CHAPTER IX
DOLLY, HOW COULD YOU?
I lay down across my bed at six o'clock that morning, but I was tootired and worried to sleep, so at seven I got up and dressed.
I was frightened when I saw myself in the glass. My eyes looked likeburnt holes in a blanket. I put on two pairs of stockings and heavyshoes, for I knew I was going to do the Eskimo act again that day andgoodness knows how many days more, and then I went down and knockedat the door of Miss Patty's room. She hadn't been sleeping either. Shecalled to me in an undertone to come in, and she was lying propped upwith pillows, with something pink around her shoulders and the nightlamp burning beside the bed. She had a book in her hand, but all overthe covers and on the table at her elbow were letters in the blueforeign envelopes with the red and black and gold seal.
I walked over to the foot of the bed.
"They're here," I said.
She sat up, and some letters slid to the floor.
"THEY'RE here!" she repeated. "Do you mean Dorothy?"
"She and her husband. They came last night at five minutes to twelve.Their train was held up by the blizzard and they won't come in untilthey see you. They're hiding in the shelter-house on the golf links."
I think she thought I was crazy: I looked it. She hopped out of bed andclosed the door into her sitting-room--Mrs. Hutchins' room opened offit--and then she came over and put her hand on my arm.
"Will you sit down and try to tell me just what you mean?" she said."How can my sister and her--her wretch of a husband have come last nightat midnight when I saw Mr. Carter myself not later than ten o'clock?"
Well, I had to tell her then about who Mr. Pierce was and why I hadto get him, and she understood almost at once. She was the mostunderstanding girl I ever met. She saw at once what Mr. Sam wouldn'thave known in a thousand years--that I wanted to save the old place notto keep my position--but because I'd been there so long, and my fatherbefore me, and had helped to make it what it was and all that. Andshe stood there in her nightgown--she who was almost a princess--andlistened to me, and patted me on the shoulder when I broke down, tellingher about Thoburn and the summer hotel.
"But here I am," I finished, "telling you about my troubles andforgetting what I came for. You'll have to go out to the shelter-house,Miss Patty. And I guess you're expected to fix it up with your father."
She stopped unfastening her long braids of hair.
"Certainly I'll go to the shelter-house," she said, "and I'll shake alittle sense into Dorothy Jennings--the abominable little idiot! Butthey needn't think I'm going to help them with father; I wouldn't if Icould, and I can't. He won't speak to me. I'm in disgrace, Minnie." Shegave her hair a shake, twisted it into a rope and then a knot, andstuck a pin in it. It was lovely: I wish Miss Cobb could have seen her."You've known father for years, Minnie: have you ever known him to beso--so--"
"Devilish" was the word she meant, but I finished for her.
"Unreasonable?" I said. "Well, once before when you were a little girl,he put his cane through a window in the spring-house, because he thoughtit needed air. The spring-house, of course, not the cane."
"Exactly," she said, looking around the room, "and now he's putting acane through every plan I have made. Do you see my heavy boots?"
"It's like this," I remarked, bringing the boots from outside the door,"if he's swallowed the prince and is choking on the settlement questionhe might as well get over it. All those foreigners expect pay for takinga wife. Didn't the chef here want to marry Tillie, the diet cook, anddidn't he want her to turn over the three hundred dollars she had in thebank, and her real estate, which was a sixth interest in a cemetery lot?But Tillie stuck it out and he wouldn't take her without."
"It isn't quite the same, Minnie," she said, sitting down on the floorto put on her stockings.
"The principle's the same," I retorted, "and if you ask me--"
"I haven't," she said disagreeably, "and when you begin to argue,Minnie, you make my head ache."
"I have had a heartache for a week," I snapped, "let alone heartburn,and I'll be glad when the Jennings family is safely married and I cansleep at night."
I was hurt. I went out and shut the door behind me, but I stopped in thehall and went back.
"I forgot to say," I began, and stopped. She was still sitting on thefloor, trying to put her heavy boots on, and crying all over them.
"Stop that instantly," I said, and jerked her shoes from her. "Get intoa chair and let me put them on. And if you will wait a jiffy I'll bringyou a cup of coffee. I'm not even a Christian in the morning until I'vehad my coffee."
"You haven't had it yet, have you?" she asked, and we laughed together,rather shaky. But as I buttoned her shoes I saw her eyes going towardthe blue letters on the bed.
