And while the tactless Gammire went on, "walking" a circle round him, Mr. Atwater's eye furiouslysearched the borders of the path, the lawn, and otherwheres, for anything that might serve as missile. He had never kicked a dog, or struck one with his hand, in his life; he had a theory that it was always better to throw something. "Idiot poodle!" he said.
But Gammire's tricks were not idiocy in the eyes of Mr. Atwater's daughter, as she watched them. They had brought to her mind the tricks of the Jongleur of Notre Dame, who had nothing to offer heaven itself, to mollify heaven's rulers, except his entertainment of juggling and nonsense; so that he sang his thin jocosities and played his poor tricks before the sacred figure of the Madonna; but when the pious would have struck him down for it, she miraculously came to life just long enough to smile on him and show that he was right to offer his absurd best. And thus, as Julia watched the little Jongleur upon the lawn, she saw this was what he was doing: offering all he knew, hoping that someone might laugh at him, and like him. And, not curiously, after all, if everything were known, she found herself thinking of another foolish creature, who had nothing in the world to offer anybody, except what came out of the wistfulness of a foolish,loving heart. Then, though her lips smiled faintly as she thought of Noble Dill, all at once a brightness trembled along the eyelids of the Prettiest Girl in Town, and glimmered over, a moment later, to shine upon her cheek.
"You get out!" Mr. Atwater shouted, "D'ye hear me, you poodle?"
He found the missile, a stone of fair diameter. He hurled it violently.
"There, darn you!"
The stone missed, and Gammire fled desperately after it.
"You get over that fence!" Mr. Atwater cried. "You wait till I find another rock and I'll——"
He began to search for another stone, but, before he could find one, Gammire returned with the first. He deposited it upon the ground at Mr. Atwater's feet.
"There's your rock," he said.
Mr. Atwater looked down at him fiercely, and through the black chrysanthemum two garnet sparks glinted waggishly.
"Didn't you hear me tell you what I'd do if you didn't get out o' here, you darn poodle?"
Gammire "sat up," placed his forepaws togetherover his nose and prayed. "There's your rock," he said. And he added, as clearly as if he used a spoken language, "Let's get on with the game!"
Mr. Atwater turned to Kitty Silver. "Does he—does he know how to speak, or shake hands, or anything like that?" he asked.
The next morning, as the peculiar old man sat at breakfast, he said to the lady across the table: "Look here. Who did give Gamin to us?"
Julia bit her lip; she even cast down her eyes.
"Well, who was it?"
Her demureness still increased. "It was—Noble Dill."
Mr. Atwater was silent; he looked down and caught a clownish garnet gleam out of a blackness neighbouring his knee. "Well, see here," he said. "Why can't you—why can't you——"
"Why can't I what?"
"Why can't you sit out in the yard the next time he calls here, instead of on the porch where it blows all through the house? It's just as pleasant to sit under the trees, isn't it?"
"Pleasanter," said Julia.
By the end of October, with the dispersal of foliage that has served all summer long as a screen for whatever small privacy may exist between American neighbours, we begin to perceive the rise of our autumn high tides of gossip. At this season of the year, in our towns of moderate size and ambition, where apartment houses have not yet condensed and at the same time sequestered the population, one may look over back yard beyond back yard, both up and down the street; especially if one takes the trouble to sit for an hour or so daily, upon the top of a high fence at about the middle of a block.
Of course an adult who followed such a course would be thought peculiar, no doubt he would be subject to inimical comment; but boys are considered so inexplicable that they have gathered for themselves many privileges denied their parents and elders, and a boy can do such a thing as this to his full content, without anybody's thinking about it at all. Soit was that Herbert Illingsworth Atwater, Jr., sat for a considerable time upon such a fence, after school hours, every afternoon of the last week in October; and only one person particularly observed him or was stimulated to any mental activity by his procedure. Even at that, this person was affected only because she was Herbert's relative, of an age sympathetic to his and of a sex antipathetic.
In spite of the fact that Herbert, thus seriously disporting himself on his father's back fence, attracted only an audience of one (and she hostile at a rather distant window) his behaviour might well have been thought piquant by anybody. After climbing to the top of the fence he would produce from interior pockets a small memorandum-book and a pencil. His expression was gravely alert, his manner more than businesslike; yet nobody could have failed to comprehend that he was enjoying himself, especially when his attitude became tenser, as it frequently did. Then he would rise, balancing himself at adroit ease, his feet one before the other on the inner rail, below the top of the boards, and with eyes dramatically shielded beneath a scoutish palm, he would gaze sternly in the direction of some object or movement that had attracted his attentionand then, having satisfied himself of something or other, he would sit and decisively enter a note in his memorandum-book.
