CHAPTER VII
ONE day last fall I received an important letter from Oliver. The twins are in college now, perfectly great fellows and awfully prominent. I don't know what they don't belong to down there at that university; and good-looking—well, I just wish Gabriella or Sarah Platt or horrid little Elsie Weil could lay their eyes on Oliver's last photograph. He's stunning! The big loose baggy clothes that college men wear, suit those two boys perfectly, and though I refuse to put on the worshipful air that Ruth assumes in the twins' presence, I'm just exactly as proud of my brothers as any girl in this world. Oliver is the better-looking of the two and the more athletic. He's a member of the crew now, and it gave me an awfully funny feeling up and down my spine when I saw my younger brother's picture in one of the Boston papers. Malcolm is the more studious, wears glasses and sings in the Glee Club. He isn't "a greasy grind" at all—not that sort, but he never gets into scrapes or mix-ups, and doesn't seem to need so much money.
Money was what Oliver's important letter to me was about. Usually he wrote to Alec but this time he appealed to me. When I tore open his letter at the breakfast table and started to read it out-loud to Alec and Ruthie as usual, I was confronted with great printed notices at the top and on the margins—PRIVATE! PERSONAL! DO NOT READ OUT LOUD! SECRET! and so forth. I assure you I shuffled that letter back into its envelope as quickly as I could and waited for a quiet hour by myself. This is what the letter said:
"Dear Bobbie,"This is very important. So shut the door and read it carefully. I'm writing to you because you have influence with Alec, and you've got to use it. Alec doesn't seem to realise the demands on a man down here. When he and Tom were at college they had all the money they wanted, and they don't in the least understand the mighty embarrassing position it puts a fellow in to have no cash. I get pretty sick of sponging. There are certain class and society dues, Athletic Association fees, etc., that any kind of a good fellow must ante up on. Alec doesn't in the least appreciate the situation. He's getting mighty close lately, it seems to me, and every time he sends me my measly monthly allowance, he seems to think it's a good chance to drool out a sermon on economy. Economy! Heavens, I've been known time and time again to walk out from town after the theatre, to save a five-cent car-fare. I've been to some of the swellest dances that are given in a hired dress-suit. Of course I had to have some evening clothes. You would know that.
Now look here, Bobbie, it so happens that I've got to have something that resembles a hundred dollars! Don't jump. I'll pay it all back—every cent. But it's serious, and I must have it. If you can't get it from Alec, can't you borrow it out of the Household Account which you have charge of? I'll make it right with you in a week or so, and be more than grateful.
"P. S.
"Don't let Malcolm know I need this money, nor tell Alec what you want it for. And by the way, I must have seventy-five of the hundred by December third at the latest absolutely. Understand this is no ordinary matter. If I don't get the money somehow it will mean public disgrace. Comprenez-vous?"
Now Oliver knew as well as I that we were dreadfully poor. Ever since Father died, Alec had made it very plain to us that we were on the ragged edge of financial disaster. We had never been what any one could call prosperous—at least not since I could remember—but when Alec took hold of the reins at Father's woollen mills he found things in a pretty bad condition, I guess. He explained to Malcolm and Oliver just exactly how uncertain our financial future was, before they even started in at college. He told them that they must let it be known, early in their college course, that they couldn't afford the luxuries of well-to-do men's sons. He said that college must mean to them a period of serious preparation. It was only due to Tom's generosity, he explained, that it was possible for the twins to go to college at all. Tom assumed the responsibility of the twins' tuition. "And sometime," announced Alec emphatically, "both you boys are to pay back that loan, every cent." "Sure. Certainly. Count on us!" were the replies they made. They were overwhelming in their assurances. There was no grumbling then when Alec preached to them about economy.
