Читать книгу The Corner House Girls in a Play - Hill Grace Brooks - Страница 3

Almost the first thing that would have caught the attention of the visitor to the old Corner House at almost any time, was the number of pets that hovered about that kitchen porch. Ruth, with a sigh, sometimes admitted that she was afraid she supported a menagerie.

Just at this hour – it was approaching noon – Mrs. MacCall, or the girl who helped her in the kitchen, might be expected to appear at the door with a plate of scraps or vegetable peelings or a little spare milk or other delicacy to tempt the appetites of the dumb creatures that subsisted upon the kindness of the Corner House family.

The birds, of course, got their share. In the winter the old Corner House was the rendezvous of a chattering throng of snow-buntings and sparrows and starlings, for the children tied suet and meat-bones to the branches of the fruit trees, as well as scattered crumbs upon the snow-crust. In summer the feathered beggars took toll as they pleased of the cherries and small fruits in the garden.

In the garden, too, was the only martin house in town, set upon a tall pole. There every spring a battle royal went on between the coming martins and the impudent sparrows, as the latter horde always appropriated the martin house during the absence of its proper owners in the South. Each cherry tree had its robin's nest – sometimes two. Mr. Robin likes to be near the supply of his favorite fruit. The wrens built under the eaves of the porch, and above the windows, in sheltered places. All the pigeons in the neighborhood flew here to strut and coo, and help eat any grain that might be thrown out.

What one saw now, waiting at the porch steps, was principally a family of cats. There were no less than nine posing expectantly before the queer looking character known to Milton folks as Seneca Sprague.

First of all, Sandyface, the speckled tabby-cat, sat placidly washing her face on the lower step. Close at her back, on the ground – one was even playing with its mother's steadily waving tail – was Sandyface's latest family, the four kittens bearing the remarkable names of Starboard, Port, Hard-a-lee and Mainsheet.

Grouped farther away from the mother cat were the four well-grown young cats, Spotty, Almira, Popocatepetl and Bungle.

Much farther in the background, and in the attitude of sleep, with his head on his forepaws, but with a blinking eye that lost nothing of what went on at the porch (for Mrs. MacCall might appear at any moment with his own particular dish) lay a big Newfoundland dog, with a noble head, intelligent brown eyes, and a muzzle now graying with age. This was the Corner House girls' newest and most valued pet, Tom Jonah.

In addition, on the clothes-drying green, was Billy Bumps. This suggestively named individual was a sturdy, wise-looking goat, with a face and chin-whisker which Mrs. MacCall declared was "as long as the moral law," and whose proclivity to eat anything that could be masticated was well-known to the Kenway children.

This collection of dumb pets the tall, lank, barefooted man in the broken straw hat and linen duster, now faced with a serious mien as though he were a real preacher and addressed a human congregation.

Seneca Sprague was a harmless person, considered "not quite right," as Tess had said, by his fellow-townsmen. Whether his oddities arose from a distraught mind, or an indulgence in a love of publicity, it would be hard to say.

His sharp-featured face and long, luxurious iron-gray hair, which he sometimes wore knotted up like a woman's, marked him wherever he went. Even those who thought him the possessor of a mind diseased agreed that he was quite harmless.

He came and went as he pleased, often preaching on street corners a doctrine which included a belief in George Washington as a supernatural being; and he was patriotic to the core.

Sometimes bad boys made fun of him, and followed and pelted him in the street; but, of course, the Corner House girls, who were kind to everybody and everything, would not have thought of harrying the queer old man, or ridiculing him.

Occasionally Seneca Sprague wrote and had printed a tract in which he ramblingly expressed his religious and patriotic beliefs, and an edition of this tract he was now selling from house to house in Milton. Ruth had, of course, purchased one and as Tess and Dot came into the old Corner House yard, Mr. Sprague was just turning away from the door, and had caught sight of the expectant congregation of pets gathered below him.

"Lo, and behold! lo, and behold!" ejaculated Seneca Sprague, in a solemn and resonant voice. "What saith the Scriptures? Him that hath ears to hear, let him hear."

Every cat's ears were pricked forward expectantly and even Tom Jonah lifted his glossy ears – probably hearing Mrs. MacCall's step at the kitchen door. Billy Bumps lifted a ruminant head and blatted softly.

"Thus saith the prophet," went on Seneca Sprague, in his sing-song tone. "There is yet a little time in which man may repent. Then cometh the Crack o' Doom! Beware! beware! beware!"