He was not always alone; sometimes he was joined by a friend, male, and, though shorter than Herbert, about as old; and this companion was inspired, it seemed, by motives precisely similar to those from which sprang Herbert's own actions. Like Herbert he would sit upon the top of the high fence; like Herbert he would rise at intervals, for the better study of something this side the horizon; then, also like Herbert, he would sit again and write firmly in a little notebook. And seldom in the history of the world have any such sessions been invested by the participants with so intentional an appearance of importance.
That was what most irritated their lone observer at the somewhat distant upstairs back window. The important importance of Herbert and his friend was so extreme as to be all too plainly visible across four intervening broad back yards; in fact, there was sometimes reason to suspect that the two performers were aware of their audience and even of her goaded condition; and that they deliberately increased the outrageousness of their importance on her account.And upon the Saturday of that week, when the notebook writers were upon the fence the greater part of the afternoon, Florence's fascinated indignation became vocal.
"Vile Things!" she said.
Her mother, sewing beside another window of the room, looked up inquiringly.
"What are, Florence?"
"Cousin Herbert and that nasty little Henry Rooter."
"Are you watching them again?" her mother asked.
"Yes, I am," said Florence; and added tartly, "Not because I care to, but merely to amuse myself at their expense."
Mrs. Atwater murmured, "Couldn't you find some other way to amuse yourself, Florence?"
"I don't call this amusement," the inconsistent girl responded, not without chagrin. "Think I'd spend all my days starin' at Herbert Illingsworth Atwater, Junior, and that nasty little Henry Rooter, and call itamusement?"
"Then why do you do it?"
"Why do I dowhat, mamma?" Florence inquired, as in despair of Mrs. Atwater's ever learning to put things clearly.
"Why do you 'spend all your days' watching them? You don't seem able to keep away from the window, and it appears to make you irritable. I should think if they wouldn't let you play with them you'd be too proud——"
"Oh, good heavens, mamma!"
"Don't use such expressions, Florence, please."
"Well," said Florence, "I got to usesomeexpression when you accuse me of wantin' to 'play' with those two vile things! My goodness mercy, mamma, I don't want to 'play' with 'em! I'm more than four years old, I guess; though you don't ever seem willing to give me credit for it. I don't haf to 'play' all the time, mamma: and anyway, Herbert and that nasty little Henry Rooter aren't playing, either."
"Aren't they?" Mrs. Atwater inquired. "I thought the other day you said you wanted them to let you play with them at being a newspaper reporter or editor or something like that, and they were rude and told you to go away. Wasn't that it?"
Florence sighed. "No, mamma, it cert'nly wasn't."
"They weren't rude to you?"
"Yes, they cert'nly were!"
"Well, then——"
"Mamma,can'tyou understand?" Florenceturned from the window to beseech Mrs. Atwater's concentration upon the matter. "It isn't 'playing'! I didn't want to 'play' being a reporter;theyain't 'playing'——"
"Aren'tplaying, Florence."
"Yes'm. They're not. Herbert's got a real printing-press; Uncle Joseph gave it to him. It's arealone, mamma, can't you understand?"
"I'll try," said Mrs. Atwater. "You mustn't get so excited about it, Florence."
"I'm not!" Florence returned vehemently. "I guess it'd take more than those two vile things and their old printing-press to getmeexcited!Idon't care what they do; it's far less than nothing to me! AllIwish is they'd fall off the fence and break their vile ole necks!"
With this manifestation of impersonal calmness, she turned again to the window; but her mother protested. "Do quit watching those foolish boys; you mustn't let them upset you so by their playing."
Florence moaned. "They don't 'upset' me, mamma! They have no effects on me by the slightest degree! And Itoldyou, mamma, they're not 'playing'."
"Then what are they doing?"
"Well, they're having a newspaper. They got the printing-press and an office in Herbert's stable, and everything. They got somebody to give 'em some ole banisters and a railing from a house that was torn down somewheres, and then they got it stuck up in the stable loft, so it runs across with a kind of a gate in the middle of these banisters, and on one side is the printing-press and a desk from that nasty little Henry Rooter's mother's attic; and a table and some chairs, and a map on the wall; and that's their newspaper office. They go out and look for what's the news, and write it down in lead pencil; and then they go up to their office and write it in ink; and then they print it for their newspaper."
"But what do they do on the fence?"
"That's where they go to watch what the news is," Florence explained morosely. "They think they're so grand, sittin' up there, pokin' around! They go other places, too; and they ask people. That's all they saidIcould be!" Here the lady's bitterness became strongly intensified. "They said maybe I could be one o' the ones they asked if I knew anything, sometimes, if they happened to think of it! I just respectf'ly told 'em I'd decline to wipe my oldest shoes on 'em to save their lives!"
