“What? You boys the dinner cook?”
They nodded vigorously.
“And it will spoil if you don’t hasten,” Max continued. “You said you’d be here in two hours. We set the time half an hour later; but you are late and you have just seven minutes in which to make your toilet.”
Laughing and happy, she went upstairs; and they could hear her stepping about overhead, pulling out drawers, opening doors, and making a racket in more rooms than one. When she entered the sitting room again she was only a minute late and was in evening dress.
She was in evening dress
She was in evening dress
Both boys started. For all Max had told Sydney so much, and had realized more, even he was not prepared for the grand dame who swept in upon them, bowing low to both. Her fine white skin and plump neck, freed from the stiff collar she usually wore, gave her, as with all stout women, a stateliness the boys had little suspected; and the sweeping train added to this effect. The high-piled hair, gray but wavingand beautiful, her dark blue eyes that could be merry, tender, scornful, or stern, all her kind features they knew so well, took on an air that made her for an instant almost a stranger.
“In honor of my dear young men, Sydney and Max, I have dressed for dinner.”
Sydney did not know that her elegant finery, shipped from Germany, was old in style. Max knew, but didn’t care, since it was rich and becoming.
“Thank you, dear Mrs. Schmitz. Madame, dinner is served.”
Sydney merely stared. Max’s “thank you” was spoken as a most loving son might greet his mother; but he wore an apron and carried a napkin on his arm; and his “dinner is served,” was in the tone of the most obsequious servant.
They went out in great state, Sydney giving his arm, and Max throwing open the door, drawing the chair for Madame and, when he had seated her, standing stiffly behind her.
Before she could touch her soup Sydney brought a jar of marmalade, insisting that she should try it at once.
“No, no! Not before soup!” Max objected, forgetting his “place” as waiter. “Take your sweets away till dessert.”
“They’re his sweets too. It’s really a three-partner job,” Sydney explained.
Mrs. Schmitz pronounced it excellent with such fervor that both boys were convinced. She never told them that it was “clear as mud.” How could it be otherwise when Max had “stirred it to death”?
With great merriment, and in several courses, the dinner passed. Max insisted on serving in great style because he knew how it should be done; but she blighted his vanity by commanding him to his own seat while they ate. It was really a success. She praised everything, entering into their fun; and the boys, taught by her absence, felt a deeper joy in all she did, realizing gratefullyhow much a part of her home life she considered them.
A few days after this came a telephone summons from Bess Carter for Max to bring his violin and music. There was an invitation for Sydney also, but he refused—so curtly that Max, who, though leaving the room, could not help hearing it, was out of patience with him. And when he came home after an evening of music and joy he painted it in extravagant fashion, intending to punish Sydney for slighting Miss Carter. He never dreamed he was stirring an already hot-burning fire in Sydney’s heart.
It was by no means love for Bess that seethed in his veins. Neither was it any passion that Sydney could recognize and analyze. It was a savage sort of resentment that another should be able to please, not only Bess, but all, girls and boys; that Max should be able to say with ease the most appropriate and interestingthings, while he, Sydney, the tongue-tied, could merely mumble. That Max could make exquisite music, do the gallant thing at the right moment, and wear his clothes as if they were king’s ermine—it was all this that made the less gifted, untaught waif of a boy—boy yet though a man in size—rage at himself and hate everyone, Max in particular.
Twice more Max came home radiant, the second time full of plans for more music through that part of the vacation when Bess should be in town, and afterward when both should be in the university. For Max, the housebreaker, had taken a new hold on life, had determined to be a man in the world of best men. Mrs. Schmitz had resurrected his ambition.
Then the blow fell.
It was the day when Max was to be voted into the Fussers Club. He sat waiting in the anteroom, feeling keenly the air of expectation, a thrilling sense of important things impending. He wondered if some disturbance was going on in the assembly room of the club; speculated vaguely upon what part in the fortunes of the organization he might be called to play. Whatever it might be, he would not shirk.
In a corner two young men were evidently though noiselessly quarreling. Presently Walter Buckman and Billy Bennett came from the club room and joined the others, when the altercation became more violent. Short disjointed remarks floated out to the listeners “—a chance,” from Billy; and “—any such example,” from Walter.
“What are they talking about?” Max asked one standing near him, noting that with each moment the number in the room increased.
“That is the investigating committee.”
“Do they often disagree so?”
“No. And today there’s only one candidate; there must be something doing.” The speaker moved quickly away.
Max noticed this, and Walter’s increasing vehemence; and instantly a premonition of disaster swept him like a cold, wet blast.
A premonition of disaster swept him
A premonition of disaster swept him
“I tell you I won’t stand for any thieves being voted into the Fussers,” Walter shouted, heedless of a sibilant “Hush!” from one of the others.
“I’ll stake my honor he’s all right,” Billy Bennett shouted back, and Max silently blessed him for those words.
Max understood—saw it all as plain as the sum of two and two. This was the way Walter Buckman had taken to “get even.” He hadurged Reed Hathaway to present Max’s name, had “talked up” the candidate right and left, and had even told Billy, who had repeated it to Max, that the proposed member would lend more style and more genius to the club than any ten previous members.
Now Max knew these honeyed praises were only for the purpose of attracting attention, for filling the room with the curious, so that Walter’s bomb would have an audience.
