A DAY AT SCHOOL.
Itwas with a most unwilling mind and an unhappy heart that Mary began her third week at school. In the first place she could not bear to tear herself away from all that was going on at the new house. She wanted to have a hand in the dear delights of home-making. She wanted to poke the camp-fire, and dabble in the paste, and watch the walls grow fresh and clean as the paper spread over the old patches. The smell of the fresh paint drew her, and gave her a feeling that there were all sorts of delightful possibilities in this region, yet unexplored.
In the second place, life in the new school was a grievous burden, because the boys, seeing how easily she was teased, found their chief pleasure in annoying her. She was a trusting little soul, ready to nibble the bait that any trap offered.
"Never mind! You'll get used to it after awhile," her mother said, consolingly, each evening whenshe came home with a list of fresh woes. "You're tired now from that long walk home. Things will seem better after supper." And Joyce would add, "Don't look so doleful, Mother Bunch; just remember the vicar, and keep inflexible. Fortune is bound to change in your favour after awhile." But the third Friday found her as unhappy as the third Monday.
There were two rooms in the school building, one containing all the primary classes, the other the grammar grades, where Holland found a place. Mary had one of the back seats in the primary department, and one of the highest hooks in the cloak-room, on which to hang her belongings. But this Friday morning she did not leave her lunch-basket in either place.
She and Patty Ritter, the little girl who sat across the aisle from her, had had an indignation-meeting the day before, and agreed to hide their baskets in a hedgerow, so that there could be no possibility of Wig Smith's finding them. Salt on one's jelly cake and pepper in one's apple-pie two days in succession is a little too much to be borne calmly. Wig Smith's fondness for seasoning other people's lunches was only one of his many obnoxious traits.
"There," said Mary, scanning the horizon anxiously,to see that no prowling boy was in sight. "Nobody would think of looking behind that prickly cactus for a lunch-basket! We're sure of not going hungry to-day!"
With their arms around each other, they strolled back to the schoolhouse, taking a roundabout way, with great cunning, to throw Wig Smith off the track, in case he should be watching. But their precautions were needless this time. Wig had set up a dentist's establishment on the steps of the stile, his stock in trade being a pocket-knife and a hat full of raw turnips. Nothing could have been friendlier than the way he greeted Mary and Patty, insisting that they each needed a set of false teeth. Half a dozen of his friends had already been fitted out, and stood around, grinning, in order to show the big white turnip teeth he had fitted over the set provided by Nature. As the teeth were cut in irregular shapes, wide square-tipped ones alternating with long pointed fangs, and the upper lip had to be drawn tightly to hold them in place, the effect was so comical that they could hardly hold the new sets in position for laughing at each other.
In payment for his work, Wig accepted almost anything that his customers had to offer: marbles, when he could get them, pencils, apples, fish-hooks,even a roll of tin-foil, saved from many chewing-gum packages, which was all one girl had to trade.
A search through Mary's orderly pencil-box failed to show anything that he wanted of hers, but the neatly prepared home lesson which fluttered out of her arithmetic caught his eye. He agreed to make her the teeth for a copy of six problems which he could not solve. Mary had much the hardest part of the bargain, for, sitting on the stile, she patiently copied long-division sums until the second bell rang, while he turned off the teeth with a few masterful strokes of his knife.
"Let's all put them in as soon as we're done singing, and wear them till we recite spelling," he suggested. "It's mighty hard to keep from chawin' on 'em after they've been in your mouth awhile. Let's see who can keep them in longest. Every five minutes by the clock, if the teacher isn't lookin', we'll all grin at onct to show that they're still in."
Needless to say, the usual Friday morning studiousness did not prevail in the primary room that morning. Too many eyes were watching the clock for the moment of display to arrive, and when it did arrive, the coughing and choking that was set up to hide the titters, plainly told the teacher that some mischief was afoot. If she could have turnedin time to see the distorted faces, she must have laughed too, it was such a comical sight, but she was trying to explain to a row of stupid little mathematicians the mysteries of borrowing in subtraction, and always looked up a moment too late.
Mary Ware, having written every word of her spelling lesson from memory, and compared it with her book to be sure that she knew it, now had a quarter of an hour of leisure. This she devoted to putting her desk in order. The books were dusted and piled in neat rows. Everything in her pencil-box was examined, and laid back with care, the slate-rag folded and tucked under the moist sponge. There was another box in her desk. It had bunches of violets on it and strips of lace-paper lining the sides. It smelled faintly of the violet soap it had once held. She kept several conveniences in this, pins, and an extra hair-ribbon in case of loss, a comb, and a little round mirror with a celluloid back, on which was printed the advertisement of a Plainsville druggist.
