355
“Sherm, don’t you just love this room?” Chicken Little gazed about Captain Clarke’s big library with a real affection. “I don’t know why it is, but this room makes me feel the same way a sunset, or the prairie when it’s all in bloom, does. I can’t just tell you, but it makes me so satisfied with everything ... as if the world was so beautiful it couldn’t possibly be very bad.”
“I know–it’s the harmony, like in music. The colors all seem to go together ... everything seems to belong. I like that, too, but it doesn’t mean just that, to me. I see the Captain every time I step in here. It’s a part of him–almost as if he had worked his own bigness and the kind of things he loves, into furniture and books and–fixings.”
“Yes, there’s so much room to breathe here–I356s’pose being at sea so much, he had to have that. And he picked up most of these things on his voyages–he must have wanted them pretty bad or he wouldn’t have carried them half around the world with him.”
The young people had come over to the Captain’s for supper. School had closed the day before, and Chicken Little was the proud possessor of an elaborate autograph album, won as a spelling prize. Captain Clarke had attended the closing exercises at her request. He had invited them over to celebrate, this evening. He declared he had never learned to spell himself and he wanted the honor of entertaining some one who knew how.
Chicken Little had brought the album along for the Captain’s signature. “And write something, too, won’t you? Something specially for me,” she had begged winningly.
“Have they all written something–specially for you, Chicken Little? I should like to read them.”
“I haven’t asked very many people yet, just Mr. Clay and Grant Stowe and Mamie Jenkins’ little sister–Mamie’s in town you know. I asked Sherm, but he hasn’t thought up anything.”
The Captain glanced at Sherm and smiled whimsically. “Now, if I were as young as Sherm, I shouldn’t have to think up things–the trouble would be to restrain my eloquence.”
357Sherm grinned and looked uncomfortable.
The Captain was merciful; he changed the subject.
“Isn’t the middle of May a little early to close school?”
“No, it is the usual time. You see the older children have to help at home as soon as the weather gets warm.”
“Of course. What are you going to do this summer?”
“Wish Ernest was home,” Jane answered pertly, but there was a wistful look in her eyes.
Before the Captain could reply, Wing came to the door to announce a man to see him. The Captain was gone some time. When he returned, he explained that it was a buyer from Kansas City after his corn, and he should have to leave them to entertain themselves for a while.
“I’ll tell you what you can do,” he paused in the doorway as the idea occurred to him. “You two may rummage in the drawers of the cabinet. Take out anything you like the looks of. I think you will find a lot of interesting stuff there. Make yourselves at home.”
They lingered, discussing the room for several minutes after his departure, then Jane went over to the cabinet.
“Come on–there are heaps of wonderful things358here. He showed me some of them the day I ran off and came to see him on my own hook. That’s a year ago! My, I feel as if it were a dozen–it seems as if I were just a little girl then.”
“And now?” Sherm adored to set Jane off.
“None of your sarcasm, Mr. Dart.” Then soberly: “Truly, Sherm, I know I’m a lot older. Things seem so different to me.”
“I know you are, too, Lady Jane. I was only teasing you.”
They had a beautiful half hour among the Captain’s treasures. Sherm gloated especially over the prints–their wonderful composition and soft color.
“Say, the Japs know a thing or two, don’t they? That wouldn’t be my idea of what to put into a picture, but it’s awfully satisfying.” He held the print off and closed one eye to see the outlines more vividly.
“Sherm, you surely were intended for an artist.” Chicken Little had gone on to the drawer below. “Oh, Sherm, I believe this is the drawer the Captain didn’t show me before. Do you suppose he wants us to go through it?”
“He said all of them. What’s in it?”
“Oh, sashes and scarfs and things. I thought maybe they used to belong to his wife.”
Sherm lifted a Roman scarf of crimson and yellow and rich blue, and examined it admiringly. “It359doesn’t look as if this had ever been worn. I guess he wouldn’t have told us to go ahead if there had been anything here he didn’t want us to find. Say, Chicken Little, this would look dandy on you. Here, I’m going to fix you up for Captain Clarke to see.”
Sherm shook out the glowing silken folds and proceeded to wreathe the scarf around Chicken Little’s head, turban fashion. Her brown eyes glowed and the color in her cheeks grew deeper, as she met the admiration in Sherm’s eyes. He was staring at her, enchanted at the result of his efforts. Jane moved restlessly.
“Hold still there, can’t you? I want to try it another way. Didn’t I see one of those sleeveless jacket affairs in there?”
Jane rummaged and brought to light a crimson silk Turkish jacket embroidered in gold thread. She noticed that it, too, seemed perfectly fresh.
“Sherm, I do wonder how Captain Clarke happened to buy all these woman’s things. Do you suppose he bought them for his wife and she was dead when he got home with them?”
