CHAPTER VII
MAKING PLANS
Left to themselves on the _Bluebird_, Ruth, Agnes, Dot and Tess wentover every part of it again, from the engine room to the completekitchen and living apartments.
"Neale will just love fussing around that motor," said Agnes.
"You speak as if we had already decided to make the trip," remarkedRuth, with a bright glance at her sister.
"Why, yes, haven't you?" Agnes countered. "I thought you and Mr.Howbridge had fixed it up between you when you were chatting up on thefront seat of the auto."
"He never said a word to me about it," declared Ruth.
"He must have said something," insisted her sister.
"Oh, of course we talked, but not about _this_," and Ruth swept herhands about to indicate the _Bluebird_. "I was as much surprised as youto have him ask us if we would take her up to the lake."
"Well, it will be delightful, don't you think?"
"Yes, I think it will. But of course it depends on Mrs. MacCall."
"I don't see why!" exclaimed Agnes quickly and reproachfully.
"Of course you do. She'll have to go along to act as chaperone and allthat. We may have to tie up at night in lonely places along the canal orriver and--"
"We'll have Neale and Mr. Howbridge! And how about asking Luke Shepardand his sister Cecile?" went on Agnes.
Ruth flushed a little.
"I don't believe Cecile and Luke can go," she replied slowly. "Cecilehas got to go home to take care of her Aunt Lorena, who is sick, andLuke wrote me that he had a position offered to him as a clerk in asummer hotel down on the coast, and it is to pay so well that he wouldnot dream of letting the opportunity pass."
"Oh, that's too bad, Ruth. You won't see much of him."
"I am not sure I'll see anything of him." And Ruth's face clouded alittle.
"Well, anyway, as I said before, we'll have Neale and Mr. Howbridge,"continued Agnes.
"Neale. But Mr. Howbridge is not sure he can go--at least all the way.However, we'll ask Mrs. MacCall."
"I think she'll be just crazy to go!" declared Agnes. "Come on, let's goright away and find out."
"But we must wait for Mr. Howbridge to come back. He told us to."
"Well, then we'll say we're already living on board," said Agnes. "Oh,won't it be fun to eat on a houseboat!" and she danced off to the diningroom, took her seat at the table, and exclaimed: "I'll have a steak,rare, with French fried potatoes, plenty of gravy and a cup of tea anddon't forget the pie _a la mode_."
Tess and Dot laughed and Ruth smiled. They then went all over the boatagain, with the result that they grew more and more enthusiastic aboutthe trip. And when Mr. Howbridge and Neale came back in the automobile alittle later, beaming faces met them.
"Well, what about it, Minerva?" Mr. Howbridge asked Ruth. "Are you goingto act as caretakers for the boat to help me settle the estate?"
"Since you put it that way, as a favor, I can not refuse," she answered,giving him a swift smile. "But, as I told the girls, it will depend onMrs. MacCall."
"You leave her to me," laughed the lawyer. "I'll recite one of BobbyBurns' poems, and if that doesn't win her over nothing will. Neale, doyou think you can manage that motor?"
"I'm sure of it," said the boy. "It isn't the same kind I had to runbefore, but I can get the hang of it all right."
"Is there any news about your father?" asked Ruth, glancing from herguardian to the boy.
"Nothing very definite," answered the lawyer. "We found Hank Dayton, andin spite of his rough and ragged clothes I discovered him to be areliable fellow. He told us all he knew about the rumor of Mr. O'Neilhaving returned from the Klondike, and I am going to start an inquiry,with newspaper advertising and all that. And I may as well tell you thatI have engaged this same Hank Dayton to drive the mules that will drawthe _Bluebird_ on the canal part of the trip."
"Oh!" exclaimed Agnes. "I thought Neale said this man was a tramp!"
"He is, in appearance," said Mr. Howbridge, with a smile. "A person cannot wear an evening suit and drive canal mules. But Hank seems to be asterling chap at the bottom, and with Neale and Mrs. MacCall to keep himstraight, you will have no trouble.
"It is really necessary," he went on, "to have some man who understandsthe canal, the mules, and the locks to look after the boat, and I thinkthis Dayton will answer. He has just finished a trip, and so Neale and Ihired him. It will be well for Neale to keep in touch with him, too, forthrough Hank we may get more news of Mr. O'Neil. And now, if you havesufficiently looked over the _Bluebird_, we may as well go back."
"It would be a good while before I could see enough of her!" exclaimedAgnes. "I'm just in love with the craft, and I know we shall have adelightful summer on her. Only the trip will be over too soon, I'mafraid."
"There is no necessity for haste," the lawyer assured her. "Thepurchaser of the boat does not want her until fall, and you may lingeras long as you like on the trip."
"Good!" exclaimed Agnes.
A family council was held the next day at which Mr. Howbridge laid allthe facts before Mrs. MacCall. At first the Scotch housekeeper would notlisten to any proposal for the trip on the water. But when Ruth andAgnes had spoken of the delights of the boat, and when the housekeeperhad personally inspected the _Bluebird_, she changed her mind.
