CHAPTER XIIISHE FINDS A FOREIGNER
Eveley had very nearly lost faith in assimilation. She had thought it over carefully, attempted it conscientiously and decided it could not be done.
“One individuality can not be absorbed by another,” she would say very sagely. “Whether it is husbands and wives, or whether it is nations. The theorists are right in stating that America is for Americans only, and that it is the patriotic duty of those who come here to be Americanized as rapidly as possible, and the duty of the regular Americans to Americanize everybody else at top speed—but it can not be done. They are they, and we are we. It may be our duty, but we are not big enough.”
She did not call her friendship with Angelo Moreno by any such big and formal term as assimilation. They had just grown to be enormously good friends. She had forgottenabout Americanizing him, but she found him charming, with the fresh frank abandon of the unspoiled south-European. She liked his open admiration, she enjoyed his mature cynicism, she reveled in his buoyant enthusiasm. She had not believed that such opposing elements could dwell in one small person. In Angelo, she found them, and she found the combination good.
He was helpful to Eveley, as well as pleasing. He did endless small jobs for her about the car and upon the lawn of her home. And when she noticed that he quickly adopted some of her own little customs of speech and manner, she was freshly pleased and interested.
Still she could not harden her heart to the clamorous call of the world struggle. She lived so happily and so securely in her Cloud Cote, going to business by day, doing her small bits of housework in between whiles, frolicking with her friends, chumming with Angelo, playing with her sister’s babies, running about in her pretty car. It was like living in the clouds indeed, with the world ofchaos beneath. For there was the struggle of reconstruction going on, the tremendous heave and pull of masses seeking to dominate, the subtle writhe and twist of politics, a whole world straining and sinewing to rise dominant out of the molten bed of human lava left from the volcanic eruption of war.
And although Eveley still lived serene in her Cloud Cote, it was like living on the edge of the crater of a volcano. The eruption would come, must come. And when it came, her pretty Cloud Cote might be caught in the upheaval. Sometimes in the evening she stood breathless in the little pavilion on the edge of the canyon stretching down below her home, and looked far into the shadows. Being a vivid imaginer, down in the darkness she seemed to see the world in turmoil, and although she stood above it on the heights, she knew that when the final reckoning came, there would be no heights and no canyon.
“And the only thing that can stop it is Americanization, and it is impossible,” she would say helplessly. “And there you are.”
But being of a light and happy heart, she tried to forget, and plunged into her work and her play once more. The consciousness, however, of a world in travail was always with her.
This was why, when Amos Hiltze came to her with an appeal for help in a new phase of Americanization, he found such prompt and eager interest.
“It is not much, Miss Ainsworth,” he said earnestly, “and to you it may seem very aimless and trifling indeed. But it is something definite at least, a real tangible piece of Americanization, and you are the only woman I know who can help us out.”
“Yes, yes, yes,” she cried eagerly. “I will, of course. What is it?”
“It is a girl, a Spanish girl from Mexico. Her relatives joined the revolutionists, and pouf,—were blown out. By rare good fortune she escaped across the border. But what chance has she? No friends,—no training. She has never learned to meet and mingle with people. And now after the years of horror, she is afraid. She has lost her nerve.She needs a place where she can be alone, and quiet, with no one to observe or criticize. I can vouch for the girl, that she is all right. And I wondered if your spirit of Americanization would carry you to the point of temporarily adopting her.”
“Oh, mercy!” gasped Eveley, thinking with great tenderness of her cozy little Cloud Cote, her home, and hers alone.
“I know it is asking a great deal, but it will only be for a few weeks. Just until some proper arrangements can be made for her. Unless she is taken care of, and quickly, she will fall a prey to some anarchistic Bolshevik, or something worse. She is living with a bunch of low Mexicans away out in the country, and the Greasers come there from all around,—and I am afraid for the girl. If she can be taken now, treated kindly, shown the charm and wholesomeness of American customs and principles, she will be won for America. A beautiful girl, educated, talented, charming. Think what a power she can be in the Americanization of her people, when she herself has been given love and tenderness and confidence.”
Eveley decided instantly. “Very well, bring her. I can move the extra furniture out of the east bedroom, and store it in the garage, and she may have that room. She will be alone and quiet all day. But I hardly know a word of Spanish—”
“Oh, she speaks English perfectly. You are a wonderful girl, Miss Ainsworth. Not one in a thousand would have risen to such a sacrifice. If American women were all like you, there would be no need of Americanization. A country stands or falls by its women-kind. And you will not find her burdensome. She does not wish to meet people, her only desire is to be quiet, and let alone. She will keep your little home tidy for you, and she likes to cook and sew. She will not bother you much. How soon can you have her come?”
“It will take about two hours to get ready. Can you come and help me to-night? Angelo will help, too. We must move the furniture and boxes out, and then the room will be ready for her.”
“Then suppose we go for her to-night? Sheis about forty miles out in the back country in a little shack a mile off the Viejas grade. If we could leave about supper-time, we’d get there a little after dark. She wants to slip away without attracting attention. She is a nervous wreck, literally scared to death. It will take a long time to give her confidence again, but if any one can do it, it is you. Her faith in humankind has been bitterly shattered.”
Eveley was fairly quivering with excitement and delight. Her faith in herself had gone leaping skyward. She was not a slacker, not a quitter. She was a regular American after all, making a real sacrifice for a principle she believed in,—and oh, how she was going to assimilate this pretty little Mexican! Poor child! Of course she was shattered and stunned and shocked. Who wouldn’t be? Things must have been ghastly in Mexico. Eveley herself was rather vague on the subject, because her philosophy was one of peace and joy, and she found that reading of affairs in Mexico did not tend to increase either peace or joy. But she was dimly awarethat the spirit of unrest prevailing in all the world had risen to open and bloody warfare across the Rio Grande.
