have such a shock as met me there +face to face in my own new, built-over kitchen. If there wasn't the +biggest giant of a man I ever see coming out of the shadows between the +cookstove and the cellar door. And he with his head all wrapped around +in one of my best plaid roller towels, so that nothing of him was to be +seen but two fierce, staring, bloodshot eyes as gleamed like a wild +beast's. Oh, my soul and body, Mrs. Lathrop, that minute! How I ever +kept my senses I don't pretend to say, more especially as he was on me +with one jump. There was no such thing as holding on to the candle, you +can see that. It dropped, and I never knew I dropped it. For, of course, +I shut my eyes, and when your eyes is shut, there's no knowing whether +there's a lighted candle about or whether there isn't." + +In her agitation over the recital, Mrs. Lathrop, who was placing cups +and saucers on the table, let one of the cups slide crashing to the +floor. "Oh, Su--!" she exclaimed. + +"You may well say: 'Oh, Susan!'" Miss Clegg continued. "There is times +when 'Oh, Susan' don't half express the state of affairs, and this was +one of 'em, Mrs. Lathrop. It wasn't in nature for me not to scream, so I +screamed, and it was that scream that did the business. It showed the +burglar I wasn't deaf and dumb, and people as isn't deaf and dumb is +looked on by burglars as their natural enemies. Maybe some people can +scream without opening their mouths, but I never was one of that kind, +and the kind as open their mouths when they scream is the kind that all +burglars prefer. It saves 'em the trouble of forcing apart their jaws. I +never shut my mouth after opening it; for the burglar just shoved +something in it as quick as scat, and then he tied a bandage around back +of my head so I couldn't spit it out. Then he picked me up and plumped +me down hard in a chair and tied me fast to it with my own clothesline. +And all the time he never no more opened his lips to speak than if he +couldn't. It's my opinion he must have had a cold and lost his voice. +Either that, or his voice was such a unpleasant voice he was ashamed to +let anybody hear it. For it ain't in common sense as a man, even if he +is a burglar, could keep as still as he did, if he had a speaking voice +that's in any way fit for use. I know in the time he took there was a +lot of things I felt to say to him, and would if I could, and common +sense'll tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, that he must have felt to say a lot of +things to me. But he didn't make so much as a peep behind his roller +towel." + +"Did--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, pouring the tea. + +"I can't say as he did or he didn't. I haven't missed nothing yet, but +then I haven't looked. Still, if he didn't I can't say as I'd have much +respect for him. What sort of a burglar would a burglar be to take all +that trouble of breaking in, binding and gagging, and then go away +without helping himself to something for his trouble. I ain't got no +love for burglars in general or in particular. But any burglar as 'ld +do a fool trick like that I ain't got no respect for neither." + +"How--?" queried her neighbor as she passed Susan her cup. + +"It was something of a job I can tell you, but when I sets my mind to a +thing I sets my mind to it, and ropes and a kitchen chair ain't got the +power to stop me. I begun wriggling as soon as I heard the burglar shut +the door behind him, and I kept on wriggling for every minute of the +five hours. A tramped-on worm never did more turning and wriggling than +I did between two and seven this morning, and at last wriggling being +its own reward, I wriggled free, first with my hands and then with my +feet. But before I got my feet free, I undid the band and ungagged +myself and said just a few of the things that was bottled up all that +time. The Bible says there's a time to talk and a time to be still, but +there's such a thing as overdoing the still time, I think, and when +you're gagged by a burglar is one of 'em." + +Susan sipped her tea for a moment in silence. + +"Where's Jathrop and Mr. Kettlewell?" she asked at length. "Ain't they +up yet?" + +Mrs. Lathrop nodded. "They start--" she began. + +"You don't mean they've both lit out already?" asked Susan in surprise. +Then: "I was hoping to see Mr. Kettlewell again. But it's a long journey +back to New York, so I suppose they set off before light." + +Mrs. Lathrop nodded once more. + +"Aren't--?" she questioned. + +"I certainly am. I'm going to report the burglary at once. I've got a +clue, and it ought to be easy enough to run down that burglar." She drew +from her bosom a rather damp handkerchief. "That's what he left me to +chew on for five hours," she said, as she spread it out. "And there's +the clue right there in the corner." + +Mrs. Lathrop took it to the window and inspected it through her glasses. +The handkerchief was initialed with a "K." + +The New Year came and January was passing and, so far as Susan Clegg +cared to divulge at least, there was no news of her burglar. It was +noted, however, not only by Mrs. Lathrop, but by Mrs. Macy and Gran'ma +Mullins, and indeed by all the ladies of the Sewing Society, that Miss +Clegg had adopted an air of secretiveness concerning the matter that was +quite foreign to her usual frank, unreserved communicativeness. But the +curiosity provoked by this strangely unfamiliar attitude was swallowed +up in the sensational tidings which spread throughout the community +shortly after. Without so much as a hint of warning, Susan Clegg had +vanished between dark and dawn, leaving her house locked, bolted, and +barred, the blinds drawn, and the shutters fast closed. + +For once Mrs. Lathrop, thus deprived of her prop and her stay, evinced +sufficient initiative to have the cellar door forced and a search of the +premises made; a rumor having got abroad that the burglar had returned, +this time more murderously inclined, and that Miss Clegg's mangled +corpse would be found stiff and stark within her own darkened domicile. +To every one's infinite relief the search proved the rumor utterly +unfounded; and it proved something more, as well. It proved that Susan's +departure was plainly premeditated--"with malice prepense," to quote +Judge Fitch--since all her best clothes had gone with her. Whereupon +sentiment switched to the opposite pole, and it was openly declared that +Miss Clegg had gone after the burglar. + +The wonder was of a magnitude calculated to extend far beyond the +proverbial nine days, and it probably would have greatly exceeded that +limit, had not the heroine of the affair chosen to cut it short of her +own volition by reappearing quite as suddenly as she had vanished, at +the end of a single week. + +Mrs. Lathrop, looking across from her bedroom window as she arose from +her night's sleep on the morning of the eighth day, was joyously +startled to see the Clegg windows unshaded, and the house otherwise +displaying signs of rehabitation. Nor did she have long to wait for the +explanation of the mystery, which to the exclusion of everything else +had filled her mind ever since her friend's going. With a shawl over her +head and shoulders, she hastened through the pergola, and the next +moment was facing her neighbor with glad eyes across four yards of +kitchen floor space. + +"Oh, Susan! Such a fri--" These were her four and a half words of +greeting. + +"I knew it would," Miss Clegg caught her up, beaming as Mrs. Lathrop +couldn't remember ever to have seen her beam before. "I knew it would +frighten you all half to death, but when a thing's to be done, it's to +be done, and there ain't no use shirking. I had to go, and I had to go +quick, and I was never so glad of anything in my life, past or present, +as that I went. Of course, it was all along of that burglary, as any +fool might have guessed if they took the trouble. In the first place, I +don't mind telling you now, I went straight to Mr. Weskin the morning +after it happened, and I took him the clue and showed it to him. The way +he spun around in his spinning chair was fit to make even a level-headed +person like me dizzy. He examined the linen, and he examined the way the +K was worked, and then he says, no it couldn't possibly be Mr. +Kimball's. Now, what _do_ you think of that? Just as if I ever suspected +it was. I guess I know Mr. Kimball well enough to know him, even if he +has got his head wrapped up in one of my new roller towels, and I told +Lawyer Weskin so. Mr. Kimball, indeed! But Lawyer Weskin said as he +didn't never hear of a burglar whose name commenced with K, and he +didn't know a soul in these parts either, burglar or no burglar, whose +name did, except Mr. Kimball. There's only one way to ferret out the +perpetrator of a crime, he says, and that's by deduction, and the first +rule of deduction is to guess what the K stands for. I never thought +much of Lawyer Weskin, I'm free to admit that, but if he don't know +nothing else, it's as clear as shooting that he does know about +education. For in the end it worked out just as he said, and the Lord be +praised for it." + +"You don't--" began Mrs. Lathrop in astonishment. + +"I don't say as Mr. Kimball had a thing to do with it. I certainly +don't. In the first place, Mr. Kimball would never dare to come to my +house at such a hour of the morning, and in the second place Mr. Kimball +never carried as fine a handkerchief as the one I chewed on. So that put +it past Mr. Kimball. And the only other K I could possibly think of was +old Mrs. Kitts over to Meadville, who could no more of got over here +than could the king of the Sandwich Islands, whose name begins with K, +too. There was the Kellys, of course, but the Kellys couldn't qualify +neither, for they're too rich to need to do any burglarizing. Well, I +can tell you, I soon come to a point where I didn't know where to turn, +and I never would of turned neither, if it hadn't of been for a letter I +got the day of the night I went away. You'd never guess in the world, +Mrs. Lathrop, who that letter was from so I may as well tell you first +as last. It was from Mr. Kettlewell." + +Mrs. Lathrop opened her mouth in astonishment, but no sound came forth. + +"I knew it'ld surprise you, but it's as true as we're both standing in +this kitchen at this minute. It was a very nice letter, and it said as +how he had admired me from the first minute he saw me, but more +particularly after he'd sat opposite to me at the table and eat my +cranberry sauce. He said he'd always loved cranberry sauce, but as he +felt he'd never tasted none until he tasted mine. I certainly never see +a more complimentary letter than that letter of Mr. Kettlewell's. But it +was the end of the letter where he signed his name that lit me up with +the clear light of revelation. Until I see his name spelled out there in +black and white, I never once believed it begun with a K. I'd thought +all along as his name was Cattlewell, with a C. Far be it from me, Mrs. +Lathrop, to ever have suspected as Jathrop's friend would stoop to +housebreaking and to binding and gagging a lone woman, but there's other +ways as his handkerchief might have got to my mouth, and I felt to know +the truth. His address was on the letter, and there was nothing as could +have stayed me from getting to that address as fast as steam and steel +could carry me. I left in the middle of the night, and I got to New York +in the morning, and I didn't have that feeling for nothing. Mr. +Kettlewell was at his hotel, and in all my born days I never see a +person gladder to see anybody than Mr. Kettlewell was to see me. It's +marvelous what a impression a little good cooking will make on a man, +even if it's only in cranberry sauce. His mouth actually hadn't stopped +watering yet. Leastwise he said it hadn't, and I'd be a fool not to +believe him. He begun talking about it right away, and I let him talk, +just so's I could look at his shiny bald head and his red whiskers +without having to think of anything else except the sound of his +milk-and-honey voice. Finally he said he supposed I'd come to the city +to select Jathrop's Christmas present of furnishings, and if I'd like +him to help me select 'em, he'd be glad enough to go along and lend a +hand. Well, nothing could of been nicer than that, now, could it? But I +told him I wasn't one as traveled all the way to New York under false +pretences, and that if he must have the truth, I'd never give one +thought to Jathrop's present since he mentioned it. All my thought, I +said, had been give to finding a handkerchief with a K onto it, which +I'd washed and ironed with my own hands and brought to him, believing I +must of picked it up at the Christmas dinner by mistake, and not wanting +him to feel the need of it any longer. And you can believe me or not, +Mrs. Lathrop, just as you feel about it, if he didn't right then and +there on seeing that clue, confess that it did belong to him, and that +he couldn't for the life of him remember where he'd left it." + +Mrs. Lathrop, who had been standing all the while, dropped into a chair +at this point in dumb stupefaction. But Susan, who had been caught with +a bowl of batter in one hand and a spoon in the other, paused only to do +a little more stirring. + +"Yes, sir," she went on, still apparently as pleased as punch. "The clue +belonged to Mr. Kettlewell and no one else, which led me to suspect +right away that the burglar must have robbed your house first. I knowed +very well that I never carried that clue home myself, though I'd said I +might, just for the sake of drawing Mr. Kettlewell on. And so how could +it have got into my mouth unless the burglar got it from Mr. Kettlewell +himself? But there is stranger things in this world than you and me ever +dreamed of, Mrs. Lathrop, and that was one of 'em. Mr. Kettlewell is a +very frank and open gentleman, and seeing how disturbed I was over +something, though I'd never so much as breathed burglar or burglary, he +made another confession. And when it comes to dreaming, there is very +few people, he said, as has the power to dream the way he does. He +don't just lie still in bed and picture things out in his sleep, but he +gets up and does the things he's dreaming about. He ain't got no +limitations in it, either. Sleepwalkers is more or less common. But +sleepwalkers just walk, and that ends 'em. Mr. Kettlewell says he very +seldom walks. He usually drives a automobile when he's dreaming, just as +he does when he's wide awake. Sometimes he comes to while he's driving, +and he's found himself often as much as a couple a hundred miles from +home, and without a cent in his clothes, the clothes usually being just +pajamas with nothing but a handkerchief in the pocket. Now, if you had +any imagination a _tall_, Mrs. Lathrop, you'd see what I'm coming to, +but as you haven't you don't, I can tell by the way you look. So you'll +get the full benefit of the surprise when I say that on Christmas night +Mr. Kettlewell distinctly remembers he dreamed of committing a burglary. +He says it wasn't my mince pie as did it, because he's often eaten +mince pie before and never dreamed nothing worse than going to the +electric chair; and it wasn't my stuffing neither, for turkey stuffing +when it's indigestible always makes him dream he's a monkey climbing +trees. He says once he woke up sudden and fell and broke his arm, but +that that was a long while ago. Now he's had more experience, he never +wakes up till he's safe back in bed again. And he says doughnuts causes +his dreams to run back to when he was a boy, and one time he come to, +after a after-dinner nap, when he had doughnuts for dessert, playing +marbles in the back alley with a lot of street urchins. I can tell you, +Mrs. Lathrop, he was most interesting. He's got all his dreams sort of +classified in that way, and can almost tell to a dot what he'll dream +about according to what he eats. And he says soggy biscuits always makes +him dream he's robbing a house or killing somebody. It was mighty lucky +for me, as you can see for yourself, that this time he only dreamed of +binding and gagging. If he'd dreamed of murder, I'd not be here now to +tell the tale. And it's clean to be seen that your biscuits would of +been an accessory before the fact." + +"Then he--" + +"Yes, it was him as done it, and without no moral blame attaching to him +a _tall_. If he'd killed me, the law couldn't of touched him either, for +the law takes no account of what a person does while they're asleep. But +as you made the biscuits in your full senses and with your eyes wide +open, you'd of been the only one to blame." + +Mrs. Lathrop groaned. "You know, Sus--" she protested. + +"Of course if I was alive, I'd never hold it against you, because I know +very well you can't make biscuits no better, and ain't never had sense +enough to learn. But if I was murdered, my ghost couldn't testify, and I +don't see as how you could be saved from the law taking its course." + +At this juncture there was a sound overhead, and both ladies started, +Mrs. Lathrop in surprise and her friend in sudden realization of +neglected duties. + +"What is--?" inquired Mrs. Lathrop. + +"It's him," answered Susan. "Mr. Kettlewell. And the coffee's boiled now +till it's bitter, and there ain't a single cake on the griddle." She was +turning back to the stove as Mrs. Lathrop's exclamation caught her and +switched her around. + +"Why, Susan Clegg!" + +"Don't Susan Clegg me, Mrs. Lathrop," she commanded. "There ain't no +Susan Clegg any more. When Susan Clegg disappeared a week ago last +night, she disappeared for good, never to return. And if you suspect +anything else, it's best I should introduce myself here and now,--Susan +Kettlewell, from this time forth, if you please." + +Mrs. Lathrop sprang up and dropped back again. + +"You don't--" + +"I do. I do mean to say I'm married at last. We was wedded with a ring +in New York last Wednesday, and it's my husband's footsteps you hear up +there in the new bathroom." + +She dropped three spreading spoonfuls of batter on the greased griddle +and gave Mrs. Lathrop a full minute to absorb the announcement. Then, as +she drew the coffee pot to one side, she continued: + +"And it was purely a love match, make no mistake about that. He's got +money enough to buy and sell Jathrop, but he's as simple-minded and +simple-tasted as a babe in arms. And there's nothing I can think of that +he's not ready and willing to give me. Besides, he's frank and open +about everything. He says his teeth is false, and he has a bullet in his +right leg, got one time when he dreamed somebody was shooting him; but +that otherwise he's as perfect as a man of his age can be. He says he'll +buy a wig if I want him to, and that if I don't like the color of his +whiskers, he'll have 'em dyed whatever color I'd like best, and the +wig'l be made to match. But I wouldn't have him changed the least mite. +And if there's one thing in the world I'm thankful for it is that I got +him and not Jathrop. And I'm not thinking from the financial standpoint, +neither." + + +THE END + + * * * * * + + + + + Distinctive Fiction by Anne Warner + + + The reading world owes Anne Warner a vote of thanks for her + contributions to the best of American humor.--_New York Times._ + + Anne Warner has taken her place as one of the drollest of American + humorists.--_Century Magazine._ + + +The Gay and Festive Claverhouse + + A story of the desperate attempt of a supposedly dying man to lose + the love of a girl. + + +Sunshine Jane + + The joyful story of a Sunshine Nurse whose mission was not to care + for sick bodies but to heal sick souls. + + +When Woman Proposes. + + A clever and entertaining story of a woman who fell in love with an + army officer. + + +How Leslie Loved + + Not only a buoyant love story but a penetrating satire on modern + manners. + + +Just Between Themselves + + A vivacious satire on married life which is full of mirth of the + quieter, chuckling variety. + + +The Taming of Amorette + + A clever comedy telling how a man cured his attractive wife of + flirting. + + +Susan Clegg, Her Friend, and Her Neighbors + + A study of life which is most delectable for its simplicity and for + the quaint character creation. + + +Susan Clegg and a Man in the House + + The remarkable happenings at the Clegg homestead after the boarder + came. + + +The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary. + + The pranks of a scapegrace nephew who was showing his old aunt a + "good time." + + +In a Mysterious Way + + Compounded of amusing studies of human nature in a rural community. + + +A Woman's Will + + Describes the wooing of a young American widow on the continent by + a musical genius. + + +Little, Brown & Co., _Publishers_, Boston + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs, by Anne Warner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS *** + +***** This file should be named 37289-8.txt or 37289-8.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/2/8/37289/ + +Produced by Beginners Projects, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs + +Author: Anne Warner + +Illustrator: H. M. Brett + +Release Date: September 1, 2011 [EBook #37289] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS *** + + + + +Produced by Beginners Projects, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + +</pre> + + +<div class="figleft"> +<img src="images/cover.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<div class="figright"> +<img src="images/tp.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + + +<h1>SUSAN CLEGG</h1> + +<h2>AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS</h2> + +<h2>BY ANNE WARNER</h2> + +<h3>Author of "The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary," "Sunshine Jane," etc.</h3> + + +<p class="center">WITH FRONTISPIECE BY<br /> +H. M. BRETT</p> + +<p class="center">BOSTON<br /> +LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY<br /> +1916</p> + +<p class="center"><i>Copyright, 1916,</i><br /> +<span class="smcap">By Little, Brown, and Company.</span></p> + +<p class="center"><i>All rights reserved</i></p> + +<p class="center">Published, May, 1916<br /> +Reprinted, May, 1916</p> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<div class="figcenter"> +<img src="images/front.jpg" alt=""/> +</div> + + +<h3>"Nothing but the floor stopped me from falling through to +China." <span class="smcap">Frontispiece.</span> <i>See Page 144.</i></h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>CONTENTS</h2> + +<table width="50%"> +<tr><td align="right">I. </td><td><a href="#I"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg's Courting</span> </a></td><td align="right">1</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">II. </td><td><a href="#II"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg and the Chinese Lady</span> </a></td><td align="right">32</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">III. </td><td><a href="#III"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg Solves the Mystery</span> </a></td><td align="right">58</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">IV. </td><td><a href="#IV"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg and the Olive Branch</span> </a></td><td align="right">80</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">V. </td><td><a href="#V"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg's "Improvements"</span> </a></td><td align="right">104</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">VI. </td><td><a href="#VI"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg Uprooted</span> </a></td><td align="right">129</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">VII. </td><td><a href="#VII"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg Unsettled</span> </a></td><td align="right">153</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">VIII. </td><td><a href="#VIII"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg and the Cyclone</span> </a></td><td align="right">176</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">IX. </td><td><a href="#IX"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg's Practical Friend</span> </a></td><td align="right">216</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">X. </td><td><a href="#X"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg Develops Imagination</span> </a></td><td align="right">236</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">XI. </td><td><a href="#XI"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg and the Playwright</span> </a></td><td align="right">256</td></tr> + +<tr><td align="right">XII. </td><td><a href="#XII"><span class="smcap">Susan Clegg's Disappearance</span> </a></td><td align="right">277</td></tr> +</table> + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[Pg 1]</a></span></p> +<h2>SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS</h2> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<h2><a name="I" id="I"></a>I</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG'S COURTING</h3> + + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop sat on her front piazza, and Susan Clegg sat with her. Mrs. +Lathrop was rocking, and Susan was just back from the Sewing Society. +Neither Mrs. Lathrop nor Susan was materially altered since we saw them +last. Time had moved on a bit, but not a great deal, and although both +were older, still they were not much older.</p> + +<p>They were not enough older for Mrs. Lathrop to have had a new rocker, +nor for Susan to have purchased a new bonnet. Susan indeed looked almost +absolutely<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[Pg 2]</a></span> unaltered. She was a woman of the best wearing quality; she +was hard and firm as ever, and if there were any plating about her, it +was of the quadruple kind and would last.</p> + +<p>If the reader knows Susan Clegg at all, he will surmise that she was +talking. And he will be right. Susan was most emphatically talking. She +had returned from the Sewing Society full to the brim, and Mrs. Lathrop +was already enjoying the overflow. Mrs. Lathrop liked to rock and +listen. She never went to the Sewing Society herself—she never went +anywhere.</p> + +<p>"We was talking about dreams," Susan was saying; "it's a very curious +thing about dreams. Do you know, Mrs. Lathrop," wrinkling her brow and +regarding her friend with that look of friendship which is not blind to +any faults, "do you know, Mrs. Lathrop, they said down there that dreams +always go by contraries. We was discussing it for a long time, and they +ended up by making me believe in it. You see, it all began by my saying +how I dreamed last night<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[Pg 3]</a></span> that Jathrop was back, and he was a cat and +your cat, too, and he did something he wasn't let to, and you made one +jump at him, and out of the window he went. Now that was a very strange +dream for me to have dreamed, Mrs. Lathrop, and Mrs. Lupey, who's +staying with Mrs. Macy to-day and maybe to-morrow, too, says she's sure +it's a sign. She says if dreams go by contraries, mine ought to be a +sign as Jathrop is coming back, for the contraries is all there: Jathrop +<i>wasn't</i> a cat, and he never done nothing that he shouldn't—nor that he +should, neither—and you never jump—I don't believe you've jumped in +years, have you?"</p> + +<p>"I—" began Mrs. Lathrop reminiscently.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that time don't count," said Susan, "it was just my ball of yarn, +even if it did look like a rat; I meant a jump when you meant it; you +didn't mean that jump. Well, an' to go back to the dream and what was +said about it and to tell you the rest of it, there wasn't any more of +it, but there was plenty more said about it. All of the dream<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[Pg 4]</a></span> was that +the cat went out of the window, and I woke up, but, oh, my, how we did +talk! Gran'ma Mullins wanted to know in the first place how I knew that +the cat was Jathrop. She was most interested in that, for she says she +often dreams of animals, but it never struck her that they might be any +one she knew. She dreamed she found a daddy-long-legs looking in her +bureau drawer the other night, but she never gave it another thought. +She'll be more careful after this, I guess. Well, then I begun to +consider, and for the life of me I can't think how I knew that that cat +was Jathrop. As I remember it was a very common looking cat, but being +common looking wouldn't mean Jathrop. Jathrop was common looking, but +not a common cat kind of common looking. It was a very strange dream, +Mrs. Lathrop, the more I consider it, the more I can't see what give it +to me. I finished up the doughnuts just before I went to bed, for I was +afraid they'd mold in another day with this damp weather, but it don't +seem as if<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[Pg 5]</a></span> doughnuts ought to result in cats like Jathrop. If I'd +dreamed of mice, it'd been different, for some of the doughnuts was +gnawed in a way as showed as there'd been mice in the jar. It does beat +all how mice get about. Maybe it was the mice made me think Jathrop was +a cat. But even then I can't see how I did come to dream that dream. +Unless it was a sign. Mrs. Lupey's sure it was a sign. We talked about +signs the whole of the Sewing Society. Dreams and signs. Everybody told +all they knew. Mrs. Macy told about her snow dream. Whenever Mrs. Macy +has her snow dream, somebody dies. She says it's so interesting to look +in a paper the next time she gets hold of one and see who it was. One +time she thought it was Edgar Allen Poe, but when she read it over +twice, she see that it was just that he'd been born. She says her snow +dream's a wonderful sign; it's never failed once. She dreamed it the +night before the earthquake in Italy, and she says to think how many +died of it that time!<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[Pg 6]</a></span></p> + +<p>"This started Gran'ma Mullins, and Gran'ma Mullins told about that dream +she had the year before she met her husband. That was an awful dream. I +wonder she met her husband a <i>tall</i> after it. She thought she was alone +in a thick wood, and she saw a man coming, and she was scared to death. +She says she can feel her trembling now. She didn't know what to do, +'cause if she'd hid among the trees he couldn't have seen her, and that +idea scared her as bad as the other. So she just stood and shook and +watched the man coming nearer and nearer. I've heard her tell the story +a hundred times, but my blood always sort o' runs cold to hear it. The +man come nearer and nearer and, my, but she says he <i>was</i> a man! She was +just a young girl, but she was old enough to be afraid, and old enough +not to want to hide from him, neither. She says it was an awful lesson +to her about going in woods alone, because of course you can't never +expect any sympathy if the man does murder you or kiss you—everybody'll +just say, 'Why<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[Pg 7]</a></span> didn't she hide in the woods?' Well, Gran'ma Mullins +says there she stood, and she can see herself still standing there. She +says she's never been in the woods since just on account of that +dream—and then, too, she's one of those that the mosquitos all get on +in the woods. And then, besides, she doesn't like woods, anyway. And +then, besides, there ain't no thick woods around here. But, anyhow, you +know what happened—just as he got to her she woke up, and I must say of +all the tame stories to have to sit and listen to over and over, that +dream of Gran'ma Mullins is the tamest. I get tired the minute she +begins it, but my dream had started every one to telling signs, and so +of course Gran'ma Mullins had to tell hers along with the rest.</p> + +<p>"When she was done Mrs. Lupey told us about her mother, Mrs. Kitts, and +a curious kind of prophetic dream she used to have and kept right on +having up to the day she died. Mrs. Lupey said she never heard the like +of those dreams of her mother's, and I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[Pg 8]</a></span> guess nobody else ever has, +either. No, nor never will. Well, it seems Mrs. Kitts used to dream she +was falling out of bed, and the curious part is that she always <i>did</i> +fall out of bed just as she dreamed it, so it never failed to come true. +She'd dream she hit the floor <i>bang!</i> and the next second she'd hit the +floor <i>bang!</i> Mrs. Lupey said she never saw such a dream for coming +true; if old Mrs. Kitts dreamed she hit her head, she'd hit her head, +and the time she dreamed she sprained her wrist, she sprained her wrist, +and the time she had her stroke, as soon as her mind was got back in +place she told them she'd dreamed she had a stroke in her chair just +before she fell out of her chair with the stroke. Even the minister's +wife didn't have a word to say.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Lupey said her mother was a most remarkable woman. She's very +sorry now she didn't board that painter for a portrait of her. The +painter was so awful took with old Mrs. Kitts that he was willing to do +her for six weeks and with the frame for two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[Pg 9]</a></span> months. But Mrs. Lupey was +afraid to have a painter around. She'd just read a detective story about +a painter that killed the woman he was painting because he didn't want +any one else to paint her. Mrs. Lupey said it was a very Frenchy +story—there was a lot between the lines and on the lines, too—as she +couldn't make out, but it taught her never to have painters around, for +you never could be sure in a house with four other women that he'd kill +the one he was painting. But she's sorry now, for she's older now and +wiser and a match for any painter going, long-haired, short-haired or no +hair at all. But it's too late now, and there's Mrs. Kitts dead +unpainted, and all they've got left is a sweet memory and that cane she +used to hit at 'em with when they weren't spry enough to suit her, and +her hymn-book which she marked up without telling any one and left for a +remembrance. Mrs. Lupey says such markings you never heard of.</p> + +<p>"When Mrs. Lupey was all done, Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[Pg 10]</a></span> Brown took her turn and told us +some very interesting things about Amelia. Seems Amelia is so far +advanced in learning what nobody can understand that she can see quite a +little ways ahead now and tell just what she's going to do. She can't +see for the rest of the family, but she can see for herself. Sometimes +it's just a day ahead, and sometimes it's a long way ahead. The longest +way ahead that she's seen yet is that she can't see herself ever getting +up to breakfast again. Mrs. Brown says of course she respects Amelia's +religious views, but it's trying when Amelia wants to go to church, but +doesn't see herself going, so has to stay at home. She says Amelia just +loves to sew, but she can't see herself sewing any more, so she's given +it all up. She says Amelia's got a superior mind—anybody can tell that +only to see the way she's took to doing her hair—but she says it's a +little hard on young Doctor Brown and her, who haven't got superior +minds, to live with her. Amelia don't want to kill flies any more, for +fear<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[Pg 11]</a></span> they're going to be her blood relations a million years from now, +and Mrs. Brown says she never was any good once a mouse was caught, but +now she won't even hear to setting a trap; she says all things has equal +rights, and if she feels a spider, some one has got to take it off her +and set it gently outside on the grass. Oh, Mrs. Brown says, Amelia's +very hard to live up to, even with the best will in the world. Mrs.—"</p> + +<p>Here Susan was interrupted by Brunhilde Susan, the minister's youngest +child, who brought the evening milk and the evening paper.</p> + +<p>"There was a letter, so I brought that, too," said Brunhilde Susan.</p> + +<p>"A letter!" said Susan in surprise.</p> + +<p>"It's for Mrs. Lathrop," said Brunhilde Susan.</p> + +<p>"For me!" said Mrs. Lathrop in even greater surprise.</p> + +<p>"Yes'm," said Brunhilde Susan.</p> + +<p>A letter for Mrs. Lathrop was indeed a surprise, as that good lady had +only received<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[Pg 12]</a></span> two in the last five years. As those had been of the +least interesting variety, she looked upon the present one with but mild +interest. The next minute she gave a scream, for, turning it over as +some people always do turn a letter over before opening it, she read on +the back "Return to Jathrop Lathrop..." and her fingers turning numb +with surprise and her head dizzy for the same reason, she dropped it on +the floor forthwith.</p> + +<p>Brunhilde Susan had turned and gone back down the walk. Miss Clegg, who +had been regarding her friend's slowness to take action with +ill-concealed impatience, now made no attempt at concealing anything, +but leaned over abruptly and picked up the letter. As soon as she looked +at it she came near dropping it, too. "From Jathrop!" she exclaimed, in +a tone appalled. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop was quite speechless. Susan held the letter and began to +regard it closely. It was quite a minute before<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[Pg 13]</a></span> another sound was made, +then suddenly a light burst over the younger woman's face. "It's my +dream. I told you so. It <i>was</i> a sign, just as Mrs. Lupey said. He's +coming back!"</p> + +<p>She looked toward Mrs. Lathrop, but Mrs. Lathrop still sat quite limp +and gasping for breath.</p> + +<p>"Shall I open it and read it to you?" Susan then suggested.</p> + +<p>"Y—y—" began Mrs. Lathrop and could get no further.</p> + +<p>At that Susan promptly opened the letter. It was written on the paper of +a Chicago hotel, and ran thus:</p> + +<blockquote><p>"<i>Dear Mother</i>:</p> + +<p>"Years have passed by, and here I am on my way home again. I've +been to the Klondike and am now rich and on my way home. I hope +that you are well and safe at home. You'll be glad to see me home +again, I know. How is everybody at home? How is Susan Clegg? I +shall get home Saturday morning.</p> + +<div class="poem"><div class="stanza"> +<span class="i2">"Your afft. son,<br /></span> +<span class="i4">"<span class="smcap">J. Lathrop, Esq.</span>"<br /></span> +</div></div> +</blockquote> + +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[Pg 14]</a></span></p> + +<p>That was all and surely it was quite enough.</p> + +<p>"Well, I declare!" Susan Clegg said, staring first at the letter and +then at the mother. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop! Well, I declare. It <i>was</i> a +sign. You and me'll never doubt signs after <i>this</i>, I guess."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop made an effort to rally, but only succeeded in just feebly +shaking her head.</p> + +<p>Susan continued to hold the letter in her hand and contemplate it. +Another slow minute or two passed.</p> + +<p>But at last the wheels of life began to turn again, and that active +mind, which grasped so much so readily, grasped this news, too. Miss +Clegg ceased to view the letter and began to take action regarding it.</p> + +<p>"Did you notice what he says here, Mrs. Lathrop? He says he's rich. I +don't know whether you noticed or not as I read, but he says he's rich. +I wonder how rich he means!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop opened and shut her eyes in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[Pg 15]</a></span> a futile way that she had, but +continued speechless.</p> + +<p>"Rich," repeated Miss Clegg, "and me dreaming of him last night; that's +very curious, when you come to think of it, 'cause I'm rich, too. And I +was dreaming of him! It doesn't make any difference my thinking he was a +cat; I knew it was Jathrop, even if he was only a cat in a dream. +Strange my dreaming of him that way! I can see him flying out of the +window right now. He was one of those lanky, long cats that eat from +dawn till dark and every time your back's turned and yet keep the +neighbors saying you starve it. And to think it was Jathrop all the +time! Thinking of me right that minute, probably. And he says, 'How's +Susan Clegg?' And he's rich. I <i>do</i> wonder what he'd call rich!"</p> + +<p>Susan paused and looked at her friend, but Mrs. Lathrop remained dumb.</p> + +<p>"The Klondike, that's where he went to, was it? Goodness, I wonder how +he ever got there! Well, I'll never be surprised at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[Pg 16]</a></span> nothing after this. +I've had many little surprises in my life, but never nothing to equal +this. Jathrop Lathrop come back rich! Why, the whole town will be at the +station to meet him to-morrow. I wonder if he'll come in the parlor-car! +Think of Jathrop being a cat overnight and coming in a parlor-car next +day! And he says, 'How's Susan Clegg?'"</p> + +<p>The last three words seemed to make quite an impression on Susan, but +Mrs. Lathrop appeared smashed so supremely flat that nothing could make +any further impression on her. She continued dumb, and Susan continued +to hold the letter and comment on it.</p> + +<p>"I wonder what he looks like now. I wonder if he's grown any better +looking! I certainly do wonder if he's got any homelier. And he's rich! +Why, nobody from this town has ever gone away and got rich before, not +that I can remember. I call myself a rich woman, but I ain't rich enough +to dream of writing it in a letter. I certainly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[Pg 17]</a></span> should like to know +what Jathrop calls being rich. He couldn't possibly have millions, or it +would have reached here somehow. Maybe he's been digging under another +name! I suppose three or four thousand would seem enough to make him +call himself rich. If he comes home with three or four thousand and +calls that being rich, I shall certainly feel very sorry for you, Mrs. +Lathrop. He'll be very airy over his money, and he'll live on yours. If +you've got to have any one live with you, it's better for them to have +no money a <i>tall</i>, because if they've got ever such a little, they +always feel so perky over it. Mrs. Brown says if Amelia didn't have that +six dollars and seventy-five cents a month from her dead mother, she'd +be much easier to live with. Mrs. Brown says whenever Doctor Brown trys +to control Amelia, Amelia hops up and says she'll pay for it with her +own money. Mrs. Brown says to hear Amelia, you'd think she had at least +ten dollars a month of her own. Mrs. Brown's so sad over Amelia. Amelia +sees herself<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[Pg 18]</a></span> doing such outlandish things some days. Mrs. Brown says +your son's wife is the biggest puzzle a woman ever gets. I guess Mrs. +Brown would have liked young Doctor Brown never to marry."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop opened her mouth and shut it again.</p> + +<p>"I suppose you're thinking where to put Jathrop when he comes," Susan +said quickly. "I've been thinking of that, too. Where can you put him, +anyway? He never can sleep in that little shed bedroom where he used to +sleep, if he's really rich, and he'll have to have some place to wash +before we can find out."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop looked distressed. "I—" she began.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that wouldn't do," said Susan, knitting her brows quickly. "Think +of the work of changing all your things. No, I'll tell you what's the +best thing to do; he can sleep over at my house. Father's room was all +cleaned last week, and I'll make up the bed, and Jathrop can sleep there +until we find out how<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[Pg 19]</a></span> to treat him. Maybe his old shed bedroom will do, +after all, or maybe he's so awfully rich he'll enjoy sleeping in it, +like the president liked to stack hay. Maybe he'll ask nothing better +than to chop wood and take the ashes out of the stove just for a change. +I do wonder how rich he is. If he's rich enough to have a private car, I +expect this town <i>will</i> open its eyes. You'll see a great change in your +position, Mrs. Lathrop, if Jathrop comes in a private car to-morrow +morning. There's something about a private car as makes everybody step +around lively. I don't say that I shan't respect him more myself if he +comes in a private car. But he can sleep one night in father's room, +anyway, although if he calls it being rich to come home with just two or +three thousand, I think he'd better understand it's for just one night +right from the start. I wouldn't want Jathrop to think that I had any +time to waste on him if he calls just two or three thousand being rich. +It'd be no wonder I dreamed he was a cat, if he's got the face to call +that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[Pg 20]</a></span> being rich. But that would be just like Jathrop. You know yourself +that if Jathrop could ever do anything to disappoint anybody, he never +let the chance slide. I never had no use for Jathrop Lathrop, as you +know to your cost, Mrs. Lathrop. But, still, if he really is rich, I +haven't got anything against him, and I'll tell you what I'll do right +now: I'll go home and put that room in order and get my supper, and then +after supper I'll just run down to the square and see if anybody else +knows, and then I'll come back and tell you if they do. It's no use your +trying to put things a little in order, because you couldn't straighten +this place up in a month, and, besides, it isn't worth fussing till we +know how rich he is. He may just have writ that in for a joke—to break +it to you gently that he's coming back again to live here. Heaven help +you if that's the case, Mrs. Lathrop, for Jathrop never will. It isn't +in me to deceive so much as a fly on the window, and I never have +deceived you and I never will."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[Pg 21]</a></span></p> + +<p>With which promise Susan took her departure.</p> + +<p>It was all of three hours—quite nine in the evening—when Susan came +back. She found Mrs. Lathrop transferred to her back porch and seemingly +in a somewhat less complete state of total paralysis than when she had +left her.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop looked up as her friend approached and smiled.</p> + +<p>"Nobody knew," Susan announced as she mounted the steps, "but every one +knows now, for I told them. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you never saw anything +like it. There isn't a person in town as ever expected to see Jathrop +again, and only about three as always thought he'd come back rich. Every +one's going to the station to-morrow morning, even Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Macy +says if it's one of the mornings she can't walk, she'll hire Hiram and +his wheelbarrow just as she does for church those Sundays. Everybody's +so interested. I told them about the private car, and everybody hopes +that he's got one,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[Pg 22]</a></span> and that he'll come in it. Mr. Dill says he must be +rich if he's been to the Klondike and come back a <i>tall</i>. He says +there's no halfway work about the Klondike. Either you come back a +millionaire or else you eat first your dog and then your boots and +that's the last of you. Gran'ma Mullins says she never heard of eating +boots in the Klondike; she thought you rode on a sled there and that +there weren't any women. She says Hiram's spoken of going there once or +twice, and Lucy thought maybe the coasting would do him good, but +Gran'ma Mullins says not while she's alive, no, sir. Why, it's 'way +across America and up a ways, and so many people want to go up that they +have to sleep three in a berth, and she says will you only think of +Hiram, with the way she's brought him up, three in a berth. If the bed +ain't tucked in with Gran'ma Mullins' own particular kind of tuck, Hiram +kicks at night and don't get any proper nourishment out of his sleep. +No, Gran'ma Mullins says she couldn't think of Hiram in the Klondike<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[Pg 23]</a></span> +sleeping under a snow-pile and having to hunt up a whale whenever he was +in need of more kerosene oil. And she says what good would millions do +her with the bones of the only baby she ever had feeding whatever kind +of creature they have up there. No, she says, no, and a million times +more, no; she's been reading about it in a New York paper that came +wrapped around her new stove lid, and she knows all there is to know on +that subject now. She says a New York paper is so interesting. She says +the way they print them makes it very entertaining. She was reading +about a sea serpent, and when she turned, she turned wrong, and she read +twelve columns about the suffragettes, looking eagerly to see when the +sea serpent was going on again. She says she give up trying to see why +they print them so or ever trying to finish any one subject at a time; +she just goes regularly through the paper now and lets the subjects +fight it out to suit themselves. She says it makes the last part very +interesting. You read about a baby, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[Pg 24]</a></span> after a while you find out +whether it's the Queen of Spain's or just a race-horse. She says she +supposes next Sunday there'll be a picture of Jathrop in the paper; +maybe there'll be a view of this house with you and me. I think that +that would be very interesting."</p> + +<p>Susan paused to consider the idyllic little picture thus presented to +her mind's eye, and Mrs. Lathrop continued to say nothing. After a while +Susan went on again:</p> + +<p>"I've been thinking a good deal about that letter, Mrs. Lathrop. I don't +know whether you noticed or not, but to my order of thinking it was very +strange his saying, 'How's Susan Clegg?' That's a curious thing for an +unmarried man to ask his mother about an unmarried woman. When you come +to consider how Jathrop was wild to marry me once, it really means a +terrible lot. I was the first woman except you he ever kissed; he wasn't +but a year old, and I was thirteen, but those things make an impression. +I don't mind telling you that I've often thought<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[Pg 25]</a></span> about Jathrop +nights—and days, too. And lately I've been thinking of him more and +more. And you can see that he's been feeling the same about me, for he's +showed that plain enough by saying in black and white, 'How's Susan +Clegg?' Jathrop is a very silent nature, you can see that from his never +writing even to his own mother in all these years. It means a good deal +when a silent nature opens its mouth all of a sudden and writes, 'How's +Susan Clegg?' And then my dreaming of him was so strange. He had soft +gray fur and big bright yellow eyes, and the way he flew out of the +window! Even in my dream I noticed how nice he jumped. He made a +beautiful cat. And you know I always stood up for him, Mrs. Lathrop, +I always did that. Even when I thought he needed lynching as much +as anybody, I never said so. And now he's come back rich, and he's +coming home to you and me, and he says, 'How's Susan Clegg?' +'How's—Susan—Clegg?'"</p> + +<p>Susan's voice died dreamily away. Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[Pg 26]</a></span> Lathrop said nothing. After a +minute Susan's voice went on again: "It's too bad I haven't time to sort +of freshen up my striped silk. It's got awful creasy laying folded so +long. I'd of put some new braid around the bottom if I'd known, and if +this town wasn't so noticey, I'd put my hair up on rollers to-night. A +little crimp sets my wave off so. But, laws, everybody'd be asking why I +did it, and if Jathrop's got any idea of me in his head, it'll be very +easy to knock it right straight out if this town gets first chance at +him. But I don't intend that this town shall get first chance at him. I +shall be on that platform to-morrow morning, and I'll be the nearest to +that train, and once he gets off that train, I shall bring him right +straight up here to you and me. It's safest, and it's his duty, too. As +soon as you've seen him, I'll take him over to my house to wash. Then +I'll give him his breakfast, and by the time he's done his breakfast, if +he really means anything, I'll know it. If he really means anything, +we'll<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[Pg 27]</a></span> come over after breakfast, and it'll do your heart good to see +how happy we'll look. He can leave his bag in father's room then, for +we'll have so much to talk over it'll be more convenient to take him +over there. You can see that for yourself, Mrs. Lathrop—you know how +young people like to be alone together when they're engaged, and a woman +of my age don't need no looking after any longer. I'm no Gran'ma Mullins +to be worrying over woods nor yet any Mrs. Lupey as supposes every man +you let into your house may be going to hit you over the head when +you're thinking of something pleasant.</p> + +<p>"No, I ain't afraid of Jathrop Lathrop nor of any other man alive, thank +heaven. <i>But</i>, if I find out as he don't mean anything, I shall march +him over to you in sharp order, bag and all. If he don't mean anything, +I'll soon know the reason why, and as soon as I know the reason why, +I'll send Mr. Jathrop Lathrop flying. 'How's Susan Clegg?' indeed! He'll +find it's a very dangerous joke<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[Pg 28]</a></span> to go joking about me, no matter how +much money he's scraped out of the Klondike. A joke is a thing as I +never stand, Mrs. Lathrop, and if you'd been one as joked, you'd have +found that out to your deep and abiding sorrow long ago. Very few people +have ever tried to have any fun with me, and I've got even with the most +of them, I'm happy to remark. I shall find out yet who sent me that +comic valentine with the man skipping over the edge of the world and me +after him with a net, and when I do find out, I'll get even about that, +too. Me with a net! I'd like to see myself skipping after any man that +was skipping away from me. If he was skipping toward me, I wouldn't +marry him—not 'nless I loved him. I know that. Love is a thing as you +can't raise and lower just as the fancy strikes you. A woman can't love +but once, and I've got a kind of warm bubbling all around my heart as +tells me that I've loved that once and that it was Jathrop. It's very +strange, Mrs. Lathrop, but I've been thinking of Jathrop a great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[Pg 29]</a></span> deal +lately. I keep remembering more and more how much I've been thinking +about him. I suppose he was thinking of me, and that's what started me. +'How's Susan Clegg?' I can just seem to hear Jathrop's voice; Jathrop +had a very strange voice. 'How's Susan Clegg?'</p> + +<p>"The mind is a curious thing, when you stop to consider, Mrs. Lathrop. +Mrs. Brown says Amelia says minds can communicate if you know how. Mrs. +Brown says if she calls to Amelia when she's in the hammock and Amelia +don't answer, Amelia always explains afterwards as she was +communicating.</p> + +<p>"It all shows that the mind is a wonderful thing. There was Jathrop and +me communicating regularly, and me so little understanding what it all +meant that I dreamed he was a cat. I can't get over that dream. I wonder +if that meant that he's got whiskers now. If he's got whiskers, and he +loves me, he's got to cut 'em right straight off. You'll have to speak +to him about that as soon as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[Pg 30]</a></span> you see him, Mrs. Lathrop, for I won't be +able to, of course. And you can see for yourself that I couldn't have +whiskers around. You can't teach an old dog new tricks, and I've had no +experience with whiskers."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop promised to remonstrate with Jathrop if he really had +whiskers, and after some further conversation Susan went home and to bed +and slept soundly. In the morning she was up very promptly, and Mrs. +Lathrop saw her off for the station.</p> + +<p>The whole town was at the station. But in front of them all—closest to +the track—stood Susan Clegg.</p> + +<p>It was a breathless moment when Johnny ran out with the flag and the +train stopped. Susan motioned the rest back with dignity and stood her +ground alone. The car door opened, and a stout, homely man, with eyes +set wide apart and a very large mouth, appeared on the platform. He was +well dressed and carried an alligator-skin traveling-bag.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[Pg 31]</a></span></p> + +<p>Everybody gasped. But it was not his appearance nor the alligator-skin +bag that caused them to gasp. It was that Jathrop Lathrop, returning +after his long absence, had brought back a lady with him.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[Pg 32]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="II" id="II"></a>II</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CHINESE LADY</h3> + + +<p>And not merely a lady, but a Chinese lady at that. A particularly +chubby, solemn, Chinese lady, who descended from the train which brought +Jathrop Lathrop back to his native town after making a fortune in the +Klondike, and meekly trotted along in his wake, carrying the large +valise, while Jathrop carried the small one.</p> + +<p>Susan walked off straightway with Jathrop and the Chinese lady, while +the town remained stock and staring behind. The town was frankly "done +did up." That Jathrop might return with a wife had never once entered +the head of any one. Still less had the idea of any one of that +community ever wedding a Chinese been entertained. It was a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[Pg 33]</a></span> peculiarly +overwhelming sensation, and one which led Gran'ma Mullins to lean +against Hiram, while Mrs. Macy leaned against the equally firm side-wall +of the station itself. It was several seconds before people came to +their senses enough to go around by the track gate and look to see how +far the bewildering party had got on their way. They were just crossing +the square.</p> + +<p>"Well, if that doesn't beat the Dutch," said Mr. Kimball, and his words +seemed to break the deadlock; everybody scattered forthwith, all talking +at once.</p> + +<p>Meanwhile Jathrop, arriving at his mother's gate, paused and said quite +easily:</p> + +<p>"I'll go in alone, Susan; mother will like the first hour or so quite +alone with me, I know. Won't you take Hop Loo to your house for +breakfast?"</p> + +<p>Susan, who had by no means as yet recovered from the shock of the +Celestial bride, opened and shut her mouth once and her eyes twice, and +yielded. For the nonce she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[Pg 34]</a></span> seemed as speechless as Mrs. Lathrop +herself. Jathrop's appealing ease of manner had overawed her all the way +up from the station, and the walk had been accomplished in stately +silence. If the Klondike Prodigal had been surprised over the alteration +in Susan, he had not said so, and now he quietly handed Hop Loo his +alligator-skin traveling-bag (or hers, whichever it was), and passing in +through his mother's gate, shut it forthwith behind him, and went on up +the walk. Susan cast one look, which would have thrown a basilisk into +everlasting darkness, after him; and then, turning, marched back to her +own gate. Hop Loo followed, Susan opened her own gate and passed through +it; Hop Loo passed through after her. Susan went up her walk; Hop kept +close to her heels. Together they mounted the steps and then entered the +house.</p> + +<p>It was all of half an hour before Mrs. Macy, the first completely to +rally from the shock at the station, arrived to call. When<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[Pg 35]</a></span> she climbed +the steps and rang the bell, Susan came to the door at once. She looked +peculiarly grim and smileless. It was plain to be seen at the present +moment that she was not pleased with the world in general.</p> + +<p>"I thought I'd just come up for a little," began Mrs. Macy, smiling +enough for two all alone by herself. Mrs. Macy always tried to keep up +her own spirits in a laudable attempt, possibly, to heighten those of +others. "I thought maybe you'd be glad to see a face you knew."</p> + +<p>This allusion to the Chinese lady was not intended as unkindly as it +might have been in better society, Mrs. Macy being wholly incapable of +anything so subtle.</p> + +<p>"Sit down," said Susan, briefly, indicating a porch chair. "There's no +use taking you in; she's up-stairs unpacking, and she's already set +about doing his cooking. It's plain to be seen that Jathrop Lathrop +never come all this way from the Klondike to take any chances of being +poisoned by me as soon as he got here. No, sir, Jathrop Lathrop<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[Pg 36]</a></span> has +learned too many little tricks for that."</p> + +<p>Susan's tone was extremely bitter. She had removed the famous striped +silk and applied her hairbrush to both sides of her head after dipping +it (the hairbrush, not her head) in water. It was easy to be seen that +the vanities of this life had suddenly become offensive in her nostrils.</p> + +<p>"Do you suppose she's really his wife?" asked Mrs. Macy, seating herself +and looking eagerly in her friend's face.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, she's his wife," said Susan.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan," Mrs. Macy went on, her eyes becoming quite globular under +the severe stress of her curiosity, "do you suppose anybody married 'em, +or did he just buy her for beads?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Susan, rocking severely back and forth, "I don't +know a <i>tall</i>. You must ask some one wiser than me what a white man does +about a Chinese when he wants her to cook for him. You ought to have +seen her in my kitchen, Mrs. Macy; she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[Pg 37]</a></span> walked straight to my rack of +pans and took down just whatever she fancied. I <i>never</i> saw the beat! +No, nor nobody else. She's learned how to be cool from Jathrop and the +North Pole together, looks to me. I never see such ways as Jathrop has +picked up. He never said a word walking up—nothing but 'Ah' once. I +don't call 'Ah' once much of a conversation for the woman as rocked your +cradle and might have married you, too—if she'd wanted to. For I could +have married Jathrop Lathrop, Mrs. Macy; nobody but me will ever know +what passed between us, but I could have married him. I won't say what +prevented, but I can tell you it wasn't him. And he's lived to regret +it, too. Just like the minister regrets it. When the minister speaks of +the treasure that layeth up in heaven, he doesn't mean no chicken—he +means me."</p> + +<p>Susan paused and shook her head angrily.</p> + +<p>"I don't doubt but what he's sorry," said Mrs. Macy; "maybe he married a +Chinese<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[Pg 38]</a></span> for fear any other kind would remind him of you."</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg rejected this possible poetic view of Jathrop's action with a +look of great disgust accompanied by another shake of the head.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe it's very often that a man ever marries some other +woman on account of any other woman. That's very pretty in books, but +books ain't life. Life's life, and if Jathrop Lathrop's married that +heathen Chinese, he's got very strange notions of life, and that's all I +can say. Why, if she didn't lug that heavy bag along and walk a little +back, and he never bothered to speak to her. She's very different from +what I'd have been, I can tell you. You can maybe fancy me carrying +Jathrop Lathrop's bag a little behind Jathrop Lathrop! I think I see +myself. 'How's Susan Clegg?' He'll soon find out how Susan Clegg is. +What do you think, Mrs. Macy, what <i>do</i> you think? When we came to his +mother's gate, he just stopped, said he thought she'd like him alone +best,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[Pg 39]</a></span> said to me, 'Give Hop Loo some breakfast, will you?'—and then if +my gentleman didn't walk through the gate and shut it after him! Well, I +<i>never</i> did. There was me and his wife carefully shut out on the other +side of the fence like we was pigs. And then I had to bring her over +here and give her father's room. What would my dead and gone father say +to a Chinese woman having his room, I wonder! Father had very fine +feelings for a man as got about so little, and if he was alive, I don't +believe no Jathrop Lathrop would have gone sending no heathen Chinese +wife to live with <i>me</i>. She won't live with me long, I can tell you that +to your face, Mrs. Macy. I took her because I was too dumb did up over +having a gate shut in my face by Jathrop Lathrop to do anything else, +but I ain't intending to have her long. I've always been for shutting +the Chinese out, and I ain't going back on my principles at my time of +life. No, indeed. 'How's Susan Clegg?'"</p> + +<p>Susan paused angrily. Her repetition of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[Pg 40]</a></span> the deceptive phrase in +Jathrop's letter seemed to turn her boiling wrath into one of still, +white menace. She sat perfectly still, snapping her eyelids up and down, +and breathing hard.</p> + +<p>"I don't blame you one mite, Susan," said Mrs. Macy warmly; "I wish Mrs. +Lupey was here. She wanted to come, too, but she's got her bag to pack +to go home. She only come for one night, and to-night'll make two, so +she wants to get packed. But she knows all about the Chinese. Her +husband's got a cousin who is a missionary in China, and she could have +felt for you. The cousin's got eleven Chinese servants besides a Bible +class of two as she's training to be missionaries after they're trained. +Mrs. Lupey says she'd have known what to do when that Chinese lady got +off the train this morning. They don't let 'em ride in the same cars in +China."</p> + +<p>Just here Jathrop came out of his mother's front door and walked down +the path. Both ladies were freshly shocked by the sight. At<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[Pg 41]</a></span> the gate he +turned in the opposite direction. Both ladies stared after him. Soon he +was out of sight. Then they stared at each other.</p> + +<p>"Well, what is he up to now?" Mrs. Macy finally ejaculated.</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Susan in a tone of complete despair as to ever +again gaining any insight into the motives which moved Jathrop, "I d'n +know, Mrs. Macy. Don't ask me anything about Jathrop Lathrop after he's +gone home to see his mother and has handed me over a Chinese wife to +board. He may be gone up to Mrs. Brown's to run off with Amelia for all +I know. Nothing is ever going to surprise me any more after this day. I +only know one thing, if he does run off with Amelia, that Chinee'll find +herself and his valises dumped off of my premises pretty quick. I never +was one for false feelings, and I should see no call for Christian +charity toward a heathen who comes to me with two black bags on her legs +and a dressing-sack for an overcoat."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[Pg 42]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I wonder if Jathrop likes her wearing such clothes," said Mrs. Macy. +"Everybody is wondering."</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Miss Clegg, "men are very queer. There's no telling +what they are going to fancy till they get out of the train married to +it. Think of his having the face to write 'How's Susan Clegg?' and him +married to that puzzle-blocks thing all the time. I wonder what his +mother said when he told her!"</p> + +<p>"Let's go over and see Mrs. Lathrop!" suggested Mrs. Macy, "she's over +there alone now."</p> + +<p>This idea immediately found favor with Susan. "But I'll have to go in +and see what <i>she's</i> up to first," she said. "If she's caught a rat and +is making soup in my teapot with it, I shan't feel to enjoy leaving her +alone with my teapot."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Macy could but feel the extreme justice of this view, and Susan, +whose countenance indicated that she was sorely beset by misgivings, +went into the house.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[Pg 43]</a></span></p> + +<p>When she came out, her face wore a relieved expression.</p> + +<p>"She's all safe," she said. "She's asleep on the floor. I must say it's +changed my feelings toward her. It shows she knows her place."</p> + +<p>They walked sedately to Mrs. Lathrop's. They climbed the back steps, and +they knocked.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop was busy making preparations for dinner. She came to the +door with a promptitude which, in view of her well-known habit of +deliberation, was little short of miraculous.</p> + +<p>"We came to see how you were," said Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"Come in," said Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>They walked in and seated themselves on two of the wooden-bottomed +kitchen chairs. Mrs. Lathrop went on with her work. She was uncommonly +active, and her face wore a broad, unusual smile. "Jathrop's gone up to +the cemetery," she said. "He's going to have a monument put up to his +father."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[Pg 44]</a></span></p> + +<p>"What do you think of—?" interrupted Susan.</p> + +<p>"Yes, we come to—" began Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"He's going," continued Mrs. Lathrop, taking down a plate and blowing +the thick dust from its surface, "to have an awful handsome monument put +up. Not a animal like you put up to your father, Susan, but a angel +hanging to a pillar with both hands and feeling for a cloud with its +feet. He showed me the picture. And he's going to have the parlor +papered and give the town a watering-trough for horses, with a tin cup +on a chain for people, and he's—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, but—" interrupted Susan.</p> + +<p>"You know, of course—" began Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop swept off the top of the rolling-pin with the stove-brush. +"And he's going to build me on a bedroom right off the hall," she +continued, "and put a furnace under the whole house. And one of those +lamps that haul up and down, and a new set<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[Pg 45]</a></span> of kitchen things, and he'll +come here every year and see if I want anything else, and if I do, I'm +to have it. I'm to have a pew in church, even if I never do go to +church, and a paper every day, and his baby picture done big, and be +fitted for new glasses."</p> + +<p>"But, Mrs. Lathrop—" Susan interrupted, seeing that Mrs. Lathrop was +surely still in ignorance as to her Mongolian daughter-in-law.</p> + +<p>"Yes, you—" began Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"Liza Em'ly is to do all the sewing I want," went on Mrs. Lathrop, +proceeding with her baking preparations at a great rate, "and Jathrop'll +pay the bill. And any things I want, I'm just to send for, and +Jathrop'll pay the bill; and anything I can think of what I want done, +I'm just to say so, and Jathrop'll pay the bill."</p> + +<p>It seemed as if Susan Clegg would burst at this. It was plain now that +Jathrop really was rich, and here was his mother supposing the rose was +utterly thornless.</p> + +<p>"But did he tell you about his wife?" she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[Pg 46]</a></span> broke in desperately. "That's +what I want to know."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop, who was mixing butter and sugar together in a yellow bowl, +stopped suddenly and stared.</p> + +<p>"His wife!" she said blankly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, his wife," repeated Susan.</p> + +<p>"The wife he brought back with him," explained Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"The wife he—" Mrs. Lathrop pushed the yellow bowl a little back on the +table and rested her hands on the edge. They trembled visibly; "the wife +he—" she repeated.</p> + +<p>"Surely you know that he brought his wife back with him?" said Mrs. +Macy. "Surely he's told you?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop—turned her usual dumb self again—looked at Mrs. Macy with +almost unseeing eyes.</p> + +<p>"I—" she ejaculated faintly, "no, he—"</p> + +<p>"Now, you see," exclaimed Susan, half to the friend and half to the +stricken mother, "it don't make any difference what a man turns into +outside, he stays just the same<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[Pg 47]</a></span> inside. What have I always said to you, +Mrs. Lathrop? You can't make no kind of a purse out of ears like +Jathrop's. Jathrop Lathrop could turn into fifty millionaires, and he'd +still be Jathrop Lathrop. He can hang all the angels he pleases and +water all the horses from here to Meadville, and still he never could be +any other man but just himself. And being himself, he never by no manner +of means could be frank and open. He was always one that held things +back. You thought it was because he didn't have no brains, but you was +his mother and naturally looked on the best side of him. But he never +deceived me, Mrs. Lathrop; I saw through Jathrop right from the start. +There was a foxiness about Jathrop as nobody never fully saw into but +me. That was my reason for never marrying him—one of my many reasons, +for his foxiness hasn't been the only thing about Jathrop that I've seen +through. I never was one to soften the blows to a tempered lamb, so I +will say that so many reasons for not loving a man as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[Pg 48]</a></span> I've seen in +Jathrop I never see in any other man yet. But none of my reasons for not +marrying him has ever equalled this new reason as has cropped up now in +his bringing home a wife. When a man comes home with a wife, then you do +see through him for good and all, and when Jathrop come scrambling out +from between those two cars this morning with a heathen Chinee at his +heels—"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop screamed loudly. "A—"</p> + +<p>"Heathen Chinee," repeated Susan.</p> + +<p>"You know what a Chinee is, don't you?" interposed Mrs. Macy; "they're +from China, you know."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop retreated to her rocker with a totter.</p> + +<p>"Yes, she's a heathen Chinee," said Susan, with unfailing firmness, "the +kindest heart in the world couldn't mistake her for anything even as +high up as a nigger. Her eyes cross just under her nose, and she's got +her hair wound round her head with a piece of black tape to hold it on. +She wears<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[Pg 49]</a></span> divided skirts as is most plainly divided, and not a gore has +she got to her name or her figure. She <i>is</i> a Chinese and no mistake, +and you may believe me or not, just as you please, Mrs. Lathrop, but +Jathrop without a so much as by-your-leave dumped her onto me for +breakfast, and she's asleep on father's floor now."</p> + +<p>"On your—" gasped Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"No, on father's," said Susan, "and now, Mrs. Lathrop, you see what he +is at last. He not only marries a Chinese when if he'd been patient he +might have got a white one, but he brings her home, and don't even tell +you he's brought her home, or even that he's got her, or even that he's +married her, or anything. A man might line my house with furnaces and +have his baby picture done big in every room, and I'd never forgive his +acting in such a way. I never hear the beat. It throws all the other +calamities as ever come upon anybody in this community clean out of the +shade. What will be the use of your having a pew in church; you won't +even<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[Pg 50]</a></span> be able to face the minister now with your son's marrying one of +them as we have to give our good money to teach to wear clothes. What +good will your having the parlor papered be with everybody ashamed to go +to see a woman who has got a Chinese daughter. To my order of thinking, +you was better off poor. Why, they eat the hen's nests, the Chinese do, +and prefer 'em to the eggs. It's small wonder I dreamed Jathrop was a +cat, with him descending on us like the wrath of heaven married to a +China woman. Jathrop's no fool though, and if you'd seen that humble +heathen going along back of him with his big valise, you'd have to see +as the man as picks out a wife like that never could have been a fool. I +felt for her, I really did, only she was watching me with the wrong eye +all the time, and it made me dizzy to try and look at her kindly. I'll +tell you what, Mrs. Lathrop, when Jathrop comes back, you'll just go for +him and give it to him good. Men must learn as they can't bring their +Chinese wives<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[Pg 51]</a></span> into this community. There's a principle as we'd ought to +live up to whether we enjoy it or not, and it's all against marrying +Chinese. The Chinese are all right, I hope and trust, but nothing as +feeds itself with a toothpick had ever ought to be held pressed to the +bosom of families like you and me, Mrs. Lathrop. It isn't the way we're +brought up to look at them, and it's a well-known fact as no matter what +the leopard does to the Ethiopian, he sticks to his spot just the same +as before—"</p> + +<p>"But—" broke in Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mrs. Lathrop,—we've been friends +too long for me not to feel kindly to you,—but Mrs. Macy is a witness +to his bringing her, even if I wasn't well known to be one as never +lies. Mrs. Macy is a witness, too, to how he's got her dressed, and a +more burning disgrace than this keeping your chosen wife in loose +overalls and a jacket as any monkey on a hand-organ would weep to see +the fit of, I never see. It may be the custom in the Klondike<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[Pg 52]</a></span> and may +be convenient for sliding, but this is no sliding community, and, to my +order of thinking, Jathrop would have showed you more affection and us +more respect if he'd bought his wife a bonnet and a shawl before he +brought her here."</p> + +<p>Susan paused for breath. Mrs. Lathrop continued speechless. Mrs. Macy +tried to lighten the atmosphere by remarking, "Lands, she's got a +pigtail, too."</p> + +<p>Susan picked up the cudgels afresh at that. "Wound twice around her +head," she said bitterly; "oh, she <i>is</i> a figure of fun and no mistake. +I d'n know, I'm sure, what Jathrop was ever thinking of the day he +picked her out, but this I do know, and that is, that he'd better pick +her off of me pretty quick. You know, Mrs. Lathrop, as a friend is a +friend and I've always been a good friend to you, but I never was one to +stand any nonsense—not now and not never—and when a man writes, 'I'm +rich' and 'How's Susan Clegg?' he gets me where no Chinese wife ain't +going to please me in a hurry.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[Pg 53]</a></span> I'm glad Jathrop is rich, on your +account, Mrs. Lathrop, but his being rich don't alter my views of him a +mite. I look upon him as a gray deceiver, that's what I look upon him +as, and if he's brought a piece of carnelian or anything back to me, you +can tell him to give it to his lawfully wedded wife, for I don't want to +have nothing more to do with him."</p> + +<p>"But, Susan—" broke in poor Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Don't interrupt me, Mrs. Lathrop; I'm in no mood to listen to no +one just now. I ain't mad, but I'm hurt. It's no wonder I dreamed he +was a cat, for of all the sly, back-door things a cat is the +meanest. And there was always something very cat-like about Jathrop +Lathrop—something soft and slow and creepy—nothing bold and +out-spoken. I might have known as even if he did come home rich, he'd +find a way to even it up. And now look how he has evened it up. Think of +your grandchildren; there won't be one of 'em able to ever look<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[Pg 54]</a></span> anybody +straight in more'n one eye at once. Marrying Chinese is terrible, +anyway—in some States it's forbidden. It's to be hoped Jathrop'll keep +out of those States or he may land in the penitentiary yet."</p> + +<p>Just here the front door slammed, and Jathrop's voice was heard calling, +"Where are you, mother?"</p> + +<p>He didn't wait for an answer, but came straight through the kitchen. +Entering there, what he saw startled him so much that he came to a +sudden halt.</p> + +<p>"We've been telling your—" began Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"—mother about your wife," finished up Susan.</p> + +<p>Jathrop looked at all three in great astonishment. "About my <i>wife</i>!" he +repeated. "Did you say 'my wife'?"</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Susan, absolutely undaunted. "I think it would have been +kinder in you to have broke it to her yourself; but anyhow, we've done +it now."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Jathrop, my son, my son!" wailed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[Pg 55]</a></span> poor Mrs. Lathrop in +heart-wringing Biblical paraphrase.</p> + +<p>"But I haven't got any wife," said Jathrop. "What under the sun do you +mean?"</p> + +<p>There was a clammy pause; Susan and Mrs. Macy clasped hands.</p> + +<p>"What made you think I had one?" Jathrop asked, quite bewildered. "Who +said I had one?"</p> + +<p>Susan rose with dignity and coughed. Mrs. Macy rose, too, looking at +Susan. Poor Mrs. Lathrop seemed fairly terror-stricken.</p> + +<p>"I think I'll go now," said Susan. "I hope I needn't board her much +longer, that's all. Even if she's only using the floor, it's a floor as +has been sacred to my dead father up to now, and a dead father is not to +be lightly took in vain by a heathen Chinee."</p> + +<p>"But what does it all mean?" asked Jathrop, appearing genuinely +bewildered. "I don't understand. What are you talking about?"</p> + +<p>Susan moved toward the door; Mrs. Macy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[Pg 56]</a></span> faltered. "Maybe it was all +right in the Klondike," she began, trying to put a brace under the +situation.</p> + +<p>"Maybe what was all right in the Klondike?" asked Jathrop.</p> + +<p>"To buy her with beads."</p> + +<p>"To buy who with beads? Who's her?" Jathrop's voice was becoming +exasperated.</p> + +<p>"Hop Loo," said Susan, in a tone of piercing scorn, "the Chinese lady as +you brought with you and gave me to board."</p> + +<p>Jathrop looked at them all in amazement. "But Hop Loo's a boy—my boy," +he said.</p> + +<p>"Your boy!" said Susan.</p> + +<p>"Yes, my boy."</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg turned and gave him a long look fraught with disgust, pity, +and hopeless resignation.</p> + +<p>"Jathrop Lathrop," she said, "I <i>did</i> suppose you had some sense even in +the view of all that's dead and gone, but I guess now I'll have to give +up. I did have some respect for you while I thought she was maybe your +wife, but if you've gone so clean crazy that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[Pg 57]</a></span> you believe that that is +your boy—well!"</p> + +<p>Susan thereupon sailed out of Mrs. Lathrop's house with Mrs. Macy +wobbling in her wake.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[Pg 58]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="III" id="III"></a>III</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG SOLVES THE MYSTERY</h3> + + +<p>Susan Clegg and Mrs. Macy walked down to Mrs. Lathrop's gate, and out of +her gate and to Miss Clegg's gate; the whole in a silence deadly and +impressive. Mrs. Macy paused there.</p> + +<p>"I don't believe I'll come in," she said doubtfully.</p> + +<p>"I don't blame you," said Susan, "I wouldn't if it was me. Jathrop's +boy, indeed! What kind of a man is it as'll have a Chinese family and go +forcing them onto the true and long-tried friends of his one and only +mother!"</p> + +<p>"I can't see why he didn't leave the boy in the Klondike," said Mrs. +Macy slowly and reflectively. "I thought men always left their Chinese +families just where they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[Pg 59]</a></span> found 'em. It's strange Jathrop brought him +home with him."</p> + +<p>"You see now what my dream meant," said Susan darkly, "a cat, indeed. +It's small wonder I knew the cat was Jathrop Lathrop. Of all the mean, +sly, creeping creatures that ever come up against the back of your legs +sudden a cat is the worst. A snake is open and aboveboard beside a cat. +You can see a snake. You don't see 'em often around here, thank heaven."