“We have a creek up near Lexington that goes on just such unexpected sprees,” said Jimmy. “It will be a perfectly respectable citizen and every one will forget its bad behavior, when suddenly it will break loose and get so full it disgraces itself and brings shame on its family of branches.”
By this time the whole crowd was fairly damp, but they made a joke of it, with the exception of Miss Hunt, who was much irritated at the damage doneher pretty dress. Although she was covered up with three coats, she clamored for more, but no more were offered her. Professor Green took off his coat and, folding it carefully, put it under the seat in the lunch hamper.
“I fancy you think this is a funny thing to do, but I have seen a wet crowd almost freeze after a storm like this, and it is a great mistake to get all of the wraps wet. It is much better to take the rain and get wet yourself, and keep the coats dry; and then, when the rain is over, have something warm and comfortable to put on.”
“That is a fine scheme,” said Paul, and all of the men followed Edwin Green’s example, and Molly and Judy, who had prudently brought their college sweaters, did the same.
“I think it is rather fun to get wet when you have on clothes that won’t get ruined,” said Judy.
“I am glad you like it,” answered Miss Hunt, still sore over her bout with Judy, “but I must say it is hard on me with this chiffon dress. What will it look like after this?”
“Well, you know, chiffon is French for rag so I fancy it will look like a Paris creation,” called back Judy from the front seat, where she was still installed by Kent. “I’ll bet anything her hair will come out of curl,” she whispered to her companion, “and I should not be astonished to see some of her beauty wash off.”
“Eany, meany,” laughed Kent. “You are already way ahead of her, Miss Judy. Do leave her her hair and complexion.”
“Well, I’ll try to be good,” said penitent Judy. “You and Molly are so alike, it is right amusing. And the worst of it is your goodness rubs off on everybody you come in contact with. Do you realize I have been in Kentucky for weeks and that Miss Hunt is the first person I have had a scrap with, and so far I have not got myself in a single ‘Julia Kean’ scrape? I have been in so many, that the girls at college have named the particular kind of scrape I get in after me, just as though I were a famous physician who had discovered a disease.”
“Just what kind of scrape do you usually get in?”
“The kind of scrape I get in is always one I can get out of, and usually one that I fall in from not looking ahead enough at the consequences.”
“Well, I pray God that this will be a ‘Julia Kean’ scrape we are in to-night. Certainly, lack of foresight got us in. I’d like to get that weather man and throw him in this creek. ‘Generally fair and variable winds,’ much!” said Kent with such a serious expression that Judy began to realize that this was not simply a case of a good wetting, but might mean something more.
The horses were knee deep in water now, but splashing bravely on. Molly noticed that in hitching up for the homeward trip Kent had put President in the lead.
“That is because old President has so much sense and will know how to pick his way and keep his feet when the other horses would get scared and begin to struggle and pull down the whole team,” said Molly to Professor Green.Molly was fully aware of the danger they were in, but was keeping her knowledge to herself for fear of starting a panic among the girls. “There is no real danger of drowning,” she whispered to her companion, “so long as we stay in the wagon. But the banks are so steep that if we should get out we might slip into the creek and then it would be about impossible to keep our feet. Look at the water now, up to the hubs of the wheels! I am sorry for the horses, and what an awful responsibility for Kent! But he is equal to it. Do you know, I really believe Kent is equal to anything!”
It was, of course, pitch dark now, except for frequent flashes of lightning that illuminated the raging torrents, so all were forced to realize the grave situation.
“The horses are behaving wonderfully well, and so far all the passengers are. I hope it will keep up,” muttered Kent. “It is awfully hard to keep your head when you are driving if any one screams.”
“The water is in the wagon bed now. I can tell by my feet. Don’t you think your mother ought to come on the front seat, where she can be out of it somewhat?” suggested Judy.
“You are right. Mother, come on up here and help me drive. There is plenty of room for three of us, and I believe you would be more comfortable.”
Mrs. Brown got up, glad to change her position. She was more frightened than she cared to own, and was anxious to find out just how Kent felt about the matter.
“I am going on the front seat, too,” said the bedraggled Miss Hunt. “It seems to me Miss Julia Kean has had the best of everything long enough. I see no reason why she should sit high and dry during the whole drive, while here I am absolutely and actually sitting in the water.”
Kent bit his lips in fury, but held his horses and his tongue while the change was being made. Judy showed her breeding in a way that made Molly proud.
“High I may be, but not dry,” said Judy, playfully shaking herself on the already drenched Molly as she sank by her side on the soggy hay. “I am going to see how long our fair friend will stay up there. It is really the scariest place I ever got in. Down here you feel the water without seeing it, but up there every flash of lightning reveals terrors that down here are undreamed of.”
“Sit in the middle, mother, and Miss Hunt and I can take better care of you.”
“Oh, I am afraid to sit on the outside! Mrs. Brown is much larger than I am and could hold me in better than I could her,” said the selfish girl.
She squeezed in between mother and son, as Kent said afterward, taking up more room then any little person that he ever saw.
“Noah he did build an ark, one wide river to cross.Built it out of hickory bark, one wide river to cross.One wide river, and that wide river was Jordan,One wide river, and that wide river to cross.”
“All join in the chorus,” demanded Jimmy.
There were many verses to the time-honored song, and before they got all the animals in the ark the moon suddenly came out from behind a very black cloud, and the rain was over, but not the flood.
“It took many days and nights for the water to subside for old Noah, and we may expect the same delay in our case,” said the happy and irrepressible Jimmy.
Kent was glad indeed for the light of the moon. He had really had to leave it to President to take the proper road, or, rather, channel. That brave old horse had gone sturdily on, and, when one of the younger horses had begun to struggle and pull back, he had turned solemnly around and given him a soft little bite.
“Mother, did you see that? And look at that off horse now! I bet he will behave after this.”
Sure enough, the admonished animal was pulling as steadily as President himself, and they had no more trouble with him.
