CHAPTER II
FIRE, AND OTHER ESCAPES
ONE'S mother never has the appearance of any particular age. She doesnot look precisely young, because hers is the face to which our babyeyes are raised for comfort and guidance, it is from her that wereceive and hope for all things. So it is impossible to realize thatshe is quite young. On the other hand the familiar, beloved face neverwears the look of age, no matter how wrinkled it be, nor how far wehave traveled from childhood. It is too dear, too perfectly the springthat quenches our thirst for unfailing love ever to look to us witheredand age-stricken as it must to strangers. The young Scollards had neverstopped to consider whether their mother was quite elderly, or veryyouthful--her age was swallowed up in the fact of her motherhood. Inreality Charlotte Scollard was but just approaching the milestone ofthe fourth decade. She was a pale, slenderly built woman, with a worn,sweet face, like Margery's, but older and saddened. It wore a look ofill-health which her children saw too frequently to recognize fully,though the three eldest half perceived it at times, with a tighteningof fear around their hearts.
Polly and Penny clung around their mother's waist as she entered, Boband Margery encircled her from each side with their loving arms, whileHappie hugged her breathless, and Laura vainly strove for an openingfor her own welcome.
"Such a dear little home! Such joy to get home to you, my blessings!"said the mother, as she said each night. "Have you been good and happyall this day?"
She went into the front room which was that nondescript allowed byflat life, neither drawing-room, library nor living-room, but a littleof each. It was a pretty room, made so by its furnishing of books andpictures, and the mother looked about her, feeling anew that it waswell worth the effort that taxed her slender strength to the utmost tomaintain this nest and her nestlings within it.
"We've found a name for the flat at last, motherkins!" cried Happie, asshe removed her mother's hat pins, while Laura and Margery unbuttonedher coat, and the two least girls pulled off a glove from each hand.
"Happie has," corrected Margery. "It's a nice, cozy, funny little name,just like this family."
"Tell me," smiled Mrs. Scollard.
"Patty-Pans!" announced Happie triumphantly. "I thought of it when Iwas pouring my cake into the cup pans. Don't you know that these flatsare precisely like a patty-pan, every room following after and joiningon to the next one the way the cups do in those sheets?"
"I see the resemblance." Mrs. Scollard laughed, and the weariness wentout of her face for the moment as her eyes danced. "Shall we have a diecut for our letter paper: 'Patty-Pans,' and printed in bright silverlike new tins? Only I'm afraid our correspondents might think that allour letters should be dated April first!"
"And the flat across is rented; the family came in to-day," Bob said,adding his information to the small fund of entertainment which it wasthe children's custom to amass daily for their mother's return.
"Oh, me! I hope they are not people who will play the piano all theevening when we are at our lessons!" Mrs. Scollard sighed, rememberingpast troubles.
"Two big boys and their mother; I guess not," said Bob succinctly. "Theone we saw across the dumb waiter looked a good sort, and full of fun.I got home to-day earlier, mother. Mr. Felton told me that if you wouldagree to letting me come for all day he would make it worth our while."
"I am glad to hear that, Bob; it shows that he likes you. But I willnever consent to giving you up for all day to earning, leaving no timefor your studies, until we are absolutely driven to it. As long as Ican earn enough to support us all--with strict economy, to be sure, butenough--I will not let my only son lose his chance for an education.Half a day is all that I will let you spend at the office, dear Bob.But thank Mr. Felton for me; tell him I am glad indeed that he thinksyou worth having all day. Now, I must get ready for dinner. I hope itis very good and abundant, lassies, for I am pitiably hungry." Mrs.Scollard rose as she spoke, and pulled aside the sliding-door at theend of the room. It led into her own chamber, lighted by the glass inthis door, the second room of the series of seven, arranged, as Happiehad discovered, in true patty-pan order.
The girls ran through to the kitchen to serve the dinner, while Pennyand Doree lingered with the mother, waiting for the special petting towhich, as the baby, Penny was entitled.
"I always think of how the girls in Little Women got ready for theirmother to come home, don't you? When we are waiting for our marmee, Imean," said Happie, arranging her little cakes on the delicate Limogesplate. "They swept up the hearth and put their mother's slippers downto warm. I don't think flats are really homes; you can't do that kindof comfy, homey things in a flat."
"But our mother can come home just as truly, and that is the onlyimportant thing. We are fortunate to have a home," said Margery, with asuggestion of reproach in her voice.
"Mercy! Don't I know it," retorted Happie. "But won't you be glad whenwe are able to make a home for mother instead of her making one forus?"
"Next winter I shall do something towards it," said Margery in a toneof quiet conviction. "You will be old enough to keep house then withoutmy help."