Here Dot whispered to Tess: "How did Mr. Seneca Sprague come to know so much about prophets, and what's going to happen, and all that? And what is the Crack o' Doom?"

"Mercy, I don't know, child!" exclaimed Tess. "I'm sure I didn't crack it."

The queer old man was interrupted just here, too, by Ruth Kenway's reappearance upon the porch. Ruth was a very intelligent looking girl, if not exactly a pretty one. She was dark and her hair was black; she had warm, brown eyes and a sweet, steady smile that pleased most people.

"Oh, Mr. Sprague!" she said, attracting that queer individual's attention. He actually swept off his torn straw hat and bowed before her.

Ruth's voice was low and pleasant. Mrs. MacCall said she had an old head upon young shoulders. But there had been good reason for the oldest of the Corner House girls to show in her look and manner the effect of responsibility and burden of forethought beyond her years.

Before the fortune had come to them the little Kenways had had only a small pension to exist upon, and they had had to share that with Aunt Sarah Maltby. For nearly two years Ruth had taken her mother's place and looked after the family.

It had made her seem old beyond her real age; but it had likewise given her a confidence in herself which she otherwise would not have had. People deferred to Ruth Kenway; even Mr. Howbridge thought she was quite a wonderful girl.

"Oh, Mr. Sprague," she said again. "I meant to tell you that you are welcome to some of those fall pippins, down there by the hen-run – if you care to pick them up. Just help yourself. I know you don't use meat, and that you live on fruit and vegetables; and apples are hard to get at the store."

"Thank you – thank you," said the strange, old man, politely. "I will avail myself of the privilege you so kindly offer. It is true I live on the fruits of the earth wholly, for are we not commanded to shed no blood – no, not at all? Yea, verily, he who lives by the sword shall die by the sword – "

"And I hope you will like the pippins, Mr. Sprague," broke in Ruth, knowing how long-winded the old fellow was, and being cumbered by many cares herself just then.

"Ah! there you are, children," she added, addressing Tess and Dot. "Come right in and make ready for lunch. Don't let us keep Mrs. MacCall waiting. She and Linda are preserving to-day and they want to get the lunch over and out of the way."

The smaller girls hastened into the house, thus admonished, and up to the dressing room connected with the two, big, double bedrooms in the other wing, which the four sisters had occupied ever since coming to the old Corner House. Ruth went with them to superintend the washing of hands and face, smoothing of hair and freshening of frocks and ribbons. Ruth had to act as inspector after the youngest Kenway's ablutions, Tess declaring: "Dot doesn't always wash into all the corners."

"I do, too, Tess Kenway!" cried the smaller girl. "Ruthie has to watch us 'cause you button your apron crooked. You know you do!"

"I don't mean to," said Tess, "but I can't see behind me. I'd like to be as neat looking all the time as that lady in the gray cloak. Oh, Ruthie! who was she?"

"I have no idea whom you are talking about," said the elder sister, curiously. "'The lady in the gray cloak'? What lady in a gray cloak?"

At once Tess and Dot began to explain. They were both eager, they were both vociferous; and the particulars of the morning's adventure, including the meeting with Miss Pepperill, the falling of the telegraph pole, the woman in the gray cloak, and the sovereigns of England, became most remarkably mixed in the general relation of facts.

"Mercy! Mercy, children!" cried Ruth, in despair. "Let us go at the matter in something like order. Why did the lady in the gray cloak want you to learn the succession of the sovereigns of England? And did the telegraph pole hit poor Miss Pepperill, or was she merely scared by its fall?"

Tess stared at her older sister wonderingly. "Well, I do despair!" she breathed at last, repeating one of good Mrs. MacCall's odd exclamations. "I never did suppose you could misunderstand a body so, Ruthie Kenway."

Ruth threw back her head at that and laughed heartily. Then she endeavored to get at the meat in the nut by asking questions. Soon – by the time her little sisters were ready to descend to the dining room – Ruth had a fair idea of the happening and the reason for the interest Tess and Dot displayed in the identity of the woman in the gray cloak.

But Ruth could not help the little ones to discover the name of the stranger. They all went down to dinner when Uncle Rufus rang the gong at the hall door.

That front hall of the old Corner House was a vast place, with a gallery all around it at the level of the second story, out of which opened the "grand" bedrooms (only one of which had ever been occupied during the girls' occupancy of the house, and that by Aunt Sarah) and it had a broad staircase with beautifully carved balustrades.