As she polished the little mirror, the temptation to use it was too great to resist. Holding it under the desk, she stretched her lips back as far as possible in a grotesque grin, to show her set of turnip teeth. They looked so funny that she tried it againwith variations, rolling her eyes and wrinkling her nose. So absorbed was she that she did not realize that a silence had fallen in the room, that the recitation had stopped and all eyes were turned upon her. Then her own name, spoken in a stern tone, startled her so that she bounced in her seat and dropped the mirror.
"Why,Mary Ware! I'mastonished! Come here!"
Blushing and embarrassed at being called into public notice, Mary stumbled up to the platform, and submitted to an examination of her mouth. Then, following orders, she went to the door, and with much sputtering spat the teeth out into the yard.
"I'll see you about this after school," remarked the teacher, sternly, as she stumbled back to her seat, overcome by mortification.
If the teacher had not been so busy watching Mary obey orders, she would have noticed a rapid moving of many jaws along the back row of seats, and a mighty gulping and swallowing, as the other sets of teeth disappeared down the throats of their owners.
"So this has been the cause of so much disturbance this morning," she remarked, crossly."I'm astonished that one of the quietest pupils in the school should have behaved in such a manner." Then as a precaution she added, "Is there any one else in the room who has any of these turnip teeth? Raise your hands if you have."
Not a hand went up, and every face met Mary's indignant accusing gaze with such an innocent stare that she cried out:
"Oh, what a story!"
"Open your mouths," commanded the teacher. "Turn your pockets wrong side out."
To Mary's amazement, nobody had so much as a taste of turnip to show, and she stood accused of being the only offender, the only one with judgment awaiting her after school. With her head on her desk, and her face hidden on her arms, she cried softly all through the spelling recitation. "It wasn't fair," she sobbed to herself.
Patty comforted her at recess with half her stick of licorice, and several of the other girls crowded around her, begging her to come and play Bird, and not to mind what the boys said, and not to look around when Wig Smith mimicked the teacher's manner, and called after her in a tantalizing tone, "Why, Mary Ware! I'mastonished!"
Gradually they won her away from her tears,and before recess was over she was shrieking with the gayest of them as they raced around the schoolhouse to escape the girl who, being "It," personated the "bad man."
As they dropped into their seats at the close of recess, hot and panting, a boy from the grammar room came in and spoke to the teacher. It was Paul Archer, a boy from New York, whose father had recently bought a ranch near by. He held up a string of amber beads, as the teacher asked, "Does this belong to any one in this room?"
They were beautiful beads. Mary caught her breath as she looked at them. "Like drops of rain strung on a sunbeam," she thought, watching them sparkle as he turned and twisted the string. Paul was a big boy, very clean and very good-looking, and as little Blanche Ellert came up to claim her necklace, blushing and shaking back her curls, he held it out with such a polite, dancing-school bow that Mary's romantic little soul was greatly impressed. She wished that the beautiful beads had been hers, and that she had lost them, and could have claimed them before the whole school, and had them surrendered to her in that princely way. She would like to lose a ring, she thought, that is,if she had one, or a locket, and have Paul find it, and give it to her before the whole school.
Then she remembered that she had worn her best jacket to school that morning, and in the pocket was a handkerchief that had been hung on the Sunday-school Christmas-tree for her in Plainsville. It was a little white silk one, embroidered in the corners with sprays of forget-me-nots, blue, with tiny pink buds. What if she should lose that and Paul should find it, and hold up the pretty thing in sight of all the school for her to claim?
As the morning wore on, the thought pleased her more and more. The primary grades were dismissed first at noon, so she had time to slip the handkerchief from her jacket-pocket, tiptoe guiltily into the other cloak-room, and drop it under a certain wide-brimmed felt hat, which hung on its peg with a jauntier grace than the other caps and sombreros could boast. It seemed to stare at her in surprise. Half-frightened by her own daring, she tiptoed out again, and ran after Patty, who was hunting for her outside.
"There won't be any salt in our cake and pepper in our pie to-day," Patty said, confidently, as they strolled off together with their arms around each other. "Let's get our baskets, and go away off outof sight to eat our dinners. I know the nicest place down by the lateral under some cottonwood-trees. The water is running to-day."
"It'll be like having a picnic beside a babbling brook," assented Mary. "I love to hear the water gurgle through the water-gate."
Seated on a freshly hewn log, after a careful survey had convinced them that no lizards, Gila monsters, or horned toads lurked underneath, the little girls opened their baskets, and shook out their napkins. The next instant a wail rose from them in unison:
"Ants! Nasty little black ants! They're over everything!"
"Just look at my chicken sandwiches," mourned Mary, "and all that lovely gingerbread. They're walking all over it and through it and into it and around it. There isn't a spot that they haven't touched!"
"And my mince turnovers," cried Patty. "I brought one for you to-day, too, and a devilled egg. But there isn't a thing in my basket that's fit to eat."
"Nor mine, either," said Mary, "except the apples. We might wash them in the lateral."
