CHAPTER III
MR. TURNER APPLIES BUSINESS PROMPTNESS TO A MATTER OF DELICACY
Morning at Meadow Brook was even more delightful than evening. Thetime Mr. Turner had chosen for his outing was early September, andalready there was a crispness in the air which was quite invigorating.Clad in flannels and with a brand new tennis racket under his arm, hewent into the reading-room immediately after breakfast, bought a paperof the night before and glanced hastily over the news of the day,paying more particular attention to the market page. Prices of thingshad a peculiar fascination for him. He noticed that cereals had gonedown, that there was another flurry in copper stock, and that hardwoodhad gone up, and ranging down the list his eye caught a quotation forwalnut. It had made a sharp advance of ten dollars a thousand feet.
Out of the window, as he looked up, he saw Miss Westlake and MissHastings crossing the lawn, and he suddenly realized that he was hereto wear himself out with rest, so he hurried in the direction the girlshad taken; but when he arrived at the tennis court he found a setalready in progress. Both Miss Westlake and Miss Hastings barelynodded at Mr. Turner, and went right on displaying grace and dexterityto a quite unusual degree. Decidedly Mr. Turner was being "cut," andhe wondered why. Presently he strode down to the road and looked upover the hill in the direction he knew Hollis Creek Inn to be. He wasstill pondering the probable distance when Mr. Westlake and Billy andyoung Princeman came up the brook path.
"Just the chap I wanted to see, Sam," said Mr. Westlake heartily. "I'mtrying to get up a pin-hook fishing contest, for three-inch sunfish."
"Happy thought," returned Sam, laughing. "Count me in."
"It's the governor's own idea, too," said Billy with vast enthusiasm."Bully sport, it ought to be. Only trouble is, Princeman has somemysterious errand or other, and can't join us."
"No; the fact is, the Stevenses were due at Hollis Creek yesterday,"confessed Mr. Princeman in cold return to the prying Billy, "and Ithink I'll stroll over and see if they've arrived."
Sam Turner surveyed Princeman with a new interest. Danger lurked inPrinceman's black eyes, fascination dwelt in his black hair,attractiveness was in every line of his athletic figure. It was uponthe tip of Sam's tongue to say that he would join Princeman in hiswalk, but he repressed that instinct immediately.
"Quite a long ways over there by the road, isn't it?" he questioned.
"Yes," admitted Princeman unsuspectingly, "it winds a good bit; butthere is a path across the hills which is not only shorter but far morepleasant."
Sam turned to Mr. Westlake.
"It would be a shame not to let Princeman in on that pin-hook match,"he suggested. "Why not put it off until to-morrow morning. I have anidea that I can beat Princeman at the game."
There was more or less of sudden challenge in his tone, and Princeman,keen as Sam himself, took it in that way.
"Fine!" he invited. "Any time you want to enter into a contest with meyou just mention it."
"I'll let you know in some way or other, even if I don't make anydirect announcement," laughed Sam, and Princeman walked away with Mr.Westlake, very much to Billy's consternation. He was alone with thisdull Turner person once more. What should they talk about? Sam solvedthat problem for him at once. "What's the swiftest conveyance thesepeople keep?" he asked briskly.
"Oh, you can get most anything you like," said Billy. "Saddle-horsesand carriages of all sorts; and last year they put in a couple ofautomobiles, though scarcely any one uses them." There was a certainamount of careless contempt in Billy's tone as he mentioned the hiredautos. Evidently they were not considered to be as good form as othermodes of conveyance.
"Where's the garage?" asked Sam.
"Right around back of the hotel. Just follow that drive."
"Thanks," said the other crisply. "I'll see you this evening," and hestalked away leaving Billy gasping for breath at the suddenness of Sam.After all, though, he was glad to be rid of Mr. Turner. He knew theStevenses himself, and it had slowly dawned on him that by having hisown horse saddled he could beat Princeman over there.
It took Sam just about one minute to negotiate for an automobile, aneat little affair, shiny and new, and before they were half-way toHollis Creek, his innate democracy led him into conversation with thedriver, an alert young man of the near-by clay.
"Not very good soil in this neighborhood," Sam observed. "I noticethere is a heavy outcropping of stone. What are the principal crops?"
"Summer resorters," replied the driver briefly.
"And do you mean to tell me that all these farm-houses call themselvessummer resorts?" inquired Sam.
"No, only those that have running water. The others just keepboarders."
"I see," said Sam, laughing.
A moment later they passed over a beautifully clear stream which randown a narrow pocket valley between two high hills, swept under arickety wooden culvert, and raced on across a marshy meadow, sparklinginvitingly here and there in the sunlight.