"I'd rather be the one to go out; I'm better fitted for it," saidHappie. "Dinner is served, Mrs. Scollard, mum," she added, putting herhead out of the dining-room door, and calling down the three-foot hallwhich carried sound like a tunnel.
Mrs. Scollard did not prove her own assertion as to her appetite. Thechildren, anxiously watching her, saw her taste her food, and push itaway uneaten, telegraphing their uneasiness to one another as she didso.
"You said you were hungry, dear Deceiver," Happie reproached her atlast.
"I was, dear; I felt as if I could not wait for my dear girls' goodthings, but when I see them I cannot eat, although I appreciate theperfect seasoning, and how fortunate I am in my cooks." Mrs. Scollardlaughed a little as she spoke, and her eyes rested lovingly on Margeryand Happie, but she only broke a corner of one of the golden patty-pancakes, and took bird-like tastes of the delicate blanc mange. It seemedto the older girls and Bob that the pallor of her face, the shadowsunder her eyes, the droop of her lips had never been so apparent.
Before they had time to dwell on the thought and what it mightportend, there came a great clatter from the kitchen, and Doree flewinto the dining-room with his golden fur so electrified that he lookedlike a four-legged sunflower, with very little difference in his sizeand shape at any point.
"What under the canopy----" Bob began, jumping up from the table andrunning out, followed by his sisters.
Somebody was hammering madly on the dumb waiter door with a competentstick. Bob opened the door emphatically, and there, in the oppositedoorway, stood the boy whom they had seen in the afternoon, his stickraised for further pounding, but with a broad smile on his face thatdid not suggest anything in the least malicious.
"Say, what's the matter with you?" demanded Bob.
"Would you be so very kind as to return our cat?" asked the boy withexaggerated mildness.
"We haven't got your cat; that's ours," said Bob, pointing over hisshoulder to where Jeunesse Doree was standing sniffing the situationwith greatly elongated body, having returned to investigate what hadfrightened him, with true feline nervous courage and curiosity.
"'Tis true, my lord, and pity 'tis 'tis true,'" returned the boy."For that's a beauty cat. Ours is merely a cat of many colors, but weare fond of him. He is on your fire escape, having leaped across fromthis one. From the sounds I have heard, I think he has upset a pan ofsomething, though it's too dark for me to see."
"Oh, my fudge!" cried Happie, and threw up the window.
A tiger cat immediately jumped into the kitchen, to Doree's intensedisapproval, and Happie fished her pan of fudge from between the slatsof the fire escape floor, where it had lodged, caught by the transverseslats on its way down to the ground. The candy bore the unmistakableimprint of the tiger cat's "paddy-paw" feet, and Happie surveyed itwith chagrin, whi
le Polly stroked the interloper, and Penny claspedstruggling Doree to her breast, to prevent his manifest intention topunish his neighbor.
"Was it your fudge? I'm awfully sorry," said the boy across. "I guessWhoop-la sat in it."
"I guess so too," returned Happie with a laugh. "It's hard luck afterbroiling one's face to make it. Hard luck for you, too, because we'dhave offered you some if it hadn't been spoiled."
"That's noble of you, but I'm afraid you wouldn't, because I shouldn'thave knocked on your dumb waiter door, and so we wouldn't have met ifWhoop-la hadn't gone over. That is, we shouldn't have met till afteryou had eaten up all the fudge. Of course we were bound to scrapeacquaintance. Would you mind handing me Whoop-la?" The boy bowed ashe spoke, and his eyes laughed in spite of his preternaturally solemnmanner.
"Such a name for a cat!" exclaimed Bob. He picked up the tiger cat andpassed him across to his master, leaning well over the ledge of thedumb waiter to do so. "Suppose you come around to see us tonight," Bobsuggested. "We generally study and recite evenings, but to-night isSaturday, and a holiday. Won't you come?"
"I suppose the correct thing is for you to call on me first, youbeing the oldest--no, the older inhabitant, but I'll waive ceremony.I'd better waive it, because there isn't anything in this flat butbedlam--boxes and chairs you can't tell apart, burlap, and excelsior. Icouldn't very well ask you over. My mother and younger brother haven'tcome yet, so I'm a little lonely. I will come around, if you don'tmind, and thank you for asking me." The boy received his cat with handsso considerate of cat-nerves that the Scollard girls, noting, approvedof him at once.
"Just give us time to scurry the dishes away," laughed Happie. "We'reare own servants, and we couldn't entertain you while we were at work.Give us half an hour for finishing up, and then come."
"It would entertain me very much to watch you work," said this queerboy, "but I'll wait. Good-bye for thirty harrowing minutes. My watchgoes fast; you won't mind?"
The Scollards laughed as Bob shut the dumb waiter door.