Her work suffered very sadly that afternoon, and long before the appointed hour she was ringing furiously for the elevator. From her incoherent chatter on the way down, Angelo gathered that he was literally to fly to her the very minute he was off duty, and then she was clambering blindly into the car and rushing around for Mr. Hiltze.
She was quite in an ecstasy as they set about moving out the pieces of furniture to be stored in the back of the big garage, and fitting up an attractive home for the wounded little Mexican who was to be her guest,—and her food for assimilation.
Amos Hiltze was a great help, and worked with enthusiasm.
“I do what I can, but men are helpless when it comes to women. And when I knew of this child,—well, I thought of you. If you refused, I had no notion where to turn. But you did not refuse.”
“No, indeed,” chirped Eveley. “I am onlytoo happy. I want to do things, real things, and be of use. It—it is right, I suppose, and lots of fun besides.”
At six o’clock Angelo came, and looked for a moment with speculative eyes upon Mr. Hiltze. He was not enthusiastic,—rather he was frankly pessimistic.
“Why don’t you send her to a hotel?” he demanded aggressively. “You don’t want a dirty Greaser in here, messing things all up.”
“Oh, Angelo, you mustn’t,” protested Eveley, deeply shocked. “She isn’t a Greaser. She is a high caste Mexican girl.”
“There ain’t no such thing,” he said gloomily. “You’ll see. She’ll litter the whole place up with a lot of smelly bandits, and they’ll cut your throat, and steal your money, and then where’ll you be?”
Then Amos Hiltze turned on him, with something compelling in his eyes. “Cut out that nonsense, and mind your own business. This is not your affair.”
So Angelo resigned himself to the inevitable, and fell to work, not with good will, but with efficiency. And when the room wasready, while the man and boy were carrying the extra furniture out to the garage for storage, Eveley hastily prepared a light supper for the three of them. It was eaten in utter silence. Eveley was excited almost to the point of suffocation, and the others were immersed in their own thoughts. She hastily cleared the dishes from the table, and put on her heavy coat and a small hat.
“Where do you go to get your Spanish queen?” demanded Angelo.
“Oh, a long way out in the country,” said Eveley nervously. “We must hurry, Angelo. It is getting late.”
“Are you going in your car?” he persisted.
“Yes. Now, please, Angelo, I hate to rush you off, but we must go.”
“Take me along, Miss Eveley. Please—you’ve got plenty of room. Won’t you take me?”
“Nothing doing,” cut in Amos Hiltze shortly. “We’ve got to keep the girl quiet, and you would let out some rudeness that would spoil everything.”
“Honest I won’t, Miss Eveley. G’wan, bea sport. You promised to take me for a night ride, and you never have. I won’t say a word to the Grea—lady, honest I won’t. Be a sport, Miss Eveley, sure I can go along.”
“Let’s take him,” said Eveley. “He can sit in front with me coming back, and you can ride with Marie. He won’t say a word, will you, Angelo?”
Mr. Hiltze seemed not altogether satisfied, but Angelo was already half-way down the rustic stairs and headed for the garage, so he contented himself with one final word of warning.
“Just keep quiet,” he said to Angelo. “Do not even look at her. There must be no fuss or confusion, or she will be afraid to come.”
There was a heavy fog rolling up through the canyons, and Eveley, in her state of excitement, found the car prone to leap wildly through the misty white darkness. There was a great ringing in her ears, and her pulses were pounding. Hiltze at her side was silent and preoccupied, and Angelo in the rear sat huddled in a corner, in the rug which Eveley had tucked about him.
“We do not want any frozen passengers to bring home,” she had said, with a smile.
They spun swiftly along University, slowing for East San Diego where there were officers with bad reputations among speeders, through La Mesa, the cross on Mt. Helix showing faintly in the pale moonlight, through El Capon, out beyond Flynn Springs where the pavement left off.
“Are you tired?” asked the man, stirring closer to Eveley’s side.
“No,” she said, with a laugh that was really a sob. “But I am so out of breath, and thrilled, and—all stirred up, like a silly little schoolgirl. I believe I am frightened.”
“Do not be frightened, Miss Eveley,” said Angelo suddenly, reassuringly. “I’ll look after you. If we do not like the little Greaser, we’ll just ditch her.”
“You must not be afraid,” said Hiltze, pressing his arm companionably against her elbow. “You know I will take care of you. And you will like the girl. She is just a timid, nerve-racked child. You will love her in time. But this is not a question of love, only ofservice,—one phase of the scheme of Americanization that is sweeping the country. It has to come through the women, Eveley, you know that. It has to be born into the babies of the next generation.”
An audible sniff came from the back seat, but Angelo was lustily clearing his throat.
“You sound like a stump speaker,” he said critically. “Did you get that way selling autos, or did you used to be an agitator or something?”
Mr. Hiltze made no reply. He was leaning forward now, anxiously scanning the road. “We turn soon. Drive slowly, please. I do not know the road very well. Oh,—there it is,—I see it now. Just beyond the little clump of trees, this side of the big rock. Turn to the right,—the road is safe enough, but a little rough. We only go a little farther,—yes, to the right a little more,—down-grade, but it is not very steep. Now, pull off a little and stop. Yes, you wait here now, will you, while I go on to the shack? The road does not lead up to it. You need not be afraid, you are close to the main road though you can not see itfor the shrubs and rocks. She does not want the Mexicans to know where nor how she goes.”
