CHAPTER XX
A Surprise Party
THE following afternoon, all the castaways except Billy, who, however,was sitting up in bed, crouched in a row on the bank to watch twoslowly approaching objects.
"Surely we never asked for _two_ boat-loads of food," remarked puzzledBettie.
"Or medicine," added Mrs. Crane.
"Or books," said Jean.
"Or clothes," supplemented Henrietta.
"Perhaps," suggested Mr. Black, "the other boat isn't coming here."
"But it _is_," asserted far-sighted Marjory. "It's headed right thisway. And the bigger one is Captain Berry's launch, I _know_."
Twenty minutes later the boat that was _not_ Captain Berry's droppedanchor in the little bay.
"It's people!" Marjory exclaimed, as the smaller launch swung about."It looks like a picnic."
"Dear me," said alarmed Mrs. Crane, "I hope they've brought their ownlunch--_we_ couldn't give them much. And I feel like hiding in thewoods--we're terribly in need of starch and flatirons."
"They're _waving_," cried Bettie. "I do believe they're visitors forus. Oh, I guess they want a boat."
Mr. Black, who had hastened to the launch with one of the small boats,was first to recognize the passengers. Jean, who followed with thesecond boat (by this time all the girls had learned to row in theshallow, usually calm little bay), was second.
"Mercy!" exclaimed astonished Jean, almost catching a crab, "it's mostof our parents and Aunty Jane--I do hope they're not going to take ushome!"
Presently the visitors were safely landed. Doctor and Mrs. Bennett,Doctor and Mrs. Tucker, Mrs. Mapes, Henrietta's grandmother, Mrs.Slater, and Marjory's Aunty Jane.
"Where's that dreadful boy?" demanded Aunty Jane, the moment she wason shore. "Are you sure he hasn't something catching? I haven't knowna moment's peace since I knew that you'd sent for the doctor; forMarjory's never had _anything_. Are you sure it isn't smallpox? Thoselumber camps up the lake----"
"Dear me," said Mrs. Crane, "didn't we write that the boy was more thanhalf drowned? I'm _sure_ I said so."
"It was that Indian--that unspeakably filthy Indian," returned AuntyJane. "He said the boy had a fever. I went to the jail--to the _jail_,Mrs. Crane--to talk to that--that beast."
"Who--Dave?"
"I suppose so. From what little I could understand, I gathered thatthat boy had some malignant illness--typhoid, diphtheria, scarletfever, smallpox----"
"Mr. Black," interposed Doctor Bennett, "I did all I could to keepthese women home, but they _would_ come."
"I don't blame them," beamed Mr. Black, hospitably. "They wanted to seetheir girls. We're glad to see you all."
Aunty Jane, the neatest housekeeper in Lakeville, cast disapprovingglances in every direction as Mr. Black led the way to the campground.Everybody else was busy exclaiming over Bettie.
"Are you sure you _are_ Bettie?" demanded Mrs. Tucker, with delightedeyes. "Why, you're _fat_--Doctor Bennett, she hasn't been fat since shewas three years old. And brown! And look at the red in her cheeks! Andher lips!"
"I've certainly lost my patient," laughed Doctor Bennett. "But Mabelseems to be all here."
"Just look at my long Jean's brown arms," cried pleased Mrs. Mapes,vainly endeavoring to span the rounded forearm. "Bigger than mine!"
"That's muscle," laughed Jean. "Rowing and climbing trees are great foryour muscle--but hard on your clothes."
"Ugh!" shuddered Aunty Jane, sniffing disgustedly. "How horribleeverything smells! Bacon, onions, fish--just like that filthy Indian!"
"All camps smell camp-y," explained Doctor Bennett. "_You'll_ smellcamp-y after a day in the woods. But where's that boy? Until I've seenhim, these anxious mothers won't be satisfied that he hasn't somethingcontagious."