</p> + +<p>"Well, we haven't seen Jathrop often around here for a long time," said +Mrs. Macy, whose mind was as given to easy logical deduction as many of +her mental caliber, "and we do see a lot of cats—you know that, Susan."</p> + +<p>"'How's Susan Clegg?'" quoted Susan in a tone of reflective wrath. "I +don't know whether you know it or not, Mrs. Macy, but Jathrop asked +after me in his letter to his mother, and him with a Chinese wife. +'How's Susan Clegg?' What did he write that for if he was married, I'd +like to know."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[Pg 60]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Maybe he wanted to know how you were," suggested Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>The look she received in recognition of this offered explanation led to +her immediately proposing to go on home. "You've got the Chinaman to +look after, anyhow," she added.</p> + +<p>"You'd better come in while I go up and look at him again," said Susan +shortly. "It's a very strange sensation to be alone in your house with +what you fully and freely take to your dead father's bed and board, +supposing it's a wife, and then find out as it's her son instead. Come +on in."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Macy was easily persuaded, and they thereupon went up the walk. "I +guess I'll go see if he's still asleep," Susan said when they reached +the piazza, and Mrs. Macy forthwith sat down to await what might come of +it.</p> + +<p>Susan was absent but a few minutes; she returned with a fresh layer of +disapproval upon her face.</p> + +<p>"Is he still sleeping?" Mrs. Macy asked.</p> + +<p>"Yes, he's still sleeping," Miss Clegg<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[Pg 61]</a></span> replied, jerking a chair forward +for herself. "You'd know he was Jathrop Lathrop's child just by the way +he sleeps. You remember what a one Jathrop always was for sleeping. I +don't know as I remember Jathrop's ever being awake till he was fairly +grown. Whatever you set him at always just made him more sleepy. You +know yourself, Mrs. Macy, as he wouldn't be no grasshopper with Mrs. +Lathrop for his mother, but a cocoon is a comet beside what Jathrop +Lathrop always was. I don't know whether he's rich or not, but I do know +that heathen Chinee is his son, and I know it just by the way he +sleeps."</p> + +<p>"And so Jathrop's rich," said Mrs. Macy, rocking agreeably to and fro, +and evidently striving toward more pleasant conversation.</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Susan darkly, "rich and with a Chinese wife somewhere. Just +as often as I think of Jathrop Lathrop writing, 'How's Susan Clegg,' +with a Chinese wife I feel more and more tempered, and I can't conceal +my feelings. I never was one to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[Pg 62]</a></span> conceal anything; if I had a Chinese +wife the whole world might know it."</p> + +<p>Just here Gran'ma Mullins hove in sight, coming slowly and laboriously +up the street.</p> + +<p>"Why, there's Gran'ma Mullins!" Mrs. Macy exclaimed. "She's surely +coming to see you, too."</p> + +<p>Both ladies remained silent, watching the progress of Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>Gran'ma Mullins arrived a good deal out of breath. Susan brought a chair +out of the house for her.</p> + +<p>"I come to—tell you," panted the new visitor as soon as she had +attained unto the chair, "that Jathrop's—things is—coming."</p> + +<p>"What things?" asked Susan.</p> + +<p>"They all come on—the ten o'clock—from the junction; Hiram is helping +unload."</p> + +<p>"What's he brought?" Susan asked.</p> + +<p>"Well, he's brought an automobile," said Gran'ma Mullins, "and a lot of +other trunks and boxes."</p> + +<p>"An automobile!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy, "well, he <i>is</i> rich then!"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[Pg 63]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I wouldn't be too sure of that," said Susan, "some very poor folks is +riding that way nowadays."</p> + +<p>"And he brought three trunks and seventeen big wooden boxes," continued +Gran'ma Mullins, "big boxes."</p> + +<p>"Three trunks and sev-en-teen—Three trunks and sev-en—" Susan's voice +faded into nothingness.</p> + +<p>"Goodness knows what's in them," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Hiram was +getting so hot unloading that I wanted him to stop and let me fan him, +but he wouldn't hear to it. Hiram's so brave. If he said he'd unload +something, he'd unload it if he dropped dead under it and was smashed to +nothing."</p> + +<p>There was a pause of unlimited bewilderment while Mrs. Macy and Susan +raised Jathrop upon the pedestal erected by his three trunks, seventeen +boxes and the automobile.</p> + +<p>"And to think of his having a Chinese wife," Susan exclaimed, the keen +edge of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[Pg 64]</a></span> sorrow cutting crossways through all her words.</p> + +<p>It was just here that Mrs. Lupey now appeared, approaching at a good +pace. Mrs. Lupey was a large, imposing woman and wore a silk dolman with +fringe. It was immediately necessary for the party to adjourn to the +sitting-room, as the piazza was strictly limited.</p> + +<p>It was Mrs. Lupey who without loss of time did away with the Lathrop +parentage of the young Chinese.</p> + +<p>"Why, he's his servant, of course," she said in a lofty scorn. "I'm +surprised you didn't know that by his age."</p> + +<p>"I did think of his age," Susan said, "but I read once in some paper as +the women in China get married when they're four years old, so you'd +never be able to tell nothing by the age of no one there. Well, well, +and so she isn't his wife, nor yet his son. Well, I'm glad—for Mrs. +Lathrop's sake."</p> + +<p>"But if Jathrop's really got a automobile and seventeen trunks, he +<i>must</i> be awful<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[Pg 65]</a></span> rich," said Mrs. Macy. "It'll be a great thing for this +town if Jathrop's rich. He'd ought to be very grateful to the place +where his happy childhood memories run around barefoot."</p> + +<p>"Oh, he'll remember," said Gran'ma Mullins, "it's easy to remember when +you've got the money to do it. But I hope to heaven he won't set Hiram +off on that track again. Hiram does so want to go away and make a +fortune; I'm worried for fear he will all the time. And Lucy wants him +to, too. I can't understand a woman as wants a fortune worse than she +wants Hiram. Lucy doesn't seem to want Hiram 'round at all any more. If +he's asleep, she starts right in making the bed the same as if he wasn't +in it, and if she's sewing, he don't dare go within the length of her +thread.</p> + +<p>"Life has come to a pretty pass when a wife'll run a needle into a +husband just for the simple pleasure of feeling him go away when she +sticks him." Gran'ma Mullins sighed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[Pg 66]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I wonder what they're doing now!" Mrs. Macy said.</p> + +<p>All four turned at this and looked toward the Lathrop house together. It +was quiet as usual.</p> + +<p>"I d'n know as it changes my opinion of Jathrop much, that being his +servant," said Miss Clegg suddenly. "It's kind of different, his handing +his wife or his son over to me; but his heathen Chinee servant! I don't +know as I'm very pleased."</p> + +<p>"Pleased!" said Mrs. Lupey. "Why, in San Francisco they make 'em live +underground like rats."</p> + +<p>"Maybe that was why you dreamed he was a cat, Susan?" suggested Mrs. +Macy, whose brain seemed to grasp at the subject under consideration +with special illumination.</p> + +<p>Susan rose. "I think you'd better go," she said abruptly, "I've got to +get dinner. My mind's in no state to deal with all these sides of +Jathrop and his Chinaman just now."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[Pg 67]</a></span></p> + +<p>What the day brought up the street and in and around Mrs. Lathrop's +house would take too long to catalogue. Suffice it to say that poor Mrs. +Lathrop, who had been for long years the veriest zero in the life of the +community, became suddenly its center and apex.</p> + +<p>When Jathrop went to New York at the end of the week, he left his mother +not only sitting, but rocking in the lap of luxury, with her head +leaning back against more luxury and her feet braced firmly on yet more +luxury. Even her friend over the way was rendered utterly content.</p> + +<p>And the pleasantest part of it all was the way that it affected Susan +Clegg. As Susan sat by Mrs. Lathrop and turned upon her that tender gaze +which one old friend may turn on another old friend when the latter's +son has suddenly bloomed forth golden, her full heart found utterance +thus:</p> + +<p>"Well, Mrs. Lathrop—well, Mrs. Lathrop, I guess no one will ever doubt +anything again. Talk about dreams, <i>now</i>! I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[Pg 68]</a></span> dreamed Jathrop was a cat, +and the reason was that it's a well-known fact that cats <i>always</i> come +back. Why, Mrs. Macy told me once how she chloroformed a cat, and put it +in a flour sack with a stone, and put the sack in a hogshead of water, +and put the cover on the hogshead, and put a stone—another stone—on +that, and went to church to hear the minister preach on 'Do unto others +as you do unto others,' and when she came back, the cat was asleep on +top of the hogshead, and Mrs. Macy got the worst shock she ever got. So +you can easy see why I dreamed Jathrop was a cat; and he <i>did</i> come +back.</p> + +<p>"I declare that'll always be the pleasantest recollection of my life, +how I met him at the station and how we came chatting up the street +together. How he has improved, Mrs. Lathrop—not but what he was always +handsome! There was always something noble about Jathrop. Gran'ma +Mullins said yesterday as he made her think of a man she saw in a play +once as stood on his crossed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[Pg 69]</a></span> legs in front of a fire and smoked. So +careless.</p> + +<p>"And then his bringing Mrs. Macy that polar-bear skin! Mrs. Macy says if +there was one spot in the whole wide world where she never expected to +set foot it was on top of a polar bear, and now she can stand on her +head on one if the fancy takes her. I saw the minister when I was down +in the square to-night, and he told me not to speak of it, but he +thought a service of prayer for any stocks and mines as Jathrop has +would be the only fitting form of gratitude which a reverent and +affectionate congregation might offer to the great and glorious +generosity of him who is going to give us a steeple after all these +years of finishing flat at the top. Mr. Kimball came out to tell me to +ask you if you'd like some one to come regularly for your order, and he +says he'll keep caviare from now on, just on the chance of Jathrop's +being here to eat it; he says why he didn't keep it before was he +thought it was a kind of chamois skin.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[Pg 70]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It's beautiful to see the faces down-town, Mrs. Lathrop; you never saw +nothing like it. Everybody's just so happy. Hiram is grinning from ear +to ear over being took to the Klondike, and everybody is swore to not +let Gran'ma Mullins know he's going. He's going to climb out of the +window at night and get away that way, and Gran'ma Mullins won't mind +what she feels when he really does come back a millionaire, too. She'll +be just like you, Mrs. Lathrop; no one minds anything once it's over. +Little misunderstandings are easy forgot.</p> + +<p>"And to think there's been a blue automobile puffing at these very +kitchen steps! To think you and me was over to Meadville and back +between dinner and supper one day! I guess Mrs. Lupey never got such a +start. She'd been all the morning getting home on the train and was only +just putting her bonnet away in its box when we rolled up. I never +enjoyed nothing like that roll up in all my life! I never see +automobiles from the automobile's side before, but now<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[Pg 71]</a></span> I can. When a +automobile goes over a duck it makes all the difference in the world +whether it's your automobile or your duck.</p> + +<p>"And then Jathrop's generosity! Not but what he was always generous. +Deacon White says he will say that for Jathrop, he was always generous. +And look what he brought home. Every child in town is just about out of +their senses. Felicia Hemans is crazy about the earrings, and 'Liza +Em'ly won't never take off the bracelet. Mr. Shores can't keep the tears +back when he looks at his watch charm. I think it was so kind of +Jathrop. But Jathrop was always kind; you know yourself that a kinder +creature never lived than Jathrop. I always said that for him.</p> + +<p>"And then his having a new fence built around the cemetery. It was +thoughtful, and Judge Fitch says nobody can't say more. But Judge Fitch +says Jathrop was always thoughtful; he says he's been interested in him +always just for that very reason.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[Pg 72]</a></span> Judge Fitch says Jathrop's nature was +always that deep kind that's easy overlooked. He says he'll have to +confess to his shame that some of the time he overlooked him himself. He +says it's very difficult to understand a deep nature, because if a deep +nature don't make money, there's hardly any way of ever knowing that it +really was deep; people just think you're a fool then—like we always +thought Jathrop was. You know, nobody ever thought he ever could amount +to nothing. You know that yourself, Mrs. Lathrop. But making money lets +you see just what a person's got in 'em and see it plain.</p> + +<p>"I'm sure for all I've loved Jathrop as if he was going to be my own, +for years and years and years, still I never credited him with being the +man he is. I supposed he was a tramp somewhere—yes, I really did, Mrs. +Lathrop, you may believe me or not, but that's just what I thought when +I thought anything at all about him—which wasn't often.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[Pg 73]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Everybody in the whole place is busy remembering pleasant things about +him now. The minister's wife remembers his coming to a Christmas tree +once a long time ago when they both was little; she says she hasn't +thought of it in thirty years, but she remembers it as plain as day +now,—he had on a coat and a little tie.</p> + +<p>"And Gran'ma Mullins says she never will forget the day before he was +born, for she went to town and dropped her little bead bag, and you know +how much she thinks of her little bead bag now when the beads is all +worn off, so you can think what store she set by it when the beads were +still on, and so she was all back and forth along the road hunting for +it the whole blessed afternoon, and when she found it and went home, she +<i>was</i> tired, and she slept late next morning because her husband was out +very late the night before, and when he slept late she always slept +late, 'cause she said sleeping late was almost the only treat he ever +give her, and, anyhow, when they did wake up and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[Pg 74]</a></span> get up and get out, +there was Jathrop, and she says she shall never forget her joy over +having found the bead bag again.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Macy says she remembers the day he hid, and you thought he was in +the cistern, and you was kneeling down looking in when he jumped out +from behind the stove and give you such a start you went in head first.</p> + +<p>"I remember that day myself, too—father was insisting he was paralyzed +then, and mother and me wouldn't take his word for it, and we fully +expected he'd race over and help haul you out, but all he said was, +'She'll have to manage the best she can—I'm paralyzed,' and we really +began to believe him from then on.</p> + +<p>"The minister says he shall always remember how well he looked when he +put on long trousers; the minister's preparing a little paper on Jathrop +to read at the Sunday-school annual, and he says he shall begin with the +day he put on long trousers and then mark his rise step by step. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[Pg 75]</a></span> +minister's so pleased over Jathrop's patting Brunhilde Susan on the +head; he says there are pats and pats, but that pat that Jathrop give +Brunhilde Susan was what he calls, in pure and Biblical simplicity, <i>a</i> +pat."</p> + +<p>Susan paused. Mrs. Lathrop just felt her diamond solitaires, glanced at +the new kitchen range, and was silent.</p> + +<p>"And then, Mrs. Lathrop, that dear blessed little Chinese angel—I tell +you I shall never forget that boy. I liked his face when I first laid +eyes on him, and when I thought he was Jathrop's lawful wife, I loved +him as I'd loved even a Chinaman if he was your daughter; but when I saw +him cleaning up my sink, polishing my pans, washing out my cupboards and +all that, just the same as yours, <i>then</i> was when I see that a heathen +Chinee has just the same right to go to heaven that anybody else has, +and from then on I just trusted him completely and let him do every bit +of the work till he left.</p> + +<p>"I see now why everybody's so happy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[Pg 76]</a></span> being a missionary if you can just +get away and live with the Chinee. I'd have kept that boy if Jathrop +hadn't wanted him—I'd have been very glad to; and it's awful to think +we're keeping quiet, lovable natures like his from settling here. A girl +might do much worse than marry that Chinese—<i>very</i> much worse. A very +great deal worse. Though I suppose many would hesitate."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop rose, went to the cupboard, took out a bottle of homemade +gooseberry wine, poured out a little, and took a sip. She did not offer +any to Susan.</p> + +<p>"It'll do you good," said Susan encouragingly. "I don't like the taste +myself, but it'll do you good. Besides, Mrs. Lathrop, you must begin to +get used to it. When you go around with Jathrop in his private car, +you'll have to drink wine, and if I was you, I'd stop tying a stocking +around your neck nights, for you'll have to wear a very different cut of +gowns soon. If Jathrop buys that yacht he's gone to look at, you'll have +to wear a sailor blouse."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[Pg 77]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Oh," said Mrs. Lathrop faintly, "oh, Susan, I—" Miss Clegg put her +hastily back into her chair.</p> + +<p>"Never mind if it does make your head go 'round a little, Mrs. Lathrop; +you must learn how. It may be hard, but it'll make Jathrop happy, and +now he's come back rich, that's what everybody wants to do.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Brown says next time he comes she's going to make him a jet-black +pound-cake, and Mrs. Allen says she's going to work him a pincushion. +She says it'll be a plain, simple token of affection, but those whom +Fortune smiles on soon learn to know the true worth of a simple gift of +purest love. She says no one has ever known how she loved Jathrop, +'cause she kept it to herself for fear you'd think she was after him for +Polly."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop rocked dreamily.</p> + +<p>Susan rose to go.</p> + +<p>"Don't—" said Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I must," said Susan. "Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, think of his giving me those +fifty shares<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[Pg 78]</a></span> of stock just on account of my long-suffering friendship +for you. I declare he's a great character—that's all I can say.</p> + +<p>"I always had a feeling he'd end in some unusual way; when they started +to lynch him, I thought that was the way, but now I see that this was +the way, and I thank heaven that I wasn't right the other time and am +right this time. For human nature is human nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and +people are always kinder to a woman whose son comes home from the +Klondike a millionaire than they are if they had the bother of lynching +him, no matter how much he may have deserved it."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop continued to finger her solitaire earrings in happy +silence. Miss Clegg, who never exhibited any tenderness toward anything, +went over and arranged the fold-over of her friend's gold-embroidered, +silk-quilted kimono.</p> + +<p>"I'll be glad when your new hair gets here, Mrs. Lathrop," she said +tenderly, "it'll make a different woman of you. It's astonishing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[Pg 79]</a></span> what a +little extra hair can do; I always feel that when I put on my wave.</p> + +<p>"You and me will have to be getting used to all kinds of new things now. +And that beautiful dream of mine letting us know he was coming. Mrs. +Brown says Amelia says the Egyptians worshipped cats and used to pickle +them when they died.</p> + +<p>"It's astonishing how, if you know enough, you can see how any dream is +full of meaning. There's Jathrop so fond of pickles, and you and me +worshipping him. And he writing in every letter he has time to get +somebody to write for him, 'How's Susan Clegg?'"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop lapsed into beatific slumber. Susan Clegg went quietly +home.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[Pg 80]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IV" id="IV"></a>IV</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG AND THE OLIVE BRANCH</h3> + + +<p>It was not in reason to suppose that the return of Jathrop Lathrop +should continue to occupy wholly the attention of the community. Each +week—even each day—brought its fresh interests. Not the least exciting +of the provocative elements was borne back from the metropolis to which +'Liza Em'ly, that hitherto negatively regarded olive branch of the +ministerial family, had but recently emigrated. 'Liza Em'ly, it was +whispered one day, had written a book.</p> + +<p>The Sewing Society, at its next meeting, discussed it, as a matter of +course; and Susan Clegg, equally as a matter of course, promptly +reported the proceedings to her friend and neighbor, Mrs. Lathrop.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[Pg 81]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well," she began, sitting down with the heavy thump of one who is +completely and utterly overcome, "I give up. It's beyond me. I was to +the Sewing Society, and it's beyond them all, too. The idea of 'Liza +Em'ly's writing a book! No one can see how she ever come to think as she +could write a book. No one can see where she got any ideas to put in a +book. I don't know what any one thought she <i>would</i> do when she set out +for the city to earn her own living, but there wasn't a soul in town as +expected her to do it, let alone writing a book, too. I can't see +whatever gives any one the idea of earning their living by writing +books. Books always seem so sort of unnecessary to me, anyway—I ain't +read one myself in years. No one in this community ever does read, and +that's what makes everybody so surprised over 'Liza Em'ly, after living +among us so long and so steady, starting up all of a sudden and doing +anything like this. And what makes it all the more surprising is she +never<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[Pg 82]</a></span> said a word about it either—never wrote home to the family or +told a living soul. And so you can maybe imagine the shock to the +minister when he got word as his own flesh and blood daughter had not +only written a book but got it all printed without consulting him. His +wife says he was completely done up and could hardly speak for quite a +little while, and later when the newspaper clippings begin to come, he +had to go to bed and have a salt-water cloth over his eyes. I tell you, +Mrs. Lathrop, the minister is a very sensitive nature; it's no light +thing to a sensitive nature to get a shock like a daughter's writing a +book."</p> + +<p>"Is—" asked Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Well, I should say that it was," said Miss Clegg. "I should say that it +was. And not only is it being advertised, but people are buying it just +like mad, the papers say. The minister is still more upset over that; +seems the responsibilities of even being connected with books nowadays +is no light thing. There was that man as was shot for what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[Pg 83]</a></span> he wrote in +a book the other day, you know, and the minister's wife says as the +minister is most nervous over what may be in the book; she says he says +very few books as everybody is reading ought to be read, and he knows +what he's talking about, for he's a great reader himself. Why, his wife +says he's got books hid all over the house, and she says—speaking +confidentially—as he says most of 'em he's really very sorry he's +read—after he's finished 'em. She says—he says he'll know no peace +night or day now until he's read 'Liza Em'ly's book. I guess it's no +wonder that he's nervous. 'Liza Em'ly's been a handful for years, and +since she fell in love with Elijah, there's been just no managing her a +<i>tall</i>. If Elijah'd loved her, of course it would have been different, +but Elijah wasn't a energetic nature, and 'Liza Em'ly was, and when a +energetic nature loves a man like Elijah, there's just no knowing where +they will end up. I never see why Elijah didn't love 'Liza Em'ly, but +her grandmother's nose has always been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[Pg 84]</a></span> against her, and he told me +himself as it was all he could think of when he sat quietly down to +think about her. But all that's neither here nor there, for it's a far +cry from a girl's nose to her brains nowadays, thank heavens, and 'Liza +Em'ly's got something to balance her now. Polly White has sent for one +of the books. She says she'll lend it around, no matter what's in it. +Polly says there's one good thing in getting married, and that is it +makes you a married woman, and being a married woman lets you read all +kinds of books. I guess Polly's been a great reader since she was +married. She's meant to get some good out of that situation, and she's +done it. The deacon isn't so badly off, either. I wouldn't say that he's +glad he's married all the time, but I guess some of the time he don't +mind, and it's about all married people ask if only some of the time +they can feel to not be sorry. A little let-up is a great relief."</p> + +<p>"You—" said Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know," said Miss Clegg, "but I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[Pg 85]</a></span> pick up a good deal from others, +and there's a feeling as married women have when they talk to a woman as +they suppose can't possibly know anything just 'cause she never got into +any of their troubles, as makes them show forth the truth very plainly. +I won't say as married women strike me more and more as fools, for it +wouldn't be kindly, but I will say as the way they revel in being +married and saying how hard it is, kind of strikes me as amusing. <i>I</i> +wouldn't go into a store and buy a dress and then, when every one knew +as I picked it out myself, keep running around telling how it didn't fit +and was tearing out in all the seams—but that's about what most of this +marriage talk comes to. I do wonder what 'Liza Em'ly has said about +marriage in <i>Deacon Tooker Talks</i>. That's a very funny name for a book, +I think myself, but that's what she's named it. And as it seems to be +about most everything, I suppose it must be about marriage, too. Of +course 'Liza Em'ly's so wild to marry Elijah that everybody knows that +that was what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[Pg 86]</a></span> took her up to town. She didn't want to earn her living +any more than any girl does. Nobody ever really aches to earn their +living. But some has to, and some wants to be around with men, and there +ain't no better way to be around with men nowadays than to go to work +with 'em. You have 'em all day long then, and pretty soon you have 'em +all the time. 'Liza Em'ly wants to have Elijah all the time."</p> + +<p>"What—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Oh, she says she thinks they're so congenial; she told me herself as +Elijah 'understood.' It seems to be a great thing to understand +nowadays. It's another of those things we used to take for granted but +which is now got new and uncommon and most remarkable. She told me when +she and Elijah watched the sun setting together, they both understood, +and she seemed to feel that that was a safe basis on which to set out +for town and start in to earn her own living. The minister didn't want +her to go. He was very much against it. It cost such a lot,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[Pg 87]</a></span> too. The +minister's wife said it would have been ever so much cheaper to fix a +girl to get married. You can get married with six pairs of new +stockings, the minister's wife says, and it takes a whole dozen with the +heels run to earn your living. The minister's wife was very confidential +with me about it all, and 'Liza Em'ly confided considerably in me, too. +They both knew I'd never tell. Every one always confides in me because +they know I never tell. Why, the things folks in this community have +told me! Well!—But I <i>never</i> tell. The real reason I never tell is +because they always tell every one themselves before I can get around, +but then a confiding nature is always telling its affairs, and so you +can't really blame 'em. I never tell my own affairs, because I've +learned as affairs is like love letters, and if they're interesting +enough, it is very risky. But really, Mrs. Lathrop, I must be going now, +and as soon as I get hold of that book, I'll be over with my opinion. +<i>Deacon Tooker Talks!</i> My, but that is a funny<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[Pg 88]</a></span> name for a book! I can't +see myself what kind of a book it can possibly be with that title—but +anyway, we shall soon know now."</p> + +<p>"Yes, we—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed," said Susan, and the seance broke up for that day.</p> + +<p>It was resumed the day after, and the day after that, but no further +progress having been made in the development of 'Liza Em'ly's affairs, +that interesting topic remained in abeyance until after the next meeting +of the Sewing Society, when the subject was put forward with emphasis.</p> + +<p>"You never hear the beat," said the lady who nearly always went to the +Sewing Society to the lady who hadn't been there for years; "this book +of 'Liza Em'ly's seems to be something just beyond belief. Polly read it +all aloud to us to-day, and I must say it's a <i>most</i> astonishing book. I +will tell you in confidence, Mrs. Lathrop, as I ain't surprised that the +minister hid his copy and that the newspapers is all printing things +about it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[Pg 89]</a></span> Seems it's a man in bed talking to his wife who is asleep +most of the time, only he don't pay the slightest attention to her not +paying the slightest attention. Polly had the name right, it is <i>Deacon +Tooker Talks</i> (which is a <i>most</i> singular name to my order of thinking). +The cover has got a picture of the deacon's head on a pillow talking, +and you can think how the minister would feel over his daughter's book's +cover having a pillow on it! I walked home with Mrs. Fisher, and she +will have it that 'Liza Em'ly's put her father into the book, soul and +body. There's a man called Mr. Lexicon as is a lawyer in the book, and +Mrs. Fisher says it's the minister. I wouldn't swear as it wasn't the +minister myself, but I hate to believe it, for a girl as'll put her +father in a book would be equal to most anything, I should suppose. But +Mrs. Fisher's sure it's the minister; she says she knew him right off by +his ear-muffs. Only 'Liza Em'ly has disguised the ear-muffs by calling +them overshoes. Mr. Lexicon has always got on his overshoes. Mrs. +Fisher<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[Pg 90]</a></span> waited until we got away from all the rest, and then she showed +me a review from a New York paper that just took my breath away. It says +no such book has appeared before a welcoming public in two hundred and +fifty years, and she's going to write the paper and ask what the book +two hundred and fifty years ago was about. Mrs. Fisher says she's +thinking very seriously of writing a book herself. She says she's always +wanted to write a book, and now she thinks she'll go up to town and see +'Liza Em'ly and ask her about their writing a book together. She says +she'll furnish all the story, and 'Liza Em'ly can write the book. Then +they'll divide the money even. And there'll be money to divide, too, for +'Liza Em'ly's book is surely selling. Mrs. Macy come up after Mrs. +Fisher went home, and she had a piece out of another newspaper that Mrs. +Lupey sent her, saying the book was in its ninth edition already. She +had it with her at the Sewing Society, but she didn't bring it out, out +of consideration for the feelings of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[Pg 91]</a></span> minister's wife. Mrs. Macy +says she thinks she'll write a book, too. She's got the same idea as +Mrs. Fisher about writing it with 'Liza Em'ly, only she says she'll let +'Liza Em'ly use some of her own ideas mixed in with Mrs. Macy's ideas, +and she can have two thirds of the money. She says it can't be hard to +write a book, or 'Liza Em'ly couldn't never have done it, but she says +'Liza Em'ly has got the Fishers in her book, and she's surprised Mrs. +Fisher didn't recognize 'em at the Sewing Society. 'Liza Em'ly calls 'em +the Hunters. Fishers, hunters—you see! An' John Bunyan she calls Martin +Luther, an' in place of being a genius, she covered that all up by +making him a painter. Laws, Mrs. Macy says writing a book's easy. She +says that book of 'Liza Em'ly's is really too flat for words, and what +makes people buy it, she can't see. Well, I shan't buy a copy, I know +<i>that</i>. I ain't knowed 'Liza Em'ly all my life to go doing things like +that now."</p> + +<p>With which very common view as to the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[Pg 92]</a></span> works produced by our intimate +friends, Miss Clegg rose to take her departure.</p> + +<p>"Did—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, when they next met.</p> + +<p>"No—I asked, but not a soul knew. We haven't got <i>any</i> man in town as +it could <i>possibly</i> be. They was all discussing it, too. Mrs. Macy and +Mrs. Fisher is really going to town to see 'Liza Em'ly and take up their +ideas to talk over. Mrs. Macy is putting her ideas down on a piece of +paper, so as to be sure she has 'em with her. Mrs. Fisher's keeping hers +in her head, for she says if she lost them, anybody might write her +book. They think they'll go Tuesday. I hope they will, 'cause if they +do, they'll come straight from the train and tell me, and then I'll come +straight over and tell you."</p> + +<p>With which amicable arrangement Miss Clegg again took her departure.</p> + +<p>It was quite two weeks before affairs shaped themselves for Mrs. Macy +and Mrs. Fisher to go to the city on their literary errand, but they +managed it at last, and you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[Pg 93]</a></span> may be very sure that Mrs. Lathrop peeked +eagerly and earnestly out of her window many times the afternoon after +their journey. They came up to call upon Miss Clegg and narrate their +adventures quite according to their usual friendly ideals, and directly +they took their leave that good lady hied herself rapidly to Mrs. +Lathrop to tell the tale.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop met her at the door and both sank into chairs immediately.</p> + +<p>"Well, what—" said the older lady then, and her younger friend rejoined +promptly:</p> + +<p>"Perfectly dumfounding; nothing like it was ever knowed before or ever +will be again."</p> + +<p>"Wha—?" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"They're both completely paralyzed. Mrs. Fisher can't say a word, and +Mrs. Macy can't keep still."</p> + +<p>"Wha—?" began Mrs. Lathrop again.</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg drew a sharp breath. "They went to see 'Liza Em'ly, an' they +saw her. My goodness heavens, I should think they<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[Pg 94]</a></span> did see her. Mrs. +Macy says if any one ever supposed as the Hanging Gardens of Babylon was +any wonder, they'd ought to go to the city an' see 'Liza Em'ly, and the +Hanging Gardens would keep their mouths shut forever after."</p> + +<p>"Wha—?" began Mrs. Lathrop for the third time.</p> + +<p>But Miss Clegg was now quite ready to discharge her full duty. "Seems +'Liza Em'ly's book went into the twentieth edition yesterday," she said, +opening her eyes and mouth with great expressiveness. "They knew that +before they got there, for you can believe Mrs. Macy or not, just as you +please, Mrs. Lathrop, but there were actually signboards saying so stuck +up all along in the fields as the train went by. The train-boy had the +books for sale on the train, too, and kept dropping 'em on top of 'em +all the way, but they didn't mind that, for Mrs. Fisher read her book as +fast as she could until he picked it up again, and she read to good +purpose, for this afternoon she asked for a glass<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[Pg 95]</a></span> of water, and while I +was out with her in the kitchen getting it, she told me there isn't a +mite of doubt but Mrs. Macy is in the book, and Doctor Carter of +Meadville is in right along with her. Mrs. Fisher says 'Liza Em'ly has +called her Miss Grace and him Doctor Wagner of Lemonadetown, but she +says she knew 'em instantly by the description of how they was in love; +she says you'd recognize how they was in love right off. I must say, +Mrs. Lathrop, as I think 'Liza Em'ly ought to be very careful what she +writes about real people if you can tell 'em as quick as that; but +anyway, they got to town and took a street car, and then, lo and behold, +if their first little surprise wasn't the finding as 'Liza Em'ly has +stopped living where she lives and gone to live in a hotel, so they had +to go to the hotel, too, and when they got there, what do you think?—If +'Liza Em'ly wasn't giving a reception to celebrate the twentieth +edition!"</p> + +<p>"Wh—?" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, indeed," continued Miss Clegg,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[Pg 96]</a></span> "certainly—yes, I should say so, +too. If they didn't get a fine shock over 'Liza Em'ly and her hotel and +her reception and the whole thing, Mrs. Macy says she'll never know what +a shock is when she sees it. Seems they was shoved into one end of a +elevator without so much as by your leave and out the other end before +they'd caught their breath, and then they found themselves in a room +with flowers all tied up in banners, and Elijah, with his hair parted in +the middle, passing cups of tea which a lady, with her muff on her head, +was pouring out, while 'Liza Em'ly sat on a table swinging her feet in +shoes she never bought in <i>this</i> town, Mrs. Macy'll take her Bible oath, +and a dress that trained on the floor even from the table."</p> + +<p>"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Oh, that isn't anything," said Susan, "just you wait. Well, and so Mrs. +Macy says you can maybe imagine their feelings when they found their two +perfectly respectable and well brought up selves in the middle of such a +kind of a party! One man and one girl was under<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[Pg 97]</a></span> the piano playing cat's +cradle, while another man was doing a sum on the wallpaper with a +hatpin. Mrs. Macy says she wouldn't have been surprised at nothing after +that, you'd think, but she says when it comes to 'Liza Em'ly nowadays, +you don't know even what you're thinkin', for you'd suppose 'Liza Em'ly +would at least have looked ashamed of her feet and her train. Instead of +that, she just clapped her hands and said, 'Hello, home-folks,' which +nearly sent Mrs. Fisher over backwards. Elijah saw them then, and <i>he</i> +had the good manners to drop a teacup, but even he didn't look anywhere +near as used up as in Mrs. Macy's opinion a man away from business with +his hair parted in the middle in the middle of the afternoon had ought +to look. He gave them chairs though, and they set down between a young +lady as was smoking a cigarette and another as was very carefully +powdering herself in a little mirror set in her pocketbook. Just then +there was a noise like a awful crash and a hailstorm, and after they'd +both jumped and Mrs. Macy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[Pg 98]</a></span> come near dislocating her hip, they see that +a man was beginning on the piano. Well, Mrs. Macy says <i>such</i> +piano-playing her one hope is as she may be going to be spared +hereafter; she says he'd skitter up the piano with both hands, and then +he'd bang his way back to where he belonged, and every time he hit the +very bottom, he'd give his head a flop and jerk down another lot of hair +over his eyes. Mrs. Macy says she never see a man with so much loose +hair where he could manage it, for he kept getting down more and more +till he looked like a cocoanut and nothing else, so help Mrs. Macy, and +then, when he was completely hid, he hit the piano four cracks and +folded his arms and was done."</p> + +<p>"Mercy on—!" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I should say so," continued Miss Clegg, "and Mrs. Macy says everybody +clapped like mad, and then 'Liza Em'ly come to earth and went and threw +her arms around his neck, which to Mrs. Macy's order of thinking, didn't +look much like she was going to marry Elijah. And then, before they +could shake<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[Pg 99]</a></span> hands or say good-by or do a thing, a boy came in with a +lot of telegrams on a tray, and while 'Liza Em'ly was fixing half a +spectacle in one eye to read 'em, a young lady dressed in snakeskins, +and very little else, jumped into the room right over the backs of their +two chairs in a most totally unlooked-for way, and then began to spin +about and wriggle here and there and in and out generally, and Mrs. +Fisher got up and said they really must go, and Elijah showed 'em to the +door with the lady in snakeskins making figure eights around them all +three and 'Liza Em'ly throwing a rose at them and kissing her hand till +somehow they got into the hall. They walked down flights of stairs then +till they thought there never would be a bottom anywhere, and then they +looked at each other, and after a while they got where they could speak, +and then they came home."</p> + +<p>"Well, wha—?" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Me, too," said Susan, "I think it's <i>awful</i>! And the worst of it is for +her to be the minister's daughter. Think of it! They bought<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[Pg 100]</a></span> a paper as +had her picture on it and a account of the reception as they'd just been +at. It said Herr Schnitzel Beerstein played, so they know his name now, +and Madame Kalouka S-k-z-o-h danced, so when it comes to her name, they +ain't much better off than they were before. Wherever they looked they +see posters of <i>Deacon Tooker Talks</i>, and people in the cars was all +discussing the book. Two ministers is going to take it for a text +to-morrow, and the candy stores has all got little candy boxes like beds +with a chocolate drop for Deacon Tooker and a gum-drop for his wife."</p> + +<p>"Well, wha—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I don't know," said Miss Clegg. "The book's made right out of this +community, and since I've read it myself, I can see who every one is +<i>except</i> Deacon Tooker. I can't see who Deacon Tooker is, for we haven't +got anybody like him. He's talking the whole time; in fact, the book is +all what he says about everything, and all his wife ever does is to wake +up when he shakes her and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[Pg 101]</a></span> then go to sleep again. The idea's very +remarkable of a man laying awake chattering to himself all night long, +but I never heard of any such person here. Our only deacon is Deacon +White, and he never talks a <i>tall</i>."</p> + +<p>"I wonder if the min—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"No, I don't believe so," said Miss Clegg. "My goodness, suppose he did +and hit something like they did! No, I hope he won't ever think of it, +and as for 'Liza Em'ly, I hope she'll remember her married father and +mother soon and remember her quiet and loving home, too, before she gets +in the habit of having parties like that very often. My gracious, think +of going to call on a girl as you see christened and having a snake-lady +gartering her way up your leg while you were trying to say good-by and +get away alive. Mrs. Macy says the creature was diving here and +wriggling there and slipping under tables and over chairs in a way as +made your flesh go creeping right after her. Well, it's clear 'Liza +Em'ly's started on a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[Pg 102]</a></span> most singular career. Mrs. Macy says first they +give her a sandwich with a bow of ribbon on it, and she swallowed the +ribbon; and then they give her a piece out of a cake that they said had +a lucky quarter in it, and she's almost sure she swallowed the quarter, +so maybe she was prejudiced."</p> + +<p>"Well, I—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"They felt the same way," said Miss Clegg; "they've come home very much +used up. Mrs. Macy says you can talk to her about the days of ancient +Rome and the way folks act underground in Paris, but she says she knows +positively as what she and Mrs. Fisher saw with their own eyes in 'Liza +Em'ly's sitting-room beat all those kind of little circuses hollow. Mrs. +Macy says she's seen enough of what they call high life now to last her +till she dies of shame. She says the only bright spot in the whole thing +is as 'Liza Em'ly's nose isn't anywhere near as prominent as you'd think +any more, and she's got a automobile and is going to Europe when the +book goes into its fiftieth edition."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[Pg 103]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well—I—" mused Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, and I will, too," said Miss Clegg. "I'll go straight home and do +it. I'm awful tired. And it bothers me more than I like to own not +knowing who Deacon Tooker is. You know my nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and +although I was never one to try to find out things nor to talk about 'em +after I've managed to find 'em out, still I never was one to like not to +know things, and I must say I do want to know who Deacon Tooker is. +Well, they say all things comes to him who waits, so I think I won't +stop here any longer. Good-by, and when I do find out, you can count on +my coming right over to tell you."</p> + +<p>"Goo—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>But Miss Clegg had shut the door after her.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[Pg 104]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="V" id="V"></a>V</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG'S "IMPROVEMENTS"</h3> + + +<p>There was nothing small or mean or economical about Jathrop Lathrop, now +that he had turned out rich. He was the soul of generosity, the epitome +of liberality, the concentrated essence of filial devotion as expressed +in checks and carte-blanche orders directed at his mother.</p> + +<p>One of his earliest kind thoughts was to have Mrs. Lathrop's home +completely modernized, and as Susan Clegg lived next door and was his +mother's best and dearest friend, he decided to build her house over, +too.</p> + +<p>To that end he hunted up the highest-priced architect of whom he could +hear and asked to have designs submitted forthwith. The highest-priced +architect readily undertook the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[Pg 105]</a></span> reconstruction of the Lathrop and Clegg +domiciles, but being too occupied to go down into the country and look +over the field personally, he delegated one of his youngest and most +promising assistants to accomplish the task, and the young and promising +assistant forthwith packed his dress-suit case and set off.</p> + +<p>He was an assistant of most extraordinary youth and almost unbelievable +promise, and he saw a chance to plan colleges (endowed by J. Lathrop, +Esq.), palaces (to be built for Lathrop, the millionaire), possibly to +be commissioned with the overseeing of the artistic development of some +new, up-springing city (Lathropville, Alaska, or something of that +sort), if he should only succeed in at once accomplishing a close union +of feeling with the golden offspring of our old friend. His first really +rich client is to a young débutant in bricks just what a well-hung +picture is to the budding artist, or a song before royalty is to a +singer. Such being the well-known facts of life the young and promising +assistant<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[Pg 106]</a></span> fully intended to do himself proud in the reconstruction of +the two houses consigned by Jathrop's benevolence to his tender mercies.</p> + +<p>The young architect came to town and went to the hotel (at Jathrop's +expense). He spent the next ten days in going twice each day to study +his task, sketch its realities and idealities, and also make the +acquaintance of Mrs. Lathrop and Susan Clegg, for he was a young man of +new and novel ideas, and one of his newest and most novel ideas was to +build a house which would really suit those who were to live in it. He +was so young that he had no conception as to how this was to be done, +nor the faintest inkling as to what a Titanic-crossed-with-Promethean +undertaking it would be to do, if even he did know how; but he felt—and +most truly—that it was a new view of the relation between house and +builder, and he felt proud over having thought it out for himself as +well as for all time to come. Then he had another novel idea—not so +altogether his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[Pg 107]</a></span> own, however—which was that a house should "express its +dweller." This latter idea was quite beyond the grasp of his present +audience and just a little beyond his own grasp, too, but he was brave +and conscientious and didn't see it that way at all.</p> + +<p>It has taken some time to lay out all these premises, but if there is +any one with whom one can desire close acquaintance it is surely the man +who comes to build over a comfortable and in-most-ways-satisfactory home +of long years' standing, so I trust that the minutes have not been +altogether wasted.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop and Miss Clegg received the young man and his mission in +such states of mind as were entirely compatible with their individual +outlook over life.</p> + +<p>"I must say I'm far from altogether liking him," Susan said to her +friend, a very real note of disapproval in her voice, one day toward the +end of the week. Mrs. Lathrop was rocking in her new old-gold-plush +stationary rocker and listened as usual with interest. "He's on the +woodpile now, drawing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[Pg 108]</a></span> a three-quarter profile of the woodshed. The way +he perches anywhere and then goes to work and draws anything would +surely make an English snail pull his castle right into his house along +with him, for I've got a feeling as there's nothing about me as he +hasn't got in his book by this time, and there's many things he's drawn +as I never would choose to have the world in general looking over. I'm +sure I don't want no view of my woodshed going down to posterity for one +thing. I've had to have a woodshed, but I've never admired it, and the +way I've nailed anything handy over holes in it is far from my usual way +of mending. You've always mended 'hit or miss,' Mrs. Lathrop, and after +years of such doings as was more worthy a poorhouse than a Christian, +heaven has seen fit to reward your patching with a son fresh from the +Klondike, but I've always darned blue with blue and brown with brown, +and the only spot in my whole life that I haven't carefully and neatly +matched the stripes in is my woodshed, and now to-day<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[Pg 109]</a></span> when I was +thinking very seriously of using it up for the kitchen-stove next +winter, if there isn't a young man from New York out drawing it in black +and white, and ten to one he'll print it in some unexpected Sunday paper +marked 'Jathrop Lathrop's mother's friend Susan Clegg's woodshed!' +That'll be a pretty kettle of fish, and you needn't tell me that there +won't be somebody to perk up and say, 'No smoke without some fire,' +which will be as good as throwing it in my teeth that I'm one of those +as use a safety pin when a button's off, when it's a thing as I've never +done and never would do even if there is a proverb that a pin's a pin +for all that."</p> + +<p>Susan paused here and looked upon her friend in serious question. Mrs. +Lathrop, however, merely continued to rock pleasantly. A change had come +over the spirit of her rocking since the return of Jathrop. She had +rocked for years with a more or less apologetic air, as if she knew that +there were those who might criticize her action and yet she couldn't +personally feel that she really<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[Pg 110]</a></span> ought to give it up. But now she rocked +with a wide, free swing as if life was life and if she liked to rock, +she was going to rock, and if there were those who objected, they could +object—she didn't care. There is nothing that so quickly develops an +independent standpoint as the possession of money; there is nothing that +so fully produces a conviction that one is thoroughly justified in doing +just exactly what one pleases; there is nothing that leads to quite the +same lofty indifference as to whether what pleases one pleases or +displeases all the rest of the world.</p> + +<p>We have but to look at Jathrop to see that this is true. Of all the +tame, mild-eyed, listless young individuals, Jathrop was the worst, +falling asleep on an average of three times an afternoon in school, and +never keeping conscious a whole evening. Whether a sudden change in +Jathrop's character was the cause of making him a financial power or +whether his Klondike-acquired bank account was the cause of his +awakening, it still is a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[Pg 111]</a></span> fact that now in his quiet way he was a very +live person.</p> + +<p>Jathrop was indifferent to a degree, also, as witness his appearance +with his Chinese boy whom everybody took to be his wife with his great +baggy trousers and pigtail that no respectable boy, Chinese or +otherwise, should wear. Of course, it must be acceded that Jathrop was +indifferent in that case from ignorance. He did not know what the world +was saying.</p> + +<p>Perhaps that accounts for the lofty attitude, one might say lofty +altitude, of so many of our millionaires. They are so far removed from +the world that their ears cannot hear what is being said. People talk in +whispers about the "very rich," which makes it doubly hard for them to +hear, or hearing, to think that it matters very much, else people would +shout. However, when all is said, money does make a difference.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop had been a silent, sat-upon, unaggressively-rocking person +for years; now Jathrop had come back from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[Pg 112]</a></span> Klondike and altered all +that; it was not that she had turned talkative, it was not that she had +so far altered the very foundations of her being as to presume ever to +try to contradict any other body's opinions, but the return of Jathrop +and the wealth of Jathrop had found expression in his mother through the +one medium of almost all expression with her. Mrs. Lathrop had ceased to +concern herself as to the length or the vigor of her rocking. It was +beautiful to see the energy of independence with which she went back and +forth, bringing her feet down with an audible clap whenever she desired +fresh impetus.</p> + +<p>Susan Clegg did not seem to sympathize. Instead, sitting on her straight +chair opposite, she shook her head severely, further discontent making +itself visible in the manner of her shake.</p> + +<p>But Mrs. Lathrop was proof against all manifestations of disapproval +now. She flew back and forth in the old-gold-plush stationary rocker +like the happy pendulum of some beatific clock. Jathrop was home.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[Pg 113]</a></span> +Jathrop was rich. Jathrop would buy her anything she wanted.</p> + +<p>"I d'n know, I'm sure, Mrs. Lathrop," Susan went on, the discontent +ringing somewhat more distinctly in her tone, "as I'm much taken with +this idea of building us over, even if Jathrop does mean it kindly. I +know there's a many as would nigh to go out of their senses at the very +idea of being made over new for nothing, but I was never one to go out +of my senses easy, and that young man on the woodpile doesn't give me +any kind of secure feeling as to what he'll make out of my house. He +looks to me like the kind of young man as will open doors square across +windows where the knob'll smash the glass sure if you're trying to carry +a bureau out at the time of the house-cleaning. The kind of cravats he's +got looks to me like his chimneys would be very likely not to draw, and +their color gives me a feeling that doughnuts in his house will smell in +shut-up closets a week after the frying. You know what shut-up fryings +is like after they've had no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[Pg 114]</a></span> fresh air for a week, but I wasn't raised +that way. When I have fish I have fish and done with it, and when I have +onions I have onions, and I ain't very wild over maybe boarding my fish +and my onions in my best bonnet henceforth and forever.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Brown was telling me yesterday as she heard of some city woman as +had a system of ventilation put into her house, and the rats and mice +used it so freely that you couldn't sleep nights. They nested in it, and +they fought in it, and they died in it, all as happy and gay as you +please, and the family had to have it picked out of the walls in the end +and all new paper put on. That's the kind of ideas young men call modern +improvements, and that young man on the woodpile is about as modern and +improving as they make 'em, I take it.</p> + +<p>"I can't say what it is about that young man that I don't like, but, +being as I'm always frank and open with you, I will remark that so far I +ain't found one thing about him as I <i>do</i> like. He's been down cellar +hammering<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[Pg 115]</a></span> on the wall wherever the wind blew him to listeth to hammer, +and I had to sit up-stairs and listen without no chance to blow myself. +I caught him down on all fours this morning peeking under my front +porch, and he didn't even have the manners to blush. As to the way he +makes free with the outside of <i>your</i> house, I wouldn't waste breath +with trying to tell you, but my own feeling is that an architect learns +his trade on a tight-rope to judge from that young man's manner, and +from what I've seen while he was swinging by one arm from your premises, +I wouldn't feel safe to take a bath even on top of a chimney, myself."</p> + +<p>Susan rose at this and went to the window and looked out; from her +expression as she turned, it was plain to be seen that the artist was +still at his task.</p> + +<p>"I don't know, Mrs. Lathrop," she said, coming back to her seat, "I d'n +know, I'm sure, as I'm took with this idea a <i>tall</i>. I never was one for +favors either given or asked, and although I know this isn't no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[Pg 116]</a></span> favor, +but just a evidence of what I've been through with you first and last, +still it's done in spite of me and I've got no feeling that I'm going to +enjoy it. There's something about kindness as is always most trying to +the people who've got no choice but to stand up and be tried. People who +get freely given to is in the habit of getting what they don't want and +can't use, but I ain't. I'm very far from it. There's nothing in me +that's going to be pleased with getting a green hat when I needed a pink +coat—no, sir.</p> + +<p>"And I don't need nothing. Or if I do, I can buy it. I know Jathrop +means it kindly, but Jathrop can't enter into my ways of thinking. +Jathrop is looking into life from the Klondike gold-fields and I'm +looking at it from my back stoop. That young man was out swishing his +pocket handkerchief about and sucking his thumb and holding it up all +yesterday afternoon, and about the time I'd made up my mind to bolt him +out of the kitchen for a lunatic, he come in and told me he really +thought there was wind<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[Pg 117]</a></span> enough in your back yard and my back yard +together to run a windmill, in which case a water system could be easy +inaugurated. I told him I didn't know you could inaugurate anything but +a president, but he said anything as you hadn't had before and thought +was going to work fine and be a great improvement could be inaugurated. +I told him I supposed I could stand a windmill if you could.</p> + +<p>"What do you think—what <i>do</i> you think, Mrs. Lathrop, if that young man +didn't ask if he might go and look up the parlor fireplace! Well, I told +him he could, and I give him a newspaper to shake his head on after he +was done looking, too. He's been in my garret until I bet he knows every +trunk label by heart, and I must say I feel as if I'd have very little +of my own affairs to tell on Judgment Day if he gets dressed and out of +his grave quicker than I get dressed and out of mine. But that isn't +all, whatever you may think. There's a many other things about him as I +don't like and don't like a <i>tall</i>.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[Pg 118]</a></span></p> + +<p>"For one thing, he's got a way of looking around as if it was my house +that was the main thing and I was the last and smallest piece of +cross-paper tied in the kite's tail. To my order of thinking, that's a +far from polite way for a young man as Jathrop's hiring and boarding to +look on a woman whose house he may thank his lucky stars if he may get +the chance to build over. Mrs. Macy says Mrs. Lupey says architects is +all like that, but I'm far from seeing why. I don't consider that young +man superior a <i>tall</i>. I consider his brains as very far from being +equal to my own. When he asks me to hold the other end of his tape-line +and does it just as if a pin would do as well, only I was handier at the +moment, I'm very far from feeling flattered. I never saw just such a +young man before, and when I think of being delivered up to him—house +and all—for the summer, I'm also very far from feeling easy. I d'n +know, I'm sure, what will be the end of this, but I do know that it +looks to me like a pretty bad business."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[Pg 119]</a></span></p> + +<p>Susan paused again and looked at her friend, but Mrs. Lathrop just +rocked onward. Life had widened so tremendously for her that she +couldn't possibly be perturbed in any way or by anything. If the roof +fell in, Jathrop would buy her another, and if she were smashed by it, +Jathrop would have her put together again. Why worry?</p> + +<p>The young man remained ten days in all, and when his visit of +investigation was completed, he returned to New York. Jathrop took him +to the Lotus Club to wash and to the Yacht Club to lunch and to +Claremont in the afternoon (in his motor), and they talked it all over. +The young man had his sketches, ideas, ideals, and plans all tied into a +neat patent cover with cost-estimates lightly glued in the back. Jathrop +was deeply interested, and the young man expounded the inmost soul of +all his measurements and proposed altitudes and alterations. The young +man reminded Jathrop of his pertinent hypothesis that a house should +express its owner. Jathrop's own view of "express"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[Pg 120]</a></span> was that if you +could pay the bill, it beat freighting all out of sight, but he felt +that perhaps the young man meant something different, so he merely gave +him a cigar.</p> + +<p>The young man took the cigar and proceeded to elucidate his hypothesis +by explaining that, having carefully studied both Mrs. Lathrop and Miss +Clegg, he should suggest that Miss Clegg's house express her by being +severely Doric and that Mrs. Lathrop's should be rambling and Queen Anne +with wide, free floor spaces. He further suggested a hyena-headed +door-knocker for Miss Clegg and an electric button to press, so that the +door opened of itself for Mrs. Lathrop. Also a roofless pergola to +connect the two houses. Jathrop liked all his ideas and sketches very +much, but as he was really good-hearted and had not the least desire to +present green hats to those who wanted pink coats, he had the whole book +sent down to his mother and begged her to carefully inspect it in +company with Susan Clegg. They inspected it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[Pg 121]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Well," said Susan, "all I can say is I'll have to carry this book home +and sit down and try and make out what he <i>does</i> mean. He's done it very +neat, that I will say, but between crosses and dotted lines and your +house behind mine like two Roman emperors on a cameo pin, I can't make +head or tail of what's going to be done to either of us. I can't even +find my own house in this plan on some pages, and as for this bird-cage +walk that I'm supposed to run back and forth in like a polar bear in a +circus all day long, my own opinion is that if it's got no roof, it's +going to be very hard indeed about the snow in winter, for I'll have to +carry every single solitary shovelful to one end or the other so as to +throw it out of either your kitchen window or mine. That's all the good +that will do us."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop swung to and fro, totally unconcerned. No sort of +proposition could disconcert her now. If the house when built over +proved a failure, Jathrop would build her another.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[Pg 122]</a></span></p> + +<p>Susan took the prettily-bound portfolio home with her and spent the +evening over it. She studied it profoundly and to some purpose, for the +next morning when she brought it back to Mrs. Lathrop, it held but few +secrets, other than those of a purely technical character, for her.</p> + +<p>"I've been all through it," she said to her friend, "and now I can't +really tell what I think a <i>tall</i>. But this I <i>do</i> know, if we ever +really get these houses, I will be running back and forth from dawn to +dark through that wire tunnel in a way as'll make the liveliest polar +bear that ever kept taking a fresh turn look like a petrified tree +beside me. Why, only to keep the conveniences he's got put in scoured +bright would take me all of every morning in my house, to say nothing of +wiping up the floors, for Jathrop isn't intending to buy us no carpets +ever. We're to sit around on cherry when we ain't on Georgia pine, and +he's got every mantelpiece marked with the kind of wood we're to burn in +it, and he's been kind enough to tell us what<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[Pg 123]</a></span> colored china we're to +use in each bedroom. We're to shoot our clothes into the cellar through +a hole from up-stairs and wash 'em there in those two square boxes as we +couldn't make out. That thing I read 'angle-hook' is a 'inglenook,' and +so far from sitting in it to fish we're to set in it to look at the +fire, if we can get any mahogany to burn in that particular fireplace.</p> + +<p>"Those fans are stairs, we're to go up 'em the way the arrow points, and +heaven knows where or how we're to get down again. What we thought was +beds is closets, and what we thought was closets is beds, and it's +evident with all his hopping and hanging he didn't really charge his +mind with us a <i>tall</i>, for he's got a bedroom in your house marked 'Mr. +Lathrop,' when the last bit of real thought would have made him just +<i>have</i> to remember as you're a widow. He's give me a sewing-room when he +must have seen that I always do my mending in the kitchen, and he's give +us each enough places to wash to keep the whole community clean. I must +say he's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[Pg 124]</a></span> tried to be fair, for he's give both houses the same number of +rooms and the same names to each room. We've each got a summer kitchen, +but he left the spring and autumn to scratch along anyhow; we've each +got a bathtub, and we've each got a china-closet as well as a pantry, +which shows he had very little observation of the way <i>you</i> keep things +in order."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop absorbed all this with the happy calm of a contented (and +rocking) sponge.</p> + +<p>"But what takes me is the way he's not only got a finger, but has just +smashed both hands, into every pie on the place," Susan continued. "He's +moved the chicken-house and give us each a horse and give the cow a calf +without even so much as 'by your leave.' I don't know which will be the +most surprised if this plan comes true—me with my horse, or the cow +finding herself with a calf in the fall as well as the spring this year. +Then it beats me where he's going to get all his trees, for both houses +is a blooming bower, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[Pg 125]</a></span> the way tree-toads will sing me to sleep shows +he's had no close friends in the country. Trees brushing your window +mean mosquitos at night and spiders whenever they feel so disposed. And +that ain't all, whatever you may think, for you haven't got a +window-pane over four inches square and, as every window has fifty-six +of them, I see your windows going dirty till out of very shame I get 'em +washed for your funeral. And that ain't all, whatever you may think, +either, for the snow is going to lodge all around all those little +gables and inglenooks he's trimmed your roof with, and you'll leak +before six months goes by, or I'll lose my guess."</p> + +<p>But it was impossible to impress Mrs. Lathrop. If things leaked, Jathrop +would have them mended. She just rocked and rocked.</p> + +<p>"I don't know what to write Jathrop about these plans," Susan Clegg said +slowly. "Of course, I've got to write him something, and I declare I +don't know what to say. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[Pg 126]</a></span> means it kindly, and there's nothing in the +wide world that makes things so hard as when people mean kindly. You can +do all sorts of things when people is enemies, but when any one means +anything kindly, you've got to eat it if it kills you. Mrs. Allen was +telling me the other day that since she's took a vow to do one good +action daily, she's lost most all of her friends.</p> + +<p>"That just shows how people feel about being grabbed by the neck and +held under till you feel you've done enough good to 'em. Jathrop means +this well, but I've got a feeling as we'll go through a great deal of +misery being built over, and I really don't think we'll be so much +better off after we've survived. You'll have to be torn right down, and +the day that that young man was up on my porch post, he said he couldn't +be positive that I'd keep even my north wall. He pounded it all over in +the dining-room until the paper was a sight, and then when he saw how +very far from pleased I was, he tried to get out of it by saying the +wall would have to come down,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[Pg 127]</a></span> anyhow. I think he saw toward the last +that he'd gone too far in a many little ways. I didn't like his taking +the hens off their nests to measure how wide the henhouse was. I +consider a hen is one woman when she's seated at work and had ought not +to be called off by any man alive. But, laws, that young man wasn't any +respecter of work or hens or anything else! He called himself an artist, +and since I've been studying these plans, I've begun to think as he was +really telling the truth, for artists is all crazy, and anything crazier +than these plans I never did see. Not content with having us wash in the +sink and the cellar, we're to wash under the front stairs, too, not to +speak of all but swimming up-stairs."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop just smiled and rocked more.</p> + +<p>"I'm not in favor of it," said Miss Clegg, rising to go. "I don't +believe it'll be any real advantage. We'll be like the Indians that die +as soon as you civilize 'em—that's what we'll be. The windmill will +keep us awake nights, and you don't use any water to speak<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[Pg 128]</a></span> of, anyhow. +So I don't see why I should be kept awake. As for that laughing tiger +he's give me on my front door, I just won't have it, and that's all +there is about it. A laughing tiger's no kind of a welcome to people you +want, and when people come that I don't want, I don't need no tiger to +let 'em know it. No, I never took to that young man, and I don't take to +his plans. I don't like those four pillars across my front any more than +I do that mouse-hole without a roof that he's give me to go to you in. I +consider it a very poor compliment to you, Mrs. Lathrop, that he's fixed +it so if I once start to go to see you, I've got to keep on, for I can't +possibly get out so to go nowhere else."</p> + +<p>Susan Clegg paused. Mrs. Lathrop rocked.</p> + +<p>"Well?" said Miss Clegg, impatiently.</p> + +<p>But Mrs. Lathrop just rocked. If Susan didn't like it, she needn't like +it. Jathrop would pay the bill.</p> + +<p>Susan Clegg went home, her mind still unconvinced.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[Pg 129]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VI" id="VI"></a>VI</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG UPROOTED</h3> + + +<p>Many things against which we protest bitterly at first we eventually +come to accept and possibly even to enjoy. It was that way, to a degree +at least, with the reconstruction of the houses of Susan Clegg and her +friend Mrs. Lathrop, neither lady being particularly charmed with the +idea when it was originally presented, and Miss Clegg being even frankly +displeased with the plans that were sent down for approval. But the +plans were accepted, nevertheless, after some alterations, and by easy +stages Susan Clegg and Mrs. Lathrop arrived at that degree of philosophy +which enabled them to face with commendable composure the fact that they +must vacate their dwellings for an indefinitely extended period.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[Pg 130]</a></span></p> + +<p>It was not that Miss Clegg had ceased to entertain doubts as to the +advisability of "being renovated," nor was it that Mrs. Lathrop looked +forward gladly to a temporary transplanting of herself and her rocker. +But Jathrop's glory as a millionaire was now so strongly to the fore in +their minds that both bowed, more or less resignedly, to his wishes.</p> + +<p>"I must say I d'n know how this thing is going to work out in the end," +Susan observed to Mrs. Lathrop, as the date set for the beginning of the +work drew nearer. "I'm against it myself, but I ain't against Jathrop, +so I'm giving up my views just to see what will happen. My own opinion +is as it's all very well to build over most anything, but if your house +is to be built over, you've got to get out of it, and I must say as I +don't just see as yet when we get out of our houses what we're going to +get into. Jathrop says we can go to the hotel, and that he'll pay the +bill. Well, I must say it's good he'd pay the bill, for I'd never go to +any hotel if somebody<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[Pg 131]</a></span> else didn't pay the bill—I know that. But even +if I haven't got the bill to pay, I don't feel so raving, raring mad to +go to the hotel. It wouldn't matter to you, Mrs. Lathrop, for nothing +ever does matter to you, and anyway, even if anything had mattered to +you before, you'd not mind it now that Jathrop's come back. But just the +same a hotel does matter to me. They take very little interest in their +housekeeping in hotels, and no matter who's eat off of what, if they can +use it again—and they generally can—they always do. Why, they churn up +the melted odds and ends of ice-cream and serve 'em out as fresh-made +with that cheerful countenance as loveth no giver. And what we'd throw +to the cat they scrape right back into the soup pot, and glad enough to +get it. I don't suppose you'd mind what you ate, nor what kind of a +cloth had dusted your plate, but I was brought up to be clean, and I +don't want to sleep with spiders swinging themselves down to see how I +do it. No, Mrs. Lathrop, I can't consider no hotel, not even in common +affection for Jathrop.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[Pg 132]</a></span> I'd go down a well on my hands and knees to dig +coal for him if necessary, or I'd do any other thing as a woman as +respects Jathrop might do if she didn't respect herself more. But live +in a hotel I will not, and you can write and tell him so, for <i>I</i> don't +want to hurt his feelings. But all kindness has its limits, and if I let +a boy architect run through the heart of my house, I consider as I've +done enough to prove my Christian spirit for one year."</p> + +<p>"What—?" ventured Mrs. Lathrop, but Susan Clegg went right on.</p> + +<p>"I don't see where we're ever going to put our things while they haul +our walls down and rock our foundations. That young man says there won't +be a room as won't have to have something done to it, and I don't want +my furniture spoiled, even if I do have to have my house built over +against my will. My furniture is very good furniture, Mrs. Lathrop. It's +been oiled, and rubbed, and polished ever since it was bought, and none +of the chairs has ever had their middles stepped<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[Pg 133]</a></span> on, and nothing of +mine has got a sunk hole from sitting,—no, sir! My mattresses is all +slept even, from side to side, and there ain't a bottle-mark in the +whole house. It's a sin to take and wreck a happy home like mine. I +shall have untold convenience hereafter, but I shall never take any more +real comfort. That's what I see a-coming. And where under the sun we are +going to put our things the Lord only knows."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop was one of those who rarely take a question as a personal +matter. She made no suggestion; she just rocked.</p> + +<p>"I can see what I've got to be doing," said Susan, a clearer light +breaking. "I've got to be getting up and seeing where you and me can go, +and where we can put our goods. I don't want to live under the same roof +with you if I can possibly help it. And not to do it's going to be hard, +for knowing we're such friends, folks is going to naturally plan to take +us together. I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mrs. Lathrop, and yet I +can't in Christian courtesy deny that to live with you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[Pg 134]</a></span> would drive me +distracted, and so I shan't consider it for a minute. Not for one single +minute. Still, I can't live far from you, for we are old friends, and +the brother that leaveth all else to cleave to his brother wasn't more +close when he done it than I am to you. Besides, if they're building our +houses over, I shall naturally be pretty lively in watching them do it, +and as one of the houses is yours, you'll like to be where I can easy +tell you how it's being done. And so it goes without saying we've got to +be close together. But not too close together."</p> + +<p>All these premises were so undeniably true that the passive Mrs. Lathrop +could not have gainsaid them even had she been so disposed; which she +wasn't.</p> + +<p>Accordingly, upon the very next day, Susan began her search for an +abiding place, and the right abiding place was—as she had +predicted—not to be easily found.</p> + +<p>"There's plenty of places," said Susan, when she returned from her task, +"but they don't any of them suit my views. You're<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[Pg 135]</a></span> easily suited, Mrs. +Lathrop, but I'm not and never will be. I'm of a nature that never is to +be lightly took in vain, nor yet to be just lightly took either. And no +one isn't going to put me in a room that'll be sunny in July, nor yet in +one that will be shady in September. No room as is pleasant in September +can help being most hot in summer; and although I'm willing to be hot in +my own house, I will not be hot in any place where I pay board. You'll +do very well almost anywhere, Mrs. Lathrop, for Lord knows whatever +other virtues you may have, being particular could never be left at your +door in no orphaned basket. But I'm different. Mrs. Brown would take us +until young Doctor Brown and Amelia gets back, and Mrs. Allen would be +glad of the very dust of our feet; but I couldn't go to either of those +two places. Mrs. Brown would have to have both of us, for there's no one +else to take you, and Mrs. Allen would want to read us her poetry. It's +all right to write if you ain't got brains or time for nothing better, +but I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[Pg 136]</a></span> have, and I ain't going to knowingly board myself with no one as +hasn't."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop made no comment. She merely rocked and waited.</p> + +<p>"As for our things," Susan continued, "I've found where we can put +<i>them</i>. It wasn't easy, but I never give up, and Mr. Shores says he's +willing we should have all the back of his upper part. I told him as I +should want to be able to go to 'em any time, and he said far be it from +him to desire to prevent no woman from visiting what was her own. I +could see from his tone as he was thinking of his wife as run off with +his clerk, and it does beat all how you can even make a misery out of a +woman's visiting her furniture if you feel so inclined. So the goods is +off our minds, and now it's just us as has got to be put somewheres till +our own doors is opened to us again. I must say I'd like to know where +we'll end."</p> + +<p>On the very next day the solution was effected.</p> + +<p>"I've got it all fixed," said Susan, returning,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[Pg 137]</a></span> dovelike, with the +evening shadows. "Mrs. Macy'll take one of us and Gran'ma Mullins the +other. Gran'ma Mullins says with Hiram gone to the Klondike and Lucy +gone to her father, either you or me can have their room; only for the +love of heaven we mustn't look like Hiram in bed; for her heart is +aching and breaking, and the car-wheels of his train ain't grinding on +any track half as much as they're grinding in her tenderest spot. Now +the question is, Mrs. Lathrop, which'll go which, and it's a thing as I +must consider very carefully, for Lord knows I don't want to be no more +miserable than I've got to be. And it goes without saying I wouldn't +choose to live with Gran'ma Mullins, nor Mrs. Macy, nor nobody else if I +had my choice. I'm too much give to liking to live alone with myself. Of +course, Mrs. Macy is a pleasanter disposition than Gran'ma Mullins, for +she ain't got Hiram to wear my bones into skin over; but I feel as +living with Mrs. Macy all summer will surely lead to her trying to make +it come out even<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[Pg 138]</a></span> for the rent up to next January, so I would have to +worry over that. Then, too, even if Gran'ma Mullins is wearing, she's +soothing too, and I shall need soothing this summer. I declare, Mrs. +Lathrop, I can't well see how I'm ever going to pack up my things. I +can't see what's to keep 'em from getting scratched and the corners +knocked. How can I fix a toilet set smooth together? A toilet set don't +never fit smooth together; the handles always stick out. And the +frying-pan's got a handle too, and a clothesbar ain't any ways adaptable +to nothing. Chair legs is very bad and table legs is worse, and there's +Mother's wedding-present clock as found its level years ago and ain't +been stirred since. Father give it to her, and it's so heavy I couldn't +stir it if I wanted to, anyhow. But I don't want to stir it. It's my +dead mother's last wish, and as such is sacred. I wasn't to stir Father +nor the clock. It's a French clock, and it's marble. It's a handsome +clock. It was Father's one handsome present to Mother. And now I've got +to put it in storage. And<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[Pg 139]</a></span> then there's our hens. I don't know but what +it'd be wisest to set right to eating them. I know one thing—I'll never +board chickens. