CHAPTER XVI
A RELUCTANT ALTRUIST
As spring came and Carl was more out of doors playing ball and tramping the open country his watchful eyes were continually scanning passing motors for a possible glimpse of the mysterious red racing car and its genial owner. The boy had never forgotten this delightful stranger or quite abandoned the hope that he might sometime see him again. But, alas, day succeeded day and never did any of the fleeting vehicles his glance followed contain the person he sought. Neither was the search for the sender of the Christmas baskets rewarded.
Spasmodically since mid-winter the Harlings and McGregors had cudgeled their brains to discover this elusive good fairy until at length, exhausted by fruitless effort, they agreed to inter Louise's philanthropic Mr. X in a nameless grave. Despite that fact, however, he was not forgotten and tender thoughts clustered about his memory.
In the meantime May followed on April's heels and presently June, with her greenery and wealth of roses arrived, and then the startling tidings buzzed through Baileyville that Mr. John Coulter was to be married. The news thrilled young and old alike for was not young Mr. Coulter the junior partner of Davis and Coulter; and was not Davis and Coulter the heart and soul of Baileyville? Davis and Coulter meant the mills and the mills meant the town itself. Without them there would have been no village at all. Boys and girls, men and women toiled year in and year out in the factories as their fathers and mothers, often their grandfathers and grandmothers had done before them. If you were not connected with Davis and Coulter's you were not of Baileyville's aristocracy.
Hence it followed that the prospective marriage of Mr. John Coulter could not but be an event concerning which the entire community gossiped with eager and kindly interest. The lady was from New York, people said, and Mr. John had met her while doing war work in France. Both of them had large fortunes. But the fact that appealed to the villagers far more than this was the intelligence that the wedding was to take place at the old Coulter homestead and be followed by a fête to which all the mill people and their families were to be invited. How exciting that was! And how exultant were those whose connection with the mills insured them a card to this mammoth festivity!
Rumor whispered there were to be gigantic tents with games and dancing; bands of music; fireworks; and every imaginable dainty to eat. Some even went so far as to assert there would be boats on the miniature lake and a Punch and Judy show. Oh, it was to be a fête indeed!
For weeks the town talked of nothing else; and as Carl McGregor listened to these stories his regrets at not being numbered among Davis and Coulter's elect waxed keener and keener. One did not enjoy being left out of a function of such magnitude, a party to which everybody else was going. Not only did it make you feel lonely and stranded but it mortified you to be obliged to own you were not of the happy band included in so magnificent a celebration.
"Now if you'd only have let me take a job at the mills as I wanted to, Ma, we might have been going to Mr. Coulter's party along with the rest of the world," Carl bemoaned. "I always told you I ought to go into those mills the way the other fellows do. But you wouldn't hear to it. Now see what's come of it. We are left high and dry. I'll bet we are the only people in Baileyville who are not invited to that party. Everybody is to be there. If even one member of a family works at the mill that lets in the bunch."
"Like the garden parties great families used to give their tenants in the old country," Mrs. McGregor murmured reminiscently.
"I don't know about the old country," replied Carl ungraciously, "but that is what Mr. Coulter is going to do—ask whole families. Gee, but it makes me sore!"
"If your father had lived we would have been there," said the boy's mother sadly. "Your father used to be very good friends with old Mr. Coulter and he would have seen to it that none of this household was left out. But Mr. John we never knew. He was always away studying—first at school, then at college, and then in Europe. Later he started in to be a lawyer in New York and but for the war and his father's death he'd most likely be doing that now. But when the old gentleman died Mr. John gave up everything else and came home to take his place in the firm as his father had wished he should. Folks say that in spite of not caring much for the mills at first he has persisted at his job until he has become genuinely interested in them. I honor him for it, too, for a business life wasn't his real choice. Of course being away so much as he has he is little known among the mill people yet; but evidently he means to settle down here and is anxious to get better acquainted. This wedding party shows that."
"Well, there are some he won't get acquainted with," lamented Carl.
"If you mean us I reckon he can worry along without," Mrs. McGregor retorted, with a twinkle in her eye. "He's managed to up to now."
"We're just as good as anybody else," her son blazed.
"Undoubtedly we are," was the good-humored answer. "Nevertheless we won't be missed in a crowd like that."
"Don't youwantto go to the party, Ma?"
"Why, to tell the truth, I haven't had time to think much about it, sonny—that is, not to be disappointed. I'm not pretending, though, that so many parties come my way that a fine one such as this wouldn't be a treat. I can't remember the day I've been to anything of the sort. It's a quarter of a century or more, certainly—not since I was a girl and went to the balls the gentry gave in Scotland."
"Oh, I do so wish we were going to Mr. Coulter's," Carl repeated.
"I'll not deny I'd like to," confessed his mother a bit wistfully. "Still, were we to go what a stew we'd be in! It would mean days of washing and ironing; new neckties and maybe shoes for you boys; and hair ribbons and folderols for Mary and Nell. Before we were all properly equipped it would cost a pretty penny. We'd have no right to go without looking decent and being a credit to your father and to Mr. Coulter who was good enough to ask us. So, you see, there are advantages in everything. If we are not invited we shall have none of the trouble and expense of it," concluded the woman philosophically.