"And I'm nearly starved, I'm so hungry," grumbledPatty. "An apple's better than nothing, but it doesn't go very far."
"It's no use to go and ask Holland for any of his lunch," said Mary. "By this time he's gobbled up even the scraps, and busted the bag. He always brings his in a paper bag, so's there'll be no basket to carry home."
Cautiously leaning over the bank of the lateral, Mary began dabbling her apple back and forth in the water, and Patty, kneeling beside her, followed her example. Suddenly Patty's apple slipped out of her hand, and she clutched frantically at Mary's arm in her effort to save it, and at the same time keep her balance. Both swayed and fell sideways. Mary's arm plunged into the water, wetting her sleeve nearly to her shoulder, but, clawing at the earth and long grass with the other hand, she managed, after much scrambling, to regain her position.
Patty, with a scream, rolled over into the water. The ditch was shallow, not more than waist-deep, but as she had fallen full length, she came up soaking wet. Even her hair dripped muddy little rivers down over her face. There was no more school for Patty that day. As soon as her old yellow horse could be saddled, she started off on a lope toward dry clothes and a hot dinner.
Mary looked after her longingly, as she sat with her sleeve held out in the sun to dry, and slowly munched her one cold apple. She was so hungry and miserable that she wanted to cry, yet this child of nine was a philosopher in her small way.
"I'm not having half as bad a time as the old vicar had," she said to herself, "so I won't be a baby. Seems to me, though, that it's about time fortune was changing in my favour. Maybe the turn will be when Paul finds my forget-me-not handkerchief."
With that time in view, she carefully smoothed the wrinkles out of her sleeve as it dried, and pulled the lace edging into shape around the cuff. Then she combed the front of her hair, and retied the big bows. She was not equal to the task of braiding it herself, but a glance into the little celluloid mirror satisfied her that she looked neat enough to march up before the school when the time should come for her to claim her handkerchief.
Every time the door opened before the afternoon recess she looked up expectantly, her cheeks growing red and her heart beating fast. But no Paul appeared, or anybody else who had found anything to be restored to its owner. She began to feelanxious, and to wonder if she would ever see her beloved forget-me-not handkerchief again.
At recess she dodged back into the hall after every one had passed out, and stole a quick glance into the other cloak-room. The handkerchief was gone. Somebody had picked it up. Maybe the finder had been too busy to search for the owner. It would be brought in before school closed; just before dismissal probably. The prospect took part of the sting out of the recollection that she was to be kept after school that evening, for the first time in her life.
During the last period in the afternoon, the A Geography class always studied its lesson for next day. Mary specially liked this study, and with her little primary geography propped up in front of her, carefully learned every word of description, both large print and small, on the page devoted to Africa.
"Your hair is coming undone," whispered the girl behind her. "Let me plait it for you. I love to fool with anybody's hair."
Mary nodded her consent without turning around, and sat up straight in her seat, so that Jennie could reach it with greater ease. She never took her eyes from the page. The teacher, who was putting home lessons on the board for the D Arithmetic to copy, was too busy to notice Jennie's new occupation.
Painting with a braid"SHE PROCEEDED WITH A JOYFUL HEART TO PAINT THE AFRICAN LION"
Mary enjoyed the soft touch of Jennie's fingers on her hair. It felt so good to have it pulled into place with smooth, deft pats here and there. After the bows were tied on, Jennie still continued to play with it, braiding the ends below the ribbon into plaits that grew thinner and thinner, until they ended in points as fine and soft as a camel's-hair paint-brush. Evidently they suggested brushes to Jennie, for presently she dived into her desk for something quite foreign to school work. It was a little palette-shaped card on which were arranged seven cakes of cheap water-colour paint. The brush attached to the palette had been lost on Christmas Day, before she had had more than one trial of her skill as an artist.
The water-bottle, which held the soap-suds devoted to slate-cleaning, stood behind the pile of books in her desk. She drew that out, and, having uncorked it, carefully dipped the end of one of Mary's braids into it. Then rubbing it across the cake of red paint, she proceeded with a joyful heart to paint the African lion in her geography the most brilliant red that can be imagined.
Mary, still enjoying the gentle pull, little guessed what a bloody tip swung behind her right shoulder. Then the caressing touch was transferred to the left braid, and the greenest of green Bedouins, mounted on the most purple of camels, appeared on the picture of the Sahara.
The signal for dismissal, sounding from the principal's room across the hall, surprised both the girls. The time had passed so rapidly. Mary, putting her hand back to feel if her bows were properly tied, suddenly jerked her right braid forward in alarm. The end was wet, and—was itbloodthat made it so red? With a horrified expression she clutched the other one, and finding that wet and green, turned squarely around in her seat. She was just in time to see the geography closing on the red lion and green Bedouin, and realized in a flash how Jennie had been "fooling" with her hair.
