CHAPTER XVI
HOME-COMINGS
I MIGHT as well have traveled alone, for all the company Babe and Watsonproved to be. They were so absorbed in their conversation with eachother that they never once glanced out of the window, even when we weregoing along the Cape where one is apt to see a familiar face every timethe train stops.
I was so glad to get back to familiar scenes like cranberry bogs anddunes and marshes, with the pools of water shining in them like mirrors,that I kept exclaiming, "Oh, look!" I said it several times before Irealized that the landscape had no attractions for them. Neither had thestuffy car any discomforts, although the hot July sunshine streamed inacross the red velvet upholstery.
With their chairs swung facing each other, they sat and talked like twoRobinson Crusoes who had just found each other after aeons of solitudeon separate islands. For a while I watched them over the top of mymagazine; Watson mopping his shiny red face with his handkerchief, andBabe with her hat tilted crooked over one eye and a little wisp of hairstraggling over her neck, and her collar all rumpled up behind. I keptwondering what on earth was the attraction that each had for the other.One can understand it when the heroine is beautiful and the herofascinating, but how two such plain, average people as Babe Nolan andWatson Tucker can inspire the grand passion is a puzzle.
I couldn't help smiling to myself when I looked back on the time when Ihad once imagined Watson to be the most congenial man I ever met. I washeartily glad that our acquaintance had been interrupted at that point,until I grew older and wiser. Suppose I had gone on looking at himthrough the prism of my ideals until I actually believed that the halowhich my imagination put around him was a real one! What a little fool agirl of fifteen can be! It seems to me I have aged more in this lastyear at school, than in all the years that went before it put together.Only a few more days until I can count myself actually grown up--till Ihave reached that magic milestone, my eighteenth birthday!
Growing up is like the dawning of Spring. For a long time there are justa few twitters, a hint of buds in the hedgerows. Then, suddenly as anApril shower, a mist of green drops down over the bare branches like adelicate veil, and one awakens to a world of bloom and birdsong andromance.
(That's a good paragraph to start a story with. I'll put an asterisk onthe margin to mark it.)
I had expected to awaken to my Springtime and romance this verysummer--to find it perhaps, in Kentucky. Barby and I have planned foryears that my eighteenth birthday should be spent there. The very word,Kentucky, suggests romance to me. But now that the war has upseteveryone's plans, I'll have to give it up. And Romance is not likely tocome riding by to such a gray old fishing port as Provincetown.
This is what I told myself as we went along between the cranberry bogsand the dunes. But suddenly we made a turn that showed us the entire endof the Cape. There, with the sunset light upon it, was the town, curvingaround the harbor like a golden dream city, rising above a "sea of glassmingled with fire." Spires and towers and chimney tops, with the greatshaft of the Pilgrims high above them all, stood transfigured in thatwonderful shining. I took it as an omen--a good omen of all sorts ofdelightful and unexpected happenings that might come to me.
When we reached the station, I had two completely separate and distinctimpulses, which made me afraid that I still lack considerable of beinggrown up. The first fishy smell of the harbor which greeted me, with itstang of brine and tar, gave me the impulse to send my suitcase up to thehouse by the baggage man, and run all the way home. I wanted to goskipping along the streets as I used to when my skirts were knee highand my curls bobbing over my shoulders. I wanted to speak to everyone Imet and have everyone call back at me, "Hello, Georgina," in friendlyvillage fashion. I wanted to smell what was cooking for supper in everyhouse I passed, and maybe if the baker's cart came along with itsinviting step in the rear, "hang on behind" for a block or two.
The second impulse was to powder my nose a trifle, put on a little faceveil and a pair of perfectly fitting gloves, and then when the panelmirror between the car windows showed a modish and tailor-made younglady, correct in every detail, step into the bus and drive home to makean impression on Tippy.
The latter impulse dominated, and I am glad it did, for Judith andGeorge Woodson and several others of the old crowd were at the stationto meet us. Babe hadn't even set her hat straight, but she didn't knowit. Neither did Watson. They just went along, smiling vacuously (I guessthat's as good a word as any, though I'm not exactly sure of it) oneverything and everybody.
It seemed so strange to come home to a house with no Barby in it, but itwas such a satisfaction to feel that my arrival put Tippy into herlittle company flutter. It was the face veil which did it, I am sure,and the urban air which I acquired in Washington. I am taller than she,now, and I had to stoop a little to kiss her. Instead of her saying, asI expected, for me to run along and take my things off, because supperwas getting cold, she led the way upstairs to my room, just as if I'dbeen the visiting missionary's wife, or relatives from out of the state.And she went around setting things straighter, which were alreadystraight, and asking if there was anything I'd have to make mecomfortable, till I hardly knew myself, her making such company out ofme.