"I wouldn't mind the trouble, Mother," burst out Carl. "I wouldn't even care if I didn't have new shoes. Why, I'd go in my bathing suit."
Nodding her head his mother regarded him with withering censure.
"Yes, I believe you would," she agreed, "I believe you would—if you were permitted. But how lucky it is you have a mother. Without me you'd be disgracing your name, Mr. Coulter, Baileyville, and Mulberry Court."
Carl grinned in sickly fashion.
"I'd be having the time of my life!" announced he, undaunted.
"Going to an affair like that in your bathing suit, you mean? I'm not so sure about that. You are always begging to be allowed to wear that costume or grumbling because you cannot wear it. Once, I recall, you actually suggested wearing it to church on a hot Sunday. I'm sorely tempted sometime to let you have your way and see what would come of it. Think, for instance, of your sailing into Mr. John Coulter's wedding party in a get-up like that. You'd be ducked in the pond in a second."
"I'd be ready for it," was the provoking answer.
"Well, you aren't going to the Coulter party, as it happens, so there'll be no question of what you'll wear," returned Mrs. McGregor grimly.
"I know I'm not; but you don't have to rub it in, Ma," Carl answered.
"I didn't mean to rub it in, dear," was the gentle response. "I was merely stating facts. Maybe it's as well, too, that we're not going ourselves, for with the Sullivans, Murphys, and O'Dowds all invited we'll have as much as we can do to get them all creditably rigged out. I shall let Julie wear my black skirt—it just fits her; and Mrs. Sullivan my best hat. My waist Mrs. Murphy shall take if I can get it washed in time. Most likely, too, the O'Dowds will need your clothes and Timmie's."
"Need my clothes!" Carl shouted.
"Certainly. Julie can't hope to provide things for all that big family to appear in at once. Somebody will have to turn to and lend a helping hand."
"But what'll I do while the O'Dowd boys wear my clothes?" wailed Carl.
"Why, you can stay in the house. It won't hurt either you or Tim to take an afternoon of rest," came stoically from his mother.
"But I don't want to take an afternoon of rest," Carl protested wrathfully. "Not on that day of all others. I'm going up to Coulters to hang round outside and watch the fun. If I'm not invited I can at least do that."
"Carl McGregor! You'll do nothing of the sort. Hang round outside, indeed! Haven't you any pride at all? If you're not asked to the party I should hope you'd have the good taste to keep out of the way of it. Hang round outside! You ought to be ashamed even to suggest such a thing," said Mrs. McGregor with scorn. "No, you'll do no lingering on the outskirts of Mr. John's reception, you can make up your mind to that. You'll stay politely at home as the rest of us plan to do and keep under cover so folks won't be asking you why you're not up at Coulters. I've some regard for the family dignity if you haven't. And since you'll be at home anyway, you may as well take the chance to do a kindly deed and let Frankie O'Dowd wear your clothes. You don't want to grow up to be selfish."
"My pants will be miles too long for that O'Dowd kid," responded the unwilling altruist grudgingly.
"Oh, his mother can baste them up so they'll do for one afternoon," was the serene answer.
"Huh! I don't envy Frank going to that party with two thicknesses of trousers on his legs," Carl declared. "If it's a hot day he'll melt."
"Beggars cannot be choosers," Mrs. McGregor asserted. "Likely Frankie will be that tickled to go to the lawn party that he won't care what he has on any more than you would. You'd go quicker than a wink in basted-up trousers if you got the chance."
"You bet I would! Why, I'd go in—in—inanything!" was the fervent affirmation. "Somehow, Ma, it just seems as if I couldn't give up the idea of going. I feel as if somethingmusthappen so we'd get asked."
"Why, Carl—you silly boy! You don't mean to say you are actually cherishing the thought you may be invited yet?" his mother exclaimed incredulously. "Put it out of your head, son, like a sensible lad. There isn't a chance of it, dear. The invitations were sent out last week and had you been going to get one you would have received it days ago. There'll be no more people asked now."
"There might be—some might have been forgotten by mistake. Or the invitation might have got stuck in the letter box and delayed."
"I'm afraid not, Carlie!" his mother said gently. "Mark my words, all the invitations there are going to be to that garden party have gone out. There won't be any more. The folks that haven't had theirs already won't have none and if you're wise you will face that fact and give up thinking about Mr. Coulter and his wedding."
The corners of Carl's mouth drooped but he stubbornly insisted:
"Well, anyhow, Ma, don't you tell Frankie O'Dowd he can have my clothes until the very last minute, will you? Promise me that."
"Aye! I'll not mention the clothes yet awhile. I'll wait at least a day or two. Most likely Julie or the Murphys will be up by that time and ask for 'em."
And with this scanty comfort Carl was obliged to be content.
Even the concession that he would be allowed to wear his bathing suit while at home was but feeble consolation. What did it matter what he wore if he couldn't go to the Coulter fête?
