A Romance of Billy-Goat Hill Part 42

His cherished story had come back at last! The possibility of its being accepted had been the one hope he had clung to during many a desperate hour. In it he had, for the first time, dared to say the things he felt, to venture boldly into the land of romance which hitherto he had cautiously skirted. Dozens of other similar tales were teeming in his brain, only waiting to know the fate of this one. And it had come back!

It was the best he had to offer, and his best was not good enough! He looked at the shabby, dog-eared sheet, and the folded enclosure that doubtless set forth the editor's smug regrets, then with an impatient gesture he flung the envelope and its contents into the sc.r.a.p-basket, cursing himself and his conceit in thinking he could write, and editors and their conceit in thinking they could judge.

The folded enclosure, meanwhile, that had been in the ma.n.u.script elected to disprove the total depravity of inanimate things, and instead of falling face downward, fell face upward on the very top of the heap.

Thus it was that Donald Morley, charging desperately about his limited quarters, suddenly spied a word that made him s.n.a.t.c.h up the sheet of paper and rush to the light.

The editor, it appeared, had read the story with genuine pleasure.

Khalil Samad was an entirely new creation, presented with an originality and humor altogether delightful. The one fault of the story was its brevity. Of course, the magazine would accept it as it was, but the opinion of the office was to the effect that if the author had material for other stories of a similar nature it was a pity for him not to elaborate it into a book. A novel with Khalil Samad for a hero, if written with the same charm as this first story, would be an undoubted success. This was merely a suggestion, of course, and might not fall in with Mr. Morley's other literary plans. In any case the editor congratulated him upon the originality of his story and would look forward to publishing it in one form or the other.

Donald read the note through twice before he mastered its contents, then he drew a prodigious breath. Other stories of a similar nature? Why, he knew dozens of them! Khalil Samad had been his sole companion for two months, and Khalil's chief occupation had been talking about himself and his escapades. Donald knew the main incidents of his dramatic career from the time he had been stolen by a Bengali bandit and sold into matrimony at the age of ten, to the day he had salaamed a tearful farewell from the dock at Bombay.

Yes, most certainly, the writing of the novel _did_ fall in with Mr.

Morley's literary plans. But what about his other plans? He caught himself up suddenly. How did he know what twenty-four hours might bring forth? What if, through some terrible error, he was not granted a new hearing? But Noah Wicker was confident. He had discovered a point in the former trial which was technically inadmissible. A witness had been permitted to make a statement over Mr. Gooch's objection, and Noah had succeeded in finding a previous decision that made him believe a reversal was practically certain.

Somehow since his story was accepted, Donald found it much easier to share Noah's confidence. Waves of returning courage swept over him.

Perhaps after all, he was going to be able to do something worth while in the world! He would work like a Trojan, he would begin to-night.

He seized pen and paper, but the desire to share his good news prompted him to write letters rather than fiction. He wanted to tell Miss Lady, he wanted to tell the Doctor. He wanted to paralyze Cropsie Decker! Then he thought of Noah, and ramming the editor's note in his pocket, he went plunging down the steps and across to the hotel.

Noah had gone to bed, but he was unceremoniously routed out.

"Read that!" shouted Don, thrusting his hand in his pocket and pulling out an envelope.

"It isn't opened," said Noah, yawning; then recognizing Connie Queerington's handwriting he suddenly woke up.

"Hang it! That's the wrong one," said Donald, diving for the other note.

"Here it is! Behold a budding author, Wick! I've written some stuff they say is worth while. They want more!"

Noah read the note, then returned it calmly.

"It's encouraging, I congratulate you," he observed laconically.

Donald's face clouded, then cleared and he stepped forward impulsively:

"See here, Wick," he said, "you think I'm poaching on your preserves.

I'm not. That's the first letter I have had from Connie for weeks. I haven't written her a line since I left home, but she likes to keep me on the string. She just plays with Ivy and me to keep her hand in. Don't you mind either one of us. Stick to it and win."

"Oh, I'm sticking to it all right," said Noah doggedly, "but I don't seem to stand much chance with the rest of you."

"Nonsense, man! Think of your head-piece! The Lord started you out with more brains than most of us end with. The Judge said this morning that you knew more common law than any young lawyer he could think of."

"Yes, but knowledge of common law won't win this suit. She'll never look at me, Donald, except as a last resort. She thinks I am a heavy, awkward hayseed, and I reckon she's about right."

He towered there in his blue pajamas two sizes too small for him, his hair on end, and his large hands grasping the chair back. "I don't know the game," he went on helplessly. "You fellows take the trick while I am making up my mind what to play. She's too much for me. You are all too much for me, but I shan't throw down my hand, not yet."

Donald got up from the foot of the bed where he had been sitting, and took Noah by the shoulders.