"Oh, Minnie," she said, "if you only knew how peculiar they are inEurope! They'll never allow a sanatorium in the family!"
"I guess a good many would be the better for having one close," I said.
Well, I left her to get dressed and went to the kitchens. Tillie wasthere getting the beef tea ready for the day, but none of the rest wasaround. They knew the housekeeper was gone, but I guess they'd forgottenthat I was still on hand. I put a kettle against the electric bell thatrings in the chef's room so it would keep on ringing and went on intothe diet kitchen.
"Tillie," I said, "can you trust me?"
She looked up from her beef.
"Whether I can or not, I always have," she answered.
"Well, can I trust you? That's more to the point."
She put down her knife and came over to me, with her hands on her hips.
"I don't know what you're up to, Minnie," she said, "and I don't knowthat I care. But if you've forgotten the time I went to the city andbrought you sulphur and the Lord only knows what for your old springwhen you'd run short and were laid up with influenza--"
"Hush!" I exclaimed. "You needn't shout it. Tillie, I don't want youto ask me any questions, but I want four raw eggs in a basket, a pot ofcoffee and cream, some fruit if you can get it when the chef unlocks therefrigerator room, and bread and butter. They can make their own toast."
"They?" she said, with her mouth open.
But I didn't explain any more. I had found Tillie about a year before,frying sausages at the railroad station, and made her diet cook atthe sanatorium. Mrs. Wiggins hadn't wanted her, but, as I told the olddoctor at the time, we needed somebody in the kitchen to keep an eye onthings for us. It was through Tillie that we discovered that the helpwere having egg-nog twice a day, with eggs as scarce as hens' teeth, andthe pharmacy clerk putting in a requisition for more whisky every week.
Well, I scribbled a note to Mr. Van Alstyne, telling what had happened,and put it under his door, and then I met Miss Patty in the hall by thebilliard room and I gave her some coffee from the basket, in the sunparlor. It was still dark, although it was nearly eight o'clock, andnobody saw us go out together. Just as we left I heard the chef in thekitchen bawling out that he'd murder whoever put the kettle against thebell, and Tillie saying it must have dropped off the hook and landedthere.
We went to the spring-house first, to avoid suspicion, and then acrossback of the deer park to the shelter-house. It was still snowing, butnot so much, and the tracks we had made early in the morning were stillthere, mine off to one side alone, and the others close together andside by side. There was a whole history in those snow tracks, mine aloneand kind of offish, and the others cuddling together. It made me lonelyto look at them.
I remember wishing I'd taught school, as I was educated to; woman wasn'tmade to live alone, and most school-teachers get married.
Miss Patty did not say much. She was holding her chin high and lookingrather angry and determined. At the spring-house I gave her the basketand took an armful of fire-wood myself. I knew Mr. Dick would neverthink of it until the fire was out.
They were both asleep in the shelter-house. He was propped up againstthe wall on a box, with the rubber carriage robe aroun
d him, and she waslying by the fire, with Mrs. Moody's shawl over her and her muff underher head. Miss Patty stood in the doorway for an instant. Then shewalked over and, leaning down, shook her sister by the arm.
"Dorothy!" she said. "Wake up, you wretched child!" And shook her again.
Mrs. Dicky groaned and yawned, and opened her eyes one at a time.
But when she saw it was Miss Patty she sat up at once, looking dazed andfrightened.
"You needn't pinch me, Pat!" she said, and at that Mr. Dick wakened andjumped up, with the carriage robe still around him.
"Oh, Dolly, Dolly!" said Miss Patty suddenly, dropping on her kneesbeside Mrs. Dicky, "what a bad little girl you are! What a thing for youto do! Think of father and Aunt Honoria!"
"I shan't," retorted Mrs. Dicky decidedly. "I'm not going to spoil myhoneymoon like that. For heaven's sake, Pat, don't cry. I'm not dead.Dick, this is my sister, Patricia."
Miss Pat looked at him, but she didn't bow. She gave him one look, fromhis head to his heels.
"Dolly, how COULD you!" she said, and got up.
It wasn't very comfortable for Mr. Dick, but he took it much better thanI expected. He went over and gave his wife a hand to help her up, andstill holding hers, he turned to Miss Patty.
"You are perfectly right," he said, "I don't see how she could myself.The more you know of me the more you'll wonder. But she did; we're upagainst that."