CHAPTER XVII
AN ORDEAL
As the date for the Coulters' fête approached the weather was breathlessly scanned in practically every home in Baileyville and throbbing hearts almost ceased to beat lest the day be stormy or too cold to wear the finery that awaited the great occasion. Could one have taken off the roofs of the houses between his thumb and forefinger as he would lift the cover off a sugar-bowl, what a bewildering array of freshly starched muslins, clean shirts and collars, shining shoes, and rose-encircled hats would have met his gaze!
Carl McGregor had spoken truly when he had affirmed to his mother that everybody in the town was going to the wedding festival. All Baileyville was on tiptoe with excitement. The schools were to be closed for the afternoon, not alone to do Mr. Coulter honor, but because it was quite evident that no children would be found in their seats on the great day.
"We McGregors would be the only kids in the whole place, I bet, if they did have school," declared Carl gloomily. "You see, Ma, it's just as I told you—everybody's going to the Coulters'."
"I should think, hating school as you do, you'd be thankful to have a holiday," commented Mary.
"Ordinarily I would," was the prompt reply. "But what good is this holiday going to do me, I'd like to know, with Frankie O'Dowd wearing all my clothes, and Mother forbidding me to go out of the house in my bathing suit?"
"Well, at least you won't have to study," said his optimistic sister, making an effort to comfort her morose companion.
"I might as well study; it would take up my mind," fretted Carl. "I've nothing better to do."
His ill humor was so tragic that in spite of herself Mary laughed.
"Well, you needn't grin so over it, Miss Superiority, or go pretending you don't wish you could go to the lawn party."
"Of course I'd love to go," Mary confessed honestly. "But if we can't I don't see any use in mourning about it and talking of nothing else."
"Ihaveto talk about it. I think of it every minute."
"Put it out of your head."
"I can't."
"Nonsense! You don't try. Why don't you set about doing something and forget it instead of sitting round mooning and working yourself all up? You can run down and get the mail right now. There's the bell. Maybe it's a letter from Uncle Frederick."
Welcoming the diversion her brother rose with alacrity. He was in a mood when any excitement, no matter how trivial, was a boon. Down the stairs he ran only to return a second later with a square white envelope in his hand.
"Is it from Uncle Frederick?" queried Mary eagerly.
"Nope!"
"Oh, I'm sorry, we haven't heard from him for ever so long. I do hope nothing's the matter. Who is the letter from?"
"I don't know."
Something in the reticence of the reply caused the girl to glance up.
"I'll take it in to Mother," volunteered she, holding out her hand.
"It isn't for Mother," Carl answered slowly.
"Not for Mother? How funny! None of the rest of us ever have letters. Who is it for?"
"It happens to be mine."
"Carl!" Dismay and apprehension vibrated in the word.
"Yes, it's mine," her brother repeated. His obvious attempt to carry off the episode in jaunty fashion failed, however, and it was evident by his tense tones that he echoed Mary's alarm.
"But who on earth can be writing to you?" demanded his sister.
"I—I—don't know." The boy fingered the envelope with uneasiness. Mary came nearer.
"Carl, what have you been up to now?" asked she. "That looks like the teacher's writing. Aren't you going to be promoted or what is the matter?"
"How do I know until I read the thing?" snapped Carl.
"You're not in any scrape?"
"Not that I know of."
"Honestly?"
"I tell you I can't think of any. On my honor I can't."
"Oh, well then, it's probably about your work. Most likely you're behind the class in something and Miss Dewey wants to see you. Why don't you buck up and find out what she has to say?"
"I'm going to in a minute."
"You're afraid to open that letter. You've done something at school you don't want Mother and me to know about."
"I tell you I haven't."
"Then why, for pity's sake, don't you read what Miss Dewey has written instead of looking at the note as if it was a bomb? Maybe she's inviting you to supper. She does ask the boys sometimes."
This possibility was so encouraging that the startled expression in the lad's eyes gave place to a serener light. Perhaps after all the missive did not portend the calamity that a note from school usually did. Maybe his algebra was all right and he had not flunked his Latin. The fates may have graciously intervened.
Courageously he tore open the envelope; then a sharp cry came from his lips.
"Hurrah!" he cried. "Mother! Mother! Where are you?"
"Here, dear, in my room. Is anything the matter?"
Carl rushed off unceremoniously, leaving the mystified Mary alone in the middle of the kitchen.
"Oh, Ma," he panted, "what do you suppose? We're going, after all—every one of us! Think of it! We're going!"
"Going where? Have you taken leave of your senses, sonny? What are you talking about, pray?"
"We're going to the Coulters', Ma," asserted Carl, waving the white envelope above his head in a frenzy of delight. "Look! Here's the bid. And across the bottom of the paper Mr. Coulter himself has written to say that he's sorry the invitation has been so delayed and he hopes my mother and all of us—even the baby—will come. Gee!"
Quite exhausted, Carl dropped into a chair.
"But why should Mr. Coulter send this invitation to you?"
"I don't know, I'm sure. Maybe Hal Harling or somebody told him how disappointed I was at not being asked," returned Carl serenely.
