CHAPTER III
THE OLD CORNER HOUSE
"Now," said Tess, with her most serious air, "shall we take everythingin our playhouse, Dot, or shall we take only the best things?"
"Oh-oo-ee!" sighed Dot. "It's so hard to 'cide, Tess, just what _is_the best. 'Course, I'm going to take my Alice-doll and all herthings."
Tess pursed her lips. "That old cradle she used to sleep in when shewas little, is dreadfully shabby. And one of the rockers is loose."
"Oh, but Tess!" cried the younger girl. "It was _hers_. You know, whenshe gets really growed up, she'll maybe want it for a keepsake. Maybeshe'll want dollies of her own to rock in it."
Dot did not lack imagination. The Alice-doll was a very realpersonality to the smallest Kenway girl.
Dot lived in two worlds--the regular, work-a-day world in which shewent to school and did her small tasks about the flat; and a muchlarger, more beautiful world, in which the Alice-doll and kindred toyshad an actual existence.
"And all the clothes she's outgrown--and shoes--and everything?"demanded Tess. Then, with a sigh: "Well, it will be an awful litter,and Ruth says the trunks are just squeezed full right now!"
The Kenways were packing up for removal to Milton. Mr. Howbridge hadarranged everything with Ruth, as soon as he had explained the changeof fortune that had come to the four sisters.
None of them really understood what the change meant--not even Ruth.They had always been used--ever since they could remember--to whatAggie called "tight squeezing." Mr. Howbridge had placed fifty dollarsin Ruth's hand before he went away, and had taken a receipt for it.None of the Kenways had ever before even _seen_ so much money at onetime.
They were to abandon most of their poor possessions right here in theflat, for their great uncle's old house was crowded with furniturewhich, although not modern, was much better than any of theirs. AuntSarah was going to take her special rocker. She insisted upon that.
"I won't be beholden to Peter for even a chair to sit in!" she hadsaid, grimly, and that was all the further comment she made upon theastounding statement of the lawyer, that the eccentric old bachelorhad not seen fit to will all his property to her!
There was a bit of uncertainty and mystery about the will of UnclePeter, and about their right to take over his possessions. Mr.Howbridge had explained that fully to Ruth.
There was no doubt in his mind but that the will he had drawn forUncle Peter was still in existence, and that the old gentleman hadmade no subsequent disposal of his property to contradict the terms ofthe will the lawyer remembered.
There were no other known heirs but the four Kenway sisters. Thereforethe Probate Court had agreed that the lawyer should enter intopossession of the property on behalf of Ruth and her sisters.
As long as the will was not found, and admitted to probate, and itsterms clearly established in law, there was doubt and uncertaintyconnected with the girls' wonderful fortune. Some unexpected claimantmight appear to demand a share of the property. It was, in fact, nowallowed by the Court, that Mr. Howbridge and the heirs-at-law shouldoccupy the deceased's home and administer the estate, being answerableto the probate judge for all that was done.
To the minds of Tess and Dot, all this meant little. Indeed, even thetwo older girls did not much understand the complications. What AuntSarah understood she managed, as usual, to successfully hide withinherself.
There was to be a wonderful change in their affairs--that was the mainthing that impressed the minds of the four sisters. Dot had been thefirst to express it concretely, when she suggested they might treatthemselves on Saturdays to something beside the usual five cents'worth of peppermint drops.
"I expect," said Tess, "that we won't really know how to live, Dot, inso big a house. Just think! there's three stories and an attic!"
"Just as if we were living in this very tenement all, all alone!"breathed Dot, with awe.
"Only much better--and bigger--and nicer," said Tess, eagerly. "Ruthremembers going there once with mother. Uncle Peter was sick. Shedidn't go up stairs, but stayed down with a big colored man--UncleRufus. She 'members all about it. The room she stayed in was as big asall these in our flat, put together."
This was too wonderful for Dot to really understand. But if Ruth saidit, it must be so. She finally sighed again, and said:
"I--I guess I'll be 'fraid in such rooms. And we'll get lost in thehouse, if it's so big."
