CHAPTER VII
The first thing of which Cornelia was conscious in the morning was a scuffle overhead. Louise was sitting up, rubbing her eyes and looking apprehensively toward the ceiling; and the sounds grew louder and more vigorous, with now and then a heavy thud, like a booted foot dropping inertly to the floor.
Cornelia sat up also, and listened.
“It’s Harry, trying to wake Carey up!” whispered Louise knowingly. “Harry’s mad. I guess Carey came in late again, and didn’t undress. He does that way sometimes when he’s tired.”
“Yes?” said Cornelia with a shiver of understanding. “Yes, I heard him come in.”
“Oh, did you?” Louise turned a searching glance on her sister, and then looked away with a sober little sigh. “Something ought to be done about that kid before mother gets home,” she said maturely. “It’ll kill mother.”
“Something shall be done. There! don’t look so sorrowful, dear. Carey is young, and I’m sure we can do something if we all try with all our souls. I’m so glad I came home. Mother ought not to have been bearing that alone. Come, let’s get up.” She snatched her blue kimono, and dashed to the foot of the stairs.
“Harry! Harry!” she called softly. “Never mind. Let him sleep.”
Harry appeared angrily at the head of the stairs, his own costume only half completed, his hair sticking all ways.
“Great, lazy boob!” he was saying. “He never undressed at all!”
“Hush, dear! Don’t wake him. It will be better in every way if he gets his sleep out.”
“But he hasn’t seen the poetry at all,” wailed the disappointed boy. “I held it in front of his face, and he wouldn’t open his eyes. I washed his face for him, too; and he wouldn’t get up.”
“Well, never mind, dear; let him alone. I’ll save him some cakes after you are gone.”
“Yes, pet him up, the great, lazy baby! That’s what’s the matter with him; he’s too big a baby, selfish,selfish! That’s what he is.”
“Sh-sh, dear! Never mind! You can’t do anything when a person is as sleepy as that, and it’s no use trying. Come. Let’s have breakfast. I’ll be down as soon as you will”; and Cornelia smiled brightly above her aching heart, and hurried into her own clothes.
“Cakes! Cakes!” said Louise happily. “Won’t it be great? Oh, I just can hardly wait for them. I’m sorry Carey isn’t awake.”
“Never mind, dear; it will all come out straight pretty soon, and we mustn’t expect to succeed right away.”
So she cheered them on their way, and made the morning meal a success, steadily keeping her father’s thoughts from the absent boy upstairs until he had to run to catch his car. She put up a delightful lunch for Harry and Louise, with dates and cheese in some of the sandwichesand nuts and lettuce in others, and a big piece of gingerbread and an orange apiece.
“It’s just like having mother again,” said Louise fervently as she kissed her sister goodby and ran to catch Harry, who was already half-way to the corner.
Cornelia held the thought of those words in her heart, and cherished them over against the words she had heard from her young brother and sister the day before; and it comforted her. She watched them until they were out of sight, and then with a sigh climbed the stairs to Carey’s room. But Carey was locked in heavy slumber, with a flushed face and heavy breathing. She pinned up a paper to keep out the light, threw the eider-down quilt over him, and opened the window wide. Then she tiptoed away and left him. There was no use doing anything now. The fumes of liquor were still about him, and the heavy breath of cigarettes. She felt a deep horror and disgust in her soul as she thought about her brother, and tried to work out a plan for saving him as she went about clearing off the breakfast table and washing the dishes.
There was plenty of meat for dinner that night, and lots of gravy left. She would need to think only about vegetables and a dessert. Chocolate blanc-mange would be good. She would make it at once and set it on the ice. Then, when the milkman came, she must remember to get a small bottle of cream to eat with it. By and by she would run down to the store and get a few carrots and a stalk of celery, and stew them together. That made a good combination. No, that wouldn’t do, either, toomuch sweetness, carrots and blanc-mange. A can of tomatoes cooked with two onions and a little celery would be better. That she could put on in the middle of the afternoon. There was plenty of pancake batter left for Carey and herself for lunch. She fixed the griddle far back on the range, and set the batter in the refrigerator. Then she went with swift steps to the disordered front room.
She went to work unpacking the boxes and setting things in order in the hall and the dining-room. She discovered many needed kitchen utensils and some more dishes, and these she washed and put away. It was discouraging work, and somehow she did not seem to have accomplished much when at eleven o’clock she straightened up from a deep packing-box from which she had removed the last article, and looked about her. Piles of things everywhere, and not a spot to walk anywhere! When would she ever get done? A great weariness from her overwork of the day before was upon her, and she wanted to sit down in the midst of the heaps and cry. It was just then in her weakness that the thought of college came upon her, college with its clean orderliness, its regular places for things, its delightful circle of companions, its interesting work, never any burden or hurry or worry.