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, this is going to be an awful business! +Think of the carpets! Think of the window shades, and my dead mother's +lamberquins! Think of the things in the garret! And the things in the +cellar! And the things in the closets! I don't know, I'm sure, how we'll +ever get moved."</p> + +<p>As the days went on, the slow trend of life brought the problem still +more pressingly to the front. Susan decided to lodge herself with +Gran'ma Mullins. Gran'ma Mullins, whose heart was still very heavy over +Hiram's escape from the home nest, would have preferred Mrs. Lathrop. +Mrs. Lathrop's capacity for listening would have meant much to Gran'ma +Mullins in these hours of bitter loneliness; but Mrs. Macy wanted Mrs. +Lathrop, and Susan didn't want Mrs. Macy, so the outcome of that +question was a fore-gone conclusion.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[Pg 140]</a></span></p> + +<p>When all was settled, Jathrop dispatched emissaries who, with a deftness +and dexterity possessed only by the hirelings of millionaires, descended +on Mrs. Lathrop, and in the course of a single afternoon transferred +her, her rocker, and the whole contents of her bedroom to Mrs. Macy's. +The emissaries offered to do the same thing for Susan Clegg, but she +rejected their aid. Alone and unassisted Susan wrestled with her +packing, and no one ever knew just how she accomplished it. It took her +several days, and it introduced a new order of things into not only her +life but her speech. Her struggle was valiant, but towards the end she +had to call on Felicia Hemans and Sam Durny for help. When, on Saturday +night, Susan arrived at Gran'ma Mullins's, her first observation was +that when the Lord got through with the creation it was small wonder He +arranged to rest on the seventh day.</p> + +<p>"I d'n know as I shall ever get up again," she said to Gran'ma Mullins, +who was watching<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[Pg 141]</a></span> her take off her bonnet. "A apron as has been used to +carry things in for six days is bright and starched beside me. Oh, +Gran'ma Mullins, pray on your folded knees as Hiram won't come back rich +and want to build you over! Anything but that."</p> + +<p>"Oh, if he'll only come back, it's all I'll ask!" returned Gran'ma +Mullins sadly. "To think he can't get there for four weeks yet. And +think of Hiram in a boat! Why Hiram can't even see a mirror tipped back +and forth without having to go right where he'll be the only company. +And then to be in a boat! A boat is such a tippy thing. I read about one +man being drowned in one last week. They're hooking for him with +dynamite to see if they can even get a piece of him back for his wife. +His wife isn't much like Lucy, I guess. Oh, Susan, you'll never know +what I've stood from Lucy! Nobody will."</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg shook her head and looked about her quarters with an eye that +was dubious.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[Pg 142]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I've got some eggs for supper," said Gran'ma Mullins, "one for you and +one for me, and one for either of us as can eat two."</p> + +<p>"I can eat two," said Susan, who thought best to declare herself at the +outset.</p> + +<p>"Is your things all out of the house?" Gran'ma Mullins asked, as they +seated themselves at the table.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes," answered Susan, "everything is out! Towards the last we acted +more like hens being fed than anything else, but we got everything +finished."</p> + +<p>"Did you get the clock out safe?"</p> + +<p>Susan's expression altered suddenly. "The clock! Oh, the clock! What +<i>do</i> you think happened to that clock? And I didn't feel to mind it, +either."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan, you didn't break it!"</p> + +<p>"I did. And in sixty thousand flinders. And I'm glad, too. Very glad. +It's a sad thing as how we may be found out, no matter how careful we +sweep up our trackings. And I don't mind telling you as the bitterest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[Pg 143]</a></span> +pill in my cup of clearing out has been that very same clock."</p> + +<p>"It was such a handsome clock," said Gran'ma Mullins, opening her +naturally open countenance still wider. "Oh, Susan! What did happen?"</p> + +<p>"You thought it was a handsome clock," said Susan, "and so did I. It was +such a handsome clock that we weren't allowed to pick it up and look at +it. Father screwed it down with big screws, so we couldn't, and he wet +'em so they rusted in. I had a awful time getting those screws out +to-day, I can tell you. You get a very different light on a dead and +gone father when you're trying to get out screws that he wet thirty-five +years ago. Me on a stepladder digging under the claws of a clock for two +mortal hours! And when I got the last one out, I had to climb down and +wake my foot up before I could do the next thing. Then I got a block and +a bed-slat, and I proceeded very carefully to try how heavy that +handsome clock—that handsome marble clock—might be. I put the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[Pg 144]</a></span> block +beside it, and I put the bed-slat over the block and under the clock. +Then I climbed my ladder again, and then I bore down on the bed-slat. +Well, Gran'ma Mullins, you can believe me or not, just as you please, +but it's a solemn fact that nothing but the ceiling stopped that clock +from going sky-high. And nothing but the floor stopped me from falling +through to China. I come down to earth with such a bang as brought +Felicia Hemans running. And the stepladder shut up on me with such +another bang as brought Sam Durny."</p> + +<p>"The saints preserve us!" ejaculated Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"It wasn't a marble clock a <i>tall</i>," confessed Susan. "It was painted +wood. That was why Father screwed it down. Oh, men are such deceivers! +And the best wife in the world can't develop 'em above their natural +natures. I expect it was always a real pleasure to Father to think as +Mother and me didn't know that marble clock was wood. I don't know what +there is about a man as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[Pg 145]</a></span> makes his everyday character liking to deceive +and his Sunday sense of righteousness satisfied with just calling it +fooling. Well, he's gone now, and the Bible says 'to him as hath shall +be given,' so I guess he's settling up accounts somewheres. Give me the +other egg!"</p> + +<p>After supper they stepped over to Mrs. Macy's, which was next door, and +the four sat on the piazza in the pleasant spring twilight. Mrs. Macy +was so happy over having Mrs. Lathrop instead of Susan Clegg that she +smiled perpetually. Mrs. Lathrop sat and rocked in her old-gold-plush +rocker. Gran'ma Mullins and Susan Clegg occupied the step at the feet of +the other two.</p> + +<p>"Well, Susan," Mrs. Macy remarked meditatively, "I never looked to see +you leave your house any way except feet first. Well, well, this +certainly is a funny world."</p> + +<p>"Yes," returned Susan, brief for once, "it certainly is."</p> + +<p>"It's a very sad world, I think," contributed Gran'ma Mullins with a +heavy,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[Pg 146]</a></span> heavy sigh. "My goodness, to think this time last spring Hiram +was spading up the potato patch! And now where is he?"</p> + +<p>"Nobody knows," answered Susan. "See how many years it was till Jathrop +come back. But I do hope for your sake, Gran'ma Mullins, that when Hiram +does come back he won't take it into his head to buy this house and +build it over for you."</p> + +<p>Gran'ma Mullins looked at Mrs. Macy, and Mrs. Macy looked back at +Gran'ma Mullins, and a message flashed and was answered in the glances.</p> + +<p>"Well, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins with neighborly interest, "you do +see that the house needs fixing up, don't you?"</p> + +<p>Susan was the owner and Mrs. Macy only the tenant, and the implication +was not at all pleasing to her. She turned with the air of the weariest +worm that had ever done so and gave Gran'ma Mullins a look that could +only be translated as an admonition to mind her own business. Whereupon +Gran'ma<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[Pg 147]</a></span> Mullins promptly subsided, and the subject did not come up +again.</p> + +<p>It was on a Monday—the very next Monday—that the workmen arrived and +set to work to demolish the outer casing of the homes of Susan and Mrs. +Lathrop. Susan went up and stood about for an hour, viewing the way they +did it with great but resigned scorn. She went every day thereafter, and +her heart was rent at the sight of the sacrilege. Then, to add to her +woe, Gran'ma Mullins proved less soothing than had been expected, and +Susan suffered keenly at her hands.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mrs. Lathrop," she said one morning, when the exigencies of +shopping left the two old friends full freedom of intercourse, "if I'm +going to live in that house for this whole summer, the first thing that +I'll have to do is either to change Gran'ma Mullins or change me! I can +see that. Why, I never heard anything like Gran'ma Mullins' views on +Hiram. You've heard Mrs. Macy, and I've told you what Lucy's told me +whenever<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[Pg 148]</a></span> I've met her, but I never had no idea it was anything like +what it is. I'm stark, raving crazy hearing about Hiram. Gran'ma Mullins +says no child was ever like Hiram, and I begin to wonder if it ain't so. +No child ever made such an impression on his mother before,—I can take +my Bible oath on that, for she's talking about him from the time I wake +till long after I'm asleep,—and she remembers things in the stillness +of the night and wakes me up to hear 'em for fear she'll forget 'em +before morning. Last night she was up at two to tell me how Hiram used +to shut his eyes before he went to sleep when he was a baby. She said he +had a different way of doing it from any other child that's ever been +born. He picked it all up by himself. She couldn't possibly tell me just +how he did it, but it was most remarkable. He had it in May and well +into June the year he was born, but along in July he began to lose it, +and by October he opened and shut just like other people's babies. +That's what I was woke up to hear, Mrs. Lathrop, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[Pg 149]</a></span> Herod was a sweet +and good-tempered mother of ten compared to me as I listened. And then +at daybreak if she didn't come in again to explain as Hiram was so +different from all other babies that he crept before he walked, and the +first of his trying to walk he climbed up a chair leg."</p> + +<p>"Why, Jathrop—" volunteered Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Of course. They all do. But I must say I don't see how I'm going to +stand it till my house is ready to receive me back with open bosom if +this is the way she's going on straight along. I wouldn't stay with Mrs. +Macy because I was tired of hearing what she said Gran'ma Mullins said +about Hiram, but it never once struck me that if I stayed with Gran'ma +Mullins I'd have it all to hear straight from the fountain mouth. My +lands alive, Mrs. Lathrop, you never hear the beat! Hiram used to +wrinkle up his face when she washed it, and he never wanted to have a +bath. And he used to bring mud turtles into the house; and when<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[Pg 150]</a></span> she +thinks of that and how now he's off for the Klondike, she says she feels +like going straight after him. She says she could be very useful in the +Klondike. She could polish his pick and his sled-runners, and hang up +his snowy things, and wash out his gold and his clothes. She says she +can't just see how they wash out gold, but she knows how to polish +silver, and she says mother-love like hers can pick up anything. She +goes on and on till I feel like going to the Klondike myself. I'm +getting a great deal of sympathy for Lucy. Lucy always said she could +have been happy with Hiram—maybe—if it hadn't been for his mother. +Lucy's got no kind of tender feeling for Gran'ma Mullins, and I +certainly don't feel to blame her none."</p> + +<p>"Is your—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, striving towards pleasanter paths.</p> + +<p>"Well, it ain't burnt up yet," answered Susan. "I stopped at Mr. Shores' +coming back and took a look at it, and I was far from pleased to find +the door as opens into<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[Pg 151]</a></span> the next room to the room as my furniture is +locked up in a little open. Goodness knows who'd opened it, but it +looked very much like some one had been trying my door, to me. I asked +Mr. Shores, and I saw at a glance as it was news to him, which shows +just how much interest he's taking in looking out for my things. He said +maybe the cat had pushed it open. The cat! I unlocked my door and went +in. The furniture's all safe enough, but it's enough to put any +housekeeper's heart through the clothes wringer only to see how it's +piled. The beds is smashed flat along the wall, and wherever they could +turn a table or a chair upside down and plant something on the wrong +side of it, they've done it. As for the way the dishes is combined, I +can only say that the Lord fits the back to the burden, so the +wash-bowls is bearing everything. They've put Mother's picture in a +coal-hod for safety, and the coal-hod is sitting on the bookcase. It's a +far from cheering sight, Mrs. Lathrop, but you know I was against being +built<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[Pg 152]</a></span> over from the start. When I see the walls of my happy home being +smashed flat and then picked over like they was raisins to see what'll +do to use again, and then when I see my furniture put together in a way +as no one living can make head or tail of, and when I see myself woke up +at three in the night to be told that sometimes when Hiram was a baby he +would go to sleep and sometimes he wouldn't, why I feel as if that Roman +as they rolled down hill in a barrel because he wouldn't stay anywhere +else where they put him was sitting smoking cross-legged compared to me. +I d'n know what I'm going to do this summer. It would just drive an +ordinary woman crazy. But I presume I'll survive."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop looked slightly saddened. "Well, Susan,—" she began to +murmur sympathetically.</p> + +<p>"Oh, it doesn't matter," said Susan. "Of course, if it gets where I +can't stand it, we'll just have to change houses, that's all."</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[Pg 153]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VII" id="VII"></a>VII</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG UNSETTLED</h3> + + +<p>Life under the roof of Gran'ma Mullins eventually—and eventually was a +matter of days rather than weeks—became unbearable for Susan Clegg. At +least, she so decided, and finding opportunity in the fact that both +Gran'ma Mullins and Mrs. Macy had gone to market, Susan hastened to her +old friend, Mrs. Lathrop, and laid open her fresh burden of woes.</p> + +<p>"I can't stand it, Mrs. Lathrop," she declared with strongest emphasis, +"I can't stand it. No matter what the Bible says, a saint on a gridiron +would smile all over and wriggle for nothing but joy only to think as +where he was and wasn't boarding with Gran'ma Mullins. It's awful. +That's what it is—awful. I never had no idea that nothing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[Pg 154]</a></span> could be so +awful. I've got to where I'm thinking very seriously of leaving my +property to Lucy. I'm becoming very sorry for Lucy. Lucy isn't properly +appreciated. Why, Hiram was stung by a bee once,—no ordinary bee, but a +bee a third bigger than the usual bee,—and it swelled up all different +from common, and Gran'ma Mullins thought he was surely going to die +right there before her streaming eyes. But Hiram was so bright he +remembered about putting mud on bee-bites, and he did it. Only there +wasn't no mud, and nobody knew what they could do about it. But Hiram's +mind wasn't like the mind of a ordinary person. Hiram's mind is all +different, and Hiram said, just as quick as scat, to mix water and earth +and make some mud. So they did, and the water and earth, Gran'ma Mullins +says, made the finest mud she ever saw. They covered up Hiram's bee-bite +with it, and it didn't leave so much as a scar. And now there's Hiram in +the Klondike, knowing just what to do when bit by a bee,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[Pg 155]</a></span> but without a +notion what to put on if a seal catches him unawares. And all this going +on hour after hour, Mrs. Lathrop, and me sitting there waiting for my +dinner, half mad anyway over the way my dead-and-gone father's home is +being torn limb from limb, and in no mood to listen to anything. Oh, +laws, no! It's no use. I can't stand it, and I won't either."</p> + +<p>Susan paused expressively.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop gasped. "What will—?"</p> + +<p>"I'm going to find another place to live right away," Susan went on. +"I've too much consideration for you to ask you to go there, Mrs. +Lathrop, and besides, I feel it would be exchanging the fire for the +stew-pan for me to come here. I'm going this town over this very +afternoon, and I think I'll find some place where I can sleep part of +the night, at any rate. I guess I got about three quarters of a hour's +sleep last night. Gran'ma Mullins woke me up weeping on the foot of my +bed before daylight. Just before daylight is her special time for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[Pg 156]</a></span> +recollecting how Hiram used to drink milk out of a cup when he was a +baby, and how he used to eat candy if anybody gave him any, and other +remarkable doings that he did. My lands, I wish Job could have met +Gran'ma Mullins! His friends and his boils would have just been pleasant +things to amuse him, then. I'm going first to Mrs. Allen, and then I'm +going to every one. I shan't make no bones about my errand, for +everybody knows Gran'ma Mullins. I'll have the sympathy of the whole +community. I need sympathy, and I feel I can soak up a good lot of it if +I'm let to."</p> + +<p>"How's the—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"They're still pulling 'em down," said Susan gloomily. "It's a awful +sight, and one that doesn't give me more strength for Gran'ma Mullins. I +shall never have another house that will suit me as mine did, Mrs. +Lathrop. I know that Jathrop means it kindly, and I'm far from being one +to hold any gift-horse by the tail, but the truth is the truth, and I +must say nothing teaches<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[Pg 157]</a></span> you to really prize your cupboards like seeing +men going through 'em with pick-axes. There was many little conveniences +in my house as I never really thought much of until now I see 'em gone +forever. But it's a poor cat that lives on spilt milk, so I'll say no +more of that, but go back and get ready to hunt up a place to live. For +live I must, Mrs. Lathrop, and live I will. And I won't live by eating +and drinking and breathing Hiram Mullins the twenty-four hours round, +neither."</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg's round of visits ended, curiously enough, in her +establishing herself with Lucy Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Which I don't doubt is a very great surprise to you, Mrs. Lathrop," she +confessed to her friend that evening. "But Lucy ran across me in the +street, and when she saw me, those two women who met in the Bible and +knew all each other's business directly was strangers passing on express +trains beside Lucy and me. I took one look at Lucy, and I see she knowed +it all. Judge Fitch is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[Pg 158]</a></span> going to be away a lot this month, seeing where +he can hire his witnesses for a big lawsuit, and Lucy says she and me'll +be alone and able to be silent from dawn to dark and on through the +night. She don't want to have to listen to no manner of talk, she says, +and I can have the second floor all alone to myself, for her and her +father sleep in the wings down-stairs."</p> + +<p>"So you—" said Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I didn't look no more. I was suited, so I didn't see no use in +further fussing. I shall tell Gran'ma Mullins to-night and go there +to-morrow. And I may in confidence remark as no howling oasis in a +desert ever howled for joy the way I'll feel like howling when I get my +trunk on a wheelbarrow again. I've spoke for the wheelbarrow at eight +o'clock to-morrow morning, so I'll be over at Lucy's and settled before +you wake up, Mrs. Lathrop."</p> + +<p>The next day Susan went, and, surprising as it may seem, Gran'ma Mullins +was singularly content over her going.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[Pg 159]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't want to make no trouble between friends," said Gran'ma Mullins, +clambering up Mrs. Macy's steps to sit with Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Lathrop. +"But really, Susan is become most changed since her house is begun to be +built over. I wouldn't hardly have known her. I wouldn't say stuck-up +and I wouldn't say airy, but I will say as she's most changed. I +wouldn't say rude, neither, but I didn't consider it exactly friendly to +always either pull her breath in long and loud or else let it out short +and sharp whenever I mentioned Hiram. Hiram is my only legal and natural +child, and with him in the Klondike, and my heart aching and quaking and +breaking for fear the ice'll thaw and let him through into some +unexpected volcano all of a sudden, how can I but mention him? You know +what Hiram is to me, Mrs. Macy. We haven't lived in these two houses for +forty years without your knowing what Hiram is to me. You remember him +as a baby, Mrs. Macy, but you don't, Mrs. Lathrop, so I'll tell you what +Hiram was as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[Pg 160]</a></span> a baby. Hiram was a most remarkable—"</p> + +<p>When Mrs. Lathrop saw Susan Clegg again, Miss Clegg was looking far from +happy.</p> + +<p>"Are you—?" enquired Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Well, I d'n know," came the answer more than a little dubiously. Then: +"Seeing that I am always frank and open with you, Mrs. Lathrop, I may as +well say plainly as I ain't. Very far from it. I never knew when I went +to live with Lucy as Judge Fitch has got a dog as barks. He ain't no +ordinary dog—he's a most uncommon dog. He only barks when it's +moonlight, or when he hears something, and I must say he's got the +sharpest ears I ever see. But it isn't his barking that's so bad, as it +is that whenever he barks, Lucy gets right up to see whether it's Hiram +come back. It seems the reason Lucy took me to board is she hates to go +around the house alone nights with the dog and a candle. That's a pretty +thing for me to never mistrust till I got there with my trunk. I must +say I don't blame Lucy for not<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[Pg 161]</a></span> liking to go around alone, for the dog +smells your heels all the time, and if he was in the Klondike with Hiram +his nose couldn't be colder. But all the same I think she ought to of +told me. For whatever it may be to others, a cold nose is certainly most +new to my heels. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, we was out hunting with our dog +three times last night, and Lucy says often enough he gets her up nine +and ten times. Lucy's so nervous for fear Hiram'll come back that she +can't possibly sleep if she thinks there's a chance of it. She says if +Hiram's come back, she wants to know it right off. She says that's her +nature. If she's got to have a tooth out, she wants it out at once. She +says she never was one to shrink from nothing. And the dog's prompt, +too. He's quite of the same mind as Lucy. He gives one bark, and then he +don't dilly-dally none. He gets right up, and by the time he's got to +Lucy, Lucy's got up too, and they both come racing up-stairs for me to +join 'em. My door don't lock, so the dog's licking my face before I +know<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[Pg 162]</a></span> where I am. And then, before I know much more where I am, we're +all three capering down-stairs together again. Then we take the whole +house carefully around and listen at every door and window, with the dog +smelling while we listen. Then, when we know for sure as it ain't Hiram, +the dog scrambles back into his basket, and Lucy tucks him up, and she +and I go back to bed alone and untucked. That's a pretty kettle of fish. +And you can believe me or not, just as you please, Mrs. Lathrop, but I +never had no notion of having my heels smelled by a cold dog's nose +three times, and maybe nine, a night when I went to live at Judge +Fitch's, and if it keeps on, I shall just leave. Lucy's got no lease on +me, and although I'm sorry for her, I ain't anywhere near sorry enough +for her to be woke up to pussy-cornering all over the premises with a +dog the livelong night through. As between having Gran'ma Mullins +sitting on my feet wailing over Hiram, and Lucy's dog smelling of my +heels while we hunt for Hiram, I think I'd rather<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[Pg 163]</a></span> have Gran'ma Mullins. +I was warm and comfortable and laid out flat at Gran'ma Mullins, but I'm +goodness knows what at Lucy's. And I do hate having my face licked. I +don't like it. I never was used to such things, and I can't begin now."</p> + +<p>"What will—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I shall look up another nice place to live," said Miss Clegg, "and I +shall take a leaf out of the dog's book and be prompt about it, too. +I've spoke for the wheelbarrow to-morrow at ten o'clock, and I shall +move then, whether or no."</p> + +<p>Susan, again on the lookout for a new abiding place, discovered a most +attractive proposition in Mrs. Allen. Mrs. Allen and her husband lived +alone, were neat and well-fed, and kept no dog.</p> + +<p>"I'll never go where there's a dog again, I know that," said Susan. +"Why, Mrs. Lathrop, if I was in a blizzard in Switzerland and fifty of +those little beer-keg dogs they've got there came scurrying up to rescue +me, I wouldn't get up and let 'em have<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[Pg 164]</a></span> the joy of seeing me obliged. I +won't ever get up for no dog again in my life, I know that. And I know +it for keeps. And there's a bolt on my side of my door at Mrs. Allen's. +I've looked to that, too; and no one is to wake me nights; I've looked +to that. I told Mrs. Allen all the story of what I'd suffered, and she +said she'd see as I had peace in her house. She told me that I'd +suffered because I needed to suffer, but now I was to have peace, and +I'd have it with her. I didn't bother to ask what she meant, for I guess +if she's got any secret thorn, I'll find it out quick enough, anyhow. +And if it's anything that wakes me up nights, my present feeling is as I +won't be well able to bear it. Well, the wheelbarrow is set for ten +o'clock, and so I must go, and when I see you, I'll know what's wrong +with Mrs. Allen, and the Lord help me if it's something as makes me have +to move again. That's all I can say."</p> + +<p>Susan did not visit her old friend directly after her third change of +residence. Two<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[Pg 165]</a></span> whole days passed by, and Mrs. Lathrop was openly +troubled.</p> + +<p>"Don't you worry," said Gran'ma Mullins soothingly. "There's nothing the +matter with her, because I see her in the square this very morning. But +she looked at me odd and went down a side street. I'm sure I hope +Susan's not losing her mind."</p> + +<p>"Oh, wouldn't that be awful!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy with real sympathy. +"We'd have to appoint a commission to catch her and sit on her, and then +if she was put in the insane asylum, I guess Susan Clegg would be mad."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan wouldn't like that a bit," said Gran'ma Mullins meditatively. +"They make little cups and saucers out of beads. I know, because Hiram +had one once. And they read books with the letters all punched out at +you."</p> + +<p>"You're thinking of the Home for the Blind," corrected Mrs. Macy. "I was +there once, too. I don't think Susan would mind going there so much, +because of course she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[Pg 166]</a></span> can see, which would give her a great advantage +over the others, and Susan does like to have an advantage over anybody +else. But I don't believe she'd like going to the Insane Asylum much. +The Insane Asylum's so limited. My husband's sister went to the Insane +Asylum once, but it didn't help her none, so she came home. It wouldn't +ever suit Susan."</p> + +<p>"Well, maybe not," said Gran'ma Mullins amicably. "And I don't think she +could go there, anyway, for she isn't crazy, and she's got her own +money. So why should she be a charge on the county?"</p> + +<p>The very next day Susan came wearily in to see her old friend.</p> + +<p>"Well, I d'n know what I've ever done to have this kind of a summer," +she began, seating herself sadly. "Why didn't I stay in my own house and +just simply take you to board while they laid violent hands on your +house? I was against being built over all along, Mrs. Lathrop, you know +that. And now the fox has his cheese and the cow has<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[Pg 167]</a></span> her corn, just as +the Scripture says, but Susan Clegg's absolutely forced to live with +Mrs. Allen. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, you don't know what living with Mrs. Allen +is, and you can't imagine, either. I never dreamed of such a thing +before I went there. I was a little afraid she'd want to read me her +poetry, but her poetry would have been paradise to what is. Seems as if +Mrs. Allen has got a new kind of religion, and heaven help the present +run of mankind if any more new religions is sprung on us, and heaven +help me if I've got to live long with Mrs. Allen's new one. Mrs. Allen's +new religion is most peculiar. I never see nothing like it. It's +Persian, and it's very singular just to look at. But it's most awful to +live with. Lucy and her dog is simple beside it, and as to Gran'ma +Mullins, she's nothing but a baby dabbing a ball in comparison. +According to Mrs. Allen's new religion, you mustn't find fault with +nothing or nobody—never. Everything's all right, no matter how wrong it +is; and if you lose your purse, you was<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[Pg 168]</a></span> meant to lose it, so why +complain? You was give your purse for just a little while, and in place +of wildly running here and there trying to find it, you must just thank +heaven for kindly letting you have it so long, and think no more about +it. If you're meant to see any more of that purse, it'll kindly look you +up itself. But it's no manner of use your looking for it, because if +heaven takes back a purse deliberately, never intending to return it, it +never does return it, and that's all there is to be said on the subject. +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you think perhaps you can see what it would be to +live with any one that feels to see life in that way; but you don't +really know what you think a good deal of the time, and never less than +now. Mrs. Allen's things is mostly back in heaven's hands again, and her +biscuits is mostly burnt, and not one bit does she care, seeing as she +don't consider as she has the least thing to do with any of it. She's +happy and singing and forgetting from dawn to dark. She says the day'll +soon be that the whole<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[Pg 169]</a></span> earth will see the truth and be singing with +her. She says the toiling millions will cease to toil then, and life'll +be all Adams and Eves and no manner of misery. In the meantime, I don't +get nothing to eat, and when I feel to holler down-stairs, she says +dinner was meant to be late that day, or it couldn't possibly have been +late. Not by no manner of means."</p> + +<p>"Well, I—" commented Mrs. Lathrop blankly.</p> + +<p>"Just my way of seeing it," said Susan, "and she aggravates me still +more with pointing her moral, from dawn to dark. She says it's beautiful +to see how beautiful life comes along. You and me needed quiet, and we +got quiet. And now we need our houses built over, and we're getting 'em +built over. I told her I didn't need my house built over a <i>tall</i>, and +she said as I just thought so, but that I really did, or it wouldn't be +being done. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, I d'n know, I'm sure, what I will run up +against next. But I don't believe I can<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[Pg 170]</a></span> stay at Mrs. Allen's. I really +don't. There's one thing—it'll be mighty easy to leave her, for I +shan't have to say nothing. I shall say I was meant to leave and then +and there leave. It's a poor religion as don't fit others as easy as its +own selves; and I ain't washed in the Allens' dirty rain water full of +dead and drowned bugs for two days because I was meant to wash and they +was meant to drown, without learning how to turn even a drowned bug to +my advantage. No, sir, I'm going out this afternoon and see what I can +get, and if I can't do no better, I'll buy a bolt for my door and come +back to Gran'ma Mullins. Gran'ma Mullins has her good points. I always +said that, Mrs. Lathrop, Gran'ma Mullins certainly has her good points. +And I must learn to bear Hiram if I must. There's one thing certain: I +can hear about Hiram in bed, and I don't have to get up and out of bed +to hunt for him. And whatever else Gran'ma Mullins does, she don't burn +her bread and blame it on the Almighty. Mrs. Allen's got the Bible so +pat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[Pg 171]</a></span> that you don't need to do nothing, according to her—nothing a +<i>tall</i>, but just sit still and let the world turn you around with its +turning. She says Solomon said the little lilies didn't spin, and so why +should she? Well, if we're to quit doing everything that lilies don't +have a hand in, I must say we'll soon be in a pretty state. I never was +one to admire Solomon like some people, and as for David, I think he was +a fool—dancing around the ark like he'd just got it for Christmas!"</p> + +<p>Susan searched long and wearily for a fourth abiding place that +afternoon, but in the end she had to speak for the wheelbarrow for the +next morning and move back to Gran'ma Mullins's.</p> + +<p>And Gran'ma Mullins was very glad to see her back.</p> + +<p>"Your bed's all made up with the same sheets for you, Susan," she said +cordially, "and I ain't even swept so as to spoil the homelike look. +You'll see your own last burnt matches and all, just as you left 'em."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[Pg 172]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I've bought a bolt for my door," said Susan, "and I'll beg to borrow a +screwdriver and something sharp to put it on with."</p> + +<p>"I'll get 'em," agreed Gran'ma Mullins happily, "and I won't wake you no +more nights, Susan. I suppose it's only natural that you, never having +been married, can't possibly know the feelings of a mother. But I meant +it kindly, Susan. When Lucy speaks of Hiram, she means it unkindly. But +when I speak of Hiram, I always mean it kindly."</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know," said Susan, "and if I believed like Mrs. Allen does, I'd +know I was meant to listen and wouldn't mind. But I don't take no stock +in that religion of Mrs. Allen's, and I won't be woke up. And although I +don't want to hurt your feelings, I do want that understood right from +the beginning."</p> + +<p>"I'll remember," said Gran'ma Mullins submissively. "And now I'll fetch +the screwdriver."</p> + +<p>That evening the four friends sat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[Pg 173]</a></span> pleasantly once again on Mrs. Macy's +piazza.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Lathrop had a letter from Jathrop to-day. Did you know that, +Susan?" asked Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"No, I didn't," returned Susan Clegg. "What did he say?"</p> + +<p>"He's going sailing to the West Indies in his new boat," Mrs. Macy +informed her. "He's going for his health, and he's going to take three +other millionaires and their own doctor."</p> + +<p>Susan appeared unimpressed.</p> + +<p>"He sent his mother a book about the place where he's going," said Mrs. +Macy. "Do you want to see it?" She went in and brought it out.</p> + +<p>Susan took the volume and viewed the title with an indifferent eye.</p> + +<p>"<i>Stark's Guide to the Bahamas</i>," she read aloud. "What are +they—something to eat?"</p> + +<p>"You're thinking of bananas," suggested Mrs. Macy. "It's islands. It's +where Columbus hit first. Nobody knows just where<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[Pg 174]</a></span> he hit, but he hit +there; everybody knows that."</p> + +<p>Susan placed the book under her arm. "I'll read it," she said briefly. +"But I must say as to my order of thinking Jathrop's setting off just +now is very much like a hen getting up from her eggs. Here's you and +me—" addressing Mrs. Lathrop directly—"with our houses done away with, +and him as has engineered the wreck skipping away with a parcel of men."</p> + +<p>"He isn't skipping," interposed Mrs. Macy. "He's sailing—sailing in his +own private boat, like the tea-man with the cup."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I don't care what he's doing," said Susan, rising. "I'm about beat +out, and I'm going home and going to bed. Such a week! The Bible says +'Whom the Lord loveth He chaseth,' and heaven knows I've been chased +this week till my legs is about wore off. Such a week! I've had all the +chasing I want for one while. And I never was great on being loved, so +I'm going home and going to bed."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[Pg 175]</a></span></p> + +<p>Whereupon, with the <i>Guide to the Bahamas</i> under her arm and a heavy +fold between her brows, Susan Clegg stalked over to her temporary +domicile.</p> + +<p>"I don't think Susan's very well," said Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Maybe she's worried over Jathrop," suggested Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop said nothing. She just rocked.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[Pg 176]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="VIII" id="VIII"></a>VIII</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CYCLONE</h3> + + +<p>"I d'n know, I'm sure, what star this town could ever have been laid out +under," said Susan Clegg, one exceptionally hot night as the four +friends sat out on Mrs. Macy's steps, "but my own opinion is as it must +have been a comet, for we're always skiting along into some sort of hot +water. When it ain't all of us, it's some of us, and when it ain't some +of us, it's one of us, and now the walls of my house is up I'd be +willing to bet a nickel as a calamity'll happen along just because +something's always happening here and my walls is the youngest and +tenderest thing in the community now."</p> + +<p>"Your roof ain't—" began Mrs. Lathrop.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[Pg 177]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Of course not; how could it be, when my walls is only just up? I don't +wish to be casting no stones at him as is the least among us, but I will +say, Mrs. Lathrop, as Jathrop's orders seem to be taking you up under +the loving protection of their wings, while I'm running around like I +was a viper without no warm bosom to hatch me. <i>Your</i> walls have been up +and a-doing for a week, but my walls have been sitting around waiting +until I was nigh to put out. To see your laths going in and your plaster +going on, while I stay lumber and nails, is a lesson in yielding to the +will of heaven as I never calculated on. There's few things more +aggravating than to see some other house speeding along while your own +house sits silently, patiently waiting. Of course I can't say nothing, +as even the boy as carries water knows my house is going to be a present +to me in the end. It's all right, and likely enough the Lord has seen +fit to send this summer to me as a chastisement; but I will say that if +I'd known how this summer<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[Pg 178]</a></span> was going, the Lord would most certainly have +had to plan some other way to punish me. I don't say as it wasn't +natural that your walls should go up first, Jathrop being your son, and, +now that he's rich, no more to me than a benefactor—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan!" expostulated Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"That's what he is, Mrs. Macy; he's my benefactor, and I can't escape if +I want to. You may tend a man's mother ten years, day and night, house +cleanings and cistern cleanings, moths and the well froze up, and if the +man comes back rich, he's your benefactor."</p> + +<p>"Susan!" cried Mrs. Lathrop, "you—"</p> + +<p>"Don't deny it, Mrs. Lathrop; it's the truth. It's one of those truths +that the wiser they are, the sadder you get. It's one of those truths as +is the whole truth and a little left over; and I'm learning that I'm to +be what's left over, more every day. After a life of being independent +and living on my own money, I'm now going down on my knees learning the +lesson of being humbly grateful for what I don't want. I may<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[Pg 179]</a></span> sound +bitter, but if I do it isn't surprising, for I feel bitter; and Gran'ma +Mullins knows I'm always frank and open, so she'll excuse my saying that +there's nothing in living with <i>her</i> as tends to calm me much. A woman +as sleeps in a bed as Hiram must have played leap-frog over all his life +from the feel of the springs, and pours out of a pitcher as has got a +chip out of its nose, ain't in no mood to mince nothing. I never was one +to mince, and I never will be—not now and not never. Mincing is for +them as ain't got it in them to speak their minds freely; and my mind is +a thing that's made to be free and not a slave."</p> + +<p>"Well, really, Susan," expostulated Mrs. Macy, "what ever—"</p> + +<p>"Don't interrupt me, Mrs. Macy. I'm full of goodness knows what, but +whatever it is, I'm too full of it for comfort. There's nothing in the +life I'm leading this summer to make me expect comfort, and very little +to make me feel full, but there's things as would make a man dying of +starvation bust<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[Pg 180]</a></span> if he experienced them. And I'm full of such things. I +never had no idea of being out of my house all summer, and now, when my +walls is up at last, and it looks like maybe I'd get back a home feeling +some day soon, I must up and get quite another kind of feeling—a +feeling that something is going to happen. It's a very strange feeling, +and at first I thought it was just some more of Gran'ma Mullins' +cooking; but it kept getting stronger, and when I was in the square, I +spoke to Mr. Kimball about it; and he says this is cyclone weather, and +maybe a cyclone is going to happen. He says a man was in town yesterday +wanting to insure everybody against fire and cyclones. Most everybody +did it. Mr. Kimball says after the young man got through, you pretty +much had to do it. Them as had policies with the company could get the +word 'cyclone' writ in for a dollar. I guess the young man did a very +good day's work. Mr. Kimball says if it's true as there's any cyclones +coming nosing about here, he wants his dried-apple machine<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[Pg 181]</a></span> insured +anyhow. It's a fine machine, and every kind of fruit as is left over +each night comes out jam next day, while all the vegetables make +breakfast food. He says it's a wonder."</p> + +<p>"What makes him think we're going to have a cyclone?" inquired Mrs. Macy +anxiously.</p> + +<p>"He says the weather is cyclony. And he says if I feel queer that's a +sign, for I'm a sensitive nature."</p> + +<p>"I never—" said Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"No, nor me, neither. But Mr. Kimball seemed to feel there wasn't no +doubt. He says I'm just the kind of sensitive nature as could feel a +cyclone. Why, he says cyclones take the roofs off the houses!"</p> + +<p>"Ow!" cried Gran'ma Mullins in surprise.</p> + +<p>"If one's coming, I'm glad to know, for I never see one near to," said +Mrs. Macy pensively.</p> + +<p>"You won't see it a <i>tall</i>," said Susan, "for Mr. Kimball says the only +safe place in a cyclone is the cellar; and to pull a kitchen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[Pg 182]</a></span> table over +you to keep the house from squashing you flat when it caves in."</p> + +<p>"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"That's what he said. But he says not to worry, for the young man told +him as they're getting so common no one notices them any more. He says +they're always going hop, skip, and jump over Kansas and everywhere, and +no one pays no attention to 'em. He knows all about it. But he wanted it +clear as he was only insuring for <i>cyclones</i>; he says his firm wouldn't +have nothing to do with tornadoes. You can get as much on a cyclone as +on a fire, but you can't get a penny on a tornado—"</p> + +<p>"What's the diff—" asked Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"That's the trouble; nobody can just tell. A cyclone is wind and +lightning mixed by combustion and drove forward by expulsion, the young +man told Mr. Kimball. He said they'd got cyclones all worked out, and +they can average 'em up same as everything else, but he says a tornado +is something as no man<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[Pg 183]</a></span> can get hold of, and no man will ever be able to +study. Tornadoes drive nails through fences—"</p> + +<p>"Where do they get the nails?" asked Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"I d'n know. Pick 'em out of the fences first, I guess. And they strip +the feathers off chickens and scoop up haystacks and carry them up in +the air for good and all."</p> + +<p>"Oh, my!" cried Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Kimball said the young man told him that a tornado dug up a +complete marsh once in Minnesota and spread it out upside down on top of +a wood a little ways off; and when there's a tornado anywhere near, the +sewing-machines all tick like they was telegraphing."</p> + +<p>"No!" cried Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"Yes, the young man said so."</p> + +<p>"But do you believe him?"</p> + +<p>"I don't know why not. I wouldn't believe Mr. Kimball because he's +always fixing up his stories to sound better than they really are, which +makes me have very little<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[Pg 184]</a></span> faith in him; but Judge Fitch says he'd make +a splendid witness for any one just on that very account. Judge Fitch +says with a little well-advised help Mr. Kimball would carry convictions +to any man,—he don't except none,—but I see no reason why the young +man wasn't telling the truth. Young men do tell the truth sometimes; +most everybody does that. A tornado catches up pigs and carries 'em +miles and pulls up trees by the roots. I don't wonder they won't insure +'em."</p> + +<p>"The pigs?" asked Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"No, the tornadoes."</p> + +<p>"What's the signs of a tornado?" asked Gran'ma Mullins uneasily.</p> + +<p>"Well, the signs is alike for both. The signs is weather like to-day and +a kind of breathlessness like to-night. Mr. Kimball says a funnel-shaped +cloud is a great sign; and when you see it, in three minutes it's on +you, and off goes your roof if it's a cyclone, and off you go yourself +if it's a tornado."</p> + +<p>"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[Pg 185]</a></span> clutching the arms of her +old-gold-plush stationary rocker.</p> + +<p>"Do people ever come down again?" Gran'ma Mullins inquired; she was very +pale.</p> + +<p>"Elijah didn't, Mr. Kimball says."</p> + +<p>"Elijah Doxey?" cried Mrs. Macy. "Why, is he off on a cyclone? No one +ever told me."</p> + +<p>"No, Elijah in the Bible, you know. The Elijah as was caught up in a +chariot of fire. Mr. Kimball says there ain't a mite of doubt in his +mind but that it was a tornado. I guess Mr. Kimball told the truth that +time, for it's all in the Bible."</p> + +<p>"That's true," said Gran'ma Mullins. "I remember Elijah myself. He kept +a tame raven, seems to me, or some such thing."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan!" Mrs. Lathrop cried out suddenly. "There's a fun—" Her +voice failed her; she raised her hand and pointed.</p> + +<p>Susan turned quickly, and her face became suddenly gray-white. "It can't +be a cy—" she faltered.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[Pg 186]</a></span></p> + +<p>With that all four women jumped different ways at once.</p> + +<p>"Where shall we go?" shrieked Mrs. Macy. "Oh, saints and sinners +preserve us! Oh, Susan, where shall we go?"</p> + +<p>But Susan Clegg stood as if paralyzed, staring straight at the +funnel-shaped cloud.</p> + +<p>Gran'ma Mullins started for her own house; Mrs. Lathrop sprang up and +clasped the piazza post nearest; Mrs. Macy grabbed her skirts up at both +sides and faced the cyclone just as she had once faced the cow.</p> + +<p>The funnel-shaped cloud came sweeping towards them. The town was +between, and a darkness and a mighty roar arose. Buildings seemed +falling; the din was terrible.</p> + +<p>"I knew it," said Susan grimly. "It <i>is</i> a cyclone!" She faced the +worst—standing erect.</p> + +<p>The next instant the storm was on them all. It lifted Mrs. Lathrop's +old-gold-plush stationary rocker and hurled it at that good<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[Pg 187]</a></span> lady, +smashing her hard against the post. It raised the roof of Mrs. Macy's +house and dropped it like an extinguisher over the fleeing form of +Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Gran'ma Mullins, it <i>is</i> a cyclone!" Susan shrieked. But Gran'ma +Mullins answered not.</p> + +<p>A second mighty burst of fury blew down two trees, and it blew Susan +herself back against the side wall of the house which shook and swayed +like a bit of cardboard.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, it's a cyclone," Susan screamed over and over. "Oh, Mrs. +Lathrop, it's a real cyclone! It isn't a tornado; you can see the +difference now. It's a cyclone; look at the roof; it's a cyclone!"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop could see nothing. She and the old-gold-plush stationary +rocker were all piled together under the piazza post.</p> + +<p>And now came the third and worst burst of fury. It crashed on the +blacksmith's shop; it carried the sails of the windmill swooping down +the road, and then "without halting, without rest" lifted Mrs. Macy +with<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[Pg 188]</a></span> her outspread skirts and carried her straight up in the air. "Oh! +Oh!" she shrieked and sailed forth.</p> + +<p>Susan gave a piercing yell. "Oh, Mrs. Macy, it's a tornado, it's a +tornado!" But Mrs. Macy answered not.</p> + +<p>Tipping, swaying, ducking to the right or left, she flew majestically +away over her own roof first and then over that of Gran'ma Mullins' +woodshed.</p> + +<p>"Help! Help!" cried Gran'ma Mullins from under the roof.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop was oblivious to all, smashed by her own old-gold-plush +stationary rocker.</p> + +<p>Susan Clegg stood as one fascinated, staring after the trail which was +all that was left of Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"It was a tornado!" she said over and over. "Mrs. Macy'll always believe +in the Bible now, I guess. It was a tornado! It <i>was</i> a tornado!"</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>"No, they ain't found her yet," Susan said, coming into the hotel room +where Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[Pg 189]</a></span> Lathrop and Gran'ma Mullins had found a pleasant and +comfortable refuge and were occupied in recuperating together at +Jathrop's expense. Neither lady was seriously injured. Gran'ma Mullins +had been preserved from even a wetting through the neat capping of her +climax by Mrs. Macy's roof; while Mrs. Lathrop's squeeze between the +piazza post and her well beloved old-gold-plush stationary rocker had +not—as Gran'ma Mullins put it—so much as turned a hair of even the +rocker.</p> + +<p>"No one's heard anything from her yet," continued Susan, "but that ain't +so surprising as it would be if anybody had time to want to know. But +nobody's got time for nothing to-day. The town's in a awful taking, and +I d'n know as I ever see a worse situation. You two want to be very +grateful as you're so nicely and neatly laid aside, for what has +descended on the community now is worse'n any cyclone, and if you could +get out and see what the cyclone's done, you'd know what <i>that</i> means."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[Pg 190]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Was you to my house, Susan?" asked Gran'ma Mullins anxiously.</p> + +<p>"I was; but the insurance men was before me, or anyhow, we met there."</p> + +<p>"The insurance men!"</p> + +<p>"That's what I said,—the insurance men. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, we all know +one side of what it is to insure ourselves, but now the Lord in his +infinite wrath has mercifully seen fit to show us the other side. The +Assyrian pouncing down on the wolf in his fold is a young mother +wrapping up her first baby to look out the window compared to those +insurance men. They descended on us bright and shining to-day, and if we +was murderers with our families buried under the kitchen floor, we +couldn't be looked on with more suspicion. I was far from pleased when I +first laid eyes on 'em, for there's a foxiness in any city man as comes +to settle things in the country as is far from being either soothing or +syrupy to him as lives in the country; but you can maybe imagine my +feelings when they very plainly<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[Pg 191]</a></span> informed me as I couldn't put the roof +back on Mrs. Macy's house till it was settled whether it was a cyclone +or a tornado—"</p> + +<p>"Settled—whether—" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Cyclone or tornado," repeated Susan. "The first thing isn't to get to +rights, but it is to settle whether we've got any rights to get. I never +dreamed what it was to be injured—no, or no one else neither. Seems if +it's a tornado, we don't get a cent of our insurance. And to think it +all depends on Mrs. Macy."</p> + +<p>"On Mrs.—" cried Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Yes, because she's the only one as really knows whether she was carried +off or not. Well, all I can say is, if she don't come back pretty quick, +we're going to have a little John Brown raid right here in town; we—"</p> + +<p>"But what—?"</p> + +<p>"I'm telling you. It'll be the town rising up against the insurance men, +and the insurance men will soon find that when it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[Pg 192]</a></span> comes to +dilly-dallying with folks newly cycloned upside down, it's life and +death if you don't deal fair. What with chimneys down and roofs turned +up at the corner like the inquiring angels didn't have time to take the +cover all off but just pried up a little to see what was inside,—I say +with all this and everything wet and Mrs. Macy gone, this community was +in no mood to be sealed up—"</p> + +<p>"Sealed up!" cried Mrs. Lathrop and Gran'ma Mullins together.</p> + +<p>"That's what it is. Sealed up we are, and sealed up we've got to stay +until Mrs. Macy gets back—"</p> + +<p>"But—" cried Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Everybody's just as mad as you are. Charging bulls is setting hens +beside this town to-night. Even Mr. Kimball's mad for once in his life; +he's losing money most awful, for he can't sell so much as a paper of +tacks. They've got both his doors and all his windows sealed, and he's +standing out in front with nothing to do except to keep a sharp eye<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[Pg 193]</a></span> out +for Mrs. Macy. He says it ain't in reason to expect as she'll fly back, +but she's got to come from somewhere, and he means to prevent her +getting away again on the sly. He says his opinion is as she'd have +stood a better chance before airships was so common. He says ten years +ago folks would have took steps for hooking at her just as quick as they +saw her coming along, but nowadays it'd be a pretty brave man as would +try to stop anything he saw flying overhead. I guess he's about right +there. It's a hard question to know what to do with things that fly, +even if Mrs. Macy hadn't took to it, too. My view is that we advance +faster than we can learn how to manage our new inventions. I d'n know, +I'm sure, though, what Mrs. Macy is going to do about this trip of hers. +She went without even the moment's notice as folks in a hurry always has +had up to now. She's been gone most twenty-four hours. She's skipped +three meals already, not to speak of her night and her nap; and you know +as well as I do<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[Pg 194]</a></span> how Mrs. Macy was give to her nights and her napping."</p> + +<p>Susan shook her head, and Mrs. Lathrop looked wide-eyed and alarmed.</p> + +<p>"But now—" Gran'ma Mullins asked.</p> + +<p>"I've been all over the place," Susan continued. "I didn't understand +fully what was up when I scurried off to try and get those men to put +the roof back on Mrs. Macy's house, but I know it all now. It's no use +trying to get anybody to do nothing now; the whole town's upside down +and inside out. I never see nothing like it. And the insurance men has +got it laid down flat as nobody can't touch nothing till it's settled +whether it's a cyclone or a tornado. Seems a good many was insured for +cyclones right in with their fires without knowing it; but there ain't a +soul in the place insured against a tornado, because you can't get any +insurance against tornadoes—no one will insure them. The insurance men +say if it's a tornado, we won't have nothing to do except to do the best +we can; but if it's a cyclone, we<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[Pg 195]</a></span> mus'n't touch anything till they can +get some one to judge what's worth saving and how much it's worth and +deduct that from our insurance. That's how it is."</p> + +<p>"But what has—?" began Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"How long—?" demanded Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Nobody knows," said Susan. "The whole town is asking, and nobody knows. +The insurance company won't let anybody go home or get anything unless +they'll sign a paper giving up their insurance and swearing that it was +a tornado. Mr. Dill just had to sign the paper because he was taking a +bath and had nothing except the table cover to wear. He signed the paper +and said he'd swear anything if only for his shoes alone; and it seems +that his house isn't hurt a mite, and he didn't have no insurance +anyhow. A good many is blaming him, but he says he really couldn't think +of anything in the excitement and the table cloth. It's a awful state of +things. The cyclone has tore everything to pieces, and the insurance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[Pg 196]</a></span> +men has put their seal on the chips. People is being drove to all +lengths. The minister and his family is camping in the henhouse. Our +walls is fell in so goodness knows what will happen to you and me next, +Mrs. Lathrop. The wires is all down, so we can't hear nothing about the +storm. The rails is all up, so there's no trains. The church is stove +in, so we can't pray. But I must say as to my order of thinking, it +looks as if no one feels like praying. The insurance men is running all +over, like winged ants hatching out, sealing up more doors and more +windows every minute and getting more signatures as it was a tornado +before they'll unstick them. Nothing can't be really settled till Mrs. +Macy comes back. Mrs. Macy is the key to the whole situation."</p> + +<p>"But why—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"The Jilkins is in from Cherry Pond, and all it did there was to rain. +The Sperrits was in, too, and the storm was most singular with them. It +hailed in the sunshine till<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[Pg 197]</a></span> they see four rainbows—they never see the +beat. Mr. Weskins is advising everybody to go into their houses and make +a test case of it. Judge Fitch is advising everybody not to. It's plain +as he's on the side of the insurance men. He says just as they do, that +we'd better wait till Mrs. Macy comes back and hear her story. He says +in the very nature of things her view'll be a most general one. He says +all there is to know she'll know; she'll know the area affected and be +able to tell whether it was electricity or just wind. Mr. Kimball said +if she went far enough, she'd be a star witness; but no one thinks that +jokes about Mrs. Macy ought to be told now. The situation is too +serious. It may be <i>very</i> serious for Mrs. Macy. If the storm stopped +sudden, it may be very serious indeed for Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Macy isn't as +young as she was, and she hadn't the least idea of leaving town; she +wasn't a bit prepared, that we can all swear to. She was just carried +away by a sudden impulse—as you might say—and the main question is +how<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[Pg 198]</a></span> far did she get on her impulse, and where is she now? To my order +of thinking, it all depends on how she come down. Cycloning along like +she was, if she come down on a pond or a peak, she'll be far from +finding it funny. I was thinking about her all the way here, and I can't +think of any way as'll be easy for her to come to earth, no matter how +she comes. And if she hits hard, she isn't going to like it. Mrs. Macy +was never one as took a joke pleasant; she never made light of nothing. +She took life very solemn-like—a owl was a laughing hyena compared to +Mrs. Macy. It's too bad she was that way. My own view is as she never +got over not getting married again. Some women don't. She always took it +as a reflection. There's no reflection to not getting married; my +opinion is as there's a deal of things more important and most thing's +more comfortable. If Mrs. Macy was married, she'd be much worse off than +she is right now, for instead of being able to give her whole time and +attention to whatever she's doing and looking over, she'd<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[Pg 199]</a></span> be wondering +what he was giving his time and attention to doing and prying into. When +a man's out of your sight, you've always got to wonder, and most of the +time that's all in the world you can do about a man. Now Mrs. Macy's +perfectly independent, she can go where she pleases and come down when +she pleases, and she hasn't got to tell what she saw unless she wants +to. Mrs. Brown says she ain't never been nowhere. It's plain to be seen +as Mrs. Brown's envying Mrs. Macy her trip."</p> + +<p>"But why—?" began Gran'ma Mullins with great determination.</p> + +<p>"That's just it," replied Susan promptly. "I declare, I can't but wonder +what'll happen next. I'm in that state that nothing will surprise me. +Everything's so upset and off the track there's no use even trying to +think. My walls is fell into my cistern, and Mrs. Macy's roof is sitting +on the ground beside her house yet. The insurance men has sealed up +Gran'ma Mullins' house, and they wouldn't leave the henhouse open till I +signed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[Pg 200]</a></span> a affidavit on behalf of the hens and released 'em from all +claims for feed. Mr. Dill said they tried to seal up his cow. They've +got Mr. Kimball's dried-apple machine tied with a rope. It's awful."</p> + +<p>"But Susan—" interrupted Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Weskins says the great difficulty is the insurance men say they +don't see how anything is going to be settled or decided until we hear +from Mrs. Macy. The point's right here. If she comes back, it's evidence +as it was a tornado, because if she comes back it proves as she was +carried off, in which case the insurance men won't have to pay nothing +anyhow, and we'll all be unsealed and allowed to go to work putting our +roofs back on our heads and clearing up as fast as we can. But Mr. +Weskins says if Mrs. Macy don't come back, there'll be no way to prove +as she was even carried off by the storm for you, Mrs. Lathrop, had your +back turned; and you, Gran'ma Mullins, was under the roof; and I'm only +one, and it takes two witnesses to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[Pg 201]</a></span> prove anything as is contrary to law +and nature."</p> + +<p>"Do they doubt—?" cried Mrs. Lathrop, quite excited—for her.</p> + +<p>"Yes, they do. They doubt everything. Insurance men don't take nothing +for granted. They've decided to just pin their whole case to Mrs. Macy, +and there's Mrs. Macy gone away to, heaven knows where."</p> + +<p>"Well, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins, "we must look on the bright side. +Mrs. Macy'll have something to talk about as'll always interest +everybody if she does come back, and if she don't come back, we'll +always have her to remember."</p> + +<p>"Yes, and if we don't get our houses unstuck pretty soon, we'll remember +her a long while," said Susan darkly.</p> + +<p>Three days passed by and no word was heard from Mrs. Macy. As soon as +the telegraph assumed its usual route, messages were sent all about in +the direction whither she had flown, but not a trace of her was +discovered by any one. The town was very much<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[Pg 202]</a></span> wrought up, for although +its members were given to having strange experiences, no experience so +strange as this had ever happened there before. The exasperation of +being barred out of house and home until Mrs. Macy should be found, +naturally heightened the interest. Everybody had had just time to add +the magic word "cyclone" to their policies before the cyclone came +"damaging along"—as Susan Clegg expressed it. Susan was much perturbed.</p> + +<p>"Well, Mrs. Lathrop,"—she said on the afternoon of the third day, as +she came into the hotel room where the mother of the millionaire was now +equal to her usual vigorous exercise in her old-gold-plush stationary +rocker. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you may well be grateful as Jathrop has got +money enough for us to be living here, for the living of the community +is getting to be no living a <i>tall</i>."</p> + +<p>Gran'ma Mullins, still in bed, turned herself about and manifested a +vivid interest, "Well, Susan," she said, "it's three days now; how long +is this going to keep up?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[Pg 203]</a></span></p> + +<p>"It can't keep up very much longer, or we'll have a new French +Revolution, that's what we'll have," said Susan. "Why, the community is +getting where it won't stand even being said good morning to pleasantly. +The children is running all over, pulling each other's hair, and Deacon +White says he's going to buy a pistol. Things is come to a pretty pass +when Deacon White wants to buy a pistol, for he's just as afraid of one +end as the other. But it's a straw as shows which way the cyclone blew +his house."</p> + +<p>"But isn't something—?"</p> + +<p>"Something has got to be done. The boys stretched a string across the +door of the insurance men's room this morning, and they fell in a heap +when they started out; and some one as nobody can locate poured a +pitcher of ice water through the ventilator as is over their bed. Seeing +that public feeling is on the rise, they sent right after breakfast for +the appraisers, and they're going to begin appraising and un-sealing +to-morrow morning. They've entirely give up the idea of waiting<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[Pg 204]</a></span> for +Mrs. Macy. The town just won't stand for any more hanging around waiting +for nothing. I never see us so before. Every one is so upset and divided +in their feelings that some think we'd ought to horsewhip the insurance +men, and some think we'd ought to hold a burial service for Mrs. Macy."</p> + +<p>"I wouldn't see any good in holding a service for Mrs. Macy," said +Gran'ma Mullins. "She wouldn't have been buried here if she was dead; +she was always planning to go to Meadville when she was dead."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Susan, "I know. Because Mrs. Lupey's got that nice lot with +that nice mausoleum as she bought from the Pennybackers when they got +rich and moved even their great-grandfather to the city."</p> + +<p>"I remember the Pennybackers," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Old man +Pennybacker used to drive a cart for rags. It was a great day for the +Pennybackers when Joe went into the pawnbroker business."</p> + +<p>"Yes," said Susan, "it's wonderful how rich men manage to get on when +they're<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[Pg 205]</a></span> young. Seems as if there's just no way to crowd a millionaire +out of business or kill him off. I'm always reading what they went +through in the papers, but it never helped none. A millionaire is a +thing as when it's going to be is going to be, and you've just got to +let 'em do it once they get started."</p> + +<p>"It was a nice mausoleum," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Mrs. Macy has told me +about it a hundred times. It's so big, Mrs. Lupey says, she can live up +to her hospitable nature at last, for there's room for all and to spare. +Mrs. Macy was the first person she asked. Mrs. Macy thought that was +very kind of just a cousin. There's only Mrs. Kitts there, now, and Mrs. +Lupey's aunt, Mrs. Cogetts."</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Macy didn't know she had a aunt," said Susan. "Mrs. Cogetts came +way from Jacoma just on account of the mausoleum. That's a long ways to +come just to save paying for a lot where you are, seems to me; but some +natures'll go to any lengths to save money."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[Pg 206]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I wonder where Mrs. Macy is now," said Gran'ma Mullins, with a sigh.</p> + +<p>"Nobody knows. A good many is decided that it's surely a clear case of +Elijah, only nobody pretends to believe in the Bible so much as to think +that she can go up and stay there. Mrs. Macy'd have to come down, and +the higher she went the more heaven help her when she does come down. +Mrs. Macy was very solid, as we all know who've heard her sit down or +seen her get up, and I can't see no happy ending ahead, even though we +all wish her well. The insurance men is very blue over her not coming +back, for they expected to prove a tornado sure; but even insurance men +can't have the whole world run to suit them these days. Anyhow, my view +is as it's no use worrying. Spilt milk's a poor thing to cook with. If +you're in the fire, you ain't in the frying-pan. The real sufferers is +this community, as is all locked out of their houses. The Browns is +living in the cellar to the cowshed, with two lengths of sidewalk laid +over them. Mrs. Brown says she feels<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[Pg 207]</a></span> like a Pilgrim Father, and she +sees why they got killed off so fast by the Indians,—it was so much +easier to be scalped than to do your hair. Mr. and Mrs. Craig takes +turns at one hammock all night long. Mrs. Craig says they change +regular, for whoever turns over spills out, and the other one is sitting +looking at the moon and waiting all ready to get in."</p> + +<p>"I declare, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins warmly, "I think it's most +shocking. I won't say outrageous, but I will say shocking."</p> + +<p>"But what are you going to do about it?" said Susan. "That's the rub in +this country. There's plenty as is shocking, but here we sit at the +mercy of any cyclone or Congress as comes along. Here we was, peaceful, +happy, and loving, and a cyclone swishes through. Down comes half a +dozen men from the city and seals up everything in town. I tell you you +ought to have heard me when they was sealing up your house and Mrs. +Macy's. I give it to 'em, and I didn't mince matters none. I spoke my +whole mind, and it was a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[Pg 208]</a></span> great satisfaction, but they went right on and +sealed up the houses."</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan," began Mrs. Lathrop, "how are—?"</p> + +<p>"All in ruins," replied Susan promptly. "I don't believe you and me is +ever going to live in happy homes any more. Fate seems dead set against +the idea. And nobody can get ahead of Fate. They may talk all they +please about overcoming, and when I was young I was always charging +along with my horns down and my tail waving same as every other young +thing; but I'm older now, and I see as resignation is the only thing as +really pays in the end. I get as mad as ever, but I stay meek. I wanted +to lam those insurance men with a stick of wood as was lying most handy, +but all I did was to walk home. Mr. Shores says he's just the same way. +We was talking it over this morning. He says when his wife first run off +with his clerk, he was nigh to crazy; he says he thought getting along +without a wife was going to just drive him out of his senses, and he +said her taking<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[Pg 209]</a></span> the clerk just seemed to add insult to perjury, but he +says now, as he gets older, he finds having no wife a great comfort."</p> + +<p>"I wish Jathrop would—" sighed Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Well, he will, likely enough," said Susan. "Now he's rich, some girl +will snap him up, and he won't find how he's been fooled till three or +four months after the wedding."</p> + +<p>"I suppose Jathrop could marry just any one he pleased now," said +Gran'ma Mullins, sighing in her turn. "Hiram didn't have no choice; +Jathrop'll have a choice."</p> + +<p>"He may be none the better for that," said Susan darkly. "If Jathrop +Lathrop is wise, he'll not go routing wildly around like a president +after a elephant; he'll stick to what's tried and true. But I have my +doubt as to Jathrop's being wise; very few men with money have any +sense."</p> + +<p>"Who do <i>you</i> think—?" began Mrs. Lathrop, looking intently at Susan.</p> + +<p>"I d'n know," said Susan, looking hard at Mrs. Lathrop; "far be it from +me to judge."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[Pg 210]</a></span></p> + +<p>"They do say, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins wisely, "as he'll end up by +marrying you. Everybody says so."</p> + +<p>Susan shook her head hard. "It's not for me to say. Affairs has been +going on and off between Jathrop and me for too many years now for me to +begin to discuss them. What is to be will be, and what isn't to be can't +possibly be brought about."</p> + +<p>Gran'ma Mullins sighed again, and Mrs. Lathrop went on rocking. As she +rocked, she viewed Susan Clegg from time to time in a speculative +manner. It was many, many years since she had suggested to Susan the +idea of marrying Jathrop.</p> + +<hr style="width: 45%;" /> + +<p>It was the next morning that Mrs. Macy re-appeared on the scene. The +insurance men had unsealed all the houses, and the result was her +discovery.</p> + +<p>"Well, you could drown me for a new-born kitten, and I'd never open my +eyes in surprise after <i>this</i>," Susan expounded to the friends at the +hotel. "But Mrs. Macy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[Pg 211]</a></span> always <i>was</i> peculiar; she was always give to +adventures. To think of her living there as snug as a moth in a rug, +cooking her meals on the little oil-stove—"</p> + +<p>"But where—?" interposed Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I'm telling you. She's been sleeping in a good bed, too, and being +perfectly comfortable while we've all been suffering along of waiting +for her to come back."</p> + +<p>"But Susan—" cried Gran'ma Mullins, wide-eyed.</p> + +<p>"I'll tell you where she was; she was in your house—that's where she +was. The cyclone just gave her a lift over your woodshed, and then it +set her down pretty quick. She says she came to earth like a piece of +thistledown on the other side. Her story is as your back door was open, +so she run in, and then it begun to rain, so she saw no reason for going +out again. When it stopped raining, she looked out and seen nobody. That +isn't surprising, for we wasn't there. She thought that it was strange +not seeing any lights, but she started to go home, and she says <i>what</i><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[Pg 212]</a></span> +was her feelings when she fell over her own roof in the path. She says +of all the strange sensations a perfectly respectable woman can possibly +ever get to start to go home and fall over her own roof is surely the +most singular. She says she was so sleepy she thought maybe she was +dreaming, and not having any lantern, it was no use trying to +investigate, so she just went back to your house and went to bed in my +bed. She says she dreamed of Hiram's ears all night long. I'd completely +forgot Hiram's ears, which is strange, for they was far and away the +most amusing things in this community. I think that way he could turn +'em about was so entertaining. That way he used to cock 'em at you +always give him the air of paying so much attention. They say he never +cocked 'em at Lucy but once—"</p> + +<p>"Oh, my, that once!" exclaimed Gran'ma Mullins involuntarily.</p> + +<p>"It was a sin and a shame for Lucy to choke Hiram's ears off like she +did," Susan declared warmly. "She just seemed to take<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[Pg 213]</a></span> all the courage +right out of 'em. Hiram always reminded me of a black-and-tan as long as +he had the free use of his ears, but after Lucy broke their backbone +like she did, he never reminded me of much of nothing." Susan paused to +sigh. Gran'ma Mullins wiped her eyes.</p> + +<p>"You and Hiram give up to Lucy too much," said Susan. "I wish she'd +married me."</p> + +<p>"I wish she had, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins. "I wouldn't wish to seem +unkind to the wife of my born and wedded only son, but I do wish that +she'd married you, and if Hiram could only see Lucy with a mother's +clear blue eye, he'd wish it, too."</p> + +<p>"Where is—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, desiring to recur to the main object +under discussion.</p> + +<p>"Oh, she's gone straight over to Meadville," said Susan. "Oh, my, she +says, but think of her feelings as she sat inside that nice, comfortable +house and realized that she was the only person in town with a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[Pg 214]</a></span> roof +over her head! You see, she heard me talking with the insurance men, and +she didn't know why we was to be sealed up, but she got it all straight +as we was going to be turned out of house and home, and she says she +made up her mind as no one should ever know as she was in a house and so +come capering up to put her out. She says she settled down as still as a +mouse, made no smoke, and never lit so much as a candle nights. Mrs. +Macy is surely most foxy!"</p> + +<p>"And she's gone to Meadville?" said Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"Yes, she didn't want to pay board here, and her own house hasn't got no +roof, so she's gone to Mrs. Lupey. Old Doctor Carter was over here to +appraise the damage done to folks, and he took her back with him."</p> + +<p>"I wonder if she'll ever—" wondered Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"I d'n know. If folks talk about a marriage long enough, it usually ends +up that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[Pg 215]</a></span> way. Doctor Carter and Mrs. Macy has been kind of jumping at +each other and then running away for fifteen years or so. They say he'd +like her money, but he hates to be bothered with her."</p> + +<p>"She wouldn't like to be bothered with him, either," said Gran'ma +Mullins.</p> + +<p>"I know," said Susan. "That's what's making so few people like to get +married nowadays. They don't want to be bothered with each other."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop fixed her little, black, beady eyes hard on Susan.</p> + +<p>Susan stared straight ahead.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[Pg 216]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="IX" id="IX"></a>IX</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG'S PRACTICAL FRIEND</h3> + + +<p>"Mrs. Sperrit can't stand it no longer, and she's going visiting," +announced Susan Clegg to the three friends who, seated together on Mrs. +Macy's piazza, had been awaiting her return from down-town. Both Mrs. +Macy and Gran'ma Mullins were now back in their own houses after the +temporary absence due to the cyclone, and Mrs. Lathrop and she who might +yet be her daughter-in-law were reëstablished as their paying guests.</p> + +<p>"Why, I never knew that Mr. Sperrit was that kind of a man," said +Gran'ma Mullins, opening her eyes very wide indeed. "I wouldn't say he's +han'some, and I wouldn't say he's entertaining; but I always thought +they got on well together."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[Pg 217]</a></span></p> + +<p>"He isn't that kind of a man a <i>tall</i>," rejoined Susan, who had been +holding one hatpin in her mouth while she felt for the other, but now +freed herself of both. "It's just that Mrs. Sperrit's sick of all this +clutter of mending up after the cyclone. She says she's nervous for the +first time in her life and has got to have a change. She says the +carrying off of the barn and its never being heard from any more has got +on her nerves somehow, even if it was only a barn. She says God forgive +her and not to mention it to you, Mrs. Macy, but she wishes every hour +of her life as the cyclone had took you and left their barn, because the +barn had her sewing-machine in it, and she'd as leave be dead as be +without that sewing-machine."</p> + +<p>"Where—?" mildly interpolated Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Mr. Sperrit says wherever she likes. He's been upset by the barn too, +because it had his tool-chest in it, and he's such a handy man with his +tools that he feels for her in a way as not many women get felt for."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[Pg 218]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Where does—?" began Gran'ma Mullins.