The Corner House Girls Under Canvas, Page 3

  CHAPTER III

  THE DANCE AT CARRIE POOLE'S

  Tess and Dot Kenway had something of particular interest to hold theirattention, too, the minute they awoke on this Sunday morning. Dotvoiced the matter first when she asked:

  "Do you suppose that dear Tom Jonah is here yet, Tess?"

  "Oh, I hope so!" cried the older girl.

  "Let's run see," suggested Dot, and nothing loth Tess slipped into herbathrobe and slippers, too, and the two girls pattered downstairs.Their baths, always overseen by Ruth, were neglected. They must see,they thought, if the good old dog was on the porch.

  Nobody was astir downstairs; Mrs. MacCall had not yet left her room,and on Sunday mornings even Uncle Rufus allowed himself an extra hourin bed. There was the delicious smell of warm baked beans left overnight in the range oven; the big, steaming pot would be set upon thetable at breakfast, flanked with golden-brown muffins on one side andthe sliced "loaf," or brownbread, on the other.

  Sandyface came yawning from her basket behind the stove when Tess andDot entered the kitchen. She had four little black and white blindbabies in that basket which she had found in a barrel in the woodshedonly a few days before.

  Mrs. MacCall said she did not know what was to be done with the fourkittens. Sandyface's original family was quite grown up, and if thesefour were allowed to live, too, that would make nine cats around theold Corner House.

  "And the goodness knows!" exclaimed the housekeeper, "that's a wholelot more than any family has a business to keep. We're overrun withcats."

  Tess unlocked the door and she and Dot went out on the porch,Sandyface following. There was no sign of the big dog.

  "Tom Jonah's gone!" sighed Dot, quaveringly.

  "I wouldn't have thought it--when we treated him so nicely," saidTess.

  Sandyface sniffed suspiciously at the old mat on which the dog hadlain. Then she looked all about before venturing off the porch.

  The sunshine and quiet of a perfect Sunday morning lay all about theold Corner House. Robins sought their very souls for music to tell howhappy they were, in the tops of the cherry trees. Catbirds had not yetlost their love songs of the spring; though occasionally one scoldedharshly when a roaming cat came too near the hidden nest.

  Wrens hopped about the path, and even upon the porch steps, secure intheir knowledge that they were too quick for Sandyface to reach, andwith unbounded faith in human beings. An oriole burst into melody,swinging in the great snowball bush near the Willow Street fence.

  There was a moist, warm smell from the garden; the old rooster crowedraucously; Billy Bumps bleated a wistful "Good-morning" from his pen.Then came a scramble of padded feet, and Sandyface went up the nearesttree like a flash of lightning.

  "Here is Tom Jonah!" cried Tess, with delight.

  From around the corner of the woodshed appeared the big, shaggy dog.He cocked one ear and actually smiled when he saw the cat go up thetree. But he trotted right up on the porch to meet the delightedgirls.

  His brown eyes were deep pools where golden sparks played. The mud hadbeen mostly shaken off his flanks and paws. He was rested, and heacted as though he were sure of his position here at the old CornerHouse.

  "Good old fellow!" cried Tess, putting out a hand to pat him.

  At once Tom Jonah put up his right paw to shake hands. He repeated thefeat with Dot the next moment, to the delight of both girls.

  "Oh!" gasped Dot, "he's a trick dog."

  "He's just what his collar says; he's a gentleman," sighed Tess,happily. "Oh! I hope his folks won't ever come after him."

  Ruth had to come down for Tess and Dot or they would not have beenbathed and dressed in time for breakfast. The smaller girls were verymuch taken with Tom Jonah.

  They found that he had more accomplishments than "shaking hands." WhenAgnes came down and heard about his first manifestation of education,she tried him at other "stunts."

  He sat up at the word of command. He would hold a bit of meat, or asweet cracker, on his nose any length of time you might name, andnever offer to eat it until you said, "Now, sir!" or something of thekind. Then Tom Jonah would jerk the tidbit into the air and catch itin his jaws as it came down.

  And those jaws! Powerful indeed, despite some of the teeth having beenbroken and discolored by age. For Tom Jonah was no puppy. Uncle Rufusdeclared him to be at least twelve years old, and perhaps more thanthat.