Just at this hour the classes were filing into the halls and going to new work. If she were back there, she would be entering her psychology class, and looking at the blackboard for the announcement of the day’s work assigned to each member of the class. Instead of that here she was in the midst of an unending task, hopeless andweary and frightfully discouraged. A tear of self-pity began to steal out, and she might have been weeping in a minute more if she had not been suddenly arrested in her thoughts by sounds overhead, far away and slight, but nevertheless unmistakable.
She wiped her eyes, and went out into the hall, softly listening. Yes, undoubtedly Carey had waked up at last. She could hear the bedsprings rattle, and hear his feet moving lightly on the bare floor, as if he might be sitting up with his elbows on his knees and his face in his hands. Her instinct told her that he would not be very happy when he awoke. She could fancy how disgusted he must be with himself; for Carey had a conscience, and he could not but know that what he was doing was wrong. She could remember how good and helpful a boy he used to be, always thoughtful for his mother. It did not seem possible that he had completely changed.
She could hear him moving slowly about now, a few steps and stopping a long time. Perhaps he had found the poetry on the bureau, although she reflected that it was altogether likely that Harry in his wrath might have cast it under the bed or anywhere it happened. Well, she would better be getting the griddle hot.
She hurried into the kitchen, and pulled the griddle forward over the fire, opened the draughts, and began to get the table in order for an early lunch. She glanced at the clock. It was half past eleven. She would have everything ready the minute he came down. She could still hear him stirring around. He had come down tothe bathroom, and the sound of his razor-strop whirred faintly. Well, that was a good sign. He was going to fix up a little before coming down. She put the last touches to her table, set the plates to warm, put on the syrup, and made the coffee. Then she took a broom, and went back to the front room to wait until he came down.
Oh, that front room! It seemed more dreary than ever as she attempted to make a little path in the wilderness.
She was trying to drag a big packing-box out into the hall when Carey finally came down, looking wholly a gentleman except for a deep scowl on his brow. He came at once to her assistance, somewhat gruffly, it must be owned, but quite efficiently.
“What on earth are you trying to do, Nell?” he asked. “Don’t you know that’s too heavy for a girl to move? I told you I’d help. Why didn’t you wait for me?”
Cornelia, feeling a strange excitement upon her, looked up brightly, and tried to ignore the fact that he ought to have come down several hours before.
“Well, there’s so much to be done,” she said. “I certainly am glad to see you, though. But suppose we have lunch first. I’m hungry as a bear, and see, it’s five minutes to twelve. Can you eat now?”
“Oh, any time!” he said indifferently. “What is it you want done, anyway? This room’s a mess. Some dump, the whole house! It makes me disgusted.”
He stood with his hands in his pockets, surveying the desolate scene, and voicing Cornelia’s own thoughts of a few moments before. But it was Cornelia’s forte torise to an occasion when every one else was disheartened. She put on a cheery smile.
“Just you wait, brother, till I get through. I’ve plans for that room, and it won’t be so bad when it gets cleaned and fixed a little. Suppose you take those boxes down cellar, and those pictures and tubs, and the old trunk and chest out to the shed room beyond the kitchen, while I scramble some eggs and settle the coffee. Everything else is ready. Then after lunch we’ll get to work. I shall need your help to turn the piano around and open those boxes of books. Why do you suppose they put the bookcase face against the wall, with the piano in front of it? Seems to me that was dumb.”
“All movers are dumb!” declared Carey with a sweep of his arm, as if he would include the whole world. But he went to work vigorously, and carried out the things with a whirl, and Cornelia perceived she must rush to have a plate of cakes before he was done with his assigned task.
“Aw, gee! You saved me some cakes!” he said with a grin of delight when they sat down at the table. “I oughtta ’ve got up for breakfast. But I was all in. We took a joy ride last night down to Baltimore. I saw your poetry. It was great. Who wrote it? You, of course.”
“We wanted you to be sure to get up, but of course you must have been sleepy riding all that way in the wind. It must have been great, though. It was full moon last night, wasn’t it?” said his sister, ignoring the horror that the thought of the “joy ride” gave her.
“It sure was,” said the boy, kindling at the memory. “The fellas put ether in the gas, and she certainly did hum. We just went whizzing. It was a jim-dandy car, twelve-cylinder, some chariot! B’longs to a fella named Brand Barlock. He’s a prince, that boy is! Has thousands of dollars to spend as he pleases; and you’d never know he had a cent, he’s so big-hearted. Love him like a brother. Why, he’d let me take that car anywhere, and never turn a hair; and it cost some money, that car did, this year’s racing-model! Gee, but she’s a winner. Goes like a streak of greased lightning.”