"Mercy! I hope not," ejaculated his horrified mother.
"Why not?"
"Why, it would be almost like asking Mr. Coulter for an invitation."
"He wouldn't care, I guess," came comfortably from Carl. "There's plenty of room and there'll be food enough so a few people more or less wouldn't bother him."
"But I wouldn't think of going to a party, or letting you, if you had demanded in so many words to be invited," returned Mrs. McGregor with a toss of her head.
"You don't mean to say, Ma, that you're thinking of not going," her son gasped.
"I certainly shall not stir a step to Mr. Coulter's until I find out how we happened to receive this remarkable invitation."
"Ma!"
"I sha'n't," repeated his mother. "Why, the bare idea of your trying to get a card to that wedding reception!"
"I didn't try to, Mother; honest, I didn't," protested Carl. "I didn't ask anybody to do a thing for me. I was only fooling when I said that. Of course Hal Harling knows well enough that I've been crazy to go. He and Louise couldn't help seeing how sore I was about it. But I never said anything else."
"I'm thankful to hear that. One never knows what you will do."
Mrs. McGregor gave a sigh of relief and taking the card examined it.
"Perhaps," she presently observed in a gentler tone, "this invitation has nothing to do with you. It may be possible that young Mr. Coulter remembered how long your father worked in the mills and thought it would be nice to ask us because of that. If so, it was very thoughtful of him. And most likely the card was sent to you because he happened to have heard your name. Goodness knows, with the messes you're in, I should think all the town might be aware of it."
"And you'll go, Ma?" In his eagerness Carl brushed aside the unflattering picture his mother's words presented.
"If I find it's a bona fide invitation and not some of your concocting I'll go—not otherwise. It would be ungrateful to snub Mr. John if he is trying to be kind. But the thing that makes me doubtful is that the envelope should be addressed to you. Why wasn't the invitation sent to me? I am the head of the family—or at least I attempt to be," amended she with an upward curve of her lips.
"Oh, who cares, Ma, who the invitation was addressed to?" cut in Carl impatiently. "The main thing is that it's come and we are going to the party. I'd go had it been sent to James Frederick. What does it matter? Say, Ma, isn't it lucky you hadn't loaned our clothes? We'll need 'em ourselves now."
"When is the wedding?" Mary asked.
"Do you mean to say you don't even know?" inquired her brother with scorn.
"I've forgotten."
"You have! Then you are the only person in Baileyville who has," was the sarcastic rejoinder. "Well, if you must know, it's the day after to-day."
"It will be a scramble to get ready, won't it, Mother?" commented the practical Mary.
"There certainly will be a lot to do," Mrs. McGregor agreed. "However, I guess we can manage if everybody will turn to."
"I'll help," announced Carl in a burst of magnanimousness. "I'll wash and iron all my own clothes."
"I'd like a peep at the shirt you washed and ironed," taunted Mary in derision.
"I fancy a peep would be enough," put in her mother, laughing. "No, son, your talent does not lie in washing or ironing. But you can take care of the youngsters while Mary and I do it. And, Mary, we'll have to get a bunch of fresh flowers for your best hat; those pink daisies are too faded to wear. We'll get a new hair ribbon, too. And I must have some other lace in the neck of my silk waist and——"
"Oh, if you're going to talk ribbon, artificial flowers, and all that rot I'm going over to Harlings," announced Carl, rising.
"Indeed you're not," objected his mother. "You're going to get out the blacking bottle and start cleaning and polishing the shoes. There'll be seven pairs to get ready and I want a fine shine on every one of them."
"But what's the use of doing it now? They'll get all dusty again before the day after to-morrow," Carl grumbled.
"Not if they're put away," came in even accents from his mother. "We'll just have to wear slippers, sneakers and things until Tuesday. I guess we can get along. We can't go leaving everything until the last minute or we shall be all up in a heap. We must begin directly to get things done. I shall braid your hair, Mary, and Nell's right away, so it will be well crimped. And Timmie, you and Carl and Martin have all got to have baths. Yes, you have, whether you like it or not. If you don't you can't go. That's all there is about that, so stop fussing. Carl, you put some kettles of water on the stove to heat. You boys must be scrubbed whether the rest of us are or not. You need it most. And Mary, run like a good girl and see if you can hunt up a clean pair of stockings for everybody—stockings without too many holes. Mercy on us! I wish Mr. Coulter had given us a little more notice—indeed I do!"
"I don't see who's going to know, in that push, whether I've had a bath or not," persisted the argumentative Tim.
"You don't? Have you happened to get a glimpse of that ebony ring round your neck?" interrogated his mother significantly. "Anybody who saw that would have some notion."
"I hate a bath!"
"You look it."
"Oh, shut up, Timmie," cautioned Carl in an undertone. "Don't go rowing at Ma now. If you do she may get her back up and not take you to the party at all. I hate to be scrubbed within an inch of my life as much as you do, but I'm not saying so to-day. I'd be boiled in oil sooner than not go to this party. Besides, your neck is black. I'll bet it will take sapolio to get it clean. But don't go yammering about it. Just hop and do as Ma tells you. It's the only way."
