Other scholars came along and stared, wondering what had sent this usually tardy boy so far in advance of the bell. Little girls tittered. Phrony Walker tossed her braid flippantly over her shoulder, casually displaying a new hair ribbon with which she meant to impress the city girl who wore and needed none. Sophronia's hair did not kink and curl as Katharine's did, but it was "a hunderd times as long and a great deal prettier colored." Kate had said so herself, yet here was she who was so generously admiring, almost covetous, calmly unobservant of braid, ribbon, and all.
Martha and Mary Turner came, swinging their lunch-basket between them, delightfully conscious that in its depths were stored three apple turnovers, one for each of them and one for Kitty Keehoty, who was never allowed to carry pie to school. With a child's fondness for the indigestible, she had once declared that Mrs. Turner's turnovers were "sim-ply de-lic-ious," and they had teased their mother ever since to make one for their new friend. But they stopped short at sight of the light and dark head so close together over something they did not know about, and when Martha drew nearer and informed the dark-haired scribbler that she had "brought it," Kate merely nodded her head and continued scribbling.
Bob and Ned arrived, tackle over shoulder, intent upon playing hookey at afternoon session, and disgusted that Monty was so little excited by their grimacing pantomime, as they demonstrated how they would escape to the woods and invited his company. Then they tried ridicule, calling "girl-boy, girl-boy," as loudly as they dared, with Katharine's scornful glances upon them. Monty grew fiery red and tossed his blond head as if shaking an obnoxious insect from it, but did not cease to scratch it for ideas, which he whispered to his companion as fast as he dug them out.
Even when the teacher came and Kate sprang to her feet to bid him her always courteously ready "Good morning," also dragging Montgomery to his own feet as a reminder of what was correct, that excited, exalted expression left neither young face.
Matters continued thus all through school. Monty was worse than ordinary in the matter of lessons, and that was saying much. Katharine, having had better advantages, stood far in advance of her class, so had no need to study, and kept her slips of paper in her book all the time she sat at her desk. She was not a rapid writer and she certainly had a deal of writing to do. At recess the before-school performance was repeated; and when the truants, Bob and Ned, disappeared in the direction of the "Eddy" after "noonin'," Monty failed to send one regretful glance thither. He was more occupied in watching the face of the clock than anything else, and as soon as dismissal-bell rang, darted from the schoolroom as if propelled by a gun. Just then, too, the first warning notes of Reuben Smith's horn came floating through the trees and down the street, and thereafter all that was seen of the boy was a pair of heels vanishing in air.
"Why, what in the world ails Monty? And say, Katy, didn't you like your turnover?" asked Martha Turner, drawing near to her heroine and showing that she felt somewhat aggrieved.
"Oh, Monty's all right. He – Don't you worry. You'll all know sometime. And didn't I eat it?"
"Yes. You ate it fast enough, but you didn't say whether you liked it or not. I think ma, she – "
"Oh, you dear thing! Of course I liked it; and please make my regards to your mother and tell her that I thank her very much. It was the nicest turnover I ever had, and – and it was the first one."
To an older mind this might not have been so convincing an argument, but it satisfied Martha. She considered that Katharine Maitland had the "perfectly sweetest manner of any girl in the world," and was daily trying to improve her own by the pattern set. "Make my regards." She had never heard that phrase before, but it impressed her as very stately and "Miss Eunicey," so put it away in her memory for future use. She was further delighted by Katharine's begging her and Mary to walk home with her, as far as they went her way, for she had something to talk over with them.
But when she revealed this "something" it proved not so much after all. She merely inquired exactly how many boys and girls there were in their school and out of it. "I want to get the name of every single child that isn't more than sixteen years old. As much younger as you please, but older than that would be grown-ups. At least, they would be in Baltimore."
That settled it. Whatever was done "in Baltimore" seemed to these young provincials as the acme of correctness; little knowing that to a wider world even "Baltimore" was also provincial.
But it was easy enough to "count noses," as Mary phrased it, and the list of names Katharine had already prepared swelled considerably. She wrote as she walked, the cover of her book her desk, and with such haste that the writing was almost illegible. However, a trifle of that sort could be overcome.
