CHAPTER XII
THE VIRTUE OF RESOLVE
But something had happened to Nancy. The cake failure represented to hermuch more than a simple episode, for it had suddenly summed up all theawful possibilities of untrained hands. It was well enough to makeexcuses, to claim business and even artistic talent, for Nancy coulddraw and color, and was among the best in her class as an art student,but the fact now bore down upon her with undisguised horror! She couldnot do what other girls could do. She could not even bake a cake.
"And just as mother so often told me," she reflected bitterly, "it isnot at all a question of preference but of simple, civilized living.What _I_ don't do and should do someone else _must_ do, and that'sanything but fair play on my part," Nancy sadly admitted.
"Aren't you going to open the store, Nan?" Ted asked her. "There's beensomeone knocking a long time and now they're going away--"
"Oh, never mind," she answered indifferently, "I'm going to get teaready so mother won't have to bother. She does it like an angel when Iplead store business, but I guess, Ted, the old store--"
"Isn't all it's cracked up to be," Ted helped her out rather willingly,for he had not, at any time, shared her enthusiasm in the littlebusiness venture.
Nancy sighed dramatically. She was feeling rather sorry for herself andthat is always a symptom of wounded pride. It was the same day, in earlyevening, of the picnic and cake experience, and her crying spell stillstirred its little moisture of hurt emotions. Ted couldn't bear to seehis sister cry, ever, and he was now all attention and sympatheticinterest.
"I wish, Nan, you'd just sell out. The store would make a swell gym, andwe scouts need a place just like that--"
"Ted Brandon! Do you think _I_ would quit just because a thing is hard!Why, I should think you would remember how hard mother works," shedeclared, in a sudden outburst of virtue. "And the harder it is the morereason to--to do it," she floundered.
"Oh, yeah, sure," agreed Ted amicably. "Of course that's so. Want me toset table?"
"Thanks, Ted, I wish you would. I'm going to try a cooked custard, Imean a top of the stove custard. If I can cool it by putting the dishesflat on the ice," Nancy reasoned aloud.
"But they'll melt right through, if they're hot," Ted reminded her. "Iknow my taffy pan did--"
"Well, perhaps I'd better not try it then, as it's so late," Nancydecided, relieved to find a genuine excuse. "Suppose we have toastedcrackers with cheese on top? Mother always likes that and _that_ can'tgo wrong."
Fortified with a new determination, Nancy went at her task, and in lesstime, much less time than she usually required, succeeded in preparingnot only an appetizing but a really tempting meal. Ted arranged thecrisp lettuce leaves while Nancy cut the tomatoes, which she "nested" inthe lettuce, prettily. The toasted cheese-crackers were in the oven andas this was not only a favorite dish with the Brandons, but is also afavorite with many others, it might be well to know how Nancy preparedit.
She buttered saltines, enough to cover the bottom of a flat pan, the panusually used for "Johnnie Cake," then, on top of the cracker layer, sheshowered, plentifully thick, grated cheese; another layer of crackersand another shower of cheese. Next, she wet the layers with just enoughmilk to moisten the crackers. The pan was then allowed to stand longenough for the crackers to absorb the milk, after which the preparationwas baked in a quick oven. A delicious brown cheese-cake was the result,and it "didn't go wrong."
"I'm glad I can do that much, at any rate," Nancy half-complained,half-praised. "And Ted, you have made the table look lovely. I shall beso sorry when the roses are gone--"
"Say Sis," broke in Ted abruptly, "you know I was telling you about howMr. Sanders disappeared."
"Were you?" Nancy was polishing her water glasses.
"Sure, I was. When you had the headache and was crying. Don't you know?"
"Oh, yes, I do remember," admitted Nancy. "But it's too foolish, Ted--"
"Foolish nothing! I tell you I saw him go," Ted declared in a voice thatadmitted of no argument.
"How funny!" cried Nancy. "Do _you_ really believe in that stuff, Ted?"she asked quizzically.
"Oh, say!" Ted was too disgusted to attempt explanation. That any oneshould doubt _his_ eyes was beyond his understanding.
"Well, I'll tell you," Nancy condescended. "I'm going to call on MissTownsend soon, that is, mother and I are, because Miss Townsend has beensick, you know," she elucidated. "Then, I'm just going to ask herstraight all about that weird story."
"As if she'd tell," scoffed the boy. "Why, her own dog never left herhouse since she's been sick, if you want to know. What do you make outof that?"
"Cute doggie," replied Nancy, now shutting off the gas stove to awaither mother's coming. "And another thing, Ted, I wish you could see howthat dog acts around this place."
"I'm just thinking that maybe Miss Townsend is acting sick just to getback here," hazarded Ted. "I hope mother won't give in, if she is, for Ilike it here, don't you, Nan?"
"Love it! Here's mother! Quick Ted, the ice water. There, let's hide!"
The joy of a thing well done was Nancy's reward for her extra efforts.The little meal was indeed a credit to her, and that it gave her motherunmistakable pleasure was Nancy's greatest satisfaction.
"I am always sure that you can do it, little girl," her mother told her,as they all three turned in to clear away the table things, "but I alsoknow you have to find things out for yourself. How did you manage it allso nicely?"
"Well, I didn't mean to tell you," Nancy sighed, "but I might just aswell."
"Better," chimed in Ted mischievously, as he scurried around to do hispart in the clearing up ceremony.
"All right," Nancy agreed affably. "I had better tell you, Mother. Yousee, it was the day of the sale--the church sale the girls were allgoing to. And I expected to get my cake at the French Bakery."
"And you couldn't on account of the rain," Mrs. Brandon helped therecital along.
"It never stopped for one half hour," Nancy added. "So I tried, that isI just _tried to make_ a cake."
