At the Sign of the Jack O'Lantern

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  AT THE SIGN OF THE JACK O'LANTERN

  ByMYRTLE REED

  Author of

  Lavender and Old LaceThe Master's ViolinA Spinner in the SunOld Rose and SilverA Weaver of DreamsFlower of the DuskEtc.

  New YorkGROSSET & DUNLAPPublishers

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  Copyright, 1902

  BYMYRTLE REED

  By Myrtle Reed:

  A Weaver of Dreams Sonnets to a LoverOld Rose and Silver Master of the VineyardLavender and Old Lace Flower of the DuskThe Master's Violin At the Sign of the Jack-o'-LanternLove Letters of a Musician A Spinner in the SunThe Spinster Book Later Love Letters of a MusicianThe Shadow of Victory Love Affairs of Literary MenMyrtle Reed Year Book

  This edition is issued under arrangement with the publishersG. P. Putnam's Sons, New York and London

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  CONTENTS

  CHAPTER PAGE I. The End of the Honeymoon 1 II. The Day Afterward 18 III. The First Caller 35 IV. Finances 53 V. Mrs. Smithers 68 VI. The Coming of Elaine 84 VII. An Uninvited Guest 100 VIII. More 119 IX. Another 136 X. Still More 154 XI. Mrs. Dodd's Third Husband 173 XII. Her Gift to the World 191 XIII. A Sensitive Soul 210 XIV. Mrs. Dodd's Fifth Fate 226 XV. Treasure-Trove 243 XVI. Good Fortune 264 XVII. The Lady Elaine Knows Her Heart 282 XVIII. Uncle Ebeneezer's Diary 299 XIX. Various Departures 319 XX. The Love of Another Elaine 338

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  I

  The End of the Honeymoon

  It was certainly a queer house. Even through the blinding storm they coulddistinguish its eccentric outlines as they alighted from the stage.Dorothy laughed happily, heedless of the fact that her husband's umbrellawas dripping down her neck. "It's a dear old place," she cried; "I love italready!"

  For an instant a flash of lightning turned the peculiar windows intosheets of flame, then all was dark again. Harlan's answer was drowned by acrash of thunder and the turning of the heavy wheels on the gravelledroad.

  "Don't stop," shouted the driver; "I'll come up to-morrer for the money.Good luck to you--an' the Jack-o'-Lantern!"

  "What did he mean?" asked Dorothy, shaking out her wet skirts, when theywere safely inside the door. "Who's got a Jack-o'-Lantern?"

  "You can search me," answered Harlan, concisely, fumbling for a match. "Isuppose we've got it. Anyhow, we'll have a look at this sepulchral mansionpresently."

  His deep voice echoed and re-echoed through the empty rooms, and Dorothylaughed; a little hysterically this time. Match after match sputtered andfailed. "Couldn't have got much wetter if I'd been in swimming," hegrumbled. "Here goes the last one."

  By the uncertain light they found a candle and Harlan drew a long breathof relief. "It would have been pleasant, wouldn't it?" he went on. "Wecould have sat on the stairs until morning, or broken our admirable necksin falling over strange furniture. The next thing is a fire. Wonder wheremy distinguished relative kept his wood?"

  Lighting another candle, he went off on a tour of investigation, leavingDorothy alone.

  She could not repress a shiver as she glanced around the gloomy room. Thebare loneliness of the place was accentuated by the depressing furniture,which belonged to the black walnut and haircloth period. On themarble-topped table, in the exact centre of the room, was a red plushalbum, flanked on one side by a hideous china vase, and on the other by abasket of wax flowers under a glass shade.

  Her home-coming! How often she had dreamed of it, never for a momentguessing that it might be like this! She had fancied a little house in asuburb, or a cosy apartment in the city, and a lump came into her throatas her air castle dissolved into utter ruin. She was one of those rare,unhappy women whose natures are so finely attuned to beauty that uglinesshurts like physical pain.

  She sat down on one of the slippery haircloth chairs, facing the mantelwhere the single candle threw its tiny light afar. Little by little theroom crept into shadowy relief--the melodeon in the corner, the what-not,with its burden of incongruous ornaments, and even the easel bearing thecrayon portrait of the former mistress of the house, becoming faintlyvisible.

  Presently, from above the mantel, appeared eyes. Dorothy felt them first,then looked up affrighted. From the darkness they gleamed upon her in away that made her heart stand still. Human undoubtedly, but not in theleast friendly, they were the eyes of one who bitterly resented thepresence of an intruder. The light flickered, then flamed up once more andbrought into view the features that belonged with the eyes.