It was just before the twins went to college that we were all put on an allowance. Alec called us together one day in the sitting-room and we talked it over. Alec conducts those discussions of ours with a lot of ceremony. He sits in Father's big chair and allows each one of us to state his or her opinion, while the rest sit quietly and listen. Even little Ruth may say what she thinks and no one is allowed to break in or interrupt. Alec is the jury and the judge all in one, and when he has heard both sides and weighed the question carefully he makes the decision. Tom is the higher court, but I've never known Tom once to disagree with Alec's verdict, so it doesn't do much good to appeal your case. At that meeting in the sitting-room it was arranged that Ruth and I should receive each twelve dollars a month, and when it came to the twins we all agreed that they ought to have a great deal more than two girls living at home. Alec said that he would start them on twenty-five apiece, and out of that amount everything, except board and room and doctor's bills, should be paid. At the same time Alec also arranged a household allowance, and I was very proud when he appointed me keeper of the Household Account. I was glad he thought me old and able enough for such a position and was bound to prove myself worthy. Every month he made out a check to me for fifty dollars and put it in the bank under my name. I paid the grocery and provision bill on the tenth of every month, submitted a report of the different items to Alec on a long ruled sheet of paper, which he, when he had time, examined and O.K'd. He impressed upon me again and again the absolute necessity of keeping the Household Account separate from my own. He told me in a long talk how awfully dishonest it would be if I ever used a single cent of that deposit for anything but household expenses. He went so far as to give me examples of cashiers in banks who were put in prison because they borrowed a little money now and then from the bank for their own use, fully intending to pay it back as soon as they could. So you see that when Oliver suggested my borrowing from the Household Account it was entirely out of the range of possibility to consider such a thing.
I felt sorry for Oliver. I knew exactly how much he must have wanted a dress-suit. It seemed to me a perfect shame to have two corking fine fellows like the twins cheated out of friends and good times and popularity—like myself at boarding-school—because they couldn't afford the proper clothes or pay their shares on spreads and theatre parties. A hundred dollars was an awfully lot but I put Oliver's letter into my work-bag the evening of the day it came and went down into the sitting-room after supper to join Alec by the drop-light on Father's desk. Every evening I sewed while Alec worked on the factory books. Alec didn't talk much lately. He didn't seem to want to. He was usually too tired for anything but bed, when he finally closed the big ledgers, but I was always there beside him just the same. The twins sent their laundry home every two weeks in an extension-bag, and it's quite a job keeping two strapping college boys sewed up. To-night as I weaved in and out across a delicate little hole in a mauve-coloured sock of Oliver's it looked to me as if it were an expensive sock: it had silk clocks embroidered up the side. I was so busy, planning just how I would approach Alec for that hundred dollars, that he startled me when he turned around in Father's revolving desk-chair.
"Bobbie, I want to talk with you," he said.
"All right," I replied gladly. "Go on." Perhaps, I thought to myself, there will be a chance to introduce Oliver's letter.
Alec folded his hands on the slide of the desk drawn out between us.
"We're spending too much money," he said simply.
I had heard that same sentiment expressed so often that I wasn't deeply impressed. I had observed in spite of Alec's continued talk about economy that there was always enough to pay the bills. I continued sewing.
"Of course; I know," I said, trying to appear sympathetic.
"No, Bobbie," Alec replied; "I don't think you do. It is different this time. Will you stop sewing?"
"What do you mean?" I asked, dropping my work in my lap.
"Bobbie," Alec said, "perhaps you will understand the seriousness of the situation when I tell you that I do not think that we ought to live in such a big house."
"Not live here?" I exclaimed.
"I'm afraid not, Lucy. It's a big place to keep up for just you and me and Ruth. We can't afford it."
"Has the business failed, Alec?" I interrupted with kind of a sick feeling in my stomach.
"Certainly not," he said in an annoyed sort of manner as if he had not liked me to ask. "We're simply living way beyond what we can afford; that's all. We've got to cut down. I don't know how long it may take to make a favourable sale of this house, but in the meanwhile we can't afford to keep two servants. I'm sorry, Lucy; I'm sorry; but it's a matter of economy to-day, not economy to-morrow. I've thought it all out," my brother continued, beginning now to pace up and down the room. "I know Nellie has been with us twenty years. We shall miss her; but she's not strong, she can't cook or wash. We must have a good young Irish girl—five dollars a week—not more. It means a big change this time, you see. I had hoped to avoid such a course as this, but if we are to escape a worse catastrophe—"
I don't know what Alec went on talking about as he walked up and down that sitting-room floor; I don't know how long he continued explaining, and trying to make clear to me the seriousness of our situation; I don't know; I really don't know. I sat stunned and silent in my chair, not stirring a muscle. Sell our home! Why, Father had built it. I had been born in it. Dismiss Nellie! Why, Nellie had known my mother. Nellie was part of the foundation of our lives. I couldn't take in the succeeding facts because those two were stuck in my throat. I felt like crying out, "Don't, don't cram any more in. I'm choking!" But Alec kept right on.
