Sowing Seeds in Danny Part 8

Do you see anything about him to make his mother cry?"

The doctor looked critically at the czar, who returned his gaze with stolid indifference.

"I never saw a more perfect nub on any nose," he answered honestly.

"He's a fine big boy, and his mother should be proud of him."

"There now, what did I tell you!" Pearlie cried delightedly, nodding her head at an imaginary audience.

"That's what I always say to his mother, but she's so tuk up with pictures of pretty kids with big eyes and curly hair, she don't seem to be able to get used to him. She never says his nose is a pug, but she says it's 'different,' and his voice is not what she wanted. He cries lumpy, I know, but his goos are all right. The kid in the book she is readin' could say 'Daddy-dinger' before he was as old as the czar is, and it's awful hard on her. You see, he can't pat-a-cake, or this-little-pig-went-to-market, or wave a bye-bye or nothin'. I never told her what Danny could do when he was this age. But I am workin'

hard to get him to say 'Daddy-dinger.' She has her heart set on that.

Well, I must go on now."

The doctor lifted his hat, and the imperial carriage moved on.

She had gone a short distance when she remembered something:

"I'll let you know when he says it, doc!" she shouted.

"All right, don't forget," he smiled back.

When Pearlie turned the next corner she met Maudie Ducker. Maudie Ducker had on a new plaid dress with velvet tr.i.m.m.i.n.g, and Maudie knew it.

"Is that your Sunday dress," she asked Pearl, looking critically at Pearlie's faded little brown winsey.

"My, no!" Pearlie answered cheerfully. "This is just my morning dress.

I wear my blue satting in the afternoon, and on Sundays, my purple velvet with the watter-plait, and basque-yoke of tartaric plaid, garnished with lace. Yours is a nice little plain dress. That stuff fades though; ma lined a quilt for the boys' bed with it and it faded gray."

Maudie Ducker was a "perfect little lady." Her mother often said so; Maudie could not bear to sit near a child in school who had on a dirty pinafore or ragged clothes, and the number of days that she could wear a pinafore without its showing one trace of stain was simply wonderful!

Maudie had two dolls which she never played with. They were propped up against the legs of the parlour table. Maudie could play the "Java March" and "Mary's Pet Waltz" on the piano. She always spoke in a hushed vox tremulo, and never played any rough games. She could not bear to touch a baby, because it might put a sticky little finger on her pinafore. All of which goes to show what a perfect little lady she was.

When Maudie made inquiries of Pearl Watson as to her Sabbath-day attire, her motives were more kindly than Pearl thought. Maudie's mother was giving her a party. Hitherto the guests upon such occasions had been selected with great care, and with respect to social standing, and blue china, and correct enunciation. This time they were selected with greater care, but with respect to their fathers' politics. All conservatives and undecided voters' children were included. The fight-to-a-finish-for-the-grand-old-party Reformers were tabooed.

Algernon Evans, otherwise known as the Czar of all the Rooshias, only son of J. H. Evans, editor of the Millford Mercury, could not be overlooked. Hence the reason for asking Pearl Watson, his body-guard.

Millford had two weekly newspapers--one Conservative in its tendencies and the other one Reform. Between them there existed a feud, long standing, unquenchable, constant. It went with the printing press, the subscription list and the good-will of the former owner, when the paper changed hands.

The feud was discernible in the local news as well as in the editorials. In the Reform paper, which was edited at the time of which we write by a Tipperary man named McSorley, you might read of a distressing accident which befell one Simon Henry (also a Reformer), while that great and good man was abroad upon an errand of mercy, trying to induce a drunken man to go quietly to his home and family.

Mr. Henry was eulogised for his kind act, and regret was expressed that Mr. Henry should have met with such rough usage while endeavouring to hold out a helping hand to one unfortunate enough to be held in the demon chains of intemperance.

In the Conservative paper the following appeared:

We regret to hear that Simon Henry, secretary of the Young Liberal Club, got mixed up in a drunken brawl last evening and as a result will be confined to his house for a few days. We trust his injuries are not serious, as his services are indispensable to his party in the coming campaign.

Reports of concerts, weddings, even deaths, were tinged with partyism.

When Daniel Grover, grand old Conservative war-horse, was gathered to his fathers at the ripe age of eighty-seven years, the Reform paper said that Mr. Grover's death was not entirely unexpected, as his health had been failing for some time, the deceased having pa.s.sed his seventieth birthday.

McSorley, the Liberal editor, being an Irishman, was not without humour, but Evans, the other one, revelled in it. He was like the little boys who stick pins in frogs, not that they bear the frogs any ill-will, but for the fun of seeing them jump. He would sit half the night over his political editorials, smiling grimly to himself, and when he threw himself back in his chair and laughed like a boy the knife was turned in someone!

One day Mr. James Ducker, lately retired farmer, sometimes insurance agent, read in the Winnipeg Telegram that his friend the Honourable Thomas Snider had chaperoned an Elk party to St. Paul. Mr. Ducker had but a hazy idea of the duties of a chaperon, but he liked the sound of it, and it set him thinking. He remembered when Tom Snider had entered politics with a decayed reputation, a large whiskey bill, and about $2.20 in cash. Now he rode in a private car, and had a suite of rooms at the Empire, and the papers often spoke of him as "mine host" Snider.

Mr. Ducker turned over the paper and read that the genial Thomas had replied in a very happy manner to a toast at the Elks' banquet.

Whereupon Mr. Ducker became wrapped in deep thought, and during this pa.s.sive period he distinctly heard his country's call! The call came in these words: "If Tom Snider can do it, why not me?"