Before she could sputter out her indignation, the teacher rapped sharply on the table for attention. "Will youpleasecome to order, Mary Ware?" she said, sternly. "Remember, you are to remain after the others are dismissed."
To have been publicly reprimanded twice in one day, to have been kept after school, to have had one's lunch spoiled by ants, and to have been leftmiserably hungry all afternoon, to have had the shock of a plunge almost to the shoulder in icy water, and the discomfort of having a wet sleeve dried on one's arm, to have had one's hair used as paint-brushes, so that stains were left on the back of the new gingham dress, was too much. Mary could keep inflexible no longer. Then she remembered that no one had brought back the forget-me-not handkerchief, and with that to cap her woes, she laid her head down on the desk and sobbed while the others filed out and left her.
Usually, Holland found her waiting for him by the stile when the grammar grades were dismissed, but not seeing her there, he forgot all about her, and dashed on after the boy who tagged him. Then he and George Lee hurried on home to set a new gopher-trap they had invented, without giving her a thought. The faithful Patty, who always walked with her as far as the turn, had not come back to school after her plunge into the lateral. So it came about that when Mary finally put on her hat and jacket in the empty cloak-room, the playground was deserted. As far as her tear-swollen eyes could see up and down the road, not a child was in sight. With a sob, she stood a moment on the top step of the stile, then slowly swinging her lunch-basket,in which there were no scraps as usual to appease her after-school hunger, she started on the long, two-mile walk home.
It looked later than it really was, for the sun was not shining. She had gone on a long way, when a sound of hoofs far down the road made her look back. What she saw made her give another startled glance over her shoulder, and quicken her pace. Half-running, she looked back again. The sound was coming nearer. So was the rider. Another glance made her stand still, her knees shaking under her; for on the pony was an Indian, a big, stolid buck, with black hair hanging in straight locks over his shoulders.
She looked wildly around. Nobody else was in sight, no house anywhere. The biggest man-eating tiger in the jungles could not have terrified her like the sight of that lone Indian. All the tales that Jack and Holland had told for their mutual frightening, all that she had read herself of tortures and cruelties came into her mind. Their name was legion, and they were startlingly fresh in her memory, for only the evening before she had finished a book called "On the Borders with Crook," and the capture of the Oatman girls had been repeated in her dreams.
Sure that the Indian intended to tomahawk her the instant he reached her, she gave one stifled gasp of terror, and started down the road as fast as her fat little legs could carry her. A few rods farther on her hat flew off, but she was running for her life, and even the handsome steel buckle that had once been Cousin Kate's could not be rescued at such a risk.
She felt that she was running in a treadmill. Her legs were going up and down, up and down, faster than they had ever moved before, but she seemed to be making no progress; she was unable to get past that one spot in the road. And the Indian was coming on nearer and nearer, with deadly certainty, gaining on her at every breath. She felt that she had been running for a week, that she could not possibly take another step. But with one more frantic glance backward, she gave another scream, and dashed on harder than before.
WARE'S WIGWAM
Phil Tremont, driving out from Phoenix in a high, red-wheeled cart, paused at the cross-roads, uncertain whether to turn there or keep on to the next section-line. According to part of the directions given him, this was the turning-place. Still, he had not yet come in sight of Camelback Mountain, which was to serve as a guide-post. Not a house was near at which he might inquire, and not a living thing in sight except a jack-rabbit, which started up from the roadside, and bounded away at his approach.
Then he caught sight of the little whirl of dust surrounding Mary in her terrified flight, and touched his horse with the whip. In a moment he was alongside of the breathless, bareheaded child.
"Little girl," he called, "can you tell me if this is the road to Lee's ranch?" Then, as she turned a dirty, tear-stained face, he exclaimed, in amazement,"Of all people under the sun! The little vicar! Well, youarea sprinter! What are you racing with?"
Mary sank down on the road, so exhausted by her long run that she breathed in quick, gasping sobs. Her relief at seeing a white face instead of a red one was so great that she had no room for surprise in her little brain that the face should be Phil Tremont's, who was supposed to be far away in California. She recognized him instantly, although he no longer wore his uniform, and the broad-brimmed hat he wore suggested the cowboy of the plains rather than the cadet of the military school.
"What are you racing with?" he repeated, laughingly. "That jack-rabbit that passed me down yonder?"
"A—a—aIndian!" she managed to gasp. "He chased me—all the way—from the schoolhouse!"
"An Indian!" repeated Phil, standing up in the cart to look back down the road. "Oh, it must have been that old fellow I passed half a mile back. He was an ugly-looking specimen, but he couldn't have chased you; his pony was so stiff and old it couldn't go out of a walk."
"Hewasa-chasing me!" insisted Mary, the tears beginning to roll down her face again. She looked so little and forlorn, sitting there in a heap beside the road, that Phil sprang from the cart, and picked her up in his strong arms.
