Pee-Wee Harris Part 5

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There were many others, enough to decorate the road for miles in both directions. If Pepsy as chef could live up to Pee-wee's promises the neighborhood would soon become famous. That was her one forlorn hope, that the fame of their offerings would get abroad and lure the traffic from its wonted path. But Pee-wee's enthusiasm and energy carried all before them like a storming column and she was soon as hopeful and confident as he.

When her ch.o.r.es were finished that afternoon she hurried to their refreshment parlor, where Pee-wee sat behind the new counter like a stern schoolmaster, cards strewn about him, his round face black with stencil ink, still turning out advertising bait for the public.

"I don't care what they say," she panted; "we're going to make a lot of money and buy the tents. I tripped on the third step in the house just now and that means surely we'll have good luck and I can help just as much as if I was a really truly scout, can't I? Aunt Jamsiah says if I make a lot of doughnuts you'll just eat them all and there won't be any to sell. We mustn't eat the things ourselves, must we?"

"That shows how much she knows," Pee-wee said; "we might have to do that to make the people hungry. If they see me eating a doughnut and looking very happy, won't that make them want to buy some? We have upkeep expenses, don't we?"

"Yes, and I'm sorry I didn't tell her that," Pepsy said, "but I never thought of it. You always think of things. I'm going to wash the ink off your face, so hold still."

She dipped her gingham ap.r.o.n under the trapdoor in the flooring where the clear, cool water was, and taking his chin in her coa.r.s.e little freckly hands, washed the face of her hero and partner. And meanwhile Wiggle tugged on her ap.r.o.n as if he thought she were inflicting some injury upon the boy.

So blinded was Pee-wee by this vigorous bath and so preoccupied the others that for the moment none of them noticed the young fellow of about twenty who, with hat tilted rakishly on the side of his head and cigarette drooping from the corner of his mouth, stood in the road watching them.

CHAPTER X

DEADWOOD GAMELY TALKS BUSINESS

Deadwood Gamely was the village sport and enjoyed a certain prestige because his father was a lawyer. He was also somewhat of an object of awe because he went to Baxter City every day, and worked in the bank there.

His ramshackle Ford roadster was considered an evidence of the terribly reckless extravagance of his habits, but it was really nothing more than a sort of pocketbook, since all his money went into it, and a very shabby one at that. He had a cheap wit and swaggeringly condescending air which he practiced on the simple inhabitants of Everdoze, and in his banter he was not always kind. Yet notwithstanding that he was tawdry both in dress and speech the villagers did not venture much into the conversational arena with him because they knew that they were not his equals in banter and retort.

"h.e.l.lo, little orphan Annie," he said. "Bungel was telling me the wagon is coming for you pretty soon. Over the hill to the poorhouse. Ever hear that song? What's that you've got there, a soldier? Watcher doing with him? Lucky kid, I'd like to be a soldier."

"What were you, a slacker?" Pee-wee shouted.

This was not the kind of retort that Deadwood Gamely was accustomed to hearing and he gave a quick look at the small stranger in khaki who sat behind the counter like a judge on the bench staring straight at him.

"Don't get him riled," Pepsy whispered. "He likes to get me riled so's just to make me feel silly; it's--it's Deadwood Gamely. He's always togged out swell like that," she added fearfully.

"The only thing that's swell about him is his head," said Pee-wee in his loudest voice. "Don't you be scared of him, I'm here."

"What's that?" said the young man in a tone intended to be darkly menacing.

"You'd better put your hat on the top of your head or it'll blow off,"

said Pee-wee. "I said that I'm here. Let's hear you deny it. If I was a crow I might be afraid of you."

Slightly taken aback by his ready retorts, the young man could only say, "If you were a crow, hey?" He stepped a little closer to the counter but the ominous advance did not alarm Pee-wee in the least. He sat behind his card-strewn counter holding the stencil brush like a sort of weapon ready to besmear that face of sneering a.s.surance if its owner ventured too near.

