At the Age of Eve Part 17

"Big?" Cousin Eunice was going over the row of dishes again, to make sure that she was going to be able to use them all. "Why, she speaks seven different languages, and has all her underclothes suspended from her shoulders."

"Mercy! Then it will take every piece of silver and fine gla.s.s you can muster to offset that, I'm sure."

"Naturally I must make an impression some way. If my book had been published and talked about all I should do would be to offer them a cup of tea and a wafer--and they would fall all over themselves for the honor of coming."

"Meanwhile, being humble and obscure, you have to serve flesh and fowl and coffee--say, don't you reckon I'd better be scrubbing out the coffee-pot?"

"Please do," she nodded, as she went on with her work while I bearded Waterloo and demanded the glittering object of his admiration.

Manlike, he had already tired of the plaything, and was ready to scamper away with Grapefruit, for she had found a dead frog out in the yard, she said, and they would have a grand funeral if he would come on.

"Take him for a little walk now and save the funeral ceremonies until afternoon," I suggested, "so he'll stay out of his mother's way during the party."

Then I poured the marbles out of the coffee-pot into his grimy little hands, the life-lines and head-lines of which const.i.tuted little streaks of whiteness, thereby proving them to be the hands of a Caucasian.

"There's one that won't come out," he informed me, as he pocketed the others and departed with Grapefruit.

I investigated and found a marble lodged firmly in the neck of the spout, a most tantalizing position it occupied, resisting coyly my efforts to remove it, yet protruding almost halfway into the body of the pot. I stood there fingering it until Cousin Eunice came to see what was the matter. I explained, and when she insisted upon trying her own hand at the marble's removal I reluctantly gave it over to her.

"Now isn't that _too_ bad?" she finally exclaimed with a nervous impatience after she saw that it was useless to try any further. "It serves me right for giving it to him to play with--but I _do_ hate to get him started before breakfast."

Each member of the family and the servants took turns at trying to get the marble out of the fine new coffee-pot, spending, all told, several hours of the busy morning, and when Rufe came in to luncheon the story was poured into his somewhat unsympathetic ears.

"I knew he would do the thing some damage when I saw you hand it over to him to play with this morning," he said with a fatherly air.

"Doesn't he tear, or break, or _chew_, or sprinkle over with talc.u.m powder everything he can get his hands on?"

"Maybe you can get the marble out," I said, bringing the coffee-pot to Rufe, and he worked over it for a full half-hour.

"Oh, it's ruined," he said disgustedly, when he saw that it wasn't coming out. "Of course the coffee won't _pour_! It will just drop, as reluctantly as tears at a rich uncle's funeral."

"Why, we hadn't thought to try," Cousin Eunice said, and I took the thing from Rufe's hand and sped with it to the kitchen sink.

"It pours," I announced triumphantly.

"Then your glory as a hostess is saved," Rufe comforted her.

"But who wants to go through life with a marble up the coffee-pot spout?" she persisted, with little worried lines between her eyes.

"Besides it will be sure to taste like marbles," I added.

The little worried lines between Cousin Eunice's blue eyes grew deeper in the early afternoon as the ices and cakes were delayed an hour in coming, and we found that Waterloo had sprinkled frazzled wheat biscuit all over the chairs and floor of the reception-room, just as the door-bell was ringing to announce the first Scribbler. Then she grew cheerful again when some of her best friends among the club members arrived, and only slightly flurried at the advent of Mrs.

Barnette.

I stayed in the presence of the learned body long enough to hear with my own ears that they were not discussing anything too deep for me to understand, everything being spoken in plain English; but this happened to be a business meeting as well as an occasion for social enjoyment, so when the time for election of officers drew near I fled, fearing at least Esperanto--if not actual blows.

I was present once at a meeting of mother's missionary society when this ordeal had to be gone through with, and I shall never forget the injured expression and cutting accents of the secretary _pro tem._ when she found that the office was not permanently hers.

The only untoward event that happened this afternoon (and that wasn't untoward through any fault of ours) was when Mrs. Howard, an immensely tall, raw-boned Scribbler, happened to speak in complimentary terms of dear Mrs. Clayborne's lovely sylvan room.

"I am _so_ sensitive to rooms," she said, fluttering her rich lace scarf toward one corner of the apartment which she particularly liked, "and the least false note gets so on my nerves!" She was sitting alone upon a small sofa--alone, yet not alone, for Waterloo's little, but _loud_, mechanical bug was also sitting on the sofa, although his presence was unsuspected by Mrs. Howard.

This amazing insect is like love in the springtime, it only takes a touch to set it a-fluttering, for it seems always to be wound up. The heavy lace scarf hanging from Mrs. Howard's long arms and creeping over its back and sprawling legs was quite enough. It caught in the silken fabric with its sudden zizzing, clicking noise; and it climbed steadily upward, toward the lady's stalwart, but nervous, shoulders.

