CHAPTER IX

CHAPTER IX

Joycehad walked for three blocks in frantic haste with sinking heart before she saw any land that looked at all promising. They were all smug dwellings with beautiful lawns about them, and she had sense enough to know that people who lived in houses of that kind wanted their lawns to themselves, and could not be persuaded to sell or rent even a foot for any such sum as she could offer. But the turn of the next block brought in sight a row of neat stores and just beyond an old-fashioned house set back from the street built of field stone that looked as if it had stood there years before the little new town had ever been heard of. It was neat and trim with a wide piazza the length of the front, and tall spruce and hemlock trees standing in a friendly group about it. There was a street running across between it and the stores, and on this side yard there was a bright garden of flowers and a grassy place with two maple trees just far enough apart to let her little house in, and here Joyce paused and looked with longing eyes. If only she could get permission to put her house here. If she could have it between those maples, with the right to use the side gate! And there was an outside faucet with a hose attached. They might let her get water there—!

She stood for several minutes taking in the whole situation. It would be nice to have the protection of a house near by provided nice people lived there. It would be around at the back of the house so the owners wouldnot need to feel they were losing any of their own front yard, or privacy, and it was near enough to the street so that she would feel she had a spot of her own.

It was like Joyce not to hunt up any land agent and try to find a place in the conventional way but to just fasten her eyes upon the desirable spot and then go after it.

Timidly she opened the gate and went in, choosing the side gate instead of the front. It was unusual to have a gate. That was because it was an old-fashioned house. She was glad there was a gate. It made her feel as if she would be more secure in a little house all by herself to have a gate shutting her in. But this was too much like a fairy tale. She must not get up her hopes. Of course these people wouldn’t hear to her request. They would think she was crazy perhaps to dare to ask.

There was some one in the diningroom setting the table. The door was open on a side porch, and she could see as she went up the steps that the table was long, and spread with a white cloth, and there were flowers in the middle in a glass bowl, blue violets, quantities of them. The door beyond was open through an airy pantry to a kitchen, and there was a savory odor of broiling meat. She sniffed it hungrily as she put out a timid hand to knock, and thought anxiously that it must be getting late if some one was getting dinner ready so early.

A pleasant-looking woman with her hair in crimping pins over her forehead and a long, plain gingham apron covering her dress came to the door with a tea towel and a glass in her hand, polishing as she came. Joyce almost lost her voice at the thought of her own audacity while she looked into the pleasant gray eyes of the elderlywoman. This was just the kind of woman she would have chosen if the fairy tale were real. But she remembered that ten minutes of her hour were already gone, and she must hurry.

“I’ve just stopped in to see if there is any possibility that I could rent, or perhaps buy, a very few feet of your yard, here at the back. I have a little house and I want to put it somewhere right away.”

“A house!” said the woman astonished. “Why no, we don’t want to sell any land. This place has been in the family for four generations and it’ll go on to my son when he comes of age. He’s only in high school yet, but he’s fond of the old place, and we don’t want to give up any more land. We’ve just got about enough. My husband wouldn’t think of selling any, not even a foot.”

“Would you rent a little spot? It’s a very little house. I could put it quite close to the fence if it was necessary, and away at the back.”

“Mercy, no!” said the woman, “We like our privacy. We wouldn’t want another house so close. It’s bad enough to have all those stores across the street. My husband wouldn’t have sold that land if he’d known they were going to build stores—Mercy! What’s that?”

The woman had turned with a start of horror, for a flash of light had blazed up from the kitchen that flickered over the room like a sudden illumination, and a pungent odor of burning meat filled the air at the same instant. Strange what a short interval there is between cooking and actual burning, and what a sudden odor burnt meat can impart to a room. The place was filled with it.

Joyce was standing so that she could see straight intothe kitchen range and she saw exactly what was the matter. There were flames bursting out from the cracks of the gas range oven, and flames lighting up the seams of the broiling oven. Having had the same thing happen to herself once when she was cooking she understood just what had occurred. Without more ceremony she threw the screen door open and walked in, straight through into the kitchen. While the owner of the calm eyes was hurrying distractedly about the kitchen seeking for the pie lifter and a holder, Joyce quickly turned out the gas under the oven, and threw open the lower door. It was as she supposed, there was grease and drippings from the broiling chops in the pan below the broiler and it had caught on fire and was blazing high. It was of no use to try to smother it out or to save the chops. They were burned to a crisp already and the kitchen was filling fast with a black, oozy soot that was fastening to every immaculate pot and pan and to the wall and ceiling.

The gray-eyed woman moaned, for the chops were many and expensive and she was preparing for a company dinner. Then her despair was changed to terror as she saw the flames shoot out into the room bringing dense, black smoke with them.