"The stable, of course, I shall close immediately. We mustn't keep a horse. I shall have to get rid of Dixie."
It isn't a nice figure, but at that last announcement I gulped up all that I had tried to swallow before.
"O Alec," I interrupted, "poor little Dixie! Please, please, please don't sell Dixie!" I pleaded. "Please don't sell our home," I cried. "Why, where shall we live? Don't send Nellie away. Don't! Don't! I'll do anything! I won't buy a stitch for myself. And I'll work—I'll work my hands to the bones! I can earn something. But oh, don't sell dear, poor little Dixie." I leaned forward suddenly and burst into tears. "Oh, everything has always been hard in my life—hard, hard, hard!" I sobbed.
Alec came over and stood in front of me perfectly silent. He hadn't seen me go into a passion like this for years. I could feel his tired kind gaze burrowing through my two hands that covered my face. I wished he wouldn't look so troubled and sad, for though I didn't glance up, I knew exactly how disappointed in me he was—how shocked by my tears. For a full half-minute he said nothing. He waited until I was perfectly quiet, then he spoke very gently.
"Why, Bobbie," he said, "ever since the day that you came from boarding-school when Father was so ill, and I came into the room and found you strong and calm and self-possessed, ever since then I have thought of you as my partner." He stopped. "But perhaps this—this is too much. Perhaps—"
"No, Alec," I said, ashamed; "no, it isn't too much. Just wait a minute, please."
"I will," said Alec kindly, and walked over to the window.
I guess it might have been two minutes he waited. His back was toward me when I mopped my eyes, when I tucked my handkerchief into the front of my shirt-waist and stood up. I summoned all my strength. Alec is my commander-in-chief, and I tried to rally my forces before him. I must not be a coward before Alec. I took up my sewing.
"I won't be so foolish again," I remarked evenly. "You can tell me anything now."
And my general replied, "That's the sort," and smiled. "As to the twins," he went on, taking me at my word, "here's a letter stating the situation to them." He gave a short laugh with no joy in it. "The twins' allowances are going to be cut down almost half!"
"The twins!" I had completely forgotten Oliver's letter. "The twins! Can't you possibly—O Alec, college boys need so much and—Oliver, you know—"
"I'm tired of Oliver's extravagances," burst forth Alec impatiently. "I don't want to hear another word from Oliver about money. If he can't get along on the amount I am able to send, he can come home and go into the mill."
Just here the cheerful honk-honk of Dr. Maynard's automobile sounded outside the window. Alec went to the door and let him in. As Dr. Maynard entered the room he brought in a big breath of fall evening.
"Hello," he said. "What are you two up to? Come on, Al, put on an overcoat and come out for a run around the reservoir. I've got my engine working like a bird again."
"Thanks, Will, wish I could," said Alec with that tired smile of his, "but I've got a lot of work on hand to-night. I think I'll send Bobbie."
"All right! Fine!" said Dr. Maynard, and though I didn't have much heart for going, I knew that Alec didn't want to talk with even Will Maynard to-night, so without a word I went for my things that were hanging in what we called the "Black Closet."
I was glad to escape for a minute to the protecting dark. I stood pressing up against the old overcoats and ulsters, waiting for my eyes to appear less swollen, and wondering why Oliver needed seventy-five dollars by December third. The vision of Oliver in overalls at work in the mills, disgrace, no home, no Nellie, no Dixie, rags, poverty, wriggled before my eyes like moving pictures. I took hold of the nearest garment at hand and pressed it against my face. It happened to be Father's old overcoat. I recognised it by the feeling, for often I had groped for it when Father had been alive and brought it out to him waiting in the hall. I reached up to-night and touched the dear familiar, worn, velvet collar. "O Father," I whispered, "everything is tumbling down. What shall I do about Oliver?" Probably another girl would have breathed a little prayer to God but I make all my requests of Father. It seems to me that Father is more likely to take a personal interest in my affairs than any one else in heaven.
"What are you up to?" Dr. Maynard sang out; and I called back, "Coming," and hustled into my warm overshoes.