Mrs. Atwater sighed. "You mustn't use such expressions, Florence."
"I don't see why not," the daughter promptly objected. "They're a lot more refined than the expressions they used on me!"
"Then I'm very glad you didn't play with them."
But at this, Florence once more gave way to filial despair. "Mamma, you justcan'tsee through anything! I've said anyhow fifty times they ain't—aren't—playing! They're getting up arealnewspaper, and have peoplebuyit and everything. They been all over this part of town and got every aunt and uncle they have besides their own fathers and mothers, and some people in the neighbourhood, and Kitty Silver and two or three other coloured people besides. They're going to charge twenty-five cents a year, collect-in-advance because they want the money first; and even papa gave 'em a quarter last night; he told me so."
"How often do they intend to publish their paper, Florence?" Mrs. Atwater inquired absently, having resumed her sewing.
"Every week; and they're goin' to have the first one a week from to-day."
"What do they call it?"
"The North End Daily Oriole. It's the silliest name I ever heard for a newspaper; and I told 'em so. I told 'em whatIthought of it, I guess!"
"Was that the reason?" Mrs. Atwater asked.
"Was it what reason, mamma?"
"Was it the reason they wouldn't let you be a reporter with them?"
"Poot!" Florence exclaimed airily. "Ididn't want anything to do with their ole paper. But anyway I didn't make fun o' their callin' it 'The North End Daily Oriole' till after they said I couldn't be in it.ThenI did, you bet!"
"Florence, don't say——"
"Mamma, I got to say somep'n! Well, I told 'em I wouldn't be in their ole paper if they begged me on their bented knees; and I said if they begged me a thousand years I wouldn't be in any paper with such a crazy name and I wouldn't tell 'em any news if I knew the President of the United States had the scarlet fever! I just politely informed 'em they could say what they liked, if they was dyingIdeclined so much as wipe the oldest shoes I got on 'em!"
"But whywouldn'tthey let you be on the paper?" her mother insisted.
Upon this Florence became analytical. "Justso's they could act so important." And she added, as a consequence, "They ought to be arrested!"
Mrs. Atwater murmured absently, but forbore to press her inquiry; and Florence was silent, in a brooding mood. The journalists upon the fence had disappeared from view, during her conversation with her mother; and presently she sighed, and quietly left the room. She went to her own apartment, where, at a small and rather battered little white desk, after a period of earnest reverie, she took up a pen, wet the point in purple ink, and without great effort or any critical delayings, produced a poem.
It was in a sense an original poem, though like the greater number of all literary projections, it was so strongly inspirational that the source of its inspiration might easily become manifest to a cold-blooded reader. Nevertheless, to the poetess herself, as she explained later in good faith, the words just seemed tocome toher;—doubtless with either genius or some form of miracle implied; for sources of inspiration are seldom recognized by inspired writers themselves. She had not long ago been party to a musical Sunday afternoon at her Great-Uncle Joseph's house, where Mr. Clairdyce sang some of his songs againand again, and her poem may have begun to coagulate within her then.
THE ORGANESTByFLORENCE ATWATERThe organest was seated at his organ in a church,In some beautiful woods of maple and birch,He was very weary while he played upon the keys,But he was a great organest and always played with ease,When the soul is weary,And the wind is dreary,I would like to be an organest seated all day at the organ,Whether my name might be Fairchild or Morgan,I would play music like a vast amen,The way it sounds in a church of men.
THE ORGANEST
ByFLORENCE ATWATER
The organest was seated at his organ in a church,In some beautiful woods of maple and birch,He was very weary while he played upon the keys,But he was a great organest and always played with ease,When the soul is weary,And the wind is dreary,I would like to be an organest seated all day at the organ,Whether my name might be Fairchild or Morgan,I would play music like a vast amen,The way it sounds in a church of men.
Florence read her poem seven or eight times, the deepening pleasure of her expression being evidence that repetition failed to denature this work, but on the contrary, enhanced an appreciative surprise at its singular merit. Finally she folded the sheet of paper with a delicate carefulness unusual to her, and placed it in her skirt pocket; then she went downstairs and out into the back yard. Her next action was straightforward and anything but prudish; she climbed the high wooden fences, one after the other, until she came to a pause at the top of that whereon the two journalists had lately made themselves so odiously impressive.
Before her, if she had but taken note of them, were a lesson in history and the markings of a profound transition in human evolution. Beside the old frame stable was a little brick garage, obviously put to the daily use intended by its designer. Quite as obviously the stable was obsolete; anybody would have known from its outside that there was no horse within it. There, visible, was the end of the pastoral age.