Miss Susan Triplett has been here ever since Barby went to Washington,but she's going home soon, now that I have come back. Between them I gotall the news of the town during supper. Aunt Elspeth is very, very ill.They're afraid she can't last long at this rate. They have a trainednurse for her and Belle has to spend so much of her time over there thatTippy has been taking care of little Elspeth and Judson in the daytime.
Titcomb Carver and Sammy III have both enlisted, and the two Fayal boys,Manuel and Joseph, are in the Navy. Nearly everyone I asked about was insome kind of government service. Tippy says the Portuguese boys haveresponded splendidly, and she keeps tab on the whole town. But she saidit is a tragedy about George Woodson. He's tried four times to enlist,but he can't pass the physical examination. His sight is imperfect andthe old trouble with his knee that he got from a football accident inhis Junior year bars him out. Tippy never liked George. He was impudentto her one time, years ago. Ran his tongue out at her when she told himto quit doing something that she thought he had no business to do, andshe never forgave him. But now she respects him so much for thedesperate way he has tried to get into the service, and is so sorry forhis disappointment, that she can't say nice enough things about him.
It was late when the expressman brought my trunk. Miss Susan had alreadygone upstairs and was putting up her front hair in crimping pins. ButTippy never made any objections when I started to unpack. I simply can'tget used to being treated with so much deference. It's worth growing upjust to have her listen so respectfully to my opinions and to know thatshe feels that my advice is worth asking for.
I only unpacked the top tray to get some things Barby and I had boughtfor her in the Washington shops, and to take out something she was evenmore interested in than her gifts. It was a little silk service flag tohang up in honor of Father. She took it in her hands as if it weresacred. I never saw her so moved to admiration over anything, as she wasover that little blue star in its field of white with the red borderaround it.
Her voice didn't sound natural, because there was a queer sort of chokein it when she said: "I never before wanted to be a man. But I do now,just for the chance to be what that star stands for."
I had intended to wait till morning before hanging it in the frontwindow, but she had a hammer and a push-pin out of a box in the hallcloset before I knew what she was looking for, and carried the lampahead of me down the stairs. "Liberty enlightening the World," I calledit, as she stood holding the lamp up for me to see, while I drove thepush-pin into the window sash.
But she didn't laugh with me. It was a solemn thing to her, this placingof the symbol which showed the world that a patriot had gone out fromthe house in defence of his country. Although she's a thin, gaunt figurewith her hair twisted into a hard little knot on th
e back of her head,and there's nothing statuesque about a black silk dress gathered full atthe waist, and a ruffled white apron, her waiting attitude seemed todignify the occasion and make a ceremony of it. I started to saysomething, jokingly, about firing a salute with our ancestral musket, orsinging "America," but the expression on her face stopped me. The spiritof some old Revolutionary forbear seemed shining in her eyes. I hadn'tdreamed that Patriotism meant _that_ to Tippy; something exalted enoughto transform her homely old features with a kind of inner shining.
Something wakened me very early next morning, soon after daybreak.Sitting up to look out of the window nearest my bed, I saw somebodyhoeing in the garden. A Portuguese woman I supposed, who was taking theplace of the regular gardener. Ever since old Jeremy Clapp reached hisnineties, we've had his nephew, young Jeremy. But they told me the nightbefore, that he's gone to be a surfman in the U. S. Coast patrol. It wasespecially hard to give him up as the war garden he had just put in wastwice the size we usually have.
Then I recognized the flapping old sport hat which the woman wore. Itwas one which I discarded last year. Underneath it, her skirts tucked upto her shoe-tops to avoid the heavy dew, was Tippy, hoeing weeds as ifshe were making a personal attack on the Hindenburg line and intendeddemolishing it before breakfast.
Funny as she looked in her scare-crow working outfit, there wassomething in the sight that made me want to stand and salute. It gave methe kind of thrill one has when the troops march by, and everyone cheersas the colors pass. I can't put it into words, but it was the feelingthat brusque, rheumatic old Tippy with her hoe, stood for as fine a kindof patriotism as there is in the world. She's just as eager to do somesplendid, big, thrilling thing for her country as any man in khaki, yetall she can do is to whack weeds. I wish I were artist enough to make acompanion piece for the poster I brought home in my trunk--a goddess ofliberty unfurling a star-spangled banner across the world. I'd make ahomely work-roughened old woman in her kitchen apron, her face shininglike Tippy's did last night, when she looked at the star and wished shecould be the hero it stood for.
