V
THE PINK SHIRT-WAIST
The morning after Billy Fenelby's arrival at the Fenelby home heawakened unusually early, as one is apt to awaken in a strange bed,and he lay awhile thinking over the events of the previous evening.He was more than ever convinced that Kitty was not the kind of girlhe liked. He felt that she had made a bare-faced effort to flirtwith him the evening before, and that she was just the kind of agirl that was apt to be troublesome to a bachelor. She was the kindof a girl that would demand a great deal of attention and expect itas a natural right, and then, when she received it, make the manfeel that he had been attentive in quite another way, and that theonly fair thing would be to propose. And he felt that she was thekind of girl that no man could propose to with any confidencewhatever. She would be just as likely to accept him as not, andhaving accepted him, she would be just as likely to expect him tomarry her as not. He felt that he was in a very ticklish situation.He saw that Kitty was the sort of girl that would take any air ofrude indifference he might assume to be a challenge, and any comelypolite attention to be serious love making. He saw that the onlysafe thing for him to do would be to run away, but, since he hadseen Kitty, that was the last thing in the world that he would havethought of doing. He decided that he would constitute her brighteyes and red lips to be a mental warning sign reading "Danger" inlarge letters, and that whenever he saw them he would be as wary asa rabbit and yet as brave as a lion.
He next felt a sincere regret that he had refused to pay the duty onthe clean collar he had brought with him, and that he had left onthe railing of the porch. He got out of bed and looked at the collarhe had worn the day before, and frowned at it as he saw that it wasnot quite immaculate. Then he listened closely for any sound in thehouse that would tell him Mr. or Mrs. Fenelby were up. He heardnothing. He hastily slipped on his clothes, and tip-toed out of theroom and down the stairs. This tariff for revenue only was wellenough for Thomas and Laura, and assessing a duty of ten per cent.on everything that came into the house (and thirty per cent. onluxuries) might fill up Bobberts' bank, and provide that baby withan education fund, but it was an injustice to bachelor uncles whenthere was an unmarried girl in the house. If this Kitty girl waswilling to so forget what was due to a young man as to appear in onedress the whole time of her stay, that was her look-out, but for hispart he did not intend to lower his dignity by going down tobreakfast in a soiled collar. If creeping down to the porch in hisstockings, and bringing in that collar surreptitiously, wassmuggling, then--
Billy stopped short at the screen door. From there he could see thespot on the railing where he had put the collar, and the collar wasnot there! No doubt it had fallen to the lawn. He opened the screendoor carefully and stepped outside. The early morning air was cooland sweet, and an ineffable quiet rested on the suburb. He tip-toedgently across the porch and down the porch steps, and hobbledcarefully across the painful pebble walk and stepped upon the lawn.There was dew on the lawn. The lawn was soaked and saturated andsteeped in dew. It bathed his feet in chilliness, as if he hadstepped into a pail of ice water, and the vines that clambered upthe porch-side were dewy too. As he kneeled on the grass and pawedamong the vines, seeking the missing collar, the vines showered downthe crystal drops upon him, and soaked his sleeves, and added afinishing touch of ruin to the collar he was wearing. The othercollar was not there! It was not among the vines, it was not on thelawn, it was not on the porch, and soaked in socks and sleeves heretreated. He paused a minute on the porch to glance thoughtfully atthe moist foot-prints his feet left on the boards, and wondered ifthey would be dry before Tom or Laura came down. At any rate therewas no help for it now, and he went up the stairs again.
The most uncomfortable small discomfort is wet socks, whether theycome from a small hole in the bottom of a shoe or from walking on alawn in the early morning, and Billy wiggled his toes as he slowlyand carefully climbed the stairs. As he turned the last turn at thetop he stopped short and blushed. Kitty was standing there awaitinghim, a smile on her face and his other collar in her hand. She laidher finger on her lip, and tapped it there to command silence, andraised her brows at him, to let him know that she knew where he hadbeen and why.
"I thought you would want it," she said in the faintest whisper, "soI smuggled it in last night. I had no idea _you_ would stoop tosuch a thing, but--but I felt so sorry for you, without a collar."
"Thanks!" whispered Billy. It was a masterpiece of whispering, thatword. It was a gruff whisper, warding off familiarity, and yet itwas a grateful whisper, as a whisper should be to thank a prettygirl for a favor done, but still it was a scoffing whisper, with atinge of resentfulness, but resentfulness tempered by courtesy.Underlying all this was a flavor of independence, but not such crudeindependence that it killed the delicate tone that implied that thehearer of the whisper was a very pretty girl, and that that factwas granted even while her interference in the whisperer's affairswas misliked, and her suspicions of dishonest acts on his partconsidered uncalled for. If he did not quite succeed in getting allthis crowded into the one word it was doubtless because his feetwere so wet and uncomfortable. Billy was rather conscious that hehad not quite succeeded, and he would have tried again, adding thistime an inflection to mean that he well understood that her objectwas to get him into a quasi conspiracy and thus draw him irrevocablyinto confidential relations of misdemeanor from which he could notescape, but that he refused to be so drawn--I say he would haverepeated the word, but a sound in one of the bed-rooms close at handsent them both tip-toeing to their rooms.