All this was lost upon Florence. She sat upon the fence, her gaze unfavourably though wistfully fixed upon a sign of no special aesthetic merit above the stable door.
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The inconsistency of the word "daily" did not trouble Florence; moreover, she had found no fault with "Oriole" until the Owners & Propreitors had explained to her in the plainest terms known to their vocabularies that she was excluded from the enterprise. Then, indeed, she had been reciprocally explicit in regard not only to them and certain personal characteristics of theirs, which she pointed out asfundamental, but in regard to any newspaper which should deliberately call itself an "Oriole." The partners remained superior in manner, though unable to conceal a natural resentment; they had adopted "Oriole" not out of a sentiment for the city of Baltimore, nor, indeed, on account of any ornithologic interest of theirs, but as a relic left over from an abandoned club or secret society, which they had previously contemplated forming, its members to be called "The Orioles" for no reason whatever. The two friends had talked of this plan at many meetings throughout the summer, and when Mr. Joseph Atwater made his great-nephew the unexpected present of a printing-press, and a newspaper consequently took the place of the club, Herbert and Henry still entertained an affection for their former scheme and decided to perpetuate the name. They were the more sensitive to attack upon it by an ignorant outsider and girl like Florence, and her chance of ingratiating herself with them, if that could be now her intention, was not a promising one.
She descended from the fence with pronounced inelegance, and, approaching the old double doors of the "carriage-house," which were open, paused to listen. Sounds from above assured her that theeditors were editing—or at least that they could be found at their place of business. Therefore, she ascended the cobwebby stairway, emerged from it into the former hay loft, and thus made her appearance in the printing-room ofThe North End Daily Oriole.
Herbert, frowning with the burden of composition, sat at a table beyond the official railing, and his partner was engaged at the press, earnestly setting type. This latter person (whom Florence so seldom named otherwise than as "that nasty little Henry Rooter") was of a pure, smooth, fair-haired appearance, and strangely clean for his age and occupation. His profile was of a symmetry he had not yet himself begun to appreciate; his dress was scrupulous and modish; and though he was short, nothing outward about him confirmed the more sinister of Florence's two adjectives. Nevertheless, her poor opinion of him was plain in her expression as she made her present intrusion upon his working hours. He seemed to reciprocate.
"Listen! Didn't I and Herbert tell you to keep out o' here?" he said. "Look at her, Herbert! She's back again!"
"You get out o' here, Florence," said Herbert,abandoning his task with a look of pain. "How often we got to tell you we don't want you around here when we're in our office like this?"
"For Heaven's sake!" Henry Rooter thought fit to add. "Can't you quit runnin' up and down our office stairs once in a while, long enough for us to get our newspaper work done? Can't you give us a littlepeace?"
The pinkiness of Florence's altering complexion was justified; she had not been within a thousand miles of their old office for four days. With some heat she stated this to be the fact, adding, "And I only came then because I knew somebody ought to see that this stable isn't ruined. It's my own uncle and aunt's stable, I guess, isn't it? Answer me that, if you'll kindly please to do so!"
"It's my father and mother's stable," Herbert asserted. "Haven't I got a right to say who's allowed in my own father and mother's stable?"
"You have not," the prompt Florence replied. "It's my own uncle and aunt's stable, and I got as much right here as anybody."
"You have not!" Henry Rooter protested hotly. "This isn't either your ole aunt and uncle's stable."
"It isn't?"
"No, it is not! This isn't anybody's stable. It's my and Herbert's Newspaper Building, and I guess you haven't got the face to stand there and claim you got a right to go in a Newspaper Building and say you got a right there when everybody tells you to stay outside of it, I guess!"
"Oh, haven't I?"
"No, you 'haven't—I'!" Mr. Rooter maintained bitterly. "You just walk down town and go in any Newspaper Buildings down there and tell 'em you got a right to stay there all day long when they tell you to get out o' there! Just try it! That's all I ask!"
Florence uttered a cry of derision. "And pray, whoever told you I was bound to do everything you ask me to, Mister Henry Rooter?" And she concluded by reverting to that hostile impulse, so ancient, which, in despair of touching an antagonist effectively, reflects upon his ancestors. "If you got anything you want to ask, you go ask your grandmother!"
"Here!" Herbert sprang to his feet. "You try and behave like a lady!"
"Who'll make me?" she inquired.
"You got to behave like a lady as long as you're inour Newspaper Building, anyway," Herbert said ominously. "If you expect to come up here after you been told five dozen times to keep out——"
"For Heaven's sakes!" his partner interposed. "When we goin' to get our newspaperworkdone? She'syourcousin; I should think you could get her out!"