Max decided to hurry the explosion. He stepped forward and faced the committee in the corner. “I understand that my name is the only one under consideration, and that the investigating committee is embarrassed concerning it. I withdraw my name as a candidate for the Fussers Club.” He bowed and was turning away when Walter Buckman strode into the middle of the room with an air of importance, exclaiming:
“No, sir! You don’t walk off with that airof injured innocence. Right here and now I brand you as a thief, Max Ball!”
Max would have replied but a great hubbub rose. He had won friends among pupils and teachers; and those who best knew Walter were sure there was some malevolence back of this attack, and they stood for fair play. Walter’s father, however, was a wealthy business man of large power in the city and this had weight with the truculent ones, making a following for the son as well as the father.
But Billy Bennett cared nothing at all for Buckman, senior or junior, when fair play was at stake; nor even for the much admired magnate, Mr. Smith, May Nell’s father. “I protest,” he cried. “This accusation is unworthy a student. No matter how incriminating circumstances may appear, there is always a chance that they may not be true. Walter Buckman, I want you to retract that statement.” All knew Billy was recalling his own bitter experience of the year beforewhen Jim Barney trapped him into appearing as a thief.
“I retract nothing!” Walter shouted vindictively. “I say that last winter he robbed our ice box; and I dare him to deny it.”
Pale as ever he would be in his coffin, Max stepped to the center of the room, looked about him, and said in a low, steady voice, “Gentlemen, it is true. I only hope that if such a great temptation—such a great need should come to any one here he will have more strength than I had to resist it.”
He bowed comprehensively, and before any of them could recover from amazement, was gone.
It took minutes for even quick-witted Billy to comprehend what had really happened; and still more time to think what to do next. He voiced the opinion of all the more thoughtful ones there when he said, “Fellows, I believe we’ve made the mistake of our lives.”
“We?” Sis Jones called out. “It’s onlyBuckman here. He’s the spot-light kicker. We had a chance to help a good man to success, and Buckman’s kicked him out of the procession.”
“So? You stand for approving thieves, I suppose,” Walter sneered.
“Whatever he’s done must have been because of some terrible reason,” Billy averred. “Looking into his face when he said those last words, one must believe in him.”
“Well, you may. I don’t. I know about him; and those who stand for that fellow may cut my acquaintance after this.” Walter strode off, with a large number obsequiously accompanying him.
“Well, wouldn’t that totter you?” Billy turned to “Sis.”
“We must kick in for Max good and plenty,” “Sis” flashed. “He’s good meat clear through to the bone.”
A little longer they talked, trying to think out some way to save Max from his enemy.
“Do you suppose he was ever really hungry—desperately so?” “Sis” asked with awe.
“Gee! I’ve been hungry enough between sunrise and sunset to eat an ice box whole.”
“So have I. Suppose a fellow had no father and no money, and had—gone—two days, say, unfed?”
Billy nodded violently. Words could not express such a contingency.
“I’m going right out to see Mrs. Schmitz. She and Mumps and I together surely can cook up some scheme to put Max to the good again. We’ll enlist Bess and May Nell and you and Redtop—Oh, I know, I’ll get Cousin Hec to give some sort of swell function for Max, show off his music; invite all the bang-ups, and Walter Buckman and his crowd, too—”
“Bully! Walter’s too much of a snob to slight the Prices or Hec’s gang; and if Walter goes he’ll have to swallow Max whole and shut off his gab.”
Billy started away to see Sydney. He was detained by unexpected duties however, and it was an hour after the explosion at school before he arrived to find his friends in the greatest excitement.
“He iss gone!” Mrs. Schmitz burst out with no other greeting, as Billy appeared at the open door. “Mine poor boy! The world kicks him down already.”
“And it’s my fault,” Sydney added gloomily.
“How’s that?” Billy asked, mystified.
“Read you this.” Mrs. Schmitz thrust a letter into his hand. “A messenger brings it but this minute.”
With clumsy fingers Billy unfolded the sheet and read:
Dear Mrs. Schmitz, my Second Mother:The boys found me out and exposed me. I could not deny the charge, and explanations would have been useless.I must go away and begin all over again where no one knows me. But don’t worry about me. Wherever I am I shall not shame you. If I can’t earn food I shall not steal,but starve as quietly as I may. Yet I have a feeling that somewhere I shall make good; I owe that to you.I shall love you and Sydney always. This is good-by to you both.Max.
Dear Mrs. Schmitz, my Second Mother:
The boys found me out and exposed me. I could not deny the charge, and explanations would have been useless.
I must go away and begin all over again where no one knows me. But don’t worry about me. Wherever I am I shall not shame you. If I can’t earn food I shall not steal,but starve as quietly as I may. Yet I have a feeling that somewhere I shall make good; I owe that to you.
I shall love you and Sydney always. This is good-by to you both.
Max.
Billy stared at the others over the paper, and for a moment the room was quite still.
Mrs. Schmitz was in a brown study. Poor Sydney’s head was bowed, his face dark with self-accusation. The clock ticked noisily, and a proud rooster across the street, adding his voice to that of a laying hen, cackled with the vigor of a dozen cocks, Billy thought. From a spring-fed, marshy lot beyond, a bullfrog croaked suddenly. These sounds, usually unheeded, now thrust themselves upon Billy’s attention with insistence and annoyance.