There were many large holes in the creek bed, and, of course, the wheels often went into them. Once it looked for a moment as though they might have a turnover to add to their disasters. The wagon toppled, but righted itself in a moment. Miss Hunt, as Judy had said, on the front seat was able to see the danger as she could not down in the wagon, and when the wheels went down that particularly deep hole she let out a piercing scream and tried to seize the reins from Kent.
Kent pulled up his horses as soon as the wagon was on a level and called to John, “John, will you please help Miss Hunt back into the seat she has just vacated? She finds she is not comfortable here.”
At that Miss Hunt very humbly crawled back, and, like the Heathen Chinee, “subsequent proceedings interested her no more.”
As dawn was breaking they drove into the avenue at Chatsworth, not really very much the worse for wear. The warm, dry wraps produced from under the seat after the moon came out had been wonderfully comforting. Edwin Green had made Mrs. Brown take his coat, and as he folded it around her he had whispered, “Kentucky women are very remarkable. They meet danger as though it were a partner at a ball.”
“Yes,” said Kent, who had overheard him, “I could never have come through the deep waters if it had not been for the brave women. You saw how the one scream unnerved me, to say nothing of that little vixen grabbing my reins. Here, Ernest, we are on the pike at last, and I am just about all in. I wouldn’t give up until we got through, but take the reins. Maybe Miss Hunt would like to drive,” he had slyly added, but a low moan from under the wet coats was all the proud beauty could utter.
Aunt Mary greeted them at Chatsworth with much delight.
“The sto’m here been somethin’ turrible. I ain’t seed sich a wind sence the chilluns’ castle blowed down. All of yer had better come back to the kitchen whar it’s warm and eat somethin’. I got a big pot er hot coffee and pitchers er hot milk an’ a pan er quick yeast biscuit. I done notice ef you eat somethin’ when you is cold an’ wet, somehow you fergits ter catch cold.”
They all came trooping back to the warm old kitchen, “ev’y spot in it as clean as a bisc’it board,” and there they ate the hot buttered biscuit and drank the coffee and milk. It was noticed that John let the “extras” take care of Miss Hunt, and he devoted himself to his mother. Just as they were separating for the morning he hugged his mother and whispered to her, “You need not have any more uneasiness about me, mumsy. I don’t believe there is a Brown living who could go on loving a woman who has no more sense than to grab the reins.”
“Judy, Mrs. Woodsmall has just ‘phoned over that her hated R. F. D. Woodsmall is bringing you a letter from your father. She says she could only make out it was from him, but could not decipher anything else. She has an idea he is on his way, as the postmark showed it was mailed on the train somewhere in Kansas. Isn’t she too funny? She makes some of the neighbors furious, but we always laugh at her little idiosyncrasy. After all, it is perfectly harmless. She really is as kind a little soul as there is in the county. Her life has been so narrow. If she could have been a real worker in a big city she might have grown into a very remarkable person. What a detective she would have made!”
Judy yawned and stretched and sat up as Mollycame in bearing a tray of lunch for her tired friend as well as the news of a letter from Mr. Kean, somewhere on the road, and to be delivered some time that day if Bud Woodsmall’s automobile behaved.
“Oh, Molly, I am tired! Are you the only one of the crowd to be up and doing after last night?”
“I have persuaded mother to stay in bed and get a good rest. The boys took a late train into town, and Miss Hunt never did go to bed. Aunt Mary said she came down early this morning and ’phoned over to Aunt Clay’s coachman to come for her immediately, and off she went without saying ‘boo to a goose.’ I wish you could have heard Aunt Mary’s description of her!
“‘Yo’ Aunt Clay’s comp’ny sho ain’t no wet weather beauty. Her ha’r was so flat her haid looked jes’ like a buckeye; and her dress ‘min’ me of a las’ year’s crow’s nes’. She was so shamefaced like she resem’led that ole peacock when Shep done pull out his tail.’”
Judy laughed. “Oh, I do love Aunt Mary!But, Molly, won’t it be fine to see mamma and papa? Do you suppose they are really on their way?”
“It will be fine to see them, but it will be pretty sad to have them take off my Judy. I am mighty afraid that is what they are going to do. Go back to sleep now and I will bring you your letter as soon as Bud puts in his appearance. I am going to have a hard game of tennis with Jimmy Lufton against Ernest and that nice Miss Rogers. Weren’t those girls spunky last night? An experience like that will make you know people better than years of plain, everyday life. Professor Green has struck up quite an acquaintance with Miss Ormsby. It seems they have many mutual friends, both of them having summered many times at ‘Sconset.’”
Molly spoke quietly, but there was a slight tremor of lip and a deepening of color that the sharp Judy saw and noted, but nothing would have made her let Molly know that she had betrayed herself in the least.
“Molly was perfectly unconscious of what she was doing last night,” thought Judy, “but all the same she was making poor Professor Green live up to his name with jealousy. I don’t know but it might make Molly open her childlike old eyes if the patient professor should kick up his staid heels and jump the fence and go grazing in another paddock for a while.” And then aloud she said, “All right, honey, I’ll take forty winks and then get up and come down to the tennis court.”
Mr. Kean’s letter arrived in due time and, sure enough, Mrs. Woodsmall’s surmises were correct. He was on the way to Kentucky with Mrs. Kean, and expected to be in Louisville the next day at a hotel, and would motor out to Chatsworth in the afternoon.
“Your father and mother must not think of stopping at a hotel, Judy,” declared Mrs. Brown. “We have an abundance of room. Miss Rogers and Miss Ormsby are going in town after supper to-night with Ernest and Professor Green. Mr.Lufton expects to go back to Lexington to-morrow, and Professor Green is only waiting for some mail and will take his departure, too. We shall be forlorn, indeed, when all of them go. I’ll make Kent look up what train Mr. Kean will come in on and he will meet it and send them both right out here.”
“Oh, Mrs. Brown, you are so good. I would love for mamma and papa to be here and to know all of you and have you know them. They are as wonderful in their way as you are in yours, and your meeting would be a grand combination.”
Molly rather dreaded the coming of evening. She had promised Jimmy to take a walk with him by moonlight, and she had a terrible feeling that he might bring up the subject of “lemons” again. She was not prepared for the question that she felt almost sure he was going to ask her.
