Old Caravan Days Part 20

[Ill.u.s.tration: THE CHILD LAY QUITE DOCILE AND SUBMISSIVE.]

"The things she had on her when she come to us," said Grandma Padgett, "were literally gone to nothing. The children had run so far and rubbed over fences and sat in the gra.s.s. I didn't even think it was worth while to save the pieces; and I put my least one's clothes on her for some kind of a covering.

"It was her concert dress," said the woman, regarding aunt Corinne's pantalets with some contempt. "I suppose I hought to thank you, but since she was hinticed away, I can't. When one 'as her feelings 'arrowed up for nearly a week as mine have been 'arrowed, one can't feel thankful. I will send these 'ere things back by Jarvey. Well, ladies and gentlemen, let me bid you good evening. The performance 'as already begun and we professionals cannot shirk business."

"You give an exhibition in Greenfield to-night, do you?" inquired the lawyer.

"Yes, sir," replied the woman, standing with Carrie in arms. She had some difficulty in getting at her pocket, but threw him a handbill.

Then pa.s.sing out through the hall, she shut the front door behind her.

There were two other front doors to the house, though only the central one was in constant use, being left open in the summer weather, excepting on occasions such as the present, when William Sebastian's wife thought it should be locked. One of the other front doors opened into the sitting-room, but was barred with a tall bureau. The third let into a square room devoted to the lumber acc.u.mulations of the house. A bar and shelves for decanters remained there, but these William Sebastian had never permitted to be used since his name was painted on the sign.

Mrs. Sebastian felt a desire to confuse the outgoing woman by the three doors and imprison her in the old store room.

"I don't think the child's hers," exclaimed Mrs. Sebastian.

"Thee isn't Solomon," observed the Quaker, twinkling at his wife.

"Thee cannot judge who the true mother may be."

"She shouldn't got in here if I'd had the keeping of the door,"

continued Mrs. Sebastian. "I may not be Solomon, but I think I could keep the varmints out of my own chicken house."

Grandma Padgett set her gla.s.ses in a perplexed stare at the door.

"She didn't let us say good-by to Fairy Carrie," exclaimed aunt Corinne indignantly, "and kept her face hid away all the time so she couldn't look at us. I'd hate to have such a ma!"

"She'll whip the poor little thing for running off with us, when she gets her away," said Robert Day, listening for doleful sounds.

"Well, what does thee think of this business?" inquired William Sebastian of the lawyer who was busying himself drawing squares on the tablecloth with a steel fork. "It ought to come in thy line. Thee deals with criminals and knows the deceitfulness of our human hearts.

What does thee say to the woman?"

The lawyer smiled as he laid down his fork, and barely mentioned the conflicting facts:

"She took considerable pains to tell something about herself: more than was necessary. But if they kidnapped the child, they are dangerously bold and confident in exhibiting and claiming her."

CHAPTER XX. SUNDAY ON THE ROAD.

Aunt Corinne occupied with her mother a huge apartment over the sitting-room, in which was duplicated the fireplace below. At this season the fireplace was closed with a black board on which paraded balloon-skirted women cut out of fashion plates.

The chimneys were built in two huge stacks at the gable-ends of the house, outside the weather boarding: a plan the architects of this day utterly condemn. The outside chimney was, however, as far beyond the stick-and-clay stacks of the cabin, as our fire-stone flues are now beyond it. This house with log steps no longer stands as an old landmark by the 'pike side in Greenfield. But on that June morning it looked very pleasant, and the locust-trees in front of it made the air heavy with perfume. There is no flower like the locust for feeding honey to the sense of smell. Half the bees from William Sebastian's hives were buzzing overhead, when Bobaday and aunt Corinne sat down by Zene on the log steps to unload their troubles.

All three were in their Sunday clothes. Zene had even greased his boots, and looked with satisfaction on the moist surfaces which he stretched forth to dry in the sun.