"There," said he, lifting her into the cart. "'Weep no more, my lady, weep no more to-day!' Fortune has at last changed in your favour. You are snatched from the bloody scalper of the plains, and shall be driven home in style by your brave rescuer, if you'll only tell me which way to go."
The tear-stained little face was one broad smile as Mary leaned back in the seat. She pointed up the road to a clump of umbrella-trees. "That's where we turn," she said. "When you come to the trees you'll see there's a little house behind them. It's the White Bachelor's. We call him that because his horse and dog and cows and cats and chickens are all white. That's how I first remembered where to turn on my way home, by the place where there's so awful many white chickens. I was hoping to get to his place before I died of running, when you came along. You saved my life, didn't you? I never had my life saved before. Wasn't it strange the way you happened by at exactly the right moment? It's just as if we were in a book. Ithought you were away off in California at school. Howdidit happen anyway?" she asked, peering up at him under his broad-brimmed hat.
A dull red flushed his face an instant, then he answered, lightly, "Oh, I thought I'd take a vacation. I got tired of school, and I've started out to see the world. I remembered what your brother said about the quail-shooting out here, and the ducks, so I thought I'd try it a few weeks, and then go on somewhere else. I've always wanted a taste of ranch life and camping."
"I'm tired of school, too," said Mary, "specially after all the terrible unpleasant things that have happened to-day. But my family won't let me stop, not if I begged all night and all day. How did you get yours to?"
"Didn't ask 'em," said Phil, grimly. "Just chucked it, and came away."
"But didn't your father say anything at all? Didn't he care?"
The red came up again in the boy's face. "He doesn't know anything about it—yet; he's in Europe, you know."
They had reached the White Bachelor's now, and turning, took the road that ran like a narrow ribbon between the irrigated country and the desert. Onone side were the wastes of sand between the red buttes and old Camelback Mountain, on the other were the green ranches with their rows of figs and willows and palms, bordering all the waterways.
"Now we're just half a mile from Lee's ranch," said Mary. "We'll be there in no time."
"Do you suppose they'll have room for me?" inquired Phil. "That's what I've come out for, to engage board."
"Oh, I'm sure they will, anyhow, after to-morrow, for we're going to move then, and that'll leave three empty tents. We've rented a place half a mile farther up the road, and Jack and Joyce are having more fun fixing it up. That's one reason I want to stop school. I'm missing all the good times."
"Hello! This seems to be quite a good-sized camp!" exclaimed Phil, as they came in sight of an adobe house, around which clustered a group of twenty or more tents, like a brood of white chickens around a motherly old brown hen. "There comes Mrs. Lee now," cried Mary, as a tall, black-haired woman came out of the house, and started across to one of the tents with a tray in her hands. Her pink dress fluttered behind her as she moved forward,with a firm, light tread, suggestive of buoyant spirits and unbounded cheerfulness.
"She's doing something for somebody all the time," remarked Mary. "If you were sick she'd nurse you as if she was your mother, but as long as you're not sick, maybe she won't let you come. Oh, I never thought about that. This is a camp for invalids, you know, and she is so interested in helping sick people get well, that maybe she won't take any interest in you. Have you got a letter from anybody? Oh, I do hope you have!"
"A letter," repeated Phil. "What kind?"
"A letter to say that you're all right, you know, from somebody that knows you. I heard her tell Doctor Adams last week that she wouldn't take anybody else unless she had a letter of—of something or other, I can't remember, because one man went off without paying his board.Wehad a letter from her brother."
"No, I haven't any letter of recommendation or introduction, if that's what you mean," said Phil, "but maybe I can fix it up all right with her. Can't you say a good word for me?"
"Of course," answered Mary, taking his question in all seriousness. "And I'll run and get mamma, too. She'll make it all right."
Springing out, Phil lifted her over the wheel, and then stood flicking the dry Bermuda grass with his whip, as he waited for Mary to announce his coming. He could hear her shrill little voice in the tent, whither she had followed Mrs. Lee to tell her of his arrival.
"It's the Mr. Phil Tremont we met on the train," he heard her say. "Don't you know, the one I told you about running away with his little sister and the monkey and the music-box one time. He isn't sick, but he wants to stay here awhile, and I told him you'd be good to him, anyhow."
Then she hurried away to her mother's tent, and Mrs. Lee came out laughing. There was something so genial and friendly in the humourous twinkle of her eyes, something so frank and breezy in her hospitable Western welcome, that Phil met her with the same outspoken frankness.
"I heard what Mary said," he began, "and I do hope you'll take me in, for I've run away again, Mrs. Lee." Then his handsome face sobered, and he said, in his straightforward, boyish way that Mrs. Lee found very attractive, "I got into a scrape at the military school. It wasn't anything wicked, but four of us were fired. The other fellows' fathers got them taken back, but mine is in Europe, andit's so unsatisfactory making explanations at that long range, and I thought they hadn't been altogether fair in the matter, so I—well, I just skipped out. Mary said I'd have to have references. I can't give you any now, but I can pay in advance for a month's board, if you'll take me that way."