He grinned at Miss Patty, and after a minute Miss Patty smiled back. Butit wasn't much of a smile. I was unpacking the breakfast, putting thecoffee-pot on the fire and getting ready to cook the eggs and maketoast. But I was watching, too. Suddenly Mrs. Dick made a dive for MissPatty and threw her arms around her.
"You darling!" she cried. "I'm so glad to see you again--Pat, you'lltell father, won't you? He'll take it from you. If I tell him he'll haveapoplexy or something."
But Miss Patty set her pretty mouth--both those girls have theirfather's mouth--and held her sister out at arm's length and looked ather.
"Listen," she said. "Do you know what you have done to me? Do you knowthat when father knows this he's going to annul the marriage or have Mr.Carter arrested for kidnaping or abduction?--whatever it is." Mrs. Dickpuckered her face to cry, and Mr. Dick took a step forward, but MissPatty waved him off. "You know father as well as I do, Dolly. You knowwhat he is, and lately he's been awful. He's not well--it's his liveragain--and he won't listen to anything. Why, the Austrian ambassadorcame up here, all this distance, to talk about the etiquette of the--ofmy wedding, something about precedence, and he wouldn't even see him."
"He can't annul it," said Mr. Dick angrily. "I'm of age. And I cansupport my wife, too, or will be able--soon."
"Dolly's not of age," said Miss Patty wearily. "I've sat up all nightfiguring it out. He's going to annul the marriage, or he'll make ascandal anyhow, and that's just as bad. Dolly,"--she turned to hersister imploringly--"Dolly, I can't have a scandal now. You know howOskar's people have taken this, anyhow; they've given in, because heinsisted, but they don't want me, and if there's a lot of notoriety nowthe emperor will send him to Africa or some place, and--"
"I wish they would!" Mrs. Carter burst out suddenly. "I hate the wholething. They only tolerate you--us--for our money. You needn't look atme like that; Oskar may be all right, but his mother and sisters arehateful--simply hateful!"
"I'll not be with them."
"No, but they'll be with you." Mrs. Dicky walked over to the window andlooked out, dabbing her eyes. "You've been everything to me, Pat, andI'm so happy now--I'd rather be here on a soap box with Dick than ona throne or a dais or whatever you'll have to sit on over there, withOskar. I want to be happy--and you won't. Look at Alice Thorne and herduke!"
"If you really want me to be happy," Miss Patty said, going over to her,"you'll go back to school until the wedding is over."
"I won't leave Dicky." She swung around and gave Mr. Dick an adoringglance, and Miss Patty looked discouraged.
"Take him with you," she said. "Isn't there some place near where hecould stay, and telephone you now and then?"
"Telephone!" said Mrs. Dick scornfully.
"Can't leave," Mr. Dick objected. "Got to be on the property."
Miss Patty shrugged her shoulders and turned to go. "You're bothperfectly hopeless," she said. "I'll go and tell father, Dorothy, butyou know what will happen. You'll be back in school at Greenwich byto-night, and your--husband will probably be under arrest." She openedthe door, but I dropped the toast I was making and ran after her.
"If he is arrested," I said, "they'll have to keep him on the place. Hecan't leave."
She didn't say anything; she lifted her hand and looked at the rubyring, and then she glanced back into the room where Mr. Dick and hiswife were whispering together, and turned up her coat collar.
"I'm going," she said, and stepped into the snow. But they called herback in a hurry.
"Look here, Miss--Miss Patricia," Mr. Dick said, "why can't we stayhere, where we are? It's very comfortable--that is, it's livable.There's plenty of fresh air, anyhow, and everybody's shouting for freshair nowadays. They've got somebody to take my place in the house."
"And father needn't know a thing--you can fix that," broke in Mrs. Dick."And after your wedding he will be in a better humor; he'll know it'sover and not up to him any more."
Miss Patty came back to the shelter-house again and sat down on the soapbox.
"We MIGHT carry it off," she said. "If I could only go back to town!But father is in one of his tantrums, and he won't go, or let me go.The idea!--with Aunt Honoria on the long-distance wire every day, havinghysterics, and my clothes waiting to be tried on and everything. I'mdesperate."
"And all sorts of things being arranged for you!" put in Mrs. Dickenviously. "And the family jewels being reset in Vienna for you and allthat! It would be great--if you only didn't have to take Oskar with thejewels!"
Miss Patty frowned.