“I’d better call the Fire Company!” she gasped and turned toward the telephone.

“No! Wait!” gasped Joyce amid the smoke, “Give me that bread blanket! Quick!”

The woman seized the thick, soft woollen cloth that lay tucked snugly about three pans of biscuits on the table and Joyce swathed her hands in its folds and courageously gripping the broiling pan, broiler, chops and all,carried them flaming to the back door and flung them out into the grass.

It was all done in a second and the two stood in the doorway and watched the conquered fire flash up a few times and go out. Then the woman turned to the girl:

“You’re wonderful!” she said earnestly, “I can’t thank you enough. I don’t know what I should have done if I’d been alone. I never could have carried that out all afire that way. I don’t see how you did it. And you got burned! I’ll bet you did! Yes, and there on your arm too. That’s too bad! Now come over here and I’ll do it up. I’ve got some sweet oil and linen—.”

The tears of pain were stinging into Joyce’s eyes but she shook her head and tried to smile.

“No, thank you,” she said, “I haven’t time to wait. I’ll just put it in cold water a minute to take the smart out, and then if you have some baking soda I’ll cover it up and it’ll be all right. It’s not much of a burn anyway, and it was my fault your meat burned. If I hadn’t hindered you, you wouldn’t have forgotten it. I’m afraid you were going to have company too. I think I ought to pay for that meat.”

“Oh, no, it wasn’t your fault. I ought not to have left that grease in the pan. I knew it was there and I just forgot it. But I don’t know what I’m going to do about the chops. It’s Wednesday afternoon and all the stores are closed. My company comes on the five o’clock train, my cousins from New York on their way up from Florida, and they’re only going to stop over till the nine o’clock train. I don’t see them very often and I’d like to have a little something extra, and now I don’t know whatI am going to do. I shouldn’t have broiled them so long beforehand only I wanted to get the smell out of the house before the folks came, and I knew I could keep them warm in the warming oven all right. Now what in time am I going to do for meat?”

“Haven’t you got anything at all in the house?” asked Joyce turning from dusting her burns with soda.

“Nothing but some ham. Got plenty of that on hand, bought a whole one the other day, but one doesn’t want to give New York City folks fried ham for dinner. That’s kind of farm food. I wanted a little something nice.”

“Did you ever bake it in milk?” asked Joyce, wishing she knew some way to help the woman for she understood her distress and felt that she was really to blame for having bothered her when she was busy.

“No, I never tried it. I’ve heard some say they cook it that way, but I don’t know how. Do you? I don’t see how that would be any different from stewed ham.”

“Oh, but it is! It’s delectable. If you can get the things quickly I’ll fix it for you. You’ve just about time if you want dinner at five. It has to bake an hour. Have you plenty of milk? And mustard?”

“Loads of milk. We have a cow, and mustard too, but what do you want with mustard?”

“You’ll see,” said Joyce. “Cut the ham in thick slices, as much as you want. My! That’s nice ham, nice and pink looking and good and big. How many people? Yes, I guess you need two slices. Can I use these two iron frying pans? I think it bakes best in iron. You light the oven please, turn it on full power. Now, see, I take a handful of mustard and rub it into the meat, allover thickly, and put it into the pan. Then fill it up with milk till it almost covers the meat. Put it into the oven and bake it just an hour, a good hot oven, and it will be the sweetest, tenderest thing you ever put into your mouth. There, there’s just room enough for both pans, and you needn’t worry about meat. They’ll like that I know. I found the recipe in an advertisement of ham in a magazine and I tried it. Everybody loves it. Now I must go, but I just wish I could wait and help you to make up for spoiling those chops. You don’t know anywhere I could go that they would rent me a piece of land, do you?”

“Well, no, I don’t just know, but suppose you wait till tomorrow morning and my husband may know of something. He might be able to find you just the right thing. If you’d be willing to stay and help me here a little while I’d pay you well and I’d help you with all my heart.”

Joyce smiled sorrowfully:

“That would be too late. I’ve got to have a place within a few minutes now or I’ll lose the house. The man said they couldn’t wait but an hour and ten minutes and I must have used up more than three-quarters of it now. I’d love to stay and help you, and if I can possibly get through what I have to do I’ll come back and help you. Perhaps I could get here in time to wait on the table if you’d like me. I wouldn’t want any pay. I feel as if I owed you something. But I just can’t stay now. I must save this little house. It’s the only place I could ever hope to have for a home that I could afford, and I’ve really bought it, so Imustfind a place to put it.”

“For pity’s sake! Bought a house and must have a place to put it right away. Why, I never heard ofanything so unreasonable. Couldn’t you buy the land it was on? Where is it?”

“No, the man wants to clear his land. When I came on them they were breaking it up into kindling wood, and it’s the dearest little place, just big enough for one. It’s about four blocks away from here on the edge of a big place.”