“Will you be gone long?” asked Eveley, gazing somewhat fearfully into the black shadows about her.
“Oh, just a few minutes. It is only a little bit of a way, and Marie is ready to come at once.”
“How does she know you are coming after her?” asked Angelo.
“I told her I would come to-night if I could make arrangements for her, and she said she would be ready. She has only a small bag, so her preparations are simple. Now, don’t be frightened, Eveley. You know I would not leave you if there were any danger. Angelo will be with you.”
“You bet I will. Beat it, Mister, and cop the lady.”
Eveley and Angelo listened in silence, as Hiltze strode quickly away. When the last sound had echoed to silence, Angelo leaned over the seat, his thin dark face close to Eveley’s.
“Say, Miss Eveley, where did you pick up that guy?”
“He was the salesman who sold me my car, but he has many friends who are my friends also, so I have met him often. He was only selling autos temporarily, and is making plans now to go into business for himself.”
“I’ll bet your friend Inglish ain’t stuck on him.”
“Not unnaturally,” admitted Eveley, laughing. “He is not.”
“Well, he’s a smart guy, Inglish is,” said Angelo shrewdly. “You can pretty well put it down he’s on the level about folks.”
“You do not seem partial to Mr. Hiltze, Angelo. But he is most kind and sympathetic, and no one works harder for the Americanization of the foreign element than he does.”
“Lots of folks work hard for something to keep the real things dark. I guess he’s got a mash on this dame.”
Eveley was silent.
“Don’t you think so?”
“No, I hardly think so.”
“Oh, you can’t tell. Some guys can have mashes on two or three at a time, you know.”
“Angelo, please, let’s not talk this way. I do not like it. And I do not wish my friends to criticize my other friends. I know you like Mr. Inglish best of all, and that is why you try to underrate the others—but please don’t.”
“Oh, I think he is smart enough,” said Angelo ingratiatingly. “It ain’t that. I just don’t like his wishing foreign dames off on to you because you are easy and will stand for it.”
“Listen—they are coming.”
Angelo got out then and clambered in beside her, and they both peered into the darkness whence footsteps came. The two were walking slowly, Hiltze leading the girl carefully. She walked shrinkingly, her face showing deathly pale in the shadowy night.
Eveley got out at once and went to meet them, surprised at the great wave of tenderness sweeping over her. She felt somehow that it was a daughter of hers, comingback to her out of suffering and sorrow. She put her arms protectingly about the girl, and kissed her cheek.
“Marie,” she said softly, “you are going to be my sister. I—I think I love you already. I felt it when I saw you come out of the darkness.”
The girl did not speak, but her slender fingers closed convulsively about Eveley’s, and there was a catch like a little sob in her throat.
Eveley herself helped her into the car, and pulled the rugs and blankets about her.
“It is very foggy, and the air is cold. We do not want a little sick girl on our hands. Pull them close about you. Oh, your cape is very light—you must take my furs. It is much warmer in front, and I do not need them. Now, are you all ready? This is my little pal Angelo Moreno with me, but don’t pay any attention to him to-night. You will see him again. Now, all ready and off we go.”
Angelo sat silently musing in his corner during the long ride back to town, and Eveley sang softly almost beneath her breath. Inthe back seat there was silence, too. Only once Eveley turned to call to them blithely:
“I was frightened and anxious at first, but now I feel happy and full of hope. I think you are going to bring me great good fortune, Sister Marie.”
“You are—most heavenly kind,” said Marie, in slow soft English, with the exquisite toning of her Spanish tongue.
“Oh, Marie,” cried Eveley rapturously. “Those are the first words I ever heard you say—such kind and loving words. I shall never forget them.”
The rest of the ride was taken in absolute silence, and at the door of her cottage when she ran the car into the garage, Angelo carried Marie’s bag up the steps silently, and Hiltze helped her, while Eveley ran hospitably in front to have the window open and the lights on. She thrust out an eager hand to help Marie through the window, and then she gaily faced their escorts.
“Not to-night,” she cried. “You can not come in even for a minute. Sister Marie and I are going to have hot chocolate all byourselves, and—and find out how we like each other’s looks. Many thanks—good night.”
Then she closed the window and turned to the slender shrinking figure at her side, drawing back the heavy hood that shielded the girl’s face to look into the features of the little foreign waif she had taken to her heart.
CHAPTER XIVNEW LIGHT ON LOYALTY
A quick thrill of pleasure swept over Eveley as she looked into the face of her young guest.
“Duty?” No, it would be a joy to teach this soft and lovely creature the glorious principles of freedom, justice and equality. This was Eveley’s sphere—she felt it—she knew it. She took Marie’s slender hands in both of hers, and squeezed them rapturously.
“Oh, I am so happy,” she cried ecstatically. “I think you are adorable.”
For Marie’s soft dark eyes, the soft waves of dark hair drooping over the low forehead, the slender oval of the olive tinted face, the crimson curving lips, the shrinking figure presented such a picture of exquisite helplessness that Eveley’s brave and buoyant soul rose leaping to the appeal.
She removed the dark cape from Marie’s shoulders, and took her bag, leading her intothe small east bedroom which had been so charmingly dressed for her.
“This is your home now, Marie, I hope for a long, long time. It is your home, and you are as free as a bird. You are not my servant, but my sister and my friend. I want you to be happy. You are to think as you like, do as you like, go or stay as you like. You are mistress of your own life, now and all the time.”
