Poor Jim said nothing. He stood waiting with bowed head while she lavished her indignation upon him, and realizing, for the first, how great a part of a lonely old life even dumb animals may become. When, for want of breath, or further power to contemn, she sank back in her stoop chair, he turned to go, a dejected, disappointed creature that would have moved Mrs. Cecil's heart to pity, had she opened her eyes to look. But she had closed them in a sort of hopeless despair, and he had already retraced his footsteps some distance toward the outer road when there sounded upon the air that which sent her to her feet again – this time in wild delight – and arrested him where he stood.
At once, following those joyful barks, that both hearers would have recognized anywhere, came the leaping, springing dogs; dangling their broken chains and the freshly gnawed and broken ropes – with which old Ephraim had unwisely reckoned to restrain them from the sweets of a once tasted liberty.
But even amid her sudden rejoicing where had been profound sorrow, the doting mistress of the troublesome Great Danes felt a sharp tinge of jealousy.
"They're safe, the precious creatures! But – they went to that farm boy first!"
CHAPTER V
AN ACCIDENT AND AN APPARITION
The screams of Dorothy and Alfaretta brought Mrs. Chester hurrying back to them and as she saw what had happened her alarm increased, for it seemed impossible that a helpless person, like her husband, should go through such an accident and come out safe.
For a moment her strength left her and she turned giddy with fear, believing that she had brought her invalid here only to be killed. The next instant she was helping the girls to free themselves from the tangle of wheels, briars, and limbs; and then all three took hold of the heavy chair to lift it from the prostrate man.
"John! John! Are you alive? Speak – do speak if you love me!" cried poor mother Martha, frantic with anxiety.
But for a time, even after they had lifted him to the bank above, Mr. Chester lay still with closed eyes and no sign of life about him. There was a bruise upon his forehead where he had struck against a rock in falling; and, seeing him so motionless, poor Dorothy buried her face in her hands and sobbed aloud:
"Oh! I've killed him! I've killed my precious father!"
"There is a bridge across the ditch just yonder! – Why didn't you see it! How could you – " began Mrs. Chester; yet got no further in her up-braidings, for father John opened his eyes and looked confusedly about him.
Either the sound of voices or the liberal dash of cold water, which thoughtful Alfaretta had rushed away to bring and throw upon him, had restored him to consciousness, and his beclouded senses rapidly became normal. It had been a great shock but, more fortunately than his frightened wife at first dared to believe, there were no broken bones, and it was with intense thankfulness that she now picked up his crutches and handed them to him at his demand.
"Well, I reckon wooden feet are safest, after all! I've never – I'll never go without them. Good thing I brought them – No, thank you! Walking's good!" he cried, with all his usual spirit though in a weak voice.
They had managed to get the chair into position and found it as uninjured as its owner. A few scratches here and there marred the polish of the frame and one cushion had sustained an ugly rent. It had been a very expensive purchase for the donors and an ill-advised one. A lighter, cheaper chair would have been far more serviceable; and, as father John tried to steady himself upon his crutches, he regarded it with his familiar, whimsical smile that comforted them all more readily than words:
"The boys might as well have given me an automobile! Wouldn't have been much more clumsy – nor dangerous!" he declared, trying to swing himself forward from the spot where he stood, striving to steady himself upon his safer "wooden feet."
"O John! how can you joke? You might be – be dead!" wailed mother Martha, weeping and unnerved for the first time, now that all danger was past.
"And that's the best 'joke' of all. I might be but I'm not. So let's all heave – heave away! for that pleasant shore of a wide lounge and a – towel! With the best intentions – I've been ducked pretty wet!"
"That was my fault! I'm awful sorry but – but – that time John Babcock he fell off the barn roof ma she flung a whole pail of water right out the rain-barrel onto him and that brung him to quicker'n scat. So I remembered and I'm real sorry now," explained Alfaretta, more abashed than ordinarily: and in her own heart feeling that the guilt of carelessness which caused the accident had been more hers than Dorothy's. "And nobody needn't scold Dolly C. 'Cause she didn't know about the bridge over an' I did, and – "
"No, no! My fault, my very own!" interposed Dorothy hastily.