Heeding the wisdom of his elder brother Tim ceased further protests andhopped.
Indeed the hopping became very spirited and general during the short interval that preceded the wedding day. And when at last that glorious morning dawned cloudless and fair, what a scarlet, shining, spotless cavalcade of McGregors its radiant light shone upon!
First there was Mrs. McGregor, hot but triumphant in a petticoat that crackled like brittle ice beneath her black alpaca skirt and a pair of white cotton gloves at the fingers of which she was continually tugging. Both her hat and Mary's gleamed ebon under a recent coat of blacking—so recent that they entertained some concern lest it trickle down their heated faces in disfiguring rivulets. Mary's white dress rustled as crisply as did her mother's petticoat and her hair, crimped and ironed until it was fuzzy as a bushman's, drifted out behind her, a hempen whirlwind. New flowers on her hat and accompanying pink streamers afforded her tranquil satisfaction as did also the string of coral beads Uncle Frederick had once sent from Naples, a gift worn only on very special occasions.
As for the boys, every hair of their heads had been plastered securely into place, and blistered with scrubbing, they stood wretched but hopeful in a row waiting with patience the moment when clean shirts, creased trousers, and sparkling boots might be forgotten in the delights the Coulter party promised.
Even Nell and the baby looked unnatural and reflected the general discomfort and self-consciousness.
The getting-ready had been a fatiguing ordeal and everybody's nerves were at the breaking point. Systematically Mrs. McGregor had proceeded with the process, beginning with the eldest of the family, and as each work of art was completed it was set aside much as a frosted cake is set away to cool, and the next victim was summoned.
In the meantime those who had beenfinished, motionless in chairs, were allowed the entertainment of watching each succeeding martyr put through his round of torture. Yet diverting as this had been, the waiting had been tedious, particularly for those who stood at the head of the line.
Now, the rite over, everybody drew a long breath and struggled to forget past miseries. Therefore when Hal and Louise Harling, who were to augment the procession, arrived, every cloud was put to flight and the delegation set forth in the highest of spirits.
"What a pity it is Uncle Frederick Dillingham isn't here!" commented Mrs. McGregor, as they went along. "And what a shame, too, that Grandfather Harling and your mother, Louise, cannot see this day! It would furnish them with something to talk of for weeks."
"Hal and I will tell them all about it," returned the girl brightly. "Isn't it splendid you all could go? Poor Carl was so disappointed when he thought he was to be out of it."
"I know he was," nodded the lad's mother. "In fact, it worried me not a little lest it was because he made his disappointment so evident that we got invited. I was afraid some well-meaning person might have taken pity on him and begged him a card. Had not you and Hal declared you had nothing to do with our being asked, I should not have stirred a peg to the party, let Carl plead as he might. But now I feel more comfortable about our going, although I must confess it puzzles me why the invitation was sent to him instead of to me. It certainly seems a little funny. However, it may have been an accident. Of course Mr. Coulter has had a lot to think of and might well be forgiven one mistake. It isn't likely he could remember my husband's name. He was pretty good to think of us at all."
"They say at the mills that Mr. John is very friendly and has ever so many plans afoot for the workers. There is even talk of a recreation building being put up on the factory grounds."
"Not much like his father, who wouldn't spend a cent he didn't have to," mused Mrs. McGregor.
"No. Mr. John is different; everybody says so. Besides, he is younger and belongs to a generation with other ideas."
"Better ideas, I hope. If children didn't improve on their fathers where would the world be?" Then suddenly cutting short her philosophical meditations Mrs. McGregor called imperatively:
"Timmie, stop chasing those butterflies this minute. Do you want to spoil the shine on your shoes before you even get to the party? You'll have your collar ruined if you gallop round and get so hot. Come back here and walk beside me. I'm resolved to land you all at Mr. Coulter's looking like human beings, whatever happens afterward. Then if you prefer to smooch your face with dirt and rumple up your hair, I can't help it. But you shall stay clean until you're inside the gate."
Glaring for a moment on her subjects with subduing ferocity Mrs. McGregor drew herself up and moved majestically in at the entrance of the Coulter mansion.
CHAPTER XVIII
THE SOLUTION OF MANY MYSTERIES
Once inside the magic portal of the great estate, however, Mrs. McGregor's task became increasingly difficult. What a bewildering scene it was! The green lawns, terraced down to the lake, were dotted with tents and from each one floated out tantalizing hints of the delights within. The strains of a band and the laughter of dancers drifted forth from one; waiters with heavily laden trays passed in and out of another; around still a third swarmed children and one glimpsed through the open doorway a marionette show. Under a gay red umbrella at the edge of the garden women, fluttering like multi-hued butterflies, ladled lemonade from giant punch-bowls.
Oh, a wonderland of myriad delights beckoned in every direction and it was only by dint of extreme severity that Mrs. McGregor succeeded in keeping her little army in formation and preventing its neatly ranged ranks from becoming lost in the surrounding hubbub.