"Though I never thought, in my old age, I'd come to bein' a houseboatkeeper," she chuckled. "But 'tis all in the day's work. I'll gang withye ma lassies. A canal boat is certainly more staid than an ice-boat,and I went alang with ye on that."
"Hurray!" cried Agnes, unable to restrain her joy. "All aboard for LakeMacopic!"
The door opened and Aunt Sarah Maltby came in.
"I thought I heard some one calling," she said anxiously.
"It was Agnes," explained Ruth. "She's so excited about the trip."
"Fish? What fish? It isn't Friday, is it?" asked the old lady, who wasgetting rather deaf.
"No, Auntie dear, I didn't say _fish_--I said _trip_." And Ruth spokemore loudly. "We are going to make a trip on a houseboat for our summervacation. Would you like to come along?"
Aunt Sarah Maltby shook her head, as Tess pulled out a chair for her.
"I'm getting too old, my dear, to go traipsing off over the country inone of those flying machines."
"It's a houseboat--not a flying machine," Agnes explained.
"Well, it's about the same, I reckon," returned the old lady. "No, I'llstay at home and look after things at the Corner House. It'll needsomebody."
"Yes, there's no doubt of that," Ruth said.
So it was arranged. Aunt Sarah Maltby would stay at home with Linda andUncle Rufus, while Mrs. MacCall accompanied the Corner House girls onthe houseboat.
There was much to be done before the trip could be undertaken, and manybusiness details to arrange, for, as inheritors of the Stower estate,Ruth and her sisters received rents from a number of tenants, some ofthem in not very good circumstances.
"And we must see that they will want nothing while we are gone," Ruthhad said.
It was part of her self-imposed duties to play Lady Bountiful to some ofthe poorer persons who rented Uncle Peter Stower's tenements.
"Well, as long as you don't go to buying 'dangly jet eawin's' for OlgaPederman it will be all right," said Agnes, and they laughed at thisremembrance of the girl who, when ill with diphtheria, had asked forthese ornaments when Ruth called to see what she most wanted.
Eventually all the many details were arranged and taken care of. Amechanic had gone over the motor of the _Bluebird_ and pronounced it inperfect running order, a fact which Neale verified for himself. He hadmade all his plans for going on the trip, and between that and eagerlywaiting for any news of his missing father, his days were busy ones.
Mr. Howbridge had closely questioned Hank Dayton and had learned allthat rover could tell, which was not much. But it seemed certain thatMr. O'Neil had started from Alaska for the States.
That he had not, even on his arriva
l, written to Neale, was probably dueto the fact that the man did not know where his son was. His Uncle BillSorber, of course, knew Neale's address, but the trouble was that thecircus, which was not a very large affair, traveled about so, on nowell-kept scheduled route, that Mr. Sorber was difficult to find.Letters had been addressed to him at several places where it was thoughthis show might be, but, so far, no answer had been received. He wasasked to send a message to Mr. Howbridge as soon as any word came fromMr. O'Neil.
To Hank Dayton was left the task of picking out some mules to tow thehouseboat through the stretch of canal. About a week, or perhaps longer,would be consumed on this trip, as there was no hurry.
Where the voyage is kept up for any length of time, two sets of mules orhorses are used in towing canal boats. When one team is wearied it isput in the stable, which is on board the canal boat, and the other teamis led out over a bridge, or gangplank, specially made for the purpose,on to the towpath.
But on the _Bluebird_ there were no provisions for the animals, so itwas planned to buy only one team of mules, drive the animals at aleisurely pace through the day and let them rest at night either in theopen, along the canal towpath, or in some of the canal barns that wouldbe come upon on the trip. At the end of the trip the animals would besold. Mr. Howbridge had decided that this was the best plan to follow,though there was a towing company operating on the canal for such boatowners as did not possess their own animals.
As Mr. Howbridge had shrewdly guessed, the rough clothes of Hank Daytonheld a fairly good man. He had been in poor luck, but he was notdissipated, and even Mrs. MacCall approved of him when he had beenshaved, a shave being something he had lacked when Neale first saw him.Then, indeed, he had looked like a veritable tramp.
Gradually all that was to be done was accomplished, and the day camewhen Ruth and Agnes could say:
"To-morrow we start on our wonderful trip. Oh, I'm so happy!"
"What about your Civic Betterment Club?" asked Agnes of her sister.
"That will have to keep until I come back. Really no one wants toundertake any municipal reforms in the summer."
"Oh, my! The political airs we put on!" laughed Agnes. "Well, I'm gladyou are going to have a good time. You need it."
"Yes, I think the change will be good for all of us," murmured Ruth."Tess and Dot seem delighted, and--"
She stopped suddenly, for from the floor above came a cry of alarmfollowed by one of distress.
"What's that?" gasped Ruth.
"Dot or Tess, I should say," was the opinion of Agnes. "They must havestarted in to get some of their change already. Oh, gee!"
"Agnes!" Ruth took time to protest, for she very much objected to Agnes'slang.
A moment later Dot came bursting into the room, crying:
"Oh, she's in! She's in! And it isn't holding her up at all! Come on,quick. Both of you! Tess is in!"