"Let nobody blame nobody! All's well that ends well! Alfaretta mustn't regret her serviceable memory nor my drenching, for she's a wise little maid and I owe my 'coming to,' to her 'remembering.' As for you, Dolly darling, let me see another tear in your eye and I will 'scold' in earnest. Now, Martha, wife, I'll give it up. I'm rather shaky on my pins yet and the chair it must be, if I'm to put myself in connection with that lounge. I shan't need the towel after all. I've just let myself 'dreen,' as my girl used to do with the dishes, sometimes!"
He talked so cheerily and so naturally that he almost deceived them into believing that he was not a whit the worse for his tumble, and as they helped him to be seated and began to push him up the slope toward the cottage, he whistled as merrily as he had used to do upon his postal route.
"And you ain't goin' to the gold mine after all?" asked Alfy, much disappointed. It was a spot she had hitherto shunned on account of its ghostly reputation, but was eager to visit now in company with these owners of it, who scoffed at the "haunt." She wanted to show them she was right and see what they would say then.
"Gold mine? Trash! If there had been such a thing on this farm, a man as clever as my uncle Simon Waterman would have used some of the 'gold' to keep things in better shape. I don't want to hear any more of that nonsense, nor to have you, Dorothy, go searching for the place. Our first trip to hunt for gold has been a lesson to us all," said mother Martha, with such sharpness that Alfaretta stared and the others, who knew her better, realized that this was a time to keep silence.
More than once that day was the good housewife tempted to send the three visiting Babcocks home, but was too courteous to do so. She longed to have her daughter to herself, and to discuss with her not only the happenings of the past but plans for the future. Besides this desire, she also saw, at last, how badly shaken by his fall her husband was and that he needed perfect quiet – a thing impossible to procure with Alfaretta Babcock in the cottage.
However, the day wore away at length. The girl showed herself as useful in the dinner-getting and clearing away as she had done at breakfast time; also, she and her sisters brought to it as keen an appetite, so that, after all, the clearing away was not so great a matter as might be.
Dorothy kept the smaller girls out of doors, helping them to make a playhouse with bits of stones, to stock it with broken crockery and holly-hock dolls, and to entrance them with her store of fairy tales to such a degree that Baretta decided:
"I'm comin' again, Dorothy Chester. I'm comin' ever' single day they is."
"Oh, no! You mustn't do that!" gasped the surprised young hostess. "I will have to work a great deal to help my mother and I shan't have time for visiting."
"Me come, too, Do'thy Chetter," lisped Claretta. "Me like playhouth futh-rate. Me come to-mowwow day, maybe."
Dorothy said no more, but found a way to end their plans by getting a book for herself, and becoming so absorbed in it that they ceased to find her interesting and wandered off by themselves to rummage in the old barn; and, finally, to grow so tired of the whole place that they began to howl with homesickness.
Dorothy let them howl. She had recently been promoted to the reading of Dickens, and enthralled by the adventures of Barnaby Rudge she had wandered far in spirit from that mountain farm and the disgruntled Babcocks. Curled up on the grass beneath a low-branched tree she forgot everything, and for a long time knew nothing of what went on about her.
Meantime, to keep Alfaretta's tongue beyond reach of her husband's ears, Mrs. Chester had gone down into the cellar of the cottage which, her visitor informed her, had once been the "dairy." Until now, since her coming to Skyrie, the housemistress had occupied herself only in getting the upper rooms cleaned and furnished with such of her belongings as she had brought with her, and in attendance upon father John. She had not attempted any real farm work, though she had listened to his plans with patient unbelief in his power to accomplish any of them.
"If Dorothy should be found," had been his own conclusion of all his schemes, during the time of their uncertainty concerning her; and afterward, when news of her safety and early coming had reached them, he merely changed this form to: "Now that Dorothy is found."
Everything had its beginning and end in "Dorothy." For her the garden was to be made, especially the flower beds in it; the farm rescued from its neglected condition and made a well-paying one, that Dorothy might be educated; and because of Dorothy's love of nature the whole property must be rendered delightfully picturesque.