“I am nothing but a kid, after all,” moaned Molly to herself. “Professor Green was right in calling me ‘dear child.’ Mother was marriedwhen she was my age, but somehow I can’t seem to grow up. Jimmy is so nice, and I do like him so much, but as for spending the rest of my life with him—oh, I just simply can’t contemplate it. Why, why doesn’t he see how it is without having to talk it over? I wish none of them would ever get sentimental over me.” And then she blushed and told herself that she was a big story teller and sentimentality from some one who should be nameless would not be so trying, after all.
Supper was over, Professor Green and Ernest had gone gaily off, driving Miss Rogers and Miss Ormsby to Louisville, Judy and Kent were making a long-talked-of duty call on Aunt Clay, “just to show Miss Hunt there is no hard feeling,” laughed Judy. And now it was time to take the promised walk with Jimmy Lufton.
“You look a little tired, Miss Molly. Maybe you would rather not go. You must not let me bore you,” said Jimmy, a little wistfully.
“Oh, no, I’m all right. I fancy it will take allof us a few days to get over last night. I have wanted to tell you how fine you were and what it meant to all of us to have you so cheerful and tactful. The boys can’t say enough in your praise. We had to have some safety valve, and if we had not been laughing we might have been crying.”
“Oh, I’m a cheerful idiot, all right, all right. I have such a short upper lip and such an eternal grin on me that no one ever seems to think I have any feelings. I get no more sympathy than a fat man. I wish I could make people understand that I am as serious as the next, but somehow me Irish grandmither comes popping out in me and I have to joke if I am to die the next minute.”
“I think your disposition is most enviable,” said Molly kindly, “and, as for the dash of Irish, I always think that is what makes our mother so charming. It was almost a fad with our professor of English at college to find the Irish mother or grandmother for almost all of thegreat poets or essayists.” Molly could not quite trust herself to say Professor Green’s name, the picture of the seemingly ecstatic Edwin driving off with Miss Ormsby was too fresh in her mind, and she could not help smiling at herself for her formal “our professor of English.”
Their footsteps led them into the garden and then through the apple orchard down by the little stream, and on to the beech woods.
“I wonder why we are coming this way,” thought Molly, trying to keep her mind off another walk she had taken over that same ground not so long ago.
“Let’s sit down here,” said Jimmy, stopping under the great beech tree where Molly and Edwin had sat on that memorable day when he had spoken of his vision of the white-haired Molly, and then had stopped himself so suddenly with a joke about his own possible baldness.
“Oh, not right here,” said Molly hurriedly. “I know a nice rock a little farther on.”
“Molly, Miss Molly, Miss Brown!——Oh,Molly, darling, there is no use in going any farther because I know you know that I have brought you out here to tell you that I——”
“Jimmy, please don’t say anything more. It ’most kills me to hurt you.”
“Is there no hope for me? I’ll wait a week, oh, I don’t mean a week, I’ll wait forever if there is a chance for me. I know this is a low question to ask you, but is there any one else?”
Honest Molly hung her head. “Not exactly.”
That “not exactly” was enough for Jimmy. He smiled a wan little smile that would have put his Irish grandmother to shame.
“Well, don’t you mind, Miss Molly. I wouldn’t have you feel blue about me for a million. You never did lead me on one little bit, and I was almost sure when I came to Kentucky that there would be nothing doing for yours truly; but somehow men are made so they have to make sure about such things. You and I have too much sense of the ridiculous to do any spiel about the brother and sister business, but I’lltell you one thing, I am your friend forever, and you must know that, and understand that as long as I live I’ll hold myself in readiness to do your bidding.”
“Oh, Jimmy, you are so good and generous,” holding out her hand to him, “I am your friend forever, and I hope we shall always see a lot of each other.”
Jimmy took her hand and for a moment bowed his curly black head over it. Molly put her other hand on his head, feeling somehow that it was like comforting Kent.
“You are sure, Molly?”
“Yes, Jimmy.”
“Well, le’s go home. I know you are tired.
“‘If no one ever marries meI sha’n’t mind very much;I shall buy a squirrel in a cage,And a little rabbit-hutch,’”
sang the irrepressible.
When Judy got back to Chatsworth she found Molly weeping her soul out on the pillow, and she had noticed as they passed the office porch that for once Jimmy Lufton was whistling in the minor.
“Sister Ann, do you see any dust arising?” called Molly to Judy, who had actually climbed up on the gate post, hoping to see a little farther up the road, expecting the automobile from Louisville with her beloveds in it.
“I see a little cloud and I hear a little buzzing. Oh, Molly, I believe it’s them.”
“Is it, oh, Wellington graduate? Get your cases straight before they come or your father will think that diploma is a fake.”
“Grammar go hang,” said Judy, performing a dangerouspas seulon the gate post and then jumping lightly down and racing up the avenue to meet the incoming automobile. Molly followed more slowly, never having been the sprinter that Judy was. Mr. Kean sprang fromthe car and lifted Judy off her feet in a regular bear hug.
“Save a little for me, Bobby,” piped the little lady mother. “Judy, Judy, it is too good to be true that we have got you at last, and I mean to keep you forever now, you slippery thing.” And then they all of them got into the car and had a three-cornered hug. Molly came up with only enough breath to give them a cordial greeting, welcoming them to Chatsworth.
“That is a very fine young man, your brother, who met us at the station, Miss Molly. Kent is his name? He recognized us by my likeness to you, Judy, so make your best bow and look pleased.” In looking pleased, Judy did a great deal of unnecessary blushing which her mother noticed, but, mothers being different from fathers, said nothing about it.
Mrs. Brown came hurrying down the walk to meet her guests. She was amused to see how much Judy resembled both her parents, although Mrs. Kean was so small and Mr. Kean so large.Mother and daughter were alike in their quick, extravagant speech, and a certain bird-like poise of the head, but father and daughter had eyes that might have been cut out of the same piece of gray and by the same pattern.
