CHAPTER XVII
A BUNCH OF LETTERS
When people went down to breakfast the next morning they found a cardhanging on the office door with a half dozen new rules on it, and whenI went out to the spring-house the guests were having an indignationmeeting in the sun parlor, with the bishop in the chair, and SenatorBiggs, so wobbly he could hardly stand, making a speech.
I tried to see Mr. Pierce, but early as it was he had gone for awalk, taking Arabella with him. So I called a conference at theshelter-house--Miss Patty, Mr. and Mrs. Van Alstyne, Mr. and Mrs. Dick,and myself. Mrs. Dick wasn't dressed, but she sat up on the edge of hercot in her dressing-gown, with her feet on the soap box, and yawned. Aswe didn't have enough chairs, Miss Patty jerked the soap box away andmade me sit down. Mr. Dick was getting breakfast.
We were in a tight place and we knew it.
"He is making it as hard for us as he can," Mrs. Sam declared. "The ideaof having the card-room lights put out at midnight, and the breakfastroom closed at ten! Nobody gets up at that hour."
"He was to come here every evening for orders," said Mr. Dick, measuringground coffee with a tablespoon, as I had showed him. "He came justonce, and as for orders--well, he gave 'em to me!"
But Miss Patty was always fair.
"I loathe him," she asserted. "I want to quarrel with him the minute Isee him. He--he is presumptuous to the point of impertinence--but he'shonest: he thinks we're all hypocrites--those that are well and thosethat are sick or think they are--and he hates hypocrisy."
Everybody talked at once, then, and she listened.
"Very well," she said. "I'll amend it. We're not all hypocrites. Mymotives in all this are perfectly clear--and selfish."
"You and old Pierce would make a fine team, Pat," Mrs. Dick remarkedwith a yawn. "I like hypocrites myself. They're so comfy. But if you'renot above advice, Pat, you'll have Aunt Honoria break her neck orsomething--anything to get father back to town. Something is going toexplode, and Oskar doesn't like to be agitated."
She curled up on the cot with that and went sound asleep. The rest of ushad coffee and talked, but there wasn't anything to do. As Mr. Sam said,Mr. Pierce didn't want to stay, anyhow, and as likely as not if we wentto him in a body and told him he must come to the shelter-house forinstructions, and be suave and gentle when he was called down by theguests about the steam-pipes making a racket, he'd probably prefer to godown to the village and take Doctor Barnes' place washing dishes at thestation. That wouldn't call for any particular mildness.
But he settled it by appearing himself. He came across the snow from thedirection of Mount Hope, and he had a pair of skees over his shoulder.(At that time I didn't even know the name of the things, but I learnedenough about them later.) I must say he looked very well beside Mr.Dick, who wasn't very large, anyhow, and who hadn't had time to put onhis collar, and Mr. Sam, who's always thin and sallow and never takes astep he doesn't have to.
I let him in, and when he saw us all there he started and hesitated.
"Come in, Pierce," Mr. Sam said. "We've just been talking about you."
He came in, but he didn't look very comfortable.
"What have you decided to do with me?" he asked. "Put me underrestraint?"
He was unbuttoning his sweater, and now he took out two of the smallestrabbits I ever saw and held them up by the ears. Miss Patty gave alittle cry and took them, cuddling them in her lap.
"They're starving and almost frozen, poor little devils," he said. "Ifound them near where I shot the mother last night, Minnie, and by wayof atonement I'm going to adopt them."
Well, although the minute before they'd all been wishing they'd neverseen him, they pretty nearly ate him up. Miss Patty held the rabbits, sowe all had turns at feeding them warm milk with a teaspoon and pattingtheir pink noses. When it came Mr. Pierce's turn they were about fullup, so he curled his big body on the floor at Miss Patty's feet andtalked to the rabbits and looked at her. He had one of those facesthat's got every emotion marked on it as clear as a barometer--when hewas mad his face was mad all over, and when he was pleased he glowed tothe tips of his ears. And he was pleased that morning.
But, of course, he had to be set right about the sanatorium, and Mr. Sambegan it. Mr. Pierce listened, sitting on the floor and looking puzzledand more and more unhappy. Finally he got up and drew a long breath.
"Exactly," he agreed. "I know you are all right and I'm wrong--accordingto your way of thinking. But if these people want to be well, why shouldI encourage them to do the wrong thing? They eat too much, they don'texercise"--he turned to Mr. Van Alstyne.
"Why, do you know, I asked a half dozen of the men--one after theother--to go skeeing with me this morning and not one of them accepted!"
"Really!" Mr. Sam exclaimed mockingly.
"What can you do with people like that?" Mr. Pierce went on. "They don'twant to be well; they're all hypocrites. Look at that man Biggs! I'lllay you ten to one that after fasting five days and then stealing awhole chicken, a dozen oysters and Lord knows what else, now that he'ssick, he'll hold it against me."
"He's not holding anything," I objected.
"Because HE is a hypocrite--" Mr. Sam began.
"That's not the point, Pierce," Mr. Dick broke in importantly. "You wereto come here for orders and you haven't done it. You're running thisplace for me, not for yourself."