"He's a character," cried Bob, elated at the prospect of his visitor.
Mrs. Scollard bore off Penny to bed, which she shared with her mother,and lying down beside the baby for her nightly story-telling, fellasleep beside her from sheer exhaustion.
Margery, Happie and Laura washed and wiped the dishes, and Polly putthem away, with Bob's help for the higher closet shelves. They workedso fast that only twenty of the thirty minutes were consumed by thetask. They were rather excited by the coming of a caller of their ownage. Their mother discouraged them from making acquaintances lightly.Living, as they did, in a neighborhood of low rents and crowdedapartment-houses, she feared for them contact with young minds lesscarefully shielded from the knowledge of evil than their own, dreadedtheir possible contact with manners and morals such as she would nothave had them imitate.
Happie's bright hair was curly and moist around her temples from thehasty dash of water which she had thrown over her face, and Margery wasdaintily drying her fingers one by one when the bell rang, so promptwas the new boy in keeping his appointment to the moment. Polly openedthe door for him, and in he walked, hailed by a shout of laughter fromBob which brought the girls in at once, although Margery was consciousof lingering dampness around her little finger.
The new boy had made a label for himself of a box cover, and on it hehad written his name, "Ralph Gordon," in very bold letters for all whoran to read. This improvement upon a visiting card he had hung aroundhis neck, so that there could not be an instant's doubt as to whom theScollards were entertaining.
"Now if you'd only stand by the dumb waiter whistles in the cellarwith that thing on, we'd never be troubled with your groceries aswe were to-day," said Bob, shaking hands with the arrival. "Wait aminute. You've set the example of labor-saving introductions; I'llfollow it. Here, girls, draw up in line, oldest first, and so on. Now,this, Mr.--let's see, oh, yes! Mr. Ralph Gordon----" Bob pretended tobe near-sighted, and to consult Ralph's card at short range. "This,Mr. Ralph Gordon, is my oldest and elder sister, Margery, christenedMargaret. This is Keren-happuch, next younger than I. This is Laura,musical at twelve. This is pretty Polly, Polly-put-the-kettle on, mysensible, reliable sister of nine. Penny, you can't see because she isin bed. She's the baby, and we consider her a bright Penny, a fairlynew one, for she's only four years old, and we wouldn't give her fora five dollar gold piece, as some people do bright new pennies. I amRobert, 'Robert toi qui j'aime'--you know the air? I have only tomention that the last named Scollard is the flower of the family, andmy duty's done."
"Fully," commented Margery, with her gentle smile. "We would not saythat he is not _a_ flower, but _the_ flower--well, that's anothermatter."
"Yes," said Ralph with a little look at Margery that held the value ofa compliment.
"Quite another matter. He's not a violet, anyway, because that's amodest flower. But what did he call you?" he added turning to Happie.
Happie laughed. "Did you ever hear such a name?" she cried."Keren-happuch. But they mercifully call me Happie. I was named afteran old lady, a friend of mother's mother, and she was named after hergrandmother. I think they might as well have stopped with her, and notgone on handing down such a fearful name!"
"Well, it is rather a heavy weight," admitted Ralph. "But Happie isenough to make up for it. I suppose it's a case of 'What's the odds aslong as you're Happie.' It ought to be a kind of fairy godmother forwhom you're named! Sounds like an old lady who was the only one of herpattern, and who showered gifts on mere mortals."
"Miss Keren-happuch Bradbury is the only one of her pattern; you'reright there," Bob answered for Happie. "But she's not a fairygodmother. She's as eccentric as she can be, most interesting, and asindependent as the Thirteen Colonies on July, 1776; rather mannish inher ways, but very thoroughly a gentlewoman. However, she's not rich,or we suppose she's not, so she can't play fairy godmother very well."
"And we need fairy godmothers," added Happie. "Our dear father didn'tknow how to get rich, and when he died, four years ago, poor littlemother had to take his place. She's such a frail, delicate littleCharlotte-mother! It's not easy. We are all pining for the day when shewon't have to work for us, but we can work for her. How she goes downin town every morning to an office. We keep house alone. Bob is in areal estate office in the forenoon, but mother insists on his stayingat home to study in the afternoon; she is such a learned darling thatshe gives us all a good education by teaching us at night, though sheis tired to death. Isn't she blessed? That's all of us; our history."