Mrs. Mapes, Doctor and Mrs. Tucker, and the Bennetts were delightedwith Pete's Patch and went quite wild over the scenery; but it wasclear to everybody that Henrietta's decidedly aristocratic littlegrandmother and Marjory's overwhelmingly neat Aunty Jane had never beenintended by nature for camp life. Mrs. Slater, to be sure, enjoyedthe fine sky, the wonderful expanse of blue water, the beautifulgolden-brown river, and the deep, cool forest. She liked all these ina quiet, understanding way; but one could see, although the tactfulgentlewoman was most polite about it all, that the lowly balsam beds,the rough benches, the careless attire of the castaways had provedrather shocking to a lady accustomed always to luxurious ways ofliving. As for Aunty Jane, she liked nothing and did not hesitate todenounce camp life and all pertaining to it, Terrible Tim included.
"Marjory!" she had exclaimed, at first sight of her usually spotlessniece, "your dress is a perfect sight! Go this instant and put on aclean one."
"Why!" returned surprised Marjory, "this is my clean one--I washed ityesterday."
"_Washed_ it!" gasped Aunty Jane. "Well, you couldn't have used muchwater."
"Only the whole lake," returned Marjory, meekly. "But we haven't anyflatirons, so we just pull things somewhere near the right shape anddry them on the bushes. It's lovely fun to wash--we go right in withour clothes."
"Do you _cook_ in those filthy pans?" next demanded Aunty Jane,inspecting the fruit of the large pine that served, as Mr. Black punnedmerrily, as a "pan-tree."
"They're clean _inside_," defended Jean. "That's smoke from the campfire."
"I wash the _outside_ of my saucepans," sniffed Aunty Jane, withblighting emphasis. "Also my frying-pans."
"It isn't considered proper in camp," returned Mr. Black, whose eyeswere twinkling wickedly; "but if you'd like a little missionary work,Miss Jane, there's the dishcloth."
"Dishcloth!" gasped Aunty Jane, disdainfully, eying the fairly cleanrag drying in the sun. "I wouldn't scrub my coal bin with a cloth thecolor of that."
"I wouldn't scrub mine with _anything_," laughed Mrs. Bennett; "butnever mind, Aunty Jane, our girls seem to be thriving in spite of torndresses and unscoured pans. This life is doing them a world of good."
"Good!" sniffed Aunty Jane. "Why! The place must be fairly swarmingwith germs. I shouldn't _think_ of permitting Marjory to remain here--Ishall take her home with me to-night."
This was lightning from a clear sky. For a moment nobody said a word.Then there was a chorus of protests.
"No, no!" shrieked Bettie, hurling herself upon Aunty Jane. "She can'tgo."
"Oh, _please_, Aunty Jane," cried Jean. "We can't spare her--she's ourtelescope and our ears."
"Oh, _no_," stormed Mabel, "we _must_ keep her. _She_ likes ithere--and look at her face--all brown----"
"With dirt," snapped Auntie Jane. "It'll take me a month to get thatchild clean--and a year to scour off those disgusting freckles."
Marjory groaned. The prospect was certainly dismal.
"Never mind," counseled impish Henrietta, whispering in Marjory's ear."You can run away--I'll help you. You can easily hide in the bushes soshe can't find you when the time comes--there's forty good places tohide in--let's find one now."
"No," moaned Marjory, "I _can't_ do that--I wouldn't dare to. And itwon't do a mite of good to tease. If she says a thing she sticks toit--it's all over for poor me."
When things went wrong, Bettie cried easily, Henrietta wept copiously,and Mabel wailed uproariously; but Marjory, restrained little soulthat she was, was seldom known to shed tears. But now several largespecimens began to roll down Marjory's cheeks, and presently, to Mr.Black's dismay, the little girl was sobbing bitterly, with her headagainst Jean's flat but motherly bosom.
Both Mr. Black and Mrs. Crane pleaded with Aunty Jane. All the parentsreasoned with her. Even Mrs. Slater, who was no camper herself,implored Miss Higgins to change her mind. But that was a thing thatthe poor lady never _could_ do. Some people _can't_ change theirminds--Aunty Jane couldn't. Even when she wanted to she couldn't.
"Perhaps she'll be more amiable after dinner," suggested gentle DoctorTucker, whose mild eyes were shining at the prospect of catching atrout with the hook that Mr. Black was baiting for him. "M
any personsare."