“Where is your baggage? Surely Kent gave you my message and you are going to visit us?”
“You have been so kind to my girl that I see no way but to let you be kind to us, too, and if we will not inconvenience you we will accept your invitation,” said Mr. Kean. “As for baggage: Mrs. Kean is a dressy soul, but she only carries a doll trunk which holds all of her little frocks and fixings and even leaves a tiny tray for my belongings.”
He assisted his smiling wife to alight and then from the bottom of the car produced a wicker trunk that was really no bigger than a large suitcase, but much more dignified looking.
“She says a trunk gives her a little more permanent feeling than a bag and makes a hotel room seem more homelike,” went on Mr. Kean.Mrs. Brown thought that she had never heard such a pleasant voice and jolly laugh.
“Judy, show your mother and father their room. I know they are tired and will want to rest before dinner.”
“Tired! Bless your soul, what have we done to be tired? We have been on a Pullman four nights, and that is when we get in rest enough for months to come. I know Julia will want to get at her doll trunk and change her traveling dress, but, if you will permit me, I shall stay down here with you. What a beautiful farm you have! How many acres in it?”
“I have three hundred acres in all; two hundred under cultivation and in grass, fifty in woodland, and fifty that are not worth anything. It is a strange barren strip of land that my father had to take as a bad debt and I inherited from him. We graze some forlorn sheep on it, but they won’t drink the water, and it is almost more trouble than they are worth to drive them to water on another part of the place.”
Mr. Kean listened intently. “I should like to see your farm, Mrs. Brown. Did you ever have the water on the barren strip analyzed?”
“No, Mr. Brown thought of looking into it but never did, and I have had so many problems to solve and expenses to meet with my large and growing family that I have never thought of it any more.”
Mrs. Kean and Judy came down to join the others in a very short time, considering that Mrs. Kean had unpacked her tiny trunk and shaken out her little frocks and changed into a dainty pink gingham that looked as though it had just come from the laundry, showing no signs of having been packed for weeks.
“What have you done to my Judy, Mrs. Brown? I have never seen her looking so well.”
“Fried chicken and candied sweet potatoes are the chief of my diet, and who would have the ingratitude not to show such keep?” laughed the daughter, pulling the little mother down on her lap and holding her as tenderly as though theirrelationship were reversed. “Robert and Julia, are you aware of the fact that your lady daughter has been a perfect lady since she came to these parts, and has got herself into no bad scrapes, and has not been saucy but once, and that was necessary? Wasn’t it, Mrs. Brown?”
“It certainly was. My old mammy used to tell me, ‘Don’ sass ole folks ‘til they fust sass you’; and Saint Paul says, ‘Live peaceably with all men, as much as lieth in you.’ When Judy felt called upon to speak out to Miss Hunt she had the gratitude of almost every one present.”
Professor Green joined them and, having made the Keans’ acquaintance at Wellington, introductions were not necessary. That young man was in a very happy frame of mind as his hated rival that he had to like in spite of himself had taken an early train to Lexington; and there had been a dejected look to his back as he got into the buggy that Edwin Green decided could not belong to an accepted lover. Molly had a soft, sad look about her blue eyes, but certainly noneof the elation of the newly engaged. He had held a cryptic conversation with Mrs. Brown that morning on the porch, in which he had gathered that the dear lady considered Molly singularly undeveloped for a girl her age; that any thought of her becoming engaged for at least a year was very distasteful to her mother; that her mind should be left free for the postgraduate course she was so soon to enter upon. But she very delicately gave him to understand that she liked him and that Molly also liked him more than any friend she had. The conversation left him slightly dazed, but also very calm and happy, liking Mrs. Brown even better than before and admiring her for her delicate tact and frankness that does not often combine with such diplomacy. His mail had come and he had no excuse for further delay, and had determined to go home on the following day.
“Professor Green, I have been so long on the train that I feel the need of stretching my legs.Could you tear yourself away from these ladies long enough to show me around the farm?”
“Indeed, I could; but maybe the ladies would like to come.”
“No, indeed,” answered Mrs. Kean. “I know Bobbie’s leg-stretching walks too well to have any desire to try to keep up with him. It is so pleasant and restful here, and Mrs. Brown, Molly, Judy and I can have a nice talk.”
The two gentlemen started off at a good pace.
“Professor, I should like to see this barren strip of land Mrs. Brown tells me of. It sounds rather interesting to me. You know where it is, do you not?”
“Yes; and, do you know, I was going to ask you to look at it and give your opinion about it. It has the look to me of possible oil fields. I haven’t said anything to any of the family about it, as they are such a sanguine lot I was afraid of raising their hopes when nothing might come of it, but I had determined to have a talk with Kent before I left. He is the most level-headed member ofthe family, and would not fly off half-cocked. Miss Molly tells me they are contemplating selling this wonderful bit of beech woods. They have a good offer for it, but it is like selling members of the family to part with these trees.”
The two men walked on, discovering many things to talk about and finding each other vastly agreeable. Their walk led them through the beech woods, then through a growth of scrub pines and stunted oaks and blackberry bushes, until they gradually emerged into a hard stony valley sparsely covered with grass and broomsedge.
“About as forlorn a spot as you can find in the whole of Kentucky, I fancy,” said the younger man. “Its contrast with the beech woods we have just passed is about as great as that between Mrs. Brown and her sister, Mrs. Clay, who, with all due respect, is as rocky as this strip of barren land and as unattractive. She is the only person of whom I have ever heard Miss Molly and herbrother Kent say anything unkind, and they cannot conceal their feeling against her. It seems that Mrs. Clay had the settling of her father’s estate, and arranged matters so well for herself that Mrs. Brown’s share turned out to be this stony strip. Mrs. Brown accepted it and refused to make a row, declaring that she would never have a disagreement with any member of her family about ‘things.’ She is a wonderful woman,” added the professor, thinking of his talk of the morning.
Mr. Kean stopped at the banks of a lonesome tarn, filled with black water with a greasy looking slime over it.