"Here's running water without a summer resort," observed the passenger,still smiling.
"It's too much shut in," replied the chauffeur as one who had voiced afinal and insurmountable objection. All the "summer resorts" in thisneighborhood were of one pattern, and no one would so much as dream ofvarying from the first successful model.
Sam scarcely heard. He was looking back toward the trough of those twopicturesquely wooded hills, and for the rest of the drive he asked butfew questions.
At Hollis Creek, where he found a much more imposing hotel than the oneat Meadow Brook, he discovered Miss Stevens, clad in simple white fromcanvas shoes to knotted cravat, in a summer-house on the lawn, chattinggaily with a young man who was almost fat. Sam had seen other girlssince he had entered the grounds, but he could not make out theirfeatures; this one he had recognized from afar, and as they approachedthe summer-house he opened the door of the machine and jumped outbefore it had come properly to a stop.
"Good morning, Miss Stevens," he said with a cheerful self-confidencewhich was beautiful to behold. "I have come over to take you a littlespin, if you'll go."
Miss Stevens gazed at the caller quizzically, and laughed outright.
"This is so sudden," she murmured.
The caller himself grinned.
"Does seem so, if you stop to think of it," he admitted. "Rather likedropping out of the clouds. But the auto is here, and I can testifythat it's a smooth-running machine. Will you go?"
She turned that same quizzical smile upon the young man who was almostfat, and introduced him, curly hair and all, to Mr. Turner as Mr.Hollis, who, it afterward transpired, was the heir to Hollis Creek Inn.
"I had just promised to play tennis with Mr. Hollis," Miss Stevensstated after the introduction had been properly acknowledged, "but Iknow he won't mind putting it off this time," and she handed him hertennis bat.
"Certainly not," said young Hollis with forcedly smiling politeness.
"Thank you, Mr. Hollis," said Sam promptly. "Just jump right in, MissStevens."
"How long shall we be gone?" she asked as she settled herself in thetonneau.
"Oh, whatever you say. A couple of hours, I presume."
"All right, then," she said to young Hollis; "we'll have our game inthe afternoon."
"With pleasure," replied the other graciously, but he did not look it.
"Where shall we go?" asked Sam as the driver looked back inquiringly."You know the country about here, I suppose."
"I ought to," she laughed. "Father's been ending the summer here eversince I was a little girl. You might take us around Bald Hill," shesuggested to the chauffeur. "It is a very pretty drive," sheexplained, turning to Sam as the machine wheeled, and at the same timewaving her hand gaily to the disconsolate Hollis, who was "hard hit"with a different girl every season. "It's just about a two-hour trip.What a fine morning to be out!" and she settled back comfortably as themachine gathered speed. "I do love a machine, but father is ratherbackw
ard about them. He will consent to ride in them under necessity,but he won't buy one. Every time he sees a handsome pair of horses,however, he has to have them."
"I admire a good horse myself," returned Sam.
"Do you ride?" she asked him.
"Oh, I have suffered a few times on horseback," he confessed; "but youought to see my kid brother ride. He looks as if he were part of thehorse. He's a handsome brat."
"Except for calling him names, which is a purely masculine way ofshowing affection, you speak of him almost as if you were his mother,"she observed.
"Well, I am, almost," replied Sam, studying the matter gravely. "Ihave been his mother, and his father, and his brother, too, for a greatmany years; and I will say that he's a credit to his family."
"Meaning just you?" she ventured.
"Yes, we're all we have; just yet, at least." This quite soberly.
"He must talk of getting married," she guessed, with a quick intuitionthat when this happened it would be a blow to Sam.
"Oh, no," he immediately corrected her. "He isn't quite old enough tothink of it seriously as yet. I expect to be married long before heis."
Miss Stevens felt a rigid aloofness creeping over her, and, having avery wholesome sense of humor, smiled as she recognized the feeling inherself.
"I should think you'd spend your vacation where the girl is," sheobserved. "Men usually do, don't they?"
He laughed gaily.
"I surely would if I knew the girl," he asserted.
"That's a refreshing suggestion," she said, echoing his laugh, thoughfrom a different impulse. "I presume, then, that you entertainthoughts of matrimony merely because you think you are quite oldenough."
"No, it isn't just that," he returned, still thoughtfully. "Somehow orother I feel that way about it; that's all. I have never had time tothink of it before, but this past year I have had a sort of sense oflonesomeness; and I guess that must be it."
In spite of herself Miss Josephine giggled and repressed it, andgiggled again and repressed it, and giggled again, and then she letherself go and laughed as heartily as she pleased. She had heard mensay before, but always with more or less of a languishing air,inevitably ridiculous in a man, that they thought it about time theywere getting married; but she could not remember anything to comparewith Sam Turner's naivete in the statement.