The meshes of the lace concealed the true ident.i.ty of the intruder, and Mrs. Howard no doubt considered herself to be in the clutches of some poisonous and persistent spider. She shook her scarf; she tried to slay the monster with her book of minutes; she screamed. Finally, jerking the scarf from her shoulders and flinging it into the middle of the floor, she bravely trampled the "thing" underfoot, and thus she silenced it. Then she subsided upon the sofa, pale and exhausted.

"Let's have the sandwiches--quick," Cousin Eunice whispered to me, and I fled to the dining-room to see that everything was in readiness.

Under the genial influence of the buffet luncheon I found that they all unbent somewhat--enough to get down to commonplaces, even discussing such things as husbands, wall-paper and j.a.p-a-lac.

I vibrated between the scene of gaiety in the house and the more enjoyable frog funeral, which was in full blast in the back yard.

Grapefruit had taken down one of the kitchen window shades to make a tent, under which there was an attractive tub of water, with several members of the bereaved frog family sporting heartlessly around in its muddy depths.

I had not thought of danger, although I had seen Waterloo dabbling in this tub pretty constantly during the last sad rites; but after the final Scribbler had departed and his weary mother came upon the scene, little Waterloo was ordered peremptorily in the house, and dire predictions were made.

"Oh, you'll be sure to have croup to-night," Cousin Eunice said dejectedly, as she followed Waterloo up the stairs and rubbed down his dripping little hands and arms with a Turkish towel. This task being finished to her maternal satisfaction, she turned to me with a look of unutterable weariness.

"Unhook me, Ann; my head is bursting. I'm going to bed."

So this is how it came about that when the door-bell rang at eight o'clock to-night there was n.o.body but me in fit condition to receive callers. Rufe was alternately filling the hot-water bottle for Cousin Eunice's aching head and racking his own brain trying to remember where he had put the wine of ipecac after Waterloo's last spell of croup. And the poor little darling was coughing in a manner that to me was frightfully alarming. With no thought in my mind save to help Rufe in his nursing feats, I had taken off my party frock and had slipped on a low-neck Peter Pan blouse, with a fresh linen skirt. My hair was about ready to tumble and my face flushed with worry over Waterloo.

"Oh, the devil!" Rufe p.r.o.nounced, when the penetrating sound of the door-bell reached us. But it was not the devil.

"It is Mr. Chalmers," I said, with a little catch in my breath as I heard his voice down in the hall.

"Well, you run down and get him settled," Rufe said, holding up a little bottle of dark-colored liquid to the light to read the label, "--then come on back for a few minutes and help me give the rooster a dose of this--will you? It always requires an a.s.sistant."

"Let's give the medicine now--then I'll dress before I go down."

"Nonsense! You look a thousand times prettier flushed and careless--as you are now--than you do all fixed up with your hair smooth. I don't like to keep him waiting long, for he might have come to see me about something important. You sound him, like a good girl, and if he doesn't want to see me particularly tell him that my family is ill and that you will entertain him."

I did take time to glance into the mirror to satisfy myself that Rufe was not entirely wrong--then I ran down-stairs.

Mr. Chalmers was standing on the hearth-rug with his back to the fire (which Cousin Eunice had ordered kindled up all over the house when she realized that there was danger of Waterloo having croup), as I came down the steps, and when he saw, through the big doorway, that I was alone, he came to the foot of the stairs to meet me. The front part of the house was still open, and there was a beautiful moonlight.

After I had greeted him I stood in the dimly lighted hall a moment, looking out into the night; then I went on into the long, beautiful room, which was filled with the scent of roses to-night, and, as we drew up before the fire, I shivered a little. There was just enough crispness in the chilly air to cause a deliciously shivery sensation.

"Well, you have no engagement for this evening, I hope," he began, as I moved closer to the hearth and stirred the fire into a brighter blaze. "I should have telephoned, I know, but I was detained at the office until quite late."

"No, there are no engagements to-night. Cousin Eunice has gone to bed with a headache and Rufe is nursing Waterloo through a spell of croup.

By the way, you'll excuse me while I run back a few minutes and help give the little fellow a dose of medicine?"

"Certainly--if you'll promise not to be long," he said with a smile.

"Oh, it will take only a little while. Then, when the invalids both get settled Rufe can come down--unless you are in a special hurry to see him about some mighty political secret. In that case I can send him right now, and play the part of nurse myself."

"Please do _not_," he answered, speaking much more earnestly than the occasion warranted. "I came solely to see you. Tell Clayborne he is not to disturb himself on my account."

Waterloo was breathing better and had gone to sleep by the time I reached his bedside again.

"I don't believe he's going to need the stuff, after all," Rufe said, unb.u.t.toning his collar and beginning to make preparations to be comfortable. "Eunice says her head is a little easier, so I'm going to lie down here and read the paper until I'm sleepy. Chalmers didn't want anything special with me, did he?"