“Look at those bubbles over there! Could they be caused by turtles? No, turtles could not live in this Dead Sea. Look, look! More and more of them. Watch that big one break! See the greasy ring he made!”
He was so excited that Edwin Green smiled to see how alike father and daughter were, and was amused at himself for speaking of theBrowns as being people who went off half-cocked to this man who was a hair trigger if ever there was one.
Mr. Kean stooped over and scooped up some of the water in his hand. “‘If my old nose don’t tell no lies, seems like I smell custard pies.’ Why, Green, smell this! It’s simply reeking of petroleum! I bet that old Mrs. Clay will come to wish she had made a different division of her father’s estate. Come on, let’s go break the news to the Browns.”
“But are you certain enough? They may be disappointed,” said the more cautious Edwin.
“I am sure enough to want to send to Louisville immediately for a drill to test it. I have had a lot of experience with oil in various places and I am a regular oil wizard. You have heard of a water witch? My friends say that my nose has never played me false, and I can smell out oil lands that they would buy on the say-so of my scent as quickly as with the proof of a drill and pump. My, I’m glad for this good luck tocome to these people who have been so good to my little girl.”
The two men were very much excited as they made their way back to the house.
“It is funny the way oil crops up in unexpected places,” said Mr. Kean. “There is very little of it in this belt, and for that reason Mrs. Brown should get a very good price for her land. I think it best for her to sell to the Trust as soon as possible. There is no use in fighting them. They are obliged to win out. They will be pretty square with her if she does not try to fight them. What a fine young fellow that Kent is! And as for Miss Molly, she is a corker! She has got my poor little wild Indian of a Judy out of dozens of scrapes at college. Judy always ends by telling us all about the terrible things that almost happened to her. She seems to me to be a little tamer, but maybe it is a strangeness from not seeing us for so long.”
Edwin Green had his own opinion about the reason for that seeming tameness, but he heldhis peace. He could not help seeing Kent’s partiality for Miss Julia Kean, and had no reason to believe otherwise than that the young lady reciprocated. Love, or the possibility of loving, might be a great tamer for Judy. He was really not far from the mark. Judy was interested in Kent, very much so, but it was ambition that was steadying her and a determination to do something with the artistic talent that she was almost sure she possessed. Paris was her Mecca, and she was preparing herself to talk it out with her parents. They, poor grown-up children that they were, had no plans for their daughter’s future. College had solved the problem for four years, but, now that that was over, what to do with her next? They loved to have her with them and had looked forward eagerly to the time when she could be with them, but after all was a railway camp the best place for a girl of Judy’s stamp?
“Mrs. Brown, what will you take for that barren strip of land over there?” said Mr. Kean,sinking into a chair on the porch where the ladies were still having their quiet talk.
“Well, Mr. Kean, since it is not worth anything, and I have to pay taxes on it, I think I would give it away to any one who would promise to keep up the fences.”
“Can you get right-of-way through the adjoining place to the road behind you, where I see that a narrow-gauge railroad runs?”
Mrs. Brown flushed and hesitated. “There is a lane connecting these two turnpikes older than the turnpikes themselves. My place does not go through to this narrow-gauge railroad that you saw this morning, but my father’s old place, the Carmichael farm, now owned by my sister, Mrs. Clay, borders on both roads. This lane divides the two places as far as mine goes and then cuts through her place to the road behind. She has lately closed that lane, fenced it off and put it in corn.”
“Rather high-handed proceedings,” growled Mr. Kean. “Did you protest?”
“The boys went to see her about it, as it blocks their short cut to the Ohio River, where they go swimming, but she was so insulted at what she called their interference that I insisted upon their letting the matter drop. Paul, who always has insisted on his rights, went so far as to see a lawyer about it. His opinion was that Sister Sarah had no more right to fence off that lane than she would have to build a house in the middle of Main Street. But, if you knew my Sister Sarah, you would understand that if she decided to build a house in the middle of Main Street she would do it.”
“Perhaps she would if the Law were as ladylike as you are, Mrs. Brown,” laughed Mr. Kean, “but the Law happens to be not even much of a gentleman. What I wanted to get at was whether or not you hadright-of-way, not way. You have the right if not the way. Now I am going to come to business with you. Did you know, my dear lady, that that despised strip of land is worth more than all of your fruitful acres puttogether, beech woods and apple orchard thrown in?” He jumped up from his chair, able to contain himself no longer, and in clarion tones literally shouted, “Lady, lady, you’ve struck oil, you’ve struck oil!”
BOOK II.
BOOK II.
“Wellington! Wellington!”
Molly waked from her reverie with a start. It seemed only yesterday that she was coming to Wellington for the first time, “a greeny from Greenville, Green County,” as she had been scornfully designated by a superior sophomore. She could vividly recall her arrival, a poor, tired, timid little girl in a shabby brown dress, with soot on her face and seemingly not a friend on earth. She smiled when she thought of how many friends she had made that first day, friends who had really stuck. First of all there had been dear old Nance Oldham; then Mary Stewart, who had taken her under her wing and looked after her like a veritable anxious hen-mother duringthe whole of her freshman year; then the vivid, scintillating Julia Kean, her own Judy; then Professor Green, who certainly had proved a friend. On looking back, it seemed that every one with whom she had come in contact on that day had done something nice for her and tried to help her. Mother had always told her that friends were already made for persons who really wanted them, made and ready with hands outstretched, and all you had to do was reach out and find your friend.
Now, as before, the trainload of girls piled out at the pretty, trim little station, and there was dear old Mr. Murphy ready to look after the baggage, no easy job, as he declared, there being as many different kinds of trunks as there were young ladies. Molly shook his hand warmly, for, after all, he was really the very first friend she had made at Wellington. Her trunk being shabby had had no effect on his manner to her as a Freshman, but he noticed now that she had a new one and remarked on its elegance.
“I simply had to have a new one, Mr. Murphy, ‘the good old wagon done broke down.’ It was old when I started in at Wellington, and four round trips have done for it.”