“I wonder. Perhaps we oughtn’t to be handling them. See all those queer beads, and there’s a bracelet! Isn’t it a beauty? See, it is like silver lace. I guess those blue stones must be turquoises.”
“Isn’t it dainty? That must be the filigree work we read about.”
360Sherm was staring thoughtfully at the contents of the drawer. “One thing sure,” he muttered, “he must have thought a heap of her.”
Chicken Little had continued exploring. “Here’s a photograph and two locks of hair in a little frame. Oh, Sherm, it’s her! Yes, it must be, this is the same baby. I wonder why he doesn’t have this on his bureau, too.”
Sherm took the picture and stared at it so long that Jane grew impatient.
“What is it, Sherm? What’s the matter?”
Sherm started, passing his hand over his forehead and eyes as if he were dazed.
“Funny, the face seems sort of familiar. I had such a queer feeling about it for a minute.”
“I know why it looks familiar–there’s a tiny bit of resemblance to you–not as much as in the pictures of the baby. I suppose the baby got it from the mother. Still, I think it looks like Captain Clarke, too, don’t you?”
“Let’s put these things back, Chicken Little. Poor little lady, I wonder what happened to her.” Sherm laid the picture gently back in the bottom of the drawer and helped Jane fold and lay away the other things. They had both forgotten the Roman sash which still adorned her dark hair.
Captain Clarke, coming in soon after, started when he saw her and glanced at the cabinet.
361“Dressing up, Chicken Little? That gew gaw was evidently intended by Providence for you. Won’t you accept it as a present to keep that autograph album company?”
Chicken Little put her hand to her head in dismay. Captain Clarke must have thought she wanted it. She stammered awkwardly:
“Oh, Captain Clarke–I–couldn’t take it. I oughtn’t to have put it on.”
Sherm calmly took the matter out of her hands.
“She didn’t put it on, Captain Clarke. I’m the guilty party. I thought it would be so becoming to Chicken Little–her dark hair and eyes–you know. I didn’t realize till we came across the picture that it belonged to your wife–and–you might not like to have us handle it.”
“It was never Mrs. Clarke’s,” the Captain said evenly. “I bought it for her, but she”–he hesitated an instant–“she–died before my return. I told you to rummage the drawers, and that scarf is entirely too becoming to Chicken Little’s bright eyes to be wasted in a drawer any longer. You will be doing me a favor, my dear.
“You seem to have an eye for color, Sherm. Juanita loved color, too, that is why I picked up so many gay things for her.” Captain Clarke seemed to have formed a sudden resolution. He plunged his hand down among the rustling silks and brought up362the picture. His hand trembled a little as he handed it to Chicken Little. “I have never shown you her picture before. She had eyes something like yours.”
Chicken Little took the picture and tried to look as if nothing had happened. She described the scene to Marian afterwards. “O Marian, I felt as if I were standing in a story book. The Captain’s face was as white, but he went on talking just as if I knew all about his wife, and–I do wonder! I felt so sorry for him. Sherm said he wanted to kick himself for being so thoughtless.”
“Don’t worry about it, Jane, and don’t be trying to make a mystery out of what was merely a big sorrow. It must have been an awful blow to him to come home and find wife and baby both dead, but it happened years ago. I expect it did him good to talk to you and Sherm about it.”
Chicken Little forgot about it after a few days, except when she went to the box where she kept the scarf. She always thought of the picture of the young mother and baby whenever she saw it.
“I don’t believe I ever can wear it,” she told Sherm.
“Oh, yes, you will, some of these days; the Captain would be hurt if you didn’t.”
Sherm hadn’t heard from his mother for over a week when a neighbor came one evening and handed363Dr. Morton a yellow envelope. “No bad news, I hope,” he said.
It was addressed to Dr. Morton and read: “My husband died this morning. Break news to Sherm–he must await letter.”
Sherm, too, was older than he had been a year before. He was coming up the lane whistling, swinging his supple young body along at a good pace, as if he enjoyed being alive. Dr. Morton watched him, dreading to have to tell him the bad news and wondering how he would take it. “It’s a pity,” he thought, “Sherm’s a fine manly fellow and ought to have his education and a chance at life, and I am afraid this means more than losing his father.”
He waited until the boy came up to him. He was still holding the telegram in his hand, but Sherm did not notice it until he spoke.
Dr. Morton’s voice was very kind. “My boy, I am–afraid—” He got no farther. Sherm saw the telegram and understood. “Father?” he questioned. Dr. Morton nodded.
Sherm stood motionless, as if he were trying to realize that the blow he had so long dreaded, had fallen. Presently he looked up at the Doctor.
“There isn’t any train before to-morrow, is there?”