"Well, I'm goin' to, ain't I?" Herbert protested plaintively. "I expect to get her out, don't I?"
"Oh, do you?" Miss Atwater inquired, with severe mockery. "Pray, how would you expect to accomplish it, pray?"
Herbert looked desperate, but was unable to form a reply consistent with a few new rules of etiquette and gallantry that he had begun to observe during the past year or so. "Now, see here, Florence," he said. "You're old enough to know when people tell you to keep out of a place, why, it means they want you to stay away from there."
Florence remained cold to this reasoning. "Oh, Poot!" she said.
"Now, look here!" her cousin remonstrated, and went on with his argument. "We got our newspaper work to do, and you ought to have sense enough to know newspaper work like this newspaper work wegot onourhands here isn't—well, it ain't any child's play."
His partner appeared to approve of the expression, for he nodded severely and then used it himself. "No, youbetit isn't any child's play!" he said.
"No, sir," Herbert continued. "This newspaper work we got on our hands here isn't any child's play."
"No, sir," Henry Rooter again agreed. "Newspaper work like this isn't any child's play atall!"
"It isn't any child's play, Florence," said Herbert. "It ain't any child's play at all, Florence. If it was just child's play or something like that, why, it wouldn't matter so much your always pokin' up here, and——"
"Well," his partner interrupted judicially;—"we wouldn't want her around, even if itwaschild's play."
"No, we wouldn't; that's so," Herbert agreed. "We wouldn't want you around, anyhow, Florence." Here his tone became more plaintive. "So, for mercy's sakes can't you go on home and give us a little rest? What you want, anyhow?"
"Well, I guess it's about time you was askin' me that," she said, not unreasonably. "If you'd askedme that in the first place, instead of actin' like you'd never been taught anything, and was only fit to associate with hoodlums, perhaps my time is ofsomevalue, myself!"
Here the lack of rhetorical cohesion was largely counteracted by the strong expressiveness of her tone and manner, which made clear her position as a person of worth, dealing with the lowest of her inferiors. She went on, not pausing:
"I thought being as I was related to you, and all the family and everybody else is goin' to haf to read your ole newspaper, anyway it'd be a good thing if what was printed in it wasn'talla disgrace to the family, because the name of our family's got mixed up with this newspaper;—so here!"
Thus speaking, she took the poem from her pocket and with dignity held it forth to her cousin.
"What's that?" Herbert inquired, not moving a hand. He was but an amateur, yet already enough of an editor to be suspicious.
"It's a poem," Florence said. "I don't know whether I exackly ought to have it in your ole newspaper or not, but on account of the family's sake I guess I better. Here, take it."
Herbert at once withdrew a few steps, placing hishands behind him. "Listen here," he said;—"you think we got time to read a lot o' nothin' in your ole hand-writin' that nobody can read anyhow, and then go and toil and moil to print it on our printin'-press? I guess we got work enough printin' what we write for our newspaper our own selves! My goodness, Florence, Itoldyou this isn't any child's play!"
For the moment, Florence appeared to be somewhat baffled. "Well," she said. "Well, you better put this poem in your ole newspaper if you want to have anyhow one thing in it that won't make everybody sick that reads it."
"Iwon't do it!" Herbert said decisively.
"What you take us for?" his partner added.
"All right, then," Florence responded. "I'll go and tell Uncle Joseph and he'll take this printing-press back."
"He will not take it back. I already did tell him how you kept pokin' around, tryin' toruneverything, and how we just worried our lives out tryin' to keep you away. He said he bet it was a hard job; that's what Uncle Joseph said! So go on, tell him anything you want to. You don't get your ole poem inournewspaper!"
"Not if she lived to be two hunderd years old!"Henry Rooter added. Then he had an afterthought. "Not unless she pays for it."
"How do you mean?" Herbert asked, puzzled by this codicil.
Now Henry's brow had become corrugated with no little professional impressiveness. "You know what we were talkin' about this morning?" he said. "How the right way to run our newspaper, we ought to have some advertisements in it and everything? Well, we want money, don't we? We could put this poem in our newspaper like an advertisement;—that is, if Florence has got any money, we could."
Herbert frowned. "If her ole poem isn't too long I guess we could. Here, let's see it, Florence." And, taking the sheet of paper in his hand, he studied the dimensions of the poem, without paining himself to read it. "Well, I guess, maybe we can do it," he said. "How much ought we to charge her?"
This question sent Henry Rooter into a state of calculation, while Florence observed him with veiled anxiety; but after a time he looked up, his brow showing continued strain. "Do you keep a bank, Florence—for nickels and dimes and maybe quarters, you know?" he inquired.
It was her cousin who impulsively replied for her. "No, she don't," he said.