"So I'm a scarecrow, eh?" Mr. Gamely said with a side glance at Pepsy.

He was not going to have her witness his discomfiture at the hands of this glib little stranger. Moreover, a slur at his personal splendor was a very grave matter and not to be overlooked.

"I don't like fresh kids," said Mr. Deadwood Gamely, advancing with an air of veiled menace.

"Sometimes they get so fresh they have to be salted a little. Don't you think you'd better take that back?"

Pepsy waited, fearful, breathless.

"Sure I will," said Pee-wee; "the next scarecrow I meet I'll apologize to him."

Deadwood Gamely paused. His usual procedure in an affair of this kind would have been to advance quickly, ruffle his victim's hair in a goading kind of swaggerish good humor and send him sprawling. He would not really have hurt a youngster like Pee-wee but he would have made him look and feel ridiculous.

But a glance at Pee-wee's gummy stencil brush reminded Mr. Gamely that discretion was the better part of valor. A dexterous dab or two of that would have put an end to all his glory. Pee-wee left no doubt about this.

"This summer-house is on private land," he said, "and I'm the boss of it. If you try to get fresh with me I'll paint you blacker--blacker than a--than a tomato could--I will. You come ten steps nearer, I dare you to."

Gamely paused irresolute, at which Pepsy, under protection of her partner's terrible threat, set up a provoking laugh. Wiggle, appearing to sense the situation, began to bark up-roariously. There was nothing for the baffled village sport to do but retreat as gracefully as he could.

"Can't you take a joke?" he said weakly. "Do you think I'd hurt you?"

"I know you wouldn't," said Pee-wee; "you wouldn't get the chance. You think you're smart, don't you, talking about the wagon coming to get her and getting her all scared."

Deadwood Gamely broke into a very excessive but false laugh. "No harm intended," he said, vaulting on to the fence and sitting discreetly at that distance. "What's all this going on here? Going to have a circus or play store or something?"

Pee-wee was always magnanimous in victory. Abiding enmity was a thing he knew not. So now he laid down his stencil brush (within easy reach) and said, "We're going to start a refreshment shack and sell fruit and lemonade and waffles and things and maybe auto accessories and souvenirs."

Pepsy seemed a bit uncomfortable as Pee-wee said this, perhaps just a trifle ashamed. She was afraid that this clever, sophisticated young fellow would ridicule their enterprise, as indeed there was good reason to do. Yet she felt ashamed, too, of her momentary faithlessness to Pee-wee.

"Maybe some people will pa.s.s here when they have the carnival at Berryville," she said, half apologetically.

To her surprise Deadwood Gamely, instead of emitting an uproarious, mocking laugh, appeared to be thinking.

"Bully for you," he finally said, looking all about as if to size up the surroundings. "Right on the job, hey? I'd like to buy some stock in that enterprise. Whose idea is it? Yours, kiddo?"

"We're going to make money enough to buy three tents for the scout troop I belong to," Pee-wee said.

"Visiting here, hey?"

"I live in Bridgeboro, New Jersey; I'm here for the summer."

Deadwood Gamely sat on the fence still looking, about him and whistling.

Then, instead of bursting forth in derisive merriment as Pepsy dreaded he would do, he made an astonishing remark.

"I tell you what I'll do," he said. "You kids take care of the place and furnish the fruit and stuff and I'll put up the coin for all the stuff you have to buy--chewing gum, and accessories, and souvenirs and junk that has to be got in the city, and we'll share even. I'll put up the capital and be a silent partner. How does that strike you? You two will be the active partners. We'll make the thing go big. I mean what I say."

"What's a silent partner?" Pee-wee demanded.

"Oh, that's just the fellow that puts up the money and keeps in the background sort of, and n.o.body knows he's interested."

"I'd rather be a noisy partner," Pee-wee said.

"I wouldn't be silent for anybody, I wouldn't." Deadwood Gamely paused a moment, smiling.

"No, but you could keep a secret, couldn't you?" he asked.