Six Girls and Bob: A Story of Patty-Pans and Green Fields

by Marion Ames Taggart

  CHAPTER VI

  MAKING THE BEST OF IT

  HAPPIE was awakened "in her chamber towards the east" by the sunstreaming in upon her, and with a vague impression that the house wason fire. Never had there been such a blaze of light at that hour in NewYork, never at any hour such a resplendent, rosy glare. In the girls'little chamber at home it had been at best but a lighter shade of graylight, chastened by the air shaft, that summoned them to a new day.

  Happie sprang up to greet the dawn and to look out at hermountains--already it gave her a thrill of pleasure to feel that theywere _her_ mountains.

  She awakened her sister with her cry of delight, Surely it was goingto be worth suffering much discomfort and deprivation to waken everymorning to such beauty as this. And when one remembered that the beautywas to restore their mother, what did exile and more or less furniturematter?

  More beautiful than when clad in verdure the trees stood outlinedagainst the eastern sky, their perfect symmetry of line and limb throwninto relief by the sunrise glow. Mists tinged with every exquisite tintof color flowed around the mountainsides like the soft draperies ofAurora. Quietly brown at her feet lay the waiting fields, except wherethe rye of autumn's sowing was beginning to hint of coming green. Pinesand firs stood black against the sky, while the faintest tone of redshowed to a keen eye that the maple buds were forming and the fresh saprunning.

  The glad bird chorus of later spring was wanting, but the blithe,brave bluebird uttered his cheering note, liquid as the brooks whichtaught it to him, and the robin defied possible frosts with his clarionwhistle, sounds the more delightful that they were the only springanthems yet audible.

  Laura and Polly fluttered into the room as they heard Happie'sexclamation. Happie turned towards them with a shining face.

  "Oh, girls, oh, Margery, isn't it heavenly?" she cried in an ecstasy."Really we must be happy here no matter how we hate it!"

  A remark which her sisters hailed with such a shout of laughter that itcheered their mother's waking across the hall.

  "The Lord is in His holy temple; let all the earth keep silence beforeHim," said Margery softly. "I never before realized what that meant."

  Even Laura scrambled into her clothes with considerable cheerfulnessafter this auspicious beginning of the beginning, and the four girlsgot down-stairs in good time and in good spirits.

  But alas! for the weakness of human nature and the brief duration ofits exalted moods! When they began to grapple with the problem ofgetting breakfast, and of persuading the stove to burn the wood whichBob had piled ready to hand the night before, as if he had long been acountry boy used to gathering fuel, the benediction of the dawn beganto lose effect.

  "Maybe we'd better wait for mother and Aunt Keren to advise us," saidHappie at last, sitting back on her heels with ashes on her hair anddespair on her face, having vainly blown the fire through the draughtswhich did not draw.

  "What's up?" inquired Bob entering in time to catch her suggestion."Say, I have to wash at the pump like a farm hand! I hope that freightcar will come to-day."

  "We're up. So is mother--I heard her--but she isn't down," said Happie."This fire is too much for me, Bob."

  "Don't you mean it is too little for you?" suggested Bob. "I don't seehow it possibly can be too much for you--there's none at all. I'll havea try at it; I learned a trick about it last night. You have to lightthe fire in the southeast corner of the grate--it's not cracked there."

  Bob's knowledge of the geography of the cracked stove stood him in goodstead, and when Miss Bradbury and Mrs. Scollard came down the fire wasunder way.

  Miss Keren-happuch cracked her egg with a decisive blow on the edge ofa saucer--her establishment did not boast an egg cup.

  "That Shale stratum which brought our trunks, and Bob and Happie,last night, is going to lend himself, with the aid of Peter Kuntz,our driver, to bringing up our household goods to-day, if the cargets here, as they think it will," she said. "I never realized howappropriately one's effects might be called _goods_--they will indeedbe goods to us in this dearth of everything. And the first thing Ishall do will be to find a woman to preside over our housework, for Isuspect that will be the attitude these independent farmers' wives willtake towards it. Bob, perhaps you had better look after the carting,and we two Keren-happuchs, Happie my dear, will look for the woman--asthe proverb advises one to do whenever there is trouble."

  "Why not ask Jake Shale if he knows of one? He is coming now,"suggested Mrs. Scollard. Miss Bradbury hurried out to the steps.