  But he had the physique of a lion--a great, broad chest, and musclesin his shoulders that slipped under the skin when he was in actionlike a tiger's. Now that he was somewhat rested from the long journeyhe had evidently taken, he seemed a very powerful, healthy dog.

  "And he would have eaten that tramp up, if he'd gotten hold of him,"Agnes declared, as they gathered at the breakfast table.

  "Oh, no, Aggie; I don't think Tom Jonah would really have _bitten_that Gypsy man," Tess hastened to say. "But he might have grabbed hiscoat and held on."

  "With those jaws--I guess he would have held on," sighed Agnes.

  "Anyway," said Dot, "he saved Ruthie's hens. Didn't he, Ruthie?"

  "I'll gladly pay his license fee if he wants to stay with us," saidRuth, gaily.

  The cornmeal muffins chanced to be a little over-baked that morning;at least, one panful was. Dot did not like "crusts"; she had beenknown to hide very hard ones under the edge of her plate.

  She played with one of these muffin crusts more than she ate it, andAunt Sarah Maltby (who was a very grim lady indeed with penetratingeyes and a habit of seldom speaking) had an accusing eye upon thelittle girl.

  "Dorothy," she said, suddenly, "you will see the time, I have nodoubt, when you will be hungry for that crust. You had better eat itnow like a nice girl."

  "Aunt Sarah, I really do not want it," said Dot, gravely. "And--and ifI don't, do you think I shall really some day be hungry for just_this_ pertic'lar crust?"

  "You will. I expect nothing less," snapped Aunt Sarah. "The Kenwayswas allus spend-thrifts. Why! when I was your age, Dorothy, I was gladto get dry bread to eat!"

  Dot looked at her with serious interest. "You must have been awfullypoor, Aunt Sarah," she said, sympathetically. "You have a much bettertime living with us, don't you?"

  Ruth shook her head admonishingly at the smallest girl; but for onceAunt Sarah was rather nonplussed, and nobody heard her speak againbefore she went off to church.

  Neale came over later, dressed for Sunday school, and he was as muchinterested in the new boarder at the Corner House as the girlsthemselves.

  "If he belongs anywhere around Milton, somebody will surely know abouthim," said the boy. "I'll make inquiries. Wherever he comes from, hemust be well known in that locality."

  "Why so?" demanded Agnes.

  "Because of what it says on his collar," laughed Neale O'Neil.

  "Because of what it _doesn't_ say, I guess," explained Ruth, seeingher sister's puzzled face. "There is no name of owner, or licensenumber. Do you see?"

  "It--it would be an insult to license a dog like Tom Jonah," sputteredTess. "Just--just like a tag on an automobile!"

  "Yo' right, honey," chuckled Uncle Rufus. "He done seem likefolkses--don' he? I'se gwine tuh give him a reg'lar barf an' cure updem sore feetses ob his. He'll be anudder dawg--sho' will!"

  The old man took Tom Jonah to the grass plot near the garden hydrant,and soaped him well--with the "insect-suicide" soap Dot had talkedabout--and afterward washed him down with the hose. Tom Jonah stoodfor it all; he had evidently been used to having his toilet attendedto.

  When the girls came home from Sunday school, they found him lying onthe porch, all warm and dried and his hair "fluffy." They had askedeverybody they met--almost--about Tom Jonah; but not a soul knewanything regarding him.

  "He's going to be ours for keeps! He's going to be ours for keeps!"sang Tess, with delight.

  Sandyface's earlier family--Spotty, Almira, Bungle andPopocatepetl--had taken a good look at the big dog, and then backedaway with swelling tails and muffled objections. B
ut the old cat hadto attend to the four little blind mites behind the kitchen range, soshe had grown familiar enough with Tom Jonah to pass him on her way toand from the kitchen door.

  He was too much of a gentleman, as his collar proclaimed, to pay herthe least attention save for a friendly wag of his bushy tail. To thefour half-grown cats he gave little heed. But Tess and Dot thoughtthat he ought to become acquainted with the un-named kittens in thebasket immediately.

  "If they get used to him, you know," said Tess, "they'll all livetogether just like a 'happy family.'"