Next to Molly’s big new trunk,—and this time it was a big one, as she had some new clothes and enough of them for about the first time in her life, and had bought a trunk with plenty of trays so as to pack them properly,—and snuggled up close to it as though for protection, was the strangest little trunk Molly had ever seen: calf-skin with the hair on it, spotted red and white, a little moth eaten in spots, with wrought iron hinges and a lock of great strength but of a simple, fine design—oak leaves with the key hole shaped like an acorn. A rope was tied tightly around it, reminding Molly of a halter dragging the poor little calf to slaughter.
“Well, well, I haven’t seen such a trunk as this since I left the ould counthry,” said the baggage master, putting his hand fondly on the strange-looking trunk. “I’ll bet the owner of this, MissMolly, will have many a knock from some of the high-falutin’ young ladies of Wellington. They haven’t seen it yet, because it is hiding behind your grand new big one. I pray the Blessed Virgin that the poor little maid will find a strong friend to get behind and to look after her.”
Molly smiled at the old man’s imagery, and thought, “What a race the Irish are! I am glad I have some of their blood.”
She turned at the sound of laughter and saw coming toward her as strange a figure as Wellington Station had ever sheltered, she was sure. A tall girl of about twenty years was approaching, dressed in a stiff blue homespun dress with a very wide gathered skirt and a tight basque (about the fashion of the early eighties), and a cheap sailor hat. In her hand she carried a bundle done up in a large, flowered, knotted handkerchief. Her hair was black and straight and coming down, but when your eyes once got to her face her clothes paled into insignificance, and Molly, for one, never gave them another thought.Imagine the oval of a Holbein Madonna; a clear olive skin; hazel eyes wide and dreamy; a broad low forehead with strongly marked brows; a nose of unusual beauty (there are so few beautiful noses in real life); and a determined mouth with a “do or die” expression. She came down the platform, head well up and an easy swinging walk, no more regarding the amused titter of the crowd of girls, separating to let her pass, than a St. Bernard dog would have noticed the yap of some toy poodles. On espying her trunk—of course it was hers, the little hair trunk with the wrought iron hinges and lock—she quickened her gait, as though to meet a friend, stooped over, picked it up, and swung it to her broad fine shoulder, more as though it had been a kitten than a calf. Turning to the astonished Molly, she said in a voice so sweet and full that it suggested the low notes of a ‘cello, “Kin you’uns tell me’uns whar—no, no, I mean—can you tell me where I can find the president?”
“Indeed, I can,” answered Molly. “I am going to seeher myself just as soon as I get settled in my quarters in the Quadrangle, and if you will tell me where you are to be I will take you to your room and then come for you to go and see President Walker. Mr. Murphy, the baggage master, will attend to your trunk. You will see to this young lady’s trunk soon, won’t you, Mr. Murphy?”
“The Saints be praised for answering the prayers of an ould man in such a hurry! Of course I will, Miss Molly; and where shall I be after sinding the little trunk, miss?”
“I don’t know until I see the president. I think I’ll just keep my box with me. I can carry it myself. ’Tain’t much to tote.”
“Oh, no, I wouldn’t do that,” said Molly, hardly able to keep back the laugh that she was afraid would come bubbling out in spite of her. “I tell you what you do: let Mr. Murphy keep your trunk until you find out where your room is to be, and in the meantime you come to my place; then as soon as you are located we can ‘phonefor it.” The girl looked at her new-found friend with eyes for all the world like a trusting collie’s, and silently followed her to the ’bus.
“My name is Molly Brown, of Kentucky. Please tell me yours.”
“Kaintucky? Oh, I might have known it. I am Melissa Hathaway, and am pleased to make your acquaintance, Molly Brown of Kaintucky. I come from near Catlettsburg, Kaintucky, myself.”
“Well, we are from the same state and must be friends, mustn’t we?”
There were many curious glances cast at Molly’s new friend, but the giggling at her strange clothes had stopped and the spell of her countenance had in a measure taken hold of the girls. Molly spoke to many friends, but she missed her intimates and wondered where Nance was, and if any of the others were coming back for the postgraduate course. At the thought of Nance she smiled, knowing just how she would take her befriending this mountain girl. Shewould be cold at first and perhaps a bit scornful in her ladylike way, and end by being as good as gold to her, and perhaps even making her some proper clothes.
The door at No. 5 Quadrangle was ajar and Molly could see Nance flitting back and forth getting things to rights. What a busy soul she was and how good it was to know she was already there! The girls were soon locked in each other’s arms, so overjoyed to be together again that Molly for a moment forgot her guest; and Nance did not see her as she stood in the doorway, a silent witness to the enthusiastic meeting of the chums.
“Oh, Melissa, what am I thinking of, leaving you standing there so long? You must excuse me. Nance Oldham and I always behave this way when we get back in the fall; and now I want to introduce you two. Miss Oldham, this is my new friend, Miss Hathaway, also of Kentucky.”
Nance shook hands with the quaint-lookingnew friend and awaited an explanation, which she knew would be forthcoming from Molly as soon as she could get a chance. Melissa was quiet and composed, taking in everything in the room. Her eyes lingered hungrily on the books that Nance had already arranged on the shelves, and then rested in a kind of trance on the pictures that Nance had unpacked and hung.
“Nance, I have some biscuit and fudge in my grip, if you could scare up some tea. I am awfully hungry, and I fancy Miss Hathaway could eat a little something before we go to look up the president. She does not know where her room is to be, and I asked her to come with us until she is located.”
“You are very kind to me, and your treating me so well makes me feel as though I were back in the mountains. We-uns—I mean we always try to be good to strangers, back where I come from.”
Nance was drawn to the girl as Molly had been.
“She knows how to sit still, and waits until she has something to say before she says anything,” thought the analytical Nance. “I believe I am going to like Molly’s ‘lame duck’ this time; and, goodness me, how beautiful she is!”
Melissa was glad to get her tea, having been in a day coach all night with nothing but a cold lunch to keep body and soul together until she got to Wellington. Nance noticed that she knew how to hold her cup properly and ate like a lady; her English, too, was good as a rule, with occasional lapses into the mountain vernacular. The girls were curious about her, but did not like to question her, and she said nothing about herself.