He pulled out such a large roll of bills as he spoke, that Mrs. Lee looked at him keenly. All sorts of people had drifted to her ranch, but never before a schoolboy of seventeen with so much money in his pocket. He caught the glance, and something in the motherly concern that seemed to cross her face made him say, hastily, "Father left an emergency fund for my sister and me when he went away, besides our monthly allowance, and I drew on mine before I came out here."
While they were discussing prices, Mrs. Ware came out with a cordial greeting. Mary's excited tale of her rescue had almost led her to believe that Phil had snatched her little daughter from an Indian's tomahawk. She was heartily glad to see him, for the few hours' acquaintance on the train had given her a strong interest in the motherless boy and girl, and she had thought of them many times since then. Phil felt that in coming back to the Wares he was coming back to old friends.After it was settled that he might send his trunk out next day, when a tent would be vacant, he sat for a long time talking to Mrs. Ware and Mary, in the rustic arbour covered with bamboo and palm leaves.
Chris was calling the cows to the milking when he finally rose to go, and only rapid driving would take him back to Phoenix before nightfall. As the red wheels disappeared down the road, Mary exclaimed, "This has certainly been the most exciting day of my life! It has been so full of unexpected things. Isn't it grand to think that Mr. Phil is coming to the ranch? Fortune certainly changed in my favour when he happened along just in time to save my life. Oh, dear, there come Joyce and Jack! They've just missed him!"
Saturday afternoon found the new home all ready for its occupants. Even the trunks had been brought up from the ranch and stowed away in the tents. Although it was only two o'clock, the table was already set for tea in one corner of the clean, fresh kitchen, behind a tall screen.
Joyce, with her blue calico sleeves tucked up above her white elbows, whistled softly as she tied on a clean apron before beginning her baking. She hadnot been as happy in months. The hard week's work had turned the bare adobe house into a comfortable little home, and she could hardly wait for her mother to see it. Mrs. Lee was to bring her and Norman over in the surrey. Any moment they might come driving up the road.
Jack had offered to stay if his services were needed further, but she had sent him away to take his well-earned holiday. As he tramped off with his gun over his shoulder, her voice followed him pleasantly: "Good luck to you, Jack. You deserve it, for you've stuck by me like a man this week."
Since dinner Mary and Holland had swept the yard, brought wood for the camp-fire, filled the boiler and the pitchers in the tents, and then gone off, as Joyce supposed, to rest under the cottonwood-trees. Presently she heard Mary tiptoeing into the sitting-room, and peeped in to find her standing in the middle of the floor, with her hands clasped behind her.
"Isn't it sweet and homey!" Mary exclaimed. "I'm so glad to see the old furniture again I could just hug it! I came in to get the book about Hiawatha, sister. Holland keeps teasing me 'cause I said I wished I was named Minnehaha, and saysI am Mary-ha-ha. And I want to find a name for him, a real ugly one!"
"Call him Pau-Puk-Keewis,—mischief-maker," suggested Joyce. "There's the book on the second shelf of the bookcase." She stepped into the room to slip the soft silk curtain farther down the brass rod.
"I'm prouder of this bookcase than almost anything else we have," she said. "Nobody would guess that it was made of the packing-boxes that the goods came in, and that this lovely Persian silk curtain was once the lining of one of Cousin Kate's party dresses."
"I'm glad that everything looks so nice," said Mary, "for Mr. Phil said he was coming up to see us this evening. I'm going to put on a clean dress and my best hair-ribbons before then."
"Very well," assented Joyce, going back to the kitchen. "I'll change my dress, too," she thought, as she went on with her work. "And I'll light both lamps. The Indian rugs and blankets make the room look so bright and cosy by lamplight."
It had been so long since she had seen any one but the family and the invalids at the ranch, that the thought of talking to the jolly young cadet added another pleasure to her happy day.
"Oh, Joyce," called Holland, from behind the tents, "may we have the paint that is left in the cans? There's only a little in each one."
"I don't care," she called back. That had been an hour ago, and now, as she broke the eggs for a cake into a big platter, and began beating them with a fork, she wondered what they were doing that kept them so quiet. As the fork clacked noisily back and forth in the dish and the white foam rose high and stiff, her whistling grew louder. It seemed to fill all the sunny afternoon silence with its trills, for Joyce's whistle was as clear and strong as any boy's or any bird's. But suddenly, as it reached its highest notes, it stopped short. Joyce looked up as a shadow fell across the floor, to see Jack coming in the back door with Phil Tremont.
She had not heard the sound of their coming, for the noise of her egg-beating and her whistling. Joyce blushed to the roots of her hair, at being taken thus unawares, whistling like a boy over her cake-baking. For an instant she wanted to shake Jack for bringing this stranger to the kitchen door.