“It is very lovely,” said Marie softly. “And you are an angel from Heaven.”
“Not a bit of it,” laughed Eveley. “You do not know me. I am the humanest thing you ever saw in your life.” She lifted Marie’s bag lightly to a low table. “Now, this door opens to the bath—my bedroom door leads into it from the opposite side. And this is your closet, and these drawers are all empty, so use them as you wish. Why don’t you put on a negligee, now, and rest? And while you are alone for a minute, to collect yourself and unpack your bag, I shall run out and put on the chocolate. We must have a hot luncheon after our cold ride. Are you very cold? Ithink I’d better light the fire in your grate—it is all ready. There, that is better now. If I ever do get married I must certainly have wonderful luck, if there is any faith in signs, for I do build the fieriest fires. Now, do not hurry, I’ll come back in a few minutes. I think I shall put on a negligee too,” she added, as Marie drew a silk gown from her bag. “And then we’ll be surely settled down and right at home together.”
With a warm and dazzling smile, she ran out to put the chocolate on the grill, and arrange the sandwiches and fruit and cake on the table around the bowl of drooping roses, and then, humming blithely, hurried into her own room to change from her heavy dress to a soft house gown.
When, a few moments later, she returned to Marie, she found her standing pensively in the center of the room, the heavy folds of a dark red gown falling about her graceful figure, her head sunk on her breast in reverie. Eveley put her arms around her tenderly.
“You are beautiful,” she said. “Don’t worry, dear. You are going to be very happy,even yet. Just trust me—and—do you know the song of the Belgian girl—Well, we shall make an American Beauty of you, sure enough. Just try to be happy, and have confidence in me, Marie. I shall never go back on you. My, how quick you were! Your bag is all unpacked, isn’t it?” She glanced with quickly appraising eyes at the heavy silver articles of toilet laid out on the dressing-table, and at the gowns swinging from the pole in the closet.
“Come along, baby sister,” she said affectionately, “or the chocolate will run all over the grill.”
There was deep if unvoiced appreciation in Marie’s eyes as she observed the fine heavy furniture of the little dining-room, the lace doilies on the mahogany table, the fine pieces of china, and the drooping roses. Eveley led her gaily to her place at the table, and sat down beside her.
“We really ought to ask a blessing,” she said. “I feel such a fountain of gratitude inside of me. My own sister was ten years older than I, and there were no babies afterwardfor me to make a fuss over. This is a brand-new experience, and I am just bubbling over.”
“But I am no baby,” said Marie, smiling the wistful smile that suggested tears and heartaches. “I think I am quite as old as you.”
“Oh, impossible,” gasped Eveley. “Why, I am twenty-five years old.”
“Really!” mocked Marie, and she laughed—and Eveley realized it was the first time Marie had laughed. “Well, I am twenty-three and a half.”
“Oh, you can’t be. Mr. Hiltze said you were a child, and you are so little and slim and young.”
“You have been a woman, living a woman’s life, with all a woman’s interests. But our women are sheltered, kept away from life, and that is why I am like a child in facing the world—because I have never faced it. I look young, and act young, because—well, with us, our women marry early. If they do not, they must retain the charm of youth until they do. That is what we are taught,it is our business as women to be young and lovely until we marry.”
“I love to hear you talk,” said Eveley irrelevantly. “You are just like a chapter out of a new and thrilling story—See, I have let my chocolate grow cold just looking at you, and listening. I am very glad you are nearly as old as I—we can not only be sisters, but twins if you like.”
Marie sipped her chocolate, daintily, dreamily. Then she looked at Eveley searchingly.
“Is this your patriotism?” she asked at last. “To throw open your home on a moment’s notice, to a stranger from a strange land?”
“We call it Americanization,” said Eveley. “We call it the assimilation of—of—” She hesitated, not wishing to speak of “flotsam and jetsam” to this soft and pliant creature. “We call it the assimilation of the whole world into American ideals.”
“Then,” said Marie slowly, dark eyes still searching Eveley’s face, “I suppose, having this vision of patriotism yourself, you can understand patriotism of others from otherlands? You can understand why people plot, and steal, and kill—for love of country? My own land, for instance—so many call us bloody butchers because we fight for our country and for freedom. But you—you know what patriotism is. And you can understand, can you not?”
“Of course I understand,” said Eveley rather confusedly, for the Mexican business was a terrible muddle to her. “I understand that your men must fight to save their country from the rebels and anarchists who would wreck and ruin her.”
“Yes, but—it is the rebels and anarchists who would save her,” said Marie, with childish earnestness. “I—we—I am of the revolutionists. My father was killed. My brothers were killed. My sisters were made captive. But still the struggle goes on. The best of our men must fight and die. Poor Mexico must struggle and blunder on from one disaster to another, until at last she rises triumphant and free among the nations of the world. It is those in power in her own land from whom Mexico has most to fear—thosewho would sell her, body and soul, land and loyalty, to foreign devils for gold. It is not against the outside world we fight—it is the vile, the treacherous ones inside our borders.”
“But how can you tell who is for, and who against?” asked Eveley bewildered. “They all promise so much—and peace is assured—but there is no peace. And who can tell where freedom really lies?”
“Alas, it is true,” said Marie sadly. “But those with eyes that see and hearts that love, know that Mexico is still in the hands of traitors, and that the spirit of revolution must live.”
“Of course you know more about it than I do,” admitted Eveley. “We—we do not understand the situation at all. I—think perhaps they are too shrewd for us. Let’s not talk of it—it excites you, dear. I want you to rest and be quiet. I did not know that any one could love—Mexico—like that.”