</p> + +<p>"She didn't know at first, but now she thinks she'll go and stay with +her cousin. She hasn't had much to do with her cousin for years, and she +says she feels as maybe the barn was a judgment. She never got along +well with her cousin. She says her cousin was pretty, with curls, and +she herself was freckled, with straight hair, and so it was only natural +as she always hated her. I don't feel to blame her none, for curls is +very hard on them as is born straight-haired. But there was more reasons +than one for Mrs. Sperrit not to get along with her cousin, and she says +it never was so much the curls as it was her not being practical. Mrs. +Sperrit is practical, and she's always been practical, and her cousin +wasn't. They didn't speak for years and years."</p> + +<p>"Whatever set 'em at it again?" asked Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"Well, Mrs. Sperrit says it come by degrees. She says she first noticed +as her cousin was trying to make up about five years<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[Pg 219]</a></span> ago, but she +thought she'd best wait and be sure. Mrs. Sperrit's practical; she don't +never look in anywhere until she's leaped around the edge enough to know +what she's doing. She says her cousin named her first boy Gringer, which +is Mrs. Sperrit's family name; but then, it is the cousin's family name, +too, so she didn't pay any attention to that. Then she named her first +girl Eliza, which, as we know, is Mrs. Sperrit's own name, but seeing as +it was the name of the grandmother of both of them, she didn't pay any +attention to <i>that</i>, either. Then she named the second boy Sperrit, +which was a little pointed, of course; and Mrs. Sperrit says if her +cousin had been practical, she would certainly have thought that the +Sperrits ought to have given the child something. But she wasn't and +didn't, and they didn't. Then she named the second girl Azile—which is +Eliza spelt backwards—and Mrs. Sperrit says it was the spelling of +Eliza backwards as first showed her how awful friendly her cousin was +trying to get to be. Then, when she named the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[Pg 220]</a></span> third boy Jacob, after +Mr. Sperrit, and the fourth boy Bocaj—which is Jacob spelled +backwards—Mrs. Sperrit says that it was no use pretending not to see. +Besides, naming the baby Bocaj just did go to her heart, particularly as +the baby wasn't very strong, anyway. So since then the Sperrits has sent +'em a turkey every Thanksgiving and a quarter apiece to the children +every Christmas."</p> + +<p>"What's she named the other children?" asked Mrs. Macy with real +interest.</p> + +<p>"Why, there ain't no more yet. Bocaj is only six months old."</p> + +<p>"Oh, then they ain't sent no turkey yet!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"No, not yet, but when they begin, they'll keep it up steady. And now +Mrs. Sperrit says she'll go and visit and see for herself how things +are. She's not very hopeful of enjoying herself, for she says visiting a +person as isn't practical is most difficult. She knows, because when she +taught school, she used to board with a family as was that way. She says +she kept the things she bought then,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[Pg 221]</a></span> and she shall take 'em all to her +cousin's. She says when you stay with any one as isn't practical, you +must take your own spirit-lamp, and teapot, and kettle, and tea, and +matches, and a small blanket, and pen and ink, and a box of crackers, +and a sharp knife, and some blank telegrams, and a good deal of +court-plaster, and a teacup, and sugar if you take it, and a ball of +good heavy string, and your own Bible, and a pillow. And never forget to +wear your trunk-key round your neck, even if you only go down-stairs to +look at the clock. She's got all those things left over from her +school-teaching days. She says everything always comes in handy again +some time if you're practical, and she thanks God she's practical."</p> + +<p>"I don't think that I should care to visit that way," said Gran'ma +Mullins thoughtfully. "I wouldn't say I wouldn't, and I wouldn't say I +couldn't, but I don't think—"</p> + +<p>"She's going Tuesday," continued Susan Clegg. "Mr. Sperrit says she can, +and she's going Tuesday. She's written her cousin,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[Pg 222]</a></span> and her cousin's +written her. Her cousin says they'll be too glad for words, and for her +to stay till Christmas—or till Thanksgiving, anyway. Mrs. Sperrit says +she won't do that, but she'll stay until the end of next week if she can +stand her cousin's husband. She says she never had any use for her +cousin's husband, because he isn't practical either, and when he was +young, his tie was never on straight. Mrs. Sperrit says a man that wears +his tie crooked when he's young is the kind to keep shy of later. She +says he'll never have a pocket knife and borrow hers, and never have a +pencil and borrow hers. And then, too, she's almost sure as by this time +he's spoilt her cousin's temper; and visiting a cousin whose temper's +spoilt wouldn't be fun, even if she was practical. Which this one +ain't."</p> + +<p>"If her cousin's got a sharp tongue I—" began Gran'ma Mullins in quiet, +sad reminiscence.</p> + +<p>"She was buying some wood alcohol and a cheap spoon at Mr. Kimball's," +Susan went<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[Pg 223]</a></span> on. "She took me in her buggy and drove me up to look at our +houses, which is trying feebly to climb again to where they was before +the cyclone. But they're a sorry sight. I don't know when we're ever +going to get into them, I'm sure. I only wish Jathrop was to see how +slow those carpenters can be." Then Miss Clegg's countenance assumed a +coy expression, her eyes lowered bashfully, and her fingers nervously +sought to touch between the buttons of her waist some treasured object +hidden within. "I—I had a letter from him to-day."</p> + +<p>And at that all three listeners started in more or less violent +amazement.</p> + +<p>"What!" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Nothing that I can tell any one," said Susan serenely. "So it's no use +asking me another word about it."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Sperrit left on Tuesday precisely and practically as she had +planned; but she returned very much sooner than she had expected.</p> + +<p>"And no wonder," declared Susan, just<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[Pg 224]</a></span> back from the Sewing Society, to +Mrs. Lathrop, who never went. "I should say it was no wonder. Well, Mrs. +Sperrit has had an experience, and I guess no lost barn will ever lead +her into looking up no more cousins after this."</p> + +<p>"She's so worn-looking," said Gran'ma Mullins, who had returned with +Susan. "I wouldn't say white, and I wouldn't say worried, but I call it +peaked."</p> + +<p>"Why, she's been through enough to make a book," said Mrs. Macy, who had +come in with the others, "—a book like <i>The Jungle</i>, as makes you right +down sick in spots."</p> + +<p>"Oh, <i>The Jungle</i> isn't so bad," said Susan. "If it was, Roosevelt would +have straightened it out soon enough when he was in it himself. But +what's awful about Mrs. Sperrit is what she has suffered, for that woman +certainly has suffered. She's a lesson once for all as to visiting. No +one as hears her is ever going lightly visiting after this. She lost her +trunk-key as soon as she landed in the house, and she says she was too +took up<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[Pg 225]</a></span> to miss it for three days, which shows what kind of a time she +had. Why, her cousin went right to bed as soon as she got there, because +she said as she knowed that Mrs. Sperrit was practical and could do +everything better than she could. So that was a nice beginning to begin +with. Well, she says such a house you never see. The chickens come into +the dining-room, and they was raising mud turtles in the bathtub, and +caterpillars in the cake-box. The children was awful right from the +start. She slept in the room with two of them, and they woke her up +mornings playing shave with the ends of her braids. She found out as +they dipped 'em first in the water pitcher and then in the tooth powder +to make it like lather."</p> + +<p>"My heavens alive!" exclaimed Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Then Jacob, who's only two and a half, ate mashed potatoes with his +fingers, which is a thing, Mrs. Sperrit says, as must be seen to be +believed, and they all just swum in jam from dawn to dark. She says she +never see<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[Pg 226]</a></span> such children, anyway. Whenever anybody sat down, they'd play +she was the Alps, and go back and forth over her wherever they could get +a purchase. And she says—would you believe it?—her cousin is got to be +so calm that it drives you out of your senses only to see the way she +takes things. Mrs. Sperrit says all she can say is as when a woman as +isn't practical does go to bed, she's resigned to that degree that you +wish you could blow her up with dynamite if only to see her move quick +just once."</p> + +<p>"Why didn't she come home?" asked Mrs. Macy. "My view would be as I'd +come home. I said so to her to-day."</p> + +<p>"She did come home, didn't she?" said Miss Clegg. "You heard her, and +you know she's home. It's Mrs. Lathrop as all this is new to, isn't it? +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, it would go to your heart to hear what happened to +all those little conveniences as she took. There wasn't no sharp knife +in the house but hers, so she never see hers after she unpacked it. +There wasn't no string<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[Pg 227]</a></span> or court-plaster either, so they disappeared +too. Then they run out of tea the minute they see she brought some, and +not being practical, her cousin's teapot naturally didn't have no nose, +so she lost her teapot, too. The whole family took her hairbrush and +used it for a clothes brush, and she thinks for a shoe brush when she +was down-town. Her cousin wore her stockings and her collars, and her +cousin's husband slept on the pillow with the blanket folded around him. +Not being practical, he liked his feet free."</p> + +<p>"Well, I nev—!" ejaculated Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Mrs. Sperrit said by the third day she had to begin to do something, so +she asked if she could clean her own room, and her cousin said she was +going to let her make herself happy in her own way and just to go ahead +and clean the whole house if she liked. So she went to work and cleaned +the whole house, and she says such a house she never dreamed could +exist. She found families of mice, and families of swallows, and +families of moths. She found things as had been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[Pg 228]</a></span> lost for years, and +they was wild with delight to see 'em again. She found things as, she +says, she wouldn't like to say she found, because when all's said and +done a cousin is still a cousin, but she says—Good lands, what she +found! Well, she says when she got the house cleaned, her cousin was +still in bed, so she took heart of grace and asked if she might teach +the children to mind. Her cousin said she didn't care, so Mrs. Sperrit +went to work on those six children. Well, she says that was a job, and +it was that as led to her coming away like she did. She says the +children was the very worst children anybody ever saw. She says she +taught school, and she thought she knew children, but anything like +those children nobody—even those as is chock full of things not fit to +eat—could ever by any possibility of dreamed of. Why, she says they was +used to heating the poker and jabbing one another with it when mad; and +while you was leaning down to tie your shoe, they'd snatch your chair +away from behind you, and such games. But Mrs.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[Pg 229]</a></span> Sperrit is practical, +and she believes in her Bible, and she thought as how the Lord had +delivered them into her hands and set to work. She said she begun by +washing them all—for they was always slippery from jam. And then she +cut their nails very short and started in. Well, she says it was some +work, for they was so funny she could hardly keep from laughing. She +says they're mighty bright children—she must say that for 'em, although +it don't soften her feelings a mite towards 'em. Well, she says you +couldn't do nothing a <i>tall</i> with 'em. But she didn't lose courage. When +she talked serious, they took it as a great joke, and she had to stop +for meals so often that it used her all up; for she says such steady +eating she never see. She says the meals was most terrible, too, as they +always had herring, and of course the bones made so much picking that +the children kept telling her she ate with her fingers, herself. She +says that was the most awful part, the way they talked back. But she +didn't despair. She kept washing them out<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[Pg 230]</a></span> of the jam and taking a fresh +cut at their nails, until finally come the last hour of wrath. And then, +she says, they did make her mad—good and mad."</p> + +<p>"But what did—?" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Well, seems the worst child was 'Zile. Of course, Mrs. Sperrit, having +taught school, thought they'd pronounce it like Azalea, and make a real +pretty name out of Eliza spelt backwards, but seems they dropped the A +and just called her 'Zile to rhyme with file; and Mrs. Sperrit says she +rhymed with file all right."</p> + +<p>"Go on, Susan," urged Mrs. Macy.</p> + +<p>"Well, the cousin and the husband was invited to go on a all-day +excursion, so the cousin got up and dressed and went. She said she might +as well, seeing as Mrs. Sperrit was there with the children. When they +was gone, Mrs. Sperrit made up her mind as now was her chance to bring +those children to time, once and for all. So she rolled up her sleeves +and give 'em all a good bath—for she says the way they'd get freshly +jammed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[Pg 231]</a></span> was most astonishing—and then she went up-stairs to get her +scissors to cut their nails. She was opening her trunk to get out the +scissors when she heard a click. Well, when she run to the door, what do +you suppose? She found they'd locked her in.</p> + +<p>"Well, maybe you can imagine her feelings! She says she was never so mad +in all her life. She called through the door, but not a sound. There was +a crack big enough to put your hand through under the door, and she +tried to look through it, but it wasn't high enough to put your eye to. +Then she heard a shout and run to the window. There they all was, out on +the grass in front,—all but Bocaj, who was asleep in his cradle +down-stairs. Well, such doings! She says 'Zile, who was always full of +ideas, was just outstripping herself in ideas this time. They had a old +pair of scissors, and first they went to work for half an hour cutting +each other's hair. She says you can maybe think of her feelings in the +upper window, left in charge of 'em, with full permission to whip 'em +if<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[Pg 232]</a></span> necessary, and having to sit and watch 'em trim each other anyway +the notion hit 'em. She says tying a man to a tree while cannibals eat +up his family is the only thing as would express it a <i>tall</i>. After they +got done cutting hair, they went in and got a pot of jam and brought it +out and sat down in full sight and eat jam with their fingers till there +was no more jam. She says she'd stopped calling things to 'em by that +time and was just sitting quietly in the window, thanking God for every +minute as they stayed where she could see what they was doing. But when +they had finished the jam, they went in the house and was so deathly +quiet she was scared to fits. She thought maybe they was setting fire to +something. But after a while they begun to bang on the piano, and when +she was half crazy over the noise, she looked towards the door, and +there was the key poked under. She made a jump for the key, and it was +jerked back by a piece of string. And her own string at that. Then she +was called to the window by Gringer yelling, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[Pg 233]</a></span> while she was trying +to hear what he had to say—the piano jangling worse than ever—they +opened the door suddenly and bundled Bocaj into the room and then locked +the door again.</p> + +<p>"The baby was just woke up and hungry, and it was a pretty kettle of +fish. She says she made up her mind then and there to quit that house +and adopt Bocaj. She says she saw as there was no use trying to reform +the rest; but Bocaj was so little and helpless, and nothing in her heart +made her feel as he couldn't be raised to be practical. She went to work +and fed him crackers soaked in boiling water while she packed her trunk. +And when her cousin came home, she was sitting with her bonnet on ready +to go. Her cousin just naturally felt awful. She wanted to call it a +joke; but Mrs. Sperrit is a woman whose feelings isn't lightly took in +vain. She left, and she took Bocaj with her. She telegraphed Mr. +Sperrit, and he met her at the train. He was some disappointed because +he'd forgotten about the baby's name and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[Pg 234]</a></span> thought from reading it in the +telegraph that she was bringing back a monkey. Seems Mr. Sperrit has +always wanted a monkey, and she wouldn't have one. But now she says he +can have a monkey or anything else, if he'll only stay practical. She +says she doesn't believe she could ever live with any one as wasn't +practical, after this experience."</p> + +<p>Susan paused, Mrs. Macy and Gran'ma Mullins rose to go to their kitchens +and get suppers for their guests. When they had gone, Susan, having Mrs. +Lathrop alone, eased a troubled conscience.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Mrs. Lathrop," she confided, "do you remember me saying the other +evening I'd had a letter from Jathrop?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop suddenly stopped rocking. "Yes—yes, Susan," she answered +eagerly. "I—"</p> + +<p>"Well, I didn't have one. It was just as everybody in this community has +got their minds fixed on Jathrop's being wild about me, so I felt to +mention a letter, and I shall<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[Pg 235]</a></span> go on mentioning getting a letter from +him whenever the spirit moves me."</p> + +<p>"Why, Susan—!" exclaimed Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"It doesn't hurt him a <i>tall</i>," said Susan Clegg with calm decision, +"and it saves me from being asked questions. And you know as well as I +do, Mrs. Lathrop, that I can have him if I want him."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop sat open-mouthed, dumb.</p> + +<p>"If I don't have him, it'll be because I don't want him," added Miss +Clegg with dignity. "So it's no use your saying one other word, Mrs. +Lathrop."</p> + +<p>And Mrs. Lathrop, thus adjured, refrained from further speech.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[Pg 236]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="X" id="X"></a>X</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG DEVELOPS IMAGINATION</h3> + + +<p>"Far be it from me, Mrs. Lathrop," said Susan Clegg, returning from an +early errand down-town and dropping in at Mrs. Macy's to find her friend +still in her own room and rocking in her old-gold stationary rocker. It +was now autumn, and to take the chill off the room an oil burner was +brightly ablaze. "Far be it from me to say anything disrespectful of +such a good Samaritan as your son Jathrop, but as we have it in the +scriptures, he certainly does move in a mysterious way his neighbors to +inform. It's mighty good of him to go to all the expense of building +over my house in a way I'd never in this wide world have had it if I +could 'a' understood those plans of that boy architect, and it may +be—providing we escape<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[Pg 237]</a></span> earthquake, fire, blood, and famine—that I'll +get into it once more before next summer, notwithstanding it's all of +two months behind yours, you being his mother, Mrs. Lathrop, and me only +your friend. But a early frost is sure to crack the plaster, and, seeing +as the glass blowers has gone on a strike, there's no telling when +they'll blow the panes for the windows. Just the same, kind and good as +Jathrop is, he might have had more consideration for me as would this +day have been his wife, if I'd felt to answer him with a three-letter +word instead of a two, than to put me on the pillar of scorn before a +community as has known me always as a scrupulous lover of the voracious +truth."</p> + +<p>"You don't—" began Mrs. Lathrop, in mild astonishment.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I do," continued Susan, with growing indignation. "Jathrop has +done his best to make me out a liar, and I don't know as I'll ever be +able to hold my head up again. He's struck me in the tenderest spot he +could strike me in, and not boldly neither, but in a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[Pg 238]</a></span> skulking, +underhand way that makes it all the bitterer pill to swallow."</p> + +<p>"I can't see—" objected Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"No, nor me neither. But he did, and in no time everybody'll know it +from Johnny, at the station, to Mrs. Lupey in Meadville, not forgettin' +the poor demented over to the insane asylum. And it all comes of those +letters I have been getting from Jathrop during the summer."</p> + +<p>"But—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, I know and you know there was no letters a <i>tall</i>. But everybody +else, except you and me and the postmaster, believed I had a letter +regular every week. Whenever I run short of subjects at the Sewing +Society, I just fell back on my last letter from Jathrop and told them +all about what he was doing in those islands. I'd read the book he sent, +and I'd read it to good profit. There was some things as I didn't quite +understand, of course, but on them I just put my own interpretations, +and knowing Jathrop as I did, it was easy enough for me to figure out +how<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[Pg 239]</a></span> he'd be most likely to act in a strange, barbaric land. The book +didn't have a word to say about the costumes of the native tribes, but +I'm not so ignorant as not to know how those South Sea Islanders never +wear nothing more hamperin' than sea-shell earrings and necklaces of +sharks' teeth; and I'd read, too, that foreign visitors, on account of +the unbearable heat, was in the habit of adoptin' the native fashions in +dress. When you get started makin' things up, there's no knowing just +where you're likely as to end. It's so easy to go straight ahead and say +just whatever you please that seems in any way interesting. And so, when +Mrs. Fisher asked me one day whether I supposed there was any cannibals +there, I said there was one cannibal tribe that was most ferocious and +had appetites that there was no such thing as quenchin'. I said that in +Jathrop's last letter he had written me about how this tribe had +captured the cook off the yacht and that when they finally found his +captors and defeated them in a desperate battle lasting three days,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[Pg 240]</a></span> all +that was found of the cook was two chicken croquettes."</p> + +<p>"For gra—!" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"That's what Mrs. Fisher said. Of course, with the cook eat up—all but +what was in the two croquettes, that is,—Jathrop and his millionaire +friends was a good deal put about. There wasn't a one of 'em as knew the +first thing about cooking, and after the exercise of the three days' +battle they was most awful hungry. And then, I says, quoting from the +letter from Jathrop which never came, they had a piece of real luck, +just as millionaires is always having. They had taken one prisoner, and +by means of signs, not knowin' a word of the cannibal language, they +discovered that the prisoner was the cook of the tribe. He pointed to +the croquettes as a example of his handiwork, and Jathrop said that he +never saw anything in the cookin' line that looked more toothsome than +they did. So, of course they engaged the cannibal cook on the spot and +carried him back to the yacht with 'em. Everything<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[Pg 241]</a></span> went well for a few +days, but on a day when they had invited the chief of a friendly tribe +to dinner, there was something as aroused their suspicions. The +principal dish for the feast was, so far as they could make out from the +cook's sign-language, a savory rabbit stew. Now as they had never seen +or heard tell of a rabbit in the Bahamas, they was naturally curious to +learn where the cook had managed to dig it up. He either couldn't or +wouldn't tell. I says that Jathrop says you might 'a' thought that the +cook was a thirty-second degree mason and that the origin of the rabbit +was a thirty-second degree masonic secret. The millionaires gathered in +council and discussed the question, pro and con, from every obtainable +or imaginable angle. Then, just as they were about to adjourn without +having reached any conclusion whatever, they rang for the cabin boy to +fetch some liquid refreshment. But there wasn't no answer. And they +might 'a' been ringing yet as to any good it would do. They never did +see that cabin boy, and the only one to eat<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[Pg 242]</a></span> the savory rabbit stew was +the visiting chief."</p> + +<p>"I don't—" observed Mrs. Lathrop, rocking faster.</p> + +<p>"Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you're right about that," Susan confirmed, +loosening her shawl, for the oil-stove was rapidly lifting the room's +temperature. "I don't see, myself, why anybody should ever have known +any better, and nobody would have, if it hadn't been as Jathrop took it +into his head to talk to a newspaper man at Atlantic City on about the +same day as I had him missing the cabin boy and refusing a helping to +the rabbit stew. Mr. Kimball showed me the paper as came from New York +wrapped around a new ledger he just received by express. The reporter +had written two columns and over about the 'Klondike Bonanza King,' and +if Jathrop had set his mind to makin' me out a Ananias and a Saphira +boiled into one, he couldn't have succeeded better. He hasn't been in +the Bahamas a <i>tall</i>. The yacht started for there, but it went<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[Pg 243]</a></span> to Cuba +instead, and he and his friends only stayed in Cuba a week. From there +they went down to Panama and looked over the canal as far as it's gone. +They spent the summer sailin' from one summer resort to another, and I +must say I should think there was better ways of passin' the time than +that. When it comes to eatin', I'd about as leave eat the dishes of a +cannibal cook as eat things made of the salt water that people go +bathin' in, and that's what they do at Atlantic City. The minister +showed me some candy 'Liza Em'ly sent him from Atlantic City in July, +and I know what I'm talkin' about, for it was printed on the paper +around each piece. 'Salt-water Taffy.' Think of that! It's plain to be +seen that they ain't got any fresh water there, or they wouldn't use +salt. Jathrop and the other millionaires, I suppose, drink nothin' but +wine, but the poor folks must drink salt water or go thirsty. I suppose +it saves salt in seasonin', but I'd rather have my vituals unseasoned +than have 'em salted with water that folks has swum in.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[Pg 244]</a></span> They certainly +ain't got no enterprise, that's sure. If they had they'd pipe +water—fresh water—from somewheres. And if there's no place near enough +to pipe it from, they'd build cisterns. But water's not the only thing +as shows their shiftlessness. Our town isn't exactly a metropolis, but +we got a few cement sidewalks. Atlantic City ain't got a one. I heard +about that long ago. And in these days of progress, too! Nothing but a +board walk on its principal street—nothing a <i>tall</i>."</p> + +<p>"What did—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"He said a good deal more'n his prayers, I can tell you that. He said +his object in going to the Bahamas, to which he never went, after all, +was to look into the possibility of securin' a large tract of land there +for the cultivation and growth of sisal. Now what under the sun would +you suppose sisal was? I saw in the book that sisal was being grown in +increasing quantities in the islands, and I just naturally supposed it +was some sort of animal. It might of been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[Pg 245]</a></span> buffalo, or it might of been +guinea pigs, but when I spoke at the Sewing Society of how Jathrop had +mentioned the great number of sisal, and Mrs. Allen says: 'What is +sisal?' I just right then and there on the spur of the minute says: +'Why, don't you know? Sisal is a sort of small oxen striped like a zebra +and spotted like a leopard.' And would you believe it, Mrs. Lathrop, +when Mr. Kimball asked me that same question to-day, I said the very +same thing—small oxen striped like a zebra and spotted like a leopard. +'That's what Mrs. Allen told me you said, Miss Clegg,' says he, 'but +accordin' to the paper, Jathrop Lathrop don't quite agree with you.' I +don't know, Mrs. Lathrop, I d'n know, I'm sure, why Jathrop should take +pleasure in making me appear like a ignoramus, but there ain't no +question about it that that's what he did when he gave that interview to +that there reporter. 'What kind of animal is a sisal, then, Mr. +Kimball?' I asked, and you can believe me my blood was boilin' in my +veins. 'It ain't no animal a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[Pg 246]</a></span> <i>tall</i>,' he says. 'It's hemp what they +make ropes out of to hang murderers with. And the seeds they feed +canaries on.' 'Well,' I says, 'that may be the reporter's sisal, but it +ain't mine, and it ain't Jathrop's. The newspapers never get nothin' +right nohow, but when it comes to reducin' cattle into rope and +birdseed, they are certainly goin' one better on the Chicago pork +packers.' In all my life I have never been a respecter of the untruth, +but I know enough on the subject to tell a good lie when necessity calls +upon me and to stick to it as long as it has an eyelid to hang by. But I +will say this for your son Jathrop, Mrs. Lathrop, and that is that +before he got done with that reporter, he didn't leave so much as a +eyelash, let alone a lid. It wasn't only that he'd never been to those +islands a <i>tall</i>, and I'd been tellin' everybody in town as how I'd had +a letter from him there every week the whole summer through, but he must +air his acquaintance with things on the islands just as if he'd been +born and raised there. And it seems there<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[Pg 247]</a></span> ain't no natives within miles +of the Bahamas, and hasn't been since Columbus and his people was there, +goin' on fifteen hundred years ago. Columbus told 'em that he'd take 'em +to the land where all their dead relatives and friends had gone to, a +land flowin' with milk and honey, and he kept his word. Seems he shipped +every last mother's son and daughter of 'em back to Spain with him, and +left the islands bare for the next comers. It may have appeared a rather +roundabout way for the native Bahamians to reach heaven and their +departed folks, seeing as it led through hard work in the Spanish mines, +but there ain't no question whatever that they every one got there in +the end."</p> + +<p>"You mean—" suggested Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"I mean that unless Lathrop or the reporter made it up, or the pair of +'em together, that nobody lives there now except whites and blacks, and +there's not enough whites to make a nice shepherd's plaid out of the +combination. But savagery, except for pirates, has never had any place +there, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[Pg 248]</a></span> cannibalism is absolutely unknown. It's all very +humiliating, and it'd 'a' been much better to let people ask me and +never said nothing back a <i>tall</i>. When people is in the dark, they've +got to imagine for themselves, and as long as they don't tell what they +imagine to others, no piece in a newspaper can never make 'em blush. I +can tell you it's learnt me a lesson as I won't soon forget. I'll never +get over the way Mr. Kimball looked at me when he said as how sisal was +hemp; and me thinking all the time it was a animal when it was a herb. +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, it's a ill wind that don't chill the shorn lamb. I'm +that chilled that I feel I never shall talk again. I'll never say black +is black or white is white until I've looked at the color twice with my +glasses on. Accuracy is the best policy, I says, from this day +henceforth."</p> + +<p>"You might—" began Mrs. Lathrop sympathetically.</p> + +<p>"That's true, too. I might have known that it didn't sound true to be +getting letters every week from a man who went away to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[Pg 249]</a></span> the Klondike and +never sent his mother so much as a picture postal card in all the years +he was there. But then, too, you've got to consider the kind of folks as +you're telling things to, and with all due respect to the ladies of the +Sewing Society, from Mrs. Allen to Gran'ma Mullins, they're not +over-burdened with the kind of intellect as can add two and two and get +the same answer twice in succession. There wasn't a one of 'em as +thought of that, or they'd 'a' said it straight out, without once +considering my feelings. And I'll say this much for you, Mrs. Lathrop: +you're not the best housekeeper I ever see, and you're about a match for +Mrs. Sperrit's cousin when it comes to being practical, but you have got +some brains, and I'd no more think of trying to deceive you than I'd +think of trying to deceive Judge Fitch when he'd got a big retainer to +get the truth out of me."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop leaned down and turned out the oil burner.</p> + +<p>"Was that—?"<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[Pg 250]</a></span></p> + +<p>"No, it wasn't all. There was something else that has set me all of a +flutter. If it wasn't as you never can tell whether a newspaper is +voracious or just bearing false witness, I'd certainly feel as if +Jathrop was playing fast and loose with my affections. I can remember, +and you can remember, too, when the freedom of the press didn't mean +freedom to make a Pike's Peak out of a ant hill. But in these days +there's no telling whether, when we read of a poor soul being attacked +by a wild beast, it's a jungle tiger or just a pet yellow kitten. Folks +would rather read about the tiger than the kitten, and so the papers +give 'em what they want without any regard for the real facts a <i>tall</i>. +Elijah Doxey, who's a real editor if there ever was one, and knows all +about the paper business, says that the newspaper, like everything else, +has to keep abreast of the times or go to the wall, and that since +people in these days 'ld rather read fiction than history, it stands to +reason a paper can't stand in its own light by sticking always to cold +commonplace facts."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[Pg 251]</a></span></p> + +<p>"Did the—?" Mrs. Lathrop attempted mildly to question.</p> + +<p>"I don't know, I d'n know, I'm sure, Mrs. Lathrop. But the interview +with Jathrop wasn't all interview, by no means. It said a lot about his +party, and it mentioned each of the millionaires as was in it. Seems the +interview was given on one of those Atlantic City board walks, and it +was given—from what on earth do you think, Mrs. Lathrop? From a wheel +chair. Jathrop in a wheel chair! Think of that! And not alone, either. +'Beside him,' wrote the interviewer, 'was the beautiful, dark-eyed Cuban +señora who, rumor says, is soon to become his bride.' My lands! If it +hadn't been for Mr. Kimball's apple barrel, I certainly would have +dropped. It would 'a' been bad enough if they was both strong and well, +but to think of Jathrop being too weak to walk and going to marry a +foreigner no more robust than himself. You can't imagine the shock it +give me. For a minute I was clean speechless, and I'd 'a' been dumb yet, +I do believe, if it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[Pg 252]</a></span> wasn't as I begun to figure things out in my head +and got sight of a ray of hope. Just as like as not, I says, Jathrop was +suffering from the sudden change of climate,—from the Klondike to Cuba +seems to me a pretty rigorous switch for any constitution,—and the +Cuban woman was more'n likely his trained nurse fetched from the island. +Either that or the woman was just recovering from a illness, and Jathrop +got in to ride with her out of pure kindness of heart. Then, too, I +remembered that: 'rumor says,' and cheered right up. Rumor never told +the truth yet, as far as I know, and it's not in reason to believe the +shameless thing is going to reform in these degenerate days. Jathrop may +be going to marry the señora, I don't say he isn't, and I don't say he +is. But before I believe it, I've got to have some better authority than +what rumor says. He's steered clear of wives in the Klondike, and he's +steered clear of 'em in other places, and I don't see as there's any +reason to think his steering apparatus come to grief while he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[Pg 253]</a></span> was in +Cuba. 'How's Susan Clegg?' That was what he wrote in the first letter +you'd had from him in a dog's age, Mrs. Lathrop, and it showed pretty +clear to me who he was thinking of while engaged in the steering +operation."</p> + +<p>"You don't think—" Mrs. Lathrop began distressfully.</p> + +<p>"No man as was seriously sick, Mrs. Lathrop, ever talked two whole long +newspaper columns to a reporter. You can bank on that. He was well +enough to make me out the king of prevaricators, and it took some +strength and a good deal of attention to small details to do it, and as +the Cuban señora never said one word in all that time, I can't think as +she is cutting any figure eights in his affairs. Consequently, I don't +believe it'll pay either of us to do any great lot of worrying."</p> + +<p>"If—" Mrs. Lathrop attempted once more to interpolate.</p> + +<p>"That's just what I told Mr. Kimball. 'If Mrs. Lathrop could only see +this paper,'<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[Pg 254]</a></span> I says, 'I know she'd be delighted.' It stands to reason +as a mother must be proud of a son who, after having no more sense than +to take a kicking cow for a bad debt, goes to the Klondike and comes +back a millionaire; but it stands to reason, too, that she'd be more +proud of him to get two columns of free advertising in a New York paper +that can sell its columns to the department stores for real money. Well, +I asked him for the paper just to show you, and though he didn't feel to +part with it, just the same he did in the end, and I carried it away in +triumph."</p> + +<p>"You've brought—"</p> + +<p>"No, I haven't. I'm sorry to disappoint you, Mrs. Lathrop, more sorry +than I am to disappoint Mr. Kimball in not being able to return it, but +the truth is I lost it on the way home."</p> + +<p>"Lost—"</p> + +<p>"Every last scrap of it. And I can't say as it was altogether accidental +either. As Shakespeare says: 'Self-protection is the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[Pg 255]</a></span> best part of +valor.' If that paper was ever to get before the Sewing Society, my +character would be stripped off me to the last rag. Mr. Kimball can say +what was in it, but without the paper itself, he'll have a hard time +proving anything, and my word when it comes to a dispute is as good as +his and a thousand times better."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop leaned forward and for a moment stopped rocking.</p> + +<p>"You—" she said quietly but tensely.</p> + +<p>"Tore it into small bits," returned Susan, rising, "and scattered them +to the winds of heaven. There's a paper trail all the way from the +square to Mrs. Macy's gate."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop resumed her rocking and relapsed into silence.</p> + +<p>Susan Clegg, laying her finger to her lips as a parting warning, went +quietly out.</p> + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[Pg 256]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XI" id="XI"></a>XI</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG AND THE PLAYWRIGHT</h3> + + +<p>"Well," said Miss Clegg to her dear friend in the early fall of that +same year, while they still waited under alien roofs the completion of +their own made-over houses, "the men who write the Sunday papers and say +that when you look at the world with a impartial eye in this century you +can't but have hopes of women some day developing into something, surely +would know they spoke the truth if they could see Elijah Doxey now."</p> + +<p>"But Eli—" expostulated Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"No, of course not. But 'Liza Em'ly is, and it's her I'm talking about. +She was up to see me this afternoon, and she says she'll spare no money +nowhere. The trained nurse is to stay with him right along forever<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[Pg 257]</a></span> if +he likes, and the two can have her automobile and ride or walk or do +anything, without thinking once what it costs. There was a doctor up +from the city again yesterday, and that makes four visits at a hundred a +visit. But 'Liza Em'ly says even if Elijah hadn't anything of his own, +she'd pay all the bills sooner'n think anything that could be done was +being left out. It's a pretty sad case, Mrs. Lathrop, and this last +doctor says he never see a sadder. He said nothing more could be done +right now, for there really is nothing in this community to remind +Elijah that he ever wrote a play, if they only could get those clippings +from the newspapers away from him. But that's just what they can't do. +He keeps looking them over, and then such a look of agony comes into his +eyes,—and Elijah was never one to bear pain as you must know, +remembering him with the colic,—and he clasps his hands and shakes his +head, and—well, Mrs. Lathrop, Elijah just wasn't strong enough to write +a play, and some one as was stronger<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[Pg 258]</a></span> ought to of restrained him right +in the first of it."</p> + +<p>"He—" said Mrs. Lathrop pityingly.</p> + +<p>"Yes, that's it," confirmed Susan, "and oh, it's awful to take a bright +young promising life like his and wreck it completely like that! To see +Elijah walking about with a trained nurse and those clippings at his age +is surely one of the most touching sights as this town'll ever see. +'Liza Em'ly says she offered a thousand dollars to any newspaper as +would print one good notice, 'cause the doctors say just one good notice +might turn the whole tide of his brain. But the newspapers say if they +printed one good notice of such a play, the Pure Food Commission would +have 'em up for libel within a week, and they just don't dare risk it. +This last doctor says he can't blame Elijah for going mad, 'cause he +knows a little about the stage through being in love with a actress +once, and he says he wasn't treated fair. He says play-writing is not +like any other kind of writing, and Elijah wasn't prepared<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[Pg 259]</a></span> for the +great difference. Seems all words on the stage mean something they don't +mean in the dictionary, and that makes it very hard for a mere ordinary +person to know what they're saying if they say anything a <i>tall</i>. And +then, too, Elijah never grasped that the main thing is to keep the +gallery laughing, even if the two-dollar people have tears running down +their cheeks. And you can't write for the stage nowadays without you +keep folks laughing the whole time. Elijah never thought about the +laughing, because his play was a tragedy like <i>Hamlet</i>, only with Hamlet +left out. For the lady is dead in the play, and her ghost is all that's +left of her. But 'Liza Em'ly told me to-day as his trouble came right in +the start, for the people who look plays over no sooner looked Elijah's +over before they took hold of it and fixed it. And they kept on fixing +it till it was <i>Hamlet</i> with nobody but Hamlet left in. And then, so as +to manage the laughs, they dressed everybody like chickens if they +turned back-to. So that while the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[Pg 260]</a></span> audience was weeping, if any one on +the stage turned 'round, they went off into shrieks of laughter. 'Liza +Em'ly says they never told Elijah about the chicken feathers, and the +opening night was the first he knew about that little game, for he was +laid up for ever so long before then. He got all used up in the first +part of the rehearsals; for it seems you can only have a theater to +rehearse in at times when even the people who sweep it don't feel to be +sweeping. And so they always rehearse from one to six in the morning. +And Elijah naturally wasn't used to that. But they'd had trouble even +before then; for right from the start there was a pretty how-d'ye-do +over the plot. Seems Elijah wanted his own plot and his own people in +his own play, and they had a awful time getting it through his head as +it's honor enough to have your own play, and it's only unreasonable to +stick out for your own plot and your own people too. 'Liza Em'ly says +they had a awful time with him over it all, and there was a time when he +felt so bad<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[Pg 261]</a></span> over giving up his plot and his people that any one ought +to have seen right there as he'd never be strong enough to stand all the +rest of what was surely coming. 'Liza Em'ly didn't tell me the whole of +the rest what come, but Mr. Kimball told me that what was one great +strain on Elijah, right through to the hour he begun to scream, was that +the leading lady fell in love with him and used to have him up at all +hours to fix up her part, and then kiss him. And Elijah didn't want to +fix up her part, and he hated to be kissed. But they told him the part +must be fixed up to suit her, and that the kisses didn't matter, because +they was only little things after all.</p> + +<p>"He was wading along through the mire as best he could, when all of a +sudden it come out as she had one husband as she'd completely overlooked +and never divorced. He turned up most unexpectedly and come at Elijah +about the kisses. Then they told Elijah he couldn't do a better thing by +his play than to let the man shoot him two or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[Pg 262]</a></span> three times in places as +would let him be carried pale and white to a box for the opening night; +and then, between the last two acts, marry the lady and let it be in all +the morning papers. You can maybe think, Mrs. Lathrop, how such a idea +would come to the man as is to be shot. But, oh, my, they didn't make +nothing of Elijah's feelings in the matter. Nothing a <i>tall</i>. They just +set right to work and called a meeting of the play manager and the stage +manager and the leading lady's manager and Elijah's manager, and the man +who really does the managing. They all got together, and they drew up a +diagram as to where Elijah was to be hit, and a contract for him and the +leading lady to sign as they wouldn't marry anybody else in the +meantime. And if it hadn't been for 'Liza Em'ly, the deal, as they +called it, would have gone straight through. For Elijah was so dead beat +by this time that about all he was fit for was to sit on a electric +battery with a ice bag on his head, and look up words in a stage<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[Pg 263]</a></span> +dictionary and then cross 'em out of his play."</p> + +<p>"Oh, I—" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"That's just what 'Liza Em'ly said she said," rejoined Susan Clegg. "I +tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, 'Liza Em'ly is no fool since her book's gone +into the thirty-seventh edition, and that's a fact. She told me to-day +as when she realized the man she loved—for 'Liza Em'ly really loves +Elijah; any one can see that just by looking at the trained nurse she's +got him—was being murdered alive, she went straight up and took a hand +in the matter herself. I guess she had a pretty hard time, for the +leading lady wouldn't hear to changing any of what they call the +routing, and said if Elijah wasn't shot and married according to the +signed agreement, she wouldn't play. And when a leading lady won't play, +then is when you find out what Shakespeare really did write for, +according to 'Liza Em'ly. For a little they was all running this way and +that way, just beside themselves, with the leading<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[Pg 264]</a></span> lady in the +Adirondacks and two detectives watching her husband. And the man as was +painting the scenery took a overdose of chloral and went off with all +his ideas in his head, and that unexpected trouble brought 'em all +together again. The husband came down off his high horse and said he'd +take five per cent, of the net—Don't ask me what that means, for Mr. +Dill don't know either—and the littlest chorus girl and go to Europe. +And he said, too, as he'd sign a paper first releasing Elijah from all +claim on account of his wife. So they all signed, and he sailed. He was +clear out to sea before they discovered as he had another wife as he'd +never divorced, so the leading lady could of married Elijah, after all. +Well, that was a pretty mess, with a husband as had no claim on nobody +gone off to Europe with five percent of the net. The stage manager and +Elijah's manager took the <i>Mauretania</i> and started right after him, for +when it comes to five per cent. on any kind of stage thing, Mr. Kimball +says, any<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[Pg 265]</a></span> monkeying counts up so quick that even hiring a yacht is +nothing if you want to catch that five per cent. in time. So they was +off, one in the captain's room and the other in the bridal suite, while +'Liza Em'ly was down in Savannah getting local color to patch up the +scenery, leaving Elijah totally unprotected on his battery with his +ideas.</p> + +<p>"But Elijah wasn't to be left in peace even now. Seems they was having a +investigation into the poor quality of the electricity in the city, and +a newspaper opened a referendum and made 'em double the power. The +company was so mad, they didn't give no warning to a soul, but just slid +up the needle from 100 to 200 right then and there; and one of the +results was they blew Elijah nearly through the ceiling. Nothing in the +world but the ice bag saved him from having his skull caved in, and the +specialist thinks he's got a concussion in his sinus right now. Poor +Elijah!"</p> + +<p>"But—?" Mrs. Lathrop queried.</p> + +<p>"They took him to the hospital, and from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[Pg 266]</a></span> then on to the opening night +he had nothing to do with his own play. The leading lady married the +stage manager till she got the stage to suit her, and then she married +the man who really does the managing until she got everything else to +suit her. Next, without letting any of the others know, she married +Elijah's manager secretly, so that when poor Elijah in the hospital +thought he was looking at his manager, he was really nursing a viper in +his bosom. When 'Liza Em'ly came back with her local color, they told +her they didn't want it because they was going to have the camping-out +scene in the parlor, and play the people all liked a joke. When she went +to a lawyer to protest, the lawyer looked through all Elijah's contracts +and said Elijah had never stipulated as the camping-out scene should be +in the woods. So 'Liza Em'ly paid him fifty dollars and come away a good +deal wiser than she went.</p> + +<p>"Then come the opening night, and Mr. Kimball says he shall never forget +that opening night as long as he lives. You know he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[Pg 267]</a></span> bought himself one +of those hats as when you sit on 'em just gets a better shape, and then +he went up to see his own nephew's own play. Seems he sat on his hat in +Elijah's own box, but he says Elijah was looking very bad even before +the curtain went up. Seems Elijah didn't expect much, but he did have +just a little hope that here and there in spots he'd see some of his own +play. But the hope was very faint. After the curtain went up, it kept +getting fainter. Of course Elijah meant it for a tragedy and called it +<i>Millicent</i>; and seeing the title changed to <i>Milly Tilly</i> was a hard +blow to him right in the beginning. Seems the woman poisoned herself +because she was unhappy, and after she's dead, she remembers there was +some poison left in the bottle, and so she wants to warn the family. It +was a very nice plot, Polly White thinks, and Elijah was wild over it +'cause there's never been a plot used like it. But of course his idea +was as it should be took seriously. Do you wonder then, Mrs. Lathrop, +that the first time in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[Pg 268]</a></span> play when one of the play actors turned +round he nearly died? Mr. Kimball says he nearly died himself. He says +he never saw anything so funny as those chicken backs in all his life. +He says people was just laying any way and every way in their seats, +wailing to stop, so they could stop too. He says he was laughing fit to +kill himself when all of a sudden he looked up to see Elijah, and he +says nothing ever give him such a chill as Elijah's then-and-there +expression. Seems Elijah was just staring at the leading lady as was +flapping her wings and playing crow, while the gallery was pounding and +yelling like mad. And then Elijah suddenly shot out of the box and round +behind the scenes and vanished completely."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop gasped and lifted her hands, but no word issued from +between her lips.</p> + +<p>"Well, of course we know now what happened, but nobody did then. Nobody +was expecting him on the stage, before the scenes or behind 'em, and Mr. +Kimball didn't know<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[Pg 269]</a></span> where he was gone. So it was the end of the piece +before he was really missed. Then they begun to hunt, and no Elijah high +or low nowhere. You know how the papers was full of it, and there would +have been more about it, only Mr. Kimball and 'Liza Em'ly supposed it +was just advertising. Even 'Liza Em'ly thought it was the wrong kind of +advertising and that the leading lady had seen Elijah's face and thought +it was better to kidnap him until the play got settled down her way. +Seems if you can keep a play going any kind of a way for a little while, +you can't never change it afterwards, no matter what you've put in it. +It's all most remarkable business, a play is. But anyway, wherever he +was, they all moved on to the next town anyhow. 'Liza Em'ly and Mr. +Kimball went right with them to protect Elijah's interest, as it was +plain to be seen from where Elijah's manager was sleeping, where his +interest was now. And as soon as they begun to unload the scenery, the +afternoon of that day, whatever do you<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[Pg 270]</a></span> suppose? There was Elijah, just +where he'd fell when he tripped over the first scene. They'd carted him +off in the triangle that unfolds into a grand piano, right along to the +baggage-car, where they'd piled the whole of his play on top of him, +ending up even with the chicken feathers."</p> + +<p>"Great heav—!" cried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"So he said," interrupted Miss Clegg. "But there was no help for it. +Seems while you're playing Act III. of a play, Act II. is getting packed +up, and Act I. is already in the train. So Elijah was all packed and +pretty flat before they even missed him, and most crazy before he was +found. Well, and so to try and soothe him they took him to the theater +that night again, and the leading lady, when she looked at him and saw +how awful weak he looked, sent him in a new idea she'd got, which was to +let her have a poster done of him packed up in the scenery. Then every +night he could sit in a box and at a certain sign give a yell and shoot +out. Then she'd make a speech about his having<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[Pg 271]</a></span> been in the scenery car +all the night before, and being naturally kind of excited. She said it +would make the play draw like mad. Well, Elijah wouldn't consent to that +a <i>tall</i>. And then again they worked with him and talked to him and +called him a fool till he really begun to get awfully scared. They had +in all the managers together, and they wouldn't let him consult any one. +Seems they just all sat looking at his forehead just over his nose where +you hypnotize people, and he kept getting more and more scared. Seems he +told his nurse, during what they call a lucid interval, that you can +talk all you please about will power—and it may be true of people in +general—but no rule ever made on earth can possibly apply to any one +who has just written a play. There's something about writing a play as +takes all the marrow out of your bones and the blood out of your body. +And he says he wasn't no more responsible when he signed that contract +to go mad in a box every evening and at least one matinée every week +than a grasshopper. He<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[Pg 272]</a></span> says his one and only thought by that time was +to get away from 'em and make a break to where he'd never hear about his +play again. But after he'd signed, they never let him out of sight. They +locked him up in a dressing-room with the leading lady's pet mouse until +after the performance, and then they took him and introduced him to two +very big managers as was engaged to do nothing except manage him nights +in the box.</p> + +<p>"Well, you know the rest, Mrs. Lathrop. He really did go mad, then, and +we've got him here now helpless, getting rich almost as fast as 'Liza +Em'ly, and crazy as a loon. I declare, it's one of the saddest cases I +ever see. I don't know whatever can be done. They say as fast as he gets +sane, the play'll surely drive him crazy again, so I don't see what +'Liza Em'ly will do. She set with me the whole afternoon and talked very +nicely about it all. To see her here, you'd never think she could act +the way Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Fisher tell about. I can see she's got a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[Pg 273]</a></span> +little airy, and she says she misses her maid and her secretary more +than she ever tells the minister's family; but on the whole I like her +very much, and her devotion to Elijah is most beautiful. She says he's +the one love of her life, and she shall marry him if ever he gets sense +enough to know what he's doing. If he doesn't, she says she shall take a +yacht and sail with him and write books until he dies. She says they can +land once in a while to get their provisions and their royalties. But +she says the only possible salvation for Elijah, as things are now, will +be to stay where he never sees a car to remind him of scenery, or a +house to remind him of a stage, for years and years to come. I asked her +what she <i>really</i> thought of his play, and she said she thought the +leading lady was just right and very clever, only Elijah was too +sensitive a nature to understand little artistic touches like the +chicken feathers. She says folks are too tired nowadays to be bothered +to laugh. They want to be made to laugh without even thinking. She says +Elijah is a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[Pg 274]</a></span> earnest nature as likes to work his laughs out very +carefully and conscientious; but the leading lady understands getting +the same effect, only a million times quicker, with chicken feathers and +divorces. 'Liza Em'ly says the leading lady is very fair according to +her own idea of fairness. She didn't have no money to put in the play, +so she agreed to put in four divorces and one scandal as her part of the +stock. Now the play's only been on a month, and she's paid up everything +except one divorce and the scandal; and she's done so well they're +trying to work up some scheme to let her pay both those off at the same +time. The play is going fine. They print columns about Elijah and his +madness, and the whole company is learning to crow together at the end +of the second act. Every night they take out a little of what Elijah +wrote, and the main manager says that there'll soon be nothing of Elijah +left in except the ghost, and the ghost of the bottle, and the agreement +to pay Elijah his royalties. And according to the main manager's<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[Pg 275]</a></span> views, +that's being pretty fair and square with Elijah."</p> + +<p>"Do you—?" queried Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Well, I don't know," answered Miss Clegg, "I really d'n know what to +say. I'm kind of dumb did over both 'Liza Em'ly and Elijah, for you know +as well as I do, Mrs. Lathrop, that nobody ever looked for those kind of +things from them."</p> + +<p>"Shall—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, if it ever comes where I can," responded Miss Clegg, "I shall like +to see it very much."</p> + +<p>"Did—?" pressed Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Oh, yes, I asked her," Susan admitted, "I asked her fair and square. I +says: ''Liza Em'ly, there's no use denying as you've used real people in +this community in your book, and now I want to know who is Deacon +Tooker?' She said Deacon Tooker was just the book itself. She seemed +more amused than there was any particular sense in; but I thought if +anything could give her a good laugh, it wasn't me would begrudge her.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[Pg 276]</a></span> +There's this to be said for our young folks when they do get rich, Mrs. +Lathrop, and that is that they're nice about it, and it makes every one +feel kindly towards 'em. Every one feels kindly towards Jathrop, and +every one feels kindly towards 'Liza Em'ly, and as for poor, dear +Elijah—Well!"</p> + +<p>The tone was expressive enough. Mrs. Lathrop shook her head sadly. Then +both were silent.</p> + + + + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> +<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[Pg 277]</a></span></p> +<h2><a name="XII" id="XII"></a>XII</h2> + +<h3>SUSAN CLEGG'S DISAPPEARANCE</h3> + + +<p>The "building-over" of Susan Clegg and her friend, Mrs. Lathrop, was +completed during the second week in December, and in less than +twenty-four hours they were once more established in their own +dwellings, surrounded by their own goods and chattels. For only the +briefest space, however, did Miss Clegg remain where she was put. Then +she hurried through the passageway afforded by the connecting pergola +and burst excitedly into her neighbor's brand new kitchen in the very +center of which sat Mrs. Lathrop in her old-gold-plush stationary +rocker, calmly surveying her domiciliary spick-and-spanness. On her lap +lay a just-opened letter; but for once the scrupulously observing Miss +Clegg failed to observe. She was too full of fresh trials.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[Pg 278]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I d'n know whatever sins I committed in this world, Mrs. Lathrop," she +began, dropping into the nearest chair and facing her friend in an +upright, a little bent forward attitude that was clearly pugnacious, +"that I should have these things visited upon me. The Lord knows, just +the same as you do, as I've always been a good and pure woman, loving my +neighbors like myself and doing all my Christian duties as I was give to +see 'em. When I was tore up from my home by the roots and cast wilted +and faded upon Gran'ma Mullins, where the infant memories of Hiram +certainly wasn't calculated to do no reviving, I made the best of it. I +made the best of Lucy and a dog with a cold nose, too; and I bore up +with courage and no complaint under Mrs. Allen and her Persian religion. +And I did it all to please you, Mrs. Lathrop, and your fool of a son, +Jathrop, whose money, it's my opinion, has acted on him in a most +injurious way. He never had much sense, as you yourself know, but now he +ain't got no sense a <i>tall</i>."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[Pg 279]</a></span></p> + +<p>"I don't—" Mrs. Lathrop started gently to protest.</p> + +<p>"Well, I do," rejoined Susan Clegg spiritedly; "and if you don't, you +ought to. Anyhow, I mean to tell you, if it's the last act of my life. +Anybody as has any sense a <i>tall</i> must have seen that building over was +just a mite removed from building new; and what's new never did go with +what's old, and it never will. If we was to be built over, we ought to +have been all built over or let alone. Jathrop's built the houses over, +but he ain't built over the furnishings, and the built-over houses and +the not-built-over furniture and carpets and window shades and pots and +kettles and pans and china and linen and everything else don't agree and +just naturally can't and never can. They're fighting now like sixty, and +they'll go on fighting the longer they're kept together. My house was +restful and peaceful before, but now it's like a circus with all the +wild animals let loose. And I can tell you this, Mrs. Lathrop; my things +is getting the worst of it.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[Pg 280]</a></span> Why, before they went to storage at Mr. +Shores', they was in the best repair you ever see, and now it would make +your heart ache to look at 'em. They've aged a century at least during +the summer. They're wrinkled and halt and lame and blind, and the new +paper on the walls and the new polish on the floors and the new paint on +the woodwork is making 'em look sicker and sicker every minute. If +there's a society for the prevention of cruelty to furniture and other +household goods, it ought to put Jathrop Lathrop in prison. I feel so +sorry for those poor tables and chairs and bedsteads and all the rest of +'em as I could cry my eyes out this very minute. There's one walnut, +haircloth sofa as Father laid on before he was took to his bed as is +pitiful to behold. It looks sicker than Father did even in his last +hours, and I wouldn't be surprised any minute to see it just turn over +all of itself and give up the ghost. And everything has on such a +reproachful look it's more than human nature can bear to face it. If I'd +ever thought as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[Pg 281]</a></span> being built over would of come to this, I'd of gone on +my knees and worked 'em to the bare bones before I'd of put up with it."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop continued to rock in silence.</p> + +<p>"Still, there's no cloud, however black, as hasn't got some silk in its +lining, and the silk in this is the clock as Father gave Mother, which +was supposed to be marble and wasn't. Much as I hated that clock, I +couldn't have borne to see its agonies when set on by the new fireplace +below, and the pink and gold wall paper behind, and the roses and cupids +in the cornish above. It must just of shriveled in shame instead of +going out in glorious flight, as it did when I set it flying at the end +of the bed-slat. Lord knows, though, Mrs. Lathrop, that's a small thing +to be thankful for; and it's the only thing. I haven't begun yet to tell +you all. And I don't intend to. There's a limit to my temper, and if I +once got started, there's no saying where I'd end. But there's one thing +more as I can't hold in, and it's the thing as was marked on the plans: +'But. Pan.' I<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[Pg 282]</a></span> never did understand why I should be give a separate room +to keep butter pans in, seeing as I ain't got no cow, let alone no +dairy. And even if I had, why I should keep my butter pans or my milk +pans either in a little alley-way between the kitchen and the +dining-room, just where the heat and smells could get at 'em from one +side and the flies from both, not to mention the added footsteps put on +me journeying from the stove to the dinner table. You can see for +yourself, Mrs. Lathrop, there's no sense in it, whatever. But I'd never +say a word about it, if that was all. But it ain't all. It's the +littlest part. For Jathrop's cruelty hasn't stopped with torturing the +furniture. It's clear he couldn't be satisfied till he fixed up a trap +as sooner or later would hit me square in the face and break my nose. At +both ends of his 'But. Pan.' he's had hung doors as swing, and springs +on 'em to make 'em swing hard and deadly. What either one of those +swinging doors might do to my features, let alone to the pudding or stew +I might be<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[Pg 283]</a></span> carrying, it isn't in mortal tongue to express. If I could +find one thing as was right in the whole house, I'd be fair and square +enough to overlook the others; but there ain't to my mind a single +solitary betterment. There's glass knobs on all the doors as will show +every finger mark, and will keep me busy wiping from dawn to dark. The +old brown knobs never showed nothing and didn't never have to be thought +of, let alone polished. It's always been my idea as a cupboard was a +place to shut things up in out of sight, and here if he hasn't gone and +put glass doors on the one in the corner of the dining room, so as every +one can see just what's meant to be hid. It's clear to be seen he's +crazy on the subject of glass, which I ain't and never have been. And I +don't like the way he's stinted things as is necessary and put all the +money in things as had better been left out. Necessities before +everything is my motto. What use, I'd like to know, is that cupid and +rose cornish? But he puts that there just to catch dust and leaves out +the whole of one<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[Pg 284]</a></span> parlor wall. If you'll believe me, Mrs. Lathrop, +there's not a hair or hide of a wall between my entry hall and my +parlor. Nothing but a pair of white posts as most people use on their +piazzas. How I'm ever going to keep that parlor dark I don't see; for +he's got glass over the front door and on both sides of it, and no +shutters to keep the sun out. He's built in both the kitchen stove and +the ice box, and for the life of me, I can't find no reasonable way of +taking the ashes out of the one or the water out of the other. The +builder says the ashes dump into a place in the cellar and the water +from the ice drains down a pipe underneath the house. But I don't like +neither plan. The drip from a ice box is a very cheering sound, I think, +and with hot ashes going down cellar where you can't see 'em, I'll be in +deadly fear of the house going up in smoke while I'm dreaming in my bed. +The long and the short of it is, Mrs. Lathrop, I feel as I have been +assaulted and robbed. Jathrop's took away my home and left me a house as +isn't a home to me<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[Pg 285]</a></span> and never can be. And as far as I can see, he's done +the same to you, which is ten thousand times worse, you being his +mother."</p> + +<p>"I—" began Mrs. Lathrop, taking up the letter from her lap so that at +last it was forced upon Susan's observance.</p> + +<p>"From him, I suppose," Miss Clegg instantly concluded, reaching for it. +"If he's got anything to say in his defence, I'm sure I'd delight to +read it. But no matter what he says, he can't undo to me what he's done +to me. I'll never feel the same towards Jathrop, your son or not your +son, Mrs. Lathrop, as long as I live."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop passed the letter to Miss Clegg. Like all of Jathrop's +letters, it was brief and to the point. He announced that he would spend +Christmas with his mother in her rebuilt home and would bring with him a +friend as his guest. Susan read it over twice, turning the page each +time, evidently in hope of finding an enlightening postscript.</p> + +<p>"Well, of all things!" she exclaimed, as she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[Pg 286]</a></span> passed the letter back to +her friend. "Coming to see his work of destruction and going to bring +<i>her</i> with him!"</p> + +<p>"He don't—" Mrs. Lathrop endeavored to explain.</p> + +<p>"He don't, because he don't dare; but there's no question what he means. +He's bringing the señora. And he wouldn't bring her if it wasn't that +he's going to marry her. Even you must see that. And if there was ever a +insult multiplied by perjury, Jathrop's done it in that action. It's a +good thing he didn't ask: 'How's Susan Clegg?' this time, as he did the +time he was coming back from the Klondike. For I don't believe I could +ever have stood that. All I can say, Mrs. Lathrop, is as I'm sorry for +you from the soles of my feet up. You'll never in the world be able to +get up a Christmas dinner as will please any señora, you can take my +word on that. And not to please her will be a bad beginning with a +señora as is to be your future daughter-in-law. Señoras don't care +shucks for turkey and mince pie. They're<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[Pg 287]</a></span> not used to 'em and likely to +get indigestion from 'em, and think what it would mean to Jathrop, let +alone to her, if she should be carried off by a acute attack right here +in your new, built-over house, at the dinner table. He'd blame it on +you, and like as not she'd haunt you the rest of your living days. No, +sir. You've got to give her Spanish omelets with lots of red peppers in +'em, and everything else Creole style, which means all he't up with +tabasco sauce fit to burn out your insides. It's eating like that as +makes those Spaniards and Cubans so dark colored you can't tell 'em from +mulattoes. The peppers and the tabasco sauce bakes 'em brown on the +outside, after leaving 'em all scorched and parched within."</p> + +<p>For once, however, Susan Clegg was wrong in her deduction. Jathrop +arrived in a red automobile on the day before Christmas, with a +chauffeur in bear-skins driving, and a guest in sealskin beside him. But +the guest was not the señora. It was one of Jathrop's millionaire +friends who, Jathrop said,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[Pg 288]</a></span> could buy and sell him twenty times over. He +was a small man with a bald head and a red beard and old enough to be +Jathrop's father.</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg viewed the arrival from her bedroom window and was so glad it +wasn't the señora that she at once set about baking extra doughnuts and +mince pie to contribute to the festivities of the morrow. This occupied +her until supper time. Then she made a hurried meal, washed her one +plate and cup and saucer, and loaded down with her thank offering, +flitted through the pergola and in at Mrs. Lathrop's kitchen door. The +kitchen was empty, but voices penetrating from the dining room told her +that her friend and her visitors were still at table. Being a trifle +nervous and unable to sit quietly, she began at once to put the +disordered kitchen into some degree of order, purely for the sake of +occupation.</p> + +<p>She had just finished washing and scouring the pots and pans and was +flushing the waste-pipe of Mrs. Lathrop's new porcelain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[Pg 289]</a></span> sink with +lye-water so strong that her eyes ran tears from the fumes, when the +voices growing more and more audible told her that Jathrop was leading +his mother and his guest toward the kitchen. She just had time hurriedly +to dry her hands on the roller towel when they appeared.</p> + +<p>"Well, well," exclaimed Jathrop, in apparent surprise, "if here ain't +our old friend, Susan Clegg!"</p> + +<p>There is no question that Miss Clegg was slightly flustered at thus +being taken unawares, but she recovered herself promptly, and shook +hands cordially with Jathrop and not less cordially with the little +millionaire, whom he introduced as Mr. Kettlewell. And Mr. Kettlewell +was cordiality itself. Everybody sat down, right there in the kitchen +and talked for a full hour, and in the course of the talk, Jathrop told +Susan that he had arranged with a department store in New York to let +her have whatever she needed for her built-over house and charge the +same to his account. She could select the things from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[Pg 290]</a></span> the firm's +catalogue, or go to the city at his expense and pick out the actual +articles. It was his Christmas present to his mother's and his own +oldest friend. In conclusion, Jathrop joined with his mother in an +invitation to Susan to take Christmas dinner with them; and Mr. +Kettlewell smilingly begged her, for his sake, not to refuse. Altogether +Susan had the pleasantest evening she had experienced in years, and the +next morning, while Jathrop and Mr. Kettlewell were off in the car after +evergreens with which to decorate the two houses, she ran over with the +express purpose of telling Mrs. Lathrop so.</p> + +<p>"Jathrop mayn't have much judgment when it comes to selecting +architects," she began, "nor again when it comes to selecting servants, +as was proved by his bringing that Hop Loo all the way from the +Klondike. Nor again, neither, when it comes to wives, if it's a real +fact that he's going to marry a brown-baked señora; but there's no +getting away from the fact that he's a king in choosing his men friends. +I've seen men in my<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[Pg 291]</a></span> life of all sorts and descriptions, from the +minister to the blacksmith, but I ain't never see before such a +handsome, high-minded, superior gentleman as Jathrop's friend, Mr. +Kettlewell. I never thought much of bald-headed men before, but his head +is so white and shiny, it's a pleasure to look at it. And I always just +hated a red beard; but Mr. Kettlewell's beard is of a different red. +It's a nice, warm, comforting red as makes you feel as cosy as the glow +of a red-hot stove when the thermometer's down around zero. I can't say +either, Mrs. Lathrop, as I wasn't more or less prejudiced against men as +never rightly grew up, but stopped in the women's sizes. But there's a +something about Mr. Kettlewell's proportions as gives you the idea he's +really taller than he seems. And there's only one thing to compare his +voice to. It's milk and honey. My lands, what a sweet, clear-rolling, +liquid voice that Mr. Kettlewell has!"</p> + +<p>"Ja—" began Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"Yes, I heard him. But I don't put that<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[Pg 292]</a></span> against Mr. Kettlewell, not a +<i>tall</i>. I'm sure he made every penny of it honestly, and if he's retired +from business now, it don't mean he's quit work. It's no easy job +cutting coupons off all the bonds he must have, and collecting rents is +a occupation I don't envy nobody. It's the penalty that rich men have to +pay for their success. They work hard to get the principal, and then +they're made to work twice as hard to get the interest. There's no such +thing as rest for the rich any more'n there is for the poor. I used to +think before Father died as I'd like to roll in wealth, but it ain't no +easy rolling, I can tell you that, Mrs. Lathrop, especially when you've +got a tenant like Mrs. Macy, who won't buy so much as a gas-tip or do so +much as drive a nail without charging it up to the owner."</p> + +<p>Miss Clegg's participation in the Christmas dinner at her neighbors' was +twofold. She took part in its preparation as well as in its discussion. +It was her soup which began it, it was her "stuffing" which added zest +to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[Pg 293]</a></span> the roast turkey, it was her cranberry sauce which sweetened +contrastingly the high seasoning, and it was her mince pie which brought +the repast to a fitting and enjoyable close. Seated opposite to Mr. +Kettlewell, where she could revel in a full view of his shining pate and +his warmly comforting whiskers, her enjoyment was ocular as well as +gustatory; and under the caressing sweetness of his voice it was +likewise auricular. For the occasion Jathrop had provided a fine vintage +champagne, and though Miss Clegg, whose total-abstinence principles +forbade her to even taste, refrained from so much as touching her lips +to the edge of her glass, she unquestionably warmed in the stimulating +atmosphere of the sparkling, bubbling, golden juice of the grape. To her +it was indeed the red-letter Christmas of her life, and every incident, +of the dinner especially, was a matter for reflection and rumination in +the succeeding hours.</p> + +<p>In this vale of tears, however, there is apparently no great joy without +its compensating<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[Pg 294]</a></span> sorrow; and in Susan Clegg's case the one followed +swiftly on the heels of the other. In the pale gray of the dawn of the +following day, Susan Clegg dashed wildly out of her kitchen door and +flitted with lifted skirts across the brief intervening space that led +to Mrs. Lathrop's back door. As pallid as the morning itself, her scant +hair streaming, her eyes wide with mixed terror and indignation, she +burst into her neighbor's kitchen, where to her great relief she found +her old friend already up and occupied.</p> + +<p>One glimpse of Susan was enough for Mrs. Lathrop. Up went her hands and +down went she on to the nearest chair with an inarticulate gasp of +horrified yet questioning astonishment, while Miss Clegg flopped limply +into another at the end of the kitchen table.</p> + +<p>There she must have sat for a full minute before she could get breath to +utter a word, which, being contrary to all her habits, was in itself +terrifying to her friend. Eventually, however, she forced herself to +assume<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[Pg 295]</a></span> an upright position and simultaneously attained a somewhat +feeble attempt at speech.</p> + +<p>"Well, of all things in this world to happen to me!" Then she paused for +a fresh breath, which being utterly without precedent, added mightily to +Mrs. Lathrop's alarm. "And even now at this minute I don't really know +whether I'm more dead than alive, or more alive than dead."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop, believing that the situation being extraordinary, some +extraordinary effort on her part was demanded, stirred herself to a +prolonged speech.</p> + +<p>"Don't tell me I'm looking—"</p> + +<p>"No, I'm not a ghost, if that's what you mean. You are looking at Susan +Clegg in the flesh—all the flesh that ain't been scared clean off her. +But it's the greatest miracle as ever happened in this community that +it's my body and not my spirit as is here to tell the tale. My house was +broken into by a burglar, Mrs. Lathrop, and I was tied up and gagged in +one of my own chairs."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[Pg 296]</a></span></p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop just gasped. Susan drew herself up a little straighter, +gaining courage from the sound of her own voice, and striking something +like her old oral gait.