Cap'n Dan's Daughter Part 19

He listened while his wife dilated upon the wonderful happenings at the meeting and the glorious consequences which she felt sure were to follow. Just before putting out the light he asked one more question.

"That--that Mrs. Lake?" he said. "She's a gra.s.s widow, ain't she--isn't she, I mean?"

"Yes, what of it?"

"Oh, nothing. Only I thought you were kind of prejudiced against--against--"

"I've had a good many prejudices, I suppose, like other people. But Mrs.

Lake's husband was a brute; Mrs. Black told me so. He must have been, for she is perfectly lovely. I've met them all, and they are ALL lovely.

They're going to call and--and everything. Oh, Daniel, this means so much to us!"

Captain Dan turned out the gas.

"Yes, Serena," he said slowly. "I shouldn't wonder if it did."

The calls began the very next afternoon. Mrs. Black, having made up her mind that the taking of the Dotts under her wing was a necessity, made a virtue of that necessity and explained to her fellow members of Scarford Chapter that Serena and Daniel were really very nice people. "A little countrified, of course. You must expect that. But they are very kind hearted and immensely wealthy--oh, immensely." She was kind enough to add that Serena was quite an exceptional person and an advanced thinker, considering her opportunities. "The club people were going to take them up, and so I felt that we should get in first," she explained. "If they should prove to be impossible we can drop them at any time, of course."

In making this explanation she did not mention the Fenholtzes, and yet if it had not been for the call of the Honorable Oscar and his wife it is extremely doubtful if Serena would have become a member of Scarford Chapter so soon. Also it is doubtful if the little dinner given by the Blacks to Mr. and Mrs. Dott would have taken place within the week. At that dinner Captain Dan wore his first dress suit. He bought it ready made at one of the Scarford shops and it fitted him remarkably well, considering. What he could not do, however, was to feel at ease in it.

"Good land, Serena!" he said, when the dressing was completed and they were about to start for the dinner, "don't pick at me so everlastin'ly.

Don't you suppose I know I look as stiff and awkward as if I'd froze?

You won't let me put my hands in my pockets, and all I can do is hang 'em around loose and think about 'em, and this blessed collar is so high I can't scarcely get my chin over it. I'm doin' my best, so don't keep remindin' me what I look like all the time."

"I don't care what you say, Daniel," declared his wife. "The clothes are just what you ought to wear, and if you would only forget them for a little while you would look all right."

"But I can't forget. I know the clothes are all right. It's me that's all wrong. My red face stickin' over the top of this collar looks like a fireman's shirt on a white fence. I tell you I ain't used to this kind of thing. I wasn't born to it and it don't come natural to me."

"Neither was Mr. Black 'born to it,' but he has got used to it and so can you if you will try."

"Oh, I'll try. But I'm beginnin' awful late in life. I know you'll be ashamed of me, Serena. You ought to have a different husband."

"I don't want a different one. I wouldn't change you for anybody. But I do think you ought to try and help me as much as you can. My chance has just come; I am only just beginning and I mean to go on and improve myself and our position in life all I can. All I ask you to do is not to hold me back by complaining."

The "little dinner" was not as little as it might have been. Annette had taken pains to make it as elaborate and as costly an affair as she could. This was not solely on the Dotts' account. She had invited Mr. and Mrs. Fenholtz and the impression was to be made upon them, if possible. But, unfortunately, the Fenholtzes did not attend. Mrs.

Fenholtz wrote that she had a prior engagement and sent regrets, just as she had previously done on the occasions of Mrs. Black's other "little"

functions.

However, the leading lights of Scarford Chapter attended and the display of gowns and coiffures was more varied and elaborate than at the open meeting. Serena, seated at the right hand of B. Phelps, was in her glory. She felt that at last she was in touch with the real thing.

Daniel, sandwiched between Annete and Mrs. Lake, was not as happy. The necessity of forgetting his clothes and remembering his grammar was a heavy burden. His conversation was limited to "Yes" and "No" and "I shouldn't wonder," and after a time the ladies ceased in their efforts to make him talk and carried on an animated dialogue across his shirt front.

After dinner there was music and bridge. Daniel was fond of music, but most of the songs, sung by a thin young lady with a great deal of hair and a decollete gown, were in a language which he did not understand, and the piano solos seemed to him to be made up of noise and gymnastics with very little melody. He watched Serena, however, who, in turn, was watching Mrs. Lake and the rest; when they applauded, she applauded and the captain followed suit.

Bridge was an unknown quant.i.ty to both of them, and they sat and looked on while Mrs. Black made it "without" and found fault with her partner when they lost. The thin young lady, who had obliged with the vocal selections, asked the captain if he played "nullos." Daniel, who was not sure whether "nullos" was a musical instrument or a game, replied that he wasn't sure, but he didn't think he did; after which he retired into the corner to avoid further questioning.

