CHAPTER XV
"A DISH OF GOSSIP"
The seamstress came on Monday to the old Corner House. Mrs. McCall hadrecommended her, and in Milton Miss Ann Titus was a person ofconsiderable importance.
She was a maiden lady well past middle age, but, as she expressed itherself, "more than middling spry." She was, as well, a traveling freeinformation bureau.
"Two things I am fond of, gals," she said to Ruth and Agnes, the firstday. "A cup of tea, and a dish of gossip."
She was frank about the last named article of mental diet. She knewthat most of the people she worked for enjoyed her gossip as much asthey desired her needle-work.
Ruth had opened and aired a room for her at the back of the house, andthere she was established with her cutting table and sewing machine.She would not hear of remaining at night with them.
"I got an old Tom-cat at home that would yowl his head off, if Ididn't give him his supper, and his breakfast in the morning. He canforage for himself at noon."
She lived in a tiny cottage not far from the old Corner House--thegirls had seen it. She had lived there most of her life, and she had atidy little sum in the savings-bank. Miss Ann Titus might have livedwithout working at her trade.
"But I sartain-sure should die of lonesomeness," she declared. "Acat's well enough as far as he goes; but you can't call him rightinspiritin' company."
Ruth went to the big store where Mr. Howbridge had opened a chargeaccount for her and bought such goods as Miss Titus wanted. Then thecapable woman went to work to make up several summer and fall dressesfor the four girls.
These were busy times at the old Corner House. The sewing room was ascene of bustle and hurrying from morning to night. One or the otherof the girls seemed to be "trying-on" all the time. Ruth and Agnes, tosay nothing of Mrs. McCall, spent all their spare minutes helping thedressmaker.
"You young-uns have sartain-sure got pluck to come to this old placeto live," Miss Titus declared on the second day. The wind was rising,the shutters shook, and loose casements rattled.
"It's a very nice house, we think," said Ruth.
The smaller girls were not present, but Miss Titus lowered her voice:"Ain't you none afraid of what they say's in the garret?"
"What is in the garret?" asked Ruth, calmly. "We have cleaned it allup, and have found nothing more dangerous than old clothes andspiders. We play up there on rainy days."
"I wouldn't do it for a farm!" gasped Miss Titus.
"So you believe in that ghost story?"
"Yes, I do. They say some man, 'way back before Peter Stower's fatherlived, hung himself up there."
"Oh!" cried Ruth. "How wicked it is to repeat such stories."
"I dunno. I can find you half a dozen good, honest folks, that haveseen the ghost at the garret window."
Ruth could not help shivering. She had begun to refuse to acknowledgethe evidence of her own eyes, and _that_ had helped. But Miss Titusseemed so positive.
"Is--is it because they are afraid of ghosts, that so few people havecome to call on us, do you suppose?" Ruth asked.
The seamstress glanced at her through her spectacles. She had verysharp eyes and she snipped off threads with a bite of her sharp teeth,and stuck a sharp needle into her work in a very sharp manner.Altogether, Miss Ann Titus was a very sharp person.
"I shouldn't wonder if there was another reason," she said. "Ain't theminister's wife been?"
"Oh, yes. And we think she is lovely. But not many of the girls wemeet at church have called. I thought maybe they were afraid. Thehouse has had a bad name, because it was practically shut up so long."
"Yes," agreed Miss Titus. "And Peter Stower acted funny, too. They say_his_ ghost haunts it."
"How foolish!" said Ruth, flushing. "If people don't want to comebecause of _that_----"
"Maybe there _is_ another reason," said the gossip.
"I'd like to know what it is!" demanded Ruth, determined to learn theworst. And Miss Titus _did_ look so knowing and mysterious.
"Well, now," said Miss Titus, biting off another thread. "Speakin' formyself, I think you gals are just about right, and Mr. Howbridge didthe right thing to put you into Peter's house. But there's them thatthinks different."
"What _do_ you mean?" begged the puzzled Ruth.
"There's been a deal of talk. Mr. Howbridge is blamed. They say he didit just to keep the property in his own hands. He must make a goodspeck out of it."
"But you are puzzling me, more and more," cried Ruth. "I suppose Mr.Howbridge does not handle Uncle Peter's estate for nothing. How couldhe?"
"Trust Howbridge for feathering his nest all right," said theseamstress, bitingly. "But that ain't it. You see, there's them thatbelieves other folks than you Kenway gals should have the old CornerHouse and all that goes with it!"
"Oh!" gasped Ruth. "You do not mean Aunt Sarah?"
"Sally Maltby?" snapped Miss Titus. "Well, I should say _not_. Sheain't got no rights here at all. Never did have. Never would have, ifPeter had had his way."