"No, Mattie, I know it isn't very plain, but I guess I'll make it out. Let's hurry. Reuben Smith's blowing his go-away horn, and I want to see – Oh, yes! There he is! The stage-driver keeps blowing every little while, yet he keeps talking, too, so I know it's all right! Oh, just fancy! It's going to be perfectly, perfectly splendid! Oh, you dear, dear things!"
Katharine's playmates were accustomed to being caught up and hugged whenever anything pleased her more than common, and she was usually as free in explaining her delight as in expressing it physically. But she explained nothing now. She merely squeezed their hands, and stared at Mr. Smith still arguing with Montgomery, till suddenly looking around she saw their puzzled faces.
"Never mind me, girls. I can't tell yet, not just yet, because it's a beautiful secret. But you'll all know right soon. You're going to be in it, too; we're all going to be in it! Oh, the happy old man! Oh, the fun! Oh, the queer crazy decorations! I believe I'm just too happy to live! But the stage is going and I must run to Monty. Good-by. Be sure to be at school to-morrow. Then you'll know."
Reuben Smith mounted to his high seat, blew a farewell blast on his ancient horn, and drove away out of the village, while Montgomery fairly tumbled over himself in his haste to meet Katharine, who greeted him with the question:
"Well, will he do it?"
"Y-y-y-ye-es!" gasped the breathless lad, and sat down on the edge of the path to recover.
For once careless of dust, Kate dropped down beside him and counted questions off upon her fingers so fast that Monty could only nod his head in acquiescence. Then she drew a small chain purse from her blouse pocket, where it had been carefully pinned ever since she left home in the morning. From this she took a pile of new one-dollar bills – ten in all – and laid them one by one on Montgomery's outstretched palms. It was the largest amount of money Kate had ever owned, it was almost the largest the boy had ever seen. A feeling like awe stole upon him and he whispered, – without a stutter, – "S'pose he should lose it!"
"That's a good boy. Monty, you're improving so fast, you'll beat the time I set for you to conquer in. Have you said your piece to-day? And, of course he won't lose it. Men don't lose things. Except Uncle Moses his 'specs' and the deacon his two-pronged fork, that's never in the hay-mow when he wants it there. Stage-drivers don't lose, anyway, and I'm glad it's you, not I, who have to deal with him. He doesn't like me much. I was saucy when I came. I don't think I am quite, not quite so saucy spoken as I was when I came. Do you, Monty?"
"O-o-oh, not n-n-nigh!" he easily replied, never having thought at all about it. He was still entranced with the possession, even temporary, of such vast wealth as he was now bestowing in an old and hitherto useless purse. The crisp new bills. How fat they made it! How utterly and entirely delightful was this girl from the outside world who had such wonderful ideas and the ability to carry them out!
Then the purse was put away in the innermost of all his many inner pockets, and around his blouse, beneath his jacket, Monty fastened a leather strap. Buckling this so tight he could hardly breathe, and fastening the coat over all, he slapped his chest admiringly, and valiantly declared:
"A-a-anybody get that a-a-away from me'll have to k-k-kill me f-f-first!"
Katy jumped up. "Let's go ask Aunt Eunice about the pumpkins!"
In an instant they were off down the street, and some, looking out of window as they raced past, remarked:
"There they go again, Sturtevant and Maitland, each generation as close friends as the other. But chummy as they've been ever since Johnny's girl came to Marsden, there's something more than common on the carpet now."
There certainly was. They burst in upon Miss Maitland's solitude, forgetful to tap at door as they both knew they should, and simultaneously besought the startled lady:
"Please, Aunt Eunice, may we have all the pumpkins in the south corn-field?"
At least, that was what Katharine said. Monty's request was proffered stammeringly but not less earnestly, and he said "punkins" with no attempt at correctness of speech.
"Children! What a pair of noisy creatures you are! Where have you come from? You are late if just from school. And, Montgomery, does your grandmother know that you are here?"
"N-n-no, Aunt E-E-E-Eunice. Nev' mind her. She w-w-won't care. C-c-c-can we?"
"I – don't think I quite understand. Did you ask me for a pumpkin? Please repeat."
"'A pumpkin' – that's one; no, indeed!" said Katy, scornfully. "We want the whole field full of them. We sha'n't hurt them any, Monty says, and he knows 'bout country things better than I do." Here she bestowed such an approving smile upon her comrade that he flushed and smiled beatifically. There were so few, so very few, things in which he could really excel this superior city creature, yet she was so generous as to perceive them even before he did himself.