  "Like _us_?" suggested Dot, who did not quite understand thereference, having forgotten the particular cage thus labeled in thecircus they had seen the previous summer.

  "Why! of course like us!" laughed Tess, and Sandyface being awayforaging for her brood, Tess seized the basket and carried it out onthe porch, setting it down before Tom Jonah who was lying in the sun.

  The big dog sniffed at the basket but did not offer to disturb thesleeping kittens. That would not do for the curious girls. They had todelve deeper into the natural lack of affinity between the canine andthe feline families.

  So Tess lifted one little black and white, squirmy kitten--just as itsmother did, by the back of its neck--and set it upon the porch beforethe dog's nose. The kitten became awake instantly. Blind as it was, itstiffened its spine into an arch, backed away from the vicinity of thedog precipitately, and "spit" like a tiny teakettle boiling over.

  "Oh! oh! the horrid thing," wailed Dot. "And poor Tom Jonah didn't doa thing to it!"

  "But see him!" gasped Tess, in a gale of giggles.

  For really, Tom Jonah looked too funny for anything. He turned awayhis head with a most embarrassed expression of countenance and wouldnot look again at the spitting little animal. He evidently felthimself in a most ridiculous position and finally got up and went offthe porch altogether until the girls returned the basket of kittens toits proper place behind the stove.

  At dinner that Sunday, when Uncle Rufus served the roast, he held theswinging door open until Tom Jonah paced in behind him into thedining-room. Seeing the roast placed before Mrs. MacCall, Tom Jonahsat down beside her chair in a good position to observe the feast; butwaited his turn in a most gentlemanly manner.

  Mrs. MacCall cut some meat for him and put it on a plate. This UncleRufus put before Tom Jonah; but the big dog did not offer to eat ituntil he was given permission. And now he no longer "gobbled," but atedaintily, and sat back when he was finished like any well-bred person,waiting for the next course.

  Even Aunt Sarah looked with approval upon the new acquisition to thefamily of the old Corner House. She had heard the tale of his rescueof Ruth's poultry from the marauding Gypsy, and patted Tom Jonah'snoble head.

  "It's a good thing to have a watch-dog on the premises," she said,"with all that old silver and trash you girls insist upon keeping outof the plate-safe. Your Uncle Peter would turn in his grave if he knewhow common you was makin' the Stower plate."

  "But what is the good of having a thing if you don't make use of it?"queried Ruth, stoutly.

  Ruth was a girl with a mind of her own, and not even the carpingcriticisms of Aunt Sarah could turn her from her course if once shewas convinced that what she did was right. Nor was she frightened byher schoolmates' opinions--as note her friendship with Rosa Wildwood.

  Bob Wildwood was a "character" in Milton. People smiled at him andforgave his peculiarities to a degree; but they could not respect him.

  In the first place, Bob was a Southerner--and a Southerner in a NewEngland town is just as likely to be misunderstood, as a Northerner ina Georgian town.

  Bob and his daughter, Rosa, had drifted to Milton a couple of yearsprevious. They had been "drifting" for most of the girl's short life;but now Rosa was quite big enough to have some influence with hershiftless father, and they had taken some sort of root in the harshNew England soil, so different from their own rich bottom-lands of theSouth.

  Besides, Rosa was in ill health. She was "weakly"; Bob spoke of her ashaving "a mis'ry in her chest." Dr. Forsythe found that the girl hadweak lungs, but he was sane and old-fashioned enough to scout the ideathat she was in danger of becoming a victim of tuberculosis.

  "If you go to work, Bob, and earn for her decent food and a warmshelter, she will pull through and get as hearty and strong as ourNorthern girls," declared the doctor, sternly. "You say you lost hertwin two years ago----"

  "But I didn't done los' Juniper by no sickness," muttered Bob, shakinghis head.

  The Corner House girls thought Bob Wildwood a most amusing man, for hetalked just like a darky (to their ears); but Uncle Rufus shook hishead in scorn at Wildwood. "He's jes' no-'count white trash," the oldcolored man observed.