"No. Of course, we won't live all over the house. Maybe we'll livedays on the first floor, and sleep in bedrooms on the second floor,and never go up stairs on the other floors at all."
"Oh, well!" said Dot, gaining sudden courage--and curiosity. "I guessI'd want to see what's on them, just the same."
There were people in the big tenement house quite as poor as theKenways themselves. Among these poor families Ruth distributed thegirls' possessions that they did not wish to take to Milton. TommyRooney's mother was thankful for a bed and some dishes, and thekitchen table. She gave Tommy a decisive thrashing, when she caughthim jumping out of the dark at Dot on the very last day but one,before the Kenways left Essex Street for their new home.
Master Tommy was sore in spirit and in body when he met Tess and Doton the sidewalk, later. There were tear-smears on his cheeks, but hiseyes began to snap as usual, when he saw the girls.
"I don't care," he said. "I'm goin' to run away from here, anyway,before long. Just as soon as I get enough food saved up, and can swapmy alleys and chaneys with Billy Drake for his air-rifle."
"Why, Tommy Rooney!" exclaimed Tess. "Where are you going to run to?"
"I--I----Well, that don't matter! I'll find some place. What sort of aplace is this you girls are going to? Is it 'way out west? If it is,and there's plenty of Injuns to fight with, and scalp, mebbe I'll comethere with you."
Tess was against this instantly. "I don't know about the Indians," shesaid; "but I thought you wanted to be an Indian yourself? You have anIndian suit."
"Aw, I know," said Master Tommy. "That's Mom's fault. I told her Iwanted to be a cowboy, but she saw them Injun outfits at a bargain andshe got one instead. I never did want to be an Injun, for when youplay with the other fellers, the cowboys always have to win thebattles. Best we Injuns can do is to burn a cowboy at the stake, oncein a while--like they do in the movin' pitchers."
"Well, I'm sure there are not any Indians at Milton," said Tess. "Youcan't come there, Tommy. And, anyway, your mother would only bring youback and whip you again."
"She'd have to catch me first!" crowed the imp of mischief, who forgotvery quickly the smarts of punishment. "Once I get armed andprovisioned (I got more'n a loaf of bread and a whole tin of sardineshid away in a place I won't tell you where!), I'll start off and Momwon't never find me--no, sir-ree, sir!"
"You see what a bad, bad boy he is, Dot," sighed Tess. "I'm so glad wehaven't any brother."
"Oh, but if we did have," said Dot, with assurance, "he'd be a cowboyand not an Indian, from the very start!"
This answer was too much for Tess! She decided to say no more aboutboys, for it seemed as impossible to convince Dot on the subject as itwas Aggie.
Aggie, meanwhile, was the busiest of the four sisters. There were somany girls she had to say good-by to, and weep with, and promiseundying affection for, and agree to write letters to--at least three aweek!--and invite to come to Milton to visit them at the old CornerHouse, when they once got settled there.
"If all these girls come at once, Aggie," said Ruth, mildlyadmonitory, "I am afraid even Uncle Peter's big house won't holdthem."
"Then we'll have an overflow meeting on the lawn," retorted Aggie,grinning. Then she clouded up the very next minute and the tearsflowed: "Oh, dear! I know I'll never see any of them again, we'regoing away so far."
"Well! I wouldn't boo-hoo over it," Ruth said. "There will be girls inMilton, too. And by next September when you go to school again, youwill have dozens of spoons."
"But not girls like these," said Aggie, sorrowfully. And, actually,she b
elieved it!
This is not much yet about the old Corner House that had stood sincethe earliest remembrance of the oldest inhabitant of Milton, on thecorner of Main and Willow Streets.
Milton was a county seat. Across the great, shaded parade ground fromthe Stower mansion, was the red brick courthouse itself. On this sideof the parade there were nothing but residences, and none of them hadbeen so big and fine in their prime as the Corner House.