“No, Sherm, and I don’t think your mother expects–here, read the message.”
364Sherm’s hand shook. He read the meager words through twice, then crushed the paper in his fist.
“I am going home to-morrow,” he said doggedly. “I’ve got enough saved up for the railroad fare. He was my father–I haven’t seen him for a year. They might have told me! I am not a child any longer!”
Dr. Morton laid his hand on his shoulder. “Don’t, Sherm–don’t add bitterness to grief. Your mother may not have known in time. Death often comes suddenly at the last in such cases. And, my boy, I would think twice before setting out rashly. Your mother asks you to wait for her letter–she must have some good reason. The message was sent this morning. There will probably be a letter to-morrow.”
“I don’t care whether there’s a letter or not, I’m going.” There was a hard look on the boy’s face.
Chicken Little came running up, with Jilly panting alongside. “My, we had a good race, didn’t we, Jilly Dilly? Why–what’s—” She stopped short at sight of their grave faces.
Dr. Morton told her.
She stood a moment awestruck; Chicken Little had never had death come so near her before. Then she turned to Sherm, her face so full of tender pity that his face softened a trifle.
“Don’t worry about me, Chicken Little,” he said365gruffly, “I am all right. If you’ll help me knock my things together after a while, I’ll be grateful. I guess I’ll take a–walk–now.” His voice broke a little at the last.
He did not wait for an answer, but walked hurriedly away. Jane gazed after him, undecided whether to follow or not. Dr. Morton divined her thought. “I wouldn’t, dear. Let him have it out alone first–you can comfort him later on. I want you to help me persuade him not to rush off before he receives his mother’s letter. I must say I don’t blame Sherm for resenting his mother’s attitude. I think she is making a big mistake.”
Dusk came and the darkness closed round while Chicken Little strained her eyes in vain for Sherm. It was almost ten before he came back. She was standing at the gate watching for him. The rest of the family had gone to bed. “Chicken Little can comfort him better than any of us,” Dr. Morton had told his wife. “He will be glad not to have to face any of the rest of the family to-night.”
“You shouldn’t have stayed up, Chicken Little,” Sherm called, as soon as he caught sight of her. “I forgot I asked you to help me–I’d have come home sooner if I’d remembered. The duds can wait till morning–I can get up early.” He spoke quietly.
“Do you think you ought to go, Sherm?”
Sherm’s eyes smouldered. Jane could not see him366very distinctly, but she could fairly feel his determination.
“It’s no use talking, I’m going!”
They went up the walk in silence. The lilacs and the white syringia in the borders were in bloom. She hoped Sherm did not notice the heavy fragrance–it was so like a funeral. He did not say anything till they got to the foot of the stairs.
“Thank you, Jane, for–for waiting.” His voice broke pitifully.
When Dr. Morton discovered the next morning that Sherm was not to be moved from his purpose, he decided to go into town early and see if by any chance there might be another telegram or a letter. Letters from the east sometimes came down by a branch line from the north. There was nothing, and he finally resolved to telegraph Mrs. Dart as to Sherm’s state of mind. Sherm was to come later in the day with Frank in time to catch the evening train, which was the only one that made close connections at Kansas City. It was late afternoon before he received a reply. The message was emphatic. “Shermmustawait letter.”
“Mrs. Dart evidently knows her own mind,” thought the Doctor. He drove a little way out of town and waited for Frank and Sherm. Chicken Little was with them. He gave the boy this second message, explaining what he had done. Sherm read367it over and over, as if he hoped in some way to find a reason for his mother’s decision lurking between the lines.
At length he said stolidly: “I’ll wait till to-morrow. Perhaps the letter will come to-night.”
They talked it over and Sherm and Chicken Little went on to town with the light buggy to wait for the mail, while Dr. Morton and Frank drove home.
There was a handful of letters in the box. Sherm took them out hastily.
“I guess this is it,” he said, stuffing one into his pocket. “And here’s three for you.”
“Three? Whoever from?” Jane held out her hand. “Ernest and Katy–and here’s another with an Annapolis postmark. Who do you suppose?”
Sherm glanced over her shoulder. “That’s Carol Brown’s handwriting.”
“Carol?–writing to me? How funny!”
They hurried out to the team.
“Let me drive while you read your letter, Sherm.”
Sherm shook his head. “Read yours first–this will keep.”
“The idea–I wouldn’t be so piggy selfish.”
“Please, Jane, I’d rather get out of town before I tackle it.”
“Sherm, I wish I could—” She didn’t need to finish. Sherm understood.
“Read Carol’s first,” he said.
368She read it with a beaming face. Sherm was looking at her without seeing her. She started to tell him the contents of the letter, then suddenly stopped. She couldn’t rejoice over being asked to a hop when Sherm was in such trouble. Laying the letter in her lap, she took up Ernest’s. Sherm noticed the movement and, remembering, asked her what Carol had to say.