Now Dorothy had really come; and, unfortunately, as Mrs. Chester expressed it:
"I can see to the bottom of our pocket-book, John dear, and it's not very deep down. Plans and talk are nice but it takes money to carry them out. As for your doing any real work yourself, you can't till you get well. 'Twould only hinder your doing so if you tried. We'll have to hire a man to work the ground for us and clear it of weeds. If we can get him to do it 'on shares,' so much the better; if he won't do that – Oh! hum! To think of folks having more dollars than they can spend and we just enough to starve on!"
This talk had been on that very day before, while they sat impatiently awaiting her arrival, and it had made John Chester wince. While his life had been in danger, even during all their time of doubt concerning their adopted child, Martha had been gentleness and hopefulness indeed. She had seemed to assume his nature and he hers: but now that their more serious fears were removed, each had returned to his own again; she become once more a fretter over trifles and he a jester at them.
"Don't say that, dear wife. I don't believe we will starve; or that we'll have to beg the superfluous dollars of other people," he had answered, hiding his regret for his own lost health and comfortable salary.
But the much-tried lady was on the highroad toward trouble-borrowing and bound to reach her end.
"I might as well say it as think it, John. I never was one to keep things to myself that concern us both, as you did all that time you knew you was going lame and never told me. Besides the man, we must have a horse, or two of them. Maybe mules would come cheaper, if they have 'em around here. We'll have to get a cow, of course. Milk and butter save a lot of butcher stuff. Then we must get a pig. The pig will eat up the sour milk left after the butter's made – "
"My dear, don't let him eat up the buttermilk, too! Save that for Dorothy and me, please. Remember how the little darling used to coax for a nickel to run to the 'corner' and buy a quart of it, when we'd been digging extra hard in our pretty yard. And don't forget, in your financial reckonings, to leave us a few cents to buy roses with. I've been thinking how well some climbing 'Clothilde Souperts' would look, trained against that barn wall, with, maybe, a row of crimson 'Jacks,' or 'Rohans' in front. Dorothy would like that, I guess. I must send for a new lot of florists' catalogues, since you didn't bring my old ones."
"I hadn't room; and I hope you won't. We've not one cent to waste on plants, let alone dollars. Besides, once you and Dorothy get your heads together over one those books you want all that's in it, from cover to cover. There's things I want, too, but I put temptation behind me. The whole farm's run to weeds and posies, anyhow. No need to buy more."
Father John had thought it wise to change the subject. Martha was the best of wives, but there were some things in which she failed to sympathize. He therefore remarked, what he honestly believed:
"I think it's wonderful, little woman, how you can remember so much about farming, when you haven't lived on one since you were a child."
"Children remember better than grown folks. I don't forget how I used to have to churn in a dash-churn, till my arms ached fit to drop off. And I learned to milk till I could finish one cow in a few minutes; but it nearly broke my fingers in two, at first. I wonder if I can milk now! I'll have to try, anyway, soon as we get the cow. I guess you'd better write an advertisement for the Local News, and I'll go to Mrs. Calvert's place and ask her coachman to post it when he goes down the mountains to meet the folks. Just to think we shall have our blessed child this very night before we sleep!" ended the housemistress, with a return of her good spirits.
Father John laughed with almost boyish gayety. Dorothy was coming! Everything would be right. So he hobbled across to his own old desk which Martha had placed in the cheeriest corner of the room assigned to him, looking back over his shoulder to inquire:
"Shall it be for a cow, a horse, or that milk-saving pig? Or all three at one fell swoop? Must I say second-hand or first-class? I never lived on a farm, you know, and enjoyed your advantages of knowledge: and, by the way, what will we do with the creatures when we get them? I haven't been into that barn yet, but it looks shaky."
"John Chester! Folks don't keep pigs in their barns! They keep them in pens. Even an ex-postman ought to know enough for that. And make the thing short. The printers charge so much a word, remember."
"All right. 'Brevity is the soul of wit.' I'll condense."
Whistling over his task, Mr. Chester soon evolved the following "Want Ad.":
"Immediate. Pig. Cow. Horse. Skyrie."
This effusion, over which he chuckled considerably, he neatly folded and addressed to the publisher of the local newspaper and left on his desk for his wife to read, then hobbled back to his bed to sleep away the time till Dorothy came, if he could thus calm his happy excitement. But it never entered his mind that his careful wife would not read and reconstruct the advertisement before she dispatched it to its destination.