“Have you seen Mexico? Oh, not the dry, barren border country, but my Mexico, rich with jewels and gold, studded with magnificent cities, flowering with rare fruits andspices, a mellow, golden, matchless land, peopled by those who are skilled in arts and science, lovers of beauty, and—Ah, you do not know Mexico. You know only the half-breed savages who run the borderland, preying on Mexican and American alike. You do not know the real Mexico of beautiful women, and brave and gallant men. How could you know?”
Then her voice became soft and dreamy again. “I visited here long years ago. I was out in your Old Town, where the Indian maid Ramona lived. I stood in the square there. Do you know the story, Eveley, of the early days when your Captain Fremont and his band of soldiers stood there, ready to lower the flag of Mexico and to raise in its place your Stars and Stripes? As your soldier stepped forward to tear down our flag, a little girl of Mexico, another Marie like me, who was watching with aching heart from the window of the ’dobe house on the other side, shocked at the outrage, leaped from the casement forgetting her fear of the foreign soldiers, and with one tug of her sharp knifecut the rope. As the flag of Mexico fell, she caught it in her bare hands, and pressed it against her lips, her little form shaken with sobs. ‘Forgive me,’ she said to the soldiers, but it is the flag of my country, I could not see it dragged in the dust.’”
Eveley leaned over and put her hand on Marie’s arm. “I have heard the story many times, but I never caught the glory of it before. It was the feeling in her that is in me now—that is in all America—only ours is for America, and hers was for Mexico—as yours is.”
“When I look at you, and know the tenderness of you, and the great heart of you, I feel that America must be the heaven of all the world, and Americans the angels.” Then Marie’s face darkened, and her lips became a scarlet line. “But who then has stood heartlessly by, and watched the writhing and anguish of my Mexico, withholding the hand of power that could bring peace? Who has stood by and smiled while Mexico lay crushed and bleeding beneath the heel of despotism and treachery?”
“We haven’t understood, Marie,” begged Eveley. “We could not understand. We—we naturally trust people, we are like that, you know, and—”
“And whom can one trust? My faith has been as my faith in God—yet when so many falter, and then turn back in betrayal—how can one trust? Perhaps we are all deceived—perhaps every faction in my country is seeking only to despoil and enslave.” Then her face grew bright and luminous as she said, “But there are those who are princes of sacrifice and love, risking all their world, their lives, their honor, for my Mexico. If there be any faith, it is in them. You call them bandits—Yes? I call them sons of God.”
Eveley changed the subject as quickly as she could. The bandits who had been driven desperately from crag to cranny, berated in the press, denounced in the pulpit, deprecated on the platform—were these the princes of Marie’s Mexico, the idols of their women’s hearts, the saviors of their faith, their hope of freedom? It was very confusing.
She told Marie how she worked every day down-town, and how the little Cloud Cote would be her own all day, how she had friends coming often in the evening, friends who would love Marie, but whom she never need to see except when her heart desired. And she told of the lovely lawn, with its pavilions and pergolas and crevices and vines, and of the canyon drifting away down to the bay.
And Marie sat with her chin in her hands, her eyes soft and humble, dog-like, on Eveley’s face.
CHAPTER XVSERVICE OF JOY
It was not often that Eileen Trevis, who was manifestly born for business, waxed hysterically enthusiastic. And so one morning a few days later, when an incoherent summons came from her over the telephone, Eveley was astonished almost to the point of speechlessness.
“What is it?” she gasped. “What has happened? Is it bad news?”
“Good, good, good,” exulted Eileen. “Wonderful, delicious, thrilling. Please hurry. It is nearly lunch-time, isn’t it? I have been trying to get you all morning,—come quickly.—Never mind about your luncheon.—Are you coming?”
“I am on the way,” shouted Eveley, crashing the receiver on to its hook, and flying with scant ceremony from the office, hoping it was truly the luncheon hour, but scorning to waste the time to look.
“She is in love,” she said aloud as she ran down the stairs, spurning a tardy elevator. “She is in love, and she is engaged, or maybe she has eloped and is already married. Eileen Trevis,—of all people in the world. Whoever would have thought it?”
Only the absence of traffic officers in that part of the city kept Eveley from arrest that day, and only the protection of Heaven itself saved her from total wreckage, for she spun around corners, and dodged traffic warts at a rate that was positively neck-breaking. The last block before she reached Eileen’s home was one long coast, and she drew up sharply with a triumphant honk.
Eileen was on the steps before she had time to turn off the engine.
“Is it a husband?” cried Eveley.
“No, babies,” chortled Eileen.
Eveley put her fingers over her lips, and swallowed painfully.
“It isn’t your turn,” she said disapprovingly. “You have to do these things in proper order. You can’t run backward. It isn’t being done.”
“Don’t be silly,” said Eileen. “Hop out, and come in. I am having a nursery made out of the maid’s bedroom that has never been used. It is perfectly dear, with blue Red-Riding-Hoods, and blue wolves and blue Jacks-and-Jills on a white background.”
“There is something wrong about this,” said Eveley solemnly, as she followed Eileen into the house, and up the two flights of stairs to her apartment.
“It is Ida’s babies, stupid,” explained Eileen at last. “I am to have them after all. Poor Jim’s sister is ill, and I must say, it almost serves her right,—she was so snippy about the children.”
“Oh, Ida’s babies! And has the Aunt-on-the-Other-Side-of-the-House had a change of heart?”