Cornelia suppressed her apprehension over the possibilities of accident both physical and financial, and bloomed with interest. Of what use would it be to reprove her brother for taking such chances? It would only make him angry, and turn him against her. She would see whether she could win him back to the old comradeship, and then there might come a time when her advice would reach him. At present it would be useless.
“It must be great to have a fine car,” she said eagerly. “I love to ride. There were two or three girls at college who had cars, and used to take us out sometimes; but of course that didn’t happen very often.”
“I’ll borrow Brand’s car and take you sometime,” he said eagerly. “He wouldn’t mind.”
“O Carey! No, you mustn’t do that!” she cried in alarm, “at least”—as she saw his frown of displeasure—“not till I know him, you know. I shouldn’t at all like to ride in a car whose owner I didn’t know. You mustbring him here when we get all fixed up, and I’ll meet him. Then perhaps he’ll ask me to go along too sometime, although I’m not sure I’d like to go like a streak of lightning. Still, I’ve never tried it, and you know I never used to be afraid of things.”
“Sure, you’re all right, Nell. But I’d never bring Brand to this dump! He’s a rich man’s son, I tell you, and lives in a swell neighborhood.”
“Doesn’t he know where you live?”
Carey shrugged his shoulders.
“Oh, yes; he drives around, and honks the horn for me, and brings me home again; but I wouldn’t ask him in——”
“Wait, I say, till we get it fixed up. You know I’m an interior decorator! Oh, I wish there was just a fireplace! It makes such a cozy, cheerful place.”
“I could build one if I had the stuff,” declared Carey, interested. “What kind do you want? But then, everything costs so darned much. If I only had a job!”
“Oh, you’ll get a job, of course,” said his sister sympathetically, trying to reconcile his troubled look with what the children had said about his indifference toward work. “Where did you work last?”
The color rolled in a slow, dull wave over Carey’s restless young face; and a look of sullen hopelessness came into his handsome eyes.
“Oh, I haven’t had anything regular since I left school. I—you see—that is—oh, hang it all! I can’t get anything worth while. I’ve been doing some tinkering down at thegarage. I could work steady there, but Dad makes it so hot for me when I do that I have to do it on the sly. He says it’s just a lazy job, hanging round with the fellas getting rides. He don’t know anything about it. It’s real man’s work, I tell you, hard work at that; and I’m learning all about machinery. Why, Nell, there isn’t a fella at the garage can tell as quick as I can what’s the matter with a car. Bob sends for me to find out after he’s worked half a day, and I can tell right off the bat when I hear the engine go what’s wrong.”
Cornelia watched his eyes sparkle as he talked, and perceived that when he spoke of machinery he was in his element. He loved it. He loved it as she loved the idea of her chosen profession.
That being the case, he ought to be encouraged.
“Why, I should think it was a good thing to stick at it while you are looking around for something better,” she said slowly, wondering whether her father would blame her for going against his advice; “I should think maybe it will prepare you for something else in the line of machinery. What is there big and really worth while that you’d like to get into if you could? Of course, you wouldn’t want to be just a mender of cars all your life.”
His face took on a firm, manly look, and his eyes grew alert and earnest.
“Of course not!” he said crisply. “Father thinks I would, and I can’t make him see it any other way. He’s just plain disappointed in me, that’s all”—the young man’s tone took on a bitter tinge,—“but I know it will be a stepto something. Why, there’s all sorts of big concerns now that make and sell machines; and, if you understand all about machinery, you stand a better chance for getting in to be business manager some day. There’s tanks, and oil-wells, and tractors, and a lot of things. Of course I couldn’t jump into a thing like that at the start. Dad thinks I could. He thinks if I had any pep at all I could just walk up to the president of some big concern, and say, ‘Here I am; take me,’ and he’d do it, just like that. But—for one thing, look at me! Do I look like a business man?” He stood back, and lifted his arms with a dramatic gesture, pointing toward his shabby raiment.
“And then another thing, I’ve got to get experience first. If I only had a pull somewhere—but——”
“I’ll talk to father,” said Cornelia soothingly. She looked at him thoughtfully. “You ought to earn enough for a new suit right away, of course, and have it ready—keep it nice, I mean, so that, when a good opportunity offers, you will be suitably dressed to apply for it. Suppose I talk to father; I’ll do it tonight. Meantime, you help me here a day or two, and then you go back to that garage, and work for a week or two, and earn money enough for your suit and what other things you need, and keep your eye open for something better all the while.”
“That’s the talk!” said Carey joyfully. “Now you’re shouting! You put some heart in a fella. Gee, I’m glad you’re home. It’s been awful without mother. It was bad enough the last few months when she was sick, but it was some dump when she went away entirely.”
