CHAPTER XVI
UNBOUNDED HOSPITALITY
Although life at the Hurly-Burly was full of irritating incidents and even serious disappointments which were caused by the general forgetfulness and careless habits of the family, yet there were also many pleasures, and Patty enjoyed the summer very much and became warmly attached to her happy-go-lucky relatives.
Uncle Ted was kindness itself, and Aunt Grace was very loving and affectionate towards her motherless niece. Bob and Bumble were trumps, and Nan was so irresistibly funny that she made merry jokes of what would otherwise have been real troubles.
The days flew by and Patty thought she had never known a summer to pass so rapidly.
She almost lived out of doors, for Uncle Ted said he was determined to transform the little Boston bluestocking into a wild Indian; and so Patty had become browned by the sun, and her rowing and swimming had developed a fine amount of muscle. But as we are always more or less influenced by the character of those about us, Patty had also imbibed much of the spirit of the Hurly-Burly family and lived as if the pleasure of the present moment were the only thing to be considered.
"Be careful, my Patty," her father wrote to her, "you do not send me letters as regularly as you used to, and what you tell me sometimes sounds as if you thought it no harm to break a promise or to fail to keep an engagement you have made. You know I want you to learn by your experiences, and imitate only the best qualities of those about you. I'm not going to have my house run on any Hurly-Burly plan, Miss Pattikins, so if you expect to secure the position of housekeeper, you must be prepared to keep things right up to the mark. We will have an exact proportion of methodical regularity, without having so much of it that it will be a bugbear. Oh, I tell you, my lady, our home is going to be a veritable Paradise on earth, and I am impatient to get it started. You have only one more visit to make, and then I will come and kidnap my own daughter and carry her off with me for a Christmas present"
"What a dear, wise father I've got," mused Patty, after reading this letter, "and how he understands everything, even without my telling him. I will try not to grow heedless ind rattle-pated, though it's hard to be any other way in this house."
One morning in August, Mrs. Barlow said to her husband, "Ted, you know the Carletons are coming this afternoon to stay several days, and I want you to go over to the three o'clock train to meet them. Don't forget it, will you? And you'll have to engage a stage to bring them over, for there'll be Mr. and Mrs. Carleton and four children, and perhaps a nurse. I don't know where we're going to put them all to sleep, but we must stow them away somehow. Patty, would you mind giving up your room for a time?"
"Not a bit, Aunt Grace. Put me wherever you like."
"That's a good girl. Well, suppose you sleep with Bumble. She has only a three-quarter bed, but if you don't quarrel you won't fall out."
"All right," said Patty. "I'll move my things It once."
"Very well, my dear; then we can give your room to Mr. and Mrs. Carleton, and Gertrude will have to room with Nan, and the other children must go up in the third story; no,—Harry can sleep with Bob. I declare I didn't think it would crowd us so, when I invited the whole family. But it will be only for a week, and we'll get along somehow."
"Many hands make light work," and with much flurrying and scurrying the rooms were made ready for the expected guests.
About noon the expressman came, bringing two trunks.
"'Coming events cast their shadows before,'" said Uncle Ted; "here come the wardrobes of the Carleton family."
"They must have sent them by express yesterday," said Aunt Grace; "dear me, how fore-handed some people are. I wish I had been born that way. But when I go anywhere I take my trunk with me, and then I always leave it behind."
They all laughed at this paradoxical statement, and Uncle Ted said, "That's where you differ from an elephant." Then as the trunks were set out on the veranda, he exclaimed, "Good gracious, my dear, these aren't the Carleton's trunks. They're marked 'F. M. T.,'—both of them."
"'F. M. T.,'" echoed Mrs. Barlow, "why, who can that be?"
"The Carletons have borrowed other people's trunks to come with," suggested Nan.
"Not they," returned Aunt Grace; "they're the most particular people on the face of the earth. Why Kate Carleton would as soon think of borrowing a house as a trunk. No, these belong to somebody else. And I know who it is! It's Fanny Todd. Before I left home I asked her to come down here the first week in August, and I never thought of it again from that day to this. But I should think she would have written."
"Why, mamma," said Bumble, "there was a letter came for you from Philadelphia a day or two ago. Didn't you get it? I saw it on the hall table."
"No, I didn't get it. Run and look for it, child."
But the letter couldn't be found. So Mrs. Barlow assumed that it was from her friend, Miss Todd, and concluded that that lady would shortly arrive.
"Where can we put her to sleep?" she queried, "every room is already filled."
"She can have my room," said Bob, "and Harry Carleton and I will sleep out in the tent. He's a good fellow and he won't mind."
"But his mother will," said Mrs. Barlow; "she's so fussy about such things. Still, I can't see anything else to do. If it doesn't rain, I suppose you'll be all right."
The Carletons came first, and Mrs. Barlow welcomed them with a gracious hospitality which gave no hint of the flurried turmoil of preparation that had been going on all day.
Gertrude Carleton, the eldest daughter, was one of those spick-and-span beings who look as if they ought always to be kept in a bandbox. She had a languishing die-away sort of air, and after a few moments' conversation with her, Bumble excused herself and slyly nudged Patty to come outside with her. She took her cousin up-stairs and said, "Patsy, I'm sure that blown-glass girl won't like to room with Nan. She looks as if she always had a whole suite of rooms to herself, parlor and all. I can imagine her fainting away when Nan takes off her wig. Now, how would it do to give Miss Gertrude our room, and you and I go in with Nan? I'll bunk on the sofa; I don't mind a bit."
"Neither do I," declared Patty. "Yes, let's give your room to the Lady Gertrude, and never mind asking Nan about it, either."
So the girls changed things around in short order, and then went down-stairs and conducted Gertrude to her room.
Aunt Grace gave a little surprised smile, but with her usual tact, said nothing.
Harry Carleton seemed to be a very nice boy, and he went off to the tent with Bob, in great glee, while the two little Carleton children and their nurse were installed in rooms on the third floor.
Before the guests had reappeared down-stairs, a carriage drove up to the veranda, and a lady and gentleman got out.
"Oh," thought Mrs. Barlow, as she went to greet them, "who has Fanny brought with her?"
"How do you do, Grace?" cried sprightly Miss Todd, "I've come, you see, though I didn't get the telegram I asked you to send me. And I brought Mr. Harris, as I said I would. I know you'll welcome him gladly after what I told you."
"Fanny," said Mrs. Barlow, deeming it best to make a clean breast of the matter, "I didn't get your letter. At least, they say it came, but somehow it was lost before I read it, and it can't be found. However, it doesn't matter, and I am very glad to welcome Mr. Harris in any capacity."
"Then greet me as Miss Todd's future husband," said Mr. Harris, smiling, and Mrs. Barlow gave him a hearty welcome and congratulations at the same time.
But Mr. Harris was a new problem. Although he intended to remain only one night, yet a room must be provided for him, and poor Mrs. Barlow was at her wits' end.
But it was at her wits' end that the good lady oftenest found a way out of her difficulties, and after a glance into Mr. Harris' merry blue eyes, she felt sure she could ask him to sleep on the couch in the music-room without offending his dignity in the least. And so it turned out that the Hurly-Burly was filled with guests, and it goes without saying that they all had a merry time.
Uncle Ted was in his element, and he provided fun for the children and entertainment for the older guests, until even languid Gertrude was stirred to enthusiasm.
It was late when they all retired, and after Mrs. Barlow had insured the comfort of her guests and her children, she lay down to rest and fell asleep at once.