“Yes, a regular one. Heart failure, they call it. I tried so hard to get them when Ida died, but Agnes flatly refused to give them up and since her brother was their daddy and he was alive, I could not do much. I asked for them again, you know, when Jim died, and she was ruder than ever. But since thedispensation of heart failure, she can not keep them. I got a letter this morning, and wired for them to start immediately and I just got an answer that they will be here to-morrow afternoon. Then I sent for the decorators.”
“You aren’t any mother for small children,” protested Eveley, with an argumentative wave of her hand. “You are born for business. Everybody says so. You do not know anything about babies.”
“Oh, yes I do,” cried Eileen ecstatically. “They have fat legs and dimples, and Betty sucks her thumb and has to be scolded, and Billy shouts ‘More jam’ and smudges it on his knees.”
“Are you giving up your position?”
“Oh, mercy, no. We have to live. Poor Jim only left them insurance and nothing else, and that did not last very long. I sent the other aunt a small check every month to help along and sort of heap coals of fire on her head at the same time. No, I shall have to work harder than ever now. But I get one seventy-five a month now,—and lots of families live on less.”
“Who will keep house then—Betty?”
“Don’t ask silly questions, Eveley, I am so nervous anyhow I hardly know what I am saying. You remember my laundress, don’t you? She is so nice and motherly and a Methodist and respectable and all that,—only old and hard up. She is coming to live with us,—she will have the den for her room, and is closing her cottage. She is to keep house and look after the babies while I am at work. She only charges twenty-five a month, so I can manage. The rent does seem high, fifty dollars,—but we need the room, though you all thought it was so extravagant for me to have such a large apartment to myself. But you know how I am, Eveley,—I like lots of space,—a place for everything, and everything where it belongs. So I was willing to stand the expense, and now it is a good thing I did. Come and see the baby room.”
Eveley duly admired the blue Red-Riding-Hoods and Jacks-and-Jills, exclaimed over the tiny white beds, and tiny white tables and chairs, and then said:
“You seem to be enjoying this experience,so I suppose you do not feel it is your duty, nor anything sordid like that?”
“Oh, no,” laughed Eileen. “I am doing it because I am just crazy about those babies, and I am sort of lonely, Eveley, though I have never realized it before. And when I think of coming home to a frolic with fat little babies in white dresses and blue ribbons,—well, I am so happy I could fairly cry.”
So Eveley put her arms around her, and kissed her, and offered a few suggestions about appropriate food for angel babies,—feeling very wise from her recent experience with Nathalie and Dan, and invited them all to go driving with her on Saturday afternoon, and mentally planned to send them an enormous box of candy in the morning after their arrival, and then said she must hurry back to work.
“Oh, you poor thing,” cried Eileen in contrition. “You did not have any luncheon at all, did you? Wait until I fix a sandwich and you can slip into the dressing-room and eat it. It will only take a minute. You may have some of these animal cookies too,—I got adollar’s worth,—I knew the babies would love them. Now, Eveley, won’t you come to dinner to-morrow night and meet my little blesseds? The train comes at six-ten, and Mrs. Allis, I mean, Aunt Martha,—we have decided to call her Aunt Martha,—will have dinner all ready for us.”
“Certainly I’ll come,” said Eveley promptly. “I shall love it. And I’ll come for you in the car and take you to the station.”
After work that night, Eveley went into the ten-cent store, and bought a startling array of drums and horns and small shovels, and sent them out to Eileen’s for the babies. And that night she insisted that Nolan must come to dinner with her to hear the great good news.
“It is just because she wants to do it,” she said happily. “That is why she is so full of joy. It is plain selfishness,—she has no thought of doing her Christian duty nor any such nonsense. And—well, you would hardly know Eileen. Her eyes are like stars, and her voice runs up and down stairs in beautiful trills, and she forgot to wear her hair net.”
“Wait till Billy gets jam on her lace bedspread, and Betty cuts up her new bonnet to get the pretty flowers, and wait till they both get mad and yowl at once,—she’ll be lucky if she remembers her Christian duty then.”
“Isn’t he crabbish, Marie?” asked Eveley plaintively. “He doesn’t like to see people happy and thrilled and throbbing.”
“Oh, yes, I do. I am thrilled and happy and throbbing myself right now. There is something about this Cote in the Clouds that—”
“And dear Eileen has lived alone so long, poor thing.”
“I can sympathize with her all right. I have, too.”
“And now she will have a home, a real home—”
“My own dream for years.”
“Sweet companionship—”
“Heaven on earth, Eveley, heaven on earth.”
“Something to live for—”
“Alas, how I envy her.”
“Nolan, if you do not keep still and pay attention, I shall stop talking and let youpropose,—right before Marie,—and then where will you be?”
“Married, I hope.”
So Eveley decided there was no use to try to talk sense with Nolan, but she arranged to call for him at eight o’clock the next morning to take him to Eileen’s and show him the blue Red-Riding-Hoods and the toys.
As she left the house to keep her engagement with Nolan, she was surprised to see Mrs. Severs starting out, for Mrs. Severs was not used to being out so early.
“Why, little Bride, whither away?” laughed Eveley.
Mrs. Severs flushed. “I am going to spend the day with father,” she admitted, rather shyly. “It is sort of lonesome here alone all the time,—and we have lots of fun in the little cottage on the hill. And sometimes we go out on the beach and lie on the sand,—he takes me in his jitney. He thinks I need more sunshine and fresh air.”
“He is great, isn’t he?” said Eveley warmly.