However, this she did not do. She simply sealed and delivered it to old Ephraim, just as he was on the point of starting for his mistress at the Landing: and the result of its prompt appearance in the weekly sheet, issued the next morning, was not just what either of the Chesters would have desired.
After all, Alfaretta was good company down in that old cellar-dairy, poking into things, explaining the probable usage of much that Martha did not understand. For instance:
"That there great big wooden thing in the corner's a dog-churn. Ma says 'twas one more o' old Si Waterman's crazy kinks. He had the biggest kind of a dog an' used to make him do his churnin'. Used to try, anyhow. See? This great barrel-like thing is the churn. That's the treadmill 'Hendrick Hudson' – that was the dog's name – had to walk on. Step, step, step! an' never get through! Ma says 'twas no wonder the creatur' 'd run away an' hide in the woods soon's churnin' days come round. He knew when Tuesday an' Friday was just as well as folks. Then old Si he'd spend the whole mornin' chasing 'Hudson' – he was named after the river or something – from Pontius to Pilate; an' when he'd catch him, Si'd be a good deal more tuckered out an' if he'd done his churnin' himself."
Martha laughed, and rolling the big, barrel-churn upon its side was more than delighted to see it fall apart, useless.
"How could he ever get cream enough to fill such a thing? Or enough water to keep it clean? And look, Alfy! what a perfect rat-hole of dirt and rubbish is under it. That old dog-churn must come down first thing. I've a notion to take that rusty ax yonder and knock it to pieces myself," she remarked and turned her back for a moment, to examine the other portions of her future dairy.
Now good-natured Alfaretta was nothing if not helpful, and quite human enough to enjoy smashing something. Before Mrs. Chester could turn around, the girl had caught up the ax and with one vigorous blow from her strong arm sent the dog-churn, already tumbling to pieces with age, with a deafening rattle down upon the stone floor.
The sound startled John Chester from his restful nap, silenced the outcries of the little Babcocks, and sent Dorothy to her feet, in frightened bewilderment. For there before her, in the flesh, stood the hero of the very book she dropped as she sprang up – Barnaby Rudge himself!
CHAPTER VI
MORE PECULIAR VISITORS
"Barnaby Rudge! Fiddlesticks! That ain't his name nor nothing like it. He's Peter Piper. He's out the poorhouse or something. He ain't like other folks. He's crazy, or silly-witted, or somethin'. How-de-do, Peter?" said Alfaretta, as Dorothy, closely followed by the little Babcocks and the "apparition" himself, dashed down into the dust-clouded dairy where Mrs. Chester stood still, gazing in bewilderment at the demolished dog-churn.
Anybody might have easily been startled by the appearance of the unfortunate creature who had, also, come into the cellar; especially a girl whose head was already filled with the image of another storied "natural," as Dorothy's was. He was tall and gaunt, with an unnaturally white face and a mass of hair almost as white in color, though not from age. His narrow, receding forehead was topped by a hat bestowed upon him by some parading political band of the autumn previous, and was gay with red cock feathers and a glittering buckle polished to the last degree. His clothing was also, in part, that of a parader: a brilliant-hued coat worn over his ordinary faded suit of denim. In one hand he carried the same burnt-out torch bestowed upon him with his hat, and by the other he led a cow that might once have been a calf. He did not speak, though he evidently heard and understood Alfaretta's greeting, for he turned his protruding eyes from Dorothy to her and answered by a foolish smile.
"Why, Peter Piper, what you bringin' old Brindle up here for? Who told you to?"
Again Peter grinned and answered nothing, but he turned his gaze from Alfaretta to Mr. Chester, who had come to the window above, and stared until the gentleman fidgeted and broke the spell by saying:
"Good-afternoon, lad. 'Peter Piper,' are you? Well, I'm glad to see you;" then added in a voice only Dorothy, who had run in to stand beside him, could overhear. "Wonder if he's any relation to the man who pricked his fingers picking pickled peppers!"
"Looks as if he might be, doesn't he? Only, Dad, I feel so sorry for him."