Tea over, they went to call on the president, leaving Nance to go on with her “feminine touches,” as Judy used to call her arrangements.
Miss Walker was very glad to see Molly, kissing her fondly and calling her “Molly.” “It is good, indeed, to have you back. Every Wellington girl who comes back for the postgraduatecourse gives me a compliment better than a gift of jewels. And this is Miss Melissa Hathaway? I have been expecting you, and to think that you should have fallen to the care of Molly Brown on your very first day at college! You are to be congratulated, Miss Hathaway. Molly Brown’s friendship keeps one from all harm, like the kiss of a good fairy on one’s brow. Molly, if you will excuse me, I shall take Miss Hathaway into my office first and have a talk with her and shall see you later.”
Molly was blushing with pleasure over the praise from Prexy, and was glad to sit in the quiet room awaiting her turn.
Melissa was closeted for some time with the president, and in the meantime the waiting-room began to fill with students, some of them newcomers tremblingly awaiting the ordeal of an interview with the august head of Wellington; others, like Molly, looking forward with pleasure to a chat with an old friend. Melissa came back alone with a message for Molly to come in toMiss Walker, and told her that she was to wait, as the president wished Molly to show the stranger her room.
“Molly Brown, how did you happen to be the one to look after this girl? It seems providential.”
“Well, Mr. Murphy attributes it to himself, and declares it is the direct answer to his prayers,” laughed Molly, and told Miss Walker of the little calf trunk and the old baggage master’s sentimentality about it.
“I am going to read you part of a letter concerning Melissa Hathaway, and that will explain her and her being at Wellington better than any words of mine. This letter is from an old graduate, a splendid woman who has for years been doing a kind of social settlement work in the mountains of Virginia and Kentucky.
“‘I am sending you the first ripe fruit from the orchard that I planted at least ten years ago in this mountain soil. You must not think it is acentury plant I am tending. I gather flowers every day that fully repay me for my labor here, but, alas, flowers do not always come to fruit. Melissa Hathaway is without doubt one of the most remarkable young women I have ever known, and has repaid me for the infinite pains I have taken with her, and will repay every one by being a success. She comes from surroundings that the people of cities could hardly dream of, in spite of the slums that are, of course, worse because of their crowded condition and lack of air. But in these mountain cabins you find a desolation and ignorance that is appalling, but at the same time a rectitude and intelligence that astonish you; and unbounded hospitality.
“‘A generation ago the Hathaways were rather well-to-do, for the mountains; that is, they owned a cow and some hogs and chickens and did not sleep in the kitchen, but had a second room and some twenty beautiful home-made quilts. A feud wiped almost the whole family off the face of the earth. Melissa’s father,grandfather and three uncles were killed in a raid by their mortal enemies, the Sydneys, and the grandmother and Melissa were the only ones left to tell the tale. (Her young mother died in giving birth to Melissa.) Melissa was eight years old at the time of the wholesale tragedy, which occurred a few days before I came here to take up my life work. I went to old Mrs. Hathaway’s cabin as soon as I could make my way across the mountain. The old woman received me with dignity and reserve, but some suspicion. I asked her to let Melissa come to school. She was rather eager for her to learn, since she was nothing but a miserable girl. She was bitter on the subject of Melissa’s sex. “Ter think of my bringing forth man-child after man-child, and here in my old age not a thing but this puny little gal ter look to, ter shoot down those dogs of Sydneys!”
“‘This child of eight (Melissa is now eighteen, but looks older), came to school every day rain or shine, walking three miles over the worst trailyou have ever imagined. Her eagerness for knowledge was something pathetic. I realized from the beginning that she had a very remarkable intellect and gave her every chance for cultivation and preparation for college, determined that my Alma Mater should have the final hand in her education if it could be managed. And now, managed it is by a scholarship presented to my now flourishing school by the Mountain Educational Association. I am sorry her clothes are not quite what my beautiful Melissa should have, but she would not accept a penny for clothes from any of the funds that I sometimes have at my disposal. “Money for my education is different,” she said. “I mean to bring all of that back to the mountains and give it to my people, but I cannot let any one spend money on clothes for me. They would burn my back unless I earned them myself.” She was that way from the time she first came to me. I remember she had a green skirt and an old black basque of her grandmother’s, belted in on her slim little figure.I wanted all of my pupils to have a change of clothing, as from the first I was trying to teach cleanliness and hygiene along with the three R’s. I asked the children one day to let me know if they had two of everything. Melissa stood up and proudly raised her hand. “Please, Miss Teacher, we’uns is got two dresses; one ain’t got no waist and one ain’t got no skirt, but they is two dresses.”
“‘I know that my dear Miss Walker will do her best to place my girl where she can make some friends and not get too homesick for her mountains. I wish she had clothes more like other people, but, since she is what she is, I fancy the clothes in the long run will not make much difference.’
“That is all of interest to you,” concluded Miss Walker. “Miss Hathaway is, to say the least, a very remarkable young woman. Her entrance examination was unconditioned. And now to get her into a suitable room! I had expected to puther in one over the postoffice, but she would be so isolated there. I wish she could have the singleton near you in the Quadrangle. I, too, have some funds at my disposal that would enable me to give her one of these more expensive rooms, but do you think she would accept it?”
Molly, rather amused at being asked by Prexy herself to decide what to do with this proud girl, smilingly answered, “I am proud myself, but lots of things have been done for me without my knowing about it, and when I do find out I am not hurt but pleased to feel that my friends want to help me. I can’t remember being insulted yet.”
“Well, my child, if I have your sanction about a little mild deceit, I think I’ll put Miss Hathaway in the singleton near you. I believe she is going to be a credit to Wellington. Kentucky has been good to us, indeed.”
“I’ll do all I can to help Melissa,” said Molly, her eyes still misty over the letter concerning thechildhood of the mountain girl. “She interests me deeply.”