  Dorothy would have screamed, had it not been for the lump in her throat. Astep came nearer and nearer, from some distant part of the house,accompanied by a cheery, familiar whistle. Still the stern, malicious faceheld her spellbound, and even when Harlan came in with his load of wood,she could not turn away.

  "Now," he said, "we'll start a fire and hang ourselves up to dry."

  "What is it?" asked Dorothy, her lips scarcely moving.

  His eyes followed hers. "Uncle Ebeneezer's portrait," he answered. "Why,Dorothy Carr! I believe you're scared!"

  "I was scared," she admitted, reluctantly, after a brief silence, smilinga little at her own foolishness. "It's so dark and gloomy in here, and youwere gone so long----"

  Her voice trailed off into an indistinct murmur, but she still shudderedin spite of herself.

  "Funny old place," commented Harlan, kneeling on the hearth and layingkindlings, log-cabin fashion, in the fireplace. "If an architect plannedit, he must have gone crazy the week before he did it."

  "Or at the time. Don't, dear--wait a minute. Let's light our first firetogether."

  He smiled as she slipped to her knees beside him, and his hand held herswhile the blazing splinter set the pine kindling aflame. Quickly the wholeroom was aglow with light and warmth, in cheerful contrast to the stormytumult outside.

  "Somebody said once," observed Harlan, as they drew their chairs close tothe hearth, "that four feet on a fender are sufficient for happiness."

  "Depends altogether on the feet," rejoined Dorothy, quickly. "I wouldn'twant Uncle Ebeneezer sitting here beside me--no disrespect intended toyour relation, as such."

  "Poor old duck," said Harlan, kindly. "Life was never very good to him,and Death took away the only thing he ever loved.

  "Aunt Rebecca," he continued, feeling her unspoken question. "She diedsuddenly, when they had been married only three or four weeks."

  "Like us," whispered Dorothy, for the first time conscious of a tendernesstoward the departed Mr. Judson, of Judson Centre.

  "It was four weeks ago to-day, wasn't it?" he mused, instinctively seekingher hand.

  "I thought you'd forgotten," she smiled back at him. "I feel like an oldmarried woman, already."

  "You don't look it," he returned, gently. Few would have called herb
eautiful, but love brings beauty with it, and Harlan saw an exquisiteloveliness in the deep, dark eyes, the brown hair that rippled and shonein the firelight, the smooth, creamy skin, and the sensitive mouth thatbetrayed every passing mood.

  "None the less, I am," she went on. "I've grown so used to seeing 'Mrs.James Harlan Carr' on my visiting cards that I've forgotten there ever wassuch a person as 'Miss Dorothy Locke,' who used to get letters, and gocalling when she wasn't too busy, and have things sent to her when she hadthe money to buy them."

  "I hope--" Harlan stumbled awkwardly over the words--"I hope you'll neverbe sorry."

  "I haven't been yet," she laughed, "and it's four whole weeks. Come, let'sgo on an exploring expedition. I'm dry both inside and out, and mostterribly hungry."

  Each took a candle and Harlan led the way, in and out of unexpected doors,queer, winding passages, and lonely, untenanted rooms. Originally, thehouse had been simple enough in structure, but wing after wing had beenadded until the first design, if it could be dignified by that name, hadbeen wholly obscured. From each room branched a series of apartments--asitting-room, surrounded by bedrooms, each of which contained two orsometimes three beds. A combined kitchen and dining-room was in everyseparate wing, with an outside door.

  "I wonder," cried Dorothy, "if we've come to an orphan asylum!"

  "Heaven knows what we've come to," muttered Harlan. "You know I never washere before."

  "Did Uncle Ebeneezer have a large family?"

  "Only Aunt Rebecca, who died very soon, as I told you. Mother was his onlysister, and I her only child, so it wasn't on our side."

  "Perhaps," observed Dorothy, "Aunt Rebecca had relations."

  "One, two, three, four, five," counted Harlan. "There are five sets ofapartments on this side, and three on the other. Let's go upstairs."

  From the low front door a series of low windows extended across the houseon each side, abundantly lighting the two front rooms, which wereseparated by the wide hall. A high, narrow window in the lower hall,seemingly with no purpose whatever, began far above the low door and endedabruptly at the ceiling. In the upper hall, a similar window began at thefloor and extended upward no higher than Harlan's knees. As Dorothy said,"one would have to lie down to look out of it," but it lighted the hall,which, after all, was the main thing.