Mr. Pierce looked at Mr. Dick and from there to Mr. Sam and smiled.
"I did come," he explained. "I came twice, and each time we playedroulette. I lost all the money I'd had in advance. Honestly," heconfessed, "I felt I couldn't afford to come every day."
Miss Patty got up and put the baby rabbits into her sister's big furmuff.
"We are all talking around the question," she said. "Mr. Pierceundertook to manage the sanatorium, and to try to manage itsuccessfully. He can not do that without making some attempt atconciliating the people. It's--it's absurd to antagonize them."
"Exactly," he said coldly. "I was to manage it, and to try to do itsuccessfully. I'm sorry my methods don't meet with the approval ofthis--er--executive committee. But it might as well be clear that Iintend to use my own methods--or none."
Well, what could we do? Miss Patty went out with her head up, and therest of us stayed and ate humble pie, and after a while he agreed tostay if he wasn't interfered with. He said he and Doctor Barnes had aplan that he thought was a winner--that it would either make or breakthe place, and he thought it would make it. And by that time we were someek that we didn't even ask what it was.
Doctor Barnes and Miss Summers were the first to come to the mineralspring that morning. She stopped just inside the door and sniffed.
"Something's dead under the floor," she said.
"If there's anything dead," Doctor Barnes replied, "it's in the centerof the earth. That's the sulphur water."
She came in at that, but unwillingly, and sat down with her handkerchiefto her nose. Then she saw me.
"Good gracious!" she exclaimed. "What have you done that they put youhere?"
"If you mean the bouquet from the spring, you get to like it after awhile," I said grimly. "Ordinary air hasn't got any snap for me now."
"Humph!" She looked at me suspiciously, but I was busy wiping off thetables. "Well," she said, holding up the glass Doctor Barnes had broughther, "it doesn't cost me anything, so here goes. But think of payingmoney for it!"
She drank it down in a gulp and settled herself in her chair.
"What'll it do to me?" she asked. "Mixed drinks always play the deucewith me, Barnes, and you know it."
"If you'll cut down your diet and take some exercise it will make youthin," I began. "'The process is painless and certain: kindly nature inher benevolent plan--'"
"Give me another!" she interrupted, and Doctor Barnes filled her glassagain. "Some women spell fate f-a-t-e," she said, looking at the water,"but I spell it without the e."
She took half of it and then put down the glass. "Honestly," shedeclared, "I'd ra
ther be fat."
Mr. Pierce met them there a few minutes later and they had athree-cornered chat. But Miss Summers evidently didn't know just howmuch I knew and was careful of what she said. Once, however, when I wasin the pantry she thought I was beyond ear-shot.
"Good heavens, Pierce," she said, "if they could put THAT in a play!"
"Cut it out, Julia," Doctor Barnes snapped, and it wasn't until they hadgone that I knew she'd meant me. I looked through the crack of the doorand she was leaning over taking a puff at Doctor Barnes' cigarette.
"Curious old world, isn't it?" she said between puffs. "Here we are thethree of us--snug and nice, having seven kinds of hell-fire water andnot having to pay for it; three meals a day and afternoon tea ditto,good beds and steam-heat ditto--and four days ago where were we? Pierce,you were hocking your clothes! Doc, you--"
"Washing dishes!" he said. "I never knew before how extravagant it is tohave a saucer under a cup!"
"And I!" she went on, "I, Julia Summers, was staring at a ceiling in theFinleyville hotel, with a face that looked like a toy balloon."
"And now," said Doctor Barnes, "you are more beautiful than ever. I am asuccessful physician--oh, lord, Julia, if you'd hear me faking lines inmy part! And my young friend here--Pierce--Julia, Pierce has now becomea young reprobate named Dicky Carter, and may the Lord have mercy on hissoul!"
I tried to get out in time, but I was too late. I saw her rise, saw theglass of water at her elbow roll over and smash on the floor, and sawher clutch wildly at Mr. Pierce's shoulder.
"Not--not DICKY Carter!" she cried.
"Richard--they call him Dick," Mr. Pierce said uneasily, and loosenedher fingers from his coat.
Oh, well, everybody knows it now--how she called Mr. Dick everything inthe calendar, and then began to cry and said nobody would ever know whatshe'd been through with, and the very dress she had on was a part ofthe trousseau she'd had made, and what with the dressmaker's bills--
Suddenly she stopped crying.
"Where is he, anyhow?" she demanded.
"All we are sure of," Mr. Pierce replied quietly, "is that he is not inthe sanatorium."
She looked at us all closely, but she got nothing from my face.
"Oh, very well," she said, shrugging her shoulders, "I'll wait until heshows up. It doesn't cost anything."
Then, with one of her easy changes, she laughed and picked up her muffto go.
"Minnie and I," she said, "will tend bar here, and in our leisuremoments we will pour sulphur water on a bunch of Dicky's letters that Ihave, to cool 'em." She walked to the door and turned around, smiling.
"Carry fire insurance on 'em all the time," she finished and went out,leaving us staring at one another!