Rudder Grange Part 28

"Well, we kep' straight on to the doctor's, an' glad we was when we got there, an' mad he was when we lef' Mrs. Jackson an' the General on his hands, for we wouldn't have no more to do with 'em, an' he couldn't help undertaking' to see that they got back to the asylum. I thought at first he wouldn't lift a finger to get us our trunk; but he cooled down after a bit, an' said he hoped we'd try some different kind of inst.i.tution for the rest of our trip, which we said we thought we would.

"That afternoon we gawked around, a-lookin' at all the outside shows, for Jone said he'd have to be pretty careful of his money now, an' he was glad when I told him I had two free tickets in my pocket for a show in the evenin.'

"As we was a-walkin' down to the ferry, after supper, says he:

"'Suppose you let me have a look at them tickets.'

"So I hands 'em to him. He reads one of 'em, and then he reads the other, which he needn't 'a' done, for they was both alike, an' then he turns to me, an' says he:

"'What kind of a man is your boarder-as-was?'

"It wasn't the easiest thing in the world to say jus' what he was, but I give Jone the idea, in a general sort of way, that he was pretty lively.

"'So I should think,' says he. 'He's been tryin' a trick on us, and sendin' us to the wrong place. It's rather late in the season for a show of the kind, but the place we ought to go to is a potato-field.'

"'What on earth are you talkin' about?' says I, dumbfoundered.

"'Well,' says he, 'it's a trick he's been playin'. He thought a bridal trip like ours ought to have some sort of a outlandish wind-up, an' so he sent us to this place, which is a meetin' of chaps who are agoin'

to talk about insec's,--princ.i.p.ally potato-bugs, I expec'--an' anything stupider than that, I s'pose your boarder-as-was couldn't think of, without havin' a good deal o' time to consider.'

"'It's jus' like him,' says I. 'Let's turn round and go back,' which we did, prompt.

"We gave the tickets to a little boy who was sellin' papers, but I don't believe he went.

"'Now then,' says Jone, after he'd been thinkin' awhile, 'there'll be no more foolin' on this trip. I've blocked out the whole of the rest of it, an' we'll wind up a sight better than that boarder-as-was has any idea of. To-morrow we'll go to father's an' if the old gentleman has got any money on the crops, which I expec' he has, by this time, I'll take up a part o' my share, an' we'll have a trip to Washington, an' see the President, an' Congress, an' the White House, an' the lamp always a-burnin' before the Supreme Court, an'--'

"'Don't say no more, says I, 'it's splendid!'

"So, early the nex' day, we goes off jus' as fast as trains would take us to his father's, an' we hadn't been there mor'n ten minutes, before Jone found out he had been summoned on a jury.

"'When must you go?' says I, when he come, lookin' a kind o' pale, to tell me this.

"'Right off,' says he. 'The court meets this mornin'. If I don't hurry up, I'll have some of 'em after me. But I wouldn't cry about it. I don't believe the case'll last more'n a day.'

"The old man harnessed up an' took Jone to the court-house, an' I went too, for I might as well keep up the idea of a bridal-trip as not. I went up into the gallery, and Jone, he was set among the other men in the jury-box.

"The case was about a man named Brown, who married the half-sister of a man named Adams, who afterward married Brown's mother, and sold Brown a house he had got from Brown's grandfather, in trade for half a grist-mill, which the other half of was owned by Adams's half-sister's first husband, who left all his property to a soup society, in trust, till his son should come of age, which he never did, but left a will which give his half of the mill to Brown, and the suit was between Brown and Adams and Brown again, and Adams's half-sister, who was divorced from Brown, and a man named Ramsey, who had put up a new over-shot wheel to the grist-mill."

"Oh my!" exclaimed Euphemia. "How could you remember all that?"

"I heard it so often, I couldn't help remembering it," replied Pomona.

And she went on with her narrative.

"That case wasn't a easy one to understand, as you may see for yourselves, and it didn't get finished that day. They argyed over it a full week. When there wasn't no more witnesses to carve up, one lawyer made a speech, an' he set that crooked case so straight, that you could see through it from the over-shot wheel clean back to Brown's grandfather. Then another feller made a speech, and he set the whole thing up another way. It was jus' as clear, to look through, but it was another case altogether, no more like the other one than a apple-pie is like a mug o' cider. An' then they both took it up, an' they swung it around between them, till it was all twisted an' knotted an' wound up, an' tangled, worse than a skein o' yarn in a nest o' kittens, an' then they give it to the jury.

"Well, when them jurymen went out, there wasn't none of 'em, as Jone tole me afterward, as knew whether is was Brown or Adams as was dead, or whether the mill was to grind soup, or to be run by soup-power. Of course they couldn't agree; three of 'em wanted to give a verdict for the boy that died, two of 'em was for Brown's grandfather, an' the rest was scattered, some goin' in for damages to the witnesses, who ought to get somethin' for havin' their char-ac-ters ruined. Jone he jus' held back, ready to jine the other eleven as soon as they'd agree. But they couldn't do it, an' they was locked up three days and four nights. You'd better believe I got pretty wild about it, but I come to court every day an' waited an' waited, bringin' somethin' to eat in a baskit.