“This will throw out the class play,” he said abruptly.
“That’s no great matter. You can alter it.”
Billy recognized Sydney’s impatience. “Itismatter. I’ve built the whole play with Maxin view for the leading character; and you to play up to him. His violin, too—why, there’s no one in the world but him to fit in right and do the part.”
“Write another play then,” Sydney exclaimed irritably.
Billy, not knowing the cause of Sydney’s impatience, turned in despair to Mrs. Schmitz. “Write a three-act play and coach it, in less than two months—and keep my place in class. And I’m expected with the play to win out for the Fifth Avenue High on the literary contest. Mumps! It beats the school! Don’t you see? If we don’t find Max we lose to one of the five other Highs; don’t you see?”
Billy probably did not know it, but he came as near having tears in his voice as a deep-voiced young man with some pride can come and not really sob.
This added to Mrs. Schmitz’s own zeal. She had been thinking to some purpose. “We shallfind him! Soon! He shall play—save your drama!” She started up.
“I’m the one. It’s up to me to do the trick. I wish I could see how.” Sydney clenched his hands harder, and his perplexed scowl grew deeper.
“I’ll tell you—I’ll advertise.”
Then Sydney astonished them by making the longest speech they had ever heard from him. “This job of finding Max is mine. If I hadn’t been yellow clean through I’d have been there in the anteroom when Walter Buckman played his mean trick; been there to hit back, to come out with Max, to make him come home with me. Five minutes with you, Mrs. Schmitz, would have put him steady again. He’s no coward, but he feels things a lot—his skin’s thinner than my thick hide, and—”
“Stop! You shall not call mine Seedney names.”
He nodded grimly and continued. “But Iwas jealous of him, that’s what. Jealous from that first night when you put him in the best room, Mrs. Schmitz. Even after you talked it out of me the day you gave me my new room, and I thought I had the little deev killed and buried for good, he came to life like a cat on one of her nine laps. I hated Max because everything he did was fine. He could please everybody, play, do things right the first time—Oh, it’s no use talking about that any more. I’ve got to do the fair thing now—find him, find him!”
“We’ll do it. We’ll advertise,” Mrs. Schmitz declared again.
“There’s danger he won’t read the papers. Wouldn’t a detective be better?”
“Gee! That’ll be the trick!” Billy approved; “but it will take a lot of money.”
“I’ll find that money!” Mrs. Schmitz offered quickly.
“I’ll pay it back if it takes me years to earnit. And I’ll never go inside the Fifth Avenue High again till Max goes with me.” Sydney straightened with a decision new to Billy. It seemed as if he had in a moment taken up a great burden that he would carry to success or die in the attempt.
Mrs. Schmitz stood beside him and patted his arm. “Seedney, that leetle yeller fellow iss good and dead now already. He never again squeaks. Now I will go mit you to find—”
He faced her with determination. “No, Mrs. Schmitz, I must do this alone—if I can. Let me take my own way for three days. If the detective—if I learn nothing then I will ask you—”
“Me, too, Mumps!” Billy flung in.
“Yes, both of you. Max had no money to speak of; I happened to see his purse when he paid his fare this morning; there was only a little small change. He can’t go far on that.”
“No. And while you’re hunting him I’lltalk things over with mother and sister, the quartette and the bunch; and when Max returns we’ll all camp on his trail, so that no matter what the Buckman crowd does, Max will feel he has a jolly good gang behind him.”
“Goot! That’s right, Billy. The friends that beliefs in you before you prove out are worth having. After you are successful you don’t need ’em. Comes so many then they are in the way.”
Sydney left them and went down town, going first to Mr. Streeter, and laying the whole case before him, not sparing himself.
His faith was warranted, for Mr. Streeter had not befriended many boys in trouble without coming well in touch with the machinery of the law. He knew the best detective, and went with Sydney to find him. This man had more than once successfully run down a boy for this kind friend of boys.
Sydney told his story and answered manyquestions; and when the search had been thus launched, he wandered about, not knowing just what to do next. At a busy corner he was recalled from a brown study by a familiar greeting, “Kla-how-ya!” A Chinook salutation.
“Kla-how-ya!” he returned, stopping beside a group of Indian women, two squaws and a child, squatted against a store front with their wares exposed for sale, baskets, mats, and beadwork. He knew them well; had met them several times at the Reservation. Often he and Max stopped to chat with them, and the older squaw had taken a great fancy to Max.
“Come Tu-la-lip tonight?”
“No; I can’t go tonight.”
“Heap big wau-wau and shantie.” She meant that the Indians were to have a story-telling and sing. Twice Max and Sydney had gone to Tu-la-lip Reservation, for Max was deeply interested in the Indians, some of them old friends of Sydney’s. He had sung for them; and Maxplayed his violin—“tin-tin,” they called it, their name for any musical instrument—and they liked it immensely.
Sydney declined the old squaw a little carelessly. “Some other time.”
“Ow go already.” This was her word for “younger brother,” and meant Max.
Sydney sprang toward her, excited. “When? What boat?”
She told him. It was the four o’clock boat. The next was at six-thirty; and Sydney had ample time to catch it. The Indians rose slowly, rolled up their goods, and plodded gravely toward the dock; the Government obliged them to be at the Reservation every night.