They had hardly reached safety when the door of Mr. Fenelby's roomopened and Mr. Fenelby stole out quietly, stole as quietly down thestairs and out upon the porch. He looked at the railing where Billyhad left the collar, and then he peered over the railing, and assilently stole up the stairs again. He paused at Billy's door andtapped on it. Billy opened it a mere hint of a crack.
"What is it?" he whispered.
"That collar," whispered Mr. Fenelby. "I thought about it all night,and I didn't think it right that you should be made to do withoutit. I just went down, to get it, but it isn't there."
"Never mind," whispered Billy. "Don't worry, old man. I will wearthe one I have."
Mr. Fenelby hesitated.
"Of course," he whispered, "you won't--That is to say, you needn'ttell Laura I went down--"
"Certainly not," whispered Billy. "It was awfully kind of you tothink of it. But I'll make this one do."
Mr. Fenelby waited at the door a moment longer as if he hadsomething more to say, but Billy had closed the door, and he wentback to his room.
It was with relief that Bridget heard the door close behind Mr.Fenelby. She had been standing on the little landing of theback-stairs, where he had almost caught her as she was coming up. Ifshe had been one step higher he would have seen her head. Usuallyshe would not have minded this, for she had a perfect right to be onthe back-stairs in the early morning, but this time she felt that itwas her duty to remain undiscovered. Now that Mr. Fenelby was goneshe softly stepped to Billy's door and knocked lightly.
"Misther Billy, sor, are ye there?" she whispered. Billy opened thedoor a crack and looked out.
"Mornin' to ye," she said in a hoarse whisper. "I'm sorry t'disthurb ye, but Missus Fenelby axed me t' bring up th' collar yeleft on th' porrch railin', an' t' let no wan know I done it, an' Ijust wanted t' let ye know th' reason I have not brung it up isbecause belike someone else has brang it already, for it is gone."
"Thank you, Bridget," whispered Billy. "It doesn't matter."
She turned away, but when he had closed the door she paused, andafter hesitating a moment she tapped on his door again. He openedit.
"I have put me foot in it," she said, "like I always do. W'u'd ye beso good as t' fergit I mentioned th' name of Missus Fenelby, that'sa dear man? I raymimber now I was not t' mention it t' ye."
"Certainly, Bridget," said Billy, and he closed the door and wentagain to the window, where he was turning his so
cks over and over inthe streak of sunlight that warmed a part of the window sill.
It took the socks a little longer to dry than he had thought itwould, and they were still damp enough to make his feet feelanything but comfortable when he heard the breakfast bell tinklefaintly. He hurried the rest of his toilet and went down the stairs,assuming as he went the air of unsuspected innocence that is theinborn right of every man who knows he has done wrong. The bodilyBilly was more conscious of the discomfort of his feet, but themental Billy was all collar. He had never known a collar to be soobtrusive. He felt that he must seem all collar, even to the mostcasual eye, but he was upheld by the belief that no one would dareto mention collar to him in public. If he had sinned he was not theonly sinner, for he was but a partner in conspiracy. He walked downthe stairs boldly.
"And to think that his vanity should be the cause of robbing poorlittle Bobberts," he heard a clear voice say as he neared thedining room door. "It is too mean! I can never look up to man withthe faith I have always had in man, after this. But I know they werehis foot-prints, Laura."
"Are you so sure, Kitty?" asked Mrs. Fenelby. "Mightn't theybe--mightn't they be Bridget's?"
"They were not," said the voice of Kitty, and Billy paused where hewas and stood still. "Bridget does not go about in the wet grass inher stocking feet. Those were Billy's tracks on the porch. I am noSherlock Holmes, but I can tell you just what he did. He stole downbefore we were awake, to look for that collar, and he did not findit on the railing where he had left it. Then he saw it where it hadfallen and he went down on the wet lawn and got it. Watch him whenhe comes in to breakfast. He will be wearing a collar, and it willnot be the one he wore last night."
Billy turned and tip-toed softly up the stairs again, undoing histie as he went. When he came down his neck was neatly, butinformally swathed in a white handkerchief. Three pairs of eyeswatched him as he entered, but he faced them unflinchingly. Mr. andMrs. Fenelby let their eyes drop before his glance, but Kitty methis gaze with a challenge. There was nothing of treachery in herface, and yet she had sought to betray him. He looked at her withgreater interest than he had ever known himself to feel regardingany girl, and as he looked he had a startled sense that she wasfairer than she had been, and he caught his breath quickly and beganto talk to Mrs. Fenelby.
"Tom," he said, after breakfast, as Mr. Fenelby was getting readyto leave to catch his train, "I think I'll walk over to the stationwith you. I have something I want to say to you."