They reached home about two o'clock, and the captain fell sound asleep in the taxi and had to be shaken into consciousness when the machine reached the Dott door.

"My soul, Serena," he said, when they were upstairs in the bedroom, "don't those folks ever go to bed? There was stuff enough to eat at that dinner to last the average family through three meals. Time I had finished the ice cream I was ready to curl up like a cat in front of the fire; but the rest of them seemed to be just startin' in to be lively.

Are we goin' to keep this up very long? If we are, I'll have to sleep in the daytime, like a fo'mast hand on night lookout."

"But wasn't it splendid?" explained his wife. "Weren't they cultivated, brilliant people? You and I never went to anything like THAT dinner before, Daniel Dott."

The captain admitted that they never did. "Could you make anything out of that game they were playin'?" he asked. "What was it they called it?"

"Bridge. No, I couldn't, but I'm going to. I'm going to learn it just as soon as I can. Mrs. Black says everybody plays it now."

Her husband chuckled. "Those that don't play it had better not try,"

he observed. "Judgin' from what I saw to-night, if they do try they get into trouble. That Lake woman was givin' that poor little bald-headed fellow she was playin' with fits most of the time. Whenever they won she patted herself on the back, and when they didn't she said it was his fault. He ought to have 'echoed' or hollered back--or somethin'. One time she put down a card and he put another kind of a one on it, and she glared at him and said, 'Havin' no clubs?' and he had one that he'd forgot. He spent the next ten minutes beggin' her pardon, but 'twas a good thing SHE didn't have a club. She'd have used it on him if she had. He was all shriveled up like a frostbitten cranberry when they got through."

After they were in bed he said, "Serena, what was that black stuff they had on the toast at the beginnin' of that supper? Looked like tar, but it tasted kind of salty and good."

"Don't say supper, Daniel. It was a dinner. All city people have dinner at night. That was caviar on the toast. I've read about it. It comes from Russia."

Silence for a moment. Then Captain Dan said reflectively, "Caviar?

Caviar, eh? I've heard of that somewhere before; where was it? Yes, yes, I know. 'Twas a caviar sandwich the waiter asked that young fellow I met in the Rat Cellar to have. I never found out who that young fellow was, and yet I know I've met him somewhere before. I wish I could remember where it was. My memory is failin' me, I guess; must be gettin' old.

Can't you remember, Serena?"

But his wife bade him stop talking and go to sleep.

The next day there were more calls, and Serena was asked to attend a committee meeting as a guest. She attended it and returned more full of Chapter enthusiasm than ever. She announced that she might be asked to prepare a paper to be read before the Chapter, and that she intended to study and prepare for it. Study and prepare she did, and, between dodging callers, or helping to entertain them, and keeping out of his wife's way while she was busy with the encyclopedias which she had taken from the library, the captain began to feel somewhat deserted. Hapgood's company was too stately to be congenial, and Daniel sought refuge in the kitchen, where Azuba, as usual, was always ready to talk.

Azuba was br.i.m.m.i.n.g over with the novelty of city life. She had been to the theater once already since her arrival, and to the moving picture show three times.

"Don't talk to ME," she said. "If them pictures ain't the most wonderful things that ever was, then _I_ don't know. _I_ never expected to see such sights--soldiers paradin', and cowboys a-ridin', and houses a-burnin', and Indians scalpin' 'em! I was so worked up I hollered right out."

"I should think you would. An Indian scalpin' a house is enough to make anybody holler."

"They didn't scalp the house; what sort of foolishness would that be--the idea! They scalped the folks IN the house. That is, they would have scalped 'em, only along come the cowboys wavin' pistols and hurrahin'--"

"Could you hear 'em hurrah?"

"No, but I could see 'em. And the way they went for them Indians was a caution. And--Oh, say, Captain Dott, there was one set of pictures there made me think of you. 'Twas all about some people that wanted to go into society. She had a paralyzed father and they had a child, a real pretty girl, and, would you believe it, they commenced to neglect their child and go off playin' cards and dancin' and carousin' around, and the child was took down sick and the poor paralyzed grandfather--"

"Grandfather? Thought you said it was a father."

"'Twas the WOMAN'S father--the child's grandfather. Well, anyhow, the poor thing had to take care of it, and the nurse went to sleep and the father come home and found her dyin'--"

"Who, the nurse?"

"No, no, the child. The nurse wa'n't sick; but the child was terrible sick."

"What was the matter with the child; paralysis, too?"

"I don't know what was the matter with it. 'Tain't likely 'twas paralysis. You get me so mixed up I shan't know what I AM sayin' pretty soon. Well, anyhow, what happened was that the child's mother and father neglected it on account their fashionable goin's-on, and the child up and died. 'Twas the most affectin' thing. There was the child a-dyin', and the mother and father cryin', and the old grandfather goin' all to pieces--"

"All to pieces! That's worse than paralysis. Hold on a minute, Azuba!

Was all this in the picture?"

"Yes."