“He is dear,” cried Mrs. Severs, the quickcolor surging her face. “I am not very well, and he is so gentle and sweet to me. I—wish I had been more patient,—I am very lonely now. But we are great chums. He has taught me to play pinochle, and I fill his pipe for him. And onions aren’t so bad.”
“Hum,” thought Eveley, as she drove down-town. “You can’t suit some people, no matter how finely you adjust their difficulties.” Then she brightened. “Still, it is better to love each other in two houses, than to be bad friends in one,—as they were.”
That evening, she and Eileen stood at the station impatiently waiting,—having arrived at five-thirty, fearing the train might come ahead of time.
“Oh, Eveley,” Eileen wailed. “Suppose they should not like me?”
Eveley laughed at that. “Suppose you do not like them?” she parried.
“I do. I haven’t seen them for over two years, but they are adorable. They are seven now. The prettiest things,—long yellow curls, and—”
“Billy will probably be shaved by this time,—I mean barbered.”
“Oh, never. No one would cut off curls like his. Their hair will be longer I suppose, probably darker,—and Betty lisps and swallows while she is talking,—”
“Oh, she will be over that now.”
“In two years? Why, certainly not. They will be just the same, only more so.”
Eveley began to experience a curious internal sinking. Eileen was too deliriously optimistic about those children. They were angel babies, of course, for Eileen said so, but Eveley remembered Nathalie and Dan, angels, too,—but how they shouted and tore through the house. And they were always exhibiting fresh cuts and bruises, and Dan had insisted on the confiscation of his curls at four years. If Billy was still wearing curls at seven, he needed a tonic for he was not regular.
“Eileen,” she began very gently, “you—you mustn’t expect too many dimples and curls. Children are angels,—but they arefunny, too. They are always bleeding, you know, and—”
“Bleeding!” gasped Eileen. “Agnes never mentioned bleeding! Do they always do it?”
“Always. They are always getting themselves smashed and scratched, and blood runs all over them, and gets matted in their hair, and their hands are constitutionally dirty, and—they always have at least one finger totally and irrevocably smashed. Some times it is two fingers, and once in a while a whole hand, but the average is one finger.”
Eileen looked at her friend in a most professional manner.
“I do not know if you are trying to be insulting, or just amusing, but I saw those children. I was right there for three weeks only two years ago, and they were always clean, they had curls, and they were certainly not smashed or I should have noticed it.”
“They shout, too, Eileen,” Eveley went on wretchedly, determined to prepare Eileen for the shock that was sure to follow. “They—they just whoop. And—”
“If you can not be a little pleasanter, dear, suppose you go and wait for me in the car. I am too nervous. I simply can not stand it.”
“I do not want to be unpleasant, and I shall not say another word. I just wanted to remind you of—of the shouting—and the blood.”
“One would think they were savages, Eveley, instead of my own sister’s little babies.”
“Here comes the train,” cried Eveley, and added in a soft whisper that Eileen could not hear, “Oh, please, for Eileen’s sake, let ’em have dimples and curls, and don’t get ’em smashed before the train stops.”
Hand in hand, with eager shining eyes, the girls ran along the platform, and when the porter put down his stool beneath the steps, the first thing that appeared was a small dimpled girl with golden curls, and a flower-like face beneath a flower-laden bonnet.
Eileen leaped upon her, catching her in her arms, and in her rapturous delight, she did not hear a small brusk voice exclaiming, “Oh, pooh, I don’t need your old stool.”
And she did not notice Eveley’s gasp,—forEveley had seen a small sailor-clad form hurtle itself from the step and fall flat upon the gravel platform. It was not until a sudden lusty roar went up that Eileen remembered she had two babies en route. She dropped Betty like a flash, and turned.
The porter very grimly picked up the child, and held him out, and Eileen saw with horror that his face was fairly sandpapered from the fall, and blood was starting from a dozen tiny pricks.
“If this is yourn, for Gawd’s sake, take ’im,” begged the porter. “He’s fell off’n everything and into everything between here and Seattle.”
Eileen clung desperately to Betty’s moist hand.
“Don’t get scared, Auntie,” chirped the small bright voice. “Billy always falls into things, and he ain’t never broke anything yet,—himself, I mean, arms or legs or necks,—he breaks lots of dishes and vases and things like that.”
Eileen was stricken dumb, but Eveley took the writhing roaring boy from the porter’shand, and dusted him lightly with her handkerchief.
“Why, where are your curls, Billy?” she demanded, hoping to distract his attention. And she succeeded only too well, for he stopped so suddenly in the midst of a loud wail that he almost choked. When he finally recovered his breath, he snorted derisively.
“Curls! Huh! I ain’t no girl. I ain’t got any curls. I never did have curls.”
“Oh, yes, you did,” she argued. “Two years ago you had beautiful, long golden curls just like Betty’s.”
Billy hunched up his shoulders and clenched a small brown fist.
“You got to say, ‘Excuse me for them words,’” he said belligerently. “Ain’t so, and you got to say it.”
Scenting battle, Eveley hastily muttered the desired words, and passed him over to Eileen.
Billy thrust out a sturdy hand, but to Eileen’s evident delight he refused to be kissed.
“Betty’s got to be whipped, Aunt Eileen,”he announced. “Aunt Agnes told me to tell you all she did on the train, and you would whip her. She stuck a pin in a fat man that was asleep,—that’s the man right there,—Say, didn’t Betty stick a pin in you?”