"Come along," said Mr. Fenelby. "But you will have to walk quickly.I have just time to catch my train."
"Did you notice anything peculiar about Miss Kitty this morning?"asked Billy, when they had left the house.
"Peculiar?" said Mr. Fenelby. "No, I don't think so."
"Well, I don't want to make trouble, Tom," said Billy, "but I thinkI ought to speak about this thing. If it wasn't serious I wouldn'tmention it at all, but I think you ought to know what is going on inyour own house. I think you ought to know what kind of a girl MissKitty is, so that you can be on your guard. Now, you went down toget that collar for me, didn't you?"
"I wish you wouldn't mention that," said Mr. Fenelby with someannoyance.
"Oh, I know all about that," said Billy, warmly. "You say thatbecause you don't like to be thanked for all these nice, thoughtfulthings you do for a fellow. But I do thank you--just as much as ifyou had found the collar and had brought it up to me. That was allright. You would have paid the duty on it, and that would have beenall right. But what do you think Miss Kitty did? Why do you thinkyou could not find that collar? Do you know what she did? Shebrought that collar into the house--smuggled it in--and she had thenerve, the actual nerve, to give it to me. And I took it. I couldn'tdo anything else, could I, when a girl offered it to me? I couldn'tsay I wouldn't take it, could I? I had to be a gentleman about it.And then she tried to get me into trouble by telling you I wouldcome down to breakfast wearing that collar. She tried to make outthat I was a smuggler."
"I suppose it was just a bit of fun," said Mr. Fenelby. "Girls arethat way, some of them."
"Well, I want it understood that that collar is in the house, andthat I didn't bring it in," said Billy, "and that if this DomesticTariff business is to be carried out fairly it is Miss Kitty'sbusiness to pay the duty on it. I want to set myself right with you.But the thing I wanted to speak about was far more serious. Do youknow what she had on this morning?"
"What she had on?" asked Mr. Fenelby. "What did she have on?"
"She had on a pink shirt-waist," said Billy fiercely. "That is whatshe had on. Right at breakfast there, in plain sight of everyone. Apink shirt-waist!"
"Well, that's all right, isn't it?" asked Mr. Fenelby, doubtfully."It's proper to wear a pink shirt-waist at breakfast, isn't it? Ithink Laura wears shirt-waists at breakfast sometimes. I'm sure it'sall right. An informal home breakfast like that."
"But it was pink," insisted Billy. "I looked right at it, and Iknow. Real pink. You wouldn't notice it, because you are so honestyourself, and so confiding, but I noticed it the first thing. Nowwhat do you think of your Miss Kitty? What do you say to that--agirl coming right down to breakfast in a pink shirt-waist, rightbefore the whole family?"
"I--I don't know what to say," faltered Mr. Fenelby, and this wasthe truth, for he did not.
"Well, what would you say if I told you that she had on a whiteshirt-waist last evening--a white one with fluffy stuff all aroundthe collar?" asked Billy. "Wouldn't you say that that proved it?"
"I don't see anything wrong in that," said Mr. Fenelby. "What doesit prove?"
"It proves that she has two shirt-waists," said Billy, seriously,"that is what it proves. Two shirt-waists, a white one and a pinkone, one for dinner and one for breakfast. I don't blame you for notnoticing it, but I am strong that way. I notice colors and trimmingsand all that sort of thing. And I tell you she has two. I saw themboth and I know it. If that isn't serious I don't know what is."
"Well?" said Mr. Fenelby.
"Well," echoed Billy, "she is only supposed to have one. She onlypaid duty on one, and she has two. That is what I call realsmuggling. And nobody knows how many more she has. Dozens for all Iknow. Imagine her talking about my one poor old last year's collar,and then flaunting around in two shirt-waists right before our eyes.I call that pretty serious. I'm going to watch her. You can't behere all day to do it, but I haven't anything else to do, and I'mgoing to stay right around her all day and find out about thisthing."
"If you don't want to--" began Mr. Fenelby, remembering Billy'sprotestations of dislike for girls.
"I'll do my duty by you and Bobberts, old man," said Billy,generously.
"I was only going to say that Laura could look out for that sort ofthing," said Mr. Fenelby. "I might say a word to her."
"Well, now, I didn't like to bring that part of it up," said Billy,"but since you mention it, I guess I had better say the whole thing.It isn't natural that a woman shouldn't notice what another womanhas on, is it? They are all keen on that sort of thing. I don't sayLaura is standing in with Kitty on this shirt-waist smuggling. Isuppose it worries her terribly to see Kitty smuggling clothes inright under her nose, but how can Laura say anything about it? Kittyis her guest, isn't she? You leave it to me!"
Just then they reached the station and the train arrived and Mr.Fenelby jumped aboard, and as it pulled out Billy turned and walkedback to the house.
The Cheerful Smugglers Page 5