CHAPTER VI
THE AWARD
Patty was in high spirits. It was the twentieth of April, and it wasalmost time for the postman to call on his afternoon round. The twoFarringtons and Kenneth were present, and all eagerly awaited theexpected letter, telling the result of the Prize Contest.
“Just think,” said Patty, “how many anxious hearts all over this broadland are even now waiting for the postman, and every one is to bedisappointed, except me!”
“I believe you enjoy their disappointment,” said Elise.
“You know better, my child. You know I _hate_ to have peopledisappointed. But, in this case, only one can win. I’m glad I’m thatone, and I’m sorry for the others.”
“S’pose you don’t win,” observed Roger; “what will you do?”
“There’s no use s’posin’ that, for it can’t happen,” declared Patty,turning from the window, where she had been flattening her nose againstthe glass, in a frantic endeavour to catch a first glimpse of thebelated postman.
“But, just for fun,” urged Kenneth, “just for argument’s sake, if youdidn’t get that prize, what would you do?”
“I wouldn’t do anything. I’d know the company that offered it was afake, and had gone back on its own promise.”
“Patty, you’re incorrigible!” said Ken. “I give you up. You’re the mostself-assured, self-reliant, cocksure young person I ever saw.”
“Thank you, sir, for them kind words! Oh! sit still, my heart! _Do_ Ihear that familiar whistle at last?”
“You do!” shouted Kenneth, making a spring for the front door.
They all followed, but Kenneth first reached it, and fairly grabbed theletters from the astonished letter-carrier.
Returning to the library with his booty, he ran them over slowly andtantalisingly.
“One for Mrs. Fairfield,” he said. “From a fashionable tailor. Do yousuppose it’s a dun? Or, perhaps, merely an announcement of new springfurbelows. Next, one for Mr. Fairfield. Unmistakably a circular! Nogood! Ha! another for Mrs. Fairfield. Now, this——”
“Oh, Ken, stop!” begged Patty. “Have pity on me! Is there one for me?”
“Yes, yes, child. I didn’t know you wanted it. Yes, here’s one for you.It is postmarked ‘Vernondale.’ Take it, dear one!”
“Nonsense, Ken. Not that one! But isn’t there one from the Rhodes andGeer Motor Company?”
“Why, yes; since you mention it, I notice there is such a one! Do youwant it?”
Kenneth held it high above Patty’s head, but she sprang and caught it,and waved it triumphantly in the air.
“I told you so!” she cried.
“But you haven’t opened it yet,” said Elise. “Maybe it only tells youyou’ve failed.”
“Hush, hush, little one!” said Patty. “I’ll show it to you in a minute.”
Accepting the letter-opener Kenneth proffered, she cut open theenvelope, and read the few lines on the typewritten sheet enclosed. Sheread them again, and then slowly refolded the sheet and returned it toits envelope.
“After all,” she said, calmly, “it is well to be of a philosophicalnature in a time of disappointment.”
“Oh, Patty, you didn’t win!” cried Kenneth, springing to her side, andgrasping her hand.
“No, I haven’t won,” said Patty, with a heart-rending sigh.
“I thought you were terribly positive,” said Elise, not very kindly.
“I was,” sighed Patty. “I was terribly positive. I am, still!”
“What are you talking about, Patty?” said Roger, who began to think shewas fooling them. “Let me see that letter.”
“Take it!” said Patty, holding it out with a despairing gesture. “Readit aloud, and let them all know the worst!”
So Roger read the few lines, which were to the effect that, owing to theunexpected number of answers received, the decision must be delayeduntil May first.
“Oh, Patty!” exclaimed Kenneth, greatly relieved. “How you scared me! Ofcourse you’ll get it yet.”
“Of course I shall,” said Patty, serenely, “but I hate to wait.”
Since it was not failure, after all, the young people felt greatlyrelieved, and congratulated Patty upon her narrow escape.
“But the situation is too dramatic for my nerves,” declared Kenneth.“When the real letter comes, I prefer not to be here. I can’t stand suchharrowing scenes.”
“It won’t be harrowing when the real letter comes,” said Patty. “It willbe just one grand, triumphant jubilee.”
“Well, jubilees are nerve-racking,” said Kenneth. “I think I’ll stayaway until the shouting is over.”
“You can’t,” said Patty, saucily. “You’ll be the first one here, the daythe letter is due.”
“Oh, I suppose so! Curiosity has always been my besetting sin. Butto-day’s entertainment seems to be over, so I may as well go home.”
“Us, too,” said Roger. “Come on, Elise.”
So good-byes were said, and Patty’s friends went laughing away.
Then Patty took up the letter and read it again.
“Ten days to wait,” she said, to herself. “And suppose I shouldn’t getit, after all? But I will,—I know I will. Something inside my brainmakes me feel sure of it. And, when I have that sort of sureness, itnever goes back on me!”
She went upstairs, singing merrily, and without a shadow of doubt in hermind as to her success in the contest.
The ten days passed quickly, for Patty was so absorbed in thefurnishings for the new summer home that she was occupied every momentfrom morning till night.