"I am sure _that_ is not so," began Ruth. Then she stopped. Sherealized that Miss Titus would carry everything she said to her nextcustomer. She did not know that either Mr. Howbridge, or Aunt Sarah,would care to have the news bandied about that Uncle Peter had leftAunt Sarah a legacy.
"Well, you're welcome to your own belief, Ruthie," said Miss Titus,curiously eyeing her. "But it ain't Sally Maltby that folks aretalking about."
"Who can possibly have any right here?" queried Ruth. "Mr. Howbridgedeclares there are no other heirs."
"He ain't heard of 'em--or else he don't want to acknowledge 'em,"declared Miss Titus. "But these folks live at a distance. They'reanother branch of the Stower family, I reckon, and 'tis said thatthey've got a better right than you gals."
"Oh!" gasped Ruth again.
"That's why folks don't come to congratulate you, I reckon. They ain'tsure that you'll stay here long. Maybe them other relatives will comeon, or begin suit in the courts, or something. And the neighbors don'tlike to mix in, or take sides, until the matter's straightened out."
"Oh, dear, me!" sighed Ruth. "We love staying here at the old CornerHouse, but we never wished to take anybody's rights away from them.Mr. Howbridge assured us that we were the only heirs, and that theestate would in time be settled upon us. It makes me feel verybadly--this news you tell me, Miss Titus."
"Well! let sleepin' dogs lie, is _my_ motter," declared theseamstress. "You might as well enjoy what you got, while you got it."
If Ruth had been troubled before by the circumstances that had broughther and her sisters to the old Corner House, she was much moretroubled now. Uncle Peter had made a will, she had been assured by Mr.Howbridge, which left the bulk of the old man's estate to the Kenwaygirls; but that will was lost. If other claimants came forward, howshould Ruth and her sisters act toward them?
That was Ruth's secret trouble. Without the will to make their ownclaim good, did not these other relatives Miss Titus had spoken ofhave as good a right to shelter in the old Corner House, and a shareof the money left by Uncle Peter, as they had?
Ruth could not talk about it with her sisters--not even with Agnes.The latter would only be troubled, while Tess and Dot would notunderstand the situation very well. And Aunt Sarah was no person inwhom to confide!
Mr. Howbridge had gone away on business again. She had written him anote to his office about Joe Maroni and Mrs. Kranz, and Mr. Howbridgehad sent back word--just before his departure on the sudden trip--thatshe should use her own judgment about pacifying the tenants in theMeadow Street houses.
"You know that every dollar you spend on those old shacks reduces therevenue from the property. You girls are the ones interested. Now, letus test your judgment," Mr. Howbridge had written.
It put a great responsibility upon Ruth's shoulders; but the girl ofsixteen had been bearing responsibilities for some years, and she wasnot averse to accepting the lawyer's test.
"We want to help those Maronis," she said to
Agnes. "And we want Mrs.Kranz to help them, too. We'll just clean up that old house, and thatwill help all the families in it."
She ordered the whitewashing materials, and Joe promised to whiten hiscellar. She hired the boy, Iky, and another, to clean the yard, too,and paid them out of her own pocket. Mrs. Kranz smiled broadly, whilethe Maronis considered "the litla Padrona" almost worthy to be theirpatron saint!
Ruth had begged Miss Titus to say nothing before Agnes or the littlegirls regarding those possible claimants to Uncle Peter's property.She was very sorry Mr. Howbridge had gone away before she could seehim in reference to this gossip the seamstress had brought to thehouse.
It seemed that a certain Mrs. Bean, a friend of Miss Ann Titus, whodid not attend the First Church, but another, knew all about thepeople who claimed relationship with Uncle Peter Stower. Ruth wassorely tempted to call on Mrs. Bean, but then, she feared she had nobusiness to do so, until she had talked with the lawyer.
Mr. Howbridge had given her a free hand in many things, but thismatter was too important, it seemed to Ruth, for her to touch withouthis permission. With the expectation of other claimants to theproperty looming before her, Ruth was doubtful if she ought to goahead with the frocks for her sisters and herself, or to increasetheir bills at the stores.
However, their guardian had already approved of these expenditures,and Ruth tried to satisfy her conscience by curtailing the number ofher own frocks and changing the engagement of Miss Titus from threeweeks to a fortnight only.
"I must confer with Mr. Howbridge first, before we go any farther,"the girl thought. "Mercy! the bills for our living expenses here atthe old Corner House are mounting up enormously."
Agnes was so delighted over the frocks that were being made for her,that she thought of little else, waking, and probably dreamed of themin sleep, as well! She did not notice Ruth's gravity and additionalthoughtfulness.
As for Tess and Dot, they had their small heads quite full of theirown affairs. They were having a better time this summer than ever theyhad dreamed of having in all their young lives.