"You're not to stir a step from this spot until I tell you you may," commanded she. "The very notion of your all racing off to enjoy yourselves before you have so much as said a word of thanks to Mr. Coulter who asked you here! Where are your manners? Are you forgetting so quick that it is his wedding day? Aren't you going to wish him joy as is proper to do when he has taken all this trouble to give you a good time?"
Her tone was withering in its rebuke and as if hypnotized by its cadence the wriggling children thronging in her wake stood motionless.
"In my day folks were grateful for what was done for them and expected to saythank youto their elders. Now there seems to be no such thing as politeness among youngsters. But to-day, whether you will or no, before you do anything else we are going to hunt up Mr. John and his bride and every one of you is to thank him for asking you to his party. And Tim, you and Mary and Carl are to repeat the speech I taught you. I pray you've not forgotten it already. You hope he and his wife will have many days as happy as this one. Remember and don't get mixed up and say the wrong thing."
With this final caution Mrs. McGregor wheeled about and marshalled the miniature procession following her into a vast, rose-garlanded tent at the right of the entrance. Two aisles roped off with laurel divided it, and throngs of people were moving down one of these and returning by the other. In the far distance one could see a canopy of green, a figure misty in white tulle, and a bevy of bridesmaids in pink, blue, yellow, and lavender.
"This seems to be the right place," whispered Mrs. McGregor. "We'll fall right in behind this man and woman. Now mind your manners, all of you. Poor though we are, we can be polite without it costing us a cent. Timmie, you keep close at my heels with Mary. I've got all I can do to handle the baby and Nell. Carl, see that you don't squeeze Martin's hand too tight and get him peevish. Take hold of him gently. And don't one of you dare to push. We must expect to move along slowly and wait our turn. Yes, I know it's hot. But there'll be lemonade and ice cream by and by. I guess you can stand the heat for a little while. What is it, Tim? Your boots hurt? Nonsense! They're the same boots you always wear, aren't they? Were you racing round playing ball in them it's little notice you'd be taking of them, I reckon. Don't be silly and get sulky now or next time I shall leave you at home."
To an accompaniment of these and similar admonitions the McGregor host proceeded on its way along with the other guests.
Then at last when the receiving party was well in sight and Mrs. McGregor and her family were making a decorous approach the anxious mother was horrified to see Carl, forgetful of all else, rush from the line and racing up to Mr. John Coulter, seize both his hands.
"Oh!" cried the boy, in a voice so shrill with ecstasy that its accents penetrated to every corner of the great tent, "Oh, Mr. Coulter, I never dreamed it was you! Why didn't you tell me who you were? I'm so glad to see you again! I thought I never would. I've hunted and hunted for you and your red car ever since."
I've hunted for you and your red car ever since."I've hunted for you and your red car ever since."Page253.
Plainly Mr. John Coulter, instead of being offended by this unexpected onslaught, was delighted for he beamed down on the excited lad, shook both his hands heartily, and laughed so the ring of it echoed all about.
"So you didn't guess the riddle, little chap," Mrs. McGregor heard him say. "Well, I didn't mean you should."
"And to think it was you!" Carl was still murmuring, as if in a trance. "Just to think it was you! Of course you were the one who got Louise her new place."
"Guilty."
"Gee, but it was white of you! She's right here behind my mother." Then inspired by sudden understanding he added, "And the Christmas dinners came from you, too."
"Come, come, youngster, this is no moment to be confronting me with all my crimes," the blushing bridegroom protested. "Here's Mrs. Coulter just married to me—what is she going to think if you tell her how many conspiracies I have been mixed up in? This, Marion, is one of my very good friends, Carl McGregor. His father was for many years in our mills and if I mistake not here is his whole family coming up to speak to us."
"Indeed we are, sir," declared Mrs. McGregor, making a quaint English curtsy, "and it's scandalized enough I am to see my boy here racing at you as if he was a wild beast and forgetting all the etiquette I've taught him. He had a nice speech ready to say but where it is now heaven only knows!"
"I'd far rather he said to me what he did," asserted Mr. Coulter. "You see, Carl and I are old friends."
"I don't see," replied the mystified mother, "but no doubt you are, since you tell me so. I myself had no idea the lad know you from Adam."
"And I hadn't either, Mother. Gee, but it is rich! To think I went riding with you that day, Mr. Coulter, and speeled off all that guff, and you never so much as raised an eyelash!"
"Carl!" ejaculated his despairing parent.
"Well, I hope this is not to be the end of our acquaintance, youngster," Mr. Coulter returned, passing over Mrs. McGregor's rebuke. "Come and see Mrs. Coulter and me some day. And remember that if you ever wish to enter the mills I will make a place for you."
"That's bully of you, sir!"
"Carl!" Mrs. McGregor was dumb with consternation. "The very idea of your speaking to Mr. Coulter like that!" declared she, when at last she could catch her breath. "Come away before you say anything more to disgrace the family. There's others waiting to give him their good wishes and you seem to have forgotten all about yours, although goodness knows you were drilled and drilled on the speech you were to make. Yes, Mrs. Coulter, these are my children—all six of them. The baby's name? James Frederick, after his uncle. And this is Mary, and Timmie, and Martin, and Nell. The oldest ones had nice things ready to say to you but Carl has knocked 'em clean out of their heads. I hope you'll not lay it up against us. No, marm, this tall boy and girl don't belong to me, but I'm that fond of 'em I wish they did. They are our neighbors, Hal and Louise Harling."
