Back to the Woods

  CHAPTER V.

  JOHN HENRY'S TELEGRAM.

  When I reached the cottage I found all the members of my householddressed for the day, and lined up on the piazza, eager for newsfrom the battlefield.

  "Gee whiz!" exclaimed Uncle Peter, "the boy is bareheaded! Where'syour hat, John?"

  "Mercy! I hope you're not scalped!" Aunt Martha cried,sympathetically.

  I explained that the desperado put up a stiff fight against Diggsand myself and, warming up to the subject, I went into the detailsof a hand to hand struggle that made them all shiver and blinktheir lanterns.

  When finally I finished with the statement that the robber knockedus both down and had made a successful break for liberty. UnclePeter gave expression to a yell of dismay, and once again he andhis bow and arrow held a reunion.

  Tacks suggested that we burn the house down so the burglar wouldn'tbe able to find it if he came around after dark. I thoughtextremely well of the suggestion, but didn't dare say so.

  Aunt Martha had just about decided to untie a fit of hysterics,when Clara J. reached for the kerosene bucket and threw oil on thetroubled waters.

  "Let's drop all this nonsense about burglars and ghosts and go tobreakfast," she suggested. "I don't believe there ever was a ghostwithin sixty miles of this house, and to save my soul I couldn't beafraid of a burglar whose specialty consisted of falling in thecellar and swearing till help came!"

  After breakfast I was dragged away to the brook to fish for lambchops or whatever kind of an animal it was that Uncle Peter andTacks decided would bite. Aunt Martha posted off to the city onurgent business, the nature of which she carefully concealed fromeverybody.

  Clara J. said she'd be delighted to have the house all to herselffor an hour or two, there were so many rooms to look through and somany plans to make.

  Uncle Peter gave her his bow and arrow with full instructions howto shoot if danger threatened, and Tacks carefully rubbed the stepsleading up to the piazza with soap so the burglar would fall andbreak his neck. Then the little shrimp called my attention to hishandiwork and demonstrated its availability by slipping thereonhimself and going the whole distance on his face. He didn't breakhis neck, however, so to my mind his burglar alarm failed to makegood.

  As time wore on I felt more and more like a mock turtle being ledto the soup house.

  The fact that Bunch was sore worried me, and I began to realizethat it was now only a question of a few hours when I'd have tocrawl up to Clara J. and hand in my resignation.

  Every time I drew a picture of that scene and heard myself tellingher I was nothing but a fawn-colored four-flush I could see myfuture putting on the mitts and getting ready to hand me one.

  And when I thought of the dish of fairy tales I had cooked for thatgirl I could feel something running around in my head and trying tohide. I suppose it was my conscience.

  At the brook, Uncle Peter began to throw out hints that he was theoriginal lone fisherman. The lobster never lived that could backaway from him, and as for fly-casting, well, he was PiscatorialPeter, the Fancy Fish Charmer from Fishkill.

  The old gentleman is very rich, but he loves to live around withhis relatives, not because he's stingy, but simply because he likesthem and knows they are good listeners.

  Uncle Peter is a reformed money-maker. He wrote the first Monopolythat ever made faces at a defenceless public. He was the owner ofthe first Trust ever captured alive, and he fed it on governmentbonds and small dealers till it grew tame enough to eat out of apocketbook.

  Uncle Peter sat down on a rock overhanging the clay bank whichsloped up about four feet above the lazy brooklet. He carefullyarranged his expensive rod, placed his fish basket near by andentered into a dissertation on angling that would make old IkeWalton get up and leave the aquarium.

  In the meantime Tacks decided to do some bait fishing, so with anold case knife he sat down behind Uncle Peter and began to digunder the rock for worms.

  "Fishing is the sport of kings," the old man chuckled; "an it's along eel that won't turn when trodden upon. If you're not going tofish, John, do sit down! You're throwing a shadow over the waterand that scares the finny monsters. A fish diet is great for thebrain, John! You should eat more fish."

  "There's many a true word spoken from the chest," I sighed, just asUncle Peter made his first cast and cleverly wound about eight feetof line around a spruce tree on the opposite bank.

  The old man began to boil with excitement as he pulled and tuggedin an effort to untangle his line, and just about this time Tacksbecame the author of another spectacular drama.

  In the search for the elusive worm that feverish youth known asTacks the Human Catastrophe, had finally succeeded in prying therock loose and immediately thereafter Uncle Peter dropped his rodwith a yell of terror and proceeded to follow the man from Cook's.

  Tacks--the Boy Disaster.]

  The rock reached the brook first, but the old gentleman gave it awarm hustle down the bank and finished a close second. He was inthe money, all right.

  Tacks also ran--but in an opposite direction.

  For some little time my spluttering relative sat dumfounded inabout two feet of dirty water, and when finally I dipped him out ofthe drink he looked like a busy wash-day. Everything was damp huthis ardor.

  However, with characteristic good nature he squeezed the water outof his pockets and declared that it was just the kind of exercisehe needed. He made me promise not to tell Aunt Martha, because shewas very much opposed to his going in bathing on account of theundertow. Then I sneaked him up to his room and left him to changehis clothes.

  On the piazza I found Clara J., her face shrouded in the after-glowof a wintry sunset.

  She handed me a telegram minus the envelope and asked me, with avoice that was intended to be cuttingly sarcastic, "Is there anyanswer?"

  I opened the message and read:

  New York.

  John Henry, Jiggersville, N. Y.

  The two queens will be out this afternoon. They are good girls sotreat them white.