She handed him the letter. He read it through absently. The houses were thinning along the road. The prairie stretched ahead of them in solitary sweeps of tender green, dappled with flowers. Jane reached for the reins.
“Read your letter, Sherm.”
He obeyed in silence. Chicken Little kept her eyes on the road ahead. A sharp exclamation from Sherm startled her:
“God, it can’t be true!”
Sherm swearing? She looked at him in amazement. The boy was not swearing; he had cried out in utter agony. He dropped the letter on the floor of the buggy and buried his face in his hands.
“Sherm, Sherm, what is it?” Chicken Little was frightened.
He did not answer. He did not seem to have noticed that she had spoken. She reached over and touched him. “Sherm! Sherm!” He shook off her hand impatiently.
369Chicken Little hesitated a moment, then flicked the horses into a swift trot. She must get him home. Perhaps he was going to be ill. The boy did not move or look up for miles. When the horses splashed through the ford at Elm Creek, he roused himself and looked dully at Jane.
“Sherm, please tell me. It will make it easier for you to tell somebody, and I’m worried to death.”
He stooped and picked up the letter. Smoothing it out, he thrust it into her hand. “Read it.” He took the reins.
Chicken Little ran over the letter hurriedly. It bore a date some days previous.
“My Dear Boy:
“Dr. Jones has just told me it can be only a question of days now. I have been studying whether to send for you or not. Father settled the question for me. He said he wanted sorrowfully to see you, but in view of the things that must be told you, it would be too painful an ordeal for all of us. He said to tell you you were very precious to him–as precious as if you had really been his own son.”
Chicken Little gave a little cry. “Sherm, what does she mean?”
“Read it all.”
“For, Sherm, you are not our own. If Father could have lived, we never intended you to know370this–at least not until you were a man and had made a place for yourself. But Father’s illness is leaving us penniless. Sue’s husband has offered Grace and myself a home with them, but he thinks you must be told the truth–that it is only fair to you. We took you when you were about two and a half years old under very peculiar circumstances. It was while we were still living in New York, and Sue was a tot of five. We were going up to my father’s in Albany and were a little late. Father told the hackman to drive fast; he’d give him an extra dollar if he’d catch the train. The man had been drinking and drove recklessly. He was just dashing round the corner to the station–the train was already whistling–when he knocked down, and ran over, a woman with a child in her arms. The child was pitched to one side and escaped with a few bruises. The woman never regained consciousness. You have probably guessed that you were that child. We could never find out who she was, though we advertised for several weeks. We decided to bring you up with Sue, and when we moved to Centerville, soon after, no one knew you were not our own child. We had you baptized Sherman after the great general who had just won his way to notice then. I have saved the clothing you wore, and a brooch and wedding ring of your mother’s. I will send them to you, together with a hundred dollars, which is all I can371give you to start you on your way.” The remainder of the letter was filled with her grief over parting with her husband, and her separation from Sherm himself.
Chicken Little swallowed hard–something seemed to be gripping her by the throat.
“And your father isn’t your father, Sherm?–or your mother or Sue or Grace?” The tragic extent of what had happened was dawning slowly upon Jane.
Sherm’s lips trembled.
“No, I–haven’t any father–I’ve never had a father!... I haven’t got anybody.... I haven’t even got a name that belongs to me!” Sherm’s voice grew shriller and shriller till it broke with a dry sob.
Chicken Little slipped her hand into his and the boy clung to it spasmodically, as if that slim, brown hand were all he had in the world to cling to. The tears were raining down Jane’s cheeks, but Sherm’s eyes were dry and burning. The team trotted along evenly. They turned mechanically into the stable yard when they reached the ranch. It was growing dusk.
Sherm helped her out, saying: “Will you please tell them, Chicken Little? I won’t come in just yet.”
She ran to the house and poured out her tale. Her372father hurried to the stable. Sherm was not there. Jim Bart, who was milking in the corral near by, said he had saddled Caliph and gone off down the lane. Dr. Morton talked it over with Frank and they decided that Sherm had done the wisest thing possible in going for a gallop.
“He doesn’t mean to do anything rash or he wouldn’t have taken Ernest’s horse,” Frank declared.
But as hour after hour went by, the family grew more and more anxious. At eleven o’clock, Frank saddled Calico and tried to find him. He returned some time later in despair.
“You might as well try to look for a needle in a haystack. Poor lad, I have faith he will ride the worst of it off and Caliph is a pretty steady little beast now. He’ll bring him home.”