But Sydney ran ahead of them, his brain in a whirl. What could have decided Max to go there, of all places in the world? The fare, to be sure, was only a quarter, but that sum would take him to any one of a score of small ports on the Sound. At the Reservation there was positivelynothing in the way of work for Max. Over and over during the half-hour’s travel Sydney pondered the matter, arriving at no conclusion.
When the boat touched the landing he was off before the hawser was thrown, skimming the narrow strip of water in a leap, even while the angry captain shouted a command to wait.
He ran up the patch to the agent’s house, but his anxious query brought no information; Max had not been seen there.
Baffled, Sydney turned, pointing to the old squaw of the street shop in the City of Green Hills. “She told him he came on the early boat,” he panted.
The agent questioned the squaw in her own language; but before he had spoken many words a little boy standing by broke in, jabbering fast, and pointing across a wooded peninsula where the Sound waters dip into the forested hills in a narrow inlet.
“This chap says your friend came here buthurried across the Point to the mill. A lumber ship is loading there,” the agent translated.
Sydney waited for no more but set out at a run. That was what Max intended—to ship to some distant port! That would certainly hide him well, and give him a living on his way. Sydney thought of sensitive, gifted Max handling “tackle,” and “bossed” around by some profane mate; treated like a machine rather than like a human being—no, worse; machines are property and get consideration. It is only human life that is wasted with unconcern, it is so plenty.
Running faster and faster, Sydney emerged from the woods to see the ship steaming slowly into the bay. For a minute his legs trembled under him and he almost fell. Too late! Max was surely there, lost to them forever! Suddenly Sydney knew how thoroughly he had uprooted his jealousy, how deeply Max had become fixed in his heart, a part of his life, his joy and inspiration.
Another quick thought buoyed Sydney—no one would be likely to find a berth on a ship so near to sailing as this had been.
He watched her a moment and turned back toward the mill, stumbling along out of breath, and arriving to learn that one resembling Max had tried and failed to ship, and had set off southward.
Southward! The Pritchard Mills, one of them the largest shingle mill in the world! Ships were always loading there; of course that was where Max would turn next. The millman said one ship was due to sail with the tide that night if she could get a crew. The captain had been unable to sail sooner for lack of men.
Max would surely be taken! Sydney must hurry. He asked for a horse and was laughed at. Horses there in those dense forests were “scarce as hen’s teeth.”
There was nothing for it but to walk—nine miles. Sydney knew the road skirting the shorefor he had traveled it when on a “hike” with his troop; but in daylight and with a guide was a different matter; now it was nearing dark—it must be half past seven. Yet he must try it; yes, try, and succeed! He must, must arrive before the ship sailed.
He started off slowly, for he had run the two miles from the Reservation with no thought of saving himself; now he must husband his strength if he would endure, arrive. It was too bad that he could not begin with speed for the first three miles were open and clear; the dark road was farther on.
Yet he restrained himself sternly, and in spite of the light fog he saw settling beneath the early stars. There were many short cut-offs where a dim path led over some sharp pitch that the road circled at sea level. Sydney took these as long as he could see, noting that many cow paths led off at various angles, and were in some cases more distinct than the right one.
After a time he broke into his best pace, choosing his path as carefully as possible. He judged he had traveled about five miles when he came to a tongue of heavily wooded land making far out into the Sound.
The trail was good and he had little difficulty in keeping it. Once or twice he found himself a few steps off, but was quickly warned by the difficult going. Yet so long the tramp seemed to him that he feared he had lost the way, and was beginning to despair, when he heard the welcome lap-lap of the waves, and was soon on the wagon road again, with the distant lights of Pritchard Mills beckoning cheerily in long, brilliant spikes through the thin fog, and several ships a-light riding at anchor in the harbor.
Heartened, Sydney ran on at fine speed over the smooth springy road, arriving at the wharfinger’s office, spent and breathless, but in good spirits. No ship was leaving.
Sydney described Max.
“Oh, yes. That chap blew in half an hour ago; but he’s done up. He’ll not leave port very soon, if ever.”
Chilled with apprehension, Sydney, following the man’s directions, set out once more to find Max.
Sydney found Max lying in a lumberman’s bunk, partially restored and able to give greeting with both hand and word.
“The jig’s up, you runaway; you’ve got to come home with me.” Sydney was still panting from his long run.
Max shook his head wearily, but not before his eyes had flashed tell-tale joy at the word “home.” “I can’t, Sydney. I must not bring shame to my friends, Mrs. Schmitz, you—”
“Shame, nothing! We’re only ashamed that you ran away.”
“But Walter Buckman—”
“Be hanged! The bunch he runs with would have troubles of their own if they were investigated. Jim Barney—rotten bad, he was—he was Walter’s particular pal last year; andWalter’s stand for high morals is too thin. He can’t put it over. Come on.”
“But Mrs. Schmitz?”
“She says she’ll be everlastingly ashamed of you if you don’t come home.”
Max had not dreamed he was doing less than right by her in taking himself permanently out of her life. Sydney’s report of her attitude put a new light on the matter. It was enough. He would go back, would meet the issue; in Sydney’s parlance, take what was coming.