  "What is?" the family within heard him ask. "Some one to help you out?I guess. Mebbe she might help you a little first along."

  "She?" repeated Miss Bradbury.

  "Her, yes," said Jake. "We hain't got so much work now to our place,but she couldn't do it long."

  "Oh, your wife!" exclaimed Miss Bradbury, enlightened. "If you willbring her here, I will not look for any one else. You are sure she'llcome?"

  "I guess," affirmed Jake. And he drove away with Bob on the seat besidehim.

  The family hailed them with delight reappearing at noon, seated onfamiliar crates piled high on the wagon. Jake not only brought his wifewhen he came down in the afternoon, but his elongated son of eighteen,who opened boxes industriously, but who could not be persuaded to openhis mouth.

  As fast as Noah Shale pried open crates, his father and Bob carriedtheir contents to their place, and the new stove, their own chairs,rugs, and the best beloved of the pictures, which were hurried intosomething like order that afternoon, gave the forlorn old Ark a verydifferent aspect by the second night from that which it had worn on thefamily's arrival.

  Miss Bradbury surveyed her house by lamp-light--for she had boughtoil--with an amused criticism that held the germ of approval.

  "Who can kalsomine?" she demanded suddenly of Mrs. Jake passing out ofthe room to get a few sticks of wood for the hearth which to the joyof all the exiles they found in the living-room, and with a perfectdraught.

  "What is?" said Mrs. Shale stopping short. "I kin, fer one, and he kin,and the boy could if he wanted, and you could--most anybody, I guess,that wants to. Why did you want to know?"

  "I'm going to make these walls clean, at least, upstairs and down,"said Miss Bradbury, pointing to the blackened walls and ceilings whichseemed to indicate that the wood-fire on the hearth had not alwayscrackled and snapped as it was then doing.

  "Make it look whiter," remarked Mrs. Shale, resuming her way with aslightly superfluous statement.

  Not only did grass have no chance to grow under Miss Bradbury's feet;it could not so much as sprout. By the next day Jake Shale, young NoahShale and Peter Kuntz were all wielding kalsomine brushes upstairs anddown in the Ark, with Bob as an understudy learning with each stroke tomake the next one better.

  White and sweet with lime on the morning of the fifth day of life init, the Ark reflected the sunshine on the wall of Happie's room whenshe opened her eyes and aroused Margery.

  They found Miss Bradbury in the living-room, bending over a trunk thathad not heretofore been opened. She turned to meet the girls' brightfaces with a smile on her own, and held up her finger warningly.

  "It's only five o'clock," she whispered. "Don't wake your mother. Thiscomes of having such brilliant walls to make our eastward-lookingchambers light in the morning, girls. I hurried to dress, thinking itwas fully half-past six--my clock had stopped. This is the trunk ofsilkalines and other possibilities of beauty at ten cents the yard.Come and choose the color and pattern for the curtains in your ownroom, Margery and Happie." She threw out several rolls of the prettiestmaterials, and the girls plunged into them ecstatically.

  "Oh, Aunt Keren, do you think it would matter to any one else if we hadthis in our room?" cried Margery holding up a roll of silkaline, whitewith soft green maiden hair fern wandering over it.

  "But only look at this yellow jasmine, Margery!" cried Happie, holdingup a rival pattern.

 
"But green for our room with the morning sunshine to lighten it--wouldyou mind, Aunt Keren?" persisted Margery.

  "Why should I tell you to choose if I minded?" said Aunt Keren, butthe pleasure in her eyes at their pleasure belied the gruffness of hermanner.

  That day the entire population of the Ark, excepting Penny and Doree,but including Polly, worked on window curtains, hemming as fast asfeminine fingers could fly, and tacking and hanging as fast as Bobcould work.

  When the sunset breeze wandered around the Ark, it found lovelywistaria blossoms in their green leaves to flutter in Mrs. Scollard'swindows; the yellow jasmine responded to his fingers in MissKeren-happuch's room; Bob offered him crimson roses, Laura and Polly'swindows were hung with sweet pea blossoms, while the soft maiden hairfern blew into the two eldest girls' room, brushing lightly againstthe white counterpane on their bed. The newly kalsomined walls lookedfresh and restful, and the sash curtains transformed the exteriorscene, still bleak and forbidding.