  In each of the two front rooms, upstairs, was a single round window, toohigh for one to look out of without standing on a chair, though in bothrooms there was plenty of side light. One wing on each side of the househad been carried up to the second story, and the arrangement of rooms wasthe same as below, outside stairways leading from the kitchens to theground.

  "I never saw so many beds in my life," cried Dorothy.

  "Seems to be a perfect Bedlam," rejoined Harlan, making a poor attempt ata joke and laughing mirthlessly. In his heart he began to doubt the wisdomof marrying on six hundred dollars, an unexplored heirloom in JudsonCentre, and an overweening desire to write books.

  For the first time, his temerity appeared to him in its proper colours. Hehad been a space writer and Dorothy the private secretary of a Personage,when they met, in the dreary basement dining-room of a New Yorkboarding-house, and speedily fell in love. Shortly afterward, when Harlanreceived a letter which contained a key, and announced that Mr. Judson'shouse, fully furnished, had been bequeathed to his nephew, they hadlight-heartedly embarked upon matrimony with no fears for the future.

  Two hundred dollars had been spent upon a very modest honeymoon, and thethree hundred and ninety-seven dollars and twenty-three cents remaining,as Harlan had accurately calculated, seemed pitifully small. Perplexity,doubt, and foreboding were plainly written on his face, when Dorothyturned to him.

  "Isn't it perfectly lovely," she asked, "for us to have this nice, quietplace all to ourselves, where you can write your book?"

  Woman-like, she had instantly touched the right chord, and the cloudsvanished.

  "Yes," he cried, eagerly. "Oh, Dorothy, do you think I can really writeit?"

  "Write it," she repeated; "why, you dear, funny goose, you can write abetter book than anybody has ever written yet, and I know you can! By nextweek we'll be settled here and you can get down to work. I'll help you,too," she added, generously. "If you'll buy me a typewriter, I can copythe whole book for you."

  "Of course I'll buy you a typewriter. We'll send for it to-morrow. Howmuch does a nice one cost?"

  "The kind I like," she explained, "costs a hundred dollars without thestand. I don't need the stand--we can find a table somewhere that willdo."

  "Two hundred and ninety-seven dollars and twenty-three cents," breathedHarlan, unconsciously.

  "No, only a hundred dollars," corrected Dorothy. "I don't care to have itsilver mounted."

  "I'd buy you a gold one if you wanted it," stammered Harlan, in someconfusion.

  "Not now," she returned, serenely. "Wait till the book is done."

  Visions of fame and fortune appeared before his troubled eyes and set hissoul alight with high ambition. The candle in his hand burned unsteadilyand dripped tallow, unheeded. "Come," said Dorothy, gently, "let's godownstairs again."

  An open door revealed a tortuous stairway at the back of the house,descending mysteriously into cavernous gloom. "Let's go down here," shecontinued. "I love curly stairs."

  "These are kinky enough to please even your refined fancy," laughedHarlan. "It reminds me of travelling in the West, where you look out ofthe window and see your engine on the track beside you, going the otherway."

  "This must be the kitchen," said Dorothy, when the stairs finally ceased."Uncle Ebeneezer appears to have had a pronounced fancy for kitchens."

  "Here's another wing," added Harlan, opening the back door. "Sitting-room,bedroom, and--my soul and body! It's another kitchen!"

  "Any more beds?" queried Dorothy, peering into the darkness. "We can'tkeep house unless we can find more beds."

  "Only one more. I guess we've come down to bed rock at last."

  "In other words, the cradle," she observed, pulling a little old-fashionedtrundle bed out into the light.

  "Oh, what a joke!" cried Harlan. "That's worth three dollars in the officeof any funny paper in New York!"

  "Sell it," commanded Dorothy, inspired by the prospect of wealth, "andI'll give you fifty cents for your commission."

  Outside, the storm still raged and the old house shook and creaked in theblast. The rain swirled furiously against the windows, and a swift rush ofhailstones beat a fierce tattoo on the roof. Built on the summit of a hilland with only a few trees near it, the Judson mansion was but poorlyprotected from the elements.

  None the less, there was a sense of warmth and comfort inside. "Let'sbuild a fire in the kitchen," suggested Dorothy, "and then we'll try tofind something to eat."

  "Which kitchen?" asked Harlan.

  "Any old kitchen. The one the back stairs end in, I guess. It seems to bethe principal one of the set."

  Harlan brought more wood and Dorothy watched him build the fire with asense that a god-like being was here put to base uses. Hampered in hislog-cabin design by the limitations of the fire box, he handled thekindlings awkwardly, got a splinter into his thumb, said something underhis breath which was not meant for his wife to hear, and powdered hislinen with soot from the stove pipe. At length, however, a respectablefire was started.