I made up my mind to say something like that to her, something to showher how fine I think it is for a woman of her age to put in suchvaliant licks in a vegetable garden when greater things are denied her.But when I went downstairs and found she had changed from her gardenclothes into her immaculate gingham house dress, and was stepping aroundin the brisk, capable way that used to make me afraid of taking anyliberties with her, I couldn't have made such a speech to her any morethan I could have made it to the refrigerator. My first glance showed meshe had lost her company flutter. I saw she would soon have me back inmy old place of doing as I was bid and not questioning her authority, ifI did not assert myself at once.
The chance came while we were at breakfast. A man came with a great lotof blueberries that she had ordered last week. Not expecting them sosoon she had promised Belle to spend most of the day in Fishburn Court,because the nurse wanted to get off for a while. She was dreadfully putout about the berries, afraid they wouldn't keep. She was starting tocarry them down cellar when I rose and took the pails away from her, andannounced that _I'd_ can the whole lot of them, myself.
Goodness knows I didn't want to. I was simply aching to get down to thebeach and go for a long row, and look in on the neighbors long enough tosay howdy to everybody. But having once said I'd do it and been flatlyrefused, I simply had to carry my point. I grabbed her by the elbows ina laughing sort of scuffle and sat her down hard in a chair, and toldher to stay put. To my astonishment, she gave right up, but for a reasonthat completely took the wind out of my sails.
"Well," she said thoughtfully, "I suppose you do want to do your bit forUncle Sam. It's about all a young thing like you _can_ do, so I oughtn'tto stand in your way if you feel that way about it."
Then I found out she has been canning and preserving everything she canget her hands on, as a patriotic measure, and she supposed that was mymotive. It gave me a jolt to think that while I was saying: "Poor oldthing, there's so little she can do," she was feeling the same pity formy youth and inefficiency.
Many a time I've helped put up fruit, but this was the first time I'dever been allowed the whole responsibility. The minute she took herselfoff I began. Miss Susan was upstairs, starting to pack her trunk, so Ihad the kitchen all to myself. It is an attractive old kitchen, everytin silver-bright, and all in such perfect order that I could go to anynail or shelf in the dark, absolutely sure of finding on it the utensilit is expected to hold.
Just outside the screen door, on the back step, Captain Kidd lay withhis head on his paws, watching every movement through his shaggy bangs.I think he is happy to have me at home again, but the house has been soquiet during my long absence, that my singing disconcerts him. He sleepsa lot now that he is such an old dog, and he couldn't take his usual napwhile I was canning those berries. At Harrington Hall I never could letmy voice out as I wanted to for fear of disturbing the public peace. Nowwith the whole downstairs to myself, I sang and sang, all the time Istirred and sweetened and weighed and screwed the tops on the long rowsof waiting glass jars.
I was pretty hot by the time I came to the last kettleful. My hands werestained, and I had burned my wrist and spilled juice all down the frontof my bungalow apron. But the end was in sight, and I swung into thetune of "Tipperary" as the soldiers sometimes do on the last lap of along march. All of a sudden, Captain Kidd, who had been drowsing forawhile, lifted his head with such an alert air that I stopped singing tolisten, too. He seldom shows excitement now. Then with an eager littleyelp that was half bark, half whine, he bounded off the step and torearound the house like a crazy thing.
That cry meant but one thing. It had never meant anything else since hewas a puppy. _Richard was coming._
He always heralded him that way. If I had had any doubt of that firstlittle cry of announcement there could be none about the fury of barkingwhich followed. That ecstasy of greeting was reserved for one personalone. It couldn't be any one but Richard.
A figure in khaki strode past the window, the dog leaping up on him andalmost turning somersaults in his efforts to lick his face. Then splashwent the ladle into the kettle (I had been holding it suspended in mysurprise), and the juice splashed all over the stove. The next instantRichard was in the kitchen, both hands outstretched to grasp mine, andwe were looking questioningly into each others eyes. It was a long gaze,for we were each frankly curious to see if the other had changed.
Barby was right. The two years had, made a man of him. He was larger inevery way, and in his lieutenant's uniform looked every inch a soldier.He spoke first, smiling broadly.
"The same old girl, only taller than Barby now!"
"The same old Dare-devil Dick!" I retorted, "only----" I started to add"so tremendously good-looking in that uniform," but instead justlaughed, as I drew my hands away.
"Only what?" he persisted in his old teasing fashion. But I wouldn'ttell, and there we were, right back again on our old squabbling grounds,just where we left off two years ago.