  But the Ark was doomed to ride on troublous waters for a time. The nextday Mrs. Jake announced that she must return to her bereft family, andMiss Bradbury vainly went abroad in search of her successor.

  "There is nothing for it, Charlotte and other children," said MissBradbury, after two days of scouring the country in Jake Shale's openwagon, "but for me to go to town and find some one there. Though howI shall persuade a person accustomed to city improvements, or prettysummer cottages, to come to our primitive Ark, I can't imagine.However, I shall go down on Monday to try."

  "Oh! And leave us alone!" cried Margery.

  "Yes, _all_ of you alone. How can one leave 'us' alone? It doesn't seemlikely on the face of it that half a dozen Scollards could miss oneancient Bradbury, does it?" said Miss Keren-happuch.

  "You are the Head of the House, and it is hard to be decapitated, AuntKeren," said Bob. But decapitated they were on Monday, when the weatherwept copiously over their bereavement.

  The inmates of the Ark awakened to the swish of rain against the smallwindow panes, and to the thought of Miss Bradbury's departure. Theydiscovered that in the few weeks that had passed since Mrs. Scollardwas taken ill, Miss Bradbury had come to seem as much and necessary apart of their lives as their own heads and hands.

  Happie and Bob met with dismal faces to offer their morning oblationsof wood to the stove.

  "If the violets would come, I could bear it better," remarked Happiesuddenly.

  "If the mud would dry up, and the roads get decent _I_ could bear itbetter," retorted Bob. It was becoming a family joke, the number ofthings which they discovered would make life in the Ark bearable. Foreach of the family felt in the bottom of a courageous heart that thenew conditions were hard to bear, and every night Happie lay downlonely and discouraged to wonder how she was going to face another day.Somehow, though, that other day never would seem dreadful to her whenshe opened her eyes upon it. It was always so beautiful, seen in thelight of the sun mounting over the hills before her chamber window.

  "I have engaged our friend Pete Kuntz to make the garden this weekduring my absence, and to put out our vegetables. Pete doesn't plant;he 'puts out' seeds. I shall expect Bob to keep it watered if naturefails us, as I should think she would have to after this flood--nowonder we call this house the Ark!" said Miss Bradbury, as she pulledon her gauntlets, and walked towards the door where Jake Shale waswaiting with his drooping steeds to take her to the station. "Andgood-bye, my family. I shall return _with_ my shield, and not uponit, for by fair means, if possible, but somehow in any case, I shallinveigle a woman up here to work for us."

  She nodded to each one, patted Mrs. Scollard on the shoulder as shepassed her--Miss Bradbury was not given to kissing--went out the doorinto the drenching rain, mounted the dismal wagon and slowly drove away.

  "Now, motherkins, and other girls," said Happie, wheeling towards thedoor to hide her eyes, and hoping that the rising inflection which shehad forced into her voice might be mistaken for the ring of happiness,"now, let's go up attic! We youngsters have been aching to get at it.I'd like to see if rain on the old attic roof sounds as sweet as poetrysays it does--it's a good day to test it."

  Margery sighed and Laura groaned. "It's perfectly dreadful!" she said."I don't see how you can help minding such weather! Think of livinghere in such storms as this!"

  "Yet fancy moving every time the weather changed, Laura," Happieretorted. "We would have to leave an order with Pete Kuntz, Jake Shaleand some other teamsters like this: When the sun shines, don't come.If it looks cloudy, keep your horses ready to start if it rains. Thenwhen it rains, hook up, as you would say, and drive right over to theArk, to move the Scollards, because the third Scollard girl can't livein that house in stormy weather. Don't you think it might be hard tomake them understand, Laura? For instance, what would they do if it wascloudy and misting a little? Or how would they know what to do in ashower? No; it's better to live in a house and never mind the weatheronce you have moved in."

  Happie had rattled on, one eye on her mother's face, and was rewardedby her laughing a little when she stopped; her nonsense usually madeher mother smile.

  "Such a goose-girl, Happie!" she exclaimed. And Happie did not mindLaura's pouting at being made fun of, for she had accomplished whatshe had set out to do, and had tided her mother over the firstconsciousness of being left alone.

  "I hope Aunt Keren will find a nice, clean, rosy-faced girl to help us,Margery," said Mrs. Scollard, as they mounted atticward.