In the first place there were three-quarters' of an acre of groundabout the big, colonial mansion. It fronted Main Street, but set sofar back from that thoroughfare, that it seemed very retired. Therewas a large, shady lawn in front, and old-fashioned flower beds, andflowering shrubs. For some time past, the grounds had been neglectedand some of the flowers just grew wild.
The house stood close to the side street, and its upper windows werevery blank looking. Mr. Peter Stower had lived on the two lower floorsonly. "And that is all you will probably care to take charge of, MissKenway," said Mr. Howbridge, with a smile, when he first introducedRuth to the Corner House.
Ruth had only a dim memory of the place from that one visit to it whenUncle Peter chanced to be sick. She knew that he had lived here withhis single negro servant, and that the place had--even to herinfantile mind--seemed bare and lonely.
Now, however, Ruth knew that she and her sisters would soon liven theold house up. It was a delightful change from the city tenement. Shecould not imagine anybody being lonely, or homesick, in the big oldhouse.
Six great pillars supported the porch roof, which jutted out above thesecond story windows. The big oak door, studded with strange littlecarvings, was as heavy as that of a jail, or fortress!
Some of the windows had wide sills, and others came right down to thefloor and opened onto the porch like two-leaved doors.
There was a great main hall in the middle of the house. Out of this awide stairway led upward, branching at the first landing, one flightgoing to the east and the other to the west chambers. There was agallery all around this hall on the second floor.
The back of the Corner House was much less important in appearancethan the main building. Two wings had been built on, and the floorswere not on a level with the floors in the front of the house, so thatone had to go up and down funny, little brief flights of stairs to getto the sleeping chambers. There were unexpected windows, with deepseats under them, in dark corners, and important looking doors whichmerely opened into narrow linen closets, while smaller doors gaveentrance upon long and heavily furnished rooms, which one would nothave really believed were in the house, to look at them from theoutside.
"Oh-oo-ee!" cried Dot, when she first entered the big front door ofthe Corner House, clutching Tess tightly by the hand. "We _could_ getlost in this house."
Mr. Howbridge laughed. "If you stick close to this wise, big sister ofyours, little one," said the lawyer, looking at Ruth, "you will notget lost. And I guarantee no other harm will come to you."
The lawyer had learned to have great respect for the youthful head ofthe Kenway household. Ruth was as excited as she could be about theold house, and their new fortune, and all. She had a little color inher cheeks, and her beautiful great brown eyes shone, and her lipswere parted. She was actually pretty!
"What a great, great fortune it is for us," she said. "I--I hope we'llall know how to enjoy it to the best advantage. I hope no harm willcome of it. I hope Aunt Sarah won't be really offended, because UnclePeter did not leave it to her."
Aunt Sarah stalked up the main stairway without a word. She knew herway about the Corner House.
She took possession of one of the biggest and finest rooms in thefront part, on the second floor. When she had lived here as a youngwoman, she had been obliged to sleep in one of the rear rooms whichwas really meant for the occupancy of servants.
Now she established herself in the room of her choice, had theexpressman bring her rocking-chair up to it, and settled with hercrocheting in the pleasantest window overlooking Main Street. Theremight be, as Aggie said rather tartly, "bushels of work" to do tostraighten out the old house and make it homey; Aunt Sarah did notpropose to lift her hand to such domestic tasks.
Occasionally she was in the habit of interfering in the very thingsthe girls did not need, or desire, help in, but in no other way didAunt Sarah show her interest in the family life of the Kenways.
"And we're all going to have our hands full, Ruth," said Aggie, insome disturbance of mind, "to keep this big place in trim. It isn'tlike a flat."
"I know," admitted Ruth. "There's a lot to do."
Even the older sister did not realize as yet what their change offortune meant to them. It seemed to them as though the fifty dollarsMr. Howbridge had advanced should be made to last for a long, longtime.
A hundred thousand dollars' worth of property was only a series offigures as yet in the understanding of Ruth, and Agnes, and Tess, andDot. Besides, there was the uncertainty about Uncle Peter's will.
The fortune, after all, might disappear from their grasp as suddenlyas it had been thrust into it.