There was no boat till morning; and by that time, he was able with the help of his friend to make the trip and arrive at the nursery home where Mrs. Schmitz, apprised by Sydney’s telephone message, had Dr. Carter waiting. His examination resulted in a mild prescription, mostly rest; and Mrs. Schmitz took charge.
“You get to bed mit you, right away quick—you, Max. A boy when he runs away gets punished mit the bed.”
The twinkle in her eye and the mother-tone in her voice were very welcome to the overwrought boy who had lived, it seemed, years of misery since the hour he left the schoolhouse.
He was not really ill, though his exhaustion, following his protracted illness of the winter, was serious. But Mrs. Schmitz had no use for “mollygrups.” She petted, coaxed, scolded, and laughed at him in turn, and soon had him on his feet again, “so goot as efer.”
The “bunch,” instigated by Billy, did a beautiful thing on the trying morning of Max’s return to school. They stood together in one of the halls where, by appointment, Sydney brought Max—the “cream of the seniors,” “Sis” Jones declared in a hissing whisper as Walter passed.
When the two came the greeting was not noisy; just hearty handshakes, and silent messages from, sympathetic eyes, with quiet jokes and, “on the side,” promises of friendship.
When Max reached his desk he found a fatletter containing “welcome” notes from Billy, Bess, May Nell, and many others. By the light in his teacher’s eye when she spoke to him, Max knew he was still trusted; and he lifted his head with courage, and entered upon his task of “living down” any accusations Walter Buckman and his friends might make, a task that loomed very large to him.
Billy’s efforts, enlisted by Sydney in behalf of Ida Jones, had long before this borne fruit. May Nell’s own shining electric motor stood more than once in front of the house where Ida lived, impressing the family little less than when she was driven up in her mother’s great limousine. And Bess Carter, whether she walked, came by trolley, or was dropped from his motor car by Dr. Carter, radiated power and a bluff sort of queenliness all her own that was even more impressive than evidence of wealth.
The Pattons, with whom Ida lived, were not unkind to her. They received her as one of thefamily, including her in such privileges as they enjoyed, which were few enough. For there was a houseful of small children to be cared for on slender means, entailing hard work for both Ida and her employer, who was uneducated and not in sympathy with the girl’s intense devotion to school.
Yet when she saw the friends Ida had made, and that their visits were not merely formal, she looked with increased respect upon her little helper, and planned for her more leisure, to the end that Ida found herself in a new world, the world of music and refinement.
One of the homes opened to her was Billy’s. Mrs. Bennett and her daughter often asked the girl to dine, and in delicate ways assisted her, lending books, suggesting reading, and helping her with bits of sewing.
During one of these visits she met Mrs. Schmitz, who had been invited with her two protégés to hear the quartette sing; and unknownto herself Ida acquired a new and ardent friend in the bright German woman.
Mrs. Wright discovered that Ida could sing, not in a trained way but in a true, sweet voice “placed” by nature; and she asked her frequently to the house, giving her many valuable lessons.
These occasions were often on Friday afternoons, when she would stay to dinner and to the “quartette practice.” Then it fell to Sydney to take her home; and the friendship thus fostered was the best thing that could have happened to him; for he was compelled to talk, and soon learned to do it “the same as if she were a chap.”
One day he was alone with Mrs. Schmitz in the lily house. They had worked for some time in silence when she asked suddenly, “How old you think iss Miss Jones?”
“She said she was eighteen.”
“Mine leetle Ida would be eighteen already”
“Mine leetle Ida would be eighteen already”
A sigh that was almost a sob was her only reply,and she worked silently for some minutes, when she said abruptly, “Mine leetle Ida would be eighteen already.” She pronounced the name as if it were spelled Eda.
“How old was she when—when she—” Sydney could not make himself finish the sentence.
“Last time I saw her she was five. But if she live or if she iss dead I know not. Most times I think she iss dead. To think she lives makes me crazy almost, for I do not find her.”
“Are you still looking—hunting—”
“Always. All the time I have men paid to hunt. But they do not find—her. They say she iss dead.”
Sydney was troubled at her distress. She continued her work, but he saw tears falling on the plants she handled. He had never seen her cry before. Tears embarrassed him; and he pottered about awkwardly, waiting for her to speak, wondering if it would be more polite to “sneak”out of the lily house, or remain and give some sign of sympathy. As a compromise he turned his back and coughed apologetically, thoroughly uncomfortable.
Absorbed in her thoughts she forgot him and time—which was passing so slowly for him—till she needed his help in moving some fertilizer. When they were both at work again she spoke.
“I have never told you of mine family for it was too much sorrow to speak of them. It iss for that I like not to see girls. Some people think I am down on girls. Not so. To see them makes me think of mine leetle Ida. Miss Jones iss a nice girl. I look at her last efening at Mrs. Wright’s, look at her much; ant all night I think of her; I cannot sleep.”
“That’s too bad.” Sydney wished he could think of something less inane to say, but no words would come.
“It was the shipwreck—when we came to America, three of us, mine husband, leetle Ida,and mineself. All passengers they put in boats; first the women; in the other boats some of the men. I went down the shipside mit Ida on mine arm, but the sailors say,’No,’ ant take her from me to give me again when I am in the leetle boat. Then comes the captain’s call to put no more in that boat, ant a big wave takes us away, ant I mitout mine baby go on the sea.” She stopped and turned aside.