He paid no attention to the laughter, for he had suddenly leanedforward to the chauffeur.
"There is another clump of walnut trees," he said, eagerly pointingthem out. "Are there many of them in this locality?"
"A good many scattered here and there," replied the boy; "but old manGifford has a twenty-acre grove down in the bottoms that's mostly allwalnut trees, and I heard him say just the other day that walnutlumber's got so high he had a notion to clear his land."
"Where do you suppose we could find old man Gifford?" inquired Mr.Turner.
"Oh, about six miles off to the right, at the next turning."
"Suppose we whizz right down there," said Sam promptly, and he turnedto Miss Stevens with enthusiasm shining in his eyes. "It does seem asif everything happens lucky for me," he observed. "I haven't anyparticular liking for the lumber business, but fate keeps handinglumber to me all the time; just fairly forcing it on me."
"Do you think fate is as much responsible for that as yourself?" shequestioned, smiling as they passed at a good clip the turn which was tohave taken them over the pretty Bald Hill drive. Sam had not eventhought to apologize for the abrupt change in their program, becauseshe could certainly see the opportunity which had offered itself, andhow imperative it was to embrace it. The thing needed no explanation.
"I don't know," he replied to her query, after pausing to consider it amoment. "I certainly don't go out of my road to hunt up these things."
"No-o-o-o," she admitted. "But fate hasn't thrust this particularopportunity upon me, although I'm right with you at the time. It neverwould have occurred to me to ask about those walnut trees."
"It would have occurred to your father," he retorted quickly.
"Yes, it might have occurred to father, but I think that under thecircumstances he would have waited until to-morrow to see about it."
"I suppose I might be that way when I arrive at his age," Sam commentedphilosophically, "but just now I can't afford it. His 'seeing about itto-morrow' cost him between five and six thousand dollars the last timeI had anything to do with him."
She laughed. She was enjoying Sam's company very much. Even if a bitstartling, he was at least refreshing after the type of young men shewas in the habit of meeting.
"He was talking about that last night," she said. "I think fatherrather stands in both admiration and awe of you."
"I'm glad to hear that," he returned quite seriously. "It's a goodattitude in which to have the man with whom you expect to do business."
"I think I shall have to tell him that," she observed, highly amused."He will enjoy it, and it may put him on his guard."
"I don't mind," he concluded after due reflection. "It won't hurt aparticle. If anything, if he likes me so far, that will only increaseit. I like your father. In fact I like his whole family."
"Thank you," she said demurely, wondering if there was no end to hisbluntness, and wondering, too, whether it were not about time that sheshould find it wearisome. On closer analysis, however, she decidedthat the time was not yet come. "But you have not met all of them,"she reminded him. "There are mother and a younger sister and an olderbrother."
"Don't matter if there were six more, I like all of them," Sam promptlyinformed her. Then, "Stop a minute," he suddenly directed thechauffeur.
That functionary abruptly brought his machine to a halt just a littleway past a tree glowing with bright green leaves and red berries.
"I don't know what sort of a tree that is," said Sam with boyishenthusiasm; "but see how pretty it is. Except for the shape of theleaves the effect is as beautiful as holly. Wouldn't you like a branchor two, Miss Stevens?"
"I certainly should," she heartily agreed. "I don't know how youdiscovered that I have a mad passion for decorative weeds and things."
"Have you?" he inquired eagerly. "So have I. If I had time I'd berather ashamed of it."
He had scrambled out of the car and now ran back to the tree, where,perching himself upon the second top rail of the fence he drew down alimb, and with his knife began to snip off branches here and there.The girl noticed that he selected the branches with discrimination,turning each one over so that he could look at the broad side of itbefore clipping, rejecting many and studying each one after he hadtaken it in his hand. He was some time in finding the last one, a longstraggling branch which had most of its leaves and berries at the tip,and she noticed that as he came back to the auto he was arranging themdeftly and with a critical eye. When he handed them in to her theyformed a carefully arranged and graceful composition. It was a new andan unexpected side of him, and it softened considerably the amusedregard in which she had been holding him.
"They are beautifully arranged," she commented, as he stopped for amoment to brush the dust from his shoes in the tall grass by theroadside.
"Do you think so?" he delightedly inquired. "You ought to see my kidbrother make up bouquets of goldenrod and such things. He seems tohave a natural artistic gift."
She bent on his averted head a wondering glance, and she reflected thatoften this "hustler" must be misunderstood.
"You have aroused in me quite a curiosity to meet this paragon of abrother," she remarked. "He must be well-nigh perfection."