Just then Susanna came in greatly flurried, and, catching Eunice's arm, tried to draw her hastily out of the room. Miss Maitland herself had swiftly caught her housemate's perturbation. Indeed, she had already been perturbed when the children intruded upon her, and had, apparently, now forgotten them.
Katharine saw their opportunity slipping from them, and opportunity was something that girl never wasted for want of readiness to seize it. Running after the departing lady, she clasped her skirt and stayed her long enough to put her question once more:
"May we, aunty? Oh, please, before you go, say – yes!"
"Yes. Why, of course, yes, yes," returned the lady, all unheeding unto what she had given her consent.
But she was to learn. Ah, yes! She was to learn in good time.
CHAPTER XIX.
WHAT THE MOON SAW IN THE CORN-FIELD
October had now nearly gone, and there was a chill in the air which would, under ordinary circumstances, have made both Eunice and Susanna pause before setting off into the woods at that hour in the afternoon. Certainly they would not have gone without wraps and shawls galore, but neither paused now. As swiftly, almost as secretly, as two guilty schoolgirls would have started upon some surreptitious adventure, they left the house by the back door and passed through the back garden. From thence they struck into the path to the woodland and hurried forward. Between strides the widow managed to interject a few explanatory sentences.
"I got the wash off the line." Pause. "An' I got oneasy." Another pause. Resuming: "I felt druv to go out there, alone even, an' see. What you said about starvin' him worked on me, dreadful. I took a basket o' victuals. Bad as he is – Oh, my suz!"
"Walk slower, Susanna. We shall be overdone if we keep this pace. What then?" asked Miss Maitland.
"Well, I went. I run 'most all the way. I got there – an' he wasn't. He wasn't at all!"
"Do you mean that he had left the cottage?"
"My suz! I should think he has. He's left, an' my log-cabin quilt's left, an' my best feather tick, an' pillows, an' a pair blankets – that kitchen-bedroom bedstead's stripped as clean as 'twas the day it was born – I mean, sot up. Now – what do you think of that?"
"I think – Oh, what a miserable business it all is! I am so worried I cannot sleep. Right and wrong, right and wrong, like the pendulum of the clock the two sides of the matter swing in my mind till I'm half-distracted. I hardly know what I am doing or saying, I am so anxious to do the best for everybody, yet what is best? I have a fear that those children asked me something absurd a few minutes ago, and I said 'yes' to them without comprehending. I think they said 'a field of pumpkins.' What could they want with a field —a field– of pumpkins?"
"Didn't want 'em, of course. Some their silliness. Don't worry. What's punkins, anyhow, compared with that log-cabin quilt?"
"Little, to be sure. And I hope it isn't really lost. Are you certain that the poor wretch is he you said?"
"As sure as I draw my breath," averred Susanna, solemnly.
"Then Squire Pettijohn must never know," said Eunice, with equal solemnity.
After that they hurried silently onward again, reckless of the fact that they had left a bedridden man alone in the house, for although the deacon was still about his evening chores, such kept him wholly outside. As for Katharine, she might or might not be on hand if Moses summoned her. Evidently she and her boy-chum had some fine scheme on hand and were away to put it in train, since they had both been more than commonly excited and eager.
Never mind. There are times in life when its commonplace affairs must yield to the extraordinary. These two quiet householders had come to such a time on that late October day.
They had walked almost as far as Susanna's cottage when Eunice paused, and held her companion also back, as she pointed through the darkening wood to a wild-looking creature prowling among the trees. He was evidently looking for something. His search so earnest and troubled that the caution he had heretofore displayed had deserted him. Stooping, poking among the leaves and bracken, rising, moving toward another tree, stooping again – repeating endlessly this same proceeding, the watchers soon tired of simply observing him.
"Stay here, Susanna. You were right. It is he. I will go and speak to him."
"Alone? Oh, Eunice, don't! Let the old quilt go! I wish I hadn't told ye. Besides, who'd ever want to sleep under it after he'd touched it?"