  However, spurred by the doctor's threat, Bob let drink alone for themost part, and went to work for Rosa, his remaining daughter, who wasjust Ruth's age and was in her class at High--when she was well enoughto get there. In spite of her blood and bringing up, Rosa Wildwood hada quick and retentive mind and stood well in her classes.

  Bob became a coal-heaver. He worked for Lovell & Malmsey. He drove apair of mules without lines, ordering them about in a most wonderfulmanner in a tongue entirely strange to Northern teamsters; and he wasblack with coal-dust from week-end to week-end. Ruth said there onlywas one visible white part of Rosa's father; that was the whites ofhis eyes.

  The man must have loved his daughter very much, however; for it washis nature to be shiftless. He would have gone hungry and raggedhimself rather than work. He now kept steadily at his job for Rosa'ssake.

  On Monday Rosa was not at school, and coming home to luncheon at noon,Ruth ran half a block out of her way to find out what was the matter.Not alone was the tenement the Wildwoods occupied a very poor one, butRosa was no housekeeper. It almost disgusted the precise and prim RuthKenway to go into the three-room tenement.

  Rosa had a cold, and of course it had settled on her chest. She wasjust dragging herself around to get something hot for Bob's dinner.Ruth made her go back to bed, and she finished the preparations.

  When she came to make the tea, the Corner House girl was horrified toobserve that the metal teapot had probably not been thoroughly washedout since the day the Wildwoods had taken up their abode in Milton.

  "Paw likes to have the tea set back on the stove," drawled Rosa, withher pleasant Southern accent. "When he gets a chance, he runs in and'takes a swig,' as he calls it, out of the pot. He says it's good forthe gnawin' in his stomach--it braces him up an' is _so_ much betterthan when he useter mix toddies," said the girl, gratefully. "We'dhave had June with us yet, if it hadn't been for paw's toddies."

  "Oh!" cried Ruth, startled. "I thought your sister June died?"

  Rosa shook her head and the tears flowed into her soft eyes. "Oh, no.She went away. She couldn't stand the toddies no more, she said--andher slavin' to keep the house nice, and us movin' on all the time.June was housekeeper--she was a long sight smarter'n me, Ruth."

  "But the teachers at school think you are awfully smart," declared theCorner House girl.

  "June warn't so smart at her books," said Rosa. "But she could do_anything_ with her hands. You'd thunk she was two years older'n me,too. She was dark and handsome. She got mad, and run away, and then westarted lookin' for her; but we've never found her yet," sighed Rosa."And now I've got so miserable that I can't keep traveling with paw.So we got to stop here, and maybe we won't ever see June again."

  "Oh! I hope you will," cried Ruth. "Now, your father's dinner is allready to dish up. And I'll come back after school this afternoon andrid up the house for you; don't you do a thing."

  Ruth had time that noon for only a bite at home, and explained to Mrs.MacCall that she would be late in returning from school. She carried avoluminous apron with her to cover her school frock when she set about"ridding up" the Wildwood domicile.

  Ruth wanted to help Rosa; she hoped Rosa would keep up with the classand be promoted at the end of the term, as she was sure to be her
self.And she was sorry for sooty, odd-talking Bob Wildwood.

  What Rosa had said about her lost twin sister had deeply interestedRuth Kenway. She wanted, too, to ask the Southern girl about "June,"or Juniper.

  "We were the last children maw had," said Rosa. "She just seemed togive up after we were born. The others were all sickly--just droopedand faded. And they all were girls and had flower names. Maw was rightfanciful, I reckon.

  "I wish June had held on. She'd stuck it out, I know, if she'dbelieved paw could stop drinking toddies. But, you see he _has_. He'swigs' an awful lot of tea, though, and I expect it's tanning himinside just like he was leather!"

  Ruth really thought this was probable--especially with the teapot inthe condition she had found it. But she had put some washing soda inthe pot, filled it with boiling water, and set it back on the stove tostew some of the "tannin" out of it.

  While the Corner House girl was talking with Rosa in the littlebedroom the girl called her own, Bob brought his mules to a haltbefore the house with an empty wagon, and ran in as usual.

  The girls heard him enter the outer room; but Ruth never thought ofwhat the man's object might be until Rosa laughed and said:

  "There's paw now, for a swig at the teapot. I hope you left it fullfo' him, Ruthie, dear."