"Not since I was about seven years old!" And Florence added sharply, though with dignity: "Do you still make mud pies in your back yard, pray?"
"Now, see here!" Henry objected. "Try and be a lady anyway for a few minutes, can't you? I got to figure out how much we got to charge you for your ole poem, don't I?"
"Well, then," Florence returned, "you better askmesomep'n about that, hadn't you?"
"Well," said Henry Rooter, "have you got any money at home?"
"No, I haven't."
"Have you got any money with you?"
"Yes, I have."
"How much is it?"
"I won't tell you."
Henry frowned. "I guess we ought to make her pay about two dollars and a half," he said, turning to his partner.
Herbert became deferential; it seemed to him that he had formed a business association with a genius, and for a moment he was dazzled; then he remembered Florence's financial capacities, always wellknown to him, and he looked depressed. Florence, herself, looked indignant.
"Two dollars and a half!" she cried. "Why, I could buy this whole place for two dollars and a half, printing-press, railing, and all—yes, and you thrown in, Mister Henry Rooter!"
"See here, Florence," Henry said earnestly. "Haven't you got two dollars and a half?"
"Of course she hasn't!" his partner assured him. "She never had two dollars and a half in her life!"
"Well, then," said Henry gloomily, "what we goin' to do about it? How muchyouthink we ought to charge her?"
Herbert's expression became noncommittal. "Just let me think a minute," he said, and with his hand to his brow he stepped behind the unsuspicious Florence.
"I got to think," he murmured; then with the straightforwardness of his age, he suddenly seized his damsel cousin from the rear and held her in a tight but far from affectionate embrace, pinioning her arms. She shrieked, "Murder!" and "Let me go!" and "Help! Hay-yulp!"
"Look in her pocket," Herbert shouted. "She keeps her money in her skirt pocket when she's gotany. It's on the left side of her. Don't let her kick you! Look out!"
"I got it!" said the dexterous Henry, retreating and exhibiting coins. "It's one dime and two nickels—twenty cents. Has she got any more pockets?"
"No, I haven't!" Florence fiercely informed him, as Herbert released her. "And I guess you better hand that money back if you don't want to be arrested for stealing!"
But Henry was unmoved. "Twenty cents," he said calculatingly. "Well, all right; it isn't much, but you can have your poem in our newspaper for twenty cents, Florence. If you don't want to pay that much, why, take your ole twenty cents and go on away."
"Yes," said Herbert. "That's as cheap as we'll do it, Florence. Take it or leave it."
"Take it or leave it," Henry Rooter agreed. "That's the way to talk to her; take it or leave it, Florence. If you don't take it you got to leave it."
Florence was indignant, but she decided to take it. "All right," she said coldly. "I wouldn't pay another cent if I died for it."
"Well, you haven't got another cent, so that's allright," Mr. Rooter remarked; and he honourably extended an open palm toward his partner. "Here, Herbert; you can have the dime, or the two nickels, whichever you rather. It makes no difference to me; I'd as soon have one as the other."
Herbert took the two nickels, and turned to Florence. "See here, Florence," he said, in a tone of strong complaint. "This business is all done and paid for now. What you want to hang around here anymorefor?"
"Yes, Florence," his partner faithfully seconded him, at once. "We haven't got any more time to waste around here to-day, and so what you want to stand around in the way and everything for? You ought to know yourself we don't want you."
"I'm not in the way," said Florence hotly. "Whose way am I in?"
"Well, anyhow, if you don't go," Herbert informed her, "we'll carry you downstairs and lock you out."
"I'd just like to see you!" she returned, her eyes flashing. "Just you dare to lay a finger on me again!" And she added, "Anyway, if you did, those ole doors haven't got any lock on 'em: I'll come right back in and walk right straight up the stairs again!"
Herbert advanced toward her. "Now you pay attention, to me," he said. "You've paid for your ole poem, and we got to have some peace around here. I'm goin' straight over to your mother and ask her to come and get you."
Florence gave up. "What difference wouldthatmake, Mister Taddletale?" she inquired mockingly. "Iwouldn't be here when she came, would I? I'll thank you to notice there's some value to my time, myself; and I'll just politely ask you to excuse me, pray!"
With a proud air she crushingly departed, returning to her own home far from dissatisfied with what she had accomplished. Moreover, she began to expand with the realization of a new importance; and she was gratified with the effect upon her parents, at dinner that evening, when she informed them that she had written a poem, which was to be published in the prospective first number ofThe North End Daily Oriole.
"Written apoem?" said her father. "Well, I declare! Why, that's remarkable, Florence!"