Ralph Gordon's humorous face grew grave, and a look of admiration andrespect dawned in his laughing eyes. "It's great," he said in boyishcommendation of true heroism. "I have a good mother, too," he added."My father died when Snigs--that's my brother; he's thirteen, and Iguess his name's Charley, but of course Snigs is much better--well,when Snigs was three years old and I was five, father died. Motherdidn't have much either. She has kept us at school, and managed prettywell--you see she came of good old fighting, revolutionary stock, andshe never dipped her colors once, though she had enough to discourageher. She means me to go to college--she has gone without everythingshe could give up to save enough to start me, and for the rest I am tohelp myself through. She has moved up here thinking she could rent aroom or so in this flat to some of the boys up there at Columbia, andso get on better until I start, which can't be for two years more. Iguess my mother is stronger, more able to bear her burdens than yoursis, from what you say, but I've got my hat off to my mother, too, everytime. Talk about women's rights! They're about as near right as theycan be, rights or not, and when there's anything to be done they don'tfall far behind men in pluck and stick-to-it-iveness, I notice."
"Hear, hear!" cried Margery and Happie. "We're much obliged."
"Don't mention it," said Ralph generously. "I hope you will live up tomy high opinion."
"I wonder if your cat--Whoop-la, isn't it?--got into both pans offudge, Happie?" suggested Margery.
&nb
sp; "Sure enough!" cried Happie departing on this hint, as Ralph exclaimed:"Thank goodness, you are beginning to prove yourself worthy of myconfidence in your sex!"
Happie returned with a pan of fudge, which she examined carefullyunder the gaslight, turning it at different angles to make sure thatWhoop-la's paws had not touched it.
"I think it's all right," she announced at last. "It would surely showif he had stepped into it."
"Certainly," assented Ralph promptly. "And departing leave behind him,footprints in the bands of line. I see you've marked it off intosquares. But if he had stepped on it, N'importe! as we said when I wasMinister to Paris. Whoop-la is the cleanest cat on Manhattan Island. Helicks each snowy paw till it's free from fleck or flaw."
"Ugh!" shuddered Laura. "How disgusting! Think of eating candy he'dtouched with licked paws!"
"Oh, he didn't, Laura!" cried Margery. "He got into one pan, but hemissed the other."
"I believe you like nonsense as well as a Scollard--better than Lauraand Polly, who worry because it doesn't seem quite sensible," saidHappie approving the new boy more and more.
He shook his head reproachfully at Laura and Polly. "Do you not knowthe full title of this highest form of philosophy, my sisters?" heasked. "It is called: _Non sensus sed_, defense--us. That means itis not sense but a defense, because it defends us from the horriblefate of being dull. This has been contracted into one Englishword--nonsense. But the whole title fits better."
Laura stared doubtfully at the lecturer, and Polly gazed at him withround-eyed admiration, while Margery, Bob and Happie chuckled over hisfooling, beginning to suspect that this merry-looking boy with thequeer ways was decidedly clever.
"Pretty good fudge, Sister Keren-happuch; just a suspicion too sugary,but I can use it," said Bob, helping himself to a corner piece,and devouring it with the same relish he had shown for its threepredecessors.
"Same here!" remarked Ralph, following Bob's example. "It will go."
"So it seems," laughed Happie. "Much obliged."
"And I must do in like manner," Ralph supplemented his precedingremark, rising. "I am tired with the effort of superintending the vanmen and moving things around after they had gone. I felt tired enoughto dread the evening all alone in the lunatic asylum our place lookslike to-night. So I'm no end grateful to you for taking me off my ownhands. Hope you'll all come to see me. Next time maybe we'll get atmusic--I play the violin and the mandolin a little, and I see some onefiddles and pianos here."
"Bob plays the violin, but Laura is our musical girl; we all sing moreor less, and better or worse," said Happie. "Please come again. I'msorry you couldn't see mother for she is--well, you will see her by andby."
She held out her honorably burnt little right hand, which had beenscalded that night by the gravy, and Ralph took it with a look ofhearty liking and respect.
"You're all my sort," he said. "I'm mighty glad we're neighbors.You'll like my mother, too, though I say it who should, for I know herbetter than any one else ever can."
Margery laughed, and shook hands so cordially that Bob and Happie knewthat Ralph had accomplished the difficult feat of winning reservedMargery's approval in his first visit.
"We've had cat escapes, fudge escapes, loneliness escapes, formalityescapes, all turning on Whoop-la on your fire escape," said Ralph. "Weought to sing, 'For We Are Jolly Good Fellows,' in parting, but I'mafraid we should disturb your mother and wake up your Penny. Good-bye,and heaps of thanks."
"Hold on; I'll get my top coat and glasses, and take you home in myautomobile," said Bob, opening the door, and shaking hands with his newfriend across the narrow hall as Ralph fitted his key into the dooropposite. "You won't wait? Good-night, then, and drop over as often asyou can, unceremoniously, like your intelligent Whoop-la."
"He's all right," he added to the girls as he closed the door ofPatty-Pans.