A few moments after his return, a messenger came from Captain Clarke, saying that he had been wakened by Caliph neighing at the gate and had gone out to find Sherm dazed and apparently completely exhausted. He had got him to bed where he was sleeping heavily. Captain Clarke was afraid they must be worried. He would care for him till morning, but he would be glad to have some inkling of what had happened so that he might know what to say to the boy when he waked.
Dr. Morton got out his medicine case and went back with the man.
373
Chicken Little climbed the hill of sleep painfully that night, and slept late the following morning in consequence. While she was eating breakfast, Frank came in with two tear-stained, dusty letters, which he had found in the bottom of the buggy.
“Is this the way you treat your correspondence, Sis?”
“The idea–it’s Ernest’s and Katy’s letters and I never read them. Sherm’s trouble drove them clear out of my mind.”
“Evidently, one is torn part way open, and the other hasn’t been touched.”
“Hurry up and tell us what Ernest has to say. I was wondering why he hadn’t written.” Mrs. Morton paused expectantly.
374“He says a lot of things,” replied Jane, skimming rapidly through the letter. “He says they are going to start on their summer cruise next week and the boys are tickled to death to go, though they’re probably just going to cruise around to Navy yards and see dry docks and improving things. He says that it’s rumored that Superintendent Balch is going away and Old Rodgers is coming back as superintendent. And this year’s class graduated three Japs–the Japanese government sent them over. He gives the names, but I can’t pronounce them. One is I-n-o-u-y-e.”
“Skip the Japs and give us the rest.” Frank was waiting to hear the news.
“That’s about all that would interest you.”
“My dear, anything concerning Ernest interests me,” protested her mother.
“But it isn’t about Ernest; it’s about Carol Brown.”
“Well, what is it?”
“Oh, nothing much–he just took a fancy to my picture and asked Ernest a lot of questions.” Chicken Little folded the letter and hastily slipped it back into the envelope, devoutly hoping her mother wouldn’t demand to see it. She tore open Katy’s. Before she had read two lines she gave a little cry of delight.
“Oh, Mother, do you think I could? Oh, wouldn’t375it be just too wonderful? Oh Mother, you must say Yes!”
“Jane, what are you talking about? Calm yourself and tell me.” Mrs. Morton looked up over her spectacles severely.
“Why, she says her mother wants me to come and live with them next year and go to the High School and that Alice and Dick want me to come there. And, perhaps, I could stay part of the time at one house and part at the other, and for me to tell you and let you be thinking about it, and Alice and Mrs. Halford are both going to write you all about it, and–oh, Mother, wouldn’t it be too wonderful?”
Mrs. Morton looked both surprised and worried. “It is certainly most kind of them all, but I shall have to think the matter over.”
“Well,” said Frank, “that doesn’t have to be settled to-day. Jane, Marian wishes to know if you want to go over to the Captain’s with her to see Sherm. She is going to start in a few minutes.”
Chicken Little jumped to her feet. “I’ll be ready in a jiffy!”
Sherm had still not wakened when they arrived. He had roused once toward morning; Captain Clarke had spoken to him, telling him where he was, then he had dropped quietly off to sleep again.
Captain Clarke asked Chicken Little a good many questions.
376“I should like to see that letter,” he said.
“It’s in his coat pocket. I tucked it in–I was afraid he’d lose it.”
Dr. Morton, who was still there, sat for several minutes in a brown study.
“I think,” he said presently, “that under the circumstances we should be justified in reading it without waiting for Sherm’s permission.” He looked at Captain Clarke.
The latter nodded assent.
Both read it and discussed it briefly. Still Sherm did not waken.
“I believe I’ll drive over to Jake Schmidt’s while I am waiting–I have an errand with him. Marian, don’t you want to ride over with me?”
“Captain Clarke,” said Jane rather timidly after they had gone, “would you mind showing me that picture of your baby again?”
Captain Clarke rose and brought the photograph. Chicken Little studied it carefully, then glanced up at the Captain. Sherm certainly was like the picture–as much like it as a boy who was almost a man grown could be. Should she dare to ask him? Chicken Little felt herself growing hot and cold by turns. Her heart was beating so she thought the Captain must surely hear it. One minute she was sure she didn’t dare, the next, she remembered Sherm’s broken-hearted words about not belonging377to anybody, and she was sure she could screw her courage up–in just a minute. Captain Clarke helped her out. He had been observing her restless movements for several minutes and was wondering if she could possibly have guessed what was in his own mind.
“Out with it, little woman, what’s troubling you?”
Chicken Little got up from her seat and went and stood close beside him. “I want to say something to you awfully, only I am afraid you–won’t like it,” she said earnestly.
“My dear child, don’t be afraid of me.”
Chicken Little summoned up her resolution.