But though she caught at her mistress's hand to prevent such foolhardiness, Susanna could not stop her. She was walking swiftly toward the searcher and almost noiselessly, and had come up to him before he was aware. When she was close at his side, so close that her firm fingers rested on his ragged shoulder, he discovered her and started away. But she held him quiet, more by her will than her grasp, while, looking steadily into his eyes, she spoke his name, gently, kindly, as one who welcomes a long absent friend:
"Nathan! Why, Nathan! How glad I am to see you!"
The tramp no longer struggled to free himself, but as if spellbound by her gaze returned it in silence. Gradually there stole over his haggard features the light of recognition, and, instead of remembering later events, his mind reverted to his boyhood.
"Be you Miss Eunice? But – I hain't got my lesson."
Again he would have slunk away expecting a reprimand; yet none came. Quite to the contrary, Miss Maitland's own face brightened and she laughed, answering:
"Never mind the lesson, laddie. We're not little boy and young woman to-day, Sunday scholar and Sunday teacher. We're just two old friends well met, with other things to learn besides printed lessons. What have you lost? Can I help you find it?"
"A box. His'n. I fetched it safe so fur – an' now – now – I can't see it nowhere. Planck'll frown an' make me feel mean. I promised – "
There a pitiful stupidity took the place of the intelligent recognition he had momentarily displayed, and he resumed that fruitless search under the trees.
"Wait, Nathan. Maybe I know. Maybe I can help you. The box was an old, old box. It was of mahogany, heavy, bound with brass, with neither key nor keyhole, and only those who had been shown how could open it. Is that the one, Nathan?"
"Yes, yes! It's all safe inside. He put it there – just when – just – "
With a sudden outburst of grief he began to weep. The great tears ran down his dirty cheeks and streaked them. His breath came in great blubbering sobs which he made no effort to check.
Eunice Maitland also went back in spirit many years and saw before her now, not the repellent vagrant, but a forlorn child who must be comforted. Without shrinking she clasped his vile hand in her dainty one and turned him back toward Susanna's cottage. That good soul had now drawn near and was herself crying bitterly. Why – she could hardly have explained. Surely, not from any affection for Nathan Pettijohn, returned rascal, nor from any sentimental memory of bygone years, such as her mistress's; but just naturally, in sympathy with two other tear-wet faces. She found the tears a relief. Indeed, they all appeared to do so, and began to retrace the way to the woodland cottage with swifter steps. The two women, because they were feeling the cold and now realizing what a foolish thing they had done in coming out unprotected from it. The vagrant, because it was his nature to follow rather than lead. Arrived there, they found the door wide open and the furnishing sadly disordered. Evidently, Nathan had rummaged the place thoroughly.
The Widow Sprigg had long since dried her unaccountable tears, and was freshly indignant at the state of affairs. So soon as they were within doors she turned upon the intruder, and demanded:
"What did you mean by such doin's as these, Nate Pettijohn? Ain't you ashamed to destroy folkses prope'ty this way? Where's my log-cabin quilt? My pillows? All my things?"
The man paid no heed to her, but fixed a hungry gaze upon the basket she had brought earlier in the afternoon, and Eunice interposed:
"Wait, Susanna. Let us feed him first, and hear his story afterward."
With that she opened the basket and set fresh food before him, while, with that thoughtfulness which was so constantly belying her sharp tongue, the cottage mistress went to the well and brought in a fresh pail of water. Though not as ravenous as he had been that afternoon by the riverside, he even now devoured, rather than ate, the sandwiches and cakes, swallowing them noisily and so rapidly that what the housekeeper had supposed would be sufficient to last any one for at least twenty-four hours disappeared in less than as many minutes.
"Well, my suz! If that don't beat the Dutch! I shouldn't think, if I hadn't knowed better, 'at you'd seen a mouthful o' victuals sence you scooted out o' Marsden a dozen years ago! An' as for manners – why, our pigs is better behaved. Water? Drink your fill, an' then, Nate Pettijohn, you walk right straight out to that wash-dish in the lean-to an' scrub yourself well. Of all the dirty creatur's – Why, what?"
The vagrant had been seized by a violent fit of coughing, so fierce that it threatened hemorrhage; and Susanna's wrath died.
"Consumption!" she whispered to Eunice, and shivered. It was of consumption "Spriggs, he" had died.