Instantly Mr. Coulter reached forward and greeted the young people.
"The new job is going well?" he asked, addressing Louise.
"Oh, I'm so happy in it, Mr. Coulter."
"That's good! And you, Harling?"
"I'm getting on splendidly, sir."
"Excellent! There'll be a raise coming to you next month—quite a substantial one. We've been looking you up."
"Oh, sir, how can I——"
"There, there! We mustn't stop to talk about it now. If you must thank somebody for it thank this young scoundrel here. It was he put me up to it."
There was time for nothing further. Swept onward by crowds that surged behind, the McGregors, like chips on the crest of a mammoth wave, were borne forward and out of the tent.
In the open air Mrs. McGregor wiped her perspiring brow.
"Now," began she, turning accusingly on her son, "perhaps you will be so good as to tell us what all this is about. How came you to know Mr. John Coulter well enough to be treating him like a long-lost brother? And what had you to do with Hal and Louise and the Coulter mills? I feel as if I were going crazy! One minute you don't even know Mr. Coulter by sight and the next he is sending us a Christmas dinner and you are fairly falling on his neck."
Carl shook with laughter.
"Oh, Mother, it's all so rich—so perfectly corking!" he cried. "You couldn't half appreciate it if I told you."
"I could try," came curtly from Mrs. McGregor.
But her son did not heed her.
"To think of that being Mr. John Coulter," chuckled he. "And, oh, the things I said to him! I tremble to recall them. I told him Corcoran was a low-down skunk, I know that. And I gushed on a lot about Hal and Louise. I only wish I could remember what I did say. Jove! He must have split his sides laughing."
"When? When did you do all this?" interrogated the lad's mother impatiently.
"Oh, when was it?" ruminated Carl, struggling to collect his scattered wits. "It seems ages and ages ago that all that happened. It was before Christmas, I'm certain of that."
"And you went riding with Mr. Coulter? I heard you saying something about it."
"Yes."
"You actually went to ride with him?"
"I sure did!"
"Well, all I can say is I should like to know when all these miracles took place," repeated Carl's mother. "Where was I, and why wasn't I told? You might at least have mentioned it at home."
"I know it, Ma," apologized Carl with disarming frankness. "I did try twice to tell you but the chance never seemed to come right; and by and by it got to be so long ago that I forgot all about it."
"Forgot you went motoring with Mr. John Coulter?" Mrs. McGregor spoke with incredulity.
"You see I didn't know at the time that it was Mr. John Coulter, Ma."
"I don't see! I don't understand anything about it," repeated the woman helplessly.
"Well, you will by and by. It is a long story—too long to tell now. When we get home you shall hear it from beginning to end. But now—— Gee whizz! There goes Martin making for the pond! I'll head him off."
Away went Carl across the velvet lawn and with an unsatisfied air Mrs. McGregor wheeled about to collect Nell and Tim, who were already tugging at her skirts. She felt as if the events of the past half-hour were a dream. Carl, her harum-scarum son, the catastrophe worker of the family, was the acknowledged friend of Mr. John Coulter, one of the richest and most revered citizens of Baileyville. And more than that he appeared to possess the influence to have men removed from their jobs and discharged employees reinstated in lost positions. He even had power to have people's salaries raised. Would wonders never cease?
CHAPTER XIX
UNRAVELING THE SNARLS
How late the McGregors sat up talking that night it would have been alarming to confess. It was so late that the streets became silent and deserted and conversation had to be conducted in whispers lest it arouse the O'Dowds, Sullivans, and Murphys.
And what tense, eager whispers they were!
Mrs. McGregor, her bonnet still in her lap, sat on the edge of a chair too engrossed to so much as think of the shrimp pink tulle dress she had planned to finish before she went to bed that night; nor did she, in her usual methodical manner, take time to slip out of her best skirt or put away her company shoes and gloves. She was far too excited for that.
Happy, tumbled, and nodding the babies had been put to sleep and afterward their elders, joined by Hal and Louise Harling, huddled in the kitchen, closed the doors, and talked and talked. Every detail of Carl's amazing story had to be told over and over again that his listeners might enjoy to the full the marvel and humor of each successive event. Everything was clear as crystal now—Corcoran's transfer, Louise's reinstatement, Hal's increasing salary, the Christmas dinners. Even the conundrum of the watch remained an enigma no longer.
"It was, of course, Mr. Coulter who told Corcoran about your rescuing his baby," Carl explained to his chum. "I remember that I happened to mention the accident to him."
Hal nodded.
"But the thing I don't understand," he said with a puzzled air, "is how you could go to that office looking for a job and never so much as suspect who Mr. Coulter was. There must have been signs up with the firm's name on them."