“Gee! That was rough!” If the words were not consoling the tone was, for Mrs. Schmitz reached out and gave Sydney a grateful pat.
“We came by another ship that took us on board. One other boat full of people they save by another ship that newspapers say went to California. Ant in that paper passengers say mine husband iss drowned in that third boat. No one sees mine leetle Ida.”
“Did you never hear any more?”
“Not from her. I came by New York. I advertise, I wait—wait. I am all alone; I speakleetle English. I think some days I am crazy. Then goes the money. I see I must make some more. I come then to California, ant there I hear that some of those people of the shipwreck have already gone to Washington, so I come too.”
“Was that long ago?”
“Thirteen years already. I know something about plants, so I get a job working here by a nurseryman, by name Walker. I do well. I make some new flowers for him that make him much money. He dies four years ago already, ant I buy this place from Mrs. Walker.”
“Gee! You didn’t save all that money from your wages, did you?”
She smiled. “No. I make one big—bluff some people call it; I call it trust in God. I pay the leetle I have ant give a mortgage for the rest.” She chuckled softly, ending with a sigh, the echo of the sorrow she had combated with all her forceful, cheery nature. “Mrs. Walker—she thought I’d never pay; but I have.”
“What? Not for all of it?”
“Yes. Since you came I got mine deed. Next thing iss to buy some new furniture that iss not all the time fighting mit the colors.”
Sydney looked at her with deeper respect. He knew the property was valuable. “I can’t see how—other nurserymen make money, but not so fast.”
She stepped nearer and laid her hand impressively on his. “Seedney, there iss a secret—love.”
He looked his wonder, his mystification.
“Listen. I tell you. Plant, tree, insect, animal—all are God’s. His life iss in all. He gifes all breath the same as man; that iss, life. Then all are brothers;nicht wahr? I think so; ant so I do. I love mine leetle plants same as if they could speak. I watch them close, every leetle thing I see. I talks mit them; for that they better grow. That iss how I can make new plants—what you say in English? create newcolors, new roses. Those I send to Germany; for them mine friends pay much money.”
“Friends?”
“Yes. Already I make many friends mit the nurserymen. I do most business there because I write not the English goot, ant Germans like the flowers grown far away.”
“But I don’t understand about the love part of it.”
“Hard that iss to explain in English. It iss like this. When you know that God gifes life to all, when you think this all the time, sitting down, rising up, night ant day, then all anger leafes you. Also the fear. You kill nothing if you can help it, not even the snake. You love the birds ant they sing for you. Bees will not sting you, nor dogs bite you. All that iss nature turns to you mit love, ant from you gets help. If so you feel toward plants, you see things otherwise you could not see; and that makes you wise to breed, to make new plants to grow. I cannot tell you;it iss one secret everyone himself must discover. Max already sees it.”
“But if we don’t kill snakes and bad things, they will kill us.”
“Who says anything God makes iss bad? Let the snake alone ant he will run. He flies away as fast as man comes; into the wilderness he goes. No creature hurts things only when he gets afraid already. Even man iss goot if he iss not afraid.”
“But what about bad people? Grafters, murderers?”
“They are seek people, crazy mit the drink or mit injustice, or mebbe from the parents they get it. Most people are bad from fear. Fear that they will not have enough to eat, or mebbe their children. Suppose you have always plenty work and plenty money, and know it iss always to be so; will you steal?”
“I’d be a fool to.”
“But suppose you are not strong, you workhard, cannot do so well as the man next to you, ant have hungry leetle children; ant soon you get discharged. Chance to steal some money comes, ant your leetle children are hungry. What you do?”
“I—I’m afraid to think of it.”
“You see? We must not hate those people. We must love them, help them, so they steal no more.”
Sydney looked up quickly. “That’s what you did for Max; you trusted him first.”
“You have said it. Trust helps to success. You can make a man fail by telling him he will; you can also make a man succeed by telling him he will. After success comes plenty friends. Friends! That kind are like flies, much in the way.”
Sydney laughed, and just then the five o’clock whistle blew.
“Mine gracious! So late already. Come. We’ll have dinner soon ant then be ready forthe musicale. Good iss Mrs. Wright to ask me. It iss living once more to be mit people who make the music. Mine father was forty years Herr Kapellmeister, ant he wrote much music.”
They went in. All through the dinner and while dressing Sydney pondered her life in the old country, wondering if, as Max believed, she really had played before vast audiences, perhaps before crowned heads. Not that crowned heads made any difference to democratic Sydney; but in Europe that is often made the test of highest excellence.
They found the Wright home lovely and fragrant as spring fields, banked with wild green things the boys had brought from the woods, and starred with dogwood blossoms and spirea.
The night was warm enough for open windows, and when the three from the nursery arrived many guests were present; and looking in from the outside the scene must have reminded Mrs. Schmitz of something in her past, for shestood still a moment on the porch, holding up her hand for silence.
“It iss beautiful! Ant see! Miss Jones—she looks lovely in the efening gown. Ah! She iss a goot girl! I know it!”
Ida was near a window, wearing the same frock she had worn at Bess’s party.