"We just stopped by for a drink," Jack explained. "Tremont was coming out of the ranch with his gun when I passed with mine, so we'vebeen hunting together. Come in, Phil, I'll get a cup."
There was such a mischievous twinkle in Phil's eyes as he greeted her, that Joyce blushed again. This was a very different meeting from the one she had anticipated. Instead of him finding her, appearing to her best advantage in a pretty white dress, sitting in the lamplight with a book in her hands, perhaps, he had caught her in her old blue calico, her sleeves rolled up, and a streak of flour across her bare arm. She rubbed it hastily across her apron, and gathered up the egg-shells in embarrassed silence.
"Did you tell those kids that they might paint up the premises the way they are doing?" demanded Jack.
"What way?" asked Joyce, in surprise.
"Haven't you seen what they've done to the front of the house? They haven't waited for your name contest, but have fixed up things to suit themselves. You just ought to come out and look!"
Phil followed as they hurried around to the front of the house, then stood smiling at the look of blank amazement which slowly spread over Joyce's face. Down one of the rough cottonwood posts, which supported the palm and bamboo thatch of theirRobinson Crusoe porch, was painted in big, straggling, bloody letters: "W-A-R-E-S W-I-G-W-A-M." Joyce groaned. She had made such an attempt to convert the rude shade into an attractive spot, spreading a Navajo blanket over her mother's camp-chair, and putting cushions on the rustic bench to make a restful place, where one could read or watch the shadows grow long across the desert. She had even brought out a little wicker tea-table this afternoon, with a vase of flowers on it, and leaned her mother's old guitar against it to give a final civilizing touch to the picture. But the effect was sadly marred by the freshly painted name, glaring at her from the post.
"Oh, the little savages!" she exclaimed. "How could they do it? Ware's Wigwam, indeed!"
Then her gaze followed Jack's finger pointing to the tents pitched under the cottonwood-trees. The one which she was to share with Mary and her mother stood white and clean, the screen-door open, showing the white beds within, the rug on the floor, the flowers on the table; but the large, circular one, which the boys were to occupy, was a sight to make any one pause, open-mouthed.
Perched beside it on a scaffolding of boxes and barrels stood Holland, with a paint-can in one handand a brush in the other, putting the finishing touches to some startling decorations. Mary, on the other side, was brandishing another brush, and both were so intent on their work that neither looked up. Joyce gave a gasp. Never had she seen such amazing hieroglyphics as those which chased each other in zigzag green lines around the fly of the tent. They bore a general resemblance to those seen on Indian baskets and blankets and pottery, but nothing so grotesque had ever flaunted across her sight before.
"Now, get the book," called Holland to Mary, "and see if we've left anything out." Only Mary's back was visible to the amused spectators. She took up the copy of "Hiawatha" from the barrel where it lay, careful to keep the hem of her apron between it and her paint-bedaubed thumbs.
"I think we've painted every single figure he wrote about," said Mary. "Now, I'll read, and you walk around and see if we've left anything out:
"Very spacious was the wigwamWith the gods of the DacotahsDrawn and painted on the curtains."
"No, skip that," ordered Holland. "It's farther down." Mary's paint-smeared fingers travelled slowly down the page, then she began again:
"Sun and moon and stars he painted,Man and beast and fish and reptile."Figures of the Bear and Reindeer,Of the Turtle, Crane, and Beaver."Owl and Eagle, Crane and Hen-hawk,And the Cormorant, bird of magic."Figures mystical and awful,Figures strange and brightly coloured."
"They're all here," announced Holland, "specially the figures mystical and awful. I'll have to label mine, or somebody will take my turtle for a grizzly."
"Oh, the little savages!" exclaimed Joyce again. "How could they make such a spectacle of the place! We'll be the laughing-stock of the whole country."
"I don't suppose that'll ever come off the tent, but we can paint the name off the post," said Jack.
"Oh, that's a fine name," said Phil, laughing, "leave it on. It's so much more original than most people have."
Before Joyce could answer, the rattle of wheels announced the coming of the surrey, and Mrs. Lee drove into the yard with Mrs. Ware and Norman, and her own little daughter, Hazel. Then Joyce's anger, which had burned to give Holland and Marya good shaking, vanished completely at sight of her mother's amusement. Mrs. Ware had not laughed so heartily in months as she did at the ridiculous figures grinning from the tent. It seemed so good to see her like her old cheerful self again that, when she laughingly declared that the name straggling down the post exactly suited the place, and was far more appropriate than Bide-a-wee or Alamo, Joyce's frown entirely disappeared. Mrs. Lee caught up the old guitar, and began a rattling parody of "John Brown had a little Indian," changing the words to a ridiculous rhyme about "TheWares had a little Wigwam."