  "Now," he asked, "what shall I do next?"

  "Wind all the clocks. I can't endure a dead clock. While you're doing it,I'll get out the remnants of our lunch and see what there is in the pantrythat is still edible."

  In the lunch basket which the erratic ramifications of the road leading toJudson Centre had obliged them to carry, there was still, fortunately, asupply of sandwiches and fruit. A hasty search through the nearest pantryrevealed jelly, marmalade, and pickles, a box of musty crackers and acanister of tea. When Harlan came back, Dorothy had the kitchen table setfor two, with a lighted candle dispensing odorous good cheer from thecentre of it, and the tea kettle singing me
rrily over the fire.

  "Seems like home, doesn't it?" he asked, pleasantly imbued with therealisation of the home-making quality in Dorothy. Certain rare women withthis gift take their atmosphere with them wherever they go.

  "To-morrow," he went on, "I'll go into the village and buy more things toeat."

  "The ruling passion," she smiled. "It's--what's that!"

  Clear and high above the sound of the storm came an imperious "Me-ow!"

  "It's a cat," said Harlan. "You don't suppose the poor thing is shut upanywhere, do you?"

  "If it had been, we'd have found it. We've opened every door in the house,I'm sure. It must be outside."

  "Me-ow! Me-ow! Me-ow!" The voice was not pleading; it was rather acommand, a challenge.

  "Kitty, kitty, kitty," she called. "Where are you, kitty?"

  Harlan opened the outside door, and in rushed a huge black cat, with theair of one returning home after a long absence.

  "Poor kitty," said Dorothy, kindly, stooping to stroke the sable visitor,who instinctively dodged the caress, and then scratched her hand.

  "The ugly brute!" she exclaimed. "Don't touch him, Harlan."

  Throughout the meal the cat sat at a respectful distance, with hisgreenish yellow eyes fixed unwaveringly upon them. He was entirely black,save for a white patch under his chin, which, in the half-light, carriedwith it an uncanny suggestion of a shirt front. Dorothy at length becamerestless under the calm scrutiny.

  "I don't like him," she said. "Put him out."

  "Thought you liked cats," remarked Harlan, reaching for another sandwich.

  "I do, but I don't like this one. Please put him out."

  "What, in all this storm? He'll get wet."

  "He wasn't wet when he came in," objected Dorothy. "He must have somewarm, dry place of his own outside."

  "Come, kitty," said Harlan, pleasantly.

  "Kitty" merely blinked, and Harlan rose.

  "Come, kitty."

  With the characteristic independence of cats, the visitor yawned. Theconversation evidently bored him.

  "Come, kitty," said Harlan, more firmly, with a low swoop of his arm. Thecat arched his back, erected an enlarged tail, and hissed threateningly.In a dignified but effective manner, he eluded all attempts to capturehim, even avoiding Dorothy and her broom.

  "There's something more or less imperial about him," she remarked, wipingher flushed cheeks, when they had finally decided not to put the cat out."As long as he's adopted us, we'll have to keep him. What shall we namehim?"

  "Claudius Tiberius," answered Harlan. "It suits him down to the ground."

  "His first name is certainly appropriate," laughed Dorothy, with a ruefulglance at her scratched hand. Making the best of a bad bargain, she spreadan old grey shawl, nicely folded, on the floor by the stove, and requestedClaudius Tiberius to recline upon it, but he persistently ignored theinvitation.

  "This is jolly enough," said Harlan. "A cosy little supper in our ownhouse, with a gale blowing outside, the tea kettle singing over the fire,and a cat purring on the hearth."

  "Have you heard Claudius purr?" asked Dorothy, idly.

  "Come to think of it, I haven't. Perhaps something is wrong with hispurrer. We'll fix him to-morrow."

  From a remote part of the house came twelve faint, silvery tones. Thekitchen clock struck next, with short, quick strokes, followed immediatelyby a casual record of the hour from the clock on the mantel beneath UncleEbeneezer's portrait. Then the grandfather's clock in the hall boomed outtwelve, solemn funereal chimes. Afterward, the silence seemed acute.

  "The end of the honeymoon," said Dorothy, a little sadly, with a quick,inquiring look at her husband.

  "The end of the honeymoon!" repeated Harlan, gathering her into his arms."To-morrow, life begins!"

  Several hours later, Dorothy awoke from a dreamless sleep to wonderwhether life was any different from a honeymoon, and if so, how and why.