Mrs. Wright was unprepared for the magnificence of Mrs. Schmitz, when she swept down the stairway without her cloak. She wore a rich and becoming gown remodeled from one of her old ones, and a few rare jewels. The long train lent height to her massive body; and the lines of skirt and bodice gave her an elegance that was entirely lost in the squat effect of her ordinary severely tailored street suit.
Sydney looked at her again and again. That day in the lily house she had been wonderful; but tonight she was some one else he felt, and he was shy about speaking to her. But Max was not; he paid her extravagant compliments andwith pride introduced her to his friends, and to Dr. and Mrs. Carter.
They belonged together, those two, Sydney thought; not because of any physical resemblance between the slender, aristocratic looking boy and the big woman, but because each possessed a spirit that compelled attention, that won all, that was the essence of good breeding, world wide.
There was no bitterness in Sydney’s attitude now; he was beginning to recognize the value of daily association with Max.
The musicale progressed much as musicales usually do; yet for two people it became the greatest occasion in the world.
Toward the close of the program Mrs. Wright persuaded Ida to sing, explaining to the audience the youth and inexperience of her “song bird.” Ida’s simple ballad, sung without affectation in her fresh voice, pleased them all and won an encore.
She stood again and sang without accompaniment a plaintive German song, a sweet, tender tune that lingered even after she took her seat.
With the first note Mrs. Schmitz bent forward, lips parted, her wide eyes fixed on the girl. Sydney, watching Ida, saw her look their way; saw her countenance change, though she continued steadily to the end.
But when he looked again at Mrs. Schmitz he knew that it was her face, white as the dogwood blossom hanging above her, not his, that arrested the singer’s eye.
“Seedney!” the German said quietly as soon as the song ended, “you bring Miss Jones to me—in the hall—no, on the porch, I must speak to her. It iss of great importance. Hurry!”
Still holding herself to quietness she rose and passed through the door to the porch.
Mrs. Schmitz was waiting in a deserted corner of the porch far from the noisy company around the punch bowl; and when Sydney came forward with Ida, she stepped toward them, reaching both hands to the wondering girl, and asking in a tremulous voice,
“Girl! Girl! Where learned you that song?”
“I think my mother must have taught it to me when I was very little; I can’t remember when I did not sing it.”
“Your mutter—do you remember her?”
Ida looked around startled, and again at Mrs. Schmitz. “Oh, sometimes I think I can; a tall, lovely woman, not large like you. Then it fades,—that picture, and I see nothing but darkness and—” She shivered.
“Ant water?” Mrs. Schmitz volunteered excitedly.
“Yes. How—do you know?”
“How do I know? Because you are mine leetle Ida! Because mine father write that song for you, and taught it to you. And it never was printed, ant no one sings it but mine leetle Ida!” She smoothed back the girl’s hair, and studied her face anxiously.
“That’s true. No one sings it but me.”
“Ant I was that tall woman; in America I grow fat.”
“Ida! Ida,” the girl mused, giving the name its German sound. “They used to call me so; I can dimly remember.”
With one sweep of her loving arms Mrs. Schmitz took the girl to her heart, so long hungry for her child. Ida, who had drifted from the orphan asylum to one home after another, had found at last the mother for whom she had so long prayed.
It was the daughter who first noticed that others had approached. The discovery of her mother had changed her whole future. In a moment, almost in a breath, the shadowy hand of family relationship had reached across the sea, bringing dim memories of her native land and speech; had given her a family where before she had been a lonely waif. Yet, for this is the way of youth, the present moment seemed the all important one to her.
“Mutterchen,” she whispered, and knew not that she said “mother dear,” in German; “they are looking at us.”
The mother, older and wiser, looked both ways on life, to the past and to the future. Not only had her heart massed the longing and sadness of dreary years and flung it to the winds in this instant of glad discovery; she was also planning for the future. No wonder she had no eyes for people, time, or place; for anything but this miracle of happiness; her child was found!
But once recalled, her innate courtesy prompted the kind course. With a long embrace that held the pent tenderness of years, she released Ida, and they went quietly in. After the other guests had gone Mrs. Schmitz told her story to the rejoicing Wrights, Max, and Billy and his mother.
She wished to take Ida home with her that very night, but was surprised with opposition.
“I think I should stay where I am till the end of the semester. That is only a week or so; and it will inconvenience Mrs. Patton for me to go away now.”
“But what will she do in summer time? Seedney tells me summer times you work for money to buy your clothes.”
“Yes, but that is all planned for. When school closes they are going to the country; they have made their arrangements.”
“So? Well, then I’ll hire a good servant to take your place.”
Ida hesitated. It was a great temptation; yet her duty was clear, as her mother could see by her decision. “A stranger would be a lot of bother for such a short time. The little children would be afraid of her, and the big ones wouldn’t mind her, and Mrs. Patton couldn’t leave the baby with her, and—Oh, don’t you see? I want to be with you, but I must stay where I am till vacation begins.”
For an instant no one spoke. Mrs. Schmitz did not conceal her disappointment, yet she did a strange thing. She rose from her chair and drew Ida up beside her, gazing into her eyes, smoothing back her hair, noting every feature of her small, expressive face. She saw the loveliness there and her mother’s pride rejoiced in it; but she was looking deeper, was singing in her heart a song of joy.