Mrs. Ware sat down to try the new rustic seat, and then jumped up like a girl again to look at the view of the mountains from the camp-chair, and then led the way, laughing and talking, to investigate the new home. She was as pleased as a child, and her pleasure made a festive occasion of the home-coming, which Joyce had feared at first would be a sorry one.
Phil shouldered his gun ready to start off again, feeling that he ought not to intrude, but Jack had worked too hard to miss the reward of hearing his mother's pleased exclamations and seeing her face light up over every little surprise they had preparedfor her comfort. "Come and see, too," he urged so cordially that Phil fell into line, poking into all the corners, inspecting all the little shelves and cupboards, and admiring all the little makeshifts as heartily as Mrs. Lee or Mrs. Ware.
They went through the tents first, then the kitchen, and last into the living-room, of which Joyce was justly proud. There was only the old furniture they had had in Plainsville, with the books and pictures, but it was restful and homelike and really artistic, Phil acknowledged to himself, looking around in surprise.
"Here's the Little Colonel's corner," said Mary, leading him to a group of large photographs framed in passe-partout. "You know mamma used to live in Kentucky, and once Joyce went back there to a house-party. Here's the place, Locust. That's where the Little Colonel lives. Her right name is Lloyd Sherman. And there she is on her pony, Tar Baby, and there's her grandfather at the gate."
Phil stooped for a closer view of the photograph, and then straightened up, with a look of dawning recognition in his face.
"Why, I've seen her," he said, slowly. "I've been past that place. Once, several years ago, I was going from Cincinnati to Louisville with father, andsomething happened that we stopped on a switch in front of a place that looked just like that. And the brakeman said it was called Locust. I was out on the rear platform. I believe we were waiting for an express train to pass us, or something of the sort. At any rate, I saw that same old gentleman,—he had only one arm and was all dressed in white. Everybody was saying what a picture he made. The locusts were in bloom, you know. And while he stood there, the prettiest little girl came riding up on a black pony, with a magnificent St. Bernard dog following. She was all in white, too, with a spray of locust blossoms stuck in the cockade of the little black velvet Napoleon cap she wore, exactly as it is in that picture; and she held up a letter and called out: 'White pigeon wing fo' you, grandfathah deah.' I never forgot how sweet it sounded."
"Oh, that was Lloyd! That was Lloyd!" called Mary and Joyce in the same breath, and Joyce added: "She always used to call out that when she had a letter for the old Colonel, and it must have been Hero that you saw, the Red Cross war-dog that was given to her in Switzerland. How strange it seems that you should come across her picture away out here in the desert!"
Mary's eyes grew rounder and rounder as she listened. She delighted in romantic situations, and this seemed to her one of the most romantic she had ever known in real life, quite as interesting as anything she had ever read about.
"Doesn't it seem queer to think that he's seen Lloyd and Locust?" she exclaimed. "It makes him seem almost like home folks, doesn't it, mamma?"
Mrs. Ware smiled. "It certainly does, dear, and we must try to make him feel at home with us in our wild wigwam." She had seen the wistful expression of his eyes a few moments before when, catching Joyce and Jack by the arms, she had cried, proudly: "Nobody in the world has such children as mine, Mrs. Lee! Don't you think I have cause to be proud of my five little Indians, who fixed up this house so beautifully all by themselves?"
"Come back and take supper with us, won't you?" she asked, as he and Jack started on their interrupted hunt. "We'll make a sort of house-warming of our first meal together in the new wigwam, and I'll be glad to count you among my little Indians."
"Thank you, Mrs. Ware," he said, in his gentlemanly way and with the frank smile which shefound so winning; "you don't know how much that means to a fellow who has been away from a real home as long as I have. I'll be the gladdest 'little Indian' in the bunch to be counted in that way."
"Then I'll get back to my cake-making," said Joyce, "if we're to have company for supper. I won't promise that it'll be a success, though, for while it bakes I'm going to write to Lloyd. I've thought for days that I ought to write, for I've owed her a letter ever since Christmas. She doesn't even know that we've left Plainsville. And I'm going to tell her about your having seen her, and recognized her picture away out here on the desert. I wish she'd come out and make us a visit."
"Here," said Phil, playfully, taking a sprig of orange blossoms from his buttonhole, and putting it in the vase on the wicker table. "When you get your letter written, put that in, as a sample of what grows out here. I picked it as we passed Clayson's ranch. If it reaches her on a cold, snowy day, it will make her want to come out to this land of sunshine. You needn't tell her I sent it."
"I'll dare you to tell," said Jack, as they started off.
Joyce's only answer was a laugh, as she went backto her egg-beating. Almost by the time the boys were out of sight, she had whisked the cake dough into a pan, and the pan into the oven, and, while Mrs. Ware and Mrs. Lee talked in the other room, she spread her paper out on the kitchen table, and began her letter to the Little Colonel.