She went with Nan to all sorts of fascinating shops, where they selectedwall-papers, rugs, furniture, and curtains. Not much bric-a-brac, andvery few pictures, for they were keeping the house simple in tone, butcomfortable and cheerful of atmosphere. Christine gladly gave her advicewhen needed, but she was very busy with her work, and they interruptedher as seldom as possible.
Patty bought lovely things for her own rooms,—chairs of blue and whitewicker; curtains of loose-meshed, blue silky stuff, over ruffled dimityones; a regulation brass bedstead for her bedroom, but a couch thatopened into a bed for her out-of-door dormitory. By day, this could be achintz-covered couch with chintz pillows; by night, a dainty, white nestof downy comfort. Several times they went down to Spring Beach, toinspect the work going on there, and always returned with satisfactoryreports.
As the time of departure drew near, Elise began to realise how much shewould miss Patty, and lamented accordingly.
“I think you might have arranged to go where we’re going,” she said.“You know you could make your people go wherever you wanted to.”
“But you go to the Adirondacks, Elise; I couldn’t run my motor car muchup there.”
“Oh, that motor car! Even if you do get it, Patty, you won’t use it morethan a few times. Nobody does.”
“P’raps not. But, somehow, it just seems to me I shall. It just _seems_to me so. But, Elise, you’ll come down to visit me?”
“Yes; for a few days. But you’ll have Christine there most of the time,I suppose.”
“I’ll have Christine whenever she’ll come,” said Patty, a littlesharply; “and, Elise, if you care anything for my friendship, I wishyou’d show a little more friendliness toward her.”
“Oh, yes; just because Mr. Hepworth thinks she’s a prodigy, and Mrs. VanReypen has taken her up socially, you think she’s something great!”
Patty looked at Elise a moment in astonishment at this outburst, andthen she broke into a hearty laugh.
“I think you’re something great, Elise! I think you’re a great goose!What kind of talk are you talking? Christine is a dear, sweet, bravegirl,—and you know it. Now, drop it, and never, never, never talk likethat again.”
Elise was a little ashamed of her unjust speech, and only too glad toturn it off by joining in Patty’s laughter. So she only said, “Oh,Christine’s all right!�
� and dropped the subject.
By the first of May, everything was ready for occupancy at “ThePebbles.” The lawn and grounds were in fine condition, and the house inperfect order.
But Patty begged that they shouldn’t start until she had received wordabout her prize car.
“Why, Puss, all the mail will be forwarded,” said her father. “You’llget your precious missive there just as well as here.”
“I know that, daddy dear,—but, well,—I can’t seem to feel like going,until I know that car is my very own. Just wait until the third of May,can’t you?”
She was so persuasive that Nan went over to her side, and then, ofcourse, Mr. Fairfield had to give his consent to wait. Not that hecared, particularly, but he was a little afraid that Patty would not getthe prize, and thought she might bear her disappointment better if awayfrom her young friends.
But they waited, and again the group of those most interested gatheredin the Fairfield library to await the letter.
Christine and Mr. Hepworth were there, too, this time; also Philip VanReypen.
Mr. and Mrs. Fairfield, though outwardly calm and even gay, were perhapsthe most anxious of all, for they knew how keenly a disappointment wouldaffect Patty.
The whistle sounded. The postman’s step was heard. Instead of rushing tothe door, Patty felt a strange inertia, and sank back in her chair.
“Go, Ken,” she said, faintly, and Kenneth went.
Silently he took the mail from the carrier, silently he returned with itto the library. There was none of the gay chaffing they had had before,and all because Patty, the moving spirit, was grave and quiet, with ascared, drawn look on her sweet face.
Hastily running over the letters, Kenneth laid aside all but one, andslowly extended that to Patty.
She took it, opened it, and read it with a dazed expression.
The eager ones circled round, with faces tense and waiting.
Again Patty read her letter. Then, still with that dazed look on herface, she glanced from one to another. As her eyes met Mr. Hepworth’s,she suddenly held the paper out to him.
“I’ve won,” she said, simply, and gave him the letter.
Then she drew a short little sigh, almost a sob of relief, and then thecolour came back to her face, the light to her eyes, and she smilednaturally.
“I’ve won!” she cried again. “It’s all right!”
Then there was jubilation, indeed! Everybody congratulated everybodyelse. Everybody had to read the wonderful letter, and see for himselfthat the prize, the Electric Runabout, had indeed been awarded to MissPatricia Fairfield, for the best and most complete list of answers tothe puzzles in the contest.
Only the girls’ parents and Gilbert Hepworth knew how tightly thetension of Patty’s nerves had been strained, but they had been alertlywatching for any sign of collapse, and were thankful and relieved thatthe danger was over.
Hepworth didn’t stop then to wonder why Patty had handed him the letterfirst. And, indeed, she didn’t know herself. But she felt his sensitivesympathy so keenly, and saw such deep anxiety in his eyes, thatinvoluntarily she turned to him in her moment of triumph.
“I told you so!” Philip Van Reypen was shouting. “I knew we’d win!Hepworth, old man, you did it, with that last charade! Bully for you!”