The paroxysm passed and left its victim exhausted. With a longing for rest, he tottered out of the kitchen into the lean-to, but not to wash as its owner had suggested. He went directly to the now uncovered manhole of the cistern and slowly descended a short ladder which protruded from it and had always hitherto hung upon the wall. The women watched him in astonishment, then Susanna hastily procured a candle, and, lighting it, held it above the opening.
As she had herself once said, the cistern was as dry as possible, and was in reality like a low-ceilinged little room, with the manhole for sky-light. Into this place the vagrant had tossed the missing bedding, and with his habit of hiding had bestowed himself upon it. In all probability, he had rarely occupied so snug and comfortable, though peculiar, a bedchamber.
"My – s-u-z!" gasped the widow, and sat down on a wash-bench to recover from her amazement.
Miss Maitland said nothing, yet an expression of great satisfaction settled upon her countenance, and, motioning her friend back into the kitchen, explained its cause.
"Nathan himself has decided what should best be done with him. He is perfectly safe and comfortable in that cistern. It is warm and sufficiently aired. He will not be apt to build a fire, as you feared, especially if we see to it that he has enough to eat. Nobody will think of looking for him in such a place, even though, as he declared he should, his father organizes a search for him. Unhappy father, if he does, and – poor, unhappy son. He looks very ill, and he certainly is no more intelligent than when he went away. But he is evidently faithful to Verplanck Sturtevant, as he always was. It is he that has brought back and for safe-keeping, presumably, hidden the brass bound box that Katharine found, and that has led to so many wild rumors. Do you not think we would better leave him undisturbed for the present, until I can secure better clothing for him? Also, can decide that awful question – whether or not to tell Elinor the stolen box is found. It will be like deliberately trying to break her heart over again if I give it to her and it is empty. Yet, it is not mine, and it rests on my conscience like an actual weight. Do advise me, Susanna."
From which it appears that the widow's curiosity had already been satisfied concerning the fabulous "find" in the Maitland forest, and she readily assented to her companion's idea.
"No, Eunice, we couldn't do better. Let him be. Poor wretch, he won't trouble nobody long, by the sound o' that cough. An' if Squire Pettijohn is mean enough an' onfeelin' enough to treat him like he vowed he would ary tramp, 'even his own son,' I guess we can let the Lord 'tend to him. He wouldn't know another day's peace, not if he's human; 'cause once that mis'able creatur', no matter what he is now, was a baby – a baby in arms. But – my suz, Eunice! I've just figured it out! How can the Squire 'rest anybody? He ain't no constable. Nobody ain't a constable here in Marsden. Ain't been none sence Isaac Brewster died, an' nobody would take his place. 'Less I'm one, myself, as Moses said."
At which she laughed heartily, then hastily added:
"But we must be gettin' home to oncet. I'll step up attic an' get a couple o' shawls to wrop 'round us, heads an' all. I do hope we shall be pervented from takin' cold temptin' Providence the way we have, at our time o' life. Nate, he won't stir no more to-night. He's too tuckered out an' too well fed. Sleep's the best medicine for him, so we'll shut up quiet like an' start. But where in the world'll you get clothes, as you said? Man's clothes, you an' me, old women without a man betwixt us, except Moses, an' it bein' kep' secret from him still. If you tell him he'll tell the deacon, an' what the deacon knows belongs to the hull community."
"I'll find them, Susanna; I'll send an order for all he needs by the morning stage."
"Tell Reub Smith! My suz! Might as well proclaim it from the church steeple!"
"No, indeed. I shall not tell him, but simply send an order by him when he goes to town in the morning."
Then they hurried home, and Miss Maitland rested better that night than she had done since the children brought her the brass bound box from out the forest.
Next morning Monty "hooked school." Not that this was an extraordinary thing to happen, although its purpose was mysterious. He did not seek either woods or river, for nuts or fishes, but hung about the post-office till Reuben Smith drove tooting down South Hill into the village street on his way outward toward the county town. The stage drew up with a jerk, Reuben stepped down with unusual liveliness, and behold! there were two patrons ready with orders to be executed.
Miss Eunice and Montgomery Sturtevant. They faced each other in mutual surprise. Each held a sealed letter in hand and each was in haste. The lady spoke first: "Why, Monty! Is your grandmother trusting you to take care of her business matters already? That's fine."