  "Oh, goodness mercy me!" cried the Corner House girl, and darted outto the kitchen to warn the man.

  But she was too late. Already the begrimed Bob Wildwood had the spoutof the teapot to his lips and several swallows of the scalding andacrid mixture gurgled down his throat before he discovered that it wasnot tea!

  "Woof! woof! woof!" he sputtered, and flung pot and all away from him."Who done tryin' poison me! Woof! I's scalded with poison!"

  He coughed and spluttered over the sink, and then tried a draught ofcold water from the spigot--which probably did him just as much goodas anything.

  "Oh, dear me, Mr. Wildwood!" gasped Ruth, standing with clasped handsand looking at the sooty man, half frightened. "I--I was just boilingthe teapot out."

  "Boilin' it out?"

  "Yes, sir. With soda. I--I----It won't poison you, I guess."

  "My Lawd!" groaned Bob. "What won't yo' Northerners do nex'? Wash outer teapot!" and he grumblingly went forth to his team and drove away.

  Ruth felt that her good intentions were misunderstood--to a degree.But Rosa thanked her very prettily for what she had done, and the nextday she was able to come to school again.

  It was only a few days later that Carrie Poole invited a number of thehigh school girls and boys--and some of the younger set--to the lastdance of the season at her home. She lived in a huge old farmhouse,some distance out of town on the Buckshot road, and the Corner Housegirls and Neale O'Neil had spent several pleasant evenings thereduring the winter and spring.

  The night before this party there was a big wind, and a part of one ofthe chimneys came down into the side yard during the night with anoise like thunder; so Ruth had to telephone for a mason beforebreakfast.

  Had it not been for this happening, the Corner House girls--at least,Ruth and Agnes--and Neale O'Neil, would have escaped rather anembarrassing incident at the party.

  Neale came over to supper the evening of the party, and he brought hispumps in a newspaper under his arm.

  "Come on, girls, let's have your dancing slippers," he said to the twoolder Corner House girls, who were going to the dance. "I'll put themwith mine."

  And he did so--rolling the girls' pretty slippers up in the sameparcel with his own. He left the parcel in the kitchen. Later it wasdiscovered that the mason's helper had left a similarly wrapped parcelthere, too.

  When the three young folk started off, it was Agnes who ran back afterthe bundle of dancing slippers. Neale carried it under his arm, andthey walked briskly out through the suburbs of Milton and on along theBuckshot road.

  "Are you really going to Pleasant Cove this summer, Neale?" demandedAgnes, as they went on together.

  "If I can. Joe has asked me. And you girls?"

  "Trix says we must come to her father's hotel for two weeks at least,"Agnes declared.

  "Humph!" said Neale, doubtfully. "Are you going, Ruth?"

  "I--don't--know," admitted the older Corner House girl.

  "Now, isn't that just too mean?" complained Agnes. "You just say thatbecause you don't like Trix."

  "I don't know whether Trix will be of the same mind when the timecomes," said Ruth, firmly.

  "I believe you," grunted Neale.

  Agnes pouted. "It's just mean of you," she said. "Of course she willwant us to go." While Agnes was "spoons" with a girl, she was alwaysstrictly loyal to her. She could not possibly see Trix Severn's faultsjust now.

  They arrived at the farmhouse and found a crowd already assembled.There was a great deal of talking and laughter, and while Neale stoodchatting with some of the boys in the hall, Ruth and Agnes came to himfor their slippers.

  "Sure!" said the boy, producing the newspaper-wrapped bundle hecarried. "Guess I'll put on my own pumps, too."

  He unrolled the parcel. Then a yell of derision and laughter arosefrom the onlookers; instead of three pairs of dancing slippers, Nealeproduced two pairs of half-worn and lime-bespattered shoes belongingto the masons who had repaired the old Corner House chimney!

  "Now we can't dance!" wailed Agnes.

  "Oh, Neale!" gasped Ruth, while the young folk about them went offinto another gale of laughter.

  "Well, it wasn't my fault," grumbled Neale. "Aggie went after thebundle."

  "Shouldn't have left them right there with the masons' bundle--sonow!" snapped Agnes.