But the splendid noon dinner that hungry Aunty Jane had expectedto devour was still nearly a mile from shore in Captain Berry'slaunch, and the other launch-man couldn't go after it; because,having incautiously ventured too near shore, he was now engaged inhalf-hearted attempts to dislodge his stranded craft from a troublesomesand bar. He declined all offers of assistance, saying that CaptainBerry, whose engine would surely work _sometime_, could easily towhim into deeper water--_he_ wasn't goin' to work hisself to death fornobody, no, not he.
As nobody wanted to row a mile or more and then back again with a loadof heavy baskets, nobody did; so Mrs. Crane did the best she could withwhat she had; but the camp-cooked dinner did not appeal to Aunty Jane,who refused to eat venison that Dave had touched and had no appetitefor plain beans, boiled potatoes, and cindery johnny-cake. Altogether,poor Aunty Jane, who was never _very_ pleasant, was in her unhappiestmood.
"You see," apologized Mrs. Crane, "our provisions are pretty low; wehaven't a very large supply of cups and plates, and of course youhaven't been here long enough to acquire an appetite for camp fare. Letme give you a piece of this trout, Miss Higgins."
"No, thank you," was Aunty Jane's frigid reply. "I never eat fish."
"These beans," assured Mrs. Slater, politely, "are very nice indeed."
"And I'm sure," said Doctor Bennett, "this is excellent coffee, even ifI _do_ have to drink from a cocoa can."
But Aunty Jane scorned them both.
"Tell us," urged Mr. Black, "about that boy of ours. What do you thinkof him?"
"Why," replied the merry doctor, "the lad's all right, consideringwhat he's been through. But, judging from his extreme thinness, beingshipwrecked is only a small part of his unhappy experience."
"What _do_ you mean?" demanded Mrs. Mapes, uneasily.
"No, my dear woman--_all_ my dear women," Doctor Bennett hastened toadd, "he hasn't had smallpox. But I _do_ know that he was a sick boy_before_ he was shipwrecked, because his body shows that he has lostmore flesh than a boy _could_ lose in so short a time."
"Yes," corroborated Mrs. Crane, "he was _very_ thin when we found him."
"Tuberculosis!" breathed Aunty Jane.
"Nothing of the kind," declared the doctor.
"But he was dreadfully thin," asserted Mabel. "His legs----"
"Never mind his legs," said Doctor Bennett. "It's his head thattroubles us now. His body is mending with every moment; but there'ssomething seriously wrong with his memory----"
"A dangerous lunatic!" gasped excitable Aunty Jane, half rising fromher seat.
"No, no!" shouted the exasperated doctor, who didn't like AuntyJane. "Nothing of the sort. Merely a very pitiable boy who has beenextremely ill, probably with pneumonia. A boy who is naturally verybright, in all ways but the one. A boy with an excellent constitutionor this last experience would have finished him. The best thing we canpossibly do for him is to keep him right here, build up his strengthin this splendid air, and then, when he's entirely well, take him to aspecialist--I'm wiser about bodies than brains."
"Could I make him a pudding?" demanded Mabel, unexpectedly.
"No," roared the doctor. "We want him to get _well_."
"As for me," said Henrietta, "I shan't be able to sleep nights until Iknow that boy's real name."
"Take my word for it," warned Aunty Jane, "he isn't worth saving. He'llprove either a thief or a tramp; or perhaps both. I wouldn't _think_ oftaking in a stranger like that."
Mabel was about to retort indignantly, and, it is to be feared,impolitely; for this candid child was sometimes too candid; whenHenrietta whispered in her ear:
"Wouldn't it be terrible if he proved to be just like Aunty Jane!"
This thought was so appalling, in spite of its impossibility, that forten seconds Mabel sat in silence, with her eyes fairly bulging.
"Henrietta," she breathed finally, "weren't--weren't you just fooling?"
"Listen!" warned Henrietta.
"I'd rather be deceived fifty times," Mrs. Crane was saying, "than leteven a tramp go hungry; but that's an honest lad or I never saw one.It's quite possible that he's poor, but that's no crime."