Sunny Slopes Part 10

"Of course it is. We'll just rest and play a couple of months, and then come back better than ever. No, let's get a church out there and stay forever. That will be Safety First. Isn't it grand we have that money in the bank, David? Think how solemn it would be now if we were clear broke, as we were before we decided to economize and start a bank-account."

David nodded, smiling, but the smile was grave. The little bank-account was very fine, but to David, lying there with the wreck of his life about him, the outlook was solemn in spite of it.

CHAPTER IX

UPHEAVAL

"Forty-eight, forty-nine, fifty, fifty-one, fifty-two, fifty-three,--for goodness' sake!--fifty-four, fifty-five." Carol looked helplessly at her dusty hands and mopped her face desperately with her forearm.

David, watching her from the bed in the adjoining room, gave way to silent laughter, and she resumed her solemn count.

"Forty-six, forty--"

"Fifty-six," he called. "Don't try any trickery on me."

"Fifty-six, fifty-seven, fifty-eight, fifty-nine, sixty." She sighed audibly. "Sixty-one, sixty-two, sixty-three, sixty-four--sixty-four perfectly fresh eggs," she announced, turning to the doorway and frowning at her husband, who still laughed. "Sixty-four perfectly fresh eggs, all laid yesterday."

"Now, I give you fair warning, my dear, I am no cold storage plant, and you can't make me absorb any sixty-four egg-nogs daily just to even up the demand with the supply. I drank seven yesterday, but this is too much. You must seek another warehouse."

"You are very clever and facetious, Davie, really quite entertaining.

But what am I to do with sixty-four fresh eggs?"

"And I may as well confess frankly that I consider a minister's wife distinctly out of her sphere when she tries to corner the fresh egg market, particularly at the present price of existence. It isn't scriptural. It isn't orthodox. I am surprised at you, Carol. It must be some more Methodism cropping out. I never knew a Presbyterian to do it."

"And as for milk--"

"There you go again,--milk. Worse and worse. Yesterday I had milk toast, and milk custard, and fresh milk, and b.u.t.termilk. And here you come at me again first thing to-day. Milk!"

"Seven whole quarts have arrived this morning,--bless their darling old hearts."

"The cows?"

"The parishioners," Carol explained patiently. "Ever since the doctor said fresh milk and eggs, we've been flooded with milk and--"

"Pelted with eggs. But you can't pelt any sixty-four eggs down me."

"David," she said reproachfully, "I must confess that you don't sound very sick. The doctor says, 'Take him west,' and I am taking you if I ever get rid of these eggs. But I do think it would be more appropriate to take you to a vaudeville show where you might coin some of this extravagant humor. There's a market for it, you know."

"Here comes Mrs. Sater, with a covered basket," announced David, glancing from the window. "I just wonder if the dear kind woman is bringing me a few fresh eggs. You know the doctor advised me to eat fresh eggs, and--"

Carol clutched her curly head in despair. "c.o.c.k-a-doodle-doo," she crowed.

"You mean, 'Cut-cut-cut-ca-duck-et,'" reproved David.

Mrs. Sater paused outside the manse door in blank astonishment. Dear, precious David so terribly ill, and poor little Carol getting ready to take him away to a strange and awful country, and the world full of sadness and weeping and gnashing of teeth, and yet--from the open windows of the manse came the clear ring of Carol's laughter, followed closely by David's deeper voice. What in the world was there to laugh at, since tuberculosis had rapped at the manse door?

They were young, of course, and they were still in love,--that helped.

And they had the deathless courage of the young and loving. But Mrs.

Sater bet a dollar she wouldn't waste any time laughing if tuberculosis were stalking through her home.

"Come in," said Carol, in answer to her second ring. "We saw you from the window, but I was laughing so I was ashamed to open the door.

David's so silly, Mrs. Sater. Since he isn't obliged to strain his mental capacity by thinking up sermons, he has developed quite a funny streak. Oh, did you bring us some nice fresh eggs? How dear of you.

Yes, the doctor said he must eat lots of them."

"They were just laid yesterday," said Mrs. Sater complacently. "And I said to myself, 'Nice fresh eggs like these are too good for anybody less than a preacher.' So I brought them. There's just half a dozen,--he ought to eat that many in one day."

"Oh, yes, easily. He is very fond of egg-nog."

David sputtered feebly among the pillows. "Oh, easily," he echoed helplessly.

"I knew a woman that ate eighteen eggs every day," said Mrs. Sater encouragingly. "She got well and weighed two hundred and thirty pounds, and then she had apoplexy and died."

David turned on Carol reproachfully. "There you see! That's what comes of eating raw eggs." Then he added suspiciously, "Maybe you knew it before and have been enticing me to raw eggs on purpose."

Both Carol and David seized this silly pretext to relieve their feelings, and laughed so heartily that good Mrs. Sater was quite concerned for them. She had heard it sometimes affected folks like that,--a great nervous or mental shock. She looked at them very anxiously indeed.

"Are you selling your furniture pretty well?" she asked nervously.

"Oh, just fine. Mr. Barker at the drug store has promised to fumigate everything after we are gone, so we won't scatter any germs in our wake." Carol spoke hurriedly, her heart swelling with pity as she saw the sudden convulsive clutching of David's hands beneath the covers.

"Mr. Daniels has a list of 'who bought what,' and will see that everything is delivered in good shape. Only, we take the money ourselves in advance. Now look at this chair, Mrs. Sater,--a lovely chair," she rattled, thinking wretchedly of that contraction of David's hands and the darkening of his eyes. "A splendid chair. It isn't sold yet. It cost us eight seventy-five one year ago, and we are selling it for the mere pittance of five dollars even,--we make it even because we haven't any change. A most beautiful chair, an article to grace any home, a constant reminder of us, a chair in which great men have sat,--Mr. Daniels, and Mr. Baldwin, and the horrible gas collector who has made life wretched for every one in the Heights, and--all for five dollars, Mrs. Sater. Can you resist it?"

Carol's voice took on a new ring as she saw the shadow leave David's eyes, and his lips curve into laughter again.

"Well, I swan, Mrs. Duke, if you don't beat all. Yes, I'll take that chair. It may not be worth five dollars, but you are."

Carol ostentatiously collected the five dollars, doubled it carefully into a tiny bit, and tied it in the corner of her handkerchief.

"My money, Mr. David Arnold Duke, and I shall buy candy and talc.u.m with it."

Then she ran into the adjoining room to answer the telephone.

Mrs. Sater looked about her hesitatingly and leaned forward.

"David," she said in a low voice, "Carol ought to go home to her father. It's dangerous for her to stay with you. Everybody says so.

Make her go home until you are well. She may get it too if she goes along. They'll take good care of you at the Presbyterian hospital out there, you a minister and all."

The laughter, the light, left David's face at the first word.

"I know it," he said in a heavy voice. "I have told her to go home.

But she won't even talk it over. She gets angry if I mention it.

Every one tells me it is dangerous,--but Carol won't listen."

"Just until you get well, you know."

"I shall never get well unless she is with me. But I am trying to send her away. What can I do? I can't drive her off." His hands closed and then relaxed, lying helplessly on the covers.