“I wanted to ask–to ask you, if you wouldn’t adopt Sherm. You see he looks like your little boy would have looked, and he hasn’t got anybody or any name, and he isn’t going to want to live hardly, I am afraid. And I thought.... You don’t know how fine Sherm is. He’s so honorable and kind–so–so you can trust him. I just know you’d be proud of him after a while.”
Chicken Little was pleading with eyes and voice and trembling hands. The Captain gazed at her a moment in astonishment, then he tenderly drew her toward him.
“Chicken Little, I doubt if Sherm would agree to that. But if he is willing, I should be proud and happy to call him my son. But don’t get your hopes378up–I fear Sherm is too proud to let us find any such easy solution of his troubles. But we’ll find a way to put him on his feet, you and I–we’ll find a way, if it takes every cent I have!
“I think perhaps the first thing to do, Chicken Little,” he continued after some pondering, “is to try to find out something about Sherman’s real parentage. It hardly seems possible that a comfortably dressed woman could have disappeared with her child without making some stir. I am in hopes, by getting somebody to search through the files of two or three of the leading New York newspapers immediately following the day of the accident, we might secure a clue. I shall write to Mrs. Dart at once for particulars, and then send to a man I know and pay him to make a thorough investigation.”
They were so interested discussing what could be done, that Sherm entered the room before they knew he was awake. The boy was calm, but looked years older, and very white and worn. Captain Clarke greeted him cheerfully.
“I hope you rested. Jane tells me you had a staggering day yesterday. Chicken Little, would you mind telling Wing to serve Sherm’s breakfast?”
As soon as she disappeared, he gripped the boy’s hand, saying confidently, “I don’t wish to talk about your trouble just now and I have no words to comfort you for your loss, lad, but I want to tell you not379to begin to worry yet about your identity. I believe we shall find a way to get track of your people and that you will find you have an honorable name, and, possibly, a living father to make up a little for the kind foster-father you have lost.”
“I don’t see how we could–after all these years.”
“Will you leave the matter to me for a few days? And Sherm, make an effort to eat something for Chicken Little’s sake–she is worrying her heart out over your trouble. You have some good friends right here–don’t forget that. Dr. Morton watched by you all night. Brace up and be a man. I know you have it in you, Sherm.”
Letters came to Sherm in a short time from Sue Dart, from Dick and Alice Harding, and from Mrs. Halford, who painstakingly wrote him all the details of his supposed father’s last days. She evidently knew nothing of his not being the Dart’s own son. Sue’s letter seemed to comfort him a little. He did not show it to anyone, even to Chicken Little. He confided to her, however, that the folks were sending his things to him the next day. They had already broken up the home and were going back to Chicago with Sue the following week.
When the express package arrived, Sherm took it straight to Jane.
“You open it,” he said.
Chicken Little took his knife and cut the string and380folded back the paper wrappings carefully. It seemed some way as if she were meeting Sherm’s mother.
The quaint little old-fashioned garments were musty and faded. A frock of blue merino braided in an elaborate pattern in black lay on top. There was a cape to match, and a little cloth cap. Beside these lay a funny pair of leather boots with red tops–almost like a man’s–only, oh, so tiny!
Chicken Little hardly knew whether to laugh or cry at these.
“Oh, Sherm, did you ever wear them? How you must have strutted! I can fairly see you.”
Sherm smiled and took them up tenderly. Did he, too, feel as if there were another presence haunting these relics of his childhood?
The tiny yellowed undergarments came next, all made by hand with minute even stitches. A pair of blue and white striped knitted stockings was folded with these, and last, at the bottom, a little pasteboard box appeared, containing a ring, a brooch, and a flat oval locket on a fine gold chain.
Sherm examined the ring first. Inside was inscribed William-Juanita. May 1860.
The brooch contained a lock of dark hair under a glass; the whole set in a twisted rim of gold. The locket held miniatures of a white-haired man and woman with foreign-looking faces. Both Sherm and381Chicken Little looked these over in silence. Presently Sherm sighed, then laid the trinkets all back in Chicken Little’s lap.
“I don’t see anything there that could help much,” he said hopelessly.
Chicken Little slowly folded up the little garments and laid them neatly back in their wrapping. Her brow was puckered into a frown.
“I am trying to think where I have heard that name Juanita–some place lately. I don’t remember ever to have known anybody by that name. It’s Spanish, isn’t it?”
“I guess so, but what you’re thinking of is the song, ‘Juanita.’”
“Oh, I expect it is. Sherm, do you mind if I take these things over and show them to Captain Clarke? He said he would like to see them when they came.”
“No, take them along. If you’ll wait till I get the feeding done, I’ll go with you.”
“All right, let’s take Calico and Caliph.”
Sherm lingered out on the veranda while Chicken Little displayed the contents of the package to the Captain. He examined each little article of clothing for some identifying mark.