It was a beautiful dark starry night, and I wished Alec could have felt a little of the cold air on his hot head. I love an automobile! I'm never happier than when I'm sitting with my two hands on the wheel, one toe on the gas, the other on the brake, a heel on the little pedal that makes the old machine snort up a hill like a horse dug in the side with a spur. But to-night I didn't care to run the car. I suppose I wasn't a very entertaining companion, for on the way home, after we had been out about an hour, Dr. Maynard asked in his friendly manner:
"What is it, Bobbie? You're leaving it to me to have most of the fun to-night."
"Dr. Maynard," I exclaimed, "I'd give anything in the world if I were a man and could earn some money."
"What profession would you follow?" he laughed at me.
"I'm serious. Has Alec ever told you much about the business?"
"Not much, but I know he's been disturbed about something lately."
"Well," I said, "there's one of those pictures in that big Doré book with illustrations of the Old Testament, that reminds me of the Vars' affairs. It's a picture of Samson, and he's standing in a great huge kind of hall, pushing down two perfectly enormous stone pillars. The walls and the ceiling and the roof are all caving in—people headfirst, arms, legs, great blocks of granite, children, men,—oh, everything you can think of—tumbling down in horrible confusion. That picture used to give me the nightmare; and now it seems to me as if some old giant of a Samson had gotten down underneath us. All our underpinnings are giving way and we're all failing down—headfirst a thousand feet, smash, on to rock-bottom."
"Why, what do you mean, Bobbie?" laughed Dr. Maynard, amused.
"I mean," I replied—though perhaps I ought not to have told—"I mean, that Alec is going to sell the house and Dixie and we're going to keep only one girl. I mean that the business is on the ragged edge of nothing, and that we're as poor as paupers."
Dr. Maynard slowed down our speed to ten miles an hour.
"Al's a plucky fellow," he said. "I hadn't an idea!" Then he added, "You want to help?"
"Well," I replied, "I've got to have a lot of money right off, and I don't like to ask Alec. It's for an emergency," I added. "Can you think of any possible way for a girl who can't do a thing on earth but scrub and darn stockings, to earn a fortune?"
I think we ran about a mile before Dr. Maynard spoke. Then when he did, he seemed to be almost apologising for his scheme, which seemed to me perfectly lovely.
Dr. Maynard has stacks of money and since his mother died, lives all alone in the big, white-pillared house where he was born. Eliza, their old servant, takes care of him. "But," he explained to me, "cooking and cleaning are Eliza's strong points. Now there are lots of odds and ends she doesn't have time for. She never liked to sew, and I have a pretty hard time keeping socks mended, and linen, and towels, and such things in good condition. I hire a woman now by the day once in a while. But I'm sure I'm way behind now. If the scheme appeals to you at all, I'll have Eliza lay out a pile of stuff that needs a few stitches, and you can sew on it at odd moments. Just keep track of your time and I'll pay you—well, you seem to be a fairly busy person, I'll pay you double what I'm paying now which would be about fifty cents an hour."
"Dr. Maynard," I said, "I think you're the very kindest man I ever knew!"
"Oh, no," he broke in, "this is purely a business transaction."
"But," I went on, "fifty cents is a lot too much. That would be giving me money."
"Well, let it be understood," he said, "I'm not giving you anything. You're earning it in just as businesslike a manner as a stenographer—or Eliza. I'd like you to keep an accurate account of your time, please, and send me an itemised bill. I said fifty cents and I stick to it. Shall I come over to-morrow with your first relay?"
I thanked Dr. Maynard with my whole heart. I was so relieved I didn't know what to do.
"Would you mind," I said as he opened the front door for me, "waiting just a minute? I've a note upstairs that I wish you'd mail on your way home."
I dashed up to my room, directed an envelope in mad haste to Oliver, and on a half-sheet of note-paper I scratched:
"In spite of Alec's news I may be able to scare up some of the money.Alec had half a dozen letters for Dr. Maynard to mail also, and I had the satisfaction of laying my note to Oliver on top of the announcement which cut his allowance in half. After the door had closed and Alec and I were alone, I went and kissed my brother good-night.
"Good-girl," he said wearily; "the ride brightened you up."
"Yes," I replied; "and I know we're going to come out all right, Alec." And I felt that we should, now that I was going to put my shoulder to the wheel.