Uncle Rufus was a tall (though stooped), lean and brown negro, with a fringe of snow-white wool around his brown, bald crown. He always appeared to serve at table in a long, claw-hammer coat, a white vest and trousers, and gray spats. He was the type of old Southern house servant one reads about, seldom finds in the North; and he had lived in the old Corner House and served Uncle Peter Stower "endurin' of twenty-four year," as he often boasted.

Uncle Rufus did much more than serve the table, care for the silver and linen, and perform the other duties of a butler. He was Ruth's chief assistant in and out of the house. Despite his age, and occasional attacks of rheumatism, he was "purty spry yit," according to his own statement. And since the Kenway girls had come to the old house, Uncle Rufus seemed to have taken a new lease on life.

Aunt Sarah Maltby was already in her place at the table when Ruth and the two smaller girls entered the dining room. She was a withered wisp of a woman, with bright brown eyes under rather heavy brows. There were three deep wrinkles between her eyes; otherwise Aunt Sarah did not show in her countenance many of the ravages of time.

Her hair was only a little frosted; she wore it crimped on the sides, doing it up carefully in little "pigtails" every night before she retired. She was scrupulous in the care of her hands, being one of those old ladies who almost never are seen bare-handed – wearing mits or gloves on all occasions.

Her plainly made dresses were starched and prim in every particular. She was a spinster who never told her age, and defied the public to guess it! Living a sort of detached life in the Kenway family, nothing went on in domestic affairs of which she was not aware; yet she was seldom helpful in any emergency. Usually, if she interfered at all, it was at a time when Ruth could have well excused her assistance.

Aunt Sarah had chosen the best bedroom in the house when first they had come to Milton to live; and, as well, she had the best there was to be had of everything else. She had, all her life, lived selfishly, been waited upon, and considered her own comfort first. It was too late now for Aunt Sarah to change in many particulars.

Mrs. MacCall bustled in from the kitchen, her face rather red and a burned stripe on her forearm which she had floured over to take out the smart. "Always get burned when I am driv' like I be to-day," declared the housekeeper, whom Ruth insisted should always eat at their table. Mrs. MacCall was much more than an ordinary houseworker; she was the friend and confidant of the Kenway sisters, and was nearer to all their hearts than was stiff and almost wordless Aunt Sarah.

"Do you know who the lady in the gray cloak is?" asked Tess, of Mrs. MacCall, having put the question fruitlessly to both Uncle Rufus and Aunt Sarah.

"What's that – a conundrum?" asked the housekeeper. "Don't bother me, child, with questions to-day. I've got too much on my mind."

"I guess," sighed Tess to Dot, "we never shall find out who she is."

"Don't mind," said the comforting Dorothy. "She gave you the list of sov-runs. You've got them, anyhow."

"But I do mind!" declared Tess. "She is just one of the nicest ladies I ever met. Of course I want – "

But who is this bursting into the dining room like a young cyclone, and late to lunch? "Oh, Agnes! you are late again," said Ruth, admonishingly. Aunt Sarah glared at the newcomer, while Mrs. MacCall said:

"You come pretty near not getting anything more than cold pieces, child."

All their wrath was turned, however, by Agnes' smile – and her beauty. Nobody – not even Aunt Sarah Maltby – could retain a scowl and still look at Agnes Kenway, plump and pretty, and brown from the sea air and sun. Naturally she was light, blue-eyed and with golden-yellow hair. The hair was sunburned now and her round cheeks were as brown as fall leaves in the woods.

"Oh, dear! I couldn't really help being late," she said, dropping into the seat Uncle Rufus pulled out for her. The old darkey began at once heaping her plate with tidbits. He all but worshipped Ruth; but Agnes he petted and spoiled.

"I couldn't help being late," she repeated. "What do you think, Ruth? Eva Larry was just telling me at the front gate that Mr. Marks has threatened to forfeit all the basket ball games our team won in the half-series last spring against the other teams of the Milton County League, and will refuse to let us play the series out this fall. Isn't that awful?"

"I don't know," said Ruth, placidly; she was not a basket ball enthusiast herself. But Agnes had secured a place on the first team of the Milton Schools a few weeks before the June closing. She was athletic, and, although only in the grammar grade then, was big and strong for her age.

"I don't know just how awful it is," repeated the oldest sister. "What have you all done that the principal should make that ruling?"

"Goodness knows!" wailed Agnes. "I'm sure I haven't done anything."

"Of course you haven't, Aggie," put in Dot, warmly. "You never do!"