The idea took hold of him. He began to brush his hair artfully over the bald spot. He made strange faces at his mirror, wondering which side of his face would be the best to have photographed for his handbills. He saw himself like Cincinnatus of old called from the plough to the Senate, but he told himself there could not have been as good a thing in it then as there is now, or Cincinnatus would not have come back to the steers.

Mr. Ducker's social qualities developed amazingly. He courted his neighbours a.s.siduously, sending presents from his garden, stopping to have protracted conversations with men whom he had known but slightly before. Every man whose name was on the voters' list began to have a new significance for him.

There was one man whom he feared--that was Evans, editor of the Conservative paper. Sometimes when his fancy painted for him a gay and alluring picture of carrying "the proud old Conservative banner that has suffered defeat, but, thank G.o.d! never disgrace in the face of the foe" (quotation from speech Mr. Ducker had prepared), sometimes he would in the midst of the most glowing and glorious pa.s.sages inadvertently think of Evans, and it gave him goose-flesh. Mr. Ducker had lived in and around Millford for some time. So had Evans, and Evans had a most treacherous memory. You could not depend on him to forget anything!

When Evans was friendly with him, Mr. Ducker's hopes ran high, but when he caught Evans looking at him with that boyish smile of his twinkling in his eyes, the vision of chaperoning an Elk party to St. Paul became very shadowy indeed.

Mr. Ducker tried diplomacy. He withdrew his insurance advertis.e.m.e.nt from McSorley's paper, and doubled his s.p.a.ce in Evans's, paying in advance. He watched the trains for visitors and reported them to Evans.

He wrote breezy little local briefs in his own light cow-like way for Evans's paper.

But Mr. Ducker's journalistic fervour received a serious set back one day. He rushed into the Mercury office just as the paper went to press with the news that old Mrs. Williamson had at last winged her somewhat delayed flight. Evans thanked him with some cordiality for letting him know in time to make a note of it, and asked him to go around to Mrs.

Williamson's home and find out a few facts for the obituary.

Mr. Ducker did so with great cheerfulness, rather out of keeping with the nature of his visit. He felt that his way was growing brighter.

When he reached the old lady's home he was received with all courtesy by her slow-spoken son. Mr. Ducker bristled with importance as he made known his errand, in a neat speech, in which official dignity and sympathy were artistically blended. "The young may die, but the old must die," he reminded Mr. Williamson as he produced his pencil and tablet. Mr. Williamson gave a detailed account of his mother's early life, marriages first and second, and located all her children with painstaking accuracy. "Left to mourn her loss," Mr. Ducker wrote.

"And the cause of her death?" Mr. Ducker inquired gently, "general breaking down of the system, I suppose?" with his pencil poised in the air.

Mr. Williamson knit his s.h.a.ggy brows.

"Well, I wouldn't say too much about mother's death if I were you.

Stick to her birth, and the date she joined the church, and her marriages--they're sure. But mother's death is a little uncertain, just yet."

A toothless chuckle came from the adjoining room. Mrs. Williamson had been an interested listener to the conversation.

"Order my coffin, Ducker, on your way down, but never mind the flowers, they might not keep," she shrilled after him as he beat a hasty retreat.

When Mr. Ducker, crestfallen and humiliated, re-entered the Mercury office a few moments later, he was watched by two twinkling Irish eyes, that danced with unholy merriment at that good man's discomfiture. They belonged to Ignatius Benedicto McSorley, the editor of the other paper.

But Mrs. Ducker was hopeful. A friend of hers in Winnipeg had already a house in view for them, and Mrs. Ducker had decided the church they would attend when the session opened, and what day she would have, and many other important things that it is well to have one's mind made up on and not leave to the last. Maudie Ducker had been taken into the secret, and began to feel sorry for the other little girls whose papas were contented to let them live always in such a pokey little place as Millford. Maudie also began to dream dreams of sweeping in upon the Millford people in flowing robes and waving plumes and sparkling diamonds, in a gorgeous red automobile. Wilford Ducker only of the Ducker family was not taken into the secret. He was too young, his mother said, to understand the change.

The nomination day was drawing near, which had something to do with the date of Maudie Ducker's party. Mrs. Ducker told Maudie they must invite the czar and Pearl Watson, though, of course, she did not say the czar.

She said Algernon Evans and that little Watson girl. Maudie, being a perfect little lady objected to Pearl Watson on account of her scanty wardrobe, and to the czar's moist little hands; but Mrs. Ducker, knowing that the czar's father was their long suit, stood firm.

Mr. Ducker had said to her that very morning, rubbing his hands, and speaking in the conspirator's voice: "We must leave no stone unturned.

This is the time of seed-sowing, my dear. We must pull every wire."

The czar was a wire, therefore they proceeded to pull him. They did not know he was a live wire until later.

Pearl Watson's delight at being asked to a real party knew no bounds.

Maudie need not have worried about Pearl's appearing at the feast without the festal robe. The dress that Camilla had made for her was just waiting for such an occasion to air its loveliness. Anything that was needed to complete her toilet was supplied by her kind-hearted mistress, the czar's mother.

But Mrs. Evans stood looking wistfully after her only son as Pearl wheeled him gaily down the walk. He was beautifully dressed in the finest of mull and valenciennes; his carriage was the loveliest they could buy; Pearl in her neat hat and dress was a little nurse girl to be proud of. But Mrs. Evans's pretty face was troubled. She was thinking of the pretty baby pictures in the magazines, and Algernon was so--different! And his nose was--strange, too, and she had ma.s.saged it so carefully, too, and when, oh when, would he say "Daddy-dinger!"

But Algeron was not envious of any other baby's beauty that afternoon, nor worried about his nose either as he b.u.mped up and down in his carriage in glad good humour, and delivered full-sized gurgling "goos"

at every person he met, even throwing them along the street in the prodigality of his heart, as he waved his fat hands and thumped his heavy little heels.