"I suppose there were," Carl answered. "I don't know about that. You see, I was too rattled and wrought up to notice much of anything. Besides, I was some scared. It was such a swell joint and that bell-boy (or whatever you call him) was so lofty and elegant that it froze the blood in my veins. More than that I was crazy to get a position and was so darned afraid they wouldn't take me that I wasn't thinking of anything else."
"You're a bully little pal, Carl," Hal remarked, placing an affectionate hand on the younger boy's shoulder.
"Pooh! I did no more than you'd have done for me if I'd been in a hole," replied Carl modestly. "You'd move heaven and earth to help us if we needed you."
"You've said it, youngster!"
"Then what is there so remarkable in my trying to do the same for you and Louise?"
"It was splendid of you, Carlie," whispered Louise.
"Oh, I didn't do much," was the gruff retort. "As it happened, I didn't really do anything. But I wanted to—you can bank on that."
"Evidently you convinced Mr. Coulter of the sincerity of your good intentions," grinned Hal.
"Mr. Coulter! Gee! Every time I think of him I have to laugh. Picture my having the nerve to go reforming his mill for him and complaining of his employees! And fancy me parading into his private office asking him for work! Had I known what I was doing I should have been petrified with fear." Smothered laughter convulsed the boys frame. "Well, as Ma says, ignorance is bliss and fools rush in where angels fear to tread."
"I guess Mr. Coulter sized up the situation all right," mused Hal.
"Oh, he knew; he understood the whole thing. He told me so to-day," Carl responded quickly. "He's live wire enough not to let a joke slip past him. He had his fun out of the affair and don't you think he didn't. What's more, he didn't mean ever to let me find out what a boob I'd been. He was just going to keep the secret to himself. Then this wedding party came along and he happened to think we might like to come. So he took a chance and sent the bid."
"And that explains why the invitation came to you," reflected Mrs. McGregor.
"That's it, Ma. You have your little son Carlie to thank for your card to the spree," the lad responded impishly. "I'll be getting you into high society some day if you're good."
"If you don't get us all into jail or some other place before then we'll be lucky," came brusquely from his mother.
"Now isn't that gratitude for you?" growled Carl with mock indignation. "Here I take my mother and all her family to a perfectly good party and this is all the thanks I get for it."
"Yes, this happened to be a perfectly good party," agreed Mrs. McGregor mischievously. "But it might have ended in some scrape or other and like as not it would another time. One never can be sure where your adventures will bring up."
"Well, Ma, Mr. Coulter appreciates me if you don't."
"Apparently he does—up to date. Just you take care that you go on deserving his good opinion."
"I mean to," Carl flashed. "Say, folks, sha'n't we have something to write Uncle Frederick now? I'll bet it will take ten sheets of paper to retail the whole thing; and then he won't really have any idea of what happened. None of you ever can. You just ought to have been there and seen the play."
"It's as good as a play—as good as any moving picture, in my opinion," Louise ventured.
"What wouldn't I have given to be under the seat of that car and listened when you were laying out poor old Cork!" Hal ejaculated.
"I laid him fine and flat," acknowledged Carl with candor.
"Events have proved you did. Poor Cork! Still, Corks float, you know, and he has. He isn't dead yet by any means," jested Hal. "In fact, he told me only a day or two ago that he liked his new job much better than he did the old one so I guess nobody need waste pity on him."
"I'm afraid he wasn't punished much, after all," sniffed Mrs. McGregor.
"Oh, he's had it borne in upon him that he was a brute, Ma; don't you fret," declared Carl. "Mr. Coulter never does things by halves. When he starts in he finishes up a job in bang-up style. Corcoran's learned his lesson; and if he has that is all that is necessary."
A clock struck softly.
"Hal Harling! Do you realize it is twelve o'clock?" Louise exclaimed in dismay. "We must go home this minute. The very idea of our staying here and keeping the McGregors up until this hour! I'd no idea it was so late. Why, you may be robbed of your precious Corcoran watch if you don't hurry home out of the lonely streets. Good-night, everybody! And blessings on you, Carlie! You've been a trump. I'm going to begin to-morrow and work harder than ever for Mr. John Coulter."
"Here's to him!" Carl began. But a restraining hand was clapped over his mouth.
"Carl! Carl! For mercy's sake, remember that it's twelve o'clock and everybody's abed and asleep. Don't go cheering for Mr. Coulter now. You can go out in the field and do it to-morrow."
"I'm afraid I'll be too busy to-morrow."
"And what'll you be doing to-morrow, pray, that's of so much importance?"
"Why, I'll have to be deciding whether I want to go to college, or go to sea with Uncle Frederick; or go into Mr. Coulter's mills," was the teasing answer. "I seem to have three careers open to me. Maybe I'll have to toss up a penny to find out which I'd better take. Will you lend me the penny, Ma?"
"Indeed I won't," snapped his mother wrathfully. "Three careers! Humph! Still I'm not saying that if you could go into the mills with Mr. Coulter to stand behind you you might not make your fortune. But there's time enough to decide that later. We needn't argue it at twelve o'clock at night."