"You are not going to marry him," she said, with a glance at Mr. Dick,who, with his coat off, was lying flat on the floor, one arm down in thehole where the things had been hidden, trying to hook up a can of bakedbeans. "If it doesn't turn out well, you and father have certainly doneyour part in the way of warning. It's just as Aunt Honoria said; thefamily will make a tremendous row beforehand, but afterward, when it allturns out well, they'll take the credit."
Mr. Dick was busy with the beans and I was turning the eggs. Mrs. Dickwent over to her sister and put her arm around her.
"That's right, Patty," she said, "you're more like mother than I am.I'm a Jennings all over--except that, heavens be praised, I've got theSherwood liver. I guess I'm common plebeian, like dad, too. I'm plebeianenough, anyhow, to think there's been a lot too much about marriagesettlements and the consent of the emperor in all this, and not enoughabout love."
I could have patted Mrs. Dicky on the back for that, and I almost upsetthe eggs into the fire. I'm an advocate of marrying for love every time,although a title and a bunch of family jewels thrown in wouldn't worryme.
"Do you want me to protest that the man who has asked me to marry himcares about me?" Miss Patty replied in an angry undertone. "Couldn'the have married a thousand other girls! Hadn't a marriage been arrangedbetween him and the cousin--"
"I know all that," Mrs. Dicky said, and her voice sounded older thanMiss Patty's, and motherly. "But--are you in love with him, Pat?"
"Certainly," Miss Patty said indignantly. "Don't be silly, Dolly."
At that instant Mr. Dick found the beans, and got up shouting that we'dhave a meal fit for a prince--if princes ate anything so every day asbaked beans. I put the eggs on a platter and poured the coffee, and weall sat around the soap box and ate. I wished that Miss Cobb could haveseen me there--how they insisted on my having a second egg, and was mycoffee cold, and wasn't I too close to the fire? It was Minnie here andMinnie there, and me next to Miss Patty on the floor, and she, as youmay say, right next to royalty. I wished it could have been in thesprin
g-house, with father's crayon enlargement looking down on us.
Everybody felt better for the meal, and we were sitting there laughingand talking and very cheerful when Mr. Van Alstyne opened the door andlooked in. His face was stern, but when he saw us, with Miss Patty onher knees toasting a piece of bread and Mr. Dicky passing the tin basinas a finger-bowl, he stopped scowling and looked amused.
"They're here, Sallie," he called to his wife, and they both came in,covered with snow, and we had coffee and eggs all over again.
Well, they stayed for an hour, and Mr. Sam talked himself black in theface and couldn't get anywhere. For the Dickys refused to be separated,and Mrs. Dick wouldn't tell her father, and Miss Patty wouldn't do itfor her, and the minute Mr. Sam made a suggestion that sounded rationalMrs. Dick would cry and say she didn't care to live, anyhow, and shewished she had died of ptomaine poisoning the time she ate the badoysters at school.
So finally Mr. Sam gave up and said he washed his hands of the wholeaffair, and that he was going to make another start on his weddingjourney, and if they wanted to be a pair of fools it wasn't up tohim--only for heaven's sake not to cry about it. And then he wipedMrs. Dicky's eyes and kissed her, she being, as he explained, hissister-in-law now and much too pretty for him to scold.
And when the Dickys found they were not going to be separated we hadmore coffee all around and everybody grew more cheerful.
Oh, we were very cheerful! I look back now and think how cheerful wewere, and I shudder. It was strange that we hadn't been warned by Mr.Pierce's square jaw, but we were not. We sat around the fire and ate andlaughed, and Mr. Dick arranged that Mr. Pierce should come out to himevery evening for orders about the place if he accepted, and everybodyfelt he would--and I was to come at the same time and bring a basket ofprovisions for the next day. Of course, the instant Mr. Jennings leftthe young couple could go into the sanatorium as guests under anothername and be comfortable. And as soon as the time limit was up, and theplace was still running smoothly, they could declare the truth, claimthe sanatorium, having fulfilled the conditions of the will, and confessto Mr. Jennings--over the long-distance wire.
Well, it promised well, I must say. Mr. Stitt left on the ten train thatmorning, looking lemon-colored and mottled. He insisted that he wasn'table to go, but Mr. Sam gave him a headache powder and put him on thetrain, anyhow.
Yes, as I say, it promised well. But we made two mistakes: we didn'tcount on Mr. Thoburn, and we didn't know Mr. Pierce. And who could haveimagined that Mike the bath man would do as he did?