Then Molly and Miss Walker plunged into a talk about what Molly was to study. English Literature and Composition were of course the big things, but she was also anxious to take up some special work in Domestic Science, a new and very complete equipment having been recently installed at Wellington and a highly recommended teacher, a graduate from the Boston school, being in charge.
“Miss Hathaway is to do work on that line, too, and I fancy you will be put into the same division. She is preparing herself to help her mountain people, and I think they need domestic science even more than they do higher mathematics.”
Molly escorted Melissa to her small room in the Quadrangle, where she was duly and gratefully installed. Her shyness was passing off with Nance and Molly, and now they noticed that she never made the slips into the mountain vernacular.But on meeting strangers, or when embarrassed in any way, she would unconsciously drop into it, and then become more embarrassed. She never let herself off, but always bit her lip and quickly repeated her remark in the proper English.
“She is really almost as foreign as little Otoyo Sen,” said Nance.
“Molly, do you know you are a grown-up lady?” asked Nance a few days after they had settled themselves and were back in the grind of work. “I have been seeing it in all kinds of ways; firstly, you have gained in weight.”
“Only three pounds, and that could not show much, spread over such a large area,” laughed Molly.
“Well, you look more rounded, somehow. Then I notice you keep your pumps on and don’t kick them off every time you sit down; and when you do sit down you don’t always lie down as you used to do. Now, I have always been a grown-up little old lady, but you were a child when you left college last June, and now you are a beautiful, dignified woman.”
“Nonsense, Nance, I am exactly the same. I don’t kick off my pumps because I might have a hole in the toe of my stocking, and I don’t lie down when I sit down because of my good tailored skirt. You are just fancying things. I am the same old kid. It is thanks to Judy that I have the tailor-made dress and the other things that make me feel grown-up. You see, my family have always had an idea that I did not care for clothes just because I wore the old ones without complaining. One day Kent spoke of my indifference to clothes to Judy, and she fired up and told him I did love clothes and would like to have pretty ones more than any girl she knew of; that I pretended to be indifferent just to carry off the old ones with grace. Kent was very much astonished and the dear boy insisted on my going into Louisville before Judy left and having a good tailor make me two dresses, this blue one for every day and my lovely best gray. I was so afraid of hurting Miss Lizzie Monday’s feelings (she is the little old seamstress who has mademy clothes ever since I was born); but Kent fixed that up by going to see Miss Lizzie himself, asking her advice and requesting her company into Louisville, where we did the shopping and interviewed the tailor, had lunch at the Watterson and took in a show in the afternoon. Miss Lizzie had the time of her life and was as much pleased over my having some good clothes as I am myself. Dear old Kent had to draw on his savings that he is putting by with a view to taking a finishing course on architecture, but mother says she is going to reimburse him just as soon as there is a settlement made for the oil lands we are selling.”
“Do you know, Molly, when I got your letter telling me about Mr. Kean’s nosing out oil on your place, I was so happy and excited that I began to cry and got my nose so red I had to skip a lecture at Chautauqua, which shocked my mother greatly. To think of your dear mother having an income that will make her comfortable and independent!”
“Mother does not seem to be greatly elated over it. She is very glad to pay off the mortgage on Chatsworth; relieved that we shall not have to sell our beautiful beech woods; but money means less to my mother than any one in the world, I do believe. Why, talking about my being a kid, I was born more grown-up than my mother, in some ways. It’s the Irish in her. The Irish are all children.”
Molly had very cleverly got Nance off of the subject of there being a change in her, but Nance was right. Molly was older, and she felt it herself. The summer had been an eventful one for her and had left her older and wiser. Mildred’s marriage; Jimmy Lufton’s proposal, or near proposal; the family’s change of fortune; Professor Green’s evident preference for her society; all these things had combined to sober her in a way.
“I am as limber as ever, and don’t feel my age in my ‘jints,’ but I am getting on,” thought Molly. “Nance sees it, and I wonder if Professor Green notices it. He seemed a little stiff with me, butseeing him for the first time in class might account for that.”
The class in Domestic Science was proving of tremendous interest both to Molly and Melissa. Melissa had much to learn and Molly much to un-learn. It was a special course, and for that reason girls from all classes were mixed in it. There were quite a number of Juniors, and Molly was sorry to see Anne White among them, as she had been on the platform at Wellington when Melissa arrived, and, in the quiet way for which she was famous in making trouble, had been the one to start the titter that had grown, as that seemingly unconscious young goddess made her way down the platform, into a wave of laughter. Melissa had been fully aware of the amusement she had caused, but she had borne no malice against the thoughtless girls.
“I reckon I was a figure of fun to these rich girls,” Melissa said to Molly, “but I know they did not mean to be unkind; and if they knew what it means to me to come to college perhaps theywould look at me differently. Anyhow, you were so nice to me from the very minute I spoke to you; and even before I spoke, Molly, dear, because I saw your sweet eyes taking me in as I came up the platform between the rows of grinning students. And I said to myself, ‘All these are just second-growth timber and don’t count for much. That girl with the blue eyes and the pretty red hair looking at me so kindly is the only tree here that is worth much.’ And somehow I have been resting in the shade of your branches ever since.”
This little conversation was held one morning as the girls were getting their materials ready for some experimental bread-making. A tremendously interesting lecture on yeast had preceded it, and now was to be followed by various chemical experiments. The lecturer had not arrived, but had appointed certain students to get the materials in order.
Anne White was one of the monitors, and was moving around in a demure way, daintily settingout the little bowls of flour and portions of yeast. Anne White was a small, mousy-looking, brown-haired young woman who looked as though butter would not melt in her mouth, but who was in reality often the ring-leader in many foolish escapades. She was a great practical joker, and when all is told a practical joker is a very trying person, and very often a person lacking in true humor. As she placed the bowls of yeast, she sang the following song with many sly looks at Molly and her friend:
“The first time I saw Melissa,She was sitting in the cellar,Sitting in the cellar shelling peas.And when I stooped to kiss her,She said she’d tell her mother,For she was such an awful little tease.Oh, wasn’t she sweet? You bet she was,She couldn’t have been any sweeter.Oh, wasn’t she cute? You bet she was,