"You've been working like a dog on my case, old fellow. Suppose you let me take charge of yours?"

"How do you mean?"

"You say you don't know the rules of the game. I know them backwards and forwards and upside down. You let me play this hand for you with Connie Queerington, and you stand to win."

"But--but you?"

"Heavens, man! Do you suppose if it were anything to me I'd have forgotten to read her letter all this time? No, I am through with that sort of thing." He turned his head abruptly and his face darkened.

"There never was but one race for me, that was worth the running and I got left at the post."

"Perhaps Miss Connie--"

"Likes me? Of course she does. And I like her tremendously. That's how I am going to help you. Leave it to me, Wick. Let me write her all the letters I want to. Let me tell her about the stir you are making up here, about the Judge cottoning to you, and the Governor asking you to dinner. In short, let me dramatize you, Wick; I'll write her a play in five acts with you for the hero. All you have to do is to ease up on your letters and keep out of her sight for a month or so. Tell her that as long as you can't be anything more to her you will be a good friend.

Connie hates a man to be a friend! She wants him to be either an acquaintance or a lover. You have gotten out of the first cla.s.s, and she will never let you alone until she gets you back into the third."

Noah rubbed his ma.s.sive and bewildered brow. "It's too complicated for me," he said; "I guess I'll have to accept your services."

That night Donald worked until the small hours, eagerly blocking out the chapters of his new book. So absorbed was he that it was not until he straightened his tired back, and started to make ready for bed that he remembered that he had not yet read Connie's letter.

It was a blotted and incoherent scrawl.

"Dear Cousin Don," he read, "I don't see how I am ever going to write, for my eyes are almost out from crying, but Miss Lady simply _can't_ do everything, and somebody has to tell the relatives. Hattie ought to help me, but she thinks she has to write to her intimate friends first, and she's got about a dozen. You know how hateful she is.

"Well, he was taken worse last week, Father, I mean. I can't go into the details for I have told them over to so many people now that I'm about crazy, and every time I go over them I almost cry myself to death. He didn't know any of us all last night or this morning, except once he called for Miss Lady and patted her cheek. At the end he seemed to get stronger and opened his eyes and asked for his ma.n.u.script. It was the most pitiful thing you ever saw at the last, to see him trying to turn over the sheets, with his poor eyes staring out at the wall, not knowing any of us. You'll see about the funeral in the morning's paper. I don't see how we are ever going through with it.

"Your loving cousin,

"CONSTANCE QUEERINGTON.

"P. S. Please tell Mr. Wicker--I'd rather die than write another letter."

CHAPTER XXV

The summer that followed the People's Bank failure was one of those uncompromising summers that arrive in May and depart only with the last leaf in October. The river dwindling to a feeble stream staggered between distant banks, and the countryside lay parched and panting beneath an unrelenting sun.

In the city Noah Wicker toiled laboriously over his first case which had been granted a rehearing, and set for November the sixth. At the Capitol, Donald Morley sat day after day, coatless, collarless, in the torrid confines of his small bedroom, furiously covering reams of paper with compact handwriting. At Thornwood Miss Lady, who had been left in command of a sinking ship, struggled heroically to bring it into port.

One day early in July, Myrtella Flathers sat just inside the screen door of the summer kitchen, armed with a fly-spanker and a countenance of impending gloom. She was evidently rehearsing a speech, for her lips moved in scornful curves, and her bristling black locks were tossed in defiance. Mike, venturing out of a shady corner and catching a glimpse of her face, thought her inaudible remarks were addressed to him and retired with guilty eyelid and drooping tail to the woodshed.

Myrtella's bitter reflections were interrupted by the appearance of Miss Lady on the vine-covered porch. She looked absurdly young in her widow's weeds, in spite of the fact that her color was gone and her eyes beginning to look too big for her face.

"They've come to stay a week!" she announced, sinking wearily on the top step and casting a desperate glance at the closed shutters of the guest room above. "And it's Friday, and Mr. Gooch will be here to supper. Do you see how we are ever going to hold out?"

"_I_ ain't!" declared Myrtella, spanking a fly into eternity with deadly precision. "I'm sick and tired of company. There ain't been a day in the three months since the Doctor died that we ain't had his kin folks on our hands. It beats my time how half the world gits a prowlin' fit every summer, and goes pestering them that stays at home. As to these old maids that come to-day, if they had a eye in their heads they'd see you was plumb wore out. I wouldn't 'a' ast 'em to stay."

"But I had to. They are the Doctor's cousins. They said they'd been coming to see him every summer for years, and they don't want to lose sight of the children."

"Umph! The children wouldn't mind losing sight of them! Miss Hattie got sent to bed onct for sa.s.sing the thin one that wants special dishes and all her water boiled. I bet she'll ast you to change her mattress."