  "I wouldn't mind if she weren't young, and was as brown as a berry, ifonly she were nice and clean, mama," said Margery pensively.

  "Poor daughter! I'm afraid you find exile harder than the rest of us,"said her mother, laying her hand on pretty Margery's arm.

  "Not a bit!" declared Margery quickly. "It isn't hard for any of us,for you are getting better!"

  The steep attic stairs, intended apparently "for the use of flies,"Happie remarked, issued into the single gabled room running the entirelength and width of the house, dusty and musty, dark in the heavystorm, yet attractive with the charm no attic can escape. Happieplunged under the eaves, followed by Penny and Doree, who had comeup with them, the former singing in her crooning voice that soundedvery like the latter's purring, which was loud, for the yellow kittenexpected mice.

  "There's an old trunk in here, motherums, a little hair trunk that hasgone quite bald in spots," Happie called in a muffled voice from underthe eaves. "It's as shabby as a trunk can be, but there are thingsin it--it is heavy--and there's a B in brass nails on one end. TheBittenbenders must have left it here. May we open it? What has becomeof the Bittenbenders? What was a Bittenbender anyway? And why did theygo off and leave Aunt Keren their house, furnished, too, after itsway, and with their worn-off-horsehair trunk left behind?" And Happieemerged from her dusty exploration, rubbing her nose violently, andmaking up queer faces to keep from sneezing.

  Her mother laughed. "I don't know what a Bittenbender was, Happie dear,any more than you do. We know it was--collectively--the family whoowned this farm, and who owed Aunt Keren more money than this placewas worth, which was all that she could get in payment. Though if thisfarm were taken care of, it could be made a good one. As to the trunk,I'm sure Aunt Keren did not insist on that as a part of her bargain--itmust have been left because it was not worth taking."

  "Don't open the trunk to-day, Hapsie," protested Margery. "I don'tlike the rain on the roof nearly as well as I thought that I should.And it's leaking around that gable, and it is so dark and damp anddismal! Let's go down to the kitchen where it is warm and comparativelycheerful. At least the fire is red! Truly I can't stand this dank,dark, dreary, dusty, dismal hole and the beat of that rain."

  "Poor Peggy! She's getting her adjectives high, and her spirits low!"cried Happie. "What is it about attic salt? Hers is lumpy from wetweather. Come on, you poor dear! We'll go down to the kitchen and boileggs. Mother, when do you suppose we shall get anything to eat besideseggs? I asked Jake, and he said the butcher began coming
through inJune. Now what in the world does the butcher come through? And aren'twe to have any meat till he has come through it? We cannot possiblylive on eggs till June. We've cooked them in every way by this time,and they still come out eggs--more or less so, at least. For:

  'You may boil, you may scramble the rest, if you will, But the taste of the egglet will cling to it still.'

  Laura, go first if you want to be noble, and be the cushion at thebottom of the heap of your family when we all tumble down thesebreakneck attic stairs!"

  "Happie, what an absurd girl you are!" cried Margery. "Jake Shale meantthat the butcher came through Crestville after June, carrying meat tothe hotels beyond, and then we can get it easily enough. But it isserious business getting it till then. Aunt Keren said she would bringmeat when she came back, and if she buys a horse, as she means to, wecan drive somewhere where it is to be had."

  "Won't it be fun, jogging around the country picking up a roast hereand a chop there?" cried incorrigible Happie. "I hope it will be ahorse that we all can drive."

  "Aunt Keren said she should buy a cheap horse, too tired to bedangerous, and we are to rest him while we drive," said Laura,unconscious of Miss Bradbury's humor, and repeating with entire gravitythis statement at which the others all laughed. "For my part," sheadded, "I shall be mortified to drive such a horse."

  "You can sit on the back seat and look like a guest; Margery and Iwill drive," said Happie. She danced ahead of the others towards thekitchen, swinging Penny to her shoulder as she ran. She stopped shortin the doorway with a shocked little cry.

  "What's the matter?" said Margery.

  "We have no horse to blush for, but we must blush for ourselves; thebread has run over the pans, and down on the table! Only look! And weare all so hungry! It must be as sour as sour! I'm so scatter-brained!"And Happie pulled her own bright locks with a contrite face, offeringPenny the ear nearest the shoulder on which she was seated to be boxed.But Penny kissed her sister's flushed cheek instead.