He had not seen Carrie borne away, but he had been to the show afterwards, and heard her sing one of her songs. He told the children she acted like she never see a thing before her, and would go dead asleep if they didn't stick pins in her like they did in a woman he seen walkin' for money once. Robert was fain to wander aside on the subject of this walking woman, but aunt Corinne kept to Fairy Carrie, and made Zene tell every sc.r.a.p of information he had about her.

"After I rubbed the horses this mornin'," he proceeded, "I took a stroll around the burg, and their tent and wagon's gone!"

"Gone!" exclaimed aunt Corinne. "Clear out of town?"

Zene said he allowed so. He could show the children where the tent and wagon stood, and it was bare ground now. He had also discovered the time-honored circus-ring, where every summer the tinseled host rode and tumbled. But under the circ.u.mstances, a circus-ring had no charms.

"Then they've got her," said Bobaday. "We'll never see the pretty little thing again. If I'd been a man I wouldn't let that woman have her, like Grandma Padgett did. Grown folks are so funny. I did wish some grand people would come in the night and say she was their child, and make the show give her up."

Aunt Corinne arose to fly to her mother and Mrs. Sebastian with the news. But the central door opening on the instant and Mrs. Sebastian, her husband and guest coming out, aunt Corinne had not far to fly.

"The woman is a stealer," she added to her breathless recital. "She didn't even send my things back."

"She's welcome to them," said Grandma Padgett, shaking her head, "but I feel for that child, whether the rightful owners has her or not."

"This is Lord's Day," said William Sebastian to the children, "along the whole length of the pike, and across the whole breadth of the country. Thy little friend will get her First Day blessing."

He wore a gray hat, half-high in the crown, and a gray coat which flapped his calves when he walked. His trousers were of a cut which reached nearly to his armpits, but this fact was kept from the public by a vest crawling well toward his knees. Yet he looked beautifully tidy and well-dressed. His wife, who was not a Quaker, had by no means such an air of simple grandeur.

Grandma Padgett and aunt Corinne, somewhat reluctantly followed by Zene, were going to the Methodist church. Already its bell was filling the air. But Robert hung back and asked if he might not go to Quaker meeting.

"Thee couldn't sit and meditate," said William Sebastian.

Bobaday a.s.sured William Sebastian he could sit very still, and he always meditated. When he ran after his grandmother to get her consent, it occurred to him to find out from Zene how the pig-headed man was, and if he looked as ugly as ever. But aunt Corinne scorned the question, and quite flew af him for asking it.

The Methodist services Robert knew by heart: the open windows, the high pulpit where the preacher silently knelt first thing, hymn books rustling cheerfully, the hymn given out two lines at a time to be sung by the congregation, then the kneeling of everybody and the prayer, more singing, and the sermon, perhaps followed by an exhortation, when the preacher talked loud enough for the boys sitting out on the fence to hear every word. Perhaps a few children whispered, or a baby cried and its mother took it out. Everybody seemed happy and astir. After church there was so much handshaking that the house emptied very slowly.

But on his return he described the Quaker meeting to aunt Corinne.

"They all sat and sat," said Bobaday. "It was a little bit of a house and not half so many folks could get in it as sit in the corners by the pulpit in Methodist meeting. And they sat and sat, and n.o.body said a word or gave out a hymn. The women looked at the cracks in the floor. You could hear everything outdoors. After a long time they all got up and shook hands. Mrs. Sebastian said to Mr. Sebastian when we came away, 'The spirit didn't appear to move anybody this morning.' And he said, 'No: but it was a blessed meeting.'"

"Didn't your legs cramp?" inquired aunt Corinne.

"Yes; and my nose tickled and I wanted to sneeze."

"But you dursn't move your thumb even. That lawyer that ate supper here last night would like such a meeting, wouldn't he?"

The lawyer was coming up the log steps while Robert spoke of him.

And with him was a lady who looked agitated, and whom he had to a.s.sist.

Robert and Corinne, at the open sitting-room window, looked at each other with quick apprehension.

"Aunt Krin, _that's_ her mother," said aunt Krin's nephew. His young relative grasped his arm and exclaimed in an awe-struck whisper:

"Bobaday Padgett!"

CHAPTER XXI. HER MOTHER ARRIVES.