“Mine child, for those words I love you more. Already you are like your father ant grandfather. Also like mine goot mutter, so much tothink of others. You stay, yes; but I shall hire the Japanese boy to do much work for you, scrub, clean, ant do things mit the dishrag.”
She joked a little to keep back the tears, and saw Ida go away with Sydney, while she started home with Max.
Both were silent till they had left the car and were walking toward the nursery, when Max said, with a cadence of regret in his voice, “I’ll never find another home like yours in the City of Green Hills.”
She whirled, blocking his way. “You are not going. You ant Seedney are still mine boys.”
“We’ll be in the way.”
“Never! You are mine mascot. Seedney iss mine strong right hand. I got plenty rooms. Don’t you see?” Under the arc light he saw her face beaming with the joy of planning. “That’s what for I save mine best room mit the porch; that iss now Ida’s. Ant we will have a quartette, four parts.”
Inside the house they discussed that matter and many others, excitedly. In imagination they refurnished the house, disputing whether pink or blue would be nicest for Ida. Max and his new sister went through the university, Max deciding his profession; and they were hotly debating the question whether Ida’s voice could be developed into a high dramatic soprano, or would only be a mezzo soprano, when Sydney came, Sydney, the practical.
“It’s half past two,” he warned. “Max, if you don’t behave, Ida will lose her mother as soon as she’s found her. You gink! can’t you see our mother-on-the-side is worn to a frazzle?”
Mrs. Schmitz laughed and started toward the hall. “Goot Seedney!” she called back. “Ida finds already two fine brothers; one, Max, to make her fly mit the clouds; ant Seedney, to hold her to the earth, from which all our life must come. She iss a lucky girl.”
“The nursery is all right for the night,”embarrassed Sydney said by way of changing the subject. “The temperature has dropped; I turned on the heat for the orchids.”
She patted his arm. “Goot boy! Goot night, two goot boys,” she said cheerily in another tone, and left them.
At school the silent prejudice against Max had shown itself in looks, in subtle ways impossible to define, and in the fact that he was omitted from some of the class affairs. Yet as the weeks passed he could feel it decline.
Billy was the best of friends. He told Max that all the “good ones of the bunch” liked him from the day he went back to school and marched boldly up to Walter in the presence of his special friends and said, “Mr. Buckman, when one does wrong the only way he can atone is to make good for it if possible, and live it down. I paid for the food I took, as you know; and I intend to stay in Fifth Avenue High till I graduate. Some day I may get even with you.”
The words were not a menace. Max’s face and tone were kind, greatly puzzling Walter. When he least expected it and in the most astonishing way Walter was to acknowledge that Max was more than even.
It was perhaps two weeks after the musicale that Max and Sydney were at Billy’s, planning and rehearsing some of the details of Billy’s play. It was well on the way toward presentation. He had worked hard, beginning in early autumn, and revising again and again, till at last he had won high commendation from his teacher of English, who had spurred him to write it.
A committee from each high school in the city would hear it, and on their joint decision rested the award of the prize. If Billy won it would be for the honor of his school as well as for himself.
Late in the afternoon Billy’s small cousin, Madge Price—little Miss Snow, her brotherHec called her because of her white hair—ran in, gesticulating wildly, scarcely able to speak coherently.
“Quick! Come! It’s Dottie Buckman! She’s all swallowed up! She’ll be dead in a minute!”
Before she had finished, Billy swung her to his arm and ran out with her, questioning as he went. Max and Sydney followed. Around the corner they hurried to where the city, in the process of street grading, had made a huge cut.
Instantly they knew. All the children in the neighborhood played there at “making caves.” Many little hands had worked far into the sand bank, easy to dig yet damp and hard packed enough to stay in place. But at last the root-netted crust above became too thin to support its weight, and had fallen, imprisoning the little child in its fatal clutch.
“Oh, oh! She’ll be all dead!” Madge cried piteously as Billy put her down.
Heedless of her, the boys frantically tore atthe earth with their hands. Billy grasped the situation, as Max could see, while he snatched at the earth with inadequate fingers.
“Run, Madge! Tell mother, everybody! Tell them to bring shovels!” Billy commanded, and sent out ringing calls for help in every direction.
There were no men near at that hour, and only women came running with every sort of an implement from a shovel to kitchen spoons; but they worked as frantically as the boys.
“Some one get a basin of water,” Max commanded.
“Who’s going to stop to drink water?” Billy asked sarcastically.
No one halted to answer, least of all Max. He had a fierce sort of strength that outmatched sturdy Sydney and even big, strong Billy. He drove his shovel deeper, piled it higher, and plied it faster than any one else. The perspiration poured from him, yet he shivered with dread of what they should presently see.
“Out of my way!” he cried to a hysterical woman who ran in front of him, and did no work herself. “Take her away, Billy!” he demanded in a voice that would be obeyed, the long, rapid sweep of his arms never halting, never slacking, indeed, moving more swiftly with each dip of the shovel. He did not see or know that the woman slipped back at his first fierce word.
It seemed hours, in reality it was less than minutes, when a fragment of a little skirt was uncovered.
“Here she is!” Max shouted wildly; and the boys worked with more fury, till presently three pairs of hands drew the limp little figure to the light, apparently dead.