  Bunch.

  The unspeakable idiot, to send me a wire worded like that! Nowonder Clara J. was sitting on the ice cream freezer! Of courseit only meant that Bunch's sister and her daughter were coming outto look at their property, but--suffering mackerel! what an eyeClara J. was giving me!

  "And who are the two queens?" she queried, bitterly.

  My face grew redder and redder. Every minute I expected to turninto a complete boiled lobster. I could see somebody reaching forthe mayonaise to sprinkle me.

  "Well," she continued, "is there no answer? Of course, they aregood girls, and you'll treat them white, but--" Then the heavensopened and the floods descended.

  "Oh, John!" she sobbed; "how could you be so unkind, so cruel!Think of it, a scandal on the very first day in my new home, and Iwas so happy!"

  I would confess everything. There was no other way out of it. Iwas on my knees by her side just about to blurt forth the awfultruth when my courage failed and suddenly I switched my bet andgave the cards another cut.

  "It's all a mistake," I whispered; "it's only Bunch Jefferson doinga comedy scene. Don't you understand, dear; when Bunch tries toget funny all the undertakers have a busy season. I simply don'tknow who he means by the two queens, and as for scandal, well, youknow me, Pete!"

  I threw out my chest and gave an imitation of St. Anthony.

  "You must know who he means," she insisted, brightening a bit,however.

  "Ah, I have it!" I cried, brave-hearted liar that I was; "he meansmy Aunt Eliza and her daughter, Julia! You remember Aunt Eliza,and Julia?"

  "I never heard you speak of them before," she said, stillunconvinced.

  Good reason, too, for up to this awful moment I never had an AuntEliza or a cousin Julia, but relatives must be found to fit theemergency.

  "Oh, you've forgotten, my dear," I said, soothingly. "Aunt Elizaand Julia are two of the best Aunts I ever had--er, I
mean AuntEliza is the best cousin--well, let it go at that! Bunch may havemet them on the street, you see, and they inquired for my address.Yes, that's it. Dear, old Aunt Eliza!"

  "Is she very old?" Clara J. asked, willing to be convinced if Icould deliver the goods.

  "Old," I echoed, then suddenly remembering Bunch's description;"oh, no; she's a young widow, about 28 or 41, somewhere along inthere. You'll like her immensely, but I hope she doesn't come outuntil we get settled in a year or two."

  Clara J. dried her eyes, but I could see that she hadn't restoredme to her confidence as a member in good standing.

  She pleaded a headache and went away to her room, while I sat downwith Bunch's telegram in my hands and tried to find even a cowpaththrough the woods.

  Uncle Peter came out, none the worse for his cold plunge, and satdown near me.

  "Ah, my boy, isn't this delightful!" he cried, drinking in the air."There's nothing like the country, I tell you! Look at that view!Isn't it grand? John, to be frank with you, up until I saw thisplace I didn't have much faith in your ability as a business man,but now I certainly admire your wisdom in selecting a spot likethis--what did it cost you?"

  Cost me! so far it had cost me an attack of nervous prostration,but I couldn't tell him that. I hesitated for the simple reasonthat I hadn't the faintest idea what the place had cost Bunch. Ihad been too busy to ask him.

  "It's all right, John," the old fellow went on; "don't think meinquisitive. A rubberneck is the root of all evil. It's onlybecause I've been watching you rather closely since we came outhere and you seem to be nervous about something. I had an ideamaybe it took all your ready money to buy the place, and possiblyyou regret spending so much--but don't you do it! The best day'swork you ever did was when you bought this place!"

  "Yes, I believe you!" I sighed, wearily, as I turned to look downthe road.

  I stiffened in the chair for I saw my finish in the outward form oftwo women rapidly approaching the house,

  "It's Bunch's sister and her daughter," I moaned to myself. "Well,I'll be generous and let the blow fall first on Uncle Peter!"Accordingly, I made a quick exit,

  In the kitchen I found Clara J., her headache forgotten, busilypreparing to cook the dinner.

  She's a foxy little bundle of peaches, that girl is; and I was wiseto the fact that her suspicion factory was still working over-time,turning out material for the undersigned.

  I felt it in my bones that the steer I gave her about Aunt Elizahad been placed in cold storage for safe keeping.

  Her brain was busy running to the depot to meet the scandal Bunch'stelegram hinted at, but she pretended to catch step and walk alongwith me.

  "John," she said, "I certainly do hope your relatives won't comeout for some little time, because we really aren't ready forvisitors, now are we, dear?"

  "Indeed we are not," I groaned.

  "I can't help thinking it awfully strange that you should benotified of their coming by Mr. Jefferson, and in such peculiarlanguage," she said, after a pause.

  "Didn't I tell you Bunch is a low comedian," I said, weakly."Besides, he knows them very well. Aunt Fanny is very fond ofBunch."

  "Aunt Fanny," she repeated, dropping a tin pan to the floor with acrash; "I thought you said her name was Eliza?"

  "Sure thing!" I chortled; while my heart fell off its perch anddropped in my shoes. "Her name is Eliza Fanny; some of us call herAunt Eliza, some Aunt Fanny--see?"

  She hadn't time to see, for at that moment Tacks rushed in,exclaiming, "Say, sister, they's two strange women on the piazzatalking to Uncle Peter, and maybe when they go one of them willfall down the steps if I put some more soap there!"

  Like a whirlwind he was gone again. Clara J. simply looked at mequeerly and said, "The queens are here; treat them white, John!"

  I felt as happy as a piece of cheese.