She drew in her lips and puckered her pretty face into a wry misgivingexpression. Nancy was looking very pretty in her rose colored linendress (the one her mother had finished off with peasant embroidery), andher dark eyes were agleam now with enthusiasm and interest.
Frankly she told her mother the story of her spoiled cake, and how theyall three laughed when the mother explained why it had failed--justbecause Nancy didn't know enough to grease the tins!
Ted, all this time, was casting suspicious glances first at Nancy thenat his mother. He seemed to be enjoying a secret that even his glanceswere not imparting to the others.
"You may run along, Ted," his mother told him, as she always excused himjust a little earlier than she and Nancy were prepared to finish. "Iguess you can call your part complete. Here dear. I'll put the sweeperaway. You run, I hear some code whistling at the side window."
"All right, Mother, but I can chase the sweeper in the pantry as I go,"Ted offered. "But I wanted to tell you." He sidled up to his mother veryconfidentially, "I think Nancy's good and sick of the store."
"Why Ted!" His mother showed complete surprise at the frank declaration.Nancy was not within hearing so Ted ventured further.
"Yep," he continued. "I'll bet she chucks it up pretty soon, and if shedoes, Mother, could we fellers have it?" he pleaded.
"You boys have it?"
"Yeah; for a gym. Fine and dandy. We've got a lot of things to exercisewith--" Nancy was back from the ice box now so Ted could say no more.The next moment he darted off to the boys who were calling, his ownvociferous answer shrilling the path he made as he rushed out.
Nancy remained silent for some minutes and neither did her mother seeminclined to talk. Mrs. Brandon put the center piece on the table andNancy straightened the window shades, replaced the fruit dish on thelittle table near the cool window, and suddenly remembered to wind thecloc
k.
"That's Ted's business, dear," her mother reminded her. "You see, even aboy must get some training in these little household matters. He toolives in a house."
"Oh, yes," agreed Nancy. "And isn't it strange that I always rememberhis part while I so often forget my own?"
"No, not strange," her mother said gently. "Ted's little schedule is newand novel to you, therefore interesting; yours is old and monotonous toyou, therefore irksome." Mrs. Brandon managed to get her armaffectionately over her daughter's shoulder. "But don't be discouraged,dear. You may make a star housekeeper in the end," she prophesied.
"Oh dear. I'm afraid not, Mother," and Nancy sighed heavily. "It seemsto me I get tired of everything. I thought it would be wonderful to earnmoney," she faltered, "and I suppose because I always liked to playstore I thought it would be just as much fun to have a real store. ButMother," and she snuggled against the sympathetic breast, "Mother, I dowant to help you--"
"And you have," brightened Mrs. Brandon. "You have no idea what miraclesI have worked with your extra dollars, earned in that little store."
"Really, Mother?"
"Yes, indeed. In fact I am thinking of taking a real vacation when mylittle two weeks come around. I had expected to do some extra work--"
"In your vacation?" exclaimed Nancy. She had squatted her mother down inthe arm chair and was herself resting on the side cushion. "Indeed, Ishould say not," she scoffed, pouting prettily.
"But if we buy this little summer place, dear, we must do a lot ofcertain things," explained her mother vaguely.
"Then I'm not going to get tired of the store," determined Nancy,suddenly.
"Yet Nannie, we might do very well to rent it," suggested Mrs. Brandon."A business place is worth something, you know."
"Rent it? To whom?"
"I think it would cure Miss Townsend of her imaginary ills, to have achance to come back--"
"Oh, Mother, somehow I shouldn't like to have her around," falteredNancy. "She's sweet and quaint and all that," conceded Nancy, "but shegives one the creeps. She sort of brings ghosts along with her when shecomes here. And her dog! Why, he'd bark us all to death if we ever lethim in to fight with the chimney place."
Mrs. Brandon laughed good-naturedly. "I've felt rather againstconsidering the plan myself," she admitted, "for as you say, dear, wewould feel like intruders with Miss Townsend established in the store.Well, we don't have to think about it now, at any rate," she decided."Come along for a walk. I'm afraid you haven't been out much today andthat's one thing that would really worry me, dear. I don't want you tostay indoors to take care of the store," her mother admonished. "Wedon't pretend to carry real necessities that people might expect to buyfrom us, and such stock as we do keep can be had at our convenience, aswell as at theirs," she finished definitely.
"You are perfectly right, Mother," Nancy answered emphatically. "Andthat's one thing I don't like about business. Everybody just thinks _we_are their servants, and they even become rude when I tell them I haven'tgot something they happen to want."
"Oh, yes, I know. But I wouldn't worry about that. It all adds to thevalue of the lesson, you know. Just be sure you are right, keep a coolhead and a steady hand," her mother laughed, "then, let the other folkslose their patience if they are foolish enough to do so. But listen,"she paused attentively. "Here comes Miss Manners. And she seems to be introuble. I'll let her in."
The little lady was indeed in trouble for her face, small and somewhatpinched with threatening years, showed, as she entered the room, theunmistakable signs of weeping.
"Oh dear," she sighed brokenly, as Nancy pulled out the rocker for her,"I don't know why I should come to you folks, for I'm sure," she gulpedback her interrupting sobs, "you must have troubles enough of your own.But I just had to talk to somebody--"
"Talk away," replied Nancy's mother cheerily. "You know that is the bestway to conquer one's own troubles--to attack them with the troubles ofsomeone else."
"Maybe that's so," replied Miss Manners, brushing back a stray strand ofher graying hair, "but I don't just see how that is going to help me,"she faltered.
"Tell us yours," urged Nancy, "and then we will be better able tojudge." Nancy sat back in her own chair, quite prepared now for a newchapter in the current events of Long Leigh.