But the fat man gave them a venomous glare, and hurried away. “And she pulled the beads off of that blonde lady’s coat,—and if you don’t believe it, you can look in her pocket ’cause she’s got ’em yet. And she swiped a box of candy from that lady in the yellow suit, and the lady said the porter did it, and they had an awful fight. And she sangThe Yanks Are Comingin the middle of the night and everybody swore something awful. And she wouldn’t eat anything but ice-cream at the table, and one meal she had five dishes.”
Eveley and Eileen had listened in fascinated silence during this recital of his sister’s wrongdoing. But Betty stuck a fat thumb between rosy lips, and drooped her eyes demurely behind her curling lashes.
“Did—you do all that, Betty?” demanded Eileen at last, very faintly.
“I did more than that,” she said proudly. “I put the pink lady’s bedroom slippers in a man’s traveling bag, and they haven’t found it out yet. And I slipped Billy’s wriggly lizard down the black lady’s neck, and she said a naughty word. And—”
“And what did Billy do?”
Betty’s lips curled with scorn. “Billy? He didn’t do anything. He’s too good. He don’t ever do anything.”
Billy advanced with the threatening hunch of his shoulders and clench of the brown fists.
“You say, ‘Excuse me for them words,’” he said in a low voice. “And say it quick.”
Betty jerked her finger from her mouth and mumbled rapidly in a voice of frightened nervousness, “Excuse me for them words, please excuse me for them words.” And then, as her brother’s shoulders relaxed, she sidled up to him, rubbing herself affectionately against his arm, and whispered, “Aw, Billy, I was only joking. You ain’t mad at me, are you?”
“Let’s go,” said Eileen. “I feel—faint.”
“Sticking pins is good for faintness,” saidBetty hopefully. “I did it to Aunt Agnes twice when she nearly fainted, and she came to right away.”
“And she gave Betty a good whipping.”
“Yes, she did, and I only did it to cure her,” said Betty in an aggrieved voice.
“Let’s go fast,” begged Eileen. “Take your handkerchief, Billy, and see if you can wipe a little of the dirt and blood off your face.”
“He mustn’t do that,” interrupted Betty promptly. “Handkerchiefs is full of germs, and if he gets the germs in his scratches he gets blood poison and dies. You got to wait till you get home, Billy, and then lie on your back on Aunt Eileen’s bed, and she’ll take clean gauze and soak ’em off in cold water. If you haven’t got any gauze handy you can use mine, but you’d better buy some. Billy uses as much as a dollar’s worth of gauze in no time.”
Eileen put her hand over her face, and turned away. The children followed, looking about them in frank interest and pleasure.
“Is that a palm tree?” asked Betty. “Billy says God never made ’em grow like that. Hesays men just tie those fins on top to make ’em look funny. Did God do it, Aunt Eileen? What did He do it for?—Oh, is this your car, Aunt Eileen? Billy knows how to start a car so you better not let him in it by himself.” Then as the small boyish shoulders assumed the dreadful hunch, she cried excitedly, “Oh, no, he can’t either, honest he can’t. He doesn’t know what to turn, nor anything. I was joking. You ain’t mad at me, are you, Billy?”
Eveley slipped silently into her place behind the wheel, and Billy opened the door for his aunt and sister, banged it smartly after their entrance, and climbed in front with Eveley.
“They oughtn’t to let women drive cars,” he said in a judicial tone. “Women is too nervous. There ought to be a law against it.”
Eveley laughed. “I think so, too,” she agreed pleasantly. “But until there is such a law, I think I shall keep on driving.”
Billy stared at her suspiciously. “You don’t need to agree with me to be polite,” he said.“It won’t hurt my feelings any. I ain’t used to it, anyhow.”
Betty, in the rear seat, cuddled cozily against her rigid aunt and kept up a constant flow of conversation in her pretty chirpy voice.
“Are you an old maid? Aunt Agnes said you were. Did you do it on purpose, or couldn’t you help yourself? I am not going to be an old maid. I am engaged now. Billy tried to be engaged, too, but Freckle Harvey cut him out.”
Billy suddenly squared about in his seat, and Betty shivered into a small and terrified heap. “Aw, no, he didn’t either. Billy didn’t like her worth a cent. He thinks she is just hideous, don’t you, Billy? You ain’t mad at me, are you, Billy?”
When Eveley drew the car up before the big apartment-house on Sixth Street, Billy forgot his temporary burst of manners. With a hoarse shout he slid deftly over the door and dashed up the steps. Shrieking gleefully, Betty followed swiftly in his wake.
“Oh, Eveley,” faltered Eileen, “I am afraid they scratched the car.” She got out hastily, and caught her lips between her teeth as she saw the long jagged scratch on the door where Betty’s sharp heel had passed.
“Never mind,” said Eveley bravely. “It doesn’t make a bit of difference. We all know how children are.”
“I—I didn’t,” said Eileen weakly. “I—guess I am an old maid. I hadn’t realized it.”
In Betty’s extravagant delight over the new room, and Billy’s quiet but equally sincere pleasure, something of Eileen’s own enthusiasm returned, and although her ministrations upon Billy’s marred countenance, performed under the critical and painstaking eye of Sister Betty, left her weak-kneed and pale, she took her place at the table with something very much akin to pleasure, if it were not the jubilant delight she had anticipated.
Eveley went home immediately after dinner, stopping on her way for Nolan. They spent an uproarious hour over her account of the twins and their reception. And at last,weak with laughter, Eveley wiped her eyes, and said with deep sympathy:
“Poor Eileen! And the twins are adorable. But I believe one needs to be born with children and grow up with them gradually. For when they spring upon you full grown they are—well, they are certainly a shock.”