Peter Part 21

They talked of the tunnel and when it would be finished; and of the village people and whom they liked and whom they didn't--and why--and of Corinne, whose upturned little nose and superior, dominating airs Ruth thought were too funny for words; and of her recently announced engagement to Garry Minott, who had started for himself in business and already had a commission to build a church at Elm Crest--known to all New Jersey as Corklesville until the real-estate agencies took possession of its uplands--Jack being instrumental, with Mr.

MacFarlane's help, in securing him the order; and of the dinner to be given next week at Mrs. Brent Foster's on Washington Square, to which they were both invited, thanks to Miss Felicia for Ruth's invitation, and thanks to Peter for that of Jack, who, at Peter's request, had accompanied him one afternoon to one of Mrs. Foster's receptions, where he had made so favorable an impression that he was at once added to Mrs.

Foster's list of eligible young men--the same being a scarce article.

They had discussed, I say, all these things and many more, in sentences, the Scribe devoutly hopes, much shorter than the one he has just written--when in a casual--oh, so casual a way--merely as a matter of form--Ruth asked him if he really must go back to Corklesville in the morning.

"Yes," answered Jack--"there is no one to take charge of the new battery but myself, and we have ten holes already filled for blasting."

"But isn't it only to put the two wires together? Daddy explained it to me."

"Yes--but at just the right moment. Half a minute too early might ruin weeks of work. We have some supports to blow out. Three charges are at their bases--everything must go off together."

"But it is such a short visit."

Some note in her voice rang through Jack's ears and down into his heart.

In all their intercourse--and it had been a free and untrammelled one so far as their meetings and being together were concerned--there was invariably a barrier which he could never pa.s.s, and one that he was always afraid to scale. This time her face was toward him, the rosy light bathing her glorious hair and the round of her dimpled cheek. For an instant a half-regretful smile quivered on her lips, and then faded as if some indrawn sigh had strangled it.

Jack's heart gave a bound.

"Are you really sorry to have me go, Miss Ruth?" he asked, searching her eyes.

"Why should I not be? Is not this better than Mrs. Hicks's, and Aunt Felicia would love to have you stay--she told me so at dinner."

"But you, Miss Ruth?" He had moved a trifle closer--so close that his eager fingers almost touched her own: "Do you want me to stay?"

"Why, of course, we all want you to stay. Uncle Peter has talked of nothing else for days."

"But do you want me to stay, Miss Ruth?"

She lifted her head and looked him fearlessly in the eyes:

"Yes, I do--now that you will have it that way. We are going to have a sleigh-ride to-morrow, and I know you would love the open country, it is so beautiful, and so is--"

"Ruth! Ruth! you dear child," came a voice--"are you two never coming in?--the coffee is stone cold."

"Yes, Aunt Felicia, right away. Run, Mr. Breen--" and she flew up the brick path.

For the second time Miss Felicia's keen, kindly eyes scanned the young girl's face, but only a laugh, the best and surest of masks, greeted her.

"He thinks it all lovely," Ruth rippled out. "Don't you, Mr. Breen?"

"Lovely? Why, it is the most wonderful place I ever saw; I could hardly believe my senses. I am quite sure old Aunt Hannah is cooking behind that door--" here he pointed to the kitchen--"and that poor old Tom will come hobbling along in a minute with 'dat mis'ry' in his back. How in the world you ever did it, and what--"

"And did you hear my frogs?" interrupted his hostess.

"Of course he didn't, Felicia," broke in Peter. "What a question to ask a man! Listen to the croakings of your miserable tadpoles with the prettiest girl in seven counties--in seven States, for that matter--sitting beside him! Oh!--you needn't look, you minx! If he heard a single croak he ought to be ducked in the puddle--and then packed off home soaking wet."

"And that is what he is going to do himself," rejoined Ruth, dropping into a chair which Peter had drawn up for her.

"Do what!" cried Peter.

"Pack himself off--going by the early train--nothing I can do or say has made the slightest impression on him," she said with a toss of her head.

Jack raised his hands in protest, but Peter wouldn't listen.

"Then you'll come back, sir, on Sat.u.r.day and stay until Monday, and then we'll all go down together and you'll take Ruth across the ferry to her father's.

"Thank you, sir, but I am afraid I can't. You see, it all depends on the work--" this last came with a certain tone of regret.

"But I'll send MacFarlane a note, and have you detailed as an escort of one to bring his only daughter----"

"It would not do any good, Mr. Grayson."

"Stop your nonsense, Jack--" Peter called him so now--"You come back for Sunday." These days with the boy were the pleasantest of his life.

"Well, I would love to--" Here his eyes sought, Ruth--"but we have an important blast to make, and we are doing our best to get things into shape before the week is out."

"Well, but suppose it isn't ready?" demanded Peter.

"But it will be," answered Jack in a more positive tone; this part of the work was in his hands.

"Well, anyhow, send me a telegram."

"I will send it, sir, but I am afraid it won't help matters. Miss Ruth knows how delighted I would be to return here and see her safe home."

"Whether she does or whether she doesn't," broke in Miss Felicia, "hasn't got a single thing to do with it, Peter. You just go back to your work, Mr. Breen, and look after your gunpowder plots, or whatever you call them, and if some one of these gentlemen of elegant leisure--not one of whom so far has offered his services--cannot manage to escort you to your father's house, Ruth, I will take you myself. Now come inside the drawing-room, every one of you, or you will all blame me for undermining your precious healths--you, too, Major, and bring your cigars with you. So you don't drop your ashes into my tea-caddy, I don't care where you throw them."

It was late in the afternoon of the second day when the telegram arrived, a delay which caused no apparent suffering to any one except, perhaps, Peter, who wandered about with a "Nothing from Jack yet, eh?"

A question which no one answered, it being addressed to n.o.body in particular, unless it was to Ruth, who had started at every ring of the door-bell. As to Miss Felicia--she had already dismissed the young man from her mind.

When it did arrive there was a slight flutter of interest, but nothing more; Miss Felicia laying down her book, Ruth asking in indifferent tones--even before the despatch was opened--"Is he coming?" and Morris, who was playing chess with Peter, holding his p.a.w.n in mid-air until the interruption was over.

Not so Peter--who with a joyous "Didn't I tell you the boy would keep his promise--" sprang from his chair, nearly upsetting the chess-board in his eagerness to hear from Jack, an eagerness shared by Ruth, whose voice again rang out, this time in an anxious tone,

"Hurry up, Uncle Peter--is he coming?"

Peter made no answer; he was staring straight at the open slip, his face deathly pale, his hand trembling.

"I'll tell you all about it in a minute, dear," he said at last with a forced smile. Then he touched Morris's arm and the two left the room.

CHAPTER XIV

The Scribe would willingly omit this chapter. Dying men, hurrying doctors, improvised stretchers made of wrenched fence rails; silent, slow-moving throngs following limp, bruised bodies,--are not pleasant objects to write about and should be disposed of as quickly as possible.

Exactly whose fault it was n.o.body knew; if any one did, no one ever told. Every precaution had been taken each charge had been properly placed and tamped; all the fulminates inspected and the connections made with the greatest care. As to the battery--that was known to be half a mile away in the pay shanty, lying on Jack Breen's table.

Nor was the weather unfavorable. True, there had been rain the day before, starting a general thaw, but none of the downpour had soaked through the outer crust of the tunnel to the working force inside and no extra labor had devolved on the pumps. This, of course, upset all theories as to there having been a readjustment of surface rock, dangerous sometimes, to magnetic connections.