"He is," replied Sam instantly, turning to her very earnest eyes. "Hehasn't a flaw in him any place."
She smiled musingly as she surveyed the group of branches she held inher hand.
"It is a pity these leaves will wither in so short a time," she said.
"Yes," he admitted; "but even if we have to throw them away before weget back to the hotel, their beauty will give us pleasure fo
r an hour;and the tree won't miss them. See, it seems as perfect as ever."
"It wouldn't if everybody took the same liberties with it that youdid," she remarked, glancing back at the tree.
Sam had climbed in the car and had slammed the door shut, but any replyhe might have made was prevented by a hail from the woods above them atthe other side of the road, and a man came scrambling down from thehillside path.
"Why, it's Mr. Princeman!" exclaimed the girl in pleased surprise."Think of finding you wandering about, all alone in the woods here."
"I wasn't wandering about," he protested as he came up to the machineand shook hands with Miss Josephine. "I was headed directly for HollisCreek Inn. Your brother wrote me that you were expected to arrivethere yesterday evening, and I was dropping over to call on you rightaway this morning. I see, however, that I was not quite prompt enough.You're selfish, Mr. Turner. You knew I was going over to Hollis Creek,and you might have invited me to ride in your machine."
"You might have invited me to walk with you," retorted Sam.
"But you knew that I was coming and I didn't know that you even knew--"he paused abruptly and fixed a contemplative eye upon young Mr. Turner,who was now surveying the scenery and Mr. Princeman in calm enjoyment.
The arrival at this moment of a cloud of dust out of which evolved alone horseman, and that horseman Billy Westlake, added a new angle tothe situation, and for one fleeting moment the three men eyed oneanother in mutual sheepish guilt.
"Rather good sport, I call it, Miss Stevens," declared Billy, aware ofa sudden increase in his estimation of Mr. Turner, and letting the catcompletely out of the bag. "Each of us was trying to steal a march onthe rest, but Mr. Turner used the most businesslike method, and ofcourse he won the race."
"I'm flattered, I'm sure," said Miss Josephine demurely. "I reallyfeel that I ought to go right back to the house and be the belle of theball; but it's impossible for an hour or so in this case," and sheturned to her escort with the smile of mischief which she had worn thefirst time he saw her. "You see, we are out on a little business trip,Mr. Turner and myself. We're going to buy a walnut grove."
Mr. Turner turned upon her a glance which was half a frown.
"I promised to get you back in two hours, and I'll do it," he stated,"but we mustn't linger much by the wayside."
"With which hint we shall wend our Hollis Creek-ward way," laughedPrinceman, exchanging a glance of amusement with Miss Stevens. "Ithink we shall visit with your father until you come back."
"Please do," she urged. "He will be as glad to see you both as I am,"with which information she settled herself back in her seat with alittle air of the interview being over, and the chauffeur, with properintuition, started the machine, while Mr. Princeman and Billy lookedafter them glumly.
"Queer chap, isn't he?" commented Billy.
"Queer? Well, hardly that," returned Princeman thoughtfully. "There'sone thing certain; he's enterprising and vigorous enough to commandrespect, in business or--anything else."
At about that very moment Mr. Turner was impressing upon his companiona very important bit of ethics.
"You shouldn't have violated my confidence," he told her severely.
"How was that?" she asked in surprise, and with a trifle of indignationas well.
"You told them that we were going to buy a walnut grove. You oughtnever to let slip anything you happen to know of any man's businessplans."
"Oh!" she said blankly.
Having voiced his straightforward objection, and delivered his simplebut direct lesson, Mr. Turner turned as decisively to other matters.
"Son," he asked, leaning over toward the chauffeur, "are there anyspeed limit laws on these roads?"
"None that I know of," replied the boy.
"Then cut her loose. Do you object to fast driving, Miss Stevens?"
"Not at all," she told him, either much chastened by the late rebuke ormuch amused by it. She could scarcely tell which, as yet. "I don'tparticularly long for a broken neck, but I never can feel that my timehas come."
"It hasn't," returned Sam. "Let's see your palm," and taking her handhe held it up before him. It was a small hand that he saw, and mostgracefully formed, but a strong one, too, and Sam Turner had anextremely quick and critical eye for both strength and beauty. "Youare going to live to be a gray-haired grandmother," he announced afteran inspection of her pink palm, "and live happily all your life."
It was noteworthy that no matter what his impulse may have been he didnot hold her hand overly long, nor subject it to undue warmth ofpressure, but restored it gently to her lap. She was remarking uponthis herself as she took that same hand and passed its tapering fingersdeftly among the twigs of the tree-bouquet, arranging a leaf here and aberry there.