This made the family laugh. Dot's loyalty to Agnes was really phenomenal. No matter what Agnes did, it must be all right in the little one's eyes.

"Well, I don't care," repeated Dot, sturdily, "Agnes is awful good! 'Course, not the same goodness as Ruthie; but I know she doesn't break any school rules. And she knows a lot!"

"I wish she knew who my gray lady is," put in Tess, rather complainingly.

"What gray lady?" demanded Agnes, quickly.

Dot, the voluble, got ahead of her sister in this explanation. "She isn't the Salvation Army, nor she isn't a deaconess like Mrs. Mumford had come to see her; but she's something awfully religious, I know."

Tess managed to tell again about the sovereigns of England, too.

"Oh, I know whom you mean," Agnes said briskly. "I saw her with you up on the Parade. Eva Larry told me she was the matron of the Women's and Children's Hospital – and they're going to shut it up."

"The child means Mrs. Eland," said Mrs. MacCall, interestedly. "She is a splendid woman and that hospital is doing a great work. You don't mean they are really going to close it, Agnes?"

"So Eva says. They have to. There are no funds, and two or three rich people who used to help them every year have died without leaving the hospital any legacy. Mrs. Eland doesn't know what will become of her now. She's been matron and acting superintendent ever since the hospital was opened, five years ago. Dr. Forsyth is the head visiting physician."

"Mercy, child!" gasped Ruth. "Where do you pick up so much gossip?"

"Eva Larry has been here," said Tess, soberly. "And, you know, she's a fluid talker. You said so yourself, Ruthie."

"Fluent! fluent!" gasped Agnes. "And Eva always does have the news."

"She is growing up to be a second Miss Ann Titus," said Ruth drily. "And I think Tess got it about right. She is a fluid speaker. When Eva talks it is just like opening the spigot and letting the water run."

It was later, after lunch was over, and Tess and Dot had wandered into the garden with their dolls. Tess said, reflectively:

"I wish awfully we might help that Mrs. Eland. She's such a lovely lady. And I know the sovereigns of England half by heart already."

Dot was usually practical. "Let's gather her some apples and take them to her," she suggested.

"We-ell," said Tess, slowly. "That won't keep the hospital going, but maybe she likes apples."

"Who doesn't?" demanded Dot, stoutly. "Come on."

When they reached the fall pippin tree which, that year, was loaded with golden fruit, the two little girls were quite startled at what they saw.

"O-o-oh!" gasped Dot. "See Billy Bumps!"

"For pity's sake! what's he doing?" rejoined Tess, in amazement.

The old goat had the freedom of the yard, as the garden was shut away from him by a strong wire fence. He liked apples himself, did Billy Bumps, and perhaps he considered the bagful that Mr. Seneca Sprague had picked up and prepared to carry away, a direct poaching upon his preserves.

Mr. Sprague had reclined on the soft grass under the wide-spreading tree and filled his own stomach to repletion, as could be seen by the cores thrown out in a circle about him. Billy Bumps had approached, eyed the long hair of the "prophet" askance, and finally began to nibble.

The luxuriant growth of hair that the odd, old man had allowed to grow for years, seemed to attract Billy Bumps' palate. Mr. Seneca Sprague slept and Billy gently nibbled at the hair on one side of Seneca's head.

It was just at this moment that Tess and Dot spied the tableau. Billy Bumps browsing on Seneca Sprague's hair was a sight to startle and amaze anybody.

"O-o-oh!" gasped Dot again.

"Billy! you mustn't!" shrieked Tess, realizing that all of the "prophet's" hair was in danger, and fearing, perhaps, that, snake-like, Billy might be about gradually to draw the whole of Mr. Seneca Sprague within his capacious maw.

"Billy! stop!" cried both girls together.

At this moment Mr. Sprague awoke. Between the shrieking of the little girls and the activities of Mr. Sprague when he learned what was going on, Billy Bumps' banquet was quite spoiled.

"Get out, you beast!" shouted the "prophet," but using most unprophetical language. "Ow! ow! ouch!"

For Billy had no idea of losing what he had already masticated. He pulled so hard that he drew Mr. Sprague over on his back, where he lay with his legs kicking in the air, wild yells of surprise and pain issuing from him.

Over the fence at the rear of the Corner House premises bobbed a flaxen head, and a boyish voice shouted: "What's the matter, girls?"

"Oh, Neale O'Neil!" shrieked Dot. "Do come! Quick! Billy Bumps is eating up Mr. Sneaker Sp'ague – and he's beginning at his hair."