"Oh! I'm sorry for him, too. I am sincerely. But – I'm a trifle sorry for myself, as well. I wonder – is this the beginning of things! What a power the press certainly is, if one little advertisement – Why, Martha, Martha! Come up here, please! Come right away."
Mrs. Chester promptly obeyed, surprised by the mingled mirth and vexation expressed by her husband's face. And came not only Martha but the trio of Babcocks, behind her. At which father John frowned and observed:
"I was speaking to Mrs. Chester."
"Yes, I heard you," answered Alfaretta, coolly: at which all the Chesters laughed, and she joined heartily in, not dreaming that what her host afterwards called her "perfect ease of manner" was the cause of the fun.
"Well, John, what is it? You seemed to want me."
"My dear, I always do. Never more than now when I wish you to tell me – Did you rewrite that advertisement sent to the local newspaper yesterday?"
"Rewrite it? No, indeed. Why should I? You understand such things better than I. So I just sealed it, with money inside to pay – By the way, there should be considerable change due us. I don't believe one advertisement in a country paper would cost a whole dollar: do you?"
Mr. Chester laughed now in earnest.
"No, I do not. Not that I sent, anyway. Martha, why didn't you look? Why didn't you? My dear, you wanted it brief and I made it so. But if such brevity brings such an answer, so soon, why – it will fairly rain cows before we're many hours older. Cows! And horses! And pigs! But worst of all, I've made the new Skyrie folks ridiculous in the eyes of their future townsmen."
"Tell it, John. Tell it exactly as you wrote it."
So he did; and though the lady was dismayed she couldn't help smiling under her frown, and it was a momentary relief to hear Alfaretta calmly explaining:
"That there cow don't belong to nobody. All her folks are dead. I mean all the folks she belonged to. She's a regular pest, ma says, an' 'twould be a real kindness to kill her. But nobody won't. She's too old for beef, or the butcher would; and she makes out to get her livin' without botherin' nobody much. She goes onto folkses' lawns an' nibbles till she's driv' off – summer times an' in winter, why 'most anybody 't has a barnyard and fodder give her a little. Pa he says she's a relict of a glorious past and is due her keep from a – a kermune – ity she's kep' in hot water as many years as she has. Ma she says she can recollect that old Brindle ever since she was a little girl, an' that cow has got more folks into lawsuits than any other creatur', beast or human, in Riverside villages – Upper or Lower.
"Last one took her in an' done for her was Seth Winters, that lives up-mounting here, an' goes by the name o' 'Learned Blacksmith.' He's another crank; but ma she says he's a practical Nanarchist, 'cause he lives up to his idees. He's rich, or he was; but he's give his money away an' just lives in his old shop an' the woods, same as poor folks. He treats Peter Piper same as he does old Brindle. Keeps 'em both to his place, if they want to stay; an' don't hinder 'em none when they clear out. Pa an' him both say how 'freedom' is the 'herintage' of every livin' thing, an' they both take it. Ma she says there's consid'able difference in their ways, though; 'cause Seth he works, constant, an' pa he never does a stroke. Say, Peter, did Seth Winters send you an' Brindle up here?"
Peter did not answer. As if the question had roused some unsettled matter in his clouded mind, he frowned, studied the earth at his feet, and slowly walked away. A pitiable object in the sunset of that fair summer day, with his bedraggled scarlet feathers, and his scarlet leather uniform that must have been uncomfortably burdensome in the heat.
But Brindle tarried behind and foraged for her supper by nibbling the grass from the overgrown dooryard.
Suddenly, remembered Alfaretta:
"Ma she said I was to come home in time to get the cows in from pasture and milk 'em. She 'lowed she wouldn't get back up-mounting till real dark: 'cause she was goin' to stop all along the road, and get all the news she could an' tell what she knows, back. Ma she's a powerful hand to know what's doin', 'round. So, Baretta Babcock! Claretta Babcock! Put your toes together; even now, an' make your manners pretty, like I showed you teacher learned me, and say good-by."