"I'm glad the boys were nice about it," said her mother. "I should have feared they couldn't appreciate it, after being so cross to you about letting you have anything to do with the printing-press. They must have thought it was a very good poem."
"Where is the poem, Florence?" Mr. Atwater asked. "Let's read it and see what our little girl can do when she really tries."
Unfortunately Florence had not a copy, and whenshe informed her father of this fact, he professed himself greatly disappointed as well as eager for the first appearance ofThe Oriole, that he might felicitate himself upon the evidence of his daughter's heretofore unsuspected talent. Florence was herself anxious for the newspaper's début, and she made her anxiety so clear to Atwater & Rooter, Owners & Propreitors, every afternoon after school, during the following week, that by Thursday further argument and repartee on their part were felt to be indeed futile; and in order to have a little peace around there, they carried her downstairs. At least, they defined their action as "carrying," and, having deposited her in the yard, they were obliged to stand guard at the doors, which they closed and contrived to hold against her until her strength was worn out for that day.
Florence consoled herself. During the week she dropped in on all the members of "the family"—her grandfather, uncles and aunts and cousins, her great-aunts and great-uncles—and in each instance, after no protracted formal preliminaries, lightly remarked that she wrote poetry now; her first to appear in the forthcomingOriole. And when Great-Aunt Carrie said, "Why, Florence, you're wonderful! I couldn'twrite a poem to save my life. I nevercouldsee how they do it," Florence laughed, made a deprecatory little side motion with her head, and responded, "Why, Aunt Carrie, that's nothing! It just kind of comes to you."
This also served as her explanation when some of her school friends expressed their admiration, after being told the news in confidence; though to one of the teachers she said, smiling ruefully, as in remembrance of midnight oil, "Itdoestake work, of course!"
When opportunity offered, upon the street, she joined people she knew (or even rather distant acquaintances) to walk with them a little way and lead the conversation to the subject of poetry, including her own contribution to that art. Altogether, if Florence was not in a fair way to become a poetic celebrity it was not her own fault but entirely that ofThe North End Daily Oriole, which was to make its appearance on Saturday, but failed to do so on account of too much enthusiasm on the part of Atwater & Rooter in manipulating the printing-press. It broke, had to be repaired; and Florence, her nerves upset by the accident, demanded her money back.This was impossible, and the postponement proved to be but an episode; moreover, it gave her time to let more people know of the treat that was coming.
Among these was Noble Dill. Until the Friday following her disappointment she had found no opportunity to acquaint her Very Ideal with the news; and but for an encounter partly due to chance, he might not have heard of it. A sentimental enrichment of colour in her cheeks was the result of her catching sight of him, as she was on the point of opening and entering her own front door, that afternoon, on her return from school. He was passing the house, walking somewhat dreamily.
Florence stepped into the sheltering vestibule, peeping round it with earnest eyes to watch him as he went by; obviously he had taken no note of her. Satisfied of this, she waited until he was at a little distance, then ran lightly down to the gate, hurried after him and joined him.
"Why, Mr. Dill!" she exclaimed, in her mother's most polished manner. "How supprising to seeyou! I presume as we both happen to be walking the same direction we might just's well keep together."
"Surprising to see me?" Noble said vaguely. "Ihaven't been away anywhere in particular, Florence." Then, at a thought, he brightened. "I'm glad to see you, Florence. Do you know if any of your family or relatives have heard when your Aunt Julia is coming home?"
"Aunt Julia? She's out of town," said Florence. "She's visiting different people she used to know when she was away at school."
"Yes, I know," Mr. Dill returned. "But she's been gone six weeks."
"Oh, I don't believe it's that long," Florence said casually; then with more earnestness: "Mr. Dill, I was goin' to ask you somep'n—it's kind of a funny question formeto ask, but——"
"Yes, she has," Noble interrupted, not aware that his remark was an interruption. "Oh, yes, she has!" he said. "It was six weeks day-before-yesterday afternoon. I saw your father downtown this morning, and he said he didn't know that any of the family had heard just when she was coming home. I thought maybe some of your relatives had a letter from her by this afternoon's mail, perhaps."
"I guess not," said Florence. "Mr. Dill, there was a question I thought I'd ask you. It's kind of a funny question forme——"
"Are yousurenobody's heard from your Aunt Julia to-day?" Noble insisted.
"I guess they haven't. Mr. Dill, I was goin' to ask you——"
"It's strange," he murmured, "I don't see how people can enjoy visits that long. I should think they'd get anxious about what might happen at home."