“Yes, he did!” cried Patty, holding out her hand to Mr. Hepworth, with asmile of gratitude; “but you all helped me. Oh, isn’t it splendid! Ididn’t so much care for the car, but I wanted to _win_!”
“Oh, _listen_ to that!” exclaimed Kenneth. “She didn’t care for the car!Oh, Patty, what _are_ you saying? Give me the car, then!”
“Oh, of course I want the car, you goose! But I mean I really cared morefor the _game_,—the winning of it!”
“Of course you did!” declared Van Reypen. “That’s the true sportsmanspirit: ‘not the quarry, but the chase!’ I’m proud of you, MissFairfield! Your sentiments are the right sort.”
Patty smiled and dimpled, quite her roguish self again, now that theexciting crisis was past.
“Nan,” she cried, “we must celebrate! Will you invite all this hilariouspopulace to dinner, or give them an impromptu tea-fight right now?”
“Dinner!” cried Philip Van Reypen; and “Dinner!” took up the othervoices, in gay insistence.
“Very well,” said Nan; “but, if it’s to be dinner, you must all run awaynow and come back later. I can’t order a celebration dinner at amoment’s notice.”
“All right, we will.” And obediently the guests went away, to returnlater for a gala dinner.
And a real celebration it was. Mr. Fairfield himself went out to theflorist’s and returned with a centrepiece for the table, consisting of awicker automobile filled with flowers.
By dint of much telephoning, Nan provided place cards and favours oflittle motor cars; and the ices were shaped like tiny automobiles; andthe cakes like tires. And all the viands were so delicious, and theguests so gay and merry, that the feast was one long to be remembered byall.
“When will you get the car, Patty?” asked Elise.
“I don’t know exactly. In a fortnight, perhaps. But we’ll be down atSpring Beach then, so whoever wants a ride in it will have to come downthere.”
“I want a ride in it,” said Philip Van Reypen, “and I will come downthere. May I ask you to set the date?”
“You’ll get a notification in due season,” said Patty, smiling at theeager youth. “I’m not sure it’s your turn first. No, Elise must befirst.”
“Why, I didn’t help you at all,” said Elise, greatly pleased, however,at Patty’s remark.
“No, but you’re my lady friend, and so you come first. Perhaps yourbrother will come with you.”
“_Perhaps_ he _will_!” said Roger, with emphasis.
“And who comes next?” asked Kenneth, with great interest.
“Christine, of course,” said Patty, smiling at the Southern girl, whowas enjoying all the fun, though quiet herself.
“Just as I guessed,” said Kenneth. “And, _then_, who next? Don’t keep mein suspense!”
“Owing to the unexpected number of applicants, decision is delayed forten days,” said Patty, laughing at Ken’s disappointed face. “We’ll letyou know when you’re due, Ken. Don’t you worry.”
“Need _I_ worry?” asked Van Reypen, and then Hepworth said, “Need I?”
“No, you needn’t any of you worry. But I’m not going to take anybodyriding until I learn how to manage the frisky steed myself.”
“But I can show you,” said Philip, insinuatingly.
“So can I,” said Roger.
“No, you can’t,” said Patty. “Miller is going to teach me, andthen,—well, then, we’ll see about it.”
And, with this somewhat unsatisfactory invitation to “The Pebbles,” theywere forced to be content.
After dinner, Kenneth remarked that it looked like a shower.
“What do you mean?” asked Patty. “It’s a still, clear night.”
“You come here, and I’ll show you,” said Kenneth, mysteriously. Then,taking Patty’s hand, he led her to a large davenport sofa, and seatedher in the centre of it.
“Now,” he said, “let it shower!”
As if by magic, a half a dozen or more parcels of all shapes and sizesfell into Patty’s lap.
“It’s a shower, for you!” explained Elise, dancing about in glee. “Openthem!”
“Oh! I see,” said Patty. “How gorgeous!”
The parcels were in tissue paper, ribbon-tied, and Patty was not long inexposing their contents. One and all, they were gifts selected withreference to her new motor car.
Elise gave her a most fetching blue silk hood, with quaint shirring, anddraw-strings, and wide blue ribbon ties.
Christine gave her a lovely motor-veil, of the newest style andflimsiest material.
Roger gave her gauntleted motor-gloves, of new and correct make.
Kenneth gave a motor-clock, of the most approved sort; and Philip Va
nReypen presented a clever little “vanity case,” which shut up into smallcompass, but held many dainty toilette accessories.
Mr. Hepworth’s gift was an exquisite flower vase, of gold and glass, tobe attached to her new car.
Patty was more than surprised; she was almost overcome by this “shower”of gifts, and she exclaimed:
“You are the _dearest_ people! And you needn’t wait for invitations.Come down to ‘The Pebbles’ whenever you want to, and I’ll take you allriding at once! I don’t see where you ever found such beautiful things!Nor _why_ you gave them to me!”
“Because we love you, Patty dear,” said Christine, so softly that shethought no one heard.
But Kenneth heard, and he smiled as he looked at Patty, and said, “Yes,that’s why.”
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