“Oh! The Land Office. Thatispretty. Yes, I heard some one had bought that old house and was going to fix it up. Why—but that’s not a house. It’s only a room. That wouldn’t take up much room. I should think most anybody would be willing to let you have enough land for that. If that’s all maybe papa wouldn’t mind. He wouldn’t sell any land but he might rent it.”

“Oh,” said Joyce clasping her hands eagerly, “Where can I find him? I’ll go right away. Perhaps I’ll be in time if I hurry.”

“Why, no, you can’t find him anywhere. He’s gone to the city. He won’t be home till the folks come. He went to meet them. But if you’re in such a hurry as all that I suppose you could bring your house here for the night anyway, and then we could see about it tomorrow. About how much were you figuring to pay? Could you pay as much as a dollar a week?”

“Oh, I think so,” said Joyce relieved, “I’m expecting to get a position right away.”

“Well, you can bring it here tonight and if it doesn’t look too much in the way we’ll try it. Our missionary society is getting up a fund to get some chime bells for our church, and each one of us has to earn some extra money some way. If I choose to earn mine by giving up a piece of the back yard my husband won’t object. Thehouse is really mine anyway. You can come and try it and we won’t promise anything on either side till we see how it goes. Now. Can’t you hurry right back and help me. I’m almost distracted with all there is to do, and I’m all shaken up with that fire and all.”

“I certainly will,” said Joyce with almost a shout of glee in her voice, as she turned and fairly flew back the four blocks to her little house, straining her eyes as she came nearer to make sure it still stood whole and fair before her. Yes, there it was, all vine clad. How dear and sweet. But the vine would have to go of course. It could not survive. What a pity. Of course those men would think that was all nonsense. If she only had a little time perhaps she might have managed to get the root loose and maybe it would live, but there wasn’t time and she mustn’t think of it. She must hurry, hurry back to that woman who had been so good, and help her with all her might.

“She’s a comin’,” growled Tom as the sound of her swift footsteps drew near, “an’ she don’t sound discouraged neither.”

“What’d I tell ye?” growled the other. “The hour ain’t up fer ten minutes yet neither.”

“Mebbe she’s comin’ to ask fer more time,” urged Tom squinting down the street speculatively.

“No,” said the other, “she wouldn’t come till the time was up to the minute ef that was it. Anyhow, look at her! She’s ashinin’ like a robin just back fer spring. That ain’t no discouragin’ countenance, ur my name ain’t McClatchey.”

The big auto truck was just lumbering around the corner as Joyce arrived panting and triumphant:

“I’ve found a nice place,” she said joyously, “just down this street three blocks, and one around the corner. It’s opposite the side of a row of stores, just beyond the stores on the side street. There’s a fence, but I thought perhaps you could back right up to it and slide the house over it.”

“Most likely we kin,” said the boss filling his pipe speculatively, and straightening up to await the truck.

“What! Ain’t ya got the kindlin’ ready to pile on yet, boys? It’s most quittin’ time now. You said—.”

“Hold your clack!” commanded the chief. “This here is a house, it ain’t no load o’ kindlin’ wood. You made a mistake. I’ve sold this here buildin’ an’ it’s gotta be delivered to oncet. You clamber down, Sam, an’ git them jacks an’ rollers from behind that hedge, an’ get busy.”

“Can you tell me how much it will be?” asked Joyce anxiously remembering that this was a momentous question and might yet present an impossible barrier to her plans. She looked from the driver to the chief in a troubled way, and the chief spoke up gruffly:

“Oh, you kin give him five bucks too ef you want fer keepin’ his tongue still, but he has to do what I say, and I say this here house is goin’ to be moved t’night. Look out there Sam, don’t you knock that there hangin’ garding off’n the end. That’s a part of the proposishun, an’ don’t wantta be destroyed. Get me?”

“Oh,” said Joyce, quite childishly clapping her hands. “You’ve saved the vine! Oh, thank you so much!”

“Sure,” said the chief, “sold it to you, didn’t I? Part o’ the house, ain’t it? I ’low to keep my contrac’s. Now, you kin run ’long, an’ be on the spot when we git thar to say where you want her put. This ain’t no place fer a girl while we’re movin’ her, you might git hurt.”

“Shall I pay you first?” she asked opening her little handbag.

“No,” said the chief quite crossly, “don’t take no pay till we deliver the goods. Down across from the stores you say? Stone house? Picket fence? Yep. I know the place. Ain’t but one picket fence in the place. Folks wouldn’t sell an inch of ground. You’re lucky! But then ennybody kin see you’re that kind. Run along. We’ll be along in a leetle while. You needn’t to worry.”

Back to IndexNext