"Oh, grandpa's all right; he says he kind of likes to have the house nice and quiet to himself; and anyway Aunt Julia enjoys visiting," Florence assured him. "Aunt Fanny saw a newspaper from one the places where Aunt Julia's visiting her school room-mate. It had her picture in it and called her 'the famous Northern Beauty'; it was down South somewhere. Well, Mr. Dill, I was just sayin' I believe I'd ask you——"
But a sectional rancour seemed all at once to affect the young man. "Oh, yes. I heard about that," he said. "Your Aunt Fanny lent my mother the newspaper. Those people inthatpart of the country—well——" He paused, remembering that it was only Florence he addressed; and he withheld from utterance his opinion that the Civil War ought to be fought all over again. "Your father saidyour grandfather hadn't heard from her for several days, and even then she hadn't said when she was coming home."
"No, I expect she didn't," said Florence. "Mr. Dill, I was goin' to ask you somep'n—it's kind of a queer kind of question formeto ask, I guess——" She paused. However, he did not interrupt her, seeming preoccupied with gloom; whereupon Florence permitted herself a deprecatory laugh, and continued, "It might be you'd answer yes, or it might be you'd answer no; but anyway I was goin' to ask you—it's kind of a funny question formeto ask, I expect—but do you like poetry?"
"What?"
"Well, as things have turned out lately I guess it's kind of a funny question, Mr. Dill, but do you like poetry?"
Noble's expression took on a coldness; for the word brought to his mind a thought of Newland Sanders. "Do I like poetry?" said Noble. "No, I don't."
Florence was momentarily discouraged; but at her age people usually possess an invaluable faculty, which they lose later in life; and it is a pity that they do lose it. At thirteen—especially the earlier months of thirteen—they are still able to set aside and dismissfrom their minds almost any facts, no matter how audibly those facts have asked for recognition. Children superbly allow themselves to become deaf, so to speak, to undesirable circumstances; most frequently, of course, to undesirable circumstances in the way of parental direction; so that fathers, mothers, nurses, or governesses, not comprehending that this mental deafness is for the time being entirely genuine, are liable to hoarseness both of throat and temper. Thirteen is an age when the fading of this gift or talent, one of the most beautiful of childhood, begins to impair its helpfulness under the mistaken stress of discipline; but Florence retained something of it. In a moment or two Noble Dill's disaffection toward poetry was altogether as if it did not exist.
She coughed, inclined her head a little to one side, in her mother's manner of politeness to callers, and, repeating her deprecatory laugh, remarked: "Well, of course it's kind of a funny question formeto ask, of course."
"What is, Florence?" Noble inquired absently.
"Well—what I was saying was that 'course it's sort of queermeaskin' if you liked poetry, of course, on account of mywritingpoetry the way I do now."
She looked up at him with a bright readiness to respond modestly to whatever exclamation his wonder should dictate; but Noble's attention had straggled again.
"Has she written your mother lately?" he asked.
Florence's expression denoted a mental condition slightly disturbed. "No," she said. "It's goin' to be printed inThe North End Daily Oriole."
"What?"
"My poem. It's about a vast amen—anyhow, that's proba'ly the best thing in it, I guess—and they're goin' to have it out to-morrow, or else they'll have to settle withme; that's one thing certain! I'll bring one over to your house and leave it at the door for you, Mr. Dill."
Noble had but a confused notion of what she thus generously promised. However, he said, "Thank you," and nodded vaguely.
"Of course, I don't know as it's so awful good," Florence admitted insincerely. "The family all seem to think it's something pretty much; but I don't know if it is or not.Really, I don't!"
"No," said Noble, still confused. "I suppose not."
"I'm half way through another one I think myself'llbe a good deal better. I'm not goin' as fast with it as I did with the other one, and I expect it'll be quite a ways ahead of this one." She again employed the deprecatory little laugh. "I don't know how I do it, myself. The family all think it's sort of funny I don't know how I do it, myself; but that's the way it is. They all say if they could do it they're sure they'd know how they did it; but I guess they're wrong. I presume if you can do it, why, it justcomesto you. Don't you presume that's the way it is, Mr. Dill?"
"I—guess so." They had reached his gate, and he stopped. "You're sure none of your family have heard anything to-day?" he asked anxiously.
"From Aunt Julia? I don't think they have."
He sighed, and opened the gate. "Well, good evening, Florence."
"Good evening." Her eyes followed him wistfully as he passed within the enclosure; then she turned and walked quickly toward her own home; but at the corner of the next fence she called back over her shoulder, "I'll leave it with your mother for you, if you're not home when I bring it."
"What?" he shouted, from his front door.
"I'll leave it with yourmother."
"Leave what?"
"Thepoem!"
"Oh!" said Noble. "Thanks!"
But when his mother handed him a copy of the first issue ofThe North End Daily Oriole, the next day, when he came home to lunch, he read it without edification; there was nothing about Julia in it.