Tess and Dot were not without friends of their own age to play with,in spite of the fact that the Creamer girls next door had proved sounpleasant. There were two girls next door to Mrs. Adams who werenice, and as Mrs. Adams promised, she arranged a little tea party forTess and Dot, and these other girls, one afternoon. The new friendswere Margaret and Holly Pease.
Mrs. Adams had the tea on her back lawn in the shade of a big tuliptree. She had just the sort of cakes girls like best, and strawberriesand cream, and the "cambric tea," as Mrs. Adams called it, was richwith cream and sugar. Mrs. Adams herself took a cup of tea that hadbrewed much longer; she said she wanted it "strong enough to bite," orit did not give her a mite of comfort.
From where the pleasant little party sat, they could look over thefence into the big yard belonging to the Pease place. "Your folks,"said Mrs. Adams to her next door neighbors, "are going to have a rightsmart lot of cherries. That tree's hanging full."
The tree in question was already aflame with the ripening fruit.Margaret said:
"Mother says we'll have plenty of cherries to do up for once--if thebirds and the boys don't do too much damage. There are two nests ofrobins right in that one tree, and they think they own all the fruit.And the boys!"
"I expect that Sammy Pinkney has been around," said Mrs. Adams.
"There's worse than him," said Holly Pease, shaking her flaxen head."This morning papa chased an awfully ragged boy out of that tree. Thesun was scarcely up, and if it hadn't been for the robins scolding so,papa wouldn't have known the boy was there."
"A robber boy!" cried Mrs. Adams. "I wager that's who got my milk. Iset a two quart can out in the shed last night, because it was coolthere. And this morning more than half of the milk was gone. Thelittle rascal had used the can cover to drink out of."
"Oh!" said Tess, pityingly, "the poor boy must have been hungry."
"He's probably something else by now," said Mrs. Adams, grimly. "Halfripe cherries and milk! My soul and body! Enough to snarl anybody'sstomach up into a knot, but a boy's. I guess boys can eatanything--and recover."
Holly said, quietly: "There was a boy worked for Mrs. Hovey yesterday.He was awfully hungry and ragged. I saw him carrying in wood from herwoodpile. And he just staggered, he was so small and weak. And hishair looked so funny----"
"What was the matter with his hair?" asked her sister.
"It was red. Brick red. I never saw such red hair before."
"Oh!" cried Tess. "Did he have sure enough _red_ hair?" Then sheturned to Dot. "Do you s'pose it could be Tommy Rooney, Dot?"
"Who's Tommy Rooney?" asked Mrs. Adams.
The Corner House girls told them all about Tommy, and how he had runaway from home, and why they half believed he had come here to Milton.
"To shoot Indians!" exclaimed Mrs. Adams. "Whoever heard of such acrazy notion? Mercy! boys get worse and worse, every day."
Perhaps it was because of this conversation that Tess and Dot at oncethought of Tommy on the way home that evening after the party, whenthey saw a man and a dog chasing a small boy across Willow Street nearthe old Corner House.
"That's Sammy Pinkney's bulldog," declared Tess, in fright. "And it'sSammy's father, too."
The boy crawled over the high fence at the back of their garden andgot through the hedge. When the girls caught up with the man, Tessasked:
"Oh, sir! what is the matter?"
"That young rascal has been in my strawberry patch again," declaredMr. Pinkney, wrathfully. He seemed to forget that he had a boy of hisown who was always up to mischief. "I'd like to wallop him."
"But the dog might have bit him," said Dot, trembling, and drawingaway from the ugly looking animal.
"Oh, no, little girl," said Mr. Pinkney, more pleasantly. "Jockwouldn't bite anybody. He only scared him."
"Well, he _looks_ like he'd bite," said Tess, doubtfully. "And hescared our cat, Sandy-face, almost to death."
"Well, bulldogs always seem to think that cats are their enemies. I amsorry he scared your cat, girls."
Tess and Dot hurried on to their gate. They looked for the boy in thegarden, but he was nowhere to be found. When they entered the house,the back door was open and everybody seemed to be at the front.
The two girls went immediately up the back stairs to the bathroom towash and make themselves tidy for dinner.
"Where do you s'pose he went, Tess?" asked Dot, referring to thestrange boy.
"I don't know," said Tess. Then she stopped to listen in the halloutside the bathroom door.
"What's the matter, Tess?" demanded Dot, quickly. "Did you hearsomething? Up the garret stairs?"
"It sounded like the latch of the garret door," said Tess. "But Iguess it was just the wind. Or maybe," she added, laughing, "it wasyour goat, Dot!"
"Humph!" said the smaller girl, in disgust. "I know there isn't anyold goat living up in that garret. That's silly."
The girls thought no more about the odd noise at that time, buthurried to join the rest of the family down stairs.