</p> + +<p>"I was gagged for five hours, Mrs. Lathrop, and knowing me as you do for +all these years and years, maybe you can feel what being gagged for five +hours and not able to say even 'boo' meant to a active person like me. +Every one of those hours was like a eternity in a Spanish inferno of +torture. And everything I possess in this world, from my bonnet and +striped silk dress to Father's deeds at the mercy of that gagger. And +all I've got to say is this: If I hadn't of been built over, it never in +the wide creation would have happened. And if your son Jathrop thinks he +can ever make up to me for being gagged by inviting me to a Christmas +dinner, most of which I cooked with my own hands, and offering to give +me strange pieces of furniture to take the place of pieces as is old +friends and dearer than the apples of my two eyes, he'd better do<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[Pg 297]</a></span> some +more thinking. There never was nothing about the house I was born in and +my mother and father died in to make a burglar look at it twice. No +burglar as had any respect for himself or his calling, Mrs. Lathrop, +would have looked at it once or knowed as it was there. But built over +it's as different as diamon's is from pebbles. It looks money from the +tips of its lightning rods to its cellar windows and is as inviting to +robbers as if it had a sign on the gatepost, reading: 'Walk in!' So, +however you look at it, there's nobody responsible for my gagging and +for whatever is missing but one man, and that man is Jathrop Lathrop. +It's easy to be seen as he's no more fit to have money than a crow as +steals gold trinkets that cost fortunes and goes and hides 'em in hollow +trees. He was born poor, and the Lord meant him to stay poor, no matter +what Mrs. Allen and her Persian religion has to say about things as +happens being meant to happen. The Lord hadn't nothing to do with +Jathrop going to the Klondike and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[Pg 298]</a></span> getting rich, you can be certain +about that. If he hadn't been fool enough to take a kicking cow for a +perfectly good debt and then let it loose to ride over a peaceful and +long-suffering community, he'd 'a' lived and died a pauper in this here +very town. So's far as I can see it was the devil and not the Lord as +guided Jathrop from the first, and everything as has happened since +shows the devil is still guiding him. Everything he turns his mind to +goes by contraries. I'm not saying anything against the goodness of +Jathrop's intentions, mind you, Mrs. Lathrop, but no matter how good +they are, evil and misery certainly seems sure to follow."</p> + +<p>The tirade stirred Mrs. Lathrop to her feet, but she was not resentful. +She knew that Susan Clegg's bitterness was confined to her tongue, and +that even with that she could salve as well as sting.</p> + +<p>"Can't I—?" she suggested.</p> + +<p>"Indeed you can," answered Miss Clegg. "I never felt as I needed a cup +of tea more, and if the doughnuts I brought you ain't all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[Pg 299]</a></span> eat up, I'd +relish four or five of 'em right now."</p> + +<p>"You haven't—" began Mrs. Lathrop, taking down the teapot.</p> + +<p>"No; but I'm coming to it. I begun with the cause, and the effect'll +come trailing after like the tails of Mary's little lambs. Only the +tails in this case was bigger than the sheep. It may have been hearing +the noise Jathrop makes when he eats, or it may have been your turkey +gravy or your biscuits, Mrs. Lathrop, or all of 'em put together. Not +knowing which, I'm not foolish enough to blame one more'n the other. But +it's a fact as is undeniable that I never slept poorer than last night. +I was in bed by nine, but I never closed my eyes till eleven, and I +certainly heard the clock strike midnight. I counted goats jumping over +a stile, and I counted 'em backward as well as forward, but I heard one +struck, and I heard two. And then I heard something as set my hair up on +end and the gooseflesh sprouting all over me. It sounded like footsteps +in the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[Pg 300]</a></span> 'But. Pan.,' and they was too heavy for the cat's, I could tell +that at once, though at two in the morning it's surprising how loud a +cat's footsteps can sound, especially when it's reached the pouncing +stage, and the rat ain't got no hole to run to. I'd forgot to put the +turkey leg in the ice-box as I'd carried home with me, and all I could +think of was that if it was the cat, there'd be nothing left on that +bone by morning, unless I stopped things right then and immediately. +You'd never believe how cold a house can be at two o'clock in the +morning of the day after Christmas unless you'd got up in it as I did; +and now to look back at it, I see how lucky it was as it was as cold as +it was, for if it hadn't of been, I'd a gone down just as I was, and I +was in no trim to meet a man burglar, I can tell you <i>that</i>. So I just +slipped into this flannel wrapper and a old pair of slippers, which I've +got on now under these arctics, and I picked up the candle as I'd lit, +and down-stairs I went. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, I hope you may never in your +born<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[Pg 301]</a></span> days in this world or the other have such a shock as met me there +face to face in my own new, built-over kitchen. If there wasn't the +biggest giant of a man I ever see coming out of the shadows between the +cookstove and the cellar door. And he with his head all wrapped around +in one of my best plaid roller towels, so that nothing of him was to be +seen but two fierce, staring, bloodshot eyes as gleamed like a wild +beast's. Oh, my soul and body, Mrs. Lathrop, that minute! How I ever +kept my senses I don't pretend to say, more especially as he was on me +with one jump. There was no such thing as holding on to the candle, you +can see that. It dropped, and I never knew I dropped it. For, of course, +I shut my eyes, and when your eyes is shut, there's no knowing whether +there's a lighted candle about or whether there isn't."</p> + +<p>In her agitation over the recital, Mrs. Lathrop, who was placing cups +and saucers on the table, let one of the cups slide crashing to the +floor. "Oh, Su—!" she exclaimed.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[Pg 302]</a></span></p> + +<p>"You may well say: 'Oh, Susan!'" Miss Clegg continued. "There is times +when 'Oh, Susan' don't half express the state of affairs, and this was +one of 'em, Mrs. Lathrop. It wasn't in nature for me not to scream, so I +screamed, and it was that scream that did the business. It showed the +burglar I wasn't deaf and dumb, and people as isn't deaf and dumb is +looked on by burglars as their natural enemies. Maybe some people can +scream without opening their mouths, but I never was one of that kind, +and the kind as open their mouths when they scream is the kind that all +burglars prefer. It saves 'em the trouble of forcing apart their jaws. I +never shut my mouth after opening it; for the burglar just shoved +something in it as quick as scat, and then he tied a bandage around back +of my head so I couldn't spit it out. Then he picked me up and plumped +me down hard in a chair and tied me fast to it with my own clothesline. +And all the time he never no more opened his lips to speak than if he +couldn't. It's my opinion he must<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[Pg 303]</a></span> have had a cold and lost his voice. +Either that, or his voice was such a unpleasant voice he was ashamed to +let anybody hear it. For it ain't in common sense as a man, even if he +is a burglar, could keep as still as he did, if he had a speaking voice +that's in any way fit for use. I know in the time he took there was a +lot of things I felt to say to him, and would if I could, and common +sense'll tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, that he must have felt to say a lot of +things to me. But he didn't make so much as a peep behind his roller +towel."</p> + +<p>"Did—?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, pouring the tea.</p> + +<p>"I can't say as he did or he didn't. I haven't missed nothing yet, but +then I haven't looked. Still, if he didn't I can't say as I'd have much +respect for him. What sort of a burglar would a burglar be to take all +that trouble of breaking in, binding and gagging, and then go away +without helping himself to something for his trouble. I ain't got no +love for burglars in general or in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[Pg 304]</a></span> particular. But any burglar as 'ld +do a fool trick like that I ain't got no respect for neither."</p> + +<p>"How—?" queried her neighbor as she passed Susan her cup.</p> + +<p>"It was something of a job I can tell you, but when I sets my mind to a +thing I sets my mind to it, and ropes and a kitchen chair ain't got the +power to stop me. I begun wriggling as soon as I heard the burglar shut +the door behind him, and I kept on wriggling for every minute of the +five hours. A tramped-on worm never did more turning and wriggling than +I did between two and seven this morning, and at last wriggling being +its own reward, I wriggled free, first with my hands and then with my +feet. But before I got my feet free, I undid the band and ungagged +myself and said just a few of the things that was bottled up all that +time. The Bible says there's a time to talk and a time to be still, but +there's such a thing as overdoing the still time, I think, and when +you're gagged by a burglar is one of 'em."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[Pg 305]</a></span></p> + +<p>Susan sipped her tea for a moment in silence.</p> + +<p>"Where's Jathrop and Mr. Kettlewell?" she asked at length. "Ain't they +up yet?"</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop nodded. "They start—" she began.</p> + +<p>"You don't mean they've both lit out already?" asked Susan in surprise. +Then: "I was hoping to see Mr. Kettlewell again. But it's a long journey +back to New York, so I suppose they set off before light."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop nodded once more.</p> + +<p>"Aren't—?" she questioned.</p> + +<p>"I certainly am. I'm going to report the burglary at once. I've got a +clue, and it ought to be easy enough to run down that burglar." She drew +from her bosom a rather damp handkerchief. "That's what he left me to +chew on for five hours," she said, as she spread it out. "And there's +the clue right there in the corner."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop took it to the window and inspected it through her glasses. +The handkerchief was initialed with a "K."<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[Pg 306]</a></span></p> + +<p>The New Year came and January was passing and, so far as Susan Clegg +cared to divulge at least, there was no news of her burglar. It was +noted, however, not only by Mrs. Lathrop, but by Mrs. Macy and Gran'ma +Mullins, and indeed by all the ladies of the Sewing Society, that Miss +Clegg had adopted an air of secretiveness concerning the matter that was +quite foreign to her usual frank, unreserved communicativeness. But the +curiosity provoked by this strangely unfamiliar attitude was swallowed +up in the sensational tidings which spread throughout the community +shortly after. Without so much as a hint of warning, Susan Clegg had +vanished between dark and dawn, leaving her house locked, bolted, and +barred, the blinds drawn, and the shutters fast closed.</p> + +<p>For once Mrs. Lathrop, thus deprived of her prop and her stay, evinced +sufficient initiative to have the cellar door forced and a search of the +premises made; a rumor having got abroad that the burglar had returned, +this time more murderously inclined, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[Pg 307]</a></span> that Miss Clegg's mangled +corpse would be found stiff and stark within her own darkened domicile. +To every one's infinite relief the search proved the rumor utterly +unfounded; and it proved something more, as well. It proved that Susan's +departure was plainly premeditated—"with malice prepense," to quote +Judge Fitch—since all her best clothes had gone with her. Whereupon +sentiment switched to the opposite pole, and it was openly declared that +Miss Clegg had gone after the burglar.</p> + +<p>The wonder was of a magnitude calculated to extend far beyond the +proverbial nine days, and it probably would have greatly exceeded that +limit, had not the heroine of the affair chosen to cut it short of her +own volition by reappearing quite as suddenly as she had vanished, at +the end of a single week.</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop, looking across from her bedroom window as she arose from +her night's sleep on the morning of the eighth day, was joyously +startled to see the Clegg windows unshaded, and the house otherwise<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[Pg 308]</a></span> +displaying signs of rehabitation. Nor did she have long to wait for the +explanation of the mystery, which to the exclusion of everything else +had filled her mind ever since her friend's going. With a shawl over her +head and shoulders, she hastened through the pergola, and the next +moment was facing her neighbor with glad eyes across four yards of +kitchen floor space.</p> + +<p>"Oh, Susan! Such a fri—" These were her four and a half words of +greeting.</p> + +<p>"I knew it would," Miss Clegg caught her up, beaming as Mrs. Lathrop +couldn't remember ever to have seen her beam before. "I knew it would +frighten you all half to death, but when a thing's to be done, it's to +be done, and there ain't no use shirking. I had to go, and I had to go +quick, and I was never so glad of anything in my life, past or present, +as that I went. Of course, it was all along of that burglary, as any +fool might have guessed if they took the trouble. In the first place, I +don't mind telling you now, I went straight to Mr. Weskin the morning<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[Pg 309]</a></span> +after it happened, and I took him the clue and showed it to him. The way +he spun around in his spinning chair was fit to make even a level-headed +person like me dizzy. He examined the linen, and he examined the way the +K was worked, and then he says, no it couldn't possibly be Mr. +Kimball's. Now, what <i>do</i> you think of that? Just as if I ever suspected +it was. I guess I know Mr. Kimball well enough to know him, even if he +has got his head wrapped up in one of my new roller towels, and I told +Lawyer Weskin so. Mr. Kimball, indeed! But Lawyer Weskin said as he +didn't never hear of a burglar whose name commenced with K, and he +didn't know a soul in these parts either, burglar or no burglar, whose +name did, except Mr. Kimball. There's only one way to ferret out the +perpetrator of a crime, he says, and that's by deduction, and the first +rule of deduction is to guess what the K stands for. I never thought +much of Lawyer Weskin, I'm free to admit that, but if he don't know +nothing else, it's as clear as shooting that he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[Pg 310]</a></span> does know about +education. For in the end it worked out just as he said, and the Lord be +praised for it."</p> + +<p>"You don't—" began Mrs. Lathrop in astonishment.</p> + +<p>"I don't say as Mr. Kimball had a thing to do with it. I certainly +don't. In the first place, Mr. Kimball would never dare to come to my +house at such a hour of the morning, and in the second place Mr. Kimball +never carried as fine a handkerchief as the one I chewed on. So that put +it past Mr. Kimball. And the only other K I could possibly think of was +old Mrs. Kitts over to Meadville, who could no more of got over here +than could the king of the Sandwich Islands, whose name begins with K, +too. There was the Kellys, of course, but the Kellys couldn't qualify +neither, for they're too rich to need to do any burglarizing. Well, I +can tell you, I soon come to a point where I didn't know where to turn, +and I never would of turned neither, if it hadn't of been for a letter I +got the day of the night I went away. You'd<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[Pg 311]</a></span> never guess in the world, +Mrs. Lathrop, who that letter was from so I may as well tell you first +as last. It was from Mr. Kettlewell."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop opened her mouth in astonishment, but no sound came forth.</p> + +<p>"I knew it'ld surprise you, but it's as true as we're both standing in +this kitchen at this minute. It was a very nice letter, and it said as +how he had admired me from the first minute he saw me, but more +particularly after he'd sat opposite to me at the table and eat my +cranberry sauce. He said he'd always loved cranberry sauce, but as he +felt he'd never tasted none until he tasted mine. I certainly never see +a more complimentary letter than that letter of Mr. Kettlewell's. But it +was the end of the letter where he signed his name that lit me up with +the clear light of revelation. Until I see his name spelled out there in +black and white, I never once believed it begun with a K. I'd thought +all along as his name was Cattlewell, with a C. Far be it from me, Mrs. +Lathrop, to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[Pg 312]</a></span> ever have suspected as Jathrop's friend would stoop to +housebreaking and to binding and gagging a lone woman, but there's other +ways as his handkerchief might have got to my mouth, and I felt to know +the truth. His address was on the letter, and there was nothing as could +have stayed me from getting to that address as fast as steam and steel +could carry me. I left in the middle of the night, and I got to New York +in the morning, and I didn't have that feeling for nothing. Mr. +Kettlewell was at his hotel, and in all my born days I never see a +person gladder to see anybody than Mr. Kettlewell was to see me. It's +marvelous what a impression a little good cooking will make on a man, +even if it's only in cranberry sauce. His mouth actually hadn't stopped +watering yet. Leastwise he said it hadn't, and I'd be a fool not to +believe him. He begun talking about it right away, and I let him talk, +just so's I could look at his shiny bald head and his red whiskers +without having to think of anything else except the sound of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[Pg 313]</a></span> +milk-and-honey voice. Finally he said he supposed I'd come to the city +to select Jathrop's Christmas present of furnishings, and if I'd like +him to help me select 'em, he'd be glad enough to go along and lend a +hand. Well, nothing could of been nicer than that, now, could it? But I +told him I wasn't one as traveled all the way to New York under false +pretences, and that if he must have the truth, I'd never give one +thought to Jathrop's present since he mentioned it. All my thought, I +said, had been give to finding a handkerchief with a K onto it, which +I'd washed and ironed with my own hands and brought to him, believing I +must of picked it up at the Christmas dinner by mistake, and not wanting +him to feel the need of it any longer. And you can believe me or not, +Mrs. Lathrop, just as you feel about it, if he didn't right then and +there on seeing that clue, confess that it did belong to him, and that +he couldn't for the life of him remember where he'd left it."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop, who had been standing all<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[Pg 314]</a></span> the while, dropped into a chair +at this point in dumb stupefaction. But Susan, who had been caught with +a bowl of batter in one hand and a spoon in the other, paused only to do +a little more stirring.</p> + +<p>"Yes, sir," she went on, still apparently as pleased as punch. "The clue +belonged to Mr. Kettlewell and no one else, which led me to suspect +right away that the burglar must have robbed your house first. I knowed +very well that I never carried that clue home myself, though I'd said I +might, just for the sake of drawing Mr. Kettlewell on. And so how could +it have got into my mouth unless the burglar got it from Mr. Kettlewell +himself? But there is stranger things in this world than you and me ever +dreamed of, Mrs. Lathrop, and that was one of 'em. Mr. Kettlewell is a +very frank and open gentleman, and seeing how disturbed I was over +something, though I'd never so much as breathed burglar or burglary, he +made another confession. And when it comes to dreaming, there is very +few people, he said, as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[Pg 315]</a></span> has the power to dream the way he does. He +don't just lie still in bed and picture things out in his sleep, but he +gets up and does the things he's dreaming about. He ain't got no +limitations in it, either. Sleepwalkers is more or less common. But +sleepwalkers just walk, and that ends 'em. Mr. Kettlewell says he very +seldom walks. He usually drives a automobile when he's dreaming, just as +he does when he's wide awake. Sometimes he comes to while he's driving, +and he's found himself often as much as a couple a hundred miles from +home, and without a cent in his clothes, the clothes usually being just +pajamas with nothing but a handkerchief in the pocket. Now, if you had +any imagination a <i>tall</i>, Mrs. Lathrop, you'd see what I'm coming to, +but as you haven't you don't, I can tell by the way you look. So you'll +get the full benefit of the surprise when I say that on Christmas night +Mr. Kettlewell distinctly remembers he dreamed of committing a burglary. +He says it wasn't my mince pie as did it, because he's often eaten<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_316" id="Page_316">[Pg 316]</a></span> +mince pie before and never dreamed nothing worse than going to the +electric chair; and it wasn't my stuffing neither, for turkey stuffing +when it's indigestible always makes him dream he's a monkey climbing +trees. He says once he woke up sudden and fell and broke his arm, but +that that was a long while ago. Now he's had more experience, he never +wakes up till he's safe back in bed again. And he says doughnuts causes +his dreams to run back to when he was a boy, and one time he come to, +after a after-dinner nap, when he had doughnuts for dessert, playing +marbles in the back alley with a lot of street urchins. I can tell you, +Mrs. Lathrop, he was most interesting. He's got all his dreams sort of +classified in that way, and can almost tell to a dot what he'll dream +about according to what he eats. And he says soggy biscuits always makes +him dream he's robbing a house or killing somebody. It was mighty lucky +for me, as you can see for yourself, that this time he only dreamed of +binding and gagging. If he'd dreamed of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_317" id="Page_317">[Pg 317]</a></span> murder, I'd not be here now to +tell the tale. And it's clean to be seen that your biscuits would of +been an accessory before the fact."</p> + +<p>"Then he—"</p> + +<p>"Yes, it was him as done it, and without no moral blame attaching to him +a <i>tall</i>. If he'd killed me, the law couldn't of touched him either, for +the law takes no account of what a person does while they're asleep. But +as you made the biscuits in your full senses and with your eyes wide +open, you'd of been the only one to blame."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop groaned. "You know, Sus—" she protested.</p> + +<p>"Of course if I was alive, I'd never hold it against you, because I know +very well you can't make biscuits no better, and ain't never had sense +enough to learn. But if I was murdered, my ghost couldn't testify, and I +don't see as how you could be saved from the law taking its course."</p> + +<p>At this juncture there was a sound overhead, and both ladies started, +Mrs. Lathrop<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_318" id="Page_318">[Pg 318]</a></span> in surprise and her friend in sudden realization of +neglected duties.</p> + +<p>"What is—?" inquired Mrs. Lathrop.</p> + +<p>"It's him," answered Susan. "Mr. Kettlewell. And the coffee's boiled now +till it's bitter, and there ain't a single cake on the griddle." She was +turning back to the stove as Mrs. Lathrop's exclamation caught her and +switched her around.</p> + +<p>"Why, Susan Clegg!"</p> + +<p>"Don't Susan Clegg me, Mrs. Lathrop," she commanded. "There ain't no +Susan Clegg any more. When Susan Clegg disappeared a week ago last +night, she disappeared for good, never to return. And if you suspect +anything else, it's best I should introduce myself here and now,—Susan +Kettlewell, from this time forth, if you please."</p> + +<p>Mrs. Lathrop sprang up and dropped back again.</p> + +<p>"You don't—"</p> + +<p>"I do. I do mean to say I'm married at last. We was wedded with a ring +in New<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_319" id="Page_319">[Pg 319]</a></span> York last Wednesday, and it's my husband's footsteps you hear up +there in the new bathroom."</p> + +<p>She dropped three spreading spoonfuls of batter on the greased griddle +and gave Mrs. Lathrop a full minute to absorb the announcement. Then, as +she drew the coffee pot to one side, she continued:</p> + +<p>"And it was purely a love match, make no mistake about that. He's got +money enough to buy and sell Jathrop, but he's as simple-minded and +simple-tasted as a babe in arms. And there's nothing I can think of that +he's not ready and willing to give me. Besides, he's frank and open +about everything. He says his teeth is false, and he has a bullet in his +right leg, got one time when he dreamed somebody was shooting him; but +that otherwise he's as perfect as a man of his age can be. He says he'll +buy a wig if I want him to, and that if I don't like the color of his +whiskers, he'll have 'em dyed whatever color I'd like best, and the +wig'l be made to match. But I wouldn't have him changed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_320" id="Page_320">[Pg 320]</a></span> the least mite. +And if there's one thing in the world I'm thankful for it is that I got +him and not Jathrop. And I'm not thinking from the financial standpoint, +neither."</p> + + +<h3>THE END</h3> + +<hr style="width: 65%;" /> + +<h2>Distinctive Fiction by Anne Warner</h2> + +<blockquote><p>The reading world owes Anne Warner a vote of thanks for her +contributions to the best of American humor.—<i>New York Times.</i></p> + +<p>Anne Warner has taken her place as one of the drollest of American +humorists.—<i>Century Magazine.</i></p></blockquote> + +<h3>The Gay and Festive Claverhouse</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>A story of the desperate attempt of a supposedly dying man to lose +the love of a girl.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>Sunshine Jane</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>The joyful story of a Sunshine Nurse whose mission was not to care +for sick bodies but to heal sick souls.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>When Woman Proposes.</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>A clever and entertaining story of a woman who fell in love with an +army officer.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>How Leslie Loved</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>Not only a buoyant love story but a penetrating satire on modern +manners.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>Just Between Themselves</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>A vivacious satire on married life which is full of mirth of the +quieter, chuckling variety.</p></blockquote> + +<h3>The Taming of Amorette</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>A clever comedy telling how a man cured his attractive wife of +flirting.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>Susan Clegg, Her Friend, and Her Neighbors</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>A study of life which is most delectable for its simplicity and for +the quaint character creation.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>Susan Clegg and a Man in the House</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>The remarkable happenings at the Clegg homestead after the boarder +came.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary.</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>The pranks of a scapegrace nephew who was showing his old aunt a +"good time."</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>In a Mysterious Way</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>Compounded of amusing studies of human nature in a rural community.</p></blockquote> + + +<h3>A Woman's Will</h3> + + +<blockquote><p>Describes the wooing of a young American widow on the continent by +a musical genius.</p></blockquote> + + +<h4>Little, Brown & Co., <i>Publishers</i>, Boston</h4> + + + + + + + + +<pre> + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs, by Anne Warner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS *** + +***** This file should be named 37289-h.htm or 37289-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/2/8/37289/ + +Produced by Beginners Projects, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs + +Author: Anne Warner + +Illustrator: H. M. Brett + +Release Date: September 1, 2011 [EBook #37289] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS *** + + + + +Produced by Beginners Projects, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + + + + + + + + + + + SUSAN CLEGG + + AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS + + BY ANNE WARNER + + Author of "The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary," "Sunshine Jane," etc. + + + WITH FRONTISPIECE BY + H. M. BRETT + + BOSTON + LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY + 1916 + + _Copyright, 1916_, + + BY LITTLE, BROWN, AND COMPANY. + + _All rights reserved_ + + Published, May, 1916 + Reprinted, May, 1916 + + + + +[Illustration: "Nothing but the floor stopped me from falling through to +China." FRONTISPIECE. _See Page 144._] + + + +CONTENTS + + + I. SUSAN CLEGG'S COURTING 1 + + II. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CHINESE LADY 32 + + III. SUSAN CLEGG SOLVES THE MYSTERY 58 + + IV. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE OLIVE BRANCH 80 + + V. SUSAN CLEGG'S "IMPROVEMENTS" 104 + + VI. SUSAN CLEGG UPROOTED 129 + + VII. SUSAN CLEGG UNSETTLED 153 + + VIII. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CYCLONE 176 + + IX. SUSAN CLEGG'S PRACTICAL FRIEND 216 + + X. SUSAN CLEGG DEVELOPS IMAGINATION 236 + + XI. SUSAN CLEGG AND THE PLAYWRIGHT 256 + + XII. SUSAN CLEGG'S DISAPPEARANCE 277 + + + + +SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS + + + + +I + +SUSAN CLEGG'S COURTING + + +Mrs. Lathrop sat on her front piazza, and Susan Clegg sat with her. Mrs. +Lathrop was rocking, and Susan was just back from the Sewing Society. +Neither Mrs. Lathrop nor Susan was materially altered since we saw them +last. Time had moved on a bit, but not a great deal, and although both +were older, still they were not much older. + +They were not enough older for Mrs. Lathrop to have had a new rocker, +nor for Susan to have purchased a new bonnet. Susan indeed looked almost +absolutely unaltered. She was a woman of the best wearing quality; she +was hard and firm as ever, and if there were any plating about her, it +was of the quadruple kind and would last. + +If the reader knows Susan Clegg at all, he will surmise that she was +talking. And he will be right. Susan was most emphatically talking. She +had returned from the Sewing Society full to the brim, and Mrs. Lathrop +was already enjoying the overflow. Mrs. Lathrop liked to rock and +listen. She never went to the Sewing Society herself--she never went +anywhere. + +"We was talking about dreams," Susan was saying; "it's a very curious +thing about dreams. Do you know, Mrs. Lathrop," wrinkling her brow and +regarding her friend with that look of friendship which is not blind to +any faults, "do you know, Mrs. Lathrop, they said down there that dreams +always go by contraries. We was discussing it for a long time, and they +ended up by making me believe in it. You see, it all began by my saying +how I dreamed last night that Jathrop was back, and he was a cat and +your cat, too, and he did something he wasn't let to, and you made one +jump at him, and out of the window he went. Now that was a very strange +dream for me to have dreamed, Mrs. Lathrop, and Mrs. Lupey, who's +staying with Mrs. Macy to-day and maybe to-morrow, too, says she's sure +it's a sign. She says if dreams go by contraries, mine ought to be a +sign as Jathrop is coming back, for the contraries is all there: Jathrop +_wasn't_ a cat, and he never done nothing that he shouldn't--nor that he +should, neither--and you never jump--I don't believe you've jumped in +years, have you?" + +"I--" began Mrs. Lathrop reminiscently. + +"Oh, that time don't count," said Susan, "it was just my ball of yarn, +even if it did look like a rat; I meant a jump when you meant it; you +didn't mean that jump. Well, an' to go back to the dream and what was +said about it and to tell you the rest of it, there wasn't any more of +it, but there was plenty more said about it. All of the dream was that +the cat went out of the window, and I woke up, but, oh, my, how we did +talk! Gran'ma Mullins wanted to know in the first place how I knew that +the cat was Jathrop. She was most interested in that, for she says she +often dreams of animals, but it never struck her that they might be any +one she knew. She dreamed she found a daddy-long-legs looking in her +bureau drawer the other night, but she never gave it another thought. +She'll be more careful after this, I guess. Well, then I begun to +consider, and for the life of me I can't think how I knew that that cat +was Jathrop. As I remember it was a very common looking cat, but being +common looking wouldn't mean Jathrop. Jathrop was common looking, but +not a common cat kind of common looking. It was a very strange dream, +Mrs. Lathrop, the more I consider it, the more I can't see what give it +to me. I finished up the doughnuts just before I went to bed, for I was +afraid they'd mold in another day with this damp weather, but it don't +seem as if doughnuts ought to result in cats like Jathrop. If I'd +dreamed of mice, it'd been different, for some of the doughnuts was +gnawed in a way as showed as there'd been mice in the jar. It does beat +all how mice get about. Maybe it was the mice made me think Jathrop was +a cat. But even then I can't see how I did come to dream that dream. +Unless it was a sign. Mrs. Lupey's sure it was a sign. We talked about +signs the whole of the Sewing Society. Dreams and signs. Everybody told +all they knew. Mrs. Macy told about her snow dream. Whenever Mrs. Macy +has her snow dream, somebody dies. She says it's so interesting to look +in a paper the next time she gets hold of one and see who it was. One +time she thought it was Edgar Allen Poe, but when she read it over +twice, she see that it was just that he'd been born. She says her snow +dream's a wonderful sign; it's never failed once. She dreamed it the +night before the earthquake in Italy, and she says to think how many +died of it that time! + +"This started Gran'ma Mullins, and Gran'ma Mullins told about that dream +she had the year before she met her husband. That was an awful dream. I +wonder she met her husband a _tall_ after it. She thought she was alone +in a thick wood, and she saw a man coming, and she was scared to death. +She says she can feel her trembling now. She didn't know what to do, +'cause if she'd hid among the trees he couldn't have seen her, and that +idea scared her as bad as the other. So she just stood and shook and +watched the man coming nearer and nearer. I've heard her tell the story +a hundred times, but my blood always sort o' runs cold to hear it. The +man come nearer and nearer and, my, but she says he _was_ a man! She was +just a young girl, but she was old enough to be afraid, and old enough +not to want to hide from him, neither. She says it was an awful lesson +to her about going in woods alone, because of course you can't never +expect any sympathy if the man does murder you or kiss you--everybody'll +just say, 'Why didn't she hide in the woods?' Well, Gran'ma Mullins +says there she stood, and she can see herself still standing there. She +says she's never been in the woods since just on account of that +dream--and then, too, she's one of those that the mosquitos all get on +in the woods. And then, besides, she doesn't like woods, anyway. And +then, besides, there ain't no thick woods around here. But, anyhow, you +know what happened--just as he got to her she woke up, and I must say of +all the tame stories to have to sit and listen to over and over, that +dream of Gran'ma Mullins is the tamest. I get tired the minute she +begins it, but my dream had started every one to telling signs, and so +of course Gran'ma Mullins had to tell hers along with the rest. + +"When she was done Mrs. Lupey told us about her mother, Mrs. Kitts, and +a curious kind of prophetic dream she used to have and kept right on +having up to the day she died. Mrs. Lupey said she never heard the like +of those dreams of her mother's, and I guess nobody else ever has, +either. No, nor never will. Well, it seems Mrs. Kitts used to dream she +was falling out of bed, and the curious part is that she always _did_ +fall out of bed just as she dreamed it, so it never failed to come true. +She'd dream she hit the floor _bang!_ and the next second she'd hit the +floor _bang!_ Mrs. Lupey said she never saw such a dream for coming +true; if old Mrs. Kitts dreamed she hit her head, she'd hit her head, +and the time she dreamed she sprained her wrist, she sprained her wrist, +and the time she had her stroke, as soon as her mind was got back in +place she told them she'd dreamed she had a stroke in her chair just +before she fell out of her chair with the stroke. Even the minister's +wife didn't have a word to say. + +"Mrs. Lupey said her mother was a most remarkable woman. She's very +sorry now she didn't board that painter for a portrait of her. The +painter was so awful took with old Mrs. Kitts that he was willing to do +her for six weeks and with the frame for two months. But Mrs. Lupey was +afraid to have a painter around. She'd just read a detective story about +a painter that killed the woman he was painting because he didn't want +any one else to paint her. Mrs. Lupey said it was a very Frenchy +story--there was a lot between the lines and on the lines, too--as she +couldn't make out, but it taught her never to have painters around, for +you never could be sure in a house with four other women that he'd kill +the one he was painting. But she's sorry now, for she's older now and +wiser and a match for any painter going, long-haired, short-haired or no +hair at all. But it's too late now, and there's Mrs. Kitts dead +unpainted, and all they've got left is a sweet memory and that cane she +used to hit at 'em with when they weren't spry enough to suit her, and +her hymn-book which she marked up without telling any one and left for a +remembrance. Mrs. Lupey says such markings you never heard of. + +"When Mrs. Lupey was all done, Mrs. Brown took her turn and told us +some very interesting things about Amelia. Seems Amelia is so far +advanced in learning what nobody can understand that she can see quite a +little ways ahead now and tell just what she's going to do. She can't +see for the rest of the family, but she can see for herself. Sometimes +it's just a day ahead, and sometimes it's a long way ahead. The longest +way ahead that she's seen yet is that she can't see herself ever getting +up to breakfast again. Mrs. Brown says of course she respects Amelia's +religious views, but it's trying when Amelia wants to go to church, but +doesn't see herself going, so has to stay at home. She says Amelia just +loves to sew, but she can't see herself sewing any more, so she's given +it all up. She says Amelia's got a superior mind--anybody can tell that +only to see the way she's took to doing her hair--but she says it's a +little hard on young Doctor Brown and her, who haven't got superior +minds, to live with her. Amelia don't want to kill flies any more, for +fear they're going to be her blood relations a million years from now, +and Mrs. Brown says she never was any good once a mouse was caught, but +now she won't even hear to setting a trap; she says all things has equal +rights, and if she feels a spider, some one has got to take it off her +and set it gently outside on the grass. Oh, Mrs. Brown says, Amelia's +very hard to live up to, even with the best will in the world. Mrs.--" + +Here Susan was interrupted by Brunhilde Susan, the minister's youngest +child, who brought the evening milk and the evening paper. + +"There was a letter, so I brought that, too," said Brunhilde Susan. + +"A letter!" said Susan in surprise. + +"It's for Mrs. Lathrop," said Brunhilde Susan. + +"For me!" said Mrs. Lathrop in even greater surprise. + +"Yes'm," said Brunhilde Susan. + +A letter for Mrs. Lathrop was indeed a surprise, as that good lady had +only received two in the last five years. As those had been of the +least interesting variety, she looked upon the present one with but mild +interest. The next minute she gave a scream, for, turning it over as +some people always do turn a letter over before opening it, she read on +the back "Return to Jathrop Lathrop..." and her fingers turning numb +with surprise and her head dizzy for the same reason, she dropped it on +the floor forthwith. + +Brunhilde Susan had turned and gone back down the walk. Miss Clegg, who +had been regarding her friend's slowness to take action with +ill-concealed impatience, now made no attempt at concealing anything, +but leaned over abruptly and picked up the letter. As soon as she looked +at it she came near dropping it, too. "From Jathrop!" she exclaimed, in +a tone appalled. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop!" + +Mrs. Lathrop was quite speechless. Susan held the letter and began to +regard it closely. It was quite a minute before another sound was made, +then suddenly a light burst over the younger woman's face. "It's my +dream. I told you so. It _was_ a sign, just as Mrs. Lupey said. He's +coming back!" + +She looked toward Mrs. Lathrop, but Mrs. Lathrop still sat quite limp +and gasping for breath. + +"Shall I open it and read it to you?" Susan then suggested. + +"Y--y--" began Mrs. Lathrop and could get no further. + +At that Susan promptly opened the letter. It was written on the paper of +a Chicago hotel, and ran thus: + + "_Dear Mother_: + + "Years have passed by, and here I am on my way home again. I've + been to the Klondike and am now rich and on my way home. I hope + that you are well and safe at home. You'll be glad to see me home + again, I know. How is everybody at home? How is Susan Clegg? I + shall get home Saturday morning. + + "Your afft. son, + "J. LATHROP, ESQ." + +That was all and surely it was quite enough. + +"Well, I declare!" Susan Clegg said, staring first at the letter and +then at the mother. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop! Well, I declare. It _was_ a +sign. You and me'll never doubt signs after _this_, I guess." + +Mrs. Lathrop made an effort to rally, but only succeeded in just feebly +shaking her head. + +Susan continued to hold the letter in her hand and contemplate it. +Another slow minute or two passed. + +But at last the wheels of life began to turn again, and that active +mind, which grasped so much so readily, grasped this news, too. Miss +Clegg ceased to view the letter and began to take action regarding it. + +"Did you notice what he says here, Mrs. Lathrop? He says he's rich. I +don't know whether you noticed or not as I read, but he says he's rich. +I wonder how rich he means!" + +Mrs. Lathrop opened and shut her eyes in a futile way that she had, but +continued speechless. + +"Rich," repeated Miss Clegg, "and me dreaming of him last night; that's +very curious, when you come to think of it, 'cause I'm rich, too. And I +was dreaming of him! It doesn't make any difference my thinking he was a +cat; I knew it was Jathrop, even if he was only a cat in a dream. +Strange my dreaming of him that way! I can see him flying out of the +window right now. He was one of those lanky, long cats that eat from +dawn till dark and every time your back's turned and yet keep the +neighbors saying you starve it. And to think it was Jathrop all the +time! Thinking of me right that minute, probably. And he says, 'How's +Susan Clegg?' And he's rich. I _do_ wonder what he'd call rich!" + +Susan paused and looked at her friend, but Mrs. Lathrop remained dumb. + +"The Klondike, that's where he went to, was it? Goodness, I wonder how +he ever got there! Well, I'll never be surprised at nothing after this. +I've had many little surprises in my life, but never nothing to equal +this. Jathrop Lathrop come back rich! Why, the whole town will be at the +station to meet him to-morrow. I wonder if he'll come in the parlor-car! +Think of Jathrop being a cat overnight and coming in a parlor-car next +day! And he says, 'How's Susan Clegg?'" + +The last three words seemed to make quite an impression on Susan, but +Mrs. Lathrop appeared smashed so supremely flat that nothing could make +any further impression on her. She continued dumb, and Susan continued +to hold the letter and comment on it. + +"I wonder what he looks like now. I wonder if he's grown any better +looking! I certainly do wonder if he's got any homelier. And he's rich! +Why, nobody from this town has ever gone away and got rich before, not +that I can remember. I call myself a rich woman, but I ain't rich enough +to dream of writing it in a letter. I certainly should like to know +what Jathrop calls being rich. He couldn't possibly have millions, or it +would have reached here somehow. Maybe he's been digging under another +name! I suppose three or four thousand would seem enough to make him +call himself rich. If he comes home with three or four thousand and +calls that being rich, I shall certainly feel very sorry for you, Mrs. +Lathrop. He'll be very airy over his money, and he'll live on yours. If +you've got to have any one live with you, it's better for them to have +no money a _tall_, because if they've got ever such a little, they +always feel so perky over it. Mrs. Brown says if Amelia didn't have that +six dollars and seventy-five cents a month from her dead mother, she'd +be much easier to live with. Mrs. Brown says whenever Doctor Brown trys +to control Amelia, Amelia hops up and says she'll pay for it with her +own money. Mrs. Brown says to hear Amelia, you'd think she had at least +ten dollars a month of her own. Mrs. Brown's so sad over Amelia. Amelia +sees herself doing such outlandish things some days. Mrs. Brown says +your son's wife is the biggest puzzle a woman ever gets. I guess Mrs. +Brown would have liked young Doctor Brown never to marry." + +Mrs. Lathrop opened her mouth and shut it again. + +"I suppose you're thinking where to put Jathrop when he comes," Susan +said quickly. "I've been thinking of that, too. Where can you put him, +anyway? He never can sleep in that little shed bedroom where he used to +sleep, if he's really rich, and he'll have to have some place to wash +before we can find out." + +Mrs. Lathrop looked distressed. "I--" she began. + +"Oh, that wouldn't do," said Susan, knitting her brows quickly. "Think +of the work of changing all your things. No, I'll tell you what's the +best thing to do; he can sleep over at my house. Father's room was all +cleaned last week, and I'll make up the bed, and Jathrop can sleep there +until we find out how to treat him. Maybe his old shed bedroom will do, +after all, or maybe he's so awfully rich he'll enjoy sleeping in it, +like the president liked to stack hay. Maybe he'll ask nothing better +than to chop wood and take the ashes out of the stove just for a change. +I do wonder how rich he is. If he's rich enough to have a private car, I +expect this town _will_ open its eyes. You'll see a great change in your +position, Mrs. Lathrop, if Jathrop comes in a private car to-morrow +morning. There's something about a private car as makes everybody step +around lively. I don't say that I shan't respect him more myself if he +comes in a private car. But he can sleep one night in father's room, +anyway, although if he calls it being rich to come home with just two or +three thousand, I think he'd better understand it's for just one night +right from the start. I wouldn't want Jathrop to think that I had any +time to waste on him if he calls just two or three thousand being rich. +It'd be no wonder I dreamed he was a cat, if he's got the face to call +that being rich. But that would be just like Jathrop. You know yourself +that if Jathrop could ever do anything to disappoint anybody, he never +let the chance slide. I never had no use for Jathrop Lathrop, as you +know to your cost, Mrs. Lathrop. But, still, if he really is rich, I +haven't got anything against him, and I'll tell you what I'll do right +now: I'll go home and put that room in order and get my supper, and then +after supper I'll just run down to the square and see if anybody else +knows, and then I'll come back and tell you if they do. It's no use your +trying to put things a little in order, because you couldn't straighten +this place up in a month, and, besides, it isn't worth fussing till we +know how rich he is. He may just have writ that in for a joke--to break +it to you gently that he's coming back again to live here. Heaven help +you if that's the case, Mrs. Lathrop, for Jathrop never will. It isn't +in me to deceive so much as a fly on the window, and I never have +deceived you and I never will." + +With which promise Susan took her departure. + +It was all of three hours--quite nine in the evening--when Susan came +back. She found Mrs. Lathrop transferred to her back porch and seemingly +in a somewhat less complete state of total paralysis than when she had +left her. + +Mrs. Lathrop looked up as her friend approached and smiled. + +"Nobody knew," Susan announced as she mounted the steps, "but every one +knows now, for I told them. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you never saw anything +like it. There isn't a person in town as ever expected to see Jathrop +again, and only about three as always thought he'd come back rich. Every +one's going to the station to-morrow morning, even Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Macy +says if it's one of the mornings she can't walk, she'll hire Hiram and +his wheelbarrow just as she does for church those Sundays. Everybody's +so interested. I told them about the private car, and everybody hopes +that he's got one, and that he'll come in it. Mr. Dill says he must be +rich if he's been to the Klondike and come back a _tall_. He says +there's no halfway work about the Klondike. Either you come back a +millionaire or else you eat first your dog and then your boots and +that's the last of you. Gran'ma Mullins says she never heard of eating +boots in the Klondike; she thought you rode on a sled there and that +there weren't any women. She says Hiram's spoken of going there once or +twice, and Lucy thought maybe the coasting would do him good, but +Gran'ma Mullins says not while she's alive, no, sir. Why, it's 'way +across America and up a ways, and so many people want to go up that they +have to sleep three in a berth, and she says will you only think of +Hiram, with the way she's brought him up, three in a berth. If the bed +ain't tucked in with Gran'ma Mullins' own particular kind of tuck, Hiram +kicks at night and don't get any proper nourishment out of his sleep. +No, Gran'ma Mullins says she couldn't think of Hiram in the Klondike +sleeping under a snow-pile and having to hunt up a whale whenever he was +in need of more kerosene oil. And she says what good would millions do +her with the bones of the only baby she ever had feeding whatever kind +of creature they have up there. No, she says, no, and a million times +more, no; she's been reading about it in a New York paper that came +wrapped around her new stove lid, and she knows all there is to know on +that subject now. She says a New York paper is so interesting. She says +the way they print them makes it very entertaining. She was reading +about a sea serpent, and when she turned, she turned wrong, and she read +twelve columns about the suffragettes, looking eagerly to see when the +sea serpent was going on again. She says she give up trying to see why +they print them so or ever trying to finish any one subject at a time; +she just goes regularly through the paper now and lets the subjects +fight it out to suit themselves. She says it makes the last part very +interesting. You read about a baby, and after a while you find out +whether it's the Queen of Spain's or just a race-horse. She says she +supposes next Sunday there'll be a picture of Jathrop in the paper; +maybe there'll be a view of this house with you and me. I think that +that would be very interesting." + +Susan paused to consider the idyllic little picture thus presented to +her mind's eye, and Mrs. Lathrop continued to say nothing. After a while +Susan went on again: + +"I've been thinking a good deal about that letter, Mrs. Lathrop. I don't +know whether you noticed or not, but to my order of thinking it was very +strange his saying, 'How's Susan Clegg?' That's a curious thing for an +unmarried man to ask his mother about an unmarried woman. When you come +to consider how Jathrop was wild to marry me once, it really means a +terrible lot. I was the first woman except you he ever kissed; he wasn't +but a year old, and I was thirteen, but those things make an impression. +I don't mind telling you that I've often thought about Jathrop +nights--and days, too. And lately I've been thinking of him more and +more. And you can see that he's been feeling the same about me, for he's +showed that plain enough by saying in black and white, 'How's Susan +Clegg?' Jathrop is a very silent nature, you can see that from his never +writing even to his own mother in all these years. It means a good deal +when a silent nature opens its mouth all of a sudden and writes, 'How's +Susan Clegg?' And then my dreaming of him was so strange. He had soft +gray fur and big bright yellow eyes, and the way he flew out of the +window! Even in my dream I noticed how nice he jumped. He made a +beautiful cat. And you know I always stood up for him, Mrs. Lathrop, +I always did that. Even when I thought he needed lynching as much +as anybody, I never said so. And now he's come back rich, and he's +coming home to you and me, and he says, 'How's Susan Clegg?' +'How's--Susan--Clegg?'" + +Susan's voice died dreamily away. Mrs. Lathrop said nothing. After a +minute Susan's voice went on again: "It's too bad I haven't time to sort +of freshen up my striped silk. It's got awful creasy laying folded so +long. I'd of put some new braid around the bottom if I'd known, and if +this town wasn't so noticey, I'd put my hair up on rollers to-night. A +little crimp sets my wave off so. But, laws, everybody'd be asking why I +did it, and if Jathrop's got any idea of me in his head, it'll be very +easy to knock it right straight out if this town gets first chance at +him. But I don't intend that this town shall get first chance at him. I +shall be on that platform to-morrow morning, and I'll be the nearest to +that train, and once he gets off that train, I shall bring him right +straight up here to you and me. It's safest, and it's his duty, too. As +soon as you've seen him, I'll take him over to my house to wash. Then +I'll give him his breakfast, and by the time he's done his breakfast, if +he really means anything, I'll know it. If he really means anything, +we'll come over after breakfast, and it'll do your heart good to see +how happy we'll look. He can leave his bag in father's room then, for +we'll have so much to talk over it'll be more convenient to take him +over there. You can see that for yourself, Mrs. Lathrop--you know how +young people like to be alone together when they're engaged, and a woman +of my age don't need no looking after any longer. I'm no Gran'ma Mullins +to be worrying over woods nor yet any Mrs. Lupey as supposes every man +you let into your house may be going to hit you over the head when +you're thinking of something pleasant. + +"No, I ain't afraid of Jathrop Lathrop nor of any other man alive, thank +heaven. _But_, if I find out as he don't mean anything, I shall march +him over to you in sharp order, bag and all. If he don't mean anything, +I'll soon know the reason why, and as soon as I know the reason why, +I'll send Mr. Jathrop Lathrop flying. 'How's Susan Clegg?' indeed! He'll +find it's a very dangerous joke to go joking about me, no matter how +much money he's scraped out of the Klondike. A joke is a thing as I +never stand, Mrs. Lathrop, and if you'd been one as joked, you'd have +found that out to your deep and abiding sorrow long ago. Very few people +have ever tried to have any fun with me, and I've got even with the most +of them, I'm happy to remark. I shall find out yet who sent me that +comic valentine with the man skipping over the edge of the world and me +after him with a net, and when I do find out, I'll get even about that, +too. Me with a net! I'd like to see myself skipping after any man that +was skipping away from me. If he was skipping toward me, I wouldn't +marry him--not 'nless I loved him. I know that. Love is a thing as you +can't raise and lower just as the fancy strikes you. A woman can't love +but once, and I've got a kind of warm bubbling all around my heart as +tells me that I've loved that once and that it was Jathrop. It's very +strange, Mrs. Lathrop, but I've been thinking of Jathrop a great deal +lately. I keep remembering more and more how much I've been thinking +about him. I suppose he was thinking of me, and that's what started me. +'How's Susan Clegg?' I can just seem to hear Jathrop's voice; Jathrop +had a very strange voice. 'How's Susan Clegg?' + +"The mind is a curious thing, when you stop to consider, Mrs. Lathrop. +Mrs. Brown says Amelia says minds can communicate if you know how. Mrs. +Brown says if she calls to Amelia when she's in the hammock and Amelia +don't answer, Amelia always explains afterwards as she was +communicating. + +"It all shows that the mind is a wonderful thing. There was Jathrop and +me communicating regularly, and me so little understanding what it all +meant that I dreamed he was a cat. I can't get over that dream. I wonder +if that meant that he's got whiskers now. If he's got whiskers, and he +loves me, he's got to cut 'em right straight off. You'll have to speak +to him about that as soon as you see him, Mrs. Lathrop, for I won't be +able to, of course. And you can see for yourself that I couldn't have +whiskers around. You can't teach an old dog new tricks, and I've had no +experience with whiskers." + +Mrs. Lathrop promised to remonstrate with Jathrop if he really had +whiskers, and after some further conversation Susan went home and to bed +and slept soundly. In the morning she was up very promptly, and Mrs. +Lathrop saw her off for the station. + +The whole town was at the station. But in front of them all--closest to +the track--stood Susan Clegg. + +It was a breathless moment when Johnny ran out with the flag and the +train stopped. Susan motioned the rest back with dignity and stood her +ground alone. The car door opened, and a stout, homely man, with eyes +set wide apart and a very large mouth, appeared on the platform. He was +well dressed and carried an alligator-skin traveling-bag. + +Everybody gasped. But it was not his appearance nor the alligator-skin +bag that caused them to gasp. It was that Jathrop Lathrop, returning +after his long absence, had brought back a lady with him. + + + + +II + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CHINESE LADY + + +And not merely a lady, but a Chinese lady at that. A particularly +chubby, solemn, Chinese lady, who descended from the train which brought +Jathrop Lathrop back to his native town after making a fortune in the +Klondike, and meekly trotted along in his wake, carrying the large +valise, while Jathrop carried the small one. + +Susan walked off straightway with Jathrop and the Chinese lady, while +the town remained stock and staring behind. The town was frankly "done +did up." That Jathrop might return with a wife had never once entered +the head of any one. Still less had the idea of any one of that +community ever wedding a Chinese been entertained. It was a peculiarly +overwhelming sensation, and one which led Gran'ma Mullins to lean +against Hiram, while Mrs. Macy leaned against the equally firm side-wall +of the station itself. It was several seconds before people came to +their senses enough to go around by the track gate and look to see how +far the bewildering party had got on their way. They were just crossing +the square. + +"Well, if that doesn't beat the Dutch," said Mr. Kimball, and his words +seemed to break the deadlock; everybody scattered forthwith, all talking +at once. + +Meanwhile Jathrop, arriving at his mother's gate, paused and said quite +easily: + +"I'll go in alone, Susan; mother will like the first hour or so quite +alone with me, I know. Won't you take Hop Loo to your house for +breakfast?" + +Susan, who had by no means as yet recovered from the shock of the +Celestial bride, opened and shut her mouth once and her eyes twice, and +yielded. For the nonce she seemed as speechless as Mrs. Lathrop +herself. Jathrop's appealing ease of manner had overawed her all the way +up from the station, and the walk had been accomplished in stately +silence. If the Klondike Prodigal had been surprised over the alteration +in Susan, he had not said so, and now he quietly handed Hop Loo his +alligator-skin traveling-bag (or hers, whichever it was), and passing in +through his mother's gate, shut it forthwith behind him, and went on up +the walk. Susan cast one look, which would have thrown a basilisk into +everlasting darkness, after him; and then, turning, marched back to her +own gate. Hop Loo followed, Susan opened her own gate and passed through +it; Hop Loo passed through after her. Susan went up her walk; Hop kept +close to her heels. Together they mounted the steps and then entered the +house. + +It was all of half an hour before Mrs. Macy, the first completely to +rally from the shock at the station, arrived to call. When she climbed +the steps and rang the bell, Susan came to the door at once. She looked +peculiarly grim and smileless. It was plain to be seen at the present +moment that she was not pleased with the world in general. + +"I thought I'd just come up for a little," began Mrs. Macy, smiling +enough for two all alone by herself. Mrs. Macy always tried to keep up +her own spirits in a laudable attempt, possibly, to heighten those of +others. "I thought maybe you'd be glad to see a face you knew." + +This allusion to the Chinese lady was not intended as unkindly as it +might have been in better society, Mrs. Macy being wholly incapable of +anything so subtle. + +"Sit down," said Susan, briefly, indicating a porch chair. "There's no +use taking you in; she's up-stairs unpacking, and she's already set +about doing his cooking. It's plain to be seen that Jathrop Lathrop +never come all this way from the Klondike to take any chances of being +poisoned by me as soon as he got here. No, sir, Jathrop Lathrop has +learned too many little tricks for that." + +Susan's tone was extremely bitter. She had removed the famous striped +silk and applied her hairbrush to both sides of her head after dipping +it (the hairbrush, not her head) in water. It was easy to be seen that +the vanities of this life had suddenly become offensive in her nostrils. + +"Do you suppose she's really his wife?" asked Mrs. Macy, seating herself +and looking eagerly in her friend's face. + +"Oh, yes, she's his wife," said Susan. + +"Oh, Susan," Mrs. Macy went on, her eyes becoming quite globular under +the severe stress of her curiosity, "do you suppose anybody married 'em, +or did he just buy her for beads?" + +"I don't know," said Susan, rocking severely back and forth, "I don't +know a _tall_. You must ask some one wiser than me what a white man does +about a Chinese when he wants her to cook for him. You ought to have +seen her in my kitchen, Mrs. Macy; she walked straight to my rack of +pans and took down just whatever she fancied. I _never_ saw the beat! +No, nor nobody else. She's learned how to be cool from Jathrop and the +North Pole together, looks to me. I never see such ways as Jathrop has +picked up. He never said a word walking up--nothing but 'Ah' once. I +don't call 'Ah' once much of a conversation for the woman as rocked your +cradle and might have married you, too--if she'd wanted to. For I could +have married Jathrop Lathrop, Mrs. Macy; nobody but me will ever know +what passed between us, but I could have married him. I won't say what +prevented, but I can tell you it wasn't him. And he's lived to regret +it, too. Just like the minister regrets it. When the minister speaks of +the treasure that layeth up in heaven, he doesn't mean no chicken--he +means me." + +Susan paused and shook her head angrily. + +"I don't doubt but what he's sorry," said Mrs. Macy; "maybe he married a +Chinese for fear any other kind would remind him of you." + +Miss Clegg rejected this possible poetic view of Jathrop's action with a +look of great disgust accompanied by another shake of the head. + +"I don't believe it's very often that a man ever marries some other +woman on account of any other woman. That's very pretty in books, but +books ain't life. Life's life, and if Jathrop Lathrop's married that +heathen Chinese, he's got very strange notions of life, and that's all I +can say. Why, if she didn't lug that heavy bag along and walk a little +back, and he never bothered to speak to her. She's very different from +what I'd have been, I can tell you. You can maybe fancy me carrying +Jathrop Lathrop's bag a little behind Jathrop Lathrop! I think I see +myself. 'How's Susan Clegg?' He'll soon find out how Susan Clegg is. +What do you think, Mrs. Macy, what _do_ you think? When we came to his +mother's gate, he just stopped, said he thought she'd like him alone +best, said to me, 'Give Hop Loo some breakfast, will you?'--and then if +my gentleman didn't walk through the gate and shut it after him! Well, I +_never_ did. There was me and his wife carefully shut out on the other +side of the fence like we was pigs. And then I had to bring her over +here and give her father's room. What would my dead and gone father say +to a Chinese woman having his room, I wonder! Father had very fine +feelings for a man as got about so little, and if he was alive, I don't +believe no Jathrop Lathrop would have gone sending no heathen Chinese +wife to live with _me_. She won't live with me long, I can tell you that +to your face, Mrs. Macy. I took her because I was too dumb did up over +having a gate shut in my face by Jathrop Lathrop to do anything else, +but I ain't intending to have her long. I've always been for shutting +the Chinese out, and I ain't going back on my principles at my time of +life. No, indeed. 'How's Susan Clegg?'" + +Susan paused angrily. Her repetition of the deceptive phrase in +Jathrop's letter seemed to turn her boiling wrath into one of still, +white menace. She sat perfectly still, snapping her eyelids up and down, +and breathing hard. + +"I don't blame you one mite, Susan," said Mrs. Macy warmly; "I wish Mrs. +Lupey was here. She wanted to come, too, but she's got her bag to pack +to go home. She only come for one night, and to-night'll make two, so +she wants to get packed. But she knows all about the Chinese. Her +husband's got a cousin who is a missionary in China, and she could have +felt for you. The cousin's got eleven Chinese servants besides a Bible +class of two as she's training to be missionaries after they're trained. +Mrs. Lupey says she'd have known what to do when that Chinese lady got +off the train this morning. They don't let 'em ride in the same cars in +China." + +Just here Jathrop came out of his mother's front door and walked down +the path. Both ladies were freshly shocked by the sight. At the gate he +turned in the opposite direction. Both ladies stared after him. Soon he +was out of sight. Then they stared at each other. + +"Well, what is he up to now?" Mrs. Macy finally ejaculated. + +"I don't know," said Susan in a tone of complete despair as to ever +again gaining any insight into the motives which moved Jathrop, "I d'n +know, Mrs. Macy. Don't ask me anything about Jathrop Lathrop after he's +gone home to see his mother and has handed me over a Chinese wife to +board. He may be gone up to Mrs. Brown's to run off with Amelia for all +I know. Nothing is ever going to surprise me any more after this day. I +only know one thing, if he does run off with Amelia, that Chinee'll find +herself and his valises dumped off of my premises pretty quick. I never +was one for false feelings, and I should see no call for Christian +charity toward a heathen who comes to me with two black bags on her legs +and a dressing-sack for an overcoat." + +"I wonder if Jathrop likes her wearing such clothes," said Mrs. Macy. +"Everybody is wondering." + +"I don't know," said Miss Clegg, "men are very queer. There's no telling +what they are going to fancy till they get out of the train married to +it. Think of his having the face to write 'How's Susan Clegg?' and him +married to that puzzle-blocks thing all the time. I wonder what his +mother said when he told her!" + +"Let's go over and see Mrs. Lathrop!" suggested Mrs. Macy, "she's over +there alone now." + +This idea immediately found favor with Susan. "But I'll have to go in +and see what _she's_ up to first," she said. "If she's caught a rat and +is making soup in my teapot with it, I shan't feel to enjoy leaving her +alone with my teapot." + +Mrs. Macy could but feel the extreme justice of this view, and Susan, +whose countenance indicated that she was sorely beset by misgivings, +went into the house. + +When she came out, her face wore a relieved expression. + +"She's all safe," she said. "She's asleep on the floor. I must say it's +changed my feelings toward her. It shows she knows her place." + +They walked sedately to Mrs. Lathrop's. They climbed the back steps, and +they knocked. + +Mrs. Lathrop was busy making preparations for dinner. She came to the +door with a promptitude which, in view of her well-known habit of +deliberation, was little short of miraculous. + +"We came to see how you were," said Mrs. Macy. + +"Come in," said Mrs. Lathrop. + +They walked in and seated themselves on two of the wooden-bottomed +kitchen chairs. Mrs. Lathrop went on with her work. She was uncommonly +active, and her face wore a broad, unusual smile. "Jathrop's gone up to +the cemetery," she said. "He's going to have a monument put up to his +father." + +"What do you think of--?" interrupted Susan. + +"Yes, we come to--" began Mrs. Macy. + +"He's going," continued Mrs. Lathrop, taking down a plate and blowing +the thick dust from its surface, "to have an awful handsome monument put +up. Not a animal like you put up to your father, Susan, but a angel +hanging to a pillar with both hands and feeling for a cloud with its +feet. He showed me the picture. And he's going to have the parlor +papered and give the town a watering-trough for horses, with a tin cup +on a chain for people, and he's--" + +"Yes, but--" interrupted Susan. + +"You know, of course--" began Mrs. Macy. + +Mrs. Lathrop swept off the top of the rolling-pin with the stove-brush. +"And he's going to build me on a bedroom right off the hall," she +continued, "and put a furnace under the whole house. And one of those +lamps that haul up and down, and a new set of kitchen things, and he'll +come here every year and see if I want anything else, and if I do, I'm +to have it. I'm to have a pew in church, even if I never do go to +church, and a paper every day, and his baby picture done big, and be +fitted for new glasses." + +"But, Mrs. Lathrop--" Susan interrupted, seeing that Mrs. Lathrop was +surely still in ignorance as to her Mongolian daughter-in-law. + +"Yes, you--" began Mrs. Macy. + +"Liza Em'ly is to do all the sewing I want," went on Mrs. Lathrop, +proceeding with her baking preparations at a great rate, "and Jathrop'll +pay the bill. And any things I want, I'm just to send for, and +Jathrop'll pay the bill; and anything I can think of what I want done, +I'm just to say so, and Jathrop'll pay the bill." + +It seemed as if Susan Clegg would burst at this. It was plain now that +Jathrop really was rich, and here was his mother supposing the rose was +utterly thornless. + +"But did he tell you about his wife?" she broke in desperately. "That's +what I want to know." + +Mrs. Lathrop, who was mixing butter and sugar together in a yellow bowl, +stopped suddenly and stared. + +"His wife!" she said blankly. + +"Yes, his wife," repeated Susan. + +"The wife he brought back with him," explained Mrs. Macy. + +"The wife he--" Mrs. Lathrop pushed the yellow bowl a little back on the +table and rested her hands on the edge. They trembled visibly; "the wife +he--" she repeated. + +"Surely you know that he brought his wife back with him?" said Mrs. +Macy. "Surely he's told you?" + +Mrs. Lathrop--turned her usual dumb self again--looked at Mrs. Macy with +almost unseeing eyes. + +"I--" she ejaculated faintly, "no, he--" + +"Now, you see," exclaimed Susan, half to the friend and half to the +stricken mother, "it don't make any difference what a man turns into +outside, he stays just the same inside. What have I always said to you, +Mrs. Lathrop? You can't make no kind of a purse out of ears like +Jathrop's. Jathrop Lathrop could turn into fifty millionaires, and he'd +still be Jathrop Lathrop. He can hang all the angels he pleases and +water all the horses from here to Meadville, and still he never could be +any other man but just himself. And being himself, he never by no manner +of means could be frank and open. He was always one that held things +back. You thought it was because he didn't have no brains, but you was +his mother and naturally looked on the best side of him. But he never +deceived me, Mrs. Lathrop; I saw through Jathrop right from the start. +There was a foxiness about Jathrop as nobody never fully saw into but +me. That was my reason for never marrying him--one of my many reasons, +for his foxiness hasn't been the only thing about Jathrop that I've seen +through. I never was one to soften the blows to a tempered lamb, so I +will say that so many reasons for not loving a man as I've seen in +Jathrop I never see in any other man yet. But none of my reasons for not +marrying him has ever equalled this new reason as has cropped up now in +his bringing home a wife. When a man comes home with a wife, then you do +see through him for good and all, and when Jathrop come scrambling out +from between those two cars this morning with a heathen Chinee at his +heels--" + +Mrs. Lathrop screamed loudly. "A--" + +"Heathen Chinee," repeated Susan. + +"You know what a Chinee is, don't you?" interposed Mrs. Macy; "they're +from China, you know." + +Mrs. Lathrop retreated to her rocker with a totter. + +"Yes, she's a heathen Chinee," said Susan, with unfailing firmness, "the +kindest heart in the world couldn't mistake her for anything even as +high up as a nigger. Her eyes cross just under her nose, and she's got +her hair wound round her head with a piece of black tape to hold it on. +She wears divided skirts as is most plainly divided, and not a gore has +she got to her name or her figure. She _is_ a Chinese and no mistake, +and you may believe me or not, just as you please, Mrs. Lathrop, but +Jathrop without a so much as by-your-leave dumped her onto me for +breakfast, and she's asleep on father's floor now." + +"On your--" gasped Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, on father's," said Susan, "and now, Mrs. Lathrop, you see what he +is at last. He not only marries a Chinese when if he'd been patient he +might have got a white one, but he brings her home, and don't even tell +you he's brought her home, or even that he's got her, or even that he's +married her, or anything. A man might line my house with furnaces and +have his baby picture done big in every room, and I'd never forgive his +acting in such a way. I never hear the beat. It throws all the other +calamities as ever come upon anybody in this community clean out of the +shade. What will be the use of your having a pew in church; you won't +even be able to face the minister now with your son's marrying one of +them as we have to give our good money to teach to wear clothes. What +good will your having the parlor papered be with everybody ashamed to go +to see a woman who has got a Chinese daughter. To my order of thinking, +you was better off poor. Why, they eat the hen's nests, the Chinese do, +and prefer 'em to the eggs. It's small wonder I dreamed Jathrop was a +cat, with him descending on us like the wrath of heaven married to a +China woman. Jathrop's no fool though, and if you'd seen that humble +heathen going along back of him with his big valise, you'd have to see +as the man as picks out a wife like that never could have been a fool. I +felt for her, I really did, only she was watching me with the wrong eye +all the time, and it made me dizzy to try and look at her kindly. I'll +tell you what, Mrs. Lathrop, when Jathrop comes back, you'll just go for +him and give it to him good. Men must learn as they can't bring their +Chinese wives into this community. There's a principle as we'd ought to +live up to whether we enjoy it or not, and it's all against marrying +Chinese. The Chinese are all right, I hope and trust, but nothing as +feeds itself with a toothpick had ever ought to be held pressed to the +bosom of families like you and me, Mrs. Lathrop. It isn't the way we're +brought up to look at them, and it's a well-known fact as no matter what +the leopard does to the Ethiopian, he sticks to his spot just the same +as before--" + +"But--" broke in Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mrs. Lathrop,--we've been friends +too long for me not to feel kindly to you,--but Mrs. Macy is a witness +to his bringing her, even if I wasn't well known to be one as never +lies. Mrs. Macy is a witness, too, to how he's got her dressed, and a +more burning disgrace than this keeping your chosen wife in loose +overalls and a jacket as any monkey on a hand-organ would weep to see +the fit of, I never see. It may be the custom in the Klondike and may +be convenient for sliding, but this is no sliding community, and, to my +order of thinking, Jathrop would have showed you more affection and us +more respect if he'd bought his wife a bonnet and a shawl before he +brought her here." + +Susan paused for breath. Mrs. Lathrop continued speechless. Mrs. Macy +tried to lighten the atmosphere by remarking, "Lands, she's got a +pigtail, too." + +Susan picked up the cudgels afresh at that. "Wound twice around her +head," she said bitterly; "oh, she _is_ a figure of fun and no mistake. +I d'n know, I'm sure, what Jathrop was ever thinking of the day he +picked her out, but this I do know, and that is, that he'd better pick +her off of me pretty quick. You know, Mrs. Lathrop, as a friend is a +friend and I've always been a good friend to you, but I never was one to +stand any nonsense--not now and not never--and when a man writes, 'I'm +rich' and 'How's Susan Clegg?' he gets me where no Chinese wife ain't +going to please me in a hurry. I'm glad Jathrop is rich, on your +account, Mrs. Lathrop, but his being rich don't alter my views of him a +mite. I look upon him as a gray deceiver, that's what I look upon him +as, and if he's brought a piece of carnelian or anything back to me, you +can tell him to give it to his lawfully wedded wife, for I don't want to +have nothing more to do with him." + +"But, Susan--" broke in poor Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Don't interrupt me, Mrs. Lathrop; I'm in no mood to listen to no +one just now. I ain't mad, but I'm hurt. It's no wonder I dreamed he +was a cat, for of all the sly, back-door things a cat is the +meanest. And there was always something very cat-like about Jathrop +Lathrop--something soft and slow and creepy--nothing bold and +out-spoken. I might have known as even if he did come home rich, he'd +find a way to even it up. And now look how he has evened it up. Think of +your grandchildren; there won't be one of 'em able to ever look anybody +straight in more'n one eye at once. Marrying Chinese is terrible, +anyway--in some States it's forbidden. It's to be hoped Jathrop'll keep +out of those States or he may land in the penitentiary yet." + +Just here the front door slammed, and Jathrop's voice was heard calling, +"Where are you, mother?" + +He didn't wait for an answer, but came straight through the kitchen. +Entering there, what he saw startled him so much that he came to a +sudden halt. + +"We've been telling your--" began Mrs. Macy. + +"--mother about your wife," finished up Susan. + +Jathrop looked at all three in great astonishment. "About my _wife_!" he +repeated. "Did you say 'my wife'?" + +"Yes," said Susan, absolutely undaunted. "I think it would have been +kinder in you to have broke it to her yourself; but anyhow, we've done +it now." + +"Oh, Jathrop, my son, my son!" wailed poor Mrs. Lathrop in +heart-wringing Biblical paraphrase. + +"But I haven't got any wife," said Jathrop. "What under the sun do you +mean?" + +There was a clammy pause; Susan and Mrs. Macy clasped hands. + +"What made you think I had one?" Jathrop asked, quite bewildered. "Who +said I had one?" + +Susan rose with dignity and coughed. Mrs. Macy rose, too, looking at +Susan. Poor Mrs. Lathrop seemed fairly terror-stricken. + +"I think I'll go now," said Susan. "I hope I needn't board her much +longer, that's all. Even if she's only using the floor, it's a floor as +has been sacred to my dead father up to now, and a dead father is not to +be lightly took in vain by a heathen Chinee." + +"But what does it all mean?" asked Jathrop, appearing genuinely +bewildered. "I don't understand. What are you talking about?" + +Susan moved toward the door; Mrs. Macy faltered. "Maybe it was all +right in the Klondike," she began, trying to put a brace under the +situation. + +"Maybe what was all right in the Klondike?" asked Jathrop. + +"To buy her with beads." + +"To buy who with beads? Who's her?" Jathrop's voice was becoming +exasperated. + +"Hop Loo," said Susan, in a tone of piercing scorn, "the Chinese lady as +you brought with you and gave me to board." + +Jathrop looked at them all in amazement. "But Hop Loo's a boy--my boy," +he said. + +"Your boy!" said Susan. + +"Yes, my boy." + +Miss Clegg turned and gave him a long look fraught with disgust, pity, +and hopeless resignation. + +"Jathrop Lathrop," she said, "I _did_ suppose you had some sense even in +the view of all that's dead and gone, but I guess now I'll have to give +up. I did have some respect for you while I thought she was maybe your +wife, but if you've gone so clean crazy that you believe that that is +your boy--well!" + +Susan thereupon sailed out of Mrs. Lathrop's house with Mrs. Macy +wobbling in her wake. + + + + +III + +SUSAN CLEGG SOLVES THE MYSTERY + + +Susan Clegg and Mrs. Macy walked down to Mrs. Lathrop's gate, and out of +her gate and to Miss Clegg's gate; the whole in a silence deadly and +impressive. Mrs. Macy paused there. + +"I don't believe I'll come in," she said doubtfully. + +"I don't blame you," said Susan, "I wouldn't if it was me. Jathrop's +boy, indeed! What kind of a man is it as'll have a Chinese family and go +forcing them onto the true and long-tried friends of his one and only +mother!" + +"I can't see why he didn't leave the boy in the Klondike," said Mrs. +Macy slowly and reflectively. "I thought men always left their Chinese +families just where they found 'em. It's strange Jathrop brought him +home with him." + +"You see now what my dream meant," said Susan darkly, "a cat, indeed. +It's small wonder I knew the cat was Jathrop Lathrop. Of all the mean, +sly, creeping creatures that ever come up against the back of your legs +sudden a cat is the worst. A snake is open and aboveboard beside a cat. +You can see a snake. You don't see 'em often around here, thank heaven." + +"Well, we haven't seen Jathrop often around here for a long time," said +Mrs. Macy, whose mind was as given to easy logical deduction as many of +her mental caliber, "and we do see a lot of cats--you know that, Susan." + +"'How's Susan Clegg?'" quoted Susan in a tone of reflective wrath. "I +don't know whether you know it or not, Mrs. Macy, but Jathrop asked +after me in his letter to his mother, and him with a Chinese wife. +'How's Susan Clegg?' What did he write that for if he was married, I'd +like to know." + +"Maybe he wanted to know how you were," suggested Mrs. Macy. + +The look she received in recognition of this offered explanation led to +her immediately proposing to go on home. "You've got the Chinaman to +look after, anyhow," she added. + +"You'd better come in while I go up and look at him again," said Susan +shortly. "It's a very strange sensation to be alone in your house with +what you fully and freely take to your dead father's bed and board, +supposing it's a wife, and then find out as it's her son instead. Come +on in." + +Mrs. Macy was easily persuaded, and they thereupon went up the walk. "I +guess I'll go see if he's still asleep," Susan said when they reached +the piazza, and Mrs. Macy forthwith sat down to await what might come of +it. + +Susan was absent but a few minutes; she returned with a fresh layer of +disapproval upon her face. + +"Is he still sleeping?" Mrs. Macy asked. + +"Yes, he's still sleeping," Miss Clegg replied, jerking a chair forward +for herself. "You'd know he was Jathrop Lathrop's child just by the way +he sleeps. You remember what a one Jathrop always was for sleeping. I +don't know as I remember Jathrop's ever being awake till he was fairly +grown. Whatever you set him at always just made him more sleepy. You +know yourself, Mrs. Macy, as he wouldn't be no grasshopper with Mrs. +Lathrop for his mother, but a cocoon is a comet beside what Jathrop +Lathrop always was. I don't know whether he's rich or not, but I do know +that heathen Chinee is his son, and I know it just by the way he +sleeps." + +"And so Jathrop's rich," said Mrs. Macy, rocking agreeably to and fro, +and evidently striving toward more pleasant conversation. + +"Yes," said Susan darkly, "rich and with a Chinese wife somewhere. Just +as often as I think of Jathrop Lathrop writing, 'How's Susan Clegg,' +with a Chinese wife I feel more and more tempered, and I can't conceal +my feelings. I never was one to conceal anything; if I had a Chinese +wife the whole world might know it." + +Just here Gran'ma Mullins hove in sight, coming slowly and laboriously +up the street. + +"Why, there's Gran'ma Mullins!" Mrs. Macy exclaimed. "She's surely +coming to see you, too." + +Both ladies remained silent, watching the progress of Gran'ma Mullins. + +Gran'ma Mullins arrived a good deal out of breath. Susan brought a chair +out of the house for her. + +"I come to--tell you," panted the new visitor as soon as she had +attained unto the chair, "that Jathrop's--things is--coming." + +"What things?" asked Susan. + +"They all come on--the ten o'clock--from the junction; Hiram is helping +unload." + +"What's he brought?" Susan asked. + +"Well, he's brought an automobile," said Gran'ma Mullins, "and a lot of +other trunks and boxes." + +"An automobile!