“There doesn’t seem to be anything to help on those,” he said, disappointed. “Let’s have a look at the jewelry.”
Chicken Little unwrapped the ring from its layers382of tissue paper, and handed it to him. Captain Clarke took it, regarded the flat golden circle intently for an instant, then turned it to read the inscription.
A pained cry broke from his lips. Chicken Little glanced hastily up to find him holding the ring in shaking fingers, staring off into vacancy. “Juanita!” he whispered, “Juanita!”
Chicken Little touched his hands in distress.
“Captain–Captain Clarke, what is it?”
He looked down at her with a start. “I–it is—Excuse me a moment, Chicken Little.”
He walked into his bedroom with the ring still in his hand and closed the door.
Chicken Little waited and waited, not knowing whether she ought to go and tell Sherm what she suspected. It seemed too strange to be possible. And if it were true, surely Captain Clarke would want to tell him himself. Perhaps she oughtn’t to be there. She rose softly and slipped out to Wing in the kitchen. After a time she heard Sherm get up from his seat on the veranda step and go into the library. Immediately after, the bedroom door opened and she heard the murmur of voices. She left a message with Wing and running quietly out to Calico, untied him, and rode home in the twilight.
“You needn’t ever say again, Ernest Morton,”383she wrote to her brother the next evening, “that E. P. Roe’s stories are too goody-goody and fishy to be interesting. He can’t hold a candle to what’s happened to the Captain and Sherm. I have to go round pinching myself to believe it is really so. I am almost afraid I will wake up and find it isn’t, still. Do you remember the picture of the Captain’s little boy that looked like Sherm? Well, it was Sherm. I can hear you say: ‘What in the dickens?’ So, I’ll put you out of suspense right away. The Captain’s boy was not dead, only lost, and he is Sherm or Sherm is he, whichever way is right–I’m sure I don’t know. You see the Captain went off on a long voyage and got shipwrecked and was gone ages and ages. And Juanita’s father and mother were way off in California–they used to be Spanish. That’s what made them so foreign-looking in the locket picture. Well, nobody knows exactly what happened. When the Captain got back to New York and hunted up the boarding house where she had lived, they said she had left six months before to go to her parents in California. Captain Clarke wrote to California and found that her father was dead and her mother hadn’t heard from Juanita for months, and didn’t know anything about her coming home. Wasn’t it dreadful? He paid detectives to hunt her up, but they never found the slightest clue. The Captain thought she’d gone off and left him on purpose–that’s384what made him such a woman-hater–and so sad all the time. You wouldn’t know him now. He looks like Merry Christmas all the year round. You should see him gaze at Sherm. Marian says it makes her want to cry, and Mother says it is the most wonderful manifestation of Providence she has ever known. It seems to me Providence would show more sense not to muddle things up so in the first place. Sherm is as pleased as can be to find he really is somebody, and he’s awfully fond of the Captain, but you see he’d got so used to loving the Darts as his own folks that he can’t get unused to it all of a sudden. He choked all up when he tried to call Captain Clarke ‘Father,’ and the Captain told him not to. There’s heaps more to tell, but Mother has been calling me for the past three minutes.”
“No wonder Sherm feels dazed,” said Dr. Morton two evenings later, watching the boy, who was making a vain pretense of playing checkers with Chicken Little.
He was so heedless that she swept his men off the board at each move, to Chicken Little’s disgust. Sherm usually beat her when he gave his mind to the game. Presently, she picked up the board and dumped the checkers off into her lap.
“A penny for your thoughts, Sherm.”
385“I was just wondering if Captain–Father–would find out anything more in New York.”
“How long will he be gone?”
“I guess that depends on whether he gets track of anything new. After he comes back we’re going to Chicago to see–Mother.”
“Oh, I am so glad. It will make you feel a lot better to have a good visit with them all.”
“Yes, and he told me I might buy back the old home for her if she wants it–if I’d only known last week, she needn’t have sold the place. And the Captain–Father–says he will give me some money to put out at interest so she’ll have enough to live on comfortably. He says he owes her and Father a debt he can never repay for bringing me up.”
Chicken Little was thoughtful. “Sherm, he seems to have plenty of money, maybe you can go to college and to the Beaux Arts, too.”
“He said I could have all the education I wanted.”
“Will you go to college next year?”
“Yep.”
“O dear, it will be awful here unless Mother lets me go to Centerville.”
“Don’t fret, she is going to.”
“How do you know?”
“She told Marian so last night.”
Chicken Little got to her feet and shot two feet386into the air with a whoop of joy. “Goody! Goody!! Goody!!!”
“Save a little breath, Jane. I know something better than that. Promise you won’t tell–your mother would skin me if she knew I were giving away her cherished plans.”