"One day, at dinner-time, I seed the judge astandin' at the court-room door, a-wipin' his forrid with a handkerchief, an' I went up to him an'

said, 'Do you think, sir, they'll get through this thing soon?'

"'I can't say, indeed,' said he. 'Are you interested in the case?'

"'I should think I was,' said I, an' then I told him about Jone's bein'

a juryman, an' how we was on our bridal-trip.

"'You've got my sympathy, madam,' says he, 'but it's a difficult case to decide, an' I don't wonder it takes a good while.'

"'Nor I nuther,' says I, 'an' my opinion about these things is, that if you'd jus' have them lawyers shut up in another room, an' make 'em do their talkin' to theirselves, the jury could keep their minds clear, and settle the cases in no time.'

"'There's some sense in that, madam,' says he, an' then he went into court ag'in.

"Jone never had no chance to jine in with the other fellers, for they couldn't agree, an' they were all discharged, at last. So the whole thing went for nuthin.

"When Jone come out, he looked like he'd been drawn through a pump-log, an' he says to me, tired-like,

"'Has there been a frost?'

"'Yes,' says I, 'two of 'em.'

"'All right, then,' says he. 'I've had enough of bridal-trips, with their dry falls, their lunatic asylums, and their jury-boxes. Let's go home and settle down. We needn't be afraid, now that there's been a frost.'"

"Oh, why will you live in such a dreadful place?" cried Euphemia. "You ought to go somewhere where you needn't be afraid of chills."

"That's jus' what I thought, ma'am," returned Pomona. "But Jone an' me got a disease-map of this country an' we looked all over it careful, an'

wherever there wasn't chills there was somethin' that seemed a good deal wuss to us. An' says Jone, 'If I'm to have anything the matter with me, give me somethin' I'm used to. It don't do for a man o' my time o' life to go changin' his diseases.'"

"So home we went. An' there we is now. An' as this is the end of the bridal-trip story, I'll go an' take a look at the cow an' the chickens an' the horse, if you don't mind."

Which we didn't,--and we gladly went with her over the estate.

CHAPTER XVII. IN WHICH WE TAKE A VACATION AND LOOK FOR DAVID DUTTON.

It was about noon of a very fair July day, in the next summer, when Euphemia and myself arrived at the little town where we were to take the stage up into the mountains. We were off for a two weeks' vacation and our minds were a good deal easier than when we went away before, and left Pomona at the helm. We had enlarged the boundaries of Rudder Grange, having purchased the house, with enough adjoining land to make quite a respectable farm. Of course I could not attend to the manifold duties on such a place, and my wife seldom had a happier thought than when she proposed that we should invite Pomona and her husband to come and live with us. Pomona was delighted, and Jonas was quite willing to run our farm. So arrangements were made, and the young couple were established in apartments in our back building, and went to work as if taking care of us and our possessions was the ultimate object of their lives. Jonas was such a steady fellow that we feared no trouble from tree-man or lightning rodder during this absence.

Our destination was a country tavern on the stage-road, not far from the point where the road crosses the ridge of the mountain-range, and about sixteen miles from the town. We had heard of this tavern from a friend of ours, who had spent a summer there. The surrounding country was lovely, and the house was kept by a farmer, who was a good soul, and tried to make his guests happy. These were generally pa.s.sing farmers and wagoners, or stage-pa.s.sengers, stopping for a meal, but occasionally a person from the cities, like our friend, came to spend a few weeks in the mountains.

So hither we came, for an out-of-the-world spot like this was just what we wanted. When I took our places at the stage-office, I inquired for David Dutton, the farmer tavern-keeper before mentioned, but the agent did not know of him.

"However," said he, "the driver knows everybody on the road, and he'll set you down at the house."

So, off we started, having paid for our tickets on the basis that we were to ride about sixteen miles. We had seats on top, and the trip, although slow,--for the road wound uphill steadily,--was a delightful one. Our way lay, for the greater part of the time, through the woods, but now and then we came to a farm, and a turn in the road often gave us lovely views of the foot-hills and the valleys behind us.

But the driver did not know where Dutton's tavern was. This we found out after we had started. Some persons might have thought it wiser to settle this matter before starting, but I am not at all sure that it would have been so. We were going to this tavern, and did not wish to go anywhere else. If people did not know where it was, it would be well for us to go and look for it. We knew the road that it was on, and the locality in which it was to be found.

Still, it was somewhat strange that a stage-driver, pa.s.sing along the road every week-day,--one day one way, and the next the other way,--should not know a public-house like Dutton's.