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy, "well, he _is_ rich then!" + +"I wouldn't be too sure of that," said Susan, "some very poor folks is +riding that way nowadays." + +"And he brought three trunks and seventeen big wooden boxes," continued +Gran'ma Mullins, "big boxes." + +"Three trunks and sev-en-teen--Three trunks and sev-en--" Susan's voice +faded into nothingness. + +"Goodness knows what's in them," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Hiram was +getting so hot unloading that I wanted him to stop and let me fan him, +but he wouldn't hear to it. Hiram's so brave. If he said he'd unload +something, he'd unload it if he dropped dead under it and was smashed to +nothing." + +There was a pause of unlimited bewilderment while Mrs. Macy and Susan +raised Jathrop upon the pedestal erected by his three trunks, seventeen +boxes and the automobile. + +"And to think of his having a Chinese wife," Susan exclaimed, the keen +edge of sorrow cutting crossways through all her words. + +It was just here that Mrs. Lupey now appeared, approaching at a good +pace. Mrs. Lupey was a large, imposing woman and wore a silk dolman with +fringe. It was immediately necessary for the party to adjourn to the +sitting-room, as the piazza was strictly limited. + +It was Mrs. Lupey who without loss of time did away with the Lathrop +parentage of the young Chinese. + +"Why, he's his servant, of course," she said in a lofty scorn. "I'm +surprised you didn't know that by his age." + +"I did think of his age," Susan said, "but I read once in some paper as +the women in China get married when they're four years old, so you'd +never be able to tell nothing by the age of no one there. Well, well, +and so she isn't his wife, nor yet his son. Well, I'm glad--for Mrs. +Lathrop's sake." + +"But if Jathrop's really got a automobile and seventeen trunks, he +_must_ be awful rich," said Mrs. Macy. "It'll be a great thing for this +town if Jathrop's rich. He'd ought to be very grateful to the place +where his happy childhood memories run around barefoot." + +"Oh, he'll remember," said Gran'ma Mullins, "it's easy to remember when +you've got the money to do it. But I hope to heaven he won't set Hiram +off on that track again. Hiram does so want to go away and make a +fortune; I'm worried for fear he will all the time. And Lucy wants him +to, too. I can't understand a woman as wants a fortune worse than she +wants Hiram. Lucy doesn't seem to want Hiram 'round at all any more. If +he's asleep, she starts right in making the bed the same as if he wasn't +in it, and if she's sewing, he don't dare go within the length of her +thread. + +"Life has come to a pretty pass when a wife'll run a needle into a +husband just for the simple pleasure of feeling him go away when she +sticks him." Gran'ma Mullins sighed. + +"I wonder what they're doing now!" Mrs. Macy said. + +All four turned at this and looked toward the Lathrop house together. It +was quiet as usual. + +"I d'n know as it changes my opinion of Jathrop much, that being his +servant," said Miss Clegg suddenly. "It's kind of different, his handing +his wife or his son over to me; but his heathen Chinee servant! I don't +know as I'm very pleased." + +"Pleased!" said Mrs. Lupey. "Why, in San Francisco they make 'em live +underground like rats." + +"Maybe that was why you dreamed he was a cat, Susan?" suggested Mrs. +Macy, whose brain seemed to grasp at the subject under consideration +with special illumination. + +Susan rose. "I think you'd better go," she said abruptly, "I've got to +get dinner. My mind's in no state to deal with all these sides of +Jathrop and his Chinaman just now." + +What the day brought up the street and in and around Mrs. Lathrop's +house would take too long to catalogue. Suffice it to say that poor Mrs. +Lathrop, who had been for long years the veriest zero in the life of the +community, became suddenly its center and apex. + +When Jathrop went to New York at the end of the week, he left his mother +not only sitting, but rocking in the lap of luxury, with her head +leaning back against more luxury and her feet braced firmly on yet more +luxury. Even her friend over the way was rendered utterly content. + +And the pleasantest part of it all was the way that it affected Susan +Clegg. As Susan sat by Mrs. Lathrop and turned upon her that tender gaze +which one old friend may turn on another old friend when the latter's +son has suddenly bloomed forth golden, her full heart found utterance +thus: + +"Well, Mrs. Lathrop--well, Mrs. Lathrop, I guess no one will ever doubt +anything again. Talk about dreams, _now_! I dreamed Jathrop was a cat, +and the reason was that it's a well-known fact that cats _always_ come +back. Why, Mrs. Macy told me once how she chloroformed a cat, and put it +in a flour sack with a stone, and put the sack in a hogshead of water, +and put the cover on the hogshead, and put a stone--another stone--on +that, and went to church to hear the minister preach on 'Do unto others +as you do unto others,' and when she came back, the cat was asleep on +top of the hogshead, and Mrs. Macy got the worst shock she ever got. So +you can easy see why I dreamed Jathrop was a cat; and he _did_ come +back. + +"I declare that'll always be the pleasantest recollection of my life, +how I met him at the station and how we came chatting up the street +together. How he has improved, Mrs. Lathrop--not but what he was always +handsome! There was always something noble about Jathrop. Gran'ma +Mullins said yesterday as he made her think of a man she saw in a play +once as stood on his crossed legs in front of a fire and smoked. So +careless. + +"And then his bringing Mrs. Macy that polar-bear skin! Mrs. Macy says if +there was one spot in the whole wide world where she never expected to +set foot it was on top of a polar bear, and now she can stand on her +head on one if the fancy takes her. I saw the minister when I was down +in the square to-night, and he told me not to speak of it, but he +thought a service of prayer for any stocks and mines as Jathrop has +would be the only fitting form of gratitude which a reverent and +affectionate congregation might offer to the great and glorious +generosity of him who is going to give us a steeple after all these +years of finishing flat at the top. Mr. Kimball came out to tell me to +ask you if you'd like some one to come regularly for your order, and he +says he'll keep caviare from now on, just on the chance of Jathrop's +being here to eat it; he says why he didn't keep it before was he +thought it was a kind of chamois skin. + +"It's beautiful to see the faces down-town, Mrs. Lathrop; you never saw +nothing like it. Everybody's just so happy. Hiram is grinning from ear +to ear over being took to the Klondike, and everybody is swore to not +let Gran'ma Mullins know he's going. He's going to climb out of the +window at night and get away that way, and Gran'ma Mullins won't mind +what she feels when he really does come back a millionaire, too. She'll +be just like you, Mrs. Lathrop; no one minds anything once it's over. +Little misunderstandings are easy forgot. + +"And to think there's been a blue automobile puffing at these very +kitchen steps! To think you and me was over to Meadville and back +between dinner and supper one day! I guess Mrs. Lupey never got such a +start. She'd been all the morning getting home on the train and was only +just putting her bonnet away in its box when we rolled up. I never +enjoyed nothing like that roll up in all my life! I never see +automobiles from the automobile's side before, but now I can. When a +automobile goes over a duck it makes all the difference in the world +whether it's your automobile or your duck. + +"And then Jathrop's generosity! Not but what he was always generous. +Deacon White says he will say that for Jathrop, he was always generous. +And look what he brought home. Every child in town is just about out of +their senses. Felicia Hemans is crazy about the earrings, and 'Liza +Em'ly won't never take off the bracelet. Mr. Shores can't keep the tears +back when he looks at his watch charm. I think it was so kind of +Jathrop. But Jathrop was always kind; you know yourself that a kinder +creature never lived than Jathrop. I always said that for him. + +"And then his having a new fence built around the cemetery. It was +thoughtful, and Judge Fitch says nobody can't say more. But Judge Fitch +says Jathrop was always thoughtful; he says he's been interested in him +always just for that very reason. Judge Fitch says Jathrop's nature was +always that deep kind that's easy overlooked. He says he'll have to +confess to his shame that some of the time he overlooked him himself. He +says it's very difficult to understand a deep nature, because if a deep +nature don't make money, there's hardly any way of ever knowing that it +really was deep; people just think you're a fool then--like we always +thought Jathrop was. You know, nobody ever thought he ever could amount +to nothing. You know that yourself, Mrs. Lathrop. But making money lets +you see just what a person's got in 'em and see it plain. + +"I'm sure for all I've loved Jathrop as if he was going to be my own, +for years and years and years, still I never credited him with being the +man he is. I supposed he was a tramp somewhere--yes, I really did, Mrs. +Lathrop, you may believe me or not, but that's just what I thought when +I thought anything at all about him--which wasn't often. + +"Everybody in the whole place is busy remembering pleasant things about +him now. The minister's wife remembers his coming to a Christmas tree +once a long time ago when they both was little; she says she hasn't +thought of it in thirty years, but she remembers it as plain as day +now,--he had on a coat and a little tie. + +"And Gran'ma Mullins says she never will forget the day before he was +born, for she went to town and dropped her little bead bag, and you know +how much she thinks of her little bead bag now when the beads is all +worn off, so you can think what store she set by it when the beads were +still on, and so she was all back and forth along the road hunting for +it the whole blessed afternoon, and when she found it and went home, she +_was_ tired, and she slept late next morning because her husband was out +very late the night before, and when he slept late she always slept +late, 'cause she said sleeping late was almost the only treat he ever +give her, and, anyhow, when they did wake up and get up and get out, +there was Jathrop, and she says she shall never forget her joy over +having found the bead bag again. + +"Mrs. Macy says she remembers the day he hid, and you thought he was in +the cistern, and you was kneeling down looking in when he jumped out +from behind the stove and give you such a start you went in head first. + +"I remember that day myself, too--father was insisting he was paralyzed +then, and mother and me wouldn't take his word for it, and we fully +expected he'd race over and help haul you out, but all he said was, +'She'll have to manage the best she can--I'm paralyzed,' and we really +began to believe him from then on. + +"The minister says he shall always remember how well he looked when he +put on long trousers; the minister's preparing a little paper on Jathrop +to read at the Sunday-school annual, and he says he shall begin with the +day he put on long trousers and then mark his rise step by step. The +minister's so pleased over Jathrop's patting Brunhilde Susan on the +head; he says there are pats and pats, but that pat that Jathrop give +Brunhilde Susan was what he calls, in pure and Biblical simplicity, _a_ +pat." + +Susan paused. Mrs. Lathrop just felt her diamond solitaires, glanced at +the new kitchen range, and was silent. + +"And then, Mrs. Lathrop, that dear blessed little Chinese angel--I tell +you I shall never forget that boy. I liked his face when I first laid +eyes on him, and when I thought he was Jathrop's lawful wife, I loved +him as I'd loved even a Chinaman if he was your daughter; but when I saw +him cleaning up my sink, polishing my pans, washing out my cupboards and +all that, just the same as yours, _then_ was when I see that a heathen +Chinee has just the same right to go to heaven that anybody else has, +and from then on I just trusted him completely and let him do every bit +of the work till he left. + +"I see now why everybody's so happy being a missionary if you can just +get away and live with the Chinee. I'd have kept that boy if Jathrop +hadn't wanted him--I'd have been very glad to; and it's awful to think +we're keeping quiet, lovable natures like his from settling here. A girl +might do much worse than marry that Chinese--_very_ much worse. A very +great deal worse. Though I suppose many would hesitate." + +Mrs. Lathrop rose, went to the cupboard, took out a bottle of homemade +gooseberry wine, poured out a little, and took a sip. She did not offer +any to Susan. + +"It'll do you good," said Susan encouragingly. "I don't like the taste +myself, but it'll do you good. Besides, Mrs. Lathrop, you must begin to +get used to it. When you go around with Jathrop in his private car, +you'll have to drink wine, and if I was you, I'd stop tying a stocking +around your neck nights, for you'll have to wear a very different cut of +gowns soon. If Jathrop buys that yacht he's gone to look at, you'll have +to wear a sailor blouse." + +"Oh," said Mrs. Lathrop faintly, "oh, Susan, I--" Miss Clegg put her +hastily back into her chair. + +"Never mind if it does make your head go 'round a little, Mrs. Lathrop; +you must learn how. It may be hard, but it'll make Jathrop happy, and +now he's come back rich, that's what everybody wants to do. + +"Mrs. Brown says next time he comes she's going to make him a jet-black +pound-cake, and Mrs. Allen says she's going to work him a pincushion. +She says it'll be a plain, simple token of affection, but those whom +Fortune smiles on soon learn to know the true worth of a simple gift of +purest love. She says no one has ever known how she loved Jathrop, +'cause she kept it to herself for fear you'd think she was after him for +Polly." + +Mrs. Lathrop rocked dreamily. + +Susan rose to go. + +"Don't--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I must," said Susan. "Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, think of his giving me those +fifty shares of stock just on account of my long-suffering friendship +for you. I declare he's a great character--that's all I can say. + +"I always had a feeling he'd end in some unusual way; when they started +to lynch him, I thought that was the way, but now I see that this was +the way, and I thank heaven that I wasn't right the other time and am +right this time. For human nature is human nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and +people are always kinder to a woman whose son comes home from the +Klondike a millionaire than they are if they had the bother of lynching +him, no matter how much he may have deserved it." + +Mrs. Lathrop continued to finger her solitaire earrings in happy +silence. Miss Clegg, who never exhibited any tenderness toward anything, +went over and arranged the fold-over of her friend's gold-embroidered, +silk-quilted kimono. + +"I'll be glad when your new hair gets here, Mrs. Lathrop," she said +tenderly, "it'll make a different woman of you. It's astonishing what a +little extra hair can do; I always feel that when I put on my wave. + +"You and me will have to be getting used to all kinds of new things now. +And that beautiful dream of mine letting us know he was coming. Mrs. +Brown says Amelia says the Egyptians worshipped cats and used to pickle +them when they died. + +"It's astonishing how, if you know enough, you can see how any dream is +full of meaning. There's Jathrop so fond of pickles, and you and me +worshipping him. And he writing in every letter he has time to get +somebody to write for him, 'How's Susan Clegg?'" + +Mrs. Lathrop lapsed into beatific slumber. Susan Clegg went quietly +home. + + + + +IV + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE OLIVE BRANCH + + +It was not in reason to suppose that the return of Jathrop Lathrop +should continue to occupy wholly the attention of the community. Each +week--even each day--brought its fresh interests. Not the least exciting +of the provocative elements was borne back from the metropolis to which +'Liza Em'ly, that hitherto negatively regarded olive branch of the +ministerial family, had but recently emigrated. 'Liza Em'ly, it was +whispered one day, had written a book. + +The Sewing Society, at its next meeting, discussed it, as a matter of +course; and Susan Clegg, equally as a matter of course, promptly +reported the proceedings to her friend and neighbor, Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well," she began, sitting down with the heavy thump of one who is +completely and utterly overcome, "I give up. It's beyond me. I was to +the Sewing Society, and it's beyond them all, too. The idea of 'Liza +Em'ly's writing a book! No one can see how she ever come to think as she +could write a book. No one can see where she got any ideas to put in a +book. I don't know what any one thought she _would_ do when she set out +for the city to earn her own living, but there wasn't a soul in town as +expected her to do it, let alone writing a book, too. I can't see +whatever gives any one the idea of earning their living by writing +books. Books always seem so sort of unnecessary to me, anyway--I ain't +read one myself in years. No one in this community ever does read, and +that's what makes everybody so surprised over 'Liza Em'ly, after living +among us so long and so steady, starting up all of a sudden and doing +anything like this. And what makes it all the more surprising is she +never said a word about it either--never wrote home to the family or +told a living soul. And so you can maybe imagine the shock to the +minister when he got word as his own flesh and blood daughter had not +only written a book but got it all printed without consulting him. His +wife says he was completely done up and could hardly speak for quite a +little while, and later when the newspaper clippings begin to come, he +had to go to bed and have a salt-water cloth over his eyes. I tell you, +Mrs. Lathrop, the minister is a very sensitive nature; it's no light +thing to a sensitive nature to get a shock like a daughter's writing a +book." + +"Is--" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, I should say that it was," said Miss Clegg. "I should say that it +was. And not only is it being advertised, but people are buying it just +like mad, the papers say. The minister is still more upset over that; +seems the responsibilities of even being connected with books nowadays +is no light thing. There was that man as was shot for what he wrote in +a book the other day, you know, and the minister's wife says as the +minister is most nervous over what may be in the book; she says he says +very few books as everybody is reading ought to be read, and he knows +what he's talking about, for he's a great reader himself. Why, his wife +says he's got books hid all over the house, and she says--speaking +confidentially--as he says most of 'em he's really very sorry he's +read--after he's finished 'em. She says--he says he'll know no peace +night or day now until he's read 'Liza Em'ly's book. I guess it's no +wonder that he's nervous. 'Liza Em'ly's been a handful for years, and +since she fell in love with Elijah, there's been just no managing her a +_tall_. If Elijah'd loved her, of course it would have been different, +but Elijah wasn't a energetic nature, and 'Liza Em'ly was, and when a +energetic nature loves a man like Elijah, there's just no knowing where +they will end up. I never see why Elijah didn't love 'Liza Em'ly, but +her grandmother's nose has always been against her, and he told me +himself as it was all he could think of when he sat quietly down to +think about her. But all that's neither here nor there, for it's a far +cry from a girl's nose to her brains nowadays, thank heavens, and 'Liza +Em'ly's got something to balance her now. Polly White has sent for one +of the books. She says she'll lend it around, no matter what's in it. +Polly says there's one good thing in getting married, and that is it +makes you a married woman, and being a married woman lets you read all +kinds of books. I guess Polly's been a great reader since she was +married. She's meant to get some good out of that situation, and she's +done it. The deacon isn't so badly off, either. I wouldn't say that he's +glad he's married all the time, but I guess some of the time he don't +mind, and it's about all married people ask if only some of the time +they can feel to not be sorry. A little let-up is a great relief." + +"You--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, I know," said Miss Clegg, "but I pick up a good deal from others, +and there's a feeling as married women have when they talk to a woman as +they suppose can't possibly know anything just 'cause she never got into +any of their troubles, as makes them show forth the truth very plainly. +I won't say as married women strike me more and more as fools, for it +wouldn't be kindly, but I will say as the way they revel in being +married and saying how hard it is, kind of strikes me as amusing. _I_ +wouldn't go into a store and buy a dress and then, when every one knew +as I picked it out myself, keep running around telling how it didn't fit +and was tearing out in all the seams--but that's about what most of this +marriage talk comes to. I do wonder what 'Liza Em'ly has said about +marriage in _Deacon Tooker Talks_. That's a very funny name for a book, +I think myself, but that's what she's named it. And as it seems to be +about most everything, I suppose it must be about marriage, too. Of +course 'Liza Em'ly's so wild to marry Elijah that everybody knows that +that was what took her up to town. She didn't want to earn her living +any more than any girl does. Nobody ever really aches to earn their +living. But some has to, and some wants to be around with men, and there +ain't no better way to be around with men nowadays than to go to work +with 'em. You have 'em all day long then, and pretty soon you have 'em +all the time. 'Liza Em'ly wants to have Elijah all the time." + +"What--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Oh, she says she thinks they're so congenial; she told me herself as +Elijah 'understood.' It seems to be a great thing to understand +nowadays. It's another of those things we used to take for granted but +which is now got new and uncommon and most remarkable. She told me when +she and Elijah watched the sun setting together, they both understood, +and she seemed to feel that that was a safe basis on which to set out +for town and start in to earn her own living. The minister didn't want +her to go. He was very much against it. It cost such a lot, too. The +minister's wife said it would have been ever so much cheaper to fix a +girl to get married. You can get married with six pairs of new +stockings, the minister's wife says, and it takes a whole dozen with the +heels run to earn your living. The minister's wife was very confidential +with me about it all, and 'Liza Em'ly confided considerably in me, too. +They both knew I'd never tell. Every one always confides in me because +they know I never tell. Why, the things folks in this community have +told me! Well!--But I _never_ tell. The real reason I never tell is +because they always tell every one themselves before I can get around, +but then a confiding nature is always telling its affairs, and so you +can't really blame 'em. I never tell my own affairs, because I've +learned as affairs is like love letters, and if they're interesting +enough, it is very risky. But really, Mrs. Lathrop, I must be going now, +and as soon as I get hold of that book, I'll be over with my opinion. +_Deacon Tooker Talks!_ My, but that is a funny name for a book! I can't +see myself what kind of a book it can possibly be with that title--but +anyway, we shall soon know now." + +"Yes, we--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, indeed," said Susan, and the seance broke up for that day. + +It was resumed the day after, and the day after that, but no further +progress having been made in the development of 'Liza Em'ly's affairs, +that interesting topic remained in abeyance until after the next meeting +of the Sewing Society, when the subject was put forward with emphasis. + +"You never hear the beat," said the lady who nearly always went to the +Sewing Society to the lady who hadn't been there for years; "this book +of 'Liza Em'ly's seems to be something just beyond belief. Polly read it +all aloud to us to-day, and I must say it's a _most_ astonishing book. I +will tell you in confidence, Mrs. Lathrop, as I ain't surprised that the +minister hid his copy and that the newspapers is all printing things +about it. Seems it's a man in bed talking to his wife who is asleep +most of the time, only he don't pay the slightest attention to her not +paying the slightest attention. Polly had the name right, it is _Deacon +Tooker Talks_ (which is a _most_ singular name to my order of thinking). +The cover has got a picture of the deacon's head on a pillow talking, +and you can think how the minister would feel over his daughter's book's +cover having a pillow on it! I walked home with Mrs. Fisher, and she +will have it that 'Liza Em'ly's put her father into the book, soul and +body. There's a man called Mr. Lexicon as is a lawyer in the book, and +Mrs. Fisher says it's the minister. I wouldn't swear as it wasn't the +minister myself, but I hate to believe it, for a girl as'll put her +father in a book would be equal to most anything, I should suppose. But +Mrs. Fisher's sure it's the minister; she says she knew him right off by +his ear-muffs. Only 'Liza Em'ly has disguised the ear-muffs by calling +them overshoes. Mr. Lexicon has always got on his overshoes. Mrs. +Fisher waited until we got away from all the rest, and then she showed +me a review from a New York paper that just took my breath away. It says +no such book has appeared before a welcoming public in two hundred and +fifty years, and she's going to write the paper and ask what the book +two hundred and fifty years ago was about. Mrs. Fisher says she's +thinking very seriously of writing a book herself. She says she's always +wanted to write a book, and now she thinks she'll go up to town and see +'Liza Em'ly and ask her about their writing a book together. She says +she'll furnish all the story, and 'Liza Em'ly can write the book. Then +they'll divide the money even. And there'll be money to divide, too, for +'Liza Em'ly's book is surely selling. Mrs. Macy come up after Mrs. +Fisher went home, and she had a piece out of another newspaper that Mrs. +Lupey sent her, saying the book was in its ninth edition already. She +had it with her at the Sewing Society, but she didn't bring it out, out +of consideration for the feelings of the minister's wife. Mrs. Macy +says she thinks she'll write a book, too. She's got the same idea as +Mrs. Fisher about writing it with 'Liza Em'ly, only she says she'll let +'Liza Em'ly use some of her own ideas mixed in with Mrs. Macy's ideas, +and she can have two thirds of the money. She says it can't be hard to +write a book, or 'Liza Em'ly couldn't never have done it, but she says +'Liza Em'ly has got the Fishers in her book, and she's surprised Mrs. +Fisher didn't recognize 'em at the Sewing Society. 'Liza Em'ly calls 'em +the Hunters. Fishers, hunters--you see! An' John Bunyan she calls Martin +Luther, an' in place of being a genius, she covered that all up by +making him a painter. Laws, Mrs. Macy says writing a book's easy. She +says that book of 'Liza Em'ly's is really too flat for words, and what +makes people buy it, she can't see. Well, I shan't buy a copy, I know +_that_. I ain't knowed 'Liza Em'ly all my life to go doing things like +that now." + +With which very common view as to the works produced by our intimate +friends, Miss Clegg rose to take her departure. + +"Did--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, when they next met. + +"No--I asked, but not a soul knew. We haven't got _any_ man in town as +it could _possibly_ be. They was all discussing it, too. Mrs. Macy and +Mrs. Fisher is really going to town to see 'Liza Em'ly and take up their +ideas to talk over. Mrs. Macy is putting her ideas down on a piece of +paper, so as to be sure she has 'em with her. Mrs. Fisher's keeping hers +in her head, for she says if she lost them, anybody might write her +book. They think they'll go Tuesday. I hope they will, 'cause if they +do, they'll come straight from the train and tell me, and then I'll come +straight over and tell you." + +With which amicable arrangement Miss Clegg again took her departure. + +It was quite two weeks before affairs shaped themselves for Mrs. Macy +and Mrs. Fisher to go to the city on their literary errand, but they +managed it at last, and you may be very sure that Mrs. Lathrop peeked +eagerly and earnestly out of her window many times the afternoon after +their journey. They came up to call upon Miss Clegg and narrate their +adventures quite according to their usual friendly ideals, and directly +they took their leave that good lady hied herself rapidly to Mrs. +Lathrop to tell the tale. + +Mrs. Lathrop met her at the door and both sank into chairs immediately. + +"Well, what--" said the older lady then, and her younger friend rejoined +promptly: + +"Perfectly dumfounding; nothing like it was ever knowed before or ever +will be again." + +"Wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"They're both completely paralyzed. Mrs. Fisher can't say a word, and +Mrs. Macy can't keep still." + +"Wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop again. + +Miss Clegg drew a sharp breath. "They went to see 'Liza Em'ly, an' they +saw her. My goodness heavens, I should think they did see her. Mrs. +Macy says if any one ever supposed as the Hanging Gardens of Babylon was +any wonder, they'd ought to go to the city an' see 'Liza Em'ly, and the +Hanging Gardens would keep their mouths shut forever after." + +"Wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop for the third time. + +But Miss Clegg was now quite ready to discharge her full duty. "Seems +'Liza Em'ly's book went into the twentieth edition yesterday," she said, +opening her eyes and mouth with great expressiveness. "They knew that +before they got there, for you can believe Mrs. Macy or not, just as you +please, Mrs. Lathrop, but there were actually signboards saying so stuck +up all along in the fields as the train went by. The train-boy had the +books for sale on the train, too, and kept dropping 'em on top of 'em +all the way, but they didn't mind that, for Mrs. Fisher read her book as +fast as she could until he picked it up again, and she read to good +purpose, for this afternoon she asked for a glass of water, and while I +was out with her in the kitchen getting it, she told me there isn't a +mite of doubt but Mrs. Macy is in the book, and Doctor Carter of +Meadville is in right along with her. Mrs. Fisher says 'Liza Em'ly has +called her Miss Grace and him Doctor Wagner of Lemonadetown, but she +says she knew 'em instantly by the description of how they was in love; +she says you'd recognize how they was in love right off. I must say, +Mrs. Lathrop, as I think 'Liza Em'ly ought to be very careful what she +writes about real people if you can tell 'em as quick as that; but +anyway, they got to town and took a street car, and then, lo and behold, +if their first little surprise wasn't the finding as 'Liza Em'ly has +stopped living where she lives and gone to live in a hotel, so they had +to go to the hotel, too, and when they got there, what do you think?--If +'Liza Em'ly wasn't giving a reception to celebrate the twentieth +edition!" + +"Wh--?" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, indeed," continued Miss Clegg, "certainly--yes, I should say so, +too. If they didn't get a fine shock over 'Liza Em'ly and her hotel and +her reception and the whole thing, Mrs. Macy says she'll never know what +a shock is when she sees it. Seems they was shoved into one end of a +elevator without so much as by your leave and out the other end before +they'd caught their breath, and then they found themselves in a room +with flowers all tied up in banners, and Elijah, with his hair parted in +the middle, passing cups of tea which a lady, with her muff on her head, +was pouring out, while 'Liza Em'ly sat on a table swinging her feet in +shoes she never bought in _this_ town, Mrs. Macy'll take her Bible oath, +and a dress that trained on the floor even from the table." + +"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Oh, that isn't anything," said Susan, "just you wait. Well, and so Mrs. +Macy says you can maybe imagine their feelings when they found their two +perfectly respectable and well brought up selves in the middle of such a +kind of a party! One man and one girl was under the piano playing cat's +cradle, while another man was doing a sum on the wallpaper with a +hatpin. Mrs. Macy says she wouldn't have been surprised at nothing after +that, you'd think, but she says when it comes to 'Liza Em'ly nowadays, +you don't know even what you're thinkin', for you'd suppose 'Liza Em'ly +would at least have looked ashamed of her feet and her train. Instead of +that, she just clapped her hands and said, 'Hello, home-folks,' which +nearly sent Mrs. Fisher over backwards. Elijah saw them then, and _he_ +had the good manners to drop a teacup, but even he didn't look anywhere +near as used up as in Mrs. Macy's opinion a man away from business with +his hair parted in the middle in the middle of the afternoon had ought +to look. He gave them chairs though, and they set down between a young +lady as was smoking a cigarette and another as was very carefully +powdering herself in a little mirror set in her pocketbook. Just then +there was a noise like a awful crash and a hailstorm, and after they'd +both jumped and Mrs. Macy come near dislocating her hip, they see that +a man was beginning on the piano. Well, Mrs. Macy says _such_ +piano-playing her one hope is as she may be going to be spared +hereafter; she says he'd skitter up the piano with both hands, and then +he'd bang his way back to where he belonged, and every time he hit the +very bottom, he'd give his head a flop and jerk down another lot of hair +over his eyes. Mrs. Macy says she never see a man with so much loose +hair where he could manage it, for he kept getting down more and more +till he looked like a cocoanut and nothing else, so help Mrs. Macy, and +then, when he was completely hid, he hit the piano four cracks and +folded his arms and was done." + +"Mercy on--!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I should say so," continued Miss Clegg, "and Mrs. Macy says everybody +clapped like mad, and then 'Liza Em'ly come to earth and went and threw +her arms around his neck, which to Mrs. Macy's order of thinking, didn't +look much like she was going to marry Elijah. And then, before they +could shake hands or say good-by or do a thing, a boy came in with a +lot of telegrams on a tray, and while 'Liza Em'ly was fixing half a +spectacle in one eye to read 'em, a young lady dressed in snakeskins, +and very little else, jumped into the room right over the backs of their +two chairs in a most totally unlooked-for way, and then began to spin +about and wriggle here and there and in and out generally, and Mrs. +Fisher got up and said they really must go, and Elijah showed 'em to the +door with the lady in snakeskins making figure eights around them all +three and 'Liza Em'ly throwing a rose at them and kissing her hand till +somehow they got into the hall. They walked down flights of stairs then +till they thought there never would be a bottom anywhere, and then they +looked at each other, and after a while they got where they could speak, +and then they came home." + +"Well, wha--?" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Me, too," said Susan, "I think it's _awful_! And the worst of it is for +her to be the minister's daughter. Think of it! They bought a paper as +had her picture on it and a account of the reception as they'd just been +at. It said Herr Schnitzel Beerstein played, so they know his name now, +and Madame Kalouka S-k-z-o-h danced, so when it comes to her name, they +ain't much better off than they were before. Wherever they looked they +see posters of _Deacon Tooker Talks_, and people in the cars was all +discussing the book. Two ministers is going to take it for a text +to-morrow, and the candy stores has all got little candy boxes like beds +with a chocolate drop for Deacon Tooker and a gum-drop for his wife." + +"Well, wha--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I don't know," said Miss Clegg. "The book's made right out of this +community, and since I've read it myself, I can see who every one is +_except_ Deacon Tooker. I can't see who Deacon Tooker is, for we haven't +got anybody like him. He's talking the whole time; in fact, the book is +all what he says about everything, and all his wife ever does is to wake +up when he shakes her and then go to sleep again. The idea's very +remarkable of a man laying awake chattering to himself all night long, +but I never heard of any such person here. Our only deacon is Deacon +White, and he never talks a _tall_." + +"I wonder if the min--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, I don't believe so," said Miss Clegg. "My goodness, suppose he did +and hit something like they did! No, I hope he won't ever think of it, +and as for 'Liza Em'ly, I hope she'll remember her married father and +mother soon and remember her quiet and loving home, too, before she gets +in the habit of having parties like that very often. My gracious, think +of going to call on a girl as you see christened and having a snake-lady +gartering her way up your leg while you were trying to say good-by and +get away alive. Mrs. Macy says the creature was diving here and +wriggling there and slipping under tables and over chairs in a way as +made your flesh go creeping right after her. Well, it's clear 'Liza +Em'ly's started on a most singular career. Mrs. Macy says first they +give her a sandwich with a bow of ribbon on it, and she swallowed the +ribbon; and then they give her a piece out of a cake that they said had +a lucky quarter in it, and she's almost sure she swallowed the quarter, +so maybe she was prejudiced." + +"Well, I--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"They felt the same way," said Miss Clegg; "they've come home very much +used up. Mrs. Macy says you can talk to her about the days of ancient +Rome and the way folks act underground in Paris, but she says she knows +positively as what she and Mrs. Fisher saw with their own eyes in 'Liza +Em'ly's sitting-room beat all those kind of little circuses hollow. Mrs. +Macy says she's seen enough of what they call high life now to last her +till she dies of shame. She says the only bright spot in the whole thing +is as 'Liza Em'ly's nose isn't anywhere near as prominent as you'd think +any more, and she's got a automobile and is going to Europe when the +book goes into its fiftieth edition." + +"Well--I--" mused Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, and I will, too," said Miss Clegg. "I'll go straight home and do +it. I'm awful tired. And it bothers me more than I like to own not +knowing who Deacon Tooker is. You know my nature, Mrs. Lathrop, and +although I was never one to try to find out things nor to talk about 'em +after I've managed to find 'em out, still I never was one to like not to +know things, and I must say I do want to know who Deacon Tooker is. +Well, they say all things comes to him who waits, so I think I won't +stop here any longer. Good-by, and when I do find out, you can count on +my coming right over to tell you." + +"Goo--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +But Miss Clegg had shut the door after her. + + + + +V + +SUSAN CLEGG'S "IMPROVEMENTS" + + +There was nothing small or mean or economical about Jathrop Lathrop, now +that he had turned out rich. He was the soul of generosity, the epitome +of liberality, the concentrated essence of filial devotion as expressed +in checks and carte-blanche orders directed at his mother. + +One of his earliest kind thoughts was to have Mrs. Lathrop's home +completely modernized, and as Susan Clegg lived next door and was his +mother's best and dearest friend, he decided to build her house over, +too. + +To that end he hunted up the highest-priced architect of whom he could +hear and asked to have designs submitted forthwith. The highest-priced +architect readily undertook the reconstruction of the Lathrop and Clegg +domiciles, but being too occupied to go down into the country and look +over the field personally, he delegated one of his youngest and most +promising assistants to accomplish the task, and the young and promising +assistant forthwith packed his dress-suit case and set off. + +He was an assistant of most extraordinary youth and almost unbelievable +promise, and he saw a chance to plan colleges (endowed by J. Lathrop, +Esq.), palaces (to be built for Lathrop, the millionaire), possibly to +be commissioned with the overseeing of the artistic development of some +new, up-springing city (Lathropville, Alaska, or something of that +sort), if he should only succeed in at once accomplishing a close union +of feeling with the golden offspring of our old friend. His first really +rich client is to a young debutant in bricks just what a well-hung +picture is to the budding artist, or a song before royalty is to a +singer. Such being the well-known facts of life the young and promising +assistant fully intended to do himself proud in the reconstruction of +the two houses consigned by Jathrop's benevolence to his tender mercies. + +The young architect came to town and went to the hotel (at Jathrop's +expense). He spent the next ten days in going twice each day to study +his task, sketch its realities and idealities, and also make the +acquaintance of Mrs. Lathrop and Susan Clegg, for he was a young man of +new and novel ideas, and one of his newest and most novel ideas was to +build a house which would really suit those who were to live in it. He +was so young that he had no conception as to how this was to be done, +nor the faintest inkling as to what a Titanic-crossed-with-Promethean +undertaking it would be to do, if even he did know how; but he felt--and +most truly--that it was a new view of the relation between house and +builder, and he felt proud over having thought it out for himself as +well as for all time to come. Then he had another novel idea--not so +altogether his own, however--which was that a house should "express its +dweller." This latter idea was quite beyond the grasp of his present +audience and just a little beyond his own grasp, too, but he was brave +and conscientious and didn't see it that way at all. + +It has taken some time to lay out all these premises, but if there is +any one with whom one can desire close acquaintance it is surely the man +who comes to build over a comfortable and in-most-ways-satisfactory home +of long years' standing, so I trust that the minutes have not been +altogether wasted. + +Mrs. Lathrop and Miss Clegg received the young man and his mission in +such states of mind as were entirely compatible with their individual +outlook over life. + +"I must say I'm far from altogether liking him," Susan said to her +friend, a very real note of disapproval in her voice, one day toward the +end of the week. Mrs. Lathrop was rocking in her new old-gold-plush +stationary rocker and listened as usual with interest. "He's on the +woodpile now, drawing a three-quarter profile of the woodshed. The way +he perches anywhere and then goes to work and draws anything would +surely make an English snail pull his castle right into his house along +with him, for I've got a feeling as there's nothing about me as he +hasn't got in his book by this time, and there's many things he's drawn +as I never would choose to have the world in general looking over. I'm +sure I don't want no view of my woodshed going down to posterity for one +thing. I've had to have a woodshed, but I've never admired it, and the +way I've nailed anything handy over holes in it is far from my usual way +of mending. You've always mended 'hit or miss,' Mrs. Lathrop, and after +years of such doings as was more worthy a poorhouse than a Christian, +heaven has seen fit to reward your patching with a son fresh from the +Klondike, but I've always darned blue with blue and brown with brown, +and the only spot in my whole life that I haven't carefully and neatly +matched the stripes in is my woodshed, and now to-day when I was +thinking very seriously of using it up for the kitchen-stove next +winter, if there isn't a young man from New York out drawing it in black +and white, and ten to one he'll print it in some unexpected Sunday paper +marked 'Jathrop Lathrop's mother's friend Susan Clegg's woodshed!' +That'll be a pretty kettle of fish, and you needn't tell me that there +won't be somebody to perk up and say, 'No smoke without some fire,' +which will be as good as throwing it in my teeth that I'm one of those +as use a safety pin when a button's off, when it's a thing as I've never +done and never would do even if there is a proverb that a pin's a pin +for all that." + +Susan paused here and looked upon her friend in serious question. Mrs. +Lathrop, however, merely continued to rock pleasantly. A change had come +over the spirit of her rocking since the return of Jathrop. She had +rocked for years with a more or less apologetic air, as if she knew that +there were those who might criticize her action and yet she couldn't +personally feel that she really ought to give it up. But now she rocked +with a wide, free swing as if life was life and if she liked to rock, +she was going to rock, and if there were those who objected, they could +object--she didn't care. There is nothing that so quickly develops an +independent standpoint as the possession of money; there is nothing that +so fully produces a conviction that one is thoroughly justified in doing +just exactly what one pleases; there is nothing that leads to quite the +same lofty indifference as to whether what pleases one pleases or +displeases all the rest of the world. + +We have but to look at Jathrop to see that this is true. Of all the +tame, mild-eyed, listless young individuals, Jathrop was the worst, +falling asleep on an average of three times an afternoon in school, and +never keeping conscious a whole evening. Whether a sudden change in +Jathrop's character was the cause of making him a financial power or +whether his Klondike-acquired bank account was the cause of his +awakening, it still is a fact that now in his quiet way he was a very +live person. + +Jathrop was indifferent to a degree, also, as witness his appearance +with his Chinese boy whom everybody took to be his wife with his great +baggy trousers and pigtail that no respectable boy, Chinese or +otherwise, should wear. Of course, it must be acceded that Jathrop was +indifferent in that case from ignorance. He did not know what the world +was saying. + +Perhaps that accounts for the lofty attitude, one might say lofty +altitude, of so many of our millionaires. They are so far removed from +the world that their ears cannot hear what is being said. People talk in +whispers about the "very rich," which makes it doubly hard for them to +hear, or hearing, to think that it matters very much, else people would +shout. However, when all is said, money does make a difference. + +Mrs. Lathrop had been a silent, sat-upon, unaggressively-rocking person +for years; now Jathrop had come back from the Klondike and altered all +that; it was not that she had turned talkative, it was not that she had +so far altered the very foundations of her being as to presume ever to +try to contradict any other body's opinions, but the return of Jathrop +and the wealth of Jathrop had found expression in his mother through the +one medium of almost all expression with her. Mrs. Lathrop had ceased to +concern herself as to the length or the vigor of her rocking. It was +beautiful to see the energy of independence with which she went back and +forth, bringing her feet down with an audible clap whenever she desired +fresh impetus. + +Susan Clegg did not seem to sympathize. Instead, sitting on her straight +chair opposite, she shook her head severely, further discontent making +itself visible in the manner of her shake. + +But Mrs. Lathrop was proof against all manifestations of disapproval +now. She flew back and forth in the old-gold-plush stationary rocker +like the happy pendulum of some beatific clock. Jathrop was home. +Jathrop was rich. Jathrop would buy her anything she wanted. + +"I d'n know, I'm sure, Mrs. Lathrop," Susan went on, the discontent +ringing somewhat more distinctly in her tone, "as I'm much taken with +this idea of building us over, even if Jathrop does mean it kindly. I +know there's a many as would nigh to go out of their senses at the very +idea of being made over new for nothing, but I was never one to go out +of my senses easy, and that young man on the woodpile doesn't give me +any kind of secure feeling as to what he'll make out of my house. He +looks to me like the kind of young man as will open doors square across +windows where the knob'll smash the glass sure if you're trying to carry +a bureau out at the time of the house-cleaning. The kind of cravats he's +got looks to me like his chimneys would be very likely not to draw, and +their color gives me a feeling that doughnuts in his house will smell in +shut-up closets a week after the frying. You know what shut-up fryings +is like after they've had no fresh air for a week, but I wasn't raised +that way. When I have fish I have fish and done with it, and when I have +onions I have onions, and I ain't very wild over maybe boarding my fish +and my onions in my best bonnet henceforth and forever. + +"Mrs. Brown was telling me yesterday as she heard of some city woman as +had a system of ventilation put into her house, and the rats and mice +used it so freely that you couldn't sleep nights. They nested in it, and +they fought in it, and they died in it, all as happy and gay as you +please, and the family had to have it picked out of the walls in the end +and all new paper put on. That's the kind of ideas young men call modern +improvements, and that young man on the woodpile is about as modern and +improving as they make 'em, I take it. + +"I can't say what it is about that young man that I don't like, but, +being as I'm always frank and open with you, I will remark that so far I +ain't found one thing about him as I _do_ like. He's been down cellar +hammering on the wall wherever the wind blew him to listeth to hammer, +and I had to sit up-stairs and listen without no chance to blow myself. +I caught him down on all fours this morning peeking under my front +porch, and he didn't even have the manners to blush. As to the way he +makes free with the outside of _your_ house, I wouldn't waste breath +with trying to tell you, but my own feeling is that an architect learns +his trade on a tight-rope to judge from that young man's manner, and +from what I've seen while he was swinging by one arm from your premises, +I wouldn't feel safe to take a bath even on top of a chimney, myself." + +Susan rose at this and went to the window and looked out; from her +expression as she turned, it was plain to be seen that the artist was +still at his task. + +"I don't know, Mrs. Lathrop," she said, coming back to her seat, "I d'n +know, I'm sure, as I'm took with this idea a _tall_. I never was one for +favors either given or asked, and although I know this isn't no favor, +but just a evidence of what I've been through with you first and last, +still it's done in spite of me and I've got no feeling that I'm going to +enjoy it. There's something about kindness as is always most trying to +the people who've got no choice but to stand up and be tried. People who +get freely given to is in the habit of getting what they don't want and +can't use, but I ain't. I'm very far from it. There's nothing in me +that's going to be pleased with getting a green hat when I needed a pink +coat--no, sir. + +"And I don't need nothing. Or if I do, I can buy it. I know Jathrop +means it kindly, but Jathrop can't enter into my ways of thinking. +Jathrop is looking into life from the Klondike gold-fields and I'm +looking at it from my back stoop. That young man was out swishing his +pocket handkerchief about and sucking his thumb and holding it up all +yesterday afternoon, and about the time I'd made up my mind to bolt him +out of the kitchen for a lunatic, he come in and told me he really +thought there was wind enough in your back yard and my back yard +together to run a windmill, in which case a water system could be easy +inaugurated. I told him I didn't know you could inaugurate anything but +a president, but he said anything as you hadn't had before and thought +was going to work fine and be a great improvement could be inaugurated. +I told him I supposed I could stand a windmill if you could. + +"What do you think--what _do_ you think, Mrs. Lathrop, if that young man +didn't ask if he might go and look up the parlor fireplace! Well, I told +him he could, and I give him a newspaper to shake his head on after he +was done looking, too. He's been in my garret until I bet he knows every +trunk label by heart, and I must say I feel as if I'd have very little +of my own affairs to tell on Judgment Day if he gets dressed and out of +his grave quicker than I get dressed and out of mine. But that isn't +all, whatever you may think. There's a many other things about him as I +don't like and don't like a _tall_. + +"For one thing, he's got a way of looking around as if it was my house +that was the main thing and I was the last and smallest piece of +cross-paper tied in the kite's tail. To my order of thinking, that's a +far from polite way for a young man as Jathrop's hiring and boarding to +look on a woman whose house he may thank his lucky stars if he may get +the chance to build over. Mrs. Macy says Mrs. Lupey says architects is +all like that, but I'm far from seeing why. I don't consider that young +man superior a _tall_. I consider his brains as very far from being +equal to my own. When he asks me to hold the other end of his tape-line +and does it just as if a pin would do as well, only I was handier at the +moment, I'm very far from feeling flattered. I never saw just such a +young man before, and when I think of being delivered up to him--house +and all--for the summer, I'm also very far from feeling easy. I d'n +know, I'm sure, what will be the end of this, but I do know that it +looks to me like a pretty bad business." + +Susan paused again and looked at her friend, but Mrs. Lathrop just +rocked onward. Life had widened so tremendously for her that she +couldn't possibly be perturbed in any way or by anything. If the roof +fell in, Jathrop would buy her another, and if she were smashed by it, +Jathrop would have her put together again. Why worry? + +The young man remained ten days in all, and when his visit of +investigation was completed, he returned to New York. Jathrop took him +to the Lotus Club to wash and to the Yacht Club to lunch and to +Claremont in the afternoon (in his motor), and they talked it all over. +The young man had his sketches, ideas, ideals, and plans all tied into a +neat patent cover with cost-estimates lightly glued in the back. Jathrop +was deeply interested, and the young man expounded the inmost soul of +all his measurements and proposed altitudes and alterations. The young +man reminded Jathrop of his pertinent hypothesis that a house should +express its owner. Jathrop's own view of "express" was that if you +could pay the bill, it beat freighting all out of sight, but he felt +that perhaps the young man meant something different, so he merely gave +him a cigar. + +The young man took the cigar and proceeded to elucidate his hypothesis +by explaining that, having carefully studied both Mrs. Lathrop and Miss +Clegg, he should suggest that Miss Clegg's house express her by being +severely Doric and that Mrs. Lathrop's should be rambling and Queen Anne +with wide, free floor spaces. He further suggested a hyena-headed +door-knocker for Miss Clegg and an electric button to press, so that the +door opened of itself for Mrs. Lathrop. Also a roofless pergola to +connect the two houses. Jathrop liked all his ideas and sketches very +much, but as he was really good-hearted and had not the least desire to +present green hats to those who wanted pink coats, he had the whole book +sent down to his mother and begged her to carefully inspect it in +company with Susan Clegg. They inspected it. + +"Well," said Susan, "all I can say is I'll have to carry this book home +and sit down and try and make out what he _does_ mean. He's done it very +neat, that I will say, but between crosses and dotted lines and your +house behind mine like two Roman emperors on a cameo pin, I can't make +head or tail of what's going to be done to either of us. I can't even +find my own house in this plan on some pages, and as for this bird-cage +walk that I'm supposed to run back and forth in like a polar bear in a +circus all day long, my own opinion is that if it's got no roof, it's +going to be very hard indeed about the snow in winter, for I'll have to +carry every single solitary shovelful to one end or the other so as to +throw it out of either your kitchen window or mine. That's all the good +that will do us." + +Mrs. Lathrop swung to and fro, totally unconcerned. No sort of +proposition could disconcert her now. If the house when built over +proved a failure, Jathrop would build her another. + +Susan took the prettily-bound portfolio home with her and spent the +evening over it. She studied it profoundly and to some purpose, for the +next morning when she brought it back to Mrs. Lathrop, it held but few +secrets, other than those of a purely technical character, for her. + +"I've been all through it," she said to her friend, "and now I can't +really tell what I think a _tall_. But this I _do_ know, if we ever +really get these houses, I will be running back and forth from dawn to +dark through that wire tunnel in a way as'll make the liveliest polar +bear that ever kept taking a fresh turn look like a petrified tree +beside me. Why, only to keep the conveniences he's got put in scoured +bright would take me all of every morning in my house, to say nothing of +wiping up the floors, for Jathrop isn't intending to buy us no carpets +ever. We're to sit around on cherry when we ain't on Georgia pine, and +he's got every mantelpiece marked with the kind of wood we're to burn in +it, and he's been kind enough to tell us what colored china we're to +use in each bedroom. We're to shoot our clothes into the cellar through +a hole from up-stairs and wash 'em there in those two square boxes as we +couldn't make out. That thing I read 'angle-hook' is a 'inglenook,' and +so far from sitting in it to fish we're to set in it to look at the +fire, if we can get any mahogany to burn in that particular fireplace. + +"Those fans are stairs, we're to go up 'em the way the arrow points, and +heaven knows where or how we're to get down again. What we thought was +beds is closets, and what we thought was closets is beds, and it's +evident with all his hopping and hanging he didn't really charge his +mind with us a _tall_, for he's got a bedroom in your house marked 'Mr. +Lathrop,' when the last bit of real thought would have made him just +_have_ to remember as you're a widow. He's give me a sewing-room when he +must have seen that I always do my mending in the kitchen, and he's give +us each enough places to wash to keep the whole community clean. I must +say he's tried to be fair, for he's give both houses the same number of +rooms and the same names to each room. We've each got a summer kitchen, +but he left the spring and autumn to scratch along anyhow; we've each +got a bathtub, and we've each got a china-closet as well as a pantry, +which shows he had very little observation of the way _you_ keep things +in order." + +Mrs. Lathrop absorbed all this with the happy calm of a contented (and +rocking) sponge. + +"But what takes me is the way he's not only got a finger, but has just +smashed both hands, into every pie on the place," Susan continued. "He's +moved the chicken-house and give us each a horse and give the cow a calf +without even so much as 'by your leave.' I don't know which will be the +most surprised if this plan comes true--me with my horse, or the cow +finding herself with a calf in the fall as well as the spring this year. +Then it beats me where he's going to get all his trees, for both houses +is a blooming bower, and the way tree-toads will sing me to sleep shows +he's had no close friends in the country. Trees brushing your window +mean mosquitos at night and spiders whenever they feel so disposed. And +that ain't all, whatever you may think, for you haven't got a +window-pane over four inches square and, as every window has fifty-six +of them, I see your windows going dirty till out of very shame I get 'em +washed for your funeral. And that ain't all, whatever you may think, +either, for the snow is going to lodge all around all those little +gables and inglenooks he's trimmed your roof with, and you'll leak +before six months goes by, or I'll lose my guess." + +But it was impossible to impress Mrs. Lathrop. If things leaked, Jathrop +would have them mended. She just rocked and rocked. + +"I don't know what to write Jathrop about these plans," Susan Clegg said +slowly. "Of course, I've got to write him something, and I declare I +don't know what to say. He means it kindly, and there's nothing in the +wide world that makes things so hard as when people mean kindly. You can +do all sorts of things when people is enemies, but when any one means +anything kindly, you've got to eat it if it kills you. Mrs. Allen was +telling me the other day that since she's took a vow to do one good +action daily, she's lost most all of her friends. + +"That just shows how people feel about being grabbed by the neck and +held under till you feel you've done enough good to 'em. Jathrop means +this well, but I've got a feeling as we'll go through a great deal of +misery being built over, and I really don't think we'll be so much +better off after we've survived. You'll have to be torn right down, and +the day that that young man was up on my porch post, he said he couldn't +be positive that I'd keep even my north wall. He pounded it all over in +the dining-room until the paper was a sight, and then when he saw how +very far from pleased I was, he tried to get out of it by saying the +wall would have to come down, anyhow. I think he saw toward the last +that he'd gone too far in a many little ways. I didn't like his taking +the hens off their nests to measure how wide the henhouse was. I +consider a hen is one woman when she's seated at work and had ought not +to be called off by any man alive. But, laws, that young man wasn't any +respecter of work or hens or anything else! He called himself an artist, +and since I've been studying these plans, I've begun to think as he was +really telling the truth, for artists is all crazy, and anything crazier +than these plans I never did see. Not content with having us wash in the +sink and the cellar, we're to wash under the front stairs, too, not to +speak of all but swimming up-stairs." + +Mrs. Lathrop just smiled and rocked more. + +"I'm not in favor of it," said Miss Clegg, rising to go. "I don't +believe it'll be any real advantage. We'll be like the Indians that die +as soon as you civilize 'em--that's what we'll be. The windmill will +keep us awake nights, and you don't use any water to speak of, anyhow. +So I don't see why I should be kept awake. As for that laughing tiger +he's give me on my front door, I just won't have it, and that's all +there is about it. A laughing tiger's no kind of a welcome to people you +want, and when people come that I don't want, I don't need no tiger to +let 'em know it. No, I never took to that young man, and I don't take to +his plans. I don't like those four pillars across my front any more than +I do that mouse-hole without a roof that he's give me to go to you in. I +consider it a very poor compliment to you, Mrs. Lathrop, that he's fixed +it so if I once start to go to see you, I've got to keep on, for I can't +possibly get out so to go nowhere else." + +Susan Clegg paused. Mrs. Lathrop rocked. + +"Well?" said Miss Clegg, impatiently. + +But Mrs. Lathrop just rocked. If Susan didn't like it, she needn't like +it. Jathrop would pay the bill. + +Susan Clegg went home, her mind still unconvinced. + + + + +VI + +SUSAN CLEGG UPROOTED + + +Many things against which we protest bitterly at first we eventually +come to accept and possibly even to enjoy. It was that way, to a degree +at least, with the reconstruction of the houses of Susan Clegg and her +friend Mrs. Lathrop, neither lady being particularly charmed with the +idea when it was originally presented, and Miss Clegg being even frankly +displeased with the plans that were sent down for approval. But the +plans were accepted, nevertheless, after some alterations, and by easy +stages Susan Clegg and Mrs. Lathrop arrived at that degree of philosophy +which enabled them to face with commendable composure the fact that they +must vacate their dwellings for an indefinitely extended period. + +It was not that Miss Clegg had ceased to entertain doubts as to the +advisability of "being renovated," nor was it that Mrs. Lathrop looked +forward gladly to a temporary transplanting of herself and her rocker. +But Jathrop's glory as a millionaire was now so strongly to the fore in +their minds that both bowed, more or less resignedly, to his wishes. + +"I must say I d'n know how this thing is going to work out in the end," +Susan observed to Mrs. Lathrop, as the date set for the beginning of the +work drew nearer. "I'm against it myself, but I ain't against Jathrop, +so I'm giving up my views just to see what will happen. My own opinion +is as it's all very well to build over most anything, but if your house +is to be built over, you've got to get out of it, and I must say as I +don't just see as yet when we get out of our houses what we're going to +get into. Jathrop says we can go to the hotel, and that he'll pay the +bill. Well, I must say it's good he'd pay the bill, for I'd never go to +any hotel if somebody else didn't pay the bill--I know that. But even +if I haven't got the bill to pay, I don't feel so raving, raring mad to +go to the hotel. It wouldn't matter to you, Mrs. Lathrop, for nothing +ever does matter to you, and anyway, even if anything had mattered to +you before, you'd not mind it now that Jathrop's come back. But just the +same a hotel does matter to me. They take very little interest in their +housekeeping in hotels, and no matter who's eat off of what, if they can +use it again--and they generally can--they always do. Why, they churn up +the melted odds and ends of ice-cream and serve 'em out as fresh-made +with that cheerful countenance as loveth no giver. And what we'd throw +to the cat they scrape right back into the soup pot, and glad enough to +get it. I don't suppose you'd mind what you ate, nor what kind of a +cloth had dusted your plate, but I was brought up to be clean, and I +don't want to sleep with spiders swinging themselves down to see how I +do it. No, Mrs. Lathrop, I can't consider no hotel, not even in common +affection for Jathrop. I'd go down a well on my hands and knees to dig +coal for him if necessary, or I'd do any other thing as a woman as +respects Jathrop might do if she didn't respect herself more. But live +in a hotel I will not, and you can write and tell him so, for _I_ don't +want to hurt his feelings. But all kindness has its limits, and if I let +a boy architect run through the heart of my house, I consider as I've +done enough to prove my Christian spirit for one year." + +"What--?" ventured Mrs. Lathrop, but Susan Clegg went right on. + +"I don't see where we're ever going to put our things while they haul +our walls down and rock our foundations. That young man says there won't +be a room as won't have to have something done to it, and I don't want +my furniture spoiled, even if I do have to have my house built over +against my will. My furniture is very good furniture, Mrs. Lathrop. It's +been oiled, and rubbed, and polished ever since it was bought, and none +of the chairs has ever had their middles stepped on, and nothing of +mine has got a sunk hole from sitting,--no, sir! My mattresses is all +slept even, from side to side, and there ain't a bottle-mark in the +whole house. It's a sin to take and wreck a happy home like mine. I +shall have untold convenience hereafter, but I shall never take any more +real comfort. That's what I see a-coming. And where under the sun we are +going to put our things the Lord only knows." + +Mrs. Lathrop was one of those who rarely take a question as a personal +matter. She made no suggestion; she just rocked. + +"I can see what I've got to be doing," said Susan, a clearer light +breaking. "I've got to be getting up and seeing where you and me can go, +and where we can put our goods. I don't want to live under the same roof +with you if I can possibly help it. And not to do it's going to be hard, +for knowing we're such friends, folks is going to naturally plan to take +us together. I don't want to hurt your feelings, Mrs. Lathrop, and yet I +can't in Christian courtesy deny that to live with you would drive me +distracted, and so I shan't consider it for a minute. Not for one single +minute. Still, I can't live far from you, for we are old friends, and +the brother that leaveth all else to cleave to his brother wasn't more +close when he done it than I am to you. Besides, if they're building our +houses over, I shall naturally be pretty lively in watching them do it, +and as one of the houses is yours, you'll like to be where I can easy +tell you how it's being done. And so it goes without saying we've got to +be close together. But not too close together." + +All these premises were so undeniably true that the passive Mrs. Lathrop +could not have gainsaid them even had she been so disposed; which she +wasn't. + +Accordingly, upon the very next day, Susan began her search for an +abiding place, and the right abiding place was--as she had +predicted--not to be easily found. + +"There's plenty of places," said Susan, when she returned from her task, +"but they don't any of them suit my views. You're easily suited, Mrs. +Lathrop, but I'm not and never will be. I'm of a nature that never is to +be lightly took in vain, nor yet to be just lightly took either. And no +one isn't going to put me in a room that'll be sunny in July, nor yet in +one that will be shady in September. No room as is pleasant in September +can help being most hot in summer; and although I'm willing to be hot in +my own house, I will not be hot in any place where I pay board. You'll +do very well almost anywhere, Mrs. Lathrop, for Lord knows whatever +other virtues you may have, being particular could never be left at your +door in no orphaned basket. But I'm different. Mrs. Brown would take us +until young Doctor Brown and Amelia gets back, and Mrs. Allen would be +glad of the very dust of our feet; but I couldn't go to either of those +two places. Mrs. Brown would have to have both of us, for there's no one +else to take you, and Mrs. Allen would want to read us her poetry. It's +all right to write if you ain't got brains or time for nothing better, +but I have, and I ain't going to knowingly board myself with no one as +hasn't." + +Mrs. Lathrop made no comment. She merely rocked and waited. + +"As for our things," Susan continued, "I've found where we can put +_them_. It wasn't easy, but I never give up, and Mr. Shores says he's +willing we should have all the back of his upper part. I told him as I +should want to be able to go to 'em any time, and he said far be it from +him to desire to prevent no woman from visiting what was her own. I +could see from his tone as he was thinking of his wife as run off with +his clerk, and it does beat all how you can even make a misery out of a +woman's visiting her furniture if you feel so inclined. So the goods is +off our minds, and now it's just us as has got to be put somewheres till +our own doors is opened to us again. I must say I'd like to know where +we'll end." + +On the very next day the solution was effected. + +"I've got it all fixed," said Susan, returning, dovelike, with the +evening shadows. "Mrs. Macy'll take one of us and Gran'ma Mullins the +other. Gran'ma Mullins says with Hiram gone to the Klondike and Lucy +gone to her father, either you or me can have their room; only for the +love of heaven we mustn't look like Hiram in bed; for her heart is +aching and breaking, and the car-wheels of his train ain't grinding on +any track half as much as they're grinding in her tenderest spot. Now +the question is, Mrs. Lathrop, which'll go which, and it's a thing as I +must consider very carefully, for Lord knows I don't want to be no more +miserable than I've got to be. And it goes without saying I wouldn't +choose to live with Gran'ma Mullins, nor Mrs. Macy, nor nobody else if I +had my choice. I'm too much give to liking to live alone with myself. Of +course, Mrs. Macy is a pleasanter disposition than Gran'ma Mullins, for +she ain't got Hiram to wear my bones into skin over; but I feel as +living with Mrs. Macy all summer will surely lead to her trying to make +it come out even for the rent up to next January, so I would have to +worry over that. Then, too, even if Gran'ma Mullins is wearing, she's +soothing too, and I shall need soothing this summer. I declare, Mrs. +Lathrop, I can't well see how I'm ever going to pack up my things. I +can't see what's to keep 'em from getting scratched and the corners +knocked. How can I fix a toilet set smooth together? A toilet set don't +never fit smooth together; the handles always stick out. And the +frying-pan's got a handle too, and a clothesbar ain't any ways adaptable +to nothing. Chair legs is very bad and table legs is worse, and there's +Mother's wedding-present clock as found its level years ago and ain't +been stirred since. Father give it to her, and it's so heavy I couldn't +stir it if I wanted to, anyhow. But I don't want to stir it. It's my +dead mother's last wish, and as such is sacred. I wasn't to stir Father +nor the clock. It's a French clock, and it's marble. It's a handsome +clock. It was Father's one handsome present to Mother. And now I've got +to put it in storage. And then there's our hens. I don't know but what +it'd be wisest to set right to eating them. I know one thing--I'll never +board chickens. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, this is going to be an awful business! +Think of the carpets! Think of the window shades, and my dead mother's +lamberquins! Think of the things in the garret! And the things in the +cellar! And the things in the closets! I don't know, I'm sure, how we'll +ever get moved." + +As the days went on, the slow trend of life brought the problem still +more pressingly to the front. Susan decided to lodge herself with +Gran'ma Mullins. Gran'ma Mullins, whose heart was still very heavy over +Hiram's escape from the home nest, would have preferred Mrs. Lathrop. +Mrs. Lathrop's capacity for listening would have meant much to Gran'ma +Mullins in these hours of bitter loneliness; but Mrs. Macy wanted Mrs. +Lathrop, and Susan didn't want Mrs. Macy, so the outcome of that +question was a fore-gone conclusion. + +When all was settled, Jathrop dispatched emissaries who, with a deftness +and dexterity possessed only by the hirelings of millionaires, descended +on Mrs. Lathrop, and in the course of a single afternoon transferred +her, her rocker, and the whole contents of her bedroom to Mrs. Macy's. +The emissaries offered to do the same thing for Susan Clegg, but she +rejected their aid. Alone and unassisted Susan wrestled with her +packing, and no one ever knew just how she accomplished it. It took her +several days, and it introduced a new order of things into not only her +life but her speech. Her struggle was valiant, but towards the end she +had to call on Felicia Hemans and Sam Durny for help. When, on Saturday +night, Susan arrived at Gran'ma Mullins's, her first observation was +that when the Lord got through with the creation it was small wonder He +arranged to rest on the seventh day. + +"I d'n know as I shall ever get up again," she said to Gran'ma Mullins, +who was watching her take off her bonnet. "A apron as has been used to +carry things in for six days is bright and starched beside me. Oh, +Gran'ma Mullins, pray on your folded knees as Hiram won't come back rich +and want to build you over! Anything but that." + +"Oh, if he'll only come back, it's all I'll ask!" returned Gran'ma +Mullins sadly. "To think he can't get there for four weeks yet. And +think of Hiram in a boat! Why Hiram can't even see a mirror tipped back +and forth without having to go right where he'll be the only company. +And then to be in a boat! A boat is such a tippy thing. I read about one +man being drowned in one last week. They're hooking for him with +dynamite to see if they can even get a piece of him back for his wife. +His wife isn't much like Lucy, I guess. Oh, Susan, you'll never know +what I've stood from Lucy! Nobody will." + +Miss Clegg shook her head and looked about her quarters with an eye that +was dubious. + +"I've got some eggs for supper," said Gran'ma Mullins, "one for you and +one for me, and one for either of us as can eat two." + +"I can eat two," said Susan, who thought best to declare herself at the +outset. + +"Is your things all out of the house?" Gran'ma Mullins asked, as they +seated themselves at the table. + +"Oh, yes," answered Susan, "everything is out! Towards the last we acted +more like hens being fed than anything else, but we got everything +finished." + +"Did you get the clock out safe?" + +Susan's expression altered suddenly. "The clock! Oh, the clock! What +_do_ you think happened to that clock? And I didn't feel to mind it, +either." + +"Oh, Susan, you didn't break it!" + +"I did. And in sixty thousand flinders. And I'm glad, too. Very glad. +It's a sad thing as how we may be found out, no matter how careful we +sweep up our trackings. And I don't mind telling you as the bitterest +pill in my cup of clearing out has been that very same clock." + +"It was such a handsome clock," said Gran'ma Mullins, opening her +naturally open countenance still wider. "Oh, Susan! What did happen?" + +"You thought it was a handsome clock," said Susan, "and so did I. It was +such a handsome clock that we weren't allowed to pick it up and look at +it. Father screwed it down with big screws, so we couldn't, and he wet +'em so they rusted in. I had a awful time getting those screws out +to-day, I can tell you. You get a very different light on a dead and +gone father when you're trying to get out screws that he wet thirty-five +years ago. Me on a stepladder digging under the claws of a clock for two +mortal hours! And when I got the last one out, I had to climb down and +wake my foot up before I could do the next thing. Then I got a block and +a bed-slat, and I proceeded very carefully to try how heavy that +handsome clock--that handsome marble clock--might be. I put the block +beside it, and I put the bed-slat over the block and under the clock. +Then I climbed my ladder again, and then I bore down on the bed-slat. +Well, Gran'ma Mullins, you can believe me or not, just as you please, +but it's a solemn fact that nothing but the ceiling stopped that clock +from going sky-high. And nothing but the floor stopped me from falling +through to China. I come down to earth with such a bang as brought +Felicia Hemans running. And the stepladder shut up on me with such +another bang as brought Sam Durny." + +"The saints preserve us!" ejaculated Gran'ma Mullins. + +"It wasn't a marble clock a _tall_," confessed Susan. "It was painted +wood. That was why Father screwed it down. Oh, men are such deceivers! +And the best wife in the world can't develop 'em above their natural +natures. I expect it was always a real pleasure to Father to think as +Mother and me didn't know that marble clock was wood. I don't know what +there is about a man as makes his everyday character liking to deceive +and his Sunday sense of righteousness satisfied with just calling it +fooling. Well, he's gone now, and the Bible says 'to him as hath shall +be given,' so I guess he's settling up accounts somewheres. Give me the +other egg!" + +After supper they stepped over to Mrs. Macy's, which was next door, and +the four sat on the piazza in the pleasant spring twilight. Mrs. Macy +was so happy over having Mrs. Lathrop instead of Susan Clegg that she +smiled perpetually. Mrs. Lathrop sat and rocked in her old-gold-plush +rocker. Gran'ma Mullins and Susan Clegg occupied the step at the feet of +the other two. + +"Well, Susan," Mrs. Macy remarked meditatively, "I never looked to see +you leave your house any way except feet first. Well, well, this +certainly is a funny world." + +"Yes," returned Susan, brief for once, "it certainly is." + +"It's a very sad world, I think," contributed Gran'ma Mullins with a +heavy, heavy sigh. "My goodness, to think this time last spring Hiram +was spading up the potato patch! And now where is he?" + +"Nobody knows," answered Susan. "See how many years it was till Jathrop +come back. But I do hope for your sake, Gran'ma Mullins, that when Hiram +does come back he won't take it into his head to buy this house and +build it over for you." + +Gran'ma Mullins looked at Mrs. Macy, and Mrs. Macy looked back at +Gran'ma Mullins, and a message flashed and was answered in the glances. + +"Well, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins with neighborly interest, "you do +see that the house needs fixing up, don't you?" + +Susan was the owner and Mrs. Macy only the tenant, and the implication +was not at all pleasing to her. She turned with the air of the weariest +worm that had ever done so and gave Gran'ma Mullins a look that could +only be translated as an admonition to mind her own business. Whereupon +Gran'ma Mullins promptly subsided, and the subject did not come up +again. + +It was on a Monday--the very next Monday--that the workmen arrived and +set to work to demolish the outer casing of the homes of Susan and Mrs. +Lathrop. Susan went up and stood about for an hour, viewing the way they +did it with great but resigned scorn. She went every day thereafter, and +her heart was rent at the sight of the sacrilege. Then, to add to her +woe, Gran'ma Mullins proved less soothing than had been expected, and +Susan suffered keenly at her hands. + +"Oh, Mrs. Lathrop," she said one morning, when the exigencies of +shopping left the two old friends full freedom of intercourse, "if I'm +going to live in that house for this whole summer, the first thing that +I'll have to do is either to change Gran'ma Mullins or change me! I can +see that. Why, I never heard anything like Gran'ma Mullins' views on +Hiram. You've heard Mrs. Macy, and I've told you what Lucy's told me +whenever I've met her, but I never had no idea it was anything like +what it is. I'm stark, raving crazy hearing about Hiram. Gran'ma Mullins +says no child was ever like Hiram, and I begin to wonder if it ain't so. +No child ever made such an impression on his mother before,--I can take +my Bible oath on that, for she's talking about him from the time I wake +till long after I'm asleep,--and she remembers things in the stillness +of the night and wakes me up to hear 'em for fear she'll forget 'em +before morning. Last night she was up at two to tell me how Hiram used +to shut his eyes before he went to sleep when he was a baby. She said he +had a different way of doing it from any other child that's ever been +born. He picked it all up by himself. She couldn't possibly tell me just +how he did it, but it was most remarkable. He had it in May and well +into June the year he was born, but along in July he began to lose it, +and by October he opened and shut just like other people's babies. +That's what I was woke up to hear, Mrs. Lathrop, and Herod was a sweet +and good-tempered mother of ten compared to me as I listened. And then +at daybreak if she didn't come in again to explain as Hiram was so +different from all other babies that he crept before he walked, and the +first of his trying to walk he climbed up a chair leg." + +"Why, Jathrop--" volunteered Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Of course. They all do. But I must say I don't see how I'm going to +stand it till my house is ready to receive me back with open bosom if +this is the way she's going on straight along. I wouldn't stay with Mrs. +Macy because I was tired of hearing what she said Gran'ma Mullins said +about Hiram, but it never once struck me that if I stayed with Gran'ma +Mullins I'd have it all to hear straight from the fountain mouth. My +lands alive, Mrs. Lathrop, you never hear the beat! Hiram used to +wrinkle up his face when she washed it, and he never wanted to have a +bath. And he used to bring mud turtles into the house; and when she +thinks of that and how now he's off for the Klondike, she says she feels +like going straight after him. She says she could be very useful in the +Klondike. She could polish his pick and his sled-runners, and hang up +his snowy things, and wash out his gold and his clothes. She says she +can't just see how they wash out gold, but she knows how to polish +silver, and she says mother-love like hers can pick up anything. She +goes on and on till I feel like going to the Klondike myself. I'm +getting a great deal of sympathy for Lucy. Lucy always said she could +have been happy with Hiram--maybe--if it hadn't been for his mother. +Lucy's got no kind of tender feeling for Gran'ma Mullins, and I +certainly don't feel to blame her none." + +"Is your--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, striving towards pleasanter paths. + +"Well, it ain't burnt up yet," answered Susan. "I stopped at Mr. Shores' +coming back and took a look at it, and I was far from pleased to find +the door as opens into the next room to the room as my furniture is +locked up in a little open. Goodness knows who'd opened it, but it +looked very much like some one had been trying my door, to me. I asked +Mr. Shores, and I saw at a glance as it was news to him, which shows +just how much interest he's taking in looking out for my things. He said +maybe the cat had pushed it open. The cat! I unlocked my door and went +in. The furniture's all safe enough, but it's enough to put any +housekeeper's heart through the clothes wringer only to see how it's +piled. The beds is smashed flat along the wall, and wherever they could +turn a table or a chair upside down and plant something on the wrong +side of it, they've done it. As for the way the dishes is combined, I +can only say that the Lord fits the back to the burden, so the +wash-bowls is bearing everything. They've put Mother's picture in a +coal-hod for safety, and the coal-hod is sitting on the bookcase. It's a +far from cheering sight, Mrs. Lathrop, but you know I was against being +built over from the start. When I see the walls of my happy home being +smashed flat and then picked over like they was raisins to see what'll +do to use again, and then when I see my furniture put together in a way +as no one living can make head or tail of, and when I see myself woke up +at three in the night to be told that sometimes when Hiram was a baby he +would go to sleep and sometimes he wouldn't, why I feel as if that Roman +as they rolled down hill in a barrel because he wouldn't stay anywhere +else where they put him was sitting smoking cross-legged compared to me. +I d'n know what I'm going to do this summer. It would just drive an +ordinary woman crazy. But I presume I'll survive." + +Mrs. Lathrop looked slightly saddened. "Well, Susan,--" she began to +murmur sympathetically. + +"Oh, it doesn't matter," said Susan. "Of course, if it gets where I +can't stand it, we'll just have to change houses, that's all." + + + + +VII + +SUSAN CLEGG UNSETTLED + + +Life under the roof of Gran'ma Mullins eventually--and eventually was a +matter of days rather than weeks--became unbearable for Susan Clegg. At +least, she so decided, and finding opportunity in the fact that both +Gran'ma Mullins and Mrs. Macy had gone to market, Susan hastened to her +old friend, Mrs. Lathrop, and laid open her fresh burden of woes. + +"I can't stand it, Mrs. Lathrop," she declared with strongest emphasis, +"I can't stand it. No matter what the Bible says, a saint on a gridiron +would smile all over and wriggle for nothing but joy only to think as +where he was and wasn't boarding with Gran'ma Mullins. It's awful. +That's what it is--awful. I never had no idea that nothing could be so +awful. I've got to where I'm thinking very seriously of leaving my +property to Lucy. I'm becoming very sorry for Lucy. Lucy isn't properly +appreciated. Why, Hiram was stung by a bee once,--no ordinary bee, but a +bee a third bigger than the usual bee,--and it swelled up all different +from common, and Gran'ma Mullins thought he was surely going to die +right there before her streaming eyes. But Hiram was so bright he +remembered about putting mud on bee-bites, and he did it. Only there +wasn't no mud, and nobody knew what they could do about it. But Hiram's +mind wasn't like the mind of a ordinary person. Hiram's mind is all +different, and Hiram said, just as quick as scat, to mix water and earth +and make some mud. So they did, and the water and earth, Gran'ma Mullins +says, made the finest mud she ever saw. They covered up Hiram's bee-bite +with it, and it didn't leave so much as a scar. And now there's Hiram in +the Klondike, knowing just what to do when bit by a bee, but without a +notion what to put on if a seal catches him unawares. And all this going +on hour after hour, Mrs. Lathrop, and me sitting there waiting for my +dinner, half mad anyway over the way my dead-and-gone father's home is +being torn limb from limb, and in no mood to listen to anything. Oh, +laws, no! It's no use. I can't stand it, and I won't either." + +Susan paused expressively. + +Mrs. Lathrop gasped. "What will--?" + +"I'm going to find another place to live right away," Susan went on. +"I've too much consideration for you to ask you to go there, Mrs. +Lathrop, and besides, I feel it would be exchanging the fire for the +stew-pan for me to come here. I'm going this town over this very +afternoon, and I think I'll find some place where I can sleep part of +the night, at any rate. I guess I got about three quarters of a hour's +sleep last night. Gran'ma Mullins woke me up weeping on the foot of my +bed before daylight. Just before daylight is her special time for +recollecting how Hiram used to drink milk out of a cup when he was a +baby, and how he used to eat candy if anybody gave him any, and other +remarkable doings that he did. My lands, I wish Job could have met +Gran'ma Mullins! His friends and his boils would have just been pleasant +things to amuse him, then. I'm going first to Mrs. Allen, and then I'm +going to every one. I shan't make no bones about my errand, for +everybody knows Gran'ma Mullins. I'll have the sympathy of the whole +community. I need sympathy, and I feel I can soak up a good lot of it if +I'm let to." + +"How's the--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"They're still pulling 'em down," said Susan gloomily. "It's a awful +sight, and one that doesn't give me more strength for Gran'ma Mullins. I +shall never have another house that will suit me as mine did, Mrs. +Lathrop. I know that Jathrop means it kindly, and I'm far from being one +to hold any gift-horse by the tail, but the truth is the truth, and I +must say nothing teaches you to really prize your cupboards like seeing +men going through 'em with pick-axes. There was many little conveniences +in my house as I never really thought much of until now I see 'em gone +forever. But it's a poor cat that lives on spilt milk, so I'll say no +more of that, but go back and get ready to hunt up a place to live. For +live I must, Mrs. Lathrop, and live I will. And I won't live by eating +and drinking and breathing Hiram Mullins the twenty-four hours round, +neither." + +Miss Clegg's round of visits ended, curiously enough, in her +establishing herself with Lucy Mullins. + +"Which I don't doubt is a very great surprise to you, Mrs. Lathrop," she +confessed to her friend that evening. "But Lucy ran across me in the +street, and when she saw me, those two women who met in the Bible and +knew all each other's business directly was strangers passing on express +trains beside Lucy and me. I took one look at Lucy, and I see she knowed +it all. Judge Fitch is going to be away a lot this month, seeing where +he can hire his witnesses for a big lawsuit, and Lucy says she and me'll +be alone and able to be silent from dawn to dark and on through the +night. She don't want to have to listen to no manner of talk, she says, +and I can have the second floor all alone to myself, for her and her +father sleep in the wings down-stairs." + +"So you--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, I didn't look no more. I was suited, so I didn't see no use in +further fussing. I shall tell Gran'ma Mullins to-night and go there +to-morrow. And I may in confidence remark as no howling oasis in a +desert ever howled for joy the way I'll feel like howling when I get my +trunk on a wheelbarrow again. I've spoke for the wheelbarrow at eight +o'clock to-morrow morning, so I'll be over at Lucy's and settled before +you wake up, Mrs. Lathrop." + +The next day Susan went, and, surprising as it may seem, Gran'ma Mullins +was singularly content over her going. + +"I don't want to make no trouble between friends," said Gran'ma Mullins, +clambering up Mrs. Macy's steps to sit with Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Lathrop. +"But really, Susan is become most changed since her house is begun to be +built over. I wouldn't hardly have known her. I wouldn't say stuck-up +and I wouldn't say airy, but I will say as she's most changed. I +wouldn't say rude, neither, but I didn't consider it exactly friendly to +always either pull her breath in long and loud or else let it out short +and sharp whenever I mentioned Hiram. Hiram is my only legal and natural +child, and with him in the Klondike, and my heart aching and quaking and +breaking for fear the ice'll thaw and let him through into some +unexpected volcano all of a sudden, how can I but mention him? You know +what Hiram is to me, Mrs. Macy. We haven't lived in these two houses for +forty years without your knowing what Hiram is to me. You remember him +as a baby, Mrs. Macy, but you don't, Mrs. Lathrop, so I'll tell you what +Hiram was as a baby. Hiram was a most remarkable--" + +When Mrs. Lathrop saw Susan Clegg again, Miss Clegg was looking far from +happy. + +"Are you--?" enquired Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, I d'n know," came the answer more than a little dubiously. Then: +"Seeing that I am always frank and open with you, Mrs. Lathrop, I may as +well say plainly as I ain't. Very far from it. I never knew when I went +to live with Lucy as Judge Fitch has got a dog as barks. He ain't no +ordinary dog--he's a most uncommon dog. He only barks when it's +moonlight, or when he hears something, and I must say he's got the +sharpest ears I ever see. But it isn't his barking that's so bad, as it +is that whenever he barks, Lucy gets right up to see whether it's Hiram +come back. It seems the reason Lucy took me to board is she hates to go +around the house alone nights with the dog and a candle. That's a pretty +thing for me to never mistrust till I got there with my trunk. I must +say I don't blame Lucy for not liking to go around alone, for the dog +smells your heels all the time, and if he was in the Klondike with Hiram +his nose couldn't be colder. But all the same I think she ought to of +told me. For whatever it may be to others, a cold nose is certainly most +new to my heels. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, we was out hunting with our dog +three times last night, and Lucy says often enough he gets her up nine +and ten times. Lucy's so nervous for fear Hiram'll come back that she +can't possibly sleep if she thinks there's a chance of it. She says if +Hiram's come back, she wants to know it right off. She says that's her +nature. If she's got to have a tooth out, she wants it out at once. She +says she never was one to shrink from nothing. And the dog's prompt, +too. He's quite of the same mind as Lucy. He gives one bark, and then he +don't dilly-dally none. He gets right up, and by the time he's got to +Lucy, Lucy's got up too, and they both come racing up-stairs for me to +join 'em. My door don't lock, so the dog's licking my face before I +know where I am. And then, before I know much more where I am, we're +all three capering down-stairs together again. Then we take the whole +house carefully around and listen at every door and window, with the dog +smelling while we listen. Then, when we know for sure as it ain't Hiram, +the dog scrambles back into his basket, and Lucy tucks him up, and she +and I go back to bed alone and untucked. That's a pretty kettle of fish. +And you can believe me or not, just as you please, Mrs. Lathrop, but I +never had no notion of having my heels smelled by a cold dog's nose +three times, and maybe nine, a night when I went to live at Judge +Fitch's, and if it keeps on, I shall just leave. Lucy's got no lease on +me, and although I'm sorry for her, I ain't anywhere near sorry enough +for her to be woke up to pussy-cornering all over the premises with a +dog the livelong night through. As between having Gran'ma Mullins +sitting on my feet wailing over Hiram, and Lucy's dog smelling of my +heels while we hunt for Hiram, I think I'd rather have Gran'ma Mullins. +I was warm and comfortable and laid out flat at Gran'ma Mullins, but I'm +goodness knows what at Lucy's. And I do hate having my face licked. I +don't like it. I never was used to such things, and I can't begin now." + +"What will--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I shall look up another nice place to live," said Miss Clegg, "and I +shall take a leaf out of the dog's book and be prompt about it, too. +I've spoke for the wheelbarrow to-morrow at ten o'clock, and I shall +move then, whether or no." + +Susan, again on the lookout for a new abiding place, discovered a most +attractive proposition in Mrs. Allen. Mrs. Allen and her husband lived +alone, were neat and well-fed, and kept no dog. + +"I'll never go where there's a dog again, I know that," said Susan. +"Why, Mrs. Lathrop, if I was in a blizzard in Switzerland and fifty of +those little beer-keg dogs they've got there came scurrying up to rescue +me, I wouldn't get up and let 'em have the joy of seeing me obliged. I +won't ever get up for no dog again in my life, I know that. And I know +it for keeps. And there's a bolt on my side of my door at Mrs. Allen's. +I've looked to that, too; and no one is to wake me nights; I've looked +to that. I told Mrs. Allen all the story of what I'd suffered, and she +said she'd see as I had peace in her house. She told me that I'd +suffered because I needed to suffer, but now I was to have peace, and +I'd have it with her. I didn't bother to ask what she meant, for I guess +if she's got any secret thorn, I'll find it out quick enough, anyhow. +And if it's anything that wakes me up nights, my present feeling is as I +won't be well able to bear it. Well, the wheelbarrow is set for ten +o'clock, and so I must go, and when I see you, I'll know what's wrong +with Mrs. Allen, and the Lord help me if it's something as makes me have +to move again. That's all I can say." + +Susan did not visit her old friend directly after her third change of +residence. Two whole days passed by, and Mrs. Lathrop was openly +troubled. + +"Don't you worry," said Gran'ma Mullins soothingly. "There's nothing the +matter with her, because I see her in the square this very morning. But +she looked at me odd and went down a side street. I'm sure I hope +Susan's not losing her mind." + +"Oh, wouldn't that be awful!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy with real sympathy. +"We'd have to appoint a commission to catch her and sit on her, and then +if she was put in the insane asylum, I guess Susan Clegg would be mad." + +"Oh, Susan wouldn't like that a bit," said Gran'ma Mullins meditatively. +"They make little cups and saucers out of beads. I know, because Hiram +had one once. And they read books with the letters all punched out at +you." + +"You're thinking of the Home for the Blind," corrected Mrs. Macy. "I was +there once, too. I don't think Susan would mind going there so much, +because of course she can see, which would give her a great advantage +over the others, and Susan does like to have an advantage over anybody +else. But I don't believe she'd like going to the Insane Asylum much. +The Insane Asylum's so limited. My husband's sister went to the Insane +Asylum once, but it didn't help her none, so she came home. It wouldn't +ever suit Susan." + +"Well, maybe not," said Gran'ma Mullins amicably. "And I don't think she +could go there, anyway, for she isn't crazy, and she's got her own +money. So why should she be a charge on the county?" + +The very next day Susan came wearily in to see her old friend. + +"Well, I d'n know what I've ever done to have this kind of a summer," +she began, seating herself sadly. "Why didn't I stay in my own house and +just simply take you to board while they laid violent hands on your +house? I was against being built over all along, Mrs. Lathrop, you know +that. And now the fox has his cheese and the cow has her corn, just as +the Scripture says, but Susan Clegg's absolutely forced to live with +Mrs. Allen. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, you don't know what living with Mrs. Allen +is, and you can't imagine, either. I never dreamed of such a thing +before I went there. I was a little afraid she'd want to read me her +poetry, but her poetry would have been paradise to what is. Seems as if +Mrs. Allen has got a new kind of religion, and heaven help the present +run of mankind if any more new religions is sprung on us, and heaven +help me if I've got to live long with Mrs. Allen's new one. Mrs. Allen's +new religion is most peculiar. I never see nothing like it. It's +Persian, and it's very singular just to look at. But it's most awful to +live with. Lucy and her dog is simple beside it, and as to Gran'ma +Mullins, she's nothing but a baby dabbing a ball in comparison. +According to Mrs. Allen's new religion, you mustn't find fault with +nothing or nobody--never. Everything's all right, no matter how wrong it +is; and if you lose your purse, you was meant to lose it, so why +complain? You was give your purse for just a little while, and in place +of wildly running here and there trying to find it, you must just thank +heaven for kindly letting you have it so long, and think no more about +it. If you're meant to see any more of that purse, it'll kindly look you +up itself. But it's no manner of use your looking for it, because if +heaven takes back a purse deliberately, never intending to return it, it +never does return it, and that's all there is to be said on the subject. +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you think perhaps you can see what it would be to +live with any one that feels to see life in that way; but you don't +really know what you think a good deal of the time, and never less than +now. Mrs. Allen's things is mostly back in heaven's hands again, and her +biscuits is mostly burnt, and not one bit does she care, seeing as she +don't consider as she has the least thing to do with any of it. She's +happy and singing and forgetting from dawn to dark. She says the day'll +soon be that the whole earth will see the truth and be singing with +her. She says the toiling millions will cease to toil then, and life'll +be all Adams and Eves and no manner of misery. In the meantime, I don't +get nothing to eat, and when I feel to holler down-stairs, she says +dinner was meant to be late that day, or it couldn't possibly have been +late. Not by no manner of means." + +"Well, I--" commented Mrs. Lathrop blankly. + +"Just my way of seeing it," said Susan, "and she aggravates me still +more with pointing her moral, from dawn to dark. She says it's beautiful +to see how beautiful life comes along. You and me needed quiet, and we +got quiet. And now we need our houses built over, and we're getting 'em +built over. I told her I didn't need my house built over a _tall_, and +she said as I just thought so, but that I really did, or it wouldn't be +being done. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, I d'n know, I'm sure, what I will run up +against next. But I don't believe I can stay at Mrs. Allen's. I really +don't. There's one thing--it'll be mighty easy to leave her, for I +shan't have to say nothing. I shall say I was meant to leave and then +and there leave. It's a poor religion as don't fit others as easy as its +own selves; and I ain't washed in the Allens' dirty rain water full of +dead and drowned bugs for two days because I was meant to wash and they +was meant to drown, without learning how to turn even a drowned bug to +my advantage. No, sir, I'm going out this afternoon and see what I can +get, and if I can't do no better, I'll buy a bolt for my door and come +back to Gran'ma Mullins. Gran'ma Mullins has her good points. I always +said that, Mrs. Lathrop, Gran'ma Mullins certainly has her good points. +And I must learn to bear Hiram if I must. There's one thing certain: I +can hear about Hiram in bed, and I don't have to get up and out of bed +to hunt for him. And whatever else Gran'ma Mullins does, she don't burn +her bread and blame it on the Almighty. Mrs. Allen's got the Bible so +pat that you don't need to do nothing, according to her--nothing a +_tall_, but just sit still and let the world turn you around with its +turning. She says Solomon said the little lilies didn't spin, and so why +should she? Well, if we're to quit doing everything that lilies don't +have a hand in, I must say we'll soon be in a pretty state. I never was +one to admire Solomon like some people, and as for David, I think he was +a fool--dancing around the ark like he'd just got it for Christmas!" + +Susan searched long and wearily for a fourth abiding place that +afternoon, but in the end she had to speak for the wheelbarrow for the +next morning and move back to Gran'ma Mullins's. + +And Gran'ma Mullins was very glad to see her back. + +"Your bed's all made up with the same sheets for you, Susan," she said +cordially, "and I ain't even swept so as to spoil the homelike look. +You'll see your own last burnt matches and all, just as you left 'em." + +"I've bought a bolt for my door," said Susan, "and I'll beg to borrow a +screwdriver and something sharp to put it on with." + +"I'll get 'em," agreed Gran'ma Mullins happily, "and I won't wake you no +more nights, Susan. I suppose it's only natural that you, never having +been married, can't possibly know the feelings of a mother. But I meant +it kindly, Susan. When Lucy speaks of Hiram, she means it unkindly. But +when I speak of Hiram, I always mean it kindly." + +"Yes, I know," said Susan, "and if I believed like Mrs. Allen does, I'd +know I was meant to listen and wouldn't mind. But I don't take no stock +in that religion of Mrs. Allen's, and I won't be woke up. And although I +don't want to hurt your feelings, I do want that understood right from +the beginning." + +"I'll remember," said Gran'ma Mullins submissively. "And now I'll fetch +the screwdriver." + +That evening the four friends sat pleasantly once again on Mrs. Macy's +piazza. + +"Mrs. Lathrop had a letter from Jathrop to-day. Did you know that, +Susan?" asked Mrs. Macy. + +"No, I didn't," returned Susan Clegg. "What did he say?" + +"He's going sailing to the West Indies in his new boat," Mrs. Macy +informed her. "He's going for his health, and he's going to take three +other millionaires and their own doctor." + +Susan appeared unimpressed. + +"He sent his mother a book about the place where he's going," said Mrs. +Macy. "Do you want to see it?" She went in and brought it out. + +Susan took the volume and viewed the title with an indifferent eye. + +"_Stark's Guide to the Bahamas_," she read aloud. "What are +they--something to eat?" + +"You're thinking of bananas," suggested Mrs. Macy. "It's islands. It's +where Columbus hit first. Nobody knows just where he hit, but he hit +there; everybody knows that." + +Susan placed the book under her arm. "I'll read it," she said briefly. +"But I must say as to my order of thinking Jathrop's setting off just +now is very much like a hen getting up from her eggs. Here's you and +me--" addressing Mrs. Lathrop directly--"with our houses done away with, +and him as has engineered the wreck skipping away with a parcel of men." + +"He isn't skipping," interposed Mrs. Macy. "He's sailing--sailing in his +own private boat, like the tea-man with the cup." + +"Oh, I don't care what he's doing," said Susan, rising. "I'm about beat +out, and I'm going home and going to bed. Such a week! The Bible says +'Whom the Lord loveth He chaseth,' and heaven knows I've been chased +this week till my legs is about wore off. Such a week! I've had all the +chasing I want for one while. And I never was great on being loved, so +I'm going home and going to bed." + +Whereupon, with the _Guide to the Bahamas_ under her arm and a heavy +fold between her brows, Susan Clegg stalked over to her temporary +domicile. + +"I don't think Susan's very well," said Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Maybe she's worried over Jathrop," suggested Mrs. Macy. + +Mrs. Lathrop said nothing. She just rocked. + + + + +VIII + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE CYCLONE + + +"I d'n know, I'm sure, what star this town could ever have been laid out +under," said Susan Clegg, one exceptionally hot night as the four +friends sat out on Mrs. Macy's steps, "but my own opinion is as it must +have been a comet, for we're always skiting along into some sort of hot +water. When it ain't all of us, it's some of us, and when it ain't some +of us, it's one of us, and now the walls of my house is up I'd be +willing to bet a nickel as a calamity'll happen along just because +something's always happening here and my walls is the youngest and +tenderest thing in the community now." + +"Your roof ain't--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Of course not; how could it be, when my walls is only just up? I don't +wish to be casting no stones at him as is the least among us, but I will +say, Mrs. Lathrop, as Jathrop's orders seem to be taking you up under +the loving protection of their wings, while I'm running around like I +was a viper without no warm bosom to hatch me. _Your_ walls have been up +and a-doing for a week, but my walls have been sitting around waiting +until I was nigh to put out. To see your laths going in and your plaster +going on, while I stay lumber and nails, is a lesson in yielding to the +will of heaven as I never calculated on. There's few things more +aggravating than to see some other house speeding along while your own +house sits silently, patiently waiting. Of course I can't say nothing, +as even the boy as carries water knows my house is going to be a present +to me in the end. It's all right, and likely enough the Lord has seen +fit to send this summer to me as a chastisement; but I will say that if +I'd known how this summer was going, the Lord would most certainly have +had to plan some other way to punish me. I don't say as it wasn't +natural that your walls should go up first, Jathrop being your son, and, +now that he's rich, no more to me than a benefactor--" + +"Oh, Susan!" expostulated Mrs. Macy. + +"That's what he is, Mrs. Macy; he's my benefactor, and I can't escape if +I want to. You may tend a man's mother ten years, day and night, house +cleanings and cistern cleanings, moths and the well froze up, and if the +man comes back rich, he's your benefactor." + +"Susan!" cried Mrs. Lathrop, "you--" + +"Don't deny it, Mrs. Lathrop; it's the truth. It's one of those truths +that the wiser they are, the sadder you get. It's one of those truths as +is the whole truth and a little left over; and I'm learning that I'm to +be what's left over, more every day. After a life of being independent +and living on my own money, I'm now going down on my knees learning the +lesson of being humbly grateful for what I don't want. I may sound +bitter, but if I do it isn't surprising, for I feel bitter; and Gran'ma +Mullins knows I'm always frank and open, so she'll excuse my saying that +there's nothing in living with _her_ as tends to calm me much. A woman +as sleeps in a bed as Hiram must have played leap-frog over all his life +from the feel of the springs, and pours out of a pitcher as has got a +chip out of its nose, ain't in no mood to mince nothing. I never was one +to mince, and I never will be--not now and not never. Mincing is for +them as ain't got it in them to speak their minds freely; and my mind is +a thing that's made to be free and not a slave." + +"Well, really, Susan," expostulated Mrs. Macy, "what ever--" + +"Don't interrupt me, Mrs. Macy. I'm full of goodness knows what, but +whatever it is, I'm too full of it for comfort. There's nothing in the +life I'm leading this summer to make me expect comfort, and very little +to make me feel full, but there's things as would make a man dying of +starvation bust if he experienced them. And I'm full of such things. I +never had no idea of being out of my house all summer, and now, when my +walls is up at last, and it looks like maybe I'd get back a home feeling +some day soon, I must up and get quite another kind of feeling--a +feeling that something is going to happen. It's a very strange feeling, +and at first I thought it was just some more of Gran'ma Mullins' +cooking; but it kept getting stronger, and when I was in the square, I +spoke to Mr. Kimball about it; and he says this is cyclone weather, and +maybe a cyclone is going to happen. He says a man was in town yesterday +wanting to insure everybody against fire and cyclones. Most everybody +did it. Mr. Kimball says after the young man got through, you pretty +much had to do it. Them as had policies with the company could get the +word 'cyclone' writ in for a dollar. I guess the young man did a very +good day's work. Mr. Kimball says if it's true as there's any cyclones +coming nosing about here, he wants his dried-apple machine insured +anyhow. It's a fine machine, and every kind of fruit as is left over +each night comes out jam next day, while all the vegetables make +breakfast food. He says it's a wonder." + +"What makes him think we're going to have a cyclone?" inquired Mrs. Macy +anxiously. + +"He says the weather is cyclony. And he says if I feel queer that's a +sign, for I'm a sensitive nature." + +"I never--" said Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, nor me, neither. But Mr. Kimball seemed to feel there wasn't no +doubt. He says I'm just the kind of sensitive nature as could feel a +cyclone. Why, he says cyclones take the roofs off the houses!" + +"Ow!" cried Gran'ma Mullins in surprise. + +"If one's coming, I'm glad to know, for I never see one near to," said +Mrs. Macy pensively. + +"You won't see it a _tall_," said Susan, "for Mr. Kimball says the only +safe place in a cyclone is the cellar; and to pull a kitchen table over +you to keep the house from squashing you flat when it caves in." + +"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"That's what he said. But he says not to worry, for the young man told +him as they're getting so common no one notices them any more. He says +they're always going hop, skip, and jump over Kansas and everywhere, and +no one pays no attention to 'em. He knows all about it. But he wanted it +clear as he was only insuring for _cyclones_; he says his firm wouldn't +have nothing to do with tornadoes. You can get as much on a cyclone as +on a fire, but you can't get a penny on a tornado--" + +"What's the diff--" asked Gran'ma Mullins. + +"That's the trouble; nobody can just tell. A cyclone is wind and +lightning mixed by combustion and drove forward by expulsion, the young +man told Mr. Kimball. He said they'd got cyclones all worked out, and +they can average 'em up same as everything else, but he says a tornado +is something as no man can get hold of, and no man will ever be able to +study. Tornadoes drive nails through fences--" + +"Where do they get the nails?" asked Gran'ma Mullins. + +"I d'n know. Pick 'em out of the fences first, I guess. And they strip +the feathers off chickens and scoop up haystacks and carry them up in +the air for good and all." + +"Oh, my!" cried Mrs. Macy. + +"Mr. Kimball said the young man told him that a tornado dug up a +complete marsh once in Minnesota and spread it out upside down on top of +a wood a little ways off; and when there's a tornado anywhere near, the +sewing-machines all tick like they was telegraphing." + +"No!" cried Mrs. Macy. + +"Yes, the young man said so." + +"But do you believe him?" + +"I don't know why not. I wouldn't believe Mr. Kimball because he's +always fixing up his stories to sound better than they really are, which +makes me have very little faith in him; but Judge Fitch says he'd make +a splendid witness for any one just on that very account. Judge Fitch +says with a little well-advised help Mr. Kimball would carry convictions +to any man,--he don't except none,--but I see no reason why the young +man wasn't telling the truth. Young men do tell the truth sometimes; +most everybody does that. A tornado catches up pigs and carries 'em +miles and pulls up trees by the roots. I don't wonder they won't insure +'em." + +"The pigs?" asked Mrs. Macy. + +"No, the tornadoes." + +"What's the signs of a tornado?" asked Gran'ma Mullins uneasily. + +"Well, the signs is alike for both. The signs is weather like to-day and +a kind of breathlessness like to-night. Mr. Kimball says a funnel-shaped +cloud is a great sign; and when you see it, in three minutes it's on +you, and off goes your roof if it's a cyclone, and off you go yourself +if it's a tornado." + +"My heavens alive!" cried Mrs. Lathrop, clutching the arms of her +old-gold-plush stationary rocker. + +"Do people ever come down again?" Gran'ma Mullins inquired; she was very +pale. + +"Elijah didn't, Mr. Kimball says." + +"Elijah Doxey?" cried Mrs. Macy. "Why, is he off on a cyclone? No one +ever told me." + +"No, Elijah in the Bible, you know. The Elijah as was caught up in a +chariot of fire. Mr. Kimball says there ain't a mite of doubt in his +mind but that it was a tornado. I guess Mr. Kimball told the truth that +time, for it's all in the Bible." + +"That's true," said Gran'ma Mullins. "I remember Elijah myself. He kept +a tame raven, seems to me, or some such thing." + +"Oh, Susan!" Mrs. Lathrop cried out suddenly. "There's a fun--" Her +voice failed her; she raised her hand and pointed. + +Susan turned quickly, and her face became suddenly gray-white. "It can't +be a cy--" she faltered. + +With that all four women jumped different ways at once. + +"Where shall we go?" shrieked Mrs. Macy. "Oh, saints and sinners +preserve us! Oh, Susan, where shall we go?" + +But Susan Clegg stood as if paralyzed, staring straight at the +funnel-shaped cloud. + +Gran'ma Mullins started for her own house; Mrs. Lathrop sprang up and +clasped the piazza post nearest; Mrs. Macy grabbed her skirts up at both +sides and faced the cyclone just as she had once faced the cow. + +The funnel-shaped cloud came sweeping towards them. The town was +between, and a darkness and a mighty roar arose. Buildings seemed +falling; the din was terrible. + +"I knew it," said Susan grimly. "It _is_ a cyclone!" She faced the +worst--standing erect. + +The next instant the storm was on them all. It lifted Mrs. Lathrop's +old-gold-plush stationary rocker and hurled it at that good lady, +smashing her hard against the post. It raised the roof of Mrs. Macy's +house and dropped it like an extinguisher over the fleeing form of +Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Oh, Gran'ma Mullins, it _is_ a cyclone!" Susan shrieked. But Gran'ma +Mullins answered not. + +A second mighty burst of fury blew down two trees, and it blew Susan +herself back against the side wall of the house which shook and swayed +like a bit of cardboard. + +"Oh, yes, it's a cyclone," Susan screamed over and over. "Oh, Mrs. +Lathrop, it's a real cyclone! It isn't a tornado; you can see the +difference now. It's a cyclone; look at the roof; it's a cyclone!" + +Mrs. Lathrop could see nothing. She and the old-gold-plush stationary +rocker were all piled together under the piazza post. + +And now came the third and worst burst of fury. It crashed on the +blacksmith's shop; it carried the sails of the windmill swooping down +the road, and then "without halting, without rest" lifted Mrs. Macy +with her outspread skirts and carried her straight up in the air. "Oh! +Oh!" she shrieked and sailed forth. + +Susan gave a piercing yell. "Oh, Mrs. Macy, it's a tornado, it's a +tornado!" But Mrs. Macy answered not. + +Tipping, swaying, ducking to the right or left, she flew majestically +away over her own roof first and then over that of Gran'ma Mullins' +woodshed. + +"Help! Help!" cried Gran'ma Mullins from under the roof. + +Mrs. Lathrop was oblivious to all, smashed by her own old-gold-plush +stationary rocker. + +Susan Clegg stood as one fascinated, staring after the trail which was +all that was left of Mrs. Macy. + +"It was a tornado!" she said over and over. "Mrs. Macy'll always believe +in the Bible now, I guess. It was a tornado! It _was_ a tornado!" + + * * * * * + +"No, they ain't found her yet," Susan said, coming into the hotel room +where Mrs. Lathrop and Gran'ma Mullins had found a pleasant and +comfortable refuge and were occupied in recuperating together at +Jathrop's expense. Neither lady was seriously injured. Gran'ma Mullins +had been preserved from even a wetting through the neat capping of her +climax by Mrs. Macy's roof; while Mrs. Lathrop's squeeze between the +piazza post and her well beloved old-gold-plush stationary rocker had +not--as Gran'ma Mullins put it--so much as turned a hair of even the +rocker. + +"No one's heard anything from her yet," continued Susan, "but that ain't +so surprising as it would be if anybody had time to want to know. But +nobody's got time for nothing to-day. The town's in a awful taking, and +I d'n know as I ever see a worse situation. You two want to be very +grateful as you're so nicely and neatly laid aside, for what has +descended on the community now is worse'n any cyclone, and if you could +get out and see what the cyclone's done, you'd know what _that_ means." + +"Was you to my house, Susan?" asked Gran'ma Mullins anxiously. + +"I was; but the insurance men was before me, or anyhow, we met there." + +"The insurance men!" + +"That's what I said,--the insurance men. Oh, Mrs. Lathrop, we all know +one side of what it is to insure ourselves, but now the Lord in his +infinite wrath has mercifully seen fit to show us the other side. The +Assyrian pouncing down on the wolf in his fold is a young mother +wrapping up her first baby to look out the window compared to those +insurance men. They descended on us bright and shining to-day, and if we +was murderers with our families buried under the kitchen floor, we +couldn't be looked on with more suspicion. I was far from pleased when I +first laid eyes on 'em, for there's a foxiness in any city man as comes +to settle things in the country as is far from being either soothing or +syrupy to him as lives in the country; but you can maybe imagine my +feelings when they very plainly informed me as I couldn't put the roof +back on Mrs. Macy's house till it was settled whether it was a cyclone +or a tornado--" + +"Settled--whether--" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Cyclone or tornado," repeated Susan. "The first thing isn't to get to +rights, but it is to settle whether we've got any rights to get. I never +dreamed what it was to be injured--no, or no one else neither. Seems if +it's a tornado, we don't get a cent of our insurance. And to think it +all depends on Mrs. Macy." + +"On Mrs.--" cried Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Yes, because she's the only one as really knows whether she was carried +off or not. Well, all I can say is, if she don't come back pretty quick, +we're going to have a little John Brown raid right here in town; we--" + +"But what--?" + +"I'm telling you. It'll be the town rising up against the insurance men, +and the insurance men will soon find that when it comes to +dilly-dallying with folks newly cycloned upside down, it's life and +death if you don't deal fair. What with chimneys down and roofs turned +up at the corner like the inquiring angels didn't have time to take the +cover all off but just pried up a little to see what was inside,--I say +with all this and everything wet and Mrs. Macy gone, this community was +in no mood to be sealed up--" + +"Sealed up!" cried Mrs. Lathrop and Gran'ma Mullins together. + +"That's what it is. Sealed up we are, and sealed up we've got to stay +until Mrs. Macy gets back--" + +"But--" cried Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Everybody's just as mad as you are. Charging bulls is setting hens +beside this town to-night. Even Mr. Kimball's mad for once in his life; +he's losing money most awful, for he can't sell so much as a paper of +tacks. They've got both his doors and all his windows sealed, and he's +standing out in front with nothing to do except to keep a sharp eye out +for Mrs. Macy. He says it ain't in reason to expect as she'll fly back, +but she's got to come from somewhere, and he means to prevent her +getting away again on the sly. He says his opinion is as she'd have +stood a better chance before airships was so common. He says ten years +ago folks would have took steps for hooking at her just as quick as they +saw her coming along, but nowadays it'd be a pretty brave man as would +try to stop anything he saw flying overhead. I guess he's about right +there. It's a hard question to know what to do with things that fly, +even if Mrs. Macy hadn't took to it, too. My view is that we advance +faster than we can learn how to manage our new inventions. I d'n know, +I'm sure, though, what Mrs. Macy is going to do about this trip of hers. +She went without even the moment's notice as folks in a hurry always has +had up to now. She's been gone most twenty-four hours. She's skipped +three meals already, not to speak of her night and her nap; and you know +as well as I do how Mrs. Macy was give to her nights and her napping." + +Susan shook her head, and Mrs. Lathrop looked wide-eyed and alarmed. + +"But now--" Gran'ma Mullins asked. + +"I've been all over the place," Susan continued. "I didn't understand +fully what was up when I scurried off to try and get those men to put +the roof back on Mrs. Macy's house, but I know it all now. It's no use +trying to get anybody to do nothing now; the whole town's upside down +and inside out. I never see nothing like it. And the insurance men has +got it laid down flat as nobody can't touch nothing till it's settled +whether it's a cyclone or a tornado. Seems a good many was insured for +cyclones right in with their fires without knowing it; but there ain't a +soul in the place insured against a tornado, because you can't get any +insurance against tornadoes--no one will insure them. The insurance men +say if it's a tornado, we won't have nothing to do except to do the best +we can; but if it's a cyclone, we mus'n't touch anything till they can +get some one to judge what's worth saving and how much it's worth and +deduct that from our insurance. That's how it is." + +"But what has--?" began Gran'ma Mullins. + +"How long--?" demanded Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Nobody knows," said Susan. "The whole town is asking, and nobody knows. +The insurance company won't let anybody go home or get anything unless +they'll sign a paper giving up their insurance and swearing that it was +a tornado. Mr. Dill just had to sign the paper because he was taking a +bath and had nothing except the table cover to wear. He signed the paper +and said he'd swear anything if only for his shoes alone; and it seems +that his house isn't hurt a mite, and he didn't have no insurance +anyhow. A good many is blaming him, but he says he really couldn't think +of anything in the excitement and the table cloth. It's a awful state of +things. The cyclone has tore everything to pieces, and the insurance +men has put their seal on the chips. People is being drove to all +lengths. The minister and his family is camping in the henhouse. Our +walls is fell in so goodness knows what will happen to you and me next, +Mrs. Lathrop. The wires is all down, so we can't hear nothing about the +storm. The rails is all up, so there's no trains. The church is stove +in, so we can't pray. But I must say as to my order of thinking, it +looks as if no one feels like praying. The insurance men is running all +over, like winged ants hatching out, sealing up more doors and more +windows every minute and getting more signatures as it was a tornado +before they'll unstick them. Nothing can't be really settled till Mrs. +Macy comes back. Mrs. Macy is the key to the whole situation." + +"But why--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"The Jilkins is in from Cherry Pond, and all it did there was to rain. +The Sperrits was in, too, and the storm was most singular with them. It +hailed in the sunshine till they see four rainbows--they never see the +beat. Mr. Weskins is advising everybody to go into their houses and make +a test case of it. Judge Fitch is advising everybody not to. It's plain +as he's on the side of the insurance men. He says just as they do, that +we'd better wait till Mrs. Macy comes back and hear her story. He says +in the very nature of things her view'll be a most general one. He says +all there is to know she'll know; she'll know the area affected and be +able to tell whether it was electricity or just wind. Mr. Kimball said +if she went far enough, she'd be a star witness; but no one thinks that +jokes about Mrs. Macy ought to be told now. The situation is too +serious. It may be _very_ serious for Mrs. Macy. If the storm stopped +sudden, it may be very serious indeed for Mrs. Macy. Mrs. Macy isn't as +young as she was, and she hadn't the least idea of leaving town; she +wasn't a bit prepared, that we can all swear to. She was just carried +away by a sudden impulse--as you might say--and the main question is +how far did she get on her impulse, and where is she now? To my order +of thinking, it all depends on how she come down. Cycloning along like +she was, if she come down on a pond or a peak, she'll be far from +finding it funny. I was thinking about her all the way here, and I can't +think of any way as'll be easy for her to come to earth, no matter how +she comes. And if she hits hard, she isn't going to like it. Mrs. Macy +was never one as took a joke pleasant; she never made light of nothing. +She took life very solemn-like--a owl was a laughing hyena compared to +Mrs. Macy. It's too bad she was that way. My own view is as she never +got over not getting married again. Some women don't. She always took it +as a reflection. There's no reflection to not getting married; my +opinion is as there's a deal of things more important and most thing's +more comfortable. If Mrs. Macy was married, she'd be much worse off than +she is right now, for instead of being able to give her whole time and +attention to whatever she's doing and looking over, she'd be wondering +what he was giving his time and attention to doing and prying into. When +a man's out of your sight, you've always got to wonder, and most of the +time that's all in the world you can do about a man. Now Mrs. Macy's +perfectly independent, she can go where she pleases and come down when +she pleases, and she hasn't got to tell what she saw unless she wants +to. Mrs. Brown says she ain't never been nowhere. It's plain to be seen +as Mrs. Brown's envying Mrs. Macy her trip." + +"But why--?" began Gran'ma Mullins with great determination. + +"That's just it," replied Susan promptly. "I declare, I can't but wonder +what'll happen next. I'm in that state that nothing will surprise me. +Everything's so upset and off the track there's no use even trying to +think. My walls is fell into my cistern, and Mrs. Macy's roof is sitting +on the ground beside her house yet. The insurance men has sealed up +Gran'ma Mullins' house, and they wouldn't leave the henhouse open till I +signed a affidavit on behalf of the hens and released 'em from all +claims for feed. Mr. Dill said they tried to seal up his cow. They've +got Mr. Kimball's dried-apple machine tied with a rope. It's awful." + +"But Susan--" interrupted Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Mr. Weskins says the great difficulty is the insurance men say they +don't see how anything is going to be settled or decided until we hear +from Mrs. Macy. The point's right here. If she comes back, it's evidence +as it was a tornado, because if she comes back it proves as she was +carried off, in which case the insurance men won't have to pay nothing +anyhow, and we'll all be unsealed and allowed to go to work putting our +roofs back on our heads and clearing up as fast as we can. But Mr. +Weskins says if Mrs. Macy don't come back, there'll be no way to prove +as she was even carried off by the storm for you, Mrs. Lathrop, had your +back turned; and you, Gran'ma Mullins, was under the roof; and I'm only +one, and it takes two witnesses to prove anything as is contrary to law +and nature." + +"Do they doubt--?" cried Mrs. Lathrop, quite excited--for her. + +"Yes, they do. They doubt everything. Insurance men don't take nothing +for granted. They've decided to just pin their whole case to Mrs. Macy, +and there's Mrs. Macy gone away to, heaven knows where." + +"Well, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins, "we must look on the bright side. +Mrs. Macy'll have something to talk about as'll always interest +everybody if she does come back, and if she don't come back, we'll +always have her to remember." + +"Yes, and if we don't get our houses unstuck pretty soon, we'll remember +her a long while," said Susan darkly. + +Three days passed by and no word was heard from Mrs. Macy. As soon as +the telegraph assumed its usual route, messages were sent all about in +the direction whither she had flown, but not a trace of her was +discovered by any one. The town was very much wrought up, for although +its members were given to having strange experiences, no experience so +strange as this had ever happened there before. The exasperation of +being barred out of house and home until Mrs. Macy should be found, +naturally heightened the interest. Everybody had had just time to add +the magic word "cyclone" to their policies before the cyclone came +"damaging along"--as Susan Clegg expressed it. Susan was much perturbed. + +"Well, Mrs. Lathrop,"--she said on the afternoon of the third day, as +she came into the hotel room where the mother of the millionaire was now +equal to her usual vigorous exercise in her old-gold-plush stationary +rocker. "Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you may well be grateful as Jathrop has got +money enough for us to be living here, for the living of the community +is getting to be no living a _tall_." + +Gran'ma Mullins, still in bed, turned herself about and manifested a +vivid interest, "Well, Susan," she said, "it's three days now; how long +is this going to keep up?" + +"It can't keep up very much longer, or we'll have a new French +Revolution, that's what we'll have," said Susan. "Why, the community is +getting where it won't stand even being said good morning to pleasantly. +The children is running all over, pulling each other's hair, and Deacon +White says he's going to buy a pistol. Things is come to a pretty pass +when Deacon White wants to buy a pistol, for he's just as afraid of one +end as the other. But it's a straw as shows which way the cyclone blew +his house." + +"But isn't something--?" + +"Something has got to be done. The boys stretched a string across the +door of the insurance men's room this morning, and they fell in a heap +when they started out; and some one as nobody can locate poured a +pitcher of ice water through the ventilator as is over their bed. Seeing +that public feeling is on the rise, they sent right after breakfast for +the appraisers, and they're going to begin appraising and un-sealing +to-morrow morning. They've entirely give up the idea of waiting for +Mrs. Macy. The town just won't stand for any more hanging around waiting +for nothing. I never see us so before. Every one is so upset and divided +in their feelings that some think we'd ought to horsewhip the insurance +men, and some think we'd ought to hold a burial service for Mrs. Macy." + +"I wouldn't see any good in holding a service for Mrs. Macy," said +Gran'ma Mullins. "She wouldn't have been buried here if she was dead; +she was always planning to go to Meadville when she was dead." + +"Yes," said Susan, "I know. Because Mrs. Lupey's got that nice lot with +that nice mausoleum as she bought from the Pennybackers when they got +rich and moved even their great-grandfather to the city." + +"I remember the Pennybackers," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Old man +Pennybacker used to drive a cart for rags. It was a great day for the +Pennybackers when Joe went into the pawnbroker business." + +"Yes," said Susan, "it's wonderful how rich men manage to get on when +they're young. Seems as if there's just no way to crowd a millionaire +out of business or kill him off. I'm always reading what they went +through in the papers, but it never helped none. A millionaire is a +thing as when it's going to be is going to be, and you've just got to +let 'em do it once they get started." + +"It was a nice mausoleum," said Gran'ma Mullins. "Mrs. Macy has told me +about it a hundred times. It's so big, Mrs. Lupey says, she can live up +to her hospitable nature at last, for there's room for all and to spare. +Mrs. Macy was the first person she asked. Mrs. Macy thought that was +very kind of just a cousin. There's only Mrs. Kitts there, now, and Mrs. +Lupey's aunt, Mrs. Cogetts." + +"Mrs. Macy didn't know she had a aunt," said Susan. "Mrs. Cogetts came +way from Jacoma just on account of the mausoleum. That's a long ways to +come just to save paying for a lot where you are, seems to me; but some +natures'll go to any lengths to save money." + +"I wonder where Mrs. Macy is now," said Gran'ma Mullins, with a sigh. + +"Nobody knows. A good many is decided that it's surely a clear case of +Elijah, only nobody pretends to believe in the Bible so much as to think +that she can go up and stay there. Mrs. Macy'd have to come down, and +the higher she went the more heaven help her when she does come down. +Mrs. Macy was very solid, as we all know who've heard her sit down or +seen her get up, and I can't see no happy ending ahead, even though we +all wish her well. The insurance men is very blue over her not coming +back, for they expected to prove a tornado sure; but even insurance men +can't have the whole world run to suit them these days. Anyhow, my view +is as it's no use worrying. Spilt milk's a poor thing to cook with. If +you're in the fire, you ain't in the frying-pan. The real sufferers is +this community, as is all locked out of their houses. The Browns is +living in the cellar to the cowshed, with two lengths of sidewalk laid +over them. Mrs. Brown says she feels like a Pilgrim Father, and she +sees why they got killed off so fast by the Indians,--it was so much +easier to be scalped than to do your hair. Mr. and Mrs. Craig takes +turns at one hammock all night long. Mrs. Craig says they change +regular, for whoever turns over spills out, and the other one is sitting +looking at the moon and waiting all ready to get in." + +"I declare, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins warmly, "I think it's most +shocking. I won't say outrageous, but I will say shocking." + +"But what are you going to do about it?" said Susan. "That's the rub in +this country. There's plenty as is shocking, but here we sit at the +mercy of any cyclone or Congress as comes along. Here we was, peaceful, +happy, and loving, and a cyclone swishes through. Down comes half a +dozen men from the city and seals up everything in town. I tell you you +ought to have heard me when they was sealing up your house and Mrs. +Macy's. I give it to 'em, and I didn't mince matters none. I spoke my +whole mind, and it was a great satisfaction, but they went right on and +sealed up the houses." + +"Oh, Susan," began Mrs. Lathrop, "how are--?" + +"All in ruins," replied Susan promptly. "I don't believe you and me is +ever going to live in happy homes any more. Fate seems dead set against +the idea. And nobody can get ahead of Fate. They may talk all they +please about overcoming, and when I was young I was always charging +along with my horns down and my tail waving same as every other young +thing; but I'm older now, and I see as resignation is the only thing as +really pays in the end. I get as mad as ever, but I stay meek. I wanted +to lam those insurance men with a stick of wood as was lying most handy, +but all I did was to walk home. Mr. Shores says he's just the same way. +We was talking it over this morning. He says when his wife first run off +with his clerk, he was nigh to crazy; he says he thought getting along +without a wife was going to just drive him out of his senses, and he +said her taking the clerk just seemed to add insult to perjury, but he +says now, as he gets older, he finds having no wife a great comfort." + +"I wish Jathrop would--" sighed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, he will, likely enough," said Susan. "Now he's rich, some girl +will snap him up, and he won't find how he's been fooled till three or +four months after the wedding." + +"I suppose Jathrop could marry just any one he pleased now," said +Gran'ma Mullins, sighing in her turn. "Hiram didn't have no choice; +Jathrop'll have a choice." + +"He may be none the better for that," said Susan darkly. "If Jathrop +Lathrop is wise, he'll not go routing wildly around like a president +after a elephant; he'll stick to what's tried and true. But I have my +doubt as to Jathrop's being wise; very few men with money have any +sense." + +"Who do _you_ think--?" began Mrs. Lathrop, looking intently at Susan. + +"I d'n know," said Susan, looking hard at Mrs. Lathrop; "far be it from +me to judge." + +"They do say, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins wisely, "as he'll end up by +marrying you. Everybody says so." + +Susan shook her head hard. "It's not for me to say. Affairs has been +going on and off between Jathrop and me for too many years now for me to +begin to discuss them. What is to be will be, and what isn't to be can't +possibly be brought about." + +Gran'ma Mullins sighed again, and Mrs. Lathrop went on rocking. As she +rocked, she viewed Susan Clegg from time to time in a speculative +manner. It was many, many years since she had suggested to Susan the +idea of marrying Jathrop. + + * * * * * + +It was the next morning that Mrs. Macy re-appeared on the scene. The +insurance men had unsealed all the houses, and the result was her +discovery. + +"Well, you could drown me for a new-born kitten, and I'd never open my +eyes in surprise after _this_," Susan expounded to the friends at the +hotel. "But Mrs. Macy always _was_ peculiar; she was always give to +adventures. To think of her living there as snug as a moth in a rug, +cooking her meals on the little oil-stove--" + +"But where--?" interposed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I'm telling you. She's been sleeping in a good bed, too, and being +perfectly comfortable while we've all been suffering along of waiting +for her to come back." + +"But Susan--" cried Gran'ma Mullins, wide-eyed. + +"I'll tell you where she was; she was in your house--that's where she +was. The cyclone just gave her a lift over your woodshed, and then it +set her down pretty quick. She says she came to earth like a piece of +thistledown on the other side. Her story is as your back door was open, +so she run in, and then it begun to rain, so she saw no reason for going +out again. When it stopped raining, she looked out and seen nobody. That +isn't surprising, for we wasn't there. She thought that it was strange +not seeing any lights, but she started to go home, and she says _what_ +was her feelings when she fell over her own roof in the path. She says +of all the strange sensations a perfectly respectable woman can possibly +ever get to start to go home and fall over her own roof is surely the +most singular. She says she was so sleepy she thought maybe she was +dreaming, and not having any lantern, it was no use trying to +investigate, so she just went back to your house and went to bed in my +bed. She says she dreamed of Hiram's ears all night long. I'd completely +forgot Hiram's ears, which is strange, for they was far and away the +most amusing things in this community. I think that way he could turn +'em about was so entertaining. That way he used to cock 'em at you +always give him the air of paying so much attention. They say he never +cocked 'em at Lucy but once--" + +"Oh, my, that once!" exclaimed Gran'ma Mullins involuntarily. + +"It was a sin and a shame for Lucy to choke Hiram's ears off like she +did," Susan declared warmly. "She just seemed to take all the courage +right out of 'em. Hiram always reminded me of a black-and-tan as long as +he had the free use of his ears, but after Lucy broke their backbone +like she did, he never reminded me of much of nothing." Susan paused to +sigh. Gran'ma Mullins wiped her eyes. + +"You and Hiram give up to Lucy too much," said Susan. "I wish she'd +married me." + +"I wish she had, Susan," said Gran'ma Mullins. "I wouldn't wish to seem +unkind to the wife of my born and wedded only son, but I do wish that +she'd married you, and if Hiram could only see Lucy with a mother's +clear blue eye, he'd wish it, too." + +"Where is--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, desiring to recur to the main object +under discussion. + +"Oh, she's gone straight over to Meadville," said Susan. "Oh, my, she +says, but think of her feelings as she sat inside that nice, comfortable +house and realized that she was the only person in town with a roof +over her head! You see, she heard me talking with the insurance men, and +she didn't know why we was to be sealed up, but she got it all straight +as we was going to be turned out of house and home, and she says she +made up her mind as no one should ever know as she was in a house and so +come capering up to put her out. She says she settled down as still as a +mouse, made no smoke, and never lit so much as a candle nights. Mrs. +Macy is surely most foxy!" + +"And she's gone to Meadville?" said Gran'ma Mullins. + +"Yes, she didn't want to pay board here, and her own house hasn't got no +roof, so she's gone to Mrs. Lupey. Old Doctor Carter was over here to +appraise the damage done to folks, and he took her back with him." + +"I wonder if she'll ever--" wondered Gran'ma Mullins. + +"I d'n know. If folks talk about a marriage long enough, it usually ends +up that way. Doctor Carter and Mrs. Macy has been kind of jumping at +each other and then running away for fifteen years or so. They say he'd +like her money, but he hates to be bothered with her." + +"She wouldn't like to be bothered with him, either," said Gran'ma +Mullins. + +"I know," said Susan. "That's what's making so few people like to get +married nowadays. They don't want to be bothered with each other." + +Mrs. Lathrop fixed her little, black, beady eyes hard on Susan. + +Susan stared straight ahead. + + + + +IX + +SUSAN CLEGG'S PRACTICAL FRIEND + + +"Mrs. Sperrit can't stand it no longer, and she's going visiting," +announced Susan Clegg to the three friends who, seated together on Mrs. +Macy's piazza, had been awaiting her return from down-town. Both Mrs. +Macy and Gran'ma Mullins were now back in their own houses after the +temporary absence due to the cyclone, and Mrs. Lathrop and she who might +yet be her daughter-in-law were reestablished as their paying guests. + +"Why, I never knew that Mr. Sperrit was that kind of a man," said +Gran'ma Mullins, opening her eyes very wide indeed. "I wouldn't say he's +han'some, and I wouldn't say he's entertaining; but I always thought +they got on well together." + +"He isn't that kind of a man a _tall_," rejoined Susan, who had been +holding one hatpin in her mouth while she felt for the other, but now +freed herself of both. "It's just that Mrs. Sperrit's sick of all this +clutter of mending up after the cyclone. She says she's nervous for the +first time in her life and has got to have a change. She says the +carrying off of the barn and its never being heard from any more has got +on her nerves somehow, even if it was only a barn. She says God forgive +her and not to mention it to you, Mrs. Macy, but she wishes every hour +of her life as the cyclone had took you and left their barn, because the +barn had her sewing-machine in it, and she'd as leave be dead as be +without that sewing-machine." + +"Where--?" mildly interpolated Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Mr. Sperrit says wherever she likes. He's been upset by the barn too, +because it had his tool-chest in it, and he's such a handy man with his +tools that he feels for her in a way as not many women get felt for." + +"Where does--?" began Gran'ma Mullins. + +"She didn't know at first, but now she thinks she'll go and stay with +her cousin. She hasn't had much to do with her cousin for years, and she +says she feels as maybe the barn was a judgment. She never got along +well with her cousin. She says her cousin was pretty, with curls, and +she herself was freckled, with straight hair, and so it was only natural +as she always hated her. I don't feel to blame her none, for curls is +very hard on them as is born straight-haired. But there was more reasons +than one for Mrs. Sperrit not to get along with her cousin, and she says +it never was so much the curls as it was her not being practical. Mrs. +Sperrit is practical, and she's always been practical, and her cousin +wasn't. They didn't speak for years and years." + +"Whatever set 'em at it again?" asked Mrs. Macy. + +"Well, Mrs. Sperrit says it come by degrees. She says she first noticed +as her cousin was trying to make up about five years ago, but she +thought she'd best wait and be sure. Mrs. Sperrit's practical; she don't +never look in anywhere until she's leaped around the edge enough to know +what she's doing. She says her cousin named her first boy Gringer, which +is Mrs. Sperrit's family name; but then, it is the cousin's family name, +too, so she didn't pay any attention to that. Then she named her first +girl Eliza, which, as we know, is Mrs. Sperrit's own name, but seeing as +it was the name of the grandmother of both of them, she didn't pay any +attention to _that_, either. Then she named the second boy Sperrit, +which was a little pointed, of course; and Mrs. Sperrit says if her +cousin had been practical, she would certainly have thought that the +Sperrits ought to have given the child something. But she wasn't and +didn't, and they didn't. Then she named the second girl Azile--which is +Eliza spelt backwards--and Mrs. Sperrit says it was the spelling of +Eliza backwards as first showed her how awful friendly her cousin was +trying to get to be. Then, when she named the third boy Jacob, after +Mr. Sperrit, and the fourth boy Bocaj--which is Jacob spelled +backwards--Mrs. Sperrit says that it was no use pretending not to see. +Besides, naming the baby Bocaj just did go to her heart, particularly as +the baby wasn't very strong, anyway. So since then the Sperrits has sent +'em a turkey every Thanksgiving and a quarter apiece to the children +every Christmas." + +"What's she named the other children?" asked Mrs. Macy with real +interest. + +"Why, there ain't no more yet. Bocaj is only six months old." + +"Oh, then they ain't sent no turkey yet!" exclaimed Mrs. Macy. + +"No, not yet, but when they begin, they'll keep it up steady. And now +Mrs. Sperrit says she'll go and visit and see for herself how things +are. She's not very hopeful of enjoying herself, for she says visiting a +person as isn't practical is most difficult. She knows, because when she +taught school, she used to board with a family as was that way. She says +she kept the things she bought then, and she shall take 'em all to her +cousin's. She says when you stay with any one as isn't practical, you +must take your own spirit-lamp, and teapot, and kettle, and tea, and +matches, and a small blanket, and pen and ink, and a box of crackers, +and a sharp knife, and some blank telegrams, and a good deal of +court-plaster, and a teacup, and sugar if you take it, and a ball of +good heavy string, and your own Bible, and a pillow. And never forget to +wear your trunk-key round your neck, even if you only go down-stairs to +look at the clock. She's got all those things left over from her +school-teaching days. She says everything always comes in handy again +some time if you're practical, and she thanks God she's practical." + +"I don't think that I should care to visit that way," said Gran'ma +Mullins thoughtfully. "I wouldn't say I wouldn't, and I wouldn't say I +couldn't, but I don't think--" + +"She's going Tuesday," continued Susan Clegg. "Mr. Sperrit says she can, +and she's going Tuesday. She's written her cousin, and her cousin's +written her. Her cousin says they'll be too glad for words, and for her +to stay till Christmas--or till Thanksgiving, anyway. Mrs. Sperrit says +she won't do that, but she'll stay until the end of next week if she can +stand her cousin's husband. She says she never had any use for her +cousin's husband, because he isn't practical either, and when he was +young, his tie was never on straight. Mrs. Sperrit says a man that wears +his tie crooked when he's young is the kind to keep shy of later. She +says he'll never have a pocket knife and borrow hers, and never have a +pencil and borrow hers. And then, too, she's almost sure as by this time +he's spoilt her cousin's temper; and visiting a cousin whose temper's +spoilt wouldn't be fun, even if she was practical. Which this one +ain't." + +"If her cousin's got a sharp tongue I--" began Gran'ma Mullins in quiet, +sad reminiscence. + +"She was buying some wood alcohol and a cheap spoon at Mr. Kimball's," +Susan went on. "She took me in her buggy and drove me up to look at our +houses, which is trying feebly to climb again to where they was before +the cyclone. But they're a sorry sight. I don't know when we're ever +going to get into them, I'm sure. I only wish Jathrop was to see how +slow those carpenters can be." Then Miss Clegg's countenance assumed a +coy expression, her eyes lowered bashfully, and her fingers nervously +sought to touch between the buttons of her waist some treasured object +hidden within. "I--I had a letter from him to-day." + +And at that all three listeners started in more or less violent +amazement. + +"What!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Nothing that I can tell any one," said Susan serenely. "So it's no use +asking me another word about it." + +Mrs. Sperrit left on Tuesday precisely and practically as she had +planned; but she returned very much sooner than she had expected. + +"And no wonder," declared Susan, just back from the Sewing Society, to +Mrs. Lathrop, who never went. "I should say it was no wonder. Well, Mrs. +Sperrit has had an experience, and I guess no lost barn will ever lead +her into looking up no more cousins after this." + +"She's so worn-looking," said Gran'ma Mullins, who had returned with +Susan. "I wouldn't say white, and I wouldn't say worried, but I call it +peaked." + +"Why, she's been through enough to make a book," said Mrs. Macy, who had +come in with the others, "--a book like _The Jungle_, as makes you right +down sick in spots." + +"Oh, _The Jungle_ isn't so bad," said Susan. "If it was, Roosevelt would +have straightened it out soon enough when he was in it himself. But +what's awful about Mrs. Sperrit is what she has suffered, for that woman +certainly has suffered. She's a lesson once for all as to visiting. No +one as hears her is ever going lightly visiting after this. She lost her +trunk-key as soon as she landed in the house, and she says she was too +took up to miss it for three days, which shows what kind of a time she +had. Why, her cousin went right to bed as soon as she got there, because +she said as she knowed that Mrs. Sperrit was practical and could do +everything better than she could. So that was a nice beginning to begin +with. Well, she says such a house you never see. The chickens come into +the dining-room, and they was raising mud turtles in the bathtub, and +caterpillars in the cake-box. The children was awful right from the +start. She slept in the room with two of them, and they woke her up +mornings playing shave with the ends of her braids. She found out as +they dipped 'em first in the water pitcher and then in the tooth powder +to make it like lather." + +"My heavens alive!" exclaimed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Then Jacob, who's only two and a half, ate mashed potatoes with his +fingers, which is a thing, Mrs. Sperrit says, as must be seen to be +believed, and they all just swum in jam from dawn to dark. She says she +never see such children, anyway. Whenever anybody sat down, they'd play +she was the Alps, and go back and forth over her wherever they could get +a purchase. And she says--would you believe it?--her cousin is got to be +so calm that it drives you out of your senses only to see the way she +takes things. Mrs. Sperrit says all she can say is as when a woman as +isn't practical does go to bed, she's resigned to that degree that you +wish you could blow her up with dynamite if only to see her move quick +just once." + +"Why didn't she come home?" asked Mrs. Macy. "My view would be as I'd +come home. I said so to her to-day." + +"She did come home, didn't she?" said Miss Clegg. "You heard her, and +you know she's home. It's Mrs. Lathrop as all this is new to, isn't it? +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, it would go to your heart to hear what happened to +all those little conveniences as she took. There wasn't no sharp knife +in the house but hers, so she never see hers after she unpacked it. +There wasn't no string or court-plaster either, so they disappeared +too. Then they run out of tea the minute they see she brought some, and +not being practical, her cousin's teapot naturally didn't have no nose, +so she lost her teapot, too. The whole family took her hairbrush and +used it for a clothes brush, and she thinks for a shoe brush when she +was down-town. Her cousin wore her stockings and her collars, and her +cousin's husband slept on the pillow with the blanket folded around him. +Not being practical, he liked his feet free." + +"Well, I nev--!" ejaculated Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Mrs. Sperrit said by the third day she had to begin to do something, so +she asked if she could clean her own room, and her cousin said she was +going to let her make herself happy in her own way and just to go ahead +and clean the whole house if she liked. So she went to work and cleaned +the whole house, and she says such a house she never dreamed could +exist. She found families of mice, and families of swallows, and +families of moths. She found things as had been lost for years, and +they was wild with delight to see 'em again. She found things as, she +says, she wouldn't like to say she found, because when all's said and +done a cousin is still a cousin, but she says--Good lands, what she +found! Well, she says when she got the house cleaned, her cousin was +still in bed, so she took heart of grace and asked if she might teach +the children to mind. Her cousin said she didn't care, so Mrs. Sperrit +went to work on those six children. Well, she says that was a job, and +it was that as led to her coming away like she did. She says the +children was the very worst children anybody ever saw. She says she +taught school, and she thought she knew children, but anything like +those children nobody--even those as is chock full of things not fit to +eat--could ever by any possibility of dreamed of. Why, she says they was +used to heating the poker and jabbing one another with it when mad; and +while you was leaning down to tie your shoe, they'd snatch your chair +away from behind you, and such games. But Mrs. Sperrit is practical, +and she believes in her Bible, and she thought as how the Lord had +delivered them into her hands and set to work. She said she begun by +washing them all--for they was always slippery from jam. And then she +cut their nails very short and started in. Well, she says it was some +work, for they was so funny she could hardly keep from laughing. She +says they're mighty bright children--she must say that for 'em, although +it don't soften her feelings a mite towards 'em. Well, she says you +couldn't do nothing a _tall_ with 'em. But she didn't lose courage. When +she talked serious, they took it as a great joke, and she had to stop +for meals so often that it used her all up; for she says such steady +eating she never see. She says the meals was most terrible, too, as they +always had herring, and of course the bones made so much picking that +the children kept telling her she ate with her fingers, herself. She +says that was the most awful part, the way they talked back. But she +didn't despair. She kept washing them out of the jam and taking a fresh +cut at their nails, until finally come the last hour of wrath. And then, +she says, they did make her mad--good and mad." + +"But what did--?" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, seems the worst child was 'Zile. Of course, Mrs. Sperrit, having +taught school, thought they'd pronounce it like Azalea, and make a real +pretty name out of Eliza spelt backwards, but seems they dropped the A +and just called her 'Zile to rhyme with file; and Mrs. Sperrit says she +rhymed with file all right." + +"Go on, Susan," urged Mrs. Macy. + +"Well, the cousin and the husband was invited to go on a all-day +excursion, so the cousin got up and dressed and went. She said she might +as well, seeing as Mrs. Sperrit was there with the children. When they +was gone, Mrs. Sperrit made up her mind as now was her chance to bring +those children to time, once and for all. So she rolled up her sleeves +and give 'em all a good bath--for she says the way they'd get freshly +jammed was most astonishing--and then she went up-stairs to get her +scissors to cut their nails. She was opening her trunk to get out the +scissors when she heard a click. Well, when she run to the door, what do +you suppose? She found they'd locked her in. + +"Well, maybe you can imagine her feelings! She says she was never so mad +in all her life. She called through the door, but not a sound. There was +a crack big enough to put your hand through under the door, and she +tried to look through it, but it wasn't high enough to put your eye to. +Then she heard a shout and run to the window. There they all was, out on +the grass in front,--all but Bocaj, who was asleep in his cradle +down-stairs. Well, such doings! She says 'Zile, who was always full of +ideas, was just outstripping herself in ideas this time. They had a old +pair of scissors, and first they went to work for half an hour cutting +each other's hair. She says you can maybe think of her feelings in the +upper window, left in charge of 'em, with full permission to whip 'em +if necessary, and having to sit and watch 'em trim each other anyway +the notion hit 'em. She says tying a man to a tree while cannibals eat +up his family is the only thing as would express it a _tall_. After they +got done cutting hair, they went in and got a pot of jam and brought it +out and sat down in full sight and eat jam with their fingers till there +was no more jam. She says she'd stopped calling things to 'em by that +time and was just sitting quietly in the window, thanking God for every +minute as they stayed where she could see what they was doing. But when +they had finished the jam, they went in the house and was so deathly +quiet she was scared to fits. She thought maybe they was setting fire to +something. But after a while they begun to bang on the piano, and when +she was half crazy over the noise, she looked towards the door, and +there was the key poked under. She made a jump for the key, and it was +jerked back by a piece of string. And her own string at that. Then she +was called to the window by Gringer yelling, and while she was trying +to hear what he had to say--the piano jangling worse than ever--they +opened the door suddenly and bundled Bocaj into the room and then locked +the door again. + +"The baby was just woke up and hungry, and it was a pretty kettle of +fish. She says she made up her mind then and there to quit that house +and adopt Bocaj. She says she saw as there was no use trying to reform +the rest; but Bocaj was so little and helpless, and nothing in her heart +made her feel as he couldn't be raised to be practical. She went to work +and fed him crackers soaked in boiling water while she packed her trunk. +And when her cousin came home, she was sitting with her bonnet on ready +to go. Her cousin just naturally felt awful. She wanted to call it a +joke; but Mrs. Sperrit is a woman whose feelings isn't lightly took in +vain. She left, and she took Bocaj with her. She telegraphed Mr. +Sperrit, and he met her at the train. He was some disappointed because +he'd forgotten about the baby's name and thought from reading it in the +telegraph that she was bringing back a monkey. Seems Mr. Sperrit has +always wanted a monkey, and she wouldn't have one. But now she says he +can have a monkey or anything else, if he'll only stay practical. She +says she doesn't believe she could ever live with any one as wasn't +practical, after this experience." + +Susan paused, Mrs. Macy and Gran'ma Mullins rose to go to their kitchens +and get suppers for their guests. When they had gone, Susan, having Mrs. +Lathrop alone, eased a troubled conscience. + +"Oh, Mrs. Lathrop," she confided, "do you remember me saying the other +evening I'd had a letter from Jathrop?" + +Mrs. Lathrop suddenly stopped rocking. "Yes--yes, Susan," she answered +eagerly. "I--" + +"Well, I didn't have one. It was just as everybody in this community has +got their minds fixed on Jathrop's being wild about me, so I felt to +mention a letter, and I shall go on mentioning getting a letter from +him whenever the spirit moves me." + +"Why, Susan--!" exclaimed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"It doesn't hurt him a _tall_," said Susan Clegg with calm decision, +"and it saves me from being asked questions. And you know as well as I +do, Mrs. Lathrop, that I can have him if I want him." + +Mrs. Lathrop sat open-mouthed, dumb. + +"If I don't have him, it'll be because I don't want him," added Miss +Clegg with dignity. "So it's no use your saying one other word, Mrs. +Lathrop." + +And Mrs. Lathrop, thus adjured, refrained from further speech. + + + + +X + +SUSAN CLEGG DEVELOPS IMAGINATION + + +"Far be it from me, Mrs. Lathrop," said Susan Clegg, returning from an +early errand down-town and dropping in at Mrs. Macy's to find her friend +still in her own room and rocking in her old-gold stationary rocker. It +was now autumn, and to take the chill off the room an oil burner was +brightly ablaze. "Far be it from me to say anything disrespectful of +such a good Samaritan as your son Jathrop, but as we have it in the +scriptures, he certainly does move in a mysterious way his neighbors to +inform. It's mighty good of him to go to all the expense of building +over my house in a way I'd never in this wide world have had it if I +could 'a' understood those plans of that boy architect, and it may +be--providing we escape earthquake, fire, blood, and famine--that I'll +get into it once more before next summer, notwithstanding it's all of +two months behind yours, you being his mother, Mrs. Lathrop, and me only +your friend. But a early frost is sure to crack the plaster, and, seeing +as the glass blowers has gone on a strike, there's no telling when +they'll blow the panes for the windows. Just the same, kind and good as +Jathrop is, he might have had more consideration for me as would this +day have been his wife, if I'd felt to answer him with a three-letter +word instead of a two, than to put me on the pillar of scorn before a +community as has known me always as a scrupulous lover of the voracious +truth." + +"You don't--" began Mrs. Lathrop, in mild astonishment. + +"Yes, I do," continued Susan, with growing indignation. "Jathrop has +done his best to make me out a liar, and I don't know as I'll ever be +able to hold my head up again. He's struck me in the tenderest spot he +could strike me in, and not boldly neither, but in a skulking, +underhand way that makes it all the bitterer pill to swallow." + +"I can't see--" objected Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, nor me neither. But he did, and in no time everybody'll know it +from Johnny, at the station, to Mrs. Lupey in Meadville, not forgettin' +the poor demented over to the insane asylum. And it all comes of those +letters I have been getting from Jathrop during the summer." + +"But--" + +"Yes, I know and you know there was no letters a _tall_. But everybody +else, except you and me and the postmaster, believed I had a letter +regular every week. Whenever I run short of subjects at the Sewing +Society, I just fell back on my last letter from Jathrop and told them +all about what he was doing in those islands. I'd read the book he sent, +and I'd read it to good profit. There was some things as I didn't quite +understand, of course, but on them I just put my own interpretations, +and knowing Jathrop as I did, it was easy enough for me to figure out +how he'd be most likely to act in a strange, barbaric land. The book +didn't have a word to say about the costumes of the native tribes, but +I'm not so ignorant as not to know how those South Sea Islanders never +wear nothing more hamperin' than sea-shell earrings and necklaces of +sharks' teeth; and I'd read, too, that foreign visitors, on account of +the unbearable heat, was in the habit of adoptin' the native fashions in +dress. When you get started makin' things up, there's no knowing just +where you're likely as to end. It's so easy to go straight ahead and say +just whatever you please that seems in any way interesting. And so, when +Mrs. Fisher asked me one day whether I supposed there was any cannibals +there, I said there was one cannibal tribe that was most ferocious and +had appetites that there was no such thing as quenchin'. I said that in +Jathrop's last letter he had written me about how this tribe had +captured the cook off the yacht and that when they finally found his +captors and defeated them in a desperate battle lasting three days, all +that was found of the cook was two chicken croquettes." + +"For gra--!