“Don’t be afraid, she just wants me to act surprised, and I can do it a lot better if I know about it before hand.”
“Well, she’s coming on at Christmas time for a visit in Centerville, and she’s going to take you on to visit Ernest.”
“Sherm, truly?”
“That’s what she said.”
Chicken Little gave an ecstatic hop. “Sherm,” she exclaimed presently, a new idea striking her, “I can go to that hop with Carol!”
“Carol?” Sherm sat up a little straighter. “What do you mean?”
“Don’t you remember that letter I got from Carol? You don’t remember a single thing about it, do you? He wrote to ask me if I wouldn’t come on some time and go to a Navy hop with him. He said he was asking me in time so I couldn’t promise anybody else.”
“It strikes me Carol is getting mighty fresh.”
Chicken Little stole a surprised glance at Sherm.
“I don’t see anything fresh about that–I think it387nice of him to remember me so long. My, I used to think Carol was the most wonderful thing. I hung a May basket to him the last spring we were in Centerville.”
“You did? Why, I thought I got yours. Who hung mine?”
“Gertie. I guess she won’t mind if I tell–it’s been so long.”
Sherm whistled. After a little he inquired rather sheepishly:
“Say, Chicken Little, you don’t like Carol best now, do you?”
Chicken Little looked up hastily. She was disgusted to feel her face growing hot. “Why, Sherm–I haven’t seen Carol for four years. I don’t know what I should think of him now.” Then, seeing the hurt look in Sherm’s eyes, she added: “I guess I’d have to like him pretty awfully well, if I did.”
Captain Clarke was gone two weeks and he had added only two facts to those they had been able to piece together. He had accidentally run across an old friend. This friend had supposed him dead all these years, and could scarcely believe his own eyes when he saw him. From him, he learned that his wife had also believed him dead before she would consent to leave New York. This friend told him he had suspected that her money was running low and388had offered to help her, but she refused. He thought, after hearing the Captain’s story, that she must have had barely enough left to take her home, and that this explained why she was walking to the wharf instead of taking a hack, the day she was run down.
Sherm stayed on with the Morton’s until the following week when he set out with his new-found father to visit his adopted family. Youth recovers readily from its sorrows. It was almost the old Sherm who raised his cap to Chicken Little as the train got under steam and slid away from the long wooden platform.
“O dear!” she exclaimed, “seems to me I haven’t done anything this whole year but see somebody off. I think it ought to be my turn pretty soon.”
“Have a little patience, Humbug,” said her father, “your turn is almost here. It is hard for me to realize how fast my baby is growing up.”
Chicken Little liked the sound of those words–“growing up.” There was something magical about them. They lingered in her mind for days.
One hot Sunday afternoon late in June, she arrayed herself in an old blue lawn dress of Marian’s that trailed a full inch on the floor at every step. She coiled her hair high on her head and tucked in a rose coquettishly above her ear. Highly gratified with the result of her efforts, she swept downstairs in a most dignified manner to astonish the family.389Unfortunately the family–Father and Mother, and both pups, were taking a siesta. She went over to the cottage; a profound silence reigned there also. She rambled around restlessly for a few moments, then, taking “Ivanhoe” and a pocketful of cookies, went out into the orchard. It was hot even there. The air seemed heavy and the birds contented themselves with lazy chirpings. She swung herself up into her favorite tree and began to munch and read.
But she did not read long. The charm of the green world around her was greater than the pictured world of the book. Chicken Little fell to making pictures of her own–dream pictures that changed quickly into other dream pictures, as real dreams sometimes do. As she stared down the leafy arcades between the rows of apple trees, she saw an immense ball room hung in red, white, and blue bunting and filled with astonishingly handsome young men in blue uniforms. Ernest was there. And a tall, curly-headed Adonis, who looked both like, and unlike, the good-natured, plump Carol of Old Centerville days, was close beside her. But when the supposed Carol spoke, it was certainly Sherm’s voice she heard, and it was Sherm’s odd, crooked smile that curved the dream midshipman’s lips. Chicken Little recognized the absurdity of this herself and laughed happily. A bird on a bough nearby took this for a challenge, and burst into an ecstasy of trills.
390“Pshaw,” she whispered to herself, “I wonder what it would really be like.” She kept on wondering. She felt as if she and the orchard were wrapped about with a great cloud, like a veil, and that beyond this, all the wonderful things that must surely happen when she grew up, were hidden. The twilight was falling before she stretched her cramped limbs and slid down the rough tree trunk. She picked up her neglected book, which had fallen to the ground unnoticed, and said aloud, with a little mocking curtsey:
“Your pardon, Sir Walter, but I made a romance of my own that was–nicer.”
Then she tucked the slighted author under her arm and flew to the house before the pursuing shadows. Chicken Little was growing up.