With that the amusing girl drew herself up to her tallest, squared her own bare feet upon a seam of the carpet, and bent her body forward with the stiffest of bows. Then she took a hand of each little sister, and said – with more courtesy than some better trained children might have shown:
"I've had a real nice visit, Mis' Chester, an' I enjoyed my victuals. I'll come again an' you must let Dorothy C. come to my house. I'm sorry I tipped Mr. Chester into the ditch an' that I couldn't done more toward cleanin' up that cellar that I did. Good-night. I hope you'll all have nice dreams. Too bad Peter Piper went off mad, but he'll get over it. Good-night. Come, children, come."
So the three Babcocks departed, and the silence which succeeded her deluge of words was soothing to her hosts beyond expression. They sat long on the west veranda of the little cottage, resting and delighting in the beauty of nature and in the presence of each other. Then Dorothy slipped away and after a little absence returned with a tray of bread and butter, a big pitcher of milk, and the jar of honey Mrs. Calvert had sent.
"Bread and honey! Fare fit for a prince!" cried father John, as the food appeared. "And princes, indeed, we are to be able to sit and feast upon it with all this glorious prospect spread out before us."
He seemed to have entirely recovered from the shock of his fall and on his fine face was a look of deep content. He had suffered much and he must still so suffer – both pain of body and of mind. Poverty was his, and worse – it was the lot of his dear ones, also. To live at all, he must run in debt; and to his uprightness debt seemed little less than a crime.
However, the present was theirs. They had no immediate needs; there was food for the morrow, and more; and leaning back in the old rocker Martha brought for him, he let his fancy picture what Skyrie should be – "Some time, 'when my ship comes in'! Meanwhile – Sing to us, Dolly darling! I hear a whip-poor-will away off somewhere in the distance, and it's too mournful a sound for my mood. Sing the gayest, merriest songs you know; and, Martha dear, please do let Dorothy bring another rocker for yourself. Don't sit on that hard bench, but just indulge yourself in comfort for once."
When they were quite settled again Dorothy sang; and in listening to her clear young voice both her parents felt their spirits soothed till they almost forgot all care. Indeed, it seemed a scene upon which nothing sordid nor evil would dare enter; yet, just as the singer uttered the last note of her father's beloved "Annie Laurie," there sounded upon the stone pathway below a heavy footstep and, immediately thereafter, an impatient pounding upon the kitchen door.
Since their arrival at Skyrie none of their few visitors had called so late in the day as this, and it was with a real foreboding that Mrs. Chester rose and went to answer the summons. At a nod from her father, Dorothy followed the housemistress and saw, standing on the threshold, a rather rough-looking man, whose impatience suddenly gave place to hesitation at sight of the pair before him.
"Good-evening," said Martha, politely, though still surprised. Then, as he did not at once reply and she remembered the absurd advertisement in the Local, she asked: "Did you come to see about work, or selling us a horse, or anything?"
"H'm'm. A – Ahem. No, ma'am. 'Twasn't no horse errand brought me, this time, though I might admit I be ruther in the horse-trade myself, being's I keep livery in Lower village. 'Twas a dog – a couple of dogs – sent me away up-mounting, this time o' day, a-foot, too, 'cause all my critters have been out so long they wasn't fit to ride nor drive, neither. Been two summer-boarder picnics, to-day, an' that took 'em. 'Shoemakers go barefoot,' is the old sayin', and might as well be 't liverymen use shanks-mares. I – "
By this time the housemistress had perceived that though the man was rough in appearance he was not unkindly in manner and that he was reluctant to disclose his errand. Also, if he had walked up the mountain he must be tired, indeed; so she fetched a chair and offered it, but only to have the courtesy declined:
"Thank ye, ma'am, but I – I guess you won't care to have me sit when I've told my job. 'Tain't to say a pleasant one but – Well, I'm the constable of Lower Riverside, and I've come to serve this summonses on that there little girl o' yourn. You must see to it that she's on hand at Seth Winterses' blacksmith shop an' justice's office, to-morrow morning at ten o'clock sharp. Here, ma'am, is the writ of subpœny 't calls for her to be a witness in a case of assault an' battery. Leastwise, to bein' known to the critters what assaulted and battered."
Before Mrs. Chester could really comprehend what he was saying or doing, the man had thrust a paper into her hand, and had vanished. He had never performed an official act of which he was more ashamed; nor can words properly express her amazement.