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"That's what Mrs. Fisher said. Of course, with the cook eat up--all but +what was in the two croquettes, that is,--Jathrop and his millionaire +friends was a good deal put about. There wasn't a one of 'em as knew the +first thing about cooking, and after the exercise of the three days' +battle they was most awful hungry. And then, I says, quoting from the +letter from Jathrop which never came, they had a piece of real luck, +just as millionaires is always having. They had taken one prisoner, and +by means of signs, not knowin' a word of the cannibal language, they +discovered that the prisoner was the cook of the tribe. He pointed to +the croquettes as a example of his handiwork, and Jathrop said that he +never saw anything in the cookin' line that looked more toothsome than +they did. So, of course they engaged the cannibal cook on the spot and +carried him back to the yacht with 'em. Everything went well for a few +days, but on a day when they had invited the chief of a friendly tribe +to dinner, there was something as aroused their suspicions. The +principal dish for the feast was, so far as they could make out from the +cook's sign-language, a savory rabbit stew. Now as they had never seen +or heard tell of a rabbit in the Bahamas, they was naturally curious to +learn where the cook had managed to dig it up. He either couldn't or +wouldn't tell. I says that Jathrop says you might 'a' thought that the +cook was a thirty-second degree mason and that the origin of the rabbit +was a thirty-second degree masonic secret. The millionaires gathered in +council and discussed the question, pro and con, from every obtainable +or imaginable angle. Then, just as they were about to adjourn without +having reached any conclusion whatever, they rang for the cabin boy to +fetch some liquid refreshment. But there wasn't no answer. And they +might 'a' been ringing yet as to any good it would do. They never did +see that cabin boy, and the only one to eat the savory rabbit stew was +the visiting chief." + +"I don't--" observed Mrs. Lathrop, rocking faster. + +"Well, Mrs. Lathrop, you're right about that," Susan confirmed, +loosening her shawl, for the oil-stove was rapidly lifting the room's +temperature. "I don't see, myself, why anybody should ever have known +any better, and nobody would have, if it hadn't been as Jathrop took it +into his head to talk to a newspaper man at Atlantic City on about the +same day as I had him missing the cabin boy and refusing a helping to +the rabbit stew. Mr. Kimball showed me the paper as came from New York +wrapped around a new ledger he just received by express. The reporter +had written two columns and over about the 'Klondike Bonanza King,' and +if Jathrop had set his mind to makin' me out a Ananias and a Saphira +boiled into one, he couldn't have succeeded better. He hasn't been in +the Bahamas a _tall_. The yacht started for there, but it went to Cuba +instead, and he and his friends only stayed in Cuba a week. From there +they went down to Panama and looked over the canal as far as it's gone. +They spent the summer sailin' from one summer resort to another, and I +must say I should think there was better ways of passin' the time than +that. When it comes to eatin', I'd about as leave eat the dishes of a +cannibal cook as eat things made of the salt water that people go +bathin' in, and that's what they do at Atlantic City. The minister +showed me some candy 'Liza Em'ly sent him from Atlantic City in July, +and I know what I'm talkin' about, for it was printed on the paper +around each piece. 'Salt-water Taffy.' Think of that! It's plain to be +seen that they ain't got any fresh water there, or they wouldn't use +salt. Jathrop and the other millionaires, I suppose, drink nothin' but +wine, but the poor folks must drink salt water or go thirsty. I suppose +it saves salt in seasonin', but I'd rather have my vituals unseasoned +than have 'em salted with water that folks has swum in. They certainly +ain't got no enterprise, that's sure. If they had they'd pipe +water--fresh water--from somewheres. And if there's no place near enough +to pipe it from, they'd build cisterns. But water's not the only thing +as shows their shiftlessness. Our town isn't exactly a metropolis, but +we got a few cement sidewalks. Atlantic City ain't got a one. I heard +about that long ago. And in these days of progress, too! Nothing but a +board walk on its principal street--nothing a _tall_." + +"What did--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"He said a good deal more'n his prayers, I can tell you that. He said +his object in going to the Bahamas, to which he never went, after all, +was to look into the possibility of securin' a large tract of land there +for the cultivation and growth of sisal. Now what under the sun would +you suppose sisal was? I saw in the book that sisal was being grown in +increasing quantities in the islands, and I just naturally supposed it +was some sort of animal. It might of been buffalo, or it might of been +guinea pigs, but when I spoke at the Sewing Society of how Jathrop had +mentioned the great number of sisal, and Mrs. Allen says: 'What is +sisal?' I just right then and there on the spur of the minute says: +'Why, don't you know? Sisal is a sort of small oxen striped like a zebra +and spotted like a leopard.' And would you believe it, Mrs. Lathrop, +when Mr. Kimball asked me that same question to-day, I said the very +same thing--small oxen striped like a zebra and spotted like a leopard. +'That's what Mrs. Allen told me you said, Miss Clegg,' says he, 'but +accordin' to the paper, Jathrop Lathrop don't quite agree with you.' I +don't know, Mrs. Lathrop, I d'n know, I'm sure, why Jathrop should take +pleasure in making me appear like a ignoramus, but there ain't no +question about it that that's what he did when he gave that interview to +that there reporter. 'What kind of animal is a sisal, then, Mr. +Kimball?' I asked, and you can believe me my blood was boilin' in my +veins. 'It ain't no animal a _tall_,' he says. 'It's hemp what they +make ropes out of to hang murderers with. And the seeds they feed +canaries on.' 'Well,' I says, 'that may be the reporter's sisal, but it +ain't mine, and it ain't Jathrop's. The newspapers never get nothin' +right nohow, but when it comes to reducin' cattle into rope and +birdseed, they are certainly goin' one better on the Chicago pork +packers.' In all my life I have never been a respecter of the untruth, +but I know enough on the subject to tell a good lie when necessity calls +upon me and to stick to it as long as it has an eyelid to hang by. But I +will say this for your son Jathrop, Mrs. Lathrop, and that is that +before he got done with that reporter, he didn't leave so much as a +eyelash, let alone a lid. It wasn't only that he'd never been to those +islands a _tall_, and I'd been tellin' everybody in town as how I'd had +a letter from him there every week the whole summer through, but he must +air his acquaintance with things on the islands just as if he'd been +born and raised there. And it seems there ain't no natives within miles +of the Bahamas, and hasn't been since Columbus and his people was there, +goin' on fifteen hundred years ago. Columbus told 'em that he'd take 'em +to the land where all their dead relatives and friends had gone to, a +land flowin' with milk and honey, and he kept his word. Seems he shipped +every last mother's son and daughter of 'em back to Spain with him, and +left the islands bare for the next comers. It may have appeared a rather +roundabout way for the native Bahamians to reach heaven and their +departed folks, seeing as it led through hard work in the Spanish mines, +but there ain't no question whatever that they every one got there in +the end." + +"You mean--" suggested Mrs. Lathrop. + +"I mean that unless Lathrop or the reporter made it up, or the pair of +'em together, that nobody lives there now except whites and blacks, and +there's not enough whites to make a nice shepherd's plaid out of the +combination. But savagery, except for pirates, has never had any place +there, and cannibalism is absolutely unknown. It's all very +humiliating, and it'd 'a' been much better to let people ask me and +never said nothing back a _tall_. When people is in the dark, they've +got to imagine for themselves, and as long as they don't tell what they +imagine to others, no piece in a newspaper can never make 'em blush. I +can tell you it's learnt me a lesson as I won't soon forget. I'll never +get over the way Mr. Kimball looked at me when he said as how sisal was +hemp; and me thinking all the time it was a animal when it was a herb. +Well, Mrs. Lathrop, it's a ill wind that don't chill the shorn lamb. I'm +that chilled that I feel I never shall talk again. I'll never say black +is black or white is white until I've looked at the color twice with my +glasses on. Accuracy is the best policy, I says, from this day +henceforth." + +"You might--" began Mrs. Lathrop sympathetically. + +"That's true, too. I might have known that it didn't sound true to be +getting letters every week from a man who went away to the Klondike and +never sent his mother so much as a picture postal card in all the years +he was there. But then, too, you've got to consider the kind of folks as +you're telling things to, and with all due respect to the ladies of the +Sewing Society, from Mrs. Allen to Gran'ma Mullins, they're not +over-burdened with the kind of intellect as can add two and two and get +the same answer twice in succession. There wasn't a one of 'em as +thought of that, or they'd 'a' said it straight out, without once +considering my feelings. And I'll say this much for you, Mrs. Lathrop: +you're not the best housekeeper I ever see, and you're about a match for +Mrs. Sperrit's cousin when it comes to being practical, but you have got +some brains, and I'd no more think of trying to deceive you than I'd +think of trying to deceive Judge Fitch when he'd got a big retainer to +get the truth out of me." + +Mrs. Lathrop leaned down and turned out the oil burner. + +"Was that--?" + +"No, it wasn't all. There was something else that has set me all of a +flutter. If it wasn't as you never can tell whether a newspaper is +voracious or just bearing false witness, I'd certainly feel as if +Jathrop was playing fast and loose with my affections. I can remember, +and you can remember, too, when the freedom of the press didn't mean +freedom to make a Pike's Peak out of a ant hill. But in these days +there's no telling whether, when we read of a poor soul being attacked +by a wild beast, it's a jungle tiger or just a pet yellow kitten. Folks +would rather read about the tiger than the kitten, and so the papers +give 'em what they want without any regard for the real facts a _tall_. +Elijah Doxey, who's a real editor if there ever was one, and knows all +about the paper business, says that the newspaper, like everything else, +has to keep abreast of the times or go to the wall, and that since +people in these days 'ld rather read fiction than history, it stands to +reason a paper can't stand in its own light by sticking always to cold +commonplace facts." + +"Did the--?" Mrs. Lathrop attempted mildly to question. + +"I don't know, I d'n know, I'm sure, Mrs. Lathrop. But the interview +with Jathrop wasn't all interview, by no means. It said a lot about his +party, and it mentioned each of the millionaires as was in it. Seems the +interview was given on one of those Atlantic City board walks, and it +was given--from what on earth do you think, Mrs. Lathrop? From a wheel +chair. Jathrop in a wheel chair! Think of that! And not alone, either. +'Beside him,' wrote the interviewer, 'was the beautiful, dark-eyed Cuban +senora who, rumor says, is soon to become his bride.' My lands! If it +hadn't been for Mr. Kimball's apple barrel, I certainly would have +dropped. It would 'a' been bad enough if they was both strong and well, +but to think of Jathrop being too weak to walk and going to marry a +foreigner no more robust than himself. You can't imagine the shock it +give me. For a minute I was clean speechless, and I'd 'a' been dumb yet, +I do believe, if it wasn't as I begun to figure things out in my head +and got sight of a ray of hope. Just as like as not, I says, Jathrop was +suffering from the sudden change of climate,--from the Klondike to Cuba +seems to me a pretty rigorous switch for any constitution,--and the +Cuban woman was more'n likely his trained nurse fetched from the island. +Either that or the woman was just recovering from a illness, and Jathrop +got in to ride with her out of pure kindness of heart. Then, too, I +remembered that: 'rumor says,' and cheered right up. Rumor never told +the truth yet, as far as I know, and it's not in reason to believe the +shameless thing is going to reform in these degenerate days. Jathrop may +be going to marry the senora, I don't say he isn't, and I don't say he +is. But before I believe it, I've got to have some better authority than +what rumor says. He's steered clear of wives in the Klondike, and he's +steered clear of 'em in other places, and I don't see as there's any +reason to think his steering apparatus come to grief while he was in +Cuba. 'How's Susan Clegg?' That was what he wrote in the first letter +you'd had from him in a dog's age, Mrs. Lathrop, and it showed pretty +clear to me who he was thinking of while engaged in the steering +operation." + +"You don't think--" Mrs. Lathrop began distressfully. + +"No man as was seriously sick, Mrs. Lathrop, ever talked two whole long +newspaper columns to a reporter. You can bank on that. He was well +enough to make me out the king of prevaricators, and it took some +strength and a good deal of attention to small details to do it, and as +the Cuban senora never said one word in all that time, I can't think as +she is cutting any figure eights in his affairs. Consequently, I don't +believe it'll pay either of us to do any great lot of worrying." + +"If--" Mrs. Lathrop attempted once more to interpolate. + +"That's just what I told Mr. Kimball. 'If Mrs. Lathrop could only see +this paper,' I says, 'I know she'd be delighted.' It stands to reason +as a mother must be proud of a son who, after having no more sense than +to take a kicking cow for a bad debt, goes to the Klondike and comes +back a millionaire; but it stands to reason, too, that she'd be more +proud of him to get two columns of free advertising in a New York paper +that can sell its columns to the department stores for real money. Well, +I asked him for the paper just to show you, and though he didn't feel to +part with it, just the same he did in the end, and I carried it away in +triumph." + +"You've brought--" + +"No, I haven't. I'm sorry to disappoint you, Mrs. Lathrop, more sorry +than I am to disappoint Mr. Kimball in not being able to return it, but +the truth is I lost it on the way home." + +"Lost--" + +"Every last scrap of it. And I can't say as it was altogether accidental +either. As Shakespeare says: 'Self-protection is the best part of +valor.' If that paper was ever to get before the Sewing Society, my +character would be stripped off me to the last rag. Mr. Kimball can say +what was in it, but without the paper itself, he'll have a hard time +proving anything, and my word when it comes to a dispute is as good as +his and a thousand times better." + +Mrs. Lathrop leaned forward and for a moment stopped rocking. + +"You--" she said quietly but tensely. + +"Tore it into small bits," returned Susan, rising, "and scattered them +to the winds of heaven. There's a paper trail all the way from the +square to Mrs. Macy's gate." + +Mrs. Lathrop resumed her rocking and relapsed into silence. + +Susan Clegg, laying her finger to her lips as a parting warning, went +quietly out. + + + + +XI + +SUSAN CLEGG AND THE PLAYWRIGHT + + +"Well," said Miss Clegg to her dear friend in the early fall of that +same year, while they still waited under alien roofs the completion of +their own made-over houses, "the men who write the Sunday papers and say +that when you look at the world with a impartial eye in this century you +can't but have hopes of women some day developing into something, surely +would know they spoke the truth if they could see Elijah Doxey now." + +"But Eli--" expostulated Mrs. Lathrop. + +"No, of course not. But 'Liza Em'ly is, and it's her I'm talking about. +She was up to see me this afternoon, and she says she'll spare no money +nowhere. The trained nurse is to stay with him right along forever if +he likes, and the two can have her automobile and ride or walk or do +anything, without thinking once what it costs. There was a doctor up +from the city again yesterday, and that makes four visits at a hundred a +visit. But 'Liza Em'ly says even if Elijah hadn't anything of his own, +she'd pay all the bills sooner'n think anything that could be done was +being left out. It's a pretty sad case, Mrs. Lathrop, and this last +doctor says he never see a sadder. He said nothing more could be done +right now, for there really is nothing in this community to remind +Elijah that he ever wrote a play, if they only could get those clippings +from the newspapers away from him. But that's just what they can't do. +He keeps looking them over, and then such a look of agony comes into his +eyes,--and Elijah was never one to bear pain as you must know, +remembering him with the colic,--and he clasps his hands and shakes his +head, and--well, Mrs. Lathrop, Elijah just wasn't strong enough to write +a play, and some one as was stronger ought to of restrained him right +in the first of it." + +"He--" said Mrs. Lathrop pityingly. + +"Yes, that's it," confirmed Susan, "and oh, it's awful to take a bright +young promising life like his and wreck it completely like that! To see +Elijah walking about with a trained nurse and those clippings at his age +is surely one of the most touching sights as this town'll ever see. +'Liza Em'ly says she offered a thousand dollars to any newspaper as +would print one good notice, 'cause the doctors say just one good notice +might turn the whole tide of his brain. But the newspapers say if they +printed one good notice of such a play, the Pure Food Commission would +have 'em up for libel within a week, and they just don't dare risk it. +This last doctor says he can't blame Elijah for going mad, 'cause he +knows a little about the stage through being in love with a actress +once, and he says he wasn't treated fair. He says play-writing is not +like any other kind of writing, and Elijah wasn't prepared for the +great difference. Seems all words on the stage mean something they don't +mean in the dictionary, and that makes it very hard for a mere ordinary +person to know what they're saying if they say anything a _tall_. And +then, too, Elijah never grasped that the main thing is to keep the +gallery laughing, even if the two-dollar people have tears running down +their cheeks. And you can't write for the stage nowadays without you +keep folks laughing the whole time. Elijah never thought about the +laughing, because his play was a tragedy like _Hamlet_, only with Hamlet +left out. For the lady is dead in the play, and her ghost is all that's +left of her. But 'Liza Em'ly told me to-day as his trouble came right in +the start, for the people who look plays over no sooner looked Elijah's +over before they took hold of it and fixed it. And they kept on fixing +it till it was _Hamlet_ with nobody but Hamlet left in. And then, so as +to manage the laughs, they dressed everybody like chickens if they +turned back-to. So that while the audience was weeping, if any one on +the stage turned 'round, they went off into shrieks of laughter. 'Liza +Em'ly says they never told Elijah about the chicken feathers, and the +opening night was the first he knew about that little game, for he was +laid up for ever so long before then. He got all used up in the first +part of the rehearsals; for it seems you can only have a theater to +rehearse in at times when even the people who sweep it don't feel to be +sweeping. And so they always rehearse from one to six in the morning. +And Elijah naturally wasn't used to that. But they'd had trouble even +before then; for right from the start there was a pretty how-d'ye-do +over the plot. Seems Elijah wanted his own plot and his own people in +his own play, and they had a awful time getting it through his head as +it's honor enough to have your own play, and it's only unreasonable to +stick out for your own plot and your own people too. 'Liza Em'ly says +they had a awful time with him over it all, and there was a time when he +felt so bad over giving up his plot and his people that any one ought +to have seen right there as he'd never be strong enough to stand all the +rest of what was surely coming. 'Liza Em'ly didn't tell me the whole of +the rest what come, but Mr. Kimball told me that what was one great +strain on Elijah, right through to the hour he begun to scream, was that +the leading lady fell in love with him and used to have him up at all +hours to fix up her part, and then kiss him. And Elijah didn't want to +fix up her part, and he hated to be kissed. But they told him the part +must be fixed up to suit her, and that the kisses didn't matter, because +they was only little things after all. + +"He was wading along through the mire as best he could, when all of a +sudden it come out as she had one husband as she'd completely overlooked +and never divorced. He turned up most unexpectedly and come at Elijah +about the kisses. Then they told Elijah he couldn't do a better thing by +his play than to let the man shoot him two or three times in places as +would let him be carried pale and white to a box for the opening night; +and then, between the last two acts, marry the lady and let it be in all +the morning papers. You can maybe think, Mrs. Lathrop, how such a idea +would come to the man as is to be shot. But, oh, my, they didn't make +nothing of Elijah's feelings in the matter. Nothing a _tall_. They just +set right to work and called a meeting of the play manager and the stage +manager and the leading lady's manager and Elijah's manager, and the man +who really does the managing. They all got together, and they drew up a +diagram as to where Elijah was to be hit, and a contract for him and the +leading lady to sign as they wouldn't marry anybody else in the +meantime. And if it hadn't been for 'Liza Em'ly, the deal, as they +called it, would have gone straight through. For Elijah was so dead beat +by this time that about all he was fit for was to sit on a electric +battery with a ice bag on his head, and look up words in a stage +dictionary and then cross 'em out of his play." + +"Oh, I--" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"That's just what 'Liza Em'ly said she said," rejoined Susan Clegg. "I +tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, 'Liza Em'ly is no fool since her book's gone +into the thirty-seventh edition, and that's a fact. She told me to-day +as when she realized the man she loved--for 'Liza Em'ly really loves +Elijah; any one can see that just by looking at the trained nurse she's +got him--was being murdered alive, she went straight up and took a hand +in the matter herself. I guess she had a pretty hard time, for the +leading lady wouldn't hear to changing any of what they call the +routing, and said if Elijah wasn't shot and married according to the +signed agreement, she wouldn't play. And when a leading lady won't play, +then is when you find out what Shakespeare really did write for, +according to 'Liza Em'ly. For a little they was all running this way and +that way, just beside themselves, with the leading lady in the +Adirondacks and two detectives watching her husband. And the man as was +painting the scenery took a overdose of chloral and went off with all +his ideas in his head, and that unexpected trouble brought 'em all +together again. The husband came down off his high horse and said he'd +take five per cent, of the net--Don't ask me what that means, for Mr. +Dill don't know either--and the littlest chorus girl and go to Europe. +And he said, too, as he'd sign a paper first releasing Elijah from all +claim on account of his wife. So they all signed, and he sailed. He was +clear out to sea before they discovered as he had another wife as he'd +never divorced, so the leading lady could of married Elijah, after all. +Well, that was a pretty mess, with a husband as had no claim on nobody +gone off to Europe with five percent of the net. The stage manager and +Elijah's manager took the _Mauretania_ and started right after him, for +when it comes to five per cent. on any kind of stage thing, Mr. Kimball +says, any monkeying counts up so quick that even hiring a yacht is +nothing if you want to catch that five per cent. in time. So they was +off, one in the captain's room and the other in the bridal suite, while +'Liza Em'ly was down in Savannah getting local color to patch up the +scenery, leaving Elijah totally unprotected on his battery with his +ideas. + +"But Elijah wasn't to be left in peace even now. Seems they was having a +investigation into the poor quality of the electricity in the city, and +a newspaper opened a referendum and made 'em double the power. The +company was so mad, they didn't give no warning to a soul, but just slid +up the needle from 100 to 200 right then and there; and one of the +results was they blew Elijah nearly through the ceiling. Nothing in the +world but the ice bag saved him from having his skull caved in, and the +specialist thinks he's got a concussion in his sinus right now. Poor +Elijah!" + +"But--?" Mrs. Lathrop queried. + +"They took him to the hospital, and from then on to the opening night +he had nothing to do with his own play. The leading lady married the +stage manager till she got the stage to suit her, and then she married +the man who really does the managing until she got everything else to +suit her. Next, without letting any of the others know, she married +Elijah's manager secretly, so that when poor Elijah in the hospital +thought he was looking at his manager, he was really nursing a viper in +his bosom. When 'Liza Em'ly came back with her local color, they told +her they didn't want it because they was going to have the camping-out +scene in the parlor, and play the people all liked a joke. When she went +to a lawyer to protest, the lawyer looked through all Elijah's contracts +and said Elijah had never stipulated as the camping-out scene should be +in the woods. So 'Liza Em'ly paid him fifty dollars and come away a good +deal wiser than she went. + +"Then come the opening night, and Mr. Kimball says he shall never forget +that opening night as long as he lives. You know he bought himself one +of those hats as when you sit on 'em just gets a better shape, and then +he went up to see his own nephew's own play. Seems he sat on his hat in +Elijah's own box, but he says Elijah was looking very bad even before +the curtain went up. Seems Elijah didn't expect much, but he did have +just a little hope that here and there in spots he'd see some of his own +play. But the hope was very faint. After the curtain went up, it kept +getting fainter. Of course Elijah meant it for a tragedy and called it +_Millicent_; and seeing the title changed to _Milly Tilly_ was a hard +blow to him right in the beginning. Seems the woman poisoned herself +because she was unhappy, and after she's dead, she remembers there was +some poison left in the bottle, and so she wants to warn the family. It +was a very nice plot, Polly White thinks, and Elijah was wild over it +'cause there's never been a plot used like it. But of course his idea +was as it should be took seriously. Do you wonder then, Mrs. Lathrop, +that the first time in the play when one of the play actors turned +round he nearly died? Mr. Kimball says he nearly died himself. He says +he never saw anything so funny as those chicken backs in all his life. +He says people was just laying any way and every way in their seats, +wailing to stop, so they could stop too. He says he was laughing fit to +kill himself when all of a sudden he looked up to see Elijah, and he +says nothing ever give him such a chill as Elijah's then-and-there +expression. Seems Elijah was just staring at the leading lady as was +flapping her wings and playing crow, while the gallery was pounding and +yelling like mad. And then Elijah suddenly shot out of the box and round +behind the scenes and vanished completely." + +Mrs. Lathrop gasped and lifted her hands, but no word issued from +between her lips. + +"Well, of course we know now what happened, but nobody did then. Nobody +was expecting him on the stage, before the scenes or behind 'em, and Mr. +Kimball didn't know where he was gone. So it was the end of the piece +before he was really missed. Then they begun to hunt, and no Elijah high +or low nowhere. You know how the papers was full of it, and there would +have been more about it, only Mr. Kimball and 'Liza Em'ly supposed it +was just advertising. Even 'Liza Em'ly thought it was the wrong kind of +advertising and that the leading lady had seen Elijah's face and thought +it was better to kidnap him until the play got settled down her way. +Seems if you can keep a play going any kind of a way for a little while, +you can't never change it afterwards, no matter what you've put in it. +It's all most remarkable business, a play is. But anyway, wherever he +was, they all moved on to the next town anyhow. 'Liza Em'ly and Mr. +Kimball went right with them to protect Elijah's interest, as it was +plain to be seen from where Elijah's manager was sleeping, where his +interest was now. And as soon as they begun to unload the scenery, the +afternoon of that day, whatever do you suppose? There was Elijah, just +where he'd fell when he tripped over the first scene. They'd carted him +off in the triangle that unfolds into a grand piano, right along to the +baggage-car, where they'd piled the whole of his play on top of him, +ending up even with the chicken feathers." + +"Great heav--!" cried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"So he said," interrupted Miss Clegg. "But there was no help for it. +Seems while you're playing Act III. of a play, Act II. is getting packed +up, and Act I. is already in the train. So Elijah was all packed and +pretty flat before they even missed him, and most crazy before he was +found. Well, and so to try and soothe him they took him to the theater +that night again, and the leading lady, when she looked at him and saw +how awful weak he looked, sent him in a new idea she'd got, which was to +let her have a poster done of him packed up in the scenery. Then every +night he could sit in a box and at a certain sign give a yell and shoot +out. Then she'd make a speech about his having been in the scenery car +all the night before, and being naturally kind of excited. She said it +would make the play draw like mad. Well, Elijah wouldn't consent to that +a _tall_. And then again they worked with him and talked to him and +called him a fool till he really begun to get awfully scared. They had +in all the managers together, and they wouldn't let him consult any one. +Seems they just all sat looking at his forehead just over his nose where +you hypnotize people, and he kept getting more and more scared. Seems he +told his nurse, during what they call a lucid interval, that you can +talk all you please about will power--and it may be true of people in +general--but no rule ever made on earth can possibly apply to any one +who has just written a play. There's something about writing a play as +takes all the marrow out of your bones and the blood out of your body. +And he says he wasn't no more responsible when he signed that contract +to go mad in a box every evening and at least one matinee every week +than a grasshopper. He says his one and only thought by that time was +to get away from 'em and make a break to where he'd never hear about his +play again. But after he'd signed, they never let him out of sight. They +locked him up in a dressing-room with the leading lady's pet mouse until +after the performance, and then they took him and introduced him to two +very big managers as was engaged to do nothing except manage him nights +in the box. + +"Well, you know the rest, Mrs. Lathrop. He really did go mad, then, and +we've got him here now helpless, getting rich almost as fast as 'Liza +Em'ly, and crazy as a loon. I declare, it's one of the saddest cases I +ever see. I don't know whatever can be done. They say as fast as he gets +sane, the play'll surely drive him crazy again, so I don't see what +'Liza Em'ly will do. She set with me the whole afternoon and talked very +nicely about it all. To see her here, you'd never think she could act +the way Mrs. Macy and Mrs. Fisher tell about. I can see she's got a +little airy, and she says she misses her maid and her secretary more +than she ever tells the minister's family; but on the whole I like her +very much, and her devotion to Elijah is most beautiful. She says he's +the one love of her life, and she shall marry him if ever he gets sense +enough to know what he's doing. If he doesn't, she says she shall take a +yacht and sail with him and write books until he dies. She says they can +land once in a while to get their provisions and their royalties. But +she says the only possible salvation for Elijah, as things are now, will +be to stay where he never sees a car to remind him of scenery, or a +house to remind him of a stage, for years and years to come. I asked her +what she _really_ thought of his play, and she said she thought the +leading lady was just right and very clever, only Elijah was too +sensitive a nature to understand little artistic touches like the +chicken feathers. She says folks are too tired nowadays to be bothered +to laugh. They want to be made to laugh without even thinking. She says +Elijah is a earnest nature as likes to work his laughs out very +carefully and conscientious; but the leading lady understands getting +the same effect, only a million times quicker, with chicken feathers and +divorces. 'Liza Em'ly says the leading lady is very fair according to +her own idea of fairness. She didn't have no money to put in the play, +so she agreed to put in four divorces and one scandal as her part of the +stock. Now the play's only been on a month, and she's paid up everything +except one divorce and the scandal; and she's done so well they're +trying to work up some scheme to let her pay both those off at the same +time. The play is going fine. They print columns about Elijah and his +madness, and the whole company is learning to crow together at the end +of the second act. Every night they take out a little of what Elijah +wrote, and the main manager says that there'll soon be nothing of Elijah +left in except the ghost, and the ghost of the bottle, and the agreement +to pay Elijah his royalties. And according to the main manager's views, +that's being pretty fair and square with Elijah." + +"Do you--?" queried Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Well, I don't know," answered Miss Clegg, "I really d'n know what to +say. I'm kind of dumb did over both 'Liza Em'ly and Elijah, for you know +as well as I do, Mrs. Lathrop, that nobody ever looked for those kind of +things from them." + +"Shall--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, if it ever comes where I can," responded Miss Clegg, "I shall like +to see it very much." + +"Did--?" pressed Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Oh, yes, I asked her," Susan admitted, "I asked her fair and square. I +says: ''Liza Em'ly, there's no use denying as you've used real people in +this community in your book, and now I want to know who is Deacon +Tooker?' She said Deacon Tooker was just the book itself. She seemed +more amused than there was any particular sense in; but I thought if +anything could give her a good laugh, it wasn't me would begrudge her. +There's this to be said for our young folks when they do get rich, Mrs. +Lathrop, and that is that they're nice about it, and it makes every one +feel kindly towards 'em. Every one feels kindly towards Jathrop, and +every one feels kindly towards 'Liza Em'ly, and as for poor, dear +Elijah--Well!" + +The tone was expressive enough. Mrs. Lathrop shook her head sadly. Then +both were silent. + + + + +XII + +SUSAN CLEGG'S DISAPPEARANCE + + +The "building-over" of Susan Clegg and her friend, Mrs. Lathrop, was +completed during the second week in December, and in less than +twenty-four hours they were once more established in their own +dwellings, surrounded by their own goods and chattels. For only the +briefest space, however, did Miss Clegg remain where she was put. Then +she hurried through the passageway afforded by the connecting pergola +and burst excitedly into her neighbor's brand new kitchen in the very +center of which sat Mrs. Lathrop in her old-gold-plush stationary +rocker, calmly surveying her domiciliary spick-and-spanness. On her lap +lay a just-opened letter; but for once the scrupulously observing Miss +Clegg failed to observe. She was too full of fresh trials. + +"I d'n know whatever sins I committed in this world, Mrs. Lathrop," she +began, dropping into the nearest chair and facing her friend in an +upright, a little bent forward attitude that was clearly pugnacious, +"that I should have these things visited upon me. The Lord knows, just +the same as you do, as I've always been a good and pure woman, loving my +neighbors like myself and doing all my Christian duties as I was give to +see 'em. When I was tore up from my home by the roots and cast wilted +and faded upon Gran'ma Mullins, where the infant memories of Hiram +certainly wasn't calculated to do no reviving, I made the best of it. I +made the best of Lucy and a dog with a cold nose, too; and I bore up +with courage and no complaint under Mrs. Allen and her Persian religion. +And I did it all to please you, Mrs. Lathrop, and your fool of a son, +Jathrop, whose money, it's my opinion, has acted on him in a most +injurious way. He never had much sense, as you yourself know, but now he +ain't got no sense a _tall_." + +"I don't--" Mrs. Lathrop started gently to protest. + +"Well, I do," rejoined Susan Clegg spiritedly; "and if you don't, you +ought to. Anyhow, I mean to tell you, if it's the last act of my life. +Anybody as has any sense a _tall_ must have seen that building over was +just a mite removed from building new; and what's new never did go with +what's old, and it never will. If we was to be built over, we ought to +have been all built over or let alone. Jathrop's built the houses over, +but he ain't built over the furnishings, and the built-over houses and +the not-built-over furniture and carpets and window shades and pots and +kettles and pans and china and linen and everything else don't agree and +just naturally can't and never can. They're fighting now like sixty, and +they'll go on fighting the longer they're kept together. My house was +restful and peaceful before, but now it's like a circus with all the +wild animals let loose. And I can tell you this, Mrs. Lathrop; my things +is getting the worst of it. Why, before they went to storage at Mr. +Shores', they was in the best repair you ever see, and now it would make +your heart ache to look at 'em. They've aged a century at least during +the summer. They're wrinkled and halt and lame and blind, and the new +paper on the walls and the new polish on the floors and the new paint on +the woodwork is making 'em look sicker and sicker every minute. If +there's a society for the prevention of cruelty to furniture and other +household goods, it ought to put Jathrop Lathrop in prison. I feel so +sorry for those poor tables and chairs and bedsteads and all the rest of +'em as I could cry my eyes out this very minute. There's one walnut, +haircloth sofa as Father laid on before he was took to his bed as is +pitiful to behold. It looks sicker than Father did even in his last +hours, and I wouldn't be surprised any minute to see it just turn over +all of itself and give up the ghost. And everything has on such a +reproachful look it's more than human nature can bear to face it. If I'd +ever thought as being built over would of come to this, I'd of gone on +my knees and worked 'em to the bare bones before I'd of put up with it." + +Mrs. Lathrop continued to rock in silence. + +"Still, there's no cloud, however black, as hasn't got some silk in its +lining, and the silk in this is the clock as Father gave Mother, which +was supposed to be marble and wasn't. Much as I hated that clock, I +couldn't have borne to see its agonies when set on by the new fireplace +below, and the pink and gold wall paper behind, and the roses and cupids +in the cornish above. It must just of shriveled in shame instead of +going out in glorious flight, as it did when I set it flying at the end +of the bed-slat. Lord knows, though, Mrs. Lathrop, that's a small thing +to be thankful for; and it's the only thing. I haven't begun yet to tell +you all. And I don't intend to. There's a limit to my temper, and if I +once got started, there's no saying where I'd end. But there's one thing +more as I can't hold in, and it's the thing as was marked on the plans: +'But. Pan.' I never did understand why I should be give a separate room +to keep butter pans in, seeing as I ain't got no cow, let alone no +dairy. And even if I had, why I should keep my butter pans or my milk +pans either in a little alley-way between the kitchen and the +dining-room, just where the heat and smells could get at 'em from one +side and the flies from both, not to mention the added footsteps put on +me journeying from the stove to the dinner table. You can see for +yourself, Mrs. Lathrop, there's no sense in it, whatever. But I'd never +say a word about it, if that was all. But it ain't all. It's the +littlest part. For Jathrop's cruelty hasn't stopped with torturing the +furniture. It's clear he couldn't be satisfied till he fixed up a trap +as sooner or later would hit me square in the face and break my nose. At +both ends of his 'But. Pan.' he's had hung doors as swing, and springs +on 'em to make 'em swing hard and deadly. What either one of those +swinging doors might do to my features, let alone to the pudding or stew +I might be carrying, it isn't in mortal tongue to express. If I could +find one thing as was right in the whole house, I'd be fair and square +enough to overlook the others; but there ain't to my mind a single +solitary betterment. There's glass knobs on all the doors as will show +every finger mark, and will keep me busy wiping from dawn to dark. The +old brown knobs never showed nothing and didn't never have to be thought +of, let alone polished. It's always been my idea as a cupboard was a +place to shut things up in out of sight, and here if he hasn't gone and +put glass doors on the one in the corner of the dining room, so as every +one can see just what's meant to be hid. It's clear to be seen he's +crazy on the subject of glass, which I ain't and never have been. And I +don't like the way he's stinted things as is necessary and put all the +money in things as had better been left out. Necessities before +everything is my motto. What use, I'd like to know, is that cupid and +rose cornish? But he puts that there just to catch dust and leaves out +the whole of one parlor wall. If you'll believe me, Mrs. Lathrop, +there's not a hair or hide of a wall between my entry hall and my +parlor. Nothing but a pair of white posts as most people use on their +piazzas. How I'm ever going to keep that parlor dark I don't see; for +he's got glass over the front door and on both sides of it, and no +shutters to keep the sun out. He's built in both the kitchen stove and +the ice box, and for the life of me, I can't find no reasonable way of +taking the ashes out of the one or the water out of the other. The +builder says the ashes dump into a place in the cellar and the water +from the ice drains down a pipe underneath the house. But I don't like +neither plan. The drip from a ice box is a very cheering sound, I think, +and with hot ashes going down cellar where you can't see 'em, I'll be in +deadly fear of the house going up in smoke while I'm dreaming in my bed. +The long and the short of it is, Mrs. Lathrop, I feel as I have been +assaulted and robbed. Jathrop's took away my home and left me a house as +isn't a home to me and never can be. And as far as I can see, he's done +the same to you, which is ten thousand times worse, you being his +mother." + +"I--" began Mrs. Lathrop, taking up the letter from her lap so that at +last it was forced upon Susan's observance. + +"From him, I suppose," Miss Clegg instantly concluded, reaching for it. +"If he's got anything to say in his defence, I'm sure I'd delight to +read it. But no matter what he says, he can't undo to me what he's done +to me. I'll never feel the same towards Jathrop, your son or not your +son, Mrs. Lathrop, as long as I live." + +Mrs. Lathrop passed the letter to Miss Clegg. Like all of Jathrop's +letters, it was brief and to the point. He announced that he would spend +Christmas with his mother in her rebuilt home and would bring with him a +friend as his guest. Susan read it over twice, turning the page each +time, evidently in hope of finding an enlightening postscript. + +"Well, of all things!" she exclaimed, as she passed the letter back to +her friend. "Coming to see his work of destruction and going to bring +_her_ with him!" + +"He don't--" Mrs. Lathrop endeavored to explain. + +"He don't, because he don't dare; but there's no question what he means. +He's bringing the senora. And he wouldn't bring her if it wasn't that +he's going to marry her. Even you must see that. And if there was ever a +insult multiplied by perjury, Jathrop's done it in that action. It's a +good thing he didn't ask: 'How's Susan Clegg?' this time, as he did the +time he was coming back from the Klondike. For I don't believe I could +ever have stood that. All I can say, Mrs. Lathrop, is as I'm sorry for +you from the soles of my feet up. You'll never in the world be able to +get up a Christmas dinner as will please any senora, you can take my +word on that. And not to please her will be a bad beginning with a +senora as is to be your future daughter-in-law. Senoras don't care +shucks for turkey and mince pie. They're not used to 'em and likely to +get indigestion from 'em, and think what it would mean to Jathrop, let +alone to her, if she should be carried off by a acute attack right here +in your new, built-over house, at the dinner table. He'd blame it on +you, and like as not she'd haunt you the rest of your living days. No, +sir. You've got to give her Spanish omelets with lots of red peppers in +'em, and everything else Creole style, which means all he't up with +tabasco sauce fit to burn out your insides. It's eating like that as +makes those Spaniards and Cubans so dark colored you can't tell 'em from +mulattoes. The peppers and the tabasco sauce bakes 'em brown on the +outside, after leaving 'em all scorched and parched within." + +For once, however, Susan Clegg was wrong in her deduction. Jathrop +arrived in a red automobile on the day before Christmas, with a +chauffeur in bear-skins driving, and a guest in sealskin beside him. But +the guest was not the senora. It was one of Jathrop's millionaire +friends who, Jathrop said, could buy and sell him twenty times over. He +was a small man with a bald head and a red beard and old enough to be +Jathrop's father. + +Miss Clegg viewed the arrival from her bedroom window and was so glad it +wasn't the senora that she at once set about baking extra doughnuts and +mince pie to contribute to the festivities of the morrow. This occupied +her until supper time. Then she made a hurried meal, washed her one +plate and cup and saucer, and loaded down with her thank offering, +flitted through the pergola and in at Mrs. Lathrop's kitchen door. The +kitchen was empty, but voices penetrating from the dining room told her +that her friend and her visitors were still at table. Being a trifle +nervous and unable to sit quietly, she began at once to put the +disordered kitchen into some degree of order, purely for the sake of +occupation. + +She had just finished washing and scouring the pots and pans and was +flushing the waste-pipe of Mrs. Lathrop's new porcelain sink with +lye-water so strong that her eyes ran tears from the fumes, when the +voices growing more and more audible told her that Jathrop was leading +his mother and his guest toward the kitchen. She just had time hurriedly +to dry her hands on the roller towel when they appeared. + +"Well, well," exclaimed Jathrop, in apparent surprise, "if here ain't +our old friend, Susan Clegg!" + +There is no question that Miss Clegg was slightly flustered at thus +being taken unawares, but she recovered herself promptly, and shook +hands cordially with Jathrop and not less cordially with the little +millionaire, whom he introduced as Mr. Kettlewell. And Mr. Kettlewell +was cordiality itself. Everybody sat down, right there in the kitchen +and talked for a full hour, and in the course of the talk, Jathrop told +Susan that he had arranged with a department store in New York to let +her have whatever she needed for her built-over house and charge the +same to his account. She could select the things from the firm's +catalogue, or go to the city at his expense and pick out the actual +articles. It was his Christmas present to his mother's and his own +oldest friend. In conclusion, Jathrop joined with his mother in an +invitation to Susan to take Christmas dinner with them; and Mr. +Kettlewell smilingly begged her, for his sake, not to refuse. Altogether +Susan had the pleasantest evening she had experienced in years, and the +next morning, while Jathrop and Mr. Kettlewell were off in the car after +evergreens with which to decorate the two houses, she ran over with the +express purpose of telling Mrs. Lathrop so. + +"Jathrop mayn't have much judgment when it comes to selecting +architects," she began, "nor again when it comes to selecting servants, +as was proved by his bringing that Hop Loo all the way from the +Klondike. Nor again, neither, when it comes to wives, if it's a real +fact that he's going to marry a brown-baked senora; but there's no +getting away from the fact that he's a king in choosing his men friends. +I've seen men in my life of all sorts and descriptions, from the +minister to the blacksmith, but I ain't never see before such a +handsome, high-minded, superior gentleman as Jathrop's friend, Mr. +Kettlewell. I never thought much of bald-headed men before, but his head +is so white and shiny, it's a pleasure to look at it. And I always just +hated a red beard; but Mr. Kettlewell's beard is of a different red. +It's a nice, warm, comforting red as makes you feel as cosy as the glow +of a red-hot stove when the thermometer's down around zero. I can't say +either, Mrs. Lathrop, as I wasn't more or less prejudiced against men as +never rightly grew up, but stopped in the women's sizes. But there's a +something about Mr. Kettlewell's proportions as gives you the idea he's +really taller than he seems. And there's only one thing to compare his +voice to. It's milk and honey. My lands, what a sweet, clear-rolling, +liquid voice that Mr. Kettlewell has!" + +"Ja--" began Mrs. Lathrop. + +"Yes, I heard him. But I don't put that against Mr. Kettlewell, not a +_tall_. I'm sure he made every penny of it honestly, and if he's retired +from business now, it don't mean he's quit work. It's no easy job +cutting coupons off all the bonds he must have, and collecting rents is +a occupation I don't envy nobody. It's the penalty that rich men have to +pay for their success. They work hard to get the principal, and then +they're made to work twice as hard to get the interest. There's no such +thing as rest for the rich any more'n there is for the poor. I used to +think before Father died as I'd like to roll in wealth, but it ain't no +easy rolling, I can tell you that, Mrs. Lathrop, especially when you've +got a tenant like Mrs. Macy, who won't buy so much as a gas-tip or do so +much as drive a nail without charging it up to the owner." + +Miss Clegg's participation in the Christmas dinner at her neighbors' was +twofold. She took part in its preparation as well as in its discussion. +It was her soup which began it, it was her "stuffing" which added zest +to the roast turkey, it was her cranberry sauce which sweetened +contrastingly the high seasoning, and it was her mince pie which brought +the repast to a fitting and enjoyable close. Seated opposite to Mr. +Kettlewell, where she could revel in a full view of his shining pate and +his warmly comforting whiskers, her enjoyment was ocular as well as +gustatory; and under the caressing sweetness of his voice it was +likewise auricular. For the occasion Jathrop had provided a fine vintage +champagne, and though Miss Clegg, whose total-abstinence principles +forbade her to even taste, refrained from so much as touching her lips +to the edge of her glass, she unquestionably warmed in the stimulating +atmosphere of the sparkling, bubbling, golden juice of the grape. To her +it was indeed the red-letter Christmas of her life, and every incident, +of the dinner especially, was a matter for reflection and rumination in +the succeeding hours. + +In this vale of tears, however, there is apparently no great joy without +its compensating sorrow; and in Susan Clegg's case the one followed +swiftly on the heels of the other. In the pale gray of the dawn of the +following day, Susan Clegg dashed wildly out of her kitchen door and +flitted with lifted skirts across the brief intervening space that led +to Mrs. Lathrop's back door. As pallid as the morning itself, her scant +hair streaming, her eyes wide with mixed terror and indignation, she +burst into her neighbor's kitchen, where to her great relief she found +her old friend already up and occupied. + +One glimpse of Susan was enough for Mrs. Lathrop. Up went her hands and +down went she on to the nearest chair with an inarticulate gasp of +horrified yet questioning astonishment, while Miss Clegg flopped limply +into another at the end of the kitchen table. + +There she must have sat for a full minute before she could get breath to +utter a word, which, being contrary to all her habits, was in itself +terrifying to her friend. Eventually, however, she forced herself to +assume an upright position and simultaneously attained a somewhat +feeble attempt at speech. + +"Well, of all things in this world to happen to me!" Then she paused for +a fresh breath, which being utterly without precedent, added mightily to +Mrs. Lathrop's alarm. "And even now at this minute I don't really know +whether I'm more dead than alive, or more alive than dead." + +Mrs. Lathrop, believing that the situation being extraordinary, some +extraordinary effort on her part was demanded, stirred herself to a +prolonged speech. + +"Don't tell me I'm looking--" + +"No, I'm not a ghost, if that's what you mean. You are looking at Susan +Clegg in the flesh--all the flesh that ain't been scared clean off her. +But it's the greatest miracle as ever happened in this community that +it's my body and not my spirit as is here to tell the tale. My house was +broken into by a burglar, Mrs. Lathrop, and I was tied up and gagged in +one of my own chairs." + +Mrs. Lathrop just gasped. Susan drew herself up a little straighter, +gaining courage from the sound of her own voice, and striking something +like her old oral gait. + +"I was gagged for five hours, Mrs. Lathrop, and knowing me as you do for +all these years and years, maybe you can feel what being gagged for five +hours and not able to say even 'boo' meant to a active person like me. +Every one of those hours was like a eternity in a Spanish inferno of +torture. And everything I possess in this world, from my bonnet and +striped silk dress to Father's deeds at the mercy of that gagger. And +all I've got to say is this: If I hadn't of been built over, it never in +the wide creation would have happened. And if your son Jathrop thinks he +can ever make up to me for being gagged by inviting me to a Christmas +dinner, most of which I cooked with my own hands, and offering to give +me strange pieces of furniture to take the place of pieces as is old +friends and dearer than the apples of my two eyes, he'd better do some +more thinking. There never was nothing about the house I was born in and +my mother and father died in to make a burglar look at it twice. No +burglar as had any respect for himself or his calling, Mrs. Lathrop, +would have looked at it once or knowed as it was there. But built over +it's as different as diamon's is from pebbles. It looks money from the +tips of its lightning rods to its cellar windows and is as inviting to +robbers as if it had a sign on the gatepost, reading: 'Walk in!' So, +however you look at it, there's nobody responsible for my gagging and +for whatever is missing but one man, and that man is Jathrop Lathrop. +It's easy to be seen as he's no more fit to have money than a crow as +steals gold trinkets that cost fortunes and goes and hides 'em in hollow +trees. He was born poor, and the Lord meant him to stay poor, no matter +what Mrs. Allen and her Persian religion has to say about things as +happens being meant to happen. The Lord hadn't nothing to do with +Jathrop going to the Klondike and getting rich, you can be certain +about that. If he hadn't been fool enough to take a kicking cow for a +perfectly good debt and then let it loose to ride over a peaceful and +long-suffering community, he'd 'a' lived and died a pauper in this here +very town. So's far as I can see it was the devil and not the Lord as +guided Jathrop from the first, and everything as has happened since +shows the devil is still guiding him. Everything he turns his mind to +goes by contraries. I'm not saying anything against the goodness of +Jathrop's intentions, mind you, Mrs. Lathrop, but no matter how good +they are, evil and misery certainly seems sure to follow." + +The tirade stirred Mrs. Lathrop to her feet, but she was not resentful. +She knew that Susan Clegg's bitterness was confined to her tongue, and +that even with that she could salve as well as sting. + +"Can't I--?" she suggested. + +"Indeed you can," answered Miss Clegg. "I never felt as I needed a cup +of tea more, and if the doughnuts I brought you ain't all eat up, I'd +relish four or five of 'em right now." + +"You haven't--" began Mrs. Lathrop, taking down the teapot. + +"No; but I'm coming to it. I begun with the cause, and the effect'll +come trailing after like the tails of Mary's little lambs. Only the +tails in this case was bigger than the sheep. It may have been hearing +the noise Jathrop makes when he eats, or it may have been your turkey +gravy or your biscuits, Mrs. Lathrop, or all of 'em put together. Not +knowing which, I'm not foolish enough to blame one more'n the other. But +it's a fact as is undeniable that I never slept poorer than last night. +I was in bed by nine, but I never closed my eyes till eleven, and I +certainly heard the clock strike midnight. I counted goats jumping over +a stile, and I counted 'em backward as well as forward, but I heard one +struck, and I heard two. And then I heard something as set my hair up on +end and the gooseflesh sprouting all over me. It sounded like footsteps +in the 'But. Pan.,' and they was too heavy for the cat's, I could tell +that at once, though at two in the morning it's surprising how loud a +cat's footsteps can sound, especially when it's reached the pouncing +stage, and the rat ain't got no hole to run to. I'd forgot to put the +turkey leg in the ice-box as I'd carried home with me, and all I could +think of was that if it was the cat, there'd be nothing left on that +bone by morning, unless I stopped things right then and immediately. +You'd never believe how cold a house can be at two o'clock in the +morning of the day after Christmas unless you'd got up in it as I did; +and now to look back at it, I see how lucky it was as it was as cold as +it was, for if it hadn't of been, I'd a gone down just as I was, and I +was in no trim to meet a man burglar, I can tell you _that_. So I just +slipped into this flannel wrapper and a old pair of slippers, which I've +got on now under these arctics, and I picked up the candle as I'd lit, +and down-stairs I went. Well, Mrs. Lathrop, I hope you may never in your +born days in this world or the other have such a shock as met me there +face to face in my own new, built-over kitchen. If there wasn't the +biggest giant of a man I ever see coming out of the shadows between the +cookstove and the cellar door. And he with his head all wrapped around +in one of my best plaid roller towels, so that nothing of him was to be +seen but two fierce, staring, bloodshot eyes as gleamed like a wild +beast's. Oh, my soul and body, Mrs. Lathrop, that minute! How I ever +kept my senses I don't pretend to say, more especially as he was on me +with one jump. There was no such thing as holding on to the candle, you +can see that. It dropped, and I never knew I dropped it. For, of course, +I shut my eyes, and when your eyes is shut, there's no knowing whether +there's a lighted candle about or whether there isn't." + +In her agitation over the recital, Mrs. Lathrop, who was placing cups +and saucers on the table, let one of the cups slide crashing to the +floor. "Oh, Su--!" she exclaimed. + +"You may well say: 'Oh, Susan!'" Miss Clegg continued. "There is times +when 'Oh, Susan' don't half express the state of affairs, and this was +one of 'em, Mrs. Lathrop. It wasn't in nature for me not to scream, so I +screamed, and it was that scream that did the business. It showed the +burglar I wasn't deaf and dumb, and people as isn't deaf and dumb is +looked on by burglars as their natural enemies. Maybe some people can +scream without opening their mouths, but I never was one of that kind, +and the kind as open their mouths when they scream is the kind that all +burglars prefer. It saves 'em the trouble of forcing apart their jaws. I +never shut my mouth after opening it; for the burglar just shoved +something in it as quick as scat, and then he tied a bandage around back +of my head so I couldn't spit it out. Then he picked me up and plumped +me down hard in a chair and tied me fast to it with my own clothesline. +And all the time he never no more opened his lips to speak than if he +couldn't. It's my opinion he must have had a cold and lost his voice. +Either that, or his voice was such a unpleasant voice he was ashamed to +let anybody hear it. For it ain't in common sense as a man, even if he +is a burglar, could keep as still as he did, if he had a speaking voice +that's in any way fit for use. I know in the time he took there was a +lot of things I felt to say to him, and would if I could, and common +sense'll tell you, Mrs. Lathrop, that he must have felt to say a lot of +things to me. But he didn't make so much as a peep behind his roller +towel." + +"Did--?" asked Mrs. Lathrop, pouring the tea. + +"I can't say as he did or he didn't. I haven't missed nothing yet, but +then I haven't looked. Still, if he didn't I can't say as I'd have much +respect for him. What sort of a burglar would a burglar be to take all +that trouble of breaking in, binding and gagging, and then go away +without helping himself to something for his trouble. I ain't got no +love for burglars in general or in particular. But any burglar as 'ld +do a fool trick like that I ain't got no respect for neither." + +"How--?" queried her neighbor as she passed Susan her cup. + +"It was something of a job I can tell you, but when I sets my mind to a +thing I sets my mind to it, and ropes and a kitchen chair ain't got the +power to stop me. I begun wriggling as soon as I heard the burglar shut +the door behind him, and I kept on wriggling for every minute of the +five hours. A tramped-on worm never did more turning and wriggling than +I did between two and seven this morning, and at last wriggling being +its own reward, I wriggled free, first with my hands and then with my +feet. But before I got my feet free, I undid the band and ungagged +myself and said just a few of the things that was bottled up all that +time. The Bible says there's a time to talk and a time to be still, but +there's such a thing as overdoing the still time, I think, and when +you're gagged by a burglar is one of 'em." + +Susan sipped her tea for a moment in silence. + +"Where's Jathrop and Mr. Kettlewell?" she asked at length. "Ain't they +up yet?" + +Mrs. Lathrop nodded. "They start--" she began. + +"You don't mean they've both lit out already?" asked Susan in surprise. +Then: "I was hoping to see Mr. Kettlewell again. But it's a long journey +back to New York, so I suppose they set off before light." + +Mrs. Lathrop nodded once more. + +"Aren't--?" she questioned. + +"I certainly am. I'm going to report the burglary at once. I've got a +clue, and it ought to be easy enough to run down that burglar." She drew +from her bosom a rather damp handkerchief. "That's what he left me to +chew on for five hours," she said, as she spread it out. "And there's +the clue right there in the corner." + +Mrs. Lathrop took it to the window and inspected it through her glasses. +The handkerchief was initialed with a "K." + +The New Year came and January was passing and, so far as Susan Clegg +cared to divulge at least, there was no news of her burglar. It was +noted, however, not only by Mrs. Lathrop, but by Mrs. Macy and Gran'ma +Mullins, and indeed by all the ladies of the Sewing Society, that Miss +Clegg had adopted an air of secretiveness concerning the matter that was +quite foreign to her usual frank, unreserved communicativeness. But the +curiosity provoked by this strangely unfamiliar attitude was swallowed +up in the sensational tidings which spread throughout the community +shortly after. Without so much as a hint of warning, Susan Clegg had +vanished between dark and dawn, leaving her house locked, bolted, and +barred, the blinds drawn, and the shutters fast closed. + +For once Mrs. Lathrop, thus deprived of her prop and her stay, evinced +sufficient initiative to have the cellar door forced and a search of the +premises made; a rumor having got abroad that the burglar had returned, +this time more murderously inclined, and that Miss Clegg's mangled +corpse would be found stiff and stark within her own darkened domicile. +To every one's infinite relief the search proved the rumor utterly +unfounded; and it proved something more, as well. It proved that Susan's +departure was plainly premeditated--"with malice prepense," to quote +Judge Fitch--since all her best clothes had gone with her. Whereupon +sentiment switched to the opposite pole, and it was openly declared that +Miss Clegg had gone after the burglar. + +The wonder was of a magnitude calculated to extend far beyond the +proverbial nine days, and it probably would have greatly exceeded that +limit, had not the heroine of the affair chosen to cut it short of her +own volition by reappearing quite as suddenly as she had vanished, at +the end of a single week. + +Mrs. Lathrop, looking across from her bedroom window as she arose from +her night's sleep on the morning of the eighth day, was joyously +startled to see the Clegg windows unshaded, and the house otherwise +displaying signs of rehabitation. Nor did she have long to wait for the +explanation of the mystery, which to the exclusion of everything else +had filled her mind ever since her friend's going. With a shawl over her +head and shoulders, she hastened through the pergola, and the next +moment was facing her neighbor with glad eyes across four yards of +kitchen floor space. + +"Oh, Susan! Such a fri--" These were her four and a half words of +greeting. + +"I knew it would," Miss Clegg caught her up, beaming as Mrs. Lathrop +couldn't remember ever to have seen her beam before. "I knew it would +frighten you all half to death, but when a thing's to be done, it's to +be done, and there ain't no use shirking. I had to go, and I had to go +quick, and I was never so glad of anything in my life, past or present, +as that I went. Of course, it was all along of that burglary, as any +fool might have guessed if they took the trouble. In the first place, I +don't mind telling you now, I went straight to Mr. Weskin the morning +after it happened, and I took him the clue and showed it to him. The way +he spun around in his spinning chair was fit to make even a level-headed +person like me dizzy. He examined the linen, and he examined the way the +K was worked, and then he says, no it couldn't possibly be Mr. +Kimball's. Now, what _do_ you think of that? Just as if I ever suspected +it was. I guess I know Mr. Kimball well enough to know him, even if he +has got his head wrapped up in one of my new roller towels, and I told +Lawyer Weskin so. Mr. Kimball, indeed! But Lawyer Weskin said as he +didn't never hear of a burglar whose name commenced with K, and he +didn't know a soul in these parts either, burglar or no burglar, whose +name did, except Mr. Kimball. There's only one way to ferret out the +perpetrator of a crime, he says, and that's by deduction, and the first +rule of deduction is to guess what the K stands for. I never thought +much of Lawyer Weskin, I'm free to admit that, but if he don't know +nothing else, it's as clear as shooting that he does know about +education. For in the end it worked out just as he said, and the Lord be +praised for it." + +"You don't--" began Mrs. Lathrop in astonishment. + +"I don't say as Mr. Kimball had a thing to do with it. I certainly +don't. In the first place, Mr. Kimball would never dare to come to my +house at such a hour of the morning, and in the second place Mr. Kimball +never carried as fine a handkerchief as the one I chewed on. So that put +it past Mr. Kimball. And the only other K I could possibly think of was +old Mrs. Kitts over to Meadville, who could no more of got over here +than could the king of the Sandwich Islands, whose name begins with K, +too. There was the Kellys, of course, but the Kellys couldn't qualify +neither, for they're too rich to need to do any burglarizing. Well, I +can tell you, I soon come to a point where I didn't know where to turn, +and I never would of turned neither, if it hadn't of been for a letter I +got the day of the night I went away. You'd never guess in the world, +Mrs. Lathrop, who that letter was from so I may as well tell you first +as last. It was from Mr. Kettlewell." + +Mrs. Lathrop opened her mouth in astonishment, but no sound came forth. + +"I knew it'ld surprise you, but it's as true as we're both standing in +this kitchen at this minute. It was a very nice letter, and it said as +how he had admired me from the first minute he saw me, but more +particularly after he'd sat opposite to me at the table and eat my +cranberry sauce. He said he'd always loved cranberry sauce, but as he +felt he'd never tasted none until he tasted mine. I certainly never see +a more complimentary letter than that letter of Mr. Kettlewell's. But it +was the end of the letter where he signed his name that lit me up with +the clear light of revelation. Until I see his name spelled out there in +black and white, I never once believed it begun with a K. I'd thought +all along as his name was Cattlewell, with a C. Far be it from me, Mrs. +Lathrop, to ever have suspected as Jathrop's friend would stoop to +housebreaking and to binding and gagging a lone woman, but there's other +ways as his handkerchief might have got to my mouth, and I felt to know +the truth. His address was on the letter, and there was nothing as could +have stayed me from getting to that address as fast as steam and steel +could carry me. I left in the middle of the night, and I got to New York +in the morning, and I didn't have that feeling for nothing. Mr. +Kettlewell was at his hotel, and in all my born days I never see a +person gladder to see anybody than Mr. Kettlewell was to see me. It's +marvelous what a impression a little good cooking will make on a man, +even if it's only in cranberry sauce. His mouth actually hadn't stopped +watering yet. Leastwise he said it hadn't, and I'd be a fool not to +believe him. He begun talking about it right away, and I let him talk, +just so's I could look at his shiny bald head and his red whiskers +without having to think of anything else except the sound of his +milk-and-honey voice. Finally he said he supposed I'd come to the city +to select Jathrop's Christmas present of furnishings, and if I'd like +him to help me select 'em, he'd be glad enough to go along and lend a +hand. Well, nothing could of been nicer than that, now, could it? But I +told him I wasn't one as traveled all the way to New York under false +pretences, and that if he must have the truth, I'd never give one +thought to Jathrop's present since he mentioned it. All my thought, I +said, had been give to finding a handkerchief with a K onto it, which +I'd washed and ironed with my own hands and brought to him, believing I +must of picked it up at the Christmas dinner by mistake, and not wanting +him to feel the need of it any longer. And you can believe me or not, +Mrs. Lathrop, just as you feel about it, if he didn't right then and +there on seeing that clue, confess that it did belong to him, and that +he couldn't for the life of him remember where he'd left it." + +Mrs. Lathrop, who had been standing all the while, dropped into a chair +at this point in dumb stupefaction. But Susan, who had been caught with +a bowl of batter in one hand and a spoon in the other, paused only to do +a little more stirring. + +"Yes, sir," she went on, still apparently as pleased as punch. "The clue +belonged to Mr. Kettlewell and no one else, which led me to suspect +right away that the burglar must have robbed your house first. I knowed +very well that I never carried that clue home myself, though I'd said I +might, just for the sake of drawing Mr. Kettlewell on. And so how could +it have got into my mouth unless the burglar got it from Mr. Kettlewell +himself? But there is stranger things in this world than you and me ever +dreamed of, Mrs. Lathrop, and that was one of 'em. Mr. Kettlewell is a +very frank and open gentleman, and seeing how disturbed I was over +something, though I'd never so much as breathed burglar or burglary, he +made another confession. And when it comes to dreaming, there is very +few people, he said, as has the power to dream the way he does. He +don't just lie still in bed and picture things out in his sleep, but he +gets up and does the things he's dreaming about. He ain't got no +limitations in it, either. Sleepwalkers is more or less common. But +sleepwalkers just walk, and that ends 'em. Mr. Kettlewell says he very +seldom walks. He usually drives a automobile when he's dreaming, just as +he does when he's wide awake. Sometimes he comes to while he's driving, +and he's found himself often as much as a couple a hundred miles from +home, and without a cent in his clothes, the clothes usually being just +pajamas with nothing but a handkerchief in the pocket. Now, if you had +any imagination a _tall_, Mrs. Lathrop, you'd see what I'm coming to, +but as you haven't you don't, I can tell by the way you look. So you'll +get the full benefit of the surprise when I say that on Christmas night +Mr. Kettlewell distinctly remembers he dreamed of committing a burglary. +He says it wasn't my mince pie as did it, because he's often eaten +mince pie before and never dreamed nothing worse than going to the +electric chair; and it wasn't my stuffing neither, for turkey stuffing +when it's indigestible always makes him dream he's a monkey climbing +trees. He says once he woke up sudden and fell and broke his arm, but +that that was a long while ago. Now he's had more experience, he never +wakes up till he's safe back in bed again. And he says doughnuts causes +his dreams to run back to when he was a boy, and one time he come to, +after a after-dinner nap, when he had doughnuts for dessert, playing +marbles in the back alley with a lot of street urchins. I can tell you, +Mrs. Lathrop, he was most interesting. He's got all his dreams sort of +classified in that way, and can almost tell to a dot what he'll dream +about according to what he eats. And he says soggy biscuits always makes +him dream he's robbing a house or killing somebody. It was mighty lucky +for me, as you can see for yourself, that this time he only dreamed of +binding and gagging. If he'd dreamed of murder, I'd not be here now to +tell the tale. And it's clean to be seen that your biscuits would of +been an accessory before the fact." + +"Then he--" + +"Yes, it was him as done it, and without no moral blame attaching to him +a _tall_. If he'd killed me, the law couldn't of touched him either, for +the law takes no account of what a person does while they're asleep. But +as you made the biscuits in your full senses and with your eyes wide +open, you'd of been the only one to blame." + +Mrs. Lathrop groaned. "You know, Sus--" she protested. + +"Of course if I was alive, I'd never hold it against you, because I know +very well you can't make biscuits no better, and ain't never had sense +enough to learn. But if I was murdered, my ghost couldn't testify, and I +don't see as how you could be saved from the law taking its course." + +At this juncture there was a sound overhead, and both ladies started, +Mrs. Lathrop in surprise and her friend in sudden realization of +neglected duties. + +"What is--?" inquired Mrs. Lathrop. + +"It's him," answered Susan. "Mr. Kettlewell. And the coffee's boiled now +till it's bitter, and there ain't a single cake on the griddle." She was +turning back to the stove as Mrs. Lathrop's exclamation caught her and +switched her around. + +"Why, Susan Clegg!" + +"Don't Susan Clegg me, Mrs. Lathrop," she commanded. "There ain't no +Susan Clegg any more. When Susan Clegg disappeared a week ago last +night, she disappeared for good, never to return. And if you suspect +anything else, it's best I should introduce myself here and now,--Susan +Kettlewell, from this time forth, if you please." + +Mrs. Lathrop sprang up and dropped back again. + +"You don't--" + +"I do. I do mean to say I'm married at last. We was wedded with a ring +in New York last Wednesday, and it's my husband's footsteps you hear up +there in the new bathroom." + +She dropped three spreading spoonfuls of batter on the greased griddle +and gave Mrs. Lathrop a full minute to absorb the announcement. Then, as +she drew the coffee pot to one side, she continued: + +"And it was purely a love match, make no mistake about that. He's got +money enough to buy and sell Jathrop, but he's as simple-minded and +simple-tasted as a babe in arms. And there's nothing I can think of that +he's not ready and willing to give me. Besides, he's frank and open +about everything. He says his teeth is false, and he has a bullet in his +right leg, got one time when he dreamed somebody was shooting him; but +that otherwise he's as perfect as a man of his age can be. He says he'll +buy a wig if I want him to, and that if I don't like the color of his +whiskers, he'll have 'em dyed whatever color I'd like best, and the +wig'l be made to match. But I wouldn't have him changed the least mite. +And if there's one thing in the world I'm thankful for it is that I got +him and not Jathrop. And I'm not thinking from the financial standpoint, +neither." + + +THE END + + * * * * * + + + + + Distinctive Fiction by Anne Warner + + + The reading world owes Anne Warner a vote of thanks for her + contributions to the best of American humor.--_New York Times._ + + Anne Warner has taken her place as one of the drollest of American + humorists.--_Century Magazine._ + + +The Gay and Festive Claverhouse + + A story of the desperate attempt of a supposedly dying man to lose + the love of a girl. + + +Sunshine Jane + + The joyful story of a Sunshine Nurse whose mission was not to care + for sick bodies but to heal sick souls. + + +When Woman Proposes. + + A clever and entertaining story of a woman who fell in love with an + army officer. + + +How Leslie Loved + + Not only a buoyant love story but a penetrating satire on modern + manners. + + +Just Between Themselves + + A vivacious satire on married life which is full of mirth of the + quieter, chuckling variety. + + +The Taming of Amorette + + A clever comedy telling how a man cured his attractive wife of + flirting. + + +Susan Clegg, Her Friend, and Her Neighbors + + A study of life which is most delectable for its simplicity and for + the quaint character creation. + + +Susan Clegg and a Man in the House + + The remarkable happenings at the Clegg homestead after the boarder + came. + + +The Rejuvenation of Aunt Mary. + + The pranks of a scapegrace nephew who was showing his old aunt a + "good time." + + +In a Mysterious Way + + Compounded of amusing studies of human nature in a rural community. + + +A Woman's Will + + Describes the wooing of a young American widow on the continent by + a musical genius. + + +Little, Brown & Co., _Publishers_, Boston + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's Susan Clegg and Her Love Affairs, by Anne Warner + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK SUSAN CLEGG AND HER LOVE AFFAIRS *** + +***** This file should be named 37289.txt or 37289.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + https://www.gutenberg.org/3/7/2/8/37289/ + +Produced by Beginners Projects, Mary Meehan and the Online +Distributed Proofreading Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This +file was produced from images generously made available +by The Internet Archive/American Libraries.) + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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