“Yes, I know,” said the sister sympathetically, reflecting that it would be wiser not to suggest that he might have helped to make the mother sick by his careless life. “Well, we must get things fixed up nice and pleasant for her when she gets back, and try to keep her well and happy the rest of her life.”
“That’s right!” said Carey with a sudden deep note in his voice that came from the heart, and gave Cornelia a bit of encouragement.
“I think I could clean that suit up a little for you, and make it look better——”
Carey looked down at himself doubtfully.
“It’s pretty bad,” he said; “and it costs a lot to have it cleaned and pressed. I tried last week to do something, but we couldn’t find the irons.”
“I found them yesterday,” said Cornelia brightly. “We’ll see what we can do this evening if you can be at home.”
“Oh, this evening!” said Carey doubtfully.
“Yes, we can’t spare the time till then, because this house has got to be put in order.” She gave him a swift, anxious glance and a winning smile. “If you have another engagement, break it for once. There’s so much to be done, dear, and we do need you terribly. Tell that Brand friend of yours that you’re busy for a few days, and you’ll make it up by inviting him to a fudge party when we get settled.”
“Oh! Gee! Could we?” said Carey half doubtful,half pleased. “Well, all right! I’ll do my best. Now, what do you want done with this old junk?”
“Those go in the back shed, over by the tubs. Take that out in the yard and burn it, and this pile goes upstairs. Just put it in the upper hall, and I’ll attend to it later. My! What a difference it makes to get a little space clear!”
They worked steadily all the afternoon, Carey proving himself as willing as herself.
They washed the windows and the floor, and swept down the walls of parlor and hall.
“Ugly old wall-paper!” said Cornelia, eying it spitefully. “That’s got to come off if I have to do it myself and have bare walls.”
“Why, that’s easy!” said Carey. “Give me an old rag!” and he began to slop the water on and scrape with an old caseknife.
“Well, that’s delightful!” said Cornelia with relief. “I didn’t know it would be so easy; we’ll do a little at a time until it is done, and then we’ll either paper it ourselves or paint it. I do wish we could manage to get a fireplace.”
“Well, maybe we can find some stone cheap where they’re hauling it away. Harry’ll know some place likely; he gets around with that grocery wagon. You know I helped a stone-mason last summer for a while. Mother hated it, though; so I quit; but I learned a lot about mixing cement and how to lay it on. I know about the draughts too. I bet I could make as good a fireplace as the next one. Gee! I wish I knew where to get some stone or brick.”
“Stone would be best,” said Cornelia; “it would makea lovely chimney mantel, but I suppose you couldn’t be so elaborate as making a mantel!”
“Sure, I could! But it would take some stone to do all that.”
“I know where there’s a lot of stone!” They turned around surprised and there stood Harry in the doorway, with Louise just behind him, looking in with delighted faces at the newly cleaned room and the hard-working elder brother.
“Where?” Carey wheeled around eagerly.
“Down on the dump. It was brought there yesterday, a whole lot of it, several cartloads; came from a place where they have been taking down an old wall, and they had no place to put it, I guess. Anyhow, it’s there.”
“I’ll go see if there’s enough,” said Carey, flashing out of the door and up the street.
He was back in a minute with a big stone in his hand.
“It’s just cellar stone,” he said deprecatingly; “but there’s plenty.”
“Humph!” said Louise maturely. “Well, I never thought I’d be glad I lived near that old dump! Do you mean we’re going to have a real fireplace, Carey?”
“That’s the contract, kid, and I guess I can make good. But how are we going to get that stone here?”
“There’s the express-wagon,” said Louise thoughtfully. “Harry has to work, but I could haul some.”
“You!” said Carey contemptuously; “do you suppose I’d let a girl haul stone for me? No, I’ll go borrow a truck. I know a fella has one, and it’s almost quitting time. Iknow he’ll lend it to me; and, if he does, I’ll work until I get those stones all landed, or like as not somebody else will get their eye on them. Stones like that cost a lot nowadays, even if they are only cellar stones.”
“Cellar stones are lovely,” said Cornelia delightedly. “They have a lot of iron in them, and make very artistic houses. I heard a big architect say that once in a lecture at college.”
“Well there’s nothing like being satisfied with what you have to have,” said Carey. “Here, Nell, you look out for the rest of that base-board; I’m off to borrow a truck. Next time you see me I’ll be riding a load of stone!”
“I’ll come down at six o’clock and help you load!” shouted Harry from the third story, where he was rapidly changing into his working-clothes.
“All right, kid; that’s the stuff. Nell will save us some supper, and we’ll work till dark.”
“It won’t be dark,” said Louise sagely. “It’s moonlight tonight.”
“That’s right too,” said Carey as he seized his hat and dashed out of the house.